*i*^f RING FOR NANCY She was standing with her back to a clrcssing-tabl( IING FOR NANCY R (^MEDY FORDJMADOX HUEFFER Author o/ LADIES WHOSH BRIGHT EYES. KTC. ILLUSTRATED BY F. VAUX WILSON INDI/ NAPOLIS THE BOBBS-M RRILL COMPANY PUBLISHERS Copyright 1913 The Bobbs-Merrill Company into PRESS OF BRAUNWORTH & CO. BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS BROOKLYN, N. Y. # I DEDICATION Dear Miss Ada Potter : Since it was historic tragedy which, as you might say, brought us together, accept the dedication of this very unhistoric comedy for which you are so largely responsible. Why it should have come Into your head to inspire me to a task obviously so frivolous and one which will draw down upon my head the reprehensions of the great and serious, and the stern disapproval of eminent and various critics, is a matter that lies between yourself and your conscience. But I suppose, in this odd, frequently unpleasant and almost always much too serious world, eveW'^a person so earnest as yourself feels the desire to be made to laugh by an historian so obviously earnest as I am. Accept therefore the full responsibilities of this at- tempt to satisfy your demand in the spirit which dictates the offer and believe me. Your humble, obliged and obedient servant, F. M. H. Maim ^ 3958 1'J RING FOR NANCY PART I RING FOR nancy: TiJ-AJOR EDWARD BRENT FOSTER, the ^^^ youngest major in the British army, was choosing railway Hterature at the book-stall of the chief departure platform of the terminus of a railway company that ran in a south- western direction out of London. He had, under one arm, a whole sheaf of illustrated journals. For these he had not yet paid. He was looking at the novels that, in a bright col- ored wall, rose up before his dim eyes, when his tired glance wandered toward the entrance from the booking office. He exclaimed: "Oh, my aunt!" For he had a sense of a lady dressed, as he perceived out of the corner of his eye, in pink voile with an emerald-green dust-cloak. With a quick glance of dismay, in spite of his short-sightedness, he had recog- nized Mrs. Kerr Howe, a by-now obviously marriageable widow, with whom, during the lifetime of her late husband, he had been quite innocently almost too familiar. He thought, however, that he had managed not to convey 1 2 RING FOR NANCY his recognition and he moved swiftly but cir- curaspe.Gtly down the platform. He kept, in- deed, an eye over his shoulder while he at- tempted to hum nonchalantly, and he was aware that Mrs. Kerr Howe was undoubtedly following him. He walked more swiftly — un- der the passenger bridge, past another railway book-stall, past the railway barber's and the railway gimcrack shop. He was, indeed, al- most in the passage that leads to the south- eastern line, and he was wondering if he would ever be able to stop before he reached Ton- bridge or even Calais. Then he ran against a quite girlish figure in very white muslins who had following her a porter burdened with four sorts of dressing-cases. She exclaimed: "Teddy Brentr. And Major Brent Foster could not help ejaculating: "Oh, my uncle!" since these relatives were really in his mind. For this was Miss Flossie Delamare, with whom, three years before, he had been almost more familiar. She was fair and quite happy, and if her feat- ures showed traces of having been overpowdered professionally, there was not any doubt that she still had a complexion to lose. And she was so pleasantly glad to see him that Major Brent RING FOR NANCY 3 Foster took a desperate resolve. He had slued round to face her, and he was aware out of the corner of his eye that Mrs. Kerr Howe was hovering a little distance away. "You've got to save me, Flossie," he said quickly and humorously. "An awful past is after me. I'm not Teddy Brent any more, and I am a reformed character." Miss Delamare took on a slightly injured — nay, it occurred to him that it was a very hurt air. "Oh, well, Teddy," she said, "I'm not part of your awful past ! If you don't want to be Teddy Brent to me, you can be the Reverend Jonas Whale, though it's not like you, Teddy." He was aware that Mrs. Kerr Howe, brought up by this conversation, was moving regretfully back to the main line platform. "Oh, keep talking, Flossie, darling!" he ex- claimed. "Keep talking! The cloud's rolling by! I am a reformed character — but it's roll- ing by." "Teddy," she said, "I don't believe you need — that you ever needed to be a reformed char- acter.'* "Oh, but I am," he asseverated with an air that was partly earnest and partly humorous. "I don't drink when anybody's looking, and 4 RING FOR NANCY only between meals, anyhow. And I don't smoke when any one can smell it. And as for . . . that sort of thing . . ." She said, "Well.^" interestedly. "Oh, well," he sighed, "of course, there's Olympia — Olympia Peabody that I'm engaged to. And that doesn't leave any smell. I mean "You mean," she said, "that it does not mat- ter — who's looking or whether it's between meals or at them. And it's not much fun. And we're all getting older and wiser. . . . That sort of disagreeable thing. . . . Now, at Simla . . . at Simla . . ." She suddenly turned upon her porter. "Look here," she exclaimed, "I shall miss my train. Go and put my things in a first — an empty first smoker. I want to be alone. Tell the guard, Miss Flossie Delamare." The porter said, "Yes, miss," and lurched away beneath all her dressing-cases. "And you . . . you're as famous as all that?" he asked. "As all what?" she said. "That every guard knows your name?" "Oh, is that all?" she said. "Why, every Anabaptist minister knows my name." Major Brent Foster raised his eyebrows in- terrogatively. "Anabaptist?" he asked. RING FOR NANCY 5 "Oh, particularly !" she said. "Fve been caus- ig trouble in that camp." Conscious of a minute pang of something re- imbling jealousy, he said: "Of course, you would cause trouble in that camp. Now, I've got an uncle who's an Anabaptist — a Post Ana- baptist. . . ." "My old Johnnie's a Post Anabaptist, too," Miss Delamare said. "Well, that's all right, that's all right," Major Brent Foster exclaimed touchily. "Those are your private affairs. I've got to catch my train," and he moved off toward the platform. She walked beside him. "You know, Teddy," she said rather plain- tively, "you're very funny to-day. You're not a bit like your old Irish self. You're not a bit even like a gentleman." "Oh, hang it all!" he exclaimed. "No, I'm not a bit like my old Irish self. I'm not even a gentleman. I tell you I'm a reformed char- acter." She opened resignedly her immense reticule, which was made of brown canvas sewn over with silver lace, black pearls and red coral. She produced a large white card. "Oh, well, Teddy," she said, "here's my ad- dress. Come and see me one day next week." 6 RING FOR NANCY He gave a start back as if the card had been red-hot. "My God, no!'* he exclaimed. "I shall be in the country all next week. I never call on any- body. I shut myself up. I work, I tell you. I read the complete works of Henry James. That's why I'm the youngest major in the Brit- ish army." "Oh, well, Teddy," she said, "you're very funny. Almost as funny as you used to be in the old days. Only in another way. Don't you remember Simla . . . and the pucka drives? . . . Don't look so miserable! Pm not your awful past. I'm not going to upset Miss Olympia Peabody. I guess that's your awful past waiting for you under the foot-bridge." He gave an agitated glance toward those shadows. Sure enough, though to him she was nothing but a blur of gay colors, beneath the foot-bridge, there was the emerald-green tulle dust-cloak and the immense black hat with the pink roses of Mrs. Kerr Howe. Major Brent Foster clutched the wrist of Miss Delamare. "Oh, stop with me, Flossie," he said; "stop with me! She won't come near me while you are here." "I'll stop with you," she said. "I'll stop with RING FOR NANCY 7 you as long as you like, old boy. That's to say, I'm traveling by the six forty-eight, so I shall have to leave you and cut at six forty- six." "I'm traveling by the six forty-eight, too," he answered; and then he exclaimed: "Look here, Flossie, Mrs. Kerr Howe isn't really my awful past. I haven't got an awful past at all. Only a damned beastly unpleasant past. Dust and ashes — that's what has crocked up my poor eyes — and alkali wells in Somaliland." Miss Delamare said rather viciously: "Oh, we always knew, even in Simla, that it had got its little girl waiting for it with trusting eyes in a little parsonage. But we didn't know that its little girl's little name was Olymnia. I shouldn't care to waste twelve years — not for an Olympia. I'd have my little horse show in between the big meetings." "I don't in the least understand you," Major Brent Foster said. "Of course, you wouldn't!" she said. "Being so long out of England and studying; for the staff college exam, and all." "What I want you to understand," he an- swered, "is that Mrs. Kerr Howe is not an aw- ful past. She's just a burr. She's a sticker. That's what she is. And as she is got up in 8 RING FOR NANCY pink and green, and her husband's been dead eighteen months, it's a sign that she's danger- ous." "Well, I seem to be dangerous, too," Miss Delamare said plaintively. "Oh, you're dangerous in another way," Ma- ijor Brent Foster said earnestly. "Don't you see, she's a black draft: you're a little spoon- ful of jam. That's the difference. She's re- morse: you're temptation. That's the differ- ence, too." I "Well, now, Teddy, that's decent of you," she said. "I'll forgive you miles and miles for that ■■ — and leave you to your Olympia." She looked up the platform; they were stand- ing in front of the other book-stall, just near the gimcrack shop. "Mrs. Kerr Howe," she said, "seems to have given up the game, so I can go and find my seat. Of course, it's a privilege to have been allowed to gaze on Mrs. Kerr Howe even from a distance." "Why the devil should it be?" he asked. i "Well, you did entertain angels unawares — in Simla," she mocked at him. "There you had me — and ain't I the top notch of musical comedy? And there you had Mrs. Kerr Howe, and isn't she the greatest and most popular novelist the world has even seen?" RING FOR NANCY 9 "I didn't know," Major Brent Foster said in- nocently; "but, of course, I'm awfully glad, Flossie. You used to be rather a starved little rat — in Simla." I "So I was, Teddy," she said, "and you were pretty good to me. I shan't forget it. Good- by, old Teddy. I expect you'll be a sidesman and take round the plate before we meet again." She moved away up the platform, and Major Brent Foster remained looking at the book- stall. The name "Juliana Kerr Howe" met his eye at least twenty-seven times. There was Pink Passion, by Juliana Kerr Howe, with the picture of a lady in a pink nightgown. There was All for Love, by Juliana Kerr Howe, with the gilt design of a pierced heart and a broken globe on the cover. There was a lady's weekly periodical with the inscription in purple let- ters, ''The Lonely Girl. Read about her in- side. By Juliana Kerr Howe." Major Brent Foster exclaimed, "My God!" in an appalled manner. Then he suddenly at- tacked the small boy who was sitting behind the stall. "Do you mean to say," he said, and in his agitation the trace of an Irish accent became audible in his voice, "do you mean to say that you haven't got a single book of James'?" 10 RING FOR NANCY "Never heard the name/' the book-stall boy- said. *'But there's plenty of novels by Mrs. Kerr Howe." *That kelch!" Major Foster exclaimed. "I tell you, it was reading the books of James that made me the youngest major in the Brit- ish army. You tell all your customers that." And then extraordinary things happened to Major Brent Foster. It began with the soft crawling voice of Mrs. Kerr Howe that ex- claimed at his elbow: "Captain Edward Brent!" He spun round and exclaimed: "Mrs. Kerr Howe, by all that's wonderful! I was just buy- ing all your books !" And almost simultaneously he heard from behind his back the voice of Miss Flossie Dela- mare saying plaintively, "Teddy, dear, there's something I want to say to you. I don't want you to think I am any worse than I am." There was also the gruff voice of the clerk at the first book-stall remarking: "You haven't paid for them magazines." Major Brent Foster spun round on his heel once more. Mrs. Kerr Howe walked frostily up the platform, and Miss Delamare gazed after her with spiteful glee. "I'm watching over you, Teddy, all right!" she laughed. "I watched that cat of a woman. "Q^f go away!" Major Brent Fosici exclaimed RING FOR NANCY 11 She was hiding on the other side of the steps of the bridge. And the moment she saw me leave you she sailed down. Did you see her draw her skirts together as I came up? She was afraid I was going to defile her. Her! Who writes books called A Maid and No Maid, I should be ashamed!" "You're a regular brick/' Major Foster ex- claimed. They had walked a little way from the book-stall. The voice of the first clerk came in a sort of chorus: "You haven't paid for them magazines. Three and fourpence." "Not but what," Miss Delamare continued, "I wasn't speaking the truth when I said that I had something to tell you. It's true that I don't want to let you think that I am worse than I am. Now this old Johnnie — this Ana- baptist that I was speaking of. I don't want you to think — to think that I'm . . ." — she brought it out — "living with him." "Three and fourpence," the book-stall clerk remarked. "You come to my stall and you took three and fourpence worth of papers and you never paid for them." "Oh, go away!" Major Brent Foster ex- claimed, and he pushed his elbow into the book-stall clerk's chest. He continued to Miss Delamare: 12 RING FOR NANCY . "I'm awfully glad to hear it, old girl. I al- ways warned you against that sort of thing. It doesn't pay!" "If you don't pay that three and fourpence . . ." the clerk chimed in. "It's like this, Teddy," Miss Delamare said in a sort of whisper of confession. And then she suddenly raised her voice quite high. "Aren't you going to kiss me, Teddy?" she exclaimed. "Not a good-by kiss if we part forever?" Her voice was a fine wail. But this itime Mrs. Kerr Howe, who had returned, was not to be driven off. "I only want to tell Captain Brent," she said in her sweetest and most crawling tones, "that I shall be in the special carriage that his uncle has reserved for his guests. There is only five minutes before the train starts." "I'll come and find you," Major Brent Foster said. "I just want a word with my sister." Mrs. Kerr Howe answered meaningly: "Then I won't intrude." She added, "A tantotf' languishing, and really went away. The book-stall clerk remarked: "I shall have to fetch an ofBcer." Major Brent Foster burst into the most vio- lent oaths. "That woman!" he screamed, "going to my •RING FOR NANCY 13 uncle's! In the same carriage with me! How does she know my uncle? How does she know I've got an uncle?" "Oh, well, Teddy," Miss Delamare said, "every one's got an uncle. Even I've got one real one. And there are hundreds of Johnnies who have offered to be uncles to me. But I've done my best for you. You'll have to see it through now. And what I wanted to explain is this . . ." "I'm going to fetch an officer now," the book-stall clerk exclaimed, and he went away. "You know, Teddy," Miss Delamare said, "you'd better pay that man." Major Brent Foster exclaimed violently: "Oh, hell!" Then he fumbled in his waist- coat pocket and pitched half a sovereign on to the book-stall. After the half-sovereign he pitched the papers themselves. The boy began to scramble among his literature for his coin. "Now, that's like the old dear Teddy," Miss Delamare said. He had hooked his hand into her arm and was drawing her away up the platform. "That's more like you — to chuck away half a sov. and not to wait for the change." "I'm ruined, anyhow, if Mrs. Kerr Howe is going to my uncle's," he answered vindictively. 14 RING FOR NANCY "Poor old Teddy!" Miss Delamare said with a note of commiseration. And then she con- tinued swiftly: "But what I wanted to tell you was this — about how I came to get in with those people. You know, somewhere up in the north of London there are a lot of rich Non- conformists. People with hothouses and peaches, and being aldermen and so on. And I've got a chum — Lottie Charles. And Lottie Charles was precious down on her luck, and the North London Congregations had started a Society for the Reform of the Stage. And Lottie, as she couldn't get anything in the world to do, used to walk before them once a week as an awful example — you know the sort of thing. "So one day Lottie Charles came to me, and she says it would be doing her no end of a good turn if I would come and pose, too. Well, of course, I've nothing against doing any- thing in the world to oblige an old chum. She and me were on the old North Circuit. Roomed it and ate off the same old red herring together. So, of course, I said I'd do it. But it did not suit me to be wept over and pawed by a lot of Nonconformists, so I said I'd read them a lec- ture on The Real Reform of the Stage. Of course, I don't know anything about reforms; RING FOR NANCY 15 the stage is all right as long as you're jolly well on the top. **But IVe got another pal — Robin, his name is — a dramatic critic. Awful prim and respect- able chap; always with an umbrella. But he writes articles about me that bring the tears to your eyes; he says I'm the symphonic em- bodiment of quaint imbecility, and as such have my worth. I learned the words by heart, though what they mean passes me. So up I goes to Robin on the first night of Pigs is Pigs, and I just asked him point-blank to write the lecture for me — on the real reform of the stage. And, tvhat's more, he did it. So I learned it by heart, and I just slung it at those Johnnies. My! you should have heard me. Cheer? I don't think! Cry at the pa- thetic passages? Not half they did not. . . . But it was the fine lecture and all. The stage! The stage was to regenerate the people's mor- als. It was to replace the old pulpit. It was to fill the minds of the unthinking with thought ! My goodness me, I never heard such talk! But I slung it at them in a sort of awful mournful voice, like Mrs. Pat's. You know! . . . And the end of it is that the old chap who was the chairman, and a millionaire, and a Common Councilman — that old chap is never 16 RING FOR NANCY out of my diggings. And his missus, too, you understand. There's nothing underhand about it. His missus likes me as much as he does, and more. Like a mother she is. And I'm go- ing down now to stop at their country house. . . . But the long and short of it is that the old chap is building a theater for me. And we're going to put on the weirdest sort of old reforming plays. And I've got a ten years' contract, and that critic man is to be general •manager. So I'm provided for, Teddy, old boy. It's a funny world." II TiyrAJOR BRENT FOSTER was not, how- ^^^ ever, paying much attention to his com- panion. As they approached the train he ob- served Miss Delamare's porter standing at the door of one first-class carriage. At the door of the next was Mrs. Kerr Howe, and the compartment beside which she stood was la- beled "Reserved." The book-stall clerk was speaking to a railway policeman at the door of the booking office. Miss Delamare walked straight to the door of her compartment; she held out her peachy pink cheek, and remarked: "Ain't you really going to kiss me, Teddy — for old time's sake?" And there was such a plaintive tone in her voice that, with a fierce determination, he stretched out his lips. But she just laughed and jumped into her carriage. "Keep it for the horse show," she said. He was by now in a temper that made him ready to face Mrs. Kerr Howe and half a dozen devils, so that he marched straight upon the reserved compartment. But again his heart failed. He was ready to face the lady and sev- 17 18 RING FOR NANCY eral devils. Facing her alone was another mat- ter. And the compartment was empty! At that moment he perceived a rather dia- bolical-looking old gentleman in a fur coat, though it was June, and a soft, curious felt hat. The old gentleman, accompanied by a guard and a porter, was obviously looking for a first- class carriage. And Major Brent Foster chanced his luck. He did not know the old gentleman from Adam, but he exclaimed: "Come along, Sir Arthur. Glad to see you. Get in here, and let's travel together. It's a long time since we met." The old gentleman seemed haughtily puz- zled. But the carriage was comfortably empty, and the major had already pushed in the por- ter, bags and all. And immediately he was in the midst of a scene. There was Miss Dela- mare laughing out of her window. There was the guard with his flag, lingering, as if to give the finishing touches to his train. There was Mrs. Kerr Howe just getting in. And then suddenly the voice of the book-stall clerk ex- claimed: "OfBcer, arrest that man for theft." Major Brent Foster got into the carriage, and treading on the old gentleman's toes as he turned, exclaimed: 9 I RING FOR NANCY 19 "Go away! I haven't got your magazines." "You've disposed of them to an accomplice," the book-stall clerk cried out. "I paid half a sovereign for them," the major exclaimed good-naturedly. "Not at my stall," the clerk said. "No, of course not," the major said. "I never do pay at the stall v^here I buy them. It's the only way to keep a check on you fel- lows. I'm a shareholder." The guard suggested that it was time; the railway policeman, who had said that he had no powers to arrest, suggested that the gentle- man might leave his name and address. The major called out: "Major Brent I^oster, the Manor, Basildon, Hants," and the train moved on. The major sank down in the seat opposite the old gentleman, and exclaimed: "What a day!" \, Almost at the same moment Mrs. Kerr Howe exclaimed: "So you've changed your name, Teddy." And the old man said violently: "Who are you, sir? I don't know your name, sir! What is the meaning of this outrage?" "Of course, I changed my name," the major explained first to Mrs. Kerr Howe. "My old name wasn't popular. It stunk in my uncle's 20 . RING FOR NANCY nostrils. I changed it on the day I was engaged to Olympia." Then he turned mildly on the old gentleman. "That's probably why you do not recognize my name. I used to be called Edward Brent." "Fm not a connoisseur of unsavory names," the old gentleman said bitterly. *T presume you're a groom?" "Now I don't see why you should presume that," the major said. "You say you're engaged at Olympia," the old man said. "I can not imagine any one but grooms being engaged there." The major exclaimed, "Oh!" And then he said, "That's what you all mean. The fact is, I've been out of England for so long — put away, as you might say, and working like a nigger to get through — that I can't be expected to recog- nize these topical matters. Of course, Olympia is a horse show. That's what Flossie meant!" He looked at Mrs. Kerr Howe as if for confirm- ation, and then he added, "Of course, Sir Arthur, I said I was engaged not at, but to, Olympia — Miss Olympia Peabody, of Boston State Reformatory." The old gentleman positively shivered. "I'm not losing my nerve," he said, "I never lost my nerve in my life, but all this has a very RING FOR NANCY 21 criminal sound. Be good enough to explain, or I shall certainly pull the alarm cord." "But, my dear Sir Arthur . . " Major Brent Foster exclaimed. "How do you know my name?" the old gentleman asked sharply. He had a very hale and hearty face, with red cheek-bones, a white beard, a savage black mustache and savage black eyebrows. "As if I did not know your face," the major said, and he wondered amiably who the old gentleman could be in the world. "Wasn't your photograph on the study desk of my best chum Toppy at Harrow?" "It certainly wasn't," the old gentleman said. "I do not know any individual of the name of Toppy. You trepan me into the compartment of yourself and your female companion. The first thing I hear is that you are accused of theft. You stamp upon my toes, and announce that you have changed your name because it is unsavory to your relatives. You certainly ap- pear to know my name. But there is nothing astonishing about that, for in these curiosity- mongering times my face is constantly appear- ing in the public press." "Oh, I say," Major Brent Foster said guile- lessly, "there's nothing curious about your face. 22 RING FOR NANCY It's rather a fine face, if you'll excuse my saying so. Major Brent Foster was upon the whole happy, for the longer he could keep up any sort of talk with this mysterious Sir Arthur, the longer he could stave off a private explanation with Mrs. Kerr Howe. Sir Arthur blushed with fury, and his eyes positively sparkled. "I did not mean," he said, "that my face is a curiosity, as if it were, what I believe it is the custom to call, a freak. I meant that, as I enjoy a certain celebrity, my face is frequently repro- duced in the press." "But that only means," Major Brent Foster said amiably, "that the press is doing its duty. It inspirits us nobodies to know what our lead- ers look like." Sir Arthur appeared modified in his course of rage. "Understand me," he said, "if the press con- fined itself to the portrayal of leaders of thought, there would be little to complain of." "Now that was what I was just saying to my little friend, Miss Flossie Delamare," the major invented boldly. "She is in the next com- partment because she was too shy to come into such distinguished society as that of you and Mrs. Kerr Howe." RING FOR NANCY 23 The old gentleman raised both his hands in an attitude of tragic horror; but Mrs. Kerr Howe said eagerly: *'You're such a consummate liar, Teddy, that there^s never a chance to know what you do mean. But if that was Miss Flossie Delamare, why in the world did you not bring her in here?" The major did not in the least understand where he was getting to. "I don't see why a great writer like you should want to know a poor little thing like Flossie," he said. "But, at any rate, she was too modest. She's a retiring little thing." *'You said she was your sister," Mrs. Kerr Howe remarked sweetly. "So she is," the major said pleasantly; "a sort of half-sister. Only, of course, it's a pain- ful subject, and it would not be quite kind to mention it, you understand. You understand. But still, she's my oldest woman friend." "It's strange you never mentioned her at Simla," Mrs. Howe said. "Don't you remember Simla and the pucka drives? And you never once mentioned her name." "Of course, I should not," the major said; "that's only her stage name. Besides, at that time we had quarreled. I should not have been -H O 24 RING FOR NANCY likely to mention her name. It was a deadly quarrel — about her being on the stage." *'I suppose it was the same old quarrel going on just now?" Mrs. Kerr Howe asked. "But we weren't quarreling," the major an- swered. *'We're the best of friends. If I were not going to marry Olympia, I don't see that I could do better than marry Flossie." "Your half-sister!" Mrs. Howe uttered. "You're awfully unimaginative for a writer," the major said. "What I mean is that if I were not going to marry Olympia, I should have little Flossie to keep house for me. She's the best and kind-heartedest and stanchest little thing in the world. That's how I feel." "And I'm sure," Mrs. Howe said, "it does your fraternal feelings credit. But that does not explain how you come to be parting for good. For I heard her ask you to kiss her for that reason." "Oh, you're a perfect fool sometimes, my dear Juliana," the major said. "Of course we are on the best terms in the world. And of course we have to part for good. It explains itself. How can I have an unexplained half-sister going about with me when I am going to marry Olympia? It's a ridiculous idea. Think of the discredit it would cast on my family." RING FOR NANCY 25 Sir Arthur began suddenly to speak, and the major heaved a sigh of relief. He would just as soon — being Irish ! — lie as not. But Mrs. Howe was a little w^earying. "My young friend," the old man said, "I begin to understand that you are not, as I at first con- sidered you, a criminal. You stand up for your humble relation in a way that is quite creditable in this immoral and thoughtless age. But you will oblige me by kindly explaining where you have met me before, and who Toppy is — the gentleman who used to have my likeness on his desk." Major Brent Foster heaved a deep sigh. "I used to meet you at the admiral's balls at Portsmouth," he said succinctly, "and Toppy was the nickname of your son Arthur at Har- row. He was my room-mate." "And pray who am I, then?" Sir Arthur asked. "You !" the major said guilelessly. "You are Rear-admiral Sir Arthur Bowles." The old gentleman had such a martial air that the major thought he was safe to put him in one or the other of the services — more probably in the navy, because of his beard. The old gentleman raised both of his hands to heaven. "I," he said, "I am Sir Arthur Johnson, the 26 RING FOR NANCY president of the First Church of Christ Quietist in London." "Well, it's a most extraordinary world I've come back to," the major sighed. "Everybody I have met since I left Somaliland, is a reformer of something. There's Olympia. She's the hon- orary secretary of the Massachusetts Reforma- tory, and perpetual grand mistress of the Bos- ton Society for the Abolition of Vice. There's my aunt that I'm going to, dear old soul, who knows about as much of evil as an egg knows of aeroplanes, and she's the secretary of the Society for the Suppression of Sin. Now what are you reforming, Juliana?" "I?" Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "I am the presi- dent of the Society for Abolishing Conventional Marriage." "My God!" the major said, "I guess you're cut out for the part. But I'm hanged if the only person that I know that isn't the president of something or other isn't my old humbug of an uncle, and yet you'd say he was just cut out for the part. Why even Flossie, little Flossie, is something of the sort. She's the only woman on the stage who looks anything than a stuffed fiddle in tights — and she's going to be the first manager of a show for the reform of the the-^ RING FOR NANCY 27 Mrs. Kerr Howe leaned forward from her corner to say as clearly as possible: ''It's your uncle who is the founder of the National Society for Theater Reform. It's he who is going to build the theater for Miss Dela- mare." The major sank down in his seat, all crumpled together as if he had fallen from a great height. *7ust heaven!" he said: "then my uncle and aunt are the respectable couple that Flossie said she was going to visit. Then she's travehng down with us. She ought to have been in this carriage." "I wish she had been," Mrs. Kerr Howe said sweetly. *T most particularly want to talk to her." "More than you want to talk to me?" the major asked. "Oh, of course, I shall have to have an ex- planation with you before the day is out," Mrs. Kerr Howe said grimly. "I certainly intend to have one. But I want a regular — what you might call — heart talk with Miss Delamare be- fore she gets down to your uncle." "About" — the major rather gasped — "about things r' "Of course, about things," Mrs. Kerr Howe said; "about the most important things in the 28 RING FOR NANCY world. I want to point out to Miss Delamare that you can't reform the theater without re- forming the conventional idea about marriage. I want a play I've written to be the very first that she puts on at the Reformed Theater. This is not self-seeking on my part — it's the most im- portant thing in the world, the reform of con- ventional marriage." "Oh, I see," the major said amiably, "you want to nobble her before she makes any busi- ness arrangements with my uncle." He paused and remained lost in thought. But Sir Arthur Johnson was anxious to explain his position. "I am anxious to explain my position," he said, "so that there may not be any mistake about it." "I am sure it will be extremely interesting," the major said politely. "I am not in the habit," the president of the Quietist Church continued, "of entering into conversation with strangers in a railway car- riage. I never lose my temper — that is the great lesson that Quietism teaches us. No, I never lose my temper. But when you stamped very hard upon my toes, that, I must confess, induced in me what we are accustomed to call a marked quickening of ideas. That, you see, is quite different from losing one's temper. From RING FOR NANCY 29 the fact that you have dragged me into this car- riage, stamped upon my toes, mentioned that you have changed a discreditable name and had, what I took to be, an engagement in a place frequented by grooms, horsey people and the criminal classes generally — from all these facts together I imagined that you yourself were either a groom or a member of a horsey and criminal class. I imagined that, knowing that I was the head of an advanced and wealthy body, you imagined that I carried about with me in my hand-baggage, which you had observed to be very heavy, the funds of the church of which I am the head." *'So that there we all, in a manner of speak- ing, are," the major astonishingly remarked. "I don't take you," Sir Arthur said frostily. "Oh, that's a way I've got," the major said, "from studying the works of Henry James. His characters are perpetually remarking *so that there, in a manner of speaking, we are.' And, of course, as you can never make out where they are, it's extraordinarily strengthening to the brain to work it out. That's why I'm the youngest major in the British army." "I don't see what all that has to do with me," Sir Arthur said frostily. "What I have to do is to make my position quite plain to you. When 30 RING FOR NANCY I considered that you and your female com- panion were dangerous criminals intent on steal- ing from me the contents of my very heavy lug- gage, I at once matured a plan. That is one of the great benefits of Quietism that, instead of letting your thoughts waste themselves on use- less anger, they are quickened. I immediately matured a plan. I said to myself, these are dangerous robbers, intent on obtaining the con- tents of my luggage. What I have to do is, be- fore they come to any actual deed of violence, to let them understand that the contents of my bags consist of nothing but works of reference — every kind of work of reference, but nothing else." "Now that's extraordinarily interesting," the major said. "I suppose you toughen your brain on works of reference, just as I do mine on the works of the author to whom I can never be sufficiently grateful. Now I wonder," he con- tinued, "if your sort of literature has the same effect on your mind as mine has on mine? I mean that I can't possibly read any book in which the characters aren't always saying *so there, in a manner of speaking, we are.' It's like a craze — a sort of infection. Nothing else seems really to amuse me. And I dare say it's the same with you. I mean, I suppose you RING FOR NANCY 31 can*t read anything that doesn't look like, *Den- mark, pop. 8,000,742. King constitutional. Cap. Cit. Copenhagen. . . .' That's the sort of thing that you get in works of reference." "I don't know about that," Sir Arthur said haughtily; "but I certainly can not read the cryptic, morbid and unpleasant stuff that in the present day passes for literature." ".Well, of course," the major said, "here, in a manner of speaking — I mean, that accounts for it all. It's been an extraordinary privilege and pleasure, getting to know you. The moment I saw you, I knew^ you to be some one command- ing. There couldn't be the least mistake about that. I thought you were Vice-admiral Sir Arthur Bowles. . . ." "You said Rear-admiral just now," Sir Ar- thur said. "Rear-admiral Sir Arthur Bowles," the major continued, undisturbed, "because, of course, an admiral in his own fleet is a sort of pope. And the moment I saw your, if you will pardon my saying so, noble head, I knew you were a sort of pope. And you are. You are the head of a church. I was perfectly right in wanting your company. It will, in a manner of speaking, pur- ify the whole day, and be a memory to retain till the end of one's life." 32 RING FOR NANCY Sir Arthur Johnson appeared visibly flattered. He stroked his white beard, touched with his gloved hands his blue-black mustache, and his blue-black and formidable eyebrows assumed a mollified turn. "Then let that be the end of it," he said. "I was about to address some further remarks to you. But they would probably strike you un- pleasantly. Of course I have not the least ob- jection to being unpleasant if it would be for your good, but at the end of this journey we shall part, and you are probably hardened in what I am bound to call your evil courses." "Well, you speak straight, and no mistake," the major said. "I do," Sir Arthur answered, "and if you would kindly remove yourself to the other end of the carriage, opposite your companion, I may be able to resume the studies that you have in- terrupted." The major humbly got up and humbly sat down opposite Mrs. Kerr Howe. The train con- tinued on its way; the old gentleman arose and, a fierce and martial figure in his fur cloak, he began to take a great quantity of red and blue and green books out of a large leather kit-bag. These he laid upon the seat in front of him, where the major had vacated it. RING FOR NANCY 33 ^'Extraordinary sort of clay this," the major remarked to Mrs. Kerr Howe. Mrs. Kerr Howe said nothing, and for a mo- ment there was a tranquillity that even Major Brent Foster — though he loved a scrap — consid- ered blessed. Mrs. Kerr Howe was looking out of the window, and he considered her carefully. If he was going to spend at his uncle's several days, weeks, or months in the society of Mrs. Howe, of Flossie Delamare and of his fiancee, Miss Peabody, who was not in her first youth — being six years older than the major — and in consequence was not too certain of her charms, w^ell, he would certainly need to know how the land lay. It was an extraordinary muddle. There was Mrs. Kerr Howe; there could not be the least doubt about her charms. Olympia certainly would not doubt them — ^and the major sighed, because, of course, from duty and inclination, he had to consider Olympia first. Mrs. Kerr Howe was little and dimpled to a degree that the major hardly believed credible. It struck him as a sort of false pretenses. She ought to be fluffy-minded, clinging and affection- ate; so at least he had imagined her to be in the first days at Simla, where she had come in the train — as a sort of guest — of the viceroy's 34 RING FOR NANCY wife. In those days he had been lonely, rottenly poor, four years younger, and twenty-four years gayer and more irresponsible that he was even then. And Mrs. Kerr Howe had trotted about with him, little and dimples and all. She had even read her novels to him — sloppy novels that she turned out at the rate of one a fortnight, each one containing a lady like Mrs. Kerr Howe — a sentimental lady who went extraordinarily "wrong". At that date she had not been able to find a publisher for any one of them, though she had paid to publish two. And little by little he had discovered, even at Simla, that in that little dimpled body there dwelt the spirit of a six-foot grenadier. She knew what she wanted, and she was extraordi- narily set on getting it. And one of the things that she wanted, it had appeared, was Captain Edward Brent. There was not a doubt about that. He really had not done much. He might have taken her for a drive half a dozen times; he had listened to four or five of her novels — it was true that when she had come to the gurgly love passages she had always gazed into his eyes, but that was not his fault. He had taken her to the Swanston pony races, and almost beggared himself over it, since he hadn^t a pice RING FOR NANCY 35 but his captain's pay. He had certainly com- miserated with her over the singularly brutal letters that her husband had written her. Her husband had been a disagreeable invalid, and she had come to India strongly against his will while he remained at home. He had sat with her half a dozen times looking at the sunset from Dawson's Tea Gardens through the deo- dars — a remote spot that was pretty solitary, because few of the Simla people knew of its ex- istence. But up to the quite fatal day, he could not recall a single thing that he had "done" — not so much as squeezing her hand. And then, suddenly — it had happened to be at that damned Dawson's and a sunset under the deodars — she had said: "When we are married, we shall always live in a sunset land." And immediately afterward she had looked steadily at him and remarked, "My husband can not live more than three years." He could not even accuse himself of having been weak. He was Irish, and polite enough to be perfectly frank. He had said that he simply was not taking any, and that he wanted to marry some one else; that he did not intend to' marry any one unless he could mairy some one else. 36 RING FOR NANCY And she had answered: "Oh, I know. A girl called Mary Savylle. That was a silly boy and girl affair! Why, you probably would not recognize her if you saw her again." He had sworn under his breath at that — ^be- cause it just showed him that in the damned gossiping nest that Simla was, there was not a single blessed thing they did not find out sooner or later — though possibly the only per- son that would be found to tell it to a man's face was a brazen woman like Mrs. Kerr Howe. Simla itself was damned gossiping, but damned discreet all the same. That was what made the place so confoundedly snaky and dangerous. Indeed, the very next thing that Mrs. Kerr Howe had said on that occasion had been: "You know, everybody will expect you to marry me as soon as my husband dies. And why shouldn't you? You can't go on starving as a lower grade officer in India all your life." He had been perfectly good-humored; he had said simply that he did not deserve the honor. But she had stuck to it; she was particularly earnest on the point that he would never marry Mary Savylle, whom he would not know if he met her again. It had given him what would have been the lesson of his life if he had been able to learn any RING FOR NANCY 37 lessons. He had gone a thousand miles up country, but Mrs. Kerr's letters pursued him: sometimes they spoke about her blasted reputa- tion; sometimes she spoke about her broken heart; sometimes she wrote about the good time she was having in Ceylon, in Rangoon, in Cali- fornia, in the Sierra Nevadas. She took a year to get home, and he supposed that she was try- ing to make him jealous. Sometimes he an- swered her; sometimes he did not. He had a lonely life in a hill station; and sometimes he wrote her chaffy pages for the sheer want of something to do, or the sheer want of keeping in contact with some one who was not buried a thousand miles deep. Then, next season, he had come across Flossie Delamare, who had been, as he had said, a half- starved sort of little rat at the time — she had been playing French maids in a rotten company that was going round the eastern world, in places like Hongkong and Tokyo — in a rotten company in which every one had seemed to be a hundred and two except Flossie. He had found Flossie receiving attentions from a doubtful sort of Parsee, and he had just sailed in to yank her out of it, as he said. He was not any great shakes in Simla; people could get on without him all right, and he was a detrimental even for 38 iRING FOR NANCY garrison hacks. But just about then he had a letter from Mrs. Kerr Howe to say, "Your old flame is marrying a fat old man — the Earl of Cumberland," so he just sailed in to give Flossie Delamare — who had been a shop-girl from Ox- ford Street — as decent a sort of time as he could. Nevertheless, he had told her carefully at the start that there was not to be the least idea of his marrying her; but he used to take her to Dawson's to tea, and when he felt sick about Mary Savylle he used to kiss her. And he took her to Swanston pony races and made bets for her that turned out remarkably well, so that she had a good time all the way. And he used to help her rehearsing her little parts, and that was about all there was to it. Then one day in the theater he had seen a fat old man with a fattish, darkish, pleasant-looking woman by his side. He learned from an attache — quite by the grace of God — that it was the Earl of Cumberland with his new wife, who had been the Dowager Lady Mary Savylle — his own Mary's aunt! So that Mrs. Kerr Howe had been lying or very clumsily mistaken. And next day he had packed Flossie back to London with every penny he could scrape up and borrow and a letter to a fat, kind, real actress RING FOR NANCY 39 that he had known before his father broke. She had written to him once or twice to say that she had got "goodish shops/' and then he had gone to Somaliland to watch over a well that depos- ited alkali at the bottom of the corrugated iron cisterns at the rate of three inches a day. But the well had been all-important for the safety of the Empire in that part of the world, and his readiness in watching over it had caused him to be favorably regarded by his immediate superi- ors; and in the meantime he had read the ex- traordinary novels that had, he considered, toughened his brain fiber. But the alkali and the well and the shadelessness and the reading had played the devil with his eyesight, so that when he had passed his really brilliant examina- tion and was really the youngest major in the British army, the army doctors just said that he would not be fit for active service any more. That had been a confoundedly hard knock. He had come home from the physical examina- tion blundering into the calm of the common room of his Bloomsbury boarding-house, and had just tumbled into an armchair in a sort of fit or faint or something. He considered that it was up to him to go on a spree, paint the town red — there was nothing else left. After all those years and years there was nothing else 40 RING FOR NANCY left. He could not now go to Mary Savylle — even if she still existed as Mary Savylle, which he did not know — and ofifer the hand and heart of a damaged major with crocky eyes and the end of the world before him. But in that common room of the Bloomsbury boarding-house, when he had come in and col- lapsed, Miss Olympia Peabody had been sitting. She had got up and approached him with the words: "My! Whatever is the matter?" And the major, as soon as he could speak, had looked up at her with the words : "I'm just drunk. Couldn't toe a line. Couldn't say the words *Sixty-six identifications.' Couldn't pass any police tests. Suspected of seeing double. See two of you. Wish there were four." Olympia had started back from him, and then she said: "But you did say the words sixty- six, and so on." He had replied with a sort of hysterical laugh: "That was because I wasn't trying. I couldn't do it if I tried!" And then he just told her all about it. It was the first time in his life that he had not kept up a mystification when he had once begun it. And that first time did for him — it engaged him to Olympia Peabody. RING FOR NANCY 41 And that, he could not help seeing, had been entirely his own fault. Because he really had flirted with poor Olympia quite outrageously. It had begun by his simply wishing to give her a good time, just as he had tried to do for Flossie. She had seemed to him a lonely, poor- ish, lost sort of soul in a Bloomsbury boarding- house. He, on the other hand, had appeared to her to be a brilliant lost sheep on the road to perdition. Even on that day she had not been able not to believe that he was drunk. He cer- tainly announced that he was going to paint the town red, so she had insisted on accompanying him to the Empire Theater of Varieties to see that he did not throw four commissionaires down the stairs. He was rather astonished to find that they w^ent there together in an im- mense motor-car, that apparently belonged to Miss Peabody herself. But it was he who took her to the Tower, be- cause the Tower seemed to be the proper place for an American maiden lady. She, on the other hand, suggested that they should explore White- chapel, and later the opium dens of the docks. He also accompanied her to Wormwood Scrubbs and Borstal Prisons, to which apparently the American embassy had obtained admission. He made a last attempt to keep her to orthodox 42 RING FOR NANCY tourist lines, such as were fitted for maiden ladies from Boston, by taking her to Hampton Court, where he informed her that Lely's Duch- ess of Portsmouth reminded him of herself. But, except for that remark that had a great deal of success, the day was such a failure that he gave up the tourist ghost. He could not escape from the conviction that Miss Peabody was enor- mously earnest. She was, he discovered, simply here in order that she might study social problems, and more especially that of vice. He discovered also that she was enormously wealthy, that she was the founder of the B.S.S.V., and that if she was in a Bloomsbury boarding-house, it was simply in order to study the serious problems of British vice at close quarters. Then he gave her a letter of introduction to his aunt, Mrs. Arthur Foster, his mother^s sis- ter, whom he had not seen for ten years because his uncle, Arthur Foster, Esquire, a Common Councilman of the City of London, had abused his dead father. The major was, however, really fond of his aunt and was glad of an oppor- tunity to come into contact with her again. It would not have entered his head if, in the long unoccupied hours that he had to get through, he had not read listlessly in a newspaper the item RING FOR NANCY 43 that Mrs. Arthur Foster of The Pines, Hornsey, the president of the N.S.R.S. (The National So- ciety for the Reform of Sin), was giving an afternoon to the members of the N.L.S.R.T. (The North London Society for the Reform of the Theater). He could not imagine his pleas- ant, soft old aunt as being connected with either sin or theaters; but he had been ten years out of England, and he recognized that both sin and theaters might have changed. So he sent Miss Peabody up to his aunt, and the result was that both ladies had been hanging round his neck ever since. Then he had learned from his aunt that poor Olympia certainly ex- pected him to marry her, because she had saved him from hell, and he had said she was like the Duchess of Portsmouth. The idea had seemed to him to be ridiculous until he had read in the paper that the heiress and successor to Lord Savylle, of Higham, was Mary Savylle — that very Mary Savylle of whom Mrs. Howe had said that he probably would not recognize her if he saw her again. It had appeared from the newspaper report of the decease of the late peer that three of her cousins having died in the ten years, the title, as well as the estate, going in tail female, had fallen to her. That really knocked the bottom out of him 44 RING FOR NANCY and he had, as he considered, just let himself go to what was practically the devil. He had con- sented to change his name to Brent Foster on the definite condition that he became his uncle's heir, married Miss Peabody, who enjoyed an income of ninety thousand dollars (eighteen thousand pounds) a year, and settled down as a country gentleman. But he did not care to consider these details of his fall. He was out of conceit with himself and life, and he was going down to remake the acquaintance of Arthur Foster, Esquire, Common Councilman of the City of London, at the country house that he had hired. His aunt had never let him come up to The Pines, Hornsey, because she had the idea that her nephew had led a worldly and glit- tering life. She thought it would be less of a shock to him to meet his uncle in one of the really stately homes of England. It was called The Manor, Basildon, in Hampshire, and Olym- pia, who had been down with Mrs. Foster to inspect it, reported that it was chock-full of old armor, old contraptions, and secret rooms and Vandyke paintings. But Major Edward Brent Foster did not care a damn. He sat opposite Mrs. Kerr Howe and just wondered gloomily what was going to happen. There he was going down to a house with that RING FOR NANCY 45 woman and Flossie. And poor dear Olympia was as jealous as they make them, and heaven knew what racket there would not be. He al- most wished that he had not dragged the old gentleman into the carriage. Then he would have been able to have it out with Mrs. Kerr Howe, and to get to know just what she did intend to do about it. The old gentleman was deep in one of seven books, and he was just going to risk things and ask her, when she looked round from the window, and with every sign of exasperation, asked — her foot tapping ominously on the floor of the carriage: "How in the world could you be such an idiot as not to let Miss Delamare get into this car- riage?'* The major started back and said: "Well, I thought she'd be in the way — considering how things are between us, I thought she would be in the way." "How things are between us?" she asked carelessly. "How are they, I should like to know?" "Well, I certainly thought," the major said, "that you intended to marry me whether I wanted it or no." "That's all very well," she said, "that cock isn't going to fight. You aren't going to get out 46 RING FOR NANCY of it in that way. I want to talk to Miss Dela- mare before she can get to your uncle's. I can settle you afterward." "Oh, no, you don't," the major said with some heat. "I'm not going to have poor Olym- pia upset. When we meet at my uncle's, we meet as strangers." "Oh, no, we don't," she mocked him. "As if I care whether poor Olympia is upset!" "Well, she isn't going to be," the major said with his most businesslike air. "Well, we can't meet as strangers," she still mocked him. "Your aunt thinks I am your oldest ' friend. That's why she has asked me down to meet you." The major exclaimed: "My aunt! . . ." with an accent of horror. "Yes, Teddy," Mrs. Howe continued, "your dear good aunt. She wants everybody to be nice and homelike for you. Everybody and everything! That is why she has taken Basildon Manor. She took no end of trouble to get it to welcome you in." The major said blankly: "Basildon Manor? I don't understand . . ." "Well, it's not my business to give you under- standing," the lady said. "There it is. Your aunt wanted you to be nice and comfy and in RING FOR NANCY 47 the society that you are accustomed to. So she asked me because I told her that I was your oldest friend. And she's told me that she asked Miss Delamare because Miss Dela- mare said she was your oldest friend, too." The major said Hmply: "But what an ex- traordinary idea!" "It's a surprise party," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "It certainly is," the major said. "And what I want to know is," the lady con- tinued, "how you could be such an utter oaf as to head Miss Delamare off from me. She. is going to sign her contract with your uncle for the New Theater the moment she gets down. And it's the most important thing in the world for me to get her to promise to put on my play before she signs. Your uncle is opposed to my ideas, and he won't let her do it afterward. . . . The whole of my future — the whole of our future may depend on it. I suppose you don't want to be a beggar, and I lose my husband's fortune on remarrying." "Oh, I shan't be a beggar," the major said; "Olympia's got eighteen thousand a year." "Oh, you're not going to marry Olympia," the lady said; "that's a silly affair. She's not in the least suited to you. . . ." The major was just saying: "Look here. 48 RING FOR NANCY Juliana, this thing has got to be settled here and now/' when a roar that positively re- minded him of his first tiger came from the other end of the carriage. Sir Arthur Johnson had sprung to his feet and had flung a blue volume on to the floor. The major saw vaguely that it was the Navy List. *'The only thing that I can think is that youVe drunk, sir. Outrageously drunk!" Sir Arthur shouted. His whole face was purple and his whitish blue beard was quivering. He began furiously throwing books into his open kit-bag and missing the opening each time. He gave an idea of violent and stormy motion, for as each book fell on the floor he threw it at the kit-bag again, and the breath came from his nostrils like a tempest. The major said: "Well, I'll admit we were talking of rather intimate matters. Perhaps we ought not to have been. But, you see, I'm engaged to this very charming lady. It's a painful circumstance, and there's ever so much to talk about." The old gentleman became dangerously calm and his eyes glittered. "Do you mean to say, sir," he said, "that you accuse me of listening to your filthy and degen- erate conversation?" RING FOR NANCY 49 "Well, I don't know what else it could have been," the major said, and he bent humbly to pick up the blue book. But the old man stamped his foot hard upon it and stood like an old sea-lion at bay. "No, you don't, sir," he hissed. "You shall not destroy the evidence of your guilt. That, sir, is a Navy List. The major brought out: "A Na . . ." And then he said, "Oh!" »"Yes, sir, *oh !' " the old man said violently. "A Navy List. In that book there is no such name as that of Sir Arthur Bowles, Rear- admiral." "Well, of course, he has been dead two .. years," the major said mildly. P "That book, sir," the old gentleman said coldly, "is three years old. Your friend would have been in it if he only died two years ago!" "Well, but he was in the United States navy!" the major said. "He was a baronet in his own right, and he deserted to the United States in 1863. He wanted to see service against the South. There wasn't anything discreditable in his desertion." "Sir, I have written a history of the war in the United States. I am intimately acquainted with all the circumstances. There was no 50 RING FOR NANCY English baronet of the name of Bowles m the Federal naval service." "Well, of course, he changed his name, too," the major said, "like me. He did not naturally want it known. Now, would he?" "This is a pack of lies," Sir Arthur said. I "Why, so it is," the major said brightly. "But even you will admit that there is such a thing as tact." "No, there is no such thing," the president of | the Quietist Church exclaimed. "There is the truth. And there are lies. You had better tell j the truth or I shall take the proper steps." I "Well, I've done my best to shield all par- | ties," the major sighed resignedly. "I was only doing my best for poor Olympia. Because I don't want her to think I am not a reformed character. I really am." The old gentleman continued standing at one end of the carriage. "Come, sir. The truth!" he exclaimed, and his eyes wandered up to the alarm signal. "Well, then, this is the exact truth," the major said. "I am engaged to Miss Peabody, of Boston, Massachusetts." "A minute ago you said you were engaged ., to this lady," Sir Arthur convicted him trium- | phantly. RING FOR NANCY 51 "Why, so I did," the major said pleasantly. "But then I was lying. Now I am telling the truth." The old gentleman turned upon Mrs. Kerr Howe. "This appears to be a sordid story, mad- am," he said. "But if the matter should come to a breach of promise trial I am at your dis- posal as a witness that this person said that he was engaged to you." The major said: "That's very amiable of you. But you admitted yourself that every- thing I was saying then was a pack of lies. Those were your exact words. You can't have it both ways." And Mrs. Kerr Howe exclaimed: "I beg you not to associate me with anything so vul- gar as a breach of promise case. I have other ways of enforcing my rights. I am not the president of the Society for the Reform of Conventional Marriage for nothing. Let me introduce myself. I am Mrs. Kerr Howe, the famous authoress." |t The old gentleman shivered and exclaimed: "Infamous!" The real truth is," the major continued, "that I am engaged to Olympia I did not wish to travel down alone in a carriage with a much too attractive lady. So I used what was a little sub- 52 RING FOR NANCY terfuge, I admit, to provide myself with a chap- eron. So that's the real truth, and I hope you will admit that it was harmless enough." "I don't believe a word of it," Sir Arthur said. "I'm not accustomed to being called a liar," the major said angrily. "Damn it, I won't stand that." Sir Arthur stretched out his hand to the alarm signal and continued, holding the knob in his hand : "Don't you try to threaten me, sir. I recog- nized you from the first for the coward and hired bully that you are. I dare say that my life is in danger, but I am not to be intimidated. I shall say my say come what will. No one ever said that I was wanting in courage. Let me tell you that I recognized your type from the first." He paused and pointed an accusing finger at the major. "You, sir," he hissed, "are a military charac- ter. You, madam, are an immoral authoress pandering to the cryptic and morbid tastes of the day. I quite understand that you have joined causes in this monstrous outrage on my- self." He breathed deeply and continued: "You entice me into this carriage. I am will- RING FOR NANCY - 53 ing to give you the excuse that you are both drunk. I am willing even to admit that you do not mean to rob me or even to assault me. You may want no more than to gloat in some low pot-house with your boon companions over the low trick that you have played on me. I can quite see that your infamous causes of prize-fighter and panderer to the filthy tastes of the day would not be advanced by the re- port that you had assaulted an old man — a feeble nonagenarian like myself " "You're quite sure that you are talking about us?" the major asked. "It's certainly more confusing than reading Henry James. It really » The old gentleman really screamed: "Stop, sir!" he shouted. "If you think that it is humorous to force upon my attention the name of another of your filthy young writers "Young!" the major exclaimed in a puzzled manner. "I thought he was quite old. A clas- sic!" "Sacred shade of Byron!" Sir Arthur ex- claimed. "And you, too, sacred name oi Walter Scott, that I knew in my childhood! Where are Thackeray and Tennyson, and my good old friend Lewis Morris! That I should have lived 54 RING FOR NANCY ninety years in the land to hear these lewd striplings applauded as classics !" "But you can't call that writer a stripling," the major said. *'You could run him three times round a mile course yourself, I would not mind betting." "I do call that writer a stripling!" the old man said fiercely. "1 do. A purveyor of cryp- tic and morbid vileness!" "Now, come," the major said, "I don't be- lieve you have read a word that was written since Macaulay died." "I haven't, sir," Sir Arthur exclaimed fierce- ly. "Not a word. All my efforts since then have been confined to damming up the foul tricklings of that morbid stream. And let me tell you, sir, prize-fighter that you are, I should never have lived to this splendid and green old age if I had so befouled my mind." "I don't see why you call me a prize-fighter," the major said. "Of course it makes things much more amusing. But it's odd!" "Of course you are a prize-fighter!" Sir Arthur exclaimed. "What else should you be? Is It not inevitable and demonstrable! You are a military person and you outrage me and you talk of meretricious and obscene tales by young writers and you join in your insult to RING FOR NANCY 55 me with the most meretricious female writer that I have ever heard of — so, of course, I join you with prize-fighters. I do not mean that you have muscle and nerve to stand up against a trained man with your fists. Your unclean living has probably deprived you of those at- tributes of a man — physical courage and nerves. But you are one of those persons who organize the disgusting exhibitions in which the degen- erate descendants of the most infamous type of gladiators . . ." "I! Organize a prize-fight!" the major ex^ claimed. "My God!" "That is what you do!" Sir Arthur said. And suddenly Mrs. Kerr Howe cried out: "The rude old man thinks that you are one of the promoters of the Military Boxing Dis- plays that a lot of silly parsons got stopped!" "I certainly," Sir Arthur said, "used all my influence as head of the Quietist Church to get those infamous displays suppressed — that and my efforts to drive foul literature off the book- stalls. . . ." "Oh, of course," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "You are one of the old Pharisees in fig-leaves who tried to get up the boycott of my books. I thought I knew your name!" "Knew my name!" Sir Arthur suddenly 56 RING FOR NANCY foamed. "This to me — the author of Economic Ethics and the Modern State! To me, whom the most eminent statesmen of the nineteenth cen- tury were proud to be privileged to consult. To me!" He choked and once more began to cram his books into his kit-bag. And then he suddenly threw the bag out of the window and pulled the alarm cord. "To me !" he said. "Just Gods! that my only title to fame in this degenerate day should be that I stopped a prize-fight and attempted to cleanse the world of filthy books." His fury was so terrific that both the major and Mrs. Kerr Howe cowered in their corners while he stamped up and down from end to end of the carriage. The train slowed, jolted, ground along the rails and then came to a stop just at a little roadside station. Sir Arthur sprang out, and stamping on the platform, be- gan to shout for the guard. The guard came running up. "I shall see if the laws of my country will not protect me from such Yahoos," Sir Arthur hissed back at the carriage. Then he called out: "Guard, arrest these people for drunk- enness, the use of obscene language and as- sault." The guard said: "There, there. Sir Arthur, RING FOR NANCY 57 you know perfectly well I haven't got the power to arrest anybody. You've got to issue a summons, as you usually do." "Find me an empty first-class carriage," Sir Arthur exclaimed majestically, and he began to stalk off up the platform. The major came to the door of the carriage. "You'd better," he said to the guard, "smell my breath and hear if I can say 'sixty-six inci- dentals.' " The guard said: "Oh, that's all right, sir. Very fiery old gentleman. Sir Arthur. This is the third time he stopped the six forty-eight this year." And he shut the door and went up the platform after Sir Arthur. The engine-driver having stopped the train at a station instead of in the open country, none of the passengers had paid any particular attention to the stoppage, except Miss Flossie Delamare, who came to her window, and lean- ing out, kissed her hand to the major. He drew his own head in precipitately. For, just as before he had been anxious to be protected from a scene with Mrs. Kerr Howe, now, upon reconsideration, he was anxious for an expla- nation with her. He wanted to get perfectly settled what she was going to be up to before he got down to his uncle's. 58 RING FOR NANCY He pulled up the window and was about to sit down opposite Mrs. Kerr Howe. ^'This appears to me," Mrs. Kerr Howe said, ''to be an excellent opportunity for me to have some conversation with Miss Delamare about my play," and she rose to her feet. "Oh, come," the major said, ''that can wait. We've got to settle about our relationships." "They're settled already," that lady said. "But of course we must have a talk about them before the day is done," and vigorously she pushed past him toward the door. He caught hold of her wrist. "Look here, Juliana," he said, "I can't go having tete-a-tetes with you in my uncle's house." "It would upset Olympia.^" she asked amia- bly. "It would upset the whole blooming lot," the major said. "My uncle, my aunt, Olympia, me — everybody." She slipped her hand neatly out of his fin- gers. "Oh, would it?" she said. "Well, I'm afraid they are going to be upset," and she was gone out of the carriage. She got hold of a sleepy porter who had been awakened from a nap by the unaccus- tomed stopping of the mail, and in a minute RING FOR NANCY 59 she had got her dressing-bag and her jewel- case out of the major's carriage and into Miss Delamare's. From the door the major could perceive Sir Arthur foaming down the platform like a great white wave. And the major had to do a lot of rapid reflection. In the first place, he knew perfectly well that it would not be the least use getting in with Flossie and Mrs. Kerr Howe. Mrs. Kerr Howe would be talking about her play the whole way down, and that would bore him to extinction. On the other hand, if he didn't get into the same carriage to check them they would almost cer- tainly compare notes as to his past career, and he didn't know that he wanted that. He had, of course, to think of poor Olympiads feelings as much as possible, and he was convinced that Mrs. Kerr Howe would do all that she possibly could to give poor Olympia a lively time. His uncertainty, however, was cut short by the guard, who came running up to beg him to get into the other carriage with his other lady friends, so as to leave Sir Arthur an empty first. And the major, with a good-tempered "Oh, well," got himself out of his own carriage and into the next. He was just saying cheer- fully to Flossie Delamare, *'You wicked, aban- doned little wretch," when Sir Arthur, his eyes 60 RING FOR NANCY blazing, his beard working convulsively, thrust his head in at the window and shouted: *'.You wicked abandoned wretch. Don't think to escape me in this way. You hired bully, you atrocious drunken sot with your abandoned female companions, the moment I get to my destination I shall issue a summons against you for drunkenness, assault and the use of obscene language." His head disap- | peared like that of a Jack-in-the-box, leaving the guard visible behind him. "Do you suppose he'll take out a summons against me?" the major asked. "He'll certainly issue it himself," the guard said. "He's one of these liberal J.P.'s — pre- cious fond of issuing summonses." The guard disappeared. "Drunkenness! Assault! The use of obscene language!" Miss Flossie Delamare laughed. "That'll make a pretty lively time for poor Olympia when the summons comes on." The major said, "Oh, rot!" and then he hur- riedly began to talk to her in the hope of heading off Mrs. Kerr Howe. "You wicked, abandoned little wretch," he said, "what do you mean by not telling me you were going down to my aunt's? What do you mean by telling my aunt that you were one of my best friends?" RING FOR NANCY 61 "Oh, well, Teddy," Miss Delamare said, "if it comes to good wishes, I am sure I'm the best friend youVe got in the world. And as for taking you in . . . why, you're such a precious hand at mystification yourself that it's a fine old temptation to score off you sometimes." "But hang it all," the major said, "you did it so confoundedly well. When you talked about parting forever there were tears in your eyes." "Oh, well, Teddy," Miss Delamare said with a little hurt air, "you seem to forget sometimes that I a7n an actress." Mrs. Kerr Howe suddenly cut in with what appeared to be a victorious snicker: "Your half-brother," she said, "has been tell- ing me the most romantic story about your re- lationships." Miss Delamare exclaimed, "My half-brother!" and then she looked at the major and got from his face one of her brilliant inspirations. "Oh, Teddy you mean!" she said. "I thought you meant that old gentleman who might have been an uncle to me. Well, I hope Teddy hasn't been saying things against me behind my back." And the major sank down into his corner with a sigh of deep relief. He couldn't now have any doubt that Flossie Delamare wouldn't h 62 RING FOR NANCY give Mrs. Kerr Howe any kind of a handle against him, and he just said: "The times weVe seen!" "Yes, the times we've seen, Teddy!'* Miss Delamare said with a little regretful sigh, and then, immediately afterward, Mrs. Kerr Howe was all over her like a wave with her projects for the New Theater. The major never got another word in. Mrs. Kerr Howe explained the plot of her play. She dilated on the high- mindedness of all the characters except the villain. She explained how the play would help on the reform of conventional marriage. The major never got a word in, and at last he took from the pocket of his rain-proof coat a volume called The Sacred Fount, and began to puzzle over its contents. The Westinghouse brake, which had been strained by the sudden stopping of the train, burst about a quarter of an hour later, and by the time the train had slowed down a little, one of the carriages about three ahead of them took it into its head to run off the line. It was nothing like a serious ac- cident, but it jolted them a good deal. But Mrs. Kerr Howe talked on steadily about her play, and although it was a quarter to eleven before they reached Basildon Manor she was still talking about it. Ill lyrRS. ARTHUR FOSTER— Major Brent ITA Foster's annt — was anxiously seeing to the warmth of his bedroom in Basildon Manor at about half past ten that night. It is true that it was early June, but she was con- vinced that, after many years in one tropic and another, he would find it cool enough. A fire burned in the grate; there was a hot bottle in the immense and shadowy four-post bed. And! all the room wavered between shadowiness and warmth. The fireplace was as large as a Lon- don pantry; the dogs on the hearth w^ere as large as the London umbrella stand; the burning logs were as big as Mrs. Foster's husband's portman- teau; the velvet curtained bed was as big as she imagined desert islands to be, and the immense picture of Ancestors that faced the foot of the bed was at least as large as the immense fold- ing-doors between the front and rear dining- rooms of The Pines, Hornsey. And Mrs. Arthur Foster was a little afraid of this picture — "the panel," her ladyship's own maid called it. It represented three fierce men 63 64 RING FOR NANCY in broad-brimmed and plumed hats; three ladies in velvet, pearls, low necks and fringes; one lit- tle boy v^ith long curls and a slouch hat; three little girls in low necks, one of them held a par- rot, another a monkey, and the third attended on by a greyhound. A baby, also in a low- necked dress, sprawled on the ground in the at- tempt to reach a parti-colored ball. All these people were represented as standing in the open air, in a group like a wall, as people stand now- adays to be photographed, and with the excep- tion of the baby, gazed fiercely, mildly, or with unseeing glances at Mrs. Arthur Foster. Having done all she could for the major*s room, she had to pause and look round, and those eyes irresistibly drew her glance. She really shivered, and then she said to her lady- ship's own maid: "Dear me, Miss Nancy Jenkins, my dear, wouldn't you say they were asking me how I dared to be in their room?" "No, I shouldn't ma'am," her ladyship's own maid replied; "you're nothing to the peo- ple they did see in their own rooms when they were alive." "No, poor dears, I dare say not," Mrs. Fos- ter said. "And I dare say they'd know how re- spectful and how like an intruder I feel." RING FOR NANCY 65 "Now you needn't, ma'am," Miss Nancy Jen- kins said kindly. "I'm sure the last thing her ladyship would want you to feel is anything but entirely at home. Her ladyship begged me to make you and Major Brent feel absolute- ly and entirely as if the place belonged to you. Her ladyship begged me particularly to ask you to remember, if there isn't any other way of making you see it, that if it wasn't for you taking the place in the summer she could not afford to live in it for the spring and autumn. She would have to sell it and all the dear old things." Mrs. Foster looked timidly at her ladyship's own maid. "Dear me, Miss Nancy Jenkins," she said, "did her ladyship really ask you to say that?" "It's what her ladyship particularly wishes you to understand," the maid answered. "Par- ticularly. More than anything else. She loves the old things, and she wants them to make people happy." "I feel afraid of them really," Mrs. Foster said. "I would not like people to know it. But they're all so old and so stern and so precious that sometimes I'm afraid to turn round for fear of breaking them. And sometimes — ohl I really wish I was back in my own drawing- 66 RING FOR NANCY room at Hornsey, where there's nothing really valuable except the Berlin wool-work screen that was worked by the Princess Alice's own hands for the Great Exhibition of '52," She stopped and looked almost lovingly at her ladyship's own maid. Miss Jenkins smoothed her black alpaca apron. "I'm afraid," she said, "that it's her lady- ship's leaving me that has given you that sort of idea," she said. "But, indeed, madam, that was not meant as a ... as a precaution against yourself. The best of people have now and then a servant that's a breaker, and her lady- ship values every stick of her house as if it were one of her little fingers." She stopped, and then added: "But rather than take away from your satisfaction, rather than you should feel that you are being watched upon, I'm perfectly certain that her ladyship would pre- fer me to go to-night." "Oh, but my dear, my dear Miss Nancy Jen- kins," Mrs. Foster exclaimed on a note of al- most painful anxiety, and then she stopped dis- tractedly. "You're perfectly certain/^ she asked, "that those cigars are the sort of cigars the major will like?" "Well, you never can be quite certain what a RING FOR NANCY 67 gentleman will like, ma'am," Miss Jenkins an- swered; "but you can be perfectly certain that they're not the kind of cigars that you need be ashamed of, and that's the important point. They're the sort that her ladyship always has in the house for her gentlemen friends. And they're the sort that Captain Brent used always to smoke at Holbury before he went away. Of course, there's no saying that his tastes may have changed." *'Then there you are. Miss Nancy," Mrs. Foster said triumphantly. "How could I get on in this great ugly old house if I hadn't you to back me up? What do I know about gen- tlemen's tastes? Of course there's Mr. Foster < — he's a true gentleman; but of course he's not a real gentleman. I mean not a manly gentle- man like the major." "Well, of course, you couldn't have every one in the world like the major," Miss Jenkins said, "or there wouldn't be room to hold us." Mrs. Foster's eyes wandered to the panel. "Now, who did you say all those angry-look- ing people were?" she asked. "You've told me once, but I've forgotten. And it would be too silly not to be able to tell the major any- thing about anything." Miss Jenkins pointed to the tallest of the three men in slouch hats. 68 RING FOR NANCY "That was the fourth earl," she said succinct- ly. "Fell at Naseby four years after the pic- ture was painted. The two elder sons, Lord Edward, afterward fifth earl, and Lord Charles fell at the battle of the Boyne. The baby on the -ground. Lord James, afterward sixth earl, was attaindered after the battle in which he took part. The baby's son. Lord William, was restored to the Barony of Higham, but not the earldom, upon his reconciliation with Queen Anne. He was known as 'Wild Higham,' be- cause there was nothing that he would stick at. His portrait is in the long dining-room: said to bear a strong resemblance to her lady- ship." "That's what I can't bear," Mrs. Foster said with deep feeling. "W^herever I go all over the house they're all, all of them, always look- ing at me, and they're all alike. And the wife of the eldest son always has that same pearl necklace on, and they all, you feel, all of them, stick at nothing." "That's so, ma'am," Miss Nancy Jenkins said. "There's not one of them that ever would. Never stick at anything once it came into their heads — the Wild Highams wouldn't." "Now, I don't know how I feel about ^that, Miss Nancy," Mrs. Foster said. "Everything's RING FOR NANCY 69 always so difficult to get at. In the first place, on principle, I oughtn't to approve of people who don't care what they do. But then I can't help saying that there was my brother-in-law, Admiral Brent, the major's father — he stuck at nothing, as you put it, and I always used to think he was the finest man I ever met, though of course I shouldn't like Mr. Foster to hear me talking like that. Not that he's jealous, but he strongly disapproved of everything the admiral did. But he was a fine man, though what with not paying attention to Mr. Foster's advice about his speculations, and what with high living and throwing his money out of the window, and charities he couldn't afford and all the rest of it — he took a race horse full gal- lop down some cliffs in India, where they say only ponies went, for a bet. And he won the bet. "But he died three weeks after my poor sister — Edward's mother — and he didn't leave behind him any money, but eleven hundred and sixty-two pounds' worth of debt which I paid out of my own jointure, for the sake of the name. Though that made Mr. Foster furi- ously angry, for he said, what was the name of a dissolute scoundrel to him. And poor dear Edward — the major — paid the money back out 70 RING FOR NANCY of his salary — I mean his pay, because, of course, you ought not to talk of what an offi- cer gets as a salary. But he did his best, poor dear, having put aside fifty pounds a year, which was paid me regularly by the paymaster of the war office when he was only a captain, and then advancing it to seventy-five pounds a year when he was on active service, when, of course, they get more, as you doubtless know. So that at the present moment he only owes me four hundred thirty-three pounds, thir- teen shillings, fourpence, with interest. And that was what all the trouble was about," Mrs. Foster ended suddenly. "I don't see about what, ma'am," Miss Nancy Jenkins said, "or what the trouble was." "The trouble was," Mrs. Foster said, "that he blacked his uncle's eye. Because, of course, Mr. Foster, who's the kindest and best gentle- man in the world, but a little wanting in tact where his brother-in-law the admiral was con- cerned — Mr. Foster was much more outrageous when Captain Edward started to pay the money back than he was with me for having paid it out — he said that I wasn't to take money from the pauper son of a bankrupt swindler. But I said, no, let the boy do his duty to his father's memory! It was right and proper, and it RING FOR NANCY 71 showed a good spirit. Not, of course, that I was going to take the money, for God knows there isn't a thing I wouldn't give the boy, even down to the gold and the false teeth out of my head, though, of course, that's not a thing I ought to say, but it's perfectly true. And then, there came that awful trouble, and I never saw my Edward again for ten years." Mrs. Foster broke off and remarked innocently, *'Why, you're crying, Miss Nancy!" "You're crying yourself, ma'am," Miss Nancy said sharply. "And well I may be," Mrs. Foster said, "con- sidering the difference there is in the poor boy." "Oh, don't say that, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said. "But it's true," Mrs. Foster maintained. "There was a time when you could say he didn't care what he did, like those people there," and she pointed to the panel. "Now, you can say he doesn't care what he does — just because he doesn't care what becomes of him. There's no spirit left in him." Miss Jenkins said, "Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" with so much real concern that Mrs. Foster was heartened to continue talking about her nephew; for, as a rule, she was too much afraid of bor- ing Miss Jenkins to talk for long about any one 72 RING FOR NANCY subject. And as, indeed, she was afraid of bor- ing everybody, her conversation was usually extremely disjointed. Mrs. Foster was the daughter of a Ports- mouth ship-chandler in very good circum- stances, and it was characteristic of Edward Brent's father — the gentleman who stuck at nothing — that he should just have sailed in and married her sister, who was a handsome flash- ing woman. He was at the time a penniless Irish naval lieutenant. It was not until many years later that Mrs. Foster married Mr. Ar- thur Foster, at that time a .West End baker with five flourishing businesses. It was char- acteristic of Mr. Arthur Foster that he should have inquired carefully how much money the ship-chandler's daughter had to her account be- fore he proposed to her. And with her money, he had been able to turn his business into a limited company, which had twenty-three branches in London and over a hundred in various cities of the United Kingdom and the colonies. So that, until lately, Mr. Arthur Fos- ter had been able to boast himself the largest wholesale baker in the world. Latterly, how- ever, he had come to talk less of being a baker and more of the fact that he was a Common Councilman of the City of London. He even RING FOR NANCY 73 had a hope of an aldermanship — nay, in his dreams he even passed the Chair. The lieutenant — later the admiral — quarreled most ferociously with his wife whenever he was at home. There never, Mr. Foster was accus- tomed to say, were such scenes. Nevertheless, to the long unmarried sister, Captain Brent had always been held up as the very model of manly virtues — as long as he was at sea. His rapid promotion, his quite splendid service in Western Chinese waters, and the extraordinary facility in slinging out oaths, caused him to be, for the unmarried sister, a sort of splendid ter- ror. And this made her husband — the respect- able and wealthy Baptist — detest the admiral even more than he would otherwise have done. Thus, when the admiral died in debt and Mrs. Foster had paid it off, and Captain Ed- ward announced his intention of paying his aunt back, Mr. Arthur Foster really had called the captain "the pauper son of a bankrupt swindler" to the captain's face. Mr. Arthur Foster had particular reason to be cock-a-hoop that day, for he had just made arrangements for the opening of the last fifty of his bakers' shops — in Australasia. He had never been bigger than his boots before, for he had always been a rather timid person. And he certainly never 74 RING FOR NANCY was again, for when the captain knocked him down he got such a shock, that, for the rest of his life, he was humble even to the pay-check girls in the glass cases in his shops. He was simply afraid of getting a harsh word addressed to him by anybody. But Captain Brent had simply disappeared. He had gone right straight out to India, and they had never heard another word from him. Not a single word! His father, the admiral, had really spoiled him in no ordinary manner — had never grudged him a penny, and had never suggested that he was not to live up to ten thousand a year for the rest of his life. And since Captain Brent had been gay, reck- less and always in a good humor, he had lived like a fighting-cock in the best of society. It was characteristic of him, however, that he had not made a good match, but had fallen head over heels in love at last with a Miss Mary Savylle, whom he met during a three weeks' stay at the Duke of Cumberland's at Thorbury. Miss Savylle had been a daredevil young lady, without a penny to her name, though her granduncle. Lord Savylle of Hig- ham, allowed her four hundred pounds a year, and she spent her life traveling with a maid from country-house to country-house. RING FOR NANCY 75 Miss Savylle had appealed to him, because she was simply the only girl he had ever met who didn't care what she did. She didn't care a rap. She contradicted the Bishop of Liverpool at table when he said that her bulldog had not got a soul, and she put on the old duke's favorite old boots over her slippers when she wanted to run over the wet lawn one early morning, because she had thrown her hair-brush out of the window at a terrier that was chasing a cat. The duke had his favorite boots for fourteen years — Welling- tons they were^r^nd he put them on every hunting morning. So that the valet turned green when Miss Savylle rushed from her bed- room in her wrapper and slippers, and tearing the boots from his hands, pulled them suddenly on and streamed out of the front door. The terrier was still worrying the cat, and Miss Savylle got slightly scratched and badly bitten in separating them. There was even blood upon the sacrosanct boots. . But the duke hardly even grumbled, which was a thing un- heard of in Thorbury. That afternoon the captain declared his love to Miss Savylle, and that night he had had a telegram to say that his mother was dead. Three weeks later his father had died of having ye RING FOR NANCY nobody to quarrel with. Captain Edward had found himself worse than penniless, and they had just had to part. For Lord Savylle of Higham threatened to cut off his great-niece's allowance of four hundred a year if she thought of marrying a man who hadn't at least that much above his captain's pay. Captain Edward had indeed gone up to The Pines, Hornsey, definitely intending to ask his aunt to settle four hundred pounds a year on Mary Savylle. His aunt had neither chick nor child; she had always told him to regard himself as her heir, and he would not have had any compunction in asking her. Unfortunately, his aunt had been out, and he had come upon his uncle in a cock-a-hoop mood, and angry because Mrs. Foster had paid the father's debts. Thus, the frightful row had arisen; the captain had felt forced to pay his aunt back; the Common Councilman had a very black eye, which kept him away from business for the best part of a fortnight, and Captain Edward found himself, not four hundred pounds a year richer, but fifty pounds a year poorer. "Oh, Miss Jenkins," Mrs. Foster said, "he went away without a word from me, and al- though I made Mr. Foster write letter after let- ter of apology — which does not say that Mr. RING FOR NANCY 77 Foster had much spirit, though it shows he had a kind heart and a conscience — Captain Edward always sent the letters back unopened. And I've heard that he has had a very bad time, working terribly hard. And now he's come back, and his eyes have failed, and he can't go on active service any more. And he had to change his name — which was a good honorable name, and it seems a shame. But I was quite firm about it, for I said — though Mr. Foster wasn't himself so set upon it — but I said, 'justice is justice,' and if the boy is to inherit his uncle's money, it is only just that he should spend it in the name of the man that made it, and he's going to marry a ter- rible woman." Miss Jenkins asked: *'Don't you like Miss Peabody, ma'am?" "No, I don't," Mrs. Foster exclaimed, with a sudden vehemence. "I don't believe I ever disliked anybody else in my life except a man cook we once had." **I don't believe you ever did dislike anybody, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said. "But I disHke Miss Peabody," Mrs. Foster said. "Before she got the major she was quite different, you would have said that butter wouldn't melt in her mouth. And I did my 78 RING FOR NANCY very best to bring the match off, because I thought she would save the major from the road to ruin. But now she's got him she's per- fectly different. Why, she might be that odious man cook, with her impertinence and her offish ways. I know I'm a stupid woman, but it's no one's business to tell me so all day long. And the eyes she makes at Mr. Foster, and the compliments he pays her on her ability. And to tell the truth, she's a great deal more fitted for Mr. Foster than the major — they're more of an age, anyhow. I tell you what it is. Miss Nancy" — and Mrs. Foster's eyes became almost shining with rage — "I'd give almost any woman four hundred a year — I'd give it to Miss Dela- mare or Mrs. Kerr Howe, or I'd give it to you for the matter of that — if you would get the major away from that woman. You couldn't do it, of course, because the major is so set on his duty. And he considers it is his duty to marry that odious old maid. Why, her teeth aren't even her own. But you couldn't get him away." "I don't know about that," said Miss Jenkins, and she smoothed down her apron. "But upon my word, ma'am, it's rather a wicked sug- gestion." "I don't see it's a wicked suggestion," Mrs. I RING FOR NANCY 79 Foster said. "I've got to think of my poor nephew's happiness. Now, Miss Delamare is a dear Httle thing, and I've often felt I should like to adopt her as a daughter. And Mrs. Kerr Howe isn't so nice, but she'd make the major an intellectual companion. And as for you. Miss Nancy, I like you the best of them all, for, though I've only known you for the three days we've been down here getting ready, I feel that you are quite one of the family — though of course your family is not so good as his. But his father married below him, marrying my sister; and though they did quarrel like cat and dog, it was one of the happiest marriages I have ever known, and they died within three weeks of each other." Miss Jenkins pushed her hands into the pock- ets of her alpaca apron. "You can't be quite in earnest, ma'am." Mrs. Foster answered quaintly: "I don't know that I should be so in earnest if it was possible to happen, but as it is, I'm in deadly earnest. I'd rather see the major married to you than to that odious woman, with her odious lap-dog. Even the lap-dog himself hates her. But you couldn't get him away from her. No- body could. He's a gentleman, and he's passed his word to marry the lady." 80 RING FOR NANCY "But don't you think," Miss Jenkins said, "that the lady might be got to throw the gentle- man over?'* "Never!" Mrs. Foster exclaimed, "never, while there is a sun in the sky, or a railway from Hornsey to the city, which is almost the same thing." And then she added with singular vivacity: "Do you say that's wicked. Miss Nancy? Well, then it's just got to be wicked. I've never done anything wicked in my life, and I'd often wanted to know what it would feel like. And if I'm doing something wicked now, it feels very good — that's what it feels. And I don't won- der at people going on being wicked." They heard at that time distinctly a voice say, "Hallo, aunt!" from the stairs. Mrs. Foster exclaimed, "That's the major!" and positively she turned pale. She ran out in the passage, and coming back with the major following her, she burst out: "I do hope you find everything you want, Edward. Miss Jen- kins, here ..." But Miss Jenkins was not in the room, al- though, as far as Mrs. Foster could remember, she had not passed them on the staircase. The major, who, being an Irishman, knew exactly how to please all women, took a long look round the bedroom. RING FOR NANCY 81 "Well, it's a jolly old room," he said, "and large enough for the officers of a whole regi- ment to sleep in. And that's what I like." And he added cheerfully, "Are there any ghosts about?" ■ Mrs. Foster said: "You know your uncle and I don't hold with ghosts. It's not a mod- ern belief at all." "Well, well!" the major said cheerfully. "I guess you can't hold with them when they come whether you ask them or not." Mrs. Foster's old butler was bringing in the major's things one by one. Mrs. Foster shiv- ered a httle. "Oh, dear Brent!" she said — "I'm going to call you Brent, instead of Edward, so as to keep you in remembrance of the name you changed. But, oh, my dear Brent, don't talk to me about ghosts and things. It makes me nervous in this queer old house. Your uncle doesn't hold with ghosts, but I know he's ner- vous, walking about the dark corridor. It's only Olympia who keeps us all in our places." The major said: "Oh, poor Olympia! How's her dog?" Mrs. Foster stiffened in the very slightest. "I am bound to say," she exclaimed, "that her dog is a very troublesome little animal. It snaps at everybody in the house, even your uncle." S2 RING FOR NANCY "And the funny thing is/* the major said, "that the little beast has taken such a fancy to me. Of course, I bought it for her, but that isn't a reason why it should love me, and not her. When I saw it in the shop in Seven Dials, it seemed to me exactly the sort of animal to be the proper protector for a maiden lady — I mean, of course, before I had any idea of mar- rying Olympia." "So you gave it to her," the aunt asked, "be- fore you were engaged?" "Oh, yes," the major said innocently. "That was what gave her the idea, when she saw that the little beast was always running after me. She said that she knew I couldn't be wholly bad." He seemed to be on the point of sigh- ing, and then he said briskly: "Anyhow, it*s a jolly old place, and you're a jolly old woman, and we're going to have a jolly old time, and if some jolly old ghosts turn up, that will make it all the jollier." Mrs. Foster said: "I don't know about that, my dear; there are said to be ghosts to this family. But their records are most disreputable — women as well as men " The major let out lightly: "Oh, well, they won't disturb me." But Mrs. Foster exclaimed: "My dear, I RING FOR NANCY 83 don't like to hear you talk like that. Disre- putableness is always a painful thing to hear of, even though it may have taken place hun- dreds of years ago." The major exclaimed: "Yes, I alv^ays used to wonder that they let us read the Book of Kings at school. But, anyhow, if there aren't any ghosts, I hope youVe got some sliding doors and secret panels on top." "I don't know," Mrs. Foster said, and she gazed rather apprehensively at the fierce man on the large panel. "I shouldn't wonder if there were dozens. From the way Miss Jen- kins vanished just now, it wouldn't in the least surprise me if there were a secret door into this very room." She looked again at the pic- ture. "But some of the doings of those gen- tries," she said, "were such that no modern person would care to contemplate." "I don't know about that," the major said; and then he asked: "Who have you got stop- ping here, old woman? I know there's Olym- pia; and Flossie Delamare and Mrs. Kerr Howe came down with me in the train. But who are the rest of your rum old menagerie?" "I'd have had Lady Savylle," Mrs. Foster said, "but she's not coming down for a fort- night or so. And then she's going to the 84 RING FOR NANCY Dower House. She wouldn't stop with us, though we told her that it was her own house if we did pay her rent for it." The major exclaimed: "Lady Savylle? Lady Savylle, of Higham? This is her house? My God, why didn't I remember?" "Of course you know," Mrs. Foster said, with a little note of triumph in her voice, "Hig- ham itself passed to the Duke of Rothbury in 1842. Lady Savylle has only inherited this house and about two thousand acres." Mrs. Foster was a little triumphant because she had remembered at least this detail. The old butler had opened up the major's portmanteau and unpacked most of the articles from his kit-bag, and just at that moment he noiselessly withdrew. "My dear," Mrs. Foster said, "I think it's about time that we had a little explanation." "I think it's just about it, old woman," the major said. "Of course, I'm only a stupid old person," Mrs. Foster began. "Of course, of course," the major said affec- tionately. "I never took any prizes at school," she con- tinued, "and I don't suppose I ever shall now. But when you went away like that, and dis- RING FOR NANCY 85 appeared, your uncle said that you had prob- ably gone to lead the idle and dissolute life of an army officer." ''Well, so I had, so I had," the major said amiably. "Three shillings a day, and be your own dustman." "But I knew better," his aunt continued, "and when you didn't answer our letters I just asked and asked. I don't mean to say that I put detectives on you, my dear, but I just asked and asked everywhere. Whenever I heard of people coming home from India, I either got introduced to them somehow or I just simply invited them to dinner, without knowing them, which was easy, as your uncle was a Common Councilman. I asked and asked. If there wasn't any other way of doing it, I just told them that I was anxious for news about you, and nobody was rude to me, even though I didn't know them. W^hy, I even went to the old Duke of Cumberland and asked him what there was between you and that Mary Savylle, who's now the Lady Savylle, of Hig- ham." "There were six thousand miles between us," the major said grimly. "And I got to know ten or a dozen officers, and one of them was an old Colonel Sax of your 86 RING FOR NANCY regiment, and they all said you were working very hard. And Colonel Sax said you weren't a very brilliant officer, but a regular good plodder." *'Well, that was kind of Colonel Sax," the major said. "And then," Mrs. Foster continued, "I came upon Miss Flossie Delamare, and afterward Mrs. Kerr Howe, and then I knew that the sort of women you picked up were quite the nicest sort of women." "The devil you did!" the major exclaimed. "And I knew, or I supposed you were just working up to get Lady Savylle, and I hoped and prayed you would. That I did, when I heard how good you'd been to Miss Delamare and paid her passage back. And I'm sure you had to go to those dreadful Indian money- lenders to do it, and you had to suffer for it afterward. And then you went to Somaliland and I lost track of you, until I saw in the mili- tary information in The Times, that you were ordered home. And then I saw in the 'Army and Navy Gazette about your brilliant examina- tion, and that same day you sent Olympia to me and she told me that you were going blind. And then I knew that you would never have your Mary Savylle, after all the way you'd RING FOR NANCY 87 worked and suffered in that sun and that hor- rible dusty place, and then . . ." The major sank down in a long deep armchair before the fire. "Olympia was exaggerating," he said. "I wasn't going blind. I was only pipped for active service. And I wasn't engaged to Olym- pia. I never even thought of it." "She said," Mrs. Foster said vindictively, "that it was practically certain to come, and she showed me that horrid little dog that you had given her, and, oh, my boy, my boy, I knew you'd given up." "Oh, you mustn't say that about a man," the major said, "who was just going to get en- gaged to a charming lady. That's the begin- ning of life, that isn't chucking up the sponge." "But she isn't your sort, she isn't your kind; she isn't meant to make you happy," Mrs. Fos- ter almost wailed. "And, oh, I was desperately unhappy, and I took a stern determination. Yes, I did, a determination. I just set my teeth and I said: *My boy shall have a good time now, if he never did in his life.' And I said I'd get the best house I knew in England for him to spend his last days of freedom in. And I ordered in the best wines and the best cigars, at twelve guineas a hundred — though it SS RING FOR NANCY was Miss Jenkins who chose them, and she said they were the kind you used to smoke at Thorbury." "But, I say, old woman," the major said, "who is Miss Jenkins? And why did you choose this house of all the houses in the world?" A look of real triumph charmed in Mrs. Fos- ter's eyes. "Ah!" she exclaimed. "I said to myself, 'If Edward is going to live in prison for the rest of his life, I'm going to let him see his old friends for the last time.' And so I asked Miss Delamare and Mrs. Kerr Howe because they seemed so fond of you, and I was perfectly de- termined that I would get Lady Savylle, too. And I thought of that plan of getting her ladyship to let me this house, because I thought it was sure to be full of portraits of her, and remembrances of her. And I was de- termined to ask her ladyship to be good enough to come and stop with us while we were here, because you would be the son of the house." "I say, old woman," the major said, "that was an awfully rum thing to do." "Well, I did it," Mrs. Foster said. "I wrote to her ladyship in exactly those words. I've 1 RING FOR NANCY 89 never seen her herself, but she answered kindly that she couldn't come and stop with us . . ." The major said: "Ah!'' "But that she would leave her own maid to help settle us in, and that she would be coming to stop at the Dower House just at the end of the garden next week." Mrs. Foster paused to take breath. "So there you are," she said; "you will have your old friends and your old wine and your old cigars, and there are six of the best horses that could be got from Whiteleys'. And I forced your uncle to agree to it all, for, I said, if he didn't, I would take my money out of the business. For my father saw to it that all my money was settled on me, under trustees, with the permission to your uncle to use it as capi- tal, and I said I would take all my money out and come and live down here with you. For he and I have lived together twenty-five years, and I don't see why we shouldn't separate now. I don't, for Fve had a great deal to put up with, though I shouldn't like anybody else to hear it. . . . And then your uncle said quite mildly that he didn't see anything against the scheme, and that he'd long thought of making you his heir, because we were childless, and he knew Fd like to adopt you. But that was only m RING FOR NANCY what he said. It was really Olympla's doing. She can twist him round her little finger. They sit and hold confabulations together by the hour, leaving me quite out in the cold. And it was she who got your uncle to make you his heir." "Well, you can hardly blame her for that, old woman," the major said mildly. "She didn't do it for you," Mrs. Foster ex- claimed, "she did it to get the money for her- self. But I said that if you were going to have all that money, you must change your name to Foster, for it only seemed just." There was quite a long pause, and then the major said: "Well, old woman, you don't often break out, but when you do ruzzle round, you certainly do. \ It's an extraordinary rum collection you've got j together." "Oh, Teddy, dear," Mrs. Foster exclaimed on a note of anguish, "I do hope there's nothing wrong. I do hope there's nothing you don't like." "Oh, there's nothing wrong," the major said. "It's only just queer." He got up from his chair and put both his hands heavily and affec- tionately on his aunt's shoulders. "You know, old woman, you do get the most extraordinary fc RING FOR NANCY 91 ideas into that head of yours. It's all most in- genious jumble. But if you'd got a large barrel of gunpowder and knocked its head off and put half a dozen barrels all round it, and then stuck a lighted candle in the naked powder — well, you couldn't have more ingeniously in- cited a little plot for a jolly big explosion. Ex- cept, of course, that I am a reformed char- acter." *'Oh, Teddy," Mrs. Foster said plaintively, "I do hope you don't mean to set the house on fire by smoking in your bedroom and I do hope much more that you aren't going to be a re- formed character until you marry Olympia. Your uncle has forced me to be the president of a society for the suppression of sin, but I do hope and pray that you enjoy yourself here after all the trouble I've taken to make things nice for you." "Oh, it's all right, old woman," the major said. "I'm going to have the time of my life; but I guess one can enjoy one's self without sinning." Mrs. Foster looked very dubious. "I don't know about that," she said, and the major shook her with his laughter because he still had his hands on her shoulders. You do have the rummiest old, funniest old 92 RING FOR NANCY ideas Tve ever heard of," he said. "And youVe the most courageous old plotter I ever met. ,You don't fear and you do what you want, and you don't care about the consequences!" **I don't know that I do — much," Mrs. Foster said. "I'm beginning to think that I don't." The major said: "Oh, come, old woman!" "I don't, and I don't, and I don't," Mrs. Fos- ter exclaimed. "I'm going to do what I think is right and proper, and — and hang the conse- quences. That's what you'd say, isn't it?" The major recoiled a full step from his rela- tive and stood transfixed, holding out his arms before him. "In spite of your uncle and in spite of your Olympia, who is a Wesleyan Episcopal," Mrs. Foster said slowly, with an air of fiendish deter- mination, "while we are in this house we — are — all going to church on Sundays." The major exclaimed: "By gum!" "We shall go there," Mrs. Foster said, "out of deference to Lady Savylle and to set the tenants a good example." "But if you're . . ." the major said slowly, "if you're what you are in fact, surely it isn't a good example to go to church." "I don't care," Mrs. Foster said. "It's a sign to them that you are master of this house. RING FOR NANCY 93 You would not like the other thing; it is not what youVe been used to. Besides, it would be against true hospitality to use Lady Savylle's house in order to spread a form of belief that her ladyship would not approve of." **0h, I don't believe Mary would care a button." "Well, that's enough about that," Mrs. Fos- ter said. And then to change the subject she asked, after a long pause: "My dear, did you know Lady Savylle very well?" "Well . . ." the major said. "Oh, yes, very well." And his manner seemed to shut in as if he had snapped his lips together. "But tell me just one thing," Mrs. Foster pleaded. "You were engaged to her. . . ." "Yes, for three days," the major said in a short tone. "I'd only known her a fortnight. There, there, that's enough." "If you'd only told me ! If you'd only told me!" Mrs. Foster almost wailed. "If you'd only told your uncle ! He would have made it all right. He would have seen that you were in earnest . . ." "Oh, chuck it, old woman!" the major said. "I tell you, I won't talk about it. It would have been a pretty way to show that I was in 94 RING FOR NANCY earnest, just to marry a girl who might be coming into a title. If that's earnestness, damn it, I say." "But it might have meant a seat for the County," Mrs. Foster pleaded. "That was how your uncle looked at it, after the duke had very kindly told me he thought you were en- gaged to the young lady, . but he couldn't be sure." The major said: "There, there, that will do." "You know how strong a Nonconformist Unionist your uncle is," Mrs. Foster said. "He would have made any sacrifices for the party or to get you into it." "Oh, I know what my uncle is," the major said; "the blessed Unionist party is a thing no decent man would stand for, because of people like him and his sacrifices. You're a good sort, but he's a confounded prig, and a tuft-hunter — and unsuccessful at that. He never gets a chance to bow down to his boots to an honor- able's third son, except at some charity func- tion. He wanted me to marry money or a title to show I was an orderly member of society. I wouldn't do it then. I'm doing it now, be- cause my spirit is broken; I'm used up. Done. I go out. I'm marrying Olympia for her money — that's the dirty truth, and I'm not RING FOR NANCY 95 proud of it. You know he would throw me over to-morrow if she threw me over. So, I shall behave so that she will not throw me over — and, of course, I'll do my best to give her a good time. That's my duty, and I'll do it." In moments of agitation the major spoke like one of his sergeants. He finished with, "There, there, there!" And then he began again agi- tatedly: "I tell you, I'm tired! Used up! I must have comfort, quiet! I can't stodge away any more. God knows I've done enough to get it — and it hasn't all been any good. Worse than useless! Worse! If I hadn't sweated so hard, I should be in a better position! I'd have had better eyes — that would mean more money ! That's what it comes to! I slogged like that for Mary — upon my word, just for Mary! We could have got along on a major's pay, out there. Just got along! And then the blasted girl goes and gets rotten titles and moldy houses to her back on the day the bottom drops out of me. The very black, beastly, blighted day . . ." In her turn Mrs. Foster said: "There, there, there !" "That very same hateful day," he raved on. And then he fixed his aunt with a glaring gaze. "Look here," he said, "don't think that I'm 96 RING FOR NANCY not young enough to enjoy a good time — and to deserve it. God knows I can laugh like an- other, and lark above most. Young! I'm the youngest major in the British army, for the rotten twopence halfpenny that it's worth! And consider the time that IVe had. The long evenings with nothing to do; and the beastly dust going pink in the sunsets, and the nigger johnnies sitting eating dough under the wilted palm-trees — and everything stinking of paraffin, and some sort of beastly animal yap, yap, yap- ping away from the filthy, blistering, low hills! Why, I've got the feel of it in my bones, and not all the iced wine of Champagne, and not all the kisses that were ever kissed by a hun- dred women, could wash it out again. Wine! Kisses! I've drunk lukewarm pale ale, and I could have screamed, mad ghut, and run amuck in the native quarters. . . ." He stopped and looked at his aunt. "There, there, old woman," he said, "that's how it feels. But don't you worry. I'll be shocking Olympia, so that it tickles her and makes her good all over to- morrow! What you feel in your bones, don't show in your face." His aunt reflected a moment. "Yes, yes, that's what Olympia likes!" she said. "That's the fascination. You can shock RING FOR NANCY 97 her, and she thinks that you are bold and dash- ing and dangerous — and that she's got you, and can trust you." "Well, she has," the major said. "And, please God, she can." Again Mrs. Foster remained reflective for a long minute. And then she asked slowly: "Then, it is true that a man can remain faith- ful to a woman for a long time — for ten years "Eight years, nine months, and a week," the major said. "And only saw her once for four- teen days. Yes, it's true enough. But what's there wonderful in that?" "It's what every woman really wants to know," Mrs. Foster said, "and she hasn't ever really any chance of knowing." "Oh, well," the major said rather tiredly, "it's so. It's certainly so, but looking at the matter from the inside, as I've got to do, I can't see that it's anything particularly wonderful or romantic, or even particularly meritorious. It's something just funny, rather than anything else." "I can't see how it's funny," Mrs. Foster said; "you might say that it was sad, or sorrowful, or something." "Then that would just make it grotesque," 98 RING FOR NANCY the major said. "And I dare say it is grotesque — a mixture of the sorrowful and the funny. See here, I don't mean to say that I spent my whole time sighing about Mary Savylle, or that I hung for hours over her photograph. I didn't! I haven't got a photograph; I lost it be- fore I got as far as Aden, and I cut a photo- graph of somebody like her out of an illustrated paper, and it used to stand on my writing-table in quarters, until I got sick of it and chucked it into the Ganges. No, I didn't sigh; perhaps I didn't sigh once in ten years. I'm not the sighing sort, anyhow. But it was like ... it was like. . . ." The major paused and cast about in his mind for an illustration. "It was like being always slightly thirsty, or having a very slight touch of indigestion all the time." "Oh, my dear," Mrs. Foster expostulated. "Well, that is what it really was mostly like," the major said, "but I'll withdraw it if it shocks you. It was something that spoilt everything; that took the edge off everything. I don't mean to say that I never looked at an- other woman. There wasn't even anything in honor to bind me not to. No engagement. It was just broken off. She never even wrote to me, because her confounded old great-uncle said that if she did he would cut off her allow- RING FOR NANCY 99 ance, which was all she had to live on, and of course, she wasn't the sort to do it in secret. I shouldn't have wanted it. She'd just gone right out of my existence. I never heard from her, I never heard of her. Just gone ! Dropped down an infernal deep well. "And that's what I mean by saying that it took the edge off things. Of course, you un- derstand that the only thing that is really in- teresting to a young man is young women. That is a heart talk, so you needn't be shocked. And there wasn't any woman that came along that interested me in the least. Not one that made by pulse beat in the least quicker. Of course I talked to 'em; and of course I larked with them. I'm not Irish, I suppose, for noth- ing. But that was just it — they didn't interest me. I had to cover up yawns sometimes, in the midst of the larkiest of larks. That sort of thing." "That's what I call love," Mrs. Foster said. "Oh, I don't know," the major answered; "of course, if you're satisfied, you're satisfied. But I don't want to pose as a sentimental char- acter. If any other woman had come along that did interest me " "But no one could have," Mrs. Foster said. "There wouldn't be one in the world." 100 RING FOR NANCY "Oh, that's probably sentimental gap," the major retorted; "you are a silly old, senti- mental old woman. It's absurd that in the millions and millions there are, there shouldn't have been one that couldn't make me forget a tomboy that I had only seen for three weeks in my whole life, and been engaged to for three days. Supposing that it was the look in the eye that did it, and the high instep, and the swing- ing walk of the creature that she was — do you mean to tell me — supposing that that was what I was looking for — that I shouldn't have found the same look and the same voice, and the same way the black hair of her curled, in a thousand others? The doctrine of chances forbids it. If there's a chance of a million to one against it, aren't there about five hundred million women in the world?" "Then you never looked for one," Mrs. Fos- ter said. "Oh, you rotten, sentimental old ass," the major addressed his aunt. "I dare say you've got at the truth of it. I never did look for one. But don't you go running away with the idea that that was love. It wasn't. It was a sort of selfishness. It was like this. I felt' that my job in life was to make myself the sort of career that would lit me to pick up with RING FOR NANCY 101 Mary again. Don't you understand? I plod- ded and stodged for just that, and nothing else. That was why when on the same day the bot- tom fell out of me, and Mary jumped up in the social scale as if she'd been a balloon that you'd let go the ropes of, I just proposed right away to Olympia. It wasn't love; it wasn't morals or faith; it was just want of interest and selfishness." "Now, you can say what you like, my dear Edward," Mrs. Foster said, "Fm not a very clever woman, but I can tell a great A from a bull's foot. But that's the sort of love that any sensible woman would want to get hold of. It isn't your ramping, tearing, raging, obstrep- erous sort of young man that any woman in her senses would want, as they say in the poem that I never can remember the words of, but it's something about the burden of my song, though what that means I haven't the least idea of. But you'll want to be getting to bed, and not stopping talking to an old woman like me, who goes on and on talking about one and the same thing. But there's one thing I would like to tell you, because it was my very own idea. There'll be lots of people that you know coming down in a day or two — all the people that I told you I'd picked up because they I 102 RING FOR NANCY knew you, and your uncle's cook is famous throughout the city. But what I want to tell you is, sometimes, as I dare say you've heard, rather unpleasant things happen in these large country houses." "Oh, I've heard it all right," the major said. "Well," Mrs. Foster exclaimed triumphantly, "with the help of Miss Jenkins, who knows the house from roof to cellar, I've arranged that all the men — the gentlemen — sleep in one wing of the house, and all the ladies in the other." Again the major ejaculated: "My God!" "Of course it's a little confusing — the house is," his aunt continued. "At any rate, there are the dining-room and the breakfast-room, and a whole lot of halls and oflfices in between the two wings. That is to say, they are not rightly two wings. If I understand the ar- rangement, they are really back to back. But at any rate the sexes are separated. Don't - you think it's splendid?" i "Oh, splendid! splendid!" the major said; "and you are the most dangerous old inflam- matory I've ever come across." His aunt smiled rather complacently. "My dear," she said, "when a woman comes to my age there's a certain change comes over | her. God knows I've been a good wife to your RING FOR NANCY 103 uncle. But when a man's sixty he looks forward to retiring — so does a woman, and I'm over sixty. I've looked after your uncle's house; I've lived up to the standard of your uncle's requirements, whether in morals or what they call customs — or is it conventions? And pre- cious foolish many of his morals and customs — or if it's conventions, then conventions — have seemed to me, often and often. But now the time has come when I mean to do what pleases me, and what seems right to me. I don't mean to say that I should have done it if you hadn't introduced that Olympia into this house — but if your uncle can be influenced by one woman, he's got to do what another wants — and that one's me — or else he's got to do without her." The major said: *'0h, dear, I do hope Olympia hasn't . . ." "Oh, I don't mean anything of that sort," Mrs. Foster answered. "Your uncle always must have some one to philander with in his silly complimenting manner, which reminds me of an old sheep trying to make love to a chicken. A.nd when it was a matter of Flossie Delamare, I didn't mind. For she's a dear, good, bright little thing, and deserves all she gets, and it's a great comfort to me to know her, for she does bring a little brightness into 104 RING FOR NANCY my life. And I don't mind if your uncle builds her a dozen theaters as long as he can afford it. And I wish it was her you were marrying, for I've often thought of adopting her. "And I don't really object to Mrs. Kerr Howe, though she has rather pushed her way into the house, and some of her opinions are . . . well, I haven't got any words for them. Still, I don't object to her, because she does pay me the attention of reading her books to me, and very pretty, if not quite proper, some of them are. But, when it comes to Olympia — why, she treats me all the time as if she were a shop-walker trying to tell me that I don't know tulle from nun's veiling — which is the most insulting thing that can happen to one. But there, there, you've had enough of me. Good night." "I say, wait a minute," the major said. "Where does that beastly dog of poor Olympia's sleep?" Mrs. Foster answered: "On the door-mat outside her door. She says that she can not sleep if the dog isn't somewhere near, and at the same time, it's unhealthy to have an ani- mal sleeping in your bedroom." "Oh, I know, I know," the major groaned. "It was like that at Gordon Square. And in RING FOR NANCY 105 the middle of the night the horrid little animal will come whining and scratching at my door, and then poor dear Olympia will discover that her dog isn't outside her door. And she'll come to find the dog, and I shall have to get up and invent loving speeches through the door at four in the morning." "Oh, I don't think that either the dog or Olympia could find their way through all these dark, old, winding corridors, that I'm almost afraid to go along myself," Mrs. Foster said, and she shivered a little. "That only shows," the major answered, "that you don't know either of them. They'll come all right, for all you've separated the sexes so neatly." Mrs. Foster caught at that moment the eye of the fierce dark man in the panel, and she dis- appeared quickly into the terrors of the corri- dors, calling over her shoulder: "Well, you've had enough of me/* IV ^TpHE major shut his door, and then remained, -*■ pottering round his room, making mut- tering exclamations at what he saw — the fire- dogs, the great fireplace, the immense bed, the walls hung with dark tapestry. Then he came back to the fireplace, and standing before it he quoted aloud: "So that there, in a manner of speaking, we all are." He sauntered over to the large mahogany- washing-stand, and exclaimed over that: "Hullo, no hot water! Poor aunt always did have the worst servants in Christendom." Then he pulled a long strip of embroidery that hung at the side of the fire and sat down to await the servant. He did not even take off his coat, for he supposed the servant would be a woman, and he disliked any woman to see him in his shirt. It seemed to be disrespectful to them. He sat in his armchair with his back to the panel, just thinking and thinking. And sud- denly he said: "Well, there aren't going to be any more 106 RING FOR NANCY 107 cakes and ale — that's flat." He heard a slight knock from somewhere and sat still looking at the door. And then quite distinctly, but very softly, he heard from behind his back some- thing that sounded like his name: "Teddy Brent." He really jumped quite out of his chair, and seeing just behind his chair the figure of a maid in cap and apron, he exclaimed almost violently : "Hullo, who the devil are you? What do you mean by springing up like that?'* "I came in through the little door behind the hangings," the servant said. "That is the door her ladyship likes us to use, because her ladyship dislikes seeing us about the corri- dors, sir." She spoke very stiffly and correctly, with her eyes on the floor, and she added: "What did you please to want, sir?" "Oh, hang it all," the major said, "you don't come into a man's room and startle him out of his seven senses by calling him Teddy Brent, and then ask him what he pleases to want." "I'm very sorry, sir," the maid said. "It slipped out, sir, along of my being her lady- ship's own maid and having served her so long, sir." She spoke very low, distinctly and very levelly, like the most perfect of servants, and 108 RING FOR NANCY the major exclaimed — for he felt confused and stupid: "Not so many sirs. I know I am your social superior without being reminded of it every three words." The maid suddenly laughed, and then she said quickly: "I beg your pardon, sir, it slipped out, sir. It's because I'm so glad for her ladyship, sir, that you've come back, sir. It's made me a little hysterical. I can't help it, sir, remem- bering so well the old days at Holbury, sir, nine years ago and more. What did you please to want, sir?" The major stood looking at her with a puz- zled expression. His slight doze in the arm- chair had muddled him. Suddenly he moved up close to her and said: "What I want, desperately, is to kiss you, and that's the truth." She moved precisely two steps back. "That couldn't have been what you wanted when you rang, sir." The major sank down once again into his chair. "It's extraordinary," he said, "but she couldn't have had the cheek to try It on. No one could." And then he added regretfully: "Oh, RING FOR NANCY 109 well, I am a reformed character, when it's all said and done." Her ladyship's own maid interjected: "Yes, sir," interrogatively. And the major said irritably: "Oh, drop those sirs. They get on my nerves. It's enough to make one believe you're not a ser- vant at all. I never knew one to use so many." "Well, you're the odd gentleman," Miss Jen- kins said calmly. "If you would please to tell me what you want. . . . I'm sure her lady- ship would give me a character as long as her life, pretty nearly, sir." "I don't believe you're a day older than Lady Savylle," the major said. "You can't have been her nurse, so don't try to make me believe it. .What's your name?" Miss Jenkins, who had been standing with her hands at her sides, clasped them behind her. "I was born on the same day as her lady- ship," she said, "and I'm sure I've tried to be a faithful servant to her all my life. My name is Nancy Jenkins, called after the Lady Nancy Savylle that was her ladyship's grandmother." The major remained glaring moodily in front of him. "Oh, I see, I see," he said at last; "a sort of 110 RING FOR NANCY foster-sister — that's what they call it, isn't it?" Miss Jenkins, with her eyes upon the ground, said: "As you're pleased to say so." The major immediately became filled with compunction. "Oh, I really beg your pardon," he said, "I'm afraid I've been too inquisitive. A foster-sister, of course !" Miss Jenkins said calmly: "Oh, there's no occasion at all, sir. It isn't a painful question at all as far as I know." "Then that's all right, that's all right," Major Foster said cheerfully. "I think I under- stand." He recovered, indeed, all his usual calmness of demeanor. He remained, however, silent for a moment, and Miss Jenkins re- marked : "Her ladyship has left me in the house here to see that the tenants don't break the heir- looms." The major said: "Yes, yes, very proper, very proper, I'm sure. So you were at Holbury. And you recognize me! I never noticed you." "One doesn't notice one's social inferiors very much, sir," Miss Jenkins said, "but I should have recognized you, sir, anywhere. That's what startled me a little when I came into the room." "What I want, desperately, is to kiss you" RING FOR NANCY 111 The major said: ''Yes, yes; and what about her ladyship? Has she changed much?" "You would better know than I, sir," Miss Jenkins said. "I'm too much with her to be able to notice changes, but I shouldn't say her ladyship has changed much." The major said: "Well, when you see her, tell her that I haven't changed at all. Only tell her that I had the rottenest time any chap ever had, and tell her that I'm having a rotten time now, and that I don't expect to get any better." He was looking full at the girl's face. Her lips were very red, and he was almost certain that they never moved; nevertheless, he was almost certain that she said, "Poor fellow!'* And he exclaimed sharply: "What's that?" Miss Jenkins said: "I didn't say anything, sir." And he added: "I thought you said, 'poor fellow.' " Miss Jenkins said : "I shouldn't be so familiar, sir. From being so much with her ladyship I'm perhaps more familiar than I should be, but I shouldn't be so familiar as that, sir." "Oh," the major said, "I am a poor fellow, so I shouldn't mind it much. A reformed char- acter, that's what I am." 112 RING FOR NANCY "Oh, I hope not," Miss Jenkins said. "It would disappoint her ladyship. And you did try to kiss me." "Oh, what's that?" the major said despond- ently. "It's almost a duty to kiss a servant. It's not like trying to kiss your equal, but it's not likely to be found out. Don't you see, the whole thing about being a reformed character consists in doing things that aren't likely to be found out." Miss Jenkins said: "Oh, I didn't know, sir. At any rate, no gentleman has tried to kiss me as a matter of duty. Not since Holbury, sir." "Do you and her ladyship live in an asylum for the blind?" he asked; and she answered: "Thank you, sir, no, sir, I live here with her ladyship. We don't see many gentlemen at all, sir." "Oh, I say," Major Foster exclaimed with real concern, "I hope Mary isn't a reformed character. I hope she's had a good time. It would be too rotten if we both of us muffed our lives." "Oh, she lives as she pleases," Miss Jenkins said, "but it doesn't include men who want to kiss me." The major looked at her seriously. "I don't RING FOR NANCY 113 like to hear that," he said. ''She ought to marry." "Ah, well, she's like me," Miss Jenkins com- mented. "She doesn't take stock in men." The major stood up in front of the fire. **Ah, well," he said, with a slight sigh, "that's the different way it takes. She hasn't run after men — for my sake; and I've run after women — for her sake — if you understand me." "Yes, yes, I think I understand," Miss Jen- kins said. "You meant to get her out of your head." Major Foster said quickly: "Oh, it wasn't only that. It was hardly that at all. I wanted to get myself out of her head. I thought if I came a holy mucker she would come to hear of it, and that would sicken her of me and so she'd forget." He was not looking at her at that moment, and yet he was perfectly certain that she said, "Poor fellow," when he accused her of it. "Why, so I did, sir," she said. "Don't you see that if you'd come a hundred and fifty muckers her ladyship would have understood it was her fault, and only cared for you all the more. Besides, you didn't come any mucker." "Oh, that's only what they call the grace of God," the major said. 114 RING FOR NANCY Miss Jenkins looked at the floor. "If you'd kindly tell me what you pleased to want." The major said explosively: "Oh, shut up ! I won't tell you what I want. I want to kiss you, I want to hear about Mary, I want . . ." "But you're a reformed character, sir," Miss Jenkins reminded him. "You're engaged to Miss Peabody." "Oh, poor Olympia!" the major said. "Look here, does Mary talk about me much?" Miss Jenkins said briefly: "Her ladyship never mentioned your name." "Then how do you know " the major was beginning. | "Oh, I know, if it isn't presumptuous of me to say so, when her ladyship is thinking of you." "Look here," the major said suddenly, "I suppose I'm an awful nuisance to you. But if you could find any use for a fiver . . ." Miss Jenkins put her hands behind her back. She smiled suddenly with a sort of gay malice. "Her ladyship doesn't allow me to take tips. But if you give me that half threepenny bit, sir . . ." The major said "What?" in a really appalled voice. "Give you? . . . What's that?" RING FOR NANCY 115 Miss Jenkins looked him hardly in the eyes. **If you'll give it to me you may kiss me," she said. "I am damned if I will," he said. "I don't know how you come to know about that. I suppose Lady Savylle told you. But I'm par- ticularly damned if I do anything of the sort." **I don't believe you've got it," Miss Jenkins said. "I believe you've given it to Miss Pea- body or Miss Delamare or Mrs. Kerr Howe." The major fumbled irritably inside his collar. "You're a sort of impertinent blackmailer," he said. "But I suppose if you don't see it you'll tell her ladyship that I've given it away." "I should certainly be inclined to do so, sir," Miss Jenkins said calmly. With a sawing sound a little gold chain came up above the major's collar, and upon the chain, a very small gold locket into which there fitted visibly a threepenny bit. "There!" he exclaimed. Miss Jenkins leaned forward to look at it. "You may kiss me now, if you like," she really murmured. But the major exclaimed: "No, certainly not, certainly not." "Well, you may kiss me and think it's her," Miss Jenkins said. "That would be nonsense," the major an- 116 RING FOR NANCY swered. "I don't think I like you at all. I think you've a bad character, even for a serv- ant." "Then I'd better go," Miss Jenkins said. "Good night, sir," and she was turning; back toward the little door. "But," the major exclaimed, "here, hang it all, wait a minute, I want you to talk about her ladyship." I "There is nothing more to tell," Miss Jenkins said. "Besides, it isn't right. You're engaged to Miss Peabody." "You've only just remembered that" the major exclaimed. I "I wish I hadn't got it to forget," Miss Jen- kins retorted. "But it's too late. I must go." "Oh, look here," the major said, "stop and talk. I feel lonely. I'm not a bit sleepy. I am afraid of the ghosts." Miss Jenkins said: "Oh, get along, sir." "Now don't talk like a servant," the major said. "You've been talking like a lady. You know all about this old place?" | Miss Jenkins answered: "I know just about as much as Lady Savylle does. Of course, she's only owned it about six months. But she's just soaked herself in it until you might say it was part of herself." RING FOR NANCY 117 ^"Well, then, look here," the major asked, iren't there ghosts here? And secret doors? nd sHding panels?" "There's the little door I came in by," Miss } Jenkins said. "That used to be a secret door i for priests to escape by, but it leads to the I servants' quarters; and then there's the panel between this room and the next. That's quite secret. You see, if anybody wanted to escape and the pursuers were in this wing, he would just slip through the panel and shut it again, and out of another secret door that's in Miss Delamare's room, and they'd have to run the whole length of a house before they could catch him. It's one of the most ingenious and complete systems of secret paneling that there is in the kingdom, and her ladyship has had it completely repaired so that it runs on castors." The major said: "A panel. In this room? Where is it?" "Well, of course, it's the picture, sir," Miss Jenkins said. "It stands to reason that a bed- room is an out-of-the-way place to put a picture by Van der Burg in. Especially when it is a very valuable picture of the second earl and his family — unless there's special reason for its being there." "Oh, it's that?" the major asked. 118 RING FOR NANCY Miss Jenkins walked deliberately up to the picture, and scrutinizing the large carved frame, she put her finger on the corner of a wooden leaf. "If you press this place, just beside the elec- tric light switch," she said, "the panel will slide back into the wall and let you right into the next room." "That would be rather a lark," the major said. "Where did you say it exactly was?" i Miss Jenkins had turned back into the room and was going toward the little door. She looked back over her shoulder and said: "It would let you into Miss Flossie Dela- mare's room, sir." The major sank back into his armchair again. "Oh, heavens!" he exclaimed; "then don't show me. Don't tell me. I don't want to know anything about knobs and things. Go away. Go away quickly. It's most improper your being here, and I wouldn't mind betting half a crown that Olympia will be here in a minute or two." "Well, I'm glad you've thought of that at last, sir," Miss Jenkins said. "I don't mind saying," the major confessed, "that Miss Olympia is particularly jealous of RING FOR NANCY 119 attractive servants. We're only going to have men when v^e are married." Miss Jenkins disappeared under the dark hangings, and again the major was perfectly certain that she said: "Oh, poor fellow!" /^NCE again the major was left to potter ^^ about his room and to think. And once more he exclaimed to himself that there, in a manner of speaking, they all were, only, that the deuce of the matter was that he couldn't in the least tell in any manner of speak- ing where in the world it was that they could be said to be, and he certainly hadn't got any hot water, and he knew that he would go with- out it, for he was pretty certain that that young lady wouldn't answer his bell again. He was, therefore, just beginning to take off his coat when, with a little click, the electric lights went out, and he grumbled vigorously that it was only in a house tenanted by his aunt that you could be certain of having no water, and equally certain of having no light. The fire had rather died down, so that it was pretty darkish as he strolled across the room in a brown study and stretched his hand toward the switch. He couldn't for the life of him make up his mind whether Miss Jenkins was the second woman in the four hundred 120 RING FOR NANCY 121 million, or whether she wasn't as he put it, something altogether too preposterously impos- sible — that she could possibly be. It had af- fected him like something impossible, really as if he had seen a ghost. He was looking at Miss Flossie Delamare. There wasn't the least doubt that he was look- ing at Flossie. She was in a peignoir that was a foam of pink. She was standing with her back to a dressing-table that was covered with shining things. She was just saying good night to somebody who had just gone out of the room, and she looked exactly like a rather small Olivia out of the Vicar of Wakefield. The walls were all covered with a pink-flowered chintz, the hangings of the four-post bed were all of pink-flowered chintz, and so were the curtains and the valances over the long windows. It was an extraordinary effect, as if it had been sunlight; it was as if he had stepped right straight out of the gloom of the seventeenth century bang into the eighteenth. The panel had just gone; noiselessly upon its castors it had disappeared, and Major Edward Brent Fos- ter found himself explaining to himself that now he could understand why Mary Savylle treasured her house enough to leave her own maid behind her when it contained such perfect I 122 RING FOR NANCY treasures of old rooms, for over the high white mantelpiece there was an undoubted Gainsbor- ough — a gentleman in a bright red coat point- ing his finger to distant cannon fire. But he hadn't the least hesitation about ad- vancing into the room and exclaiming: "Here, I say, for goodness' sake, Flossie, lend me one of your candles and let me find that blessed knob again.'' Miss Delamare's eyes became rather wide, and she exclaimed: "Teddy Brent, by all that's wonderful!" "Oh !" the major exclaimed. "Why don't you say, 'Teddy Brent, by all that's damnable?' You've got to remember that my respectable name is Foster now, and that I am a reformed character." "Well, I didn't ask you to come into my bed- room, Teddy," Miss Delamare said, with a slightly injured air. "I don't object to your being here. But I didn't ask' you. Your aunt's just gone, I've been sitting talking to her, or goodness knows what dreadful things you mightn't have seen." "Well, lend me a candle," the major said. "But what's it all about?" Miss Delamare asked. "You don't surely come into a lady's room at a quarter past twelve and ask her for a candle?" RING FOR NANCY 123 "I do," the major exclaimed. "Don't you understand there's a sliding panel between these rooms? And I touched the knob by accident, and I can't get it shut." And the major dis- appeared once more and began to fumble with the frame of the picture. Miss Delamare came delicately across the room bearing one of her candles, and looked in upon the major. She said maliciously: "I say, Teddy, aren't you going to admire my new dressing-gown? Aren't you going to kiss me, or anything? Don't you remember Simla and the pucka drives?" The major recoiled from the frame, and his shadow w^ent dancing all over the walls and the ceiling of his room. "Don't you come into this room!" he said. "Don't you dare to!" "Teddy'' Miss Delamare said, "what's the matter with you?" The matter with me," the major said grimly, is that I'm engaged to marry Miss Olympia Pea- |ody." 'Oh, Teddy," she said woefully, "I knew m were going to marry some one pretty awful -but that old mummy! Oh, Teddy, that's flaying it too low down." The major said: "Well, I'm not proud of it. But I've got to get this panel shut." 124 RING FOR NANCY ".Well, it doesn't look as if you could, Teddy," Miss Delamare said amiably. "You'd better let me come in and try. Men aren't a bit of good at that sort of thing." And she came into his room and set the candle down on his dress- ing-table. The major moved away from the frame as if he were afraid of her. "I don't believe you can do anything," he said gloomily. "And what will poor Olympia say if she hears it's found open in the morn- ing?" "Oh, I guess she'll have some pretty sweet things to say," Miss Delamare said, with her back to him and slightly abstractedly, because she was feeling along the heavily carved frame for the knob. The frame was perhaps a foot and a half broad, of carved wood representing an inextricable tangle of bunches of grapes, roses and thistles. "The servant said," the major continued, "that it was just beside the Hght switch." The picture was there in its place. Noise- lessly, and as if in a procession they had been drawn along on a car, the three fierce men, the three bare-shouldered, mild, blond women and the children, occupied their places and looked | dim in the light of Miss Delamare's candle. RING FOR NANCY 125 "Well, it isn't," Miss Delamare said; "it's a full foot above the switch." { The major, who had sprung back at the ] ghostly arrival of the panel, now sprang for- ward. "Hang on to it!" he exclaimed. "For good- ness' sake hang on to it, or we shall be caught like rats in a trap. That thing is the very- devil!" "All right, I'm hanging on," Miss Delamare said, appearing as if she were nailed to the wall by one white raised hand. "But it really isn't necessary. It's this knobby thistle thing that does the trick." "Then for goodness' sake," the major re- peated, "do the trick and get back to your room and shut it after you, and let's have a night's rest." "All right, Teddy," Miss Delamare repeated in her turn; "but you might give me a minute or two, I do think." "Not a minute, not a second," the major answered hotly. "It's too dangerous. .We can talk to-morrow." "No, we can't, Teddy," she answered. "Your Olympia — you should just have seen her face when your aunt introduced me to her as your very oldest, dearest, darlingest friend — your 126 RING FOR NANCY Olympia will jolly well see to that. No more talks for us." "But it would give my aunt her death if you were found here," the major pleaded. "I don't believe it would," she said. "Your aunt's too sensible for that. But I'll go, if it's for her sake. I'm hanged if I would if you'd mentioned the other woman again!" She moved her wrist on the frame. "By Jove, Teddy," she said, "I'm wiggling the button thing up and down for all I am worth, and the old panel thing doesn't move a step." The major stepped agitatedly toward her, and she continued: "It isn't a thing you press; you click it up and down like a switch. Here, you have a try." With a face full of a sort oi awe the major began clicking the thistle-like knob, interjecting from time to time: "Oh, hell!" And with the awe intensified he looked around upon Miss Delamare. "It — won't — move," he exclaimed slowly. Miss Delamare seated herself comfortably in his armchair and kicked off her shoes. She extended her stockings to the fire. "Oh, go on wiggling, I can wait," she said. The major set his face to the wall, first on RING FOR NANCY 127 one side of the knob and then on the other. He pulled out his penknife and tried to remove what he thought might be some dirt from the workings of the thistle shank. "I believe the clockwork's run down," Miss Delamare said. "It must work by a spring, or it couldn't be so quiet. Don't you be too vio- lent or you'll break the whole blessed thing, and then we shall be in the cart." The major tried pressing and tried pulling. He drew out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead, and then he ran his nails along the edge of the picture itself. "You can kiss me if you like, Teddy," Miss Delamare's voice came to him mockingly. "Then it would be quite like old times." The major repeated: "Oh, hell!" "No, I didn't say anything so nasty," Miss Delamare continued to mock him. "I said you could kiss me. Don't you remember Simla?" The major was fumbling in his kit-bag for a little oil-can he always carried with him. "No, I don't," he said. "I don't want to. I'm not going to." He paused to recover his breath. "Look here. There's no cause to open that panel again. You just get out of my room by the usual way." And at a very slight shake of Miss Delamare's head he went on: "I'll give 128 RING FOR NANCY you a pearl necklace if you'll go quietly — one I bought for poor Olympia.'* Again Miss Delamare shook her head. "I'd like to do that Yankee in the eye," she ejaculated. "But if you think, Major Edward Brent Foster, late of His Majesty's One Hun- dred and Twenty-sixth Regiment, that I'm go- ing to walk all along these old corridors in the dark and black beetles . . ." "Oh, rot!" the major said. "You used to walk all over Simla in the dark." "But not black beetles, Teddy," Miss Dela- mare exclaimed. "Up the Bazaar and along the Chota Hazri Drive and King William Street — everywhere." "You're remembering Simla now, Teddy," Miss Delamare said softly. "I don't want to, but IVe got to," the major conceded, "for the sake of argument. . . ." And then Miss Delamare said softly and as- tonishingly: ''Poor fellow!" The major really jumped. "Don't say that!" he ejaculated. "That's what Mary's housemaid said!" "Well, you are a poor, poor fellow," Miss Delamare corroborated. "Did ums want its old friend out of its little bedroom?" "Yes, I do," the major said frankly. "Look RING FOR NANCY 129 here, Flossie, do the decent thing and quit. I don't beHeve I'm very well. I've had a sort of message from — from Mary Savylle. You heard me speak of her in Simla.'' "Oh, / don't remember Simla!" Miss Dela- mare said, with a toss of her head. "And so this Alary Savylle?" "I don't know," the major said. "She hasn't married. . . . But just trot away, there's a good chap. I'll kiss you and give you the pearl neck- lace, too." Miss Delamare jumped out of her chair and faced him in her stockinged feet. "Who wants your old kisses and who wants your pearl necklaces?" she exclaimed. "Keep them for Olympia Peabody, and joy go with them." She moved toward the door and then turned to say: "I was never the one to come between a man and his fair and blushing bride. I don't want to spoil sport. I wish you all the joy you can get. ALL!" She paused, and then she added: "But you may kiss me if you want to, Teddy." The major looked at her and then at the fire. "I don't really think I want to, Flossie," he said slowly. "I don't — I don't believe I can be very well." i 130 RING FOR NANCY "Oh, well, Teddy," she said, with a remon- strating voice, *'don't talk to me as if you were seasick and I were a pork-chop. Just say you've seen the girl you really like again. Don't put it as if I didn't look good to kiss. That would damage my professional chances. The other's only a matter of my heart." "Oh, lord, no," the major said. "You're a sweet good brick — a lump of nougat — and the prettiest girl — the prettiest girl — only — I just want to get a chance to think . . ." Miss Delamare said "Poor fellow!" again, and the major said: "Don't say that, I don't like it," again in a really appealing voice; and he added: "Go away as quietly as you can." "All right, Teddy," she answered. "I'm in my stockinged feet and I shan't ring a fire-bell. I don't in the least know whether I can find my way, but I guess I'll get in somewhere all right." For the third time the major fell into his armchair, but this time he exclaimed: | "No, I can't see — even though Flossie doesn't ^' add anything to the problem at all — I can't see in any imaginable manner of speaking where we all . . ." VI 'T^HERE came a knock upon his door — -■- quite a loud knock — and he started for- ward in his low chair and sat listening, with his right hand almost on the floor. "That'll be Olympia! If she's seen Flossie going . . ." The knocking was repeated more determinedly, and he called, "Come in," because he imagined that Olympia would not really care to come into his room. Mrs. Kerr Howe came in. She was in a purple Japanese kimono with a swallow worked in gold thread over each breast, and a great roll and bow at the back, her maid having learned how to put kimonos on in Tokyo. She tripped in — and her smallness gave a cer- tain Japanese air of littleness, resignation and obedience — and remarked: "I said we must have an explanation before to-morrow morning. I've come for it." And she sat herself down on the edge of the arm- chair facing the major's and looked at him. The contrast between her appearance and her mental attitude always surprised the major so 131 132 RING FOR NANCY 1 much — he was always expecting some sort of soft fluffiness to come out somewhere — that he simply gave up the situation. He let drop any attempt to understand and to control it with the words: "I'm simply too flabbergasted to be able to try to explain anything. I couldn't explain the theory of lateral strains in bridges. And there seem to be ten or a dozen women determined to go after me here. I never knew such a place. It's like being mad." And suddenly he really felt a sort of glad madness — he couldn't imagine that he was not at least going to get some fun out of it. Mrs. Kerr Howe said: "Well, I'm glad you feel some remorse." "Oh, it's not exactly remorse," he answered almost gaily. "It's like having indigestion very badly. So that you can't eat with ten dishes that you'd hke to eat very much just under your poor nose." Mrs. Kerr Howe said contemptuously: "I suppose you think that I am one of the ten or a dozen. It's like you to regard yourself as the Grand Turk!" "It's like you, Juliana," the major said, "to say polygamous things of that sort. I wish I just felt like that." RING FOR NANCY 133 "No doubt you do," Mrs. Kerr Howe said with an even deeper note of determination. ''But I'm going to have my explanation. There was not time in the train because I wanted to get my play settled about. And from what I've seen of Miss Peabody — ^your aunt introduced me to her as your oldest, best and most affec- tionate friend, so she's prepared for what's coming — from what Fve seen of the lady I don't imagine she will leave us much time to- gether to-morrow. So it has got to be now." *'But, my dear Juliana," the major said, ''I'm a reformed character!" *T don't in the least understand you," Mrs. Kerr Howe said; "I haven't asked you to do anything but your simple duty." "It's really all I can do to understand my- self," the major laughed. "I can only tell you that I vowed to reform the moment I crossed my aunt's threshold. I'm bound to say that, from what I can make of it, she does not seem anxious that I should. But still, that's my job — a difficult one, but I'm doing my best." Mrs. Kerr Howe pointed to Miss Delamare's slippers that were on the fender. "You've been having some one to help you," she said amiably. But the major had noticed her eye on them by the speech before the last. 134 RING FOR NANCY "Oh, those?" he said; "that's a little present I brought for poor Olympia. She's so liable to cold that I was airing them a little. But I do wish you'd go." And then Mrs. Kerr Howe remarked: "Poor fellow!" The major started energetically forward in his chair. "Look here," he shouted, "don't you say that. I can stand anything but that. There's nothing the matter with me. I don't want pity." Mrs. Kerr Howe was looking down upon the fender with what she meant to be an expression of meditative cruelty. "Do you always give people second-hand hearts — and presents?" she asked. "These slippers have been worn, I see." "Why, of course, Juliana," the major an- swered with an engaging air of candor, "I always have presents worn when I bring them from abroad. It saves the customs duty." "I see," she said slowly, as if she were work-^ ing out a riddle; "you get Flossie Delamare to wear them before you present them to your fiancee. That's what's called standing in an- other woman's shoes, isn't it? And to save you the trouble of lying any more — I hid in a door- way as she left this room; I had enough de- cency not to want to be seen. She did not seem to mind." RING FOR NANCY 135 "Mind?" the major asked. "Why should she mind? She's got a good conscience and a heart of gold." "Do you mean to say that I haven't?" Mrs. Kerr Howe asked. "I don t see how you can have," the major said, still with his candid air — "coming to a man's rooms like this, and trying to steal him from his fiancee." And then — for as a rule his trouble was that he forgot his past inventions — he had a brilliant stroke of memory, and he added: "You know, my dear Juliana, you are astonishingly off the track here. It won't wash. It really won't wash. When I said in the train that little Flossie was a sort of half-sister of mine, you thought I was lying. But I wasn't. I wasn't, really. It was only what's called in- telligent anticipation. You see, my aunt was in this room a short time ago, saying that she meant to adopt Flossie, because she is a dear Httle thing. And then she went and talked to Flossie, and so, of course, Flossie was naturally excited about it, and wanted to talk to me. And if you don't believe that, you'd better go and ask my aunt if it isn't true. That's what you ought to have understood when I said a sort of half-sister. It is only the president of a society like yours that could put an evil con- struction on the words." 136 RING FOR NANCY "Oh, I have no doubt," Mrs. Kerr Howe said calmly, "you can get your aunt into a tale with you. You're capable of anything in the per- suasion line. And I have no doubt Miss Dela- mare can look after herself." "But what about your reputation?" the major asked — "what about your reputation if you should be discovered here?" Mrs. Kerr Howe laughed sharply. "Oh, I knew you'd take that line," she said; "but look here, my friend, we live in the twen- tieth century, not the eighteenth, and a woman can perfectly be alone with a man without losing her reputation." "Oh, you can tell that to my aunt," the major said. "So I have," Mrs. Kerr Howe asserted, "and she entirely agrees with me that censoriousness is the worst of the vices." "Oh, well," the major said, "you just tell her to-morrow morning that you came to my room at a quarter past twelve at night, and you'll see the fur fly. You aren't going to be her adopted daughter." "Oh, you aren't going to get out of it in that way," Mrs. Kerr Howe said calmly. "I've come here as one man might to another to ask you what you mean to do." RING FOR NANCY 13Z "Well, I'll tell you what I jolly well mean to do,'* he answered. "I'm engaged to Miss Olym- pia Peabody, of Boston, Massachusetts, and I mean to be as faithful to her as I can. I used to think that it would be as easy as eating eggs, to be a reformed character under the virtuous roof of my aunt and uncle. But it's more like the temptation of Saint Anthony. I couldn't have imagined that British middle-class fami- lies could be this sort of thing. They evidently are, but I never knew anything like it." It was at that point that Mrs. Kerr Howe said softly, with a glance on the ground: "Aren't you going to kiss me, Teddy?" And the major remarked, with the air of one bathed in monotony: "No, I'm shot if I am!" "Don't you," Mrs. Kerr Howe said, "don't you remember Simla?" "Oh, you are too late at the fair," the major said. "I don't remember Simla. I don't in the least want to remember Simla. The last time I was there was just after some Abor gentle- man had shot a rotten little stone-headed arrow into my thigh, and the silly little stone head came off, and the bone sawyers had no end of a job in getting bits of it out for months after I got back to the residency. No, I don't in the least want to remember Simla." 138 RING FOR NANCY "I ought to have been there to nurse you," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "You ought to have been nursing your huj band," the major said grimly. "I had an R. C* Sister." And again Mrs. Kerr Howe dropped her voice : "Don't you want to marry me, Teddy?" "Well," the major said levelly, "speaking as man to man, I don't. I want to marry Olym- pia. That is to say, I don't want to, I've got to. I'm bound in honor, and that's an end of it." "But at Simla you said . . ." Mrs. Kerr Howe was beginning. But the major inter- rupted her in a businesslike voice: "I never said a single word about marrying you at Simla. I remember every blessed word I did say. How could I have talked about mar- rying you? You had a husband, and you weren't a bit more in earnest than I was. You were just flirting with a subaltern to pass the time, and to get conversation to put in your books. Why, you were ten years older than I was then. Of course, you're younger now. But there is some one else on the scene. I am very sorry — you're too late. You said I was to talk to you as a man. So there, you've got it. I don't want . . ." RING FOR NANCY 139 But he was interrupted in his turn by Mrs. Kerr Howe, who exclaimed: "Why! where did that horrible little dcg come from?" And, indeed, a very small Pekinese spaniel, ike a piece of glossy brown hearth-rug, was sit- ing beside the major's chair, and gazing up with adoration at one of his hands that hung over le side. The major sprang up sharply, just in ime to see the little animal, that knew his labits very well, crawl under the very low bed. He sprang after it, but it had already disap- peared, and he was quite unable to move the bed which, with its great carved pillars and heavy walnut canopy, weighed nearly half a ton. "Great heavens !" the major exclaimed, "we're lost. I'm lost — you're lost. I knew it would come. Why in the world did you leave the door open? If I could have caught the little beast, I might have chucked him outside, and thrown boots and things at him till he went back to his mistress. As it is, there's no hope." Mrs. Kerr Howe drew herself up with an expression approaching as near as possible to one of severe virtue. "Do you suppose," she said, "that I was going to be alone with a man at night with a door shut?'* 140 RING FOR NANCY "Well, it's usual to shut the door on these occasions," the major said. Mrs. Kerr Howe remarked: "I don't know what sort of women you can be used to." But the remark failed considerably of its ef- fect, because the major was upon his stomach trying to get under the bed, which was much too low for him. He leaned upon one elbow and glared fiercely at Mrs. Kerr Howe. Mrs. Kerr Howe laughed. "I don't see what it matters," she said. But the major waved at her the arm that he was not leaning on, and said violently: "What it matters is that I shall lose Olympia. She'll be here in a minute, I'll bet my head she will. There's a sort of psychic afifinity between her and that Httle beast under the bed. She says she wakes up in the night and feels cold if it isn't lying on her door-mat. I tell you, I shall lose Olympia." "Well, I don't care," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "And if you're found here," the major con- tinued, "they'll say you're compromised, and I shall have to marry you." "Well, I don't care," Mrs. Kerr Howe re- peated. "But I tell you this too, Juliana," the major said seriously, "if you're compromised, my uncle [RING FOR NANCY 141 certainly won't let Flossie Delamare produce your old play. That's what it will come to." Mrs. Kerr Howe suddenly started to her feet. "Not produce my play!" she exclaimed. "But that's infamous!" "That's what will happen," the major re- peated. "You ought to have thought of that before you came. My uncle is absolutely de- voted to Olympia." "I've never heard of such a thing," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "I'm going at once." "That's your beastly artistic pride," the major commented; "you'd rather have a play pro- duced than even a husband like me. But you're not going down that staircase when there's a twenty-to-one chance that Olympia is coming up it. Listen! Listen!" He held up one finger. There couldn't be any doubt that some one was coming up the stairs, which were of un- carpeted and polished black oak. "Not an- other word," the major whispered. "I'll do my best;" and lying upon his stomach the major began to emit, in a series of melancholy yelps, the name "George"; for in a moment of jocular humor the major had christened his present to Miss Peabody "George Washington." And at the necessary point he called out sharply: "Who's there?" 142 RING FOR NANCY An American voice with a highly cultured English accent answered: "It is I, Olympia." "Oh, well," the major said, "the father of his country is under my bed, and Tm doing my best to get under my bed, so there, in a manner of speaking, we all are." He was aware that Mrs. Kerr Howe, behind the great bed curtains, was pressing as close to the wall as she reasonably could. "I woke up," Miss Peabody's voice said. "I was awakened by feeling in my bones that George was not in his basket on the mat out- side my door. I was convinced that he would be here. May I come in?" The major was getting up on to his knees. "That you certainly may not!" "But why not?" the voice came from the door. "I can see through the crack that you are fully dressed. I'm coming in." The major stormed as fast as he could toward the door, but Miss Peabody was al- ready in front of the fireplace. "What a fine room you've got," she said; "it's so ancestral, so distinguished. Don't you think we could induce Lady Savylle to sell it to us for our home?" The major said — and he really was furiously angry: RING FOR NANCY 143 "Now this really won't do. You must get out of my room at once. It's unheard of at this time of night. You've never done anything like this before." And he headed her off from going to observe the panel. The room was very dark, since the only light it contained was that of the candle that Miss Delamare had left. Olympia said: "It's ridiculous of you, Ted- dy! It's not as if I was some flighty young girl or one of your dissolute companions, that I hope you've given up for good. I suppose I can be trusted." "No, you can't," the major said. "No one can be trusted at this time of night, and in this latitude." "You don't seem at all glad to see me," Miss Peabody said. "Aren't you going to kiss me?" The major said: "Oh, damn!" And then he added: "Look here, Olympia, I'll kiss you with pleasure once you're outside my room. You don't understand. You can't possibly under- stand. This isn't Boston. I can't have things said against my wife. Any one may be coming in." "You don't seem quite master of yourself to-night," Olympia said. "I hope you haven't been taking that nasty champagne again. Who would be likely to come in at this hour?" 144 RING FOR NANCY "Anybody might," the major answered. "It's the custom of the comitry. Besides, it's the principle of the thing that I object to. It isn't right. It isn't proper." And suddenly his face really paled beneath its tan, and his attitude of appalled listening was so intense that even Miss Olympia was silent. From far away he had heard a voice wailing: "Teddy! I say, Teddy! I can't find my room." It was only the trained voice of an actress that could have carried so far, and have made the words so distinct. "What's that?" Olympia exclaimed. *T don't know," the major said desperately. "It's an echo! It's a ghost. You never know what goes on in these old houses." And first he thought of pushing Miss Pea- body out of the room and then he thought of running to the door to keep the other woman out; but if he did that, he was perfectly certain that Olympia would go to examine the panel, and see Mrs. Kerr Howe, who was hiding be- hind the curtain. If it had only been the purple kimono she would have been invisible in the shadows, but the golden embroidered swallows upon the lady's breast he had observed already to gleam like brass plates. And then Miss RING FOR NANCY 145 Delamare, who had evidently been coming very fast, ran into the room and exclaimed breath- lessly: *'I say, Teddy, I can't find my room. I've been walking for miles and I can't find it. I shall have to stop here all . . ." And she stopped suddenly with the exclama- tion: "Oh, I didn't know you'd got company; I'm sure I beg your pardon." VII T?OR a moment the major was certain that •*• an icy chill passed between the two ladies. He could feel it in his bones. And then he remarked seriously to Olympia: "Now you have gone and ruined my repu- tation !" Miss Peabody had become the fiery red of pure rage. She remarked simply: "Nonsense! You're a man!" "But haven't you," the major said, "haven't you rubbed it into me enough that a man has to be just as careful about these things as a woman? Aren't you always saying that a man ought to be as spotless as a nun? Isn't that why you're president of the Boston Society for Reforming Young Men? And now, Olympia, you have ruined my reputation forever." But Miss Peabody, who was growing redder and redder, positively hissed between her teeth: "This appears to me to be nonsense!" And she snapped at Miss Delamare the words: "What are you doing here?" Miss Delamare answered in a quite deter- 146 RING FOR NANCY 147 mined tone: ''Well, for the matter of that, what are yoii doing here?" There seemed to the major nothing to remain but to treat the whole thing in a spirit of sheer farce. As far as he could see, his hands were perfectly clean, but he simply wouldn't face the least chance of proving it — and for the matter of that, all these women's reputations would be damaged, and there would be a regular beastly scandal, if he didn't do his level best to carry the whole thing off with a hand light enough for the whipping of silHbubs. And he just said: ''In the name of heaven, what are we all doing here?" And Olympia, dropping for a moment the cold purity of her training, remarked harshly: "Now that's enough of this. I want an ex- planation." "That's just," the major said, "that's just exactly what Mrs. Kerr Howe wanted. I'm no good at explanations. You'd better ask Flos- sie." Miss Peabody remarked, as was to be ex- pected of her: "Flossie, indeed!" And then she fixed Miss Delamare with a baleful glare. "Well, I'm waiting." "So am I," Miss Delamare said. "And if 148 RING FOR NANCY you want to know what I'm waiting for, it's this: I've been brought down to this place in the interests of the pure drama. It doesn't seem to me that I ought to be exposed to the chances of finding unmarried American ladies in gentlemen's bedrooms." "Edward!" Miss Peabody exclaimed tragic- ally, "are you going to see me exposed to these insults?" "But, my poor dear Olympia," the major said, "she is only expressing what I told you I felt myself. Oh, hang it all, I can't explain. Then the only thing left seems to be for Juliana to do it." And he called out: "Hi! Mrs. Kerr Howe, come out from behind that curtain." For it had suddenly occurred to him that there were ten chances to one that the lady would be discovered, and there was nothing in the world to prevent her being used, even at that late date, as chaperon. She must, by all reasonable chances, be under his thumb. And when Mrs. Kerr Howe, with a face pale with rage, came around the foot of the bed, he said to Miss Delamare, whom he could trust to leg him up: "Oh, I say, put a screen in front of the fire- place. There will be another woman coming down the chimney, and it might not look de- corous." RING FOR NANCY 149 Mrs. Kerr Howe exclaimed sharply: "Major Foster, I insist upon an explanation of this insult," almost at the same moment as Miss Peabody asked: "Who is this person?" The major said, with all the air of a calm introducer: "Let me introduce Mrs. Kerr Howe to you. yirs. Kerr Howe, the authoress of the future pure drama — I brought her down by the last train with me." "So it appears," Miss Peabody exclaimed; and then she added: "I know all about Mrs. Kerr Howe." And at almost the same moment Miss Dela- mare said in a quite audible voice: "Good old Teddy!" Mrs. Kerr Howe and Olympia were maintain- ing an ominous silence. And then the major got his idea. He had been thinking of once more claiming Flossie as his half-sister, because his aunt might be trusted to leg him out. Just then what he thought was inspiration came to him, and he exclaimed: "That's right — that's how I like to see you — - nice and friendly. We shall all be kissing and making friends in a minute or two." "That we certainly shan't," Miss Peabody said. h 150 RING FOR NANCY He took no notice of her, but drew his breath for a long speech. "Oh, yes, we shall," he be- gan, "as soon as I've given my explanation. I've got it! It's as clear as mud. See here, Juliana — ^you came down with me in the last train, didn't you? And you, Flossie, you were dying to tell me all about your new theater. And so you, Juliana, very kindly offered to chaperon Flossie, and to help explain about the new pure theater. So there we were, all three comfortably sitting over the fire, when Flossie remembered that she'd forgotten to bring the plans of the new theater, so, of course, Flossie went to get the plans, so Juliana was left alone with me. I don't see anything wrong about that. Olympia, do you?" "But why," Miss Peabody asked suspiciously, "did Miss Delamare leave her shoes?" It was then that the major made what was very nearly a fatal mistake. For, as it oc- curred to him afterward, nothing would have been easier than to say that Flossie just didn't want to make a noise; instead of which he said: "Oh, the shoes! Well, you see, they were a little present I was going to bring you from Paris. And Flossie was wearing them so as to air them, and to prevent my having to pay customs duty. So, of course, when Flossie went RING FOR NANCY 151 away she left the shoes on my grate. Because, you know, theyVe really your shoes. She couldn't take them. And really, it's you who ought to explain how your shoes come to be found by my grate." Olympia again became very red. "I don't understand what all this rigmarole is about," she said. *'Oh, go away and think it over," the major exclaimed quite cheerfully. "It explains every- thing." "But it doesn't," Olympia exclaimed. "If the shoes are already in this country, why should you have to pay customs duty on them?" "Oh," the major answered, "I was going to give them to you in Paris : it would have been French customs duty." "But I'm not going to Paris," Miss Peabody said. "Well, you see," the major answered, "I'm a man who likes to be prepared for everything. I thought that one day you might be going to Paris, and so it would be nice to have them already to give you. You ought to regard it as a touching attention on my part, instead of kicking up such a terrible row. And all about a pair of shoes. Oh, Olympia, I'm ashamed of you!" 152 RING FOR NANCY Miss Peabody exclaimed ominously: "Major Brent Foster . . ." And the major, though he didn't at the mo- ment know why, felt a sudden gush of joy; nevertheless he said: "Major Brent Foster! Why don't you call me Edward — or even Teddy?" "Because," Olympia exclaimed, "I believe that all is over between us." Miss Delamare exclaimed just under her breath: "Poor fellow!" For a moment the major felt a strong in- clination to leave it at that. And he would have left it if there hadn't come into his rather chivalrous soul the disagreeable idea of all these women's reputations. There would be Miss Pea- body going envenomedly about the world mis- calling, in a quite skilful manner, not only Mrs. Kerr Howe, but Flossie, who certainly hadn't deserved it. And there would certainly be Mrs. Kerr Howe going about casting doubts on the virtue of poor Olympia, who equally didn't de- serve it. So he exclaimed: "Oh, do let us have a little common sense! Haven't I explained everything?" "No, you explained nothing at all," Miss Peabody said. "In the first place, Miss Dela- mare was just as much astonished as I was to see Mrs. Kerr Howe here at all." RING FOR NANCY 153 "Of course, she would be," the major said. *'She had been gone from the room a long time. She naturally expected to find that Juliana would be gone when she came back. It wouldn't have been proper for Juliana to be here alone without Flossie on hand to chaperon her." "But why," Olympia asked, "did Mrs. Kerr Howe hide behind the bed curtain if she hadn't a guilty conscience?" "Why, that," the major said, "that's because she has such a kind heart. Mrs. Kerr Howe has the kindest heart of any woman that I know. She hid behind the curtain in order to spare your blushes, Olympia. She thought you would have been embarrassed if you knew you were discovered coming to my room like this. Because, of course, it makes it so much worse your being engaged to me. So she hid behind the curtain so that you shouldn't know she knew. That explains that." He didn't in the least know how it happened, but suddenly he was aware of the voice of her ladyship's own maid, and that the white cap and strings and the white apron of Miss Jenkins were in the room. She was standing at the foot of the bed with her hands clasped before her, and her' mysterious confidentially confident air of the really good servant who, being above 154 RING FOR NANCY all the vicissitudes and tragedies of this earth, can put everything right by a suggestion or tv^o. And she was remarking in the most perfectly level tones: "Wouldn't it be much better, sir, just to tell the truth? I'm sure there's nothing in the least wrong about the truth, sir." The major suddenly fell down again into his armchair. "My God, Flossie!" he exclaimed; "you can take the screen away from the front of the fire again. She's come by the secret door instead of the chimney!" The high voice of Miss Peabody sounded in the room. "Perhaps you will kindly explain your pres- ence." Miss Jenkins stood with her hands still down as if she were smoothing out her apron. "Well, miss," she said, "I am in charge of this house in the interests of her ladyship, Mary, Countess Savylle." "But that doesn't explain why you're here," Miss Peabody repeated. "Well, miss, you see, miss," Miss Jenkins continued calmly, "I heard a great noise of quarreling, if you'll excuse me, miss, and so I came to see if you mightn't be breaking the furniture over one another, if you'll excuse my RING FOR NANCY 155 being so free, miss, since it's my duty to look after the furniture. There are some very valu- able things here in this room. Now this panel, for instance, I'm sure her ladyship would he heart-broken if anything happened to this panel. For the painting, it's by Van Dyke, and if one of you was to throw the other against it, it might be very bad for its works. It works like this, miss, don't you see, miss.'^" And Miss Jenkins moved calmly toward the frame of the panel. The knob moved so easily that she ap- peared, in the gloom, merely to wave her hand and the panel no more to exist. Instead there was the brilliant light of Miss Delamare's room shining in upon them all. The major exclaimed: "Well, now, that ex- plains everything/' But Miss Peabody merely answered: *T am not a bit satisfied and nothing is ex- plained." "But don't you see," the major asked, "that's Flossie's room — that's how she came to be here." Miss Peabody said icily: "I quite under- stand that. Major Foster. It only makes it all the worse.'* Once more Miss Jenkins interposed: "If I might make so bold, miss, as to ask you to listen to me, miss." 156 RING FOR NANCY "That you certainly may not," Miss Peabody said. "Fm not used to being talked to by servants." "Of course, that's your American way, miss," Miss Jenkins said, with a calmness of extreme insolence, "you are so democratic. But this is England, miss, and you see Fm a sort of foster- sister to the countess. And she treating me just as if I were her equal, it makes me a little free in my speech with such old friends of the countess as Major Foster is. So I hope you'll pardon me, miss, if I ask you to think the best you can of Major Foster, for I'll give you my word of honor, if you'll take a servant's word, being so American-like, and remembering that you're in England, that the major is perfectly innocent, thought apt to be a little frivolous in such things as explanations, miss." There seemed to have arisen between these two women, from the very sight of each other, one of those bitter hatreds of which only women are capable. And it was with a rudeness really extraordinary that Miss Peabody answered: "No, I'll certainly not take your word. No servant ever spoke the truth." "That's because you're used to American servants, miss, if I may make so bold," Miss Jenkins answered. "We only export inferior RING FOR NANCY 157 ones to the United States. Her ladyship and such-like keep the best at home." "It's no good talking." Miss Peabody at- temped to close the discussion. "I'm not the one to act precipitately. But I shall certainly act." "That was what I wanted to suggest, your Ladyship — I beg pardon — miss," Miss Jenkins said; "but being so much with her ladyship it seems to come natural-like. What I wanted to suggest was that you shouldn't come to any determination for a day or two, and then you can keep an eye upon the major and these ladies, and see how they behave." At this point Miss Delamare exclaimed again : "Poor old Teddy!" "That's precisely what I intend to do," Miss Peabody said. "But don't you imagine that it is at your suggestion. I shall keep an eye on these people. And if I observe anything in the least suspicious, I shall break off my engage- ment with Major Foster at once " "What!" the major exclaimed. "Isn't it broken off already?" "I shall break off my engagement at once," Miss Peabody continued, "and then I shall go to Mr. Foster and tell him why; and that will be an end of your theater. Miss Delamare, and 158 RING FOR NANCY your play, Mrs. Kerr Howe, and Major Foster will be cut out of his uncle's will." "And very proper too, miss," Miss Jenkins said. "I didn't ask you to make a remark," Miss Peabody exclaimed; and then she said clearly and distinctly: "Edward, you may kiss me — to show these ladies " The major started violently. "Oh!" he said, and he pointed to the door behind Miss Pea- body's back. "Oh! the dog! George Washing- ton's just run out of the door." Miss Peabody wavered for a moment, and then she turned toward the door. She dis- appeared, and they could hear her calling in the corridor: "Georgie! Georgie!" The major pulled out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead. "Thank heaven, that taught me that lie," he said. ''Didn't the dog go out of the door?" Mrs. Kerr Howe asked. "Not a bit," the major answered cheerfully. "The little beast is under my bed. But if that lie hadn't come into my head I should have had to kiss Olympia — and think how painful that would have been for all of you!" At that point Miss Jenkins remarked in Her cool and businesslike tones: RING FOR NANCY 159 "I think, if you'll excuse me, Mrs. Kerr Howe and Miss Delamare, you had better just go through that panel into Miss Delamare's room, and then I'll close it. If the dog is still here, it's likely Miss Olympia will be coming back, and you'd better not be seen here again." '*0h, yes," the major exclaimed energetically. "Good gracious! Go! Go!" And he positively pushed them through the opening. Miss Dela- mare smiled at him maliciously over her shoul- der. "Aren't you going to kiss us good night, Teddy?" she asked. But Miss Jenkins fatefully extended her hand to the frame and the portraits of her lady- ship's ancestors marched right across Miss Delamare's face. VIII QHE stood looking at him, vaguely lighted ^ from beside the panel, and for the last time, he sank down into his chair. *'My girl,'' he said, "you've saved my bacon." She answered, with her calm and superior intonation: "I would not be so certain of that, sir." "Oh, 111 be as careful as the grave," he said confidently. "A night like this would have been enough to make Solomon himself a reformed character." In some way he read on her expressionless face an expression of dubiety. "I don't know, sir," she said. "Of course, you may have done the right thing, treating the whole thing as a farce. I recognized what you were doing, sir, but a time seemed to come when it appeared better to tell the truth. That was why I came in. I hope you will excuse it, sir." He gave her a keen glance. "Fow were listening all the time," he said. "I certainly was, sir," she answered coolly. 160 RING FOR NANCY 161 "It seemed to be my duty, sir. I'm not in the least ashamed, sir." The major said: "It's the sort of thing that most servants would be ashamed of being caught at." "But you see, sir," she answered, " I wasn't caught. I just stepped in when it appeared to be useful. I knew something of the sort would happen. Something of the sort always does happen. And I wanted to be able to report to her ladyship . . ." The major ejaculated: "By God! you're go- ing to report the whole thing to Mary Savylle?" "Every word, sir," Miss Jenkins answered calmly. "That is my duty." Again the major said: "Great heavens!" "I don't see," Miss Jenkins said argumenta- tively, and with her eyes on the ground, "if you come to think of it, that you have done any- thing that would displease her ladyship. You've tried to be faithful to Miss Olympia as was your duty, though a difficult one. And you've said nothing about her ladyship that would not have made her a pleased and proud woman if she heard it. And you behaved very — very straightforwardly with the other ladies." Miss Jenkins' voice became rather low, and as if she were whispering reflectively, she said: 162 RING FOR NANCY "No, I can not see that anything will displease her ladyship.'* The major brightened suddenly. "Why, I believe you're right," he said. "I have been behaving rather creditably. Who would have thought that?" He remained thinking, and she remained looking down at him. And suddenly he began to feel emotions, quivers and thrills of emotions. He leaned forward in his chair and said: "I say, what's your name?" She answered dutifully: "Yes, sir?" And he exclaimed: "Won't you let me kiss you?" It appeared to him at the moment the most desirable, the most important thing in the world. She did not appear to be a servant; she did not appear even to be a woman — but she seemed to be a warmth, a force, a light, a magnet that was drawing him toward her. And it was like being awakened very early and roughly when with a dry voice she said: "Certainly not, sir." He said dully: "No, I suppose not. But it's as true as death that I'm desperately in love with you." "I dare say, sir," she answered in a matter-of- fact tone. "But there's Miss Olympia." He passed his hand down his forehead. He was vastly disturbed. RING FOR NANCY 163 ''Of course, there^s poor Olympia," he said. "You wouldn't throw Miss Olympia over?" ]\Iiss Jenkins asked. "Not even for her lady- ship?" "No," he answered. "No, I certainly couldn't. When, just now, she talked as if she were going to have done with me — why, my heart jumped in my side . . ." "So that if Miss Peabody could be got to throw you . . ." The major, who had been inspecting his boots, looked up at her. "Now," he said, "we can't decently talk that over. It isn't proper. I don't want to seem to reprove you, but the lady is my affianced wife, and she has done nothing at all to deserve being talked over." "Not even just now?" the girl asked, with a touch of hardness. "When she was so out- rageously rude . . ." The major shook his head. "No," he answered decisively. "It was per- fectly natural. It was perfectly legitimate. Circumstances looked very suspicious; there's no denying it. She could not be asked to be- have as if she were at a tea-party. She's a good lady; she has been as kind to me as she knows how. I can't have her talked over if you at- tracted me a million times as much." 164 RING FOR NANCY "I'm talking for her ladyship," the girl said. "I'm pleading for her ladyship, if you like. I'm not ashamed. You had a moral duty to her, ladyship. When you went away you nevert swore to be faithful to her. But wasn't it im- plied? Wasn't it implied enough to keep her' faithful to you for years and years? Wasn't it? Wasn't it?" The major hung his head down. j "That sort of thing is rather all nonsense," he I said. "It isn't three hundred years ago." "Oh, yes, it is," she answered; "in that it's three hundred years. Nothing has changed' since Jacob served for Rachel. You gave hen: ladyship certain rights. You gave her the; right to expect that you would ask her again. You never did. Then what's to prevent her; ladyship saying things against Miss Peabody?: What's to prevent it? There are things to say against her. She's taken away another wom-i an's man." "She didn't know it," the major said list-i lessly. "Didn't know it!" the girl said with a fierce contempt. "Of course, she knows it. Of course, she knows that she is a criminal." "Now drop that," the major said harshly. "A criminal," the girl continued. "Isn't it RING FOR NANCY 165 criminal for a woman of her type to take a man of yours? Doesn't she know that if she were worthy of the name of a woman she ought to put you back again? In her heart she knows it. In her heart she felt bad. "When she was talking to me or to little Miss Delamare she was odious and rude and hateful. Why? Be- cause she felt wicked, evil, criminal. . . . She saw you standing beside me or her — and she knew that it was one Hke us that ought to be your proper mate . . ." "Now drop that," the major exclaimed harsh- ly. "Do you understand? That is not talk for the servants' hall. IVe got to behave honor- ably." "What do you know of the servants' hall?" she said bitterly. "What do you know of honor, for the matter of that?" "I've got my rules," the major said. "Now you go!" "Rules!" she repeated harshly. "Yes, rules that will let a woman sicken and pine and long and linger as — as her ladyship has done. And wake up in the night, and in the morning there would be her pillow wet for the servants to find and know the shameful truth that she was cry- ing for a man that cared more for his rules than all her tears! That's the thing that shames a 166 RING FOR NANCY woman! And you never came, and you never w^rote, and you never thought . . ." "Damnation!" the major really screamed. "Was it me that should go running to a woman I couldn't support? Was it me that should go running to a woman with castles and jewels and titles to her name?" "Yes, damn your Irish honor!" she cried out; "and damn your black, novel-reading, Papist pride! It was your duty to come crawling to the woman you adored; it was your duty to give her the pride and joy of tending you, and you, you give it to another woman! You give it to the wicked stranger and she gets all the pride and joy of tending you who have tried like a hero, and ruined your poor eyes like a scholar and ruined your life and the life of the woman you adored, God help you both, like the black evil fool that you are." The major looked at her, leaning forward in wide-eyed astonishment. "Now by the seven wonders of the world. . . ." he shouted at last. And then he fell back against the cushions of his chair and began to laugh feebly like a child. "And isn't this the grand comedy!" he said while his sides still shook. "Here's you and here's me, and the two of us working ourselves into epileptical pas- RING FOR NANCY 167 sions, when in the hearts of us we're both of us agreeing the one with the other, and for all I know admiring the other more than is good for us — at least it's true of me — and — and '* He stood up suddenly and stretched out his hand. "And it's taking my hand you will be doing!" he exclaimed; "for I'm no more than a poor Irish fool, that will be always in the wars life the father before me, and his fathers forever and ever! And where it will all end, God in His mercy knows! But I'm sick enough and sore enough to make it good and soothing to me to touch the hand of a good woman that's your own self!" She put her own hand swiftly behind her back. "You're agreeing with me," she said, "but not I with you. I don't agree that honor demanded what you've done, which is what you have been trying to trepan me into saying. I don't agree, and I will never take you by the hand, Major Brent Foster, and you have no right to ask it of a poor servant — until your hand is laid in her ladyship's in the pledge of marriage. And that I will work for, and that, by the grace of God, I will bring about." The major, whose moods altered like the sky in April, looked at her with laughing eyes. 168 RING FOR NANCY *'Well, the blessing of God go with you," he said. "But keep this in your obstinate, pretty, lovely head, that never will I ask her ladyship that question until Miss Olympia gives me up as freely and as frankly as you refused me the kiss I asked of you." "She shall do it with ten times the loathing that I did," Miss Jenkins exclaimed, "if I have to burn down this old place to bring it about." The major suddenly stretched himself. "It's time we were remembering our places," he said. "My girl, this is more like the bogs of Galway than the eastern end of God-fearing Hampshire. WeVe forgotten ourselves, and that is the truth of it." Miss Jenkins drew herself up and smoothed her apron. "You wanted some hot water, sir," she said. "I'll put it outside your door and knock, for you will be wanting to get to bed." "Oh, don't spoil me," the major said. "It is what her ladyship would wish, sir," she answered. When she was gone the major took off his coat and then loosened his collar. He pulled down the brass blower before the great fire- place, for the fire was out, and a weary noise of wind came from the great chimney. "So RING FOR NANCY 169 that there . . ." he was beginning to say. And then he threw up his hands, and an expression of awe-struck panic came into his face. "By heaven!" he called out. *'With all this talk of honors and morals, four women have asked me to kiss them this night, and not once have I brought it off." PART II THE next two days were uncomfortable, but not so extraordinarily uncomfortable as they might have been. Indeed, as far as the major was concerned, it might have been better to call them merely odd. He himself had not any activities. He sat about on knolls in the grounds, and tried to make head or tail of a story called The Great Good Place; but he just simply could not make anything, and his eyes were rather bad. It took the form of a dimness that would last two or three days, and then give place to two or three days in which his vision would be rather clearer than usual. So he really had not anything to do, for the doctors had told him that he was not even to ride much, and riding was the only thing that could have taken him out of the grounds; for, as for fishing, he could not really see well enough to tie a fly. Miss Flossie Delamare spent the whole of her days with Mrs. Foster in a small room giv- ing off the drawing-room. She listened to in- terminable tales of the irregular actions of the 173 174 RING FOR NANCY dashing Admiral Brent; she did her best to learn Berhn wool-work, for which she developed no particular talent, and she spent many hours a day with old Mrs. Foster at the piano in the great drawing-room, where the armor stood. Mrs. Foster was doing her best to help Miss Delamare to learn her two songs for the musical comedy called Pigs is Pigs. This successful piece having run for two years and seven nights, Miss Delamare had insisted on a fortnight's holiday, during which her place was taken by her friend. Miss Lottie Charles. Miss Delamare said that that old play was driving her regular dotty, and she had insisted on being provided with three new dances and two new songs if she was to go on with the part. But by the time she had reached Basildon Manor she rather wished she had not. Because learning was extraordinarily diflfiicult to her. She never could get words into her head, and she had only five notes in her voice. The song called Chipper-chipper Chip-chip did not present so many difficulties as far as Miss Delamare was concerned, but it proved ex- tremely difficult for Mrs. Foster to accompany. The main body of the song had to be per- formed by the hero of the musical comedy. This had not been the intention of the three RING FOR NANCY 175 authors of the words and the two composers of the music; but this Miss Delamare had in- sisted should be so. According to the original intention of the composers and the authors, Miss Delamare was to have sung the whole composition, which was a touching story of the love-affairs of a tomtit and a dormouse. But Miss Delamare had abso- lutely refused to take so much trouble, so the words had been handed over to the hero, though Miss Delamare had consented to sing the chorus if it was very much simplified. The hero, Mr. Roy Regulin, had absolutely refused to sing anything about a dormouse, or anything about a tomtit. He wanted to sing about his adven- tures in walking after a young lady with a band- box in the city of Paris. He was firm, and Miss Delamare was firm; so that in the end the three worried authors and the two distracted com- posers left it at that, and a very good song it turned out to be. For the hero related how he met the young lady with the bandbox on the boulevards and how he turned and followed her. And then Miss Delamare sang: "But she only said ... *Chipper-chipper Chip-chip.' " And at the end of every six lines of this song, 176 RING FOR NANCY Miss Delamare, who carried a bandbox, sang her artless refrain. The only difficulty was that old Mrs. Foster, whose knuckles were very gouty, and who had never in her youth got beyond playing Rock Me to Sleep, Mother, and Woodman, Spare that Tree — Mrs. Foster found it extremely dif- ficult to accompany the young lady, to whom she was much attached. Miss Delamare, on the other hand, said she would be absolutely unable to practise the song unless Mrs. Foster could at least pick out the melody with one finger upon the grand piano. They might, in- deed, have had the major in, for he had some working acquaintance with the instrument, and in the evenings, when they were all prop- erly clothed, he managed to rattle out the tune very spiritedly. But Miss Delamare said that she could not possibly dance the steps in the extraordinary tight skirts that were all she had with her. So that it was not, Mrs. Foster said, to be thought of that he could assist at the rehearsals, for Flossie had not got so much as one petticoat in all her eleven boxes. Thus, Mrs. Foster, having had all the Indian rugs taken out of the great drawing- room, and having all the doors locked from half past eleven till one, did her laborious best. RING FOR NANCY 177 This had two great advantages. It enor- mously pleased Mrs. Arthur Foster, who was never tired of seeing Flossie kick the tortoise- shell comb out of the back of her own head; whereupon her cunningly arranged hair would fall all over her like a waterfall. And, on the other hand, it simpHfied the task of Miss Peabody. Miss Peabody, as the major had to observe, was simply wonderful. She had the job of keeping four women away from two men, and of keeping in touch with the two men herself all the time. The geographical position of the house did, of course, aid her. Very long and very low, she occupied Mr. Foster's study in the middle, as a sort of strategic position. The house stood on a knoll, with the park drop- ping away from the front and the kitchen garden behind. And the kitchen garden was so really a place of vegetables that no young couple could possibly have the excuse of wan- dering into it to admire its beauties, since its beauties consisted mainly of cabbages, and it was too early in the year for the wall fruit to have fallen. Thus there only remained the park. B, Miss Peabody would arrange the major, with ^K rug tucked round his knees, under a large I 178 RING FOR NANCY oak. She would let him have the book called The Sacred Fount to read, and several lumps of sugar v^ith which to feed the deer if they came his way. And, planted in the window of Mr. Arthur Foster's study, she could see him perfectly well, and if she caught him as much as stand- ing up, she would be out at the hall door with her smelling-salts ready to offer him before he had walked as much as five steps. In the meanwhile, she knew that Miss Delamare was conveniently shut up with Mrs. Foster, and she could generally perceive Mrs. Kerr Howe ranging the distances of the park with a book in her hand, or leaning her proofs up against the trunk of a distant tree — which Miss Pea- body observed she generally did when she was in the view of the major — correcting them in a style and fashion very proper for a profes- sional lady writer. And, on the other hand. Miss Peabody had her thumb well down upon Mr. Arthur Foster. The poor old gentleman simply could not move. She had concocted an enormous plan for amal- gamating the L.S.S.V. and the B.A.A.S. (Lon- don Society for the Suppression of Vice, and the Boston Association for the Abolition of Sin). She had persuaded the old gentleman i; RING FOR nancy; 179 that, by amalgamating these two societies, of the one of which he was founder and the other of which she was the perpetual grand mistress, he would be absolutely certain of a knighthood, if not even of a baronetcy, which would probably descend to the major. And she kept the poor old gentleman stuck there over her papers so that neither Miss Delamare with her plans for the new theater, nor Mrs. Kerr Howe with her arguments in favor of her new play, ever got a chance of speaking to him. Moreover, a quite definite coldness had sprung up between her and Mrs. Arthur Foster, who was understood to back up Miss Delamare and the theater. It had happened in this way. On the first morning of their all breakfasting together, Mr. Arthur Foster had come down first and had opened a letter that had con- tained a report from the secretary of the L.S.S.V. It had filled him with real enthu- siasm. He had not been able to refrain from saying briskly to her ladyship's own maid, who was waiting at the sideboard because Saunders, the butler, had apparently turned his ankle, slipping on a rug on the polished oak floor of the corridor, to which he was unac- customed because he had spent the last twenty years of his service at The Pines, Hornsey,^ 180 RING FOR NANCY, where the passages were covered with linoleum — Mr. Arthur Foster could not refrain from reading his letter aloud to Miss Jenkins, who stood with her hands folded before her in front of the largest ham she had ever seen. "Now, this is famous!" Mr. Foster had said; "it is really excellent! Listen to this, Nancy, my dear — just listen to this." Miss Jenkins stood absolutely motionless; the water in the silver kettle hissed pleasantly; the kidneys over their spirit-lamp bubbled and shook the silver lid that covered them. "This is from Colonel Hangbird," Mr. Foster said, "the secretary of the L.S.S.V. that my wife is president of. Colonel Hangbird says that he is happy to be able to announce that, during the year while my wife has been president of the society, and lastly, owing to your — I mean my — generous contributions to its funds, vice of all kinds in the kingdom has diminished by one per cent. What do you think of that. Miss Nancy?" Miss Jenkins regarded the Turkey carpet. "You ought to be made a baronet, sir, or a knight at least," she said. And then she asked disconcertingly: "Now how long would it take at that rate for vice to be rooted out of the country altogether?" RING FOR NANCY 181 Mrs. Foster was just coming in at the door, so Mr. Foster said, '*Ssh! Ssh!" and then he ad- dressed his wife with the words: "My dear, here's splendid, here's glorious news! Read this letter. Nancy says — I mean it's generally con- sidered — that I ought to be a baronet, or at least a knight." Mrs. Foster took the letter without much en- thusiasm. She read rather slowly, and then began upon the breakfast with which Miss Jen- kins served them; but she did bring out at last: "Yes, my dear, I have no doubt it is perfectly splendid, but I don't see anything about a knighthood." "Oh, that," Mr. Foster said, "that's just the general opinion. Colonel Hangbird's report will be in all the papers. Just think, I shall be a knight, and people will have to call you *my lady.' " "I don't know that I shall like that," Mrs. Foster replied speculatively. "It will seem rather odd. But how long will it take to get rid of vice altogether at that rate? Not so very long, I should think." Mr. Foster happened to be coughing over his cup of coffee, and Miss Jenkins remarked with extreme deference: 182 RING FOR NANCY "It will take just a thousand years, ma'am." But Mrs. Foster was thinking of something else, and she turned eagerly upon her lady- ship's own maid. "Have you any news of her ladyship?" she asked. "Do, if you write to her, repeat and repeat it again, that Mr. Foster and I would be delighted if she will consider this house her home instead of going to the Dower House at all.'' Mr. Foster immediately became exceedingly animated. "Certainly, certainly!" he exclaimed; "by all means tell her ladyship that." And then he got up to run toward Miss Peabody, who was entering the room, and he continued his ex- clamation: "How odd it would be if Mrs. Fos- ter were *her ladyship' and Lady Savylle were 'her ladyship.' . . ." Mrs. Foster said rather frostily: "I don't think we should mention our titles in conversa- tion," and she appealed to Miss Jenkins for corroboration. Miss Jenkins said: "It isn't usual, ma'am." Mr. Foster appealed to her rather wistfully. "Still, every now and then . . ." he said. Miss Jenkins continued to gaze remorselessly at the carpet. RING FOR NANCY 183 *'Hardly even every now and then, sir," she remarked. And then Mr. Foster spoke to Miss Peabody. "I don't see," he exclaimed, "that it is any use having a title if it is never to be used to you." Miss Jenkins remarked: "Of course, it's a matter of taste, sir." But Miss Peabody, who was rather flushed, pushed in between her host and her ladyship's own maid, and it was only then, after having exhausted this engrossing topic, that Mr. Foster remembered his duty to his guest. His ac- quaintance with polite conversation came most- ly from novels, of which he had read several between the ages of eighteen and twenty-three, and his speeches when addressing a lady were, apt at times to startle his hearers. Thus he remarked now: "Down before all the others and with the flush of youth and beauty on your cheek! How I envy my nephew, lucky dog!" Mrs. Foster, who was gazing quite angrily at the toast-rack, remarked: "I don't believe you're going to get a title, and I don't in the least want one for my own part." Miss Peabody said rather fiercely: "I don't see why Mr. Foster should not have a title. 184 RING FOR NANCY Hasn't he deserved it? Aren't his successes and his pubHc services perfectly splendid?'* And it was at that moment that there v^as born in Miss Olympia's mind the idea that Mr. Arthur Foster must certainly be made into a baronet, with a special remainder to his nephew whom she was going to marry. But Mr. Foster was pushing into her hand the letter from Colonel Hangbird. He said: "Now just read that. Isn't that splendid?" As a matter of fact, Olympia commented be- fore reading the letter: "I was going to apol- ogize for being so late. I had rather a bad night." Miss Jenkins came suddenly forward and asked Miss Peabody if her coffee was to her taste. Miss Peabody paid no attention what- ever. She finished reading the letter. "Of course," she said, without any signs of appearing impressed, "of course, it's satisfac- tory; but it doesn't seem so much to me. You see, we're used to so much larger figures in my country. The last report of my Secondary Society — the Boston League for the Reform of Young Men — the B.L.R.Y.M. as we call it — the last report showed that our roll of members numbers six hundred and forty thousand — an increase of forty thousand in the year." RING FOR NANCY 185 "Oh, of course," Mr. Foster said, with an i elaborate politeness in his air, "the B.L.R.Y.M. is a very different thing." "And consider what it means," Olympia con- tinued, with that hard enthusiasm which comes over even the mildest of Americans when they talk of the institutions of their own country, "consider what it means. Here are six hundred and forty thousand young men all between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five, and all re- formed characters." Mr. Foster interrupted with a rather enthusi- astic "Splendid! Splendid! But even our hum- ble L.S.S.V., which we hope soon to be .able to call the R.L.S.S.V. . . ." But the voice of Miss Peabody, which had continued and which was growing louder and louder, took up her tale: "And every one of those six hundred and forty thousand young men is pledged to ab- stain from drinking alcohol, playing cards, or any form of gambling, swearing or using loose expressions, attending race meetings" — and Miss Peabody's voice swelled until it became a formidable organ — "frequenting theaters or music-halls, or the society of young women other than their mothers unless they are en- gaged to them. They pledge themselves all to 186 RING FOR NANCY be at home by ten o'clock at night, unless their professions call for it . . ." Mr. Foster exclaimed: "Glorious! Glorious!" But Mrs. Foster put in with an amiable de- termination: ''I don't quite see, my dear, and I never have seen, my dear, though I have heard you say the same thing at least twenty times, how young people are ever to get engaged at all under your rules. Mayn't they even know their female cousins?" "Oh, yes," Miss Peabody said in her most superior manner; "they may see them in the presence of some fitting elderly woman." "But even that," Mrs. Foster replied quite mildly, "must make it rather difficult when a young man wants to propose. Perhaps that is why the birth-rate in America is decreasing." Miss Peabody stood up so suddenly that she upset her large coffee-cup. "Mrs. Foster," she said, and her cheeks were exceedingly red, "if I was not perfectly sure that you were not, I should think that you de- sired to insult me by suggesting that I advocate race suicide." "I'm sure I don't know what that means," Mrs. Foster answered. "I may have been sug- gesting that you do advocate it; perhaps you do. You're not the pope, that I know of — RING FOR NANCY 187 infallible, and all that sort of thing; though they do say that he isn't infallible, after all." For a moment Miss Peabody really looked quite dangerous, but she sat down after she had shrugged her shoulders. "Of course" — she addressed herself markedly to Mrs. Foster — "a young man can always pro- pose by letter, preferably addressed to the par- ents of his intended. That is a very great ad- vantage, for a young man can not afterward get out of his engagement as he could if the proposal were made in the private circum- stances that are usual in Europe. I expect to see a complete disappearance of the Breach of Promise Suit in the United States." Mrs. Foster, who was really placable enough, remarked: "Oh, well, my dear, I have no doubt that if you are managing the United States, they're well managed. But if you didn't sleep well, I hope there wasn't anything the matter with your room; because, of course, that's my business, and not these things that I don't understand very well; though Admiral Brent was accustomed to say, that for all I was so quiet, I could see as far over a millstone as the man who made the sixty-two foot telescope there was such an excitement about in the year 1852, which was two years after I was born." 188 RING FOR NANCY Olympia said: "Oh, there was nothing the matter with the room. I had anxieties." Miss Jenkins said suddenly: "Will you not take some more coffee, miss?" And Miss Peabody answered tartly: "I have already signified that I desire more coffee. It stands to reason as I upset my first cup." Mr. Foster exclaimed: "Anxieties, my hon- ored guest? I hope not. Not about money, or — er — about my nephew?" Miss Jenkins said: "Miss Peabody's little dog was lost nearly all night, sir." "And enough to make anybody anxious," Mr. Foster commented. Olympia said coldly: "It is extraordinary how servants interrupt in this country. In Bos- ton we should not stand it for a minute." Mrs. Foster really trembled with nervousness. "Oh," she said, "Miss Jenkins is hardly a servant. She's the Lady Savylle's confidential attendant. She has very kindly consented to wait upon us because the butler has a bad foot, and though I'm sure we have other servants enough, I don't think I should like to see them handle her ladyship's best breakfast service, which is all real Spode, though I am sure I don't know what that may mean. But per- haps," she continued anxiously, "your little dog RING FOR NANCY 189 doesn't like your room. Perhaps you would like to change on that account?" Again Miss Jenkins interrupted. "Major Foster doesn't like his room. Per- haps her lady — I mean Miss Peabody — would like to change with him?" "I shall certainly do nothing of the sort," Miss Olympia said. And then Mrs. Foster continued: "As for Edward, I'm perfectly certain he never gave anybody any anxiety in his life, except when he went away like that. I had a long con- versation with him last night, and it quite brought the tears to my eyes. We have been cruel and misjudging to him all these years, and I'm not going to sit here and listen to sug- gestions that he cost anybody any anxiety. It's not fair, and I won't." And Mrs. Foster, who was really shaking with anger, stood up and be- gan to move along the table. "I'm sure," she exclaimed, "if there's anything I can do to make up for it I will; and it's the greatest satisfaction to me to have him in this house, and I hope he will never leave it." "But it's Lady Savylle's house," Mr. Foster said. "I don't care," Mrs. Foster repHed; "I don't care whose house it is. It's the house he likes 190 RING FOR NANCY best in the world, and I hope he may never leave it." And Mrs. Foster went agitatedly out of the room. It was not really a very comfortable breakfast for anybody. The major and Miss Delamare and Mrs. Kerr Howe drifted in one after the other. But Miss Peabody, who had finished her breakfast at least half an hour before, was peer- ing into the breakfast-room from behind the statue of a plaster lion that was gnawing the head off of a plaster serpent. Miss Jenkins was careful to inform them of this fact, ^nd indeed they could see George Washington frisk- ing round the base of the statue itself, so that they all sat as far away as they could from one another at the long table and spoke hardly at all. And after that they had a long day of the park, and the piano, and the proofs, which were cor- rected against tree-trunks, all of them being under the surveillance of Miss Peabody. And in the evening the major and Mrs. Kerr Howe and Miss Delamare tried to play bridge, but, as Miss Peabody was in a mood to unbend and desired to learn this frivolous and innocent game, they all retired to bed at a quarter to ten, having got with difficulty through one rubber. The major had changed his bedroom because, RING FOR NANCY 191 as he remarked to his aunt, the noise in the huge chimney was distracting. And as he also remarked, if his day could not have been said to resemble the dazzling glitter of life which he had not been accustomed to lead among the idle and dissolute Smart Set, it could not, on the other hand, be said to differ very much from a rest cure in the country which the doctors had recommended him to take. So that there, as he said, they all were. In this singular peace three days passed. They were all really very tired people on whom London had enforced a desire for rest — all ex- cept Miss Peabody, who desired not so much rest as a period for reflection. Miss Peabody, of course, did not desire that any of Mr. Fos- ter's money — which she regarded as already her own — should go to Miss Delamare's theater. At least, she was not quite sure that she did not desire it. She had a natural hatred for Miss Delamare, as she had a natural hatred for most people. And she would very much have liked to have hit Miss Delamare very hard, just as she would very much have liked to have hit Mrs. Kerr Howe harder still. But when it came to the theater she was not quite certain. She was even not quite certain that she would be 192 RING FOR NANCYi able, by any amount of denunciation, to make Mr. Foster abandon that scheme — but these were not quite ordinary circumstances. Mrs. Foster was not deeply engaged on the side of Miss Delamare, and although Miss Peabody had the greatest contempt in the world for Mrs.- Foster, she could not help seeing that Mr. Fos- ter was really extremely afraid of his wife. And even if Miss Peabody had wanted to smash Miss Delamare and Mrs. Kerr Howe over the inci- dent of the panel, she was not by any means; certain that they could be proved to have be- haved disreputably enough to give her the han- dle which she wanted. She considered that they had been hateful, but she could not prove that they had acted disreputably, without at least showing that she herself had been rather ridicu- lous. She had, indeed, had a haughty interview with Miss Jenkins on the following night, and Miss Jenkins' tale had so exactly coincided with the version that she got from the major himself, that Miss Peabody simply did not see how she could get any kind of guilt out of the pro- ceedings. And, indeed, she was not quite certain that she wanted the new theater suppressed. She would have liked to smash Miss Delamare RING FOR NANCY 193 without smashing the theater. She had tried to point out to Mr. Foster that Miss Delamare, whose chief accomplishments were that she could sing five notes and kick down her own back hair, was not exactly the sort of person to run a theater which, she imagined, would be chiefly concerned with the plays of Ibsen and Mr. Bernard Shaw. But when she had pro- pounded this theory to Mr. Foster it simply did not come off at all. Mr. Foster was so entirely ignorant of any theatrical knowledge, that he did not know the difference between musical comedy and the serious drama. Indeed, the only theatrical performance that he had ever seen was that Pigs is Pigs itself, and this performance had so bewildered and so delighted him, and Miss Delamare had kicked about and sung with such grace, and smiled with such jolly sweetness, that Mr. Arthur Foster seriously considered that she was not only the greatest, but the nicest and most respectable actress in the world. Mrs. Foster, on the other hand, had several times been taken to performances of Shakes- peare by her sister, the admiral's wife, and these performances had so terrified or so bored her, since they all appeared to be gouging out one another's eyes, or stabbing some one 194 RING FOR NANCY else in the back, or being an unpleasant ghost, or making incomprehensible speeches over skulls — Shakespeare, in fact, had so terrified and agonized Mrs. Foster, that when she came to see Pigs is Pigs, and Flossie twirling about and squeaking with her little voice, she really thought that this was, comparatively speaking, heaven. And she had already found Flossie so kind and attentive, and as it were, daughterly, that she simply told her husband that there was an end of it. He had simply got to consider Miss Delamare as not only the greatest actress in the world, but as absolutely the one most suited to manage the new pure drama. So that when Miss Peabody tried gently to suggest that she could not imagine Miss Dela- mare playing Nora in A DolVs House, or the heroine in Man and Superman, or, for the matter of that, a tragic charwoman who had to be arrested by a policeman for stealing a silver box that she had not stolen, she found that Mr. Foster, though he simply did not understand her, regarded her as talking almost blasphem- ously, since it was an article of faith in that household to consider that Miss Delamare could do anything. Moreover, Mr. Foster was aware that the greatest and most serious Nonconform- ist dramatic critic of the day had several times RING FOR NANCY 195 called Miss Delamare the symphonic embodi- ment of quaint imbecility; and although Mr. Foster did not in the least understand what this meant — for the matter of that, Miss Delamare herself did not — it seemed to be a satisfactory testimonial to some sort of gift and obvious respectability, since neither Mrs. nor Mr. Fos- ter could imagine the great critic praising any- body who was not at least as respectable as Mrs. Gurney, of Earlham. They were perfectly convinced that he would not have soiled his pen by praising any one who was at all disreputable — that was how it struck them; and Miss Pea- body knew quite well that if she tried any fur- ther to interfere with this belief, they would simply tell her that, being a foreigner, she could not be expected to understand an institution so thoroughly British as musical comedy. In that way she was really up against it, and as has been remarked, she was not by any means certain that she wanted to stop the new theater altogether. For, remarkable as it ap- peared to her, the prospect of being married, which for many years had seemed to her to be singularly remote, had operated in an extraordi- nary manner in changing her point of view. She found, when she questioned herself each night over her diary, that, extraordinary as the 196 RING FOR NANCY confession seemed, she was not any longer half so interested in the suppression of sin. She had actually to write down in the pages of that locked book that now that she was going to have — and, indeed, she was actually having — a good time herself, she was not so anxious to suppress the enjoyment of six hundred and forty thousand reformed young men. Life, in- deed, appeared to have an entirely new aspect for Miss Peabody. She was beginning in England to discover that there were such things as social amenities, social scales and social advancements. In Bos- ton she had been a member of a rather dis- agreeable upper six hundred, but she was be- ginning to discover that it might be almost more agreeable in England to have the right to go through a door before some other woman. And she was beginning to think that it must be extraordinarily sweet to be called "your lady- ship." Once or twice when Miss Jenkins had given her this title by a slip of the tongue. Miss Peabody had positively quivered with delight. And Miss Peabody had been observing the man- ners and customs of the English people for long enough to know that the stage in some singular way led to titles. As far as she had been able to discover, every wife of an actor-manager was RING FOR NANCY 197 always "her ladyship." So that she was not by any means certain that she desired the scheme for the new pure theater to be sup- pressed. And even her scheme for the amalgamation of the L.S.S.V. and the B.A.A.S. tended a Httle in this direction. She was beginning to get tired of these things, and she was beginning to think that she wanted Mr. Foster to drop them, too. She could not help seeing that sort of thing was not really fashionable in England, and she imagined that, by amalgamating the two so- cieties, putting them under the managership of a professional philanthropist like Colonel Hang- bird and nominating herself president and Mr. Foster vice-president — though they would have nothing whatever of the work of the associa- tions, they would get just as much as ever of the glory, and at the same time, they would not have attaching to them the sort of snuffy Nonconformist feeling that she perceived to attach to most British philanthropists, who gen- erally wore low collars, soft felt hats and untidy beards. Since she had known and become en- gaged to the major, these adornments of the male being no longer appeared to her as desir- able as they had done in the days when they had seemed to her to be the symbols of purity. 198 RING FOR NANCY benevolence and teetotalism. Alas! she no longer cared much for any of these three things, for she could not find any particular trace of them in her "intended". So that, as she saw her future life, she was going to be a patroness — a haughty and aloof patroness — of a quite meritorious philanthropic enterprise, and she was also going to be, as Mrs. Edward Brent Foster, quite a distinguished figure in British social life because she would have so much influence with the new theater. It was an entirely different world. And, indeed, the only use that she had left for the labors of her old life was, that by keeping Mr. Foster hard at work on the amalgamating of the two societies that she intended to throw over, she kept him also entirely under her thumb, and occupied his study, which commanded a view of the entire parkland territory where a few deer wandered about between the characters of the drama that she was engaged in managing. It was just before lunch on the third day that Miss Peabody observed her ladyship's own maid, who was all black and white like a mag- pie in her cap and apron, marching straight over the greensward in a bee-line for where the major was sitting under his oak tree. She was coming RING FOR NANCY 199 from the front door, which was at the end, not the middle, of the house. And Miss Peabody was out upon the greensward before she had breathed twice. And then all sorts of people turned up. Mr. Foster looked out of the win- ' dow of his study; Mrs. Foster and Miss Dela- ^^are came out of the French windows of the ^Krawing-room ; Mrs. Kerr Howe, with her long ^ftroofs streaming from her hands, was walking ^■iwiftly toward the major, and round the corner !^H>f the house, from the direction of the front ^■oor, there appeared no less than two police- ^Bnen with bicycles, and a terrific old gentleman ^Bn a fur coat, who sat very high upon an im- mense horse. And they all of them bore down upon the major. And the first sound that struck all their ears was the terrific voice of the old gentleman, who had reined up his brown horse within a yard or so of the major, and was extending his arm in a splendid gesture. "Officers," he shouted, "do your duty! That is the man. Arrest him at once for drunken- ness, assault, the use of obscene language and theft!" They all of them stood absolutely still in the sunlight, except the two policemen, sturdy and pink-faced fellows, who pushed their bicycles 200 RING FOR NANCY bashfully toward the major. They each of them touched the glazed black shades of their caps to him, and pulling their wallets from behind their backs, produced the one a blue, the other a white slip of paper; and each of them remarked, *'Very sorry, sir; a summons, sir." The major carefully placed his book-mark be- tween the pages of The Sacred Founts set the book down on the brown rug upon which he was sitting, extended his hand and exclaimed as he took the papers: "That's all right, that's all right, my good men. Go round to the kitchen and get them to give you some beer." The two poHcemen, with automatic actions, swung their bicycles round, and pushing them at their sides, went away toward the house- end. II T was Mr. Arthur Foster who broke next the spell of appalled silence. He came out >f his French window, and when he was near |hem he called in agitating and panting tones: "What's all this dreadful thing?'' The major was contentedly, and with atten- tive expression, reading the two summonses ^hile he leaned his back against the trunk of the oak tree. But the old gentleman, who was mrveying them all triumphantly from the top ►f his immense horse, shouted out: "This abandoned wretch has been visited by lis country's laws for the offense of drunken- less, assault, the use of obscene language and :heft!" Mr. Foster threw his hands up to the sky; !rs. Foster remarked beneath her breath that Edward really seemed to have been enjoying life in spite of everything; Miss Delamare paughed so loudly that she really had to hold ler sides; Mrs. Kerr Howe shook her proofs Lt the old gentleman and remarked: "You in- famous old scoundrel !" Miss Jenkins stood per- 201 202 RING FOR NANCY fectly still, looking at Miss Peabody with a watchful, attentive and questioning expression; Miss Peabody stood gazing at the major with enormous eyes, and her eyes did not believe and did not understand what they saw. She had observed for one thing, in a sort of dream, that one of the policemen had, with a sudden, extraordinarily stiff and sharp movement, saluted Miss Jenkins as he went by, and Miss Jenkins had shaken her head and put one finger to her lips. And, in a sort of dream, Miss Pea- body had noticed these things with satisfaction, for she considered that they pointed with abso- lute certainty to the fact that Miss Jenkins had a vulgar intrigue with this policeman, and she considered that this would give her a handle against Miss Jenkins, who was certainly not the sort of person to be confidential attendant upon a lady of title. She remarked to herself: "I've got you, my lady." And then she shook off her stiffness of consternation and addressed the major in the following terms. She stretched her arms out, indeed, and was preparing to fall upon his neck, when it occurred to her that as the major was sitting against a tree-trunk, that operation would be not only difficult but prob- ably dangerous. "Edward," she said, "I don't for a moment RING FOR NANCY 203 believe these odious and scandalous charges; but even if they w^ere proved to the hilt, believe that your battered and tried heart should find upon this bosom a resting-place." Miss Jenkins looked at the major with a cool and dispassionate glance, and they all heard her remark to Mrs. Foster: "Well, then, even that's no go, ma'am." She walked away also in the direction of the house- end, and Miss Peabody remarked to herself with satisfaction that the odious creature had certainly gone to rejoin her policeman. They all of them made the ejaculation that might have been expected of them, but the major sat against the tree-trunk and just laughed, while Mrs. Kerr Howe voluminously explained the situation. "My dear thing," the major remarked to Miss Peabody in the dog-cart — for the first summons had been returnable for that very afternoon — "it's remotely possible that I may be in some sort of a fix, but I can assure you . . ." "Oh, my dear Edward," she exclaimed, and she was really perfectly in earnest, "you don't need to assure me of anything. I regard you simply as a hero — and a hero for my sake. I quite understand that you imagined that I 204 RING FOR NANCY should dislike your traveling for many hours alone with Mrs. Kerr Howe. And although that was exceedingly foolish of you — for it must be obvious that I haven't a spark of jealousy in my composition, and I hope I am above any foolishness of that sort — all the same, you have lived entirely in a conventional world, and I quite understand that it was just part of your invariable kindness and consideration for me when you pulled that dreadful old gentleman into the carriage to act as a chaperon. And I have no doubt that you may have taken a little more champagne than was exactly good for you at lunch because you may have been taking farewell of some of your male friends "I assure you, Olympia," the major said, "I was as sober as the twenty judges. I had a boiled mutton-chop and some barley water at the Rag." "It's impossible, my dear Edward," Miss Peabody continued kindly but firmly, "for me to follow out my train of thought, or even to construct a grammatical sentence, if you will persist in interrupting me with statements that are quite unnecessary. I say I simply do not inquire whether you had had too much cham- pagne or not. I have begun to realize, as with- RING FOR NANCY 205 out doubt you notice, that there are certain things — certain customs in this old country which, although they would ill become a gentle- man of America, are nevertheless appropriate and necessary for a person of your position in this country. One of these customs I under- stand is, that when a young man is upon the point of marrying, he gives a farewell entertain- ment — or even a series of farewell entertain- ments — to the bachelor friends of his youth. And I understand that upon these occasions a great deal of wine is drunk because, as I have been told, it is the custom for every person present at the table to toast the bride; where- upon the young man must reply by drinking a full glass of wine with each person present, the phrase, as far as I can remember it, running, 'And no heel-taps.' " "Oh, hang it all, Olympia," the major said, "youVe been reading about the eighteenth cen- tury. Modern people never touch anything stronger than barley water at lunch." "So that," Miss Olympia continued with equanimity, "if you were slightly — let me say, elevated — I can only consider that you were in that sad condition entirely for my sake. And of course, when it comes to the use of obscene language, I must confess that some of the 206 RING FOR NANCY phrases you use, though in themselves perfectly innocent and having no blasphemous or im- proper significance, are nevertheless singular and incomprehensible. You are fond, for in- stance, of saying that some one handed you a lemon . . ." *'Oh, but hang it all," the major interrupted, "that's an Americanism; I only use American- isms now and then to make you feel comfort- able and home-like. Personally I detest them. To hand any one a lemon means . . ." *T am perfectly well aware what the phrase means," Miss Peabody said. "It signifies what in English we should term a rebuff or a slap in the face. But you must consider, that to a person not in the least knowing what the phrase may signify, and casting about in his or her mind for an allegoric meaning — to such a per- son — supposing you should use the phrase, *She handed him a lemon and he quit,* as you are fond of doing when you desire to be amusing — to such a person the words might seem to con- note a reference to the fall of man when Eve handed Adam an apple — which, however, was a fruit more exactly resembling a lemon and not an apple at all — and our first parents were forced to leave the Garden of Eden ; and, as you arc aware, to many old-fashioned people, any RING FOR NANCY 207 reference to Holy Writ is apt to be considered not only blasphemous, but even in this particu- lar case possibly obscene." "But I never said anything about handing anybody a lemon," the major said. *'I shouldn't among English people. They don't like your American slang. And look here, you say I was drunk . . ." The major was about to enter upon an eloquent disclaimer, when the horse that he was driving shied a little because his uncle's motor, which contained Mr. and Mrs. Foster, Mrs. Kerr Howe, Miss Delamare, and, beside the chauffeur. Miss Jenkins, passed them rapidly, being bound also for the county town. And when he had coaxed the horse to be quiet, it suddenly occurred to the major that to con- vince his fiancee that he had not been drunk, and that he had not used any obscene language at all, would be to inflict a certain cruelty upon her. For the lady was obviously reveling in the romance of an eighteenth-century situation. She had, she imagined, got hold of a terrific lover who swore, drank with no heel-taps, and swaggered ferociously about the world at the mention of his mistress's name. And, indeed. Miss Peabody continued tranquilly: "I don't in this case blame you for having taken too much champagne, and supposing that 208 RING FOR NANCY you did become rather heated with the old gentleman and used fierce language when he objected to your having dragged him into the railway carriage, all the same, since the whole thing was for my sake . . .'* "Well, Olympia," the major said, "you really have averaged it out pretty well. It's astonish- ing how perspicacious youVe been. I was, of course, a little bit on, but I'm glad you see that the circumstances demanded it in your honor. And, of course, I was absolutely determined to have some sort of chaperon for the sake of your peace of mind, and the old gentleman did become rather violent, and I did answer him back with some ferocity . . ." "I don't say," Miss Peabody said softly, "that it's at all discreditable to you . . ." "All the same," the major put in, "I can't exactly acknowledge these things in court." "Oh, why not?" Miss Peabody said, and she appeared decidedly disappointed. "Oh, well," the major answered, "I don't want to get a month." "I should be just the same to you when you came out," Olympia remarked. "Of course, that would be very precious," the major conceded; "but what should I feel like when I was in? Besides, there's Mrs. Kerr 'RING FOR NANCY 209 Howe to be considered. She insists on giving evidence. She v^ouldn't like it to appear that she traveled with a drunken and disreputable companion. She hasn't got the advantage of knowing as you do that it was entirely for her sake." "But still . . ." Miss Peabody was beginning. "Oh, no, Olympia," the major interrupted, "I can't let it go so far as that. Of course, you're at liberty to tell all your friends in private how creditable the whole thing really was, and how pleasing it must naturally be to you. But I am afraid I've got to defend it. I've wired, in fact, to the guard of the train to come and give evi- dence, and, of course, that good fellow, not being particularly quick in his perceptions, will give evidence that I was as sober as the twenty judges I have just mentioned." "I must say that is rather disappointing." Miss Olympia gave up the contest. "But I will say this, Edward, that, whatever happens, I am thoroughly and entirely convinced of your chiv- alrous attachment to myself, and that I have nothing in the world to complain of with re- gard to your own proceedings, whatever I may have to say of other people. I never till now met a man with whom I was so entirely satis- fied, and I don't suppose I ever shall again." 210 RING FOR NANCY "Well, of course, it would be rather awkward if you did," the major said. He gazed hard at the polished metal that decorated the horse's breeching-strap, and he remained lost in reflec- tion. A speck of dust flew into his tender eye, and he realized that he ought not to have been driving at all. But he had wanted to have a talk with Olympia. He had had it. Of that there could be no doubt. He set down Miss Peabody on the front step of the County's Meet Hotel, where the rest of the party were awaiting them, and then he drove round into the inn yard to give up the horse to a hostler. His eye was really hurting him so much that it was all he could do to find his way into the private bar, for very decidedly he needed a drink. The bar was rather dark, and an amiable barmaid gave him a whisky and soda, and then inspected his eyelid which he pulled down, to see if she could discover the speck of dust. At the other end of the coun- ter a man, whom he made out only dimly, was talking to a lady whom he could not make out at all. "I can't say, ma'am," the man said. "I didn't intend to go on the bench at all to-day. I just meant to sit in the well of the court and take notes." The major could not hear what the lady said RING FOR NANCY 211 beneath her breath. He only caught the name "Mr. Broadrib," and he recognized that the other man was the labor member of ParHa- ment for one of the three constituencies that met in that part of the world. "It's no use talking any nonsense, ma'am," Mr. Broadrib said in his metallic voice. *'The bench is set on giving your friend three months. And they'll make it six if they get any kind of a chance. I tell you plainly they won't if I can stop it, but I don't know whether I can." Again the lady said something. "It's no good my going on the bench," Mr. Broadrib said, "if I'm to be out-voted when they retire to consider their decision. You don't know the extraordinary old crowd of od- dities they've got together. You know perfectly well that the Lord Chancellor's hand has been forced so that he daren't appoint any Conserva- tive J.P.'s in this part of the world. And in this part of the world there's not a Liberal that's got threepence-halfpenny a week to his name. I quite agree with your ladyship that it's a shame there shouldn't be; but you know what these country districts are, and except in my constituency, you are the only person who dare call herself a Liberal for fear of losing the bread and butter out of her mouth. So the Lord Chancellor has to fall back upon cranks. 212 RING FOR NANCY "It's a most extraordinary sight, our bench. They've all got beards like morning mists and hair like sheep's wool that's never been combed. But there it is. There's Mr. Justice Hills, He's a judge of King's Bench, and he goes mad at the sight of an Irishman. And I understand your friend is an Irishman. And there's Sir Arthur Johnson. Of course, as he's the prose- cutor, he ought not to sit on the bench, but he'll probably make a jolly good shot at doing so, and you never know what these country justices won't do. Then there's Christopher Sharp, the Privy Councilor. You know him. He's a millionaire squire, and he goes mad at the sight of any man with a decent coat on his back. Socialism of the cracked variety! And there's the Honorable Charles Widgeon. He's the second son of the field-marshal. He's the gentleman who accused Thomas Atkins of spit- ting twenty thousand Boer babies with bayonets during the South African War. He goes mad at the sight of a soldier. So, I'm afraid, whatever happens, your friend is pretty sure of three months, and just as likely as not it will be six." The lady whispered again. "I tell you, your Ladyship," the man's- voice repeated, "that it wouldn't be the least use. I should only be one against three or four if I RING FOR NANCY 213 \\ sat on the bench. They'd out-vote me. The [\ very most that I can do is to listen to the evi- dence from the v^ell of the court, and telegraph to the home secretary the moment the sen- tence is pronounced." The major, rubbing his sore eyes, heard the lady's voice say clearly and distinctly: "Why not telegraph to him at once as if the sentence had been pronounced? Then he might suspend judgment before it is uttered." Mr. Broadrib pushed his bowler hat back on his head. "That's an idea," he said; "that's certainly an idea. I have already written to the home secretary giving him the details of the case. The point is, that we can't have these tribunals, which are supposed to be Liberal, though they certainly aren't, be made to appear ridiculous. Now can we, your Ladyship?" Again the lady said clearly: "I should think it would be extremely bad for the party." And the major really started. His eyes were no longer watering, but, before each of them, was the fatal round blur like a mist that had ruined his career. He could not see the bar- maid's face; he could not see Mr. Broadrib's face; by looking quickly downward he seemed to be able to dodge the blur and to see for a 214 RING FOR NANCY moment his own hands. But that was as far as it went. Mr. Broadrib struck the bar counter with his fist. "It's certainly an idea," he said; and then he added: "Give me a minute or two to think about it. I was never the one to desert a friend, and you fought Hke a Trojan for me at the election. If I can think of a form of words, I certainly will telegraph to the home secre- tary within these five minutes." The lady suddenly disappeared in the deep shadows through a little door that led into the hotel. Mr. Broadrib sat still, looking abstract- edly at three scarlet claret glasses that formed the decoration just under his nose. "I say," the major finally addressed him, "who did you happen to be talking about?" "About a man," Mr. Broadrib said, "called Major Edward Brent Foster." "Well, that's me," the major said. "Of course, I knew it was," Mr. Broadrib answered. "I thought you might like to know how the land lay, or I should not have talked like that in a bar." The major said, "Oh!" and then: "Fm very much obliged." Then he asked: "And that lady who appeared to be interested in me — who was she?" I RING FOR NANCY 215 "That was Lady Savylle, of Higham," Mr. Broadrib said. "She's an old friend of mine." "Well, she was always a confounded Radical/* the major commented. "She can afford to be." And then he made a clumsy rush toward the dark door through which the lady had dis- appeared. He upset three high cane stools and stumbled over a copper spittoon. Then he felt his arm grasped by Mr. Broadrib. "Look here, my friend," the Liberal member said, "you are not going into court drunk, are you?" "I'm not drunk," the major answered him. "I'm going blind." He tried to look at Mr. Broadrib, but he could not see him. "In the service of my grateful country," he added. Mr. Broadrib grasped his arm firmly by the elbow. "Then you had better let me take you into :ourt," he said. "Come along with me." He marched the major off. Ill ^TpHE Lady Savylle, of Higham, was per- •*• mitted by the manager of the County's Meet Hotel to watch the proceedings in court from the little generally disused door that com- municated from one of the upper passages of the old hotel with the court room of the old town hall. In the old days the county magis- trates had been used to permit any smugglers that were brought before them to escape up a little staircase running up the wall behind their worships* backs. If there looked to be any strong evidence against the smugglers, one of the magistrates would just wink at them, and these hardy and desperate fellows, as the news- papers of the day used to put it, would elude the attention of their guards, rush behind the magistrates' bench up the little wooden stair- case, and through the little door into the hotel corridor. And the door would be slammed in the faces of the constables, who were never in any particular hurry to get their noses pinched. Nowadays the staircase had been taken down, but the door remained, and Lady Savylle 216 RING FOR NANCY 217 had heard of its existence from a waiter who had been, man and boy, sixty years in the serv- ice of the hotel. She had given the waiter half a sovereign, and had had the door opened just a little so that she could see well down into the court. The court was a dilapidated place of old panels and decayed woodwork. The smell that came up from it was none of the pleasantest, but the view was quite good. There were a number of people in the court: Mr. Foster and his party, some reporters, a rat-catcher in vel- veteen, and an old mad lady who muttered and winked. Five quite old gentlemen sat on a raised platform. Four of them, indeed, had, in the words of Mr. Broadrib, beards like morn- ing mist and hair like uncombed sheep's wool. Mr. Justice Hills, however, the chairman of the bench, was so exceedingly bald and so clean- shaven, that his head appeared to have been skinned. And all the five of them had heavy expressions, drooping eyelids and airs of buoy- ant ill-temper. The clerk to the justices, a dis- mal man in a very dirty collar, appeared more depressed than anybody else. There were sev- eral policemen about the court, and an old man in a very ragged gown. Lady Savylle felt her- self to be in the presence of the legal powers of her country in formidable array. 218 ORING FOR NANCY They dismissed the cases against three poach- ers, threatening to have the gamekeepers who appeared against them prosecuted for perjury and forgery. They sentenced a publican, who was accused of permitting drunkenness on his premises, to ten days' imprisonment without the option of a fine. But this sentence the clerk of the court proceeded to revise. They disa- greed energetically about a case in which the defendant was said to have contravened the regulations against swine fever; for two of the magistrates professed themselves anarchist in- dividualists, and said that the law was prepos- terous, while Sir Arthur Johnson absolutely refused to take the evidence of any inspector. So that case was adjourned. Then Lady Sav- ylle heard a weak voice bleat: "Call Edward Brent Foster." The major was stepping into a sort of high pew, and a great deal of bustle began; she could see one of the reporters sharpening his pencil with great jerks, and she wondered why he had not got a fountain-pen. And there really was a moment when Sir Arthur Johnson seemed inclined to sit on the bench, but he descended to the witness-box and gave extraordinary and violent evidence, and with many gestures of a sweeping nature so that he resembled a splen- RING FOR NANCY 219 did viking. And the story he had to tell was so coherent and so extravagant, that Lady Savylle really thought that the major must have been committing mad crimes. She had the emotions of a person reading a wild Irish book; for Sir Arthur had a most tenacious memory, and repeated phrase after phrase of the major's with the accuracy of a shorthand reporter. i The major called the railway guard, who swore that the major was perfectly sober, and in addition, that Sir Arthur was always getting into adventures on the six forty-eight. But the justices would not permit him to continue that part of his evidence. Then the major called Mrs. Kerr Howe, who was at once put into a violent rage by her own particular problem. For she was too frightened of the major's uncle to declare that she was engaged to the major, and extra- ordinarily unwilling to declare that she was not. And then the justices cut her short and sent her out of the witness-box. What the impres- sion she had made on the court was. Lady Savylle could not gather; and no one there had any say in the affair but the justices, so that it did not really matter. The trial, indeed, though it was eccentric enough, was not in the least thrilling except for the imposing attitude of 220 RING FOR NANCY Sir Arthur, and except for Sir Arthur's evi- dence, it did not take seven minutes — two for the railway guard, two for Mrs. Kerr Howe and three for the major. The major went into the witness-box and leaned engagingly over the rail when he had taken the oath. The presiding justice told him to stand up, and he stood at attention. Then he began to speak. "I was traveling by the six forty-eight," he said, "and without the beginnings of a reflec- tion on her, I was anxious not to be alone with the lady who has just gone out of the box." The presiding justice snapped out, "Why?" and Sir Arthur Johnson from the well of the court called out: "That shows the sort of fellow this is!" And then majestically he looked all round him. "What we want to know," the tired but ferocious gentleman on the right of the bald chairman asked, "is whether you did, or did not, entice the prosecutor into your compart- ment.?" "I invited him," the major said. "I had half a hazy notion that I knew him." "You admit, then, that you were hazy?" the tired but ferocious gentleman on the left of the presiding justice asked. RING FOR NANCY 221 "I admit nothing of the sort," the major said. "I wanted a companion; the old gentleman wanted a first-class corner seat. I had a re- served carriage and I offered him what he wanted." "You admit to being drunk," the chairman said. "You admit to enticing the prosecutor into your compartment. Did you, or didn't you, stamp on his toes?" "Of course I stepped on his toes," the major said; "but it was the merest accident. You might have done it." The Lady Savylle suddenly had tears in her eyes; she did not know why it was. She was looking down upon him, and he was tired and dispirited; and she felt that he did not care — he did not care for anything so long as he shielded the reputations of Mrs. Kerr Howe and Miss Delamare, and the feelings of Miss Peabody. She wiped her eyes suddenly, for she just had to wipe them. It affected her like a story she had read frequently in Christmas supplements — a story in which a clown keeps his end up thoroughly before the footlights while his little daughter is dying at home of pneumonia and starvation. There was Edward Brent Foster playing his part; amiably and in a voice that just moved her bones. (It felt really like that. 222 RING FOR NANCY When he spoke she seemed to have little elec- tric currents running down the very bones of her arms and feet.) He v^as just talking to those farcical old men. And yet for half a dozen reasons he must have misery in his heart. "So that you admit," the voice of the bald gentleman v^as saying, "to drunkenness, entic- ing and assault. Now about the theft from the book-stalls . . ." The clerk to the justices looked up from below and said: "Really, my lord, that is a case upon another summons and in another court. Your Wor- ships can not try that!" "It's a question as to the credit of the wit- ness," Sir Arthur thundered. The three old men had all whispered together, and then with an astonishing swiftness the chairman remarked: "Two months for the assault, two months for the drunkenness, and two for the use of blas- phemous and obscene language. The decencies of life must be maintained against these liber- tines. The sentences to run consecutively." And then he added: "Call the next case!" and fell back into his chair as if he were exhausted to the point of death. This was his favorite attitude when he had disposed of a case in the King's Bench. RING FOR NANCY 223 It was then that Miss Delamare fainted. She fell right off the bench on which she had been sitting with a thud, but with no other sound. And she was so pretty, and so picturesque, that the policeman who had been suggesting to the major that he should leave the dock and go into the door marked "Prisoners," ran away to get a glass of water. Sir Arthur exclaimed: "Infamous!" though it was not clear whether his remark was addressed to the policeman or to Miss Delamare; and some one bleated, "Si- lence !" to no one in particular. And then Mary Savylle saw a telegraph boy wandering along the high backs of the pen that contained the court. He looked about stupidly, and in her excitement she called down: "Mr. Broadrib is there! Mr. Broadrib's there!" And she found that she had opened the door and was out on the little gallery trying to at- tract the attention of the labor member. And the only person who saw her was the major, who looked up and exclaimed: "Mary! By God, Mary!" His eyes, which had been rested because he had closed them long and frequently while he waited for his case to come on, had for just a moment grown clearer. He kicked open the 224 RING FOR NANCY door of the dock, jumped clear over the form of Miss Delamare, and stumbled against Sir Arthur Johnson, who had set his shoulder toward the major as if he were an association footballer resisting a charge. It was extraor- dinarily quick. Sir Arthur had grasped the major's shirt collar, and before Lady Savylle could understand what they were doing, a white linen circlet was in the irrepressible old gentleman's hand, and the major was tumbling over the telegraph boy in the outer passage. But he picked himself up. And then her lady- ship turned and ran. She went down the gallery like a lapwing, and turned up some very moldy stairs; she found herself in a corridor that had two of its windows broken, and the panes stuffed with straw. She pushed open a dilapidated white- washed door and she heard a scream. A ser- vant in her bodice and petticoat was washing her neck at a cracked basin. She exclaimed: "I'm Lady Savylle. Lock the door." The servant shivered. "I know your lady- ship," she said, "but I don't believe the door's got a lock." "Then put the chest of drawers in front of the door," her ladyship commanded. "A man will RING FOR NANCY 225 be breaking in here — a wild tearing Irishman!" The girl shivered "Oo-oo-oo !" and sank down upon her truckle-bed. And the whole back of the chest of drawers came out when Mary Sav- ylle, who was strong enough, just turned it round and set it against the rotten door. The floor was encumbered with the girl's clothes, cardboard boxes, and hairpins in an immense profusion. It was as if the poor girl who pos- sessed nothing else in the world had spent the whole of her poor fortune on these implements of decoration. She took her hand off her heart and remarked: "Your ladyship give me sich a turn!" And then she added: "But I understand it all! Your ladyship is pursued by a too ardent suitor!" "That's what they'd say in novelettes," Mary commented. "But he's not really a bit too ar- dent — only the moment is inconvenient. He has been sentenced to six months' labor." "Oh, poor dear," the servant said. "Them crule police!" Suddenly she jumped off the bed. "If a gentleman's coming here it's best he shouldn't see me in my naked neck and shoulders," she exclaimed, and she got herself into a black costume that had rusty brown pas- sages and white split seams. Her ladyship was listening. I 226 RING FOR NANCY "There's a noise," she said. "Then the sooner I make meself decent," the girl continued, "the better for us all. I shouldn't like a gentleman to see me without my cap and apern." She was covering up the deficiencies of her attire in a passably clean frilled apron, when Mary Savylle asked: "Isn't there anything else we could put against the door?" "Nothing," the girl answered, with a pro- found conviction. "For the bed, if you do seek to move him, all his legs they do fall off, and the washer-stand do be nailed against the wall, having but two to its body, and the way it do spill water is too tragic, for I suppose you wouldn't want your ardent suitor to get wet." At that moment the Lady Savylle could not have said what had brought her there. She must, she supposed, have acted in a sudden panic such as makes the eternal woman flee from the eternal man who in primeval days did his courting with a stone ax. "Well, I suppose I had better be going," she said. "There's some one on the stairs," the girl cried out. And then she began to scream. She screamed like the whistle of a locomotive; she screamed like the maddest wind in ten thou- 'Your ladyship give me sich a turn RING FOR NANCY 22Z sand telegraph wires. The Lady Savylle shut her ears hard, and saw the rotten door fall over the chest of drawers; then the chest of drawers fell over, letting out new streams of unsus- pected hairpins; and then the major was tramp- ling over the chest of drawers that dissolved leneath his feet. He plunged on the girl in her ip and apron, and shouted out: l"Mary, darling, I've got you now! This ily disguise can't deceive me any more." The girl continued to scream systematically, [onotonously and without emotion, as if she ire a pig being taken to market and having le time of its life, while the major held her a firm grasp. And then the word "Infamous!" sounded irough the room. Sir Arthur Johnson, quite It of breath but still triumphant, was crash- ing through the remains of the drawers and the cardboard boxes. He roared: "This is the sort of thing! Seduction of a poor servant in the very arms of justice!" And then he cried: "Officers, come up!" The Lady Savylle moved across to the major. She touched his arm that encircled the girl, and said in his ear: "If you want Mary Savylle, I am Mary Sav- ylle!" 228 RING FOR NANCY He looked round at her with an unseeing glance. "I can't see you," he said. "I only saw the cap and apron. Because they/re white," he added. His arms released the servant, and she sank down on the bed. The bed collapsed like an over-burdened camel, and there were two frightened policemen in the doorway. Sir Ar- thur thundered: "Officers, advance!" and the girl stopped screaming. It was as if a tap in her had been turned off, and the sudden silence was like a pain. The major looked unseeingly at the girl. '*You must be her ladyship's maid!" he ex- claimed with a sort of wonder and awe. "What an extraordinary thing." "Fve got too weak a heart," the girl an- swered. "The doctor he say that excitement would kill me. But it's worth it to be her ladyship's maid and live in a novelette and then die sudden!" The major repeated in an awed voice: "Extraordinary! though the other night . . . I could have sworn the other night . . ." Then i he tried to look at Mary Savylle. "I can't see i you," he said. "It's the exertion. It's affected my circulation! My eyes are full of blood!" RING FOR NANCY 229 Sir Arthur shouted: "Enough of this blas- phemous foolery! Officers, do your duty!" The frightened policemen did nothing at all. Mr. Broadrib walked into the room; he took hold of the major's elbow. *'You'd better go back to the dock," he said in metallic but calm tones. "TheyVe deter- mined to revise your sentence." He added to one of the policemen: "Here, you! Lead this gentleman back to the dock. Be careful with him; he's blind." And the major was led away with his dazed and puzzled expression. The Lady Savylle looked at Mr. Broadrib. "Oh, my good man!" she exclaimed, and her face was lamentable. "If he's blind . . ." And suddenly she stretched out her arms and fell upon Mr. Broadrib's broadcloth shoulder. She wept passionately and passionately. "There! There!" Mr. Broadrib said in the tones of an old woman comforting a child for a lost doll. "It's curable! I've seen many cases of it in Africa. Only make him a happy man and let him live at ease . . ." The servant, who had begun to cry, crawled, sitting, along her broken bed and began to kiss Lady Savylle's motionless hand that hung against Mr. Broadrib's side. 230 RING FOR NANCY *'If faithful service though, with but a weal heart, for the doctor he says it is so . . ." shd' began to blubber out, and she pressed her wet cheek against the hand. But Sir Arthur Johnson, who had remained triumphant and majestic, exclaimed to the two women : "Now you perceive the results of debauchery and feather-headedness. That infamous scoun- i drel is struck blind in the midst of his excesses; he is overwhelmed by the laws of his country, and you are two betrayed and abandoned women . . ." Mr. Broadrib looked round over the Lady Savylle's head that was still upon his shoulder. "Oh, go away for a silly old goat," he said. "Didn't you hear me tell the fellow that his sen- tence is to be revised?" f "Yes," Sir Arthur answered, with a splendid unconcern. "I told them they must give him another year, and they will." "Well, you run away and see," Mr. Broadrib said. I Sir Arthur looked him hard in the eyes. "You mean," he gasped, "that you have been meddling! Infamous!" He rushed from the room and they heard him exclaiming "Infa- mous!" all down the stairs. IV, THE major was taken back to Basildon, wrapped up like a bale of merchandise, in the motor; and it fell to Miss Peabody to be driven by the major's uncle in the dog-cart. For Miss Peabody had been deeply offended by Mrs. Foster in the well of the court. Mrs. Foster had wept over the condition of Miss Delamare when she fainted, and this had ap- peared to Miss Peabody to be excessive. She had said that she was the person to be con- sidered, as it was her fiance who was to be sent to prison, not Miss Delamare's. And Mrs. Foster had snapped out that she loved little Flossie's little finger better than the whole of Miss Peabody's body, and so did the major, and so did everybody with eyes in their heads. The words were unconsidered and spoken in emo- tion, but Miss Peabody treasured them up. The trial had been resumed and concluded with an air of extraordinary solemnity. The three justices upon the bench looked more tired and more tempestuous than ever; but they had received a telegram addressed to Mr. Broadrib 231 232 RING FOR NANCY and communicated to them which was couched in extraordinarily vigorous terms from the home secretary. And they reaHzed that the eyes of two great parties would certainly be upon them. They were going to act with the dignity that their country and the civilized world expected from them. Twenty minutes before they had been- in a very different case; they had been presiding in an obscure court over an obscure allegation against an obscure mem- ber of the wealthy classes. The moment the major was again in the dock, Mr. Justice Hills, who had by now remembered that he was a judge of the King's Bench, re- marked peremptorily: "Have you anything to say why sentence should not be pronounced on you?" The major remarked: "I thought you had pronounced sentence; I don't care tuppence. You obviously can't do anything so ridiculous as to sentence me to six months' imprison- ment for offenses that I never committed." Mr. Justice Hills appeared to be paying him no attention. "The offenses that you have com- mitted," he said, "are very serious, and we might take into consideration also your disre- spectful conduct to the court in leaving the dock before the end of the trial. But taking RING FOR NANCY 233 into consideration the fact that a female con- nection of yours had become indisposed, and that you were only acting in the interests of common humanity in desiring to fetch restora- tives for the lady . . ." "But I wasn't doing anything of the sort," the major said. ". . . taking into consideration the fact that you appeared" the judge said significantly, "to be going to fetch restoratives for the lady, we shall pass over that portion of your conduct. The sentence that we have already pronounced upon you was merely by way of showing you what are our powers. It should serve as an excellent warning to all evil-doers who may be tempted to act in the future as you have done in the past." "But bless my soul," the major said, "I didn't do anything at all." "But taking into consideration your youth and inexperience," the judge said, "and consid- ering also that a distinguished ornament of this bench" — here Mr. Justice Hills bowed in the direction of Mr. Broadrib — "has seen fit to in- tercede for you, and to explain that you have suffered what it is customary to call *consider- able hardship' in the service of your country, we are ready to use the powers of reconsidera- 234 RING FOR NANCY tion that the law has given into our hands, and to apply to you the First Offenders' Act. You are discharged." "Well," the major said, "I guess the First Offenders' Act was never more fittingly applied. For wasn't it the first offense of the sort that was ever tried? — to offer an old gentleman a corner seat in one's reserved carriage — for that's the only offense that has been proved against me." Then he stepped down out of the dock and gave the blushing policeman half a sov- ereign. He felt that it was the least he could do under the circumstances. There was a great deal of tension in the Manor House that night, for during her drive in the dog-cart, Miss Peabody, who was not in the least satisfied with the course the trial had taken, took occasion to insist that Mr. Arthur Foster should refuse absolutely to sign the con- tract for the new theater. She took occasion also to say many things that completely de- stroyed the character of Miss Delamare. For what had most irritated her in the things of the trial had been the fact that Miss Delamare had fainted and not she herself. This appeared to her to be the most disgraceful episode in the disgraceful career of that actress, for she con- sidered that the fainting fit was an absolute RING FOR NANCY 235 proof of what she called "guilty relations" be- tween Miss Delamare and the major. So that, when he got down from the dog-cart, Mr. Arthur Foster went straight to his wife's room and an- nounced that he was determined to refuse Miss Delamare the leading part in the new theater. To his intense relief his wife said not a single word beyond the one phrase: "Then I advise you not to say a word of it to Miss Delamare." But there was a sort of steely enigmatic man- ner about the lady that seriously alarmed Mr. Foster. He attempted to explain the motives of his resolve, but Mrs. Foster only answered: "It's your own money, I suppose. You can do what you like with it. You had better go away now; I want to give orders about Edward's dinner. He won't come down this evening; he is not well. I shan't either; I'm not well, and Flossie will dine with me. She's not well." And the moment Mr. Foster was gone Mrs. Foster rang the bell and told her maid to tell her ladyship's own maid that if Miss Jenkins was at liberty, she would come and see Miss Jenkins in the housekeeper's room. And she followed so hard on the heels of her own maid, that she was in Miss Jenkins' room before the servant had got the words out of her mouth. She said, with the remains of the dignity that she had been bestowing upon her husband: 236 RING FOR NANCY "I'll trouble you, Miss Jenkins, to arrange that I have another room, and that my things are removed from mine to-morrow morning." And then, the servant being gone from the room, she said: "I really can't help it. Miss Jen- kins; either that v^onian goes, or I do." And she burst into a flood of tears. Miss Jenkins settled her dov^n into her arm- chair before the fire. She produced a small green phial that contained sedative drops; she dropped six of these on to a lump of sugar and she put the lump of sugar in Mrs. Foster's mouth. "You will feel better in three minutes," she said; "and during those three minutes you had better just cry, ma'am." The room was small and square and comfort- able, and Mrs. Foster cried on, letting her tears fall on the fender. Miss Jenkins stood calm and erect on the other side of the table that had a red baize covering. She looked down at her fingers and reflected. "Of course, ma'am," she said at last, "if you really wanted Miss Peabody ejected from this household, I can do it for you!" Mrs. Foster looked up from the fireplace. "If I want it!" she exclaimed. "I want nothing else; nothing else in the world. That RING FOR NANCY 237 woman is the ruin of all our lives, and if I spoke discourteously to her in the court, which I couldn't help, being carried out of myself by anxiety for Flossie — for I said to her, meaning Miss Peabody, that I loved Miss Delamare's little finger better than the whole of Miss Pea- body's body — though it would be more proper to say that I hate the whole of Miss Peabody's body and soul and mind and machinations, for she's plotting and plotting and plotting — and so did the major love Flossie better, though I'm not saying that he's in love with her, and so would anybody who had a feeling heart in his or her breast. "And now she's plotted and plotted until she's got Mr. Foster to desert Flossie Delamare — and I'm sure if I wasn't afraid the major would need my money, I'd set Miss Dela- mare up in a theater myself. And I'm sure of this, too, that unless Mr. Foster changes his mind in the night without any words spoken by me, I will never sleep in the same room with him again, for he's so weak and so easily influ- enced, that I'm tired of him and done with him; ^and that's the last word I mean to say about this for fear of boring you. Miss Jenkins; but this isn't the last word I'm going to think, and the thoughts come bubbling up in me like the 238 RING FOR NANCY water of a plum-pudding that I used to watcH boiling when I was in my father's house. For the admiral he was a man, though a rampant roaring man and the major is my own boy, and I'd go to the bad for him; but as for Mr. Fos- ter . . ." — Mrs. Foster suddenly closed her lips tight — "well, I can't think of what to say about Mr. Foster, and it wouldn't beseem me to say it if I could think of it." Miss Jenkins remained reflecting for quite a long time. At last she said: "Of course, I'm willing to attempt to eject the lady; and if you give me a free hand I'm perfectly willing to try to do it, and do it I think I can. I should prefer it just to come about, for, if there's any kind of decency in things, it would come about. But there doesn't seem to be — any kind of decency in things. I should have thought that when those charges were made against the major Miss Peabody, consid- ering her nature, would have thrown the major over. But that doesn't seem to be her nature. On the contrary, it's acted in the other way. So that if you ask me, I will do what I can, though it appears to me to be a discreditable action, and that's all there is to it." Mrs. Foster suddenly stood up. "A discredit- able action?" she asked. "Did you ever hear of RING FOR NANCY 239 Saint George? — the gentleman who rescued a naked princess from a dragon. And did you ever hear that that was a discreditable action? — though I can't say that the major is anything like a naked princess, and neither am I for the matter of that. But if you could rescue us from this dragon — two of us . . ." and Mrs. Foster broke off, to begin again with extraordinary vigor: ''Discreditable! why she's the ruin . . . why she's the end . . ." and Mrs. Foster broke off again and remarked: "But I'm boring you." Miss Jenkins still remained standing perfectly ill, looking downward and reflecting. "It seems to me, ma'am," she said at last, 'that if you are going to separate from Mr. 'oster, it would be more proper and seemly |lhat he should be moved away from your room |than you. And if you agree to that, that's what I'll do to-morrow morning." "I dare say you're right. Miss Jenkins," Mrs. Foster said. "You put us all right in every- thing. But that's not the important point. The important point is, what are you going to do about the other thing?" "I don't think I can tell you about that, ma'am," Miss Jenkins answered. PART III TiyrR. ARTHUR FOSTER had a thoroughly^ ^^^ uncomfortable dinner with Miss Peabod}^ and Mrs. Kerr Howe. Miss Peabody was ex- ceedingly nervous; Mr. Foster was thoroughly fidgety; and Mrs. Kerr Howe talked inces- santly, and with a hard insistence, about the reform of conventional marriage and her new play, which she had almost persuaded Miss Delamare to promise to stage at the reformed theater. This made Mr. Foster extremely un- comfortable, for he could not help remembering at every word of Mrs. Kerr Howe, that he had promised to suppress the reformed theater. Miss Peabody, on the other hand, was pleased. She thought it really splendid that Mrs. Kerr Howe should prove by her conversation, which could only be regarded as immoral in the ex- treme, that a reformed theater conducted by a person like Miss Flossie Delamare would be an exceedingly undesirable thing, not only for the morals of the country, but also for Mr. Foster^s own social advancement. She wanted, indeed, to explain this to Mr. 243 244 RING FOR NANCY Foster after dinner. She meant to tell him that merely turning out Miss Delamare need not necessarily suppress the theater altogether. She herself, she wanted to say, was perfectly ready and able to run the theater. Of course, she was not capable of acting herself, but with the lit- erary education that she had received in Bos- ton, which is the acknowledged metropolis of learning for the world, she would be perfectly able to select the plays which were to be pro- duced, and to engage actresses of serious and not merely frivolous gifts. She was anxious, moreover, to insist that Mr. Foster should en- force his authority and have Miss Delamare ejected from the house next day. She wanted to say that Flossie was leading the major astray. She was absolutely certain of this. She thought she had surprised glances between the major and Miss Delamare in the court. But she did not get any conversation with Mr. Foster. He was fidgetingly anxious for some conversation with his wife, and when Mrs. Kerr Howe said that she was going to get her play and read them the second act, he took the opportunity of going up-stairs to his wife's bed- room. Miss Peabody, also, went to her own room; so that when Mrs. Kerr Howe returned to the drawing-room she found no audience at RING FOR NANCY 245 all for her play, and she spent the rest of the evening playing the music of Pigs is Pigs in solitude among ghostly men in armor. Mr. Foster did not find his wife in her bed- room. And when he asked her maid, he was told that Mrs. Foster was with the major. He went there himself, and there he found the major in his dressing-gown lying in the long armchair before the fire. He had a green shade over his eyes, and Mrs. Foster and Miss Delamare were also there. Mrs. Foster was knitting Berlin wool; Miss Delamare was mak- ing up a ball from a skein that the major held over his two hands, and they were all laughing at the tops of their voices, because Miss Dela- mare was giving them an exact imitation of the mannerisms of all the three justices, of the policemen, of Mr. Broadrib and Sir Arthur Johnson. Just as Mr. Foster came into the room, she was erecting her head, frowning tre- mendously and exclaiming: "Infamous!" The pleasant family tone of the room affected Mr. Foster with a sort of homesickness. He asked to be permitted to sit down, and no one forbade it. And then he informed his nephew that he intended to write to The Times to de- nounce the Lord Chancellor's new experiments in justices of the peace. The major thanked 246 RING FOR NANCY his uncle, and begged him not to take so much trouble; but Mr. Foster said it was his duty as the sturdy Nonconformist Unionist that he was. Mrs. Foster just sat and knitted, but there was in her eyes an expression so nearly resembling the steely and the ironical, that Mr. Foster's nervousness increased. And then once again, Flossie, who was the most good-natured little soul alive, and who perceived that there was in the air a decided strain, began a new series of imitations of the trial. But Mr. Foster observed that, although his wife laughed till the tears c^me when Miss Delamare said: "Have you anything to say why sentence should not be passed upon you?" Mrs. Foster became steely and cold in expression whenever he raised his own voice. And after an hour and a half of it he really could not stand it any longer. He said: ^ "My dear, I should be really glad of a word with you." Mrs. Foster rose in an extraordinarily stiff manner and followed him out of the room. He led her into the next bedroom, turned up the light and closed the door. "My dear," he began at once in a hurried and flustered voice, "I want you to understand that I am perfectly reasonable in the step I propose RING FOR NANCY 247 to take. Putting aside the facts of Flossie's past history, I have just been listening to the plot of a play by Mrs. Kerr Howe . . ." Mrs. Foster interrupted him suddenly and disconcertingly: "If you can find it in your heart to say anything against that little creature who's sitting in there with my Edward . . ." "I wasn't saying anything at all against her," Mr. Foster exclaimed: *'but this play of Mrs. Kerr Howe's that she has promised to put on . . ." "She hasn't promised to put on any play by Airs. Kerr Howe at all," Mrs. Foster said. "She hasn't promised, and she isn't going to." "But it's a terrible play," Mr. Foster re- marked. "It's no good talking, Arthur," his wife answered, "and I'm not going to talk:. If your own heart doesn't tell you what's right and proper, you're not the man I took you for, and there's an end of it. I won't hear another word." "But consider the whole of the circum- stances," Mr. Foster said. "Consider that we could not possibly have Miss Delamare in the house when Edward is married to Olympia. Consider all the trouble it would make. Con- sider the scandal it would cause if Olympia ob- 248 RING FOR NANCY jected. Surely, surely, we've got to consider that splendid and gifted woman before the pri- vate wishes of any other member of the house- hold. You haven't got anything to say against that, have you?" He paused for some reply from his wife, but there came none. There was beginning a babble of voices from the corridor. "That appears to me to be the first thing to be considered," Mr. Foster repeated. "Surely you will not deny that!" "That first thing that seems to me to be con- sidered," Mrs. Foster said maliciously, "is that, by your silliness, Flossie and Edward have been left alone in his bedroom, and that your fine madam has discovered them there. You can hear her pretty voice . . ." And there was no mistaking the fact that the raised tones of Miss Peabody were coming from somewhere at no great distance. They went side by side into the next room. "This is the end," Miss Peabody was exclaim- ing tragically, in the closing words of a long invocation. She turned upon Mr. Foster. "Here," she exclaimed, "you have ocular proof of the abandoned nature of this young person. Is it conceivable that any other mem- RING FOR NANCY 249 ber of her sex would be found in these circum- stances?" There was such fire in her voice and gestures that Mr. Foster was really sHghtly alarmed. ''God bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "Not in each other's arms!" "And why shouldn't they be?" Mrs. Foster asked, with an alarming sharpness. It was so alarming that Mr. Foster blurted out: "Of course, it would not be a proof of guil — of guilty . . ." And then Miss Peabody exclaimed, "Silence!" with such vigor that they were all quiet. "They were not in each other's arms," she continued. "Why should they be? I am not complaining of Edward. I trust him implicity. But it is this abandoned and shameless woman whom I find here that I denounce. I accuse her of creeping after my fiance on every occasion; of using devices to attract his affection. I accuse her . . ." "Really, Olympia," the major began, but she took no notice; and for a minute they were talking together. Miss Peabody's voice came out triumphant. "A woman who is capable of putting herself into such a situation . . ." "Of course, my dear lady," Mr, Foster said. 250 RING FOR NANCY "it is very shocking. But still there are . . . there are extenuating circumstances . . ." Miss Peabody said, "What are they?" with such violence that Mr. Foster forgot completely all that he had meant to say. And she con- tinued triumphantly: "A woman who will come to a man's rooms . . ." And then Miss Delamare stood up. "Don't you forget," she remarked good- humoredly, "that I am not the only pebble on the beach. You're making such a ridiculous ex- hibition of yourself, that you do not deserve any sympathy; but still — ^just remember that for a minute." Miss Peabody exclaimed, "Mr. Foster!" in tones so tragic that Mr. Foster started toward her side. "Now we've had enough of this," Mrs. Foster remarked, and at the same moment Miss Pea- body said: "We've had more than enough of this," and she looked fixedly at Mr. Foster to remark: "Either Miss Delamare leaves this house, or I do." And like an echo Mrs. Foster said: "Either Miss Delamare stays here, or I go." Miss Peabody really started. "Either Miss Delamare stays in this house," RING FOR NANCY 251 Mrs. Foster repeated categorically, "or I go out of it, I hope you understand me." Mr. Foster stuttered: "What? What? W^hat?" "Yes, what, what, what," Mrs. Foster said hysterically. "For a long time Miss Delamare has been more than a daughter to me. I've never known what it was to have a child, or any comfort; and now I know it, and I'm not going to give it up. I've had the dear and precious luxury of having my Edward, but that's going to be only for a week or two. He's going to be taken from me by a woman whom I can never like. And I am not going back to my loneliness again. So that it's come to this . . ." And Mrs. Foster looked round her with an expres- sion of courageous terror. "Now here, with all of you to witness, I adopt Miss Delamare for my own child. So long as she stays where I am she is my own dear daughter. And if she is driven out of it I go with her. And I will be her chaperon and wait for l;er outside the theater, or whatever it is her paid chaperon does, if she'll have me, until world without end." For a moment Miss Peabody gazed round her in what might have been called a baleful man- ner. Then she swallowed a disagreeable lump in her throat. She had got hold of the situa- 252 RING FOR NANCY tion so thoroughly that, although this announce- ment entirely changed the situation, it did not take her more time than that moment of swal- lowing to know pretty well where she stood. She knew, for instance, that although she had Mr. Foster very much under her thumb, she had not got him sufficiently there to make him con- template with equanimity the prospect of a definite breach with Mrs. Foster. She could See that that elderly gentleman was exceedingly "on the jump," as nervous as a man well could be; and she knew that she would have to do something to calm matters down. She was still determined to eject Miss Delamare from the re- formed theater scheme, and she thought she could always influence Mr. Foster sufficiently for that by just forcing it perpetually on his attention that no one would take Miss Delamare seriously enough, if she were left as the acting manageress of the theater — aeriously enough to make the theater any good for Mr. Foster's social advancement. She knew that there she was on pretty safe ground, whereas when it came to attacking Miss Delamare's moral character, although she was perfectly certain that Miss Delamare was an infamous woman, she realized that she had not got anything to go upon. She 1^ RING FOR NANCY 253 had never heard a single word against Flossie. But Flossie could not be taken very seriously, and a theater that Flossie ran certainly could not be taken seriously enough to get Mr. Fos- ter a knighthood as a national benefactor. She remained perfectly determined to oust Flossie Delamare from that family; but she saw that she had been too precipitate. She would just have to wait till she was safely mar- ried to the major. She had time enough in that one action of swallowing to feel what you might call all the elements in that situation, although she certainly did not have time to put them into thoughts. And she just said: "Of course, that entirely alters matters alto- gether. Of course, if Mrs. Foster has adopted Miss Delamare, it makes Miss Delamare in a sort of a way almost Edward's sister. So that I can see that various little tokens of affection from Flossie — if I might call her Flossie . . ." "I think you had better call me Florence," iss Delamare said. "That's my name." ". . . any little evidences of affection that Florence may have shown Edward are, of course, upon an entirely different basis." "Of course, of course," Mr. Foster said. "And that being so," Miss Peabody con- tinued, "there doesn't seem to me to be any- 254 • RING FOR NANCY thing left for me but to congratulate Florence on the news that I have just heard, and to hope that everything will be very pleasant in the future." "So that that's all right, that's all right," Mr. Foster remarked. "Things have got to be much more pleasant in the future," Mrs. Foster said hardly. "They've just got to be. I'm not going to have my Edward worried any more. I don't like to see him sitting about here with a green shade over his eyes. I'm going to take him up to town to-morrow in the motor, myself, to see a specialist. I want to hear what's said, and what's to be done for him. I know that excite- ment and trouble and all these things are bad for his eyes, and there's an end of it." For a moment Miss Peabody thought of say- ing that, in that case, she ought to be allowed to be of the party; but she suddenly remem- bered that that would leave Mr. Foster open to the advances of Miss Delamare, and she said instead: "That would be an immense relief to my mind." "Well," the major remarked from under his green shade, "you have had the most terrific and edifying scrap over my poor body, and I hope you are admiring the pretty way in which I laid ¥ RING FOR NANCY 255 still and didn't poke my nose into it. And now that it's all settled — and it's thankful I am that it's all settled without my having to make any exertions — for usually it's me who has to take command of all these situations ..." "Oh, but, Teddy," Miss Delamare suddenly interrupted him, "it isn't all settled; it isn't really quite altogether settled. I guess I want an apology — an exact, and what you would call a specific, apology from Miss Peabody." Olympia exclaimed: "But good gracious, I've apologized and withdrawn everything." "Oh, it isn't for me," Flossie said amiably. "I have a public character, and I guess I can stand all the shot that's ever shot against me without the hair of one of my wigs, whether it's auburn or black, standing up on end. No, it isn't for me I want the apology, but it's for Mrs. Fos- ter." "But," Mr. Foster exclaimed, "nobody has insulted Mrs. Foster." "Well, if you can't see it," Miss Delamare said, "I can. Miss Peabody has accused Mrs. Foster of throwing in the major's way the sort of woman — well, the sort of woman that you couldn't leave alone with him . . ." "Oh, come, Flossie, dear," the major said; "there's quite enough of all this." 256 RING FOR NANCY "No, there isn't," Miss Delamare answered. "If Mrs. Foster's going to be my mother, I'm going to stand up for my mother, and things have got to be perfectly good and straight." Miss Peabody had started with rage when she heard the major say "Flossie, dear." She had sufficient sense to see that she was up against it — right absolutely up against it. She would have to apologize to Mrs. Foster at the demand of Flossie Delamare, and that was the bitterest proposition that had ever been put to her in her life. In some odd way it increased her hatred for Miss Delamare a thousandfold. She felt almost that, supposing a knife had been handy, she could have plunged it into Miss Dela- mare's throat. But when Mrs. Foster exclaimed, "I certainly think that some sort of apology ought to be made to me," Miss Peabody said from a dry throat: "Of course, I had no idea of insulting any- body; and it stands to reason that if I have done so I take it all back. I simply did not know what the circumstances were." "Well, then, that's handsome," Miss Dela- mare said; "and just to let you know exactly what the circumstances are — and I'm sure it ought to put your troubled mind at rest — I will RING FOR NANCY 257 just tell you that I love Teddy here just as much as it's possible to love anybody in the world. And how couldn't I! For when I come to think of what I might have been, if it had not been for Teddy picking me up and putting me on my feet at a time when, as he says, I was a half-starved little rat — I just shudder to think about it. So I just love Teddy w^ith the deepest gratitude you could possibly get out of a half- starved rat; but if you think, Olympia, that I'd go poaching on your, or any other woman's, preserves — why, you're a much sillier fool than I ever took you for, and you appear to me to be pretty foolish at times.'* "Oh, I quite believe you," Miss Peabody said. And the odd thing was, that she did perfectly believe Miss Delamare and that she hated her — in spite of that belief — so that she really felt that she was going to faint. She said to Mr. Foster: "If you will just give me that paper of statistics — the blue one, A32 — I shall go to my room and study them." With a frightened glance at his wife — a sort of agonized appeal to her — Mr. Foster went out of the room. This did not please Mrs. Foster. II T^ISS PEABODY managed to fix up her ^^^ own particular side of the matter pretty well before the unfortunate Mr. Foster got to bed that night. She really had begun to make him see that Miss Delamare was not the person to run a serious theater. She had the sense to repeat in private what she had said, as it were, in public, before the others. She with- drew in the frankest and most unlimited way anything that she had ever said against Flossie's moral character. But she pointed out with great insistence that a lady whose highest idea of praise was to be called the "symphonic em- bodiment of quaint imbecility" was not obvious- ly the person to manage a theater that should stand for great and serious moral truths. Mr. Foster took his stand upon the words "sym- phonic embodiment." These seemed to him to be words matchless and remarkable. He did not exactly know what they meant, but they appeared to him to be very strengthening. But Miss Peabody hammered in the other two words "quaint imbecility." She said that there could 258 RING FOR NANCY 259 not possibly be any mistake as to what those words meant, and they certainly did not mean anything that had anything at all to do with a high and serious moral purpose. • And the unfortunate old gentleman knew so absolutely nothing about the theater or about the drama, that Miss Peabody spent an hour and a half in trying to instruct him as to the literary point of view of Boston, which is the center of the serious world. She committed herself so far as to say that Flossie was a dear little thing. She had to get the words out though they nearly choked her; but what, she asked, had a dear little thing to do with the high region of starlit thought that was sym- bolized by such great names as Emerson, Long- fellow, Henry Ward Beecher and Nathaniel Hawthorne — not to mention Walt Whitman, and Henrik Ibsen who didn't come from Bos- ton? She pointed out delicately that although Mrs. Foster was the most amiable person in the world, she was not a lady of whose intellectual opinions Mr. Foster himself had a very high view. And she pointed out, too, that from the beginning to the end of this theater scheme, Mr. Foster must really have been actuated by his wife's affection for dear little Flossie; and she sfot him to see at last that that was not a 260 RING FOR NANCY very rational position, and she got him at last to be exceedingly afraid that he would become the laughing-stock of all the serious people who read Emerson and Thoreau and Walt Whitman, and all the other serious American, Noncon- formist and Puritan writers. And she made him understand that the people in high places who could confer titles read nothing else but the works of these transatlantic moralists. Ab- solutely nothing else. It was the greatest triumph of Miss Pea- body's career. For, before she let Mr. Foster go to bed, she had extracted from him a promise — in his interests, in hers, in Mrs. Foster's, in the major's, and even in dear little Flossie's own interests — that he would absolutely suspend any decision about the theater — at any rate for a day or two — until Miss Peabody had had an opportunity of talking to all the parties con- cerned. She was convinced that she would be able to make it clear even to Flossie that it could only do her harm to attempt to run a theater in such a way as to be the laughing- stock of all admirers of Oliver Wendell Holmes or even of Mr. Bernard Shaw, though she could not be quite certain that Mr. Shaw was always serious. The praise that she had been forced to bestow Upon Miss Delamare made Miss Peabody feel RING FOR NANCY 261 actually ill. Each time that she called Flossie a dear little thing — and she did it half a dozen times in the course of the evening — her hatred mounted and mounted. And nothing would have prevented her going up to Flossie's bed- room, and giving her the piece of her mind, which she certainly intended to do, save that she really felt herself too shaky to do herself jus- tice. Mr. Foster went rather tremblingly up to bed. Mrs. Foster was lying with her head side- wise on the pillow and her eyes open. And at first Mr. Foster really intended to do his un- dressing and to get into bed without saying a word, as indeed was his general practise. But while he was loosening his braces he suddenly brought out the words: **IVe decided to suspend my judgment about the theater.*' Mrs. Foster, without moving, asked: "That's all, then?" "Well, my dear," Mr. Foster began to pro- test, "you can hardly expect more than that. There are an immense number of reasons . . ." "I don't want to listen to any reasons," Mrs, Foster said. "I want to go to sleep. Your money's your own, and your risks are your own; and that's all there is to say about it." And Mr. Foster decided to leave it at that. Ill A^ASTING about in her mind for something ^^ that would aid her cause, Miss Peabody, in the early morning, hit upon the idea that if she used a little skill, she might be able to make very effective use of her ladyship's own maid. She reflected that servants were usually venial, untruthful and immoral, and she imagined that she might be able to use these qualities in the excellent work of ridding that household at least of Miss Delamare. She began to foresee that she might even rid it of Mrs. Foster herself, though that was a very great flight. Accordingly, after the major and his aunt had set off in the motor for London, she rang her bedroom bell and told her maid to tell her ladyship's own maid that she would be obliged by an interview. Before, however, she let her own servant go, she inquired as to the habits and customs of Miss Jenkins. What she learned was mostly that, in the opinion of her own maid, her ladyship's own maid could scarcely be considered a servant. She was more like a land-stewardess; the other 262 RING FOR NANCY 263 servants hardly ever saw her. She lived in a housekeepers room of her own. At first she had been waited on by Mr. Foster's servants, but yesterday she had imported an own maid of her own from the county town, and she Hved more sechided than ever. Miss Peabody's maid informed her that there was nothing very un- usual in all this, though her ladyship's own maid carried haughtiness rather further than most, treating even Saunders, Mr. Foster's butler, at a great distance, though most politely. Miss Peabody's maid knew nothing to speak of about a policeman. She had — like all the other servants — seen Miss Jenkins talking to a policeman. But they had all wanted to talk to the policemen, and there was nothing to be said against Miss Jenkins' talking to him first. She had the right, con- sidering her position, and the officer had touched his cap to her most civilly and re- spectfully. And when Miss Peabody had said that all this seemed a little strange, the servant had answered: "Oh, dear me, no, miss," and she added: "Not at all strange, miss, that, in these Radical times with heaven knows who, and foreigners, and all that, ladies like her ladyship's own 264 RING FOR NANCY j maid should be wishful to keep themselves select." So that Miss Peabody thought it would be better to leave it at that. She realized that her task was more formidable than she had supposed, and it was with a certain nervous- ness that she thanked Miss Jenkins for coming to her with great promptitude. And she added at once: j "I quite understand. Miss Jenkins, that it would be useless for me to offer you any — any pecuniary reward, but I want to ask you, as from one woman to another, whether you did not think that the present position of affairs is very odd." And it relieved her immensely when Miss Jenkins answered: "Extremely odd, miss." And then Miss Peabody imagined that Miss Jenkins might not understand her, and she thought to make her position quite plain by adding: "I mean this affair of Mrs. Foster's . .adopting Miss Delamare." \ Miss Jenkins answered: "I perfectly under- stand, miss." "So that you won't find it strange," Miss Peabody continued, "if I have asked you to give me your own views of it all." "It's flattering, miss, if I may say so," her RING FOR NANCY 265 ladyship's own maid commented. "But as to views . . ." "Oh," Miss Peabody said airily, "I thought you might have some little information to give me about . . . well, about just anything. Tri- fles, you know . . /' "Information!" Miss Jenkins repeated. "They say, you know," Miss Peabody said, "that servants — let us say onlookers — know more of us than we know ourselves. And you might know something about Miss Delamare — just as by accident I happen to have observed the little incident of yourself and the police- man . . ." Miss Jenkins said: "The policeman?" And then she added: "Oh!" And Miss Peabody had not the slightest doubt that the small start which Miss Jenkins gave was indicative at least of a perturbed and probably of a guilty conscience. She continued therefore: "Of course, I don't attach any im- portance to such a little thing, but still . . . you understand ... if it was only that it might be regarded as a mesalliance . . ." And then Miss Peabody paused, for she felt she was upon dangerous ground; but she continued at last: "So that if you had observed any little things ^ — trifles — in the behavior of Miss Del . . ." 266 RING FOR NANCY "I don't think I have observed anything, miss," her ladyship's own maid rephed; "not anything that one could really mention . . ." "But I think you might as well mention it," Miss Peabody said. Miss Jenkins answered: "Oh, no, miss. They're not things that one really could men- tion. I'm certainly not going to mention them." And Miss Jenkins' Hps closed under Miss Peabody's eyes so firmly, that Miss Pea- body was convinced that she certainly did not mean to impart any of the unmentionable things that Miss Peabody imagined her to have seen. And Miss Peabody had to reflect for a minute. Then she gave up the idea of trying to coerce her ladyship's own maid. It simply was not, she could plainly see, to be done. It would be much better to seek to make a friend of her. ' She therefore made the following reasoned and subduedly passionate appeal to the feelings of her ladyship's own maid. a "You will have seen," she said, "and, indeed, 1 you acknowledge that you have seen, what is going on in this house. You perceive that a young lady — without doubt a charming young lady, but still a young lady — has obtained such a hold over the mistress of the house, that the entire establishment is in danger of misery and RING FOR NANCY W may very well be in danger of ruin. I don't know if you know the exact circumstances. This young lady, by means which I won't specify, has obtained from Mr. Foster an absolute prom- ise, not only to start a theater for her, but to run it for a considerable period of time. Mr. Foster is, of course, an exceedingly wealthy man; he runs a hundred and fifty bakers' shops. But you probably know as well as I do that the expenses of a theater are enormous, and that the profits of a hundred and fifty bakers' shops may be very well eaten up by the expenses of less than one theater. Putting the matter on this basis, this young lady is therefore a very^ dangerous — well, let me say adventuress." "I quite follow you, miss," her ladyship's own maid said. "And not only that," Miss Peabody con- tinued, "but this person threatens to destroy the peace of the family that until she came into it was exceedingly united. I don't think it can be denied that her influence upon this family is a very unhealthy one. She has obtained over Mrs. Foster an influence which can only be sig- nalized by that one word 'unhealthy,' and al- though I have no wish to suggest anything against the major, her influence over him is bound to be unhealthy in the long run. Simi- 268 RING FOR NANCY larly it is not healthy for Mr. Foster — an elderly and impressionable gentleman — to be closeted for long hours with a young and attractive woman. As for Mrs. Foster, her attachment to this person partakes of the nature of an imbecile obsession; for it is absolutely unnatural that an old woman with no particular brains, provided with a most excellent husband, an attached nephew and a prospective niece-in-law who is ready to treat her with all the kindness that she deserves — it is unthinkable that if the old lady were sane and healthy, she should find it neces- sary to adopt a casual stranger off the streets. I suppose you understand what I mean?'* "Well, I can hear what you are saying, miss," Miss Jenkins said. "Now I am sure," Miss Peabody continued, "that you have the proper feelings that do credit to our common womanhood, and I am sure that you will do all that you can to put an end to this state of things." "Fm sure Fm quite ready to, miss," Miss Jenkins said, "but . . ." "But!" Miss Peabody ejaculated almost in- credulously. "Can there be any doubt about it? Can you have any hesitation about helping to put an end to a state of things that is lament- able and disgraceful to a family in which you RING FOR NANCY 269 are bound to take some interest? Of course, I am aware that you may say you are in this house only in the interests of Lady Savylle. But I think I can take upon myself to say in your mistress's name that her ladyship would entirely approve of your attempt to break down this infamous position." "Oh, I have no doubt her ladyship would approve,^ Miss Jenkins said slowly. "The only thing is, do you feel perfectly certain that things will turn out exactly as you wish?" "I haven't the least doubt of it," Miss Pea- body said. "Only give me a hold over this in- famous woman, and the old state of peace will descend upon this family." "I don't know, miss," her ladyship's own maid said; "I think I know more about family quarrels than probably you do, and it will aston- ish you how people split up and fly apart." "My good girl," Miss Peabody said sharply, "I am probably ten or fifteen years older than you, and I think I may be said to know tKe world quite well enough to be able to manage my own affairs." "Of course, that's as it may be," Miss Jenkins was beginning, when Miss Peabody broke in upon her speech. "Do you mean to say," she exclaimed, — "but. 270 RING FOR NANCY of course, you wouldn't dare to insinuate — that Major Edward will not fulfil his duty to me?" "Oh, no, miss," her ladyship's own maid answered. "That's the one thing in the situa- tion that can be regarded as perfectly certain — ^ that Major Foster will stick to his duty." "Then," Miss Peabody exclaimed triumphant- ly, "what do you propose to imagine can happen to mef You don't suppose that it's my inten- tion again to accuse Miss Delamare of indiscre- tions before other people? That, I acknowl- edge, was a great mistake on my part, but I was carried away by my legitimate indignation. What I wish to do is to obtain a private hold over Miss Delamare." Miss Jenkins said, "Oh!" and Miss Peabody asked her sharply what she meant. "I only mean, miss," her ladyship's own maid said, "that that seems the proper — well, let us say the most effective course you can pursue." "I'm glad you see that/' Miss Peabody said. "But it won't be so very easy," Miss Jenkins answered. "I have got an absolute trust in you," Miss Peabody retorted. "Of course, I expect you to do it for me." "I don't think you can quite expect me to do that, miss," her ladyship's own maid said. RING FOR NANCY 271 "But you're acquainted with all the winding staircases and secret doors of this old house in a way no one else here can approach/* Miss Peabody answered. "And you do listen at doors. We know from the other night that you do listen at doors." "But I only listen at doors, miss," her lady- ship's own maid said, "when it seems likely that there will be a misunderstanding that I can smooth out. It's my duty to look after the reputation of her ladyship's house; and," she continued, "I don't think it's for me to take up the business of a spy, and I should strongly ad- vise you, miss, not to have anything to do with it either." "Spy!" Miss Peabody said. "Do you wish to insult me?" "Of course, miss," her ladyship's own maid conceded, "that's all a matter of point of view. Of course, if I did it, I should feel like a spy, supposing that any harm to anybody was to come of it. But of course you, miss, may feel like a righteous detective about to confront a guilty person." "Of course, that's exactly what I do feel like," Miss Peabody said. "Then your conscience is probably all right," Miss Jenkins answered, "and I don't see that there's anything more to be said about it, miss." Z72 RING FOR NANCY ''Do you mean to say," Miss Peabody asked, "that you don't mean to help me?" "I am perfectly ready, miss," her ladyship's own maid said, "to give you the best oppor- tunity in the world for spying upon Miss Dela- mare and for giving her, as you call it, a piece of your mind. Of course, I don't believe it's much use your trying to spy upon the lady. Let us say that's only because she's likely to be careful as long as she's in this house, and not because she's naturally a virtuous character." "I feel it in my bones that she isn't," Miss Peabody said. "I feel it in my bones that, if I could get a quiet talk with her in circumstances which had already compromised her a little, by sheer force of virtuous indignation I could so address her that she would leave this household for good, crushed and overwhelmed." "I don't think I would be too sure of that," said Miss Jenkins. "My good girl," Miss Peabody retorted, "I've done too much talking to abandoned women in my time — you forget that I'm the president of the Boston Association for the Suppression of Sin — and I haven't been the president of that society for ten years without knowing how to deal with abandoned women. They're like wax in my fingers." RING FOR NANCY 273 "That may very well be, miss," Miss Jenkins said; *'but can you be perfectly certain that Miss Delamare is an abandoned woman? There's really nothing in the world that's ever been said against her." *T tell you I feel it," Miss Peabody said. "I know it. I shudder when I think of her." "But that," Miss Jenkins urged, "may be only just a natural antipathy — the sort of anti- pathy that some people have for Jews." "A natural antipathy!" Miss Peabody ex- claimed. "Yes, the natural antipathy that the virtuous and respectable feel for the frivolous, sordid, degenerate, thoughtless and idle crea- tures of their own sex." And rendered the more eager by Miss Jenkins' opposition. Miss Peabody exclaimed: "Only give me the opportunity really to con- front that viper, and I will give her such a talking to, that at the end of it she will cer- tainly know that my heel is upon her head." "Of course, I can do what you wish, miss," her ladyship's own maid said reasonably, "and of course it may — it probably will — lead to driv- ing what you might call the dragon out of this household. But I will urge you not to do it, miss. Miss Delamare is an innocent and harm- less little creature, and I'm not certain that if 274 RING FOR NANCY you attempt to harm her it won't recoil upon your own head. Indeed, I am pretty certain that it will." '*My good girl," Miss Peabody said with dig- nity, "that's the sort of sentimental nonsense that you read in novelettes in the servants' hall. You may rely upon my judgment, that of a mature woman, and you may be certain that anything that I do, or anything that you do for me, will be perfectly justified." "I shall be perfectly justified," Miss Jenkins answered slowly; "well, I hope I shall, and if I'm not, your blood will be upon your own head." "That's a ridiculous phrase again, my good girl," Miss Peabody said; "so let's make an end of this nonsense. I simply order you to do what I have suggested, and there's an end of it." Miss Jenkins suddenly looked at Miss Pea- body. "Miss Olympia," she said gravely, "has it ever struck you as quite a side issue, that the arrangement of rooms in this house is slightly questionable? I must say it struck me as ex- traordinary that you never should have raised any objection." Miss Peabody started and exclaimed: "What do you mean?" } RING FOR NANCY 275 "Of course," Miss Jenkins continued, "I don't want to raise any suspicions, but it seems to me a thing that might be changed, that pos- sibly ought to be changed — that the major and Miss Delamare should have rooms side by side with only that panel in between." Miss Peabody became suddenly the vivid red of a turkey-cock's wattles. She opened her mouth, but she found positively no words to utter. "That I should never have thought of it!" she exclaimed. "Well, it has always struck me as odd, miss," Miss Jenkins answered, "that you never should." ^ "Of course it must be changed at once," K Miss Peabody answered. "It must be changed P immediately." "Of course it shall be, miss," her ladyship's own maid said. "I shall see to that. And in view of what you've just been asking of me, it seems that there would be another little ar- rangement . . ." Miss Jenkins hesitated, and again Miss Peabody asked sharply: "What do you mean?" "I hardly like to suggest it, miss," Miss Jen- kins said. "Nonsense!" Miss Peabody exclaimed. "I order you to do so." 276 RING FOR NANCY "Fd much rather you thought about it, miss/* her ladyship's own maid said. "I don't really care to speak of such things;" and faced by the new firmness of Miss Jenkins' lips, Miss Pea- body really did reflect. **If you consider what you've asked for, miss," Miss Jenkins said, "the opportunity for de- nouncing Miss Delamare in circumstances that might appear slightly — well, let us say awkward for her . . ." Miss Peabody suddenly shook with the birth of a new idea. "That's it!" she exclaimed. "That's precisely it. You will have my things removed to the major's room, and you will have the major's things removed to my room. At once; with- out any delay. The major will be away all day, and he will probably not return until late at night. And you will give him no intimation that the change has been made. I positively refuse to allow you to give him any warning. And then he will come up to my room. And we shall just see what takes place." Miss Jenkins remonstrated with Miss Pea- body for so long that Miss Peabody simply could not for the life of her understand why she did it. She could only in the end put it down to some undeveloped ideas of womanly pro* * RING FOR NANCY 277 priety which might do Miss Jenkins as a servant a great deal of credit, but which, with her superior knowledge, Miss Peabody considered to be the merest nonsense. IV. TN spite of their ideas to the contrary, the "*• major and his aunt spent a long day in town — for the speciaHst whom they went to consult about the major's eyes strongly recom- mended them to get all the distraction they could. He said that what the major chiefly needed was peace of mind, and with the amiatle penetration that these people sometimes pos- sess, he seemed to discern that the Manor House, Basildon, if one of the quietest, was not one of the most restful houses in the United Kingdom. So that, first, to get a really good change they went to interview the manager of the book-stall business that had issued a summons against the major. This gentleman was really puzzled by the major's plain explanation. He could not un- derstand what the major had to talk to Miss Delamare about with such concentration when, as Mrs. Foster insisted on explaining, she was the major's adopted sister, and was going to stay with him in the same house. It did not strike the manager as a reasonable explanation for refusing to pay for four and twopence worth 278 RING FOR NANCY 279 of magazines. He was puzzled, and since he was manager of an immense business and had all the time in the world on his hands, he just listened to the major's fine confusion with ami- ability and for a tremendous time — from half past eleven until twenty past twelve. Another thing that he could not understand was the major's statement that for magazines that he purchased at one stall he paid on prin- ciple at another. The major explained that he was a shareholder of the company out of grati- tude to the novelist who had helped him to pass his remarkable examination; and that, too, the manager was unable fully to understand. The major said that that was as plain as eating eggs. He asked the manager to picture for himself what sort of a job guarding a well in Somaliland was; and the manager said that he could not in the least begin to imagine it, but that he had a son who had just come back from that pleasant country. Then it turned out that the manager's son was Sammy Lowes, who had had charge of the next well two hundred and seventy miles away, and that the major had put in a good many evenings at poker over the tele- graph wire with Captain Lowes, though he had never actually met his next-door neighbor. He had to explain then how you could play poker by telegram. 280 RING FOR NANCY Then he returned to the subject of the nov-» elist who had so helped him. He explained carefully that his grim determination to un- derstand every sentence that that gentleman had ever written had toughened his compre- hension to such an extent that there was not a single thing in the w^orld that he could not understand. The manager asked some one on his telephone to send up Mr. Barnes; and Mr. Barnes, who was introduced as the company's book inspec- tor-general, declared that he had not even heard the name of the novelist. He went away, how- ever, and then returned with the information that he had got from a subordinate, that not a single book by that gentleman had ever been sold at their stalls. He appeared to be asked for, however, in the circulating department, and there was one solitary exception. Kew had brought nine copies — thirteen being counted as twelve — of a work by this writer. "So that," the book inspector-general said, "you can pretty well tell that he's one of your intellectuals." And the manager nodded his head in cordial agreement. "But hang it all," the major .asked, ''how can you tell?" The manager looked at his inspector-general of literature. RING FOR NANCY 281 "Oh," the inspector-general remarked gloom- ily, "you can tell because really intellectual peo- ple never buy nezv. It's only intellectual people that have discovered that you can buy library copies for a shilling after they have already been used." "Now can you do that?" Mrs. Foster asked. "But it seems rather mean, doesn't it?" "It's only intellectual people," the inspector answered, "only quite intellectual people who know^ how to be really mean. And the fact of the sale of three copies at Kew goes to back up my contention. For Kew is where we sell only the very crankiest of stuff — health periodicals and the halfcrown monthlies. So if there wasn't vegetarianism in that particular book, there must certainly have been Christian Science or spiritualism." The major said: "Oh," and then he added: "You call it spiritualism." "Then there we are," the inspector said tri- umphantly. "There," the major remarked politely, "in a manner of speaking, you may safely say we all certainly are." "But," the manager hazarded when the in- spector had gone, "I may be frightfully stupid, but I can't in the least see how where we stand, wherever it is, interferes with your frightful 282 RING FOR NANCY crime of stealing periodicals from a railway book-stall." *'But," the major said, "it's just established that I'm an intellectual." "No defense at all," the manager said grave- ly; "there can be no crime more mean than steaHng from a book-stall. You are a share- holder, and you won't deny that it's the very height of meanness. It's not as if books were bread, or anything necessary or important. And we've just established that the intellectuals are the only people who know how to be thor- oughly and efficiently mean. For what in the world can be meaner than buying second-hand library copies, thus robbing us of our legitimate profit, and the writer of any profit at all? You confess that you belong to the meanest class in the world . . ." "But I don't feel in the least like an intel- lectual," the major said penitently. "I never knew I was till this moment." "You certainly don't look like one," the man- ager said encouragingly. "And I certainly never," the major said, "bought a library copy in my . . ." He stopped, and then he exclaimed slowly, and with his face of awe, "My God! Every one of his hooks that I had in Somaliland had a canceled yellow label out- RING FOR NANCY 283 side itr And he stopped as if he were really terror-stricken. "Then there," the manager said, "you really are. You are convicted of the stupidity — it's worse than a crime, considering the advantages we offer the public — of dealing with any firm other than us. For we do not deface our library copies with yellow labels, contenting ourselves with a chaste stamp on the title page. And — though that does not matter so much — you have received great benefits at the hands of a dis- tinguished personage without making him one penny the richer." "Good heavens!" the major exclaimed. "Doesn't he get any thing?" "Not one penny!" the manager answered. "So that you are branded as belonging to that infamous band of sweaters, the purchasers of library copies. You are plainly a sweater, and you stand in danger of being convicted for theft." Mrs. Foster protested that her Edward could never be called a thief, but the manager gravely but firmly presented her with many facts con- cerning the financial side of what he styled an infamous and unsanitary transaction. But gradually the major became more cheer- ful. "After all," he said, "I could not know any- 284 RING FOR NANCY thing about the matter. A great parcel of books was sent me by; Charles Grand — he was a jour- nalist I knew at Simla, and he is now reviewing for the London newspapers . . ." "Then," the manager said quietly but very sadly, "the majority of them were review copies which your friend received for nothing and sold to you for two shillings." "But," the major exclaimed, "is there nothing but villainy in your business?" "Nothing!" the manager answered still very sadly. "The authors are only fools, but the readers are sweaters, and the pubhshers — well, the less I say about publishers the less I shall have to answer for in the courts of my country; but all reviewers are villains. The only bright spot is the book-stall, where everything is above-board !" "Well, Fm glad to know that I was right," the major said. "Right!" the manager exclaimed. "You've never been right in your life!" "But I was," the major said, "when I took shares in your company, in order to influence the sales of the author to whom I am grateful." The manager became instantly attentive. "And how do you propose to do that?" he asked. RING FOR NANCY 285 "I am doing it already,'* the major answered. "I never go near a book-stall without asking for the works of my benefactor. And when they are not to be had, I lecture the book-stall boy very severely. I say that I am a shareholder "I trust," the manager interrupted him, "that you have never found any of the works of this author upon our book-stalls?" "Never!" the major exclaimed. "Then that's all right," the manager said, "and you may continue with your explanation." "I tell the book-stall clerk," the major accord- ingly continued, "that I am a shareholder, and that I insist upon his ordering all the novels of that author." "And do you ever notice that it has been done?" the manager asked. "I have never been able to discover that it has," the major said. "Well," the manager continued, "it's best to make certain," and he took the telephone which stood on the desk before him. "Barnes," he re- marked into that instrument, "will you kindly give instructions that no books by the author of What Maisie Knew are ever put on sale upon the stalls, except, of course, as library copies?" He put down the telephone, and looking con- 286 RING FOR NANCY tentedly at the major, he remarked: "So that's all right. We had better go to Waterloo." "But I don't in the least understand," the major said. "Oh, that's all right, that's all right," the manager answered. "It's all perfectly right." "But it seems to me . . ." the major said. "It seems to me," Mrs. Foster remarked, "that you have just prevented the books of your friend from being sold at all." "That was exactly what was wanted," the manager said. "Here we were in the face of an atrocious conspiracy to plant upon our firm books that couldn't possibly be sold. I have fortunately put an end to that." "But hang it all! . . ." the major said. The manager looked gravely and benevo- lently at the major. "My dear young friend, don't become ex- cited," he advised. "I observe in you a distinct tendency to become excited. I can only imagine that comes from the class of literature that you have been reading. Now take my advice. Give it up. Just give it up." "But, confound your impertinence," the major exclaimed hotly, "it has made me the youngest major in the British army." "There, there, there, there, there!" the man- RING FOR NANCY 287 ager said. "Hush! Hush! I can not imagine what possible advantage it can be to be the youngest major in the British army. But just you take my advice. When you came in I was, reading a book. I am an exceedingly busy man, so it's absolutely necessary that at times I should relax my mind. That is to say, some- times, even in office hours, I take up a book and read. Let me tell you, my young friend, that there's nothing so salutary in the world as liter- ature. And I consider that I, as the manager of this great business, and you as one of its share- holders, are conferring upon humanity the greatest boon that this century . . ." "My dear chap," the major said, "this isn't a dinner to the Newsvenders' Benevolent Asso- ciation, or whatever it is where you make speeches like that." "The purpose of literature," the manager con- tinued, "is to refresh, to recreate, to enlighten, to uplift. Buried deep in the soothing pages of a book, how blissfully the soul pursues its course! With what a smooth current do the minutes pass, with what a . . ." "Oh, hang it all!" the major exclaimed. "I can't stand this. This is like listening to Mrs. Kerr Howe reading aloud." "And it was precisely to the works of that 288 RING FOR NANCY great and splendid writer," the manager said, "that I was desiring to direct your attention. If you would go round the book-stalls now and observe whether there are any works of that lady to be seen, I should be pleased to empower you to threaten to horsewhip any book-stall clerk whose stall did not display at least six copies of six different works by Mrs. Kerr Howe in a very prominent position. In the most prominent place he can give them, indeed." "Then," Mrs. Foster suddenly asked the man- ager, "Mrs. Kerr Howe really is a great writ- er?" "Madam," the manager said impressively, "Mrs. Kerr Howe is the greatest writer the world has ever seen. You can prove it by every possible means. Do you wish to prove it by statistics? Then let me tell you that the com- plete works of Mrs. Kerr Howe had enjoyed up to the day before yesterday a world sale of seventeen and a half million copies. Supposing all these volumes were stacked on their sides, they would reach from here to the moon. Sup- posing them to be laid end to end, they would reach twice from here to the moon and back. The mere quantity of printers' ink employed in their production has been eight and a half thousand gallons. To make the paper required for them one entire forest in the colonv of New- RING FOR NANCY 289 foundland, several woods in Norway, and the entire output of rags for one year of a city the size of Liverpool have been required." "This is extremely interesting," Mrs. Foster said. "I'm sure Mrs. Kerr Howe will be de- lighted to know this." She looked at the major reflectively. "My dear Edward," she said, "I sometimes thought that I should like you to marry Mrs. Kerr Howe. But now that I have heard these beautiful facts, my mind is more at rest upon the subject. Of course, in my heart I should much prefer you to marry Miss Dela- mare. And I am sure both ladies are only just waiting to be asked, to jump down your throat." The manager suddenly stood up. "Do I un- derstand," he said, with an accent almost of awe, "that I am talking to people who are upon intimate terms with those two great ornaments of the social life of the day — Mrs. Kerr Howe and Miss Flossie Delamare?" "But they are both stopping with us at the present moment," Mrs. Foster said. "And they are both most extremely anxious to marry my nephew. At least, Mrs. Kerr Howe is, though I don't know how it may be with Miss Dela- mare, for, of course, she's my adopted daughter, and the major's my adopted son, so perhaps the church would forbid the marriage. I am not very clever at these things.'* 290 RING FOR NANCY "You've been extremely clever, madam," the manager said, "in adopting a distinguished and charming family; and I trust that whtn your son does marry, he will permit me to present to the bride, v^hichever lady she may be, a com- plete set of the works of Mrs. Kerr Howe bound in our half-roan with gilt backs and marble tops. There could be no present in the world more appropriate to a newly married lady, for these books will refresh and recreate her weary hours . . ." "Well, I'm sure I'm much obliged," the major said. "Of course," the manager continued, address- ing Mrs. Foster, "I imagine that from the sam- ples of your nephew's conversation and be- havior that I have been privileged to hear and to hear of, her weary hours — or at any rate her unexcited hours — will be quite few and far between. But I can imagine nothing better calculated to engross the mind and to relieve it of gloomy thoughts while, say, the lady is wait- ing in the corridors of a police-court, or during the assizes, while she is expecting the verdict of the jury who will retire to consider it — I can not imagine anything better calculated to dis- tract the mind than any volume by the author of Pink Passions or Crime in a Nightgozvn/' The RING FOR NANCY 291 manager pulled out his watch. "Thank heaven!" he exclaimed; "it's twenty past twelve. Now let's go to Waterloo." "But what are we going to Waterloo for?" the major asked. "To investigate on the spot," the manager answered, "the details of your sordid crime." "But that will be taking up a tremendous amount of your time," Mrs. Foster said. "My dear lady," the manager answered, "that's exactly what I want. Do you suppose that a man like myself has anything in the world to do? I am the head of one of the most important, of one of the most extended enter- prises in the world. We employ nine hundred and seventy carts in the distribution of weekly periodicals alone. And is it thinkable that I — the head of this great business — should have anything in the world to do?" "But I should have thought . . ." Mrs. Fos- ter began timidly. "My dear lady," the manager said, "just re- flect for a moment. What is the secret of busi- ness success? What is it that makes an enter- prise run smoothly once it has started on its proud career? I will tell you. The secret of all these things is efficient subordinates. Now my subordinates are so absolutely efficient that b 292 RING FOR NANCY 1 there is nothing in the world left for me to do. I sit here for whole mornings playing patience, or reading the works of Mrs. Kerr Howe, or in the alternative simply twiddling my thumbs and praying heaven for an occupation. Thanks to yourself and the major, my mind has been occu- pied from half past eleven till twenty minutes past twelve by this extraordinary and engross- ing story of passion and crime." "Oh, hang it all!" the major said, "where does the passion come in?" *T have gathered," the manager answered, "in the course of our conversation, that you are en- gaged to at least two ladies, and that at least two other ladies are anxious to marry you. Of course, it is no affair of mine; but I can easily gather from these glimpses of the background of affairs of the heart what thrilling situations, what tremendous escapes and outpourings of the soul must occur in the course of your daily life. What a subject for Mrs. Kerr Howe! And how eagerly, did it only know the circum- stances, would the public await that lady's next volume. But now let us go to Waterloo. As I have said, I have been in an agony all this morning for the want of an occupation. And now that I have a chance to make a criminal investigation on my own account, is it to be RING FOR NANCY 293 thought that I will let the matter drop until I have sifted it to the bitter end?" They drove to Waterloo in the motor that had brought them up from Basildon. And there the manager interviev^ed the book-stall clerk, whose manner was respectful while it was self-respect- ing, and the book-stall boy, who was in tears. The book-stall boy declared that he had certain- ly found eight sixpenny magazines, one penny daily, and two halfpenny dailies upon his stall. And these he had sent back to the central ofHce as "returns," because he did not know what else in the world to do with them. Similarly, he had found upon his stall the half-sovereign that the major had thrown there, and this he had taken to the Lost Property Office which, he under- stood, was the correct thing to do. At the end of three months, if the major did not in the meantime identify his coin, the half-sovereign would have become the property of the paper- boy. *Tt results from all this" — the manager ad- dressed the major and his aunt — "that, although an obvious attempt at theft was made, yet, the offender having returned the stolen goods, and made an honest though mistaken attempt to pay for them, the company — though I say it re- gretfully — would hardly be justified in attempt- 294 RING FOR NANCY ing to prosecute the offender who might be very difficult to identify." "But hang it all!" the major said. "That, my young friend/' the manager re- plied, "is the fifth time that you have said, *Hang it all!' in the course of an hour. I can only put down the smallness of your vocabulary to the nature of your favorite literature. For books, while they refresh the mind, recreate the senses, and are boons to minds weary and depressed . . ." The manager's eye at this mo- ment fell upon the clock that, upon the main line departure platform, marked the hour of one. "God bless my soul!" he said. "Let's all go and have lunch together. That is to say, I shall be delighted if you will lunch with me, for I am extremely obliged to you for getting me through this morning. For this afternoon I am safe, since I have an engagement to play golf with the manager of the P.Q.Q.G., who, let me tell you, is one of the busiest men of our busy commercial world." V ^T^HEY lunched at an excellent and ex- •*• tremely costly restaurant that was hidden way in a dirty back alley, behind Token- house Yard. Here they had the opportunity of inspecting the features of gentlemen who, the manager assured them, were the twenty-seven busiest men of their great commercial world. He also told them that they might, if they im- agined carefully, imagine that there they heard the very wheels of London finance whirring along. But when they listened with attention, the sound most audible to them was made by the head of the firm of Howe, Hough, Blades and Kershaw, who was snuffling over his soup. "Well," the manager said reflectively when they had finished lunch, "I'm very much obliged to you for your society and for clearing up the mystery." "But there could not have been any mystery," the major said. "You can't really have sus- pected me of wanting to steal four and tuppence worth of cheap literature!" "Oh, that wasn't the mystery," the manager 295 L 296 RING FOR NANCY answered. "You see, for a long time past I have been puzzled by reports from various book-stalls of a gentleman — and all the clerks reported that he was strange in his manner — who insisted on their providing their stalls with copies of works that couldn't by any imagin- able probability ever get sold. And what I really wanted was to get the facts of this sin- gular proceeding and if possible to put an end to it. I think I have done that." "I think I must acknowledge that you have done that," the major said rather ruefully. "Henceforth the book-stalls will be protected from these spurious demands," the manager continued amiably. "I think you will acknowl- edge that, too." "I think I must," the major conceded; and then he asked: "You don't happen to be an Irishman by any chance?" "No, I was born in Peckham," the manager answered, — "silly Peckham." "But probably under the table of a solicitor's clerk," the major commented. "Oh, no," the manager answered. "Just in the usual ordinary common-sense parsley-bed." He had accompanied them to the opening of the dirty court where their motor-car was awaiting them, and he held up his finger to a taxicab. RING FOR NANCY 297 "You see/* he said, "what's the trouble with all you Irish people is that you are too clever by half, whereas we who are born in Peckham are only just clever enough. That's what gives us our immense pull." He recommended them very strongly, if they wanted to be interested, to go to the matinee of Pigs is Pigs and see how they liked it without Miss Delamare as the leading lady. And this they really did. The major, who had never seen this entertaining work which united in itself the talents of two authors and three musical composers, was quite interested in its simple display; but Mrs. Foster said that it was not worth seeing in the absence of the "symphonic embodiment of quaint im- beciHty." Afterward they dined in the ladies' room of the major's club, and there the major met a man whom he had not seen for eleven years. And Mrs. Foster, who had really a great dread of traveHng in the motor by night, went back to Basildon by the eight forty-three, so that the major should have his talk out with his old friend. She insised on this because she wished him to have a very thorough change. It may have been a quarter past ten when the major left his club steps in the large motor. And as the roads were quite empty, and the moonlight very bright, they got full forty miles 298 RING FOR NANCY an hour out of her, and he reached Basildon Manor not much more than twenty minutes after his aunt, who had gone straight up to Miss Delamare. He himself went straight up to his own room. Mr. Arthur Foster had spent a tranquil but somewhat tiring day over the amalgamation of the two societies that were interested in the cause of virtue, and it was not until just before dinner that he went up to his room to dress. Then he discovered that all his things had been cleared out. He rang the bell, which was an- swered by Mrs. Foster's maid, and Mrs. Fos- ter's maid said she knew nothing about it, but she would ask her ladyship's own maid. Her ladyship's own maid waited upon Mr. Foster and informed him that such were Mrs. Foster's orders. She could not help it; she was not responsible for it. She had just done what she was told. Mr. Foster protested lamenta- bly; he wanted her ladyship's own maid to inform him what he had done, that at this time of life he should be moved around the house like a parcel sent by post. Her ladyship's own maid could only say that the room which had been allotted to Mr. Foster was thoroughly comfortable and perfectly pretty, being the room which was called the pink room. 9 RING FOR NANCY 299 "But what have I done?" Mr. Foster asked mildly. Miss Jenkins reflected for a moment, and then she said slowly: "Mrs. Foster, I believe, is extremely angry because you have not signed the contract with Miss Delamare. I believe that is the reason." "Well, but what am I to do?" Mr. Foster said. "It isn't for me to advise you, sir," Miss Jen- kins said; "but if I might suggest, I should say that you ought to sign that contract immedi- ately after dinner, and then, as I imagine Miss' Peabody will be thoroughly angry, I should advise you to stop with the other ladies until about half past ten, and then go to your room and wait quietly till Mrs. Foster comes back. For I may say that I know pretty well what women are, and I think, sir, if you give proof of deference to Mrs. Foster's wishes and of obedience to her commands, she will probably be inclined to forgive you." "But this is awful," Mr. Foster said. "I simply daren't sign that contract." "You will find it much more awful if you don't, sir," Miss Jenkins said. "Mrs. Foster is determined not to speak another word to you." Mr. Foster groaned and groaned. And then he permitted Miss Jenkins to lead him to the 300 RING FOR NANCY » pink room, where he dressed for dinner. At dinner he sat pallid and depressed, and did nothing to enliven the conversation of the three ladies who were under his charge. But, having drunk three and a half glasses of Moselle, two of champagne, two of port, and one of liqueur brandy which he took with his coffee, he joined the ladies with a firm step and courageous manner. I **Miss Delamare," he exclaimed in loud tones, "if you will kindly bring me that contract for the new theater, I will go into my study and sign it with you at once. Miss Jenkins and one of the other servants can be the witnesses." Miss Peabody started violently and opened her mouth, but as Mrs. Kerr Howe was pres- ent, she did not feel that it would be wise to make any remark. And Mr. Foster remained under the shelter of the presence of Mrs. Kerr Howe until Miss Delamare returned with the contract. Mrs. Kerr Howe was talking about the end of the third act of her play. And she went on talking about it to Miss Peabody until ten minutes after Mr. Foster and Miss Dela- mare had gone away. Then she perceived that Miss Peabody had fainted in her grandfather^s chair. It was not for nearly an hour and a half that RING FOR NANCY 301 she was brought round. Under the ministra- tions of her own maid, her ladyship's own maid and Mrs. Kerr Howe, she had cold rigors, warm heats, and finally a real and typical fit of hysterics. It being then about a quarter past ten, Miss Jenkins suggested that she had bet- ter drink a little whisky and water and then go quietly to bed. **I am not going to bed" Miss Peabody said; but as she had been talking nonsense — sheer simple nonsense — for the last three-quarters of an hour, no one took any particular notice of the speech, and her own maid and her lady- ship's own maid conducted her up to her room which was by now the room with the panel. She dismissed her own maid, but she begged Miss Jenkins to stay with her. And immedi- ately, with eyes that glittered with rage. Miss Peabody commanded: "Tell me how this panel works." With their forbidding, unseeing or threaten- ing eyes the three men, the three women, the three children and the baby on its hands and feet gazed at Miss Peabody. They appeared immense and threatening. Miss Jenkins said slowly : "You work it by a knob in the carved frame. That is to say, miss, there are two knobs, one 302 RING FOR NANCY to shut it and one to open it. That was why the major couldn^t shut it the other night. He got hold of the one that opened it first, and it never entered his head that there was another to shut it. And then Miss Delamare found the one to shut it, and it never entered her head that there would be another to open it." Miss Peabody said: "That fiendish woman !s at the bottom of everything." "All the same, miss," Miss Jenkins said slow- ly, "I don't think if I were you that I should :attempt to interview Miss Delamare to-night. I should personally advise you to let the knobs alone." "I shall certainly do nothing of the sort," Miss Peabody said. "It almost makes me inclined to say," Miss Jenkins replied slowly, "your blood be upon your own head." Miss Peabody said sharply: "That's a most improper remark." "It would be," Miss Jenkins returned, "if it were a question merely of superior and inferior. But you have insisted on my joining in what appears to be — in what you consider to be — a plot. And plotters have got to be considered equals. I don't think it a proper thing that you should attack Miss Delamare. And what's RING FOR NANCY 303 more, I don't think it will be a good thing for yourself." Miss Peabody became calmly hard and ob- stinate. "My girl," she said, "I don't know why you should be so concerned for Miss Delamare. I don't believe that I can consider you a friend of mine." "I wish you wouldn't consider me a friend of yours," Miss Jenkins replied. "I am certainly not, and it will make your position plainer if you consider that I am very decidedly not a friend of yours. But it is the most friendly thing I have ever said to you when I recom- mend you to leave that panel alone/* "And is it likely," Miss Peabody said, "that I should take the advice of a servant who defi- nitely tells me that she is not my friend?" She laughed again with a high incredulity. "Is it really believable?" she said. "A servant who is not my friend!" Miss Jenkins stood still with her hands hang- ing before her. There was quite a silence, and then Miss Peabody said sharply: "Well?" "I have nothing in the world to say, miss," Miss Jenkins continued. "The position is abso- lutely at a deadlock. I have recommended you very earnestly to leave the thing alone. It 304 RING FOR NANCY doesn*t appear to me to be a dignified proceed- ing; it doesn't appear to me to be the proceed- ing of a lady, or even of a decent-hearted woman. And if you persist in doing it, all I can say is, that that takes away any reluctance I may feel. Because, of course, it makes me all the more absolutely certain, if I was not certain enough already, that you are absolutely unfitted for the position you are called upon to occupy." Miss Peabody remained perfectly calm. "I don't in the least understand your threats," she said. **And I don't in the least want to under- stand them. To-morrow I shall deal with you. .What do you think your mistress will say when she hears of your outrageous insolence to a guest of her house?" "I think her ladyship will be in entire agree- ment with me," Miss Jenkins said. "I don't believe anything of the sort," Miss Peabody answered. "You may understand ser- vant nature very well, but it's pretty certain that you don't understand the nature of em- ployers. You will find, I think, that her lady- ship will entirely agree with me. You will find, I think, that there is a sort of freemasonry between employers, and that your employer, hearing that you have been insolent to another RING FOR NANCY 305 person of her class, will turn you out of your situation at once. And I am glad of it, for you are a more puffed-up creature than any one I have ever met in this world." "Well, all I can say is," Miss Jenkins an- swered, "that if there is that sort of freema- sonry between employers, and if that's the sort of thing that can happen to a good servant who does what is only her duty in such circum-^ stances as I have done my duty — all I can say is, that if that sort of thing happens, servants are a bitterly wronged class, and I shall cer- tainly see to it that my servants are on a dif- ferent footing." '^Yoiir servants!" Miss Peabody exclaimed. "What have you got to do with servants?" "Of course I have my servants like anybody; else," Miss Jenkins said. "Do you suppose I shouldn't have?" "Then all I can say is," Miss Peabody an- swered, "that the condition of affairs in this country is infinitely more corrupt — is infinitely more revolutionary than they can be said to be even in my own country. Heaven knows in Boston there's infinitely too little discipline, there's infinitely too little respect of class for class. But if the sort of thing that I find here is typical of your upper classes, if subordinates I 306 RING FOR NANCY are not only to be treated as familiars by their superiors, but to be furnished with all the luxuries and the privileges of their superiors themselves, how is it to be wondered at that this branch of the Anglo-Saxon brotherhood is drifting to decay? I don't know who you are, and I don't know what you are, but it's quite evident to me that you must have some hold over your mistress. Probably the origin of that hold is in something corrupt. Almost cer- tainly it is, and that's the end of the whole mat- ter. Everywhere here I find corruption, and corruption, and again corruption." "I'm sure that's extremely interesting," Miss Jenkins said. "But if you will kindly give me any further orders that you may have, I shall be pleased to take them. Or if not I shall be glad to be dismissed." "I order you," Miss Peabody exclaimed, "to reveal to me the secret of that panel." Miss Jenkins produced a very small stamp- case of green leather from the pocket of her apron. She opened it and took out a little piece of stamp-paper; and, coming toward the frame of the immense picture panel, she stuck the little piece of stamp-paper on a protruding knob. "That," she said, "is the knob that opens the RING FOR NANCY 307 panel. You ordered me to show it you, and I have shown it to you much against my will." "But where," Miss Peabody asked, "is the knob that closes the panel?" "That," Miss Jenkins exclaimed, "I shall cer- tainly not show you. You insist on opening that panel in order to give Miss Delamare what you would probably call a piece of your mind. And as you will probably give an untruthful account of the transaction to-morrow, I am perfectly determined that, if the panel is opened, it shall remain open as evidence of the fact that it was you who opened it. The panel can not be opened frohi the next room, so that proof is absolutely conclusive. "And, indeed," she continued, "I tell you plainly, that I shall go straight from here and throw the closing gear of that panel out of action. So that if you open it, you certainly will not be able to close it even though you should find the other knob." Miss Peabody said with a sort of high irony: "Well, this is a pretty condition of affairs, I'm sure." "Her ladyship," Miss Jenkins replied, "left me here to act upon my own discretion for the protection of her friends in this house and of the reputation of the house itself. I don't want 308 RING FOR NANCY to have scenes here, and I won't have scenes here. But as it is obviously impossible for me to stop you making a fool of yourself, I certain- ly insist upon your making a fool of yourself in my own way — in the way that is least likely to cause inconvenience to her ladyship, or to any other person in this house. And as for Miss Delamare, if you attack her, I don't think, knowing her as I do, that you will get very much change out of her." I "I fail to understand these vulgar expres- sions," Miss Peabody said. **Not to get much change out of a person,'* Miss Jenkins replied, with the utmost equa- nimity, "is an Americanism. It means that you come off second best. It means that Miss Delamare's case is so absolutely impregnable, that you won't be able even to make her wince and that she will make you wince all the time." "Everything you say," Miss Peabody said, "only makes me all the more determined to do what I am determined to do." "I am quite aware of that," Miss Jenkins said. "It's a little proceeding which will lead you to disaster, and I don't see that I am par- ticularly concerned in saving you from disaster. I am concerned in satisfying my own con- science. If you come to grief I shall probably RING FOR NANCY 309 profit by it, so I am not going to let you come to grief until I have used every possible argu- ment that would dissuade a decent woman. For the main point for me is that if you are not a decent woman, I have every possible right to profit by your collapse.'* Miss Peabody, still ironically, exclaimed: "What language!" "Yes, collapse," Miss Jenkins said gravely. "That's what you will do. If you indulge in this vicious and vulgar spite you will collapse. You will collapse utterly. You will go out. I warn you that you will go out, and you will probably be miserable to the end of your days. And you will deserve it. For what has Miss Delamare done to you? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! It's just because she's little and gen- tle and pretty and gay and nice — and to be sure you're none of those things — and it's just be- cause she's been kind to another old woman — kind and gentle and considerate — and to be sure you're none of those things either. But it's just because of them that you hate her as an unpleasant cat hates a pleasant dog. It isn't because — it isn't because you're my rival that I hope to see you thrown out of this house. "If you had been a nice woman, heaven knows I wouldn't have stirred a finger against you. 310 RING FOR NANCY heaven really knows that I wouldn't. But you have such an evil nature! You have such a dislike of anything that is good and gay and pleasant, that even though I don't want to do so for my own sake, I shall certainly do for his — the very best that I possibly can to save from you the man whom I have loved for years, and a man who is as good and as gentle and as gay as any man ever was in this world. So I tell you quite plainly that, if you attempt to in- terfere with Miss Delamare, you will lose the man you are engaged to. I hope you will do it and I hope you may lose him, for if you do I shall most certainly get him, and I want him more than anything else in the world; and that's just all there is to it, and this is the last word that I shall say. I've just planked my cards on the table and you can do as you like." Miss Peabody remained gazing at her for a long minute in an absolute speechlessness, and Miss Jenkins was just moving toward the door when she exclaimed sharply: "No, stop! You!" She put her hand up to her forehead. "So that," she said at last, "you are in league with that creature. With that Miss Delamare. And you are trying to shield her. That's it! I see through the whole dis- RING FOR NANCY 311 creditable and disgusting thing. I'm not going to speak about it any more. I shall attend to the matter to-morrow. But to-night I shall speak to this woman in such a way as to drive her right out of this house. You may hope that I can't do this, but I certainly can. I have had to do with too many abandoned and fallen women in my life not to let my tongue be like the whip of a lash. And I begin to see so far into this disgusting and sordid affair that in a few minutes I shall be absolutely at the bottom of it, and then I shall be prepared to act. But as for your imagining that Major Foster will ever fall to you, I tell you this, that if God struck me with lightning at this minute and you were the only woman in the world, he would never look at you. Now you may go." Miss Jenkins withdrew without another word. And Miss Peabody remained alone, leaning on the high mantelpiece and really trying to get to the bottom of things. And then sud- denly the bottom of things came up at her like a flash. It was really the plainest intrigue that she had ever been called upon to solve. Miss Delamare was to plunder Mr. Foster, and she had agreed upon this with her ladyship's own maid, giving the major himself over to Miss Jenkins as the price of Miss Jenkins' support! 312 RING FOR NANCY There simply could not be any doubt about this. And with a step of extreme firmness, she marched straight over toward the panel. She was just going to tell Miss Delamare that she had unshakable proof that she was Mr. Foster's mistress, and that the granting of the lease of the new theater was the price of her sin. VI MR. FOSTER was sitting in front of his bedroom fire in a state of the most thorough dispiritude. He did not Hke his room, which was hung all with pink chintz ;and did not seem to be the proper room for a gentleman; he was exceedingly afraid of what he saw to be the considerable change in Mrs. Foster, and he was extremely afraid of what Miss Peabody might be going to do or, still more, to say, now that he had definitely signed with Miss Delamare the agreement for the new theater. His simple soul was thoroughly fright- ened, thoroughly worried and thoroughly; shaken. For nearly an hour he had been trying to read a book by Mrs. Kerr Howe called Pink Passions. This book troubled him exceed- ingly; for, to tell the truth, he had never read a book since the publication of The Woman in White. And it did not seem to him to be nat- ural that people should behave as they did in Mrs. Kerr Howe's book, and the characters certainly seemed to him to be chiefly improper 313 314 RING FOR NANCY persons. On the other hand, Mrs. Foster was perpetually dinning into him the fact that Mrs. Kerr Howe was a great author. And in his muddled and troubled state, the poor man be- gan reflecting upon what was to be expected from great authors. He had a vague idea that the purpose of literature was said to be to ennoble the world; but, on the other hand, he had an idea that the end of authors, or the life of authors for the matter of that, was spent in the divorce courts. And he imagined that the greater the author, the more frequent were his visits to these establishments. So that he could not very well see how the products of obvious- ly immoral persons could help on moral causes in the world. And at the same time he was so anxious to be received back, if not into his old quar- ters, at least into Mrs. Foster's favor, that he was really desperately anxious to appre- ciate not only Miss Delamare, but also Mrs. Kerr Howe. He felt that if he could do this, Mrs. Foster would, for reasons that he could not understand, be kind to him again. And he was looking into his fire and brooding rather miserably. For he was determined to await the return of Mrs. Foster before he got into bed. He wished to tell her as well as he could RING FOR NANCY 315 that, in the end, he found that she was more important to him than the wishes of Miss Pea- body. Though this again muddled him, for he had really wanted to propitiate his wife by do- ing everything that he possibly could to please her nephew. And he had perfectly believed that, the more he pleased Miss Peabody, the more joy it ought to cause Major Edward Brent Foster; for so simple was his soul that it had never occurred to him to notice that his wife exceedingly detested that lady. He had usually been taught by his friends in the city, and other places, to consider that women were incomprehensible, but he had really had so little to do with women — though it is true that having been as normally unfaithful to Mrs. Foster as most of his friends were to their wives, he had now and then had his whiskers damaged before he shaved them in order to be more in the fashion — he had really had so little to do with women, that the fact they were in- comprehensible had not really seemed to him to matter at all. But now he dropped Pink Passions, and look- ing at the fire, exclaimed in a bitterly aggrieved tone: "Why, they're incomprehensible!" He had been trying to do his best to please 316 RING FOR NANCY everybody all round, and he seemed to have come in for so much abuse, that he simply felt bruised and black and blue all over his moral being. "JVhy, they're incomprehensible!" he repeat- ed. For, if Mr. Foster had not been strictly virtuous all his life, he had certainly been strictly respectable, and in the present transac- . tions, he had not only been extremely respecta- | ble but even quite absolutely virtuous. There was not, he was perfectly certain, a single thing that could possibly be said against his virtue. Not a single thing. He was as spotless as an angel, and he tried to be as obliging as a Cook's Guide. He heard a little swish — a negligible sound in these old houses — and suddenly there burst upon him the words: "You infamous man! You abandoned woman !" Mr. Foster tried to spring clean out of his chair; but since he was not normally very ac- tive, he only succeeded in achieving a sort of shuffle. Miss Peabody was standing in a sort of lighted square that had disappeared from the pink chintzed paneling of one of his walls. And his mind having been running upon his respectable but not impeccable past, Mr. Fos- RING FOR NANCY 317 ; ter imagined that Miss Peabody must have heard what he would have called a thing or two about himself, and exclaimed in a breath- less alarm: "What woman?" And then there began a breathless dialogue, for Miss Peabody exclaimed: *'That actress — that Miss Delamare! I know all about her." Mr. Foster ejaculated: "What about her?" And Miss Peabody said convictingly: "You are in her room." "Certainly not," Mr. Foster almost screamed. "This is my room." "You can't expect me to believe that," she said. "Oh, nonsense!" he answered. "You've gone mad with jealousy." Olympia advanced upon him. "Mr. Foster," she exclaimed with a fixed gravity, "don't lie to me. I expected to find you here. I was convinced that I should find you here, and I have found you here. There's no getting away from that. If you like to behave penitently, I may be inclined to conceal your guilt. But I insist upon your leaving that atrocious woman to me. I insist upon your at once leaving this room." "But damn it!" Mr. Foster said, and it was the first time he had ever sworn in his hfe, "I 318 RING FOR NANCY must have some room somewhere. Mrs. Fos- ter has turned me out of my room, and Fm certainly not going to let you turn me out of this." Miss Peabody repeated stonily: "I insist up- on your leaving that atrocious woman to me." "But there's no woman here but yourself, my good soul," Mr. Foster said. "You can see that there isn't." Miss Peabody exclaimed: "Nonsense! She's hiding behind the curtains. She's got under the bed." Mr. Foster ejaculated: "By heaven! Women are incomprehensible! You're out of your senses. It's a most extraordinary mistake." And after a moment he added: "Come and look behind the curtains. Get under the bed yourself if you want to. I'm sick of all this." Miss Peabody advanced right into the room. She did look behind the curtains, and she satis- fied herself that the bed came so low that no- body could possibly get under it. And Mr. Foster by this time had become so furiously enraged, that he began to run about the room throwing open the wardrobes, the drawers and even the cover of his dressing-table. "Look here, you infernal idiot," he said; "there you can see my suits. And there you Mr. Footer let go of Miss Peabody altogether RING FOR NANCY 319 can see my vests and pants. And there you can see my spare studs and my shaving things. Does that satisfy you? Miss Delamare doesn't shave." Miss Peabody stood for a terrified moment v^ith her eyes so distended that he thought she v^ould burst the lids. "Then it's your room!" she exclaimed. "How horrible!" She caught her breath sharply. "My dear man," she exclaimed, "my dear friend, how can I have wronged you!" Her brain began to swim and she made desperate and even exaggerated efforts to get back to the courtly and old-fashioned phraseology that she had always used when speaking to Mr. Foster. "My good friend," she repeated, "my dear friend! My dear, dear friend!" And then, as she felt really faint, she said: "Support me! You are so strong! So noble! Lay me on my bed." And as she actually did totter, Mr. Fos- ter could not see anything for it but to try and support her back into her own room. He really did try, too, to carry her, but, as she was no light weight, he hardly succeeded in doing more than make her stumble along the floor. And then he perceived Mrs. Foster standing in the square opening. She exclaimed, in what he knew to be tones of the deepest contempt: 320 RING FOR NANCY "Mr. Foster! Miss Peabody!'* And this affected Mr. Foster so much that he let go of Miss Peabody altogether. She col- lapsed upon the floor like a badly jointed doll and gave just one, but a very violent scream. Mr. Foster stood perfectly still with his jaw hanging down, and then Mrs. Foster said slowly : "I presume you will explain what this means. Or don't you intend to?'* j Mr. Foster began to giggle feebly. " "My dear," he said, "I don't know. I don't know what it means. Miss Peabody came into my room suddenly." | Mrs. Foster said simply: "So it appears"; and Miss Peabody remarked faintly from the floor: "Mrs. Foster!" Then, suddenly, Mrs. Foster appeared to be- come enraged. She rushed up to Miss Pea- body, and leaning over her exclaimed: "Don't speak! Don't you dare to speak, or I shall spurn your abandoned face with my foot." Mr. Foster tried to get in a "But, my dear . . ." but Mrs. Foster, who was perfectly white with rage, exclaimed: "Hold your tongue!" And then she added: "This is what it means! This is what it has all •RING FOR NANCY 321 meant. This is the meaning of your compli- ments to that — that thing. This is why I have been thrown into the society of this woman that I always detested. This is why my poor Edward must marry her — to cover up an abominable intrigue. . . ." And then suddenly Miss Delamare and Mrs. Kerr Howe appeared in the room behind. *Tn the name of heaven what's the matter?" Mrs. Kerr Howe said. "Who's that scream- ing?'* And they both stood in the opening of the panel with wide and incredulous eyes. Mrs. Foster turned upon them with an im- mense dignity. "This is the matter," she exclaimed. "I have discovered that that woman on the floor is the basest of mortals. That she and my husband "But that isn't possible," Mrs. Kerr Howe said. Mrs. Foster answered: "But I tell you I saw it with my own eyes. Mr. Foster was car- rying this woman in his arms. She had her arms round his neck." "Oh, I can't beheve that," Miss Delamare said. Mrs. Foster was beginning again: "She had her arms round his neck. I heard her with 322 RING FOR NANCY my own ears ask him to carry her to her bed. This is philanthropy! This is the suppression of vice! And to think that it should be my husband — and to think that she's such a thing! She's — she's old! Her teeth are false, her hair's false. I know it is. I've seen it hanging over her looking-glass." Miss Peabody began to scream lamentably, but Mrs. Foster continued without pity: "My dear, if he had wanted to betray me with you, I shouldn't mind so much. You're young and pretty and charming, and you've got a nice heart and gay manners. Or if it had been you, Mrs. Kerr Howe, it wouldn't have been so insulting. You've got good looks, though you're too little to be really handsome, and you dress well. And you have got an intel- lect. But that it should be that thing — she's as old as myself or older, and she dresses out of the rag-bag, and she's wizened and she's spite- ful and she's stupid . . ." She was interrupted by Mrs. Kerr Howe, who remarked: "Mrs. Foster, there's somebody knocking at the door." And a deep silence fell upon them. They heard the voice of Major Brent Foster exclaim clearly from within: "Olympia, may I come in? They say they've changed our rooms." RING FOR NANCY 323 And Mrs. Foster exclaimed: "Oh, come in and look at this disgraceful spectacle." The major came in, with his amiable smile which gradually changed into an appalled ex- pression. "Why, what!" he ejaculated. "Olympia on the floor! Why, whatever! . . . Olympia, get up. I've bought you this ring in town." And he was crossing the room to go to Olympiads side, when Mrs. Foster stretched her arm rigidly across his chest. "My dear," she said, "come away. You can't stop here any longer." "But what's the matter?" he asked. "We must go aw^ay," Mrs. Foster said. "You and I and Flossie — out of this house for good." "But hang it all!" the major said. "I must have some sort of an explanation. You can't clear out of the house as if you were taking a twopenny ticket on the tube. What's the mat- ter, Olympia?" But Mrs. Foster said quite harshly: "Ed- ward! No, don't speak to that — that — harlot." It was at this word that Miss Peabody began to scream again, and she screamed quite re- spectably for some minutes. And then they perceived that Miss Jenkins was coming into the room from behind the hangings. She pushed them aside and stood among them, 324 RING FOR NANCY rather rigidly, looking down at Miss Peabody, her lower lip just curling in the very slightest. "I told you!" she said in the lowest of voices. The major became pale when he looked at her. She was in what Mrs. Foster called a roofed-in dress of dark blue silk. *'My God!" he ejaculated. "You here! I insist upon some explanation." But Mrs. Foster exclaimed: "No, no, my dear, not now. We must go away. I couldn't explain here. You would kill your uncle. Fm afraid it would be your duty to kill your uncle." The major exclaimed: "Good God! Kill my uncle! What's the meaning of all this?" Miss Peabody got up from the ground. "Ed- ward," she said, "I shall explain to you and to no one else." "Well, I certainly think," the major com- mented, "that somebody ought to explain to some one." "Then I shall explain to no one at all," Miss Peabody said. "I shall leave this house at once." "I should certainly advise you," Miss Jenkins said slowly, "to give an entire explanation of everything. I believe, miss, that you are per- fectly innocent." Miss Peabody looked at Miss Jenkins, and RING FOR NANCY 325 her lips almost silently let fall the one word, "Devil!" Then she turned upon Major Foster. "There's no need of explanation," she said. But Miss Jenkins exclaimed with her level intonation: "I don't know so much about that, Miss Peabody. You see, the other night you said that things didn't look so innocent. And yet the other night . . ." Mrs. Foster said: "What's that about the other night?" with the sharpness of a cross- examining barrister. "It w^as a most infamous scene," Miss Pea- body said. "There were all these women run- ning after that fool of a nephew of yours." "Oh, I say!" the major exclaimed. "What have / done, Olympia?" Miss Peabody turned upon him with an ex- traordinary fierceness. "If you had had the spirit of a man," she said, "you would have struck your aunt dead at my feet." "Oh, come, Olympia," the major said. "Kill my aunt as well as my uncle? I should be an orphan." "You would have struck your aunt dead at your feet," Aliss Peabody repeated, "before you would have let her utter the abominable insults she has poured on me." "But I haven't heard any of the insults," the 326 RING FOR NANCY major said amiably. "She must have poured them out before I came in." "She didn't say a single word that was not true," Miss Delamare exclaimed. "Not a sin- gle word." "You hear her?" Miss Peabody exclaimed to the major. "You hear her, and you don't strike her to the ground at once!" "Oh, I say, Olympia," the major said. "You want a town butcher for this job." Miss Peabody was by now enraged past bear- ing. And her face as she looked toward the major trembled visibly. "You utter imbecile!" she said. "You grin- ning amiable fool. It's disgusting to me that I ever saw your face, and it will disgust me so that I shall be ill if I ever see your face again. This is a house of madmen and fools and of corruption. I leave this house at once. Send for my maid to take away my things. I shall give no explanation; I shall go: for this house is Sodom and Gomorrah." And suddenly she pulled off her engagement ring and threw it at the major's feet. "My own car," she continued, "will take me to town at once. I say good night to nobody; I say good-by to nobody. I only hope that all your sins may be rewarded as they deserve." RING FOR NANCY 327 And suddenly they perceived that Miss Pea- body was just gone. They had all been think- ing so hard along one train of thought or the other that it was almost as if she had vanished into the ground. The major exclaimed: "Oh, I say! We can't let the poor woman go off like that." And he made a movement toward the door. But Mrs. Foster caught him fiercely by the hand. "Edward," she said, "if you go after that woman, I shall pray God to strike you dead at my feet." "Oh, come," the major said, "you wouldn't do that." They all stood about awkwardly; there sim- ply was not any one there who had a word to say, it seemed to have grown so extraordinarily quiet with the absence of Miss Peabody. It was as if a tempest had suddenly died away and left them listening for departing gusts. And then suddenly Miss Peabody's maid ap- peared in the room that had been Miss Pea- body's, and without a word, she began pack- ing Miss Peabody's trunks. In a sort of bewil- dered silence they all of them began to help her. Miss Jenkins was the first to do this, and then Mrs. Kerr Howe, and then Miss Dela- mare. The girl was gone in an astonishingly 328 RING FOR NANCY short space of time, and still they all hung about, for every one of them felt that he or she had something remarkable to say. But no- body said anything; only at last Miss Jenkins remarked: "I think. Major Edward, if you would help me to bring some of your things here it would be just as well. I don't suppose Mrs. Foster would want the servants to know anything more than they need know." Nobody said anything, for Mrs. Foster was beginning just slightly to whimper. "And if," Miss Jenkins continued, "Mrs. Kerr Howe and Miss Delamare will go to bed, it might make things all the quieter. I'm certain Mrs. Foster is wanting a quiet word with her husband." And slowly, under Miss Jenkins's direction, they all dissolved, until Mr. and Mrs. Foster were left standing there alone. lVII A ND suddenly, since she no longer had the -^ ^ stimulating presence of Olympia to stiffen her into hostility, Mrs. Foster burst into tears and exclaimed: "How could you, Arthur!" Mr. Foster did the best that he could with several sentences beginning with the words, "But, my dear . . ." He could not, however, finish any of them. And then Mrs. Foster be- gan to speak with a real and quite touching; mournfulness. "Again I have got to say," she exclaimed, "how could you, Arthur! For although I have known for years that you haven't been a good husband to me in that sort of way, it didn't seem somehow to matter to me. I know I ought to have been enraged; I know it is highly improper of me — it's probably not even virtuous of me — not to have made frightful scenes. I suppose I ought to have cared, but I simply did not see how I could care. I've sat up in bed at night trying to shake myself into rages, but I just couldn't. But when it comes to this — this is so unnatural — this is so horrible." 329 330 RING FOR NANCY "But I'm damned," Mr. Foster said, "if I understand what this is! I know I ought not to swear, but I simply can't help it. What's it all about? What is thisf . . ." Mrs. Foster contented herself with remark- ing still more mournfully: "How could you! How could you!" "But hang and confound you," her husband exclaimed, "I couldn't! I didn't do anything; I don't know what it's all about." "But she was in your room," Mrs. Foster said. "She was," her husband answered; "but I can't help that. I don't know what happened. I had been reading a book, and suddenly the wall opened and then she came in and accused me of having Miss Delamare concealed there. She came in to search the room." A new anger overwhelmed Mrs. Foster. "What business," she exclaimed, "what busi- ness was it of that woman to search your room — unless you had given her a right to be jeal- ous? Why did you let her?" "My dear," Mr. Foster said, "how in the world could I stop her? She was like a sort of policeman over me. You know she was like a sort of policeman over me." "Yet," Mrs. Foster said, "I found you carry- ing her." RING FOR NANCY 331 "She was fainting," Mr. Foster replied in self- defense. "It doesn't matter whether she was fainting or not," his wife said. "If you could have car- ried her out, you could have stopped her com- ing in — a great strong man like you. No, I am convinced of it, you had arranged with her beforehand to press that knob and open that panel." Mr. Foster said bewilderedly: "What pan- el? .What panel?" And when his wife had explained he seized his advantage quickly, and with a quite virtuous indignation, he said: ''You knew about that panel. I didn't. You changed my room. I didn't. It's you who are to blame; I am certainly not. I was as obedi- ent as any husband ought to be. I was trying to read a book you told me to read in a room you told me to be in, and suddenly — I'm hanged if it didn't feel as if all the pots from the side of a grocer's shop fell on my head at once. It was all entirely your fault." "It's no good your trying to get out of it like that, Arthur," Mrs. Foster said. "But I am going to get out of it like that," her husband answered energetically. "I've had too much of it; I'm going to take a stand. Not only did you put me in this room, but you put that woman in that other room." 332 RING FOR NANCY "I certainly didn't," she answered. "It was Teddy's room, and it has always been Teddy's room." "That's all nonsense," Mr. Foster said. "You're the mistress of this house. It's your business to arrange people's rooms." "But that's just the whole thing," Mrs. Fos- ter said. "I've never been the mistress of this house. That's been the whole cause of com- plaint with me. I may be now, though heaven knows what other woman mayn't come wrig- gling in . . ." And just at that moment Miss Jenkins came into the major's room carrying his kit-bag. And because Mrs. Foster felt that things were entirely at a deadlock between her- self and her husband, since they were each accusing the other with words of the utmost veracity and sincereness, Mrs. Foster turned upon Miss Jenkins and said: "Now, Miss Jenkins, my dear, perhaps you will kindly tell Mr. Foster who is the real mis- tress of this house. I know I sit at the head of the table, and I know the servants call me *ma'am'; but who, for instance, has had the arranging of the bedrooms? Who is really re- sponsible for these extraordinary scenes? For that's the person who is the real mistress of the house." RING FOR NANCY 333 Miss Jenkins looked quite softly at Mrs. Fos- ter. "Well, if you ask me, ma'am," she said, *'l should just simply say that I think I am." She added, looking down at the kit-bag that she still held: "You see, I am arranging it even now." "Then perhaps," Mr. Foster exclaimed quite confidently, "you will kindly explain what the whole of this confounded business has really meant." "I am sure," Miss Jenkins said, "that I am perfectly ready to explain everything, and to take every possible kind of responsibility. And I am perfectly ready to begin by saying that everybody in the house is entirely innocent of any kind of guilt — except Miss Peabody, whose motor has just gone tearing down the avenue. If it hadn't, I should not be quite so ready to explain. But she's safely out of it, and we're all safely out of it. So that I can quite well say that even she has not been guilty of any- thing except simple spite." "You don't expect me to believe that!'* Mrs. Foster said. "I do, ma'am," Miss Jenkins answered. "I expect you to believe every word that I say. For if I've said that I've been responsible for all this arrangement, I certainly expect it to be 334 RING FOR NANCY believed that I was not aiding and abetting Miss Peabody or anybody else to do anything that could be called immoral." "Well, I think I will allow that," Mrs. Fos- ter said. "I think you will have to, ma'am," Miss Jen- kins answered. "I'm not going to say that Miss Peabody didn't insist on being transferred to this room; because she did. She didn't do it with any view to midnight interviews with Mr. Foster. And Mr. Foster could not possibly have had any idea of midnight interviews with Miss Peabody, because he hadn't the slightest idea in any manner of speaking of where he really was. He was just planked down in a room he didn't know. So that clears him. And I don't really suppose that he in the least wanted any midnight conversation with Miss Peabody because, as a matter of fact, I know pretty well that he was just hiding in his bed- room in order to get away from Miss Pea- body." "Why should he want to get away from Miss Peabody?'* Mrs. Foster asked. "Well, just because, ma'am," Miss Jenkins answered, "because he signed the contract for the new theater with Miss Delamare this eve- ning after dinner." RING FOR NANCY 335 Mrs. Foster said, "Oh I" "So that you can understand," Miss Jenkins continued, "that Mr. Foster was not particular- ly anxious to have an interview with the lady. And I dare say you can understand that Miss Peabody was anxious to have an interview with Miss Delamare. That was why she insisted upon having this bedroom. That is why we're all — all of us — feehng perceptibly happier." Mrs. Foster looked at Miss Jenkins. "What a way you have of understanding things, Miss Jenkins, my dear," she said. "For it's perfectly true that we're all of us ever so much happier. I think I was heart-broken, but the minute that woman went out of the room I knew I was standing on what some poet called his native heath, though, of course, this isn't really my own house." "Oh, well, for all practical purposes," Miss Jenkins said, "you can consider it absolutely your own house." "But I never shall really," Mrs. Foster an- swered. "Not really quite absolutely." "I wouldn't make too certain of that, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said. Mrs. Foster looked at her with bewildered eyes that gradually widened and widened. And then she asked as a certain enhghtenment 336 ^ RING FOR NANCY seemed to pass across her mild and simple features : "You really think you can manage that?" "I really mean, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said, "that I wouldn't be too certain that I couldn't — and that you could be perfectly and abso- lutely certain that if I could, you would, in a manner of speaking, be standing on your native heath." "I don't understand what this is all about," Mr. Foster said. "But women are always in- comprehensible, so it doesn't matter. I want to know if there is any charge hanging over my head." Mrs. Foster looked at Miss Jenkins. "Then this," she said, "is really the happiest day of my life. For even Mr. Foster, for the first time since I've known him, has really behaved like a man, and you can't imagine what an immense satisfaction that is to me. For he has just said, *Damn it!' quite loud and strong, and he has just stood up to me as if he hadn't got a back- bone that was made of india-rubber. . . . Yes, yes, for the very first time ! For, for the whole of his life he has been cringing before me be- cause he has been afraid that I should find out about some red-haired shop-girl out of a glass case, and I have known all the time, especially RING FOR NANCY Z2>7 when he came home with the whiskers that he used to wear damaged and bedraggled. And I've known and I haven't cared, and I've been so ashamed of not having cared that I haven't dared to tell him for fear he should tell me that I was immoral. And now it's all come out, and he has really stood up and spoken like a man; and that alone is enough to make me happier than I've ever been since my wedding- day. And if only my Edward were here . . ." *'0h," Miss Jenkins said, "I told him to wait outside the door till I said he could come in^ He's there quite all right. But I thought it was not quite fitting that he should hear the delicate things I knew we should have to dis- cuss." "But we've really discussed everything, Miss Jenkins, my dear," Mrs. Foster said, "and I don't think he should be kept outside the door any longer than is absolutely necessary, for these corridors are cold and draughty and nasty and anxious sort of places, and it's all so cleared up, and there are such tremendous weights ofif my mind; so that I think we ought to let my dear Edward come in and tell him that I am going to have him too all to myself for the rest of the time." "I should not be too certain of that, ma'am," 338 RING FOR NANCY Miss Jenkins said softly. "And I should not be too certain that we've discussed all the delicate things that we've got to discuss, because I want a little direction from you on that very subject." i "What very subject?" Mr. Foster asked. But Mrs. Foster continued composedly: "The only thing that I stipulate is that the next one he chooses shan't be an old maid with a skin like lawyers' parchment, and a temper like what Lucifer is said to have, though I don't believe his can be really as bad." "I don't think, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said, "that she will be that. Though, of course, it isn't for me to say. But perhaps, ma'am, if you tell me just exactly what it is you want, I might be able to provide you with something that would come up to sample. For you must remember, ma'am, that you promised me four thousand pounds, and that I might have the major for myself if I got that woman out of the house. And I have got that woman out of the house, as every one will clearly acknowl- edge. So that if you don't feel inclined to keep your promise — though as for the four thousand pounds I don't want it — I should just like to know what it is that exactly you do want — what it is that would suit you ex- actly and absolutely down to the ground." RING FOR NANCY 339 Mrs. Foster looked almost piteously at Miss Jenkins. She was really in a most extraordinary state of mind. "Miss Jenkins, my dear," she said, "I have always felt that you were one of the family. I have felt from the very first moment I came here — and w^ith no disloyalty to Flossie, for that's quite another sort of thing, and she doesn't strike me as being so much a woman as a child — that you were the very nicest w^oman I have ever met, and — that if you had certain other things which you don't appear to have — but you're so extraordinary that there's no knowing what you have or haven't, or might have, or mightn't have — that it would make me the very happiest woman in the world if you married my Edward. For you are capa- ble and sensible, and more handsome than any- body I have ever seen, and good-tempered and disciplined. I can tell that because you have such an excellent quiet way of being a servant, and you're high-spirited, and you like your fun, and you can make any one in the world fond of you . . ." "I think, ma'am," Miss Jenkins interrupted her, "that I know quite well what I am, but I should just like you to tell me what you want me to have." Mrs. Foster looked at Miss Jenkins with the 340 RING FOR NANCY | expression of a child who gazes into the fire in search of fairy palaces. **I don't quite exactly know," she said. "It isn't what I want her to have so much, for I almost hope she won't have much money so that he can't be said to be dependent on her; but I hope she will be of good family, because he's of good family himself, his father, the ad- miral, being descended, as I have heard him say many times, from the old ancient kings of Ireland, and moving in the society of the best in the land. And I wouldn't object to her hav- ing a title, because that's a nice thing, too, though heaven knows I've never wanted it myself. A title — and a house like this — and a little estate like this — but not too big . . ." "Of course, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said, "you're talking about Lady Savylle. Well, I don't see any difficulty about that, ma'am." Mrs. Foster had come altogether too near it already to start now. And she just said : "You mean that Lady — Lady Savylle would marry him.^" "I'm perfectly certain she will, ma'am," Miss Jenkins said, "the moment he asks her." "But he loves her," Mrs. Foster said. "He loves her most devotedly." "I believe he does, ma'am." RING FOR NANCY 341 It was at that moment that Mr. Foster saw something confident and man-like to say, and he remarked: "If Edward doesn't propose to Lady Savylle to-morrow, I shall cut him straight out of my will." And it was really his turn to be surprised when Miss Jenkins remarked: "I should not, if I were you, be too aston- ished if he did it to-night." "But surely," Mr. Foster said, "it's too late. You don't expect him to get on a horse and go galloping ... I mean, I shouldn't like it my- self. His eyes have got to be considered." Miss Jenkins remarked: "Then if all that has got to be considered, and if you really think it is gefting near the statutory hour for barring proposals of marriage, don't you think it would make it come a little earlier if you went into the next room and I closed the panel — you and Mrs. Foster — for the major is waiting outside with a portmanteau on his back, and the sooner I have a word with him the sooner all this will be settled to everybody's satisfaction." The grim men and the vacant women marched across the old couple as they went into the pink room, and Miss Jenkins, closed in and up against it, stood with her hand still 342 RING FOR NANCY upon the knob. She was undoubtedly pantmg shghtly, and she looked at the little secret door of escape that was only half hidden by the shadowy arras. The electric light had never got itself repaired, so that she and the room and the great picture and the great bed were only shadowily lit by the pair of long wax candles on the dressing-table. But she aban- doned her impulse of flight and called: "Now you can come in, Major Edward." The major pushed the door open with the portmanteau that was upon his shoulder, but that was the last use that he made of it, for he pitched it straight on to the ground, and rushing forward with extended arms, he grasped Miss Jenkins and kissed her repeatedly upon every one of her features that his lips could be expected to reach. *TVe brought it off at last," he gasped. "IVe kissed somebody at last." Miss Jenkins with quite a firm grasp removed his hands from her shoulders. "And don't you think it is very wrong of you, sir?" she asked. "I'm hanged if I do," the major said. "Fm not engaged to Olympia now." "But you are in love with her ladyship," Miss Jenkins answered The major grasped Miss Jenkins and kissed her repeatedly RING FOR NANCY 343 "I am in love with you, with you, with you," the major said. "But you have got to marry Lady Savylle,*' Miss Jenkins asserted. "Your uncle says he will cut you out of his will if you don't propose to her to-morrow." "I am proposing to you to-night," Major Foster said. "Will you marry me?" "But you have got to marry money or a title, sir," she informed him. "One or the other." "I don't care," he answered. "YouVe got to marry me." "A poor servant, sir?" Miss Jenkins said. "You'll be cut out of your uncle's will." "I don't care," he exclaimed. "I'll work." "You couldn't, sir," she said. "You'll have to leave the army altogether if you marry a servant. You'll have to live on my wages." "Oh, they'll do for two," the major answered. "I'll come as butler." Miss Jenkins was searching on his dressing- table. "You haven't got a piece of paper?" she asked. He produced from his kit-bag a complete sheet of note-paper. "What do you want paper for?" he asked. "To write upon, sir," she answered. 344 RING FOR NANCY "Well, you can have half the sheet," he said, and he tore it in half. "You want to make me sign a promise to marry you ; then I shall make you sign a promise to marry me. You're a wicked, cunning, intricate and slippery eel, and you are not going to get out of it." He lent her a fountain-pen from his traveling desk, and she wrote a very short message that could not have been more than three words by the scratching of the pen. She folded the sheet of paper carefully, and then regarded him with a sort of humorous intentness. "You're determined to marry me, sir?" she said. "It does seem a pity when we had it all so nicely arranged, your uncle, your aunt and I. You were to marry some one with a title and a little house like this, and a little estate like this." "I am going — to marry — you," the major said. She held the paper toward him. "Then you had better read this when I am gone," she said. "Here, you wait a minute," he commanded cheerfully. "I can do a Httle bit of writing, too; give me my pen." He scribbled four words upon his piece of paper, folded it and held it out toward her. "Turn about's fair trading," he said. "You RING FOR NANCY 345 give me your paper, and you may have mine; but you're to read yours here and I will read mine." She looked at him with an odd smile, and he said: "Well, this is what we call the game of con- sequences. You've just got to bear them. Open your paper." "No, open yours first," she said. . He remarked, "Oh, well . . ." And then he read. "Oh, is that all?" he exclaimed non- chalantly. "All.^" she ejaculated. "Well," he said, "if you look at your paper you will see that there is only one word in each of them that differs. You've written, 'I'm Mary Savylle,' and I've written, ^You're Mary Savylle.' It seems a silly thing to have done, but it's what you wanted, and I suppose it's my job in life to give you what you want." "Then you knew all the time?" she said. "All the blessed, blessed time," he answered. "Don't suppose that though the eyes in my head are damaged they didn't know you from the start, though you puzzled me? And don't you suppose it has been a blessed, blessed time just being in the same house with you, and just having you fluttering round, and just knowing 346 RING FOR NANCY and just loving and just wondering — ^just won- dering what you were going to do ? And wasn't it just the blessing of God only to sit in this room and to know it was full of you where you had been walking round and round so that the trace of your footsteps interlaced, and every bit of the air in which must have touched you and kissed you? And don't you suppose ..." "Oh, you Irish villain !" she exclaimed. "Oh, you wicked designing witch!" he an- swered. "How did you dare to do it?" "Do you suppose," she mimicked him, "that I could bear you to be in England a minute and me knowing it and not being with you every second of the time? And don't you suppose I have passed every minute of the time that I could spare from these botherations just being in this room when you were not in it, and just looking at the cold ashes of the wood and just thinking how they had glowed when you looked upon them? And haven't you been the sun in the air to me, and the sky that carries it all, and the green of the grass, and the love that is in all the world? And don't you suppose that when I have laughed at you I have trembled too, because I knew it was you who was the master of me? And don't you suppose . . ." And she put her hands upon his shoulders and RING FOR NANCY 347 drew him close against her. "Don't you sup- pose . . ." "What a . . ." he was beginning, when again she interrupted him with: "Now, my wild Irishman, don't you be saying that I am anything, and I won't be giving you any title. But just let's remember that it's not you, and it's not me, but it's just us from now on to the end of time, and just say what's fit for both our mouths . . . and that's what a pair of us we are!" "What a pair of us we are!" he repeated en- thusiastically. And just at that moment there was not any panel there at all, and Mrs. Foster was remarking: "Teddy, there's a knob on this side of the panel as well as on that; we've just found it." She surveyed contentedly the couple who were disengaging themselves from each other's arms, and she remarked: "Ah!" "So that," Miss Jenkins said, "you really expected this all the time." "I certainly really suspected something of the sort from the very beginning," Mrs. Foster said. "From the first moment that I set eyes on — on her ladyship's own maid." "Oh, you wicked old person!" Miss Jenkins said. 348 RING FOR NANCYi "My dear," Mrs. Foster replied, "the first thing I learned in my life from Edward's father, the admiral, was that it's best to let young people alone. For he nearly bit my head off when I tried to give Edward's mother good advice during their courting. And a very rash and sudden thing it was, for it only lasted three days from the time when he came into the shop to order twenty pounds of wax candles for the captain's cabin, because things were differ- ent in those days. And I think you will ac- knowledge that I have let you alone ... I think you will acknowledge that I have done my best for my dear Edward. And if a woman really sets herself to do her best, there's not anything in this silly world that is going to prevent her doing it." "But hang it all!" Mr. Foster said, reassert- ing after the manner of men his masculine dig- nity. "I refuse not to be credited with my share of perspicacity. Your brother-in-law was undoubtedly a most distinguished officer, I am informed that his cutting our affair with the boats on the Kowloon River in the China War of I forget the date . . ." "My dear," Mrs. Foster said, "I'm sure we are most of us anxious to get to bed." ". . . was a most spirited action." Mr. Foster RING FOR NANCY 349 continued his speech, "and at the first available sitting of the Common Council I shall move that a fitting memorial be erected, either in St. Paul's Cathedral or elsev^here in the city to the memory of one who w^as not only a gallant defender of his country but w^hat I may call the founder of a family v^hich will long adorn our native annals." "My dear," Mrs. Foster said, "you go a little too far if you go any further." "If you w^ould only," Mr. Foster retorted, "let me speak as I want to speak without dis- tracting me as you might say with red herrings, I want to point out that I, too, certainly did suspect something. For I remember distinctly that that morning at breakfast when her lady- ship handed me the sausages, or it may have been fried soles, for I can not at this distance of time be expected to remember a detail so small . . . and it can hardly be imagined that a man with my knowledge of the world and one who has built up so considerable a business beginning from nothing . . . But what I wanted to say was that I distinctly remember calling her ladyship *Nancy, my dear,' which I cer- tainly should not have done if I hadn't sus- pected something." "My dear," Mrs. Foster said, "if you want 350 RING FOR NANCY to accuse yourself of making eyes at the house- maid, I'm perfectly ready to beheve it. But when it comes to suspecting things I'm sure we are all a great deal too ready to do that. But, on the other hand when I come to think of it, if it hadn't been for suspicions, I suppose we shouldn't any of us have been here in this particular situation, so that in a manner of speaking, we may say that perhaps it's suspi- cions that make the world go round." "And topsy-turvy and upside down and in- and-out and in every possible kind of a happy blessed way," the major said, "for that's the way it's gone with me." THE END 53V 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. This book is due on the last date stamped below, or on the date to which renewed. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. 19.35P'59CS| FEE 11 iQft4 ^£c^ tcr rec'd circ. JAN 2 3 1984 S£iL^ iFdb'saag CD LD 11962 % - 71 -9 AM 9 7 ^% General Library University of California Berkeley CDSnmDb33