THJE 
 
 *V V : A *Hk 4 i |} 'V ^**i ** W*W"* w*% 
 
 W 4Hv <I^HW JHvU ^ ''4BH9 i(HIM^^ s^Hi 4HW ^^^BWBBB <^J^N^^^ 
 
 ELIZABETH R CORBETT
 
 ,-
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 ELIZABETH F. GORBETT 
 
 UNIV. OF GAL1F. Lf&RARY. LOS ANGELES
 
 THE 
 
 VANISHED HELGA 
 
 BY 
 
 ELIZABETH F. CORBETT 
 
 AXJTHOB OP "CECILY AND THE WIDE WOELD," ETC. 
 
 "0, wilt thou not let the summer days be sweet?" 
 
 THE WELL AT THB WORLD 7 * END 
 
 NEW YORK 
 GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 
 
 A
 
 Copyright, 1918, 
 By George B. Doran Company 
 
 Printed in the United States of America
 
 TO MY FATHER 
 
 2126536
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. JIM WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY is AROUSED . n 
 
 II. AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT ... 28 
 
 III. A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY ..... 43 
 
 IV. WELL-LAID PLANS ......... 60 
 
 V. THE GANGING A-GLEY . . ... . . 70 
 
 VI. THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD ... 82 
 
 VII. AND JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND His DEPTH . 93 
 
 VIII. FAR OUT AT SEA . . 108 
 
 IX. UNCHARTED WATERS ... . . . .117 
 
 X. JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS . . . .128 
 
 XI. "THERE COMES AN END TO SUMMER" . . 137 
 
 XII. IN Tow ........... 147 
 
 XIII. Rio, THE PLACE is CALLED 160 
 
 XIV. VALEDICTORY . 174 
 
 XV. JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME . . .183 
 
 XVI. DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS . . . . . . 198 
 
 XVII. WAITING 210 
 
 XVIII. THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION . .220 
 
 XIX. OUT OF THE NIGHT 238 
 
 XX. THE FLESH-P^' OF EGYPT 249 
 
 XXI. MANNA 259 
 
 XXII. PRINCE COPHETUA 268 
 
 XXIII. THE PARTING OF THE WATERS .... 280 
 
 XXIV. THE SUNDERING FLOOD 290 
 
 vii
 
 viii CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXV. A HOUSE UPON A HILL ....... 299 
 
 XXVI. A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD AGAIN . 311 
 
 XXVII. TIME'S REVENGES 325
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY is AROUSED 
 
 THAT Saturday in May when he went out to the 
 Evingtons' for the week-end, Jim Whittaker was 
 by way of liking everything. He liked his time of life, 
 for one thing: he had passed the glorious but fussy 
 period of youth and had not yet begun to settle into the 
 shadow of middle age. He was a bachelor, with no 
 definite prospect of becoming anything else, though he 
 looked vaguely forward to establishing a household of 
 his own some day, when freedom should have lost a lit- 
 tle of its sweetness. Meanwhile women troubled him 
 very little. He had ceased to regard them as a class, and 
 was beginning to think of them as individuals; but none 
 of them had as yet made herself too individual for his 
 comfort. Pending the arrival of such a disturber, he 
 had ordered his life very nicely, dividing his time about 
 equally between business, culture, and sport, with the 
 balance inclining of late rather toward culture. He con- 
 sidered himself the most rational of men, although, as he 
 was aware, the run of opinion among his friends was 
 that his head was always a little in the clouds. 
 
 Jim liked his friends, however, even if they were 
 mistaken about him. He particularly liked Stuart 
 Evington, his host this week-end, a pleasantly weary 
 
 ii
 
 12 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 middle-aged man, who by dint of complexity and packed 
 experience had achieved in the end a notable simplicity. 
 He liked June Evington, marriage to whom had been 
 the final expression of Stuart's attainment of simplicity. 
 He liked their spreading terraced country place, with its 
 glimpses of groves and water. He liked their big old 
 house, vine-grown, flower scented, surrounded with trees, 
 adequate for anything, yet quite unostentatious. Jim 
 would have a place something like that himself, if he 
 ever needed it. 
 
 Jim's footing at the Evingtons' was quite that of 
 best friend: he went there very often, and most infor- 
 mally. This time, however, he understood that there 
 were to be other guests. Well, he liked the house par- 
 ties that the Evingtons made up : their combinations 
 seemed just to happen, yet you were always sure of 
 meeting somebody interesting and new. 
 
 Finally, Jim liked leaving his little flat, and leaving 
 the big noisy city, and getting into the open, and the 
 spring. For the country Jim had that cultivated appre- 
 ciation which no one but a confirmed city dweller ever 
 can have. Had he been condemned to spend all his time 
 in the country, he would have died of ennui in a month ; 
 but the country from Saturday night to Monday morn- 
 ing was a mistress to whom he gave himself with rap- 
 ture. 
 
 He went out by train on this particular occasion ; and 
 the Evingtons' car met him at the station. Jim climbed 
 in beside the driver. The driver, with the privilege 
 of an old friend, at once entered into conversation. Jim 
 heard him, and even answered; but his mind was not 
 solely occupied with the man's talk of the season's new 
 cars. He was thinking how warm it was for May, and 
 how lovely the country-side looked in the late light, and
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 13 
 
 how pleasant was the rush of the air in one's face. His 
 fingers returned now and again to the book in his pocket 
 he had been reading in the train; and remembered 
 phrases floated in his mind, mingling with sensations of 
 the pleasantness of the moment and anticipations of his 
 bath and tea. He always liked to arrive in his night's 
 sleeping-place at the tea hour, which was to his mind 
 quite the pleasantest idlest hour of the whole day, a 
 noted pause between the day's work and the scarcely 
 less organised occupations of the evening. 
 
 The drive from the station to the Evingtons' was long- 
 ish, and Jim had time enough to imagine the Evingtons' 
 terrace crowded with people at tea-time. As events 
 turned, however, he actually had tea alone with June. 
 She was waiting for him beside the table, which had 
 been laid at the foot of a huge, distinguished oak, known 
 in the parlance of the Evington household as "the big 
 tree." It occurred to Jim, as he strolled out to her, that 
 there was something appropriate in this glimpse of her. 
 She was one of the few people he knew who could wait 
 without fretting; and her ever so slightly maturing 
 charm gave a quaint intimacy, a delicate hint of the 
 ministering woman, to even such an incidental and every- 
 day act as pouring tea. 
 
 "They've all gone off," June explained as he settled 
 himself, "Stuart and the rest of them. Motoring some- 
 where in the big car." 
 
 "Why didn't you go with them?" asked Whittaker. 
 
 "I don't care for long motor rides," she assured him. 
 "And beside, as surely as I went with them, something 
 would happen here at home." 
 
 Jim laughed, with the universal masculine amusement 
 at the universal feminine dread of domestic disaster. 
 "Haven't the babies been well lately?" he asked.
 
 14 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Oh, indeed they have!" said June. "So well that 
 they can't keep it up much longer." 
 
 She joined in his laugh at this particular pessimism. 
 In spite of his actual respect for June, she looked to 
 Jim just then for all the world like a little girl playing 
 at being the head of a family. She was ridiculously 
 pretty in her simple summer dress; and she had one of 
 those faces in which lies the memory of every age it 
 has passed through, the promise of every age it will. 
 Jim, watching her now, could see just how she had 
 looked as a baby, round and pink-cheeked like one of 
 her own babies, and as a school girl of astonishing 
 naivete, and as a young woman of a particularly fresh 
 loveliness, like a pink rose plucked with the dew upon 
 it. She had been just at that stage when she and Eving- 
 ton were married, and Jim met her for the first time. In 
 view of her changes since and her truth to type, it 
 required no great stretch of imagination for Jim to see 
 her as an old lady, very pretty, thoroughly wholesome, 
 whom life had not marred and had only pleasantly 
 taught. 
 
 In the fulness of his vision he stared at her. As they 
 had now finished their tea, they lacked even the pretence 
 of an occupation. With characteristic lack of self-con- 
 sciousness, June stared back at Jim. She was thinking 
 how handsome he looked, lying relaxed in his big chair, 
 and smiling at her rather sleepily. He was good-tem- 
 pered as well as good-looking, she knew; and she be- 
 lieved him to be tractable. June saw in him the makings 
 of an excellent husband, and sighed at the thought that 
 such possibilities might go to waste. She saw, too, that 
 he might make a marriage which would put a stop to 
 his intimacy with the Evingtons: June liked him, and 
 wouldn't wish to see that happen. Of course, the only
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 15 
 
 sure way to prevent it was to marry him to some nice girl 
 whom she and Stuart both liked. Though even in that 
 case you never could tell ; and perhaps the best thing was 
 simply to be glad that she and Suart had a home for 
 Jim to enjoy, and that Jim did enjoy it. 
 
 The calm of the moment was so great that they had 
 assumed it must somehow be endless; and they both 
 started at an interruption. One of the Evington chil- 
 dren they were all so blonde and changed size so fast 
 that in spite of the frequency with which he saw them 
 Jim was never quite sure which was which one of the 
 Evington children appeared in the veranda, saw his 
 mother, and rushed across the lawn to her. June ran 
 to meet him, and picked him up ; across his fuzzy flaxen 
 head her eyes met Jim's. Here he had just been thinking 
 that life wouldn't teach much to June; before her un- 
 conscious smile over those chubby arms and legs he felt 
 that June had in her life magically got to the heart of 
 things, and that he himself was no better than an in- 
 expert dabbler in back-waters. 
 
 June put down the child, and addressed Jim. "Will 
 you come and see the children have their supper?" she 
 asked. 
 
 It was a regular event in Jim's visits at the Evingtons' 
 to view the nursery at one time or another; but June 
 always asked him to go there as if it were something 
 unheard of, and awaited his reply as if there were ac- 
 tually grave doubt what it would be. Now, when he 
 said he should be charmed to see the children have their 
 supper, she beamed at him; and holding the wandering 
 Evington by the hand, she led Jim upstairs. 
 
 The baby had already been put to bed; but the other 
 children were now set down to supper in the big day 
 nursery. Jim and June sat down with them. The chil-
 
 16 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 dren were delighted at the incursion, and also at the 
 opportunity for lengthening out the supper hour and so 
 postponing bed-time. June knew how to bring out all 
 that was most delightful in her children, anyway; and 
 they brought out all that was most delightful in her. 
 Jim listened and laughed, and enjoyed himself thor- 
 oughly; and all the while there was present in his mind 
 his never-dying wonder that his friend Stuart's late and, 
 as he himself had thought at the time, rash marriage, 
 should have resulted in the production of this idyllic 
 charm. 
 
 They lingered so long in this atmosphere of sub- 
 limified bread and milk that a maid came seeking June, 
 with the news that Mr. Evington had returned, and 
 was asking for her. June sped away in answer to the 
 summons; and Jim, taking a more leisurely course to 
 his room, reflected that he hadn't even asked her who 
 was to be here this week-end. 
 
 He learned, however, when he came down to dinner; 
 for the rest of the party had all had time to dress, and 
 were taking advantage of the unusual warmth of the 
 day to view the sunset from the terraces. The Allen 
 Camps were there : a highly nice couple, related to Stuart. 
 Stuart himself waved a hand to Jim: a thin, lounging, 
 rather bald man, this Stuart Evington, with eyes that 
 missed nothing. June, who had changed in a jiffy, 
 smiled at Jim as if there were between them some deli- 
 cious secret understanding, and resumed her conversa- 
 tion with Sam Drummond. That left Jim to Jessica 
 Drummond, and he strolled over to her accordingly. 
 
 The gipsy Jessica was a diverting soul; but she and 
 her husband gravitated normally toward a swifter set 
 than the Evingtons'. She had gone to school with June, 
 however, and June seemed to cling to her. It was proof
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 17 
 
 of June's loyalty that the Drummonds were here now, 
 for she loathed Sam Drummond ; but in spite of her dis- 
 like and of his reputation she kept on asking him, be- 
 cause Jessica kept on living with him. 
 
 Jessica, in black jet that glittered horribly in the sun- 
 light, lifted her saucy face to Jim's. ''Have you ad- 
 mired Stuart's sunset," she wanted to know, "and 
 Stuart's lion?" 
 
 "I wasn't aware that there was anything especially 
 noteworthy about Stuart's sunset; the sun sets on the 
 landward side of this place. Stuart's moonrise is better 
 worth while. And I didn't even know there was a lion 
 here," said Jim. 
 
 "Oh, the wrong side of the sunset is superb !" Jessica 
 assured him. "Olive and violet, I believe Stuart sees in 
 it. But actually, haven't you met his lion?" 
 
 "I haven't so much as seen her," asserted Jim. "Is it 
 a lady?" 
 
 "Yes, it is." 
 
 "What does she do beside let us admire her?" asked 
 Jim. 
 
 "Oh, she doesn't do anything! Doing anything isn't 
 the point, with her." 
 
 "Is she so wealthy that simply her money is enough, 
 or so beautiful that she exists merely to be looked at?" 
 
 "She has money, and I believe she is beautiful. But 
 to be honest with you," said Jessica, "you will have to 
 find out from Stuart why she is such a lion. I don't 
 know." 
 
 "Where is this personage?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Turn your head until you look in the direction in 
 which I am looking. There!" said Jessica. "In the 
 white dress, conscientiously contemplating the wrong 
 half of the sunset."
 
 18 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Well, I can't see much of her at this distance," Jim 
 objected. 
 
 He had, to be sure, made out a woman in a white din- 
 ner gown, standing with her back toward him; and he 
 was aware that Stuart was talking to her. But if he 
 hadn't just been insisting on the points of the compass 
 for Jessica's benefit, he might have blamed the sun in 
 his eyes for his own singular quick sensation. This was 
 a very lovely back, to be sure; but in a time when backs 
 are commonly as lovely as faces, and in a country and 
 a social class where a considerable amount of loveliness in 
 women is taken for granted, it requires more than a 
 lovely back to account for a sudden crimsoning of the 
 vision and catch in the throat, even when the affected 
 party is a very young man ; and Jim Whittaker was no 
 longer a very young man. 
 
 "Let's stroll over there/' suggested Jessica, "and per- 
 haps Stuart will stop being piggish, and introduce you." 
 
 Stuart, however, had remembered his duties as a host, 
 and turned that instant to beckon. "A summons," said 
 Jim quickly, and slipped his hand under Jessica's arm. 
 
 "I've met the lady already," she objected. 
 
 "Then you meet her again. Three's a crowd, you 
 know, but four can always be divided into two couples," 
 said Jim. 
 
 It seemed to him, indeed, that he could never have 
 got across that strip of green lawn if it hadn't been for 
 Jessica. Yet the lady in white hadn't even turned to 
 look; didn't turn until they were close upon her. Then 
 for a second Jim held his breath, half for fear that this 
 delicious agitation mightn't continue, and half because 
 he had seen lovely backs before, and been disappointed in 
 faces. 
 
 But when this particular lady did turn, Jim at once re-
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 19 
 
 versed Jessica's verdict on her looks. Hers was a pale 
 and remote loveliness, that suggested marble and lilies 
 and moonlight nights. It suggested things perhaps 
 that was why it hadn't appealed to Jessica; or perhaps 
 Jessica saw at a glance where acceptance of that white 
 beauty would put her own gipsy charm. 
 
 The white lady acknowledged the introduction with 
 the politest and slightest of smiles, and the smallest in- 
 clination of the head. And just as Jim, fortified by her 
 coolness, had decided that her indubitable beauty was 
 no cause for agitation, and that now he saw it face to 
 face he wasn't agitated any more just at that moment 
 her eyes met Jim's; and her eyes were neither pale nor 
 remote. They were dark blue in colour; and although 
 her hair was very fair indeed, her eyelashes were black. 
 They supplied just the accent necessary to make her 
 face quite lovely; but their beauty struck Jim less than 
 their oddity. "Those eyes are Irish," he thought, "and 
 the rest of her face isn't Irish at all. How strange!" 
 
 She was a conscious beauty at least to this extent, 
 that she accepted his stare as homage; and Jim for his 
 part could have stared for hours and not wearied. But 
 a hand fell on his arm, and June's voice said in his ear, 
 "You will take Jessica in to dinner, Jim? You can talk 
 to Miss Lenox afterward." 
 
 For a moment Jim was disappointed: he felt that as 
 he and the stranger were the only two unmarried people 
 present, June might have put them together at the 
 table. But when he found himself seated almost di- 
 rectly opposite Miss Lenox, and realised that he could 
 watch her all through the meal without having to talk 
 to her just yet, he felt that after all the strategic posi- 
 tion was his. Perhaps June had arranged it that way on 
 purpose.
 
 20 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 It was Jessica's practice, when she was with a man 
 she liked, always to establish a tete-a-tete, no matter how 
 small or how congenial the gathering. Jim had not al- 
 ways liked that tendency ; but to-night he blessed it. He 
 had only to answer "Yes" and "No," and to look at 
 Jessica feelingly in the pauses; she would do the rest. 
 
 Presently he heard her say, "I don't blame you;" 
 from her voice he judged that she required an answer. 
 He looked around at her; she was watching him. "I 
 say I don't blame you," she explained. "You have agreed 
 with me three times when you ought to have disagreed. 
 But she really is well worth looking at." 
 
 Jim flushed a little, but he laughed frankly. Jessica 
 laughed too. "If it were anybody but you, Jim, I'd be 
 angry," she said. "Because any other man would try 
 to wriggle out of it." 
 
 "I think I'm bewitched," said Jim. "I stare and stare, 
 as if I never saw a woman before. Who is she, any- 
 how?" 
 
 "Stuart could tell you that much better than I," purred 
 Mrs. Drummond. "He always knows everybody, and 
 every last thing about everybody and without seeming 
 to try to know." 
 
 "Her name is Lenox?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Yes. Zoe Lenox, I believe." 
 
 She had pronounced both syllables in the first name. 
 "Then she isn't an American?" Jim hinted. 
 
 "My dear Jim, you might flatter me by assuming that 
 I, although an American, am educated ! But as a matter 
 of fact I think she isn't native to this country." 
 
 "Is that all you know about her ?" asked Jim. 
 
 "All. I'm not Stuart Evington, you know. But you 
 ought to be satisfied with that. It would be hard for 
 any story to come up to her appearance, don't you think ?
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 21 
 
 Better look at her and rejoice in your ignorance; you 
 won't enjoy her beauty half so much when you learn 
 that she is the daughter of an English curate and lives 
 principally on bread and butter, like any ordinary 
 woman." 
 
 "I'm to look at her," Jim wanted to know, "and be 
 thankful that her name is Zoe?" 
 
 "Oh, her name ought to have been more than that! 
 You see that in knowing her name you already know too 
 much. Her name ought to be Galataea, or Melisande." 
 
 "Or Lady Clara Vere de Vere," suggested Jim. 
 
 "Perhaps she can marry a Lord Vere de Vere, and 
 thus rectify Nature's error, or Society's," suggested 
 Jessica. "There, you shuddered when I said that. I 
 should advise you not to make her acquaintance, Jim; 
 you never could endure her as human nature's daily 
 food. Get a nice picture of her, and worship that. She 
 might be framed just as she is, mightn't she?" 
 
 They both looked at Miss Lenox, who had just then 
 turned her head a little to listen to Evington; one long, 
 firm hand, tapering toward the finger-tips, rested 'on the 
 table. "A coiffure all her own, the simplest sort of dress, 
 and no jewels; and she makes me look like a country 
 shop-girl, and June like the shop-keeper's wife," said 
 Jessica in a sudden flare of admiration. "That isn't 
 clothes or grooming or setting for you, or prettiness or 
 comeliness: that's real beauty." 
 
 The fact that Jessica was sincere in her admiration of 
 another woman pleased Jim. Jessica hadn't that sort 
 of reputation. She was amusing everybody was willing 
 to grant that; and in a decorous circle she could be de- 
 corously amusing. But most people held that she was 
 a viperous creature. She had married Drummond be- 
 cause he was rich, and in spite of what she knew about
 
 22 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 his personal character. She despised him for having 
 been taken in by her, and herself for taking him in. It 
 was the surviving good in her, Jim felt, that made her 
 cynical. She hadn't lived up to her standards, and she 
 couldn't help seeing that other people did sometimes live 
 up to theirs. She used her cleverness to discover how 
 often they failed to live up to them, and found therein, 
 it is to be hoped, a wry consolation. 
 
 But she was never at her worst with Jim. She was 
 rewarded now for not having been nasty, by seeing him 
 drop the subject of the lady across the table, and set to 
 work to amuse her. Yes, it was a reward; if rewards 
 always followed good deeds so promptly, she thought, it 
 would strengthen the sprouting good in the Jessicas of 
 this world. 
 
 They talked of winter resorts, southern and northern, 
 and of sea bathing in Florida as opposed to winter sports 
 at Saranac. Then they turned to tennis, and realised 
 that they hadn't played together since last season. And 
 then Jessica launched into a description of a match she 
 had seen in the south. 
 
 She felt cleaner when she talked like this, and to 
 such a man. She liked Jim Whittaker; as she herself 
 would have said, he was rather less a spoiled baby than 
 most of the young men one met about. She had some- 
 times gleams of a queer feeling in connection with him. 
 To have kept oneself unspotted from the world, and then 
 to see the eyes of such a man warm to one's own per- 
 haps that would have been worth the effort it cost. But 
 the Jim Whittakers of this world are few, and they al- 
 ways come too late, after a woman has taken a Drum- 
 mond's money and a Drummond's self. Having taken 
 them, she would be a fool not to get what she could out 
 of them. And as to mere amusement, which Jessica
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 23 
 
 might not have scrupled to take on her own account 
 well, Jim wasn't that kind of man, and it was earnestly 
 to be hoped that he never would be. 
 
 When Jessica rose at length, tennis was still the topic 
 of her conversation. "Do you suppose we shall have 
 some to-morrow?" she breathed, her gipsy eyes spark- 
 ling into Jim's. "If we do, I engage you for a set 
 that is, of course, if the goddess doesn't play." 
 
 The after-dinner pause never lasted long at the Eving- 
 tons'. After one cigarette Jim was free to stroll forth 
 in search of Miss Lenox, if he liked. He wasn't quite 
 sure whether he liked. But as he hesitated one card- 
 table was filled, Jessica Drummond, Evington and the 
 Camps sitting down eagerly to the evening's game. That 
 left, apparently, no one for a second table but Jim and 
 Mrs. Evington. Jim started toward June, purposing 
 at least to talk to her. 
 
 But June had heard sounds from the music-room; 
 and she seated herself with a book, and every promise 
 of absorption in it. Her smile told Jim to be a good 
 boy and run along. Jim was a good boy; and it was 
 but natural for him to look and see who was playing the 
 piano. 
 
 It was Miss Lenox who was playing; and it was Drum- 
 mond, with his seasoned taste for beauty and his abso- 
 lute lack of hesitation in tracking it, who had followed 
 her first. He stood leaning on one end of the piano, a 
 prematurely stout man whose bearing was a compound 
 of sensuality and swagger. Jim felt a carnal desire to 
 eject him from the room, or at least to step in between 
 him and the woman he was daring to look at. 
 
 His looking at her didn't seem to disturb Miss Lenox ; 
 indeed she was apparently unaware that he was there at 
 all. She glanced up when Jim came in, smiled and said,
 
 24 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Won't you sit down?" Then she became oblivious of 
 him, too. Her playing absorbed her. 
 
 Jim found himself wishing at first that she would 
 stop playing, and let him hear her voice again. It was 
 a pleasant English voice, but it seemed to him that her 
 intonation was not quite English. He would like to hear 
 it again, and make sure. And then suddenly Jim per- 
 ceived that he was spectator at a little private comedy. 
 Drummond had been trying to be gallant to her; and if 
 Drummond wasn't particularly attractive, he was at least 
 experienced. But before her indifference Drummond 
 had already begun to wither when Jim came in; and 
 the presence of an audience farther embarrassed him. 
 The pauses between his remarks grew longer and longer ; 
 once or twice he floundered helplessly, like a nonplussed 
 school-boy. All the time the sweet profile remained 
 turned toward him, the sweet music went on and on. It 
 was like trying to make love to Saint Cecilia. Drum- 
 mond gave up; and heedless of Jim's knowledge of his 
 discomfiture, he quit the room in exceeding disgust. 
 
 Saint Cecilia's blue eyes met Jim's; across her rapt 
 face came a smile that was wickedly human. "Do you 
 like Grieg?" she asked unexpectedly. 
 
 "Yes. Oh, yes!" said Jim. 
 
 "Then I will play Grieg to you," she said. "I'm afraid 
 Mr. Drummond doesn't like him at all." 
 
 The music, however, lasted only a minute longer. Miss 
 Lenox ran up and down the piano, and then suddenly 
 sprang to her feet. "I think after all that I'm tired of 
 playing," she said. "Let's go outdoors." 
 
 She found a wrap in the hall ; and together they slipped 
 out a side door, and strolled to the terrace where he had 
 seen her first. The rising moon made a silver ladder on 
 the water far below them.
 
 25 
 
 "Nature does very well about here, sometimes," said 
 Jim. "Take this moonlight on water, for instance; it's 
 a primitive effect, but good." 
 
 She was quite serious, however. Resting her hands 
 on a little stone parapet, she stood drinking in the pros- 
 pect. "Oh, water in any light!" she said. "Water it- 
 self!" 
 
 He was right; she had an accent. How queerly she 
 said "water." "Are you fond of the water?" he asked. 
 
 "I am never long happy away from it," she said. She 
 turned her head to ask, "And you?" 
 
 "I don't know much about it," he confessed. "I swim, 
 of course; but I don't know anything about boats." 
 
 "You don't care for boats?" 
 
 "It isn't that exactly," Jim explained. "I happen never 
 to have had much to do with them. It's curious, too, be- 
 cause I've gone in for almost every other sort of sport, 
 at one time or another." 
 
 "Many people seem to have the same failing," she 
 said. "Here Mr. and Mrs. Evington own a place on 
 a piece of navigable water, and the only boat they 
 have is one launch." 
 
 "And that is antiquated," said Jim. 
 
 "You've been yachting, of course?" she asked. 
 
 "I've lunched and dined and danced on yachts," he 
 said, "but I've never been on an extended cruise. It is 
 odd, now that you speak of it ; I hadn't thought of it be- 
 fore." 
 
 "Perhaps you will take your maiden trip in mine, 
 then," she said. "The Evingtons have promised to go 
 some time for a cruise with me." 
 
 "That would be charming," said Jim promptly, and 
 added illogically, "You are a yacht owner?" 
 
 "Yes. Just at present it happens that I have a per-
 
 26 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 fectly new yacht. I haven't made a real cruise in her 
 myself yet." 
 
 "A new yacht?" 
 
 "She was built to my order. I planned her myself, 
 from stem to stern. She is not only my boat; she's my 
 creation." 
 
 "You must have to know a lot about boats, to do that," 
 said Jim. 
 
 "Oh, I've always lived in boats; I know more about 
 them than about anything else." 
 
 "And now," he sympathised, "you've given yourself 
 a final luxury you've let your fancy run riot, your 
 knowledge come to a head, in planning this one?" 
 
 For a moment the thought seemed to thrill her; then 
 her excitement died, and she shook her head. "I'm not 
 sure," she said. "The Helga is a steam yacht, pure and 
 simple, without a trace of sail ; and I'm not sure I shan't 
 miss sails." 
 
 "I thought all water traffic had been carried on by 
 steam in our lifetime," said Jim. 
 
 "Oh, no indeed! Not even in America," she assured 
 him. 
 
 "To be intensely original, do you like America?" 
 asked Jim. 
 
 "Yes. It is so odd," she answered. 
 
 Their moment's intimacy, brought about by the sub- 
 ject of boats, had passed. She had chosen to label her- 
 self a condescending foreigner; and Jim, as one of the 
 odd Americans, didn't care to show any farther curiosity. 
 It might be the very hall-mark of oddity to ask questions. 
 
 There wasn't much more opportunity, anyway. 
 Drummond, whose self-confidence had been so lately 
 routed, recovered sufficiently to come bustling out to 
 them, announcing that Mrs. Evington wanted a second
 
 WHITTAKER'S CURIOSITY IS AROUSED 27 
 
 table of bridge, if they would be so good as to come in 
 now. Jim didn't know whether to hail Drummond as 
 a deliverer or curse him for an interfering fool; but 
 he certainly envied the fat man his self-confidence. 
 
 Indoors it was Jim's luck to cut in at the table that 
 had been formed earlier in the evening; and the fall of 
 the cards gave Miss Lencx to Drummond for a partner 
 at the other table. Her eye caught Jim's after she was 
 seated; and if she didn't smile at him again, she might 
 just as well have. It struck him then that her accent 
 matched her eyes; perhaps she had derived eyes and ac- 
 cent from one parent, and the beauty that required ac- 
 centing from the other. Jim shuffled and cut. "Are 
 you going to be in town late this spring, Camp?" he 
 asked.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 
 
 WHEN the party broke up for the night Stuart 
 Evington found opportunity to say to Whittaker, 
 "You'll come in for a little while to-night, Jimmie?" 
 
 Jim nodded. The long late talk with Stuart was as 
 much a feature of his stays at the Evingtons' as the visit 
 to the nursery with June, and as clear a mark of how 
 they set him apart from their other guests. Stuart was 
 one of those who talk best late at night; and many and 
 many a time, even in his bachelor days, he and Jim 
 had seen the dawn over their pipes. June had never 
 attempted to alter her husband's arrangement of his day : 
 when she got him, she explained, he was too old to 
 change. 
 
 Jim got into his smoking coat and slippers, and stifled 
 a yawn. Then quite without excuse he began to smile, 
 and abruptly changed the smile to a frown. He was 
 not in a normal frame of mind to-night. It would be 
 easy for him to slip into an infatuation for the woman 
 he had just met; and such an infatuation would fit the 
 least in the world into his pleasant orderly life. He 
 shivered at the thought of what such a woman might do 
 to a man. 
 
 But a moment later he was wishing that she might 
 do her worst, and thereby find out that her worst wasn't 
 very bad. This was Saturday night, and Monday morn- 
 ing he was due back in town. Probably he and the 
 
 28
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 29 
 
 woman would never see each other again: she would 
 go off cruising, and be drowned or captured by pirates; 
 and he would let all his years slip uneventfully along, 
 and perhaps waken some morning to find that life had 
 passed him by. 
 
 Let her do what she could, if she could do anything. 
 She had beauty, of course; but perhaps it was only his 
 imagination that endowed her with significance. Beauty 
 and seamanship. He grinned at the idea of falling in 
 love with her seamanship; and then suddenly wished 
 that he could have her to himself for a day against the 
 background of the sea. The sea he knew it as one 
 does from crossing in liners and reading of it in books; 
 perhaps it was for some interpretation of the sea that 
 he longed to know her. Or perhaps the sea would in- 
 terpret her. "I am never long happy away from the 
 water," she had said. Then to see her on water would 
 be to see her happy ; and to see her happy would be worth 
 while. In spite of her calm, she didn't look as if she 
 were made for happiness. Could happiness ever come to 
 such a nature ? Or had he actually any slightest clue as 
 to what her nature really was? 
 
 With a start Jim came to himself, and realised that 
 he had stood mooning there for half an hour. He would 
 be lucky if Stuart hadn't given him up and gone to bed. 
 Rather feverishly Jim hoped he hadn't ; he felt a sudden 
 desire for company, cool reasonable company mas- 
 culine company, in short. 
 
 There was a light, however, in Stuart's little study, 
 which was separated from June's room by another, so 
 that she wasn't ever disturbed by what went on there. 
 A little fire burned in the grate; and Stuart, in shabby 
 smoking-coat and dilapidated mocassins, was established 
 before it with a book and pipe, as if the hour were nine
 
 30 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 in the evening instead of half-past one. He laid down 
 the book at once, and motioned toward the tobacco. 
 " 'Self at home," he said. "I was thinking you had for- 
 gotten me." 
 
 Jim found his own pipe on the table, and lighted it. 
 He looked about the dim room, recognising a dozen 
 things he had known always, it seemed to him ; he looked 
 at Stuart, growing a little bald with the years, but weary, 
 kindly, intelligent, just as he always had been. Of a 
 sudden Jim was deeply grateful for the familiarity of 
 things. 
 
 "I knew you wouldn't be in bed yet," he answered his 
 friend's remark. Then mingling this train of thought 
 with his own, he brought out, "I have known you and 
 your bad habits too long, Stuart. Marriage doesn't 
 interfere much with a man's bad habits, does it?" 
 
 "Oh, indeed it does! It interferes abominably. It 
 has interfered with all mine except night-hawking. June 
 is such a sleepy-head that I'm ready at my worst to get 
 up when she does, or I suppose it would have interfered 
 with this, too." Stuart puffed at his pipe, and eyed Jim. 
 "Thinking of trying it ?" he asked. 
 
 "Not for a good many years yet," said Jim. His own 
 confident tone pleased him. 
 
 "Well, there are some things to be said in favour of 
 early marriages," Evington remarked. "Not that yours 
 would be so awfully early, Jim, even if you made haste 
 now." 
 
 "It will be awfully late, unless I do. But it isn't a 
 question of ages," responded Jim. "I haven't yet found 
 my June." 
 
 "Oh, there are plenty of Junes!' asserted June's hus- 
 band. "June is nothing but a natural unspoiled woman ; 
 and unspoiled women are still fairly common, in spite
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 31 
 
 of what we read in the papers and hear from pulpits. 
 I could have picked a dozen as good in every way as 
 June. But one doesn't here's a point for your side 
 of the argument one doesn't, you know, actually pick 
 at all." 
 
 "One falls in love?" Jim suggested. 
 
 "That is, I believe, the vulgar expression. And you're 
 not to understand me as implying that one's own par- 
 ticular June isn't in actual practice a sufficient motive 
 even for marriage." 
 
 "Not all particular Junes are as satisfying as yours, 
 even if she could be so easily replaced " Jim began. 
 
 "I never said she could be replaced," Evington inter- 
 rupted parenthetically. 
 
 "For instance," Jim went on,- "if I wanted to gossip 
 about your guests, I could say that right here under your 
 roof are particular Junes less satisfying than yours." 
 
 "I'm not so sure about that," answered Evington 
 promptly. "Allen Camp finds his perfect; the Camps 
 may bore you, but they satisfy each other. They are 
 fervent advocates of matrimony fervent: I think they 
 regard themselves as the chief props of the institution. 
 As for Jessica Drummond, she married for money, 
 and got it. June, I know, thinks that she isn't con- 
 tented with her bargain; but perhaps June reads too 
 much of herself into Jessica. I dare say Jessica is as 
 cheerful as most of us." 
 
 "She's cheerful enough. I suppose when you have 
 spoiled your life it's best to think as little as possible 
 about that." Jim reached for the tobacco. "But it's 
 only lately, Stuart, that you've come to believe in uni- 
 versal wedded bliss." 
 
 "Oh, I don't go so far as that/' asserted Evington.
 
 32 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Indeed, my belief would halt under this roof, though 
 not on the Drummonds." 
 
 "Miss Lenox would give you pause?" asked Jim. 
 
 "She would. She's a breath-taker, if you like; a 
 world's wonder, if you're young enough; a woman to 
 go mad about and blow your brains out, if that's your 
 idea of a fitting tribute to beauty. But as a fireside 
 companion I simply can't imagine her." 
 
 "I can imagine breakers ahead for her husband," said 
 Jim, "but I supposed you would be just the man to want 
 to equip her with such an article. On the contrary, you 
 would advise men to steer clear of her?" 
 
 "By no means. I should say that to fall in love with 
 her might be very educational, so long as you didn't fall 
 too far. If I were young again, I shouldn't mind hav- 
 ing a try at her myself she's so deliciously cold- 
 blooded." 
 
 "In other words," said Jim, "flirt, but don't fall in 
 love?" 
 
 "If it's for yourself you are asking, don't do either," 
 said Evington promptly. "But our hypothetical young 
 man could, I think, learn something from that aggrega- 
 tion of ice." 
 
 "You insist that she's cold?" asked Jim. "Aren't you 
 making a common mistake, and attributing northern 
 qualities to her because of her northern blondeness?" 
 
 "Perhaps cold isn't the word. Perhaps what I mean 
 is that she's a creature of negations," mused Eving- 
 ton. "Either would be odd, you know: negativeness 
 from a descent like hers, or coldness from the South 
 Pacific Ocean." 
 
 "You imply that she has a story," said Jim. 
 
 "She has," assented Evington. 
 
 That was what Jim had come to hear; and knowing
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 33 
 
 Stuart, he knew that the story trembled on the older 
 man's lips. Jim settled himself in his chair; he hoped 
 that the story would last till dawn. 
 
 Evington threw his head back, and his eyes rested 
 on the ceiling; he seemed to watch the play of light there, 
 firelight and lamplight, one ever changing, the other so 
 constant of itself, but drawn into motion by its com- 
 panion. When he began to speak, his voice was not 
 keyed as for ordinary conversation: he had fallen into 
 his narrative mood. 
 
 "Her father was Dan Lenox," the narrative voice 
 told Jim. "He was an Irishman by birth, hard-drinking, 
 hard-hitting, so taciturn as to be almost speechless. In- 
 cidentally, he was a very handsome man, in a threaten- 
 ing way, like a volcano always on the eve of eruption. 
 Eruptions were not infrequent with him, too. 
 
 "He quarrelled with all his relatives, and got, I be- 
 lieve, into bad odour with the authorities. At any rate, 
 he left Europe suddenly, and went to the Far East. 
 There, instead of going directly to the dogs, as any one 
 might have prophesied that he would, he began almost 
 at once to show what was in him. 
 
 "Dan Lenox had a most unusual mind for an Irish- 
 man, organising instead of destructive. Perhaps that's 
 why he wasn't popular at home. Maybe Europe was 
 too highly organised to suit him, anyway, there at the 
 beginning. But in the East he got into traffic and mer- 
 chandising, and prospered exceedingly. He could con- 
 ciliate a native Rajah, bribe the representative of a Euro- 
 pean power, sail a boat or get drunk with the captain, 
 show a roustabout how to work or knock him down, all 
 with the same ease and authority. But chiefly, he could 
 organise all things and people so that they worked to- 
 gether for Dan Lenox's good.
 
 34 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 He spent money like water, not only to back his 
 projects, but on huge debauches, yet money came in 
 faster than he could spend it. And his fame spread and 
 spread." 
 
 "Hasn't he ever been written about?" asked Jim. 
 
 "He was later on. Not in America, perhaps, though 
 I rather think he was here, too. You may have heard 
 his name a dozen times without remembering it no 
 associations, you know. Yes, he had his share of fame, 
 even written-down fame. He had his share of every- 
 thing, old Dan Lenox did." 
 
 Evington was silent for a moment, seeming to trace 
 on the ceiling some of those mighty scenes in which 
 old Dan Lenox had had such a share. The light on the 
 ceiling was steadier now, for the fire had died down to 
 a bed of red coals. All about them Jim could feel the 
 sleeping stillness of the house; and he was almost star- 
 tled when with a quick-drawn breath Evington resumed 
 his story. 
 
 "Lenox was a middle-aged man when he met Helga. 
 I don't know what her last name was, and I don't think 
 Dan himself did. I know he wasn't aware what par- 
 ticular variety of Scandinavian she was perhaps to an 
 Irishman they were all the same anyhow. You under- 
 stand I never saw Helga, and all the details about her 
 are vague. She would seem like a lovely shadow, if it 
 hadn't been for Lenox's love, which itself gave her a 
 certain substance. 
 
 "She needed something like that, for she had had 
 the devil of a life. Married to a man who abused her, 
 she ran away from him with a lover who left her, all 
 those thousands of miles away from home. Heaven 
 knows what would have become of her if Dan hadn't
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 35 
 
 found her; but perhaps Fate owed her one kindness be- 
 fore she died. Well, she had landed right at last. 
 
 "Perhaps you can imagine how a man of Dan Lenox's 
 nature could love. And it must have given the final 
 cruel refinement to his passion to know that it couldn't 
 endure very long. Helga was already pretty far gone 
 in consumption when he met her. His love was a refuge 
 for her; I don't know that she had life enough to return 
 it. But perhaps she did. I don't know much about her, 
 you see. A faint, pale figure, Helga, living, when I 
 came to learn the story, only in the fastnesses of Dan 
 Lenox's memory. 
 
 "They were married very soon after they met ; or per- 
 haps they weren't ever married. She may not have been 
 legally free; and the ceremony isn't a thing that Dan 
 Lenox would ever have considered important. At any 
 rate, they went off honeymooning on one of his ships. 
 Sailing agreed with Helga, and they continued to sail. 
 They must have been a ghastly ship-load. So much of 
 the time she couldn't talk, and he never had. But I dare 
 say he made her happy in a wan way; if he didn't, it 
 wasn't for lack of loving her. 
 
 "Their daughter was actually born at sea; and when 
 she was just big enough to toddle, Helga had one last 
 hemorrhage, and died. 
 
 "I shouldn't have thought Dan Lenox was a man to 
 care much about little children; I suppose he didn't in 
 general. But this was his child. Paternity gripped him 
 as hard as had love. He adored that mite, though he 
 was never soft with her. I suppose his manner toward 
 her was always what June would have called harsh; 
 but I think Zoe understood from the beginning 
 
 "Zoe grew up under his eye. As he couldn't leave his 
 trade yet, or thought he couldn't, that meant growing
 
 36 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 up in ships and strange sea-ports. He couldn't be sepa- 
 rated from her ; that was out of the question. She must 
 have had an odd youth ; and as a result she knows more 
 outlandish dialects than any other woman in civilised 
 society, I suppose. 
 
 "She was as attached to her father, I think, as he to 
 her. She was the only being now on earth that he 
 cared about and also the one person he knew who 
 wasn't a little afraid of him. And he's the only soul liv- 
 ing or dead who ever warmed her icy little heart thanks 
 to the fact that I've never been in a position to try." 
 
 Evington poured a little water from a patent bottle 
 at his elbow, and drank it. Jim Whittaker followed 
 his example: these late sessions of theirs were always 
 highly temperate, for even mild intoxicants have a tend- 
 ency at last to obscure conversation. 
 
 "When Zoe was a grown girl," Stuart resumed, "Dan 
 Lenox closed up his interests in the East and took her 
 to Europe. It was there that I happened to meet them. 
 They were a strange couple, as you may believe, though 
 not in the least ridiculous. Dan Lenox wasn't one of 
 those rough diamonds who eat with their knives ; indeed, 
 I think he came originally of very decent people. He 
 was simply a strong man, and he showed it. That was 
 what all those years in the East had done for him; his 
 oddity was just that he was so strongly charactered. 
 Against the background of average people in a hotel, he 
 and Zoe stood out, I can tell you. Even the girl, young 
 as she was, was perfectly self-possessed, with all Europe 
 coming at her head. 
 
 "I lost no time in getting acquainted. June and 
 I were on our honeymoon. We had been for some 
 time; and we were beginning to be bored, though 
 we were too newly married to admit it. June showed
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 37 
 
 Zoe lots of little things about clothes; and I think 
 Zoe was grateful for the assistance, though she 
 never thanked her. June admired the girl's beauty, and 
 was more than half afraid of her silence and strange- 
 ness. Her bringing-up had left traces, of course. She 
 had, for example, an old Malay woman who acted as a 
 sort of maid to her ; perhaps she was more a companion 
 and familiar spirit than a maid, at that. Well, June 
 tried to get Zoe to have a competent Frenchwoman in- 
 stead. Zoe wouldn't hear of it; and the old creature 
 refuted all objections except those raised to her per- 
 sonality by becoming as good a maid as the best of them. 
 Imagine the daughter of a native Rajah or more likely 
 the daughter of a pirate or a common boatman learning 
 to manicure and massage as well as the Frenchest of 
 them! Zoe has the old witch still; she must always 
 sleep in the room next to her mistress, and have her 
 meals brought to her on a tray. She still gives June the 
 horrors. 
 
 "Dan Lenox and I got quite chummy; I suppose that 
 like Zoe he was glad of any company. He wasn't com- 
 municative at first. But he got drunk one night, and 
 told me about his love affair and his child. Drink 
 loosened that stiff tongue of his, but it didn't impair his 
 dignity. I never saw anything more tremendous than 
 the old man sitting up behind the empty bottles he 
 wouldn't let the waiters take any of them away and 
 calling up in his short gruff sentences the shade of the 
 vanished Helga. 
 
 "We left Paris the next month; and I never saw him 
 again. I wish I had been there for a few years," Eving- 
 ton mused, "I should have liked to watch Dan Lenox 
 discovering Europe. Discover Europe he did, and he 
 entered the world of European finance. I suppose Euro-
 
 38 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 pean finance expected to get the better of him; but if so, 
 it was mistaken. He kept his Midas touch; he dupli- 
 cated his South Sea success. I love the idea of his 
 starting in at his age to find new worlds to conquer, and 
 conquering them. He ought to have been an American, 
 though he ought to have been an American. 
 
 "I can't say that he amassed money, however, during 
 those last years of his life. The opportunities for spend- 
 ing were too great. He developed a fine taste in pictures, 
 and a pleasant mania for houses. The collection he left 
 to the South Kensington was a joy; and I suppose that 
 my lady has establishments in a dozen of the world's 
 most picturesque spots. And of course he had always 
 a ship, or five or six ships. Those Zoe hasn't, though. 
 With native extravagance she has scrapped them all, and 
 built one to suit herself." 
 
 "So she told me," said Jim. "The Helga, she said 
 it was called; I didn't of course get the significance of 
 the name then." 
 
 "Yes, The Helga. Dan Lenox had, I think, never 
 named a boat after his wife, living or dead. He had 
 all sorts of reserves and hesitancies, that steaming high- 
 handed man. So has Zoe, but not the same ones. 
 
 "Well, in course of time Dan Lenox died. Up to 
 that moment Zoe had been having a gay time. With 
 her beauty and her money, you may imagine that coro- 
 nets were laid at her feet : even a crown, they say. But 
 she couldn't make up her mind to accept any of them. 
 She isn't calculating, and she hasn't any heart for a man 
 to touch. That makes her interesting, though the 
 spurned Grand Dukes probably didn't feel so about it. 
 
 "Her father's death was the only thing that could 
 come near to overwhelming Zoe. Off she went to sea, 
 and stayed for two years, severing all her connections,
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 39 
 
 brooding over her loss. Then of a sudden I suppose 
 she wojce to her own independence and power; and at 
 the same time she discovered America. The Lenox pas- 
 sion for discovering, you see. In that state of mind, 
 just returning to normal after a mighty blow, a new 
 country of course fascinated her. Mountains, rivers, 
 lakes and cities: she tried to absorb the whole country. 
 And she had her new yacht built here, because she wanted 
 to oversee its construction, and she didn't want to leave 
 America. 
 
 "We encountered her one afternoon in Fifth Avenue. 
 June and I were shopping, and were on foot; we heard 
 ourselves hailed from a motor. There was Zoe, wrapped 
 in sables worth a fortune, and looking like a Grand 
 Duchess or a prima donna or something. But when you 
 got below the sables she was almost laughably the same 
 that she had been years before. Neither the passage 
 of time nor her very real grief over her father's death 
 had made any actual difference in Zoe. She was more 
 polished, of course, and she understood better her own 
 possibilities; but that was all. 
 
 "She was very nice to us, though; I think she re- 
 tained some gratitude to June for her early services. 
 And with all America to choose from, she honours our 
 humble dwelling by making here the only week-end visit 
 she contemplates in America." 
 
 "Why wasn't I warned that I was about to meet such 
 a celebrity?" asked Jim. "And why isn't she shared 
 with more people ?" 
 
 "I didn't warn you because I wanted your first im- 
 pression of her to be unshaded by preconceptions. And 
 I haven't asked more people down to meet her because 
 personally I find Zoe disappointing." 
 
 Jim laughed. "After your exceedingly appreciative
 
 40 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 history of her, interspersed with wishes that you were 
 young enough to make love to her, I can't believe that," 
 he said, 
 
 "Oh, I appreciate her looks ! I love to see Dan Lenox's 
 eyes looking out of the face of the vanished Helga. I 
 love to hear in her speech an echo of the man who taught 
 her English you've noticed her accent? And I love 
 beauty above all things, and she has it. She has it, and 
 she trusts it. Did you notice her turn-out to-night: no 
 jewels, no colour, just a rich simple gown, not much like 
 what other women are wearing now, and her splendid 
 hair in a low coil about her head, utterly unmodish ? She 
 trusts her beauty," Evington repeated. 
 
 "Isn't it perhaps that she trusts her money?" Jim 
 suggested. "She is Zoe Lenox, and she doesn't have to 
 dress to be appreciated isn't it, perhaps, partly that?" 
 
 "No, I think not. Yet, perhaps, it is that, too; for if 
 Zoe appreciated anything it would be because of its nega- 
 tions." 
 
 "Whatever that means," commented Jim. 
 
 Joyfully Evington elucidated. "It seems to me that 
 in view of all the passion behind her, the violent con- 
 trasts of which she is the product, you might reasonably 
 expect Zoe to be passionate herself, and imaginative. 
 And she isn't." 
 
 He leaned back in his chair; again he watched the 
 ceiling whereon the first faint heralding of the dawn 
 was now reflected. When he spoke again his voice 
 seemed to come from a distance. "Dan Lenox's love," 
 he mused, "the South Seas European capitals and 
 Grand Dukes. it ought to produce a woman of sorts. 
 And in spite of her beauty and her magnificent sur- 
 roundings, Zoe is a woman of no sort whatever. A 
 nihilist, if that's what you choose to call her. A hanger-
 
 AND EVINGTON TRIES TO SATISFY IT 41 
 
 back, if you like. At any rate, something not quite 
 human." 
 
 "An Olympian, perhaps," suggested Jim. 
 
 "Oh, a goddess, no doubt! Any young man would 
 feel that way about her," said Stuart. 
 
 "Interesting to anybody but an analyst like yourself," 
 Jim maintained. 
 
 "Interesting enough to me, or I shouldn't stay up all 
 night talking about her." Evington's voice was farther 
 and farther away. 
 
 "It occurs to me," said Jim, "that in the course of 
 an all-night session you might have recalled one trifling 
 fact that seems to have escaped you. You knew only 
 one of Miss Lenox's parents, but she undoubtedly had 
 two." 
 
 "Yes, didn't I say Oh, I see what you mean! You 
 think that Zoe reproduces her mother instead of her 
 puissant father?" 
 
 "I haven't any opinion on the subject," said Jim 
 coolly. "But I thought you ought to think so." 
 
 "It was stupid of me not to," admitted Evington. 
 "That is an obvious idea, Jim, and a good one. The 
 unhappy Helga must have allowed life to use her pretty 
 much as it would." 
 
 "She must have allowed men to use her pretty much 
 as they would." 
 
 "Yes. One wonders what would have become of her 
 if she hadn't met Dan Lenox," said Evington. "And 
 if your plausible theory is correct, Jim, one wonders 
 where Zoe's Dan Lenox is to come from." 
 
 "Perhaps she won't find one," said Jim. 
 
 "Oh, my dear fellow!" protested Evington. "When 
 you think of a charming theory, have the courage to 
 follow it out to the end. Perhaps she won't, actually ;
 
 42 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 but it's fascinating to try to imagine what he would be 
 like if she did. Upon my soul, Jim, whether I'm con- 
 sistent or not, I say again that if I were young and 
 free " 
 
 "I don't mind your saying it," returned Jim, "because 
 I know that you don't believe it, Stuart." 
 
 "No, of course I don't. But if I were in your place, 
 Jim, I can't say what I mightn't do." 
 
 "If you were in my place, Stuart, you'd be just as 
 prosaic and unenterprising as I am. But if I were in 
 your place I shouldn't, even as an analyst, be regretting 
 youths and Dianas." Jim strolled to the window, and 
 looked out at the lawn greying in the early twilight. 
 "June took me to see the babies at supper last night," 
 he went on, with or without connection. "That's the 
 sort of sight I like." 
 
 All the remoteness went out of Evington's voice: the 
 analyst and man of the world disappeared in a twink- 
 ling. Evington paterfamilias sat straight in his chair 
 and beamed upon his friend. "Were they eating nice- 
 ly?" he asked. "When they do, it's very, very nice; but 
 when they don't, it's 'orrid."
 
 CHAPTER III 
 A SUNDAY IN TH COUNTRY 
 
 JIM dozed for two hours after leaving his friend that 
 early Sunday morning. Through the borderland of 
 sleep, phantoms pursued him: Dan Lenox in his covet- 
 ousness and his power and his passion ; the faint Helga, 
 so reminiscent even in her life-time of old, unhappy, far- 
 off things, and now one of those things herself; the 
 superb Zoe, who had been loved by Grand Dukes, and 
 who had walked queenly into the Evingtons' circle in 
 sables worth a king's ransom. They were all lovely 
 phantoms, it seemed to him, and they were all sad; he 
 could have wept as he watched them. 
 
 Suddenly he came broad awake, to realise that it was 
 a May morning, and the sun was shining. And he had 
 all day, a long, glorious day, to find and follow Zoe, 
 if that was what he cared to do. She was flesh and 
 blood, and here ; he was a young man, on a May morn- 
 ing, and he laughed in his strength. Weariness was 
 farthest from his thoughts. He leaped out of bed, stood 
 under an icy shower, and dressed hastily in what came 
 to hand. Ten minutes after he had been in bed he was 
 out to greet the morning. 
 
 Of course, he reflected, the morning was probably 
 all that he would greet for some time yet. Zoe Lenox 
 might suggest Diana to the adoring mind; but in sober 
 fact she was a luxurious modern woman, and undoubt- 
 edly not given to walking the hills at dawn. But the 
 
 43
 
 44 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 morning was worth greeting for itself, especially when 
 a man was in god-like mood, and felt that he owned 
 the morning, and everything that appertained thereto. 
 
 It was such a morning as comes only in the late spring 
 of a land whose winters are frigid: a limpid, laughing, 
 maiden morning, that wooed and promised and never 
 quite surrendered. Jim chose the easiest path down to 
 the water-side. The water was deep blue in the shadow 
 near at hand; farther out it sparkled almost intolerably 
 in the morning sunlight. This was a morning to yield 
 oneself to the water, to swim and splash, or to ride the 
 waves in a shell even to go for a cruise in a yacht 
 named The Helga. Jim laughed to see how he was weav- 
 ing into the freshness of the morning the story he had 
 heard overnight; laughed to think that Zoe couldn't es- 
 cape him even by staying out of his sight. The morning 
 was murmurous with her. 
 
 There was no yacht at hand, Helga or other ; and one 
 didn't go swimming in one's clothes. As for merely 
 looking at the water, that wasn't enough to satisfy Jim 
 for very long. He couldn't have looked passively at 
 anything for very long not even at the things the hour 
 kept hidden when this morning's exultation was upon 
 him, seeking outlet through the sinews if it were not to 
 flood back through the nerves. 
 
 After all, the sea was to him chiefly a thing to look 
 out upon from the land; but of the land he liked even 
 the rough places, liked them perhaps the best. He hon- 
 oured mountains not only by admiring them, but by 
 scrambling up their steep sides. He would have liked 
 to climb a mountain now, to express his silly, wonderful 
 exaltation by going laboriously but triumphantly up and 
 up and up. 
 
 The Evington "place" afforded no mountain; but the
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 45 
 
 bluff at its steepest point was a capital substitute. In- 
 deed, it looked unscalable just there; but it could be 
 scaled, and Jim had done it, choosing the steepest place 
 to try his strength. What he had done before, he could 
 do again; yes, and to-day he could do things that he 
 never had done before! 
 
 He set to work to climb to the summit of the bluff. 
 It was a year since he had done any climbing, but he 
 hadn't lost the knack. The quick eye for foot-holds, 
 the strong arm and steady foot ah, it was fine for a 
 man to feel he had them! Up and up and up he went. 
 His breath got a little short, but not disagreeably; he 
 could feel his heart pounding and his blood dancing; 
 he would have shouted aloud in his glee, but the sun- 
 shine and the dancing blood seemed to shout for him. 
 He was climbing, climbing ; he was climbing up to Para- 
 dise! 
 
 Of course, it would be a little disappointing to achieve 
 the end: to reach what should have been Paradise, and 
 find only the Evingtons' familiar terraces and trees, and 
 in their midst the spreading hospitable house where peo- 
 ple were scarcely beginning to think of getting up. If 
 he were concerned with climax, he might better have 
 gone around to the other side, where there was no climb 
 to speak of, and the view burst upon any one who simply 
 surmounted a few rocks. 
 
 It wasn't climax he was thinking of, though; it was 
 climb. Climb, climax ; climax, climb his brain revolved 
 the words, endeavoured to shape a pun from them, gave 
 up the attempt. He laughed anyhow; to-day he didn't 
 need an excuse for laughing. 
 
 As he neared the top Jim thought that he heard some 
 one on the other side of the wall of rock. He listened 
 a moment, and then decided that he was mistaken; he
 
 46 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 must himself have displaced a stone. With a last 
 careful planting of his feet, a last mighty heave 
 of his body, he reached the very top; his head came 
 above the highest rock, and he looked over. Instead of 
 gazing at a peaceful and familiar prospect, he looked 
 at close range into a woman's face, the brows drawn 
 and the cheeks flushed with exertion and surprise. 
 
 It was an easy thing to explain, when you thought 
 of it afterward. Any one climbing up on the land side 
 to get the best view would come to the same particular 
 spot to which Jim had chosen to climb on the water 
 side. If the two arrivals synchronised, the two climb- 
 ers would find themselves at their journeys' end with 
 their faces not a foot apart. But the effect of such an 
 apparition was startling to a man who had supposed 
 himself the only waking creature about the place; and 
 when Jim realised after his first shock who it was that 
 thus confronted him, only the habit of his muscles held 
 him where he was. 
 
 For a moment he hung there breathless, in no little 
 actual danger. She perceived his situation, and spoke. 
 "Come up the rest of the way," she said. "Unless, of 
 course, you intend suicide; in that case please jump off 
 at once, and don't keep me waiting." 
 
 She said it very coolly, but her slight un-English ac- 
 cent was more pronounced than usual; he could have 
 placed it to-day without assistance from Evington. His 
 mind slid to her accent; quite calmly he mounted and 
 stood erect on the rampart of rock. "Come up here 
 to see the prospect ?" he suggested, and extended a hand 
 to draw her up beside him. 
 
 If he wasn't going to fall, Miss Lenox saw no reason 
 for changing her intention of getting the view. She 
 laid a cool firm hand in his, and stood with him on the
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 47 
 
 rampart. Together they gazed at the magnificent pano- 
 ramic view which was the choicest thing Stuart Eving- 
 ton owned. They stood in silence, close together on the 
 little ledge. They gazed like confirmed Nature wor- 
 shippers. Perhaps, indeed, Zoe formed a picture to 
 carry with her when she left America; but for all that 
 Jim saw, pitch blackness might have begun ten feet from 
 where they stood. 
 
 Zoe turned from the prospect presently, and he got off 
 the rock and gave her a hand. She began to walk away, 
 and he fell into step beside her. His knees were shak- 
 ing a little; but it was with disappointment he noted 
 that she was starting directly for the house. 
 
 "Wouldn't you like to walk for a little while?" he 
 suggested. 
 
 "I've been walking," she replied. "Straight across 
 the meadows, for hours and hours." 
 
 Jim could think of no better answer than, "You must 
 have got up early." 
 
 "I sometimes do," said Zoe. 
 
 They walked slowly across the widest part of the 
 lawn. As she moved thus by his side Jim noted for 
 the first time how tall she was, very nearly as tall as he. 
 In her short white skirt and simple blouse, elbow-sleeved 
 and open at the neck, she showed how well-muscled she 
 was, how deep-chested, how sure and easy in her move- 
 ments. Her heavy fair hair, which she had worn the 
 evening before in a coil like a coronet a Grand-ducal 
 coronet was twisted now into a great knot that would 
 have overbalanced a smaller woman. She was dressed 
 with no thought of the public eye; she wasn't even, this 
 morning, deliberately ignoring it. But she walked in 
 beauty. Realising how her beauty followed her, how, 
 whether she liked it or not, it must largely condition her
 
 48 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 life, Jim felt a sudden whimsical sympathy with her. He 
 felt, too, a quick rebellion against Evington's diagnosis 
 of her character. If she were indifferent, it was not 
 from any inherent defect in her : it was because she was 
 bored. And beasts like Evington and Jim himself 
 were what bored her. Man-like, however, Jim intended 
 to continue to bore her. 
 
 Under the pergola Zoe paused. "I think I'll have my 
 breakfast out here," she said. "It's warm enough, and 
 I believe Mrs. Evington wouldn't object." 
 
 "No, she never objects," said Whittaker. "I may 
 breakfast with you, mayn't I? I'm sure we are the only 
 two who are up yet." 
 
 "Certainly you may, if you like," she said. Her 
 boredom didn't deepen visibly at the suggestion; she 
 wasn't bored for the effect's sake. 
 
 Jim went in search of a servant, and ordered break- 
 fast for two brought out to the pergola. When he re- 
 turned Zoe Lenox had seated herself, and was looking 
 at the view and yawning. "Will you ask somebody to 
 ask my maid to bring me a coat?" she suggested. 
 
 The coat appeared before the breakfast; Zoe's Malay 
 maid brought it. She was brown and wrinkled enough 
 for a witch in a fairy-tale; but she was dressed like 
 anybody else's maid, and in taking the coat from her 
 Zoe said, 'Thank you, Anna." 
 
 "Did you say 'Anna'?" Jim couldn't help asking. 
 
 "Yes. It isn't her name, but she has me call her that 
 before people," answered Zoe carelessly. 
 
 "A strong sense of social conformity somewhere," 
 thought Jim. "In which would it be less appropriate, a 
 brown pirate's daughter, or Dan Lenox's?" 
 
 When their breakfast was brought, Zoe gave it her 
 full attention. She was hungry, and she seemed also
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 49 
 
 to be drowsy. The morning breeze stirred the hair about 
 her temples, and she yawned. The same breeze brought 
 Jim the fullest sensation of life. To breakfast under 
 a pergola of a sunny May morning, with a goddess seated 
 on the other side of the table wasn't that an ambrosial 
 way to begin a day? 
 
 Her breakfast must have done the goddess good; at 
 its conclusion her yawns had disappeared. She looked 
 at Jim, curiously, a little daringly. "I am thinking," 
 she announced, setting down her cup for the last time, 
 "of something shocking." 
 
 "Do tell me," said Jim. 
 
 "I am thinking," she said, "that I should like to go for 
 a sail." 
 
 "And the Evingtons haven't a boat!" ejaculated Jim. 
 
 "No. But the people who own the next landing have," 
 remarked Zoe. 
 
 "Will that do us any good?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Why not ? It's early yet, and the boat is simply tied. 
 Tied to the pier, too; it oughtn't to be." 
 
 "You are thinking of borrowing it without disturb- 
 ing them?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Exactly. To ask them would be to reflect on our 
 host and hostess, don't you think?" 
 
 He thought that she was only talking; but suddenly 
 she stood up and asked, "Well, shall we go?" 
 
 And because she was a goddess, and it was a May 
 morning, he stood up, too. "Certainly we will," he 
 said. 
 
 They made for the boundary wall, casting back 
 glances at the house to see if any one was watching them. 
 They scaled the wall, and followed it down to the water's 
 edge. No one hailed them, or tried to discover their
 
 50 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 business; they seemed to move in the midst of a sleep- 
 ing world. 
 
 The sail-boat lay just where Zoe had said it was: her 
 early morning explorations had been to some purpose. 
 As she put out quick hands to untie the rope that held 
 it, Jim remarked, "You will find me an awful duffer 
 in a boat. Lubber, I believe, is the technical term." 
 
 He said it, not diffidently, but as a simple matter of 
 fact : Jim's way of dealing with his own deficiencies was 
 one of the best things about him. For a moment Zoe 
 looked at him curiously; then she said indifferently, 
 "Oh, I can sail enough for two." 
 
 When they were actually in the boat, however, she 
 let him hold the sheet. "This isn't a particularly good 
 boat," she remarked as she steered away from shore. 
 "I suppose we ought to be grateful for it, though." 
 
 To Jim it seemed that it was a particularly good boat : 
 quite a wonderful, a celestial boat. It flew over the 
 water; and the water sparkled, and the wind blew all 
 the earthiness out of a man's being. He need never 
 touch the earth again; he was purified, exalted. His 
 spirit found wings. 
 
 But he felt at last a need to say something; and he 
 gave vent to the not particularly original remark, "Sail- 
 ing is like flying, isn't it ?" 
 
 Zoe kept her eyes straight ahead; but she returned 
 promptly, "Haven't you ever flown?" 
 
 "Yes, I have. Twice, come to think of it," he re- 
 plied. "Have you?" 
 
 "Several times. Always, I think, in Paris," she an- 
 swered. 
 
 "It was in Paris that I flew," said Jim. "With one 
 of those fine French aviators aren't they wonders? 
 Isn't it odd that we should both have flown in Paris?
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 51 
 
 Do you suppose we were ever there at the same time?" 
 
 "Very likely," she responded. "Where else would 
 you go if you wanted to fly?" 
 
 Jim felt that a passion for coincidence was one of 
 the things which would bore her. He went back to his 
 true subject. "Weren't you just a little bit disappointed 
 in the experience ?" he asked. 
 
 "Not at all," she said flatly. She was good enough 
 to add in explanation, "But then, I hadn't expected too 
 much of it, as I think people are likely to. I hadn't 
 expected much : the air isn't my native element." 
 
 "The water is?" 
 
 "I feel that it is," she said, with her first glance to- 
 ward him. 
 
 "I can believe that," he assured her. 
 
 She changed the boat's course, and went on, "In a 
 sailing vessel, you know, you're almost a part of the 
 surrounding elements, no matter how large your boat." 
 
 "Especially when the elements are boisterous?" sug- 
 gested Jim. 
 
 "No; when they're boisterous the ship seems a bul- 
 wark against them. But that's just my own feeling; 
 perhaps many people wouldn't agree with it at all." 
 
 "I suppose you have been in all sorts of squalls ?" 
 
 "In all sorts," she agreed. 
 
 "What difference do you suppose you will notice when 
 you cruise in your new yacht?" he wanted to know. 
 
 "I expect to have more comfort, and less fun," she 
 answered. 
 
 "A fair exchange?" 
 
 "I don't know. Probably, for I think I'm getting 
 soft." 
 
 She didn't look soft, though: she looked alert and 
 strong, capable and quiet. Whittaker thought that never,
 
 52 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 under any possible conditions, could she show to 
 greater advantage than here. Little waves slapped the 
 boat; the wind flapped the sail, and flapped Zoe's tie, 
 and blew her hair into glorious confusion. She had 
 hair like a Viking's daughter; she sailed like a Viking 
 himself. And yet she condescended to go a-sailing of 
 a summer morning in a borrowed boat with Jim Whit- 
 taker, who was a typical duffer no, lubber. And they 
 were getting on very nicely indeed, if anybody should 
 ask. 
 
 Back and forth she took the little boat, dipping dar- 
 ingly on the turns. After an especially daring turn she 
 spoke to Jim. "I should like," she said, "to tip the boat 
 over, and duck us both. That is, if it weren't a bor- 
 rowed boat. But it mightn't be considered proper any- 
 how, of a Sunday morning." 
 
 "It might be conspicuous," Jim agreed. 
 
 "Do you usually go to church of a Sunday morning?" 
 she wanted to know. 
 
 "I do not. I usually play golf or tennis," he answered. 
 "Tennis when the weather is nice, and golf when it 
 isn't." 
 
 "I don't go either," she said. "But I like to have the 
 other people in the house go. It makes it so quiet for 
 me, if I want to take a nap." 
 
 "No one will disturb you here, whatever you want to 
 do. Mrs. Evington is a verv unobtrusive hostess," said 
 Jim. 
 
 "Ah, she's charming ! She knows so well what she 
 wants, doesn't she?" 
 
 "I don't know. Perhaps she has only a strong in- 
 stinct for her niche in life," said Jim. 
 
 "At any rate, her wisdom doesn't seem to have fur- 
 rowed her brow," remarked Miss Lenox. "She looks
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 53 
 
 so young. With all those children, she seems scarcely 
 older now than the first time I ever saw her, which was 
 on her honeymoon." 
 
 "I met her at her own wedding," said Jim. 
 
 Again a silence fell. Jim scarcely knew whether he 
 preferred her speech or her silence. He liked her voice, 
 and he was fascinated by her accent, with its faint de- 
 licious Irishry, which time and opportunity could culti- 
 vate but never conquer. Yet it was wonderful to sit 
 beside her in silence : there was intimacy in such silence, 
 out here among the elements. And in the silence things 
 were adumbrated in a man's mind, rare things, which 
 he might be sillily afraid to think too much about. To 
 sail so, everlastingly, over a sapphire sea, with the sum- 
 mer wind now on breast, now on back, to feel always 
 beside him beauty and strangeness, giving significance 
 to the very elements themselves ah, that would be 
 more than life! That would be Paradise, such a Para- 
 dise as lies not even on the tops of the unsealed moun- 
 tains. 
 
 For an hour longer he glimpsed this Paradise. Then 
 Zoe headed the boat for its own pier, and tied it just as 
 she had found it. "Now let any one connect us with 
 trespass," she said as she and Jim crossed the boundary 
 wall on their way home. 
 
 ''That was awfully jolly," he murmured as they en- 
 tered the house. 
 
 "Awfully," she agreed. "I could make a sailor of 
 you, I believe." 
 
 Their eyes met; and Jim could not have helped it if 
 she read significance in his. Probably she would not 
 have minded ; he was not the first man who had looked 
 at her so. But coming in from the fresh air completed 
 just then what early rising and a hearty breakfast had
 
 54 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 begun: she yawned uncontrollably. "Oh, I beg youi- 
 pardon! It's time, I see, for my nap," she said, and 
 vanished up the stairs. 
 
 Jim went to his room, too; but it was only to dress 
 more carefully In spite of his short night, he had never 
 felt less like sleep. He redescended, and roamed over 
 the house. How could people lie a-bed on such a 
 morning? 
 
 Finally the other members of the party came straying 
 down in various states of alertness, and sought break- 
 fast or diversion. Evington, June and the Camps break- 
 fasted together, or at least overlapped; Jessica, who 
 never appeared in public until she was fortified for it, 
 came down later alone ; and last of all came Drummond, 
 who was always cross of a morning, though in company 
 he was at some pains to conceal it. 
 
 Jim strolled up to Jessica, to claim his game of tennis. 
 Jessica, however, was in a petulant mood. She had oc- 
 cupied a room looking toward the side lawn, where 
 couples approaching from the boundary wall were read- 
 ily visible; and she had seen what she had seen. She 
 dragged Evington, who disliked violent exercise, and 
 the Camps, who would rather have gone to church, out 
 to the tennis court for doubles. Drummond retired to 
 the library, and buried himself in Sunday papers. Jim 
 stalked alone through empty rooms, seeking some out- 
 let for his energy. 
 
 At the climax of his impatience he came upon June 
 Evington, as fresh and smiling as the morning itself. 
 "Aren't you playing tennis?" she asked. "Shouldn't 
 you like to play?" 
 
 "They've made up the set without me," said Jim. 
 
 "I'll go to the other court with you, if you like," she 
 said. "I prefer singles to doubles myself; don't you?"
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 55 
 
 "Should you really like to play?" asked Jim. 
 
 Of course she would like to: that was June. Jim 
 suddenly felt appeased, and almost merry. He enjoyed 
 his game with her, even if June's tennis wasn't as good 
 as her intentions. 
 
 They came in just at lunch-time, as did the four from 
 the other court. Drummond reappeared from the li- 
 brary, and there were seven of them at the table. "Isn't 
 Miss Lenox coming down?" asked Edith Camp. 
 
 "Evidently not. Her maid says she is asleep," re- 
 plied June placidly. 
 
 "The siesta is a good habit," remarked Drummond. 
 "It kills so much time." 
 
 "Why not adopt the good habit, Sam?" asked Jessica 
 Drummond. "Sleep the twenty-four hours round, and 
 really enjoy yourself." Incongruously her eyes met 
 Jim's at that moment with a beseeching look ; she seemed 
 to be begging his pardon for something ignoring him 
 when she made up her set for tennis, probably. 
 
 The talk turned on plans for the afternoon. Jim had 
 no mind to kick his heels in the hall for the rest of the 
 day, waiting for Zoe Lenox to appear. She mightn't 
 appear anyway. He meditated going off, somewhere, 
 anywhere, by himself; he meditated staying with the 
 rest of the party, and, say, flirting with Jessica Drum- 
 mond. He and Jessica never had flirted, but he knew 
 she wasn't the woman to ignore a challenge. In the 
 end he did neither. A motor party was made up, and 
 at his own request he was left out of it. Jessica looked 
 hard at him for a moment, and then pointedly looked 
 away. 
 
 June stopped a moment beside him as they were leav- 
 ing. "I suppose Miss Lenox will be down soon," she 
 said. "Amuse each other, won't you, when she does ap-
 
 56 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 pear? It makes it stupid for you, I know, having the 
 rest all old married people. Have you seen the new 
 books that Stuart got yesterday?" 
 
 With an armful of Stuart's new books, Jim estab- 
 lished himself in the deserted hall. That hall of the 
 Evingtons' was no mere passage-way: it was rather 
 the heart of the house. Cool and dim in summer, cheer- 
 ful with a crackling fire in winter, it was always a fa- 
 vourite place for tea and talk and lounging. Incidental- 
 ly, it commanded the house. 
 
 Whittaker stretched himself on a couch, and opened 
 one of Stuart's new books. For a few minutes he was 
 uneasy, casting frequent glances at the stairs, of which 
 he had an uninterrupted view. Then he became inter- 
 ested in his book ; finally, at the end of an hour, he was 
 desperately sleepy. He fought off his lethargy; he 
 wouldn't for the world have a descending goddess find 
 him sprawling in slumber. But the dimness, the silence, 
 and last night's short sleep were all against him. His 
 book drooped, and then dropped from his hand; he un- 
 disguisedly slept. 
 
 He woke with the feeling that he had been asleep a 
 long time: he was chilly and a little bit stiff. Every- 
 thing in the house was quiet: if a goddess had passed 
 that way, she had left no trace. Jim covered himself 
 then with a rug, and settled his limbs in resignation. If 
 sleeping were the order of the day, he would at least 
 sleep in comfort. 
 
 He didn't sleep again, however; he lay with half- 
 closed eyes and watched the hall darken. He wondered 
 what had become of Zoe Lenox, and whether the motor 
 party would come home for tea, or stop somewhere else. 
 He thought of his morning's glorious sail, and what 
 might happen that evening; and he speculated as to the
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 57 
 
 outcome of a business appointment he had for the next 
 day. 
 
 Then somebody crossed the field of his vision, pass- 
 ing slowly through the hall and mounting the stairs. It 
 was Zoe's Malay maid, whom she called Anna. Whom 
 she called Anna ; that seemed funny to him now, and he 
 grinned. Just at that moment the maid halted half- 
 way up the stairs, turned, and looked down upon him. 
 In the gathering dusk he couldn't see her expression; 
 perhaps he could not make it out if he had seen it. 
 But that glance somehow affected him as sinister. It 
 woke him very thoroughly; and when the maid had dis- 
 appeared up the stairs, he rose and turned on the lights. 
 
 He sat down to one of Stuart's books, and tried to re- 
 vive his interest in it; he was becoming conscious of a 
 dull sense of injury. And then suddenly Zoe herself 
 appeared at the top of the stairs, and began to descend. 
 
 She came slowly, the fingers of one hand skimming 
 the banister; she might have been in some solemn pro- 
 cession, descending some staircase of state. Again this 
 evening she was dressed in white, a white robe that fell 
 straight from bosom to hem ; it had wide chiffon sleeves, 
 shaped like an angel's wings, and a dull gold girdle. 
 That was all. No sheen of fabric, no jewels, her hair 
 in that simple massive coil; yet she advanced like an 
 army with banners. This was more than beauty; this 
 was the true imperial front. 
 
 Jim was at the foot of the stairs as soon as she was. 
 "Where is everybody?" she asked. 
 
 "They have all gone motoring. They ought to be 
 back very soon," Jim answered. "Would you like your 
 tea now?" 
 
 "No, thank you. It's late for tea. Don't you know 
 what time it is?" she asked.
 
 58 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "I've been asleep," Jim explained. 
 
 "So have I. And I've been reading." She passed 
 him, and moved toward the library. 
 
 Jim started after her; but he heard outside the ap- 
 proach of the motoring party. Reflecting that if it were 
 as near dinner time as Zoe had said, the first man dressed 
 would be first in the field, Jim turned and sped up- 
 stairs. He hurried through his preparations for din- 
 ner; but he felt that he ought not to scamp them too 
 much. When one appeared before a goddess, it must 
 be with candid soul and body. 
 
 The candid soul and body, however, may find a less 
 candid in possession. When Jim found Miss Lenox 
 again, Drummond, incredibly sleek in his evening clothes, 
 fat and waggish and altogether loathsome, was holding 
 forth to her; and she, who had snubbed him so flatly 
 the evening before, was looking rather more amused 
 than displeased. 
 
 Drummond certainly enjoyed that evening, and it is 
 possible that Miss Lenox did. Drummond and Camp 
 both sat with her after dinner, and she kept them both 
 in play. Stuart had a headache, and was very quiet; 
 the entertainment of three women fell upon Jim. He 
 got them to playing bridge finally; he himself took up 
 his position at the table with his back to Miss Lenox. 
 
 It was not, Jim reflected as he undressed, quite the 
 sort of evening he had looked forward to. Even his 
 usual late talk was knocked in the head by Stuart's 
 indisposition. Well, the gods decide; and perhaps they 
 were now benevolently busy in keeping Jim Whittaker 
 from making a fool of himself. 
 
 He fell asleep wondering what was the matter lately 
 with Jessica Drummond. She hadn't said a spiteful 
 thing all the evening; and her high spirits had vanished
 
 A SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY 59 
 
 with her malice. Perhaps Sam had at last gone too 
 far; though if Evington could be trusted, there wasn't 
 any enormity on Sam's part that Jessica hadn't already 
 put up with. Well, perhaps the high-spirited one was 
 simply wearing down as she grew older. It didn't seem 
 likely; but this was a topsy-turvy world.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 PLANS 
 
 JIM WHITTAKER went back to town Monday 
 morning, just as he had planned. He left on an 
 early train, when the rest of the house-party was still 
 a-bed. June alone breakfasted with him; she pleaded 
 that he prolong his stay. "At least until to-night," she 
 urged. "You haven't had a gay time at all, but per- 
 haps to-day might be better. What is Monday in town, 
 anyhow? And it's almost summer, and lovely weather. 
 Do stay, Jim." 
 
 Ordinarily he would have stayed; this time he ad- 
 hered to- his decision, and left. This was emphatically 
 a case where a little discretion might be the saving of 
 a man. He wasn't enamoured of the lovely Zoe yet; 
 but the signs were clear that with opportunity he might 
 be. And he didn't care to be. Perhaps, if he were given 
 the opportunity and the desire, he might for a time re- 
 lieve her consuming ennui; but he wasn't keen for the 
 task, with no better reward in view than that of a more 
 or less extended dangling at her regal skirts. He 
 couldn't hope, to marry her if he could, wouldn't the 
 emotion be* rather dread than hope? And he wasn't 
 thrilled at the prospect of joining the probably already 
 large crowd of worshippers at her austere shrine. 
 
 Women, he thought as he settled back in his seat, 
 were queer things anyway. Some of them were born 
 destroyers, like Jessica Drummond; Jim seemed to feel 
 that even if a worthy man had early put his trust in 
 
 60
 
 WELL-LAID PLANS 61 
 
 Jessica, Jessica would only have flouted his worthiness. 
 And there was Zoe Lenox ; and there was June. June as 
 she had sat at the breakfast table that morning came 
 before his mental eye more clearly than when he had sat 
 near her: little, pink and white, pretty, contented June; 
 she was one of the upbuilders. Did Stuart, when he 
 wasn't for argument's sake insisting that there were 
 plenty of Junes in this world, realise how lucky he was 
 to have June, and the babies, and a house on a bluff, to 
 come home to every night? 
 
 If Jim himself ever got a house, it should be in a high 
 place. A house upon a hill, so that in approaching it 
 he would go up and up and up. A white house with 
 spreading wings, candid crown to a gracious slope. If 
 it were 'within motoring distance of town, the practical 
 thought came, he could motor up every evening. The 
 picture grew in distinctness when he saw himself mo- 
 toring up; he could see just how he would get out of 
 the motor, and run up the steps to the wide white-pil- 
 lared veranda. And if he were a householder, of course 
 there would be somebody waiting for him in the veranda. 
 He saw her suddenly just as she would stand waiting, 
 one hand resting against a pillar, her hair flaming in 
 the late sunlight. A moment the picture stayed, and 
 then Jim realised who it was that he had thus placed 
 at the head of his imaginary household : the acquaintance 
 of a day, a lady who had a dozen houses of her own at 
 command. He flushed like a boy at his own folly. 
 
 That morning he went on no imaginative excursion; 
 he drove from the train straight to his office. He found 
 himself glad to get there. He liked his office, anyway; 
 and his being there at all was proof that he sometimes 
 thought for himself. Jim was the youngest of four 
 brothers, every one of whom had studied law; indeed,
 
 62 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 every male Whittaker since the dim dawn of history 
 had studied law. But Jim, who had happened into the 
 world after his parents were rather tired of having chil- 
 dren, and who had grown up pretty much alone, was not 
 a typical Whittaker. Not only did he snub the law : 
 he devoted himself to the liberal arts, even to the ex- 
 tent of a year or two of graduate work. Emerging 
 therefrom without any delusion that Nature had in- 
 tended him for either an artist or a savant, Jim had 
 embarked with his share of his father's estate on a busi- 
 ness career. He and a man slightly older than him- 
 self formed a partnership, and sold bonds. He made 
 money; and although that did not alter the family opin- 
 ion that he was an odd fish, it certainly raised him in 
 the family esteem. All his sisters-in-law stood ready to 
 find him a wife. Jim, however, blandly resisted their 
 efforts; he preferred a flat to himself, and meals all over 
 town, as the fancy struck him. 
 
 When he reached his flat on this particular evening, 
 it looked very attractive after his two days' absence. He 
 was glad to find that it did strike him so; that proved 
 that his dream of a house on a hill was a dream only, 
 not a waking aspiration. But, to be sure, it was a very 
 nice flat. He kept it nicely, too; there was a pipe on 
 every article of furniture, indeed, but with that excep- 
 tion it was flawlessly neat. Jim was your true bachelor, 
 not a married man whose wife has gone for a vacation. 
 The living-room boasted a fine fire-place, where a fire 
 was now laid; in front of it was a low couch, with a 
 small revolving book-case at hand. There were plenty 
 of books: the walls were almost lined with cases, and 
 above them with pictures. The effect was a bit crowded, 
 but to Jim's eye full of suggestion. Athletic trophies 
 had been relegated to the bed-room, where they kept
 
 WELL-LAID PLANS 63 
 
 company with family portraits, that is, the photographs 
 of his father and mother, both dead now, after lives in 
 which they had neither manifested nor cared to mani- 
 fest the slightest "queerness." 
 
 Jim lighted his fire, and stretched himself on the 
 couch before it; he had dined on his way uptown. He 
 turned on his reading-lamp, got his pipe a-going, and 
 stretched out his hand toward the revolving book-case : 
 he had the evening before him. 
 
 In the act of taking down a book he was halted by 
 a vision; the white house upon a hill came Before his 
 eyes so vividly as to be almost an hallucination. It lasted 
 only a moment, but it left a deep disgust in its wake. 
 Here he was, with the materials for happiness all at 
 hand ; and it had always been his secret boast that, given 
 the materials for happiness, he had wisdom enough to 
 use them to be happy. Yet he was disturbing himself 
 about nothing, acting as if his mission in life were to 
 cry for the moon. 
 
 Well, he was tired to-night. Being tired, he was hard 
 to please; he realised that as he ran down the books 
 under his hand, and failed to find anything that pleased 
 him. These were all new books : a biography, some con- 
 temporary criticism, two printed plays, and several 
 novels. One who could not be interested by some of 
 them was hard to please; yet Jim was not interested 
 enough to take down one of them. 
 
 In these dilemmas, however, there is always some 
 way out for the man who has arranged his life well. 
 Jim gave the book-case a little shove; revolving, it ex- 
 posed to view a side loaded with old favourites, some 
 of them very shabby. Jim selected one of the shabbiest. 
 It bore on its cover the name of Fenimore Cooper; 
 and because the stirring simple narrative had thrilled
 
 64 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 his youth, Jim felt that it would suffice to distract his 
 manhood. With the certainty of long practice, he 
 opened to page eighteen, where the actual story began, 
 and plunged into the opening paragraph. 
 
 At eleven o'clock Jim yawned, stretched, .and put 
 down the book. The charm had worked so well that 
 he forgot at first why he had had recourse to it. When 
 he remembered, he grinned. A woman had never yet 
 hurt him; yet here he had acted as if he were afraid 
 of Zoe Lenox. Idiot! Why hadn't he stayed in the 
 country to-day, and perhaps gone sailing with her again ? 
 She was wonderful to go sailing with: yesterday she 
 had given him a heavenly morning. He would in all 
 probability never see her again; he ought to have pro- 
 longed his fleeting association with her when he could 
 so well. Idiot, idiot! to throw away his chance of an- 
 other such divine quarter of an hour for the sake of a 
 safety that wasn't even menaced. 
 
 His vision of a house on a hill recurred at intervals 
 during the next few days. He finally got rid of it by ex- 
 panding the house into a marble palace surrounded with 
 formal gardens, such as Zoe Lenox should have for 
 background. Whereupon, in its manifest unfitness to 
 Jim Whittaker it was superbly beyond his means 
 the whole structure of his dream collapsed: Jim's pri- 
 vate House of Usher went splashing into the pool. 
 
 A week after his return from the Evingtons', his mail 
 one morning brought a communication addressed in an 
 unfamiliar hand. Jim, without premonition, slit the en- 
 velope; he was whistling in early morning cheerfulness 
 as he withdrew the folded sheet. He glanced over it, 
 and whistled with a different emphasis. 
 
 It was a letter from Zoe Lenox; more than that, it
 
 WELL-LAID PLANS 65 
 
 was an invitation. In her very clear hand, and very 
 briefly, she told him that the yacht Helga was perfectly 
 satisfactory, and that she planned to take her on her 
 first real cruise. "Down the coast of your charming 
 America, past Mexico, over the line and down the coast 
 of South America, if we all like it," she gave as her 
 route. Mr. and Mrs. Evington were coming with her. 
 Would Jim like to go, and have his maiden experience 
 of a cruise ? The Helga would sail in a week. She her- 
 self had gone into the Adirondacks for a last look at 
 them, and could be addressed * 
 
 "It isn't an invitation," said Jim to himself. "It's a 
 royal command." 
 
 He laid the letter down on his desk, and sat staring 
 at it. His face hardened a little as he stared. "I should 
 like to go cruising with you, Zoe Lenox," he said half 
 aloud. "I should like it very much indeed." 
 
 When his partner came in half an hour later he was 
 still sitting and staring. Jim turned at his step. 
 "Stephen," he said deliberately, "I think I'll take a va- 
 cation." 
 
 "Do you mean you want to go now?" asked the crisp 
 alert Stephen. 
 
 "In a week or so," said Jim. "Is there any reason 
 why I can't?" 
 
 "The business can spare you as well now as any time, 
 I suppose," answered Stephen. "I think you do need 
 a re"st; you're looking a little seedy. Have you any- 
 thing particular in view?" 
 
 "I think of going for a cruise on a silver ship," said 
 Jim gravely. 
 
 "With a crew of angels?" asked his partner. 
 
 "With a single nymph would appeal to me more," an- 
 swered Jim.
 
 66 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "With a chaperone?" pursued the other. 
 
 "With two chaperones," said Jim promptly. "When 
 I say nymph, Stephen, you are not to think it is a 
 euphemism for improper person." 
 
 Stephen was so used to Jim's nonsense that he could 
 swim along in the current. "Better wed the nymph, 
 and make it a honeymoon cruise," he suggested to round 
 off the subject. 
 
 He had no idea that there was any meaning behind 
 Jim's nonsense; but after he had left the office Jim sat 
 and soberly considered whether he should go on the 
 proposed cruise. There were many things to be said 
 in favour of going: he had no other plans for a vaca- 
 tion, and he would get a good rest and some novel ex- 
 perience. The reasons against going seemed to sum 
 themselves up in one: nymphs were dangerous to a 
 man's peace of mind. But that reason against was what 
 finally decided Jim for going. If a man were to pussy- 
 foot through the world, scenting danger around every 
 corner or in the presence of every pretty woman he 
 might as well give up at once trying to be a man, and 
 climb permanently into a bath-chair. 
 
 With his own hand, in characters big with decision, 
 Jim thanked Miss Lenox for her invitation, and ac- 
 cepted it. He addressed the envelope, and looked at 
 her name in his own writing. Then he turned and 
 looked out of the window: warmth suffused him from 
 head to foot. For a long time he sat so, with actuality 
 a thousand miles away from him. All he saw was 
 sun-glints on water ; all he heard was wind and the slap- 
 ping of waves against a boat. What he felt he couldn't 
 have said himself. But he faced about finally with a 
 conscious grin, and muttered, "I think I'm beginning 
 already." But his last saving remnant of discretion
 
 WELL-LAID PLANS 67 
 
 had gone; for he sent his stenographer at once to mail 
 his note, so that he wouldn't think better of the matter 
 and perhaps change his mind about going. 
 
 He had all that week the feeling of a man who is 
 taking delicious risks ; his inner being was at once braced 
 and warmed by the sensation. And because he knew 
 that he was actually taking no risk worth mentioning, 
 he had also the feeling that he was buying his delicious 
 sensations cheap. So he could at once enjoy himself 
 and laugh at himself: could know at once the ^elf-satis- 
 faction of a wise man and the headlong pleasure of a 
 fool. 
 
 The week was outwardly a full one. There were sev- 
 eral business matters to be settled before Jim could 
 leave with a clear conscience; and when he wasn't at- 
 tending to business, there were things to be bought. 
 Clothes, of course, and books, equally of course; this 
 would surely be a great opportunity to read those things 
 one had always intended to read, and had always de- 
 ferred for lack of leisure. Dinners took two evenings, 
 and a fraternity reunion another. He had intended to 
 run out to the Evingtons' for a night, to talk over the 
 proposed trip; but late afternoon of the last day found 
 him with that still undone, and his packing all to do. 
 So he telephoned Stuart instead. They would see each 
 other the next day, on board the Helga. 
 
 In his flat that evening Jim ignored his empty trunk, 
 and sat down to reread his second note from Zoe. She 
 was staying in the Adirondacks until the last moment, 
 she told him : Zoe, too, he would not see until they were 
 on board the Helga. He might make his own arrange- 
 ments for going aboard, she told him; then he could go 
 whenever he liked, even the day before, if he wished to. 
 She herself would probably not come on board until the
 
 68 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 last minute; the Evingtons were to board on the last 
 afternoon. She went on to give directions for reaching 
 the Helga: her letter would occupy a place of reference, 
 if not indeed of honour, in Jim's pocket until he was 
 actually aboard. 
 
 Jim was alone, and rather tired ; and the flat was very 
 quiet. Those facts together might account for the sink- 
 ing feeling he had as he sat there with Zoe's letter in his 
 hand. The woman took a great deal for granted; and 
 he was horrified to find how little he resented her taking 
 things for granted. He ought to have at least slightly 
 resented her tone of royal command; he needn't have 
 showed resentment, but he was dismayed not to feel it. 
 How long had he been a door-mat of a man? 
 
 He actually went so far as to rise and look at him- 
 self in the mirror of his dresser. He looked reassur- 
 ingly unlike a door-mat; and when he saw the familiar 
 reflected visage, good-tempered, controlled, sufficiently 
 assertive and unhesitatingly masculine, Jim began to 
 grin at himself. In view of the Jim Whittaker who 
 had stared back at him shaving so many mornings, pre- 
 luding well-ordered days, he wondered what on earth 
 he had been shivering about. Zoe Lenox wouldn't bite 
 him, certainly ; and why should he suppose that his spirit 
 was any more vulnerable than his physique ? 
 
 He stowed things away in his trunk, whistling to him- 
 self the while. Then he telephoned to his oldest brother ; 
 then, feeling hungry after his exertions, he went out and 
 had something to eat. When he came back he purposed 
 going to bed; instead he sat and smoked, and tried to 
 rid himself of his silly, ghastly feeling that he was on 
 the eve of some crisis. 
 
 Of course it must spring in some way from his nerves, 
 this idiotic feeling; but he couldn't altogether lose it.
 
 WELL-LAID PLANS 69 
 
 He felt yes, that was it as if there were thunder in 
 the air; and yet the evening was cool and lovely. "Per- 
 haps it's only the prospect of change, and of the un- 
 known, the sea and its life," he said to himself. "If a 
 break in my routine upsets me this way, though, it's 
 high time I had a change. Perhaps I'm really not very 
 fit." 
 
 With a determined materialism, he laid all his dis- 
 turbance to that: he wasn't feeling fik^'A month of 
 loafing and reading, and bridge with the Evihgtons" 
 he spoke as if bridge were always a three-handed 
 game "a month of that will put me right as right." 
 
 He went to bed late, and slept longer than he had in- 
 tended : he was to board the Helga at noon. Well, that 
 abridged leave-takings; and man-like Jim hated leave- 
 takings. However, he actually performed only one ; for 
 after breakfasting heartily, so that it wouldn't matter if 
 he missed lunch, he sent his luggage on ahead and 
 stopped at his office. 
 
 With the true American instinct for never admitting 
 that any occasion approaches the solemn, Jim shook 
 hands with his office force, and reserved his one speech 
 for his partner. It was neither a long speech nor an 
 impressive. "Take care of yourself, and try to behave," 
 he said. "I'll be back in a month, you know. Good- 
 bye." 
 
 The office door closed behind him; his taxicab bore 
 him away. Jim Whittaker was off on the longest and 
 most momentous month of his life.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 THE GANGING A-GI,EY 
 
 T TNCONSCIOUS of her destiny, the yacht Helga 
 ^ rode at her moorings. All about her things 
 gleamed ancl shone; she waited like a bride on her wed- 
 ding day. Jim Whittaker, approaching, was thrilled by 
 the sight. Lightly as a bubble the Helga rode the waves ; 
 but he imagined her electric with her impulse to be off. 
 
 A pale-faced deferential person came running up to 
 Jim as he boarded. The pale-faced person wore a white 
 coat, and was, Jim supposed, the steward; at least, he 
 didn't look like a maritime character, aside from his 
 coat. 
 
 "Miss Lenox hasn't come on board yet," said this per- 
 son. "We expect her at almost any moment, but she 
 sent word to make you comfortable if she was detained. 
 You are Mr. Whittaker, sir?" 
 
 Jim admitted it. 
 
 "Would you like to go to your state-room, sir ?" asked 
 the deferential one. 
 
 Jim followed him along an immaculate deck, on which 
 it seemed almost sacrilegious to tread, into the desig- 
 nated state-room. It was a beautiful little room, with 
 ivory-tinted furniture, and a neat space provided for 
 everything, from Jim's trunk down. A diminutive pri- 
 vate bath, perfect even to the shower, opened off it. 
 Over all presided the miraculous neatness of a new ship 
 
 70
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 71 
 
 in port. A month in such quarters as these wouldn't be 
 bad. , 
 
 The steward hovered near. "Have you lunched, sir?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "Yes," said Jim. "Bring me a cup of tea, though, if 
 you will." 
 
 He drank his tea, and ate some biscuits; then he 
 changed his clothes, and emerged on deck. Already he 
 wasn't afraid to walk the deck ; in a few minutes he had 
 come to take pleasure in doing so. He walked it for 
 some minutes, casting occasional proud glances at the 
 land ; already the land had become alien to him. Indeed, 
 it was almost beneath his notice as a seagoing person. 
 
 A young man in uniform stopped him presently, and 
 introduced himself. He was Mr. Masterson, the mate. 
 He took Jim up to the captain, and introduced him. 
 Then he asked if Jim would like to see the ship. 
 
 "Would it be good sea-going etiquette for me to prowl 
 about before the rest of the party comes aboard ?" asked 
 Jim, smiling. 
 
 Mr. Masterson looked gravely back at him. He was 
 a smooth-shaven, blue-eyed chap, about Jim's own 
 height; he would have been handsome if he had not 
 looked so sullen. His stare lasted so long that it made 
 Jim uncomfortable. When he finally opened his mouth 
 it was only to say, "At least you might see the saloons, 
 Mr. Whittaker. If Miss Lenox spends the whole after- 
 noon on shore, you'll get tired of the deck." 
 
 "That seems a happy compromise," said Jim. "I will 
 see the saloons, and no more." , 
 
 The saloons were in the after part of the ship, it ap- 
 peared. The forward and smaller would have been a 
 dining-room on shore. A white table was hung from 
 chains in the centre; the chairs were of white wood and
 
 72 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 cane. In cupboards about the walls could be glimpsed 
 blue and white dishes. A long receptacle in one corner 
 was filled with flowering plants, and above it hung a cage 
 of bright-coloured birds. Pushed into one corner was 
 a tea-wagon with a device for anchoring it in place, a 
 "brake," Jim called it: the maritime character of this 
 piece of furniture appealed strongly to him. 
 
 The after saloon kept to white furniture, too, but failed 
 to echo the blue of the dining-room. There were moss- 
 green rugs on the floor, and the cushions were green and 
 gold. A white and gold piano stood near the stern end 
 or should one say stood, when it was obviously fas- 
 tened there? Opposite, in front of a delightful fire- 
 place, was a high wooden settle ; nearby was a little writ- 
 ing-table, with stationery marked "Yacht Helga," just 
 as if a yacht were solid like a residence or a business 
 house, instead of a bubble ready to burst when one 
 drew a long breath. 
 
 Thus far Jim progressed under guidance of Mr. Mas- 
 terson ; but Mr. Masterson seemed of a sudden to weary 
 in showing the conveniences of a ship's saloon. "If you 
 really don't care to go over the rest of the ship, I'll leave 
 you here, Mr. Whittaker," he said. "There's plenty 
 here to read; and there are chairs on deck, if you prefer 
 that." 
 
 "Thank you," said Jim. "I'll look for something to 
 read." 
 
 When he was alone Jim did in fact turn his attention 
 to the books, both for their own sake and to see what 
 Zoe liked in the way of books. There were book-cases 
 of varying heights all the way around the room; strips 
 of wood at top and bottom served to hold the volumes 
 in place. Miss Lenox seemed to have a catholic taste.
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 73 
 
 to which neither subject nor language was barrier. "If 
 she actually reads all these " thought Jim. 
 
 Between windows and book-cases, there wasn't much 
 room left for pictures. There were, however, in a cor- 
 ner by themselves, several framed photographs of ships; 
 on the deck of one Zoe herself could be descried. And 
 there were three paintings : a grey-green landscape hazy 
 with mystic brush-work, a Winslow Homer seascape 
 with a characteristic lifting composition, and, over the 
 mantel-piece, a portrait of a grey-haired man. 
 
 Jim hadn't noticed that picture at first; but when at 
 length he did, he wondered how he could for a moment 
 have been blind to it. It dominated the room, and the 
 longer he looked at it the more it dominated. There 
 could be no doubt as to the subject; the placing of the 
 picture would have decided that, even if it hadn't borne 
 a certain resemblance to Zoe. It was Dan Lenox; and 
 it must have been a very good picture, for it fitted with 
 Lenox's story as Jim had had it from Evington. The 
 portrait showed a man advanced in years, but so vigorous 
 that to call him old would simply have been to show 
 oneself lacking in discernment; he had a long straight 
 nose, a powerful jaw, thick upstanding grey hair that in 
 itself would be a guarantee of virility and pugnacious- 
 ness, and, in the midst of all these signs of strength, 
 acuteness and purpose, deep-set blue eyes that seemed to 
 look on life with an infinite wistfulness. 
 
 Jim got a book, and established himself on the settle. 
 He looked up at the portrait of Dan Lenox more than 
 he read; but he read for some time. It drew toward 
 the middle of the afternoon; and still there was no sign 
 of Miss Lenox or the Evingtons. Jim was very com- 
 fortable; and he began to be very sleepy. He seemed 
 always to be sleepy when Zoe approached; or was it
 
 74 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 simply that her presence or too much thought of her 
 robbed him of his rightful rest? At any rate, he dozed 
 for a few minutes, returning once or twice to his book ; 
 and then he frankly slept. 
 
 Just as he dozed off the last time it seemed to him 
 that he saw Zoe flash past the window, accompanied by 
 her maid; and he thought vaguely that the Evingtons 
 must be there, too, and that he ought to get up and go 
 out to them. But he was already too far gone; his ef- 
 fort to rouse himself only slid him deeper into all-en- 
 veloping sleep. 
 
 He woke with a feeling that he had slept for a long 
 time. As his eyes opened he was aware of Zoe Lenox's 
 maid, standing and peering down at him through a dusk 
 much her own colour. He knew then where he was: in 
 the Evingtons' hall, waiting for Zoe to come down- 
 stairs. 
 
 A moment later he was alone; and he became aware 
 that the whole hall was vibrating like a ship under way. 
 Then suddenly Jim jumped to his feet. He wasn't at the 
 Evingtons' at all; he was on Zoe Lenox's yacht, with 
 the Evingtons aboard; and he had slept oaf-like so long 
 that the yacht had left her anchorage, and the cruise had 
 actually begun. 
 
 He started for the cabin door; and just before he 
 reached it the light above his head was turned on; Zoe 
 herself stood on the threshold. For a moment they con- 
 fronted each other thus, much as they had over the rocky 
 palisade at the Evingtons'; and to Jim's not yet thor- 
 oughly awakened senses it seemed as if something of the 
 same startled expression crossed her face. 
 
 "You didn't know where I was?" he asked. "Mr. 
 Masterson left me here; and while I was waiting I went 
 most idiotically to sleep."
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 75 
 
 "Mr. Masterson knew you were on board ?" she asked. 
 
 "Yes. He and the captain, and your steward. Did 
 you think I was lost?" 
 
 "The steward is an idiot," remarked Zoe, "and the 
 captain I haven't seen. I don't know what to think of 
 Mr. Masterson." 
 
 Her unintentional neglect of him /deemed to disturb 
 her. "Don't think anything more about it," he advised 
 kindly. "I had my nap out, and feel the better for it." 
 
 Then to his awakening brain it occurred that it was 
 odd of her to order the cruise started if she didn't know 
 where he was, and wasn't apparently even sure that he 
 had boarded. "We are under way, aren't we?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "We have been for some hours," said Miss Lenox, 
 still as if she were uneasy about something. 
 
 "Where are June and Stuart?" asked Jim. 
 
 "At home, of course," replied Miss Lenox. 
 
 Jim stared in amazement. "At home ? But they were 
 to be here! How? Why ?" 
 
 "Didn't you get my telegram ?" she asked. 
 
 "I haven't had any telegram. Do you mean to tell 
 me ?" 
 
 "Mr. Evington telegraphed this morning. One of the 
 children was taken sick suddenly, and Mrs. Evington 
 wouldn't leave her. Of course he wouldn't come with- 
 out his wife, so they telegraphed that I wasn't to expect 
 them. I telegraphed their message on to you." 
 
 "And it never came," concluded Jim. 
 
 He was silent, striving to appreciate the enormity of 
 the situation that had thus come about, wondering what 
 the easiest way out would be. The yacht under way, and 
 he and Zoe its only passengers ! As he grew uneasy, 
 however, Zoe's perplexity seemed to vanish. "I hope
 
 76 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 that Mr. Masterson's neglect to tell me you were here 
 didn't mean he isn't over his shore drunk," she remarked 
 in passing. "He has always been perfectly sober on 
 ship-board, but his reputation for shore behaviour isn't 
 the best." 
 
 "You know him of old ?" Jim asked. 
 
 "Oh, yes ! He has been with me for some time ; and 
 the captain was in Dad's employ before he was in mine. 
 Nine years, he has been with us." She glanced at the 
 watch on her wrist. "I am hungry; I'm glad to see it's 
 nearly dinner time," she remarked. "And I'm glad you 
 are here, Mr. Whittaker; now I shall have some one to 
 talk to during dinner." 
 
 "Just where are we, geographically speaking?" asked 
 Jim. 
 
 "Somewhere off the coast of New Jersey, I think. My 
 notions of American geography aren't as clear as they 
 might be, all things considered." 
 
 Jim was hungry, fearfully hungry, in fact. He didn't 
 know what he ought to do about his position on board 
 the Helga: get himself put back on land as quickly as 
 possible, he supposed. But it wouldn't be sensible to 
 land fasting; and now that she had mentioned dinner 
 he found that his ravenous hunger was for the moment 
 more distressing than his anomalous position. "What 
 costume is de rigueur for dinner on board your yacht?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "In port I often dress for dinner. On a cruise I 
 don't; to-night I shall keep on what I am wearing." 
 
 At that he looked to see what she was wearing, and 
 discovered that it was a white cloth suit, very plain and 
 very jaunty; a little white hat was pulled down so far 
 on her head that it almost concealed her hair. Jim was 
 conscious of acute regret that he wasn't going to make
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 77 
 
 this cruise with her : he had a feeling that to cruise with 
 her was to see a Zoe such as he had sailed with that 
 magic morning in the stolen boat, not a Zoe on dress 
 parade; he was sure that between the two was a liberal 
 difference, worth a man's while to investigate. 
 
 "I'll go and brush up a bit," he saidl , 
 
 When he returned a few minutes later, Zoe was wait- 
 ing for him. She had broken her word to the extent 
 of removing her hat and coat; for the latter she had 
 substituted a long white coat with a fur collar, unbut- 
 toned over a lace blouse. Bare-headed, she sat down 
 opposite him at a little table lighted with pink candles, 
 arranged in a sheltered spot on deck. 
 
 If it had not been for his uncomfortable sensation of 
 not knowing just where he was nor on what footing he 
 stood, Jim would thoroughly have enjoyed that dinner. 
 Zoe did enjoy it. She was back upon her native ele- 
 ment, with the prospect of months of it ahead; more- 
 over, she was dining for the first time on the yacht 
 Helga, now regularly beginning an ocean cruise. 
 
 After the first course or two of the excellent dinner 
 she talked at some length, first of books, and then of 
 pictures. She described the collection that her father 
 had left to the South Kensington Museum, and some 
 pictures that she herself had bought. "I got two lovely 
 Vandykes a year ago," she related. "But I think I care 
 more for the moderns, and prefer landscape and sea- 
 scape to pictures of people. My father would be horri- 
 fied to hear me say that; he knew too much about pic- 
 tures to judge them by their subjects." 
 
 "Your father was a wonderful connoisseur, wasn't 
 he?" asked Jim. 
 
 "I suppose so. I don't like, though, to hear him de-
 
 78 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 scribed by such a finicking word. I have," said Miss 
 Lenox, "known too many connoisseurs." 
 
 "You can't carry many paintings on board a ship, can 
 you?" suggested Jim. 
 
 "No. I miss them, to a certain extent," she answered. 
 
 "Of course, you have always the sea," said Jim. 
 
 "Yes, and I care more for the sea than for pictures. 
 But you don't think, do you, that I consider the sea 
 picturesque ?" 
 
 "Personally, I consider it rather monotonous," Whit- 
 taker admitted. 
 
 "So it is. When you find any one who says it's pic- 
 turesque, or whose admiration for it isn't more than 
 half habit, and a solid quarter terror, you'll find, Mr. 
 Whittaker, some one who has admired the sea from the 
 land only." 
 
 "You feel terror of it?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Not patently, perhaps; but underneath, it is always 
 
 there. Now of men who have painted the sea, " she 
 
 went on. 
 
 After dinner they took a turn about the deck, and 
 stood for a time looking out over the ocean. It was a 
 fine night, with stars but no moon ; an antic wind stirred 
 Zoe's hair, and blew loose locks of it in her face. They 
 stood together, motionless and in silence; it seemed to 
 Jim as if the Helga were a sentient thing, bearing them 
 along thus; but as if neither he nor Zoe had strength 
 or volition. 
 
 She finally moved, however, and he followed her into 
 the saloon. She sat down near the fireplace, where 
 a small blaze glowed, and warmed one foot; presently 
 she yawned slightly. It was for all the world as if she 
 had forgotten him; and although normally it might be 
 altogether possible for her to forget Jim Whittaker, her
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 79 
 
 doing so at the present moment struck him as actually 
 uncanny. 
 
 When he had waited some time for her to break 
 the silence, and she did not, Jim himself spoke, "What," 
 he asked, "are you going to do with me?" 
 
 "Do with you?" She turned toward him, tyiitted her 
 brows, seemed trying to collect her wits. 
 
 "Do with me. In view of the fact that the party has 
 been broken up, and I am here only by an idiotic fluke, 
 I'd like to know," Jim stated clearly, "what you propose 
 to do with me." 
 
 "Well, I should hardly care to make you walk the 
 plank, or anything like that, just to be rid of you. What 
 would you yourself like to have me do?" she asked. 
 
 Jim had supposed that she would offer either to have 
 the Helga take him back to New York, or the launch 
 land him at the nearest point on the coast. As it didn't 
 seem to occur to her that one or the other was the only 
 thing to do, Jim hesitated to propose either. It wouldn't 
 do to ask to be treated as if one had small-pox. 
 
 "You can land me somewhere," he suggested. "Any- 
 where that you find it convenient to land me." 
 
 She nodded. "You intend to be away from home for 
 some time, don't you? Perhaps I can take you some- 
 where where you would like to spend your vacation," she 
 said. 
 
 After all, she treated it very sensibly; she braced Jim 
 to treat the matter sensibly too. "That would be fine," 
 he said heartily. 
 
 "Very well. That is what we will do. Where," asked 
 Miss Lenox, "would you like to go?" 
 
 "We are headed south?" asked Jim. 
 
 She nodded. "To Florida?" she suggested.
 
 80 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "This is the wrong time of year to go to Florida. 
 People are all leaving there now," he said. 
 
 "Yes, that's true. If you are going south in search 
 of a cool place, South America will be the nearest," she 
 said. 
 
 Did she suggest South America in derision? Jim 
 looked hard at her; but there was no hint of derision in 
 her look or tone. "I have never been in South America," 
 he said slowly. 
 
 "Then go. You will find it a very interesting coun- 
 try," said Miss Lenox heartily. "We can put in at 
 several places, you know ; and you may choose your own 
 climate." 
 
 It seemed to Jim that she spoke to him quite simply, 
 and as a man might to another man. He ha'd one last 
 moment's hesitation over that; he was old enough to 
 know that there is danger in a woman who can speak to 
 a man as another man might. 
 
 Then in a flash he perceived that Zoe indeed spoke sim- 
 ply to him ; but it was by virtue of her limitations. To her 
 who had lived so long among men, who had been actually 
 cradled by men in that wild East, to her who was the 
 daughter of such a man as Dan Lenox, what did the 
 presence aboard the Helga of a Jim Whittaker more or 
 less signify? And what chance was there of Jim Whit- 
 taker's ever disturbing her peace of mind, who was also 
 the daughter of the pale Helga, and whose icy heart 
 Grand Dukes, and perhaps principalities and powers un- 
 guessed, had never been able to melt? 
 
 If she had been a human woman, she would never 
 have talked so to him. If she had been even human 
 enough to consider questions of propriety no, he was 
 glad she wasn't just human enough for that. If she 
 couldn't be altogether human, and a woman, Jim was
 
 THE GANGING A-GLEY 81 
 
 glad that she was altogether remote, and hedged by nega- 
 tions, and a goddess. And her remoteness guaranteed 
 not only her own peace of mind but his as well. 
 
 Whittaker drew a long breath. "It is most kind of 
 you to offer," he said. "I shall let you put me ashore 
 somewhere in South America." 
 
 "Good! I know you will enjoy South America," re- 
 plied Miss Lenox. "The voyage will be pleasanter for 
 you in some ways than if you were in a steamer. You 
 won't be in my way," she assured him kindly, "and 
 when you are bored with my society you can talk to the 
 officers or the men. You will find the captain very 
 pleasant, I think, in an old-saltish way. The mate, if 
 not communicative, is at least receptive; the mate is 
 English." 
 
 "Is he all right to-night?" asked Jim, alluding to an 
 earlier remark of hers about Mr. Masterson. 
 
 "Um m m. He will be in the morning," said Miss 
 Lenox calmly. 
 
 Having put everything straight, she took her well- 
 earned recreation at the piano. She played for a long 
 time that evening; and Jim sat near the piano in a low 
 chair, and listened. Sometimes he watched her hands 
 move over the keys ; sometimes he looked at her profile, 
 crowned by golden hair that was always brightest under 
 artificial light some blonde hair 'was like that. Once 
 or twice he looked up at the big picture of Zoe's father, 
 there in the other end of the saloon; and idly he remem- 
 bered how dead Dan Lenox had voyaged with his 
 shadowy Helga in the dim past when, strange thought, 
 that dim past was a throbbing now.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 HEXGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 
 
 JIM emerged next day into a sparkling morning. Light 
 had revealed the fact that they were out of sight of 
 land; and the Helga scudded merrily along through the 
 dancing water. There were a lot of little fleecy clouds 
 in the sky; and they were all going the same way as the 
 Helga. Companioned by the clouds, and with the oppos- 
 ing water rushing by on either hand, the gull-like yacht 
 bore to the south. 
 
 It was the sort of morning, it seemed to Jim, when you 
 couldn't help expecting things to happen. Zoe, how- 
 ever, appeared to feel no stir, actual or anticipatory. 
 She came on deck about ten o'clock, was arranged in a 
 chair by her maid, and opened a book. Then, recalling 
 that she was a hostess, she sent her maid to find Jim. 
 
 When he was convoyed before her Miss Lenox raised 
 her eyes, nodded "Good-morning," and asked, "Have 
 you seen the ship?" 
 
 "No. I haven't yet had an opportunity," answered 
 Jim. 
 
 "I thought not." She seemed to measure the deck with 
 her eye; Jim supposed that she was on the point of of- 
 fering to rise and escort him. But she thought better of 
 it, and said, "I shall ask Mr. Masterson to take you 
 over, I think." 
 
 So in the end Jim had the escort he had refused the 
 day before. Mr. Masterson, very erect, with a frown of 
 
 82
 
 THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 83 
 
 ill-temper imposed upon his seaman's scowl, took him 
 over; and did it very thoroughly. In face of the sea- 
 man's knowledge of the ship, Jim felt abysmally igno- 
 rant, and very humble ; but as they proceeded he gathered 
 somehow that Mr. Masterson's scorn was not 'for him: 
 it was simply the man's usual attitude toward life. Jim 
 was interested to note that in spite of Mr. Masterson's 
 forbidding manner the men seemed to like him. 
 
 The gull-like yacht, as Jim now saw her, proved to 
 be a creature made for use : every smallest part was put 
 cunningly in place, not for looks, but to serve a definite 
 practical end. But the looks were there; and you could 
 no more nullify the Helga's beauty by looking too closely 
 upon it than you could by your scrutiny damage the 
 beauty of the Helga's mistress. 
 
 Mr. Masterson finally turned Jim over to the captain ; 
 and in his company Jim spent the rest of the morning. 
 The captain was a florid old man with a small white 
 beard, who looked exactly as if he had stepped out of 
 some sea-faring romance. If Zoe hadn't told him that 
 the captain had once been with her father Jim would 
 have believed that he was selected for his appearance. 
 The captain, indeed, soon revealed that he hadn't been 
 with Mr. Lenox very long; he had captained Miss Len- 
 ox's yachts, however, off and on since her father's death. 
 She had twice dismissed him, it appeared, and had twice 
 made overtures to him, and taken him back. It didn't 
 do, the captain averred, to place too much reliance on 
 what a woman said, anyway: they weren't in the habit 
 of knowing their own minds. He spoke from experi- 
 ence, having a wife and two daughters back in the 
 States. Having struck this topic, the captain's conver- 
 sation flowed inexhaustibly on. He could talk all day
 
 84 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 about his girls; he might very well have done so, if the 
 luncheon hour hadn't intervened. 
 
 Considering how much he had seen and heard that 
 morning, Jim might perhaps have been satisfied, for a 
 time at least. But he wasn't. He wanted to see more, 
 to hear more : all topics here related themselves to one 
 fascinating inscrutable topic. He thirsted for informa- 
 tion, if he were not to have the relief of action. 
 
 The afternoon, however, proved to be less eventful 
 than the morning. Zoe returned after lunch to her 
 chair and her book ; alternately she read and watched the 
 sky and water. Jim tried to follow her example, but 
 could not settle to reading. He arose and prowled about 
 the ship, only to find that it had become less interesting 
 since morning. By tea-time he had reached the point 
 of actual irritability; he scarcely knew himself, for he 
 was not by nature an irritable man. "I don't think this 
 yachting agrees with me," he said to himself. "How 
 restless I am !" 
 
 Miss Lenox's tea was taken to her where she sat ; and 
 Jim was served in the same unsociable way. Jim 
 groaned, fidgeted, wished he were back on land; he be- 
 gan to wonder how long it would be before the yacht 
 would indeed discharge him at his destination. He was 
 bound, he supposed, to go to South America; but the 
 nearest port in South America should be his destination. 
 What in thunder was the nearest port in South America ? 
 Idiot ! He couldn't even tell where he was going without 
 looking in the atlas! 
 
 Miss Lenox finished her tea, closed her book, and 
 rose from her chair; she advanced down the deck to 
 where Jim sat, and stood before him. In the sunlight 
 of late afternoon her hair burned like molten metal ; her 
 voice fell cool and caressing on his chafing spirit. "I
 
 THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 85 
 
 am going to walk for a time now," she said. "Shouldn't 
 you like to walk with me?" 
 
 A moment later they were pacing the deck shoulder 
 to shoulder. As on that Sunday when they had crossed 
 the lawn at the Evingtons', Jim noted that her shoulder 
 was almost level with his; and her stride was long and 
 lovely. Her hair was different, though; it was ar- 
 ranged to-day much as it had been on that first evening, 
 instead of in the great loose knot she had worn when 
 they sailed together in the borrowed boat. It was parted 
 in the middle now, and arranged artfully and very com- 
 pactly; one great coil went around her head, and there 
 was more hair close packed at the back of her head and 
 behind her ears. She must have a wonderful amount 
 of hair; and as she was so tall, she probably didn't like 
 to wear it on top of her head. But if this were her us- 
 ual arrangement, day-time as well as evening, why had 
 she on that never to be forgotten morning worn it in 
 that great loose knot? 
 
 The answer was simple enough, to be sure; she had 
 undoubtedly dressed herself that morning, and had done 
 her hair as best she could. When the explanation oc- 
 curred to him, Jim didn't like it in the least. To be 
 sure, most of the women he knew couldn't do their own 
 hair successfully; but then they weren't daughters of 
 Dan Lenox, and you didn't expect much of them. 
 
 Well, the original Zoe must be by this time pretty 
 much overlaid by a social deposit. She had lived these 
 last several years as the daughter of a moneyed man, 
 and then herself as a woman with money; you could 
 expect her to have all the habits, and almost the exact 
 tone, of the social order that had adopted her. She 
 did differ from it in some ways, to be sure, and you 
 weren't surprised when she did: it had never, for in-
 
 86 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 stance, occurred to Jim as noteworthy that Zoe hadn't 
 somewhere in the background the social anchorage of an 
 aunt of some sort, real or acquired. She had enough 
 originality, or a sufficiently strong derivation from her 
 early environment, to carry off many things of that sort. 
 What bothered Jim was that she had so few to carry off. 
 With all her beauty, and in spite of the strangeness of 
 her origin, she was so much the lady. That was what 
 Stuart Evington had meant by his complaint that she 
 wasn't human; and it saddened Jim to think that prob- 
 ably Stuart was perfectly right. 
 
 This was a mighty meditation, doubtless, to start from 
 the arrangement of a lady's hair; but empires have been 
 overthrown for less. Attila the Hun was himself over- 
 come, Jim seemed to remember, by that very thing : was 
 actually strangled by the long fair braids of a German 
 princess, his unwilling bride. That German princess 
 must have had hair much like Zoe's, long and heavy and 
 very fair; and it wound about and about the throat of 
 the Scourge of God, and smothered the life that had it- 
 self smothered half Europe. Jim could fairly imagine 
 Zoe as that German princess; yes, could indeed imagine 
 it. Once in a way she would have the courage for a 
 desperate deed; her possible negative-mindedness and 
 her acquired social tone had not so completely smothered 
 the original Dan Lenox in her as to make her a safe 
 bride for an Attila. 
 
 "Did you succeed in reading much this afternoon?" 
 asked the putative bride of Attila. 
 
 Jim started: the question was comically out of keep- 
 ing with his thoughts. "No, I didn't," he replied after 
 a moment. "I haven't mentally got my sea-legs yet." 
 
 "I have read most of the day," she informed him as 
 if he hadn't noticed it.
 
 THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 87 
 
 "I suppose your sea-attitude comes to you automati- 
 cally?" he suggested. 
 
 "I suppose it does," she said. 
 
 "Probably I shall soon begin to read," Jim remarked. 
 "I know I always read a good deal crossing to the other 
 side. I suppose on a long cruise one reads proportion- 
 ately more?" 
 
 "I should think so," she said. "I do most of my read- 
 ing on shipboard, I know. That was the way I got the 
 larger part of my education. My father was constantly 
 travelling from port to port, and he always took me with 
 him. He used to have great boxes of books sent out to 
 us. They would be delivered on board unopened ; and I 
 would open them, and read. All the top rows first, and 
 then the second, and so on. I was a systematic child, 
 and I must have been thoroughly unimaginative." She 
 smiled a little. "I was a grown woman before Europe 
 was anything to me except a place in books; I had some 
 strange ideas of the European world, too." 
 
 "Had you any idea of America?" he asked. 
 
 "Oh, yes ! There was a Fenimore Cooper in one of the 
 boxes. My America was the America of Fenimore 
 Cooper." 
 
 "Did you like Fenimore Cooper?" asked Jim eagerly. 
 
 "I doted upon him. Oh, the hours I have spent and 
 the tears I have wept over his noble redskins !" 
 
 "I read him still; and I laugh at him only as one may 
 at the peculiarities of a friend," said Whittaker. 
 
 "Of a friend, to be sure," she echoed quickly. 
 
 It was almost as if she were accepting a correction at 
 his hands. She halted in her walk, and stood at the 
 rail, watching the sunset. The warm light tinted her face 
 like Ivory. Jim looked at her instead of at the sunset. 
 "What were you reading to-day?" he brought out.
 
 88 
 
 She had been reading French memoirs, very enter- 
 taining memoirs; she proceeded to illustrate, turning to 
 look at him as she did so. "I finished it," she wound up. 
 "To-morrow I shall begin something a little more solid." 
 
 "Solid?" 
 
 "Yes. Don't you like to read a hard book once in 
 awhile? A dry heavy book," she explained, "or perhaps 
 a book with much in it, but badly written. Don't you like 
 to throw yourself against the obstacles, and overcome 
 them, and triumphantly get what's there in spite of the 
 author's spirited attempt to keep you from getting it ?" 
 
 He was silent for a moment ; and she divined his idea. 
 "You didn't expect to hear that from me?" she asked. 
 "You think me a lazy creature. So I am. But I have a 
 brain, and it has never found any activity but ceaseless 
 reading, which is on the whole a poor business in life for 
 a grown woman. People, society?" With a quick ges- 
 ture of her arm she seemed to sweep them all into the 
 sea. "Charity? I give away money, of course; but 
 I'm not charitable. I'm willing to let the unfortunate 
 keep their distance. A book and a boat are better, by 
 your leave. The Helga is almost an end in life, isn't 
 she?" 
 
 "The Helga is wonderful," he assured her. "Are you 
 liking her better than you had feared ?" 
 
 "I am liking her pretty well," she said. 
 
 She turned her head away from him again ; she stared 
 unwinking at the sun, now half below the horizon. So 
 might Leif Ericsson have looked toward the west, his 
 eyes dreamy under a brazen helmet. 
 
 At dinner that night she left most of the talking to 
 him; and Jim, to show that he appreciated the after- 
 noon's burst of confidence for her, it surely was a burst 
 of confidence exerted himself to be entertaining. He'
 
 THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 89 
 
 assumed that she had brought him along as a sort of 
 court fool, to make merry for her while she dined; and 
 she laughed and accepted the assumption. It didn't make 
 much difference to her why he was there, or why he 
 thought he was; but if he chose to exert himself for her 
 entertainment, so much the better. In return she played 
 for him after dinner. 
 
 The days that followed were much like this one. Zoe's 
 burst of confidence was not repeated, but everything else 
 was : the delicious dinners, the musical evenings, Jim's 
 rambles over the ship, the captain's stories. The weather 
 was perfect; the Helga sped on through the sunshine. 
 When he was not more actively occupied, Jim read a 
 little; but usually he dreamed vaguely instead of read- 
 ing. Most of the time he couldn't have told what he 
 was dreaming about; walking or sitting, he was simply 
 in a happy daze. For hours at a time he would watch 
 the clouds and the water, his mind a delightful blank. 
 
 At first he struggled against this state, and strove to 
 maintain something of his on-shore alertness. Then he 
 succumbed; after all, he hadn't come on this voyage to 
 preserve his town attitude. So he came to love his men- 
 tal vagueness, his idle routine, to dread anything that 
 would make a break in either. 
 
 It was eloquent testimony to that negativeness with 
 which Stuart Evington charged Zoe, that thrown in her 
 society as he constantly was, and interested as he had 
 been in her from the moment he first laid eyes on her, 
 Jim didn't at once fall in love with her. But their rela- 
 tions actually seemed not to advance as day followed 
 day; and Jim's happy endless meditations were by no 
 means always concerned with her, though perhaps she 
 was always in the penumbra of his consciousness. It is
 
 90 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 not every beautiful woman, seen every day, who will 
 still restrict herself to the penumbra. 
 
 The Helga stopped for a day at Havana; the stupid 
 immaculate steward went ashore to buy provisions, and 
 Jim to see the town, under conduct of Mr. Masterson. 
 Miss Lenox did not leave the ship. In the evening Jim 
 returned, extraordinarily eager for his dinner and music ; 
 and as he and Zoe ate together at their little table, the 
 Helga steamed out of the harbor. 
 
 The Helga resumed her southward course; and the 
 dream-like calm of Jim's life aboard deepened. As they 
 approached the Equator, the heat deprived him of his 
 last spark of energy. He sat in the shade, and at inter- 
 vals absorbed iced drinks brought him by the steward, 
 who atoned by his cleverness with a lemon squeezer for 
 his stupidity as a herald of guests. Jim did not even read ; 
 indeed at no time during the voyage did he ever succeed in 
 giving much attention to a book. And when in those daz- 
 zling tropical days he saw Zoe hard at her book, when 
 in the glorious tropical evenings she talked of what she 
 had read, he felt mingled wonder and impatience. Her 
 industry was praiseworthy, and no doubt voyaging in 
 the tropics was an old story to her ; but he sometimes al- 
 most hated her for the obvious normality in which her 
 days were passing. 
 
 He was driven to wonder whimsically if he were in- 
 deed Jim Whittaker: perhaps some other soul had 
 strayed into his body, say that first afternoon as he lay 
 asleep. For he didn't act like Jim Whittaker or rather 
 refrain from acting; he was loafing as he had never in 
 his life loafed before. And he no longer saw things 
 as Jim Whittaker would surely have seen them. He 
 didn't know exactly what his position on the Helga was, 
 and he didn't care. Around him were people who might
 
 THE HELGA VOYAGES SOUTHWARD 91 
 
 be wondering about that very thing : the old captain, and 
 the steward, and the silent mate. But Jim didn't care 
 about that either. His sense of social values, and his 
 civilized man's feeling of moving constantly in the midst 
 of an arena of observing eyes, had not accompanied him 
 on shipboard. He was a man without history or back- 
 ground, borne along without his volition between the 
 strange southern stars and the magic unresting sea. 
 
 Their approach to South America threatened a break 
 in Jim's entrancing routine. The Helga put into port, 
 and Jim waited for Miss Lenox to hint his dismissal. The 
 Helga came to rest, and still he waited. Miss Lenox 
 failed to hint. 
 
 "Shall I take myself on shore in the morning?" asked 
 Jim when she rose from the piano that evening. 
 
 "Won't you take me too?" she asked. "I should like 
 to spend a day seeing this town." 
 
 In the morning they went on shore together ; they mo- 
 tored about the port, lunched, went into a few shops; 
 then they returned to the Helga. 
 
 "I like that sort of glimpse at a town," said Zoe at 
 dinner. "I don't care for more just now, because South 
 America is an old story to me." 
 
 "You have been here often?" asked Jim politely. 
 
 "Not often; only once. But I was here for quite a 
 time. I came here with Dad, after we had settled in 
 Europe. We were in this country a year, I think; he 
 was almost tempted to stay. It offered a field for his 
 talents and capital, just the sort of field he liked. But 
 perhaps he felt that he was getting a little old for such 
 a huge undertaking. Then, too, this was all after he 
 had fallen in love with art. A most romantic attach- 
 ment for one's old age, don't you think?" 
 
 She lifted her hand, adjusted a candle shade, and
 
 92 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 looked up at her caged birds they were dining in the 
 cabin. "So, you see," she concluded musingly, "South 
 America is as great a bore as Europe in one way. It is 
 swarming with people I know." 
 
 There was a long silence after that. Jim smoked a 
 cigarette, and then another. Zoe didn't smoke that was 
 another of the things she was remarkable for not doing. 
 She wasn't worried, Jim thought, at the possibility that 
 some of her South American acquaintances might see 
 her with him. It would be beneath her, and outside her 
 as well, to worry about anything like that. If worry ever 
 did wrinkle the white forehead under that magnificent 
 hair, it was over the hideous possibility of being bored. 
 
 "Yet you thought South America might interest me," 
 said Jim finally. 
 
 "You wouldn't like to stay in this town indefinitely, 
 .would you?" she asked. 
 
 "No," answered Jim. 
 
 "When you see a place where you would like to dis- 
 embark, say the word. Until you do, stay on the Helga, 
 if you like." 
 
 "I like it on board the Helga," said Jim, puffing smoke 
 lazily. 
 
 Zoe yawned, rose slowly, trailed the magnificence in 
 which she had dined that evening into the other saloon. 
 Jim followed. She sat down at her piano, made some 
 remark about its keeping in tune. She began to play. 
 
 Thus casually are decided matters big with fate.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 AND JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 
 
 A SITUATION so anomalous, Jim supposed, could 
 scarcely prolong itself indefinitely; but that was 
 exactly what his passage on the Helga gave signs of do- 
 ing. The yacht held her course down the coast of South 
 America, putting in at each of the principal ports for a 
 day. In each Jim watched Miss Lenox for a sign that 
 she had had enough of his company, waited for a hint 
 to take his trunk and go. He must go one of these days ; 
 but he was living just now in a beautiful mental secur- 
 ity ; and for all its beauty he knew that any move might 
 overthrow his security completely. 
 
 Zoe's security wasn't at all that kind; she trusted it 
 absolutely. But she was living just now a life which 
 suited her, and in which Jim Whittaker had proved to be 
 an unexpectedly pleasant accessory ; she saw no reason to 
 disturb herself. 
 
 In each port at which they touched she and Jim re- 
 peated their excursion. They would go ashore after 
 breakfast, and get a conveyance, and ride slowly about 
 the city and its environs. They would lunch at their 
 leisure, and afterward would either go back to the Helga 
 or resume their deliberate tour about the town. Zoe, 
 indeed, made her land excursions shorter and shorter. 
 She was growing, she told Jim, more instead of less 
 bored with land. She desired the sea, perpetually, day 
 
 93
 
 94 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 after day without a break. When they reached the south- 
 ern extremity of the continent she would, she believed, 
 go on south. And Jim imagined himself going with her. 
 His days on the Helga seemed to stretch out before him 
 as they already stretched behind. He had forgotten 
 that he ever lived any other life; he could not imagine 
 that he ever would live any other. 
 
 He did, indeed, compromise with reality to the ex- 
 tent of at length dispatching two letters home. One was 
 written to his eldest brother, the other to his partner; 
 and in both Jim stated that he found cruising enjoy- 
 able and healthful, and would keep on, he thought, a 
 few weeks longer. So little did these two know of his 
 intimate concerns that he could tell them half the truth 
 without risk of their guessing the other half. They 
 might guess it, of course, if either of them happened to 
 meet and compare notes with Stuart Evington; but their 
 conjectures and judgments belonged to the far-away 
 life of that other Jim Whittaker, with whom the placid 
 sailor in summer seas had no longer any connection. 
 
 The Helga, to be sure, had drawn by this time into 
 a cooler latitude. In the cool of the day Zoe now wore 
 a splendid white fur coat, of a high immaculateness and 
 a rich luxury; she did more of her reading indoors, and 
 walked the deck a bit more briskly. Yet Jim failed to 
 perceive any change in her until the memorable after- 
 noon when she changed to him definitely and for all time. 
 
 It was a beautiful sunny afternoon. In the shade of 
 the cabin, and sheltered by it from the wind, Jim lay 
 stretched in a long chair, and watched the sky. He had 
 just eaten his lunch, which was preceded by a shower; 
 his body was agreeably idle, his mind agreeably and to 
 all appearances permanently empty. He had reached 
 the climax of his lotus-eating interval; he was near the
 
 JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 95 
 
 end. But it seemed to him as if lotus-eating marine 
 lotus-eating were what he was put on the earth for. 
 
 He hadn't seen Miss Lenox since breakfast; but pres- 
 ently as he lay there she rounded the end of the ship and 
 approached him. Jim moved his head just sufficiently to 
 watch her. She was wearing her favourite shipboard 
 white, with a bright sash knotted on one hip; she was 
 bare-headed, and her hair flamed in the sun. A tall 
 column of a woman she was, Jim thought, a Caryatid; 
 and even on deck, in her short skirt and low heels, she 
 walked magnificently. There recurred to Jim his old 
 childish superstition that people who looked out of the 
 common run must somehow feel different, too. Zoe 
 Lenox, if that were true, must feel an unspeakable 
 Olympian. 
 
 Zoe came on; and Jim saw that she in her turn was 
 watching him. He didn't stir; he could appreciate an 
 Olympian spectacle without disturbing himself. She 
 came quite up to him; she stood beside him, and her 
 skirt brushed his hand as it lay on the chair-arm. She 
 looked down at him, and spoke; Jim's heart began to 
 flutter in the oddest way. He was quiet now to keep 
 from trembling. 
 
 "You're not asleep?" she said. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "I thought perhaps you were asleep. You were so very 
 quiet." 
 
 "No. I haven't been asleep at all. Did you want 
 anything?" To his own ears Jim's voice sounded un- 
 steady. 
 
 "No, nothing. I was simply wondering what had be- 
 come of you." Jim made a movement to rise, but she 
 smiled and shook her head. "Don't disturb yourself, 
 please. You inspire me with a wish to do as you are
 
 96 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 doing. You look so comfortable so abysmally com- 
 fortable." 
 
 She went on her way again, and vanished. Jim sank 
 obediently back in his chair; and with the wide-spread 
 peace and solitude of the sea all about him, he suddenly 
 threw up his arms and covered his face. He felt ac- 
 tually and physically dazzled. He had looked at Zoe 
 often enough, in all conscience, during these weeks ; and 
 he had never looked without appreciation. He had al- 
 ways recognised her beauty, her strength and grace and 
 finish; but he had recognised them as an amused specta- 
 tor may the studied perfections of an actress on the other 
 side of the footlights. And now suddenly the footlights 
 were gone ; gone was the proscenium arch, gone the pro- 
 tecting distance that had separated him from her. Like 
 a man passing out from under the influence of a drug, 
 Jim was painfully conscious of everything that impinged 
 upon his senses; and the little sounds that came to his 
 ears, the light that filtered through his closed eyelids, 
 awakened in him a sort of dread. His magic lotus-eating 
 interval was over, he felt; and this was neither the time 
 nor the place that he would have chosen to come to 
 himself. 
 
 He dined with Zoe quite as usual that evening; and 
 with the restraint of habit managed to conduct himself 
 much as he always had. Zoe certainly hadn't changed in 
 any way that a third person would recognise; and her 
 view of Jim was evidently quite the same as it had 
 been. But in Jim's view of her the veils between them 
 had been rent ; and where he had once looked steadily and 
 wide-eyed, he now dared only to steal glimpses, as if 
 the light were too bright for him. 
 
 The phenomenon of his clear and unimpeded vision 
 persisted during the days which followed. Cooler air
 
 JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 97 
 
 and the rest he had had combined to wake his brain from 
 its late lethargy. He was aware of everything oh, 
 yes, everything! but he was disturbed only by his ter- 
 rible consciousness of Zoe. That was sometimes like 
 a blinding light, sometimes like a gnawing pain; and it 
 was always there, brushing him lightly, making inroads 
 upon him, invading him heavily, until he could have 
 snouted aloud in his anguish. This was a fixed idea, 
 and his nerves rebelled against it. 
 
 Late one afternoon he and Zoe were walking together 
 on deck. A strong wind was blowing, and the sea ran 
 high; the tumult in Nature appealed to his strained 
 nerves. Two or three times they made the turn of the 
 ship in silence; then Zoe halted in the prow, and stood 
 looking out ahead. Jim looked, as he always did now 
 when he was not consciously on his guard, not at the 
 surroundings but at her. All her Viking blood seemed 
 to come to the surface at such a moment ; the great clean 
 wind blew away her Olympian sophistication, her more 
 than mortal boredom. She had fronted the mightiest and 
 most implacable of the elements, in her own person and 
 those of her ancestors, for hundreds of years. Sud- 
 denly Jim forgot to rage because he saw her too well; 
 when she looked as she did now, no sight of her could 
 be too clear. Her wonderful pale profile and bright hair, 
 against a background of clouded sky and stormy sea 
 her magnificent body erect against the wind and the 
 wind drumming in his ears too and the ship bearing 
 them ever onward! This hour stood forth for him in 
 majesty and might. Jim Whittaker, there with Zoe 
 Lenox in the Helga's prow, lifted out of himself by the 
 magnificent rush of his sensations, saw before him all 
 the kingdoms of the earth, and took them to be his. He 
 had only to ask, and Life would offer; he would ask, and
 
 98 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Fate would superbly grant. This hour alone was worth 
 the placid life-time that lay behind him. 
 
 In his berth that night he woke suddenly, shivering. 
 It was pitch-dark in his stateroom, and a well-regulated 
 person like Jim should have slept for hours longer. In- 
 stead he sat up in a cold sweat, with the unpleasant con- 
 sciousness of a spectre on his pillow. He who had lately 
 been so magnificent now saw himself simply as a fool. 
 An unmitigated fool, but by no means a plain fool: a 
 fool, indeed, who went very far out of his way to be 
 foolish. Putting himself in a position where he saw very 
 much of such a woman was bad enough; but that might 
 have passed. What could not pass, what might have con- 
 sequences that would sit spectre-like on his pillow all the 
 rest of his natural life, was his mad continuation of a 
 course that to the intellect of the veriest idiot he had 
 ever known, apart from himself, would have spelled dan- 
 ger. To sit at the feet of Galatsea was, of course, in 
 itself to take a risk, but it was such a risk as men do 
 take. But to embark with Galatsea on a voyage a deux 
 in the general direction of the South Pole was to be, 
 finally and ignominiously, a fool. 
 
 The panic of the night watches seldom endures into 
 the day; unfortunately, their wisdom is only slightly 
 more enduring. At four in the morning Jim Whittaker 
 registered a solemn vow that he would that very day 
 have himself immediately and incontinently set upon the 
 nearest land, no matter what it was. He saw no safety 
 except in flight, and he determined to flee at once. But 
 Jim Whittaker, emerging into the sunlight at nine after 
 an excellent breakfast, could not see that his position was 
 particularly different from what it had been the day 
 before. He was in the position, even if he had some- 
 what unguardedly placed himself there. Being where
 
 JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 99 
 
 he was, he decided that the better course was for him to 
 get all possible enjoyment out of it. 
 
 He did, however, so far regard the writing on the wall 
 as to seek some information presently from the mate. 
 Jim had never managed to get acquainted with Mr. Mas- 
 terson; and of late he had almost forgotten the man's 
 presence : so far as Jim's perceptions had recently been 
 concerned, he and Zoe might have been together in an 
 otherwise empty ship. 
 
 But as the opportunity chanced that day to present it- 
 self, Jim asked casually, "When shall we touch land 
 again, do you think, Mr. Masterson?" 
 
 The mate favoured him with a curious sidewise glance, 
 and answered curtly, "When we cross the South Pole, 
 perhaps." 
 
 "Eh?" asked Jim, startled. 
 
 "Our last stop was to be the last for some time," as- 
 serted Mr. Masterson. 
 
 "Of course," said Jim, his throat feeling a little dry. 
 "Could you show me on a chart where we are?" 
 
 "Of course. Right here, Mr. Whittaker." 
 
 Jim followed the mate's brown forefinger across the 
 chart. "You see we have swung altogether away from 
 South America, and are heading west of Graham's 
 Land." 
 
 "Aren't there any islands, even?" asked Jim, trying 
 to seem only curious. 
 
 "No. If we keep on we shall come to a very desolate 
 part of the ocean. I don't know what Miss Lenox's idea 
 is; but she probably will change it, anyhow." 
 
 Jim thought that he would demand that she change 
 it. The situation was more serious than he had real- 
 ised: the unaccountable woman did actually seem to be 
 heading for the South Pole. The mate didn't know
 
 100 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 where she was going; undoubtedly the captain didn't 
 know; perhaps Zoe herself didn't. But Jim Whittaker 
 intended to find out. Having come at last to a deter- 
 mination, he only waited for a chance to put it into 
 action. 
 
 Zoe was later than usual in appearing that morning. 
 She not only breakfasted in her stateroom ; she stayed 
 there, and still she stayed. When at length she did 
 emerge, she found Jim loitering outside her door; and 
 Jim had an opportunity of seeing her somewhat tardily 
 greet the day. 
 
 Her maid was behind her, bearing her fur coat. Zoe 
 sniffed the morning air, and looked unsmilingly at Jim. 
 Then with a quick swallow-like motion she dipped first 
 one shoulder and then the other, and stood erect again 
 in her coat. She plunged her arms to the elbows in its 
 great pockets; once more she inhaled slowly. Then she 
 came over to Jim, and said, "Good-morning." 
 
 She turned to walk the deck, and he turned with her. 
 Their steps fell into accord; briskly and silently they 
 walked the turn of the deck. There was an especial 
 charm for Jim in walking thus with her, in harmony and 
 in silence; and for some moments he forbore to break 
 the charm. 
 
 It was Zoe, indeed, who spoke first. She turned her 
 head slightly toward him, and asked, "Do you read 
 Greek?" 
 
 Jim couldn't believe his ears; and Zoe obligingly re- 
 peated her question. "I studied Greek, long enough 
 ago," he said. "I shouldn't exactly say that I read it." 
 
 "I have studied it a little myself," she said. "A mis- 
 sionary taught me. I have a Greek name; perhaps that 
 was what first put him upon the idea." 
 
 "Did you like it?" asked Jim.
 
 JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 101 
 
 "Very much. I should like to go on with it. I was 
 hoping that you would know more about it than I do." 
 
 "It is as a tutor, then, that I am here!" thought Jim. 
 Considering what was in his mind, that hypothesis ought 
 perhaps to have relieved him; but instead it made him 
 angry. He was silent, and glared ahead of him. 
 
 Zoe felt him stiffen. "I'm sure that you know more 
 about it than I do," she said sweetly. 
 
 Jim knew that she spoke only to mollify him ; he felt 
 that if he had had an ounce of proper self-assertion he 
 would have turned upon her then and there, and rowed 
 her. But when she spoke to him that way he didn't want 
 to row her; he was actually absurdly mollified. "I shall 
 be glad to try to read with you, if you have the books," 
 he said. 
 
 "Now?" she asked, with childish eagerness. 
 
 "Now, at once, this moment," Jim answered, smiling. 
 
 She drew him at once to the main cabin, and sought 
 out the books. A neat fire was burning in the grate ; and 
 they sat side by side on the settle, with texts and trans- 
 lations heaped before them. "You take the text," she 
 said, "and I'll hold the pony and the lexicon. With what 
 shall we begin ?" 
 
 Jim inspected the texts before him. In succession he 
 picked up and put down Plato's Apology, the Philippics, 
 and the Iliad. His fingers crept toward another book, 
 which he had seen at once and had tried to disregard ; he 
 found himself opening it, paging it over, seemingly un- 
 able to reject it. Zoe looked over his shoulder. "Anti- 
 gone," she read. "Oh, yes ! The Antigone !" 
 
 It was the last touch of the idyllic in the situation, Jim 
 felt : a touch that he clearly didn't need. But it seemed 
 to interest Zoe. She drew him back to the Greek read- 
 ing in the afternoon, and substituted it for music in the
 
 102 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 evening. They came back to it next day without a word 
 on either side; when they had finished "Antigone" they 
 began "Medaea." And Jim said not a word of what he 
 had meant to say to Zoe ; and the writing on the wall be- 
 came ever dimmer and dimmer in his mind. Borne thus 
 aloft on the wings of a great art, and of Zoe's magic and 
 unexpected enthusiasm, Jim hadn't an ear or a corner 
 of his mind for common prudence. 
 
 It was like some dream of his youth, to read Greek 
 drama thus before an open fire in a sort of enchanted 
 solitude, with one sympathetic soul who could, and did, 
 appreciate and thrill as Jim himself appreciated and 
 thrilled. And Zoe was more than a companion in his 
 reading: she wove herself in with it, she became iden- 
 tified with the very source of the inspiration. Anti- 
 gone? She was Antigone, in all her native nobility; 
 and when they read "Medaea," she was Medaea in her 
 terror. The free-striding, fair-haired, deep-bosomed 
 heroines of antiquity she was all of them; and she 
 sailed ever in a silver ship on a wine-dark sea, and she 
 and Jim Whittaker were sailing straight for Heaven. 
 
 He might have gone on forever thus, in spite of the 
 deep forebodings that had so lately chilled him, in spite 
 of the fact that the Helga, silver ship with her golden 
 freight, had gone on for days now, south and ever south, 
 without sight of an island. Jim had lost count of how 
 long they had sailed so ; his days passed one like another, 
 but each more wonderful than the last. Reading and 
 walking and dreaming it was so that he spent his days, 
 his head miles above those of mortals; and he was pre- 
 vented from sordid stumblings by the fact that the meals 
 he only half ate were still dimly perceived to be as won- 
 derful as ever. That was, although it didn't occur to Jim
 
 at the time, due to the amazing cleverness of Americans 
 with sheet tin. x 
 
 He was smoking under the bridge one morning, be- 
 fore it was time for the reading to begin, when he be- 
 came conscious of voices overhead. One was the voice 
 of Zoe; he noted that gladly, for he had not supposed 
 she was up as yet. They could begin very soon now, 
 doubtless; perhaps before they began Zoe would like to 
 walk for a few minutes. Jim smoked faster, to be 
 through when she descended. 
 
 Then all at once their raised voices penetrated to his 
 consciousness, Zoe's first. "But we have coal and water 
 and provisions enough," she was saying. "When we are 
 half through all of them, or any of them, it will be time 
 enough to turn back." 
 
 "That would be all right, perhaps, barring accidents," 
 said the captain; his voice sounded angry. "But at sea 
 you never can bar accidents. And we must be very close 
 now to the region of floating ice." 
 
 "All the better if we are," answered Zoe. She was not 
 angry; she was simply determined not to have her will 
 crossed. "I shall like that above all things. I wish to 
 float among ice-bergs, and see penguins." 
 
 "It isn't safe," insisted the captain in exasperation. 
 "It's all right for a whaler to take such chances, Miss 
 Lenox; but for a pleasure cruise " 
 
 "Ideas of pleasure differ," Zoe reminded him. The 
 captain's snort was audible where Jim stood. "So long 
 as you are captain of my yacht, you will consider my 
 idea of pleasure," she went smoothly on. "If you dis- 
 approve too heartily, you can resign your commission, 
 and Mr. Masterson will take your place. We can carry 
 you as a passenger, if you don't want the responsibility 
 of being captain any longer. Or if you are afraid," she
 
 104 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 added rather nastily, "we can turn back to the nearest 
 port to drop you." 
 
 "I shall continue as the Helga's captain," he rejoined 
 stoutly, "until I see her safe in port. I'm responsible 
 for the crew ; and I should like to remind you, Miss 
 Lenox, that the Helga is a very beautiful yacht, and I'd 
 hate to see anything happen to her." 
 
 "I am glad you feel that way about her," said Zoe, and 
 added after a moment, "and I am sure you could take 
 her right up to the Pole itself without damaging her." 
 
 At this compliment to his seamanship the captain again 
 snorted ; and a moment later Zoe left him, and descended 
 to the deck. After her easy victory Jim expected to see 
 her quite her usual self ; but she passed him without see- 
 ing him, and with an expression such as he had never 
 before seen her wear : pale cheeks flushed, brows drawn, 
 eyes glittering. Something had affected her strongly; 
 and the captain's abortive attempt at rebellion was hardly 
 enough to account for her strange perturbation. 
 
 She did not reappear that day until after lunch; and 
 Jim had plenty of time to think. He thought about the 
 strange direction of their voyage. It was odd that he 
 hadn't thought more about it before; but Zoe wasn't 
 the kind of woman whose dictates may be effectively 
 questioned. If she wished to voyage among ice- 
 bergs and see penguins, that must suffice. But was she 
 really so keen about ice-bergs and penguins? Jim could 
 hardly suppose that she was so directing the Helga's 
 course merely to give herself a long tete-a-tete with Jim 
 Whittaker. But mightn't she it struck him suddenly 
 be acting from sheer bravado? Perhaps she wished 
 to show to show him and herself that she wasn't 
 afraid of a very long tete-a-tete with Jim Whittaker. 
 
 Jim's heart leaped up, and a dizzying glory seemed
 
 to swim before his eyes. No woman that is born of 
 woman is absolutely invulnerable; and in the world of 
 man and woman things go not by fear or favour, and 
 least of all by desert. They go by blind, stumbling 
 chance. And if chance had stumbled thus unthinkably 
 against Jim Whittaker, Jim was dazzled, but undaunted. 
 
 Zoe walked with him that afternoon; and in the 
 evening they sat down together to read. Their read- 
 ing was a refuge; they stuck at it doggedly, and until 
 after their usual hour. Finally it grew more embarrass- 
 ing to read on than to stop. They stopped, and rose 
 from their settle. 
 
 At the table, as they laid down their books, his hand 
 happened to touch hers. He covered it for a moment, 
 and pressed it; his doing so was half involuntary, and 
 half experimental. The effect on Zoe was startling. A 
 wave of colour went over her face ; her eyelids drooped 
 and she swayed as she stood. Jim's arm went around 
 her; he started to draw her toward him. Then he be- 
 thought himself, and put her gently into a chair. "You've 
 been overdoing yourself," he stammered. "Sit quiet 
 until I call your maid." 
 
 She sat quiet, very quiet; he left her so. 
 
 Half that night Jim Whittaker walked the deck, the 
 ecstasy in his blood defying chill. His star-crowned 
 Antigone, daughter of the dead Helga, wooed of Grand 
 Dukes, and wooed in vain, had swayed toward Jim 
 Whittaker, and crimsoned when his hand clasped hers. 
 It might be only a passing impulse on her side; but it 
 was his part to make permanent that impulse. And 
 with the fire that was in him he could do it, even to Zoe 
 Lenox. To hold her and kiss her, kiss her into warm 
 sweet life, kiss her into loving him Jim flung his arms 
 out to the empty night.
 
 106 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 If only things weren't as they were, so that he might 
 begin at once! Practically alone with her hundreds of 
 miles away from society as he knew it, her guest on 
 her own ship, he had to behave. There was for the pres- 
 ent no course open to him except an iron rigidity, even 
 if she hated him for it. But she wouldn't hate him 
 for it; she would see what restrained him. And once 
 they were back on land, she would love him. If only 
 for a month or a fortnight or a day, the star-crowned 
 one would love him, and he would be blessed above all 
 other men, 
 
 Tired at length, although sleep was very far from his 
 eyelids, Jim turned to go back to his state-room. There 
 was a light in the main saloon; a few minutes before, 
 when he passed that way, it hadn't been there. The 
 door was a little ajar, letting escape a narrow band of 
 light; Jim approached in some curiosity. 
 
 As he put out his hand to the door it opened wide: 
 Zoe's maid, the Malay woman she called Anna, appeared 
 on the threshold. For a long minute they stood so, and 
 scrutinised each other in the light that came from the 
 cabin. 
 
 He had seen very little of Anna on the voyage: she 
 clung to her little state-room, and almost never ap- 
 peared on deck except when she waited actively on Zoe; 
 and when she waited it was swiftly and silently, with 
 lowered eyelids. Jim had never seen enough of her to 
 feel at ease in her presence : to him there was something 
 sinister about her. If she crossed his path, it seemed al- 
 ways to be for the purpose of scrutinising him before 
 she vanished into her mysterious limbo. 
 
 "Is Miss Lenox resting well?" Jim heard himself 
 ask presently; to his own ears his voice sounded a lit- 
 tle strange.
 
 JIM WHITTAKER BEYOND HIS DEPTH 107 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Whittaker," said the maid. Her sparse 
 English was as good as Zoe's own, her manner that of 
 the respectful servant. But Jim couldn't forget his 
 impression of her. The light in the cabin went out ; she 
 glided past him in the shadow. Jim shuddered, just as he 
 had seen some people do when a cat went too near them. 
 
 He went to his stateroom and undressed; his 
 thoughts still ran on the Malay maid. How Zoe could 
 bear to have such a creature always about her, handling 
 her every 'garment, brushing her hair ! Well, it was 
 a part of her strangeness; and to be sure he loved Zoe 
 for her strangeness, and regretted it when she didn't 
 show enough to please him. 
 
 No, he wouldn't have her altered, wouldn't wish her 
 to incline more to the conventional mould. All he wished 
 was to have her warm to him, as she must warm, would 
 warm, now. He had got so far that he no longer dis- 
 trusted even what he had once bewailed as her lack of 
 humanness.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 FAR OUT AT SEA 
 
 HE would carry his love, he thought, carefully be- 
 fore him; in secret he could enjoy its aroma, but 
 except when he was alone he would bear it like a goblet 
 of precious waters. He would bear it so, but not, he 
 hoped, for long. Of course, if Zoe never stopped to 
 sip it with him, he might have to carry it carefully all 
 his life, watching it ebb only as life itself ebbed; and 
 when he came to be a very old gentleman, he would know 
 himself from other old gentlemen chiefly by its fainter 
 but never-dying fragrance in his soul. 
 
 But Jim didn't actually for a moment believe that it 
 would ever come to that. What concerned him was tid- 
 ing over this present crisis. And he could tide it over; 
 certainly he could. Only he hoped that Zoe would not 
 unnecessarily prolong the situation. 
 
 But that was exactly what Zoe se,emed determined to 
 do. Southward, ever south, sailed the Helga. Ice was 
 sighted, and the captain steered away from it. He may 
 have grumbled in secret, but Jim heard him offer no 
 farther remonstrance to his employer. And Jim himself 
 could not remonstrate without saying too much. If Zoe 
 saw anything at all, she ought to have known what to 
 do without his telling her. If she saw nothing, so much 
 the better, perhaps; Jim could hold up his end unas- 
 sisted, provided Zoe's blindness were real. 
 
 How much did Zoe see, and how much, if anything, 
 
 108
 
 FAR OUT AT SEA 109 
 
 did she herself feel? Jim didn't know. To be sure, in 
 the hours that he and Zoe spent together he hadn't any 
 great opportunity to judge; for when he and Zoe were 
 together he was now constantly watching himself. Then 
 too, those hours had been of late'considerably abridged. 
 The Greek readings were discontinued without a word 
 said on either side. The promenades on deck, with their 
 strides matching and the wind in their hair, seldom re- 
 curred now. Was she forcing herself to ignore him, 
 fighting down her feelings, purposely making her eyes 
 blank when they met his? It didn't seem possible; she 
 would hardly have passed unscathed through the atten- 
 tions of Grand Dukes only to fall in love with Jim 
 Whittaker. If his imagination showed signs of running 
 away with him, Jim had only to recall those deterrent 
 Grand Dukes. And yet, if she were as indifferent to him 
 as he must politely assume that she was, why was she 
 having the Helga run ever steadily to the south ? 
 
 The ship's course was to Jim the strong proof of Zoe's 
 weakness. She had seen the penguins it was her avowed 
 object to see. The weather was disagreeable, sailing so 
 was in itself monotonous; and the Helga steamed for- 
 ward now, even Jim was aware, in danger from ice, 
 both apparent and hidden. He mustn't think much 
 about it; but if he could have allowed himself to think 
 about it, Jim's conclusion would certainly have been that 
 Zoe was clinging desperately to the ideal of herself 
 which she had all her life shaped and tended. The first 
 thing required by that ideal was for her not to swerve or 
 admit fear fear of ice-bergs or Jim Whittaker, of 
 things or men. 
 
 They had gone on so, it seemed to Jim, a very long 
 time after his fateful admission to himself, when Zoe 
 went one evening to the piano. She had not played for
 
 110 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 a long time; and Jim was glad to see her go, believing 
 that music might relieve the tension of her spirit. But 
 it had no chance to do so. She sat there for a long 
 time and read music ; but she did not touch the keys. Her 
 dumb distress was perceptible even to a man who was 
 trying to look away; and it was really pitiful. She made 
 too much of the matter, poor proud girl. Sooner than 
 see her go on like this, thought Jim, he would throw his 
 scruples into the Antarctic Ocean. 
 
 As they parted for the night he took her hand and 
 kissed it. This was an attention she must have received 
 from the Grand Dukes ; but it melted her singularly now. 
 She looked at Jim with quivering lips, and her hand 
 trembled in his. And at this point of possible fusion, 
 at this moment of high and wonderful strain that might 
 have done for them what they could not soberly and 
 coolly do for themselves, Jim was fool enough to mur- 
 mur, "Zoe, have the Helga turned back." 
 
 She snatched away her hand as if it had been burnt, 
 and fled. Jim started after her, calling to her to wait, 
 attempting stumbling apologies, incoherent fragments of 
 explanation and excuse. Her stateroom door banged 
 in his face. Jim went to his own room, and spent a 
 wakeful night in a state of humiliation and disgust which 
 he expressed privily as a desire to kick himself. Zoe's 
 proud head had been ready to stoop; if he had but held 
 his peace, she might have come to him in a yielding that 
 was almost beyond his dreams. And he had been so 
 stupid, so ridiculous, so utterly fatuous as to choose that 
 exact moment for saying what he ought never to have 
 said to her at all. "Have the Helga turned back ! Have 
 the Helga turned back!" And save Jim Whittaker's 
 skin, or his precious reputation, or his doubly precious 
 idea of himself. "Have the Helga turned back !" Have
 
 FAR OUT AT SEA 111 
 
 Jim Whittaker walk the plank, rather, and thus assure 
 yourself that there will be one less fool alive ! 
 
 Jim emerged in the morning into greyness both ma- 
 terial and spiritual. The Helga made her way slowly 
 through fog. The captain was too peevish to approach, 
 and Mr. Masterson's thin lips were set in a straight, for- 
 bidding line. Zoe did not appear at all; and Jim failed 
 even to catch sight of her maid. 
 
 He spent a wretched day kicking his heels about the 
 ship. He tried to read, and failed; he tried to smoke, 
 and found it distasteful. He began several letters, to 
 be posted God knew when; he had nothing to say in 
 them. Even his sea appetite failed ; and the meals which 
 the steward set before him in the charming blue dining 
 saloon were taken away almost untasted. 
 
 He went to bed early ; he was wretchedly tired, but he 
 didn't feel like sleeping. He did succeed in dozing, how- 
 ever; for he had left a light in the room, and presently 
 he lost it for moments at a time, and was conscious of 
 recovering it as if that were somehow a very important 
 thing to do. 
 
 At last he slept soundly, and dreamed most horribly. 
 Zoe was always before him ; but for one reason and an- 
 other he could never get to her. She was imprisoned 
 in a block of ice, and appealing to him to release her, 
 and he couldn't get to her; and just when he made a 
 mighty effort, and burst the bonds that held him, she 
 wasn't appealing to him at all. She floated in the air 
 just above him and just beyond his reach, and mocked 
 with shrill derisive laughter his efforts to catch her. 
 
 She was stretched on her back, chained to rocks that 
 pierced her flesh. She was naked and bleeding; she 
 turned toward him eyes that were full of entreaty and 
 shame. She saw that he was separated from her by a
 
 112 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 horrible chasm, that he was trying to get to her. She 
 didn't see that his one thought was to release her, to 
 bind up her wounds and kneel at her feet. She was 
 afraid of him ; oh, God, she was afraid ! And when he 
 tried to call to her he was dumb, and the chasm yawned 
 dizzyingly between them. 
 
 And then he was back in his berth aboard the Helga; 
 and something had happened to the ship. He seemed to 
 hear sharp tones and hurried footsteps. He wanted to 
 get up and find out what the trouble was, but he couldn't 
 wake. In agony like that of a drowned man returning 
 to life he fought and fought. With a final mighty ef- 
 fort, which seemed to rend his beii\g, he came to him- 
 self. The light was burning just as he had left it; and 
 in the familiar cabin all was peaceful and orderly. 
 
 Jim got up for a drink, thinking to shake off his 
 nightmare before he returned to bed. With the glass 
 halfway to his lips he paused. Rapid footsteps were in- 
 deed passing his door, and he heard orders shouted. And 
 then there fell a quiet that seemed somehow out of place 
 on shipboard, a. quiet that rasped his already overstrung 
 nerves. Hastily getting into some clothes, he flung open 
 the door that led on deck. 
 
 The outer air came raw and damp against his face. 
 Jim hesitated for a moment; then he had a curious im- 
 pression that the Helga wasn't moving. That alone, 
 added to his previous apprehensions, was enough to make 
 him start down the deck in search of information. 
 
 In a moment he knew that his apprehension had some 
 foundation; for grouped together on the after-deck, 
 clearly illuminated by a large electric light, were three 
 people where by rights at that hour of the night there 
 should have been none. Miss Lenox was standing there 
 in her white fur coat; at her side, facing Jim, was the
 
 FAR OUT AT SEA 113 
 
 captain. Mr. Masterson, a lantern swinging from his 
 hand, was saying something to them; and the captain's 
 eyes and mouth were as round as marbles; his white 
 beard seemed to bristle with excitement and consterna- 
 tion. Zoe was as white as her coat; but when she saw 
 Jim she stopped Mr. Masterson, and stepped toward the 
 newcomer. "I understand perfectly, Mr. Masterson," 
 she said with a polite inclination of her head. "Thank 
 you." 
 
 She took Jim's arm, and began to move away. She 
 was so calm, and her fingers lay so lightly on his sleeve, 
 that her mere pallor would not have betrayed her to 
 Jim; she was always pale. But her speech, short as it 
 was, showed that she too was deeply moved; for the 
 slight burring of her r*s and lengthening of her vowels 
 which her father had taught her when he taught her 
 English, and to which Jim was so accustomed that in 
 its ordinary manifestation he never noticed it nowadays, 
 had become almost comically pronounced. As much to 
 hear her speech broaden again as for what she might 
 have to say, Jim awaited her next remark. 
 
 "Let's go into the cabin," she whispered, and then, 
 rather unexpectedly, "You were a long time coming." 
 
 "There has been an accident?" Jim murmured as they 
 stepped inside the cabin door. 
 
 "An accident? Yes." Zoe surveyed him in the bright 
 light he had just turned on. "It spoils one's rest, any- 
 thing happening so in the night. I don't feel a bit sleepy. 
 Do you?" Jim shook his head. "I think I shall send 
 word to the cook to get breakfast." 
 
 Her hastily coiled hair loosened itself just then, and 
 descended about her shoulders; on the glistening white 
 of her coat it glistened gold. Unperturbed, she shook 
 it back. "Shall we say breakfast in half an hour?" she
 
 114 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 suggested. "That is, if you really are wide awake?" 
 
 She must have hurried her toilet that early morning; 
 for during the allotted half hour she not only dressed 
 but had time for a conference with her officers. At 
 breakfast she was perfectly calm, and the trace of for- 
 eignness in her speech had regained its usual tenuous- 
 ness. But she ate nothing, and between her successive 
 cups of coffee Jim had an uneasy feeling that she was 
 watching him. Small wonder if she were, of course; 
 but he couldn't decide on the mood of her scrutiny. 
 
 Finally she opened fire. "You know," she said, lean- 
 ing one elbow on the table, "the day before yesterday you 
 asked me to turn the Helga back." 
 
 "Yes," replied Jim, surprised at her coolness in al- 
 luding to that scene. 
 
 "Well, the Helga won't turn back for a few days." 
 Zoe met his eye, and added casually, "She has had 
 rather an accident the ice, you see." 
 
 "Just what do you mean," Jim wanted to know, "by 
 'rather an accident'?" 
 
 She hesitated for a second, then risked telling him. 
 "The propeller is gone," she said. 
 
 Her brief sentence conveyed no meaning at all to 
 Jim's landlocked mind. "Don't you carry an extra one, 
 in case of emergencies?" he asked. 
 
 He knew from her smile that he had made a silly 
 remark: that even he, after being so long aboard the 
 Helga, should have known better. But she didn't seem 
 to scorn him for his triviality, even if it did amuse her; 
 and she began at once to talk of indifferent matters. 
 
 She began, and she continued. She had never be- 
 fore put herself to so much trouble to entertain him ; and 
 Jim was puzzled by this flow of general conversation 
 at this eerie hour. He found it difficult to connect with
 
 FAR OUT AT SEA 115 
 
 the trumpery accident to the yacht; and was driven at 
 length to suppose that she remembered all too well the 
 happenings of two days before, and was talking to save 
 the situation. Only so ran his mental accompaniment 
 to her talk the situation hadn't been anything like that 
 bad, and whatever else Zoe was doing, she didn't seem 
 to be treading down embarrassment. 
 
 Be her motive what it might, however, the wonder- 
 ful fact remained : she dedicated all that long day to him. 
 Once only she withdrew for a talk with her officers; 
 but the rest of the day was Jim's, even to queer games 
 of cards after tea. She knew games for two of which 
 he had never even heard. She knew, she told him, prob- 
 ably almost every game for two that had ever been in- 
 vented : she and her father had played them all. What 
 she had learned from Dan Lenox she now saw fit to 
 teach Jim Whittaker ; and he was vaguely elated because 
 she perceived no incongruity in her so teaching. 
 
 In the evening she once more played the piano to 
 him; but it seemed that she had never played before as 
 she played now. It was like an enchantment, to sit here 
 with Zoe in warmth and brightness and music, and to 
 think of the disabled Helga lying like a dead thing in 
 the midst of the icy sea. 
 
 The enchantment finally overcame his scruples : or had 
 those honourable scruples been simply the unconscious 
 product of his lady's coldness? Perhaps scruples are 
 never anything but a slight precipitate of civilisation, 
 readily dissolved in the sweetness of a lady's smile. 
 
 For when, late in their warm bright evening, Zoe rose 
 from the piano, Jim rose too and stretched out his arms 
 to her. Her hands met his, and lay quietly within them. 
 Slowly he drew her toward him ; slowly, exquisitely she 
 came, her face white as marble, her eyes almost black in
 
 116 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 the shadow of her drooping lashes. Not a word was 
 spoken until after their lips had met ; then she said husk- 
 ily, "Dear Jim ! dear Jim !" and his plain familiar name 
 so pronounced became superb and regal. 
 
 So the day's long talk came to an end ; for what that 
 tongue could say would not be an anti-climax after the 
 mute speech of lips and eyes and hands? She was his 
 pearl among women, utterly adorable and supremely 
 adored ; yet he felt that that would have been but a tame 
 thing to tell her after the divine unconscious eloquence 
 of her child-like "Dear Jim!" 
 
 They did not linger in the saloon after their moment's 
 embrace; to keep a moment perfect, one should not try 
 to hold it too long. Again that night Jim did not sleep ; 
 and in spite of accumulated fatigue he was glad not to 
 sleep. It was fitting that a white night should be dedi- 
 cated to that white woman. He felt that in her state- 
 room on the other side of the yacht Zoe was not sleep- 
 ing. Half their lives they had been working toward 
 that passing moment; the other half must date from it.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 
 
 OE appeared in the blue saloon next morning, and 
 breakfasted with him. This was only the second 
 time that she had done so on the cruise ; but she did not 
 repeat yesterday's talkativeness. Her "Good-morning" 
 was almost shy; she sat with her eyes on her plate, and 
 said nothing. 
 
 Jim, sitting on her right hand, devoured her with his 
 eyes. She was like any other woman in love. For she 
 was in love : strange fact, so strange that he could repeat 
 it over and over to himself, always with a fresh sense 
 of its novelty. She, Zoe Lenox, was in love with Jim 
 Whittaker. She had stooped from her pedestal to his 
 embrace. And behold her humble, troubled, exquisite; 
 behold her altogether human! Jim would have liked to 
 show her thus to Stuart Evington; yet he was glad 
 enough that he hadn't at present to show her to any- 
 body. The claims of the world, its grinding besmirch- 
 ing complications, its silly little buzz of wonder, would 
 have to be met later on. Just now it was providential 
 that all this pother was so far off. Jim only hoped that 
 the Helga wouldn't be repaired for a day or two. 
 
 After breakfast he and Zoe stood at the rail and 
 looked forth on a wilderness of grey waters with a grey 
 sky above. There is much space wasted in the southern 
 hemisphere: for in all this expanse the only point of 
 
 117
 
 118 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 colour and sensation was where Zoe stood motionless by 
 the rail, with her shoulder touching Jim's. 
 
 Jim roused himself once to ask, "Is the Helga stand- 
 ing still? She seems to be." 
 
 The sound of his voice must have startled his com- 
 panion, for he felt her quiver against him. But it was 
 in the calmest tone that she answered, "She is drifting, 
 of course." Zoe was always very polite in regard to his 
 lubberism. Her politeness, however, didn't encourage 
 him to manifest it farther. 
 
 They went back to the main saloon presently, and 
 thence to the blue saloon for lunch. But saloon or dining- 
 cabin or deck, it was all one to Jim, so long as they were 
 together. And that day, and the days that followed, they 
 were constantly together, all day long, he triumphant in 
 his love, she tremulous, silent, shy, and exquisite in hers. 
 All human, all woman, this Zoe Lenox in love! From 
 his Antarctic perspective, Jim challenged the world to 
 produce her equal. 
 
 In the hour after he left her and before he slept, he 
 had time, if no great inclination, to think things over; 
 and it struck him sometimes in his midnight meditation 
 as odd that Zoe, having fought him desperately and suc- 
 cessfully so long, should have chosen that particular 
 moment to yield. He might almost have thought that 
 the ship's breakdown had influenced her to yield. Per- 
 haps in a way it had. Perhaps she chose to love against 
 a drab background from the same instinct that made 
 her robe herself severely, scorning jewels and minor 
 adornments. A fine enough statue didn't fear display 
 against a sheer blank wall. But Jim was in no anxiety 
 to know whether or not this theory was correct. He 
 was just now too blissful to be critical. 
 
 This close daily and hourly companionship with Zoe
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 119 
 
 naturally drew him away from even such beginnings of 
 companionship as he had made' with the other souls on 
 the Helga. Once or twice he fancied that Mr. Master- 
 son looked at him curiously under his habitual scowl; 
 but as Jim stared back the notion dwindled, and he set 
 its inception down to his own self-consciousness over the 
 fact that Zoe loved him. And for the most part Jim 
 lived as if there had been no one on board the Helga but 
 himself and Zoe, served occasionally with the semblance 
 of meals by some pale ghost of a steward. 
 
 One day, however, Jim did seek a chat with the cap- 
 tain. By way of beginning the young man asked where 
 the Helga was drifting; and the ancient mariner re- 
 plied evasively, and was presently relating a long story 
 of the time when he had served in the East Indies. "Ex- 
 actly as if he wanted to throw me off the track," thought 
 Jim. "I don't believe the old humbug himself knows 
 where we are." 
 
 He conceived a suspicion that the captain was incom- 
 petent; but he decided to say nothing to Zoe about it. 
 Zoe was worried anyhow. He would catch her eyes on 
 him sometimes with the strangest beseeching look, and 
 when he caught her so her glance was always averted at 
 once, as if she felt that it betrayed her. "She looks 
 exactly as if she had something to ask my pardon for, 
 or even something she was afraid to tell me," he thought. 
 It was more likely, though, that she was worried about 
 herself and the problem of making this love fit into a 
 life with which it was after all incongruous. That was 
 like a woman, and even, it appeared, like a super-woman : 
 one and all, they would let the uncertain future over- 
 shadow a perfect if fleeting bliss. 
 
 He tried to draw her to his own way of looking at 
 things; and she seemed to make an effort to see things
 
 120 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 as he did. But as the days went by and the Helga still 
 drifted, she became not less but more uneasy. A brood- 
 ing dejection overhung her. It lifted at moments: his 
 kisses could always lift it, or cheerful whimsical talk. 
 But in their silences, which Jim would otherwise have 
 loved, it always came back, and when he returned to her 
 after an absence, it was invariably to find a dark spirit in 
 possession. 
 
 Her dark moods were wonderful, to be sure ; and the 
 connoisseur in him, the side to which Zoe had first ap- 
 pealed, savoured them. Blondes were in general likely, 
 Jim seemed to remember, to attain no higher than a 
 simple peevishness. He took it as final proof of Zoe's 
 once debatable humanness that she gloomed like the 
 daughter of her powerful sullen father, sulked with a 
 mighty Celtic sulk. 
 
 His effort to raise Zoe from her dejection combined 
 with his own reaction against it to lift Jim into a state 
 of exaltation. It seemed to him as if nothing could 
 ever affect for the worse a; life that had been so smiled 
 upon. And although he realised the comedy of his 
 state, he humoured it. One does not reject the gifts of 
 the gods, even their famous fatal preliminary madness. 
 
 Zoe gave a final proof of her subjectness to the com- 
 mon lot by one day worrying herself into a nervous head- 
 ache. To Jim, at the breakfast-table which had never of 
 late been solitary, her maid came bringing a note. Zoe 
 thought of keeping her state-room for the day ; she was, 
 sure that a day's uninterrupted rest would put her back 
 on her feet. 
 
 Jim scribbled a reply, bidding her take all possible care 
 of herself. He would miss her, of course, but she mustn't 
 mind that. Only, if her headache got better she must 
 come to him. He gave his note into the hand of Zoe's
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 
 
 t 
 
 maid ; above her extended ape-like hand the strange crea- 
 ture looked at him very hard. It was only natural, doubt- 
 less, that she should; she must know that he was Zoe's 
 beloved, she doubtless wondered about the whole rela- 
 tion in her outlandish way. But Jim shuddered at her; 
 he only forced himself to meet her eye by thinking 
 sternly, "I won't let a nigger stare me out of counte- 
 nance." As she turned away he had a vision of those 
 ape-like hands busied about Zoe's head and hair; and 
 he shuddered afresh, and uncontrollably. 
 
 Jim went on deck presently, to face the day without 
 Zoe. He felt as if he were bereft of an arm, a leg, and 
 half his mind, but supposed he should get through some- 
 how. He smoked and walked. He essayed speech with 
 Mr. Masterson, who had not a word to say for himself ; 
 with the captain, who talked, indeed, but very bad-tem- 
 peredly; even with the steward, that pale shadow of a 
 man. He tried to talk with one of the sailors, who looked 
 at him askance. Nobody entertained him even passingly, 
 and about everybody he had the oddest illusion: it 
 seemed to him that they all cast on him in their differing 
 ways the same sinister glance as the Malay. Doubtless 
 they had all seen the change in his relations with Zoe; 
 doubtless they thought the whole episode of his being 
 there and making love to her very strange, as indeed it 
 was. But their perception of the situation between him 
 and Zoe wasn't what bothered Jim. That situation had 
 now worked itself out to the finest Tightness and regu- 
 larity, as everybody would presently understand; and 
 meanwhile Jim in his fine high freedom wasn't afraid 
 of glances. What troubled him to-day was a ridiculous 
 but powerful feeling that there was something some- 
 thing in some way affecting him which everybody on
 
 122 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 board knew except himself, and which everybody was 
 in a conspiracy to keep him from finding out. 
 
 This strong uncanny feeling was doubtless due simply 
 to the fact that he missed Zoe, and hadn't adjusted him- 
 self to doing without her. Determined, however, at least 
 to act sensible whatever his sensations, Jim established 
 himself in the main saloon with an armful of books. 
 They were all works of an English-writing foreigner 
 who had himself once been a sailor, a man who was 
 just beginning to attract attention in America. He was 
 an old favourite of Zoe's. "A sailor-man himself," she 
 had said to Jim. "What a sailor he must have been!" 
 From Zoe that was, indeed, high praise. 
 
 The sailor-man's novels looked a little sustained for 
 Jim's present mood : "He is a substantial writer," Zoe 
 would say. A volume of short pieces on various aspects 
 of the sea and sea life appealed more to Jim's present 
 mood. He opened it, and skimmed along with consid- 
 erable satisfaction and growing respect for a hundred 
 pages or so. If this author were seamanlike, then to be 
 seamanlike was evidently to be of a world apart; but 
 to be this particular seamanlike author was to make the 
 world apart comprehensible to a member of Jim's world. 
 
 The author went on presently to talk of ships missing 
 and overdue. Even to a landsman, these things implied 
 drama. With heightened attention Jim read on. " 'Of 
 all ships disabled at sea/ " began one paragraph, " 'a 
 steamer who has lost her propeller is the most helpless. 
 And if she drifts into an unpopulated part of the ocean 
 she may soon become overdue.' ' 
 
 Jim stopped reading with the start of one jerked from 
 the pleasant world of selected impressions by the icy 
 hand of reality. " 'Of all ships disabled at sea, a 
 steamer who has lost her propeller is the most helpless.' '
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 123 
 
 And the Helga had lost her propeller. " 'If she drifts 
 into an unpopulated part of the ocean ' " The Helga 
 
 was in an unpopulated part of the ocean. " ' she may 
 
 soon become overdue.' ' While he sat there, compla- 
 cently reading books in the beautiful little saloon, the 
 ship was as good as lost ! 
 
 This was what everybody on board but himself had 
 known, and had tried to keep from Jim. His first sen- 
 sation was one of humiliation at being thus deceived; 
 one would have supposed him a baby. Probably every- 
 body did suppose him a fool. It was only after a minute 
 or two of this protest of his ego that Jim's civilised brain 
 began to grope with the fact itself, the fact of imminent 
 physical disaster. The danger might for all he knew be 
 acute: he himself and his magnificent Zoe and all the 
 other souls on board might be within sight of their 
 reckoning. And at the idea that the end which we ac- 
 cept perhaps as inevitable but completely ignore every 
 hour of our protected, insulated lives, could be, was, 
 right there ahead of him, just as his dinner and his bed- 
 time were, Jim sat stunned and gaping. 
 
 Even as he sat so, the door opened, and Zoe appeared 
 in the opening. She stood for a moment with one hand 
 resting against the door- jamb ; all about her was an ex- 
 quisite faint languor. A trailing green scarf around her 
 shoulders brought out every gleam of gold in her high- 
 piled hair. Under her eyes the skin was faintly blue, and 
 on her lips she wore the smile of a woman who does 
 something consciously heroic, and expects to be praised 
 for it. All this Jim saw; but if he thought anything, it 
 was only that soon, very soon now, this complex won- 
 derful product of the ages and the climes would sink into 
 nothingness. 
 
 When he said nothing, Zoe spoke. "I got so lonely
 
 124 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 without you, Jim," she said. She said it sweetly, without 
 a shade of reproach. 
 
 "Is your head better?" asked Jim mechanically. 
 
 The deadened tone of his voice revealed to her that 
 something was wrong. She looked hard at him, looked 
 down at the book he hdd. She sprang to his side, and 
 over his shoulder read what he had just read. Her agon- 
 ised cry rang through the cabin, "Jim! Jim!" She 
 grasped his arm convulsively, and burst into tears. 
 
 Jim soothed her as best he might : seated her and knelt 
 beside her, kissed and petted her as if she had been a 
 frightened child. Like a frightened child she continued 
 to cling to him ; and with her sobs in his ears he caught 
 himself once or twice wondering what he was doing here 
 and what the pother was all about. 
 
 "You know now," she said at length, when she was 
 quiet enough for speech. 
 
 "Yes," answered Jim. "You have known for a long 
 time?" She nodded mutely. "And everybody else on 
 board knew too?" She did not answer. "I asked you 
 a question, Zoe," he said coldly. 
 
 "I wanted to tell you," she began chokingly. "I wanted 
 to. But I couldn't. After I brought you along so wan- 
 tonly, to have you know that by my persistence in folly 
 I had perhaps thrown away all our lives I couldn't tell 
 you that." 
 
 "We are as good as lost?" he asked. 
 
 "By no means. But we are in real danger." 
 
 "You are telling me the full truth this time?" 
 
 "The full truth," said Zoe, meeting his eye. 
 
 "It all depends on our chance of rescue?" he wanted 
 to know. 
 
 "Yes. On that, and of course on our holding out. 
 We have plenty of water the Helga was built with a
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 125 
 
 f 
 
 very large tank ; and there's coal enough to keep us warm 
 a long time. But food " 
 
 "It's half rations, then," muttered Jim. "After all, 
 that's no worse than what most fashionable women en- 
 dure all the time, for the sake of their appearance." 
 
 Zoe actually smiled at that, so great was her relief 
 now that he knew. She sank down in a low chair before 
 the fire, and rested her chin in her hand. She wasn't 
 even concerned to learn what he thought of her duplic- 
 ity. Perhaps relief overshadowed her self-consciousness 
 for the time being; or perhaps what Jim Whittaker 
 chanced to think of her was simply the least of her 
 troubles. 
 
 Jim himself wasn't doing anything that could be called 
 thinking. A mighty surge of sensation battered him, 
 now on this side, now on that; and he could feel it lift- 
 ing him little by little up, up, up to where the Jim he had 
 left behind could never have got. 
 
 He began to walk up and down the cabin, steadily, 
 restlessly, never varying the rhythm of his walk. Some- 
 times when he passed her he looked at Zoe; but Zoe, chin 
 in hand and eyes on the fire, did not glance up, did not 
 even seem to feel his presence. The lovely face half 
 averted, the absolute motionlessness, even her complete 
 lack of nervousness as he raged to and fro behind her 
 chair they were all typical. Often and often that in 
 Zoe for which they stood had held Jim back; now it 
 lured him on. 
 
 He left the cabin presently, and measured the deck in 
 his restless round. Here he was held prisoner on this 
 hulk. If he could have got out and away But if he 
 could have got out and away, he wouldn't have gone. 
 If unlimited friendly land had been right at his hand, 
 he would still have turned and gone back to Zoe. He
 
 126 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 would have gone back to her, as he was going now. 
 
 It was really an hour or so before he went back, though 
 he knew that his holding off did not alter the situation, 
 except, perhaps, as it allowed the surges to carry him 
 higher. When at length he opened the cabin door and 
 went back to her, Zoe still sat just as he had left her. 
 
 Jim went and stood near her, with his back to the 
 fire; thunder-claps deafened the ears of his spirit, and 
 lightning seemed to rend him. Then Zoe looked up at 
 him. She had never looked quite so sweetly or so can- 
 didly; she had never seemed so young. Before her 
 flower-like candour, her May-like youth, the lightning in 
 Jim ran into a solid tongue of flame. He found his 
 voice, found words, found what must be said once and 
 for all. 
 
 "Zoe," he began. 
 
 "Yes, Jim?" 
 
 "We may never reach home, Zoe." 
 
 Her breath came tremulously; she echoed, "Never." 
 
 "Do you love me, Zoe ?" 
 
 "Yes, dear." 
 
 "Then, Zoe, will you be my wife here and now, in 
 this interval of time that we may still call ours?" 
 
 Her face fell; she covered her eyes with her hands. 
 The thunder-claps in Jim's ears ceased; in a silence that 
 seemed as if it spanned everything and would go on to 
 all eternity, he stood over her and waited. 
 
 Suddenly Zoe slipped to the edge of her chair, and 
 leaned over. Jim wondered what she was going to do, 
 wondered it vaguely, in this strange silence that had fal- 
 len upon his spirit. She picked up the fire-tongs, and 
 carefully selected a coal. Jim, moving just enough to 
 keep her various motions in sight, followed the coal with 
 his eyes.
 
 UNCHARTED WATERS 127 
 
 s 
 
 She shook back the drapery from her left wrist; her 
 right hand held the tongs midway. Deliberately Zoe 
 laid the coal on her bare wrist, just where the blue veins 
 came nearest the surface. For a moment she held it un- 
 wincingly there. Jim's movement of protest checked it- 
 self halfway. The sharp odour of burning flesh came to 
 his nostrils. 
 
 Again she leaned forward, and groped with her tongs. 
 With an alacrity that left no time for volition, Jim held 
 out his own wrist ; a moment later a thin trail of pungent 
 blue smoke ascended from it. 
 
 The tongs dropped clattering from Zoe's hand. Jim 
 put his arms about her, and drew her up to him. For 
 an instant they stood together so, knee to knee, heart to 
 heart, lip to lip. Then she seemed to droop against him ; 
 and as she drooped she drew him. 
 
 She drew him away from the hearth where the tongs 
 had fallen, out of the defiled cabin, on and on, into the 
 spot on shipboard where he had never been. Or did he 
 draw her? In spite of the surges and the lightning, 
 Jim's mind had been clear enough up to this point; but 
 always afterward there was a haziness about those later 
 details of his strange barbaric nuptials.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS 
 
 A STRANGE thing curiously sought may still be 
 strange when we come upon it ; but a strange thing 
 that has made itself our own may be at length life's 
 sweetest and most familiar possession. 
 
 Nothing surely could be stranger than for a young 
 man like Jim Whittaker, born, bred and colleged in the 
 most accepted and, to his judgment as well as that of his 
 elders, quite the best way, a young man very rational, 
 very collected, and even a little tepid, than to be thus 
 floating about the Antarctic on a derelict ship as the 
 lover of Zoe Lenox. Yet to Whittaker, so floating, it 
 seemed that this was the one thing he had been born, 
 bred, and colleged to do. He blessed the very rationality 
 and collectedness that enabled him to focus so on this; 
 he blessed even the tepidity that had kept him out of 
 minor scrapes, and allowed him to go thus virgin and 
 whole-heartedly into a scrape that was so mightily worth 
 while. 
 
 His curious position never troubled or baffled him. 
 What did trouble him sometimes, and what baffled him 
 when he tried to bring his focussed rationality to bear, 
 was something in Zoe herself. It was a fierceness of 
 passion which sometimes bewildered and sometimes 
 almost frightened him. There was passion enough in 
 his own love, to be sure; yet if he had fallen some little 
 behind her, he would not have been surprised. After 
 
 128
 
 JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS 129 
 
 all Jim Whittaker was a slow and gentle individual, 
 who would perhaps three-quarters of the time rather 
 dream a passion than act it out. But Zoe's stormy out- 
 bursts, her sudden drawings back and quick renewals, 
 her coming at him fairly, sometimes, as if she had but 
 this moment of eternity in which to love him, and must 
 in mere greed and pressure eat him up all this left Jim 
 rather stunned. He had to remind himself very ration- 
 ally whose daughter she was, and what an autocrat her 
 training had made her, and how unusual were the cir- 
 cumstances of this love of theirs. At these moments it 
 was recalled to him that he had originally considered Zoe 
 Lenox a hanger-back from life. 
 
 Another thing that came to him sometimes in the 
 same pallid intellectual way was the fact that he might 
 have minded the situation on board the Helga, that he 
 ought rather to have minded it. But he didn't seem to. 
 As day followed day, he came nearer to rescue, or death ; 
 and he knew it. But he had no enthusiasm to spare for 
 that knowledge, no fear, nothing that would lend it col- 
 our and transform it into a breathing fact of his life. He 
 wasn't consciously courageous; if things had been but 
 a very little different, he might have been consciously 
 cowardly. As it was, the mere life and death issue left 
 him simply indifferent. 
 
 It may have been that some actual deep-rooted phi- 
 losophy came to Jim's aid. Of course, we pass most of 
 our life in ignoring the inevitable end of the bright hu- 
 man comedy; and perhaps Jim may have rested now in 
 his perception that he was no nearer the actual end at 
 present than on many a day when he had gone from his 
 own flat to his office, and dined at a friend's, and so 
 back in quietness to his own bed. But it is more likely 
 that he didn't worry about drowning or freezing because
 
 130 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 there was more danger of his being suffocated by the 
 woman Zoe. And he was mad about her; and no hu- 
 man soul admits the sway of two ruling passions at the 
 same time. 
 
 His madness had every chance to prove itself, and 
 even to perceive in the woman a hint of true greatness, 
 as distinguished from the mere trappings of greatness, 
 from beauty and fortune. For days came when food 
 was very short, and even fuel threatened to give out. 
 The grey Antarctic tossed to a bare horizon, with noth- 
 ing but ice to break the monotony. Jim and Zoe, fur- 
 wrapped and wan, sat in the cabin, huddled over a miser- 
 able bit of fire ; or shoulder to shoulder they would walk 
 the deck, and stop to look out over the wilderness of 
 water, and then walk again. By the greying of Zoe's 
 face Jim measured the greying of his own. But her 
 greyness was as eloquent as if she had assumed it only 
 for the purpose of eloquence; and her essential golden- 
 ness made vibrant for him the vast silences of the Ant- 
 arctic. 
 
 It was final proof of Jim's state that he felt consist- 
 ently as if he and Zoe were the only souls on board the 
 Helga. Jim was by nature neither callous nor cruel; 
 yet in the midst of these endangered lives he couldn't 
 recognise anybody but himself and his adored one as 
 living at all. He passed the captain and the mate with 
 oblivious eyes; if he spared them a thought, it was that 
 in the present peril they were probably eyeless for him, 
 too. 
 
 Mr. Masterson, indeed, was as good as eyeless a great 
 part of the time now. It had always been rather more 
 than suspected that he was a hard drinker on shore; 
 but except for the hint he had given the evening the 
 Helga sailed, his conduct on shipboard had always, so
 
 JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS 131 
 
 far as was known, been exemplary. But in these dark 
 days he drew steadily on some private store of whiskey : 
 and the only contrast he showed to being drunk was 
 when he was drunker. It is proof of what had become 
 of the ship's discipline that his transgression was winked 
 at. In general, to be sure, he was quiet enough, and 
 only slightly more saturnine than usual; but sometimes 
 his intoxication took the form of a sort of staring rude- 
 ness toward Zoe. Once Jim called her attention to it; 
 but Zoe only said quietly, "You can't blame him, Jim. 
 And I don't mind." 
 
 So Masterson's conduct went in with the other things 
 that Jim didn't mention. Among them was the posi- 
 tion of the Helga. She had drifted, of late, rather to- 
 ward the north: a circumstance which, to Jim's mind, 
 decreased the probability of the ship's being crushed 
 among ice-floes, and therefore increased the likelihood 
 of their all starving. One might have hoped for an end 
 a trifle less protracted ; and yet to them in their various 
 sorts of intoxication perhaps even starvation would 
 seem to go fearfully fast. 
 
 One day, when he was rather less drunk than usual, 
 Mr. Masterson fell on the deck and broke his leg. Zoe's 
 maid, who had been in a sickening funk for weeks, 
 somewhere in the penumbra of Jim's consciousness, came 
 suddenly and sharply into the limelight. She set the 
 leg, with the assistance of one of the crew. Zoe found 
 the bandages and handed them; she looked admiringly 
 on as those ape-like black paws went about their work. 
 Jim felt a childish jealousy of those hands and the ad- 
 miration they evoked in Zoe. He said as much to her 
 as she turned away; he wished that a liberal education 
 had included the art of bone-setting. 
 
 Zoe smiled in appreciation, and said sweetly, "If you
 
 132 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 would really like to do something, suppose you sit be- 
 side him for a while and see if he wants anything." 
 
 A few minutes later Jim was actually alone with the 
 mate. Masterson lay with closed eyes, asleep or ex- 
 hausted; his little cabin was very, very quiet. Jim ex- 
 amined the contents of the book-shelf, a scanty nautical 
 collection that could not interest him. Then he turned 
 to some photographs that were tacked up nearby. One 
 picture showed a placid English countryside, one a fine 
 English family, father, mother, shy sister, and three 
 tall sons, of whom this present Masterson was the tall- 
 est. The pictured face was young, and handsome and 
 proud ; but it showed a trace of the sullenness which had 
 evidently developed later. Jim turned to look at the 
 original in the berth, and it seemed to him wan and piti- 
 ful. He stooped over the recumbent man; but as he 
 stooped a faint smell of alcohol reached his nostrils. 
 Disgusted, Jim snatched a book and sat down. 
 
 He looked up once, with some idea of searching for 
 concealed whiskey bottles; but Masterson's helplessness 
 forbade. You couldn't take advantage of a man so pat- 
 ently down, even for the man's own good. Jim returned 
 doggedly to his book, which was a treatise on naviga- 
 tion, and not particularly distracting to his thoughts. 
 
 It must have been an hour later that he looked up 
 suddenly, to find Mr. Masterson's eyes on him. Jim 
 nodded cheerfully. "Want anything?" he asked. 
 
 The sick man did not reply. He continued to look, 
 unmoving, unwinking, until his steady stare made Jim 
 uncomfortable. Jim got up and restored his book to its 
 place; he bent over Masterson, and rearranged the bed- 
 clothes. Before that unwinking stare he felt as if he 
 were ministering to a corpse. 
 
 Suddenly the corpse stirred under his hands ; the tense
 
 JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS 133 
 
 lips opened and spoke. "She loves you," said Mr. Mas- 
 terson. 
 
 "What?" asked Jim, not believing his ears. 
 
 "She loves you," repeated Masterson, slowly and rea- 
 sonably, even with manifest patience. 
 
 Jim looked hard at him ; but this was neither delirium 
 nor alcoholism. "Better keep quiet," he advised. 
 
 "Quiet!" Masterson's voice was still low, but it 
 seemed to penetrate to every corner of the room, and 
 then echo back to Jim's ears. 
 
 "Quiet!" said Masterson again. "Do you think any 
 man can be near Zoe Lenox and then ever be quiet after- 
 ward?" 
 
 "Don't think about her now," urged Jim soothingly. 
 
 "Don't think about her? I'm not thinking about her; 
 I don't have to think about her. She's in me in me." 
 Masterson raised himself on one elbow, hurt his leg, and 
 fell back groaning; drops of perspiration came out on his 
 forehead. "I sailed with her a few cruises, she said 
 half-a-dozen sentences to me in all that time, and I'm 
 done for," he groaned. "I never used to drink, and I'm 
 never sober any more ; I'll drink myself to death, I sup- 
 pose, if I don't do worse. Anything to forget for a mo- 
 ment her damned white face, her eyes that look as if 
 she could love you, would love you, wanted to love you, 
 when all the time she's cold, cold, cold." 
 
 Jim wanted to tell him to stop ; but he hung fascinated 
 on the man's rapid, bitter words. "Why should any man 
 love her, the harpy?" Masterson swept on. "It's only 
 an accident that any one loves her. But men do men 
 do. And the lucky ones, those in her own class, interest 
 her for a time; she warms herself on them. But she's 
 too superior even to sell out to them. Up to now and
 
 134 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 now she falls in love with you." He took Jim in with a 
 scornful glance. 
 
 Jim smiled. "That is hard to understand," he mur- 
 mured. 
 
 Masterson was a little disarmed. He stirred in his 
 berth and muttered, "Well, live up to her if you can. 
 And keep her, or she'll turn to poison in your blood." 
 His eyes closed ; he looked suddenly quite spent. "Give 
 me a drink," he gasped. 
 
 A moment later Masterson was again lying with closed 
 eyes; and Jim watched beside him in silence. It seemed 
 to him as if after that revelation something farther 
 must be said; standing so, that curious burst of talk 
 meant nothing, and even accused Jim of a certain cad- 
 dishness in having listened to it. But of course the true 
 explanation was that it actually did mean nothing. Mas- 
 terson was evidently the victim of a ridiculous passion 
 for Zoe; and his hopelessness, and his whiskey, and the 
 nervous shock of his fall, had combined to make him say 
 things that hadn't any meaning, or any bearing. 
 
 Jim Grayed with Masterson until dinner-time; the sick 
 man neither moved nor spoke again. "How did you 
 leave your patient ?" asked Zoe when he joined her. 
 
 "Oh, he talked a little; he's quiet now," said Jim. 
 
 They sat down to a dinner still served with some show 
 of order, but exiguous. Zoe didn't eat anything, hadn't 
 eaten for days. Jim still kept his appetite; but to-night 
 he found himself inclined to palter with his food. Some- 
 how, there was something different in the atmosphere. 
 And yet Zoe was as golden as ever, as vibrant as she 
 had only lately, apparently, learned how to be. Well, 
 if his peace was a bit disturbed, probably he should get 
 it back some time, as good as ever. His peace ? Well, 
 yes ; he might almost call it that, this element so blended,
 
 JIM SIGHTS UNWELCOME FACTS 135 
 
 compounded, so warm and exquisite, this insulating 
 medium wherein he had come to float so freely. He cer- 
 tainly might call it peace, for ever so slight a disturbance 
 in its delicate balance made him feel as he was feeling 
 to-night. 
 
 "Are you pensive, Jim?" asked Zoe when they were 
 alone after dinner. 
 
 "Pensive, a bit," he answered. 
 
 She drew him to the settle, and established herself 
 with her head against his shoulder. "Light a cigarette," 
 she commanded. "There, that's better." 
 
 "Zoe," asked Jim as he smoked, "what ever made you 
 admit that you loved me?" 
 
 She laughed. "You are the slowest man ever born, 
 Jimmie," she said. "Here we've loved each other for 
 weeks and weeks, and you've never asked that sort of 
 question before." 
 
 "Well, a fact is usually enough for me," he explained. 
 "But I have wondered, if I haven't spoken." 
 
 "Go on wondering," she suggested lazily. "Or ex- 
 plain it to suit yourself; one explanation is exactly as 
 good as another." 
 
 There was wisdom in that ; and her exquisite nearness 
 was not favourable to argument. Jim rested his cheek 
 against her hair, and was quiet. And presently her voice 
 seemed to come to him from a distance, faint and sweet 
 and mellow. "I never thought that this would happen to 
 me, Jim; I never thought it would happen to me." 
 
 So she denied her own superiority; so she admitted 
 that when he stood on the threshold of things, she stood 
 on the threshold with him. Jim closed his eyes. Again 
 that golden voice came to his ears. 
 
 "I went on so long, you see, playing at love. Such 
 years and years, without finding the real thing. I didn't
 
 136 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 believe there was such a thing; and if there was, I didn't 
 half want to find it. I was so sure of myself, Jim." 
 
 "Aren't you sure of yourself now?" It was Jim's 
 own voice which asked the question. 
 
 "I shall never be sure of myself again," she whis- 
 pered. 
 
 They did not speak again until they rose from the 
 settle. Then Zoe, looking up at the big painting of her 
 father Jim did not follow her gaze, he was watching 
 the adorable long lines of her throat said softly, "If 
 the Helga should actually founder, or if we should un- 
 accountably starve, I think I shall cut Daddy's picture 
 out of the frame, and have it with me at the last." 
 
 "I think you will not," said Jim calmly. "You will 
 have me with you; one man is enough." 
 
 "Of course," said Zoe carelessly, "it won't ever come 
 to an extremity." 
 
 "Of course not," Jim answered. "But when it does, 
 Zoe, remember what I am telling you."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 "THERE COMES AN END TO SUMMER" 
 
 WITH an eagerness that surprised himself, and was 
 certainly half dread, Jim went the next day to 
 sit with Masterson. It seemed impossible that the sick 
 man, having made his one revelation, should not make 
 another. Exactly what he had revealed Jim couldn't 
 have said or perhaps didn't want to think. But there 
 was undeniably some interest in the prospect that Mas- 
 terson might talk; and if he did, Jim knew that he him- 
 self would listen. 
 
 But Masterson lay with closed eyes, apparently asleep, 
 although Jim knew that he was not asleep. Once he 
 asked for a drink ; and as Jim gave it to him their eyes 
 met briefly. 
 
 "Thank you," said Masterson, almost as if he alluded 
 to more than the water. 
 
 "You are welcome," said Jim. 
 
 Their dialogue was over for the day. 
 
 Jim went to sit with the sick man the next day, and 
 again the next. His doing so compelled him to leave 
 Zoe alone for some part of every afternoon, but Zoe 
 bade him go. The hour's absence made coming to- 
 gether doubly sweet; incidentally, perhaps, she showed 
 that she didn't care what he might hear from a third 
 person. But in her comment she went no farther than 
 to say, "You and Masterson are getting to be great 
 pals." 
 
 137
 
 138 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Hardly that," responded Jim. 
 
 They weren't pals at all, in fact ; and yet it seemed to 
 Jim that they ought to be. They had discussed Zoe 
 Lenox; and their discussion was either a bond or an 
 indiscretion. It should have made them either friends 
 or enemies, instead of leaving them just as it found 
 them. Possibly though Masterson didn't even recall 
 ever having taken part in such a conversation: that ex- 
 planation Jim liked the least of the three. 
 
 A second staring moment of revelation finally came, 
 after Jim had given up expecting anything of the sort. 
 Masterson caught his eye one day, and remarked casu- 
 ally, "We're going down some day, you know." 
 
 "Eh?" Jim was startled. 
 
 "We're going to drown, if we don't starve first. There 
 is not," said Masterson, "a chance in a thousand of our 
 being rescued." 
 
 "Are you mathematically exact?" asked Jim. 
 "Mayn't there even be a chance in a hundred ? So long 
 as there is even that, I shall cling to it, you know." 
 
 "You needn't. And you're a fool if you do. Pray to 
 die with her in your arms; that's the best thing that can 
 happen to you." 
 
 This was little enough, in all conscience ; but that same 
 evening Masterson managed to find a bottle, and got 
 very drunk; and Jim shivered under Zoe's caresses. 
 
 His shivering seemed to date from that time; for all 
 at once his lulled senses awakened, his raw nerves 
 quivered to the horrors about him. The days of actual 
 grinding misery were upon them now. Food had in 
 serious earnest begun to give out; worse than lack of 
 food, even for the sorriest soul on board, was the mad- 
 dening monotony of waiting for their fate. Masterson 
 lay in his berth, a grim hulk of a man ; the captain slunk
 
 "THERE COMES AN END- TO SUMMER" 139 
 
 mournfully about, and made silly needless allusions to 
 his daughters back in the States. The crew played cards, 
 and slept, and quarrelled suddenly and fiercely about 
 nothing. The steward, sunk to a grey pallor, let dust 
 gather in the tea-cups; the maid Anna, glimpsed now 
 and then, shivered and chattered as if in an ague. Only 
 Zoe preserved her calm. 
 
 It was more than calm, indeed, that she preserved; 
 it was always with joy that she turned to Jim. But Jim 
 had reached the point where he couldn't meet her with 
 a reciprocal joy. The situation had at last settled down 
 on him. Insufficient food, steady damp and cold, the 
 emotional strain he had so long been under, all united 
 with the essential horror of his surroundings to produce 
 in him a sick disgust. 
 
 In that disgust he made his connection with what lay 
 before him : he realised at last that he was going to die. 
 To die, here on a stranded ship in the grey Antarctic ; to 
 float, perhaps for years thereafter, in a ship full of 
 corpses; to be himself an unburied corpse, loathsome, 
 pestilential. To die, he, Jim Whittaker, who should 
 have had half his life before him, who had been born 
 and trained and ministered to there in the kindly North 
 in order that he might live. Not death in the abstract 
 faced him; he was confronted with the immediacy of 
 Jim Whittaker's death. The idea made sick his civi- 
 lised soul; it poisoned the little of life that remained to 
 him. 
 
 It didn't poison Zoe's days or nights ; it stimulated her, 
 rather, to get the most out of them. Was it that a 
 powerful stimulus was necessary to awaken her, and was 
 here hideously but effectively supplied? Or was it that 
 she was woman enough to wrap herself in her illusions, 
 and dare biting reality to do its worst? Whatever the
 
 140 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 reason, the fact remained. Zoe, who had hung back so 
 coldly when all of life was offered her, accepted these 
 few parched pinched days as a priceless gift, and sang 
 her way through them. "To die," was Jim's burden ; "to 
 die with you," Zoe's carol. 
 
 Jim might have felt rebuked, like a coward in the 
 presence of courage; but he didn't. She exasperated 
 him. After all, he was a man, and wanted to live like 
 one. He was a man in love, and he wanted to possess 
 his love in life: to take her hand in his, and step boldly 
 forth, and conquer. In the present situation he could 
 keep from crying out ; but he couldn't keep from resent- 
 ing the idea of early and grim death. Zoe, he could not 
 help feeling, would rather die with him than live with 
 him. 
 
 Yet she was magnificent in these days. Grimly he 
 found himself admitting that she fairly bore the situa- 
 tion for both of them. She was graceful, indomitable, 
 gay. Her superb body was his for his consolation or 
 for his diversion. For him her mind opened during 
 these days like a golden flower with thrice-pure gold at 
 the heart of it. To beguile the moments he gave so 
 grudgingly, she had ransacked the ages, spoiled the 
 climes. The tropics had yielded their nature and Eu- 
 rope its art, Dan Lenox had loved and lost, and Grand 
 Dukes had pursued and been baffled, in order that Zoe 
 might offer Jim Whittaker the distraction he accepted 
 so sulkily. 
 
 It wasn't that Zoe didn't suffer physically from the 
 hardships that were now coming thick upon them. She 
 would allow herself to fare no better than the rest of 
 them; and privation and strain were working their will 
 with her. Her cheeks had flattened, her long hands were 
 meagre and transparent; her clothes hung loosely about
 
 "THERE COMES AN END TO SUMMER" 141 
 
 her. The fine pure lines of her face were clearer than 
 ever, though, and what she had lost in superbness she 
 had more than made up in the translucence which let 
 escape the inner, light. 
 
 One especially dreary afternoon the two of them had 
 gone into her stateroom. The early splendours of the 
 room were a little tarnished, its white curtains not so 
 white, its chintz curtains not so gay; but for Jim the 
 room had never lost its special sanctity. He always 
 breathed quicker on its threshold. Perhaps Zoe had that 
 in mind when she drew him thither ; for in these days he 
 taxed her every resource. 
 
 Wrapped in her fur coat, which like the room had 
 suffered a little lately, Zoe established herself in her 
 chaise longue. Jim sat beside her, where he could touch 
 her hand without moving. With her head turned to- 
 ward him, and resting against the chair-back, she talked 
 for a long time, gaily enough. At first she talked about 
 the two of them ; and before that topic threatened break- 
 ers, she shifted easily to painting, and collections of pic- 
 tures. If she had been an artist at all it was a painter 
 she would have chosen to be. If one could choose among 
 them, painting was the most interesting of the arts 
 didn't Jim think so? It sprouted so immediately from 
 the tips of the fingers perhaps that was why. Zoe 
 held up her own hand, as if she expected actually to see 
 sprouts coming; she smiled at her own childishness, and 
 dropped it. 
 
 You couldn't learn anything about an art, she went 
 on, simply by looking at it, even if you looked ever so 
 long. Whistler was right about that, of course, and 
 Ruskin was wrong. Only Zoe believed that there were 
 occasional people who simply by some force that was in
 
 142 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 them mounted to the comprehension of an art they 
 couldn't practise. Her Daddy was such a person, and 
 she had known one or two others who were so in lessej 
 degree. But they didn't learn about art by looking at 
 it or by living with it. They just knew; they were 
 born so. 
 
 Jim listened to her with outward attentiveness and 
 inward apathy. He couldn't deny her magnificence; 
 but he felt oddly annoyed that it should be displayed 
 toward him. Why must she be gay for him ? He wasn't 
 gay. And what were Whistler and Ruskin to him ; and 
 what above all was Dan Lenox Dan Lenox, who always 
 came into his daughter's conversation to clinch things? 
 
 She wasn't assuming anything, though; or if she were, 
 her assumptions were so one with her that she was still 
 perfectly natural. For when she tired of her own 
 gaiety, she dropped it, and went off into a long silence. 
 And then presently she grew sleepy. She did fight off 
 sleep, but it gained upon her; and finally with a little 
 apologetic smile she succumbed, and her eyes closed. 
 Just as she was, with her head resting against her chair- 
 back, she slept. 
 
 Jim sat watching her as she slept ; and his antagonism 
 melted. In her sleep there was always to his eye some- 
 thing pathetic about her: the natural woman in the 
 ascendant, helpless and off her guard. He stooped and 
 kissed the hand that lay near him. Through her sleep 
 Zoe seemed to feel his kiss: she stirred a little, and 
 smiled. 
 
 As darkness gathered they sat so; and gradually a 
 curious happiness came over Jim. She was so perfectly 
 his, here in the quiet and the dusk; and to have her his 
 like this was better than to have the tribute of her mag- 
 nificence, was better even than to have her his before the
 
 "THERE COMES AN END TO SUMMER" 143 
 
 world. Jim possessed himself of her hand; then he sat 
 very still, so that he might not disturb her. 
 
 He must himself have dozed as he sat there. He was 
 awakened by having her hand withdrawn from his; she 
 had started to her feet, and was standing in the middle 
 of the room. "What's that?" she asked breathlessly. 
 "What's that?" 
 
 Jim couldn't tell her what it was, but his ear detected 
 it, too. There seemed to be noise, confusion, a bustle 
 such as had not for a long time resounded in that death- 
 like ship. Then there was an actual, unmistakable knock 
 at the state-room door. Zoe answered it. 
 
 Through the opening of the door came the voice of 
 the pale steward, curiously vibrant. "Captain asked me to 
 tell you, Miss Lenox, that a ship has been sighted, and 
 is putting off a boat to us." 
 
 "Thank you," said Zoe. "Tell the captain I am com- 
 ing on deck at once." 
 
 She closed the door quickly, and reeled against it, half 
 fainting. Jim ran forward to catch her; and for a min- 
 ute she leaned heavily on him. Then she seemed to re- 
 cover: her breath came regularly once more, and her 
 limbs regained their strength. 
 
 But Jim didn't let her go. Renewed life had just 
 been proclaimed to him; and he seized it as new life to 
 live with Zoe. If they stood so for a moment, in that 
 moment they dedicated the new life. Zoe must feel 
 that as readily as he. 
 
 It was dim enough in the cabin, but Jim could see 
 her. At first, to be sure, he didn't look at her; but he 
 held her to him, so that her heart seemed almost to beat 
 in his own side. Then he did look around, and with a 
 long breath released her. For Zoe was looking at him
 
 144 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 in white horror, as if it were a stranger who had thus 
 impiously strained her to him. 
 
 Jim pressed his hands for a moment over his eyes. 
 Of course, he had been a fool to urge himself upon her 
 just at this moment, when her nerves were still quivering 
 with the shock of surprise. He waited until he could 
 speak quite calmly to her; then he asked, "Shan't we go 
 on deck?" 
 
 She had slipped out of her coat when she answered 
 the door. He found the coat on her chair, and enveloped 
 her in it; he opened the door for her, and followed her 
 on deck. 
 
 The captain and crew were grouped near the rail, 
 watching the approach of the boat that was bringing them 
 their deliverance. Masterson had somehow hobbled out 
 to them; and directly under the light was Zoe's maid, 
 with tears drying white upon her gnome-like visage. A 
 little group rescued from the shadow of imminent death, 
 huddling there to watch life come toward them : it was, 
 Jim knew, a group pathetic, eloquent, symbolic. But he 
 didn't feel its symbolism just yet ; he was watching Zoe. 
 
 The group parted to let her in; she took her place 
 beside the captain. She seemed to ask him two or three 
 questions; at the last answer she nodded. Then she 
 stood perfectly quiet while he interchanged words with 
 the boat which had now pulled alongside. Suddenly she 
 herself leaned forward and called over the rail. "That 
 will do very well," she said. "My maid and I will come 
 aboard, and you may take the Helga in tow." 
 
 She started back toward her stateroom; on the way 
 Jim intercepted her. "Am I to stay on board the 
 Helga?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes, if you like," she answered hastily. "There will 
 be things sent over to make you comfortable."
 
 "THERE COMES AN END TO SUMMER" 145 
 
 "I like the Helga well enough; but how do you sup- 
 pose I am going to be comfortable with a towing rope 
 and some yards, of ocean between you and me?" he 
 wanted to know. 
 
 "I'm worn out. I'm going aboard the Polyphemia, 
 and going to bed," she informed him. She kept her 
 eyes fixed on his neck-tie. "I shall see you again later, 
 Jim." 
 
 What she said was reasonable enough; and Jim made 
 up his mind that it was no time to be impatient just 
 when their lease of life had been renewed. "You'll 
 bid me good-night before you go?" he asked. 
 
 "Good-night now," she said. Her hand was laid for 
 a moment in his, and then withdrawn; it was ice-cold, 
 and gave to his fingers no answering pressure. The door 
 of her stateroom, which half an hour before had been 
 Jim's sanctuary as well, closed ruthlessly in his face. 
 
 Jim lingered on deck, waiting to see her actually start. 
 He enjoined patience upon himself, and consideration; 
 he even took to scolding himself sharply, to conceal from 
 himself the fact that he was damnably low in his mind. 
 A man who had just been rescued from imminent peril 
 of death ought not in mere decency to feel as Jim was 
 feeling. And as for Zoe's conduct, Zoe herself un- 
 doubtedly knew best how to regulate that. The eyes of 
 the outside world were again upon them : any woman 
 not a fool would show some deference to that fact. 
 
 But of course so lately the eyes of the world had not 
 been upon them. He had had her all to himself; natu- 
 rally he resented not having her so now. Yes, and when 
 he had had her all to himself, how had he appreciated 
 her and her splendour? Hadn't he been impatient and 
 unhappy all the time lately, worrying about himself and 
 his bereaved appetite and his precious neck instead of
 
 146 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 resting in his love for her? He had an impulse to abase 
 himself and beg her pardon, to throw himself on his 
 knees before her stateroom door, and let her walk on 
 him when she crossed the threshold yes, and then to 
 get up and follow her on board the Polyphemia. 
 
 After the lapse of some aeons Zoe came on deck, fol- 
 lowed by her maid with two valises. She herself carried 
 a dressing-case, and wore a little close hat which hid 
 most of her hair. He had not seen her in a hat for a 
 long time ; so framed, her face looked strange and alien. 
 Jim stepped toward her and took her dressing-case; 
 across their hands their eyes met. Her gaze, too, was 
 alien. She kept up a splendid front; Jim couldn't help 
 admiring it. Only just now, when the eye of the world 
 blinked a bit, she might for a second have let him see 
 not that this splendid front wasn't the real thing, he 
 knew that it wasn't the real thing but that she herself 
 knew it wasn't. Doubtless, though, she was wiser not 
 to. Jim felt that he was on the brink of some sort of 
 demonstration; at a sign from her, he might have been 
 guilty of any pointless folly. 
 
 As it was, he saw the armoured young woman aboard 
 the Polyphemia's boat, and was guilty of nothing worse 
 than waving his hand to her as it put off. She inclined 
 her head gravely in reply ; and under his breath he cursed 
 her furious propriety. It was of very recent birth: as 
 Jim turned away from the rail he was guilty of hugging 
 to himself the memory of her late passionate excesses 
 things, by George, that he hadn't been able to come up to. 
 
 And then suddenly he realised that she was no longer 
 here. He was here, and Zoe had gone. The Helga was 
 no better than an empty ship. If he could but have got 
 her back, he would have been grateful just then even 
 for her propriety.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 IN TOW 
 
 T T NABLE to face the prospect of that first evening 
 ^ alone, Jim had gone after dinner to sit with Mas- 
 terson. Masterson was perfectly sober; but for once in 
 his life he was talkative. He had gathered a good deal 
 of information in a very short time, and he made Jim 
 the recipient of it. 
 
 "The Polyphemia was hardly out of her course," he 
 said as they sat smoking. "The fact is, we have been 
 drifting toward the ordinary path of navigation all the 
 time lately; but I don't think the captain has known it." 
 
 "He has been in rather a funk, I suppose," said Jim, 
 "but I thought a sailor " 
 
 "He isn't a sailor anyhow," said Masterson remorse- 
 lessly. "I'll grant he looks like one, and he can talk 
 like one. There's an agreeable smack of the old salt 
 in his conversation that fits him for just such a place as 
 the captaincy of a rich man's yacht. It's on his conver- 
 sation and his looks that he is hired. To tell you the 
 truth, I'm surprised that Miss Lenox has put up with 
 him as long as she has. She isn't an ordinary million- 
 aire; she ought to know better." 
 
 "Perhaps," suggested Jim, slowly refilling his pipe, 
 "Miss Lenox has rather relied on your seamanship, all 
 along." 
 
 Masterson flushed, and threw Jim a searching look. 
 Jim reached for a match. "Masterson," he said, "why 
 
 147
 
 148 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 don't you pull up? A drunken sailor on land is no- 
 body's business; but a drunken sailor on shipboard is 
 bound straight for hell." 
 
 "Wait until you're in the same boat that I am; then 
 perhaps you can preach," said Masterson sulkily. 
 
 "When I am in the same boat that you are, perhaps I 
 shall do very much worse than you are doing," said 
 Jim steadily. "That isn't the point. The point is that 
 you can do a great deal better." 
 
 "What do you want me to do? Turn parson?" sug- 
 gested Masterson. 
 
 "No," said Jim. "Don't leave the sea. It's your 
 proper livelihood, and I suspect that all in all it's the 
 best life for you. But leave the Helga." 
 
 "Oh, that's the answer, is it?" 
 
 "Yes, that's the answer. The Helga isn't a healthy 
 place for you." 
 
 "Has it been for you?" Masterson let fly at him, and 
 then added hastily, "I beg your pardon, Mr. Whittaker ; 
 I didn't mean to say that. What you said to me made 
 me writhe." 
 
 "Go ahead; writhe all you like," said Jim quietly. "I 
 don't in the least mind what you may happen to say as 
 you writhe. You would better take my advice; but I 
 don't expect you to be grateful for it. It isn't necessary, 
 or usual, to be grateful for anything so bitter." 
 
 Masterson flung his arm up over his eyes. "To ship 
 in some freight boat, and work hard and long, and be 
 a man once more I should like that," he said dream- 
 ily, as if he were talking to himself. "But never to see 
 
 the Helga again " His mouth contracted in a 
 
 swift spasm of pain. 
 
 "You will leave the Helga, though. You can, you 
 will," asserted Jim.
 
 IN TOW 149 
 
 "You will help me if I do?" asked Masterson, sitting 
 up suddenly. 
 
 "Of course, if I can do anything," said Jim simply. 
 
 Masterson smiled at him, smiled as if he liked him. 
 That was notable, for one didn't expect Masterson to 
 like anybody. But was there not in the smile a subtle 
 hint of irony? Well, what if there were? Jim felt no 
 inclination to resent irony; and he knew well enough 
 that he was in no position to do so had he felt the in- 
 clination. 
 
 The talk turned to indifferent matters, and the two 
 men sat long together. When they separated Jim went 
 to lean on the rail and watch the Polyphemia steaming 
 on ahead. Her indistinct bulk loomed up with a cer- 
 tain majesty. It pleased him to attribute the majesty, 
 not to favouring darkness, but to the ship's conscious- 
 ness of what she carried; for doubtless under ordinary 
 circumstances the Polyphemia beside the Helga would 
 have looked as the Polyphemia's captain's wife, if he 
 had a wife, might have looked beside Zoe Lenox. 
 
 Next morning the Polyphemia stood forth indeed in 
 daylight as dumpy and inelegant, built for strength and 
 utility rather than for speed and show. She was no 
 swallow, to skim the waves as had the Helga; and her 
 tow made her slower than usual. To men who had been 
 drifting as long as had the crew of the Helga, however, 
 her sturdy progress may have seemed swift enough. 
 
 But to Jim Whittaker it seemed that she endlessly 
 crawled. He might have derived an impatient pleasure 
 from looking ahead to the end of this voyage; but for 
 some reason he couldn't look ahead. He looked back 
 instead at those days that he and Zoe had spent together 
 under the fear of death their quite ridiculous fear, ac- 
 cording to what Masterson now told Jim. Jim envied
 
 150 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 himself under the shadow of his fear, ridiculous or well- 
 founded, it didn't matter. He had fallen, to be sure, 
 far below the level of a cloud-compeller then ; but it was 
 now that he was actually desolate. He told himself 
 that this curious desolation was merely the aching of 
 his senses for the stimulus now denied them; but he 
 did not for one second believe his own explanation. 
 He felt as if something had been permanently withdrawn 
 from his life; and that something was what he could 
 the least in the world afford to lose. 
 
 He would have been immensely consoled, to be sure, 
 by a mere glimpse of Zoe. A hundred times a day he 
 found himself at the rail, watching the Polyphemia, 
 waiting for Zoe to appear and wave her hand to him. 
 But she never did appear; he had never so much as a 
 glimpse of her. And after standing there until he could 
 not make excuses to himself for waiting any longer, 
 he would turn away, and go back to his pretence of oc- 
 cupation somewhere else. 
 
 The fact that he never saw her at all grew presently 
 to have rather an immediate significance. Jim recalled 
 her increasing thinness in their last days together, her 
 lack of appetite, her loss of sleep. He decided that she 
 was sick. She must be sick. He couldn't imagine Zoe 
 sick ; the splendour of her physique would seem to guar- 
 antee her even against mortality. But of course she was 
 mortal ; and of course she might be sick ; and surely that 
 supposition accounted better than anything else for her 
 having so cut herself off from his sight. 
 
 Jim fumed endlessly about the deck, now once more 
 kept clean; he glowered savagely at the pale steward, 
 who served his solitary meals in the blue cabin. Event- 
 ually he took to eating with the captain and the mate. 
 Masterson was now able to limp about the ship, with
 
 IN TOW 151 
 
 the help of a cane. He was as taciturn as he had ever 
 been; he seemed to grudge opening his mouth even to 
 put food in it. They would have made a gloomy trio 
 had it not been for the captain, who had recovered his 
 tone of the cheery old salt, and looked forward gar- 
 rulously to seeing his daughters in the States. 
 
 In the course of a few days the steward went to the 
 Polyphemia for provisions. On his return Jim asked 
 casually whether he had seen Miss Lenox. The steward 
 answered that he had not ; he added that they told him 
 on the Polyphemia that she had been keeping her berth. 
 The steward's manner was on the surface as respectful 
 as ever; but in his eye there was the ghost of a pale 
 smirk. Jim would have liked to hit him; afterward he 
 wondered if it mightn't have been better for all con- 
 cerned if he actually had hit him. 
 
 His idea that Zoe might be sick, thus strongly con- 
 firmed, began to torture him. She was sick, and alone, 
 except for that black beast he thus described the faith- 
 ful Anna. Jim himself ought to be with her; or at least 
 he ought to see her. It was no more than decent for 
 him to try to see her; and if she didn't want to see him, 
 let the refusal come from her. 
 
 There were practical difficulties in his way. He 
 didn't quite know how he was to reach the Polyphemia ; 
 he didn't particularly care to emphasise, in the minds of 
 those on board the Polyphemia, that the Helga carried 
 a man passenger. But he knew from the day of the 
 steward's visit that he should try to see Zoe ; it was only 
 a question of waiting until his inward irritation increased 
 to such a point that it forced him to action. 
 
 What it forced him to first of all was laying his 
 dilemma before Masterson. He didn't like to show his 
 abject state where he had just been preaching self-con-
 
 152 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 trol; but he had got to the point where scruples simply 
 didn't weigh. 
 
 Masterson took his revelation without comment, con- 
 sidered for a moment, and then brought out, "You 
 could wear one of my uniforms, couldn't you? We are 
 about the same size." 
 
 Jim stared at him. Masterson went on, "You might, 
 you know, go aboard the Polyphemia as the Helga's 
 mate. You could ask to see Miss Lenox on business." 
 
 It sounded very fantastic; the fantasy in this small 
 scheme bulked larger just then for Jim than the strange- 
 ness of the whole situation. But Masterson went on in 
 his cool way, "I'll take you in the launch some evening, 
 if my leg will let me; and no one on the Polyphemia will 
 ever be any the wiser." 
 
 After all, there was nothing against the plan except 
 Jim's exquisitely respectable sense of contrasts. In its 
 wild way the scheme seemed practicable enough; and 
 Jim finally gave it his hearty assent. It was generous 
 of Masterson, he felt, thus to help him to Zoe. 
 
 They accomplished their transition the very next 
 night ; for now that Jim had decided the thing could be 
 done, he was consumed with impatience. In Master- 
 son's cabin he donned a uniform of the mate's, and found 
 it a little tight for him, although the mate was a large 
 muscular man. In consideration of his own sinews, 
 Jim did not see how he could fail to succeed in his en- 
 terprise. He would batter down the walls of Jericho 
 to get to Zoe, let alone a cabin door or two. 
 
 They signalled the Polyphemia to slow down, and put 
 off to her. In an incredibly short space of time Master- 
 son was left in the launch alongside, and Jim stood on 
 the Polyphemia's deck, with his simple plausible excuse 
 upon his lips.
 
 IN TOW 153 
 
 The maid Anna came out to him ; and of course with 
 her it was impossible to maintain his alias. Jim sig- 
 nalled silence to her, and scribbled a note for her to take 
 to her mistress. "Dearest," he wrote, "I have come over 
 to see you. I miss you, and I am worried about you. 
 Let me have five minutes. You will, if you realise what 
 it means to me." This creditably moderate production 
 he signed with his initials. 
 
 The reply came at once ; he read it by a dim light near 
 the door of her cabin. "Not to-night, Jim. There is 
 no need to worry ; I am not sick. But I must rest ; please 
 go away and leave me. And don't come on board the 
 Polyphemia again. I will see you in Rio." Her note 
 was unsigned. 
 
 Jim stuffed it in his pocket, and stood confronting 
 the dark maid. Did Zoe actually believe that he would 
 go away at her mere feeble bidding? She disposed of 
 him very easily ; but Jim wasn't to be quite so easily dis- 
 posed of. 
 
 "I am going to see Miss Lenox for a minute, if you 
 will stand out of the way," he said. 
 
 The Malay must have known what was in the note in 
 his pocket. She shook her head, and. did not budge from 
 the door; it seemed to Jim that her eyes sparkled with 
 hatred of him, with malign pleasure in seeing him frus- 
 trated. 
 
 "Stand out of the way, or I will put you out," he said 
 shortly. "You don't want to create a disturbance, do 
 you?" 
 
 Still the creature stood at her post. Jim put out his 
 arms, took her around the waist, and set her neatly out 
 of his way. As he released her he felt a stinging pain ; 
 looking down, he saw that she had fastened her teeth 
 in the back of his hand.
 
 154 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 The pain, and the sight of his own blood, and a queer 
 sense of humiliation, combined to remove Jim's last 
 scruple. He threw the door open, entered, and stood 
 with his back to it; he heard the Malay woman, just 
 too late, hurl herself against it from without. 
 
 In the dingy little cabin that some one had vacated 
 for Zoe, he stood wiping the blood from his hand. Zoe 
 confronted him ; on the floor between them lay the writ- 
 ing materials she had dropped when she rose at his en- 
 trance. 
 
 "I must say, Zoe, you give me rather a warm wel- 
 come," said Jim ; to his own ears his voice sounded heavy 
 and queer. 
 
 "What do you mean by rushing in on me like this?" 
 demanded Zoe. 
 
 "You know well enough what I mean, and have meant 
 all along," he said. "I think there's some explanation 
 coming from you, though, in view of the oddity of your 
 behaviour." 
 
 "You think explanations are due you?" she repeated. 
 She turned half away from him, as if the very sight of 
 him were too much for her. Over her shoulder she 
 uttered some words that he didn't catch, and didn't need 
 to catch : her tone was enough. 
 
 At the sight and sound of her anger, Jim's own mys- 
 teriously cooled. He found himself wondering how on 
 earth he and his exquisite Zoe came to be standing here 
 in this dingy little cabin, abusing each other in the tone 
 and even in the very terms of a world with which they 
 had clearly no connection. 
 
 "I got lonesome for you, dear," he said in his own 
 natural tone. "I simply wanted to see you for a min- 
 ute, and hear from your own lips that you were all
 
 IN TOW 155 
 
 right. When you denied me as little as that, though, I 
 lost my temper' I'm sorry." 
 
 "It is you who deny me a little," she said. "A little 
 peace, a few days' rest, a chance to make up my mind 
 to things I'm not even to be allowed that, it seems." 
 
 "I admit I'm acting like a brute," he said. "That's 
 a a tribute to your influence, Zoe, for it isn't in the 
 least like me." 
 
 "I could do without such tributes," retorted Zoe, still 
 not looking at him. 
 
 "Of course you could; but I didn't think you would 
 be afraid of them," said Jim quickly. 
 
 "Afraid? Who says I am afraid?" she demanded; 
 and then, before he could have replied if he had wanted 
 to, she went on, "Well, perhaps I am. If I am afraid, 
 leave me to get over it by myself, Jim. That's the natu- 
 ral thing." 
 
 "Thank you; you just then called me by my name," 
 he said. 
 
 She called him by it again. "Jim," she said, turning 
 suddenly full on him, "Jim, did you come over here 
 under cover of darkness simply to pick a quarrel with 
 me? Because it sounds very much as if you did." 
 
 "I came simply to find out your intentions," said Jim 
 lamely. 
 
 "My intentions are to rest for a few days, and make 
 peace with myself, and to see you in Rio," she answered. 
 
 "And you adhere to your intentions?" 
 
 "I think I do. I see no reason to change them." 
 
 "Very well. Rio it shall be," said Jim. "I am glad 
 to see that you are as well as you are, Zoe. I thought 
 your late privations might have laid you up." 
 
 "Thank you, I am well enough." 
 
 "All you want, as you have just remarked, is peace ?"
 
 156 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "That is all." 
 
 Jim looked down, winding his handkerchief carefully 
 about his bitten hand. "Until Rio, then," he said. 
 
 "Until Rio," she repeated, making it a bargain. 
 
 Masterson, awaiting him in the launch, had eyes for 
 nothing but navigation, and no tongue. "Gad! If he's 
 human at all, he would like to know how successful I've 
 been," thought Jim grimly. 
 
 And yet, he told himself later that night, he was no 
 worse off than he had been; he was even better, as his 
 very definite anxiety about Zoe had been relieved. And 
 he would see her, and they would settle their difficulties, 
 in Rio; and of course there was only one way that their 
 difficulties could ever be settled. 
 
 The next day Jim ascertained the position of the 
 Helga at sea, and the distance to Rio. The Polyphemia 
 was to make several earlier stops, it appeared; but the 
 Helga could be best repaired at Rio. Probably that 
 had had something to do with Zoe's decision. It was 
 like her, to make the settling of her own affairs depend 
 upon the repairing of the Helga. 
 
 But perhaps Jim flushed with pleasure at the idea 
 perhaps she wanted the Helga put in order for a very 
 special reason. Perhaps she intended nothing less than 
 a honeymoon aboard it. Probably in a calm, discreet 
 way she had planned a whole program of delights : Rio, 
 and a marriage at the American consul's, and a voyage 
 on the repaired Helga, and then home. His home, or 
 hers his homes and hers! If she contemplated that, 
 or anything like it, she had a right to ask him to let her 
 have a breathing-space now. 
 
 It was a long time to wait ; but surely that for which 
 he waited was worth it. The idea of his and Zoe's 
 living their lives in common was a very strange idea; if
 
 IN TOW 157 
 
 he had twice the time he had now, he shouldn't be able 
 to get accustomed to it. Yet it was gloriously possible ; 
 it was all but certain. For if it weren't for that, what 
 would all the rest mean? 
 
 The Polyphemia made her various stops; with each 
 fresh start they were a stage nearer Rio. With each 
 stage nearer Rio Jim forgot a little more of what he 
 would have liked to forget; he remembered only that he 
 was going to Rio to keep tryst, and that from his tryst 
 at Rio he would date the beginning of all things. 
 
 When at last they actually entered the mouth of the 
 long-desired harbour, Jim's excitement amounted almost 
 to delirium. It came oddly to his mind that the Helga 
 had halted here on her way down the coast; but the city 
 had meant nothing to him then but a day's sight-seeing. 
 Everything had been different then; or rather, nothing 
 of any consequence had been at all. 
 
 As the Helga trailed in the wake of the stumpy Poly- 
 phemia up the most magnificent harbour in the world, 
 Jim Whittaker leaned on the Helga's rail. He wore his 
 hat pulled down very far over his eyes, and he was 
 smoking one cigarette after another: he looked very 
 much like the Jim Whittaker of every day. But he 
 knew himself for a bridegroom, come here to celebrate 
 his splendid nuptials; and he knew the Polyphemia's 
 sturdy unemphatic steaming up the harbour for a tri- 
 umphal progress. 
 
 He awaited his lady's instructions, which came a few 
 moments after they anchored. The note was without 
 address or salutation. It told him to take all his things, 
 and go to a certain hotel in Rio. ("Of course," he 
 thought, "the Helga will be uninhabitable for some time 
 to come in dry dock or something.") She herself
 
 158 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 would go to another hotel, and would see him the next 
 afternoon he could expect another message. The note 
 was unsigned : it was her whim, it seemed, to have a 
 whiff of intrigue about the whole thing. Delightful girl, 
 unaccountable girl, to give their marriage this flavour 
 of conspiracy, this whimsical suggestion of an eight- 
 eenth-century propriety, this final delicate tang of pro- 
 priety evaded. 
 
 Jim put the letter gallantly next his heart, and went 
 about his preparations for going ashore. His farewell 
 to the captain was singularly brief; he had never been 
 anything but an audience for the ancient mariner, and 
 he had lately felt some irritation at the sight of that 
 cheery incompetent visage, and the thought of the suf- 
 fering to which that incompetence had put him and Zoe. 
 
 With Masterson, on the other hand, Jim had a talk, 
 short but to the point. In spite of what he might have 
 seen that night when he put Jim in his uniform aboard 
 the Polyphemia, Masterson had evidently considered 
 what Jim said to him worthy of note; or perhaps the 
 mere sight of the way this woman was eating into Jim's 
 life sickened the other man with what she had done to 
 his own. At any rate, Masterson introduced the subject 
 of his own future, and informed Jim that he was quit- 
 ting the Helga at the end of the present cruise. He half- 
 promised to look Jim up later. Jim pressed him to do so ; 
 said heartily as he wrung the mate's hand, "I know you 
 won't ever regret this, Masterson." 
 
 "No," said Masterson, "I think I never shall." 
 
 That sentence was oddly enough the last thing Jim 
 Whittaker heard on board the Helga. With it went a 
 look that was paternal and a little pitying ; under the cir- 
 cumstances, that look was odder still. For why should 
 any one, least of all poor Masterson, look pityingly at
 
 IN TOW 159 
 
 Jim Whittaker when he was set ashore in Rio de Janeiro 
 to meet his ineluctable and splendid destiny? 
 
 He dined late and luxuriously, at the hotel to which 
 Zoe had directed him. After dinner he sat for a long 
 time at a little table in the courtyard, drinking coffee 
 and listening to the plash of a fountain. He was not 
 thinking, he was not even dreaming. On this night of 
 nights he was simply being, with the velvet air all about 
 him and the stars of an alien hemisphere swinging low 
 and friendly in their courses.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS 
 
 TIM WHITTAKER lay late the next morning, be- 
 ** tween sleeping and waking. This he did partly be- 
 cause it was delicious in itself, and partly because he 
 shrank a little from facing this new day. Of course he 
 wanted to see Zoe; of course he was eager to be wtih 
 her again. But he knew that as soon as he definitely 
 waked to this new day he must take up a burden of re- 
 sponsibility a delicious burden, one that in fact he ached 
 to assume, but a burden heavy with the contact of the 
 actual. He would have arrangements to make, perhaps 
 this very day; and there would be people at home to 
 notify. It was a long time since he had thought much 
 about home ; yet very soon he should be on his way there. 
 In a few days, perhaps, he would be starting north as 
 a married man; he shivered deliciously as he lay. As a 
 man to whom a woman's happiness had been entrusted, 
 a man who must help a woman to make her adjustments 
 to his world; and the woman was strange in herself, 
 and of a world very far removed from Jim's. Adjust- 
 ment would not be altogether easy. 
 
 Jim turned his mind from responsibility and the neces- 
 sity of adjustment; he wrapped himself again in his 
 grateful lethargy. He was roused by a servant, who 
 brought to his bedside the expected note from Zoe. A 
 moment longer Jim postponed knowledge, from native 
 cowardice and also to prolong the pleasure of anticipa- 
 
 160
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 161 
 
 tion. For responsible or not, he was mad about the 
 woman ; and to lie here holding in his hand the envelope 
 that had so lately been in hers, and to read again and 
 again his own name written in her even exact hand her 
 penmanship was wonderfully unaffected and legible to 
 lie here so was a luxury becoming and grateful to a 
 lover. 
 
 It was, perhaps, fortunate that Jim got his ecstasy 
 over before he opened her note; for there was nothing 
 inside to stir him unless the ultimate purport of her brief 
 message did so. She simply asked him to come to her 
 hotel that afternoon, and named the hour. Jim was dis- 
 appointed: he had, somehow, expected something more, 
 or at least something different. Was she appropriately 
 and delightfully modest, here and now? Or was she 
 simply cautious some natures shrank from incrimi- 
 nating themselves in writing? Or did she accept the 
 situation implicitly, and see no need for any great talk- 
 ing? 
 
 Jim breakfasted at some length, although he was not 
 very hungry. Then he strolled out to explore the city. 
 His geographical knowledge was not greatly increased 
 by what he saw ; for inside ten minutes he had bethought 
 himself of his first visit here, when he and Zoe spent 
 a few hours exploring the city together. After that he 
 strolled on oblivious of the beautiful southern capital, 
 sprawling picturesquely among heights. He remembered 
 only Zoe, and more especially Zoe as she had been at 
 the time of that first visit. He shuddered even now at 
 the remembrance of her icy remoteness; and remember- 
 ing it so well, he couldn't for the life of him see why 
 the woman had ever changed as she had. Some terrible 
 things lose their terrors on acquaintance ; but the terrors 
 are an integral part of others. A man may conceivably
 
 162 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 wrestle even with an angel; but some mountain peaks 
 remain forever unscalable. 
 
 Dreamily Jim drifted back to his hotel; mechanically 
 he made him ready to go to Zoe. Then presently he 
 was in the streets again. And then without warning he 
 suddenly found himself broad awake, most thrillingly 
 and eagerly conscious of every trifle that impinged upon 
 his sharpened senses. 
 
 It was the hour of the afternoon promenade; and all 
 fashionable Rio de Janeiro was taking the air along the 
 way which led him to Zoe. Jim was on foot himself ; at 
 first they passed him in vehicles, but later, in their fa- 
 mous promenade, the natives too were walking. It 
 seemed to Jim that he had never seen men of such dis- 
 tinction; these southern peoples, when you came right 
 down to it, had an aptitude for attracting some sorts of 
 experience and then moulding it into themselves that we 
 Anglo-Saxons conspicuously lacked. And as for the 
 women, Jim felt that on his way to his so different 
 woman he ought perhaps to notice them only for pur- 
 poses of contrast ; and perhaps it was so that he noticed 
 them. But he noticed them horribly: he seemed to be 
 drawn in a dozen different directions at once by the allure 
 of their shapely little heads and their black eyes and 
 their quick southern gesticulation. 
 
 He arrived at Zoe's hotel, however, without mishap. 
 He was not ahead of time, but he was most becomingly 
 prompt. And without delay he was shown to Zoe's sit- 
 ting-room; she had left word for him to be sent up at 
 once. 
 
 The hotel seemed very cool and dim after the street; 
 and it was quiet, almost dismally quiet. Jim, following 
 the soft-shod attendant along the corridor, seemed to 
 his own consciousness to come as a disturber: at any
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 163 
 
 rate, he had never, in his life been himself farther from 
 tranquillity. 
 
 Zoe's voice answered the attendant's knock. He 
 opened the door for Jim, and closed it behind him. And 
 after many days the lovers were once more together. 
 
 She had been waiting for him. She stood near the 
 opposite end of the long room, with the fingers of one 
 hand resting lightly on a table. Her hair was in its 
 familiar low coil, which glinted even in the carefully 
 shaded room. She wore a shining white dress, belted 
 at the hips with magnificent gold and peacock embroid- 
 ery; it fell in swirling folds about her feet. Just as she 
 stood she might have been put ,on canvas by any painter 
 daring enough to make the attempt: such was her self- 
 control, so complete as to be in the end unconscious, such 
 was her signal, her startling beauty. 
 
 It was, indeed, her mere beauty which for the mo- 
 ment possessed Jim. Their brief bitter interview on the 
 Polyphemia had passed from his consciousness as if it 
 had never taken place ; and in those last days aboard the 
 Helga he had had her so completely that he had scarcely 
 ever to look at her. Now it seemed to him that he could 
 never have done looking. He did, indeed, advance to- 
 ward her; but it was with the halting progress of a man 
 dragged along in a trance. 
 
 Finally he reached the table near which she stood; 
 still he feasted his eyes, and still he did not approach her 
 with lip or hand. Then it came to him that under the 
 circumstances he was probably doing the best thing pos- 
 sible: this was no time to thrust himself hungrily for- 
 ward. Now he should encounter, doubtless, the last 
 stand of her retreating maidenhood. This was her time 
 to hold herself dear, all the dearer, indeed, poor girl, for 
 what had gone before. Jim felt in that curious en-
 
 164 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 compassing silence a sudden twinge at the thought of 
 what had gone before; it occurred to him that he would 
 like it better if he were now for the first time approach- 
 ing her as a lover. Then he hated himself for the 
 thought, as if Zoe were merely a sweet morsel, to be 
 preferred above other sweet morsels according to its 
 superior freshness! She was in fact generous above 
 all other women, as he very well knew. In tribute to 
 her perfect generosity, no less than to her perfect beauty, 
 Jim finally stood waiting. 
 
 She moved just in time to keep their long silence from 
 becoming ridiculous. She motioned him to a seat near 
 the open shaded windows; she herself sat down nearby, 
 crossing one knee over the other, and revealing silk-clad 
 ankles and delicately arched slippers for a moment be- 
 fore her shining gown was readjusted into fresh folds. 
 One hand lay relaxed on her knee ; the other lay on the 
 seat beside her. Again her eyes met his, and held them 
 in silent scrutiny. Like a worshipper who appreciates 
 the beauty of the sanctuary while he waits for services 
 to begin, Jim Whittaker sat and watched Zoe. 
 
 When at length the goddess spoke, it was to offer him 
 tea. To Jim's American taste the weather was too warm 
 for tea; but in his trance-like condition he accepted and 
 drank. And then suddenly he was aware of a familiar 
 but ever-new pleasure, the pleasure of little things shared 
 with the beloved, and of a many times experienced but 
 always unbelievable wonder, the incredible sight of the 
 heaven-descended absorbing nourishment just like one's 
 earth-born self. 
 
 "Will you have another cup?" she asked. 
 
 So Jim drank another, partly for the fun of watching 
 her pour it, and partly in order not to have to begin yet 
 with what must soon be said.
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 165 
 
 "Is it a wonderful day ?" asked Zoe, setting down her 
 own cup. 
 
 "Wonderful, but very warm. Haven't you been out?" 
 asked Jim. 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Then that's an idea. Shan't we go?" 
 
 She shook her head. "I'd rather stay here, where it's 
 quiet," she said. 
 
 "Then here we stay," announced Jim. And then it 
 was very quiet indeed; and he grew unexpectedly em- 
 barrassed. 
 
 "What do you hear from the Helga?" he asked. 
 
 "What do I hear from her?" 
 
 "Yes. About repairs." 
 
 "Oh, it won't take long for repairs. The captain was 
 here this morning to report." 
 
 "I am glad to hear that," said Jim. "There really 
 wasn't much damage done, then, by all that knocking 
 about?" 
 
 "Surprisingly little. Oh, I have had a bit of news!" 
 she recalled. "Mr. Masterson sent a letter by the cap- 
 tain; he intends to leave the Helga as soon as I can 
 replace him." 
 
 Jim whistled inwardly: Masterson wasn't letting any 
 grass grow under the feet of his good intentions. "Shall 
 you be sorry to lose him?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes, I shall," said Zoe definitely. "You mustn't 
 judge Mr. Masterson by what you saw of him n this 
 cruise. He's really a good sailor, much too good, indeed, 
 to linger along as the mate of a private yacht. But his 
 leaving puts a double burden of finding new people on 
 me, I'm afraid. Without him, I may have to let my 
 captain go.'*
 
 166 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Then you no longer think so highly of that ancient 
 mariner?" 
 
 Zoe frowned; but she said frankly enough, "My dear 
 Jim, if that ancient mariner had been worth a grain of 
 his marine salt, we might have been spared the worst 
 part of our tragic faux pas." 
 
 Jim didn't like that. "I wouldn't have spared a pang 
 of it," he said, low but hotly. 
 
 "Wouldn't you?" asked Zoe. "Well, I would." 
 
 To all appearances they had now broken into their sub- 
 ject; yet Jim didn't find it easy to go on. They might 
 talk about her captain, or her plans, or her soul ; but he 
 couldn't catch the tone he had caught on the Helga. She 
 was a strange woman : she didn't belong. Jim felt as if 
 during the days of her seclusion aboard the Polyphemia 
 she had been proofing her soul in armour. Probably that 
 was just what she had been doing; perhaps that was why 
 his instinct had protested against having her aboard the 
 Polyphemia by herself. 
 
 He was uncomfortably silent; then he began to won- 
 der about Masterson, and whether that singular man was 
 actually freeing himself. Freedom was a very fine thing 
 for Masterson; it wouldn't do for Jim to think how 
 fine a thing freedom was. 
 
 He ceased to think very much of anything; he sat ab- 
 sently in the dim quiet of the big room ; absently his eyes 
 followed the long lovely line from Zoe's thigh to her 
 knee, the other line from her knee to the toe of her shoe. 
 He was roused by her voice, full and sweet, with its 
 trilled r's that lingered in the ear. "After all, it isn't 
 easy to part, is it, Jim?" 
 
 "To part? Who is going to part?" asked Jim, hon- 
 estly bewildered. 
 
 "You and I, Jim. I shall wait here until the Helga is
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 167 
 
 repaired; and you will take a passage for New York 
 as soon as you can get it." 
 
 "Shall I ?" he wanted to know. "Perhaps you can tell 
 me how soon that will be, Zoe?" 
 
 "You can get a passage in less than a week." 
 
 "Can I ? You seem to have it very thoroughly worked 
 out in your mind." 
 
 "Then it is agreeable to you?" she asked. 
 
 "No, of course it isn't. And of course I'm not going. 
 It may seem ungrateful, Zoe; but your kindly thought- 
 out arrangements don't happen to suit me. They don't 
 suit me at all." 
 
 "What would suit you?" she asked, glancing at him 
 for the first time in many minutes. 
 
 "To stay here with you, of course, and leave with you, 
 in the Helga. Incidentally and in the meantime, to marry 
 you at one of the consulates. You can have your choice 
 as to the consulate, I think; are you a British subject, 
 Zoe?" 
 
 "That would be rather idyllic," she said smoothly. 
 "Unfortunately, it isn't possible." 
 
 "Which part of it isn't possible ? And why not ?" de- 
 manded Jim. 
 
 "My marrying you isn't possible." 
 
 "Zoe!" 
 
 "I simply haven't any idea of marrying you," she said 
 gently and clearly. 
 
 "You startled me," he explained. "I thought for the 
 moment that you had a husband already." 
 
 "Oh, dear, no! A husband is the last thing in the 
 world that I want. That is what I am telling you." 
 
 "Is that all?" asked Jim. "A good many girls feel 
 that way, Zoe; but their minds can be changed." 
 
 "I'm not a callow miss, and mine can't," she argued.
 
 168 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "If I wanted to marry pardon me for calling this to 
 your attention don't you suppose that I could have 
 married fifty times over to better advantage than I should 
 gain by marrying you?" 
 
 "You needn't beg my pardon for that," asserted Jim. 
 "That is obvious. But I'd like to call your attention to 
 one or two facts that seem to have escaped you." 
 
 "I am listening," she said. "If anything has escaped 
 me " 
 
 "In the first place, everybody does marry, you know, 
 sooner or later. The institution isn't ideal, by any 
 means; but it's still the best thing we have. In the sec- 
 ond place, Zoe, marriage needn't hamper you much," 
 said the conscientious Jim. "We Americans don't find 
 it hampering, as you may have gathered ; and my own 
 opinions on the subject are fairly liberal." 
 
 "And thirdly?" she asked, as if some clever exposition 
 of ideas were being offered for her benefit. 
 
 "Thirdly, my dear, you love me," finished Jim. 
 
 "Oh, love !" A gesture of her arm sought to sweep 
 love away. 
 
 "Yes, you do. Whether you admit it or not, whether 
 you realise it or not, you love me. Of course," Jim went 
 on, "after you have shut yourself up from me for days 
 and days, and spent your time hardening your heart 
 against me, you can make yourself believe that you don't. 
 But I know better." 
 
 "You know very well, if you know all that," she said. 
 "I don't even believe in love, in the sense in which you 
 use the word." 
 
 "Do you believe in it in any sense?" 
 
 "Oh, there is something ! Something that makes 
 a man agreeable to a woman in a certain way. I don't 
 know how I should have endured those days on the Helga
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 169 
 
 if it hadn't been <for you. Jim, I thought we were lost 
 I did indeed. And I was frightened. I don't ever re- 
 member having been frightened before. I thought my 
 life was almost over; I realised how much of life I had 
 after all missed. I I snatched." 
 
 She covered her face with her hands, and sat so a 
 breathing-space. Suddenly she flung her hands out with 
 a little cry. "You are not to think that I'm not fond of 
 you, Jim. I am fond of you; I appreciate you. No 
 woman ever had a lover who was finer or more con- 
 siderate. But don't you see, dear, if any other man 
 not in himself disagreeable had happened to be aboard 
 the Helga with me then, the result would have been much 
 the same?" 
 
 "I do see that," answered Jim. "And I can't say that 
 I take any pleasure in the seeing. At the same time, Zoe, 
 I think you make too much of it. It was I, and not an- 
 other man, who was there, you see." 
 
 "I see. I thank you for the practical, the immensely 
 masculine character, of the suggestion," she said. "You 
 were there." 
 
 She rose from her chair, and walked to the window; 
 she pushed the blind aside, and stood for a minute look- 
 ing down into the street. When she returned to him her 
 face was twisted with anguish. Perhaps partly to hide 
 that face from him, but partly no doubt in order to soften 
 what she had to say, she came and stood behind his chair ; 
 she put one arm around his neck, and laid her cheek 
 against his hair. "I fall between two stools, Jim, that's 
 all," she murmured. "I don't know what's the matter, 
 but two strains always seem to be fighting it out in me ; 
 and on this point they have fought it out to a miserable 
 balance. If I believed in love absolutely, as you do, I 
 should marry you, I dare say. If I absolutely disbe-
 
 170 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 lieved in it except as a pleasant temporary bond, perhaps 
 I should marry you I think I should. But as it is, I'm 
 going to go on until I find something more, or until I 
 forget you." 
 
 Jim took her hands and kissed them. "You can't go 
 on that way, Zoe," he said. "You're a human woman, 
 though I sometimes think that you have never yet realised 
 that fact. If you try to keep on in your own indifferent 
 way, either this thing or one like it will tear you to pieces 
 in the end." 
 
 She gave a miserable little laugh. "Ah, Jim, if it only 
 would 'tear me to pieces' then I should at least know !" 
 
 "You will find out," he said. 
 
 She withdrew her hands, and as she did so he rose. 
 They stood confronted over the back of his chair. "I 
 shan't give up my hopes," he said, very low. 
 
 "You would better. Vain regrets won't help you, and 
 that is what your hopes will change to," she said. 
 
 "You will see." 
 
 "Oh, I shan't see much ! It is unlikely," she told him, 
 "that after the next few days we shall ever see each other 
 again." For a moment he thought that her eyes, her 
 curious black-lashed intense eyes, were dazzling and 
 inimical. 
 
 "It is more unlikely that we shall never see each other. 
 The world," Jim assured her, "is a small place, and you 
 are a marked woman, you know, Zoe." 
 
 "At least, we can see each other a few times before you 
 leave for home," she said. 
 
 "To-morrow, and the day after, and the day after 
 that?" he wanted to know. 
 
 She laughed a little. "Yes, perhaps all three of them," 
 she said. "If you come here to-morrow with your pas- 
 sage in your pocket, I think definitely all three."
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 171 
 
 She was very, sure of herself; he would almost have 
 liked it better if Zoe had cut him off then and there. 
 Her sureness flashed across his mind a suspicion 
 that this wasn't the first affair of the kind in which Zoe 
 had been engaged. Of course, it wasn't particularly his 
 business if it weren't; but that might account for many 
 things. Only the suspicion somehow couldn't stand. 
 The people on the Helga had taken his presence and de- 
 meanour very calmly; and Masterson had looked pity- 
 ingly at him along toward the end, as if perhaps he had 
 seen other ends like it. If that were indeed the case, 
 what a figure he must cut in Zoe's eyes, solemnly pro- 
 posing marriage ! 
 
 But his suspicion wasn't true. Masterson had him- 
 self said, "She loves you," had explicitly let Jim know 
 that he regarded him as the chosen one. And Zoe on 
 board the Helga hadn't gone about things like a prac- 
 tised mistress; she had been straightforward and pas- 
 sionate, and at times quite startlingly naive. No, what- 
 ever else she took from him, she must leave him the 
 memory of those precious days on the Helga, those days 
 under the shadow of fear that now, with the bright sun- 
 shine all about him, he looked back upon and envied. 
 
 "Zoe," he cried, "if we had only gone down together 
 on the Helga !" 
 
 "Jim, if we only had !" 
 
 Her eyes were shining and splendid then; he couldn't 
 believe that she had ever been afraid of death. But she 
 was afraid of life; and if she kept on much longer she 
 would end by making him afraid, too. 
 
 He took her in his arms for a moment, kissed her, re- 
 leased her. "If you could only trust life a little more, 
 my dear " 
 
 "I can't. I never have," she said.
 
 172 THE VANISHED HELGA 1 
 
 Jim had an odd feeling at that moment, almost as if 
 the dead Dan Lenox and the vanished Helga were ac- 
 tually in the room with their descendant. It was un- 
 canny; but^it left him enough himself to think that if 
 they had been there, they would have marvelled greatly 
 at the doings of another generation. Dan Lenox and 
 his Helga hadn't been afraid to trust their love; they 
 would have been dum founded at the spectacle of their 
 child so coolly denying hers. Yet it probably wasn't 
 Zoe's fault that in her case things approached so tame a 
 termination, or rather no termination at all. Dan Lenox 
 would take his woman by storm ; whereas Jim Whittaker 
 stood and argued with his. 
 
 A sense of perfect hopelessness, a feeling that he 
 didn't deserve anything he wished for, and that he 
 wouldn't get anything better than he deserved, came over 
 Jim. "I think I shall bid you good-bye until to-morrow, 
 Zoe," he said dully, and revived a little to add, "that is, 
 if I may surely come to-morrow." 
 
 "Yes, do. Come for luncheon, if you like," said Zoe 
 heartily. She was never one to cavil about details. 
 
 "To-morrow," said Jim. He kissed her, and left her; 
 he went down to the street. In an hour, the whole com- 
 plexion of the world had altered. He trod the same streets 
 that had been golden when they led to her; they were 
 now unspeakably mean and dull, and heavy with an acrid 
 odour of hateful humanity. And the heavenly people who 
 had earlier walked with him had given place to horrible, 
 smirking foreigners, and she-devils without even a she- 
 devil's characteristic charm. 
 
 Jim stopped on his way to order flowers for Zoe; as 
 he walked he planned a series of entertaining little jaunts 
 for the two of them. If he still had five or six days 
 with her, five or six days might mean much. It was his
 
 RIO, THE PLACE IS CALLED 173 
 
 policy, he saw clearly, to keep up hope and endeavour. 
 But actually he had to-night no hope. He who had gone 
 forth like a conquering hero so shortly before returned 
 utterly weary and dispirited. He was disgusted with 
 Zoe, with himself, with life. And not the least of what 
 he had to endure was that as the hours drew on he felt 
 more and more sickeningly a fool. To have ever thought 
 of imprisoning Zoe Lenox in the neat little nest which 
 was what he could offer as marriage had showed him a 
 fool to begin with. And having made the offer, to yield 
 her up as he felt he was now going to yield her that 
 showed him a fool in conclusion. A fool, a fool he 
 took a dismal delight in repeating the good old English 
 word. A fool, a fool; and not the less so for having 
 always been a well-intentioned fool, and for being, as he 
 laid him down in his lonely bed to-night, an anguished 
 fool as well.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 VALEDICTORY 
 
 JIM woke in a better frame of mind. He had still 
 almost a week with Zoe; and if a man has but a 
 week, all is not lost. Many a woman has been wooed 
 and won in less, though to be sure a rewinning is rather 
 more difficult. 
 
 He went out about the middle of the morning, and 
 booked his passage north. The steamer was to sail in 
 five days Zoe had been pretty well informed ; she must 
 have telephoned to find out. Then he wrote to his part- 
 ner and to his oldest brother, telling them when they 
 might expect him. He didn't know whether they might 
 expect him alone or accompanied, and of course he said 
 nothing on that point. But this morning he had strength 
 to hope that Zoe would be convinced, not perhaps by 
 him, but by the power of the truth that was in him. 
 
 The two of them lunched and motored together that 
 day; they lunched and dined together the next. Zoe 
 fell in with all his suggestions; apparently she gave him 
 every opportunity to advance his cause. That only 
 showed how secure she was in her resolution. For he 
 had every opportunity, and his cause didn't advance. 
 He wooed his lady softly, caressingly; and she met him 
 softly, distantly. He wooed her hotly ; and she met him 
 coolly. He neglected her, scolded her, gloomed before 
 her; and she became gay and good-natured, and sought 
 to amuse him.
 
 VALEDICTORY 175 
 
 Jim was forced finally to the conclusion that her at- 
 tachment to him had been solely the product of circum- 
 stances. She thought that the whole ship-load of them 
 was doomed to destruction; groping to find something 
 that would keep her from going mad, she had found him. 
 But when they were all restored to life, he no longer 
 suited her ; and in those secluded days on board the Poly- 
 phemia she had regained her self-control, until her nerves 
 were as steady as her purpose. 
 
 One evening as they lingered over their after-dinner 
 coffee, Jim seized her hand across the table her left 
 hand, as it happened. She let him keep it for a moment, 
 intending to withdraw it when she pleased. But it wasn't 
 Jim's purpose simply to sit with her fingers in his. He 
 slowly turned her hand over, exposing a pink scar on 
 the inner side of the wrist. Holding it firmly with his 
 right hand, he laid his own scarred left wrist beside it, 
 and looked Zoe in the eye. "Your scar has healed bet- 
 ter than mine," he remarked. "Or perhaps it wasn't 
 burned quite so deeply." 
 
 He had found a small chink in the armour. Zoe 
 flushed scarlet, and he could feel the tenseness of her 
 arm. "Don't, please don't," she said, "remind me of 
 that childish folly." 
 
 "Folly, if you like," said Jim. "Or madness, rather. 
 Perhaps we thought at the time that it was madness. But 
 it was a sublime madness, dear, a madness the conse- 
 quences of which we needn't refuse to accept." 
 
 Slowly her colour subsided, her tenseness relaxed ; she 
 laid a cool right hand on his. "Madness or folly, or 
 mere unmentionable freak, as you like," she said. "Fix 
 its character to suit yourself ; I ask you only to remem- 
 ber that it's a sealed book. So long as you remember 
 that, you may call it anything you like."
 
 176 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Jim released her, and she picked up her coffee-cup. 
 Over its brim she remarked, "What seems to worry 
 you most, Jim, is just the queerness of it all. Yet that's 
 really what ought to worry you least. It's just my queer- 
 ness. Can't you allow for that? I'm a queer foreigner 
 you knew that from the beginning." 
 
 "And I'm an odd American?" suggested Jim. 
 
 "Yes. An odd American, with honourable intentions." 
 She smiled suddenly, brilliantly, overwhelmingly. Jim 
 smiled in answer, but rather sheepishly. Of course she 
 could carry this thing against him, if she took that par- 
 ticular tone : she could make him out a ridiculous, seri- 
 ous, inexperienced boy. But he hated that tone, and not 
 only because it made him out a fool. It was what it 
 made her out that bothered him. 
 
 Eventually he gave the whole thing up, and said so; 
 but it was not until their last evening together. Jim 
 was to sail the next day; and they dined at her hotel, 
 with the understanding that they were not to see each 
 other again. Their little table was set beside a window 
 that opened on a courtyard full of tropic plants; and in 
 the velvet sky visible above their tops, those southern 
 stars which had looked down on Jim's romance presided 
 over its cool termination. 
 
 For it was not Zoe alone who was cool to-night. Now 
 that he had come to a realisation of his own defeat, Jim 
 was quite glacial. He looked at Zoe critically; he ad- 
 mitted and appraised her charm; he paid tribute, now 
 and always, to her beauty. And Zoe, relieved that he 
 was at last taking things so well, carried the evening 
 glowingly forward. 
 
 Over his cigarette Jim waxed critical and valedictory. 
 "You are nothing, you know, but a hedonist," he in- 
 formed her.
 
 VALEDICTORY 177 
 
 Zoe smiled sweetly, and leaned a little forward. "I 
 am glad you realise that," she said. 
 
 "The accident of your beauty," he went on, "and the 
 farther accident of your wealth, which enables you to 
 give your beauty a becoming and magnificent setting, 
 make you more or less dangerous. If you had a little 
 more strength in yourself, you would be dangerous any- 
 way. But you aren't." 
 
 "I haven't any desire to be," Zoe assured him. "I 
 don't care for power, you see ; hedonists don't. Give me 
 a quiet life " 
 
 "And such occasional distraction as may appeal to 
 you?" 
 
 She accepted the suggestion. "Yes. Give me those 
 two things, and you may have your strength and your 
 resultant power." 
 
 Jim smoked a minute in silence, studying her across 
 the table. "Do you intend," he asked, "to go on in ex- 
 actly this way forever ?" 
 
 "That, my dear Jim," she said with smiling patience, 
 "is what I have been trying for a week to impress upon 
 you!" 
 
 "Because," Jim went on slowly, "that is exactly what 
 you can't do, you know." 
 
 That hit told; but she rallied her self-confidence in a 
 twinkling. "I shall," she declared. "For ever and ever. 
 If the time ever comes when I can't, I shall lie down and 
 die. I won't live, unless I can live as I choose." 
 
 "That sounds very young, Zoe," he said. "In some 
 ways you are experienced enough ; but in this particular 
 you are quite shockingly young. Perhaps that is all 
 that is the matter with you ; for it's natural enough in our 
 youth to want to go about and see the world. It's com- 
 mendable, then, to try to seize all you can of its beauty
 
 178 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 and perfume; if you erred, it would probably be on the 
 side of not seizing strongly enough. But, you see, we 
 aren't always young." 
 
 "People are nowadays," objected Zoe. 
 
 "Not actually young," demurred Jim. "And there's 
 no greater tragedy than to grow old and sincerely re- 
 fuse to admit it, whether you're an old fool making your- 
 self ridiculous over a girl or an old woman clinging to 
 the beauty of her youth instead of developing the beauty 
 that's proper for her age." 
 
 "I didn't know you were such a moralist, Jim," she 
 said. "What is the application of your death's head 
 philosophy? I suppose there is an application?" 
 
 "Simply that there are things you ought to know of 
 yourself, without being told," replied Jim. 
 
 "More simply still, that I ought to marry you?" 
 
 "That too, of course," he admitted. 
 
 "That seems always to lie at the end, doesn't it?" she 
 asked amiably. "Men are so clever; they can begin 
 anywhere, and end with that !" 
 
 "I know what you think," said Jim. "But after all to 
 see the foundation of things beneath the superstructure 
 implies a certain directness, if it doesn't imply cleverness. 
 And a woman, Zoe, often flatters herself that she's clever 
 when she's only evasive." 
 
 "Selfish, weak and sly," summarised Zoe. "I wonder 
 that you don't think yourself well rid of me." 
 
 "Perhaps I shall, sooner or later," said Jim. 
 
 "I'm sure I hope so," she said. 
 
 She rested one arm on the table, and looked at him. 
 Jim looked back at her. With a sudden huskiness he 
 said, "That is all very well, dear, if it were true. Un- 
 fortunately, it isn't. You are more of a woman than 
 you realise; and some day you will learn that fact."
 
 VALEDICTORY 179 
 
 She didn't belieVe him, but she didn't choose to argue 
 farther. "Perhaps I shall, Jim." Then she added with 
 sudden sweetness, "If I have that to learn, Jim, I'm sorry 
 that you weren't the one to teach it to me." 
 
 "You may learn it by yourself, and in bitterness of 
 heart," he said. 
 
 She shivered a little, and her lips grew white. She 
 picked up a wine-glass, and drank for a minute; but 
 when she put it down it looked as full as when she had 
 taken it up. "Some one walked across my grave just 
 then," she said. "Please, Jim, no more Jeremiads this 
 evening." 
 
 "Very well," agreed Jim; and he rose from the table. 
 He supposed he ought to propose some entertainment, 
 if there were to be no more Jeremiads. "Shan't we get 
 a car, and drive about for a few hours?" he asked. "It's 
 too wonderful a night to sit still." 
 
 "Too wonderful a night to sit still," she mimicked; 
 she found that, of course, very American. But she had 
 a wrap brought; she allowed him to summon a car, and 
 to seat her in it. 
 
 To drive together in a motor-car seemed to suit him 
 and Zoe in a distinctive way. Seclusion with a woman 
 presents itself differently according to the character of 
 the woman. It seems natural for some women to sit 
 across a little table from a man, and for others to walk a 
 wind-blown height with him. Jim and Zoe had done 
 both, and enjoyed both; but it was not in such positions 
 that they came best to realise themselves and each other. 
 Shoulder to shoulder at the Helga's rail was more like 
 it. And to sit facing the same way, as they sat to-night, 
 side by side in the silent dusk, borne along through space 
 without effort on their part oh, this was very much 
 like it ! Even after what had passed between them, even
 
 180 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 in view of what lay before, this was fairly the real thing ! 
 
 Zoe seemed to feel it, even as Jim did. She sat lean- 
 ing back, her motionless profile toward him ; he wondered 
 afresh at that characteristic stillness of hers, so curious 
 in an age of jumping nerves. He was glad she was so 
 quiet, glad she was so silent; his spirit seemed to find a 
 wonderful peace to-night, just when he might have ex- 
 pected it to be riven asunder by the thought of their 
 parting. 
 
 "I'm sorry, Jim," she said after a long, long time, "that 
 my conduct and ideals don't suit you. If you carry me in 
 mind, I should like to have you carry me as a perfect 
 episode; and I'm afraid you can't do that now. You 
 have been lovely, Jim; in spite of your fixed idea, you 
 have. I shall have something pleasant to remember, you 
 see. And so might you, if that conduct and those ideals 
 satisfied you as well as shall I say my eyes and hair?" 
 
 "My dear, there is only one point on which your con- 
 duct and ideals don't suit me," he said. "And you could 
 remedy that if you would, as you couldn't a defect in 
 your eyes or hair." 
 
 "No, I couldn't, Jim. Truly, truly, it is better as it 
 is," she whispered, pacifically, almost drowsily. 
 
 Jim let the matter rest, and in silence the car rolled on 
 and on. The damp air of night, the southern stars, the 
 beloved woman beside him, and a car that rolled silently 
 on and on it all made for Jim a moment of peace be- 
 tween hurricanes. 
 
 Zoe's hand found his finally, and her head his shoul- 
 der. Jim wondered how, feeling as she did, she could 
 endure the contact ; but to him it was pleasant, and not in 
 the least disturbing. He was grateful for his dreamy 
 calm, grateful and surprised. He knew that such quiet
 
 VALEDICTORY 181 
 
 would not always be his ; to have had it his to-night was 
 a boon. 
 
 It was late when they gave the word to turn back to 
 her hotel. "Shall you come in?" asked Zoe. 
 
 "Only to see you in," said Jim. 
 
 "Then " She put her lips to his, her arms around 
 
 his neck; with all the sweetness that was in her, she 
 kissed him good-bye. 
 
 Jim kissed her, and released her. Their last kiss, he 
 knew it to be ; he was curiously calm about it. Perhaps 
 this was the ease of weariness; but very possibly this 
 whole breaking off was going to be easier for him than 
 he had supposed it could be. 
 
 It seemed to be harder for Zoe. She drooped against 
 him ; she murmured "Jim, Jim !" like a child in need of 
 comforting. Jim leaned over her to assure her kindly, 
 almost paternally, that they needn't part, of course, if 
 it made her feel that way. They weren't bound to be 
 consistent; and they needn't hesitate if they saw fit to 
 change their minds. There was still time ; she had only 
 to say the word. 
 
 "That isn't what I want, of course," she said. She 
 sat up, drying her eyes. "I was only thinking that I 
 shall miss you, Jim." 
 
 "Yes. I'm a good, simple soul; and I've always been 
 easy for you to manage," said Jim quietly. 
 
 She laughed a little. "Perhaps that is what I had in 
 mind," she said. 
 
 "An ordinary woman," went on Jim, "would have in- 
 ferred from my docility that I should make a good hus- 
 band ; and she would have inferred correctly." 
 
 "You good, simple, docile souls show amazing inge- 
 nuity in working around to your favourite topic," re- 
 torted the extraordinary woman.
 
 182 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 They did not speak again on the way back. At Zoe's 
 hotel Jim alighted ; together they crossed the hotel lobby 
 toward the marble staircase. 
 
 On the second step Zoe turned, and gave him her hand 
 in dismissal. Now that the final moment was upon them, 
 Jim might have expected his calm to break; but if it did 
 anything it deepened. He pressed the smooth cool hand 
 in his, and dropped it before she had a chance to with- 
 draw it. As he stood looking up at her, white cloak 
 and white dress, white neck and white face, all seemed 
 to run together into one indiscriminate whiteness; and 
 he couldn't find her eyes. But the gleam of her hair, 
 her warm fair hair, the hair that she had of her mother, 
 was before him as he turned away. 
 
 The next morning he sailed for New York, alone.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 
 
 IN after years, when Jim Whittaker reviewed the hap- 
 penings of his adventure with Zoe, there was not a 
 transaction aboard the Helga that his memory shunned. 
 He would recall those last days in Rio, and even those 
 brief brutal moments on the Polyphemia. But never if 
 he could help it did he revert even for an instant to his 
 passage from Rio home. 
 
 His first few days on the north-bound steamer he kept 
 the factitious calm of his parting from Zoe; he kept it, 
 and came to loathe it. This calm was succeeded by a 
 rage of defeated passion. He could not eat, he could not 
 sleep; he walked the deck hour after hour, until his legs 
 failed under him. He hated the steamer because it con- 
 tained him; and he hated it because it was a ship, and 
 therefore reminiscent of the Helga. He hated the other 
 people on board ; he walked among them like a ghost, or 
 like a living man among ghosts, to judge from the vol- 
 cano that was within him. But he was filled with a 
 nervous dread of the time when he should have to leave 
 this ship and these people, and again take up his life 
 among the surroundings that had once been his. 
 
 It occurred to him, the last night he spent on the water, 
 that there were practical as well as spiritual difficulties 
 ahead of him in his attempts to renew the old life. Jim 
 tossed all night in his berth, wondering how he could 
 best explain his long absence. All his life he had made 
 
 183
 
 184 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 it a habit to tell the truth: sometimes the whole truth, 
 and sometimes a judiciously selected fragment, as the 
 case seemed to demand. Having neither the memory nor 
 the invention to lie, he had always found the truth a 
 capital working medium. But in this case the truth, al- 
 though simple, was absolutely untellable. 
 
 On dry land and in the light of day, he was met by a 
 humiliating but convenient fact: he needn't, unless he 
 chose, give much of any explanation of his absence. 
 People hadn't spent all these months exclusively in won- 
 dering where Jim Whittaker was and what he was do- 
 ing; they had been, on the contrary, quite busy with 
 their own concerns. They inquired about his absence, 
 to be sure, and said they were glad to see him back ; but 
 few of them went beyond mere perfunctory civility. 
 With the few who did, Jim found that the best policy 
 was to begin copiously and cheerfully to give informa- 
 tion about South America; that soon made them sheer 
 off. 
 
 There was one person, however, who made the dis- 
 covery that when Jim talked about South America he 
 didn't know what he was talking about. That one per- 
 son was his partner. Stephen sought to learn of the 
 business opportunities in South America; and in a half 
 hour that was rich with torture for Jim, discovered that 
 Jim hadn't learned anything about them himself. Then 
 he gave up. "Well, so long as you know about business 
 here, I suppose it's all that's necessary," he concluded; 
 and then, just as Jim was beginning to breathe easily, 
 remarked, "I think such a change ought to have set you 
 up more, though. You look a little seedy." 
 
 "I'm a little tired this morning. I shall settle to 
 things soon, though; uid then you will see that I'm 
 better than ever."
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 185 
 
 "I hope so," agreed Stephen. He turned with relish 
 to talk about their business, in which Jim strove reso- 
 lutely to immerse himself. 
 
 His pride was hurt, during the next few weeks, by the 
 discovery that there were after all few things in which 
 he could immerse himself. He had always supposed that 
 he lived a fairly busy life; but now it seemed to him that 
 before the advent and withdrawal of Zoe he must have 
 dawdled along for years without compelling interest. 
 He had his business, and he had his books a fine com- 
 pelling interest for a grown man, reading! He had 
 such gentlemanly exercise as golf and riding; he had the 
 friends he had always had, and social distraction of a 
 sort was never lacking. But his friends, all cheerful, 
 complacent, well-to-do people, seemed to touch his life 
 lightly just now. As for social distraction, he found 
 that in his present state of mind it didn't distract, it only 
 worried and wearied him. 
 
 His family connections never suggested themselves to 
 him as a possible resource ; they weren't that kind of con- 
 nections. But in these days that were so difficult at 
 their best, Jim did his duty by going to see first one and 
 then another of his brothers. 
 
 The preoccupied eldest took a hurried paternal inter- 
 est in Jim; he meant always to keep an eye upon the 
 youngster, but in the pressure of his own concerns he 
 never seemed to find the opportunity. His wife would 
 have been delighted at any time to help Jim to make a 
 suitable match; she bore him no grudge, even after all 
 these years wherein he had smilingly evaded her efforts. 
 They were good souls, both of them. Jim heaved a sigh 
 of relief when their front door closed behind him; and 
 he could imagine that within they were doing the same. 
 
 The second brother it happened that Jim visited them
 
 186 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 in the order of their seniority was the one against 
 whom Jim had had to wage the sternest conflict when he 
 determined not to enter the family office. He was a 
 tight-lipped inimical man. His wife Jim briefly de- 
 scribed as a cat. It was only when he looked at her that 
 Jim ever felt any sympathy for Sydney. 
 
 The third brother and his wife didn't get on, never had 
 got on, had always at intervals been causing agitated 
 ripples in the Whittaker family circle by threats of open 
 rupture. Jim wondered in passing if he and Zoe, sup- 
 posing them to have married and lived to regret their 
 marriage, could ever have come to such a state. Even 
 with his present view of Zoe's limitations, Jim didn't 
 think that they could. 
 
 At the close of this visit Jim went back with relief to 
 his own quiet flat; the worst of his own miseries was 
 better than the sordidness he had seen. Now he could 
 shut himself in with his unhappiness, and grouch; and 
 emerge some day an old bachelor, with a soured dispo- 
 sition, perhaps, but an equanimous front. 
 
 Yet there were two people he still wished to see. He 
 couldn't indeed rest until he had seen them; yet he 
 dreaded the meeting. They were Stuart and June Eving- 
 ton, that domesticated couple without whose defection at 
 a critical moment this present state of things would never 
 have come to pass. To Jim in his loneliness their hos- 
 pitable house beckoned; yet he hesitated to enter those 
 doors which had always opened so freely before him. 
 He hesitated because he feared that the whole lovely 
 place might recall Zoe too vividly to his mind. He had 
 been there a thousand times before he ever heard of Zoe ; 
 yet the few days there which she had dominated might 
 efface the recollection of his many peaceful visits. He 
 wanted exactly what those earlier visits had always given
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 187 
 
 him, wanted it acutely where he had once welcomed it 
 vaguely : he wanted peace and warmth, and respite from 
 his Furies. But if he sought these things at the Eving- 
 tons', he might simply be putting on the screws. 
 
 From day to day Jim put off seeing the Evingtons, 
 until at length he realised that his nervous dread was 
 making him ridiculous in his own eyes. Then he tele- 
 phoned to Stuart Evington. 
 
 "I've been waiting for you to call me," Stuart's voice 
 informed him. "I heard that you were back. Did you 
 enjoy yourself?" 
 
 "Yes, indeed," said Jim with a sick heartiness. 
 
 "When are you coming out to see us?" asked Stuart. 
 
 "When can you have me?" 
 
 "The sooner the better," declared Stuart. "June will 
 be anxious to see you, I know. How about to-night?" 
 
 "To-night will do," said Jim. "That is, if I may 
 come on the six o'clock."' 
 
 "Well, if you can't come earlier I'll have the car at 
 the station to meet you. Or no I'll wait and take the 
 six o'clock too." 
 
 "Don't," said Jim smiling. "That would be to make 
 company of me. I thought that yours was a house where 
 I might always be treated with nonchalance." 
 
 "Oh, very well. We shall be looking for you," said 
 Stuart. 
 
 The car was indeed waiting for Jim when he de- 
 scended from the train; and the Evingtons' chauffeur 
 gave him a friendly grin. Jim jumped briskly in beside 
 the man and grinned back. "It seems good to be home 
 again," he said gaily. "How is every one back at the 
 house?" 
 
 Every one was well, it appeared; and the chauffeur, 
 having assured Jim of that, began to babble about cars.
 
 188 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Jim announced that he himself planned to buy a new car 
 in the spring; what kind would the chauffeur advise? 
 The chauffeur advised copiously, all the way to the house. 
 He and his brethren were a race apart, Jim reflected, not 
 servants, certainly, though hired as servants are. The 
 Evingtons' chauffeur talked to Jim as man to man; he 
 showed him respect enough, but it was not the respect of 
 the hireling. It was that of the expert for the amateur 
 who knows almost as much about a science as himself, 
 and yet beautifully asks his expert advice. 
 
 To the accompaniment of talk about cars the familiar 
 country sped by; the keen air of autumn dusk fanned 
 their faces. Nothing was changed, except that the year 
 had progressed to its fall. Already Jim began to feel 
 cheered. Nothing in the world had changed except him- 
 self ; and in view of that fact, and of the exquisite nor- 
 mality manifested all about him, Jim couldn't continue 
 to believe that his own relation to everything was chaoti- 
 cally and tragically altered. 
 
 Everything that touched him to-night seemed to be 
 simple and sweet. Stuart and June both came into the 
 hall to meet him; both their faces were joyously alight 
 at his coming. "So awfully glad to see you, old man," 
 muttered Stuart, wringing his hand. 
 
 June gave him both hers. "It has been such a long 
 time since we saw you last," she said, her pretty face 
 eager with welcome. "We have spoken of you so much." 
 
 "We wondered if we were ever going to see you 
 again," Stuart took up the refrain. "Our household has 
 fairly seemed incomplete these last few months, hasn't 
 it, June?" 
 
 Jim finally managed to get away to dress ; as he did so 
 he realised that his heart was warmer than it had been 
 for many a day. Was this conceivably what he had been
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 189 
 
 dreading ? Why, a ghost couldn't live in the atmosphere 
 of these blessed people; and as for any sneaking suspi- 
 cion Jim might have had that his friends would either spy 
 or censure well, it just wasn't so. Stuart and June 
 Evington couldn't even be made to stand as representa- 
 tives of a spying, censuring world. All they wanted of 
 a fellow of this particular fellow, at any rate was to 
 be good to him ; and they didn't even consciously set out 
 to do that. Their richly appreciated goodness was quite 
 spontaneous. 
 
 On the stairs, as Jim descended, he found June in wait 
 for him. She asked if he would like to see the children 
 put to bed ; she enacted that never to be omitted part of 
 their old program with just her old air of doing it for 
 the first time. And when Jim assented, she smiled as if 
 his words were a delightful surprise. 
 
 He followed her trailing draperies down the hall to the 
 night nursery. The children were already in bed, the 
 whole quiverful of them ; the baby indeed had been asleep 
 for two hours, and the next to the smallest had dozed off 
 as he awaited the good-night kiss. The elder two, how- 
 ever, could scarcely have gone to sleep without it; and 
 not to be there to bestow it would have seemed to June 
 a breach of trust. 
 
 "Stuart has already been in here," June explained. "I 
 was waiting for you." 
 
 Jim followed her as she went from bed to bed, four of 
 them, if you counted the baby's. Over each she stooped, 
 tender, soft-eyed, maternal; every time that she stooped 
 her gown draped itself anew, and her pearls swung for- 
 ward softly, and then fell back on her neck as she straight- 
 ened up. June's pearls were fine ; the single short string, 
 which brown natives had somewhere dived and perhaps 
 drowned to collect, had cost a comfortable fortune. But
 
 190 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 on June they were not a sign of costliness or emblem of 
 magnificence; subdued like everything else about her to 
 her own kindness and innocence, they swung softly from 
 her round neck against the cheeks of her children. 
 
 As June stooped for the last time, the familiar scene 
 connected itself with that underlying stratum in Jim's 
 mind which he had supposed it was making him forget. 
 What, he wondered suddenly, if Zoe should ever have a 
 child? For a moment the picture was present visually 
 before him : Zoe standing with her child in her arms, Zoe 
 laying her cheek against the top of her baby's head. By 
 God, if that had happened ! His blood was all driven 
 back to Jim's heart at the thought. 
 
 If June had turned to him just then she would have 
 surprised something that she hadn't known was in her 
 friend Jim; perhaps she would never again have asked 
 him to visit her peaceful nursery. But June's eldest 
 child held her in speech for a moment; and when she 
 turned back to Jim it was to indicate that the ceremony 
 of good-night was over. 
 
 "Edith is to have a room of her own next year," June 
 confided to him when they were in the hall once more. 
 "That makes me feel like an old woman, Jim. So long 
 as they were all in the nursery together " 
 
 "An old woman you ?" exclaimed Jim. 
 
 "An old woman," she nodded. "See!" She pointed 
 to where in the hall below the top of Stuart's head was 
 visible ; their vantage ground of the stairs commanded a 
 view of his increasing baldness. At this sign of age, if 
 not on June's part, at any rate on that of June's lesser 
 half, she and Jim giggled like two naughty children; so 
 giggling they descended upon Stuart. 
 
 It was a very gay little dinner, served to the three of 
 them at a small round table lighted with many unshaded
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 191 
 
 candles. "A table like a birthday cake" was June's de- 
 clared ideal; and when they were alone she and Stuart 
 dined always in this wax-lit state. They admitted Jim 
 to their candle orgies as they did to their nursery ; he was 
 their best of friends, and even their private inanities 
 would never bore him. 
 
 The conversation about the table was animated enough. 
 Jim insisted from the beginning on being listener rather 
 than talker; they wouldn't be interested, he averred, in 
 his impressions of South America, and he was very 
 much interested in hearing all the gossip about their 
 common friends. 
 
 "You decided to go on to South America when Stuart 
 and I were forced to desert Miss Lenox?" June wanted 
 to know. 
 
 "Yes. I had my mouth made up for South America, 
 and my arrangements already made for a holiday," 
 answered Jim. 
 
 "I'm so glad that you did," said June. "Then you at 
 least weren't disappointed." 
 
 "What was the trouble with the children ?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Measles," said June tragically. "A run of measles 
 straight through the family." 
 
 "They all recovered perfectly?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Perfectly. But it was a siege." 
 
 All the Evington children had had time to have measles 
 and recover while he was away; well, Jim could believe 
 that. He tried to think of another question that would 
 keep June on the subject of the children; but Stuart 
 struck in, "Probably you were better off to go as you did, 
 Jim, than as you had planned in the first place. Some 
 of those steamers are very comfortable, and you haven't 
 to reckon with a yacht-owner's caprice." 
 
 "Perhaps you are right. I can't imagine that I could
 
 192 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 have had a more interesting time than I did," said Jim 
 promptly. 
 
 "The steamers are good?" Stuart asked. He asked it 
 simply enough, but it seemed to his friend that for just a 
 moment he looked rather hard at him. 
 
 "Very good," answered Jim, and gave a few particu- 
 lars about the one in which he had come north. 
 
 "Then the only regret," remarked Evington, "the only 
 regret we have among us, is a little one of mine." 
 
 "What is it?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Simply that I hadn't a chance to complete my picture 
 of Zoe Lenox by viewing her on her native heath." 
 
 June laughed. "If your curiosity has had to go un- 
 satisfied, Stuart, I wonder that you survive the disap- 
 pointment," she said. 
 
 Stuart grinned back at her. "Speaking of curiosity," 
 he began, "Allen Camp told me the other day " 
 
 The stream of their gay gossip ran on, with but oc- 
 casional comments from Jim. Stuart Evington and June 
 told things in a sort of antiphony, one supplying what 
 the other forgot or neglected : it was usually, Jim found, 
 June who gave the kindly turns, and Stuart who put in 
 the racy touches. 
 
 It was all deliciously warm and human and friendly. 
 Presently Jim realised with a start that he had for min- 
 utes together lost his awkward new consciousness: the 
 strange woman and her influence had dropped completely 
 from his mind. For weeks before they had never been 
 actually absent from that tortured mind, even at its mo- 
 ments of comparative peace. Perhaps this momentary 
 lull was an intimation that he might soon be again as 
 other men were, as he himself had once been, and not so 
 long ago either. At the very idea Jim felt free, felt 
 rested. He saw himself reconciled to life, in the very
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 193 
 
 place where he had dreaded to come for fear he might 
 be farther alienated. But here he was back in the warm 
 current of human life, back with dear average human 
 people. 
 
 Once during the evening, indeed, June's face clouded ; 
 but it was with a farther proof of her humanity. She 
 had been gossiping brightly about people and things, and 
 politics and plays and books June always gave a gos- 
 sipy personal turn to every subject she discussed. Sud- 
 denly she paused, looked troubled, and said, "There has 
 been a flare-up in the house of one of our friends while 
 you were away, Jim. Perhaps you haven't heard " 
 
 "I haven't heard much," Jim assured her. "Who is 
 it?" 
 
 "Jessica Drummond. You haven't " 
 
 "I haven't heard about it," Jim assured her. "I've been 
 pretty busy since I got back to this country; and my or- 
 bit and the Drummonds' don't cross anyway. This is the 
 only place I ever met them." 
 
 "Well, you won't be likely to meet the two of them at 
 the same place any more," struck in Stuart. 
 
 "Oh h h! They've quit?" 
 
 "She has," June assured him. 
 
 "That's rather unexpected," said Jim. "The two of 
 them were here the last time I was here for a week-end, 
 weren't they, June?" 
 
 "Yes ; and they seemed as far as ever from a break-up. 
 No one ever thought that they were happy together, 
 but " 
 
 "It seems to me, as I recall her," said Jim, "that Jes- 
 sica Drummond had always a sort of amused tolerance 
 for Sam and his peccadillos. I should have said that 
 as a modus vivendi it was serviceable, and as likely to 
 endure as any other."
 
 194 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "I thought so too/' said June. "I must admit that I 
 hated her attitude, but I never actually expected to see it 
 change." 
 
 '"And she has left him ?'" asked Jim. 
 
 "And plans to divorce him," replied Evington. 
 
 "Has he done something particularly fearful?" asked 
 Jim. 
 
 "Sam Drummond? No, he hasn't mind enough to 
 do anything particularly fearful. This is just more of the 
 same," said Evington. "It's Jessica that something seems 
 to have happened to, but I don't know what. I must 
 confess I rather admire her for getting her back up." 
 
 "Poor thing ! Imagine being forced to make a decision 
 like that," sighed June. 
 
 "Poor thing all you like; but I wonder just what has 
 influenced her to act so," remarked her husband. And 
 for the second time that evening, Jim fancied that his 
 host's eyes rested passingly but shrewdly on his own face. 
 But a moment later he set down his impression to a too 
 irritable vanity, for with the remark, "Poor Jessica ! She 
 would have made a nice wife for 'some good fellow, if 
 he had got her years ago," Stuart let the subject drop. 
 And about the glowing table the atmosphere was once 
 more as bland and soothing as a bath of warm milk. 
 
 Afterward over the library fire they were not so talka- 
 tive; but their content sank deeper into them by reason 
 of their silence. June was a centre of content, wise and 
 fortunate woman; and Stuart was contented because he 
 had her. To-night they were both happy because Jim 
 was once more with them; and Jim knew himself for 
 thrice blessed because he had such friends to take him 
 into their home and heart. 
 
 They sat late over the library fire ; but the hour did not 
 keep Stuart from calling after Jim as he started up the
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 195 
 
 stairs, "Come into my room for a crack, if you're not 
 too tired." 
 
 Jim nodded, looking gratefully and appreciatively 
 down on them as they stood together in the hall: keen- 
 eyed mordant middle-aged Stuart, gracious radiant ever- 
 young June, these friends who had restored him to his 
 balance. 
 
 In his own room Jim got into his smoking jacket and 
 slippers, and stretched luxuriously. He wouldn't for 
 the world have missed his promised talk with Stuart ; his 
 spirit looked eagerly forward to that rambling seasoned 
 talk. He wasn't in the least sleepy; if he had been, it 
 wouldn't have mattered. It would take, he felt, some- 
 thing more powerful than sleep to keep him from one of 
 Stuart's Attic nights. 
 
 There was no hurry, however, about beginning. It 
 would be half-an-hour, probably, before Stuart was es- 
 tablished for one of his late sessions. Jim could use 
 that half-hour to good advantage in savouring his pres- 
 ent content : it was some time since he had had a sensa- 
 tion that he cared to savour. He opened a window and 
 leaned on the sill, drinking in the crisp air of the autumn 
 evening. An air sane, chill and bracing: an air to ban- 
 ish cobwebs from the brain, and make a man stand up to 
 his full manly stature. Only Jim hadn't any longer any 
 cobwebs ; and as he leaned there in the window he felt as 
 clear and strong and peaceful as the November air it- 
 self. 
 
 The land before him, bathed in starlight, rose gently 
 toward the bluff; from his vantage point of the second 
 story Jim caught glimpses of the water beyond. He 
 leaned on the sill, and gazed. Silly vagrant things came 
 into his head, snatches of poetry, old aspirations and 
 dreams, memories of his boyhood, all blended to one hue
 
 196 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 with the pale gold of the night. He was not only happy 
 he had been happy before, happier than this. But 
 to-night and now he seemed to have got somehow at the 
 spirit of things; and the spirit of things was good, was 
 golden, was wonderful, and would abide with him. 
 
 Then as he lingered, to make the impression durably 
 his, without warning Zoe seemed to stand beside him, 
 leaning lightly against him with her hand on his shoulder, 
 just as she had stood so many times under other stars. 
 So sudden and so powerful was the impression that Jim 
 actually looked around, wildly expecting to meet her eyes, 
 or at least to see her gaze thoughtfully averted, under 
 the crown of her magnificent hair. 
 
 The room was empty except for his own presence ; it 
 lay beneath its shaded lights in midnight tranquillity. And 
 it came over Jim with sickening vividness that never 
 again would he and Zoe stand as he had just now imag- 
 ined that they were standing: never again, under these 
 stars or the southern, would that strong hand fall lightly 
 on his shoulder, that splendid head incline toward him. 
 And never, never, would he be able to free himself from 
 the bondage of what had happened, or forget what might 
 have. All the rest of his life, he would embrace empty 
 air ; until he was an old, old man, he would unceasingly 
 follow a shadow. 
 
 Jim's head fell forward on his extended arms. The 
 autumn air seemed to have turned inimical ; it chilled him 
 as he sat. But he was unwilling to move from the place 
 of his visitation; and anyhow there was no reason why 
 he should move,, for he couldn't face human society again 
 that night. Even Stuart, who had helped to bring him 
 peace that evening, was more than he could now con- 
 front. 
 
 Jim's appointment for a "crack" with Stuart was
 
 JIM WHITTAKER'S FRIENDS AT HOME 197 
 
 broken; and Jim never tried to explain the breach. He 
 was tied to Stuart in so many ways ; and even as a mat- 
 ter of policy, he ought certainly to keep Stuart from 
 thinking too much about some things, ought as far as 
 possible to act like his own old self. But how could he 
 spare a thought for a world of Stuarts, when he was 
 brought thus hideously against the thing that mattered? 
 The thing that mattered the only thing that mattered. 
 In his whole normal, sane, full life, the thing that had 
 had power to lift him above his own normality, and that 
 now sank him in misery and abasement; the incredible 
 fact, the sole significant fact, that Zoe Lenox had once 
 lain in his arms, and would lie there no more.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 FROM OLYMPUS 
 
 JIM never again experienced that factitious sense of 
 freedom which he had had at the Evingtons' ; on the 
 other hand, he never again went through quite such a 
 crisis of abasement as he had known later the same eve- 
 ning. The winter passed for him in a sort of grey misti- 
 ness, varied by occasional bursts of restlessness and long- 
 ing. He learned to live with his love, and with his dis- 
 appointment ; and he learned something else as well. 
 
 He had called Zoe, in the early days of their acquaint- 
 ance, an "Olympian," and the term certainly fitted one 
 aspect of her. What he had not in those days realised 
 was that he himself was almost equally an Olympian. He 
 had no such god-like physique or magnificent setting or 
 storied background as set his friend off; but it is not in 
 these things that the essence of the Olympian character 
 lies. It lies in having your head in the clouds, in viewing 
 from the standpoint of your own superiority the pitiful, 
 ridiculous struggles and sufferings of humanity; it lies 
 in living carefully in your ideas, and in seeing that you 
 get those ideas decently second-hand, and that they do 
 not connect themselves too greedily to the experience 
 from which they may be derived. It may be known by 
 its characteristic calm. 
 
 That calm Jim Whittaker had forever lost ; but as he 
 saw it, it was nothing to regret. It wasn't the strength 
 of a conqueror; it was simply the carefully erected and 
 
 198
 
 DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS 199 
 
 constantly tended tranquillity of a hanger-back. A hang- 
 er-back that was what he had once been. A hanger- 
 back, Zoe was still. 
 
 Now at last Jim Whittaker was on earth with common 
 men ; he knew it, and rejoiced in it. With common men, 
 who suffered and laboured and sweated; common men, 
 who lived not by their ideas, those charmingly eclectic 
 ideas which were the motor-springs of the Olympians, but 
 by something black and biting and fierce that was in them. 
 Down in the dust with common men, although he might 
 sweat and choke and sicken, Jim was learning what he 
 had never learned on his calm Olympian heights. 
 
 Common men, indeed, if they could have spared a 
 thought from their own concerns, might have been sur- 
 prised to learn that Jim Whittaker was living down 
 among them. He had apparently slipped back without 
 delay and without friction into just the niche in life that 
 he left when he went cruising in the Helga. He was still 
 attentive to his excellent business, and deeply interested 
 in its success; he still read solidly and critically; he still 
 mingled with his intimates freely enough, especially on 
 those occasions when he wouldn't have to meet too many 
 women. If his acquaintances noticed a change in him, 
 it was simply that he seemed graver, and had grown thin, 
 and had got into the habit of saying queer things. But 
 then Jim was always a bit queer; and perhaps now he 
 had taken up socialism or some such matter to beguile 
 his leisure. Anyhow, socialism or any such matter wasn't 
 worth noticing in the case of such a thoroughly good 
 fellow. 
 
 Actually, however, though it might not be patent to 
 the common, still less to the Olympian eye, Jim's entire 
 range of vision had changed. Things that had once 
 bulked large for him were important no more, though
 
 200 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 he knew in a vague way that they were still there ; things 
 and people that he had never before noticed now during 
 this winter became significant. 
 
 Once the world had been peopled with two fairly def- 
 inite classes yes, fairly definite, even if one wasn't a 
 snob. There were the full-fed, self-satisfied people, one's 
 intimates ; and there were less full-fed people, for whom 
 one had a facile sympathy. But now the two circles ran 
 strangely together: Olympians appeared in botH, and in 
 both Jim saw his suffering common people, and poor 
 pathetic frustrated people; and all these latter had be- 
 come by the turn of a wheel Jim's own people. 
 
 There were old maids, for instance. In Jim's own 
 circle they were well enough disguised ; and in the Olym- 
 pian days Jim would have held that present-day civilisa- 
 tion offers no nook for such as they. But he saw them 
 now, even through the disguises offered them by mod- 
 ern life, not the least of which are our countless "move- 
 ments." He saw them for poor frustrated creatures, 
 some of whom have held out for too high an ideal, some 
 of whom have simply been passed over; in both cases 
 they seemed to him at bottom dim beings who had missed 
 whatever in the world was songful or colourful or pur- 
 poseful. 
 
 Then there were the weary fathers of families, drudg- 
 ing their lives away for offspring who didn't realise and 
 didn't care to realise what the drudgery meant. In most 
 cases the fathers themselves didn't realise what it meant ; 
 they figured in a plan of which they had only the dimmest 
 conception, for whose perhaps mighty workings they felt 
 not the slightest thrill. And there were women who 
 ought to be mothers but weren't ; and others who oughtn't 
 to be but were. Beneath the clatter and glitter, the fine 
 brave show of the great city where he lived, beneath even
 
 DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS 201 
 
 the brave pose of the circle of people he knew best, Jim 
 saw the weary face of humanity. The marvel was per- 
 haps that he hadn't seen it all along. And yet the marvel 
 wasn't so great, after all; many people lived their lives 
 and begat another generation and died without ever hav- 
 ing seen it. His present perception was, quite incongru- 
 ously, his golden Zoe's gift to him. 
 
 He had gone, one day in early spring, into the city's 
 great art museum. The greyness of his days had been 
 broken this particular afternoon by a mood of horrible 
 unrest, one of those hours when he would without sec- 
 ond thought have ground the recently perceived face of 
 humanity into the dust, if by striding across it he could 
 gain one actual sight of a certain Olympian face now for- 
 ever lost to him. In such a mood as this the company of 
 the masters was sometimes soothing; and at least he ran 
 in this particular place very little risk of meeting any 
 one he personally knew. 
 
 A personal acquaintance was, however, exactly what 
 he finally met. He had gravitated toward the Rodin gal- 
 lery, and was looking with a kind of, bitter satisfaction 
 at the ruthless presentation of the old courtesan. If you 
 were an artist, he supposed, you always saw things with 
 the mask off; only if you were an artist you probably 
 loved to see them so, instead of writhing at their ugli- 
 ness. But this particular statue cannot continue before 
 the Anglo-Saxon eye indefinitely without outraging the 
 Anglo-Saxon sensibilities; and Jim was beginning to be 
 rather ashamed of himself as he turned away. Many 
 things were so, but it was cruel to insist upon them. He 
 began to drift down the gallery. 
 
 And there, lost in gazing at another piece of the same 
 artist's work, stood Jessica Drummond. To find Jessica 
 in the Metropolitan was alone worthy of note ; but Jim's
 
 202 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 surprise in the bare fact was swallowed by blank 
 amazement when he caught sight of her expression. She 
 was standing before the "Orpheus and Eurydice"; and 
 in her little gipsy face, in the very pose she had un- 
 consciously taken, were echoed the infinite learning and 
 the overhanging frustration of the statue. 
 
 Jim's first impulse was to go on, pretending that he 
 had not seen her. He hadn't happened to meet Jessica 
 all that winter, and had rather been hoping for some 
 such opportunity as this to let her see well, to let her see 
 that he too knew what it was to be no longer among the 
 Olympians. But to speak to her as she was now was to 
 take her with her mask off ; even to one but newly eman- 
 cipated from the Olympian view-point, it seemed scarcely 
 decent. 
 
 He hesitated too long, however; Jessica felt his gaze, 
 and turned. In an instant her mask snapped back into 
 place; and it was with much of her old saucy smile that 
 she greeted him. "It's wonderful to see you !" she cried, 
 her eyes beginning to sparkle. "Have you been in town 
 all this winter? Whatever have you been doing with 
 yourself? Are you thin, or do I imagine it?" 
 
 "Such a volley of questions!" he commented, grasping 
 her outstretched hand. They had both ungloved, and 
 her hand in his was warm and nervous, and quite dread- 
 fully alive. "Yes, I am thinner, and hence more fash- 
 ionable. I have been in town all the winter, and have 
 been doing just the usual things. Where are you living 
 now?" 
 
 '"Oh, I have a small apartment," she said vaguely. 
 
 Hastening to change the subject, Jim could think of 
 nothing better to say than, "This is a strange place to 
 find you, Jessica." 
 
 Apparently however she didn't care whether or not
 
 DESJCENT FROM OLYMPUS 203 
 
 they avoided the subject of her changed life. "I come 
 here quite often now," she said. "It's quiet and cheap." 
 Then she laughed, and added, "And I'm beginning ac- 
 tually to know what I'm looking at. Have you seen 
 those new Chinese porcelains that are being so much dis- 
 cussed ?" 
 
 "No. Where are they ?" asked Jim. 
 
 "I'll show you," she volunteered. 
 
 They left the little gallery, and mounted the main 
 stair-case. Jessica went unhesitatingly to the small sec- 
 ond-floor gallery where the porcelains in question were 
 displayed. "This one " she began to explain, "and this 
 one and this one " 
 
 And then again she didn't seem to care to avoid what 
 must be a painful subject. Suddenly she stopped point- 
 ing, and turned toward Jim. "You know," she asked, 
 "that I've left Sam?" 
 
 Jim nodded. Jessica wasn't looking exactly at him, but 
 he was sure that she saw the nod. "Yes," she continued 
 meditatively, "I've left him. In fact, I have divorced 
 him; you have probably heard that too. I am now a 
 femme seule, and shall doubtless become a great fre- 
 quenter of museums." 
 
 "I have heard," said Jim. "You will let me sayy won't 
 you, how sorry I am? You must have had a very bad 
 time." 
 
 "Oh, no, indeed ! I haven't had half such a bad time," 
 she said with a flicker of a smile, "as poor old Sam has 
 had. I don't think that to his dying day Sam will ever 
 see what the smash was all about. He had always con- 
 sidered me an essentially reasonable woman, you see." 
 
 That remark was in its coolness quite like the old 
 Jessica ; but Jessica was not the same as of old. Even if 
 Jim couldn't feel a change in her, he must know from
 
 204 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 the mere fact of her decision that some change had taken 
 place. Her decision set her as oddly as a nun's head- 
 dress a gipsy; but its very oddity made Jim find it 
 touching. For the first time in a pleasure-loving life, 
 tolerant always in the wrong places, Jessica had deliber- 
 ately made a decision that would cost her something. 
 
 Jim took her hand and pressed it ; he remembered aft- 
 erward that as it lay in his it suddenly went cold. "I 
 want to tell you, my dear," he said, "that I know you're 
 treading a hard path for conscientious reasons. I ap- 
 preciate that; all your friends must." 
 
 It was a stiff little speech, made with obvious good 
 intention; Jim wasn't prepared for its reception. For 
 Jessica, looking at him across their clasped hands, flushed 
 crimson, and began to tremble ; then suddenly she stooped 
 and dropped a kiss on the back of the hand that held 
 hers. 
 
 A moment later Jim was alone in the darkening gal- 
 lery. He stood still, to let Jessica make her escape, and 
 also because he was too dumfounded to move. The sin- 
 cerity of his own surprise was startling; for what sur- 
 prised him so had evidently been more or less known to 
 other people for some time. This was what had made 
 Stuart Evington look at him so hard when Jessica's di- 
 vorce was mentioned ; Stuart had divined the whole thing, 
 of course. Well, doubtless Stuart would keep his sus- 
 picions they could be little more than suspicions to 
 himself, and not spread, by innuendo or otherwise, the 
 story of Jessica's poor Quixotic little passion. 
 
 It wasn't such a very little passion, either, if it had 
 driven Jessica to leave her comfortable nest merely to 
 keep her passion from being defiled. She had left with- 
 out hope ; it was her hopelessness that had made natural 
 and touching her na'ive expression of her passion.
 
 DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS 205 
 
 Jim liked that expression ; it stirred him curiously. As 
 he walked slowly out of the museum and started toward 
 home, he seemed to feel Jessica's kiss still on his hand. 
 It happened to be the same hand that the Malay woman 
 had once bitten; but there are some things we forget as 
 quickly as possible, and others that we may allow our- 
 selves to remember. 
 
 Would Jessica like to have him remember that im- 
 pulsive kiss? Well, she probably wouldn't like to have 
 him forget it too soon ; yet she certainly didn't expect him 
 to remember it in any very practical way. But suppose 
 Jim felt his breath coming a little short as he sauntered 
 leisurely along suppose that was exactly what he did 
 do? Zoe had taken with her something that could never 
 be replaced ; he could never feel for another woman just 
 what he had felt for her. But Zoe had gone from him ; 
 and he had the rest of his life still to live. What better 
 could he do with it than dedicate it to a woman for 
 whom he could after all do something? If he could do 
 anything for Jessica, it was more than he had ever been 
 able to for Zoe. 
 
 Of course, he wasn't in the least in love with Jessica. 
 But if she loved him well, a man could always have a 
 certain sort of feeling for a pretty woman. And if he 
 anchored this restless life of hers, if he and she were to 
 go smoothly on side by side He couldn't exactly see 
 that happening; Jessica brought him no inspiring vision 
 of himself mounting to her, of herself waiting for him 
 in a house on a hill. A white house on a hill how 
 often he had dreamed of that ! A white house on a hill, 
 and a white ship Jim's whole being contracted in a 
 spasm of rage and defeated longing. 
 
 And then came resolution. "I will not live forever as
 
 206 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 I am living now," he said to himself. "I will go to Jes- 
 sica to-morrow." 
 
 Of course, Jessica wouldn't be expecting him. It 
 would be kinder, perhaps, to wait; but he wished to take 
 her before she had had a chance to cool. "Before I have 
 had," he knew he meant; but he didn't dare to look the 
 situation too eagerly in the eye. 
 
 He hardened in his resolution, however, as he walked 
 along in the sweet spring twilight. He did not go di- 
 rectly home ; he walked for a long time, indeed, not much 
 caring whither. He dined somewhere, quite inciden- 
 tally, on he didn't actually know what. Then at length 
 he walked home, sure at least of having secured to him- 
 self, by weary limbs and an empty mind, sound sleep, 
 the portion of the unharassed. 
 
 The bright day and lovely twilight had been succeeded 
 by the chilly night of northern springs. The change 
 from outer air to inner made Jim actually drowsy. If 
 he turned in now, he had time for a long sleep : it was 
 half-past nine by his watch. But Jim didn't turn in. 
 Instead he lighted the fire, and sat smoking over it. 
 From moment to moment he kept resolving to go sen- 
 sibly to bed ; from moment to moment he put off going. 
 
 He had, indeed, this past winter conceived an antipathy 
 for going to bed. Time was when the bed-time hour 
 stood as the climax of an ordered day: when a well- 
 laved and well-pajama'd Jim, stretching himself between 
 the cool sheets to review drowsily the day's happenings, 
 and then drifting off in the sleep that always came, knew 
 the fullest earthly content. 
 
 His bed-time peace was among the things that Zoe had 
 taken. Through the day he could be cheerful, or at 
 least busy ; and he needn't unless he chose be much alone. 
 But in the quiet of the night and the loneliness of his
 
 DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS 207 
 
 bedroom Zoe everlastingly awaited him: Zoe and the 
 lack of her. The strength that he had managed to gain 
 during the day, this hour regularly took from him. 
 
 To-night, however, Zoe seemed to have deserted him. 
 When at length he did go to bed, it was to meet the re- 
 ward of a man whose mind is definitely and honourably 
 made up. He sank almost at once into a deep sleep, 
 such a sleep as even a healthy man rarely knows : the pro- 
 found sweet slumber of childhood. Once he partly awak- 
 ened, and saw the curtains blowing in the wind, white in 
 the surrounding dimness. The wind was cool upon his 
 head, the bed deep and warm below, about, above him. 
 Jim kept hold of consciousness only long enough to 
 realise that a miracle was being accomplished for him; 
 then he drifted back into that wonderful sleep. 
 
 Suddenly he wasn't asleep any more, and he wasn't 
 at home. He was alone still, but he knelt on the pave- 
 ment of a tiny chapel. He recognized the chapel at once : 
 it was the tribute of wealthy bereavement to its dead, 
 and appertained to a cathedral about which Jim had 
 walked with out-of-town friends. But now he seemed to 
 belong there; he knelt on the pavement, feeling its chill 
 through his clothing, and watched the tall candles burn 
 on the altar. They were so tall, and they burned with a 
 steady unflickering flame. They were so white; and 
 there were white flowers with them ; and the little chapel 
 itself was white, white, white. 
 
 Jim was waiting for something; he couldn't have said 
 for what, but he knew it was something wonderful and 
 awesome; he trembled as he waited. Then something 
 came between him and the tall white altar, almost as if it 
 materialised out of the candle-flame and the lilies. A 
 tall white figure, veiled mistily from head to foot; Jim 
 knew it by the beating of his own heart. How pale she
 
 208 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 was, how exquisite ! She came a little way forward, and 
 lifted her eyes. Through all the veiling Jim made out 
 her features; and then her eyes called him, her eyes 
 burning blue through all the mistiness. She saw him; 
 she desired him to come to her. 
 
 Jim struggled to rise from the pavement and go. So 
 struggling, he found himself back in bed. The wind 
 blew chill upon him ; the curtains were waving now in the 
 pale light of dawn. 
 
 He closed his eyes, and tried to summon back the 
 dream. Zoe coming to him like that ! He, fought his 
 returning consciousness ; he wanted to go back and meet 
 her. But consciousness came inexorably back; and he 
 found himself sitting up, broad awake, but with the pull 
 of the dream still upon him. 
 
 Suddenly he left his bed, and turned on the water for 
 his bath. Then he stood erect in the middle of the floor, 
 and smiled in high conscious happiness. Zoe would 
 never come to him like that, perhaps ; but he didn't care 
 particularly how she came. Only he saw that it was 
 time she did come. These months had been long enough 
 for her dignity to recuperate; on behalf of, his own san- 
 ity, he didn't care to have them stretch out any longer. 
 
 H!e breakfasted early, and went down to his office 
 before any one else arrived. For an hour he sat staring 
 at the wall above his desk; then, when it was about the 
 hour that other offices opened, he went out again. 
 
 This was the day, he recalled as. he walked briskly 
 along, that he had meant to go to Jessica. Jessica's 
 day wouldn't begin for another hour yet; and when it 
 did, she wouldn't know how near it had come to being a 
 special sort of day. For it never would be that now. It 
 was not to Jessica that Jim was going. 
 
 He walked several blocks, entered an office, and sent
 
 DESCENT FROM OLYMPUS 209 
 
 in his name. It was an office where he had never been 
 before; it was, indeed, a sort of office where he had 
 never expected to come. But he felt very cool as he 
 waited; he had the strength of a man who knows his 
 own mind at last. 
 
 He found himself presently aCross a table from a 
 burly, keen-eyed man, the person to whom he was re- 
 quired to state his business. "There is something," be- 
 gan Jim, "that I would like to have you find out for me, 
 if you can." 
 
 "We can try," the burly man assured him. He took 
 a pencil in his thick fingers, and waited considerately; it 
 would make no difference in that professionally consider- 
 ate manner of his, Jim felt, whether he were asked to 
 trace missing jewelry or a missing wife. 
 
 He did, however, lose his professional calm so far as 
 to stare for a moment when Jim brought out, "Please 
 learn, if you can, what disposition was ever made of a 
 private yacht called the Helga who owns her now, and 
 whether she is in commission, and if so, where she is 
 sailing." 
 
 A moment later, however, the eyes of the burly one 
 were on his desk, and he was noting Jim's replies as he 
 asked in his unruffled way, "Who owned her when you 
 knew of her? Where was she chartered from? 
 What ?"
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 WAITING 
 
 IT was a month before Jim received the burly one's 
 * final report, although he had several preliminary 
 ones. It was part of the business, he supposed, not to 
 let results appear too easily achieved; and his agents 
 seemed to be actually tracing the wanderings of the 
 Helga after she left Rio de Janeiro. Under the circum- 
 stances, Jim could afford to wait. 
 
 He trod on air, indeed, during the interval before that 
 final report: he was as happy as a spirit escaped from 
 prison, as brilliantly uneasy as a bridegroom on the eve 
 of his nuptials. Exactly what lay ahead of him he did 
 not know ; but he had now no doubt as to the final out- 
 come. So long as he and Zoe were both in the land of 
 the living, there could be but one possible outcome. As 
 for the recent past, he didn't regret it. There was in his 
 present mood no room for regrets: and at any rate the 
 recent past had probably given Zoe time to find herself. 
 But in view of what he now knew, this time of separation 
 and indecision seemed absurd enough: with but one life 
 to live, look at all the months they had wasted ! 
 
 When it came, the burly one's report dumfounded 
 Jim. He had thought himself prepared for anything; 
 had walked into the detective's office, summoned by a 
 telephone call, with a proud consciousness of being ready 
 to meet the issue. And here was the issue eluding him. 
 
 2IO
 
 WAITING 
 
 After a moment's startled silence, Jim was disposed to 
 argue the matter. "That can't be true, you know," he 
 heard himself say. "You may have been on the right 
 track up to this point; you seem to have been. But lat- 
 terly you must have gone astray. The Helga was a 
 perfectly new yacht, and built to her owner's design. 
 She was very beautiful, and very costly. She may have 
 been sold; but you must be wrong about the other." 
 
 "You can retrace our inquiry ; I have had copies of the 
 correspondence made for you," said his friend. "You 
 can see for yourself that not a link in the chain is miss- 
 ing. I admit that the disposition of the yacht was pe- 
 culiar; but, don't you see, a peculiar case may be traced 
 the most surely." 
 
 "I can see that, in general," Jim admitted. "But the 
 Helga scrapped ! The Helga was the most beautiful 
 ship that ever floated; even to my landsman's eye, she 
 was a miracle of beauty. And her owner loved her, 
 doted on her." 
 
 "The psychology of the case would seem to be some- 
 what peculiar; it would have to be, to justify the facts, 3 ' 
 the other admitted. "But it is the facts of the case that 
 are my business, not the psychology." 
 
 The reasonable tone of every day asserted itself in 
 Jim. "Of course, you must be right," he said. "I am 
 surprised, that's all. May I have the correspondence 
 you spoke of, please? And if I can settle for this now, 
 I won't trouble you to send a bill to my office." 
 
 He took the correspondence home with him that night, 
 and read and reread it from beginning to end. It was 
 for the most part cablegrams, but there were one or two 
 explanatory and confirmatory letters. There seemed 
 to be no flaw in the evidence : the facts were before him, 
 from beginning to end. But his mind groped in vain
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 for the significance of the facts. Zoe sell the Helga? 
 It couldn't be. Zoe contemptuously give away "for 
 scrap" the beautiful ship she had herself planned, the 
 surpassing successor to the various boats that she had all 
 her life loved? It couldn't be. But it was. It was. But 
 it couldn't be. 
 
 The significance, of course, lay clearly enough before 
 him all the time; it was only that his mind refused to 
 accept that obvious significance. Zoe had thrown away 
 the Helga because it had been the scene of his love and 
 hers. Jim caught and admired the magnificence of her 
 gesture: it was as good as telling him that Heaven 
 itself wouldn't be big enough for the two of them. No, 
 that wasn't it, either. It was as good as telling herself 
 that. She had no certainty that Jim would ever learn 
 what had become of the Helga ; and knowing Zoe as 
 he did, Jim couldn't believe that she very much cared 
 whether he ever did learn. It was to herself that she 
 was acting. 
 
 If she acted like that for her own benefit, of course it 
 showed one thing conclusively: Zoe hadn't been able 
 simply to erase him from her mind. A woman wouldn't 
 throw away even the money that the Helga represented, 
 let alone the triumphant Helga herself, in order not to 
 be reminded of a man whom she could conveniently for- 
 get anyway. Plainly, she loved him; as plainly, she 
 would not yield to her love for him. Well, he had never 
 doubted that first fact ; but a life-time would not be long 
 enough to convince him of the second. Yet it was plainly 
 before him, and his intellect, at least, accepted it. 
 
 She loved him; both his intellect and his instinct be- 
 lieved that. And he didn't even know where she was, 
 nor how nor with whom she spent her days. Curiosity, 
 which had slumbered in Jim all these months, awoke and
 
 WAITING 213 
 
 tortured him. Zoe wasn't imprisoned in their common 
 past, as he had appeared to assume. Like him, she 
 breathed and walked the earth visibly; she ate, drank 
 and talked. Where? With whom? This very eve- 
 ning she was probably not alone; somebody's eyes were 
 being gladdened by the sight of her white shoulders and 
 massed hair. Or if it were now morning where she was, 
 she might be walking the uplands in her splendour and 
 not alone, not alone. 
 
 His life and Zoe's, flowing together so completely 
 and then so completely apart, were indeed strangely and 
 singularly free from natural points of contact. There 
 wasn't anybody to whom he could say casually, "Where 
 is Zoe Lenox now? And what is she doing?" He didn't 
 know anybody who could give him even an approximate 
 answer. Stuart Evington knew nothing as to her where- 
 abouts or occupation, although it was Stuart who had 
 introduced Jim to her. It seemed to Jim that Zoe ought 
 to be fairly an international figure; and yet the people 
 among whom he lived were the kind who knew every 
 international reputation; and they appeared never to 
 have heard of Zoe Lenox. 
 
 Enlightenment of a sort reached Jini that summer 
 from an unexpected although by no means unusual 
 source. At the height of its slack season, the great Amer- 
 ican press suddenly discovered Zoe Lenox. 
 
 One morning she stared at Jim, as he ate his leisurely 
 Sunday breakfast, from the gaudy page of a highly il- 
 lustrated "supplement." An enterprising correspondent 
 had written her up as a full-page "feature," with sev- 
 eral photographs and with some veracity. She was, the 
 article had it, a striking figure of European society, and 
 one in whose future much interest was shown. She had, 
 too, enough of a past to engage the imagination of a
 
 214 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 reporter. Dan Lenox's career was boldly shadowed 
 forth, and Zoe's early life in the tropics. 
 
 But it was in Zoe's suitors that the interest of the ar- 
 ticle centred. Now at last Zoe's Grand Dukes were spe- 
 cially set before Jim, names and titles and achievements 
 some of the achievements being more than a little 
 questionable. "Grand Dukes" had been Jim's jocular 
 generic term for the gentlemen who sought Zoe's favour ; 
 but there were two actual Grand Dukes in the list here 
 given. Several other noblemen of varying degrees were 
 categorically set down, and a reigning monarch was 
 rather more than hinted at. The reporter who wrote 
 that "feature" knew his business, and doubtless beguiled 
 a few minutes for more than one Sabbath-weary reader. 
 It was but natural that Jim Whittaker, considering his 
 peculiar interest in the subject, should read the article 
 with avidity, and then throw down the paper in dis- 
 gust. 
 
 A moment later he picked it up again; for he hadn't 
 more than glanced at the pictures. He needn't read 
 twaddle about her; but he couldn't blame himself if he 
 looked rather hard, and perhaps more than once, at her 
 pictures. 
 
 The largest, near the centre of the page, reproduced a 
 photograph that Jim had seen; there was a copy on 
 board the Helga. It was probably her official picture. 
 It was of her head and shoulders only, and was taken 
 directly from the front: it showed the perfect features, 
 the level gaze, of a conscious and successful beauty. It 
 showed, too, the characteristic hairdressing that Jim re- 
 membered so well. To the right of this picture was a 
 smaller one, evidently a snap-shot, taken outdoors and 
 in riding costume. Jim had never seen her dressed so; 
 he had to acknowledge that she looked very handsome,
 
 WAITING 
 
 and quite self-confident, as she stood crop in hand, tall 
 and graceful and at her ease. She was smiling a little; 
 and Jim's heart beat faster because of that smile her 
 very smile on paper ! Jim had smiled a little in answer, 
 before he remembered to wonder at whom she had been 
 smiling when the picture was taken; and then he smiled 
 at his own absurdity, and passed to the picture on the 
 left. 
 
 This too showed her at full length ; and it was a new 
 picture. Her dress would never have dated the picture : 
 Zoe's idiosyncratic evening gowns might have done duty 
 from season to season, Jim supposed, and no Grand 
 Duke of them all would ever have been any the wiser. 
 It was Zoe's face that was different, different enough to 
 show even in a newspaper "cut" : the cheeks a little 
 flatter, the lips a little compressed, the eyes hollow and 
 bright. If it had been the face of a stranger, Jim would 
 have said that it showed power of a sort, but not the ul- 
 timate sort: it was the face of a woman who would 
 throw away kingdoms, not to speak of yachts, without a 
 tremor or an afterthought, but who couldn't quite pos- 
 sess herself. Yet when Jim had met Zoe Lenox for the 
 first time, at the Evingtons' that day now a year agone, 
 that had been emphatically just what she could do, just 
 what she was notable for doing. She had possessed her- 
 self absolutely. 
 
 Jim threw down the paper, and then picked it up. It 
 had occurred to him that the article might give some hint 
 as to an address, in case he wanted to write to Zoe. But 
 he didn't want to write. He had nothing to say, in the 
 first place: all that he could have told her she knew al- 
 ready, and refused to acknowledge. Anyway, he couldn't 
 have written in the face of that article. To write to Zoe 
 in the light cast by an American supplement would be
 
 216 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 like bombarding a prima donna with notes. After all, 
 he was at least an intimate friend of the lady's; and it 
 behooved him to remember even that surface fact. 
 
 Jim had plenty of that artificial white light during the 
 weeks that followed : again and again it showed and dis- 
 torted his lady and his love. The American journalist, 
 having at last discovered Zoe Lenox, had found in her 
 a congenial and a fruitful theme. She had a romantic 
 background and a rich setting; she photographed beauti- 
 fully ; and best of all, she consented just now to perform 
 exploits for his benefit. 
 
 Even allowing for journalistic embroidery, there was 
 enough left in the account of those exploits to puzzle 
 Jim. He could imagine Zoe as the centre of a certain 
 amount of stir; but only as its passive, perhaps its bored 
 centre. To rush from one end of Europe to the other 
 in restless excitement, in positive, aggressive, ceaseless 
 activity, wasn't like her at all. As Zoe herself would 
 have said, she would rather sit still and read. But now- 
 adays she never was still: perhaps she had burned her 
 library when she destroyed the Helga. She was in a 
 whirl of events and undertakings : and through the pub- 
 lic prints her lover could glimpse her, entertaining lav- 
 ishly and extensively, being entertained furiously in re- 
 turn, figuring conspicuously with other notables in the 
 hunting-field she, the daughter of the sea! organis- 
 ing picturesque regattas, and herself sailing in some 
 events and winning, organising oh, final touch of the 
 incongruous! two or three huge charitable bazaars of 
 a Yankee efficiency and ingenuity. 
 
 But chiefly and always, Zoe figured in those articles 
 as sought by men. In a way there was nothing surpris- 
 ing in that fact : she always had been sought so, and with 
 her qualifications she always would be. But Jim some-
 
 WAITING 217 
 
 how gathered that now she deliberately invited wooing 
 deliberately, and desperately. To Jim, reading the 
 account of her doings, it seemed as if seven devils must 
 have entered into her. 
 
 He was himself rather given up to devils these days. 
 If he could have arrived at a conviction that Zoe was 
 forever lost to him, and rested in that conviction, he 
 might have been by this time on the way to recover his 
 poise. But he couldn't believe that she was lost to him. 
 His spirit refused to admit the possibility; and these 
 glimpses of her that he had through the public prints 
 corroborated the findings of his instinct. She was driv- 
 ing herself through her program; she was striving 
 with all her might to forget. That meant she couldn't 
 forget easily. Some day she would tire of her driving 
 and striving; and when she tired, she might make him a 
 sign. Or she might not; it would be rather more like 
 her not to. 
 
 It is easier to learn to do without a limb than to live 
 always on the point of an amputation which is some- 
 how never performed. Still, one does not feel any 
 worse than one has to. And there are things to be en- 
 joyed, one may suppose, even in the shadow of the gal- 
 lows, if a man have the proper temperament. There are 
 certainly things to be curious about the duration of 
 the hempen caress, for example. And there is always, 
 to a man of the Anglo-Saxon tradition, the possibility 
 of at any moment making himself ridiculous in his own 
 eyes, and spending his last earthly moments in the toils 
 of a wounded and writhing self-esteem. 
 
 Jim's spirit gave that final proof of vitality whenever 
 he thought of Jessica Drummond. He did not see her 
 again for months after that evening when he had planned 
 to marry her out of hand. But he thought of her many
 
 218 TftE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 times, and he could never think of her without writhing 
 at the remembrance of how he had in his own mind con- 
 descended to her. 
 
 That following summer he did finally see her again. 
 She and he were both members of a small house-party at 
 the Evingtons'. It was not the first time Jessica had 
 been there in the last year, for June still clung to her 
 friend; but it was the first time she and Jim had hap- 
 pened to be there together. 
 
 They encountered at tea on the terrace. The first 
 moment might have been horrible with constraint; but 
 it simply wasn't. Jessica met him quite naturally; and 
 her lack of embarrassment bred the same ease in him. 
 She didn't expect anything from him, and she wasn't 
 ashamed of what she had given. Appreciating her at- 
 titude, Jim experienced a prompt mental side-glimpse 
 toward a woman whose favours were greater, but not 
 granted in so ungrudging a spirit. Then mentally he 
 apologised to Jessica because he couldn't accept her on 
 her own merits, without reference to the short-comings 
 of another. 
 
 He set himself to be very nice to her; and he found 
 that Jessica was different from what she once had been. 
 She had ceased to grasp and clamour ; she seemed to have 
 found a whole range of new values, exactly the values 
 that Jim would never have expected her to find. Being 
 nice to her was unexpectedly easy; he was nice to her, 
 off and on, from the Saturday afternoon to the Monday 
 morning. On leaving he was rewarded by a special 
 smile from June; and he wondered if all June's combi- 
 nations were quite without calculation. He couldn't, 
 however, pierce June's clear-eyed candour ; and of course 
 in this case it didn't matter anyhow. 
 
 Later he was for another week-end at the Evingtons',
 
 WAITING 219 
 
 and Jessica Drummond wasn't there; later still for an- 
 other, and she was. He had looked toward this second 
 meeting with some eagerness ; but when it came it bored 
 him. He chanced to be wretchedly out of tune with life 
 that day: he was thinking of things which he felt were 
 better forgotten; and it seemed to him that the world 
 was peopled entirely with women, and that never a 
 woman of them all could get along even for a day with- 
 out making demands that taxed a man eternally, or lur- 
 ing with promises that she never meant to fulfil, and 
 couldn't have fulfilled if she would. 
 
 Summer flowered and waned. Jim would have said 
 that for him every day dragged; but he was surprised 
 when at length he realised that a year had passed since 
 he returned from his cruise in the Helga. A year, and 
 he was still waiting. Another year might find him wait- 
 ing so, and another, and another: find him with his 
 yearning fainter, his weariness greater, but still wait- 
 ing. Already he had wearied of his position, or his 
 complication, if that was what you chose to call it; but 
 he knew better than to rebel actively. If he cast envi- 
 ous glances back into the pleasant places of his bachelor- 
 hood, or sidewise into the charming domestic gardens of 
 his friends well, the eyes and the thoughts will wan- 
 der, and doubtless he was envious. But he was letting 
 it go at that. 
 
 And that next winter he had fairly direct news of his 
 vanished Zoe and her vanished Helga.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 
 
 ALONG late in the afternoon he was in his office 
 signing his letters. He had had a busy and an 
 unusually normal day ; but he was beginning to reflect in 
 some dismay that an empty evening lay ahead of him. 
 One so seldom had, in these days, that he ought actually 
 to have welcomed a little leisure; but he had become 
 craven, and feared that leisure might make him prey to 
 thick-coming fancies. Well, he could look in at a the- 
 atre if he actually found that he was too much for him- 
 self. But perhaps, he reflected, it would be better not to 
 indulge his restlessness at the expense of his intellect, 
 as must happen if he chanced on a poor play. And even 
 if he chanced on a good one, he would be entertained 
 only by some variation of the great human duet and dis- 
 cord. It might be as well to give in to emptiness, and to 
 fight himself to sleep at ten instead of at one. 
 
 As Jim scrawled his last signature he heard the an- 
 nouncement, "A gentleman to see you, Mr. Whittaker." 
 He blotted his writing and pushed the pile aside as he 
 looked up ; then for a minute he remained motionless and 
 staring. His visitor advanced with outstretched hand : he 
 was as if he had been bodied forth from Jim's thoughts, 
 and yet he somehow wasn't. But Jim's first moment of 
 incredulity was followed by a pleasure he didn't have 
 to force. "Masterson !" he cried. "By George, this is 
 
 220
 
 THE YACHT HELGADESTINATION 
 
 a surprise! Wherever did you come from? You're as 
 welcome as spring flowers, and as unexpected." 
 
 Masterson was smiling as Jim would hardly have 
 supposed he could smile. But when he stopped smiling, 
 his seriousness was no less surprising. His sullenness 
 was gone ; or perhaps rather it had been transformed into 
 simple power and earnestness. It wasn't the accident of 
 shore clothes which had made him a little strange to Jim's 
 eye; it was the change in the man himself. "Has all 
 the world taken to reforming itself?" thought Jim. Aloud 
 he said, motioning the man to a chair, "How splendid 
 you are looking ! What are you doing now ?" 
 
 "I took your advice, you see, and I have benefited by 
 it," said Masterson. "I'm captain of a coasting vessel 
 whose owner wants to sell her, and I'm here in connec- 
 tion with that business." 
 
 "Good!" exclaimed Jim. "And how much time have 
 you free?" 
 
 "This evening, Mr. Whittaker," said Masterson. 
 
 "So, by great good luck, have I," said Jim. "We'll go 
 forth and celebrate, shan't we ?" 
 
 "If you like," said the other, smiling. 
 
 "I more than like." Jim jumped up, shutting his desk 
 with a bang. "Come on! Isn't the first thing dinner?" 
 
 He found himself oddly roused and agitated as he 
 strolled forth to dine with the quondam mate of the 
 Helga. Seeing Masterson was almost like seeing Zoe, 
 for one thing; but there was more in it, there was more 
 in it than that. And at first that something more was 
 what told with Jim. The former mate's bearing as 
 he and Jim walked down the street side by side, the look 
 of him across the dinner-table, the astounding fact that 
 he took two glasses of wine with his meal, and having 
 taken them stopped there all these things proclaimed
 
 - 
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 the truth that Masterson was once again a free man. He 
 who had been so abjectly and so long the slave of the 
 devouring Zoe, was now free and on his feet. That re- 
 markable fact forced an interesting conclusion: having 
 been a slave, one could yet be free; the chains did not 
 eat into one's soul. If hope proved futile and yearning 
 vain, at least there was liberty ahead. Jim's heart leaped 
 up at the thought of freedom. 
 
 It was inevitable that the topic of Zoe should come up 
 between Jim and Masterson. Not to have let it come up, 
 indeed, would have been quite too pointed. But dur- 
 ing dinner her name was never once mentioned, nor 
 was there any allusion to the yacht Helga. Masterson 
 did most of the talking. Either he had found a tongue 
 where he found his self-respect, or he was pouring out 
 now, once and for all, the accumulations of years. He 
 spoke of the things an active man of affairs with a turn 
 for observation might see and mentally record : Jim was 
 amazed at the number of such things there seemed to 
 be, without ever once touching the great human duet. 
 Masterson phrased his ideas well enough, but that wasn't 
 what surprised Jim. The marvel was that Masterson 
 should think it worth his while to phrase anything at 
 all, Masterson, whom Jim remembered as a whiskey- 
 soaked wretch ridden by a fixed idea, an idea which, it 
 would have been reasonable enough to suppose at that 
 time, might one day ride him into madness. 
 
 Did Masterson see in him, Jim wondered, a corre- 
 sponding change in the other direction? Did he the 
 enfranchised despise the enthralled as the enthralled at 
 times despised himself ? Jim knew that he was morbid : 
 resolutely he set himself to follow the talk, and to keep 
 from looking below its surface. Masterson certainly 
 hadn't looked him up merely for the purpose of gloating
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 223 
 
 over him. Exactly why, the question presented itself, 
 had he looked him up? Impatiently Jim shook himself 
 free of his own silly questions. Masterson had, of 
 course, looked him up as one man does another, to re- 
 new an acquaintance and to fill an idle evening. Mas- 
 terson wasn't interested in Jim Whittaker's psychology, 
 and he hadn't conceivably any message to deliver. 
 
 They sat for a long time over their dinner; so that 
 although it was early when they began, it was by no 
 means early when they finished. "Shall we drop in 
 somewhere?" asked Jim, and proceeded to run over for 
 his friend's benefit the mental list of diversions that 
 he had made earlier in the day for his own. Masterson 
 did not care about dropping in anywhere. He could 
 go to any of those places when he was alone ; to-night he 
 preferred to talk with Jim. He had talked to Jim so far; 
 he had been uncommonly talkative. Now it should be 
 Jim's turn. 
 
 Jim didn't know that he had much to say ; but a quiet 
 evening would suit him perfectly. They could go up to 
 his flat, and smoke. 
 
 That was what they finally did. Jim lighted a fire, 
 and drew forward two chairs; the cigars were within 
 easy reach of both. The two men established themselves, 
 and a long silence fell, a silence that might have ended 
 in embarrassment, but ended instead in understanding. 
 They both looked around at the same moment; and as 
 their eyes met, Jim asked, "When did you leave the 
 Helga?" 
 
 "Well not when I said I would." Masterson's glance 
 followed a trail of smoke to the ceiling, and then re- 
 turned to Jim. "No, of course not when I said I would." 
 
 "I rather thought that you would just then," Jim 
 stated.
 
 224 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Oh, I fully meant to, at the moment when I told you I 
 was going. I fully meant to, but at the bottom of my 
 heart I never thought I would. You see, I was valuable 
 to my employer; I was doubly valuable just then, be- 
 cause her captain was on the point of leaving. I meant 
 to leave; but she would come to me some day, and look 
 at me with her cool eyes, and say, 'You are staying on, 
 Mr. Masterson ? You will take the Helga to Liverpool ?' 
 or the Windward Isles, or Kamchatka, or wherever 
 suited her fancy. And I should look back at her; and 
 with an honourable life in one scale, and casual contact 
 with that woman in the other, I should stay. She would 
 know that, you see, and count upon it." 
 
 "And was that the way it happened?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Very nearly. The Helga was repaired at Rio de 
 Janeiro, and then sailed for the States. The captain 
 left us in Florida; Miss Lenox was really very angry 
 with him, for some reason ; or perhaps she was angry 
 with herself, for keeping him so long. She ought to 
 have been a better judge of seamen. When he had gone 
 ashore, she sent for me, and asked if I would get another 
 mate, and would myself take the Helga to Liverpool. 
 She didn't seem even to remember that I had talked of 
 resigning. She wouldn't, you know, remember anything 
 that it wasn't convenient for her to remember." 
 
 "And you stayed ?" suggested Jim. 
 
 "I stayed, just as she had expected me to. I would 
 have given anything I possessed for the ability to turn 
 on my heel and leave the Helga then and there; but all 
 I did was to say in the fewest possible words that I 
 would take the Helga as far as Liverpool. She said 
 sweetly, 'Thank you very much,' and she laughed a lit- 
 tle. I could have wrung her neck for that laugh. Her 
 sweetness was all calculated; when she was as idle and
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 225 
 
 angry as she was that day, I suppose she had a sort of 
 pleasure in making me do as she wished, and knowing 
 that it was quite against my will." 
 
 "Yet you must have derived some satisfaction from 
 being with her," Jim argued, "or with the odds so heav- 
 ily against it, you wouldn't have stayed." 
 
 "Satisfaction, nonsense! Nothing but torture," as- 
 serted Masterson. "As much satisfaction as a man may 
 get from delirium tremens." 
 
 "It's only that hell is better than a void ?" suggested Jim. 
 
 "Yes, if you come to choosing." Masterson reached 
 for a fresh cigar, and the hand with which he lighted it 
 shook. He noted the shaking, and smiled. "I get very 
 angry when I talk about her," he explained more calmly. 
 "Very angry, and a little bit excited. I haven't got her 
 quite out of my system even yet, and I don't suppose 
 I ever shall. That isn't surprising. The marvel is that 
 I have got her out as well as I have." 
 
 "That's what I have been wondering at," said Jim 
 quietly. 
 
 "Yes, oh, yes ! It's like you know, I have never read 
 very many books of a literary nature " 
 
 "I know," murmured Jim, remembering the contents 
 of Masterson's sea-going library. 
 
 "Yet somewhere I remember having read something 
 that fitted this case well enough. I don't know where I 
 read it, though you will probably recognise the quota- 
 tion; but I remembered it from the once reading. It 
 goes something like this: 
 
 ' So is my spirit, as flesh with sin, 
 
 Filled full, eaten out and in, 
 
 With the face of her, the eyes of her ' " 
 
 " ' The lips, the little chin, the stir 
 Of shadow round her mouth,' "
 
 226 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Jim finished for him. 
 
 "Yes, I thought you would know it; it may be fa- 
 mous, for all I know. 'Filled full, eaten out and in, 
 
 with the face of her, the eyes of her ' ' Masterson 
 
 drew a long breath. "So was my spirit," he said. 
 
 In the pause that followed his bracing sanity seemed 
 to make itself felt in the room. Jim scanned the hand- 
 some browned face, with its resolute frown, the keen 
 blue eyes, the well-knit figure that had again relaxed into 
 the chair; and for the hundredth time he marvelled at a 
 recovery so complete. The fact of Masterson's recovery 
 was indubitable, even if the means were to remain a 
 mystery. But perhaps he should soon learn the means. 
 "You took the Helga to Liverpool?" he suggested. 
 
 "No, as it turned I didn't. But I agreed to take her 
 there, and the start was made. Then my lady changed 
 her mind: she decided to stop at the Bermudas. We 
 circled back, made the Bermudas, anchored where she 
 bade me. She wouldn't disembark. She told me to 
 start for Naples. In the Mediterranean we actually 
 got as far as the Mediterranean she changed her mind, 
 and wanted to go to Genoa instead. I finally took the 
 Helga through the Dardanelles and part way up the 
 Danube." 
 
 "That wasn't like herP' ejaculated Jim. 
 
 "No, it wasn't. But it was more like her than she 
 was like herself during all that time. I had come to 
 watch her with a new curiosity; I wanted to make out 
 what she was about, or thought she was. Well, during 
 all that voyaging about and about, it seemed to me that 
 she struggled to keep her outer life just as usual. She 
 adhered to her daily routine as if there were some magic 
 virtue in doing so or perhaps as if she were mortally 
 afraid to vary from it. But all the while something
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 227 
 
 was preying on her, preying on her until my own state 
 was peace and strength itself compared to hers. Only 
 she wouldn't give in to it a hair's breadth. 
 
 "You are not to understand, Mr. Whittaker, that I 
 myself gave in completely. You saw me when I was 
 at the worst I've ever been in my life. Ordinarily even 
 in those days I didn't drink when I was on shipboard; 
 and when the Helga wasn't drifting derelict, the mere 
 work I had to do gave me a certain strength. I am a 
 seaman, you mustn't forget. And I never wholly gave 
 in to my own silliness until the end. That is what I am 
 coming to." 
 
 Masterson paused, poured himself a glass of water, 
 and drank. He seemed just at that point curiously un- 
 willing to go on; he seized a pretext for delay. "You 
 think it strange that I am telling you all this?" he asked. 
 
 "Not any stranger than all the rest of the affair," said 
 Jim. "It has all been rather rum, you know." 
 
 Masterson nodded. "There are times when it seems 
 to me like something I have dreamed," he said. "And 
 of course your part in it was stranger than mine. You'll 
 pardon any roughness in my telling, won't you? I'm 
 not used to telling things of the sort: they are outside 
 the province of sailors' yarns." 
 
 '''Which you never told anyway," remarked Jim. 
 
 "No. But the captain of the Helga used to tell you 
 a few, didn't he?" 
 
 "The ancient mariner? He did." 
 
 "Perhaps it was for his conversation Miss Lenox 
 kept him so long, though I always thought it was for 
 his appearance. Well, that's neither here nor there. 
 He had been left behind, and I was acting as captain 
 of the Helga, and not enjoying my command in one 
 sense. In another, though, I loved it. The Helga was
 
 228 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 a magnificent little ship, you know, as swift and sea- 
 worthy as she was beautiful, and she was quite the most 
 beautiful " 
 
 Masterson's brow contracted, and his hands clenched. 
 "I can't tell you quite how a seaman feels about a ship," 
 he said. "But I grew to love the Helga as I was sailing 
 her crazily about the globe ; and when I remembered who 
 had planned her, I felt kinder toward the Helga's mis- 
 tress. She was a miracle, the Helga, a toy ship, if you 
 like, designed only for an idle woman's pleasure, but 
 the most beautiful thing I ever expect to see in this 
 world." 
 
 "Even a landsman could see how beautiful she was, 
 if he couldn't appreciate her other merits," said Jim. 
 And he thought, this ship of which we speak is the ship 
 on which I had that unbelievable report; this miracle 
 that has moved this man is the toy which that woman 
 cast away. 
 
 Masterson threw the butt of his cigar in the fire, clasped 
 his hands around his knee, and swung back in his chair 
 as he resumed his story. "One evening as we were 
 sailing up the Danube, bound no one knew whither, I 
 wished to see Miss Lenox about something or other. 
 She had just finished her dinner, and was in the main 
 saloon ; so I went in there to talk to her. She was wear- 
 ing one of those shimmery white things she was so fond 
 of dressed as if for a party, to dine alone. She stood 
 near the fire-place, under the picture of that old josser, 
 her father, you know " 
 
 "Tall and white," said Jim softly. 
 
 "Tall and white," repeated Masterson calmly, "and 
 looking as if something were tearing at her vitals. But 
 determined to look her best, you understand or rather 
 determined to look and live in accordance with her ideal
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 229 
 
 of Zoe Lenox, even if it killed her. Well, I said what 
 I had come to say, and she replied. I bade her good- 
 night, but somehow I knew I wasn't going away from 
 her just then. I not only lingered ; I stepped up a little 
 closer to her. And then for the first time in all our ac- 
 quaintance, I didn't fight her. I stood there and let 
 her penetrate me ; softly and in silence I enjoyed her, at 
 a distance of six feet or thereabouts." 
 
 Jim made some sort of inarticulate sound, and his 
 hands tightened on his chair-arms. But Masterson 
 didn't heed him; he had for the moment forgotten his 
 audience in the vividness of his recollections. "She 
 stood and looked at me," he went on, "in her highly in- 
 telligent way. She understood, but she didn't shrink. I 
 always did her the justice of realising that her failings 
 aren't connected with any mere feminine cowardice. I 
 made her shrink that evening, but it was in quite another 
 way. As I stood there beneath her cool gaze, I dare 
 say my own became as cool. I found myself saying, 
 'Well, why don't you give in to it?' 
 
 " 'Give in to what?' she asked, as if she didn't under- 
 stand ; and perhaps just for the moment she didn't. 
 
 " 'Why go on pretending that you aren't hit ?' I asked. 
 'It's surprising, I know, for you to be hit, but it isn't 
 disgraceful. And he's really a very good sort of fel- 
 low perhaps in some ways a much better fellow than 
 you deserve, if you'll pardon me for saying so/ 
 
 "You may judge of the extent of her consternation," 
 Masterson abruptly returned to his audience to say, "by 
 the strain in which she replied to me. 'I don't know 
 what you are talking about, Mr. Masterson,' says she 
 shortly, 'and I think you are extremely impertinent.' 
 
 " 'I know I'm impertinent,' I answered, 'but you know
 
 230 
 
 well enough what I mean. Or if you would rather be 
 told, I'll tell you. I mean Jim Whittaker.' " 
 
 Jim fairly choked at the mention of his own name in 
 the scene Masterson evoked. He could not choose but 
 hear, however, for Masterson went relentlessly on. 
 
 "She went all to pieces for a moment then : she grew 
 as white as her gown, and threw out her hands to steady 
 herself. I took one of them, and guided her to a chair. 
 There, you see, it isn't worth the effort,' I said. 'All 
 this resisting, and tying yourself in knots. After all, 
 why shouldn't you love him? You are lucky to be able 
 to love, if you ask me; and if you are going to love, you 
 must do it as it comes to you.' 
 
 "I was prepared for anything then, except for what 
 she actually did. If she had ordered me out I should 
 simply have gone, ordered by my ship's owner. If she 
 had gone to pieces and abased herself, I shouldn't have 
 loved her any the less ; and if she had denied everything 
 that is what most women would have done under the 
 circumstances, I suppose, simply have denied everything. 
 But Zoe Lenox threw back her head, straightened her 
 distorted features, and looking steadily at me, though 
 not into my eyes, said, 'And what of it ?' " 
 
 It seemed to Jim that he couldn't endure another word, 
 yet he feared to interrupt. Passionately he desired to 
 know all, to know the worst; he hated himself for lis- 
 tening to all this, yet he went on listening. 
 
 "I can't tell you how that made me feel," said Mas- 
 terson. "She was baffling me again, just as she always 
 had. It seemed to me that she wasn't a woman at all, 
 that she couldn't be and do as she did; yet I was fright- 
 fully conscious that she was a woman. I lost control of 
 myself, which was probably just what she wanted; I
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 231 
 
 cried out, 'You dare say that to me? You dare say it, 
 here in the very scene of your love?' 
 
 " The scene of my love ?' she repeated. 'You mean 
 the Helga?' 
 
 " 'Of course I mean the Helga,' I said. 
 
 " 'I shall tell you,' she said softly, 'what I plan to do 
 with this so-called scene of my love, Mr. Masterson. 
 You will take the Helga straight to Hamburg ; and when 
 we get there I shall sell her for scrap.' 
 
 "Even at that moment her threat rather staggered me, 
 as she had of course intended that it should. Not that 
 I for a moment believed she would ever do it ; but even 
 the bare idea was nauseating. The Helga was her crea- 
 tion as well as her property; and the Helga was the 
 most beautiful boat I ever saw. A triumph, a work of 
 art, in the only art that I understand that is what she 
 was." 
 
 "Was?" Jim echoed politely, although he knew the 
 answer. 
 
 Masterson nodded, with averted eyes. "She did it," 
 he said, scarcely above his breath. "She did it, and 
 she did it thoroughly. There is no hesitation in her, 
 when she is living up to her idea of Zoe Lenox. Prob- 
 ably I only strengthened her in her decision by presum- 
 ing to argue the matter. 'You can't sell her for scrap/ 
 I said. 'No one would scrap this beautiful new boat. 
 Of course, if you wish to sell her, you're at liberty to do 
 so; but don't think that I believe you when you talk 
 nonsense.' 
 
 " 'I will scrap her myself,' she answered. She spoke 
 now quite coolly; she was rapidly becoming her own 
 mistress once more or as much her own mistress as it 
 is possible for her to be nowadays. 
 
 "I turned on my heel and left her; I was still incredu-
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 lous, though perhaps I was even then beginning to be 
 frightened. 'You have your orders, Mr. Masterson,' 
 she called after me. 
 
 "I didn't act at once on those new orders; I gave her 
 a chance to come to herself without having openly to 
 avow that she had changed her mind. I only brought 
 down a rebuke on myself : hadn't I understood her latest 
 orders?" 
 
 "And she actually ?" suggested Jim. 
 
 "She actually saw the Helga scrapped. Under her 
 own eyes the ship was knocked to pieces, with a fiend- 
 ish thoroughness ; and she took good care to sell a piece 
 here and a piece there, so that the Helga couldn't pos- 
 sibly be rehabilitated. The excellence of the job she 
 made gave me an increased respect for her intelligence, 
 to be sure. No wonder her father made a fortune, if 
 he did all his little jobs so well." 
 
 "You stayed until the end?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Until the very end. I couldn't tear myself away: 
 the whole business had an ugly fascination for me. Of 
 course, at first I kept hoping that she would relent." 
 
 "But she didn't relent?" 
 
 "No. She finished the job, and paid me even for 
 those last days on shore, and looked at me with triumph 
 in her eyes as she told me that of course now she had no 
 farther need of my services. And as I stood before her 
 for the last time, with her money in my hand, I was 
 suddenly glad that she hadn't relented. For every stroke 
 that had dismantled the Helga had driven another nail 
 in the coffin of the wretched feeling I had so long cher- 
 ished for her. I could endure most things, even the 
 knowledge of my own deterioration; but that piece of 
 childish folly was more than I could endure. And then 
 the Helga was the most beautiful boat I suppose a
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 233 
 
 landsman never could see what I mean, and I'm not 
 clever enough to make him see but the Helga was the 
 most beautiful boat I ever saw." 
 
 On that refrain, the beauty of the Helga, Masterson's 
 voice dropped as if he had finished his story. There was 
 a long silence after that. Masterson himself broke it, 
 turning to Jim with a smile. "You have no idea how 
 odd it feels, having been in such a position for so long, 
 to be your own man again. I felt positively naked at 
 first: I shivered. Many, many times I longed to go 
 back. But there wasn't any going back ; and I shouldn't 
 actually have gone if opportunity had offered." 
 
 "You surely are your own man again?" Jim asked, 
 chiefly in order to ask something. Masterson was his 
 own man : that was the fact which had been patent all 
 the evening. 
 
 "She found the only way to cure me. I myself hadn't 
 known there was a way," said the sailor. 
 
 "Did you hope," asked Jim, "by telling me all this, to 
 cure me, too?" 
 
 "No," said Masterson. "No, I didn't expect any- 
 thing definite. And probably you think that in telling 
 you I have been more than a little of a cad. Actually, 
 of course, I didn't come here to tell you all this. I came 
 simply because I wished to see you ; then I got to talking, 
 more or less for my own benefit; and when I had once 
 begun, I couldn't stop. You are the only audience I 
 ever had who could appreciate this particular story ; and 
 this is the only good story I ever had to tell." 
 
 "And you taciturn people, when you really get started, 
 are the worst of any," said Jim, smiling. 
 
 "Yes, oh, yes! Pent-up accumulation, you see. I 
 suppose to-morrow I shall wish I had held my peace; 
 but somehow just now I don't regret having told you.
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 I may have given you a moment's pain; but you're not 
 a weak man, and you can stand it. I don't think you 
 resent pain so much anyhow : what you would resent is 
 not having things straight in your own mind." 
 
 "I don't know that I ever resent anything now," said 
 Jim slowly. 
 
 "You are pretty much down?" asked the other. 
 
 "I am pretty much down." 
 
 For a moment the eyes of the two men met in under- 
 standing; then they fell in embarrassment. Masterson 
 launched suddenly into talk of an indifferent nature. 
 Jim was not listening; and he doubted afterward if Mas- 
 terson himself had had much idea of what he said. It 
 got them, however, over the crisis of their emotion, 
 without their having to avow that there was such a crisis. 
 
 As suddenly as he had begun, Masterson ceased to 
 talk; he stood up, and looked at his watch. "I had no 
 idea it was so late," he said, exposing the dial to Jim. 
 "How I have run on !" 
 
 "Come up again the next time you are in town, and 
 run on again," said Jim. 
 
 "That may be a long time. If this sale falls through, 
 I shan't come your way again very soon, probably," 
 replied Masterson. 
 
 "At least, I am glad you have come my way this 
 time," said Jim. 
 
 Masterson held out his hand, and Jim shook it. A 
 moment the sailor stood regarding his friend; the little 
 wrinkles deepened about his keen eyes. Then he mut- 
 tered something about next time, turned on his heel, and 
 walked out of the room. He had let himself out the 
 door before Jim could get there; he seemed to vanish 
 from the room, and from the saga: for Jim Whittaker 
 never saw him again after that night.
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 235 
 
 He never, when he came to think it over, expected to 
 see him again. It wasn't fitting that he should, for he 
 now had Masterson' s story complete. The story was 
 queer enough, too, as Jim thought it over in silence and 
 at leisure, while he waited in vain for sleep to come. 
 Zoe's destruction of the Helga had done for Masterson 
 what neither hi own pride nor any other outrageous- 
 ness on her part could have done. Jim appreciated fully 
 that his friend had now been restored to man's stature. 
 The very possibility of such a restoration was enough to 
 put heart into a man. 
 
 But here entered the deadly parallel Masterson 
 had been feeding himself for years on the empty husks 
 of a love. It was time for him to be cured ; indeed the 
 time had come when he must be cured or perish. And 
 Masterson had never known that fulfilment of love which 
 eats into man's bones as its denial never can. The 
 balance that keeps things human from ever getting quite 
 to their worst had reclaimed Masterson in the nick of 
 time. 
 
 It had chosen a horrible enough instrument for the 
 reclaiming. Zoe's outrage upon the Helga did not seem 
 to Jim the unspeakable thing that it must seem to the 
 seaman Masterson. But Jim had his own solid recogni- 
 tion of the claim to respect of the product of human 
 ingenuity and human labour; and he had a civilised 
 man's regard for a thing of beauty. He closed his eyes 
 in the darkness, and he could see suspended before him 
 the Helga as she had floated above him in the blue, be- 
 fore he set foot upon her for the first time. He seemed 
 to board her again, and to go all over her; over every 
 inch of her he went, in a sudden spurt of fancy that put 
 her almost visually before him. He recalled her beauty 
 and shapeliness, her miraculous detail and surpassing
 
 236 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 design; he fairly yearned to her perfection. And then 
 he recalled that that perfection was no more: it had 
 been broken up and cast to the four winds of heaven, 
 because Zoe willed it so. The thought sickened him. 
 
 Perhaps what ought to have haunted him was not the 
 deed itself, but the spirit which had prompted it. Zoe 
 had destroyed the Helga to prove to herself her own 
 surpassing indifference: to show Zoe Lenox and the 
 world that she didn't care for anything, or, in the last 
 analysis, that she didn't care if she did care. Wanton 
 destructiveness would have been almost preferable to 
 this actual attitude, with its monumental insincerity, its 
 huge, strange conceit. And yet, as Jim thought over 
 and over this action of his lady's in the light he now 
 had upon it, it became not only comprehensible to him, 
 but even in a way admirable. An egotism so towering, 
 even if it did not wholly trust itself, still came near to 
 being a magnificent madness; it held more than a hint 
 of the hereditary greatness for which Jim had once 
 thought to search Zoe's nature in vain. With such a 
 gesture of disdain did your splendid half-Olympians toss 
 worlds away. 
 
 For, of course, if you were an Olympian through and 
 through, your disdain was too deep for mere theatrical 
 display. If Zoe had reincarnated her father, she could 
 have sailed on in the Helga to the end of time without 
 losing a jot of her magnificence. Ah, but if Zoe had 
 reincarnated her father, she could have admitted and 
 embraced her love, without ever abating her splendour 
 or damaging her priceless self-esteem. 
 
 All roads led Jim to the same conclusion : it was only 
 by the frank avowal of her love that Zoe could finally 
 have possessed herself. He smiled even now at the 
 persistence with which his mind came back to this same
 
 THE YACHT HELGA DESTINATION 237 
 
 point; yet his mind doubted as little as did his heart 
 that on this all-important point he was right 
 
 He might be right; but Zoe was at least consistent. 
 A consistent woman : no woman but a complete hanger- 
 back had ever been consistent. What cynic ever wanted 
 a woman to be consistent, anyway ? But what lover of 
 consistency wouldn't have loved Jim Whittaker, who 
 was, whether he liked it or not, quite the most consistent 
 mortal in existence? If only one didn't get tired of 
 one's own consistency. 
 
 But Jim did. He was tired of his own consistency, 
 and his lady's vagaries, and the general sameness of 
 the universe, together with its appalling absence of de- 
 sign. He was tired of not sleeping better, too: tired of 
 nights like this, when he crooked an elbow under his 
 head and waited wearily for the dawn. Only there was 
 nothing to be done about it, except wearily to wait. 
 
 Just about dawn he actually went to sleep ; and in his 
 sleep he retraced once more the plan of the Helga. There 
 seemed to be some obligation on him to hold the whole 
 thing together; and finally in spite of his efforts it flew 
 all to pieces, and he had to reassemble it. He couldn't 
 see why the task should have been given to him : he was 
 a landsman, as they could easily see. But the point 
 was not to shrink; if it was his duty to get the Helga to- 
 gether, get it together he must. And all through the 
 scant remainder of the night he toiled, bringing together 
 what Zoe had scattered, working because of the obliga- 
 tion that is on all men: but working more particularly 
 because it was his lot to follow and serve a woman who 
 belonged to the disdainful destructive ones of the earth.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 
 
 ASTERSON'S "one good story" had told Jim too 
 much; and of course it recalled to him more than 
 it actually told. The small measure of calm which Jim 
 had acquired in a year was overset in an evening. His 
 nights were once more feverish, his days deadly. The 
 easiest were those that were black with despair; but 
 usually now he burned with impatience, and sometimes, 
 worst of all, he glowed with hope, foolish futile hope, 
 which was born only to turn with sickening promptness 
 and rend him. 
 
 He reached a climax of tenseness one night, and wrote 
 Zoe a long letter. He was relieved when he had written 
 it; and without rereading, he sealed and sent it. In 
 the corner he put his usual "return," although it might 
 serve as warning to Zoe if she chose not to open the 
 letter. For the address he singled out what seemed to 
 him the most likely from the dozen supplied him by the 
 press articles about Zoe: he had saved every one of 
 those articles, although he was rather ashamed of saving 
 them, and always meant to destroy them. 
 
 He stole out at midnight to post his letter ; and as the 
 pillar-box clanged shut, he had a queer feeling that now 
 at last he had done something. Yet he regretted that 
 he could not maintain forever the silence of the past 
 year; it was as effective as any other attitude on his 
 part, as productive, and more dignified. 
 
 238
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 239 
 
 Still, when one has sent a letter, one always has some 
 vague expectation of an answer. Jim waited a month, 
 and none came: he wrote again. Later still, he wrote 
 a third time. It was scarcely possible that all three let- 
 ters should miscarry. 
 
 Like a love-sick girl, Jim lived these days for the ad- 
 vent of the postman. Every mail that came into his 
 office he scanned with his heart in his throat ; he blessed 
 human stupidity when he saw that his stenographer laid 
 his mail on his desk with no idea that it was more im- 
 portant than it always had been. One got mail a dozen 
 times a day, too, down town in a great modern city; 
 a dozen times a day Jim went through his little comedy, 
 letting a moment pass before he picked up his letters, 
 going over them slowly, because until you had turned to 
 it you could always almost believe that the next letter 
 would be the one, scanning doubtful envelopes a dozen 
 times, to make the direction look like her writing. 
 
 When he returned home at night, it was to experience 
 symptoms of suffocation as he entered the heavy outer 
 door of the building. She might, of course, have sent a 
 letter here rather than to his office. She never had: 
 there was never so much as a post-card. Very well, 
 then : to-morrow, she might. 
 
 That was the worst of the situation, hope's habit of 
 springing eternal ! The final analysis of his mail always 
 left him utterly downcast: the blankness told him all 
 he needed to know. But every morning, no matter what 
 the discouragement of the previous day or the fever 
 of the night, he woke with a settled conviction that to- 
 day the letter must come. The very fact that it hadn't 
 come before showed conclusively that it would come to- 
 day. And always at the sight of a handful of letters 
 his heart leaped up: leaped up perversely, it seemed to
 
 240 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 him, in order that it might sink the lower a moment 
 later. And then it wouldn't stay down; it simply 
 wouldn't stay. 
 
 The passage of time without his seeing or even hear- 
 ing directly from the lady of his heart put Jim himself 
 into a painful uncertainty about the whole affair. Face 
 to face with Zoe he was positive enough; but back in 
 his old life he could see things rather differently. This 
 uncertainty was natural, would have been natural even 
 without his peculiar circumstances. What makes the 
 love of a mature man so harassing is that it always 
 produces this division of the being. The folly of youth 
 is at least whole-hearted. But when one is old enough 
 to know folly for what it is, and at the same time is 
 none the tess irresistibly foolish, there is pain enough 
 and to spare, and a curious rankling shame. We should 
 be so cynically amused, if the case were only our neigh- 
 bour's instead of our own. 
 
 It could hardly be said that in these days Jim learned 
 to understand Zoe better; he had never misunderstood 
 her. Indeed he had had no chance to : for she had 
 worked herself out with maddening clearness along the 
 lines that Stuart Evington had laid down for her when 
 Jim's acquaintance with her was only hours old. She 
 didn't take simply, as another woman might have done, 
 or as Jim himself was prepared to do; she didn't take 
 powerfully, as one might have expected of the daughter 
 of Dan Lenox. She refrained from taking, refrained 
 systematically, refrained elaborately, refrained as if her 
 fullest expression were in mere negation. Once only 
 she had had courage to take; and that courage she had 
 gathered from the very shadow of death itself. That 
 was like her; it was very like her. 
 
 Jim himself could see that there was much to be said
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 
 
 against a marriage between him and Zoe. A woman of 
 her means and opportunities, who had lived a spacious 
 enough life, after all, could hardly be expected to settle 
 down as Jim Whittaker's wife; and for all his native 
 adaptability, Jim could not figure himself being hauled 
 about the surface of the globe as Zoe Lenox's husband. 
 
 But it wasn't to the inappropriateness of the match 
 that Zoe objected, although in her intelligent way she 
 undoubtedly appreciated that inappropriateness much 
 more thoroughly than did Jim. It wasn't even to mar- 
 riage as marriage that she said her final nay, although 
 she probably disliked the idea of marriage in its simpler 
 aspects. What gave her pause, Jim knew as well as if 
 she had told him so, was the horrible finality of the 
 thing. Marriage was as definite as death itself, and for 
 civilised beings almost as inevitable. 
 
 With all said against marriage in general, however, 
 and against this marriage in particular, it was mere folly 
 to perpetually dash oneself against a stone wall. And 
 how much worse, when the stone wall was of one's own 
 erecting! For it wasn't money, or difference in station 
 or nationality, or any defect, real or assumed, in the 
 marriage relation, that stood between Jim and Zoe: it 
 was Zoe herself. And as Jim imagined her industriously 
 piling up that stone wall of hers, and then dashing her- 
 self against it until she was all bruised and bleeding, 
 yes, and then not pausing for breath before she turned 
 to build it higher, and to stop any breaches that her 
 natural feeling might have made, as he saw all this with 
 his inner eye, Jim could have wept for very pity of the 
 spectacle. 
 
 And for all his weariness of the subject he had been 
 over it all so many times he waited with a certain 
 apprehensiveness the farther development of Zoe's con-
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 duct of her life. For in spite of the dreariness of these 
 present days he had an insistent feeling that some day 
 he should hear more about her; and he was hoping 
 against hope when he tried to think that that "more" 
 would come simply in the shape of a friendly answer to 
 his letters. 
 
 Mention of Zoe in the public prints had fallen off dur- 
 ing the months when Jim waited for the letter that never 
 came. In May, however, following that unquiet win- 
 ter, she was once more brought to the notice of the 
 world, and Jim Whittaker. 
 
 The paper that bore him word now was not the vari- 
 coloured Sunday "supplement" which had so exploited 
 Zoe. It was the sufficiently sober press of a week-day 
 morning of Saturday morning, to be exact. A cabled 
 news-item, bearing every evidence of authenticity, an- 
 nounced the engagement and approaching marriage of 
 Zoe Lenox, daughter of the late millionaire, to an Italian 
 prince, a member of the reigning family. 
 
 A short sketch of the prince's career was appended 
 in brackets; but although Jim read it conscientiously, it 
 told him nothing that he hadn't already known. The 
 prince's fame had penetrated the Western hemisphere, 
 and Jim had long known it. He had been hunter, ex- 
 plorer, soldier, even social reformer, and had won his 
 spurs in every field. No dissolute or enfeebled prince- 
 ling this: Jim had at least been supplanted by a man. 
 For so much, and for his feeling that her future was 
 now in a way reasonably safe, Jim strove to be grate- 
 ful. It wasn't so bad as it might have been. Only, he 
 thought with a twinge, he should never have written 
 those ridiculous letters; nothing could have been more 
 mal a propos than their reaching Zoe just when they did. 
 
 Jim was surprised at his own coolness ; and as the day
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 243 
 
 wore away, he began to think that perhaps at last his 
 definite release had been signed. He got through a 
 crowded hour at the office, clearing up to the end of the 
 week's work, and left rather early. He had promised 
 to play that afternoon in a tennis match; and there 
 seemed to be no very good reason why he should not 
 play as he had promised. He caught his train, lunched 
 frugally, went to the courts, and played. 
 
 His was not usually tournament form ; but that after- 
 noon he surpassed himself, and won the match, which 
 was a preliminary, but hotly contested. He took a fierce 
 satisfaction in winning: he liked standing in the hot 
 sun, and leaping for balls, and smashing them back, and 
 showing all these onlookers that he could. He could, 
 and did; he strolled off the court feeling how pleasant 
 even a trifling success may be, if it comes at exactly the 
 right moment. 
 
 Stuart Evington happened to be present at the match ; 
 and he strolled over afterward to wring Jim's hand in 
 congratulation. "The best game I ever saw you play," 
 was his comment. "Sure you didn't do yourself up, 
 though ? You look rather seedy." 
 
 "The sun is hot," said Jim. "Give me a cigarette, if 
 you have one about you, Stuart." 
 
 Evington offered his case. "Have you heard," he 
 inquired casually as he lighted a cigarette for himself, 
 "of the brilliant alliance our friend is forming? Zoe 
 Lenox, I mean of course." 
 
 "I read about it in the morning paper," said Jim. 
 
 There were people all about them, crowds of people, 
 many of whom they both knew; but just at that mo- 
 ment the two of them seemed to be insulated. The acci- 
 dent gave Evington a chance to go on, in his role of 
 chronicle and brief commentary of their time. "Pretty
 
 244 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 good, for a girl who sprang from nothing and alighted 
 from nowhere, shouldn't you say? What can't women 
 do, when they once make up their minds to?" 
 
 "One thing they always can do," returned Jim, "and 
 that is to marry advantageously. But that's not surpris- 
 ing, when a woman has beauty and wealth, and a cer- 
 tain amount of intelligence." 
 
 "And no scruples, eh?" Stuart grinned as he added, 
 "I'm afraid, now, she's lost to me forever: that's my 
 one objection to the arrangement. I say, Jim what a 
 princess she'll make!" 
 
 "Yes, won't she?" said Jim appreciatively. "The kind 
 you read about." Even to his own ears his voice 
 sounded quite natural; he was getting away with this 
 thing famously. 
 
 Evington nodded two or three times, savouring his 
 idea. There was a movement in the crowd about them ; 
 some one else came up to speak to Jim. "When are you 
 coming out to see us, Jim?" asked Evington quickly. 
 "Shan't I wait for you and take you over to-night?" 
 
 "No, thank you," answered Jim. "I'm going home 
 to-night. I'm rather done up; and I think I can get a 
 better night's rest there than elsewhere." 
 
 "Well, some time soon," said Evington, turning away. 
 
 Somebody else seized Jim's hand and shook it. There 
 seemed to be a great many people about him now, and 
 they all talked at once. Jim, listening to them, and try- 
 ing to separate their comments one from another, real- 
 ised that he was indeed very badly done up: his head 
 ached hard, and his limbs, which had been agile enough 
 a few minutes before, were beginning to feel stiff and 
 heavy. He had had other invitations beside Stuart's 
 for the week-end, but fortunately he had declined them. 
 He would shut himself up for a good rest; and by Mon-
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 245 
 
 day morning he would doubtless be fit as a fiddle, and 
 seeing all things once more in their proper relations. 
 
 It was about eight o'clock when Jim reached his flat. 
 He threw himself into a big chair by the open window, 
 and sat there without stirring for a long time. Finally 
 he rose and turned on the light. He was a little unsteady 
 an his feet, he noted; he was giddy, too. Then he re- 
 membered that he hadn't had any dinner. For a mo- 
 ment he stood still, wondering whether he shouldn't go 
 out and get dinner. But the thought of food sickened 
 him. He would have a drink or two instead, partly to 
 celebrate his release, and partly because drink might 
 help a man to forget, but food and the resuscitation it 
 brought would only make him remember. 
 
 It should be a celebration, this lonely drinking-bout: 
 it should mark the end with a definite mile-stone, or, say, 
 with a holocaust. He would like to burn everything up ; 
 at least he could burn the physical traces of everything. 
 Jim walked unsteadily about his living-room, trying to 
 collect in one place all his relics of Zoe. There was lit- 
 tle enough to collect: when he saw how little, he could 
 have wept. It wasn't in proportion : to devastate a man's 
 life and then leave him with nothing to show except 
 three or four notes and a handful of reluctantly treas- 
 ured newspaper clippings it wasn't fair, it wasn't gen- 
 erous. 
 
 Such as they were, however, he would burn his relics : 
 he would not leave even this much of Zoe in his life. 
 But first he would make a roaring fire: all the combus- 
 tion of which his little grate was capable would really 
 be too little to mark fittingly the passing of Zoe. He 
 would be glad of a fire, anyway : he shivered with cold. 
 He had been so burning hot this afternoon: it was
 
 246 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 strange that he who had so burned could be now so 
 chilly. 
 
 He got his fire splendidly alight; it burned up as if 
 it knew what its proud destiny should be. Only one 
 thing now remained to be done before he burned his 
 papers. Jim got out a bottle of whiskey; then he thought 
 better of it, and produced also a bottle of wine and two 
 glasses. "I'll drink your health, my dear, and you shall 
 drink mine," he muttered. "We shall part as friends, 
 you see." 
 
 He filled both glasses; then standing before his splen- 
 did fire, he raised one of them. His mantle was old- 
 fashioned, and had a mirror set in it: his image lifted 
 its glass to him. As they stood so with lifted glasses 
 Jim's vision cleared suddenly : he saw his own reflection 
 well and minutely, and its ghastly face startled him. He 
 jumped, and dropped the glass. It was shattered on the 
 hearth-stone, and at his feet the spilled wine spread and 
 spread, like a pool of blood. 
 
 Jim laughed sillily, and stooped to pick up the pieces 
 of broken glass. "I seem to be pretty drunk now, be- 
 fore I have touched a drop," he thought. 
 
 He cleared away the breakage, and mopped up the 
 spilled wine as carefully as if his life depended on the 
 excellence of the job he made. Stooping increased his 
 giddiness; he had to hold to the mantle when he again 
 stood erect. "Now, once more," he said to himself, and 
 reached for the second wine-glass. 
 
 His hand shook, and a little of the wine was spilled. 
 That annoyed him. It was because he was cold that 
 his nerves were so unsteady; he set the glass on the 
 mantel, and put his hands down to warm them. The 
 fire was big and bright; but it didn't warm him any 
 more than a painted fire would have. With chattering
 
 OUT OF THE NIGHT 247 
 
 teeth he huddled closer and closer to it; he stretched 
 out his hands to that illusory warmth until he almost 
 burned them. 
 
 He felt no heat ; yet on the back of one hand the heat 
 he could not feel brought out two marks, as if they had 
 been printed there in invisible ink awaiting develop- 
 ment. In fascination Jim watched them come, horri- 
 fied, but unable to take either his eyes or his hand away. 
 Two long jagged marks, curving concentrically; he had 
 once had them raw upon him, doubtless, but he couldn't 
 seem to remember how they got there. The scar was 
 not that of Zoe's burn, for that was on the other wrist, 
 and moreover had never effaced itself. He turned 
 his wrist over to make sure; the shiny white spot was 
 just where he remembered it. This wasn't a trace of 
 Jessica Drummond's kiss no, of course not: kisses 
 didn't leave traces, even when they were mad kisses. 
 And that had been a healing, saving kiss; if Jessica were 
 here now, to kiss him like that 
 
 He drifted away on the wrack of this notion, rose 
 miles in the ether, and came back to reality with a jerk. 
 Suddenly he knew what that mark was ; it was the faded 
 scar of the Malay woman's teeth. 
 
 A blinding light seemed to come over Jim. He sprang 
 to his feet, lifted his glass, and shouted aloud, "Your 
 health, my darling!" His own voice came oddly back 
 to him from the confines of his small room ; it beat upon 
 his ear-drums, and receded, and then returned and beat 
 again, giving him a curious and distinct pleasure. He 
 felt all at once very warm and very strong, and perfectly 
 happy : he had never been so happy before. He drained 
 his glass at a draught, and felt the gladdening wine warm 
 within him. 
 
 Then the beating in his ears grew louder, grew quite
 
 248 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 unbearably loud, so that he covered his ears with his 
 hands to stop it. The room whirled about him. The 
 walls receded to an immense distance, and then began 
 to close in upon him; and the speed of their rotation 
 grew greater. Closer and closer they came: Jim knew 
 that he was about to be smothered between them. He 
 flung out his arms, to keep the walls away; he tried to 
 cry for help. 
 
 He must indeed have cried out ; for he heard his own 
 agonised voice above the beating in his ears. But no 
 one came to him. He might die here and rot, and no 
 one would come to him. He staggered as he stood, and 
 tried to steady himself : he remembered those papers on 
 the table, and that he must get to them and burn them 
 before any one came. He took an uncertain step, and 
 then another. At first he was relieved to find that he 
 could move ; then he realised despairingly that he wasn't 
 going in the right direction. With an effort that seemed 
 to rend his being he faced about ; he saw the table, and 
 distinguished the papers on it : the little pile of clippings, 
 the four notes lying by themselves. In another moment 
 he should have them; and the smoke of their burning 
 would be incense to him even now. 
 
 And then, with victory all but his, he swayed, rooted 
 to the spot where he stood, just out of reach of the table ; 
 he flung out his arms in one last convulsive effort, and 
 toppled over on the floor. His head struck the hearth- 
 stone, and he lay still ; and where he had carefully sopped 
 up the wine a few minutes before, another red pool 
 spread and spread.
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 THE FI.ESH-POTS OF EGYPT 
 
 THEY must actually have come and found him lying 
 so, instead of leaving him to perish; for the next 
 thing that Jim knew he was in a hospital bed, and a very 
 capable nurse had charge of him. She kept him nicely 
 packed in ice, and she didn't encourage him to ask ques- 
 tions. She wouldn't even answer those he did ask, and 
 of course he didn't ask about the things he really cared 
 to know about: only how long he had been there, and 
 when he should get out, and such trash as that. What 
 he really wanted to know was whether they had found 
 those papers in his room, those meagre notes lying by 
 themselves, those fatuous tell-tale clippings ; and whether 
 they must know, if he had only dared to ask them 
 whether Zoe Lenox had yet become the bride of her 
 chosen princeling. 
 
 Jim had enough to do, to be sure, in keeping a watch 
 on his tongue. His first moment of returning conscious- 
 ness was followed, he knew, by times when he lost him- 
 self. But he did not lose himself completely enough to 
 talk. A burning river of eloquence was dammed up 
 within him, a mighty impulse to favour the world with 
 a store of wisdom such as in his normal moments he 
 wasn't aware of having seen even in sages and saints, 
 let alone having accumulated himself. But he had to 
 keep all this pent up within him, although it tortured 
 
 249
 
 250 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 him mightily. He knew that if he once began to talk, 
 her dear, her execrated name would sooner or later pass 
 his lips; and it mustn't, it mustn't. The world would 
 have to do without the wisdom he could have taught it; 
 and Jim would have to keep it to himself, though it 
 might irk him ceaselessly. 
 
 His perceptions of outward facts were vague enough 
 just now ; but he knew that he must be lying here a very 
 long time. Many days went by just alike, in a sort of 
 scrambled light and darkness, a dank immobility and a 
 horrid effort to keep himself in hand. Then he must 
 have grown better ; for silence grew easy and even grate- 
 ful to him, as it normally was, and he came to have a 
 sort of passive affection for his nurse, who kept things at 
 bay for him. 
 
 Later still he began to wish that they had selected 
 a prettier nurse he was considerably better by that time. 
 And then presently shapes of people passed his bed in 
 dim review : they were his friends, coming to "see" him. 
 His partner came early in the procession, and came often 
 thereafter: the alert Stephen, treading softly, as one 
 would do at a funeral, and making inquiries in some 
 embarrassment. His brothers came, dutiful and bored, 
 and some at least of his brothers' wives. Stuart Eving- 
 ton came several times, usually with June in attendance. 
 Once, along near the end, he brought Jessica Drummond 
 instead. Jim found himself unexpectedly alive to Jes- 
 sica's presence, doubtless because it was a surprise, and 
 perhaps also because she was looking very pretty, and 
 sparkled in the strait room like running water brought 
 suddenly into a prison. 
 
 Yes, he must be better, or they wouldn't be letting all 
 these people come to see him. Jim could feel, too, that 
 he was getting better: His strength was returning, his
 
 THE FLESH-POTS OF EGYPT 251 
 
 perceptions were becoming sharper. He didn't much 
 care in general whether he got better or not: only he 
 hated to think of leaving this hospital room. When he 
 did leave it, he would have to connect with ordinary life 
 again; and such connections were a wrench upon the 
 spirit, and didn't do a man much good anyway as wit- 
 ness Jim's painfully wrought connection after his cruise 
 in the Helga. They were made only to be ruptured. 
 You had to make them, for very shame's sake, but they 
 didn't benefit you. It was better to lie here and watch 
 the sunlight creep up the white wall. 
 
 When Jim actually got out of the hospital it was late 
 summer, with a hint of fall already in the air. He had 
 nothing now to hope or fear: long ere this, Zoe must 
 have espoused her princeling. He hadn't heard of the 
 fact, but he almost fervently hoped she had. He was 
 weary of the whole subject. 
 
 After his first few days back in the world, Jim found 
 himself rather eager to crawl back to life. He even 
 resisted well-meant attempts to get him farther to post- 
 pone his connecting with the affairs of every day. The 
 doctor advised a change; and his partner seconded the 
 doctor's efforts. Jim laughed at them both. 
 
 Stephen even argued the matter with him, in his 
 kindly, shrewd, rather preoccupied way. "You've had a 
 close call, Jim," he urged, speaking casually on his way 
 out of the other's office, to avoid all appearance of the 
 sentimental. "Of course you gave your head an awful 
 knock; if it hadn't been hard to begin with, you would 
 scarcely have survived. And lying there so long with- 
 out attention didn't do you any good. But the doctor 
 says the real trouble is that you were in poor condition 
 to begin with. Hadn't you better be sensible, Jim? Be 
 sensible, and do something about it,"
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "I've done something already, Stephen. I've for- 
 sworn the follies of youth," said Jim, smiling. 
 
 Stephen smiled too, but he looked doubtful. "That's 
 all the better, of course," he remarked. "Or it would be, 
 if it were true." 
 
 "It's true enough, in an inverted way," Jim assured 
 him. "It is my youth that has given me up. I'm going 
 to forswear tennis, and take to collecting prints; and in 
 a year or so more, now, I shall be a very nice old gen- 
 tleman, and more than a little of an old fogy." 
 
 That, of course, was mere talk ; and yet it was not so 
 very far beyond the truth. Tennis was now out of the 
 question; and although collecting prints was not yet in 
 it, Jim could already feel himself settling by degrees to 
 a prim, permanent bachelorhood. Already he had a sharp 
 foretaste of the condition that might some day be his. 
 He tired easily these days ; and when he was once tired, 
 it was hard for him to become completely rested. This 
 deviation from the normal worried Jim more than he 
 cared to admit In vain he told himself that it was tem- 
 porary, and under the circumstances altogether to be 
 expected. He could not reason himself out of chafing 
 at his own weakness. It was extreme calamity to have 
 one's mind fly all to bits, and perhaps beside it nothing 
 else ought to have mattered : but the humiliation of the 
 body still rankled. 
 
 His illness, Jim found, had at least passed a sponge 
 over some hitherto all too legible matters in his past; 
 and if he were not yet exactly in full mental health, he 
 had at any rate come to desire health. He had got back 
 much of his old interest in his business, and found solid 
 satisfaction in "boning away at it," to use his own 
 phrase. He bought a new car late in the fall, to keep 
 him in the open air as much as possible; and with it he
 
 THE FLESH-POTS OF EGYPT 258 
 
 indulged in a series of petty explorations which dis- 
 tracted and delighted him. And without ever thinking 
 the thing out to the point of deliberate intention, as natu- 
 rally as a heifer turns to grass, and as inevitably, Jim 
 sought a woman who should help him to forget the other 
 woman. 
 
 It wasn't that he intended to fall in love again. He 
 couldn't have fallen in love now if he had tried; and 
 remembering his recent sufferings, he had no mind to 
 try. But in his present state a feminine atmosphere was 
 almost necessary to him. His relaxed nerves made him 
 crave things all soft and silken, required to be discreetly 
 sympathised with .and delicately ministered to. He was 
 in the condition in which many a man is married : where 
 without his having ceased for a moment to love another 
 woman, he is caught, as the saying is, on the rebound. 
 And yet what Jim, in common with other men in this 
 state, desired was not a woman, but woman. 
 
 He might have been expected at this crisis to turn 
 naturally to June Evington. She had long supplied him 
 with feminine atmosphere, at no cost of consequence 
 or remorse to either of them ; she was the woman whom 
 he knew best, better actually than he had ever known 
 Zoe ; and she had just the sort of charm which Jim now 
 desired. 
 
 But June was just now at a crisis of her own. She 
 had married Evington when she left boarding-school, 
 and had become the mother of four children in rapid 
 succession; she had taken her life calmly and sunnily, 
 apparently with no question as to whether all other 
 women's lives were the same. But now she had wearied 
 of the domestic atmosphere, and of the responsibilities 
 she had so simply assumed : she had gone in at a gallop 
 for gaiety and stir, and very likely for flirtation as well.
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 It was a mild enough crisis, as such things go: Stuart 
 Evington recognised that at the time, even at the height 
 of his own annoyance. But it barred out Jim, with his 
 sick longing to be soothed. 
 
 There were plenty of girls in Jim's circle of acquaint- 
 ance, pretty girls, charming girls, girls refreshing in 
 their gaiety and youth. But their very freshness made 
 them distasteful to Jim just now : he wanted something 
 more seasoned and subdued, something that didn't fling 
 its strident youth in your face, something too that didn't 
 look on every bachelor as an eligible, and expect him 
 sooner or later to propose for its hand, if only to show 
 that he appreciated its charm. 
 
 He finally sought his solace at the hands of Jessica 
 Drummond. It wasn't because he and she had much of 
 the past in common : as a matter of fact, he had never 
 known her so very well. And in view of the chief thing 
 he knew about her, the thing she had so naively and so 
 finally revealed to him that afternoon among the Chi- 
 nese porcelains, it would have been better, or at least in 
 better taste, for him to have stayed away from her. 
 But Jim wasn't thinking of taste, wasn't deliberately 
 choosing a line of conduct. In a world that seemed 
 suddenly to have gone empty, he caught a glimpse of 
 something that sparkled and allured ; and before he had 
 time to think, he was following that allure. Afterward 
 he saw no particular reason to think, and gladly availed 
 himself of the immunity: hadn't he sought refuge here 
 actually to keep from thinking? 
 
 Jessica had at this time a kitchenette flat, and was liv- 
 ing alone and very quietly. She had both a spiritual 
 and an economic urge to quietness, although it did not 
 occur to Jim to suspect the second : she was living well 
 within her means. "I'd better, you know," she one day
 
 THE FLESH-POTS OF EGYPT 255 
 
 told June Evington, in a burst of confidence. "For if 
 poor old Sam were to get an apoplexy, where would 
 my alimony be?" 
 
 Her quietness allowed Jim readier access to her: she 
 was always at home. The simplicity of her accommoda- 
 tions gave them a sort of intimacy to start with. Under 
 the circumstances, it needed only acceptance on her part 
 and the passage of time to make them really intimate. 
 
 Intimate was what they soon became. During the 
 winter Jim passed from an occasional call to a custom 
 of spending three or four evenings a week at her flat. 
 In between he dined and drove her. She frankly loved 
 the dinners: doing her own housework had given her a 
 fine appreciation of cooking not her own. She liked the 
 drives, too: entered into the spirit of his petty explora- 
 tions, and proved herself an explorer, too, and more in- 
 ventive and adventurous than he. Always she fitted into 
 his plans; always she supplied him with just what he 
 needed, and demanded nothing at all, and enjoyed what 
 he chose to give her. She was curiously unlike her old 
 self as Jim remembered her unless she were somehow 
 transcending herself just now. 
 
 It was in their evenings at her flat, however, that 
 she shone most. Out of the simplest materials, out of 
 herself, fairly, she constructed the hours that were at 
 once the highest reward and the strangest manifestation 
 of their friendship, hours the recollection of which some- 
 times came over him in after years like a whiff of per- 
 fume. 
 
 The evenings were much alike. Jim would come to 
 her straight from his dinner, and would find her estab- 
 lished by the lamp in her diminutive living-room. She 
 would have her sewing in her lap, perhaps: she made 
 some of her own clothes now. He would inquire about
 
 256 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 the sewing, and together they would laugh over her 
 awkwardness with her needle, while he privately ad- 
 mired the pluck that kept her awkwardly at it. Then he 
 would tell her about his day's doings; and very likely 
 after that he would read aloud to her for a couple 
 of hours; and they would both interrupt the reading to 
 discuss what they read. 
 
 That reading, so hugely uncharacteristic of the old 
 Jessica, revealed much about the new. She never used 
 to read ; but in the pause that followed her flare-up with 
 Sam she had been driven to it from sheer ennui. Then 
 she had discovered her own ignorance "How ignorant 
 one can be, and still be received in civilised society, 
 Jim!" and also her very keen intellectual curiosity. 
 And she had read and read: everything from Dickens 
 upward. Jim knew so much, and could tell her so many 
 things to read, that she was glad to follow him as his 
 disciple; and Jim on his side was mightily interested to 
 see how her mind took hold of things. 
 
 "George, but you are quick!" he remarked once. 
 
 "I ought to be I'm starving," she said with a laugh. 
 
 She would take the book from him, if he tired; or she 
 would bend over her sewing as he read, or occasionally 
 light a cigarette, or just frankly listen with her hands in 
 her lap. And then very likely they would have some 
 sandwiches and beer, or even popcorn and apples; and 
 then they would talk for another hour. And so she 
 would send him home to sound sleep, refreshed and 
 soothed; and he would come back the next evening, or 
 at farthest the one after. 
 
 This intimacy, especially considering its bookish char- 
 acter, might well have recalled to Jim other days and 
 another reader; but somehow it didn't. It had once or 
 twice, to be sure, just at first. But Jim made up his
 
 THE FLESH-POTS OF EGYPT 257 
 
 mind that this at least was a pleasure which he wasn't 
 going to have spoiled by mental references to his lost, 
 and it was to be hoped forgotten, Antigone. This one 
 pleasant interlude he would keep for himself. 
 
 And then one evening he kissed Jessica. It was just 
 as he was bidding her good-night at her door : she stood 
 with her gay little face, which never lost its native sauci- 
 ness, upturned to him, and the gay little smile that she 
 could always show him parted her lips. He took her 
 face between his hands, and kissed her smiling. 
 
 It was but the shadow of an embrace, after all, for 
 she slipped at once away from him ; but he saw that her 
 lips were now trembling. "There, there, Jim!" she said 
 hastily. 
 
 "I beg your pardon, Jessica. That was nasty of me, 
 and I didn't mean to do it," Jim apologised, rather too 
 sincerely. 
 
 "It's all right. I don't mind," she said slowly; and 
 he felt more ashamed of himself. 
 
 "Give me your hand, if you really forgive me," he 
 said. 
 
 She gave it unhesitatingly ; and Jim kept it as he went 
 on, "I meant to behave myself for a long, long time. 
 It's the least I can do, when you are so sweet to me, 
 letting me come here like this and all. But now that 
 this much has slipped out, I want to tell you something. 
 Some day, when I've got the last trace of fever out of 
 my system, I want to have a serious talk with you." 
 
 She had recovered some of her native flippancy. 
 "Don't, Jim," she said. "Don't, for it would be the end 
 of all things." 
 
 "Things must end, you know," he urged. "How they 
 end is what makes the difference." 
 
 "Yes, perhaps, though it doesn't seem so to me. Any-
 
 258 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 way, we won't speak of that, to-night," said Jessica. 
 
 "No, indeed we won't," he answered. "And thank 
 you for your forbearance, Jessica. I'm a brute, but at 
 least I know it." 
 
 "No, you're not a brute. But please remember, an- 
 other time. Good-night, Jim," she said. 
 
 He felt like a brute, as he started on his drive home. 
 He must have given Jessica a nice idea of what men were 
 like: silly beasts, only waiting while you trusted them 
 for a better chance to display their beastly silliness. And 
 then he remembered how she had looked at him with her 
 lips trembling; and although the remembrance surely 
 ought to have made him feel much worse, it made him, 
 on the contrary, feel a great deal better. 
 
 He was simply passing slowly back to an idea that 
 had been his months before. Only now he was going 
 to Jessica because he liked her, because he wished to be 
 with her; and then he had been ashamed because he 
 wanted to go to her only in the magnanimity of his 
 spirit. Now, on the contrary, he would go in all hu- 
 mility. He couldn't give her what she doubtless had a 
 right to expect, in view of what he meant to ask. But 
 he could give her his comparative decency, and his devo- 
 tion, and his need of her ; and perhaps he might come, in 
 some distant sweet conclusion, to feel that all the past, 
 even to its most smashing feature, had worked together 
 for the production of good to that blundering brute, Jim 
 Whittaker.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 MANNA 
 
 OF course, Jim experienced a violent reaction from 
 that evening's pleasing certitude: went through a 
 storm of the old passion, a whirl of recollection, a period 
 of sick disgust with things as they were. Then he 
 steadied again, realised that to cry for the moon was 
 simply human nature, and reflected that a man had still 
 his life to live, and to live if possible in accordance 
 with some vague idea of what befitted a man, even if 
 he did have to stop sometimes and disgrace himself by 
 howling. 
 
 Jessica Drummond seemed to make nothing of the 
 incident of his kiss; he might have supposed from her 
 demeanour that it had somehow slipped her mind. He 
 couldn't quite suppose that; and was driven to feel that 
 she was ignoring it, so that it shouldn't spoil their rela- 
 tion. He discovered in those days a steadily growing 
 respect for her power of living only in the present, of 
 ignoring anything that seemed to threaten a smiling now. 
 That must be a distinctively feminine power. At any 
 rate, Jim had nothing like it himself; and he seemed to 
 recollect that Zoe had. Zoe had been happy in the 
 shadow of imminent death, and he hadn't. Well, that 
 was a long time ago: why, in those days he had still 
 been of the opinion that Jessica Drummond was an in- 
 significant little nonentity! 
 
 259
 
 260 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 They were sitting together in her living-room one 
 evening in early spring. It was very warm for the sea- 
 son, and they had the window open for air. They 
 could hear the pleasant familiar hum of the city below 
 them, that running accompaniment which a true city- 
 dweller so misses when he must leave it; and Jim had 
 been reading aloud, quite as usual. He had glanced at 
 her oftener than usual, though. She made no pretence 
 of occupation to-night; she sat with her hands in her 
 lap, or flung one arm over the back of her little chair, or 
 picked up some small article from the table and played 
 with it. She was always a little unquiet; it would not 
 have been Jessica if she had actually sat still. She 
 looked very pretty to-night, in her little black dress and 
 string of dark coral beads, with a rose to match them 
 pinned at her girdle : there was such soft deep colour in 
 her cheeks, and her dark hair clustered so charmingly 
 about her little ears. 
 
 He laid the book on the table presently. Jessica be- 
 gan some remark about what he had just read, and 
 stopped midway There was just a second of silence; 
 and then, without preface or hesitation, Jim asked her 
 to marry him. 
 
 Jessica was quiet for a moment; then she looked at 
 him, and smiled her usual smile, and spoke. "That's 
 sweet of you, Jim. It's really doubly sweet of you, be- 
 cause you aren't in love with me." 
 
 "Aren't men usually in love with the women they ask 
 to marry them?" he countered. 
 
 "I don't think so," she said. "I think that very few 
 women are ever actually loved. However, that isn't 
 what interests us. You simply aren't in love with me, 
 and I recognise it." 
 
 "Recognise all you like, but be careful you don't
 
 MANNA 261 
 
 recognise too much," he said. "I'm not a poet, Jessica ; 
 I can't make very exciting love to you. I wish I could ; 
 but if you can get along without, perhaps you will find 
 that I'll make you rather a good husband." 
 
 "Oh, my dear, my dear!" she cried, impulsively put- 
 ting out her hand to him ; her eyes filled with tears. Yet 
 he had no sooner seized her hand than she laughed and 
 said, "It won't do, though. I'm going to keep my beau- 
 tiful faith in you; it has been priceless to me. I'm going 
 to keep it, by not putting it to the test." 
 
 "That's a shameful way to keep anything," declared 
 Jim rather hotly. 
 
 "Oh, I know that, my dear! I know that. But it's 
 better than not keeping it at all. I'm not so young as 
 I once was, and my illusions are pretty well shattered. 
 One or two of them I choose to keep, Jim, even if to 
 keep them I have to put them under glass." 
 
 "You don't trust me very much, do you?" asked Jim, 
 letting go her hand. 
 
 "I don't trust life," she said simply. "And I know 
 myself, you see. I'm a little rotten at the core, Jim. 
 There was a time when you recognised my rottenness. 
 Oh, yes there was, even if you don't care to remember 
 it! I've been lifted a bit above myself the last year or 
 two, that's all." 
 
 "Then go on lifting," said Jim eagerly. "I mean 
 what did you mean when you said you had been 
 lifted ?" 
 
 "Just what you thought I meant, Jim. I've loved you, 
 and it has helped me. Through it I've got a bit above 
 myself." 
 
 "Then if that's true, don't you see, it ought to be 
 shoulder to shoulder for you and me from this time 
 on?" he asked.
 
 262 
 
 She shook her head. "If I had come to you when 
 I was young, I might always have lived up to you. But 
 the mark of the beast is on me now." 
 
 "That's nonsense," said Jim sharply. "It's nonsense 
 from every point of view. I'm not different from any 
 other man, Jessica. If anything has been done for you, 
 your own feeling has done it, and not any Jim Whit- 
 taker of them all." 
 
 "You're arguing on my side now, logical male!" she 
 said merrily. "It's exactly my 'feeling' that I want to 
 keep, and you want me to exchange it for a flesh and 
 blood Jim Whittaker." 
 
 "Well, it's more or less futile to argue these matters," 
 he said. "It's a question, of course, of how you happen 
 to feel on the subject. But the practical point is, do you 
 care to be my wife, or don't you ?" 
 
 "I can't ever be. I care too much," she said softly. 
 
 "You exquisite, wrong-headed woman, do you know 
 what you're doing to me?" he asked. "You're turning 
 me out in the cold. Mine was such a nice solution of 
 existing complications, too. Don't you see how nice?" 
 
 Jessica smiled upon him. "Indeed, I do see. I think 
 that that was what gave you the idea in the first place. 
 But perhaps that is another thing we would better not 
 argue, Jim." 
 
 "We won't argue it," agreed Jim. "But let me oay 
 my despised idea this tribute " 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "If we don't marry each other, what becomes of 
 us?" 
 
 w "Ah, your idea has that much point, Jim; I admit it 
 freely. If we married, that would dispose of us, at least 
 for a time. No, don't interrupt. I didn't mean to be 
 cheap. I'll say for all time, if you like. But as we
 
 MANNA 263 
 
 shan't marry, why, we'll get along reasonably well, 
 both of us. You will always be yourself, married or 
 single, your own honest self, Jim. I hope that some 
 day you will marry, marry some one much nicer than 
 I or even if she isn't any nicer, some one you think 
 more of than you do of me. That's the point, isn't it, 
 your thinking of her? I do honestly hope that you will 
 marry such a woman, though I never could promise to 
 dance at your wedding. As for me " 
 
 The beautiful tenderness went out of her eyes; and it 
 was in rather a hard voice that she continued, "As for 
 me, I may go on as I am. I hope I shall. But it may 
 not be possible. Anyhow, I can find some opening: 
 there always is an opening, if one isn't too particular. 
 If worse comes to worst, I suppose I can go back to 
 Sam Drummond. He's been making overtures to me 
 lately. I think that in his own way he actually misses 
 me." 
 
 Jim looked at her in amazement. At the sight of his 
 face Jessica broke into merry laughter, though it seemed 
 to him on thinking it over afterward that she had been 
 just a little hurt by his taking her remark seriously, even 
 for a moment. "I haven't any actual intention of doing 
 that, Jim," she said. "Sam never has been able to 
 fathom my leaving him, though : in his own eyes he was 
 no worse than other men, and he had always taken it 
 for granted that I agreed with him. In one way, to be 
 sure, he wasn't so far wrong: in a numerical way, I 
 mean. There are plenty of Sam Drummonds in this 
 world, Jim. But I'm not fearful now of any or all of 
 them. Actually I have a strange feeling as if nothing 
 could touch me now. Even if there were another Sam 
 as the most prominent feature in my life, that couldn't 
 touch me. Perhaps you don't see "
 
 264 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "I see, Jessica; but I wouldn't advise you to put that 
 sweet faith to the test," said Jim, turning his back and 
 walking across the room. 
 
 "I haven't much idea that I shall, Jim. I suppose that 
 my fate in this world will really be somewhat indetermi- 
 nate," she said. 
 
 "An indeterminate fate is the last thing I should ever 
 have expected of you," said Jim over his shoulder. 
 
 "Yes, isn't it?" she agreed. "But lately I've had just 
 those things that I never did expect to have." 
 
 "Have you missed those you never expected to miss?" 
 he asked, wheeling to face her. 
 
 "I haven't missed much," she said. "Lately I've had 
 two great luxuries." 
 
 "Do you want to tell me what they were?" 
 
 "If you care to listen, I think I should rather like to." 
 
 Jim resumed his chair, and she went on, not looking 
 exactly at him, yet not looking too pointedly away from 
 him, "The first of them, of course, was loving you. 
 You might have guessed that, mightn't you? The sec- 
 ond, and for me almost the greater of the two, was not 
 expecting to get anything out of it. You must remem- 
 ber how I was brought up, Jim, and how I had always 
 lived; you must remember what idle, luxury-loving 
 women are like, and you must know that in time they 
 learn to expect something from everything. They never 
 enter any relation without figuring, consciously or un- 
 consciously, what they can get out of it." 
 
 "Aren't you a little hard?" 
 
 "Perhaps I am. Perhaps we're always hard in our 
 judgments of anything we have succeeded even partially 
 in sloughing off. But go back a little. What did you 
 think of me when you first knew me? You thought, I 
 believe, that it was strange such an embodiment of the
 
 MANNA 265 
 
 domestic virtues a June Evington could care to keep up 
 her acquaintance with such a calculating beggar as me. 
 Isn't that so?" 
 
 "I don't remember that it is." 
 
 "It is, even if you are too polite to remember it. And 
 it is in view of all that, you see, that my second luxury 
 has so particularly counted with me. To have you come 
 to me as you have come this winter, and to feel that I 
 could help you oh, ever so little! and yet I did help 
 you you see what it must have been to me, Jim?" 
 
 "I see; I see that perfectly. What I don't see is the 
 bearing this has on what I asked you about a little while 
 ago." 
 
 "You can't ? You actually can't see that to reward me 
 as you have proposed would be to deprive me at a blow 
 of both my luxuries ?" 
 
 "That's nonsense, Jessica that talk of rewarding." 
 
 "I withdraw the word, then, if it hurts you. But you 
 will admit that for a person of my temperament and 
 upbringing my transcendent luxuries may well weigh 
 more in the scale than a forgive me Tim, than a nice 
 husband?" 
 
 "I will admit anything you like, Jessica; I can see 
 anything you have yet asked me to see. But you can't 
 make me believe that you are refusing me for any such 
 refinement of sentiment as you have set forth." 
 
 She grew a little pale at that; but her eyes met his 
 steadily for a moment. "No, you're right," she said. 
 "All that I have said is true; it's a real motive, too, if it's 
 not my chief one. But, of course, the reason I am re- 
 fusing you, the actual fundamental reason, is that I'm 
 not good enough for you." 
 
 "Not good enough for me !" exclaimed Jim, genuinely 
 horrified. "Not good enough for me ! You don't know
 
 266 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 what you're talking about, Jessica Drummond! Why, 
 even now " 
 
 Her hand fell lightly on his mouth, lightly, but effec- 
 tively enough to muffle farther conversation. "Never 
 mind, I don't want to know," said Jessica promptly. "I 
 don't want to hear any unpleasant facts, Jim, if there are 
 any. You see I'm a poor thing, and I doubt my own 
 ability to face facts. But I do know that in all essential 
 respects you are too good for me. I know that. I 
 know it." 
 
 Jim kissed her restraining hand, seized and kissed the 
 other. Then he kept them both in his as he said, "Really, 
 Jessica, you are too good to be true. I have a mind to 
 thank you for your exquisite goodness by continuing to 
 come back here and claim your kindness." 
 
 "Oh, my dear, if you only would !" she cried. "Fear 
 that you mightn't has been the only thing that has 
 marred my enjoyment lately and the only thing that 
 has impelled me toward snatching you, Jim." 
 
 "I wish it had impelled a little farther. But as it 
 hasn't, I think the best thing we can do is to continue 
 the past." 
 
 "Only so long," she stipulated, "as it is really grateful 
 to you." 
 
 "Well, only so long as it is grateful to us both," he 
 agreed. 
 
 So it came to pass that Jim Whittaker ended that 
 evening apparently with every value in his life un- 
 changed, and yet somehow with a great deal to think 
 about. He was, however, blissfully indisposed to think 
 just then. He meditated a little, to be sure, on the 
 surface irony of his golden virgin who was neither 
 chaste nor generous, and his gipsy divorcee who was 
 both. But that irony was too shallow to be disturbing;
 
 MANNA 267 
 
 or perhaps it was simply that to-night Jim was not dis- 
 turbed by it. For the imperious devils that had come of 
 late years to live in his brain had all gone to sleep to- 
 night, instead of chasing each other as was their wont 
 in their silly unending round. A woman had lulled them 
 now, as another woman had in the beginning set them 
 going in their long mad dance. So he was led to believe 
 that the same thing which maddens may also save: that 
 love, which devours, can also make whole.
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 
 
 JIM stayed in town all that next spring and summer; 
 and he packed his partner off for a two months' 
 vacation. Stephen protested, but his wife and Jim both 
 insisted; and he finally gave in, and left Jim to run the 
 business. He was outwardly satisfied, once he had given 
 in: there was no niggardliness about Stephen. But he 
 may well have had his compunctions: Jim was the best 
 fellow in the world, according to his way of thinking, 
 but he needed an eye always upon him, the eye of an 
 older man, and, Stephen fondly believed, a steadier. 
 
 Nobody could have been steadier, however, than Jim 
 was in these days. He was delighted, to begin with, by 
 what his partner's absence allowed him to clearly see. He 
 had always rather supposed that he himself stood pas- 
 sively between the shafts, while the business was pulled 
 heartily forward by the more aggressive Stephen. But 
 now he found that he knew his business, and liked his 
 business, and, applying the true American touch-stone, 
 could get results from his business. And his results led 
 him to the not unpleasing conclusion that, although he 
 might not die a rich man according to New York stand- 
 ards, he was even now becoming a well-to-do man, ac- 
 cording to any standard that you pleased. 
 
 He still went to see Jessica Drummond, as he had 
 promised that he would, although perhaps his visits 
 
 268
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 269 
 
 were falling off in frequency. Her influence, his hard 
 work, his pleasure at his own success, all combined to 
 restore him to vigour and sanity. He would always carry 
 the scar of what had been, of course, and a vague regret 
 for what might have been. Sometimes, too, chance sights 
 or sounds, often of the most whimsical or trivial char- 
 acter, would call his love vividly up before him. A look 
 intercepted between two lovers whom he passed in the 
 street, a few bars of sentimental music from a hand- 
 organ, a glimpse of a woman whose carriage and air 
 vaguely recalled Zoe's, any one of these would some- 
 times blind him for a moment, would make his heart 
 beat and his face burn as if he had parted from his be- 
 loved only the day before. 
 
 In general, however, he flattered himself that he was 
 restored. He wasn't as stable, of course, as if certain 
 disturbances had never occurred; he couldn't expect to 
 be. But as he walked abroad and faced his fellow-men, 
 Jim felt that now at last he was fairly out from under 
 the dominion of the spirit of Zoe. 
 
 And just as his new confidence was becoming rooted, 
 there occurred the disquieting apparition of Zoe in the 
 flesh. 
 
 Jim was walking, late on a lovely autumn afternoon, 
 up that street where one may see more pretty girls than 
 anywhere else in the world. He had just greeted one 
 of the prettiest, the daughter of a family that had al- 
 ways known his. "By George, I might have had a 
 daughter almost that age myself, if I had married 
 young," he thought; perhaps this particular girl had 
 shown in her very greeting that she knew the difference 
 between an eligible and an old family friend, whom she 
 might very well have been brought up to call "uncle." 
 "Well, no, I couldn't actually have had a daughter that
 
 270 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 age," Jim concluded on second thoughts. "But it shows 
 the time of life I've come to, if I'm beginning to figure 
 myself as the father instead of the lover of what beauty 
 presents itself." 
 
 A smile at his own idea succeeded the smile he had 
 given the girl; he was not yet old enough so that re- 
 flection upon his own age had ceased to be a smiling 
 matter. The second smile had not died upon his lips 
 when he was aware of that familiar foolish catch at his 
 heart : some one in the stream of promenaders flowing 
 by on the other side of the walk had reminded him of 
 Zoe. 
 
 After his mechanical start and pause he had actually 
 taken a step forward again; and he might have gone on 
 so, and eluded his destiny, if the woman had not at the 
 same moment taken a step in his direction. Then, and 
 then only, did Jim realise that this actually was Zoe. She 
 knew him, had known him at once; and when he knew 
 her too, it seemed to Jim's excited consciousness that 
 there on the sunny crowded walk, in the midst of the 
 urban throng, they leaped into each other's arms. All 
 that happened, however, was that Jim put out his hand 
 and drew Zoe into a convenient doorway. 
 
 They stood there mute, and looked at each other. 
 To the mind of each, it must have seemed strange that 
 the subject of so many fruitless thoughts, the companion 
 of so many lonely vigils, should be thus bodied forth in 
 the flesh. But at least Zoe saw in Jim pretty much the 
 man she had expected to see; in fact at this eager mo- 
 ment of meeting Jim was altogether the old Jim. 
 
 It was Zoe who was markedly different. The differ- 
 ence showed even in superficialities in her dress, for in- 
 stance : she was wearing a black suit and a yellow blouse 
 she who to his knowledge had never worn black. But
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 271 
 
 it was not a difference that could be attributed to dress 
 alone. She was still beautiful, still to Jim's eye quite the 
 most beautiful woman he had ever seen; but her face 
 had changed. The lines had sharpened, the angles had 
 defined themselves ; her once cool glance had grown rest- 
 less, and a flame of colour burned in the cheeks that had 
 always been so smoothly pale. That colour was so curi- 
 ous that Jim might have suspected artifice if it had not, 
 when he drew her into the doorway, deepened and deep- 
 ened, and then faded, and deepened again; after that it 
 continued to burn feverishly in her cheeks. Only her dear 
 hair was as he remembered it, coiled about her head and 
 massed at the back, glowing golden under the shade of 
 her wide dark hat. He blessed her hair because it was 
 the same: he so intensely desired that something about 
 her should be quite, quite as he remembered it. 
 
 Because she was she, and yet not she at all, Jim would 
 have liked to stand there forever, noting and bewailing 
 the changes in her, working his way down bit by bit to 
 her fundamental truth to herself for at bottom she was, 
 she must be, the same. But as a matter of practical con- 
 duct, he couldn't stand forever by her side in a door- 
 way; and Jim presently looked around to see just where 
 they actually were. 
 
 They had, by a stroke of luck, encountered each other 
 just outside a tea-room, ingress to which they were now 
 effectively blocking. Jim faced around, and laid his 
 hand on Zoe's arm to make her do the like. "Let's have 
 some tea," were his first words to her after their age- 
 long silence. "Or have you already had yours, Zoe? I 
 think it's a little late." 
 
 Her throat contracted horribly before she managed 
 to speak; but when at length her voice passed her lips, 
 it was the same full sweet voice that he remembered.
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "No," she said. "I haven't had tea. I should be glad 
 of some." 
 
 Jim's eager wonder sublimated itself into a flame-like 
 happiness. Actually to sit opposite Zoe and break bread 
 with her seemed compensation enough for all he had 
 endured or ever could endure; and to sit so, with an 
 endless half -hour ahead of him, was transcendent. 
 
 Zoe leaned her forearms on the table, and began to 
 draw off her gloves. From the kid chrysalides her hands 
 emerged, long, smooth and exquisite. They held his 
 eye as he said, "I have always held that one might meet 
 any one on earth in Fifth Avenue. But I don't know 
 that I ever actually expected to find you there." 
 
 Her manner was still not wholly unembarrassed; but 
 she said indifferently enough, "You might expect to 
 find a globe-trotter like me anywhere." 
 
 Her chance use of the word "globe-trotter" brought to 
 Jim's mind what he had until now quite inconceivably 
 forgotten. In his natural delight at seeing her, the 
 social factor had altogether slipped his mind : for all he 
 knew, he had been addressing a princess by her first 
 name. The hands whose ungloving he had just watched 
 conveyed no information on that point ; even as he looked 
 once more, to make sure, his eyes strayed to her left 
 wrist, and discovered that it was completely concealed 
 by her long cuff. Jim soared again ; it was with actual 
 hope that he asked casually, "Is your husband in New 
 York with you?" 
 
 The tea arrived just then ; and after it was safely de- 
 posited before them Zoe kept him waiting for an answer 
 until she had poured it. Then she said sweetly, "I haven't 
 any husband. Is it possible you don't keep me in sight 
 any better than that?"
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 273 
 
 "How could I know what you were doing?" asked 
 Jim. "You never wrote." 
 
 "Don't reproach me with my rudeness," she said. "I 
 know I should at least have answered your letters." 
 
 "You have had them?" he could not keep from ask- 
 ing eagerly. 
 
 "Yes. Two of them or was it three?" She wrinkled 
 her forehead delicately over the doubtful point, and 
 then caught his eye, and said quickly, "It was three, 
 wasn't it? But haven't you really known what I have 
 been about?" 
 
 "I must have known something, mustn't I? Or I 
 shouldn't have suspected you of a husband," he said. 
 
 "Yes. Where did you get that quaint idea?" 
 
 "From the great American press, which has been my 
 one source of information as to your comings and go- 
 ings. It is not a reliable source, I fear; but lacking a 
 better, I came to depend upon it. And the last thing I 
 remember seeing about you was that you were on your 
 way to the altar with an Italian prince." 
 
 Zoe broke a muffin, buttered a bit, ate it, and reached 
 for another, all, as he knew, to keep him waiting for 
 her answer. Then she said with fine deliberateness, "You 
 somehow missed the year's sensation. I broke with my 
 prince." 
 
 Jim started with joy ; but lest he should seem too eager 
 he too allowed a pause before he asked, "When did that 
 occur?" 
 
 "A year ago this summer, I think it was," Zoe said 
 idly. The subject seemed to bore her. 
 
 "A year ago this summer? Oh, I wasn't reading any 
 newspapers then!" said Jim. "I wasn't doing much of 
 anything about that time. But I swear to you that hence- 
 forth neither physical nor mental infirmity shall pre-
 
 274 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 vent me from keeping at least that poor track of you." 
 
 She disregarded the "track." "Were you sick, Jim?" 
 she asked. She seemed honestly concerned ; and it struck 
 him as odd that she should be. 
 
 "I suppose I was: they all seemed to think so. I 
 think myself that I was only sick with disgust, and 
 tired of living. I've climbed back pretty much to nor- 
 mal since then; but never mind all that. The whole 
 thing is very uninteresting. I'd rather talk of your 
 prince. Let me have the year's sensation, even if it's 
 last year's. What became of your prince?" 
 
 A gesture of Zoe's right hand seemed to obliterate 
 the prince from the earth; but she did not answer in 
 words. Jim grinned. "Didn't you, after all, like him 
 any better than you liked me?" he asked. 
 
 Zoe drew her breath sharply; evidently there was 
 something deadly about the parallel. But for her lost 
 prince she had only sublime unconcern. She emptied her 
 cup, and said cheerfully as she set it down, "His royal 
 family objected to me." 
 
 "Yes, I suppose so. They naturally would object to 
 any commoner, however illustrious. What then?" 
 
 "Why should there be any 'then'? That was enough, 
 I should say." 
 
 Jim shook his head. "You might say that to some 
 people, and be believed. I don't believe you, however. 
 A royal family would be but a slight obstacle to you, if 
 your mind were really set on anything." 
 
 She smiled a little at that : it was the first time during 
 the interview that he had seen her smile. "As a matter 
 of fact, you are right," she conceded. "That was only 
 the beginning of the trouble. His family objected, and 
 he dared them to do their worst. He vowed that he 
 would adhere to me, come what might: kingdoms and
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 275 
 
 thrones themselves shouldn't move him, to say nothing of 
 royal relatives." 
 
 "You must have been flattered," said Jim. 
 
 "Oh, I was, at first," said Zoe. "I was positively al- 
 most stirred, Jim, until until I saw that I was meant to 
 be." 
 
 "He condescended to you?" 
 
 "He did. In a way perhaps he couldn't be blamed. 
 He was in love with me, I suppose, and he really en- 
 dured a great deal of unpleasantness for my sake. But 
 in his own mind he saw himself as King Cophetua stoop- 
 ing to the beggar maid." 
 
 "And in your own mind you are always Queen Co- 
 phetua, Zoe." 
 
 "Well, perhaps. But at least I'm Zoe Lenox." 
 
 "By the grace of God?" Jim suggested. 
 
 "Exactly. And oughtn't that to count for more than 
 a mere accident of European politics? In other words, 
 Jim, in vulgar words, I was miffed. So I put an end 
 to it all." 
 
 "At least in ending it you had a fine sensation," said 
 Jim. "It isn't every young woman, or even every beauty, 
 who can jilt a member of a reigning house." 
 
 "You think I look for nothing in life but sensations, 
 especially crul sensations?" she asked, resting her el- 
 bow on the table and her chin in the palm of her hand. 
 
 "Far from it. I think that so far as possible you 
 avoid sensations. You know I have always thought 
 that of you. But this sensation, involving as it did the 
 avoidance of so much, must have been grateful to you." 
 
 "Probably you're right, in that case. If you knew 
 Well, perhaps you're right anyway." 
 
 "Perhaps I am," said Jim. "Not that it matters par-
 
 276 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 ticularly. What did you do after you had polished off 
 your prince?" 
 
 "I resumed my pilgrimage," said Zoe. 
 
 "In the Helga?" asked Jim, to see what she would 
 say. 
 
 She changed colour a little, but she answered readily 
 enough, "No, not in the Helga. I don't care for the 
 water as I once did, I find. It is hard to believe that 
 one can change so; but it happens." 
 
 "Oh, yes, it happens!" 
 
 "You haven't changed much," she said rather wist- 
 fully. 
 
 "No, very little. Have you been in New York long?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "Several days." Her colour deepened as she made 
 this simple admission. 
 
 "And how long do you expect to be here?" 
 
 "As much longer, perhaps. Or I may decide to spend 
 a month here. I never can say with any certainty. I'm 
 a bird of passage, you know." 
 
 "Yes, I know. Where are you staying?" 
 
 "I have an apartment across the Park. Isn't that 
 what you call it in the States an apartment?" 
 
 "Yes, that is what we call it. You must expect to be 
 with us more than a few days, though, if you're so set- 
 tled as all that." 
 
 "Oh, not necessarily! One is so much more comfort- 
 able in a place of one's own, don't you think ? And one 
 tires so of hotels." 
 
 "Can you get a satisfactory furnished flat anywhere 
 in Christendom that you may choose to drop down?" 
 
 "Oh, I couldn't! But my secretary sees to all that. 
 A most efficient person I have nothing against her ex-
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 277 
 
 i 
 
 cept her efficiency. I hadn't any secretary when you 
 knew me, had I, Jim?" 
 
 "No. But I suppose one has become necessary to you 
 now." 
 
 "Or I have deteriorated so far as to think I need one ? 
 Perhaps that is it. This woman I have now would gladly 
 spare me the trouble of breathing for myself." 
 
 "How heavenly!" commented Jim. "And is Anna 
 still with you?" 
 
 "No. I have pensioned Anna, and sent her back to 
 her own people. She was growing too old; and per- 
 haps I was growing a thought too civilised to tolerate 
 her any more. I have a Frenchwoman to do me now." 
 
 "You look as if you had been done by a French- 
 woman. At least, I suppose that's it. You don't look 
 your old self, anyway," said Jim rather bitterly. 
 
 "Make some allowance for the ravages of time, my 
 dear friend," she said. That was a patent absurdity, 
 and was probably uttered as such: whatever had rav- 
 aged her, it was certainly not time. 
 
 As if to make her statement more absurd, she rose 
 from the table just then; and looking down on him 
 from the height that she carried so gracefully, all ease 
 and assurance once more, she said, "Shall we be going 
 now?" 
 
 Jim scrambled reluctantly to his feet. "If you haven't 
 any more time " he muttered. 
 
 When their eyes were once more level she smiled at 
 him. "Walk with me across the Park, if you care to," 
 she said. "I'm sorry, I have an engagement for dinner 
 to-night; but this won't be the last time I shall see you, 
 I hope." 
 
 "I hope not," said Jim. "I know you must be very 
 much in demand, Zoe,"
 
 278 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Not so very much," she said as they went out to- 
 gether. "I am here," she went on with a smile, "more 
 or less incognito. These people I am dining with to- 
 night, however, I couldn't ignore; I know them very 
 well." She gave him the name of "these people," a 
 name as international as her own had now become. 
 
 They swung along in silence for a few minutes after 
 that; just to walk so with her brought back so many 
 things. When they were fairly in the Park, however, 
 Zoe broke the silence. "You will let me give you dinner 
 some evening?" 
 
 "I shall be delighted." 
 
 "You needn't be afraid of the dinner," she said. "I 
 have an excellent cook." 
 
 "Picked up at a day's notice?" Jim wished to know. 
 
 "By my excellent secretary." 
 
 "How smoothly your life must, glide !" said Jim. 
 
 Zoe's eyes had sought the road ahead. "Is that an 
 empty taxicab?" she asked. "It is. That's luck. I 
 think I'll leave you now, Jim." 
 
 He halted the taxicab, and turned to help her in. 
 "Shall we set a day for our dinner?" she asked. 
 
 "Yes. The earlier the better," said Jim. 
 
 "I think so too. Shall we say to-morrow?" 
 
 "To-morrow will suit me perfectly," he replied. 
 
 "To-morrow at seven, then," said Zoe. 
 
 She gave him her hand, and Jim kept it in his for a 
 moment. As they stood so a last ray of sunlight some- 
 how found its way to them ; and in that mellow radiance 
 she stood and looked at him. Between her dusky hat 
 and her bright blouse her face and throat stood forth in 
 all their essential loveliness, and her hair glowed and 
 shone like a living thing. And suddenly Jirri ceased to 
 be merely thrilled and disturbed by her; suddenly her
 
 PRINCE COPHETUA 279 
 
 hand was on his heart-strings, and she was drawing 
 therefrom music that was like a nightingale's, 
 
 Jim was alone before he realised that he should have 
 followed her while this mood was on him: that thanks 
 to Zoe's dinner engagement and the waiting taxicab he 
 had missed a rare opportunity. To-morrow night he 
 might simply be disturbed and anxious. He might even 
 be bored by the whole affair: boredom was, at such a 
 late stage of a relation, not inconceivable. And just 
 now 
 
 Jim drew a long breath ; and looking down discovered 
 that he held in his hand a memorandum of her address: 
 Zoe's address, visible reminder of a veritable engage- 
 ment with the haunter of his dreams. He stood for a 
 moment staring at it; then, as it did not vanish from 
 before his eyes, he thrust it in his pocket, and walked 
 slowly on. 
 
 And as he walked there came abruptly to his mind, 
 and almost to his lips, the query, "Why on earth has 
 she come here anyway?" And by the fact that he hadn't 
 thought of that natural question first of all, that he had 
 waited to think of it until she was out of his sight, he 
 measured the depth of the morass in which, whether 
 cheered or not by nightingales' songs, he still endlessly 
 struggled.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 
 
 TIM waited upon his lady the next evening fifteen 
 ** minutes before the appointed hour. He had left 
 the office early that afternoon, because work was impos- 
 sible to him then ; and he had spent a ridiculous amount 
 of time on his toilet, chiefly to give himself something 
 to do. Now he found Zoe's flat and rang her bell in a 
 mood of high if carefully suppressed excitement. He 
 was as badly off as he had ever been, conscience rose 
 now and then to assure him. But he had a crushing re- 
 tort for conscience: what did it matter how badly off 
 he was, when he was actually on his way to her? 
 
 He felt a strong delicious curiosity, not only as to the 
 character and the outcome of this evening's visit, but 
 even as to its most minute details. What would she 
 wear, and what would she have ordered for dinner, and in 
 what surroundings would they eat it? Only to think of 
 her dressing for him, and no doubt selecting a menu to 
 suit his taste, for all the world as if they were back in 
 the Helga! Only to think of the two of them, coolly 
 dining together, after all they had experienced and all 
 they had missed! 
 
 Jim had a moment to himself in her drawing-room; 
 and before Zoe came in he bethought himself to look 
 about him it wasn't likely that he would do so after she 
 came in. The flat that she had taken was sizeable, fur- 
 nished in perfect taste, and of itself, Jim judged, abso- 
 
 280
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 281 
 
 lutely characterless. Of course, that was all the better : 
 Zoe hadn't to expunge the traces of a previous inhabi- 
 tant before she made her surroundings look exactly like 
 herself. Her books lay on the table, with her monogram 
 staring up from the cover. Dull gold cushions of her 
 choosing lay about everywhere, on chairs and sofa and 
 floor; and there were flowers innumerable, flower heads 
 floating in shallow bowls of water, long stems thick with 
 blue and yellow and white bells erect in tall vases that 
 stood on the floor. Many of the flowers were strange to 
 Jim; he wondered where she had found them all. He 
 wondered, too, how there could be so many flowers to- 
 gether with no heavy flower odour ; and decided that per- 
 haps she had chosen scentless flowers on purpose. 
 
 Jim made a circuit of the drawing-room once before 
 he discovered something quite breath-taking, breath-tak- 
 ing only because it was so familiar. The big portrait of 
 Dan Lenox that had once hung above the mantel in the 
 Helga's cabin hung in this room too, though less con- 
 spicuously. Even as Jim stood gazing up at it, he had 
 a farther proof of Zoe's sublime disregard of the un- 
 wieldiness of impedimenta in a wandering life: for a 
 huge and very fine mastiff came into the room, and 
 sniffed inquiringly at Jim. Jim patted the animal's head : 
 he hadn't known that Zoe liked dogs. He hoped that 
 she did like this one: he hated to think of a fine dog at 
 the mercy of even her magnificent caprice. 
 
 And then Zoe came to him, with a soft rustle of drap- 
 eries and a little click of high heels on the polished floor. 
 She gave him both her hands; and he kept them in his, 
 but drew back to look her over. "Jove, but you're mag- 
 nificent to-night !" he said. 
 
 She gave a little soft laugh of pleasure. "I tried to 
 be," she said.
 
 282 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Even to an eye not a lover's, she would have seemed 
 that evening unusually splendid. She was dressed for 
 conquest, in a very long, very soft, white gown, with a 
 curious cape arrangement of gold embroidery that shaded 
 off into purple. At her embroidered girdle was a knot 
 of violets: a knot of violets, which on another woman 
 might have been the very symbol of the ingenuous, was 
 here the last touch of sophistication. But it was her 
 expression which drew and held the eye, so softly bright 
 it was, so unlike her usual look. It must arouse hopes 
 in a lover's breast. If she could look like that when he 
 came to her 
 
 "Zoe," began Jim, "Zoe " 
 
 Zoe wheeled suddenly, drawing her hands away from 
 him; her quicker ear had heard an approaching tread. 
 "My secretary," she said in an undertone. "She always 
 dines with me, except sometimes, of course, when I have 
 a big party. You don't mind, do you, Jim?" 
 
 Oh, no, he didn't mind! He could have torn the 
 hapless secretary limb from limb. He sat down at the 
 table with her, wishing that she might be smitten by all 
 the seven plagues of Egypt, by anything and by every- 
 thing, if it would only force her to leave the table. And 
 yet the secretary was a very pleasant, well-informed, 
 middle-aged woman, obviously of good social class; and 
 doubtless her wholesome individuality would in the long 
 run influence Zoe for good. Zoe needed more feminine 
 companionship than she had ever had ; and Zoe Lenoxes, 
 to their misfortune, could get feminine companionship in 
 an untarnished form, only from some such middle-aged 
 and not too personable source as this. 
 
 Most of the conversation over the dinner table de- 
 volved upon the secretary. Jim asked her what her im- 
 pressions of America were, and didn't she find servants
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 283 
 
 hard to get in this country, and hadn't they been having 
 a fine fall. Zoe sat silent for the most part, and watched 
 her plate. Once, however, Jim surprised her eyes upon 
 him, and when she saw that she was caught she flushed 
 a little, and then gave him a look of fairly bewildering 
 sweetness. Jim felt of a sudden warm and happy; he 
 was gracious even to the secretary for the rest of the 
 meal. 
 
 Afterward they went to a small music-room which 
 opened off the drawing-room; and there the secretary 
 must have made her excuses and withdrawn. For pres- 
 ently Jim felt that he and Zoe were alone; and he found 
 himself standing behind her, watching her white shoul- 
 ders as she played and played, endlessly on and on, as 
 if her life depended on her not stopping. 
 
 Then suddenly Jim's hands fell heavily on hers, and 
 her throbbing music ended in discord. "That's enough, 
 Zoe," he said. She did not protest; she turned her head 
 a little toward him. Jim drew her up to him ; her eyes 
 closed, and their lips met. 
 
 It was one of their old passionate caresses; she met 
 him in it fully, as she always had, as a free woman ought. 
 Jim's spirit soared to the skies. When she presently 
 stirred in his arms his grasp relaxed ; he held her off and 
 looked at her. Her eyes opened and found his. Jim felt 
 as if shackles had dropped from him; he was free and 
 calm, and could see very clearly. He kissed her again, 
 lightly on the cheek, and let her go with a little laugh. 
 "Everything is just as it should be, my dear," he said. 
 "Quite, quite as it should be." 
 
 Zoe sank into a nearby chair. Her huge dog came 
 wandering in just then, and sat down beside her: Zoe 
 laid one hand on the massive head. It was a little white 
 and gold chair that she was sitting on, and one of her
 
 284 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 slippers rested on a gold-coloured cushion. She com- 
 posed a perfect picture; Jim stood back and feasted his 
 eyes. Beauty like hers excused and atoned for every- 
 thing, he felt ; it always would. Yet would there be 
 much hereafter for it to atone for? Even to-night, talk 
 of atonement seemed sflly : Zoe was herself, and as her- 
 self she could not fail to be sufficient. If only she would 
 lift her eyes and look at him if only she would lift her 
 eyes. 
 
 Suddenly she did lift them; and she spoke with some 
 abruptness. "Jim," she said, "do you know why I came 
 here to New York?" 
 
 "I have been wondering," answered Jim. "Was it to 
 see ?" 
 
 "I came to see you," she said. "That's all I came 
 for, but I was ashamed to try directly to see you. I 
 have been here a week, Jim, a week watching for 
 your face in the crowd." 
 
 "Zoe, my dear!" he cried. "It's wonderful, that is, 
 and it's wonderful of you to tell me." 
 
 "I wouldn't admit it even to myself," she said with 
 curious tenseness. "But it's true. I came because I 
 couldn't stay away from you any longer." 
 
 "Does that mean that you have ceased to struggle?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "I'm afraid not. Simply that I'm tired, and I re- 
 membered you so well too well." 
 
 "I bless even your discouragement, since it has brought 
 you here," said Jim. "But for your own sake, Zoe, stop 
 fighting me and yourself. It only grinds you down, 
 and it doesn't do any good. In the end you will have 
 to give in or be destroyed no, in the end you will give 
 in. Now you are only holding off the inevitable. You
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 285 
 
 are making yourself suffer, and me suffer; and you are 
 wasting the best years of both our lives." 
 
 "How shall I avoid those dire consequences?" she 
 asked bitterly. 
 
 "You wish me to say it again? I'll say it as often as 
 you like. I shan't tire of saying it; but I would be 
 glad if you did tire of hearing: tire enough to do it, and 
 so put a stop forever to my repetition of my formula. 
 Marry me, Zoe." 
 
 "That is the only way I can avoid wasting my life?" 
 she wished to know. 
 
 "It sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?" he conceded. "A 
 woman like you, and an ordinary duffer like me. But 
 you know yourself that it isn't ridiculous. The the 
 actuality wouldn't be so bad, I assure you. And if worse 
 ever came to worst, and you wished yourself out, those 
 things can be arranged. But I have no idea things would 
 ever come to the worst; and even if they did, the worst 
 that lies that way, the quite impossible worst, isn't so 
 bad as things are now." 
 
 "Oh, nothing is so very bad now !" she said, stirring in 
 her chair. "Don't take my sentimental regrets too seri- 
 ously, Jim ; I don't take them too seriously myself. And 
 don't feel compelled to starve your own life simply be- 
 cause I happen to have found you the most agreeable 
 man I ever knew." 
 
 "Zoe, my love, don't ask me to doubt the evidence 
 of my senses. You have changed mightily in the last 
 two years. Anybody could see it, I should think, let 
 alone a man who " 
 
 "Silly, silly, it's only that I am crying for the moon!" 
 she said almost tenderly. "I can't eat my cake and keep 
 it too. That's human destiny, Jim, and usually I am 
 wise enough to know it. But to-night things have got
 
 286 , THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 on my nerves. It is seeing you, I think ; because for the 
 most part I can keep things off my nerves." 
 
 "You expect me to believe that ?" 
 
 "Why not, as it's the truth?" 
 
 "Well, it is customary to take a lady's word, I sup- 
 pose. But I see what I see, Zoe." 
 
 "You see a great deal, and you say a great deal. And 
 the moral to all you see and say, Jim, is just 'Marry 
 me!'" 
 
 "That is a sharp one. But even if it's true, that is a 
 sufficiently good moral." 
 
 "It is to preach this moral, that you remain single 
 from year's end to year's end?" 
 
 "Zoe, are you trying to irritate me?" he asked. 
 
 If she were trying, she had certainly succeeded this 
 time. Her question brought sharply into Jim's mind 
 the fact that he shouldn't even to-night be in a position 
 to preach his "moral" to her if it hadn't been for an- 
 other woman's magnanimity. Jessica's refusal of him 
 had been magnanimity, and Zoe's was sheer nihilism. 
 The sacrifice of love had built Jessica up to a height : 
 the denial of love was wearing Zoe down. Why should 
 he love the one of them and not the other? And why 
 where he did love, and believed himself loved in return, 
 couldn't he make his love signally effective ? 
 
 Jim turned away from Zoe, and walked into the next 
 room. He was disgusted with her for talking so fool- 
 ishly, and with himself for answering her. They were 
 both children of an age that talks too much, and for 
 the most part foolishly. Jim was tired of Zoe, and of 
 himself; he longed to be alone in the open air, and to 
 forget to think. 
 
 He strolled to an open window, and stood looking out ; 
 then presently he turned to one of the very tall vases of
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 287 
 
 very long-stemmed flowers that stood nearby. He laid 
 his face among them; and the petals were cool and 
 sweet, and scentless. How like her, to have flowers with 
 no scent! As well the asphodel fields at once, and the 
 dull life of the shades. That seemed to be her ideal, 
 anyhow. 
 
 And as he stood there sulking and storming to him- 
 self, Zoe came up to him. He had half thought that 
 she would come; yet when he actually heard her step 
 behind him, it was with a start of incredulous joy. She 
 showed her love for him in strange ways; but for a ni- 
 hilist she found it singularly hard to let him alone. 
 
 Jim stood as he was until she came quite up to him. 
 She stopped beside him, and he still ignored her. She 
 too put her face to the flowers, so that her head ap- 
 proached his; and Jim held himself in leash. She turned 
 a little toward him, and laid one hand on his shoulder; 
 Jim caught her in his arms. 
 
 She drew him down with her to a little sofa that stood 
 nearby; and no old caress of them all had ever been like 
 this one. The old passionate exhilaration, the old ex- 
 quisite excitement, came and swelled within him, and 
 were lost. Their embrace earlier in the evening had 
 cleared the atmosphere; this one blinded and deafened 
 Jim, and left him only a mass of sublimated instincts. 
 His arms tightened and tightened about her : his breath 
 came sharply audible. 
 
 It might have ended almost anyhow, had not the child 
 of a too talkative age taken to speech. "Jim," Zoe whis- 
 pered, turning her face a little away from him, "never 
 mind the rest. Take me to-night only take me to-night, 
 Jim." 
 
 In an instant Jim was himself, somewhat shaken, to 
 be sure, but quite in possession of his faculties and his
 
 288 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 normal view-point. He released her gently, and stood 
 up. "That won't do, Zoe," he said. 
 
 She sank face downward on the sofa, with her arms 
 extended; her golden cape covered her like a pall. Jim 
 stood over her and spoke; his tone was very gentle, but 
 its firmness surprised even his own ear. 
 
 "Once that might have done," he said. "But it won't 
 do now. We have had the first fruits of our passion. 
 From now on, it must be all or nothing." 
 
 "You have said it, then," came in a muffled tone from 
 Zoe. "It must be nothing." 
 
 "I'm sorry," said Jim. "I'm doubly sorry, because I 
 shall probably wait for you all my life. It won't be a 
 willing sacrifice; I can't help myself. That's my sole 
 point of 'superiority to you, Zoe; I admit the inevi- 
 table." 
 
 She did not answer that ; she lay very still, very tense. 
 Jim stooped a little nearer to her, could not resist mak- 
 ing one last appeal. "Dear heart, won't you admit the 
 inevitable? Won't you look at it simply, as it is? It is 
 very simple. Can't you look at it so? Have you built 
 the wall about you so high that you can't see over it, 
 even if you cared to? I suppose you have; I suppose 
 you aren't even wholly to blame for building your wall. 
 Perhaps I'm not superior to you, Zoe ; perhaps I'm only 
 luckier. Even if I die waiting for you, and you never 
 come to me, perhaps that will be only a last bit of luck. 
 I'm afraid I shall die so, if you never do come. But 
 that's all my own simplicity, and I dare say you do well 
 to ignore it." 
 
 It was very still now in the room. Jim straightened 
 up, and looked about him, and marvelled at this stillness. 
 Then he looked down at Zoe again. "I am going now, 
 dear," he said.
 
 THE PARTING OF THE WATERS 289 
 
 At those words the muscles in the back of her neck 
 rippled faintly, and a contraction went over her whole 
 body, as if she were about to rise. But she did not rise, 
 or even change her position; and she who had so lately 
 used her fatal gift of speech now found no word to 
 utter. 
 
 Jim laid his hand for a moment on her golden hair; 
 but she did not seem to feel his touch. Then he turned 
 and walked out, steadily, without a backward glance, 
 steadily and alone, into the encompassing loneliness. 
 
 Of course, before the night was over he cursed him- 
 self for a fool.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 SUNDERING FLOOD 
 
 HE went back to Zoe's flat, of course, that next day ; 
 indeed he went there in the morning. He was not 
 particularly surprised, however, to find that she had left 
 the city, vanishing by some impossibly early train, por- 
 trait, mastiff, secretary, maid and all. On the principle 
 that where one train has gone another will some day go, 
 Jim tried to learn her destination. But the janitor had 
 evidently been well feed, and knew nothing; the agent 
 through whom the flat was leased had received his 
 money in advance, and was quite indifferent to the de- 
 mands of young men with obviously trumped-up pre- 
 texts for seeing a departed tenant. 
 
 It was probably better this way, Jim tried to console 
 himself by thinking. He and Zoe had got beyond the 
 stage of rational argument, and had moreover no hope 
 of convincing each other; to go on now would simply 
 be to descend to recrimination and repetition, with per- 
 haps worse to come. And yet it was pitiful to think 
 of her going on in her present state. She must have 
 been awfully worn down before she would ever come to 
 him so: he recalled her restlessness, her flushed cheeks, 
 her every sign of fever and distress ; and he remembered 
 that he had sent her thus on her lonely way. 
 
 Only it wouldn't necessarily or even probably be a 
 lonely way. There were people enough to beguile her 
 
 290
 
 THE SUNDERING FLOOD 291 
 
 loneliness frankly, there were men enough. That was 
 the worst of it : he had sent her forth in such a state, al- 
 though he knew what might come of his so doing. Per- 
 haps she knew too. Doubtless she thought he was both 
 ungenerous and unmanly. He thought so himself, when 
 he came right down to it. And yet underneath he was 
 sure that he had been right : between them henceforth it 
 had to be all or nothing. But how could he be right, 
 and bring down such consequences? And yet he was 
 right. 
 
 For a man who was in the right he suffered, to be 
 sure, from something singularly like a bad conscience. 
 But that was only part of his sufferings. For his dark 
 spirit was now fully in the ascendant, and during many 
 days he was thoroughly wretched. He came to the con- 
 clusion that he should never see Zoe again; he fully 
 believed that he should never love any other woman. And 
 because he had loved, he knew what he was missing, and 
 he tortured himself with the thought. 
 
 He wondered sometimes in his solitary reveries what 
 Dan Lenox would have done in his place. Seized the 
 lady piratically, no doubt, and given her, so to speak, 
 her choice between a pirate's love and walking the plank. 
 Well, Jim was no Dan Lenox: he had recognised that 
 more than once. And Zoe was not on this side of her 
 Dan Lenox's daughter at all. It seemed to Jim, gloom- 
 ing over the whole affair, that now Dan Lenox was dead 
 indeed, in influence as well as in the flesh ; but the spirit 
 of the vanished Helga lived, waxed and was glorified in 
 Zoe's devouring renunciations. 
 
 A month after she left New York, Zoe quite unex- 
 pectedly wrote to Jim. The letter was written on both 
 sides of a large sheet of paper; with no address or date 
 line, it began:
 
 292 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Jim, dear, 
 
 "I never expect, to see you again. With my consent, 
 you shall never see me. That is why I write to you to 
 tell you what I do. No, I write because I can't help it, 
 and simply to ease my own mind. If you never get this 
 letter, so much the better ; but I shall send it, because 
 
 "Jim, dear, I loved you those days in the Helga. You 
 taught me what the word meant, and I have never un- 
 learned the lesson. I loved you then. I love you now. 
 
 "And I can't give in. I can't. It isn't that you aren't 
 good enough for me. You're too good, dear, simple- 
 hearted Jim; and if you were only a hundredth part as 
 good as you are, any woman but me would submit, 
 rather than suffer as I am suffering now. 
 
 "I can't yield. Those days in the Helga when life and 
 death played me false ought to have taught me, but 
 they haven't. Always, always I must captain my soul; 
 and that's only another way of saying that I never have 
 captained it. Jim, do you understand? Sometimes I 
 think I'm a little bit mad; and sometimes I fairly hope 
 that I may go mad, and so end this particular torture. 
 
 "You do understand, don't you? I want you to un- 
 derstand, because you will never see me again. I will 
 kill myself before I'll let you see me again. 
 
 "You should have taken what I had to offer that last 
 night. It might have sayed us both. 
 
 "Jim, my darling, my darling! You could have saved 
 me from myself; you could have saved me from this 
 hell of nothingness." 
 
 It was signed with her initials. Jim, reading her 
 wild words in her impossibly clear writing, was at first 
 simply stunned. And then he was delighted that she
 
 THE SUNDERING FLOOD 293 
 
 could on occasion write so wildly ; it showed that she was 
 not altogether the spiritual hue of a ghost. 
 
 He read her letter a second time, and then, with a 
 furious thrill, a third. On the third reading he turned 
 cold at the end. "Jim, my darling! my darling!" as 
 if she stretched out her arms to him "You could have 
 saved me from myself; you could have saved me from 
 this hell of nothingness." 
 
 And so he could. Heaven help them both, so he 
 could. Good Christian man, what had he meant by his 
 niggling attitude? Didn't he know that when a man 
 had once gone to a woman as he had to Zoe, had taken 
 her love and given his in exchange, he couldn't draw 
 back, no matter what the conditions? He had had his 
 fine ideal, had scorned the compromise she offered, had 
 even perhaps cherished scruples. He had despised her 
 for hanging back, and what was he himself but a hang- 
 er-back of the worst sort? The sum of his righteous- 
 ness was that he had cast forth his beloved into outer 
 darkness. 
 
 She had given him no address ; she had not meant her 
 appeal to be answered. Indeed, this letter was unanswer- 
 able; Jim could not see himself sitting down and pen- 
 ning an answer to it. But suppose he were to go to her? 
 If with nothing better than the post-mark to guide him 
 he were to rush forth, and seek her and seek her seek 
 her all over the world if need be, and never rest until he 
 found her? 
 
 As in a vision Jim saw himself so pursuing; and the 
 strength of his impulse brought him to his feet. To 
 find her that was the main thing. Once she were found, 
 he could either prevail upon her to do as he wished, or, 
 if he could do no better, give in to her way of thinking. 
 It would be better than this, whatever came.
 
 294 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 But his vision completed itself with fatal clearness. 
 If he went rushing off like a fool, it would be only to a 
 renewal of disappointment. He might indeed find her: 
 the world was not so large, and she was a fairly con- 
 spicuous figure. But when he reached her, it would not 
 be to offer her some fine bold compromise, such as she 
 could fairly take; or even to make the man's part the 
 more generous, and submit to her exactions. It would 
 be simply to renew the old conflict. No matter what 
 his longing or her necessity, he could take her only on 
 his own terms. He was as fatally bound by his tem- 
 perament as Zoe by hers. He saw that with the bright- 
 ness of a vision, and knew it to be a sober fact. 
 
 The years might flow on in everlasting clarity and 
 emptiness, leaving him the husk of a man, and making 
 of Zoe what they would. He was as powerless to 
 change the character of what they brought him as to 
 alter the course of the years themselves. Things would 
 go on and on, wearily, boresomely, irritating alike in the 
 changes they made and in those they failed to make. 
 Then on some pair of days he and Zoe would go down 
 to final extinction; and the pitiful part would not be the 
 extinction, but the fact that they had had nothing before 
 it. 
 
 Life had doubtless become a flat dull matter, without 
 form or significance. But a man could not very well sit 
 down and whine about it. And so long as you kept go- 
 ing and tried to be moderately interested in something 
 beside your aching ego, there were always things that 
 did interest you, pleasantly or painfully. 
 
 Even that next year brought several such items to 
 Jim. In November, to begin with, the brother next him- 
 self in age accomplished his long-threatened breach with 
 his wife. She went abroad to heal her broken heart,
 
 THE SUNDERING FLOOD 295 
 
 with a promise of legal proceedings when the proper time 
 came; and Roy, who was at outs with himself as well 
 as with her, turned to Jim in his trouble. They had never 
 been intimate; but they contracted a sort of intimacy 
 now. Jim was useful to his brother in many small mat- 
 ters connected with the breaking up of his household 
 and with his divorce; but he was more useful in the 
 role of confidant. Roy Whittaker fell into the habit of 
 coming to Jim's flat whenever he thought there was any 
 chance of finding him there, to smoke with him and rail 
 at the universe. 
 
 Jim listened in silence for the most part. Some- 
 times Roy too was silent; and they would sit all the 
 evening grimly, without a word to say for themselves. 
 At other times Roy would discharge all his accumulated 
 venom at the world, and women, and marriage. "You've 
 done damn well to keep out of it, Jim," he would re- 
 mark, and perhaps add, "You were always the wisest 
 of the family, though I suppose none of us have ever 
 sufficiently appreciated that fact. I used to think you 
 were a very cool duffer, and almost to despise you for 
 shrinking from experience. Experience ha!" 
 
 And Jim would take out his pipe long enough to re- 
 mark, "Well, perhaps you were right, Roy." To him- 
 self that seemed like high irony; but Roy interpreted it 
 as a simple instance of Jim's good temper. 
 
 If Roy's ill-starred marriage was unmaking itself 
 during those winter months, another marriage was at the 
 same time a-making in Jim's small circle of intimates. 
 Jim heard of it one evening when he had managed to 
 avoid Roy, and had gone to see Jessica Drummond. He 
 hadn't seen her before for a week. Thanks largely to 
 Roy, and partly perhaps to other reasons, his visits had 
 of late become increasingly infrequent; and their fre-
 
 296 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 quency was not aided by his instinctively perceiving 
 that although Jessica's feeling toward him had appar- 
 ently not altered, she did not seem to mind his not com- 
 ing oftener. Perhaps she had some other interest now, 
 he thought, meaning by "interest" something masculine. 
 
 That, it proved, was exactly the case. Jessica had 
 not only acquired a new masculine interest: she pur- 
 posed to marry it. Her bridegroom was a man from 
 California, considerably older than herself. "He's aw- 
 fully honest and high-minded, Jim," she said. "I sup- 
 pose he isn't a shining light intellectually he can't be, 
 or he wouldn't think what he does of Jessica. He isn't 
 a fool, though; he isn't altogether deceived even in me. 
 He thinks me gay and good-tempered ; and I am gay and 
 good-tempered, Jim. And who knows? I may in time 
 evolve into a pretty decent sort." 
 
 "A pretty decent sort is what you are now," said 
 Jim. "I can't tell you how glad I am that you are going 
 to be happy, Jessica." 
 
 "Aren't you glad I refused you?" she asked with her 
 own saucy little smile. "I had to have sense for us two, 
 just about that time." 
 
 "A woman usually does have to have, at one time or 
 another," said Jim. "I'm not sure even yet how well 
 you did for me, Jessica. And now here you are taking 
 my good pal away from me. Shall we ever, do you 
 suppose, see each other again after you are married?" 
 
 "I suppose we shall," she answered. "Jessica's in- 
 tended is fairly well to do I didn't tell you that, did I ? 
 How I have changed ! We shall probably come to New 
 York from time to time. And if you ever come out to 
 California, of course you will come to see us. Come on 
 your wedding journey, Jim."
 
 THE SUNDERING FLOOD 297 
 
 "I'd rather not postpone my visit quite so long as 
 that," said Jim. 
 
 "Well, you will come to my wedding?" 
 
 "Indeed I will. When is it to be, Jessica?" 
 
 "New Year's Day. There isn't any point in our wait- 
 ing, and I haven't many preparations to make. Just you 
 and the Evingtons and two or three .others are to be 
 there; but come and try to make it gay, won't you? I 
 should hate a weepy little wedding." 
 
 It turned out not to be a "weepy" wedding; the only 
 tears were those unshed in the bride's eyes when Jim 
 Whittaker took her hand to bid her good-bye. 
 
 There came over them both just then a flashing per- 
 ception of how happy they had been in each other; and 
 perhaps they both felt that life would never hold any- 
 thing better for either than the cool intimacy which they 
 were even now laying away in lavender. It had been 
 given them to help each other over their respective crises, 
 to give human sympathy and aid without compromise 
 or afterthought. If there was a regret now, it was on 
 Jim's part ; and that was both just and natural, for Jes- 
 sica had all along been the more sincere and single- 
 hearted of the two. 
 
 "Good-bye, Jim; good luck," she whispered. 
 
 "Good-bye, Jessica and thank you," he whispered 
 back. 
 
 So the surge of ordinary events carried Jim on. For 
 the most part he was neither happy nor unhappy. He 
 tried to be busy all the time, and not to think about 
 himself. It seemed to him that he was settling, settling 
 toward the man he was to be; and when he did allow 
 himself the pleasure of introspection, it was to look with 
 some curiosity for the Jim Whittaker with whom he 
 was to spend the latter half of his life.
 
 298 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 And then one day he did something which he tried 
 hard to persuade himself was a reasoned thing, and 
 very suitable for a man at his time of life. Yet he ac- 
 tually knew that he did it on a mere vagrant impulse; 
 and, worse still, he fulfilled an old dream, and gave in 
 to what he should have been striving to forget. But 
 his friends approved on merely practical grounds; and 
 after all it is best for a man not always to go too deeply 
 into the motives for his own conduct
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 A HOUSE) UPON A HIW, 
 
 WHAT Jim did was to buy himself a house. He 
 could afford it ; and a house in the country might 
 well be of benefit to him, especially during the summer. 
 But the myriad reasons why he needed a house, and this 
 particular house, Jim thought of afterward, to prop his 
 tottering self-esteem. The house was actually bought 
 with no definite look toward utility, and with no thought 
 to practical matters of plumbing and exposure; it was 
 bought from the baldest sentimental consideration, be- 
 cause it was a white house upon a hill. 
 
 Like many another thing done in all rashness, this 
 purchase turned out very well. This was not, to be sure, 
 a spreading marble palace, such as the husband of a 
 princess might have bought; it was not even framed in 
 ilexes. It was a good-sized, substantial frame dwelling 
 with a gable roof and green blinds ; and the hill it crowned 
 was all that the eye or the soul could desire. It was 
 within motoring distance of town, and within easy reach 
 of the Evingtons, with whom Jim was now, in the fluctu- 
 ations of a life's interests, once more on intimate terms. 
 
 The three of them rode over on horse-back from the 
 Evingtons' to inspect Jim's purchase before he planned 
 any alterations. June led the two men over every inch 
 of the house, taking the lead naturally away from the 
 owner : crooned over the fire-places, of which there was 
 
 299
 
 300 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 one in almost every room, deplored the lack of modern- 
 ity in the kitchen, pointed out the possibility of parti- 
 tioning off a ball-room and perhaps a billiard-room too 
 in the garret, selected the room in which she would sleep 
 when Jim gave house-parties. Stuart grinned, and held 
 his peace; Jim was relieved to find that after all it ap- 
 peared he had not done anything irremediably foolish. 
 
 They finally went back to the largest room, where 
 opened blinds let the sunshine in upon the dust. "You 
 think that the whole place has possibilities?" Jim asked. 
 
 "Such possibilities!" June dusted her skirt with her 
 gloves, and her strokes emphasised what she said. "The 
 proportions and all are right, you know; what you have 
 to do is to take the note from the house itself. Furnish 
 all through in spindle-legged mahogany and homespun 
 blue and white " 
 
 "Not too daintily, June," protested Jim. "Remember 
 this is for a single man." 
 
 "Not daintily at all," said June. "But when you have 
 the house all ready to live in, Jim, you will probably 
 decide that all you need now is a wife." 
 
 Jim shook his head. "Dear lady, don't you see that 
 this house is an acknowledgment, and if you like a 
 boast, that that is exactly what I don't need?" 
 
 "Surely, June," Evington sided in with his friend. 
 "This is to be an establishment run by a man alone and 
 for a man alone that is, if Jimmie's telling the truth. 
 And when a man sets up for himself like that, it signi- 
 fies the beginning of permanent bachelorhood." 
 
 June, who had begun quite in fun, was now sweetly 
 in earnest. "But Jim's so young," she protested, speak- 
 ing as if Jim weren't there at all. 
 
 Jim laughed shortly. It came sweeping over him, as 
 it would do sometimes even now, that he was the oldest
 
 A HOUSE UPON A HILL 301 
 
 old man who had lived since the beginning of the world. 
 Then came the saving reflection that to feel old in that 
 way one must, after all, be rather young: the truly old 
 have acquired patience and lost the fine ironic bitterness 
 that drives things home. He remembered, too, that he 
 would be thirty-eight the next month ; and he knew as a 
 matter of fact that thirty-eight was not old. 
 
 He laughed again, this time with the pleasant throaty 
 laugh his friends were used to hearing. "Will you help 
 me with the doing over and the furnishing, June?" he 
 asked. "I am a permanent bachelor, indeed, and there- 
 fore entitled to the assistance of my friend's wife in such 
 a matter as this." 
 
 "I should love to," said June heartily. 
 
 "Then when it's all ready to be admired, we'll give a 
 house-warming, and you and Stuart can chaperone," 
 Jim went on. 
 
 "That will be fun, too," said June, dimpling. "And 
 we won't ask any too susceptible girls to the house- 
 warming, or any too appealing girls: because the house 
 is going to be so very pretty that they might be tempted, 
 you know, to try and possess themselves of it; and then 
 we should see our cherished bachelorhood " 
 
 "Go hang," said Jim. "Well, I trust your judgment 
 in anything, June." 
 
 He trusted her judgment, to be sure, rather more than 
 he did her intentions. June had never yet tried any 
 match-making on his behalf; but in some matters all 
 women were alike, and this would certainly be a fine 
 opportunity for June to do just what she expressly dis- 
 avowed any idea of doing. She couldn't do any harm, 
 though. She wouldn't do anything, he was confident, 
 that would make either him or the girl ridiculous ; and as 
 for the outcome of any possible series of machinations
 
 302 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 well, Jim's soul was proofed in armour, whether he 
 liked it or not. As a matter of fact, he did not like it, 
 except in this connection. 
 
 The business of repairs and remodelling, and even of 
 looking for furniture and fittings which would accord 
 with June's decorative scheme, was begun at once, and 
 went merrily forward all that summer. At the same 
 time Jim employed a gardener, so that the outside im- 
 provements would have a good start by the next year. 
 In spite of drawbacks the gardener did well ; he had, in- 
 deed, something to work on. But although the inside 
 work went steadily on, there was, as usually happens in 
 such cases, more to do than had been expected. Autumn 
 found them only fairly well along with the inside work. 
 "I do hope we can finish before spring," June would 
 say as she surveyed what was going on. "Stuart wants 
 to go abroad in the spring, and it would be fun to have 
 the house-warming before we go." 
 
 As it turned, the house was finished and almost fur- 
 nished before the Evingtons left; and the garden was 
 already beginning to be wonderful. But Jim decided 
 to postpone the house-warming until just after their re- 
 turn. He wanted time, he said, to become accustomed 
 to his new responsibilities; he didn't care to call his 
 friends in as witnesses of his house-holding until he had 
 grown into the house-holder's part. And there was the 
 question of servants ; and there were oh, lots of things ! 
 When June and Stuart returned, they wouldn't lose any 
 time in having their party. 
 
 What actually deterred him was his persistent feel- 
 ing that this house, the very purchase of which had been 
 a sentimental excess, was likely to lead him into senti- 
 mental excesses all along the line. There was the mat- 
 ter of a bedroom, for instance. The house had two
 
 A HOUSE UPON A HILL 303 
 
 large front bedrooms, one of which June suggested that 
 Jim take as his. But Jim demurred: to him there was 
 something connubial in their very size. He chose a 
 smaller side room, on the plea that it opened on the gar- 
 den, and also on the rising sun: he discovered an un- 
 suspected fancy for being awakened by the morning 
 sun in his eyes. But the room he had chosen lay just 
 behind the more desirable of the front bedrooms; and 
 he encouraged June to make that the most attractive 
 room in the house. When he realised what he had done, 
 he was disgusted ; but he was glad that June apparently 
 didn't see any significance in what they had done. And 
 June, who had privately no doubt that that best bed- 
 room had been furnished for a not impossible she, con- 
 trived to do her smiling when Jim wasn't looking. 
 
 The whole house was very attractive: perhaps shades 
 of desirability existed principally in Jim's mind. June 
 had kept to the colonial type of decoration which, as 
 she rightly said, the house suggested. She had had the 
 wood-work painted white, and more white panelling put 
 in than the house had originally boasted. She had 
 bought the slender-legged, but not too slender-legged, 
 mahogany that she had threatened in the beginning; and 
 she had shown great ingenuity in discovering tufted bed- 
 spreads and blue and white home-spun hangings. But 
 being more of a woman than a decorator, and not being 
 Jim's wife, she had left a great many details for him to 
 settle as he personally pleased; and throughout his al- 
 most "period" interior there was a liberal flavour of Jim 
 Whittaker. 
 
 Jim did not give up his flat in town, although it would 
 be possible for him to reach his house in any but the 
 worst weather. He had a curious feeling that the flat 
 was what was suitable for a man in his position. But
 
 304 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 he moved many of his personal belongings out to his 
 house, and as the weather grew warmer took to spend- 
 ing many of his nights and all his week-ends there. He 
 got two negroes, man and wife, as servants; and either 
 went down alone or took his brother Roy with him. Roy 
 was still melancholy company; but he had ceased to 
 talk much about his troubles. Usually Jim was only sorry 
 for him, and conscious of a duty toward him ; but there 
 were times these later days when he was rather pleas- 
 antly aware of the position of the two Whittakers who 
 sat upon the edge of the world and glowered at it. The 
 world had pointedly done for them both; indeed, they 
 had both been done for by women. And Jim's con- 
 sciousness of that fact, coupled with Roy's total lack 
 of suspicion that his brother was in anything like his 
 own fix, gave Jim a certain grim enjoyment. 
 
 The two of them went down to the house together for 
 two weeks in August. Mrs. Roy Whittaker was now 
 establishing a residence in a western state where divorce 
 is easy; and Roy was beginning to be interested in 
 dogs, and even to think of establishing a kennel. Jim 
 wished no kennel on his premises; and they disagreed 
 healthily about it, quite as they had always disagreed 
 when they were young men. Toward the end of their 
 fortnight, indeed, they began to be very much bored 
 with each other's society; and Jim judged from that 
 fact that they were both pretty much at normal. Soon 
 enough they would cease to sit together on the edge of 
 the world, and glower at it in unison. Soon enough 
 they would both plunge back into it; and if they glow- 
 ered when they chanced to meet, it would be at each 
 other. 
 
 One soft, still evening just before they moved back 
 to town, Roy went off by himself for a walk. Jim, who
 
 A HOUSE UPON A HILL 305 
 
 had been out of doors all the afternoon, stayed at home. 
 He and Roy had smoked their after-dinner cigars in the 
 library; but when Roy left him Jim took his book across 
 the hall into trie austere living-room, because the garden 
 was on this side of the house. The night-wind that 
 stirred the thin curtains brought with it faint sweet 
 summer smells, smells that were not only pleasant in 
 themselves, but reminded Jim pleasantly of his afternoon 
 out among them. He sat down to read, but his mind was 
 only half on his book. He was thinking that he would 
 do more with the garden another year, and more still 
 another. So far as he could see, the house was quite 
 perfect: it was at least satisfactory, and might remain 
 indefinitely just as it was now. But with a garden one 
 could always make improvements year by year, could 
 pass from a coarser perfection to a finer, learning as 
 one worked, and so at length grow old, surrounded by 
 roses and clematis and lavender. 
 
 A nest in which to grow old was that what he had 
 had in mind when he bought this house ? Well, that was 
 not a bad idea. At any rate there was nothing to be 
 ashamed of in the whole transaction. He had, now he 
 came to think of it, spent the last year wholesomely and 
 delightfully, thanks largely perhaps to his house. Well, 
 one thing had lately combined with another to make him 
 pretty much his own man again. 
 
 Jim suddenly flung his arms above his head, and 
 stretched every nerve in sheer delicious abandonment to 
 his own strength. He, to talk of getting old ! Because 
 he had once weakly fancied that things were in a mess 
 for him, and had allowed that fancy to worry him, was 
 he now to believe in the immanence of a premature old 
 age, or indeed even in the gradual advance of an inevi- 
 table old age? Every fibre in him splendidly contra-
 
 306 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 dieted the idea: his whole physique, his peaceful mind, 
 the delicious hour, combined to push it into absolute 
 nothingness. 
 
 He could not, to be sure, sit still as he had once 
 been able to. Even now he must presently get up and go 
 to the nearest window, to look out at the summer night. 
 A full moon rode just above the rustling trees ; the gar- 
 den was bathed in the kindest light, in the softest, deep- 
 est shadow. Jim leaned with his arm along the case- 
 ment, drinking in the peace and purity of the scene; not 
 a thing seemed to move all down the slope of the hill, 
 until you came to the grove of old oaks at the bottom; 
 and their top branches moved always, always. If one 
 could only get up there and ride, as one used in child- 
 hood to dream of doing: ride in the wind, and play with 
 the shadows! 
 
 And as Jim's spirit was riding in his tree-tops, there 
 flashed into his mind, quite uninvited, a sentence of the 
 book he had just been reading. He repeated it almost 
 aloud, "O, wilt thou not let the summer days be sweet ?" 
 The summer days and the summer nights ! And there 
 in the clear calm of the unchanging night, the old long- 
 ing rent him: the old sweetness, the old ecstasy, the 
 old loss. 
 
 Drops of perspiration came out on his forehead. 
 "Nights like this do make a fellow feel sentimental," 
 he muttered to himself, and turned away from the win- 
 dow. He passed the chair where he had sat a moment 
 before; he began to walk up and down the room, his 
 whole being in a curious contraction. He was fairly 
 beyond thought at first ; but thought returned to him soon 
 enough, and he tried to argue with himself. He hadn't 
 so much as thought of Zoe Lenox for days, he told his 
 struggling spirit. He didn't care to think about her;
 
 A HOUSE UPON A HILL 307 
 
 he didn't actually even want her any more. He was 
 satisfied with things as they were: must he always be- 
 long to her, body and soul, until his dying day? 
 
 He tried to laugh at his mood; indeed he saw it as 
 ridiculous enough. But his laughter came with diffi- 
 culty, and sounded horribly hollow. Then he gave him- 
 self all the accustomed excuses: the night, moonlight, 
 loneliness, too much reading. He even, as he passed it 
 lying where he had dropped it on the floor, kicked at 
 the golden fiction "of William Morris. Golden ladies 
 in golden days: he hadn't any business to be reading 
 about them anyway. 
 
 Discovering that it was useless to struggle against his 
 mood, Jim gave in to it deliberately. If he must think 
 about Zoe, he would think about her completely. He 
 got all her letters, and spread them out before him; he 
 unfolded one by one, and read in order, all his clippings 
 about her. There were the older ones, which he had 
 not succeeded in burning, and newer bits as well. Prob- 
 ably Jim hadn't missed many allusions to her in the 
 newspapers, except her "season's sensation." In spite 
 of himself, he was still a reader of the class of paper 
 and the portion thereof which dealt freely and "chat- 
 tily" with celebrities and near-celebrities. Now he went 
 minutely over all the silly stuff. 
 
 It told him some curious facts. The object of his 
 interest, it appeared, was in these days much in Paris; 
 she had a salon, or at least a following, and was even 
 herself dabbling in painting now. This departure the 
 papers took with seriousness, because the departing one 
 had money and prestige. Jim knew how seriously it 
 ought actually to be taken, knew that Zoe herself was 
 too wise to take it seriously. She was not an artist ; she 
 had not in her the makings of an artist. She was simply
 
 308 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 bored and restless; and for a season she had resolved to 
 queen it in that superior Bohemia where the stimuli were 
 sharper, where the diversions impinged more directly on 
 the nerves, than in the world to which she was better 
 accustomed. 
 
 She might succeed in deceiving even herself for a 
 time. She would at any rate find plenty of people who 
 were ready to tell her what she wanted to hear. But Jim 
 Whittaker knew better. Zoe might think, the people 
 who surrounded her might think, that she was leading 
 a life which was fairly well suited to her endowments, 
 both natural and social. But Jim, alone in his colonial 
 drawing-room of a scented summer night, knew that 
 hers was a life awry. 
 
 " 'Wilt thou not let the summer days be sweet ?' take 
 what they have to offer, humble though it be? The 
 very taking will ennoble it. Wilt thou not face what is, 
 and accept what must be, and perhaps even at the con- 
 summation grow old along with me? Or at the worst, 
 shall we not fail honourably together, and part shat- 
 tered but at peace?" 
 
 It was the great question on which they had split. 
 Jim could take things simply and take them whole or 
 at least he had once been able to. But Zoe must be for- 
 ever weighing and measuring, forever rejecting any- 
 thing that didn't fit in with her ideal of herself. And 
 youth was leaving them, and the sumrner days were 
 going beyond recall. And some things were fading 
 as youth went; that was worse than the very going of 
 youth. But the bitterness of moments like this never 
 faded, even when one was beginning to be bored with 
 the whole affair. The bitterness of what has been may 
 pass; the bitterness of what is must be endured. But 
 the bitterness of what has never been, of what human
 
 A HOUSE UPON A HILL 309 
 
 perversity has never allowed to be, is a bitterness that 
 never sweetens. 
 
 Jim laid down the last of his clippings, and his eyes 
 went over his drawing-room, and out to the garden be- 
 yond. The austere beauty of which he had here pos- 
 sessed himself would be a background not unworthy of 
 a king's daughter. A king's daughter or a pirate's; 
 it might be hers to possess and colour. Only the daugh- 
 ter of a hanger-back, herself still more a hanger-back, 
 might not enter here. And there was only one such ; and 
 she was the one person whose entry was needed to make 
 the whole thing perfect. 
 
 Well, he was bored with the whole affair, or rather 
 perhaps with himself for making so much of it. One 
 by one Jim twisted up his clippings and lighted them; 
 when each was blazing nicely, he tossed it into the grate. 
 Her letters he threw in all together; and when they had 
 burned he stirred the ashes w'ith a poker, to obliterate 
 the last faint traces of her writing. Of course, he knew 
 every word of them all by heart, could even see in his 
 mind's eye how all the words looked as she wrote them. 
 But to part from the actual letters was something, was 
 more than he had once been capable of. Yes, his weari- 
 ness was increasing; and it was high time that it did. 
 
 Jim went upstairs presently, hoping to get away from 
 Roy. The thought of Roy was too much for him to- 
 night. But Roy, entering half an hour later, pursued 
 Jim to his bedroom with talk of his projected kennel. 
 "It isn't as if I wanted to keep big dogs," he explained, 
 just as he had explained twenty times before. "Bostons 
 will never annoy anybody. It isn't as if " 
 
 Jim sat up in bed to contradict him more impres- 
 sively. "Small dogs are a bigger bother than large ; they
 
 310 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 haven't any dignity; they aren't ever still/' he main- 
 tained. 
 
 "But the place is so big. You would never know " 
 
 "If you want to keep dogs, get a place of your own. 
 I wouldn't object to a dog or two in the house, of 
 course; but I won't have any kennel here so long as 
 this place belongs to me." 
 
 "It belongs to you, of course. But you don't know 
 what you're missing, Jim." 
 
 And so the argument went on, with more than usual 
 vehemence on Jim's side. He was nervous, for one 
 thing; but he was awfully grateful to Roy, after all, for 
 coming in so to disturb him. His silly talk about kennels 
 was at least a man's talk ; and any masculine note, how- 
 ever silly, was music to Jim to-night.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 A WARMED HOUSE) MAY ffAU, COLD AGAIN 
 
 BUT finally and actually, the house wasn't Jim's at 
 all: it was Zoe's. Jim had bought it without a 
 thought to her it would have been absurd to think of 
 her in connection with these rooms which she would 
 never enter. If she didn't enter them, though, perhaps 
 it was partly because she didn't have to. He had got 
 him a lodge in the wilderness, and dedicated it to a 
 peaceful middle life; and her unquiet spirit had per- 
 vaded it, marring the peace of his retreat, but height- 
 ening its interest. He might send Zoe in the flesh away 
 from him; he might send his mementoes of her up the 
 chimney, with a fervent hope that his memory of her 
 would somehow follow. She was not to be so eluded: 
 she was in the air he breathed. 
 
 He was at home in the house, and accustomed to the 
 spirit that haunted it, by the time that summer had 
 merged into fall. In the fall the Evingtons came back 
 to America; and a week after they landed Jim gave his 
 promised house-warming. It was absurd, of course, to 
 call it a house-warming : the house had already, to Jim's 
 mind, been much lived in, had acquired its stock of sug- 
 gestions and memories, most of which to be sure he 
 had unpacked as he unpacked his books. 
 
 At any rate, though, he gave a nice party; and for 
 a nice party any excuse will do, and none at all is needed. 
 Jim's guests, chosen by himself and June, were con- 
 
 3"
 
 312 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 genial; the household arrangements proved surprisingly 
 adequate. The weather could not have been better if 
 they had ordered it: the clear, crisp autumnal air lured 
 one abroad in the day-time, and brought one gratefully 
 home at night. Jim's guests seemed to enjoy every- 
 thing; and Jim found himself unexpectedly in his ele- 
 ment. He enjoyed the party from the very first: per- 
 haps in time his settling spirit would come to enjoy 
 this kind of thing more than all other kinds of things. 
 
 He reached the apex of his contentment on Saturday. 
 As the party was breaking up for the night, Jim detained 
 Stuart Evington. "Are you sleepy yet?" he wished to 
 know. 
 
 Evington shook his head: he was never sleepy. His 
 keen tired eyes showed that he knew what was coming; 
 already his smile welcomed it. "Don't you want to 
 come to my room and have a talk-over?" asked Jim. 
 
 They went together up the stairs, and along the hall 
 to the room that Jim had made his. A fire was laid in 
 the grate; Jim touched a match to it, and they drew up 
 their chairs. The fire blazed up, and they sat and 
 watched it, both luxuriously silent. The same thought 
 was in their two minds ; they both needed this moment to 
 realise the ultimate Tightness of things. For this was 
 the first time that they had sat together so since the 
 night when Jim, newly returned from the Helga, had 
 learned his thralldom and broken his appointment. Now 
 the goodly custom of years was renewed, with no hint 
 on either side as to its breach; and they owed to the 
 renewal the tribute of a moment's sifence. 
 
 Soon, however, they began to talk; and just as of 
 old, Jim did most of the listening and Stuart most of 
 the talking. He had gathered on his travels an in- 
 finite amount of material; and now that he had the
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 313 
 
 select companion and the inspiring hour, he poured it 
 forth endlessly. For such moments as this it was that 
 he lived his daily life. 
 
 Jim listened, sometimes attentively, sometimes a lit- 
 tle bit absently. He wasn't sleepy, but, he was relaxed, 
 dreamy, quite delightfully at peace. Little pictures of 
 the day's happenings came drifting through his head, 
 forming a sort of background to what Stuart was say- 
 ing. Good old Stuart he was really worth listening to ! 
 Jim had missed these talks with him. He couldn't say 
 why he hadn't renewed them sooner: perhaps fear of 
 giving himself away had had something to do with it. A 
 silly fear in the beginning, and sillier now because it 
 was outworn. He had now nothing to give away. 
 
 Two o'clock struck just as Stuart was getting wound 
 up; at three, he was in form to talk all the rest of the 
 night. Jim, who had been outdoors all day, began to 
 get sleepy along toward four; he wondered if he 
 mightn't tactfully break up the conference. 
 
 Suddenly through the haze that was beginning to 
 surround him a question struck swift and sharp. Jim 
 lifted his head, awake at once, and alert. "Whom do 
 you suppose," Evington had asked, "whom do you sup- 
 pose I met in Paris?" 
 
 Jim had a smile for his own folly: at that moment, 
 indeed, he had almost given himself away. "I'm sure I 
 can't guess. One may meet almost anybody in Paris," 
 he said aloud. 
 
 "But this was a most particular somebody," insisted 
 Evington. 
 
 "Fine or superfine, as we used to say when we played 
 forfeits?" 
 
 "Superfine. A finer couldn't be produced. My old 
 friend Zoe Lenox."
 
 314 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "Zoe Lenox?" Jim repeated. 
 
 Evington chose to take it that his friend was puzzled 
 as to the lady's identity. "Yes. Don't you remember 
 meeting her at my house three or four years ago? I 
 told you about her then. A sufficiently unusual woman, 
 and a great beauty you couldn't forget her. We were 
 all going yachting with her after that ; but our kids got 
 measles or something, and the trip never came off." 
 
 "Oh, yes!" said Jim. "I remember her perfectly. I 
 remember all you told me about her, too. She had quite 
 a romantic story, hadn't she?" 
 
 "Yes. I'm glad you remember. I hate to have any 
 of my stories forgotten, especially when I'm about to 
 put you in possession of the sequel," said Evington. 
 
 "Then there is a sequel?" 
 
 "Indeed there is. There was bound to be, you know. 
 No human woman could go on all her life as Zoe was 
 going. No half -human woman, even, could do it. Per- 
 haps that is actually what our friend is, only half- 
 human." 
 
 "Yes. I've heard you say that before," said Jim 
 shortly. 
 
 "Ah, doubtless I do repeat myself! The garrulity of 
 a g e > yu know," Evington explained, "and a natural 
 liking for a good subject." 
 
 "Yes. You do like a good subject, Stuart." 
 
 "I admit it; and Miss Lenox is a very good subject. 
 She has always remained a conundrum to me, Jim. 
 How a woman could be all that she is, and at the same 
 time be no more, is what I can't for the life of me see." 
 
 "You have a consistent mental picture of her, I sup- 
 pose," said Jim. 
 
 "In other words a theory, and it colours all I see? 
 Well, perhaps," said Evington.
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 315 
 
 "You describe the lady," went on Jim, "as a woman 
 whom a man might, I should think, do almost anything 
 to achieve ; and then he wouldn't know what to do with 
 her when he had got her." 
 
 "I'd keep her in a cage, if she belonged to me," said 
 Evington. "But the question of what to do with her 
 when they got her was the last thing that ever bothered 
 any of the men Zoe knew. The difficulty was just that 
 they couldn't any of them get her." 
 
 "Unassailable, was she?" 
 
 "Unassailable, until " Evington paused to refill 
 
 his pipe, for the twentieth time that evening; his fingers 
 moved with maddening deliberation. 
 
 Jim tried to wait for the completion of the filling, and 
 couldn't. "Until ?" he demanded. It seemed to him 
 that the tone in which the word came out must lift his 
 friend off his chair. 
 
 Evington, however, was not in the least disturbed. 
 He lighted his pipe and leaned back in his chair be- 
 fore he resumed; and then the first thing he said was, 
 "Until lately." 
 
 He puffed placidly for a moment, and then removed 
 his pipe to say, "In a story taken from life, you see, 
 there are always lacunae and lapses. The omniscient 
 novelist can give you the whole thing from beginning 
 to end, from the colour of the heroine's underwear to 
 her sensations when she has her baby. The humble but 
 veracious raconteur, on the other hand, has to give you 
 simply what comes under his own eye." 
 
 "Why this lengthy apology?" asked Jim, speaking 
 more naturally now. "I never asked you, to borrow 
 your own elegant phrase, the colour of anybody's under- 
 wear." 
 
 "No. You've always taken what I have chosen to im-
 
 316 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 part. You have always been a charming audience, Jim, 
 as our friendship of years will bear witness. Don't 
 think I'm not appreciative." 
 
 An hour ago those words on his friend's lips would 
 have delighted Jim beyond measure. Now they added 
 fuel to his consuming impatience, which he was trying 
 to beat down by telling himself that probably after all 
 he wouldn't hear anything worth listening to about Zoe. 
 But it was so long since he had heard anything at all: 
 and one could get so very hungry for trifles. 
 
 "What is the lacuna in this case?" he allowed himself 
 to ask. 
 
 "The last three or four years, to be sure," replied the 
 "veracious raconteur." "I heard rumours, indeed; 
 and I remember reading in our papers of an engage- 
 ment to an Italian prince, and of its breaking off. But 
 that doesn't fill in very much." 
 
 "Probably there wasn't much that was worthy of rec- 
 ord or recounting," Jim suggested. "A few of the usual 
 years of an idle rich woman." 
 
 "Ah, that's just where you're wrong!" exclaimed 
 Evington. "In the time we speak of, something has 
 happened to her, and left its mark." 
 
 "Left a mark on that smooth surface? That is very 
 hard to believe." To himself Jim was saying, "It wasn't 
 just my imagination, then. She loved me ! She needed 
 me!" And he continued to look at Stuart with polite 
 interest. 
 
 "That surface isn't so smooth any more," Evington 
 informed him. "You know, she used to seem to me like 
 some great Pagan deity. Perhaps it was largely her 
 looks ; but I think there was a certain spiritual basis for 
 the comparison."
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 317 
 
 "Very possibly," said Jim, recalling his golden-haired, 
 far-striding one. 
 
 "Well, if that is the case," went on Evington, en- 
 joying himself hugely, "she has repeated in her own 
 person the history of our civilisation. During that 
 lacuna of which I speak she passed through the Middle 
 Ages; and they have left her a modern woman." 
 
 "Do you mean a broken woman ?" asked Jim. 
 
 "A harassed and feverish woman: a woman you can 
 imagine weeping to herself o' nights, instead of en- 
 joying the deep and dreamless sleep of a Pagan god- 
 dess," replied Evington. 
 
 "You speak with some gusto," said Jim. 
 
 "I saw with interest, although with some pain," re- 
 turned his friend. 
 
 Jim heard with more than a little pain; the subject 
 had its dangers, too. But now that Stuart fell silent, 
 as if to drop that phase of the subject, Jim brought him 
 back to it. He had to hear every word. "In what 
 form," he asked, "should you say that the Middle Ages 
 would present themselves to a woman of her endow- 
 ment?" 
 
 "With my native crudity," answered Evington, "I 
 should say, in the form of a man." 
 
 Now that Stuart was, as they say in children's games, 
 "warmer," Jim for some reason felt more at his ease. 
 "Well, there was her Italian prince," he suggested. 
 
 Evington shook his head. "If a prince could cut 
 such a swathe with her, it would give me an increased 
 respect for royalty. Quite a man, I should say, would 
 be required to affect such a woman so strongly." 
 
 "Oh, I don't know," Jim demurred, beginning to like 
 the very ticklishness of the conversation. "It mightn't 
 be anything in the man himself, you know. It might be
 
 318 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 something in the lady, or some chance in the whole situa- 
 tion. The man might be as ordinary a fellow as you 
 or I." 
 
 "Yes. He might even be you or I. But if he were, 
 his cutting the swathe would be proof to my mind that, 
 in spite of all appearances to the contrary, he really was 
 a very remarkable man," said Evington. 
 
 His eye was on Jim as he spoke, his kindly, critical 
 eye, which always saw so much. There was no telling 
 how much he saw in this matter; perhaps in three 
 guesses he could have got quite to the bottom of it. 
 Jim felt a sudden sharp desire to tell him all; felt that 
 his soul would be rid of half its burden, once it were 
 confessed. He checked the impulse before it actually 
 led him to speech : there were some things a man didn't 
 tell, however great his longing for sympathy or his 
 unselfish desire to complete a friend's good story. 
 
 Perhaps, too, they could actually tell each other more 
 by allusion and innuendo than their Anglo-Saxon shame- 
 facedness would ever allow them to speak out. At any 
 rate, it gave Jim a certain oblique pleasure to dally thus 
 with his subject. "Prince or commoner," he said, "yon 
 think that a man made this woman human, and then 
 they separated? I am to understand that they did sepa- 
 rate, am I not? You never saw him with her in Paris, 
 this hypothetical conqueror of hers?" 
 
 "No. I never saw him or heard her speak of him. I 
 suppose that there was such a man; but he either left 
 her or was sent away. Very likely he was sent away. 
 Whatever happened, he was a fool to leave her." 
 
 Jim could not restrain a start as that last sentence 
 came crackling out. "Why?" he asked. "What do 
 you mean? Did he leave the field clear for another 
 man?"
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 319 
 
 "For rather less than a man," answered Evington. 
 "When a woman who has become modern oh, all too 
 modern, Jim ! falls out with her man, she usually takes 
 to a brute. It's a natural resource, now that convents 
 are out of date. I've seen the thing happen before. I 
 hope never to see it happen again." 
 
 For a moment Jim sat utterly quiet, not even breath- 
 ing. Evington went on with a certain wryness, "I wish 
 I hadn't even seen that, let alone spoken of it. I see 
 too much for my own comfort, to be sure; but there 
 are some things a man can't be excused for repeating 
 about a woman, I'm afraid. This seems to be one of 
 them. I didn't realise when I began quite how dis- 
 tasteful the topic would be. Let's consider it all unsaid, 
 Jim, and drop the topic now." 
 
 Jim didn't hear those final sentences; for a few mo- 
 ments the world seemed to have fallen silent all about 
 him. Then his own chair scraped back across his ar- 
 tistically bare floor, struck the edge of a homespun rug, 
 and toppled over. Jim stood where his single bound 
 had placed him ; and now all the world seemed to whirl 
 about him, and to jeer at him as it whirled. He heard 
 his own voice, seeming to come from somewhere outside 
 himself. Then once more there was that ghastly silence; 
 and his universe seemed to gather itself together for 
 some horrible final convulsion that should put an end 
 to him. 
 
 Evington's hand fell on his arm; Evington's familiar 
 face came close, all strange concern. "Jim, I didn't 
 know I couldn't realise I was lying, Jim, or at least 
 as good as lying. I ought to be shot; I was talking 
 to hear myself talk, and I might have known I have 
 suspected." 
 
 "It's all true enough," Jim managed to say quite
 
 320 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 clearly. "Yes, you must have suspected, Stuart." 
 
 "Nothing worse can be said about her than about 
 most women," Evington assured him. "I should have 
 kept my tongue off her, and my beastly thoughts to my- 
 self." 
 
 "It's only about some women that we care what is 
 said," replied Jim. He tried to smile, and produced a 
 ghastly distortion of feature that put the finishing touch 
 to Evington's contrition. 
 
 "Jim, I would have bitten my tongue out before I 
 
 Oh, I suspected, but I'never believed my own suspicions. 
 You couldn't tell me, I suppose; but Jim, why did you 
 make such an effort to conceal it? It must have 
 half " 
 
 "Half nothing," said Jim shortly. He was already 
 ashamed of himself for giving way as he had, and of 
 his friend for taking so much notice of his disturbance. 
 He started toward the fire, and wavered in his walk. 
 That made him farther ashamed. He sat down in the 
 chair Evington had vacated, and avoided Evington's 
 eye. "Pour me a drink of brandy, will you, Stuart?" 
 he asked. "In the cabinet there the next shelf." 
 
 He drank, and set the glass down carefully. Then 
 he made a great effort to recover the tone of ordinary 
 conversation. It seemed to him that much depended on 
 his being able to talk along as if nothing had hap- 
 pened; and of course he still had a great deal to learn. 
 "Please forgive my hysterics, Stuart," he said. "You 
 were saying ?" 
 
 "As I've told you so much, I suppose I ought to go 
 on," said Evington, relieved to see that Jim was pulling 
 himself together. "Fd better tell you all I know. It 
 really isn't so very bad; it's not half as bad as what 
 you will imagine if you are left to yourself."
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 
 
 "It involves her lover?" asked Jim. 
 
 "Yes. Of course most of what I know is only hear- 
 say, although I did " 
 
 "You saw them together?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "What is the brute like? I think that was what you 
 called him the brute?" 
 
 "My liking for strong language, Jim. I dare say 
 he doesn't discredit her taste. He's a Frenchman, a 
 highly popular and successful actor. A handsome man, 
 and powerful in a way well, you know what those 
 Frenchmen are. Personally, I would rather see a daugh- 
 ter of mine take up with a good honest coal-heaver ; but 
 I suppose this really isn't so bad, as things go in the 
 great world." 
 
 It must be pretty bad, Jim thought, or Stuart wouldn't 
 keep striving to minimise it. But Stuart was upset 
 about his friend. Well, then Jim must show him how 
 absolutely collected he was. He was beginning to feel 
 the brandy he had drunk ; and as it mounted to his head 
 he was conscious of a thirst for the undisguised truth. 
 "It's one of those affairs everybody seems to know 
 about?" he suggested. 
 
 "I'm afraid he has made rather a parade of it," Eving- 
 ton admitted. 
 
 Something seemed to stick in Jim's throat for a min- 
 ute; but he managed to say quite coolly, "You see, I 
 have imagined everything. There is nothing left for 
 you to tell." 
 
 "Nothing, I see." 
 
 "Was it still going on when you left Paris?" asked 
 Jim. 
 
 "Yes. But if I hazarded a guess, I should say that it 
 wouldn't go on much longer."
 
 322 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 "No. It could hardly go on forever," said Jim. 
 
 Evington laid another log on the fire, righted Jim's 
 overturned chair, and sat down. Silence fell between 
 them; and all about them was the quiet of a sleeping 
 household. It was very late, and there was nothing 
 more to say; but he didn't like to leave his friend alone 
 with his thoughts. 
 
 Abruptly Jim turned to him. "How does she look, 
 Stuart?" he asked. And then without waiting for an 
 answer he began to talk, and told his friend everything. 
 
 There was more to tell than Jim had thought; and it 
 had been stored so long in his mind, had rehearsed it- 
 self so often for his benefit, that it came forth now as 
 a story rivalling in finish one of Stuart's own. And as 
 he told it the whole intrigue was clearer to him than it 
 had ever been before : each part seemed to fall into 
 place and assume significance, and the whole had a thrill 
 that lifted him beyond himself, as well as beyond any 
 reserve that he owned or had cultivated. The initial 
 fluke by which he had been carried off in the Helga, 
 and Zoe's native unconcern, which had allowed him to 
 remain it all sprang from that. It all sprang from 
 her, actually. 
 
 Then came the golden days when their love had 
 grown up within them: he could only touch on that 
 lightly to Stuart, but it kindled afresh within him as 
 he talked ; and it culminated afresh for him, as he hinted 
 at its culmination. And then came the grey story of 
 Zoe's renunciation, of her finally refusing Jim and send- 
 ing him about his business. 
 
 Here Stuart for the first time interrupted. "By God, 
 you shouldn't have gone!" he cried. "Not if you had 
 to carry your own trunk up the stairs of her hotel, and
 
 A WARMED HOUSE MAY FALL COLD 323 
 
 put it down in her room, and yourself on top of it. You 
 shouldn't, you simply shouldn't have left her!" 
 
 "I know I shouldn't have left her, Stuart," Jim 
 paused to argue. "But you must take into account the 
 defences that women can put up, and that civilisation 
 has taught us to respect. And I didn't want to hold her 
 simply by our common past." 
 
 "Better hold her by it than leave her at the mercy 
 of it," insisted Evington. "Though of course my wis- 
 dom is ex post facto, and under the conditions you pic- 
 ture I myself should undoubtedly have acted quite as 
 you did." 
 
 Jim's story stopped there; perhaps it would have 
 stopped there even if Stuart had not interrupted him. 
 It would have been difficult to tell about Zoe's visit to 
 New York without a good deal of glossing over; and 
 even with a gloss, Jim's attitude then would never have 
 met with Stuart's approval. "It must be all or nothing 
 between us now, Zoe." Jim's mouth went wry when 
 he thought of it. Surely, surely he had been as right 
 as one can be in things human ; he had been right at cost 
 to himself. But not to himself alone; that was the hor- 
 ror of these things. Look at the results of his conscien- 
 tious self-denial look look He couldn't have gone 
 on to the end. 
 
 It was seven o'clock of a fine fall morning when Jim 
 finally slept, lying down just as he was on the outside of 
 his bed. Only when he was asleep did Stuart leave him, 
 and go to face a sleepy and perhaps righteously indig- 
 nant June. 
 
 The two men met at a late Sunday breakfast, both 
 appearing quite as if nothing had happened. They had 
 to contrive to appear like that, if they were to continue 
 to meet.
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 The day went by just as Jim and June had planned 
 it, and just as successfully as had the Saturday. Two 
 of the guests left for home that night. "You are stay- 
 ing until to-morrow, of course?" Jim asked casually of 
 Stuart. 
 
 "Oh, yes!" answered Stuart. 
 
 "I am moving into town myself to-morrow, I think. 
 This is really rather too far to come in winter. There 
 are some advantages about my flat, anyway," said Jim. 
 
 "Can I help you pack?" asked his friend. 
 
 "Oh, no, thank you. I am taking nothing but my 
 clothes with me. Shall you come in to talk to me to- 
 night?" 
 
 "If I shan't be in the way of your packing." 
 
 "Not at all. I want you to come," Jim assured him. 
 
 They sat together for an hour that night, and talked 
 careful impersonalities. Once only Jim thrust down 
 to bed-rock; and then it was only to hint, "Could I do 
 anything, do you suppose, if I went over there?" 
 
 Stuart understood, and shook his head. "She must 
 be left to do for herself. She can't sink or swim by your 
 help." 
 
 They went back to other themes; they both went to 
 bed at an hour which was not unreasonable. On Mon- 
 day morning Jim packed, dismissed his careful negroes, 
 and locked the door of his deserted house. Once more 
 things had closed down on him; once more he took 
 refuge in the round of every day.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 TIME'S RVNGS 
 
 IT was not only that he gave himself no time to think : 
 during those next few months Jim tried to get as 
 far as possible out of the habit of thinking. His think- 
 ing wouldn't be fruitful; and where was the good of 
 simply tormenting himself? He felt that this was the 
 last stage of cynical weariness, this going softly to avoid 
 any possible jolt that might call up the bitter unforget- 
 table, this drugging one's soul for the sake of peace. 
 But it was what we all came to ; and after all he did not 
 feel especially cynical, and he was no wearier than he 
 had been for a very long time. 
 
 One night late in the winter he sat alone in his flat. 
 Roy Whittaker had been coming to spend the evening 
 with him; but it had begun to snow, a clinging damp 
 snow that might later change to rain, and Roy, who 
 deferred to weather, had not appeared. So Jim had 
 lighted his cheerful little fire, and had stretched himself 
 before it with his book. He always made a point nowa- 
 days of having something "interesting" to read, and of 
 being interested in it : it was not safe, perhaps, to let his 
 attention wander. 
 
 While he lay there reading, in the same room and the 
 same attitude as he had lain that night when he came 
 home after his first meeting with Zoe Lenox, he might 
 have struck a casual observer as looking very much the 
 same. His hair was beginning to show a little grey, and 
 
 325
 
 326 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 about his mouth and eyes were tired lines that had not 
 been there a year before. He was thinner and graver 
 than he had once been. But all the rending and wither- 
 ing of which he had been so keenly conscious had not 
 perceptibly overlaid the natural man: to any of his 
 friends, he was still the same Jirn Whittaker, kindly, 
 staunch, a little romantic, essentially sound. 
 
 He had read, somewhat doggedly although with no 
 very terrible strain, for some two hours, when he was 
 startled by a ring at his door-bell. It might be Roy, 
 though it was curious if Roy would miss the earlier 
 part of the evening, and then arrive just at bed-time. 
 Beside, it was not Roy's ring. Smiling at himself, be- 
 cause he was still young enough to expect to see his des- 
 tiny walk in every time there was a strange ring at his 
 door-bell, Jim went to answer. It was probably the 
 janitor, or some late-coming casual friend who had no- 
 ticed his light. 
 
 He flung open the door to greet such a one; but his 
 visitor chanced to be a woman. In the dim discreet 
 light of the hall Jim saw that she was a tall woman, 
 dressed in black; and she must have come on foot, for 
 her hat and the shoulders of her fur coat were thickly 
 powdered with snow. It was strange that after all 
 these months he should be always reminded of what he 
 was trying to forget; yet just because this woman was 
 tall she made him think of Zoe. Only Zoe never wors 
 black, and never drooped as she stood; and Zoe never, 
 never would come to him like this. This was some one 
 looking for another flat. "I beg your pardon," began 
 Jim. "Did you wish " 
 
 She raised her head and looked at him through her 
 veil. Then in spite of the veil and the dimness, he knew 
 her. His heart seemed to rise in his throat and stifle
 
 TIME'S REVENGES 327 
 
 him; his mind was blank, unable to contend with the 
 fact thus presented to it. 
 
 Fortunately the habits of a civilised man came to his 
 aid. He stepped back and held the door for her. "Come 
 in, Zoe," he said. "I couldn't see you very plainly at 
 first." 
 
 She came in, and stood quietly beside him. "In this 
 way," he said. "I've been alone all the evening. I " 
 
 Still he couldn't cope with the fact of her presence. 
 He put out his hand toward her, and it encountered wet 
 fur. "Bless me, how wet you are!" he exclaimed. 
 "Here, let me take your coat." 
 
 She spoke then, like one in a dream. "Yes. Yes, I 
 am wet," she said. 
 
 She pushed up her veil and looked at him, fixedly, 
 dully, as if she couldn't quite believe her eyes. Jim 
 rallied to a certain briskness. He took her coat and 
 hung it up, took her hat and veil, the damp chiffon 
 clinging clammily to his fingers. He placed a chair for 
 her before the fire. "Sit down here," he commanded. 
 He stooped to lay a hand on her skirts. "Heavens, how 
 wet you are!" he repeated. "Couldn't you find a taxi- 
 cab, on a night like this?" 
 
 She laid her cheek against the cushions of the chair- 
 back. "I came up in one," she said dully. "I've been 
 walking around outside for a long time, though." 
 
 "Outside? Outside here?" he asked in amazement. 
 "Why, whatever made you do that, Zoe?" 
 
 "I wanted to see you. I wanted to see you alone. I 
 wasn't sure " 
 
 "I've been alone all the evening," he said cheerfully. 
 "You could have telephoned to find out, you know. Of 
 course I could have come to you, wherever you were 
 staying. But it's awfully fine of you to come to me
 
 328 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 like this. Only you shouldn't have hesitated, especially 
 on such a nasty night." 
 
 "No, I shouldn't have hesitated," she said. "I 
 shouldn't ever have hesitated." 
 
 She lay in his big chair, relaxed and utterly weary. 
 Against the dark cushions her profile was startlingly 
 clear. She was dressed all in black, perhaps with some 
 vague penitential idea; but the habit of years had made 
 her see to it that her penitence was expressed very be- 
 comingly. It was unconscious habit, though; there was 
 no thought of effect in anything she did to-night. Never, 
 Jim thought, had he seen a human being so utterly down. 
 And to think that this was Zoe, the conquering and 
 radiant one. His heart yearned over her; he wanted 
 to take her loneliness and weariness to his arms. That 
 was, of course, precisely the thing which under the cir- 
 cumstances he would not do. He chose the cheerful tone 
 of every day. "Now 'that you are here, I mustn't let 
 you perish," he said. "Let me see. Here, you'd better 
 drink this." 
 
 She put her hand out obediently for the glass. 
 "Brandy," he explained. "It isn't nice, but it will do 
 you good." 
 
 Zoe drank half, hesitated, caught his eye, and drained 
 the glass. "That's good," said Jim approvingly. He 
 knelt beside her, and began to unbutton her wet shoes. 
 "It's easy to see that you belong to the carriage class of 
 society," he said. "You don't own a pair of overshoes, 
 I suppose, Zoe." 
 
 He fetched a pair of slippers from his room, and put 
 them on her ; he laughed to see how they flapped on her 
 slim high-arched feet. She looked to see what he was 
 laughing at; and she, too, smiled faintly. Then, when 
 he could think of nothing else to do for her, Jim caught
 
 TIME'S REVENGES 339 
 
 her hand and kissed it. Still holding it in his, he sat 
 down on the floor beside her. When presently her fin- 
 gers returned his pressure, he kissed her hand again, 
 and was idiotically happy simply to sit so. 
 
 "You are glad to see me, Jim ?" she asked after a long 
 time. 
 
 "Glad, honey." 
 
 There was another pause; then she said, "I've come 
 a long way to see you, you know." 
 
 "So you have, honey." 
 
 "You're sure you're glad to have me here?" 
 
 "So glad that I don't want to tell you how glad I am 
 until you've rested a little," he said quickly. 
 
 "I'm resting now, Jim." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Yes what?" 
 
 "Yes, Zoe," he corrected himself. 
 
 "No. What you said before." 
 
 "Yes honey?" 
 
 "Yes." She smiled at the queerness of the word, and 
 at his queerness and her own; and then once more she 
 lay quiet. 
 
 Many minutes went by in silence ; then Jim could feel 
 her shudder. She drew away the hand that he held, 
 and sat up in her chair. "Now I'm ready to talk to 
 you, Jim," she said. 
 
 Jim went to lay more fuel on the fire; then he stood 
 before it and looked down at her. "Yes?" he said en- 
 couragingly. 
 
 For a moment she did not seem to find it easy to be- 
 gin. Yet perhaps she was beginning, as she sat there 
 and simply looked at him. Now as always her beauty 
 soothed and uplifted him; but in her weariness and her 
 strange simplicity he saw that she had dissociated her-
 
 330 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 self from her beauty, had tried to cast loose from her all- 
 pervading ideal of herself. She had endeavoured to 
 come to him in straitness of spirit; and she had almost 
 succeeded in her endeavour. 
 
 He let her go on to speech, to make whole her under- 
 taking. And she presently found words, words of the 
 simplest. "Do you know why I have come here to see 
 you, Jim ?" 
 
 "Tell me why," he urged. 
 
 "I have come to marry you," she said with her fine 
 simplicity, and then added, faltering, "That is, if you 
 still want me." 
 
 "I still want you, Zoe. I want you more than ever," 
 he said. He was gratified at the warmth of his own 
 tone. And then so impulsively that he startled himself, 
 he demanded, "When will you marry me?" 
 
 "Whenever you like," she said. 
 
 "The sooner the better," urged Jim. 
 
 "The sooner the better," she agreed. "To-morrow, 
 if you like. Or is that too soon ?" 
 
 "It's not too soon, if you mean it." 
 
 "It can be done, Jim?" 
 
 "I think these things can be done at very short notice, 
 if one knows how. To-morrow it shall be," he said. 
 
 "I'd rather it were to-morrow," she began hurriedly 
 to explain. "I've given in, you know, just as you said 
 I would. I want to marry you, Jim; but I don't trust 
 myself. If you really want me, you'd better not give me 
 any chance to change my mind again." 
 
 "I should say not!" he ejaculated. "If you think I'm 
 going to let you run off to the world's end again, or even 
 think about running off, after you've so wonderfully 
 come here " 
 
 "There's nothing wonderful about it," she said. "It
 
 TIME'S REVENGES 331 
 
 had to be: that's all. Only keep me, now that I am 
 here." 
 
 "I'll keep you endlessly Zoe." 
 
 "I knew that you would, even if you only half cared 
 to. Jim, you understand that since those days in the 
 
 Helga even since the last time I saw you I have 
 
 But there's no need to tell you. You understand every- 
 thing." 
 
 "I understand that. I don't mind, dear; it had to 
 come." 
 
 "Yes. I suppose so." She lay back again, and her 
 eyes closed. 
 
 A clock struck the hour, waking Jim to his responsi- 
 bilities. She could not sit here like this all night. He 
 stooped over her, and lifted her to her feet. Her eyes 
 opened then, and her pale face was suddenly flooded 
 with colour. "I might have come to you like a queen in 
 her glory," she whispered. "Instead I have waited until 
 I had to come like this." 
 
 "But you have come," he whispered back. "We won't 
 look beyond that: you have come." 
 
 Should he always, he wondered, be shortening her 
 view for her, sweetening her remorse, explaining away 
 her appreciation of her own mistakes? He looked at 
 the golden head lying so quietly on his shoulder; and 
 for a moment it was bitter to him too that she hadn't 
 come to him "like a queen in her glory." But the bit- 
 terness didn't last. She would be punished all her life 
 long, he felt, for not having taken things in their fresh- 
 ness; and he was only glad that he should be always 
 there to lighten her punishment a little. 
 
 Suddenly her arms tightened about his neck, and she 
 began to sob. "Tell me that you love me, Zoe, honey,"
 
 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 Jim said quickly. "You do love me? Then tell me 
 you do." 
 
 She nodded, catching her breath like a frightened 
 child. "That's what I wanted to know," he went on. 
 "That's what matters, and it's all that matters." 
 
 Something came fluttering to him from the past; he 
 seized it and gave it to her for her salvation. "Love 
 may devour," he told her. "But the very love that de- 
 vours can in the end make whole. It can, it can, Zoe." 
 
 She lifted her face to his, and kissed him on the lips. 
 "If you tell me so, I can believe even that," she whis- 
 pered. 
 
 He let her go presently. "It's midnight," he said. 
 "Time for to-morrow's brides to be asleep. Shall I take 
 you back to your hotel now ?" 
 
 She looked a little frightened. "Must you?" she 
 asked. "I I don't want to be left alone, Jim." 
 
 "Perhaps now that I've got you I'd better keep you,", 
 he said, catching her idea. "You might run away even 
 now if I gave you the chance, mightn't you?" 
 
 "I'm afraid so, Jim. Might I can I stay here?" 
 
 "Yes, I think you can. Yes, you can, of course. 
 There isn't any one who will be worried if you don't 
 appear?" 
 
 "No one in the wide world, Jim, to worry over me." 
 
 "Except me," said Jim promptly. "And I'm going 
 to keep you so close that I won't have to worry over 
 you." 
 
 He got her a warm dressing-gown, turned down his 
 bed, adjusted the night-light. "Make yourself as com- 
 fortable as you can, dear," he said. "I shall spend the 
 rest of the night by the fire, I think, because I must be 
 stirring early. I shall have so much to see to, you know. 
 You can call me if you want anything."
 
 TIME'S REVENGES 333 
 
 "Yes, Jim," she said. "Good-night." She put up 
 her face for his good-night kiss. 
 
 "Get a good sleep," he admonished her. "I'll call you 
 when it's time for you to dress." 
 
 She vanished into the bedroom. Jim gave a long 
 look around, as if he were trying to recall what had 
 just happened. One of Zoe's shoes had got too near 
 the fire; he went over and carefully altered the position 
 of both. Then he turned off the lights, and went and 
 sat down at the window. 
 
 Once during the night he rose to replenish his little 
 fire : they allowed the steam to go down toward morning, 
 and anyhow the fire was like a friend in the dim room. 
 Once he went to the door of the bedroom and listened 
 to Zoe's quiet breathing, as she slept the sleep of the 
 utterly weary. 
 
 Then he sat down again with folded arms, and waited 
 for the dawn of a new day. It was to usher in a new 
 life for him: not just the life he had planned, but cer- 
 tainly a life which would call out all that was in him. 
 He kept vigil here, and felt that it was fitting he should. 
 But he could not have slept to-night if he had tried. 
 The haunting past, the unguessed future, the ghostly 
 shapes of what might have been, all were here to keep 
 him company. 
 
 And here, too, with him was the love of which he had 
 spoken to Zoe : the love which may devour in the be- 
 ginning, but which makes whole again in the end. A 
 brave saying: would it be fulfilled in and by them? It 
 would, if his determination had power to fulfil it. She 
 might have come to him in her glory; but at least she 
 had found strength to come. And as he waited for the 
 dawn of his wedding day, his fingers found and stroked
 
 334 THE VANISHED HELGA 
 
 the fading scar upon his wrist, almost vanished me- 
 morial of an earlier and perhaps a happier bridal. 
 
 But his thoughts drove resolutely ahead to what was 
 to be; and he felt a boy's impatience when he reflected 
 that no farther ahead than to-morrow, or perhaps to- 
 day, or next week at the farthest but next week was 
 too far he and his beloved should enter together his 
 house upon a hill.
 
 A 000 051 876 1 
 
 NAMJS 
 
 -B.