)rni| 
 al 
 
 Victoria
 
 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 HILDA AGAINST THE WOBLD 
 
 THE NIGHT OF TEMPTATION 
 
 THE LIFE SENTENCE 
 
 A GIHL OF THE KLONDYKE 
 
 Six WOMEN 
 
 Six CHAPTERS OF A MAN'S LIFE 
 
 TO-MORHOW?
 
 Just as the sun was losing its fierceness, they started.
 
 BY 
 
 VICTORIA CROSS 
 
 f 
 
 NEW YORK 
 THE MACAULAY COMPANY
 
 Copyright, 1920, by 
 VIVIEN CORY GRIFFIN 
 
 Copyright, 1921, by 
 VIVIEN CORY GRIFFIN 
 
 'All rights reserved 
 
 FEINTED IN THE U. S. A.
 
 DEDICATED 
 
 TO 
 
 MY BELOVED AND ADORED 
 MOTHER 
 
 THE INSPIBER OP ALL MY WORK, WHOSE SPIRIT 
 LIVES EVER IN MY SOUL, AND WHO, BY REASON 
 OF HER GLORIOUS BEAUTY, DIVINE GIFTS, AND 
 THE WONDERFUL GREATNESS OF HER CHARACTER, 
 WAS HERSELF MOST TRULY A DAUGHTER OF HEAVE 27 
 
 2134305
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAG* 
 
 I THE BACHELOR ... .. . m , w ,., ll 
 
 II THE VISION OF LOVE .. ,., M m l% 32 
 
 III THE PRICE OF AN HOUR .. ... , 46 
 
 IV THEIR HONEYMOON . ,., , ,., lw 67 
 V TRIUMPH ........ ,. ,. 99 
 
 VI MORE CRUEL THAN THE BEAST OF 
 
 PREY 131 
 
 VII PLAYING THE GAME . . , ,. ,. 183 
 
 VIII THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE :w ,., . 228 
 
 IX THE RIDE INTO LIFE , . 256
 
 Sons and Daughters of Heaven, 
 
 What is your heritage here? 
 Pain and sorrow and sighing, 
 
 Weeping and toil and care. 
 
 Sons and Daughters of Heaven, 
 
 What is your guerdon above? 
 Triumph, fulfilment, rejoicing, 
 
 Peace and infinite love. 
 
 Would you exchange for earth's playthings 
 
 Visions your eyes have seen? 
 Would you lose the amaranth flowers 
 
 For coins of golden sheen? 
 
 Wealth and Pleasure and Power, 
 
 And all that this world can give 
 Are nothing to you, O children, 
 
 Whom God has taught how to live. 
 
 Your eyes with truth are shining, 
 
 Your feet with light are shod; 
 Your thoughts are fixed on Heaven, 
 
 Your spirit dwells with God. 
 
 What is to you the darkness, 
 
 The travail of the way ? 
 You walk with steps unfaltering 
 
 Towards Eternal Day. 
 
 VICTORIA CROSS.
 
 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN
 
 DAUGHTERS OF 
 HEAVEN 
 
 THE BACHELOR 
 
 YES: he was a bachelor and he had never 
 wished to be anything else till he went 
 for his holidays one year to the Yellowstone 
 Park, one of the most mysteriously beautiful 
 places in the world. He stayed at the Foun- 
 tain Hotel, and opposite him at the narrow din- 
 ing-table sat the girl who was to change his 
 views. She was small and fair, with fluffy sunny 
 hair and blue eyes, and seemed overshadowed 
 by a somewhat grim-looking aunt who sat be- 
 side her. He soon found out they were Eng- 
 lish, travelling for pleasure, and, with true 
 American dash, not only obtained an introduc- 
 tion but had won over the aunt on the second 
 day of his stay. On the third he had persuaded 
 them to a moonlight stroll round the paint 
 
 pots, or mud geysers, and looking at the girl's 
 
 11
 
 12 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 delicate face in the silver light, felt his heart 
 beat in the real romantic way. She seemed so 
 ethereal, so dainty, so refined! she appealed to 
 him, perhaps because she was something so 
 different from himself. He was a great big, 
 strong fellow a typical American, straight 
 and tall, with a good figure and fine features, 
 all of which the blue eyes saw with pleasure, 
 and so they smiled prettily on him whenever 
 he looked at her. He had a large heart, full 
 of friendliness, and a hand always ready to 
 help the weak or injured or oppressed. He 
 had sentiment, too, though in New York his 
 was counted amongst the hardest heads, senti- 
 ment that made him feel attracted towards all 
 that was fragile and delicate. He would 
 watch the white butterflies that floated in at 
 his office window in the spring with kindly 
 eyes, and their confidence was never abused. 
 
 The aunt liked him, as did everyone else, 
 and generally spoke of him to her niece as 
 "that lively American." The niece liked him 
 even better than the aunt did, and generally 
 thought of him as "that handsome American."
 
 THE BACHELOR 13 
 
 They went for numerous walks together, the 
 girl and the man alone, without any chaperon, 
 as the sensible American custom allows. The 
 aunt did not want to walk the long distances, 
 and after suitable remonstrance gave in to her 
 persuasive niece. 
 
 "You couldn't do it in England, Eva," the 
 elder lady remarked. 
 
 "No, but Neil Johns is an American, he'll 
 understand it, and it will be all right," replied 
 the younger, and won her point and enjoyed 
 her walks, in which both she and the American 
 learnt something of each other and liked what 
 they learnt, and incidentally saw much of the 
 mystic charm of the park, one of the brightest 
 jewels in America's crown of beauty. 
 
 Two weeks slipped by pleasantly while they 
 visited the different pools wonderful magic 
 pools of emerald, of deep cobalt, of lightest 
 sapphire and listened awestruck to the mut- 
 terings and groanings, the stifled threats and 
 moans of the waters imprisoned beneath their 
 feet two weeks of August weather, sunny and 
 beautiful, and yet with occasional skifts of
 
 14 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 snow, for at eight thousand feet up it is never 
 too hot, even in August, and with frosty morn- 
 ings when the hoofs of the deer rang sharply 
 on the hard glittering roads. 
 
 One day about the middle of the month there 
 was excitement in the hotel. The fountain 
 geyser, the finest in the park, was announced to 
 be going to play at midnight that night, and a 
 brake or coach would be ready to take any of 
 the guests who wished to see it to the pool, 
 about a mile and a half from the hotel. Only 
 at intervals of many years did this particular 
 geyser rise in its glory, and no absolutely cer- 
 tain date could ever be fixed for it, as it was the 
 most capricious in the Yellowstone. None of 
 the guests then in the hotel had ever seen it 
 play, though many were on their third or fourth 
 yearly visit to the park. Calculations had been 
 made of the time since the last display, and it 
 was thought without doubt the time had come 
 round again. 
 
 So the idea of the visit to it by night was en- 
 thusiastically welcomed, a supper was served 
 at eleven, and a little before midnight the
 
 THE BACHELOR 15 
 
 coach came round and was filled to overflowing 
 with tourists of all nationalities. A merry, 
 rollicking crowd they were, laughing and 
 shouting and jesting good-humouredly in the 
 scramble for places. A few minutes more and 
 they were off at a canter down the white road. 
 
 It was a glorious night; the moon filled the 
 sky with radiance, and threw its soft light over 
 the weird, enchanting landscape, over the turfy 
 grass at the side of the road, over the gleaming 
 white areas of the formations, the natural pla- 
 teau or border round each boiling spring, 
 formed by the overflowing of its lime and sul- 
 phur charged waters, over the glistening, boil- 
 ing lakes, and shone in pale rainbows on the 
 veils of steam that hung above them. All 
 round, far off on the horizon, where the land 
 rose against the sky like the edges of a bowl, 
 stood a belt of fir trees, black and impressive 
 in the moonlight. 
 
 Neil and Eva sat in the back of the coach 
 close together, and felt happy. 
 
 When they arrived near the geyser, the 
 coach swept off the high-road over a green
 
 16 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 grassy trail among the trees, and then drew up 
 on the outer edge of the clearing a wide, cir- 
 cular space five hundred yards across which 
 was the home of the fountain geyser. Green, 
 mossy grass bordered the circle, then came the 
 court of the formation, its smooth limey surface 
 gleaming white in tfoe moonlight, with little 
 boiling streams wandering here and there on it, 
 and in the centre, the pool of the geyser itself, 
 black as ink, boiling, throwing its hot breath in 
 curls of steam upon the air. 
 
 The more noisy of the tourists gave a shout 
 of delight as they saw it, and, scrambling down 
 from the coach, dispersed chattering and laugh- 
 ing over the formation. Neil helped his com- 
 panion down, and they walked together to the 
 rim of the pool. Though inactive at present, a 
 practised eye could see that an eruption was at 
 hand. The agitated waters seethed bubbling 
 to the brink, where they lapped over steaming, 
 sending rivulets in all directions over the flat 
 court. The pool was unusually full and the 
 surface heaved with a continual swaying move- 
 ment.
 
 17 
 
 The man and girl stood staring down into the 
 troubled depths for a few moments in silence. 
 Then the girl looked up and round, at the 
 stately trees on the edge of the forest which 
 loomed black and impenetrable round them, at 
 the turfy margin where the other tourists al- 
 ready satisfied with their inspection had 
 grouped themselves together to await the 
 "burst up," as they familiarly called it, at the 
 clear sky, ablaze with stars, stretching over all. 
 
 "We might make those folks a fire, they 
 look pretty cold," remarked the American re- 
 flectively. "There's lots of wood about," and 
 as the girl readily assented, they went off to 
 gather up the old sticks which, as always in 
 these mountain forests, lay strewn in all direc- 
 tions, bleached and dry, looking in the moon- 
 light like the old and whitened bones of skele- 
 tons, and adding to the weird ferocity of the 
 scene. 
 
 His idea was soon taken up, and while the 
 women had shaw r ls and rugs spread out for 
 them and were told to sit still and watch for 
 events, the men all started after wood in every
 
 18 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 direction. A quarter of an hour later a roar- 
 ing camp-fire blazed merrily, throwing a rich, 
 red light over the marble-like floor of the for- 
 mation and ruby-like reflections on to the 
 steaming flats of water that stretched out now 
 stealthily even to the edge of the turf. They 
 sat round the fire and told stories and sang 
 songs, and wore the first hour away. 
 
 Then when one and two o'clock had come 
 and passed, the cold and monotony of waiting 
 began to tell upon them. First one and then 
 another grew horribly sleepy and yawned. 
 The women shivered and dozed in their wraps, 
 and at last one man said decisively : 
 
 "I reckon the thing's not going to work. I 
 am going right along home." 
 
 This was the signal for the whole party to 
 rise with cheerful acquiescence. Most of them 
 were so sleepy they had ceased to care whether 
 the geyser played or not. Only Eva sat still. 
 She did not look sleepy nor cold. Neil bent 
 over her. 
 
 "I feel quite sure the geyser is going to rise 
 and pretty soon now. Wouldn't you like to
 
 THE BACHELOR 19 
 
 stay a little longer, or would you be afraid?" 
 
 She looked up quickly. 
 
 "Afraid! I shouldn't be afraid anywhere 
 with you," she answered, and the American felt 
 his heart beat with pleasure. 
 
 "The coach is starting, shall we let it go and 
 walk home?" he asked, as the last tourist swung 
 himself thankfully up the side, and the driver 
 shouted "All aboard." 
 
 "Yes, we can walk quite well," she answered; 
 "let the coach go." 
 
 "Aren't you coming, Neil?" called out a 
 friend. 
 
 "No, I am going to see the thing through 
 now I am here," he answered. 
 
 "Well, you'll just have something to tell us 
 in the morning if the old thing gets up after all. 
 Good night!" and the coach rattled off. 
 
 It was very still : not a sound came from the 
 forest; the moon dropped slowly through the 
 limpid sky; their fire had burned to a still, red 
 core of heat; the man and girl sat close by it 
 watching. Once as they sat without speaking, 
 one of the Yellowstone bears came out of the
 
 20 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 surrounding belt of trees and ambled across the 
 open space in front of them. The great, vel- 
 vety fellow threw his head over his shoulder 
 and looked at them steadily for a moment, 
 snuffing the air, then, as they made no hostile 
 movement, he ambled on and disappeared in 
 the forest. They waited while another hour of 
 silver silence stole by, and ever the boiling 
 water brimmed over the edge of the pool, 
 spreading itself silently towards them, like a 
 sinister hand groping after victims. 
 
 Then with a sudden roar, like the roar of a 
 wild beast, and a tremor that ran through the 
 whole formation, the geyser rose in its majesty, 
 the surface of the water was flung upward, the 
 whole mass of the water reared itself up eighty 
 feet in the air, boiling, hissing, shrieking as if it 
 were a soul in agony, dazzling white in the 
 moonlight, throwing off clouds of steam which 
 floated away, coloured with a thousand rain- 
 bows, that were dissipated in the silver air and 
 spray that fell like showers of diamonds. Un- 
 like the other geysers, from the surface of 
 which rises a jet or narrow column of water, the
 
 THE BACHELOR 21 
 
 entire volume of this one is thrown into the air 
 and remains a solid standing body from which 
 great limb-like jets of water are pushed out 
 from moment to moment. The whole seems 
 like a colossal human figure, shrouded in a 
 sheet, struggling violently to free itself, throw- 
 ing out its arms wildly, this way and that, in 
 mad efforts to fling off its clinging stifling veils, 
 and giving vent to convulsive smothered 
 screams. Illusion is complete, and the two sol- 
 itary spectators on the edge sat motionless, 
 awe-struck, staring at this revelation of Nature 
 in agony. Shrieking, groaning in direst pain, 
 pitifully imploring for help, the great figure 
 swung from side to side, stretching out its arms, 
 enveloped always in its clinging w r hite drap- 
 eries, now towards them, now towards the calm 
 and jewelled sky. Desperately under its muf- 
 fling sheet of white, among its veils of steam, 
 it fought and struggled, calling aloud to the 
 silent heavens for relief, for liberation. For 
 twenty minutes the twisting mass of water 
 stood at its greatest height, then it sank and 
 fell lower; the giant prisoner, as if exhausted,
 
 22 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 seemed to droop ; the wild cries changed to low 
 moans. 
 
 Eva laid a hand on her companion's arm ; he 
 turned and. saw her eyes were wide with atten- 
 tion and full of tears. 
 
 "Isn't it wonderful?" she whispered. "Is it 
 not alm'ost heartrending? It seems as if it 
 must be a living thing, struggling to escape 
 from that awful boiling cradle. Look at it! 
 'Look now ! it seems to beckon us" 
 
 With a louder, more piercing, shriek the 
 geyser had again risen to its highest pitch ; the 
 fury of the tortured water was at its height, 
 swayed slightly by the draught it created. 
 The figure seemed, as the girl said, to lean to- 
 wards them, to throw out its white waving arms 
 toward them. For an instant only, then the 
 body staggered and, wavered and sank; its 
 strength was failing; the struggle was over. 
 With sobbing cries, like those torn from an an- 
 guished human breast, it fell back exhausted to 
 its prison home. Down, lower and lower, 
 never ceasing its despairing sobs, it descended, 
 until at last before the strained eyes of the
 
 THE BACHELOR 23 
 
 watchers there was nothing but the smooth 
 black surface of the boiling pool. The appari- 
 tion was gone; the last smothered, gurgling 
 groan died upon the air, and all was completely 
 still ; the prisoner was drawn back to its terrible 
 prison from which through the dull aeons of 
 the years it had tried fruitlessly to escape- 
 drawn back by that mysterious, invisible, irre- 
 sistible force that is the law of its being. 
 
 The girl shivered. 
 
 "How sad it seems," she said, "to look on 
 and not be able to help. Did it not seem in 
 wild distress as if longing to leap out; it was 
 beautiful, magnificent but terrible, don't you 
 think? I feel so sorry for it." The American 
 laughed. 
 
 "Oh, I reckon the geyser is all right; you 
 needn't worry about it. If it has a jollification 
 and a burst up like this every few years it pre- 
 vents it getting dull." 
 
 "It did not seem very happy," remarked the 
 girl thoughtfully, her eyes fixed on the black 
 lake in front of them, strangely tranquil now; 
 motionless.
 
 24 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 The man glanced round ; it was nearing four 
 in the morning and the moon was sinking. 
 The cold was great, but the beauty of the spec- 
 tacle had absorbed their attention and pre- 
 vented them feeling it. Now the biting air 
 pierced home. Neil rose to his feet. 
 
 "We must be getting back," he said. 
 
 The girl looked up, and the great stillness, 
 the sublime solitude of the vast arena in which 
 they were, the beauty of the mingling lights, 
 the deep glow of the red fire and the fading 
 moon-rays, impressed her deeply. The scene 
 had all that fierce, grand beauty of America 
 that so delights the eye unused to it. She felt 
 no fear of the cold nor of the solitude. Look- 
 ing up at his tall, strong figure above her, she 
 felt confident that he could protect her against 
 all dangers. She would have liked to stay 
 there and watch through this night of silent 
 beauty, till the dawn came up again in all its 
 splendour. She rose reluctantly. 
 
 "I will come," she said, "but I must go and 
 have a look at the geyser first. I feel sorry for 
 it. It seemed to call, appeal to me"
 
 THE BACHELOR 25 
 
 He laughed good-naturedly. 
 
 "I'll fetch you an extra wrap," he answered. 
 "Don't go near the edge," he called back, as he 
 went towards the camp fire. 
 
 The girl moved over the formation towards 
 the jagged brink, and stood there, looking 
 down into the now quiet, black mirror of the 
 boiling lake ; little swirls of steam rose from it 
 here and there. The moonlight fell on her and 
 her image, dainty and fairy-like, showed in the 
 dark mirror beneath. Suddenly a little crack 
 like the break of steel ... a call of terror. 
 Neil turning from the fire, saw the slender fig- 
 ure disappear ; a volume of steam rushed up as 
 the water foamed over the crumbling edge. 
 Like a madman he tore to the brink and 
 plunged in after her as the formation split into 
 long fissures under his feet. A projecting 
 ledge of rock about four feet down had caught 
 the girl. From this his strong arms lifted her, 
 raised her. Scalded and blinded he struggled 
 to the rim and half threw, half pushed her, 
 maimed, inert, senseless with pain, on to the 
 solid limestone. The water hissed and foamed
 
 26 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 in boiling waves to his shoulders as he took back 
 its prey. The next moment he had sprung 
 out. An agony such as he had never dreamed 
 of in his life, wrapt him from knee to shoulder. 
 He staggered back with her to the bank where 
 their coats and rugs had been left. 
 
 "Say, are you hurt very much? Are you in 
 great pain?" 
 
 "Not so very much," came back her voice. 
 It was only a whisper, but what a dreadful 
 sound of pain it had ! He looked down at her 
 face in the bright white light. It was like mar- 
 ble; but the eyes were dilated and strangely 
 luminous ; under his gaze the lips trembled into 
 their sweet little familiar smile. He dropped 
 to his knees on the bank, and commenced to 
 wrap a rug round her to protect her from the 
 freezing air. As he did so an irrepressible 
 groan of agony broke from him. 
 
 "How good of you to save me! How good 
 of you!" she whispered. He bent over her. 
 Such an overwhelming sensation of love for her 
 filled him that for the moment it completely 
 conquered his pain.
 
 THE BACHELOR 27 
 
 "Dearest, if we both get through this, noth- 
 ing shall ever part us. You love me say you 
 do?" 
 
 One arm came round his neck; the other 
 hung helpless. 
 
 "You know I do; I love you." 
 
 "You will marry me?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 The black pines stood round in their sol- 
 emn ring; the formation gleamed cruelly be- 
 hind him; the jagged black mouth of the now 
 silent geyser grinned. 
 
 The man's agony was almost unendurable, 
 but the words poured new strength into 
 him. He raised his head, and his lips were 
 firm. 
 
 "I must try and carry you home, darling." 
 
 "It will be too much for you," she mur- 
 mured. "You must be so hurt." 
 
 "Xo, you are no weight. I shall do it easily. 
 I like to carry you. Are you suffering very 
 much?" 
 
 "Xo, don't worry about me." 
 
 The man strode on. His heavy leather boots
 
 28 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 had protected his feet the pain was not there, 
 well, Heaven be thanked for that; he could 
 walk. From the middle of the leg to the waist 
 he felt on fire ; the torment of the scalded flesh 
 lashed him. He walked at a furious pace, 
 though the sweat broke out on his forehead 
 from sheer agony, and rolled down his face in 
 the icy night. It was very still, the road white 
 and silent before him; the hills in their beauti- 
 ful outlines on the horizon showing dark 
 against the calm and radiant sky. How long 
 the distance seemed ! Would it never end, this 
 long white road? this torture of burning flesh? 
 Yet in all his pain, his thoughts leapt about as 
 he pressed his precious burden to him. How 
 light she was! How like those white butter- 
 flies so delicate and fragile. Was she suffering 
 much he wondered! No, she would faint or 
 cry out he thought. Her eyes were wide open, 
 and whenever he looked down at her she smiled. 
 Those smiles were like draughts of wine to him. 
 Heaven be thanked! She could not be much 
 hurt if she could so smile. His own torture 
 seemed to grow. But what did it matter? he
 
 THE BACHELOR 29 
 
 had saved her. He was strong; he could suf- 
 fer and set his teeth and not care. 
 
 At last the hotel came in sight. At the 
 threshold he almost fell, stiff, cramped, ex- 
 hausted, sick with pain. He was just able to 
 reach a bench and sink down on it, still holding 
 the girl in his arms. His head swam. As in 
 a dream, he saw first one white, frightened face 
 peer at him, then another, till he was sur- 
 rounded by an ocean of them. His burden was 
 taken from him and laid on another bench. 
 He saw a man a doctor he supposed bend 
 over it and lift the rug away he had so care- 
 fully wrapped round it. How still the girl lay. 
 A terror gripped his heart, and, with agony in 
 every movement, he staggered on to his feet 
 again. Some hands held him back, at the same 
 moment he heard a cold measured voice say: 
 "Nothing is of any use, she is already dead." 
 
 He tore himself away from the detaining 
 fingers and pushed his way to the doctor's side. 
 
 "Dead?" he repeated wildly. "Why? 
 Why? I got her out at once. She did not 
 seem to suffer much. What has killed her?"
 
 30 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 He saw the doctor's cold, unmoved face as 
 in a red mist. He heard him answer as from a 
 long distance: 
 
 "Shock, I should say, my dear sir, and the 
 extreme agony she must have been in." 
 
 Extreme agony for her! the little delicate 
 white butterfly! And she had smiled at him 
 through it all in silence as he had carried her! 
 The thoughts seemed to strike his brain like 
 blows. The next minute all was dark before 
 his eyes. Then suddenly he fell with a crash 
 amongst the awed men and sobbing women. 
 
 "He jumped in after her!" "He risked his 
 life!" "What a hero!" "Jumped into the 
 boiling water!" rj.n in whispers round him as, 
 shuddering, some of the men stooped and car- 
 ried him over the threshold. 
 
 
 
 Two months later he was able to leave the 
 Yellowstone, looking aged and careworn, with 
 lines of pain stamped deep in his face, and 
 many seams and scars upon his body, but 
 deper far than any was the scar upon his mem- 
 ory. Never could he forget the red agony of
 
 THE BACHELOR 81 
 
 that night in the mountain park, nor the girl 
 who had died so quietly, in such a brave silence, 
 in his arms : the little white butterfly with the 
 courageous soul, and so he is still a bachelor.
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 
 
 THE corridor above the great hall of 
 Braithwaite Abbey was wrapped in thick 
 shadow, the only light in it seemed to emanate 
 from the white arms and shoulders of a girl 
 who leant on the balustrade, looking over into 
 the space beneath. 
 
 Lamps were still burning there though mid- 
 night had already struck, and her eyes fol- 
 lowed wistfully, intently, the movements of a 
 man's figure below, as he walked restlessly 
 backwards and forwards over the great stone 
 flags. 
 
 Every now and then he would stop by the 
 open hearth and pause there, looking into its 
 dying fire, and the red glow fell on a face, hand- 
 some in every line, but stamped now with a look 
 of absolute despair. 
 
 He was smoking absently, feverishly it 
 .seemed, for he would light a cigarette and then 
 Jay it down and leave it to go out, then pick 
 
 32
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 33 
 
 it up, light it again and again lay it down, like 
 a man whose brain takes no heed of what his 
 muscles are doing. 
 
 Finally he threw himself into a chair and 
 buried his face in his hands, and a low groan 
 came up to the listening, watching girl. 
 
 Her white hand closed hard on the balus- 
 trade at the sound, and she leant still lower 
 over it, while the eyes that gazed down upon 
 him, grew more intensely yearning. 
 
 Suddenly the man started up, gathered to- 
 gether some papers on a table near him, and 
 with a decided step walked across the hall and 
 disappeared through the pillared arches at the 
 end. 
 
 The girl above waited, but he did not come 
 back, and after a few minutes she turned away, 
 went down the corridor and entered her own 
 room. 
 
 It was a beautiful room, like all of those at 
 the Abbey, and it struck her so, as she turned 
 the switch and flooded the place with light, but 
 she had not been happy there. 
 
 Her visit came to an end tomorrow, and
 
 34 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 but for leaving him, she would not regret it. 
 Of the house-party she had been admitted to 
 be the least important and least noticeable 
 guest, and such a fact does not contribute to 
 a woman's pleasure; also she was the poorest. 
 All her clothes were just a little less fashion- 
 able than the other women's. Not rich enough 
 to possess a maid, her hair was never quite so 
 well done as theirs. The youngest of any of 
 them, even this seemed against her, in a so- 
 ciety where smartness was everything. 
 
 The kindest of the men and women had 
 simply ignored her, the others had laughed at 
 and made fun of her. 
 
 But now it was over and she was going and 
 nothing mattered at all, except that she was 
 parting from him, perhaps never to see him 
 again. He had been the only thing that had 
 really mattered, after all, the whole time. She 
 had not cared very much when the women 
 smiled at her short simple frocks, but when his 
 great dark eyes had looked over her, absently, 
 as if he did not see her, ah, that had hurt ! And 
 she was far too timid to speak to him ! one is so
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 35 
 
 stupidly timid at seventeen! If they could 
 only have had one little talk together, how she 
 would have enjoyed it! but he had always been 
 with the older women, those witty, laughing 
 women, or the men. 
 
 Now she was going away, and, that which 
 seemed so dreadful, she knew after what she 
 had seen that she was leaving him in the grip of 
 some great trouble. 
 
 "What can it be?" she asked herself, over and 
 over again, "money? debts? disgrace? If I 
 only knew! if I could only help him!" And 
 the bitter thought came quickly in answer 
 young, poor, insignificant, she could do noth- 
 ing. 
 
 It seemed as if it would be impossible to 
 sleep. She sat there, tense, motionless, hear- 
 ing that terrible groan he had given, in all the 
 air about her. Then suddenly she rose and un- 
 dressed and threw herself on the bed in a pas- 
 sion of tears. "I can do nothing, nothing. 
 What is the use of loving a person if one is poor 
 and helpless ?" 
 
 While all sound gradually died down into
 
 36 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 silence and even the girl fell asleep, worn out 
 with tears, the man downstairs, Eric Allan, 
 paced up and down his room on the lower floor, 
 in an agony of indecision and despair. 
 
 Wonderfully handsome and attractive, 
 young, as the thick, black hair and strong, lis- 
 som figure testified, with all the best gifts the 
 Gods can give, in his hands, his straight, beau- 
 tiful features seemed contracted with misery, 
 his clear, smooth skin drawn and lined with 
 pain. 
 
 "What a fool I have been!" he exclaimed to 
 himself, coming up to the table and letting his 
 haggard, burning eyes wander over its disor- 
 dered piles of papers. "Debts, summonses, 
 claims, and nothing to meet them with; and 
 now not able to pay even Carlyon my card 
 debts. It's time I went, I think. Why not 
 shoot myself and have done with it all?" He 
 flung himself into a chair and stared blankly 
 opposite him. 
 
 "I can't raise another penny anywhere that 
 I can see. . . . That game to-night, I only 
 played to get something, and then lost. ... I
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 37 
 
 wonder if Carlyon plays straight? . . . Don't 
 let me begin to doubt my host. No, it's my 
 own fault. I think a pistol is the best cure for 
 me." 
 
 There was a long silence while the man 
 thought, heavy, painful thoughts that drag 
 across the brain, cutting it. 
 
 "There seems no way out, nothing I can do 
 ... of course I could work. There must be 
 something I am fit for, but then ... is it 
 worth it? I don't know that this life's much 
 fun ... I have done most things. ... I 
 wonder what love is? I've never met that. 
 I wonder if I found a woman now who really 
 loved me, without any other motive whatever, 
 I should feel differently?" 
 
 He was silent again, while before him, passed 
 in review, images of women he had known and 
 now knew, beautiful faces, sweet voices, lovely 
 forms, but always floating with them, came a 
 misty memory of gold and jewels given them, 
 of sacrifices made for them, of fresh debts con- 
 tracted of iron fetters, those soft, small hands 
 had forged for him.
 
 38 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 He sprang to his feet again, a pallor of 
 death on his face. 
 
 "No, curse them all," he muttered. "They 
 have only helped in the general destruction. 
 I want no more of them. I've done with them 
 and this maddening existence. One shot set- 
 tles it all." 
 
 He crossed over to a writing-table, unlocked 
 a drawer and took out a revolver. He looked 
 it over carefully, saw it was loaded, cocked it, 
 and then, suddenly, the creak of a door open- 
 ing, startled him. He turned round sharply. 
 His door was open, and on its threshold stood 
 the fairest being he thought his eyes had ever 
 rested upon. He stood transfixed, motionless, 
 his heart beating. A girl stood there, so 
 young, she seemed almost a child, in the long, 
 straight night-gown that fell to her little bare 
 ivory feet and opened at her throat, showing a 
 warm column of rose-tinted neck. Above her 
 brows rested masses of fair hair, which fell in 
 shining waves, unbound upon her shoulders. 
 Her face was very pale, delicate, transparent 
 almost, and her eyes, wide open, looked fear-
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 39 
 
 lessly into the room before her. The man 
 stood still, hardly breathing, expecting her to 
 speak. But she came in quite silently and 
 without a sound, glided round the table in the 
 centre, softly, gently, avoiding the furniture, 
 and approached him. She came quite close to 
 him, and then raised one hand and laid it on his 
 arm and looked into his face. Allan gazed 
 down upon her, and his whole soul seemed sud- 
 denly upraised like that of one who sees a heav- 
 enly apparition. In that countenance was 
 shining love unconcealed, untrammelled, ecsta- 
 tic, that glorious vision beautiful that men and 
 women seek to banish from this world; inno- 
 cent, appealing, devoted, unafraid, love looked 
 up to him. The girl's lips were a little parted, 
 but no sound came from them, and, gazing into 
 those blue, wide-open eyes, he saw, that, tender, 
 heavenly though they were, consciousness was 
 veiled behind the cloud of sleep. Nothing was 
 there but love, that love which was part of her- 
 self and could not be lost, even in sleep. Intel- 
 ligence, meaning, knowledge, was all lost, leav- 
 ing love alone and triumphant. With those
 
 40 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 wonderful, melting eyes on his, eyes that 
 seemed to speak to him of life's mysteries he 
 had still to learn, she put her other hand softly 
 on the revolver that he held, closing her deli- 
 cate fingers round and over the muzzle, and the 
 man stood still, unable to move. 
 
 He recognised the girl as a fellow guest 
 in the house, he saw she was walking in her 
 sleep, but his inner-self was not occupied with 
 these things. To it, she was Love incarnate, 
 come into that room, where he had invoked 
 Death, to drive it forth and triumph. How 
 lovely she was! How exquisite in that tran- 
 scending power of emotion! Never in all his 
 life had he seen the glory we call "of heaven" so 
 reflected in a human face. And suddenly in 
 one mad passionate rush of feeling that shook 
 him from head to foot, he realised that it shone 
 there for him. He had called it there. Un- 
 conscious now though her action was, love for 
 him in her waking moments, was its hidden 
 spring. And such love! in a form of earthly 
 beauty, he saw displayed for him, the whole 
 dazzling wonder of a woman's soul.
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 41 
 
 The thought of death rolled from his brain 
 like a dark cloud, he heard all the voices of 
 triumphant life calling in his heart and blood. 
 Yes, he would live ! and into those dark eyes of 
 his, meeting hers, as they stood there, eyes 
 which had never seen her as she was, till now, 
 came such a fire of tenderness and passion that 
 it reached her sleeping brain and satisfied it. 
 Slowly she relaxed her hold upon the weapon, 
 yet she still stood gazing at him, that magic 
 love pouring on him from her eyes. "You 
 promise me?" they seemed to say, and Allan 
 quivered from head to foot with the longing to 
 seize her in his arms and press his lips on those 
 flower-like ones before him. Never, hitherto, 
 had he denied himself a kiss that he could get, 
 but here he felt afraid. He could not trespass 
 here. She was too sacred, too defenceless, too 
 divine. A few seconds more they stood there, 
 then noiselessly, slowly, she glided from his 
 side, passed to the door, over the threshold, and 
 was gone. For a moment Eric remained spell- 
 bound, gazing at the door, wondering if he had 
 seen a celestial vision, as indeed he had. To
 
 42 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 few is it allowed to see what he had seen, the 
 inner human soul, burning in the white flame of 
 passionate love, divested of every other qual- 
 ity, free from all those shams and pretences 
 that cling round it in the world, apart from all 
 self-interest, deprived even of consciousness of 
 self, he had seen this and he recognised it was 
 Divine. 
 
 He turned to the long windows and saw the 
 light was just breaking. With his wild, im- 
 petuous being shaken in a great re-action, he 
 went to the writing-table, replaced the revolver 
 in the drawer, locking it, and then stepped out 
 upon the lawn. All round him was the dim 
 radiance of a spring morning. The melody of 
 a thousand birds filled the air, the whole of Na- 
 ture's world was rejoicing; v and in a mad gust 
 of exultation, he realised that he lived. And 
 had she not come, he would now have been lying 
 there dead, dishonoured, blind, deaf, cold, in- 
 stead of here with all the resistless tide of his 
 glorious youth and health and strength, surg- 
 ing in his veins, and asking him how he could 
 have planned its destruction. Why, how could
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 43 
 
 he have thought of dying for a few wretched 
 debts, some mere worldly considerations, and 
 leaving all this rapture of the earth and the 
 stored up joyous mysteries of a woman's love 
 behind him? 
 
 He walked down the lawn and through the 
 grounds, the light strengthening all about him, 
 just as the hope and courage seemed growing 
 within himself. With buoyant steps he went 
 through the woods where the gossamer threads, 
 sparkling with dew, made a silver splendour, 
 and back by soft, mossy paths where the green 
 shadow was deep and cool, and the scent of the 
 firs floated above him. He regained the lawn, 
 and there paused for a long time, gazing up at 
 the grim, grey outlines of the Abbey, massed 
 against the luminous wonder of the pearly sky. 
 All the wealth and power and worldly good 
 that it represented, he was without, and those 
 wordly fetters of debt that he had taken on 
 himself clung to him still, but he would go out 
 into the wilderness, and somewhere under the 
 blue and living heavens he would work and 
 work till all was paid to the uttermost farthing,
 
 44 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 and his honour was clear, and in the wilderness 
 those white hands should lead and caress him. 
 
 Suddenly, as he stood there, listening to the 
 thrilling joy of the birds poured out in the fra- 
 grant air, he saw a slight figure in blue serge 
 come down the steps, on to the gravel walk, 
 and went forward to meet it. 
 
 The girl looked pale in the early light, and 
 her eyes were sad, but a sweet little smile 
 curved her red lips as she saw him advance. 
 
 Eric, with all the hot blood in his head, and 
 his brain overturned under the weight of the 
 emotions rolling over it, longed to draw her into 
 his arms, but he restrained himself, holding out 
 his hand. 
 
 "Miss- Rivers, Stella, darling, you are going 
 away to-day, but you shall not go alone. Let 
 us go together. My own, will you marry me? 
 I know that you love me." 
 
 And not even the amaze, the bewilderment, 
 the wonder in all her startled face, could hide 
 the conquering delight that rushed over it and 
 shone in it. His quick eyes reading this, he 
 drew her closer.
 
 THE VISION OF LOVE 45 
 
 "I am poor, I have nothing, I am dishon- 
 oured, but all shall be redeemed. Come with 
 me into the wilderness and it shall blossom like 
 a rose for us." 
 
 "Eric, I don't understand ... I can't think 
 why . . . how ... it all is, but, oh yes, I do 
 love you, adore you, with my whole soul I only 
 want to be with you." 
 
 And then in that passion of joy that Nature 
 holds locked in her hands for each one of us, 
 and that is worth ten thousand times all the 
 things of the world, its mines, its armaments, its 
 wealth, its power, he threw his arm round her, 
 and they kissed in the light of the young day.
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 
 
 OUTSIDE, the streets were wet and 
 dark, and the yellow November fog was 
 creeping slowly about in them. Inside the 
 large, comfortable study of the Manwarings' 
 house, the fire blazed cheerily, the electric light 
 threw out its warm radiance, the roar of Lon- 
 don's voice, beyond the solid windows and 
 heavy curtains, sounded muffled and far away. 
 
 John Manwaring stood on the hearth-rug, 
 and his wife gazed at him lovingly from the 
 depths of the armchair. He was a success ! and 
 it was she who largely had made him so. 
 
 As all men do, to the women they live with, 
 he had given to her at the beginning the keys 
 of his life. In her hands it lay whether he 
 should succeed or fail, be ill or well, happy or 
 unhappy. Seven years since their wedding- 
 day had gone by, and he had succeeded, he was 
 well, he was happy. She looked upon her 
 work with loving pride. 
 
 46
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 47 
 
 He had won his seat in Parliament by a 
 large majority. To-morrow he would make 
 his first speech in the House. To-night he was 
 going to a big dinner given to him by his sup- 
 porters. How animated, pleased, elated he 
 looked! She delighted in gazing on him and 
 feeling vibrate through her, his feelings of tri- 
 umph, of joy in his life. What an ovation 
 awaited him to-morrow, she thought, letting 
 her eyes wander slowly over the dear figure, 
 straight and tall and exceedingly pleasing, to 
 the handsome head, the black hair, the fine fore- 
 head and features, the warm glow of health in 
 the clear skin. He had all that beauty and 
 charm of appearance that introduce an orator 
 so favourably to his audience; before he opens 
 his lips his battle is half won, and if, when they 
 are opened, power and intellect flow from them 
 in passionate melody of tone, such as she knew 
 this man was master of, he becomes irresistible. 
 He looked to her, standing there, like a king 
 whom Life had crowned with its greatest gifts. 
 
 "Well, darling, come and kiss me!" he said, 
 smiling into her adoring face. "With your
 
 48 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 kiss on my lips I shall speak so much better at 
 the dinner. I wish you were coming with me !" 
 
 She rose, and with one swift movement was 
 in his arms. 
 
 "I wish I were! But I know how you will 
 speak! like one inspired, and carry them all 
 away ! Good-bye !" 
 
 "Good-bye, my sweet," he said, his lips on 
 hers. "I shall be very late, perhaps, but I shall 
 find you in my room to-night, sha'n't I?" 
 
 A shiver went through the form on his breast. 
 She raised her head hastily. 
 
 "Oh, not to-night, dearest! We must not 
 think of it! Remember to-morrow is every- 
 thing to you! You will be late this evening, 
 anyway. You will need all the rest and sleep 
 you can get. I want your nerves to be as firm 
 and strong as steel when you speak in the 
 House, and your brain at its best. I shall go 
 to my own room. I must for your sake." 
 
 He held her away from him and looked down 
 at her half laughing, half sadly. 
 
 "What a dear, wonderful little Spartan you
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 49 
 
 are! But I wonder sometimes if you do really 
 love me and want me as I do you." 
 
 The girl, for she was not much more in age, 
 seemed to shrink, and her form to crumple up 
 with shock and pain, just as if a knife had been 
 thrust into her bosom. The words hurt so. 
 Her situation, like so many in life, was so cruel, 
 so impossible to deal with. It seemed to grind 
 her to death at times, as if she were caught be- 
 tween the steel teeth of a trap. 
 
 She sank back into the chair, her face white 
 with anguish. 
 
 "I can't help what you think," she said des- 
 perately, in a low tone, knotting her hands to- 
 gether in her lap. "I can't do anything but 
 refuse you. You ought to know that I love 
 you to distraction." 
 
 "Darling, forgive me, I do know," he said, 
 impulsively, bending over her and kissing her 
 again. 
 
 "Good night, then!" 
 
 The door opened. 
 
 "Your car, sir, is at the door."
 
 50 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Very good, I'm coming," and after strain- 
 ing her to him in a last embrace, he went out. 
 
 The girl bent her head down on the cush- 
 ioned arm of the chair in a passion of tears. 
 
 The scene just passed through was one of a 
 long series that occurred between these two be- 
 ings the man, passionate, excitable, impulsive, 
 pleasure-loving, seeking gratification, yet re- 
 gretting its price; the woman, loving, tender, 
 wise, protective, maternal, trying to shield him 
 at all costs to herself, from the passion that 
 seemed too like a devouring flame that would 
 consume his life and his powers. 
 
 After a time, her sobs ceased. She sat up 
 and gazed into the fire, silent, absorbed in her 
 thoughts. 
 
 She remembered the evening of their engage- 
 ment, how he had said to her as he kissed her, 
 "I love you so intensely I am afraid it will pre- 
 vent me doing anything else. I should like my 
 wife to help me if possible in my career, help 
 me to work. Will you promise to do that?" 
 And she had promised. She remembered the 
 first year of their marriage, before the birth and
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 51 
 
 death of their child. What a dream of pas- 
 sionate delight it had been! The house in the 
 country, the wild hill walks together, the hours 
 in the sunny rose-gardens, the moonlight nights 
 of love, that left them only inclined to doze and 
 dream away the bright morning hours. Truly 
 wonderful that time had been, a circle of jew- 
 elled days. At the end she woke up to see this 
 was not keeping her promise. This was not 
 helping him to work, to develop the great tal- 
 ents that she knew lay beneath his light, sunny 
 temper as the hidden diamond mines lie under 
 the bright landscape. When she realised all 
 this on her awakening, she rose to act. 
 
 The country house was given up, the rose 
 gardens where they had known such rapture 
 were abandoned. They came to town; he en- 
 tered the lists for the fight; he contested and 
 won his seat. He had told her, the wish of his 
 heart was this. But at what a cost to her! 
 For she had soon seen it was more than the life 
 of idle ease, more than the country house that 
 must be given up. It was their passionate love 
 that must be sacrificed. The Moloch of mod-
 
 52 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ern worldly success demands from us nothing 
 but our best, even as did the Moloch of ancient 
 days. 
 
 It was Manwaring's love for her, his passion, 
 his delight in her, that sapped his strength and 
 left his brain empty of ideas, his mind tired and 
 listless, his body demanding rest not effort, and 
 when his wife saw this, the image of Delilah 
 rose in her mind, with Samson bound and help- 
 less at her feet. 
 
 She explained all this to him. She talked to 
 him, and he knew it as well as she did, and 
 agreed to it, but what are explanations, and 
 what are words, and what are resolves, even, in 
 the face of desire? Manwaring was like a 
 child, as all men are, praying for a thing one 
 moment, that he regretted accepting the next, 
 insisting on her love over-night, reproaching 
 her for it the following day. Hers was the 
 part so often allotted to the woman, whether as 
 maiden or wife, to be strong as iron, inflexible 
 as ice, in the face of his entreaties, in the face of 
 the flames of her own passion for him. To re- 
 sist, to refuse, to deny, when she was being
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 53 
 
 urged, implored, commanded to do what she 
 herself most ardently longed to do, yet dared 
 not for his sake. Such was her almost super- 
 human task, but she had done it. For six years 
 now, she had worked for him, with him, guarded 
 him, tended him, so ordered his life that every 
 smallest circumstance in it should tend to his 
 health, his strength, his success. Herself was 
 nothing to her. She had crushed and subdued 
 and chained and starved it, and suffered acutely 
 always from the bitter knowledge that he could 
 not fathom the depth of her sacrifice, that, per- 
 haps, as he had hinted to-night, he only misun- 
 derstood! For no man of his temperament 
 and physique exactly understands himself. 
 Full of tremendous nervous force and energy, 
 alive with keen impulses and desires, it does 
 not occur to him how he can over-draw upon 
 that splendid vitality. He over-strains, over- 
 works himself willingly, as a race-horse will. 
 He is tired. What does that matter ! A stim- 
 ulant makes him feel doubly well, ready to 
 over-tax himself again. He does not see the 
 spectres of collapse, paralysis, madness, that
 
 54 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 the far-seeing eyes of the woman who loves him 
 perceive with horror. 
 
 Manwaring was in those dangerous years 
 that lie between forty and fifty, when the full 
 tide of life seems to rise to its highest, and yet 
 beneath is the creeping undertow, drawing se- 
 cretly and implacably the strong swimmer to- 
 wards the icy depth of age. At that time a 
 man has to choose whether he will follow his 
 passions and affections or the gods this world 
 has set up. 
 
 Manwaring would not accept this, would not 
 acknowledge it, but his wife knew it, and the 
 iron cruelty of it went into her soul and wrung 
 it just as agony wrung those ancient African 
 women's souls who saw their first-born darl- 
 ings given to Moloch to be thrust living into his 
 all-devouring furnace. 
 
 * 
 
 As she sat there in the soft, red silence of 
 the fire-lit room, the first little tinkle of the 
 telephone bell and then the sharp whirring jar 
 of it came to her. 
 
 She rose and walked over to the other end of
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 55 
 
 the room, sat down at Manwaring's desk, and 
 wearily took up the receiver. Of late the tele- 
 phone had rung almost continuously; she ex- 
 pected the usual query: "Is this Mrs. Man- 
 waring?" 
 
 "Yes?" she said, listlessly. Then she bent 
 forward suddenly, the colour flying from her 
 cheeks, her eyes dilating. 
 
 "Ivan? Ivan? Is it you? I recognise 
 your voice. Where are you?" 
 
 The receiver was pressed in close now to her 
 white ear, her gold hair fluffed over its edge. 
 She listened breathlessly as a dear familiar 
 voice leapt to her over the wires. 
 
 "Are you alone in the room ? Then, darling, 
 I must say it! I am back from Russia. I 
 have a little studio here. What are you doing 
 this evening?" 
 
 "I am alone. Jack has gone out to a men's 
 dinner." 
 
 Her heart beat so with surprise, excitement, 
 pleasure, that little pants got into her voice and 
 travelled over to his ear. 
 
 "May I come to see you then?"
 
 56 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "No, no, no, certainly not. Jack said he 
 would kill you if you ever came here again." 
 
 She heard the man's laugh at the other end 
 of the line. 
 
 "I will come all the same if it's to see you, if 
 you'll let me!" 
 
 "I won't let you." 
 
 "Come to me then, just for an hour. You 
 shall be perfectly safe and sacred. I will not 
 detain you a minute more than you wish, but 
 I am so hungry for the sight of you. I have 
 come all the way back from Russia just for 
 that. Come, do come! It can do no harm. 
 No one need know !" 
 
 She trembled so the receiver almost fell from 
 her hand. 
 
 "What is your address?" 
 
 "One hundred and thirteen West St. An- 
 drew's Street, S.W." 
 
 "Give me a minute or two. Wait for me. 
 You can ring again." 
 
 She turned from the telephone, tore a scrap 
 of paper from the margin of a journal, and 
 wrote down the address on it. In the whirling
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 57 
 
 confusion of her brain it might slip from her 
 memory. Then she turned and walked over 
 to the fire, stinging, lightning-like bolts of 
 thought whizzing through her brain. Her 
 whole soul leapt up in joy at the idea of seeing 
 Ivan again; the beautiful, reckless, pleasure- 
 loving Ivan, the careless, light-hearted Rus- 
 sian artist who had come into her life about two 
 years ago, whose brain had flamed up with pas- 
 sion for her, who had offered her all that she 
 desired so much in life and dared not accept 
 from her husband. 
 
 As a fire burning sways objects to itself in its 
 hot draught, so his passion had drawn her to- 
 wards him. There had been a few motor 
 drives together, a few teas, whitely innocent, 
 but never to be forgotten by either of them. 
 Then the husband's jealousy had intervened. 
 Ivan had been forbidden the house; she had 
 been forbidden to see him ; he had left for Rus- 
 sia; she had dropped back into the ice-house of 
 her married life, through the dim panes of 
 which she could see the fires of love sparkling 
 upon other hearths.
 
 58 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 She did not complain. She loved her hus- 
 band with a higher, better, more comprehensive 
 love than she did Ivan, a maternal, all-sacrific- 
 ing love, but she loved Ivan, too, as men love 
 the sunshine, or the keen air, or the wine in 
 their glasses, anything that adds brilliance and 
 colour and joy to their lives. 
 
 Should she go now to see him, just for an 
 hour? Bathe in the sunshine? Feel the keen 
 air of life on her face? She paused irresolute 
 on the hearth, every pulse clamouring, the 
 blood racing and dancing in her veins. Just 
 to see him! To see the beauty in his face! 
 The wild passion in his eyes for her ! To feel 
 his kiss ! 
 
 She had no thought beyond this ; no idea of 
 infidelity to her husband. To a refined and ex- 
 alted nature it is not the actualities of love that 
 appeal, it is the feeling of empire over another's 
 emotions. Should she go? Her husband 
 would not like it; it was not right; it was not 
 wise, but oh, how incredibly she longed to go ! 
 
 For two years now she had been an absolute 
 slave to her duty. Might she not take one lit-
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 59 
 
 tie hour now for herself? an hour of pleasure, 
 innocent though secret, harmless though for- 
 bidden? 
 
 The telephone rang again. She flew to it 
 and listened. 
 
 "Well . . . well . . . yes, then, yes. I will 
 come, yes. " 
 
 She hung up the receiver. As she turned 
 from it the fire fell in with a crash of coal, and 
 its strong scarlet light illuminated her. 
 
 One could easily realise how the man might 
 hunger for the sight of her. She was lovely 
 with the essential beauty of sex; one felt she 
 was created for love and passion; from the 
 warm gold of her thick rippling hair and the 
 soft fair skin of her face and her wide dark 
 eyes, to the long exquisite line of her figure, to 
 the small and perfect foot beneath her rose- 
 coloured skirt. She ran quickly and silently 
 up to her room, wrapped herself in a dark 
 cloak, descended, let herself out, walked a few 
 steps, then called a taxi and drove to St. An- 
 drew's Street. 
 
 In the cab it occurred to her suddenly that
 
 60 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 she had not brought the slip of paper bearing 
 his address with her. She must have left it ly- 
 ing on the desk by the telephone. No matter, 
 she knew the direction, and nobody probably 
 would even enter the room before she returned. 
 
 It seemed a long way up interminable flights 
 of stairs to his studio at the top of the house, 
 and when she arrived there she was white and 
 breathless. Ivan's door stood wide open. He 
 was expecting her. As her light, hesitating 
 step fell on the landing, he came to the en- 
 trance. She was drawn over the threshold into 
 his arms. 
 
 "Ivan ! at last, after all this time !" 
 
 "Violet! darling!" 
 
 He kissed her. Ah, the wonder of some 
 kisses! The realisation of joy given and re- 
 ceived! Her senses swam in dizzy circles of 
 delight as she saw the clear white of his face 
 above her, the blue eyes dark with passionate 
 tenderness, the straight brows, the glint of the 
 lights on his hair. 
 
 He drew her over to his fire, and pressed her 
 into a chair a low, deep chair and then knelt
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 61 
 
 by her, holding her hands close in his, looking 
 into her face, devouring every detail of it, every 
 ripple of her hair, with his gaze. 
 
 "How good of you to come! The delight 
 that you have given me! The sight of you 
 is like food and water to a man starving in the 
 wilderness." 
 
 "Even as she was starving in her wilder- 
 ness! How strange this life can be!" she 
 thought. She slipped one hand from his hold 
 and clasped it over his, her warm soft palm 
 upon his wrist, and so they remained for some 
 moments absorbed, enfolded in an indefinable 
 delight. 
 
 "Go and sit opposite me, Ivan," she said 
 softly, after a time. "I can only stay a very 
 little while. I want to hear your news of all 
 this time." 
 
 She glanced round. The room, though not 
 rich in any way, suggested ease, comfort. It 
 was well-lighted, warm. Everywhere stood 
 his pictures. Strong, powerful pictures; they 
 confirmed what the room said of him. Here 
 was an artist whose work was good enough
 
 62 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 to provide him, from a single sale, with ease 
 and comfort for a year. No need for him to 
 grind or plod or toil. Within his brain lay the 
 mint from which in a week of inspired labour, 
 he could coin the ruddy gold. Her eyes came 
 back from the room to its owner. Strong and 
 lithe, glowing with the vitality of his thirty 
 years, rich with that best wealth of all youth 
 he sat opposite her watching her with a little 
 smile. And beneath the truly Russian beauty 
 of his face lay all that fine intelligence, that 
 impetuous fire, that force of an ardent soul 
 that also is truly Russian, and which makes 
 this nationality irresistible in power and charm. 
 They talked on. He told her what she 
 asked ; he spoke of his art, his recent successes. 
 She spoke of her husband. His place he had 
 won ; his triumph. And all the time the waves 
 of her attraction flowed out to him and over 
 him, calling him to her, and he felt each mo- 
 ment pass with a stinging tread upon his flesh ; 
 moments drawing them near to their parting. 
 Yet he stayed where he was, as she had com- 
 manded him. She was his guest, and sacred.
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 63 
 
 And she gazed upon him, as a prisoner brought 
 to his cell window might gaze on the light of 
 Heaven, and drew strength out of his beauty 
 and the joy it gave her, for the years to come. 
 
 Minutes flew on. The treacherous time 
 slipped by. More than the hour passed. She 
 rose to go. Ivan approached her for the last 
 kiss. His face was deadly white and strained. 
 He hardly knew if the kiss would be a pleasure 
 or an agony to him, but he knew it would be 
 a pleasure to her. She turned to him. . . . 
 Hark! what was that? A firm, quick step 
 upon the stair, a step she knew, her husband's. 
 She left Ivan and advanced towards the door. 
 It was thrown open and Manwaring entered. 
 In one swift moment she knew that tragedy 
 was upon them. His face was distorted. She 
 could not recognise it. His eyes seemed set, 
 unseeing. In his hand she saw the gleam of 
 his revolver. His lips moved strangely. 
 
 "I said I would shoot you if I found you 
 with this man again," and a blinding, suffo- 
 cating horror of regret and terror rushed over 
 her as she heard ; not terror for herself of her-
 
 64 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 self she never thought but terror for him. So 
 he was to be sacrificed! He would shoot her 
 and then himself. His life must pay forfeit! 
 The dear life she had worked for, watched over, 
 guarded all these years. And he was at life's 
 topmost pinnacle now. His success so hardly 
 won, his splendid powers, his life of promise, 
 were to be flung away for her, wasted, lost 
 through her. She sprang to him, she tried to 
 take his arm. 
 
 "Wait, wait, till you have heard me. I can 
 explain to you." 
 
 But the man for the moment was trans- 
 formed into a maniac. Before Ivan could 
 reach her, before she could speak again, he had 
 fired. Her soft breast and throat were close 
 to him. Three bullets went into them. She 
 sank to the floor between the two men, the 
 blood welling from her mouth. 
 
 Instantly the flames of Manwaring's anger 
 quenched. His eyes cleared. The madness 
 of jealousy fell away from him, leaving him 
 sane.
 
 THE PRICE OF AN HOUR 65 
 
 "God! what have I done?" he exclaimed, 
 dropping on his knees beside her. 
 
 Ivan was supporting her head. Manwaring 
 did not see or heed him. His eyes, stricken 
 with agony, were fixed on her face, in which 
 the shadow of death was gathering. She 
 panted, struggled to speak, and did so in spite 
 of the suffocating blood streaming from her 
 lips. 
 
 "Jack, you must not die for me. I cannot 
 have you throw away your life for me. Prom- 
 ise me you will live." 
 
 "No, no, no, not now, not to survive you, my 
 darling, if I could." He bent over her. She 
 felt his unavailing tears stream warmly on her 
 face. She clasped her hands desperately on 
 her bosom where the wound ate into her life. 
 On the calm unruffled forehead, on the sweep- 
 ing brows, sat a great resolution. 
 
 "My only anguish now," she whispered, "is 
 to think I have destroyed your life. That life 
 is mine. I worked for it, built it up and suf- 
 fered in the building. It is a sacred trust.
 
 66 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 You must carry it on. Your country wants 
 you! Life calls you! go to it. You can. 
 You are guiltless. Ivan! I killed myself, do 
 you hear? He is guiltless." 
 
 Ivan bowed over her. 
 
 "Yes, I am witness. He is guiltless." 
 
 The darkening eyes turned on her husband. 
 
 "Let me die content promise me?" 
 
 His face was grey with horror. 
 
 "I cannot live without you, and I cannot 
 live a lie." 
 
 "Dearest one, you will forget me in time. 
 You have your work, your duty, and there 
 shall be no lie." 
 
 She stretched out one hand and clasped the 
 revolver. Before either could stop her, before 
 they realised her intent, she had turned the 
 weapon against her wounded breast and emp- 
 tied the two remaining shots into it* 
 
 Then she fell back motionless between them, 
 and the two men knelt beside her, stricken 
 utterly.
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 
 
 SHE was exquisitely pretty. Her hair 
 was soft and glossy like spun glass in the 
 sun, with a wonderful sheen on every golden 
 curl of it; wide, sparkling, dark blue eyes and 
 a pure white skin went well with her soft red 
 mouth. She was just tall enough to be grace- 
 ful, and her pale blue cloth dress and little blue 
 hat, with the white rose tucked under the brim, 
 suited her to perfection. 
 
 Merrily the trap spun along the shady road. 
 Harrington always drove well, and his horses 
 loved him; he was as dark as his bride of that 
 morning was fair, with black hair that she 
 dearly loved, straight, beautiful features, and 
 a gay, distinguished air. 
 
 They were both so happy on this morning of 
 the Egyptian spring. The sunlight was so 
 bright that dropped between the trees, the fields 
 of goodly standing crops, rich green and mus- 
 tard yellow or claret pink, looked so brilliant 
 
 67
 
 68 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 on either side of the cool, shady road that runs 
 between arching lebbek trees from Cairo to the 
 Pyramids. 
 
 Never had the lebbeks seemed so stately and 
 their shade so grateful as to-day; never had 
 their leaves rustled and whispered together so 
 musically. 
 
 They were going out to the "Orient Hotel" 
 to lunch, and then as the cool of the late after- 
 noon advanced they were going delight of 
 delights far into the mysterious desert to have 
 the most romantic and novel honeymoon pos- 
 sible. It was to be but three days. That was 
 the extent of his wedding leave, but they did 
 not complain. That three days alone in the 
 desert loomed upon before their vision, en- 
 chanting, all sufficing. It seemed to stretch 
 into Eternity itself. It glowed to their eyes 
 with such a dazzle of joy it quite blocked the 
 view of anything or any time beyond. Nettie 
 was just seventeen, and sitting that morning 
 by Harrington, driving out to the Pyramids, 
 she recognised she was a fortunate individual, 
 and hugged her happiness and was grateful.
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 69 
 
 At seventeen usually the human being has po- 
 tential happiness, but not actual. That is to 
 say, he has his youth, his strength, his powers, 
 his fresh-hearted capacity for joy. He could 
 be happy, but he rarely is, for artificial cir- 
 cumstances and restraints block his way. He 
 has the power to enjoy, but not the opportun- 
 ity, and later in life he has the opportunity, 
 but not the power. Rarely do these two come 
 together. Therefore, rarely is the human be- 
 ing happy. But for the moment this girl held 
 both in her soft and rosy hands, and she was 
 gloriously content as she sat watching the 
 sunny vistas on either side, and feeling the 
 light air playing on her face. 
 
 "Of what is my Nettie thinking she is so 
 silent?" asked Harrington. 
 
 "I am almost too happy to talk," she said, 
 looking up at him. "It seems like enchant- 
 ment. This motion along this beautiful road, 
 with these fields on every side, so sunny, so 
 animated, so laughing with crops, as it were, 
 under the endless blue skies; and to think we 
 are moving towards the desert, the vast un-
 
 70 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 known, mysterious, shadowy desert. To think 
 we are going into it to-night! Into its violet 
 darkness, that it will receive us, perhaps swal- 
 low us up for ever! Perhaps we shall never 
 come out!" 
 
 "Good heavens, I hope so!" returned the 
 man, laughing. He threw back his handsome 
 head, and the sun struck on his white and even 
 teeth. He was full of the joy of life, secure 
 in the possession of happiness and love. 
 
 "Of course, we shall, darling! Don't worry 
 about that!" 
 
 "I'm not worrying. I'm absolutely happy. 
 But the desert is like the future. One cannot 
 tell what it holds." 
 
 When they reached the "Orient Hotel" the 
 day was in its full glory. It was one of those 
 wonderful Egyptian days when the sun is 
 ablaze, but there is no oppressive heat, when 
 the blue arch of the sky seems infinitely high 
 above the earth, and is full of little clouds 
 white, round, light-filled clouds when a fresh 
 air stirs, and the atmosphere is clear as crystal,
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 71 
 
 and a thin, light, delicate breeze comes, cool, 
 not hot, from out of the desert. 
 
 Basil lifted her from the trap glorying in 
 that moment, when her light weight pressed 
 his arms and his fox terrier sprang out after 
 them. They were rather late, and most of the 
 people were already in the luncheon room. 
 Nettie and the dog went up the steps on to 
 the verandah in the shade, to wait while Basil 
 saw that the horse was looked after, and went 
 to see where their table had been reserved for 
 them. The girl sat down in one of the many 
 lounge chairs, and the dog kept guard beside 
 her. Her eyes looked out of the shaded veran- 
 dah, where the scent of flowers from the garden 
 at the side rose sweetly, far out through the 
 dancing sunlight, towards the desert. 
 
 This was very nice and interesting, being 
 all alone with Basil, really married that morn- 
 ing how long ago the morning already 
 seemed ! and lunching here with him was fun ; 
 but the transcendent charm of all was the com- 
 ing night in the desert, alone with those myriad
 
 72 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 year old sands, alone there in the dimness and 
 the hush with him! She had seen the Pyra- 
 mids and the Sphinx, she had climbed to the 
 highest, points, and snaked her body along the 
 underground tunnels, where one can only 
 crawl, and been into all the square dark cham- 
 bers of those ancient tombs; but all this was 
 not what caught her fancy most. These were 
 on the edge of the great unexplored region. 
 She had never been very far into it. But to- 
 night they were going. It was the desert it- 
 self, with its remoteness, its silence, its wild 
 sunsets that colour its sands to mauve and 
 ruby, which attracted her, its solitary palms, 
 its wandering winds, its lustrous midnights of 
 blazing stars. 
 
 Basil rejoined her almost directly, and they 
 went into luncheon, Jack, the terrier, being 
 left on the verandah, where, with true canine 
 self-abnegation, he curled himself round in a 
 chair on his master's gloves, and docilely went 
 off to sleep. 
 
 The restaurant was filled with gay lunchers 
 and bright with sun and flowers. They went
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 73 
 
 to their table, which the waiter had thought- 
 fully selected for them in a secluded corner by 
 a bank of greenery and bloom, but even here 
 they were found out, and visited by numerous 
 friends, who came up to joke, jest, laugh, and 
 congratulate them. Nettie was all smiles, and 
 talked gaily with them, her blue eyes sparkling 
 with merriment ; but in her heart she was long- 
 ing for the peace and silence of the desert. 
 After luncheon she went to pin her hat on more 
 firmly, and fix a veil, for the camel ride, and 
 as she stood before the looking-glass in the 
 dressing-room, studying her reflection with joy, 
 for she had never looked more lovely, a woman 
 she knew in Cairo came up behind to rearrange 
 her hat and face. 
 
 "You know, my dear, I do think you're mis- 
 guided to go off into the desert for your honey- 
 moon," she said, fluffing a white chalky mix- 
 ture all over her nose and cheeks. "Just 
 fancy! No looking glasses, no bathrooms; 
 not a soul to speak to; it will be awful!" 
 
 Nettie laughed gaily. "Mirage for looking 
 glass, sun for a bath, we'll be all right," she
 
 74 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 answered. "Au revoir." She slipped out and 
 went down the outer passage of the hotel, which 
 led to the verandah. She heard the desert 
 sand blown with a tinkling sound against the 
 outside of the wall, and forced through the 
 wooden shutters with a sizzling noise. She 
 paused and looked through one of the slits. 
 There it lay, so bright, stretches and stretches 
 of glittering sand, sunny, inviting as her won- 
 derful future. 
 
 She found Basil and coffee waiting for her 
 on the verandah; also Jack, who had had his 
 luncheon brought out by an Arab waiter. 
 Two fine riding camels were at the foot of the 
 steps. 
 
 "I have had our suit-cases sent on," Basil 
 said, as she came up, "and the man says the 
 house is quite ready for us. Come and have 
 some coffee; there's no need to hurry. It'll 
 be getting cooler all the time." 
 
 They took their coffee and cigarettes, and 
 saw most of the gay lunchers depart in various 
 directions, some to the Pyramids, some back 
 to Cairo. Then just as the sun was losing its
 
 75 
 
 fierceness, they started. Basil helped her on 
 to the kneeling camel, and she begged for Jack, 
 and tucked him securely under one arm. Then 
 Basil mounted, and, with a parting cheer from 
 their few remaining acquaintances on the ve- 
 randah, who had gathered in a little knot to 
 see them start, they rode out into the sun and 
 sand. 
 
 "Oh, Basil, this is perfectly lovely! I'm so 
 happy," she exclaimed, as she felt the stately, 
 slow swing of the great beast under her as the 
 two camels moved side by side into the desert. 
 
 "So glad, darling," Basil answered, and he, 
 too, felt that extreme elation of the soul that, 
 alas ! comes so rarely in sad, struggling human 
 lives. Four and a half years of his life lay 
 behind him engulfed in the war, scarred all 
 over with suffering and pain. No matter! 
 There were three bright days ahead of him 
 now, bright as the sun that hung above in the 
 radiant sky. They rode on easily with singing 
 hearts, and, just as evening approached, they 
 came into sight, over a ridge of drifted sand, 
 of a low, square, mud-built house by a group
 
 76 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 of palms. A veil of rose and gold colour was 
 dropping over the desert, turning the shadows 
 in the ripples of the sand to tender mauve and 
 washing the house and palms in a rich saffron 
 glow. A small bodyguard of six white-clothed 
 figures came out of the house door to meet 
 them. 
 
 Ahmed Ali Pasha owned the house, a 
 wealthy Turkish gentleman, and when Basil 
 heard of his darling's wish to spend their three 
 precious days in the desert, he had at once 
 thought of this place as suitable, and had gone 
 to see Ahmed and put his request to him. 
 Ahmed knew and liked the young English of- 
 ficer, and, without conditions, had set the house 
 at his disposal for his honeymoon. He would 
 hear of no pay and no reward. He was not 
 using the house, he said, and the Captain was 
 entirely welcome to it. More, he would send 
 out there six of his own most trusted servants, 
 and charge them with making the English com- 
 fortable there, cooking for them and seeing 
 to all their wants. Basil had most gratefully 
 accepted, and Nettie was wild with enthusiasm
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 77 
 
 over it all. Brought up as a child to be inde- 
 pendent, to do everything for herself without 
 help from a maid, and accustomed to travel, 
 with all its accompanying discomforts and 
 trials, which, to minds like hers, only mean 
 fun and adventure, she had no misgivings about 
 a mud house and Turkish attendants. 
 
 They dismounted in the golden glow, the 
 camels were led off to a heap of green alfalfa 
 lying at the side of the house, and Basil and 
 Nettie entered at the main door. They 
 stepped at once into a large, well-proportioned 
 room. The floor was merely hardened mud, 
 but perfectly clean swept till its surface was 
 smooth as marble. Two large square windows 
 without glass, but with wooden shutters, now 
 standing open, faced them. There were no 
 chairs, but several low stools and a square 
 wooden table, low to match. Across one end 
 of the room swung scarlet curtains from a 
 string stretched from wall to wall. Black, 
 arched rafters formed a lofty ceiling. A vase 
 of beautiful flowers stood on the table. 
 That was all there was. Like Oriental rooms
 
 78 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 in general, its characteristics were cleanliness, 
 coolness, and space. 
 
 The head Turk showed them in deferentially, 
 then closed the door softly. Basil and Nettie 
 were at last by themselves. Their honeymoon 
 had really begun. They just rushed into each 
 other's arms, and sank down on one and the 
 same low wooden stool at the back of the room, 
 giving themselves up to a summer storm of 
 kisses. 
 
 Presently he took off her hat and unwound 
 the pale blue scarf from her neck. They 
 parted the scarlet curtains and looked in. 
 There was a low wooden bedstead, broad and 
 comfortable-looking, with coloured blankets 
 and white sheets, all exquisitely clean. A lit- 
 tle oval mirror in a gilt frame had been tacked 
 up to the wall. She put her hat, veil, and 
 gloves down on the red quilt, and walked 
 through the curtains again, drawing them be- 
 hind her. Jack was running about their new 
 quarters, snuffing for impossible rats in the 
 clean corners. The silent-footed, white-robed 
 attendant brought in tea for them on a shining
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 79 
 
 brass tray, and set it on the table by the open 
 windows. Basil took his seat on one of the 
 stools, and proceeded to pour it out for her. 
 She sat just opposite him, gazing at him with 
 delight in her eyes and a proudly beating heart. 
 Beyond the windows the light failed in the 
 quick Eastern way; the sky turned to deep 
 orange and then rapidly paled to a clear, lumin- 
 ous green. The planet, Venus, in all her sil- 
 ver glory broke out in it and looked down upon 
 them. A breath of delicious coolness came in 
 and touched their faces. Nettie drank her tea, 
 then pushed away her wooden seat, and supped 
 on to the floor by the window at his feet, bend- 
 ing her head back against his knee, and he 
 played with the little golden tendrils of hair 
 that curled about her forehead. 
 
 Suddenly a sound of whispering came to 
 them from the outside. Then words in an un- 
 dertone just from the side of the house. They 
 paid no attention at first, lost in the sense of 
 each other's propinquity and all the joyous 
 excitement of the moment. Then as a bullet 
 flies through space and strikes and kills, one
 
 80 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 word came to them, borne in on that lovely eve- 
 ning air, from under the tranquil green of the 
 sky. Basil saw that she had heard. He was 
 looking down into her deep blue eyes, and he 
 saw them change and dilate suddenly with 
 horror. 
 
 "These people are speaking Arabic," she 
 whispered. 
 
 "Yes; do you understand it?" 
 
 "Yes." Then they both listened intently, 
 breathlessly. 
 
 "There'll be some massacres to-night," re- 
 marked one voice, low but jubilant. "Fine 
 doings in Cairo, eh?" Here some listener was 
 evidently nudged, and grunted appreciatively 
 in return. "So few English officers there, 
 most fortunate, so many given leave lucky for 
 them, lucky for us !" 
 
 "They are travelling all along the road from 
 here to Cairo ; the Bedouins are a great people. 
 What can the English do against them when 
 Allah leads? The Bedouins march along all 
 roads," here the speaker broke into a low, 
 chant-like refrain. "The officers are on leave,
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 81 
 
 and their ladies dance. You know the 'Hotel 
 Suisse'?" 
 
 An assenting grunt. 
 
 "They fire it to-night ! The ladies will burn ! 
 Great is Allah!" There was silence. The 
 listeners within waited breathlessly. Informa- 
 tion was so valuable. Not a sound. Basil 
 rose silently, leaned his hands on the window- 
 sill, and looked out. There was no one near. 
 He vaulted over the sill, and looked into the 
 gathering dusk on every side. He went round 
 the house. There was nothing, silence, and 
 gathering shadow, and stars without. Within, 
 lamplight at the back of the house and their 
 servants moving hither and thither, busy with 
 preparing their dinner. The messengers of 
 evil omen had melted away into the dark, ab- 
 solutely without trace. He came back. The 
 girl was kneeling by the window where he had 
 left her. She rose and came to him. 
 
 "Those were not our servants they would 
 be talking Turkish ; those were passing Arabs !" 
 He nodded, his eyes on the floor. 
 
 "Damn them! Damn them!" he broke out
 
 82 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 furiously. "Why should they come by our 
 window with their gossip?" 
 
 "You don't mean that, Basil!" 
 
 "I do. I don't care for anything except you 
 to-night. I don't want to think of duty or 
 country or anything but you. I want your 
 kisses and your arms around me. I've slaved 
 at duty for four years. I've waited for you 
 for two. I've looked forward to this night for 
 months. I'm off duty. I'm away. Damn 
 them ! I've only three days. Why didn't they 
 keep away?" 
 
 She put her soft hand over his mouth. He 
 was mad for the moment. Incoherent and be- 
 side himself. He took her hand from his lips. 
 
 "What shall I do?" he asked, more calmly. 
 They looked at each other for a second in si- 
 lence. They saw what this meant for them. 
 Cold duty thrusting itself between them like 
 a great wedge, separating them, just when all 
 the fibres of their two beings were clinging to- 
 gether, when it was acute pain to take their 
 hands from each other's, when that invisible,
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 83 
 
 mysterious all-powerful circle of electricity was 
 round them, so that it needed real physical ef- 
 fort to break from contact with each other. 
 Wild thoughts surged in a mad rush through 
 his brain as he searched her eyes in that agon- 
 ised moment. He remembered he had once 
 said that he liked soft, silly, pretty women who 
 were afraid of mice and spiders, were clinging, 
 and needed protection. He hated heroics. 
 Would she cling to him now? Ask him to 
 stay, from love or fear? Beg him not to leave 
 her? In that tense moment of -lightning 
 thought he had the extraordinary experience of 
 longing to hear her appeal to him and give him 
 the excuse to stay, yet, at the same time, feeling 
 an agonised fear of her doing so, and so de- 
 stroying for ever his respect for her. Further, 
 he felt a terror that he would not be able to re- 
 fuse if she asked, and so would for ever lose his 
 respect for himself. So in a tangle of pain he 
 seemed thirsting to hear the words he hated 
 telling him to go, and yet loathing to hear the 
 words he loved telling him to stay.
 
 84 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 It was only a fleeting instant, for the girl 
 had no hesitation. To her the way was quite 
 clear. 
 
 "There isn't anything to do," she answered, 
 "but to go back at once. Warn them at the 
 hotel, get your men together, telephone head- 
 quarters." 
 
 He saw she was very white. Her great eyes 
 were burning. 
 
 "What about you?" 
 
 "I'll do whatever you wish. If I can be 
 the slightest use to you I'll come with you. If 
 I shall only be a responsibility and a worry 
 I'll stay here and wait till you come back." 
 
 Do what she would to be calm, her lips quiv- 
 ered. He was going out to riot and disorder. 
 He might never come back. 
 
 Basil thought rapidly. Where would she 
 be safest? With the roads full of hostile 
 Bedouins, Cairo in revolt, the spirit of licence 
 and rioting abroad, the road to the town and 
 the streets, when there, would be full of dan- 
 ger. She was better off here, perhaps, if she 
 could stand it, and he would be freer, more able
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 85 
 
 to do and to accomplish without her. But to 
 most women, a night alone in the desert, with 
 only Turks to guard them, would be insupport- 
 able. 
 
 "Are you afraid to stay here?" 
 
 "Afraid!" she echoed. "I am afraid of 
 nothing. Only think of what is best for your- 
 self and for what you've got to do." 
 
 "You feel you can trust these Turks?" 
 
 "I'm sure of it. I have lived in Turkey, 
 I know them. I'd trust a Turk anywhere. 
 Call them in and explain it all." 
 
 "My own brave one! Oh, darling, this is all 
 so different from what we dreamed of." He 
 stretched out his arms to her, and she flew to 
 them, and locked hers round his neck. They 
 kissed each other passionately, despairingly. 
 Ah, such different kisses from the first gay, 
 happy ones in this room ! These were like the 
 kisses before death. 
 
 He released her and called to the servants. 
 They came at once all of them alarmed at 
 his sharp-edged tones. He was not a great 
 master of the language, but he had studied it,
 
 86 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 and deep emotion spurred on his brain and 
 found him the words. He told them what he 
 had heard, said he had to return to his duty, 
 and that he was going to leave his wife a 
 sacred charge in their hands, and would they 
 accept it? Their dark faces grew very grave, 
 but the Oriental is brave and can look death 
 in the face as well as any man. With one ac- 
 cord, without hesitation, they took the oath to 
 protect her, even at the cost of their own lives. 
 She said a few words in Turkish to them, and 
 they brightened and smiled. 
 
 "Get the camel ready, I'm going at once," 
 he told them, as they salaamed again and with- 
 drew. 
 
 Then he turned to the girl and took her once 
 more into his arms. The dog, thoroughly un- 
 easy with all the new sorrow in the air, whined 
 at their feet. 
 
 "Take this," Basil said, putting a little 
 revolver into her hands. " It may be use- 
 ful." 
 
 "Keep it for yourself."
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 87 
 
 "I have my own, a big one; this is small, but 
 good. You know how to use it?" Nettie 
 nodded. 
 
 "I'll keep Jack; he'll be safer here." 
 
 "Darling, you are a brick." 
 
 "Well, I ought to be soldier's daughter and 
 soldier's wife. Good-bye, dearest, I shall pray 
 for you till you return, and wait here till you 
 come, mind, no matter how long." 
 
 An exclamation from outside startled them. 
 They ran out together. The servants in a 
 white-clothed group, stood round the alfalfa 
 heap. The camels were gone! 
 
 Wildly they hunted round the house. It 
 seemed impossible, but there was the fact. 
 Without sound or trace, they had been spir- 
 ited away. Silence and darkness, but for the 
 flashing splendour of the stars, reigned now in 
 the desert. 
 
 Basil was greatly disturbed. The long, hot, 
 dangerous walk on foot moved him less than 
 the question had the servants been in collu- 
 sion with the thieves? And if so, how could
 
 he trust her to them? But Nettie seemed to 
 read his thoughts. "I'm sure the Turks are all 
 right," she said. "Perhaps those Arabs whom 
 we heard talking took the camels." 
 
 He was relieved by her confidence. She 
 steadied and calmed him, made his duty as 
 easy as she could. There was nothing for it 
 but to walk ; there was no riding animal nearer 
 than the "Orient Hotel." There he could pick 
 up his trap, if, indeed, the hotel itself was not 
 in the hands of howling Arabs. He set out 
 with clenched teeth and a seething rage of an- 
 ger in his heart. He looked back from a few 
 paces, and the last he saw of her was her 
 sweet figure in the doorway with the lamp, now 
 lighted by the servants, shining behind her, 
 his dog clasped in her arms, and a smile on her 
 little red mouth. 
 
 Basil walked away to his duty like an Eng- 
 lishman, and like an Englishman, swearing. 
 
 He had only asked three days of Fate, and 
 it begrudged him that. 
 
 The girl turned back into the empty room, 
 and now there was no more need to check them,
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 89 
 
 let the tears surge up to her eyes and over the 
 lid. She hated his going, hated being left. 
 She wanted him so much. With the dog still 
 clasped in her arms, she fell on her knees by 
 the window and prayed. Her prayers were all 
 for him. That he should be guarded, that he 
 should reach Cairo in safety, that he might 
 come back in safety. Of herself she never 
 thought, for herself she did not pray. 
 
 Silent, sympathetic, and respectful, the serv- 
 ants brought in her dinner, and she, seeing 
 how carefully they had prepared it, took a little 
 of it all. The rest she told them to keep for 
 him. "He may be back any time," she said, 
 "and he may be hungry." She fed Jack, and 
 got out a wrap from her suit case to make a 
 bed for him. When the servants had cleared 
 away, and the lamp and flowers stood alone 
 on the table, one of the men paused by the 
 door. 
 
 "Two of us will be on guard all night while 
 the others sleep. We will take it in turns. 
 We trust the lady will sleep." 
 
 "Thank you, all of you. I know you will
 
 90 
 
 guard the house well. For myself, I shall 
 spend the night in prayer." 
 
 The Turk salaamed and withdrew. 
 
 Two hours passed and all was quite silent. 
 The girl sat back, wearied with anxious thought 
 and prayer, but no feeling nor idea of sleep 
 came near her. She felt the sense of approach- 
 ing ill, and sat wide-eyed to meet it. As she 
 sat there alone, oppressed with vague forebod- 
 ing and cold in the desert night, she thought 
 with pleasure of the women dancing at the 
 "Suisse," of the warning that would be given 
 in time, of the riot that would be checked, and 
 the lives saved just because she had heard and 
 understood that whispered conversation. She 
 had no feeling of regret that she had heard. 
 In spite of her anxiety for her lover, she was 
 still great enough to be glad, and she believed 
 he was, too, in spite of his frenzied words to 
 the contrary. Suppose they had not heard, 
 and then learned afterwards that their hours of 
 passionate joy had been bought at the price 
 of others' lives, and enjoyed while they were 
 crying vainly for help in the flames ! What a
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 91 
 
 legacy of pain and regret always bound up 
 with memories of their honeymoon ! 
 
 Suddenly, without the least warning, a rifle 
 shot that rang out through the stillness. She 
 sprang up, darted to the windows, and drew 
 the shutters to, bolting them firmly. At the 
 same moment the door was opened and the 
 Turkish servants crowded into the room. 
 They dragged in with them the sentry, whose 
 arm hung useless beside him. Then they shut 
 the door and shot the heavy wooden bolts. 
 Jack stood by the girl, growling and quivering. 
 
 "There's a band of Bedouin rioters coming 
 up from the desert, madam," said one of the 
 Turks, breathlessly, turning to her. "One of 
 them shot the sentry, but perhaps they're not 
 all armed. Buldo, draw up the table across 
 the corner and put a seat for the lady behind 
 it. Hang the lamp on the wall ! That's right ! 
 Now the bed, and pile up the stools on the 
 table." The man addressed as Buldo pushed 
 up the table with a will, the others collected 
 rapidly the wooden seats and piled them on 
 it. Nettie took a cord from her suit case and
 
 92 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 fastened Jack up securely in the corner, taking 
 her place in front of him and behind the table. 
 The head man and one of the others dashed 
 aside the curtains, and dragged forward the 
 bed, stripping it of rugs and cushions, and 
 heaping these on the table and all round the 
 girl. Delay was their one idea. To protect 
 her from stab and shot from moment to mo- 
 ment, since at any second help might come. 
 The Captain was gone to the city. He would 
 bring or send assistance soon, they felt sure. 
 
 One of the men stood by the door on the 
 watch with his eye to the crack. 
 
 The wounded sentry sat on the floor with his 
 back against the wall, while a companion ban- 
 daged his arm. 
 
 Nettie spoke to him cheeringly, and he 
 looked up, smiling, and thanked her. She felt 
 quite calm and no fear, only tension, great 
 tension, and desire to do whatever was best in 
 each moment as it came along. 
 
 "Here they are!" called the man on watch. 
 "I see nine of them." 
 
 Immediately a yell and a burst of execra-
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 93 
 
 tions went up outside the house. There was 
 another shot, and a bullet went whistling 
 through the door and straight through the 
 room. No one was hit. Nettie was safe in 
 her corner, and the men ducked their heads 
 as the missile went by. The next moment 
 crashing blows of axe and hatchet fell on the 
 stout door. The wood split and broke. More 
 blows, the door crashed in, and the horde of 
 Bedouins poured into the room. The Turks 
 drew their knives, and fell back in a close line 
 before the table, guarding the corner. Nettie, 
 with her hand in the bosom of her dress on the 
 revolver, stood watching her opportunity. 
 She had but five shots. Each must tell. Only 
 one of the Arabs had a rifle and apparently no 
 more ammunition, for he did not fire again. 
 The Turks fought magnificently with the fero- 
 city and the deadly earnest of all brave things 
 at bay. They were ready to die in her de- 
 fence. Their sacred charge could not be 
 reached except over their lifeless forms. 
 
 The Bedouins, their eyes lighted up with the 
 lust of battle, their dusky faces aflame, pushed
 
 94 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 forward in a solid block with bared knives, 
 but four shots in succession came out of the 
 corner, and each time a man fell, and a howl 
 went up from the Arabs. They tried to rush 
 the corner, but the numbers were now even 
 five to five and they could not pass that bar- 
 rier of Turkish courage and Turkish steel. 
 Desperately, in hand to hand struggles, both 
 sides fought. The Turks had had many 
 wounds before her shots had evened the num- 
 bers. They went down one after another, but 
 in their grip dragging their opponent with 
 them. With agonised eyes, Nettie saw them 
 sink to the floor. There was little noise in the 
 room, only deep, quick breathing, scrape of the 
 struggling feet, very rarely a gasp or a groan. 
 Now only one standing figure remained, the 
 leader of the Arabs, an immensely tall and 
 powerful man. He came close up to the table, 
 leaned on the barricade, looked hard into the 
 fair face of the girl, and slowly sheathed his 
 knife. Nettie saw the deliberate action, also 
 the look in his eyes eyes fixed on her, welling 
 over with desire. The next instant he bent
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 95 
 
 slightly to grip and wrench away the fence her 
 friends had made. Nettie held her little 
 weapon steadily in her slim white fingers, and 
 as he bent his head she fired straight into the 
 forehead. He fell with a great crash to the 
 floor, dragging part of the defences with him. 
 Nettie climbed on the barricade, and then 
 jumped from it to the ground. Through the 
 smashed door she saw the whiteness of the 
 dawn, and across the threshold lay one of the 
 Arabs. He had tried to crawl out, and died 
 there in the attempt. She stepped over him, 
 and ran to the little lean-to kitchen built at the 
 side of the house. There was water there in 
 great earthenware cooling jars against the wall. 
 She filled a pitcher with it, took up a cup and 
 came back. The room, with its floor covered 
 with the huddled forms, some moving and 
 groaning, others rigidly still, with pale, up- 
 turned faces, looked terrible as she entered it. 
 The grey light of morning, hardly stronger 
 than the failing lamplight, showed dimly, dark 
 and moving stains on the ground. A feeble 
 murmur of "Moiya, moiya," came from the
 
 96 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 Arabs as they saw her pitcher. Jack was 
 whining in his corner and straining at his cord. 
 Nettie's lips were white, but resolutely folded. 
 She stepped carefully and delicately amongst 
 the fallen men, and gave each one that was con- 
 scious, water, putting her arm under his head 
 as she held the cup to his lips. Her pitcher 
 was nearly empty, and she stooped over one of 
 the Arabs lying near the door to give him the 
 last cupful. His eyes were closed and he made 
 no movement, only repeated the word "Moiya" 
 in a craving whisper. She bent near with her 
 cup, and like a flash his right arm shot out of 
 its great falling sleeve. With his last strength 
 he drove his knife into her shoulder. He had 
 aimed at her heart, but his muscles failed, and 
 the point went sideways. The blow given, he 
 rolled over with a guttural laugh, and grew 
 still. 
 
 A stab with a sharp knife gives little pain 
 at the moment. Nettie started up conscious 
 only of a feeling of deep burning in the flesh. 
 She thrust her handkerchief beneath her bodice, 
 hard against the wound. She was rather
 
 THEIR HONEYMOON 97 
 
 proud of it. In a way she was glad. She had 
 hated to see her guard cut down while she was 
 safe, hated to see them suffer while she was 
 unhurt. She felt a slow trickle on her arm, 
 in spite of the handkerchief, but it did not 
 alarm her. She picked up the overturned cup 
 and pitcher, and went again to the kitchen. 
 Coming back with the water, her head swam 
 suddenly, her knees trembled, and she sank 
 down by the wall. She would have stayed 
 there, she felt so strangely tired, but she heard 
 Jack whining piteously within, and after a few 
 seconds nerved herself to go on. She crossed 
 the threshold, stepping over its silent guardian, 
 and entered the dim room. She found her way 
 to the dog, and gave him some water. He 
 drank it thirstily, and licked her hand in grati- 
 tude. She slid down beside him. She wanted 
 to go to the Turks and see if she could bind up 
 their wounds, but she could not move. She 
 looked at their vague and shadowy forms lying 
 round her. All seemed growing far off and 
 dim. The groaning and the sighing had al- 
 most ceased. Her eyes closed, and she seemed
 
 98 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 unable to open them again. The lamp went 
 out, and there was silence. 
 
 
 
 A little later the sun broke fully over the 
 desert, and the great shafts of light struck 
 Ahmed's house by the palms. At the same 
 moment a little knot of horsemen galloped 
 over the sand drift and came up to the wide- 
 standing door. 
 
 Harrington entered first. "Nettie," he 
 called, and then again in agony, "Nettie! 
 Nettie!" but only the clamour of the dog an- 
 swered him.
 
 TRIUMPH 
 
 THE sun was sinking behind the far blue 
 hills and the whole sky was glowing with 
 a radiant flush of rose. The earth, too, seemed 
 dipped in the warm reflection; everything took 
 on the same hue of lustrous pink as if all were 
 dyed in some magic, sparkling, rosy wine. 
 Trees and rolling hills, meadows and little 
 brooks, brown cattle and white cottages, all 
 gained added beauty from the soft enchanting 
 light. And on one thing above all others it 
 seemed to fall with a divine touch, the up- 
 turned face of a girl, as she stood by the stile 
 on the slope of the hill by her cottage. A man 
 stood beside her, looking down on her, and it 
 seemed to him that his eyes had never rested on 
 anything so lovely as her face. Her hair and 
 eyebrows were dark, her eyes dark and beauti- 
 ful, but the transcendent charm of her face lay 
 in the glory of the skin. White and trans- 
 parent as the finest porcelain, with a lovely 
 glow of colour in the cheek, one could have held 
 
 99
 
 100 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 a wild-rose against it, and its fairness could 
 not have suffered in the comparison. Nature, 
 the divine artist, had here accomplished a mas- 
 terpiece, and at this moment the setting sun 
 was throwing on it the light of heaven. 
 
 "Rosa, darling Rosa," the man murmured, 
 as his fascinated eyes wandered over her face. 
 "Why do you look so wonderful this very night 
 we've got to part? I've never seen you so 
 lovely." 
 
 "It's the sunset, Jim, that's all: one always 
 looks nice in the pink light." 
 
 "I love you, I do love you, oh, how I love 
 you!" he murmured, tightening his arms 
 round her waist and gazing with devouring 
 eyes into her face, where the colour grew a 
 little deeper under the pure, pearly, trans- 
 parent skin. To see her blush was like looking 
 at a red light through an alabaster screen. 
 The man did not know why he loved her; he 
 only knew that the pleasure he drank in 
 through his eyes, fixed on her, was so great, 
 that he didn't even want to bend down to kiss 
 her and so break the spell of sight.
 
 TRIUMPH 101 
 
 "I can't go. I can't go and leave you." 
 
 She heard real agony in his voice ; his brows 
 were drawn together, as in deep pain. 
 
 "Oh, but you must, dearest. We've no right 
 to think of ourselves now. You must go, and 
 I will wait for you, and I won't be idle either, 
 I will do something to help." 
 
 The man held her in silence. His clutch 
 on her waist had less of the touch of an embrace 
 than the grip of the drowning man on the life- 
 belt. He felt in that moment, gazing on her 
 sunlit face, that she was his life, his all. Parted 
 from her, it seemed, a cold sea of despair, an 
 ocean of unknown desolation would close over 
 his head. 
 
 With a sudden movement he dragged her 
 towards him, hard against his breast. A suf- 
 focating sob broke from him, and he buried his 
 face in the silky wealth of her hair. 
 
 "Oh, Rosa, I can't leave you." 
 
 She put up both arms round his neck, and 
 her soft bright lips to his ear. 
 
 "Jim! my own darling brave heroic Jim! 
 Of course you must go! England is waiting
 
 102 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 for you! Think, Jim, what am I beside Her? 
 She is looking for you, calling you. She is in 
 danger. You can't fail her." 
 
 "There are heaps of others." 
 
 The words were just muttered. She hardly 
 caught them. His lips were buried in her hair. 
 
 "And they are going," she whispered back, 
 "all of them are going, all the men who count, 
 You wouldn't stay, you wouldn't be one of the 
 no-accounts." 
 
 "Suppose I come back . . . blind" his 
 hoarse whisper was one of shaken horror. 
 
 "No matter. It will be for England. And 
 I will wait on you hand and foot, and read to 
 you and kiss you and sing to you." 
 
 "But not to see you . . . ever again," he 
 pushed her out from him and so held her while 
 his eyes travelled over her face, searchingly, 
 hungrily. He wanted to stamp on his mind 
 so as to carry with him everywhere, through 
 shot and shell and down into the darkness of 
 blindness or death, that sweet and lovely image. 
 
 She smiled back at him. "Darling, good- 
 bye," she whispered, "we shall meet again. If
 
 TRIUMPH 103 
 
 not here, in Heaven. Nothing will matter so 
 long as we have each done all we could." 
 
 The rosy glow was fading. The sun was 
 withdrawing his light and glory from the earth. 
 The swiftly approaching violet shadows of the 
 evening enfolded the lovers, and in them she 
 heard his passionate good-bye, with his hot 
 tears falling on her face. 
 
 It was the eve of both their birthdays, Sep- 
 tember 1st, 1914. He was twenty, and she was 
 nineteen. 
 
 When the shadows had grown still deeper 
 and had hidden finally from her long gaze, 
 Jim's retreating figure going down away 
 through the slender, feathery larch trees to the 
 town, she went slowly back to the cottage, small 
 and white, that nestled in the curve of the hill. 
 Her eyes were clear ; the great pain in her heart 
 seemed so deep, so far down, it was below the 
 level of any tears. 
 
 When she reached her home it was all astir, 
 for her father also was "joining up," and some 
 friends had come in to wish him luck. He was 
 head gardener at a neighbouring big house, a
 
 104 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 tall, strong, kindly man, who never held his 
 grizzled head higher than when someone said 
 he was old enough to let the young men go, and 
 stay behind. He could "get out of it." "I 
 don't want to get out of it," he had said simply, 
 fixing the speaker with his brave, kind eye. "I 
 want to fight." 
 
 That was the simple reason, the great grand 
 reason why England won. Her men, the most 
 of them, the best of them, wanted to fight. 
 And as long as the world lasts, whatever pacts 
 are made, and whatever phrases are coined, 
 every game animal and every man and woman 
 worthy of the name, will, when attacked, want 
 to fight. 
 
 So the gardener Bell, of forty, joined up, 
 and Jim Brown of twenty, and Rosa Bell was 
 left in the cottage to take care of it and her 
 younger sister Ella. There were no tears. 
 Rosa's eyes were proud and glad. Her brain 
 was only filled with one question What can 
 I do? Her whole heart panted with longing 
 for work and self-sacrifice.
 
 TRIUMPH 105 
 
 It was blazing, three o'clock of an August 
 afternoon, and the white road through the val- 
 ley gave back to the eye a pitiless and stony 
 glare. The hedges on either side were coated 
 with a peculiar yellowish dust; a heavy suffo- 
 cating scent of sulphur hung in the stifling air 
 which seemed throbbing and pulsating with the 
 ring of hammer on steel, and the confused 
 sounds of many workers working, which came 
 from the huge munition works, the great camp 
 in the valley well away from the town. Two 
 tall chimneys gave out thick columns of brown- 
 ish smoke, which seemed to hesitate a moment 
 before loosening their tight convolutions, and 
 then to roll slowly onwards, spreading in a 
 sullen, ponderous way all over the valley to its 
 furthermost rim of hills. 
 
 A girl walked along this burning road with 
 a slow and weary step, and as she came near a 
 gate in the hedgerow, she turned aside to it, 
 and when she reached it leaned hard on it and 
 seemed to draw her breath with difficulty. Be- 
 fore her stretched a meadow, yellow in the sun-
 
 106 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 shine, flecked with huge shadows as the trail- 
 ing clouds of smoke passed over it, and through 
 it wound a little green path, leading on through 
 many a fence and stile up to the cool green 
 slopes of the hills where the woods grew thick, 
 and over them towered, rich in velvet turf and 
 crowned by sweeping beech trees, the ancient 
 camp that once had dominated the valley. 
 
 The girl's hot tired eyes looked longingly 
 up the path. How she longed for the shade 
 of the beeches ! for the cool air that played with 
 the dancing leaves on the summit of the camp ! 
 How strange to think that four years had gone 
 by since she and Jim had walked up that path 
 together one sunny afternoon, when the air 
 had been clear as crystal, and only the birds' 
 sweet notes had broken the golden silence, when 
 there had been no munition camp in the valley, 
 no smoke overhead, no thought of war in their 
 minds. Four aching years, how they had 
 limped away and were gone now for ever, lost 
 in a great gulf of pain. Her father had been 
 taken. He would never come back to the cot- 
 tage ; and Jim, would he ever come back? She
 
 TRIUMPH 107 
 
 had never seen him since he left. He had been 
 in Mesopotamia, he had been wounded, very 
 ill. That was all she knew. His letters were 
 few, with long intervals between them. Some- 
 times two or three came altogether. Some- 
 times not a line reached her for months. Yet 
 her hope and her sense of duty never failed her. 
 She had written to him regularly every week. 
 All the rest of the time she had worked. She 
 knew it was not her part to idly think of him, 
 nor to spend her time in weeping for him. 
 She knew she must work. And she had saved. 
 She put everything away that she earned. 
 She was saving for him. He might come back 
 disabled, infirm, crippled, blinded. She must 
 have money to provide for him if he needed. 
 Food, wine, medicine, care, what might he not 
 need? and what would be her intense joy to be 
 able to give him not only the care of her hands, 
 the devotion of her soul, but also luxuries, 
 things that money could buy the money she 
 had earned? 
 
 Wherever the economy touched herself, she 
 pinched and screwed. It was only Ella that
 
 108 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 never suffered. She herself grew thinner, but 
 Ella matured and bloomed into greater beauty 
 every day. She had clothes and shoes and hats 
 as she wanted them, but Rosa for herself could 
 hardly bear to spend a penny of her precious 
 hoard. The over-alls she was wearing were 
 of the roughest, cheapest kind; her shoes were 
 old and patched ; her hat three years old. She 
 did not care so long as the hoard grew and grew 
 for him. When the call for the extra muni- 
 tions came, when the nation awoke suddenly to 
 the bitter need of her soldiers in the field, it 
 was Rosa who begged to be given more and 
 more work, and if the deadlier things to make 
 were the more highly paid, she pleaded to be 
 chosen for them. However painful, however 
 dangerous, she could face them, as she would 
 have faced death by snake-bite or any other 
 poison for him. 
 
 But now, as she leaned on the rail, she re- 
 alised how great had been the price she had paid 
 to win that little hoard. Her strength was 
 gone. She felt frightened. Suppose after all 
 when he returned, ill or helpless, she was not fit,
 
 TRIUMPH 109 
 
 not able to nurse him, wait upon him? She 
 must pull up a little. She must take a little 
 more care. That was why she was leaving the 
 camp so early this afternoon. She was going 
 home to rest. She had fainted that morning 
 at her work. So silly of her ! She hated her- 
 self. Why, the war might' go on for ages yet, 
 and she must go on working to the very end 
 just as Jim himself was doing. Her hero! 
 She must be worthy of him. She must be 
 more careful. She would go home and rest 
 now, and after a long sleep she would 
 be fit again. She turned from the gate and 
 resumed her way, trying to press her steps, 
 but her chest was strangely tight, she could 
 hardly breathe. She walked more slowly, 
 thinking. She had tried to be careful, but 
 somehow she was afraid the poisonous fumes 
 had got round the edge of the mask, or perhaps 
 through the gloves into the pores of the skin. 
 She looked at her hand in the sunlight. It was 
 strangely yellow, and it had always been so 
 white. 
 
 After a long, hot walk through the town, for
 
 110 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 her home lay on the opposite side of it, she 
 entered her cottage on the hill with tired feet. 
 She almost stumbled on the threshold. 
 
 A young girl sprang up to greet her. "Oh, 
 Rosa, how ill you look!" she exclaimed. 
 "Come and sit down while I make you some 
 tea. The kettle is just on the boil." 
 
 She led her sister to the old armchair by the 
 window, where geraniums and muslin curtains 
 fought with the sunlight, and put a pillow be- 
 hind the bent and stooping shoulders, cramped 
 by unaccustomed hours of toil. Then she bent 
 over her with a lively smile. She was truly 
 lovely, this girl, now nineteen; with all the 
 wonder of colour in her flower-like face that 
 Rosa had had, but joined with a regularity of 
 feature, a perfection of contour that the elder 
 girl had never possessed. 
 
 "I have a secret! Guess what it is!" she 
 called in her clear merry voice, both hands now 
 behind her back. 
 
 Rosa lifted her face, the insidious poisons 
 had sucked out the rose colour from cheek and 
 lip ; it was dully, horribly yellow, stamped, al-
 
 TRIUMPH 111 
 
 though quite young, with the ghastly colour of 
 extreme old age. She made an effort to smile. 
 "Tell me," she whispered hoarsely. 
 
 "It's Jim!" cried the younger sister joyfully, 
 "he's coming home. I have his telegram here, 
 he's in London. What'll you give for it?" and 
 she danced away and round the room holding 
 up the telegram, her eyes full of mischief. She 
 was so well and full of life. She had been so 
 well looked after, so well nourished, so shel- 
 tered from overwork and care. 
 
 "I'll give you a kiss," answered Rosa, 
 stretching out her hand. "Oh, let me have it I 
 What does he say? " 
 
 "A kiss !" laughed the other. "Who'd want 
 a kiss from you, you dear old yellow- face! 
 Why, you look poisonous! Never mind, you 
 shall have your telegram! He's your man! 
 but I'm jolly glad he's come back, for now 
 you'll leave off that beastly munition work!" 
 
 She flicked the telegram orer to her sister 
 and turned her attention to the kettle which 
 was boiling over on the little stove. She did 
 not mean to be unkind, she was only thought-
 
 112 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 less, and spoke lightly without weighing words 
 just what came into her giddy little head. 
 
 Rosa caught the telegram in her trembling 
 hands. She hardly heard her sister's remarks. 
 Jim in England, London, coming home ! The 
 whole world seemed standing still as she read 
 the wire. The amazing joy of it ! The words 
 danced before her eyes. "Back safe and 
 sound. Coming to you to-morrow. Jim." 
 She lay back in the chair panting. He was 
 safe and well, and coming to her. The glori- 
 ous luck of it all. How thankful she ought to 
 be! How grateful! And it was just in time. 
 She could not have held out much longer. 
 Now she could rest a little. How pleased he 
 would be when she told him all she had done. 
 She would take him to the post office and draw 
 out all that little hoard and press it into his own 
 dear hands. Had he come back ill it would 
 have been a necessity to him, since he was well 
 it would be a joy. He should have it all. 
 
 "Here's your tea! Do take a drink and 
 buck up a little! You look so bad." 
 
 She opened her eyes which had closed of
 
 TRIUMPH 113 
 
 themselves as they so often did now without 
 will of her own, and saw her sister standing, 
 holding out a cup of tea. She took it and 
 drank it eagerly. 
 
 "Thanks, I feel a lot better now. It's done 
 me good. Oh, Ella, isn't it lovely to think 
 we'll have him back after all he's gone through. 
 We must straighten up the cottage, and we'll 
 give him father's room. I expect he can stay 
 a few days anyway. Oh, isn't it just 
 Heaven?" 
 
 She was speaking eagerly, excitedly, now. 
 A flush burnt in her cheeks. Her soft dark 
 eyes were full of fire. 
 
 "I expect you'll be marrying soon," Ella 
 said slowly, "and then I'll have to get out." 
 
 "What an idea! Of course you won't. 
 You'll stay with us just as long as ever you 
 like, but you'll be marrying yourself, Ella, 
 pretty soon. You are just lovely like a pic- 
 ture." 
 
 "Do you think so?" queried Ella a little 
 doubtfully, going to the mirror on the wall, a 
 small, square mirror with green tissue-paper
 
 114 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 twisted ornamentally round its narrow frame. 
 It was not too small to give back perfectly the 
 soft glowing image of her face, crowned with 
 the silky darkness of her hair. She peered into 
 it and noted the transparent depth of pearly 
 whiteness in the smooth cheek with its wonder- 
 ful wavering flush of delicate rose. 
 
 "My skin is just like yours was, isn't it?" 
 she said contentedly, after a minute's survey. 
 "I always thought you pretty before you went 
 in for munish. I think it was a mistake you 
 did that," she added, judicially. 
 
 "I ... I thought it was right," faltered the 
 elder girl, a little chill creeping over her, a 
 little breath of some vague and distant fear. 
 " Father had gone . . . given his life . . . Jim 
 was there ... so bad. They wanted the 
 things so much . . . Jim told me we couldn't 
 win, unless they had more. . . . Someone had 
 to make them." 
 
 "Plenty of others to do it ... ugly girls," 
 returned Ella briefly. 
 
 "I didn't want you to have to work hard,
 
 TRIUMPH 115 
 
 you were younger, and you see Jim might have 
 come back ill or blind or ... or ... without 
 limbs at all," she added in a lower tone. 
 
 "Good gracious, yes! but you'd never have 
 wanted to marry him then!" 
 
 "Ella! of course I would! I'd have loved 
 him more than ever, and you see all the money 
 they gave me would have come in then so well 
 for him." 
 
 "Well I know I wouldn't marry a helpless 
 lump. He'd have to go to a hospital or some- 
 thing." 
 
 "Oh, don't! you hurt me!" and she covered 
 her face with her hands. "My Jim in a hos- 
 pital!" 
 
 "Well, there, it's all right. No need to 
 bother about it now. Come and help me make 
 things look a bit tidier." 
 
 For the rest of the day both girls were busy. 
 There were so many delightful things to do, 
 the dusting of shelves, the polishing of hard- 
 ware, the making of the most comfortable bed 
 in the world, the gathering of bunches of flow-
 
 116 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ers for every table, the hanging of clean white 
 curtains in Jim's room, the exact arrangement 
 of the best pillow in the best frilled pillow- 
 case on which the hero would rest his handsome 
 head! 
 
 Extremely tired but supremely happy, Rosa 
 went to bed that night. The last thing, she 
 looked into Jim's room. It was very neat, 
 very clean, and full of the scent of flowers. 
 A delightful smile played on her face. Pass- 
 ing the toilet glass she caught her own reflec- 
 tion. A little pang went through her. It was 
 very yellow. She looked closer. The deadly 
 stain had spread down the round neck, up to 
 the roots of her hair, and the hair itself had a 
 reddish, rusty look, different from the silky 
 blackness of four years back. Her eyes took 
 on a frightened questioning. Then she smiled. 
 
 "How silly I am! Of course Jim will love 
 me all the better when he knows it was the 
 work that did it," and she went away to happy 
 dreams of the morrow. 
 
 The following day was suffocatingly hot, 
 and the girls, in a state of nervous tension,
 
 TRIUMPH 117 
 
 awaited the great event, finding still more work 
 to do, and running to window or door every 
 two or three minutes to look down the sunny 
 garden and hillside to the road. 
 
 Rosa had been out many times with the sun 
 hot on her bare head, and after all it was Ella, 
 who, late in the afternoon, strolling down the 
 garden path, first caught sight of Jim. Rosa, 
 after a long watch at the gate had returned, 
 and was sitting in the arm-chair when she first 
 heard the beloved voice she had thirsted to hear 
 for so many weary months. 
 
 "Rosa! darling! at last! How lovely you 
 are!" The clear ringing tones came to her 
 "lovelier than ever," and then her sister's voice 
 with a little giggle in it. 
 
 "Shut up, you old donkey! I'm not Rosa. 
 Don't you remember me? You used to call 
 me the kid. Rosa's inside." 
 
 They were now on the threshold. Rosa had 
 sprung to her feet. She rushed forward, and 
 her arms were about his neck. 
 
 "Oh, Jim! darling, darling Jim!" 
 
 The young man was laughing over his mis-
 
 118 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 take. He held her close and kissed her two or 
 three times. Then he held her out at arm's 
 length from him just as he used to do in old 
 times when he wanted to feast his eyes on her. 
 
 She looked back at him, adoringly. Oh, how 
 handsome he was ! so brown ! but such a lovely, 
 clear, bright tan, and he had grown so broad ! 
 
 "I say, Rosa, old girl, what's come to you?" 
 he asked in tones of concern. She saw his ex- 
 pression had changed. That little chill came 
 again to her heart. 
 
 "Why, Jim, it's all the munish," broke in 
 her lively sister, "Rosa's worked like a slave 
 all the time you've been gone. She's been as 
 good as gold and now she's the colour of it!" 
 and she giggled as she did at everything. 
 Why not? To temperaments like hers all life 
 is one great joke. 
 
 "My poor old dear," ejaculated the man, 
 drawing her close into his arms again. "Poor 
 dear old girl," he repeated, kissing her hair. 
 It was loving, he was kind, but in Rosa's breast 
 sounded a death knell. To her woman's ear, 
 so sensitive, so acute, so attuned to catch the
 
 TRIUMPH 119 
 
 tones of love, the difference between his voice 
 now and the triumphant rapture of his first ex- 
 clamation, was quite clear. 
 
 "Lovelier than ever!" Oh, how it rang in 
 her brain, and that was not for her now. It 
 was for another, for the sister whose health 
 and beauty she had fostered while she had given 
 herself to the deadly sulphurous fumes. 
 
 She clung to him trembling, her face hidden 
 on his breast, and he stood patting her shoul- 
 ders gently and kindly, and looking across to 
 where the soft lustre of Ella's face glowed in 
 the hot summer light. 
 
 "What made you work so hard, my dear?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "I ... I wanted the money for you. . . . 
 I've been saving for you," she murmured. 
 
 Then she raised her head suddenly and saw 
 his eyes fixed on the girl by the window, and 
 her whole heart and body grew cold as ice. 
 She withdrew herself from his arms and sat 
 down in the arm-chair to support her trembling 
 frame. 
 
 "Ella, dear, leave Jim and me a little while.
 
 120 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 We've so much to say to each other," she said. 
 
 "I want to hear Jim's news too," Ella re- 
 marked, reluctantly going to the door. 
 
 "You shall, later, he'll tell us that at supper. 
 I only want to tell him more about myself. 
 You know all that." 
 
 "Right oh! I'll be in the garden if you 
 want me." 
 
 She flashed a brilliant smile at the young 
 man and strolled out. Rosa turned to him. 
 She felt very weak and nervous, and a little 
 confused by Jim's slight air of dissatisfaction. 
 But she must tell him all that her heart had 
 been bursting with for so long; and all about 
 the little hoard at the post office. She had so 
 looked forward to this moment, but now, some- 
 how, it was not what she had thought it would 
 be. She talked to him, with his dear hand in 
 hers. She told him all that it had been so im- 
 possible to express in her letters ; she told him 
 how she had thought of him, worshipped him, 
 loved him, prayed for him, worked for him, 
 saved for him. And he listened gravely with 
 his eyes bent upon the floor. She remembered
 
 TRIUMPH 121 
 
 how formerly they had never left her face while 
 she talked to him. He was kind, he seemed 
 grateful, but she felt there was no response. 
 She was a creature pleading for her life, and 
 she knew it. She talked on, and her voice was 
 very sweet, so full of the accent of love, but 
 she felt like a musician tapping a board instead 
 of the speaking notes of an instrument. 
 Something had come up between them, a wall, 
 a partition she could not penetrate. All fire, 
 all fervour, rapture and enthusiasm seemed to 
 have gone out of him in that first exclamation. 
 She could not win it back. At last she came 
 to the disclosure of the amount of her little 
 savings. It seemed very big to her. She had 
 a note of triumph in her voice as she told him. 
 He did not seem surprised, nor even very 
 pleased. She put before him all her motives; 
 all her fears; her great love spoke in every 
 word. Then she waited for some response. 
 
 "It's awfully good of you, old girl, but you 
 needn't have bothered, the Government's 
 bound to look after me, and I'm sorry you've 
 messed up your face so," that was all he said.
 
 122 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Is it so very bad?" she said falteringly, put- 
 ting up her hand to her thin cheek. 
 
 "Well, it is rather rotten," he replied, look- 
 ing at her closely and then away again. "See 
 how different your sister's is! You were the 
 image of her when I left you," and he sighed. 
 
 Rosa was silent. The great, the awful, the 
 crushing knowledge of having made a mistake 
 in a vital matter, filtered, with its deadly hope- 
 lessness, slowly, into her brain. She had done 
 wrong ; she had failed. 
 
 There was a long, long silence between them. 
 
 She sat half dazed, with a feeling of misery 
 she could hardly explain. After a time he got 
 up and stretched himself. 
 
 "I'd like a turn in the garden," he said con- 
 strainedly. "You sit here and rest a little." 
 
 Rosa nodded with a faint smile, and watched 
 him go out. Ella was in the garden. There 
 are many cups of bitterness in life, and this 
 girl, without philsophy, without education, 
 knew that one was being held out to her now, 
 and that she must drink it. 
 
 She sat perfectly motionless, her elbow on
 
 TRIUMPH 123 
 
 the chair arm, her chin resting in her hand, 
 her gaze fixed on the floor. 
 
 She was not only tender and loving, she 
 was brave. She had the soul of a lioness, and 
 she looked straight into the face of this great 
 ruin she had brought into her life. She did 
 not attempt to palliate it to herself. She had 
 lost; lost everything; lost her health, lost her 
 beauty, lost Jim. None of the things she had 
 so dreaded had happened, he had not been 
 killed, crippled, blinded. He had come back 
 safe and well as she had so ceaselessly prayed, 
 but she had lost him. It was so extraordinary 
 she could hardly grasp it. Had he only loved 
 her then for the fugitive blush of her cheek? 
 It looked like it. And he ? Had he come back 
 most horribly disfigured she would only have 
 loved him more. How she would have taken 
 him into her arms and loved and honoured and 
 treasured him the more for every scar, every 
 hideous wound, sign of his courage and sacri- 
 fice. Ah, well, men were different. It was 
 her fault. She should have known. She saw 
 now that to be idle and selfish and worthless,
 
 124 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 with a pink cheek and a bright lip, was better 
 in a man's eyes than to be hard-working and 
 self-sacrificing, if it meant a stain on the coun- 
 tenance ! There were steps outside, they were 
 passing the window. She sprang up and stood 
 where she was in the middle of the room, and 
 looked out. Yes, there they were together. 
 How pleased he looked, how handsome, flushed, 
 and animated; and her sister, how sweet her 
 up-turned face as she walked beside him, hang- 
 ing on his words. He was telling his adven- 
 tures "And then they put us on rafts . . ." 
 she heard, the words floated in as they passed 
 the window. 
 
 Rosa sat down again, and it seemed to her 
 that iron hooks were being driven into her 
 breast and sinking heavily through bone and 
 flesh, down to her inmost soul. 
 
 Presently they came back laughing and talk- 
 ing, and it was time to get the evening meal. 
 With a good deal of chaff and giggling and 
 clatter of plates, the supper was laid, and the 
 bread, the cheese, the ham, the precious bottles 
 of beer, were all put out, the cold pie, the cakes ;
 
 TRIUMPH 125 
 
 and they all sat down. Jim, between the two 
 girls, who both waited on him. 
 
 He told them fine stories of the crossing of 
 rivers, the holding of bridges, the firing of the 
 last shot, the failing ammunition; of the heat, 
 of the flies, of the lack of water; and Rosa 
 listened to it all in a dream. His voice was 
 music to her, but now it seemed throbbing 
 through empty chambers where her heart had 
 been. 
 
 The meal passed over at last, and Jim, filling 
 his pipe from the new little box Rosa had 
 bought and put ready for him with loving care, 
 suggested they should all go out for a walk. 
 
 "It'll be a jolly evening, and I'd like a turn 
 through those old woods at the back where we 
 used to go." He looked at Rosa as he spoke, 
 and she might have been wrong, but she fancied 
 from his eyes he did not want her much to 
 come. 
 
 "I don't think I feel quite up to it," she said, 
 a nervous shrinking filling her, and she saw at 
 once a bright look of relief light up his eyes. 
 
 "You poor old dear, go up and get to bed
 
 126 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 and to sleep and get rested. The kid and I'll 
 take just a turn round. We won't be late." 
 He came over to her and kissed her. Then in 
 a mist, she saw her sister put on her hat, and 
 they went out. There were the things stand- 
 ing on the table to be washed up. She did 
 it mechanically, not realising what she did. 
 When all were done and put away, she went 
 up to the room the sisters shared, and fell upon 
 the bed. She could not think. She was done. 
 
 A long time, it seemed, must have passed 
 when she opened her eyes again. She did not 
 know whether it was sleep or unconsciousness 
 into which she had fallen. Night had come, 
 and the moon was up, its light fell faintly into 
 the room; a little air was blowing across it 
 from the open casement. She wondered what 
 had waked her. She put out her hand to her 
 sister's place. It was empty. Then she heard 
 voices. Jim was speaking. He must be 
 standing below in the garden. 
 
 "It's no use, dear, I simply can't stand old 
 yellowface, and as for marrying her, I couldn't 
 do it. Now I'll tell you what we'll do.
 
 TRIUMPH 127 
 
 We'll hook it quietly, you and I, and just 
 leave her here so there'll be no fuss or 
 bother. She'll be all right; she's got the cot- 
 tage and a bit saved up, what she'd done for me. 
 Now you be a good kid and do as I say. ..." 
 The voice trailed off, the speaker had passed 
 on, and the light air changed its course, and 
 there was silence. 
 
 Rosa sat up in the moonlight. A great pain 
 was at her heart, tearing it to pieces. So that 
 was her Jim ! her hero ! And she would have 
 staked her life on his being true and great and 
 fine. That agony of disillusionment, is there 
 anything like it? It seemed to Rosa what she 
 had suffered before at losing his love was noth- 
 ing to what she suffered now in losing her faith. 
 The awful pain was not in giving up her idol, 
 but in seeing it shattered. So he did not love 
 her, had never loved her, never cared for her, 
 only for the colour in her cheek ! Then a great 
 fact leapt up before her like a light in darkness. 
 If that were so, was his love worth anything? 
 Did it matter whether one won it or lost it, pos- 
 sessed it or not? No. Then another thought
 
 128 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 caught fire like a torch in the blackness of her 
 misery. It was not this that she had worked 
 and suffered for, not this light and worthless 
 love. No, after all, it was for England, for her 
 country, for all those fighting, of which Jim was 
 but one. Whatever might have happened now, 
 she did not regret what she had done. What 
 was this fleeting thing, men's love? If she 
 could have bought it again, had her beauty re- 
 stored, and her labours blotted out, would she 
 have done it? No, not now that she knew 
 what that love was worth. A great agony 
 came over her, out of her heart, and cramping 
 all her limbs, and suddenly she realised that all 
 things of earth were passing away for her. 
 She did not exclaim, she did not call. Just 
 staggering to her feet, she got a pencil and a 
 slip of paper, wrote a couple of words, and then 
 climbed back on to the bed, and stretched her- 
 self there. 
 
 The soul is a lonely thing. It lives alone. 
 And in the last hour of life none can even ap- 
 proach near to it. Its own past actions rise 
 then and stand round it on every side, guarding
 
 TRIUMPH 129 
 
 its threshold. Rosa knew if the arms of her 
 lover were round her, if her sister held her 
 hand, her soul would still, preparing for its 
 homeward flight, be utterly alone. She was 
 not afraid. She needed no one. Even the 
 pain seemed passing away. The walls of her 
 narrow room seemed to fall and dissolve into 
 lighted spaces, she heard the heavenly choir 
 singing, and freed from all desire of this world, 
 her bright and stainless spirit took its upward 
 flight. 
 
 Entering on tip-toe a little later, Ella stum- 
 bled at the bedside and put her hand, in the 
 dark, on her sister's face. 
 
 She shrieked. 
 
 "Jim! Come here." 
 
 Jim hurried up from the lower room. 
 "What's wrong?" he exclaimed, putting the 
 match he held to the candle on the dressing- 
 table. As the light flared up, he saw Ella 
 standing over the form on the bed. 
 
 "She's dead! oh, Jim!" 
 
 The man approached and gazed into the
 
 130 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 face. It was stone white now, the hated yel- 
 low tint hardly showed. The sweet and gentle 
 lips were set almost in a smile. He nodded. 
 He knew well the face of death. 
 
 "What's this?" he muttered, drawing a slip 
 of paper out from under her hand. He spread 
 it flat, only two words were traced on it. 
 
 He read them out slowly. 
 
 "I forgive."
 
 LILY had been brought up in an old 
 cathedral town, and some of its quiet 
 tranquillity seemed to have got into her blood, 
 some of its stately dignity into her character. 
 Her parents were dead, and she had lived un- 
 der the care of an old unmarried aunt who 
 owned "The Grange," a roomy secluded house 
 surrounded by wildly lovely gardens, and shel- 
 tered by masses of walnut and lime trees. 
 In these gardens, among lilies that were no 
 fairer than herself, Lily grew to the age of 
 seventeen. On her seventeenth birthday she 
 was tall, slight without being thin, and ex- 
 actly, in appearance, like her name. She had 
 an exquisite carriage, full of grace and dignity, 
 and moved as lightly as a lily sways in the 
 wind. Her head was small and bore a crown 
 of sunlit waving hair, her skin was warmly 
 white as a lily seen in the noon-day, and her 
 
 131
 
 132 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 eyes a beautiful lustrous blue. But above all 
 the charm of her face or form was the magic 
 of her voice ; that wonderful voice that thrilled 
 and drew the heart towards her. Such a sym- 
 pathy dwelt in it, such a comprehensiveness as 
 it seemed of all things ; of the woe and suffering 
 in the world, of the joys and the passions, the 
 loves and griefs and tumult of the soul. It 
 had every subtle inflexion in all its clear, pure 
 tones. It was a perfect instrument of sound, 
 rich and soft, disclosing and revealing the ten- 
 der loving temperament that lay behind it. 
 That voice was irresistible, animals were 
 swayed by it instantly, the restive horse, the 
 growling dog, the wildly frightened cat, all 
 grew calm, the moment those sweet notes of 
 Lily's voice fell upon their ears. The divine 
 compassion of it, unlike most of the sounds of 
 earth, changed their rage or fear into a startled 
 wonder of silent listening. 
 
 In the dark and quiet house, of which she 
 was the acting mistress, for her aunt was old 
 and inactive, she moved like a radiant being, 
 uncomplaining, happy, as the ray of sunshine
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 133 
 
 dances in the old lumber room. The servants 
 were old and deaf, her aunt lived a life aloof 
 and distant from her, and Lily lived in a world 
 of her own. Splendidly educated by the best 
 and highest teachers in literature and lan- 
 guages, in music and painting, and with a mind 
 that absorbed easily every form of knowledge, 
 wide fields of thought stood open to her, and 
 over these her spirit took flight like a falcon. 
 Overseeing domestic duties in the morning, 
 driving to the shops in the afternoon with her 
 aunt, sitting tranquilly in the long chair be- 
 neath the walnut in the evening, Lily's soul 
 was wandering afar, through the Damascus 
 Gate at Jerusalem, perhaps, or amongst the 
 palms of some desert oasis, or with (Enone on 
 Mount Ida, or "going up" with Xenophon, or 
 accompanying Creusa in her flight from burn- 
 ing Troy. 
 
 She lived in a world of thought, of knowl- 
 edge amongst great and heroic minds of the 
 past, where nothing small or sordid ever came. 
 And when she emerged from this inner life of 
 hers, it was the animals who were her com-
 
 134 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 panions, it was they that she studied, and with 
 them she played. Flowers and trees, sunshine 
 and sunsets she loved, everything that was 
 sweet and good and beautiful, but the animals, 
 who are all of these things, she loved most of 
 all. Her pleasures were not the tea-parties, 
 the tennis matches, the little dances, which the 
 other girls of her age looked forward to, her 
 dreams were not of lacey hats and rose-silk 
 gowns. In the cramped drawing-room, sur- 
 rounded by the venomous chatter of human 
 beings, stabbed by their envious, hate-filled 
 glances on her beauty, she felt wearied and 
 bored, but in the garden watching the cooing 
 pigeons courting their mates, or the Per'sian 
 cat fondling its little ones, or racing Nelson, 
 the great, glossy retriever, across the lawns, 
 then she felt happy and at ease. 
 
 The song of the blackbird in the evening, 
 when the sky grew red behind the lines, filled 
 her with a joy she could not analyse nor ex- 
 plain, simply she sat there motionless, listening 
 with all her soul to the exquisite melody pour- 
 ing so easily from his little throat, and feeling
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 135 
 
 the peace of God which passeth all understand- 
 ing, gathering her into itself. 
 
 The last Christmas before the War, her aunt 
 had her nephew, Major Brandon, down to 
 stay with them for a fortnight, and Lily met 
 her cousin for the first time since she had left 
 the schoolroom. He was a very handsome 
 man, taken altogether, certainly the hand- 
 somest human being she had ever seen. He 
 was tall, and his figure was beautiful in every 
 line, quite as beautiful as the Persian cat she 
 played with in the garden, and her glossy bay 
 riding mare. Up till now she had thought all 
 human beings rather ugly, ugly -as they were 
 stupid, with awkward shambling movements, 
 compared with the lithe grace of animals and 
 the swift inimitable flight of birds. All ani- 
 mals and birds were^ 'beautiful as they were all 
 clever and sweet and loving. Human beings 
 mostly were as dull -and plain as they were 
 spiteful and evil speaking, but Douglas Bran- 
 don was really a pleasure to gaze at, so full of 
 strength and symmetry, and with great brown 
 eyes as dark and clear as the eyes of an ox, and
 
 136 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 straight noble features, and a quick warm flush 
 under the clear skin of his cheek. They met 
 at dinner. Lily, dressed in a straight white 
 silk frock with a girdle of gold cord round her 
 slender waist and a tiny gold chain about her 
 throat looked exactly like a flower in its open- 
 ing bloom, and Douglas, delighted with her 
 beauty, gazed on her with fire steadily growing 
 in the velvet darkness of his eyes. He laughed 
 and talked, told stories, and laid himself out 
 to amuse her and her aunt, exerted himself to 
 be perfectly charming, and succeeded abso- 
 lutely. 
 
 After dinner, when the curtains were drawn 
 closely over the windows in the drawing-room, 
 and the logs were blazing cheerily on the 
 hearth, her aunt dozed in an armchair and 
 Douglas drew his own near to Lily's and con- 
 versed in a soft undertone, and under pretence 
 of telling her fortune took her little white petal 
 of a hand and held it lovingly, deferentially in 
 his, and at ten, when she went up to her 
 topmost room amongst the swallows' nests and 
 the climbing jessamine, at this season, empty
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 137 
 
 nests and bare wind-shaken boughs, she realised 
 exactly that the incident she had so often 
 watched from its' first inception to its end in 
 the animal world she loved, was taking place 
 now in her own life. 
 
 The blue-grey Persian of infinite beauty and 
 litheness had leapt over the fruit garden's high 
 wall to woo the snow-white Persian, a darling 
 of kittenhood that gambolled with the butter- 
 flies along the sunny, bricked paths, between 
 walls of peach and plum. Instinctively she 
 knew now that into the walled garden of her 
 life had come a mate. 
 
 She'was amused, interested, pleased but not 
 extremely so. She undressed quickly in the 
 chill air, got into her little fluffy white bed, 
 put her hand under her cheek and fell asleep, 
 with only a passing thought of an eye, not 
 quite so beautiful as the velvet darkness of the 
 bovine eye, and of a figure not more graceful 
 than a cat's. Love came to all. She slept 
 tranquilly. She was not one to question the 
 decrees of Nature and of Fate. 
 
 The next morning at breakfast, Douglas,
 
 138 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 gazing at Lily, realised that if she had looked 
 lovely last night, she looked lovelier still this 
 morning behind the coffee-pot and silver ket- 
 tle. Like most fair people she looked her best 
 in the white light of early day. It showed the 
 heavenly blue of the lustrous eyes whereas at 
 night they looked black, and the untouched 
 silky whiteness of her skin. 
 
 Her aunt did not appear at breakfast and 
 the two young people talked gaily together, 
 their conversation wandering over many 
 grounds, and Lily, responsive but not assertive, 
 rarely offering an opinion and listening in- 
 tently to all he said never suggested for a mo- 
 ment to the not very observant male mind that 
 she was judging him accurately and impartially 
 and forming an imperishable and indestructible 
 estimate of him. 
 
 Douglas had been at Eton, and from there 
 had passed through Woolwich, to the Army. 
 And the Army was not only his career, it was 
 his life. He was an excellent officer. For the 
 rest he was what is generally understood by an 
 English gentleman. He knew nothing of mu-
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 139 
 
 sic and when Lily had offered last evening to 
 sing and play for him he had said, "Oh no, 
 let's talk," nothing of painting, sketching, 
 sculpture or any of the arts, nothing of old- 
 world history, his studies of the classics having 
 been superseded by mathematics. Besides, 
 the human mind retains in memory what it 
 most loves, and since to Douglas, 'all the sub- 
 limity of ancient literature and philosophy, all 
 the glorious sentiments of past ages, all the 
 music of Pindar and all the wisdo*m of Plato, 
 had always seemed "a precious lot of rot" he 
 was not likely to have remembered much of it. 
 Scenery, and beauty in anything except the 
 female human being, he could not see. Imag- 
 ination he had none, and he never thought. 
 
 He was a good polo player, a good pig- 
 sticker, a good shot. He rode well and swam 
 and .sculled and liked eating and drinking and 
 fighting and hunting and fishing. 
 
 All this came out quite simply and easily in 
 their conversation, following on her soft re- 
 marks which covered deft inquiries. All was 
 noted and swiftly engraved on the bright steel-
 
 140 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 like tablets of her mind while the blue eyes 
 beneath their curling lashes seemed to smile 
 approval and encouragement after each damn- 
 ing statement that he made. On his side, he 
 never troubled about Lily's thoughts or views. 
 He supposed that like himself, she had not got 
 any. He saw before him a creature who had 
 youth and beauty the only two things that 
 men think they value. She was well bred, well 
 brought up, of good birth. She had a charm- 
 ing manner and a lovely voice and he meant to 
 marry her for the flame of passion scorched 
 him from brow to heel like a great sword driven 
 through his being. She had no money and he 
 was glad. He wanted none. He had plenty 
 and it always seemed to him a wife was easier 
 to keep in order if she had nothing of her own. 
 Of Lily's feelings he never thought. Whether 
 he could make her happy, whether the life he 
 had to offer would suit her, whether he was 
 worthy of her, such considerations never came 
 near him. His regard for her was exactly his 
 regard for a glowing peach growing on a sunny 
 sheltered wall and accidentally espied by him.
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 141 
 
 He would tear it down, set his strong white 
 teeth in it and devour it. He didn't care about 
 the peach except for the pleasure it gave him, 
 and he felt to the girl exactly the same, only the 
 peach did not have to be consulted before being 
 eaten and Lily did. So in order to make sure 
 of her consent to the process, he had to throw 
 deference into his eyes and tones and would 
 buy her goodwill with expensive presents and 
 much flattery. 
 
 They finished their breakfast and went into 
 the garden. It was quite wild and the roses 
 were still blooming, a delight to Lily, but Dou- 
 glas did not care for roses, nor trees, nor birds, 
 nor anything to be found in -the garden. He 
 expressed surprise that there were no tennis 
 courts, that was the only comment he made and 
 then suggested a walk into town. Arrived 
 there, Lily took him into the cathedral, to her a 
 place -of wonder, of divine peace, of ineffable 
 charm and awe and mystery where the writing 
 of the ages stands round one in solid pillar and 
 carved capital. But Douglas knew nothing of 
 architecture, nor of stained glass windows, and
 
 142 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 saw nothing of mysticism or charm anywhere, 
 so they left the sacred edifice just as one deep 
 note from the organ went pealing through the 
 arches. 
 
 "Oh, I say," said Maj-or Brandon hastily, 
 "he is going to play, let's get -out," and they 
 passed through the ancient portals where the 
 tooth of time and Horace's "edax imber" had 
 been so long at work and went and found a 
 boot-shop where Brandon spent half an hour 
 ordering some boots while Lily sat re'ading an 
 illustrated paper in the front of the store where 
 he had left her. 
 
 There was a little tilt of her eyelashes, a lit- 
 tle curl of her lip, that was not brought there 
 by the comic bits in the paper. They drove 
 back to luncheon and after took a long walk to- 
 gether in the mild winter afternoon and Dou- 
 glas looked extremely handsome, his cheeks 
 flushed with exercise, and his great dark eyes 
 bright and animated with passion as he walked 
 beside her. He was so much handsomer out- 
 side than inside, that Lily almost wished he 
 would walk in silence, instead of turning out
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 143 
 
 the inside of his character for her to see. She 
 knew enough now and she ceased to elicit by 
 soft phrases any further information. 
 
 When they had returned from their walk 
 and separated, each to go to their room to dress 
 for dinner, his comment to himself was, "We're 
 getting along splendidly, the little witch is half 
 in love already," and hers to herself was, "He 
 can never enter into my inner world but per- 
 haps for other things he might do." 
 
 On the last evening of his stay, their aunt 
 retired earlier than usual leaving them sitting 
 side by side before the fire. She told Lily not 
 to stay up late but to come in and say "Good 
 night" to her at half past ten on her way to bed. 
 Then the door closed behind her and Brandon's 
 arm went round Lily's delicate silk-clothed 
 waist and his other hand seized hers and drew 
 towards him, the shell-tinted fingers resting in 
 her lap. "Darling, I love you so much. Will 
 you come out to Egypt with me? I am or- 
 dered there in a month. We could be married 
 in town and spend our honeymoon there. I 
 know you would love Cairo and the life there."
 
 144 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 He had no possible ground for supposing this, 
 but it sounded well. 
 
 Lily sat quite still, looking into the fire. He 
 waited. Then, as she had not drawn away 
 from him or given any sign of aversion, he 
 pulled her round to him and kissed her, kissed 
 her on her pure white cheek, on her gentle 
 mouth, on her brow and on her soft springy 
 hair which felt like crinkled silk under his lips. 
 To kiss her, after that fortnight spent with her, 
 under the pressure of the rising tide of passion 
 within him, rigorously kept under, was like 
 drinking long draughts of cooled wine after a 
 day's journey through the arid desert. Lily 
 sank into his arms against his breast, just as 
 the gathered rose sinks and yields under the 
 hot hands that press it. Still the silence lasted, 
 then he said, "Speak to me, darling! Tell me 
 you love me and will marry me!" and he sat 
 back flushed, animated, exceedingly handsome 
 as nature only allows man to be in such mo- 
 ments. 
 
 Lily looked at him and her lips framed a 
 sweet little half audible "Yes."
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 145 
 
 "Kiss me," he commanded, and then to his 
 vague surprise, the passive, silent, shy, half in- 
 fantile creature before him seemed to pass 
 through a subtle metamorphosis. Her eyes 
 widened and grew full of fire, scarlet colour 
 glowed in her lips. She lifted her slender arms 
 and twined them passionately round his neck 
 and kissed him over and over again, while he 
 felt her heart beating and leaping against his 
 breast. It was astonishing. He had some- 
 how expected her to shrink from him and be 
 timidly frightened rather than pleased at his 
 caresses and quite incapable of returning them. 
 This was bewildering but it was delightful too, 
 intoxicating, enchanting. He showed none of 
 the surprise he felt, did nothing to check that 
 warm innocent ardour but welcomed her into 
 his arms and revelled in her soft enthusiastic 
 kisses. 
 
 Whatever his faults, the two patron dei- 
 ties of his life, the only gods he knew, Mars 
 and Venus, had never any cause to complain 
 of him. He was always ready and eager to 
 respond to the call of either of them. He was
 
 146 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 delightfully flattered and pleased by her enthu- 
 siasm, her sudden awakening into this vivid 
 emotion under his kiss. He would have been 
 less flattered and less pleased had he seen into 
 the girl's mind and understood her attitude to- 
 wards him. To her, this scene in the drawing- 
 room was but the replica of those pictures she 
 had often watched amongst the leaves in the 
 garden. She was now the white kitten being 
 caressed and courted by the noble Persian from 
 the Abbey grounds, and though the marriage 
 ceremony would be more formal and delayed, 
 the feelings and motives that led up to it, were 
 exactly the same. Although she would be 
 taken to a sacred edifice and many religious 
 words said over her and about their union, she 
 knew very well that there would be nothing sa- 
 cred about it. She knew this man had no real 
 love or consideration for her, that if she lost 
 those attributes which pleased him, he would 
 not care a straw if she died in the gutter before 
 his eyes. She knew that she was the fruit on 
 the wall which he longed to gather and devour. 
 For her own part, she knew that the world in
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 147 
 
 which she lived, filled with mystic music and 
 the most elevated thoughts, with the songs of 
 Pindar and the lofty ideals of Buddha, with 
 glorious visions and vistas of unknown worlds, 
 must ever be closed to him. And how could 
 she love him in the sense that the soul loves, a 
 man with an intelligence far below the guinea- 
 pig's and with a delight in slaughter more cruel 
 than the tiger's? No, the soul must stand aloof 
 from such a union. But the wind that nature 
 causes to blow across the world fertilising it 
 from end to end, was driving these two to- 
 gether. Love, or rather this breath of desire 
 that animates our dust, comes to all. Why 
 should she not have her share though her soul 
 dwelt in marble palaces alone, where the infi- 
 del's foot might never tread ? She remembered 
 the snow-white kitten under the sunny wall and 
 she accepted Brandon's kisses and gave him 
 back the most charming endearments, exquis- 
 ite, dainty and innocent, copied from the feline 
 blue-eyed fairy in the garden. When the first 
 fervour had subsided, he drew out a sapphire 
 ring and put it on her finger.
 
 148 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "You will marry me soon?" he asked again. 
 
 "If my aunt approves." 
 
 "You dear old-fashioned little prig," he re- 
 turned laughing, "don't you know we've done 
 with the age of 'ask Mama.' The old lady will 
 have to approve. If not, we'll j oily well marry 
 without her approval." 
 
 Lily's lip set, ever so slightly. 
 
 "Aunt Alicia has been very good to me. I 
 would not do anything to grieve her." 
 
 "She'll approve all right," remarked the man 
 lightly, "otherwise, why ask me down?" 
 
 "I will tell you to-morrow, and if she con- 
 sents it's 'Yes,' " returned Lily. "Now, good 
 night, dear darling," and she kissed him again 
 on his charmingly cut, and perfectly turned 
 mouth and then slid away from him, deaf to 
 protestations, untwining herself from his cling- 
 ing arms. 
 
 On her way upstairs she went into her aunt's 
 room and found her, as she half expected, not 
 in bed but sitting by the fire reading. She 
 looked up as her niece entered, and Lily came 
 in and took a chair opposite her.
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 
 
 "Douglas has asked me to marry him. 
 Would you like me to?" she said simply. 
 
 Her aunt looked a little surprised. It was 
 not surprise at the news but at the girl's way of 
 communicating it. 
 
 "Dear child, it's a matter for yourself," she 
 answered. "Do you love him?" 
 
 The girl's glorious radiant eyes fixed them- 
 selves on the kind old eyes opposite her. 
 
 Love! Love seemed so remote, so es- 
 tranged, so incongruous, in connection with 
 herself and Douglas. 
 
 "I like him to kiss me," she murmured at 
 last, "but he doesn't admire the cathedral, nor 
 care for animals, nor music, nor art, and he's 
 forgotten even where Troy was." She 
 stopped, but the inference: How can I love 
 such a person? was quite clear. 
 
 Her aunt did not answer immediately. She 
 gazed into the fire in silence. Then she said 
 slowly like one remembering past things, "You 
 like him to kiss you. Yes, that is one of their 
 best uses. To kiss us, to work for us, to fight 
 for us. That's what men are for. As long MX
 
 150 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEX 
 
 one expects nothing else from them, it's all 
 right." She paused, then she added, "a man 
 can never be a companion to a woman's soul. 
 Sometimes I think they have no souls them- 
 selves and never must you think they can give 
 you sympathy nor that they possess such things 
 as honour or fidelity or truth where women are 
 concerned. Men are selfish, stupid brutes, 
 their public schools and colleges make them 
 that. If we had the training of them, we 
 would make them very different." 
 
 "Are they all as bad as Douglas?" queried 
 Lily timidly. "He is the first I have seen, 
 close." 
 
 Alicia straightened herself in the chair, a 
 look of animation lighted up her face, in the 
 soft glow from the fire her fine features took 
 on a youthful light. 
 
 "Lily, you know I was a beauty in past days. 
 I travelled with my father, I saw the world and 
 many many men. My first offer of marriage 
 was made me at sixteen. I was not satisfied 
 with the man. I waited for others thinking 
 they would be different. I have had over three
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 151 
 
 hundred offers. Fifteen of them were in as 
 many different languages. Do you know 
 what I found? They were all alike. Super- 
 ficially, yes, men differ, fundamentally no. 
 Little things are different: colour of hair and 
 eyes and skin; in essentials, there is not a hair's 
 breadth of difference between one man and an- 
 other. Take a man from the farthest ends of 
 the earth and put him, side by side, with an 
 English country gentleman. Below the sur- 
 face they will be alike. Their proposals will be 
 alike and made in the same way. Their insane 
 jealousy, their untruthfulness, their lack of 
 honour, their intense selfishness, their ineffable 
 stupidity will be the same in every case." 
 
 Lily gazed at her aunt fascinated. She had 
 never spoken to her so intimately before and 
 the girl listened to her, awe-struck. She was 
 not, evidently, the least bitter. She spoke as 
 a professor expounding the nature and habits 
 of an interesting natural history specimen. 
 
 "So, dear," Alicia continued, "if you like be- 
 ing kissed and must therefore marry, you may 
 as well marry Douglas as any other. There is
 
 152 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 no need for you to hurry. You will have lots 
 and lots of offers as I have had, but what you 
 are vaguely thinking of, a good, true, sympa- 
 thetic man as intelligent as a woman or an ani- 
 mal, that you will never find." 
 
 "I see," return Lily with a sigh. 
 
 Alicia smiled at her. "Marry Douglas by 
 all means if you like, only remember in dealing 
 with him or any man, expect nothing" 
 
 She rose and kissed her niece and said good 
 night and Lily went slowly up to bed thinking 
 over this good advice. 
 
 A month later they were married very sol- 
 emnly with a very fine service and swore with 
 the utmost gravity, a variety of absolutely im- 
 possible things, after the manner of human be- 
 ings and then left to spend their honeymoon 
 in Cairo. 
 
 The honeymoon was splendid, much better 
 than most honeymoons which are frequently 
 anything but honied. These two were both 
 singularly gifted with good health and im- 
 mensely pleased with each other in a physical 
 sense. Therefore the idyll of the white kitten
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 153 
 
 and Persian cat was satisfactorily repeated and 
 Lily found it all just as ecstatic as the white 
 kitten had done. Murmurs of love and kisses 
 are the most soothing drugs, and matters such 
 as the situation of ancient Troy and the beau- 
 ties of a cathedral were left in abeyance. 
 
 As nearly as possible with the end of the 
 month came the end of the idyll. Brandon 
 pale and fretful, told her one night that he 
 should sleep in the dressing-room, he was dead 
 tired, had a bad head and must get a good 
 night's rest. 
 
 Lily acquiesced with exquisite sweetness and 
 sympathy, and when the door of her room was 
 shut and she was alone, she pushed open the 
 wide casement and gazed out into the tropic 
 splendour of the night. She did not regret his 
 absence. She also was tired, and glad to be 
 alone. 
 
 She recognised what had happened. She re- 
 membered that after a considerable time of 
 regular visits the Persian cat had gone back to 
 the Abbey and the little white kitten played 
 alone bv the wall. In course of time she had
 
 154 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 multiplied herself with five little creatures of 
 fairy loveliness and then in the spring Lily had 
 seen her again with a mate, but this time it was 
 one of a velvet blackness, and she was as gay 
 and happy in his caresses as she had been with 
 the Persian. It occurred to Lily now sitting 
 alone in the fragrant darkness that as the his- 
 tory of their love had so closely followed so 
 far the episode of the Persian cats, it was 
 rather a pity it could not end in the same way. 
 She rather wished there was an Abbey near by 
 to which Major Brandon could retire, leaving 
 her alone to the joys and cares of maternity 
 and with the freedom, these once over, to join 
 again in the laughing dancing world, to choose 
 another mate another season. These thoughts 
 chased through the girl's brain as she sat watch- 
 ing the stars wheel and flash in the purple sky 
 above and the tiny white moths, existing but 
 for an hour, flitting back and forth across her 
 windowsill. But she knew such thoughts were 
 vain. The wedding ceremony altered things. 
 "Till death do us part" she repeated the words 
 wonderingly to herself. Why on earth should
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 155 
 
 she live with and love and cleave to and honour 
 and obey and nurse and cherish this boring man 
 whom she had never seen until six weeks ago 
 and who did not love her any more than he 
 loved his soup at dinner? 
 
 The logic of the thing seemed to her abso- 
 lutely preposterous and ridiculous. He was 
 an absolute stranger to her heart and soul and 
 brain, he did not know any of her thoughts, 
 and would have been incapable of understand- 
 ing them if he had. Well, she had never had 
 much human companionship. She had always 
 lived in that inner world of hers, that world of 
 thought, philosophy, of ideas, her joys had al- 
 ways been in art, in study and in the beauty of 
 nature and the companionship of animals, and 
 her marriage had done this much for her, it 
 had brought her to a new part of the world, to 
 a place where skies were golden and the sunsets 
 visions of glory where she could watch the 
 dreaming Nile flow past its miraculous pink 
 hills, under its waving palms. Whatever 
 Brandon did or did not, was or was not, she 
 could never be unhappy here. She leaned out
 
 156 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 of her window to draw in the breath coming 
 up from the gardens beneath. The breath of a 
 myriad roses asleep under the stars. She 
 stretched out her arms to the wondrous peace 
 and fragrance and mysterious charm of the 
 Eastern night and Egypt, centuries-old mother 
 of mankind, took her and folded her to its 
 bosom. 
 
 Cairo was very full that season when the 
 Brandons were there and very gay, and Lily, 
 by reason of course, of her youth and beauty 
 and bridehood, sipped of the very cream of its 
 pleasures and gaieties. Social life never at- 
 tracted her, she hated the mockery of it and the 
 selfish malice that underlay all the apparent 
 friendliness, the venomous desire to wound, to 
 hurt, to destroy the pleasure of each other that 
 prompts all these senseless human beings, but 
 she loved dancing. Music was the life of her 
 soul and the physical expression of music, 
 which is dancing, was a supreme ecstasy to her. 
 There was a ball every night at Cairo and she 
 went to them all. Brandon disliked music and 
 could not dance, but there were plenty of men
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 157 
 
 to whom he could talk, pleasant side-rooms 
 where one could play billiards, smoke, or read 
 the latest papers, and various dainty curtained 
 little dens where one could have unlimited 
 drinks. So he did not object to accompanying 
 Lily, and it seemed quite a reasonable thing for 
 her to wish to dance. All officers' wives did. 
 It was as much the way of the army wife to 
 dance as of her husband to fight. Lily had 
 but six simple evening dresses, and she wore 
 them each in turn, and then began again. All 
 the women and girls there, did their level best 
 to make her uncomfortable by laughing at her 
 "rotatory" method of changing her frocks, and 
 by shrugging their shoulders as she passed their 
 gorgeous toilettes in her simple wisps of black 
 or white or pink. But Lily did not care. She 
 knew she was beautiful, and saw that the men 
 thought her so. She never retaliated, never 
 uttered an unkind word, or let her lip curl at 
 the fattest Jewess in the most outrageous gown. 
 Neither did she envy the enormous wealth that 
 was often displayed about her; nor did any 
 jealousy of another girl's beauty nor of an-
 
 158 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 other woman's diamonds come near her. She 
 was one of those who are born full of the 
 Grace of God, and her little feet trod on no 
 one's heart, trampled on no one's feelings, as 
 with an exquisite happiness, she danced away 
 the hours of those brilliant nights. 
 
 One evening there was an unusually beauti- 
 ful ball and fete given by one of the big hotels ; 
 the grounds of which were all illuminated, and 
 the inner rooms decorated with palms and 
 roses. Lily was there, wild with delighted an- 
 imation, for Fate had sent her a partner whose 
 step exactly suited hers, and the joy of the 
 perfect dance is indescribable. He was an 
 American, young and good-looking, a musician 
 of great natural gifts and ear, and an enthusi- 
 astic dancer. To Lily, who had found hitherto 
 her partners often spoiled the dances by want 
 of skill, this man's art came as a revelation. 
 His feet had a velvet touch on the floor, his 
 embrace of her was so light she hardly felt it, 
 yet the strength of it was so great that they 
 seemed to turn and move as one. It was just 
 the simple Austrian waltz that they were danc-
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 159 
 
 ing, but he danced with long steps taken ex- 
 tremely fast, so that they seemed to be flying 
 rather than dancing. It seemed to Lily that 
 an extraordinary force, partly thrown into her- 
 self, still partly outside, was lifting her up, 
 bearing her round and round in those flying 
 circles in which the earth seemed left behind, 
 and like two swallows they skimmed through 
 space. It was beautiful to do, and nearly as 
 beautiful to watch. Little groups gathered 
 here and there in the corner of the room to 
 stand and watch them go by. Others' part- 
 ners grew tired and stopped, sat down, or went 
 out to the cool of the garden; these two, as 
 long as the music continued, swept on in their 
 airy flight. 
 
 When the band ceased, and only then, they 
 stopped. He looked into the fair unflushed 
 face of his partner; beyond the light in her 
 eyes, and the bright glow in her lips, the dance 
 had not affected her. 
 
 "That went all right?" he said gently. 
 
 "It was heaven," she answered simply, and 
 he laughed.
 
 160 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Come now, let me get you an ice or some- 
 thing outside. May we have the next to- 
 gether?" 
 
 "I would love to but I think I'm engaged." 
 
 They passed out of the ball-room, and he 
 steered her through a side suite of rooms which 
 was a quick way to the large buffet in a flower- 
 girdled tent in the grounds. 
 
 As they passed through the last little room, 
 which was dimly lighted by an Eastern stained- 
 glass lamp swinging from above, Lily suddenly 
 gave an exclamation. It was so sharp, though 
 not loud, that her companion started. 
 
 "What is it?" he asked. 
 
 "Nothing . . . come along," she laid her 
 little snowflake of a hand on his arm, and noth- 
 ing loath, the American hurried on with her to 
 the outer air, where under a huge banyan tree 
 he found her a chair, and then started off to the 
 tent in quest of refreshments. 
 
 Lily leaned back against the tree and 
 thought. What she had seen in the little room, 
 was her husband sitting on a corner seat half 
 concealed by heavy green curtains draped
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 161 
 
 across and further sheltered by a screen, and 
 on his knee, her lips on his, the waitress at the 
 bar where the iced drinks were served. She 
 knew the woman well by sight, a common 
 woman . . . not very pretty . . . such a 
 woman! Surprise was her chief feeling. 
 
 The American came back with champagne 
 and delicious ices, and they sat and sipped and 
 rested in the cool, sweet, scented air. 
 
 "I'll tell you what we'll do. You are all en- 
 gaged, and so am I, up to two o'clock, but as I 
 meant to go home early I've nothing after two. 
 There will be lots more dances from two till 
 four. Let's stay till four and take them, if 
 you haven't given them already," this from her 
 partner as he gazed admiringly on the fair soft 
 head, bare of all ornament except its own lit- 
 tle crinkled waves. 
 
 Usually the Brandons left about) two. She 
 knew Douglas liked it better than staying, as 
 she would have done, to the end, and faithfully 
 at that hour she would seek the ante-room, 
 where sometimes at the bar or asleep on a 
 lounge, she would find her husband and say she
 
 162 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 was ready. It struck her, however, to-night 
 she would not go to the ante-rooms, and also 
 that Major Brandon could possibly amuse him- 
 self to the later hour. She was always tireless 
 at night and she could have danced, she felt, 
 through eternal centuries. 
 
 "A good idea," she answered. "Come for 
 me at two. The rooms will be more empty. 
 We'll have a lovely free floor." 
 
 Many of the guests left at two. Lily, who 
 had been dancing all the evening, had seen 
 nothing of Douglas, and met the American 
 coming to claim her with a smile. 
 
 They danced, and several other couples, en- 
 thusiasts like themselves, shared the floor with 
 them. The rooms began to grow cool and 
 empty ; some lookers-on lounged in the corners. 
 Lily danced on and on, intoxicated with the di- 
 vine joy of speed, the magic of swift motion. 
 
 "It was heaven before: it's the seventh 
 heaven now," she whispered, "that the crush 
 is over." 
 
 Such hours in life seem very short. Four 
 o'clock and the cold light of day seemed to
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 163 
 
 come almost immediately after two o'clock, and 
 the music ceased and everything seemed sud- 
 denly to come to an end. Lily said "good 
 night" to her partner after promising many 
 dances together for all the future fetes, and 
 then turning to go to the dressing-room, found 
 herself face to face with her husband. 
 
 "Oh, Douglas, there you are. I am so glad. 
 I was just going to fetch my cloak." 
 
 "Yes, I should think it's about time," he 
 returned in such a savage tone that she glanced 
 at him in surprise. His face was black and 
 scowling. 
 
 "I won't be a minute," she said, and dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 Not a word did he utter on their homeward 
 drive, and Lily sat back in a dream going over 
 those exquisite last hours, and feeling the thrill 
 of motion still in all her blood. 
 
 When they reached their own quarters, just 
 as she was going to say "good night," he burst 
 out: 
 
 "What do you mean by dancing all the even- 
 ing with that American and staying there till
 
 164 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 the end with all those fellows looking on?" 
 
 Lily gazed at him: quite at a loss to account 
 for the turgid wrath of his face, the fury of his 
 eyes. 
 
 "I am sorry if you wanted to come home ear- 
 lier. I only danced the last dances with 
 Mason. We were both engaged for all the 
 early ones to other people," she answered 
 gently. 
 
 "Making yourself the laughing stock of 
 Cairo," he went on furiously, "and keeping me 
 up to all hours ! Why didn't you come to me 
 at two o'clock as usual?" 
 
 Lily had naturally a good temper, but this 
 attack upon her seemed so uncalled for that a 
 spirit of indignation came into her words. 
 
 "I saw you in the grey room with the wait- 
 ress on your knee, and I thought you did not 
 want to be interrupted. That's why I didn't 
 come," she answered. 
 
 She had hardly finished when Brandon 
 sprang forward and caught her arm. He 
 shook her till she was almost dazed. 
 
 "Don't answer me when I speak to you," he
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 165 
 
 said, in a voice of concentrated rage and ex- 
 actly as if she had been a servant, "and remem- 
 ber this, what I do and what you do are two 
 different things. I shall have any number of 
 women that suits me, but I'll take damned good 
 care you don't disgrace yourself. We go up 
 to Wady Haifa to-morrow, and if I find you 
 write to that fellow Mason, I'll blow his brains 
 out." 
 
 Gripped by the arm in his savage fingers 
 she glanced up at his distorted face bent over 
 her. Curiosity as to the nature of this extraor- 
 dinary beast that man proved himself to be, 
 filled her rather than any fear. She had al- 
 ways heard that English gentlemen did not 
 strike a woman, but she saw the impulse to 
 strike her, alive in his face. She said nothing 
 from sheer astonishment, and the next instant 
 Brandon pushed her violently from him, down 
 the two little steps that descended to her room 
 from his, and banged the door behind her with 
 a terrific crash. The push given her had sent 
 her down the steps and onto her knees on the 
 floor. She picked herself up instantly.
 
 166 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "And it is said that women are illogical!" 
 she thought, crossing to her window and lean- 
 ing her arms on the sill, and again Egypt took 
 her to itself and soothed and comforted her. 
 
 
 Wady Haifa pleased her immensely; that 
 valley of deep grass set amongst the hills. 
 Brandon liked being there because there was 
 some sport in the country round. Also the 
 hotel had an uncommonly good cuisine, and the 
 quail there were the fattest in Egypt. The 
 rooms, too, were cool and comfortable. Lily 
 hardly noticed the rooms or the cuisine, but her 
 whole soul went out to the garden: long and 
 narrow, and ending in a wild shrubbery of 
 green and sweet-scented things; bauble and 
 mimosa, oleander and eucalyptus, poinsettia 
 and rose-trees, rioted there together, under a 
 roof of palms. On the first evening after ar- 
 rival, Lily, having dressed quickly in her black 
 chiffon evening-gown, and hurriedly twisted 
 the golden coils of hair round her shapely head, 
 went out down the narrow centre path to enjoy 
 her new domain.
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 167 
 
 This would be her happy shrine of content- 
 ment where she would sit and muse and dream 
 and dream, while Brandon drank and smoked 
 at the club, went out quail shooting, played bil- 
 liards, or cuddled his waitresses in quiet cor- 
 ners. 
 
 She had not spoken to him of her joy in 
 Wady Haifa. She never spoke of anything 
 she felt to him. It was no use. The idyll was 
 completely finished as far as Lily was con- 
 cerned. He had shaken the last life out of it 
 the night of the dance. She regarded him now, 
 as indeed, if the truth were fully known, a vast 
 number of women do regard the men with 
 whom they are associated, as simply a boring 
 circumstance in her life, something to put up 
 with, as one does with a cold. He was a 
 damper on her happy spirits, a restraint on her 
 innocent pleasures. She never knew at what 
 moment he might fly into a senseless rage with 
 her, and her cheeriest hours were when he de- 
 parted to some of his own amusements and left 
 her to herself. He had brought her to Egypt: 
 that was his one saving grace for which she was
 
 168 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 always grateful. As she walked this evening, 
 the sky was red with the sunset fires, every- 
 thing about her glowed in the softest pink, and 
 she walked along lightly, charmed at the bam- 
 boo arches over the intersecting paths and the 
 flight of the hoopoes through the oleander trees. 
 Suddenly she paused, before her was a low 
 archway in a thicket of bauble and rose. It 
 was dark beyond, a green darkness. Before 
 the leafy cave, only a few paces from her, in 
 her path, standing with head erect and gently 
 swaying tail, stood a magnificent lioness. 
 Tawny sides, gold in the sunset light, open 
 brow, where the hair grew short and thick and 
 soft as velvet, great wide and kindly eyes, faced 
 her as she paused. 
 
 "Oh, you beauty!" she said, in a murmur of 
 love, and the words fell softly, in her magic 
 voice, on the ears of the hesitating animal. 
 "You perfect love, where have you come 
 from?" and the lioness lowered her ears as a 
 dog does at a sweet voice. 
 
 From between the oleander trees at the side 
 came a sound of swishing leaves, and then the
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 169 
 
 round face of a grinning Arab boy appeared. 
 
 "Him very good lioness," he explained vol- 
 ubly. "Him pet of hotel, never hurt anyone." 
 
 Lily had hardly needed this reassurance, 
 nor did the lioness pay any heed to the black 
 boy's eulogies. 
 
 With velvet paws and sinuous motion she 
 advanced to the girl's feet and there sat down, 
 deliberately leaning her smooth heavy side and 
 shoulder against Lily's knee, and putting up 
 her head to be stroked as does the domestic cat. 
 Lily bent over her, and gazed into those deep, 
 yellow eyes : eyes where the red fires of savage 
 jungle hate and jungle lusts, turn into such 
 melting looks of love as she gazes on her cubs, 
 or, as now, when under the electric spell of a 
 really pure human soul. 
 
 The tale of Una and the lion, and of Andro- 
 cles and the lion are true all the world over. 
 Animals and man are of the same brotherhood. 
 It is only the cruelty of man that has drawn a 
 line between them. The animal's love for man 
 is always there, his trust, his reverence, and the 
 man who betrays that trust and is guilty of
 
 170 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEX 
 
 cruelty to an animal, degrades himself below 
 the least of them. 
 
 The black boy squatted on his heels, the 
 tassel of his red fez swinging over his ear, and 
 watched the beautiful English girl bend her 
 golden head over his lioness, with contented 
 black eyes. He fed the lioness and brought it 
 water and dry leaves for its bed. In his own 
 way he loved it, but he felt that the love Lily 
 showed for it had greater force than his. It 
 seemed to come from some great store within 
 her of overwhelming power, and it did not sur- 
 prise him that his lioness yielded to it, since he, 
 too, felt he could sit there listening to those 
 tones of love, indefinitely. 
 
 "To whom does she belong?" asked the girl 
 of him, looking over the creature's head which 
 rubbed gently against the silken chiffon folds 
 of her gown. 
 
 "Him belong manager of hotel. Me kitchen 
 boy ; me feed lioness, me do everything, me take 
 care lioness since so big," he put his hands out 
 about a foot apart. "Him lioness brought here 
 by one English officer, him here ever since."
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 171 
 
 "It's a beautiful creature, you must be proud 
 of it." 
 
 "Me very proud," nodded the boy genially. 
 "Me like lioness very much." 
 
 Further talk was cut short by the booming 
 of the dinner gong coming down through the 
 peace of the garden, and Lily, putting her 
 hands round the animal's soft neck, kissed it 
 between its eyes and went back quickly up the 
 narrow path to the house. 
 
 She seldom spoke to Brandon about any of 
 her own thoughts, plans, or interests, but she 
 was so full of delight at her discovery of this 
 new playmate that the confidence slipped out 
 as it were, by accident. 
 
 "Douglas, I found such a lovely lioness in 
 the garden," she said, as they began dinner. 
 
 Brandon looked up. 
 
 "A what?" he asked. 
 
 "A lioness, it belongs to the hotel. It's quite 
 tame. It will be so nice to play with." 
 
 "Do you mean it's loose in the garden?" 
 
 "Yes, it was walking about. Oh," she added 
 hastily, seeing where his thoughts were tending,
 
 172 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "it wouldn't do any harm. The boy who looks 
 after it says it's been here since a cub." 
 
 "Most dangerous I should say," returned 
 Brandon, going on with his soup, "to have it 
 wandering about like that ... a cub's all 
 right, but as they grow up they get savage. I 
 shall speak to the manager about it. It ought 
 to be fastened up." 
 
 The girl bit her lips. She said no more. 
 She devoutly hoped he would forget this as 
 quickly as he generally did everything she said 
 to him. 
 
 To have the darling creature chained up or 
 put behind bars, as a result of her stupid tongue 
 would be calamity indeed. 
 
 "One must always remember they are beasts 
 of prey," the Major continued, "don't trust 
 it." 
 
 "Very good," murmured Lily, and quickly 
 asked him if it had been hot in the desert that 
 day while he was shooting, and what luck the 
 party had had. 
 
 That night Lily sat long at her window gaz- 
 ing across the tangle of beauty under the -moon-
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 178 
 
 light, and to her joy caught a glimpse of a 
 tawny form pacing majestically with silent 
 footsteps, the stone-flagged paths between the 
 rose-trees. 
 
 Some days passed. The Major forgot all 
 about the lioness, as he never came into the 
 garden, and the verandah where he smoked, 
 drank, and slept, lay on the other side of the 
 house. 
 
 The hotel was very empty just then as it was 
 late in the season and most of the travellers 
 had already come down from the Soudan and 
 not many were passing up. Brandon, who 
 never felt the heat, went out shooting most 
 days, and Lily was quite content with all the 
 treasures of the place, the baby hoopoe birds 
 that played round the oleander, the palms and 
 half ruined mosque of which she made a little 
 gem of a water colour, and the enchanting 
 lioness that followed her steps and lay beside 
 her while she painted and to whom she read 
 aloud the Arabic she was studying. 
 
 One evening Brandon came back late, he 
 had missed his way and gone too far down a
 
 174 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 gully, and to get back sooner to the house, he 
 cut across a rough piece of ground that joined 
 the lower end of the garden. A huge mass of 
 bauble, bamboo, and oleander hid the garden, 
 and just as he was passing this, following a 
 narrow path that led up to the side of the 
 hotel, he heard a sweet magic tone that could 
 only be his wife's voice, come floating through 
 the flowery barrier. 
 
 "Sa eedah aziz! Bukra, hena, saar saat" 
 came the words softly to his ear, and then the 
 only just audible sound of a soft kiss. Then 
 silence. 
 
 Brandon stopped dumbfounded. The words 
 were: "Good night, beloved; to-morrow, here 
 at seven o'clock," and in his wife's voice. A 
 kiss! An appointment for to-morrow with 
 her beloved! So that was the charm of the 
 garden! She speaking Arabic. Why, he 
 never knew she could speak it ! Then it must 
 be a black ! A black his wife ! 
 
 He stood there glaring, rooted to the spot. 
 His thoughts, furious disconnected thoughts, 
 dashed stinging through his brain. He gazed
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 175 
 
 at the leafy screen. No eye could penetrate 
 it. He thought of calling to her, but by now 
 she had doubtless sped back to the house, there 
 to meet him with her innocent smile. He had 
 his gun. Should he fire through the trees- 
 was the miscreant black crouching somewhere 
 there ? Then he ground his teeth and tramped 
 on ferociously to the hotel. "To-morrow at 
 seven o'clock." There seemed an added in- 
 sult to his sense of injury, as those were the 
 very words he had spoken this morning to 
 Miss Evangeline Jinks who presided over the 
 bar attached to the hotel, and whose somewhat 
 thick fingers had fastened into his buttonhole 
 the white camellia that still adorned his shoot- 
 ing coat. But he had another appointment 
 now, and Miss Jinks would have to console 
 herself with a subaltern. His plan was 
 formed. He would leave the hotel at seven 
 to-morrow as usual, and his wife, who doubt- 
 less had fixed her assignation for the time when 
 she knew him always to be away, would go to 
 her guilty tryst thinking he was well out of 
 the way. But where he would go would be
 
 176 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 the oleander thicket whence the enchanting love 
 whisper had come. There he would confront 
 the shameful pair, and his revolver would soon 
 settle with the black. While Lily . . . Lily 
 ... he fumed and raged and could not settle 
 what should be Lily's fate. He felt mad 
 enough to shoot them both. 
 
 He reached the hotel in a black fury, which 
 was not any abated by the sight of the cool and 
 delicate image of his wife, seated waiting for 
 him by the window. She had finished her 
 painting of the little mosque, and was looking 
 at it with that peace in the countenance that 
 only comes in the contemplation of what the 
 worker knows is perfect work. 
 
 She looked up, saw the flower in his coat, 
 knew whose hand had put it there, saw the 
 scowl on his face, reflected he was probably in 
 one of "his rages," and forbore to speak. 
 After a little smile of welcome, she let her eyes 
 fall again on the infant creation of her brain. 
 
 Brandon passed through to his dressing- 
 room, where she heard him banging and kick- 
 ing things about, and cursing his Soudanese
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 177 
 
 attendant. He did not address her till dinner- 
 time, and she kept silence, wondering why he 
 looked so furious. 
 
 "Been out in the garden?" he said, presently. 
 
 "Yes, till it was time to dress for dinner." 
 
 "Anyone with you?" 
 
 "Not a soul," then, thinking that might 
 sound like a complaint, she added, "I don't 
 mind being alone, you know I never have, and 
 I perfectly adore this place. I hope we shan't 
 have to go for ages." 
 
 The very speech to confirm his monstrous 
 suspicions. 
 
 "Are you studying Arabic?" was his next 
 abrupt question. 
 
 "Yes," replied Lily, rather surprised that 
 he should take the least interest in what she 
 was doing, but quite ready to respond. "It's 
 a wonderful, beautiful language. I've got 
 some books and I am getting on quite well." 
 
 More and more incriminating. One always 
 loves the language spoken by one's "beloved." 
 Brandon scowled into his plate and made no 
 reply but a churlish grunt.
 
 178 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 The following day, towards the fated hour 
 of seven, Miss Jinks in her little room above 
 the bar in the annex to the hotel, was frizzing 
 her rather dusty looking hair before her mir- 
 ror, and fixing in her front teeth. Lily with 
 her sketch-pad under one arm and an Arabic 
 grammar in her hand, clothed in a cool white 
 linen with a knot of white roses at her breast, 
 was going slowly down the centre garden path, 
 and Brandon with soundless rubber shoes on 
 his feet and a newly cleaned and loaded re- 
 volver in his pocket was creeping round by a 
 circuitous path, completely overhung with 
 pomegranate and bamboo, which led, outside 
 the garden, to the back of the oleander thicket. 
 Arrived there, he crept in, parting with diffi- 
 culty all the twining undergrowth of tropical 
 plants, and took up a position behind a screen 
 of shrubs, so thick that he felt sure he could 
 not be seen, but between the leaves of which he 
 could see out into the sunshine. 
 
 In front of the grove where he was, ran one 
 of the narrow garden paths, winding from the 
 hotel on his left hand, down to the jungle of
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 179 
 
 flowers and palm at the garden end. Directly 
 opposite him was the great mass of bamboo and 
 bauble behind which he had passed the previous 
 evening. 
 
 Here he waited for Lily and his vengeance, 
 and Miss Jinks waited vainly for him, in the 
 bar. 
 
 The air was still extremely hot, yet at in- 
 tervals a little breeze amongst the sweet- 
 scented things on every side brought a hint of 
 coolness. The sky stretched above a tranquil 
 blue of the purity of a flawless sapphire. The 
 coo of some doves came from the grove of 
 palms, two crimson butterflies fluttered deli- 
 cately above the path. A sense of repose and 
 peace hovered over the garden, all was pleas- 
 ing to the eye and ear, all nature seemed rest- 
 ing beneath a canopy of fragrance, awaiting 
 the evening coolness. Only in the heart of the 
 man in the thicket rioted the red thirst for 
 murder and revenge. Lily came along the 
 path; he could see her light gracious walk, 
 and the lustrous eyes beneath their arching 
 brows, glancing from side to side, apparently
 
 180 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 drinking in all the beauty round her with de- 
 light. She was chanting softly to herself some 
 little song, and her lips were parted and bright 
 in their smiling curves. She came close past 
 him and went a little way beyond. Confound 
 it, where was she going? It was difficult to 
 follow her now; the leaves were so thick at 
 his side. Still he could see her back and shoul- 
 ders and golden head. Suddenly his blood 
 seemed to stand still in his veins. She was 
 speaking. 
 
 "Oh, darling, here you are. I was afraid I 
 should miss you in the thicket. How fine you 
 look! how splendid!" 
 
 This in the loveliest voice surely that was 
 ever heard out of Eden; tones so rich and soft 
 and filled with the enthusiasm of love ! 
 
 Brandon's blood now seemed to race on 
 again, and boil and seeth with wrath. Red 
 mists swam before his eyes. He dodged the 
 branches this way and that, and vainly craned 
 his neck. Where was the fellow? He could 
 not see him though he could still the back of 
 his wife's standing figure. She had been speak-
 
 THE BEAST OF PREY 181 
 
 ing English now. Perhaps after all her lover 
 was one of the officers stationed here. Could 
 that fellow Mason . . . ? He clutched his re- 
 volver tightly and brought it into position, 
 but he could not see where to aim, nor could 
 he catch any reply to her greeting. He made 
 an effort to part the branches and snapped one. 
 He saw that Lily started and turned. Afraid 
 that he had given warning of his presence and 
 his quarry would escape, he thrust the barrel 
 of the weapon through the leaves, and aiming 
 in front of her, where he thought her lover 
 must be standing, he fired. 
 
 Instantly, and blinded by rage and savage 
 jealousy as he was, he fell back in horror, for 
 the white clothed figure turned and threw up 
 its arms as if to defend some object and ward 
 off the blow. 
 
 "Oh, don't shoot!" came her voice in an 
 agonised cry, that changed to a moan of physi- 
 cal pain, and she sank down on the path, the 
 shot buried in her breast. 
 
 Blindly, beside himself with he knew not 
 what feelings, he burst forward through the
 
 182 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 veils of clinging restraining creeper and net- 
 work of plant and tree. He rushed forward 
 to raise her. Then stopped short, glaring, 
 petrified, knowledge breaking in with its fear- 
 ful pitiless white light on his confused and 
 staggered brain. 
 
 There, across the convulsed and bleeding 
 body of his murdered wife, he met the up- 
 braiding eyes of the beast of prey.
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 
 
 HE sat in his log cabin reading her letter 
 with knitted brows. It was such a dear 
 sweet letter, so kind and loving, so sympa- 
 thetic in all its wording, that it seemed strange 
 and incongruous that the recipient should knit 
 his brows over it. But he did, and when he 
 had come to the end, he sighed heavily and 
 gazed down on the floor, lost in apparently 
 painful thought. He was a picturesque figure 
 as he sat there leaning against his rough deal 
 table with his elbow resting on it, and his well- 
 shaped, bright, golden-brown head supported 
 on his hand. He was tall, and his form had all 
 that lean hard grace which comes from great 
 strength and constant work, incessant, varied, 
 and not of the hardest kind. Dressed as he 
 was in long riding boots, blue jean trousers and 
 shirt, leather belt round his slight and flexible 
 waist, he looked a perfect figure to sketch or 
 to paint or to weave a romance round. His 
 
 163
 
 184 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 soft wide-brimmed grey felt hat, turned up at 
 one side, itself suggestive of poetry, fiction, and 
 heroic adventure, lay beside him on the table 
 near to the fateful letter in the neat and deli- 
 cate female hand. 
 
 There was nothing to disturb his long rev- 
 erie. It was the middle of an Arizona summer 
 afternoon, and here in the heart of the glori- 
 ous forest, not less than seventy-five long miles 
 away from the nearest little human settlement 
 and post office, it can easily be imagined that 
 silence deep and calm as the still water in a 
 well, reigned supreme. The heat was great, 
 but the quality of the air, four thousand feet 
 above sea level, was so pure, thin, light, and 
 dry, that it had no depressing nor enervating 
 effect. It had still all the exhilarating power 
 that the high elevation gave it. As one moved 
 one felt neither clammy nor oppressed. There 
 was a pleasant feeling of heat in the air, such 
 as one experiences on putting the hand into a 
 heated oven at home, that was all. 
 
 Great bands of yellow sunlight striped the 
 floor of the cabin ; a floor of perfect cleanliness,
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 185 
 
 made of neatly fitted boards resting upon logs; 
 the one wide horizontal window stood open; 
 so did the door, and both showed beyond a vista 
 of delicate green. Green, green was every- 
 where like a great ocean in which the cabin 
 floated as a boat. Greenness and silence for 
 seventy-five miles in every direction. 
 
 Round the cabin walls, formed of log lying 
 upon log, with moss deftly packed into the 
 chinks between, hung pots and pans of every 
 size and description, each clean and polished 
 as a jewel, each hanging apparently in its 
 place on its own appointed nail, each and every 
 one testifying no less than the clean steel tools 
 also hanging there, and the bright gaily painted 
 almanack showing the day's date, to the indus- 
 try and love of order of the owner. 
 
 Indeed for anyone lost and wandering in 
 the endless beauty of that wondrous forest to 
 stumble upon this hut and to be entertained 
 by its master, Victor Grey, would be a sur- 
 prising and pleasant experience he would not 
 soon forget. 
 
 Log cabins are very generally dirty and un-
 
 186 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 tidy places, their occupants often rough and 
 disorderly, however hospital, and yet to a trav- 
 eller starving for food and wearied to death of 
 the eternal green glades for ever opening be- 
 fore him, these cabins seem havens of comfort 
 and relief, and this one of Victor's, with its 
 air of refined peace, its note of order and 
 plenty, combined with thrift and sobriety, 
 would seem to the foot-sore one,-a magic palace 
 of delight. 
 
 Through the golden stillness, a leaf cracked 
 faintly under a light step outside. 
 
 Victor wheeled round in his chair, and then 
 rose as he saw a trim young figure of a girl in 
 the doorway. 
 
 "I came to bring you these few eggs, Mr. 
 Grey," she said softly, stopping on the thresh- 
 old and holding out a little basket in which 
 half a dozen clear brown hens' eggs were nest- 
 ling in some hay. 
 
 "How very kind of you! Do come in a mo- 
 ment," he answered, and put a chair for her 
 beside his own. 
 
 The girl came in with a shy and timid but
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 187 
 
 pleased air. From their looks and manners, 
 from the tone of their voices, from the gentle- 
 ness of their pleased glances, it was quite ob- 
 vious that these two were linked together by 
 those first light subtle chains of love, delicate 
 as the jessamine wreath or the daisy chain 
 which Xature weaves and that man replaces 
 later by ones of his own, more substantial but 
 not more sweet. 
 
 She sat down and faced the bright radiance 
 of the window : her cheeks were round and very 
 soft and the pale pink colour of the manzanita 
 which grew in its beautiful wild clumps, bear- 
 ing its Dresden-china-like flowers just outside 
 his door; her hair gathered back from her white 
 forehead and tied with a blue ribbon, was of 
 the deep rich tone of the chestnut, and golden 
 lights sparkled all over it and in amongst its 
 thick curling waves. Her eyes were large and 
 dark, and looked out from dark arching brows 
 as do those of the deer not yet accustomed 
 to the brutality of man, with a tender enquiring 
 innocence, confidence and awe mingling in their 
 velvet depths. As she sat on the oak chair, her
 
 188 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 form not heavy, but well developed, her limbs 
 round, yet slight, her head well carried, her 
 whole pose easy, yet alert, she conveyed the 
 impression of great strength, great capacity for 
 work, great fitness to bear with and go through 
 successfully a hard and trying existence. The 
 man looked down upon her with a tender gaze, 
 it was a sort 'of enveloping glance that seemed 
 to take in everything about her : her youth, her 
 health, her vigour, her natural sunlit beauty, 
 her coarse and simple, yet perfectly clean and 
 tidy blue jean clothing. 
 
 Then he turned his eyes to the window, but 
 not until with a swift passing scrutiny they 
 had rested for a second on a framed photograph 
 standing on his rude mantel-shelf. The face 
 in it presented a striking contrast to the girl's 
 in the oak chair. The pictured face was the 
 most exquisite and ethereal one could well 
 imagine, with that fairness and delicacy that 
 the snowdrop and the anemone show, trembling 
 on their stalk. It was the face, moreover, of 
 one who has never known and could not stand 
 manual work, and whose life was the intellec-
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 189 
 
 tual one of cities. Still more the photo re- 
 vealed, for it showed a costly dress of lace and 
 a jewelled spray in the beautiful wealth of 
 golden hair. As far removed from each other 
 as any two human beings could be in this world 
 were the two girls, who, at that moment, one 
 on the painted card, one in her living self, sat 
 in Victor's cabin, 
 
 He took the chair beside her, and closed 
 his great strong hand over her slim, supple, 
 brown one. 
 
 "May! dear little May," he said softly. 
 
 The girl said nothing. They had never 
 called each other by their Christian names. 
 He had never spoken a word of love to her. 
 She had felt instinctively, though he never 
 talked of his affairs, that the face in the frame 
 was the cause. 
 
 "I love you, May," he went on in the same 
 soft undertone, which had a great seriousness 
 in it, "and you love me, I know. You could 
 not have been sweet and dear to me if you did 
 not, and that is why I am talking to you like 
 this to-day. I am going away to England, and
 
 190 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 I want to tell you the truth before I go." 
 
 She looked up. "Why are you going?" she 
 asked. 
 
 "I am going to get married and bring my 
 wife out here with me." 
 
 "Ah!" he felt a shiver run through her. 
 She sat back in the chair, drawn together sud- 
 denly, almost as if .someone had pushed a dag- 
 ger into her breast. 
 
 "All this time," he went on, "I have been 
 engaged, and that has been why I have never 
 spoken of love to you, and never come to your 
 home as your father wished. One cannot al- 
 together help one's feelings and thoughts, but 
 one can command one's words and actions. 
 You have guessed all this?" 
 
 "Yes," the girl whispered back, "the photo- 
 graph?" 
 
 The man nodded. 
 
 "I am engaged to her. I fell very much in 
 love with her three years ago, when she passed 
 through here with a hunting party. That 
 was before you and four father came to the 
 clearing."
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 191 
 
 He paused for a moment, looking away from 
 the girl, out through the window into its world 
 of mysterious green beyond. He was recalling 
 a vision of a lovely face that had looked in 
 through that frame three years ago, of a sil- 
 very voice with its sweet delicate tones that had 
 called to him for directions before its owner had 
 swept onwards by the broad turfy track under 
 the maze of interlacing boughs, which led to 
 the strangers' camp, a little distance from his 
 cabin. 
 
 "Do you love her still?'* came the girl's 
 pained voice at his side. 
 
 "Yes, I think I do," he answered. "But, 
 oh! May, I see now the horrible mistake of it 
 all. I love her, in a way, yes, as you and I, 
 May, love the gorgeous planets that flash above 
 us, over the corral at night. When she came 
 here she threw enchantment over me. She was 
 like a spirit dropped from another world. I 
 looked upon her as something too wonderful to 
 touch, almost to look upon, and then she loved 
 me. Why, I can't think." 
 
 May looked up at him, her eyes resting
 
 192 
 
 adoringly on his bright head, his noble features, 
 the fine clear whiteness of his skin that no ex- 
 posure could coarsen, and did not share his 
 wonder in the least. 
 
 "Of course she would fall in love with you," 
 she retorted with an indignant little frown. 
 
 "I don't know why she should," he rejoined 
 simply, "her own life was so brilliant, she had 
 everything in it, but I felt she loved me, and 
 when I asked her if she would marry me and 
 accept this life, she said 'Yes,' because she 
 loved me though she would hate the life, and 
 I was so mad and foolish, I persisted in it all, 
 and when she went away we made a definite 
 solemn promise to each other that no distance, 
 no length of time, only death should divide 
 us." 
 
 His voice sank. There was silence. The 
 girl beside him sat still, numb and cold and 
 sad, sick with apprehension and despair. 
 
 She had always loved him. Her heart had 
 flown out to him, in spite of her strenuous ef- 
 forts to restrain it, at their very first meeting
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 193 
 
 when she and her father had settled in the 
 clearing three miles away, and he had come over 
 and generously helped them with his own time 
 and labour in setting up their simple house. 
 But on her first visit to his cabin, when she had 
 seen the lovely picture on his mantel-piece, 
 she had determined to let no sign of love es- 
 cape her. She had nobly tried to throw out 
 of her heart the love that strove to take pos- 
 session of it. But even so, he had guessed 
 ... he had known. 
 
 "Well, but ... but ... if you love her 
 still, it's all right?" she ventured to say at last, 
 a bitterness she could not help in her tone. 
 
 "I loved her then, as a sort of enchantment, 
 and I love her still as a glorious memory of that 
 time, but in all these three years, you can un- 
 derstand, the magic has faded, and then, I see 
 the fatal folly of it. She can do nothing. She 
 has always been rich, waited on, accustomed to 
 pleasure, to the gay brilliance of the cities. 
 What will she do here? where one must work, 
 everyone must work hard all day, where there
 
 194 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 is nothing but just mere existence, the getting 
 and preparing of food, eating and working 
 and sleeping. She will be miserable here . . . 
 grow to hate me as well as the life." 
 
 "I expect she'll learn to do things. She'll 
 have to," remarked the girl sturdily, with a 
 vicious little snap in her voice. 
 
 She knew what she could do, cook and bake 
 and sew, wash and mangle, scrub and clean; 
 cut wood and chop and saw, milk cows and 
 harness horses, rise at sun-up and work till 
 dark, and never know an ache or a pain nor a 
 feeling of fatigue. She knew how perfectly 
 happy she would be sharing this existence with 
 him; his log cabin would be a palace to her, in 
 which there were but light and joyous tasks, 
 and she had no patience with the idea of this 
 golden fairy who could wish for anything bet- 
 ter or different. 
 
 "Well, there it is," he went on after a pause. 
 "I have given my word of honour and I can't 
 break it. I have hoped at times that she might 
 change and tire, but she has not. She is true 
 as steel."
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 195 
 
 "Why don't you write and ask her to release 
 you, say you have changed?" broke in the girl 
 eagerly, a great flame suddenly mounting in 
 her dark brown eyes. "If you really have," 
 she added a little petulantly. 
 
 "Darling," said the man suddenly, putting 
 his arm round her waist, "you know I have. 
 You know I love only you now, and I see we 
 are so suited. I know I could make you 
 happy. I love reality in you. I only love a 
 vision, a dream in her, but don't you see I can't 
 ask her. I know she would release me in a 
 minute, I know she would hate and scorn to tie 
 any man to her against his will. She is hon- 
 our and greatness itself. She would do it. 
 She would cable me that I was free, but if she 
 should not wish it, if she really loves me still, if 
 she should be very unhappy ! just think ! How 
 can I withdraw my word if she might suffer by 
 it. Only a cad and a brute could do it." 
 
 "Well, I know some men just go away and 
 marry someone else and never ask for release 
 or even tell the girl they're engaged to. They 
 just leave her to find it out."
 
 196 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 An indignant flush swept across the fine face 
 of the ranchman. 
 
 "She would forgive me, I know, even if 
 I did that, but she would think me the most 
 contemptible hound that ever lived. How 
 could she help it? And I know I'd blow my 
 brains out rather than so degrade myself. 
 No, May, my family is an old one, and we've 
 never lost our honour. Noblesse oblige" 
 
 "What's that you said last?" said the girl, 
 sharply looking up at him. She saw for the 
 moment his eyes and thoughts were far 
 away. 
 
 He started. "Eh? Oh, well, freely trans- 
 lated it means playing the game." 
 
 "I don't understand now," May returned 
 pettishly, "what game ?" 
 
 "The game of life. Well, it means that if 
 you value your self-respect you have go't to 
 act in a certain way; that's all. You can't 
 cheat and lie. Common worthless people can 
 and do because they don't know any better." 
 
 There was a -long tense silence. At last 
 the girl broke it.
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 197 
 
 "Then it is to be good-bye for ever?" she 
 said in a timid voice, her lip quivering. 
 
 He turned and took her wholly into his arms, 
 and she laid her head 'down on his shoulder, 
 crying passionately. 
 
 "Darling little May, yes, it must be. Your 
 father was talking of going away, right out of 
 these parts ; you will go with him, go and for- 
 get me. Perhaps it would have been better if 
 we had not talked like this, but somehow I 
 thought you would rather know just what I 
 felt. And we could not help each other seeing 
 how we loved. Dear little May, don't cry so! 
 You are so young, only sixteen, you will find 
 someone who is free, and love him much more 
 than me and be ever so happy, I know you 
 will." He stroked the soft mass of glinting 
 hair that lay on her shoulders, and held her to 
 him very gently, and she lay in his arms and 
 cried and cried, till from fatigue, she could 
 cry no more. He kissed her many times on 
 her white soft brow and on her chestnut curls, 
 feeling in those moments that duty was very 
 bitter.
 
 198 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 The sun sank to a crimson glory in the West, 
 and the whole forest was lit up with a flood of 
 red and gold as they left the cabin together, 
 and almost in silence, and with slow feet and 
 heavy hearts, they walked through the fairy 
 glades back to her father's place. 
 
 
 
 Four thousand miles away on the same after- 
 noon in one of the drawing-rooms of Grosvenor 
 Square, two girls sat talking across the silver 
 and Dresden china of their little tea-table. 
 
 "I feel sometimes as if I couldn't do it, and 
 yet I know I must. I can't write and say I 
 won't come after all this time, and perhaps 
 break his heart." The speaker lay back in her 
 chair as if exhausted by some mental struggle. 
 One arm in its exquisite embroidered muslin 
 hung over the side, her head with its crown of 
 fair burnished hair rested wearily on the silk 
 cushion. 
 
 "But you don't know it would break his 
 heart," remarked the other girl cheerfully, se- 
 lecting a choice De Reszke from her little gold 
 case. "Why don't you write and find out?"
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 199 
 
 "How can I?" responded the other reproach- 
 fully, turning to her companion her wide blue 
 eyes, the same as looked from the framed card 
 on Victor's mantel-piece. "The moment I 
 even faintly hinted I wanted my freedom, he 
 would release me at once, whatever it cost him. 
 You don't know, Hilda, how .good and fine he 
 is. If it killed him, he would never complain 
 or reproach me." 
 
 Hilda struck a match with an emphasis that 
 somehow conveyed her disbelief in Victor's 
 early demise. She only said, however, after 
 a minute. 
 
 "Well, the alternative is to go out to the 
 ranch, marry the divinely good man, and live 
 happily ever after." 
 
 "I believe I could if it wasn't for Bertie," 
 the other murmured disconsolately. 
 
 "Yes, there's Bertie," resumed Hilda, smok- 
 ing with serene contentment and half closed 
 eyes. "Now, Ada, how do you know that 
 Bertie's heart won't break just as much as the 
 other man's." 
 
 "It's altogether different," Ada answered.
 
 200 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Bertie has his regiment and lives here in Lon- 
 don where there are such heaps of distractions, 
 you know life's a whirl. Out there in the soli- 
 tude and silence where a year may go by and 
 you never hear another human voice, a dream, 
 a hope, becomes so magnified, the mind must 
 brood upon, cling to it, and if that dream is 
 dispelled, there is nothing to take its place, no 
 possible distractions nor solace. Only the 
 same dreary round of work in absolute soli- 
 tude." 
 
 "How you will enjoy it!" returned Hilda. 
 "I can see you in .blue jean, in your dreary 
 round of work, scrubbing, washing, cooking, 
 sewing, I suppose. Victor out all day, riding 
 after cattle, you in absolute solitude, but per- 
 haps there'll be some cheery infants clinging to 
 the blue jean skirts, as you with your hair 
 tightly screwed back and your sleeves rolled up, 
 go to feed the little black pigs crowding round 
 the door!" 
 
 "I don't mind the pigs, they'll be company 
 anyway!" returned Ada, turning her golden 
 head listlessly on the cushion. "You can be as
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 201 
 
 sarcastic as you like, Hilda, but you won't 
 make me go back on my word and throw over 
 a man who has been waiting for me and think- 
 ing of me for three years. However I hate 
 it, I've got to go through with it now. It's 
 only playing the game." 
 
 Hilda was silent. She let her eyes wander 
 round the beautiful room so full of all the 
 evidences of luxury and wealth, of the best 
 that civilization can bring to the human beings. 
 Her gaze rested on the grand piano that could 
 give out such a glory of sound; on the almost 
 priceless lilies and orchids, marvels of bloom 
 and colour, on the tables; on the silk uphol- 
 stered furniture which wooed one to rest in its 
 depths of softness and ease ; on the form of her 
 friend clothed simply enough but in fabrics so 
 light and soft that they were hardly felt. 
 
 Then as her reflective gaze swept round this 
 home of beauty and ease, it caught the large 
 picture hanging on the wall behind Ada's head. 
 The portrait of one of her ancestors who had 
 cheerfully laid down his life for his king in the 
 Great Rebellion, and for five hundred years
 
 202 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 not one of Ada's noble line had failed when 
 duty called him, or withdrawn his plighted 
 word ; and neither would this girl disgrace her 
 line she knew. Though she looked so fragile, 
 and had been brought up in the softest luxury 
 and ease, she was ready to go forward and ac- 
 cept the fate she had made for herself, to face 
 hardship and die under it rather than speak one 
 word which would have brought her release, be- 
 cause that one word seemed to her to bring 
 dishonour too. And Hilda quite understood: 
 in spite of her sarcasm and her teasing and her 
 worldly wisdom, she understood. 
 
 She rose and went over to Ada's chair. She 
 had thrown away her cigarette and was but- 
 toning her glove. 
 
 "Well, dear, you said Bertie was to come at 
 five, so I will go now. You would like to see 
 him by yourself for the last time. When did 
 you say Victor was coming over?" 
 
 "He will arrive in about three weeks." 
 
 "Then you'll marry and go out with him?" 
 
 "I suppose so." 
 
 Her face was very white, her eyes were
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 203 
 
 closed. Then suddenly she opened them and 
 fixed them in a horrified clinging gaze on her 
 friend's face. 
 
 "Oh! Hilda, it's dreadful! Not the man, 
 Victor's all right. When you meet him, you'll 
 see better how it's all happened, but the life, 
 that awful ranch life, with never a note of 
 music in it nor an intellectual idea! The 
 monotony, the loneliness, the sordid incessant 
 work! Work w r ith no attainment in it, work 
 that is no use, carries you nowhere, has no end ! 
 You work one day that you may exist to work 
 the next." 
 
 "I know. It's frightful. I wish to heaven 
 you had not bound yourself to the wretched 
 man. He can't leave his old farm or what- 
 ever it is, I suppose?" 
 
 Ada shook her head. 
 
 "Everything he has, all his capital is in it, 
 and I haven't much of my own, you know, and 
 he wouldn't live on my money if I had." 
 
 "Wretched business! but if you love him, it 
 mayn't be as bad as you think." 
 
 "I don't not now. I love Bertie."
 
 204 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Well really ... I almost think . . ." 
 
 The other girl sprang up. 
 
 "Now you're going to advise me again to 
 break my word ! It's no good, Hilda ! That 
 would be worse than the other thing." 
 
 Hilda looked at her and gave a little shrug 
 of her shoulders. 
 
 "Well, so-long, dear. You'll be at the Op- 
 era to-night?" 
 
 "Yes. I won't have many more chances !" 
 
 Hilda went out, and going down the stairs, 
 she just caught a glimpse of the handsome head 
 of Captain Herbert Dennis, as the noiseless 
 lift glided up past her to the drawing-room. 
 
 Ada was standing with her head bent down 
 and her forehead resting on the mantel-piece 
 when the young officer came in. She straight- 
 ened herself immediately, and went forward 
 with hand outstretched and a little smile. 
 She belonged to the rank where everything, the 
 deepest wounds, the most bitter enmity, the 
 greatest agony, death itself, is met with that 
 brave and charming smile. 
 
 "I am so glad you wanted to see me before
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 205 
 
 I started for Egypt," he said, clasping and 
 holding her hand. "Your telephone message 
 this morning bucked me up tremendously." 
 
 "I ... I ... felt I wanted to see you 
 once more." 
 
 There was silence. The young man looked 
 at her steadily. There was a great whiteness 
 and a great pain in her face, the smile had died 
 away. Then he came very close to her and 
 took her hand again. 
 
 "Ada! dearest! Are you sorry I'm going?" 
 "I ought not to be sorry. I am going to be 
 married very soon, and going away myself to 
 Arizona." She hurried the words out and tried 
 to turn away and withdraw her hand, but he 
 would not let her. 
 
 "Yes, I knew you were engaged, and that's 
 why I've never told you, but you knew, you 
 guessed, didn't you, how I love you. Oh! 
 Ada, I'd give up my life if you could come 
 with me now; is it possible? Do you love me? 
 Tell me, you must tell me!" He threw his 
 arms round her, and caught her chin in his 
 hand, turning her averted face up to his, so that
 
 206 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 he could look down into her eyes. They were 
 full of desperate tears, but in their swimming 1 
 depths he read his answer. 
 
 "Come, come, come with me!" he whispered, 
 kissing her cold white face and quivering lips. 
 "Don't let anything come between us. All 
 this time I've said nothing because I did not 
 know if you cared, but I loved you the moment 
 I saw you, that first night we danced. We'll 
 be married directly . . . to-morrow . . . and 
 go to Egypt together." 
 
 As soon as she could she struggled out of 
 his arms and sat down on a little chair near 
 her, covering her face with both hands and 
 sobbing, not loudly, but as if her whole body 
 would break to pieces. 
 
 He sank on his knees by the chair and put 
 his arms round her. 
 
 "Why shouldn't we?" he murmured. 
 
 At last she regained her voice. She sat up 
 and looked at him. 
 
 "Three years ago I promised to marry this 
 man in Arizona, and he has waited all that time
 
 PLAYIXG THE GAME 207 
 
 for me. Now he is coming over for me. I 
 can't break my word, can I?" 
 
 The man grew very pale, too. He did not 
 answer, and Ada went on. 
 
 "Suppose it was your case. Suppose you'd 
 been engaged three years, and the girl loved 
 you and had written you every week, would 
 you throw her over just because you had met 
 someone else you loved better?" 
 
 Bertie got up and paced up and down the 
 long room in silence, frowning. 
 
 "Men do, and girls too, every day," he mut- 
 tered after a minute, "but somehow I think 
 I'd hate myself rather if I did." 
 "Well, I feel just the same." 
 There was another long silence. The girl 
 sat white and still in her chair. The passion- 
 ate weeping and feeling of rebellion was over. 
 She was quiet now. She knew there was no 
 way out. The man paced restlessly up and 
 down, staring at the carpet. What he was 
 feeling was this great truth that to act like a 
 coward or a cad you have got to be one all
 
 208 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 through. For the naturally noble to be led 
 into a dishonourable act for any reason what- 
 ever is fatal. Before his eyes swam a picture 
 of a fellow officer lying dying from his own 
 revolver shot, in their tent in the Soudan. 
 This man, overcome by some nervous crisis in 
 a skirmish had turned and fled from the enemy, 
 leaving his friends in the lurch. He had come 
 back, explained, been exonerated by them, but 
 that night he had shot himself in his tent. His 
 last words sounded in Bertie's ears: "It's no 
 good, if you want to act like a cad you must 
 be a cad. I wasn't, I'm not, so good-bye, old 
 man." 
 
 He had not forgotten that, and now in all 
 the stress and strain of his passion, in the whirl 
 of joy that swept over him at knowing defi- 
 nitely that she loved him, this scene and those 
 words came back to him insistently, and the 
 great truth that it is better to die than to live 
 dishonoured stood between him and his great 
 desire. He felt, instinctively, there would be 
 no happiness for them with this spectre of a 
 broken word between them.
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 209 
 
 He went over to her suddenly, lifted her 
 wholly off the chair and into his arms, and 
 pressed her hard to his breast. 
 
 "Good-bye, girlie, my own brave dearest 
 dear. I'll never love anybody as I love 
 you. I'll think of you all my life. Good- 
 bye." 
 
 Then he was gone. She made no effort to 
 speak, to return his caress. She was numb, 
 sinking down slowly through an icy well of 
 despair to which there seemed no end. 
 
 About two months later, on a night splendid 
 with stars and glittering with frost, a wagon 
 with two horses and containing two occupants 
 was rolling steadily along the red road that 
 runs from Flagstaff to Phoenix, passing 
 through hundreds of miles of glorious forest 
 land. And about this Arizona forest there is 
 nothing of deadliness, nor terror, nor gloom, 
 such as is hid in many a tropical forest. It is 
 full of sweet-scented sunshine and light air. 
 The trees stand apart so that the laughing blue 
 overhead is rarely out of one's sight. The soil
 
 210 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 is light and dry and fine, there are no tangled 
 creepers lying in wait for the foot ; the under- 
 growth is simply great bushes of the manzan- 
 ita, a lovely flowering shrub, and clumps of 
 the wild azalea. There are no swamps, no 
 treacherous marshy land, no layers of rotting 
 vegetation, nothing to depress the mind or poi- 
 son the blood. The air circulates freely be- 
 tween golden cedar and lofty pine, spreading 
 beech and oak and giant red-wood tree. 
 Laughing and gushing streamlets, sparkling 
 in their gravel bed, flow through it. Bright 
 blue jays scream and chatter overhead. There 
 are open sunny spaces. The whole breath of 
 the forest is life and health, the whole spirit of 
 it gaiety and joy. The bright clear air 
 sparkles like a yellow diamond through the 
 golden days, air so fine and dry that nothing 
 seems to corrupt in it, hardly to decay, and at 
 night when the temperature sinks suddenly 
 from seventy-five degrees to thirty-two de- 
 grees, and the brooks coat quickly over with 
 ice, the breeze comes to one's lips bringing the 
 exhilaration of ice cool wine. The wagon
 
 PLAYIXG THE GAME 211 
 
 rolled on easily, the sound of its wheels distinct 
 on the frosted road, past the little clearing- 
 where for a short time a house had been, past 
 the old cattle corral where Victor had formerly 
 penned his cattle at the round-up, through a 
 seemingly endless avenue of enormous firs, and 
 then under the fire and flash and radiance of 
 the stars, pulled up at Victor's cabin. He 
 sprang to the ground. 
 
 "Here we are at last. I expect you're tired 
 to death?" he said, pulling back the canvas flap 
 and disclosing Ada sitting inside, wrapped in 
 her long fur cloak. 
 
 "Not a bit," came her clear, dainty voice. 
 "I've enjoyed every bit of it ! What a wonder 
 this forest is! It strikes me as more beautiful 
 than ever." 
 
 Victor did not reply: he was busy with straps 
 and flaps, making a way for her to descend, 
 but a little flush of pride burnt on his cheek. 
 He loved this land and home he had chosen; 
 loved to hear it admired. He lifted her down 
 gently, and then turned to unfasten the door. 
 It stood ajar. Victor pushed it open hur-
 
 212 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 riedly, and an exclamation of dismay, of grief, 
 broke from him. Ada went to his side. 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 "Some boys have been along and broken in. 
 I expect they have taken everything," he an- 
 swered, getting out a box of matches and 
 striking a light. A lamp was on the table just 
 at his hand. He lighted and turned up the 
 wick. The light drew up well and showed a 
 scene of desolation. Revellers had been there 
 evidently, supping, drinking, smoking, and 
 when they had partaken of this free hospi- 
 tality, had cleared out, leaving their host hours 
 of work to put things again in order. 
 
 Victor looked round the place with a groan. 
 He had left it all so perfect, knowing his bride 
 was returning with him. Fire laid ready to 
 kindle; wood neatly stacked by the stove; tins 
 of canned food with tin opener ranged on the 
 shelf; floor of the whiteness of marble; lamps, 
 tools, utensils, all sparkling with brightness; 
 kettle and pannikin and frying pan clean and 
 ready to fill and pop on the fire. In such a 
 climate as this where there is no damp, dust,
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 213 
 
 rust, mildew or moth to corrupt and spoil, a 
 cabin will t remain spotless and clean, unat- 
 tended to for many months. But by ill chance, 
 one in a thousand, some of the boys on a tear 
 had passed by and camped here, that was evi- 
 dent. 
 
 Ada stood for a moment in the centre and 
 stared about her, not recognising the place. 
 Victor's cabin as she had seen it, and remem- 
 bered it, had been an immaculate picture of 
 order and peace. This place was filthy, the 
 floor stained everywhere with tobacco juice, the 
 stove dirty and burnt out ; a pile of unwashed 
 tin plates and cups thrown down beside it. 
 Cases of provisions had been dragged out of 
 the orderly cupboards against the wall, broken 
 open, and their contents hurriedly gone 
 through, and much of it left strewn on the 
 floor. The table was covered with a litter of 
 dirty plates and knives and greasy paper. In 
 the middle lay a leaf torn from a pocket book. 
 on which were scrawled a few words. Victor 
 picked it up and read : "Thanks for a preciou s 
 good time, old boy. Will give you the same if
 
 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 you're lost round Tiller's ranch on the burnt 
 oak trail. Two of the boys." 
 
 Victor put it down with an exclamation of 
 angry disgust. 
 
 "Never mind, Vic," Ada said. "We can put 
 it all straight in no time. I'll light the fire 
 while you look after the horses. They must 
 be cold out there." 
 
 It was cold. The liquid in a glass on the 
 table was frozen hard. 
 
 "Can you really?" he answered, looking at 
 her doubtfully. A wonderfully beautiful and 
 regal figure she looked standing there with her 
 soft plumed hat nearly touching the rafters, 
 and the fur of her costly coat shining in the 
 lamplight. 
 
 "Of course. I suppose it's the custom of 
 the country to break into your neighbour's hut 
 for anything you want ?" 
 
 "Yes," he replied. "We all do it. I don't 
 mind that, but they should leave things straight 
 and clean when they go." 
 
 "They'd never seen such order as yours, I 
 expect," she said, laughing. "They would not
 
 PLAYIXG THE GAME 215 
 
 know how to put it back, or perhaps they re- 
 sented it." 
 
 She passed into the other room to lay her 
 cloak down, but stopped on the threshold in 
 dismay. Here the confusion and disorder was 
 more apparent even than in the sitting-room. 
 The bed had evidently been lain upon by some- 
 one too tired or too drunk to remove his boots ; 
 clothes had been taken out of cupboards and 
 thrown about. The jug on the washing stand 
 had been filled and left with water in it, which, 
 freezing, had broken the china to pieces ; in the 
 basin stood dirty frozen water; on the towels 
 half- washed hands had been dried, leaving their 
 imprint on them, the soap was black. 
 
 Ada said nothing however to Victor. She 
 hastily hung her coat on a hook in the wall, 
 and then returned, closing the door after her. 
 She heard him outside talking to the horses and 
 pushing the wagon into its place. Very quick 
 and light in her movements, she went down on 
 her knees before the stove and raked it clear 
 of all the ash. She had never seen a stove like 
 this before, and never laid or lighted a fire in
 
 216 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 her life, but she had all that general intelligence 
 which belongs to a well-developed brain, and 
 all the grit of the true aristocrat who is never 
 seen to better advantage than when plunged 
 suddenly into novel and trying situations. 
 The stove was cleaned and the paper from the 
 table put in, but there was no wood anywhere. 
 She pulled open a little cupboard by the stove. 
 A chopper lay there amongst some chips, all 
 that was left of Victor's neat store. She took 
 the chopper and went out. There were some 
 bigger logs still untouched in the lean-to out- 
 side. With great care, for she was a little 
 afraid of the chopper, and there was only star- 
 light to work by, she chopped up one of the 
 logs and brought back an armful of wood to 
 the cabin. She filled the stove carefully, and 
 after putting the match to it, was rewarded 
 by its cheerful crackling. Then she peered 
 into the large iron kettle; its lid was missing, 
 and a little stale and rusty coloured water was 
 frozen at the bottom of it. She looked round: 
 where was the water? She thought she had 
 seen a stream somewhere near the cabin, years
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 217 
 
 ago, but she did not remember exactly. She 
 must go and look. She went out with the 
 heavy iron kettle, and walked round the hut. 
 She could hear Victor still moving about in 
 the stable with the horses. She knew he would 
 not be content until he had rubbed them down 
 and fed them. 
 
 The starry splendour of the night seemed to 
 speak to her, give her great pleasure, and in 
 spite of the icy air on her coatless body, and 
 the weight of the two gallon kettle, and the 
 need for speed, she could not help pausing and 
 looking up to it. This beauty all round her, 
 pressing in upon her, would be the solace and 
 comfort she foresaw of her distasteful exist- 
 ence. She looked up, and a calm seemed to 
 fall upon her, a joyous calm. Then she has- 
 tened on. In the summer the streams are easy 
 to find, their sweet chatter and light trickling 
 laughter as they run can be heard long before 
 the banks are reached, and lead one to them, 
 but now, in winter, frozen over and asleep, they 
 make no sign. She went all round the cabin; 
 then at a little distance in the starlight, to which
 
 218 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 her eyes were growing accustomed, she made 
 out a long line" of white through the trees, and 
 ran towards it. 
 
 When she reached the edge, she saw it was 
 no easy task to fill the kettle. She wished she 
 had brought something as a dipper. There it 
 lay beneath her, the stream, solidly covered 
 with ice. The bank was only a few feet high, 
 but very steep, frozen also, glistening and hard. 
 
 She knelt down, and with the kettle at arm's 
 length she could touch the ice. It broke after 
 many blows : she drew the kettle up with a little 
 water in and washed it out as well as s*he could. 
 It was cold with freezing ground and air and 
 water, but she seemed literally -burning with 
 anxiety to do the work and do it well. With 
 soft slim fingers and a dry leaf, she scrubbed 
 out the kettle, rinsed it, and then started to 
 fill it. The stream was running rapidly be- 
 neath the ice, and showed clear and dark with 
 the stars mirrored in it. The kettle filled as 
 she sank it into the well she had made, but when 
 she attempted to pull it up to her level on the 
 bank, she found two gallons of water hard to
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 219 
 
 handle ; as it swung up towards her under her 
 persistent effort, the edge of the bank on which 
 she was kneeling gave way, and she fell side- 
 ways down into the icy water. The shock and 
 the cold almost took her breath away, but she 
 gave no sound, only clutched on to the kettle 
 more tightly still, refilled it, and with it scram- 
 bled up the broken side of the bank. Her feet 
 and clothes were wet, but she was unhurt, and 
 getting up instantly, she ran like the wind back 
 to the cabin. 
 
 Victor was still away. She set the kettle on 
 the stove, found the lid in the litter on the 
 table, put it on, and then proceeded to clear up. 
 Moving very swiftly, and with her quick brain 
 at work all the time, she soon had made great 
 progress, and when Victor stood on the thresh- 
 old he saw something like comfort again re- 
 stored. The stove was well alight, the kettle 
 singing, the table cleared, and two clean cups 
 and saucers and plates set out upon it. He 
 smiled, and a feeling of surprise came over 
 him. Even May could not have been quicker 
 or done better.
 
 220 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 She made no remark about herself, nor spoke 
 of her fall, her chilled limbs, or damp clothes. 
 The plain serge travelling frock she wore 
 showed no damage in the dull light of an un- 
 cleaned lamp. 
 
 "Where do you keep your tea?" she asked 
 brightly as the kettle boiled. 
 
 "In the left hand corner cupboard if they've 
 left us any," he answered. He sat down for 
 a moment in the chair she had cleared for him. 
 He suddenly felt very tired, nearly forty miles 
 continuous driving, and then the unharnessing 
 and rubbing down of the horses, and then haul- 
 ing in and stacking up in order all their lug- 
 gage and the contents of the wagon, had left 
 him glad of a moment's rest. 
 
 Ada went to the cupboard and opened it. 
 There were many things in it. Victor's more 
 personal belongings, which by him were kept 
 neatly in their respective places, but this nook 
 had been overhauled by the marauders and left 
 like the rest of the place in confusion. A 
 work-box with stout thread and buttons and 
 reels in it jostled against a writing-pad and
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 221 
 
 some packets of envelopes, a bottle of ink and 
 a roll of jean stood in front of the tea-can. 
 Ada lifted them out, then the can; as she did so 
 a photograph that had been hastily pushed in 
 behind it fell forward, and she picked it up. 
 In a large writing that she could not help read- 
 ing in the first glance, was written: "With 
 love from your little May. Good-bye, darl- 
 ing," and the dates of the month and year fol- 
 lowed, the date of Victor's last letter to herself 
 saying he was coming home. Mechanically 
 she turned it over, and the sixteen-year-old face 
 of May looked up at her from the card. Obey- 
 ing the physical feeling which made her limbs 
 seem to sink under her, she sat down on the 
 floor with the card in one hand and the tea-can 
 in the other. Only a word is necessary, a look, 
 a sigh to those whose brains are keen, and a 
 whole history is revealed. Ada, crushed and 
 silent, sitting on the floor, forgot Victor, forgot 
 the cabin, forgot everything near her. With a 
 rebound, rapid and violent, her mind sprang 
 back to an image she had resolutely forced 
 from her ever since her marriage.
 
 222 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 She was in Bertie's arms ; she was back with 
 him. She was going to Egypt to the life she 
 loved of brilliance, of change, of travel, of fun, 
 of adventure, the life of an officer's wife. 
 
 The kettle boiled so furiously and began to 
 splutter so viciously on the stove that Victor 
 sprang up and lifted it to one side. 
 
 "Have you found the tea?" he called out. 
 Then as no answer came he looked round and 
 saw her sitting in a little huddled heap before 
 the cupboard. 
 
 "Why, dear, what's the matter?" he said con- 
 cernedly, going over to her. Then he saw: the 
 card lay in her lap: her eyes were fixed on 
 something far beyond his cabin walls. 
 
 "Oh, darling, I'm sorry you should have seen 
 that," he said, and lifted her up bodily and 
 brought her over to the stove and set her in his 
 chair. He realised instantly that to her fine 
 perception all was clear. There was no pos- 
 sibility of deception or excuse. 
 
 "Give it to me. Let me tear it up." 
 
 He took the card from her nerveless hand
 
 PLAYIXG THE GAME 223 
 
 and tore it into minute pieces, opened the door 
 of the stove, and thrust them in. 
 
 "Don't think of it," he said, bending over 
 and kissing her. "It's all over. You and I 
 have set our feet on the trail now, and we are 
 going to travel it together." 
 
 She had watched him tear up and burn the 
 card in passive silence. She accepted his caress 
 passively, almost unconscious of it. She was 
 stupefied by the intensity of the blow. After 
 a minute she got up and stood beside him. 
 Never had she seemed so lovely, he thought. 
 It was the magic vision that had looked in at 
 his window and thrown enchantment over him 
 three years before. Her face was white, her 
 eyes strangely dilated, the pale gold of her 
 silky hair beneath her little travelling hat 
 gleamed in the lamp rays. 
 
 "Tell me, Victor," she said after a minute, 
 and her voice was quite calm. "Did you love 
 that girl and want to marry her?" 
 
 "I did. Yes," he answered simply. There 
 was a force emanating from her that simply
 
 224 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 tore the straight truth from him. He could 
 not hesitate, nor evade, nor prevaricate, even 
 had he wished to. 
 
 "Why did you not write and tell me?" 
 
 "Because I knew you would have released 
 me at once, and I thought it was not playing 
 the game to ask you." 
 
 "I would have released you gladly" The 
 last word came from her as a cry of physical 
 pain, and it startled the man and brought a 
 sudden fear with it. He looked at her quickly. 
 
 "Did you want to be free?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes, a thousand times yes !" Her tone was 
 so bitter, so sharp with the intensity of the pain 
 she was suffering, it seemed to strike him as a 
 blow. 
 
 She saw the red colour leap into his face. 
 Then he turned and sat down by the table and 
 put his head in his hands. "God in Heaven," 
 it was a sort of unconscious groan that broke 
 from him. Then there was silence in the freez- 
 ing cabin as each one of them stared into the 
 face of their future. 
 
 So it hadn't been necessary after all! this
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 225 
 
 great sacrifice ! That was what she was think- 
 ing as her ice cold feet seemed to freeze to the 
 floor, as her eyes rested on the cramped space 
 round her, as her ears noted the deadly stillness 
 without, the silence of her living tomb. So he 
 had not been longing for her but hating to part 
 with that little girl of the photo. So had she 
 sent the words she feared would hurt him so 
 much he would have been infinitely rejoiced! 
 Oh, the pain, the agony of it, and the humilia- 
 tion, that deadly wound to our vanity at finding 
 we have over-valued self. And then all slipped 
 from her, swept away by the tide of longing 
 for her vanished happiness. As in a vision she 
 saw herself in Egypt. It was a ball such as is 
 held there nightly. She saw herself gliding 
 with light steps over the satin-like floor, the 
 strain of music lifting her soul to the heights, 
 as the notes floated on the warm rose-scented 
 air. She heard the laughter and the comments 
 on her beauty, she felt the soft folds of her 
 silken dress; then she was in the gay supper- 
 room, friendly faces laughed round her: the 
 lights were soft and many coloured, the little
 
 226 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 table by the flowers was before her, Bertie was 
 there; his eyes smiled his admiration as he 
 poured into her delicate crystal glass the yellow 
 sparkling wine. She was radiant, happy, ad- 
 mired, beloved, clothed in beautiful things, tak- 
 ing part in an exquisite pageant of sunlighted 
 beauty and love. 
 
 And she had given this all up for nothing, 
 for a man who didn't want her, but wanted 
 somebody else! 
 
 Then slowly she came out of her dream. 
 The wretched constrained little interior, the 
 aching cold, the stiffness of her tired limbs, 
 the image of the man sitting by the table with 
 bowed head, became realities again. He had 
 made the sacrifice too: there was an infinite 
 bitterness in that thought, but the bitterness 
 even had a soft edge to it. He had kept faith 
 as she had. They had both made a mistake, 
 and they both suffered, but they had kept their 
 honour, the only thing worth keeping after 
 all, the only thing to keep fast hold of in this 
 shifting, swaying, uncertain, transient, misty
 
 PLAYING THE GAME 227 
 
 thing we know as life, the only thing that mat- 
 ters. 
 
 She moved towards him. She put her hand 
 on his shoulder, and then her lips to his ear. 
 
 "Victor, we see now it has all been a mis- 
 take. But we did it for the best. Perhaps 
 we each over-valued ourselves. Anyway we 
 thought we were playing the game, and all we 
 can do now is to play it to the end. I'm 
 ready." 
 
 He raised his head with a great sob and drew 
 her into his arms. As their wounded hearts 
 beat one against the other with throbs of dis- 
 appointment, disillusionment, bitterness and 
 pain, some happiness, some joy and pride min- 
 gled with all the anguish. Each knew the 
 other had kept faith at any cost. Each heart 
 knew the other had stood the test and been 
 found pure gold.
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 
 
 GOLDEN silence brooded over the sum- 
 mit of the Umbrail Pass, sunlight, si- 
 lence, and infinite peace rested there. The 
 heat was intense, and nowhere was the slightest 
 fleck or hint of shade. From the golden soil 
 of the pass to the deep, brilliant, unfathomable 
 blue of the sky above, there was nothing but a 
 glory of all pervading glittering light. 
 
 Not the faintest breeze stirred the hot, light 
 air, not the softest little whisper of sound dis- 
 turbed that unutterable silence; not the rustle 
 of a tree, not the tinkle of a brook, not the note 
 of a bird. 
 
 There are no trees, brooks, nor birds any- 
 where within many miles, yet Beauty has her 
 home here, and Venus her attendants, for on 
 the ground lies a magic carpet more gorgeous 
 than any from Turkey or Bagdad; a carpet of 
 vivid and dazzling circles of colour, blue and 
 mauve and violet, crimson, scarlet and rose, 
 
 228
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 229 
 
 orange and amber and purple and yellow ; none 
 of the circles run into each other, only fit 
 closely. They are cushiony to the touch and 
 intoxicating to the scent, for they are flowers, 
 stalkless, leafless flowers growing close to, or 
 rather flat upon the earth, compact masses of 
 gloriously coloured, sweet perfumed bloom, 
 and over this marvel of vivid colour and ex- 
 quisite design danced and floated and hovered, 
 thousands upon thousands up to uncounted 
 millions of rainbow hued butterflies. 
 
 Up and down, up and down, swayed with- 
 out ceasing the radiant cloud, as the butterflies, 
 "set to partners," whirled and wheeled and 
 hovered, fluttered and floated and sank and 
 rose in their never-ending dance. 
 
 Oh, those butterflies of the Umbrail Pass, 
 chosen children of God to carry a message of 
 joy to the eye of the beholder! Who can be 
 sad looking at them dancing, radiantly clothed 
 in the sun, to a rhythm of their own? Little 
 brown wings like velvet, striped with scarlet, 
 large blue wings like silk starred with two dark 
 blue eyes, lemon coloured wings barred with
 
 230 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 black, orange coloured wings tipped with 
 flame! Some were deep blue with delicate 
 green circles on their wings, others were or- 
 ange embroidered with scarlet, and not the 
 least lovely were those absolutely and purely 
 white that fluttered like falling flakes of snow 
 which never fell. Then there were clear bright 
 yellow ones, and small delicate blue ones of the 
 most heavenly azure, as if they were pieces of 
 the dome of sky itself: and each was perfect, 
 in the zenith of its beauty, each tiny feather was 
 smooth, unruffled, each brilliant wing-tip clean- 
 cut and shapely. There had been no rain nor 
 wind to roughen their glossy gay plumage. 
 They seemed miraculous in their finished com- 
 pleteness and splendour, such butterflies as 
 might float over the Elysian fields. Some- 
 times they would rise altogether, forming a 
 wonderful spiral of whirling colour, then, high 
 up, they would spread out fan-like, flame col- 
 oured orange and gold against the blue, circle 
 softly over the brilliant blooms beneath them, 
 and then gently flutter together, to rise in their 
 dazzling column upward again.
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 231 
 
 As the butterflies danced on in their silent, 
 beautiful, mystic dance, symbolising the im- 
 mortal hope and joy of the world, a human 
 being toiled wearily up the broad white dust- 
 laden road that winds between the flower- 
 cushioned slopes to the top of the pass. It was 
 a man, tall and handsome, one of Nature's 
 favourites on whom she had showered her rich- 
 est gifts, beauty and litheness and strength, 
 grace in the limbs, rich dark colour in hair and 
 eye, and bright intellect behind the broad fore- 
 head. Yet he walked heavily as one in chains, 
 and his eyes were bent on the blinding road in- 
 stead of on the glory of the sunlit scene. 
 
 Count Arese d'Aledo, owner of a palace in 
 Rome and another on the Arno, with horses 
 and jewels and other earthly toys, courted and 
 feted and flattered, was sick with utter misery 
 and desolation of soul, while the butterflies, 
 who owned nothing but their painted wings, 
 floated on the scented crystal air in an ecstasy 
 of j oy . They had the Empire of Freedom and 
 the Sun. 
 
 After a weary climb, long because made with
 
 232 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 such laboured steps, Arese reached the sum- 
 mit of the pass, and there fell rather than sat 
 down on a slab of rock jutting from the moun- 
 tain side. Under the rock and all round it 
 nestled the pillows of Alpine flowers, brilliant 
 pink and blue, tiny and exquisite blossoms in 
 miniature, and far above the rock stretched the 
 sky of dazzling lapis lazuli, and close above it 
 hovered the radiant cloud of dancing shining 
 wings. 
 
 The man, blind to everything, collapsed upon 
 the rock and buried his face in his hands. 
 Fatigue ached all through him. Italians do 
 not care greatly for walking. Arese had never 
 gone so far on foot in his life. He had hardly 
 ever been out at this glorious hour of noon, the 
 sun's grand reception time when he holds full 
 court, before. Arese was generally in bed at 
 noon. Electric and moonlight were more fa- 
 miliar to him than the light of the sun, and 
 the heat of steam-pipes and charcoal than its 
 heat. Mountains, flowers, blue sky, and the 
 scorching kiss of the sun were practically un- 
 known to him, though he lived in a land of
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 233 
 
 them. The cool shaded street where his palace 
 stood, its dark richly furnished rooms, the gay 
 crowded lighted gambling halls, the dainty 
 silk-shrouded boudoirs of women, these were 
 the places where his days and nights were 
 passed. 
 
 Presently pain and fatigue subsided some- 
 what within him, and he raised his head and 
 looked dazedly about him. He had started to 
 walk to the top of the pass, and he supposed 
 he had done so, but it seemed now that his long 
 weary climb had brought him into another 
 world. How intensely hot it was! yet it 
 seemed a life-giving, not a destructive heat ; all 
 distress was dying out of his limbs; the pure 
 clean air filling his lungs seemed pouring en- 
 ergy through his frame, bracing him. He be- 
 gan to know that he was hungry, and he felt 
 in his pocket for the parcel containing his 
 luncheon. His hand touched something small 
 and cold, and he drew it out and looked at it in 
 the sunshine: a little dark blue bottle with cor- 
 rugated sides and a red label. In it was a tiny 
 quantity of prussic acid, which is one of the
 
 234 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 low, dark, easily swinging doors in the beauti- 
 ful walls of the world through which one can 
 step swiftly into the . . . What? which lies 
 outside. Arese gazed at it with frowning 
 brows. Down there in the dark cities, in the 
 shade of palaces he had mortgaged, surrounded 
 by erstwhile smiling friends now turned into 
 scowling creditors, stifled by debt, and deserted 
 by the women who had helped to lead him into 
 it, this bottle had seemed to him the only means 
 of rescue and of help. Now on the top of this 
 glorious pass with its masses of incense breath- 
 ing flowers, its laughing sky, its golden silence, 
 and its troupes of painted butterflies, the bottle 
 looked quite different, and he slipped it into his 
 breast pocket with a sigh that had a dismissive 
 sound, and put his hand again into his side 
 pocket. 
 
 This time he drew out a large flat flask of 
 golden Falernian wine, which glowed like a 
 topaz in the sun. "Ha! ha! this is better!" he 
 thought, and took a long draught from it; a 
 draught of that same rich wonderful wine 
 which Horace drank of old, and that he was
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 235 
 
 accustomed to seal up in cool jars in his cellar 
 and write odes about. 
 
 Arese drank now and was much refreshed, 
 and attacked with good appetite his roll and 
 meat sandwiches, and after every crumb had 
 been disposed of, he drank again, and then sat 
 gazing reflectively at the flask and its contents 
 sparkling in the sun. After all, why leave a 
 world in such a hurry which had in it old Fa- 
 lernian such as that, and skies so blue and air 
 so keen and dry and sweet? And when one 
 was young with every limb so strong? Those 
 women whose desertion had gone to his heart, 
 why mourn for them? There were women in 
 every corner of the world who would love him 
 even though very poor, while his hair was black 
 and his teeth white. Life was a gamble any- 
 way, one never knew what was coming. He 
 was young, why should he not wait to see the 
 end of the game. Soon the end must come in 
 any event. Death, the owner of Life's great 
 gambling saloon, would come and turn off all 
 the brilliant lights and stop the players. Why 
 not wait till then? Arese stretched himself
 
 236 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 luxuriously on his rock in the sun, and gazed 
 up at the butterflies gently floating and sway- 
 ing above him. How happy they were ! Pal- 
 aces were nothing to them, nor mortgages, nor 
 gambling debts, nor false human friends, and 
 as he sat gazing at them, to his poetic fancy 
 they suddenly seemed to find voices and sing 
 to him. 
 
 "We are the messengers of Hope. We are 
 the children of realised dreams. Hope on, 
 hope always. None can tell what the future 
 holds. We were captives in bondage. We 
 were grubs on the earth. We dwelt on the 
 dark soil under the cabbage leaves. We saw 
 the brilliant butterflies above us, but we were 
 deaf, we could not hear what they told us. 
 Birds ate us; they were flies who came and 
 stung us in every one of our joints, then carried 
 us away in helpless agony to their nests, there 
 to lay eggs in our paralysed bodies, and the 
 young when they hatched out ate us alive. 
 Our life was passed in terror, in darkness, in 
 toil. We could not understand, but we en- 
 dured patiently, we hoped there might be some-
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 237 
 
 thing good ahead. Then came the end, we 
 had toiled and crawled but we were so weary 
 we could do not more. We wove our little 
 shroud, and wrapped ourselves in it in an ob- 
 scure corner and lay down to die, submissive, 
 tmcomp laming, patient. Heat struck at us 
 and cold, and we ached with cramping pains we 
 could not understand. Then one day there 
 was a report like thunder, our bonds grew 
 loose, our shroud fell, w r e broke out dressed in 
 dazzling splendour, and on our glorious wings 
 floated upwards to the sky in ecstasy. This 
 was what we had waited for! Our dreams 
 were true! Our hope was realised. Nothing 
 now but to dance and rejoice, to love, and to 
 sip nectar, to whirl and wheel in the blue spaces 
 of the sky. Hope on! through life, through 
 death, hope on." 
 
 Arese seemed to hear them singing this quite 
 distinctly as his eyes followed their soft smooth 
 movements, and with a sudden re-birth of life- 
 desire in his soul, he rejected definitely the idea 
 of self-destruction with which he had started 
 out from his home; seeking a place where he
 
 would die unknown, perhaps unrecognised, 
 merely some poor tramping stranger who had 
 met his end by accident amongst the steep 
 rocks of a mountain pass. Everything was 
 different now. The new world he had found 
 on the top of the pass, full of these beautiful 
 denizens, had transformed him. 
 
 After all, debts could be paid, mortgages 
 lifted, new loves found. The magic of life, 
 the philosopher's stone that turns all it touches 
 into gold, was work, and that lay within every- 
 one's powers. Everyone was good for some- 
 thing. Some to rule a state, others to mend 
 its roads, and the world had room for each and 
 everyone, a measure of joy like a drink of 
 Falernian was there for all who would work, 
 and the blue sky and the clear air, the top of 
 the pass, and the dance of the butterflies, was 
 a free gift to all. He would work, and he 
 knew how; he had powers in his brain long 
 unused, but now they should be brought out. 
 He had written a poem he remembered, just 
 a light sparkling poem that had come into his 
 head at a banquet. A friend had sent it to a
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 239 
 
 journal, and some time after, when Arese had 
 entirely forgotten it, he had received a cheque 
 in return. In those days the sum had seemed 
 so small that he had been only amused, and in 
 light-hearted derision had twirled it into a spill 
 and lighted his cigarette with it! Arese's 
 cheeks flamed for a moment as he recalled 
 this now. No matter! those days were dead. 
 This hour on the pass had shown him himself 
 and life as he had never seen them before. 
 Now he w r ould work, and if he could only at- 
 tain to a vine-clad hut, with a crust a day, still 
 he would be patient and await .... 
 
 Arese had just got to this point in his reflec- 
 tions when the gritty sharp sound of a turning 
 wheel caught his ear. He sat up and looked 
 down the slope of the pass. 
 
 Coming up slowly he saw the bright bay of 
 a horse drawing a carriage with two occupants. 
 English evidently, a tall slim military looking 
 man with grey hair, and a girl whose lovely, 
 glowing face he could just see under her large 
 white hat. She was all in white, soft and filmy 
 like a cloud about her, which formed such a,
 
 240 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 contrast to her jet black hair, glossy and blue- 
 shaded like an Italian's, and her eyes were large 
 and midnight-dark, imfathomably lovely as an 
 Italian girl's might be. But the complexion 
 was different from the olive-tinted skin of the 
 South. Its tint was pure white, exquisitely 
 white with the pale pink flush of the English 
 wild-rose on the cheeks and a sweet light car- 
 mine on the gentle lips. Arese drew in his 
 breath sharply, and he felt an enthusiastic fer- 
 vour of devotion rush through him for such a 
 delicate charming flower of girlhood. How he 
 could worship such a sweet creature, he was 
 grateful even for the joy of seeing her pass by. 
 
 The carriage, surrounded by a coloured 
 cloud of butterflies, that, tame and inquisitive, 
 had danced out to meet it, crawled up very 
 slowly till it reached the flat on the crown of 
 the pass, and here the coachman drew the horse 
 to a halt and turned in his seat to address the 
 travellers. 
 
 Arese next saw him jump down and lead 
 the horse to the inside edge where he could 
 browse comfortably on the short bushes grow-
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 241 
 
 ing amongst the rocks. The next minute the 
 girl had opened the door and got out ; she then 
 stood leaning on the carriage side and talking 
 to her companion. After a little discussion the 
 man inside settled himself apparently to a quiet 
 sleep, stretching himself out in the carriage and 
 opening an umbrella as a screen against the 
 sun. The girl arranged this, closed the door, 
 went to the horse's head and patted its neck, 
 and then went slowly down over the side of 
 the road down the steep flower-covered slope 
 of the mountain. 
 
 She did not see Arese, as a jutting piece of 
 rock sheltered his motionless figure. Singing 
 softly to herself she went down among the 
 gorgeous hued blossoms, and was lost to his 
 view. The coachman had disappeared, seek- 
 ing a shelter for a siesta amongst the rocks : the 
 man left in the carriage seemed to have fallen 
 asleep, and the horse browsed quietly at the 
 road's edge. 
 
 Arese, alert and attentive, open-eyed and 
 interested, watched and listened. 
 
 The golden silence that had been interrupted
 
 242 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 fell again on the pass. There was only the 
 clear soft notes of the girl's singing voice as 
 she went further and further down, wandering 
 from flower to flower, and the clop clop of the 
 browsing horse. 
 
 Arese lighted a cigarette and watched its 
 smoke dreamily. He would much have liked 
 to follow the lovely Signer ina and help her in 
 her search for bouquets, but he knew the Eng- 
 lish were strict and formal in their ways, and 
 he would gain nothing but her adverse opinion 
 of him if he dared address her. Suddenly a 
 rasping sound of grating pebbles drew his eyes 
 back to the horse, and he was horrified to see 
 the animal had strayed all across the wide road 
 to the outer edge, and was now busily cropping 
 flowers and grass indiscriminately and in care- 
 less eagerness, getting his feet over the side on 
 to the steep slope. The carriage wobbled and 
 dragged along after him; its occupant inside 
 apparently asleep and unconscious of his dan- 
 ger. 
 
 Arese sprang to his feet. Before the thing 
 happened he saw distinctly it was going to hap-
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 243 
 
 pen. The horse, intrigued by a gorgeous cush- 
 ion of yellow a little further down the slope, 
 reached his long neck out for it, stepping 
 down the stony incline; one of the fore-wheels 
 of the carriage was already over the edge, the 
 carriage tilted and lurched. 
 
 The next instant Arese was flying in light- 
 ning leaps along the precarious edge to the 
 horse's head. He had no thought of his own 
 danger. He did not even think of the lovely 
 fairy whom he was serving. He was just 
 obeying that great fiery impulse to save, to 
 help, to rescue, which lives in every noble soul, 
 and distinguishes it from the base. 
 
 There was a furious scramble of horse's 
 hoofs as the frightened animal plunged on the 
 edge, trying to regain its foothold. Arese at 
 its head, with magnificent strength and cour- 
 age, struggled with his firm slim hands to sup- 
 port and push it back on to the path. His feet 
 were digging into the treacherous slope as he 
 stood below, holding back and up with all his 
 force, horse and vehicle. But the weight was 
 too great, the balance irretrievably gone; he
 
 244 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 knew he could not avert the disaster, only per- 
 haps by the sacrifice of self, lessen it. 
 
 "Jump out, sir," he called desperately to the 
 Englishman, whose face, unwhitened and un- 
 afraid, looked out at him over the front of the 
 carriage. 
 
 The door on the far side of the vehicle swung 
 open, the man sprang out on to the road in 
 safety in just that second while Arese sum- 
 moning all his strength held back the plunging 
 animal and tilting carriage. 
 
 Then a great roar went up of falling stone 
 and rock, and a cloud of white dust shot into 
 the air as the edge gave way beneath the rock- 
 ing weight and Arese, horse and carriage, all 
 inextricably mixed together, rolled headlong 
 over and down the precipitous flower-decked 
 slope. A cry of great anguish went up. It 
 came to Arese's ears amongst all the thunder 
 of his fall. He guessed it was the girl's. She 
 had seen his act. Good. If this were death 
 he was quite content to have met it in her serv- 
 ice. That was his last thought. Then dark- 
 ness and quiet.
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 245 
 
 Julia, the flowers falling from her hands, 
 rushed straight up the breast of the mountain, 
 to the shelf of green turf, on which a tangled 
 mass of harness, shafts, and overturned car- 
 riage were lying. The horse by a miracle had 
 broken loose, rolled freely to a lower table- 
 land, and now having picked himself up, was 
 blithely resuming his interrupted grazing. 
 
 Her father and the coachman she saw above 
 her finding their way down cautiously to the 
 wreck, but she reached it first. 
 
 With small white hands, delicate as the but- 
 terfly's wing, she wrenched aside the obscur- 
 ing carriage hood, pushed back a broken wheel, 
 and with arms made strong by the fire of emo- 
 tion, drew gently out the slight passive form 
 that lay so terribly still now after that tense 
 glorious moment of struggle on the pass. Her 
 face was as white as the one beneath her, her 
 eyes torn wide open, black with distress and 
 pain. 
 
 "Is he dead?" she murmured. "Oh, God, 
 not that." She put her hand on his chest. 
 She could feel no heart-beat. She looked at
 
 246 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 the long scarlet line by the temple, but that 
 was not deep, surely? With deft fingers she 
 loosened the dark blue tie that seemed keeping 
 the collar of his soft shirt too tight, and freed 
 his throat. What a round splendid throat it 
 was, and then seating herself on the mountain 
 side drew his head on to her lap. She 
 smoothed the dark hair, all covered with white 
 and stony dust, from the brow, and gazed 
 down into the marble-like face with a passion- 
 ate tenderness. 
 
 In a few moments her father was beside her ; 
 the old coachman behind him expostulating, 
 self -accusing, mumbling. 
 
 "I hope he is not killed, Ju, is he? Such a 
 splendid thing to do! I shall never forgive 
 myself if it's cost him his life." 
 
 Julia looked up piteously. 
 
 "I don't know. ... I think he must be 
 ... it was so awful. ... I saw him fall. 
 Isn't it a beautiful face? I never saw anyone 
 so handsome." 
 
 The old soldier, Colonel of an Indian regi- 
 ment, nodded.
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 247 
 
 "Fine fellow, and had the pluck of the 
 devil!" He went down on his knees and put 
 his flask of brandy to the white lips. A very 
 little seemed to go down the throat, but Arese 
 neither sighed nor moved. 
 
 "I do believe he is dead," said Julia, begin- 
 ning to sob, and her hot tears fell on the un- 
 conscious face. 
 
 The Colonel shook his head, and looked at it 
 doubtfully. 
 
 "You know, Ju, I don't like the idea of 
 carrying him up the mountain to the road our- 
 selves, even if we could do it. There may be 
 fractures somewhere, and if we double him up 
 at all, or move him awkwardly we shall make 
 them much worse. Regular stretcher bearers 
 and stretcher and ambulance is what we want. 
 Had we better send Beppo down after 
 them?" 
 
 "Beppo is no good. He won't get enough 
 attention paid him. You had better go your- 
 self." 
 
 "But my Italian's so poor. I'm helpless 
 without you."
 
 248 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 "Well, you had better both go. Beppo can 
 do the talking." 
 
 "But what about you . . . left alone?" 
 
 "I shall be all right. I would like to stay 
 with him. Think what he has done for us," 
 and a fresh rain of tears broke from her pain- 
 filled eyes. 
 
 Now it was about this time that conscious- 
 ness came back to Arese; at first only a dim 
 glimmer, not enough to make him move nor 
 open his eyes, but he heard their voices and 
 what they were arranging, faintly, and rather 
 as if in a dream ; then slowly memory revived, 
 helped by their words. He recalled the acci- 
 dent, yes, and the fall, and then he realised his 
 present position ; his head was on her lap, that 
 darling girl ! Soft white clouds seemed round 
 him, and a warm smooth palm brushed back 
 his hair. Such delicious sensation bathed his 
 whole frame, he thought he had better not come 
 to just ye*t. Where could he be better off? 
 Whatever they did with him, he wished for 
 nothing better than this, to lie clasped in those 
 sweet arms, soothed, caressed, cried over. He
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 249 
 
 lay perfectly still and listened. From their 
 talk he guessed they thought him dead or dy- 
 ing. He knew he was not dead, nor did he 
 think himself to be very seriously injured. 
 He was in no pain except what might come 
 from bruises and scratches, and every fibre of 
 his body seemed conscious and thrilling to her 
 touch. Arese heard them planning that the 
 two men should walk down to the town and get 
 help, and Julia should meantime stay watching 
 him on the mountain side. This he thought 
 was a perfect arrangement. 
 
 Presently the talk ceased, and the scratching 
 and rattling of small stones told him the men 
 were climbing back to the pass. 
 
 There was silence for a few minutes, and 
 then her sweet low voice, like the voice of a 
 dove on its nest, broke out again. 
 
 "Oh, darling, darling. I hope you haven't 
 died for us, you beautiful darling, I shall never 
 be happy again if you have !" and the soft palm 
 caressed his forehead. 
 
 Arese felt an intolerable longing to open his 
 eyes and gaze on the lovely face he knew was
 
 250 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 just above his own, but like Orpheus bringing 
 Eurydice back from Hades, he knew that if 
 he allowed himself that gaze, Julia, though she 
 might not fade from his eyes, would certainly 
 raise up instantly the cold barrier of conven- 
 tionality between them, now so completely 
 thrown down by emotion, anxiety, admiration, 
 and his own helplessness and apparent death- 
 like unconsciousness. So he steadily remained 
 with eyes closed, while every other sense in 
 him was drowned in delight at her touch, her 
 voice, her proximity, at the adoring, admiring 
 tenderness she poured over him. 
 
 It was very lonely and quiet on the moun- 
 tain side. Golden silence had resumed its 
 sway, and the butterflies in their gentle clouds, 
 not a bit afraid of these human beings who 
 kept so still, alighted on them in fluttering 
 numbers, and floated round and over them, and 
 settled on the ground near them. The girl 
 would not let them alight on his face, but gently 
 waved them from it. Arese would not have 
 minded if they had. He loved those butter- 
 flies. Had they not saved him in his darkest
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 251 
 
 hour whispered to him of Hope and Life's 
 great promise, nearly always fulfilled for those 
 who work and wait. But for them he might 
 have crept through the low dark door, but they 
 had coaxed him to wait, and brought him to 
 this, to the paradise of her enclosing arms. As 
 he lay there he was profoundly thankful for 
 two things, that he had followed the butter- 
 flies' advice, and that he had learnt English. 
 How he had hated his English lesson as a boy, 
 but his mother had wished him to learn, and 
 to please that beautiful and adored mother he 
 had learnt. He had struggled through that 
 barbarous tongue as he might have done 
 through rocks and boulders. And now ! in her 
 voice, it was like the whispers of Heaven, and 
 the murmur of a thousand harps and flutes. 
 
 "Oh, darling, if you would only open your 
 eyes !" 
 
 How Arese longed to ! But no. This was 
 too divine to spoil. Arese knew that to a con- 
 scious man no woman will ever really open her 
 heart. Never does he see more than the mere 
 presentment of her soul. There are veils there
 
 252 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 of reserve, of reticence, of illusion that she will 
 never divest herself of. But here in his death- 
 like trance, with closed physical eyes, he was 
 beholding in all its splendour, in all its glory, 
 without a veil between, the tender, passionate, 
 shining female soul. He was awed, over- 
 whelmed ; the sincerity of her pity, her tender- 
 ness, her grief vibrated all through her and 
 through him. The glow of her passionate ad- 
 miration for him seemed to pour along his veins 
 its soft white fire. Never had he been so loved ; 
 in all the arms he had lain, none had clasped 
 him quite like this. Mere physical ecstasy of 
 the senses was something quite apart, infinitely 
 inferior. In this, he felt her soul and being had 
 entered, every emotion in her heart and brain 
 had been roused, enthusiasm for his deed, ten- 
 derest pity for his fate, passionate admiration 
 for his face, all these, like volcanic streams set 
 loose by seismic shock, he realised were rushing 
 through her pure and lovely frame and passing, 
 all mingled in one great electric wave, from 
 her to him. Had he indeed been dead, Arese 
 thought, that living wave of love must have
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 253 
 
 brought him back on its crest, to the world. 
 
 Never again he knew, though they might 
 marry and have children, would any embrace 
 be quite so close in its truest sense, as this. 
 Physical intimacies, though human souls strain 
 after them, hoping to buy such moments as this, 
 do not bring them, rather do they seem to push 
 the yearning desiring spirits asunder. 
 
 It is only in moments like this of extreme 
 shock, of joy, of pain, of death, that one soul 
 dashes out of its prison house, freed for one 
 moment, and mingles and fuses with another; 
 one terrible moment of awed delight. Then 
 the escaped soul must go back alone to the 
 human breast that owns it. Its lot is to dwell 
 alone. 
 
 But Arese realised he was in the centre of 
 one of those great maelstroms in which the 
 soul gets free; he knew that hers was rushing 
 to his, and he beheld it for that supreme mo- 
 ment in all its dazzling purity and beauty, and 
 knew it was his own. 
 
 So drowned was he in all the flood of ex- 
 quisite emotion and sensation that poured
 
 254 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 round him and through him and swept his men- 
 tal being along with it, that the cramping pain 
 of all his body from lying without moving, es- 
 caped him; it was subconscious. All he re- 
 alised was that whirling, electric waves of de- 
 light were circling through him, and that each 
 time her gentle arms pressed his yielding shoul- 
 ders, he knew a fresh delirium of joy. 
 
 Suddenly he heard her say. 
 
 "Oh, if I can't revive him, I'll die with him. 
 I can't bear this." 
 
 He felt her little hand press again on his 
 breast. Surely he thought his heart was beat- 
 ing hard enough to tell her the truth. But 
 she did not seem to feel that. Her hand struck 
 against the hard bottle in his breast pocket and 
 she drew it out. 
 
 "Prussic acid!" it was just an awed whisper. 
 
 Then remembering the lightning deadliness 
 of that bottle, knowing if she but drew the cork 
 it might be the end, Arese broke instantly from 
 those lovely chains which held him. 
 
 He shot out an arm, snatched the vial from 
 her, and tossed it down the slope. His eyes
 
 THE BUTTERFLIES' DANCE 255 
 
 were upon her face, radiant, lovely, with self- 
 revelation as he might never see it again. 
 
 "Darling, I am alive!" 
 
 He saw the scarlet rush over cheeks and 
 brow, he saw the glorious eyes veiling them- 
 selves with white lids, he felt the arms falling 
 from him. He threw both of his round her, 
 crushing the lovely breast together, drawing 
 her down to him irresistibly, and their lips met 
 with an electric shock of exquisite happiness, 
 but in that moment her soul leapt back to its 
 cell, and the gates of mundane existence were 
 put up and barred.
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 
 
 BLUE trees, green sky, and red road, what 
 a strange landscape ! The kind of land- 
 scape which if pictured and hung on the walls of 
 the Academy, maiden ladies, who had never 
 been out of England, would pause before and 
 say to each other, "You know, my dear, it 
 couldn't possibly be like that!" And yet here 
 it was in life, in the fact, one of the most beauti- 
 ful, vivid, and attractive, if bizarre, landscapes 
 that the Divine hand ever created, gorgeous, 
 glowing, dazzling, bathed in the topaz radiance 
 of an Arizona evening. 
 
 The one solitary wayfarer coming down the 
 red road on horseback, drew gently rein, and 
 turned in his saddle to gaze on it. He had 
 been riding down the incline from the West, 
 and on the crown of the slope dark firs, their 
 sharp pointed summits jutting into the pure 
 bright emerald green of the sky. No other 
 colour appeared in it, no fleck of cloud stained 
 
 256
 
 THE RIDE IXTO LIFE 257 
 
 the perfect clearness of it. Just that one mar- 
 vellous tint of luminous transparent green was 
 all over it so that it looked like a hollowed out 
 emerald hung above the earth. 
 
 Slowly the man's eyes travelled up the road 
 he had come, that bright red road, like a broad 
 uncreased crimson ribbon, laid down among 
 the blue firs that pressed up to its borders. It 
 was the month of December, and in that month 
 the Arizona fir dresses its little ones in pale 
 sky-blue clothes, giving an eerie look to the hill- 
 sides. The older trees remain their usual dark 
 colour, but all the little firs from a foot high 
 to six or seven feet, put on at this season their 
 suits of fairy blue. And to eyes such as those 
 of the man now gazing on it, the scene in all its 
 strange, still, lonely loveliness carried a pro- 
 found delight. 
 
 He was nearing the tiny Mormon settlement 
 of Fir, buried in the heart of the Tonto Basin, 
 a hundred miles approximately from any- 
 where; he could already see a few white cot- 
 tages amongst the trees, and smell the scent of 
 wood fires in the still golden air. The swift
 
 258 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 bright sunset would soon be over, and he pre- 
 ferred to enjoy it here on the road alone rather 
 than amongst the settlers. He could enter the 
 village at the fall of dark. 
 
 The horse waited motionless with him, 
 statuesque, without restlessness, fully in ac- 
 cord, as always, with his owner's moods. 
 
 He was hung all over with useful and varied 
 articles : One could find most things necessary 
 and common to camp life dangling against 
 him, or strapped tightly with small buckskin 
 straps, but one looked in vain for a whip or a 
 spur. Edgar Ashley and his horse Ben were 
 close and constant companions, they talked 
 without words; thought and impulse passed 
 from one to the other without effort, and Edgar 
 would no more have dreamed of striking his 
 horse than a man does of striking his dearest 
 friend. 
 
 Ben knew perfectly well now that he had 
 to stand still and admire the landscape while 
 his master did the same, being well accus- 
 tomed to these halts, especially at sunset when 
 earth and sky seemed to flame round then, and
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 259 
 
 he was quite content to remain there though 
 he knew by the camp-fire scent in the air that 
 rest and oats were temptingly near feeling 
 the serene joy in his master's veins quiver 
 through his own. 
 
 Ben was a Turkish horse; a jet black stallion 
 of great size and power. Edgar had acquired 
 him in Constantinople where such horses are 
 common, for the Turk, unjustly abused and 
 misunderstood as he is in England, is in truth 
 the very best breeder and trainer of horses, be- 
 cause one of the kindest-hearted men in the 
 world. Horses in the East are born without 
 vice. This is a well-known fact, and why? 
 Because vice in the horse is only the result of 
 man's inhuman cruelty, and in the East the 
 horse is allowed to maintain the true docility 
 of his nature unimpaired. Whip and spur in 
 the streets of Stamboul are unknown, except 
 where foreigners have introduced them. 
 There is no horse-breaking hideous word in 
 Turkey. In countries where man "breaks" 
 horses he has indeed but the broken fragment 
 of a horse. In Turkey one can still see the
 
 260 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 horse itself, magnificently strong, intelligent 
 as a woman, docile and sweet tempered. Ben 
 had never been hurt in his life: he had been 
 brought up as a household pet, and all his 
 Turkish ancestors before him also. Of man 
 he had neither hatred nor fear, only love. 
 Love and caresses he had been used to all his 
 life, and he gave back the service of his superb 
 gifts in return. 
 
 The glow faded, and the swift soft dusk 
 came down enfolding all the strange barbaric 
 colours in its own even mauve, and the silver 
 sickle of the new moon showed one delicate 
 point above the belt of pine trees in the East. 
 
 Edgar turned with a sigh, and let Ben trot 
 through the little brook that broke out from the 
 wood and dance unrestrained across the road 
 at the bottom of the incline, and thus rode into 
 the little Mormon settlement of Fir. 
 
 There were things he wanted to buy, so he 
 walked his horse slowly amongst the scattered 
 frame houses, finally pausing before a fairly 
 large substantial dwelling, on the door of 
 which he knocked.
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 261 
 
 It was opened at once by a man who had 
 that distinctive look that these Western Mor- 
 mons always have. His large white square 
 face was surmounted by a flat black shovel hat ; 
 he was all in black, thin old-looking black, and 
 the frock-coat was buttoned tightly down the 
 middle of his body, which gave the same ex- 
 traordinary impression of being fat and swelled 
 as the large pale face. 
 
 Edgar recognised the look at once, never 
 having seen any Mormon without it, but the 
 man's looks were not bothering him at all then, 
 his ability and willingness to sell stores was the 
 main point. 
 
 "Good evening," he said pleasantly. "Can 
 I get some bread, milk, and eggs from you, 
 and most important of all, some oats? I can 
 pay in cash." 
 
 "I think we can manage to let you have all 
 those," the man answered, amiably. "Will 
 you come in?" 
 
 Edgar dismounted and stepped over the 
 threshold straight into a large square room, the 
 very picture of cleanliness and order. A blaz-
 
 262 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ing fire roared up the great open chimney, its 
 cedar logs crackling under the swinging iron 
 kettle, its warm red light falling cheerily on the 
 boards of the floor which showed a flour-like 
 whiteness. 
 
 "Will you tie your horse?" 
 
 Edgar laughed. "Oh, no, Ben won't stir 
 away without me. We're one, eh, Ben?" he 
 said, slapping gently the satin of the creature's 
 arching neck. Then he closed the door and 
 followed his host to the fire. 
 
 "You've a nice place here," he said, stretch- 
 ing his hands to the blaze. From seventy de- 
 grees fahrenheit at noon the temperature sinks 
 rapidly to freezing at dark in the Arizona win- 
 ter, and this warm interior, full of its rough 
 clean comfort, struck pleasingly his eyes. 
 
 "Glad to make you welcome. You're a 
 stranger in these parts, I guess. Hunting 
 mountain lion for the bounty, perhaps?" 
 
 "T^o. I'm just touring through the coun- 
 try making pictures of it. I'm an artist." 
 
 "Ah, just so," replied the other with vague 
 politeness, which Edgar knew covered the
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 263 
 
 other's scepticism. Men only went to the 
 Tonto Basin for two reasons, one of which 
 was hunting the animals on which the State had 
 set a bounty, the other, to escape the law. 
 
 Edgar saw that he was in the other's eyes, if 
 not a hunter then probably a fugitive. 
 
 "Sit down," the Mormon said, hospitably 
 drawing up a large wooden rocking chair, "and 
 I'll go and see what we have." 
 
 He went through an inner door, and Edgar, 
 left alone, rocked in his chair in the firelight 
 and looked about him. 
 
 "Whatever faults these Mormons have," he 
 thought to himself, "lack of cleanliness, order, 
 and friendly hospitality is not one of them." 
 While he sat there musing on these strange peo- 
 ple and their ways, and on the justice or in- 
 justice of their being driven forth from the 
 city they had created at Salt Lake into wilds 
 like these, the door opened again, and he 
 turned, expecting to see the swelled figure and 
 white face of his host. The next instant he had 
 risen, for instead there stood framed in the 
 doorway the form of a girl, and such a dear
 
 264 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 charming delightful girl. As she advanced 
 into the glow of the firelight, Edgar could not 
 help thinking she looked like something de- 
 licious to eat. Why this occurred to him he 
 could not say, except that where her blue cot- 
 ton gown turned down at the throat, it revealed 
 a skin of the most exquisite whiteness, and the 
 cheeks had such a pure and lovely rose colour 
 on their firm round outlines. Her hair of 
 burnished chestnut was brushed away from her 
 smooth white forehead, and gleamed with red 
 and golden lights in the glow from the fire. 
 Her dark blue grey eyes looked cool and clear, 
 and added to the impression she gave of ex- 
 quisite freshness, purity, and health. 
 
 In one hand she held a basket, in the other a 
 frothing jug of milk. 
 
 "We have half a dozen eggs and this milk, 
 and father is bringing the oats and bread," she 
 said, setting the basket and jug on the table. 
 
 Then she looked up at him, and he down at 
 her, in the red light. Edgar was good-looking, 
 and he knew it, but never until now, under her
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 265 
 
 soft mild scrutiny, had that knowledge brought 
 him his present glad satisfaction. 
 
 "I saw you riding down to our place a little 
 while ago in the sunset," she said, gazing up at 
 him frankly. "You looked one with your 
 horse, just like a picture I have, look here!" 
 
 She ran to the great wooden dresser that 
 filled up nearly all one side of the room, pulled 
 open a drawer, and took out an old and much 
 torn magazine. With swift fingers she turned 
 over the pages till she found the desired one; 
 then laid the book flat on the table and pointed 
 to a full page, well-engraved illustration. 
 
 "There!" she said. 
 
 Edgar, amused, bent over the picture beside 
 her. She seemed deeply interested in it, al- 
 most fascinated. Her little pink forefinger 
 pointed to its title, "The Centaur." It was la 
 picture full of life and fire. The equine part 
 of the fabled creature certainly resembled the 
 beautiful form of Ben, while the curly head and 
 strong shoulders of the human part, Edgar saw 
 in a glance, bore a strange accidental resem-
 
 266 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 blance to his own. In his arms, however, the 
 Centaur of the picture carried a protesting 
 nymph. 
 
 Edgar laughed as the girl hung over the 
 magazine; a great curl of her chestnut hair 
 fell forward over her shoulder and almost hid 
 the page. Then she looked up again. 
 
 "The girl there is struggling," she remarked, 
 "but I shouldn't! I am sealed to Ezra to be 
 his seventh wife : he has six already you know, 
 and I've often hoped someone would come and 
 carry me away. I've looked at that picture 
 every day for months, and then this evening 
 when I saw you riding down the hill it 
 seemed ..." 
 
 She broke off suddenly, giving him a deep 
 penetrating look from her dark blue eyes as if 
 searching him to see if he were ridiculing her. 
 But Edgar was only giving acute attention as 
 his wont was to any new thing presented to him. 
 Her talk was rather bewildering, but he 
 guessed at the thread of it, and she was won- 
 derfully, absorbingly pretty to look at, as
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 267 
 
 lovely and bright and fresh as a flower that 
 sways in the wind at one's feet. 
 
 "It seemed," he took up her words gently, 
 "as if I'd come straight out of the picture to 
 you?" 
 
 There was a, noise of feet without, voices, 
 and the opening of the door. She had no time 
 to answer. She closed the magazine and 
 slipped it into its drawer, and was putting some 
 hay over the eggs in the basket when her father 
 and some of the other elders came into the 
 room. They all were in the same thin faded 
 black, with puffed looking figures and square 
 white faces beneath flat shovel hats which they 
 took off on entering, displaying smooth lank 
 hair, worn sufficiently long to reach their col- 
 lars. A stout well-made woman came in with 
 them, who smiled genially at Edgar, and one 
 or two ordinary looking girls. His host came 
 forward with a great bag of oats swinging in 
 one hand, and a roll of fine white bread in the 
 other. 
 
 "Our own baking," he remarked, eyeing it
 
 268 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 proudly. "Now, Mister, shall I pack these on 
 the horse right now, or will you stay and have 
 supper with us?" 
 
 Edgar looked round the room crowded with 
 figures, and the customary quiet of his camp 
 under the stars alone with Ben called to him. 
 The very fact that the girl's great beauty and 
 her mysterious words to him had created a 
 bond between him and her, was another reason 
 why he did not wish to accept hospitality from 
 her father, and possibly the obnoxious Ezra. 
 Which was he of all these men present, he won- 
 dered. They all looked exactly alike to him. 
 
 "It's very kind of you, but I think I'll go on 
 and make camp," he said, with his pleasant 
 smile. "How much do I owe you?" 
 
 The Mormon named a very moderate sum, 
 which Edgar laid on the table. He took the 
 milk and poured it into a calabash slung over 
 his shoulder, picked up the basket of eggs, and 
 with a cheery "Good night and thanks," fol- 
 lowed his host through the main door. The 
 girl came after them. 
 
 The night reigned now in all its glory; the
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 269 
 
 intoxicating Arizona night with its splendour 
 of glittering stars, its frosty fine dry air, which 
 seems as one drinks it in, like draughts of 
 chilled champagne, and its essence of manznn- 
 ita flowers rising all round one, mixed with the 
 scent of the cedar and the pine. 
 
 Ben was waiting, patient and docile, and as 
 her father went to tie on him the oats and bread, 
 the girl went to his head and looked straight 
 up into his great lustrous eyes. She stroked 
 him, and then put her cheeks and lips to his 
 satin neck. Edgar watched her, and such was 
 his love for the horse that nothing she could 
 have done would 'have moved him more. 
 While the Mormon was busy with the oat bag, 
 she managed to murmur to Edgar as they both 
 stood at Ben's head. 
 
 "Help me! Save me! I don't want to 
 marry Ezra." 
 
 "I will camp close here by the clump of 
 redwoods," was all he could whisper back. 
 
 Then he mounted, and Ben shot away like 
 an arrow as Edgar waved his hat and called 
 "Good night" to them. He saw father and
 
 270 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 dauhter disappear into the gush of light as the 
 big door swung open and shut. The road led 
 up a slight incline from the spring, and the 
 clump of great redwood firs lay on the right 
 hand, well away from the settlement. 
 
 Here Edgar reined in Ben, and dismounting 
 began to strip everything off him, and when 
 this was done, Ben sprang away from him and 
 took a delightful roll on the ground between 
 two great bushes of manzanita flowers; there 
 was no grass to roll on, only the dry, soft, 
 sandy soil, but that did just as well, and after, 
 he was ready for the feed of oats Edgar turned 
 out for him on a gunny sack. A little silver 
 trickle of water ran down beside the redwoods, 
 and here Edgar filled his kettle, and half an 
 hour after his arrival, his simple camp was 
 made, and he sat down to drink his tea and 
 think. Something he felt had boomed down 
 into his easy simply existence when he had first 
 spoken to the girl that evening, something that 
 threatened to wreck and destroy rather than 
 promised to bless. 
 
 The cedar logs burned brightly at his feet,
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 271 
 
 making a clear red gold fire with only a faint 
 blue smoke, which in rising threw out a scent 
 like incense on the air. The night was per- 
 fectly still, and walls of velvet darkness stood 
 round him. The flare of the fire showed the 
 huge red trunks of the trees, going up and up 
 it seemed, to infinite heights until far above 
 him spread the roof of their glorious green 
 foliage supported on the red rafters of their 
 boughs. Through the roof here and there, he 
 could see the flash of a tremendous star. 
 
 A few cut pine branches with a blanket 
 thrown on them made his bed, and no bed of 
 eiderdown encased in gold could be more 
 sumptuous. The spring of the pine branch is 
 better than any spring ever invented by man. 
 The supple rock of it as one turns or moves 
 cannot be imitated by any bed in the world, 
 nor can any other couch cradle one into such 
 soft slumber. 
 
 He rose next morning with the dawn. 
 Dawn in the Tonto Basin! The words are 
 simple, but what a spectacle of grandeur they 
 cover ! The sea of pink light that comes swim-
 
 272 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ming through the trees! The straight stems 
 of the pine all lit with sun till they look like 
 pillars of solid gold ! The bright clear blue of 
 the morning sky ! The scent in the air of resin ! 
 The exquisite tracery of frost on all the little 
 trees ! The wonderful 'music of the birds that 
 burst into a chorus of rejoicing! The flight 
 of jays to the brook, that comes down through 
 the pink air, a swooping cloud of blue ! Here 
 is a banquet to the senses that the poor grovel- 
 ling house-bound dweller under roofs never en- 
 joys. Civilisation has robbed him of his birth- 
 right, the banquet Nature spreads for us every 
 day at dawn. 
 
 Edgar got up from his bed of pine branches 
 feeling every muscle rested by their spring, 
 and his lungs toned up by their fragrance. 
 
 He whistled, and Ben came trotting up to 
 him with a joyous whinney, kicking up the 
 golden leaves of the beech and chestnut that 
 strewed the ground, crisp and sun-baked. 
 
 Edgar fondled and fed him, and then walked 
 singing to the brook. All his system seemed 
 to sing. He felt so keenly all his health and
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 273 
 
 youth and strength; life seemed bubbling up to 
 the very brim of his being. He made his cedar 
 log fire and sat down to enjoy his breakfast in 
 the clear sparkling air. 
 
 After breakfast he cleared up his camp, 
 thoroughly groomed Ben, had a wash in the 
 brook which he shared with the fluttering, fuss- 
 ing, screaming jays, and then boiled up some 
 water, and hanging a little mirror on a cedar 
 bough, had a careful and successful shave. All 
 this over, he presently sat down on a log by the 
 fire and gazed meditatingly towards the Mor- 
 mon houses which were just visible through 
 the innumerable intervening trees; and a pic- 
 turesque figure he looked in blue jean, with his 
 high boots, belt round his slim waist, and large 
 sombrero hat shading his dark and handsome 
 face. "Would she come, and when, and what 
 should he do and say?" were the questions tor- 
 menting him. 
 
 He loved the Tonto Basin, and so far he had 
 roamed about in its hundreds of miles of beauty 
 perfectly happy and without a care. He had 
 never clashed with any of the inhabitants, the
 
 274 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ranchers, few and far between, had traded with 
 him, the hunters, seeing him wandering with 
 his artist's sketch pad, had not resented his 
 presence, and now the Mormons had been 
 friendly. He was free of all the delights of 
 that blessed, peaceful, solitary valley where the 
 sun always blazed, and skies were blue as in 
 Paradise, and he foresaw, if he took this girl, 
 as she evidently wished, the Tonto Basin must 
 for ever be closed to him. If they both es- 
 caped the Mormons could not follow them to 
 civilisation since they themselves and their cus- 
 toms were outside the law, but they would con- 
 tinue to live in the Basin, and their vengeance 
 would be upon him if he ever returned. He 
 sighed, he had been so free, so guiltless, harm- 
 ing no one, now somehow this girl had trod 
 straight into his life and brought, as woman al- 
 ways does, difficulties, chains, hostilities, with 
 her. 
 
 Of course it was easy to jump on Ben and 
 away for a hundred miles to West or North or 
 South or East. There was no tangible ob- 
 stacle to that. But even if he did that now, he
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 275 
 
 felt his free happiness, his lightness and ease 
 of conscience would have departed. His 
 happy camps were gone. If he left her to 
 her fate would not her shadow stand by his 
 camp fire every evening? Would not her dark 
 blue reproachful eyes seem to gaze upon him 
 from everywhere ? Yes ; there was nothing for 
 it now but to go ahead. 
 
 Yet the Mormons had been friendly to him, 
 the unknown stranger, he had eaten of their 
 food, bought, it is true, but still essential to him 
 and supplied by them. To steal away their 
 daughter in return seemed to him unworthy 
 and dishonourable, and yet to give her against 
 her will to one of those hideous bulging old 
 Mormons ! That was not right on their part. 
 Perhaps he was justified . . . ? 
 
 But he was not happy, and he wished he and 
 Ben had gone on, and that he had never seen 
 the Mormons. 
 
 Suddenly, as he sat there, his chin resting 
 on his hands, his shoulders hunched over his 
 ears almost, and his eyes staring gloomily into 
 the heart of the golden cedar wood coals, a
 
 276 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 little sound came to him, a pant, a sigh, a step. 
 
 He looked up, and she was there in all the 
 glory of her sixteen years, her bright curling 
 hair, her deep blue eyes, and smiling crimson 
 mouth. A fresh pink cotton dress reached just 
 to her ankles, her hair was confined by a pink 
 band. There was a bright pink in her cheek. 
 Coming from behind a manzanita bush, she 
 looked like one of its radiant blossoms taking 
 life and girlhood to itself. 
 
 He sprang to his feet; she was so lovely as 
 she looked up at him questioningly, that he 
 obeyed a sudden impulse and lifted her right 
 up in his strong arms off the ground, and kissed 
 her. She laughed, and put her arms round 
 his fine throat and kissed him back, sweetly, 
 innocently. 
 
 "Oh, I am so glad to be with you!" she said 
 as he set her down, and they both sat side by 
 side on the log, his arm still round her. 
 
 "You are my Centaur, aren't you? You'll 
 take me away?" 
 
 Ah, farewell for ever to the Tonto ! But his 
 lips were quite firm as he answered:
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 277 
 
 "Come now, if you like . . . this very min- 
 ute." 
 
 "No, oh no," she answered. "We should be 
 seen and tracked directly. They have good 
 horses all of them, good rifles and pistols, and 
 heaps of friends. What could you do, just one 
 man fighting the whole lot of them?" He saw 
 her exquisite colour fade out, her eyes grow 
 wide at the thought. 
 
 "Our only hope," she went on, speaking in 
 a very low tone, though there were only the 
 bright-eyed jays gazing down at them, "is to 
 steal away to-night, very quietly in the dark, 
 and get a long, long way ahead of them before 
 they find we're gone. Don't you think so?" 
 
 Edgar nodded. "Perhaps, darling." 
 
 "Listen, they all go up to the Chief Elder's 
 house to-night, to a prayer meeting, and I 
 shall be left alone about six, just as it's dark; 
 then I'll come to you here, and if you and Ben 
 are ready, we'll go then . . . ride out to Flag- 
 staff, you know the way?" 
 
 "Yes, I know all the Basin; it's about 
 seventy-five miles to Flagstaff, we ought to get
 
 278 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 there in the morning." Then he added, draw- 
 ing her close, "And when we get to Flagstaff, 
 and you are free and among the Gentiles, do 
 you want to stay with me? Or is it only Ezra 
 you want to escape?" 
 
 She looked up at him, a beautiful flame of 
 love in her eyes. 
 
 "I want to stay with you for ever and ever, 
 and 'work for you all the days of my life." 
 
 Edgar threw back his head and laughed. 
 The last proposition sounded so quaint to Eng- 
 lish ears. 
 
 "Sweet one, we'll be married in Flagstaff if 
 we can, and as you say we'll be together for 
 ever and ever, but I don't think we'll have to 
 w T ork very hard, either of us. We'll go all 
 round the world and see everything. Will you 
 like that?" 
 
 "Anywhere with you will be heaven." 
 
 The jays above were very interested in all 
 this, and screeched loudly at intervals. They 
 were sorry when the two human beings, after 
 much talk and many kisses, rose from the log, 
 and the girl stole softly away alone through the
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 279 
 
 manzanita. They came down and flew round 
 her, their brilliant blue plumage flashing tur- 
 quoise in the sunlight. "Edna! Edna!" they 
 seemed crying. "You are going away from 
 us." 
 
 Edgar, left alone, stood gazing at the glow- 
 ing coals at his feet for a time in silence. Then 
 with a sigh, he got his sketching things to- 
 gether, and strolled away on foot into the 
 golden forest. He would leave Ben to rest 
 till the evening. He had much before him. 
 
 Evening came, and with it the soft and sud- 
 den dark, and it found Edgar waiting beneath 
 the redwoods, standing by Ben, one arm flung 
 over the saddle. Not a spark of fire or light 
 remained to mark the camp ; all his simple ne- 
 cessities were packed most carefully and tightly 
 on the horse. As he galloped, not a thing 
 would move nor rub his glossy skin. Edgar, 
 in years of camping, had learned that wonder- 
 ful art to pack a horse with weight that he does 
 not feel, and with things that cannot move the 
 fraction of an inch. Now he waited, a fever
 
 280 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 of impatience in his veins. Minutes passed 
 and she did not come, and while on this morning 
 there had been hesitation in his mind while he 
 felt sure of her, now when it seemed after all 
 he might lose her, an overwhelming feeling of 
 disappointment, of loss, swept over him. 
 
 He grew perfectly mad standing there in the 
 frosty darkness waiting in vain, and felt at 
 last he could go down and storm the house and 
 shoot everyone on sight, set fire to the house if 
 necessary, and smoke all the rats out, do any- 
 thing in fact, so long as he got her out of it 
 and into his arms again. But he held himself 
 in check as long as he could. She would come 
 no doubt, so many things might have delayed 
 her. But an hour passed since the fall of 
 dark, and she had not appeared. 
 
 He decided to reconnoitre on foot, and lead- 
 ing Ben, he slowly and silently passed between 
 the trees towards the back of the Mormon's 
 dwelling. 
 
 He prowled round the house in the scented 
 starlit darkness, but there was neither light nor 
 sound from it. It seemed dark, deserted as a
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 281 
 
 tomb. Then going back a little way from it 
 and standing on tiptoe, craning bis whole six 
 feet of height to its utmost, he caught a flicker 
 of light from the roof ; a small uncovered sky- 
 light in the slope of the tiles at the back made 
 a patch of yellow in the darkness. Silently as 
 a cat, Edgar swung his long limbs up an angle 
 of the house, helped first by the water butt, 
 then by an old walnut tree, till he could scram- 
 ble on to the roof, to the skylight, and look 
 down. And then he saw all he wanted, more 
 than he wanted. Almost an exclamation broke 
 from him, but he choked it down. There was 
 need of swift noiseless work. She was there 
 alone, tied with her arms behind her to the great 
 main pole that supported in the centre the 
 main beam of the living room roof. Her hat 
 and cloak were thrown on a neighbouring 
 chair. In a flash it occurred to him she had 
 been on the point of leaving the house when 
 she had been caught, and precautions taken 
 against her renewing her attempt. He 
 rapped on the glass skylight. He saw her 
 start and turn her face upward. He saw ter-
 
 282 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 ror and delight struggling together in it, as she 
 saw him. In an instant he had wrenched out 
 the little glass casement and his legs were 
 dangling through the hole, his hands clinging 
 to the window ledge. 
 
 "To the right, to the right," she called in a 
 whisper, as she saw his feet swinging, trying 
 to find the cross-beam to rest on. He found 
 it, and from there it was an easy leap to the 
 floor. 
 
 "Oh, leave me, if they find you, they'll kill 
 you," she whispered as he came up to her. 
 
 Edgar had out his great clasp knife, and cut 
 the cords that bound her as she spoke. He put 
 his mouth to her ear. 
 
 "Quick ! To the door ! The horse is there," 
 he drew her to the main door; it was bolted 
 heavily and locked. 
 
 "Not- that," she whispered back, and darted 
 to the small side-door just left on the latch; 
 this led through a sort of scullery. He fol- 
 lowed, swift, silent as a shadow. The next in- 
 stant they had passed out to the serene and 
 starry night.
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 283 
 
 Ben was waiting. Not a sound did he make. 
 He caught silence as he caught joy or grief 
 from his master. Without a sound Edgar 
 lifted the girl up and put her on his back while 
 he stood without a quiver, then Edgar leapt 
 into the saddle. 
 
 "Keep tight hold of my belt, and cling with 
 your knees," he breathed to her. Then he 
 headed the horse in the direction of the main 
 road to Flagstaff, and leaning forward let the 
 reins fall slack on his neck. This Ben knew 
 was the signal to gallop, and like a shooting 
 star in the heavens, or the sea-lion in his swim- 
 ming rush, Ben shot from the shadow of the 
 house down the long starlit alley before him 
 between the pines. 
 
 Soundless, with flying hoofs and tail borne 
 out a straight black streamer on the wind of 
 his flight, with the two human beings seated on 
 his back, the man erect and easy as always, and 
 the girl clinging desperately with her knees to 
 his sides, 'her arms round Edgar's waist, and 
 her whole body bowed down, oppressed by the 
 tremendous speed, the great beast tore on, neck
 
 284 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 stretched out, nostrils wide, and elastic limbs 
 flying through the soft dark air. Up one long 
 silent avenue and down another, sometimes 
 arched over by beeches, sometimes flanked by 
 oaks, then by pines, then by oaks again, then 
 maple, cedar, and fir, but on always, on with- 
 out pause through these lofty silent sentinels, 
 endless line upon line of motionless trees under 
 the flashing light of the stars. At first there 
 was no sound, then far off in the distance, there 
 was a faint whoop in the frosty air. 
 
 The girl clung tighter in a perfect agony to 
 Edgar's waist as her quick ear caught it. 
 
 "Oh," she breathed, against his spine, "Ed- 
 gar, they have found out. They've started.'* 
 
 "Don't worry," he returned. "Ben's heard 
 them." 
 
 It was the first time they had spoken since 
 the start. The whirl of awful terrified break- 
 ing loose, and the wild speed of the gallop 
 literally had taken away power of speech from 
 the girl. And in Edgar's brain there was a 
 tension that left no inclination for words. 
 
 Ben had heard that faint, far cry, and he
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 285 
 
 felt the thoughts of horror that passed through 
 the brains of those he carried. Fast as he was 
 going he was yet only using half his powers, 
 not knowing how long his master would want 
 him to keep up the pace, and holding as his 
 habit was, much strength in reserve. 
 
 Now he put on extra steam; they felt the 
 motion of his hind-quarters quicken and 
 strengthen beneath them, the magnificent for- 
 ward bounds became smoother, more lightning 
 swift. 
 
 A storm of those faint, far cries, broke some- 
 where in the distance ; the girl's terrified mental 
 vision could see it all, the whole scene those 
 cries indicated. The Mormons had turned out 
 in a body. They were finding their horses, 
 mounting, hallooing to each other, getting into 
 a band for the pursuit. They all had rifles, 
 would they get within firing range? Would 
 they shoot Edgar? Shoot Ben? Recapture 
 her? Her brain seemed alight and burning. 
 The thought that these two, her rescuers, might 
 be sacrificed through their effort to save her, 
 was so terrible that she felt almost she ought
 
 286 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 to slip off and run back to her pursuers, give 
 herself up, and end the chase and danger, but 
 the square white face and the bulging form of 
 Ezra rose before her, and involuntarily her 
 slender arms tightened in a straining clutch 
 round Edgar's lithe, sinewy waist, and she 
 pressed her soft cheek close into the little hol- 
 low between his shoulder blades. 
 
 The cries grew less behind them, and still 
 the great horse tore on. The wonderful joy 
 of speed got hold of her. Her fears dropped 
 from her as a falling mantle. They would 
 win! No horse could beat this pace, and he, 
 this great, black, glorious beast, was bearing 
 her away to love, to freedom, to a life, to worlds 
 she had not known, would never have known 
 had he not come down the road to Fir that sun- 
 lit evening. Now, as the air fled past her, 
 as the smooth rocking motion lifted and low- 
 ered her as waves in the sea, she realised she 
 was going forward to the unknown, and the 
 unknown has always a joyous call to youth. 
 
 Behind her the settlement in the great forest 
 shut in by the unchanging pines, the hills, the
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 287 
 
 singing brook, her duties from dawn till dark 
 in that square frame house, the presence and 
 companionship of Ezra till she grew old in 
 serving him. The beauty of the forest of the 
 Tonto Basin was unparalleled, superb, but she 
 would not be allowed to wander amongst its 
 beauties, its forest glades, its golden slopes, she 
 would be mewed in a kitchen, baking, stewing, 
 washing, mending, never with time to go hardly 
 beyond the brook or to the summit of the hill- 
 she knew the existence of the women in Fir. 
 
 And now she was being borne away from all 
 that, borne to life. This was life itself. She 
 seemed to drink in great draughts of it as they 
 fled down those long silent avenues under the 
 sparkling heavens, and instead of Ezra she 
 clasped this slight and beautiful form full of 
 strength and grace, -the mere touch of which 
 filled her with delight. To hear him speak, to 
 see him smile, to feel his eyes upon her seemed 
 to lift her soul away and away to other worlds 
 of ecstasy, and they were going to be together 
 for uncounted periods of time, perhaps for al- 
 ways. Existence spread before her as one
 
 288 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 great pulse of tremendous joy. The picture 
 had come true; her lonely gazings on it, her 
 tears, her hopes, her prayers, her wild dreams, 
 her longings, she remembered them all, and 
 they had welded themselves into this. 
 
 Suddenly her dream scattered as a shining 
 bubble seems to break into shafts and splinters 
 of coloured light, it broke before reality. 
 
 She felt beneath her that sudden redoubled 
 plunging of the hoofs that a galloping horse 
 makes before a leap. She heard a deep in- 
 drawn breath go through the form she held. 
 She looked past Edgar's shoulder, and there, 
 in their very path, she saw one of those huge 
 pits that occur here and there throughout 
 this country. Vast, menacing, devouring, it 
 yawned there waiting for them, easily discern- 
 ible in the starlight, a great pitch black circle 
 of shadow. They were upon it so suddenly 
 there was no time to change their course or 
 stop. Edgar sat like a statue, not even a fin- 
 ger tightened on the rein; all now depended on 
 Ben, if he had the power to reach the other 
 .side of that great gulf or not. His, the de-
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 289 
 
 cision, the planning how and when to take that 
 awful leap, not one touch, one movement must 
 disturb the working of that great brain that 
 lay within the noble lovely head. The girl, 
 with eyes wide open, strained, and bloodless 
 lips, stared at the chasm. This was death. 
 No animal could leap that abyss. 
 
 Ben had smelt the hollow of the pit as they 
 approached. Every fibre, every muscle was 
 preparing for it: as he neared the lip of the 
 gulf, treacherous with bramble and under- 
 growth, he gathered his legs beneath him, with 
 terrific force struck the loose soil a great pound- 
 ing blow, and then soared there is no other 
 word for it high into the air over the gaping 
 void. 
 
 In spite of the terror of the moment there 
 was an amazing joy in it. The girl's heart 
 leapt with the horse, exhilaration, triumph, the 
 pride of conquest the conquest of boundless 
 spaces, surged up in her, and poured through 
 all her veins. Up, up, Ben seemed to go, for 
 ever flying, then down, and braced as the riders 
 both were for jerk and jolt of his descent, there
 
 290 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 was hardly any, he came down on the other 
 side, as a deer does from its flying bounds, 
 seemingly on rubber. They heard the lip of 
 the gulf crumble and give, and the soil and 
 stones fall into it with a roar behind them, but 
 Ben was again in his smooth lightning gallop, 
 half-way down the next long avenue. A sob 
 broke from the girl, of joy, of great elation. 
 
 "Are you frightened, darling?" 
 
 "No, oh, no, so very happy ; Edgar, if I died 
 now I shouldn't care. I felt I knew every- 
 thing in a thousand lives when he gave that 
 great soaring leap. Wasn't it Heaven?" 
 
 "As we got over . . . yes, it was." 
 
 "Did you think he would do it?" 
 
 "I couldn't tell. I thought so," he added 
 after a minute. 
 
 "We must rest him soon, he can't go on like 
 this," and he laid his hand on his neck. 
 
 "Ben, Ben, quiet there." 
 
 Almost at once the gallop subsided into the 
 long easy canter which is the horse's natural 
 pace; quickly, easily, in long loping strides, 
 they still sped incredibly fast over the ground.
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 291 
 
 "Let's camp here," Edgar said presently. 
 "We can well stay for a little while. I can't 
 see how they can catch us up now." 
 
 They had entered a truly glorious camping 
 ground; the forest stood away here. They 
 were descending into a beautiful open valley 
 ringed round by rising hills, a flat round bowl 
 open to the sun, with one of the dashing spark- 
 ling streams, an off-shoot from the Tonto 
 River, flowing through it. Their road wound 
 across it, over the stream and up the other side 
 where trees rose again in feathery loveliness 
 against the sky. Here in the valley only a few 
 great cedars stood dotted about, and these not 
 the great dark cedar of Lebanon with its hint 
 of stately gloom, but the smaller more bushy 
 cedar of Arizona, the foliage of which is at this 
 season, a bright golden colour, studded all over 
 with small dark purple berries. 
 
 Edgar drew Ben gently to a halt beneath 
 one of these golden trees where the laughing 
 stream dashed by, and there was a plateau of 
 finest pure white sand that looked like the salt 
 in the salt cellars of an English dining-table.
 
 292 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEX 
 
 "Darling, darling, welcome home," he said 
 as he lifted the girl to the ground, and there 
 they stood alone beneath the stars, lighted by 
 the most wondrous lamps, sheltered by the fin- 
 est cedar roof, sung to by the bewitching voice 
 of running water, canopied round by curtains 
 of soft dark air, and in that mighty number 
 Two which means a world. 
 
 The girl flung her arms round him in rap- 
 ture. 
 
 "Oh, Edgar, I shall die of happiness." 
 
 They kissed there in the solitude. Such 
 kisses as are only given and taken when the 
 mind is roused into supreme elation. 
 
 Then they turned to the horse, and he 
 neighed gently as he smelt the water, clear 
 life-giving stream that ran too rapidly to freeze 
 in the coldest night. 
 
 For a good half -hour they waited on him, 
 seeing to all his wants, petting and praising 
 him; then when he sank down on the sandy 
 space by the cedar to rest, they turned and 
 threw themselves into each other's arms. Food 
 was nothing to them, nor drink; kisses and
 
 THE RIDE IXTO LIFE 293 
 
 contact and the dear embrace of each other was 
 all they needed. The pressure of his arms 
 round her, the touch of her soft wealth of curl- 
 ing hair all shaken loose long since from its 
 ribbon band, these were enough. They lay 
 locked in each other's arms beneath the cedar 
 boughs on the friendly earth, his cloak thrown 
 over them both, shut into that magic chamber 
 of delight where neither cold, nor fatigue, nor 
 hunger, nor any other ill can come, and to 
 which love alone can give the key. 
 
 Orion had wheeled down towards the hori- 
 zon, a faint quiver of grey seemed to lift the 
 curtain of night in the eastern sky when the 
 girl suddenly awoke. A sense of fear filled 
 her. She could not tell what had roused her. 
 Edgar still slept unconscious. Her first 
 thought was Ben. She looked for him beside 
 
 O 
 
 them, yes he was there sleeping too, then, ah, 
 what was that dark lump creeping, creeping up 
 nearer Ben? With a feeling it menaced him, 
 the darling one that she loved only second to 
 her lover, she sprang up, she was on her feet. 
 In the dim starlight she saw a sudden gleam of
 
 294 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 steel. She rushed forward just as the ap- 
 proaching lump was close to the sleeping horse. 
 There was a smothered scream, an oath, a 
 scrabble on the sand, and then she and Ezra 
 were rolling over and over towards the brook, 
 as she clung with a wild cat's grip to his wrist, 
 the wrist that held the knife with which he 
 meant to kill or ham-string Ben. The horse 
 was on his feet snorting. Edgar had leapt to 
 his feet and seized his rifle, Edna and the Mor- 
 mon, still wrestling for the knife, had rolled 
 down into the slashing stream. In a second 
 Edgar was on the brink, the girl with the 
 wrested knife had struggled to the other side. 
 Edgar brought his rifle butt down on the man's 
 head just as he was dragging the girl beneath 
 the water. It was only a single blow, but the 
 man's skull gave in ; he sank back like a stone, 
 and the next moment the stream had doubled 
 him up, pushed him down, borne him on, and 
 now rushed by laughing. The Tonto is ever 
 laughing. 
 
 A drenched, bruised, but triumphant Edna
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 295 
 
 crossed back to him, holding the long steel 
 knife. 
 
 "Oh, Edgar, I saved him. I'm so glad! 
 Think if he'd murdered Ben!" 
 
 Edgar looked in dismay at her. 
 
 "You will freeze before the morning. Tear 
 off those things, I'll give you a suit of mine." 
 He ran to Ben's pack which lay under the cedar 
 and got out an old suit of jeans, and Edna, 
 laughing and happy, took them from him and 
 passed behind the shelter of the tree. 
 
 Edgar went back to the stream and down it 
 a little way, looking for the body of Ezra. He 
 thought he was dead, but he wanted to make 
 sure. A little way down he found it crumpled 
 up and resting against a snag in the stream, 
 the great white face turned upwards to the 
 stars. Oddly enough, the log had caught and 
 stayed him just by where on the bank to a small 
 cedar his horse stood tethered; the horse he 
 had generally mis-used and now ridden almost 
 to death to come up with them in his mad pur- 
 suit.
 
 296 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 Edgar turned to the animal which was snort- 
 ing and quivering as he smelt the dead man in 
 the stream. Edgar soothed him with comfort- 
 ing words and set him free. Then he went 
 back to Edna. She looked a queer little figure 
 in his coat many sizes too large for her, over 
 which her hair fell in a great cape, but she was 
 not thinking of herself as she came towards him. 
 
 "Oh, Edgar, there may.be more of them! 
 Ezra only probably pressed on ahead. We 
 stayed here too long. We ought not to have 
 slept. Let's get away now as quickly as we 
 can." 
 
 Edgar nodded. 
 
 "Quick, get the pack up and your clothes. 
 They'll dry in the sun. Ben boy, can you do 
 another gallop? We'd best be out of here." 
 
 Ben pricked his ears and gave a little whin- 
 ney. 
 
 Their simple camp was soon struck. 
 Within a few minutes they had mounted, and 
 were away up the opposite slope across the 
 stream that went tumbling and laughing on 
 its way. What were dead men to it? It had
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 297 
 
 seen many since first in the dawning of the 
 world it had broken loose from its ice chains 
 and become a stream. 
 
 Just as Ben got half-way up the slope of 
 the opposite side, a band of Mormons broke 
 into the bowl-like valley. Ezra's riderless 
 horse dashed straight into their midst, and look- 
 ing across the stream by the strengthening twi- 
 light of the dawn, they saw the black flying 
 blot which was Ben ascending the opposite in- 
 cline. 
 
 With oaths and curses they dismounted. 
 They were too late, they knew they could only 
 overtake that wonder horse by the hare and 
 tortoise trick, never in straight riding. The 
 light was bad, but still they would fire into the 
 brown and hope that the pot shot might find 
 its mark. 
 
 They knelt, each man raised his rifle, took 
 the best aim he could towards that moving spot, 
 and fired. 
 
 A hail of bullets came whistling through the 
 air close by his satin sides, close past his for- 
 ward pricked ears, one sent up the dust just
 
 298 DAUGHTERS OF HEAVEN 
 
 by his fore-foot, but all the shots went wide. 
 Ben raced up the slope as his master never let 
 him race up hill before, and with one of his 
 great flying leaps cleared the rim of the valley, 
 went over the crest of the mounting track, and 
 simply bolted over the wide flat plain that lay 
 above. Here were trees, but not dangerously 
 close together. Like an Indian's arrow he 
 sped on, and at the moment when he cleared the 
 crest of the hill, the sun came over the edge, 
 and the whole sky flared up in a radiant glow- 
 ing pink. Great shafts of red gold light came 
 stabbing through the trees. The branches 
 tossed and swayed in it, and from every side 
 burst a chorus of bird notes, the voice of the 
 forest, a great psean of triumph, of jubilation 
 with which a thousand little bird throats greet 
 a new day. 
 
 And so in the pink on-rush of light, in the 
 frosty gleaming dawn with the birds singing, 
 they drew towards Flagstaff, town of the Gen- 
 tiles, outpost of civilisation, threshold of the 
 new world she was to see. 
 
 "Darling," Edgar murmured, bending back
 
 THE RIDE INTO LIFE 299 
 
 towards her, "what a ride you have had, 
 seventy-five miles into Flagstaff." 
 
 She laid warm lips on his neck. There was 
 a sombre glory in her eyes. 
 
 "Oh, it has been so much more than that, 
 Edgar, it has been a ride into Life'' 
 
 FINIS
 
 PRESS OPINIONS OF VICTORIA 
 CROSS'S WORKS 
 
 "Victoria Cross has great gifts, both descriptive 
 and emotional." The Times. 
 
 "What is so marked in her stories is the beauty of 
 the writing. Her atmosphere is delightful." Tlie 
 Queen. 
 
 "Her work is full of glow and charm, aflame with 
 the enthusiasm of art and love." The Morning 
 Leader. 
 
 "Victoria Cross is, above all, distinguished by the 
 splendid vitality that glows in all her work. She 
 writes as we may hope our descendants in the next 
 century may write when our civilisation will have 
 advanced to the point she has already reached." 
 Singapore Free Press. 
 
 "Victoria Cross has amazing insight, as well as a 
 truly virile, graphic, picturesque style of narrative." 
 Hong-Kong Daily Press. 
 
 "Her books give furiously to think. Few writers 
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 beauty of style and power over language." Pall 
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