Hiiiiliiiiiipiiiiiii 
 
 THE POISONER
 
 Ex Libris 
 C. K. OGDEN 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE POISONER
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 SET DOWN IN MALICE ; 
 
 A BOOK OF REMINISCENCES 
 Large post 8vo. 8s. 6d. net 
 
 TALES of a CRUEL COUNTRY 
 
 Crown 8vo. 7s. net 
 
 ROSALYS and OTHER POEMS 
 
 Crown 8vo. 3s. 6d. net 
 
 GRANT RICHARDS LTD. 
 ST martin's street 
 
 LONDON
 
 THE POISONER 
 
 BY 
 
 GERALD CUMBERLAND 
 
 I 
 
 LONDON 
 GRANT RICHARDS LTD. 
 
 ST MARTIN'S STREET 
 1921
 
 PRINTKD IN GREAT BRITAIN BV THE RIVERSIDK PRESS LIMITED 
 EDINBURGH
 
 TO 
 
 
 GRANT RICHARDS 
 
 Ga:2l 
 
 
 \^ .r1_ O 3 
 
 r 
 
 « r-» i f i^jT'^i I
 
 Piu vile cosa 
 e quello dhai fatto : 
 darte ^ntransatto 
 al mondo fallentej 
 lo corpo per servo 
 te fo dato atto 
 hcH H fatto matto 
 per te dolente; 
 si^nor negligente 
 fa servo regnare 
 e s6 dominare 
 en rea signoriaj 
 hat presa via 
 ca questo c'e entrato. 
 
 Jacopone da Todi.
 
 BOOK I 
 
 Al> omnibus oportet te aliquando separari, sive velis, 
 stve nolis.
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 IT TV? as impossible not to be exhilarated, even excited, 
 by the bounding west wind that, driving the ocean's 
 heavy bulk into the estuary, took the dunes at a 
 leap, scattering the sand before it in long, trailing 
 clouds. Martin Stavart leaned back against the rushing 
 air as he came striding along the Stannar ; his shock 
 of black hair whipped his cheeks, got into his eyes, 
 and half-blinded him. The heavy sand-filled waves 
 lunged at him threateningly, squandering their strength 
 on the large, heaped-up pebbles of which the vast 
 natural breakwater was composed. On his right was 
 the open sea ; on his left, the little salt-water lake 
 protected from the sea by the breakwater on which he 
 was walking. 
 
 The March day was drawing to its stormy close. 
 Nature was convulsed with her own energy. It was 
 indeed the violence of the afternoon that had drawn 
 Martin out of doors. It had created a riot in his 
 mind and had quickened his pulses ; the soft comfort 
 of his study had become irksome^ and his work a 
 burden. His two hours' walk along the firm, sandy 
 beach and back home on the difficult Stannar, whose 
 stones gave way beneath his tread, had braced his 
 nerves and freed his imagination, and he shouted 
 and sang alternately. He had become a part of this 
 violence. In moments like these he was vividly, un- 
 naturally alive. He took deep draughts of air through 
 his nostrils ; his flesh tingled with the rushing blood 
 beneath it ; from time to time he licked his salt- 
 encrusted lips. 
 
 At the point where the Stannar joins the dunes of 
 the mainland he stopped, turned about, and faced 
 the wind and sea. In the cloudless sky the sun was 
 setting with an easy deliberateness that mocked the 
 unrestrained violence of the earth ; its lower rim had 
 already disappeared behind the horizon. The sun was 
 heavy and blood-red, and for a few moments the spray 
 from the breaking waves was tinged with its colour. 
 It dipped and dipped, and was gone ; at the moment 
 
 II
 
 12 THE POISONER 
 
 of its going, the heaving and hurrying sea was blackened 
 with theatrical suddenness. 
 
 " And now, darkness ! " said Martin to himself, and, 
 like a child, he told himself he was about to escape 
 from the threatening forces of Nature into the security 
 of home. He turned quickly and walked into the midst 
 of the flying sand whose sharp grains pricked his bare 
 neck and ears like needles. 
 
 Monica was looking through her bedroom window as 
 he opened the wooden door in the high wall surrounding 
 the house. She watched him come half-way up the 
 path, and then hurried downstairs to greet him. 
 
 " Splendid, isn't it ? " he said, shaking the fine, 
 dry sand from his clothing. " It's as exciting as 
 champagne." 
 
 She stood aside to let him enter. 
 
 "It's made father very restless," she said. " I do 
 wish he'd change his bedroom to the back of the 
 house." 
 
 " Yes," said Martin ; "he ought to have my 
 study." 
 
 He took off his hat and coat and hmig them in the 
 hall. 
 
 " Well, it's bucked me up enormously," he said. " I 
 feel fit for anything. I'm going up to my room to 
 work." 
 
 " Dinner will be ready in an hour. Father's going 
 to get up in your honour." 
 
 Martin was already half-way upstairs ; leaning over 
 the banisters, he said, in a low voice : 
 
 " Oh, he shouldn't do that ! Is he well enough ? 
 
 Although it was half dark in the hall, she could see 
 the indigo-blue of his deep-set eyes — vivid spots of 
 colour in his pale face. 
 
 " He's much better this afternoon, Martin. Really, 
 he is. Besides, he's far too restless to stay in bed." 
 
 " Sure ? Well, it'll be good to see him down again. 
 And now I'm going to compose the most wonderful 
 song that's ever been written." 
 
 >»
 
 THE POISONER 13 
 
 But though he spoke cheerfully, he felt slightly 
 depressed because Monica's father was to dine down- 
 stairs. Mrs Bass^tt, by some lucky chance, was out 
 that evening, and all day he had been picturing to 
 himself a tite-d-tete dinner with Monica. 
 
 His room was at the back of the house, facing east — 
 a large room containing nothing but books, a desk, 
 a Bechstein grand, a colossal music-cabinet, and three 
 upholstered arm-chairs. A few lithographs of ultra- 
 modern drawings hung on the walls. 
 
 He sat down at the piano and began to improvise, 
 whipping himself into an ecstasy. But though the 
 violence of the storm had bred in him a corresponding 
 violence, his rapidly functioning mind soon controlled 
 this. His playing became hushed and tentative ; he 
 groped his way through a harmonic progression as 
 though with difficulty translating into sound what he 
 heard with his inner ear. He was creating an atmosphere 
 — definitely establishing a mood. He rose, took from 
 his bookshelves a volume of Ernest Dowson's, and 
 opened it on the music-stand of his piano. The 
 page gave him Cynara. His spirit was already half- 
 intoxicated, and very soon he found the musical " idea " 
 for the poem with which for some days past his mind 
 had been saturated. . . . 
 
 Stavart's brain was filled with the music of Debussy, 
 Ravel, and all the modern French school ; nevertheless 
 he possessed a rich vein of originality. It was im- 
 possible to examine a page of his music without detect- 
 ing abundant evidence of independent thought and 
 feeling. In spite of his youth — he was only twenty-five 
 — he had already arrived at an idiom of his own. . . . 
 
 He moved over to his desk and began to work quickly, 
 intensely. All the subtler forces of his mind were con- 
 centrated in the effort to transfuse this golden poetry 
 into golden sound. From the marriage of his mind 
 with the verse issued music that merely hinted, sug- 
 gested, whispered. Stavart detested what he called the 
 * heavy -handedness " of Brahms, in whose music, he
 
 14 THE POISONER 
 
 averred, no beauty is hidden, and where everything 
 is underhned and exclamation-marked. Brahms, he 
 always said, had no secrecy, no decency ; beauty spouted 
 from his music hke blood from a wounded man, 
 
 A gong sounded. With an exclamation of irritation, 
 he pushed away the sheets of music-paper and pondered 
 for a few moments. Should he continue his work and 
 leave Monica and Mr Symons to dine alone ? It was 
 so difficult to recapture a mood like this — so difficult, 
 indeed, to engender it in the first instance. But no ! 
 Duty bade him leave his work and go downstairs. 
 
 He looked into the drawing-room when he had 
 reached the large, square hall, but there was noTlight 
 there save that afforded by the newly lit fire. The 
 dining-room was empty, and, smiling, half in contempt 
 and half in amusement, he stood in the doorway looking 
 at the ugly, comfortable room with its big mahogany 
 table, its heavy mahogany chairs, its massive fireplace 
 of brawn-like marble, its impossible sideboard. Not 
 yet had he accustomed himself to this room ; each 
 time he entered it he received a slight shock of surprise. 
 
 Presently he heard Monica's father coming slowly 
 and heavily downstairs. Martin passed into the halj. 
 Symons was supported on one side by a stick and on 
 the other by his man, Cubbins. 
 
 Symons' large figure, dignified in spite of his feeble- 
 ness and old age, suggested a kind of timid and furtive 
 friendliness. But his eyes, with their swollen pupils, 
 devastated his face, giving the beholder the impression 
 of undeserved ruin. 
 
 " Well, my boy," he said, '' I'm down once more, 
 you see. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; and jolly glad I am that you're well enough 
 to come. Let me help, Cubbins." 
 
 Mr Symons stood still while Martin took Cubbins' 
 place. The old man gently squeezed with his farm 
 the hand that Martin placed within his armpit. 
 
 " That's right, boy." he said ; " we can get along 
 now, I think.' 
 
 »>
 
 THE POISONER 15 
 
 But when he was seated at the table under the big 
 hanging lamp, he appeared exhausted, for his hands 
 shook and he breathed with difficulty. 
 
 Monica entered quietly. 
 
 " All right, father ? " she asked, placing a gentle 
 hand upon his shoulder. 
 
 " Yes, yes, dear. But, do you know, T seem to get 
 heavier every day. I don't think I shall be able to 
 come downstairs many more times." 
 
 She regarded him for a moment with anxious eyes. 
 His face was paler than usual, and so shrunken was his 
 frame that his white beard almost touched his plate. 
 
 "We ought to have had dinner in your room with 
 you, sir," said Martin. 
 
 " No, boy ; no. You are going to leave us to-morrow, 
 and I wanted to see you at my table once more. But 
 it's only for a week, eh, Martin ? " 
 
 Martin was on his right and Monica on his left at 
 one end of the long table, and as the old man spoke 
 he put his lean, intricately veined hand upon Stavart's. 
 
 " A week — or less. I shall be glad to get back." 
 
 " You are happy with us ? " asked Symons. 
 
 " Very, very happy." 
 
 " Sometimes I think," said Monica, " that you must 
 find it very dull here. We verv rarely have friends 
 in " 
 
 " Oh no ! " Martin interrupted. " I have my work. 
 Besides, I don't care about acquaintances." 
 
 " And," said Symons, "like your father, you have a 
 solitary mind." 
 
 Symons so rarely mentioned Martin's dead father that 
 the young man looked up in surprise, and, as he always 
 did on these occasions, felt a strange inward disturbance. 
 
 " Yes," said Martin, breaking the sudden silence 
 with an effort, " I think my mind is solitary, particularly 
 when I'm working. Though in Leipzig I had several 
 close friends," he added. 
 
 " I wish you could make one or two friends here, 
 Martin," said Monica.
 
 16 THE POISONER 
 
 "Why ? " he asked, smiling. 
 
 " Because some day, when you're not in the humour 
 for work, you'll feel bored, and you'll run away to 
 London or Paris." 
 
 " No," said Symons uneasily, " you won't do that, 
 boy, will you ? " 
 
 Martin himself felt uneasy as he replied : 
 
 " I am too happy here to go elsewhere." 
 
 But he spoke with confusion and his cheeks were 
 flushed. 
 
 "Dr Foster called this afternoon," announced 
 Symons ; " not professionally, though. He came to 
 let us know that he's going to London himself on 
 Saturday. He's taken tickets for your concert." 
 
 Martin smiled. 
 
 " What a good fellow he is ! Why, it's only the 
 other day that he told me he is tone-deaf. ' I don't 
 know the difference between God Save the Weasel and 
 Pop Goes the King ' — that's how he put it." 
 
 " To-day," said Symons, smiling, " he said he be- 
 lieved in supporting local industries. You are the 
 local industry." 
 
 " I must look out for him. I do wish you and 
 Monica were coming as well. One wants to be sur- 
 rounded by one's friends on an occasion like this: 
 they help to ward off disaster." 
 
 " Disaster ? " queried Monica, raising her fine 
 straight eyebrows. 
 
 "Well, it's rather tempting Providence, don't you 
 think, to devote an entire musical programme to the 
 works of one man ? — especially when that man is living 
 and not very well known." 
 
 " It's courageous, certainly. But the Fates love 
 courage." 
 
 She looked at Martin honestly and squarely as she 
 spoke : she had great pride in him. And she did not 
 believe that any audience could resist that wistful, 
 though strong, face with its determined chin and long, 
 curved lips.
 
 THE POISONER 17 
 
 "Well, I feel prepared for anything. Did I tell you 
 that Beresford's coming? Beresford," he explained, 
 turning to Symons, " is far and away the best of the 
 critics. Why he should choose to live in the provinces, 
 Heaven alone knows. I wrote to him the other day 
 inviting him ; he says he'll be in town on Monday and 
 will make a point of looking in at Queen's Hall. I trust 
 his opinion absolutely." 
 
 " But surely, Martin," said Symons, " surely you 
 have enough faith in yourself without wanting the 
 support of other people ? " 
 
 No, sir ; I wish I had. Of course, I have moods 
 when I feel jolly well pleased with myself. But I never 
 really know. After all, what man can know ? " 
 
 "Wagner did," said Monica. 
 
 " Oh, Wagner ! " he protested, as though Monica 
 had mentioned the name of God. "Wagner was 
 Wagner ; I, unfortunately, am only I." 
 
 " You've nothing to fear, boy," said the old man 
 affectionately, " though," he added, " I must confess 
 I know as little about music as Foster. You'll let us 
 know how everything goes off, won't you ? " 
 
 " Yes, Martin," said Monica ; "we don't want any 
 sixpenny telegrams. You must spend at least five 
 shillings — ^though I suppose The Manchester Guardian 
 will have something to say about it. . . . Father dear, 
 you're not eating." 
 
 " What's that ? No, Monica ; no. I can't eat 
 to-night." 
 
 In spite of a little anxiety on his account, Monica 
 smiled at him reassuringly. 
 
 " What a wind 1 " exclahned Symons, holding up his 
 head to listen. 
 
 " Yes, sir," said Martin, " I was out on the Stannar 
 this afternoon. It was great sport." 
 
 The old man turned his protruding eyes on Stavart. 
 
 " Ah, you're young, boy — ^young and strong," he 
 said, almost enviously. 
 
 His chin sank heavily upon his breast, and he
 
 18 THE POISONER 
 
 appeared to brood. Monica and Martin knew that his 
 spirit was far away. 
 
 " Father ! " said Monica. 
 
 He looked up slowly. 
 
 " Father, may I order you some bread and milk ? " 
 
 He pushed his plate away. 
 
 " No, dear ; no. If you'll excuse me, I think I'll 
 sit by the fire." 
 
 Martin rose to help him across the room. The old 
 man sat down, folded his hands, and stared into the 
 glowing embers with his eyes that always looked so 
 startled. His great body seemed to shrink, and again 
 he gave both Martin and Monica the impression that 
 his spirit had flown. 
 
 For a long time the two young people ate in silence. 
 Then: 
 
 " You've ordered the cab ? " asked Monica, in a 
 low tone. 
 
 " Yes. It's arriving at nine-thirty. I'm catching the 
 one-o'clock train from London Road, but I've a little 
 business to do in Manchester first." 
 
 " I shall be thinking of you a great deal while you 
 are away." 
 
 " And I shall think of you. Did you know, Monica, 
 that all my compositions that are being given on 
 Monday night have been written in this house ? " 
 
 " Really ? And all in four months ! But, of course, 
 you've worked frightfully hard." 
 
 " Yes. I've had the time of my life here. It's been 
 one continuous flow of ideas. I've no sooner finished 
 one work than I've begun another. When I came here 
 last November, I hadn't an idea in my head. I was 
 stale and hopeless. But within a week my pen couldn't 
 keep pace with my brain. It was you who did that 
 for me." He hesitated a moment, and then added : 
 " You and your father." 
 
 Mr Symons stirred uneasily in his chair. 
 
 " Are you there, Martin ? " he asked, in a weak, 
 unsteady voice.
 
 THE POISONER 19 
 
 " Yes, sir. ho you want anything ? " 
 
 Martin hurried over to his side. 
 
 "No, my boy; no. . . . Have you finished dinner? 
 Yes ? Well then, Monica dear, you will find a box of 
 cigars in the top right-hand drawer of my dressing- 
 table. Will you get it for me ? " 
 
 He watched her as she crossed the room ; with diffi- 
 culty he turned round to make sure she had shut the 
 door behind her. 
 
 " Martin," he said hurriedly, " you will take care ? 
 You promise ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. I will take care. I promise you. You 
 need have no fear." 
 
 " And you will come back at the end of a week ? " 
 
 " Yes ; or perhaps even sooner." 
 
 "While you are away I shall not worry; I shall 
 know you are safe." 
 
 " Yes, quite safe." 
 
 " But I wish you were not going. It will be as 
 though a part of myself were away." 
 
 " I will come back in five days." 
 
 " No, my boy ; no. Don't come back until you have 
 finished your business." 
 
 " In five days, sir. I promise." 
 
 "Martin?" 
 
 He placed a trembling hand on the young man's arm. 
 
 " Yes, sir. I am here." 
 
 " Monica shall never know," he whispered. 
 
 Martin paled a little, but made no answer. Symons 
 sighed deeply. 
 
 I trust you, you know, as if you were my own 
 
 son." 
 
 It was because you trusted me last November- 
 
 " Yes, yes, boy ; I always trust you. Success is the 
 great exhilarater. It will brace you. You will come 
 back to me." 
 
 At this moment Monica returned. 
 
 " Shall I cut you a cigar, father ? " she asked. 
 
 " Is that you, Monica ? Yes, dear ; do."
 
 20 THE POISONER 
 
 But, having lit his cigar, he took only two or three 
 puffs. Then, with a weary gesture, he let it fall into the 
 hearth. 
 
 " I'm very tired," he said ; " I think I shall be better 
 in bed. Ring the bell for Cubbins, dear." 
 
 But it was Martin who brought him his stick and 
 helped him upstairs, Cubbins following. He stayed in 
 the bedroom while Cubbins undressed his master and 
 put him to bed. 
 
 On his return to the hall he found Monica in the 
 drawing-room. 
 
 " Tell me, Martin — what do you think of father ? 
 Tell me all you think." 
 
 He gave her a rapid, veiled look as he seated himself 
 on the sofa by her side. 
 
 " I don't know what to think," he said cautiously, 
 " but he certainly seems to get weaker every day." 
 
 " You've noticed that ? Oh, Martin, so have I. 
 Sometimes it seems to me as though the best part of 
 him has already gone to another world. If you could 
 have seen him as he was two years ago, before your 
 father died — how bright he was^ how greedy with his 
 books ! But now ... his mind is growing old ; it is 
 dying gradually with his body." 
 
 " Yes. It is death — a slow, creeping death. I think 
 you must make up your mind to that, Monica." 
 
 " He clings to nothing now except you and me. 
 He's finished with the rest of the world." 
 
 " After all, it is only what one would expect. He's 
 very old, and he's lived a hard, full life." 
 
 " Yes," she acknowledged. " But somehow or 
 other I can't reconcile myself to it. He does not want 
 to die — something troubles him." 
 
 "Do you think that ? " asked Martin. 
 
 " Oh yes, I do. I'm sure of it. Some very definite 
 thing, some anxiety, is on his mind. Martin, I some- 
 times think it is something connected with you that 
 worries him. But how fond he is of you ! If you were 
 his o-vvn son he could not be fonder."
 
 THE POISONER 21 
 
 n 
 
 Yes ; it hurts me sometimes. I'm not worthy of it. 
 I'm so selfish where he is concerned. There are scores 
 of httle things I could do for him and don't do. But 
 I'm centred in myself, somehow, and " 
 
 "Oh no ! " she protested ; " you are very, very 
 good to him. I believe it is you who keep him ahve. 
 Perhaps he seemed ill to-night because you are going 
 away." 
 
 " I'll write to him every day. Oh ! I do hope I'm 
 successful on Monday, if only for his and your sake. 
 I shall seem so much like a pretender if I fail." 
 
 She smiled. 
 
 " I'm like father," she said, " I can't understand 
 why you aren't sure of your own powers. It isn't as 
 though you'd done nothing already." 
 
 " I know. And yet . . . Monica, if you and your 
 father hadn't believed in me, I should never have 
 written another bar. I shall never cease to thank 
 God that your father and mine were bosom friends. 
 The love he had for my father is now given to me." 
 
 " I wonder if he knows how much he has helped you ? " 
 
 " And I, Monica, wonder if you realise how much 
 you have helped me ? ' ' 
 
 " Oh, have I, Martin ? " she cried ; " have I really 
 —helped ? " 
 
 " Of course you have," he answered, in a low voice ; 
 "you have been — you have been — almost everything 
 to me." 
 
 Her girlish but serious face was radiant. Turning 
 from him, she looked wistfully into the fire. 
 
 " I am so glad — so very glad," she said, folding her 
 hands tightly together. 
 
 He looked at her for a moment, stirred uneasily, rose, 
 and went to the other side of the fireplace, where he sat 
 down facing her. His eyes approached her cautiously ; 
 then, feeling that she was not looking his way, he gazed 
 at her passionately, hungrily. Her abundant, golden 
 hair was like steady flame, and in her deep, serious eyes 
 was nothing but goodness.
 
 22 THE POISONER 
 
 " Monica," he said, " will you tell me something 
 about your mother ? Do you mind ? " 
 
 " What is it you want to know ? " 
 
 " Anything — anything you like to tell me. Do you 
 know that during all the time I have lived here, neither 
 you nor your father has ever mentioned her ? " 
 
 " Yes, I know. I don't think I have spoken of her 
 to anyone since she died, least of all to father. I 
 couldn't have done, even if I had wanted. But it is 
 different with you, Martin." 
 
 She glanced at him for a moment, and then her gaze 
 fastened on the little leaping flames in the hearth. 
 
 " Although I was only eighteen when mother died, 
 
 three years ago, I had known for a long time that father 
 
 was her whole world. Her spirit seemed to live in his 
 
 body. But although he loved her passionately, she 
 
 was not his only, or even his first, interest in life. 
 
 That, I suppose, is often so with men of great intellect. 
 
 When at home he was always absorbed in his books, 
 
 in his languages and translations, and then, of course, 
 
 he was frequently away for months, and even years at 
 
 a time — on his travels in Central and West Africa. 
 
 During those times she was always occupied with some 
 
 work of his — studying the books he had written, or 
 
 preparing one of his MSS. for the press, or correcting 
 
 the proofs of a new volume. Father often used to say 
 
 that no one in England knew more about his special 
 
 subjects than she did. But you must not think of her 
 
 as a blue-stocking. In every way she was womanly, and 
 
 few of her friends, either in Barton or Salten, guessed 
 
 that she was a profound scholar." 
 
 She paused a moment, pondering. 
 
 " And she was very brave too," she continued, in a 
 voice that had become unsteady. " You know, she 
 died of cancer. Father was in Sierra Leone when she 
 became ill. From the very first she suspected what 
 her disease was, though Dr Foster was himself puzzled. 
 She very rapidly became worse and unfit for work, but 
 when she took to her bed she would not write, or allow
 
 (( 
 
 THE POISONER 23 
 
 me to write to father to tell him she was dying. If, 
 at last, I had not disobeyed her and cabled to father, 
 she would have died without him by her side." 
 
 Monica's voice had grown so husky and tremulous 
 that she was afraid to continue. After a while she 
 said, with a piteous attempt at a smile as she turned 
 towards him : 
 
 "I'm afraid I can't tell you anything more, Martin — 
 not to-night, I mean." 
 
 " No, dear Monica, don't," he said ; " some other 
 time, perhaps." 
 
 He went to the piano and played softly for a few 
 minutes ; then, suddenly breaking off : 
 
 "When I come back, Bernard will be here," he said. 
 
 " I wish he was home for good. But he'll be leaving 
 school at midsummer, and after that we shall have him 
 home for week-ends, at all events." 
 
 He's still keen on being a doctor ? " 
 Oh yes, keener than ever. And I'm very glad. 
 Father has always wanted him to be a soldier, but he's 
 not spoken of that for a long time." 
 
 " He's much too clever for the army," said Martin. 
 " By the way, I owe him a letter." 
 
 "Do write to him, Martin. He thinks the world 
 of you." 
 
 " Yes, I must. I'll write to-night." 
 
 They heard the front door open and close, and a 
 moment later a middle-aged woman, short and rather 
 stout, entered the room. It was Mrs Bassett — Monica's 
 maternal aunt. 
 
 " Such a night ! " she said. " I had to take a cab 
 from Salten. I simply couldn't walk. No, I won't 
 sit down, Martin, thanks. I bought that bonnet I told 
 you of, Monica," she added triumphantly. 
 
 " I knew you would, aunt. You've been dreaming 
 of it for weeks." 
 
 " Yes, and I've ordered a new rug for the dining- 
 room, and old Flynn has finished your father's reading- 
 desk — it'll be delivered on Saturday, and I've settled
 
 24 THE POISONER 
 
 all the tradesmen's bills, and I paid that call on the 
 Vicaress that's been owing for months and months, and 
 Martin, the piano-tuner will be here to-morrow. If 
 you don't call that a good afternoon's work, / do." 
 
 " Bravo ! " cried Martin. " Thanks awfully for the 
 piano-tuner." 
 
 " And what is the news ? " asked Monica. 
 
 " No, I'm not going to stop and gossip. I'm busy." 
 
 " Father came down to dinner to-night, aunt," said 
 Monica. 
 
 " Oh, Monica dear, why did you let him ? " 
 
 " He begged to come. But he was in bed again 
 before half-past eight. He ate very little. I'm going 
 to say good-night to him presently." 
 
 Mrs Bassett left the room rather importantly ; she 
 went to the servants' quarters, fully persuaded that 
 in her five hours' absence the working of the household 
 had been completely disorganised. 
 
 " I must write some letters before I go to bed," said 
 Martin, rising. 
 
 An hour later he was in bed listening to the exciting 
 wind. Life ! It was life ! It moved — it rushed swiftly 
 — it struggled and fought. . . . He could hear the deep 
 boom of the sea, and his flesh tingled as his imagination 
 threw his naked body against that angry water. . . . 
 And the sand that, ghost-like, fled in the dark. . . . 
 
 All nature was in turmoil, like the spirit of man, like 
 his own spirit. His desires rushed up to the stars and 
 crept down to the hot bowels of the earth.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THERE is no " musical public " : there are 
 many musical publics. Few men are so catholic 
 as to admire both Purcell and Stravinsky, or 
 Bach and Hugo Wolf. 
 
 Martin had his own public. There was something 
 of himself in each member of his audience that Monday 
 night, some characteristic differentiating him and them 
 from the norm. It was an exotic audience, an audience 
 steeped in modernity, an audience crying out for a 
 new god. 
 
 Yet there was nothing exotic in Martin Stavart's 
 appearance. He had the body — all bone, muscle, and 
 sinew — of an athlete ; the massive head of a thinker ; 
 the chin of a fighter. The features, however, though 
 sensitive, hinted at a conquering brutality. 
 
 Already he had a wide reputation both as pianist 
 and composer. His pianoforte-playing was sedulously 
 intimate. It was insinuating and equivocal. He 
 played the works of the great masters not so much with 
 the object of interpreting them, but in order that he 
 might disclose himself. 
 
 Two years ago he had given a series of twelve recitals 
 in the little Apollo Hall, that tantalisingly remote 
 music-room that no one had ever heard of until Stavart 
 made it famous. To this place he drew the jaded and 
 the blase, the old-young men and women to whom music 
 was a drug and life an experience from which to escape. 
 The Apollo Hall is not as other halls. A little circular 
 platform occupies the middle of the floor ; around 
 this platform five hundred chairs are placed, tier upon 
 tier, and so arranged that even those members of the 
 audience farthest away from the pianist are almost 
 within hand-reach. There are neither galleries nor 
 windows. 
 
 Music, Stavart maintained, was so delicate and fragile 
 a thing that it was robbed of half its power when listened 
 to from the usual distance separating a platform from 
 the last row of the stalls. Physical proximity of a 
 performer to his audience was indispensable. In all 
 
 25
 
 26 THE POISONER 
 
 the arts it was personality only that told. Reserve 
 smothered all the meaning of music. Nothing should 
 be kept back unless it were in order to pique curiosity 
 that would be satisfied later on and only at the right 
 moment. The true artist was the man who revealed 
 everything, who dissipated himself on others. " I 
 am not my own ; I belong to those who like me " was 
 his motto. 
 
 Because his personality was strange and disturbing, 
 and because his brutality had the appearance of ex- 
 quisite refinement, he quickly won his public, and for 
 six weeks he was one of the most notable figures in 
 London. He was praised, he was ridiculed, he was 
 sought after. 
 
 Then, almost immediately, came the tragic death of 
 his father, and after that the dark period lasting eighteen 
 months during which Martin Stavart disappeared and 
 was seen by none of his former friends. During this 
 time two volumes of his songs were published — hot, 
 erotic stuff that offended all who were capable of feeling 
 offence, and that seduced all the coarse-fibred young 
 ladies in England who were not yet married. Martin 
 found himself one of those not uncommon phenomena 
 in music — a man of genius who is also popular. 
 
 The dark period had come to an end through the 
 intervention of his father's old friend, Henry Symons. 
 Martin was taken to Barton to live in Symons' house- 
 hold. 
 
 Even now Stavart was not sure what was the tie 
 that bound him to Symons. Symons and his father 
 had been big-game hunters and explorers, friends of 
 Sir Richard Burton : silent men ; men who had left 
 England because England had no use for their talents. 
 Two startling facts darkened Martin's reading of the 
 past : his father's death, he knew, was not due to 
 " accident," as the coroner's jury had concluded, but 
 to despairing suicide ; and Symons had been broken 
 and rendered he pless by a " stroke " on hearing of old 
 Stavart's death.] Martin, fearing what the past might
 
 THE POISONER 27 
 
 reveal to him, closed his mind to everything except the 
 work of the moment and the possibilities of the future. 
 Only in moods of elation, when he was sure of himself, 
 and in moods of deep depression, when he was not master 
 of himself, did he seek to lift the curtain that divided 
 him from the secret past. 
 
 The applause that greeted him this evening as he 
 stepped on to the platform to conduct the orchestra 
 was that kind which is given to a public favourite who 
 has been a long time away and now returns. 
 
 Noon in Sumatra was the title of the first com- 
 position, and from the opening bars it held the audience. 
 It was a piece of pure impressionism. The tenuous 
 sound of muted violins, violas and violoncellos 
 shimmered in empty harmonies, swaying with a parched 
 voluptuousness that suggested the heat-mist of the 
 tropics. In that music nothing melted ; the harmonies 
 did not progress, they leapt ; discords, ever on the 
 point of being resolved, were abandoned for more dis- 
 cords. Soon a sinister note, deep and sustained, crept 
 into the web of sound and obliterated it. It was like 
 some prowling monster, full of evil. . . . 
 
 The thing, for what it was, was superbly done. It 
 plucked at the tense nerves of his neurotic audience 
 and set them quivering. The jaded men and women 
 imagined all the cruelty and fate of jungles ; they saw 
 tropical plants, spiky, and hot to the touch ; they heard 
 primeval sounds from beasts whose jaws dripped blood. 
 The listeners had not been so deeply thrilled since they 
 had read the last novel of Pierre Louys. Other com- 
 positions there were, even stranger than this. One, 
 frankly called Decadence, epitomised the audience that 
 listened to it ; Torlure, an extravagant miniature 
 taking scarcely sixty seconds to perform, was encored 
 twice. 
 
 The concert, indeed, was a succession of thrills care- 
 fully graduated in their intensity. Madame Calcini sang 
 two groups of his songs and, towards the end of the 
 concert, Martin, temporarily abandoning his baton,
 
 28 THE POISONER 
 
 played three of his own pianoforte pieces. The applause 
 was more than friendly ; it was enthusiastic. His 
 success was much greater than he had dared to hope 
 for. 
 
 The concert over, he evaded those of his old-time 
 friends who came round to his private room to con- 
 gratulate him. Having left the hall, he jumped into 
 a cab and was driven to his hotel, where he found Dr 
 Foster, whom he had invited to supper, waiting for him 
 at the entrance. 
 
 "A great evening, Stavart ! " exclaimed the little 
 man, beaming through his spectacles. " I had a 
 splendid tune. And so did the audience." 
 
 " Yes, it was rather jolly, wasn't it ? But really, 
 doctor, if you told the truth you would have to confess 
 that you were bored to death." 
 
 " On the contrary ! It's true I can't make anything of 
 your music — or any music — but I studied the audience. 
 Besides, I like that feeling of being in at the kill. The 
 old man will be delighted, won't he ? " 
 
 " Yes. But come upstairs to my own rooms. I've 
 ordered supper there." 
 
 Foster was only a few years younger than Symons, 
 but he took much pleasure in referring to his patient 
 as the "old man." And indeed, physically, Foster, 
 with his irrepressible energy and cheerful spirits, was 
 separated by thirty years from Symons. 
 
 In Martin's sitting-room supper was laid. 
 
 " What wine may I order you ? " asked Stavart, as 
 they sat down. 
 
 "I'm one of those accommodating people to whom 
 nearly all wines taste the same," said Foster. " Really, 
 I've no choice. Order what you yourself like and I'll 
 help you to drink it," 
 
 " But I don't drink at all," said Martin. 
 
 " Well, then, I really don't care about it either. . . . 
 Supposing I have a whisky and soda." 
 
 Martin gave the order. 
 
 "We were talking about Mr Symons," he said.
 
 THE POISONER 29 
 
 " Yes. As you know, this success of yours will 
 make him young again for a few days. He requires 
 stimulus. He is thrown too much on himself; he 
 broods." 
 
 " I've noticed that. Sometimes I've thought — 
 well, I've thought that he tortures himself." 
 
 Foster gave his companion a keen, inquiring look. 
 
 " Tortures himself ? What about ? " 
 
 " I don't know. To be quite frank, I was hoping 
 you would be able to tell me." 
 
 " No, Stavart, I can't. But all old men have their 
 memories ; some indeed live almost entirely in the 
 past." 
 
 " Dead memories come back to life ? " asked Stavart, 
 after a pause. 
 
 " Well, yes, they do. Though no memories really die, 
 you know. Things may seem to be forgotten for thirty, 
 forty, or even fifty years ; then suddenly they come 
 back. Something happens to recall them." 
 
 " Something serious ? " 
 
 " Oh no. Anything almost. The whiff of a par- 
 ticular brand of cigar, the sight of a flower — or the 
 sound of a musical phrase — anything ! It touches 
 the brain cells, they respond, and back to life comes the 
 memory of something that has lain unregarded in the 
 subconscious mind for half-a-century." 
 
 Martin ate in silence, telling himself he was foolish 
 to make these inquiries. If Foster knew anything 
 — well, it might happen that by accident some 
 disclosure 
 
 " Yes," went on Foster, "it is wonderful what is 
 packed away in our brains." 
 
 " Ancestral memories ? " asked Martin, goaded by a 
 curiosity he feared and hated. 
 
 " Yes, those too, I suppose." 
 
 "' Heredity's a strange thing," said Martin broodingly. 
 
 " So strange, indeed, that we know very little about 
 it. Now, Weismann maintains " 
 
 He was interrupted by a knock at the door, and by
 
 30 THE POISONER 
 
 the entrance of a page-boy, who handed Martin a card. 
 He read it and frowned. 
 
 "Certainly not," he said. "I can't see him. Tell 
 him I'm out." 
 
 But there was a gleam of desire in his eyes. 
 
 " Yes. Tell him I'm out. See ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir," said the page, and left the room. 
 
 But Martin did not take up his knife and fork ; for 
 a minute he sat with his gaze directed towards his 
 plate ; then suddenly he looked up at Foster. 
 
 " Excuse me a minute, will you ? " he asked. " I 
 think I'd better see him, after all." 
 
 Martin went to the door and opened it, paused a 
 moment, returned to the table, seized the card that 
 lay near his plate and put it in his trouser-pocket. 
 
 " I won't be a minute," he said, as he left the room. 
 
 In the entrance-hall a tall, dark, and not undis- 
 tinguished-looking man was waiting for him. As 
 Martin reached the foot of the stairs this man came 
 eagerly forward. 
 
 " It is good to see you again ! " he exclaimed. " How 
 are you ? — and congratulations, old fellow." 
 
 Martin gave him his hand. 
 
 " You were at my concert ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes. What extraordinary enthusiasm ! " 
 
 " Yes," agreed Martin listlessly. 
 
 His visitor, a little disconcerted by his lukewarm 
 reception, hesitated a moment. 
 
 " Are you staying in town long ? " 
 
 " No. I go north to-morrow." 
 
 " None of us has seen you for ages, Martin. How 
 long is it? Four months at least. Where have you 
 been ? " 
 
 Martin drew back a pace. 
 
 " Oh, I very rarely come to town nowadays." 
 
 "Yes, but your disappearance! It was so extra- 
 ordinary." 
 
 "To you, Morgan, I daresay it'^'was. You did not 
 expect it. You did not know me well enough to guess
 
 THE POISONER 31 
 
 what was coming. You see, it wasn't so much a 
 disappearance as an escape.^'' 
 
 "Escape? From what?" 
 
 " Who knows ? Myself, perhaps." 
 
 Morgan looked at him with unconcealed astonishment. 
 
 " Really ? Yourself ? I don't see what you 
 
 mean." 
 
 " No : I don't suppose you do. When your card 
 was given to me I thought I'd better come down to tell 
 you that that life, for me, is finished. I think it is only 
 fair to let you know. You can pass it on to the others 
 — to Amy and Alice — and — oh ! I forget their beastly 
 
 names." 
 
 Morgan winced as though he had been struck. 
 
 " You're changed, Stavart," he said, full of curiosity. 
 
 " You're quite right ; I am." 
 
 " But what is it ? What has happened ? " 
 
 They were still standing and, as Martin answered, he 
 tapped Morgan's chest with his forefinger. 
 
 "Ask yourself! Don't you know? The beast is 
 underneath ! " 
 
 Martin smiled cryptically, and, as his companion 
 made no reply, went on : 
 
 " Yes ; the beast is underneath. He's still there, of 
 course. But I've got my foot on him. He's been 
 underneath ever since I left you four months ago." 
 
 " Me? Do you regard me as responsible ? " 
 
 Martin shook his head. 
 
 " Responsible ? " he echoed ; " no. But these things 
 don't matter. All I want you to know is that I've 
 finished." 
 
 " With me ? " 
 
 "With you." 
 
 Morgan paled a little. 
 
 " You make me feel very uncomfortable," he said. 
 
 " I'm glad. I like you well enough to be glad of 
 that." 
 
 "I wish you'd explain," urged Morgan. "What 
 made you change ? "
 
 32 THE POISONER 
 
 " Well, I was rotting — rotting on a dung-heap. And 
 I was lifted out of it. A friend lifted me out — an old 
 friend of my father. He's stuck to me ever since, 
 and I to him." 
 
 Morgan felt as though he had been repudiated. 
 
 " I'm very sorry I came to see you," he said, " for 
 you have made me feel that I am evil." 
 
 Martin flushed. 
 
 "And you have made me feel as though I've been 
 self-righteous." 
 
 They stood for a few moments in awkward silence. 
 
 " But someone, as you say, lifted you out of it. No 
 one has tried to lift me," said Morgan. 
 
 " No. I was lucky." 
 
 His companion held out his hand. 
 
 "Well, good-bye," he said. 
 
 " I don't like to let you go like this," said Martin 
 hesitatingly. 
 
 "Why not? Why should you care about me? 
 You're safe." 
 
 " Look here, Morgan. You wish me to help you ? " 
 
 " I did not say so." 
 
 " No ; but you do. Well, I can't. It is as much as 
 I can do to help myself — to keep the beast where he is — 
 where he is, under my foot. Sometimes I think it is 
 more than I can do. I may perhaps save myself ; I 
 can't save you as well." 
 
 "I know. Besides, I'm not sure that I want to be 
 safe — saved. I'm not sure there's anything to be 
 saved, to begin with." 
 
 " Oh yes, there is, Morgan. Do you think I don't 
 know you ? 1 do know you, though for some time I've 
 been trying to forget you — you and all the rest. There's 
 good and evil in everyone." 
 
 " Yes, but which is which ? And can they be 
 separated ? Aren't good and evil fused together ? . . . 
 Never mind. This is good-bye." 
 
 Martin took the outstretched hand. 
 
 " Good-bye, Freddie," he said, using Morgan's
 
 THE POISONER 33 
 
 Christian name for the first tinie. He watched the 
 man who had been his greatest friend walk to the 
 revolving doorway — watched him hesitate, stop, and 
 ponder — watched him as he pulled himself together 
 and went out. Then, slowly, he walked upstairs and 
 rejoined Foster. 
 
 " I have been a long time away," he said ; " forgive 
 me." 
 
 " Your food was going cold, so I put your plate in 
 the hearth." 
 
 " Thanks. But somehow or other I don't feel like 
 eating to-night. I'm restless. I suppose the concert 
 has excited me." 
 
 " Very hkely," said Foster. 
 
 But Martin, though he did not try to eat, sat down 
 at the table. There was silence for a few moments. 
 Then ; 
 
 "Do you mind talking shop ? " asked Martin. 
 Your shop or mine ? " 
 Yours. I'm puzzled about a lot of things." 
 
 " So is the whole world," said the doctor, with a laugh. 
 " Really, it's astonishing how little we know about 
 anything that really matters. Tons of facts, but no 
 knowledge. No co-ordination. Theories, of course, 
 by the million. But nothing proved." 
 
 " I was wanting to ask you about dual personality." 
 
 Martin's manner suggested reluctance, and his words 
 came hesitatingly. 
 
 " Yes ? " _ • 
 
 The little red-faced man was at once on his guard ; 
 he felt instinctively that here was a patient coming to 
 him for relief. He should have it. 
 
 "Well, thaCs more than a theory, isn't it ? " asked 
 Martin. 
 
 "We know nothing, Stavart. Just a mere handful 
 of facts. The Psychical Research Society has slogged 
 at it for years and years — Lodge, Myers, Sidgwick, 
 Podmore, and the rest of them. But they can tell us 
 nothing. They even disagree among themselves." 
 
 ii.
 
 34 THE POISONER 
 
 " Yes — but the conscious self and the subconscious 
 self?" 
 
 Foster considered a few moments. 
 
 "Do you know, Stavart, what I regard as one of the 
 most mischievous habits of these times ?— -and not only 
 mischievous but dangerous ? It is the habit of intro- 
 spection. It's bad — bad every time. It helps you to 
 nothing. Nothing is ever gained by it — particularly 
 by men of your kind." 
 
 "What kind of man am I ? " asked Martin, perplexed. 
 
 " You're what the layman calls ' highly strung ' — 
 neurotic, imaginative, impressionable. When a man 
 of your kind begins to peer beneath the surface of his 
 mind, he nearly always thinks he sees evil there ; but 
 he is mistaken. He analyses all his motives and comes 
 to the conclusion that they're all selfish ; but they're 
 not. Nearly all men are better — finer, nobler — than 
 they are willing to believe. And the man who thinks 
 himself evil is nearly always better than his fellows." 
 
 " But how did you know I believe myself to be 
 evil ? " 
 
 " I didn't know. I don't know. But I know how 
 easy it is for the artist mind to begin to suspect itself — 
 to begin to attack its own foundations. Don't do it, 
 Stavart— don't do it ! " 
 
 The little doctor rose from the table. 
 
 " And now," said he, " will you walk back with me 
 to my hotel ? The exercise will help to compose 
 you." 
 
 Martin's hands were in his pockets. As he drew 
 them out, his right hand drew with it a card. Half- 
 consciously he looked at the name — Frederic Morgan. 
 He took it to the fire, dropped it carefully in the middle 
 of the flames, and watched it burn. 
 
 " Yes, I'll come with you," he said, his depression 
 already lifted ; " of course I'll come. How jolly it 
 will be to be back home to-morrow ! I detest London. 
 And yet, at Barton, I'm often wishing to be here." 
 Foster laughed.
 
 THE POISONER 35 
 
 " In my Latin grammar at school there was this 
 sentence : ' Men love summer in winter and winter in 
 summer.' Even as a kid of eleven I saw how true that 
 was." 
 
 "Yes, it's always the thing we haven't got," said 
 Martin. " I was wondering "
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 ON the following morning Martin woke early,; 
 Clear, warm sunshine was on the roofs and in 
 the streets. He always slept with his windows 
 open and his blinds undrawn. And, this morning, the 
 noise of the traffic and the sight of the blue sky 
 quickened his spirit. 
 
 As he dressed, he reviewed the events of the previous 
 evening, and began to conjecture what the critics would 
 have to say about his work. He had enough experience 
 to know that the verdict of the public was one thing 
 and the verdict of the critics another, and he was much 
 too serious an artist to regard the public's favour as a 
 proof that his music had merit. 
 
 Stavart cared little for fame. To be talked of and 
 written about was, no doubt, amusing ; it was nothing 
 more than that. But he cared a great deal that his 
 work should be good ; that it should be recognised by 
 the right people; that it should influence his con- 
 temporaries. He craved for a richer and fuller mode 
 of living. It was not enough for him that his spirit 
 should live in his own frame and be fed and nourished 
 by his mind and emotions ; something of him must 
 live in other people also. By means of his music he 
 could, he imagined, project his spirit throughout the 
 world. His music, saturated with his own personality, 
 must be made to add colour and grandeur to the best 
 minds of Europe. He had a masterful desire to spend 
 himself — to scatter and squander himself upon the 
 world. . . . 
 
 Before breakfasting he went to the nearest post office 
 and dispatched a telegram to his friends at Barton. 
 He could not bring himself to write more than a laconic 
 message, in which he said that the concert " went off 
 all right or seemed to," and that he would be home 
 for dinner. And then he bought a dozen different 
 newspapers and carried them to his hotel. 
 
 At the breakfast-table he opened his papers. Two 
 " largest circulation " sheets, true to their tradition, 
 made " stories " of his concert — that is to say, there 
 
 36
 
 THE POISONER 87 
 
 was no attempt at musical criticism, but merely a 
 serio-comic descriptive account of his audience, himself, 
 and his work. The Daily Marconigraph, on the other 
 hand, took his work seriously, and dealt with it at 
 length. He received praise for his originality and 
 musicianship, but Martin found that the effect of the 
 entire article was definitely disquieting. It hinted at 
 something objectionable, even sinister, in his personality 
 — hinted vaguely but unmistakably. And yet, reading 
 the criticism a second time, he was unable to put his 
 finger on a single line to which he could take exception. 
 So impressionable was he, so prone to self-distrust, that 
 he immediately felt himself to be tainted with evil. 
 The words that Morgan had spoken a few hours before 
 came back to him : " I'm very sorry I came to see you, 
 for you have made me feel that I am evil." 
 
 Disturbed and resentful, he scanned the other papers. 
 His talent was treated with respect in all of them : 
 that is to say, it was' acknowledged that he had unusual 
 gifts. But it was clear that at least two of the more 
 responsible critics found his music repellent. Martin 
 would have brushed these aside had he not felt that he 
 had reason to distrust himself. All men, he supposed, 
 had an evil side to their natures ; sleeping somewhere 
 was the ineluctable beast. But in him the beast had 
 crouched and sprung and, for a time, conquered ; not 
 very long ago he had for a period surrendered himself 
 to the forces of evil. Was he, then, tainted through- 
 out ? Did the evil within him ooze and ripple and run 
 over into his music ? 
 
 He ate his breakfast slowly and without appetite, 
 feeling a heavy hand upon his spirit. 
 
 By ten o'clock he was at Euston, waiting for Foster, 
 for they were to travel by the same train. At the 
 bookstall he had bought several provincial papers, just 
 arrived ; among them was The Bardley Gazette, the 
 paper for which Beresford wrote. 
 
 Foster, short, fat, and rubicund, hailed him with a 
 shout.
 
 88 THE POISONER 
 
 (C 
 
 Hullo, Stavart ! It's what journalists call ' a 
 good Press,' eh ? Seen The Times ? Oh yes — 
 excellent ! " 
 
 "Have^you read the Daily Marconigraph notice?" 
 asked Martin. 
 
 " Yes — I've seen 'em all. I suppose we can call you 
 famous now, eh ? " 
 
 Martin smiled. 
 
 " He has not noticed It," he said to himself, and his 
 heart felt appreciably lighter. 
 
 They secured an empty carriage, and Martin began 
 to unfold his copy of The Bardley Gazette. His hungry, 
 anxious eyes sought the famous initials, "J. B.," and 
 found them. Yes : it was favourable ! Moreover, it 
 was genial. "Mr Martin Stavart is young, and he 
 says the kind of things that an older man would have 
 left unsaid. But he does say them. There is no 
 stammering and stuttering, no falsely apologetic pre- 
 liminaries. For some little time, I suppose, we shall 
 have to regard him as the enfant terrible of music. . . . 
 Healthy animal spirits are at the root of his music — 
 the naughty desire to shock." Of course, this was 
 true ; Martin knew it was true. Evil ? No. But 
 then if not evil — what ? Just impudence. Nothing 
 more. 
 
 Reassured, once more trusting himself, he filled his 
 pipe and lit it as the train, suddenly becoming alive, 
 began to slide along the rails. He and his companion 
 were alone. 
 
 "Well, are you satisfied?" asked Foster, looking 
 over the top of his gold-rimmed spectacles. 
 
 " Yes, more than satisfied. Just read The Bardsley 
 Gazette. It's Beresford, you know — the best critic of 
 the lot." 
 
 Having read the half-column, Foster handed the 
 paper back to Martin. 
 
 " Of course," he said, " all this sort of thing's a 
 mystery to me. How can music, without words, 
 say anything ? "
 
 THE POISONER 39 
 
 (; 
 
 Well it doesn't — not anything very definite. You 
 can put excitement into music, and solemnity and 
 voluptuousness and gaiety and so on. That is to say, 
 you can express moods. But you can't make anything 
 happen." 
 
 " Yes, but Beresford declares you say things." 
 
 " Oh, he means that I express feelings. . . . You 
 see, the title of a composition counts for so much : it 
 is the clue. If, for example, I call a piece Decadence, 
 the hearers will anticipate the kind of music that suggests 
 decadence — something that is over-ripe and decaying, 
 and perhaps artificial. If Debussy had composed my 
 Decade7ice, he might have called it The Hothouse. 
 There's a man called Erik Satie : it is conceivable that 
 he, a cruder and more daring spirit, might have named 
 it Ungaihered Peaches in Late September. Many 
 different things, you see, suggest the same atmosphere 
 and even the same feelings." 
 
 Foster laughed. 
 
 "All this modern art jargon's a complete puzzle to 
 me, and there are times — forgive me, won't you ? — 
 when I feel disposed to believe that it's all a kind of 
 conspiracy of the j^ounger generation against the older. 
 It's the same in literature and the same in art. I've 
 no use whatever for your Wyndham Lewises and your 
 Edith Sitwells and your — what's the man's confounded 
 name ? — you know, that Italian mountebank who came 
 over four or five years ago. No ; they don't come into 
 my scheme of things at all. And yet I think I know 
 something of literature and art. Walter Scott, now, 
 and Fielding. . . . But you're smiling." 
 
 " Only at myself, doctor. I like Fielding, but 
 Walter Scott — well, to quote yourself, he's a ' complete 
 puzzle ' to me. ... I think there's a little fever in 
 the blood of our modern men. Few of us are quite 
 healthy. We are what we are and nothing can change 
 
 us." 
 
 But that," said Foster, " doesn't make you any 
 
 the less dangerous.
 
 40 THE POISONER 
 
 " You think we're dangerous ? " 
 
 " Well, you've confessed to fever," said Foster, with 
 a laugh, " and most forms of fever are infectious. We 
 have doctors to cure our sick bodies, but sick minds 
 are left to work what ruin they may." 
 
 " Certainly, no one tries to cure us, but there are 
 many who would, if they could, consign us to the lethal 
 chamber." 
 
 " What a pity Dr Johnson isn't alive ! What an 
 exciting time he'd give you ! " 
 
 "Or we him. Johnson was a bully with a bludgeon. 
 We would sting him to death." 
 
 They both laughed, but when their laughter had died 
 away and they had relapsed into silence, Martin's 
 mind, a little disturbed by Foster's half-serious remarks, 
 began again to torture itself with self-distrust, and his 
 self-distrust rapidly gave way to self-criticism. 
 
 " I have two selves," his thoughts ran ; " ojie self 
 is revealed to everyone — it is my everyday self : it is 
 the self that is universally liked. Is it universally 
 liked ? Yes, I'm sure it is. People think I'm ' a good 
 fellow.' Children take to me : I'm sure they do. And 
 that self is the one that I know — the one I acknowledge. 
 But is it really I ? What about that other self — the 
 self that is hidden, that nobody sees, that conceals 
 itself even from me ? — the self that exposes itself in 
 my music ? Yet Monica likes my music ! She would 
 not like it if it were tainted by the evil of my sub- 
 conscious self. Yes ; but perhaps to the pure all things 
 are pure. That would account for Monica ; it would 
 account for Beresford ; it would account for all those 
 critics who have not perceived in my music the evil that 
 in my heart of hearts I know is there. What will 
 Symons and Monica and Bernard think of the newspaper 
 criticisms ? Svmons : inscrutable man : there indeed 
 the mystery is dark." 
 
 His thoughts, long denied this victim, leapt upon 
 Symons, the mystery of Symons and his relationship 
 to Martin's father, to Martin himself.
 
 THE POISONER 41 
 
 "What is behind it all? Why save me? Why 
 save me ? " 
 
 Lincoln, where Martin's father had sought for and 
 found death, was spread out in his mind as a rank 
 city of evil. In those last years old Stavart had kept 
 himself apart from everyone, even from his son. He 
 had put up a barrier of silence between himself and the 
 world — the silence of doom. It had almost seemed, 
 indeed, that he hated his son ; certainly he could not 
 bear to be with him, to look upon him. 
 
 Martin knew so little. He knew nothing of those 
 two long letters that had reached Symons from Lincoln 
 during the week that witnessed that dark and pitiful 
 tragedy. He knew nothing of Stavart's years of 
 remorse before that tragedy took place. He knew 
 nothing of the heroic fight that, even now, Symons 
 was making against the darker destinies shadowing his 
 life. He was conscious of nothing save a mystery — 
 perhaps a crime ? — in which both Symons and his dead 
 father were involved. He had never desired to know 
 of these things : afraid, he had kept the thought of them 
 out of his mind. Only in such moments as these did 
 something threatening stir uneasily in his mind and 
 rise up crying and saying : "I am still here ! I am 
 not dead ! " 
 
 He felt compassed about by a cloud of inimical 
 witnesses : underneath him were the everlasting arms 
 of treachery. Oh, for a healthy mind ! a clear 
 conscience ! a forgiveness and a reconciliation ! . . . 
 But soon he would be home — in that house with its 
 walled-in garden where, despite the presence of Symons, 
 no evil could hurt him, though it was so near. . . . He 
 thought happily of Monica, of the winds that blew by 
 day and night, of the salt stimulus of the air, of the 
 long, reluctant sunsets, of the music he would make. 
 . . . His dark mood slowly passed. 
 
 At Preston they ate a late lunch in the station 
 refreshment-room. It was while they were drinking 
 their coffee that a rather stout and obviously short-
 
 42 THE POISONER 
 
 sighted man entered and sat down at a neighbouring 
 table. Something in his walk and in his manner of 
 peering at everything, as though it were just beyond the 
 reach of his eyes, seemed to Martin curiously familiar. 
 He stared at him for a few moments until there flashed 
 into his mind a vision of this same figure bending over 
 a desk, his nose almost touching the paper on which 
 he was writing. In a second he was back in the library 
 of the Leipzig Conservatoire. He rose and went over 
 to the other table. 
 
 " Surely," said he, " surely you are Jimmy Calvert." 
 
 The man addressed looked up with an instant smile. 
 
 " I can't see you," said he, " but I know your voice. 
 You're Stavart ! — Martin Stavart ! What a damned 
 curious thing ! I've just been reading about you in 
 the papers." 
 
 " Have you ? Good ! But what extraordinary luck 
 meeting you in a hole-and-corner place like this. They 
 all told me you'd settled down in Munich." 
 
 " That's right ; I did. But I soon got sick of it. I 
 wrote to you about two years ago to tell you I was 
 coming back. But ni}' letter was returned : you'd gone 
 and left no address." 
 
 " Yes, yes," said Martin hurriedly. " Are you living 
 here in Preston ? " 
 
 " I am. Stavart, I'm an organist. Now, don't 
 abuse me — I can guess all the things you want to say. 
 You remember all our dreams in the old days ? Well, 
 mine liave dissolved into thirty pounds a year from 
 St Jude's and a teaching practice. Lord ! I could 
 grind my teeth with rage when I think of it." 
 
 But he smiled happily enough as he placed the 
 remaining bit of sandwich into his mouth. 
 
 Martin laughed. 
 
 " Poor old chap ! But the world is like that. But 
 we're going to see a lot of each other, aren't we ? For 
 the last four months I've been living at Barton with an 
 old friend of my father's." 
 
 And I never knew ! Good Lord, Stavart, why, I 
 
 a
 
 THE POISONER 43 
 
 go to Ferringford once every week to teach idiots how 
 to play the piano — only half-a-dozen miles from you." 
 
 " What day do you go ? " 
 
 " Tuesdays. I generally return by the five-twenty." 
 
 " Good ! Well, next Tuesday break your journey at 
 Barton on the way home and come and dine with me. 
 I'll play you some of my spanking music." 
 
 " Thanks, I will. But I must be off — I'm going 
 to Manchester to-night for a change and must catch 
 the next train." 
 
 When Martin returned to Doctor Foster, he found 
 him reading the Daily Marconi graph. His friend, 
 seeing him, put the paper on the table. 
 
 " Rather an unfavourable notice that," said Foster. 
 
 " Yes. I can't quite make out what he's getting at." 
 
 " Have you met him ? " 
 
 " No ; but I know his work very well. As a rule, he 
 is kindly and urbane, but it is quite clear he doesn't 
 like me.'''' 
 
 "Well, an artist who doesn't make enemies isn't 
 much use as a rule," said Foster. 
 
 The train to Barton was full of business men returning 
 to their seaside homes after the day's work in Preston. 
 It was but a forty minutes' journey. Both Foster and 
 Stavart alighted at Salten, the station before Barton — 
 Foster, because he lived there, and Martin because he 
 could obtain a cab there to convey his luggage, whereas 
 at Barton there were neither cabs nor porters. 
 
 As soon as Stavart opened the door admitting him 
 to the garden of Narrow End, he saw that every room 
 at the door of the house was lit up, and he knew that 
 Monica had done this to welcome him home. The door 
 was opened almost at the moment the bell sounded. 
 Monica and Bernard were waiting for him in the hall. 
 
 " Oh, Martin," said Monica, rushing to greet him, 
 "we are so glad." 
 
 Her eager, happy face touched him deeply. 
 
 Bernard, shy and silent, stood a little apart. 
 
 " Hello, old son," said Martin, " how goes it ? "
 
 44 THE POISONER 
 
 The boy, auburn-haired and blue-eyed, flushed with 
 pleasure as Martin, taking him by the arm, led him to 
 the drawing-room, Monica following. 
 
 " What was it like, Martin ? " he asked ; " tell us." 
 
 " Awfully jolly. The audience behaved itself very 
 well, on the whole, I think," he answered, smiling. " I 
 do wish you'd been there. And you also, Mrs Bassett," 
 he added, as Monica's aunt entered the room. 
 
 " It must have been a great night, Martin," said 
 Mrs Bassett. " We've got most of the papers." 
 
 "I've read them all to father," said Monica. " Oh, 
 Martin ; he is so pleased. But he wants to see you. 
 He told me to let him know as soon as you came in." 
 
 Symons was propped up by pillows in a sitting 
 posture. A lamp with a green shade stood on the 
 table at his side ; by the lamp was a little heap of 
 newspaper cuttings. He looked at Martin with startled 
 eagerness as the young man came into the room ; his 
 protruding eyes were hot with excitement. 
 
 " You are quite well, Martin ? " he asked, as they 
 shook hands. 
 
 " Why, yes — well and happy. And you ? " 
 
 But the old man did not answer. Placing a trembling 
 hand upon the newspaper cuttings, he began speaking 
 hurriedly. 
 
 " Sit down, Martin, boy : sit down. There ! Draw 
 your chair up. These — these fellows" — he tapped the 
 cuttings with his hesitating fingers — " they know what 
 they're talking about, eh ? It is true what they say ? " 
 
 "Well, I like to believe it is," answered Martin, with a 
 smile ; " some of them certainly know what they're 
 talking about." 
 
 " Yes ; it's true : I'm sure it is. I feel you've got it 
 in you. You will be a great man, and I shall die 
 happy. Your father — if he knew — but he was a great 
 man too, Martin. Not famous as you are going to be ; 
 not recognised by his peers or by the public ; but a 
 great man all the same." 
 
 Martin, startled by this sudden proud reference to his
 
 THE POISONER 45 
 
 father, about whom a cloud of shame always seemed to 
 hang, flushed and moved uneasily. 
 
 " You see," he said, " I know so little, so very little, 
 about him." 
 
 " Yes, I know. He was very unhappy. But he 
 was a great man, Martin. And you are his son. I 
 can do so little for you. If I were strong " 
 
 He turned away his head and fixed his eyes upon the 
 lamp while they sat in silence for a moment. 
 
 " But, sir," protested Martin, " you are doing every- 
 thing for me. I have often wondered what there is in 
 me to have earned your kindness." 
 
 But Symons still looked at the lamp, and Martin, 
 gazing at him, mechanically noted the green of the 
 shade reflected in his heavy eyeballs. 
 
 " You are your father's son," said the old man. 
 
 " Am I like him ? " 
 
 " No — and yet yes. . . . But tell me — begin at the 
 beginning. Tell me all that happened." 
 
 So Martin related the entire story of his visit to 
 London, keeping for the end of his narration the news 
 that he had given instructions to his agent to arrange 
 for a series of six pianoforte recitals in June. But he 
 did not mention his meeting with Frederic Morgan. 
 Symons, lying back on his pillows, listened eagerly, 
 finding satisfaction and a curious solace in every word. 
 
 " Good ! " said he, when Martin had finished. " You 
 will win through, my boy — I know you will." 
 
 He closed his eyes in weariness. Martin gazed with 
 affection at the massive head, the hawk-like nose — the 
 white, coarse-haired beard resting upon the counter- 
 pane. The old man's body was relaxed in every muscle. 
 Soon his breathing became regular and heavy, and 
 Martin knew that he slept. Standing up, Martin 
 hovered over him for a minute, seeking to do him some 
 trifling service ; crossing to the other side of the bed, 
 he lowered the lamp a little and adjusted the shade so 
 that the old man's eyes were untroubled by the light.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 DURING the week following his return from 
 London, Martin found it impossible to settle 
 down to the placid routine of Narrow End. 
 Spring came early that year, and, high above, a 
 hundred larks sang of freedom. The blue-green 
 grass of the sandhills glowed with its dull lustre ; 
 farther inland, the water-logged meadows were busy 
 with new life ; and the sun's fervour, disturbing 
 the whole earth, disturbed Martin also. Even old 
 Symons felt in his veins the rebirth of that land, 
 as a half-ruined oak feels and responds to the cool 
 sap its roots draw so gently and unconsciously from 
 the ground. 
 
 It was Martin's habit to spend the hour before lunch 
 in Symons' room, reading to him, or perhaps playing 
 chess, a game in which both men were adepts. From 
 breakfast to noon he worked at his piano ; in the after- 
 noon, wet or fine, he walked ; in the interval, from tea 
 to dinner, he composed ; and after dinner he was always 
 in the drawing-room with Monica, Mrs Bassett and 
 Bernard. An easy life : a protected life in which it was 
 possible to work hard and yet keep the brain fresh and 
 stimulated. But though Martin was protected from 
 the outside world like a walled city, in the citadel of 
 his heart dwelt the betrayer. He loved Monica with 
 the conquering selfishness of the artist ; unconsciously 
 he used her as an inspiration for his work, growing 
 apprehensive when that love, overflowing, threatened, 
 as it often did, to submerge ambition and drown him 
 in its warm waves. 
 
 In these last days of March, blue-skied and windless, 
 he ignored his work and roamed restlessly about the 
 house, among the sandhills and on the Stannar, his 
 thoughts drifting and agonisedly turned inwards in a 
 teasing dissection of himself. The old problem con- 
 tinually faced him — the problem of his real self. A 
 single glance at the future made him apprehensive. 
 Would those powers for evil within him control and 
 master his destiny after all ? 
 
 46
 
 THE POISONER 47 
 
 Sometimes Bernard, shy yet communicative, accom- 
 panied him on his walks, and on one occasion they 
 went to Poulton across the moorland skirting the park. 
 They had started early in the morning and for nearly 
 two hours had proceeded almost in silence, Martin 
 troubled by chaotic thoughts and Bernard occupied 
 in eager observation of the country-side. But on their 
 return journey, Martin pulled himself out of his swarm- 
 ing thoughts. 
 
 "Do you know," he said, " that we've scarcely said 
 a word all this time ? " 
 
 " I suppose we haven't, though I've scarcely noticed 
 it. But I like that — it shows we're friends. It's 
 rotten having to make conversation, isn't it ? " 
 
 " Yes," agreed Martin ; " there's nothing more 
 dreadful. But we got over that stage during the 
 Christmas holidays. Which reminds me that in the 
 summer you'll be coming home for good." 
 
 "I'm looking forward to it. It will be awfully 
 exciting living in Manchester. Of course, I shall be 
 home for week-ends " 
 
 Bernard stopped abruptly. 
 
 "Well," asked Martin, "what were you going to 
 say?" 
 
 "Nothing much. Well — you won't laugh at 
 me ? " 
 
 " My dear boy, of course I won't." 
 
 " No ; I know you won't. But I have often wanted 
 to tell someone and have felt ... it sounds conceited, 
 but I want to be a great scientist — a great discoverer. 
 I want to find out something new — something that no 
 one has ever known before." 
 
 "Yes. For instance ? " 
 
 " Anything ! The cause and prevention of cancer, 
 consumption, Bright's disease — I don't care what it is. 
 I should hate to spend my life patching up sick bodies, 
 just mending them till they break down again. Any- 
 one can do tliat. The thing is to stop them breaking 
 down in the first instance."
 
 48 THE POISONER 
 
 " You don't want to be a fashionable doctor in Harley 
 Street, then, and make a lot of money ? " 
 
 "Money? I hadn't thought of that. But father... 
 You see, Martin, doctors know so little. They haven't 
 time to learn — to find out. I don't suppose they want 
 to find out. They are content with just what is taught 
 them." 
 
 " Do 3^ou know, Bernard, you are very like your 
 father?" 
 
 " Am I ? " asked the boy, flashing a smile at his 
 companion. 
 
 " Why, of course you are. Hasn't he been an ex- 
 plorer, and don't you want to explore ? Every man 
 does — every man who is worth anything. It is the 
 undiscovered — and very often the undiscoverable — that 
 draws us ; it is the same whether we are travellers, 
 or scientists, or artists. We all want to get inside — 
 inside the core of things." 
 
 "That's it— that's just how I feel. I'd like— I'd 
 like " 
 
 "Well?" asked Martin. 
 
 " Oh, I don't know. It's all vague. . . . But to be 
 of use— real use, I mean ; to do something that would 
 matter always — help things on for ever." 
 
 Martin glanced at his companion, surprised and a 
 little puzzled. 
 
 " I don't feel it quite that way," he confessed slowly ; 
 " I suppose only the really great artists do. I seek the 
 undiscovered for the excitement that the search brings 
 me. I want to find out for myself — I mean for the 
 thrill of it. Other people don't matter in the least." 
 
 " Yes, it must be thrilling," said Bernard haltingly, 
 wondering if he understood Martin's point of view. 
 
 They came across an almond-tree in full blossom, and 
 stopped to enjoy it. 
 
 "This tree has its secret too," said Martin. "But 
 I'm quoting Wordsworth — a damnable habit." 
 
 They fell into silence as they resumed their way. 
 The boy glowed with a feeling that, though not new to
 
 THE POISONER 49 
 
 him, he had never felt so intensely before. He admired 
 Martin beyond measure. Martin understood — always. 
 Martin felt as he, Bernard, did about the world — about 
 work — about everything that mattered. And Bernard 
 was always at ease and happy in his friend's company. 
 It was comforting to feel that Martin was strong 
 and self-reliant. He admired his physical strength, 
 grace and courage. . . . He remembered Martin's 
 daring at Black Pond the previous Christmas when, 
 skating, a boy had fallen, broken the two days' ice, and 
 disappeared. Martin had crawled by the edge of the 
 hole, slipped quietly in, dived and reappeared, clutching 
 the boy's hair with one hand. . . . Half-an-hour had 
 passed before a rope and ladder were brought and they 
 were rescued, and during that half-hour Martin became 
 king in Bernard's eyes. . . . 
 
 That evening, when Bernard was working at 
 chemistry in his room, he heard the piano begin to play 
 downstairs. He pushed his book away and listened, 
 captured in spite of himself. He knew nothing of 
 music, but he felt its strong appeal and distrusted it. 
 It was disintegrating. It weakened one — at least, 
 modern music did. It melted one and left one tired 
 and unbraced. And yet, who could resist it ? Bernard 
 couldn't. 
 
 Disturbed and half- resentful, though wholly en- 
 raptured, he opened his bedroom door to let in the 
 magical sound. It was full of passionate despair, a 
 dying ecstasy ; an ecstasy that was quenched by a 
 fever of unsatisfied desire. He disliked himself for 
 liking it. It was against his whole boyish philosophy 
 of life. His instincts revolted against it. . . . Was it 
 possible that people were like that ? — that anyone was 
 like that ? Was there such suffering in the lives of all 
 men and women— such glorification of suffering ? 
 
 For a moment he felt that he had lost his hold on 
 life ; everything that he had imagined to be secure 
 fell away beneath his feet. Martin, as many times be- 
 fore, had become a stranger. Attracted and repelled, 
 
 D
 
 50 THE POISONER 
 
 he stood by his open door; then his legs, moving 
 as it were by their own vohtion, took him slowly 
 downstairs. At the drawing-room door he stopped a 
 moment. The music was now ebbing tiredly away like 
 an exhausted sea at low tide. Noiselessly, he opened 
 the door and peeped in. For a few frightened moments 
 he stared, spellbound, at his sister. Unconscious of 
 Bernard's presence, she was gazing at Martin with eyes 
 that spoke of— what ? The boy did not know ; but 
 he felt that he was beholding nakedness. He was 
 looking at something that instinct told him was to be 
 feared. This was not his sister, Monica; a strange 
 woman was in that room. 
 
 Tremblingly he stepped back and closed the door. 
 Then without thought he opened the hall door and 
 strode into the garden. On the lawn he stood among 
 the stars. ... So that music was true, after all. 
 People were like that ! People did suffer in that way 
 and they did glorify their suffering ! . . . Impatient 
 and angry, he dug the turf with his heels, repeating the 
 curses he had learned at school. 
 
 Ten minutes later, the music having ceased, he was 
 back in his room, working. He kept everything out 
 of his mind except the formulae before his eyes. He was 
 bent over his book, his head in his hands, when, an hour 
 later, Martin entered. 
 
 " Aren't you coming down to the drawing-room ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " No," answered Bernard, sitting back in his chair 
 and frowning. 
 
 "Busv?" 
 
 " Yes:" 
 
 " Am I in your way ? " 
 
 " Of course not, Martin," said the boy awkwardly, 
 and flushing a little. 
 
 " Then I'll sit down and have my fmal smoke." 
 
 There was a long silence during which Bernard sat 
 with his eyes cast down. Martin filled his pipe, struck 
 a match, and began to smoke.
 
 THE POISONER 51 
 
 " Is anything the matter ? " he asked. 
 
 " No— nothing." 
 
 " Come and sit in my study for a bit ; there's a fire 
 there. You must be dreadfully cold here." 
 
 Martin rose and reluctantly, almost sullenly, Bernard 
 closed his book but made no attempt to get up. 
 
 " Come along, that's a good chap." 
 
 The boy followed Martin to the latter's study, and 
 they sat down in front of the fire. 
 
 " I wish I could work like you," said Martin. 
 
 " But I'm a bad worker ! My thoughts are always 
 wandering." 
 
 " But you seem to stick at it. I've scarcely done a 
 stroke since I came back from London." 
 
 "Well, you deserve a holiday — you've earned it." 
 
 " Have I ? But I don't like holidays — not enforced 
 ones. It's rotten to want to work and not to be able 
 to. I feel unsettled and restless." 
 
 " I know — but I always feel like that. As soon as 
 I start a thing I want to be doing something else." 
 
 "But you got honours in your Matric. at Christmas. 
 That meant hard work, didn't it ? " 
 
 " Yes. But then, of course, I made myself work." 
 
 " Well, that's just what I can't do." 
 
 Martin knew and Bernard felt that this little con- 
 versation was artificial, "made." They were both 
 uncomfortable, and the boy could not hide his dis- 
 comfort. Suddenly he rose. 
 
 I'll get off to bed, I think," he said. 
 Tell me : why did you open the drawing-room door 
 to-night and then close it without coming in ? " 
 
 The boy flushed hotly. 
 
 " How do you know I did ? " he asked defiantly. 
 
 " I know your way of opening a door. Besides, who 
 else could it have been ? Mrs Bassett has only just 
 returned from the Vicarage." 
 
 Bernard began to edge towards the door. 
 
 " You won't tell me ? " asked Martin. 
 
 " No— I can't." 
 
 a
 
 52 THE POISONER 
 
 " Why can't you ? " 
 
 " Because I don't know why I didn't go in." 
 
 " Oh, that's absurd," said Martin, with a friendly 
 smile; "I've been thinking that perhaps you felt I 
 was in the way — that you wanted to have Monica 
 alone." 
 
 On the instant, Bernard stepped eagerly forward. 
 
 " Oh no ! " he exclaimed ; "it wasn't that at all : 
 you must never think that ! " 
 
 " Good ! But what was it then ? " 
 
 " I can't tell you, and even if I could, I wouldn't." 
 
 " I wish you would." 
 
 " Am I to have none of my thoughts and feelings to 
 myself? Martin, you do pry into people's minds — 
 you know you do ! " 
 
 Martin winced. 
 
 " I'm sorry, sonny. You're right. It's one of my 
 vile habits — it's the way I'm made. Forgive me and 
 forget all about it." 
 
 The boy smiled reassuringly. 
 
 " Right-o ! Of course I will. Good-night. Shall we 
 row on the lake to-morrow ? " 
 
 "Yes. Let's. Good-night." 
 
 Left alone, Martin began to reproach himself. 
 Strange that with his constant habit of introspection, 
 of almost fanatical self-dissection, he had never dis- 
 covered this fault that Bernard had disclosed to him. 
 Yet it was true ! There was in human nature nothing 
 that was sacred from his prying eyes, that were always 
 so anxious to strip souls naked. It was, as he had said, 
 a vile habit ; but yet it was more than a habit. It 
 was a strong, deep-rooted instinct : a hunger, a passion. 
 He recalled instances where his ruthless curiosity had 
 eaten its cruel way into the minds and hearts of his 
 friends. He recalled them, and turned from himself 
 in disgust. 
 
 • ••••••• 
 
 The following night Jimmy Calvert, his old friend of 
 the Leipzig days, came to dinner. Despite the disparity
 
 THE POISONER 53 
 
 in their ages — Calvert was in his early forties — they had 
 for a period of two years been close friends, and Martin 
 had often regretted that the North Sea divided them. 
 It would be difficult to find two men more dissimilar 
 both in mental calibre and physical exterior. Whereas 
 Martin was full of malaise and self-distrust, Calvert 
 had the easy, though far from shallow, philosophy that 
 is based on a complete acceptance of self ; he no more 
 doubted his own essential goodness than he doubted 
 the beneficence of the sun's heat and light ; it was to 
 him one of the things the sane man took for granted. 
 Outwardly Martin was handsome and brilliant ; Calvert, 
 on the other hand, had the thick, shuffling figure, the 
 awkwardness of movement, and the aspect of a man 
 whose boyhood and youth have been wholly spent in 
 physical labour on the heavy soil. A nobly shaped 
 head alone redeemed him from grotesqueness. 
 
 They were now in Martin's room. Calvert's heavy 
 figure was sprawled over an easy-chair, and the younger 
 man was standing with his back to the fire ; occnsionally 
 he made a slight gesture with the hand that held his 
 pipe. 
 
 " I don't at all see why someone shouldn't do it," 
 Martin said, " or, for the matter of that, why I shouldn't 
 do it myself. The public is fed up with the love plot 
 in opera — with the indecently frank tenor and the 
 excited virgin : it is sick of lust, and jealousy, and 
 revenge. Why shouldn't an opera be written about 
 religion, trade, the intrigues of politicians, or — or any- 
 thing? The w^hole business nowadays is so smeared 
 over with sex that a decent man can't take himself — 
 never mind his sister — to Covent Garden or the Paris 
 Opera House. Mind you, I don't object to the healthy 
 animalism of an opera like Carmen. It is when I hear 
 Tristan and Isolda, or any of those sumptuous beastli- 
 nesses of the French and German composers, that I grow 
 sick. Think of Tristan's divine ditherings ! — think of 
 how the passion of the two lovers is teased and excited 
 and energised — gloated over ! That's the word ! It's
 
 54 THE POISONER 
 
 as indecent as a man of seventy peeping through the 
 keyhole of a bridal chamber ! " 
 
 When Calvert laughed, his long, slit-like eyes dis- 
 appeared entirely, and they disappeared now as he 
 leant back in his chair, holding his pipe aloft in one hand 
 and tugging at his beard with the other. Martin stood 
 for a few moments gazing surprisedly at his friend until 
 he too began to laugh. 
 
 " Oh, don't stop, please ! " cried Calvert. " What en- 
 thusiasm ! What zest ! What — er — what propriety ! " 
 
 " But I'm right, don't you think ? " 
 
 " Theoretically, you may be. People ought perhaps 
 to be fed up with love and orchids — and jealousy and 
 daggers, and longing and lollipops — but, as a matter of 
 fact, they're not." 
 
 " Then the musical public is a beastly public." 
 
 " No doubt. At least, a section of it is. They use 
 sweet sound as a discreet aphrodisiac." 
 
 " The truth of the matter is, Calvert, that operatic 
 composers know next to nothing of human nature. 
 They can manipulate the cruder emotions skilfully 
 enough, but any emotion that is elusive and secret — 
 any bit of psychology that does not lie on the surface 
 of the mind — they miss altogether. And yet music is 
 the most mysterious and the most ineluctable of all 
 the arts. It can say anything ! " 
 
 "Well, it can suggest anything. . . . But, look here, 
 Stavart, you've talked enough. I want to hear some 
 of your stuff." 
 
 " Good ! I was wondering when you were going to 
 ask me ! I'll play you some of my latest experiments." 
 
 "Experiments?*" 
 
 " Yes ; the sort of thing I've been talking about. 
 I'm doing a volume of Psychological Studies." 
 
 He played a rather long, sultry piece that was re- 
 markable for an insistent figure that was never entirely 
 absent — a figure that suggested hungry longing and 
 crept among sluggish harmonies that slid the one into 
 the other without ever reaching a resolution.
 
 THE POISONER 55 
 
 "Has it got a name ? " asked Calvert, when Martin 
 had finished. 
 
 " Yes. It's called The Young Girl Goes into the 
 Woodr 
 
 " Not a very ' nice' girl, Stavart, and a decidedly 
 nasty wood." 
 
 " You're quite right. I'm glad you've got that — 
 it was what I was trying for. If you'd had the title in 
 your mind before I began, you'd have followed the thing 
 all right, eh ? " 
 
 " Yes, I think I should." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 "Well what?" 
 
 " What do you think of it ? " 
 
 "It's new, of course — I mean original — and it's 
 damnably clever. Also it's music right enough." 
 
 He paused. 
 
 " And yet ? " asked Martin, smiling. 
 
 " Well, I was going to say it was unhealthy, but that 
 adjective strikes me as rather stupid. Nearly all 
 original composers have been accused of being unhealthy, 
 but they don't appear to have spread any disease. 
 However, play it again." 
 
 Martin did so. 
 
 " Disagreeable — that's the word ! " ejaculated 
 Calvert ; " definitely disagreeable. Unpleasant." 
 
 " But beautifully as well as definitely disagreeable ? " 
 asked Martin, with some anxiety. 
 
 " Oh yes — undoubtedly ! Haven't I said that it is 
 music right enough ? Mind you, its unpleasantness 
 might not strike anybody else ; indeed all that seemed 
 disagreeable in it may not be there at all, but merely 
 something in myself." 
 
 "Oh no! It's there all right," said Martin, with a 
 laugh. " I felt it when I wrote it. I intended it." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " What a question ! " 
 
 "No — but tell me. Why did you write something 
 that is unci — unpleasant ? "
 
 56 THE POISONER 
 
 " You were going to say ' unclean ' ! " cried Martin. 
 
 " Yes ; I believe I was." 
 
 "Do you really think it unclean ? " 
 
 " No ; I shouldn't use that word." 
 
 " But you nearly did." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " My dear chap, you mustn't press me like that. 
 You know as well as I do that in conversation one 
 doesn't pick and choose one's words. Disagreeable 
 was my word — unpleasant, if you like." 
 
 " You're being honest with me ? " 
 
 " Of course I am. But I still ask — why? Why do 
 you wilfully compose unpleasant stuff ? " 
 
 " It must be because I'm unpleasant myself." 
 
 " Oh no — you're not. You must remember that I 
 know you. I saw you nearly every day for two years. 
 ... I do hope, Stavart, that you're not trying to make 
 yourself ' interesting.' It's so easy for us artists to 
 ipose : we do it quite unconsciously, without the least 
 premeditation." 
 
 Martin laughed nervously. 
 
 " I can assure you that so far as I know it is not a 
 pose. I know that on the surface I am all right, and 
 what I may call my instincts of everyday life are all 
 right too. But underneath " — his voice had become 
 deep and solemn — " underneath, deep below, there is 
 something — a nest of wickedness, a pool of infamy." 
 
 He stopped, astonished at the words that rushed 
 from his lips. 
 
 "And when did you find this out?" asked Calvert, 
 in a voice that would have trembled had he not 
 mastered it. 
 
 " Soon after my return from Leipzig." 
 
 " Only then ? " queried Calvert, assuming an air of 
 mild amusement. " Only then ? Why, I discovered 
 that the devil himself was inside me when I was about 
 twelve. Everybody possesses your ' pool of infamy,' 
 Stavart. We are all damned funny mixtures."
 
 THE POISONER 57 
 
 " Ah ! yes. But it is worse than that. My pool 
 flows over. Flows over into my work and — yes — into 
 my life as well sometimes." 
 
 Calvert remained silent. What was there for him 
 to say ? If Stavart was not going to be more explicit, 
 it would be better if he had not broached this subject 
 at all. But Martin added nothing. Rather moodily, 
 he played more of his music. But before Calvert left 
 they were again on their old terms of happy camaraderie.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 A MONTH passed and, Bernard having returned 
 to school, the household at Narrow End settled 
 down to its ordinary routine. Next month 
 Martin was to give half-a-dozen pianoforte recitals 
 in the Apollo Hall, and the greater part of the day 
 was occupied in practising the programmes he had 
 chosen. In his spare hours he was w^orking at an 
 operatic libretto based on the vaulting ambition of a 
 fabled king. 
 
 That wonderful spring had vivified him : the sweet 
 fresh winds, always sea-scented, acted upon him like 
 a mild intoxicant ; for a long stretch of weeks he lived 
 to the utmost capacity of his being, his senses hungry 
 for experience, his mind eager and never tired, his spirit 
 exalted. 
 
 Conscious and glad of his slightly abnormal condition, 
 he would sometimes ask himself: "How^ long will it 
 last ? " and each morning he would wake up with the 
 fear that to-day the high tension had relaxed. But, no ! 
 As soon as he got into his bath, his heart was uplifted, 
 and he sang in his deep, rough voice. Monica, dressing 
 in her room, would stand motionless for a few seconds 
 as his song reached her — would stand motionless, happy 
 yet half-tearful, her hand upon her breast. 
 
 But though the spring had brought Martin something 
 more than happiness, she could not share that joy. 
 Her young, trusting mind could find no way out of the 
 labyrinth in which Fate had placed her. Her love for 
 Martin w^as crying out for expression ; she w^as choked 
 with its abundance. Not yet had she learned to practise 
 deceit towards her beloved, and in many ways, small 
 and tender, she revealed to herself (and perhaps to him 
 — she did not know) that he was the " Little Leaf of My 
 Heart " that she called him in her dreams. Those 
 small and tender ways : narcissi and daffodils and early 
 blossoms from the fruit trees in the orchard, she placed 
 daily in his room ; she made a fair copy of his libretto 
 as he wTote it ; it was she who dusted his room and 
 left the untidy mass of papers undisturbed on his 
 
 58
 
 THE POISONER 59 
 
 desk ; and it was she who so arranged the work of the 
 servants that he should, when writing, be undisturbed 
 by noise. 
 
 Martin, immersed in his work, noticed none of these 
 things. He simply accepted them. But he knew of 
 Monica's love, for it was their mutual passion that pro- 
 vided his inexhaustible energy, that transformed this 
 world of waking beauty into a slow miracle of delight. 
 But though he nursed his passion and brooded over 
 it, he permitted it no outlet by look or word. Artist 
 first and man afterwards, he was frightened at the 
 possibility of destroying the source of his inspiration. 
 The waning of love, he told himself, is always preceded 
 by love's consummation, and declaration is a very 
 opening of the gates of love. The time would come, 
 this fever of work over, when, relaxed and spent, he 
 would turn to Monica for consolation. In the mean- 
 time he did not guess that his artist selfishness was 
 torture to Monica, that it was washing the colour from 
 her cheeks, and dimming her eyes' lustre. 
 
 In truth, these days were full of uncertainty for 
 Monica. Martin was kind, and good, and generous ; 
 Martin had his way to make in the world, she knew, and 
 if in the afternoon he went long walks and left her un- 
 invited at home, it was because he wanted to think 
 over and plan his work. He was as kind, as charming 
 — and as indifferent — as an elder brother. 
 
 On one occasion indeed he did ask her to accompany 
 him. She came into the hall just as he was preparing 
 to go out, and he gave her a long, grave, appraising 
 look. 
 
 "Why, Monica," he exclaimed, "you've lost all 
 your colour ! " 
 
 " Have I ? " 
 
 " Yes. And now I come to think of it, I've noticed 
 it for the last few days. It's been at the back of my 
 mind, worrying me." 
 
 She gave him a rather wan smile. -C^ 
 
 "Do you know what you are going to do this
 
 60 THE POISONER 
 
 afternoon ? No ? Well, I'll tell you. You're coming 
 along with me. We'll go down the road to Blore and 
 come back by the Stannar. Will you ? " 
 
 " Oh, I should love it," she said. 
 
 It seemed to Martin that the May sun singled them 
 out for its generous warmth, and it was for them alone 
 the larks were singing. Already the exercise had 
 recalled the colour to Monica's cheeks, and, clad in a 
 short, loose skirt, she stepped out in pace with him. 
 
 "I wonder," said Martin, " if anywhere in England 
 there is anything quite like this little stretch of coast — 
 these two miles between Barton and Blore." 
 
 " Well, Cornwall has nothing like it, nor has Devon, 
 and the North Welsh coast and Yorkshire and Norfolk 
 are as different " 
 
 "Cornwall!" snorted Martin. "W^hat a county! 
 Do you know why it's so popular ? Because it's so 
 easy ! All its romance lies on the surface : even 
 stockbrokers feel romantic when they go there. And 
 people like to look at the big seas and far sails and granite 
 rocks and lonely lighthouses — and feel how immune 
 they are from all that danger. But there's more 
 romance here " — he waved his hand towards the dunes 
 and the sea — " than in all the thousands of coves and 
 moors of Cornwall." 
 
 " It's the smell," said Monica, " the smell of the sea, 
 and the hot sand beating back the sun, and the dirty, 
 angry waves. . . . Oh yes ! and the melanchol}^ look 
 of the miles and miles of wet sand at low tide. We 
 like it, Martin, but would other people call it beautiful ? " 
 
 " Perhaps not. ... I know what it is ! " he ex- 
 claimed eagerly. " You're right about the smell, 
 but that's only a small part of it. It's the way the 
 earth and the sea and the sun seem to permeate one's 
 entire body. They appear to be part of one's very 
 flesh. The sun is striking into us through our skins, 
 isn't it ? — and the smell of the sea, the salt of it — why 
 you can taste it on your lips ! " 
 
 " And the sand, on a windy day," said Monica,
 
 THE POISONER 61 
 
 laughing, " how it does get into your eyes and ears 
 and mouth and down your neck ! " 
 
 Martin laughed too. 
 
 "Well, in any case, it's a great place to live in," he 
 said. " There's a kind of barren sumptuousness about 
 Cornwall that is rather sickening," he added, as an 
 afterthought, " here you have to make your own beauty 
 — or, at all events, you've got to find it." 
 
 " That's what I like so much about your music, 
 Martin. Unless you, so to speak, meet it half-way and 
 contribute something of your own to it, it means nothing 
 at all. I'm afraid you'll never be popular." 
 
 " Oh, shan't I ? You wait and see ! I bet you 
 anything you like, Monica, that this time next year I 
 shall be the man. I'm going to be fashionable. They 
 will be giving my opera at Covent Garden, all the little 
 girls with bobbed hair will be trying to play my piano 
 pieces, and my songs will be selling like Landon 
 Ronald's. Oh ! I'm going to have a deuce of a time." 
 
 Monica felt a sudden pang. It would be as she 
 feared : Martin's genius, instead of bringing them 
 together, would separate them ; it would carry him to 
 other lands, to other people, to triumphs she could not 
 share — could not even witness. 
 
 " Oh, I must tell you ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "Well, I had intended keeping it a secret until 
 nearer the event. But I can't. Guess." 
 
 " Don't be absurd, Martin." 
 
 She tried to smile, but she feared that his news 
 might . . . she did not know what she feared. But 
 possible separation was always in her thoughts. 
 
 "' Oh, but you must ! . . . Well, I won't tease you 
 for, after all, it's nothing so very wonderful. But both 
 Mengelberg in Rotterdam and Weingartner some- 
 where in Germany are going to give my Noon in 
 Sumatra this month. I don't suppose such a thing 
 has ever happened before to an Englisliman of my 
 age."
 
 62 THE POISONER 
 
 Monica, relieved and genuinely delighted, turned her 
 radiant face towards him. 
 
 " And all those stupid people will hear it before I do! " 
 
 But her thoughts said : "Never mind. I can hear 
 his voice. I can touch his sleeve. I have him with 
 me. For a little while I can pretend he's mine." 
 
 They crossed the dunes. In the little shaded hollows 
 cool air was cupped, and they walked across them 
 slowly, their feet sinking deeply into the soft, silvery 
 sand. As they breasted each hillock, the long, spiky 
 grass penetrated their clothing, and pricked their skin. 
 Occasionally a rabbit scurried away to its place of 
 safety. . . . Here in the hollows they were alone ; 
 looking upwards, Monica could see nothing but the sun- 
 smitten sky. How near she was to him and yet hoAV 
 distant ! Never a look from him. Never a word. 
 He had withdrawn into himself ; around him was the 
 impalpable barrier of her love. If only she loved him 
 less, how much closer friends they might be ! If only 
 he loved her more. . . . 
 
 On the Stannar talk was impossible, for the going was 
 hard. They had Avalked laboriously for nearly half- 
 an-hour when Monica, who was deep in her own 
 thoughts, was startled to hear him speaking in a tone 
 of anxiety. 
 
 "Why, Monica!" he exclaimed, standing still to 
 observe her, " you do look pale and ill. What a' careless 
 idiot I am to tire you out like this ! Let's sit down 
 and rest." 
 
 " Oh no," she said ; " I'm all right — really I am. 
 A bit tired, of course, but it's nothing." 
 
 He put his arm beneath hers, and as he closed his 
 strong fingers tightly round her wrist she felt a sudden 
 thrill of happiness, and the blood rushed to her cheeks. 
 Never before had they been in such close contact, and 
 as they resumed their walk she felt a quick virtue being 
 pumped pulsingly from his body to hers. She did not 
 mar her happiness by telling herself that his clasp was 
 but that of a comrade, a brother ; it was enough that
 
 THE POISONER 63 
 
 it was her wrist that lay in his hand, that it was she 
 whom he protected, that for these brief minutes she 
 was in his thoughts. . . . 
 
 After an hour's rest at home, she felt physically- 
 better but mentally distressed. The inevitable reaction 
 was upon her, and her disappointment was great when, 
 after dinner, Martin went up to his study to practise. 
 He was playing rapid scales in octaves, playing them 
 over and over again with ever-varying gradations of 
 tone. 
 
 There was something fierce in his energy, something 
 almost inhuman in his vitality. The amount of work 
 he got through in these days would have crushed an 
 ordinary man, but Martin never became wearied. 
 He carried all before him with an astounding verve and 
 gusto, and Monica, listening to his scales as they came 
 crashing down upon her from upstairs, felt pitifully 
 weak and insignificant. Indeed, Martin's energy over- 
 whelmed her. His vehement personality seemed to 
 have half-obliterated her own, and she found that she 
 was turning page after page of Compton Mackenzie's 
 Guy and Pauline without understanding a word of 
 what she read. 
 
 " Is that a nice book, Monica ? " asked Mrs Bassett, 
 placing her tatting on her knees and looking at her 
 niece with her kind, mild eyes. 
 
 Monica for a moment was at a loss for an answer. 
 
 " Yes. No. I mean it's beautiful rather than nice. 
 But dreadfully, dreadfully sad." 
 
 " Well, now, the Vicaress was telling me about a 
 book the other day. She was reading it. Dear me ! 
 now, what was it called ? Tut-tut ! What a memory 
 I've got ! Something about — no ! I can't recollect 
 it. However, the author's name was Florence . . . 
 was it Florence ? . . . dear, dear ! it was on the tip 
 of my tongue a minute ago," She hesitated a moment. 
 Then : " The book had a red binding, I remember," 
 she added triumphantly ; " you should get it out of the 
 library, dear."
 
 64 THE POISONER 
 
 " Yes, aunt, I will," said Monica, only half hearing. 
 
 The girl was listening to the rapid music, but she 
 became fully conscious of her surroundings when her 
 aunt, having taken off her spectacles and put them 
 on the table by her side, asked : 
 
 " Has Martin told you when he is going to London ? " 
 
 " No," answered Monica, all eagerness, " but it will 
 be some day early next month. His first recital is on 
 June the fifth." 
 
 " Well, I've been thinking you need a change, dear. 
 What do you think of going up to town with Martin ? 
 You could stay with your friends the Lewises. They're 
 always inviting you, and you never go." 
 
 " The Lewises, aunt ? " 
 
 " Yes. Stay with Mabel Lewis for a fortnight." 
 
 Monica smiled. 
 
 "Dear aunt, you mean Margaret Luton." 
 
 " Yes. I said Margaret Luton, didn't I ? Martin 
 could see you safely there and put you on the train 
 at Euston. That is, when you come back. Just for a 
 couple of weeks. It would do you good. And you 
 would like to hear Martin." 
 
 " Oh, but I couldn't leave father ! And besides, 
 if you were left alone, you'd be terribly overworked." 
 
 "Well, I've spoken to your father already; as a 
 matter of fact, it was really his idea. That you should 
 have a little holiday, I mean. You know, he's grown 
 much stronger the last few weeks. And, of course, 
 with Cubbins. We'll call it arranged. Yes. You'd 
 better write to Miss Lewis to-morrow." 
 
 The prospect of witnessing Martin's triumph was 
 irresistible. 
 
 " You and father are awfully kind to me. If I can 
 be spared . . . Oh, but my G.F.S. girls ! " 
 
 " I've thought of them. I'll take them myself. That 
 is, if you'll allow me. I can chatter to them about 
 something. Social unrest and gaiety and present high 
 prices — you know." 
 
 Again Monica smiled.
 
 THE POISONER 65 
 
 " They'd love it," she said. " Just be your dear self 
 and they'll worship you." 
 
 When, a couple of hours later, Martin joined them 
 and was told of the new scheme, he appeared slightly 
 embarrassed. 
 
 " You intend coming to my recitals ? " he asked 
 Monica. 
 
 " To the first two, at all events," she answered. 
 
 " I shall be dreadfully nervous if you do." 
 
 " Nervous ? Of me ? " 
 
 He sat down. 
 
 " Yes. I'm sure I shall." 
 
 " But you've played to me often here at home." 
 
 " Ah ! that's a very different thing." 
 
 " Yes ? " 
 
 " I can't explain," he said peremptorily, " but it 
 will be different." 
 
 Though perplexed, Monica questioned him no further. 
 She would go to London, but she would be unable to 
 witness Martin's success. 
 
 £
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 " "X" X TELL, Stavart, what do you say ? Shall we 
 %/\/ smoke our cigars outside ? Good. You'll 
 T ▼ join us, Judith, won't you? " 
 Mrs Leopold exhibited her brilliant smile for exactly 
 five seconds ; then it disappeared as suddenly and 
 unexpectedly as it had arrived. 
 
 " Of course, Francis. I'll bring out the coffee myself. 
 Let's sit under the laburnum-trees." 
 
 Martin walked with his host across the lawn to the 
 far side of the garden at Great Gain ; only a hedge 
 separated the primly arranged grounds from the gorse- 
 covered moorland that swept in gentle curves to the 
 river showing rather lividly in the twilight. 
 
 Francis Leopold was reputed to be the most astute 
 concert agent in London. Two years ago, when Martin 
 had made the Apollo Hall famous, Leopold had leased 
 it for five years, with an option for a further five, at an 
 almost nominal rent, and in the meantime it had become 
 the most fashionable hall in London. He knew nothing 
 of music ; indeed, he rather despised it. Nevertheless, 
 his drawing-room contained a fine Bechstein, and in 
 his study was an old-fashioned but very sweet-toned 
 Collard and Collard. His policy of establishing social 
 relations with his clients made it necessary for him to 
 infuse an atmosphere of culture throughout his house ; 
 it was for that reason he had bought so many books and 
 a few pictures " of undoubted quality," as his wife was 
 fond of insisting to her friends. 
 
 The men seated themselves on deck-chairs, in front 
 of which was a long, low table. 
 
 " You'll have the most fashionable audience to- 
 morrow, Stavart, that London can provide. You will 
 play to the Duchess of Nottingham, the Countess de 
 Maracholi, Princess Maradian, all the five daughters of 
 Lord Salford, the Bishop " 
 
 "Don't frighten me, Leopold, for Heaven's sake. 
 But who is the Macaroni lady ? " 
 
 "Maracholi. . . . Mar-a-cho-H. . . . Well, she was 
 in Rome." 
 
 66
 
 THE POISONER 67 
 
 " Yes ? " 
 
 " And then in Paris." 
 
 He paused significantly, stroking his double chin. 
 
 " You wish me to infer ? " 
 
 " Precisely." 
 
 " Will she bring a suite with her ? " 
 
 " No. At present, I think, it is Prince Radioshisky. 
 A Pole. . . . But all your recitals have attracted the 
 same kind of people. The entire six are booked up. 
 Even you, if you wanted to buy a stall for a friend, 
 would be unable to secure one." 
 
 " Is that so ? Well, I must confess to some dis- 
 appointment, for, as a matter of fact, I was just about 
 to ask you if I could have a couple. A close friend of 
 mine is on a visit to London. She could hardly go 
 alone." 
 
 " My dear boy — why on earth didn't you speak 
 before ? But of course you must have mine and my 
 wife's. We shall be dreadfully disappointed, but then 
 I can listen to you from the stairway and Judith will 
 be able to hear you later on." 
 
 Martin was in the middle of a protestation when 
 Mrs Leopold arrived with the coffee. As soon 
 as the situation was made clear to her, she eagerly 
 joined her husband in his offer. Secretly she was 
 greatly relieved at the turn events had taken, 
 for music bored her excessively, and there was no 
 charm even in the prospect of sitting for two hours 
 among five hundred of London's most fashionable 
 notabilities. 
 
 "Well, that's that," said Leopold, having won his 
 point. " I'd better get you the tickets now while the 
 matter is still on my mind." 
 
 He hurried to the house, and in a few moments 
 returned and handed the tickets to his guest. 
 
 " Good Lord ! " exclaimed Martin, " they're a guinea 
 each." 
 
 Leopold smiled indulgently. 
 
 "I thought that would surprise you."
 
 68 THE POISONER 
 
 " Yes, but I had an idea we'd agreed on twelve- 
 and-six for the best seats and seven-and-six for the 
 remainder." 
 
 " You're right ; so we did. But when I drew up the 
 first advertisement, I had an inspiration. You see, 
 I knew the whole scheme was going to be a great success ; 
 I have a flair for that kind of thing. It is, so to speak, 
 what I'm for. I flatter myself I've accomplished some- 
 thing that nobody has ever done in London. You see, 
 Stavart, all the seats are priced at a guinea. The 
 gross proceeds of your six recitals will be three thousand 
 guineas." 
 
 "You see?" said Mrs Leopold. Martin, turning 
 towards her, caught in the dusk the shadow of her 
 excessive smile. " This is success, Mr Stavart. It is " 
 — she paused — " it is the Real Thing." 
 
 " Undoubtedly," agreed her husband, crossing one 
 fat leg over the other. 
 
 But Stavart was unmoved. Indeed, he could not 
 rise to this kind of thing ; if anything, he found it 
 rather depressing. 
 
 "You see?" repeated Mrs Leopold insistently. 
 "Not even Pachmann . . . not even Paderewski 
 himself." 
 
 "It's all very flattering, of course," said Martin, 
 " but how long will it last ? " 
 
 " It win last," said Leopold, " as long as you do. I 
 know. I don't say you will always have an over- 
 whelmingly large public — but, mind you, I don't say 
 you won't ; still, while the world is what it is, there'll 
 always be a certain class of people fighting to hear you. 
 Berhn now, and Vienna, and Paris. All those places. 
 But " — he paused dramatically — " it is in America 
 where, sooner or later, you will witness the greatest 
 achievements of your life." 
 Martin smiled. 
 
 "Well," said he, "let's take one thing at a time. 
 I may as well tell you, Leopold, that as soon as these 
 beastly recitals are over, I'm going back home where
 
 THE POISONER 69 
 
 I shall sit at my desk for six solid months. I intend to 
 write an opera." 
 
 A creak from Mrs Leopold's chair betrayed her 
 agitation. Her husband sighed. 
 
 " There go all my dreams — biff ! I confess, Stavart, 
 that even I have my dreams. I have seen you in 
 Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Spain, Belgium, and 
 Holland. Egypt even. Imagine yourself in Cairo ! 
 Good Lord ! And then I've dreamed you into America, 
 Canada, South Africa, Australia. A world tour ! And 
 everywhere people worshipping, people prostrate, people 
 laying down their money. Chicago, Boston, New York. 
 I know mv America, Stavart, and I know what they 
 like." 
 
 "And you think they*d like me?" asked Martin, 
 amused. 
 
 " Like you ? " echoed Mrs Leopold. " They would 
 worship you. ... So distingue, so ar-ristocratic, so 
 —so ''' 
 
 "Now, tell me, Stavart," said his host, "you've 
 made up your mind to compose your opera. Nothing 
 will shake your determination ? " 
 
 " Nothing — absolutely nothing." 
 
 " And it will take six months ? " 
 
 " At least. Perhaps a year." 
 
 " And then ? " 
 
 " Well, my dear fellow, if you will then arrange some 
 more recitals for me in London I shall be delighted." 
 
 " And Berlin and Paris ? " 
 
 " Well, it depends — depends on my private affairs, 
 you know. We can discuss the matter in a few months' 
 time." 
 
 " And to-morrow we can talk about your opera — 
 from a business standpoint, I mean." 
 
 "Wh}^ yes, certainly," said Martin, not quite 
 gathering the drift of his host's remark. 
 
 " Good, I can offer you terms, Stavart. Your opera 
 shall be given wherever opera is given." 
 
 Stavart knew Leopold sufficiently well to be aware
 
 70 THE POISONER 
 
 that he never said a word he did not mean. It was 
 indeed Leopold's faith in Martin that had been at the 
 back of the latter's success. The concert agent had a 
 flair not only for successful strokes of business, as he 
 had boasted, but for people as well, and in Martin he 
 recognised a personality so magnetic, so outre, and yet 
 so full of dignity and masterfulness that in every large 
 city he would attract a host of admirers. In art — 
 as in business— personality was more than half the 
 battle. 
 
 Martin's dilatoriness in testing his powers with the 
 public had, more than two years ago, been overcome by 
 Leopold. It was his concert agent who had cajoled 
 and bullied him, who had given him more self-confidence, 
 who had, as it were, " discovered " him and exploited 
 him. For this Martin was grateful, but it was his 
 nature to jib at any grandiose plans Leopold might 
 make for his future. And yet all Leopold's prophecies 
 had been fulfilled. Not a single hitch had ever arisen. 
 The two men had confidence in each other. Leopold's 
 expert advisers had assured him that Martin had genius, 
 and he himself recognised the peculiar attraction of his 
 personality. Martin, on his side, had every faith in 
 Leopold's business capacity, and he found both him 
 and his wife amusing, if rather absurd, people. 
 
 • ••••••• 
 
 The first thing that Martin noticed next morning 
 was Mrs Leopold's smile : it was waiting for him in the 
 hall. 
 
 " Have I time to telephone to London before 
 breakfast ? " he asked. 
 
 " Well, we'll put the call through for you," she said, 
 " and if you get your number soon, well and good. 
 If you don't, you may get up from the table for a 
 minute or two." 
 
 Until late the previous afternoon Martin had not 
 entertained the idea of giving his consent to Monica's 
 presence at his first recital. A month ago, on hearing 
 of her intention to go to the Apollo Hall, he had
 
 THE POISONER 71 
 
 instinctively vetoed it without giving the matter much 
 thought. He felt that she would not " fit " in the 
 audience he w-as likely to gather together ; she would 
 strike a discordant note ; her virginal innocence would 
 be a disturbing influence. But he felt more than this, 
 though unconsciously. If he had analysed his motives, 
 he would have discovered that what he feared was her 
 discovery of himself ; through the ambush of his 
 outward charm she might catch a glimpse of the 
 sleeping beast. 
 
 But yesterday, when travelling to Maidenhead alone, 
 after his journey with Monica from Barton to London, 
 it had seemed to him that, in denying her permission 
 to attend his recital, he was depriving both himself 
 and her of pleasure. It was useless for him to deny 
 that he was anxious for Monica to witness his triumph ; 
 useless to tell himself that he was superior to all that 
 kind of sex vanity that instigates so many lovers to 
 showy deeds. Monica must be present. Risk ? It 
 was infinitesimal. She had heard him play a hundred 
 times, had heard his music a hundred times. Yet she 
 had never guessed. Not even a suspicion ; not even 
 the smallest inkling of the truth. 
 
 The call was put through before breakfast. 
 
 " Is that you, Monica ? Martin speaking. Good 
 morning ! Are you free this morning ? " 
 
 " Well, we were going to see Chu Chin Chow, but we 
 can easily put that off if it's anything important." 
 
 " Have you booked seats ? " 
 
 "No." ' 
 
 " Well, you'll never get in. Booked up weeks, if 
 not months, ahead. I was wondering if you and your 
 friend would care to come and hear me. I shall be 
 in great form." 
 
 " Oh, Martin, how splendid ! But you are sure you 
 don't mind ! " 
 
 " On the contrary, I shall be bitterly disappointed 
 if you're not there." 
 
 It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him why he
 
 72 THE POISONER 
 
 had so suddenly changed his mind on this subject ; 
 but she refrained, though, as she did so, it was registered 
 in her brain that this was the first time in her experience 
 that Martin's conduct had been inexpHcable. 
 
 " But of course we'll come. I shall wear my new 
 pink frock." 
 
 " Well, that's splendid of you ! I'll leave the 
 tickets at the box office. They'll be in an envelope 
 addressed to you. And, look here, Monica ; ask your 
 friend if she'll come to tea with us afterwards. As soon 
 as I've finished my fifth encore at the end of the recital " 
 — he laughed — " come round to the back entrance. I 
 shall be waiting for you. Good-bye." 
 
 On his return to the breakfast-room, Mrs Leopold's 
 gay smile suggested that it was very playful of him to 
 want to telephone so early in the day. Her eyebrows 
 said : " Oh, you men ! How you do carry on ! " And 
 the way in which, her plump arm rounded, she tucked 
 in a loose strand of her very yellow hair, added a note 
 of coquetry to her manner. In reality she found 
 Martin rather dull, but was he not, in Francis's mind, 
 going to add substantially to their fortune ? He had 
 been won over by her husband, but he must be won 
 over by herself as well. Her method of " winning him 
 over " was what might be called the motherly-arch 
 method. It had succeeded with other men. 
 
 Leopold came into the room waving that morning's 
 Daily Marconigraph. 
 
 " Here you are," he said ; " look ! " 
 
 On the front page was an entire column advertisement 
 devoted to Martin — extracts from criticisms of his 
 playing and of his compositions. Ernest Newman of 
 The Observer was quoted, Robin Legge of The Daily 
 Telegraph, Edwin Evans of The Musical Times, Samuel 
 Langford of The Manchester Guardian, A. J. Sheldon 
 of The Birtningham Daily Post, R. Capell of The Daily 
 Mail, and many other notable critics. It was an 
 imposing, even a staggering, column. 
 
 " Golly ! " said Martin, throwing the paper on a sofa
 
 THE POISONER 73 
 
 and covering it with a cushion. "But, Leopold, why 
 this expense ? What did it cost ? " 
 
 " Well, it wasn't done for nothing, I can tell you. 
 But here's coffee and things." 
 
 They sat down at the flower-covered table. 
 
 " You see, Stavart," said Leopold, " one doesn't 
 always advertise in the hope of getting immediate 
 results. Even business men have to think of the future 
 sometimes. I'm building up your reputation — putting 
 it on a firm basis. That column is one of the smaller 
 foundation-stones. To-day, between twelve-thirty and 
 three, Pagani's — by the way, we's lunching at Pagani's 
 — will be buzzing with it. The provinces will raise 
 their eyebrows, and your name will whisper itself into 
 the ears of the musicians of New York." 
 
 " How interesting," said Martin ; " how very interest- 
 ing. Mrs Leopold, will you do me a favour ? " 
 
 " Of course. What is it ? Do you want another 
 kidney ? " 
 
 " Not at the moment, thank you. I want you to 
 forbid your husband to talk of me any more. Really, 
 Leopold, I mean it. I love praise, of course, but you 
 often seem to discuss me as though I were a new kind 
 of patent medicine or shaving soap." 
 
 After breakfast Leopold showed Martin his hot- 
 houses and forcing-beds. It was while they were 
 idly gazing at a pool of lethargic gold-fish that Leopold 
 broached the sul3Ject of Martin's opera. Martin knew 
 enough of the business side both of publishing and 
 operatic production to recognise that the terms his 
 agent had to offer him were extremely generous. 
 Perhaps his experience had not been very wide, but 
 he had always found publishers and agents particularly 
 reasonable and accommodating people. 
 
 It was not until nearly eleven o'clock that Leopold 
 appeared to recall the fact that he had work to do in 
 town. 
 
 His wife waved them a coquettish good-bye as the 
 car, crunching the gravelled drive, made its fussy exit
 
 74 THE POISONER 
 
 from the grounds. They passed down leafy Tcnnysonian 
 lanes whose banks were covered with flowers ; the little 
 woods were alive with birds ; through the trees they 
 caught glimpses of the self-satisfied Thames. 
 
 "■ Charming country, eh ? " said Leopold, 
 
 " Oh yes ; quite charming. Like a little girl with 
 a blue sash on going to her first party. One only hopes 
 she won't spill tea on her new frock." 
 
 " What on earth do you mean ? " 
 
 "Well, really, I don't quite know. But don't you 
 find it all a bit irritating ? To live w^ith, I mean. So 
 suave, so fatly contented, so excessively soothing." 
 
 " Oh, we like that, Judith and I," said Leopold rather 
 lamely. 
 
 " One imagines the ghost of Alfred Austin decorating 
 these woods with his simpering smile. That's the 
 word, Leopold, ' simpering ' : this stretch of country 
 simpers." 
 
 " Does it ? " asked his companion vaguely. " I 
 dare say you're right, Stavart. You know more about 
 that sort of thing than I do." 
 
 Martin laughed. 
 
 " You're an old humbug, Leopold, and you know it." 
 
 Leopold, feeling more than ever at sea, changed the 
 subject. 
 
 " Talking about scenery, Stavart, I want to discuss 
 with you the question of encores. Do you propose to 
 give any ? " 
 
 " If they're asked for — really demanded, I mean — 
 I shall, of course." 
 
 " Well, I feel that you ought to put yourself in my 
 hands in this matter. Don't be too kind. Do you 
 know what an audience, especially a very fashionable 
 audience, really loves ? It likes to be treated with in- 
 difference — an indifference that borders on, but never 
 really reaches, contempt. I'm telling you what I 
 know, Stavart. Fashionable people like being spurned." 
 
 " Splendid word — ' spurned ' ! " said Martin soito voce. 
 
 " But they do. It's a new sensation to them. It
 
 THE POISONER 75 
 
 whets their appetite, increases their ardour. If you 
 play them half-a-dozen encores, they'll think they can 
 do what they like with you and then you will lose some 
 of your mystery." 
 
 " And that, I suppose, would be fatal. But what 
 about Pachmann and Paderewski ? I've heard both 
 of them give a sort of post-recital, the audience crowd- 
 ing round them on the platform, at the end of two hours' 
 playing — yet they're more popular now than they've 
 ever been." 
 
 " True. But you're different. You entice and hold 
 your public by a kind of mystery that hangs about you. 
 The more mysterious you are, the more firmly will your 
 admirers stick to you." 
 
 " So I am to exploit my personality ? " 
 
 " Well, isn't that what all artists do ? " 
 
 " Oh yes. Please don't imagine for a moment that 
 I object to exploiting any funny little idiosyncrasies I 
 may possess : it's all in the day's work. But what I 
 want to understand is this quality of mystery that you 
 say I possess. What is it, precisely ? " 
 
 " If I could explain it, it wouldn't be there. It's a 
 contradiction— an opposition : your — oh, damn it, 
 Stavart ! . . . I'm no good at this sort of thing. Any- 
 how, it's there. You've got your admirers in the hollow 
 of your hand, and your fingers are closed about them. 
 Keep 'em there ! Don't give them more than is good 
 for them ! Don't spoil them ! I'll allow you to give 
 one encore only. At your final recital you may give 
 as many as you please." 
 
 " In these matters, Leopold, I am as a little child. 
 Your orders shall be obeyed." 
 
 They were now in suburban London, and a slight 
 oppressiveness, oozing from this hideousness, descended 
 upon both men." 
 
 " I think I'll go to South Kensington till lunch- time," 
 said Martin, " and look at the Rodin and da Vinci 
 things. I've not seen them for nearly two years." 
 
 Leopold's office was in Bond Street.
 
 76. THE POISONER 
 
 " You'd better come in for a minute to read your 
 letters," suggested Leopold, when the car had drawn 
 up at a block of business offices. 
 
 Among the handful of letters awaiting him were 
 only three of any interest. The first letter he opened 
 was from Monica. It was just the unforced, sympathetic 
 kind of note he would expect her to write. It was 
 dated the previous evening, evidently having been 
 written immediately on her arrival in Chelsea, and 
 wished him the best of luck. A few letters of similar 
 tenor from various friends were cursorily read, until 
 his eye caught the small but very picturesque hand- 
 writing of Symons ; walking over to a seat in a corner 
 of the room, he opened the letter, and read : 
 
 My dear Boy : — You have been gone but a few 
 hours, yet already the house seems different without 
 you. It is different. But my imagination takes me 
 out of it and carries me to London — that city which 
 was always so cruel to your father and has been always 
 so indifferent to me. This afternoon, as I lay in bed, I 
 saw your and Monica's arrival at Euston ; I entered 
 the taxi with you ; I was by your side in the train from 
 Paddington to Maidenhead. The weak, Martin, always 
 live their real lives in the actions of the strong. What 
 I in my seventy years have failed to do, you are on the 
 brink of accomplishing in your youth. Can you wonder, 
 therefore, that I follow you from place to place — that 
 in your youth I live again ? 
 
 But this note is just to wish you well and to tell you 
 that while you are playing to-morrow I shall be with 
 you. 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 Henry Symons. 
 
 Martin replaced the letter in its envelope, reflecting, 
 as he did so, that never, even in his boyhood, had he 
 received an affectionate message from his father. 
 
 The last letter he opened he tore into fragments 
 as soon as he had read it.
 
 THE POISONER 77 
 
 " In spite of what you said to me two months ago, 
 I feel that I cannot let this opportunity pass without 
 telling you that I am still your well-wisher and that 
 I hope your concerts will be as successful as you 
 deserve. 
 
 " Frederic Morgan."
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 FRANCIS LEOPOLD was by no means the sort 
 of man to leave the details of any of his big 
 " stunts " to a second person, though it is true 
 he had consulted his wife about the decoration of the 
 Apollo Hall. 
 
 " Flowers," she had said. " They're cheap in June. 
 Smother the platform with flowers. Let him walk on 
 into the very midst of them." 
 
 " N — no. I think not. To begin with, he's not that 
 kind of man. And then flowers are awfully vieux jeu. 
 Melba, now, or Tetrazzini ; but not Stavart. I)o 
 suggest something, dear. Something original, but not 
 outre.'''' 
 
 But Mrs Leopold who, after all, was not a very 
 resourceful woman, had been unable to suggest any- 
 thing, and in the end her husband had been com- 
 pelled to adopt a modification of her very obvious 
 suggestion. 
 
 " I want just a note — a spot of colour," he said to 
 his secretary. " Scarlet, I think. Yes. Two bowls 
 of scarlet tulips. Are there such things ? One on 
 either side of the piano. And we'll get young Nevinson 
 to do a design for the programme. Rather expensive, 
 I know, but I think we can run to twenty guineas 
 or so." He smiled with self-satisfaction. "And — 
 yes ! I think we'll get Stavart to autograph each 
 copy." 
 
 " I think not, sir," said his secretary, looking at his 
 polished finger-nails with an abstracted air. 
 
 " You think not ? " 
 
 " Yes. It's cheap. We don't want to cheapen 
 him." 
 
 " Very well then. No autographs. See that some 
 scarlet tulips are found, won't you ? If Nature doesn't 
 make them — have them dyed." 
 
 " Poppies, sir." 
 
 " You think poppies ? " 
 
 "I do." 
 
 So when Stavart came up the oak staircase leading 
 
 78
 
 THE POISONER 79 
 
 to the circular platform, he saw a black bowl of scarlet 
 poppies on either side of him. 
 
 " Good Lord ! " he exclaimed to himself, " what a 
 man Leopold is ! " 
 
 But Leopold's instinct had been right. The little 
 decorative scheme on the platform struck exactly the 
 correct note, and Martin's female worshippers un- 
 consciously took pleasure in the contrast between his 
 pale cheeks and black hair and the vivid scarlet of the 
 flowers. The Countess de Maracholi called her escort's 
 attention to the colour of Martin's eyes. 
 
 " Very remarkable," she said. " The eyes of most 
 people sitting two yards away have no colour at all. 
 But you could see the colour of Stavart's eyes across 
 the road. I've never seen such a blue ! " 
 
 Prince Radiosinsky smiled disagreeably as he faced 
 the fact that his own eyes were of that nondescript 
 colour called hazel. . . . 
 
 To Monica, sitting with her friend Margaret Luton, 
 Martin seemed almost a stranger. It was as though 
 he wore a mask. As he bowed to the applauding women 
 he looked hostile and slightly contemptuous. And 
 indeed, his looks expressed his feelings. These people 
 had come not to hear but to see him. As he sat down 
 at the pianoforte, he reflected rather bitterly that just 
 as some people collect foreign postage stamps, others 
 collected personalities. He was to them a rare — perhaps 
 a unique — specimen, 
 
 Leopold, at the foot of the staircase, listened with 
 strong approval to the kid-gloved applause and the 
 well-bred rustle of excitement that followed each piece. 
 He was an expert in applause. He cared nothing for 
 the whistling and shouting of the unmoneyed gallery, 
 nor for the hearty approval of the pit ; these Avere for 
 other, and smaller men. He gauged the value of 
 applause not by its quantity but by its quality. And 
 the just-heard sigh that trembled on the air at the con- 
 clusion of Palmgren's Cradle Song was sweeter to him 
 than the frantic yells of the uneducated plebs.
 
 80 THE POISONER 
 
 The audience, indeed, " succeeded." Stavart's play- 
 ing of a little group of Chopin pieces was a criticism 
 rather than an interpretation ; he " guyed " them ever 
 so slightl}^ throwing upon their rather intense senti- 
 mentality a cynicism that the modern point of view 
 seemed to justify. But he made of the B-flat minor 
 Scherzo a thing of brittle fragility ; the skeleton of it 
 was pieced together by wires : the bones of it were of 
 chalk : it stretched out its disconcertingly thin limbs 
 vaguely and wanly. ... In his hands the hurricane- 
 like close reminded more than one of his listeners 
 of the imitation wind one sometimes hears on the 
 stage. 
 
 But it was his album of Psychological Studies that 
 achieved the great hit of the afternoon. They were 
 extremely varied both in subject and style. One, 
 entitled The Lovers, was almost insultingly impertinent. 
 Two halting melodies, played simultaneously but 
 separated by a couple of octaves, crept closer and closer 
 together until, meeting, they merged one into the other 
 in a discordant bombilation and suffocation that 
 struggled upwards on to the leger lines of the music 
 paper, where it died in feminine shrieks. . . . The 
 Countess de Maracholi tittered, and through the hall 
 went a murmur of delighted satisfaction. The little 
 dart of poison had found its place in the minds of the 
 listening women. . . . More music, equivocal and 
 miasmic, followed. The five daughters of Lord Salford 
 gloated ; their intuitions were never astray. Monica, 
 taking the music at its surface value, as her unsuspect- 
 ing heart took everj^thing, frowned with puzzlement at 
 the attitude of the audience. Her friend, Margaret, 
 at first enthusiastic, because Martin was Monica's 
 friend, became by slow degrees unresponsive and then 
 secretly hostile. 
 
 The recital over, the audience showed a disinclination 
 to disband. The women tapped their parasols upon the 
 floor, or banged their podgy, gloved hands together ; two 
 or three cried " Bravo ! " each time Martin reappeared
 
 THE POISONER 81 
 
 upon the platform ; and the men, incited by their 
 female companions, added to the applause. 
 
 But the Countess de Maracholi was busy writing the 
 following on her programme : 
 
 The Countess de Maracholi presents her compliments 
 to Martin Stavart, Esq., and would be grateful if he 
 ivould improvise 07i this theme that has just occttrrcd 
 to her. Perhaps Mr Stavart will do this for us — 
 for her ? 
 
 " Please take this to one of the attendants," she said 
 to Prince Radiosinsky, " and tell him to give it to 
 Stavart immediately." 
 
 The Prince, imperturbed, did as he had been bidden. 
 
 A couple of minutes later, Martin, having been 
 recalled to the platform for the seventh or eighth time, 
 went to the pianoforte, fixed the music-stand in 
 position, and placed upon it the Countess de Maracholi' s 
 programme. Before he began plajdng, his gaze swept 
 the audience in front and at each side of him ; his eyes 
 were for a second arrested by the dark, expectant eyes 
 of a woman seated in the front row. In that second 
 he had given and received a message. 
 
 True improvisation is one of the rarest of the arts, 
 and to appreciate it at its full value the listener must 
 himself be a musician. Martin vaguely w^ondered why 
 the Countess had written her " subject " twice, the 
 first time in C minor and the second in F minor, and 
 decided that it had been done to prove to him that she 
 was not altogether without knowledge of music — that 
 he indeed was free to exercise all his scholarship, for 
 she would follow and understand. So he concentrated 
 his powers on the little theme, so bald and unpromising, 
 and made of it a series of vignettes in the style of 
 Schumann's Papillons. Each idea issued from its 
 
 F
 
 82 THE POISONER 
 
 predecessor without effort. The last of all was tender 
 and wistful, and ended questioningly on the chord of 
 the dominant seventh. . . . 
 
 Martin was waiting for Monica and her friend when 
 they arrived at the back entrance of the Apollo Hall. 
 Miss Luton and Martin met for the first time. As he 
 shook hands, he looked into a pair of eyes that, though 
 candid, were also wise. She was tall, dark and upright. 
 At the first glance she gave one the impression that she 
 was extremely competent and level-headed, and Martin 
 was quick to notice that she seemed to put her entire 
 personality into her slightest action. She was self- 
 contained rather than self-assured, and the congratu- 
 lations she offered Stavart were devoid of undue 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 It was not until they were seated at their table in 
 the Regent Street teashop that Martin noticed Monica 
 was ill at ease. 
 
 " You have said very little, Monica," he began. 
 " You were not satisfied with my recital. You did 
 not like it." 
 
 " Oh yes, I did— immensely," she said impulsively, 
 " but . . . the audience ! Where do such people 
 come from ? " 
 
 "Oh, Belgravia chiefly," said Miss Luton indifferently, 
 " but there was a sprinkling from Hampstead and I 
 expect there'd be one or two from Sloane Street and 
 the Chelsea Embankment." 
 
 " But why didn't you like them ? " asked Martin. 
 
 " That's just what I can't tell you. Somethings 
 I don't know what it was. ' Knowing ' is almost the 
 word. I didn't like the way they almost giggled." 
 
 " From the way they behaved," said Miss Luton, 
 looking Martin straight in the eyes, " you might almost 
 have been Yvette Guilbcrt singing her risky songs." 
 
 " Yes ; they were rather a rotten crowd. But 
 every pianist, I suppose, gets the kind of audience he 
 deserves." 
 
 Martin already felt that his little tea-party was a
 
 THE POISONER 83 
 
 failure. It was clear that Miss Luton and he were 
 not going to be friends. And Monica, for once, was 
 unaccountably tactless. He felt that he had been 
 adversely criticised by both his guests, for though he 
 could, without injury to himself, disapprove of and 
 despise his audience, it was a very different matter 
 when that audience was condemned by others. 
 
 He broke a few minutes' awkward silence by : 
 
 "Who is the Countess de Maracholi ? " 
 
 As he asked the question he took from his pocket the 
 programme on which that lady's request was written. 
 
 Miss Luton's gaze dropped before the attack of his 
 eyes. 
 
 " I don't know. I don't think she is anyone in 
 particular, but she goes everywhere. She is the kind of 
 lady who gets her photograph into the illustrated 
 papers." 
 
 Her voice was pitched on a note of well-bred contempt. 
 
 " Is she clever ? " 
 
 " Well, I suppose she has that kind of cleverness." 
 
 " And the man who was with her— who is he ? " 
 
 " Really — Mr Stavart, I don't know. Are you going 
 to the Opera to-night ? " 
 
 Martin was not going to the Opera, and after he had 
 conveyed this fact to Miss Luton there fell another 
 painful silence. He was now depressed and appre- 
 hensive, as he always was when he met an honest man 
 or woman who palpably disliked him. At the back of 
 his mind he was asking himself what it was that Miss 
 Luton had discovered. He was relieved when, tea 
 finished, the ladies prepared to depart. 
 
 " When shall I see you again ? " he asked Monica. 
 
 Monica looked at her friend with questioning eyes. 
 
 " Oh, I was going to ask you, Mr Stavart," said Miss 
 Luton, regretting and obviously trying to overcome 
 her dislike of Martin ; "I am having music at my 
 studio to-morrow evening at nine. I should be glad " 
 — she hesitated for a fraction of a second — " awfully 
 glad if you would come."
 
 84 THE POISONER 
 
 Her awkwardness disturbed him strangely, and it was 
 with an effort that he answered. 
 
 " You are very kind : I shall be delighted. But I 
 go to visit Sir Henry Chillingham to-morrow, and it 
 is possible he has already fixed up the evening. If 
 not " 
 
 " Oh, do bring him with you, please," said Miss Luton. 
 
 He left them in the street, explaining that he was 
 going to Leopold's office. 
 
 The two girls walked in silence down Regent Street 
 towards Piccadilly Circus. Monica felt miserable and 
 resentful, and it was some time before she could trust 
 herself to speak. 
 
 " You didn't like it," she blurted out at last ; "I 
 could feel you didn't." 
 
 " I know you could, dear, and that's why I didn't 
 try to conceal my thoughts." 
 
 " But why didn't you like it ? Everybody else did." 
 
 Miss Luton gave her a swift look. 
 
 " I don't know," she answered ; " I just didn't." 
 
 " Oh, but you must know. You mustn't hide any- 
 thing from me, Margaret," she protested, in tremulous, 
 excited tones. 
 
 " Well, did you like it yourself ? " 
 
 " Yes ! I like everything Mr Stavart does. I think 
 he's a magnificent musician." 
 
 " Oh yes, I agree. His playing is absolutely first- 
 rate, and his compositions are extraordinarily original." 
 
 " Then what's the matter ? Why do you dislike 
 him ? " 
 
 Miss Luton hesitated a few moments, considering 
 her answer to this question. 
 
 " I don't disUke him." 
 
 " That's not like you, Margaret. It's unfair to put 
 me off with a silly lib." 
 
 '' But it's true. Well, I don't know whether I like 
 or dislike him. He's disconcerting — that's all. In any 
 case, here's our No. 19." 
 
 But Monica refused to travel to Chelsea by bus.
 
 THE POISONER 85 
 
 " I want to talk," she said ; " we'll take a taxi." 
 When they were seated in the cab Monica at once 
 became overwhelmingly insistent. She spoke as though 
 her present and future happiness depended on her 
 forcing from her friend a confession, an analysis, of 
 her feelings and intuitions with regard to Martin. 
 
 " Listen, Margaret. You have admitted that you 
 didn't like the recital, and now you say you don't know 
 whether you like or dislike Mr Stavart. But we'll 
 leave him out of the question so far as we can. Now, 
 tell me : what was there in the recital you didn't like ? 
 Never mind the audience : it doesn't count." 
 
 Her companion gave no answer. 
 
 " You must tell me, Margaret. It will be unkind 
 of you if you don't. Please — we've always been so 
 absolutely frank with each other." 
 
 " I know, dear. I'll do my best. But it isn't easy 
 for me to dig into my mind and bring things out — even 
 for my own inspection. It's all so vague. ... I 
 think I found the music disagreeable — the way it was 
 played. And though Mr Stavart' s own compositions 
 were frightfully clever, they were . . . what is the 
 word ? . . . they were not nice — unclean." 
 
 Monica recoiled as though she had been struck, for 
 an unknown something in her mind had given an 
 instant affirmation to that word. Margaret's candid, 
 kind eyes sought those of her friend, and she realized 
 that in that moment she had lost her friend : she and 
 Monica could|never again be quite the same towards 
 each other. 
 
 " Oh, Monica dear, I don't know if that is the word. 
 You dragged it out of me." 
 
 " But you said it." 
 
 " Yet I don't know if I meant it." 
 
 " You did ! You did mean it ! And it isn't; true ! 
 Why, Martin is the best, the kindest, the most generous 
 man that ever breathed. You don't know him but I 
 do. That word — that word you used — is as far from 
 Martin as it is from vou."
 
 86 THE POISONER 
 
 They sat in silence for a minute. Then : 
 
 "But you should have told me," said Margaret, in a 
 low voice ; " it wasn't fair. You should have told me 
 that you — that you liked him so much. If I had 
 known that " 
 
 " If you had known I loved him, you wouldn't have 
 said it — that's what you mean." 
 
 She looked at Margaret hotly and miserably for a 
 moment and then turned her face away. 
 
 As the cab swung through Sloane Square into Kmg's 
 Road, she added : 
 
 " Never mind, I know now. We must be careful 
 not to——" 
 
 Margaret, looking at Monica's pale face and dark- 
 rimmed eyes, impulsively placed her hand on Monica's 
 arm. 
 
 " Forgive me," she said. 
 
 " For being honest ? " Monica tried to smile. " Why, 
 there's no question of forgiveness. But you'll change 
 your mind. Before my fortnight with you is finished, 
 you'll cohie to me and tell me you're mistaken." 
 
 But for all Monica's braveness and attempted cheerful- 
 ness, it was a very listless and melancholy figure that 
 opened the door admitting them to Rossetti Studios. 
 She went to her room, brushed her hair, took from a 
 drawer a photograph of Martin, and gazed long and 
 longingly at his strong, appealing and, she sometimes 
 thought, wistful face.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 AS Martin walked towards Leopold's office, he 
 congratulated himself that he had promised 
 to stay only two nights with his agent. The 
 prospect of even one more evening in company with Mrs 
 Leopold's arch smile Avas the reverse of alluring. For 
 the rest of his visit to London he was to stay with Sir 
 Henry Chill ingham at his house in Kensington Square. 
 Chillingham was a bachelor of thirty, whose friendship 
 Martin had gained two years ago, when he had made his 
 first impress on musical and social London — a bachelor 
 of considerable means and artistically expensive tastes. 
 He entertained largely, and he had that childlike 
 reverence for people of great musical talent that is 
 generally possessed by the schoolgirl. . . . 
 
 That evening at Maidenhead taxed Martin's patience 
 to breaking-point. It was not until the middle of 
 dinner that he realized what a heavy strain his recital 
 had imposed upon him. The reaction came suddenly. 
 His gaiety was extinguished instantly, like a flame that 
 is thrust in water. He became moody and silent, and 
 listened with uncomprehending ears to Mrs Leopold's 
 idle chatter. Early in the evening he made an excuse 
 to retire to his room. 
 
 But he could not sleep. An owl hooted in the 
 coppice, mocking him. And when at length he fell 
 into a condition of half-slumber, Margaret Luton's 
 candid eyes gazed at him in the darkness. With a 
 start he came to full consciousness and for a minute 
 tried to control his thoughts, dismiss his fancies. But 
 a phantasmagoria of ugly ideas harried him. From 
 the depths of his brain floated to the surface memories 
 that he had hoped were forgotten, and many thoughts, 
 banned during the day, thronged about him menacingly. 
 In spite of himself, in disobedience of his command, his 
 brain began to torture him : he became his own victim. 
 Several times he told himself that he could regain 
 mastery of his nerves if he rose, turned on the electric 
 light, and faced the sane commonplaceness of material 
 things . But his will was held in thrall . He commanded 
 
 87
 
 88 THE POISONER 
 
 his body to rise, but it did not rise : tortured and 
 full of unrest it lay on the mattress Hke a thing 
 without intelligence. 
 
 And as if his present utter misery were not great 
 enough to satiate his lust for self-torture, his mind 
 became crowded with the memories of his darkest 
 deeds — deeds that, in this hour, seemed infamous. 
 Like de Quincey, he was " kissed by cancerous 
 crocodiles " : the loathsomeness of his flesh lapped, 
 wave-like, about his shrinking spirit. 
 
 Even the happy sun, waking him in the early 
 morning from his wretched sleep, brought him solace 
 but slowly and with reluctance, and as Martin walked 
 downstairs at eight o'clock he felt like a man who 
 has undergone some dream-change in the night. In 
 the familiar phrase, he was " not himself " ; the 
 mood that rode him had wrought an unrecognisable 
 metamorphosis. 
 
 With an effort he threw himself into conversation 
 with his host and hostess and, bit by bit, his customary 
 personality, as it were, came back ; the usual Martin 
 Stavart was restored, but restored shaken and ready 
 for disintegration. 
 
 "Will you walk in the garden with me, Leopold ? " 
 he asked, after breakfast. 
 
 " Feeling cheap ? " asked his host, when they were 
 sauntering down the rose walk. 
 
 " Yes — a bad night. Town often upsets me. And 
 for months I've been workng too hard." 
 
 Leopold looked at him with concern. 
 
 "Do take care of yourself ! " he urged. " What 
 about a day on the river ? " 
 
 " Oh no, thanks. I feel idle. But I'm in that sort 
 of a mood when I don't want to be left alone." 
 
 " The newspapers are late this morning, but 
 you'll soon be able to feast yourself on the critics' 
 praise." 
 
 Martin made a slight gesture of disgust. 
 
 " No ; I don't want to see them. For the moment
 
 THE POISONER 89 
 
 I'm sick of myself. For the past few months I've been 
 Uving too much in my imagination : I've been, if you 
 can understand me, too close to myself. I've seen too 
 much of my own inside." 
 
 He laughed uncomfortably. 
 
 " And then," he continued, " yesterday's recital 
 was more of a strain than I realised. . . . What a rotten 
 audience it was, Leopold ! " 
 
 " Rotten ? I thought you'd be pleased. Why, 
 everyone in the smart set was there — everyone who 
 counts socially." 
 
 " Socially," Martin laughed. " Yes, I daresay. 
 But musically " 
 
 " You are, as you have said, out of sorts," remarked 
 Leopold, uneasy and quite at sea. " You're like a 
 delicate piece of mechanism that is affected by the 
 slightest change of climate. ... I hope you'll get 
 plenty of rest at Chillingham's." 
 
 " Rest ? I don't think I want to rest. I want to 
 forget — to forget myself — forget that I exist — lose 
 myself. It's the modern weakness, Leopold. We all 
 want to forget ourselves ; that's why we read novels 
 and listen to music, and gaze at pictures ; that's why 
 the theatres and music-halls are full and, I daresay, 
 the churches empty." 
 
 This, to Leopold, was a new Stavart. 
 
 " You artists are curious people," he said, feeling his 
 way; "up in the skies one hour, down in the depths 
 the next. Did you ever meet Probotski ? " 
 
 "Well, that's a strange thing! I was just on the 
 point of asking you about him. What is he doing 
 nowadays ? I've heard of all sorts of — well, gossip 
 that he'd gone under altogether." 
 
 " Yes, it's true — or nearly true. A most curious case. 
 You know, he worked like blazes to make a position for 
 himself. You'll remember, of course, what a fine artist 
 he was." 
 
 " Oh yes, I heard him play half-a-dozen times. He 
 was second to none except Kreisler."
 
 90 THE POISONER 
 
 "Well, suddenly something happened — I don't know 
 what. But he woke up one morning to find he didn't 
 care a damn about his success. ' It's like ashes in my 
 mouth,' he told his agent, Harris. Whereas, before, 
 success had been to his imagination what air was to his 
 lungs, it instantly became suffocating. He chucked 
 everything up and now lives in Soho, almost destitute." 
 
 They walked in silence for a few moments. 
 
 Martin threw away his half-finished cigarette and 
 suppressed a sigh that seemed almost to choke him. 
 
 " Poor devil ! " he said. " But I think I under- 
 stand." 
 
 "Do you ? " asked Leopold, in amazement, and with 
 a note of fear in his voice. 
 
 " Oh, don't be afraid ! I shan't follow Probotski's 
 example. I hope he has some vices in which he can 
 find consolation." 
 
 " But he hasn't— that's the strange thing about him. 
 He lives a feckless kind of life, serving across the counter 
 in one of those curious shops in Soho where they sell 
 salted fish, pickles, and Chianti." 
 
 " I'd like to help him," said Martin. 
 
 " You can't. No one can. I myself have been to 
 him, not once but several times, and offered to finance 
 him if he'd take up his work again. Three months' 
 practice— less than that — and he'd be a great violinist 
 once more. But he always gives me a curt refusal." 
 
 " Yes — I'm sure he'd do that. But I didn't mean 
 ' help ' in that way. What you have proposed to him 
 is just like going to a prize-fighter suffering from gallop- 
 ing consumption and telling him you'll make a conqueror 
 of him once more if he'll only take up the gloves. The 
 disease in Probotski lies deep — it is beyond the power 
 of the will. . . . You see, Leopold," added he, looking 
 steadily at his companion in a way that gave his words 
 an unfathomable meaning, " you see, I know something 
 of these things." 
 
 Leopold, embarrassed, put his hand to his face for a 
 moment and coughed.
 
 THE POISONER 91 
 
 "Would it be possible to make him a present of 
 fifty pounds ? " asked Martin. 
 
 "Who? Oh, Probotski. I don't know. If it 
 could be done in such a way that " 
 
 " That's what I mean. Perhaps you could do it for 
 me ? You could tell him it has been sent through you 
 to him from an anonymous admirer, of whose identity 
 you yourself are ignorant." 
 
 " Yes ; I think it might be done." 
 
 For once the Thames scenery soothed Martin as 
 Leopold drove him to town. The river was blue and 
 the fields a dozen shades of green. He was glad to have 
 said a final farewell to Great Gain. . . . 
 
 Chillingham received Martin with charming, rather 
 shy, deference born of a genuine reverence for genius. 
 Though of mature age, he had not yet ceased to regard 
 the world with undimmed wonder, and the secret 
 element of genius — its magical power, its Dionysian, 
 volcanic energy — aroused his devotion and lit his 
 imagination. 
 
 " Please understand," he said to Martin, while the 
 latter's baggage was being carried to his room, " please 
 understand you must do precisely what you want while 
 you are with me. Your time is your own and I am 
 always at your service. This room is your study and 
 the servants have orders to leave you undisturbed." 
 
 Martin threw himself on to a sofa. 
 
 " Peace ! It will all be peaceful ! " he said, with a 
 grateful smile. " After Great Gain and my hostess's 
 . . . well, never mind that. And may I go to sleep ? 
 I've had a wretched night." 
 
 " Why, of course. You look done up. Have a 
 whisky and soda ? " 
 
 For a brief moment Martin hesitated. 
 
 "Well it would be rather nice." 
 
 Chillingham went over to a cellaret in the corner of 
 the room and brought back soda water, a glass, and a 
 decanter of whisky. 
 
 " You'd like to be left alone, wouldn't you ? I
 
 92 THE POISONER 
 
 expect Lawson will be unpacking your things ; he'll 
 get you anything you want both now and at all times. 
 Dinner is at eight." 
 
 Left to himself, Martin poured himself out a drink. 
 Five minutes later he was fast asleep in that quiet, 
 luxurious room. 
 
 • • • • • ■ •• 
 
 Margaret Luton's studio was large and lofty. It 
 always had the appearance of having just been spring- 
 cleaned ; the distempered walls were spotless, the 
 parquet floor gleamed richly with polish, and the 
 furniture suggested irritatingly that it had only just 
 been made. Orderliness and conventionality were the 
 studio's notes. Only in one particular was it different 
 from the kind of thing one might find, say, in Highgate : 
 on the floor, against the entire length of one of the walls, 
 were heaped many cushions, soft, highly coloured, 
 inviting. On these cushions, as Martin and Chillingham 
 entered the studio, were reclining two girls and a plump, 
 short-sighted Irishman, whose face, with its impudent 
 nose and unaggressive double chin, suggested both 
 the street urchin and the philosopher. 
 
 The air was buzzing with talk, and as the two men 
 were being received by Miss Luton, Martin overheard 
 his name beng spoken by a little girl with bobbed hair 
 and malicious eyes. She turned away with an imitation 
 blush when she discovered that his gaze was directed 
 upon her. 
 
 Martin's long sleep and slow, comfortable dinner had 
 restored to him his customary serenity, and in a few 
 minutes he found himself sitting on the cushions next 
 to the Irishman who, with faint splutterings and much 
 earnestness, was giving his two companions his views 
 on Folk Song. Monica, whom Martin had greeted 
 with a very friendly smile and a slight raising of the 
 eyebrows, was the temporary victim of a man with 
 theories on mixed education. 
 
 " Stanford didn't like them at all," said the Irishman. 
 Then he stopped and, turning to Martin, explained :
 
 THE POISONER 93 
 
 " I am talking, Mr Stavart, about a volume of Irish 
 Folk Songs, just published, for which I have written 
 modern accompaniments. As I was sayng, Stanford 
 didn't like them at all. I was glad ; I shouldn't like 
 to be liked by Stanford. And Cecil Sharp ! . . . Well, 
 he's established a sort of corner in Folk Songs. But 
 not mine. Practically all my melodies were sung to 
 me as a child when I sat on my nurse's knee," he 
 concluded sentimentally. 
 
 " Why, you must be Thomas O'Sullivan ! " exclaimed 
 Martin. " Excuse me, but I didn't catch your name 
 when we were introduced. Your publishers sent me 
 a copy of your songs a fortnight ago, and your music 
 has been haunting my brain ever since." 
 
 Though O'Sullivan was enormously gratified, his 
 pride and what he considered he owed to his personal 
 dignity would not permit him to give expression to his 
 native geniality ; instead, his manner cooled just 
 perceptibly, and he, so to speak, screwed up his intellect 
 a notch higher and, in consequence, became flatulently 
 dull. He resumed his faint splutterings, and Martin's 
 wandering attention caught : 
 
 " This wholly artificial movement. . . . Rather 
 splendid, don't you know. . . . After all, we must live 
 in our own times. . . . Might as well ask Compton 
 Mackenzie to write in the language of Chaucer. . . . 
 This is an epoch of cinemas " 
 
 The monotonous, low-pitched voice droned on and 
 ceased abruptly only when someone struck a chord on 
 the piano as if to command silence. 
 
 Then those who were standing obtained chairs or 
 sat on the cushioned side of the floor, and someone 
 began to sing. For the first time Martin was able to 
 give his undivided attention to his fellow-guests. His 
 eyes roamed from one face to another, until, without 
 warning, they reached Monica. Her eyes were cast 
 down, but she appeared conscious of his sharp, surprised 
 scrutiny, for her unnaturally pale face suddenly be- 
 came flushed. She stirred uneasily. Martin, a prey to
 
 94 THE POISONER 
 
 a quick agitation of whose origin he was ignorant, 
 transferred his gaze to the singer. He was conscious 
 of the beating of his heart and his hands trembled. 
 
 Applause came, and the singer smiled ; but at least 
 two present had not heard a note of her music. 
 
 Then someone played the slow movement from John 
 Ireland's first Violin Sonata. Once again Martin's 
 eyes sought Monica. She was now mistress of herself, 
 and if she knew that she was the object of her lover's 
 gaze, she betrayed no sign. He noted her tiredness 
 and he saw in her averted eyes signs of unhappiness, 
 of distress. She perhaps like him had lain awake the 
 whole night through ; she, maybe, had undergone some 
 dream-change in the dark hours. For it seemed to 
 him that since yesterday she had grown from a girl 
 into a woman. It was as though she had discovered 
 the real meaning of life — almost as though she had 
 been disillusioned. In any case, it was certain that 
 she had begun to doubt, that some oppressive misery 
 encompassed her. 
 
 Martin longed to cross the room to be with her — 
 longed to be reassured by her steady, kind voice; 
 longed to bring to her face her quick smile. But almost 
 as soon as the violinist had finished, the little girl with 
 bobbed hair and malicious eyes went to the piano with 
 a confident air, and with splendid self-assurance sat 
 down and swept her gaze round the room in the manner 
 of one who is about to impart a secret. 
 
 With a feeling of disgust, almost of nausea, Martin 
 heard the hesitating, opening phrase of his own com- 
 position, The Young Girl Goes into the Wood. He 
 muttered a curse and closed his hands tightly in order 
 to endure the ordeal with some appearance of calmness. 
 In his present mood it seemed inconceivable to him 
 that he had ever written that music. It was more 
 daring, more impertinent, more gross indeed than he 
 had ever realized. His feeling of repulsion was 
 accentuated by the manner in which it was played. The 
 girl at the piano, looking demure and innocent, played
 
 THE POISONER 95 
 
 in the free, quasi-inspired manner of one who improvises; 
 each happy phrase, as it floated upon the air, seemed 
 to have been made for the first time— and the sumptuous 
 harmonies of the final section melted the one into the 
 other like the colours of a rainbow. 
 
 The piece came to a close, and two or three people 
 laughed in rather self-conscious amusement. Those 
 who did not know the music's secret turned question- 
 ingly to the player who, for her part, stared at Martin 
 and waited for a word of approval. It was not given. 
 Instead he flashed her a cold look of disdain. Her 
 malicious eyes hardened and she tauntingly hummed 
 one of the wicked little phrases she had just played. 
 
 Later in the evening Martin found an opportunity 
 to approach Monica. 
 
 " All this is new to you," he said, with a smile ; " how 
 do you like it ? " 
 
 Her answering smile was rather pitiful. 
 
 " London itself is new to me. Just at present I 
 find it very bewildering. The people are different, and 
 I begin to feel different myself." 
 
 She turned quickly to see if they could be overheard. 
 Then, with a quick rush of words, she began : 
 
 " Martin, I am so sorry about yesterday. I was 
 perfectly horrid to you — I know I was. It must have 
 seemed to you as if I hadn't enjoyed your recital in the 
 least — as if I disapproved of you in some way. But I 
 did enjoy it. And I donH disapprove of you. I don't 
 know what was the matter with me. . . . No, don't 
 interrupt ! You see, I am only a kind of country cousin 
 on her first visit to London. Everything is different 
 from what I expected. Even Margaret is different. 
 And yesterday's audience of rouged women and 
 cynical young men " 
 
 Her voice had become louder tlian was necessary, and 
 her manner was a little distraught. Martin placed his 
 hand gently on her arm for a second. 
 
 " I understand, Monica," he said, his eyes swooping 
 into hers. "I understand perfectly. I understood
 
 96 THE POISONER 
 
 yesterday. London at this moment is more over- 
 civilised than ever, and yesterday you saw a side of it 
 that is not very pleasant. But you must remember 
 that you are now in one of the world's big centres — a 
 vast whirlpool that throws up to the surface many 
 undesirable objects." 
 
 " Yes," said Monica doubtfully, " I see. I quite 
 understand. But you, Martin, are not like the others." 
 
 But even as she spoke, Martin could feel that she 
 did so, not in order to communicate something to him 
 but to reassure herself. 
 
 " No ? Well people can be in the midst of the world 
 and not yet of it. You will settle down soon, dear." 
 
 The delicious word slipped out, and for a moment 
 Monica felt intense happiness ; but immediately she 
 told herself that the tone in which it had been spoken 
 was that of a brother. Still it warmed her and drove 
 away her feeling of loneliness. It was a great deal, in 
 this hour, to have a friend upon whom she could lean. 
 
 " Yes," she agreed, " I shall settle down soon." 
 
 She stood close to him, happy in his physical nearness. 
 But Martin did not share her happiness. The spirit of 
 self-reproach was always near him, ready to spring upon 
 and victimise him, and he now began to tell himself, 
 in swift, broken sentences, that his usual attitude to 
 Monica was ungenerous, unmanly, selfish ; more — it 
 was cruel. If he loved her, why did he not marry her ? 
 The crude, violent question came into his consciousness 
 like a messenger from outside, and his mind hung poised 
 over the word " if." So perhaps, after all, this was not 
 love that he felt ; perhaps Monica was only the con- 
 venient object on which his youthful longing had been 
 focused during these strenuous months. Perhaps it 
 was her remote innocence that attracted him ; perhaps 
 she, because of the dissimilarity of her nature, was but a 
 force that pressed his compositions from his brain as a 
 hand may squeeze water from a full sponge. Certainly 
 in his feeling for her there was little enough phj^sical 
 passion . . . yet he had passion in abundance.
 
 THE POISONER 97 
 
 He looked at her from the tail of his eye. Ten 
 minutes ago she had seemed miserable and lost and ill ; 
 now she had both colour and animation. 
 
 " What are Miss Luton's plans while you are here ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " We're doing a few theatres and concerts and things, 
 and we've arranged one or two excursions up the river. 
 But Margaret works every morning. She's doing a 
 big picture for next year's Academy, and she's got three 
 orders for portraits." 
 
 "Well, let me show you Hyde Park to-morrow 
 morning. You've not seen it yet, I suppose ? " 
 
 " No. You mean me to come alone ? " 
 
 "Why not? Of course." 
 
 " Yes. It'll be different from the old Stannar, 
 won't it ? But not half so beautiful. Of course I'll 
 
 come."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 JUST as there are certain chemical compounds 
 whose composition is so unstable that the least 
 disturbance from without radically changes their 
 nature, so there are individualities that react 
 violently to change of environment. London tugs at 
 and pushes against sensitive natures with a force that 
 disintegrates ; their shifting personalities change shape 
 and colour from day to day. Nearly all large cities 
 where life is vivid and activity unending have this 
 disturbing power, but it is only the highly strung and 
 the imaginative who feel it. 
 
 Martin's restlessness and sudden changes of mood 
 were awakened by London's chronic fever. During 
 these sunny, cool days of June he was continually 
 agitated by an irrepressible energy — a desire to spend 
 himself on excitement, a hunger to get at the very core 
 of life. Even the most watchful of us know little of 
 what passes within our brains, and Martin was un- 
 aware that his restlessness was but an expression of 
 his desire to escape from himself. The Martin Stavart 
 who had lived in Barton had, on the whole, been well 
 content with the daily round, the common task ; the 
 Martin Stavart now in London longed for he knew 
 not what. So he dissipated himself for days and 
 nights on the pleasurable things of life that, though 
 they never bring happiness or content, seduce even 
 the wisest. 
 
 Towards the end of his second week in London, the 
 morning after his third recital, he and Chillingham 
 were sitting in the breakfast-room. They had finished 
 their meal, and had just lit the best cigarette of the 
 day. 
 
 " To tell you the truth," said Martin, " I don't feel 
 up to anything. London has completely demoralised 
 me. I feel like the man in Masefield's Sea Fever. I 
 would go down to the sea in ships — anything for a 
 change ! " 
 
 " Why not stay indoors and rest ? " 
 
 Martin smiled wryly. 
 
 98
 
 THE POISONER 99 
 
 " I can't. I couldn't sit still for half-an-hour. 
 What a gorgeous performance of Tristan last night ! " 
 
 " Yes — but the Countess de Maracholi ? " 
 
 Martin rose from the table and sank tiredly into an 
 easy-chair by the open window. 
 
 " I don't know. We'll go. No, we won't. Yes, we 
 will. . . . That's just how I feel about it. Honestly, 
 Chillingham, I don't care a damn whether we go or 
 not. What do you think ? " 
 
 " Well, she's terribly exhausting. She'll compel you 
 to play and talk, and perhaps even she'll want to make 
 love to you." 
 
 " Why do certain women do that ? Make love to 
 one, I mean. It always makes me feel dreadfully shy." 
 
 " Yes ? Well, London is like that these days. But 
 you should turn the tables on them. ..." 
 
 " I'm just about to — at least — oh, hang it, Chilling- 
 ham, can you picture me as a married man ? " 
 
 " Of course ! Why not ? I think men of your type 
 always make first-rate husbands." 
 
 " My type ? I wonder what my type is." 
 
 "Well, you ought to — excuse the expression! — you 
 ought to settle down. I feel about you, Stavart, that 
 you might run off at a tangent almost any day." 
 
 " You think me unstable ? " 
 
 " No man who has worked as you have done can be 
 unstable. What I mean is . . . well, I'm dashed if 
 I know what I do mean. You seem to me — lost. 
 Aimless — no, I don't mean aimless. Lost is the word. 
 You're like someone travelling in a forest, companionless 
 and with no path under your feet." 
 
 " And a wife, you think " 
 
 " She'd make a path for you. Why, you must have 
 seen the thing happen dozens of times." 
 
 " Yes ; I have. But the husband can never make 
 his own trail; he is led by his wife. . . . Oh! what 
 damned nonsense I'm talking ! Are we lunching at 
 home to-day ? " 
 
 *' Just as you like."
 
 100 THE POISONER 
 
 " My dear chap, those are just the words you must 
 not say. It mustn't be as / Hke. I haven't the 
 will-power to make a single decision — even about 
 lunch." 
 
 " Well, we'll go to the Ritz." 
 
 " Yes, and meet that dreadful Sampson woman and 
 those awful Mathers people ! No, Chillingham, we'll 
 go — we'll go — I know : we'll go to Henley and lunch 
 at that little hotel by the river. And then you shall 
 take me out in a sailing-boat and I, like Cleopatra in 
 her barge on the Nile, will lie back in the stern on hard 
 cushions. Yes, and I'll smoke cigars. And in the 
 evening — oh ! damn it all, what shall we do in the 
 evening ? " 
 
 " At 1930 hrs.," said Chillingham, laughing, " you 
 will proceed to your bedroom where, with the assistance 
 of Lawson, you will change into evening dress. At 
 1950 hrs. you will leave your bedroom and make your 
 way to the motor — for which arrangements have already 
 been made at headquarters — which will take you to 
 Lady Charnley's house, where you will arrive at 2000 
 hrs. Ne rations need be carried." 
 
 " Lady Charnley ? Who is she ? " 
 
 " The lady who wrote you that charming note after 
 your second recital." 
 
 " Yes, I remember. She said " 
 
 A knock sounded on the door, and his man, Lawson, 
 entered. 
 
 " You are being asked for on the telephone, sir," 
 he announced, " it is Miss Luton." 
 
 " Excuse me, Chillingham," he murmured, as he 
 hurried to the door. 
 
 At the telephone he seized the receiver with a hand 
 that trembled slightly — a hand that, for some days, 
 had not been completely steady. 
 
 " That you, Miss Luton ? Yes, Stavart speaking." 
 
 "Do excuse me ringing you up, won't you ? But I 
 wondered if you remembered that to-day is Monica's 
 last day in town ? "
 
 THE POISONER 101 
 
 " Good lord, no ! I'd forgotten she was going home 
 to-morrow. I say, Miss Luton. . . . Do you think . . . ? 
 Is Monica in ? " 
 
 " No ; she's shopping in King's Road. She does not, 
 of course, know that I'm ringing you up — and really, 
 perhaps I ought not to have done so." 
 
 "I'm awfully glad you did. Really it was very kind 
 of you. Are you doing anything to-day ? " 
 
 " Nothing very special. At least, Monica is not." 
 
 "But I can scarcely take her out alone." 
 
 "No?" 
 
 " No — at least, I don't quite see " 
 
 A pause. 
 
 "Are you there? " 
 
 " I'm still here, Mr Stavart." 
 
 " Well, would you kindly tell Monica that I rang her 
 up to ask her if she'll come with me on the river to-day ? 
 I propose that she and I have lunch at Henley, say — 
 or, yes ! at Henley. Or perhaps you'll have me rung up 
 when she comes in ? " 
 
 " Very good. I'll ring you up myself. It is under- 
 stood, of course, that it was you who " 
 
 " Oh yes, quite. Of course." 
 
 Simultaneously the two speakers placed their receivers 
 in position. On the face of the man was a look of 
 mingled self-reproach, irritation and apprehension. 
 As for the woman, her teeth bit far into her lip and her 
 brow was furrowed with anger and disgust. 
 
 • •••*••• 
 
 White and fragile, she lay back in the little skiff, 
 a rope in either hand. Opposite her, neck bared and 
 sleeves rolled up to the elbow, sat Martin rowing 
 spasmodically. The June sun was some hours past 
 its meridian, and they were on their way back to 
 Henley. 
 
 " The day has done me good," said Martin. " I 
 wanted a change badly. London, I always think, is 
 a very much overrated paradise." 
 
 He was saying the polite nothings that one stranger
 
 102 THE POISONER 
 
 says to another. He was telling lies. The day had 
 irked him : small, untoward incidents had jarred upon 
 him most painfully throughout that day. He was by 
 turns irritable, depressed, apprehensive. 
 
 " London is much more wonderful than I had ever 
 imagined," she answered, " but paradise is quite the 
 last word." 
 
 She stopped, for his face had twitched strangely, as 
 though he had been attacked by sudden pain. 
 
 "What is it, Martin ? " she asked, full of anxiety. 
 
 But he had regained his composure almost before 
 the question was asked. 
 
 " Nothing," he answered. " Nothing but nerves. 
 I want a couple of days in bed. I'm tired, Monica — 
 done up — done /or, I've begun to think." 
 
 A look both of lover and mother transfigured her face. 
 
 " Come and sit here ! I'll take the oars — we've 
 only another half-mile to go." 
 
 " Oh, but I'm not tired in that way. I could row 
 all night — that's what's wrong with me. I must be 
 doing something, no matter what, and yet my brain 
 and my nerves are crying out for ease, for sleep, for 
 forgetfulness." 
 
 " Oh, Martin ! " she breathed. " What shall you 
 do ? You must give up your recitals — you must come 
 home with me — if father knew " 
 
 " But you mustn't tell your father ; you know how 
 he'd worry. And really, it's nothing. All I want is 
 
 rest, and in another fortnight " He broke off and 
 
 looked around him wildly. " I feel so beastly excited 
 and uncertain of myself. I have felt sometimes these 
 last few days as though I — me — Martin — were slipping 
 away from me." 
 
 Suddenly he released the oars and clasped his hands 
 tightly. He was in the throes of incipient hysteria. 
 
 "Don't speak for a minute," he said hoarsely, his 
 face working. 
 
 ■- Monica watched him with frightened eyes ; then, 
 feeling that her gaze must be torture to him, though
 
 THE POISONER 103 
 
 he could not see her, she looked away, sickly 
 apprehensive. 
 
 In a few minutes he spoke again. 
 
 " It's all right — I'm all right now, Monica. I'm 
 sorry. Never in my Hfe have I behaved like this 
 before. You must think me an awful fool." 
 
 " I think nothing, Martin, except that you're ill. 
 I wish I could nurse you — that I could do everything 
 for you. And why shouldn't I ? At Narrow End you 
 would have -" 
 
 But he shook his head. 
 
 " No," he said ; " I shall stick it out. I can last 
 another fortnight. I must give up my late nights. 
 I've been having too much excitement. The whole 
 beastly thing has gone to my head. I hate my audience, 
 my music — everything ! But most of all I hate the 
 idiotic people who send me their damsilly letters of 
 what they think is admiration. London is full of 
 horrible people, and I feel, Monica, as though some 
 of them were getting at me." 
 
 She did not understand him. He frightened her. 
 It was almost as though he were someone else. But 
 she felt pity rising like a flood in her heart. In a flash 
 she divined the cause of his moodiness, his forced 
 cheerfulness and his occasional short fits of sullenness 
 during the day. 
 
 " Poor boy ! " she murmured. " Don't think of it. 
 Keep it all from your mind." 
 
 " But it's in my mind — in my mind's centre. It's 
 part of me, this disgust, this self-loathing." 
 
 " Self-loathing ? Self-loathing, Martin ? " 
 
 " Yes. I hate myself and all I am and all I've 
 ever done. . . . But we'll not speak of that. And yet 
 I feel — I feel as though I must tell someone." 
 
 " Then tell me. I can understand," she lied bravely, 
 fearing what he might say. 
 
 But he said nothing. Instead he took the oars and, 
 with fierce energy, began to row. For his mood had 
 suddenly changed. Tliough he had looked at Monica
 
 104 THE POISONER 
 
 many times that day, he had just seen her for the first 
 time. She had the appearance no longer of a girl but 
 of a woman who had suffered much for a long time, 
 and he told himself that he was the cause of that 
 suffering. And as we always hate most the people we 
 have injured, he hated her now — hated for for being 
 there — hated her for her goodness, for her loving- 
 kindness towards him, for her virginal purity. Had 
 he not played with her, used her ? Had he not been 
 a torture to her since last November ? Had not his 
 egoism fed upon her, bruised her, and at the end 
 cast her aside ? Oh, it was intolerable — this life, this 
 world, this whole scheme of things ! 
 
 Into each clean, deep stroke he put all his strength, 
 trying fantastically to ease the riot in his brain. As 
 the muscles of his arms expanded and contracted, they 
 seemed to him made of pliable, elastic steel ; they 
 worked with the certainty and mastery of machinery — 
 worked of their own volition ; but they could not 
 work quickly or violently enough to satisfy his lust for 
 self-spending. His strong, pale face, with its startlingly 
 blue eyes, was set with a demoniac determination, and 
 he emitted an ejaculation of disappointment when the 
 boat shot swiftly to the side of the landing-stage. 
 
 But when they were in Chillingham's motor car the 
 reaction came quickly. He dropped back into his 
 seat, limp and exhausted. As the chauffeur started 
 the engine, Martin held out his open hand, palm 
 upwards, and took one of Monica's in his gentle grasp. 
 Her hand, cold and trembling, lay in his like a bird in 
 its nest. He closed his eyes ; his head fell farther 
 backward ; he slept. But his slumber was fitful ; from 
 time to time he opened his eyes and stared about him 
 vacantly, as though he had forgotten his immediate 
 past and knew not where he was ; on each of these 
 occasions, Monica turned to him reassuringly and 
 moved her hand within his. 
 
 Though deeply distressed at Martin's condition, a 
 feeling of almost divine happiness stole over her :
 
 THE POISONER 105 
 
 happiness so exquisite that it became pain. The 
 mother instinct was awake. She was Martin's pro- 
 tector. She would have hked to place his head upon 
 her breast, to put her arms about him, to kiss those 
 tired, wild eyes, to whisper soothing words into his ear. 
 She felt sure that she, and only she, could heal him. 
 She could bring him back to health by the magic force 
 of her love. If only she could give him her sleep, her 
 calm serenity, her balanced constancj^ of mind and 
 mood ! Everything she had she would eagerly give 
 him. Health, love, life — everything ! But, seldom 
 is much taken from those who have vast stores to give, 
 and all the bounty that was hers must remain hers 
 now and, perhaps, for ever. 
 
 Before they had reached suburban London, she had 
 formed a plan. It was impossible that she could go 
 home and leave Martin ill, perhaps dangerously so, 
 in the care of a man who, however friendly, w^as only 
 a friend. Martin must have his own people about him ; 
 she herself was the one to nurse him. So close was her 
 feeling of kinship with him that it did not occur to her 
 that she, like Chillingham, was only a friend. . . . Yes, 
 she would nurse him during the coming night, at least. 
 And if, in the morning, he was not better, she would 
 telegraph home, making some plausible excuse for an 
 extension of her visit. So strangely selfish and covetous 
 is the purest love that she was almost glad of his illness 
 when she thought of the coming night of delicious 
 watchfulness. For the first time she would be able to 
 do something for him ; he would be in her care during 
 the long, short hours. 
 
 When the car stopped in Kensington Square, Martin 
 awoke with a start and gazed around him with un- 
 recognising eyes. 
 
 "I'm here, Martin," said Monica. "Shall I come 
 in with you ? " 
 
 " Oh, I do beg — but I'm sorry. I've been asleep. 
 I ought to have told Wilkins to drive to Chelsea first." 
 
 " That doesn't matter in the least. I want to come
 
 106 THE POISONER 
 
 in to see Sir Henry. Do you mind ? I only want to 
 satisfy myself that you'll be put to bed and looked after 
 and " 
 
 He acquiesced at once. 
 
 But when they had entered the house, Martin's 
 man, handing him a note, informed him that Chillingham 
 was out but would be back at half-past seven — in an 
 hour's time. 
 
 " Come into my study," said Martin, leading the way. 
 
 He arranged a cushion for her on the sofa, and they 
 sat down side by side. 
 
 " Look here, Monica," he said, with a gesture that was 
 like the beginning of a caress, "I'm not half as ill as 
 you imagine. I'm afraid I've frightened you. Really, 
 it's nothing — just nerves. Already I feel better out 
 of that brilliant sun. All I want is quiet, rest, and — 
 and twilight." 
 
 "But, Martin, I am anxious about you. Won't 
 you come home with me to-morrow ? " 
 
 He hesitated. 
 
 " It's tempting," he said ; " I should love to ! I'm 
 sick of London — I hate it. And yet I feel that I can't 
 drag myself away." 
 
 " But you can postpone your recitals. You can 
 give them in the autumn, or perhaps even next month." 
 
 " My recitals ? " He laughed. " I wasn't thinking 
 of them." A pause. "No; I wasn't thinking of my 
 recitals." 
 
 " Then of what were you thinking, Martin ? " 
 
 He rose to his feet suddenly. 
 
 " Oh, I don't know," he said impatiently ; "I don't 
 know what I was thinking of. Does it matter ? All I 
 know is I'm going to stay on in London." 
 
 She gave him a long, scrutinising look as he walked 
 backwards and forwards, his gaze on the carpet. What 
 was she to say ? More than ever sure now that he 
 was ill, she felt it imperative to nurse him. But what 
 would Sir Henry think of her ? What had seemed in 
 the motor car so natural and easy now appeared almost
 
 THE POISONER 107 
 
 impossible. The doctor would be sent for, of course, 
 and he would obtain a professional nurse. Of course ! 
 . . . She stared at him hungrily, passionately. It was 
 dreadful to feel that only she could cure him and that 
 some stranger should callously tend those tortured 
 nerves, that over-driven brain, that 
 
 " For God's sake, Monica, stop staring at me ! Do 
 you want to drive me out of my mind ? " 
 
 He had stopped in front of her and was looking 
 down upon her with a gaze that carried almost hate. 
 She started back, afraid. 
 
 " Oh, oh ! . . . I'm so sorry, Martin," she breathed 
 as, perplexed and pitiful, she turned her face away. 
 
 On the instant he was all remorse. With a quick 
 movement he sat down beside her. 
 
 " Forgive me! " he whispered. 
 
 His arms were about her ; his lips touched her cheek. 
 With a sigh, half of fear, half of satisfaction, she 
 surrendered herself to his embrace. 
 
 "Poor little Monica," he said, in a voice that could 
 just be heard. "What a brute I always am to you ! 
 How you must hate me ! " 
 
 " Oh no, Martin. I would do anything for you. 
 Martin ... let me nurse you. Let me be with you 
 till you are better. Just a few days . . . only a few 
 short days." 
 
 He drew her closer to him. 
 
 " I wonder," he said. 
 
 She placed her hand upon his head and buried her 
 fingers in his black hair. 
 
 " I can't bear to be away from you when you are 
 like this," she murmured. 
 
 ' You love me too much," he said. " You love me 
 
 more " For a minute he hesitated. " You love 
 
 me more than I deserve, more than I can repay. 
 
 " Repay ? What a strange word, Martin. 
 
 " But you do love me ? " 
 
 " With every fibre of my being." 
 
 " And I you." 
 
 5?
 
 108 THE POISONER 
 
 How she longed to believe him ! How bitterly she 
 longed ! And yet . . . and yet her heart told her 
 that this was not love : it was weakness mingled with 
 pity. He, for his part, seemed to divine her thoughts, 
 for he began to whip himself into an ecstasy. 
 
 " And I you, Monica. You have been everything to 
 me. There is no one like you in the whole world ! I 
 have belonged to you from the very first, and you to 
 me ! You are in my music and in me : you are a part 
 of me : something of you will be with me always." 
 
 He trembled a little. In one short minute he had 
 passed from consciously simulated love to self-deception. 
 He had begun to believe himself. 
 
 " From this moment," he said, " we will never part." 
 
 " Oh, Martin, do you mean that ? Am I yours, 
 really ? Do I belong to you ? " 
 
 " Yes ; you are mine — mine ! " He drew her still 
 closer to him. " Your hands are mine, your heart is 
 mine. Everything in you from this time forth belongs 
 to me." 
 
 Why should she listen to her traitorous heart that 
 refused belief ? After all, did not her heart respond 
 to his ? Was it not even now leaping within her 
 breast ? What was it then she wanted if she wanted 
 more than this ? Was she asking for paradise itself ? 
 
 She would believe ! She must ! 
 
 She closed her eyes, and her hand, slipping from his 
 head, clasped his neck and drew his face to hers. Their 
 lips met. A little moan of bliss was born from their 
 long, first kiss. . . . 
 
 But what should have brought him solace brought 
 him only additional pain. They were now seated 
 apart. His restless hands moved one within the other, 
 and on his face was the look of one who has been 
 doomed. His eyes caught the clock and he forced 
 himself to calmness. 
 
 " It's half-past seven," he said, " and Chillingham 
 will be back any moment. You'd better go to Chelsea 
 to tell Miss Luton you are staying here to nurse me."
 
 THE POISONER 109 
 
 He looked round the room craftily. " And you can 
 bring back with you anything you want. I'll tell 
 Lawson you'd like the car." 
 
 His thumb was on the bell before she could answer. 
 
 " You will be all right, dear, while I am away ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 He compelled a smile to reassure her. 
 
 When he had seen her into the car and had returned 
 to his room, he locked the door noiselessly, and his 
 movements became those of a criminal who fears de- 
 tection. He crossed the room to the cellaret in the 
 corner. With trembhng hands he half-filled a tumbler 
 with whisky ; raising it to his lips, he drank it off almost 
 at a gulp and stood waiting for it to work its spell upon 
 him. Almost at once it relieved his taut nerves and 
 held firm his disintegrating personality. . . . He stood, 
 listening. Not a sound save a street piano playing a 
 gaudy tune. The noise pleased him. The world was 
 brighter. There was even a little romance in that 
 southern melody. Catching the reflection of his face 
 in the mirror over the mantelpiece, he smiled at 
 himself, knowingly, cunningly. It was almost a leer. 
 With this stanch friend that turned all woes to bliss 
 he could face the whole world. He poured out more 
 whisky and filled the tumbler to the brim with soda- 
 water. Again he drank eagerly. Ah ! that was better 
 — much better. He was now more than a man. The 
 external world no longer existed ; he was now in the 
 real, the only substantial world — the world of his own 
 imagination. 
 
 Cautiously but hurriedly, he unlocked the door and 
 ran noiselessly upstairs to his bedroom. From a 
 drawer he took money and his cheque-book and placed 
 them in an inside pocket. For a minute he looked at 
 his suit-case and hesitated. His evening clothes and 
 fresh under-linen were spread out on his bed ; noticing 
 them, he smiled in amusement. Some sudden curiosity 
 drove him to the dressing-table, where he stopped and 
 once more looked at his reflection, gazing with approval
 
 110 THE POISONER 
 
 at his strong chin, his pale yet healthy skin, his black 
 hair from the half-shadow of which looked out those 
 astonishingly candid eyes. . . . But there was someone 
 looking over his shoulder. It was Lawson. 
 
 "Did you knock, Lawson ? " 
 
 " Oh yes, sir. Is there anything I can do for you ? " 
 
 " No. I shall not be dining out to-night. You 
 might tell your master . . . has he returned ? " 
 
 1^ Not yet, sir." 
 
 " No ; tell him nothing. That's all, Lawson. No. 
 Put these things away, please." 
 
 He pointed to the bed and, still pointing, made his 
 way towards the door. In the hall he stopped to listen. 
 Something drew him into his study. In a minute he 
 had poured out and swallowed another half-tumbler 
 of whisky. . . . 
 
 He left the house and hurried into High Street. A 
 cab bore him to Piccadilly Circus, where he alighted 
 and, having bought an evening paper, strolled, happy 
 and at home, into the Monico.
 
 M 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 ONICA was never able to recall in their 
 proper sequence the events of that evening 
 of Martin s disappearance. It seemed to 
 her that she was the only person really troubled 
 by what had happened. Sir Henry Chillingham, 
 courteous, even deferential, was content to abide the 
 morrow. 
 
 " If he does not return to-night," he said to Monica, 
 " he will telephone." 
 
 " But he was so ill," she urged. " Really, he was 
 not fit to be alone." 
 
 " Perhaps," said Chillingham, anxious to soothe his 
 visitor, " perhaps he is not alone." 
 
 " Then who can be with him ? " 
 
 " Well, he has friends, Miss Symons — hosts of them. 
 . . . After all, is there anything so very strange in 
 what he has done ? " 
 
 " Yes, something very, very strange. Sir Henry. It 
 is difficult for me to — what I mean is, he impressed me 
 all the afternoon as being at the end of his nervous 
 resources. He was ill. When he reached your house 
 he was almost in a state of collapse. As I have told 
 you I offered to nurse him. It was he who suggested 
 I should go to Chelsea and return. Besides, he left 
 you no message." 
 
 *' That certainly is not like him ; it is still less like 
 him to leave you in the lurch. What probably happened 
 was this. The moment after you left him, he received 
 a telephone message requiring his immediate presence 
 elsewhere. Full of the importance — the urgency — of 
 this message, he forgot the arrangements he had made 
 with you. A man in the condition you have described 
 might easily do that." 
 
 " Yes," urged Monica, " but later on it would occur 
 to him. . . . You see. Sir Henry, it is so easy for him 
 to communicate with either of us." 
 
 Chillingham turned to look at the clock. 
 
 "Well, it's only just after ten," he said. "To a 
 man like Stavart the night is still young." 
 
 Ill
 
 112 THE POISONER 
 
 " But can't we do anything ? " 
 
 "I'm afraid not. You see, he may be ahiiost any- 
 where. What do you suggest ? " 
 
 " Couldn't you — of course you may think it very 
 absurd . . . Couldn't you communicate with the 
 police ? Suppose he has lost his memory." 
 
 Chillingham smiled. 
 
 " Oh, really, Miss Symons, I hardly think it's as 
 serious as that. At all events, we'll wait till to-morrow. 
 He may write. He is sure to write to someone — 
 perhaps to his agent — almost certainly to you. What 
 we've got to keep in mind is that he is not like ordinary 
 men — but of course you must know that better than I 
 do. He's impulsive, erratic." 
 
 " Is he ? I have never found him so." 
 
 He gave her a quick, penetrating look. 
 
 " No ? What I mean is, he is like all artists. 
 After all, Stavart has a very sketchy notion of 
 time." 
 
 This interview brought little consolation to Monica ; 
 rather did it add to her disturbance. And as she rode 
 back to Chelsea her mind was filled with a sharp but 
 bewildered anxiety. She had confided to no one the 
 scene that had taken place between herself and Martin 
 in Chillingham's house. How could she ? Yet she 
 blamed herself bitterly that she had permitted it to 
 happen, for it could but have increased Martin's excite- 
 ment and put upon his mind an added stress it was 
 little able to bear. Perhaps she alone was to blame 
 for his inexplicable disappearance ? With this thought 
 came the sudden, sure knowledge that he did not love 
 her ; he had not been master of himself when he had 
 declared himself ; he was but a victim of his nerves. 
 No matter ! That was nothing now ; in view of the 
 greater calamity that had overtaken both him and her, 
 she could forego his love. Martin must be found : that 
 was the only necessity. 
 
 Miss Luton proved even more exasperating than 
 Sir Henry Chillingham.
 
 THE POISONER 113 
 
 " After all," she said, " are you so very surprised ? " 
 
 Monica was seated under a lamp in the studio, her 
 body tense, her nerves on edge. 
 
 " What do you mean, Margaret ? Aren't you 
 surprised ? " 
 
 " No. It's no use shutting our eyes to facts, Monica. 
 It's always been quite clear to me that Mr Stavart is 
 unstable and — and selfish. Forgive me ! I don't 
 want to hurt you ; I want only to lessen your anxiety. 
 His disappearance, instead of being the tragedy you 
 are makng of it, is merely the result of a whim — a 
 freak. What to you is so serious is to him nothing 
 at all." 
 
 "Ah, but you don't know, Margaret . . . This 
 afternoon . . . this afternoon, just before he left, he 
 asked me to marry him." 
 
 Miss Luton made a quick movement of sympathy. 
 
 " Oh, my dear child, what have I been saying ? 
 You must believe " 
 
 " Don't let us talk of it ! I only want to know he is 
 safe, Margaret. Why did I ever come to London ? I 
 hate this big city. I have felt like a stranger in it. 
 And now — and now it has got hold of him. He said 
 this afternoon that people were trying to get at him. 
 What did he mean, Margaret ? That's what he said — 
 get at him ! Why should anyone wish him evil ? 
 Who are these people ? " 
 
 Miss Luton shook her head. 
 
 " I don't know — I don't know what he meant or 
 who they are." 
 
 But by now she herself was nervous. There was 
 perhaps something sinister in this happening — some- 
 thing secret and threatening. 
 
 Suddenly Monica rose and stood trembling before 
 her friend. 
 
 " Oh, I must tell you, Margaret — I must tell some- 
 one, for if I don't " 
 
 She stopped suddenly. 
 
 " Come, dear, sit down by me," said Margaret, 
 
 H
 
 114 THE POISONER 
 
 " Let me take you in my arms, you poor, frightened 
 
 thing." ^ ,. 
 
 " No, no, no ! I can't. I can't sit still. But listen ! 
 Ever since that first recital I have felt— oh, I don't 
 know what I have felt. I can't explain it to you. I 
 can't explain it to myself. But I've felt as though 
 something dreadful were about to happen— a calamity 
 near me, near us all. I've never allowed myself to 
 think of it, but it's been there all the time— an instinct 
 —a kind of intuition. Oh, Margaret what does it all 
 
 mean ? " 
 
 *' Nothing, dear: nothing at all. You yourself are 
 ill, you know. You were overwrought and nervy when 
 you came to London, and your visit has made you 
 worse. You mustn't give way to these sick fancies. 
 London has been too much for you. Why, you and 
 Mr Stavart are surrounded by friends. Nothing 
 dreadful has happened. Nothing dreadful caw happen." 
 
 Monica sat down as suddenly as she had risen. 
 
 " Oh, I do feel so sick and cold," she said miserably. 
 
 So her friend went over to her and took her in her 
 arms and soothed her. And soon she led her to bed 
 and tucked her in. Kissing her, but with no spoken 
 word save a soft : " Good-night ! All will be Avell in 
 the morning," she left her. 
 
 But Monica did not sleep. Throughout that long 
 June night she suffered silently, patiently, her little 
 white body full of restless pain, her head filled with the 
 black thoughts that sometimes come in the dark 
 hours. 
 
 Early next morning the telephone bell rang. Monica, 
 slipping on her dressing-gown, emerged from the little 
 bedroom that gave on to the gallery, and ran down the 
 narrow staircase. 
 
 " Yes, yes ? " she said breatlilessly. " Miss Symons 
 speaking." 
 
 It was Sir Henry Chillingham. He had by the early 
 post received a letter from Martin. Oh yes ; every-
 
 THE POISONER 115 
 
 thing was quite satisfactory. Should he read it ? 
 Monica, for a moment speechless, nodded at the 
 transmitter. 
 
 "It is quite a short note," went on Chillingham's 
 exasperatingly even voice. " Here it is ; 
 
 ' My dear Chillingham : — I know you will forgive 
 me, for you have always regarded me as eccentric. 
 And perhaps I am. I'm going away for a bit. 
 London's been too much for me — much too much. 
 Do, like a good fellow, explain to Miss Symons. 
 Assure her tha'c I'm all right and that sort of thing — 
 as, indeed, I am. But I want to get away — I must 
 get away. And will you — of course you will ! — write 
 to Leopold for me and tell him that I shan't give 
 my last three recitals till the autumn. He'll know 
 what to do. Yours always, 
 
 ' Martin Stavart.' " 
 
 " Is that all ? " asked Monica unsteadily. 
 
 " Yes. Would you like me to read it again ? Yes ? 
 Very well, then." 
 
 He began to read the letter through a second time, 
 slowly and deliberately. 
 
 "I don't know what to think of it," said Monica, 
 when he had finished. " It — it frightens me. What 
 does he mean when he says : ' I want to get away. I 
 7nust get away ? ' Why must he ? " 
 
 " I wish I knew. Miss Symons. What I mean is, 
 I think I do know. You see, he's been overworked 
 and I've noticed for some days that his nerves have 
 been on edge. He's been restless and, at times, irrit- 
 able. To me it seems natural enough that he should 
 want to throw everything up for the time being. 
 Most of us, after all, feel like that at one time or 
 another." 
 
 "What is his handwriting like? Is it firm and 
 steady ? " 
 
 " Quite," came back Chillingham's reassuring voice.
 
 116 THE POISONER 
 
 " Perfectly steady. I really don't think you need 
 alarm yourself in the least. Speaking for myself, I'm 
 not very surprised he has gone — really, I'm not ; the 
 only disturbing thing about the whole matter is its 
 suddenness. But would you like me to come round 
 to see you ? " 
 
 Monica considered a moment. No — a thousand 
 times no ! She could not bear another interview with 
 Chillingham. Even now, she felt a wild impulse to 
 cry out. 
 
 " No — you are very kind," she said, summoning to 
 her aid the proud dignity she had lost these last twelve 
 hours. " I'm returning home by the noon train. I've 
 no doubt that Martin — that Mr Stavart will write 
 to us. Good-bye ! Thanks so much for all your 
 kindness." 
 
 She returned to her room and sat on the edge of the 
 bed, looking with unseeing eyes at a laburnum-tree 
 whose little pods trembled in the breeze. . . . Nothing 
 could be done. She must wait. Worst of all, her father 
 must wait. This blow and the coming anxiety would 
 kill him. 
 
 As her thoughts leapt hither and thither like wild 
 birds freshly placed in a cage, a droning sound slowly 
 crept into her consciousness. It was the subdued noise 
 of the traffic in King's Road. Involuntarily she 
 shuddered. It seemed so unminding, so callous. 
 Everybody was callous. A hysterical impulse to go 
 out into the streets to look for Martin almost over- 
 powered her. It would be useless to go, she knew, 
 yet to do something useless was better than doing 
 nothing at all. But there was her father ; he claimed 
 her ; it was she, who was herself in such dire need of 
 consolation, who must console him. 
 
 She began to dress, slowly and forgetfully. Seated 
 in front of her mirror, she started to comb her hair, but 
 with a sigh she relinquished her task. The nearness of 
 tragedy paralysed her actions. What could she do ? . . . 
 Nothing, nothing. Never was a woman so helpless,
 
 THE POISONER 117 
 
 so tricked by Fate, so firmly captured in the net of 
 circumstance. 
 
 Margaret entered and Monica, in agitated accents, 
 told her what Sir Henry Chillingham had communicated 
 to her on the telephone. 
 
 "During the night I've been thinking," said Miss 
 Luton. 
 
 " You too ? " 
 
 " Yes ; I've decided I must tell you something." 
 
 " Quick ! Let me know at once ! What is it ? " 
 
 " It's about Mr Stavart." 
 
 Monica thrust out a hand as if to defend herself. 
 
 " Well ? " she asked, in a whisper. 
 
 " You must understand, dear, that I'm telling you 
 this only because I think it may ease your anxiety. 
 Besides, everybody else " 
 
 " Oh, don't torture me. Tell me now — now ! " 
 
 "Well, this isn't the first time Mr Stavart has dis- 
 appeared. About two years ago, or perhaps more 
 than that, he went in just the same way — vanished 
 completely. It was a two days' wonder — quite a mild 
 excitement." 
 
 " He came back ? " 
 
 " I suppose so. The evening papers were full of it — 
 you see, he was giving concerts in London at the time. 
 He just went and left everybody in the lurch." 
 
 " But why— why ? " 
 
 Miss Luton hesitated a moment. 
 
 " I don't know. Malicious people said it was just 
 an advertising dodge — the sort of thing that would be 
 sure to get him talked about. Others said it was a 
 case of loss of memory. There were all kinds of con- 
 jectures. But on the third or fourth day after his 
 disappearance he wrote to the papers saying that he 
 was perfectly safe and could not understand why such 
 a fuss had been made about him." 
 
 " I see," said Monica doubtfully. " Are you keeping 
 anything back, Margaret ? " 
 
 " No — I've told you all I remember about the affair,
 
 118 THE POISONER 
 
 and I've told you because, as I've explained, I think 
 it will make your mind easier." 
 
 " Yes. Perhaps you are right. Indeed, I'm sure 
 you are." 
 
 But Monica felt that her friend's communication 
 only added to the mystery. Hitherto she had felt 
 anxiety only on Martin's account ; but now something 
 sinister seemed to threaten her also. And as she 
 continued dressing alone she recalled all the circimi- 
 stances — each disturbing enough in itself and col- 
 lectively overwhelming — that had wounded her during 
 the last fortnight. She remembered the giggling of 
 the audience at Martin's first recital ; Margaret's 
 hostility to her lover during tea that same day ; the 
 nightmare conversation in the taxicab ; the innuendo- 
 like playing of the girl with the bobbed hair and 
 malicious eyes ; Martin's self-absorption and neglect 
 of her during the past week ; his strange behaviour 
 yesterday, his illness . . . and, last, his disappearance 
 and his almost casual letter to Chillingham. She 
 could not but feel, as she thought of these things, 
 that she and tragedy were about to be irrevocably 
 mated. 
 
 After breakfast she made an excuse to be alone, 
 explaining that she wished to finish her packing. In 
 her bedroom she called all her pride and innate reserve 
 to her aid. She had known both suffering and anxiety 
 before : these she could bear with some appearance 
 of stoicism ; but mystery, dark and sinister, was new 
 to her, and there were moments when she felt that it 
 was assaulting the very foundations of her reason. 
 She could not blame Martin ; she could only pity him. 
 If he had merely deserted her and thus wounded her 
 pride, she could have held her head high and carried 
 her secret unguessed at by man or woman. But this 
 crawling fear and this sickening anxiety were too much. 
 She longed to weep and to be consoled, to cry out upon 
 a world that was so indifferent, to ease her anxiety 
 by action — action — action, no matter what. But all
 
 THE POISONER 119 
 
 that remained for her to do was to fold her garments one 
 by one and place them in her trunk. 
 
 Soon after the clock had struck ten, Margaret, who 
 was painting in her studio, heard a strained voice call 
 her name. Looking up, she saw her friend standing 
 on the gallery, her face pale and distorted. 
 
 " Margaret, Margaret ! " she called, " come to me. 
 It is more than I can bear." 
 
 In a moment Miss Luton was by her side ; having 
 led her to her own bedroom, she sank down on her bed, 
 taking the stricken girl in her arms. Human sympathy 
 brought relieving tears. Neither spoke as Monica's 
 pent-up emotion broke its bounds, and soon she ceased 
 weeping and gently disengaged herself from Margaret's 
 embrace. 
 
 " I feel that you ought not to travel to-day," said 
 Miss Luton. " As a matter of fact, poor child, you 
 should be in bed." 
 
 " Oh no ! I couldn't do that. But I feel better 
 now — much better — and I am not so weak as you 
 think. . . . You see, this — this about Martin — will 
 be in the papers to-night ; at least, there will have to 
 be an announcement saying that the recitals have 
 been postponed, and the reason that Mr Leopold will 
 give will be Martin's illness. Father is sure to see it — 
 or hear of it somehow — I don't know — but sooner or 
 later he will have to be told. And I must be with him 
 when he hears. I can't tell you how much father loves 
 him : Martin is the one great interest of his life." 
 
 " But your train goes at twelve ! " 
 
 " Yes, I know. I'm ready now. You'll come with 
 me to Euston ? " . . . 
 
 As the train rushed nearer and nearer to Preston, 
 the thought of her father and the coming critical days 
 gradually replaced her gnawing anxiety about Martin. 
 The blessed time was at hand when she could do some- 
 thing, when she could be of service, when she could 
 forget some of her own trouble in the alleviation of the 
 sorrow of someone else.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 MRS BASSETT'S greeting both warmed and 
 unnerved Monica, so genuinely affectionate 
 was it and so full of solicitude. 
 " But, my dear child," she said, placing a plump 
 hand on Monica's shoulder and examining her 
 with her kind, weak and rather watery eyes, " but, 
 my dear child, London has nearly swallowed you 
 up. You're thinner and — yes, you're paler than 
 ever." 
 
 " It's the journey, aunt. I hate travelling. And 
 the carriage had a thousand people in it and they talked 
 for ever. You got my wire saying I had missed the 
 noon train ? " 
 
 " Yes. But I wasn't surprised, what with the hot 
 weather and London so full. Well, you must have a 
 cup of tea before you go up to your father." 
 
 " How is he, aunt ? How has he been all this long 
 time ? " 
 
 " He's missed you, of course, and Martin. But he 
 seems to have been fairly content. He's read every 
 word that the newspapers have written. So kind, all 
 of them. But I don't wonder at it — going to concerts 
 and things. And how's Miss Lewis ? " 
 
 " Miss Luton's very well — working hard and going 
 to make a name for herself." 
 
 "Well, here's a cup of tea," she said, as a maid 
 entered with a tray. " Supper will be ready in half- 
 an-hour." 
 
 Mr Symons' bell rang and Mrs Bassett, explaining 
 that Cubbins had gone to Manchester on business and 
 would not be back until late the following day, hurried 
 away to see what was wanted. 
 
 The safety and the soothing orderliness of Narrow 
 End at once brought comfort to Monica. London 
 seemed like a nightmare ; it was something that 
 had existed far off and long ago. And, as she rested, 
 she began to tell herself that all her fears had been 
 groundless, that Martin was safe, and that nothing 
 but a quick impulse, the result of his sick nerves, but 
 
 120
 
 THE POISONER 121 
 
 having no evil or even mysterious significance, had 
 been responsible for his disappearance. He would 
 come back. Perhaps he was on the way now. Why 
 not ? She could understand that the intoxicating, 
 feverish atmosphere of London might unbalance 
 any man so highly strung as Martin was. It was 
 perfectly natural ; she had felt some nervous disturb- 
 ance herself. She had only to wait a day or two — 
 perhaps not so long as that, and certainly not more 
 than a week — and Martin would be at Narrow End 
 once more. 
 
 In the meantime she must present a serene front. 
 There was much work waiting for her at home, in Barton 
 and Salten ; she would have little time for brooding. 
 She must keep a constant watch upon herself and refuse 
 the insidious seduction of weak moods. Her attitude 
 towards her father should be one of calm happiness. It 
 might prove unnecessary to tell him of Martin's dis- 
 appearance. She would tell him no lies, but it would 
 surely not be difficult to 
 
 " Have you finished, dear ? " asked Mrs Bassett, 
 standing in the doorway. 
 
 " Oh yes — I'll go up to father at once." 
 
 She hurried upstairs, telling herself that she must 
 be brave ; but as she touched the handle of her father's 
 door, her heart fluttered wildly. 
 
 She opened the door and smiled upon him. With a 
 divinely loving gesture she held out her hands and 
 rushed to him, putting her arms gently about his neck 
 and kissing his forehead. Then, sitting on the side of 
 the bed, she took one of his big, hairy hands in hers and 
 patted it fondly. 
 
 All that she thought he ought to know she told him. 
 And there was much that was good and nothing that 
 was unpleasant. She dwelt not only on Martin's 
 musical victories but on his social success, and she 
 described in detail the hours she had spent with him — 
 particularly that delicious morning in Hyde Park when 
 Martin had been so care-free and boyishly happy.
 
 122 THE POISONER 
 
 Symons listened intently, and when she hesitated he 
 broke in eagerly with a question. 
 
 " When did you see him last ? " 
 
 " Yesterday evening. We were on the river to- 
 gether most of the day — just Martin and I. We 
 lunched at Henley." 
 
 " And you returned to town together ? " 
 
 " Yes. Sir Henry Chillingham lent us his car. 
 The day had been rather hot, but in the late after- 
 noon " 
 
 " Monica ! " He paused a moment ; then, removing 
 his hand from her easy clasp, he said very deliberately : 
 " Monica, tell me ; why didn't Martin write to me 
 yesterday ? " 
 
 " Didn't he ? Well, you see, it was my last day in 
 London and he gave it up entirely to me. He had no 
 time — except late in the evening. And a letter by the 
 midnight post wouldn't reach you till this evening." 
 
 He brooded for a minute. 
 
 " But to-night's post has already come, and there's 
 nothing for me ! " he exclaimed at length. " Every 
 day since he went I have heard from him — sometimes 
 just a note scribbled in pencil — a word or two always. 
 Did he give you a message for me ? " 
 
 Martin had sent no message, and Monica realized 
 that the time had come to lie swiftly and boldly. 
 
 " Of course he did ! How silly of me to forget ! He 
 sent his love and said how he longed to be back home. 
 He even told me, half- jokingly, that he felt inclined to 
 return with me to-day." 
 
 But Symons was not satisfied. 
 
 " Yet it is strange he has not written." 
 
 " You will have a letter in the morning, father. He 
 is sure to write to-day." 
 
 Monica, amazed at and ashamed of her facility in 
 inventing the necessary falsehoods, stirred uneasily 
 and stood up. 
 
 "What is the matter, dear ? Sit down again." 
 
 He patted the counterpane on which she had been
 
 THE POISONER 123 
 
 sitting, and she overcame a hysterical impulse to rush 
 from the room. She obeyed him. 
 
 " Tell me, Monica — how was he looking when you 
 left him ? Was he happy ? " 
 
 " Happy ? Why, of course he was ! Who wouldn't 
 be happy at the top of his triumph ? He has carried 
 all before him, father. He looked — he looked 
 magnificent ! " 
 
 " What sort of man is Chillingham ? " 
 
 " Well, let me see. He's young, gay and mad on 
 music. And he's devoted to Martin. His house is 
 almost as quiet as Narrow End. Not that Martin has 
 been at home much. He's been invited everywhere — 
 quite one of the small lions of the season. Did you see 
 the reference to him in Punch last week ? He was 
 awfully pleased with it." 
 
 She stopped suddenly, for she was aware that her 
 manner had become flurried and that her tongue was 
 running away with her. Anything, she felt, might 
 fall from her lips, so chaotic were her thoughts. 
 
 "But tell me about yourself, father," she said. 
 " Have you missed us ? " 
 
 His eyes were cast down and he sighed deeply before 
 he answered. 
 
 " Yes — I've missed you both. But I've felt all 
 along that you were, quite safe and happy — until last 
 night ! I haven't told your aunt about it, dear, 
 because I didn't want to trouble her ; but I can tell 
 you because you were with Martin yesterday and know 
 he's all right. Early last evening I began to feel — 
 well, depressed. I had an intuition that Martin was in 
 danger. I felt, somehow, that all was not well with him. 
 I tried to throw off the feeling, but no ! it wouldn't 
 go. It grew worse and worse. And by ten o'clock 
 I knew that something had happened to him. . . . What 
 time was it, Monica, when you left him ? Tell me, girl. 
 What time was it ? " 
 
 He thrust out a hand and caught her by the wrist 
 with his uneasv fingers.
 
 (I 
 
 124 THE POISONER 
 
 " Oh, late, father — very late. Don't distress your- 
 self, darling. It must have been after eleven. He 
 came to Margaret's studio with Sir Henry Chillingham." 
 
 But he was gazing full in her face and he was not 
 satisfied. 
 
 "Who was there ? " he asked quickly. 
 
 " No one. Just ourselves." 
 
 " You had music ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 And they went early ? " 
 
 Yes. No. Oh, father, why do you speak so 
 anxiously — so angrily ? " 
 
 He leaned back on his pillows and closed his eyes. 
 
 " I have been tormented, Monica. All last night 
 I dreamed dreams about him. He was in grave 
 danger — what, I do not know. But he is safe. You 
 swear that, Monica ? " 
 
 All her courage vanished, and for a moment she 
 hesitated. But only for a moment. For in that brief 
 space of time she realized how urgent it was that he 
 should be calmed. 
 
 " Yes, dear, I swear it." She summoned a laugh. 
 "Why, father, you are quite frightening me. You 
 forget, darling, that Martin is a grown man and can 
 take care of himself. You have been left too much 
 alone. Shall I read to you a little ? " 
 
 "Do, Monica ! "he said eagerly. " Get old Stavart's 
 book about Nigeria." 
 
 The request came to her as a shock. Never since 
 his illness had her father looked at or even mentioned 
 any of the books that he and Martin's father had 
 written together. She brought the two heavy volumes 
 from the bookshelves near the window and placed them 
 by the side of his bed. 
 
 " Tamo yira mia wo. . . . His life should be written, 
 Monica." 
 
 At once she was all attention. 
 
 " There has been no one like him since Elizabethan 
 days," he continued, " and there was no one quite like
 
 THE POISONER 125 
 
 him even then. He was aknost everything that a man 
 should be. But women — a woman — marred him. 
 Courteous, the very soul of honour, brave and pitiful — 
 the greatest scholar, the most daring adventurer, the 
 hardest worker of his time. But nothing is left of him 
 except those twenty books that no one reads. England 
 had no use for him. In France or Italy or Germany — 
 especially in Italy — he would have been a national hero." 
 
 Startled, she mused upon his words. 
 
 " But why ? " she cried, idly opening one of the 
 closely printed volumes, " why was he treated so ? 
 Why was he so neglected ? " 
 
 " He was many things that England suspects. He 
 was a materialist, he hated officialism, he was dis- 
 obedient. You see, Monica, he had such a profound 
 belief in himself that he would not be controlled or 
 curbed in any way. England hates that. The un- 
 disciplined man is ignored, shelved, insulted. And in 
 his writings he was so outspoken. He just wrote down 
 what he saw and heard ; he committed the unpardon- 
 able sin. He was more like an elemental force of nature 
 than a man ; everybody feared him. You can imagine 
 how such a man would be hated by a nation that for 
 two generations worshipped such a moral coward as 
 Tennyson. When I think of his life, as I have been 
 thinking of it these last few days, he seems to me like 
 a strong, magnificent creature trying to make his way 
 in a great swamp where there is no foothold, nothing 
 solid his hands could grasp." 
 
 " You said he was marred by a woman." 
 
 " Yes. But it was not her fault. It was fate — 
 things happened so. Martin's mother was beautiful; 
 intellectually, she was as strong as steel ; morally, as 
 brittle as porcelain. She drank — wildly, hopelessly — 
 with a kind of greed of death. Nothing could save her. 
 Stavart couldn't. It was this that gave him a veneer 
 of scorn, of brutality even. But underneath he was 
 tender and pitiful. Yet he was implacably stern 
 towards falseness, treachery. ... I remember— — "
 
 126 THE POISONER 
 
 " Yes ? " she asked, in a breathless whisper. 
 
 But for two or three minutes he appeared to have 
 forgotten Monica, his room, the present. 
 
 She waited, her expectant eyes upon him. She 
 ached for more knowledge of Martin's parents ; for, 
 perhaps, the mystery that enshrouded him was con- 
 cealed in those dead lives. But her father was absorbed 
 in the contemplation of scenes that his imagination 
 conjured up most vividly, and, after a time, she sought 
 to attract his attention by turning over the leaves of the 
 books before her. He looked at her with unrecognising 
 eyes. 
 
 " Shall I read to you, father ? " 
 
 But the mood had gone, and he refused her offer with 
 a slight gesture of dismissal. 
 
 " Tell Cubbins I want him, dear." 
 
 "Have you forgotten ? He's away in Manchester." 
 
 " In Manchester ? Yes ; I remember. Raise my 
 pillows, Monica. I want to look at the sunset. There, 
 that's right. And pull the curtains still farther aside 
 so that I may see everything." 
 
 His bedroom faced south-west, and from his bed he 
 could see the coloured sky of approaching night. A 
 copper beech outside his window Avas already black 
 and sombre. A great bank of white spiraea looked in 
 this light almost like a long pool of pale water. From 
 the rose-trees beneath him floated up an amorous, faint 
 odour. And in the room, pressing and insistent, was 
 the sweet, inspiring smell of wet sand warmed by the 
 sun of June. 
 
 " I would like to be alone now, dear," he said, when 
 she had bared the entire window and opened it to its 
 fullest. 
 
 Reluctantly she left him, hoping that he would, for 
 an hour, forget Martin. But as soon as she had closed 
 the door, his thoughts of his dead friend's son swarmed 
 thickly and tide-like upon him. He felt that Fate was 
 about to deal him one of her blunt, angry blows, and 
 as he gazed upon the sunset it seemed to presage a more
 
 THE POISONER 127 
 
 intimate dissolution. He, whose body and mind in his 
 robust years had been so severely taxed and discipHned, 
 began to realise that something within him was getting 
 beyond his control. He was afraid on Martin's account 
 — afraid and helpless. At this moment something was 
 happening to this boy ; he was in the gravest peril. 
 Symons' intuition of the previous evening came back 
 to him with stunning and disintegrating effect. That 
 former evil had overtaken Martin once more ; he was 
 slipping and sliding and dropping into the blackest 
 of pits. 
 
 He lay thus for a long time, trying with his weakened 
 will to suppress his fears ; but, in spite of all his efforts, 
 the seven months' old conviction that Martin was 
 marked out for tragedy persisted through these twilit 
 hours. Though Martin was not of his blood, Symons 
 had for him that anxiously protective instinct that a 
 woman feels towards the children she has brought into 
 the world. His own life was nothing, his happiness less 
 than nothing ; everything he had might go if only the 
 boy could escape from or conquer the forces for evil 
 that lived within him. 
 
 It was late when Monica and Mrs Bassett came to 
 wish him good-night. They had expected him to ring 
 for someone to light the lamp, though several times 
 recently he had preferred to lie through the twilight 
 until night came with her stars. His manner was 
 now curt, almost irritable, as he ordered the lamp to 
 be lit. 
 
 "Good-night, Gertrude," he said to Mrs Bassett, 
 when the small arrangements for the night had been 
 made. " Monica, I want to speak to you." 
 
 During the last two hours the girl had been defending 
 herself from the accusations of a hostile conscience ; 
 with physical exhaustion had come mental depression 
 and a nervous disquietude that, in the privacy of her 
 own room, had found expression in tears. As she 
 closed the door upon her aunt's exit, she could not make 
 steady her trembing hands and shaking knees. She
 
 (« 
 
 128 THE POISONER 
 
 walked slowly to her father's bedside, casting her gaze 
 away from his eyes. 
 
 He scrutinised her long and piercingly until, at length, 
 she felt constrained to make her eyes meet his. 
 Why, child," he said, "you are unhappy." 
 Oh no, father. Only tired and headachy." 
 
 " But you've been crying." 
 
 His tone was that of a prosecutor making a grave 
 accusation. She hesitated, telling herself how foolish 
 she had been not to follow her first impulse to retire 
 for the night without a farewell word to her father. 
 Before she had time to formulate a denial, he was 
 speaking again. 
 
 " Yes — you've been crying, Monica ! You look ill. 
 You are worried. Something has happened to make 
 you very unhappy." 
 
 "My head aches," she said, in a whisper. " It's the 
 long journey, father, and the excitement of London 
 — and — and ' ' 
 
 " Yes ? " 
 
 But she could not continue. 
 
 " It's Martin ! " exclaimed the old man, shaking 
 violently, and gripping his beard with his large, vein- 
 swollen hand. "It's Martin ! I knew it 1 I knew 
 it ! " 
 
 As he spoke, she asked herself if she might not tell 
 him. To keep him in ignorance was but to postpone 
 the inevitable evil hour ; even now he was on the rack 
 of doubt. But no ! Martin might return to-morrow ; 
 he would return ; he must ! To tell her father now 
 would be to deal him a blow that Fate, if left to work 
 her own designs, might spare him. 
 
 Suddenly she dropped on her knees by his side and 
 covered her face with her hands, her body shaking with 
 sobs. 
 
 " Oh, father, father, I am not well — I am all unstrung. 
 But what I've told you about Martin's true," she cried. 
 " He is well — he is happy — he will soon return to you. 
 You must believe me, father ; you must ! "
 
 THE POISONER 129 
 
 Convinced for the moment that what she was saying 
 was indeed the truth, he placed a hand upon her head. 
 
 " Poor child ! I'm sorry, dear. You must forgive 
 your old father. But you have made me happy — very 
 happy. To lie here and think— and think — and think ! 
 I imagine all my terrors. I lie here and torture myself 
 night and day." 
 
 " But what could happen to Martin ? " she asked, and 
 hung, trembling, on the answer. 
 
 " Nothing, Monica, nothing. Go to bed, dear. 
 Sleep and forget. In the morning there will be a 
 letter." 
 
 And it was with these last words on his lips that, 
 half-an-hour later, when all the house was still and only 
 the soothing sound of far-breaking waves fell upon his 
 ear, that he crept slowly into unconsciousness. 
 
 • ••*•••• 
 
 Two hours later he awoke with a start, as though he 
 had been violently propelled from the dream-state into 
 conscious life. In his dream he had seen old Stavart 
 kneeling in a hut struggling with something, with 
 someone. Diverse, disconnected things happened ; 
 they had no relationship with what was proceeding on 
 the floor, but yet they were important, even necessary. 
 It was all soundless and dark, yet vivid, and as strong 
 and unerring as machinery. Stavart struggled hard ; 
 his arms and legs flickered like the figures in a cinemato- 
 graph. Symons, beholding this, felt such fear as he 
 had never known in his waking life ; the entire universe 
 was instantly revealed to him as a sneaking sham, a 
 vast cruelty ; and he suddenly felt as though a drop 
 of corrosive acid had exquisitely been placed in the 
 centre of his brain. 
 
 It was only when he awoke that he was able to 
 see the face of old Stavart's antagonist. It was Martin ! 
 — Martin maddened and dead, the skin about his neck 
 stretched and torn. . . . With a low groan, Symons 
 rolled on his side and reached for the matches on the 
 table near at hand. He lit the lamp, and with the
 
 130 THE POISONER 
 
 counterpane wiped from his face the sweat that fear 
 had placed thereon. 
 
 Further sleep seemed impossible. His senses were 
 not only painfully alert, but appehensive. The surface 
 of his skin was terribly alive, and it revolted against 
 the touch and oppression of his bed-clothes. Every 
 part of his body was inordinately sensitive, and his 
 imagination began to breed innumerable monsters. 
 
 Goaded by a sudden panic, he raised his arm and 
 pulled at the bell-rope above him. In the next room, 
 where Cubbins slept, the bell sounded solemnly. No 
 answer. Just an indifferent silence. He remembered 
 dully that Cubbins was away. He sat up, threw the 
 clothes from him, with difficulty got out of bed, and 
 struggled painfully to the open window. He leaned 
 out, his chest upon the sill, and drank the odour of the 
 garden, and with his eyes swallowed the stars. Slowly 
 the spasm of suffering went and, feeling as forlorn and 
 wretched as a sick child, he crept back to bed and lay 
 there, apprehensive and ill, till dawn. 
 
 Daylight brings reasonableness to the fevered and 
 fearful. Symons recalled his interviews with Monica 
 and carefully analysed each of the sentences he could 
 remember. It was impossible to believe that she had 
 lied to him, and yet equally impossible not to be con- 
 vinced that she was under the pressure and strain of a 
 great anxiety. His conviction that Martin was in 
 grave peril was weakened by his hunger to believe 
 that what Monica had told him was true. As the time 
 for the delivery of the post drew near, it was impossible 
 to restrain his restlessness. He laboured heavily up 
 and down his room, supporting himself on one side with 
 his stick and on the other with pieces of furniture. 
 Soon he would know ! In half-an-hour, in twenty 
 minutes, a letter from Martin would lie in his hands 
 and all this agony of mind would be ended. 
 
 He went to his window, sat down there, and looked 
 out. And then, fantastically it seemed, the wooden 
 door in the wall opened, and the postman appeared.
 
 THE POISONER 131 
 
 Trembling with agitation, Symons rose to his feet 
 by the aid of his stick, walked across the room and, 
 having opened his door, paused expectantly. The 
 sound came — the sound of light packages dropping into 
 a tin box. His long dressing-gown trailing on the 
 floor, he made his way slowly and with extreme difficulty 
 along the corridor until he reached the head of the 
 stairs. He was now covered and almost dripping with 
 perspiration ; his protruding eyes were large and hot 
 with eagerness ; his breathing was stertorous. He 
 crept down, placing both feet carefully on each step. 
 When half-way down, a door on the landing above 
 opened, revealing Monica in her nightdress. 
 
 " Why, father ! father ! " she cried, in alarm. 
 
 He turned slowly, trod on the edge of his dressing- 
 gown, lost his balance, swayed for a moment, and 
 fell backwards, his bulky body crashing heavily on 
 the staircase, his head striking the sharp, carved edge 
 of the newel. 
 
 So died a man whose life had been one long epoch of 
 suffering, whose ambition had aspired and failed, and 
 whose protecting affection had been of no avail.
 
 BOOK II 
 
 Desine fata Deutnflecti sperare precatido. 
 
 Virgil
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 TOWARDS the end of July Martin woke early 
 in the morning and began to think — to torture 
 himself with thought. He was hateful to 
 himself, and yet his hatred was streaked with a profound 
 self-pity that was as genuine an emotion as any he had 
 ever experienced. On the other side of the street, a 
 blank wall faced him, shutting out the light and making 
 his drab room oppressive and sinister. All will-power 
 had left him ; he wished to rise, but the effort to make 
 the necessary decision was too great. He could only lie 
 there, profoundly dejected, and wait until his wretched- 
 ness became too poignant to be borne. 
 
 For release was at hand and could be his as soon as 
 he cared to command it. He played with the thought 
 — to be fettered yet free ! It gave him a kind of 
 perverted pleasure to submit for the moment to self- 
 torture. Besides, he must think now, and plan his day, 
 for the time would soon be near when consecutive 
 thought would be impossible and when, if no resolves 
 had previously been made, he would drift — drift — 
 drift into any company and to any place. But what 
 could he do ? What plans could he make ? None, 
 for nothing interested him. Listening to music was a 
 bore, reading a burden. To go out and wander in the 
 streets of Limehouse, where people would jostle him, 
 where sudden noises would pull like tiny pincers at every 
 nerve in his skin, where omnibuses were juggernauts and 
 open spaces vast deserts, would be a terrifying agony. 
 Of one thing he was sure : he must not remain alone. 
 Companionship would obscure the accusing and minatory 
 self within. And there was solace in the tliought that 
 he would speak to people who were perhaps more 
 despicable than himself. 
 
 Turning on his stomach, he stretched his limbs, 
 relaxed his muscles and savoured his helplessness with 
 deep, almost tearful, self-pity. During the twenty 
 minutes he had been awake, he had with little effort 
 kept at bay those enshrouding black thoughts and 
 despairs that came when he was completely sober. 
 
 135
 
 136 THE POISONER 
 
 But now they were thick upon liim. To die ! To pass 
 away 1 To feel the .sure, slow dissolution of his spirit ! 
 If only that could be ! . . . He rose to his knees in a 
 panic. What if, after all, he was mistaken ? What if 
 his memory had betrayed him ? What if there was no 
 whisky left ? 
 
 He scrambled out of bed and, shaking all over like 
 a man with palsy, tottered across the room, bending 
 down in front of a little cabinet that stood upon the 
 floor. He opened the door with a jerk, and his bright, 
 bloodshot eyes fastened their gaze upon the bottle. 
 Fool that he was to agitate himself about nothing ! 
 The bottle was nearly full ! Into a large breakfast- 
 cup lying by its side he poured the drink until the cup 
 was two-thirds full. The smell of the spirit sent a 
 spasm of nausea through his body ; he could feel the 
 revolt of his entrails against that poison. On to the 
 whisky he poured water, and then, having raised the 
 cup to his lips with both hands, took a mouthful of its 
 contents. It was with difficulty he swallowed it ; 
 having done so, he quickly placed the cup on the 
 dressing-table, fearing that if he vomited — as was only 
 too likely — the precious fluid would be spilled. He 
 waited a minute : nothing mitoward happened : his 
 body received the stuff it hated. So, again taking the 
 cup and holding it as reverently as though it held 
 sacramental wine, he put it to his lips and swallowed 
 greedily, passionately. By an effort of will, he kept his 
 protesting body under control, and relief came almost 
 at once. The oppression lifted ; his hands ceased to 
 tremble ; he became more sure of himself — more acutely 
 conscious that he was indeed he — Martin Stavart. In 
 ten minutes he changed from a shrinking, apprehensive 
 creature to a man conscious of and grateful for his 
 manhood. 
 
 He rose to his full stature and with a gesture such as 
 an actor with a thousand pairs of eyes upon him would 
 make, drew the window-curtains aside to their full limit. 
 Then he sought the reflection of his face in the mirror.
 
 THE POISONER 137 
 
 It was hideous : it was animal : it was evil. Five 
 weeks' continuous drinking had drowned the recognis- 
 able Stavart and had freed a devil to look out of his 
 eyes. He stared at himself with gloating, disgusted 
 interest. His skin was swollen and puffy ; his mouth 
 curved cruelly. He tried to bring himself — Martin — 
 back : tried desperately to look as he was when he 
 came to London seven long, long weeks ago. But 
 without success. The smile that he wished to make 
 pleasant became a knowing smirk ; the look of frank- 
 ness, of openness, was but the gaping stare of an idiot. 
 Worst of all, this effort to control his facial muscles, 
 to compel their obedience, resulted in a sudden un- 
 controllable twitching of his face. With a groan of 
 horror, he turned away from the mirror, sought the 
 bottle, and poured out even more than he had already 
 swallowed. . . . 
 
 God ! How divine ! Divine release, divine forgetful- 
 ness ! Power was his and confidence and — yes ! self- 
 respect. After all, he was Stavart, a man of position, 
 a musician on the threshold of fame. He had all his 
 life before him, and in another ten years he would be the 
 conqueror of Europe. He would be the peer of Richard 
 Strauss himself. And more than that — greater, more 
 wonderful — the very world would echo with his name — 
 he would saturate the entire culture of the world with 
 his personality — his genius would percolate through 
 the 
 
 He pulled himself up and, as was his wont, quenched 
 his dreams and turned contemptuously upon himself. 
 You're a drunkard, said he : a dipsomaniac : a man 
 for ever lost. You may try to save yourself, but the 
 sleeping beast within you will drive you on to inevitable 
 death. No hope : no shadow of a hope. For months 
 at a time you will deceive yourself ; you will think 
 you have mastered the devil within you. But all the 
 time, he will be lurking there, ready — more than ready I 
 — eager ! — feverishly eager ! He will rise, walk forth, 
 and lead you . . . lead you to that dark chamber where
 
 138 THE POISONER 
 
 Reason totters on her throne, where the skeleton is 
 visible beneath the flesh, where the fire of hope is 
 quenched, and where the voices of wickedness are 
 ceaselessly raised. And when you are dead, your life 
 will have been a smear upon the world ; you will 
 have broken another life besides your own and brovight 
 shadow to all who love you. . . . 
 
 His thoughts became intolerable. Another drink, 
 and all would be well. A deep draught of neat spirits 
 and this last nightmare would be slain. 
 
 He was standing in his pyjamas in the middle of the 
 room. He turned to the bottle, grasped it by the neck 
 and, thrusting the orifice to his mouth, drank deeply. 
 As he replaced the bottle on the dressing-table, he 
 could feel the liquor, like molten lava, bounding through 
 his veins ; a sudden fire, half pleasure and half pain, 
 flamed within him. He gasped for breath, clenched his 
 hands as he controlled a sudden, revolting turgescence 
 of his stomach, and sat down on the side of the bed. 
 In a few minutes he was master of his senses and 
 of his thoughts : he had drunk himself to complete 
 sobriety. 
 
 Twenty minutes later, he was standing in the dark, 
 squahd bar of the " Pony and Cloud." It was not yet 
 half-past ten, but already ten or twelve people were 
 assembled. To them and others was entrusted the 
 secret of admittance ; it was all done, it was said, with 
 the covert connivance of the police. 
 
 " Well, Jim," said Martin to the barman, " what do 
 you advise after three-quarters of a bottle of whisky ? " 
 
 "Oh, I should give it a miss, Mr Donkin," answered 
 the man, calling Martin by the name he had used 
 for the last five weeks. "But here! I'll mix you 
 something. Something special." 
 
 He mixed a drink of port wine, stout and cherry 
 brandy, and pushed it across the counter. 
 
 " That'll put you all right," he said. 
 
 " Oh, I'm right enough as it is ; I just felt I'd like 
 to be a bit righter. Well, here's fun." He drank the
 
 THE POISONER 139 
 
 mixture off in a single gulp. " And now, Jim, what's 
 yours ? " 
 
 " Well, I don't mind if I do. Drop of whisky for 
 me." 
 
 As Martin was feeling in his pocket for the money, 
 he became aware of a tall, smiling girl at his side. He 
 had seen her several times before in the Pony and Cloud, 
 and had passed a casual word with her, vaguely wonder- 
 ing who she was and what her occupation. He turned 
 to her now. 
 
 " May I ? " he asked, with a smile. 
 
 " You're very kind," she said softly. " I wish you'd 
 talk to me." 
 
 " Feeling lonely ? " 
 
 " Ever so." 
 
 He looked into her eyes and saw that they belied 
 the mocking smile of her lips. 
 
 " Down on your luck ? " 
 
 " N — no, not specially. But we won't talk about 
 that. I just want to feel for half-an-hour that I'm 
 near a human being. I'm sick of myself." 
 
 " Poor kid ! Come, we'll sit over there near the 
 clock. Trot along and I'll bring you half-a-bottle of 
 champagne." 
 
 " Oh no — not champagne ! Anything will do for 
 me." 
 
 " Anything ? " 
 
 " Yes — I don't care what it is." 
 
 " Well, then, I shall bring you what I like." 
 
 She walked across the dark narrow room and sat 
 down at the table he had indicated. In a couple of 
 minutes he had brought to the table a bottle of cham- 
 pagne and two wine-glasses. He sat down beside her 
 and poured out the wine. 
 
 " You are extravagant," she said. 
 
 " Yes — sometimes." 
 
 "Always," she insisted. "I have watched you. I 
 have seen you here several times lately. You are 
 drinking too much — much too much."
 
 140 THE POISONER 
 
 He looked at her and smiled, 
 
 " But you are not going to scold me ? " 
 
 "No. But if I were your friend I should be very 
 angry with you. Tell me, what is the matter ? " 
 
 She leaned slightly towards him, her lips parted, her 
 delicate nostrils dilated. 
 
 " But I thought our half-hour's talk was to bring 
 comfort to you, not to me ! " he protested. " If this 
 is a confessional, it is I who am the priest — not you." 
 
 " But I've nothing to tell. My lover has deserted 
 me — that's all. One's lover always does in the end ; 
 it's simply a matter of time." 
 
 " Yes ? Did you love him ? " 
 
 " Who knows ? I thought I did. He was very kind 
 to me. But he bored me. I liked him to kiss me, but 
 when he talked — oh, it was all so banal, so very, very 
 stupid. And then there was no surprise in him ; he 
 never did or thought an unexpected thing. One soon 
 tires of people like that — at least I do. As soon as I 
 really know a man, I cease to love him." 
 
 His eyes were on her beautiful, strong hand as it 
 held the glass poised near her lips. Her perfect, pink 
 nails looked not so much as though they had been 
 filed and polished into things of beauty, as that they 
 had naturally grown like that. Her hand had so much 
 individuality that, in some queer way, it seemed 
 conscious of itself. 
 
 " You are admiring my hand," she said, pleased. 
 
 "Yes. |It's so very much alive. All of you is 
 alive." 
 
 " But you're not. You seem to me like a man in a 
 dream." 
 
 Quickly he removed his gaze from her, startled into 
 self-consciousness. 
 
 " Don't talk about me. I'm in a mood of self- 
 loathing." 
 
 " I also." 
 
 She mused for a few moments, then laughed bitterly. 
 ' " Do you know what I would like ? " she asked. " I
 
 THE POISONER 141 
 
 would like to live in the country, in a nice house with a 
 river near by. In the river I would swim and over 
 the country I would ride to hounds." 
 
 "Well, why not?" 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. Some people — haven't you 
 noticed it ? — are driven by something inside them to 
 do just the things they don't want to do. I am driven 
 to Lunehouse by a fever of excitement ; well, no, 
 not excitement ; but by a profound desire to see low 
 life at close quarters — to be part of it, you understand — 
 to take risks and live near danger." 
 
 He flushed uncomfortably. 
 
 "What a fool I am!" he exclaimed. "Just now 
 I said ' Poor kid ! ' I thought you were just a pretty 
 butterfly from which some rough hand had removed 
 some of the beautiful dust. But now I think you are 
 more like a bright panther." 
 
 " Oh no 1 " she protested anxiously ; "I am not like 
 that. I hate suffering. A panther kills ; I would see 
 everyone happy. You are unhappy." 
 
 " Not now. Not at this moment. I have drunk 
 enough to make me forget. And you interest me. No 
 one is unhappy if he is really interested." 
 
 " And this afternoon ? " 
 
 " I shall be asleep." 
 
 " And this evening ? " 
 
 " I shall have had more drink." 
 
 " And next week — next month ? " 
 
 " Next month is a long way off. I don't know. I 
 suppose I shall be ill. But I never think of the future. 
 Life is in the immediate hour." 
 
 " But you said just now that you loathed yourself." 
 
 " Did I ? Well, I've changed my mind. I don't 
 loathe myself. Just at this minute, I think I'm rather 
 a wonderful person." 
 
 " You play the piano wonderfully." 
 
 He started violently. 
 
 " You know me ? " he asked suspiciously. " Is 
 that why you asked me to talk to you for half-an-hour ?
 
 142 THE POISONER 
 
 Are you just a woman consumed by curiosity ? Are 
 you drinking with me so that you may ferret out my 
 secrets ? " 
 
 "No. I thought I might be able to help you. I 
 can't help knowing you — it isn't my fault. I heard 
 you play two years ago. No, Mr Donkin, I thought I 
 might help you." 
 
 She spoke in a level, unemotional voice. 
 
 He smiled dryly. 
 
 " I have always found that the most dangerous women 
 are those who are anxious to help a man," he said. 
 
 "Yes," she said sorrowfully, "you think, as you 
 said, that I'm like a bright panther. And now I feel 
 that you don't like me." 
 
 " Oh yes, I do. But I shouldn't like you in the role 
 of a protector. I'm curious to know why you should 
 imagine I'm in need of help. I can assure you I'm not. 
 You think I'm lost — gone to the demnition bow-wows, 
 eh?" 
 
 She felt the covert hostility in his manner. 
 
 "Lost?" she echoed. "But who is more com- 
 pletely lost than I ? I am lost even from myself : I 
 don't know what kind of woman I am — what kind of 
 woman I was meant to be." 
 
 But her words failed to allay his suspicion. 
 
 "You know my name is Stavart," he said, in a low 
 voice. " What is your name ? " 
 
 " Olive Merrall." 
 
 " Well, Miss Merrall, were you in the habit of visiting 
 this public-house before you saw me here ? " 
 
 She hesitated a moment, and her hesitation con- 
 firmed him in his suspicion. 
 
 " You have come to spy on me ! " he whispered 
 excitedly, with an air of triumph. " I knew it ! You 
 have been sent by someone ! You have come to 
 ' rescue ' me — me ! That damned fool Leopold has 
 sent you ! Well, what is it ? What do you want ? 
 What am I to do ? What are your instructions ? " 
 
 She drew away from him coldly.
 
 THE POISONER 143 
 
 " You are making a scene," she said ; "I am sorry 
 I spoke to you." 
 
 But, beneath the cover of the table, he seized her 
 wrist in an iron grip and held her fast. 
 
 " Oh no ! " he said ; " you can't go like that." 
 
 His brilliant, hot eyes sought hers for a sign of 
 guilt, but found there nothing but suffering and 
 disappointment. Her lips trembled slightly, and sud- 
 denly he realised that she was on the point of 
 tears. He unloosed his hold and sat quietly, breathing 
 quickly. 
 
 "Why did you treat me like that?" she asked 
 mournfully. ' ' I wanted to be your friend and now ' ' 
 
 " Why ? Why should you want to be my friend ? " 
 
 " I am unhappy. And alone." 
 
 " You are not spying on me ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " You do not wish to restore me to my friends ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " You swear it ? " 
 
 "Yes. I swear it." 
 
 "Well, then," he said grudgingly, "I am sorry for 
 what I have done — I am sorry I upset you." 
 
 He stared moodily in front of him and she made a 
 movement as if to go. 
 
 " Don't leave me," he said, and stretched out an arm 
 to detain her. 
 
 " I don't want to." She moved a little nearer to 
 him, and half spoke, half whispered : "I will stay with 
 you as long as you like." 
 
 " It is strange how quickly we have become intimate. 
 It is strange, too, that I have suddenly become shy 
 of you. I feel ashamed. I ought to have trusted you, 
 but I didn't. . . . Look here. Miss Merrall, may I see 
 you this evening ? " 
 
 " Of course ! Are you going now ? " 
 
 " Yes. I'm not well — I want to be alone." 
 
 " This evening, then. Here ? " 
 
 He nodded and rose. Then, walking rather sulkily
 
 144 THE POISONER 
 
 past her, he went to the bar and asked the potman to 
 let him out. 
 
 He was overcome by a feeUng of mireaUty, a quick 
 conviction that what had just passed and what was 
 now passing was a delusion — or, if not a delusion, then 
 something that he only half realized. Alcohol clouded 
 his thinking but sharpened his suspicions. As he 
 walked through the busy streets, he tried to remember 
 what he had said to Miss Merrall and, with more anxiety, 
 what she had said to him. But the events of the past 
 hour remained in his mind as a phantasmagoria ; 
 though they were so recent, his brain no longer held 
 them. But when he had let himself into his rooms 
 on the second floor and had sat down on the sofa in his 
 sitting-room, he had a vague sensation that something he 
 valued had eluded him, had slipped through his fingers 
 ... no ! he had cast it aside ! What had happened ? 
 What had he missed ? Why had he let it go ? Dimly 
 he seemed to see a woman with a smile that strove to 
 conceal suffering. He clenched his hands in self- 
 disgust. Oh, damnation ! A thousand curses be upon 
 him and the whole world ! 
 
 Recognising instinctively that the effect of the drink 
 of the early morning was already passing away and 
 that the hour of payment could be staved off only by 
 the consumption of more alcohol, he rose and passed 
 through the door that communicated with his bedroom. 
 He opened the cabinet and took therefrom the bottle 
 of whisky. He had scarcely lifted it when his nervous 
 system received a painful shock. The bottle was 
 lighter than he had anticipated. Holding it up to the 
 window, he saw that it was half-empty. Of course ! 
 He must procure some more at once. Not a minute 
 must be lost. He felt like a man in a dark dungeon 
 who has only one match between himself and eternal 
 blackness. With a convulsive movement, he raised 
 the bottle to his lips and drank . . . and drank. 
 
 Before he had turned the lock on his rooms, every 
 vestige of the Martin Stavart that his friends at Barton
 
 THE POISONER 145 
 
 and Salten knew had completely disappeared. He was 
 now an unthinking automaton with tortured nerves 
 — a moving mass of flesh with a drugged brain but 
 painfully apprehensive sense perceptions. His entire 
 nervous system quaked with the fear that he might 
 meet with some sudden and unpleasant surprise. The 
 external, material world impinged upon his senses with 
 cruel brutality. 
 
 Yet his body moved down the staircase and along 
 the street with perfect steadiness. He neither saw nor 
 heard anything normally ; he was in a torturing world 
 of his own. Having given a secret knock on the door 
 of the Pony and Cloud, he was admitted by the potman, 
 and made his way to the bar. The things his eyes saw 
 were not consciously conveyed to his brain, so that it 
 came about he stared at OHve Merrall without seeing 
 her. 
 
 " I want two bottles of whisky, Jim." 
 
 " Sure you're all right, Mr Donkin ? " 
 
 Martin, hearing nothing, made no reply. 
 
 Jim smiled Imowingly at Miss Merrall, who was 
 looking at Stavart with eyes of pity and anger. 
 
 "Here," said Jim, leaning across the bar, "here: 
 I'll send them along for you. You don't want to be 
 dropping good stuff on the pavement." 
 
 "What's that you say? You'll send them?" 
 Stavart asked, with peculiar and unwarranted cunning. 
 " Not if I know it, Jim. Just hand them over, like a 
 good lad. Wrap them into a parcel and make them 
 look like a pair of boots." 
 
 He spoke quite clearly but with a peculiar hesitation, 
 as though embarking on each fresh sentence called for 
 a strong effort of will. 
 
 When Jim had retired to the little office at the back 
 of the bar to get the bottles. Miss Merrall turned to 
 Stavart. 
 
 " May I carry them for you ? " she asked. 
 
 He gazed at her stupidly, unrecognisingly. 
 
 "No. What for?" 
 
 K
 
 146 THE POISONER 
 
 " You might drop them." 
 
 " Oh yes," he said jeeringly. " I might drop them. 
 I can see myself dropping them. You're the girl that 
 heard me play two years ago, aren't you ? I remember 
 youy 
 
 Suddenly, he placed his elbows on the low bar and 
 hid his face in his hands. She moved close to him. 
 
 " What is it ? " she asked. " Are you ill ? " 
 
 " Let me alone ! " he snarled. " I know ^o?/." 
 
 His posture suggested abject misery and, indeed, he 
 was plunged in a profound wretchedness. His face was 
 still concealed in his hands when the potman returned 
 with a parcel. 
 
 " Two pounds to you, Mr Donkin," he said, pushing 
 the parcel across the counter. 
 
 Stavart fumbled foolishly in his pockets for a long 
 time before he found the required notes. 
 
 " Sure you're all right ? Look here, Mr Donkin, 
 I'll come along with you." 
 
 " No," said Miss Merrall authoritatively ; "I'll see 
 him home." 
 
 Stavart apparently heard neither of their offers, for 
 he was at the door waiting for Jim to unlock it. 
 
 As he passed out into the street, Miss Merrall passed 
 out also and followed a few paces behind him.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 SHE was at his side when he opened the door of 
 his rooms. 
 " I have come to look after you," she said. 
 He turned to her without surprise and held open the 
 door for her while she passed in. When they were both 
 within and he had locked the door, he gave her the 
 parcel and the key, and as he did so it seemed to her 
 that he was consciously investing her with the power 
 to control his liberty. 
 
 "Give me some whisky!" he said. "There's a 
 bottle in the cabinet in my bedi'oom." 
 
 She obeyed him at once. She half-filled a tumbler 
 with whisky and, having added an equal quantity of 
 water, handed the tumbler to him. He drank its 
 contents. 
 
 " I'm going to sleep," he announced, moving towards 
 the inner room. 
 
 " I'll take off your boots," she said, following him 
 into his bedroom. 
 
 But if he heard her, he paid no heed, for he threw 
 himself full length upon his bed, closed his eyes and 
 almost immediately began to breathe heavily. She 
 removed his boots, threw a light covering over him, and 
 prepared to leave the room. But she had scarcely 
 reached the door when, his eyes still shut, he murmured 
 entreatingly : 
 
 " You are not going to leave me ? " 
 
 " No : I shall be here when you wake.' 
 
 There was a look almost of happiness on her face as 
 she moved about his sitting-room full of cheap furniture. 
 She pulled the dirty lace curtains aside and threw open 
 the window. An oval table in the middle of the room 
 was littered with debris — a saucer of rancid butter, 
 a portion of a loaf, a tin that had contained salmon 
 but that was now half-full of flies, a volume of D. H. 
 Lawrence's poems, a few sheets of music-paper on which 
 scraps of music had been written in pencil, an over- 
 turned bottle of ink, an empty whisky bottle, a pair of 
 broken braces, and so on. From this table she removed 
 147 
 
 5»
 
 148 THE POISONER 
 
 everything and brushed the cloth, and then, tiring of 
 her work, sat down and surveyed the room. 
 
 It was devastatingly ugly and sordid. It was not 
 even clean. The wall-paper was thick with dirt, the 
 mantelpiece sticky, the ceiling dark with soot. There 
 was an indefinable but easily perceptible smell. Almost 
 all the weft of the carpet had been worn away, leaving 
 only the warp in treacherous strands. 
 
 This, she told herself, would be her home as long as 
 it was Stavart's. Having once gained an entrance, not 
 even he should turn her out. She had not been attracted 
 hither because Stavart was Stavart, but because he 
 was a man of distinction whom life was treating with 
 gross cruelty. Obviously, he was now at the mercy 
 of life : a force within him was goading him into the 
 very jaws of death. He was being butchered — butchered 
 by himself; he could not more surely destroy himself 
 if he thrust a dagger into his vitals. But she was going 
 to fight him ; she was going to range herself on the 
 side of the Martin Stavart whom the public knew and 
 fight the Martin Stavart who lay in the next room. 
 She was thrilled by the thought of the struggle, the 
 adventure, the good work to be achieved. There was 
 no sentimentality and little sentiment in her attitude 
 to him ; she had loved once and loved tragically, and 
 believed that love would never be hers again. Her 
 life lately had been one long boredom : Stavart should 
 fill it : he should be at once her work and her pleasure. 
 
 Each time she had seen him in the Pony and Cloud 
 during the last few weeks she had studied him covertly. 
 She had noted the hectic gaiety of a man whose brain 
 is energised and made brilliant by alcohol ; she had felt 
 both the charm and the power of his personality. She 
 had witnessed the stupor and moroseness that had 
 inevitably supervened, and there were times when she 
 had told herself that he was trembling on the verge of 
 delirium or perhaps even of permanent insanity. She 
 had pitied him, not m a personal manner, but in the 
 way in which one may pity any human creature who is
 
 THE POISONER 149 
 
 the resisting but helpless victim of his owii implacable 
 weakness. " He is worth saving ! " she had exclaimed 
 to herself, time and again, but not until to-day had she 
 recognised that the hour had come for her intervention. 
 She was under no delusion that she was prompted solely 
 by the desire to save the life — and perhaps the soul ? — 
 of a fellow- creature ; adventure ran in harness with 
 altruism, for to her personal risk, danger and novelty 
 were the very salt of life. . . . 
 
 She had been seated for some hours, buried in her 
 thoughts and in plans for the immediate future, when 
 she heard a movement in the inner room. The door 
 opened and Stavart stood staring at her with dazed, 
 unrecognising eyes. She rose to her feet. 
 
 " Hello ! " he said. " I had forgotten — yes — I 
 remember " 
 
 His glazed eyes and loose lips were hideous and his 
 disordered hair added to the wildness of his appearance. 
 She smiled at him. 
 
 " You asked me to stay," she said, and then, after a 
 moment's pause, added : "I wanted to." 
 
 " Oh yes ! " he exclaimed, and then made a gesture 
 with his hand as though to wipe out all the incidents 
 of the morning. 
 
 He returned to his bedroom, gazed at his reflection 
 in the mirror, and smirked at himself as though he 
 and what he saw understood each other and were 
 about to enter into a conspiracy. He noticed that 
 she had followed him. Casting his eyes on his brush 
 and comb that lay by the side of the mirror, he willed 
 himself to use them ; but the effort to do so was too 
 great. His failure to accomplish this simple act filled 
 him with exasperation, and trembling with a sudden, 
 terribly urgent craving for drink, he walked over to 
 the cabinet with a palpably affected air of unconcern. 
 With elaborate carelessness, he uncorked one of the 
 new bottles, and drank. 
 
 " Will you smoke ? " he asked, offering her a cigarette- 
 case. He was seated near the window with his back
 
 150 THE POISONER 
 
 to the light. She sat on the far side of a small table, 
 watching him closely. 
 
 " Not at present, thanks. Do you know what time 
 it is ? " 
 
 "No. Three?" 
 
 " Nearly four. Have you had any food to-day ? " 
 
 " No. At least, I don't think so. Have you ? " 
 
 " I had breakfast. I'm hungry now, though. Will 
 you take me out for some food ? " 
 
 " Oh, I couldn't. I'm sorry. I'm all on wires. I 
 couldn't face the movement and the noise." He stopped 
 and threw her a glance, half scrutiny, half appeal. 
 " Unless," he added, " unless I drank half-a-bottle of 
 whisky first." 
 
 " If you did, your food would do you no good." 
 
 " Oh, me ? I was thinking of you. I thought it 
 was you who are hungry. As for me " 
 
 He stretched out his hand for the whisky bottle that 
 he had placed on the table. 
 
 " Don't ! " she urged. 
 
 " 1 must ! " 
 
 Afraid of the excitement and strain that any inter- 
 ference from her would cause, he snatched at the 
 bottle, but his fingers closed on empty air. He had 
 misjudged the distance between himself and the object 
 of his desire. He made another attempt to secure the 
 bottle, and this time his trembling, flaccid hand upset 
 it and its contents began to pour out on the table. 
 Swiftly she picked it up and placed it out of his reach. 
 The little incident completely unmanned him. 
 
 " Don't do that 1 " he said pleadingly. 
 
 "Yes. Wait. You shall drink soon. Listen to me. 
 In fifteen minutes you shall have half-a-tumblerful. 
 An hour later you shall have the same quantity, and 
 two hours after that " 
 
 He broke out in sudden anger. 
 
 " You fool ! You don't know what you are playing 
 with ! I must drink now — now ! If I don't, I shall 
 go mad ! "
 
 THE POISONER 151 
 
 He moved round the table towards his bedroom, 
 but she intercepted him. They faced each other. 
 Though for a woman she was tall, he towered above 
 her. As she looked into his eyes, he seemed to her one 
 vast, consuming desire. 
 
 " Stavart. I've told you — you shall drink in fifteen — 
 in thirteen minutes. Sit down ! You must not think 
 that I am afraid of you." 
 
 For answer, he clasped her arms and pushed her aside. 
 
 " Very well," she said, " we shall fight." 
 
 But without a glance at her, he turned to the table 
 and seized the bottle in both hands. In a second it was 
 at his mouth ; the spirit poured into his parched throat 
 and ran from his mouth down his neck Her courage 
 suddenly deserted her ; awed by his terrible passion 
 and fascmated by his suffering, she stood helpless. 
 In a minute he was again seated ; half-choked and 
 breathing heavily, he was yet soothed. 
 
 " Now," said he," if you like, we can talk." 
 
 Though he had gained his desire, he spoke without 
 triumph. 
 
 " I am sorry," she said ; " I made a mistake." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I ought not to have opposed you." 
 
 He looked at her in surprise. 
 
 "I'm glad you recognise that." 
 
 " Do you feel well enough to discuss things ? " 
 
 " Oh yes. I shall be all right for about an hour. 
 Then the torture will begin again." 
 
 " Do you want to stop drinking ? — to be cured ? " 
 
 " ' Cured ' ? " He laughed. " There is no cure for 
 such as I am. People like me are doomed from birth. 
 There is no escape." 
 
 " You may be right : I don't know. But it is im- 
 possible for you to continue like this. You are on the 
 very verge of a breakdown — almost any day " 
 
 " Almost any hour ! " he corrected. " I feel it. 
 I know it. But what then ? I shall go into a hospital, 
 I shall be nursed and I shall recover. But only for a
 
 152 THE POISONER 
 
 time. I may appear again in public and I may achieve 
 another great success. For three months, for six months, 
 perhaps even for a year, I shall sail triumphantly over 
 the waters of life, but as surely and inevitably as the 
 sun will rise to-morrow, I shall break mvself on 
 the rocks once more." 
 
 She made a gesture of angry dissent. 
 
 " I did not think you were the kind of man to accept 
 defeat — to anticipate it and submit to it. After all, 
 the human will can accomplish almost anything. 
 Self-indulgence " 
 
 " Ah ! I see ! " he interrupted. " I see you don't 
 understand even the beginning of the subject. Self- 
 indulgence ! You might as logically accuse a con- 
 smnptive of indulging himself in his disease. The true 
 dipsomaniac never gets a moment's happiness and but 
 a very few moments' pleasure from drink. He drinks 
 for relief, though it is true that the ceaseless malaise 
 from which he escapes is not one-tenth part as dreadful 
 as that suffering into which he is very soon plunged. 
 People like you speak of the dipsomaniac's ' craving ' 
 for drink, and think of his life as a succession of cravings 
 and satiety. But I never ' crave ' for alcohol unless, 
 as at present, I am in the middle of a bout of drinking." 
 
 " Then why do you ever begin drinking ? " 
 
 " Because of my malaise. And that, of course, you 
 won't understand. Let me try to explain it to you. 
 Normally — that is to say, when I have been completely 
 sober for months at a time — I habitually feel a vague, 
 nervous discomfort, a sensation at times of acute 
 apprehensiveness, an oppression — an obsession — of 
 personal disintegration. That conveys nothing to you ? 
 I will put it more simply. I never have complete 
 mastery of myself — no certainty that during ten succes- 
 sive minutes I shall remain in the same mood. There 
 is constant fluctuation, an ebbing and flowing that 
 never cease. I am the victim of everything, however 
 trivial. Nothing in me is stable : I have nothing in me 
 that I can catch hold of : my soul can never become
 
 THE POISONER 153 
 
 anchored to anything in hfe. ... No ! I feel you don't 
 understand. But I can't explain it better; indeed, 
 never before have I explained it so well." 
 
 " But your work ! Your ambition ! Surely they 
 are permanent ? " 
 
 " Yes — so far as they minister to my vanity. Vanity 
 is the greatest spur in life ; nothing is ever achieved 
 without it. ... I often wonder if it is not vanity that 
 keeps me here in these filthy rooms — sordid picturesque- 
 ness, you know — genius drinking the dregs of life and 
 all that sort of thing." 
 
 "Are you ever sincere ? " she asked. 
 
 " I wonder. . . . But all this time we are talking 
 about nothing. You must go ovit for some food." 
 
 " And you ? " 
 
 " I shall stay here." 
 
 "Very well. I can return when I want. You gave 
 me your key, you know." 
 
 " Did I ? What ever for ? " 
 
 "I want to come here to nurse you — to be your 
 companion." 
 
 He looked at her steadily for a few moments. 
 
 " I wonder why," he said. " Really, the situation 
 is a bit unusual, isn't it ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but we are unusual people. Your own 
 situation, if you consider it, is not an everyday one. 
 But you don't want a companion ? " 
 
 He flushed deeply and drummed his fingers upon the 
 table. 
 
 " If I felt that you really wanted to stay with me . . . 
 what I mean is, if I felt that what becomes of me is a 
 matter of any consequence to you . . . no, I can't — 
 I won't, I mean — get sentimental about it. Why 
 should I ? But do you mean here — in these rooms ? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " I see," he went on. " You want to come here to 
 
 cure ' me." 
 
 " I believe that if I live with you I can wean you from 
 — from all this. I want to do it."
 
 154 THE POISONER 
 
 "And I am, so to speak, to put myself in vour 
 hands?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " But it's impossible ! I want to drink now, for 
 example. If I were in your power, you would forbid it. 
 We should quarrel every hour. Besides, what do you 
 know of dipsomania ? How can you cure me ? " 
 
 She went towards him and stopped by his side, her 
 hand upon his shoulder. 
 
 " Let me, for my own sake. I am unhappy. I told 
 you this morning — do you remember ? — that my lover 
 has deserted me. I hate loneliness — I am afraid of it." 
 
 He removed her hand from his shoulder and took it 
 within his own, 
 
 " You are a strange woman," he said, " and even I, 
 to whom many strange things happen, can't realise that 
 you are serious. It is just a whim, a freak, isn't it ? 
 You come to me to-day, but next week you will be 
 gone." 
 
 " No — I come to you for as long as you will let me 
 remain." 
 
 Four hours later, Stavart was fitfully reading a book 
 of verse while Miss Merrall cleared away the remains 
 of a meal they had just eaten. In addition to the 
 bedroom and sitting-room, Stavart also rented on the 
 same floor a second bedroom, and a room that served 
 the treble purpose of bathroom, kitchen and scullery. 
 The flat was not self-contained, and though he was 
 compelled to pay for the additional two rooms, he never 
 used the former and had almost forgotten that it 
 belonged to him. Already his companion had taken 
 possession of the second bedroom and had removed her 
 clothes and personal belongings thither. 
 
 Stavart was grateful for her presence. She had, as it 
 were, taken possession of him and he was freed from 
 the necessity of doing the hundred and one daily thing 
 that every man who lives by himself must do — things 
 that cost him enormous mental effort and that resulted
 
 THE POISONER 155 
 
 in unspeakable nervous exasperation and exhaustion. 
 For example, he was not to-night driven to the Pony 
 and Cloud by the fear of being alone. Later on, he 
 would not have to return to his rooms, dazed and afraid. 
 Food would be cooked and brought to him ; the gas 
 would be lit for him after sunset ; when he awoke in 
 the middle of the night, filled with dread and panic- 
 stricken with the fear of fear, he would be consoled by 
 the thought that someone who cared for him was at 
 hand. All suspicion of Miss Merrall had now vanished. 
 True, he did not understand her, but then, after all, 
 did he understand anyone ? . . . 
 
 He could hear her washing the knives and forks and 
 china they had recently been using. Feeling unaccount- 
 ably soothed by the homely sounds of the splashing of 
 water and the clashing of crockery, he rose, left the 
 room, crossed the little landing and stood, pipe in hand, 
 in the doorway, regarding her. 
 
 " Why," said he, " you might have been here for 
 mu-months and mu-months, so natural does it seem." 
 
 She laughed and threw him a towel. 
 
 " Wliat's this for ? " he asked. 
 
 " Never dried dishes ? It's quite easy. You take 
 hold of a plate in one hand." 
 
 "I'm awfully sorry," said he, " but look ! " 
 
 He held out his hands ; they were trembling violently. 
 
 " I should smu — smash them if — if I took h — hold 
 of any — anything." 
 
 " Are you feeling rotten ? " 
 
 " Yes — sa — suddenly. I was all — all right a ma — 
 inute ago." 
 
 " Well, you've gone two hours without anything. 
 Bravo ! Stavart ! " 
 
 She gave him a boyish, humorous look. 
 
 " Here," she said, " I'll give you a drink." 
 
 She took a key from her pocket and walked across 
 the room to a cupboard in which she had locked the 
 whisky. 
 
 " No. I ca — can stick it out a ba — it long — longer."
 
 156 THE POISONER 
 
 But she unlocked the cupboard, took out a bottle 
 and carefully measured out four tablespoonfuls of spirit. 
 He received it from her gratefullj^ and without shame 
 and, having drunk it, handed her the empty glass. 
 " That's better," said he. 
 
 But he sat down heavily, and with a depressed air, 
 on a chair near the window. 
 
 " Isn't it very close this evening ? " he asked, not 
 for the sake of saying something, but as one seeking 
 information. 
 
 '' Yes, I suppose it is. But I don't feel it myself." 
 " Tell me something about yourself." 
 "Shall I? Well . . . but I don't know where to 
 begin. Let me see. First of all, I'm an orphan. My 
 father was like you — he drank. Killed himself. But 
 there was no one to help him. I left him, because I was 
 afraid. And then for two years I earned my living as 
 an artist's model. I'm supposed to have a rather 
 wonderful neck. Rossiter painted me and so did 
 Ralph Vaughan and Leroux. Then a few months ago 
 — last February — my father died and left me enough 
 to live on." 
 
 She paused while she stretched upwards to place a 
 dish on a high shelf, and for the first time he noticed 
 how athletic and graceful her figure was. In that 
 attitude her uncorseted figure was revealed in its natural 
 shape ; its outlines were chaste, almost severe ; there 
 was about her an air of unconscious innocence. 
 " Well ? " he queried ; " is that all ? " 
 "Yes; I think it is." 
 " But you've told me nothing." 
 " The things we tell about ourselves always do mean 
 nothing ; it's the things we find out about^each other 
 that really matter." 
 
 " And what have you found out about me ? " 
 She was shaking out the towel with which she had 
 dried the dishes ; having placed it to dry on a string 
 drawn across the window, she sat down on a chair and 
 faced him.
 
 THE POISONER 157 
 
 " Not very much ! You're a good deal of a mystery 
 to me." 
 
 " To myself, also." 
 
 " Yes ? But then we're all mysteries to ourselves. 
 We think we know ourselves, and then, suddenly, one 
 day we do something " 
 
 " Tell me. You were going to say ? " 
 
 " Well, look at me here to-day ! " 
 
 " Was what you have done unpremeditated ? " 
 
 " No. Nevertheless, I am surprised at myself. 
 My whims never surprise me. It is when I calculate 
 something unusual, and think it carefully over before- 
 hand, and then do it, that I am a little staggered." 
 
 " You •don't regret ? — to-day, I mean." 
 
 " No. I'm very happy about it." 
 
 "I wonder — I wonder if you will always be happy 
 about it." 
 
 She rose. 
 
 " Come into our sitting-room and read something 
 to me." 
 
 With an effort he got up from his chair. It was with 
 a feeling nearer to contentment than he had felt for 
 weeks that he followed her across the now darkening 
 landing.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 OLIVE MERRALL knew something of dipso- 
 mania : her life with her father had taught her 
 that there is no deceit, no cunning, of Avhich the 
 dipsomaniac is incapable, that there is no sacrifice he 
 will not make — either of self-respect or of the affection 
 of those dearest to him — in order to obtain the drink 
 that is denied him. She was prepared for a long fight 
 with Martin, ready to be disappointed again and again, 
 willing to forgive until seventy times seven. Even if 
 the time came when he himself gave up hope and 
 delivered himself up to reckless despair, she would still 
 believe in him. She realised how easy it is for a man 
 of Martin's nature to embrace despair as a kind of last 
 dignity. When the friends of a sick and weak man 
 lose faith in him, they thrust him over the edge of the 
 precipice. 
 
 " I will never be guilty of that final disloyalty," she 
 said to herself, as she lay in bed in the dark that night, 
 thinking of the coming weeks and months. " Whoever 
 deserts him, I shall always remain." 
 
 But when she began to think of practical affairs — 
 how best to wean him from his vice {if, indeed, it were 
 a vice), how to reawaken in him the ambition he had 
 lost, how to restore him to vigorous health — she felt 
 dismayed by her ignorance. Of one thing she was 
 certain : he would never break himself of his habit in 
 these rooms, among these surroundings. She must get 
 him away — in the country or by the sea. She must, 
 while seeming to deny him nothing, deny him everything 
 that appealed to his morbidity ; and each time she 
 took away anything for which the darkness in his nature 
 craved, she must replace it by something else. But 
 what ? 
 
 She tried to picture him in his own room lying asleep 
 as she had left liiTn. She saw him — unshaved, blood- 
 shot eyes behind red lids, unkempt hair, liands whose 
 nails were uncared for and broken. Deliberately she 
 pictured him worse than he was in order to discover if 
 the vision of him could fill her with repulsion. " His 
 
 158
 
 THE POISONER 159 
 
 entire body is alcoholised," she told herself; "every 
 cell in his body is poisoned — even his blood is tainted. 
 There is nothing good in that man : he has deliberately 
 abandoned himself to evil. His will is broken, his self- 
 respect dead ; his very life is an invitation to death." 
 But the excess of her condemnation defeated its own 
 purpose and drove her to think of the good and worthy 
 things he had done — the continuous hard and faithful 
 work that had made him the fine artist he was ; the 
 courageous way in which he had faced life by presenting 
 to the world his authentic self. 
 
 Two years ago, when she had attended three of his 
 recitals, she had intuitively understood something 
 of his inner nature — had felt the almost collapsing 
 sensitiveness of his mind, had guessed at the brutality 
 engendered as a defence of that sensitiveness, had 
 known of a surety that here was a man at war with 
 himself, a man with good and evil potentialities so 
 equally poised that but a small psychic disturbance 
 would lift him up or drive him down. He drank, she 
 felt sure, to hide himself from himself. The problem 
 was not so much to cure him of alcoholism as to discover 
 and remove the force that drove him to alcoholism. 
 What was there in his nature that he hated ? Did he 
 himself know ? If not, could it be discovered ? Was it 
 something of which he had daily knowledge, or was it 
 something hidden deep within his subconscious mind 
 — some horrid, dead memory of childhood, or even some 
 pre-natal catastrophe ? Freud was little more than 
 a name to her, but she knew that he and many others 
 maintained that the causes of many neuroses lay 
 concealed within the " subliminal mind " of Myers. 
 
 She fell asleep, and woke, and fell to thinking of 
 Stavart once more. And as she thought, she heard 
 someone moving on the landing outside. In an instant 
 she had leapt out of bed, lit the gas, and slipped into 
 her dressing-gown. A knock sounded on her door, 
 faintly and timidly. She returned to her bed, took 
 from under the pillow the little bunch of keys she had
 
 160 THE POISONER 
 
 placed there before lying down, and opened the door. 
 Stavart was on the threshold in the half-dark. He had 
 put on his trousers. He smelt stalely of whisky. His 
 matted dark hair fell down to his wild, disconcerting 
 eyes. 
 
 " I'm so sa-sorry," he said humbly ; " don't be angry 
 with me. But I ca — can't sleep and I'm — afraid," 
 
 The last word was a whisper. 
 
 "You mustn't be afraid. You're all right — every- 
 thing is all right." 
 
 " Yes, I know. I nu-know it's all right. And yet 
 I'm afraid." 
 
 " Go back to bed. I'll come and sit with you if you 
 like." 
 
 " Wu-will you ? " he asked gratefully. " And cu-can 
 I have ... I nu-know I should be all a-right if you 
 gu-gave me some more. ... I cu-could have broken 
 the ku-kitchen cupboard open if I'd wu-wanted." 
 
 " Yes. I'll bring you some. Now, go back to bed." 
 
 He turned and, noiseless and ghost-like, disappeared. 
 In a moment or two, having visited the kitchen, she 
 passed through the sitting-room to his bedroom. The 
 gas was lit. Stavart was in bed, visibly trembling. 
 He gave her one eager look to assure himself that she 
 had fulfilled her promise ; his eyes caught the bottle, 
 and then, as if in shame, turned their gaze elsewhere. 
 He heard the liquid being poured out, but the noise 
 stopped suddenly — too soon. It was with an effort 
 that he raised his eyes to look at the glass she handed 
 to him. 
 
 " Wait until I've got you sonie water," she said. 
 
 But her back was no sooner turned than he drank 
 the whisky at a gulp. 
 
 " Thanks vu-very much," he said, as he lay back on 
 his pillow. He turned his face to the wall. 
 
 Miss Merrall sat silent for a few minutes. At length : 
 
 " Do you feel better now ? " she asked. 
 
 "A little. I can talk. But " He sat up 
 
 suddenly. "Really, Miss Merrall," he said firmly,
 
 THE POISONER 161 
 
 "you must be guided in this matter by me. What 
 I'm going to say to you — well, it isn't that I ivant more 
 whisky ; it's simply that I can't possibly do without it. 
 It's necessary to me. I can't sleep. And in hall^an- 
 hour I shall be as bad as I was before. I'm not lying 
 to you ; I'm not exaggerating. It's just as I say. If 
 a doctor were here, he'd give me more whisky — he'd 
 prescribe it." 
 
 " Give me your hand," she said. 
 
 He did so. She pressed it within her own for a 
 second ; it burned with an inmatural dry heat ; it 
 trembled ; the fingers twitched. 
 
 " You shall have just what you want. How much 
 do you usually take during the night ? " 
 
 " Between ten at night and eight the following 
 morning nearly a bottle." 
 
 ' ' Will you be satisfied if I give you half that amoimt ? 
 You are telling me the truth about the amount you 
 take?" 
 
 " Yes — of course I am ! Half-a-bottle — yes : I can 
 perhaps manage on that." 
 
 " You promise ? " 
 
 "Yes. I promise." 
 
 She returned to the washstand, held the bottle up 
 to the gas jet, and saw that it was slightly more than 
 half full. She placed this, a glass and a carafe on a 
 little table by his side. 
 
 ' ' You are very good to me, "he said gratefully. ' ' Are 
 you cold ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Well, will you stay with me a little while ? I want 
 to talk to you." 
 
 "I'll stay as long as you like." 
 
 But for some little time he had nothing to say, and 
 it was only after he had, with an unsteady hand, poured 
 himself out two more drinks and swallowed them, that 
 he began to talk. 
 
 "It's curious, isn't it? " he said. "This, I mean. 
 You being here. I wonder what the end of it all will be."
 
 162 THE POISONER 
 
 "I want you to promise me something," she said. 
 She would have added something else, but his quick 
 look of suspicion confused and intimidated her. 
 
 " Promise ? Well, what is it ? " 
 
 " I want you to allow me to bring a doctor to see 
 you in the morning." 
 
 " What ever for ? " 
 
 " Very soon, if you don't stop drinking, you will be 
 ill — perhaps dangerously ill. You are, of course, very 
 ill now : I know enough about alcoholism to realise 
 that it is a disease. I want to bring a doctor in so 
 that he may cure you." 
 
 " ' Cure ' ! " he laughed derisively. " Can't you 
 realise there is no cure ? And if there were, what do 
 you suppose the ordinary practitioner knows about the 
 disease ? Nothing — less than nothing. ' Don't let 
 him touch a drop ! ' That's his only remedy. ' Keep 
 him away from it. Fill his mind with pleasant thoughts. 
 Let him take gentle exercise.' And so forth." 
 
 " Yes, but the man I have in mind attended my 
 father." 
 
 " And your father died ! Really, Miss Merrall ! " 
 
 "You don't understand. When I speak of a cure, 
 I don't mean a permanent cure : that, I imagine, rests 
 with yourself. I mean a cure from — this — this im- 
 mediate illness. Something that will pull you round 
 temporarily. I know, of course, that the method 
 generally employed is to reduce the quantity gradually, 
 day by day. But by how much ? And then you'd 
 want sleeping draughts — peraldehyde or veronal, or 
 something, and tonics. And then I think you ought to 
 remain in bed for a few days." 
 
 " You would nurse me ? " 
 
 " Of course." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 " Oh, don't let us enter into all that. The question 
 is, may I bring in a doctor to see you ? " 
 
 " Why, yes, if you like. I'm finished. I'll submit 
 to anything. ... As a matter of fact, I — I can't think
 
 THE POISONER 163 
 
 for myself — I can't do anything for myself — not even 
 make the smallest decisions. I can't tell you how 
 comforting it will be to feel that — to feel that I am 
 being looked after — that I matter to someone — 
 that " 
 
 He broke off in a voice strained with an emotion 
 that was almost tearful. 
 
 "I'm glad," she said. " Some day, not far off, you'll 
 be yourself again — restored to your friends." 
 
 "Don't!" he exclaimed irritably. "Don't speak 
 of them. Just to think of them lacerates my mind — 
 nearly sends me mad. I daren't think of them, of the 
 way I've treated them." 
 
 "Well, think of the future — I mean your work — 
 the triumphs still awaiting you." 
 
 His responsive laugh was half a sneer. 
 
 " Do you know that I don't care a damn for success, 
 for music, for an3i:hing ? My ambition is entirely dead. 
 I hate my talent. If I had been an ordinary man, I 
 shouldn't be like — like this." 
 
 " It may seem impossible to you now, but. there will 
 come a day — soon — when you will feel entirely different, 
 when your greatest happiness will be in your work. 
 After all, you matter to the world. You are someone. 
 Your powers will bring honour to you, to your people 
 and friends, to your country." 
 
 " ' Honour ' ! I who am steeped in dishonour ! " 
 
 " Are you ? I don't believe you. . . . But I don't 
 think we'll talk about you any more," she said, with a 
 smile. " I don't think it's particularly good for you." 
 
 " No," he agreed, smiling also ; " I'm a much too 
 interesting subject. But you must go to bed now. 
 How selfish I am ! I'm always hanging on to some- 
 body — squeezing something good out of them. I shall 
 be all right. Good-night 1 " 
 
 He held out his hand and she took it. 
 
 "I'm nearer to content now than I've been for many 
 miserable weeks," he said. " Good-night and — and 
 thanks."
 
 164 THE POISONER 
 
 He turned over on his side and pulled the clothes 
 about his shoulders. She tucked him in like a child, 
 and bent over him in half-maternal solicitude. 
 
 Once again in her bed, she told herself that she had 
 won, and won without even a single struggle. He was 
 tractable ; he was willing to submit himself to her will ; 
 he would be obedient. And as she fell asleep, she filled 
 her mind with pleasant pictures of the happy weeks 
 they would spend together in the country : he, strong, 
 self-reliant and once more absorbed in his work ; she, 
 his eager servant and companion, sharing his pleasures 
 and supporting him in his hours of depression.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 IT was late in the morning of the Ibllowing day, and 
 Miss Merrall's friend, Dr Vane Ellworth, had con- 
 ckided a prolonged examination of Martin, and 
 was now in the sordid sitting-room. 
 
 " You'd better send him to a private nursing-home," 
 he said. " The least shock either of a physical or mental 
 nature would unbalance his reason — perhaps for years." 
 
 " But he would refuse to go. Besides, I don't know 
 that he has the necessary means. In any case, I'm 
 determined to nurse him myself." 
 
 " I don't think you realise what you're up against." 
 
 " No ? Well, I can find out. The bigger the pro- 
 position, the more resolved I am to carry it out. All 
 I want is instructions from you. Mind you, he's 
 perfectly willing to be cured." 
 
 Ellworth smiled. 
 
 " Who says so ? " 
 
 "He does." 
 
 " Do you know what the word of a dipsomaniac is 
 worth ? " he asked. " Just that." He snapped his 
 fingers. " When was it he told you he was willing to 
 be deprived of whisky ? " 
 
 " In the middle of the night." 
 
 " Was he drunk ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " But he had taken drink just before he told you ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "A lot?" 
 
 " Well, it seemed to me a good deal." 
 
 " Precisely. No doubt he was quite sincere when he 
 agreed to be cured. But he has been the victim of a 
 dozen different moods since then. However, I think 
 I've frightened him pretty effectively. For a day or 
 two at least he'll not try to drink more than I shall 
 
 allow him. After that ! Well, the third and the 
 
 fourth and the fifth days, during which he will be 
 tapered completely off, he'll try you sorely." 
 
 " I daresay ; but I shall be equal to it." 
 
 " Yes ; I think you may be. So long as you realise 
 
 165
 
 166 THE POISONER 
 
 that you will have to undergo a period of severe strain 
 — say, a week — and so long as you feel that you are 
 equal to it, I agree to your nursing him. Feeling fit ? " 
 
 " Yes. I always am fit." 
 
 " Very well. I shall call and see him three times a 
 day for the next week. There is, of course, always 
 the risk of delirium — in which case he will have to be 
 removed elsewhere." 
 
 He sat down at the table, asked for paper and 
 ink and began to write down prescriptions and de- 
 tailed instructions concerning treatment. Miss Merrall 
 watched hmi for a little while until her gaze wandered 
 to the window. She rose and looked out. A blank 
 wall faced her, and it was raining. All that month 
 it had rained, with only occasional gleams of watery 
 sunshine. The mean side street was deserted. Looking 
 down, she saw that the rain had collected in large pools 
 in the untidy, refuse-strewn gutter. The slight depres- 
 sion that she had felt on waking, and that had increased 
 during the morning, now descended heavily upon her. 
 She turned away with a stifled sigh. 
 
 " Oh ? " queried Ellworth, turning his keen gaze upon 
 her. " Depressed ? " 
 
 "No," she answered. "Tell me, why does Stavart 
 drink ? " 
 
 " Because he's a fool. Why else ? " 
 
 " But he's not a fool. Do you know who he is ? " 
 
 "Yes — I've heard his name. That type frequently 
 takes to drink or drugs." 
 
 " Yes, but why ? " 
 
 " There you have me. Why does anybody do 
 anything ? " 
 
 " What I want to know is — is there a taint in his 
 blood ? Is he a true dipsomaniac ? Does he inherit 
 his disease ? " 
 
 " He doesn't know. Not from his father, at all 
 events, according to him. But why call it a disease ? 
 Has the man no will ? " 
 
 " I see you're not s3Tiipathetic."
 
 THE POISONER 167 
 
 " Not in the least. Are you ? "' 
 
 She left the window and picked from the table the 
 sheets of paper on which he had been writing. Whilst 
 apparently studying them, she said : 
 
 " You've no imagination, doctor." 
 
 " I can't afford to have. But perhaps you mean 
 I've no patience with self-inflicted disease. If you do, 
 you're quite right. If every man gave way to his 
 desires, where should we all be ? " 
 
 She smiled. 
 
 " We'll not talk about it. It's sufficient for me that 
 you'll pull him round." 
 
 " Oh, but I don't guarantee to do that." 
 
 "No?" 
 
 " No. The whole thing depends on you. You 
 must watch him every hour. He'll get round you 
 some way or another, if you don't, and he'll get romid 
 you just when you're beginning to feel sure of him. 
 Don't trust him out of your sight or hearing for a 
 moment. Before you've finished with him, he'll hate 
 you. But you ^know what it is," he added, thinking 
 of her recent experience with her father. "Well, 
 good-bye. I'll look in again this afternoon and late 
 to-night. In the meantime, you mustn't let him have 
 a drop more whisky than I've laid down there. Many 
 doctors would cut him off now, altogether." 
 
 He went and she was left alone with her patient. 
 
 She entered his room. He was lying in bed, every 
 muscle of his body relaxed, his face like a mask of 
 despair. 
 
 " Leave me ! Leave me alone ! " he said, with bitter 
 irritation. 
 
 She moved noiselessly from the room, closed the 
 door behind her, and went to the kitchen. It was 
 dark, dirty and miserable-looking. She filled a kettle 
 and put it on the stove to boil. After some search, 
 she found a bucket, soap, a scrubbing-brush and a 
 washing rag. Having removed the furniture, and strip 
 of worn-out carpet that lay before the fireplace, to a
 
 168 THE POISONER 
 
 corner of the room, she stood in front of the kettle 
 waiting for its contents to boil. She was deep in de- 
 pressing thoughts. Dr Ellworth had told her that 
 Martin Avoiild soon come to hate her, but that did not 
 matter if only she could nurse him back to health. She 
 told herself that it did not matter, but her reiteration 
 of this assurance revealed to her that she was attempting 
 self-deception on a point where deception was impossible. 
 Stavart's liking of her did matter. It is impossible 
 not to have affection for one who depends upon us for 
 his health and, perhaps, for his life. The protective 
 instinct, once aroused, soon gives place to love. And 
 though Miss Merrall did not yet know that she loved 
 Martin, she was well aware that the impulse that had 
 driven her here had its origin in admiration and liking. 
 To be hated because she was kind ; to be spurned 
 because of sacrifices willingly made : was such a thing 
 possible ? 
 
 Subduing these thoughts, she turned her mind to 
 the management of the small practical details of their 
 everyday life during the coming days. She had already 
 made an arrangement with Stavart's landlady, who 
 lived in the basement, for the latter to attend to all 
 their shopping. Of money she had plenty, but she 
 was resolved to do all the work of the flat with her own 
 hands ; the meaner the labour, the more devotedly 
 she would do it. She took a joy in thinking of the 
 multitudinous things that were waiting to be done, in 
 picturing herself tending him — cooking his meals, 
 waiting on him, reading to him. Every moment of the 
 coming days would be full. Then why was she de- 
 pressed ? How was it, in view of the glad self-sacrifice 
 of the present and the future, she felt herself to be 
 immersed in gloom ? She did not know. 
 
 A sudden noise struck on her ears. She started and, 
 on tiptoe, walked to the sitting-room. Everji:hing 
 was silent save for the muffled sound of traffic in the 
 street. She crossed the room and stood with bent head 
 against the door of Stavart's bedroom. Silence. But
 
 THE POISONER 169 
 
 she was sure she had heard something. She knocked 
 on his door. No answer. So she turned the handle 
 and stepped in. 
 
 " What in God's name do you want ? " he shouted 
 angrily. 
 
 " I thought you called." 
 
 " Can't you lu-leave me in pu-peace for ten minutes 
 at a tu-time ? " 
 
 " I'm sorry." 
 
 She made a movement as though to withdraw. 
 
 " When's my next drink due ? "he asked desperately. 
 
 " At two o'clock. It's just after one now. I'll 
 bring it to you on the very stroke of the hour." 
 
 He muttered incoherently as he hid his head beneath 
 the bed-clothes. 
 
 She returned to the kitchen, emptied the now boiling 
 water into the bucket, added an almost equal quantity 
 of cold water, dropped on to her knees, and began to 
 scrub the floor. Though she worked mechanically, she 
 laboured without pause. Her mind was in Stavart's 
 bedroom ; her ears were a-strain for a betraying sound. 
 She saw without noticing the dirt-filled water as it 
 oozed between her fingers when she squeezed it from 
 the rag into the bucket. Here and there she came 
 across patches of grease on the linoleum. Beneath the 
 edges of a worn-out patch she discovered a nest of 
 lice-like insects. Though such creatures would have 
 nauseated her in a normal mood, she now removed them 
 without hesitation, even without thought. 
 
 She was still on her knees when the clock on the tower 
 of St Jude's Church struck the hour. She jumped to 
 her feet, hastily wiped her hands, and, having taken the 
 whisky from the cupboard, measured out the exact 
 quantity the doctor had prescribed. In less than half- 
 a-minute she was with Stavart. His body was in 
 precisely the same position as that in which she had 
 seen it an hour ago. He lifted his head, and though 
 he could see what she carried, he did not move. He 
 looked at her with slight contempt.
 
 170 THE POISONER 
 
 "As if that'll mu-make any difference," he said. 
 
 She put her left arm round his shoulders and helped 
 hini to a sitting posture, and he drank from the tumbler 
 she held in her hand. 
 
 " No use at all," he exclaimed pettishly as he fell 
 back on his pillow and turned his face to the wall. 
 He lay still for a few moments while she busied herself 
 tidying the few things on his dressing-table. Suddenly, 
 as though a strong current of electricity were being 
 passed through his body, he jerked himself into a 
 sitting posture. 
 
 " You think you've got me into your power ! " he 
 shouted madly, " but, by God, you haven't ! " 
 
 He sprang out of bed, and she shrank from his un- 
 shaven face with its wild, terrible eyes. He went to 
 the foot of the bed where stood the chair on which he 
 always threw his clothes at night. 
 
 " Where in hell are my clothes ? I'm going out, I 
 tell you. You — gloating over me and my suffering ! 
 Where are they ? Do you hear me — you — you — in- 
 terloper — you vampire gloating gloating " 
 
 He stopped shouting suddenly as he made a menacing 
 step towards her ; but she no longer shrank from him. 
 This was not madness : there was no power in it, no 
 real purpose. It was the violence of hysteria. 
 
 " Get into bed, Stavart," she said sternly. 
 
 " My clothes ! my clothes ! " he called out, in in- 
 effectual anger. "You — what's your name— came 
 yesterday — followed me here — you know you did ! 
 Followed 7ne ! What for ? To torture— to kill— to gloat. 
 And the man who came ! 1 heard you both. ' Because 
 he's a fool — that's why he drinks.' Damn him, say I ; 
 damn him a thousand times. The contemptible devil ! 
 ' Because he's a fool. Has the man no will ? ' Who 
 took my clothes away ? You did — you " 
 
 With one hand on the bed-rail he steadied his shaking 
 frame ; with the other he pointed at her as she gazed 
 at him unflinchingly, observantly. She could see he 
 was on the point of collapse and she held herself in
 
 THE POISONER 171 
 
 readiness to run to him when the moment of reaction 
 should come. He continued his wild words, but now 
 his voice came in a loud whisper. Her thoughts came 
 quickly as she watched him. How much of this was 
 sheer acting ? Did he himself know ? She could see 
 that he was rapidly working himself up to the point 
 where passion sinks into sheer futility. Occasionally 
 he paused for a brief moment in anger that his brain 
 could not supply his lips with words sufficiently violent. 
 Then, as she had expected, he tottered and fell to the 
 floor ; he hid his face in his hands and wept in the very 
 lees of his manhood. 
 
 In a moment her arms were about him. 
 
 " Oh, leave me ! Leave me ! " he cried. 
 
 But she drew him upwards to his feet and helped him 
 to his bed, upon which he fell weakly and lay prone 
 where he had fallen. 
 
 She hurried to her own room. Ellworth had ordered 
 a sleeping draught for three o'clock if he should not 
 sleep naturally before that hour. This she now carried 
 to him. She added [water to the viscous, fumous per- 
 aldehyde and took it to his bed-side, 
 
 " Drink this," she said. " It will make you sleep." 
 
 The promise of this precious thing stirred him into 
 eagerness. He sat up and swallowed the burning drug 
 with an ardent and repulsive greed. 
 
 " God ! How miserable I am ! " he said, in profound 
 self-pity. 
 
 Blindly his hand sought hers, as the hand of a child 
 frightened in the night will seek that of its mother. He 
 lay still, except for slight tremors that passed, wave- 
 like, over his unresisting body. He moaned a little 
 with almost pleasurable pain as the drug, beginning to 
 steal upon his senses, released him gradually from the 
 bitterness of consciousness. Then he slept, his mouth 
 slightly open, a thick dew of perspiration upon his 
 brow. If he had not looked so abandoned and pitiable, 
 the sight of him, unshaved, unkempt and dirty, would 
 have filled her with repulsion.
 
 172 THE POISONER 
 
 Even the strongest women have their moments of 
 weakness, when sentimentahsm ruins fine feehng with 
 the triviahtics of self-indulgence. Olive Merrall felt 
 the impulse to bend over and kiss that unhappy face — 
 felt the impulse and resisted it, smiling wryly as she 
 recognised that compassion can so easily degenerate 
 into sensuousness. It was with a business-like air that 
 she rose from her chair by his bed-side, arranged the 
 bed-clothes neatly, and returned to the kitchen to 
 continue her work 
 
 But though she laboured unremittingly, the events 
 of the last half-hour presented themselves continually 
 and vividly before her mind. Not content with living 
 again that distressing scene, she tried to probe into 
 Martin's mind, to discover if, in any of his recent acts 
 and words, she could find a clue indicating his real self. 
 But there was nothing. Hysteria ? Hysteria was but 
 a name given to a nervous or mental condition no one 
 understood. A kind of madness : a numbing of some 
 faculties, an excitation of others. But where had the 
 real Martin Stavart been when in his violent state ? 
 Was there a real Stavart ? Was there a real anyone ? 
 . . . She recalled Ellworth's words and repelled them 
 violently. There could be no justice in that kind of 
 attitude. Only the tough-fibred and unimaginative 
 could blame him. How little, after all, we knew about 
 the human mind ! How little we knew about anything 
 that really mattered. She pictured the whole of 
 civilised mankind patiently, through century and 
 century, burrowing for facts, testing and recording them, 
 and finally putting them away in dusty libraries. Vast 
 stores of facts about everything . . . about everything 
 but the things that really mattered. 
 
 With a sense of defeat she rose and went to Martin's 
 room. He still slept. She looked down upon him, 
 half hypnotised by the problem and the mystery he 
 presented. He, like all human creatures, like all that 
 is, was the product of countless interacting forces 
 through countless years. He was he, Martin, that in-
 
 THE POISONER 173 
 
 finitely subtle combination of chemical matter, because, 
 a thousand years ago, some man had made love to some 
 woman ; because, a few weeks ago, some accidental 
 circumstance had overtaken and overcome him ; 
 because, in the eighteenth century, say, some divine 
 beauty had stirred someone to a sudden ecstasy ; 
 because ... oh ! there was no end to the multitu- 
 dinous forces that, year in year out, moment by moment, 
 had fashioned and marred and directed our destinies, 
 even thousands of years before we were born. Nothing 
 was too insignificant, too casual, to be left out of cal- 
 culation. No man, it was clear, made himself. He was 
 but a shell thrown on to the shore of time by the sea 
 of eternity. 
 
 These thoughts deepened her depression. If this 
 were true, why strive against fate, against the whole 
 engine-like scheme of things ? But one did strive, 
 bhndly and instinctively. One never gave in. The 
 spirit of God within us strove against the very things 
 that God Himself had created, and of which, it might 
 be. He was also the sullied victim. God was a kind of 
 Frankenstein ; the world, the universe, his monster . . . 
 
 It was eight o'clock when Stavart woke, cahn, and 
 in some measure refreshed. She was moving about in 
 their sitting-room and he, hearing her, called her by 
 name. Smiling, she went in to him. 
 
 " Better ? " 
 
 "Yes, much. What's the time? Only eight? 
 But it's getting dark already." 
 
 " It's the rain and the clouds." 
 
 She lit the gas, pulled down the blinds and poured him 
 out his overdue portion of whisky. 
 
 " No," he said ; " I can do without it." 
 
 "Sure?" 
 
 "Yes. Later, perhaps." 
 
 She hesitated a moment. 
 
 " But you'd better take it now. It's medicine, you 
 know." 
 
 He was ashamed of his conduct and wanted to prove
 
 174 THE POISONER 
 
 to her that he was not so Kttle master of himself as she 
 might suppose. Divining the motive of his refusal, she 
 approached his bed. 
 
 " It is medicine," she said ; " and that is how you 
 must regard it." 
 
 He drank what she gave him. 
 
 " I feel better than I have done for weeks," he said. 
 
 " Would you like me to read to you ? " 
 
 "No, thanks. Talk." 
 
 " Very well. But I've got a kettle on the boil. 
 You will drink some tea and eat an egg ? " 
 
 He nodded and smiled. The little alcohol he had 
 just taken was producing a slight but wholly unexpected 
 feeling of nervous well-being. 
 
 "Two eggs," he urged. "And awfully thin bread 
 and frightfully thick butter." 
 
 In five minutes she had returned with his little meal. 
 
 " The first food to-day," she said. 
 
 " The first for two days," he corrected. " Oh, what 
 a miserable fool I am ! " 
 
 But he felt almost happy in her care, and as he ate 
 he glanced at her once or twice with gratitude in his 
 eyes. She also drank tea and for a few minutes talked 
 of small things. 
 
 "Don't look at me," he said, when, for a few moments, 
 he felt her gaze upon him. "I'm unshaved. I'm 
 dirty. May I get up and wash ? I'll shave as well — 
 look, my hand is quite steady." 
 
 So she left him for twenty minutes. When she re- 
 turned he was again in bed, but his mood of almost 
 contentment had vanished and he was now plunged in 
 gloom. 
 
 " Poor chap ! " she murmured, as she noted his 
 condition. " Stick it out — you'll be all right in a 
 couple of days." 
 
 " Yes," he said unbehevingly. 
 
 " Shall I talk ? " 
 
 " No. Just sit there — near me. Read, if you like 
 — to yourself, I mean."
 
 THE POISONER 175 
 
 She chose a book from a few that, the previous evening, 
 she had seen lying in his wardrobe, and sat down with 
 the volume open on her knee. But though her gaze was 
 directed upon the printed page before her, she read 
 nothing. For a long half-hour there was silence ; 
 then : 
 
 " I can't bear it any longer," he said desperately. 
 "I've begun to think." 
 
 "About what?" 
 
 "Myself." 
 
 " Oh, you mustn't do that, Stavart." 
 
 " Sooner or later I'll have to. Besides, I can't help 
 it. Those thoughts come crowding, crowding " 
 
 " Very well then," she said resolutely ; " face them. 
 Tell me — let me help you ! Don't let them bear you 
 down ! Don't accuse yourself ! " 
 
 " If only I needn't ! " 
 
 ' ' But why should you ? It — this — the last few weeks 
 — they're all finished, Stavart. Why, it's all over — 
 everything clean gone." 
 
 "Oh, myself ? For once I wasn't thinking of myself. 
 It was my friends. I've deserted them. Even now 
 they will be anxious for me, searching for me. One is 
 an old man — sick — wrapped up in me because my father 
 was his dear friend. Bedridden he is. And the other 
 is his daughter. . . . I — I asked her to marry me and 
 then — went. Why ? That's what I want to know, 
 Miss Merrall — why ? Why did I go ? — running away, 
 it almost seems. From myself, I mean. And now 
 myself has come back and I find it — horrible ! " 
 
 " Why not ? Don't we all seem horrible to ourselves 
 at one time or another ? But why don't you write to 
 your friends ? Better still : let me write. Tell them 
 you are safe and — and well." 
 
 " No ! Not that. Never again. I've gone out of 
 their lives for ever — gone out as I went in — suddenly. 
 But I wish I could stop thinking of their unhappiness." 
 
 " But they would forgive ! " she urged. 
 
 " It's that that makes it all so horrible. They would
 
 176 THE POISONER 
 
 forgive, yes, and then some day it would all happen 
 again. And again they would forgive." 
 
 " But you were happy with them ? " 
 
 "Was I? I wonder." 
 
 " But let me at least write and tell them you're safe 
 — no more than that." 
 
 " But he will know. He will know what's happened 
 to me — what I have done to myself. If they thought 
 I was dead it wouldn't matter." He sat up in bed 
 in sudden panic. "You haven't written to Leopold 
 about me ? — you haven't written to anyone ?^" 
 
 "No, indeed," she exclaimed. "I came here to 
 help you — not to interfere with your life. I will do 
 nothing— I promise it ! — except what you tell me to do. 
 I am just your servant and your friend." 
 
 His momentary suspicion died almost in the moment 
 of its birth. 
 
 " I believe you," he said ; "I trust you." 
 
 " Soon you will be at work again," she said, after a 
 pause, " and that will help you to forget." 
 
 He laughed bitterly. 
 
 " Not my kind of work," he said. " To create, even 
 to invent, you've got, as it were, to get into your mind's 
 centre — your heart's very core : you're face to face 
 with yourself and you see — things — things you know 
 are there but which you try to avoid. I can't explain 
 it to you, but it is so. To try to make things out of 
 your own mind when your mind is sick- 
 
 (( ' 
 
 Yes — I see — I understand. . . . But, Stavart, re- 
 morse dies in time. Time kills everything. You suffer 
 now, but as the days pass " 
 
 " But don't you see ! " he exclaimed, half angrily, 
 " don't you see that I can never — never — get away from 
 myself — the poison in me ? If I were wholly evil it 
 wouldn't matter." 
 
 " No, I don't see," she said. " I don't even know 
 what you are talking about." 
 
 "I'm morbid. I'm what people call neurotic — 
 though God alone knows what they mean." He made
 
 THE POISONER 177 
 
 a sound of disgust. " There's some MS. music-paper 
 in the wardrobe and I dare say you'll find a pencil 
 somewhere." 
 
 She procured the articles he required ; having lit a 
 couple of candles, she placed them at the head of the 
 bed. He began immediately to scribble. But he was 
 not composing. He was writing down from memory 
 one of the more intricate of Bach's fugues. The work 
 absorbed him, and though the effort to concentrate was 
 painful, it was a relief to check the flow of his self- 
 consuming thoughts. 
 
 Watching him, Olive Merrall told herself that he was 
 already well on the road to recovery. The worst was 
 over, she felt ; in a few days the craving would have 
 disappeared — or, at all events, it would be well in hand. 
 He was deep in his work, writing with that vital energy 
 that was an inseparable part of him. It was nearly 
 midnight when, with a sigh, half of satisfaction, half of 
 depression, he placed the sheets of music-paper on the 
 chair by his side. 
 
 "And now," said he, " put me to sleep." 
 
 She prepared a glass of warm milk and whisky and 
 gave it to him. 
 
 " I will leave all three doors open," she said. " If 
 you want me — that is, if you can't sleep — call out and 
 I'll give you some more peraldehyde. I shall hear you 
 when you call." 
 
 It was with a feeling of great tenderness and pity that 
 she hovered over him for a few moments while he settled 
 himself for sleep. And she was half asleep before she 
 remembered that Ellworth, untrue to his promise, had 
 not returned since his morning visit. 
 
 M
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 MARTIN'S recovery was extraordinarily, un- 
 expectedly rapid. His returning health re- 
 vealed itself in a dozen different ways, and 
 in no way that was more pleasant to Olive Merrall than 
 his disgust at his surroundings. He ate and slept 
 well ; he read with pleasure ; he played chess with his 
 companion ; he talked eagerly. 
 
 It was with intense joy that she began to notice that, 
 day by day, she was growing more and more necessary 
 to him, not only as a nurse who ministered to his wants, 
 but as a charming friend whom he could interpose 
 between himself and his conscience, between himself 
 and the dark doubts that assailed him. She under- 
 stood ; even if she did not understand she did not con- 
 demn or criticise. She was always on his side. She 
 believed him to be, in the main, good. And all this in 
 spite of the fact that he hid nothing from her. With her 
 he was always just himself. Never for a moment did 
 he have to act a part. . . . With Monica it had all been 
 different. For her sake perhaps more than for his own 
 he had always felt compelled to present to her a creature 
 who, it was true, was real enough but who was only a 
 part — and that part the best — of himself. It is one of 
 the tragi-comedies of life that the innocent and inex- 
 perienced selfishly demand a hero or a saint from each 
 of us. Olive Merrall demanded nothing from Martin. 
 She was happy to accept whatever he might be. 
 
 Dr Ellworth insisted upon Stavart remaining in bed. 
 
 " Keep him there until the end of the week," he said, 
 five days after his first visit. "It is Friday to-day. 
 Let him get up, say, on Monday. As a matter of fact, 
 if you are going to take him into the country you'd 
 better do so immediately he is well enough to go out." 
 
 "But why mayn't he get up to-day? He seems 
 fit enough." 
 
 " ' Seems,' I dare say. But ever so slight a thing 
 might start him drinking again. At present he is 
 ahnost without will-power ; he has no strength to put 
 up even the least resistance." 
 
 178
 
 THE POISONER 179 
 
 But Martin was well content to stay in bed. He had 
 a dread of the outside world — its noise and movement, 
 its claims upon him, its power to wound and destroy. 
 Here he felt safe, protected. 
 
 The process of weaning him from alcohol had left 
 him nervous and apprehensive. He could not recover 
 the mood in which it was a pleasure to see himself 
 fighting and struggling with the world ; rather did he 
 seek solace in the thought that his career was finished, 
 that for the rest of his days he would live quietly in 
 obscurity, unmindful of music, scornful of his talent. 
 The competency left him by his father was more than 
 modest. Later on, he would travel — in Spain, in Mexico, 
 in the islands of the South Sea, wherever life was quiet 
 and stimulating and picturesque. Perhaps Miss Merrall 
 would go with him. Why not ? He would begin life 
 anew. 
 
 His affection for his companion was sincere and deep. 
 But it was not love. He had all the male's desire to cut 
 a heroic figure before the female ; he could give his 
 love only where he was worshipped. To the kind of 
 man that Stavart was, complete knowledge was a firm 
 basis for friendship, not for love. Love to him was 
 illusion ; there could be no passion without mystery ; 
 something must always be kept back. True, Miss 
 Merrall by no means knew all there was to know 
 about him, but she knew his weaknesses, his wicked- 
 nesses. Worst of all, she had seen him cowed and 
 beaten ; he had even made himself ridiculous before 
 her. It was inevitable that he, with his restless 
 imagination, should have pictured himself as Olive's 
 lover; but he had dismissed the picture with a smile 
 of amusement. Impossible for love to bud and 
 bloom in these sordid surroundings ; impossible for 
 the breath of romance to reach and penetrate this 
 stale atmosphere so recently heavy with the reek of 
 whisky. . . . 
 
 " Well," said she, after her interview with Ellworth 
 on Friday, " the orders are bed till Monday."
 
 180 THE POISONER 
 
 He put down the book he was reading and smiled at 
 her. 
 
 " Funny chap, Ellworth. I do beheve, OUve — you 
 don't mind the ' Ohve,' do you ? " 
 
 " Like it, Ma — Martin." 
 
 "Try again." 
 
 "Martin." 
 
 " Quite good. You'll soon get used to it. As I was 
 saying — what the devil was I saying ? " 
 
 " Something about the doc." 
 
 " Oh yes. Well, I really do believe he thinks I'm 
 still hankering after drink. He's afraid that I may 
 have what you and I would call a ' breakdown.' " 
 
 "Yes, he is. Aren't you ? " 
 
 "Never was less inclined for it in my life. Indeed, 
 I have a horror of it. I'm afraid. I feel like a woman 
 who has just come through the slow fearfulness of her 
 first childbirth and who wouldn't be tempted to love 
 again by the handsomest fellow in all the world." 
 
 " I'm glad," she said, and smiled tartly. " All I can 
 say is, I hope it will last." 
 
 "You don't think it will?" 
 
 " Oh yes, I do. I have faith in you. I trust you." 
 
 " You are a strange girl ! " 
 
 " For trusting you ? " 
 
 " No — for all sorts of things. Now that I am more 
 or less normal, I can't get over the wonder of your being 
 here. Tell me, what made you come ? " 
 
 " Not your beaux yeux, my lad." 
 
 "But my eyes are rather nice all the same, don't 
 you think ? " 
 
 She laughed — laughed and was silent. 
 
 "Well, you haven't told me yet," he went on — "why 
 you came, I mean." 
 
 " Admiration, fifty per cent. ; altruism, twenty ; 
 curiosity, ten ; impulse, ten ; boredom, ten." 
 
 " Exactly a hundred. Well, I'm tremendously 
 flattered — if it's true. Admiration really fifty ? " 
 
 " Thereabouts."
 
 THE POISONER 181 
 
 He sat up with a most engaging smile, and, having 
 placed his pillow on the chair by his side : 
 
 " Do sit down," he entreated. " This is most excit- 
 ing. I love talking about myself, being flattered and 
 fooled and things." 
 
 " I wasn't flattering you," she assured him, as, quite 
 seriously, she sat on his pillow and prepared to discuss 
 him. " Really, I wasn't. Everybody admires you — 
 that is, everybody who loves music." 
 
 " Oh, that ! " he said, in disgust. " I thought per- 
 haps — do say it was so, even if it isn't true — I thought 
 perhaps you admired me for tmyself — just because I 
 am I." 
 
 He spoke half whimsically, half seriously. 
 " I do — now," she said. " Really, Martin, there is 
 quite a lot to admire in you." 
 " Do tell me ! " 
 
 " Well, you're patient and obedient. And you're 
 never idle. You're frightfully clever and — yes — and 
 interesting. You're honest, too. And your faults are 
 big faults : there's nothing mean about you. And I 
 think you're brave— you fight against your destiny." 
 He made not the least attempt to hide the childlike 
 pleasure all this gave him. 
 
 "Yes," he breathed. "Any more?" 
 " What a baby fyou are ! No, I don't think there is 
 any more." 
 
 " And now my faults ! " 
 
 " Would you be surprised if I told you you hadn't 
 any ? " 
 
 " Oh, come now. Is the woman blind ? Haven't 
 you noticed my devouring selfishness, my lack of will, 
 my instability of purpose ? " 
 
 " Yes. But those things go hand in hand with your 
 virtues. All artists are what is called selfish — that is 
 to say, they are so devoted to their art that they sacrifice 
 everything for it. Even themselves. They mow every- 
 thing down — people too — that comes in their way." 
 " Am I as bad as that ? "
 
 182 THE POISONER 
 
 "Yes, or as good — whichever way you hke to put 
 
 " It sounds dreadfully inhuman." 
 
 " Yes, but it isn't. It's just— different." 
 
 " But the great men were not like that — Shelley and 
 
 Byron and Keats and Wagner " 
 
 She interrupted him with a laugh. 
 "Why, you've just mentioned the very men who 
 were. Their passions and adventures, their demands 
 upon life — why, abnost everything they did ! " she 
 exclaimed incoherently. "What I mean is, genius 
 must first of all feed upon life, devour it, to use your 
 own word, before it can express life. People like you 
 have got to find things out — the meaning of things — 
 what they feel like, and so on. You see what I mean ? 
 Genius must at all costs satisfy its curiosity, its desire 
 for knowledge — call it what you like. And while it is 
 doing that, other people suffer. Why not? They 
 should regard it as a privilege." 
 
 " You talk like a decadent poet of twenty years ago," 
 he said indulgently. 
 
 "Do I? Well, I say what I believe." She rose. 
 " But you must feed and I must cook." 
 
 "Leave the door open so that I may hear you 
 working. ... I say, Olive, don't you ever sing ? " 
 "No. I can't." 
 
 "Well, make a lot of noise with the pots and pans ; 
 it's companionable. And do, like a good child, hand 
 me Frank Swinnerton's September. What a wonderful 
 discovery he is ! " 
 
 An hour later the two friends presented a charming 
 picture as they picnicked on the side of the bed. The 
 sordid room was no longer sordid. Olive had removed 
 all the unnecessary furniture into the kitchen, had 
 placed a glass dish of roses on the dressing-table, and 
 had exchanged the worn repp curtains for a pale green 
 silk through which the sun, banished throughout July, 
 shone this day of early August. She was dressed in 
 white, a rose at her belt, and her capable, beautiful
 
 THE POISONER 183 
 
 hands emerged, alive and graceful, from wide-open 
 sleeves. He could not disguise the admiration he felt 
 for her. 
 
 " You ought to go out for some air," he said. " You're 
 distinctly paler than you were a few days ago." 
 
 Before she had time to answer the thought of the 
 doctor's warning came to her — that Stavart would fail 
 her at the moment of her greatest confidence in him. 
 But even EUworth himself had been amazed at the 
 rapidity of his patient's recovery. Moreover, she had 
 greater trust in her own intuition than in the doctor's 
 experience, and her intuition told her that Martin was 
 no more likely to fall a victim to alcohol that afternoon 
 than she was herself. 
 
 " You think I want freshening up ? " 
 
 "No. You look ripping. I believe nursing suits 
 you. But, really, you ought to get some exercise. I 
 feel an awful rotter keeping you in a beautiful day like 
 this." 
 
 " Very well. I'll go for a ride on a bus while you 
 have your afternoon sleep." . . . 
 
 She came into his room to say good-bye. 
 
 " Oh, Martin, you ought to lie down — really, you 
 ought." 
 
 " I will soon. But I'm as wide awake as — well, as 
 anything. Didn't the paper come this morning ? " 
 
 "I'm so sorry. I forgot all about it." 
 
 She brought the morning newspaper from the sitting- 
 room. 
 
 " Promise ! " she said. 
 
 " Oh yes. I'll sleep right enough. Hope you have 
 a good time. Good-bye, Olive." 
 
 When she was gone he lit a cigarette and idly turned 
 over the sheets of the newspaper. The world was full 
 of wonders at that hour, and his eyes caught reports of 
 tragedy in Ireland and fighting in Poland, but these 
 matters had no interest for him. The world, indeed, 
 was shut out of his mind, and it was but an idle impulse 
 that made him glance at the column captions each day.
 
 184 THE POISONER 
 
 His breath quickened suddenly as there leapt from the 
 page his own name. It was disconcerting to feel that 
 though he had abandoned the world the world still 
 clung to him, and his first impulse was to turn the page 
 and forget what he had seen. But, against his better 
 judgment, his eyes focused their gaze upon the type 
 and read : 
 
 "Quite the most singular of our newer composers is 
 Martin Stavart, one of the very few musicians who have 
 something definite to say and all the technique necessary 
 for complete self-expression. Most sensitive students 
 of his music discover in it something at once disconcert- 
 ing and repellent. If music can ever be cruel, then this 
 is cruel music. It appears to us to be definitely sinister. 
 We do not refer to the vulgarities and impertinences 
 that are to be found in his volmne of Psychological 
 Studies, recently published, but to the bulk of his 
 orchestral music in which can be traced the workings 
 of an imagination occupied with the evil side of human 
 character. It is not the taint of decadence ; it is a 
 strong, active malevolence. Out of what tortured or 
 serene depths does this music come ? Music, of course, 
 is intangible and, unless already associated with an 
 idea, meaningless. Mr Stavart's great powers will, we 
 think, some day find complete expression in a tragic 
 opera which, for the first time in the history of music, 
 will explore the darker chambers of the soul of man." 
 
 He read and trembled — trembled because he feared it 
 was true. But even if it were true — what then ? Had 
 not nearly all the great poets revealed man's wickedness, 
 and cruelty and lust ? Was there not something sinister 
 in Shelley's The Cenci, in Shakespeare's Hamlet, even 
 in Milton's Paradise Lost ? . . . He nodded at the bed- 
 post in painful, distracted acquiescence. But Shelley 
 had nobility, Shakespeare was worshipped, Milton had 
 heroic qualities. But he, Martin Stavart, had inherited 
 — what ? He had no doubt now that his psychology
 
 THE POISONER 185 
 
 was twisted and made ugly by the baleful inheritance 
 of alcoholism and that his imagination, when lit, was 
 cruel and destructive. But that evil was a part of his 
 subconsciousness only — that mysterious source from 
 which his music so spontaneously issued. Apart from 
 his servitude to alcohol he could remember nothing in 
 his life that was to be deplored. His instincts and acts 
 were all kindly and clean. But were they ? Had his 
 conduct to Monica been kind ? Had he not from the 
 very beginning been her torturer? Had not he used 
 her devotion to him solely as an inspiration for his work? 
 Oh yes— these things were true ! He surrendered 
 himself weakly to the attack of his traitorous spirit, 
 and with his surrender came a panic confusion of mind 
 that had only one desire — forgetfulness. Forgetfulness 
 could be purchased in the old way. With a leap he was 
 out of bed, the prey to an agitation so violent that clear 
 thought was impossible. Bewildered, he sought his 
 clothes. Failing to find them in his wardrobe, he 
 entered the sitting-room, and, meeting with no suc- 
 cess in the sideboard cupboards, dropped on to his 
 knees and peered beneath the sofa, the table, the broken 
 writing-desk. His panic grew and, having risen to his 
 feet, he hurried along the passage to Olive Merrall's 
 room. Desperate, half-mad, he continued his search, 
 opening drawers violently, pulling their contents out 
 on to the floor, and, when still foiled, leaving them 
 heaped up while he looked scaredly and passionately in 
 the wardrobe, a chest of drawers, the little cupboard 
 below the washstand, even below the mattress of the 
 bed. But in vain. Thoroughly terrified by now, and 
 a victim of blind anger, he ran to the kitchen. Ejaculat- 
 ing curses, he pulled away his loose bedroom furniture 
 that had been stored there, searching in his fury in the 
 most unlikely places and finding — nothing ! For a few 
 moments he stood thinking ; then, as no further place 
 for search occurred to him, his anger suddenly left him 
 and, murmuring to himself broken phrases of self-pity, 
 he returned to Miss Merrall's room.
 
 186 THE POISONER 
 
 " Oh, cruel, how cruel to do this to me ! " he 
 muttered. " They don't know — nobody can ever know 
 how I suffer." 
 
 For a moment he entertained the idea of running 
 down to the Pony and Cloud just as he was, clad in 
 his pyjamas. Then he thought of his landlady. She 
 would get him what he so urgently desired. But no ! 
 That was impossible. It was after closing-time and 
 she 
 
 His gaze fell on the wardrobe, and sudden light came. 
 Standing on a chair, he reached up to the top of the 
 wardrobe, and his groping hands found his boots and 
 clothing. He pulled them out of their hiding-place on 
 to the floor, and in an incredibly short time he was 
 dressed. It seemed to him of the most vital importance 
 that not an unnecessary second should pass before he 
 drank. Even now something might happen to prevent 
 his reaching or gaining entrance within the Pony and 
 Cloud. Sometimes it chanced that, in the afternoon, 
 Mrs Bolnaverton kept the house closed even to her 
 regular, privileged customers, and it might be that 
 to-day . . . The thought of this possibility appalled 
 him, and it was with a wildly beating heart that he ran 
 down the stairs and hurried along the street. 
 
 He gave the customary slow, triple tap on the door, 
 and waited. Waited an eternity. No one came. He 
 tapped again and, with his ear to the chink separating 
 the narrow folding doors, listened. Not a sound. 
 Losing all control over himself, he kicked violently 
 on the door. They rrnist open to him ! Whatever 
 happened, he would get inside. Once more he kicked 
 at the door and once more he waited. The nervous 
 strain was unendurable ; he felt on the point of collapse. 
 It seemed to him the most important thing in the world 
 that the door should open to him. Surely so imperious 
 a will as his must get its way ! . . . And then the door 
 opened and Jim, looking sleepy and sullen, appeared. 
 
 " You can't come in, Mr Donkin. We're closed. 
 Six o'clock's our time."
 
 THE POISONER 187 
 
 Instantly he concealed his nervous, anxious condition. 
 
 " Let me in, Jim, that's a good fellow — just for five 
 minutes— I'll prohiise to go then. And I'll make it 
 worth your while." 
 
 " No, sir ; it can't be done ! " said the potman firmly. 
 
 With a tremendous effort Martin pulled a wry, 
 humorously disappointed face, as though, after all, it 
 was not of much moment whether he was let in or not. 
 As a matter of fact, he was now confident of admittance. 
 He knew his man. 
 
 " Why, Jim," he said, " I thought you were a pal 
 of mine." 
 
 The man relented at once. 
 
 " Well, just for five minutes. . . . No more, mind," 
 he added, as Martin stepped past him into the dark, 
 stale- smelling bar. 
 
 "A double double, please. And what's yours, Jim ? " 
 
 The potman's movements were so slow that Martin 
 could have cried out upon him in rage. Jim stood 
 considering a moment. 
 
 " Well, could you run to champagne ? " 
 
 His palate was his only refined possession. 
 
 " Certainly. But give me my drink first, that's a 
 good chap." 
 
 But when the whisky was pushed across the counter 
 Martin did not swallow it at once. Even to hold the 
 glass in his hand soothed him ; he was now assured of 
 relief. 
 
 " Well, here's fun," he said, and drank the neat spirit 
 as a thirsty labourer drinks beer. 
 
 And then he felt in his inside breast-pocket for money. 
 It was empty. All his pockets were empty. He might 
 have known it ! 
 
 " These'll have to go on the slate, Jim. I've come 
 out without a brass farthing." 
 
 " Oh, that'll be all right, Mr Donkin," said the man 
 
 On several occasions Martin, finding himself without 
 money late in the afternoon, after the banks had closed,
 
 188 THE POISONER 
 
 had borrowed a couple of pounds from Mrs Bolnaverton, 
 who, shrewd and far-sighted, had never hesitated to 
 trust a man so obviously well-off and trustworthy as 
 Mr Donkin. 
 
 "Good. I think I'll have something similar, Jim. 
 A splash with it this time, though. How's the 
 champagne ? " 
 
 " It's a drop of all right, this stuff. I'd like to swim 
 in it." 
 
 Rather reluctantly he put down his thin-stemmed 
 glass to measure out Martin's whisky. 
 
 The five minutes stretched into ten, into fifteen. 
 Martin had consumed half-a-bottle of whisky before he 
 prepared to leave. 
 
 "Let me have a couple of quid till to-morrow, Jim, 
 will you ? " 
 
 The potman was proud to lend it. 
 
 " Why, of course, Mr Donkin. Any time'll do. Sure 
 two's enough ? " 
 
 He detached two notes from his pocket-book and 
 handed them to Martin, who was just about to walk 
 towards the door when a thought struck him. 
 
 " I say, Jim, I've not been here this afternoon. 
 Understand ? " 
 
 The potman smiled. 
 
 "Yes. I'll tell no one. Not even Mrs Bolnaverton." 
 
 " Nor Miss Merrall. Miss Merrall above all." 
 
 "Right. But have a drink with me, Mr Donkin, 
 before you go." 
 
 Martin glanced at the clock above the door. 
 
 " Well, that's very good of you. As a matter of fact, 
 I don't want to get to the West End before six." 
 
 Jim was already pouring out a large measure of 
 whisky. 
 
 *' A very nice lady is Miss Merrall," he said, as though 
 politeness compelled some comment on her now that 
 her name had been mentioned. 
 
 " Known her long ? " asked Martin. 
 
 " No. Can't say that I have. She started coming
 
 THE POISONER 189 
 
 here about the same time that you did. Not to drink, 
 though. She just has her glass of sherry and a cigarette 
 and a look round, and off she goes." 
 
 Martin considered for a few moments. 
 
 " Will you give her a message for me ? " 
 
 " Well, she's not been in these last few days." 
 
 " I know, but she'll be in to-night. Just tell her from 
 me — will you, Jim ? — that it's no use. Just say r ' Mr 
 Donldn says he's sorry, but it's no use.' See ? She'll 
 understand." 
 
 " Yes ; I'll remember that all right." 
 
 He gave Stavart a long, penetrating look. 
 
 " Are you going awav, Mr Donkin ? " 
 
 " Why ? What makes you think that ? " 
 
 " I don't know. But I did think it." 
 
 " Well, I am. But I'll send you your money all 
 right." 
 
 " I know you will. I wasn't troubling about that." 
 
 " What were you troubling about ? " 
 
 He stood hesitating for a few moments. 
 
 " I heard you were ill," he said at length, " and that 
 Miss Merrall was nursing you. It's none of my business, 
 of course . . . but, you see . . . you don't mind me 
 asking you ? " 
 
 " No. You may ask me anything you like." 
 
 " Well, are you coming back ? " 
 
 " I don't know. No, of course I'm not. I don't 
 suppose you'll ever see me again." 
 
 The potman was visibly embarrassed. Slowly he 
 poured out the remainder of his champagne and drank 
 it. 
 
 " Why ? " asked Stavart. " Out with it ! What 
 do you want to say ? " 
 
 " Oh, nothing much. But if ever you're in trouble, 
 Mr Donkin, and I can help you . . . You see, I know 
 that everything's not all right with you . . . and I 
 might be able to help. I coidd help." 
 
 "Thanks, Jim," said Stavart. "I'll remember. 
 Well, so-long ; I'm off now."
 
 190 THE POISONER 
 
 Five minutes later he was sitting back in a taxicab, 
 astray and uncontrolled, like an unmanned ship torn 
 from its moorings. From his half-numbed brain came 
 the thought that at every crisis of his life, big and small, 
 there had been people eager to help him. The thought 
 tickled his vanity. In this mood of fatuous conceit, it 
 seemed right and fitting that all, friends and strangers, 
 should render him service. Was he not one man in ten 
 thousand — one in a million ? No faint memory of 
 Monica or Olive stirred within him. He was troubled 
 by no consideration for the morrow. He was drifting, 
 drifting. . . .
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 AS Stavart had hoped, Frederic Morgan was sitting 
 at one of the little marble-topped tables in the 
 Cafe Splendide. The gaudy, rococo place, with 
 gilt and mirrors, was already nearly full, although the 
 hour was only just after six. 
 
 It was almost with a leap that Morgan rose to his feet, 
 but a sudden timidity, an uncertainty as to what kind 
 of a welcome his old friend would give him, made him 
 pause ; he stood expectantly, his eyes scrutinising every 
 inch of Stavart's face. Stavart gave him the casual, 
 friendly nod that one man gives to another after a few 
 hours' absence. 
 
 " Thought I'd find you here," he said. 
 
 They shook hands. 
 
 "Sit at my table," said Morgan. "I'm glad you're 
 back. I thought somehow you'd come — I've thought 
 
 so ever since your disap I know, of course, that it 
 
 was no advertising stunt." 
 
 They sat down side by side on a velvet settee. An 
 impassive-faced waiter stood near by. 
 
 " The usual, Mr Stavart ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes, two of them. You're drinking whisky, eh, 
 Morgan ? " 
 
 "Thanks." 
 
 "God ! what a place this is ! " ejaculated Stavart. 
 " The same old crowd ! The same raddled women — 
 look, there's Elsie Real and the two Blotchleys — the 
 same old-young men — the same thugs — the same 
 notabilities — the same everything." 
 
 "Yes, and the same whisky! The best whisky in 
 town." 
 
 " Don't you get sick of it all ? " 
 
 "No, never. This, Martin, is mv life. I was made 
 for this." 
 
 "Yes. I believe you were," said Stavart, a note of 
 contempt in his voice. 
 
 " Why not ? One must do something. And at 
 least I'm picturesque. I ' fit.' You'll feel better, 
 Martin, when you've had a drink. You're querulous." 
 
 191
 
 192 THE POISONER 
 
 The waiter, now returned, placed their drinks on the 
 table, and Stavart paid him. 
 
 " By the way, Morgan, I want some money.'' 
 
 "Good! How much?" 
 
 "A fiver will do. Until the banks open, you 
 know." 
 
 His friend lazily counted out the notes and handed 
 them to Stavart. 
 
 " How long are you going to stav ? " he asked. 
 
 "Where? Here?" 
 
 " No, in town. You see, Mar — Stavart, I don't quite 
 know how we stand towards each other — what sort of 
 questions I may or may not ask you — I don't even know 
 if I can call you by your Christian name. You think 
 your old life was wicked. I remember that you once said 
 you were rotting on a dung-heap. I was absolutely 
 amazed to hear you say that." 
 
 " Must we really be serious ? " 
 
 " Not if you don't want to be." 
 
 " I don't think it's necessary. You see, Morgan, you 
 don't seem to understand anything at all. In any case, 
 you don't understand me." 
 
 " I admit it. But I want to. I want to know what's 
 troubling you — why you hate a gay life and yet return 
 to it — why, each time I meet you, you are never quite 
 the same. In the old days you were for a time one 
 of the happiest, most care-free fellows I've ever known. 
 And then you sank — sank right down — became a 
 different man — and while you were different, you 
 disappeared." 
 
 " It's very simple, Morgan, if you only knew. Have 
 you ever considered that I've got work to do ? That 
 I matter in the world ? That my talent is of some im- 
 portance ? You've got no special gifts — you've often 
 said so yourself, boasting that your conversation and 
 your talents were more than sufficient excuse for your 
 idle existence. Besides, as you've pointed out, this is 
 your real environment. You like depravity — so you're 
 depraved. Cocaine brings you your long thrills, and
 
 THE POISONER 193 
 
 that's all you want. We're of different stuff, Morgan. 
 I repeat, it's all very simple." 
 
 " You're frank, at any rate. That's what I like about 
 you. So I'll be frank with you. If you've got work to 
 do, why don't you do it ? And if this isn't your proper 
 environment, why don't you find out what is and get 
 into it at once and — and stay there ? " 
 
 " Ah ! now you're being rude ! I knev/ we should 
 quarrel if we began to talk seriously. But I don't wish 
 to quarrel. . . . You wanted to know how long I'm 
 staying in town. Indefinitely — till the end." 
 
 " What do you mean—' till the end ' ? " 
 
 " Well, there's got to be an end some time, hasn't 
 there ? I've chucked up what I used to call my ' career.' 
 I'm going to enjoy myself — wine, women and song, and 
 all that kind of damn nonsense. I'm going to bring 
 last summer back. I'm going to snatch a few moments 
 out of life — live dangerously and hectically." 
 
 He was speaking excitedly. Suddenly, he rapped on 
 the table. 
 
 " Bring more whisky, Alberto," he said to the waiter. 
 "Quick!" 
 
 Morgan, who had been examining him carefully during 
 the last few minutes, lit a cigarette with elaborate in- 
 dolence. He held the lighted match before him and 
 watched it as it burned. 
 
 "Don't you think," he said, and paused for a few 
 moments while with studied deliberation he blew out the 
 light — " don't you think, Stavart, you've had enough ? " 
 
 Martin turned to him with amazement. 
 
 " What can you mean ? " he exclaimed. "You, of 
 all people, to say that ! " 
 
 I'm sorry. I said it because you look ill. You 
 are all nerves — you're jangled and — and " 
 
 He broke off in confusion. 
 
 " Is it noticeable ? " asked Stavart, in a whisper. 
 " Can other people see it ? " 
 
 " Oh no, no ! It's nothing, really. I'm sorry I said 
 anything — it wasn't in the least necessary." 
 
 N
 
 194 THE POISONER 
 
 " But you were quite right. I am ill. Ill with 
 alcohol. Morgan, / can't stop drirMiig ! That's why 
 I left London last November. I can't drink for 
 pleasure. It's a disease ! " 
 
 Morgan's refined, intellectual face clouded just 
 perceptibly with distaste. 
 
 "Well, don't take it so tragically. There are worse 
 complaints than drink. Drugs, for example. Though 
 I'm a slave to cocaine, I don't make a song and dance 
 about it." 
 
 " No. But then you're not ill. It's not destroying 
 you." 
 
 "Oh yes, it is — gradually. But, Stavart, I don't 
 bore my friends by talking about it." 
 
 Martin was so full of his own trouble that he did not 
 notice Morgan's rebuke. He went on : 
 
 "Something's gone wrong with me. I don't know 
 what it is. But my nervous system doesn't react 
 properly to the stimulus of drink. Instead of being 
 exhilarated, I get depressed. It's rotten, Morgan — 
 damned rotten." 
 
 " I'm sorry, Stavart, but what can I do ? " 
 
 He reached out for his gloves, lying on the table. He 
 was bored. Stavart was utterly changed. In the old 
 days he was never like this. 
 
 " You're not going ? " Martin asked. 
 
 " I must. I have an appointment. It's after the 
 half-hour." 
 
 " Can't you telephone and put her off ? " 
 
 "No. Why should I?" 
 
 " Well, if ?/o// were ill " 
 
 There was disdain in Morgan's attitude as he turned 
 towards his companion and examined him closely. 
 
 "You forget," he said. "You forget that seven or 
 eight months ago you left all your friends, that two or 
 three months latt;r you repudiated me, and that only 
 half-an-hoiu" ago you so far forgot yoiu'self as to sneer 
 at me and my mode of living. And you don't seem to 
 realize that you are now an insufferable bore. You've
 
 THE POISONER 195 
 
 made yourself ill with drink. Well, that's your affair. 
 Get away, Stavart — get away to the seaside or to Scot- 
 land. And cut whisky out. You're not physically strong 
 enough for a raffish life. If I were you I should return 
 once more to respectability — and your ' important work.' 
 The world will miss you if you don't, you know." 
 
 Stavart could not believe what his ears told hhn. It 
 was impossible that any human being could be so hard, 
 so cyiiical. His gaze rested unseeingly on the table. 
 
 "What do you mean?" he asked painfully. "I 
 can't go away by myself — I have no friends. I am 
 alone. Everyone is against me." 
 
 Morgan's lip curled. He rose. 
 
 "Well, I'm off. Good-bye." 
 
 He nodded carelessly and went. 
 
 Stavart felt as though he had received a severe blow 
 below the belt. He told himself that he must not think 
 of what had just been said to him : he must not admit 
 that he deserved it. He must forget — at once ! 
 
 He looked round the restaurant and noticed a roguish- 
 looking girl who seemed strangely familiar to him. She 
 beckoned to him. Yes ; he remembered now. Last 
 year he had spent an entire Aveek with her — a week that 
 had begun happily and had ended in turbulence and 
 sorrow. What was her name ? He could not remem- 
 ber. As she still continued to beckon to him he rose 
 and went over to her. She was sitting among a group 
 of friends — men and women — who were discussing 
 something very earnestl3^ 
 
 "Hullo, Solemnity," she exclaimed, giving him her 
 hand. "Sit down. Roger, make room for him, that's 
 a duck. This," she said to the little company, " this is 
 my young friend, Martin." 
 
 Everyone smiled at him, and he tried to smile back 
 at them, but Morgan's words had left him sick and weak, 
 and the pleasantness he tried to put upon his face was 
 revealed as an insincere and mechanical grin. 
 
 " Molly! " he said, as the others resumed their con- 
 versation. " That's it ! Do you know I'd forgotten
 
 196 THE POISONER 
 
 your name for the minute ? But I hadn't forgotten 
 
 you ! " 
 
 "Of course you hadn't. Who could forget who 
 knows as much about me as you do ? Now begin at 
 the very beginning and tell me all about it. But, first 
 of all, I want something to drink. Just you and I, 
 Solemnity : never mind the others. I'd like "^she 
 looked at him mischievously — "absinthe. Naughty, 
 naughty Molly, to drink absinthe." 
 
 " Well, it is naughty of you. But you're looking 
 stunning, my dear. Where've you been — seaside ? . . . 
 Oh, waiter, an absinthe and a large whisky and soda." 
 
 She nestled close to him and put her warm, plmiip 
 hand on his and drew it on to her lap. 
 
 " Seaside ? No such luck ! All the war profiteers 
 have spent their money, dear, and no one can afford to 
 take poor Molly anywhere. She has been sitting in this 
 cafe every day since you left h er . Molly wants a change, 
 Solemnity. A real, nice change." 
 
 She gave him a pleading look ; her bright, hmiiid and 
 vitalising eyes suddenly intoxicated him. Magically, 
 his nervous irritability slipped from him ; in a moment 
 he felt a new man. He was full of tenderness as he 
 recalled the week he had spent with her last year. 
 
 " Well, why not '? " he said teasingly. 
 
 " With you ? " 
 
 "Will you? " 
 
 " Of course ! I should love it ! Oh, Solemnity, do 
 you mean it, really and truly ? " 
 
 She pressed his hand tightly in hers. 
 
 " Really and truly." 
 
 " You don't know how sick I am of this beastly place. 
 It's perfectly damnable the life I live — I mean it's so 
 monotonous. Just eating and drinking and making 
 love. But it will be different now you've come back. 
 You see, I like you. Tell me. Solemnity, where have 
 you been these ages and ages ? " 
 
 As he told her something of his past life during the 
 last nine months his eyes feasted themselves on her
 
 THE POISONER 197 
 
 girlish beauty. She was small, dark and winsome. Her 
 curly hair had been bobbed, revealing her slender, 
 delicious neck. Though her body was slightly plump 
 her wrists and ankles were of the utmost delicacy. Of 
 her face, one noticed little save her black eyes, so com- 
 pelling were they. Thej^ looked at you with perfect 
 trust. Half the time they were warm and affectionate, 
 the other half they were full of the innocent mischief 
 that is to be found in light-hearted people whose faith 
 in human nature is still undisturbed. Her tangerine- 
 coloured dress was less vivid than her healthy cheeks. 
 Thin, level eyebrows gave her face a touch of breeding. 
 She listened, half smiling, to his recital, and sipped the 
 absinthe the waiter had brought. 
 
 "So," she said, when he had finished, "you've been 
 happy, eh ? " 
 
 " Not half so happy as I'm going to be with you, 
 Molly. Can you spare me a month ? " 
 
 " Ah, but you'd get tired of me. Solemnity. Clever 
 people always do. I'm only a little empty-head, you 
 know. But I've got a secret for you." 
 
 "Tell me, what is it ? " 
 
 " Oh no. It shall be a surprise. You wait. Then 
 to-morrow, or the next day, or some hour when you 
 are bored with me, I will tell you. It will please you, 
 Solemnity ; oh yes, I know it will." 
 
 She clasped his hand tightly and raised it to her 
 mouth. Disengaging his forefinger, she bit it sharply, 
 and then laughed. 
 
 "You're not changed a bit," he said, laughing also. 
 " I think the moment when I began to love you was 
 when you first did that." 
 
 " Love me ? " she said, half wonderingly, half sadly. 
 " Oh no. Solemnity, you don't love me. You mustn't 
 make fun of me." 
 
 " Oh, but I do ! " he protested. " At all events I 
 like you tremendously." 
 
 " Yes ? " 
 
 Her voice, deep and musical, dropped to a caress.
 
 198 THE POISONER 
 
 " You are fond of Molly ? " she went on. " Tell me 
 why ! " 
 
 " Because — oh, a lot of reasons — you're beautiful 
 and merry and innocent and good " 
 
 She stirred uneasily and released his hand. 
 
 " You are spoiling everything ! " she said sadly. 
 '' You mustn't make fun of me. I am not good. And 
 listen ! I shall be very angry with you — very, very 
 angry with you if you call me innocent. You know 
 it is untrue. To say that of me — you, Martin — of me 
 who have let so many men " 
 
 He looked at her in surprise, she was so obviously 
 deeply disturbed. 
 
 "I'm sorry, dear,'' he said contritely. "I was not 
 making fun of you. You really do seem to me good, 
 Molly. I have never heard you say an evil thing of 
 anybody. But we won't talk about that any more. 
 You forgive me ? " 
 
 Her hand found his and in that way showed him they 
 were at peace once more. 
 
 " And now," said he, " we must decide where we shall 
 go for our holiday." 
 
 "You're ill," she said, looking at him steadily. 
 " You're run down. You must go to a bracing place. 
 You want plenty of sun and sea. Have you ever been 
 to the Isle of Man ? " 
 
 "Oh, but, my dear, it swarms with trippers in August 
 — horrid people from Lancashire." 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 " Oh, poor Solemnity. You are like everyone else. 
 You think the Isle of Man's a tiny little place.' But it's 
 big — ever so big. And we should go where there are 
 no people to be seen — no, not a single one. On the 
 curragh near Lezayre — on the rocks of Port Lewaigue 
 and Port y Vullin — on the breast of Barrule — among the 
 gorse of Maughold. Oh! Solemnity, it would be so 
 beautiful — with you. I was there three years ago, in May 
 — I was a little girl of sixteen — and on the curragh a 
 hundred cuckoos were singing, and the flowers of the
 
 THE POISONER 199 
 
 bog-bean were hot in the sun. And one day as we walked 
 along the shore towards the Point of Ayre we bathed, 
 seven times. Such water, Solenniity — clear as elear — 
 you go out in a boat, oh ! a long way, and you look o\'er 
 the side, and there you can see shells lying at the bottom, 
 so clear it is." 
 
 Her eyes were Ijig Avith wonder and with memories of 
 those happy days. He told himself that with her he 
 would, for a time, be happy. She was, he knew, as 
 innocent — or, at all events, as free from the sense of 
 guilt — as she seemed. She had the unmoral nature of 
 an animal. She did not " lie awake at night and weep 
 for her sins." She took what her little world gave her, 
 enjoyed it, and was satisfied. 
 
 " Very well," he said, " you shall show me your shells 
 and your clear water and all those places whose names 
 on your lips sound so beautiful." 
 
 She squeezed his hand ardently. 
 
 " How wonderful it will be! But is it really true ? 
 You are not teasing poor Molly ? " 
 
 He assured her that indeed he meant what he had 
 proposed, that if she could arrange her small affairs 
 they would start on the morrow. 
 
 " I myself have some shopping to do," he said. 
 
 She nodded her head wisely. 
 
 "Yes," she said. And then: ''Martin " 
 
 Her manner was awkward, and the tone of her voice 
 seemed to show that she was a little afraid. 
 
 " Yes ? " And as she remained silent : "Speak up, 
 little one." 
 
 " You won't be angry with me ? " 
 
 " Why, of course not." 
 
 " No, I know you won't, Solemnity dear. But what 
 I want to say is not very pleasant. You remember last 
 time — the only time — at Bourne End, I mean — our 
 week together " 
 
 He knew what she was about to say, and the thought 
 came to him to stop her in time. But the frightened 
 hurry of her words prevented him.
 
 200 THE POISONER 
 
 a 
 
 I was afraid, Solemnity, so this tinie you must 
 promise me that you will not — you are so much nicer 
 when you don't drink, dear — and even now you look 
 wild and— and uncertain — as though you might do 
 sudden things " 
 
 Strangely, inexplicably, there mingled with his self- 
 disgust deep sorrow. 
 
 " Hush, Molly, hush 1 Don't say it ! I know what 
 you mean, and I promise, dear, I do promise " 
 
 It seemed dreadful to him that her liking for him should 
 be streaked with fear. But she had good reason to be 
 afraid. Her last two davs with him at Bourne End had 
 been full of excitement and anxiety : his actions had 
 been unaccountable : and they had both returned to 
 London hurriedly and in a very anticlimax of passion. 
 He had been almost frenzied with drink. 
 
 She smiled at him in gratitude both for his promise 
 and because he had not been angry with her. Again 
 her little hand pressed his. 
 
 " I will drink no more," he said, and, as he spoke, 
 he pushed away from him what remained of his 
 whisky. 
 
 He felt that in the warmth and helpfulness of her 
 companionship it would be easy to resist that tempta- 
 tion. She had gaiety : she was so alive : she was 
 without guile and, in her way, honest and honourable. 
 Weakly he clung to her. happiness in the belief that, for 
 some time at least, it could provide him a harbourage 
 from his pursuing self. 
 
 " You will dine with me ? " he asked. 
 
 Involuntarily her eyes sought the clock. 
 
 "Oh, I am so sorry," she said, "but I've promised 
 Dick — Mr Veneron. You know him? No? Yes; we 
 arranged to meet here at seven." 
 
 Martin's heart sank. He had not anticipated that he 
 would now be separated from her even for a few hours. 
 He felt as though he were about to be deserted — as 
 though, indeed, Molly were proposing to behave traitor- 
 ously. She saw his disappointment.
 
 THE POISONER 201 
 
 " Oh, Solemnity dear, I can see you want me. But 
 what can I do ? I promised him." 
 
 " But, Molly, it's ten minutes past seven now, and 
 he has not come. He has not kept his engagement. 
 Surely you owe him nothing now ? " 
 
 "It is often so — with us. Our men friends are late. 
 Wc wait for them. It is nothing." 
 
 " Yes, but it provides you with a good excuse for 
 coming with me." 
 
 " But, dear, he has been so good to me. It would be 
 unkind " 
 
 He leaned forward. 
 
 " And to-night ? You receive him to-night ? " he 
 asked, in a low voice. 
 
 She nodded as though she hated to do so. Then, 
 quickly, she put her hand on his arm. 
 
 " It is nothing," she said. " You know it is nothing. 
 What I shall give him, I mean. I like you better. I 
 would rather be with you, but I did promise him. 
 Solemnity." 
 
 Her little face was perplexed and grave. 
 
 " But he is late ! " urged Martin. " The engagement 
 is cancelled. Perhaps he will not come at all " 
 
 " Oh yes. I'm afraid he will." 
 
 " Tell him you are ill. After all, Molly. I am an old 
 friend " 
 
 " You mustn't ! You mustn't ! You are making it 
 hard for me to do what I ought to do." 
 
 She shook her head sadly. 
 
 " I believe you love him ! " he said desperately. 
 
 " Oh no. But he has been very, very good to me. 
 It would be wicked of me to run away from him." 
 
 The momentary contest had excited and weakened 
 him. He felt that she was right, and he was angry with 
 himself for having attempted to persuade her to break 
 her promise. 
 
 " Very well, Molly. It shall be as you wish. But 
 we must arrange the time and place of our meeting 
 to-morrow."
 
 202 THE POISONER 
 
 " You are not angry, Solemnity ? " 
 
 " No, dear ; only disappointed." 
 
 She gave him a card. 
 
 "That is my little flat," she said. "Call in the 
 morning — but not before eleven," she added awkwardly. 
 
 So he left her and her friends, and, out in the thronged 
 streets, tried to think only of the morrow and to forget 
 the interminable hours that lay between.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 STAVART lay on his back on the bed of the room 
 he had taken for the night in the large hotel off 
 the Strand. He was fully dressed. Only half-an- 
 hour ago he had left Molly at the Cafe Splendide. 
 Driven by a desire to think things out, to face his 
 position as it really was, he had thrown himself on his 
 bed, telling himself that if, after all, his thoughts 
 became too painful, the anodyne of drink was at hand. 
 He had not forgotten his promise to Molly ; he intended 
 to keep it ; but there was, he knew, a limit to his 
 endurance. 
 
 His thoughts started from that point. Had he really 
 ever fought against the desire for drink ? Could he 
 recall any single instance of his resisting the alcohol 
 craving for a day — for an hour ? No ; he had to admit 
 that always, inevitably, he had submitted at once. 
 For the desire with him took the form of panic — the 
 panic of the claustrophobe locked in a dungeon. In- 
 variably he had felt that if he did not procure at once 
 what his body cried out for, something overwhelmingly 
 disastrous would happen to him — to his mind. Many 
 and many a time he had felt, or thought he had felt, his 
 brain seething to collapse. But what if he had held 
 out ? Would anything terrible have occurred ? Would 
 denial indeed have demented him ? Perhaps not. 
 
 Even as he lay thinking he was conscious of an in- 
 creasing craving for drink. Well, he would resist it. 
 He had everything to gain by doing so. He knew well, 
 in spite of his thousand self-deceptions, that to take 
 more whisky now would mean that in two or three hours 
 he would be drink's helpless victim, and that his pro- 
 jected holiday with Molly, that was to bring him a 
 month of happy sensual forgetfulness, would be can- 
 celled. He made a deliberate effort to suppress his 
 craving, and turned his thoughts to the material 
 necessities of the moment. . . . 
 
 To-morrow ! He must rise early and buy clothing 
 — shirts, collars, ties, socks, a raincoat — everj^thing ! 
 But why ? At Sir Henry Chillingham's lay all the 
 
 203
 
 204 THE POISONER 
 
 personal belongings he had brought to London. Could 
 not he get these ? Since he had disappeared his mind 
 had been too sorely bruised, his vague apprehensions 
 too insistently clamant, to think of these things. He had 
 crushed at its birth every thought that had led him to 
 his latest futile tragedy. He could not bear to think 
 even for a moment of Chillingham, or Symons, or Monica. 
 To write to his friend for his luggage would be to open a 
 wound that already was in the process of being healed. 
 It was impossible ever to renew relations with his friends 
 in Barton : the last word of that happy chapter in his 
 life had been written. 
 
 As he faced these thoughts he became more and more 
 agitated. . . . His arms were thrown backwards, and 
 his head lay in the cup of his hands, whose fingers were 
 intertwined. Pressing the palms of his hands against 
 the sides of his head with savage violence, he tried to 
 master himself: tried and succeeded. His success 
 amazed him, and almost light-heartedly he sprang out 
 of bed and paced the room. It had been so easy ! 
 Half-a-minute of will-concentration, and it had passed ! 
 Incredible that this should hare happened to him ! 
 
 Deliberately, yet timidly, he faced his future. How 
 must he plan his life ? It was impossible for him to 
 drift indefinitely. Without purpose his life must 
 always be full of temptation. And yet what interest 
 had he in life save his art ? None. It was everything 
 to him. He had worked with the persistence, the 
 intensity, of a man of genius : worked sometimes in 
 exaltation, but more often in moods of doubt, when it 
 seemed to him that his powers were nothing, his talent 
 but a dying flame. If there was any good in him at all 
 that goodness lay in his talent, of which now he was 
 always assured. And yet it was in his music that the 
 taint in him was made apparent. In his life, except 
 his alcoholism and his loose living, there was nothing 
 save what was fine. He was conscious of good feeling, 
 good intentions ; he <had done many generous things, 
 and nothing that was cruel or malignant ; he had
 
 THE POISONER 205 
 
 helped people weaker than himself. . . . But in the 
 midst of these assm-ances came doubt. Not cruel ? 
 How, then, name his conduct to Monica ? Cruel ! — 
 it was worse : it was caddish. Swept away by sudden 
 self-condemnation, he told himself that all his life 
 through he had been selfishly ignoble ; he had been 
 ^veak and cowardly — he was less than a man. O 
 God ! how useless this life ! How hateful himself ! 
 He seemed to peer into his own soul, and saw it a weak, 
 shivering thing. There was no bigness in his vices: 
 he sinned always through cowardice. He must — he 
 was sure of it ! — be the object of men's contempt. 
 Those who saw good in him did not know him. Only 
 he knew. Not vile, or dreadful, but contemptibly 
 mean and small ! . . . 
 
 And now it was that his brain seemed to seethe and 
 his soul to cry out against the torture he was inflicting 
 upon it. His pace quickened. He clasped his hands 
 behind his back and struggled with himself. Each 
 time he passed the mirror on the dressing-table, he 
 averted his face for fear lest he should look upon hhnself 
 and see some scalding vision of contemptible iniquity. 
 Panic was upon him. He stopped suddenly and 
 looked around. His hat ! Where was it ? He must 
 drink. Molly ? He laughed to himself. As if she 
 mattered ! As if anything mattered ! 
 
 He seized his hat, which lay on a chair in a corner 
 of the room, opened the door, and began to walk down- 
 stairs. Nothing could save him now. Body and soul 
 were fused together in one intolerable ache, and mingled 
 with the aching was the fear that something might 
 prevent him obtaining what he so anguishingly desired. 
 Perhaps the barmaid would see the terror and tur- 
 bulence of his soul depicted on his face, and refuse 
 hhii. He schooled his features to a smile. . . . 
 
 As he reached the bottom of the staircase, the thought 
 came to him— it came echo-like and dim — to try to 
 master himself. He had done it once this evening — 
 why not a second time ? Why, after all, should he
 
 206 THE POISONER 
 
 drink ? Would he indeed suffer so terribly if he did 
 not ? In the hall he paused, full, of irresolution. And 
 while he was trying to make up his mind to resist and 
 overcome temptation, lo ! his legs carried him past the 
 hotel smoke-room and out into the street. The im- 
 possible had happened ! Almost without effort, he 
 had escaped the clutching hand of doom. 
 
 But when in the street he felt weak and sick. His 
 forehead was beaded with perspiration. All his body 
 revolted against this unpremeditated denial. But, 
 though distressed by his body's suffering, he could 
 have cried aloud for joy. If only he had known self- 
 conquest was so easy ! In some strange way the 
 traflic of the street brought gradual ease to his turbulent 
 brain ; its noise was a consolation, and the busy, idle 
 people hurrying to and fro carried his mind away from 
 itself. Near Charing Cross an overwhelming impulse 
 drove him into a shop in whose window there was a 
 great display of chocolates ; of these he bought a pound, 
 and before he was again in the street had stuffed two 
 or three of the sweetmeats into his mouth. He 
 swallowed them ravenously, not because he was hungry, 
 but because, unknown to him, the chemistry of his 
 body was crying out for sugar. 
 
 In order to eat unobserved, he turned down a side 
 street towards the Embankment. A fresh wind was 
 blowing, and dark, low clouds were hurrying over the 
 tops of the plane-trees. The tide was just on the ebb, 
 and as he leaned over the Embankment's side, he 
 watched the hurrying waves in their silent tumult. 
 The wind was cold and refreshing on his sweat-covered 
 face. By the time he had consumed his bag of 
 chocolates he felt almost calm. He was free to think, 
 and his released mind sought pleasure in imagination. 
 
 He sailed down that slow river to the sea and saw 
 liimself, alone, on limitless Avaters. His fancy played 
 witJi the world and brought night about him. He 
 dizzied himself with thoughts of the stars and of the 
 vast distances separating them, and yet, said he, the
 
 THE POISONER 207 
 
 universe is nothing perchance save a little heap of sand- 
 grains in the hollow of God's hand. How trivial all 
 existence ! How miserably unimportant his own ! 
 Was it worth while to struggle ? And, if it ^yere, for 
 what, after all, was he struggling ? . . . 
 
 For forgetfulness : for escape from the prison of 
 himself ! . . . Travel : why not ? His thoughts lit 
 on Greece and all that he had read of that harsh 
 country with its tropical vegetation, its leaping, jagged 
 mountains, its sedgy lakes whose serenity mocked at 
 man's striving. Perhaps, after all, if he lived in the 
 environment best suited to his nature, he would be at 
 peace. In a country whose people were tinged with 
 cruelty, where the climate was cruel with its sharp 
 extremes of cold and heat, where life itself was not too 
 scrupulous, and the risks of life rapid and imminent — 
 perhaps in a country like that he would not feel himself 
 at odds with life, afraid of shadows one moment and 
 blindly rushing upon self-destruction the next. In 
 Spain, now, or in San Francisco, or in some island of 
 the Southern Seas . . . ! 
 
 The patter of rain on the trees above him broke in 
 upon his thoughts. Already the world was darkening 
 and, suddenly, a futile, vulgar electric sign on the 
 south bank of the river burst into light. Its fantastical- 
 ness chimed in with his thoughts. In this dim hour 
 everything seemed a little unreal. He encouraged the 
 feeling of detachment that had begun to creep over 
 him ; it gave him the illusion of immense power. This 
 sinister world was outside him ; he did not belong to 
 it ; he dwelt apart. . . . He smiled to himself as he 
 recognised that he was on the threshold of one of those 
 moods which visited him all too rarely — moods in which 
 he felt not only that all life's difficulties were smoothed 
 away but in which also he knew himself to be god-like, 
 and in which he hugged the idea that these others — 
 these myriads of crowding people — were, compared 
 with hiiiisdf, rccl>lo and negligible automata. He 
 turned his back upon the river and looked upon the
 
 208 THE POISONER 
 
 black buildings faintly outlined against the blacker sky. 
 He felt greater than London itself. The intoxicating 
 mood almost engulfed him ; his hectic genius blazed 
 up with naphtha-like flames. Waves of magnificent 
 sound broke upon his consciousness. No longer could 
 he remain still. He turned westwards and began to 
 walk. He was sufficiently master of himself to know 
 that his exaltation was evanescent, that he was the 
 victim of illusion ; but he feared that at any moment 
 the illusion might vanish. Usually, such an experience 
 as this presaged a period of nmsical productiveness. 
 It might be so now. Perhaps, when away with Molly, 
 soothed by the indolent sensuality of his life with her, 
 he would begin work once more. He would do so ; 
 he felt assured of it. 
 
 The sharpness of his ecstasy — its visionary quality 
 — faded a little, and he stopped under the bridge at 
 Charing Cross, conscious for the first time that he was 
 hungry. He would return to the Cafe Splendide and 
 eat. . . The dipsomaniac must live his life of perpetual 
 danger. And it was the desire for danger that drove 
 Martin to the one spot in London — in the whole world — 
 where the people and the atmosphere were to him most 
 alluring, most weakening, most poisonous. But he 
 told himself that in his present mood he was quite safe ; 
 he was immune from the tempting power of alcohol. 
 He would sit and watch others drink ; for himself, he 
 would merely eat and, as he ate, watch the hothouse- 
 flower women as they smoked their cigarettes and sipped 
 their liqueius. 
 
 Rain was now falling very heavily, and the wet, 
 wood-paved road shining under the electric lights 
 looked like a broad canal. He saw everything with a 
 new, an altered, vision ; it was almost as though sight 
 had been given him for the first time. His senses were 
 acutely conscious of his environment, a.nd yet seemed 
 to have no part in it. He watched a crowd struggling 
 to get on a tram , most clearly could he see their white, 
 eager faces, their outstretched hands ; and his imagina-
 
 THE POISONER 209 
 
 tion placed him in the midst of those crushed bodies. 
 Yet, though he was, as it were, in the midst of them, 
 how far off they seemed ! 
 
 A taxi drew up at the curb near where he was stand- 
 ing ; he stepped into it, and was driven to the place 
 where, less than a year ago, he had spent so many 
 evenings of wild excess. 
 
 The hour was late, and at the far end of the cafe, 
 where dinner was served, the waiters were already 
 beginning to remove the cloths from the tables. But 
 the head waiter assured him that there was still ample 
 time for dinner and gave him a table that commanded 
 the entire room. Martin sat down with a little sigh of 
 satisfaction. Though his mind was so excited and 
 vigorous, he was physically tired, and it was a comfort 
 to sit down on that soft couch, stretch out his legs, and 
 gaze, half charmed and wholly approving, at the froth 
 of life as it gleamed and glistened before him. Men 
 and women were busy with conversation that readied 
 him murmuringly and soothingly. There was a little 
 movement : people came and went without cessation, 
 and now and again a girl would rise and cross the 
 crowded room to sit for a while at another table. Over 
 all this seemingly happy throng was the haze of tobacco 
 smoke which gave a feeling of space and mystery to 
 the gaudy room. As Martin sat talking to the waiter, 
 who jotted down his orders in his notebook* he felt 
 curiously happy — happy and more than eVer powerful. 
 
 "And I am very thirsty," he found himself saying. 
 "You might bring me half-a-bottle of No. 35." 
 
 "We've got a much better champagne than that 
 since you were here, sir. Pommery, 1911." 
 
 " Good. Then perhaps I'd better drink an entire 
 bottle." 
 
 For a moment it occurred to him that he had broken 
 his resolution without even the slightest attempt to 
 keep it ; but the thought did not trouble him. He 
 felt strong enough for anything ; there was no risk so 
 great that he would fear to take it.
 
 210 THE POISONER 
 
 As he ate, he examined the people seated near him, 
 and recognised several acquaintances of whom he had 
 seen something last year. Curiously, he could not 
 remember any of their names, nor, indeed, the circimi- 
 stances in which he had met them. In the kind of life 
 he had lived he had had sudden intimacies with many 
 women whose names he had never known ; it had been 
 his custom to give them fancy names of his own, but 
 even these had escaped him. 
 
 He was sitting with his elbow on the table, his 
 champagne glass at his lips, and his large, vehement 
 eyes slowly fastening their gaze on one face after 
 another, when he suddenly became aware, with piercing 
 surprise, that he was looking into the eyes of Olive 
 Merrall. He dropped his gaze immediately, but not 
 before she had given him the nod and half-smile that 
 is exchanged between people Avhose acquaintanceship 
 is of the slightest. 
 
 Instantly, he was filled with cold and sickening 
 shame. It was as though he had been discovered in 
 the act of striking a woman. His feeling of power 
 deserted him ; a disagreeable sensation at the pit of 
 his stomach seemed to show that even his entrails 
 revolted against his conduct. Since he had left Lime- 
 house that afternoon his thought had scarcely touched 
 her. Deliberately he had thrown her kindness and 
 tenderness in her face. He had accepted her succour 
 when he needed it, and, when it was no longer necessary 
 to him, he had deserted her without a word. She 
 could not, he knew, appreciate the panic, convulsive 
 fear that had driven him out to drink, and he could not 
 explain to her what was inexplicable to himself. She 
 must think him something worse than a cad, as, in this 
 sinking shame, he felt himself to be. For, having 
 recovered from his terror, and having dulled his craving 
 he might at least have returned to his rooms, and 
 himself given her the message he had entrusted to Jim. 
 
 He seized a tumbler, filled it with champagne, and 
 gulped it down. . . . Why had she come here ? Was
 
 THE POISONER 211 
 
 she seeking him ? Was it possible that she bore no 
 resentment — that even now she was willing to be his 
 companion and nurse ? He felt that, indeed, this was 
 more than possible, for it seemed to him that a woman 
 who had done for him what she had must be ready to 
 do even more. 
 
 He gave a hasty glance in her direction, and saw that 
 she was with an elderly man, who was talking to her 
 with deep earnestness. They were drinking coffee 
 and smoking cigarettes. From the glimpse Martin 
 obtained of Miss Merrall it seemed to him that her 
 thoughts were no longer occupied with him ; her 
 attitude and her absorption in her companion's con- 
 versation suggested that something of importance and 
 directly personal to herself had occurred during the day. 
 But perhaps she was acting a part ? That careless, 
 casual nod she had given him five minutes ago was 
 surely a little overdone. 
 
 He felt confusedly that the situation demanded from 
 him action of some kind. He wanted to go to Miss 
 Merrall and explain, and yet, clearly to do that at the 
 moment was impossible. Once more he glanced at 
 her. She was in precisely the same attitude as before. 
 It was clear to him that he was no longer even at the 
 back of her thoughts. Perhaps she had washed him 
 completely from her mind : was not even angry with 
 him or disappointed at his conduct. Obviously, there 
 was nothing that he could do. But he must get 
 away from here ; her presence shamed and confused 
 him. 
 
 He was summoning the waiter for his bill, when the 
 head waiter approached him and laid a letter on his 
 table. 
 
 "I forgot this, Mr Stavart," he said. "Excuse me. 
 It was left — oh ! weeks ago^-by a young gentleman. 
 He said it was very important. Every day when I did 
 not see you I thought of it, and to-night when I did 
 see you — avcII, I did not think of it. But here it is 
 at last."
 
 212 THE POISONER 
 
 He stopped speaking and questioned Martin with his 
 eyebrows. 
 
 "It is all right?" he asked. "Then thank you, 
 thank you ! " 
 
 He walked quickly away and Martin, fearing that 
 Fate was about to deal him another blow, slit open the 
 envelope, and took out its contents. He turned to 
 the signature at once. "Bernard." The name was 
 like an echo to his fears. Familiar, pressing and in- 
 sistent though it was, he could not at first place it. 
 It called up vague horror; it belonged to something 
 terrible and tragic in the past ; it was, he was convinced, 
 about to evoke new terrors. But to whom did it 
 belong ? In what way did this familiar name come 
 before him to-night ? He read : 
 
 Dear Martin : — Father is dead and Monica lies 
 very ill. Mr Calvert and I are afraid that you also 
 may be ill, but by the time you receive this letter you 
 will perhaps be well enough to communicate with us. 
 Martin, come home. When I left Narrow End yester- 
 day, Monica was calling deliriously for yon. If you 
 want help — if an3^hing is wrong with you — if you are 
 ill— Mr Calvert will come at once to you. We all 
 miss you and want you back with us — want you back 
 at this time more than ever. Yours affectionately, 
 
 Bernard. 
 
 He read it twice and then looked at the date : 23rd 
 June. 
 
 Out — he must get out. Suddenly this place had 
 become intolerable. The old illusion that by motion 
 he could escape from himself came upon him. He 
 placed money upon the table and rose with a start, 
 upsetting the bottle of wine, whose contents, unnoticed 
 by him, ran frothing and hissing along the clotli and 
 on to the floor. His quick convulsive movements, his 
 wild eyes and white face attracted the notice of tliose 
 near him, and there was a perceptible hush in the
 
 THE POISONER 213 
 
 conversation as he strode down the cafe. But he saw 
 nothing, heard nothing ; he was in that state in which, 
 later on, nothing can ever be brought back to remem- 
 brance. He did not know that, as soon as lie had risen, 
 Miss Merrall's eyes had been upon him, that she also 
 had risen, and was now following him. Her hand was 
 upon his arm by the time he had reached the entrance, 
 out of sight of the people within. 
 
 He turned, and faced and recognised her. 
 
 "Martin," she said, "I am here! Let me help! 
 Tell me what I can do ! " 
 
 He made a gesture of uncontrolled irritability, and 
 laughed. 
 
 " Don't be alarmed," he said, " it's all right." 
 
 He stood before her, unsteady and vacillating. 
 
 "I got your message," she breathed earnestly. 
 "You said it was no use — no use your trying any more. 
 But oh ! Martin, it is. It was my fault — I ought not 
 to have left you — but I thought. . . . Let me stay 
 with you. I will nurse you — I will be more faithful 
 in serving you— you must trust me once more. I 
 promise you I will do everything that can be done — 
 I will " 
 
 He heard every word, and every word smote him 
 with its generosity. He suffered under her words. He 
 wanted to escape. 
 
 "No," he said vaguely, and shook his head. "No ; 
 I'm finished. You've been unbelievably kind but — 
 well, it's all been thrown away. Good-bye — you must 
 excuse me — I've got to go " 
 
 But she was barring his way, and already he felt 
 trapped. In the few seconds he spent in trying to 
 decide how best to evade her he began to feel that if 
 this interview were prolonged, even for another minute, 
 he must go mad. His strained nerv^es cried out upon 
 him because of the torture to which he was submitting 
 them. 
 
 "Olive," he began to plead, "you must let me go. 
 I've got to go, I tell you."
 
 214 THE POISONER 
 
 The attendant at the doorway was staring at them 
 with deep interest. 
 
 "Very well," said Miss Merrall ; "I can see you 
 have. But tell me where I can find you to-morrow." 
 
 She made way for him. He began to move. 
 
 " Oh, to-morrow ? " he laughed hysterically. " Oh — 
 damn to-morrow." 
 
 He had passed her now and was on the cafe's 
 threshold. A moment later he was in the thronged 
 street, but she was at his side. An unoccupied taxi-cab 
 stood at the footpath. 
 
 " Come back Avith me ! " she entreated, and placed 
 her hand upon his arm. " You shall have what whisky 
 you want — to-night, at least. And to-morrow we can 
 talk matters over. Martin, dear Martin, I can't leave 
 you alone." 
 
 Almost he gave in to her, and was about to step into 
 the taxi-cab, the door of which she had quickly opened, 
 when he felt driven away, or, rather, seduced elsewhere. 
 It was not drink only he craved for : he wanted excite- 
 ment, riot, the hot feel of abundant life about him ; 
 he ached to drown himself in the talk, the quick looks 
 and the breathing vitality of others. 
 
 "Don't!" he urged, in a husky, desperate voice. 
 " What must I seem to you ? I'm not coming, Olive. 
 I can't. I'm driven. I'm not myself. Oh, for God's 
 sake, let me go ! " 
 
 He tore himself away from her and walked towards 
 Piccadilly Circus. She followed him and, when at his 
 side, said : 
 
 " Remember, Martin, always — always — I'll help you. 
 Summon me when you want me — I shall ne\er grow 
 tired of helping." 
 
 Did he hear ? Had he understood ? He must have 
 done, for his walk quickened to a run, and she was 
 left alone, puzzled, distraught and — afraid.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 ON his short way from the Cafe Splendide to the 
 Uttle den of drink where alcohol could, by the 
 initiated, be obtained until the small hours of 
 the morning, Martin passed into a semi-conscious state 
 that remained permanent for many hours. It was a 
 curious conaition in which everything, though fantastic 
 and horribly unreal, was also vivid and charged with 
 intense feeling ; a condition in which he found himself 
 saying things he did not mean to say, in which he 
 performed unusual acts with automatic and alarming 
 precision, in which he no longer exercised control over 
 even his smallest deed. He was slipping inch by inch 
 down the wet, slimy hill of insanity. 
 
 Some days later, when he Avas restored to a more 
 normal state of mind, there came back to his memory 
 disconnected scenes in which he saw himself as a strange 
 wandering figure, committed, body and soul, to the 
 drastic power of chance. . . . 
 
 This is what he saw and heard. 
 
 He was in a small well-lit cellar, the atmosphere of 
 which was thick with tobacco-smoke. Standing at 
 the bar with him was a man whom he did not know 
 but who was talking in an easy and friendly maimer. 
 Before Stavart and his new acquaintance were large 
 tumblers of whisky. 
 
 "Oh yes, I know your name well enough," said 
 the man, eyeing Martin cunningly. "Who doesn't? 
 You're famous. I remember listening " 
 
 " Of course I'm famous," Martin incredibly heard 
 himself saying. " I tell you there's no one quite like 
 me living. " Art ! — music ! — it's the greatest force in the 
 world. Think of the tens of thousands of people a 
 composer influences ! And, mind you, they're the 
 best people : the most sensitive people ; the people 
 who make and administer our laws : the people who 
 build up our Empire and keep it secure. I can sway 
 those people. I do sway them. I am necessary to 
 them." 
 
 215
 
 216 THE POISONER 
 
 He was speaking without effort. Words came to 
 him in a golden flood. 
 
 "I'm glad I met you," said his companion; "proud 
 of it ! I've known one or two writers, but I've never 
 met a musical composer before. You see, I'm only a 
 man of business. But I understand art. I've got 
 imagination. . . . But you artists — ^you've got to pay 
 for your pleasure." His manner became inconceivably 
 cunning in its nonchalance. " You can't make money. 
 We men of business make our thousands while you 
 make only hundreds." 
 
 Martin, who was drinking, put down his glass with 
 decision. 
 
 "You're mistaken — quite. I am one of those who 
 do make money — I've got more than I want. Lots of 
 it. It comes easily when you're famous." 
 
 On the far side of Martin's companion was a short, 
 thickly built man, with a heavy, bloated face and glazed 
 eyes, whose unfocused gaze looked into space. A 
 careless observer would have supposed him overcome 
 by the lethargy of drink ; in reality, he was very much 
 alert ; his pricked, open ears absorbed Martin's voice 
 as greedily as a lofty hall absorbs the ticking of a watch. 
 
 "I'm glad to hear you say so," said Martin's com- 
 panion. ' ' I like to hear of men of brains making money. 
 It's right that they should." 
 
 " Not that I care a damn about money : it's nothing 
 to me. My music is everything. Power : that's the 
 secret of life, Mr — er " 
 
 "Unfortunately, Smith." 
 
 "Power's the secret of life, Mr Smith. It's more 
 intoxicating than whisky. To feel that I — me — this 
 brain that is now in communication with yours — to feel 
 that that has the power to project itself, as it were, 
 over the whole world and colour the minds and influence 
 the lives of tens and hundreds of thousands of people 
 I've never seen or even heard of — why, that's greater 
 than being a monarch — it's the life of a god. You 
 see what I mean ? Yes, I daresay you do, but you
 
 THE POISONER 217 
 
 don't understand it. I can — well — music now. You'd 
 hardly believe. . . . People think it's just impalpable 
 sound. Perhaps it is. But it has a definite, a measur- 
 able, effect on the brain cells. You've seen it excite 
 people. Well, it does excite them. Whips them up. 
 And cry ! I tell you, Mr Smith, that I've often seen 
 people crying with pained delight at music like The 
 Dream of Gerontius or even Ein Heldenleben — sensitive 
 people, of course. Do you mean to tell me that that 
 kind of music has no permanent effect on them ? And 
 then there's sensual music — whipping, erotic stuff like 
 the Paris version of the Tannhduser Overture. By 
 God ! Mr Smith, that's like an aphrodisiac. It is an 
 aphrodisiac. To think that it's allowed — funny, isn't 
 it ? And Bach — like a cathedral full of ineffable 
 aspirations — where lamps flicker and never die — ^where 
 clouds of incense roll heavily and yeastily up to the 
 clerestory — where the apparelled priest solemnly per- 
 forms his mysterious rites — where the secrets of man- 
 kind are told, told and forgiven. . . . And when I think 
 of the gaiety with which so much music is saturated — 
 when I think — ■ — " He looked round him agitatedly, as 
 though he had forgotten something of terrible import- 
 ance. " More whisky, please, miss," he shouted : 
 " two double doubles ! " And then he bent towards 
 his companion. " Is that gentleman your friend ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 Smith turned to the man next to him, gave him a 
 secret, knowing look of approaching triumph, and 
 turned round again. 
 
 " No : I don't know who he is," he said. 
 
 " Well, do you mind if he joins us ? " 
 
 Martin placed himself between the two men and 
 touched the stranger on the shoulder. 
 
 " Excuse me, sir," he said, " will you join us ? We 
 are talking of art — of music." 
 
 "You are very kind," said the stranger. "Forgive 
 me, but I've been listening to you. You have been 
 saying things that awoke memories — things that I
 
 218 THE POISONER 
 
 thought I had forgotten have been coming back to me 
 — things that I thought were dead." 
 
 His speech tapered off into a silence that suggested 
 his feehngs had been deeply stirred. 
 
 " Are you also an artist ? " asked Stavart. 
 
 " I was once, or thought I was. I have had my 
 dreams, but now I have awakened — to this ! I am 
 one of life's failures." 
 
 With an awkward gesture he indicated the bar, the 
 drinks, the dismal sordidness before them. He looked 
 into Stavart's hot, mad eyes with sudden curiosity ; 
 he saw there the astonishing, bright and abundant 
 confidence and arrogance of megalomania. He winced. 
 
 " Failure ? " echoed Stavart. " Oh, worldly failure ! 
 But so long as the soul is triumphant ! That is the 
 great thing. The ' head bloody but unbowed ' — the 
 soul for ever winging its way ! " He brooded for a 
 few moments while his brain seemed to move, to twist 
 and turn upon itself, beneath his skull. Almost he 
 felt as though the self that he knew were about to 
 depart, that its lips were formed to speak the word 
 " Farewell ! " He could have cried out with joy that 
 the evil spirit within him was being cast out. He drank 
 deeply, poisonously. 
 
 "Success lies within," he said earnestly. "Popu- 
 larity, fame, position, riches — what do they matter? 
 Little enough. If the world does not react favourably 
 to your art, it is the world that fails, not j^ou. The 
 soul can overcome everything. Things are what we 
 believe them to be." 
 
 "You talk so well, sir," said the stranger, "that — 
 forgive me, I ask it with all deference — ^I should be 
 much indebted if you would disclose your name to 
 me." 
 
 "Certainly. Why not? My name is Stavart — 
 Martin Stavart." 
 
 The stranger raised his hat with admirably assumed 
 deference. 
 
 "I should like," said he, "if so great an artist as
 
 THE POISONER 219 
 
 yourself can bring himself to listen to the sorrows of 
 one in obscurity, to tell you something of myself." 
 
 Stavart moved impatiently. His head seemed burst- 
 ing with magnificent words that must at once be 
 uttered, but he restrained himself. 
 
 "Fifteen years ago," began the stranger, "I had a 
 certain position in London as a painter. I studied 
 with Orpen. I was, above all things, a colourist. 
 There is a small canvas of mine in the Luxembourg. 
 There is " 
 
 But already Stavart had ceased to listen. The 
 pleasant but rather husky voice droned on, and it came 
 to Stavart's ears from afar. He was thick in golden 
 dreams. In those dreams he ruled the world, ruled it 
 beneficently but with absolute power. In his brain was 
 stored all the wisdom of the ages, all the knowledge 
 that humanity, with its ardent, greedy curiosity, had 
 amassed. His were the Eleusinian mysteries, the 
 Dionysian ecstasies ; the secrets of Egypt were his, 
 the learning of Alexandria ; he had walked the streets 
 of Babylon and worshipped the mild, dusky God whom 
 Pilate crucified ; in farthest Ind had he travelled and 
 had sweated in the sun of the islands of the south ; 
 he had lived with Ab61ard in Pai'is, in Rome with Nero ; 
 at his feet lay the cold magnificence of the frozen seas. 
 This vast learning, this rich experience, gave him power ; 
 almost, if he willed it so, could the inextinguishable 
 sun be extinguished. His senses were fused in an 
 orgasm of self-glorification. The very foundations 
 of his intellect were tottering to their fall. 
 
 The stranger who was talking at Stavart's side 
 watched him closely, intently. He guessed, he knew 
 that his voice was unheard, but he went on with his 
 story, keeping his voice at one monotonous level. He 
 noted the dilation of Stavart's eyes, and it was with 
 a shock that he saw the composer's lips begin to move 
 rapidly but soundlessly. The stranger stopped speak- 
 ing and waited for something to happen. Then Stavart's 
 voice came — strong and rhythmic.
 
 220 THE POISONER 
 
 "To create!" he cried. "We who can do that are 
 god-hke. We are separated from the rest of humanity 
 — above them. They are different creatures, a lower 
 order of creature. Out of nothing we create power. 
 Open the pages of Virgil, of Homer, of Shakespeare, 
 and at once you are seized by strong arms — strong arms 
 stretch out to you and drag you forward, lift you up 
 and show you the dazzling magnificence of the very 
 spirit of God ! Out of nothing, I tell you. It is strange 
 that those pages, so full of glory, so turbulent with life, 
 so hot with passion, do not burst into flame. They 
 contain the immediate essence of life. Listen while 
 I tell you something. Those who know me well never 
 guess that I am what I am : a god above them : a 
 god above kings and emperors. Even the Almighty 
 Himself has done little more than I can do. He made 
 the world. But I also can make worlds — worlds that 
 no one can see and yet which have an undying existence. 
 No one can destroy the things I make. No wonder that 
 we artists are not understood. The world deals with 
 us mockingly, hatefully ; few of us there are who escape 
 a slow crucifixion. We are tortured not from malice, 
 but from ignorance. They do not know ; they cannot 
 understand." 
 
 The ecstasy, so like an attack of petit mal, passed, and 
 he turned to his companions stupidly and wonderingly. 
 
 "How finely you talk!" exclaimed the stranger. 
 " If only I had something of your spirit. You say 
 rightly that we ordinary people do not understand. It 
 is true : we don't. Yet at moments I have dimly 
 seen. . . ." He gave Stavart a cautious, appraising 
 look. " Mr Stavart, may I talk to you frankly, 
 openly ? " 
 
 " Do — of course. But can't we sit down somewhere ? 
 Suddenly I feel dreadfully tired." 
 
 They moved over to a small table in a corner of the 
 room, carrying their drinks with them, Martin's 
 customary pallor had changed to the colour of ashes. 
 His sensation of god-like power was rapidly being
 
 THE POISONER 221 
 
 drained away by a feeling of slight physical nausea. 
 He sat down next to the stranger and turned upon him 
 his glittering eyes. 
 
 '' I feel," the stranger began, in a soft, persuasive 
 voice, "I feel that you may be willing to help me, for 
 within me also is some of the divine fire. I want to 
 lift myself out of — out of this!" Again his gesture 
 indicated their sordid surroundings. "You said just 
 now that money meant little or nothing to you. To 
 me, Mr Stavart, at this moment it means everything. 
 Money would save me." 
 
 " Then it shall save you," said Martin, his boastful 
 mood returning as soon as he saw an opportunity of 
 proving that he scorned what other men valued. ' ' How 
 much do you want ? " 
 
 Suddenly Mr Smith exhibited signs of discomfort. 
 
 " Excuse me," he said ; " you wish to talk privately. 
 I will go." 
 
 Giving the stranger a quick, significant look, he rose 
 and walked over to the bar. 
 
 " How much do you want ? " Martin asked again. 
 
 " It is a big sum. And why, after all, should you 
 lend moneyto me, a complete stranger ? " 
 
 "I have told you that if money can save you, it 
 shall." 
 
 He spoke sincerely. His corrosive vanity made hini 
 glad of this moment. To translate his feeling of power 
 into acts would intensify that power ; it would hold it 
 up before his eyes as a real substantial thing. His 
 whole being softened in its desire to feed and enrich 
 his insane self-glory. 
 
 " Well," the stranger began, and hesitated. With an 
 effort he phuiged his gaze into Stavart's eyes, and this 
 time he did not wince as he beheld that bright and 
 abundant arrogance. "Would fifty pounds . . . ? " 
 
 The amount was larger than Stavart had dared to 
 hope. 
 
 "Fifty pounds? Why, of course. But I have no 
 cheque-book — but that doesn't matter. I can write
 
 222 THE POISONER 
 
 you out a cheque on a piece of paper. Let's go to the 
 bar — they'll give us pen and ink." 
 
 Three minutes later he had handed " Mr Eustace 
 Netherby " a cheque for fifty poimds. Mr Smith 
 rejoined them and more drinks were ordered. 
 
 • ••••••• 
 
 His eyes opened to almost complete darkness, but 
 he was not yet awake. There was an oppression about 
 his heart; it was as though a hard, cold hand had found 
 its way beneath his ribs, and was squeezing his heart. 
 A terrible oppression that, at last, woke him with a 
 start and made him turn on to his back groaning. 
 He threw out his arms wildly. He was awake ; he 
 remembered. If only— if only he could die — now ! 
 If only he could cease to be and forget ! He was spent 
 utterly. It was as though every organ of his body was 
 so outworn that it could no longer function. 
 
 His eyes, bared to the darkness, looked about him 
 indifferently. He did not know where he was — did 
 not care. A naked tiny gas-jet stood poised in the air 
 like a puny threat. As time passed it pointed out 
 things. He saw the faint shine of glass. Yes : he 
 was in last night's cellar. As well there as anywhere : 
 what did it matter ? They had taken his boots off and 
 loosened his collar. ... A whine like that of an ill- 
 treated dog escaped him. It was crushed out of him. 
 And then impressions and memories began to crowd 
 disorderedly upon him. His skin burned. His feet were 
 like fire. The gas jet mocked ; it became a strident 
 complaint. The folly of that fifty -pound cheque ; 
 what had led up to it ? . . . With the faint greyness 
 of dawn his oppression increased. He closed his eyes 
 and groaned. He tried to rise from the bench on which 
 he lay, but though he willed powerfully, his body would 
 not move. He was as helpless as though bound by 
 chains. . . . The interior of the bar crept out of the 
 darkness. He examined everything carefully, gazing 
 at the spittoons, the stools, the glasses on the shelves, 
 the pieces of cake under the glass covers on the bar,
 
 THE POISONER 223 
 
 the prints upon the walls, as though committing them 
 all to memory. His brain felt like a hot oven. His 
 saliva-less mouth seemed cracked with heat. 
 
 At all costs he must rise and drink. Dimly he was 
 conscious that he was only half-conscious. His will 
 once more began to work. With a sudden movement 
 that surprised him, he half rolled, half tmnbled, off the 
 long seat on which he had been lying all night. Instinct 
 bade him move warily, silentlj'^ ; cunning told him to 
 turn on the gas only half-way. There was nothing to 
 prevent him satisfying his desire, for plenty of whisky 
 had been decanted, and, holding a large tmnbler beneath 
 the little tap at the bottom of the great glass bowl, he 
 waited until it was three-quarters full. He drank, 
 and then shivered with nausea. But no relief came. 
 He drank again, emptying the tumbler to the last drop ; 
 then waited, his arms stretched out before him, his 
 hands gripping the edge of the bar — waited intermin- 
 ably, but nothing happened. The sensation of mental 
 dissolution increased rather than diminished ; the 
 strong drink was too weak to compel reaction from his 
 alcohol-saturated body. Panic attacked him like a 
 lion, and he cowered miserably, sinking to his knees 
 on the floor. Then a terrible convulsion shook his body, 
 and out of his mouth streamed the liquor he had just 
 consiuned. He retched continuously as he held on to 
 the foot-rail that ran along the full length of the bar. 
 He prayed for death. Something within him— Avhat 
 was it ? — fluttered and went, and came back and went 
 again rapidly, without cessation. For a second he 
 was conscious — for another second his mind was obliter- 
 ated ; then again sudden consciousness, and once more 
 obliteration. With a groan he sank full-length on to 
 the floor, and there came to him what was temporarily 
 as desirable a thing as death. 
 
 He was alone in an automatic lift. It ascended 
 slowly, and when, suddenly and with a jerk, it stopped 
 at the top story, Stavart had the uncanny and horrible
 
 224 THE POISONER 
 
 feeling that the machinery was endowed with intelli- 
 gence. "Here I have brought you," it seemed to say, 
 " and now get out ! " He fumbled at the door, opened 
 it, and stepped out on to the landing. He held Molly's 
 card in his hand. Her nmnber was 27. 
 
 He rang her bell. No one came to open to him. 
 But in him both observation and thought were dead, 
 and he stood there, morose and forgetful, having no 
 memory of what had brought him thither. His chin 
 was sunk upon his breast, and his eyes, vacant and 
 unseeing, stared glassily. From time to time his 
 face worked convulsively ; his teeth chattered ; his legs 
 shook. 
 
 For ten minutes or so he stood, unconscious of 
 time or place. Then, glimmeringly, consciousness re- 
 turned, and, with consciousness, anger. He knocked 
 compellingly upon the door and called out hoarsely. 
 He felt it infamous that he should be kept waiting. 
 At last the door opened and Molly, rosy and fresh, 
 appeared in her dressing-gown. At sight of Stavart, 
 her face clouded, and when, without a word and with a 
 look of sulky ownership, he stepped forward as though 
 to enter, she put out a restraining hand. 
 
 "No!" she exclaimed sharply. "I don't want 
 you in here." 
 
 " You've damned well got to have me ! " 
 
 With her eyes fixed on his, she called out : 
 
 " Dick ! Come here, quick ! " 
 
 Stavart took her by the wrist, pulled her aside, and 
 — with jerky movements like a big doll worked by 
 electricity — strode into the narrow hall. An open 
 door on his right disclosed a bedroom. From the bed 
 a big, blond, good-natured-looking fellow was lazily 
 crawling. 
 
 " Hello ! " he exclaimed ; " what's this ? " 
 
 "Come into the sitting-room," said Molly, and, as 
 she spoke, she took Stavart by the arm and led him 
 to the end of the passage. Tlic two men and the 
 woman entered a small room darkened by drawn
 
 THE POISONER 225 
 
 blinds. With haste and excitement she pulled the 
 blinds up ; the sun streamed in and caught a big bowl 
 of roses on the table ; the blood-red flowers glowed like 
 steady flames. 
 
 "Sit down ! " said Veneron kindly. 
 
 Stavart collapsed into a low^ arm-chair. 
 
 " Roses ! " he said. " How beautiful ! " 
 
 "He's drunk ! " explained Molly. 
 
 Veneron examined him closely, noting the vacant 
 eyes, the tightly closed lips, the trembling hands, 
 the look of hunted desperation on the fine, marred 
 face. 
 
 " What's the matter, sonny ? " he asked. 
 
 " Take me away," muttered Stavart ; " put me away 
 somewhere." 
 
 " Right you are ! We'll take care of you." 
 
 He sat down by Stavart's side, and put his hand 
 comfortingly on the other's ami. 
 
 "We're friends," he said. "Understand? Well, 
 listen. I'm going to telepl one for a doctor. You 
 want a day or two in bed. Is that all right ? " 
 
 " Give me a drink ! Yes, anything's all right ! I'm 
 finished ! " 
 
 "There's a bottle of your champagne left," said 
 Molly ; "let him have that. It's better for him than 
 whisky. I'll get it." 
 
 She was back again in a minute, but in the meantime 
 Stavart had sunk into a state of apathy. Veneron held 
 a gl&ss of champagne to his lips, but those hot, dry lips 
 did not move. All the skin of his face was dry and hot, 
 and his body, huddled clumsily, suggested brittleness. 
 He looked debased, inhuman. Molly, regarding him, 
 shuddered. 
 
 " What is the matter with him ? " she asked ; "he 
 seemed all right yesterday." 
 
 " He's on the very edge." 
 
 " Of what ? " 
 
 " Insanity, I should think. Or deliriiun tremens. 
 It's hard luck on you that he should turn up here." 
 p
 
 226 THE POISONER 
 
 He looked at her narrowly, wondering if she would 
 come out of this test all right. 
 
 " Oh, I'm glad ! " she said. " I like him. But what 
 are we to do ? " 
 
 For answer, Veneron unhooked the telephone receiver 
 from the wall and, in a minute, was in communication 
 with his own doctor. . . . 
 
 " It's all right," said he to Molly. " They are sending 
 an ambulance for him. My own medical man — Sprang 
 — will be here in half-an-hour. You'd better go into 
 the other room and leave me here with him — or, better 
 still : make some tea, dear. As strong as you like." 
 
 As he spoke Stavart stirred uneasily and sat upright. 
 His movements were like a series of convulsions. More 
 than ever he suggested a doll — a doll that was hollow, 
 a doll made of matchwood, a doll ^\ith faculties 
 hideously co-ordinated, a doll with a memory that, 
 once active, was now lost. 
 
 He pointed a stiff hand in front of him. 
 
 "Out of it ! " he muttered angrily. "Out of it, I 
 say ! " He turned to Veneron imperiously. "You're 
 in it, too, / know — damned conspiracy ! Cut them off ! 
 — saw them off ! — what the hell does it matter ? " He 
 knotted the fingers of one hand into those of the other, 
 and with a jerk tried to wrench them from their sockets. 
 " Hell ! In God's name, hell, I say ! You — you — 
 you ivould — ^I know you would — well, quick with it ! " 
 
 He rose, stood still, looked about him, and began 
 to smile with devilish cunning. Then his gaze smote 
 Veneron in the eyes : a look of blue steel, piercing, hot. 
 
 "I cu-could smu-smash you!" he said — and leered. 
 
 "Yes — I daresay. I daresay you could. But is it 
 worth while ? " 
 
 Stavart took a step forward— opened his mouth and 
 made a curious baflflcd sound. Suddenly his lips 
 became red with blood, and from his open mouth blood 
 flowed appallingly. Even as Veneron moved forward 
 to his assistance, it came to his mind how strange it 
 was that even a drop of blood should come from this
 
 THE POISONER 227 
 
 doll-like creature. He put his arms about Stavart and 
 supported him ; then, pulling him slowly backwards, 
 he laid him gently on the carpet. In a minute he had 
 loosened the sick man's collar, had run to the door and 
 locked it, and had again taken the telephone receiver 
 from the wall.
 
 BOOK III 
 
 Decipimur votis et tempore fallimur et mors deride t 
 curas. Afixia vita fiihil.
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 AFTER a wonderful October of lambent sunshine 
 and soft, peaceful nights, rain came in late 
 November, and, after the rain, a night or two 
 of frost. The last golden hours went, and the wind- 
 twisted trees at Narrow End said farewell to their 
 departing leaves. The taste of salt was more than 
 ever present in the wind as it drove the sea up the 
 estuary. Though the air was warm, it was swift and 
 exhilarating. 
 
 The best of the year was dead, yet there was a quiet 
 happiness in that square old house whose master had 
 died but a few short months before. Life no longer 
 seemed to menace any of its occupants ; the past was 
 gone and, if not forgotten, was at least ignored. If, at 
 times, Monica gazed at her husband wistfully, it was 
 because Martin to her was perhaps more a son than 
 a husband. She was at peace when at night she bared 
 her throat and placed Martin's head upon her naked 
 breasts, throwing her arms about him hungrily, it may 
 be, but more in protection than because of desire. 
 And, indeed, during his weeks of convalescence, he had 
 needed that protection. Strange it was to him that 
 she, so young and so unschooled in love, and so gentle, 
 should be to him as a rock in the tumbled, angry sea 
 of life. Her spirit healed his day by day and night by 
 night. Often he woke troubled, and though he did 
 not move or sigh, she at that instant was also awake ; 
 her arms, warm under the bedclothes, would steal about 
 him and bring consolation. He moved nearer to her 
 for protection. Then, almost at once, sleep would 
 come again, and in the morning life was more desirable 
 than it had been the day before. Nni often in these 
 wakeful moments did they speak, but sometimes they 
 would murmur together ; they, alone in the world, 
 would murmur together, feeling safe ; murmur together 
 in deepest love, a delicious aching contentment in their 
 hearts, 
 
 " You, Monica : it is you ! " 
 
 " And you, Martin. Just you and I." 
 
 231
 
 232 THE POISONER 
 
 " Two of us. If only we could be one — merged 
 indissolubly." 
 
 "You feel that also?" 
 
 " Always. If I were ashes and you were ashes — sen- 
 tient, apprehending — and were mingled together " 
 
 " Yes — or the two of us one steady flame." 
 
 "My blood in your blood, your tissues woven 
 with mine : I bone of your bone, you flesh of my 
 flesh ! ' 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 "Little one ! " she muniiured, smiling in the dark- 
 ness. " You are my little one. You must sleep." 
 
 "Put your hand on my heart. . . . There! It is 
 like music." 
 
 His spirit by day also was healed. He did no work. 
 He had lost all desire for mental striving, and it was 
 well that he had, for Dr Foster had warned both Mrs 
 Bassett and Monica against permitting Martin to put 
 any undue strain upon his mind. Yet he was happy. 
 Never for a moment did he fret because ambition 
 slumbered or because he was not visited by the 
 inclination to compose. He lived for the hour. He 
 ate and slept and read and walked. Each week- 
 end Bernard returned home from Manchester where, 
 at Victoria University, he was studying medicine. 
 The boy was clever, finely tempered ; a cheerful 
 companion : yet, though cheerful, a little watchful. 
 He admired and was devoted to Martin ; yet he 
 watched him. 
 
 Early in December a clear day came, and already 
 before breakfast was over the sun was in the dining- 
 room. 
 
 " Really," said Mrs Bassett, who was at the toast and 
 marmalade stage, " really, you two children ought to go 
 for a long walk. Especially as your friend's coming." 
 
 Martin smiled. 
 
 "Your friend ? " he asked Monica. 
 
 " No," said Mrs Bassett. " Mr — what is his name ? 
 — from Preston."
 
 THE POISONER 233 
 
 " Oh, Jimmy Calvert. I'd forgotten all about him." 
 He gave Monica a quick, sly look. " But, really, Aunt, 
 what is the connection between Calvert coming this 
 evening and our going a walk this morning ? " 
 
 "I'll do the shopping. There's no wind. Besides, 
 the Vicaress." 
 
 "Oh, I see," said Martin, who did not see. "That 
 decides it. So we'll walk, eh, Monica? The tide's 
 out ; we might go along the sands f s far as the windmill, 
 or even past it." 
 
 Mrs Bassett rose and, looking like a warm and 
 extremely well-fed hen, left the room. 
 
 Ten minutes later, husband and wife set out on their 
 walk, going down to the sands at the right of Cardigan 
 House School, where the promenade ends. The wet, 
 tarnished sand was the colour of mavrodaphne, and 
 already the sun had warmed it so that it gave off its 
 tight, pungent odour The sea, just visible, lay like 
 a dark band against the blue horizon ; the river crawled 
 over its muddy bottom half-a-mile away. 
 
 As so often happened when with Monica in the freedom 
 of open spaces, Martin experienced an awkwardness, 
 a restraint, that set up a definite barrier between them. 
 There was so much about her that he could not under- 
 stand. At times he was tempted to believe that she 
 was all-wise, that by intuition as well as by observation 
 she knew all the essentials of his nature. He wished 
 she did know those essentials and, knowing them, still 
 loved him. But, on one or two occasions, he had in 
 conversation found her bewildered, utterly at sea, 
 concerning himself, and he had drawn back afraid, 
 drawn back just in time, as he expressed it to himself, 
 to save him from putting his head into a noose. He 
 had almost betrayed himself. For this reason he had 
 to step warily when, as at present, his soul was adrift 
 from the safe anchorage of home. Strange what 
 security he found in the familiarities of furniture ! 
 Extraordinary what comfort was to be obtained from 
 an accustomed atmosphere ! Here, on the wide beach,
 
 234 THE POISONER 
 
 there was nothing to separate hini from her except — 
 themselves. Space itself seemed to interdict the 
 trivialities of ordinary intercourse and to invite stark 
 honesties. 
 
 They walked for some time in silence until Monica, 
 suddenly realizing that not a word had been spoken 
 since they had left Narrow End, glanced at him in- 
 quiringly. He felt her look and, on the instant, turned 
 his face awa3\ But she had caught him — caught him 
 in a mood of rapt self-absorption. 
 
 "Tell me," she said gently, "tell me what you were 
 thinking of." 
 
 "I was playing the piano," he answered. 
 
 " Do you often do that ? — in thought, I mean." 
 
 "No, I don't think I do. I was improvising; but 
 it wasn't very happy music. By the way, has Foster 
 ever said anything to you about my not playing the 
 piano ? " 
 
 " Nothing, except that when you begin to play again 
 it will show that you are almost quite well once more. 
 Do you want to play ? " 
 
 " I think I do. I felt like it Just then. Last week, 
 when you and Aunt were out, I struck a few chords — 
 just to see. They hurt. Something in me felt too 
 bruised to listen. But that was last week." 
 
 "Well, begin just when you want to. But don't 
 force it. You'll come back again. I mean you'll be 
 your old self once more ; there's plenty of time." 
 
 His old self ! How little — yet how much — she knew ! 
 
 "I've changed," he said. "I don't care any more 
 for all that." 
 
 She did not understand him, but after a moment she 
 nodded, and said : 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 But her tone was unconvinced. 
 
 " You don't think I have changed ? " 
 
 She blushed quickly and caught at his arm, which for 
 a moment she pressed gently. 
 
 "Oh yes, I do. You know, Martin, you are — what
 
 THE POISONER 235 
 
 is the word ? — you are — simpler ! Or perhaps it is 
 that I understand you better." 
 
 " Docs one person ever understand another ? " 
 
 " Perhaps not. I daresay you're right." 
 
 She was a httle at sea. 
 
 "When I said I had changed," he exphiined, "I 
 meant that I've lost all my ambition — lost it perman- 
 ently. I never look forward to the day when I shall 
 be able to work again. Fame, position, money — the 
 power of those things over me is dead. And I'm 
 glad." 
 
 " If you're glad, then I'm glad too." 
 
 No : she didn't understand him : never even guessed 
 that there was anything remaining to be understood. 
 It was well. Or, at all events, it did not matter. . . . 
 Yet, again, perhaps she did know, did understand. But 
 how much did he himself know ? Since his return to 
 Narrow End from London last October, Monica had 
 taken the place of his art, his ambition : she had been 
 the sole object of his life ; his love for her had been the 
 sole object of his living : his almost destructive energy 
 had been quenched in his passion. Loving was creating. 
 Sex was loveliness : a loveliness that had no death. 
 He did not believe that satiety could ever overtake him. 
 It was impossible that he could ever empty himself of 
 his passion. His hunger was of the soul as well as of 
 the body. He remembered their oft-repeated con- 
 versations whispered when their bodies lay touching 
 in the darkness. 
 
 " Little Monica, it is you ! " 
 
 " And you, Martin. Just you and I." 
 
 " Two of us. Always two ! If only we could be 
 one — mingled together like water and wine ! Two souls 
 in one body, Monica ! . . . No, no : we can never 
 mingle ! " 
 
 That was always his cry. Love was an ache, an 
 aspiration, an endeavour. Nothing in itself. Just 
 a prelude — a prelude to what ? To rebirth ? Yes ; 
 perhaps love was only a cunning, low trick of Nature —
 
 236 THE POISONER 
 
 a deception by means of which the next generation 
 might be bom — one of the cogs in the machinery of 
 inexorable law. 
 
 He looked at her now as sometimes he gazed at her 
 in the dark. How far away they were each from the 
 other, in spite of their common passion ! In spite of 
 their passion ! — or because of it ? Physical love was, 
 after all, a struggle, a contest : it had its moments that 
 were more like hatred than love. The man gave : 
 the man destroyed himself. He hurled himself against 
 loveliness for his own bruising and long hurt. Did the 
 soul, perchance, resent the acts of the body and begin 
 a secret hate for the soul of the woman ? . . . He was 
 bound to Monica by will, by desire, by hope. Yet will, 
 hope and desire availed nothing. He and she were 
 separated by infinity and by eternity. 
 
 Almost he was angry with her because she un- 
 willingly eluded him. There were moments when, 
 Monica clasped in his arms, he looked long and long 
 into her eyes and felt, not that he and she were one but 
 that they were strangers. Love like this was delicious 
 pain. In his soul a mocking laugh greeted love's 
 consummation. . . . 
 
 They passed the windmill without noticing it. The 
 small wind turned its sails slowly, slowly. They 
 reached a point where the river was but a mile from 
 bank to bank ; the sun glorified the black water as it 
 slipped along the greasy mud : glorified the water and 
 made it a sham. For a quick moment it seemed to 
 Martin like a bedizened harlot. He was frightened at 
 the thought. Had his old morbidity crept im wittingly 
 upon him ? Was his declaration that he was " changed " 
 merely a boast ? His hand sought Monica's and clasped 
 it so tightly that she bit her lip in pain. 
 
 " What is it, little one ? " she asked. 
 
 " Little Monica, it is you ! " 
 
 " Yes, Martin. Just you and I." 
 
 His grip relaxed. He was no longer afraid.
 
 THE POISONER 237 
 
 Calvert arrived that evening rather earlier than he 
 was expected. During the last two months — before 
 that, even — he had become a trusted friend of the 
 household at Narrow End. In the crises of last sunmier 
 he had come unfaihngly to Monica's help : it was he 
 who, with Bernard's assistance, had made all the 
 arrangements for Symons' burial : it was his quick 
 insight that had anticipated Monica's breakdown, and 
 his prompt action that had averted its more serious 
 consequences : and it was he who had found Martin in 
 London and, after the latter's two months' illness in a 
 private nursing-home, had restored him to his friends. 
 Mrs Bassett, in her easy, comfortable way, had soon 
 become accustomed to Calvert's seemingly casual 
 comings and goings. But it was Monica, and Monica 
 only, who understood and fully appreciated the rich 
 nobiUty and deep simplicity of his nature. 
 
 During all the summer and autumn she had felt that 
 she was in a world and among people far beyond her 
 understanding. One event after another had struck 
 her apprehensive senses and numbed her into an 
 agonised, protesting bewilderment. Her girlish religion, 
 which consisted mainly of an implicit faith in an all- 
 merciful and ever-watchful Father, afforded her no 
 help when she witnessed her little, big world all broken 
 and devastated. Calvert in her eyes soon usurped the 
 place of God. He, at all events, was on her side. He 
 was there when she wanted him ; he did not wait for 
 her burden to be cast upon his shoulders ; by act rather 
 than by word he proved to her that he also hated this 
 world that bludgeoned the innocent and sacrificed the 
 meek. 
 
 On this December evening he was full of talk of a 
 young pupil of his at Ferringford to whom, early in the 
 afternoon, he had been giving a lesson. As they sat 
 in the drawuig-room after dinner, he insisted that he 
 had discovered a genius. Martin was ironically 
 sceptical. 
 
 "There's nothing so deluding as this talent for
 
 238 THE POISONER 
 
 music," he said. " Just recollect the men at Leipzig — 
 I thought that every second fellow I met was a genius. 
 Yet where are they now? What are they doing? 
 Do we ever hear a single word about them ? " 
 
 " True," replied Calvert. " I know what you mean. 
 I remember the time when I was convinced that I, also, 
 had genius : I was as certain of that as I was of my 
 existence. But, as a matter of fact, I was merely 
 drunk with the warm emotions of puberty. But this 
 pupil of mine's different. He can do anything, Martin. 
 More than that, he's got character ; he's a personality. 
 Mind you, I'm no longer deceived by mere cleverness — 
 I'm sick of it. We're all clever these days. But clever- 
 ness is the last thing you notice in young Watson, 
 though he's got it in abundance." 
 
 "Yes, I'm sure," said Mrs Bassett, who looked up 
 from her tatting and smiled at Calvert. 
 
 " What is genius ? " asked Monica. 
 
 Calvert's slit-like eyes disappeared in a smile, and he 
 tugged at his beard. 
 
 '' I don't know. Ask Martin— he's got plenty." 
 
 " Of course," said Mrs Bassett, " with all those scales 
 and things. But we never hear them now." 
 
 " You've not begun to play yet ? " asked Calvert. 
 
 " No, but I've been feeling rather like it lately. But, 
 talking about genius — well, it always seems to me a most 
 unhappy quality to possess. Nearly all men of genius 
 are profoundly wretched ; their lives end in tragedy. 
 It's an abnormality — a hideous thing in radiant cloth- 
 ing. The attitude of the world — of the intellectual 
 world — towards geniuses is horribly cruel. We all — 
 you as well, Jimmy — are delighted when we hear of a 
 new poet, a new composer, and so on ; we think of all 
 the pleasure we're going to get out of him and his 
 suffering. The life of a man of genius is one long 
 crucifixion, and not one of us cares a hang about his 
 torture so long as he pours at our feet all the beauty he 
 has to give." 
 
 Monica was looking at her husband with apprehen-
 
 THE POISONER 239 
 
 sive eyes. His voice, pitched rather low, was im- 
 perfectly under control. Calvert made a gesture of 
 amused acquiescence. 
 
 "There's something in what you say," he agreed, 
 " but not very much. The genius has many compensa- 
 tions. If his suffering is greater than the ordinary 
 man's, his delights are divine. Not that I envy him : 
 I don't. I'm middle-aged and reconciled. But if I 
 were fifteen years younger, I'd give an}i:hing — any- 
 thing ! — to possess just a spark of that fire. A spark 
 like yours, Martin." 
 
 Martin moved uneasily. 
 
 "My spark's gone out, thank God!" he said. "I 
 ask for nothing except to be the most ordinary of 
 
 men." 
 
 "Your very desire to be ordinary proves to me how 
 extraordinary you really are," pui'sued Calvert. " No, 
 Martin, you've got work to do ; and when you are 
 strong again, you will do it." 
 
 Calvert could not but notice the look of eagerness in 
 his friend's eyes. 
 
 " Yes ? You may be right." 
 
 " But Martin is not to work — yet. Not until he 
 wants to," said Monica, curbing her anxiety. 
 
 Mrs Bassett did not look up, but her firm, gentle 
 voice came from the corner where she was sitting under 
 the standard lamp. 
 
 " Not until he feels he can't help working," she said. 
 
 Martin laughed self-consciousl3^ 
 
 "I feel frightfully important," he said, "at being 
 discussed like this. So far from my beginning to work, 
 I've not even heard any music for months and months. 
 Play something, Jimmy. I know ! — I've got John 
 Ireland's Pianoforte Sonata upstairs. Will you have a 
 shot at it ? " 
 
 Calvert glanced at Monica. She nodded almost 
 imperceptibly. 
 
 " I'd love to ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 Martin left the room with some show of excitement.
 
 240 THE POISONER 
 
 He was followed almost immediately by Mrs Bassett, 
 who had suddenly recollected a neglected household 
 duty. 
 
 Monica crossed the room and sat down close to 
 Calvert. 
 
 " Is it wise ? " she asked, in a low voice. 
 
 " To play for him ? " 
 
 "Yes — and to talk as you have been talking. I'm 
 afraid you've roused him." 
 
 "But he's well again now — as fit as I am. 
 Don't you think this prolonged idleness is bad for 
 him ? " 
 
 " But he's so happy ! And I — I dread a change. 
 Besides, Dr Foster wants him to rest until he feels an 
 overpowering desire to work. I really think he ought 
 to be left to drift. Just drift until, perhaps some 
 morning, he goes to his piano quite naturally, without 
 being spurred on by us." 
 
 "Yes. I see," said Calvert gently. "But haven't 
 you noticed that he's been losing faith in himself — 
 losing faith in his power to do good work ? That's 
 bad : I'm sure it is. Believe me, Mrs Stavart, there's 
 no stimulus in the whole world like work — and no 
 anodyne like it, either. Besides, I've said very little. 
 I've simply hinted that he still has a future." 
 
 She clasped her hands tightly on her knee. 
 
 "Do forgive me!" she said. "Perhaps you know 
 best. But I've often thought that he must ass ciate 
 his work with his — his illness — with that dreadful time 
 in London. I feel that he does associate them — that 
 as soon as he thinks of his music he begins to be excited, 
 excited and afraid." 
 
 Calvert looked at her in dismay. 
 
 "Surely you are wrong!" he urged. "I'm afraid 
 that you, living with him every hour of the day, watch- 
 ing him, you know " 
 
 The door opened, and Martin entered. He opened 
 the Sonata and placed it on the music-stand of the 
 piano.
 
 THE POISONER 241 
 
 " Come along, Jimmy ! " he exclaimed, his blue eyes 
 shining like steel in moonlight. " It's beastly dillicult 
 — but what's that to you ? It's quite like old 
 times." 
 
 Calvert seated himself at the piano, and Martin 
 took a chair by his side. The remote beauty of tliat 
 music began to envelop him. To Martin beauty always 
 meant intoxication, and though Ireland's music is 
 severe and the style of it a little crabbed, it is haunted 
 by inner ecstasies. Calvert made that beauty a part 
 of himself and, in doing so, mastered it. But it was 
 different with Martin. He was beautv's victim. Its 
 swift shaft pierced and transfixed him. It changed his 
 entire world. Once again that sense of illimitable 
 power came to him, that sure knowledge that the world, 
 life, is nothing but what we deem it, that externalities 
 are deceptions, that absolute truth lies in one's own 
 soul. Drunk he was with beauty as he sat with his 
 eyes moving along the printed page, anticipating each 
 exquisite revelation before it sounded upon the air. 
 What his eyes saw approaching, his ears gave him : 
 two senses were glutted. . . . 
 
 "Some lad, this ! " exclaimed Calvert, when he had 
 finished the long, difficult music. 
 
 Monica had approached the piano and taken one of 
 Martin's hands in hers. He made no sign that he was 
 conscious of her act. 
 
 "Wonderful!" he exclaimed excitedly. "Why, 
 do you know, Jimmy, that I'd quite forgotten Avhat 
 music was like ! And to think I've lost two whole 
 months doing nothing ! I'm going to begin to-morrow. 
 I'll play the Beethoven Sonatas riglit through— and 
 a whole heap of Schumann — and then I'll gorge myself 
 on those French Johnnies — why, Monica, what's the 
 matter ? " 
 
 He drew a pace apart from her and looked down at 
 his hand, which she was clasping almost frantically as 
 though to save him from disaster. 
 
 " Nothing ! I'd forgotten ! I was listening to you ! "
 
 242 THE POISONER 
 
 She turned away from him for a moment ; then, 
 facing him again, she smiled up into his face. It was 
 with a feeling of acute but quickly passing irritation 
 that he noticed a look of half-concealed and guarded 
 wistfulness in her eyes. It seemed to him that she was 
 forbidding him his music, as though she were appealing 
 to him to be done with it for ever. 
 
 " Didn't you like the Sonata ? " he asked. 
 
 "Oh yes! It wasn't that. I'd just forgotten 
 myself for a moment." 
 
 She laid the music on the top of the piano and turned 
 over the pages ; but she saw nothing of what she was 
 looking at. She tried to speak, but could not, and, 
 feeling self-conscious and that she was betraying herself, 
 she moved away from the piano. Martin's gaze, 
 terribly observant and a little cunning, followed her. 
 
 " Monica, there is something the matter ! Tell me ! " 
 
 She made a little gesture of self-protection. 
 
 " I was frightened just for a moment." She paused ; 
 then, as he made no comment, she went on rapidly : 
 " I know it was silly of me. I could not help it But 
 I'm all right now." 
 
 " Frightened, Monica ? Frightened ? " 
 
 " Just for a little minute. I thought — I thought 
 music was about to take you away from me again." 
 
 '' Again r' 
 
 "No. Don't press me, Martin. I don't know what 
 I felt." 
 
 Martin forced a laugh, but his laugh merely added 
 constraint to the already awkward situation. 
 
 Calvert closed tlie piano quietly and stood irresolute 
 but calm. 
 
 "Really," he said, with his kind smile, so wisely 
 simple, "really, I think I am the only one who docs 
 understand. Monica " — he pronounced the word very 
 distinctly, as if to emphasise the fact that this was one 
 of the rare occasions on which he used her Christian 
 name — " Monica, like myself, is anxious that you should 
 not begin work before you arc ready for it. And just
 
 THE POISONER 243 
 
 now you spoke of playing all Beethoven's Sonatas in 
 one day, not to speak of Schumann and the modem 
 French composers — well, no wonder she was alarmed." 
 
 But though, outwardly, Martin accepted this 
 explanation, it was clear he was irritated. 
 
 " Oh, I'm all right," he said, in a tone in which was no 
 pleasantness. . . . 
 
 Late that night, when Calvert had left and Monica, 
 still a little distraught, had gone to bed, Martin sat 
 in the drawing-room gloomily staring into the fire. 
 The music he had heard that night had worked a subtle 
 change in him — a change of which he was intensely 
 conscious. His present mode of living had suddenly 
 become distasteful. He told himself it was the life 
 of an animal put out every day to graze. His ambition 
 was alive once more. More than that, he was conscious 
 of a desire, ardent and clamant, for excitement. He 
 ached for intellectual contest, for the long spiritual 
 struggle that is a part of the process of creating. He 
 dwelt on the ardours of the past, those days of in- 
 cessant labour in which his every faculty was a-strain 
 to capture and imprison in somid his dream of beauty. 
 Too long had be been idle, too long cosseted and petted. 
 He was fit for the struggle once more. To-morrow 
 he would re-enter the arena of life. 
 
 But Monica ! Ah i— there was a barrier ! There 
 was hostility ! She wished to keep him safe for herself. 
 He fretted at the thought and, as he dwelt upon it, 
 became angry. Impossible for him to pass the rest 
 of his life as he had passed these last two months. 
 True, his few weeks of married life had been happy, if 
 happiness consists of love in idleness. But perhaps 
 his passion's flame was not so fierce as heretofore, and 
 maybe he was in peril of sinking into that conjugal 
 contentment and base regularity that kill romance and 
 make of love itself a nasty appetite. God save him 
 from that ! He had deceived himself into thinking 
 he was one of the world's great lovers ; sex became 
 stale, but in art there was no finality.
 
 244 THE POISONER 
 
 Yes : Monica was jealous — ^jealous in the common 
 way. She wished to cage him whose spirit knew nothing 
 if it knew not freedom. . . . 
 
 He heard a creak on the stairs and, a moment later, 
 the door opened. It was Monica in her dressing-gown. 
 She came over to him and sat on the rug at his feet. 
 She placed her hands upon his knee and her head upon 
 her hands. 
 
 " Thinking, dear ? " she asked. 
 
 It seemed to Martin that she was farther away from 
 him than ever, but now he had no desire to merge his 
 spirit with hers. 
 
 "Yes — just thinking." 
 
 "But you're cold: the room is cold. See! — the 
 fire is nearly out. Won't you come to bed ? " 
 
 " I'm sorry, Monica : I've kept you awake." 
 
 " I wish I could make you happy, my dearest dear." 
 
 He felt a swift thrust of remorse. 
 
 " Oh, but you have made me happy. But no one 
 in the world can be happy always. The black moods 
 will come. And, you know, I change — change, I some- 
 times think, like the wind. That music to-night has 
 wakened in me something I thought was dead. But 
 nothing in us ever dies." 
 
 She rose to her feet, took his hand in hers, and pulled 
 him gently. 
 
 " Come ! " she invited. With her disengaged hand 
 she unloosed the buttons at her neck and bared her 
 breast. "Come!" she repeated anxiously; "come 
 and forget ! " 
 
 He rose and went with her hand-in-hand up the stair- 
 case. ... As they entered their bedroom, he felt as 
 though he had been trapped. 
 
 He woke from his first sleep full of revolt. He sensed 
 her wakefulness — knew that she had not slept — knew 
 that she was thinking of him. Was he never to be 
 entirely himself ? Was part of him always to be filched 
 away by her ? He must guard himself against the
 
 THE POISONER 245 
 
 assault of her spirit. He must conserve himself. Of 
 what was she thinking now ? 
 
 He breathed heavily in order to deceive her that he 
 slept. But he felt that she was not deceived. Her 
 thoughts pressed upon him, snared him. She was 
 interfering with him, tampering with his soul — trying 
 to compel him to be what she would have him be. . . . 
 It was to be a fight, then ! The antagonism lying at 
 the heart of all sexual passion seethed in him violently 
 for a few moments. Then, in that night so still with 
 frost, he heard her sigh. God ! She was appealing 
 to his pity! She was attacking him! She sighed so 
 that he might hear and melt. It was almost hate that 
 he felt for her. He pictured her there in the dark, 
 lying with puckered brow and drooped mouth ; he 
 saw her hair, whose gold always had the effect of sudden- 
 ness, of unexpectedness ; he gazed into her deep, 
 serious eyes. She was very beautiful ! No beauty 
 was quite like hers — so candid, so unconsciously allur- 
 ing. Were her eyes open or closed ? Almost he might 
 — if himself would let him — stretch out his hand and 
 touch her wide eyes with his finger-tips ; or, leaning 
 upon his elbow, raise his head and brush his lips against 
 her eyelashes. 
 
 Desire thus began to smoulder within him. And 
 with desire came shyness, shame. It was as though a 
 stranger lay by his side. And yet she was the same ; 
 it was he who had changed. He crept nearer to her, 
 inch by inch, moving as though he did not move. He 
 smelt the fresh odour of her body. 
 
 "Monica!" 
 
 In that still room his voice sounded like a shout. 
 " Ah ! Martin ! Martin ! " 
 
 His arms were about her ; the soft roundness of her 
 body, with its exciting warmth, was crushed against 
 him.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 IN the days that followed neither knew how the 
 other suffered. Martin was in his study all the 
 day, moody and irritable. She heard his piano 
 and tried to leani of his suffering by means of that 
 fateful music. He played no Beethoven, no music she 
 knew. She guessed that those hours were spent in 
 improvisation ; the sound of it was thick and clotted ; 
 no meaning issued therefrom. Useless to stand and 
 listen and ponder ! Her husband was separated from 
 her — removed afar. He was busy with his own affairs. 
 For all she mattered to hun, they might never have 
 kissed and loved. A dark stranger made music in the 
 house. 
 
 So she went about Narrow End finding work, and 
 performing it listlessly and without faith in its useful- 
 ness. And always she listened. Perhaps all this would 
 end by his calling to her. It would end — soon. He 
 would call to her and, leaving her work, she would run 
 to him and find him different. He would come back 
 to her like that — come back as suddenly as he had gone 
 away. That is what she hoped and prayed for. That 
 is why, all day long, she listened. . . . The ears, long 
 promised a sound, begin to hear that sound when no 
 sound has been made. She would start many times 
 a day thinking she heard his rich, pleasant voice 
 demanding her. 
 
 They met at meals. He conducted himself with 
 cruel politeness, even to Mrs Bassett. He talked a 
 little ; he was very attentive. The meal over, he rose, 
 held open the door for them to pass through, and then 
 bounded upstairs to his study. 
 
 She tried to win him back. Not by a sign or a look 
 did she betray her suffering, her anxiety. Yet her 
 anxiety was only just to be borne. If only she could 
 understand ! That he now occupied his own bedroom 
 seemed to her the grossest of insults ; it was as though 
 he were accusing her of incontinence. He had left 
 their common room Avithout a word of explanation, 
 without a decent word of even insincere excuse. Yet 
 
 246
 
 THE POISONER 247 
 
 she could not persuade herself that he was deliberately 
 wounding her. 
 
 Nor was he. If his conduct was selfish and cruel, 
 it was not intentionally so. He had been swept from 
 his moorings by the dark current of life. His old 
 personality, with its febrile energy, its ruthless egoism, 
 was once more predominant. His genius was awake. 
 At all costs it would tread its way. 
 
 Stavart, indeed, was in these days unobservant of his 
 surroundings. His eyes were turned inwards. Even 
 when away from the opera that he was composing, his 
 thoughts were plunged in it. He went to sleep with 
 it at night ; his first waking thought brought it back 
 to him. Perhaps only those who have worked for long 
 at a task demanding continuous concentration and a 
 steady application of all the mental faculties, can 
 appreciate Martin's condition of mind. He did not 
 dare to let the world intrude upon him. Instinctively 
 he avoided newspapers, letters, callers. He suffered, 
 as most creative artists do, from the fear that at any 
 hour this mood, this prolonged inspiration, might 
 vanish. So he hedged himself about with protections, 
 turned on the power of his will, and lived an inner 
 life that was many times more intense and real than 
 anything in the external world. As for Monica, when- 
 ever he thought of her at all, it was with a feeling of 
 relief that she had accepted their new relationship, 
 that she had not attempted to put any barriers in his 
 way, that she was busy with and apparently happy in 
 her own domestic affairs. If he did not spare the feel- 
 ings of others, he was also careless with regard to his 
 own. In short, he was faithful to his highest powers, 
 sacrificing everything for their sake and planning every 
 hour in such a way that he could be secured against 
 interruption. 
 
 Four days after Calvert's visit, Bernard, as was his 
 custom, returned home from Manchester for a short 
 week-end. During the last two months he and Martin 
 had become close companions during the boy's visits.
 
 248 THE POISONER 
 
 The attraction of opposites had established and cemented 
 a firm friendship between them. Martin was pleased 
 and flattered by the boy's hero-worship, refreshed by 
 his fixedly healthy outlook on life, while Bernard felt 
 for his brother-in-law that reverence which modest and 
 talented youth frequently has for the man who, by 
 sheer hard work, has accomplished something definite 
 in the world. 
 
 Bernard arrived at Narrow End at three o'clock on 
 Saturday afternoon. It had been snowing since noon 
 — a windless snow that fell from heavy black clouds, 
 whose shape, in the already gathering darkness, could 
 not be determined. 
 
 " Where's Martin ? " he asked, after he had greeted 
 his sister and aunt. 
 
 "He's upstairs in his study, working," answered 
 Monica. "I don't think I'd interrupt him." 
 
 " No ? Oh, nonsense, Monica ! Why not ? " 
 
 He ran into the hall. 
 
 " Martin ! Martin ! " he called. 
 
 A door opened on the landing above, and Martin 
 appeared at the head of the stairs. 
 
 " Hullo, sonny ! Is it Saturday ? I forgot you were 
 coming home." 
 
 He came downstairs by no means quickly. They 
 shook hands, and Bernard dragged him into the drawing- 
 room, where the two women were. 
 
 " Forgot I was coming ? " 
 
 " Well, no — but I haven't happened to think of it 
 during the day. You see, sonny, I've begun work 
 again — am up to the eyes in it." 
 
 "Yes, I see. I see you've been working. You 
 look tired. Can't you knock it off for a couple of 
 hours?" 
 
 " Inspiration, my boy," said Martin, assuming a self- 
 defensive, bantering tone. " Can't afford to lose a 
 minute of it — can I, Monica ? " 
 
 "Bernard ought not to have interrupted you." 
 
 The boy flushed a little at this direct reproof, and
 
 THE POISONER 249 
 
 looked first at his sister and then at Martin, with 
 bewildered eyes. 
 
 " Oh, it's all right," said Martin, with some constraint. 
 " But I'll see yon at dinner-time." 
 
 He turned to go, and had reached the door when he 
 stopped and faced Bernard. 
 
 "I'm sorry, sonny. But, really, I'm in the middle 
 of a most exciting passage — I'm composing an opera, 
 you know — and if I leave my work even for a few hours, 
 I find it frightfully hard to get back into the right mood 
 again. You understand, don't you ? " 
 
 '' Why, of course, Martin. Don't mind me ! Is the 
 hero making love, or is the villain murdering someone ? " 
 
 Martin's gaze became unfocused ; his deep-set eyes 
 glowed in the light of the fire. He stood in silence for 
 nearly a full minute, as though striving to remember 
 something that eluded him. 
 
 " No," he said at length. " They are all worshipping 
 a wonderful king — hymning him. He sits on an agate 
 throne. His face is lean with the fires of sensuality. 
 He has singled out a woman w'ith liis eyes. And with 
 his eyes he is stripping her." 
 
 He stood again in silence. Then his eyes began to 
 see again, and he understood that the three people 
 before him were looking at liim with horrified concern. 
 He turned abruptly and left them, closing the door 
 behind him in careful silence. 
 
 They all felt that something dreadful, something 
 sinister, had happened. Bernard was the first to 
 recover himself. 
 
 " Oh, Auntie, I've brought you a present. It's in 
 my bag in the hall." 
 
 " A present — for me ? " 
 
 " I do hope you'll like it.' 
 
 He went from the room. In the hall he bit his lip, 
 clenched his fists, and held his breath for a few moments. 
 And suffered. What was the matter with Martin ? 
 Was it going to begin over again ? Could it be tliat 
 once more they would all have to go tjirough that
 
 250 THE POISONER 
 
 period of anxiety, of nightmare uncertainty ? Had 
 Martin started to drink ? . . . With an effort he con- 
 quered himself, unlocked his bag, took therefrom a 
 parcel wrapped in tissue-paper, and returned with it 
 to the drawing-room. 
 
 Mrs Bassett removed the paper and disclosed a long 
 piece of Indian silk. But Monica did not stay to 
 examine it. She crept from the room and stood in the 
 hall, listening. Not a sound ! She glided slowly up 
 the staircase and along the landing, pausing outside his 
 door. Almost she was tempted to turn the handle, 
 walk inside, and face him — face him in order that she 
 might find out — what ? She did not know what her 
 fears were, did not dare to clothe them in words. 
 
 • •••• ••• 
 
 Mrs Bassett had bought just the kind of cakes 
 Bernard liked. Tea was her own affair. She sat in 
 her black silk gown with its lace cuffs, and made a 
 pleasant ritual of the meal. To-day she was specially 
 solicitous that the occasion should be as pleasurable 
 as possible. Her wise old heart had faith in the whole- 
 some effect of the happy domesticities of life : a con- 
 tented home could ward off most of life's dangers and 
 endure all its trials. As was her way when anxious, 
 she was particularly observant, and she could not but 
 admire the way in which Bernard disguised the fear 
 and depression he felt on Martin's account. The boy 
 was all attentiveness, and to Monica there was some- 
 thing ineffably soothing in the glow of his young health. 
 
 "I had cakes for lunch," he said. "No time for 
 anything else. A lot of us go to Reeves, Auntie, just 
 opposite the Coll. Milk and buns, you know." 
 
 " Oh, my dear boy, you must feed properly. I often 
 wonder — these landladies — and such a hungry place as 
 Manchester is, too. However, I've got muffins : so 
 nourishing. Begin with muffins, Bernard, won't you ? 
 and Monica and I will leave you all the cream buns and 
 chocolate eclairs." 
 
 " But I shall feel such a pig ! "
 
 THE POISONER 251 
 
 "Why not— just for once? What with the frost 
 and the snow — dinner at seven." 
 
 "Why, there are only three cups, Auntie." 
 
 "Yes," Monica interposed ; " Martin ahvays has his 
 tea in his room when he's working." 
 
 Her hand trembled a little as she took the full cup 
 that Mrs Bassett passed her, but her face was composed 
 and her voice imperturbed. 
 
 Bernard rose and brought a cushion from a sofa at 
 the other end of the room. He placed it at his aunt's 
 back, and just brushed her hair with his lips as he did 
 so. She smiled archly at him for thanks. 
 
 " Isn't it nice — snow outside ? " she said. " It 
 makes the room so snug and comfortable. And lamp- 
 light ! " She bit into a piece of muffin. " I ncA-er get 
 used to margarine — not that this is. Sweetings sends 
 it over every week from Poulton." 
 
 "It's wasted on me, Auntie. My palate's awfully 
 uneducated." 
 
 " Tell us the news, Bernard," said Monica. 
 
 "Let's see. Nothing's happened except that old 
 Criswold took me to the Halle Concert the night before 
 last. Awfully decent of him. Hamilton Harty's the 
 conductor. They're doing a thing of Martin's there 
 next month — his Bizarre Overture ; I wonder if he 
 knows." 
 
 "I don't suppose he does. Tell him at dinner-time; 
 he'll be pleased." 
 
 It was foolish, she knew, to try to keep Martin's name 
 out of the conversation, yet whenever it was mentioned 
 it gave her a thrill of apprehensiveness. With an 
 effort she added ; 
 
 " His music is plaj^ed much more in France, and even 
 in Germany, than it is here. Prophet in his own country, 
 you know." 
 
 " What's the subject of his opera ? " 
 
 " I don't quite know. He doesn't like to talk of his 
 work until it is finished. But it's about some fabled 
 \i\ng — a kind of King of Thule person "
 
 252 THE POISONER 
 
 "Will Beecham do it when it's finished? Awfully 
 hard lines on Beecham, isn't it ? — being hard np, I 
 mean," 
 
 " Well, we always have his pills in the house," said 
 Mrs Bassett. " But then very few people do what 
 they can to help." 
 
 Bernard laughed. 
 
 " I'd never thought of that. More pills more music, 
 eh ? " 
 
 Involuntarily silence fell upon them as they heard 
 Martin's footstep on the staircase. " Is he coming to 
 join us ? " thought Bernard. But no ! For a few 
 moments they heard him in the hall ; then the front 
 door was opened, and was closed with a bang. 
 
 It was useless to continue their small talk and, indeed, 
 Monica was glad to be relieved of the necessity for 
 manufacturing conversation. 
 
 " Now ! " said Mrs Bassett, passing Bernard the dish 
 of cakes. 
 
 But the boy hesitated a moment, for his thoughts 
 were outside with Martin. He wanted to be with him, 
 to share his secret. It was unendurable to feel that 
 something unknown and sinister was happening, or 
 was about to happen, in that house. He looked up at 
 his aunt, and smiled charmingly when he saw her sweet, 
 unruffled countenance. 
 
 " You spoil me ! " he said, taking a cream bun. 
 
 Monica had risen, and was standing by the fire, one 
 little foot resting on the fender. She looked very 
 solitary, and her soft dress of mourning made her seem 
 both unconsoled and remote. Bernard watched her as 
 he ate. 
 
 "I say," he began, "would either of you mind very 
 much if I went out for a walk ? " 
 
 "Why, no," answered his aunt. 
 
 "It's a horrid night, Bernard," said Monica. "It's 
 snowing hard. Do you really want to go ? " 
 
 " Not if you'd like me here. Only, you see, I thought 
 T might find Martin. I think he's lonely. I want to
 
 THE POISONER 253 
 
 talk to him, Monica. He'll have gone along the Stannar, 
 I feel sure. It's fine on a night like this — fiiie ! " 
 
 " Oh ! On the Stannar ! Do you think he's gone 
 there ? " 
 
 " He loves it, especially when it is wild and strange." 
 
 " Yes, do go ! Talk to him, Bernard — and bring him 
 back. And I daresay the walk'll do you good." 
 
 They went out into the hall together, where she helped 
 him on with his overcoat. He bent over her and 
 kissed her. 
 
 " Cheer up, Monnicita," he said ; "I hate to see you 
 so unhappy." 
 
 She smiled. 
 
 "It's all right really, dear, but I don't think I'm 
 particularly well to-day." 
 
 When outside he found the snow had stopped falling. 
 The clouds had cleared and the sky held brilliant stars 
 and a moon-sickle slowly gliding to the horizon. Frost 
 held the early night in silence. It was a white night 
 of snow, but the whiteness was mysterious, with a 
 faintly blue radiance ; the smell of snow, clean and 
 sharp, rushed quickly up one's nostrils. In five minutes 
 he had crossed the sandhills and was on the Stannar. 
 The sea was up, black and silent. The snow reached to 
 its very edge. The lake on his right was also silent and 
 black, but in its untroubled waters the stars were 
 mirrored. On either side of him he could see, stretching 
 away into the distance, a black, curving line where 
 snow and water met. 
 
 He walked slowly, for the going was hard and he 
 wanted to think. It was clear that during the week 
 he had been away in Manchester something untoward 
 had happened. One could sense it in the atmosphere 
 at Narrow End. Had Martin and Monica quarrelled ? 
 If so, it was only Monica who suffered. And yet it 
 seemed to him that Martin was remo^'"ed from them all 
 — shut out — excluded. He did not fit in. He was 
 lonely. Perhaps his excitement and his strange words 
 were the result of suffering. Yet it was by his own
 
 254 THE POISONER 
 
 choice he spent his time alone. . . . One conjecture 
 after another occurred to him ; any of them might 
 be true ; all might be false. There was nothing — 
 nothing — he could do. He must just be as kind and as 
 tactful as possible. Yet he wanted to help, and the 
 consciousness that he could do nothing distressed him 
 unbearably. Almost it was possible to hate Martin, 
 if one could hate a man in all ways save one so admir- 
 able. Until he came to Narrow End, they were all 
 happy together. And now even his aunt was troubled. 
 How alert and watchful she had been during the two 
 hours he had spent in her company ! . . . 
 
 The hard exercise of walking on the snow-covered 
 stones had made him sweat, and he stopped to regain 
 his breath. On the instant silence fell about him — 
 a silence that by ceasing to move he had made himself. 
 Its suddenness took him out of himself. Not even the 
 cry of a bird ! Not even the faint sigh of falling water ! 
 How clean everjiihing was ! The thin, keen air dizzied 
 him a little. He felt that he was an inseparable part 
 of inanimate nature : not only that this his body had 
 sprung from these waters and this soil, and would, at 
 the end, return to them : but that the spirit of nature 
 was his spirit. He felt more akin to the sea, the snow 
 and the tiunbled stones than he did to his own kind. 
 The stars were his because he saw them. The silence 
 of that night mocked his troubled spirit. . . . 
 
 He walked on, seeking peace, and, as his body tired, 
 peace slowly came. He had gone farther than he had 
 intended, and was about to retrace his steps when he 
 thought he saw a dark figure outlined against the snow. 
 It was approaching slowly and silently, and presently 
 Bernard recognised Martin, who, deep in thought, did 
 not perceive his young brother-in-law until he was 
 close upon him. 
 
 " Hullo ! You out too ? " 
 
 " Yes. I wanted a walk. Besides, I thought there 
 was a chance of meeting you. But if you'd rather be 
 alone "
 
 THE POISONER 255 
 
 " No, sonny. I came out to think, but I've done my 
 thinking. Andmy brain was getting stale. Wonderful 
 what a difference a couple of hours' exercise makes ! 
 At four o'clock this afternoon things looked black, 
 but now they're the colour of— well, of dawn." 
 
 " I've felt depressed as well." 
 
 " You ? Why, what have you got to trouble about ? " 
 
 Bernard scai'cely knew what troubled him ; indeed, 
 he wondered now, having met Martin in so cheerful 
 a mood, if there was anything at all. He laughed, 
 feeling a sudden relief. 
 
 " Nothing, I suppose. As a matter of fact, I was 
 disappointed because you went out without taking me 
 with you." 
 
 " But I would have taken you with me if I hadn't 
 wanted to work. You mustn't think I'm neglecting 
 you, Bernard, or that I've really forgotten you. You 
 see, when I'm on a big composition, I can't — I daren't 
 — think of anything else. I'vefjust got to concentrate 
 and keep everything else out of my mind." 
 
 "Yes, Martin, of course you have. I understand 
 perfectly well. I was a fool to " 
 
 " No, you weren't. But let me tell you how I work. 
 An opera, like every other work of art, big or little, 
 has to be built up. It's like, say, a cathedral. You 
 draw a plan, many plans. You sketch and alter and 
 sketch again. Then you clear the ground and dig for 
 your foundations. After that, scaffolding. You are 
 building all the time in order to present an idea, and 
 everything you do must help to enforce that idea, to 
 make it clearer, to establish it. But I'm getting in a 
 muddle ; the cathedral analogy isn't a very good one. 
 For a composer works in material infinitely more plastic 
 than stone and mortar. And I should have told you, 
 of course, that I'm writing my own libretto. He creates 
 people, and the people a man creates have a habit of 
 getting out of hand : they develop on their own lines, 
 and often enough that development tends to obscure 
 the central idea and even to obliterate it altogether.
 
 256 THE POISONER 
 
 Worst of all, it is difficult to get unity and proportion. 
 That is where concentration comes in. The imagina- 
 tion must be disciplined; you've got to keep your 
 characters in their place. And damned difficult it is 
 to do. It is the architectural part of the business — 
 the proportioning of the different paits and of the 
 subsidiary ideas — that I find almost beyond me. It's 
 an intellectual struggle all the time. I can write a 
 beautiful page, a beautiful scene, almost without effort ; 
 but often enough I find that the beautiful page isn't 
 necessary, that it is an excrescence. An opera should 
 grow like a hyacinth from its bulb. How ludicrous 
 and how monstrous it would look to have a rose petal 
 growing from the hyacinth's stalk ! That is why most 
 operas are failures as works of art. And that is why 
 Carmen is, from the classical point of view, perfection. 
 It has unity ; it is as closely and as beautifully woven 
 as a Turkish carpet. . . . But I'm wandering. What 
 I wanted to do was to explain to you why I may seem 
 self-centred, selfish. You must think of me as a man 
 with his mind occupied entirely in self-discipline. It's 
 a strain, sonny — a damnable strain. But, you know, I 
 have my hours of delight as well as my days of despair." 
 
 Whilst he was talking, Bernard was telling himself 
 how difficult it was to be just, how fatallj^ easy to 
 entertain suspicion when no suspicion was justified. 
 
 "It's awfully good of you to tell me about your work, 
 Martin. I shall never think of you as unkind or in- 
 considerate. I'd love to be doing the kind of work 
 you're doing. I remember your telling me once, Martin, 
 that I was like my father — that I had the explorer's 
 type of mind. It must be wonderful to discover new 
 countries and sail over strange seas, but it seems to me 
 much more wonderful for a man to explore into his own 
 mind, like a diver in a mountain tarn, and bring beautiful 
 and costly treasures to the surface." 
 
 " Well, it's jolly exciting — ^too exciting, I sometimes 
 think. As a matter of fact, it's wonderful what strange 
 things are hidden in our minds. Often and often I've
 
 THE POISONER 257 
 
 looked at things I've composed a little time previously, 
 and wondered where the deuce it all came from. . . . 
 But I've talked enough about myself. What news 
 have you ? " 
 
 "None, I think. Except that the Halle Concerts 
 Society are doing your Bizarre Overture next month." 
 
 "Are they, begad? I must go to hear it. I bet 
 they wouldn't have looked at it in the days of old 
 Richter. You're working hard ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " And you like it ? " 
 
 " Well, it's all pretty simple. I can get through all 
 I have to do by six o'clock. First lecture, as a rule, 
 at ten, but I generally put in a couple of hours at 
 my digs before going to Coll. I was introduced to 
 Langford, the musical critic, the other day." 
 
 " Oh, what is he like ? " 
 
 " Extraordinarily hke Mr Calvert. But he pulled 
 my leg." 
 
 The young moon behind them was sinking into the 
 haze of the horizon, and dark clouds were gathering 
 from the north. Indeed, a few flakes of snow had 
 already begun to fall and a gust of icy wind swept 
 across the Stannar. 
 
 " We shall be late for dinner," said Bernard. 
 
 "Yes. I'm afraid we shall. But I'm glad I came 
 out — glad that you came out too." 
 
 They quickened their pace and fell into silence. . . . 
 
 Strange it was that as they opened the wooden door 
 in the wall at Narrow End depression and irritation 
 fell upon Martin. He felt that he was about to 
 enter an antagonistic atmosphere — at all events, an 
 atmosphere that was vaguely hostile to his work. He 
 made an effort to recover his spirits and, when once in 
 the house, looked in the drawing-room, where his wife 
 and Mrs Bassett were seated, and smiled. 
 
 " Frightfully sorry to have kept you waiting," he 
 said. " Bernard and I have come in together — we 
 shan't be a minute."
 
 258 THE POISONER 
 
 But Monica was already on her feet ; she approached 
 him, a telegram in her hand. 
 
 "I didn't open it," she explained ; "it came just 
 half-an-hour ago." 
 
 He took it from her and left the room without examin- 
 ing the contents. Whilst* telling herself that it was 
 reasonable enough for Martin to wish to read his message 
 in private, she could not but feel slightly bewildered 
 and hurt that he had done so. But a minute or two 
 later she heard him and Bernard laughing and talking 
 upstairs, and that sound of cheerfulness, the first she had 
 heard for four days, consoled her. The two men came 
 down to dinner just as Cubbins was sounding the gong. 
 
 The talk during the meal was animated and gay, 
 and even Monica, wanned and consoled by her husband's 
 geniality, brightened and became something like her 
 customary self. Her maimer to her husband was 
 extraordinarily tender and solicitous. 
 
 Whilst Bernard and Mrs Bassett were having a 
 passage of arms, Martin took from his pocket the tele- 
 gram he had received and passed it to Monica. It read : 
 
 "Marcel Xystobam ill. Can you conduct in his 
 place on Tuesday ? Any composition of your own 
 you choose Mdll be included in programme. Rehearsal 
 Monday eleven prompt Queen's Hall. Leopold." 
 
 As she read it, she thought she knew the reason of 
 Martin's high spirits. He would go ! He would not 
 be able to resist the temptation once more to wield 
 the baton ! But she must do all in her power to 
 prevent him I She must 
 
 "What is the matter, Monica?" asked Bernard, 
 who was sitting opposite her. 
 
 " Nothing — nothing at all." 
 
 But she had paled, and her expression was one of 
 blank dismay. 
 
 " I'm sorry," said Bernard, biting his lip ; "I 
 thought you had received bad news." 
 
 " It's a telegram," explained Martin, " asking me
 
 THE POISONER 259 
 
 to conduct Marcel Xystobam's concert on Tuesday. 
 He's ill." 
 
 " In London ? " asked Mrs Bassett. 
 
 " Yes, in London." 
 
 He continued eating. 
 
 " Jolly good to be asked ! " said Bernard. 
 "Xystobam's a great man, isn't he? As great as 
 Weingartner ? " 
 
 " Yes, I suppose he is." 
 
 Monica looked at him covertly. 
 
 " I suppose," she began. " I suppose — well, of 
 course you're going ? " 
 
 " My dear child ! " he expostulated. " Do you 
 imagine for a moment that I'd leave my opera for a 
 hundred orchestral concerts ? Not likely ! Why, I'm 
 in the very thick of it. A couple of days in London 
 would just about dish me up for a month." 
 
 She began to laugh in a high, hysterical tone. 
 
 "Oh ! Oh ! . . . I'm so glad ... so very glad ! " 
 she said, between her bursts of laughter. 
 
 Something in Martin froze : he felt as though he had 
 for the first time heard of a crime he had committed. 
 He half rose from his chair and held out a protecting 
 hand. But she calmed herself. 
 
 "Poor Monica!" he said. "You've not been 
 looking well all day. You're upset." 
 
 "No, no ! Really, no I I'm quite all right — ^just a 
 headache — nothing more. But I thought — I didn't 
 want you to leave us now, Martin — and when I read 
 the telegram I thought you'd want to go — that you'd 
 think it your duty to go." 
 
 Her distress aroused all his tenderness and pity. 
 Somehow, in some inexplicable way, it was he who had 
 made her suffer like this. His little girl was ill. 
 
 But she soon lost all sign of her distress, and in a few 
 minutes appeared at ease and happy. A few minutes 
 before the meal was finished, Martin rose. 
 
 " You'll excuse me, won't you ? " he asked, looking 
 and smiling at them each in turn. "My walk has
 
 260 THE POISONER 
 
 cleared my head and I've got all sorts of won-der-ful 
 ideas. My King is still on his throne and the people 
 are still singing his praises." 
 
 " Why, of course we'll excuse you," said Mrs Bassett. 
 " But do go to bed early, won't you ? " 
 
 "And have breakfast in bed in the morning!" 
 added Monica. "You're overdoing it." 
 
 But he made no answer, and left the room with a 
 light laugh. 
 
 There come rare hours of delight to most creative 
 artists when the body, the mind and the imaginative 
 faculty seem to be in complete harmony ; they enter 
 into an alliance, they work together ; and the artist, 
 unapprehensive of difficulties, unperturbed by distress 
 from within and without, grasps his vision as a man may 
 grasp a banner, and transmutes it into words, paint 
 or music. Such an hour had come to Martin. Not an 
 hour of coolness, but an hour of excitement. He saw 
 his fabled King upon his throne, worshipped because 
 feared. He pierced within that King's soul : spread 
 out before him was the tortured cruelty of a mind that 
 had wrought nothing but devastation. In the hymn 
 of praise his subjects sang was concealed a craven fear, 
 a slowly burning hate. The music was suave and 
 beautiful ; here and there, just for a moment, it became 
 hysterical with long-subdued feeling. But to the King 
 it was all delight. He listened and smiled. He heard 
 the note of hate and loved it. He sat erect and proud, 
 feeling as a torturer must feel when he has a pinioned 
 lion at his mercy. And while the singers subtly and, 
 as it were, unconsciously, revealed their collective soul 
 in their hymn, the orchestra, like a flame in smoke, 
 disclosed the bright hatred and intense megalomania 
 of the fate-driven King. 
 
 Martin wrote, as one may, excited by the flood of 
 inspiration that carried him along with its current, 
 and more excited still by the ease with which his pen 
 automatically, as it seemed, recorded his mind's visions. 
 The music was heard and written down : his body, all
 
 THE POISONER 261 
 
 his faculties, were but parts of an extraordinarily 
 sensitive machine. He began to feel, as sometimes he 
 had felt before, strangely unsafe ; his imagination was 
 carrying him into perilous places ; he was alone and at 
 the mercy of hostile forces. He was writing down 
 terribly brutal but terribly honest things : things that, 
 though unguessed-at and seemingly alien, were yet 
 inseparably his. His music was revealing him to 
 himself. His true self was coming out, merging through 
 all his sophistications, rising nakedly and cruelly before 
 his astonished eyes. Yet, though afraid, he was lured. 
 The danger enticed and seduced him. Incredible that 
 a man should have these things within his soul and live 
 unconscious of them 1 He loved the risk of this hour, 
 was exhilarated by its disclosures, was exalted by its 
 SAvift excitements. 
 
 The quick hour merged into a second ; the second into 
 a third. It was nearly midnight when be became 
 conscious that his inspiration was beginning to fail, 
 that his energies were flagging. Exhaustion closed in 
 upon him as suddenly as, and with the finality of, a 
 lid closing upon a box. He rose, turned over his sheets 
 of MS. paper with a smile of brooding satisfaction, and 
 threw himself upon an easy-chair before the spent fire. 
 The room was chilly and his hands and feet were cold ; 
 but of these things he knew nothing, and very soon he 
 knew nothing at all, for he was in a deep, dead sleep, 
 dreamless with physical and mental exhaustion. 
 
 • ••••••• 
 
 Downstairs Monica sat alone. Bernard and Mrs 
 Bassett had early crept upstairs, silently, in order not 
 to disturb Martin, but Monica sat on guard. In these 
 days she was always on guard, protecting her husband 
 with her thoughts and hopes. She could not herself 
 rest until he was resting. So she listened for his step 
 on the landing, for the opening and closing of his 
 bedroom door. 
 
 She was, she knew, no fit mate for Martin in a time 
 like this. She could not conceal her anxiety from him ;
 
 262 THE POISONER 
 
 she could not act a part. He required an easy, un- 
 exacting cheerfulness about him, but all she could give 
 him was a face upon which sorrow was limned. She 
 could be courageous in times of crisis, but it was not 
 in her nature to assume and exhibit emotions she did 
 not feel. With a touch of jealousy that made more 
 poignant her sense of her owti deficiencies, she had noted 
 the difference in Martin's spirits already effected by 
 Bernard's visit. Was it possible that all women felt 
 thus bewildered by their husbands ? 
 
 She made many resolves as she waited with her 
 ears alert to catch the slightest sound. She must be 
 more of a companion to Martin and less of a lover. 
 She must exact nothing from him he did not want to 
 give — not even a look. Her love, if necessary, must be 
 for his uplifting and her o\vn do\\Tifalling. All love, 
 if it contain but the slightest taint of selfishness, makes 
 ultimately for misery. . . . Yet, as she thought these 
 things, she yearned for him. She longed to be with 
 him now. Why was she denied him ? Must she indeed 
 come when he bade her and depart at his fro^vn ? Was 
 she merely a thing of pleasure — a mistress ? 
 
 But into the midst of these bitter thoughts crept the 
 memory of his protective tenderness during dinner. 
 For an instant his eyes had shown, not passion, but the 
 tenderness, the solicitude, the pity of something like 
 maternal love. She blamed herself for her lack of 
 faith, her momentary treacheries. He did love her ! 
 He loved her as much as he could love anyone ! How 
 selfish, how unjust of her to quarrel with him in her 
 heart because he did not love her in the way she chose ! 
 
 The clock in the hall struck twelve and she had heard 
 no movement upstairs. She knew that the wisest 
 thing to do was to go to bed and leave Martin undis- 
 turbed. But she could not do this. She was anxious. 
 His very silence made her anxious. And with anxiety 
 was mingled desire. 
 
 I: She rose and turned off the lamp. In the darkness 
 she stood thinking of her husband ; the darkness
 
 THE POISONER 263 
 
 brought him to her. She imagmed his arms about her, 
 his hps on hers. She even heard him whisper and sigh 
 passionately. There came back to her their ardent 
 whisperings of former nights. " Monica ! " . . . 
 "Martin!" . . . "It is you ! " . . . "And you!" 
 
 . . . "If only ! " Those nights would return — 
 
 would return when he was tired of his present mistress, 
 his art. So intense were her imaginings that she 
 stretched out her arms to clasp him, and realized she 
 was in a dream-state only when her arms returned to 
 her empty and unsatisfied. She would have made a 
 little house for him within her arms, her breast his 
 pillow, her eyes his lamps. 
 
 Having left the room, she went up the silent stairs. 
 She paused outside his study. No sound ! She 
 knocked, but there came no SLunmons to enter. A 
 quick thought struck her. She stole along the passage 
 to her own room. A fire was burning for her — fo 
 her who never had a fire in her bedroom and who had 
 not ordered one to-night. Her aunt, solicitous and 
 tender, must have seen to this for her. Hastily she 
 undressed, unbound her hair and combed it. With 
 trembling fingers she buttoned her plain nightgown, 
 and then slipped on the light Japanese dressing-gown 
 of dusky silk that Bernard had bought her. On bare 
 feet she went down the passage and stopped a second 
 time at the door of his study, but a second time there 
 was no answer to her knocking. So she turned the 
 handle and entered. 
 
 He was asleep before the fireless grate. His big 
 frame was thrown on the chair ; he looked as though 
 he had fallen into sleep the moment the chair had 
 received him. A slight frown puckered his brow ; 
 his lips were a little parted ; his abundant hair was 
 disarranged. Before she tried to wake him she ran 
 her parted fingers lightly — lightly, and oh, so softly ! 
 through his hair. Her arm tingled at the touch, and 
 the thrilling disturbance reached her heart and set it 
 beating heavily. One of the arms of the chair supported
 
 264 THE POISONER 
 
 his wrist, and the long, thin, and sensitive hand hung 
 Hmply. She took it in both of hers. How cold and 
 unresponsive it was ! She chafed it gently, hoping to 
 bring him back to consciousness ; but he did not move, 
 and it was only after she had placed her arm around 
 his neck and pressed his head gently to her bosom that 
 he opened his eyes slowly and gazed at her as though 
 she were part of a wonderful dream. His large, deeply 
 blue and luminous eyes rested on hers for a full minute — 
 until, indeed, Monica's gentle smile changed to a look 
 of embarrassment. His wonder at her slowly died. 
 He shivered. 
 
 " Is it very late ? For a minute I could not remember 
 where I was." 
 
 " No," she answered. " Not very late. I just came 
 to remind you it was bedtime. But you're cold. 
 Shall I make you some coffee ? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " What time i5 it ? " 
 
 " Just after midnight." 
 
 " It's you who ought to be in bed," he said. "You 
 look after me as though I were ill — as though I required 
 a hundred little attentions, yet all the time it is you who 
 want caring for." 
 
 He regarded her gravely. 
 
 "You ought to have been in bed a couple of hours 
 ago," he said. " Go, that's a good child." 
 
 She might, indeed, have been a rather wilful child, 
 so coaxing yet impersonal was his voice. But she had 
 not come here to play that part, nor was she willing 
 at that moment to be regarded as a tender plant that 
 called for special watchfulness and consideration. 
 The midnight hour, the silence of the house, their 
 solitude and, strangely, the thought of the glowing 
 fire in her curtained white bedroom, induced in her a 
 reckless desire for self-abandonment. Gone were her 
 silent vows to demand nothing from him, to take 
 nothing save what he willingly gave ; gone was her 
 pride, submerged in the glamour of the hour.
 
 THE POISONER 265 
 
 " I'm lonely, Martin," she said. 
 
 " Lonely ! " he exclaimed. He did not mider stand 
 her. He himself was encompassed about by a cloud of 
 witnesses who hourly testified their nearness and 
 confirmed his consciousness of his ego. 
 
 "Yes — very lonely." 
 
 "I'm sorry," he said. 
 
 And that was all. He felt that she demanded some- 
 thing more of him, and resentment came quickly and 
 sealed his lips. He was in no mood to give anything. 
 The music in his brain, the people he was creating, 
 were poised delicately ; they moved and intrigued on 
 an aery foundation ; he held them in his imagination 
 only at the cost of great intellectual and emotional 
 effort : the least psychic disturbance, he knew, would 
 bring his music and his creatures tumbling confusedly 
 to the ground. But Monica did not understand this, 
 did not understand it in spite of the fact that for this 
 reason, and this reason alone, he had refused to reap 
 the honour of conducting Xystobam's concert. How 
 greedy and selfish even the best of women were ! 
 How little they understood save conjugal love and 
 the cloying happiness of domesticity ! 
 
 She waited by his side, humble, beseeching : waited 
 until sheer annoyance compelled him to speak again. 
 
 " I'm sorry, Monica," he repeated, but there was no 
 sorrow in his voice. " All of us in the end are lonely. 
 It's the price we have to pay for being alive." 
 
 He rose. 
 
 " Now go to bed, like a good girl, or we shall haVe you 
 ill on our hands." 
 
 He shivered again, and walked towards the door, she 
 following him. Then, suddenly, he relented. 
 
 " Shall I sit with you a little until you get sleepy ? " 
 he asked. " You've got a fire, haven't you ? " 
 
 " How did you know I had a fire ? " 
 
 " Oh, I told Mary to light one." 
 
 This evidence of his thoughtfulness on her account 
 shamed her because she had believed him incapable
 
 266 THE POISONER 
 
 of it. He did love her, after all. Her doubts and also 
 her hunger were set at rest by his kindness, and she 
 felt herself to be selfish and despicable. 
 
 "Oh, Martin, did you? Yes, dear, come and sit 
 with me just a little while. I feel so happy now." 
 
 Again he did not understand. He turned out the 
 light and put his arm about her protectingly as they 
 walked to her bedroom. The large, cheerful room, 
 made intimate by the fire's dancing flames and by the 
 turned-down bed-clothes, seemed, as Monica had done, 
 to claim him. When she had slipped off her dressing- 
 gown and got into bed, he extinguished the lamp, and, 
 by the light of the fire, drew a chair to her bedside and 
 sat down. 
 
 "Aren't you tired, Martin ? " 
 
 "I don't know — I suppose I am. But these days 
 I never know I'm tired till I fall asleep." 
 
 " Won't you tell me about your work ? Won't you 
 share it with me ? " 
 
 Again ! Again she was attacking him ! Again she 
 was attempting to disintegrate his dreams ! 
 
 "Haven't you ever heard," he asked, "that no one 
 ever writes the story he has told ? Men of letters tell 
 a story and then say : ' I must write that story some 
 day.' But they never do. When a story is told, it is 
 completed, finished with. So, if I told you the story 
 of my opera, I should lose interest in it. It would 
 stop." 
 
 " Yes ? But it goes along well ? It comes easily ? " 
 
 "Well, but not easily. Nothing worth doing ever 
 does come easily. It's a strain, Monica. All my 
 faculties are taut." 
 
 " Yes, I see. I understand." 
 
 And she did begin to understand. If only he would 
 talk to her more ! But she had to drag things out of 
 him, one by one. Then she fell to blaming herself 
 for her lack of understanding and for her jealousy of 
 his music. But from the very beginning it had always 
 come between them. It was the eternal and invincible
 
 THE POISONER 267 
 
 barrier. It was more. It was the force that might 
 at any moment begin to drag at him from the depths, 
 drag him down to drink, to madness ; pull him into 
 the abyss and cover him with slime. 
 
 " It's less than a week ago, Martin — do you re- 
 member ? — that you said you had lost all your am- 
 bition, that fame was nothing to you, that power and 
 riches " 
 
 " Yes, I know," he interrupted. " It was true when 
 I said it, and it's true now. In spite of what most 
 people believe and a few great men have said, there is 
 in us artists who create a motive that is stronger than 
 all those you have named. There is a deep joy in all 
 birth : pain, of course, anxiety, long-continued strain : 
 but the joy is greater than all. Creation completes 
 us ; we are fulfilled by it. It is, I suppose, what love 
 is to a woman, what children are to a woman. A 
 childless woman as she grows to middle age must 
 always feel that she has been thwarted, that life has 
 failed to complete her. She does not want children in 
 order that she may have power, or become famous or 
 wealthy ; she wants children for her own sake. With- 
 out them, the most important functions of her body 
 and of her soul are unused. It is exactly the same 
 with those of us who create. We spend ourselves on the 
 things we make precisely as you, Monica, will some day 
 spend yourself on your children." 
 
 The last few words he spoke were like light to her. 
 They were like music. They revealed her to herself, 
 and they contained a promise. How much he knew ! 
 How sane he was ! A child ! She had never dis- 
 covered what was at the bottom of her jealousy, her 
 aching, her deep, night-long yearning. Yet he knew. 
 
 " Dear Martin ! " she breathed. 
 
 Her little hand stole from beneath the bedclothes 
 and, in the darkness, found his hand. He pressed it 
 gently, sighed with weariness, and rose. 
 
 " Good-night, little Monica ! " he said, as he bent 
 over her and kissed her mouth.
 
 268 THE POISONER 
 
 Though she tried to restrain them, her arms flew up, 
 caught him roimd tlie neck, and pulled his head down 
 upon her breast. 
 
 "A baby, Martin ! A little baby ! You promised ! " 
 
 But he dragged himself away from her, harshly and 
 impatiently. In those moments he ahnost hated her. 
 
 He went to the door and, with a cold " Good-night ! ", 
 left her.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 CHRISTMAS came and went. Early in the New 
 Year Bernard went on a visit to friends at 
 Preston. He was missed almost at once. His 
 presence at Narrow End had quickened life there ; 
 his fresh, dewy youthfulness had brightened the gloomy 
 days, and his ardent spirit, so appreciative of good in 
 others and so ready to light up with enthusiasm, had 
 soothed Monica's morbidity to a quiet acceptance of 
 the changed conditions inaugurated by Martin's return 
 to work. The boy had a certain largeness of nature 
 that made it impossible for others to harbour self-pity 
 or resentment in his presence. Moreover, never by 
 the slightest word or act did he show he was anxious 
 on Martin's account. On the contrary, he took his 
 absorption in his work as a natural and desirable thing : 
 men were healthiest when at work. 
 
 During the week previous to Bernard's departure 
 for Preston, Martin had been in the habit of joining 
 the others in the drawing-room for the last hour 
 of the evening. Invariably he was excited and voluble ; 
 the intense labour of the day, instead of exhausting 
 his energy, seemed but to add to it. Because, at these 
 hours he always appeared at his best — bright eyes, 
 slightly flushed cheeks, and a laugh that rang true — 
 Monica's anxiety was stilled. After all, work suited 
 him. Yet she could not but wonder at his colossal 
 energy. She never thought of Martin as merely in- 
 dustrious ; he was much more than that, for he seemed 
 to put all of himself into his slightest action. To her 
 he was like an engine working at high pressure. 
 
 This last hour of the day, however, did not bring 
 unalloyed delight to Monica, for she suspected that it 
 was more on account of Bernard's companionship than 
 her own that he joined them. Bernard made no 
 demands upon his brother-in-law. The man and the 
 boy accept each other, without reserve, without 
 criticism. Their friendship was easy and full of 
 pleasm'e, as friendship always is between men because 
 no great depth of feeling is involved. But Monica's 
 
 269
 
 270 THE POISONER 
 
 jealous, hungry love was at times a torture. Martin 
 was always kind, always considerate, but his hail- 
 fellow-well-met attitude towards her was at once a 
 wound and a scoffing. She might almost have been 
 his sister. 
 
 And, indeed, she had some apparent reason for her 
 jealousy for, Bernard once away, Martin no longer came 
 down to the drawing-room for the last hour of the 
 evening. But Bernard's absence was not the cause of 
 Martin remaining every night in his study till he went 
 to bed. He woke up one morning to find that what 
 he had for some little time dreaded had suddenly come 
 to pass. His inspiration was gone. His body was as 
 lead ; his spirit had lost its wings. He had been 
 driving himself too hard, and at last something within 
 him had broken. 
 
 After breakfast he looked at his opera and found it 
 stale. Incredible that this empty music, so ambitious 
 and yet so strained and tedious, should have exalted 
 him and thrown him into transports of delight ! In- 
 credible that day after day he should have woven this 
 stuff from his brain and never guessed that it was banal 
 and presumptuous ! He turned away from it, sick 
 and disgusted. He was played out. He knew from 
 past experience that this mood would go ; that, what- 
 ever it might seem to him now, the music he had written 
 during the last few weeks was the best of which he was 
 capable ; and that, after a few days' rest, the old, rich 
 mood would return. But he could not rest. He chafed 
 desperately against his unproductiveness. 
 
 He sat down and made an effort to concentrate his 
 mind on the final scene of the first act. But he found 
 that the creatures he had made had become dolls that 
 mocked him by their lifelessness. The more he worked 
 upon them, the more stupid they became. His King 
 was a mouthing baboon. It was no use : he must 
 give up work for a few days. But this sudden dis- 
 covery that what for some weeks had been as the very 
 breath of life was now as stale and distasteful as the
 
 THE POISONER 271 
 
 love letters of a woman one has tired of, was more than 
 a blow to his pride : it induced a sickening and crawling 
 fear. Perhaps after all he had deluded himself con- 
 cerning his genius. What use to tell himself that he 
 had made such discoveries before and that in reality 
 they were deceptions ? Always a victim of the moment's 
 mood, he could not realise the possibility of change. 
 
 He played the piano and was exacerbated by the 
 empty sound. Even Schumann, who in the past had 
 often soothed him, seemed now but a vain sentimen- 
 talist, indecently unreserved. What colossal male vanity 
 there was in the Frauenliehe I . . . Extemporisation 
 brought him the old worn-out modulations, the over- 
 worked progressions. His spirit could not react to 
 anything that was beautiful. It was stale, stale. 
 But it was not until he had risen from the piano, and 
 was pacing the room, that his growing irritation and 
 desire for relief produced the thought of drink. The 
 thought, once formed, became clamorous. And though 
 he played with it a little, pretending to himself that he 
 was resisting temptation, he knew well that to-day he 
 would drink. Indeed, his plan for obtaining liquor 
 was already formed. He would take a day off, go to 
 Ferringford, and have a bottle of wine with his lunch, 
 walk along the cliffs to Rossall, dine early, and visit a 
 music-hall in the evening. And when he returned by 
 the last train he would bring with him a parcel : a 
 couple of bottles of whisky, one for to-morrow and 
 the second for the day after, would put him right. 
 He required change, stimulus. In two or three days 
 he would be able to begin work again. . . . 
 
 So do all dipsomaniacs reason and plan, and do so 
 honestly. Experience teaches them nothing. One 
 drink to them is fatal : they have proved it a Jhundred 
 times : for to them there is never only one drink : one 
 is as many as a score. The first drink dulls the moral 
 sense sufficiently to make the second appear less risky 
 even than the first ; the second invites a third ; and 
 after the third there is not even a delusive attempt to
 
 272 THE POISONER 
 
 curb desire. All dipsomaniacs know this. Yet there 
 come times when this knowledge seems incredible. 
 Failure to keep resolutions has happened in the past, 
 they admit, but it is impossible that such failure should 
 occur again. For them in such moments failure is the 
 unbelievable thing. Self-deception ? No doubt. But 
 self-deception that is unconscious of itself. ... 
 
 Having once planned his day, he could not wait. 
 He ran downstairs to tell Monica he was going to 
 Ferringford for change. His manner as he told her 
 was a little too casual, perhaps, but she did not notice 
 it ; indeed, the news gave her great delight. 
 
 " How splendid ! " she cried ; " it's just what you 
 want ! " 
 
 "And to-night, Monica, I think I'll go to a music- 
 hall, and come back on the last train. That is, if you 
 promise not to sit up for me." 
 
 " Not if you don't want me to. But tap on my door 
 and say good-night when you come in so that I shall 
 know everything's all right." 
 
 He ran upstairs to get a book to read in the train. 
 D. H. Lawrence's The Lost Girl was on the table of his 
 study ; happy, but with a little fever in his blood, he 
 took the book do\vnstairs, put it in his overcoat pocket, 
 and prepared to go. 
 
 Monica opened the door for him and put up her face 
 to be kissed. Strange that as his lips touched her cheek 
 he felt no compunction, no moment of self-accusation. 
 He had, indeed, no feeling save one of anxiety to be 
 free. He must be away — out — lost — a wanderer — a 
 Vagabond ! And as he swung along to the station he 
 felt that he had rid himself of the incubus of his dis- 
 tracted self. Relief in half-an-hour was relief already ; 
 anticipation was almost as satisfactory as realization. 
 
 A high north-west wind was blowing the sand across 
 the road ; it had a false touch of spring. Patches of 
 sunlight scurried across the fields, lighting up for a 
 brief moment the writhing willows, the glossy steel of 
 the straight railroad, the white gates of the level-
 
 THE POISONER 278 
 
 crossing. It was a day of movement, of busyness. 
 The little station was deserted, and as he walked up and 
 down the platform, gazing now seawards at patches 
 of blue sky, and now inland toward the bridge from 
 beneath which his train would soon so importantly 
 appear, he felt his old self-confidence return. He had a 
 dozen hours of happiness before him : he would let his 
 brain riot as it willed. It should have every stimulus 
 it required. 
 
 But his excited anticipations received a check 
 v.'hen, the train having slid to the side of the plat- 
 form, there alighted from the compartment Martin 
 had selected as his own, the short, genial figure of 
 Dr Foster. 
 
 "Hello, Stavart. I was just coming to see you. 
 Off to Ferringford ? " 
 
 "Yes. Anything important ? " 
 
 His foot was already on the step of the carriage, 
 and he showed by his manner that, whether Foster's 
 business was important or not, he had no intention of 
 postponing his journey. 
 
 " It is, rather. But it can wait." 
 
 " What is it ? " 
 
 " I wanted to talk to you about your wife. I met 
 her yesterday in Salten — had a chat with her. Seems 
 to me she's very much off colour." 
 
 "Oh? I've noticed nothing. What's wrong ? " 
 
 " That's just what I hoped you'd be able to tell me. 
 Drop in to see me to-morrow, will you ? " 
 
 The guard had waved his flag, the whistle had 
 sounded ; as Martin leaned through the window, 
 alarmed, angry, and hesitating whether or not to alight, 
 the train began to move. 
 
 " Yes. I'll come round in the morning." 
 
 With a curt nod, which only too plainly revealed his 
 annoyance, he said farewell to one of the few men who 
 knew almost as much about him as he himself did. 
 
 The little incident changed his mood completely. 
 Foster, no doubt, was right, yet all the same . . . What
 
 274 THE POISONER 
 
 could be wrong with Monica ? The mere knowledge 
 that Foster had noticed what had escaped his own 
 eyes made Martin angry and resentful. It was tanta- 
 mount to an accusation of neglect. . . . Well, he 
 had been neglectful. He was Monica's lover, not her 
 nurse. No one but a fool would expect him to watch 
 over her like a Nonconformist, uxorious spouse. Pah ! 
 
 He looked upon the dunes flying past him on either 
 side and tried to dismiss the subject. But, now as 
 ever, he had no command over his moods, and before 
 he had reached Ferringford he was bitterly accusing 
 himself of callousness, of deliberate imkindness, even 
 of cruelty. 
 
 Ferringford is a terminus. Hotels and public-houses 
 crowd about the station in thick competition. Into 
 one of the more modest of the latter Martin entered 
 with the agitation of one who realizes that a great deal 
 depends upon what happens within the next few minutes. 
 It was just after midday, but already the saloon bar 
 had many occupants. He ordered a double whisky 
 and soda and watched the barmaid anxiously and 
 greedily as she went about her work. He swallowed 
 his drink hastily. Wonderful how quickly the change 
 came ! Almost at once he felt relief. He looked 
 about him and felt friendly towards his fellow-customers. 
 He would have liked to talk to one or another of them, 
 but all had companions already. Savouring his ease 
 of mind and body and luxuriating in it, he ordered a 
 second drink ; the effect of it was one of complete 
 happiness. 
 
 He left the saloon, made his way to the wind-swept 
 promenade, and walked northwards to the third of the 
 large ugly piers. The air here was extraordinarily 
 bracing. The tide was up, and slimy waves, brown and 
 heavy, spent themselves noisily against the sea-wall. 
 He went to the railings and gazed down at this excite- 
 ment. He tingled with life throughout his body; it 
 was as though every potentiality of his system was alert 
 and anxious to function. Presently, the rapid move-
 
 THE POISONER 275 
 
 ment beneath him induced a semi-hypnosis in which 
 time was of no account. . . . 
 
 But it is little happiness that dipsomaniacs derive 
 from the indulgence of their weakness. Moods of 
 exaltation soon die, to be replaced by an urgent desire 
 for their renewal. As soon as the edge of bliss becomes 
 blunted, more drink must be obtained, and the time 
 soon comes — comes within a few hours — when that 
 false state of bliss is beyond the command of the drinker. 
 By the evening that condition had overcome Martin. 
 He sat in a music-hall dully and stupidly unhappy ; but 
 there was no keenness to his misery ; though he suffered, 
 he was only just conscious of his suffering. The lit, 
 garish stage before him was a bore. He desired 
 excitement — the company of women — the feeling 
 that he was more intimate with life — that he was 
 surrounded by risks. He would like to speak to 
 people — to witness a dispute, a quarrel — to be a party 
 to a quarrel. 
 
 He rose and left the hall, and in the stormy night 
 walked in the commoner parts of the town, seeking a 
 place that might be frequented by low men and women 
 — thieves, prostitutes, pimps. Himself debased, he 
 would be among the debased ; despised by himself, 
 he would at least be among those who would not expect 
 him to be better than themselves. Soon he found such 
 a place. It was full of loud Lancashire women, full- 
 bosomed, vulgar and, in their speech, devastatingly 
 frank. Their men were curiously small and pale-faced. 
 The free atmosphere of the room soon had its effect 
 upon Martin. The loud conversation, the laughter, the 
 steady emphasis of a mechanical piano, the bright fire 
 in the hearth into which men occasionally spat, the reek 
 and fume of spirits, the overheated atmosphere, the 
 smell of hot human bodies, the artificial but very real 
 gaiety, the abandonment and casting away of all 
 restrictions, and— yes ! — even the feeling that all these 
 people were making their way towards death — were 
 even casting themselves upon sin and waste and death :
 
 276 THE POISONER 
 
 all these things conspired to rouse him from his sloth 
 and misery. He awoke and laughed and edged his way 
 to the bar. 
 
 " Yon's a fine lad ! " a woman cried to her companion, 
 nodding in his direction. He looked at her, looked deep 
 into her greedy, lustful eyes. 
 
 " And tha's a gradely wench ! " he called back. 
 
 He took his drink from the counter and walked over 
 to her. 
 
 " What 'II you have ? " he asked. 
 
 She pointed a finger at him and roared with laughter. 
 
 " Come off it ! " she cried. " My mon's wi' mc. Not 
 but what as Ah could do with a stout." She nudged 
 her companion. " A stout for thee, Emma ? " 
 
 " Ay, Ah could do with a stout." 
 
 He left them for a minute while he obtained the 
 drinks ; when he returned the two women were 
 whispering together eagerly. 
 
 " Staying the neet ? " the first woman asked Martin. 
 
 " What !— alone ? Not likely ! " 
 
 "Ee, lad, but tha's a fair knock-out. Where's tha 
 living ? " 
 
 "Salten," he lied. 
 
 " Well, come down Saturday neet I My mon's away 
 till Monday." 
 
 He went nearer to her and placed his hand about 
 her wrist. He whispered something in her ear, and 
 again she broke into uncontrolled laughter. . . . 
 
 He remained drinking with the two women until 
 closing-time, when their menfolk came to claim them. 
 
 The night had turned cold, and the biting air with its 
 peculiarly stimulating quality dizzied him. He was in' 
 a neighbom'hood unfamiliar to him,, and he had com- 
 pletely lost his bearings. Very rarely, even wheii so 
 drunk that the memory of his doings completely left 
 him, was he unable to walk with perfect steadiness, 
 and to-night nothing of his condition was apparent 
 save when he talked. A friendly poKceman, off duty, 
 took him to the station and put him in his train.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 AN hour before dawn Martin woke up in his bed 
 at Narrow End panic-stricken. He knew — 
 though he could not remember what it was — 
 that something terrible had happened the previous day. 
 His heart-beats hurt him ; he could feel a pain in his 
 breast — a great disturbance in his breast that increased 
 and almost choked him as, one by one, the events of the 
 previous day came back to him. It was incredible, 
 what he had done. He had done such things before, 
 and many worse things, but always next morning it had 
 seemed impossible that they could have happened. 
 
 But many of yesterday's events failed to return to his 
 memory. He remembered sitting in the music-hall, 
 but he had no recollection of leaving it. Perhaps his 
 drunkenness had been observed — he had, maybe, in- 
 sulted someone — he had been thrown out. His im- 
 agination leapt at and seized upon the thought, and 
 exquisite self-torture began. But in the midst of his 
 mental anguish he calmed himself with the reflection 
 that nothing very dreadful could have hai3ppned, for 
 here he was safe at home. The police, at all events, 
 had left him alone. And then came the memory of that 
 low public-house ; the sound of it was in his ears, and 
 the smell of it insidiously crept up his nostrils. He saw 
 the red-faced woman whom he had touched lasciviously 
 with his hand ; her greedy, insatiable eyes stared at him 
 in the dark. Then, again, memory failed him. The 
 last of yesterday's pictures that remained in his mind 
 was one of this woman with her head thrown back, 
 laughing ; under cover of his overcoat, he was pressing 
 her hot hand in his own. . . . 
 
 How had he reached home ? He did not know. 
 Had he entered the house noisily and waked up Monica 
 or Mrs Bassett ? Did they know ? Had he knocked 
 at Monica's room and said good-night through the 
 closed dooi- ? . . . These and a hundred other question- 
 ings assaulted him until his mind was all confusion. He 
 despaired of himself. He felt a coward ; the desire to 
 confess and, by confession, put everything right once 
 277
 
 278 THE POISONER 
 
 more, obsessed hini. Panic drove him. For a wild 
 minute he thought of jumping out of bed and going just 
 as he was to Monica's room and telHng her everything 
 — everything ! Perhaps he would have done so had 
 not two things happened. The noise of the servants 
 coming down from the attics above reached him ; 
 simultaneously, he thought of his overcoat and what it 
 contained. He had bought two bottles of whisky and 
 placed one in each pocket ; Avhen or how he had done 
 so, he could not think ; but all through the night the 
 knowledge, inactive but consoling, had lain deep in his 
 mind. Having struggled out of bed, he lit a candle on 
 the dressing-table. As he did so, a breath of cold air 
 reached him through the open window and, looking up, 
 he saw the sky with its thousands of bright, hateful 
 stars. Yesterday's wind had dropped ; soon the stream- 
 ing sun would rise, shameless and shame-revealing. 
 
 His overcoat was thrown over the end of the bed. He 
 was at it in a stride. Yes ! The bottles were safe. 
 He put on his dressing-gown ; then crept to the door 
 and locked it. He opened his pocket-knife, but his 
 over-eager hands trembled, and the small slender blade, 
 having been plunged diagonally into the cork, snapped 
 as he tried to draw the latter out. There was nothing 
 for it but to go downstairs : there was a corkscrew, he 
 thought, in one of the drawers of the dining-room side- 
 board. He seemed like a thief in his own house as he 
 silently went down the stairs one by one ; he felt his 
 way cautiously until his hand touched the sharp edge of 
 the newel upon which Symons' head had struck a few 
 months before ; then on tiptoe he went along the hall 
 to the dining-room door. Damnation ! There was 
 somebody in the room ; probably the housemaid mak- 
 ing the fire. Without knowing why, he hid himself in 
 the hall. He felt guilty ; if he were seen, everything 
 would be discovered. He imagined that anyone had 
 only to look at him to know. So he hid in the dark by 
 the side of the old-fashioned hatstand, hid there until 
 the maid came out with a bucket half full of ashes. As
 
 THE POISONER 279 
 
 she hurried down the passage into the kitchen quarters, 
 he darted into the dining-room, secured the corkscrew, 
 and returned to his bedroom. Once more he locked the 
 door and, taking the eider-down quilt from his bed, 
 smothered the bottle of whisky within it in order that 
 the sound of drawing the cork should not be heard by 
 Monica. He half filled his tumbler, added water, and 
 drank. Then he crept back to bed to think. 
 
 Courage quickly returned. He told himself that it 
 might still be possible to remain undiscovered. If only 
 he could remember what had happened last night ! 
 In all probability, everything had been as it should be. 
 His loss of memory, after all, was no certain indication 
 that he had not been conscious of all his actions the 
 previous evening. Indeed, there were many signs to 
 show that he had behaved normally, for his clothes 
 were neatly folded, his trousers were in the press, and he 
 had brought the two bottles of whisky safely to his 
 room. But he had done one unwise thing : he had 
 brought his overcoat upstairs. But perhaps he had 
 done this in order not to run the risk of dropping the 
 bottles, as might have happened if he had carried them 
 on one arm in order that he might have a hand free to 
 knock on Monica's door. . . . He lay thinking for some 
 little while, feeling at one moment that he could carry 
 the thing through without discovery, and at the next 
 that the strain of doing so was beyond his powers. For 
 he had aroused the craving for drink and still more 
 drink ; his mental equilibrium was disturbed ; he had 
 set free forces that would give him no peace until he 
 had surrendered to them. The drink he had just taken 
 made him almost indifferent to his l^te ; he felt callous, 
 cynical, a trifle amused. After all, what was the use of 
 struggling ? Was it worth while ? Did he really care 
 a damn about life, even at its best ? Was not his in- 
 stinct towards slow self-destruction the most real, the 
 most essential, part of his being ? 
 
 Yet, in spite of these doubts, when the maid knocked 
 at his door at eight o'clock, he rose with the determina-
 
 280 THE POISONER 
 
 tion to hide all from Monica and Mrs Bassett. But 
 before he went to the bathroom, he drank another 
 tumbler of whisky and water. His brain was now clear 
 and bright. If only he could refrain from taking more ! 
 If only last night's experience did not hang about him 
 like a mephitic cloud ! . . . Having concealed his 
 bottles of liquor, he ran downstairs lightly with his 
 overcoat and hung it in the hall. ... In the bathroom 
 he sang Butterfly's song as she waits at her window for 
 Pinkerton's return. He slapped about in the cold 
 water a little longer than usual, revelling in the manner 
 in which it soothed his overheated limbs. For a few 
 minutes, as he rubbed himself down, he felt extra- 
 ordinarily exhilarated, abounding with life. But by 
 the time he had shaved, the reaction had begun, slowly, 
 insidiously. It is this mitigation of ecstasy, even the 
 first slight abatement of high pleasure, that the dipso- 
 maniac cannot endure. His pleasure must grow keener, 
 moment by moment. . . . He was now back in his bed- 
 room. He had stopped singing. In half-an-hour he 
 would be restless, depressed, irritable. He would be at 
 the breakfast-table opposite Monica. He would have 
 to talk to her — give her a false account of his doings 
 yesterday. And, blast it ! Yes ! there was Foster to 
 see. He had forgotten Foster. What had he said ? 
 That Monica was ill, that he wished to talk to Martin 
 about Monica ! . . . Yes, he would have one drink 
 more — only one. . . . 
 
 When he had replaced the whisky, he took from his 
 dressing-table a bottle of eucalyptus, moistened his 
 finger with a few drops of the sickly fluid, and vigorously 
 rubbed the inside of his mouth. Then, as the sun rose 
 opposite his window, he examined his reflection in the 
 mirror — examined it closely and apprehensively. The 
 result satisfied him : his eyes were clear, his skin firm, 
 his expression unforcedly pleasant. Certainly there 
 was nothing in his appearance to betray him, to hint at 
 anything unusual. Later on, in a couple of hours, his 
 eyes would look tired, his skin would be dry and perhaps
 
 THE POISONER 281 
 
 faintly blotched, and peevish lines would show about 
 his mouth. . . . The gong sounded. . . . 
 
 No : they knew nothing, suspected nothing. That 
 was clear from the very first moment. This sudden 
 relief almost led him to self-betrayal, for his gaiety 
 bubbled over. 
 
 " The ugliest place in the world," he said ; " worse 
 than Wigan. Still, I liked it. Such an air ! — as brac- 
 ing as — well, as the cold bath I've just had. But not a 
 soul, Monica — I never spoke to a soul the whole day." 
 
 "But it's done you good," she said ; "I can see it 
 has." 
 
 " Well, it was a change. And I'm a-\vf'ly fond of 
 music-halls, especially the kind of thing we get here in 
 Lancashire. There's something so frank, so genuine, 
 so brainlessly hearty about music-hall artists. And if 
 there's one thing I do love more than another in the 
 whole world it is that gesture — you know it ! — when, 
 having finished her little song and dance, the yellow- 
 haired lady trips down to the footlights, raises her arms 
 and her eyebrows expectantly, stands on tiptoe, and in 
 every line of her figure beseeches applause. Sometimes 
 the applause does not come. But it does not matter, for 
 the band plays fortissimo.^^ 
 
 " You're not eating, Martin," said Mrs Bassett ; 
 "kidneys, you know." 
 
 " Sorry. May I have some toast, please ? In the 
 afternoon I went to the aquarium. Empty, of course. 
 Not a soul anywhere. Piers deserted, promenade 
 devoid of human life, cliffs covered with nothing but 
 grass — but I didn't go on the cliffs !— the Tower un- 
 tenanted, the Big Wheel stationary " 
 
 He laughed and Monica, pleased to see him so gay, 
 laughed also. Even Mrs Bassett, who obser\^ed him 
 closely, smiled indulgently. 
 
 "Dr Foster called yesterday," she said. 
 
 " Oh, did he ? I met him at the station — he'd just 
 come up from Salten." 
 
 Yes. He says Monica requires a change." 
 
 a
 
 282 THE POISONER 
 
 "Isn't he absurd?" exclaimed Monica. "I told 
 him I felt as well as could be — and so I do " 
 
 "But you don't look very well, dear," said her aunt ; 
 "you haven't looked well for the last three weeks or 
 so." 
 
 " Well, I'm not going away whatever Dr Foster may 
 say — so that's that." 
 
 " We shall see," said Martin teasingly. "I'm going 
 to see Foster myself this morning." 
 
 "About me?" 
 
 " Yes : he asked me to." 
 
 "Oh, but, really — really, Martin, he oughtn't to 
 trouble you. You know how fussy he is I " 
 
 " But if I went away with you ? " 
 
 The words slipped from him^ He did not mean them. 
 But he said them. 
 
 "I should love that ! Only Aunt would be lonely." 
 
 "Stuff and nonsense! I'm much too busy to be 
 lonely. And what with the Vicarcss and the Deep Sea 
 Fishermen's woollies and things. . . . Bournemouth, 
 now. That's what Foster thinks. This bracing 
 atmosphere's bad for nerves." 
 
 "Nerves!" exclaimed Martin. "Has Monica got 
 nerves ? 
 
 " No, Martin ; I've got nothing. But I'll go away if 
 you'll take me." 
 
 " Well, I'll see Foster this morning." 
 
 Monica then explained that she was going to Preston 
 almost immediately after breakfast on some business 
 about a new coat. She would be back about tea-time. 
 The news delighted Martin. 
 
 " There's nothing I can do for you before I go ? " she 
 asked him. 
 
 "Nothing, thanks. I shall just fool about to-day, 
 though I may do a bit of work this afternoon." 
 
 Before he rose from the breakfast-table, he knew that 
 he was doomed. He might pretend to himself that he 
 would take only just enough whisky during the day to 
 keep his nerves steady, but deep within himself he knew
 
 THE POISONER 283 
 
 that, no matter what the consequences, he must drink 
 and drink and drink. But he must do it cleverly, 
 secretly ; sooner or later, they would find out ; but, in 
 the meantime, he must outwit them. 
 
 Whilst Monica was preparing to go oat, he strode up 
 and down his study, angrily impatient. To lock him- 
 self in his bedroom now in order that he might drink 
 undisturbed would excite suspicion. He must wait 
 until his wife had gone. Reality, stripped of glamour, 
 was closing in upon him. He felt that his end must be 
 tragic, but the close of life must at least mean rest, and 
 at this moment he felt for life a deep abhorrence. . . . 
 
 . . . She knocked at his study and entered. 
 
 " A lovely day ! " he exclaimed. " Do get a proper 
 lunch, Monica. Are you sure you eat enough ? " 
 
 She smiled. 
 
 " Good-bye," she said ; "I shall be back soon after 
 four." 
 
 He kissed her. He heard her go downstairs, and he 
 pressed himself against his study door in order to listen 
 to her every moment. She was moving about in the 
 hall. Now she was talking to Mrs Bassett ; their low 
 voices sounded like people entering into a conspiracy. 
 Were they discussing him ? — they must be ! The front 
 door opened. More talk. Then the door closed with a 
 bang. Silence. 
 
 After a few moments' pause, he left his study, crossed 
 the landing and, having entered Symons' untenanted 
 room, walked quickly to the window and looked out 
 from behind the curtain. He was in time to see Monica 
 open the door in the wall and disappear. Smiling 
 cunningly to himself, he went to his bedroom, took 
 therefrom the two bottles of whisky and carried them to 
 his study. He locked himself in. He was safe. 
 
 • • • •-• • • • 
 
 Men who allow their thoughts to grow unregarded 
 and at their leisure like weeds, soon become their 
 thoughts' victims. Thought begins sometimes before 
 we are conscious of it, and Symons had been in Martin's
 
 284 THE POISONER 
 
 mind many minutes before he was aware that all his 
 intellectual faculties were fastened, leech-like, upon 
 that tragic figure. Symons had always been an enigma 
 to Martin, but since' the former's death Stavart had 
 cast from his mind the intruding recollection of what 
 he had been and what he had stood for. But what had 
 he stood for ? He did not know ; he had never even 
 guessed. Thoughts, feelings and suspicions that in 
 former days used to tease his mind and harry it, had for 
 long been kept in subjection, but this morning they 
 leaped upon him, victimised him. He had prepared his 
 brain for self-torture ; the drink that at first had brought 
 him ease was now to put him on the rack. That 
 brief moment in Symons' room had aroused the old, 
 implacable nightmare. 
 
 Martin. had never liked Symons; now that the old 
 man was dead, Martin knew it : admitted it. Symons' 
 affection had been oppressive, his watchfulness a 
 burden. All his devotion, though apparently born of a 
 deep and sincere liking, M'as, Martin felt, the result of 
 nothing but a heavy feeling of duty. It was as though 
 S3aiions owed him something, as though he and that 
 other of the older generation, Martin's own father, had 
 inflicted some irreparable injury upon Martin himself. 
 This could not be reasoned out'; it could only be felt. 
 And Martin did feel it. Those two old nien shared a 
 secret ; something terrible had happened in their lives 
 that they had kept from all the world. That something 
 terrible had killed Martin's father. The boy knew it. 
 Old S3^mons had known it. And in some way — Martin 
 was sure of this — Sjmions had been responsible, or he 
 regarded himself as responsible, for old Stavart's suicide. 
 
 As Martin sat with the whisky by his side and with 
 the burning, corrosive alcohol within his veins, his eyes 
 and his ears recalled that vivid scene of eleven months 
 ago when something of the truth was revealed to him. 
 
 Symons was in bed shivering with malaria. A tem- 
 perature that in a couple of hours had leapt from the
 
 THE POISONER 285 
 
 normal to 104° had alarmed the household, and Foster 
 had been summoned. In the meantime, Martin sat by 
 the bedside listening to the muttered ejaculations of 
 the sick man. Occasionally he would talk logically, if 
 not calmly ; but more often his words were merely the 
 confused mumblings of fever. 
 
 " You are still there, Martin ? " he asked. 
 
 "Yes, sir, I'm still here. Would you Uke the lamp low? " 
 
 "No. Yes." 
 
 He rolled over on his side and turned his protruding, 
 naked eyes upon Martin ; but it was clear from their 
 empty gaze that they saw nothing. One of his hairy, 
 thick-veined hands hang outside the counterpane closed 
 and opened again. Martin bent over him. 
 
 "I cheated you, Roger," Symons muttered. Then, 
 without change of expression, and as though addressing 
 the same person, he added : "And that's why Roger 
 died. . . . And that's— why Rog — er died. . . . And 
 that's — why Rog — er died." 
 
 Martin could have smiled at the ludicrous effect of 
 this oft-repeated rhythmical line had not Roger been 
 his father's name. He stood motionless, willing the 
 old man to speak further ; but though words were on 
 his lips they were broken and indecipherable. 
 
 "What did you say ? " demanded Martin. 
 
 Symons closed his eyes as though to hide something ; 
 cunning seemed to be alive in him in spite of his clouded 
 brain. Martin placed a trembling hand upon his 
 shoulder and shook him. 
 
 " What did you say ? Tell me ! Do you hear ? — 
 tell me ! You cheated Roger Stavart — eh ? Well, 
 then— how ? " 
 
 The eyes remained closed. The hairy hand opened 
 and shut continuously. Martin released his hold of 
 Symons' shoulder, and sat down. He waited a long 
 time. Most willingly he would have increased Symons' 
 fever if by doing so he could drag from him his secret. 
 But what could he do ? What means was there of 
 compelling this stricken old man to speak ?
 
 286 THE POISONER 
 
 Martin turned out the lamp. Darkness might reveal 
 the truth just as night reveals the stars. The flickering 
 fire crowded the ceiling with busy shadows ; there was 
 no sound save the whispering of flames and the uneasy 
 breathing of Symons. Suddenly, Martin bent over 
 Symons, placed his lips against his ear and called, im- 
 periously, like a summons : " Roger Stavart ! Roger 
 Stavart ! " 
 
 Symons moved painfully. 
 
 " Betrayed ! " he muttered. " Betrayed to his death 
 — by me — by me ! " 
 
 " Yes — yes ! But how ? How did you betray him ? " 
 
 There was no reply to these or to other questions that 
 Martin asked. Never again was he to hear from 
 Symons' lips a single word that would throw light on the 
 mystery that Martin felt was still potent for evil. 
 
 Time had not dimmed the vividness of that scene of 
 last February. Martin, though he had recalled it but 
 infrequently during the last few months, could re- 
 member every word and every word's inflection. And 
 now, with his alcohol-heated brain, with his suspicions 
 released, he dwelt on it, brooded upon it. With 
 brooding came anger and a thirst for discovery. 
 
 He recalled how, after his illness of the summer, 
 Monica had on two or three occasions referred to papers 
 that her father had left, how she had said that some day 
 they would read them together. She had spoken per- 
 functorily, as though urged to do so by a sense of duty, 
 and as though she had wished to postpone the reading 
 as long as possible. And, indeed, Martin had been only 
 too ready to fall in with her implied suggestion. He 
 had imagined that the papers were part of an incom- 
 pleted book of travels, or perhaps a few unpublished 
 essays. In his state of happy, care-free convalescence 
 he had not cared to trouble about them, and certainly 
 it had never occurred to him that the papers to which 
 Monica referred could concern him closely or could have 
 any bearing upon his own or his father's life.
 
 THE POISONER 287 
 
 But now, suspicion awake, his thoughts reverted to 
 the subject, and at once his mind was aflame. Symons 
 ahve might well fear to disclose what he would be will- 
 ing to have known when he was dead. It might 
 be that those papers could solve the mystery — that 
 they contained a confession ! Whatever sin or crime 
 Symons had committed, Martin could not but admit 
 that the old man had a stern sense of duty. If he had 
 been guilty of wickedness, it could only be because he 
 had been taken by surprise. What he might for his 
 own safety or self-respect keep concealed he would be 
 anxious to divulge when the necessity for concealment 
 no longer existed. . . . No longer capable of thinking 
 clearly, but allowing suspicion to have complete 
 dominion over his mind, he felt a hot, uncontrollable 
 resentment overcoming him. Monica knew this 
 mystery ! She had known all the time ! And she 
 herself was in it, part of it ! She was concealing it from 
 him ! 
 
 He poured out more whisky and, in drinking it, felt 
 that by doing so he was revenging himself upon Monica, 
 was getting even with her. Something — some instinct 
 — led him to Sjonons' room ; he crept there softly and 
 locked the door behind him. The room had been left 
 precisely as it was in Symons' lifetime. His crutch and 
 his stick were standing against the wall in the corner ; 
 the roll-top desk at which he occasionally worked was 
 open, and various papers were neatly arranged upon it ; 
 his dressing-gown hung upon the door ; the little table 
 by the bedside was heaped with the books he had been 
 reading in his last days, and by the side of them was his 
 pipe and tobacco-pouch. Martin looked about him 
 with a slow, considering leye. Quite easily he could 
 imagine that Symons was still alive, that this room had 
 been quickened by his recent presence. But he was 
 not to be deterred by any ghostly presence ; if Symons 
 had been lying on that bed, alive and helpless, Martin 
 would have searched that desk. 
 
 He opened the drawers one by one before examining
 
 288 THE POISONER 
 
 their contents. It was typical of the household that 
 nothing was kept under lock and key ; Cubbins and the 
 maids were trusted as implicitly as Martin himself. If 
 anything were here that concerned him, he would soon 
 find it, and the conviction that before him, in one of 
 those drawers, lay the secret of his father's suicide, of 
 Sjnnons' illness and his fatherly solicitude for the friend 
 of his son, and perhaps — who knows ? — of his own 
 strange psychology, made him tremble with an eager- 
 ness that was half panic, half triumph. So little con- 
 trol had he over himself that, as he began to examine 
 the contents of one of the drawers, he could not pause 
 to give proper attention to each of the bundles of papers 
 he took out. Each bundle was neatly tied and labelled ; 
 on the labels were written in Stavart's spidery hand- 
 writing descriptions of the bundle's contents. This 
 writing was difficult to decipher and Martin, soon be- 
 coming impatient, tore off the string binding the parcels 
 and, examining the contents document by document, 
 threw them carelessly on the floor when they had served 
 his purpose. 
 
 In another mood, many of these papers would have 
 absorbed Martin. Symons had always been an in- 
 dustrious writer who, with the self-centredness peculiar 
 to genius, held the belief that all that concerned himself 
 was valuable and worthy of record. There was a series 
 of notebooks labelled " Monica : her Life " ; one 
 drawer was devoted to records of the financial aspects 
 of his various expeditions ; contracts with various 
 publishers formed another bundle ; a large volume 
 bore the title " History of my Dealings with the Foreign 
 Office"; and there were hundreds of letters, loose 
 memoranda, lists of people's names, passports, etc. 
 
 At the end of haJf-an-hour, Martin became conscious 
 of that uncontrollable restlessness which, in the dipso- 
 maniac, invariably accompanies the abatement of the 
 influence of alcohol. The floor strewn with papers 
 irritated him, and the failure to find what he wanted 
 gave him the insane feeling that circumstances, as well
 
 THE POISONER 289 
 
 as people, were in league against him. He paced the 
 room for a minute or two ; then, suddenly, he turned, 
 hurried to the door and, forgetting it was locked, tried 
 to open it ; ten or fifteen seconds passed before he 
 realized why it would not yield to his pull, and during 
 that time he tugged at the handle angrily. Even it 
 was in the conspiracy. Once in his study, he drank 
 deeply, and did not return to Symons' room until one 
 of the bottles had been emptied. 
 
 He resumed his searcli with increased excitement. 
 The drink he had taken gave him no pleasure ; he was 
 in a frenzy tliat distorted the whole world and that 
 threw him into self-hatred. He was angry at the dis- 
 order about him ; at his inability to read easily and at 
 his brain's fiery and wayward ardour that refused to 
 grasp the words before his eyes. He feared that each 
 document he threw on the floor was the document lie 
 wanted ; yet he could not compel himself to examine 
 it closely. He had not time : he told himself he had 
 not. He must find out now ! 
 
 It was before his eyes. He was holding it in his 
 hands. " For Martin Stavart when I am dead. Henry 
 Symons. June 15, 1920." He fled — fled away 
 trembling from that room, leaving the heaped-up papers 
 on the floor, unmindful of them. Out on the landing 
 he was faced by Mrs Bassett. He saw her, but was not 
 conscious of her. 
 
 " Going out, Martin ? " she asked, quietly regarding 
 him. 
 
 He heard her and did not hear her, and brushed past 
 her wildly. He held a large sealed envelope in his hand. 
 His great, lustrous eyes blazed defiance. He had got 
 it ! — he held the Secret ! He flung himself into his 
 study and banged the door behind him. Mrs Bassett 
 heard the key turn in the lock. 
 
 She went into Symons' room and saw there evidence 
 of what she had feared the previous night. She was 
 thankful it had not happened while Monica was at 
 home. But soon Monica would be back and would have
 
 290 THE POISONER 
 
 to face this mad breakdown of Martin's. . . . She 
 walked slowly downstairs to the telephone. Foster 
 would be here within the hour. 
 
 " My dear Martin " He could get no further 
 
 than that. The long letter was written in meaningless 
 words. He could not piece them together. Single words 
 seemed to jimip from the paper to his eyes, but they 
 had no connection with each other. They meant 
 nothing — absolutely nothing 1 
 
 He was drunk : not physically drunk, but mentally 
 frenzied. He could walk quite normally, and, if he had 
 tried to speak, words would have come clearly and 
 sensibly enough from his mouth. But his mind was 
 chaos. Ten minutes ago he had been all desire to learn 
 the Secret ; but now the damned thing could wait. It 
 was his, anyhow. He had got it ! He felt that he had 
 frustrated them all, and he smiled cmmingly as he 
 locked the envelope in a drawer and placed the key in a 
 hidden place within the piano. 
 
 And now for more drink ! . . . 
 
 To his friends and to those who love him the dipso- 
 maniac seems callous and cruel in his indifference to the 
 sufferings he brings upon them. But he is unconscious 
 of either callousness or cruelty. Once mider the 
 domination of drink, he feels driven by it, goaded by it. 
 He is, indeed, drink's victim, and he resents that victim- 
 isation, repudiates it, and rails against Fate that he 
 should be chosen to suffer. And yet he wilfully, 
 savagely and relentlessly increases his suffering. He 
 must do so ; he will fight to do so. He blames the 
 world that he is as he is and will simultaneously struggle 
 with the world to remain so. He is the moth in the 
 flame. . . . 
 
 Martin could not anticipate Monica's suffering be- 
 cause his own was so great; indeed, in his perverted 
 state of mind he blamed her for his downfall as he blamed 
 the rest of the world. These people tried to help him 
 by love, by a thousand kindnesses, by continuous
 
 THE POISONER 291 
 
 solicitude. And yet, secretly, they blamed him. They 
 believed he could command himself. When Monica 
 came home, she would think he had not tried. Trying ! 
 — good God ! — trying ! As reasonable to declare that 
 a consumptive had tuberculosis because he had omitted 
 to try not to have it. 
 
 His mind seethed with these thoughts. He pitied 
 himself intensely. He saw hunself as a creature whom 
 everybody had abused. . . . But what did the whole 
 damned business matter ? What was life, after all ? 
 Was he, indeed, ahve ? Maybe, he was a helpless, 
 bound creature in somebody's dream. Time, space and 
 Ufe were illusions. The beastly scheme of things was 
 only for this moment. In the end, all was dust. 
 
 He slept. He was drugged. The fire burned low 
 and died out. . . . 
 
 • •••••• • 
 
 A knocking in his head and a voice calling : " Martin ! 
 Martin ! " It went on and on, that knocking and that 
 calling. It was summoning him from his sleep. He 
 wished to wake and answer it, but could not. He 
 struggled to wake, for he felt that someone was in 
 danger and required his help. He opened his eyes. 
 He heard Mrs Bassett's voice, usually mild and gentle, 
 but now imperious and a little frightened ; she was 
 calling his name. 
 
 " Yes — yes ! " he answered, and rose. Heavy vath 
 sleep, he tottered to the door and opened it. But 
 though it was Mrs Bassett who had been calling him, it 
 was Dr Foster who stood on the threshold. 
 
 "May I come in ? " 
 
 " Why, of course. Wliat's the matter ? What time 
 is it ? " 
 
 " It's about two o'clock. But you've frightened Mrs 
 Bassett and me nearly out of our wits. We thought 
 you must be ill." 
 
 " 111 ? No. Yes, but I am. I remember now — I've 
 been drinking. Oh yes, I begin to understand," he 
 said truculently. " You were sent for, eh ? They
 
 292 THE POISONER 
 
 got afraid, eh ? Was that it ? — so they sent for 
 you ! " 
 
 "No," lied Foster calmly: "nothing of the kind. 
 But you arranged to call on me this morning " 
 
 "I?" 
 
 "Yes — about your wife. You remember — yester- 
 day—I met you at the station " 
 
 "Yes. You said she was ill. Well, what's the 
 ma-matter with her ? " 
 
 "May I sit down?" 
 
 "Do, please!" 
 
 " And, I say, Stavart — it's rather cold in here. 
 Won't you offer me some ? " 
 
 The little man waved his hand towards the whisky 
 bottle standing on the table. 
 
 "Sorry. Du— do help yourself." 
 
 "Feeling nervy? " 
 
 " Rotten ! '' 
 
 "Well, you'd better have something." 
 
 "I will." 
 
 But it was Foster who poured out Martin's drink ; 
 having done so, he placed the bottle beyond his com- 
 panion's reach. Stavart gulped down his portion neat. 
 
 " Well, what about it ?'" he asked. 
 
 " I came to talk to yon about your wife, but I can see 
 I shall have to talk about you." 
 
 " Yes ? " 
 
 "May'l?" 
 
 " Look here, Foster, what is it ? Don't make such a 
 damned mystery " 
 
 "Well, my dear chap, I'm concerned about you — 
 about your drinking. Let me help you." 
 
 Martin laughed. 
 
 "Not yet — not till I've had my fling. Not till I'm 
 ill. Not till I can't drink any more. Not till I'm 
 beaten. A week from now, if you like " 
 
 " It'll not take a week, StaVart," saidToster, holding 
 the young man's gaze in the passionate earnestness of 
 his own. " Twenty-four hours — less than that — and
 
 THE POISONER 293 
 
 you'll be in delirium. Your illness last summer finished 
 you for this kind of thing. Listen, Stavart : I swear 
 to you that unless you pull yourself up at once — now ! — 
 you'll be a madman to-morrow night ! " 
 
 Martin winced. The blow had struck. 
 
 " Oh, nu-nonsense. I know what I can take. You 
 can't frighten we." 
 
 " I don't want to frighten you. Give me your hand." 
 
 Martin placed his hand within Foster's. 
 
 " You've got a pulse — you've got a temperature," he 
 said. "You're spent. I could see it yesterday. 
 You've been driving yourself too hard, Stavart. You 
 must have a week in bed." 
 
 "You think so," said Stavart mockingly. 
 
 " Just as you please, of course. I can't compel you. 
 But I've told you what will happen — well, if this goes 
 on." 
 
 " Now you're threatening me ! " 
 
 "Warning, you mean." 
 
 " Well, Foster, look at me. You can see I'm excited 
 — that it's impossible for me to lie in bed and be nursed 
 — that I must have risks and danger ! " 
 
 " Yes, I see that. But I can give you something that 
 will make you sleep. You will wake up calm, and when 
 you wake j^ou shall have more whisky." 
 
 "How much? " 
 
 " It will depend upon your condition. But I promise 
 you you shall not suffer any more than is necessary ; 
 you will hardly suffer at all." 
 
 " Very well, then : I consent." 
 
 He looked furtively at the bottle of whisky by Foster's 
 side and then gave a sudden impulsive lunge towards it. 
 But the little doctor was too quick for him. 
 
 "No," he said, grasping the bottle round the neck 
 and holding it behind him ; " you've put yourself in my 
 charge — you must obey my orders ! " 
 
 Martin glanced upon him angrily, and Foster realized 
 that he had reached a dangerous moment. If Stavart 
 were not to slip out of his control altogether, he must
 
 294 THE POISONER 
 
 act now and act cunningly. But Foster had no cunning 
 in his nature. He could do nothing but trust himself 
 to the impulse of the moment. He rose and held out 
 his hand ; involuntarily Martin took it. 
 
 "I swear to you most solemnly, Stavart," he said, 
 " that even one more drink is dangerous — most danger- 
 ous. You are on the very borderland. Go to bed, my 
 dear fellow. You are suspicious of me. You think I 
 want to exercise power over you just for the sheer 
 pleasure of doing so. Don't think that ! It isn't true ! 
 I want to help you — for your own sake, I want to help 
 you. I am afraid for you." 
 
 As he spoke, Martin's opposition oozed away. He 
 felt weak, spent. He was finished. He turned to go. 
 
 " You'd better send Cubbins up to me." 
 
 " Thanks. I will. And, Stavart " — he smiled 
 frankly and with just a touch of mischief — " you 
 mustn't mind if I take the whisky with me." 
 
 " Throw the damned stuff away ! Let me sleep — " 
 sleep." 
 
 He left his study and went along the landing to his 
 bedroom while Foster ran downstairs to find Cubbins. 
 Mrs Bassett was waiting for him in the dining-room ; 
 she came out into the hall as she heard his step on the 
 staircase. 
 
 "It's all right," he said. "He's tractable. He's 
 getting into bed now, and in ten minutes or so he'll be 
 asleep. He wants Cubbins. Will you have a fire lit 
 for him ? Where on earth did I put my bag ? " 
 
 Upstairs Martin was undressing, dazed and only half 
 conscious, but extraordinarily relieved. It was 
 wonderful not any more to have to plan one's actions, 
 to be in the hands of someone else, to have all responsi- 
 bility taken away ! Wonderful to feel that still all 
 might be well, that in a few short minutes he would for- 
 get — that all Avould be blotted out, that comfort and 
 gradual ease would be his once more ! Yet there was 
 something lying heavily within his mind that he had 
 forgotten. He could feel its weight, its oppressiveness.
 
 THE POISONER 295 
 
 It was something that had happened to him that 
 morning. . . . The remembrance of it came to him hke 
 a flash of lightning, and on the instant he was filled with 
 a violent agitation. He returned to his study, took the 
 key of the drawer from its hiding-place, secured S^Tuons' 
 letter, and carried it back to his bedroom. He thrust 
 it under his pillow. It could wait. Later on he would 
 read it ; he would learn the Great Secret when he was 
 undisturbed — in the night, when he was alone — in the 
 still hours when he could brood upon the mystery that 
 had encompassed him these years and that still hung 
 upon him like a shroud.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 IT was midnight when Martin woke. He turned 
 over in his bed and sighed. 
 "Are you awake, sir ? " asked a low voice. 
 " Who's that ? That you, Cubbins ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 " Why aren't you in bed ? What's the time ? " 
 
 " Just gone midnight. The doctor said I'd better sit 
 up till you woke. He said you might want something." 
 
 " I don't think I do, thanks. I shall go off to sleep 
 again, I expect. But I can't allow you to sit up." 
 
 Cubbins was standing by the bedside with a half- 
 glassful of whisky and water. 
 
 " The doctor said you were to drink this, sir." 
 
 So full of drowsiness was he that Martin raised him- 
 self with difficulty. He drank without reUsh what was 
 given him. 
 
 " Fmmy," said he ; "I must have slept for ten hours, 
 and yet I feel I'm only half through. Go to bed, 
 Cubbins : I shall be all right." 
 
 But the man still lingered by the dressing-table in the 
 shadows cast by the fire. 
 
 " Have you been told to sit with me ? " 
 
 " No, sir. But Miss Monica — the mistress — would 
 like me to, I'm sure. And you may want something." 
 
 " Well, look here, Cubbins : set your alarm clock for 
 four o'clock, and come to see me then. I promise that 
 if I want you before, I will come and knock you up." 
 
 Cubbins went reluctantly, and closed the door softly 
 behind him. 
 
 Martin composed himself for sleep, but the short dis- 
 cussion had completely awakened him, and he liad not 
 been lying alone in the half-darkness for more than a 
 few moments when the thought of the unread letter 
 beneath his pillow stung him to alertness. His curiosity 
 to read it battled with his fear of what it might disclose. 
 He felt that he was on the brink of something dreadful, 
 something that would add poison to his already poisoned 
 life. For a few moments he played with the thought 
 that he might burn the letter unread, and thus rid him- 
 
 296
 
 THE POISONER 297 
 
 sielf of his nightmare mystery, but he quickly reflected 
 that a mystery for ever out of his reach would soon 
 assume enormous dimensions and, because of its in- 
 accessibility, become continuous torture. The thing 
 must be read. But now ? His raw nerves, high-keyed 
 and painful, cried out against both his present suspense 
 and the prospect of further pain. Yet he could not lie 
 awake with that document unread. 
 
 He crawled out of bed and lit the lamp that stood on 
 the table at his side. Then, trembling with apprehen- 
 siveness and feeling a little sick with fear, he drew the 
 letter from beneath his pillow. He sat on the edge of 
 his bed as he read it. 
 
 My dear Martin: — Not until I am dead will this 
 reach your hands. It is a confession. I have wondered 
 often the last few months if you ought not to be spared 
 the knowledge of what I am about to tell you, but I 
 have always decided that my reluctance to disclose to 
 you my act of meanness — of betrayal — betrayal with 
 tragic consequences — was born not only of my desire 
 not to cause you suffering, but also of my anxiety 
 that I should always stand well in your memory. I 
 have no weakness as to "confessions." Things done 
 are done. Talking about them does not alter them. 
 To " confess " them is but an attempt to evade the just 
 punishment of remorse. So I do not tell you of my 
 crime in order to get right either with myself or with 
 God — if God there be. I tell you because if in life I 
 was a cheat and, in part, a sham, I will not in death 
 be either. You shall learn what manner of man I am. 
 You will perhaps object that the more courageous 
 attitude would have been to disclose to you my secret 
 whilst I was still alive. No doubt ; but had I done 
 so, you would have repudiated me and mine, and you 
 would have made it impossible for me to give you the 
 help that, last November, you so sorely needed. I think 
 I saved you from death, or from something worse than 
 death : you once swore to me that that was so. And
 
 298 THE POISONER 
 
 having taken you into my household, where you be- 
 came your old self — happy and with your genius bearing 
 fruit day by day — it became impossible for me to act 
 in such a way as to disturb and interrupt your life. But 
 when I am dead these considerations will no longer 
 have force. But why tell you at all ? As I have said 
 above, things done are done ; why make them alive 
 again ? Well, my dear boy, I want to lay a ghost ; I 
 want to remove from your life something that is 
 darkening it. 
 
 Martin read all this with impatience, without con- 
 sideration. What had mattered so much to Symons 
 mattered nothing at all to him. It seemed to him 
 absurd that Symons should waste so much time in self- 
 explanation when the thing itself still waited to be told. 
 But with the next paragraph his attention became fixed. 
 
 Your father and I were in Central Africa, among 
 spongy swamps and tangled jungle. Our native carriers 
 had deserted us, our goats and camels were dead, our 
 medicine chest was lost, and we were both ill with 
 dysentery. It was the season of rain. For days we had 
 crawled over and waded through that rain-soaked land, 
 without food and shelter. Each of us was a mere ruckle 
 of bones. Within our armpits were ulcers. I do not 
 think that either of us had any hope left, but a stubborn 
 pride that refused to acknowledge defeat kept us mov- 
 ing. A whole day would pass without a spoken word. 
 Our only hope of sahation lay in striking the village 
 of Chitnyangwe, which we knew to be in our neighbour- 
 hood but of whose direction we were uncertain. I will 
 spare you the recital of our sufferings ; all that I wish 
 you to understand is that when, at length, we stumbled 
 upon the huts of Chitnyangwe, we were not quite sane. 
 You must understand that, Martin. It is my only ex- 
 cuse. If I had ever believed that I was wholly respon- 
 sible for my treachery, I should not be alive now : I 
 should not be fit for life. I would have made an end 
 of myself.
 
 THE POISONER 299 
 
 The natives treated us with apparent kindness, and 
 day by day our physical health improved. But mentally 
 we were sunk in a very abyss of depression and de- 
 lusion. We suspected everyone; we suspected each 
 other. Strange that though neither of us had anyone 
 to depend upon save the other, we should have quar- 
 relled violently day after day. We quarrelled about 
 nothing. Our irritation was a disease ; our fierce an- 
 tagonism a madness. But we were bound closer to one 
 another by the discovery that so far from the natives 
 being kindly disposed towards us, they were in reality 
 keeping us alive for sacrifice on one of their approach- 
 ing feast days. We found that our hut was guarded 
 by day and night. 
 
 It is now that I reach the terrible part of my story. 
 I will relate it baldly. The disclosure of the natives' 
 intentions towards us was made by the woman who 
 cooked our food and tended us. She was old, but her 
 age had not dulled her tenderness, and towards your 
 father she showed the inspired solicitude of a mother 
 for her child. She would stand gazing at him sorrow- 
 fully. She bandaged his ulcers. Secretly and by night 
 she brought him a rude coverlet when she saw him 
 shivering with malaria. And one day she bent down 
 to him as he lay on the ground and whispered something 
 in his ear and placed her hand upon his mouth so that 
 he could not reply. As she whispered she looked round 
 at me many times, darkly, warningly. When she had 
 gone 
 
 As Martin turned over the leaf, a crumpled piece of 
 paper covered with writing disengaged itself from the 
 pages of the letter, and slipped on to his chest. But he 
 paid no heed to it. His rapid vehement eyes devoured 
 Symons' letter so quickly that his brain could not keep 
 pace with their onrush, and many times he was com- 
 pelled to turn back and read a second time. 
 
 — your father motioned me to his side and told me the 
 destiny that had been prepared for us. But the old
 
 300 THE POISONER 
 
 woman had a plan for our escape. Late that evening 
 she would bring us food and arms. Two hours before 
 dawn, at an arranged signal, it would be safe for us 
 to escape. She made no explanation of how the sentry- 
 was to be disposed of. Indeed, she explained nothing. 
 It would be as she said : that was all. Well, this drew 
 us together. Our enmity ceased. And this in spite of 
 the fact that I distrusted the old woman. For some 
 little time I had been suspicious of the showy but subtly 
 ironic friendship of the chief, and the fact that our hut 
 was guarded was in itself enough to prove that our 
 seeming friends were enemies. So I believed the 
 woman's story that our death was already fully planned; 
 but I had no faith in her willingness to assist our escape. 
 Natives are not like that. Their cunning is past all 
 reckoning. They rarely act without a motive other 
 than that lying on the surface. I pointed all this out 
 to your father, but he was firm in his belief in the 
 woman's good intentions. At length I was convinced 
 or, at least, half convinced, and I fell in with the plan 
 for our escape, for I could see no other means of leaving 
 the village in safety. 
 
 During the day, fearing to excite suspicion, we talked 
 but little ; moreover, we were in no mood to talk. 
 Remember, Martin, we were not normal : / was not 
 normal. I was ready to suspect even myself. Fever 
 was in our blood. I must tell you that we had made 
 spy-holes through the wall at the back of our hut and, 
 unobserved, we could see much of what was going on 
 in the village. An hour before sunset I had my eye 
 to one of the spy-holes. The rains had ceased and the 
 evening air was warm and humid. A little more than 
 a hundred yards away I could see the old woman who 
 tended us sitting on the ground. The chief strolled 
 up to her, nodded in the direction of our hut, and 
 smiled. "Look ! " said I to your father, "they are dis- 
 cussing us ! " Your father crawled to a peephole by 
 my side. We saw the woman's yellow teeth as she 
 smiled with triumphant malice in our direction. The
 
 THE POISONER 301 
 
 chief made obscene gestures as though indicating to 
 what particular tortures we should be put before 
 we were killed. They talked excitedly together and 
 laughed, the woman swajang to and fro as she emitted 
 a hard cackle. She looked evil and cruel. We watched 
 breathlessly, but nothing further happened. But it was 
 enough ; for me it was more than enough. My suspicion 
 of the woman was now confirmed. Your father's faith 
 in her was gone. "No woman, not even the most con- 
 summate actress, could so disguise her feelings ! " I 
 said, in a whisper; "what we have just seen is what 
 she really feels." Your father nodded. We sought 
 for her motive in offering to help us to escape, and 
 concluded that mere delight in vainly raising our hopes 
 had prompted her. To the slave, we said, power is a 
 heady wine, and the mental torture of white men is too 
 rare an event to be missed. If either of us had any 
 lingering doubt of her treachery, that doubt was removed 
 when your father discovered that his revolver, care- 
 fully concealed within the wattled roof, had been 
 stolen. This, our one weapon of defence, could have 
 been taken only by her. 
 
 This new turn of events induced in us a recklessness 
 that was almost madness. We could think and talk 
 of nothing but revenge. We worked ourselves up into 
 a determination to murder. The old woman must die ; 
 she had earned her death. And, having killed her, we 
 would make a dash for liberty. We planned it all out 
 during the ensuing hour. The moment that we selected 
 for her death was the moment she would enter the hut 
 with our evening meal. She should be strangled. As 
 the word "strangle" fell from my lips, your father 
 and I looked into each other's eyes, and immediately 
 averted our gaze. I suddenly saw the horribleness of 
 what we proposed to do ; I wanted to draw back, but it 
 was too late ; the circumstance that we had put our 
 thoughts into words seemed to make the event in- 
 evitable. Again our eyes met, and each asked the 
 question : "Who is to do it? " Unobserved by your
 
 302 THE POISONER 
 
 father, I took two grains of wheat from the floor 
 and closed my hand upon them. At that moment, 
 Martin, I was quite honest: I swear I was. "I have 
 either one or two grains of wheat in my hand," I said ; 
 " if you guess right, then I will do it ; if you guess 
 wrong, then the job is yours." Without lifting his 
 eyes, he said: "Two." My hand acted of its own 
 Volition ; secretly and knavishly, two of the fingers 
 separated themselves and released one of the grains ; 
 it happened in a second ; the word " two " had scarcely 
 been spoken, and already it was done. I turned my 
 hand palm upwards, opened it, and revealed the 
 solitary grain. 
 
 He strangled her before my eyes. I who had 
 tricked him into this act of vengeance, of seeming 
 justice, watched him. 
 
 Well, we escaped. We got clear away. But it was 
 not your father who escaped with me : it was a changed, 
 a wholly different, man. He brooded everlastingly. 
 He never forgave himself; in his thoughts he was 
 always killing her afresh. When, a few months later, 
 the knowledge reached us that she had in truth been 
 our friend and that we had slain a woman ready to 
 risk her life for ours, the blow crushed your father 
 inevitably. Later, when he killed himself, I was un- 
 able to keep the knowledge from you : only you and 
 I know that he committed suicide. But it was I 
 who killed him : I slew him, not in passion, but through 
 meanness, through cowardice. I betrayed him first, 
 and then killed him. 
 
 There : I have told you all. You know now the 
 worst that can be said of me. If you for ever exec- 
 rate my name, I shall know nothing of it, but it is 
 bitterness for me to think that you must always hate 
 the memory of me. But as I write you know nothing 
 of all this, and it is possible for me to bless you and to 
 say that I am, with affection and from the bottom of 
 my heart, your well-wisher, 
 
 Henry Symons.
 
 THE POISONER 303 
 
 The long, bald statement was like a nightmare. It 
 was impossible for Martin to see each incident in its 
 proper perspective, to balance one thing with another 
 and apportion blame and find excuse. He did not 
 reason it out, but most vividly he visualised each 
 incident. His morbid, exacerbated mind gloated pain- 
 fully over the spectacle of his father's fingers digging 
 passionately into that wretched woman's neck. The 
 thing drew him, pulled at him ; it had the deep 
 fascination of repulsion. 
 
 Placing the letter upon the bed, he looked at the blank 
 wall before him, but saw nothing that was there. He 
 saw himself with cruel impulses, like his father. He 
 saw himself murdering that woman. After all, that 
 act of his father, unreasonable, mad and utterly vile 
 though it was, was no worse than many an act of his 
 own. Most wilfully he exaggerated all his faults and 
 weaknesses into vices. He felt vile. In this mood all 
 his life was spread out before him as a series of incidents 
 profoundly selfish and ruthless. He had ridden rough- 
 shod over everyone. He had been the cause of Sjnrions' 
 death, almost he had driven Monica mad ; even now he 
 was torturing her. He had no doubt that she was lying 
 awake in her room, her eyes open and distracted, her 
 mind on the rack of pain. And he did not care about 
 these things. Oh yes, he was callous — callous and 
 cruel. There was in him a hidden spirit of evil ; he 
 was, indeed, possessed. Whence had that evil come ? 
 From his mother, of whom he knew nothing ? Or from 
 his father, who had destroyed an innocent, faithful 
 savage ? But his father had suffered from remorse ; 
 in the end, remorse had slain him. How futile — to be 
 capable of great wickedness and yet to be too weak to 
 bear the consequences of that wickedness ! It was like 
 himself. He could be cruel continuously for weeks and 
 weeks and then, suddenly, would come remorse, self- 
 hatred, a loathing of his soul too deep for words. 
 
 Panic, a wrecking paranoia, seized him. He was 
 afraid for himself. He must do something — spend him- 
 self in action. He sat up in bed with his hands clasped
 
 304 THE POISONER 
 
 tightly before him. . . . How much whisky was left ? 
 Half a bottle at least — probably more. He could 
 master Cubbins — oh yes ! Cubbins would obey him. 
 As he was getting out of bed, he saw and stared at the 
 crumpled piece of paper that had fallen from the sheets 
 of Symons' letter. It was with a pain at his heart and 
 a sudden breathlessness that he perceived it was in his 
 father's handwriting. He seized it and read : 
 
 This is the end. I can bear it no longer. Since that 
 fatal hour in Chitnyangwe I have been face to face with 
 my real self. I know myself as I am. I can forgive 
 myself that we killed her — for my action was yours as 
 well — but I can no longer live with a man — myself ! — 
 who took a savage, gloomy delight in his act. Hour by 
 hour I live those minutes again, and feel once more 
 a strange uplifting, a devilish ecstasy ! What are we, 
 Symons ? What is man ? What am I ? 
 
 I have written to INIartin. He, at least, must know 
 how I die. But it will be "arranged." Our coroners 
 are not psychologists. Farewell ! Keep my secret and, 
 once more, farewell ! 
 
 His blood froze, yet his brain was lit by fire. Reason 
 went, yet cunning directed all his actions. In his bare 
 feet he tiptoed to the door. He opened it noiselessly. 
 The landing was illuminated by a large moon. Down 
 the stairs he crept, finger on lip, as though enjoining 
 silence on himself and all the world. Yet the night was 
 a very silent one : no noise at all save the turn of the 
 key in the front door's lock. His bare feet trod the 
 hard, frost-held ground. Now he was running. He 
 knew nothing of the sharp-edged stones that tore his 
 feet, which left a bloody track along the white road ; 
 knew nothing of the pricking of the flint-like grass of 
 the sandhills. But he saw the full sea with its calm 
 waves, the black Stannar curving. The moon was 
 streaked along the sea, royally. He was on the shore. 
 He ran wildly into those waves and swam out and out, 
 swam imperiously to his death, savouring every second 
 of this last luxury of life. 
 
 . 4
 
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