MU IBRAR> 30 TO 34, NEW OXFORD STREET BRANCH OFFICES J' 32 ' KENSINGT N HIGH STREET I 48, QUEEN VICTORIA SI, E.C SUBSCRI F 1-r 'ON . A GUINEA PER A' JS-rt-. - jL/fWEIGHTADEUGHT Vi*y , LIBRARYOF MODERN FICTION y 1 2, 4&# HEINEMANN'S LIBRARY OF MODERN FICTION THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO BY RALPH STRAUS HEINEM ANN'S LIBRARY OF MODERN FICTION THE WHITE PROPHET HALL CAINE. a vols. 45. net [August THE STREET OF ADVENTURE PHILIP GIBBS. i vol. 33. net [August THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO RALPH STRAUS. i vol. 35. net [September HEDWIG IN ENGLAND By the Author of " Marcia in Germany " i vol. 35. net [September IT NEVER CAN HAPPEN AGAIN W. DE MORGAN. 2 vols. 6s. net [September LORD KENTWELL'S LOVE AFFAIR F. C. PRICE. i vol. 33. net [October BELLA DONNA R. HICHENS. 2 vols. 43. net [October BEYOND MAN'S STRENGTH M. HARTLEY. i vol. 33. net [October THE SCANDALOUS ME. WALDO BY RALPH STRAUS AUTHOR OF "THE LITTLE GOD'g DKUM," "THE MAN APART," ETC. LONDON WILLIAM HEINEMANN 1909 Copyright London 1909 by William Heinemann and Washingtou U.S.A. by D. Appleton $ Company TO NORMAN FARR EATON PLACE, Dec. 12. " MONEY," said my father in his most offensively police- court manner, " is the curse of your existence." I looked up from my plate. My distinguished parent was glaring at me over his pince-nez he wears them at a ridiculous angle and a frown puckered up his narrow, high forehead into vaguely geometrical figures. His long thin fingers nervously tapped the cloth, and his lips, having helped to formulate the remark, closed tight. At the moment he is reputed the greatest criminal lawyer at the bar. He has a habit of persistent hard work, and is without ideas upon the subject of moderation. His extraordinary activity, indeed, leaves me in a state of chronic amazement. He has been honoured by every Uni- versity in the United Kingdom, and has refused two judgeships. For my particular benefit he has declined a baronetcy and accepted a knighthood. Although his income exceeds my own by some thousands, he prefers to remain a paying guest in my house. Putting prejudice aside, I am forced to admit that in spite of interminable sarcasms on his part and petty encounters between us, we remain upon friendly terms. The one disappointment in his life is myself, for I am the chief bone of contention between us. I suppose it is a little odd that father and son should be so antagonistically moulded, but so it is. Sir Henry Waldo spells sleuth-hound to the public, 3 4 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO his son Gordon myself if he spells anything at all, impracticability, gross laziness, bibliomania, and any other of the more presentable vices you may happen to recall. And yet in justice to myself, I must place on record a personal belief on this very subject. My father will have it that my income, derived, be it said, not from him but from a defunct aunt of mine with whom he was never on the best of terms, has sapped what little brain power was ever vouchsafed me. My antiquarian work he pleases to call anachronistic foolery, and my typographical monographs represent to his mind no more than so many hours of wasted time. Without more conceit than is agreeable, however, I must add that in certain quarters I have no slight reputation. My book on the " Eminent Libraries of Mediaeval Europe " unfavourably reviewed in the Athenceum by my father himself now reposes in every modern institution at all worthy the name ; and my life of John Baskerville, of all printers the greatest, obviously can only be the result of many years of patient research . . . Of my work more perhaps anon. At the moment I am concerned with my father in general, in particular with my father's remark as already recorded. " The curse of your existence ! " he was good enough to repeat. Now my father has a most annoying habit of treating his only son as a witness temporarily possessed by the other side. " That," came my reply, " must be a matter of opinion." " On the contrary it is proved to the hilt ! " " My books" I began. My father flicked a crumb of bread off the table. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 5 " Books," quoth lie, " any one can write books ! I have written them myself." He spoke truth. Waldo on " Ancient Lights " is, I understand, to be included amongst the legal classics of to-day, while the same author's " Legislation of Drains " is in marked favour with the entire bench. But of litera- ture he knows singularly little for a lawyer with a taste for epigram. I had better say here that in spite of my thirty-two years, my herculean build and my unlegal moustache, my father has not yet abandoned the most whole-hearted attempts to set me be-wigged and be-gowned in a Court of Law, and in receipt of what he calls a regular income. Incomes, it would appear, derived from property inherited from estranged relations, are not included by my father in that category. " You are wasting your time," he continued, " and it is being forced upon me daily that something must be done." " I am compiling a bibliography of the Baskerville Press." My father damned Baskerville with unnecessary vigour. " He was a great man," said I. " A mere nobody," retorted my father. " His frequent exhumations are the only points of interest about him." I was not surprised at his words. Exhumations have always been considered matters for the lawyer rather than for the scientist or the antiquarian. Even a mere ghost is not allowed the free use of his erstwhile body until the lawyers have played their game. This must be the Majesty of the Law. Meadows, my man, brought in an omelette. We were lunching together in my house a rare circum- 6 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO stance by the way, but quite unavoidable at times. The surprising change of weather in the last few days had furnished me with unpleasant sensations in almost every part of my body. My father on the other hand looked extraordinarily alert for his fifty-nine years, but having come apparently to the conclusion that I was in no fit state to lunch alone, had given orders earlier in the day to Mrs. Hutton, my very amiable housekeeper. He continued by way of comfort to dilate upon my financial position. " You have earned not a farthing," said he, " whilst your father has made ..." " My article upon the ' Chinese Printers,' " I pointed out, " brought me in fifteen guineas." " A suitable income for a man of your age ! " cried my father simulating anger. He is a very lovable old gentle- man at such times. " It is precisely fifteen guineas more than I made last year," I replied. My father uttered a bellicose exclamation. " You are incorrigible," said he. It was useless to argue that a man blessed or cursed with eight thousand a year, does not require to earn more than a maximum of a guinea and a fraction each month. I said nothing at all, whereupon my father taking silence for disbelief, as is the usual procedure with old gentlemen, indulged in his diurnal outburst of parental indig- nation. '' You are misusing your abilities ! You sit in your library and potter damnably ! You are five stone heavier than I am, and seem to glory in the fact. Your hair is monstrously unkempt, and reminds me of the Socialists every time I look at it. You attend auction THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 7 sales to buy books which you never read. Your friends one and all irritate me. Look at John Hylton . . ." " My dear father " " He may be a good fellow, but he is a drone. I see him gazing vacantly into space every time I go to the window." The Hyltons' house faces my own. " Together you make a bright pair." " John Hylton," said I, restraining a smile, " is one of the best of fellows." " Very possibly he is, but my point is that he does nothing. We are not brought into this world to do nothing at all. You cannot imagine me mooning about the house trying to make up my mind how to get through the next twenty-four hours ? " " No," said I. " Very well, then," said my father, and stopped as though he had concluded his argument. Now I am in the unfortunate position of being utterly unprovided with retorts and accusations which contain even the merest suspicion of sting. My father's life has been one of uniform success. He has remained singularly free from scandal of any kind. No one of my acquaintance has so much as a word of criticism to offer. I am there- fore obliged to confine myself to repeated assertions of my own integrity. " You take not the smallest interest in anything at all," he continued. " I read all the murder trials," I remarked facetiously. My father's eyebrows touched his hair. As one who holds the record for capital convictions, he doubtless takes this unselfishness on my part as a matter of course. " After years of coaxing ! " said he. " At any rate that is something in my favour." 8 THE SCANDALOUS MB. WALDO " It is not a profession," declared my father. "By profession," I told him, " I am a philosopher." In truth my life has long been moulded upon philosophical lines. I am interested in things equally with people if I am allowed to examine them at my leisure. The trouble is that my father is very far from being a leisurely person. For myself I find that a suspicion of hurry will ruin an investigation. I am given to understand that this is the true scientific spirit ; and it is in this scientific spirit that I have tackled the vexed question of parentage. Hence, I suppose, has followed my old-fashioned father's perpetual irritation. He would have me an obedient youth at the age of thirty-two. Life, says my philosophy, is far too short for such a sacrifice. " I have been a philosopher," I continued, " with some regularity for ten years." " A philosopher," remarked my father, " is a man who is too lazy to take more than an impersonal interest in anything." It is true that I occasionally hold a brief for sheer lazi- ness, and I would have enlarged upon his remark, but his next words turned my attention elsewhere. " Nothing, I think," said he, " will succeed in reforming you but marriage." Now if there is one word which I hate more than any other, it is reform. A perfectly contented man can hardly be expected to hold a contrary opinion. " Marriage," repeated my father impressively. I have come to look upon marriage as a ceremony that should be postponed for as long a time as is possible before being permanently avoided. " You know as well as I do," he went on, " that you will have to marry." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 9 " There is not the least necessity," I replied. " I should like to see you married," said my father. I believed him. A year ago he would have married me to a distant cousin with money and a crooked nose. Fortunately she died. Before that, I remember, he worked hard for an alliance between my unfortunate self and an Irish girl with a simper and red cheeks. On that occasion I visited Russia. "If I were to marry," said I guardedly, " I should require to be absolutely certain that my choice was the right one." " Of course it would be the right one," said my father. " You are surely old enough to know your own. mind." " That is just the point," said I. " I do not think I know a single woman who would meet ..." " Ridiculous ! " cried my father. " You are too lazy to look ! I admit that you are not so bad as John Hylton who merely gallivants with every woman he meets, but there is not the slightest reason why you should go to the other extreme." " You ought to be glad to think that I have not made you father-in-law to a chorus girl," I retorted. A faint smile crossed his features. " Nor," I continued, " have I followed the example of your friend and married my cook." This had reference to the fact that some twenty years ago Sir Austin Cardonnel, my father's greatest friend at the time, married his cook and w r as obliged in consequence to retire from the world. I can just remember my father's shock. He refused to see him again it must have been sheer cussedness on his part and people will tell you that from that time he has been wary of making new friends. My father is extraordinarily popular both in and out of his 10 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO profession but, in spite of his life of hurry and work, there is a certain forlornness about him. I am his best friend if he only knew it and it is only on the occasions when he persists in talking about marriage, that I mention Car- donnel's name to him. His wife was an impossible woman who drank herself to death. " Cardonnel," said he, angrily, " was a damned fool, and paid a price for his folly. Besides, he was mad." " I believe he has a pretty daughter," said I irrelevantly. My father's look of suspicion amused me. " I have not seen her myself," I added, " but two years ago John Hylton wanted to marry her." " I can well believe it," he replied tartly ; " I have yet to hear of a young lady whom he did not wish to marry. But you know very well that I do not wish to speak of Cardonnel." " I gather that very few people do," said I. " I know nothing about him myself, except that the Hyltons' place in Yorkshire is near to his, but surely he is a warning against ..." " My dear boy," said my father with a frown, " no one supposes you will marry your cook or your housemaid or even a Gaiety girl, but it must be obvious that an heir is er very necessary. In that case," he added, " I might accept a ..." " It will be best," said I in all seriousness, " if we agree to be silent on this matter." But my father had no intention of dropping the subject. Appeals to my better nature, whatever that may be, were interspersed with accusations of a distinctly slanderous character. I maintained a strict silence. I have found that to be the best course under the circumstances. " One day," finished my father, " you and I will quarrel." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 11 But not even five years' repetition of that remark made me attach any belief to it. My father hurried away to his chambers. I was left to my own meditations. As is usual when my health is at the mercy of meteorological eccentricities, I retired to my library, and took up the first book that came to hand. It happened to be a collection of poems by a very distinguished journalist. Personally I do not care very much either for poetry or for journalists, more particularly when their resultant happens to be ultra- soulful, but this afternoon my energies were at such a low ebb that once the book had been placed in the reader's bracket attached to my patent chair the acme of com- fort no forces could have dragged me to the bookshelves. True, my chair is provided with a bell that rings in the pantry, but one does not care to try the good nature of one's man too much, in addition to which I have an uneasy conviction that Meadows laughs at me behind my back a matter of the supremest unimportance, but perhaps the more irritating upon that score. And so with my book of poems at a convenient angle I alternately read of highly-epitheted love and slept. I have always entertained the highest philosophical admiration for this ubiquitous emotion without once being reduced to the mere position of lover. This is not the result of a horrible cynicism. A majority of my friends are of the opposite sex, and when I have sufficient energy to dress myself according to the day's fashion, I do not hesitate to enjoy myself in their company but that, I think, is all. I suppose I am a little like Bazarov, the would-be nihilist in one of Turgenieff s novels. " To my mind," says he, "it is better to break stones on the high road than let a woman have the mastery of even the end 12 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO of one's little finger." I cannot imagine myself breaking stones upon any road, but the sentence has stuck in my mind, and I like to think that it may well apply to myself. And yet I feel I have enormous capacity in the matter, and can rejoice with those of my sex who succeed in dis- covering their mate. That, I suppose, is my difficulty. The women I meet make excellent friends, or are objects of a moment's admiration. I find myself able to be more than ordinarily interested in the passionate creature so useful to our dramatists, but I would not marry her, even though my father might choose to place his veto on the proposal. On several occasions too, I have been aroused to unusual exertions by an intellectual woman only to find that she would frighten me to death within a week of our marriage. Added to which, a girl with gold hair once asked me to marry her. Since then I have lived more or less in a world of coming and going, and my imagination has fallen short of myself as a married man. A week's elopement might suit me, but that would hardly be received with approval, and I have an unfortunate knack of being found out. Anything else, so far as I can see, is out of the ques- tion. I do not believe, moreover, that I should recognise the "right woman" of whom the novelists are so fond of writing, even if she were to be thrust upon me ; but then I decline to believe in her existence. So far, indeed, as love is concerned, I might well have been born a fossil. It may be odd, but it is true, and I am inclined to think, no mean blessing. " Only a wife," one reads in the cheaper magazines, "can add the finishing touches to life." I prefer my books and my patent chair. This, however, is so unnecessary a digression that I am tempted at once to write down the news . . In truth I am amazed at my own docility. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 13 My father appeared at the dinner table in a state of suppressed excitement. A glance at his white tie, usually a model for the sartorially-minded, but now awry and of the wrong size, was enough to put me on my guard. He drank his soup with the air of a man who is counting five hundred in the fond hope that by doing so he will doze off into unconsciousness. The fish was eaten in complete silence. Meadows, I could see, was not a little surprised. He is accustomed at such times to favour me with a look not over-distant from a wink extremely subdued, I need hardly say, and respectfully carried out. To-night, however, his general carriage suggested utter bewilderment. My father maintained this unusual silence until the filet-de-bueuf. He then took occasion to ask for the mustard, observing at the same time that he proposed to enter Parliament at the general election an event, which, I understand, is to take place some time next month. " I have been approached again," he said, " and this time I have decided not to refuse. I am always refusing things, which is equivalent to churlishness. Somewhat naturally I do not wish to be considered churlish. The seat is fairly safe, and it occurs to me that politics will fit in very well with my spare time." I had a mind to lecture him upon the immorality of his outlook. " Your constituents," I observed, hiding surprise under a frown, " have every right to demand your whole time." " They shah 1 get just so much as I am able to give them." " You have really made up your mind ? " My father's look of contempt asked plainly enough whether I had ever known him change his mind. Candidly I have not. " It is an amazing proposition," said I at last. 14 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " It is nothing of the sort," said my father warmly. " My party wish for my presence in Parliament. They shall have it. In the event of my death the seat will be yours." That is so like my father. He will certainly live for another twenty-five years, but it is his whim to imagine that each new step he may take is entirely for my imme- diate benefit. From his manner you might deduce that the doctors have given him no more than a month's further span. It is often thus. I know an astoundingly healthy family, who both individually and in concert will tell you in perfect good faith that a total extinction of themselves will probably occur during the following week. For some years, indeed, I put a steadfast belief in their prophecy, but I have been disappointed. " And where is the seat ? " I asked after a pause. *' East Chapel," said my father. " Slums ! " quoth I. " An unhealthy neighbourhood," he allowed, '" but interesting. We shall have some amusing experiences." " We ? " " You shall be my confidential secretary ! " My father spoke as though he were conferring an inestimable privi- lege. Meadows' arm shook as he handed the sweet. I was not surprised. " I your secretary ? I am absolutely ignorant of electioneering. ' ' " You can do what you are told, Gordon." It was with some trepidation that I heard him pronounce my Christian name. My detestable parent uses it only when about to adopt the plaintive policy, which in unfortunately irresistible. " I particularly want your THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 15 help," he continued. " Many people will have to be seen in the committee rooms. You can have a private room to yourself. I shall want you to be interviewed by the newspaper people, whilst I am making personal calls in the district. Now, my dear Gordon, you have told me hundreds of times that you are interested to meet new types of people. Here is your chance." " But East Chapel ! " I remonstrated. " Why not ? At least it is not in the north of Scotland where one has no . . . " " My work " I began feebly. " Tah ! " cried my father, and would have become angry, but remembered his policy in time. " Well, well, your work can stand over for a time. I do not like to take on a stranger as confidential secretary. You under- stand, Gordon ? " I understood perfectly. For a time, however, I held out, but when my father suggested a small salary, the muscles of my face would no longer be governed, and amid the laughter that followed, I was induced to give an unconditional promise to attend at the Central Committee rooms daily from ten to five, much, indeed, as though I had suddenly been reduced to the painful necessity of earning a living. Over our cigars much discussion took place, and for the first time in my life I found myself being initiated into the really rather exciting secrets of " party warfare." My father would have it that much pressure had been brought to bear upon him, though I have a quaint feeling that this new idea of his concerns myself. Never before has he shown the slightest inclination actively to meddle with the purely political affairs of the nation . . . And so away go my books and my patent chair and my 16 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO delicate health. For a month I am pledged Jupiter ! to a spell of hard work. Why, I do not know. I admit to an interest in the thing, but I shudder to think what will be required of me. My friends, however, will learn once and for all time that I am no sluggard. It is incon- ceivably funny. But I am promised " amusing experiences " and possibly " adventures," whence has followed this unexpected desire to write about myself. Which reminds me that my salary is the purely nominal one of three guineas a week. II Jan. 16. MY suspicions have been confirmed. The determination of my Machiavelian parent to become immeshed in the unsavoury atmosphere of politics I use the epithet advisedly is part of a diabolically ingeni- ous assault upon myself. For five years I have managed to maintain a position of independence in my own house at no greater expense than a daily argument with the prospective Member for East Chapel. I have never interfered with his private concerns, and only under the greatest provocation have I ventured to offer him advice. In return, he has had not the smallest compunction in setting in motion a whole series of entertainments aimed specifically against myself and every one of my interests, and in the manner most calculated to unnerve and dis- tress. It was not enough that he should ensconce me in a deplorably furnished closet, where the fireplace emits everything but heat, and where the walls are plastered with crude posters teeming with unnecessary lies and personal abuse directed against a man whom I have never seen it was not enough that I accepted my father's offer of three guineas a week for the performance of such duties as were consistent with my own capacities as a liar, but he has had the -presumption to veil real issues in a manner which is as ingenious as it is certainly unnatural. 17 B 18 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO There must be something wrong with a community which allows a parent, however distinguished, to conceive, and attempt to carry out, such an iniquitous plan designed against the peace and happiness of his only son. I begin to wish for an elder brother. To put the matter in a few words, it is my firm con- viction that my father's attempt to obtain a seat in Parlia- ment is following upon nothing more than an unholy desire to see me married to Lady Mary Meddenham . . . Now I have known the Rochesters for some eight or nine years. The Duke of Rochester, who is head of the Meddenham family, admires my father in the most embar- rassing way, but is not ashamed to say that he appreciates my own work. There is a fine copy of the rare Baskerville Horace with extra illustrations in his library. He is a gentle old man with conservative habits, a suave manner with all save the waiters at his club, and a weakness for postage stamps. With his only child I have long been on the friendliest terms, but even now do not understand the apparent contradictions in her nature. She has been brought up in a curious way. There are times when I think that she does not realise her womanhood, yet we have discussed every conceivable subject with the most cheerful disregard for the conventions. She is passably intelligent occasionally her remarks carry with them a quaintness which pleases me but I do not think she understands people very well. Her one great fault, shared in part by her father, is an incredible subserviency to her mother. The Duchess, indeed, without being a super- woman, is unquestionably beyond good or evil, and will for ever merit my liveliest enmity. I have not the faintest doubt that she has twisted my fanatical parent round her ample thumbs, in which case she deserves THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 19 immediate expulsion from the country. She is what a small cousin of mine once described as a " copious woman.'' She ... As a philosopher, however, I wiUVjview the situation with impartiality. When last I wrote in these notes, I was still very generally ignorant of election procedure, but willing to learn ; and so it came about that in company with Grolier, my chauf- feur, I reached East Chapel meekly-minded, and experienc- ing such emotions as I imagine must be stirring the breasts of prospective masons at the time of their initiation. Grolier, I should mention, is primarily a mechanician, but under my tuition he has developed a seasonable interest in literature, and on more than one occasion, I believe, has been seen to visit some book-shop without his master. Last year he presented me with one of the rarer Aldine classics, picked up in Northumberland, and kept hidden from me for two months. That is Grolier's way. He and I, indeed, have explored almost the whole of England together, and each expedition has caused my father to denounce me, and incidentally my chauffeur, with increasing vehemence. If the car smashes up, I have promised to take on Grolier as librarian. But in that case my father would leave the house. The first day of my new duties passed peaceably enough. My father, it appears, has elected to be his own agent- one might have expected so much of him and I am nominally in command. I must admit, however, that I am more or less guided by Jonas, my chief clerk, who is a retired Guardsman. Jonas is very willing, as an ex-soldier, to accept orders, but he has so arranged matters that 20 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO these orders first emanate from himself under the guise of advice. My gracious consent transforms them again into commands, which Jonas promptly executes. It is an admirable arrangement. Jonas met me at the door, and conducted me through a dismantled shop filled with tables and people, scribbling, it seemed, for dear life, across a draughty passage into a square box marked " Private." Here, later in the morning, I had an interesting discussion with a reporter from one of the more trenchant daily papers, chiefly, I remember, upon the subject of watercress. In the afternoon I was given a cup of indifferent tea. Apart from superintending the unpacking of some large cases of envelopes, which Jonas views with a loving eye, I did nothing of a purely political nature. On the second day, however, Jonas came to me with the astounding intelligence that Lady Mary Meddenham was in the front room. " Whatever for ? " I asked. " She wants to see you, sir," smiled Jonas. He must marvel at my father's choice of secretary. " It was hardly worth the journey to East Chapel," I remarked. " Do you know what she wants ? " " To canvass," explained my chief clerk. From that moment I have understood the futility of allowing women a say in politics . . . " I can give her five minutes," said I, and attempted to look busy. In truth I have little enough to do for my three .guineas. She came in with a rustle of skirts, and started to laugh. I pointed to the only other chair in the room, and she sat down. " I am extremely busy," I began, and fingered a letter. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 21 "Oh, my dear Gordon ! " she cried, and laughed again. " This is undignified," said I. " But it is so absurd seeing you here of all places ! What are you doing ? " I told her that I was earning a livelihood, whereat she observed that she was in similar distressing circum- stances. " My mother bribed me to come to this place of sorrows." " Your mother," I remarked wonderingly, " must have been studying the ways of tyranny." " My mother," said Mary Meddenham in the serious tone which inevitably accompanies mention of the Duchess, " believes in the wider education." " It is a serious business," said I. We laughed in a manner which must have scandalised my chief clerk. " And so," I continued, " you have come down here to canvass the wives and their husbands ? " " For some days. You will have to put up with me." " But do you like doing this sort of thing ? " " I've never seen an election before," she replied. " I don't expect I shall, but it may be amusing. At any rate it will be amusing to see you at work." " I advise you to go home," said I. " She shook her head, and smiled. " I don't suppose it will be very dreadful." " That is not the point," said I. " The point is that you ought never to have come to a place like " " Mother sent me," she interrupted with a curious air of finality, and I was silent. She seemed fairly pleased with herself, and looked almost 22 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO pretty, but it is impossible to overcome the idea that her every action is in the nature of a maternal command. It is assuredly serious this question of parental authority. It must be so easy to bully one's children, so easy to place this one matter on a plane by itself. I would give much to see Mary Meddenham exhibiting some of the more modern qualities of her sex. There may be a refreshing quaintness about old-fashioned propriety and ultra-filial affection, but the twentieth century has fortunately brought in its trail any number of admirable innovations. Personally I dislike to see women play hockey, but if Mary had been allowed any such recreation, she would not now at the age of twenty-three be so completely over-awed by the Duchess. The Rochester menage, however, has always been so ardently Victorian that I can hardly wonder at things. And yet the Duchess permits her daughter to visit my father's committee rooms unattended ! Propriety is charmingly elastic .... I feel the want of a lengthy moralisation upon women. My ideas on the species are not, I believe, unusual, but they lack cohesion. I do not know precisely what I think about women. But who does ? Mary demanded a canvass-card without delay. " That," said I with dignity, " lies within the chief clerk's province. A secretary is concerned with issues rather than with actualities. I am here to deal with the Press, to influence if possible, voters who may call in person to abuse my father. If you come here, Mary, I may as well tell you frankly that you must not expect to see very much of me. Your immediate superior will be THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 23 Jonas, who was once a Guardsman and has not forgotten it. If you want a canvass-card, you must get it from Jonas in the front room. But I must say that if it happened to be my business instead of Jonas' I should hesitate to send you out canvassing. I am hanged," I added, suddenly magnanimous, " if I allow you to go about East Chapel unattended. The Duchess would be shocked." " But she sent me down here in the brougham ! " " She does not know East Chapel," I observed. Mary played with her gloves. " I think I had better go out," she said. "I could leave the more repulsive- looking streets to a man." " They are all repulsive," said I. " They have been built by an architect who had read and admired the life of Daniel Dancer. He designed one hut that would have suited his hero's peculiar tastes, and had a thousand copies of it erected on the smallest space possible. The result is East Chapel. I shall not allow you to go out. If you are quiet, you may sit where you are whilst I trans- act matters of state this is how they run departments, you know but if any of the newspaper people come, I shall want your chair." She shook her head again, and took off her gloves. Mary has an awkward figure, but I like the colour of her hair and cheeks. " It is no good," she said. " Mother will want to know where I have been. Besides, your father wrote to say that he wanted every possible canvasser." " Did he ask whether you might come here ? " I inquired. " I suppose he did. Mother 'didn't tell me. Why ? " I looked at her. " You had better address envelopes," said I, x " in the front room." 24 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Oh, no, that would be too dull. I want to see the people in their homes." " Some one must go with you," said I. " That is quite unnecessary," she replied. " It is absolutely essential," said I with firmness. " I would come myself only it would be illegal. I am a paid servant, and am not allowed to canvass." " Isn't it odd ? " she laughed. " You persist in canvassing ? " I demanded. " Of course I shall canvass." " Very well then," said I rashly, " I shall come with you." Which is precisely what happened. And for three days I have been breaking the law, running the most serious risk of a long term of imprisonment, and incidentally paying a number of visits to the good people of East Chapel in company with Lady Mary Meddenham. Her name, it seems, is in the nature of a bait. But I am perfectly well aware that she has not been invited into the district for that reason. On the whole it is not such bad fun, and I am waiting to see the Duchess. x She has been avoiding me of late. I see little, too, of my father, but his smile is particularly irritating. If he imagines, however .... Ill Jan. 20, midnight. SOMETHING has happened. I do not know whether I want to laugh or to cry. There are moments when I desire to do neither, but cynicism is such a difficult mantle to don at times. Every one can be cynical so long as he remains a mere spectator, but if the Unseen Forces of our truly wondrous world elect to pull one by the ear into the midst of an astonishing comedy, where people behave in a manner which I, in my ignorance, thought unthinkable, cynicism is entirely out of the question. At the moment I understand very little, and what to me seems so odd may in reality be the most ordinary occurrence. But I would not have foregone the pleasure of serving my father's interests in East Chapel for a mediaeval library in its entirety. Yesterday morning Grolier took me to the scene of action at an early hour. Passing through the city he told me that East Chapel boasted a book shop which I might well visit for a purpose other than that of converting its owner to political respectability. Grolier had apparently been canvassing by himself. He handed me over to Jonas with a fervent wish that I should meet with every success. Evidently he looks upon my own position as of greater importance than my father's, and I am almost inclined 25 26 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO to agree with him. I have certainly pledged the old gentleman to more preposterous undertakings than I could have imagined possible. If he is returned to Parlia- ment an event which I am beginning to fear is mightily probable he will be obliged to spend most of his time in evading the promises which I am giving so freely on his behalf. Honestly, however, there is much to enjoy in the science of correct electioneering, and one day I shall write a text-book on the subject. I think I enjoy the letters most of all. Yesterday's batch was rather more amusing than usual. I have never, I think, read so much unfavourable comment about my father. As a rule I hand on only the more impertinent notes to the candidate for his inspection. I was wading through the correspondence, when Jonas came in with a look of perplexity on his face. " Mr. Mabrum," said he, and stopped. " Which paper ? " I inquired. The worthy Jonas fidgeted. " He is not a reporter, sir." " What League does he represent ? " " He is a little man," replied Jonas evasively, " and ugly." " Many great men," said I, " have combined a short stature with a not very pleasing exterior. You remember Napoleon. ..." Jonas, who is always trying to impress me, remained unimpressed. " And what," I asked, " does this little man, who is also ugly, demand ? " " He wants to help, sir." " Then he is probably not a great man," said I, " or he would have come to look on. Give him some envelopes." Addressing envelopes, as Jonas well knows, is the only occupation for unknown volunteers with which I am acquainted. " Yes, sir, but he wants to see you. Would you see him for a few minutes ? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 27 My good nature obtained its usual mastery over selfish considerations. " For three minutes," said I. Jonas went out for the visitor with every appearance of relief. Candidly I was impressed when Mr. Mabrum \\ as ushered in, because the Mr. Mabrums I had seen had hitherto been confined to the music-hall stage. He came in with a quaint swagger which I should like to copy in front of a mirror from pure curiosity as to the result. He was a small man with a large head. His hair was a glossy black mass, his skin extraordinarily brown. His eyes were prominent and black. His nose might be described as wide rather than large, and it was not very regularly set upon his face. His lower lip showed me a surprising stretch of bright crimson. He wore a frock-coat of a curious shape, and a waistcoat of original design. His cravat was sap- green, his tie-pin a horse-shoe studded with small glittering crystals of uncertain colour. Two rings with diamonds and a third of plain gold could be seen upon his fingers. He wore a rakish top-hat on the back of his head and at an angle which I was inclined to regard as dangerous. His age I should judge to be twenty-seven, and he belongs, I gather, to the Jewish community. He is the oddest creature I ever saw. He gave me an awkward bow, took off his hat, and presented his card. MR. GAEL MABRUM C. Mabrum & Co. 274b New Oxford St., W.C. FRANKPOKT A/M. 28 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I glanced from him to his card it was rather grubby and back to himself. " Mr. Carl Mabrum," said I, and courted information. In nasal tones and an accent which I have not yet been able to locate, he said that he had given help during past elections, quite gratuitous help, to a friend of my father's, who had bidden him come to East Chapel on this most momentous occasion. " I'm useful at street corners," he explained, " you know what I mean at street corners. I can talk. Takes a bit of getting round a London crowd, but they listen to me, you know I can generally make people listen to me somehow and so I came along here. No payment, you understand, Mr. Waldo, I don't want a penny ; this is not my business. I do this for the Cause. Here is Mr. Clare's letter." From this interesting document I gathered that Mr. Carl Mabrum was " a willing helper of the Cause." " So I settled up a bit o' business I had," continued Mr. Mabrum pleasantly, " with a customer in Gravesend, name o' Simpson, biggish sort o' man, between you V me, Mr. Waldo, and came along here." My visitor, I saw, was to be included amongst those gentlemen who do not dislike the sound of their own voices. I determined to give him no more than his three minutes. " This is very kind of you, Mr. Mabrum," said I, " very kind indeed." A wide smile overran his features to show me as fine a set of teeth as any dentifrice company cculd desire for an advertisement. He continued to talk affably. " I've come here," he said, " to work, but I thought I'd like to see Sir Henry and yourself first, so that you knew I was here. If there's any meeting, you see, where you want THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 29 an extra speaker to keep people in their seats until the candidate comes, I'm your man. Between you 'n' me, Mr. Waldo, I'm not much hand at canvassing. No, not much hand." His candour was almost exhilarating. " There is a good deal to be done," I told him, " in the clerks' room. Perhaps you would begin with the envelopes. . . ." " Oh, yes, oh, yes," interrupted Mr. Mabrum, " but you see there is something else." " It is rather a busy time," I remarked tentatively. " Of course," agreed Mr. Mabrum, and nervously brushed his hat with three fingers ; " but perhaps you could give me a minute or two ? You see, Mr. Waldo, it's this way. You won't mind if I tell you something about myself ? " Weakly I nodded ; the creature interested me he was so naively blatant. " Well, I do a bit o' business in the cheap jewellery line rings, you know, and brooches pays very well in a manner of speaking, an' that of course brings me into contact with a lot of women." I wondered what was coming. " Oh, yes, with a lot of women," repeated Mr. Mabrum reflectively. He smiled again and cocked his head on one side like a bird. I remained silent. " Yes, I see a good deal of the girls in one way an' another," he went on ; " barmaids an' slaveys mostly rather common some o' them, but, well that's business, and they're not such a bad crowd, between you 'n' me. I've got letters from a couple of barmaids, private letters, in my pocket now ! " He made a movement as if to produce the letters in question, but I was able to prevent him. " Yes, hundreds of women," he went on, and meditated 30 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO for a moment. "I know pretty well all there is to be known about women." The amazing creature apparently believed what he said. " You see, Mr. Waldo," he continued, " I want you to know this] queer thing that happened last night. ..." Like Sir Joseph Wittoll, I might say I am good-natured and can't help it, but there comes a time w r hen it is neces- sary to be firm. " I think I had better hear the story some other time," I began. The interview appeared likely to resolve itself into a begging letter in person. Mr. Mabrum, however, snubbed me by a complete ignoring of my remark. In revenge I lit a cigarette and did not offer him my case. " Only last night," he repeated, and looked at me almost reproachfully ; " which brings me to the whole point of the thing. I've brought the girl with me." " The devil you have ! " quoth I. " What girl ? " " She is in the other room," he continued, passing my question. I find I am easily scandalised. " Who is this girl ? " I demanded again with the firm intention of asking Jonas to remove my amorous visitor and all his belongings. A curious smile came over his face. " That's the queer part about it," he said. " I don't rightly know her name. I only met her yesterday. She says. . . ." The three minutes had distinctly disappeared. " Mr. Mabrum," said I severely, " you must realise how much my father and myself appreciate your offer of help, but a central committee room is hardly the proper place for young ladies er without proper names." He tapped the table with a fat finger. " But she is a lady," he said, and paused. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 31 " Of course ! " said I brutally. " Strike me, but she is, Mr. Waldo," retorted my visitor with considerable enthusiasm. " You don't think I would bring a girl here who wasn't quite. ..." I could have laughed. To be talking in this way to a complete stranger savoured strongly of the ridiculous. But a vision of a fat Jewess, horribly ornamented with Mr. Mabrum's cheap jewellery, made me realise that the thing must speedily end. I was about to utter a final remark of a somewhat caustic nature, but was forestalled. " I met her," said Mr. Mabrum with exasperating coolness, " in an A.B.C." " I am afraid," I began, convinced that in another moment I should be making a confounded idiot of myself, " I must ask you to. . . ." " And then," he continued, " I smiled as one does " detestable bounder " an' she looked at me, an' then smiled, an' I said good evening, an' then she had some tea. I paid for it as she only had one an' sevenpence, an' no- where to go. I thought as I'd heard that story before, you know what I mean, Mr. Waldo, but I was wrong sure 's I'm standing here well that's what I want to find out," he added enigmatically. " She wouldn't tell me her name at first, but she had no money, so we had some dinner at the Tottenham Cafe perhaps you know it ? an' then we walked out Regent's Park way." He looked at me. " I can't understand her," he went on, and spoke slowly. " She didn't seem to know what she was doing. I asked her if she would like me to get her a room, and she said yes. So I got her a room in Cleveland Street I know a decent landlady there an' we had breakfast this morning together in another restaurant, and " he gave an odd little shrug 32 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO of the shoulders as his hands shot out in suppli- catory fashion " here we are ! I've spent more V a sovereign on her already, but I don't know if she's speaking the truth. She says she ran away from home because her old man father, you understand insulted her. She says. ..." " Mr. Mabrum," said I, " as I told you just now, I appreciate your offer of help, but I do not see how I can assist you. Perhaps it will be better if you come here when you have arranged matters." " But you see, Mr. Waldo," he replied, " I've no par- ticular friend to go to. There's Mannheim, of course, who used to be a partner of mine he lives in the same place as I do but he wouldn't understand, and so I thought you could perhaps advise me. I think you would like her," he added slyly. I rose. " My correspondence . . . " I began for the last time. The fellow no longer interested me, and his tale sounded sordid and not at all " queer," but I regretted to find that there was no bell. " You see," said Mr. Mabrum, backing a little, " she says she's the daughter of Sir Austin Cardonnel." " Cardonnd ! " I exclaimed, mightily wondering. " A baronet," said Mr. Mabrum with some pride. " Cardonnel ? " I repeated, thinking hard. " Shall I bring her in ? " he finished, realising that mention of the name had somehow altered matters, " or will you see her in the other room ? " " But you mean to say that she is the daughter. . . ." " That's what she says," replied Mr. Mabrum, " an' I'm inclined to believe her." " But what on earth is she doing in London ? " " That's just it," said Mr. Mabrum. " That's what I THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 33 want to find out. That's why I thought you would be able to help me." I stared hard at him. " But it is probably all made up. Miss Cardonnel. ..." " You don't know her by any chance ? " " No," said I, "I do not, but well, no matter." I stopped abruptly. " I should be grateful for your help," continued my visitor, and stared at me with an odd mixture of pathos and assurance. He must have determined to solicit my friendship from the very beginning, and was obviously satisfied at this juncture that he had secured it. Idiotically I accompanied him into the clerks' room, and there saw his friend, a fair-haired girl, calmly writing envelopes at the big table. She was dressed in dark blue, and as soon as she spoke I knew that she be- longed to my own class. I learnt that I must call her Mrs. Summers. She must have seen my stare of utter bewilderment, for she flushed painfully, and hoped that she was not in the way. It occurred to me then that her face had an exceed- ingly agreeable contour. Maturer consideration has led me to the belief that whilst her features may not be able to withstand separate scrutinies, they form a whole whose beauty will not be denied. " I had nothing to do," she said in very sweet tones, " so Mr. Mabrum suggested my coming here." My first thought concerned her beauty, my second attempted to establish some connection not quite absurd between her and Mr. Mabrum, who was looking on in silence. For the first time in my life, some unseen foe imprisoned my tongue. Jonas came to the rescue. " There are plenty of envelopes," said he. c 34 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " If you don't mind going on with them," I managed to say to the girl. She smiled. " Anything I can do," she said. To my annoyance the door opened, and Mary Meddenham came in. Mr. Mabrum without apparent desire for further introductions, had tactfully taken a seat at the far end of the table. I incline to the belief that bibliomania is a far more rational amusement than organised interference with the lives and hopes and aspirations if any of East Chapel- lians. For some time I have noticed the caution with which front doors are opened, and not even the Duke of Rochester's daughter can altogether make up for the annoyance to which these presumably peaceful housewives are being put. It would be a different matter did Mary and myself ever see the master of the house, but as this gentleman is invariably " at work " a fairly wide occupa- tion, it would appear, not altogether unconnected with the licensed houses of the district we do not even have the satisfaction of seeing an East Chapellian family in toto. Were it not that I am bound by unwritten contract to carry out this policy of interference and incidental lying and crime until the eve of the election, I would at once take Grolier to Amsterdam or Palermo or Alexandria, where I should be perfectly happy. These notes, however, aim at the composition of a narrative. . . . Mary and I continued our canvass later in the morning. With my mind full of the strange girl there is something strange about her and her curious friend, who irritated me the more I thought about him, I was unusually silent. The whole affair savoured so strongly of vulgarity that I THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 35 was annoyed to find my interest in it increasing every moment. Mr. Mabrum might be an unpleasantly-minded little Jew with a passion for intrigue, but the girl seemed to have nothing in common with him. In Heaven's name, then, why had she come to this place of sorrows ? Because she had run away from home, and, if I were to believe Mr. Mabrum's story, because she had run away from Sir Austin Cardonnel of all people ! Here, perhaps, was this very girl, whom I had jokingly mentioned to my father a few weeks ago the daughter of his erstwhile friend ! I cursed my friend, John Hylton, for being away, and tried to recall the incident of two years ago when it had needed the combined efforts of Mrs. Hylton and myself to extricate him from what I had taken to be an " entanglement." And now this girl, whom I had never seen, but for whom Mrs. Hylton had had so little liking, was in my father's committee room ! Or was the story a figment of Mr. Mabrum's imagination ? But whoever she might be, why, I asked myself a hundred times, had she elected to become on friendly terms with a glossy bounder who was proud to inform you that he had already spent more than a sovereign upon her ? " The world," said I involuntarily, " is a vulgar place." We had come to a double row of particularly squalid huts, collectively known as Victoria Avenue. " Isn't it ? " said Mary, and looked about her. There followed silence as we examined our cards. " Who is Mrs. Summers ? " she asked suddenly. " A friend of Mr. Mabrum's," said I, surprised at her tone. " And who is Mr. Mabrum ? " " You saw him in the committee room writing envelopes," I replied, and knocked on a door. " I rather liked her looks," continued Mary. 36 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Indeed ? " " But there is something about her which doesn't quite quite " Oh, these women ! " We have come to solicit your husband's vote . . ." I began according to routine. And so we went on, hut by hut. It is monotonous work. " We will ask her upstairs to share the sandwiches," said Mary a little later. " We must consider the number of sandwiches," said I guardedly. I was beginning to realise that there might be awkward passages. This is always the case when one does not know precisely what one wants to happen. To say truth, I had made up my mind to have some sort of a conversation with the girl at the earliest opportunity, but Mr. Mabrum, regarded as a luncheon guest, was im- possible. " We will see," said I. But on our return to the committee room, Mary Medden- ham forthwith invited Mrs. Summers to an upstairs room, and Mrs. Summers accepted her invitation. Mr. Mabrum, I noticed, continued to write his envelopes. I was glad to find that he did not require too much. It was only in the evening that I had a chance of speaking to the girl. Mary, secure in the belief that Mrs. Summers was " nice," had gone home, and left us to the tender mercies of an old caretaker, who made us a dish of bohea. Fortunately my father was engaged in a diplomatic encounter with the representatives of two Leagues, one in favour of vivisection, the other opposed to it. This had occupied most of his day. We drank our tea almost in silence, but at last she laughed, and I followed her example. " I just wonder what you are thinking," she said playfully. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 37 " I am thinking, Mrs. Summers, that. ..." " My name," she interrupted, " is Nesta Cardonnel. I am not married." " I am thinking," said I, " that. . . ." " That I am a horrid person ? " " That you are running great risks," I replied paternally- minded for the moment. It is rather delightful to play heavy father at times. My own parent must have fore- stalled me in this discovery by some twenty-nine years. " You know nothing about me," she said, and the smile disappeared. " Possibly not very much," said I, " but I know you have left home. I know that you met our rather curious friend Mr. Mabrum, and I know that he brought you here. I imagine that things have happened to you. I don't want to be in the least inquisitive, but I would ask you whether it is wise to go about with Mabrum of all people." She put her elbows on the table and looked into my face. " My father insulted me vilely, and I left home. I came to London, and am waiting for a friend to send me some money. In the meantime I met Mr. Mabrum, and he has been kind." I stared so hard that she laughed again. " It occurs to me," said I wondering into what kind of hermit my father's former friend had degenerated, " that I had better send a telegram to your father." Her look of mingled fear and anger showed me that my half-serious suggestion had been a mistake. I then and there determined to incur my father's displeasure by seeking further knowledge of Cardonnel. " I will help you if I can," I went on, " but candidly I do not like Mr Mabrum." 38 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " He is odd," said the girl, and turned her head away. On a sudden her whole expression had changed : before she had been almost roguish, now a look of sadness trans- figured her. I thought her very beautiful. From that moment, I believe, I have ceased to be in the least scandal- ised. Here, thought I with an odd sense of gratification, was a girl, unfortunately situated, who required help. I determined to give it to her. " And so you are waiting to hear from a friend, Miss Cardonnel ? " She nodded. " And when you hear from your friend ? " " I shall say good-bye to Mr. Mabrum," she replied very coolly indeed. I wondered what Mr. Mabrum might have to say. " He knows what has happened," she explained. At this moment my father in search of refreshment made his appearance. I introduced him to the girl, and he spoke detestable politics for a quarter of an hour. I think he imagined that she represented some paper. I had an inordinate desire to explain to him her true identity, but refrained. It was, however, a curious tea-party. The amazing thing happened just before Grolier took me home. Mr. Mabrum, who had been writing envelopes with a praiseworthy persistence from an early hour, craved a second audience. He explained that as I was now a friend of his an unknown system of logic must have brought him to this conclusion possibly I would do him a favour. And very calmly indeed he asked me to make inquiries on his behalf about the girl's truthfulness ! THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 39 We had known of each other's existence for nearly seven hours. " I have been thinking things over, Mr. Waldo," he said, " the whole of the day. An inquiry must be made. I do not wish to be seen doing the thing myself for obvious reasons, but perhaps you could ? I should be very grate- ful." He appeared to think his request a perfectly natural sone. " You see, Mr. Waldo," he continued with enormou solemnity, "I desire to marry her if I am convinced of her respectability ! " IV IT was seven o'clock before I could turn my attention to Grolier and the car. Mr. Mabrum and the girl had been gone an hour, but I was detained by a belated reporter keen for details of my father's career. I had meant to drive the candidate home, but he had suddenly decided to dine with a local publican and was gone. Jonas, I could see, was curious about the girl who had appeared in so odd a manner, but he forebore to put a direct question. As he helped me into the car, however, he could not resist the remark that Mr. Mabrum was the " funniest little chap," of his acquaintance. " He'll talk your head off, sir," opined my chief clerk with a laugh. " I shall not give him the chance," said I wrapping my rug about me. " But he's a crafty one," added Jonas. " You think so ? Well, if he addresses his envelopes properly, we shall be grateful to him." " He'll probably give us more trouble than all the others put together. I know his sort." " We must be firm," said I, and Grolier started the car. At home I dressed hurriedly, and went out to a certain restaurant where M. Quatrebras feeds me to my complete satisfaction without the preliminary harassing discussion usually necessary in such places. I have always had implicit faith in M. Quatrebras, who understands to 40 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 41 a nicety just how far an Englishman with English tastes is prepared to make an incursion into the cooking of France. " Good evening, sair," began M. Quatrebras, taking me to my usual table. " I hope ze politiques are agree- able ?" " " So you have heard about me ? " " Mais oui, monsieur. It is in ze papers. Sair 'Enry empee, n'est ce pas ? " " Very probably," said I. " And Monsieur 'Eelton, 'e is returned for ze politiques also ? " " Mr. Hylton is away." " Mais non, monsieur. 'E is returned to-night. 'E come 'ere." " Mr. Hylton coming here ? " I cried in astonishment. " But certainlee," said M. Quatrebras. " 'E as tele- phoned." This was news. I had not expected to see my friend for another week. I was delighted, however, at the chance of making an inquiry about Miss Cardonnel. It would need some considerable diplomacy, I knew, for John Hylton could be as obstinate as a mule, but I was keen to refresh my memory of the incident of two years ago. The girl was occupying rather more of my attention than I could have wished, but I had come to the conclusion that this was only natural. Her appearance I knew I believed her story was a coincidence sufficiently startling to arouse any man's curiosity. " The politiques," said M. Quatrebras, " are very fear- some ? " " Very fearsome," said I, thinking of Mr. Mabrum, " but very amusing." 42 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Ah, that is well, monsieur. Quant a moi . . . . " But at that moment John Hylton strode into the restaur- ant in his heavy dragoon manner, and M. Quatrebras' sentence remained unfinished. " Didn't expect to see you here, Gordon," began my friend sitting down by my side. " I might say the same thing," said I, " I thought . . ." "The Anstruthers' dance," he explained. "I thought I would like to come up for it after all. Are you going ? " " No," said I. " I have other things to think about politics, for instance." John stared. " I'm helping my father to get into Parliament." " The devil you are ! " cried John. " I didn't know the old boy went in for that kind of thing. I hope you're enjoying it." " Immensely," said I. " I enjoy the politics and I enjoy the other things." He looked puzzled. " What other things ? " " The coincidences and the psychology and the little Jews and Jonas," said I. John's mouth opened. " My dear fellow, what are you talking about ? " " All sorts and conditions of people including your- self," I rejoined. " I give it up," said John resignedly. Whereat I explained. Now of all my friends I do not suppose there is one who gives me greater pleasure than John Hylton. He is of the ultra-muscular breed, deliciously sentimental, amazingly THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 43 stupid, and possessed of the heart of an angelic child. His fair curly hair is eminently suited to the feminine touch, and his good looks carry with them a general letter of introduction. His whole life, moreover, is made up of a series of amorous adventures, harmlessly begun and invariably broken up shortly after the prologue. To my own knowledge he has been in love with more women than there are months in his life, and his every experi- ment is in the nature of a display of the wildest enthusiasm. Each time he has discovered the " one woman," but after the week, or in exceptional cases, the month, has passed, John's brain undergoes an extraordinary process of metabolism which leaves it in complete ignorance of the immediate past. I have known him since Cambridge days. There he amazed his contemporaries by his prowess in the various athletic fields, and during his residence sought to unite himself in holy matrimony not only to the Master's daughter but also to five or six young ladies of rather lower station. Fortunately I was able to veto the proposal on each occa- sion, a fact which ultimately led to my present honorary appointment as his Confidant-in-Chief. At the University he was popular for a year, but his almost incredible stupidity succeeded in depriving him of many friends who required some semblance of an understanding. As a matter of fact John Hylton never understood anybody, he never joined in any conversation if more than two people were present, and his amorous adventures, conducted as they were in horrible secrecy and notwithstanding that they rarely got beyond the stage of mute admiration from a respectable distance, obtained for him a bad name even amongst those whose lives were infinitely less clean than his own. Ignorance, however, is so often a criminal offence that I have never wondered at that. 44 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO He gives me considerable trouble even to this day, for he has a habit of mixing himself up in the most extra- ordinary scrapes with the other sex. Yet I doubt if he has ever kissed six women in his life. Perhaps this omis- sion explains the scrapes ; women are contrary creatures. His sensitiveness, moreover, is so keen, and his powers of expressing himself so microscopical that few women can have the patience to break through his armour of shyness. I always think of him as a huge faithful dog, aware of his own shortcomings, but irresistibly led to pour out his warm soul to the four winds. Yet he is quite without self-consciousness. I have known him drive on the top of an omnibus to Peckham Rye or some such place for the sole purpose of gazing fixedly at a young woman, laden with parcels, whose beauty could never have been discovered by any but John himself. Generally he comes to me after the last-discovered goddess to fire his heart has snubbed him. A woman's snub, he finds, resembles a hatpin used with felonious intent, and it leaves him in a state of indescribably comic despair. But it all comes right again, and his god- desses are too numerous long to remain hidden. Very little indeed satisfies him, and in spite of the periodic " thrusts into hell " his own expression culled from I know not where he thrives on a large income and regular appearances in the football field. " The whole thing," I began, addressing my friend, " started with Mr. Mabrum." " Never heard of him," said John with the air of a man who really cannot be bothered with so ugly a name. " Of course not. No one had until to-day. He came to my committee rooms this morning, told me his story, and, if I see fit, is going to be married. He will probably THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 45 ask me to be his best man, but in that case I have decided to be represented by Grolier." John's eyes opened wide. " Blessed if I understand what you're driving at," said he. " Mr. Carl Mabrum," I told him, " is a vendor of jewels with a passion for barmaids and other young ladies." Now the mere mention of the female sex invariably becomes a more or less personal matter to friend John, which explains his immediate suspicion at this moment of some subtle joke directed against himself. He rolled his eyes and prepared for the worst. " He brought the young lady with him," said I. " The young lady ? " he repeated, and his brows de- scended. " The young lady whom he desires to marry." John must have attempted some visualisation of their entry into my room. " But I don't see . . ." he began. " The girl," I continued, " happened to interest me because . . . ." " Well ? " " This is where you come in, John." He laid his knife and fork German-fashion across his plate, put his elbows on the table, and regarded me as though I had been a schoolmaster about to reprove him for being the worst pupil in the class. " Who is the girl ? " he demanded. I have never had the smallest hesitation in shocking John's feelings for the simple reason that I believe the process is beneficial. " I think," said I, " she is Sir Austin Cardonnel's daughter." " The devil ! " cried my friend, and blushed very deeply. " But what do you mean you think she is -" 46 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Of course she is Miss Cardonnel," said I. " Nesta Cardonnel ! " whispered John, and sighed a little. Then he looked sharply at me. " You swear, Gordon ? You swear you aren't fooling me ? " " My dear John, why should I be fooling you ? Of course I remember the little affair of two years ago " here John played a loud tune on the table with two forks " but I did not see the girl. Now she has turned up with Mr. Carl Mabrum, and I want to know all about every- thing." I told him the story so far as I knew it. John alternately blushed in his schoolboyish way and attempted a bovine smile. He was obviously unable properly to understand what had happened, but there could be no doubt in his mind that he had willy-nilly been forced into a mysterious affair, and although, as I learnt, he had not seen the girl for two years, he was inclined to feel primarily responsible for everything that might have occurred to her from that time. With Mr. Mabrum he seemed to have no concern whatever my visitor was a pawn to be disregarded but my story had evidently brought him to an unusual state of nervousness. Then quite suddenly the restaurant and myself were treated to a whole torrent of abuse against the obscure baronet with whom he had never been on friendly terms, and I learnt that Cardonnel possessed a temper the like of which was no longer to be found in England one of those impossibly baronial tempers peculiar to the middle ages of romance, a temper which only the great Sterne himself could have described, and that in a couple of volumes. " That explains her going away," he finished. " Possibly," said I. " But still I don't like it. East Chapel of all places ! " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 47 " And Cleveland Street ! " I added. There came a pause. " You don't want me to see her, do you ? " he asked at last. " Certainly not," said I. " I only require information." He began to excuse his own temporary devotion to the girl. " I never really knew her well," he said shamelessly. " And yet I was obliged to go to the trouble of packing you off to Brighton in that little affair of two years ago, and you swore that no other girl " He shrugged his shoulders. " You know how it is with " " I don't," said I, " but no matter. Tell me more about the girl. There is no use in being sentimental about her you haven't seen her for two years and she is not the only girl to whom you have been engaged. I want to find out precisely why she has left her father, and why she turns up with little Mabrum." But he could tell me little. Thorpe Towers, the Car- donnels' seat, had long been a hermitage, but I had known that before. In the old days our respective fathers had known Sir Austin, but his marriage had cut him off from the world. John talked very boisterously about details devoid of interest, and cast abuse on the heads of every one concerned. Then suddenly his manner changed. He looked at me closely. He put up his forefinger for a warning, which, however, was not uttered. He opened and closed his lips several times only to glare. " What is it ? " said I. " Of course," he began, and stopped. " And then," he went on as though he had treated me to a detailed descrip- tion of something, " I sheered off, as you know, to Brighton." 48 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " On my advice ! " John shook his head and smiled mysteriously. " No," he said, " I heard something about the girl." " What was that ? " He did not reply. " Something to her discredit ? " I hazarded, remembering Mrs. Hylton's appeal to myself. " It was vague," said John, " and then I do not think somehow that the girl is straight." Coming from such an incorrigible idealist as John Hylton, the word sounded odd. " What do you mean ? " I asked. Again he shrugged his shoulders, and looked round him almost angrily for a waiter. " What you have told me rather bears that out, doesn't it ? " " I only know that she had a row with this pleasant old father of hers, that she came to London ill-provided, and " " Nesta Cardonnel," said my friend, once again ridicu- lously solemn, " was very pretty, but I did not altogether like her." I showed my astonishment. " At least," he corrected himself, " not for very long. You see, I can't exactly explain, but it was a mistake the whole affair. I was much younger then," he added portentously. " Two years," said I. John ignored my words. " If you want to know the truth," he said, " I didn't think oh, well, these things can't properly be explained." " But I have been trying to make you explain things properly for the last ten minutes ! " To my amazement his forefinger was again^pointed at THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 49 my breast, and my very dear John, assuming the manner of a stagey old father, proceeded to offer advice ! " If you want to hear what I think," he said, " you will have nothing to do with her." I could not forbear laughing at him. " My dear John, I have met the girl for the first time to-day. You happen to have known her, and my father knew hers. That was sufficient to start my interest, but she told me a rather unusual story, and I thought her appearance with Mr. Mabrum, who is a bizarre gentleman with curious ideas on most subjects, odd enough to mention her to you when I got the chance." He appeared positively relieved. " And you have nothing else to tell me ? " " Nothing, old man," said John. " But did did she look all right ? " " Quite," said I. " She didn't mention me ? " " No." " I should like to hear " " You shall hear everything," said I. " But it's damned funny," he continued, and would have spoken further on the subject, but M. Quatrebras came up. " And the omelette, M. Waldo ? " he inquired. I told him that the omelette had exactly suited my mood. Truth to say, I had hardly been conscious of its existence. I should like to write a complete biography of Mr. Carl Mabrum, with detailed headlines to the chapters, a full exposition of his very remarkable philosophy, an appendix containing examples of the more amorous nature from his correspondence, and a lengthy note upon his choice of clothes. It should make an entertaining volume. D 50 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO His aspect upon things in general arouses at once my laughter and my most respectful admiration. His point of view, indeed, upon questions of ethics, is unique. His conceit at first threatened to be no more than the dullest phenomenon, but to-day's recitals have convinced me to the contrary. I cordially detest the man and would not stir an inch to save him from a grave, whether watery or otherwise, but there is something about him which compels my interest. He is of the type that will meta- morphose a chance meeting in a railway carriage into a private interview ; of the type that will deduce from a shake of the hand a very warm friendship. Insolence as an art must have its charms. Beau Brummel, I under- stand, owed everything to this gift, and so, I suppose, does Carl Mabrum. I do not suggest that they are similar rascals, but my visitor's cheek has a certain potence that is rather alarming. Yet I cannot think that he is conscious of his insolence. If that were so I would not have the smallest hesitation in kicking him at once out of the com- mittee rooms. He has found a new friend, and is making the most of his discovery. That must be all. But he has been instrumental in detracting my attention from political matters for quite ten hours in the last two days, and at the moment I can do little but marvel. Incredibility, how- ever, must follow upon nothing but inexperience. But that I am embarked upon an adventure which promises well, seems patent. It has all happened, moreover, with such ridiculous speed .... At breakfast this morning, I attempted to speak of Sir Austin Cardonnel, but my father was wrapped in his correspondence, and would only grunt out a monosyllable at intervals, and in the car going to East Chapel he main- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 51 tained an obstinate silence. He was probably thinking of the vivisection people, who have promised to call again. Mr. Mabrum arrived with the girl about ten o'clock. Jonas with none too good a grace set them to work on the everlasting envelopes, but I had not opened more than one or two letters before there was a knock at the door, and the little Jew, more gorgeously attired than before, came in. I dismissed him then in a manner which must have savoured of feudalism, but his cunning suggested a second trial during the morning. This occurred a few minutes after my father, who is rarely in the committee rooms, had gone to one of his publican friends for advice and refreshment. I notice, incidentally, that the two generally seem to go together during the course of an election. This may hint at illegality, but it is eminently natural, and has my support. " Perhaps you could spare me a minute now, Mr. Waldo ? " A fretful Jonas had just informed me that his first opinion of Mr. Mabrum had been correct, a fact which explained my caustic reply. "It is perfectly absurd," I said, " to expect me to interest myself in private affairs during an election campaign." It was one thing, I found, to take tea with Miss Cardonnel, but quite another to discuss affairs of a non-political nature with her friend. I stared moodily at him, and then involuntarily laughed. The little man's assertiveness had momentarily disappeared to show me such a woebegone figure as excited my sense of the ridiculous. " You may laugh, Mr. Waldo, but for me it is a serious matter. Our people regard marriage as a sacred function. 52 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Marriage," said I, " is a matter for two individuals and the state as represented by its registrar." " But we've been so friendly, Mr. Waldo," he con- tinued with revolting familiarity, " and I want good advice. Mannheim owes me too much money, or I would go to him, but if people owe you money they'll only give you the advice they think you want them to give. My people," he added, " live in Frankfort. And Mannheim is not really a gentleman. And then, of course, as I'm helping Sir Henry, I thought perhaps you would not mind helping me. I only want a few minutes." His argument was admirable. " But Mr. Mannheim," I suggested, " knows you so much better than I do." He moved his shoulders about and smiled incredulously. "Not a bit of it, Mr. Waldo. You an' me have got on so weU ! " It occurred to me then that Grolier's presence in my private room might save me from much unprofitable discussion, but a startling proposition was about to come from my visitor's thick lips, and after that I was entirely at his mercy. "Last night," he went on, satisfied now that he had obtained a willing ear, " we dined at Frascati's, and the dinner, Mr. Waldo, was AI prime ! " He sucked his lips. " Afterwards we went to the Oxford I know a fellow who works there and then I gave her some oysters." He leant over the table. " I'm quite in love with her," he said in his deep guttural tones. " I told her so. She . ." He paused to cock his head. " She rather likes me. Of course I generally get on well with the girls, as I told you yesterday oh, I tell you, Mr. Waldo, I've had a good time, but I'm not quite sure of her. I believe she's THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 53 speaking the truth, but I can't understand her. I don't mind if she's not very well, churchy, you know, but " " But what ? " I demanded angrily. The man thoroughly disgusted me. " If she is only fooling me," he went on, " I've had enough of it. I am not going to spend five or six pounds on a girl for nothing." It certainly did seem too much to expect from him. *" And what do you propose ? " " To-night," said Mr. Mabrum, " there is a meeting on at the London Hall. I am to speak to the overflow crowd. Nesta " " Perhaps we had better speak of her as Mrs. Summers," said I coldly. " Oh, if you like, Mr. Waldo. At any rate, she can stay here, and I thought perhaps you could find out things then." " Find out things ? " I repeated not understanding. " If she is fooling me or not," he explained. " If she will fool me, she will fool you. That stands to reason. I understand women well enough to know that. They either fool you or love you ; they can't help themselves. Then, if she fools you, I shall clear out if not, I shall ask her to marry me." Prize-fighting is an art which I have patronised as a spectator. At school I was almost always barred from the usual settlement of a dispute by the unfortunate fact of my being the larger of the disputants ; and since those much cherished days I do not think I have ever resorted to force of arms. At this moment, however, I could have punched Mr. Mabrum's sleek face into the proverbial jelly with the utmost enjoyment. Yet I did nothing of the sort. 54 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO His words sickened me, I did not like the look on his face, and his general manner was odious ; yet his request I shrink from the admission excited my waning interest. I rose from my chair. " It is a pity, Mr. Mabrum," said I, " that you should wish to marry Mrs. Summers without being in love with her." " What do you mean ? " " In matters of this kind," I told him sternly, " a man must look to himself." There was a pause while I waited for him to go. " My parents," said he at last, " would cut me off with- out a penny, if I married a girl who was not respectable. As it is she is not of my faith." " Then there is an easy solution." " What's that ? " he inquired eagerly. " You must say good-bye to her." He shook his great head. " I know she is fond of me," he said. " Last night she told me I was the only man who had been kind to her. Oh, Mr. Waldo, don't you see that everything might have happened to her if I had not found her ? I have acted straight by her, I can give you my word. I found her with nothing, and I have taken care of her, and I don't think I have asked for anything in return. I know that nothing will make her go home again. She said her father was a beast. Oh, no," he repeated, " I can't let her go now." " Then why seek my advice ? " He was puzzled for an answer. " At any rate will you talk to her to-night, and find out whether she is really fond of me ? " I cannot help thinking that that is the oddest request I have ever had put to me. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 55 " I can promise to do no such thing," I replied. Again he shrugged his shoulders. Apparently he could see no reason for my refusal. " But you will talk to her and find out what she wants ? " " I may do that." He thanked me effusively, and went out, but came back in a moment, hesitated, blinked and spoke in low tones. "*I have just seen her in there," he said. " I do love the girl, and that's the truth." It was oddly pathetic. In the following half-hour I made a serious endeavour to understand the drift of things. Why in the sacred name of Baskerville was I not giving immediate orders that the Mabrum fellow was not to be admitted again into my private room ? Why did I allow myself if somewhat passively to don the cloak of supposed friendship for a man whose acquaintance I had but just made ? If it was for Miss Cardonnel's sake, why had I spoken in the ridiculously inept manner which is involuntarily assumed by a witness under cross-examination by my father ? At the back of things, however, came the conviction that Mr. Mabrum was by no means a complete villain. Apparently he had played his part as well as his lights permitted. The girl had appeared penniless and would not go home. She was waiting for some money which, of course, would never come. And then I remembered John's words. Miss Cardonnel, perhaps, was not straight. Jonas interrupted my reverie. The Daily Telegram's representative sought an interview. . . . Mary Meddenham did not come to-day, but Miss Car- donnel politely refused my offer of sandwiches and went 58 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO out with Mr. Mabrum at mid-day to a neighbouring bun- shop. Later I annoyed my father by refusing to come to his meeting. " Rochester is coming to hear me," said he. " He will be an admirable substitute," I replied. " There are times," said my father, " when you are grossly impertinent." " The strain of an election," I began. " You are the most inefficient secretary I have ever had," he interrupted testily. We were drinking tea at the time. " You can hardly expect more for three guineas a week." My father smiled darkly. I suppose he was thinking of Mary Meddenham. This evening there were more sandwiches, and Miss Cardonnel, who seemed rather tired of her envelopes, accepted my invitation upstairs. The majority of my father's workers were gone to the meeting ; only Jonas and an aged bill-poster remained in the clerks' room. " I am glad you were able to come up," I began, " because I wanted to speak to you." " And I to you," said Miss Cardonnel. " I have been wondering why I told you my real name. Please think of me as Mrs. Summers." She pointed to a wedding ring on her finger. " Of course," said I. " I have finished with Nesta Cardonnel," she went on, suddenly passionate ; "I have finished altogether with the old life. Nothing will make me return to it." There was a pause. " And so you came to London, and met Mr. Mabrum ? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 57 The glimmer of a smile crossed her features. " It marks the separation," she said. " It is a long cry from Thorpe Towers to East Chapel ! " said I. She stared hard into my eyes, and then threw back her head. She has wonderful hair. " You know where we live ? Well, I can trust you. I have known that since yesterday morning. I want your help." Now it is a curious thing that the very moment some people demand my help the better I like them. With Mrs. Summers, as I have agreed to call her, there was a mixture of pride fighting against odds and an utter forlorn - ness. At one moment she would be what I imagined was Miss Cardonnel of Thorpe Towers, at the next the meek waif who had so oddly come into the committee rooms. " I want your help," she repeated. " How can I help you ? " " I ... do you like Mr. Mabrum ? " she asked. " No," said I with a proper cheerfulness. " I told you so last night." A look of almost relief came over her face. " I ... I loathe him," she said in a low voice ; " but he has been kind, and I am alone." She laughed rather harshly. " Fate chose him for me when I came to London, and until now I have not grumbled, but oh ! he expects me to kiss him, and talk all the nonsense he's used to, and I who thought I had buried everything I can't do it I won't ! " Again fierce emotion transfigured her. Her eyes seemed to shine out, her small fingers were clenched. Just at that moment, too, I was reminded of the stage, though she was not theatrical. " What do you want me to do ? " I asked. 58 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO She did not reply. " You must wait a little longer until your friend writes. You expect him to write ? Excuse my impertinence." " I expect him to write ? " she said slowly, " I do not know. He is in Italy." Suddenly she stood over me almost threateningly. " You knew my friend was a man ! " Then she added : " Oh, of course you would think so." There was a long silence. " It is a little difficult," I said at last, " to know exactly how things are between you and Mr. Mabrum ; but I think he wishes to marry you." ; For a moment her smile was one of the purest amuse- ment ; just then she had forgotten her plight. I am convinced that she is a creature of moods. There is a suspicion of the princess in her, and a little of I do not know what. In the end she shrugged her shoulders. " There is small use in laughing at him," she said ; " one cannot quarrel. . . ." She did not finish her sentence. " Mr. Mabrum," I told her, " asked my advice. I will tell him to wait. It might even be possible to explain that until you are engaged his affection might better be shown in a calmer spirit." She caught hold of my arm. " Yes, yes," she said eagerly. " And then when the letter comes. ..." " Sometimes," she interrupted, " I do not think the letter will come." Unfortunately Jonas appeared with the information that the Duke of Rochester was downstairs and would be pleased to drive me to Eaton Place. I looked at the girl, but she nodded. " Mr. Mabrum will be back soon," was all she said. I do not understand her. FRIARBROOK, BUCKS, Sunday. I SOMETIMES wonder what insane idea led me to purchase this cottage in a lonely, commonplace village, and pay no small sum for a few acres of rough shooting. Energetic youth may prefer to stalk its prey in the completest dis- comfort, but my age and build incline me to a well-preserved estate with a seat for myself and a bevy of beaters in attend- ance. Yet I admit to a liking of the place, far removed as it is from anywhere in particular, and Grolier has erected a useful garage in the garden. He shoots most of the birds. Friarbrook, indeed, is a retreat after London, certainly a paradise after East Chapel. Until this day, moreover, I have successfully prevented my father from accepting an invitation here, by the very simple process of not offering him one. I have always known that he would insist upon a more proper cultivation of the garden, whose general unproductiveness somehow pleases my soul. He would pull down my garage to sow turnips in its place. He would tidy the rooms and decorate the walls with unnecessary pictures. His taste would suggest a multitude of " improvements " which would effectively destroy any charm my cottage possesses. Yet at this minute he is arguing with Mrs. Sanders, the care- taker, about the drains. Yesterday he so obviously longed for a rest that I was fain to pretend to a cordiality in the matter, and asked VST 60 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO him down here. In return he has behaved in a manner which convinces me of the futility of performing supereroga- tory acts of kindness. He quarrelled with Grolier as we came out of London, he deplored the lack of turnips in my garden, and he is worrying Mrs. Sanders into a state bordering upon lunacy. Also he has twice informed me that the Duchess is disposed to be affectionately disposed towards my person. At luncheon he spoke persistently of the Rochesters. " Mary Meddenham," he said, " will make an admirable wife." " We must find her a husband," said I, not at all serious. " We will," said my father, and smiled very seriously. I looked fierce. " She has worked well in East Chapel," he continued. " She ought never to have come," said I. " What do you mean ? " " East Chapel is not exactly the place to which I should like to send a daughter of mine unattended." " Unattended ? " repeated my father. " Mary Meddenham came down alone with orders to canvass." " Certainly. I asked the Duchess if she might. We want all the canvassers we can get, and her name. . . ." " It is not right," said I, " to allow a girl. . . ." " My dear boy," retorted my father, " it is ridiculous to talk like this. Mary Meddenham does not go out alone." " No, she does not. I have seen to that, even though it has necessitated my repeatedly breaking the law of the country." " What nonsense. . . ! " " A paid servant, as you ought to know, is not allowed to canvass. You are paying me. ..." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 61 At that he laughed. " For once in a way, then, I will be a party to a crime." " I could blackmail you about that," said I musingly, " when you have taken your seat." " Try it, my dear boy, try it." There was a pause. " Yes, she has worked well," he repeated. " Under my tuition." " Precisely," said my father, and had he not been at table, would have rubbed his hands. " Precisely," he repeated with much relish. I incline to the belief that there are times when the son should not spoil the father by sparing the rod. " What do you think of Mrs. Summers ? " I asked to change the conversation. My father adjusted his pince-nez. " Who the devil is Mrs. Summers ? " he demanded. " A lady in whom I have a particular interest. She is young and beautiful, and not wholly unromantic. I admire romance in a woman so much. You met her at the committee rooms upstairs." My father instantly assumed his Counsel-for-the-prosecu- tion air. A frown appeared at his forehead, his brows seemed to shoot out above his eyes. " She represented some paper, didn't she ? " " I don't think so." " What was she doing there then ? " " I invited her upstairs." " You had no business to do so," said my father sharply. " I have every intention of repeating the invitation," said I. " Mary Meddenham likes her," I added slyly. " Er yes. I wonder you don't ask the Rochesters down here," he went on, awkwardly turning the subject. 62 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO "The cottage would not hold them," said I, thinking of the Duchess. " They would be very pleased to come." I am wondering why it is that a clever man like my father will conduct a would-be matrimonial campaign with so little idea of finesse. " They see enough of me in London," I replied. After a long pause my father informed me that the Rochesters would not mind how often they might see me a remark which prompted me to further mischief. " I think," said I with becoming gravity, " that I am in love." " Very natural," replied my father. " But not with Mary Meddenham," said I. We have hardly spoken since. EATON PLACE, Jan. 26. I am done with East Chapel. I am richer by a cheque for twelve guineas and my father takes his seat at the opening of Parliament. He is not duly elated, however, and his last words to Jonas embraced a studied reprimand, the reason for which is not clear. Certainly my chief clerk never denied admittance to Mary Meddenham. . . . In all seriousness the thing must stop. I have discovered that the Rochesters' finances are at a startlingly low ebb, and I have begun to understand more clearly the Duchess' manoeuvre. It has not been a pleasant discovery, and, if it has explained much, it has placed me in a quandary. I am exceedingly sorry for Mary, but I cannot tell her so. I would give much to secure her a rich husband, and yet John Hylton is the only man of my acquaintance who, I imagine, would satisfy the Duchess at the present moment ; THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 63 and somehow I cannot picture John as the husband of anybody. True, there is Basil Anstruther, who will be a millionaire when his father dies, but such an idea could not be tolerated for a moment. Anstruther, even though I believe the Duchess and Mary like him, is outside the pale. It is ridiculous, moreover, but I cannot speak to Mary now with the same freedom. A tiny barrier has arisen a provoking barrier which my sensitiveness will not allow me to kick over. It is just conceivable that my father was right in affirming that money was the curse of my existence. I am rich, Mary is wretchedly poor. How- ever I suppose these things happen to every one. I shall not worry myself further. Time must work out the problem. The Duchess herself appeared in East Chapel, but I was engaged at the time with a reporter, and could not be disturbed. I bribed the reporter with a cigar, and like a good sportsman, he stayed for two hours. Jonas looked frightened when I emerged. Mary herself came regularly until the election day, and during the poll insisted on my driving round the con- stituency with her in a strange car no less than six times. I had searched in vain for Grolier, and only learnt late in the afternoon that he had been engaged for the day by my father. We were cheered very generally by the crowd people must have recognised in me the author of " Eminent Libraries " and we bowed gracefully when occasion required. I begin to think that royalty has a good time. Assuredly I have done all that decency and a real friend- ship for Mary could demand. I have never allowed her to leave the committee rooms without myself in attendance, and on two occasions I have driven her to Rochester House. I have endeavoured to make her understand that her 64 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO mother's opinions are not necessarily infallible, and in general have tried to convey a wish that she will come to me when in trouble. Our frequent peregrinations together have undoubtedly pleased the hearts of our respective parents my father must have forgotten my words at Friarbrook but, as I have written, the thing must speedily end. I shall have to look out for an opportunity of speak- ing my mind to the Duchess. . . . Incidentally Mr. Mabrum obtained a third interview, and on my advice agreed to wait a few days before obtain- ing Mrs. Summers' hand. I discoursed pleasantly to him on the merits of diplomacy, and succeeded in convincing him that under no considerations would he be allowed again in my private room until the poll was announced. Of the girl herself I have little to say. Somehow the startling incidents, as I thought them, of her appearance, have become matter-of-fact, and the " adventure " upon which I had plumed myself, is hardly worthy of the name. Iti truth 1 have seen little of the girl, and if my interest in her has not waned, it has certainly not increased. Once, indeed, I had arranged to canvass with her, but Mary unexpectedly returned to East Chapel from a luncheon party, and I had no choice in the matter. Twice I intended to speak of Sir Austin to my father, but on both occasions my attention was switched on to political matters. Probably my mind has been altogether too full of other things to think of her. There is much real work to be done during the last few days of an election campaign. Envelopes are at a discount, and the canvassing cards have been filled three or four times, but there are numberless matters which require personal attention. The vivisectionists and the anti-vivisectionists were staved off, but in their place, there sprung up such a legion of unlearned societies, leagues, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 65 sects, combines and associations, as leaves me in a state of bewilderment. The number of philanthropists in the world is stupendous. John dined with me one night and demanded further particulars of Miss Cardonnel, but I pretended that she had returned to Yorkshire. On the whole I must have been inclined to take more interest in the girl than was warranted. Or perhaps she has been avoiding me. Now that I come to think of it, that is very probably the truth. She has certainly avoided me. Well, she has her reasons I suppose, and it is hardly likely that I shall see her again. My patent chair is more comfortable than ever. VI Feb. 1. I HAVE amused myself by reading about dragons, and find I have some considerable respect for them. It is a little remarkable, however, that the dragons who have bribed the historians to take note of them, have generally been of the male gender. Ahriman, slain by the Persian Mithra, Dahak of the three heads, Grendel who was demolished by that grand old hero Beowulf, Colein whom Drayton prettily describes in his Polyolbion, and the unnamed but bearded monster slain by our own St. George of very reverend memory, were all of the sterner sex. La Gar- gouille, who, after making things generally unbearable in the Seine district, seven hundred and something anno domini, suffered defeat at the pious hands of St. Roman of Rouen, alone sounds feminine ; and of her I can find little in the chronicles. In these days, moreover, it might seem impossibly quaint to suggest the existence of such a zoo- logical phenomenon, but I have come to the conclusion that in no other way can I successfully describe the Duchess of Rochester. Her Grace is a dragon provided with teeth, tongue and nails which collectively bite, snarl and scratch clearly according to tradition. Dragonwise she has cast her spell over Mary with deplorable results. The Duchess is hardly so strait-laced as the late Mrs. Grundy, but she is far more to be feared. She rampages May- fair. In her presence one longs for the armour and 66 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 67 courage of a St. George. I promise myself such an accoutrement. To-day she came, did my dear Dragon, with her husband to luncheon. My father and the plaintive policy between them had secured the invitation. I do not so much object to a call at Rochester House, where the Duchess is only within her rights to play Queen, but her presence in my own house invariably leads up to a case of Regina v. Waldo, wherein my father most unnaturally supports the prosecution. Indeed, my exit from East Chapel has been followed by the most dogged conspiracy. I have been looking into a series of emigration papers, but cannot discover the elements of " desirability " in myself. Otherwise I would surely take ship to Australia and disappear into the bush. My guests arrived at an early hour. The Duke imme- diately occupied himself with my books. The Dragon, however, ensconced in the stiffest seat in my library, lost no time in opening her campaign. " The election, my dear Gordon," she began, arranging her dress, " was a great success. I am sure you enjoyed it. Mary confessed to me that she had never enjoyed anything so much." Now I was perfectly certain that Mary had made no such confession, but the Duchess cannot be over-scrupulous in such matters. She stared hard at me, whereat I remarked that I had finished with political work. " It has served its purpose," said she, and looked at my father. " I am sorry," she continued, " that Mary could not come with us to-day, but she is lunching with Mrs. Anstruther such a nice woman ! Her son is charming." Basil Anstruther has become, I am told, an excellent judge of horse-flesh. He is a well-favoured scamp with some 68 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO influence at the Frivolity Theatre, and, as I think I have said, his father is a millionaire. " He must be thirty-two now," opined my father. " Thirty," corrected the Duchess. " His mother told me so the other day." " A suitable age," said I. The Duchess looked at me interrogatively, and even her husband put down his book. " He is good-looking," continued my father. " Almost an Apollo," I allowed. " He is rather like Grolier." " Grolier ? " cried my Dragon. " My chauffeur" I explained suavely ; "a handsome enough fellow." My father looked bellicose, but there was nothing to say, a fact of which both he and the Dragon were aware. " The Glasgow printers," interposed the Duke from his corner, " seem to have copied Dutch methods." " Undoubtedly," said I smiling grimly. That is the kind of interruption which warms my heart. " The Elzevir family, you know, exercised an enormous influence over the whole of European printing. The Glasgow type, as I expect you have noticed, resembles that of the eldest Caslon." " How interesting ! " murmured the Duchess, and looked more like a schoolmistress than ever. " Grolier," I hastened to add, " is by way of being an authority on the Foulis Press." " Your chauffeur" remarked the Duchess, " seems to be a very wonderful man." " He is detestably familiar," exclaimed my father with some show of irritation. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 69 " He is an excellent driver," said I sharply, " and he can examine a rare book without either turning up his nose or damaging the pages." " Quite a paragon," suggested the Duchess. " Gordon and I," said my father, " have agreed to differ on the subject of Grolier." " If ever I marry," said I, and looked at my Dragon, " Grolier will probably produce the present I shall prize most of all." We discussed my chauffeur at some length. Now in common with most of my countrymen I am surprisingly ignorant of military tactics, but a knowledge of the enemy's most secret intentions must surely be a possession of importance. I had suspected before, and now am quite certain, that my father and the Duchess intended this luncheon party to develop into a family council. The one duty, moreover, which was to devolve on this Cabinet of four, was my own marriage with a very sweet girl, whose only fault is an unholy submission to her mother. The East Chapel campaign had thrown us together, and both the Duchess and my father had remained as far as possible in the background. Even had Mr. Mabrum failed to put in an appearance, I cannot pretend to think that my own work would have done very much to obtain votes, and the press interviews generally resolved themselves into pertinent discussions upon literary matters. No, the Dragon sent Mary to canvass the slums, and my father, eager to become a grandfather, arranged for a chaperon. That was all. But, having so far fallen in with their plans, and guessing the rest of them, I did not, and do not, choose to go further. Which explains why the delicate hints thrown out at the luncheon table led the way to more open attacks upon 70 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO my liberty. I took, however, a firm stand, and showed myself dull or keen-witted as occasion required. I am ready to admit that Anstruther's name is dis- concerting. The Dragon, failing myself, is perfectly capable of marrying her daughter to the man. Further, I have been idiot enough in the past to let others under- stand that I should not so easily be ready to let the girl become Lady Mary Anstruther. I have thoroughly disliked the man ever since I saw him fall downstairs not wholly by accident at school. Certainly I would do all in my power to prevent such a disaster ; yet Mary in spite of our long-standing friendship, persists in regarding the Dragon as an all-wise being who is working entirely for her daughter's happiness. Mary is a contradictory person. Honestly I cannot probe her state of mind. She would be so much more attractive if she had irrevocably quarrelled with her mother. Which sounds distinctly immoral. But in that case I think I would like to marry her. After luncheon the Duchess became vague, but took occasion to court information about a Mrs. Summers, of whom Mary had spoken. " Mrs. Summers ? " said my father. " Mrs. Summers ? " I asked. " I understood Mary to say there was a Mrs. Summers helping your father in East Chapel." " Oh, yes, she did come once or twice." " I don't know the name," continued the Duchess. " The Summers of Cumberland," I began. " Cumberland is a long way from East Chapel." " About three hundred miles," said I, with a smile. The Duchess attempted to look severe, but gave way, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 71 laughed. " My dear Gordon dan," she said in softer tones, " you are trying to score off me ! " " My dear Duchess," said I, " there is an old Latin saying which begins Tu quoque ..." My father's temper was not proof against this classical retort, and, forgetful of his position of paying guest, he embarked upon a more than usually bitter denunciation of my manners, my morals, and even my personal appearance. The Duke woke up from his book to listen in amazement, while the Dragon herself looked hard for a signof repentance . But I am too old a hand for my dear father. By way of antidote, I underwent a spell of hard study in the afternoon, and collated with excessive care no less than ten copies of the octavo Baskerville Prayer Book. These, by the way, are hardly ever the same, and I was not surprised to learn some years ago that the University of Cambridge had not viewed my printer with much favour. Poor Baskerville ! your thoughts ran to printer' devil rather than to printer's God. Incidentally, I found I possessed a prayer book of his dated 1760, in which I am exhorted to pray for Queen Charlotte, who did not exist as such at the time ! The books acted as a tonic. I must have read through the Marriage Service some eight or nine times. And then, at a moment when a hitherto undiscovered " cancelled " page came to light in the middle of the Ministration of Private Baptism, Meadows announced a visitor. " Who is it ? " " I think he said his name was Abraham, sir." " Abraham ? Abraham ? " " A stranger to me, sir," continued Meadows in a tone which showed me that he did not approve of the visitor. 72 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " A stranger to you, Meadows ? Abraham ? Book- seller ? Beggar ? Ah ! it must be Mabrum." " Yes, sir, Abraham." I hesitated. It was on the tip of my tongue to say that I could not see him. The incident of Miss Cardonnel was over it belonged exclusively to East Chapel and yet I found myself possessed of the purely natural desire to learn news of her. The little Jew would bore me to death and yet, would he ? I looked up at Meadows. " Bring Mr. Mabrum up. If he calls after to-day, you will say I am not at home." A few minutes later, Meadows, with rather a suspicious air, ushered in the little man. Mr. Mabrum came up to me with his effusive smile. He was dressed ridiculously as usual. " I hope I'm not interrupting you," he began. It must have been perfectly obvious to him that he was, but I said nothing, and pointed to a chair. He sat down and took off his gloves. For a moment he expected me to speak, and then grew nervous at my silence. The library apparently overwhelmed him ; it is rather larger than my room in East Chapel. I meant him to under- stand, however, that familiarity is not seasonable in all quarters. " You wanted to see me, Mr. Mabrum ? " I said at last. " Yes," he replied. " You see, Mr. Waldo, you were so kind to me at the election. I want er and what a splendid result we had ! I'm glad I was able to help. You see er yes." He came to an abrupt stop. I maintained silence. ' You were so kind to me," he went on, staccato-fashion, "about the girl. Yes, the girl. And, you see, it's this THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 73 way. You told me to wait, and I waited. I never spoke to her, as you advised, except as an ordinary friend. I've just been paying for her meals and her lodgings, and a pretty penny it has cost me ! I had to wire to my people for more money. Wired to Germany, Mr. Waldo ! But I don't grudge it. Not a penny ! Well, I took your advice, but yesterday flesh and blood couldn't stand it any longer, an' I told her I loved her, an' gave her a kiss, and asked her to marry me." He stopped for a minute. " Mr. Waldo," he went on in louder tones, " I'm damned if I can understand her. At first she said no, and when I asked her how long she expected me to go on playing the kind friend, she actually got angry ! Stormed at me, Mr. Waldo ! Lord, I tell you I wasn't taking anything of the kind, and then all of a sudden she calmed down, and let me kiss her, and said she would think of it. Then she asked me to come here ..." " To see me ? " " To see you, Mr. Waldo. Oh, she talked a lot about you. I told her you had been kind to me, and then she said perhaps you would come and " he hesi- tated painfully. " And talk things over ? " I suggested, wondering whether I was interested or no. " Yes, that's it," cried Mr. Mabrum eagerly ; " to talk things over. Would you come to supper to-night ? We might go to the Tottenham Cafe, which is quiet. She is so very peculiar," he added in no more than a whisper. " I really am half off my head, and if things are not settled in a day or two, I think I shall ..." But what he would do under those circumstances, I did not find out, for he had taken an envelope from his pocket, and was handing it to me. Inside was a note for myself. 74 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " If you can possibly come to-night, I shall be ever- lastingly grateful. Nesta Cardonnel." " She asked me to give it you," he explained ; " I was almost forgetting it." " I will come," said I, and we agreed to meet at the Tottenham Court Road Tube station. I should like to take M. Quatrebras by the hand and lead him to the Tottenham Cafe. His artistic mind would admire the method adopted by the proprietor, who is a personal friend of Mr. Mabrum's, to entice the passer-by into its midst. One window is laden with a mixture of multi-coloured pastries, sweets in wide bottles, a row of small plants, and a small castle of unknown architecture, moulded in chocolate. The other window, appealing to the more seriously inclined, displays five or six dishes, bearing a dinner in full. There is a china bowl of cold soup, a fish of the more decorative kind, a small joint of beef, patriotically draped with a Union Jack, and a half- yard of rather forlorn-looking sausage. It is a most agree- able sight. Inside there are tables with immovable cloths of white linoleum, an array of chairs, and a complicated battery of brightly polished instruments which exude the lighter beverages at intervals. Mr. Mabrum entered the place with the air of a man sure of good treatment. Miss Cardonnel and I sat down at a corner table and listened to a conversation, carried on in German, between our host and the proprietor. I felt glad I had come. I wondered why I had omitted to ask my father for more particulars about Sir Austin. I wondered that I had almost been forgetting the girl's existence. I wondered, too, whether she could really be the girl who had once been engaged to John. At that THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 75 moment it seemed incredible. I had a horrible feeling that I should blurt out his name from pure curiosity as to the result, but the conversation between Mr. Mabrum and his friend had become more and more guttural, and John was forgotten. Supper for me consisted in the main of coffee, but that was because my digestion is particularly weak on oc- casions. On the other hand, Mr. Mabrum thoroughly enjoyed his meal, and as there was no one else in the establishment, its proprietor himself sat down with us, and drank of his own coffee. Later, however, a long-haired gentleman, armed with a double bass, a sad instrument which in my opinion merits far more attention than it generally receives, came in, and Herr Whatever-his-name-was hurried off. The girl had hardly spoken. Over her pale face had come a look which I interpreted to be one of hopelessness. It was as though she had told me that nothing could matter very much. One shrugged one's shoulders and drank coffee at home or in this Tottenham Cafe ; where was the difference ? One might find high glories, or one might come across nothing but the dregs of life ; it mattered nothing. One lived at Thorpe Towers with a baronial father, or alone in a London attic with the Mabrums of the world calling at irregular moments, and in either case the sun shone or the rain fell, and nobody bothered about one. I wished then that I had heard her story from her own lips, but I could have laughed at the oddity of the thing this meal in the queer little shop with Mr. Mabrum and the curious silent girl who was beginning to arouse in me such conflicting emotions. There could be no doubt that my interest in her had increased wonderfully since we had met half an hour before at the Tube station. Once 76 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO again 1 marvelled that she was the daughter of my father's former friend. Then I fell to musing on my surroundings, and waited to hear the reason for which I had been sum- moned. " You are very quiet, Mr. Waldo," said Mr. Mabrum, at last. " I was wondering what you want me to say." They both looked at me. " Nesta has something she wants to speak to you about." She shook her head wearily. "No, I have nothing to say," she said. " But, my dear girl," expostulated my host, " you said you wanted to see Mr. Waldo." I came to her rescue. " Perhaps I can understand things," I said boldly ; " Mrs. Summers, will you lunch with me to-morrow ? " She brightened at the invitation, and became less taci- turn. Mr. Mabrum, who seems to look upon me as a fairy godfather, beamed genially upon us. " I always said you were a good friend," he re- marked. And at the moment of writing I am wondering how matters stand in this affair. I do not deny now that I am interested. I do not deny that of all women Nesta Cardonnel puzzles me most. Her outlook is even harder to understand than the Dragon's, for with the latter, there is a more or less clearly defined policy of dragonism. This girl, moreover, who is situated so oddly, possesses an infinite charm of manner, and yet there is in her a tinge of what shall I say ? of something that is almost unpleasing. Perhaps it is that I have never yet seen her incomfortablesur- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 77 roundings, nor completely disassociated from Mr. Mabrum, who in himself has ceased to exercise in my breast any sensations except those of boredom. I regard him as a vulgar little Jew, who in the course of his philanderings, has alighted on Miss Cardonnel. I marvel that the clash has not been greater. Miss Cardonnel, however, appears to be alternately irresponsible child and weird woman of an unfamiliar world. But the Jew has, I suppose, fallen in love with her. He is a puny-minded man, whose views upon money well accord with the worser traditions of his race. He tells me that he has already spent seven pounds fifteen shillings on her particular account, and I believe him. And he has asked her to marry him, but she has refused. Is not this all ? Shall I further interest myself in this little comedy of enigma and vulgarity ? Why have I been drawn into the business at all ? At any rate, the girl is lunching alone with me to-morrow. We shall see. There is an element of piquancy in such a part as I whether involuntarily or no I cannot say am playing. And yet, after all, I suppose, it is only the spectator's part. VII Feb. 2. SHE lunched with me in the upstairs room at M. Quatrebras' restaurant. This is open to the public and contains four tables, but during many years, I have never known M. Quatrebras fill another table when I have elected to lunch or dine there with a lady. ... At the beginning of things there was some slight awk- wardness. From the very moment of our meeting outside the National Gallery, I had to remember that an " uncle- hood " alien to my nature had been thrust upon me, Trafalgar Square, moreover, is one of the most unromantic spots in the Empire. Its rows of cabs surrounding the ugliest monument in England are enough to suggest everlasting ennui to Robin Goodfellow himself. And then, as I had walked from Eaton Place, I had been some- what astonished to find that John's few words, coupled with his behaviour in M. Quatrebras' restaurant, had forced themselves into a ludicrous prominence. I recognised the utter absurdity of taking seriously anything that John might say, or think, or do, yet I could not forget his fatuous advice. And it had not been John alone : I was to lunch with Nesta Cardonnel, and the figure of Carl Mabrum was floating about uneasily in the background. At least, so it seemed to me. I had a feeling of ineptitude. We entered the restaurant, however, with the ice suitably broken into small pieces. At the table I thought her very 78 THE SCANDALOUS MB. WALDO 79 beautiful, and a new tenderness in her tones increased the charm. A tiny perfume that fascinated by its very frailty, had wrapped itself about her. It was hard to believe that I had not met her in the ordinary way at some friend's house. It was harder to believe that I had actually been instrumental in putting an end to her engagement with one of my best friends for no other reason, now I come to think of it, than that his mother objected. I suppose there are still some remnants of a parentally imbibed respectability about me. It was equally difficult, moreover, to believe that just at this moment Mr. Carl Mabrum was very probably possessing his florid soul in patience until I should have propounded my solution to his problem. " As a favour," I began, " will you be Miss Cardonnel while we are here ? " My request pleased her, for the sweetest of smiles crossed her face. Verily the Unknown Forces, which the ignorant call Fate, have a keen sense of humour, for which I thank them. One feels remarkably antique, however, when one starts to play " uncle," and so I told her, whereat she hazarded a guess that I was heartily tired of the whole business. " As I am myself," she added comically. " My father," I answered, " would dub me the laziest person in the world, and he is by way of being a truthful man outside the Courts. Laziness, Miss Cardonnel, is the most epicurean form of egoism I know, which means to say that I asked you to lunch because I wanted your company." It pleased me to play pedant for a little while until she was sure of her ground. "I'm glad you understood that I wanted to see you alone," she said. 80 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Our friend," I opined, " has much to learn in the affairs of life." M. Quatrebras superintended the soup's arrival, and suggested a brand of champagne admirably suited to the midday meal. " This tete-t-tMe" she said later, "is to me infinitely strange. I feel it sounds stupid I feel tearful." " M. Quatrebras would be everlastingly shocked," I warned her. " You see," she explained brokenly, and a damnable lump attacked the back of my throat to the serious detriment of M. Quatrebras' reputation " you see, in one's trouble, one can so easily distinguish between real help and the thing the thing " She hesitated. " Oh, I am very lonely," she went on, with a tiny sob, "and you are good to me, but I shall tell you what has happened, and then," she shrugged her shoulders, and her mouth grew obstinately firm " then there may be just a good-bye." " In which case," said I, " I shall have been so horribly scandalised that . . ." " You make fun of me ! " she interrupted, and I was silent. " You must drink your wine," said I at last. She had been staring at her glass. She drank her champagne, and I was almost disappointed to see that she did not apparently appreciate it. Her eyes were turned to her plate, and she ate her fish without noticing that M. Quatrebras' chef had surpassed himself. Then we both drank again, and quite suddenly I found that the wine had warmed her pale face into a tinting of delicate colours. A light at the back of her eyes seemed imbued with a quivering eagerness she was changed beyond recognition. She raised her head a little, and THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 81 I could see the fine contour of her neck. Before she had been beautiful now there had come a new attraction round and about her ; she was more than beautiful a warm lithe creature pulsing with young life. A tiny wondrous pang shot through my body. Her great eyes looked into mine with almost a gleam of longing in them. It seemed to me then that this table with its cloth and its dishes and spoons was at odds with us ; there should have been fine tapestries and pale blue smoke curling about us. Great pearls should have shone from her neck. I could have wished for some Magic Carpet to transport us from M. Quatrebras' neat restaurant to some Palace of the East. I verily believe she must have read my thoughts, for on a sudden the old look that I had seen in the committee rooms in East Chapel came over her, and, as she pushed her plate a little way from her, the glamour was momentarily gone. I could have shouted to her to drink more of the wine ; instead, I looked at her, chilled. " Mr. Waldo," she broke in, "I must tell you this thing that has happened. My father found out that some- one some one was coming to our house without his knowledge. One day he discovered us together. We " A waiter came in. She had spoken slowly, unimpassioned. I had learnt nothing. When we were alone again, she looked at me inter- rogatively. " You had better tell me everything, Miss Cardonnel," said I. There is nothing I would sooner forego than a distressful story, and I could have wished that it had been possible to lunch with her without explanations. A look of appeal had come into her face ; it was as though she were seeking F 82 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO for some Way to make me understand without a recital from her lips. " Of course," she said after a pause, " I must tell you everything. But it is difficult." "Let us imagine," said I, "that I am a kind of hospital nurse ! " She smiled. " Hospital nurses are as easily shocked as any one else ! " " Now you are making fun of me. I shall have to be merely the unshockable friend." She appreciated the pleasantry, but I had to wait a minute or two before she would continue. For the life of me I could think of nothing to lighten her task. And yet I wondered then at her difficulty. Her praiseworthy disregard of the conventions had, I suppose, led me to forget that human reason cannot exist by itself. For a little, I was inclined to be unnecessarily philosophical. An utter mistake when you are lunching a deux. " You see," she went on, " when I came back from school I found that my father did not want me to go anywhere. I had to stay with him and read to him and talk to him about things I loathed and detested. My mother was dead, and we two were quite alone. The Towers was a prison ; I was allowed to see no one. A few visitors came now and again, but my father hated strangers he used to be bitter about people who had pretended to be his friends and one by one they dropped off. I visited one or two families, but " she looked at me, and I thought of John, and wondered whether I should tell her that he was a friend of mine " but that came to an end like every- thing else. I was not surprised at things, nor even very sorry. And from that time I was just a prisoner," " I can picture the Life," said I. THE SCANDALOUS MB. WALDO 83 " My father never realised that I was no longer the little child who used to scramble about the garden and make herself unfit to be seen. But that was no excuse," she broke off hotly, "no excuse at all. He was kind in his way, but he was a gaoler ; he watched me, more particularly after my my mistake. You see I was engaged to some one, and it was broken off." " Yes," said I, quietly. I would have spoken further, but the intensity of her look stopped me. It occured to me that here was another instance of misplaced parentage. My own father should have been a dilettante scholar not unwilling to act as my secretary. Instead, he has chosen to be lawyer and politician with the result that we seldom agree upon anything at all. Miss Cardonnel's father I supposed to be a mistaken faddist with his grandmother's views upon the education and behaviour of young ladies. I could picture these two at their books, the girl desiring nothing but her freedom, Cardonnel blind to the fact that his daughter was a creature alive. Once again I determined to ask my father for further particulars. " It must have been very dull," I said, wishing for a better word. " Dull ? " she cried, and all her calmness was gone. " I could do nothing but read and plant things in the garden. I saw not a soul." Then she added with a smile : " It is very hard to be a hermit at eighteen." Hermits, who to my mind represent the last word in immorality, have long been my pet aversion. At the university, I remember, I wrote a pamphlet condemning them with such violence that the Dean thought fit to lecture me privately upon the monkish ideal for the best part of an evening. I hardly spoke to him afterwards. 84 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " An enforced hermitage," I told her, " is the excuse for anything." " And I am not one of those people who can dig in the mornings and read novels in the afternoons. I want to see life, to dance and shout if I like oh, to be happy in my own way. But no, I was not old enough to do any of these things ! I had made a mistake, and would have to sit at home to play respectable babe ! Once or twice I tried to explain things to him, but argument was useless, and he would lose his temper and then ..." She did not finish the sentence. " It was hopeless," she went on after a tiny pause, " and I was frightened of him then ; he would become almost ill if we quarrelled, and once he he hit me ! But one day he went into York, and I walked to the river that runs through the park, and had a little adventure." She uttered a little low laugh, but only for a moment. " I had met a boy while I was at school. His name was Raymond." She broke off and looked almost angrily at me, as if I, forsooth, had been responsible for her father's behaviour. " Oh, I can't describe him to you because you are a man. You could not understand what I meant. And I had not seen him for more than a year ! I thought he had forgotten me : I think I had almost forgotten him. He was beautiful, a beautiful boy. His face shone. And you smile ! Oh, I can't tell you anything ! " Her sudden enthusiasm for the beloved Raymond must have amused me, because I smiled I could not help it whereat came a toss of the head and anger ; but the look in her eyes changed speedily enough ; her fingers clenched themselves, she seemed to be staring through me into the past. A sensuous atmosphere had spread itself about, and again I experienced the tiny pang. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 85 I began to be mightily interested in this beloved Raymond. Her next words went near to destroying my composure. " He was in an architect's office," she explained in a matter-of-fact way. " Architecture," said I, and stopped. Her mind was again in the past. " After that," she was continuing in a low voice, " we saw one another almost every day. I arranged things. It was difficult, but I did not mind. I rather liked the trouble it was exciting, almost dangerous. He would come by the river to a corner of the park that was hidden away. He had dark hair and blue eyes, eyes like tur- quoises. Oh, you must see that things meant something to me again. I did not mind the dull evenings with my father. I did not mind digging in the garden. I lived in a little paradise. Then one day my father went to York again, and I persuaded Raymond to come into a little sum- mer-house in the garden before we had always stayed on the river and there we told each other you will under- stand we were in love." She uttered a little sigh. The warm light shone again in her eyes, and her bosom rose and fell. I felt myself to be a distant spectator, coldly intellectual, with a barrier placed over the emotions. " Then," she went on, and there was nothing of a confession in her history, rather a fine pride, for which I was I do not know why positively glad, " then came the sunset. I shall never forget that sunset. He looked like a god. Oh, you cannot under- stand what it means. ..." Obviously I could not, but her story, sordid as I might have thought it from other lips, on hers was nothing of the kind. The indescribable movements of her body, which accompanied her words, brought me memories of the old 86 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Greek mythology in particular of Shelley's description I cannot recall the words of the Anadyomine Venus. " He could not come into the Towers," she continued, " because the butler, whom I hated, would have told my father, and we had to watch that none of the other servants came near the summer-house. I sent Raymond aw r ay about six o'clock, for my father was coming home for dinner. I went into the house and sat by my window. It looked out to the west, and things were golden. A great elm. . ." Again she stopped. For a moment I wondered whether I had mistaken her character. Was this young lady sitting by my side one of the sky-born maidens so necessary to romance ? I could hardly think so. In another minute I had discovered that she had no mind for poetry, only a sense of the physical loveliness of things. " A great elm," she repeated, " stood outside, and one of its branches would have grown into my room, but for the window. As it was, it had almost fastened itself to the wall, and once when I was a child, I started to climb out. But it was too risky. I can remember crying when I got back into my room. Well, on this day I was gazing out through the branches and longing for Raymond. I wished so much that we could always be together, but he was only nineteen and had no money. I knew, too, what my father would say. Then after dinner I went up again to my room and the sun had gone and there was only a purple light shining through the tree. I looked out and there came a rustling of the branches below me. I leaned out and saw him. I cried out to him to go down, but he only smiled, and in a few minutes he had climbed into my room." Her eyes were half closed. I could have sworn that the Magic Carpet had really effected my wish. THE SCANDALOUS ME. WALDO 87 " Once he slipped," she went on in still lower tones, " and my heart stopped, but he caught hold of another branch, and saved himself. Then oh, I can never forget it we fell into each other's arms. It was so extraordinary to see him there in my room ! I could not believe it, and then a moment later I could not believe that he would not always be with me. It seemed so unfair that there should be people who would part us. We stood afterwards by the window and watched the sky as it seemed to fade into darkness. He came to see me many times, and no one saw him come. We were very careful, of course, and always we watched the sky change its colour. But one day. . ." " Ah ! " I gasped involuntarily. I had learnt little that was unexpected, yet she had completely engulfed me that is the only word of which I can think." " One day," she was continuing, when another change enveloped her. She looked at me in amazement, and I understood somehow that she was astonished at her own temerity in thus speaking of herself. " I don't don't know," she faltered, " why I am telling you this. I. . ." " You are speaking to a friend," said I, wondering how much she had explained to the little Jew. Fqr a moment there was silence. " Yes, I will tell you everything ; of course, I had settled to do that. One day while we were together, there was a noise outside my door, and my father came in. The butler had found footprints at the bottom of the elm, and my father had been shown them. He hurled himself on my poor boy, and I I hid my face. It was useless to say anything. But afterwards, when Raymond had been hurried away my father had thrashed him with his hunting crop he came back and called me a insulted me vilely. I locked myself up in my room, but he burst open my 88 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO door, and sent me away to an old servant who lives in Birmingham. I managed to get a letter to the poor boy, but he he had gone to Italy, where an uncle of his lives. My father had threatened to kill him. I had a letter to say that he would send me money. You can easily earn a living in Italy, he wrote, but no money has come. I had to pawn a brooch and came to London determined oh, sick of everything. I refused to think. I was dazed, just dazed. I don't know why I came to London per- haps only to get further away from my father. I wrote to the address in Naples which Raymond had sent me, but no answer has come. Then I I met Mr. Mabrum. You can imagine what I felt to be with him instead of with Raymond." I could. Her look explained. " But Mr. Mabrum was kind, and got me a room with a decent woman. I but that is all." " And you are waiting," said I, " to hear from Italy ? " She nodded her head. " You think it outrageous of me to have told you all this ? " " You wanted my help," said I. Again there came a pause. I was hesitating to ask a question. Something in her manner it was almost voluptuous decided me. " Are you engaged to be married ? " " To Raymond ? Yes. I yes I don't know." It occurred to me then that the beloved Raymond was a boneless fellow not at all to my liking. I pictured him a good-looking scamp with a laughing face and a mass of dark hair a poetic young architect whose work would be confined to a series of measured drawings. " And so," she continued, and looked up into my face, " you see how things are." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 89 " I do," said I, and almost involuntarily laid my hand on her own. " I cannot go back," she said. " The money," I suggested, " may still come." " His father is dead, and his uncle has very little, be- sides ..." I looked at her. " If you had the money," I hazarded, " would you go ? " " I do not know," she said slowly, and her words brought a fierce throb to my heart, " I do not know whether I love him." " You mean that ? " cried I, and leant over and kissed her. I do not excuse myself, I do not blame myself. A kiss lays the foundations for so many problems that will never be solved. It was impossible just for the moment to remember the existence of one Carl Mabrum, who had brought me the girl. It was difficult to remember that a possibly disconsolate Raymond might be pining in Italy. It was out of the question to allow John's words to come to mind. I could see nothing but her face with its look of appeal and unconscious enticement, and its soul-heating beauty. I kissed her, and then the irony of it ! became trebly imbued with my avuncular duties. We stared. She looked more radiant than ever. I was minded to tell her that this kiss was in the nature of a seal my help was hers but in the stress of things, prevarication would have been impossible. Just then, too, M. Quatrebras came in. " M. 'Eelton," said this excellent man, " lunched 'ere 90 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO yestairday. He asked after Monsieur. 'E 'as talked of going to Yorkshaire." I was smiling my appreciation of his news when I caught sigh of the girl's face. Once again it had changed ; there had come into it a suspicion of mute accusation I think it must have been accusation but this gave place to one of coolness. I understood that a barrier had arisen, and remembered what had happened. This was the girl whom John had hinted was not straight ! " Thank you, M. Quatrebras," said I, and looked at my finger-nails. All kinds of odd notions were passing through my brain at swallow pace. I had surely kissed some one who had nothing in common with the cold girl at my side. I was an elderly herald despatched by the god of respectability, if he still exist, which I doubt, for the sole purpose of offering advice. I was to promise help. It occurred to me then that she must return to Thorpe Towers. I did not think of her father I must moment- arily have forgtten her story. Mention of John's name had metamorphosed things. Inconsequently I thought of Grolier, then of the Dragon, then of Mary Meddenham. I could have damned John Hylton. " I will do anything I can for you," said I, when we were alone. " It is kind of you," she said, " I must think over things and see what is best." I have a recollection of putting her into an omnibus. VIII Feb. 6. I AM too angry to write much. They have made a fool of me. . . . There is a certain characteristic of very general oc- currence which I cordially detest. I refer to the habit of minding other people's business. My father's pro- fession, of course, implies its necessity in some cases, but there is no excuse as regards either Meadows, who is invariably trying to learn particulars of my work, or the Dragon. The worst offender, however, is myself. Circumstances suggested my own interference in two matters which I might well have left to themselves. The result in both cases has been the same. With regard to Nesta Cardonnel, several days have passed, and I have heard not a word. I begin to under- stand that I am to be grateful for being snubbed at the beginning of things. She has disappeared as mysteriously as she came. In the second matter, I have gone further, and fared worse. It would, I think, be difficult to conceive a more abject failure than I have made of it. It began my active interference on receipt of the Dragon's disgraceful letter. It lies before me as I write, and I do not think I have ever seen a more preposterous effort in the direction of Johnsonian prose. It hints at a 91 92 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO sickly sentiment in every line. Life, I reflected, on reading it for the first time, was not worth the living, when one was " commandeered " in the way my Dragon apparently thought natural and proper. Her words, indeed, suggested that my marriage with Mary was a matter of immediate concern. She did not actually say so, but her verbosity boiled down into a single sentence might so have been translated. It was the inevitable feminine postscript, however, which immediately roused all the latent pug- nacity in my nature. Therein I found a dark hint of Basil Anstruther's intentions, which, while no doubt strictly honourable, could not, I felt, be seriously enter- tained for a moment. I could only suppose that he had actually proposed to Mary a ridiculous contretemps, which seems, in the light of investigation, to be true ! The monstrousness of it all roused anger in my breast, and although I could not, and, indeed, cannot, stifle an occasional laugh modern methods of domestic diplomacy are not without their humour I had no option but to carry the guerilla warfare that is being waged against me into the enemy's country. A few hours' debate with myself led me to the conclusion that there was only one method of dealing with the problem. So far from marry- ing me or young Anstruther, Mary Meddenham, I decided, should marry John Hylton. Not once but many times had she confided to me her high opinion of his good looks and his excellent dancing. I was even surprised that the idea had never before occurred to me. Its brilliance became clearer and clearer John's income is almost as large as my own and I had no fear of opposition from himself. He is one of those delectable mortals who can be made to love any one. The impossibility of regarding him as a married man I flung aside as a juvenile super- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 93 stition. John Hylton would make as good a husband as any one else. I began to foresee a campaign of much interest. A majority of misguided beings, I told myself, occupied themselves with the ungentle art of matchmaking, and there seemed no reason why I should not join their ranks for a time. The Duchess required a son-in-law ; I would provide her with one. and if my choice did not meet with either her own or my father's approval, I could not help it. The birth of my scheme restored to me my good temper, and I lost no time in opening the campaign. In fact I then and there walked to Rochester House and saw Mary. " I have come to speak very seriously," I began. We were sitting in her father's study. " We had better have tea first," said Mary. " Mother will be in soon." " By all means," said I, " but I have no time to lose. I have an important communication to make." She started at that, I think, but recovered herself in a moment. " You are rather absurd, Gordon, when you try to be important," she said. " This is no time for rudeness," said I nettled. " Why not ? You told me once I could say what I liked to you." " So you may," I replied, " but to-day . . . your parents," I broke off, " want you to marry." I was rather surprised at her expression. She must surely have known of her mother's desire, but her look betokened nothing of the sort. She seemed positively frightened of me, and I could have wished that I had been able unhesitatingly to speak my mind. As it was, 94 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO she reddened, and from that moment I was unaccountably nervous. " I am not at all sure," I continued, " that your mother does not want you to marry me." " Why do you think that ? " she asked in no more than a whisper. I shrugged my shoulders. " I have that idea, but of course that is out of the question." " Of course," murmured Mary. " But I do think that you. . . ." " Oh Gordon, let us talk about something else. You know what . . . don't let us talk like this. I I won't." " But surely we're old enough friends," I began. " If we are friends," said Mary, and stopped. " Well ? " " Gordon please ! " " But if friends can't say what they want to, who can ? " She only shook her head, rather wearily. " Mary dear," said I after a pause, " I have had rather a curious letter from your mother. It mentioned amongst other things Basil Anstruther ..." I do not know precisely why I stopped. I do not know why I did not there and then propose that she should marry John Hylton. I do not know why I suddenly realised that I did not understand Mary in the least, but I sat there idiotically dumb, and stared. I suppose it was the look she gave me. I admit to a sense of pettiness. Perhaps it came to me then that mine was not the hand to move puppets this way or that. Perhaps the possibility that others did not look upon life with my eyes, for the first time presented itself. Yet I could not forget how the Duchess had written to me . THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 95 " But I must know about Basil Anstruther," I exclaimed at last, and strove to repress a feeling of anger. Mary's lips tightened. " Why must you know ? " she asked in tones which might have been used to a stranger. " Why ? Good heavens, you speak as though we hardly knew one another ! " " Gordon, will you do me a favour ? Will you treat me as a woman instead of a child ? You treat every one like a child, and sometimes sometimes that makes it diffi- cult for your friends. You don't understand that every one is not like yourself." " I understand perfectly," said I as stiffly as I could. I did not like Mary in this new mood. She shook her head. " You don't, Gordon. You think you do, but you don't. You don't understand things in the least." " Very well then," said I, "if you want to hide things from me, I will go." " Hide things ? " she cried. " Yes. What does this note from your mother mean ? " " Oh, Gordon, can't you understand that that. ..." She turned her head away, and again I stopped. My words were hurting her, and I cursed myself for having come on this errand of unselfishness. One is so easily misunderstood. I could only think that Anstruther had proposed, and that she was holding over her answer. But she must know that she does not love him in the least. . . . Fortunately the Duke came in at that moment, and immediately showed me a rare edition upon vellum of Petronius Arbiter. In ten minutes I was out of the house. 96 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I hardly said good-bye to Mary. 1 must have been angry with her for being so mysteriously feminine. And she was utterly indifferent to my efforts on her behalf ! To be baulked at the outset of things is not agreeable, but to be rebuked for a supposed impertinence her every word, now that I come to think of it, embodied a rebuke is more than I can stand. It is enough to make one be- lieve that civilisation is the greatest crime of which man has yet been guilty. Well, I have long had my suspicions about that. If Mary chooses to obey her mother's orders to the bitter end, I shall say nothing at all. If one attempts to reason with women, it seems, one becomes something of a cad. For the future I shall keep a strict silence on all matters save bibliography. Books may cost you a lot of money, and on occasions defy you in all manner of unexpected ways, but they are not ungrateful for a proper care of themselves. The Duchess may do what she pleases, and John Hylton can marry the veriest gutter- snipe if he wants, and Basil Anstruther may. . . . I do not care. To-morrow I am going into all the dirtiest book-shops in London to spend a hundred pounds if I can. Feb. 7. 5 P.M. A LETTER has just come from Nesta Cardonnel. I copy her words. " DEAR MR. WALDO, " I have been thinking things over. " There is no news from Naples, but Carl has arranged for our wedding. We are to be married early THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 97 on Thursday morning, and go to Lincoln for the honeymoon. My future husband has some customers there. " Thanking you for your help, " Believe me, " Yours sincerely " N. SUMMERS." I note the signature. IX EATON PLACE, Feb. 11. I AM in a better temper. Nothing has happened. I must have been wrong with regard to Anstruther. There is no engagement. I have not seen Mary for more than five minutes at a time, and then never alone, and I have come to the decision that her curious behaviour followed on the Dragon's desire for her participation in a scheme to frighten me. Anstru- ther was unconsciously to play bogie. There must be no lengths to which the Duchess and my misguided father will not go. Every day there has been some mention, direct or hidden, of their project, but I have taken no notice at all. I have merely preserved a dignified aloof- ness. This morning, however, I broke my policy of silence for a few minutes. At breakfast my father, after a vain attempt to find out whether I was attached in any way to an actress whose name and photograph, I believe, figure prominently in all the illustrated papers, chose to think from my reply that I had lost my temper the very last thing I had thought to do and observed that for his part he could wish I was of an age to have my ears boxed. My coffee almost choked me. " I can believe that," said I, " for you persist in regarding me as a boy of seven." " What nonsense ! " cried my father. " Not at all," said I warmly. " You persist in trying to marry me to Mary Meddenham you and the Duchess 98 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 99 between you, and you seem to forget that Mary may have something to say, besides myself, in the matter. Frankly, you are both becoming rather ridiculous." " Don't speak in that way," he snapped. " Why not ? You know^ well enough that your entrance into Parliament followed on your desire to see me married to Mary ! " He smiled at that. " When fellows like yourself," he remarked genially, " choose to behave like idiots, they ought to think them- selves lucky to have some one to look after them ! " " To prevent them marrying an actress with big teeth ? " " Or no one at all," added my father. " There is such a thing," I pointed out, " as liberty." " Certainly," he agreed. " And marriage," I added pointedly, " is a deadly thing to meddle with." " Who's meddling ? " inquired my father innocently. He left the house early, for I was not too careful of my words after that, and I retired to my library. I had hardly begun to read the foreign intelligence, however, before I was disturbed by an unseemly noise below me. I waited two minutes, and then went on to the landing. There I saw, and heard, Meadows endeavouring to con- vince Mr. Carl Mabrum that I was not in the house. For a moment I watched them with distinct feelings of annoy- ance, then a closer inspection of Mr. Mabrum's attire reminded me that to-day was Thursday. He was obviously dressed for the wedding ceremony. The huge white buttonhole, white gloves, white tie and white waistcoat, and the white spats on his boots, left no room for mistake. 100 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO It crossed my mind that he had come for his best man. and I wondered whether Grolier was in the servants' quarters, but something in my visitor's manner suggested a different story. I called down. Mr. Mabrum was to be brought up to the library. He uttered a little cry, and rushed up the staircase. With outstretched arms he came into the room. He was terribly excited. The muscles of his face worked spas- modically, his limbs trembled in a fashion akin to the ridiculous, and his whole manner suggested enormous shock. " Sit down, Mr. Mabrum," said I. He looked at me almost idiotically before managing to explain what had happened. " She's gone ! " he gasped. I understood in a moment. I understood that she had been frightened at the eleventh hour, and was gone probably without a word. I think, indeed, I was far from being sorry, and whatever sympathy I may have felt for this poor figure of a would-be bridegroom in all the glory of nuptial garments was tempered by considerations of another kind. " Miss Cardonnel has gone ? " said I. " Twenty minutes before I was to have fetched her ! " he jerked out ; " twenty minutes ! " he repeated, and paused for me to express incredulity. " It was a close thing," said I, waiting for details. " Twenty minutes, Mr. Waldo," continued my visitor in hoarse tones, and waved his arms. " Just think of it ! Twenty minutes more, and I should have been married ! God ! we were to have been married at ten clock. I hardly know what I am doing. My blood's THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 101 boiling, fair boiling, Mr. Waldo. I feel like a volcano a volcano," he repeated, and looked like one. His eyes were protruding from his head, there were queer blotches of colour on his brown face, and I thought he must be suffering from an attack of cramp. " I didn't believe it possible," he went on, " no, I'm damned if I did and her letter ! It's made me that wild, I could I tell you, Mr. Waldo, I feel like killing some one, and if Mannheim, the dirty skunk, hadn't gone off, there'd have been blood spilt. God, I'd kill that man if I had the chance, just as I'd stamp on a spider." His attitude had become so decidedly bellicose that I had some difficulty in retaining my composure. I could imagine his florid soul, temporarily disembodied and introspective, demanding to know why it had been attached to his person. His story, however, considerably surprised me. Mann- heim, it appeared, was a totally vicious person. His habits were catalogued in some detail by Mr. Mabrum for my benefit. In addition to his refusal to pay some seven pounds to the little man, he had taken full advan- tage of the news of Miss Cardonnel's arrival in London. A wire had been despatched by him to Sir Austin Cardonnel to the effect that very definite information as to hus daughter's whereabouts and future line of action would be forwarded on receipt of ten pounds. " And I thought he was a friend ! " groaned Mr. Mabrum, and reminded me somehow of what Shylock must have been in his youth. " It shows you can't be too careful in your choice of friends." I accepted the implied compliment in silence. He continued his story. The money must have been sent, for when Mr. Mabrum called for his bride, he was 102 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO greeted with the news that Mrs. Summers' father had appeared in the early hours of the morning, and carried off his daughter to Yorkshire. I figure the little man mouthing pitifully at a landlady innocent of intrigue, and then rushing back to his hotel, minus his bride, to seek out the unworthy Mannheim. In the hotel, how- ever, he learnt that his false friend had disappeared. Instead, there was a note in the handwriting of Miss Car- donnel. He showed me the letter. " I do not wish to see you again," it ran. " If you attempt to follow me or communicate with me in any way, I shall take effective measures to prevent you. Nesta Cardonnel." " Not a word of thanks ! " shouted Mr. Mabrum, " only a damned impertinent note ! And I have spent the best part of twenty pounds on her ! Oh, I'm seething with rage. If I don't do something I shall go mad. And Mannheim has gone ! I always said he was a wrong 'un, and- with him my seven pounds ! But I don't care about the money, Mr. Waldo, I want the girl. I'm going to bottle up Sir Austin Cardonnel in a manner he won't like. I'm going to make things precious hot for him. The whole affair will be. . ." " Mr. Mabrum," said I, " I presume you have come here for my advice ? " He nodded, none too pleased at my interruption. " Very well, then, your course is plain. You have been saved from what would have been a particularly unhappy marriage. Miss Cardonnel has shown you clearly enough her feelings in the matter. You may thank your stars that her father did not arrive in London two hours later." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 103 " And you think," he cried, " that I'm going to take the insult in that letter lying down ? " " Her father may have dictated it," I suggested. " What of that ? " retorted my visitor explosively. " I'm as good as they are any day. My ancestors have lived in Frankfort for hundreds of years. I tell you, I'm every bit as good as they are, an' a damned sight better. An' you expect me. ..." There was a kind of fascination about his anger. I could see that he was itching for a blow, but, except myself, there was nothing to hit. I think I realised then for the first time that little men may under certain con- ditions be able to frighten larger men by their very attitude, and could almost have wished that I was slightly less herculean for the occasion. Once, indeed, I thought he was about to break one of my chairs, which, according to the experts, was built by Chippendale himself, but, instead, he somewhat incontinently sat down on it, and glared. " Oh, no," he said, and his tones had become low, " oh, dear no, I'm not that sort of man. I'm not going to be treated like that. I'm not going to help a girl all I jolly well can, and spend twenty or thirty pounds on her to have this thrust under my nose. I am not accustomed to get letters of that sort." " But you have come here for my advice, Mr. Mabrum ? " There was a short pause. " I shall never forget," he went on, speaking with less intensity, " that you have been my friend throughout this affair. I shall always be grateful, but I can't stand still and pretend that nothing has happened. I'm not built that way. I want my rights. An' I want you, Mr. Waldo, if you will, to write a letter for me. I am a gentleman, and I know how to behave like a gentleman, 104 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO but I don't altogether know that I could write the letter myself. You see, that sort of letter isn't exactly in my line, and I thought that you " Whereupon it happened, that I, somewhat amused, and wishing that my dear father could have been present, indicted a pleasant enough letter to Sir Austin Cardonnel setting forth the indisputable fact that under the circum- stances, which I cited in brief, I, or rather Mr. Mabrum, would be glad to have an explanation of his daughter's letter. With this the little man was not wholly satisfied, but was induced, as I thought, to take his departure. He came back into the library, however, in a moment and apologised for so doing. The whole matter, he told me, had seriously affected his financial position. Under the circumstances, and in consideration of my very warm friendship for him, he took occasion to wonder whether I would lend him the sum of six pounds for a period not exceeding one month. I gave him a very decided refusal, whereat his manner underwent a surprising change. The blustering explosive individual who had been keen for his rights became unaccountably changed into a cringing sleek fellow determined to beg. I wondered how he had ever interested me, and the six pounds which accom- panied him to his hotel were the expression of my disgust. Later I convinced Meadows of the necessity for caution in opening the front door. He seemed inclined for sar- casm, which I angrily forbade. Grolier annoyed me, too, by being ill. Feb. 14. :. To my surprise I have had a letter from Mr. Mabrum. In the stress of my new work on " The History of Old- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 105 Time Dedications," which latter are not invariably the oleaginous prayers for patronage that most people think them, I had almost forgotten his existence. Apparently the letter which he sent to Cardonnel did not bring an answer, and he took train to York. I copy the document I have received. THE PIG AND WHISTLE HOTEL, YORK. Feb. 13. " MY DEAR MR. WALDO, " I wrote again to Sir A. Cardonnel, and had a letter from him this morning. He said he had no desire whatever to see me. He also said that my letters to him and his daughter I had to write her a few lines were pieces of gross impertinence. I replied, ' I am putting the matter in the hands of my solicitor,' on a post card, and this for the time being is the final between Sir A. Cardonnel and myself. He also wrote ' I am in no way connected with you, and will have nothing to do with you.' As soon as I got his insulting letter, I rang up a customer of mine, and told him the whole affair, and he was vert/ much interested. Now I am going to show my bad side, and I give you my word I am going to play hell with C. Within a week at most the affair is all over England, unless C. alters his tactics considerably. " Cardonnel also wrote that I must have imagined the so-called reasons which caused his daughter to leave her home, and to which I referred in my letter you did not mention them, so I added a few lines on my own. I am not sorry I have come here, now that I know what a gentleman Cardonnel is, and after all, it will be very unpleasant for him, as he is a baronet, when the affair is all over the show. I am absolutely craving to have my revenge, and I'm going to have it. 106 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " My customer, by the way, thinks there is some mystery about C. because he never goes out, and very few people know him. If we can find this out, it will be a trump card to play when the time comes." " Yours sincerely. " CARL MABRTJM." There are many flourishes beneath the signature. " You little fool," thought I, and somewhat idly won- dered exactly how near to blackmail the little man would venture. March 6. I have learnt nothing. For some weeks I have been waiting in patience for news, but Mr. Mabrum's letter has not been followed by another. If the affair is all over England, then the London Press has behaved in the most scandalous fashion, for I have not seen Cardonnel's name so much as mentioned. I am just a little disappointed. After Mr. Mabrum's letter I had promised myself some entertainment. This has not come. It may be that my six pounds has some- thing to do with its omission, but I should like to hear what has happened. However, I have other things to think about. MIDLAND HOTEL, MANCHESTER. April 14. I FIND that the most careful analysis of my thoughts and actions very often leads me to nowhere at all. Times without number I have prescribed for myself a reasonable line of conduct only to obey the whim of the moment, and act, as the most modern of the Samuel Butlers might have written, according to the teachings of the Professors of Unreason. And when the time comes for retrospection, I cannot always remember the whim, and waste hours in the attempt to explain myself. I shall end in believing with Balzac that I am no more than an instrument played on by circumstances. I do this or that, but why should I seek for a reason ? Nine-tenths of a man are a mystery to himself, and it is becoming increasingly clear to me that investigation of the remaining tenth is apt to make for monotony. As a matter of fact, I am endeavouring to understand why I am here. . . . Yesterday Grolier brought round the car at an early hour and this is the result. I know not a soul in this damp pace, and have nothing to gain by pretending to an interest in cotton. Why, then, am I here ? I could, at the outset, give a hundred reasons, not one of which would be wholly incorrect. I am here because I am tired of my father's tongue. I am here because I do not want to see any of the Rochesters, Mary least of 107 108 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO all. I am here because John Hylton has become inqui- sitive about Anstruther. I am here because I want to commune with myself away from my friends and my enemies. Also, of course, I am here in this city of chimneys because I have a perfect right to go where I choose. Weeks ago I made fun of the Duchess and spoke airily to Mary. I am beginning to see that I made a mistake. I ought to have gone to Trafalgar Square, sat astride on one of the lions, and informed the world at large that I had decided to remain a bachelor until I or the world came to an end. I ought to have told the Duchess that she would be wasting her energies if she attempted to obtain myself as son-in-law, and I ought to have refused my father's offer of three guineas a week. As it is, I am come to that state wherein I can hardly distinguish a Dutch from an Italian fount of letters ! In some inconceivable way, I have given people the impression that I have long wished to marry Mary Medden- ham. That, in a word, is the trouble. I am, of course, exceedingly fond of her I have told her so hundreds of times but why a man should not be allowed to possess women friends in peace and comfort, passes my com- prehension. The money question, moreover, has apparently helped to complicate matters. Under any regime that was in the least reasonable, I should be able to help her in that respect, but I am not allowed to do so unless, forsooth, I marry her ! And even if I were allowed, I have no doubt that Mary would find herself preposterously laden with all manner of scruples, compounded of pride, prejudice and superstition. I refuse, too, to think much about Anstruther. If he chooses to propose to Mary, he is entitled to do so. He THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 109 is a poor weak creature of a man, who wears effeminate dress and has hair delicately brushed up into curls. There is a general spotlessness about him which has always irritated me. He is without brains. His parents are without brains. I do not know why I visit them. John Hylton is the only man I know who has a good word for him, but then John has probably met half a dozen attractive young ladies at the Anstruthers' house, and he is of a grateful disposition. I shall, in fact, completely ignore the youth. . . . I had better add, however, that I am not in the faintest degree jealous of him. The Duchess thought I was, and had the effrontery to say as much, but as it is impossible to be jealous without being in love, the reason for any irri- tation I may have been feeling, must be looked for in other directions. Moreover, I am at all times of an extremely unjealous disposition. Yes, I understand why I have come to Manchester. I do not care very much what people do, but I have no par- ticular desire to see them do it. I am not supersensitive, and I am not jealous ; I am merely well, if I could discover the word, I should not be here. Looking back over the last week, I find that things have behaved themselves very oddly. I met Mary at some entertainment, and could not have imagined that she looked on me other than as a fairly young godfather not an unpleasant position to hold but two days ago, she was my partner at Lady Wilmington's dinner, and turned herself without rhyme or reason into a little dragon. At first I was rather amused, then I became puzzled, finally annoyed. From her manner you would have said 110 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO that I had insulted her. As a matter of fact, I do not remember what we were speaking about when she became so amazingly hostile, but I am certain that the subject was uncontroversial. Later in the evening, I asked for an explanation, but she could give me none of a definite character. Women when they choose, can be so vague. She said good-night in the iciest manner, and I went home seriously doubting whether I liked her. The barrier between us, so far from disappearing, as I had thought, had positively increased. Her behaviour that evening, however, was nothing to her mother's the next day. The Dragon came to tea, and no doubt under my father's tuition essayed the plaintive policy. She became frankly impossible. Within ten minutes she was hinting that I was possibly jealous of Anstruther ! The affair, she maintained, rested entirely with Mary ! I was goaded into several observations of a caustic nature, and she left bridling. After she had gone, I looked up my notes, and came to the conclusion that in the event of their publication, all mention of Mabrum and the Cardonnels should be ex- punged. The East Chapel affair is finished for all time, and I am now quite certain that I did not obtain from it anything like my six pounds' worth of pleasure. I was idly comparing Nesta Cardonnel with Mary, when John walked in, and pestered me with questions about Anstruther. Now and again John is keen for a little gossip, but I was in no mood for pleasantry and was about to send him home, when my father strolled in with the Duke of Rochester, and the three of them jabbered together until long after midnight. At one o'clock, I, who had for some time been silent, was asserting that of all bonds marriage was unquestion- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 111 ably the most immoral. I may not have thought so, but the words suited my mood. The Duke rubbed his eyes at that, and John's mouth opened wide, but my father's lips were tight. I did not get to bed until half-past two, and my father and I did not say good-night. Yesterday morning, moreover, he continued his remarks, and I summoned Grolier. There is a limit to all things. April 15. I went to the theatre last night to see melodrama, and have rarely enjoyed myself so much. The Curse of Evil effectively restored me my philosophy. I see now that the Dragon and Mary and even my father have a perfect right to behave as they please. My visit to Manchester, however, may be misunderstood for an act of pique, and so Grolier is to have the car ready in an hour. When I arrive in London, I am going to all the melo- dramas I see advertised. They act like a tonic. One becomes far too self-conscious without some stimulant or other. EATON PLACE. April 19. I had decided to go last night to the Britannia Theatre at Hoxton, but instead went to Mrs. Anstruther's dance, and probably made an idiot of myself. . . . Did I but possess the presumption of a Brummel or a Cromwellian idea of duty towards others, I would tax most weightily that particular form of entertainment known for purposes of enticement as the " small dance." In truth, I know no more detestable pastime. Clad ridiculously in starch, one is forced to career none too gracefully round a heated room in the midst of an enormous crowd engaged in persistent effort to occupy one's chosen 112 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO inch of space. There follow wounds on the heel, and muttered imprecations, which are hurriedly metamorphosed into hypocritical smiles, from the women. In a ball-room I am bereft of all idea of balance. I am not given the fullest choice of partners this may be my own fault and in the intervals of rest I am asked foolish questions by gaudy dowagers and their gaudier grand-daughters. A crowd to me is as distasteful as hurry or bad cooking. I hereby declare my unconditional refusal to attend another function of the kind. If I might appear in flannels, booted and uncombed, I might enjoy myself ; garbed conventionally, never. I found on my return, however, such a marked change in my father's behaviour, that I felt bound to investigate matters, and decided that this dance would afford me a good opportunity. My father, indeed, has become ultra- political, and meals have been passing to the tune of the Housing Question. My polite queries have remained unanswered. I was, and am at this moment, altogether at sea. I arrived late on principle, and Mrs. Anstruther, who is a pupil of the Dragon's, shook hands with a minimum of cordiality. Her colour and her expression alike remind me of a mechanical doll I once saw in an exhibition. She was wonderfully clothed, and she smiled in a meaningless manner that was calculated to inspire feelings of the most antagonistic nature. Mrs Anstruther is the only woman of my acquaintance who has no soul, for even the Dragon is provided with something of the kind hidden deep down in her innermost recesses. Yet my hostess figures in the British Press as one of the most popular women in London ! She has a daughter who takes after her. It is their annual custom to pose to some celebrated painter, and the results, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 113 if a little frightening, are very wonderful. Basil Anstruther, on the other hand, takes after his father, and makes up for their lack of temperature. I caught sight of Mary in a few minutes. A dance was just finished, and exhausted pairs were about to seek their corners. Mary was with John Hylton. I went up to them. " So you are back ! " she began, rather coldly. " As you see," said I. " Who told you I had gone away ? " " Your father." " You might say good evening," remarked John. " I will," said I, and did. " You have only just come ? " she asked me. " This minute. Please fill my programme." " I have only one dance," she said. I stared. " You're an old rotter, Gordon, to come at this hour," interposed John. " My work," I explained, " occupies most of my time." I turned to Mary. " If you can give me no more than one dance, I may as well retire to bed." " You are horribly rude ! " " I detest dancing," I replied, " and I only came here because. ..." John made an idiotic remark about the refreshments. Mary was obviously not at her ease. A curious stiffness had appeared on her face, and she repeatedly opened and closed her fan. She laughed rather forcedly at John's little joke. I became glad that I had come. Mary was in one of those curious moods of hers which I must investigate. We were sitting in an alcove temporarily furnished with an effusion of cushions and plants. Mary was dressed in H 114 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO pale blue, and the pearls round her neck pleased me. I had never noticed them before. John, I could see, was cudgelling his brains for an excuse to take off his gloves. " I came here," I went on, " because I wanted to see you." " And you have a whole dance to see me in," replied Mary, " besides this one which really belongs to Mr. Hylton." The music began before I could frame a reply. John disappeared as Basil Anstruther came up to claim his partner. The youth did not appear pleased to see me, but hoped I was well in tones that implied that the hope belonged to the conventional order of things. I told him I was well, and could not forget that I had once thrown him downstairs. They looked at one another, did these two, and I looked at them, and at once came to the conclusion that anything more impossible than their marriage had never been devised by the brain of woman. I very nearly told them so. Mary's glance might have meant anything as she walked away on his arm. I looked about for John, and found him gazing with a tense admiration upon the figure of a rather attractive girl with black hair and a green dress. " She is very beautiful," said he, with his ridiculous reverence. I had tapped his shoulder. " Seen her before ? " " Never." " Come along, then," said I. " You must take me as partner this dance." He looked at his programme, sighed, cast an almost despairing glance at the girl, and followed me into Mr. Anstruther's study. " The Anstruthers," I began in a whisper we had THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 115 retreated to a corner of the room " are charming people.'* John with an effort banished thoughts of the girl with the green dress. " The Anstruthers ? " said he. " Yes. Why ? " " My dear John," said I, " personally I detest the whole family." " Polite thing to say in their house," he commented with a laugh. " I came here because I wanted to see Mary Meddenham." " So I thought," said he slowly, and paused. " I say, old man," he went on, awkwardly trying to be at his ease, " you know they're talking people are talking you see what I mean about you. And then there's young Anstruther," he added rather inconsequently. " What are people saying ? " I demanded. John evidently regarded his position as dangerous, but struggled manfully. It seemed that people had been wondering whether Mary Meddenham was going to marry young Anstruther or myself. " You see," finished my friend, " oh, well, damn it, I don't like interfering in people's business, but I did hear that they were engaged." Very calmly I told him that although I myself might not marry Mary, I had certainly no intention of allowing her to become Anstruther's wife, whereat John observed that the Duchess seemed to have become very thick with the family. " Why don't you marry her ? " he asked in such a childish manner that I could riot forbear laughing. I had cornered John, however, to obtain information, and took no notice of his question. " Before this supposed Anstruther engagement was bruited about," I asked, " what were people saying about us ? " 116 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO John's mouth opened wide. " Lord ! " said he enig- matically, and stopped. " Lord what ? " " I mean," said he, obviously considering my question as grossly unfair ; " yes, they did say tilings," he ended lamely. " Of course they said things, you old idiot. I want to hear what they said." " They wanted to know when you would make up your minds." " The world," said I, "is a damnably inquisitive place." " But I can't for the life of me think why you don't get married," said John after a pause, and attempted to look . paternal. " My dear John," I replied, " that is precisely the question I am always asking myself about you." He blushed like a boy. " Oh, I'm different. You see I can't marry her." " The young lady upstairs ? " He became angry. " Of course not. Absurd fellow you are ! Oh, damn," he added, and then looked at me. " But there is nothing to prevent you er I say, Gordon, you haven't been seeing Nesta Cardonnel again, have you ? " If John thought he had been wily, he was very much mistaken. " No," said I, " nor am I likely to see her. I told you she had gone home." In the pause that followed, John took occasion to sigh audibly and repeatedly. " You seemed rather keen on her, you know," he said at last. I upbraided him for the bad habit of excessive deduction. " And what happened to the little Jew ? " he went on. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 117 " The little Jew borrowed six pounds and disappeared. " Just what you might have expected," said John, " but I am glad the girl went home." The Duchess came in on old Mr. Anstruther's arm. She smiled coldly at me. " You old Dragon ! " thought I. I refused to dance with Mary, but took her to the second floor where I found a lonely settee. " I've something to say," said I. Nervously she played with her fan. " I am not at all pleased with your behaviour," Icontinued. " You are not pleased with my behaviour ? " she cried. " Oh, my dear Gordon, you're simply absurd." " What do you mean ? " " I am very angry with you," she said, and turned away. " When we met the other night at Lady Wilmington's you did all you could to make me uncomfortable . . ." " And do you think you have never made me uncom- fortable ?" " Not consciously." " I can hardly believe that. You say things against my mother almost every time we meet." " I say no more than that I do not think your mother is quite fair to you." " At least she is doing her best for me," she declared with some heat, " which is more than you. . . . Oh, we shall never agree about that. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk to you at all." " Which explains the one dance ? " She looked at me angrily. " If you like." 118 THE SCANDALOUS ME. WALDO During a long pause we both stared at a large oak chest that faced us. " My dear Mary," said I, " will you kindly explain why you are nearly losing your temper again ? " She turned a flushed face to me. " Because you would make any one lose her temper. Oh, you are horrid, Gordon, not to understand." I was rendered momentarily speechless by seeing her give way to tears. There is nothing, I think, on this globe, so embarrassing as a woman in tears. I even prefer weddings, although they are functions at which that bugbear of mine, the throat-lump, inevitably puts in an appearance. Sight of Mary Meddenham in such a con- dition sharpened my wits ; I began to understand the drift of things. The Dragon must have told her innu- merable untruths. It was a most difficult situation, and I candidly regretted the existence of a second floor in Mrs. Anstruther's house. " People," said I at last, " have talked about us. My dear Mary, does that matter very much ? I think your mother. . . ." Through her tears she forbade mention of her mother's name. " I can hardly help doing so." " You have always tried to put me against her ! " she exclaimed. " I do not believe you care about anything but your car and the stacks of old books in your library. You are always quarrelling with your own father, and expect every one else to do much the same. Oh, I am not going to talk to you at all." At that moment she looked quite beautiful. I then took a plunge which has since set me wondering. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 119 " Your father and mother," said I, " want you to marry me. Do you think we should be any happier if. . . ." " I will never marry you," she cried, and pressed her lips together. Again her manner suggested that my words had embodied an insult. For some reason vaguely connected with the emotions I took hold of her hand, but she snatched it away, and rose from the settee. " Don't ever mention that subject again," she said, and I hardly recognised her. Her whole expression had undergone a surprising change. For a moment I was reminded of Nesta Cardonnel. Never before had I seen Mary so roused, so passionate. Her fingers were clenched, her lips were quivering, her bosom rose and fell. "Mary," said I, "why .-. ." She looked up into my eyes. " Gordon," she said in her ordinary tones, " do you mind waiting a moment on the stairs. My eyes are red." Amazed, I walked away, and waited. A little later we walked down together in an atmosphere of frost. The orchestra started to play a two-step, and I bowed stiffly. I was beginning to feel other emotions besides intense curiosity. Perhaps I was a little angry. My words, I thought, could so easily be construed into an actual pro- posal of marriage, while her own certainly embodied a direct refusal. That fact, however, could be forgotten for the moment; I was principally concerned with her tears. I left the house after saying good-bye to no one but the butler. April 21. I record Lady Mary Meddenham's engagement to Basil Anstruther with feelings of with no feelings. THE SECOND NOTEBOOK XI THE HALL, NETTLESHAM, YORKS. June 22. MY hostess, Mrs. Hylton, is the most agreeable old lady in the United Kingdom. She has white hair, a passion for flowers, and a delightful habit of making people thoroughly comfortable in her house. She was a great friend of my mother's, and in bygone days treated me as an extra child. Latterly she has looked upon me as her only son's mentor, and we discuss John with the utmost candour and freedom. Mrs. Hylton, indeed, is my ideal of motherhood. She treats John as though he were far older and far wiser than herself, and by consequence makes him do just precisely what she wishes. And she treats her husband, who is inclined to be pompous, if not pig- headed, in much the same way. Erasmus Hylton only differs from his son inasmuch as his one delight is archi- tecture and not women, and as Mrs. Hylton will inform you with that delicious smile of hers which makes you love her straightway, " Erasmus knows as much about architecture as John knows about women," and that, I need hardly say, is nothing at all. Together they form a delightful group, and their table-talk is vastly illuminating. My room here with its quaint diamond-paned windows looks out on to an old-world garden with fountains and Jacobean sundials and broad terraces. In the far dis- tance I can see a long line of poplars which seem to be cutting us off from the rest of mankind. I always think 123 124 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO of them as a row of sentinels, raised up by my hostess to frighten away a possible intruder. At this moment the sun is throwing orange beams across the lawn ; every- where else there are only greens and purples. There is a peacefulness here that I have never before experienced, for even Friarbrook is not wholly free from the tourist, and my walls on Sunday evenings, shelter not one couple but many. I am almost inclined to think that I ought to have left Grolier with the car at York, and driven over here in some eighteenth century chariot, such as friend Baskerville in all the glory of his gold lace was wont to use. It is in such surroundings, I suppose, that one be- comes vastly sentimental. I do honestly believe that there is nothing I like better than this chair by the window, and the ever-changing colours outside. The garden, indeed, is the most beautiful spot in the whole of England, for it has instilled into me a new enthusiasm. Even the occasional fights between aggrieved blackbirds, scientifically carried out on the lawn before me, or the lazy bark of a dog from the stables away to the left, do not mar the serenity of things. And I find myself listening to the singing birds for all the world like a spring poet. Mrs. Hylton's invitation came some time ago, shortly after the announcement of Mary Meddenham's engagement. I was in Cornwall with Grolier at the time. He had a mind to try the Cornish roads, I remember, and we took train to Plymouth. Afterwards we visited a number of small towns, ultimately seeking a week's rest at Fowey. Here Grolier made the first mistake of his career, for unless I had peremptorily bidden him prepare for immediate departure, he would have married the daughter of a local grocer. For some days I was ignorant of the affair, but I eventually came across them near the ruins of a castle THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 125 which stands at the harbour's head. 1 said nothing, but Grolier chose to explain that the young lady was the brightest girl he had ever met. I listened in patience until he began to excuse her ignorance of literature sure proof of his intentions. " We shall drive to London, to-morrow," said I. " I thought you were enjoying yourself, sir," said Grolier, and looked glum. " I was," I replied. And that was all. I do not intend to keep a married chauffeur. We returned to London to find my father engaged in a " History of the Houses of Parliament." I pointed out that there were already enough books on the subject, but he would not listen to reason. I asked after the Rochesters, but he became vague, and could tell me no more than that the Duke had promised to write him a chapter on the Lords' kitchens. " And Mary is still engaged ? " I asked. My father's look was so poignant that I was sorry for him. He is genuinely disappointed as I myself, if only for Mary's sake. Anstruther is the last man she should marry, but I am not going to worry myself further. I saw neither Mary herself nor the Dragon. They had gone to the Anstruther's country house. I wrote to Mary, and for the second time forgot to offer her my congratu- lations, but I have no doubt that she realised the meaning of the omission. For some hours, indeed, after the news had come, I had had a mind to interfere, but her words to me had made that impossible, and I condoled myself with the reflection that she was old enough to know her own mind. I could wish, however, that this were true. . . . 126 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I have been here a week, and am thoroughly enjoying myself. John is more delightful than ever. He is thinking of marrying a Miss Carruthers, a redoubtable lady with almost a masculine view of things. She is attractive, a little wilful, not at all afraid of a philosophical argument, and devoted to tennis, at which game she represents her county. I can imagine people more emo- tional than myself being afraid of her. If she marries John, I do not suppose Mrs. Hylton will object ; her mind should be easy. Miss Carruthers, I fancy, is one of those rare mortals who would successfully combine the duties of wife with those of mother. In the evenings I play billiards with John or talk archi- tecture with my host. Last year he built a draughty summer-house in a corner of the garden, and I am shown plans of it every other day. There are books in all the rooms, and I am allowed to do what I like. It is Mrs. Hylton's wish that I stay until the shooting. I told her to-day that Nettlesham was a little paradise. " Your cMuffeur told my butler as much," said she laughing. " Grolier," said I, " is a good judge of everything save . . ." " Whfct ? " " Women," said I. Mrs. Hylton pretended to be shocked. John guffawed in his usual way. " But in that respect," I added, " he is by no means an exception." Mrs. Hylton said she supposed not, and looked slyly at her son. Nothing has been said here about Mary Meddenham's THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 127 engagement. Apparently John has been good enough to say that I once hoped to occupy Mr. Basil Anstruther's present position. It is rather laughable, but I do not feel disposed to disabuse his mind. I am as tired, too, of play- ing uncle as I am of being the object of people's solicitude. Once or twice, however, I have been tempted to inform my friend that his shy scrutinies of my features are follow- ing upon misplaced concern. My views upon marriage resemble a Persian edict. June 26. I have seen her. I have seen Nesta Cardonnel. We have spoken some half-dozen words, laughed, and gone our separate ways. It is difficult to know whether I am to be outrageously frank, whence may follow all kinds of ridiculous reflections, or whether I am to write down our meeting without com- ment. If I am frank, I may possibly find myself reduced to the most unsatisfactory conclusions, whereas if I make no effort to explain things, I shall remain in a state of irritating uncertainty. I have often found indecision a blessing, for it alone has allowed me to retain my philosophy and this is a moment when I require every ounce of it I ever possessed but I shall assuredly get no for'arder in the present case without some definite plan. In the first place, the importance of certain factors is disputable. And the number of curiously inept ideas which are coursing through my brain is amazing. A middle course is impos- sible. I must. . . . The dinner gong is sounding. The solution is discovered. At the risk of becoming 128 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO morbidly introspective, I shall relate the facts with such comments as appear appropriate. At the outset I fear I have wronged Grolier. He certainly had long been desirous to obtain a sight of Cornish scenery, but it must have been I, who, a month ago, suggested an exploration of that part of the country. I can no longer doubt that in some mysterious way, Mary Meddenham's engagement rendered expedient my departure from London. In the second place, I now admit that Mrs. Hylton's invitation put me in mind of the Cardonnels. That was inevitable. I wondered then, as I have been wondering until to-day, whether I should see the girl. I decided that such a meeting would be improbable but not impossi- ble. Thorpe Towers is within two miles of Nettlesham, but on the other hand, John was once engaged to the girl, and her name somewhat naturally is not mentioned. It was obvious too, that my desire to see Miss Cardonnel again followed on the perfectly natural wish to hear news of Carl Mabrum, and I accepted Mrs. Hylton's invitation. Since my arrival here, however, I am forced to under- stand that my interest in Mabrum is not very great. It follows, I suppose, that I am interested in the girl. Well, I have never pretended otherwise. Nesta Cardonnel is an unusual person. I am therefore interested in her. That also is natural. Her history has certainly aroused my keen curiosity, but then women's histories are invariably to the taste of men ; that is the way of things. Men will go on failing to understand women and in some unfortunate cases loving them the more on that account until the globe is burnt up by a comet or succumbs to an era of ice. Also, it is not given to every man to hear such a story as this girl told me in M. Quatre- bras' restaurant. And I am naturally eager to learn more THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 129 of my father's erstwhile friend. His marriage must be investigated. Such reasons alone suffice to explain my acceptance of Mrs. Hylton's invitation. I came here primarily to enjoy the Hyltons' society, secondly to see Nesta Cardonnel. I have done both. Looking over what I have written, I really do not under- stand my hesitation to put things on to paper. I have done nothing in the least unusual. Perhaps one's innate love of intrigue has something to do with it. ... It happened this afternoon. The Hyltons had driven over to the Carruthers' cottage. By the exercise of con- siderable diplomacy I made it clear to John, who will easily become suspicious, confound him, that my work on the " Dedications " rendered a few hours' solitude imperative, and, after his departure, made my way towards Thorpe Village. I had no definite plan. Probably I had a mind to hover the purest childishness ! There is a narrow lane on the way to Thorpe bordered by low stone walls, and the country is rather bleak even in summer. I came to the summit of a hill, and saw in the valley before me a solitary mounted figure. In a few minutes Miss Cardonnel was pulling up her horse, and talking to me. I had scarcely recognised her, but have come to the con- clusion that a riding habit is the most perfect adornment for a girl not frightened of her figure. Naturally she was nervous, extraordinarily nervous. I told her that I was staying with the Hyltons at Nettlesham, arid she said she supposed so. She hoped I liked Yorkshire. After London, she said, it was a little heaven. And then in the pause that followed, we both laughed as we had laughed in East Chapel, and in M. Quatrebras' restaurant. 130 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " I am glad to see you again," said I. " Even after what has happened ? " I patted her horse's shoulder. " What has that to do with it ? " " It might have everything," she replied suddenly, solemn. " Or nothing," said I. Then this curious creature's manner altered. She stared hard at me, looked frightened, blushed, sighed I think she sighed and then before I had realised her intention, had uttered good-bye, and was cantering off. " Do you generally ride here in the afternoons ? " I called out. " Sometimes," came floating back. I thought her extremely rude. I consider that she took unfair advantage of my horselessness. I had a thousand questions to put to her. The habit which most women seem to possess of riding away from an interview at a moment when they appear most attractive should certainly be stopped. I am considering what steps I shall take in the matter. XII July 1. I HAVE always admired milestones in a hesitating kind of way from the driver's seat of my car ; they have seemed to be an integral part of things, and are assuredly the foundations of all geography. If, however, from one cause or another one of their number comes to be regarded as a chair, the unfortunate sitter is irresistibly reminded of a woolsack deprived of its wool. As a temporary couch, indeed, the average convex-topped milestone is a failure. Yesterday I sat on such a milestone between the hours of three-thirty and six. In that time I succeeded in establishing the truths of several theorems to my own satisfaction, whilst suffering the maximum of physical discomfort. I repeatedly sketched the surrounding scenery in my brain, and counted the number of stones on an estimated yard of the wall opposite me. Four labourers bade me good-day, and one spoke of the weather, and forecasted such storms as would speedily ensure the end of the world. I suspect that his forecast embraced a wish. I kept him talking for five minutes. Apparently he understood that my seat was not luxurious. I have no doubt that he thought me a fool. Well, I am inclined to agree with such a view of myself. In justice to my dignity, however, I must at once write down an explanation. . . . Three days ago I announced my intention of running 131 132 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO over to a village some twelve miles distant, where lives a very dear friend of my imagination. Things went so well that even John, who knows most of my friends, had no suspicion. I am glad, nevertheless, that most of his time is given to Miss Carruthers. " You know your way ? " asked Mrs. Hylton. " I don't suppose you do." She gave me detailed instructions and when I started the car waved her handkerchief. A mile or two from Thorpe, my chauffeur received a shock. " I shall leave you now," said I. " You may drive about according to your own sweet fancy for two or three hours. About six o'clock you will pick me up again here." " Yes, sir," said Grolier, and stared hard. There could be no doubt that he was thinking of his ridiculous adven- ture at Fowey an annoying circumstance, because, unless I am careful, he will confide in Meadows, who has an evil tongue. " I wish to work in peace," I explained. Grolier maintained that he understood perfectly. He drove off at a great pace, and I explored Thorpe Lane. Miss Cardonnel's behaviour had left me no alterna- tive. She had ridden off before I had had an opportunity of learning her news. I find I am a man of very con- siderable determination. Having journeyed into York- shire, I had no intention of leaving it until certain factors of the East Chapel comedy had been explained to me. Her appearance alone on horseback had suggested to my mind a number of possibilities. She was being kept prisoner no longer ; so much was obvious. Probably she had succeeded in showing her father that freedom is necessary to every one. I could picture the unfortunate old man accusing his daughter of dire mistakes, the while THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 133 he was in pitiful ignorance of his own near connection with their performance. On this afternoon, however, the girl did not appear, and when Grolier returned, it was my painful duty to accuse him of excessive drinking. He was by no means drunk he is far too devoted to the car's interests for that but he smelt of the public house. I was hardly surprised to learn that he had met that rarest of all phenomena a literary publican. " You will leave my service," said I, "if you continue to make mistakes." Again Grolier understood my meaning. On the following day, an excursion was out of the ques- tion. Miss Carruthers appeared with a bevy of athletic ladies who required attention. Mrs. Hylton begged me to play tennis. No excuse coming to mind, I yielded to circumstances, and took up a racquet. I found the game coming simpler than I had expected, a fact which leads me to suppose that thirty- two cannot properly constitute a veteran. In the evening we picnicked in the garden, and I found that Mrs. Hylton's cook maintained a high standard on out-of-door occasions. There was a pleasant freshness over things, and I did even object when Miss Carruthers lured me into the summer-house, and there asked my candid opinion of John. I suppose I am one of those miserable individuals for ever fated to be chosen as Father Confessor. There must be certain lines on my face which victimise me. I remem- ber that Mr. Mabrum hesitated for no more than five minutes before offering me his confidence, while John for years has committed his entire soul to my keeping. Even my father himself desired my services in his time of need ! To quote Lavater seems almost inevitable. " Trust him with little," he wrote, " who, without proofs, trusts you 134 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO with everything." Mabrum certainly comes under such a category, and Miss Carruthers' admittance is almost as certain. I had scarcely uttered a stereotyped eulogy of my friend before she was informing me in so many words that her intention to marry him was adamant. At least that is how I understood her. I expressed sympathy. She abused me in unseasonable periods, concluding with the impertinent remark that I was probably the most ridiculous person to whom she had ever spoken. " In a summer-house ? " I asked, and lectured her upon her inability to read character from the face. After which I suddenly decided that I would forget Lavater and make use of her. " I also require information," said I. " Information ? " she cried gaily. " You don't imagine you have told me anything I did not know ? " " Of course not," said I soothingly, " I can hardly suppose you would have brought me here if you had wanted to learn anything." " I think," she replied, " that you are the rudest man within miles." " Women," I told her, " invariably make the same re- mark." " I suppose you have found that it makes you popular with them ? " " Rudeness," said I, " is only another term for excessive honesty." " You must have a very good time on the whole," she went on after a pause. " I do," said I. " Well, what do you want to know ? " " The Cardonnels live here, don't they ? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 135 She started, looked at me quizzically, and allowed her features, which are pleasantly moulded, to express any number of illegible emotions. " Yes. Why ? " " Do you know them ? " " I know the girl." " A young merchant," said I, " desired to marry her. Would that have been wise ? " It occurred to me then that these questions were com- ing from my lips with quite involuntary ease. Five minutes before they might have embodied an impertinence ; now they seemed inevitable. " A young merchant ? " repeated Miss Carruthers obviously puzzled. "You are quite sure he was a young merchant ? " I wondered at her question, until I remembered that she was probably aware of John's escapade. " He was a commercial traveller," I told her. " As I don't know the young merchant," she remarked, after a pause, " I cannot say whether such a marriage would have been wise or not. Probably not." " But you know the girl ? " She nodded her head. " I told you so." " What of her ? " " She is not straight," said Miss Carruthers coolly. Which explains, I hope, my visit yesterday to the milestone. In truth I had been startled. For a moment I supposed that she was quoting John's words, but she told me after- wards that he had never mentioned the girl's name to her. In reply to my inquiry of her meaning, she informed me that a man pretending ignorance of his native tongue invariably banished her good temper. " You are not likely to meet her," she added, " unless " 136 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO She gave me a piercing look, attempted to keep back a smile, failed in her endeavour, and laughed. But a moment later she was sighing to herself. " I suppose you have met her," she said at last. " Of course ! " said I. " Of course you have," said Miss Carruthers with her usual gaiety, " or you would not have asked the question. Well, we were at the same school for a year. She is four or five years younger than I am." " And the young lady was not quite straight there ? " " On the contrary she was, so far as I know, very straight, but," she added whimsically, " you could hardly help yourself there." " I suppose not." " It was her mother's fault," declared my companion ; " she was not nice." A second pause followed, during which she evidently found cause for some anxiety and a little merriment. " Why do you laugh ? " I asked. " I was wondering why you of all people were interested in Nesta Cardonnel. I though few people ever saw her nowadays." " I met her," said I, " politically." On extremely rare occasions it may be useful to possess a parliamentary parent. Miss Carruthers did not believe me. She said good- night with an impertinent air, which made me long to warn John against her machinations. Instead, I listened in silence to a detailed description of her many virtues from John's own lips, which lasted until midnight. On the road to the milestone I decided that prejudice was the most malignant enemy against which the philoso- pher could be pitted. I held no brief for Miss Cardonnel THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 137 or any one else ; I was merely interested, as I am this moment, in certain aspects of humanity. It was love of philosophy which took me to the milestone, and a determina- tion of character which kept me there for the best part of three hours. " I will wait until doomsday," thought I with some recklessness, when the last of the four labourers had been gone an hour, and just then a ramshackle wagon came into view. It was being pulled up the hill by three of the largest and shaggiest horses I have ever seen outside the Agricultural Hall at Islington. Their driver was urging them on with unmelodious song. When they reached me, they stopped to enjoy the view and obtain breath. I entered into conversation with the driver, but we had hardly finished a somewhat bucolic though elaborate greeting that is the Yorkshire way when a bicycle bell caused me to turn, and there flashed by me an absurd figure, clad in loud yellow tweeds. His body was bent down and there was a tense look on his face. He hardly noticed the waggon, but sped on down the hill towards Thorpe. The driver made an appropriate remark, giving it as his opinion that such impossible clothes could only have originated in London. " I agree with you," said I, and believed what I said, for the rider was Mr. Carl Mabrum of Oxford Street. I did not wait longer to see the girl, but came back here, and have been wondering ever since what the little man is doing in Yorkshire. It must be some months since I received his letter. Is he blackmailing Cardonnel ? That is not likely. Apparently the old man has nothing to lose. Has he, then, in some inscrutable way won him- self back into the girl's. . . . But that is impossible. I shall wait in patience. July 3. THERE are friends of mine who, when the whim seizes them, despatch telegrams to me that should be calculated to unnerve even the most hardened sergeant in His Majesty's army. Therein refusal to do something or go somewhere is made to appear as shockingly inhuman as scholastic examination or murder ; yet in a generality of cases, I lie back in my chair, and inform Meadows that there is no reply. It is, indeed, useless to send me urgent wires, unless full reasons are stated for any ideas which I may be invited to entertain. Yet when Nesta Cardonnel's message was brought to me at the luncheon table to-day, I obeyed her request to " come at once " without realising that no reasons whatever had been given. " Nothing serious, I hope ? " asked Mrs. Hylton. " My friend," I explained hurriedly, " has broken his leg." It is a little curious this broken leg. I remember that the same explanation was forthcoming years ago when I was in residence at Cambridge ; my tutor, who was dean of the college, had become unduly inquisitive about a forthcoming expedition. At such moments, I suppose, I am incapable of any more original figure of imagination. " How dreadful ! " exclaimed Mrs. Hylton ; " how did it happe.n ? " 138 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 139 I shrugged my shoulders. " The message does not tell me," I said with perfect truth, " but I suppose I had better go over and see the poor fellow." " Of course you must go," said Mrs. Hylton. " A broken leg is a very serious thing." Erasmus Hylton agreed with his wife. He also informed us that he had nearly broken his own leg while building the summer-house. John, I could see, was doing his best to become sus- picious, but the knowledge that Miss Carruthers and a young sister were to drive over during the afternoon, rendered him comparatively harmless. In the end Grolier drove me to Thorpe a straggling village with two rather fine churches in close proximity, and an old inn which \vas more picturesque than either of them. I left my chauffeur with definite instructions upon the question of liquid refreshment, and walked up to Thorpe Towers, which lay buried away in a densely wooded park. At the lodge an old woman with teeth like a rodent's and a head almost devoid of hair peeped out, and in a startling bass voice demanded to know if I had come to see Miss Nesta. She looked round furtively as she spoke, and I wondered whether she understood to what distance her voice must be carrying. " Yes, I wish to see Miss Cardonnel," said I. She invited me into the lodge, and showed me into a small room so crowded with china and other bric-a-brac that I was fearful of moving a limb. " I'll tell her," said the old woman, and disappeared. Quoth I : " This is an adventure," and wondered what it all meant. Of course it had something to do with Mabrum, but why was I shown into the lodge ? For a second time I decided that the East Chapel Comedy was 140 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO inclined towards vulgarity, and idly asked myself what my father might have to say could he see me here in the midst of all this impossible china, and about to interview his old friend's daughter. I wondered, too, whether he had kept for Cardonnel a warm corner in his heart in spite of the twenty years' silence between them. My father has few intimate friends, but they have remained the same for as long a time as I can remember. Most of them, moreover, like Sir Austin, were at school with him. The possibility of bringing them together again occurred to me, and I was working up a little scheme, alluring if, per- haps, impracticable, when the girl came in. She looked very pretty in her rough country clothes, but her smile of greeting was sad, and there was the same look of weariness on her face that I had noticed in London. She thanked me for coming at once. " Your message was very peremptory," said I. " It was urgent," she replied. " I wanted to see you to-day. And you must think me mad to have had you shown in here, but . . . you see, apart from this present worry, I have made a curious discovery." She stared hard at me. " Did you know that your father and mine had once been friends ? " " Yes," said I. " You never told me. ..." There was a faint note of expostulation in her voice. " What was the use ? " I asked. " They have not spoken for twenty years." " I wonder why they quarrelled at least I suppose they quarrelled about something, didn't they ? " " How did] you make this discovery ? " I asked hurriedly. " I found a photograph and letters hidden away, and THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 141 asked him, but he would say nothing. I thought you ought to know this before seeing him." " You want me to see him ? " She nodded her head. " If you will. You said once you would help me. Well, things have gone wrong again. I am always making mistakes ; it is so difficult to know what to do." " It is something to do with Mabrum, of course ! " She showed no surprise. " Yes," she said, " we thought we were rid of him some time ago. Oh, he was kind to me in London, but there is no use in pretending. I hate him," she cried passionately. (I think I like her most when she is passionate). "I cannot help it. I may have behaved badly to him, but he has behaved worse." " You must remember that I know nothing," said I. "Tell me just what has happened." I could wish for the pen of a novelist to write down her story, for occasionally there were tiny movements and looks and pauses which finished a sentence without words, and these I cannot describe. I could wish, too, that circumstances had not suggested to me considerable freedom this evening with my host's most distinguished vintages. I feel in no mood, for my self-imposed task, and yet will not forego what is really a pleasure. Having once started my diary, and continued to write in its pages however irregularly I am determined to make it into some semblance of a whole. That is to say, if this suc- cession of enigmas called life will allow me. I am equally determined. . . To my adventure . . . The girl had sat down amongst the ornaments, and was holding a broken saucer in her hands. " Mr. Mabrum," she said, " told me he had seen you after my return. Oh, 142 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I was very glad to get away. I cannot tell you how glad. When I saw my father instead of him coming up the staircase in Cleveland Street, I could hardly believe my eyes, but I was very thankful. He came into the room and looked at me without speaking. He told me what Mannheim had done, and said that he had two tickets for York. Somehow I could find nothing to say. He did not expect me to say anything." She broke off. " I do not know what I should have done if Mr. Mabrum had come. I don't think I can have realised what I was doing, but I wanted to finish the uncertainty of everything, and that seemed the only way." " It was a rash business," said I. " Yes, it was rash. I do not like to think what might have happened had his train been late. He travelled all night." " The little incidents which do not happen," I declared, " should be left to themselves." " One is so stupidly emotional at the wrong moment," she replied, and again I saw the sad smile. " Well," she went on, " I don't want to keep you here the entire day. We wrote a letter together to Mr. Mabrum. I do not remember exactly what was said. I was hardly conscious of what I was doing, but my father seemed strangely different. In that attic I could hardly believe that he had ever driven me from home. He spoke in almost a whisper. I think I was horribly frightened of him. Yes, the whole thing was frightening. I felt as if I was meeting him for the first time for many years ; he seemed so old." She paused to look out of the window, and the light caught her hair. An odd little diagonal frown showed itself between her eyebrows. Suddenly a tiny shiver came over her, and at that moment, I remember, the church bells THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 143 chimed the hour. It was intenesly hot, and the sun shone in upon us, but for a little while I was caught up, as it were, into the atmosphere of her story, and a paradoxical darkness enveloped things. I could have sworn then that the place was haunted, that a presence was here with us in the little room, but a moment later she was telling her story, and I was surprised beyond measure at my own thoughts. It is, however, such small incidents which almost make me believe in what is commonly known as the occult, the strange untimely intrusions of an in- describable something which makes for mystery. I cannot explain further. " We drove to the station," the girl was continuing, " and came here. He said I must never leave him, and somehow all my anger against him seemed to disappear. I forgot his words to me weeks before he seemed a lonely old man and I found myself thinking of old times when I was a little child. You know how one does think of that sort of thing. In London I felt that no words would be too cruel for him, but when he came to fetch me " " I understand," I interrupted. It is often thus with me. " We hardly spoke at lunch," the girl went on, " but he made me promise never to leave him again. He was frightened of himself, he said, and he seemed to think that he was going to be ill. It was a queer day. My room seemed strange, and the shape of things had some- how altered. I tried to make myself believe that nothing had happened, but it was useless, and I sat on my bed and cried. And then my father came in and kissed me." There was another pause. I could hear the old woman moving about in the next room, and a faint breeze had come to impart a swishing sound to the trees outside. She told me that for a week nothing had happened save 144 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO the unexpected purchase of a horse for her own use. This, I gathered, was a sign of the times, for her father had not seen fit to renew his acquaintance with the baronial temper which had in part caused her departure. In those days he had a desire for Shakespeare, and the two of them read together. One evening, too, he had asked about the absent Raymond, seemingly forgetful of the punishment he had himself inflicted upon that unhappy youth. " And what of Raymond ? " I asked with some blunt- ness. Mention of his name annoys me. She looked at me with some little apprehension. " I have heard nothing," she said, "but Mr. Mabrum . . ." " Ah ! " quoth I smiling, " he came to York." And then in a minute or two everything was made plain to me. It seems that my estimation of the little Jew's character had not been altogether correct. I had been inclined to regard him as in no wise a member of that large and ridi- culous class of humanity, whose life is a monotony of petty aspirations : I had, rather, ascribed to him a number of singular qualities not often found outside circles to which he obviously did not belong. He was, 1 had thought, a man who should well be able to appreciate the subtleties of Herr Teufelsdrockh's opinions, and there had been times when I might have described him as the fantastic founder of a new and entertaining philosophy. Yet his action in demanding the loan of six pounds went far towards causing an alteration in my views, and when the letter from York arrived, there seemed no reason to doubt that Mr. Mabrum differed not one whit from the most ordinary mortal. Nevertheless, there are one or two points about him which interest me. There is, for in- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 145 stance, his capacity for shedding pathos about him at particular moments ; that can only be the result of much careful practice. I expect he needs it with the more romantically inclined barmaid, or the housemaid given to a perusal of the Family Herald Supplements when her mistress has finished with them. At the present moment I am looking forward to the hour when I shall castigate him without mercy, and I have no hesitation in saying that he is one of the most unpleasing scoundrels now resident in England. The letter from York breathed out a certain broad strength of purpose, but the writer's subsequent behaviour has revealed nothing but the most pitiful cunning. But I would give much to have witnessed the first expulsion of Mr. Carl Mabrum from Thorpe Towers. . . . His first visit was unexpected, I learnt, and he came in his country clothes. This in itself must have done much to startle Cardonnel, whose retiring disposition cannot have accustomed him to the more flagrant examples of masculine attire. In any case, the old gentleman had no sooner learnt the identity of his visitor than he put on the cloak of his most feudal ancestor, uttered a terrific bellow, forgot everything save the^fact that this petty individual after his daughter was a damnable intruder, and, making use of no ordinary strength, set to work literally to kick the little man out of his house. In this endeavour he must have met with almost immediate success. There came a~ repetition of my own small affair at school with Basil Anstruther, and a period of superheated abuse. Then the front door was reached, and Mr. Mabrum, badly mauled, slunk off, In, this part qf the atory I c^xnfee^ to s.e# cause for laughter. Excursion, in stage fashion, followed directly upon alarum, 146 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO and I can almost bring myself to imagine Mabrum quoting Falstaff on the day of his battle. " I like not such grinning honour as Sir Austin hath ; give me life ; which, if I can save, so ; if not, honour comes unlooked for, and there's an end." Sir John, indeed, at Shrewsbury, and Mr. Mabrum in the park of Thorpe Towers, must have ex- perienced similar reflections, but whereas the valorous knight desired little more than bodily comfort and a gallon of sack, Mr. Mabrum was already endeavouring to understand what shape his revenge should take. He was seen no more that day, however, and the girl hoped that such treatment as had been accorded him would be in the nature of a lesson. I do not wonder at her lack of sym- pathy. She told me that she had watched his exodus from her window very frightened, but a little amused. This might sound heartless if you had not met Mabrum in cycling costume. The girl's sense of humour is keen and to my liking. But the ridiculous side of the proceedings was soon forgotten, for she went into the library to find her father exceedingly ill. He appeared to be in some kind of a fit. He was storming against an imaginary foe, and treating the furniture to a lively attack from each quarter in turn. It was with some difficulty that she persuaded him to go to bed. Already, it seemed, he was regretting his brusque treatment of Mr. Mabrum. The next morning the girl continued, and you must figure me all this time hemmed in by a phalanx of china there came a message from York which brought on another fit of temper, and shortly afterwards Mr. Mabrum appeared a second time a bruised object, but made as tidy as circumstances w r ould permit, and seething with what I suppose he considered to be a righteous indignation. I THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 147 gather, however, that he was a little the worse for drink. I was somewhat surprised to hear of this second call at the Towers. The little Jew, it would seem, is not altogether a coward. Cardonnel is a big man and must have thrashed him unmercifully, yet he came back the next day, and alone. I can only imagine that he had accurately gauged Sir Austin's character. More curious, perhaps, is the fact that the latter received him, but in this connection I cannot forget my own behaviour in East Chapel. Mr. Mabrum's trade must have made him an adept at gaining an entrance into places where he is not particularly welcome. In the library he demanded money or marriage. " I was very frightened," the girl told me, " for he had changed. He spoke loudly, and seemed very sure of himself. There was a look on his face which I could not exactly interpret. He told us he had consulted his solicitor, and my father, instead of " " In fact," said I, " he threatened you." " Yes, but my father was no longer angry, only terribly frightened. You see . . ." " Frightened ? " I repeated puzzled. " Oh, yes. You see, you don't know him yet. He I cannot properly explain but he is terrified of anything like publicity. Many of our ancestors," she continued proudly, " were famous, you know, and the world knew our name, but he he has never done anything, and, well I don't know why, but he never goes anywhere, and if he thinks that people are talking about him, he has one of his bad times. He is supersensitive. Somehow Mr. Mabrum must have found that out. He asked my father to remember the letters he had written to him, and told us that he had seen the editor of one of the Yorkshire 148 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO papers. He hinted at ... oh, I don't remember what he said, but my father gave him two hundred pounds, and Ye don't laugh he bowed like a man on the stage, and said good-bye to me as though he did not know who I was. It was ludicrous. I thought two hundred pounds was far too much, but my father said it was the price of im- perative silence, and would not argue. It was foolish, but in some ways he is like a little child." " It was a large sum," I agreed, and she continued her story. With this money, it seemed, Mr. Mabrum had satisfied both himself and all the numerous people at York who had apparently espoused his cause. Under certain con- ditions, however, two hundred pounds may be spent with much celerity, and Mr. Mabrum found it necessary to call at the Towers this was the occasion upon which I saw him two days ago to demand a further sum. To Car- donnel he was good enough to admit that marriage with his daughter was, in view of what had occurred, not the most feasible proposal ; in its stead, he suggested a gift to himself of a thousand pounds, in default of w r hich, an action for breach of promise would immediately follow. In the end he agreed to wait three days for an answer. " And my father," finished the girl, " is at this moment roaming about the house. None of us like to speak to him. When Mr. Mabrum comes to-morrow, I do not know what will happen." " Do you realise," I asked, " that Mr. Mabrum ow r es money both to your father and to me ? " She put out her hands. " Oh, you don't understand. This morning my father threatened to kill him if he came again, and then in that case, I think he would kill himself." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 149 I began to understand what manner of man Sir Austin must be. " Take me to him," said I. " I haven't told him who you are," she said. " There is no need," I replied. " I will tell him myself." At all costs, I felt, he must not be allowed to be black- mailed, and if Mr. Mabrum were to undergo another hostile encounter, I did not see why I should not be present. Whereupon it happened that we two walked up a fine old drive to the Towers. To me it looked glum even in the sunlight. Its square solidity reminded me of a mauso- leum, and its hard lines were broken only at one corner, where a gigantic elm had sprung up, as it seemed, to attack the very walls. Even the few yards of bright flowers at my feet seemed sorrowful patches. We scarcely spoke until we were standing in one of those large halls so typical of eighteenth century mansions. A funereal butler stole in upon us and looked suspiciously at me. In a whisper he breathed the news that his master was lying down in the library. The girl looked at me. In this high, empty hall she seemed a very delicate figure. Momentarily I was re- minded of the stage and found myself wondering what was about to happen. In truth I did not know what I would say to her father. " You had better tell him that a friend has come to settle things with Mr. Mabrum. You might mention," I added with a smile, " that I, also, am a creditor of his." " He will ask your name." " I will tell him that myself." She hesitated for a moment, and then ran noiselessly up the stairs. I looked at the butler. He was a crooked creature with shaking head and clothes built for a larger 150 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO man than himself. His flesh hung from his face in great yellow folds. I came to the conclusion that he must be the worst possible companion for his master. We spoke no words, and the silence was only broken by the absurdly loud tick of a clock that stood in one corner. I seemed somehow to be hearing its echo in my head. A few minutes passed and the girl appeared on the stairs. " Will you come up ? " I went to her, and she whispered that her father would like to see me. Now, at the moment of my entrance into the library of Thorpe Towers, I must confess to a most absurd fit of emotion, for the years seemed suddenly to have vanished, leaving me again a boy in the unpleasant situation of being about to be interviewed by his headmaster. So vivid was this idea that I could almost swear to have heard laughing boyish voices in the yard outside. Surely this white- haired old gentleman dressed in black must be the sternest of schoolmasters ready to pronounce judgment ! And then there came one of those indescribable moments which are at once tragic and absurd. He took no notice of the girl by my side, but kept his eyes on myself. " Waldo," he said sharply, and I do not know whether he smiled or was frowning, " you have grown horribly fat ! " There followed a curious five minutes. His unexpected accusation of obesity had startled me, but I understood bis mistake. My father is only a lean and more aged, if better preserved, edition of myself. " You knew my father," said I, and held out my hand. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 151 " My God ! Waldo ! Harry's son ! " I had a mind then and there to wire to my father, bring him to the Towers, and call him and Sir Austin a couple of precious old fools, but I had just seen a look in my host's eyes which gave me pause. He had shaken my hand as in a dream, but had stepped back and was looking at me as though I, like Mabrum, had come for his money or his daughter. There presented itself to my mind a possible solution of much that had gone before. In some curious way I seemed to be suddenly understanding his bursts of temper, his treatment of his daughter, his absurd fear of publicity. There was a wandering look in his eyes. . . . " There are times," I thought, " when he is mad." There is, indeed, that about him when he is most suave and dignified, which suggests the terrible border towards which and from which his brain is constantly travelling. . . . From the first moment I was intensely interested in him, and intensely sorry for him. I could understand, moreover, the girl's loneliness, could pity her position, and excuse those few traits in her character which had not pleased me. He stood there in front of me, trying to understand what had happened. His features resembled those of the first Duke of Wellington, and the cut of his clothes carried me back in imagination to the fifties. He passed a hand over his forehead, and looked alternately at the girl and myself. She was about to speak, when he came over to me, and put his hands on my shoulders. " Did he send you to me ?" he asked eagerly. I was minded to lie, but the girl saved me the trouble. " Father, I told you Mr. Waldo had come to talk about Mr. Mabrum." " Ah!" 152 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " He owes me money," said I with a smile. " But you, Waldo are you Harry, too ? what ? Nesta, I am feeling faint." He staggered to a chair, and sank back. I became sure of my ground. . . . He spoke of my father in a way which reminded me of the Duke of Rochester. I answered his questions as fully as I could. The girl, I saw, was obviously surprised at my method of treating him, for I talked as though his twenty years' voluntary imprisonment was a negligible factor, but with no great effort I made him understand that my acquaintance with his daughter was the most natural occurrence in the world, and gave him no time to court explanation. Obviously he had an absorbing love for her, but was ashamed to show it a fact which I cannot pretend to understand. But when I was warily introducing Mr. Mabrum's name into our conversation, I had com- pleted my conquest. Incidentally, I told him that I was staying with a Mr. Jones. Mention of the Hyltons, of course, was impossible. Out of the depths I had come to this lonely old man, and he willy-nilly was borne on the stream of things. . . . His marriage to a woman out of his own class must have been the beginning of a series of mistakes which I incline to think have followed solely on an outrageous idealism. My experience has taught me that the idealist of all others is the man of most mistakes. He is the worst interpreter of life, and utterly unequal in most cases to cope with even the smallest mishap. Sir Austin Cardonnel is a product of antiquity who should have ruled over a gay, irresponsible kingdom with a cabinet of good fellows. His battles should have been fought out at Agincourt or THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 153 Waterloo rather than in the cells of his brain, and a wise matron, not jealous of his thoughts, should have presided at his board. Instead, he imagined himself in love with a drunken cook, married her and lost his friends forthwith, chose a moribund butler for a companion, became soured, and in a prolonged fit of obstinacy at finding that his daughter had a mind at odds with his own, kept her in the dull dead prison into which his own rather morbid in- clination had forced him to retire. I can see well enough what followed. The death of his wife can have made small difference to him. There must have been an endless succession of petty quarrels, all of which he mag- nified a thousandfold. And so there must have followed a time when his idea of balance had been swept away to leave him at the mercy of strange currents. Another man no longer burdened with an unpresentable wife, would have returned to the world; he, half-maddened, chose to remain a prisoner. And so the Raymond incident was inevitable, and the Mabrum affair no more unex- pected, and together they helped to strike a further blow at his intelligence. At least, so I am minded to suppose. . . . And as I talked to him, I was inwardly reflecting upon the dangers of marriage. This man had thought he had found his mate, and regardless of aU save the whim of a moment, had married a woman who had given him nothing but a meaningless existence, and this girl who had run away from her home. I promised myself a pretty argument for my father's benefit. And I was no longer astonished at his fear of Mr. Mabrum. His treatment in summarily ejecting the little man had met with my warmest approval, and so I told him, but it had become firmly rooted in his mind that he would be 154 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO called to account. More than anything he feared another public scandal he could not believe that his mesalliance was no longer the subject of conversation and the little Jew, he thought, was a man who would stop at nothing. Whereupon I determined my course of action. Later he was attempting to tell me much of himself, and during the girl's momentary absence, offered me his effusive thanks. But when I spoke again of my father, he suddenly became silent and once again was the hermit. There was an angry look on his face, and I wondered then that my father had cast him off. I felt myself to be an intruder, and hurried away. The girl would have spoken, but I wanted to think. XIV July 4. As I might almost have expected, the redoubtable Miss Carruthers has thrown immediate suspicion on my friend's broken leg, and on my return from Thorpe I found that she had been persuaded to stay to dinner. During my absence, for reasons best known to her inquisitive self, she had succeeded in obtaining what available information there was about my movements, and by giving out certain hints in my presence made the evening meal a matter of some difficulty for myself. Hence I suppose followed an unusual thirst which was gratified to the full. It is, indeed, very far from my intention that the Hyltons shall learn of my visit to Thorpe. For one thing they would make a great fuss. Yet if Miss Carruthers' tongue is not stopped, I see no way of escape. My friend's future wife I must regard her as such is a masterful woman ; her prowess with the English language is only equalled by her powers of deduction together they are an impregnable com- bination. Yet I like her immensely. She is entirely without those ultra-feminine qualities which are so petty and disappointing, and I think she approves of me, but I cannot entertain the smallest doubt that she regards Nesta Cardonnel with feelings of distrust. After dinner she piloted me in the inscrutable way clever women seem to have to a remote corner, and there asked me point blank what I thought of Thorpe Towers. 155 156 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO "J3o farjufl remember from the picture," said I. " it looks like a large tombstone." " Is there a picture ? " she asked, and looked like a schoolgirl bent on ragging her teacher. " How interesting ! But pictures are generally misleading." " I think," said I gravely, after a pause, " you are exceedingly rude." " I am one of those people," she rejoined with equal solemnity, " who see far into things, and am by way of hating organised humbug. A broken leg, you know, is so very explanatory." "If it is," said I, not so much annoyed as amused, " what matter ? Broken legs are necessary at certain times, especially when one feels in a humbugging mood." She shrugged her shoulders. " I advise you to see that the limb is mended " and she laid enormous emphasis on the word " with the least possible delay. A London surgeon might. ..." I was staring at her. I could not but feel surprise at her outrageous impertinence. " I desire to shoot here," said I, " in August." " You may be making a mistake," she replied and gave me a long searching glance. A moment later she left me indignant and not a little disturbed. There is simply no telling what she may do. She has absolutely no right to interfere with my private affairs, but is just the sort of woman who will do so for the pure joy of interference. I imagine she could be very mad on occasions. She proba- bly thinks that she understands me, a fairly common failing, I find, amongst the other sex. She has, I suppose, taken it into her head that I was rude to her, and is trying to show what she can do in that line. But I would prefer her to talk of John. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 157 I kept up the fiction with Mrs. Hylton, and her solicitude was touching. She talked village medicine for the best part of an hour, and left me in a condition of bewilderment at my own fluency. This, however, indubitably followed on the port. Erasmus Hylton keeps generous wines. Last night his port embraced a whole philosophy it was a purely intellectual wine. At the billiard-table, however, he chose to become inquisitive, but somewhat to my surprise Miss Carruthers came to my rescue. She certainly behaves splendidly in the presence of other people. On the whole she is an admirable woman, and I wish her joy- it must have been something she said to the family which enabled me to leave the house at an early hour this morning. At breakfast I laughingly suggested that my manners must have remained in Eaton Place, but Mrs. Hylton would not hear of an excuse. A broken leg, she maintained, needed every possible attention, and she did not doubt that my presence would materially aid its recovery. Grolier drove me out as usual. He preserved silence until we reached Thorpe Lane, but there asked me whether our stay in Yorkshire would be unduly prolonged. " Unduly ? " quoth I surprised. He apologised for his choice of word. " I cannot say," I replied. " Mrs. Hylton has asked me to stay over the twelfth of next month." On the summit of the hill I became aware that the stupid fellow was still thinking of the grocer's daughter. He is almost as bad as Mabrum. I dismissed him in the village and walked up to the Towers. The girl met me at the lodge, and her quiet words of thanks 158 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO brought me the curious thrill which I have experienced only in her company. I remembered then that I had kissed her in M. Quatrebras' restaurant, and decided that I wished to repeat the performance. This, however, is entirely irrelevant. . . . We spoke of her father, and she told me that he could not make up his mind about me. At one moment, he would remember that his friend Waldo had gone apart, and his pride, I suppose, would darken the atmosphere about me, at the next he would recall the reason of my presence, and then it would appear to him that my arrival at the Towers was heralding a new order of things. " But he has been different since you came," said the girl, and there was a glad note in her voice, " and I I cannot thank you enough." " You may do that," said I, " when I have seen Mr. Mabrum." It was agreed between us that the little man, when he came, should be shown into the library, where I took up my station alone at eleven o'clock. The whole idea of my taking the responsibility of things on to my own shoulders by this time appeared perfectly natural. From my own and my diary's point of view, I have been swept into an adventure, and, if this is now finished without rounding itself off into the smallest semblance of an artistic con- clusion, I cannot help it. On the whole I have thoroughly enjoyed myself. Which is unquestionably the main thing. In the library I took up a rare Baskerville pamphlet entitled " The Virtues of Cinnabar and Musk against the Bite of a Mad Dog," a delightful exposition of eighteenth century medicine. I decided to tell Mrs. Hylton of its THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 159 existence. It was bound in with an old " Family Receipt Book " which bore the signature amongst others of the late Lady Cardonnel. On the front page of this enter- taining volume, I found agreeable information written in the quaintly ornamental calligraphy of its time. Gas tar, I learnt, mixed with yellow ochre made " exelent " green paint, while the manufacture of buns was rendered easy if only you would "warm your tins or coppers before you put it in " the it being a sickly sound- ing mixture of all the groceries of which I have ever heard. Domestic economy is not very much to my liking, but I found myself becoming vastly interested in a discussion about the preparation of the " Syrup of Red Roses," wherein it appeared that I could not hope for success without a personally conducted laceration of the unfortu- nate blooms for a period of not less than twelve hours. I closed the book with a feeling of my own ignorance, and was putting it back in its appointed place, when the doo opened. I suppose the corner where I had been standing must have been dark, for almost a minute passed before the little man saw me. He came in with his impudent swagger, and sank into a chair with a gross air of ownership. His dress was amusing, but I was most interested in his face, which suggested a wild time at York. He looked, indeed, tired and ill. There were lines about his eyes, and his lips seemed to have lost any firmness they ever possessed. His hands, too, were shaking, and his whole appearance gave me the idea of unpleasant bloatedness. On the oth( r hand his hair had been plastered down with some ointment of great potence, and his high white collar a most uncom- fortable adjunct to cycling, I should imagine was spotless. As he sat there, an insolent leer came over his face. 160 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I stepped forward. He started up and looked at me, and then shot back in amazement. " Good God ! " " Good morning," said I, and smilingly pointed to a chair. " You, Mr. Waldo ! You here ? I ... I ..." His attempt at a smile was unsuccessful. " I thought you were in London." " Did you ? " said I, putting some cheerfulness into the question. " Well, you see you were wrong. I have been staying in Yorkshire for some time." He looked scared. " And why," I continued, " have I not had so much as a line from you, Mr. Mabrum ? " In a halting way he endeavoured to explain that he had not supposed I should be interested. " But surely," I protested, " you must have known I was interested, or I would hardly have taken the trouble to write a letter to Sir Austin for you." His forehead wrinkled itself. I suppose he was thinking out the precise significance of my presence at the Towers ; it must certainly have been a shock to him. " I didn't know you knew the Cardonnels . . . " he faltered, and stepped back to look round as though fear- ful of eavesdroppers. " I've come here, you see, Mr. Waldo, to see the old man." " You mean," said I wondering what he would do, " that I am in the way ? " He put out his hands and smiled dismally. " What have you come to see him about ? " It was this superfluous question, I think, which caused a change in his manner. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 161 " Mr. Waldo," he said in louder tones that had a delicious hinting of patronage in them, " you've been very kind to me, an' I'm grateful, but I only came up here this morn- ing well, to see Sir Austin. By appointment," he added. " Sir Austin," said I, " is ill." " 111 ? " repeated Mr. Mabrum, with an ugly leer. He may possibly be aware of the ministerial illnesses which diplomacy renders expedient. " And," I added, watching him closely, " he asked me whether I would see you for him. I told him, you know, that we were acquainted." At that I smiled pleasantly, and inwardly hoped he would see the humour of the thing. But he did not ; he only stared very hard at me. " What d'you mean ? " he demanded, after a moment's silence. " I mean that I am here to represent Sir Austin Car- donnel," said I with a modicum of formality. For this piece of intelligence he was so utterly unpre- pared that I was not surprised to hear a gasp followed by an oath both gasp and oath being unique of their kind. The gasp suggested enormous internal disarray, whilst the oath without being picturesque, succinctly informed me of the condition of Mr. Mabrum's mind at the moment. I altered my manner. " What have you come for ? " I asked, and stepped nearer to him. " For my rights. Mr. Waldo, surely you " " Mr. Mabrum," said I, " you were shown clearly enough that Miss Cardonnel did not desire to see you again. You came to York, however, and chose " " The only course open to me," he spluttered. " Why, you told me to come yourself ! " L 162 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " I was very careful to do nothing of the kind. If I remember aright I congratulated you on being well out of an unsuitable alliance." " Damn it," cried the little man, " I wasn't going to let things slide." " And so you chose money instead of marriage," said I, " which was an admirable alteration." He swung his head slowly from side to side, and pursed up his lips a polite contradiction. " I spent close on forty pounds on the girl," he exclaimed. " But you received that and more," said I ; " and I daresay you have not altogether lost over the business " " Damn it, what d'you mean by that ? " " I mean," said I angered at his method of speaking, " that your attempt at blackmail " here he sucked in his breath in a manner suggesting the moribund syphon " is not going to be so successful as you hoped. You owe, in point of fact, about a hundred and sixty pounds to Sir Austin, and you owe me six. I can't think that you have come here to pay these sums back ; then why have you. . ? " There was no mistaking his wrath. The amazement, moreover, which followed on the discovery that so far from being on the aggressive he had suddenly been reduced to a bare position of defence, added a preposterous air to his bearing. The human frame ordinarily is far too solid to indulge in such a change as water will undergo when heated to one hundred degrees Centigrade, but in spite of the impossibility of such a phenomenon, Mr. Mabrum's body seemed actually inclined towards a very complete change of state. There were twistings and shakings and oddly evolved writhings, and a distinct sense of bubbling which surpasses all description whatsoever. I have never, I think, seen a human being so clearly take on the functions THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 163 and eccentricities of an unstable chemical compound. His eyes were hidden behind huge projecting folds of brown skin, his large teeth seemed ready to tear anything tearable that was put in their way, whilst his hair was only waiting to fly round the room in the form of a black and oleaginous snowstorm. His arms were describing geo- metrical figures hitherto unheard of, and I thought that his collar, which was the only immovable part of him, must in a moment be acting as a properly constructed gallows. I shall not repeat the remarks in the German and English languages which followed. In the first place I did not understand all of them, and, in the second, they were prob- ably of no importance. I was interested, however, at this opportunity of learning that his warm friendship for me had entirely evaporated. It was plain, too, that his London manners had been the most unnatural thing about him, and his philosophy a product of my imagination. I let him finish before giving him to understand that my time was short. " I'll see Cardonnel," he shouted. I informed him that he would do nothing of the sort, whereat there flowed a string of curious oaths. Perhaps I was just in the least surprised to hear them falling from Mr. Mabrum's lips, for I had hardly associated him with anything more unpleasant than bounderdom, but the noise accompanying their production annoyed me. I took another step towards him, and put a sterner note into my voice. " You have tried to frighten Sir Austin into giving you more money by threatening an action for breach of promise, but I may as well tell you that you have no evidence, and if there is further mention of this, I shall be 164 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO compelled to threaten you with an action of rather a different kind. If you will take my advice . . ." " I've done nothing," he said surlily, and fizzled like a wet match. " You've demanded a thousand pounds for no reason whatever under a threat . . ." " I only said I would bring an action against him," he interrupted, and attempted an honest indignation which might have amused me at any other time. " That is not a threat, Mr. Waldo." He put out his hand again. " I am not acting by myself, you know," he went on ; "I've had advice. Cardonnel, you know, wouldn't like to come into court. . . ." He would have rambled on, had I not stpeopd him by observing that his imprisonment for blackmail was a matter of my own personal inclination. As I might have expected his choler momentarily dis- appeared, and there came the inevitable excursion into the realms of pathos. Without himself, he whined, the girl might have been ruined ; if she had not written him letters, she had at least promised to marry him, but had left him cruelly in the lurch. She had cost him fifty pounds which he could not afford, and now I, the one man in London who, &c., &c. Again I waited until he was finished. " I am wondering," said I, " what you have been doing with yourself all this time in York." " Waiting," said Mr. Mabrum, and breathed hard. *' And wasting the money. Well, you will get no more. You had better go. The police may have something to Bay. . . ." At this the puny creature actually thought fit to utter a little laugh of incredulity. " You evidently don't know, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 165 Mr. Waldo," he said, " that old Cardonnel did his best to murder me. I haven't forgotten that, and don't intend to. If. . . ." I had had no intention of losing my temper, but the leer on his face was maddening. A moment before I had been strongly reminded of the melodrama which I saw in Manchester, and now I only knew that I was itching for a blow. " Cardonnel," I cried angrily, " did no more than I shall do in a moment." He retreated a step. " Will you go ? " I roared. " I'll see Cardonnel first," he shouted, " and the girl can go to. . . ." I had caught hold of his fat neck before he could finish the sentence. He fought under rules which I cannot think have been tabulated by any one. Out of the room I bore him foaming and biting, down the stairs, across the empty hall, where he managed to hit me a blow on the chin this merited and obtained a very fair return and out of the Towers. Still struggling like a demon out of the story books, he was carried down the drive and finally thrown, an amorphous lump, through the open gates. His bicycle, which stood outside, narrowly escaped destruc- tion. " You shall pay for this," he screeched through the tears and various unintelligible sounds that were proceed- ing from him. " No doubt," said I, and went back to the house in a cheerful glow. Looking back over the affray I could wish that Mr. Mabrum's thoughts on being ejected by his whilom friend were at my disposal. Bared of their blasphemy, they 166 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO should make good reading, and yet, perhaps, they would not prove mightily instructive. I am liable to forget his lack of philosophy. The month at York with two hundred pounds in his pocket has probably reduced him to a low mental condition, and he may not have thought at all, or he may have been comparing my own methods of expulsion with those of Sir Austin. I shall not think of him further. In the hall I found Nesta Cardonnel, a pale anxious figure. " He has gone," said I, " and will not return." " You threw him out ? " " It is rather absurd, but I did." She put a caressing hand on my arm. " But he will go to the police station ! " " I could desire nothing better." She looked startled, whereupon I informed her that a charge of blackmail would take precedence of one for battery and assault. " Your father," I added, " need not feel the smallest alarm. Besides, we are both of us in the same box. We went upstairs and saw the old man. He looked at us dumbly inquiring. I made my account of the occurrence as comic as might be, and had the satisfaction of seeing a smile come over his face. " If you will regard the two hundred pounds as lost," I finished, " the whole episode may be consigned to oblivion." There was argument at this, but in the end I persuaded him, and had some difficulty to escape his thanks. He asked me, moreover, whether I could persuade my father to visit him. " It would bring back the years," he said rather wearily, and, after that remark, sat still for five minutes. The THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 167 girl and I watched him. Somehow he seemed ashamed of himself, but all signs of his temper had gone. J His daughter and I lunched together. I found myself surprisingly hungry. I liked her better than ever. . . . In the afternoon I found Grolier in the village. He informed me that my collar had lost its shape. "It is a matter of the smallest importance," said I. But on my return here I bathed, and found any number of small bruises about myself. I philosophised in the bath. There are some people who would abolish the Right of Might ! Idiots ! Here endeth the East Chapel Comedy. XV July 6. IT was Grolier who suggested the picnic. In this wise. On my return here from the interview with Mabrum, I found that a subtle change had come over the family. Mrs. Hylton was eager to hear of the leg's progress, and her husband made playful remarks upon the subject of legs in general. I could have wished for a chapter to read to them written by the learned Slawkenbergius. There seemed to be some hidden joke in their various remarks, and their solicitude for my poor friend had taken on a paradoxical gaiety. If I had not been so sure of their simplicity, I should have suspected, as now I know, that the proverbial rat had been smelt. As it was, I supposed that Miss Carruthers' tongue had been exerted on my behalf. She seems to have an extraordinary influence over the familly, for even Erasmus Hyton is careful of his words in her presence, and she is the only person whom he will not contradict. Then at breakfast the next morn- ing, Mrs. Hylton announced her intention of paying a visit to a friend in York, and my host unaccountably volunteered to go with her. A few minutes later John was wondering what he should do. His mother suggested the Carruthers as agreeable people with whom to lunch, and he eagerly embraced the idea. And when it was 168 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 169 discovered that I had been forgotten, I could not help laughing. " I shall go out in the car," I told them, and this piece of intelligence was so much to their liking that I could only think Miss Carruthers had " explained " the broken leg. Probably, I mused, the rat was taking the form of a harmless intrigue. At any rate there could have been no hinting of the truth, or I should have heard of it. The name of Cardonnel has not been mentioned since my arrival, and I can well understand the reason. It was only when we had started the car I with no fixed plan in my head that Grolier suggested the picnic There are times when my chauffeur can be grossly imperti- nent, but on this occasion I forgave him freely. There was a wood, he said, about ten miles away, which had obviously been planted for the purpose. He added that his literary publican occasionally hired out a luncheon basket of prepossessing appearance. I was instantly won over to the idea, and drove straight to the Towers. Sir Austin was not to be seen, but Nesta received me in the library. " You have lifted a great weight from my mind," she said. " We must celebrate the occasion," I told her, and explained Grolier's notion. Her face brightened. " I should love it," she said with enthusiasm, " but my father . . ." " Will give his permission," I interrupted. " What did he say when I had gone yesterday ? " For some reason she did not reply, but looked embarrassed " We shall get on famously," I continued, " for I think we understand one another. Will you take me to him." We found him in his dressing-room. I had made up 170 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO my mind how he was to be treated, and came in as a friend of the family. I talked loudly and fast. I took it for granted that he was entirely at one with each and all of my opinions, and even imparted an atmosphere of breezi- ness to things, a fact which did much to make him forget that his house was no more than a well-stocked mausoleum. I spoke of my father as though he were a constant visitor to the Towers, and took the old gentleman's friendship for myself as a matter of course. I spoke of Grolier and the car, and told him that he should be taken in it to York at the earliest opportunity. I transfixed him by several trenchant remarks upon the subject of female education, and took full advantage of the situation by descanting vigorously on the question of individual liberty. Nesta, said I, in tones of authority, must picnic at once. She must be dragged hither and thither to see all manner of strange people, in which category I included myself. At this he would doubtless have demurred had I let him, but such was by no means my purpose. When you are in the right mood, there is nothing easier in the world than the assumption of infallibility. I could see that the girl herself was listening in amazement. Probably no one has ever treated the old man in this way before. She at any rate could not have expected anything of the sort. Her father, however, is a peculiar man and needs peculiar treatment. I took him by storm and as the result, he has in part unburdened his soul to me. I saw in him a curiously pathetic combination of the weak and the strong. At one moment he would be remembering the failure he had made of life, and then the lines on his face would seem to deepen, but at the next he would be laughing at some quip of my own, and say that it reminded him of my father. I am only waiting to bring them together. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 171 I shall, of course, feel monstrously virtuous on that occasion. As I write I am astonished to think that my father would that he could have seen me at the Towers ! could have been so bigoted in the matter of Cardonnel's marriage. His behaviour was inexcusable. A friend of mine who did all he could to prevent my marrying and subsequently allowed me to stagnate alone and uncared for, would not gain my forgiveness very easily ; yet Sir Austin is eager to see him again, and asks me the absurdest questions about him ! I have been told that there is an extraordinary fascina- tion about my father, but have never believed it until now. Yet people must see his manifest faults ! I am wondering how I shall tell him. . . . Nesta and I went downstairs, and I thought that she looked like a tiny delicate child. A new colour had come into her cheeks, and very little would have caused her to shout out with glee. Even the funereal butler could not but smile at our antics. Since my treatment of Mabrum he regards me with a certain respect. Perhaps that is as well, for my militant spirit is fully aroused, and a frown on his face might lead to a blow. That is my mood. In an hour's time Grolier was driving us to his wood. Arriving there, I found that he was an observant fellow ; it was a forest for two. Our meal was a feast for the gods, and the divinities as played by the girl and myself Grolier as Mercury, ate his lunch in the car some distance away showed a decidedly mundane greed. I felt the completest satisfaction at the arrangements. In truth, the picnic has never before received from me its proper attention. My father, I know, would be scandalised at the idea. He might not object to an outdoor meal fully 172 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO attended by a posse of footmen, but a " scrambly affair " Nesta's definition eaten amidst an army of flies, would come in for his serious displeasure. Before I came to Yorkshire I undoubtedly agreed with him, a fact of which M. Quatrebras amongst others is very well aware. Yet I have never enjoyed myself so much. The girl and I divided the bread into two equal portions, and laughed at the greedy idea such an action displayed. We ate chicken with our fingers because there was a shortage of knives, and by the time that a basket of fruit was engaging our attention, all thoughts save of ourselves had miraculously disappeared. She looked very beautiful as we sat in the long grass, and I then and there summarily dismissed all thoughts of a preposterous unclehood. There was a wonderful harmony over things. We must have talked nonsense by the hour the only thing to be done under the circumstances and the nonsense continued unabated until I suddenly became conscious of my own position. And then it was as though I had discovered that an isolated two hours could no more exist by^themselves than the most athletically minded cow could jump to the moon. She was telling me, I remember, that this picnic was a realisation of some of her dreams. " I am shameless," she said, " and can tell you that I am thoroughly happy." " As I am myself," said I, and drew her towards me, and then as our lips touched, and she clung to me, the devil's own self must come gambolling past us and whisper a name ! I should not have minded had Mabrum's sleek face put in an appearance I could have laughed at his clothes ; I should not have cared very much had the forest caught fire I should have carried the girl to the THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 173 car ; I should have had no rude word ready had the Dragon herself chosen to come to our luncheon with the whole of the Anstruther family at her heels I should have been no more than flippant ; but the name of one Raymond came to slash and disturb, and I looked at the girl as though a stone had suddenly been thrown at our heads. " What is it ? " she asked, and caressed my hand. " You are a little witch," said I. " Kiss me again." " I was thinking," said I in a little. . . . She shook her head playfully. "It is no use," she cried. " I am too comfortable to think. We must make the most of our time. Oh, you don't understand what I. ..." She stopped to look into my eyes. " I mean," said I, " that this is all very well, but. ..." She did not allow me to finish. " There is no cause for worry," she laughed. " I can forget what has happened now." " That is just it," I replied. " Do you really suppose we can behave like a couple of march hares for a few hours, and then resume our respectable garbs as soon as Grolier starts the car ? For myself I am easy, but you, Nesta, you must see. . . ." I stopped in the most awkward of predicaments. In a fatuous manner the shadow of this unknown Raymond had suddenly covered me. I wondered how far I would have to plead guilty to a gross piece of caddishness. A faint veneer of Utopian philosophy eased matters for a moment, but I could not forget that in this primitive civili- sation of ours, the man holds a position of his own. It is useless to argue to the contrary. And yet at the back of things there came the conviction that I had become the 174 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO most contradictory person. I am still at a loss for the true explanation, but the words that followed came involun- tarily from my lips. I still clasped her to me, but the sensuous delight of it all was hurtled away, and the absurd devil at my side clothed me once more with most of the attributes of a step-paternity. " What of Raymond ? " I asked, and was appalled at my words. She stared almost angrily. " We will not speak of him," she said. " He has gone." " Of course," said I stupidly. " I do not know why I thought of him." " But I do," she took me up ; " you think I cannot understand and enjoy life without the usual girlish mor- bidities ! Yes, that is the only word. But I can, I can. Women are no different from men, and I have well, I have been through the mill. The present is everything. Don't spoil it for yourself and for me. Dear, don't you see that it is you who have cut me adrift from the ugly things ? Oh, I am well able to take care of myself. Don't spoil things. Kiss me, kiss me again." The devil slunk off. . . . Again we were at one with the fairy foliage about us, and the nonsense that is no nonsense at all came back with all its bewildering fantasy. There is a Garden of Eden wheresoever we look for it, and passion can no more be shelved in that garden for a philosophical analysis of the things that be, than my COAV can journey to the satellite. " There is a garden in her face," sang the poet, and I appreciate his words. It was a time for the con- fidences which pass unspoken. The whole world, thought I, was in our immediate circle. I look back on that hour with astonishment. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 175 There could be no mistake in supposing that Grolier thought us a couple of moonstricken fools, but his demean- our on the homeward journey suggested nothing so much as a respectful jealousy. I shall allow him a week's holiday in Cornwall. On my return here I found the place empty. With the intention of moralising upon my position I walked out into the garden, inspected the wonderful summer-house and sniffed at it in the manner which one architect will use towards another's work ; spoke bravely to the row of sentinel-poplars, walked round the fountains and counted the flagstones in the vicinity of each, and in the course of half an hour came to the conclusion that I was making a confounded idiot of myself. The mere fact, I mused, that I had chosen to invent a maimed limb was enough to show me myself in the most unfavourable light. Why on earth had I wanted to keep my connection with the Cardonnels a secret ? Forsooth to save five minutes' fuss and explanation ! If I chose to carry through a flirtation damnable word with one of the most bewitch- ing young girls it had been my lot to meet, why should not every one know ? Verily the daily secrets enforced on us by idiotic convention do much to spoil life. I was for outrageous confession. Let us own to our dalliances ! I had picnicked with Nesta, and was charmed with her. Wherefore philosophise ? Why worry and on Raymond's account ? Why . . . I entangled myself in as pretty a mental mess as you could imagine. . . . Yet I continued to moralise. I found that the girl became more stupendously attractive each time I saw her. I found that she was compelling a kind of physical 176 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO sentimentalism this is the most barbarous nonsense I have yet written into the diary in an almost dangerous degree. I found that her shy manners and beauty between them were carrying me into the domains of poetry. I found that her outlook on things so far as I knew it was much to my liking. I found that she was honest with herself, and incontinently fell to wondering when, if ever, Mary Meddenham would elect to follow her example. I found that the world's verdict about her would be curiously antagonistic to my own, and liked her the better for the discovery. I found, too, that I was grateful to Mabrum for having brought me the girl. In short I drifted into a delicious foolery of mind, and in so doing very nearly fell into one of the fountain pools. John returned before I had settled up matters. He seemed mysteriously elate. I inquired after Miss Car- ruthers. He rolled his eyes, but did not reply. " You lunched at her house, didn't you ? " " Yes. She has told us about you, you know." " The devil she has ! What did she say ? " " Silly ass ! " cried John, and laughed uproariously. I repeated my question. " Some friends with broken legs have sisters,%ld man." I began to see light. " She told you that ? " " Yes, she told all of us." Miss Carruthers, I thought, deserved the definition of " brick." " But why didn't you tell us the truth ? " continued my friend. I shrugged my shoulders, but was pleased with myself. This was no time for outrageous confession after all. A THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 177 mystery has its advantages. " I didn't want to bother you all," I said weakly. " I think it's jolly 'cute of her to find you out ! D'you know what I thought, Gordon ? " I shook my head. " Oh, I'm not a brainy fellow. I thought it might be Nesta Cardonnel. She lives near here, you know." " Of course I remember." I looked hard at him, but there was no cunning about him ; he believed implicitly what he had been told. " Miss Carruthers," said I, " is a good judge of character. When are you going to marry her ? " John started back. " I marry her ? " he cried as though I had proposed that he should marry the Dowager Empress of Russia ; " of course I shan't marry her. Besides," he added, " she's not going to marry any one just yet." I wondered what was afoot. " Her brother has come back," explained John. " He was away somewhere. She has to look after him. He's a rotter quite different from his sisters." " But I thought you . . ." " It's her sister," whispered my friend, and looked furtively about him. " I played tennis with her to-day." I collapsed. But later in the day, when John had been giving me an animated description of the younger Miss Carruthers, he sought for further particulars of my own affair. " But who is she ? I might be able to help. I know most of the people round here." " She is," said I solemnly, " a Miss Jones," and mentally added, " or a Miss Smith, or a Miss Brown or a Miss Robin- son I am not sure which. But I count on your secrecy," I continued. M 178 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Of course," said John pleased. " Miss Jones ? Where does she live ? " " She and her brother are staying in Yorkshire for a time. No one you know. They don't want anything said, you understand." " Of course," said my very dear John, and, satisfied that Miss Cardonnel was nowise in question, allowed the con- versation to change. I envy his state of mind. July 10. I am become the maddest lunatic in the British Isles. Circumstances and a new devilry have prompted me to a series of fantastic doings which lead I care not whither. I have entirely forgotten all the philosophy I ever learnt and feel very much better for it. Philosophy is no doubt of some use in its poor passionless way, but who in his senses wants to be passionless in the summer when the birds . . . ? I shall write the sheerest nonsense unless I am very careful. The joke is that the whole household is as mad as myself. Mr. and Mrs. Hylton are mad, and I love them for it. John is mad he is worshipping a child of sixteen and even the butler who is a staid and respectable person, has taken it into his head to amble childishly about the place and in general is as mad as the rest of us. There is a sheer glorious lunacy everywhere about us. The only marked exception is Grolier, and I am not surprised. From the day of the picnic he has elected to go his own way with the result that we have had several encounters. He is solemn and morose, and I am enter- taining thoughts of his dismissal, That, however, cannot be for some little while. In a sense he has a hold over me, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 179 and I shall not dismiss him until things have cleared them- selves. But it has been agreed between us that his conge cTeUre will follow on the slightest mistake, and by mistake he knows very well what I mean. Grolier, indeed, knows almost all there is to be known. He thinks that I should have allowed him the same opportunities in Cornwall as I am allowing myself in Yorkshire an utterly absurd idea. Oh, by the wine-cups of Bacchus, it is good to live, for I have actually decided that I am in love. Love ? It is ridiculous. It is heavenly. It is. . . . With an effort I am remembering the cold fact that this diary must embrace some sort of a narrative. Miss Carruthers' diplomacy was as successful as my own treatment of Cardonnel. Here at Nettlesham I am re- garded as the future husband of a mythical Miss Jones the Hyltons are waiting in patience to meet her and at Thorpe I have started to play picquet with its owner. True, I am just in the least disturbed about Miss Carru- thers herself, for unless John is careful, he will create a disturbance in her home ; but I am so selfishly inclined for the moment that these things must look after them- selves. I can think of nothing but Nesta and the mid- summer's day-dream into which I am come. The girl and I indulged in a second picnic which was held of all places in the grounds of Thorpe Towers ! I must have bewitched the old gentleman. I have taken the girl in my arms, and to the tune of wild kisses, have carried her round the lawns for all the world like a mad- cap of ten. I have played hide-and-seek and spoken of 180 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Nietzsche in the same five minutes. Love, if I know it at all, and who knows if I do ? what a damnable sceptic I am ! is a matter of extremes. The poor pitiful past has been obliterated, and Nesta is simply an obsession. She is wild and capricious, a nymph and a tomboy, a delicious personification of all that is bewilderingly attractive. I have been rudely awakened from my usual cold self, and fel blood and muscles attuned to great things. I verily believe I would like to plan the most fantastic elopement, and carry her off in a griffin-drawn chariot at night. For six weeks. And she she has shown me her heart. I am no longer disturbed. Each hour that I am with her but further exhilarates me. I have metamorphosed Sir Austin into the ideal parent and am deciding the course of action to be pursued with my own father. Myself and picquet and a daughter content with her lot have brought Cardonnel and even his butler out of the hermit-shell which has for so long been engulfing them. And my erstwhile fossildom has gone to the winds. I am tasting new life. And my views upon marriage . . . Quoth I to Miss Carruthers yesterday, at a moment when I suspected the absurd woman of forbidding John to make love to her sister : " Marriage may be distinctly undesirable at times." " I agree with you," said she, and gave me a curious look, " but at others ..." " The best of the conventions," said I. That at the moment is my position. Never before have I been so drawn out of my patent chair to share in the world's great delights. Never before have I understood how ridiculously inept my own opinions have been ; and THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 181 yet, I cannot make up my mind whether I am to get married or no. This reads priggishly, but the momentousness of it all is appalling. Every nerve in my body is calling for Nesta, and the hours spent away from the Towers are like scenes from the hollowest of stage-farces, but I cannot be sure of myself. This nonsense about the birds and summer keeps recurring there is so much that I do not understand, and then most important of all neither the girl nor myself have spoken a word of the future. I am wondering precisely how the average man conducts his affairs at a crisis like this. He begs leave to express his passion, does so and kneels or not as the case may be, talks glibly of the furniture for the new house, and inter- views her father. It sounds fatuous and provincial and utterly philistine. He mentions his income, I suppose, and quotes a few lines of poetry, and then waits for the bishop. Or he may crave for secrecy, and visit a registrar, and slink off in the morning, and I can figure him worried with his new responsibilities. And then there will come the cottage or the mansion, and all the rest of it ... What, then, is wrong with me ? Why do I, who must differ not one whit from hundreds of others, not do any of these things ? Of the girl I am certain. Of Sir Austin I am certain ; he has even started to hint. Of nearly everything I am certain, and yet . . . On my soul, I am forgetting my lunacy. To bed. XVI July 13. A LETTER from my father arrived this morning, an official- looking document with his signature boldly displayed in the bottom left-hand corner of a House of Commons en- velope. He wanted to know when the devil I w r as coming back to London, and hinted that all was not well between Mary Meddenham and the Anstruthers. Of a truth, I had almost forgotten their existence, for Mary is evidently offended and does not write, but I was not altogether surprised at the news. My father chose to be enigmatic, but there can be no doubt that he wants me in London. Well, in a day or two I shall be wanting him in Yorkshire. . . Poor Mary ! I should like to see her again, for I gather from the letter that she is not proving altogether tractable. That is good news, but I fear it cannot last. What a difference between her and Miss Carruthers ! And what a difference between them and my dear Nesta, whom I shall see in an hour ! No time for the diary. After all, I did not see Nesta. She sent me a message of postponement. Instead, I have been playing tennis with John. July 15. I shall write down this affair in as few words as possible. Yesterday morning at breakfast I received a note from 182 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 183 Miss Carruthers, asking me if I could lend her my car and incidentally myself for the morning. " Of course you will want reasons," she wrote, " and I suppose you will think me a masculine person to make such a demand. As a matter of fact, our dear friend John turns out to be smitten with my sister instead of with me a cruel blow to my vanity, but little more. Of course, it is utterly absurd as Clarice is only sixteen. But that is not my reason. There is another matter about which I should like to talk to you. Then I could explain my mon- strous impertinences : I am sure you have been thinking me horribly gauche. If you could manage to come here by eleven, I should be grateful. We are only five miles from Nettlesham." " You've got a letter from Mabel Carruthers ! " exclaimed John. I had thrown down the envelope. " And why not ? " said I, " since you do not intend . . ." My poor friend's look stopped me. His mother smiled at me as if to say that from John one could hardly expect more than six weeks' constancy. I believe both she and her husband are resigned to the fact that their son is cut out for a life-long bachelordom. " She wants to see me," I finished. John blushed very deeply. " You'll go in the car ? " he asked later. " Of course." " I may as Avell come . . ." " Not this morning," said I. After breakfast he took me aside and indignantly asked for a reason. I had none to give him. But he suddenly brightened. Of course, I was going upon his account, and he implored me to put in a word for him with Clarice. " Also you could explain things a bit to Mabel," he added. 184 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO On my soul he is as bad as Mabrum himself ! I decided to lunch at Thorpe Towers, and left Grolier behind. The Carruthers, I found, live in a small house standing back from the road, a mile from the village of Endale. There is a tennis-court at the side and a miniature golf course, and as soon as I entered the hall, I found athletic insignia meeting the eye from every square inch. There are cups and bowls and medals on the mantelpiece, photo- graphic groups, foils, racquets of every description, guns, ancient and modern, and old cricket bats arranged picture- fashion on the walls, and in each corner a medley of similar instruments piled up and betokening everyday usage. In the few minutes whilst I was waiting I had time to wonder what manner of family I should meet. Colonel Carruthers, as I knew from the Hyltons, is one of those men who live on the links. I believe he only condescends to appear elsewhere when his daughter is playing in an important tennis match. He was once a cricketer of more than local renown, and does not, I gather, forget it. Of Mabel Carruthers, I did not, and do not, know what to think. I should imagine that she is unpopular in many quarters, for she has a habit of speaking her thoughts, and these, somehow, are extraordinarily uncomplimentary in most cases to the people concerned. She is an excellent sportswoman, however, and one who would really knock down the man who might choose to insult her. Also she is widely read, and inclined to be interested in the study of mankind a rare quality, I should think, in a ' tennis player. As I waited, I began to think that her relations with John had not been very serious, and grew angry at the idea that she had been fooling me ; but I remembered THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 185 my own words to her on the subject, and also her behaviour with regard to Nesta, and persuaded myself that I very heartily admired her. Also I was vastly curious. She came downstairs with a rush, apologised for the lack of reception, and said she was ready for a drive. " Where to ? " I asked. " Anywhere you like," she cried, and opened the door. " My father would like to have seen you," she added, " but he had an important foursome. You'll come back to lunch, of course ! " " I don't think so," said I, " thanks very much." " Well, we can settle that later. The main thing is that I'm dying for a drive. We don't get such a luxury every day. It was good of you to come." Her good spirits were catching, but I have since been wondering with what an effort they were produced. '. . . " You roused my curiosity," said I. She laughed merrily. " Exactly what I had hoped ! It was the only way to get you here." We mounted. Miss Carruthers sat back in her seat. " I don't know my way," I told her. " Go straight on," she ordered, " until it is time to come back. That is the simplest way. Not too fast, or you won't be able to hear what I have to say." " You are delightfully mysterious," I declared, and we started off at a slow pace. " Not really," she replied. " I simply haven't the time." " Well, what is it you want to tell me ? " " I am not going to marry John Hylton," she said with such a comical emphasis that I nearly ran into a hedge. " That is the first thing." " But I knew that. You told me so in the letter." " I dare say I did," she said gaily, " and I dare say you 186 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO think I am a most impossible person to talk about it, but I have a reason. However, before you learn that, I want to know just precisely what you do really think about marriage." " Haven't we exhausted the subject ? " " Not yet. I want to know whether you are thinking of marrying Nesta Cardonnel." I was frankly annoyed at the impertinence of such a question, and did not reply. " On the face of it," she went on, " it looks as though my breeding had been thrown to the winds years ago. It looks as if oh, it looks like anything you please. I have known you three weeks and now ask you the most im- pertinent question I can think of. And you imagine that I am unwarrantably mixing myself up in your most private affairs ! Well, I have a reason." By this time I had almost brought my car to a standstill. Though the truth was very far from dawning upon me, I had begun to suspect that she knew something of which I was entirely in ignorance. " I should like to know your reason," said I. " You are a man," she said, passing my request, " who should always be allowed to go his own way so far as is possible." " You get more enigmatic," I declared, " every sentence you utter." " It is only for a few minutes. You see, even I, who am professedly the most shameless of my sex you must like me for that, you know find a difficulty in talking things over. As a rule I do not play intruder, but here I have no choice in the matter. Have you ever wondered why I should go out of my way to make things easy for you at Nettlesham ? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 187 " No," said I, " but I am grateful." " You see, I understood that you wanted your move- ments to remain a secret." I had stopped the car and was staring at her. " I wanted," she continued, " to see whether your ideas on marriage would stand the test of experiment. Well, they won't." I had nothing to say. " I wanted to see whether you would oh, well, yester- day John Hylton told me you had definitely decided to stay over the twelfth." " I had thought of doing so." " Which suggests, of course excuse my bluntness that you are thinking of marriage." " Your cleverness," said I, ruffled, " is intense." " Don't be unkind. I am doing a very unpleasant duty." " You mean," said I with some heat, " that your duty is to warn me against Nesta Cardonnel. You mean that I don't know her history, or that I don't realise what manner of woman Tier mother was, but I may as well say that I know everything there is to be known." Apparently she was astonished at my outburst, that I had taken so much for granted. " Not all, I think," she said quietly. " Everything," said I. " It is very good of you to speak in this way, but I am very well able to manage my own affairs." A faint smile crossed her features. " Do you know, that is just where I think you are making a mistake." If I had not been angry, I should doubtless have agreed with her, but for the moment I considered her action as totally superfluous. She was speaking as though her 188 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO years she cannot be more than twenty-six equalled the Dragon's, as though, indeed, she was an antiquated spinster privileged to intrude into the affairs of a nephew with expectations from herself. I was vastly annoyed, and thought that she had taken an unfair advantage of me. I told her so. " I hope not," she said. " I sincerely hope not. If I say things that displease, it is because well, because I have no option. I do not think you know everything." " If I don't," said I, " will you excuse me if I say that I don't wish to know more ? " There came a short pause. I made a pretence of starting the car. " Please wait a moment, will you ? " she said suddenly. " We are getting rather formal, and that is a pity. You say you don't want to know all, but at the risk of being turned out of the car, I am going to tell you that / am as deep in the the affair as yourself." " I do not understand," said I, coldly, " how any one else can be ' deep in an affair ' which by its nature concerns only two." "It so happens," said Miss Carruthers, " that Raymond has come back." I stared stupidly. " Raymond ? What do you know of Raymond ? " " He is my brother," was the reply. I turned round in my seat and took hold of her arm. " You mean that the Raymond who " " Made love to Nesta Cardonnel," she interrupted rather wearily, " yes, he is my brother. We sent him away to Italy, but he has come back. And the has managed to see her." Involuntarily I gasped. " Seen her ? What do you mean ? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 189 " Oh, it is impossible to make you understand, but he is different from the rest of us. Sometimes there is one in the family who seems seems almost not to belong to it. Raymond is like that. He does not like sport, he is weak and foolish, and sees things in an inexplicable way. He is a dreamer. My father hardly speaks to him. Clarice calls him a girl. I I think I despise him, but I also love him. You can't help that. He oh, we thought he would stay in Italy with our uncle, after what happened, but he has come back." She laughed rather harshly. " This is the first act of his which shows any determination at all." " But you say he has seen her ? " I cried, still marvelling at things, and wondering what I should do. " He saw her yesterday." " Good God ! " I exclaimed, and remembered Nesta's message. " Can you swear that ? " " Dear man, I am telling you what I know. He told me so himself, and to me he can never lie. Very few people can," she added whimsically. " I had hoped, at least, I think I had hoped, that he had forgotten her, but he is still wildly in love. That is proved by his venturing to the Towers, and to-day he has gone there again." I listened to her words, barely understanding their import. The thought that just at this moment Nesta might be talking to this boy, as she had talked to myself but two days before, maddened me. I jumped down from my seat, and stared at Miss Carruthers from the road. I cannot properly explain my own feelings, but I took refuge in pitiful curses, whispered to my soul. To be here in this wilderness and not at the Towers ! I had an intense desire to shout out to the four winds, and then I laughed. I was thinking of John's words to me in London ; 190 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO the girl was not straight, and so nothing mattered very much. Nothing mattered at all. Miss Carruthers beckoned me to remount. She had been watching me in patience. I demanded somewhat bitterly to know why she had not told me everything at the time of our first talk in the summer-house. " I did not know then that Raymond would come home," she said with unusual meekness. I mounted and started the car. The pace became furious I let her run for all she was worth. I was in that mood when speed is so necessary to one's nerves. Perhaps I felt as Mabrum had felt when he found himself left in London a sheer blind fury. It was useless to say that nothing mattered. I could not help recalling, one by one, the incidents of the East Chapel Comedy, and decided that I was mad ever to have bothered about her. But I re- membered our wild game in the garden, and felt her cool moist lips pressed to my own and her slim lithe figure clasped in my arms. What foolery was this, then, that I should allow an effeminate boy to cross ... In the midst of the angry reflection came a memory of the picnic, and I could not forget how I myself had mentioned his name. It was I, therefore, who had played intruder, I who had . . . " A man," said I, with set teeth, as the keen wind blew in my face, " must look to himself. I shall go to the Towers." Miss Carruthers did not hear me. She remained silent, and the car flew on past village, past hamlet, through fields and through forests, a veritable thunderer. My mind ran back to my father's persistent attacks on myself. It seemed then that I had never been in doubt about THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 191 Nesta. Of course, she should have been my wife. I would have moulded her, as only a strong man can mould a weak girl. I would have forced on Sir Austin a new life, wherein the hermit had no place at all. I would have bred children, and seen that they were not taught by our present crabbed system of letters and sums, but under broader, more open principles. And then, as I was drifting into profitless dreams, I wondered how I had ever been able to think of the girl as my own. This midsummer madness had been madness indeed. How could I ever have forgotten the beloved Raymond Raymond Car- ruthers ? She had been his on her own confession was his, of course, on this day. And I, forsooth, was in the same box as sleek Mabrum of Oxford Street ! At such times one sees things in a brutish light, and I worked myself up into a passion. . . . The whole thing could be summed up in a sentence. The girl was not straight. For a time I came to be in that mood when nothing would have stopped me from a headlong flight to London. On a sudden I wanted my patent chair and the quiet, easy philosophy which it invariably adduces for my convenience. I wanted to work on the instant, to write scurrilous sen- tences, to play havoc with the pen. And then I looked round, and saw tears in my companion's eyes. I pulled up in some embarrassment. Hitherto I had hardly regarded Miss Carruthers other than as a wise, kindly, but unemotional woman. Her very mastery in dealing with people had compelled my admiration, and now these tears added in some measure to my shock. " I am glad you asked me to come," said I hurriedly. " You have not enjoyed your drive, but you could hardly have been expecting to do that. And you must let me 192 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO apologise for my thoughtless words. I will take you back to your house and then go on to the Towers." Evidently she was ashamed of her tears, for she shook her head angrily and then turned away. A quarter of an hour must have passed before she spoke. I had turned the car round and we were speeding across a moor. I felt her hand on my arm. " What will you do ? What will you do ? " " I shall go to the girl. I do not think she will lie to me. I am not in the mood for lies." " But Raymond ? Oh, you see how I am placed ! I want to help him, but he is a boy who will not easily be helped. He does not think of the future. He is irre- sponsible. I cannot get him to understand. ..." " I will think of Raymond," said I, " after I have thought of myself." I had intended to drop Miss Carruthers at her house and rush on to the Towers, but this was not to be, for by the gate of the little house stood Raymond himself. I had known it was he before she whispered his name. He was amazingly good-looking. A first glance reminded me of Greek statuary, for he wore no hat, and his bright curly hair shone in the sun. He hailed his sister with a subdued cheerfulness, but did not move from his position. Coming down from the car, I was introduced, and he shook hands in a negligent way. Probably I have never disliked any one so much at first sight, but his face \vas so extra- ordinarily fine that mere dislike was swallowed up in other emotions. I stared at him stupidly. He was utterly unlike his sister, who is dark and red-cheeked. His skin showed that tinge of pale olive which is so rarely to be seen with fair hair. His eyebrows were dark, and his eyes the THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 193 colour of turquoise. And there was just that touch of the feminine about him which I have noticed in some of the later Greek statues, an indefinable pose which compels irritation. But I understood in a moment Nesta's words to me in M. Quatrebras' restaurant. The fellow might be a despicable scoundrel, but his white flannels fitted superbly, and he was as beautiful as a languid god. His voice, too, was soft and persuasive, and his smile almost like Nesta's own. I must have stared at him for almost a minute. " Been far, Mabel ? " he was asking. " I don't know, dear. Yes, I suppose we went a good way." " Nice car you've got," he added, turning to me. " Just the sort I should like to have for myself." I did not reply. " You you will come in to lunch ? " faltered Miss Carruthers. I hesitated, but only for a moment. It was imperative, I found, that I should learn all there was to be known about her brother, and I accepted her invitation. We walked up to the house, and I could not help noticing with what easy grace the boy moved. There was a subtle fascination about him which did much, I think, to in- crease my dislike. Miss Carruthers noticed my demeanour, but said nothing. In the hall we met Clarice, a young healthy girl, not over pretty, but of just the type which I could have imagined would appeal very strongly to friend John. The Colonel did not return, and we four lunched together. I learnt much of the boy. At the table I could see well enough that his return home had been followed by such events as he had hoped for. There was a brightness in N 194 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO his eyes, a nervous vivacity of manner which betokened a sensitive nature worked up to that pitch which passion alone can reach. He was obviously restraining his real feelings with some difficulty, and the recurrent smile at moments when the conversation had flagged could not be misunderstood. And I with a blackened soul probed deep into him, and played silent dragon for all the world like the Duchess herself. In general, he is conceited, but at that I am not sur- prised. The Apollos amongst us are invariably conceited, and it is the women's fault. He spoke of Erasmus Hylton, whom he does not know, with an airy contempt, and then branched off into a discussion of modern architecture. He had inclinations, it appeared, for Greek work, and spoke vaguely of a desire to revolutionise our home buildings on Grecian models. He had painted a picture, he told me, which was not finished, and somehow I gathered that it was a portrait of Nesta. I listened to him as one listens to the players on the stage. The girls and myself spoke little. Occasionally Clarice, whose mental horizon must be similar to her father's, administered a childish snub, but he took small notice of her, and seemed only keen to interest me in himself. He certainly succeeded beyond his expectations, and I left the house with as clear an idea of him as was very well possible. Not a word had been spoken of the Cardonnels, and Miss Carruthers' good-bye merely embraced an invitation to come over for tennis. I started the car in some doubt as to my own existence. At times I find it is difficult to believe that we are separate entities. The fact of a Whole seems indisputable, but that its component parts possess individual will is some- times hardly credible. There are moments, indeed, when I am very ready to believe that I, in common with others, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 195 am living in what are nothing but the dreams of somebody else. They are the times when I can disassociate myself from my body, and view the world's proceedings from an indefinable position without. But the rush of wind in my face brought me back to realities. I was speeding to the Towers to see Nesta, and the gods alone knew what I should say. Of Raymond himself it was little use to think. I imagined then, as now, that he emulated some of the Skimpole characteristics. He was a being of potentialities which would never undergo transformation. His philo- sophy suggested an easy passage through life ; he was one of those creatures who seem to have been brought into the world to waste money and time on nothing at all. In his family he was so utterly out of place that, remembering the estimable Butler, I could not be surprised at anything about him. He was in love with Nesta, as Apollo loved Venus and he had been thrashed by Sir Austin ! I could figure him in Italy asking delicately for a reason for ouch conduct on the old gentleman's part, and then the knowledge that he wanted Nesta above all things with no money to fetch her, and no liking for letters, had sent him back to Yorkshire an airy paradoxical person with the one idea of being happy. I had learnt incidentally that a gun in his hands was a dangerous weapon. The athlete he might have been had become the aesthete he was, through no more than a constitutional dislike of unselfish exertion. Many thoughts of my own relations with Nesta came and went. Things, however, were irrevocably altered, and I who had thought to arrive at the Towers with rage at my heart, drove up to the door in a state of such calm as afterwards caused me to wonder. It is impossible, I suppose, really to know oneself ; circumstances seem to 196 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO alter our very souls. The knowledge that the girl had played with me as she had played with Mabrum, had sent me metaphorically reeling into the arms of my patent chair. I did not doubt that Raymond's return had banished me from her mind ; her message of the day before was proof conclusive. Only my interest in her had enormously increased. The artist in me must have been beginning to predominate over the man. What would she say ? What would she do ? She came to me in the great silent hall, and I then and there relapsed into the preposterous unclehood of my own creation. A bright smiling girl she was, rosy with that love-look which will never be hid. " Raymond has come back," said I, as I shook hands. She looked into my eyes in her shy way. " Oh, my dear," she whispered, " he has really come back. It is just heaven." Not a word of enquiry ! Not a word of myself ! Not a word of explanation or surprise only a mere acquiescence in my remark, and love's sigh ! " And you two," said I, in a voice that was strange to me, " you two are lovers again." " I could not believe it," she went on. " He came to the river just as before. Oh, I had never thought I should see him again. And now, do you know, I cannot believe that he was ever away." " I hope," said I, prosaically, " you will be happy." " Happy ? " she repeated, " I would do anything in the world for him." She stopped to stare at me. " You knew he was back ? " " I have seen him to-day at his home." " Did he speak of me ? " she asked with a quivering THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 197 eagerness. " What did he say ? How did you meet him ? Oh, tell me all." I answered her questions, marvelling at my own position. Surely I had always been playing uncle ! " We want your help so much," she went on. " You are the only man. I did not speak of you, but I had decided to tell him to-morrow. Do you think you could help us ? My father ..." A tiny shudder passed through her. There was a long pause. " I will try to help you," said I at last. " Of course ! " She clasped my hand in her own, and looked up im- ploringly. " You want to marry him ? " " I can never live without him," she said in a low voice. The selfishness of love is astounding. I could do little but recall her remark to me on the question of Mabrum. If Raymond sent money, she would say good-bye to the Jew. Well, Raymond had returned, and now she was bidding good-bye to myself. And there had not been a word of me, not a memory of our kisses, only an appeal for help ! It occurred to me then that here in this selfish- ness of hers lay all explanation for the twice repeated word " straight." To others she might not appear straight ; to me she was only striving to be happy. Her last words to me in the hall displayed her character in the curious way of the master-impressionist with his few slabs of paint. I laughed loudly on my way to Nettlesham, and I have been laughing to-day. The Hyltons are certain that I have quarrelled with Miss Jones, but I am thinking of my visit to Sir Austin to-morrow. And I would give my soul to take her into my arms. . . . XVII EATON PLACE. July 19. A LEARNED friend of mine once decided to get thoroughly drunk before committing suicide. A woman with auburn hair, I believe, was the cause. He set to work on the first part of the business with some vigour, but spoilt his chances of a successful conclusion by wiring in some detail to me. I found him at night in the most barbarous public-house then in existence. His condition was dangerously senti- mental, and he prattled mysteriously of hidden revolvers. The wire, it appeared, had been despatched in a moment of sobriety that was not likely to occur twice. I saved his life by taking him there and then to Liverpool the public-house happened to be in the near vicinity of Euston and in the train produced cards for picquet. It needed some perseverance and particularly high stakes to make him realise the importance of our game, and the persistent embarking of milk-cans at the various towns on the way undoubtedly disturbed him, but a breakfast at Liverpool and a visit to its art-gallery, where I talked unmitigated nonsense for two hours, did much to help matters. From Liverpool we journeyed somehow to Edinburgh, thence northwards to Aberdeen for no reason but that I prescribed continuous movement. Afterwards, we visited Perth, armed with no more than a Gladstone bag and some Liver- pool shirts. In three days we travelled hustle-fashion some eight hundred miles, and the revolvers had been 198 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 199 lost on the way. Our return to London was in the nature of a triumph. My last days in Yorkshire brought this incident to mind. Then, as now, there had been no opportunity for clear thought, only the necessity for crowding a number of foolish things into as short a while as possible. It came upon me suddenly that I must forego the shooting, and run up to London at once. There would have to be lies to the Hyltons and lies to Sir Austin, and more tren- chant lies to my chauffeur, and my departure, of course, could only take place after all these lies had been told, but I had by no means the fullest confidence in my powers. Yet as I write again in my patent chair, I am a little surprised to find with what comparative ease the thing was done. . . . The Unknown Forces and Mabel Carruthers between them must have worked wonders. Now, more than ever, I can thank the gods for introducing me to the girl. My early impressions of her were by no means incorrect she is an invaluable friend. And she has promised to write me the news for which I am perversely eager. --In point of fact, I verily believe that Grolier presented the most difficult problem. His obstinacy almost led to his dismissal. His questions became grossly impertinent, and unless I had been familiar with Shaw's comedy on his particular species, I should undoubtedly have thrown discretion to the winds, and sent him southwards by train with a month or two's salary in his pocket. His solicitude for my welfare was entirely out of place, and I could have wished that he had not been so detestably familiar with the more esoteric emotions. I succeeded, however, in making him understand that my Yorkshire adventures had followed on nothing more than a desire to 200 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO obtain material for a psychological work an awkward confession, but the only one available under the circum- stances. Grolier refused to believe me except under the strongest protest. My views upon marriage, I told him, had remained unchanged since my twenty-fifth year, and my desire to hold a gun had evaporated in view of the immensity of the work I proposed forthwith to begin. In the end I had to promise him that two odd volumes of Rousseau which he once gave me should pay a visit to the binder. It is such subtle flattery that gains Grolier's heart. I was glad I had remembered his books, and be drove me for the last time to the Towers with his suspicions lulled to vanishing point. My visit entailed small preparation. Sir Austin, I had decided, should learn of Miss Jones' existence and in- fatuation for myself, and be persuaded that my own share in the Mabrum business had followed on nothing but a blood-thirsty desire to revenge myself on the little Jew for a supposititious insult in East Chapel a political ven- detta, in fact. I was to rely as before on my loud voice, and bend the old gentleman to my will. Of Raymond I would say that there had been misunderstandings following on Sir Austin's own ideas upon education ; and if I could adduce little in praise of the boy's manner of gaining ad- mittance to the Towers, I hoped to make it clear that such an episode had been no more than a schoolboyish prank which had had its punishment and now merited general oblivion. As I arrived at the Towers I could not help understanding that such an explanation would lack con- viction, but hoped for the best. I had told Mabel Carruthers that I would think of her brother when I had thought of myself, but my few words with Nesta had been sufficient to show me how foolish any THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 201 such self-analysis would be. For the girl's happiness a marriage was essential ; her feelings in this present matter were unmistakable. The only possible line of action had assuredly been pointed out to me. Yet I could not forget how Raymond's sister had spoken of Nesta herself, and feared no little opposition from that quarter. Marriage, we had agreed, might be the best of the conventions, but ... There were delicate points about the business. . . . For myself I had become cheerful herald. My feelings towards Nesta were in process of burial beneath intellectual considerations, and I had settled that the psychological work, of which only Grolier had heard, was to be in the nature of a scientific thesis upon " Love and Its Allies." With that natural vanity, however, which is at home in every human heart, I had perhaps suffered the smallest disappointment on finding that a mock-heroic display on my part was wholly out of the question. I should have liked to play Mr. Brokenheart for a little while in her presence, but a knowledge of Hialmar Ekdal, Ibsen's outrageous photographer, combined with my latest esti- mate of Nesta herself, obviously rendered impossible anything of the kind. No, to say truth, my opinion of her had not changed for the worse. I could not pity myself somehow the mere idea embraced an absurdity but I could well understand her demeanour. It was for her sake and for my own interest in her that I proposed to become the beloved Raymond's champion. Love plays the fool, and it is well to recognise the fact in a dignified manner. The whole of my midsummer madness that is how I shall think of it had embraced such an adventure as the novelists use mid-way in their books. 202 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO My avuncular great-coat put itself over my shoulders as we drove up to the door, and the funereal butler uncon- sciously buttoned it close. Miss Nesta, he informed me, was out this had been agreed upon between us and I walked up to the library in the utmost serenity of mind. When I came to Yorkshire I thought that Sir Austin's unnatural life had driven him perilously near to insanity. His eye and his temper, his marriage and his daughter's migration all hinted at so much. Looking back over these pages, I find that I have laid some stress upon the point. Yet I doubt very much whether I have not been completely at fault. With the madness which one asso- ciates with Hanwell or the more private establishments described by Charles Reade and others, he has nothing to do. It must be a quaint conceit which suggests to his mind to be " ill " on stated occasions. And so it hap- pened that when the name of Raymond Carruthers had been forced on his notice, he who should have done no more than express mild surprise at its mention, became im- mediately metamorphosed into a raging old fellow with fists tightly clenched and eyes blazing forth in the manner which must have brought fear to Mr. Mabrum's small heart. " Don't speak of him," he cried quivering. " But I must," said I smiling. " He involves a principle in which I am interested. Besides, I have seen him." " You have met that man ? " " Boy," I corrected airily. " Boy." " Ach ! He tried to ruin my daughter. He deserved to be thrown into the river. I had hoped he had gone out of the country." " He did so," said I, " but he has returned out of love for your daughter." THE ; SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 203 " For love of my daughter ! " he repeated with deep scorn. " Was it for love of my daughter that he came like a thief into the house, taking all that I had, stealing it behind my back ? Was it for that that he played with my daughter as he would play with a girl from the very streets ? Do you call that love for my daughter ? I should call it by a different name. Good God ! man, how can you stand there and tell me it was love ? You can't mean it, you ..." All the fiercer emotions had been playing with his body in a manner which must have alarmed me, had I not fore- seen their appearance. His foot stamped the ground, his features were distorted, he writhed in his chair. And then, whilst I was moulding my rejoinder, an unaccount- able aspect of fear came upon him. He seemed to shrink into himself. " Why do you speak of him to me ? " he asked in low tones. It seemed then that my lot was for ever to be retouching life, as it were, with a comic pencil. There was almost an atmosphere of tragedy about me, yet there had to be a veneer of lightness over things. The look on Sir Austin's face as he spoke these words brought with it an accusation ; it was as though I myself had seduced his daughter. I stood before him, a wretch forced for the time to assume a mask which I would have given much to have burned to ashes. If I had put on that mask voluntarily before, I had no inclination for it now. " I think," said I slowly, " he had better marry your daughter." I did not listen to his angry reply. I interrupted to warn him that he was playing with fire. With necessary effrontery I informed him that he had for long been 204 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO misunderstanding his daughter. She was no plaything to be dangled before him, but a live creature well able to choose a mate for herself here I forgot for the moment the unfortunate occurrence of two years ago, but this was no time to think of John Hylton and I told him that her action in leaving his house could not be misinterpreted. " It was the logical outcome," said I. " She had al- ready chosen her mate." In loud tones I assailed his self-constituted position as her lord and master. We were finished in this twentieth century with Victorian ideas, and I exhorted him to read Ibsen who has loomed much in my mind of late for a better understanding of the case. Warming to my theme, I enlarged upon the ignoble ground occupied by those who would plan schemes for any one but themselves conveniently forgetting the nature of my present business and drew highly imaginative pictures of young lives spoilt by no more than a parental mistake of the kind he was making. From anger he passed to bewilderment, but when I, sick at heart, but outwardly almost amused, demanded to know what he would have thought had his daughter elected to choose myself rather than Raymond, his amazement knew no bounds. " Suppose," said I, " she had chosen myself ! What would you have said ? Just what you are saying this minute ! You would have been thinking that the Towers without Nesta w r ould be unbearable, and you would have discovered that I as a prospective son-in-law was as un- wanted as this boy." He attempted contradiction, but only gasped unin- telligibly. " It would have been no more improbable," I added, and almost enjoyed the sharp sting of my words. " But, I thought I was sure that you and Nesta ..." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 205 " My dear sir," I rejoined sternly, " I am engaged to be married to Miss Margaret Jones." He seemed to become smaller, and for nearly a minute stared at me as though I had signed his death warrant. " I can hardly believe it," he exclaimed at last. " I was certain that you ..." " But my own affairs," I interrupted, " have nothing to do with the matter. I came here before, and am here now, solely to help your daughter. We are good friends. In this ridiculous world people are prone to look upon a friendship between people of opposite sexes as a sham. I am not responsible for that. You seem to have been mistaking my intentions. That cannot be helped. Nesta is in love with this boy Raymond Carruthers, he with her. In the natural course of events, they should marry. You must allow them to marry." He did not reply, for at that moment the butler opened the door, and presented a card to Sir Austin. I was hardly prepared for the sequel. I saw the old butler look in a scared way at his master, and I saw the latter pass a hand across his forehead. Then he sat down in his chair and held the card out at arm's length. " Miss Carruthers is here," he said. For the life of me I could not imagine why she had come. It could not be on behalf of her brother, and yet what other reason could there be ? Raymond, I supposed, had in some way influenced her. " His sister ? " asked Sir Austin. I nodded. " There is no use in my seeing her." " But," I exclaimed, thinking hard, " she may not have come ..." She has come to plead for her brother of course ! " 206 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " I am not sure," I began, still puzzled. " She is nothing to me," he interrupted roughly. His words jarred. " I do not know why she has come," I told him ; "I have met her at my friends' house, but in any case you will be wise to see her." For a while he said nothing. Then he turned suddenly to the butler. " Show her in," he ordered brusquely, and the old man hobbled out. He looked at me. " You know these Carruthers well ? " " Fairly well," said I. " As your son-in-law the boy will settle down into the ideal husband." A faint smile crossed his face. "I do not under- stand you, Waldo," he said ; " you have come into my house . . ." " To play picquet," said I facetiously, and would have continued, but the door opened and Mabel Carruthers came in. She uttered a little cry when she saw me. I introduced them formally. From me the girl looked almost imploringly at Sir Austin, and Sir Austin, in the presence of a stranger, im- mediately retired into himself, and became coldly polite. Before I had recovered from my surprise, he was bowing her into a chair, and asking in the grave manner of long ago how he could serve her. You would have said that he had never heard of her brother's existence. We shook hands in some embarrassment, but my tongue was mo- mentarily tied. It seemed so odd to see her there at the Towers. She began to falter out words which I have forgotten. But on a sudden we two were at our ease, and repeating each other in an endeavour to make him understand what must happen. For, all unaccountably, she_had become as THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 207 keen as myself on the marriage, and had come to the Towers on her brother's behalf. I did not, and do not altogether, understand how she reconciled her views upon Nesta as expressed to myself and this new desire of hers for the girl as a sister-in-law, but during the weird con- versation that followed I wish I could recall it in detail things took on such a tinge of improbability as gave me no time for thought. She told me afterwards that her visit had followed on a night's hard thinking and a long talk with her brother, but that did not explain her altered opinion of Nesta. I wonder at her courage, but she is not the woman or girl I do not know which to call her to shrink from an attempt to transform her wishes into actualities. She would step boldly into the heart of things where others would fain walk warily on the out- skirts a brave warm-hearted girl whom I shall always admire. And when I had fully realised her purpose, and she mine, we did not spare ourselves. If Sir Austin entertained the idea of a conspiracy between us, he said nothing to show it, and there followed a scene which I imagine will not soon be repeated. Taking courage, she gave the gist of her conversation with Raymond, told of his sojourn in Italy, and spoke of his sorrow for what had occurred. " Believe me," she said in all earnest entreaty, " there is a love in this world that will not be gainsaid. What has happened must have been almost inevitable. I did not think so yesterday, I did not think that I would come here to-day on my brother's behalf, but I have learnt much from him. I have learnt to believe that love alone can work those wonders we all could wish were no wonders at all. ... If they are to be kept apart, we shall be wrecking two lives." 208 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Sir Austin stared hard at his visitor, a slight frown on his face, but courteously attentive. In silence he waited until we were done, to ask the few questions that occurred to him. And then, as the girl grew more impassioned here was no mere sportswoman, thought I the faint smile again crossed his features, and he held out his hand to her. " Perhaps you are right," said he. " Perhaps I have been seeing things in a wrong light. I would like to see your brother again." " And now," said Mabel Carruthers as we drove off from the Towers, " I suppose we must start complimenting each other." Once again she seemed her usual bright self. " Question one another, you mean," I rejoined. " Oh, no questions are needed, my friend. I have altered my opinion of the girl. For one thing she has made Raymond faintly ambitious a miracle which one cannot ignore and then there is another reason which I shall not tell you." " But the compliments ? " I asked. " You for your chivalry, I for my what ? my courage in bearding the ogre in his den ! " " Our meeting," said I, " was more than a little odd." " It was the beginning of the end," replied the girl seriously. " I must give you my thanks. If you have started Raymond on a new life . . ." I did not hear the end of the sentence, for I was thinking of Nesta. The gods dose us with sentimentality for our sins, and their medicine is forced down our throats at the most inopportune moments. She prattled on, however, in the brightest of spirits, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 209 until we caine to the Endale Road. There I asked her point-blank whether her definition of " straight," had undergone a change. " I don't know," she said, " but does it matter ? I am absolutely convinced that they must marry now." " In which case," said I, " Nesta's adventure in London is of no import whatever." She looked at me in surprise. " I had a mind," I replied, " to tell you of one Carl Mabrum. He may give trouble." " Carl Mabrum ? " " Yes. If you are content to stay awhile in the car, I will tell you the whole business." " If it is interesting, I would like to hear it." Whereupon I expounded the East Chapel Comedy. When I had finished, her one question puzzled me. It concerned Mary Meddenham and Anstruther. " Will she marry this man ? " " I hope not," said I ; " but what do you think of Mabrum ? Will he . . . ? " She broke into a laugh. The little man will marry one of his barmaids or ask for a little more money from you. We need not fear him, though I am glad I know of his existence." " And his vengeance on me ? " I asked. " If it comes, it will probably take the form of a demand for a wedding present. And now will you come in and speak to my brother ? " I made an excuse. " You see," I told her, " I leave for London in two days." " I am sorry for that," she said quietly. " My work has been neglected," I added* " I shall write you the news." o 210 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO She said good-bye at the gates, and I motored back to the Hyltons. I remember making up absurd verses on the way and narrowly avoiding a pig. Nothing, wrote Victor Hugo, resembles an awaking so much as a return. I went to my bedroom with its pretty print curtains over the little windows with a feeling of depression that would not be banished. Facts had to be faced, and there was an indefinable shadow encompassing me, a veil, which made of life nothing but the saddest of blunders. In love, you read, as in war, one fights for oneself, but I had fought for another. Did that mean, then, that love and I had still to meet ? I could not other- wise answer the question that was troubling me. And so this midsummer madness thank God for the phrase ! had come and gone, and my vaporous musings had been but a sham. I had never loved the girl, I had merely been drawn into a net. I had never loved the girl, and so I had passed her to Raymond. And over the affair came an unpleasantness which would not leave me. I sat down by the window in an angry mood. It came upon me then that I, with my ideas on the damnable question of marriage, had chosen temporarily to forget them only to find out their truth. No, the gods had fashioned me for books and the car and an occasional picnic. . . . I sent a wire to my father. The Hyltons said little, but their looks showed such a sympathy as at any other time would have gladdened my soul. I talked vaguely of returning to them in Sep- tember, and Mrs. Hylton was good enough to say that the bedroom I had occupied was mine any time in the year. Lies, I found, came glib to the tongue, and John's sub- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 211 sequent solicitude was comic. He offered indeed, to inter- view Miss Jones' brother, but I would not allow it. The broken leg, it seemed, was forgotten, and the whole family gathered on the threshold to see me drive off. And here in my house, my father, deep in his duties at Westminster there is talk of an autumn session received me with open arms and the news that the Dragon was coming to London straightway. He imagined, of course, that my return had followed directly upon his letter about the Anstruther business the veriest nonsense, but I cannot persuade him to the contrary. He is an obstinate old gentleman, and although most of my time is spent at the British Museum I am well on with my "Dedications " London will not see me for long. There is a stagnancy over things which revolts me. I want to get away from the heat and the dust and my father's incessant cajolling. I want my philosophy expounded by the cool of the sea ; I want mountains and clouds and vast spaces. I could wish it were winter. . THE THIKD NOTEBOOK XVIII HOTEL DE FLANDRES. BRUGES. Oct. 15. AFTER three restless months in and amongst the Alps, I am come to this city of beautiful chimes and sad streets where once all the merchants of Europe assembled ; and would fain put black upon white. In truth my diary has been sadly neglected, yet who in his senses could write of the scenes I have been witnessing ? The ordinary carica- turist attached to the ordinary society novelist has done all and more than is required. I am sick to death of the " interesting Englishman " and " the American whose daughter, you know, married that ridiculous peer." I am sick to death of the girl with a soul given particularly on the Alps to yearns, long and earnest. Also I think I detest no one more than the Hilda Wangels of this world with their incessant chatter and " thrilling " adventures with professional, if titled, guides. From the scenery, moreover, as retailed by the authorities at so much per day, you are referred to the guide-books, excellent manuals for the most part, and I have nothing to say of the cooking. What else remains ? Very little, I think. Here in Bruges, on the other hand, one is irresistibly borne back into the middle ages without taking train for the purpose, and I, who am an historian as well as a philosopher, am moderately elate. With no qualms at all, in fact, I have been banish- ing this century of dull news and hurry, and stalking boldly into the solider ages, when the devil was not yet 215 210 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO forgotten, and the dealers not yet in being. These times would exactly have suited my mood. I should have been poorer and simpler, a scholar, perhaps, happy with illuminated manuscript. I might have sat in the studio of Hans Memling, and played Boswell or critic I hope the latter to that great man ; and then, 1 suppose, I should have come somehow to Collard Mansion, and designed a type for his press, or persuaded his visitor Caxton to follow Nicholas Jensen of Venice in his choice of a Roman char- acter. It would have mattered nothing to me that few could have read it ; I can fancy myself playing autocrat. " Roman character or death to this infernal invention ! " I would have roared, and the printers of Europe would have quaked in their shoes. At least so my imagination informs me. And then, when the sand had come to choke up the canals, and trade and religion alike were incessantly battling for life, I should have watched the fall of this city of wonders, and although I might probably have left Bruges then and there for Turkey or America, it is this fall which to-day endears me to the place. I love the quiet streets and the picturesque canals with their curious bridges and the quaintly designed houses, some humble, others wonderfully grand, as I love no other spot in the world. And who, I should like to know, shall pass with unseeing eyes the Church of St. Jacques or the Chapelle du Sang Saint or the Jerusalem Church with its orient tower ? There is a high mound outside the city from which I can look on all three, and I could wish to stay there for all time. As a diarist, however, I must leave such commonplace observations to the compiler of artistic guide-books, and be primarily concerned with myself. It is easy to forget THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 217 what has happened, but I am determined in no way to relinquish my task. Perhaps my father's letter received this morning has something to do with it. The old gentle- man is ill. I cannot wonder at the news. A man who will work at fever-heat eighteen hours in the day must sooner or later succumb. I have promised to go home if he wires. Looking over the events of the year, I am struck by their comparative unimportance. There have been notice- able incidents of course my father's return to Parlia- ment and Nesta Cardonnel's marriage to Raymond Carru- thers but such things have happened before. I have met Mabel Carruthers and Mr. Carl Mabrum, and in both cases have been naturally astonished, and I have been worried into an Alpine tour by the Duchess of Rochester, but I have done little work. I have formed gigantic projects, but nothing has come of them, and now and again a con- viction of my own uselessness comes strong upon me. It is so easy to touch the stars in the comfort of one's patent chair, so difficult to achieve great things out of its arms. This of course is the tritest commonplace, but somehow I am only realising it now. I have thought that my father's ideal is good a vast enthusiasm for everything under the sun ; yet how in the name of John Baskerville I should like to have brought the old gentleman to see the Incunabula in the Hotel de Ville how can one summon up keenness for the trifles of life ? A political party or a criminal are patronised or condemned by my father what matter to me ? A man marries a woman whom I choose to love or to detest, and I am pained or delighted for some twenty-four hours what matter to me ? It is the pettish- ness of my day that I so thoroughly dislike. The age has brought in its trail^the ogre called compromise, and with 218 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO it have come dragons and unnatural parents and ill- balanced philosophies. And I, blessed with money and an indolent spirit, have been building, I suppose, a world for myself. . . . Well, is it not best to patronise the Quatre- bras of the world and surround oneself with beautiful things ? We may be at the mercy of our emotions this day or that, but the time comes when any such business is relegated to a background of absurdity. And if I can read no meaning at all into so much that goes on about me, am I everlastingly to grope ? I have thought much of my visit to Yorkshire ; as cheerful fooling, it had points, and introduced me to Mabel Carruthers, whose letters are worth having, but I might just as well havo stayed down in Cornwall watching the ships and the birds and the southern skies. If I had stayed, I should.not have met Cardonnel, and I should not even now find myself worry- ing on his account. When I returned to London, I found it utterly impossible to mention him to my father. My little scheme had fallen, like so many others, to the ground. And now r I do not see how they can ever be brought to- gether again. Well, I must look upon that as a superero- gatory task which is postponed for all time. It is rather sad. . . . I have thought, too, of Mary Meddenham, and just at this moment am wondering what she will do. Three months ago her engagement was broken off "by mutual consent," and I fled the country. Positively my action was ludicrous and I could jeer at myself, yet I had no two ideas at the time. If I liked, I could silence the Dragon and my father by a few simple w r ords, but their utterance would probably end my friendship with Mary. That is the cussedness of things. I cannot speak for five minutes to any one of the opposite sex without thoughts of marriage THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 219 entering into the minds of all and sundry who may have learnt of the fact. Indeed my father's renewed alliance with the Rochesters proved so ominous that I refused so much as to see poor Mary at all. I pity her from the bottom of my heart. She does not, I know, care much for the life she is called on to lead, but I decline to believe that even the deepest love of which she is capable would cause her escape from the Duchess ; as it is she cannot dare to love save by permission. By the gods I have a mind to try Parliament myself, and a Bill for the Suppression of Dragons. . . . Mabel Carruthers' letters have followed me about, and I have not destroyed them. They belong to an order by themselves. Occasionally she inflicts on my notice details of tennis-matches in which I have no interest whatever, but there generally follows some shrewd observation or philosophical aside which gladdens my soul. Of Ray- mond she writes that marriage has done all and more than she hoped, and I am called on to figure two youthful people in a cottage near York, not, indeed, of Raymond's own architecture, but well up to his ideas on the subject. Occasionally I think I would like to visit them, but there are moments even now when I seize on the East Chapel Comedy to use it in much the same manner as the monks used their hair-shirts. Of a truth it is easier to make an egregious ass of oneself than might be supposed. Probably I was following in the wake of John Hylton through near proximity to his person. Which reminds me that Clarice has been forgotten in favour of a peer's daughter whom he met at Scarborough. I heard from him on the point some ten days ago, and thought to re-open my diary at the time. He attempted to say in his letter that Nesta - I use his expression had made all the running during 220 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO their short spell of intimacy, a fact which he adduced to explain his own subsequent perturbation on my account. Her marriage, he wrote, had amused his family and relieved himself. " The best possible thing " was his summing up. The shooting, he went on to inform me, had so far been excellent, and he was blessed if he understood why I had not turned up. There was, however, no mention of Miss Jones or her brother, and I hope these estimable people may now be allowed respectably to die. They have served their purpose, and taught me a lesson. For the future I shall leave Bunburying to my chauffeur or to John. i I had not left Switzerland when his letter came, and my papers were locked in their trunk. Otherwise I should have taken up my pen, although there would have been little to say. There is little enough to-day, and I feel more inclined for a guide-book account of " Bruges and its Environs " than for anything else. There is an unsettled atmosphere about me, and although I am entirely free from the smallest presentiment, I could wish that unusual things will speedily happen. My father may choose to be ill for a month, but that is the longest holiday he will allow himself. Apart from him I am not, I think, in the least inquisitive about anything at all. And yet . . . Truth to say, this aloofness is not altogether to my liking. Of late I have been regretting that Grolier was allowed to re- visit Cornwall. He had earned his holiday, I suppose, and at the time I courted solitude, but at this moment I could wish for him and the car. In a city of strangers one can be much of a hermit, and somehow I do not seem to be appreciating my fellow-travellers. One has heard their stories so often before, and knows so THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 221 well from which book their particularly original opinions are being remorselessly culled. No, I miss Grolier. An audience of one is so often agreeable, and Grolier can be admirably silent at times. I have discussed philosophy with him, and he has had the sense to remain quiet for hours at a stretch. And yet I doubt very much whether Grolier would suit my present mood. In fact I am damned if he would. I should be hopelessly bored. I want something else. I want . . . Now it is a little curious that the head- waiter should have selected the particular moment at which I intended to write down my desire, to inform me that my dinner was served. It would almost seem as though he in conjunction with the Unknown Forces had conspired to rob this diary of one of its most pregnant sentences. And yet I am not altogether clear on the point. I may have delayed my pen and thought for a while ; probably I did ; but I am morally certain that I was about to write down the barest nonsense. In point of fact I wanted, or thought I wanted, a companion of the opposite sex. Having dined, however, in a manner thoroughly to my liking, and in comparative peace, I can afford to laugh at myself. Woman is a brand of metaphysics in which at the moment I have no particular concern. Without pandering in any way to the mysogynist I am content to be in substantial agreement with his views. There are men in this world and I think of John Hylton and Mr. Mabrum to whom women and bread are about equal necessities ; but I do not include myself in their number. This is not a matter either for congratulation or the reverse ; I merely state the fact, and, were I not interested in my 222 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO mood at the time, would expunge my half- written sentence altogether. Its survival must be taken to mean that I was in an analytical mood. It is just possible, I find, that I am enormously romantic. My philosophy may appear but spasmodically at times, that is to say, when there is little else to take its place. Occasionally I may honestly believe in the things I would like to think exist the commonest form of faith and wind my way through life accordingly, but I doubt whether this is so. I may be an opportunist or a very complete villain who can tell ? In my father's eyes, indeed, I am fairly embarked upon crimes of a sinister nature, but he is prejudiced ; and that is true of the Dragon, who in spite of an adverse opinion of myself, pursues me with unrelenting ardour. To the amorous Grolier I appear cold and inhuman, and Mary for reasons best known to herself, chooses to think me an ill-behaved fool with not a spark of understanding about me! There is much to be said for John Hylton's unexpressed theory. Things happen ; one doesn't know why. Were I buying a coat of arms, I would take that for my motto. Oct. 16. I was looking over Mabel Carruthers' letters this morning when another arrived. It bore a London postmark, and I learnt that she is to spend the winter at the Hyltons' town house. It seems there is to be some special contest at Queen's Club, in which she is entered. "I am going for a London triumph," she wrote with her customary assurance, " and can do so with a clear conscience now that my brother has come under the work spell." She informed me that her trust in marriage had increased, and was THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 223 almost sorry that she had not taken John when the chance was offered ! With friendly candour she explained that her affection for him had been purely maternal, a fact which might possibly have escaped her notice at the time. I laughed loudly at this. Few women, I supposed, would care to be so frank, but from Mabel Carruthers I expect frankness as I expect assininity from John. " I shall know how to treat him," she continued in reference to my friend, " when he comes back from Scarborough, but at present Lord Archester's daughter seems to have engulfed him. His mother is vastly amused. And you, my dear man, when do you return ? I shall expect you to trudge up to Queen's. You must pretend to a zest if you have it not, and you will find that all the competitors of my sex are not the viragos you imagine them." " Viragos ! " quoth I, and laughed again ; but I doubt very much whether her tennis attracts me. " You have chosen," I wrote in return, " to come south when I am away. That cannot be helped, but I should like you to meet my father, and give me an impartial opinion. I hear he is ill, but that will not last very long. I have promised to come home if necessary, but at the risk of you thinking me rude, must tell you that I enter- tain no such idea. My father's illnesses are freaks of the moment, of the kind that should be punishable you remember how they managed affairs of that sort in Ere- whon for they are entirely his own fault." I sauntered away to watch the old women making lace. From one of them I bought a few yards with no definite idea of their final destination. We tried to converse, but my old lady was ignorant of French, and our bargain was struck in no language at all. I went to my mound but found it occupied by a bevy of children with military 224 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO intentions. They were storming its heights with the utmost enthusiasm, and I watched them whilst the attacking field-marshal challenged the chief of the defending party to single combat. A difficulty here presented itself, how- ever, for the entire armament of the two forces amounted to no more than one wooden sword. In the cause of common fairness I volunteered my stick, which was eagerly seized by the unarmed general, and the duel proceeded. After this interesting affair had ended in a draw, honourable to both parties, there was a guerilla fight, and I watched until exhaustion overcame every- body concerned. They tendered back my stick with shy thanks, and I passed on. To moralise. Ridiculous as it may sound, I had had a mind to join in their frolics. Quoth I to myself : " You must be extra- ordinarily antique, for you would like nothing better than a game of ' playing at soldiers ' or the opportunity to paste things into books, two of the most senseless occupa- tions ever invented by man." And yet it seemed some- how as I walked away that I had in reality been doing very little else all my days. I had been playing at soldiers when I threw young Anstruther down the school stairs, just as I had been playing at soldiers when years later I had kicked little Mabrum out of Thorpe Towers. And the several works which bore my name on the title page hap surely been evolved out of nothing more than an old-woman- ish habit of pasting things into books. From such postu- lates I arrived at various unpleasant conclusions, and found that I could no longer be termed optimist. This in itself was sufficiently alarming, but when it became clear that thirty-three constituted nothing if not old-age, I quickened my pace, and thought darkly of all manner of atrocities. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 225 To say truth and I shall not be easy until it is said it occurs to me that I have been wasting my life. I have had what is commonly called a good time, but am now finding out the cost. Bruges does not really interest me in the least. I am a crotchety irritable old fool, damned with faint praise ever since I can remember, and now reduced to a pitiful querulousness which is not far removed from the absurdest of diseases melancholia. I am, I suppose, in process of inheriting my father's most monstrous characteristics. As I left the children behind me, I realised these things for the first time, and from that hour to this I have been thinking them over. The only solution but I have just this moment dis- covered that there is no solution at all. We live in an insoluble world, which is a very good reason for exterminat- ing man and putting something better in his place. But I am hardly suited to begin such a task. EATON PLACE. Oct. 19. The underlying motives which lead up to such events as are properly termed historical, are, I understand, of far greater importance to the scientific historian than the events themselves. For myself, I have liked to think of history as an orderly succession of biographies, but this view no longer finds very wide support. One reads much of the science of history but very little of its romance, though I suspect that a new generation may prefer the old order of things. If I choose, however, as I do, to re- gard my father's return to Parliament and his illness of two days ago, which brought me hurrying home from Belgium, as historical facts, I am bound to admit for once that I must embrace the new view, and feel keenness only p 226 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO for the underlying motives. To any one but myself it may appear odd that these motives are in both cases the same. My father entered Parliament in order to marry me to Mary Meddenham ; he became ill for the same fell purpose. The condition of my temper at the moment of writing these words may therefore, in part, be imagined. There came, moreover, the news from Meadows that a Mrs. Grolier had arrived from Cornwall. . . . My father's wire had hinted at a possible death-bed scene, and my journey had not been passed under the most agreeable conditions. I rushed up to my father's bedroom in some considerable distress to find him placidly reading the morning's news. There were the remains of a most substantial breakfast by his side, and of nurses or medicine not a sign. " Good morning, my dear Gordon," said he attempting the invalid manner. " I am glad you have come." I looked suspiciously at him. Has whole demeanour suggested nothing so much as an athlete for the moment forbidden by his doctor to run more than ten miles at a stretch. He had even neglected to remove his pince-nez, and his case of cigarettes lay open by the breakfast tray. " My dear father," said I, " what on earth is the matter ? " " I am very feeble," he replied with a dolorous sigh, " very feeble indeed." " You don't look it," said I with considerable bluntness. *' When is the doctor coming ? " He fidgeted. " The doctor ? Not to-day, my dear boy. Perhaps I am a little better this morning." " Your wire ..." I began. " I wanted you here," said my father in his natural tones, and I believed him. " You see, there are so many things to be done which I do not feel equal to doing." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 227 I wondered what was coming. " And besides," he continued, " you have been away for so many months ! " He looked so comically alert that I could not help laughing. " It is useless," I told him, " to pretend to be ill. Hon- estly I have never seen you look so fit. It is not in you to be really ill. Why not tell me at once what you want ? We'll say nothing about the little trick to get me here perhaps I am not altogether sorry to be home but it must not happen again. You remember of course the tale which deals with a naughty child, a trusting but sensible mother, and a wolf ? " " Yes, there was a wolf in the story," said my father and laughed heartily. " Oh, my dear Gordon, it does me good to see you again." " Very well, then get up at once, and tell me the business. I shall feel more like hearing it when you are walking about the room." I had expected some show of remonstrance, some small effort to convince me that he was not in such perfect health as I supposed, but none came, and I went down to the library with mixed feelings. It was true that I was not very sorry to be home,, but his trick, whatever it might mean, had roused some resentment in my breast. The thing might so easily be carried too far. It was natural, I mused, that my father should wish to see me, but there had been no need for a complicated pretence to illness which was to collapse so ignominiously at the very moment of my appearance. I prepared myself for a warning against any repetition of the kind. And then my unnatural parent came down to the library, and with no more than a couple of introductory sentences 228 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO which explained in the coolest way that he had really been suffering from a headache, astounded me with the news that the Dragon and Mary were coming to lunch. He had taken it for granted, it seemed, that my joy to be home implied the desire to see Mary. I became aware of the significance of his plan. From Meadows to my father himself, by way of the whole of London society, every one, it seemed, had opined that my tour in the Alps had followed directly upon Mary's engagement, conveniently forgetting that my departure had taken place some time after its rupture ! My father was obviously in the best of spirits. He danced airily about the room, would listen to none of my expostulations, and seemed so sure of my agreement with every one of his ideas that I could do little but glare. He talked execrably of broken hearts and marriages post- poned, spoke wildly of careful mothers and loving daughters, and so continued until I was goaded into a final reminder that my hurried return had followed on nothing but his supposed indisposition. " My dear Gordon," he replied, and I shuddered at the continued use of my Christian name, " you are behaving ridiculously. You know well enough you were only waiting for an excuse to come home, and my headache luckily supplied it. It was just the same when you came back from Yorkshire. You came back, my boy, because you heard the news about Mary. Not a doubt of it ! Only then you must go and behave like an idiot and leave England ! But now . . ." " But this is monstrous," I exclaimed, striving to keep back my laughter, " I have not said a word about Mary." " Of course you haven't," cried my father triumphantly. " You don't imagine I expected you to mention her, do THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 229 you ? " He had removed his pince-nez to wave them play- fully in my direction. " Of course you didn't mention her," he went on, " but that is not the point. I wanted to tell you a secret." Here he became portentous. " You don't seem to realise that Mary is as much in love with you as she very well can be ! " " What nonsense ! " I exclaimed, and would have spoken my mind, but there are times when my father's mood is particularly infectious. Try as hard as I would to keep it out of focus, the joke of it all appealed strongly to my sense of humour. I accused him of Jesuitical proceedings of a peculiarly diabolical kind, I referred him to Butler for an insight into the real duties of paternity, I reiterated my intention of declining to allow Mary to marry either Anstruther or myself, and explosively warned him the irony of it ! that one day we should quarrel, but he gave me no quarter, and I sat back in my chair, and gazed help- lessly about me. Later, however, I had leisure in which to lose my temper. It was one thing to enter into my father's lightness of heart for the few minutes during which the old gentleman was holding forth on the subject, but quite another to look upon it from his own imbecile point of view when alone and clear-headed. I could not entertain a doubt that I was about once again to be immeshed in the Dragon's unsavoury net. I was to be treated again by every one save Mary herself as a pawn in the game, and the more I thought of it, the less amiable I became. Life may be an exquisite comedy, but one is not always keen for a mani- festation of the comic. I decided to speak out at lunch ; the Dragon should learn that whatever my chauffeur might do I had not seen him then his master had no intention of following his example. And I racked my brain 230 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO for a painless method of educating my father in the first principles of social economy. I took up a volume of Ibsen and found that my freedom could only depend upon a policy of frankness, and thereupon imagined myself making all kinds of quaint speeches to the Duchess. " I do not love your daughter, and will never marry her," I would say, but such a sentence savoured strongly of the cheaper drama in which I played hero, and as such led to the immediate replacement of Ibsen on the shelves. I became increasingly wroth, for it seemed fairly certain that neither the Duchess nor my father would allow matters to slide a second time without a very severe struggle. And my fondness for Mary I long ago forgave her ill-humour at our last meeting complicated matters to a surprising extent. I accused Meadows of re-arranging my books, and made him take off his coat and work for an hour in my library. . . At one o'clock my father's visitors came, and I was astonished to find that Mary was decidedly pretty. Her hair has always pleased me, but I am bound to admit that there is an attractiveness about her which has hitherto escaped my notice. She is well-made, I find, and has an agreeable carriage. Her mother, moreover, seemed less of a dragon than usual. She talked in an amiable way and her tongue lacked the gross assurance I am accustomed to expect. Things, indeed, went very well until she asked my father after his health, but at a warning glance from him, turned her head in my direction, and waited for an answer. It was skilfully done. " I have been pining on the Alps," said I. " Poor Gordon/' said the Dragon, " you ought never to have gone there alone." " I wanted to work," I replied. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 231 " Work," opined the Duchess, " is all very well in its way, but . . ." " It is not always necessary," interposed my father, and the two of them laughed. After lunch I had an opportunity of speaking to Mary alone, and I would cheerfully give half my income to have escaped it. " You never wrote to me ! " said I. We were sitting in a corner of the drawing-room. " We parted such bad friends, Gordon," she replied in a low voice which was not altogether free from a tremor. " Bad friends ? " quoth I, " what nonsense ! You chose to be angry with me for a moment because well . ." " I am sorry," she began. I looked at her uneasily. " Because," I went on boldly, " I objected to your engagement." She shivered slightly, but I had determined that there should be no further misunderstanding between us. " But when when that was over, you went away without a word ! " " Your mother," said I, " was worrying me to. . . ." Again I stopped. " To marry me ? " she whispered. " Oh, I know that, I know that, I am utterly ashamed of it all." And to my astonishment she turned away her head, and her bosom rose and fell convulsively. " Mary dear," said I, " you are angry with me again for my frankness. ..." " Oh, I'm not angry with you," she replied quickly, and turned back to me ; " I am not in the least angry with you. I only think I understand you better now." She looked at me appealingly. " Yes, I am sure I do. And 232 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO you, Gordon, perhaps you understand me better better than you did. Oh ... I. ..." " Mary ! " I cried, startled by her tones, and took hold of her arm. A feverish glow had come with the tears over her cheeks. " Mary, what do you mean ? " " We ... we had better go to your father," she fal- tered, and rose to her feet. I followed her without a word. The Duchess was elaborately polite, and left me amused ; but Mary's behaviour, which I can never describe, following on my father's few words, had brought me to a state of horrible uncertainty. It seems only too probable that the poor girl is in love with me. I have tried in every possible way otherwise to account for her manner of speaking to me, but am baffled in the effort. The discovery explains much, but the gods alone know whither it will lead. I have been driving about London to-day in omni- buses and cabs trying to blind myself to its significance, but I am afraid that it is true. To think that Mary Meddenham. . . . I am longing for Bruges and its quaint narrow streets and the bells, but I am kept here with my mind busily, but rather hopelessly, at work. And my father is ap- parently so satisfied with things in general that he has become preposterously polite. He takes my advice on every possible occasion. The discovery that you are loved may be numbered amongst the most embarrassing incidents that life has to offer. My poor Mary. . . . XIX FBIARBEOOK. Sunday. YESTERDAY I was introduced to Mrs. Grolier. She is a homely being, not of a literary disposition, but well suited, I imagine, to the new duties she has undertaken. When Grolier presented himself, he seemed so inordinately nervous that I thought it best at once to assure him of my blessing. <; You may stay in my service," said I magnificently, " on condition that the car remains at my disposal and not at Mrs. Grolier's." Whereupon, out of the warmth of his heart, my chauffeur explained that he would esteem it a favour if I would per- sonally inspect Mrs. Grolier in order to pronounce on her a judgment similar to his own. " It was inevitable," said he, in extenuation of his act ; " I knew as much when I first saw her in the shop. These things will happen, sir, you know and where should we be if they didn't ? " " Where ? " I repeated, and wrote him a cheque. But on coming back from the private garage where Grolier lives, I owned myself on the whole disappointed. Grolier had done the prosaic thing ; he had found his mate in a Cornish town and married her whilst I had been tramping the Alps, and that would probably mean that for the future he would be taking orders from two sources. It sounds farcical, but I was vaguely jealous of 233 234 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Mrs. Grolier. Why on earth couldn't the fellow have waited a year or two ? Why had he to get married the moment my back was turned. I almost regretted my cheque, since it had gone to show that I was entirely in sympathy with what he had done. And at dinner in the evening my father laughingly alluded to the subject. Since lunch the day before, when Mary had so bewildered me, he had not seen fit to mention the Rochesters, but of Grolier's marriage he could not say enough. At last the man had done something respectable, he said, and there came odious repetitions of such feeble phrases as " like master, like man," and I who should have spoken harshly to him was dumb by reason of my dis- covery. I simply could not escape my father, and whilst I was seething within, felt constrained to preserve a cold exterior. Yesterday, moreover, when Grolier brought round the car I have driven out here alone he had the ill-taste to overwhelm me with expressions of his own happiness. He spoke like an automaton. One after another the cheapest aphorisms of which the Latin gram- mars can boast, flowed from his lips, until I grew angry and warned him that he was over-stepping his duties as a mechanician. Upon that he gave me a pitying smile, and there is no use denying that for the moment I felt myself to be of a vastly inferior calibre. There is something truly damnable in the manner which a newly married man will generally adopt towards a bachelor. To-day I have attempted an interest in horticulture to please Mrs. Sanders, but I am too worried about Mary to think of much else. ... It is open to me, of course, to dismiss the matter entirely from my mind, and continue in my former cheerful blindness, but in my present sen- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 235 timental mood, I do not see how that is to be managed. And I am quaking in my boots as I think of my father's next move. What form it may take matters nothing it is bound to come. All my veneer of independence has unaccountably left me, and a sheer funk has taken its place. I feel as though I were swimming in the open sea with no immediate prospect of touching dry land. Once, I re- member, I was actually placed in such a position, and then the intense desire for something solid to clutch overcame every other feeling ; all the cold and discomfort and numbness that were gradually reducing me to so much flotsam were lost in that one craving and just now I am experiencing some such emotion again. I am drifting. . . . It must mean, I suppose, that I am an unconscionable egoist, but that does not help matters. Now, more than ever before, I would like to help Mary, and I am surrounded by a multitude of barriers of every conceivable kind. Sometimes I have thought of Mabel Carruthers as a possible helper ; I might speak to her of myself in the third person, but such a subterfuge is immediately dis- covered, and I should look the veriest fool. And yet it is not altogether my own fault. I have never led Mary to think . . . On my soul it is useless to worry. I shall visit the British Museum and seek out my " Dedications." The book should be ready in time for the spring season if I work hard. Midnight. I have been thinking of her engagement. She must have liked the man a little. I cannot imagine any woman, however overawed she may have been, agreeing to marry a man she detested. One reads of these things, but do they happen ? No, she must have discovered some 236 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO good quality in him, and then found that a friendly interest in him was all she could find in herself to give. He is out of London, or I think I would go and see him. For myself I shall stand no nonsense. EATON PLACE. Oct. 22. I am not in the least certain that I like living living, that is to say, at a totally unnatural pressure. This morning the Duchess telephoned early. She wanted me for a luncheon party. I refused on the plea that I was lunching with John Hylton his was the first name that came to mind and went out for a lonely meal at M. Quatrebras' restaurant. But the devil was in no mood for my lie, and arranged that John should turn up at the very moment when I was sitting down at a table. " Good Lord, Gordon, you here ? I thought you were abroad." " I came home a few days ago." " You might have told a fellow," he rejoined, " but I'm very glad you're back. I want your advice about some- thing." " The old complaint ? " I asked. John looked mysterious. He was about to explain, but M. Quatrebras came up, and after that John decided that he would say nothing until to-morrow. I understood his reason in a moment. " Mabel Carruthers is staying with us," he said. "Ah!" " And she's coming this afternoon with us. You'd better come, too." " Where are you going ? " " The Devereux Gallery." " Why on earth . . .? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 237 " I wonder if you know Diana Strangways ? " asked John in the coolest possible way. " No," said I, frowning. " Well, if you come with us, you'll meet her." " Indeed, and why should I wish to meet her ? " " Well, you could talk to Mabel. She's not a bad sort." "So," said I, " you have arranged things in this way. You treat Mabel Carruthers as a chaperon, and then for- tuitously discover some man to look after her. You ought to attend to your guests . . ." " My dear old man, don't preach. Come along and don't ask me any questions until you have seen her." He worried his features into such a curious expression that I laughingly promised to come. Yet even as I spoke I had the strongest presentiment that I would behave like a fool in Mabel Carruthers' presence ; and she, of course, would immediately suspect that something was wrong. For some reason or other I had no desire whatever to rouse her curiosity. And yet, I mused, it would need but very little acting to forego any disclosure at all. There are times when acting is necessary, but my wretched at- tempts in the art have made me depend where possible on other methods. Even with my father I have seldom acted a part. I cannot deny that I find a singular difficulty in hiding my emotions. As a boy I lacked the necessity, and up to a year ago basked in a general sunshine, and had no need to look at my shadow. As we talked on indifferently, however, it did not strike me, oddly enough, that I had but to plead any engagement at all to escape the con- tretemps I feared a fact which has since convinced me that the change which Mary's few words have produced in me, is stupendous. 238 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO At the gallery things happened much as I had supposed. I was introduced to Diana Strangways, a girl sure of herself and her position and pleasantly optimistic ; and im- mediately found myself alone with Mabel Carruthers. She was in the gayest of spirits. She set out to give me descriptions of matches and details of the contests before her, and obtained an unconditional promise that I would attend at Queen's Club until she should be beaten. " You must forget you are in London," she said, " and cheer whenever I get a ball over the net." I offered her the obvious compliment, and from that moment her manner changed. I felt her eyes to be upon me, the while we were presumably inspecting the pictures. She was maintaining an incessant chatter, and there came odd little questions, trickily sprung upon me. I could have cursed myself out aloud. In Yorkshire I had been able to indulge in several duels of a verbal nature : I had spoken to her in a manner not often possible with one of her sex, and we had come to expect from each other a certain challenge which had been prolonged into our correspondence. We had, for the mere whim of the thing, clothed our ideas in the airiest of mantles, whence had followed the cuts, thrusts and parries which had hurried our friendship into being. But her continuance of our tactics now met with no response ; her questions I admit it confused me, and I answered at random. Presently I was detecting a faint mockery in her tones, but it came and went unchecked. She spoke of Diana Strangways, whom she had known for some years, and supposed that John was actually making up his mind at last, but even on this subject I could hardly find my tongue, and we walked through one of the rooms in silence. " Do you know what I am thinking ? " she said at THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 239 last. " I am thinking that you want to tell me some- thing." " I'm afraid I've nothing much to tell you,'" I rejoined. She lifted her chin. " Nothing ? Not after all these months ? Then why have you suddenly become afraid of me ? " " I afraid ? My dear lady, isn't that rather grotesque ? " " No," she replied decisively, " not in the least. You have been walking about as though you dreaded to see me open my mouth." " I suppose I have hardly recovered from my very hurried return," said I, and could have wished I had accepted the Dragon's invitation. " I hope your father is better." " Completely recovered," said I. " Was he very iU ? " " No," I told her ; " he has never been really ill in his life." " But you can't expect me to believe that a mere change of plan upsets you." " Many things," said I, " upset me at times." " But you are upset at this moment ? " " Not in the least," said I, and opened my catalogue. I have not the least doubt that she smiled. There came a pause. " Your letters amused me," she went on again, " but I didn't gather that you altogether enjoyed your tour." " I didn't," said I, and stopped. " A woman of course," remarked the girl, in the most matter-of-fact way. I stared at her in amazement. ' Oh, don't look at me like that, dear man. Surely you know me well enough by this time to understand that I always say what I think, when possible. You happen to 240 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO be one of the few men to whom I can speak openly without having to think whether I am being polite. Also you have helped me to set my brother up, and so I'm doubly grateful for your existence. But don't pretend you ex- pect fashionable quips and absurdities from me. I simply couldn't do it. Now your letters, you know I have kept them and hope you have kept mine told me all sorts of things which you carefully omitted to mention. First of all there was the reason for your going away what was that ? You did not mention one word about it. Well, how could you expect me to understand your letters, if I did not know what you were worrying about ? It could not have been my my sister-in-law, because, speaking ungeographically, the Alps are no further away from Yorkshire than London is. Then why did you go ? I saw something in the papers about Lady Mary Med- denham . . ." I gasped out some words of expostulation, but she would not be interrupted. " You told me what happened at your father's election," she went on in her dry way, and laid her hand on my arm, " and I wondered why you had delayed your coming to Yorkshire until Lady Mary's engagement was announced. And I wondered again when you left England a week or two after that engagement was broken off. I will admit that my impertinence went far to astonish even myself, but that couldn't be helped, just as I could not help dis- covering that your erratic movements depended in some way on . . ." " The ordinary canons," I began. " Let us damn the ordinary canons," she replied coolly, " they have nothing to do with us if we are to remain friends. I want to help you. I do not know THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 241 Lady Mary, but that can easily be arranged if necessary. Now . . ." With an effort I exclaimed that her words were suffi- ciently startling to deprive most men of speech. " You take things for granted," said I, " that are . . ." " Fairly absurd," she finished, " but then I know you will forgive me if I say that you are a fairly absurd person." " And what," I asked, " do you expect me to say to all this ? " " If we are friends, I expect you to seek my help." Faintly I endeavoured to understand what manner of girl she must be to speak in this way. For a moment I was minded to suppose her a meddlesome person with ideas upon friendship and duty by no means in accord with my own, but at the next I was thanking her with some fervour for her offer. " But at present," I added, " there is nothing ..." " Dear man, every word you are speaking tells me there is. Now for Heaven's sake be frank. Is there to be a marriage or not ? " " A marriage ? " quoth I, again startled. " Between you and Lady Mary." " Most certainly not," said I coldly, and waited for her next words. " Then she is in love with you" remarked this strange girl very quietly indeed. I examined the pictures with a seeming care for each canvas and carried on some kind of a conversation with Diana Strangways, but my visit to the Gallery took place under unusual conditions, and I do not remember much about it. The pictures may have been remarkably fine, and Lord Archester's daughter a modern Venus I can- not say. I saw and heard nothing, and am only now Q 242 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO appreciating the power occasionally vouchsafed one of play- ing automaton. I succeeded in performing such functions as might have been expected from me until a chance remark I forget what it was gave me an opportunity to retire. Mabel Carruthers had hardly spoken another word to me, and her adieu was cold, so cold as to set me wondering whether she might not be regretting her words to me. I walked home with anarchic ideas hurtling about in my brain. I would straightway bully Mary Meddenham into marrying me and yet I would do nothing so quixotic. I would tell her lies or perhaps I would tell her the truth. I wanted to marry but did I ? No, I hated the very idea. But a growing excitement was upon me ; it was as though I were starting upon a long and perilous expedition. I imagined somehow that people would shortly be crowding about me with vague messages of comfort, and went up- stairs to find my father entertaining the Duchess and Mary. I was not surprised, nor annoyed, nor alarmed. I had come to that state of mind which can do little more than acquiesce in things with as good a grace as may be. Here was my Dragon sitting stiffly on the sofa her dress matched its cushions and every one of her features suggested a maternal triumph. Mary on a small settee was inspecting a piece of embroidery which I procured years ago from an Italian priest. My father occupied his usual position in front of the fire. I shook hands with the visitors. Tne Duchess indulged in a benevolent smile, but Mary hardly looked at me. " We were beginning to think you would never come in," said my father, rubbing his hands. " I went to the Devereux Gallery " I explained, " with the Hyltons." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 243 The Dragon shot a glance at me. " Yes, I'm so sorry you couldn't come to lunch. Professor Moorhouse came." The Professor is something of an authority on the Dark Ages, and I could only regard his presence at Rochester House as a concession to my historical experiments. " I didn't know you knew him," said I. " We met him whilst you were away," she told me, " and he said he would like to meet you." I smilingly accepted the flattering lie. " You must meet him some other time," she continued ; " an interesting man, but dreadfully untidy." " I rather think Gordon is reforming in that way." remarked my father. Mary laughed at the idea, and I joined her. " I am too old for reform," said I. " In another five years all my hair will be gone." " The Professor is bald," said the Duchess, " and sym- pathetic." " An excellent combination," said I facetiously, but felt bound to add that the Professor, though a first-rate scholar, showed a lamentable lack of imagination. My father expressed the opinion that the historian required little imagination. " On the contrary," said I, " he requires little else. Facts by themselves are used only in schoolrooms. We have to dish them up into some coherence, and without imagination ..." My father made a movement of disdain. * " That is so like you," he complained, " you will never see things as they are. You go through life imagining every sort of absurdity. You do not differentiate between the great things of life and the little. You have no idea of balance." 244 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " I am not alone there," said I, and forced a laugh. I had watched Mary fold up my embroidery as though it had been a handkerchief, and felt that it was only with difficulty she was sitting silent. " I have heard you exercise a very considerable imagination," I continued, " at the Old Bailey." " A very different thing," retorted my father. The Duchess playfully besought us not to quarrel, and proceeded to speak of imagination as though it had been possible to purchase it at so much per yard. " And what is this I hear," she added inconsequently, " about the immaculate chauffeur ? " I looked reproachfully at my father, but he only smiled. " Grolier," said I, " has accepted fresh responsibilities with a light heart. If I had been in England, I should have attended his wedding." " Ah, wedding ! " said the Duchess with almost a mirth- provoking emphasis, and fell to musing. Meadows brought in tea. It amazed me to think that a woman like the Duchess of Rochester, who has moved all her life in circles not a little strict in the matter of conventional taste, should pursue her purpose with such brazen effrontery. And yet, I suppose, she w r as unconsciously following the New View, so fitly expressed in the journals of to-day. Her assailing spirit was soaring serenely towards its goal, her dragon's wings beating the air at their maximum speed. " Grolier's marriage," thought I, and smiled grimly, " is likely to cost me dear." From that moment the atmosphere has become charged with certain gases which I cannot think have hitherto been analysed either by the chemist or by the psychologist. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 245 They are emotional vapours which react on the brain in a masterful, if esoteric, manner. I have come to feel much as I imagine a prisoner feels at the moment when the judge is about to pronounce sentence. You may protest or you may shrug your shoulders it will make no difference ; the judge will finish his address, and you will emerge or retire as the case may be. It seems, indeed, as though I have turned fatalist a preposterous business at which I might laugh at any other time. In the library afterwards I gave Mary the piece of lace I brought home from Bruges. I had taken her upstairs for the purpose. " It was made," said I, "in the oddest little house by the oddest of old women." " It was nice of you to think of me, Gordon," she said and thanked me prettily. " But I didn't think of you at the time," said I I must have spoken the words involuntarily and saw her flush. " I got it because I liked it, and I give it to you because it will make you an admirable corsage." "It is very beautiful," she said, looking up into my face. " Thanks, Gordon." I made her sit down in my patent chair, and explained its mechanism. " I don't often come into your library," she said, playing with the levers. " That must be your fault," said I. " I would much rather talk to you here than anywhere else." " I like the room, too." " Then you are at liberty to come here as often as you like." " And disturb you at work ? " " I will run that risk," said I, and watched her with the queerest of sensations. All suddenly, it seemed, my whole 246 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO soul was being wrung in pity for her. She was lonely and liable to all sorts of misunderstandings even I had mis- understood her and I thought of her as a child who has lost its way, a child keen for the games of its fellows, but inexorably barred from their pleasures. I wanted to tell her that she was becoming increasingly dear to me, that I would do anything for her, that she had only to speak, but the words froze on my lips, and I stood in front of her silent and sad. " Gordon," she said suddenly after a pause, " will you answer me a question ? I want to know what you think of me. I have been puzzling over things, and can't find out what I think of myself. You see, one hates oneself so much at times, and I ... well," she broke off with a little nervous laugh, " tell me what you think." " But I've told you hundreds of times," said I. " Just when you have taken it into your head to be polite ! " " On the contrary," I rejoined, " we've discussed each other almost every day since we first met. I've called you all sorts of names, and you have been revoltingly rude to me. Surely that was telling each other what we thought ! Why, we have dined at the same table, and danced to- gether almost night after night, and never talked about anything but ourselves ! " " But haven't things changed lately ? " she asked tremulously. " They have," I agreed, " but then things are always changing." " Sometimes," said Mary, " I think I would like to run away from every one and play housemaid." ! I told her that the servants' quarters were not always very comfortable. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 247 " I should risk that," said she. " You would be very foolish." " Why ? " " Because things are very well as they are," I replied, and moved by an irresistible impulse I leant over her and touched her forehead with my lips. XX READING ROOM, BRITISH MUSEUM. Oct. 26. 4 P.M. IN my spasmodic incursions into philosophy I have en- countered numberless difficulties in understanding the acts and emotions of a large section of humanity. This is doubtless my own fault, though I suppose the personal aspect plays barnacle with most of us. It is easy to marvel at the deeds which one could never have done oneself, just as it is easy to understand how the majority of murders and other such crimes as more particularly occupy my father's attention, come to be committed, and it requires but a small effort to realise that the world continues to exist from no other cause than that the same ideas are not common to all. Yet hardly a day passes without some astonishment on my part at this or that act of a man or woman whom I had thought to know well. It is at such times that I find so great a difficulty in putting myself into other people's places. I have long recognised the fact, for example, that John Hylton's brain is of a peculiar order, and am not now surprised at his antics, but their steady recurrence remains inexplicable. My father's outlook in the same way is beyond my intelligence : I simply cannot grasp the precise workings of his brain. Yet I doubt whether anything that others have done has bewildered me more than my own behaviour of the last few days. I do not recognise myself ; I have a positive feeling of having undergone a renaissance. I am near to 243 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 249 believing that the maddest theory on the question of re-incarnation is as true as the existence of Grolier or my car. With some reason I have been comparing myself to a home-bred boy newly arrived at a large public school. I figure him lost in a timid wonder, and there will come to him dull heavy thoughts of a past that has been remorse- lessly torn away. Of the life that is to come he knows nothing, and he who was so important at home is become no more than a unit. He will even find it hard to realise that at the moment when he is mournfully examining the cold bare study which is only in part his own, the dear people at home are pursuing their usual avocations. I am become like that boy. . . . This morning John came to Eaton Place at an early hour. His visit amused me. His confidences on the subject of Diana Strangways were deliciously frank. He had the effrontery to announce that never before had he found himself " so tied about inside " over a girl. He sought advice on a thousand points of the least importance, and I played Solomon with a becoming gravity. He won- dered whether I would care to meet Lord Archester with a view of expressing my opinion of John to that nobleman. I promised to undertake such a task in two month's time if it were still necessary. John looked offended, and accused me of flippancy. " You never can be serious about these things," he complained. And I, who had taken the most momentous of decisions but twenty-four hours before, had nothing to reply. . . . " That's the worst of you," he continued, " you are always trying to make fun of me. You fool about yourself, and so you think every one else must be fooling. Old man, you do really." 250 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO John as an accusing angel can be remarkably funny. I laughed at him. " Sometimes," said I, " you will find that I am very serious. If you still want me to go to Lord Archester in two months, I promise to go." A few minutes later I w T as discovering the fact that his early visit concerned other matters beside his own affec- tion for Diana Strangways. I gathered that Mabel Carru- thers had charged him with sundry messages. " To tell you the truth," said John in the midst of a rambling statement, " I can't understand her. She says such queer things." " I suppose she did really give you a message for me?" " Hundreds," was the solemn reply, " but I'm blessed if I remember them. I couldn't get away from her and then all this business with the Rochesters ! Why the Dickens ? " " The Rochesters ? " I interrupted. " What business ? " " She wanted to meet them worried the life out of me. Ton my soul, Gordon, that girl would wheedle anything she liked out of you." " And where did she meet Mary ? " I asked. " At Rumpelmeyers. We all had tea there two days ago. Diana was going so of course I arranged things. But the silly part of it all was that the Duchess thought I was engaged to Mabel ! " He laughed uproariously. " Then she got huffy at something I don't think she liked Mabel and they talked of you. I thought they talked rot you know the sort of thing I mean what a fellow can't understand. You know," he added reflectively, " Mabel is a bit frightening at times, don't you think ? She is so old in her ways. But she admires Diana," he THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 251 finished, and, sitting back in his chair, smiled with con- tentment. In the pause that followed I was minded to tell him the news. Instead I asked him further about Mabel Carru- thers. He told me she was a good sort but " school- mistressy." " Why," he snorted, " she wanted to know why I didn't take Diana to the nearest Registry Office and marry her at once ! " " And why don't you ? " I asked. His face expressed a comical astonishment, but he said nothing. I think he must regard his marriage as a matter infinitely desirable but far out of the range of practical politics. " You would make an admirable husband," I went on, " and I should like to see you married. It would be a relief, you know. You really should follow Grolier's example." " You ought to follow his example yourself," he retorted, and then with an absurd consciousness that he was being intensely funny, he added : " He's your chauffeur, not mine." " Marriage. ..." I began in the time-honoured way. "I've never met a fellow," he interrupted, " who talked so much about marriage without ..." " Marrying," said I. " Well, my dear John, I am going to get married myself, and then you will have to follow my example." He did not believe me. " I am engaged to be married, John." " Good Lord," said he, after a minute's silence, and he held out his hand. I did not add, however, that two whwle days had passed before I had come to that decision. I did not tell him that an exhaustive inquiry, undertaken in^this room 252 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO where I am writing, had led me to the belief that modern marriage is primarily a social arrangement. Hitherto, I found, I had been viewing the subject from the purely emotional point of view. ' ' It did not rest, " w rote one author, whose works are by my side, " on the organic instincts of the individual man, but on the need of collectivity." A further sentence in the same paragraph had strengthened my own belief. " Man," it runs, " would certainly never have invented marriage from his purely subjective psycho- logical necessities or inclinations." I did not tell my friend that I suddenly decided to make use of the very compromise which a week or two ago had so excited my scorn. I wanted to marry, even though I might still dislike the abstract idea, and the woman had appeared. That was sufficient. In the rare visions I had had of perfect companionship, I had been misled into thinking that such a phenomenon might come to pass. I had flung myself headlong into the world that exists nowhere save in the poet's brain. I had been selfish, and a little mad. I had seen happiness and misery about me only to exaggerate each into preposterous proportions. And then a few books in this museum of ours had opened themselves for my benefit, and I had found the remedy. The mystic and the realist might fight out their battles I had nothing to do with them. The desire for a mate had never been so strong, and so I had taken my resolution. But I said nothing of these things to John ; he would not have under- stood me, and in such matters I am deplorably bad at expressing myself. I said nothing, moreover, of my visit to the Duchess and her husband. I allowed him to be ignorant that Mary Meddenham was the mate of my choice. I did not speak of the one stipulation for a private engagement, for which, heaven knows why, I have been adamant. I was silent about my father's ill-concealed THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 253 joy, and about my own misgivings the relics, I hope, of my earlier education in the " higher absurdities " which had been coming and going up to the very moment of his appearance in my library. I could tell him nothing of that curious hour when I had realised the nature of her love passion, hero-worship, call it what you will, which I had formerly taken to be such a friendship as I had had for her. I merely told him under a pledge of secrecy that I was engaged to be married. He went away pitiably perplexed, and I came here in a cab. And here I have been sitting beneath the dome, worrying the attendants, and drawing execrable heads on the blotting pad. Occasionally I transcribe a Dedication, more often I look into the sociological works which have so suddenly loomed egregious about me. I watch the people and wonder who and what they may be, and I think of this thing that has happened. I have dismissed the Dragon as such from my thoughts. Her wings have fallen off, and she has become an amusing old lady genuinely fond of Mary, and prepared to undergo some considerable amount of exertion on my behalf. She has been perfectly honest in expressing her great satisfac- tion, and my father follows her example. We have quarrelled, however, over the privacy of the affair, but here I am firm, and undoubtedly hold the upper hand, a fact which he is unable to ignore. But I should like to know just how many men will visit the Museum and read up the philosophy of marriage, as expressed by the learned men of all ages, before making a practical experience in its workings. Undoubtedly, however, I am here in order to maintain my dignity. I must be attempting to excuse my conduct in a scientific way. Or I may be fighting against sentimentality. . . . XXI EATON PLACE. Nov. 5. AT last the time has come when I shall write down these things that have happened. They have, indeed, marshalled themselves into some kind of order. . . . Mary had a mind to see the old town of Graysfield, and we drove out there on a day that might properly have belonged to September. We lunched at an inn which boasted of more faked " Antiques " than I have ever seen gathered together into so small a space. There was an oak table, worm-eaten and battered, there were Jacobin chairs and an Adam settee, and two or three grandfather's clocks exhibiting Chippendale's best work, and I was hardly surprised to hear that the landlord might not object to a bargain. I had seen the waiter watching my examination. " The world," I observed sententiously, " is not satis- fied with false ethics and false emotions, but it must have false furniture as well if it is to be in the fashion." " I don't like you, Gordon, when you talk like that," said Mary. We were waiting for lunch. " Why not ? " I demanded. " You don't want me to talk about the weather, do you ? " " I think I feel in the mood for nonsense," she declared, and sat back in her chair. " I am thoroughly happy and don't want to think. You are always talking about your 254 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 255 cooks and your philosophies, but now that you're here, you must forget them. Please, Gordon, be anything but learned." Her words brought me memories of the picnic in York- shire, and from that moment I have been tossed hither and thither in a fantastic maelstrom. There have been times when I have decided that Grolier shall desert his wife and accompany me to Siberia, and times when I have thought to apply for a professorship in psychology in one of the older universities. I have ordered M. Quatrebras to compound such drinks as have vexed his soul and pained my interior, and I have frightened John Hylton into a definite engagement. I have played alternately mentor and fool, and I have well, these pages of mine will show what I have done. It was at this lunch, or just after it, that I learnt for the first time something definite about Mary and Basil Anstruther. Suddenly she took it into her head fully to explain her position. I Wanted to hear nothing, but she told me that she could no longer keep silence. It is painful to write of these things, but I have determined to burn this diary on the day of my marriage. . . . She must have passed through a multitude of distressing moments. Alternately she hated and loved me I shudder to think what hours of delicate torture she inflicted upon herself and alternately her spirit revolted against, and bowed down before, her mother's. She was placed in the cruellest of positions. Then, later, when a pride akin to her nature, had made her understand how she was situated, when, indeed, my own behaviour had driven her to bay, she had discovered Anstruther's affection, and, as is so often the case with women, fell to loving him a little in return. She must have been far fonder of the man than I ever imagined, 256 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO and I am inclined to suppose that I must have over-em- phasised his faults. There followed a change of tactics on the Duchess' part, and so came their engagement, but Mary found out her mistake, and demanded her free- dom, and. . . . She was almost crying as she told me of these things. " Our mistakes," said I, " belong to the past," and I spoke of other things. I would write more fully of our talk at Graysfield, and I would add much to what little I have said about the unfortunate Anstruther, were it not for these events which have been crowding themselves upon me. In my present position I can hardly think very much about this little incident of the past, though I feel that it must yet be worrying Mary. She is a dear creature, and her love for me . . . no, I do not at the moment feel equal even to writing about that. . . . I had just brought the car on our homeward journey to the village of Pomfret, and was slowing down to take the sharp curve at the bottom of the hill, when I heard a queer guttural cry, and looking up, saw Mr. Carl Mabrum wildly gesticulating from the door of an inn. I was about to change the gear when Mary recognised him. " Why, there's the odd little man who used to come to your father's committee rooms ! Look ! He wants to speak to you." There was certainly no mistaking his desire. He ran out into the road waving his arms, and looking rather like the ape of pantomime. " Mr. Waldo, Mr. Waldo ! " he shouted, and I with none too good a grace stopped the car. He came up and took off his cap with an absurd sweep, and then noticing Mary, started back in something like THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 257 amazement. I saw him look from me to the girl and back to her. His lips moved for speech a moment before he had recovered himself. Then with an effort he produced a broad smile, and hoped her ladyship was well. He asked after my health, and almost in the same breath hoped for another opportunity to help the cause, and asked how my father liked Parliament. " I meant to write to him only a few days ago," he said, holding on to the car, " for seats in the House. I wanted two tickets for ladies. You see, Mr. Waldo," he added, and cocked his head at a comical angle, " I'm going to be married in a few weeks, and my fiancee is keen on politics. She spouts talks you know, at public meetings, same as I do myself. I met her in Hyde Park. She lives down here. I wish you could stop and see her. She knows you by sight. And how funny meeting you here, Mr. Waldo ! Yes, how very funny . . . urn ! " He had been talking quickly, but his eyes had been roving from Mary to myself, and the smile that accom- panied his words died down suddenly to show me an almost ugly look in its place. He might have chosen to forget the circumstances of our last meeting, and he might have elected to assume a nonchalant ease, but sight of my face I was angry at seeing him brought him and his genial words to a full stop. His thick lips twitched, and his hands relaxed their hold of the car. I had a mind to drive on without a word, but reckoned without Mary. She was obviously interested, and whilst I was frowning down upon the little man, started to prattle of her efforts in East Chapel. Mr. Mabrum turned to her, and his smile gradually reappeared. I thought of the Cheshire Cat in Alice. She asked him some question about his future wife, and he answered her gaily enough. Again 258 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO our eyes met, but by this time he had surrounded himself as of old with an invisible curtain of pathos and my anger was temporarily dispersed to the winds. " And may I come and see you in London, Mr. Waldo ? " he asked. " I should like you to see my fiancee" I remembered Mabel Carruthers' words about him, just then, and laughed out an acquiescence in his proposal. " Of course you have heard the news of Nesta ? " he added. , I bent down to examine a lever. " Mrs. Summers," he explained to Mary. " She married the young fellow who er went to Italy. Ho ! I laughed when I heard of it, 'cos I thought that Mr. Waldo . . ." " Mrs. Summers ? " cried Mary. " Oh, yes, I remember her very well." " Yes, it was a funny thing," continued Mr. Mabrum, and watched me narrowly, " but I happened to be in Yorkshire just about then. I met. . . ." I had started the car before either he or Mary realised my intention. " Good-bye, Mr. Mabrum," I called out with assumed geniality, and saw him no more. " The little man gets on my nerves," said I. " You certainly left him very abruptly." " He would have kept us for hours. Besides. . . ." " Besides what ? " " He is an infernal nuisance," said I ; " that is all." " You look angry, Gordon." " I am not," said I, and there came a pause. " I liked Mrs. Summers," she remarked in a little, " but there was some mystery about, her wasn't there ? " " No mystery at all," I replied, trying to speak off- handedly. " Her father would not let her marry the THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 259 man she had chosen, and so she came to London. That was. . . ." " Oh ! she was a widow ? " I saw my mistake. " Mrs. Summers," said I, " was not her real name." " Then there was a mystery ! " " A very small one," said I. " It is all over now." " And she has married the man the right man ? " " Yes," said I, and must have spoken listlessly. " I suppose you flirted with her," said Mary, and I do not think a sentence has ever jarred more horribly on my nerves. How could she have said such a thing, and yet why not ? A stupid little string of words in pursuit of her desire for " nonsense " ! " I had little chance in East Chapel," I replied, " and I have not seen her since." I do not know precisely why I thought fit to lie. She pouted a little. " My dear Gordon," she said, " I wish I could teach you not to get angry at nothing. Well, I won't tease you. I am enjoying the drive. And so he is going to get married too ! We all seem to be going along the same way, don't we ? " " Along' the marriage road," said I. " It is a broad highway." " And a very wonderful highway," she added in low tones, " a highway which I would not miss for oh, anything you can think of." We did not speak very much after that. Mr. Mabrum's unexpected appearance had brought many matters to my mind that I had hoped were forgotten. I did not wonder very much at his behaviour. From myself on the warpath he could hope for little or nothing that was worth the having, and so, I supposed, he had chosen to 260 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO forget. In London he had made some attempt to assert no little dignity and his " rights," but I imagined that he understood that there was a time for all things. Sight of his face, however, had shown me that I could not follow his example. It seemed to me on the homeward run that he had suddenly forged a link with the past, a thin sharp link which was somehow cutting into my flesh. My mind ran back moodily over the incidents of the East Chapel Comedy, and not even the knowledge that its heroine had come to the orthodox home and happiness did much to brighten the aspect. I dined that evening at Rochester House, and the Duke for once in his life took me some way into his confidence. He is rather a lonely old man the last man indeed who should occupy his position. His yacht is his only hobby, and the Duchess has never yet set foot on its deck. He spoke of Mary as some inexplicable problem which had long been disturbing his quieter moments. He had never understood her, and was sorely afraid that his wife had also failed in the same endeavour. " It seems to me," he said puffing thoughtfully at his cigar, " that some women go through life without properly realising how large a measure of their happiness must depend on themselves. I never remember her to have taken up a position of her own ; she has always been con- tent to follow. She is far too ready to be led. Do you know, my dear fellow, I believe she would have agreed to this marriage even if she had not fallen in love with you ! " " I doubt it," said I ; " I asked her to marry me once, and she refused." " God bless my soul ! " he exclaimed, " you don't say so?" THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 261 " It was after a quarrel," I admitted ; " perhaps that explains it." He laughed. " Well, I can't express my own feelings about the marriage. I am only thankful that we have arranged things at last. My wife will no longer be worry- ing us." He smiled rather pathetically. " She is diffi- cult difficult at times, you know, but I can understand it. We always wanted a boy. That is our little tragedy." He passed a hand through his white hair. " But I don't want to be talking like this. Things are very bright, and you know, Gordon, I can't help seeing the joke of it all. I could have sworn you would always remain a bachelor. For the life of me I could not imagine you married to any one least of all to Mary. I thought you were much too content with things as they were." Here the old gentleman gave me his hand. He was enormously pleased with himself. He continued to talk of Mary, and I listened to more about the Anstruther engagement. It seemed that the Duchess could not suffi- ciently express her contrition. The whole thing, she would say to her husband, had been the most glaring error of which she had ever been guilty, and I gathered that she had no words to express her contempt for every member of the Anstruther family. " Which is rather absurd," said the Duke, " for they are very decent people. The boy is wild, but boys generally are wild when they get the chance. He certainly seemed very fond of my girl. But the Duchess will have it that they are devils every one of them. Well, I can't say much for Mrs. Anstruther myself," he added quaintly. " She is rather terrible." He paused for a moment. " There was one thing," he went on, "I wanted to ask you about 262 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO not about the Anstruthers, but mention of their name reminded me of it. The Duchess and I have been wonder- ing for how long you thought of keeping the engagement a private matter." " It was a whim of mine," said I, " for which I can give you no adequate reason. Let it remain private for a month. I think I must dislike publicity," I added. Later in the evening the Duchess took occasion to ask me a similar question. " I am very fond of you, Gordon," she said, playfully tapping my shirt, " but I wish you would be less mys- terious. I'm never quite certain what you will say or do next." " Shall I tell you why ? It is because I am one of those people who have a horror of plans. I never do know what I shall say or do next. I prefer. . . ." " Oh, I know what you would prefer. Your father has told me hundreds of times." " If you believe my father," said I, " you must think me an ogre." " Do you think yourself an ogre ? " she demanded smilingly. " Sometimes," said I. " I think," said the Duchess, " you have got into the habit of making yourself out much worse than you are." From that time this sentence has been running in my ears. I wish I could agree with her. In the hall I said good-night to the Duke, and when I left the house it was he who closed the great doors behind me had a detestable conviction that I had done^the right thing. The night was fine, and I walked home. I opened the THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 263 front door, hung up my coat, and found a telegram. With feelings which I shall not attempt to describe I read the contents. , Am staying alone Gawthorpe Hotel Rawdon Square come round without fail before eleven to-morrow must see you, ask for Mrs. Summers Nesta. I must have stared at the bit of paper for some minutes. What did it mean ? Why had it come on this day of all others, and after a silence of months ? Why was she stay- ing in London under her assumed name and eager to see me ? What could have happened ? For a moment I contemplated the absurd idea that her visit to London had something to do with Mabrum, but that was obviously impossible. Yet the coincidence was startling, and angered me. It still angers me for it has proved to be nothing but a coincidence. Why, I asked myself, in the name of the gods should the chief characters of the East Chapel Comedy elect to absent themselves for some months and then appear almost simultaneously over the horizon ? I re- read the message, and then, shrugging my shoulders, went upstairs. In my library I sat with the telegram in front of me. So once again this curious woman had chosen to come to me. In a little I was deciding to ignore her message, or to send it to Mabel Carruthers ; the next I had made up my mind that she had indulged in some trivial quarrel with her husband and in a fit of pique come to London. Her wild and thoughtless nature would have pointed out such a course. " She is a child," said I, and strove to think that my words explained all. I remembered that I had offered her help. But I sat up in my chair until my head ached and my feet became numbed with cold, and I thought of old Cardonnel, 264 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I have not even mentioned his name to my father. Well, perhaps that is well. . . . The Gawthorpe Private Hotel is one of those boarding- houses which are ashamed to be called by their proper name. I have noticed on the rare occasions when I have examined them that they are generally managed by followers of the Pipchin school, who publicly bemoan their losses from the modern equivalents of Peruvian mines with an almost religious fervour. In the hall of this particular hotel I encountered one of those military individuals, starched and ridiculous, who may invariably be found in such places. He bade me good-morning in a questioning way, as though, indeed, he was anxious to know whether I proposed to become a " guest," and I have not the least doubt that he waited to hear my business at the office. Mrs. Summers, I learnt, would see me at once, and a diminu- tive waiter, hailing from Switzerland, took me up to a room on the second floor. I sat down and waited. The room was not ill-furnished, but a gloomier place it would be hard to imagine. Furniture, I am inclined to think, must imbibe many of its owner's characteristics in time ; the pieces about me looked forlorn and uncared for. When she came in, I found myself experiencing some surprise to see that she had not altered at all. She looked just the same beautiful girl I had seen in East Chapel, the same winsome creature who had prompted me to such madness in Yorkshire, and there was the same half-humour- ous half-frightened expression on her face as she held out her hand. " Thank God I could trust you," she began, and pressed my hand between her own. " Oh, I am glad you have come. I couldn't have told things to any one but you." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 265 She looked up at me with the bright keen glance of a child who has found sure protection. " I came to this queer place last night. I chose it from a railway guide. No one must know. I could not stand it in Yorkshire, and so I came here." " You could not stand it in Yorkshire ? " I repeated awkwardly, " why, what has happened ? " "It is Raymond's fault," she cried, suddenly angry, " Raymond's fault ! I could not help myself. He has made things impossible. I cannot tell you how miserable I have been." " You have quarrelled with your husband, Mrs. Carru- thers," said I with a severity I was far from feeling; " I am sorry." " Quarrelled ? " She took me up scornfully. "Oh, no, we have not quarrelled. I did not w r ait for that." She uttered a hard little laugh. " It was not a case for quarrelling." " Then why are you here ? " I found a difficulty in putting the question. She sat down at the table, and her arms formed them- selves into arest for her head. " Listen I will tell you. When Raymond came home I lived in a kind of delirium. You will understand just how things were. Of course ! You understood them. You behaved very splendidly to me, Gordon oh, yes, I am going to call you Gordon, and I must be Nesta to you and I suppose I could not think of anything but my own happiness. I did not even think much about my father after you had spoken to him. And then we were married, and bought the little cottage near York Raymond found it somehow and we spent our honeymoon there. And all through the days we talked of our love. We used to buy food together, and talk of our 266 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO plans for the future, and I could think of nothing but him. It was just a wonderful dream with the sun shining down, and no one to come near us. Yes, just a wonderful dream," she repeated in low tones, and her eyes turned to the window, and I saw a faint smile at her lips, but it had vanished in a moment. " Things went very well then," she was telling me, " and when his sister Mabel came and told me that Raymond must work, I was as keen on the idea as she. We fitted up a tiny studio for him, and brought all his papers from Endale and I used to watch him at work. He looked so beautiful," she said with a tiny catch in her voice. " I sat on a stool and could see his profile. But he told me to bring a book if I wanted to stay, and then one day he found he would rather be alone. He would do better work, he said. So I sat in another room after that alone." She moved her position. " Do you see what is coming ? " she asked with an air that was almost comic. " May I hear everything before I speak ? " " Oh, that is like you," she laughed, and I could see that for the moment her trouble was forgotten. The shadow was gone from her face. " You're just the same as ever. I used to think you would never behave like any one else. My dear, it is good to see you again." I had meant to be severe this was surely the time for the assumption of all the authority I could summon to my aid but her delicate figure and her affectionate words had set my blood tingling. I could not trust myself to spea 1 '. I knew well enough what she was about to say, and the sharp throb had once again passed through my body. I knew that I was madly desirous to take her into my arms. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 267 " Go on," said I, " go on." : ' There is no hurry," she said frowning, " and don't look like that. You are angry, and you have heard nothing at all ! " She looked reproachfully at me. " If you are angry," she went on provokingly, " you will not be able to help me, and in that case why should I tell you any- thing ? Gordon, you are angry ! You think me a wretch worse than that ? You think ..." I could stand it no longer. Every fibre in my body seemed unnaturally tense. She might be a witch or a wanton how could one care when she looked into one's face with soft pleading eyes and a smile that would have torn away the virtue of all the monks in existence ? I could not remember that she had come for my help, that I had heard little of her story I could see nothing but her red lips and her dancing eyes. I stretched out my arms, and put my hands round her neck as though I would choke her, and she whispered my name. I held her out at arm's length for almost a minute, and she did not move. " Nesta," I gasped, "it is your fault. I cannot help myself." Our lips met but once, however, for just at that moment a truly damnable Italian started a wheezy organ in the square, and I, brought to realities, suddenly stepped back and stood by the fire, chilled and a little bewildered. But the girl only smiled, and sat down in her chair. She looked at me quizzically, as though, indeed, she was wondering whether my anger had dis- appeared. She put her hand on the table and played with a railway guide. " You can be very strong, Gordon, when you like," she said at last. " You hurt my neck ! " I could not even apologise, but stood staring. 268 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " But then you are a giant," she went on, "so we must make excuses for you. 1 " " TeU me what has happened," I demanded. " You are trying to make me frightened of you ! " she said. " Don't try to be severe. I shall only laugh at you. I have run away, and nothing that you say can alter that." Already I was cursing myself for having kissed her. " Go on with your story," I ordered, and spoke in the tones which I use to Grolier when he has annoyed me. She shrugged her shoulders, pouted resignation, sighed as a child might sigh about to start upon the evening's lessons, and proceeded to sketch the events which had led to this second flight to London. As she spoke of her life in the cottage she seemed to forget my presence I was thankful for that and her words might have been addressed to herself. She possesses that gift of suggesting much in a few words, and under other circumstances I could have followed her narrative with the enjoyment of a musician listening to a fine rendering of a Beethoven sonata. The organ outside was sending up its monstrous tunes, but I did not notice it ; I was watching her every movement. She told me nothing at which I could feel surprise, and yet I was filled with a vague wonder, for it seemed that the very fact of Raymond's effort to work had been the prime cause of the trouble. She had loved his butterfly nature, but Raymond the boy who had sculled up this little river at Thorpe, bore but small resemblance to Ray- mond the man happily set to work. The marriage which had proved to be the turning point in the boy's career, the marriage which had worked the extraordinary change THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 269 in him of which his sister had written with such enthusiasm, had brought but a short-lived joy to Nesta. A wonder- ful dream had come for a little while, but from this she had speedily awakened to find herself living with a man whose character she had never correctly gauged. Little by little, as the new responsibilities had been realised, Raymond had put away from him the very qualities which must most have endeared him to the girl. She who had wor- shipped the good-looking wastrel found little love to give to a man suddenly strengthened, little love for a man who had come to see that life was not altogether a frolicsome game. Butterfly herself she had unconsciously demanded so much from her mate. The psychology of it all was simple, but I was appalled at its tragedy, and wondered whether it could have happened to any but these two. The story revealed her character with sure touches, and for a moment I experienced something akin to disgust. This girl with the beautiful face was not straight. Others had said so, I had said so myself, and now I was realising its truth, and yet I could not help re-echoing my former opinion that she was only striving to be happy. This work of her husband's, she was telling me, had come between him and herself. Gradually she had found life to be the dull routine under which she had suffered at Thorpe Towers. Gradually too her husband had shown a greater inclination for his drawings and plans he could talk of little else and, as the weeks had passed, she who was eager for love, found him cold and what was far worse ready to preach. As she told me this I confess to a smile. The idea of Raymond taking his wife to task called up a somewhat ridiculous picture. " Oh, I see the humour of it," she cried, " I saw the 270 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO humour of it then, but one cannot go on indefinitely seeing the humour in pitiful things. It is like imagining that one's toothache does not exist ; for a minute or two it may help, but an hour's suffering will make itself felt. I suffered in silence for days, and then told him that he was neglecting me for his work. And he laughed, joked about my foolish thoughts, told me that work was necessary if we were to live ! I tried all manner of little devices, but none of them helped me. Then one day I found I did not love him at all. I hated him." There was a long pause then. Once again she was looking out into the grey square. I played with my watch chain. I had suddenly remembered Mary, and it was as though my clothes had become heavy about me. The room was hot and stuffy, and occasionally there came a rush of smoke from the chimney. A bell started to ring in^the distance, and there was a continuous hammering above. In a flash, too, it came upon me that my life in the past month had been one huge mistake. I was no longer free to behave as I wished. I was bound down with the thickest of ropes, and I of all men had tied the knots ! I realised well enough then the part I had been playing, the ignoble part wherein I had been true neither to others nor to myself. The sociological books had turned me into a weak fool ready to believe the most monstrous absurdities. I had engaged myself to Mary Meddenham, but did I love her ? The very fact that the question was suddenly looming in my mind gave me the answer. And surely that meant that I had engaged myself out of pity ! and that in its turn explained my vaguely understood desire for privacy. My own miserable caddishness appalled me. Marriage, I had come to think, was all that was claimed for it, and now I had learnt that THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 271 the one particular example which I had silently been quoting to myself in its favour, had led to Nesta's appear- ance in this fifth rate hotel ! One may realise much in a moment of time. For a little I was forgetting all save my engagement. I breathed hard. I had gone far. What could I do, what could I do ? Nesta had risen and come to me. " And so I am here," she said in soft accents. " What is to happen ? " " You must go back at once," I replied hoarsely. " You must take the next train to York." Her face hardened. " You tell me to go back ? " She shook her head angrily. " No, I will never go back. I do not love Raymond. I shall never love him again. The boy I love does not exist. My husband is old and ugly." " Did he know you were going away. . . .? " " He thinks I am at the Towers," she answered quickly. " Then go straight to the Towers. For God's sake go to your father. Tell him you came here to see your sister-in-law she is staying with the Hyltons say any- thing, but go. I cannot help you." An incredulous stare over-ran her features. " Oh, yes, you can, Gordon. You must not speak like that. You cannot leave me here alone. I have come to see you." Her hands reached up to my shoulders, but I pushed her rudely away. " Don't touch me, Nesta," I whispered, " can't you see how things are ? Don't make it difficult . . . remember you are not Nesta Cardonnel now." She laughed rather wildly. " No, I am Mrs. Summers again." " That means nothing," said I. " It means everything," she cried, and with a little sob drew me towards her. XXII MY exit from the Gawthorpe Hotel that morning was witnessed by the military gentleman with the absurd amount of starch to his person. My gait and appearance must have led him to suspect me of thievish propensities, for he glared at me in no friendly manner, and muttered inimical words, and I, reduced to a condition of ghastly uncertainty, hung my head like a first offender hearing his sentence, and miserably crept out. I do not think I could have uttered a word of defence if he had actually accused me of ransacking his bedroom. In the street, however, I found I could laugh at myself, and walked down the square in some cheerfulness. The East Chapel Comedy was con- tinuing to flourish ; quoth I : " Then I will meet it in the proper spirit." I hailed a taximeter, but on the chauffeur's inquiry for a destination found I had none to give him. He looked at me surlily as though, indeed, he doubted the existence of my purse. " You had better drive me to Manford Oak," said I at last. It was the first place that came to mind. " It is a long way," said the chauffeur. " You will earn a large fee," I replied and got in. He drove off at a pace which might have brought joy even to Grolier himself. We passed through the dirtiest slums and evaded successive hordes of squalid children by a series of miracles which I, convinced by now that I had become a stage-character, witnessed wth only a dull amaze- 272 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 273 ment. The little car danced on, however, regardless of police, and wound its way through dreary blocks of shape- less architecture and a monotonous area of villadom. I sat back in my seat, and could have sat there for ever. Of what I thought I do not precisely remember, but the one clear fact that I had agreed to look after Nesta until a solution of her difficulty which should satisfy both of us had been found, was burning itself into my brain. All ideas of such help as I in a sane mood could have wished to give her, had vanished in the little second- floor room in the Gawthorpe Hotel. I had tried to play dignified uncle, and we had laughed at my attempt. Her kisses seemed still to be hovering about my lips, and all the curses which I could have hurled at her head died down at their birth. Against my will I had taken her into my arms, and played scoundrel to the poor feck- less Raymond whose only mistake, it would seem, was his new-found determination to live like a man. And I knew well enough that on my return to the hotel I had promised to go to her again after dinner there must follow a repetition of the morning's folly. I knew in my heart that I hated and despised her, and yet I wanted nothing so much as to clasp her frail form to me, and feel her soft fingers caressing my hair. At intervals I cursed myself for my action in giving her up at the Towers without a struggle. I could have pitted my strength against Raymond's, and bent her to my will. I could have married her and possessed her body and soul for my own. Yet I had gone" away and waited until this day when she had come to me. I was playing the callous opportunist at a moment when I had engaged myself to another woman. If I had been able to think of these things in a rational manner, I might have decided upon instant flight to Siberia or Greenland as the s 274 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO only possible course to adopt, but the very muddle of it all had begun to exercise over me a certain fascination. As the car jolted on, I began to wonder at my own per- versity. I had done this and that in a meaningless way, little things of the world which had meant nothing at all. I had played with my manhood, and played a game of far less worth than even John Hylton's ridiculous gambols. I had taken no model, lived up to no rules, and things had seemed to go very well, but whither had they led me ? With an effort I roused myself. A reaction, I felt, must be summoned to my aid. Here as before the remnant of my philosophy I laugh as I write the words must be ran- sacked. Momentarily I shut my eyes to the immediate past ; and a solution presented itself forthwith. I would send her money she has never understood that side of the difficulty and a letter to say that I would never see her again. She would hate me and my brutality, but I should be free of her. Out of her presence it would be possible to forget her I had had proof of that and it would not be the first occasion upon which I had played a very complete cynic. Yet a vision of her face looking up into mine tore away any such plan. See her again I must. Life, I mused, was not a test, as one of the French philosophers has said, nor an examination room, but a potter's factory. One must live the life of one's own choosing. And the mistakes which the gods and the other mischievous imps who unwarrantably interest themselves in the doings of humanity, force upon us, are surely made to be rectified. My marriage with Mary Meddenham might give happiness to many, but how could I bind myself, as Nesta had bound herself, without that strange double love for body and soul which alone can build up a true union ? And if I were to see Nesta no more, a voice THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 275 seemed to be whispering, it would be but to marry Mary straightway. All incoherently there came to me the decision that Mabel Carruthers had been right ; the ordi- nary canons must be damned they were for the little people. I was longing for Nesta, and so I must bring her to me. Mary and the others must look to themselves. Nesta had my promise, and it must be kept. Mary had my promise, but it must be broken. The promises that are broken, and those that are kept, together make up the sum total of life. " You want the town hall, sir ? " inquired the chauffeur. He had pulled up with a jerk. " I want a hotel," said I, " where they will feed us." My last word brought a smile of anticipation to his face, and he took me without further delay to a public house at the corner of a half-finished road. Behind us was a steep hill, in the distance a railway station and a football field, near us an abruptly ending row of villas with a super- fluity of bright green tiles about them. The road itself was covered with weeds. " The end of civilisation," said I. The proprietor of the place here made his appearance, and informed me that of his beef I might eat as much as I liked. He was a large rubicund fellow with a bald head. He wore a blue collar and an apron. I followed him into a back room. " Buying property near here, I suppose ? " he began. " I own some myself." " No," said I. He seemed surprised. " Of course there is a good deal to be bought," he ex- plained ; " I shall probably buy some more myself." 276 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I expressed a hope that he would thereby make a reason- able profit. At that he laughed. " You can bet your bottom dollar on that," said he, and then in changed tones he added : " A stranger to London ? " I looked at him. " I live at Friarbrook in Buckinghamshire," said I, and immediately knew what I would do. Nesta should have my cottage ! Mrs. Sanders could look after her until we had settled what was to be done. . . . " Friarbrook," I repeated, and enlarged upon its beauties. Afterwards I tried to dismiss him, but he was one of the limpet tribe. He served me himself, and had a good word for each of his dishes. He talked in a loud voice con- tinuously throughout the meal. He told me which land would best repay purchase, and informed me that a rival of his was " going a cropper " over a public house in the near neighbourhood. If I had listened to him, I should doubtless have acquired enough knowledge to make a successful start in the publican's business, but I was think- ing of Friarbrook and the letters that would have to be written, and when I left him, his respect for me had vanished. On the homeward run I became excited, and rashly deter- mined to banish all thoughts of a future which might exist after Nesta's arrival in my cottage. Meadows greeted me with the news that the Duchess had telephoned. " Her Grace," said he, " asked you to dine to-night, sir, but I said you were dining with Mrs. Hylton." I started. " With the Hyltons ? " Meadows nodded, and I remembered the engagement. " I want a telegraph form," said I, and forthwith wrote THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 277 out a long excuse, vague but seemingly truthful, to Mrs. Hylton. " Then you will not be dining out, sir ? " " I shall," said I, " but I shall not dress." Meadows looked curiously at me. " That is all," said I. " Mr. Abrahams called, sir." Again I started. " He said he would call again," added Meadows, and moved towards the door. " I shall be out," said I. I avoided my father, and dined obscurely and uncom- fortably in Soho. Afterwards I walked round to Nesta's hotel. " I have been thinking, Gordon," she began, " that I had better leave England at once." "Where will you go ? " said I. She shrugged her shoulders. " Does it matter very much ? I can't stay here ; the people are awful. Since you came this morning, they have been eyeing me as though I were a criminal. There is a Major somebody . . ." " I was wondering," said I, " whether you would like me to lend you my cottage at Friarbrook. It is empty." " Gordon, you mean . . ." " I mean," I replied, " that it is yours for so long as you want it." " And you ? " " I will take you there on the car to-morrow." We spoke much after that, and I left the hotel in a strange state of elation. Nothing of a permanent charac- ter had been settled, but my mind was given wholly to the present. Sooner or later there must come news from 278 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Yorkshire, but I was prepared to wait unconcerned until its arrival. And all suddenly I came to look on the Roches- ters with a callousness which has since set me wondering. At that time, I must have been thinking that my father and the Duchess had been solely responsible for this dire entanglement. In my desire to make happiness, I had fallen into a trap, and not all the love which Mary might lavish upon me could excuse matters. To Mabel Carru- thers I had said I would think of Raymond after I thought of myself ; and now once again it was a question primarily of my own interests and desires. The world, I told myself, was packed with idiots who might think what they pleased. Married to Mary, my work and my freedom would be swept out of existence. I had almost made up my mind to write a letter to her explaining everything. And I remember I wished then that it had been possible to speak to Mabel Carruthers, and that Nesta had been any one but her sister-in-law. As things were, it would be necessary to avoid her, and I began to be glad that Friarbrook was not yet a fashionable resort. And having arrived at the conclusion that all systems alike of philosophy and morals were equally fatuous, I fell asleep. Our run to Friarbrook the next day was uneventful. I did not take Grolier with me. Nesta had become thought- ful and scarcely spoke. She mentioned her father, how- ever, and asked me what I thought he would do. " I should not like to pain him again," she said, " but he would never understand." I said nothing, but I was thinking how foolish had been my desire to bring him and my father together. Suddenly she looked up at me. " You are thinking, Gordon," she said, " that this is a curious business." " Perhaps I am," said I with a smile. " What then? " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 279 " Suppose," she went on, " that he Raymond should try for a divorce ..." " I was thinking of that too." She put a hand on my arm. " What would you do ? " I was silent. " We were very happy together," she continued affection- ately ; "I wonder ..." " Nesta," said I seriously, " will you do me a favour and not speak of the future ? " She laughed. " Why, you dear man, that is exactly what I don't want to do ! I was only thinking of it for your sake." We drove on in silence. At my cottage Mrs. Sanders behaved in a manner that excited my warmest commendation, and on learning that my guest was not wholly ignorant of the mysteries of horticulture, insisted upon taking her into the kitchen- garden. I was engaged with a trifling repair to the car. In the afternoon, the old caretaker brewed us a dish of tea, and, as in Yorkshire, I gave myself up to the joy of it all. The scenery had changed, but the picnic was the same. We sat in the tiny room which I have fitted up as a study, and there came a passionate hour which I cannot forget . . . It was dark when I left her. I reached M. Quatrebras' restaurant at a late hour, but John was there in a corner, sipping coffee. He greeted me with a wan smile. " You have the luck of the devil," he began prosaically. " What's the matter ? " " Oh, things don't go wrong with you." 280 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I smiled. " How do you know that ? " " Damn it, you're engaged, aren't you ? " he cried with unusual ferocity. " I don't know who the girl is I suppose it's Mary Meddenham but you are engaged. I don't know why you want to keep the thing secret, but it's like you, Gordon. You are so beastly mysterious. But I'd give a good deal to have your luck. Why didn't you turn up last night ? " He looked comically at me. " She wired for you ! Why were you out to-day when I called twice ? Out with her ! Oh, damn," he added inconsequently. " I'm in a bad temper." " John," said I, " you want to marry Diana Strang- ways ? " " Of course I do," came the mournful reply. " Is there any particular reason why you can't ? " " No particular reason," he admitted uneasily. " Then why in the name of . . ." " You see, I can't make out whether Archester . . . and then I don't know for certain that she likes me suffi- ciently . . . well, I think she does, but she hasn't actually admitted . . . : " Admitted what ? " I roared. " That she loves me, but ..." " John," said I, " if you don't go round to Lord Arches- ter's house to-night and inform every member of his house- hold that you are going to marry the girl, I shall never speak to you again." He looked thoroughly startled. " They do that sort of thing in books, but you don't suppose I can go down at this time of the day and ..." " I shall go down with you to the door," said I, " and wait while you propose." And wonder of wonders, after I had taxed M. Quatre- THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 281 bras' good temper to its utmost, that is more or less what actually happened ! At home I found my father anxious to see me. " Oh, here you are ! Where have you been ? Every one has been looking for you the whole day." " My dear father," said I, " I have been arranging an engagement for John Hylton." He stared. " What nonsense is this ? God bless my soul here are three or four whole days and you haven't been near the Rochesters ! " His tones implied that a few days' absence from the side of one's fiancee was an illegality which could hardly be allowed to pass unnoticed. " I daresay you have represented me," said I. He removed his pince-nez sure proof of a rising anger and glared at me. " One would think that you were not engaged ! " "I shall see the Rochesters the very first moment I have free." My father's exasperation was patent. " I can't understand you at all. What are you doing ? What is this nonsense about Hylton's engagement ? And why do you persist in keeping your own from the public ? It is only another instance of your appalling pig-headed- ness. One would think you were fifteen years old and totally innocent of all forms of decent convention. You well, you are asked to lunch there to-morrow," he added in calmer tones. " Professor Moorhouse is going." " Damn the Professor," said I, " I can't go." There came a pause during which my father eyed me narrowly. " You are behaving very foolishly," he said. " I can't get you to understand that every day is bringing 282 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO you new responsibilities. You know perfectly well that the Duchess ..." " The Duchess may also be damned," said I. " Gordon you are drunk ! " " Of course," said I, and went up to my room. The estimable Jowett is reported to have said that a gentleman is he who remains as such when drunk. The remark has amused me, but I have never, I think, had either the moral courage or the inclination to discover by such means whether I am to be included in the species. Drunkenness to my mind is one of the ugliest of vices ; I would far rather smoke opium or haschish, were I ordered a course of vicious pursuits. Yet there have been many occasions upon which my head has burned and my brain has worked in that curious devil-may-care way of the drunkard, for all the world as though I had been steadily imbibing a mixture of liquors for some long period of time. As I write, I can understand that my behaviour for the last few days has been that of a man in a state of mental intoxication. I have run hither and thither in that manner, peculiar to the drunkard, which is at once mechanical and amazingly cunning. I have stalked fantastically from place to place, and have laughed stupidly to myself when any difficulty has arisen. I have had an overpowering desire to treat those who may have been temporarily in opposition to myself as totally irresponsible persons, and I have cheerfully imagined a world existing solely for my own convenience. But a change has come, the inevitable change which has driven me into one of life's corners, from which a man does not often emerge whole. Yesterday I was with Nesta a day bright with the glitter and tinsel of things and I left her with a promise THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 283 to return as soon as possible. She seemed perfectly con- tent, and Mrs. Sanders' enthusiasm verged upon the ludicrous. I came home ready, if necessary, to frighten my father into a general submission to every one of my caprices, but he had retired to bed. I laughed loudly, however, over his expostulatory note awaiting me on the hall table. I went to my room still amiably drunk, and awoke this morning in a like condition. And when Mea- dows, armed with the breakfast tray, informed me that Miss Carruthers was in the library it was no more than a quarter to ten I was pleasantly amused. " I told her that you were not up," said Meadows un- easily, " but she would not. ..." " Is Sir Henry in ? " " No, sir, he went out half an hour ago." "jTell Miss Carruthers to sit in the patent chair," said I, and sprang out of bed. So the news from Yorkshire had arrived. Well, I was prepared. . . . I found her sitting back in the chair, idly gazing at the bookshelves. " Good morning," said I. " Have you come to take me to Queen's?" She rose quickly and looked at me. " You don't know what has happened ? " " You haven't scratched in the tournament ? " I asked facetiously, and lit a cigarette. She did not reply for a little. " What is the matter ? " I asked. " Nesta has gone, left my brother without a word ! She told him she was going to stay a week with her father. That was a few days ago. Since then she has gone absolutely disappeared. My brother is here in London frantic." 284 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Mrs. Carruthers has left her husband, you say ? " I began, " but I thought, why they were devoted to one another ! " " My friend," replied the girl with a trace of bitterness in her tones, " this is no time for pretence. I used to think that Nesta Cardonnel was a worthless creature, made for the moment, unstable and immoral. I thought so until you came to Yorkshire. Then my opinion changed. I told you so much, but I did not tell you why. My opinion changed oh, it will sound ridiculous because you were attracted by her. I began to ask myself whether I might not have been mistaken. I did not consider you a man to play in a haphazard way with the first pretty girl you met, and I could not suppose that you were play- with Nesta. You were not playing with her. You thought . . . . " " Does this explain . . .? " I began, considerably sur- prised at her words. " You wanted to marry her. Oh, it would have been a horrible mistake, but you wanted to marry her. You, who had always pretended to a paternal interest in women, suddenly changed into a passionate lover. You found qualities in the girl which I had not seen. You were in earnest a rare thing for you and so my opinion changed." " You are paying me compliments," I observed with sarcasm. " 1 am telling you the truth," said the girl rather list- lessly. " My opinion changed, and I went to Sir Austin to plead for my brother." " For no other reason than that I ....?" " For no other reason," was the quiet reply. I became uneasy. The interview appeared to be having an unpleasantly sobering effect. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 285 " And why do you tell me this ? " " Because I have found out that one must trust one's own opinion. I told you in Yorkshire that the girl was not straight. She married my brother, and lived with him for three or four months. I came to London, glad to think that I had been mistaken, and more than ever convinced that your judgment was correct and then just as the poor boy had rid himself of his disinclination for work, just as he was finding out its helpfulness, she left him. Oh, it is cruel. There was no reason, no reason at all. The boy loves her passionately. He has come to me haggard and old. Sir Austin is ill with the shock." Her manner suddenly changed. She looked at me steadily. "It is just possible that you can help me. She. . . " " I can give you no help at all," said I coldly. She began to walk up and down the room. " You thought I could help you ? " I asked. " Why ? " " I came in that hope." " Where do you imagine she has gone ? Is there no letter, no explanation ? " " Not a word." " And you what have you done ? Why is Raymond in London ? Does he think she has come south ? Is he employing detectives ? " " Why do you ask that ? " " I shrugged my shoulders. " I don't know. I won- dered what steps you were taking." Her next remark startled me. " You seem to have lost interest in my sister-in-law," she said. " Is that to be wondered at ? " "It is strange," she continued, " because I could have sworn that she would come to you." 286 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Nesta come to me ? " I exclaimed. A bitter smile crossed her lips. " Did she write to you ? " " No." " Nor seek your help ? Haven't you seen her ? " " If I had," said I, now scenting a difficulty in con- tinuing my pose, " you might have expected me to tell you so at once." " Dear man," she whispered, " if you want the truth, I have been waiting for that." " An accusation ..." " Yes," she said, "it is an accusation. I have come here because I believe you have seen her. There is no one else to whom she could have gone." " There is Mabrum," said I with a last remnant of flippancy. She made a movement of impatience. "It is useless to talk like that. You are the only man to whom she could have gone. In Yorkshire you helped her to what should have been the greatest happiness of her life, and when her butterfly nature longed for other delights than those my poor brother and a tiny cottage could give her, she remembered you. She did not think of the misery she might cause she only knew that it would be pleasant once again to see you. The journey to London would be an adventure ; there would be a new panorama. Oh, you cannot stand there and deny it," she cried angrily ; " every word you have spoken shows me you are acting you who pride yourself on your frankness ! How can you shield this woman when it may be a matter of life or death ? Sir Austin may die my wretched brother may kill him- self ; in his present condition he is hardly to be trusted alone. Is it honest of you ? Is it right ? I am not THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 287 melodramatic don't think it I am only angry with you for your stupidity. You are shielding her. You have seen her, and she has told you she does not love my brother. She is a romantic fool who has bewitched you with a pretty face and a pretence to a heart ! She has come to you, and you have thought ' Marriage is for the little people,' but you are forgetting that Nesta is one of the little people. You are forgetting everything save . . . Gordon, if you know where she is, for Heaven's sake tell me." I had listened in growing astonishment to her words, and at mention of my name, stepped back. A curious trembling came over me ; it was as though I had at that moment begun to breathe a different atmosphere. She was intensely agitated, and her fingers convulsively clutched at the back of the patent chair. A look of appeal, such as I had somehow never thought to see on her face, hardened the muscles of my throat. Her grey eyes seemed to be shining with a bright light. I began to realise the hope- lessness of my position. She knew nothing, and yet nothing I felt, would alter her belief. And then, on a sudden I understood that all this acting, this pretence, was a horrible sham, a meaningless puff of words ; I knew that I would tell her everything. " I know where she is," said I at last. " Ah ! " she said in a long-drawn sigh. I cannot express the enormous relief which my few words caused her. " And yet," I added, " I do not know whether I am justified in taking you to her. She sought my help, and I have given it her." " Were you justified ? " " I saw her alone in London . . ." " You could have taken her back, unless . . ." " Unless what ? " 288 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " Unless you are in love with her," she said in a low voice. " Oh, but you are not in love with her ; you are not in love with her. You blind yourself w r hen you are with her. Her frail beauty appeals to you, and she has turned to you for protection. It must have been so in East Chapel. You think of her as a wonder-child, made for kisses, and your blood surges up when she smiles oh, I know, I know. Women are not fools in these matters." She raised her voice almost to a scream. " You men are no different from us ; we breathe and eat and love as you do. We have our ideals as you have yours, and our weaknesses as you have yours. You have longed to take Nesta into your arms, and ward off the world's blows from her small weak shoulders, but that is not love. In your heart you despise her, hate her perhaps, but you cannot tell me you love her. If you had loved her, do you think you would have given her up to my brother without a struggle ? The love that can undergo sacrifices is found in the books, in heroes and heroines, but not in you or myself. We do not give up love in that way ; we are made of flesh and blood, and flesh is selfish, blood is selfish. We may talk philosophy and profess to scorn this or that small thing, but our natures lead us, and not all the will in the world can sometimes stop us. And you, Gordon oh, I know you so well you are living in an impossible world, thinking that every one about you is a product of your own imagination, bound to act as you would have him or her act. You are a child who would play with his books and papers, a great-hearted giant of a child ... Do you think I haven't read you through and through ? Do you think I would dare to speak like this if I weren't certain of the truth ? Do you think oh, dear man, I can't go on speaking like this. You must THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 289 take me to Nesta. When I have seen her, it will be time. . . ." She stopped abruptly, there were tears in her eyes. She was transformed. Never in my life had I expected to hear her speak in this way, and yet, perhaps, there may have been a vague idea in my brain that my confidence in her had followed on a suspicion of her true character. She had spoken imperiously, but she had spoken with truth. She had called me a child, but her words had cast out the child forthwith. Here, I began to understand, was a woman possessed of those very qualities which I had wrongfully ascribed to myself sure perception, love of truth, keenness for the best that life had to offer. A dull fury took hold of me as I thought of what I had done . . . " Tell me, Gordon, where is she ? " " I have lent her my cottage at Friarbrook," said I, after a pause. " I took her there from a London boarding house. I did not know what was to be done." She did not appear surprised. She did not ask of what nature my help had been. She was not apparently con- cerned with the moral aspect of all. " If you don't mind," she said, " I think I had better see her alone." Then, after a long paune she added : " you know why why she left Raymond? She must have told you. She must have given you some kind of reason." " She thought he was deserting her for his work," said I listlessly. " There you have the thing in a nutshell. She was not used to a Raymond who could think of any- thing but herself. Little circumstances enlarge rather wonderfully, you know." " I think I understand," she said slowly. " Yes, I begin to understand. But* there is a remedy." T 290 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " I saw none," said I bluntly. " Perhaps you did not look ? Ah, I don't blame you. I am only wondering at things. It seems so odd that she should think he had ceased to love her. But there is a remedy. We must thank the gods that she is a woman to whom love means much. Raymond will make her love him again. He has had a lesson." " You speak confidently," said I. " Because I am confident," she replied. " Yes, I will see her alone, and take her back. She will come." " You had better take the car there to-morrow. Grolier can drive you." "Yes. Thanks. Oh, the relief of it all ! But you . . ." " I shall probably go away," said I idly. " Then you have not become engaged ? " I stared at her. " There is a private engagement," said I, and wondered how I could speak of it. " Oh, my dear man," she exclaimed, and I could not tell whether she was laughing or crying, " what else have you done ? You don't love her ? " " She is in love with me. I I am very fond of her." " An excellent reason for not getting married," she retorted, gaining some of her usual cheerfulness. " You probably asked her to marry you in a fit of unselfishness. It often happens. You pitied her loneliness. You thought all manner of sentimentalities. You worried yourself into . . . ." "I shall marry Mary Meddenham," said I doggedly. " She has my word." " You will be selling your soul," she replied, and I was astonished at her coolness. It was as though she had forgotten Nesta's very existence. " There is no other solution.* THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 291 " Is this being true to yourself ? It may be magnifi- cent, but is it right ? You know it is not. You know you have only to go to Rochester House and tell them the truth." I shook my head. " There are many reasons . . ." " A man," said Mabel Carruthers solemnly, " who is not in love with any woman has no right to marry." And here I have sat since noon, within locked doors, hour after hour, miserably uncertain. I have tried to put down what has happened, and feel perhaps faintly relieved by the process. I have been pondering over Mabel's philippic, and if there were a looking-glass near, I would doubtless obtain a morbid pleasure from repeated examina- tions of my wan features. In truth I am utterly worn out. I have tried to read, but my mind will think of nothing but these things that have happened and Mary. In honour I am bound to marry her. I simply cannot do otherwise. I would like to listen to Mabel's reasoning, and would impersonally admit its validity, but this is a case, I suppose, when nature leads the way. There will be a wedding and presents, awnings and an inquisitive crowd and all the rest of it. No, one engagement has been broken off ; Mary shall not suffer again on my account. At least I can make an attempt to bring her some happiness. Perhaps I am imagining difficulties which do not exist. Very probably I am. The world will call it a splendid match, and for once in my life I must make up my mind to agree with the world. And I have always said that Mary should marry no one else. I will take her to Bruges . . . XXIII Nov. 7, 10 A.M. IT is with some relief that I sit down again at my desk. I am beginning to understand the morbid fascination of the confessional .... If it were not for this decision of mine, I could lie down on the sofa and laugh laugh until my cheeks ached, for I who have sauntered through life for some thirty-three years am now changed to a moody wretch, doggedly averse to all but the most abject ideas, and femininely fearful of every one about me. It is difficult to describe my feelings with accuracy, but I am become almost clownish, a kind of feeble caricature of myself, a ridiculous being who might well have stepped straight out of the pages of the atest work on Mental Pathology. Dimly I can see the humour of it, but I am come to that condition in which a man is angry at the least streak of blue in the heavens. And I know perfectly well that in a year, or a month, or a week, I shall not believe these words I am writing. " You idiot ! " I shall say, and wonder why I did not visit the doctor. " You damned porpoise ! " Or perhaps I shall have burnt this diary : it is just the sort of theatrically absurd thing I might do two hours before the marriage. In fact I remember having come to some decision on that point. . . . From the moment, indeed, when last I closed this fatuous notebook of mine, and stepped out of the house 292 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 293 for a walk in the park, I have had little peace. I listened to the yelling speakers at the Marble Arch and was tempted to contradict some of their more appalling utterances, and I directed a polite old gentleman to Shepherd's Bush, and I narrowly escaped smashing the heads of two drunken soldiers who accused me of attacking them. We had an argument, I remember, about my right to occupy a posi- tion in the middle of the path, and I was near to losing my temper, but I slunk off as though I had believed their words. After that I wandered aimlessly along the avenues, and viewed the thousands of people about me a though they had been rather dull inhabitants of a zoo. Once I sat down on a seat and fenced verbally with a woman \vho sought my company, and a little later I started with fright at the sight of the ticket man come to demand his penny. It was midnight when I returned, and my head throbbed with a steady pain. I could not sleep, but tossed on my bed, alternately enraged and resigned. At times I would think of the hours I had spent with Nesta, hours when I had been sorely tempted altogether to forget Raymond's existence, and take her for my own. Some- thing, however, had kept me back, and if I had kissed her in wild ecstasies, it was all I had done. So she could return to her husband and forget me. I asked myself whether she was morbid, a subject for the doctor's skill, or whether she was merely one of those creatures whom chance had treated cruelly by setting them down in the least congenial spot. I thought of her father, and tried to picture the cook whom he had married. It was difficult to imagine Nesta's mother to have been of the stamp of Mrs. Sanders. Yet I came to think that Nesta herself could have nothing in common with me. I had helped her, but that was all. She must disappear from my 294 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO thoughts. The world was large, and worry on her account would be misplaced. Mabel a woman truly after my own heart had taken over my responsibilities, and of all my friends she could best be relied upon for help. I revolved in my mind all she had done in the short time I had known her, and had a wish, absurd enough, then and there to write her a letter expressing my thanks. It seemed inconceivable that I had ever thought to de- ceive her, and I cursed myself for the game I had played with her as with others. I pondered over my father's oft-repeated assertions of my own ineptitude, and took childish resolutions to alter my character forthwith. The uneasy thoughts which had worried me at Bruges now returned doubly disturbing. And then in the midst of my discomfort, I remembered Mary. It was as though heavy weights had fastened themselves to my neck and limbs. I might tell myself, I did tell myself, that my marriage would be a martyrdom, wherein I should find lasting excuse for the mistakes of the future. Mabel, who understood me so well, had told me that I should be selling my soul, but on this one point she was wrong. Her woman's view could not be mine. All the philosophy in the world could not remove honour from the human path. Yet I found myself puzzling over the meaning of the word. The world from its birth had spoken of honour, but what exactly was it ? A promise redeemed ? I remembered some words on the subject which I had written earlier in the day. A promise was broken or kept the difference seemed vague. And I, who all my life, had been inveigling against the marriage of respectable convention, was now being led to adopt it ! I wanted to marry, and I had made my choice. I was tired of living alone, and Mary wanted to marry me she and my father THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 295 and the Duke all were keen for the marriage. And I had become vastly sentimental and was in process of em- bracing every one of the doctrines which had been least to my liking. It might be monstrously unjust, but that could not be helped. In some desperation I recalled the sociological books, and attempted to find solace from a memory of their wisdom. I might as well have tried to extract from a dry crust the subtlest flavours of M. Quatre- bras' art. By the morning I had decided to see Mary without delay, apologise for my long absence, and arrange for an imme- diate marriage. I sat down in a dull misery. My father beamed at me over his glasses. " I want your car to-day," said he. I told him that it was already lent. " Lent ? " he cried incredulously. " To whom ? " " Does that matter ? " I asked wearily. " Matter ? " repeated my father angrily, " is that an answer to my question ? You appear to think that I never wish to know anything about you ! Now tell me what is all this mystery ? Where is the car ? Why are you never here ? You have got into the habit of forgetting my existence ! I shall not stand it much longer." " If you want to know, I have lent the car to Miss Carru- thers, a friend of the Hyltons." He shrugged his shoulders. " Very well, then, I cannot have it. But you are too provoking." " Because I happen to have lent the car when you want it ! " I retorted hotly. " My dear father, there are times when . . ." " It has nothing to do with the car," he broke in. " I am angry because you will never treat me as a friend. 296 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO Lately you have been behaving preposterously. You do nothing but disappear. If you don't tell me what is wrong, I I shall leave the house ! You never go near the Rochesters, and the Duchess is seriously worried. Last night she asked whether you were ill. I was hard put to it for an excuse. And Mary ..." " What of her ? " I asked. He looked at me sharply. " Have you quarrelled about anything ? " " No, we have not quarrelled," said I, " and I am going round to her this morning to arrange about things." " You mean that ? " His tones annoyed me. " Of course I mean that. You don't suppose I am going to . . ." " I was really wondering," said my father anxiously, " whether you wanted to to break it off . The Duke . . ." " I shall see the Duke," said I. There was a long pause. " The Duchess," said he at last, " will blow you up." I went out but not to the Rochester House. I walked down Piccadilly, and by chance met John. " My dear old man, it's settled ! We are to be married in December. You are a splendid fellow. I feel I feel absolutely drunk. It was all arranged yesterday. I don't know what I did. My dear Gordon," he added in his most portentous manner, " the two of us are devilishly lucky oh, devilishly lucky." I had almost forgotten his existence, but congratulated him, and found some pleasure in viewing his healthy smiling face. With his hands playing with my watch- chain, he gave me a detailed account of the affair. I THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 297 was called upon to imagine Archester House as the centre of the universe, where every one was a good fairy. I listened to such a catalogue of virtues which had attached themselves to Diana Strangways as might at another time have prompted me to a playful retort, but I could only compare his joy with my own pitiable condition, and wait in patience until I could escape him. " But something has happened to Mabel," he continued, as I was preparing to leave him. " She seemed queer . two nights ago, and went out all yesterday rather myster- iously. Last night, too, she hardly congratulated me. Do you know anything about it ? " " I ? How should I know ? " " Oh, I don't know, but you seem to understand her better than I do." I smiled at that. " Perhaps I do," said I, and left him. I do not think I have ever spent a more miserable day. I walked into the city and had lunch in a cellar, and listened to a multitude of conversations which were totally unintelli- gible. At one end of the room a top-hatted crowd was devouring sandwiches in uncomfortable positions, and shout- ing their tit-bits of news. A commissionaire came in and called out a German name, and a little fat man rushed out with his mouth full of meat and crumbs covering his coat. Here, indeed, was a world of which I knew nothing at all, and I wondered whether I should ever have to enter its precincts. From the city I walked into East Chapel, and visited the dismantled shop from which our memorable cam- paign had been directed. I stood and gazed at the win- dows which had once been covered with enlarged photo- graphs of my father, and reflected that at this moment Nesta would be receiving an unexpected visitor. What 298 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO might be happening I did not know ; what exactly she might think of me I could not imagine, but from the dirty little shop there seemed to be issuing faintly accusing voices. Just then, however, my reflections were dis- turbed by a workman who wished me good-day and asked after my father. Temporarily I became politician and spoke learnedly upon the Housing Question and the Women's Suffrage movement. " I'm married since the election, sir," said my unknown friend. " You remember you came to my mother's house with 'er ladyship." " Ah ! " said I. " The missus was there too. She was 'elping the old woman, you know." " And so you are married," said I. " Well, I wish you good luck." The man chuckled. " Thank you, sir. Some of 'em needs it," he added rather cryptically. " The luck," he explained. " Some of 'em don't take on with the right gal. They're the fools w T ot deserve all they get." " Of course," said I, looking at him. " And we was married on a Friday, Liza and me ! " I could only smile vacantly. " A man," he continued and frowned sagaciously, " wot doesn't marry the right gal may as well 'ang 'imself." " You think . . .? " " I knows," said my unknown friend, and I was silenced. I left him after some discussion about an agricultural measure in which he was interested it is amazing how one can discuss such things without the smallest knowledge of them and walked eastwards. I came to a marsh- like tract of land, where the building and the vegetation seemed as moribund as the inhabitants. I wandered in THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 299 strange places, and inspected factories and odd machinery in a manner which might have done credit to a paid official himself. Ultimately, I arrived at Barking and looked at the sewers, and there moralised. It was dark when I returned. Meadows told me that my father had gone to the club. " Has any one called ? " " Mr. Abrahams, sir. He called twice in a fair temper." I smiled. " I have not the smallest desire to see him," said I. " So I thought, sir. He's a little nuisance, that's what he is." " Did you tell him that ? " I inquired. " No, sir," said Meadows almost reproachfully. " I merely told him you were out. He didn't believe me, so I shut the door." It is Mabrum's lot to be refused admission in many places, my own to be cursed with a philosophy which fails me altogether at a critical moment. Yet I suppose that is the way of things. We are become a nation of talkers. We howl out our detestation of this and of that, but we change nothing, or if we do, it is in self-defence. I am not one whit better than Mabrum. He has shouted and howled, and I have followed suit. A Martian on a flying visit to this planet would assuredly bracket us together. I am probably just as great a nuisance to the world as is the little Jew a mortifying reflection. News of Nesta came late. Grolier brought me a note at eleven o'clock. He seemed tired and suspicious. He had driven one lady to Friarbrook and brought back two, one of them being the lady of the picnic, and he desired I suppose naturally some explanation. In his face 300 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO I could see all manner of emotions. Mrs. Grolier, I thought, must already have implanted a new idea of respectability in his vagabond soul. His bibliomania, as a form of insanity, would fly before the Domestic virtues, and he would proceed to collect children in place of a library. There might even come a time when he would regret his marriage as I regretted it, and whilst I was looking at him, it occurred to me that I had made this question of marriage an absolute obsession. I had ceased to think of anything else. Well, who can wonder at that ? I read Mabel's note. It was fairly concise. She had gone to fetch her sister-in-law, and her sister-in-law had come back without a word of expostulation. And at the moment of writing, she informed me, Raymond and his wife were falling very much in love with one another, ' That is the only way," she wrote, " in which I can explain things. I did not hesitate to tell her the truth, and she was not altogether sorry to return. Raymond. I said, had seen his mistake, and I took it for granted that she would be magnanimous enough to forgive him. On our way back she spoke of you. She said you were odd. I agreed with her. She asked me if Raymond would be able to understand the life she wanted to lead, and I told her that we should all understand. She was anxious about her father. I have come to the conclusion that she is a woman whose face will always attract men and irritate women. There will assuredly be further quarrels, and you and I will probably have to lay our heads together on many occasions. My brother and his wife and you are the three most misguided creatures in the world, they for quarrel- ing, you for persisting (if you do persist) in well, I will not finish the sentence. Your chauffeur drove splendidly " THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 301 " Shall you be wanting me to-morrow, sir ? " asked Grolier. " Grolier," said I, passing the question, " how do you like marriage ? " " Very well, thank you, sir." " It has made you respectable." " What do you mean, sir ? " He stared at me uncom- fortably. " You were thinking all the way home that I was not in the least respectable ..." He grinned sheepishly. " No, I shall not require you to-morrow," said I. I spent half the night reading a Life of Peter the Great- Meadows has just come in to tell me that the Duchess is in the drawing room. I am quite unprepared .... Midnight* I am utterly incapable of writing a coherent sentence, but I am no longer engaged to Mary . . . XXIV FBIARBROOK. Nov. 11. I AM done with horticulture altogether. I am utterly sick of it. The three days, that I had meant to devote to the plotting of my thesis on "Love and its Allies," have been wasted upon one prolonged effort to follow Mrs. Sanders' instructions. There is nothing that gives me greater pleasure than a garden. Only in it can there be a perfect coalescence between man's schemings towards beauty and nature's. But if I love gardens, I do not like the making of them. When I came here, a crazy fugitive from friend and foe alike, I discovered a strong desire to impart to the semi-civilised wilderness which surrounds the cottage some semblance of culture. Mrs. Sanders procured me a spade and a man, and with their help I have been digging paths and planting various cuttings, but the experiment shows small signs of success, and I have temporarily at any rate abandoned it. Instead I have re-opened my diary. I absolutely refuse to read what I have written. I imagine it to be the sorriest stuff, the ramblings I speak of the later entries of an impossible spirit now resident, I hope, in Hades, which for some days possessed my un- fortunate person. Now, however, that ridiculous devil has been cast out without clerical aid, and once again I am able to see things with the normal eye. It is a vast relief. There may be raging souls in London, but here 302 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 303 there is peace over everything. Here I can work and prepare to add undisturbed to the world's knowledge about love. It is a task for which I am probably as well suited as any one else, and I shall not hesitate to speak the truth. As a last resource I shall publish the book at my own expense. Originally this diary of mine was supposed to embrace a narrative, but of late it must have become little more than a medley. Well, life is a medley and not a narrative. One does not arrange things from an artistic standpoint, and even if it were the fashion to do so, I should probably include myself in the minority which did not. There is, of course, a general artistry in life, but for the many, life itself can never be an art. I write down these words which may be the veriest nonsense, because it is being borne upon me that my desire to marry Mary Meddenham was nothing but a sudden wish to make of my own life something pertaining to an art. From motives of curi- osity, perhaps, I wished to build round myself a structure raised on artistic principles. Martyrdom, like any other useless thing, may be artistic. I essayed pity to find that it was appreciated neither by others nor by myself. I did not listen to Mabel Carruthers, and consequently passed hours in the very worst state of sentimentalism. And I only regained my freedom the irony of it ! by the machinations of my old friend Carl Mabrum ! Yes, after all, there is, I suppose, considerable con- tinuity in things. Of all the people in the world it has fallen to the little Jew's lot to give me my freedom. . . . Could anything be more unexpected or grotesque ? Months ago I had the pleasure of kicking the little man out of Thorpe Towers, and he swore revenge. Until four days ago, I could only suppose that he had decided 304 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO to forget his words, but I was not extremely interested. Nor had our chance meeting at Pomfret aroused my curi- osity, and his several calls at a time when I was worried almost to death meant nothing to me, but now I begin to understand their purport. On my soul, revenge is a curious thing. Here is this little Jew, flamboyant at intervals, who threatens me with all kinds of bloodcurdling horrors, and nothing happens ; but he sees me by chance with Mary Medden- ham, and remembers the past. And he revenges himself upon me. By the gods he revenges himself upon me ! I could laugh out aloud, and shout to the skies, but perhaps there is a cold muscle at the top of my larynx, and that keeps me silent, and occasionally I feel just the least forlorn. . . . I do not even yet know all the details, but I have little desire to learn more of what I now regard as a rather unnecessary farce. I did not seek admittance to the plat- form upon which it was staged, and I have made an exit in my own manner. I regret the breach with my father, but have little doubt that he will ultimately see the hope- lessness of regarding me as an infant. Of Mary herself I shall try not to think when I have written down a very few further pages, and I shall not, I expect, continue my diary. The confessional is losing its charm, and what time I have to give to literary work, is to be devoted to my love thesis. . . . When the Duchess came to Eaton Place four mornings ago, it was to give me a further, and I hope, a final insight, into the principles of dragonims. She stood in the middle of my drawing room, stiff and frowning. I had no doubt that she would have folded her arms had her corsage allowed. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 305 " Good morning," said I, opening the most unbeliev- able interview at which I have ever been present. She barely acknowledged the greeting. " I have been intending to come round to Rochester House . . ."I began. " It is late in the day to do that," was the reply. " Late, Duchess? " " After a week's absence." " Which I can explain." A scornful smile crossed her face. " We can both ex- plain it." " Perhaps not in the same way," I ventured. " In exactly the same way if we choose," said the Duchess. I stared at her. " It is so exceedingly painful," she continued, " for me to come here that I had thought of bringing my husband. But he has gone out with your father." There came a long pause. " I have often wondered," she went on at last, " if you really realise what you have done." I had a sudden overwhelming desire to be flippant. " Probably not," said I. Her look of reproach changed instantly to one of resign- ment. She stared at me as though obliged to speak to an impertinent stranger. " Duchess," said I, " you have apparently come here with an accusation. May I ask what it is ? " Another long pause intervened, and I am sorry to con- fess that a repetition of the indictment which followed is out of the question. I do not remember many of its details. I only know that the Duchess in wearisome periods ac- cused me of persistent immorality. I learnt that I had 306 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO brazenly deserted her daughter for a creature who had disgraced British womanhood by a series of appalling steps which she could hardly bring herself to mention. Whereupon I politely asked what she might mean. She had worked herself into some considerable passion, and each sentence had been angrier than the last. " You know well enough what I mean. I mean Mrs. Summers." " Mrs. Summers ? " said I, and I do not know whether I was vastly surprised or no. "It is rather ridiculous," she continued, " for you to pretend . . ." " I am pretending nothing," said I. " You have given me no time." " It has cost me something to come here," she took me Up, " and I am not in the mood for frivolity. It is only out of friendship for your father ..." " Really, Duchess," said I, with the glimmer of a smile, " I am not a schoolboy even though a good many people have got that idea into their heads. Will you kindly explain what you mean ? " " What I mean is clear enough. You became engaged to Mary whilst this woman was she still is, I suppose your mistress ! " I stared at her in the blankest amazement. Could it really be the Duchess of Rochester who was thus speaking to me in my own drawing room ? Was it not a fantasy of my own imagination, brought on by my hours of worry ? Coldly I asked for her authority. " Mr. Carl Mabrum," she replied, and pursed up her lips. I stepped back into a chair. " Mabrum ! Good Lord ! " Evidently she did not expect to find me unabashed, THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 307 and I was hard put to it not to laugh. So she had made the acquaintance of Mr. Carl Mabrum ! " And what," I asked, " has Mr. Mabrum been telling you ? " " He has told me everything. He was good enough to explain what took you to Yorkshire and the events, the shameful events, which followed. At first I did not be- lieve him, but he showed me letters from various respect- able tradespeople in York. He told me of his surprise at seeing you somewhere in the car with Mary, and explained that he was certain you had married this this woman. He wired up to York and found that she had gone to Lon- don, and by some means he found that you had seen her here. Oh, Gordon, how could you have done it ? How. . . " And you have come here. . ." " You don't deny the facts, I suppose ? " " Facts ? " quoth I, " have you given me any ? " " The facts are not pleasant, and I have not come by them in a pleasant way, but that cannot be helped. It is perfectly natural that Mr. Mabrum should have a grudge against you. He was engaged to this Mrs. Summers, when you took her away from him. He was trying to see her in Yorkshire, when you went up there and almost killed him. I should have thought," she added scorn- fully, " that you might have attacked some one of your own size." " Let us get to the other facts," said I, growing angry. " She then married another man whose name I have forgotten, and you went abroad. I have nothing to say against that, and when you came back you asked our per- mission to marry Mary, but when I gave that permission I did not expect that you would be staying with this Mrs. Summers in a London hotel within a few days." " Nor," I added, hiding my astonishment, " did you 308 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO know that she would later be going to my cottage at Friarbrook." " No, I did not know that," gasped the Duchess. " I do not know how you can tell me that." " I do not know," I broke in hotly, " how you can have employed spies in this way." She reddened. " I knew nothing until Mr. Mabrum asked to see Mary last night. It was he who, still foolishly in love with this wretched creature, had had her watched. It was discovered that she had come to London, and you were seen with her. Mr. Mabrum considered himself justified in employing detectives. There I have finished with the whole horrible business. The engagement is at an end. It is useless to deny anything." " Perfectly useless," I agreed, " for nothing would induce you to believe what I said. Oh, no, it would not. Your mind is made up. You have seen documents and you have seen Mabrum. But that is not the point. You are at liberty to accept what statements you like, but you will excuse me if I say that you are not at liberty sum- marily to announce the end of our engagement. That is a matter for Mary and myself. She laughed rather bitterly. " I might forgive you," she said, " for your father's sake, but Mary will not. I have a letter for you." " I release you from our engagement. I do not wish to see you again. Mary Meddenham." I could not help thinking of a somewhat similar note written by Nesta to Mr. Mabrum. History, I suppose, i like John Hylton, and repeats itself. " A piece of dictation," said I coolly. " Gordon, you will go too far," she cried quivering. " Let us have an end to this," said I, getting out of my THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 309 chair. " I happened to thrash Mabrum pretty severely, and he has evidently poured out his woes into your ears. For some reason or other you have elected to believe on a sudden that I should make a most undesirable son-in-law, and you have come here with an accusation which happens to be false. I say nothing to that. I can understand just what you are thinking, but to found it upon the presumably fantastic utterances of this little Jew and his detectives, is rather too absurd. Mrs. Summers is a great friend of mine or was and she has had trouble. . ." " Trouble ! " said the Duchess with sarcasm. " Trouble," I repeated, " and I have done all these things which the detectives have apparently been watching with so much interest, in order to help her. That is why I have not been able to come to Rochester House. . ." " And do you think that a man who does that kind of thing is to marry . . . ." " I shall be responsible to no one for my actions." " Gordon, if I had not the highest respect for your father, I would refuse to speak another word to you." " In that case," said I, now extremely angry, " it will be better if you leave now. I shall see Mary at once." And with regard to the Dragon that is all. I did not learn how much Mr. Mabrum had obtained for his informa- tion, but that perhaps is the only point in the whole busi- ness which I thoroughly regret. That he had chosen to employ detectives amused me, but I could not help wonder- ing whether they had been paid in cash for their services. The little Jew, I suppose, has more tenacity than I had credited him with, but I only hope he is tenacious enough to wish for another interview with myself. I saw Mary the same morning. It was not a pleasant 310 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO interview, although I left the house a free man, and abso- lutely convinced that I had saved both Mary and myself from what must have been a tragedy. Nor do I care very much to write down what I remember of her words. It was, I suppose, a repetition of our few minutes' con- versation some months ago on the second landing of Mrs. Anstruther's house. I told her exactly what had occurred with regard to Nesta so much I owed to her and pointed out that she must choose between her mother and myself. In passionless tones, however, she reminded me that I had told her a He on this very subject. I had denied seeing Nesta until a confession had been forced upon me. Almost nonchalantly she asserted that our marriage could lead to nothing but unhappiness ; the engagement had been a mistake a second mistake. Her calmness almost made me break down it seemed so strange, so unreal, that Mary and I, who had been chums that is the only word for years, should be talking like this ; but I could not help understanding into what folly I had been eager to hurl myself. I was intensely sorry for her, but her cold demeanour made me stilted, and I left the house within ten minutes. My visit had been useless. I could not tell her I loved her, and I could not doubt that she had discovered from what motives my proposal had been made. We were both of us mightily dignified, but if I see her again, which is doubtful, I shall think of the old Mary who was keen for my jokes, and I shall laugh at her. I hope, indeed, that she sees the absurdity of our attempt to gratify our respective parents. But the sense of humour which she undoubtedly possesses must /emain latent if the Duchess continues to assert her authority. I am sorry to think that Rochester House will see me THE SCANDALOUS MB. WALDO 311 no more, but that cannot be helped. Mary Meddenham will marry Anstruther, or somebody else, and I may write to her then. . . . My father at a dinner party can make himself so ex- tremely agreeable that I am often not a little proud of our relationship, and on the rare occasions when I have visited the criminal courts, I have been thrilled by his persuasive eloquence ; but within his son's house, he is no more than an obstinate old gentleman, tyrannical so far as I allow, and utterly incapable of . believing himself in the wrong. I am exceedingly fond of him, and in the past years have done what I can to show my affection. I have condoned his outbursts of temper, and I have tried to maintain a harmonious atmosphere about us. But this present business has been the means of estranging us, and to-day I cannot make up my mind whether we are to live permanently or only temporarily apart. I say nothing to his amusing behaviour in turning me out of my own house, nor to his accusations about my private charac- ter, but he somehow had arrived at the asinine conclusion that the methods, if they can be called such, which I had seen fit to adopt, had followed on the machination of Mabel Carruthers he saw me immediately after coming from Rochester House and I did not conceal my opinion of him. " You have ruined your life," he shouted without preamble. " You have told me lie upon lie. I have heard everything from the Duchess. She has begged me not to mention your name to her, and I shall certainly respect her wish. You have behaved . . ." " Like an immoral scoundrel," said I. " Really the number of people who are telling me that, I presume for my own good, is enormous. My dear father, please let 312 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO us forget this affair. It is finished. You and the Duchess worked hard to marry me, and you happen quite by chance to have failed. There was certainly a time when I thought I could meet your desire ..." " Meet my desire ? " cried my father. " Don't speak like that ! Don't dare . . ." " Both of us," I interrupted, " have some claims, you more than myself, to be called elderly people. Don't let us. . ." " Elderly people ! " screamed my father. " Yes," said I. The old gentleman raved forthwith. He culled from an extensive vocabulary several epithets which, whilst intending to insult, only amused me. I was at pains to show him that he and the Duchess had brought about the affair, and intimated that his mistaken views on my age and character had been responsible for all the worry there had been. " Not a bit of it," cried my father reduced to absurdity. "It is this Carruthers girl. I have heard a lot about her. I made it my business to hear a lot about her. She tried to marry John Hylton, and now, I suppose, she is trying to marry you. Oh, don't interrupt. I know what I'm speaking about. I have heard things about her. I have made inquiries." " The devil you have," said I. "I am sorry to think they must have disappointed you." , There was a pause. " Gordon," said my father, " you are damnably imperti- nent ! The girl is scheming ..." "To win a tennis tournament," said I facetiously, and my father was silent. At dinner, however, there came a crisis. My father's THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 313 rage knew no bounds at all, and during dessert I announced my intention of removing one of us from the house. Whereupon my father said that the sooner I disappeared from his sight the better. " The world," said he, " will probably call you a cad." " Very probably indeed," said I, and made preparations for a hurried departure. A letter has just come from Mabel. . . . XXV THE HALL, NBTTLESHAM, Jan. 26. AFTER all there must be another entry in this diary of mine. On March the second of this year I am going to be married. The years of pig-headedness are over, and I am marvel- lously content. For me this winter, which is dealing out colds to the half of Yorkshire humanity, is a very warm friend. I have retained my philosophy such as it was, and I have learnt much more, and I am in love. Every moment of the days is curiously charged with an in- describable attraction. My father may have been right in thinking that the world will call me a cad, but I can afford to laugh at its opinion, for the world in which I take any interest at all has of late grown remarkably small. The Hyltons, dear people, have forgiven me for the death of Miss Jones, and talk of a double wedding in London, but I am not to be drawn. There is a tiny church at Endale with a vicar after my own heart. I have made friends with him. He is a keen sportsman, and his library has been chosen with care. I have promised him a collection of early histories. We have decided to build a small house on the Cornish coast, not at Fowey, but in its near neighbourhood. Grolier has given his assent to the proposal. I shall find him a cottage, and have promised him the catalo- 314 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 315 guing of my books. I could hardly do less, for he, I verily believe, more than any one else, has brought about this change in my life. And he is educating Mrs. Grolier in a desirable manner. In years to come they will probably have taken on all the characteristics of old family retainers. It is a bright picture. I did not suppose that the solution of life was so simple. A thousand authors have written ten thousand books upon the subject, and they have found nothing but new words and new methods of refuting their opponents during all the years they may have worked. I am honestly amazed at them. They have been hunting for the proverbial needle in a haystack of unusually large proportions when the little piece of steel has all the time been fastened to their coat. To myself, however, the Unknown Forces have been kind, and they have made things clear in a moment. I came up here to spend Christmas with the Hyltons, and the Unknown Forces froze a number of ponds for my benefit. I borrowed some skates, and from the ice's edge glided straightway to Mabel, who was by far the most graceful figure on its surface. Our corre- spondence for the last two months had been practically unbroken, and our meeting was not altogether unexpected, but the sequel surprises me even yet. I find I must have been a slothful man, with eyes that have not seen and a brain suited to little but parchment and print. I have poked my nose into ridiculous corners, and have steadfastly refused to keep to the main road. I have worried along somehow, and temporarily attached wings to my shoulders, and when the wax has melted, I have tried to be philosophical. My muddles I have dubbed 316 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO misfortunes, and my small works I have thought master- pieces. Well, the time has come for a different life. Love and work ... But these things can be relegated to my love thesis if ever it comes to be written ! And so, for the last time, to my narrative. It happened I don't quite know how that one morning whilst I was brushing the snow from one of the new garden paths at Friarbrok, I thought of old Cardonnel, and fell to musing about him. Several letters had come from Mabel, who had just returned with the Hyltons to York- shire, but she had told me little more than that Nesta and her husband had gone back to the Towers to take up a permanent residence beneath its roof. The old man's loneliness, I supposed, had at last become burdensome. I had a sudden renewal of my desire to bring him and my father together. The latter had not written a line since my departure, but life at Friarbrook was proving mon- strously dull, and gardening does not occupy one's whole attention, even when there is a spade in one's hands. I wired on the spur of the moment for Grolier and the car, and they arrived that evening. " Grolier," said I, " I am sick of this place. I want to do something. We will go to London to-morrow morning." " Yes, sir. I'm not surprised," he added. " At my finding it duU here ? " "Yes, sir." " And yet," said I, " there is a certain fascination about solitude." My chauffeur shook his head. " Oh, there is, Grolier." " But you can easily get tired of it, sir." THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 317 " Yes, that is why you are here." There was a short pause. " Of course, sir," he went on, " it's not my place to speak, but I think . . ." He stopped, and looked at the ceiling. I was rather surprised. Grolier does not usually hesitate to say what is in his mind. " Well, what is it ? " " You ought to get married, sir." " Grolier," said I sternly, " I forgive you for marrying yourself, but you will leave my service if ever you mention the word marriage again." He played with his watch-chain. " Life," he began, " ain't worth the living . . ." and I understood then for the first time my father's periodical accusations of undue familiarity which have been levelled at my chauffeur's head. " Life," he continued, " is like a diamond on a desert island. It don't give any pleasure to any one, and you can't even make a reasonable profit on it. You should take the advice of a married man and marry." " Grolier," said I, "it is not your place to speak in this way." " No, sir," he admitted serenely, " but, you see, I know I'm right." " You can no more generalise on marriage than you can on love," said I, forgetting my thesis. " Some people ought to marry ; others should not." He gave an almost imperceptible shrug of the shoulders. " I used to think that, sir, myself," he said. I changed the conversation. " Have you seen my father ? " I asked him. " Drove him yesterday to East Chapel." " Oh ! How is he ? " " Seemed queerlike," said Grolier. 318 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO "He is getting old," said I. " It weren't that," replied Grolier, " but I expect he wants you back in the house." Then we will go home," said I. " And on the following morning at an early hour, we drove to Eaton Place, and there on the hall table, I found a letter with a German stamp. I opened it, and found that it was an anonymous letter. I did not recognise the writing, but I have no doubt as to the sender. I am only glad to think that he is no longer in England to frighten barmaids or other young ladies into marriage. So far as I remember the single sentence it contained ran as follows. " A gentleman does not forget an insult from one gentleman to another." " He probably doesn't," said I, and tearing the note up, went into the library. There I surprised my father sitting disconsolately in my patent chair. " Gordon ! " he cried. " My dear father." said I, " I have come to take you to Yorkshire. We will ask ourselves over Christmas to stay with the Hyltons." " But, my dear boy . . ." " Not a word," said I. "I have made up my mind. There is a reason . . .' " When did you get here ? " "Just now," said I. "I am tired of staying at Friar- brook, and now that I am here, I am certainly not going to quarrel with you, so you must pack up your bag and get ready." " But why the Hyltons ? " asked my father, completely bewildered. THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 319 " Because they will be delighted to see us," I replied, and continued to talk. I took him by storm he was really glad to see me again and would listen to no words of his, and on the following morning we drove up here, Grolier, my father and I, the best of friends. There had been no mention of the Rochesters, and my father had been singularly agreeable, but I could see that he was longing to speak. Something in my manner, however, warned him to say nothing. And from here a fortnight ago I drove him alone to the Towers without telling him of my intention. We had come half way up the drive before he realised where he was. " Gordon this is Thorpe Towers ! " " Exactly," said I. " You are going to see Cardonnel and his daughter. It is high time you called." A curiously pathetic look came over his face, and I knew that my little plan would be successful. " Is this why you brought me to Yorkshire ? " " Yes," said I. " You had better get out and ring the bell. You will see your old friend his wife is dead, so you have nothing to fear and you will see his daughter again. You met her once in East Chapel. She was Mrs. Summers then." " Mrs. Summers ! " he gasped. " Yes," said I, " the world is microscopic ; she is married to Mabel Carruthers' brother." His mouth opened widely, and he stared at me stupidly. " I understand nothing at all," he said faintly. " Why should you ? " I asked ; "I am here to manage things for you. The time has come when our relative positions are to be changed. From now you will do what I ask," I continued, surprisingly pleased with myself ; " so start now, and get out and ring the bell." 320 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO That was a curious day, which none of us will easily forget. Of the reconciliation, however, between these two old gentlemen, both of them pig-headed and perverse until that moment, I have no time to write, because in a few minutes I am expecting a visitor, who will doubtless want to read my diary. That is a pleasure which I have every intention of denying her, but she may not be gainsaid, and so I shall put it away once and for all in the bottom of my trunk. One does not write diaries when one is happy . . . Nesta and her husband seemed completely at one, and I recognised that my avuncular feelings had returned to me stronger than ever. There had been a midsummer madness, but without that a man does not reach manhood, and I do not regret it. It has shown me my heart, and has helped to drive the small things out of my mind. And if I regret my behaviour to Mary, I am living in hopes that she will ultimately marry, and forget the friend of her youth . . . And now for the great glory . . . I am in love and I am loved. It would need the pen of a Balzac to describe my emotions. I simply cannot speak of them. Yet I will mention one incident, before I seal up my book. Two days after my father had been taken to the Towers he has been there constantly Grolier came to me early in the morning, and particularly wished me to examine the car. The breakfast gong had not yet sounded, and I had promised to go skating with John at ten o'clock, but Grolier would not hear of a refusal. He dragged me from my room to the garage, and there suggested a short run to see what the matter was. I agreed, and he drove THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 321 me out into the country. We Avent perfectly for two miles. I looked at my chauffeur. " There is nothing wrong," said I. Grolier stared back. " Would you excuse a rude question ? " he asked. " Certainly," said I wonderingly. " Why did you come to Yorkshire, sir ? " " I wanted my father to meet an old friend Sir Austin Cardonnel, in fact." " But you are fond of skating ? " he continued. " Of course I am fond of skating." " There is a fine piece of ice half a mile along the road," said he. " But what the dickens . . . ? " I began. " Don't think me impertinent, sir," he said, " but there is a very fine skater who practises at an early hour there every morning." " Grolier," said I, "do you refer to Miss Carruthers ? " I knew of this habit of hers. " Yes, sir," said Grolier very solemnly. " Then," said I, " you are the most impertinent scoundrel on God's earth ! " And so we two skated, she and I, on that deserted stretch of water, and Grolier went away to smoke his pipe. " You never told me you were coming," said Mabel. " I didn't know myself," I replied. " Grolier brought me." " Grolier is rather an extraordinary person," said she. " He is a good friend," said I. " One day I will pension him off." Later we were talking of my father and Sir Austin Cardonnel. x 322 THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO " At first your father did not like me," she said, " but he seems to have changed. " He is a different man." " And Sir Austin," said Mabel, " will look after his children for the future in the proper manner." " I often wonder," I continued, " how we succeeded in bringing the old gentleman round to our way of thinking. Well, I suppose I had little to do with it. You were almost entirely responsible." " I seem to have been responsible in one way or another for a good deal, Gordon." " But then," said I, looking into her face, which was flushed by the keen wind, " you are a masterful person." " You think so ? " " Of course," said I, and we skated on in silence. " The Hyltons are jolly people," she continued ; "I don't wonder you like staying with them." " My dear Mabel," said I, " now that I think of it, it is just possible that I came up here to see you." " It is," she agreed, and then with the quaintest of smiles, she uttered the few words which have wrought all the change in me. " I think," she said, " we had better get married ourselves." With difficulty I kept my balance. " I think," she went on, " we are both falling in love with each other. At any rate I can speak for myself ..." " Mabel ! " I cried, " you think . . . ? " " I rather think," she replied as we came to a halt, " that you have fallen in love with me without knowing it. You are so stupid about these things ! " For a moment I stared at her in amazement, and then there passed through my body an indescribable pang. My muscles tightened, there came a momentary lump to THE SCANDALOUS MR. WALDO 323 my throat, blood whirled hither and thither, breath found a passage difficult thought, time and space seemed to have been metamorphosed into one single glory. " You dearest," said I, " of course . . . ! " She is standing over my shoulder. " Mab," say I, "do you know what I am thinking ? " " Probably about marriage." " Yes, I am thinking that it is the best of the ..." " Don't finish the sentence," orders my dearest. THE END Printed by BALLANTVNE & Co. LIMITED Tavistock Street, Covent Garden, London A '"""" i"" inn inn inn (mi | HEINEMANN'S IS & ./ J WEIGHTADELIGHT LIBRAKYOF MODERN FICTION ^