STUDIES IN WIVES
 
 BY MRS. BELLOC LOWNDES 
 
 THE UTTERMOST FARTHING 
 THE PULSE OF LIFE 
 BARBARA REBELL 
 THE HEART OF PENELOPE 
 STUDIES IN WIVES
 
 Studies in Wives 
 
 By 
 
 MRS. BELLOC LOWNDES 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 MITCHELL KENNERLEY 
 8 East 89th Street
 
 Copyright, 1910, by Mitchell Kennedy
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY .. ... w . . . . 1 
 
 II. MR. JARVICK'S WIFE . . ... ..-. k ., . t ., . 47 
 
 III. A VERY MODERN INSTANCE . . . . . . 93 
 
 IV. ACCORDING TO MEREDITH . . .. ,. . .151 
 V. SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? . . ., i. : :., . . 205 
 
 IV. THE DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE . .. ,., ... . 277 
 
 2131007
 
 I 
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 
 
 " His confidence shall be rooted out of his tabernacle, 
 and it shall bring him to the king of terrors." JOB 
 xviii. 14. 
 
 THERE came the sound of a discreet, embar- 
 rassed cough, and Althea Scrope turned 
 quickly round from the window by which she 
 had been standing still dressed in her outdoor 
 things. 
 
 She had heard the door open, the unfolding 
 of the tea-table, the setting down of the tea- 
 tray, but her thoughts had been far away from 
 the old house in Westminster which was now 
 her home ; her thoughts had been in Newcastle, 
 dwelling for a moment among the friends of 
 her girlhood, for whom she had been buying 
 Christmas gifts that afternoon. 
 
 The footman's cough recalled her to herself, 
 and to the present. 
 
 " Am I to say that you are at home this 
 afternoon, ma'am?" 
 
 Althea's thoughtful, clear eyes rested full 
 on the youth's anxious face. He had not been 
 long in the Scropes' service, and this was the
 
 4 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 first time he had been left in such a position of 
 responsibility, but Dockett, the butler, was 
 out, a rare event, for Dockett liked to be mas- 
 ter in his master's house. Before the mar- 
 riage of Perceval Scrope, Dockett had been 
 Scrope's valet, and, as Althea was well aware, 
 the man still regarded her as an interloper. 
 Althea did not like Dockett, but Perceval was 
 very fond of him, and generally spoke of him 
 to his friends as " Trip." Althea had never 
 been able to discover the reason of the nick- 
 name, and she had not liked to ask; her hus- 
 band often spoke a language strange to her. 
 
 " I will see Mr. Bustard if he comes," she 
 said gently. 
 
 Dockett would not have disturbed her by 
 askinglhe question, for Dockett always knew, 
 by a sort of instinct, whom his master and mis- 
 tress wished to see or to avoid seeing. 
 
 Again she turned and stared out of the high, 
 narrow, curtainless windows. Perceval Scrope 
 did not like curtains, and so of course there 
 were no curtains in his wife's drawing-room. 
 
 Snow powdered the ground. It blew in 
 light eddies about the bare branches of the 
 trees marking the carriage road through St. 
 James's Park, and was caught in whirling 
 drifts on the frozen sheet of water which re-
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 5 
 
 fleeted the lights on the bridge spanning the 
 little lake. Even at this dreary time of the 
 year it was a charming outlook, and one which 
 most of Althea's many acquaintances envied 
 her. 
 
 And yet the quietude of the scene at which 
 she was gazing so intently oppressed her, and, 
 suddenly, from having felt warm after her 
 walk across the park, Althea Scrope felt cold. 
 
 She moved towards the fireplace, and the 
 flames threw a red glow on her tall, rounded 
 figure, creeping up from the strong serviceable 
 boots to the short brown skirt, and so to the 
 sable cape which had been one of her husband's 
 wedding gifts, but which now looked a little 
 antiquated in cut and style. 
 
 It is a bad thing a sign that all is not right 
 with her when a beautiful young woman be- 
 comes indifferent to how she looks. This was 
 the case with Althea, and yet she was only 
 twenty- two, and looked even younger; no one 
 meeting her by chance would have taken her to 
 be a married woman, still less the wife of a 
 noted politician. 
 
 She took off her fur cape and put it on a 
 chair. She might have sent for her maid, but 
 before her marriage she had always waited on 
 herself, and she was not very tidy one of her
 
 6 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 few points of resemblance with her husband, 
 and not one which made for harmony. But 
 Mrs. Scrope, if untidy, was also conscientious, 
 and as she looked at the damp fur cloak her 
 conscience began to trouble her. 
 
 She rang the bell. " Take my cloak and 
 hang it up carefully in the hall," she said to the 
 footman. And now the room was once more 
 neat and tidy as she knew her friend, Mr. Bus- 
 tard, would like to see it. 
 
 It was a curious and delightful room, but it 
 resembled and reflected the woman who had to 
 spend so much of her life there as little as did 
 her quaint and fanciful name of Althea. Her 
 husband, in a fit of petulance at some excep- 
 tional density of vision, had once told her that 
 her name should have been Jane Jane, 
 Maud, Amy, any of those old-fashioned, early 
 Victorian names would have suited Althea, 
 and Althea's outlook on life when she had 
 married Perceval Scrope. 
 
 Althea's drawing-room attained beauty, not 
 only because of its proportions, and its delight- 
 ful outlook on St. James's Park, but also be- 
 cause quite a number of highly intelligent peo- 
 ple had seen to it that it should be beautiful. 
 
 Although Scrope, who thought he knew his 
 young wife so well, would have been surprised
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 7 
 
 and perhaps a little piqued if he had been told 
 it, Althea preferred the house as it had been 
 before her marriage, in the days when it was 
 scarcely furnished, when this room, for in- 
 stance, had been the library-smoking-room of 
 its owner, an owner too poor to offer himself 
 any of the luxurious fitments which had been 
 added to make it suitable for his rich bride. 
 
 As soon as Scrope's engagement to the pro- 
 vincial heiress Althea then was had been an- 
 nounced, his friends and he was a man of 
 many friends had delighted to render him the 
 service of making the pleasant old house in 
 Delahay Street look as it perchance had looked 
 eighty or a hundred years ago. The illusion 
 was almost perfect, so cleverly had the flotsam 
 of Perceval Scrope's ancestral possessions 
 been wedded to the jetsam gathered in curios- 
 ity shops and at country auctions for the de- 
 votion of Scrope's friends had gone even to 
 that length. 
 
 This being so, it really seemed a pity that 
 these same kind folk had not been able to oh! 
 no, not buy, that is an ugly word, and besides 
 it had been Perceval who had been bought, not 
 Althea to acquire for Scrope a wife who 
 would have suited the house as well as the 
 house suited Scrope.
 
 8 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 But that had not been possible. 
 
 Even as it was, the matter of marrying their 
 friend had not been easy. Scrope was so wil- 
 ful that was why they loved him! He had 
 barred absolutely barred Americans, and 
 that although everybody knows how useful an 
 American heiress can be, not only with her 
 money, but with her brightness and her wits, 
 to an English politician. He had also stipu- 
 lated for a country girl, and he would have 
 preferred one straight out of the school-room. 
 
 Almost all his conditions had been fulfilled. 
 Althea was nineteen at the time of her mar- 
 riage, and, if not exactly country-bred she 
 was the only child of a Newcastle magnate 
 she had seen nothing of the world to which 
 Scrope and Scrope's Egeria, the woman who 
 had actually picked out Althea to be Scrope's 
 wife, had introduced her. 
 
 Scrope's Egeria? At the time my little 
 story opens, Althea had long given up being 
 jealous jealous, that is, in the intolerant, 
 passionate sense of the word; in fact, she was 
 ashamed that she had ever been so, for she now 
 felt sure that Perceval would not have liked 
 her, Althea, any better, even if there had not 
 been another woman to whom he turned for 
 flattery and sympathy.
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 9 
 
 The old ambiguous term was, in this case, 
 no pseudonym for another and more natural, 
 if uglier, relationship on the part of a married 
 man, and of a man whom the careless public 
 believed to be on exceptionally good terms 
 with his young wife. 
 
 Scrope's Egeria was twenty-four years 
 older than Althea, and nine years older than 
 Scrope himself. Unfortunately she had a 
 husband who, unlike Althea, had the bad taste, 
 the foolishness, to be jealous of her close 
 friendship with Perceval Scrope. And yet, 
 while admitting to herself the man's folly, Al- 
 thea had a curious liking for Egeria's husband. 
 There was, in fact, more between them than 
 their common interest in the other couple; for 
 he, like Aithea, provided what old-fashioned 
 people used to call the wherewithal; he, like 
 Althea, had been married because of the gifts 
 he had brought in his hands, the gifts not only 
 of that material comfort which counts for so 
 much nowadays, but those which, to Scrope's 
 Egeria, counted far more than luxury, that is, 
 beauty of surroundings and refinement of liv- 
 ing. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Panfillen to give Egeria and 
 her husband their proper names lived quite 
 close to Althea and Perceval Scrope, for they
 
 10 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 dwelt in Old Queen Street, within little more 
 than a stone's throw of Delahay Street. 
 
 Joan Panfillen, unlike Althea Scrope, was 
 exquisitely suited to her curious, old-world 
 dwelling. She had about her small, graceful 
 person, her picturesque and dateless dress, 
 even in her low melodious voice, that harmony 
 which is, to the man capable of appreciating it, 
 the most desirable and perhaps the rarest of 
 feminine attributes. 
 
 There was one thing which Althea greatly 
 envied Mrs. Panfillen, and that was nothing 
 personal to herself ; it was simply the tiny for- 
 mal garden which divided the house in Old 
 Queen Street from Birdcage Walk. This 
 garden looked fresher and greener than its fel- 
 lows because, by Mrs. Panfillen's care, the min- 
 iature parterres were constantly tended and 
 watered, while the shrubs both summer and 
 winter were washed and cleansed as carefully 
 as was everything else likely to be brought in 
 contact with their owner's wife. 
 
 In spite of the fact that they lived so very 
 near to one another, the two women were not 
 much together, and as a rule they only met, but 
 that was, of course, very often, when out in the 
 political and social worlds to which they both 
 belonged.
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 11 
 
 Althea had a curious shrinking from the 
 Panfillens' charming house. It was there, 
 within a very few weeks of her father's death, 
 that she had first met Perceval Scrope and 
 there that he had conducted his careless woo- 
 ing. It was in Mrs. Panfillen's boudoir, an 
 octagon-shaped room on the park side of the 
 house, that he had actually made his proposal, 
 and that Althea, believing herself to be " in 
 love," and uplifted by the solemn and yet joy- 
 ful thought of how happy such a marriage 
 her marriage to a member of the first Fair 
 Food Cabinet would have made her father, 
 had accepted him. 
 
 From Old Queen Street also had taken 
 place her wedding, which, if nominally quiet, 
 because the bride still chose to consider herself 
 in deep mourning, had filled St. Margaret's 
 with one of those gatherings only brought to- 
 gether on such an occasion a gathering in 
 which the foemen of yesterday, and the ene- 
 mies of to-morrow, unite with the friends of 
 to-day in order to do honour to a fellow-poli- 
 tician. 
 
 Althea had darker memories connected with 
 Mrs. Panfillen's house. She had spent there, 
 immediately after her honeymoon, an unhappy 
 fortnight, waiting for the workpeople to leave
 
 12 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 her future home in Delahay Street. It was 
 during that fortnight that for the first time her 
 girlish complacency had forsaken her, and she 
 had been made to understand how inadequate 
 her husband found her to the position she was 
 now called upon to fill. It was then that there 
 had first come to her the humiliating suspicion 
 that her bridegroom could not forgive her his 
 own sale of himself. Scrope and Joan Panfil- 
 len were subtle people, living in a world of sub- 
 tleties, yet in this subtle, unspoken matter of 
 Scrope's self -contempt concerning his mar- 
 riage, the simple Althea's knowledge far pre- 
 ceded theirs. 
 
 In those days Joan Panfillen, kindest, most 
 loyal of hostesses, had always been taking the 
 bride's part, but how unkind yes, unkind was 
 the word Perceval was, even then! 
 
 Althea had never forgotten one little inci- 
 dent connected with that time, and this after- 
 noon she suddenly remembered it with sin- 
 gular vividness. Scrope had been caricatured 
 in Punch as Scrooge; and well Althea had 
 not quite understood. 
 
 "Good Lord!" he had exclaimed, turning 
 to the older woman, " Althea doesn't know 
 who Scrooge was ! " and quickly he had pro- 
 ceeded to put his young wife through a sharp,
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 13 
 
 and to her a very bewildering examination, 
 concerning people and places some of whom 
 she had never heard of, while others seemed 
 vaguely, worryingly familiar. He had ended 
 up with the words, " And I suppose you con- 
 sider yourself educated!" A chance mut- 
 tered word had then told her that none of these 
 places were real that none of these people 
 Perceval had spoken of with such intimate 
 knowledge, had ever lived ! 
 
 Althea had felt bitterly angered as well as 
 hurt. Tears had welled up into her brown 
 eyes ; and Mrs. Panfillen, intervening with far 
 more eager decision than she generally showed 
 about even important matters, had cried, 
 " That's not fair! In fact you are being quite 
 absurd, Perceval! I've never cared for Dick- 
 ens, and I'm sure most people, at any rate 
 most women, who say they like him are pre- 
 tending pretending all the time ! I don't be- 
 lieve there's a girl in London who could answer 
 the questions you put to Althea just now, and 
 if there is such a girl then she's a literary 
 monster, and I for one don't want to know 
 her." 
 
 As only answer Scrope had turned and put 
 a thin brown finger under Althea's chin. 
 " Crying?" he had said, " Baby! She shan't
 
 14 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 be made to learn her Dickens if she doesn't 
 want to, so there ! " 
 
 At the time Althea had tried to smile, but 
 the words her husband had used had hurt her, 
 horribly, for they had seemed to cast a reflec- 
 tion on her father the father who thought so 
 much of education, and who had been at such 
 pains to obtain for his motherless only child an 
 ideal chaperon-governess, a lady who had al- 
 ways lived with the best families in Newcastle. 
 Miss Burt would certainly have made her 
 pupil read Dickens if Dickens were in any real 
 sense an educating influence, instead of writ- 
 ing, as Althea had always understood he did, 
 only about queer and vulgar people. 
 
 Not educated? Why, her father had sent 
 her away from him for a whole year to Dres- 
 den, in order that she might learn German and 
 study music to the best possible advantage 1 
 True, she had not learnt her French in France, 
 for her father had a prejudice against the 
 French ; he belonged to a generation which ad- 
 mired Germany, and disliked and distrusted 
 the French. She had, however, been taught 
 French by an excellent teacher, a French Prot- 
 estant lady who had lived all her life in Eng- 
 land. Of course Althea had never read a 
 French novel, but she could recite, even now,
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 15 
 
 whole pages of Racine and Corneille by heart. 
 
 And yet, even in this matter of languages, 
 Perceval was unfair, for some weeks after he 
 had said that cruel thing to her about educa- 
 tion, and when they were at last settling down 
 in their own house, arranging the details of 
 their first dinner party, he had said to her with 
 a certain abrupt ill-humour, " The one lan- 
 guage I thought you did know was menu- 
 French!" 
 
 Joan Panfillen was also disappointed in Al- 
 thea. Scrope's Egeria had hoped to convert 
 Scrope's wife, not into a likeness of herself 
 she was far too clever a woman to hope to do 
 that but into a bright, cheerful companion 
 for Perceval Scrope's lighter hours. She had 
 always vaguely supposed that this was the 
 role reserved to pretty, healthy young women 
 possessed of regular features, wavy brown 
 hair, and good teeth. . . . 
 
 But Mrs. Panfillen had soon realised, and 
 the knowledge brought with it much unease 
 and pain, that she had made a serious mistake 
 in bringing about the marriage. And yet it 
 had been necessary to do something ; there had 
 come a moment when not only she, but even 
 Scrope himself, had felt that he must be lifted 
 out of the class always distrusted and de-
 
 16 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 spised in England of political adventurers. 
 Scrope required, more than most men, the solid 
 platform, nay, the pedestal, of wealth, and ac- 
 cordingly his Egeria had sacrificed herself and, 
 incidentally, the heiress, Althea. 
 
 But, as so often happens to those who make 
 the great renouncement, Joan Panfillen found 
 that after all no such thing as true sacrifice was 
 to be required of her. 
 
 After his marriage, Scrope was more often 
 with her than he had ever been, and far more 
 willing, not only to ask but to take, his Egeria's 
 advice on all that concerned his brilliant, mete- 
 oric career. He seldom mentioned his wife, 
 but Mrs. Panfillen knew her friend far too well 
 not to know how it was with him; Althea 
 fretted his nerves, offended his taste, jarred 
 his conscience, at every turn of their joint life. 
 
 There were, however, two meagre things to 
 the good Althea's fortune, the five thousand 
 a year, which now, after four years, did not 
 seem so large an income as it had seemed at 
 first; and the fact that Scrope's marriage had 
 extinguished the odious, and, what was much 
 more unpleasant to such a woman as was Joan 
 Panfillen, the ridiculous, jealousy of Joan's 
 husband. 
 
 Thomas Panfillen greatly admired Althea;
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 17 
 
 he thought her what she was a very lovely 
 young woman, and the fact that he had known 
 her father made him complacently suppose 
 that he had brought about her marriage to the 
 peculiar, he was told the remarkably clever, if 
 rather odd, Perceval Scrope. 
 
 Baulked of certain instinctive rights, the 
 human heart seeks compensation as surely as 
 water seeks its level. Althea, unknown to her- 
 self, had a compensation. His name was John 
 Bustard. He was in a public office to be 
 precise, the Privy Council Office. He lived in 
 rooms not far from his work, that is, not far 
 from Delahay Street, and he had got into the 
 way of dropping in to tea two, three, some- 
 times even four times a week. 
 
 The fact that Bustard was an old schoolfel- 
 low of Scrope's had been his introduction to 
 Althea in the early days when she had been 
 conscientiously anxious to associate herself 
 with her husband's interests past and present. 
 But of the innumerable people with whom 
 Scrope had brought her into temporary con- 
 tact, Mr. Bustard she always called him Mr. 
 Bustard, as did most other people was the 
 one human being who, being the fittest as re- 
 garded herself, survived. 
 
 And yet never had there been a man less.
 
 18 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 suited to play the part of hero, or even of con- 
 soler. Mr. Bustard was short, and his figure 
 was many years older than his age, which was 
 thirty-four. While forcing himself to take 
 two constitutionals a day, he indulged in no 
 other manlier form of exercise, and his con- 
 tempt for golf was the only thing that tended 
 to a lack of perfect understanding between his 
 colleagues and himself. He was interested in 
 his work, but he tried to forget it when he was 
 not at the office. Bustard was a simple soul, 
 but blessed with an unformulated, though 
 none the less real, philosophy of life. 
 
 Of the matter nearest his heart he scarcely 
 ever spoke, partly because he had always sup- 
 posed it to be uninteresting to anyone but him- 
 self, and also on account of a certain thorny 
 pride which prevented his being willing to ask 
 favours from the indifferent. 
 
 This matter nearest Mr. Bustard's heart 
 concerned his two younger brothers and an 
 orphan sister whom he supremely desired to 
 do the best for, and to set well forward in life. 
 
 It was of these three young people that he 
 and Althea almost always talked, and if Al- 
 thea allowed herself to have an ardent wish, it 
 was that her husband would permit her to in- 
 vite Mr. Bustard's sister for a few weeks when
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 19 
 
 the girl left the German finishing school which 
 she and Mr. Bustard had chosen, after much 
 anxious deliberation, a year before. 
 
 It soothed Althea's sore heart to know that 
 there was at least one person in her husband's 
 circle who thought well of her judgment, who 
 trusted in her discretion, and who did her the 
 compliment of not only asking, but also of tak- 
 ing her advice. 
 
 John Bustard had formed a very good opin- 
 ion of Althea, and, constitutionally incapable 
 of divining the causes which had determined 
 the choice of Scrope's wife, he considered Mrs. 
 Scrope a further proof, if indeed proof were 
 needed, of his brilliant schoolfellow's acute in- 
 telligence. He had ventured to say as much 
 to Scrope's late official chief, one of the few 
 men to whom Mr. Bustard, without a sufficient 
 cause, would have mentioned a lady's name. 
 But he had been taken aback, rather disturbed, 
 by the old statesman's dry comment: "Ay, 
 there's always been method in Scrope's mad- 
 ness. I agree that he has made, from his own 
 point of view, a very good marriage." 
 
 His wife's friendship with Mr. Bustard did 
 not escape Perceval Scrope's ironic notice. He 
 affected to think his old schoolfellow a typical 
 member of the British public, and he had nick-
 
 20 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 named him " the Bullometer," but, finding that 
 his little joke vexed Althea, he had, with un- 
 usual consideration, dropped it. 
 
 Unfortunately the one offensive epithet was 
 soon exchanged for another ; in allusion doubt- 
 less to some historical personage of whom Al- 
 thea had no knowledge, Scrope began to call 
 Bustard her fat friend. " How's your fat 
 friend? " he would ask, and a feeling of resent- 
 ment filled Althea's breast. It was not John 
 Bustard's fault that he had a bad figure ; it was 
 caused by the sedentary nature of his work, 
 and because, instead of spending his salary in 
 the way most civil servants spend theirs, that 
 is in selfish amusements, he spent it on his 
 younger brothers, and on his little sister's edu- 
 cation. 
 
 * 
 
 Althea again went over to the window and 
 looked out. It had now left off snowing, and 
 the mists were gathering over the park. Soon 
 a veil of fog would shut out the still landscape. 
 If Mr. Bustard were coming this afternoon 
 she hoped he would come soon, and so be gone 
 before Perceval came in. 
 
 Perceval was going to make a great speech 
 in the House to-night, and Althea was rather 
 ashamed that she did not care more. He had
 
 been put up to speak against those who had 
 once been of his own political household and 
 who now regarded him as a renegade, but the 
 subject was one sure to inspire him, for it was 
 that which he had made his own, and which had 
 led to his secession from his party. Althea 
 and Mrs. Panfillen were going together to hear 
 the speech, but, to his wife's surprise, Scrope 
 had refused to dine with the Panfillens that 
 same evening. 
 
 Perceval Scrope had not been well. To his 
 vexation the fact had been mentioned in the 
 papers. The intense cold had tried him the 
 cold, and a sudden visit to his constituency. 
 
 Althea could not help feeling slightly con- 
 temptuous of Perceval's physical delicacy. 
 Her husband had often looked ill lately, not 
 as ill as people told her he looked, but still very 
 far from well. Only to herself did Althea say 
 what she felt sure was the truth, namely that 
 Perceval's state was due to himself, due to his 
 constant rushing about, to the way in which 
 he persistently over-excited himself; last, but 
 by no means least, to the way he ate and drank 
 when the food and drink pleased him. 
 
 Althea judged her husband with the clear, 
 pitiless eyes of youth, but none of those about 
 her knew that she so judged him. Indeed,
 
 22 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 there were some in her circle, kindly amiable 
 folk, who believed, and said perhaps a little too 
 loudly, that Althea was devoted to Perceval, 
 and that their marriage was one of those de- 
 lightful unions which are indeed made in 
 Heaven. . . . 
 
 From the further corner of the room there 
 came the sharp ring of the telephone bell. 
 No doubt a message saying that Perceval 
 had altered his plans and was dining out, 
 alone. 
 
 Insensibly Althea's lips tightened. She 
 thought she knew what her husband was about 
 to suggest. She felt sure that he would tell 
 her, as he had told her so many times before 
 when he had failed her, to offer herself to Mrs. 
 Panfillen for dinner. 
 
 But no the voice she heard calling her by 
 name was not that of Perceval Scrope. It 
 was a woman's voice, and it seemed to float to- 
 wards her from a far distance. " Althea," 
 called the strange voice, " Althea." 
 
 " Yes? " she said, " who is it? I can hardly 
 hear you," and then, with startling closeness 
 and clearness the telephone plays one such 
 tricks came the answer in a voice she knew 
 well, "It is I Joan Panfillen! Are you 
 alone, Althea? Yes? Ahl that's good! I
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 23 
 
 want you to do me a kindness, dear. I 
 want you to come round here now at once. 
 Don't tell anyone you are coming to me. I 
 have a reason for this. Can you hear what I 
 say, Althea? " 
 
 " Yes," said the listener hesitatingly, " yes, 
 I hear you quite well now, Joan." 
 
 " Come in by the park side, I mean through 
 the garden the gate is unlocked, and I will 
 let you in by the window. Be careful as you 
 walk across the flags, it's very slippery to- 
 night. Can you come now, at once? " 
 
 Althea hesitated a moment. Then she an- 
 swered, in her low, even voice, " Yes, I'll come 
 now, at once." 
 
 A kindness? What kindness could she, Al- 
 thea Scrope, do Joan Panfillen? The fear of 
 the other woman, the hidden distrust with 
 which she regarded her, gathered sudden force. 
 "Not lately, but in the early days of Scrope's 
 marriage, Mrs. Panfillen had more than once 
 tried to use her friend's wife, believing 
 strange that she should have made such a mis- 
 take that Althea might succeed where she 
 herself had failed in persuading Scrope for 
 his own good. Althea now told herself that 
 no doubt Joan wished to see her on some mat- 
 ter connected with Perceval's coming speech.
 
 24. STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 As this thought came to her Althea's white 
 forehead wrinkled in vexed thought. It was 
 too bad that she should have to go out now, 
 when she was expecting Mr. Bustard, to whom 
 she had one or two rather important things to 
 
 say about his sister But stay, why should 
 
 he be told that she was out? Why indeed 
 should she be still out when Mr. Bustard did 
 come? It was not yet five o'clock, and he sel- 
 dom came before a quarter past. With luck 
 she might easily go over to Joan Panfillen's 
 house and be back before he came. 
 
 Althea walked quickly out of the drawing- 
 room and down into the hall. Her fur cloak 
 had been carefully hung up as she had directed. 
 Perceval always said Luke was a stupid serv- 
 ant, but she liked Luke; he was careful, hon- 
 est, conscientious, a very different type of man 
 from the butler, Dockett. 
 
 Althea passed out into the chilly, foggy air. 
 Delahay Street, composed of a few high 
 houses, looked dark, forbidding, deserted. 
 She had often secretly wondered why her hus- 
 band chose to live in such a place. Of course 
 she knew that their friends raved about the 
 park side of the house, but the wife of Perceval 
 Scrope scarcely ever went in or out of her own 
 door without remembering a dictum of her
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 25 
 
 father's: "Nothing makes up for a good 
 front entrance." 
 
 Althea walked quickly towards Great 
 George Street; to the left she passed Boar's 
 Head Yard, where lived an old cabman in 
 whom she took an interest, and whose cab gen- 
 erally stood at Storey's Gate. 
 
 How strange to think that here had once 
 stood Oliver Cromwell's house ! Her husband 
 had told her this fact very soon after their mar- 
 riage; it had seemed to please him very much 
 that they lived so near the spot where Crom- 
 well had once lived. Althea even at the time 
 had thought this pleasure odd, in fact affected, 
 on Perceval's part. 
 
 If the great Protector's house stood there 
 now, filled with interesting little relics of the 
 man, she could have understood, perhaps to a 
 certain extent sympathised with, Perceval's 
 feeling, for Cromwell had been one of her 
 father's heroes. But to care or pretend to 
 care for a vanished association ! 
 
 But Perceval was like that. No man living 
 or so Althea believed was so full of strange 
 whimsies and fads as was Perceval Scrope! 
 And so thinking of him she suddenly remem- 
 bered, with a tightening of the heart, how 
 often her husband's feet had trodden the way
 
 26 
 
 she was now treading, hastening from the 
 house which she had just left to the house to 
 which she was now going. 
 
 Jealous of Joan Panfillen? Nay, Althea 
 assured herself that there was no room in her 
 heart for jealousy, but it was painful, even 
 more, it was hateful, to know that there were 
 people who pitied her because of this peculiar 
 intimacy between Perceval and Joan. Why, 
 quite lately, there had been a recrudescence of 
 talk about their friendship, so an ill-bred busy- 
 body had hinted to Althea only the day before. 
 
 The wife was dimly aware that there had 
 been a time when Mrs. Panfillen had hoped to 
 form with her an unspoken compact; each 
 would have helped the other, that is, to " man- 
 age " Perceval ; but the moment when such an 
 alliance would have been possible had now 
 gone for ever even if it had ever existed. Al- 
 thea would have had to have been a different 
 woman, older, cleverer, less scrupulous, more 
 indifferent than she was, even now, to the man 
 she had married, to make such a compact pos- 
 sible. 
 
 When about to cross Great George Street 
 she stopped and hesitated. Why should she 
 do this thing, why leave her house at Joan 
 Panfillen's bidding? But Althea, even as she
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 27 
 
 hesitated, knew that she would go on. She 
 had said that she was coming, and she was not 
 one to break lightly even a light word. 
 
 As she crossed Storey's Gate, she noticed 
 the stationary cab of the old man who lived in 
 Boar's Head Yard. It had been standing 
 there when she had come in from her walk, and 
 she felt a thrill of pity the old man made a 
 gallant fight against misfortune. She and 
 Joan Panfillen were both very kind to him. 
 
 Althea told herself that this sad world is full 
 of real trouble, and the thought made her 
 ashamed of the feelings which she had just al- 
 lowed to possess and shake her with jealous 
 pain. And yet yet, though many people en- 
 vied her, how far from happy Althea knew 
 herself to be, and how terribly grey her life 
 now looked, stretching out in front of her. 
 
 As she passed into Birdcage Walk, and 
 came close to the little iron gate which Mrs. 
 Panfillen had told her was unlocked, she saw 
 that a woman stood on the path of the tiny 
 garden behind the railings. 
 
 Of course it was not Joan herself; the 
 thought that Joan, delicate, fragile as she was, 
 would come out into the cold, foggy air was 
 unthinkable ; scarcely less strange was it to see 
 standing there, cloakless and hatless, Joan's
 
 28 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 maid, a tall, gaunt, grey-haired woman named 
 Bolt, who in the long ago had been nurse to 
 the Panfillens' dead child. Scrope had told 
 Althea the story of the brief tragedy very 
 early in his acquaintance with her; he had 
 spoken with strong feeling, and that although 
 the child had been born, had lived, and had 
 died before he himself had known Joan. 
 
 In the days when she had been Mrs. Pan- 
 fillen's guest, that is before her marriage, Al- 
 thea had known the maid well, known and 
 liked her grim honesty of manner, but since 
 Althea's marriage to Perceval Scrope there 
 had come a change over Bolt's manner. She 
 also had made Althea feel that she was an in- 
 terloper, and now the sight of the woman 
 standing waiting in the cold mist disturbed 
 her. 
 
 Bolt looked as if she had been there a very 
 long time, and yet Althea had hurried ; she was 
 even a little breathless. As she touched the 
 gate, she saw that it swung loosely. Every- 
 thing had been done to make her coming 
 easy; how urgent must be Joan's need of 
 her! 
 
 Althea became oppressed with a vague fear. 
 She looked at the maid questioningly. ' Is 
 Mrs. Panfillen ill?" she asked. The other
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 29 
 
 shook her head. " There's nothing ailing Mrs. 
 Panfillen," she said in a low voice. 
 
 Together, quite silently, they traversed the 
 flagged path, and then Bolt did a curious 
 thing. She preceded her mistress's visitor up 
 the iron steps leading to the boudoir window, 
 and leaving her there, on the little balcony, 
 went down again into the garden, and once 
 more took up her station near the gate as if 
 mounting guard. 
 
 The long French window giving access to 
 the boudoir was closed, and in the moment that 
 elapsed before it was opened from within Al- 
 thea Scrope took unconscious note of the room 
 she knew so well, and of everything in it, in- 
 cluding the figure of the woman she had come 
 to see. 
 
 It was a panelled octagon, the panels 
 painted a pale Wedgwood blue, while just be- 
 low the ceiling concave medallions were em- 
 bossed with flower garlands and amorini. 
 
 A curious change had been made since Al- 
 thea had last seen the room. An old six-leaved 
 screen, of gold so faded as to have become al- 
 most silver in tint, which had masked the door, 
 now stood exactly opposite the window behind 
 which Althea was standing. It concealed the 
 straight Empire sofa which, as Mr. Panfillen
 
 30 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 was fond of telling his wife's friends, on the 
 very rare occasions when he found himself in 
 this room with one of them, had formerly stood 
 in the Empress Josephine's boudoir at Mal- 
 maison; and, owing to the way it was now 
 placed, the old screen formed a delicate and 
 charming background to Mrs. Panfillen's 
 figure. 
 
 Scrope's Egeria stood in the middle of the 
 room waiting for Scrope's wife. She was 
 leaning forward in a curious attitude, as if she 
 were listening, and the lemon-coloured shade 
 of the lamp standing on the table threw a 
 strange gleam on her lavender silk gown, fash- 
 ioned, as were ever the clothes worn by Joan 
 Panfillen, with a certain austere simplicity and 
 disregard of passing fashion. 
 
 Althea tapped at the window, and the wo- 
 man who had sent for her turned round, and, 
 stepping forward, opened the window wide. 
 
 " Come in! " she cried. " Come in, Althea 
 how strange that you had to knock! I've 
 been waiting for you so long." 
 
 " I came as quickly as I could I don't 
 think I can have been five minutes." 
 
 Althea stepped through the window, bring- 
 ing with her a blast of cold, damp air. She 
 looked questioningly at Mrs. Panfillen. She
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 31 
 
 felt, she hardly knew why, trapped. The 
 other's look of anxious, excited scrutiny dis- 
 turbed her. 
 
 Mrs. Panfillen's fair face, usually pale, was 
 flushed. 
 
 So had she reddened, suddenly, when Althea 
 had come to tell her of her engagement to Per- 
 ceval Scrope. So had she looked when stand- 
 ing on the doorstep as Althea and Perceval 
 started for their honeymoon, just after there 
 had taken place a strange little scene for 
 Scrope, following the example of Thomas 
 Panfillen, who had insisted on what he called 
 saluting the bride, had taken Panfillen's wife 
 into his arms and kissed her. 
 
 " Althea " Joan took the younger woman's 
 hand in hers and held it, closely, as she spoke, 
 "don't be frightened, but Perceval is here, 
 ill, and I've sent for you to take him home." 
 
 " 111? " A look of dismay came over Al- 
 thea's face. " I hope he's not too ill to speak 
 to-night that would be dreadful he'd be ter- 
 ribly upset, terribly disappointed ! " Even as 
 she spoke she knew she was using words which 
 to the other would seem exaggerated, a little 
 childish. 
 
 " I'm sure he'd rather you took him home, 
 I'm sure he'd rather not be found " Mrs.
 
 32 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Panfillen hesitated a moment, and again she 
 said the words " ' ill ', ' here '," and for the first 
 time Althea saw that there was a look of great 
 pain and strain on Joan's worn, sensitive 
 face. 
 
 "Of course not!" said the young wife 
 quickly. " Of course he mustn't be ill here ; he 
 must come home, at once." 
 
 Althea's pride was protesting hotly against 
 her husband's stopping a moment in a house 
 where he was not wanted pride and a certain 
 resentment warring together in her heart. 
 How strange London people were! This 
 woman whom folk the old provincial word 
 rose to her lips whom folk whispered was 
 over-fond of Perceval why, no sooner was he 
 ill than her one thought was how to get rid of 
 him quietly and quickly! 
 
 Mrs. Panfillen, looking at her, watching 
 with agonised intensity the slow workings of 
 Althea's mind, saw quite clearly what Perce- 
 val's wife was feeling, saw it with a bitter sense 
 of what a few moments ago she would have 
 thought inconceivable she could ever feel again 
 amusement. 
 
 She went across to the window and opened 
 it. As if in answer to a signal, the little iron 
 gate below swung widely open : " Bolt has
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 33 
 
 gone to get a cab," she said, without turning 
 round ; " we thought that it would be simplest. 
 The old cabman knows us all it will be 
 quicker." She spoke breathlessly, but there 
 was a tone of decision in her voice, a gentle re- 
 strained tone, but one which Althea knew well 
 to spell finality. 
 
 "But where is Perceval? " 
 
 Althea looked round her bewildered. She 
 noticed, for the first time, that flung carelessly 
 across two chairs lay his outdoor coat, his 
 gloves, his stick, his hat. Then he also had 
 come in by the park side of the house? 
 
 Mrs. Panfillen went towards her with slow, 
 hesitating steps. 
 
 " He is here," she said in a low tone, " behind 
 the screen. He was sitting on the sofa read- 
 ing me the notes of his speech, and and he fell 
 back." She began moving the screen, and as 
 she did so she went on, " I sent for Bolt she 
 was a nurse once, you know, and she got the 
 brandy which you see there " 
 
 But Althea hardly heard the words ; she was 
 gazing, with an oppressed sense of discomfort 
 and fear, at her husband. Yes, Perceval 
 looked ill very ill, and he was lying in so pe- 
 culiar a position! "I suppose when people 
 faint they have to put them like that," thought
 
 84 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Althea to herself, but she felt concerned, a lit- 
 tle frightened. . . . 
 
 Perceval Scrope lay stretched out stiffly on 
 the sofa, his feet resting on a chair which had 
 been placed at the end of the short, frail-look- 
 ing little couch. His fair, almost lint white, 
 hair was pushed back from his forehead, show- 
 ing its unusual breadth. The grey eyes were 
 half closed, and he was still wearing, wound 
 about his neck so loosely that it hid his mouth 
 and chin, a silk muffler. 
 
 Althea had the painful sensation that he did 
 not like her to be there, that it must be acutely 
 disagreeable to him to feel that she saw him in 
 such a condition of helplessness and unease. 
 And yet she went on looking at him, strangely 
 impressed, not so much by the rigidity, as by 
 the intense stillness of his body. Scrope as a 
 rule was never still ; when he was speaking, his 
 whole body, each of his limbs, spoke with him. 
 
 By the side of the sofa was a small table, on 
 which stood a decanter, unstoppered. 
 
 "Has he been like that long?" Althea 
 whispered at length. " He he looks so 
 strange." 
 
 Joan Panfillen came close up to the younger 
 woman; again she put her hand on her com- 
 panion's arm.
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 35 
 
 " Althea," she said, " don't you understand? 
 Can't you see the dreadful thing that has hap- 
 pened? " and as the other looked down into 
 the quivering face turned up to hers, she added 
 with sudden passion, " Should I want you to 
 take him away if he were still here? should I 
 want him to go if there were anything left that 
 I could do for him? " 
 
 And then Althea at last understood, and so 
 understanding her mind for once moved 
 quickly, and she saw with mingled terror and 
 revolt what it was that the woman on whose 
 face her eyes were now riveted was requiring 
 of her. 
 
 ' You sent for me to take him home 
 dead?" 
 
 It was a statement rather than a question. 
 Mrs. Panfillen made a scarcely perceptible 
 movement of assent. "It is what he would 
 have wished," she whispered, " I am quite 
 sure it is what he would have wished you to 
 do." 
 
 " I I am sorry, but I don't think I can do 
 that." 
 
 Althea was speaking to herself rather than 
 to the other woman. She was grappling with 
 a feeling of mortal horror and fear. She had 
 always been afraid of Perceval Scrope, afraid
 
 36 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 and yet fascinated, and now he, dead, seemed 
 to be even more formidable, more beckoning, 
 than he had been alive. 
 
 She turned away and covered her eyes with 
 her hand. " Why did you tell me ? " she asked, 
 a little wildly. " If you hadn't told me that 
 he was dead I should never have known. I 
 should even have done the the dreadful thing 
 you want me to do." 
 
 " Bolt thought that Bolt said you would 
 not know," Mrs. Panfillen spoke with sombre 
 energy. " She wished me to allow her to take 
 him down into the garden to meet you in the 
 
 darkness But, but Althea, that would 
 
 have been an infamous thing from me to 
 
 you " She waited a moment, and then in 
 
 a very different voice, in her own usual meas- 
 ured and gentle accents, she added, " My dear, 
 forgive me. We will never speak of this 
 again. I was wrong, selfish, to think of sub- 
 jecting you to such an ordeal. All I ask " 
 and there came into her tone a sound of shamed 
 pleading " is that you should allow Tom 
 Tom and other people to think that you 
 were here when it happened." 
 
 Althea remained silent. Then, uncertainly, 
 she walked across to the window and opened it. 
 The action was symbolic and so it was un-
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 37 
 
 derstood by the woman watching her so anx- 
 iously. 
 
 But still Althea said nothing. She stood 
 looking out into the darkness, welcoming the 
 feel of the cold damp air. She gave herself a 
 few brief moments they seemed very long 
 moments to Joan Panfillen before she said 
 the irrevocable words, and when she did say 
 them, they sounded muffled, and uttered from 
 far away, for Althea as she spoke did not turn 
 round ; she feared to look again on that which 
 might unnerve her, render her unfit for what 
 she was about to do. 
 
 " Joan," she said, " I will do what you ask. 
 You were right just now right, I mean, in 
 telling me what Perceval would have wished." 
 
 She spoke with nervous, dry haste, and, to 
 her relief, the other woman spared her 
 thanks. . . . 
 
 There was a long silence, and then Mrs. 
 Panfillen crept up close to Althea and touched 
 her, making her start violently. " Then I will 
 call Bolt," she said, and made as if to pass 
 through the window, but Althea stopped her 
 with a quick movement of recoil " No, no ! 
 she cried, " let me do that ! " and she ran down 
 the iron steps ; it was good to be ought of sight 
 even for a moment of the still presence of the
 
 38 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 dead the dead whose mocking spirit seemed 
 to be still terribly alive. 
 
 But during the long, difficult minutes that 
 followed, it was Joan Panfillen, not Althea 
 Scrope, who shrank and blenched. It was Al- 
 thea who put out her young strength to help to 
 lift the dead man, and, under cover of the shel- 
 tering mist, to make the leaden feet retrace 
 their steps down the iron stairway, and along 
 the narrow path they had so often leapt up and 
 along with eager haste. 
 
 To two of the three women the progress 
 seemed intolerably slow, but to Althea it was 
 all too swift ; she dreaded with an awful dread 
 the companioned drive which lay before her. 
 
 Perhaps something of what she was feeling 
 was divined by Mrs. Panfillen, for at the very 
 last Scrope's Egeria forgot self, and made, in 
 all sincerity, an offer which on her part was 
 heroic. 
 
 " Shall I come with you? " she whispered, 
 averting her eyes from that which lay huddled 
 up by Althea's side, " I will come, willingly; 
 let me come Althea." 
 
 But Althea only shook her head in cold, hur- 
 ried refusal. She felt that with speech would 
 go a measure of her courage. 
 
 Afterwards Althea remembered that there
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 39 
 
 had come a respite, what had seemed to her at 
 the time an inexplicable delay. A man and a 
 girl had gone slowly by, staring curiously at 
 the two bare-headed women standing out on 
 the pavement, and on whose pale faces there 
 fell the quivering gleam of the old-fashioned 
 cab lamp. Then, when the footfalls of these 
 passers-by had become faint, Bolt spoke to the 
 driver, and handed him some money. Althea 
 heard the words as in dream, " Get along as 
 quick as you can to 24, Delahay Street, there's 
 a good man," and then the clink of silver in the 
 stillness, followed by the full sound of the 
 man's wheezy gratitude. 
 
 There came a sudden movement and the 
 dread drive began, the horse slipping, the cab 
 swaying and jolting over the frozen ground. 
 
 With a gesture which was wholly instinctive, 
 Althea put out her arm, her firm, rounded, 
 living arm, and slipped it round the inert, 
 sagging thing which had been till an hour ago 
 Perceval Scrope. And, as she did so, as she 
 pressed him to her, and kept from him the 
 ignominy of physical helplessness, there came 
 a great lightening of her spirit. 
 
 Fear, the base fear bred of the imagination, 
 fell away from her. For the first time there 
 came the certainty that her husband was at last
 
 40 STUDIES EST WIVES 
 
 satisfied with her; for the first time she was 
 able to do Perceval Scrope dead what she had 
 never been able to do Perceval Scrope alive, 
 a great service a service which she might have 
 refused to do. 
 
 Once or twice, very early in their married 
 life, Perceval had praised her, and his praise 
 had given Althea exquisite pleasure because it 
 was so rare, so seldom lavished ; and this long- 
 lost feeling of joy in her husband's approval 
 came back, filling her eyes with tears. Now 
 at last Althea felt as if she and Perceval 
 Scrope were one, fused in that kindly sympa- 
 thy and understanding which, being the man- 
 ner of woman she was, Althea supposed to be 
 the very essence of conjugal love. 
 
 As they were clasped together, she, the 
 quick, he, the dead, Althea lost count of time ; 
 it might have been a moment, it might have 
 been an hour, when at last the jolting ceased. 
 
 As the old man got off the box of his cab, 
 and rang the bell, Big Ben boomed out the 
 quarter-past five. 
 
 Since she had last gone through that door a 
 yawning gap had come in Althea's life, a gap 
 which she had herself bridged. Fear had 
 dropped from her; she could never again be 
 afraid as she had been afraid when she, Joan
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY, 41 
 
 and Perceval had formed for the last time a 
 trinity. The feeling which had so upheld her, 
 the feeling that for the first time she and her 
 husband were in unison, gave her not only 
 courage but serenity of spirit. Althea shrank 
 from acting a lie, but she saw, for the first time., 
 through Perceval Scrope's eyes, and she ad- 
 mitted the necessity. 
 
 As the door opened, she remembered, almost 
 with exultation, that Dockett, the butler, was 
 out, and that it was only with Luke, the slow 
 young footman, that she would have to deal. 
 As she saw his tall, thin figure emerge hesitat- 
 ingly into the street, Mrs. Scrope called out in 
 a strong, confident voice, " Luke come here I 
 Help me to get Mr. Scrope indoors. He is ill ; 
 and as soon as we have got him into the morn- 
 ing room, you must go off for a doctor, at 
 once " 
 
 She waved aside the cabman almost impa- 
 tiently, and it was Althea, Althea helped by 
 Luke, who carried Perceval Scrope over the 
 threshold of his own house, and so into a small 
 room on the ground floor, a room opening 
 out of the hall, and looking out on to the 
 street. 
 
 " He looks very bad, don't 'e, ma'am? " 
 Luke was startled out of his acquired pas-
 
 42 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 sivity. " I'd better go right off now." She 
 bent her head. 
 
 And then Althea, again alone with the dead 
 man, suddenly became oppressed once more 
 with fear, not the physical terror which had 
 possessed her when Joan Panfillen had told her 
 the awful truth, but none the less to her a very 
 agonising form of fear. Althea was afraid 
 that now, when approaching the end of her 
 ordeal, she would fail Scrope and the woman 
 he had loved. What was she to say, what 
 story could she invent to tell those who would 
 come and press her with quick eager questions? 
 She knew herself to be incapable, not only of 
 untruth, but of invention, and yet now both 
 were about to be required of her. 
 
 Althea turned out the lights, and wandered 
 out into the hall. She felt horribly lonely; 
 with the exception of the kindly, stupid youth 
 who had now gone to find a doctor, there was 
 not a member of her considerable household in 
 sufficient human sympathy with her to be 
 called to her aid. 
 
 She remembered with a pang that this ques- 
 tion of their servants had been one of the many 
 things concerning which there had been deep 
 fundamental disagreement between her hus- 
 band and herself. She had been accustomed
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 43 
 
 to a well-ordered, decorous household, and 
 would even have enjoyed managing such a 
 one; but Perceval Perceval influenced by 
 Dockett had ordained otherwise, and Althea 
 had soon become uneasily aware that the order 
 and decorum reigning below stairs were only 
 apparent. Even now there came up from the 
 basement the sound of loud talking, of unre- 
 strained laughter. 
 
 Suddenly someone knocked at the door, a 
 loud double knock which stilled, as if by magic, 
 the murmur of the voices below. 
 
 Althea looked around her doubtfully, then 
 she retreated into the darkened room, but no 
 one came up, and she remembered that the 
 other servants of course supposed Luke to be 
 on duty. It might be nay, it almost certainly 
 was the doctor. With faltering steps she 
 again came out into the hall and opened the 
 front door ; and then, when she saw who it was 
 who stood there, his kind honest eyes blinking 
 in the sudden light, Althea began to cry. 
 
 The tears ran down her cheeks; she sighed 
 convulsively, and John Bustard, looking at her 
 with deep concern and dismay, was quite una- 
 ware he does not know even to this day 
 that it was with relief. 
 
 "What is it?" he said. "My dear Mrs.
 
 44 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Scrope what is the matter? Would you like 
 me to go away or or can I be of any use ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes," she said piteously. " Indeed you 
 can be of use. Don't go away stay with me 
 I'm I'm so frightened, Mr. Bustard. Per- 
 ceval poor Perceval is is ill, and I'm afraid 
 to stay in there with him." 
 
 And it was Mr. Bustard who at once took 
 command command of Althea, whom he ulti- 
 mately ordered to bed ; command of the excited 
 household, whose excitement he sternly sup- 
 pressed ; it was Mr. Bustard who, believing he 
 told truth, lied for Althea, first to the doctor, 
 and later to the coroner. 
 
 " How fortunate it was for poor Althea that 
 Mr. Bustard, that nice little man in the Privy 
 Council Office, was actually in the house when 
 poor Perceval Scrope's death took place ! " 
 bold and cruel people would say to Mrs. Pan- 
 fillen, watching the while to see how she took 
 their mention of the dead man's name. 
 
 "Yes," she would answer them quietly. 
 " Very fortunate indeed. And it was so kind 
 of Mr. Bustard to get his sister to go away 
 with Althea. Poor Althea is so alone in the 
 world. I hope she will come and stay with us 
 when she comes back to town; we were Perce- 
 val Scrope's oldest, I might say closest, friends.
 
 ALTHEA'S OPPORTUNITY 45 
 
 You know that their marriage his and Al- 
 thea's took place from our house? " 
 
 The only human being who scented a mys- 
 tery was Dockett Dockett, who was mindful, 
 as he had a right to be, of his lawful perquisites, 
 and who will never forgive himself for having 
 been out on that fateful afternoon. 
 
 "I'd give something to know the where- 
 abouts of Mr. Scrope's overcoat, to say noth- 
 ing of his hat and stick. That common ash 
 stick's a relic it may be worth money some 
 day ! " he observed threateningly to the foot- 
 man. But Luke, as only answer, stared at him 
 with stolid dislike. 
 
 Luke had seen nothing of the hat and stick; 
 no doubt they had been left in the cab in which 
 Mr. Scrope had come back, ill, from the 
 House. As for the overcoat, it had probably 
 disappeared in the confusion, the hurried com- 
 ing and going, of that evening when Luke had 
 been almost run off his legs answering the 
 door, and his head made quite giddy answering 
 enquiries. But it was not Luke's business to 
 say what he thought or did not think. With 
 such a man as Mr. Dockett, it only led to un- 
 pleasantness.
 
 II 
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 
 
 " ABOUT that letter of your uncle's? I take it 
 you have no one to suggest? " 
 
 Thomas Garden glanced anxiously at the 
 son in whom he had so strong a confidence, and 
 who was the secret pride of his eyes, the only 
 love of his austere, hard-working life. 
 
 The two were a great contrast to one an- 
 other. The older man was short and slight, 
 with the delicate, refined, spiritual face, so 
 often seen in the provincial man of business be- 
 longing to that disappearing generation of 
 Englishmen who found time to cultivate the 
 things of the mind as well as the material in- 
 terests of life. A contrast, indeed, to the tall, 
 singularly handsome, alert-looking man whom 
 he had just addressed, and whose perfect 
 physical condition made him appear somewhat 
 younger than his thirty-two years. 
 
 And yet, in spite or perhaps because of this 
 contrast between them, the two were bound in 
 the closest, if not exactly in the most confiden- 
 tial, ties of affection. And, as a matter of 
 course, they were partners in the great metal- 
 
 49
 
 50 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 broking business of Josh. Garden, Thomas 
 Garden and Son, which had been built up by 
 three generations of astute, self-respecting 
 citizens of Birmingham. 
 
 It was Easter Monday, and the two men 
 were lingering over breakfast, in a way they 
 seldom allowed themselves time to do on ordi- 
 nary week-days, in the finely proportioned, 
 book-lined dining-room of one of those spa- 
 cious old houses which remain to prove that the 
 suburb of Edgbaston was still country a hun- 
 dred years ago. 
 
 Theodore Garden looked across the table 
 meditatively. He had almost forgotten his 
 uncle's letter, for, since that letter had been 
 read and cursorily discussed, he and his father 
 had been talking of a matter infinitely more 
 important to them both. The matter in ques- 
 tion was the son's recent engagement and com- 
 ing marriage, a marriage which was a source 
 of true satisfaction to the older man. His 
 father's unselfish joy in the good thing which 
 had befallen him touched Theodore Garden 
 keenly, for the niche occupied in most men's 
 minds by their intimate feminine circle was 
 filled in that of the young man by the diminu- 
 tive figure of the senior partner of Garden and 
 Son.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 51 
 
 As is perhaps more often the case than those 
 who despise human nature believe, many have 
 the grace to reverence and admire the qualities 
 in which they know themselves to be deficient. 
 Such a man was the younger Garden. 
 
 To-day the depths had been stirred, and he 
 let his mind dwell with a certain sense of shame 
 and self-rebuke on his own and his father's 
 ideals of human conduct. Even as a school- 
 boy, Theodore had come to realise how much 
 more he knew of the ugly side of life than did 
 his father. But then, old Mr. Garden was 
 quite exceptional; he knew nothing or so at 
 least his son believed, and loved him for it 
 of the temptations, conflicts, victories, and 
 falls of the average sensual man. 
 
 Theodore's father had been engaged, at 
 twenty, to a girl of his own age whom he had 
 not been able to marry till twelve years later ; 
 she had left him a widower with this one child 
 after five years of married life, and Thomas 
 Garden, as he had himself once told his son in 
 a moment of unwonted confidence, had been 
 absolutely faithful to her before the marriage 
 and since her death. 
 
 The woman many people would have said 
 the very fortunate young woman who was so 
 soon to become Mrs. Theodore Garden would
 
 52 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 not possess such a husband as Thomas Garden 
 had been to his wife. 
 
 And yet, in his heart, Theodore was well 
 aware that the gentle girl he loved would prob- 
 ably be a happier woman than his own mother 
 had been, for he, unlike his father, in his deal- 
 ings with the other sex could call up at will that 
 facile and yet rather rare gift of tenderness 
 which women, so life had taught him, value 
 far more than the deeper, inarticulate 
 love. . . . 
 
 Garden came back to the prosaic question of 
 his uncle's letter with a distinct effort. 
 
 "Havel anyone to suggest?" he echoed. 
 " I have no one to suggest, father. I know, of 
 course, exactly the sort of man Uncle Barrett 
 is looking for; he's asking us to find him the 
 perfect clerk every man of business has sought 
 for at some time or other. If I were you I 
 should write and tell him that the man he wants 
 us to find never has to look outside England 
 for a job, and, what is more, would rather be 
 a clerk here if he's any sense than a part- 
 ner in New Zealand ! " 
 
 A smile quivered for a moment over the 
 young man's shrewd face; his uncle was evi- 
 dently seeking such a man as he was himself, 
 but such men, so Theodore Garden was able to
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 53 
 
 tell himself without undue conceit, were not 
 likely to go into voluntary exile even with the 
 bribe of eventual partnership in a flourishing 
 business. 
 
 There was a pause, and then again the older 
 man broke the silence with something entirely 
 irrelevant to the subject which was filling the 
 minds of his son and himself. 
 
 " You haven't looked at the Post this morn- 
 ing? There's nothing in it. Dearth of real 
 news is, I suppose, responsible for this? " and 
 he pointed, frowning as he spoke, to a column 
 on the middle page headed " The Jarvice 
 Mystery. New Developments." 
 
 Again a shrewd, good-humoured smile quiv- 
 ered on his son's firm mouth. 
 
 " In these days newspapers have to follow, 
 not lead, the public taste. Very few people 
 are honestly as indifferent as you are, father, 
 to that sort of story. Now even I, who never 
 met poor old Jarvice, cannot help wondering 
 how he came by his death; and yet you, who 
 knew the man " 
 
 " I knew him," said the other with a touch 
 of impatience, " as I know, and as you know, 
 dozens of our fellow-townsmen." 
 
 " Never mind ; you, at any rate, can put a 
 face to the man's name; and yet the question
 
 54, STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 as to whether he was or was not poisoned by 
 his wife, is one of indifference to you! Now I 
 submit that in this indifference you are really 
 
 a little " he hesitated for a word, but found 
 
 that none so well expressed his thought as that 
 which had first arisen to his lips " peculiar, 
 father." 
 
 " Am I? " said Thomas Garden slowly; " am 
 I so, Theodore? Nay, nay, I deny that I am 
 indifferent! Lane" Major Lane was at 
 that time Head Constable of Birmingham, and 
 a lifelong friend of the speaker "Lane was 
 quite full of it last night. He insisted on tell- 
 ing me all the details of the affair, and what 
 shocked me, my boy, was not so much the ques- 
 tion which, of course, occupied Lane that is, 
 as to whether that unhappy young woman poi- 
 soned her husband or not but the whole state 
 of things which he disclosed about them. 
 Lane told me certain facts concerning Jarvice, 
 whom, as you truly say, I have known, in a 
 sense, for years, which I should not have 
 thought possible of any man vile things, 
 which should have prevented his thinking of 
 marriage, especially of marriage with a 
 young wife." 
 
 Theodore Garden remained silent; he never 
 discussed unsavoury subjects with his father.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 55 
 
 Moreover, he had no liking for Major Lane, 
 though he regarded him with considerable re- 
 spect, and even with a feeling of gratitude. 
 Some years before, the Head Constable had 
 helped the young man out of a serious scrape, 
 the one real scrape so Garden was compla- 
 cently able to assure himself engendered 
 by his systematic and habitual pursuit of 
 women. 
 
 Even now he could not recall, without winc- 
 ing, the interview he had had on that occasion 
 with his father's friend. During that inter- 
 view Garden had felt himself thoroughly con- 
 demned, and even despised, by the older man, 
 and he had been made to feel that it was only 
 for the sake of his father his high-minded, 
 unsuspicious father that he was being saved 
 from the public exposure of a peculiarly sor- 
 did divorce suit. 
 
 But it was in all sincerity that the young 
 man now felt indignant with Major Lane for 
 having distressed such a delicately spiritual 
 soul as was Thomas Garden with the hidden 
 details of the Jarvice story. After all, what 
 interested the public was not the question of 
 Jarvice's moral character, but whether a gently 
 nurtured and attractive woman had carried 
 through a sinister and ingenious crime, which,
 
 56 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 but for a mere accident, would have utterly 
 defied detection. 
 
 Theodore Garden got up from the breakfast 
 table and walked over to a circular bow win- 
 dow which commanded charming views of the 
 wide sloping garden, interspersed with the 
 streams and tiny ponds, which gave the house 
 its name of Watermead, and which enabled 
 old Mr. Garden to indulge himself with espe- 
 cial ease in his hobby of water gardening. 
 
 Standing there, the young man began won- 
 dering what he should do with himself this 
 early spring day. 
 
 His fiancee had just left the quiet lodgings, 
 which she and her mother, a clergyman's 
 widow, had occupied in Birmingham during 
 the last few weeks, to pay visits to relatives in 
 the south of England. The thought of going 
 to any of the neighbouring houses where he 
 knew himself to be sure of a warm welcome, 
 and where the news of his engagement would 
 be received with boisterous congratulations, 
 tempered in some cases with an underlying 
 touch of regret and astonishment, filled him 
 with repugnance. 
 
 The girl he had chosen to be his wife was ab- 
 solutely different from the women who had 
 hitherto attracted him; he reverenced as well
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 57 
 
 as loved her, and hitherto Theodore Garden 
 had never found reverence to be in any sense 
 a corollary of passion, while he had judged 
 women by those who were attractive to, or, as 
 was quite as often the case, attracted by, him- 
 self. 
 
 The last few days had brought a great 
 change in his life, and one which he meant 
 should be permanent ; and yet, in spite or per- 
 haps because of this, as he stood staring with 
 absent eyes into his father's charming garden, 
 he found his mind dwelling persistently on the 
 only one of his many amorous adventures 
 which had left a deep, an enduring, and, it 
 must be admitted, a most delightful mark on 
 the tablets of his memory. 
 
 The whole thing was still so vivid to him that 
 half-involuntarily he turned round and looked 
 down the long room to where his old father 
 was sitting. How amazed, above all how 
 shocked and indignant, the man for whom he 
 had so great an affection and respect would 
 feel if he knew the pictures which were now 
 floating before his son's retrospective vision! 
 
 Like most thinking human beings, Theodore 
 Garden had not lived to his present age without 
 being struck by the illogical way the world 
 wags. Accordingly, he was often surprised
 
 58 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 and made humorously indignant by the curious 
 moral standards they had so many more than 
 one of the conventional people among whom 
 it was his fate to dwell and have his social be- 
 ing. 
 
 Not one of the men he knew, with the excep- 
 tion of his father, and of those others a small 
 number truly whom he believed to be sin- 
 cerely, not conventionally, religious, but would 
 have envied him the astonishing adventure 
 which reconstituted itself so clearly before him 
 to-day and yet not one of them but would 
 have been ready to condemn him for having 
 done what he had done. Theodore Garden, 
 however, so often tempted to kiss, never felt 
 tempted to tell, and the story of that episode 
 remained closely hidden, and would so remain, 
 he told himself, to the end of his life. 
 
 What had happened had been briefly this. 
 
 One day in the previous October, Garden 
 had taken his seat in the afternoon express 
 which stops at Birmingham on its way from 
 the north to Euston, or rather, having taken a 
 leisurely survey of the train, which was, as he 
 quickly noted, agreeably empty, he had indi- 
 cated to the porter carrying his bag a carriage 
 in which sat, alone, a singularly pretty woman.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 59 
 
 As he afterwards had the delight of telling 
 her, and, as he now reminded himself with a 
 retrospective thrill of feeling, he had experi- 
 enced, when his eyes first met those of the fair 
 traveller, that incommunicable sensation, part 
 physical, part mental, which your genuine 
 Lothario, if an intelligent man, always wel- 
 comes with quickening pulse as a foretaste of 
 the special zest to be attached to a coming pur- 
 suit. 
 
 Garden's instinct as to such delicate matters 
 had seldom played him false ; never less so than 
 on this occasion, for, within an hour, he and the 
 lovely stranger had reached that delightful 
 stage of intimacy in which a man and woman 
 each feels that he and she, while still having 
 much to learn about the other, are on the verge 
 of a complete understanding. 
 
 During the three hours' journey, Garden's 
 travelling companion told him a great deal 
 more about herself than he had chosen to reveal 
 concerning his own life and affairs; he learnt, 
 for instance, that she was the young wife of an 
 old man, and that the old man was exceedingly 
 jealous. Further, that she found the life she 
 was compelled to lead " horribly boring," and 
 that a widowed cousin, who lived near London, 
 and from whom she had " expectations,"
 
 60 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 formed a convenient excuse for occasional ab- 
 sences from home. 
 
 Concerning three matters of fact, however, 
 she completely withheld her confidence, both 
 then, in those first delicious hours of their ac- 
 quaintance, and even later, when their friend- 
 ship well, why not say friendship, for Garden 
 had felt a very strong liking as well as an over- 
 mastering attraction for this Undine-like crea- 
 ture? had become much closer. 
 
 The first and second facts which she kept 
 closely hidden, for reasons which should per- 
 haps have been obvious, were her surname 
 she confided to him that her Christian name 
 was Pansy and her husband's profession. 
 The third fact which she concealed was the 
 name of the town where she lived, and from 
 which she appeared to be travelling that day. 
 
 The trifling incidents of that eventful Octo- 
 ber journey had become to a great extent 
 blurred in Theodore Garden's memory, but 
 what had followed was still extraordinarily 
 vivid, and to-day, on this holiday morning, 
 standing idly looking out of the window, he al- 
 lowed his mind a certain retrospective licence. 
 
 From whom, so he now asked himself, had 
 first come the suggestion that there should be 
 no parting at Euston between himself and the
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 61 
 
 strange elemental woman he found so full of 
 unforced fascination and disarming charm? 
 
 The answer soon came echoing down the 
 corridors of remembrance: from himself, of 
 course. But even now the memory brought 
 with it shame-faced triumph as he remembered 
 her quick acquiescence, as free, as unashamed, 
 as joyous as that of a spoilt child acclaiming 
 an unlooked-for treat. 
 
 And, after all, what harm had there been in 
 the whole halcyon adventure what injury had 
 it caused to any human being? 
 
 Garden put the husband, the fatuous old 
 man, who had had the incredible folly to 
 marry a girl thirty-five years younger than 
 himself, out of court. Pansy, light-hearted, 
 conscienceless Pansy he always thought of 
 her with a touch of easy tenderness had run 
 no risk of detection, for, as he had early discov- 
 ered, she knew no one in London with the 
 solitary exception of the old cousin who lived 
 in Upper Norwood. 
 
 As for his own business acquaintances, he 
 might, of course, have been seen by any of 
 them taking about this singularly attractive 
 woman, for the two went constantly to the the- 
 atre, and daily to one or other of the great res- 
 taurants. But what then? Excepting that
 
 62 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 she was quieter in manner, far better dressed, 
 and incomparably prettier, Pansy might have 
 been the wife or sister of any one of his own 
 large circle of relations, that great Garden clan 
 who held their heads so high in the business 
 world of the Midlands. 
 
 Nay, nay, no risk had been run, and no one 
 had been a penny the worse ! Indeed, looking 
 back, Theodore Garden told himself that it had 
 been a perfect, a flawless episode ; he even ad- 
 mitted that after all it was perhaps as well 
 that there had been no attempt at a repeti- 
 tion. 
 
 And yet? And yet the young man, espe- 
 cially during the first few weeks which had 
 followed that sequence of enchanting days, had 
 often felt piqued, even a little surprised, that 
 the heroine of his amazing adventure had not 
 taken advantage of his earnest entreaty that 
 she would give him the chance of meeting her 
 again. He had left it to her to be mysterious ; 
 as for himself, he had seen no reason why he 
 should conceal from her either his name or his 
 business address. 
 
 Many men would not have been so frank, 
 but Theodore Garden, too wise in feminine 
 lore to claim an infallible knowledge of women, 
 never remembered having made a mistake as
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 63 
 
 to the moral social standing of a new feminine 
 acquaintance. 
 
 During the few days they had been together, 
 everything had gone to prove that Pansy was 
 no masquerader from that under-world whose 
 denizens always filled him with a sensation of 
 mingled aversion and pity. He could not 
 doubt he never had doubted that what she 
 had chosen to tell him about herself and her 
 private affairs was substantially true. No 
 man, having heard her speak of it, could fail to 
 understand her instinctive repulsion from the 
 old husband to whom she had sold herself into 
 bondage; and as human, if not perhaps quite 
 as worthy of sympathy, was her restless long- 
 ing for freedom to lead the pleasant life led by 
 those of her more fortunate contemporaries 
 whose doings were weekly chronicled in the 
 society papers which seemed to form her only 
 reading. 
 
 Once only had Garden felt for his entranc- 
 ing companion the slightest touch of repug- 
 nance. He had taken her to a play in which 
 a child played an important part, and she had 
 suddenly so spoken as to make him realise with 
 a shock of surprise that she was the mother of 
 children ! Yet the little remark made by her, 
 " I wonder how my little girls are getting on,"
 
 64 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 had been very natural and even womanly. 
 Then, in answer to a muttered word or two on 
 his part, she had explained that she preferred 
 not to have news of her children when she was 
 absent from home, as it only worried her ; even 
 when staying with the old cousin at Upper 
 Norwood, she made a point of being com- 
 pletely free of all possible home troubles. 
 
 Hearing this gentle, placid explanation of 
 her lack of maternal anxiety, Garden had put 
 up his hand to his face to hide a smile ; he had 
 not been mistaken ; Pansy was indeed the thor- 
 ough-going little hedonist he had taken her to 
 be. Still, it was difficult, even rather disturb- 
 ing, to think of her as a mother, and as the 
 mother of daughters. 
 
 Yet how deep an impression this unmoral, 
 apparently soulless woman had made on his 
 mind and on his emotional memory! Even 
 now, when he had no desire, and, above all, 
 must not allow himself to have any desire, ever 
 to see her again, Theodore Garden felt, almost 
 as keenly as he had done during the period of 
 their brief intimacy, a morbid curiosity to know 
 where she lived and had her being. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon of Easter Mon- 
 day.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 65 
 
 Theodore Garden had just come in from a 
 long walk, and, as he passed through the circu- 
 lar hall around which Watermead was built, he 
 heard the low sound of voices, those of his 
 father and some other man, issuing from the 
 square drawing-room always occupied by the 
 father and son on such idle days as these. He 
 stayed his steps, realised that the visitor was 
 Major Lane, and then made up his mind to go 
 up and change, instead of going straight in to 
 his father, as he would have done had the latter 
 been alone. 
 
 As he came down again, and crossed the now 
 lighted hall, he met the parlourmaid, an elderly 
 woman who had been in Thomas Garden's 
 service ever since his wife's death. " I wonder 
 if I can take in the lamps now, Mr. Theodore? 
 It's getting so dark, sir." 
 
 There was a troubled sound in her voice, and 
 the young man stopped and looked at her with 
 some surprise. 
 
 " Of course you can, Kate," he said quickly, 
 "why not? Why haven't you taken them in 
 before?" 
 
 " I did go in with them half an hour ago, sir, 
 but the master told me to take them out again. 
 There's firelight, to be sure, and it's only 
 Major Lane in there, but he's been here since
 
 66 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 three o'clock, and master's not had his tea yet. 
 I suppose they thought they'd wait till you 
 
 came in." 
 
 " Oh! well, if my father prefers to sit in the 
 dark, and to put off tea till he can have my 
 company, you had better wait till I ring, and 
 then bring in the lamps and the tea together." 
 
 He spoke with his usual light good-nature, 
 and passed on into the room which was the only 
 apartment in the large old house clearly asso- 
 ciated in his mind with the graceful, visionary 
 figure of his dead mother. 
 
 Thomas Garden and the Head Constable 
 were sitting in the twilight, one on each side 
 of the fireplace, and when the young man came 
 in, they both stirred perceptibly, and abruptly 
 stopped speaking. 
 
 Theodore came forward and stood on the 
 hearth-rug. " May Kate bring in the lamps, 
 father? " 
 
 "Yes, yes, I suppose so." 
 
 And the lamps were brought in. Then 
 came the tea-tray, placed by Kate on a large 
 table many paces from the fire; womanless 
 Watermead was lacking in the small elegancies 
 of modern life, but now that would soon be 
 remedied, so the younger Garden told himself 
 with a slight, happy smile.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 67 
 
 Very deliberately, and asking no questions 
 as to milk or sugar, for well he knew the tastes 
 of his father and of his father's friend, he 
 poured out two cups of tea, and turning, ad- 
 vanced, a cup balanced in each steady hand. 
 
 But halfway up the room he stopped for a 
 moment, arrested by the sound of his father's 
 voice 
 
 " Theo, my boy, I want to ask you some- 
 thing." 
 
 The mode of address had become of late 
 years a little unusual, and there was a note in 
 Thomas Garden's accents which struck his son 
 as significant even as solemn. 
 
 "Yes, father?" 
 
 " Did you not tell me this morning that you 
 had never met Jarvice? " 
 
 The one onlooker, hatchet-faced Major 
 Lane, suddenly leaned a little forward. 
 
 He was astonished at his old friend's ex- 
 traordinary and uncalled-for courage, and it 
 was with an effort, with the feeling that he was 
 bracing himself to see something terrible take 
 place, that he looked straight at the tall, fine- 
 looking man who had now advanced into the 
 circle of light thrown by the massive Argand 
 lamps. 
 
 But Theodore Garden appeared quite un-
 
 68 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 moved, nay more, quite unconcerned, by his 
 father's question. 
 
 " Yes," he said, " I did tell you so. I sup- 
 pose I knew the old fellow by sight, but I cer- 
 tainly was never introduced to him. Are there 
 any new developments?" 
 
 He turned to Major Lane with a certain 
 curiosity, and then quite composedly handed 
 him the cup of tea he held in his right hand. 
 
 " Well, yes," answered the other coldly, 
 " there are several new developments. We 
 arrested Mrs. Jarvice this morning." 
 
 "That seems rather a strong step to have 
 taken, unless new evidence has turned up since 
 Saturday," said Theodore thoughtfully. 
 
 " Such new evidence has come to hand since 
 Saturday," observed Major Lane drily. 
 
 There was a pause, and again Thomas Car- 
 den addressed his son with that strange touch 
 of solemnity, and again Major Lane, with an 
 inward wincing, stared fixedly at the young 
 man now standing on the hearthrug, a stal- 
 wart, debonair figure, between himself and his 
 old friend. 
 
 " Can you assure me can you assure us 
 both that you never met Mrs. Jarvice?" 
 
 Garden looked down at his father with $ 
 puzzled expression.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 69 
 
 " Of course I can't assure you of anything 
 of the kind," he said, still speaking quite plac- 
 idly. "I may have met her somewhere or 
 other, but I can't remember having done so; 
 and I think I should have remembered it, both 
 because the name is an uncommon one, and be- 
 cause" he turned to Major Lane "isn't 
 she said to be an extraordinarily pretty 
 woman? " 
 
 As the last words were being uttered an odd 
 thing happened. Thomas Garden suddenly 
 dropped the cup he was holding in his hand; 
 it rang against the brass fender and broke in 
 several pieces, while the spoon went clattering 
 into the fireplace. 
 
 "Father!" exclaimed Theodore, and then 
 quickly he added, " Don't trouble to do that," 
 for the old man was stooping over the rug, and 
 fumbling with the broken pieces. But Thomas 
 Garden shook his head; it was evident that he 
 was, for the moment, physically incapable of 
 speech. 
 
 A great fear came into the son's mind; he 
 turned to Major Lane, and muttered in an 
 urgent, agonised whisper, " Is it can it be a 
 seizure? Hadn't I better go and try to find 
 Dr. Curie?" 
 
 But the other, with a dubious expression on
 
 70 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 his face, shook his head. "No, no," he said; 
 " it's nothing of the kind. Your father's get- 
 ting older, Garden, as we all are, and I've had 
 to speak to him to-day about a very disagree- 
 able matter." 
 
 He looked fixedly, probingly, at the young 
 man. 
 
 "I think it's thoroughly upset him." The 
 speaker hesitated, and then added : " I dare- 
 say he'll tell you about it; in any case, I'd bet- 
 ter go now and come back later. If you can 
 spare me half an hour this evening, I should 
 like to have a talk with you about the same 
 matter." 
 
 During the last few moments Major Lane 
 had made up his mind to take a certain course, 
 even to run a certain risk, and that not for the 
 first time that day, for he had already set his 
 own intimate knowledge of Thomas Garden, 
 the life-long friend whose condition now wrung 
 him with pity, against what was, perhaps, his 
 official duty. 
 
 Some two hours before, the Head Constable 
 had entered the house where he had been so 
 constantly and so hospitably entertained, with 
 the firm conviction that Theodore Garden had 
 been the catspaw of a clever, unscrupulous 
 woman; in fact that there had come a repeti-
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 71 
 
 tion, but a hundred times more serious, of that 
 now half-forgotten entanglement which had so 
 nearly brought Garden to grief some seven or 
 eight years before. Once more he had come 
 prepared to do his best to save his friend's son, 
 so far as might be possible, from the conse- 
 quences of his folly. 
 
 But now? Ah, now, the experienced, alert 
 official had to admit to himself that the inci- 
 dents of the last ten minutes had completely 
 altered his view of the matter. He realised 
 that in any case Theodore Garden was no fool ; 
 for the first time that day the terrible suspicion 
 came into Major Lane's mind that the man be- 
 fore him might, after all, be more closely con- 
 nected with the Jarvice mystery than had 
 seemed possible. 
 
 Never, during his long connection with 
 crime, had the Head Constable come across as 
 good an actor, as cool a liar, as he now believed 
 this man of business to be. 
 
 Well, he would give Theodore Garden one 
 more chance to tell the truth; Theodore was 
 devoted to his father, so much was certainly 
 true, and perhaps his father would be able to 
 make him understand the gravity of the case. 
 Major Lane felt bitterly sorry that he had 
 come first to the old man but then, he had so
 
 72 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 completely believed in the "scrape" theory; 
 and now he hardly knew what to believe ! 
 
 For the moment, at any rate, so the Head 
 Constable told himself, the mask had fallen; 
 Theodore Garden could not conceal his relief 
 at the other's approaching departure. 
 
 " Certainly," he said hastily, " come in this 
 evening by all means ; I won't ask you to stay 
 to dinner, for I mean to try and make father 
 go to bed, but later I shall be quite free. If, 
 however, you want to ask me anything about 
 the Jarvice affair, I'm afraid I can't help you 
 much; I've not even read the case with any 
 care." 
 
 The old man, still sitting by the fire, had 
 caught a few of the muttered words, and be- 
 fore Major Lane could leave the room Thomas 
 Garden had risen from his chair, his face paler, 
 perhaps, than usual, but once more his col- 
 lected, dignified self. 
 
 "Stay," he said firmly; "having gone so 
 far, I think we should now thresh the matter 
 out." 
 
 He walked over to where his son and his 
 friend were standing, and he put his hand on 
 the older man's arm. 
 
 " Perhaps I cannot expect you, Lane, to be 
 convinced, as I, of course, have been convinced,
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 73 
 
 by my son's denials. It is, as I told you this 
 afternoon, either a plot on the part of someone 
 who bears a grudge against us, or else what I 
 think more likely there are two men in this 
 great town each bearing the name of Theodore 
 Garden. But I appreciate, I deeply appre- 
 ciate, the generous kindness which made you 
 come and warn us of this impending calamity ; 
 but you need not fear that we shall fail to meet 
 it with a complete answer." 
 
 "Father! Major Lane! What does this 
 mean?" 
 
 For the first time a feeling of misgiving, of 
 sudden fear, swept over Theodore Garden's 
 mind. Without waiting for an answer, he led 
 the way back to the fireplace, and, deliberately 
 drawing forward a chair, motioned to Major 
 Lane to sit down likewise. 
 
 " Now then," he said, speaking with consid- 
 erable authority and decision, " I think I have 
 a right to ask what this is all about ! In what 
 way are we, my father and myself, concerned 
 in the Jarvice affair? For my part, Major 
 Lane, I can assure you, and that, if you wish it, 
 on oath, that I did not know Mr. Jarvice, and, 
 to the best of my belief, I have never seen, still 
 less spoken to, Mrs. Jarvice " 
 
 " If that be indeed so," said the man whom
 
 74 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 he addressed, and who, for the first time, was 
 beginning to feel himself shaken in his belief, 
 nay, in his absolute knowledge, that the young 
 man was perjuring himself, " can you, and will 
 you, explain these letters?" and he drew out 
 of his pocket a folded sheet of foolscap. 
 
 Garden bent forward eagerly ; there was no 
 doubt, so the Head Constable admitted to him- 
 self, as to his eagerness to be brought face to 
 face with the accusation and yet, at that mo- 
 ment, a strong misgiving came over Major 
 Lane. 
 
 Even if Theodore Garden could continue to 
 be the consummate actor he had already 
 proved himself, was it right, was it humane, to 
 subject him to this terrible test, and that, too, 
 before his old father? Whatever the young 
 man's past relation to Mrs. Jarvice, nay, what- 
 ever his connection might be with the crime 
 which Major Lane now knew to have been 
 committed, Garden was certainly ignorant of 
 the existence of these terrible, these damna- 
 tory documents, and they constituted so far 
 the only proof that Garden had been lying 
 when he denied any knowledge of Mrs. Jar- 
 vice. But then, alas ! they constituted an irre- 
 futable proof. 
 
 With a sudden movement Major Lane with-
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 75 
 
 drew his right hand, that which held the piece 
 of paper. 
 
 "Stop a moment, Theodore; do you really 
 wish this discussion to take place before your 
 father? I wonder if you remember" he 
 paused, and then went on firmly, " an inter- 
 view you and I had many years ago? " 
 
 For the first time the younger man's whole 
 manner changed ; a look of fear, of guilt, came 
 over his strong, intelligent face. 
 
 " Father," he said imploringly, " I beg you 
 not to listen to Major Lane. He is alluding 
 to a matter which he gave me his word his 
 word of honour should never be mentioned to 
 anyone, least of all to you;" then, turning 
 with an angry gesture to the Head Con- 
 stable, "Was that not so?" he asked im- 
 periously. 
 
 " Yes, I admit that by asking you this ques- 
 tion I have broken my word, but good God! 
 man, this is no passing scrape that we have to 
 consider now; to-morrow morning all Bir- 
 mingham will be ringing with your name 
 with your father's name, Theodore for by 
 some horrible mischance the papers have got 
 hold of the letters in question. I did my best, 
 but I found I was powerless." 
 
 He turned and deliberately looked away, as
 
 76 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 he added in a low, hesitating voice : " And 
 now, once more I ask you whether we had not 
 better delay this painful discussion until you 
 and I are alone?" 
 
 " No ! " cried Garden, now thoroughly 
 roused, "certainly not! You have chosen to 
 come and tell my father something about me, 
 and I insist that you tell me here, and at once, 
 what it is of which I am accused." 
 
 He instinctively looked at his father for 
 support, and received it in full measure, for at 
 once the old man spoke. 
 
 " Yes, Lane, I think my son is right ; there's 
 no use in making any more mystery about the 
 matter. I'm sure that the letters you have 
 brought to show Theodore will puzzle him as 
 much as they have me, and that he will be able 
 to assure you that he has no clue either to their 
 contents or to their writer." 
 
 Very slowly, with a feeling of genuine grief 
 and shame for the man who seemed incapable 
 of either sorrow or shame, Major Lane held 
 out the folded paper ; and then in very pity he 
 looked away as his old friend's son eagerly un- 
 rolled the piece of foolscap, placing it close un- 
 der the lamp-shade in order that he might thor- 
 oughly master its contents. 
 
 As Theodore Garden completed the trifling
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 77 
 
 action, that of unrolling the piece of paper 
 which was to solve the mystery, he noted, with 
 a curious feeling of relief, that the documents 
 (or were they letters?) regarded by the Head 
 Constable as so damnatory, were but two, the 
 first of some length, the second consisting of a 
 very few lines, and both copied in the fair 
 round hand of Major Lane's confidential 
 clerk. 
 
 And then, with no premonitory warning, 
 Garden became the victim of a curious physical 
 illusion. 
 
 Staring down at the long piece of blue pa- 
 per, he found that he was only able to master 
 the signature, in both cases the same, with 
 which each letter terminated. Sometimes 
 only one word, one name that of Pansy 
 stood out clearly, and then again he seemed 
 only to see the other word, the other name 
 that of Jarvice. The two names appeared to 
 play hide-and-seek with one another, to leap 
 out alternately and smite his eyes, pressing and 
 printing themselves upon his brain. 
 
 At last, while he was still staring silently, 
 obstinately, at the black lines dancing before 
 him, he heard the words, and they seemed to be 
 coming from a long way off, " Theodore ! Oh, 
 my boy, what is the matter? " and then Major
 
 78 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Lane's voice, full of rather angry concern, 
 " Rouse yourself, Garden, you are frightening 
 your father." 
 
 "Am I?" he said dully; "I mustn't do 
 that;" then, handing back the sheet of fool- 
 scap to the Head Constable, he said hoarsely, 
 "I can't make them out. Will you read 
 them to me? " 
 
 And Major Lane, in passionless accents, 
 read aloud the two letters which he already 
 almost knew by heart. 
 
 6, LIGHTWOOD PLACE, 
 
 January 28th. 
 
 You told me to write to you if ever I was in real 
 trouble and thought you could help me. Oh! Theo, 
 darling, I am in great trouble, and life, especially since 
 that happy time you know when I mean is more 
 wretched than ever. You used to say I was extraordi- 
 narily pretty, I wonder if you would say so now, for I 
 am simply ill worn out with worry. He you know 
 who has found out something; such a little insignifi- 
 cant thing; and since then he makes my life unbearable 
 with his stupid jealousy. It isn't as if he knew about 
 you and me, that would be something real to grumble 
 at, wouldn't it, darling? Sometimes I feel tempted to 
 tell him all about it. How he would stare! He is in- 
 capable of understanding anything romantic. However, 
 I'm in no mood for laughing now. He's got a woman
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 79 
 
 in to watch me, a governess, but luckily I've quite got 
 her to be on my side, though of course I haven't told 
 her anything about my private affairs. 
 
 Will you meet me one day this week, to-morrow if 
 you can, at No. 15, Calthorpe Street? Four o'clock is 
 the safest time for me. Between the two small shops 
 you will see a swing door with " Madame Paula, Milli- 
 ner," on it; push it open and go straight upstairs. On 
 the first landing you will see a door with " Gone out, 
 enquire upstairs," on it. Push up the door knob (don't 
 try to turn it) and walk in. The room will be empty, 
 but you will see a door leading to a back room; push 
 up the knob and there there you will find your poor 
 little Pansy, fainting with joy at seeing her big strong 
 Theo again. 
 
 Send me a postcard, saying, " Mrs. Jarvice can be 
 fitted on (day you select)." If posted before eleven, it 
 will reach me in time. Of course, I'm running a risk 
 in meeting you here, so near my home, but I must see 
 you, for I have a great favour to ask you, Theo, and I 
 dare not propose going away even for one day. 
 
 PANSY JARVICE. 
 
 Major Lane paused a moment, then went 
 on: - 
 
 Theo, I wrote to you ten days ago, but I have had 
 no answer. I am dreadfully worried; I know you are 
 in Birmingham, for I saw your name in a paper before 
 I wrote to you. I have gone through such terrible days
 
 80 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 waiting for the postcard I asked you to send me. Write, 
 if only to say you don't want to hear again of poor 
 miserable PANSY JARVICE. 
 
 " I suppose you will now admit that you 
 know who wrote these letters?" asked Major 
 Lane sternly. 
 
 " Yes at least I suppose they were written 
 by Mrs. Jarvice." 
 
 Theodore Garden spoke with a touch of im- 
 patience. The question seemed to him to be, 
 on the part of his father's old friend, a piece 
 of useless cruelty. 
 
 " And can you suggest to whom they were 
 written, if not to yourself? " 
 
 " No, of course not; I do not doubt that they 
 were written to me," and this time his face was 
 ravaged with a horror and despair to which the 
 other two men had, so far, no clue. "And 
 yet," he added, a touch of surprise in his voice, 
 " I never saw these letters they never reached 
 me." 
 
 " But of course you received others? " 
 
 Major Lane spoke with a certain eagerness; 
 then, as the young man seemed to hesitate, he 
 added hastily: "Nay, nay say nothing that 
 might incriminate yourself."
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 81 
 
 " But indeed indeed I have never received 
 a letter from her that perhaps is why I did 
 not know the handwriting." 
 
 "Theodore!" cried his father sharply, 
 "think what you are saying! What you've 
 been shown are only copies surely you under- 
 stood that? What Lane has just shown you 
 are copies of letters which purport to have been 
 addressed to you, but which were intercepted 
 on their way to the post is that not so? " and 
 he turned to the Head Constable. 
 
 'Yes," said Major Lane; then he added, 
 very deliberately. 
 
 " The originals of these two letters, which 
 were bought for a large sum from Mrs. Jar- 
 vice's governess, evidently the woman referred 
 to in the first letter, are now in the hands of 
 the news editor of the Birmingham Dispatch. 
 I was shown them as a great favour " a grim 
 smile distorted, for a moment, the Head Con- 
 stable's narrow jaw. 
 
 " I did my best for your father's sake, 
 Theodore to frighten these people into giv- 
 ing them up; I even tried to persuade them 
 to hold them over, but it was no good. I was 
 told that no Birmingham paper had ever had 
 such a * scoop', I believe, was the word used.
 
 82 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 You and your father are so well known in this 
 city." And again Theodore Garden mar- 
 velled at the cruelty of the man. 
 
 Thomas Garden broke in with a touch of 
 impatience : 
 
 "But nothing else has been found, my 
 boy ! Lane should tell you that the whole theory 
 of your having known Mrs. Jarvice rests on 
 these two letters which never reached you." 
 
 Father and son seemed suddenly to have 
 changed places. The old man spoke in a 
 strong, self-confident tone, but the other, his 
 grey face supported on his hands, was staring 
 fixedly into the fire. 
 
 "Yes," said Major Lane, more kindly, "I 
 ought perhaps to tell you that within an hour 
 of my being shown these letters I had Mrs. 
 Jarvice's house once more searched, and noth- 
 ing was found connecting you with the woman, 
 excepting, I am sorry to say, this ; " and he 
 held out an envelope on which was written in 
 Theodore Garden's clear handwriting the 
 young man's name and business address. 
 
 " Now, I should like you to tell me, if you 
 don't mind doing so, where, when, and how 
 this name and address came to be written?" 
 
 " Yes, I will certainly tell you." 
 
 The young man spoke collectedly; he was
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 83 
 
 beginning to realise the practical outcome of 
 the conversation. 
 
 " I wrote that address about the middle of 
 last October, in London, at Mansell's Hotel 
 in Pall Mall East." 
 
 "The poor fellow's going to make a clean 
 breast of it at last," so thought Major Lane 
 with a strange feeling of relief, for on the 
 flap of the envelope, which he had kept care- 
 fully turned down, was stamped "Mansell's 
 Hotel." 
 
 It was in a considerate, almost kindly tone, 
 that the Head Constable next spoke. 
 
 " And now, I beg you, for your own sake, 
 to tell me the truth. Perhaps I ought to in- 
 form you, before you say anything, that, ac- 
 cording to our theory, Mrs. Jarvice was cer- 
 tainly assisted in procuring the drug with 
 which there is no doubt she slowly poisoned 
 her husband. As yet we have no clue as to 
 the person who helped her, but we have ascer- 
 tained that for the last two months, in fact, 
 from about the date of the first letter ad- 
 dressed to you, a man did purchase minute 
 quantities of this drug at Birmingham, at 
 Wolverhampton, and at Walsall. Now, mind 
 you, I do not suspect, I never have suspected, 
 you of having any hand in that, but I fear
 
 84 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 you'll have to face the ordeal of being con- 
 fronted with the various chemists, of whom two 
 declare most positively that they can identify 
 the man who brought them the prescription 
 which obtained him the drug in question." 
 
 While Major Lane was speaking, Theodore 
 Garden had to a certain extent regained his 
 self-possession ; here, at least, he stood on firm 
 ground. 
 
 " Of course, I am prepared to face anything 
 of the kind that may be necessary." He added 
 almost inaudibly: " I have brought it on my- 
 self." 
 
 Then he turned, his whole voice altering and 
 softening: "Father, perhaps you would not 
 mind my asking Major Lane to go into the 
 library with me? I should prefer to see him 
 alone." 
 
 II 
 
 And then the days dragged on, a week of 
 days, each containing full measure of bitter 
 and public humiliation; full measure also of 
 feverish suspense, for Theodore Garden did 
 not find it quite so easy as he had thought it 
 would be to clear himself of this serious, and 
 yet preposterous accusation of complicity in 
 murder.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 85 
 
 But Major Lane was surprised at the cour- 
 age and composure with which the young man 
 faced the ordeal of confrontation with the vari- 
 ous men, any one of whom, through a simple 
 mistake or nervous lapse of memory, might 
 compel his presence, if not in the dock, then 
 as a witness at the coming murder trial. 
 
 At last the awful ordeal was over, for, as 
 a matter of fact, none of those brought face 
 to face with him in the sordid promiscuity of 
 such scenes, singled out Theodore Garden as 
 resembling the mysterious individual who had 
 almost certainly provided Mrs. Jarvice with 
 the means wherewith to poison her husband. 
 
 But it was after the need for active defence 
 had passed away that Theodore Garden's true 
 sufferings began. . . . The moment twi- 
 light fell he was haunted, physically and men- 
 tally possessed, by the presence of the woman 
 he had known at once so little and so well 
 that is, of her he now knew to be Pansy Jar- 
 vice. 
 
 Especially terrible were the solitary even- 
 ings of those days when his father was away, 
 performing the task of breaking so much of 
 the truth as could be told to the girl to whom 
 his son had been engaged. 
 
 As each afternoon drew in Theodore found
 
 80 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 himself compelled to remain more or less con- 
 cealed in the room which overlooked the gar- 
 den of Waterhead. For, with the approach of 
 night, the suburban road in front of the fine 
 old house was filled by an ever coming and 
 going crowd of bat-like men and women, eager 
 to gaze with morbid curiosity at the dwelling 
 of the man who had undoubtedly been, if not 
 Mrs. Jarvice's accomplice that, to the an- 
 noyance of the sensation-mongers, seemed de- 
 cidedly open to question then, her favoured 
 lover. 
 
 But to these shameful and grotesque hap- 
 penings Theodore Garden gave scarce a 
 thought, for it was when he found himself 
 alone in the drawing-room or library that his 
 solitude would become stealthily invaded by 
 an invisible and impalpable wraith. 
 
 So disorganised had become his nerves, so 
 pitiable the state of his body and mind, that 
 constantly he seemed conscious of a faint, sweet 
 odour, that of wood violets, a scent closely as- 
 sociated in his thoughts with Pansy Jarvice, 
 with the woman whom he now knew to be a 
 murderess. 
 
 He came at last to long for a tangible de- 
 lusion, for the sight of a bodily shape which 
 he could tell himself was certainly not there.
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 87 
 
 But no such relief was vouchsafed him; and 
 yet once, when sitting in the drawing-room, 
 trying to read a book, he had felt a rounded 
 cheek laid suddenly to his, a curl of silken, 
 scented hair had touched his neck. . . . 
 
 Terrifying as was the peopled solitude of 
 his evenings, Garden dreaded their close, for 
 at night, during the whole of each long night, 
 the woman from whom he now felt so awful 
 a repulsion held him prisoner. 
 
 From the fleeting doze of utter exhaustion 
 he would be awakened by feeling the pressure 
 of Pansy's soft, slender arms about his neck; 
 they would wind themselves round his shud- 
 dering body, enclosing him slowly, inexorably, 
 till he felt as if he must surely die under their 
 gyves-like pressure. 
 
 Again and this, perhaps, was what he 
 learnt toxlread in an especial degree he would 
 be suddenly roused by Pansy's liquid, laugh- 
 ing voice, whispering things of horror in his 
 ear; it was then, and then only, that he found 
 courage to speak, courage to assure her, and 
 so assure himself, that he was in no sense her 
 accomplice, that he had had naught to do with 
 old Jarvice's death. But then there would 
 come answer, in the eager tones he remem- 
 bered so well, and the awful words found un-
 
 88 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 willing echo in his heart : " Yes, yes, indeed 
 you helped! " 
 
 And now the last day, or rather the last 
 night, had come, for the next morning Theo- 
 dore Garden was to leave Birmingham, he 
 hoped for ever, for New Zealand. 
 
 The few people he had been compelled to 
 see had been strangely kind ; quiet and gentle, 
 as folk, no doubt, feel bound to be when in 
 the presence of one condemned. As for Major 
 Lane, he was stretching no one knew it bet- 
 ter than Garden himself a great point in al- 
 lowing the young man to leave England be- 
 fore the Jarvice trial. 
 
 During those last days, even during those 
 last hours, Theodore deliberately prevented 
 himself from allowing his mind to dwell on 
 his father. He did not know how much the 
 old man had been told, and he had no wish to 
 know. A wall of silence had arisen between 
 the two who had aways been so much, nay, in 
 a sense, everything, to one another. Each 
 feared to give way to any emotion, and yet the 
 son knew only too well, and was ashamed of 
 the knowledge, with what relief he would part 
 from his father. 
 
 There had been a moment when Major Lane
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 89 
 
 had intimated his belief that the two would 
 go away and make a new life together, but 
 Theodore Garden had put aside the idea with 
 rough decision. Perhaps when he was far 
 away on the other side of the world, the former 
 relations of close love and sympathy, if not 
 of confidence, might be re-established between 
 his father and himself, but this, he felt sure, 
 would never be while they remained face to 
 face. 
 
 And now he was lying wide awake in the 
 darkness, in the pretty peaceful room which 
 had once been his nursery, and where he had 
 spent his happy holidays as a schoolboy. 
 
 His brain remained abnormally active, but 
 physically he was oppressed by a great weari- 
 ness; to-night, for the first time, Garden felt 
 the loathsome wraith that haunted him, if not 
 less near, then less malicious, less watchful than 
 usual, above all less eager to assert her power. 
 . . . Yet, even so, he lay very still, fearing 
 to move lest he should once more feel about 
 his body the clinging, enveloping touch he 
 dreaded with so great a dread. 
 
 And then, quite suddenly, there came a 
 strange lightening of his heart. A space of 
 time seemed to have sped by, and Garden, by
 
 90 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 some mysterious mental process, knew that he 
 was still near home, and not, as would have 
 been natural, in New Zealand. Nay, more, he 
 realised that the unfamiliar place in which he 
 now found himself was Winson Green Gaol, a 
 place which, as a child, he had been taught to 
 think of with fear, fear mingled with a certain 
 sense of mystery and excitement. 
 
 Theodore had not thought of the old local 
 prison for years, but now he knew that he and 
 his father were together there, in a small cell 
 lighted by one candle. The wall of silence, 
 raised on both sides by shame and pain, had 
 broken down, but, alas! too late; for, again in 
 some curious inexplicable way, the young man 
 was aware that he lay under sentence of death, 
 and that he was to be hanged early in the 
 morning of which the dawn was only just now 
 breaking. 
 
 Yet, strange to say, this knowledge caused 
 him, personally, but little uneasiness, but on 
 his father's account he felt infinitely distressed, 
 and he found himself bending his whole mind 
 to comfort and sustain the old man. 
 
 Thus, he heard a voice, which he knew to 
 be his own, saying in an argumentative tone, 
 " I assure you, father, that an extraordinary 
 amount of nonsense is talked nowadays con-
 
 MR. JARVICE'S WIFE 91 
 
 cerning well, the death penalty. Is it pos- 
 sible that you do not realise that I am escap- 
 ing a much worse fate that of having to live 
 on? I wish, dear dad, that I could persuade 
 you of the truth of this." 
 
 " If only," muttered the old man in response, 
 "if only, my boy, I could bear it for you;" 
 and Garden saw that his father's face was 
 seared with an awful look of terror and agony. 
 
 " But, indeed, father, you do not under- 
 stand. Believe me, I am not afraid it will 
 not be so bad after all. So do not pray, 
 pray, father, do not be so distressed." 
 
 And then, with a great start, Theodore Car- 
 den awoke awoke to see the small, spare 
 figure of that same dear father, clothed in the 
 long, old-fashioned linen nightshirt of another 
 day, standing by his bedside. 
 
 The old man held a candle in his hand, and 
 was gazing down at his only child with an ex- 
 pression of unutterable woe and grief. 
 
 " I will try I am trying, my boy, not to 
 be unreasonably distressed," he said. 
 
 Theodore Garden sat up in bed. 
 
 Since this awful thing had come on him, he 
 had never, even for an instant, forgotten self, 
 but now he saw that his suff erings were small 
 compared with those he had brought on the
 
 92 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 man into whose face he was gazing with red- 
 rimmed, sunken eyes. 
 
 For a moment the wild thought came to him 
 that he might try to explain, to justify him- 
 self, to prove to his father that in this matter 
 he had but done as others do, and that the 
 punishment was intolerably heavier than the 
 crime; but then, looking up and meeting 
 Thomas Garden's perplexed, questioning eyes, 
 he felt a great rush of shame and horror, not 
 only of himself, but of all those who look at 
 life as he himself had always looked at it; for 
 the first time, he understood the mysterious 
 necessity, as well as the beauty, of abnegation, 
 of renunciation. 
 
 " Father," he said, " listen. I will not go 
 away alone; I was mad to think of such a 
 thing. We will go together, you and I, Lane 
 has told me that such has been your wish, and 
 then perhaps some day we will come back to- 
 gether." 
 
 After this, for the first time for many nights, 
 Theodore Garden fell into a dreamless sleep.
 
 Ill 
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 
 
 OLIVER GERMAINE walked with long, even 
 strides from the Marble Arch to Grosvenor 
 Gate. It was Sunday morning, early in July, 
 and the comparatively deserted portion of the 
 Park which he had chosen was, even so, full 
 of walkers. A good many people, men as well 
 as women, looked at him pleasantly as he went 
 by, for the young man was an attractive, even 
 an arresting personality to the type of person 
 who takes part in Church Parade. 
 
 Germaine was tall, slim, dark, so blessed by 
 fate in the mere matter of eyes, nose and 
 mouth, that his looks were often commented 
 on when his wife's beauty was mentioned. 
 
 So it was that, as he walked quickly by, a 
 rather vexed expression on his handsome face, 
 almost every man who saw him envied him if 
 not his looks then his clothes, if not his clothes 
 then his air of being young, healthy, and, to 
 use an ugly modern phrase, in perfect con- 
 dition. 
 
 A nursemaid who watched him pass to and 
 
 95
 
 96 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 fro several times told herself, rather wistfully, 
 that he was waiting for a loved one, and that 
 the lady, as is the way with loved ones, was 
 late. 
 
 The nursemaid was right in one sense, wrong 
 in another. Oliver Germaine was waiting for 
 a lady, but the lady was his married sister. 
 Her name was Fanny Burdon, and her home 
 was in Shropshire. Germaine had a loved one, 
 but she was already his wife, his beautiful, 
 clever Bella, with whom he would so much 
 rather have been now, sitting in their pretty 
 house in West Chapel Street than waiting in 
 the Park for his sister Fanny. 
 
 It was really too bad of Fanny to be late! 
 The more so. that she would certainly feel ag- 
 grieved if, when she did come, her brother 
 made her go straight home with him, instead 
 of taking her down into the crowd of people 
 who were now seething round the Achilles 
 statue. But if Fanny didn't come at once, 
 go home they must, for Bella wouldn't like 
 them to be late quite a number of people 
 were coming to lunch. 
 
 Germaine did not quite know whom, among 
 their crowds of friends, Bella had asked to 
 come in to-day. But certain people, four or 
 five perhaps, would assuredly be there Mrs.
 
 Slade, Bella's great " pal," a nice pretty little 
 woman, with big appealing eyes; also Jenny 
 and Paul Arabin, distant relations of his wife, 
 and once the young couple's only link with the 
 exclusive world of which they now formed so 
 intimate a part. 
 
 Then there would be Uvedale. 
 
 Germaine's mind dwelt on Uvedale. Bob 
 Uvedale was one of his wife's admirers in 
 fact Uvedale made no secret of his infatuation 
 for the beautiful Mrs. Germaine, but he was 
 a good fellow, and never made either Bella 
 or himself ridiculous. 
 
 Oliver Germaine had remained very simple 
 at heart. He felt sure that Bella could take 
 care of herself; she always behaved with ex- 
 traordinary prudence and sense, in fact 
 Oliver was now far less jealous of Bella than 
 he had been in the old days, before she had 
 blossomed into a famous beauty. She was then 
 rather fond of flirting but her husband had 
 proved the truth of the comfortable old adage 
 concerning safety in numbers. Bella now sim- 
 ply had no time for flirtation! There was no 
 necessity for her to exert herself, she had only 
 to sit still and be admired and adored, adored, 
 that is, in platonic fashion, admired as you 
 admire a work of art.
 
 98 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Another man who would certainly be lunch- 
 ing with them to-day was Peter Joliffe. 
 
 Joliffe was a clever, quaint fellow, whose 
 mission in life was to make people laugh by 
 saying funny things in a serious tone. Joliffe 
 was always fluttering round Bella. He had 
 established himself as a tame cat about the 
 house, and he had, as a matter of fact, been 
 very useful to the young couple, piloting Bella 
 when she was only " the new beauty " amid 
 social quicksands and shallows of which she 
 naturally knew nothing. 
 
 Nay, more, Peter Joliffe had introduced the 
 Germaines to some of the very nicest people 
 they knew, old-fashioned, well-established 
 people, delightful old ladies who called Bella 
 " My pretty dear," courtly old gentlemen who 
 paid her charmingly-turned compliments. 
 Yes, it was nice to think Joliffe would be there 
 to-day; he always helped to make a party go 
 off well. 
 
 As for Oliver's sister, Fanny, she would 
 have to sit next Henry Buck. For a brief 
 moment Germaine considered Henry Buck, 
 Buck who was always called " Rabbit " behind 
 his back, and sometimes to his face. 
 
 Germaine hardly knew how it was that they 
 had come to know poor old Rabbit so well.
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 99 
 
 They had met him soon after they were mar- 
 ried, and ever since he had stuck to them both 
 with almost pathetic insistence. Oddly enough, 
 he, Oliver, did not reciprocate Henry Buck's 
 feelings of admiring friendship. It was not 
 that he disliked the man, but he had a sort 
 of physical antipathy to him. 
 
 The only interesting thing about Henry 
 Buck was his wealth. But then to many peo- 
 ple that made him very interesting, for he was 
 really immensely rich, and one of those rather 
 uncommon people, who don't know how to 
 spend their money! Poor Rabbit had been 
 educated at home by a foolish, widowed 
 mother, who had been afraid of letting him 
 play rough games. This was perhaps why he 
 was so dull and awkward not quite like other 
 people. 
 
 Germaine felt rather sorry that Henry 
 Buck would certainly be there to-day. Con- 
 sidering how very little he did for them no, 
 that was a beastly thing to say, even to one- 
 self 1 but considering how very unornamental 
 and uninteresting poor old Rabbit was, it was 
 really very nice of Bella to be so kind to him. 
 She never seemed to mind his being there, and 
 she had even managed to force his company on 
 certain people whose one object in life was to
 
 100 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 avoid a bore, and who didn't care a button 
 whether a man was a pauper or a millionaire. 
 
 Of course Germaine guessed what had hap- 
 pened to Fanny.* She had almost certainly 
 gone to hear some fashionable preacher for 
 Fanny was the sort of woman who likes to 
 cram everything into a visit to London. She 
 was disappointed if every waking hour did not 
 bring with it some new sensation, some new 
 amusement, and this was odd or so her sim- 
 ple-hearted brother told himself because all 
 the rest of the year Fanny was content to lead 
 the dull, stodgy life of a small Shropshire 
 squire's wife. 
 
 Oliver's irritation increased. It was fool- 
 ish of Fanny to have come to London just 
 now, in the middle of the season! Hitherto, 
 she and her husband had always come up for 
 a fortnight just before Christmas, and then 
 perhaps again just before Easter. Now she 
 had come up alone, and settled herself into 
 dull lodgings in Marylebone; and then well, 
 the young man was vaguely aware that Fan- 
 ny's visit to town was really a scouting expe- 
 dition. She evidently wanted to see for herself 
 how her brother Oliver and his beautiful wife 
 were "getting on." 
 
 Strange to say, Fanny was not quite pleased
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 101 
 
 at Bella's sudden social success not pleased, 
 and yet quite willing to profit by it. How 
 queer that was ! How queer, for the matter of 
 that, most women werel But Bella was not 
 queer in fact, Bella had been most awfully 
 nice about Fanny, and had never allowed her 
 to suspect, even by as much as a look, that her 
 presence was not welcome. Yet Fanny nat- 
 urally proved " odd man out " at all those little 
 gatherings to which her lovely sister-in-law 
 made her so carelessly welcome. Fanny knew 
 nothing of the delightful world in which Oliver 
 and Bella now moved ; she was quite convinced 
 that she belonged to the very best, exclusive 
 set, and so she did in Shropshire. But here 
 in town? Why, she was even ignorant of the 
 new social shibboleths; all her notions as to 
 what it was the right thing to do, or to avoid 
 doing, belonged to the year before last ! 
 
 Take to-day. Fanny would certainly feel 
 cross and disappointed that Bella was not 
 there, in the Park, too; and, as a matter of 
 fact, Germaine had tried to make his wife 
 please his sister in the little matter of Church 
 Parade but Bella had shaken her head smil- 
 ingly. 
 
 "You know I would do anything for 
 Fanny," she had said, "but really, darling,
 
 102 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 you mustn't ask me to do that to go into that 
 big, horrid, staring crowd. Why should I? It 
 makes one look so cheap 1 It would only bore 
 me, and I don't think Fanny would really en- 
 joy having me there," and Bella had smiled a 
 little smile. 
 
 Germaine had smiled too, he really 
 couldn't help it ! It was quite true that Fanny 
 would not enjoy seeing Bella looked at, fol- 
 lowed, in a word, triumphing, in the way she 
 did triumph every time she appeared in a place 
 where she was likely to be recognised. 
 
 Of course it was odd, when one came to 
 think of it, that Bella, who had been just as 
 pretty two years ago as she was now, should, 
 for some mysterious reason, have been sud- 
 deny discovered, by those whose word is law 
 in such matters, to be astonishingly, marvel- 
 lously beautiful ! 
 
 An involuntary smile again quivered across 
 Oliver Germaine's good-looking face. He had 
 but little sense of humour, and yet even he 
 saw something almost comic about it the way 
 that Bella, his darling, pretty little Bella, had 
 suddenly been exalted hoisted up, as it were, 
 on to a pinnacle. She was now what the Lon- 
 doners of a hundred years ago would have 
 called " the reigning toast " so an amusing
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 103 
 
 old fellow, who was a great authority on his- 
 tory, had told him a few days ago. 
 
 Still, he ought to make allowances for his 
 sister Fanny. It was not in human nature 
 or so Oliver believed for any woman, even 
 for such a good sort as Fanny undoubtedly 
 was, to be really pleased at another woman's 
 triumph. 
 
 Small wonder that, to use his sister's fa- 
 vourite expression, Fanny could not make it 
 out! It was unfortunate that Bella's fame 
 that fame of which the young husband was 
 half ashamed and half proud had actually 
 penetrated to the dull village where his only 
 sister held high state as wife of the lord of the 
 manor. 
 
 Since Fanny had been in town she had said 
 little things to him about Bella's position as 
 reigning beauty not altogether kindly or nice 
 little things. Even yesterday she had observed, 
 with a touch of sharp criticism in her voice, " I 
 wonder, dear old boy, why you allow Bella's 
 photograph to appear in all those low pa- 
 pers ! " and Oliver had shrugged his shoulders, 
 not knowing what to answer, but comfortably 
 sure, in a brotherly way, that Fanny would 
 have been quite willing to see her own fair 
 features reproduced in similar fashion, had it
 
 104 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 occurred to any of the editors of these same 
 enterprising papers to ask for the loan of her 
 photograph. 
 
 As a matter of fact, he had remembered, 
 even while she was speaking, a monstrously 
 ugly photograph of Fanny, Fanny sur- 
 rounded by her dogs and children, which had 
 appeared in a well-known lady's paper. Why, 
 she had actually sent the paper to him, 
 marked! But Oliver magnanimously re- 
 frained from reminding her of this, the more 
 so, that Fanny had hurried on from the trifling 
 question of Bella's portrait to the more serious 
 and unpleasant one of her brother's moderate 
 income. 
 
 But, as Germaine now told himself compla- 
 cently, he had been very short with her. In 
 fact he had administered a good brotherly 
 snub to inquisitive Fanny. She had no busi- 
 ness to ask him a lot of questions concerning 
 the way he and Bella chose to spend their in- 
 come ; it was no business of hers how the money 
 was spent. Unfortunately Fanny did con- 
 sider it her business, simply owing to the fact 
 that she was Oliver's only sister, and very fond 
 of him, that went without saying, and that 
 unluckily her husband was Oliver's trustee. 
 So it was that she had shown extraordinary
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 105 
 
 curiosity as to how her brother and his wife 
 managed to live in the way they did, on the in- 
 come she knew they had. 
 
 " Do you know," she had said gravely, " ex- 
 actly what your income is?" Oliver had 
 nodded impatiently. Of course he knew, 
 roughly speaking, that he and Bella had a lit- 
 tle over two thousand a year 
 
 " Two thousand and sixty-one pounds, eigh- 
 teen shillings," she had gone on impressively. 
 " At least that was what it was last year, for I 
 asked Dick." Now Dick was Fanny's hus- 
 band, and a most excellent fellow, but hope- 
 lessly under Fanny's thumb. 
 
 Oliver Germaine had not always been so 
 well off. In fact, when he first met Bella 
 something like six years ago he had been a 
 subaltern, with a very small private income, in 
 a Line regiment. And it was on that small in- 
 come that the loveliest girl in Southsea now 
 the most beautiful woman in London had 
 married him. Then had come an immense, 
 unlooked-for piece of good fortune I 
 
 A distant Scotch cousin, a crusty old chap, 
 of whom all the Germaines were afraid, and 
 who had constantly declared it to be his inten- 
 tion to leave his money outside his own family, 
 had chosen to make Oliver his heir, and had
 
 106 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 appointed Fanny's husband, the steady-going, 
 rather dull Shropshire squire, as trustee. 
 
 Of course Oliver, and even more Bella, knew 
 now that the fortune which had seemed then to 
 make them rich beyond their wildest dreams, 
 was not so very much after all. But still, at 
 first, it had been plenty plenty for everything 
 they could reasonably require. 
 
 But when Bella had become a famous 
 beauty, they had of course to spend rather 
 more, and about a year ago they had gone 
 through rather a disagreeable moment. The 
 little house in West Chapel Street which had 
 seemed so cheap had proved more expensive 
 than they had expected. However, Dick, as 
 trustee, had stretched a point in his brother-in- 
 law's favour, and the slight shrinkage which 
 had resulted in the Germaines' income mat- 
 tered not at all from the practical point of 
 view, for the simple reason that they went on 
 spending as much as, in fact rather more than, 
 they had done before but it was tiresome hav- 
 ing to pay, as they now had to do, an insurance 
 premium. 
 
 Still, it was too bad of Fanny to have spoken 
 as she had done, for Bella was wonderfully 
 economical. Take one simple matter ; all their 
 friends, or at any rate the majority of them,
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 107 
 
 had motors as a matter of course, but Bella, 
 when she was not driving, as she generally did, 
 in a car lent her by some kind acquaintance, 
 contented herself with jobbing an old-fash- 
 ioned brougham. 
 
 This restraint was the more commendable 
 inasmuch that a friend had lately pointed out 
 to her a way in which one could run a motor 
 brougham in town on almost nothing at all. 
 One bought a second-hand car for about sev- 
 enty-five pounds ; it was kept for one at a gar- 
 age for fifteen shillings a week, and one looked 
 out for a gentleman chauffeur who loved 
 motoring for its own sake, and who had some 
 little means of his own. With care the whole 
 thing need not cost more than a hundred and 
 fifty pounds the first year, and less the second. 
 They could not afford to do this just yet, 
 though Bella was convinced it would be true 
 economy, but Oliver hoped to start something 
 of the kind the following winter. 
 
 Of course Oliver was never exactly easy 
 about money. Everything always cost just a 
 little more than he expected. It sounded ab- 
 surd, and he would not have said so to anyone 
 but himself, but they had to live up to Bella's 
 reputation that is, they had to go everywhere, 
 and do everything. Yet neither of them lacked
 
 108 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 proper pride. They differed from some peo- 
 ple they knew that is, they did not (more 
 than they could help) live on their rich friends. 
 Their only real extravagance last year had 
 been sharing a house during Goodwood week. 
 That had let them in for a great deal more 
 than they had expected in fact, not to put too 
 fine a point on it, they had been rooked, regu- 
 larly rooked, and by people whom they had 
 thought their intimate friends! 
 
 Germaine sighed impatiently. This little 
 uneasiness about money was the one spot on a 
 very bright sun. But he had no wish to con- 
 fide this fact to Fanny 1 Fanny would be cer- 
 tain to blame Bella. He remembered very 
 well, though she had apparently forgotten it, 
 the way Fanny had behaved at the time of his 
 marriage. 
 
 The fact that the girl he wished so ardently 
 to make his wife was lovely (no one could have 
 denied that even then), and quite sufficiently 
 well connected, had not counterbalanced, from 
 the prudent sister's point of view, Bella Ara- 
 bin's lack of fortune and her having been 
 brought up in such a " mixed " place (what- 
 ever that might mean) as Southsea. 
 
 But Bella had never borne malice; and far 
 from being spoilt or rendered " uppish " by
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 109 
 
 her sudden intoxicating success, Bella was, if 
 anything, nicer than before. She and Oliver 
 were still devoted, still happier together than 
 apart ; their quarrels, so far, had been only lov- 
 ers' quarrels. . . . 
 
 Germaine grew restless restless and tired. 
 He had not had such a thinking bout for a long 
 time. Just as he reached Grosvenor Gate for 
 the fifth or sixth time, it struck a quarter-past 
 one. In a sense there was plenty of time, for 
 they lunched at a quarter to two ; he would give 
 Fanny ten more minutes and then go off home 
 without her. 
 
 The young man looked round. Every 
 bench was full, but there were plenty of empty 
 chairs. He dragged one of them forward, and 
 placed it with its back to a large tree. From 
 there he could see everyone who came in and 
 out of the gate, and so he and Fanny would 
 not lose a moment looking for one another. 
 But, though many went out, very few came in ; 
 the Park was beginning to empty. 
 
 Suddenly two middle-aged women, the one 
 very stout, the other very thin, walked slowly 
 through the gate, They struck across Ger- 
 maine's line of vision, and for a moment his 
 dark eyes rested on them indifferently. Then 
 his gaze changed into something like attention,
 
 110 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 for he had a vague impression of having seen 
 the elder of these two women before. What 
 was more, he felt certain he had seen her in 
 some vaguely unpleasant connection. 
 
 For a moment he believed her to be one of 
 the cook-housekeepers with whom he and Bella 
 had grappled during the earlier days of their 
 married life. But no, this short stout woman 
 with the shrewd, powerful face Germaine 
 seemed to know, did not look like a servant. 
 Even he could see that her black clothes were 
 handsome and costly, if rather too warm for a 
 fine July day. Her thin, nervous-looking 
 companion was also dressed with some preten- 
 sion and research, but she lacked the other's 
 look of stout prosperity. 
 
 They were typical Londoners, of the kind to 
 be seen on the route of every Royal procession, 
 and standing among the crowd outside the 
 church door at every fashionable marriage- 
 women who, if they had lived in the London of 
 the Georges, would have walked a good many 
 miles to see a fellow-creature swing. But to 
 Oliver Germaine they were simply a couple of 
 unattractive-looking women, one of whom he 
 thought he had seen before, and whose proxim- 
 ity was faintly disagreeable. 
 
 Germaine's mind had dwelt on them longer
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 111 
 
 than it would otherwise have done because, 
 when just in front of him, they stopped short 
 and hesitated ; then, looking round them much 
 as Germaine himself had looked round a few 
 minutes before, and, the elder woman taking 
 the lead, each dragged a chair forward, and 
 sat down a yard or so to the young man's right, 
 the trunk of the tree stretching its gnarled 
 grey girth between. 
 
 Seven minutes of the ten Oliver meant to al- 
 low Fanny had now gone by, and he felt in- 
 clined to cut the other three minutes short, and 
 go straight home. After all, it was too bad of 
 her to be so unpunctual 1 
 
 And then, striking on his ear, shreds of the 
 conversation which was taking place between 
 the two women sitting near him began to pene- 
 trate Oliver Germaine's brain. Names fell on 
 his ear Christian names, surnames, with 
 which he was familiar, evoking the personali- 
 ties of men and women with whom he was on 
 terms of acquaintance, in some cases of close 
 friendship. 
 
 Unconsciously his clasped hands tightened 
 on the knob of his stick, and he caught himself 
 listening listening with a queer mixture of 
 morbid interest and growing disgust. 
 
 It was the elder woman who spoke the most,
 
 112 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 and she was a good speaker, with that trick, 
 self-taught, instinctive, of making the people 
 of whom she was speaking leap up before the 
 listener. Now and again she was interrupted 
 by little shrieks of astonishment and horror 
 her companion's way of paying tribute to the 
 interesting nature of the conversation. 
 
 How on earth so Oliver Germaine asked 
 himself with heating cheek had the woman 
 obtained her peculiarly intimate knowledge of 
 those of whom she was speaking? The peo- 
 ple, these men and women, especially women, 
 whose lives, the inner cores of whose existences, 
 were being probed and ruthlessly exposed, al- 
 most all belonged to the Germaines' own par- 
 ticular set, if indeed such a prosperous and 
 popular couple as were Oliver and Bella, could 
 be said to have a particular set in that delight- 
 ful world into which they had only compara- 
 tively lately effected an entrance, and of which 
 the strands all intermingle the one with the 
 other. 
 
 Germaine was too young, he had been too 
 happy, he was too instinctively kindly, to con- 
 cern himself with other people's private af- 
 fairs, save in a wholly impersonal fashion. He 
 had always avoided the hidden, unspoken side 
 of life; when certain secrets were confided to
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 113 
 
 him they dropped quickly out of his mind; 
 ugly gossip passed him by. 
 
 Yet now he found himself listening to very 
 ugly gossip ; some feeling outside himself, some 
 instinct which for the moment mastered him, 
 made him stay on there, eavesdropping. 
 
 For the moment the stream of venom was 
 directed against Mrs. Slade, the pretty, harm- 
 less little woman whom he would see within the 
 next hour sitting at his own table. She was 
 one of Bella's special friends, and Oliver had 
 got quite fond of her, the more so that he was 
 well aware that she was in a difficult position, 
 owing to the fact, not of her seeking, or so the 
 Germaines believed, that her husband spent 
 most of his life away from her, abroad. 
 
 In this special case, Germaine knew some- 
 thing of the hidden wounds ; it was horrible to 
 hear this this old devil engaged in plucking 
 the scabs from these same wounds, and expos- 
 ing to her vulgar companion the shifts to which 
 the unfortunate little woman was put. Nay, 
 more, she said certain things concerning Mrs. 
 Slade which, if they were true, or even only 
 half true, made the poor little soul under dis- 
 cussion no fit friend or companion for Ger- 
 maine's own spotless wife, Bella. . . . 
 
 The burden of the old woman's talk was
 
 114 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 money, how people got money, how they spent 
 money, how they did without money. That 
 was the idea running through all her conversa- 
 tion, although it was, of course, concerned with 
 many uglier things than money. 
 
 Had they been men speaking Germaine 
 would have been sufficiently filled with right- 
 eous indignation to have found words with 
 which to rebuke, even to threaten them, but 
 they were women, common women, and he felt 
 tongue-tied, helpless. 
 
 And then, suddenly, there leapt into the con- 
 versation his own name, or rather that of his 
 wife, the woman of whom he felt so exultantly, 
 so selflessly proud. The allusion came in the 
 form of a question, a question SDoken in a shrill 
 and odious Cockney accent. 
 
 "I should like to see that Mrs. Germaine. 
 I wonder if she ever comes into the Park 
 
 " Not she ! At any rate not on Sunday. 
 Why she'd be mobbed I " snapped out the 
 other. 
 
 " You don't say so ! Do people run after 
 her as much as that? " 
 
 " There's been nothing like it since Mrs. Jer- 
 sey. I used to see people get up on chairs to 
 see Mrs. Jersey go by. Not that I ever 
 thought much of her figure great, ugly,
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 115 
 
 square shoulders. She started those square 
 shoulders, and they've never really died out." 
 
 "Mrs. Germaine's quite another sort of 
 beauty, the pocket Venus style, isn't she? I 
 suppose you've had a lot to do with making her 
 the rage," said the friend admiringly. 
 
 " I don't know about that her kind of fig- 
 ure dresses itself. She's the sort that gets 
 there anyhow. She's got that * jennysayquoy ' 
 air, as the French put it, that makes folk turn 
 round and stare. She gets her looks from her 
 mother; I remember the mother her name 
 was Arabin when I was with Cerise. They 
 weren't London people they was military. 
 Mrs. Arabin had such pretty coaxing ways, 
 same as the daughter has. Cerise used to let 
 her have the things ever so much cheaper than 
 she charged her other customers, but it paid 
 her too." 
 
 Germaine breathed a little more easily. He 
 knew now who this woman was. She was a 
 certain Mrs. Bliss, Bella's dressmaker, in her 
 way a famous old lady, whom Bella's set 
 greatly preferred to the other dressmakers in 
 vogue. It was Mrs. Bliss, so he remembered 
 having heard, who had introduced some years 
 ago the picturesque style of dressing with 
 which his sister Fanny found such fault, and
 
 116 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 which remains loftily indifferent to the 
 fashion. 
 
 Oliver recollected now where and when he 
 had seen her ; there had been some little trouble 
 about an item in his wife's bill, and Bella had 
 made him go with her to face the formidable 
 Mrs. Bliss in the old-fashioned house in Sack- 
 ville Street where the dressmaker wielded her 
 powerful sceptre. That was before Bella had 
 become a fashionable beauty, and Mrs. Bliss 
 had been rather short with them both, unwill- 
 ing to admit that she was wrong, although the 
 figures proving her so stared her in the face. 
 
 And then Germaine remembered other oc- 
 casions with which Mrs. Bliss's name, though 
 not her personality, were associated. He had 
 made out cheques to her, larger cheques than 
 Bella could manage out of her allowance. But 
 that was some time ago; his wife must now 
 have given up dealing with her; and he felt 
 glad, very glad, that this was so. A woman 
 with such a tongue was a danger to society, 
 not that anyone need believe a word she 
 said. . . . 
 
 Suddenly the shrill Cockney voice asked yet 
 another question concerning the beautiful Mrs. 
 Germaine. It was couched in what the 
 speaker would probably have described as per-
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 117 
 
 fectly ladylike and delicate language, but its 
 purport was unmistakable, and Germaine 
 made a restless movement ; then he became al- 
 most rigidly still a man cannot turn and 
 strike a woman on the mouth. 
 
 "N-o-o, I don't think so." Mrs. Bliss 
 spoke guardedly. " She's a lot of gentle- 
 men buzzing around her, but that's only to 
 be expected; and as far as I can hear there's 
 not one that buzzes closer than another. To 
 tell you the truth, Sophy, I'm puzzled about 
 those Germaines. It's no business of mine, of 
 course, but she spends three times as much as 
 she did when I first began dressing her and 
 she don't mind now what she does pay, very 
 different to what she used to do! It's only 
 the best that's good enough for my lady 
 
 now." 
 
 " Germaine's an army chap, isn't he? " 
 " He was and a handsome fellow he is, 
 too. He came into a good bit of money just 
 after they got married, but that must be melt- 
 ing pretty quick. Why, she goes everywhere! 
 Last season she really wore her clothes out. 
 They " she waved her hand comprehensively 
 round a vague area comprising Marylebone 
 and Mayfair "scratched and fought with 
 each other in order to get her."
 
 118 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " Then I suppose you don't bother about 
 your money." 
 
 " Yes, I do," said Mrs. Bliss shortly. " I'm 
 not that kind; I don't work for the King of 
 Prussia, as my French tailor used to say." 
 
 There was a pause, and then in a rather dif- 
 ferent voice Mrs. Bliss went on, " I do get my 
 money from Mrs. Germaine, but lately, 
 well, I won't say lately, but for the last eight- 
 een months or so, she's always paid me in 
 notes,, two, three, sometimes four hundred 
 pounds at a time, always in five-pound notes." 
 
 She spoke in a low voice, and yet, to Oliver 
 Germaine, it seemed as if she shouted the 
 words aloud. 
 
 The young man got up, and, careless of the 
 lateness of the hour, walked away without 
 looking around towards the Marble Arch; so 
 alone could he be sure that Mrs. Bliss would 
 not see him, and perchance leap to the recol- 
 lection of who he was. 
 
 The words the woman had said so quietly 
 seemed to be reverberating with loud insist- 
 ence in his ear: "She's always paid me in 
 notes." "Two, three, sometimes four hun- 
 dred pounds." 
 
 What exactly had Mrs. Bliss meant by this 
 statement? What significance had she in-
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 119 
 
 tended it to carry? There had been a touch 
 of regret in the hard voice, a hesitation in the 
 way she had conveyed the pregnant confi- 
 dence, which made Oliver heartsick to remem- 
 ber. 
 
 But after a time, as Oliver Germaine 
 walked quickly along, uncaring as to which 
 way he was going, almost running in his desire 
 to outstrip his own thoughts, there came a lit- 
 tle lightening of his bewildered misery. It 
 was possible, just possible, that Mrs. Bliss was 
 really thinking of some other customer. 
 
 Notes? The idea was really absurd to any- 
 one who knew Bella, as he, Oliver, thank God, 
 knew his wife! Why, there was never any 
 loose money in the house, both he and Bella 
 were always running short of petty cash. 
 
 Then the young man remembered, with a 
 sudden tightening of the heart, that this had 
 not been the case lately. During the last few 
 months, since they had moved into their new 
 house, Bella had always had money plenty 
 of sixpences and shillings, half crowns and 
 half sovereigns at his disposal. Nay more, 
 looking back, he realised that his wife no 
 longer teased him, as she had once perpetually 
 teased him, for supplements, large or small, to 
 her allowance; he had to face the fact that of
 
 120 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 late Bella's allowance had borne a surprising 
 resemblance to the widow's cruse ; it had actu- 
 ally sufficed for all her wants. 
 
 But he had been unsuspecting, utterly un- 
 suspecting, and even now he hardly knew 
 what he did suspect. 
 
 The horrible things he had heard Mrs. Bliss 
 say about other people acted and reacted on 
 Germaine's imagination. If these things 
 were true, then the world in which he and 
 Bella lived was corrupt and rotten; and, as 
 even Oliver Germaine knew by personal ex- 
 perience, pitch defiles. If Daphne Slade did 
 the things Mrs. Bliss implied she did, Bella 
 must know it, know it and condone it. Bella 
 was far too clever to be taken in, as he, Oliver, 
 had been taken in, by Mrs. Slade's pretty pa- 
 thetic manner, and appealing eyes. If Mrs. 
 Slade took money from men, what an exam- 
 ple, what a model Germaine's mind re- 
 fused to complete the thought. 
 
 Certain of Oliver's and Bella's old acquaint- 
 ances people whom they were too kind to 
 drop, but of whom they couldn't see as much 
 now as they had once done, in the days before 
 Bella became a famous beauty would some- 
 times hint darkly as to the wickedness of some 
 of the people they knew. Even Fanny had
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 121 
 
 told him bluntly that Bella had got into a 
 very fast set. " Fast " was the word his sis- 
 ter had used, and it had diverted him. 
 
 But was it possible that these people, whom 
 he had thought envious and silly and that 
 Fanny, his rather narrow-minded and old- 
 fashioned sister, had been right after all? 
 Was it possible that like so many husbands of 
 whom he had heard, for whom he had felt con- 
 tempt and pity, he had as regarded his 
 own cherished wife lived in a fool's para- 
 dise? 
 
 Germaine now remembered several things 
 that he had known known and thought for- 
 gotten for they had been completely apart 
 from his own life. He recalled the case of a 
 man in his own regiment who had shot himself 
 three days after his wife's death. It had been 
 publicly given out that the poor fellow had 
 been mad distraught with grief; but there 
 had been many to mutter that the truth was 
 far other, and that the man had made a shame- 
 ful discovery among his dead wife's pa- 
 pers. . . . 
 
 Concerning any other woman than Bella, 
 Germaine would have admitted, perhaps re- 
 luctantly, but still, if asked the plain ques- 
 tion, he would have admitted, that women are
 
 122 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 damned tricky creatures, and that well, that 
 you never can tell! 
 
 Again, out of the past, there came back to 
 him, with horrid vividness, the memory of a 
 brief episode which at the time had filled him 
 with a kind of pity, even sympathy. 
 
 It was at a ball; he was quite a youngster, 
 in fact it was the year after he had joined, and 
 a woman sitting out with him in a conserva- 
 tory had fallen into intimate talk, as people so 
 often do amid unfamiliar surroundings. 
 There came a moment when she said to him, 
 with burning, unhappy eyes, " People think 
 I'm a good woman, but I'm not." And she 
 had hurried on to make the nature of her sin- 
 ning quite clear; she had not passion for her 
 excuse only lack of means and love of lux- 
 ury. He had been startled, staggered by the 
 unasked-for confidence and yet he had not 
 thought much the worse of her; now, retro- 
 spectively, he judged her with terrible se- 
 verity. 
 
 But Bella? The thoughfof Bella in such 
 company was inconceivable; and yet, deep in 
 Oliver Germaine's heart, there grew from the 
 seed sown by Mrs. Bliss a upas tree which for 
 the moment overshadowed everything. He 
 was torn with anguished jealousy, which made
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 123 
 
 him forget, excepting as affording a proof of 
 what he feared, the sordid, horrible question 
 of the money. 
 
 Germaine had already been jealous of 
 Uella, jealous before their marriage, and jeal- 
 ous since, but that feeling had been nothing, 
 nothing to that which now held him in its 
 
 grip- 
 As a girl, Bella had been a flirt, and, as she 
 
 had since confessed more than once, she had 
 loved to make Oliver miserable. Then, for 
 some time after their marriage he had been 
 angered at the way she had welcomed and 
 courted admiration. But he had never 
 doubted her, never for a moment thought that 
 her love was leaving him, still less that her 
 flirtations held any really sinister intent. He 
 now remembered how a man, a fool of a fel- 
 low, had once brought her a beautiful jewel by 
 way of a Christmas gift; but it had annoyed 
 her, and, without saying anything about it to 
 Oliver at the time, she had actually made the 
 man take back his present! 
 
 Was it conceivable that in three or four 
 short years Bella could have entirely altered 
 have become to all intents and purposes, not 
 only another woman, but a woman of a type, 
 as even he was well aware, a very common
 
 124 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 type, he would not have cared to hear men- 
 tioned in her presence? 
 
 Germaine was now at the Marble Arch. 
 After a moment's bewildered hesitation, he 
 went up Oxford Street, and then took a turn- 
 ing which would ultimately lead him home; 
 home where Bella must be impatiently await- 
 ing him home where their intimates had al- 
 ready doubtless gathered together for lunch. 
 
 And then, during his walk through the now 
 deserted and sun-baked streets and byways of 
 Mayfair, Oliver Germaine passed in slow re- 
 view the men and the women who composed his 
 own and Bella's intimate circle. They rose 
 in blurred outline against the background of 
 his memory, and gradually the women fell 
 out, and only the men remained, two men, 
 for Henry Buck did not count. 
 
 Which of these two men who came about 
 his house in the guise of close friends, had 
 planned to steal, to buy, the wife on whose 
 absolute purity and honour he would an hour 
 ago have staked his life? 
 
 Germaine's fevered mind leapt on Bob Uve- 
 dale. What were Uvedale's relations, his 
 real relations, with Bella? Oliver, so he now 
 told himself sorely, was not quite a fool; he 
 had known men who hid the deepest, tender-
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 125 
 
 est he would not say the most dishonourable 
 feelings, towards a married woman, under 
 the skilful pretence of frank laughing flirta- 
 tion. 
 
 Uvedale, when all was said and done, was 
 an adventurer, living on his wits. He talked 
 of his poverty, talked of it over-much, but he 
 often made considerable sums of money; in 
 fact twice, in moments of unwonted expan- 
 siveness, Uvedale had offered to put Ger- 
 maine on to a " good thing," to share with him 
 a tip which had been given him by one of his 
 financial friends. Germaine now remem- 
 bered, with a sick feeling of anger, how seri- 
 ously annoyed Bella had been to find that her 
 husband had refused to have anything to do 
 with it; nay more, how she had taunted him 
 afterwards when the " good thing " had 
 turned out good after all. But that was long 
 ago, when they had first known Uvedale. 
 
 They now knew Uvedale too well at least 
 Bella did. Oliver was an outdoor man; he 
 hated crowds. He remembered how often 
 Uvedale took his place as Bella's companion 
 at those semi-public gatherings, charity fetes, 
 and so on, which apparently amused her, and 
 where the presence of the beautiful Mrs. Ger- 
 maine was always eagerly desired.
 
 126 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Germaine's mind next glanced with jealous 
 anguished suspicion at another man who was 
 constantly with Bella Peter Joliffe. 
 
 There was a great, almost a ludicrous, con- 
 trast between Uvedale and Joliffe. Uvedale, 
 so Germaine dimly realised even now, was a 
 man with a wider, more generous, outlook on 
 life than the other, capable of deeper depths, 
 of higher heights. 
 
 Joliffe was well off; and, as the Germaines 
 had been told very early in their acquaintance 
 with him, he had the reputation of being 
 "near." But Bella and Oliver had both 
 agreed that this was not true. Only the other 
 day Bella had spoken very warmly of Joliffe ; 
 when they had moved into their new house he 
 had given them a Sheraton bureau, a very 
 charming and certainly by no means a cheap 
 piece of old furniture. Oliver had supposed 
 it to be a delicate way of paying back some 
 of their constant hospitality, for Joliffe was 
 perpetually with Bella. 
 
 Time after time Germaine had come in and 
 found Joliffe sitting with her; walking through 
 the hall he had heard her peals of laughter 
 at Joliffe's witticisms, the funny things he 
 said with his serious face. 
 
 But after all jesters are men of like pas-
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 127 
 
 sions to their melancholy brethren; they can, 
 and do, throw off the grinning mask. Bella 
 had said, only yesterday, " There's more in 
 Peter than you think, Oliver. Believe me, 
 there is ! " Bella always called Joliff e Peter, 
 she was more formal with Bob Uvedale. 
 
 Germaine now reminded himself that Jo- 
 liff e did not like Uvedale, and that Uvedale 
 did not like Joliff e. There seemed a deep, 
 unspoken antagonism between the two men, 
 who were yet so constantly meeting. Joliffe 
 had gone so far as to say something not ex- 
 actly disagreeable, but condemnatory of 
 Uvedale's city connections, to Germaine. Jo- 
 liffe was annoyed, distinctly annoyed at the 
 way Bella went about with Uvedale, and by 
 the fact that she often introduced him to 
 people whose acquaintance she had herself 
 made through Joliffe. 
 
 What had he, Oliver Germaine, been about, 
 to allow his wife to become so intimate with 
 two men, of whom he knew nothing? Yester- 
 day he would have said Uvedale and Joliffe 
 were his closest pals. But what did he really 
 know of either of them of their secret 
 thoughts their deep desires and ambitions 
 their shames and secret sins? Nothing noth- 
 ing. Bella's husband knew as little of Uve-
 
 128 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 dale and Joliffe in fact, till to-day, far less 
 than they knew of him, for one or the other 
 of these men was his enemy, and had be- 
 trayed, very basely, his hospitality. 
 
 Germaine had now lashed himself into the 
 certainty that he was that most miserable and 
 pitiable of civilised beings, the trusting, 
 kindly, nay more, adoring husband, whose 
 wife betrays him with his friend. 
 
 When others had laughed, as men have 
 laughed, and will ever laugh, at similar ironic 
 juxtapositions of fate, Germaine had re- 
 mained grave, for he had a sensitive heart 
 a heart which made him realise something of 
 what lay beneath such tales. Now he told 
 himself that so no doubt he himself was be- 
 ing laughed at by the many, pitied the 
 thought stung deeper by the few. 
 
 As he at last turned into Curzon Street, 
 and so was within a few yards of his house, it 
 struck two o'clock. By now they must all be 
 waiting for him, and Bella would be angry, 
 as angry as she ever allowed her sweet-tem- 
 pered nature to be. But Germaine told him- 
 self savagely that he didn't care, he was 
 sorry to be so near home, to know that in a 
 few moments he would have to command him- 
 self, to pretend light-hearted indifference be-
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 129 
 
 fore a crowd of people most of whom he now 
 feared ay, feared and hated, for they must 
 all have long suspected what he only now 
 knew to be the truth. 
 
 Some one touched him. He started vio- 
 lently. It was his sister, Fanny, pouring out 
 a confused stream of apologies and explana- 
 tions. He stared at her in silence, and she 
 thought he was so seriously annoyed, so " put 
 out " that he could not trust himself to speak. 
 
 But though, as they stood there face to face, 
 he dimly realised what his sister was trying 
 to say, how she was trying to explain her 
 failure to keep her appointment with him in 
 the Park, Germaine could not have told, had 
 his life depended on it, the nature of her ex- 
 cuse. 
 
 Together they walked side by side to the 
 door of his house, and, as he rang the bell, as 
 he knocked, he remembered with a pang of 
 jealous anguish that Bella had asked him, 
 when they moved into this house, not to use 
 a latch-key in the daytime; she had explained 
 to him that to do so prevented the servants 
 keeping up to the mark, and he had obeyed 
 her, as he always did obey her. This trifle 
 made his anger, for the moment his impotent 
 anger, become colder, clarified.
 
 130 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 It was only an hour later, but at last they 
 were all gone, these people whom Oliver Ger- 
 maine had now begun to hate and suspect, 
 each in their different measure, women and 
 men. Everyone had left, that is, excepting 
 Henry Buck and Fanny; and Fanny was 
 just going away, Oliver seeing her off at the 
 front door. 
 
 Germaine believed that he had carried him- 
 self well. True, Uvedale had said to him, 
 " Feeling a bit chippy, old chap? " and twice 
 he had noticed Joliffe's rather cold grey eyes 
 fixed attentively on his face, but under the 
 chatter of the women Jenny Arabin was a 
 great talker and in a harmless sort of way a 
 great gossip, always knowing everybody's 
 business better than they did themselves un- 
 der cover of the women's chatter, he had been 
 able to remain silent, and, whatever the two 
 men present had suspected, one of the two 
 forced thereto by his own conscience, Bella 
 had certainly noticed nothing. She had not 
 even seen, as his sister had seen, that Oliver 
 looked tired and unlike himself. 
 
 Why, just now Fanny had spoken to him 
 solicitously about his health blundering, 
 tactless, Fanny had actually asked him if 
 anything special were worrying him I
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 131 
 
 He shut the door on his sister, and crossed 
 the little hall. The time had now come when 
 he must have it out with Bella. 
 
 Then, suddenly, there came over Germaine 
 a feeling as if he had been living through a 
 hideous nightmare. If that were indeed so, 
 then his whole life would not be too long to 
 secretly atone to Bella for his horrible sus- 
 picion. 
 
 It seemed suddenly monstrous that he 
 should suspect Bella on the word of a Mrs. 
 Bliss. His wife had a right, after all, to pay 
 her dressmaker in bank-notes if the fancy 
 seized her. Sometimes when Bella did some- 
 thing that he, Oliver, did not like or approve, 
 she explained that her mother had done the 
 same thing, and the excuse always irritated 
 him, left him without an answer. 
 
 Supposing that Bella were now to tell him 
 that the late Mrs. Arabin, whose reputation 
 for a certain daring liveliness and exceeding 
 beauty still lingered in the ever-shifting naval 
 and military society where he had first met 
 his wife, always paid her bills in notes and 
 cash rather than by cheque what then? 
 
 He walked up the staircase; Henry Buck 
 passed him coming down. Germaine's eyes 
 rested on the awkward figure, the plain, good-
 
 132 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 natured face. Rabbit was certainly lacking 
 in tact; he always outstayed all their other 
 guests, and he never knew when Bella was 
 tired, but still he was the one human being 
 present at the little lunch party at whom 
 Oliver had been able to look without a feeling 
 of unease. 
 
 Slowly he turned the painted china knob 
 of the drawing-room door. 
 
 Bella was standing before the Sheraton 
 bureau which had been the gift of Peter Jo- 
 liffe. She had apparently been putting some- 
 thing away; Germaine heard the click of the 
 lock. She turned round quickly, and her hus- 
 band thought there was a look of constraint 
 on her face. 
 
 " Why, Oliver," she said, " I thought you 
 were going out with Fanny this afternoon! " 
 
 "With Fanny?" he stammered, "I never 
 thought of doing such a thing." 
 
 " But you're not going to stay in, are you? " 
 
 He looked at her attentively, and again 
 there surged up in his heart wild jealousy 
 and suspicion. Why did she ask whether he 
 was going to stay in? Which of the two men 
 who had just left the house was she expect- 
 ing to come back as soon as he, poor deluded 
 fool, was safely out of the way?
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 133 
 
 But Bella went on speaking rather quickly : 
 " I shan't go out. I'm tired. Besides, I'm 
 expecting some people to tea. So perhaps I'd 
 better go and take my hat off. I shall only 
 be a few minutes; do wait till I come back." 
 Bella spoke rather breathlessly, moving across 
 the room towards the door. 
 
 Then she didn't want him to go out? He 
 had wronged her in this, at any rate. Ger- 
 maine stared at the door through which his 
 wife had just gone with a feeling of miserable 
 uncertainty. 
 
 Then his eye travelled round to the place 
 where she had been standing just now, in 
 front of JolifFe's bureau. A glance at Bella's 
 bank-book would set his mind at rest one way 
 or the other. It would go far to prove or 
 disprove the story Mrs. Bliss had told, for it 
 would show if Bella were indeed in the habit 
 of drawing considerable cheques to " self." 
 Why hadn't he thought of this simple test 
 before, before shaming himself and shaming 
 his wife by base suspicions? 
 
 And yet Oliver, for some few moments, 
 stood in the middle of the room irresolute. 
 Yesterday it would never have occurred to 
 him that Bella would mind his looking at her 
 bank-book, although, as a matter of fact he
 
 134 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 never had looked at it. She was a tidy little 
 woman; he knew that everything under the 
 flap which he had seen her close down <so 
 quickly just now would be exquisitely neat; 
 he knew the exact spot where her bank-book 
 was to be found. 
 
 With a curious feeling that he was doing 
 something dishonourable, and it was a feel- 
 ing which sat very uneasily on Oliver Ger- 
 maine, he took hold of the little brass 
 knob and slid up the flap of the sloping 
 desk. 
 
 The bank-book closed the ranks of the red 
 household books over which in old days, when 
 they were first married, before he had come 
 into his fortune, he had actually seen Bella 
 shed tears. 
 
 With fingers that felt numb he took up the 
 little vellum-bound book and opened it at the 
 page containing the latest items. 
 
 There, on the credit side, was the sum of 
 money which had been paid in, to his bankers' 
 order, on the last quarter day. On the debit 
 side were a few cheques made out to trades- 
 people. There was not a single cheque made 
 out to "self" on the page at which he was 
 looking; but but of course it was possible 
 that Bella, like so many women, added a few
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 135 
 
 pounds for change every time she settled a 
 tradesman's account. 
 
 He turned several leaves of the little book 
 
 backwards Here was a page which bore 
 
 the date of three years ago; and here, as he 
 had feared to find, there were constant, small 
 entries to " self." . . . 
 
 By the empty place on the shelf where the 
 bank-book had stood was a gilt file for bills, 
 a pretty little toy which had been given her, 
 so the husband now remembered, by Uvedale. 
 The letters composing the word " paid " were 
 twisted round the handle horrible symbolic 
 word! 
 
 He took up the file and ran his fingers 
 through the receipted bills. 
 
 Ah! here at last, was one which bore the 
 name of Mrs. Bliss. 
 
 The amount of the bill amazed him, eight 
 hundred and seventy-one pounds, sixteen 
 shillings, and Bella had paid four hundred 
 pounds on account about a fortnight before. 
 It was the only bill on the file on which there 
 still remained a balance owing. Germaine 
 did not need to look again at his wife's bank- 
 book to see that the majority of the receipted 
 bills had not been paid by cheque. 
 
 These bills, so he now became aware with a
 
 136 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 frightful contraction of the heart, were for all 
 sorts of things expensive trifles, costly hot- 
 house flowers, extravagantly expensive fruit 
 which he had enjoyed, and of which he had 
 partaken, believing, if he thought of the mat- 
 ter at all fool that he had been that they 
 were being paid for out of his modest income, 
 the income which had once seemed so limitless. 
 
 "What are you doing, Oliver? You've no 
 business to look at my things. I never look 
 at yours." He had not heard the door open, 
 and Bella had crept up swiftly behind him; 
 there was some anger, but there was far more 
 fear, in her soft voice. 
 
 Germaine turned round and looked at his 
 wife. 
 
 Bella had changed her dress, and she was 
 now wearing a painted muslin gown, her slen- 
 der waist girdled with a blue ribbon. She 
 looked exquisitely lovely, and so young, a 
 girl, a young and innocent girl. 
 
 There fell a heavy hand on her rounded 
 shoulder. 
 
 " Oliver!" she cried, "you're hurting me!" 
 
 He withdrew his hand quickly. 
 
 " Bella," he said, " I only want to ask you 
 one question I know everything," and in
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 137 
 
 answer to a strange look that came over her 
 face he added hurriedly, " Never mind how I 
 found out. I have found out, and now I only 
 want to ask you one thing I I have a right 
 to know who it is." 
 
 " Who it is? " she repeated. " I don't un- 
 derstand what you mean, Oliver? Who 
 what?" but as Bella Germaine asked the use- 
 less question she shrank back; for the first 
 time in their joint lives she felt afraid of 
 Oliver, afraid, and intensely sorry for him. 
 
 A sob rose to her throat. What a shame 
 it was! How on earth could he have found 
 out? She had thought he would go on not 
 knowing for ever. That this should happen 
 now, when she was so happy too, when 
 everything was so so comfortable. 
 
 " Tell me tell me at once, Bella," he said 
 again, shaken almost out of his self-control by 
 her pretended lack of understanding. 
 
 But Bella made no answer ; she was retreat- 
 ing warily towards the open window; Oliver, 
 poor angry Oliver, could not say much, he 
 could not do anything, out on the balcony. 
 
 But he grasped her arm. " Come back," 
 he said, " right into the room," and forced her, 
 trembling, down into a low chair. " Now tell 
 me," he repeated. "Don't keep me waiting
 
 138 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 I can't stand it. I won't hurt you." He 
 leant over her, grasping her soft arm. 
 
 But still Bella said nothing. Her free hand 
 was toying with the fringe of her blue sash. 
 She had become very pale, a sickly yellow 
 colour which made her violet eyes seem blue, 
 for one terrible moment Oliver thought she 
 was going to faint. 
 
 "Why should I tell you? " she muttered at 
 last, " you can't force me to tell you. It's a 
 matter personal to myself. It's no business 
 of yours. I've never spent any of the money 
 on you," she unfortunately added, " at least 
 hardly any." 
 
 Germaine took his hand from her arm. " My 
 God!" he said, "my God!" 
 
 Did a dim gleam of what he was feeling 
 penetrate Bella's brain? 
 
 " I don't know why you should trouble to 
 ask me," she said defiantly. " Surely you 
 must know well enough." 
 
 " I daresay I'm stupid, but I find it very 
 difficult to guess which of the two, Joliffe or 
 or Uvedale, is your lover." 
 
 "My lover? Joliffe Uvedale?" Bella 
 started to her feet, the colour rushed back into 
 her face. She was shaking with anger and 
 indignation.
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 139 
 
 " How dare you insult me so? " she gasped. 
 " You wouldn't have dared to say such a 
 thing if my father had been alive ! How dare 
 you say, how dare you think, I have a lover? " 
 and then with quivering pain she gave a little 
 cry, "Oh, Oliver!" 
 
 Germaine looked at her grimly enough. 
 What a fool what an abject fool he had 
 been! It fed his anger to see that Bella 
 had so poor an opinion of his intelligence as 
 to suppose that he would believe her de- 
 nial. 
 
 " I know you are lying," he said briefly. 
 " I know it is either Joliffe or Uvedale." 
 
 "But, Oliver indeed it isn't!" 
 
 She was looking at him with a very curious 
 expression ; the fear, the real terror, there had 
 been in her face, had left it. She was staring 
 at her husband as if she were seeking to find 
 on his face some indication of a distraught, 
 unhinged mind. 
 
 But he looked cool, collected, stern, and 
 anger again surged up in Bella's heart. If he 
 were sane she would never never forgive him 
 his vile suspicion of her. Was it for this that 
 she, Bella, had always gone so straight never 
 even been tempted to go otherwise, in spite 
 of all the admiration lavished on her?
 
 140 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 There had been a time in Bella Germaine's 
 life, some two years before, when she had 
 often rehearsed this scene, when she had been 
 so haunted by the fear of it that it had been 
 a constant nightmare. 
 
 But never had she imagined the conversa- 
 tion between Oliver and herself taking the 
 turn it now had. Never, in her most an- 
 guished dreams, had Oliver accused her of 
 having a lover. But she had known, only 
 too well, with what anger and amazement he 
 would learn the lesser truth. 
 
 " Peter JolifFe? " she said, with a certain 
 scorn. " How little you know Peter, Oliver, 
 if you think he would be any married woman's 
 lover, let alone mine ! Why, Peter's a regular 
 old maid ! " She laughed a little hysterically 
 at her simile, and, to her husband, the merri- 
 ment, which he felt to be genuine, lowered 
 the discussion to a level which was hateful 
 sordid. 
 
 " Then it's Uvedale," he said, heavily; and 
 this time, so he was quick to notice, Bella did 
 not take the trouble to utter a direct denial. 
 
 " Bob Uvedale? Are you quite mad? Bob 
 Uvedale is really fond of you, Oliver, do you 
 honestly think he would make love to me? " 
 
 She was actually arguing with him; he
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 141 
 
 shrugged his shoulders with a hopeless ges- 
 ture. 
 
 Then Bella Germaine came quite close up 
 to her husband. She looked at him straight in 
 the eyes. 
 
 " I'll tell you," she said. " I see you really 
 
 don't know. It's it's " she hesitated, 
 
 again a look of shame, more, of fear, came 
 into her face, " The person who has been giv- 
 ing me money, Oliver, is Rabbit." 
 
 "Rabbit? I don't believe you!" 
 
 " You don't believe me?" 
 
 Bella drew a long breath. The worst, from 
 her point of view, was now over. She had 
 told the truth, and Oliver had brushed the 
 truth aside, so possessed by insane jealousy of 
 Peter Joliffe and Bob Uvedale, that he had 
 apparently no room in his heart for anything 
 else. 
 
 Bella gave a little sigh of relief. Perhaps, 
 after all, she had made a mistake in being so 
 frightened ; men are so queer perhaps Oliver 
 would feel, as she had now felt for so long, 
 that poor old Rabbit could not find a better 
 use for his money than in making her happy. 
 
 She walked over to her pretty desk, and 
 frowned a little as she saw its condition of dis- 
 array; the receipted bills which she had found
 
 142 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 her husband looking over were scattered, even 
 the tradesmen's books had not been put back 
 in their place on the little shelf. 
 
 She touched the spring of a rather obvious 
 secret drawer. There had been a time when 
 Bella Germaine had hidden very carefully 
 what she was now about to show Oliver as the 
 certain, triumphant proof that his revolting 
 suspicions were false. But of late she had 
 grown careless. 
 
 " If you don't believe me," she said coldly, 
 " look at this, Oliver. I think it will convince 
 you that I told the truth just now." 
 
 Bella knew she had a right to be bitterly 
 indignant at her husband's preposterous ac- 
 cusation. But she told herself that now was 
 not the time to show it; she would punish 
 Oliver later on. 
 
 She waited a moment and then cried, 
 "Catch!" 
 
 Oliver instinctively held out his hands. A 
 bulky envelope fell into them. It was ad- 
 dressed in a handwriting he knew well, the 
 unformed, and yet meticulous handwriting 
 of Henry Buck. On it was written : 
 
 " Mrs. Oliver Germaine, 
 " 19, West Chapel Street, 
 " Mayf air."
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 143 
 
 In the corner were added the words: 
 
 " Any one finding this, and taking it to the above 
 address, will be handsomely rewarded." 
 
 "Open it!" she said imperiously. "Open 
 it, and see what is inside, he only brought 
 it to-day." 
 
 Oliver opened the envelope. Folded in two 
 pieces of paper was a packet of bank-notes 
 held together with an elastic band. 
 
 Germaine looked up questioningly at his 
 wife. 
 
 Bella hung her head. She had the grace to 
 feel embarrassed, ashamed in this moment that 
 she believed to be the moment of her exculpa- 
 tion. Her pretty little hands, laden with 
 rings, each one of which had been given her by 
 her husband, were again toying with the fringe 
 of her blue sash. 
 
 The silence grew intolerable. 
 
 " I know I've been a beast," her voice 
 faltered, broke into tears. "I knew you 
 wouldn't like it, but but you know, Oliver, 
 Rabbit isn't like an ordinary man." 
 
 "When did he begin to give you money?" 
 asked Oliver, in a low voice. 
 
 " A long time ago," she answered, vaguely.
 
 144 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " He came in one day when I was awfully up- 
 set about a bill a bill of that old devil, Bliss, 
 and he was so kind, Oliver. He explained 
 how awfully fond he was of us both. He said 
 we were his only friends I always have been 
 nice to him, you know. He said he couldn't 
 spend the money he'd got " 
 
 " How much have you had from him? " 
 
 " I can tell you exactly," she said eagerly, 
 and again she moved towards her bureau. 
 
 Bella felt utterly dejected; somehow she 
 had not expected Oliver to take the news 
 quite in this way; he looked dreadful not 
 relieved, as she had thought he would do. 
 
 It was with slow lagging steps that she 
 walked back to where her husband was still 
 standing with the envelope and its contents 
 crushed in his right hand. 
 
 Bella's love of tidiness and method had 
 stood her in fatally good stead. She had put 
 down all the sums she had received from 
 Henry Buck, but in such a fashion that any 
 one else looking at the figures would not have 
 known money was in question. 
 
 Oliver stared down at the piece of paper. 
 Insensibly he straightened his shoulders as if 
 to meet calmly a physical blow. " Are these 
 pounds? " he asked. 
 
 She nodded.
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 145 
 
 "But Bella, it's an enormous sum, over 
 four thousand." 
 
 " I suppose it is," she said listlessly. 
 
 Her husband put the paper in his breast 
 pocket ; then he hesitated a moment, and Bella 
 thought he was perhaps going to hand her 
 back the envelope and its contents. But that 
 also, to her chagrin, disappeared into his 
 pocket. 
 
 " I suppose the money Buck brought you 
 to-day is included in this amount? " 
 
 Bella shook her head sadly. " I hadn't 
 time to put it down," she said. 
 
 " Well, 111 see what can be done." 
 
 " I suppose you mean to pay it all back? I 
 suppose " her voice was trembling with self- 
 pity "that we shall have to go and live in 
 the country now? " 
 
 He said nothing, only looked at her with 
 that same cold look of surprise and alienation. 
 
 He was leaving the room when a cry from 
 her brought him back. She clutched his 
 hand. 
 
 " You've never said you're sorry for the 
 
 horrible thing you said to me " and, as he 
 
 looked at her, still silent, " Oliver! you surely 
 
 don't think that Rabbit Why, he's never 
 
 even squeezed my hand!" 
 
 "Stop!" he cried roughly. "Don't be
 
 146 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 silly, Bella. Of course I don't think any- 
 thing of the kind. I accept absolutely what 
 you tell me of your relations with Henry 
 Buck." 
 
 " Why, there have been no relations with 
 Henry Buck and me," she cried, protesting. 
 " What a hateful word to use, Oliver ! " 
 
 But he was already out of the door, making 
 his way to the only human being in whom he 
 still felt complete confidence, who, he knew, 
 loved him, in the good old homely sense of the 
 word. 
 
 * 
 
 " My dear boy, what is the matter? " 
 
 Fanny sat up. She had been lying down 
 on the sofa in the sitting-room of her lodgings. 
 Oliver had explained to the servant that he 
 was Mrs. Burdon's brother, and he had been 
 allowed to make his own way up to the draw- 
 ing-room floor. 
 
 " There's a good deal the matter," he said. 
 " The fact is I've made a fool of myself, 
 Fanny, and I've come to you for help." 
 
 Fanny looked up at him, and what she saw 
 checked the words on her lips. She was wide 
 awake now, but rather painfully conscious 
 that she looked untidy. Her smart voile
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 147 
 
 gown voile was the "smart" material that 
 season was crumpled. And Oliver's wife, 
 Bella, was always so dreadfully, so unnatur- 
 ally, tidy and neat, it was one of the things 
 that perhaps made people think her so much 
 prettier than she really was. 
 
 " Of course I will help you," she answered 
 briskly. " Tell me all about it." 
 
 " Have you still that five thousand pounds 
 Cousin Andrew left you? " 
 
 "Why of course I have, and it's rather 
 more now, for luckily we didn't put it into 
 Consols; we put it into a Canadian security." 
 
 " Is it invested in Dick's name? " 
 
 Dick's wife laughed. " No, of course it 
 isn't," she said. " Why should it be? " 
 
 " Could you get at it without Dick's know- 
 ing? " 
 
 ' Yes, I suppose I could." TJiere was a 
 touch of wonder in her voice. 
 
 " Fanny, I want you to lend me four thou- 
 sand pounds." Oliver spoke huskily. He 
 was staring out of the window. 
 
 His sister looked at him rather queerly for 
 a moment: "Yes, of course I will," she said. 
 And, as he turned to her, his face working, 
 " You needn't make a fuss about it, dear old
 
 148 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 boy. You'll pay me back all right, I know 
 that." 
 
 " I'll insure against it, and I'll pay you 
 proper interest for it whatever you're get- 
 ting now," he said. " And we'll get a lawyer 
 to see that it's all made safe." 
 
 " That'll be all right," said Fanny, and then 
 again she gave him that curious, considering 
 look. 
 
 Germaine pulled himself together. " You'll 
 think I've been a fool," he exclaimed abruptly, 
 he had to say something in answer to that 
 look, " and so I have. But you know at 
 least you don't know, luckily for you what 
 it's like to be mixed up with a lot of fellows 
 who are all richer than one is oneself; " and 
 then in a very different tone, one in which his 
 sister felt the ring of truth, " Are you sure 
 Dick won't know, Fanny? I don't want Dick 
 to know." 
 
 " Of course he won't know," Fanny smiled. 
 "You don't suppose I tell Dick every- 
 thing? " 
 
 Oliver stared at his sister. He was rather 
 shocked by her admission; till to-day he had 
 thought that all husbands and wives who 
 loved one another told each other everything; 
 and yet, here was Fanny, who hadn't a
 
 A VERY MODERN INSTANCE 149 
 
 thought in the world beyond Dick, the chil- 
 dren, the dogs and, and, yes, her brother 
 
 " It's none of Dick's business what I choose 
 to do with my own money not that he'd 
 mind." 
 
 " I think of spreading the re-payment over 
 five years." 
 
 "That would be rather too soon," she said; 
 and added, looking away as she spoke, " I 
 don't think it would be fair to Bella." 
 
 Oliver reddened, a man's dusky unbecom- 
 ing blush. 
 
 " Bella's been good about it," he said 
 briefly. " She said herself that we should 
 have to go and live in the country. Still, let's 
 make it seven years. I say, Fanny, you are 
 a brick," and sitting down by the table, Oliver 
 Germaine broke into hard, painful sobs. 
 
 Fanny got up off the sofa. She felt rather 
 shy. 
 
 " Don't be so worried," she said. " Bella's 
 a very good sort, and awfully fond of you, old 
 boy. She'll like the country better than you 
 think. Her looks will last twice as long there, 
 and, and if I were you, Oliver you and 
 Bella I mean," Fanny got rather mixed, and 
 very red " well, I'd try and have a baby. 
 Bella would look awfully sweet with a baby.
 
 150 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 And a baby's no trouble in the country less 
 trouble than a puppy! " 
 
 " Yes, that's true," he said, raising his head, 
 and feeling vaguely comforted. His sister 
 Fanny had a lot of sense. Oliver had always 
 known that.
 
 IV 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 
 
 " Certainly, however, one day these present condi- 
 tions of marriage will be changed. Marriage will be 
 allowed for a certain period, say ten years." Mr. 
 GEORGE MEREDITH in the Daily Mail of September 
 24th, 1904. 
 
 " GIVE you some heads? My dear fellow, 
 there need be no question of heads! This is 
 to be a model will. You need simply put 
 down, in as few words as are legally permissi- 
 ble I know nothing of such things that I 
 leave all of which I die possessed to my wife." 
 
 Philip Dering threw his head back, and 
 gave the man to whom he was speaking, and 
 opposite to whom he was standing, a confident 
 smiling glance. Then he turned and walked 
 quickly over to the narrow, old-fashioned, bal- 
 conied window which, commanding the wide 
 wind-blown expanse of Abingdon Street, ex- 
 actly faced the great cavity formed by the 
 arch of the Victoria Tower. 
 
 To the right lay the riverside garden, a 
 bright patch of delicate spring colouring and 
 green verdure, bounded by the slow-moving 
 grey waters of the Thames; and Dering's 
 
 153
 
 154 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 eager eyes travelled on till he saw, detaching 
 itself against an April afternoon horizon, the 
 irregular mass of building formed by Lambeth 
 Palace and the Lollards' Tower. 
 
 " I say," he exclaimed, rather suddenly, 
 "this is better than Bedford Park, eh? I 
 suppose a floor in one of these houses would 
 cost us a tremendous lot; even beyond our 
 means, Wingfield? " and again a happy smile 
 came over the tense, clear-cut face, still full of 
 youthful glow and enthusiasm. 
 
 "You wish everything to go to Louise? 
 All right, I'll make a note of that.'* 
 
 The speaker, a round-faced, slightly bald, 
 shrewd-looking lawyer, took no notice of the, 
 to him, absurd question concerning the rent of 
 floors in Abingdon Street. Still, he looked 
 indulgently at his friend, as he added: 
 
 "But wait a bit, I promise that yours 
 shall be a model will, only you seem to have 
 forgotten, my dear fellow, that you may out- 
 live your wife. Now, should you have the 
 misfortune to lose Louise, to whom would you 
 wish to devise this fifteen thousand pounds? 
 It's possible, too, though not very probable, I 
 admit, that you may both die at the same time 
 both be killed in a railway accident for in- 
 stance."
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 155 
 
 " Such good fortune may befall us " 
 
 Dering spoke quite simply, and accepted the 
 other's short laugh with great good-humour. 
 " Oh! you know what I mean; I always have 
 thought husbands and wives who care, I 
 mean ought to die on the same day. That 
 they don't do so is one of the many strange 
 mysteries which complicate life. But I say, 
 Wingfield " 
 
 The speaker had turned away from the win- 
 dow. He had again taken up his stand oppo 
 site the other's broad writing table, and not 
 even the cheap, ill-made clothes could hide the 
 graceful lines of the tall, active figure, not 
 even the turned-down collar and orange silk 
 tie could destroy the young man's look of 
 rather subtle distinction. 
 
 " Failing Louise, I should like this money, 
 at my death, to be divided equally between the 
 young Hintons and your kids," and as the 
 other made a gesture of protest, Dering added 
 quickly: 
 
 "What better could I do? Louise is de- 
 voted to Jack Hinton's children, and I've al- 
 ways regarded you I have indeed, old man, 
 as my one real friend. Of course it's possi- 
 ble now," an awkward shy break came into 
 his voice " it's possible now, I say, that we
 
 156 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 may have children of our own; I don't sup- 
 pose you've ever realised how poor, how hor- 
 ribly poor, we've been all these years." 
 
 He looked away, avoiding the other man's 
 eyes; then, picking up his hat and stick with 
 a quick, nervous gesture, was gone. 
 
 After the door had shut on his friend, 
 Wingfield went on still standing for awhile. 
 His hands mechanically sorted the papers and 
 letters lying on his table into neat little heaps, 
 but his thoughts were travelling backward, 
 through his and Dering's past lives. 
 
 The friends had first met at the City of 
 London school, for they were much of an age, 
 though the lawyer looked the elder of the two. 
 Then Dering had gone to Cambridge, and 
 Wingfield, more humbly, to take up life as an 
 articled clerk to a good firm of old-established 
 attorneys. Again, later, they had come to- 
 gether once more, sharing a modest lodging, 
 while Dering earned a small uncertain income 
 by contributing to the literary weeklies, by 
 ** ghosting " writers more fortunate than him- 
 self, by tutoring whenever he got the chance, 
 in a word, by resorting to the few expedi- 
 ents open to the honest educated Londoner 
 lacking a definite profession.
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 157 
 
 The two men had not parted company till 
 Dering, enabled to do so with the help of a 
 small legacy, had chosen to marry a Danish 
 girl, as good-looking, as high-minded, as un- 
 practical as himself. 
 
 But stay, had Louise Dering groved herself 
 so unpractical during the early years of her 
 married life? 
 
 Wingfield, standing there, his mind steeped 
 in memories, compared her, with an uncon- 
 scious critical sigh, with his own stolid, unim- 
 aginative wife, Kate. As he did so he won- 
 dered whether, after all, Dering had not 
 known how to make the best of both worlds; 
 and yet he and his Louise had gone through 
 some bad times together. 
 
 Wingfield had been the one intimate of the 
 young couple when they began their married 
 life in a three-roomed flat in Gray's Inn; and 
 he had been aware, painfully so, of the inces- 
 sant watchful struggle with money difficulties, 
 never mentioned while the struggle was in be- 
 ing, for only the rich can afford to complain 
 of poverty. He had admired, it might almost 
 be said he had reverenced with all his heart, 
 the high courage then shown by his friend's 
 wife. 
 
 During those first difficult years, when he,
 
 158 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Wingfield, could do nothing for them, Louise 
 had gone without the help of even the least 
 adequate servant. The women of her nation 
 are taught housewifery as an indispensable 
 feminine accomplishment, and so she had 
 scrubbed and sung, cooked and read, made 
 and mended, for Philip and herself. 
 
 Wingfield was glad to remember that it was 
 he who had at last found Bering regular em- 
 ployment ; he who had so far thrown prudence 
 aside as to persuade one of his first and most 
 valuable clients to appoint his clever if eccen- 
 tric friend secretary to a company formed to 
 exploit a new invention. The work had 
 proved congenial; Dering had done admirably 
 well, and now, when his salary had just 
 been raised to four hundred a year, a dis- 
 tant, almost unknown, cousin of his dead 
 mother's had left him fifteen thousand 
 pounds I 
 
 At last James Wingfield sat down. He 
 began making notes of the instructions he had 
 just received, though as he did so he knew 
 well enough that he could not bring himself to 
 draw up a will by which his own children 
 might so greatly benefit. 
 
 Then, as he sat, pen in hand, wondering
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 159 
 
 with a certain discomfort as to what ought to 
 be the practical effect of the conversation, 
 there suddenly came a sound of hurrying feet 
 up the shallow oak staircase, and through the 
 door, flung open quickly and unceremoni- 
 ously, strode once more Philip Dering. 
 
 "I say, I've forgotten something!" he ex- 
 claimed, and then, as Wingfield instinctively 
 looked round the bare spacious room " No, 
 I didn't leave anything behind me. I simply 
 forgot to ask you one very important ques- 
 tion " 
 
 He took off his hat, put it down with a cer- 
 tain deliberation, then drew up a chair, and 
 placed himself astride on it, an action which 
 to the other suddenly seemed to blot out the 
 years which had gone by since they had been 
 housemates together. 
 
 " As I went down your jolly old staircase, 
 Wingfield, it suddenly occurred to me that 
 making a will may not be quite so simple a 
 matter as I once thought it " 
 
 He hesitated a moment, then went on: 
 " So I've come back to ask you the meaning 
 of the term ' proving a will.' What I really 
 want to get at, old man, is whether my wife, if 
 she became a widow, would have to give any 
 actual legal proof of our marriage? Would
 
 160 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 she be compelled, I mean, to show her 'mar- 
 riage lines ' ? " 
 
 Wingfield hesitated. The question took 
 him by surprise. 
 
 " I fancy that would depend," he said, " on 
 the actual wording of the will, but all that sort 
 of thing is a mere formality, and of course any 
 solicitor employed by her would see to it. By 
 the way, I suppose you were married in Den- 
 mark? " He frowned, annoyed with himself 
 for having forgotten a fact with which he must 
 have been once well acquainted. " If you 
 had asked me to be your best man," he added 
 with a vexed laugh, " I shouldn't have forgot- 
 ten the circumstances." 
 
 Dering tipped the chair which he was be- 
 striding a little nearer to the edge of the table 
 which stood between himself and Wingfield ; a 
 curious look, a look half humorous, half dep- 
 recating, but in no sense ashamed, came over 
 his sensitive, mobile face. 
 
 " No," he said, at length, " we were not 
 married in Denmark. Neither were we mar- 
 ried in England. In fact, there was no cere- 
 mony at all." 
 
 The eyes of the two men, of the speaker 
 and of his listener, met for a moment; but
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 161 
 
 Wingfield, to the other's sudden uneasy sur- 
 prise, made no comment on what he had just 
 heard. 
 
 Dering sprang up, and during the rest of 
 their talk he walked, with short, quick strides, 
 from the door to the window, from the window 
 to the door. 
 
 " I wanted to tell you at the time, but 
 Louise would not have it; though I told her 
 that in principle not, of course, in practice 
 you thoroughly agreed with me I mean with 
 us. Nay, more, that you, with your clear, 
 legal mind, had always realised, even more 
 than I could do, the utter absurdity of mak- 
 ing such a contract as that of marriage 
 which of all contracts is the most intimately 
 personal, and which least affects the interests 
 of those outside the contracting parties the 
 only legal contract which can't be rescinded 
 or dissolved by mutual agreement! Then 
 again, you must admit that there was one 
 really good reason why we should not tell you 
 the truth ; you already liked Kate, and Louise, 
 don't you remember, used to play chaperon. 
 Now, Kate's people, you know ! " 
 
 All the humour had gone out of Dering's 
 face, but the deprecating look had deepened. 
 
 The lawyer made a strong effort over him-
 
 162 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 self. He had felt for a moment keenly hurt, 
 and not a little angry. 
 
 " I don't think," he said quietly, " that there 
 is any need of explanations or apologies be- 
 tween us. Of course, I can't help feeling 
 very much surprised, and that in spite of our 
 old theoretical talks and discussions, concern- 
 ing well, this subject. But I don't doubt 
 that in the circumstances you did quite right. 
 Mind you, I don't mean about the marriage," 
 he quickly corrected himself, "but only as to 
 the concealment from me." 
 
 He waited a moment, and then went on, 
 hesitatingly: "But even now I don't really 
 understand what happened I should like to 
 know a little more " 
 
 Dering stayed his walk across the room, and 
 stood opposite his friend. He felt a great 
 wish to justify himself, and to win Wing- 
 field's retrospective sympathy. 
 
 " I will tell you everything there is to tell! " 
 he cried eagerly; " indeed, it can all be told in 
 a moment. My wife and I entered into a per- 
 sonal contract together, which we arranged, 
 provisionally, of course, should last ten years. 
 Louise was quite willing, absolutely willing. 
 . . ." For the first time there came a defen- 
 sive note in the eager voice. " You see the
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 163 
 
 idea that of leasehold marriage? We used 
 to talk about it, you and I, of course only as a 
 Utopian possibility. All I can say is that I 
 had the good fortune to meet with a woman 
 with whom I was able to try the experiment; 
 and all I can tell you is well, I need not tell 
 you, Wingfield, that there has never been a 
 happier marriage than ours." Again Dering 
 started pacing up and down the room. 
 " Louise has been everything everything 
 everything that such a man as myself could 
 have looked for in a wife ! " 
 
 " And has no one ever guessed has no one 
 ever known? " asked the other, rather sternly. 
 
 " Absolutely no one I Yes, wait a moment 
 there has been one exception. Louise told 
 Gerda Hinton. You know they became very 
 intimate after we went to Bedford Park, and 
 Louise thought Gerda ought to know. But it 
 made no difference no difference at all ! " 
 he added, emphatically ; " for in fact poor 
 Gerda practically left her baby to Louise's 
 care." 
 
 " And that worthless creature, Jack Hinton 
 does he know too? " 
 
 "No, I don't think so; in fact I may say 
 most decidedly not but of course Gerda may 
 have told him, though for my part I don't be-
 
 164 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 lieve that husbands and wives share their 
 friends' secrets. Still, you are quite at liberty 
 to teU Kate." 
 
 " No," said Wingfield, " I don't intend to 
 tell Kate, and there will be no reason for do- 
 ing so if you will take my advice which is, I 
 need hardly tell you, to go and get married at 
 once. Now that you have come into this 
 money, your marrying becomes a positive 
 duty. Are you aware that if you were run 
 over and killed on your way home to-day 
 Louise would have no standing? that she 
 would not have a right to a penny of this 
 money, or even to any of the furniture which 
 is in your house? Let me see, how long is it 
 that you have been " he hesitated awkwardly 
 "together?" 
 
 Bering looked round at him rather fiercely. 
 " We have been married nine years and a 
 half," he said. " Our wedding day was the 
 first of September. We spent our honey- 
 moon in Denmark. You remember my little 
 legacy? " 
 
 Wingfield nodded his head. His heart 
 suddenly went out to his friend the prosper- 
 ous lawyer had reason to remember that hun- 
 dred pounds legacy, for ten pounds of it had 
 gone to help him out of some foolish scrape.
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 165 
 
 But Dering had forgotten all that; he went on 
 speaking, but more slowly: 
 
 " And then, as you know, we came back and 
 settled down in Gray's Inn, and though we 
 were horribly poor, perhaps poorer than even 
 you ever guessed, we were divinely happy." 
 He turned his back to the room and stared 
 out once more at the greyness opposite. 
 
 " But you're quite right, old man, it's time 
 we did like our betters! We'll be married at 
 once, and I'll take her off for another and a 
 longer honeymoon, and we'll come back and 
 be even happier than we were before." 
 
 Then again, as abruptly as before, he was 
 gone, shutting the door behind him, and leav- 
 ing Wingfield staring thoughtfully after him. 
 
 That his friend, that the Philip Dering of 
 ten years ago, should have done such a thing, 
 was in no way remarkable, but that Louise 
 the thoughtful, well-balanced, intelligent wo- 
 man, who, coming as a mere girl from Den- 
 mark, had known how to work her way up to 
 a position of great trust and responsibility in 
 a City house, so winning the esteem and con- 
 fidence of her employers that they had again 
 and again asked her to return to them after 
 her marriage that she should have consented 
 to such to such . . . Wingfield even in his
 
 166 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 own mind hesitated for the right word . . . 
 to such an arrangement seemed to the law- 
 yer an astounding thing, savouring indeed of 
 the fifth dimension. 
 
 No, no, he would certainly not tell Kate 
 anything about it. Why should he? He 
 knew very well how his wife would regard the 
 matter, and how her condemnation would fall, 
 not on Louise Kate had become exceedingly 
 fond of Louise no, indeed, but on Dering. 
 Kate had never cordially " taken " (a favour- 
 ite word of hers, that) to Wingfield's friend; 
 she thought him affected and unpractical, and 
 she laughed at his turned-down collars and 
 Liberty ties. No, no, there was no reason 
 why Kate should be told a word of this ex- 
 traordinary, this amazing story. 
 
 On leaving Abingdon Street, Philip Der- 
 ing swung across the broad roadway, and 
 made his way, almost instinctively, to the gar- 
 den which lay so nearly opposite his friend's 
 office windows. He wanted to calm down, to 
 think things over, and to recover full posses- 
 sion of himself before going home. 
 
 It had cost him a considerable effort to tell 
 Wingfield this thing. Not that he was in the 
 least ashamed of what he and Louise had done
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 167 
 
 on the contrary, he was very proud of it 
 but he had often felt, during all those years, 
 that he was being treacherous to the man who 
 was, after all, his best friend; and there was 
 in Dering enough of the feminine element 
 that element which Kate Wingfield so thor- 
 oughly despised in him to make him feel 
 sorry and ashamed. 
 
 However, Wingfield had taken it very well, 
 just as he would have wished him to take it, 
 and no doubt the lawyer had given thoroughly 
 sound advice. This unexpected, this huge 
 legacy made all the difference. Besides, Der- 
 ing knew well enough, when he examined his 
 own heart and conscience, that he felt very 
 differently about all manner of things from 
 what he had been wont to feel say ten years 
 ago. 
 
 After all, he was following in the footsteps 
 of men greater and wiser than he. It is im- 
 possible to be wholly consistent. If he had 
 been consistent he would have refused to pay 
 certain taxes in fact, to have been wholly 
 consistent during the last ten years would 
 have probably landed him, England being 
 what it is, in a lunatic asylum. He shuddered, 
 suddenly remembering that for awhile his own 
 mother had been insane.
 
 168 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Still, as he strode along the primly kept 
 paths of the Thames-side garden, he felt a 
 great and, as he thought, a legitimate pride in 
 the knowledge that in this one all-important 
 matter, so deeply affecting his own and 
 Louise's life, he and she had triumphantly de- 
 fied convention, and had come out victorious. 
 
 The young man's thoughts suddenly took a 
 softer, a more intimate turn; he told himself, 
 with intense secret satisfaction, that Louise 
 was dearer, ay, far dearer and more indispen- 
 sable to him now than she had been during the 
 days when she was still the " sweet stranger 
 whom he called his wife." He remembered 
 once saying to Wingfield that the ideal mate 
 should be the improbable, be able at once to 
 clean a grate, to cook a dinner, and to discuss 
 Ibsen! Well, Louise had more than fulfilled 
 this early and rather absurd ideal. 
 
 From the day when they had first met and 
 made unconventional acquaintance, with no 
 intervening friend to form a gossip-link of in- 
 troduction, Dering had found her full of ever- 
 recurrent and enchanting surprises. Her 
 foreign birth and upbringing gave her both 
 original and unsuspected points of view about 
 everything English, and he had often thought, 
 with good-humoured pity, of all those unfor-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 169 
 
 tunate friends of his, Wingfield included, 
 whose lot it had perforce been to choose their 
 wives among their own country-women. 
 
 Dering had not seen much of Denmark, but 
 everything he had seen had won his enthusi- 
 astic approval. Where else were modern 
 women to be found at once so practical and 
 so cultivated, so pure-minded and so large- 
 hearted? Perhaps he was half aware that his 
 heaven was of his own creation, but that, in 
 his present exalted mood, was only an added 
 triumph; how few human beings can evolve, 
 and preserve at will, their own stretch of blue 
 sky! 
 
 Of course it was not always as easy as it 
 seemed to be to-day; lately Louise had been 
 listless and tired, utterly unlike herself 
 even, he had once or twice thought with dis- 
 may, slightly hysterical! But all that would 
 disappear, utterly, during the first few days 
 of their coming travels ; and even he, so he now 
 reminded himself, had felt quite unlike his 
 usual sensible self Dering was very proud 
 of his good sense since had come the news of 
 this wonderful, this fairy-gift-like legacy. 
 
 The young man passed out of the garden, 
 his feet stepping from the soft shell-strewn 
 gravel on to the wide pavement which borders
 
 170 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 the Houses of Parliament. He made his way 
 round swiftly, each buoyant step a challenge 
 to fate, to the Members' Entrance, and so 
 across the road to the gate which leads into 
 what was once the old parish churchyard of 
 Westminster. It was still too cold to sit out 
 of doors, and after a momentary hesitation he 
 turned into Westminster Abbey by the great 
 north door. 
 
 Bering had not been in the Abbey since he 
 was a child, and the spirit of quietude which 
 fills the broad nave and narrow aisles on early 
 spring days soothed his restlessness. But 
 that, alas! only for a moment; as soon as his 
 busy brain began to realise all that lay about 
 him, he was filled with a sincere if half volun- 
 tarily comic indignation. It annoyed him to 
 feel that this national heritage was still a 
 church; why could not Westminster Abbey 
 be treated as are the Colosseum in Rome and 
 the Pantheon in Paris? And so, as he sat 
 down in one of the pews which roused his re- 
 sentment, he began to think over all the im- 
 provements which he would effect, were he 
 given, if only for a few days, a free hand in 
 Westminster Abbey! 
 
 Suddenly he saw, at right angles with him- 
 self, and moving across the choir, a group of
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 171 
 
 four people, consisting of a man, a woman, 
 and two children. 
 
 The man was Jack Hinton, the idle, ill-con- 
 ditioned artist neighbour of his in Bedford 
 Park, to whom there had been more than one 
 reference in his talk with Wingfield; the chil- 
 dren were Agatha and Mary Hinton, the 
 motherless girls of the Danish woman to 
 whom Louise had been so much devoted; and 
 the fourth figure was that of Louise herself. 
 His wife's back was turned to Dering, but 
 even without the other three he would have 
 known the tall, graceful figure, if only by the 
 masses of fair, almost lint-white hair, ar- 
 ranged in low coils below her neat hat. 
 
 Dering felt no wish to join the little party. 
 He was still too excited, too interested in his 
 own affairs, to care for making and hearing 
 small talk. Still, a look of satisfaction came 
 over his face as he watched the four familiar 
 figures finally disappear round a pillar. How 
 pleased Louise would be when he told her of 
 his latest scheme, that of commissioning the 
 unfortunate Hinton to paint her portrait! 
 If only the man could be induced to work, he 
 might really make something of his life after 
 all. Dering meant to give the artist one hun- 
 dred pounds, and his heart glowed at the
 
 172 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 thought of what such a sum would mean in 
 the untidy, womanless little house in which 
 his wife took so tender and kindly an interest. 
 
 Dering and Jack Hinton had never exactly 
 hit it off together, though they had known each 
 other for many years, and though they had 
 both married Danish wives. The one felt for 
 the other the worker's worldly contempt for 
 the incorrigible idler. Yet, Dering had been 
 very sorry for Hinton at the time of poor 
 Mrs. Hinton's death, and he liked to think 
 that now he would be able to do the artist a 
 good turn. He had even thought very seri- 
 ously of offering to adopt the youngest Hin- 
 ton child, a baby now nearly a year old ; but a 
 certain belated feeling of prudence, of that 
 common sense which often tempers the wind 
 to the reckless enthusiast, had given him 
 pause. 
 
 After all, he and Louise might have chil- 
 dren of their own, and then the position of this 
 little interloper might be an awkward one. 
 Louise had always intensely wished to have a 
 child nay, children and now, if it only de- 
 pended on him, and if Nature would only be 
 kind, she should have her wish. Perhaps that 
 would be the most tangible good this legacy 
 would bring them.
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 173 
 
 Dering left the Abbey by the door which 
 gives access to the Cloisters. There he spent 
 half an hour in pleasant meditation before he 
 started home, for the place which he knew to 
 be so much dearer to his wife than to himself. 
 Dering was a Londoner, the son of a doctor 
 who had practised for many years in one of 
 the City parishes, and in his heart he had much 
 preferred the rooms in Gray's Inn which had 
 been their first married home to the trim little 
 villa, of which the interior had acquired an 
 absurd and touching resemblance to that of a 
 Danish homestead. 
 
 Those who declare that the borderlands of 
 London lack physiognomy are strangely mis- 
 taken. Each suburban district has an individ- 
 ual character of its own, and of none is this 
 more true than of Bedford Park. Encom- 
 passed by poor and populous streets, within 
 a stone's throw of what is still one of the 
 great highways out of the town, this oasis, 
 composed of villas set in gardens, has the 
 tranquil, rather mysterious, charm of a river 
 backwater. 
 
 The amazing contrast between the stir and 
 unceasing sound of the broad High Road and 
 the stillness of Lady Rich Road surely the
 
 174 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 man who laid out Bedford Park must have 
 been a Cromwell enthusiast struck Dering 
 with a sense of unwonted pleasure. As he 
 put his latchkey in the front door he remem- 
 bered that his wife had told him that their 
 young Danish servant was to have that day 
 her evening out. Well, so much the better; 
 they would have their talk, their discussion 
 concerning their future plans, without fear of 
 eavesdropping or interruption. 
 
 Various little signs showed that Louise was 
 already back from town. Dering went 
 straight upstairs, and, as he began taking off 
 his boots, he called out to her, though the door 
 between his room and hers was shut: "Do 
 come in here, for I have so much to tell you! " 
 But this brought no answering word, and 
 after a moment he heard his wife's soft foot- 
 steps going down the house. 
 
 Dering dressed himself with some care; it 
 had always been one of his theories that a man 
 should make himself quite as formally agree- 
 able at home as he does elsewhere, and he and 
 Louise had ever practised, the one to the 
 other, the minor courtesies of life. Before 
 going downstairs he also tidied his room, as 
 far as was possible for him to do so, and, deli- 
 cately picking up his dusty boots, he took them
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 175 
 
 down into the kitchen so as to save their young 
 servant the trouble. 
 
 Then, at last, he went through into the din- 
 ing-room, where he found Louise standing by 
 the table on which lay spread their simple sup- 
 per. 
 
 She gave him a quick, questioning glance, 
 then : " I saw you in the Abbey," she said in 
 a constrained, hesitating voice ; " why did you 
 not come up and speak to us? Mr. Hinton 
 was on his way to some office, and I brought 
 the children back alone." 
 
 " If I had known that was going to be the 
 case," said Dering frankly, " I should have 
 joined you, but I had just been spending an 
 hour with Wingfield, and well, I didn't feel 
 in the mood to make small talk for Hinton! " 
 
 He waited a moment, but she made no com- 
 ment. 
 
 Louise had always been a silent, listening 
 woman, and this had made her seem, to eager, 
 ardent Philip, a singularly restful companion. 
 
 He went on, happily at first, rather nerv- 
 ously towards the close of his sentence, 
 "Well, everything is settled even to my 
 will. But I found Wingfield had to know 
 I mean about our old arrangement." 
 
 " Then you told him? I do not think you
 
 176 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 should have done that." Louise spoke very 
 slowly, and in a low voice. " I asked you if 
 I might do so before telling Gerda Hinton." 
 
 Dering looked at her deprecatingly. He 
 felt both surprised and sorry. It was almost 
 the first time in their joint lives that she had 
 uttered to him anything savouring of a re- 
 buke. 
 
 " Please forgive my having told Wingfield 
 without first consulting you," he said at once; 
 " but you see the absurd, the abominable state 
 of the English law is such that in case of my 
 sudden death you would have no right to any 
 of this money. Besides, apart from that fact, 
 if I trusted to my own small legal knowledge 
 and made a will in which you were mentioned, 
 you would probably have trouble with those 
 odious relations of mine. So I simply had to 
 tell him." 
 
 Dering saw that the discussion was begin- 
 ning to be very painful and disagreeable; he 
 felt a pang of impatient regret that he had 
 spoken to his wife now, instead of waiting un- 
 til she had had a thorough change and holiday. 
 
 Louise was still standing opposite to him, 
 looking straight before her and avoiding his 
 anxious glances. Suddenly he became aware 
 that her lip was trembling, and that her eyes
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 177 
 
 were full of tears ; quickly he walked round to 
 where she was standing, and put his hand on 
 her shoulder. 
 
 " I am sorry, very sorry, that I had to tell 
 Wingfield," he said; "but, darling, why 
 should you mind so much? He was quite 
 sympathetic; he thoroughly understood; I 
 think I might even say that he thoroughly 
 agrees with our point of view; but I fancy 
 he felt rather hurt about it, and I couldn't 
 help wishing that we had told him at the 
 time." 
 
 Der ing's hand travelled from his wife's 
 shoulder to her waist, and he held her to him, 
 unresisting but strangely passive, as he 
 added : 
 
 " You can guess, my dearest, what Wing- 
 field, in his character of solicitor, advises us 
 to do? Of course, in a sense it will be a fall 
 from grace, but, after all, we shan't love one 
 another the less because we have been to a reg- 
 istry office, or spent a quarter of an hour in 
 a church! I do think that we should follow 
 his advice. He will let me know to-morrow 
 what formalities have to be fulfilled to carry 
 the thing through, and then, dear heart, we 
 will go off for a second honeymoon. Some- 
 times I wonder if you realise what this money
 
 178 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 means to us both I mean in the way of free- 
 dom and of added joy." 
 
 But Louise still turned from him, and, as 
 she disengaged herself from the strong encir- 
 cling arm, he could see the slow, reluctant tears 
 rolling down her cheek. 
 
 Dering felt keenly distressed. The long 
 strain, the gallantly endured poverty, the con- 
 stant anxiety, had evidently told on his wife 
 more than he had known. 
 
 " Don't let's talk about it any more ! " he 
 exclaimed. " There's no hurry about it now, 
 after all." 
 
 " I would rather talk about it now, Philip. 
 I don't I don't at all understand what you 
 mean. It is surely too late for us now to talk 
 of marriage. The time remaining to us is too 
 short to make it worth while." 
 
 Dering looked at her bewildered. Well as 
 she spoke the language, she had remained very 
 ignorant of England and of English law. 
 
 " I will try and explain to you," he said 
 gently, "why Wingfield has made it quite 
 clear to me that we shall have to go through 
 some kind of a legal ceremony " 
 
 "But there are so few months," she re- 
 peated, and he felt her trembling; "it is not 
 as if you were likely to die before September;
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 179 
 
 besides, if you were to do so, I should not care 
 about the money." 
 
 For the first time a glimmer of what she 
 meant, of what she was thinking, came into 
 Dering's mind. He felt strongly moved and 
 deeply touched. This, then, was why she had 
 seemed so preoccupied, so unlike herself, of 
 late. 
 
 " My darling, surely you do not imagine 
 that I am thinking ... of leaving you? " 
 
 " No," and for the first time Louise, as she 
 uttered the word, looked up straight into Der- 
 ing's face. " No, it was not of you that I was 
 thinking but of myself. . . ." 
 
 " Let us sit down." Dering's voice was so 
 changed, so uneager, so cold, that Louise, for 
 the first time during their long partnership, 
 felt as if she was with a stranger. " I want 
 to thoroughly understand your point of view. 
 Do you mean to say that when we first ar- 
 ranged matters you intended our our mar- 
 riage to be, in any case, only a temporary 
 union? " 
 
 He waited for an answer, looking at her 
 with a still grimness, an unfamiliar antagon- 
 ism, that raised in her a feeling of resent- 
 ment, and renewed her courage. " Please
 
 180 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 tell me," he said again, "I think you owe me 
 the truth, and I really wish to know." 
 
 Then she spoke. And though her hands 
 still trembled, her voice was quite steady. 
 
 " Yes, Philip, I will tell you the truth, 
 though I fear you will not like to hear it. 
 When I first accepted the proposal you made 
 to me, I felt convinced that, as regarded my- 
 self, the feeling which brought us together 
 would be eternal, but I as fully believed that 
 with you that same feeling would be only tem- 
 porary. I was ready to remain with you as 
 long as you would have me do so; but I felt 
 sure that you would grow tired of me some 
 day, and I told myself secretly, of course, 
 for I could not have insulted you or myself 
 by saying such a thing to you then I told 
 myself, I say, that when that day came, the 
 day of your weariness of me, I would go away, 
 and make no further demand upon you." 
 
 "You really believed that I should grow 
 tired of you, that I should wish to leave 
 you?" 
 
 Dering looked at her as a man might look 
 at a stranger who has suddenly revealed some 
 sinister and grotesque peculiarity of appear- 
 ance or manner. 
 
 " Certainly I did so. How could I divine
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 181 
 
 that you alone would be different from all the 
 men of whom I had ever heard? Still, I loved 
 you so well ah, Philip, I did love you so 
 that I would have come to you on any terms, 
 as indeed I did come on terms very injurious 
 to myself. But what matters now what I 
 then thought? I see that I was wrong you 
 have been faithful to me in word, thought, and 
 deed " 
 
 "Yes," said Dering fiercely, "by God, that 
 is so ! Go on ! " 
 
 " I also have been faithful to you " she 
 
 hesitated. " Yes, I think I may truly say it, 
 in thought, word, and deed, " 
 
 Dering drew a long breath, and she went 
 slowly on : " But I have realised, and that 
 for some time past, that the day would come 
 when I should no longer wish to be so when 
 I should wish to be free. I have gradually 
 regained possession of myself, and, though I 
 know I must fulfil all my obligations to you 
 for the time I promised, I long for the mo- 
 ment of release, for the moment when I shall 
 at last have the right to forget, as much as 
 such things can ever be forgotten, these ten 
 years of my life." 
 
 As she spoke, pronouncing each word 
 clearly in the foreign fashion, her voice gained
 
 182 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 a certain sombre confidence, and a flood of 
 awful, hopeless bitterness filled the heart of 
 the man sitting opposite to her. 
 
 "And have you thought," he asked in a 
 constrained voice, " what you are going to do? 
 I know you have sometimes regretted your 
 work; do you intend or perhaps you have al- 
 ready applied to Mr. Farningham? " 
 
 " No," she answered, and, unobserved by 
 him, for he was staring down at the tablecloth 
 with unseeing eyes, a deep pink flush made 
 her look suddenly girlish, "that will not be 
 necessary. I have, as you know, regretted 
 my work, and of late I have sometimes 
 thought that, things being as they were, you 
 acted with cruel thoughtlessness in compell- 
 ing me to give it all up. But in my new life 
 there will be much for me to do." 
 
 "I do not ask you," he said, suddenly, 
 hoarsely; "I could not insult you by ask- 
 ing . . ." 
 
 " I do not think," she spoke slowly, answer- 
 ing the look, the intonation, rather than the 
 words, " that I am going to do anything un- 
 worthy." 
 
 But Dering, with sharp suspicion, suddenly 
 became aware that she had changed colour, 
 and that from pale she had become red. His
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 183 
 
 mind glanced quickly over their compara- 
 tively small circle of friends and acquaint- 
 ances first one, then another familiar figure 
 rose, hideously vivid, before him. He felt 
 helpless, bewildered, fettered. 
 
 "Do you contemplate leaving me for an- 
 other man? " he asked quietly. 
 
 Again Louise hesitated for a moment. 
 
 'Yes," she said at length, "that is what I 
 am going to do. I did not mean to tell you 
 now though I admit that later, before the 
 end, you would have had a right to know. 
 The man to whom I am going, and who is not 
 only willing, but anxious, to make me his wife, 
 I mean his legal wife," she gave Dering a 
 quick, strange look " has great need of me, 
 far more so than you ever had. My feeling for 
 him is not in any way akin to what was once 
 my feeling for you; that does not come twice, 
 at any rate to such a woman as I feel myself 
 to be; but my affection, my my regard, will 
 be, in this case, I believe, more enduring; and, 
 as you know, I dearly love his children, and 
 promised their mother to take care of them.'* 
 While she spoke, Dering, looking fixedly 
 at her, seemed to see a shadowy group of 
 shabby forlorn human beings form itself and 
 take up its stand by her side Jack Hinton,
 
 184, STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 with his weak, handsome face, and shifty, 
 pleading eyes; his two plain, neglected-look- 
 ing girls ; and then, cradled as he had so often 
 seen it in Louise's arms, the ugly and to him 
 repulsive-looking baby. 
 
 What chance had he, what memories had 
 their common barren past, to fight this intan- 
 gible appealing vision? 
 
 He raised his hand and held it for a moment 
 over his eyes, in a vain attempt to shut out 
 both that which he had evoked, and the sight 
 of the woman whose repudiation of himself 
 only seemed to make more plainly visible the 
 bonds which linked them the one to the other. 
 Then he turned away, with a certain deliber- 
 ation, and, having closed the door, walked 
 quickly through the little hall, flinging himself 
 bareheaded into the open air. 
 
 For the second time that day Philip Bering 
 felt an urgent need of solitude in which to 
 hold communion with himself. And yet, 
 when striding along the dimly-lighted, soli- 
 tary thoroughfares, the stillness about him 
 seemed oppressive, and the knowledge that he 
 was encompassed by commonplace, contented 
 folk intolerable. 
 
 And so, scarcely knowing where his feet
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 185 
 
 were leading him, he made his way at last 
 into the broad, brilliantly lighted High Road, 
 now full of glare, of sound, and of movement, 
 for throngs of workers, passing to and fro, 
 were seeking the amusement and excitement 
 of the street after their long, dull day. 
 
 Very soon Dering's brain became abnor- 
 mally active ; his busy thoughts took the shape 
 of completed half -uttered sentences, and he 
 argued with himself, not so loudly that those 
 about him could hear, but still with moving 
 lips, as to the outcome of what Louise had 
 told him that evening. 
 
 He was annoyed to find that his thoughts 
 refused to marshal themselves in due se- 
 quence. Thus, when trying to concentrate 
 his mind on the question of the immediate fu- 
 ture, memories of Gerda Hinton, of the dead 
 woman with whom he had never felt in sym- 
 pathy, perhaps because Louise had been so 
 fond of her, persistently intervened, and re- 
 fused to be thrust away. His own present 
 intolerable anguish made him, against his will, 
 retrospectively understand Gerda's long- 
 drawn-out agony. He remembered, with 
 new sharp-edged concern and pity, her quiet 
 endurance of those times of ignoble poverty 
 brought about by Hinton's fits of idleness ; he
 
 186 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 realised for the first time what must have 
 meant, in anguish of body and mind, the wo- 
 man's perpetual child bearing, and the deaths 
 of two of her children, followed by her own 
 within a fortnight of her last baby's birth. 
 
 Then, with sudden irritation, he asked him- 
 self why he, Philip Dering, should waste his 
 short time for thought in sorrowing over this 
 poor dead woman? And, in swift answer, 
 there came to him the knowledge why this 
 sad drab ghost had thus thrust herself upon 
 him to-night 
 
 A feeling of furious anger, of revolt 
 against the very existence of Jack Hinton, 
 swept over him. So base, so treacherous, so 
 selfish a creature fulfilled no useful purpose in 
 the universe. Men hung murderers; and was 
 Hinton, who had done his wife to death with 
 refinement of cruelty, to go free free to mur- 
 der, in the same slow way, another woman, 
 and one who actually belonged to Dering's 
 own self? 
 
 He now recognised, with bewilderment, 
 that had Louise become his legal wife ten 
 years ago, the thought of what she proposed 
 to do would never have even crossed her mind. 
 
 The conviction that Hinton was not fit to 
 live soon formed itself into a stable back-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 187 
 
 ground to all Dering's subsequent thoughts, 
 to his short hesitations, and to his final deter- 
 mination. 
 
 After a while he looked at his watch, and 
 found, with some surprise, that he had been 
 walking up and down for over an hour; he 
 also became aware, for the first time, that his 
 bare, hatless head provoked now and again 
 good-natured comment from those among 
 whom he was walking. 
 
 He turned into a side-street, and taking 
 from his pocket a small notebook, wrote the 
 few lines which later played an important 
 part in determining, to the satisfaction of his 
 friends, the fact that he was, when writing 
 them, most probably of unsound mind. 
 
 What Dering wrote down in his pocket- 
 book ran as follows: 
 
 1. I buy a hat at Dunn's, if Dunn be slill open 
 (which is probable). 
 
 2. I call on the doctor who was so kind to the 
 Hintons last year and settle his account. It is doubt- 
 ful if Hinton ever paid him in fact, there can be no 
 doubt that Hinton did not pay him. I there make 
 my will and inform the doctor that he will certainly 
 be wanted shortly at Number 8, Lady Rich Road. 
 
 3. I buy that revolver (if guaranteed in perfect work- 
 ing order) which I have so frequently noticed in the 
 pawnbroker's window, and I give him five shillings for
 
 188 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 showing me how to manage it. Mem. Remember to 
 make him load it, so that there may be no mistake. 
 
 4. I wire to Wingfield. This is important. It may 
 save Louise a shock. 
 
 5. I go to Hinton's place, and if the children are 
 already in bed I lock the door, and quietly kill him 
 and then kill myself. If the children are still up, I 
 must, of course, wait a while. In any case the business 
 will be well over before the doctor can arrive. 
 
 Dering shut the notebook with a sigh of 
 relief. The way now seemed clear before him, 
 for he had put down exactly what he meant 
 to do, and in case of doubt or forgetfulness 
 he need only glance at his notes to be set 
 again in the right way. 
 
 He spent a few moments considering 
 whether it was his duty to write a letter to 
 his employer. Finally he decided that there 
 was no need to do so. They knew of his 
 legacy; they were aware that he was leaving 
 them; and everything, even now, was in per- 
 fect order for his successor. 
 
 As he walked slowly along the unlovely 
 narrow streets which run parallel to the High 
 Road, his emotional memory brought his wife 
 vividly before him. He began wondering 
 painfully if she would ever understand, if she 
 would realise, from what he had saved her by 
 that which he was about to do. His knowl-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 189 
 
 edge of her character made him feel sure 
 and there was infinite comfort in the thought 
 that she would remain silent, that she would 
 never yield to any foolish impulse to tell 
 Wingfield the truth. It was good to feel so 
 sure ftiat his old friend would never know of 
 his failure, of his great and desolate humilia- 
 tion. 
 
 Dering spent the next hour exactly as he 
 had planned; in fact, at no point of the pro- 
 gramme did his good fortune desert him. 
 Thus, even the doctor, a man called John- 
 stone, who might so easily have been out, was 
 at home; and, though actually giving a little 
 stag party, he good-naturedly consented to 
 leave his guests for a few moments, in spite 
 of the fact that the stranger waiting in the 
 surgery had refused to state his business. 
 
 "My name is Dering. I think you must 
 have often met my wife when you were at- 
 tending the late Mrs. Hinton. In fact I've 
 come to-night to settle the Hintons' account. 
 I fancy it is still owing? " 
 
 Dering spoke with abrupt energy, looking 
 straight, and almost with a frown, as he spoke, 
 into the other's kindly florid face. It seemed 
 strange, at that moment intolerably hard, that
 
 190 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 this man, who looked so much less alive, so 
 much less intellectually keen than himself, 
 should be destined to find him within a few 
 hours lying dead, obliterated into nothingness. 
 
 " Oh, yes, the account is still owing,*' Dr. 
 Johnstone spoke with a certain eagerness. 
 " Then do I understand that you are acting 
 for Mr. Hinton in the matter? The amount 
 is exactly ten pounds " 
 
 He paused awkwardly, and not till the two 
 bank-notes were actually lying on his surgery 
 table before him did he believe in his good 
 fortune. The Hintons' account had long 
 since passed into that class of doctor's bills 
 which is only kept on the books with a view 
 to the ultimate sale of the practice, and this 
 last quarter the young man had not even 
 troubled to send it in again. 
 
 Johnstone remembered poor Mrs. Hinton's 
 friend very well; Mrs. Dering had been splen- 
 did, perfectly splendid, as nurse and com- 
 forter to the distracted household. And then 
 such a pretty woman, too, the very type 
 quiet, sensible, self-contained, and yet femi- 
 nine whom Dr. Johnstone admired; he was 
 always pleased when he met her walking 
 about the neighbourhood. 
 
 This, then, was her husband? The doctor
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 191 
 
 stared across at Dering with some curiosity. 
 Well, he also, though, of course, in quite an- 
 other way, was uncommon and attractive- 
 looking. What was it he had heard about 
 these people quite lately, in fact, that very 
 day? Why, of course. One of his old lady 
 patients in Bedford Park had told him that 
 her opposite neighbours, this Mr. and Mrs. 
 Dering, had come into a large fortune some- 
 thing like fifty thousand pounds! 
 
 Dr. Johnstone looked at his visitor with a 
 sudden accession of respect. If he could have 
 foreseen this interview, he might have made 
 his account with Mr. Hinton bear rather more 
 relation to the actual number of visits he had 
 been compelled to pay to that unfortunate 
 household. Still, he reminded himself that 
 even ten pounds were very welcome just now, 
 and his heart warmed to Mr. Hinton's gener- 
 ous friend. 
 
 Suddenly Dering began speaking: "I 
 forget if I told you that I am starting this 
 very night for a long journey, and before 
 doing so I want to ask you to do me a fa- 
 vour " 
 
 His host became all pleased attention. 
 
 "Would you kindly witness my will? I 
 have just come into a sum of money, and
 
 192 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 and, though my will is actually being drawn 
 up by a friend, who is also a lawyer, I have 
 felt uneasy " 
 
 " I quite understand. You have thought it 
 wise to make a provisional will? Well, that's 
 a very sensible thing to do ! We medical men 
 see much trouble caused by foolish postpone- 
 ment of such matters. Some men seem to 
 think that making a will is tantamount to 
 signing their own death-warrant !" 
 
 But no answering smile brightened Der- 
 ing's fiercely set face ; he did not seem to have 
 heard what the doctor had said. " If I might 
 ask you for a sheet of notepaper. I see a 
 pen and blotting-pad over there " 
 
 A sudden, instinctive misgiving crossed the 
 other's mind. 
 
 "This is rather informal, isn't it? Of 
 course, I have no call to interfere, Mr. Der- 
 ing; but if a large sum is involved might it 
 not be better to wait? " 
 
 Dering looked up. For the first time he 
 smiled. 
 
 " I don't wish to make any mystery about 
 it, Dr. Johnstone. I am leaving everything 
 to my wife, and after her to sundry young 
 people in whom we are both interested. If I 
 die intestate, I understand that distant rela-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 193 
 
 tives of my own people whom I don't like, 
 and who have never done anything for me 
 are bound to benefit." 
 
 Even as he spoke he was busy writing the 
 words, " To Louise Larsen (commonly 
 known as Mrs. Philip Dering), of 9, Lady 
 Rich Road, Bedford Park, and after her 
 death to be divided equally between the chil- 
 dren of my esteemed friend, James Wing- 
 field, solicitor, of 24, Abingdon Street, West- 
 minster, and the children of the late Mrs. 
 John Hinton, of 8, Lady Rich Road, Bed- 
 ford Park." 
 
 Short as was Dering's will, the last portion 
 of it was written on the inner sheet of the 
 piece of note paper bearing the doctor's ad- 
 dress, and the two witnesses, Johnstone him- 
 self, and a friend whom he fetched out of his 
 smoking-room for the purpose, could not help 
 seeing what generous provision the testator 
 had made for the younger generation. 
 
 As the doctor opened the front door for 
 his, as he hoped, new friend, Dering sud- 
 denly pulled a notebook out of his breast 
 pocket. 
 
 " I have forgotten a most important thing 
 
 " there was real dismay in his fresh, still 
 
 youthful voice " and that is to ask you
 
 194 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 kindly to look round at No. 8, Lady Rich 
 Road, after your friends have left you to- 
 night. I should think about twelve o'clock 
 would do very well. In fact, Hinton won't 
 he ready for you before. And, Dr. John- 
 stone in view of the trouble to which you 
 may be put " Dering thrust another bank- 
 note into the other man's hand. " I know 
 you ought to have charged a lot more than 
 
 that ten pounds " and then, before words 
 
 of thanks could be uttered, he had turned and 
 gone down the steps, along the little path, 
 through the iron gate which swung under the 
 
 red lamp, into the darkness beyond. 
 
 
 Down the broad and now solitary High 
 Road, filled with the strange brooding still- 
 ness of a spring dawn, clattered discordantly 
 a hansom cab. There was promise of a bright 
 warm day, such a day as yesterday had been, 
 but Wingfield, leaning forward, uncon- 
 sciously willing the horse to go faster, felt 
 very cold. 
 
 At last, not for the first time during this 
 interminable journey, he took from his breast 
 pocket the unsigned telegram which was the 
 cause of his being here, driving, oh! how 
 slowly, along this fantastically empty thor-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 195 
 
 oughfare, through the chill morning air, in- 
 stead of lying sound asleep by Kate's side in 
 his comfortable bed at home. 
 
 " Philip Dering is dead please come at once 
 at once at once to eight Lady Rich Road." 
 
 Wingfield, steadying the slip of paper as 
 it fluttered in his hand, looked down with 
 frowning puzzled eyes at the pencilled words. 
 
 The message had been set off just before 
 midnight, and had reached his house, he sup- 
 posed, an hour and a half later, for the per- 
 sistent knocking at his front door had gone 
 on for some time before he or his wife realised 
 that the loud hammering sound concerned 
 themselves. Even then it had been Kate who 
 had at last roused herself and gone down- 
 stairs; Kate who had rushed up breathless, 
 whispering as she thrust the orange envelope 
 into his hand: "Oh, James, what can it be? 
 Thank God, all the children are safe at 
 home!" 
 
 No time had been lost. While he was 
 dressing, his wife had made him a cup of tea, 
 kind and solicitous for his comfort, but driv- 
 ing him nearly distracted by her eager, excited 
 talk and aimless conjectures. It had seemed
 
 196 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 long before he found a derelict cab willing to 
 drive him from Regent's Terrace to Bedford 
 Park, but now well, thank God, he was at 
 last nearing the place where he would learn 
 what had befallen the man who had been, next 
 to his own elder boy, the creature he had loved 
 best in his calm, phlegmatic life. 
 
 Wingfield went on staring down at the 
 mysterious and yet explicit message, of which 
 the wording seemed to him so odd in some 
 ways recalling Der ing's familiar trick of re- 
 iteration. Then suddenly he thought of Hin- 
 ton, the artist for whom both he and his friend 
 had had reason to feel so deep if wordless a 
 contempt, and yet whom they had both tried, 
 over and over again, to help and set on his 
 feet. 
 
 With a sudden revulsion of feeling, the law- 
 yer folded up the telegram and put it back 
 into his breast pocket this mysterious, un- 
 signed request for his immediate presence had 
 obviously been despatched by Hinton, who 
 might just as well have waited for morning. 
 How stupid of him not to have realised this at 
 once, the more so that No. 8, Lady Rich Road, 
 was Hinton's address, not that of Bering. 
 Quickly he raised his hand to the trap-door 
 above his head; " Pull up at No. 8, not as I
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 197 
 
 told you, at No. 9, Lady Rich Road," he 
 shouted. 
 
 The radiance of an early spring morning, 
 so kind to everything in nature, is pitiless to 
 that which owes its being to the ingenuity and 
 industry of human hands. Dr. Johnstone, 
 standing opposite a police inspector in what 
 had been poor Mrs. Hinton's cherished, if un- 
 tidy and shabby, little sitting-room, felt his 
 wretchedness and shame for he felt very 
 deeply ashamed perceptibly increased by the 
 dust-laden sunbeams dancing slantwise about 
 him. 
 
 The inspector was really sorry for him, 
 though a little contemptuous perhaps of a 
 medical man capable of showing such emotion 
 and horror in the face of death. 
 
 " Why, doctor, you mustn't take on so ! 
 How could you possibly have told what was 
 in the man's mind? You weren't upset like 
 this last year over that business in Angle 
 Alley, and that was a sight worse than 
 this, eh? " 
 
 But Johnstone had turned away, and was 
 staring out of the bow window. " It isn't 
 that poor wretch Hinton that's upset me," he 
 muttered, " I don't mind death. It's it's
 
 198 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Bering Dering and Mrs. Bering." Reluc- 
 tant tears filled his tired, red-rimmed eyes. 
 
 " I'm sorry, too. Very sorry for the lady, 
 that is ; as for the other well, I'm pretty sure 
 he'll cheat Broadmoor, and that without much 
 delay, eh, doctor? Hullo! who's this coming 
 now? " 
 
 The tone suddenly changed, became at once 
 official and alert in quality, as the sound of 
 wheels stopped opposite the little gate. When 
 the front door bell pealed through the house 
 he added, "You go to the door, doctor; 
 whoever it is had better not see me at first." 
 And Johnstone found himself suddenly 
 pushed out of the room and into the little 
 hall. 
 
 There he hesitated for a moment, looking 
 furtively round at the half -open door which 
 led into the back room fitted up as a studio, 
 where still lay, in dreadful juxtaposition, the 
 dead and the dying, Hinton and his murderer, 
 alone, save for the indifferent yet watchful 
 presence of a trained nurse. 
 
 From the kitchen beyond came the sound 
 of eager, lowered voices,, those of the two 
 young servants who had of late coped with 
 the difficulties of the Hinton household, and 
 whose scanty wages had been paid, so John-
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 199 
 
 stone had learned in the last hour, by Mrs. 
 Dering herself. 
 
 Another impatient peal of sound echoed 
 through the house, and the doctor, walking 
 slowly forward, opened the front door. 
 
 " Can I see Mr. Hinton? Or is he next 
 door? I have driven down from town in re- 
 sponse to this telegram. I was Mr. Philip 
 Dering's oldest friend and solicitor " 
 
 " Then then it was you who were making 
 his will?" 
 
 The question struck Wingfield as unseemly. 
 How had this young man, whom he took to be 
 one of Hinton's dissipated friends, learnt even 
 this one fact concerning poor Dering's af- 
 fairs? 
 
 "Yes," he said shortly, as he walked 
 through into the hall, " that was the case. But, 
 of course well, perhaps, you will kindly in- 
 form me where I can see Mr. Hinton? " he re- 
 peated impatiently. " I suppose he is with 
 Mrs. Dering, at No. 9? " and the other no- 
 ticed that he left the door open behind him, 
 evidently intending to leave Hinton's house 
 as soon as he had obtained a reply to his ques- 
 tion. 
 
 For a moment the two men looked at one 
 another in exasperated silence. Then, very
 
 200 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 suddenly, Johnstone did that of which he was 
 afterward sorry and self-reproachful. But 
 his nerve was completely gone; for hours he 
 had been engaged in what had proved both a 
 terrible and a futile task, that of attempting 
 to relieve the physical agony of a man for 
 whose state he partly held himself to be re- 
 sponsible. He wished to avoid, at any rate 
 for the present, the repetition to this stranger 
 of what had happened the night before. 
 
 And so, " Please come this way," he mut- 
 tered hoarsely. " I ought perhaps to warn 
 you to prepare you for something of a 
 shock." And, turning round, beckoning to 
 the other to follow him, he opened the door of 
 the studio, stepping aside to allow Wingfield 
 to pass in before him. 
 
 But once through the doorway the lawyer 
 suddenly recoiled and stopped short, so dread- 
 ful and so unexpected was the sight which met 
 his eyes. 
 
 What Wingfield saw remained with him 
 for weeks, and even for months, an ever-pres- 
 ent, torturing vision, full of mingled horror 
 and mystery, a mystery to which he was des- 
 tined never to find the solution. 
 
 Focussed against a blurred background 
 made up of distempered light green walls, a
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 201 
 
 curtainless, open window, and various plain 
 deal studio properties pushed back against 
 the wall, lay, stretched out on some kind of 
 low couch brought forward into the middle of 
 the room, a rigid, motionless figure. 
 
 The lower half of the figure, including the 
 feet, which rested on a chair placed at the bot- 
 tom of the couch, was entirely covered by a 
 blanket; but the chest and head, slightly 
 raised by pillows, seemed swathed and bound 
 up in broad strips of white linen, which con- 
 cealed chin and forehead, hair and ears, while 
 the head was oddly supported by a broad band 
 or sling fastened with safety-pins Wing- 
 field's eyes took note of every detail to the 
 side of the couch. Under the blanket, which 
 was stretched tightly across the man's breast, 
 could be seen the feeble twitching of fingers, 
 but even so, the only sense of life and feeling 
 seemed to the onlooker centred in the eyes, 
 whose glance Wingfield found himself fear- 
 ing yet longing to meet. 
 
 To the right of the couch a large Japanese 
 screen had been so placed as to hide some ob- 
 ject spread out on the floor. To the left, 
 watching every movement of the still, recum- 
 bent figure, stood a powerful-looking woman 
 in nursing dress. Wingfield's gaze, after
 
 202 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 wandering round the large, bare room, re- 
 turned and again clung to the sinister immo- 
 bile form which he longed to be told was that 
 of Hinton, and as he gazed he forced himself 
 to feel a fierce gladness and relief in the 
 knowledge that Bering was dead, that in his 
 pocket lay the telegram which proved it. 
 
 At last, to gain courage and to stifle a hor- 
 rible doubt, he compelled himself to meet those 
 at once indifferent and appealing eyes, which 
 seemed to stare fixedly beyond the group of 
 men by the door; and suddenly the lawyer 
 became aware that just behind him hurried 
 whispered words were being uttered. 
 
 " This gentleman is Mr. Dering's solicitor ; 
 perhaps he will be able to throw some light on 
 the whole affair," and he felt himself being 
 plucked by the sleeve and gently pulled back 
 into the hall. 
 
 "It is isn't it? poor Hinton?" and he 
 looked imploringly from one man to the other. 
 
 " Hinton? " said the doctor sharply. " He's 
 there, sure enough but you didn't see him, 
 for we put him under a sheet, behind that 
 screen. Your friend shot him dead first, and 
 then cut his own throat, but he didn't set about 
 that in quite the right way, so he's alive still, 
 as you can see."
 
 ACCORDING TO MEREDITH 203 
 
 Wingfield drew a long breath of something 
 like relief. The torturing suspense of the last 
 few moments was at an end. 
 
 " And where is Mrs. Dering? " he spoke in 
 a quiet, mechanical voice; and Johnstone felt 
 angered by his callousness. 
 
 :< We've just sent her back into the next 
 house," he answered curtly, " and made her 
 take the Hinton children with her. For 
 well, it often is so in such cases, you know 
 the presence of his wife seems positively to 
 distress Mr. Dering; besides, the nurse and I 
 can do, and^have done, all that is possible." 
 
 "And have you no clue to what has hap- 
 pened? Has Dering been able to give no ex- 
 planation of this this horrible business?" 
 
 Johnstone shook his head. " Of course he 
 can't speak. He will never speak again. He 
 wrote a few words to his wife, but they 
 amounted to nothing save regret that he had 
 bungled the last half of the affair." 
 
 " And what do you yourself think?" 
 
 Wingfield spoke calmly and authorita- 
 tively. He had suddenly become aware, dur- 
 ing the last few moments, that he was talking 
 to a medical man. 
 
 "I haven't had time to think much about 
 it;" the tone was rough and sore. "Mr.
 
 204 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Dering seems to have come into a large sum 
 of money, and such things have been known to 
 upset men's brains before now." 
 
 " Still, he might write something of conse- 
 quence, now that this gentleman has come," 
 interposed the inspector. 
 
 But when Wingfield, standing by that 
 which he now knew was indeed his friend, 
 watched the painful, laboured moving of the 
 pencil across the slate which had been hur- 
 riedly fetched some two hours before from the 
 young Hintons* nursery, all he saw, traced 
 again and again, were the words: 
 
 " Look after Louise. Look after Louise 
 ..." and then at last : "I mean to die, I 
 mean to die. I mean to die."
 
 V 
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR?
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 
 
 " Yes ; there ; wives be such a provoking class of 
 society, because though they be never right, they be 
 never more than half wrong." The TRANTER in Under 
 the Greenwood Tree. 
 
 THE fact that it was Mrs. Rigby's Silver 
 Wedding Day, and that she was now await- 
 ing her only brother who was to be the fourth 
 at the dinner she and her husband, the re- 
 spected Town Clerk of Market Dalling, were 
 giving in honour of the event, appeared to her 
 no reason why she should sit in her parlour 
 with hands idle in her lap. There was a large 
 work-basket on a table close to her elbow, and 
 with quick, capable fingers she was engaged 
 in mending a pillow-case. 
 
 It was late June, and Mrs. Rigby sat by the 
 widely open French windows which gave ac- 
 cess to her garden one of those fragrant 
 walled gardens which still embellish the rear 
 of the High Street in a very typically English 
 market town. 
 
 Now and again the work would drop be- 
 
 207
 
 208 STUDIES IN WIVE'S 
 
 tween her hands, and lie unheeded on her 
 knee, while she looked out, focussing her dark, 
 bright eyes on the distant figure of a woman 
 who sat in a summer-house situated at the ex- 
 treme end of the garden; and as Mrs. Rigby 
 gazed thoughtfully at this, her other wedding 
 guest, her whole face would soften so might a 
 mother look at a daughter whom instinct 
 prompted her to love, and reason to condemn 
 as foolish. 
 
 And yet the sitting figure was that of a con- 
 temporary of Mrs. Rigby, being, as a matter 
 of fact, a certain Matilda Wellow, who had 
 been her bridesmaid twenty-five years ago to- 
 day, and who was now, in more than one sense 
 of the term, the most substantial spinster of 
 Market Bailing. 
 
 The sound of the door behind her quietly 
 opening and shutting made Mrs. Rigby turn 
 round, and a moment later she was looking up 
 at a tall, straight, still young-looking man, 
 who, clad in evening dress, stood smiling down 
 at her. He was David Banfield, her half- 
 brother. 
 
 " Why, you've put on all your war-paint! " 
 she exclaimed in half-pretended dismay. 
 " Didn't you know that there was only Ma- 
 tilda Wellow coming? "
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 209 
 
 " I don't know that I thought anything 
 about it," he answered, more gaily than his sis- 
 ter was now in the habit of hearing him speak. 
 " I dressed out of compliment to you, Kate, 
 and because well, I've got into the way of it 
 lately. But pray don't let Matt think that he 
 must needs follow my example ! " 
 
 Then he sat down by Mrs. Rigby, and gazed 
 out with quick, sensitive appreciation at the 
 old walled garden. 
 
 " You're a wonderful gardener, Kate," he 
 said suddenly. 
 
 " There's a lot of nonsense talked now about 
 gardening," she said drily. " With the grand 
 ladies you see such a lot of, Dave, it's just a 
 passing fad." 
 
 Her brother made no answer; he looked 
 ( down at her with uncritical and yet dissatisfied 
 [eyes. She was a handsome woman, and even 
 now only forty-six, and yet she managed to 
 convey an impression of age. This was partly 
 owing to her unsuitable dress, for Mrs. Rigby 
 was wearing a dark blue silk gown, chosen, not 
 only to grace her silver wedding day, but also 
 with a view to being her best dress during the 
 coming autumn and winter. 
 
 Kate Rigby loved her half-brother, David 
 Banfield, as only a childless woman can love
 
 210 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 the creature to whom she has stood for long 
 years in the place of mother. David was 
 twelve years younger than herself, and, with 
 one exception, he had never caused her a mo- 
 ment's real unhappiness or unease. The ex- 
 ception, however, had been paramount, for 
 with him had been connected Mrs. Rigby's 
 only taste of sharp pain and sorrow, and, 
 worse still, to such a woman as herself, of dis- 
 grace. 
 
 The young man's marriage to an Irish 
 singer, which had taken place without his sis- 
 ter's knowledge, had proved disastrous. Rosa- 
 leen Tara to give her the stage name by 
 which her charming rendering of the old na- 
 tional ballads had made her widely known 
 had never liked, or been suited to, life as led 
 at Market Dalling; and to make matters 
 worse, she was a Roman Catholic. 
 
 After a few years' unsatisfactory married 
 life, and the birth of one child, a girl, Mrs. 
 David Banfield had returned, with her hus- 
 band's grudging consent, to the musical stage. 
 Then, on the very day Banfield had been ex- 
 pecting his wife home for a short holiday, there 
 had come from her a letter telling him shortly, 
 bluntly, cruelly, that she had been unfaithful 
 to her marriage vow, and that she hoped he 
 would forget her.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 211 
 
 Had he forgotten her? No. It had only 
 been owing to his sister's urgency, and to Mat- 
 thew Rigby's more measured advice, that Ban- 
 field had at last consented to take the step of 
 divorcing his wife. 
 
 This step Mrs. Rigby had not only never 
 regretted, but and in this she was more for- 
 tunate than her husband no doubt had ever 
 crossed her mind of its having been the wisest 
 thing for her brother's happiness and peace. 
 But Matthew Rigby, cautious member of a 
 cautious profession, had learned very early in 
 his married life the futility of disagreeing with 
 the wife with whom Providence had blessed 
 him. 
 
 Now Banfield lived in solitary state with his 
 little girl, his household managed by the child's 
 nurse, an old Irishwoman, who, if devoted to 
 the child, was incapable of managing such a 
 decorous household as should have been that 
 of the Brew House. 
 
 Any day, any hour, Mrs. Rigby would have 
 bartered her personal happiness for that of 
 her half-brother, and yet the two seldom met 
 and they met almost daily without the say- 
 ing on her part of something likely either to 
 wound or to annoy him. 
 
 " I suppose Rosy is well? I thought you 
 meant sending the child in to see me to-day? "
 
 212 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " Didn't she come? " A look of worry and 
 anger crossed Banfield's dark, mobile face. 
 " I can't think what prevented it, unless 
 well, there's been rather an upset at the 
 Brew House, and perhaps Mary Scanlan 
 didn't like to go out." 
 
 " I heard there had been an upset," observed 
 his sister drily, "for baker told cook. He 
 said your housekeeper turned the younger 
 maid, old Hornby's daughter, out of the house 
 last night, and that the girl could be heard 
 crying all down the street." 
 
 Mrs. Rigby let her work fall unheeded on 
 the floor; quite unconscious of her action she 
 clasped her hands tightly together. 
 
 " David! How long is this sort of thing to 
 go on? " she asked, in a low, tense voice. " It's 
 the talk of the whole town, and it can't be good 
 for your child." 
 
 " But what would you have me do? " He 
 had hoped that to-day his sister's silver wed- 
 ding day his domestic trials would be forgot- 
 ten, or, at any rate, not mentioned. " I can't 
 dismiss Mary Scanlan now she must stay on 
 till Rosy goes to school. That won't be for 
 very long, for, as you know, I promised " he 
 averted his face as he spoke "to send the 
 child to a convent school as soon as she was 
 twelve years old,"
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 213 
 
 The idea that her brother, the wealthy, 
 highly- thought-of brewer of Market Balling, 
 should confess himself worsted by the old and 
 ill-tempered Irish-woman, who, together with 
 little Rosy, had been his wife's his unfaithful 
 wife's only legacy to him, was horrible to his 
 sister. 
 
 Even now, when bitter, disconnected 
 thoughts crowded one on another, Mrs. Rigby, 
 half-unconsciously, evoked in her mind the 
 strong personality of the one human being who 
 ever really " stood up " to her. She had had 
 the notion, so curiously common in England, 
 that your Irishwoman is invariably slatternly, 
 untruthful, and good-natured; but in Mary 
 Scanlan she had found a human being as 
 scrupulously neat, truthful, and high-minded 
 as herself, while at the same time far more ill- 
 tempered, and equally determined to have her 
 own way. 
 
 While Mrs. Rigby was allowing a flood 
 of very bitter thoughts to surge up round 
 her, David Banfield was watching her face, 
 and awaiting her next words with some anx- 
 iety. 
 
 But when Kate Rigby at last spoke, she 
 seemed to have forgotten the immediate ques- 
 tion under discussion. 
 
 "I suppose," she said slowly, "that you
 
 214 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 have never thought, Dave, that there might be 
 a simple way out of your difficulties? " 
 
 " You mean that I might marry again? 
 Well, Kate, yes I have thought of it. I sup- 
 pose there's no man, situated as I have been 
 these last four years, but thinks of a second 
 marriage as a way out; but but, apart from 
 other considerations, I don't feel as if I could 
 bring myself to do it." 
 
 " And why not, pray? " asked Mrs. Rigby 
 in a low voice. 
 
 "Well, it's difficult to explain the way I 
 look at it. Of course, no one can answer for 
 another, and yet, Kate, if anything hap- 
 pened to Matt, I don't see you marrying 
 again ? " 
 
 David Banfield was aware that he had not 
 chosen a very happy simile with which to point 
 his meaning, and perhaps, in his heart of 
 hearts, he hoped that what he had said would 
 put an end to a painful discussion. But any 
 such hope was destined to be grievously dis- 
 appointed, for his sister, with suddenly height- 
 ened colour, turned on him very sharply. 
 
 " Don't talk nonsense ! " she exclaimed. 
 "I'm an old woman, and you're a young 
 man! " and she set back her vigorous, power- 
 ful shoulders.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 215 
 
 ' You know very well that if Matthew had 
 dared to treat me as you were treated by 
 
 Rosal " something in her brother's face 
 
 caused his wife's name to die away on her 
 lips " I should have felt myself free to do ex- 
 actly what suited me best 1 Surely, when you 
 go out among your grand county friends, you 
 must meet nice young ladies who would be 
 only too pleased to become Mrs. David Ban- 
 field, and to step into such a home as the Brew 
 House?" 
 
 Mrs. Rigby looked eagerly, furtively, at her 
 brother. 
 
 The way in which he had been welcomed, to 
 a certain extent absorbed, in the rather dull 
 county society round Market D ailing, had 
 been, to his sister, a source of mingled pride 
 and jealousy, the more so that it had begun in 
 the days of his pretty wife, whose modest pro- 
 fessional fame had preceded her, and made her 
 a welcome addition to county gatherings and 
 dinner-parties. Then had come the great 
 break of the war, and in South Africa Banfield 
 had been naturally thrown with the landown- 
 ers of his own part of the world. 
 
 So it was that during the first few months 
 which had followed on his return home, Mrs. 
 Rigby had fully expected her brother to make
 
 216 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 another, maybe as disastrous a matrimonial 
 experiment as before, and in a class which was 
 as little his own as that of his Irish wife had 
 been. 
 
 But time had gone on, and David Banfield 
 had shown no disposition to make a second 
 marriage, either in the county set, or in the lit- 
 tle town world of Market D ailing, where the 
 Rigbys themselves lived and had their import- 
 ant being. 
 
 " Kate you don't understand," he said at 
 last, and, even as he uttered the words, they 
 seemed to him painfully inadequate. " In 
 fact, you never did understand " there came 
 a sudden touch of passion into his voice, and 
 he got up and walked up and down the room 
 " how I felt how for the matter of that I 
 still feel about Rosaleen. But for the war 
 but for the getting clear away I don't 
 know what I should have done! Once, when 
 I was out there in a little out-of-the-way sta- 
 tion, I saw an old bill with her name on it, put 
 up, of course, before I met her, when she was 
 touring in South Africa. Well, I can tell you 
 one thing if we had been back in the days 
 when a soldier could get killed so much more 
 easily than he can now, you would never have 
 seen me again. For days and days I couldn't
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 217 
 
 get her out of my mind she's never out of my 
 mind now " 
 
 Mrs. Rigby was frightened, almost awed, 
 not so much by the violence of his feeling, as 
 by the outspoken expression of that feeling. 
 
 She got up and walked quickly to him. 
 
 " Perhaps I understand more than you 
 think," she said in a moved voice, " but now, 
 David, you must turn your back on all that. 
 For good or evil, it's over and done with, and 
 your duty is to your child. I won't say a 
 word against Mary Scanlan, I know she's 
 been a faithful servant to you, but wouldn't 
 it be better for Rosy if you had someone who 
 could look after the house, as well as after her? 
 Even you admit that you cannot go on at the 
 Brew House as you've been doing lately. I 
 know you can't feel to anyone else as you felt 
 to to Rosaleen, but surely it would be best 
 for the child, to say nothing of yourself, to 
 have some kind, nice woman about the place, 
 instead of one who's only a servant after 
 all." 
 
 " Of course, it would be better," he said 
 sombrely. " Don't you think I know that ? 
 But where am I to find the 'nice, kind wo- 
 man ' ? As for the girls I meet, it's out of the 
 question."
 
 218 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 As he spoke, he unconsciously glanced 
 round the room in which he and his sister were 
 standing. Mrs. Rigby had not inherited the 
 good taste which had distinguished her Ban- 
 field forefathers. The Brew House was full 
 of fine old furniture, furniture which some of 
 the young brewer's " grand " friends envied 
 him; but that which the Rigbys had gradually 
 accumulated had the mean and yet rather pre- 
 tentious commonness which belonged to the 
 period in which they had married. 
 
 " There's one whom you've never thought 
 of, but who often thinks of you," said Mrs. 
 Rigby, her voice sinking to a whisper. 
 
 Banfield looked at his sister attentively. 
 His fastidious mind passed in review the vari- 
 ous young women who composed the little so- 
 ciety of Market Dalling. He regarded them 
 all with indifference, rising in some cases to 
 positive dislike, and since his matrimonial mis- 
 fortunes he had, as far as was possible, avoided 
 every kind of social gathering held in his na- 
 tive place. 
 
 " I don't know whom you mean," he said 
 at last with some discomfiture. " In the old 
 days you were always apt to fancy that the 
 girls were after me, and I can't say that you 
 ever gave them much encouragement," he
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 219 
 
 added with a rather clumsy attempt at play- 
 fulness. 
 
 " The person I have in my mind," persisted 
 Mrs. Rigby, "isn't exactly a girl; she's just 
 what we were talking about a nice, kind 
 woman and you never seem to mind meeting 
 her." 
 
 " Do you can you possibly mean " 
 
 " Matilda Wellow? Yes, of course I do. 
 It's astonishing to me, it's even surprising to 
 Matthew, that you've never noticed how much 
 she likes you. Why, she's the only person in 
 Market D ailing who ever takes any trouble 
 about little Rosy, or who ever gives the child 
 anything; Rosy always calls her Auntie 
 Tiddy." 
 
 " Matilda Wellow? " he repeated, honestly 
 bewildered. " Why, of course I like her, and 
 think well of her, but I've never thought of 
 her and don't believe she's ever thought of 
 me, Kate in that way!" 
 
 "Don't you?" she said drily. "There's 
 none so blind as those who won't see." 
 
 Then, prompted by a shrewd instinct, she 
 remained quite silent, and withdrew her anx- 
 ious gaze from her brother's face. 
 
 Only to-day Banfield had received a letter 
 from South Africa which had sorely tempted
 
 220 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 him to throw up everything and make a home 
 in the country which, perhaps unfortunately 
 for himself, held none of the glamour of the 
 unknown. As a matter of fact, the letter was 
 now in his pocket, and he felt guiltily aware 
 of the angry pain with which his sister would 
 regard the offer, especially if she guessed how 
 tempting was its effect on his imagination. 
 
 But during their strange conversation he 
 had realised, as he had never done before, that 
 there were only two ways open to him either 
 to go away and make a new life, or to attempt 
 some such solution of his troubles as that 
 which his sister had just proposed to him. 
 
 So it was that during those moments of 
 tense silence Matilda Wellow assumed in 
 David Banfield's mind the importance of an 
 only alternative. Perhaps the very fact that 
 the young man was so familiar with her per- 
 sonality, while always regarding her as a con- 
 temporary of his sister, made it easier for him 
 to come to a sudden decision. 
 
 To another important fact never forgot- 
 ten for a moment by Mrs. Rigby namely, 
 that Miss Wellow was the wealthiest spinster 
 in Market D ailing, Banfield gave no thought, 
 and it certainly played no part in his hurried, 
 anxious self -communing.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 221 
 
 " I confess," he said at last, " that this is a 
 new idea to me but that's no reason why it 
 should be a bad idea. And if you really be- 
 lieve that it would be better for Rosy, and that 
 Miss Wellow would not " he hesitated awk- 
 wardly, " think it strange of me, I will do as 
 you advise, Kate. But you must let me take 
 my own time. Perhaps when she's heard 
 what I've got to say, she won't feel about it as 
 you believe she's likely to do. I cannot pre- 
 tend that I well, that I " his lips refused to 
 form the word to him the infinitely sacred 
 word of love. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby was bewildered, awed into deep 
 joy. No piece of good fortune which could 
 have befallen herself would have given her so 
 acute a feeling it almost amounted to pain 
 of passionate relief, and David Banfield, dimly 
 gathering that it was so, felt exceedingly 
 moved. Surely it was worth almost anything 
 in the way of self-sacrifice to have brought 
 such a look to his sister's face? 
 
 They both moved more closely to one an- 
 other and she, so chary of caress, put her arms 
 round his neck. 
 
 " I'm quite sure," she spoke with a catch in 
 her voice, " quite, quite sure that you will 
 never regret it! After all, life does get
 
 222 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 smoothed out, doesn't it? I'll tell you some- 
 thing about myself that I've never told any- 
 body. Before Matthew came along, there 
 was someone else I loved loved, maybe, just 
 as dearly as you loved Rosaleen." 
 
 " I know," said her brother, wincing at the 
 sound of his late wife's name, " you mean Nat 
 Bower?" 
 
 " Why, how did you ever guess that? " she 
 asked, surprised. 
 
 "Oh! he used to take me walks when 
 I was a kid, and he always talked about 
 you." 
 
 Had Mrs. Rigby left the matter there, she 
 would have been a wiser woman, but some- 
 thing prompted her to draw a moral. 
 
 " And don't you think I'm glad now?" she 
 cried. " Think of what that poor fellow has 
 become, and what Matthew is now! " 
 
 But this was too much for David Banfield. 
 
 " I don't think that's fair ! " he exclaimed. 
 " What you ought to say is * Think of what 
 that poor fellow might have become if he had 
 married me ! ' I don't believe any man could 
 have helped going straight with you, Kate. If 
 I'd been more like you " 
 
 Then, to the young man's relief, his brother- 
 in-law, Matthew Rigby, came into the room,
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 223 
 
 with a smile on his thin lips, a joke on his 
 tongue. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby went out into the garden. 
 "Matilda!" she cried, " Tiddy dear, come 
 in! Matt is here. Dinner will be ready in a 
 minute." 
 
 But as the two women met, and together 
 walked down the path, the hostess gave her 
 guest no hint of the good fortune which lay in 
 wait for her indeed, in spite of, or perhaps 
 because of, her moment of softening, she was 
 sharply, almost cruelly, intolerant of Miss 
 Wellow's sentimental references to that cere- 
 mony of which they were about to celebrate 
 the twenty-fifth anniversary. 
 
 And now the Silver Wedding festivity was 
 drawing to a close. 
 
 The dinner, in its old-fashioned way, had 
 been really excellent, for Kate Rigby was a 
 notable housewife; but not even that fact, nor 
 the equally excellent champagne for Mat- 
 thew Rigby was too shrewd a man to drink 
 bad wine had had the effect of brightening 
 the little party, and a certain constraint now 
 sat on the four people who were linked so 
 closely together. 
 
 The host, a man of equable temperament,
 
 224 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 felt faintly uncomfortable; as he looked 
 from one to the other, he told himself that 
 something was wrong. 
 
 His brother-in-law was certainly oddly un- 
 like himself, yet surely David Banfield was too 
 sensible, and by this time too well accustomed 
 to his sister's ways, to have taken offence at 
 anything she might have said concerning the 
 well-worn subject of Brew House domestic 
 difficulties. Mrs. Rigby was also unnaturally 
 silent, and during the long course of the meal 
 she uttered none of the sharp pungent sayings 
 with which she generally enlivened each one of 
 her husband's repasts and which, it must be 
 admitted, never to him lost their savour. Last, 
 but not least, Miss Wellow, whose flowered 
 muslin gown was as much too youthful as that 
 of her hostess was too old, seemed more senti- 
 mental and more foolish than usual. 
 
 Mr. Rigby told himself with much satisfac- 
 tion that his Kate had certainly worn better 
 
 than Tiddy Wellow. And yet ? Yet, 
 
 twenty-five years ago, Tiddy had been such a 
 pretty girl! Soft and round, with dewy 
 brown eyes and pink dimpled cheeks. She 
 still had the appealing, inconsequent manner 
 which, so charming in a girl, is apt to be ab- 
 surd in a woman and then she had grown
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 225 
 
 stout! Mr. Rigby liked a woman to have a 
 neat trim figure his Kate had kept hers 
 but Tiddy. Alas! Tiddy had not been so for- 
 tunate. 
 
 So it was that Mr. Rigby paid poor Miss 
 Wellow but little attention, regarding her 
 with a curious mixture of affectionate con- 
 tempt and respect, the former due to his 
 knowledge of her character, and the latter to 
 his knowledge of her very considerable for- 
 tune. 
 
 Even to such a man as Matthew Rigby, 
 that is, to a man whose profession implies the 
 constant hearing of family secrets, and the 
 coming across of strange, almost inconceivable 
 human occurrences, the melancholy domestic 
 story of David Banfield remained painfully 
 vivid. On him had fallen all the arrange- 
 ments which had finally resulted in the divorce, 
 and, unlike his wife, he had sometimes doubted 
 the wisdom of what he and she had brought 
 about, for Banfield, left to himself, would 
 never have severed the legal tie between him- 
 self and the mother of his child. 
 
 Even now, during the course of his Silver 
 Wedding dinner, Matthew Rigby wondered 
 uneasily whether his wife's constrained silence, 
 and his brother-in-law's odd, abstracted man-
 
 226 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 iner, meant that any tidings had been received 
 of the woman who had now so completely 
 passed out of their lives. But Mr. Rigby was 
 compelled to bide his time. He knew that 
 whatever explanation there was would be 
 given to him once he and Kate were alone to- 
 gether. 
 
 Sure enough, when the two men joined the 
 ladies in the now twilit sitting-room, the 
 hostess lost no time in unceremoniously turn- 
 ing her brother and Miss Wellow out into the 
 garden. 
 
 And then, at once, Matthew Rigby realised 
 that something of real importance and mo- 
 ment had indeed occurred. For the first time 
 since the great day when her brother's divorce 
 had become an absolute fact, Mrs. Rigby 
 seemed inclined to be soft and tender in her 
 manner to the man who, she would have been 
 the first to admit, had been to her the most 
 admirable of husbands. 
 
 There are certain human beings, men per- 
 Kaps, more than women, who use those they 
 love as princes of old used their whipping 
 boys, and among these human beings Mrs. 
 Rigby could certainly have claimed a high 
 place. Matthew Rigby was, therefore, the 
 more surprised, even, perhaps, a little re-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 227 
 
 lieved, when he noted the unwonted tenderness 
 with which she slipped her arm through his ; it 
 couldn't be anything so very bad after all ! 
 
 " I don't suppose I need tell you, Matt, 
 what has happened or what is just going to 
 happen to our David and Tiddy Wellow? " 
 and she nodded her head significantly towards 
 the two figures which were now disappearing 
 into the rustic arbour, which, erected by Mrs. 
 Rigby's father-in-law, some thirty years ago, 
 had always vexed her thrifty soul as an ex- 
 travagant and useless addition to her garden; 
 just now, however, she would have admitted 
 that even arbours have their uses. 
 
 "Phew I " exclaimed Matthew Rigby, 
 
 and had it not been for the presence of his 
 wife, he would certainly have sworn some de- 
 corous form of oath to express his extreme 
 surprise. His pause prolonged itself, and 
 then, with a certain effort, he exclaimed: 
 " You're an even cleverer woman than I took 
 you for, Kate, and that's saying a good deal ! " 
 
 Mrs. Rigby turned and looked at him stead- 
 ily. Their heads were almost on a level, but 
 even she could guess nothing from his expres- 
 sion. It was his tone, rather, that jarred on 
 her very true contentment. 
 
 " Surely you think it's the best thing that
 
 228 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 could happen to him?" she asked, a note of 
 wistful anxiety in her voice. " Why, you and 
 I have talked it over dozens of times! " 
 
 " I've heard you say that you thought Ma- 
 tilda Wellow was the very woman for him, 
 time and again, but but I don't think, Kate, 
 you ever heard me say so. Still, I daresay 
 it's all right; you generally know best," and 
 the husband spoke with less irony than might 
 have been expected. Twenty-five years of 
 married life had taught him that, on the whole, 
 his wife generally did know best. 
 
 "And surely you think so, too?" and she 
 pressed more closely to him, " surely, Matt, 
 you don't doubt that Matilda Wellow will 
 make him a good wife, and be kind to the 
 child?" 
 
 "Of course, I've no doubt about that," he 
 answered reassuringly. " But still, she's not 
 exactly the woman I'd have chosen for myself, 
 and, after all, David was very fond of that 
 queer, cold little hussy." 
 
 Mrs. Rigby was given no time for a reply, 
 for her brother and Miss Wellow were coming 
 slowly towards the house. She turned up the 
 gas with a quick movement, and when they 
 approached the window a glance at her future 
 sister-in-law's face was enough. She saw that
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 229 
 
 David had spoken, but she also saw that he 
 had had the power and unconsciously her re- 
 spect for her brother grew to stifle in his 
 companion the mingled emotions his offer of 
 marriage had called forth. 
 
 Not till the long dull evening was over, not 
 till Banfield and Miss Wellow were actually 
 bidding the Rigbys good-night, did the young 
 man say the word which let loose Matilda's 
 incoherent words of pathetic joy, of rather 
 absurd amazement, at the good fortune which 
 had befallen her. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby bustled out the two men into 
 the hall. 
 
 "Matilda! Don't be silly!" she com- 
 manded. 
 
 But her words had no effect. 
 
 " It's just a dream " gasped Miss Wellow, 
 "just a dream come true! I never thought, 
 Kate, to be so happy and dear little Rosy, 
 too " 
 
 The other woman checked her harshly. 
 
 " Don't be a fool, Tiddy ! " she said in a low, 
 stern voice; "if my brother were a different 
 kind of man he'd make you remember this to 
 your dying day. You're lowering yourself 
 and you're not raising him. Don't go behav- 
 ing like a pullet that's just laid her first egg! "
 
 230 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Then, seeing the other's face redden into a 
 painful blush, " There, there, I shouldn't have 
 said that, I know. But I can't bear to see a 
 woman cheapen herself to a man! " 
 
 Banfield and his new betrothed walked arm 
 in arm through the now sleeping town to the 
 garden gate of the old Georgian house where 
 Miss Wellow had now lived for some five 
 years in solitary spinster state, and where her 
 forefathers had led lives of agreeable, if mo- 
 notonous, respectability for over a hundred 
 years. 
 
 When they reached the gate, each hesitated 
 a moment. Miss Wellow longed to ask him 
 in, but like most maiden ladies possessed of 
 means, she had a tyrant, a Cerberus in the 
 shape of a faithful servant who would now be 
 sitting up waiting sulkily for her mistress's 
 return. Banfield was awkwardly debating 
 with himself whether Matilda expected him to 
 kiss her; on the whole he thought he hoped 
 not. 
 
 But he was spared the onus of decision con- 
 cerning this delicate point; for suddenly he 
 felt himself drawn on one side, and there, in 
 the deep shadow of the wall, his companion 
 threw her arms about him, murmuring, with a
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 231 
 
 catch in her voice, " I know you don't love me 
 yet, but but David, I'll make you love me," 
 and the face turned up to his in the half dark- 
 ness was full of eager yearning. 
 
 Feeling a traitor to himself, to Rosaleen, 
 above all, to the poor soul now leaning on his 
 breast Banfield bent and kissed her; then he 
 turned on his heel, leaving her to make her 
 way as best she could up the trim path lead- 
 ing to her front door. 
 
 Hardly aware of what he was doing, he 
 walked away quickly, taking the opposite di- 
 rection to that of the quiet lane of houses 
 which would have led him straight home. In- 
 stead he struck out, instinctively, towards the 
 flat open country, for he had a fierce, unreason- 
 ing desire to be alone far away from all hu- 
 mankind. As he strode along, his eyes hav- 
 ing become so fully accustomed to the dim 
 light that he could see every detail of the 
 white-rutted road gleaming between low 
 hedges, Banfield's feeling of bewilderment, 
 even of horror, grew and grew, making him 
 feel physically cold in the warm, scented 
 night. 
 
 For the first time there swept over him that 
 awful sense of unavailing repentance for the 
 word said which might so well have been left
 
 232 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 unsaid, which most human beings are fated to 
 feel at some time of their lives. 
 
 Not even over his divorce had he felt so des- 
 perate a passion of revolt, for that act, or so 
 he had believed, was forced on him by Rosa- 
 leen herself. But to-night he realised that 
 before doing what he had just done he had 
 been free free to remain free and he now 
 saw with a sense of impotent anger how delib- 
 erately he had given himself into slavery. 
 
 As he strode along, eager to escape from the 
 material surroundings of his surrender, Ban- 
 field remembered each word of his talk with 
 his sister, and so remembering, he was amazed 
 at his own weak folly. 
 
 What were the trifling troubles connected 
 with his Irish servant, Mary Scanlan, com- 
 pared to those which lay before him? to the 
 awful knowledge that he was now the prisoner 
 henceforth the body and soul prisoner of 
 Matilda Wellow? How sluggish had been 
 his imagination when he had thought of the 
 woman, whose tears had but just now scalded 
 his lips, as of a kind, unobtrusive lady house- 
 keeper! He was now aware that there was 
 another Matilda Wellow, of whom till to- 
 night he had been ignorant, and it was this 
 stranger who was demanding as a right, and
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 233 
 
 indeed had the right to demand, that tender- 
 ness and devotion which he knew himself in- 
 capable of bestowing on any woman except on 
 the elusive, cold-natured woman who had been 
 his wife. 
 
 And then a strange thing happened to 
 David Banfield. 
 
 The near image of Matilda Wellow faded, 
 giving place to the distant, and yet in a spirit- 
 ual and even physical sense poignantly pres- 
 ent, personality of Rosaleen. 
 
 As far as was possible, Banfield till to- 
 night had banished his wife's image from his 
 emotional memory. But what he had just 
 done that is, his own lack of constancy 
 had the odd effect of making him feel lowered 
 to the level to which those about him regarded 
 Rosaleen as fallen. He told himself that now 
 he and Rosaleen were quits and deliberately 
 he yielded to the cruel luxury of recollection. 
 
 His mind travelled back to the early days 
 of their acquaintance, to the pretence at a 
 " friendship " which on his side had so soon 
 become overwhelming passion. Then had 
 come his formal offer of marriage, and for a 
 long time she had played with him, sayirtg 
 neither yes nor no. Then for a while he had 
 flung everything to the winds in order to be
 
 234 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 with her on any terms. He remembered 
 with a pang of pain the trifling reasons which 
 at last made her quite suddenly consent to be- 
 come his wife. A quarrel with the manager 
 of the concert company to which she then be- 
 longed, followed by a bad notice in the local 
 paper of the town to which he, David Ban- 
 field, undeterred by more than one half -laugh- 
 ing refusal, had come to make what he in- 
 tended should be a final offer these, it 
 seemed, had brought Rosaleen to the point of 
 decision. 
 
 Even now, Banfield never heard the name 
 of that little Sussex town without a leap of the 
 heart, for it was there that had taken place 
 their marriage, the quietest and least adorned 
 of weddings, celebrated in a small, bare Ro- 
 man Catholic chapel, the incumbent of which, 
 a wise old man, had spoken to Banfield very 
 seriously, asking him to give the young Irish- 
 woman more time for thought, and impress- 
 ing upon him the gravity of the promises 
 which he, a Protestant, had consented to make 
 concerning their future married life. 
 
 With regard to the latter, Banfield had been 
 scrupulously honourable, going, indeed, out 
 of his way to remind Rosaleen of her religious 
 obligations, and at the time of the divorce act-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 235 
 
 ing, in the matter of their child's future edu- 
 cation, according to the spirit rather than the 
 letter of his promise. . . . 
 
 With bent head and eyes fixed on the white 
 road, David Banfield insensibly slackened his 
 steps while his mind concerned itself with the 
 five years he and Rosaleen had spent together 
 at Market D ailing. They had been years of 
 secret drama, on his part of almost wordless 
 struggle for some kind of response to the pas- 
 sion which her mysterious aloofness to so 
 many men the greater part of a woman's at- 
 traction evoked and kept alive in him. 
 
 He now remembered how during these 
 years there had been minor causes of disagree- 
 ment, trifling matters or so he had consid- 
 ered them to which Rosaleen attached far 
 more importance than he had done. 
 
 The constant criticism and interference of 
 his half-sister, the dislike and jealousy of those 
 town folk who regarded themselves as having 
 a right to the close friendship and intimacy of 
 David Banfield's young wife, these were the 
 things forming such unimportant asides to 
 the course of that hidden struggle which 
 Rosaleen had brought forward when begging 
 her husband, with passionate energy, to allow 
 her to go back to her profession.
 
 236 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 But to-night, the grey fear with which he 
 now regarded his own future life at Market 
 Bailing brought to David Banfield a sudden 
 understanding of what Rosaleen had felt, 
 caged, as he had caged her, in the little town 
 to which he was now reluctantly turning his 
 laggard steps, and which had been, till so few 
 years ago, the centre of his universe. 
 
 He told himself that had he had the cour- 
 age, had be been possessed of the necessary 
 imagination, to make another life for him- 
 self and for her, none of this need have hap- 
 pened. 
 
 But why torture himself uselessly? He 
 and Rosaleen had now drifted as far apart as 
 a man and a woman can drift. What he had 
 done to-night was in its way as irrevocable as 
 what she on her side had done nay more, the 
 very fact that he had Matilda Wellow so com- 
 pletely at his mercy made Banfield feel, as a 
 less simple-hearted, generous-minded man 
 would never have felt, how impossible it was 
 for him to draw back. . . . 
 
 While returning to what had now become 
 his place of bondage, David Banfield made a 
 determined effort to dam the mental flood- 
 gates through which had run so strange a 
 stream of violent revolt and emotion, and he
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 237 
 
 was so far rewarded that almost at once some- 
 thing occurred which had the effect of bracing 
 him up, of hardening him in his determination 
 to do what he believed to be right. 
 
 As he walked down the silent, shuttered 
 High Street at the end of which stood the 
 Brew House, he saw that his hall light had 
 not been extinguished; and as he opened the 
 front door, he was confronted with the spare 
 form and the gaunt, though not ill-visaged 
 countenance of Mary Scanlan, the elderly 
 Irishwoman who had for so long waged tri- 
 umphant battle with her master's sister, Mrs. 
 Rigby. Utterly different as the two women 
 were, they yet, as Banfield sometimes secretly 
 told himself, not without a certain sore amuse- 
 ment, had strong points of resemblance the 
 one with the other. 
 
 Impelled by some obscure instinct that thus 
 was he certain to be strengthened in the course 
 of action to which he had just pledged himself, 
 Banfield invited the woman into the dining- 
 room, which had been, since his first wife's de- 
 parture, used by him as living and eating room 
 in one. 
 
 Very deliberately he lit the gas, and then 
 turned and faced his housekeeper. " I think 
 it right that you should be among the first to
 
 238 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 know," he said, " that I am going to be mar- 
 ried again to Miss Wellow." 
 
 There was a moment's pause. Banfield ex- 
 pected either a word of sullen acquiescence or 
 an outburst of anger; he had known Mary 
 Scanlan in both moods, but now she surprised 
 him by assuming a very disconcerting atti- 
 tude. 
 
 " If that's the case," she said slowly, twist- 
 ing and untwisting a corner of the black apron 
 that she was wearing, " I will be getting 
 ready little Rosy's clothes, for you will be 
 sending her to the convent rather sooner, I 
 reckon, than you meant to do. I make no 
 doubt the nuns will let me stay there for a 
 week or two till the child gets accustomed to 
 the place that is, if you have no objection, 
 Mr. Banfield?" 
 
 Banfield looked at the woman in some per- 
 plexity. 
 
 " But I've no thought of sending Rosy to 
 school yet!" he exclaimed then added: "Of 
 course, I mean to keep my promise to her 
 mother, but but the child's a little thing yet 
 too young to go to school." 
 
 Mary Scanlan was the only woman to whom 
 Banfield ever spoke of his wife, and Mrs.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 239 
 
 Rigby would have been amazed indeed had she 
 known how often these allusions and semi-al- 
 lusions were made, for to Kate, much as he 
 trusted and respected his sister, Banfield had 
 never till that day bared his heart. 
 
 " I am going to ask you," he went on, " to 
 stay in my service, simply to look after the 
 child. I know well, Mary, how devoted you 
 are to my little girl, and how good you've been 
 to her. When Miss Wellow has become " 
 he hesitated awkwardly, and then with a cer- 
 tain effort, uttered the words " my wife she 
 will, of course, take charge of the house, and 
 I suppose she will bring her own servants with 
 her. I shall no longer have any need for a 
 housekeeper but I know she will be only too 
 glad if you will stay on with Rosy." 
 
 " I don't think I can do that, sir." 
 
 Banfield moved uneasily. Mary Scanlan 
 almost invariably called him " Mr. Banfield " ; 
 it was one of the woman's many Irish idiosyn- 
 crasies which irritated his sister. 
 
 " I don't think I can stay on here, sir," re- 
 peated Mary Scanlan in a low, hesitating 
 voice. " I don't hold with a man, a gentleman 
 I mean, having two wives. I can't say a word 
 of excuse for my poor Miss Rosaleen I beg
 
 240 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 your pardon, sir, I mean Mrs. Banfield. I 
 know she behaved very wickedly and 
 strangely, but still you see, Mr. Banfield, to 
 my thinking and according to my holy reli- 
 gion, she's the woman who owns you, sir, and 
 no one else can ever take her place." 
 
 " I know, I know," he said hastily. " But 
 Mary, why don't you consult your priest? If 
 you explain the circumstances to him, he may 
 take a different view of the matter to what 
 you do." 
 
 " No, that he wouldn't ! " exclaimed Mary 
 Scanlan, with a touch of her old passionate 
 temper, " and if he did, I shouldn't be said by 
 him!" 
 
 She hesitated, and then in a low tone asked 
 the strange question, made the amazing sug- 
 gestion, " I suppose you wouldn't be after see- 
 ing Miss Rosaleen, Mr. Banfield? Not if I 
 gave you her address? " 
 
 Banfield made a nervous movement of re- 
 coil. 
 
 " Mary," he said sternly, " you forget your- 
 self! " and turning, left her in possession of the 
 room. 
 
 How describe the days that followed? 
 short days full of intense joy and looking for-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 241 
 
 ward to Matilda Wellow, long days filled 
 with perplexed misgiving and self-reproach to 
 David Banfield. 
 
 Men and women of British birth generally 
 prefer to conduct their courtships in the way 
 that best suits themselves, but those whom 
 Mrs. Rigby collectively dubbed as " foreign- 
 ers" have long ago realised the advantage of 
 having so important an episode of human life 
 as that of betrothal " stage-managed " by 
 someone more experienced in such matters 
 than the two most interested. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby had no kind of sympathy with 
 foreign fashion, and in theory thoroughly 
 disapproved of the way in which the French, 
 for instance, arrange their matrimonial af- 
 fairs. But this engagement of her brother 
 David Banfield and of Matilda Wellow was 
 one of the supreme exceptions which prove a 
 rule, and so she stage-managed every en- 
 trance, every exit, and, to pursue the analogy 
 to its bitter end, every bit of " business " con- 
 nected with the affair. 
 
 Her stern eyes, her rough tongue, kept the 
 bride-elect in order, but her watchful fear lest 
 Matilda should get on David's nerves before 
 she became securely bound to him for ever had 
 one curious effect; it made Banfield sorry for
 
 242 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 his betrothed, and caused him to feel more 
 kindly to her than he would otherwise have 
 done. 
 
 Then he was touched and surprised by Ma- 
 tilda's great loyalty to himself ; he soon discov- 
 ered that, far from discussing him with his 
 sister, she often irritated the latter by her as- 
 sumption that already she, Matilda, and he, 
 David, had a joint life in which Kate Rigby 
 played no part. This angered Mrs. Rigby 
 keenly, and it is a pathetic fact that the only 
 tears Matilda Wellow shed during the course 
 of her engagement were caused by the woman 
 who was her oldest friend, and to whom she 
 was dimly aware that she owed her good-for- 
 tune. 
 
 Blinded by that most blinding of master 
 passions, jealousy, Mrs. Rigby actually came 
 to believe that her brother was now attached, 
 in a far truer sense than he had been to Rosa- 
 leen, to the fond, foolish woman who was so 
 soon to become his wife. 
 
 " He's getting quite silly about her," she 
 observed angrily to her husband; " he goes up 
 there every evening, however busy he may be, 
 or however much I may want to have him 
 here. And now he says he won't go to that 
 good London tailor for his wedding clothes!
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 243 
 
 It's clear he doesn't want to leave Tiddy 
 even for three days ! " 
 
 But Mr. Rigby, as was his prudent wont 
 when he disagreed with his wife, only looked 
 at her, and thoughtfully wagged his head. 
 
 " Why don't you say something? " she asked 
 crossly. 
 
 "Why should David go to London?" ob- 
 served Mr. Rigby mildly. " He's a person- 
 able fellow; any tailor could fit David. If I 
 were you, Kate, I'd let him be." But Kate, 
 to her lasting sorrow, did not let David be. 
 
 Both her husband and even Matilda Wellow 
 herself could have told Mrs. Rigby that it was 
 in London that her brother had spent his 
 honeymoon with his wife; but though she had 
 been made vividly aware of the circumstance 
 for it was from there that the news of his 
 hasty marriage had reached her that fact 
 would not have seemed to her any reason why 
 David should not now do the right and proper 
 thing by his second bride. 
 
 Thus it was owing to Mrs. Rigby that Ma- 
 tilda was at last roused to a sense of what was 
 due to herself. Banfield, with some discom- 
 fiture, discovered that Miss Wellow would 
 take it ill of him not to pay her the compli- 
 ment of going to the London tailor for his
 
 244 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 wedding clothes " and then," had observed 
 his sister briskly, " you'll be able to bring 
 Tiddy back something handsome in the way 
 of jewellery; for that's a thing you owe not 
 only to her, David, but also to yourself." 
 
 II 
 
 David Banfield, just arrived in London, 
 stood in an hotel bedroom overlooking the trees 
 in Lincoln's Inn Fields. 
 
 Staring out at the leafy screen, which seemed 
 to him so lacking in country freshness, there 
 came to his mind poignant memories of a very 
 different room and a very different outlook 
 not half a mile away from where he stood, for 
 he and Rosaleen had spent the first days of 
 their married life in one of those vast hotels 
 which, overlooking the Embankment and the 
 river, are filled with light and air, as well as 
 instinct with a certain material luxury which 
 had pleased his young wife's taste more than 
 his own. 
 
 With a quick movement he pushed up the 
 old-fashioned guillotine window as far as it 
 would go, and leaned out dangerously far; 
 then he drew back sharply, feeling, as he now 
 often felt when he was alone, that he was liv-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 245 
 
 ing through an unreal, a nightmare stage of 
 his life, one which was bound to come sooner 
 or later to an abrupt end, but which now must 
 be lived through. . . . 
 
 With unseeing eyes and unthinking mind he 
 walked across to the shadowed corner where 
 had been placed his portmanteau. Slowly, 
 indifferently, he turned the key in the lock 
 and raised the lid, then quickened into alert, 
 painful attention. 
 
 Lying on the top of its neatly folded con- 
 tents was an envelope so placed that it could 
 not but attract his attention, and on it was 
 written in the sprawling, unformed hand- 
 writing which was, perhaps, the only marked 
 betrayal of Mary Scanlan's early lack of edu- 
 cation the one word " Important." 
 
 At once there leapt into Banfield's mind the 
 certain knowledge of what the envelope con- 
 tained. If he opened it, there most surely 
 would he find his wife Rosaleen's address. It 
 was this, then, that the Irishwoman had in her 
 thoughts when she had asked him the un- 
 seemly question to which he had given so short 
 and stern an answer. 
 
 But Mary Scanlan had not understood the 
 type of man with whom she had to deal. 
 
 As he stood there, longing with a terrible
 
 246 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 longing to verify his belief, telling himself, 
 with a leap of the heart, that, if he were not 
 mistaken, then Rosaleen must be living alone, 
 for if this had not been so the old servant 
 would never have thought of trying to bring 
 them together again the claims of others, 
 especially those of the woman from whom he 
 had only parted that morning, became para- 
 mount. He told himself that, from the point 
 of view of those who loved him, and whom he 
 respected, it was his duty to destroy unopened 
 the envelope lying before him. 
 
 Banfield turned away, and once more 
 walked across to the window ; and then his agi- 
 tation suddenly became puerile in his eyes. 
 
 What the Irishwoman had regarded as im- 
 portant when packing his bag might well be a 
 trifling matter, something wanted, maybe, for 
 the child. The uncertainty seemed to steady 
 his conscience; he felt that he must know. 
 
 Bending down, he took up the envelope ; the 
 flap was open, and out of it there slipped into 
 his hand a shabby little card on which was 
 printed : 
 
 Miss ROSALEEN TARA (The Colleen Bawn), 
 18, Abbey Street, 
 Westminster, S. W.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 247 
 
 There followed for David Banfield three 
 days of agonising struggle and temptation. 
 All the feelings and instincts he had battened 
 down, put determinedly from him for so long, 
 sprang into life. Now that he knew where to 
 find her, he became possessed by a deep, un- 
 reasoning longing to see Rosaleen once more 
 even if a meeting could only result in pain 
 for him, in shame for her. 
 
 On the second day of his stay in London, he 
 offered conscience a salve in the form of a fine 
 ruby ring, which was despatched to Miss Wei- 
 low in lieu of the letter which he knew only too 
 well she must be anxiously awaiting. 
 
 Had Banfield been a stronger man he would 
 have left London. But that, or so he told 
 himself, there was no need to do; and as the 
 hours dragged on, bringing him closer to the 
 moment which must see his return to Market 
 Balling to Matilda Wellow the fact that 
 he and Rosaleen were in a material sense so 
 near to one another began to affect his im- 
 agination in strangest and most poignant 
 fashion. 
 
 Walking aimlessly along the hot airless 
 streets of London in July, he found himself 
 ever furtively seeking her. . . . Such chance 
 meetings are not impossible; they happen
 
 248 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 every day. Why should such a thing not 
 come to him as well as to another? 
 
 And so in the summer twilight, not once but 
 many times, some woman's form slender, 
 graceful, light-footed as was Rosaleen's 
 would create for a moment the illusion that 
 she was there, close to him, would bring the 
 wild hope that in a moment his hungry heart 
 would be satisfied, his conscience cheated. 
 And then the woman in whom he had seen for 
 a moment his poor lost love, would turn her 
 head and Banfield, cast down but undis- 
 mayed, would again pursue his eager, aimless 
 search. 
 
 On the last evening of his stay in London, 
 this obsession became so intense that Banfield 
 saw Rosaleen in every woman's shape that 
 passed him by. He grew afraid; and after 
 an hour spent in the peopled streets, he told 
 himself that that way madness lay. 
 
 With eyes fixed on the dusty pavements, he 
 made his way back to his hotel, and sitting 
 down he wrote a letter a kind, cheerful letter 
 to Matilda Wellow, telling her that he 
 would be with her the next afternoon at five 
 o'clock. And then, for the first time since he 
 had known that Rosaleen was in London, his 
 sleep was restful and unbroken. But in the
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 249 
 
 early morning he dreamed a curious dream; 
 Rosaleen, the beloved, the longed-for woman, 
 was again with him, elusive, mysterious, 
 teasing as she had ever been, and Banfield, 
 waking in the early dawn, felt tears of joy 
 standing on his face. 
 
 When he got up in the morning, and faced 
 the day which was to see him go back to Mar- 
 ket Balling, he felt as must feel a man who 
 sees stretching before him a lifelong period of 
 servitude; but with that feeling came the 
 gloomy belief that he had conquered the temp- 
 tation that had so beset him, and this being so. 
 he argued that he had at least a right to see the 
 place where Rosaleen now lived. 
 
 Having come to this specious understand- 
 ing with himself, Banfield felt his heart 
 lighten. He told himself that he would wait 
 till he was within some two hours of the time 
 when he knew he must leave London, and, 
 having so decided, he checked his impatience 
 by various devices, packing his portmanteau, 
 paying his bill, doing first one thing and then 
 another, till the moment came for him to start 
 walking along the Embankment to Westmin- 
 ster. 
 
 When at last he reached the broad, wind- 
 swept space out of which he had been told
 
 250 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 turned Abbey Street, quietest and most se- 
 questered of urban backwaters, he lingered for 
 awhile, suddenly filled with an obscure fear of 
 that for which he had so longed a chance 
 meeting with his wife. 
 
 After a few moments of indecision, he 
 started walking slowly down the middle of the 
 street, his footfalls echoing on the cobble- 
 stones. 
 
 Banfield looked about him curiously. To 
 the right stretched the rough grey wall of Lon- 
 don's oldest garden, framing a green oasis 
 opposite the row of small eighteenth-century 
 houses which stood on the other side of the 
 street. They were quaint, shabby little dwell- 
 ings, and against more than one fanlight was 
 displayed a card bearing the word " Lodg- 
 ings." 
 
 When Banfield came opposite No. 18, he 
 stopped and looked up at the windows with 
 beating heart and the colour rushed into his 
 face, flooding it under the sunburn; following 
 a sudden, an irresistible impulse, he stepped up 
 on to the pavement, and with a nervous move- 
 ment pulled the bell. 
 
 Then followed what seemed to him a long 
 wait on the doorstep, but at last a thin, fretful
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 251 
 
 woman came to the door and enquired his 
 business. 
 
 " Does Miss Rosaleen ,Tara live here? Can 
 I see her? " 
 
 ' Yes, she lives 'ere right enough," the 
 woman spoke with weary indifference, 
 " come this way." 
 
 Banfield paused; he had never thought the 
 access to Rosaleen would be so simple, and he 
 was bewildered by the ease with which this, to 
 him so momentous a step, had been compassed. 
 
 He followed the woman up the narrow, 
 wainscoted staircase to a tiny landing. 
 " Stop," he said almost inaudibly, " I must tell 
 you what to say you must not show me 
 straight in to her, like this." 
 
 But even as he spoke, there was another tin- 
 kle of the bell, and the woman began running 
 heavily down the little staircase, leaving him 
 standing in front of the door. 
 
 He knocked, but there came no answer, and 
 at last he turned the handle, and walked into 
 the room. It was empty of human presence, 
 and yet his wife had stamped something of 
 herself on the shabbily furnished sitting-room. 
 Certain dainty trifles which he had known as 
 hers were there, and before him, on the piano,
 
 252 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 was a music-case which he himself had given 
 her. 
 
 The sight of this, his own gift, affected Ban- 
 field oddly, giving him a feeling that he had a 
 right to be there. After a moment's hesita- 
 tion, he walked over to the window, and looked 
 out into the old Abbey garden. There he 
 would wait patiently for hours if need be 
 till Rosaleen came in. 
 
 Then, quite suddenly, there fell on his ear 
 the voice which he had so often heard in 
 dreams, and which he had of late so passion- 
 ately longed to hear. He turned sharply 
 round, and noticed for the first time that the 
 door of the inner room was ajar. It was from 
 thence that the light, indifferent tones floated 
 impalpably towards him. 
 
 " Ah 1 but it's kind of you, doctor, to come 
 so soon after Miss Lonsdale asked you to see 
 me! I've only just come in, but I won't be a 
 moment I didn't expect you yet. Miss 
 Lonsdale will be in long before you leave, I 
 hope; she's almost as anxious about my voice 
 as I am and the faith she has in you, why, it's 
 something wonderful!" 
 
 To Banfield, the words recalled, not Rosa- 
 leen his wife, but Rosaleen the girl, the dear 
 bewitching stranger he had first known and
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 253 
 
 wooed, though never won. Unconsciously he 
 visualised the speaker; he seemed to see the 
 quick, bird-like movements with which she was 
 taking off her hat and smoothing her hair be- 
 fore the glass. He even saw her smiling 
 smiling as she used to smile at him in the very 
 early days of their acquaintance. 
 
 He knew that he ought to cry out tell her 
 that it was he, her husband, David Banfield, 
 who was there, and not the stranger whom she 
 had apparently been expecting; but though he 
 opened his lips, no word would come. 
 
 At last the door swung open quickly, and 
 for a moment Banfield saw her face, lit up by 
 that touch of wholly innocent coquetry of 
 which your pretty Irishwoman seems to have 
 the secret. 
 
 Then, as suddenly she realised the identity 
 of the tall man standing between her and the 
 window, a peculiar to Banfield a very ter- 
 rible change of expression stiffened Rosa- 
 leen's face into watchful fear and atten- 
 tion. 
 
 "What is it?" she asked. "Tell me 
 quickly, David! Is Rosy ill, or or dead?" 
 
 " Rosy? " he stammered. " She's all right. 
 I heard this morning " 
 
 " And I yesterday," she breathed quickly.
 
 
 254 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Then she sat down, and Banfield let his eyes 
 rest on her with a painful, yearning scrutiny. 
 
 He had thought to find her altered, coars- 
 ened by the experience he believed her to have 
 gone through, but she had the same look of 
 delicate, rather frigid refinement, which had 
 first attracted him. He noted the perfection 
 of her delicate profile, the determined, well- 
 shaped mouth, then saw with a pang that 
 there were a few threads of white in the dark 
 curly hair which, with her bright blue eyes, 
 had always been Rosaleen's principal beau- 
 ties ; and yet she looked scarcely older than on 
 the day he had last seen her that on which he 
 had accompanied her with a heavy heart to the 
 station at Market Dalling to see her off to 
 London. 
 
 Now, looking at her, it stabbed him to re- 
 member how even then she had shown an al- 
 most childish joy in leaving him. She had 
 put her arms round his neck and kissed him in 
 sign of gratitude. " It's kind of you to let me 
 go, Dave! " she had whispered. He had often 
 thought of those last words, the last he had 
 heard her speak. Now he again remembered 
 them. Alas! alas! why had he let her go? 
 
 She sat, looking away from him, her eyes 
 fixed on the empty grate.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 255 
 
 ' You frightened me," she said plaintively. 
 " Why did you come here, David, and frighten 
 me like this? Why have you come here at all 
 after after what you did to me? " 
 
 ' What I did to you?" he stammered con- 
 fusedly, and there came over him the shamed 
 fear that she had already heard of his coming 
 marriage with Matilda Wellow. 
 
 " Yes, what you did to me the documents 
 you sent me divorce papers they're called 
 
 " He felt, rather than saw, that his 
 
 wife's eyes were filling, brimming over with 
 indignant tears. " We don't have those things 
 at home in Ireland, I mean. And then 
 reading out my letter the mad letter I sent 
 you before a lot of men! " 
 
 Rosaleen had always possessed the wifely 
 art of being able to make David Banfield feel 
 himself in the wrong, and now, on hearing her 
 last words, the man before her told himself 
 with a pang that he had indeed acted in an un- 
 kind, even an unmanly, fashion to the fragile- 
 looking woman who sat with her face averted 
 from him. 
 
 "I thought of course I thought" he 
 plucked up courage as he spoke " that you 
 wanted to be free. You said you hoped I 
 should forget you."
 
 256 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " And so I did," she said quickly, " I did 
 wish to be free not so much from you, as 
 from the miserable, the stiflingly dull life you 
 made me lead at Market Balling. That's 
 why I wrote that foolish that wicked letter. 
 I thought it would make you leave me alone. 
 But, David," she made a restless movement, 
 "I didn't understand. However, I've been 
 well punished." 
 
 There was a short, strained silence. Then 
 Rosaleen got up. 
 
 " I'm afraid I can't ask you to stay on much 
 longer," she began nervously, " for I'm ex- 
 pecting a doctor who was very kind to me once 
 when I was ill before. He's a friend of Carrie 
 Lonsdale you remember her, David? The 
 truth is, my voice has given out, and I've been 
 trying to give lessons, but Carrie thinks he will 
 be able to make it come back again soon." 
 
 " And what will you do," asked Banfield in 
 a very low voice, " if he fails? " 
 
 She turned and looked up at him, her eyes 
 meeting his in direct challenge. 
 
 "Whatever I do," she said proudly, "you 
 need not fear that I shall come to you for any 
 help." 
 
 And then David Banfield felt shaken, over- 
 whelmed by a fierce spasm of violent, primi-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 257 
 
 tive jealousy. The name of the other man 
 had never been forthcoming; Rosaleen's letter 
 had sufficed to win the undefended suit. 
 
 " I suppose," he said brutally, " that you 
 can always depend on getting help from your 
 lover?" 
 
 Rosaleen's eyes dropped, her face flushed 
 darkly as she saw the change which came over 
 her husband's face and as there came into his 
 voice accents she had never heard there. 
 
 She sprang up. " How dare you insult 
 me? You have no right to say such a thing 
 to me! I am free to do exactly what I like 
 and to go to whom I choose you yourself 
 made me free ! " 
 
 But a very different man from the man she 
 had believed David Banfield to be now stood 
 before her. 
 
 Of the words she had said, the last alone re- 
 mained with him. Free? Nay, nay, Rosa- 
 leen was in no sense free ; his whole nature rose 
 up and protested against such a statement. 
 There could be no question of choice, for she 
 belonged to him, only to him, solely to him, 
 and that even if she had in a moment of aber- 
 ration, of madness his mind refused to fol- 
 low the thought to its logical conclusion not 
 even in the most secret recess of his imagina-
 
 258 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 tion had Banfield ever consented to dwell on 
 what he believed had been. Not till the last 
 few moments had he seen the torturing vision 
 which almost always haunts the man who has 
 been betrayed by a beloved woman. 
 
 He came yet closer, and put his hand on 
 her shoulder. 
 
 " Rosaleen," he said hoarsely, " you don't 
 understand. You want to know why I came 
 here to-day? Well, I came to say that I am 
 thinking of leaving Market D ailing. I came 
 to ask you if you are willing to come back to 
 me to make a fresh start. You said just 
 now that it was Market D ailing and our life 
 there that you hated not me. I've had a 
 very good offer to go to South Africa, to Dur- 
 ban, and settle there. There's even a house 
 waiting for us, and a convent school for Rosy. 
 But whether I go or not depends on you, 
 Rosaleen. If you are willing to come with 
 us, we'll all go together if not, I mean to 
 stay at Market Dalling." 
 
 Rosaleen remained quite still. She made 
 no effort to move away from his touch. 
 
 " Did you really come to ask me to do that, 
 David, and that although you think so ill of 
 me?" There was a wondering doubt, a
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 259 
 
 softer, kindlier note, than Banfield had ever 
 heard in his wife's voice. 
 
 He set his teeth and lied. 
 
 ' Yes," he said, " that is why I came. 
 Mary Scanlan gave me your address." 
 
 "Poor old Mary I" she exclaimed. "I 
 suppose everyone at Market Bailing thinks 
 I'm a bad woman? Your sister, of course, al- 
 ways hoped that I was a bad woman? " 
 
 She looked at him as if half expecting him 
 to make some kind of denial. But he re- 
 mained silent. What answer, what denial 
 could he make? Of course, everyone at Mar- 
 ket D ailing thought Rosaleen a bad woman. 
 For the matter of that, none of them had ever 
 thought well of her, not even his own people, 
 not even his sister and her husband had made 
 any attempt to understand her. 
 
 Rosaleen's imprudent question made yet 
 another matter, one which Banfield had suc- 
 ceeded for a few moments in completely for- 
 getting, become once more very present to 
 him. With a feeling of terrible self-reproach 
 there rose before him the helpless figure of 
 Matilda Wellow. 
 
 " It's not only you," he said slowly, " but I 
 myself who need to make a fresh start. I
 
 260 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 haven't so much right to blame you as you, 
 Rosaleen, perhaps think for I myself did a 
 very wrong, a wicked thing " 
 
 She slipped away from under his hand and 
 got up, facing him. 
 
 " It's absurd for you to say that," she ex- 
 claimed petulantly, "why, you couldn't do 
 anything wicked, David, if you tried! For 
 the matter of that, I never could see I never 
 have seen why people are why people make 
 
 " she seemed to be seeking for a word, a 
 
 phrase ; and it was in a whisper that she added 
 the words, " beasts of themselves." 
 
 Banfield stared at her, not understanding; 
 for the moment he was too absorbed in his own 
 feelings, in his own remorse, to take much heed 
 of what she was saying. 
 
 "Well?" he asked, "well, Rosaleen, shall 
 we both forgive each other and make a fresh 
 beginning? " 
 
 " Yes," she whispered, hanging her head as 
 might have done a naughty child. With a 
 gesture of surrender, she held out her hands. 
 "I'm ashamed of what I did, David and I'll 
 try to be a better wife to you than I've been up 
 to now." 
 
 Poor Banfield! As he took her in his arms 
 his heart beat with suffocating joy; almost
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 261 
 
 any other man would have felt her words, her 
 implied prayer for forgiveness, curiously in- 
 adequate. 
 
 She looked at him with a peculiar, earnest 
 look, as if trying to make up her mind to a cer- 
 tain course, and then, with a quick movement, 
 she shook herself free and disappeared into the 
 back room. 
 
 He heard the sound of a drawer opening, 
 the fumbling of a key. A moment later she 
 came back and thrust a small packet into his 
 hand. 
 
 ' There," she said, " open that, read what's 
 inside, and then we'll burn it. Thank God, 
 Rosy will never know now the shame you put 
 on her mother. I've often thought how you 
 would feel reading it, if I died before you 
 did!" and each word was punctuated by an 
 angry sob. 
 
 The little packet which Rosaleen had placed 
 in Banfield's hand was tied with blue ribbon, 
 and on it was written: " In case of my death, 
 to be forwarded to Mr. Banfield, The Brew 
 House, Market D ailing." 
 
 It was Rosaleen's fingers which untied the 
 knotted ribbon and which showed him, laid 
 amid her little store of jewellery, he had no- 
 ticed that she still wore her wedding ring, a
 
 262 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 sheet of note-paper on which was an attesta- 
 tion, sworn before a Commissioner of Oaths, 
 that the letter which she had written to him, 
 the confession which had sufficed to procure 
 him his divorce, had been false. 
 
 " But why? " he stammered. " Rosaleen 
 why?" 
 
 " Because I hated the life you made me lead 
 at Market Bailing ! I hate Market Dalling 
 and the hateful people who live there! You 
 wouldn't even let me play or sing on Sunday. 
 And then, your sister Kate! She never gave 
 me a kind word or look! D'you think that 
 was pleasant? " she asked fiercely, then more 
 gently she added, " But I'm ashamed, I've al- 
 ways been ashamed of that letter, and I'd no 
 idea, Dave, that it would make you do what it 
 did." 
 
 The door behind them opened. Rosaleen 
 turned around; she brushed the angry tears 
 from her cheeks; there came over her tremu- 
 lous mouth a charming, rather shy smile. 
 
 " Doctor," she said quietly, " you've just 
 come in time to see my husband. David, this 
 is Dr. Bendall, who was so kind to me when I 
 was ill." 
 
 Banfield held out his hand. . . .
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 263 
 
 III 
 
 It was the late afternoon of the same day, 
 and Mrs. Rigby was sitting as she had sat on 
 her silver wedding day, close to the window of 
 her sitting-room, her busy hands engaged now, 
 as then, in mending house-linen. Now, as 
 then also, she was expecting her brother and 
 Matilda Wellow to dinner, for before Banfield 
 left for London it had been arranged that he 
 and his betrothed should spend that evening 
 with the Rigbys. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby allowed the work she was hold- 
 ing to fall on her lap. She looked into her 
 garden with a preoccupied air. The month 
 which had elapsed since her silver wedding 
 day had brought with it great changes in her 
 life, and what she saw before her seemed, in a 
 sense, symbolic of those changes, for in spite 
 of her careful watering and constant attention, 
 the flower-beds, and above all the beautiful 
 herbaceous borders of which she was so 
 proud, were beginning to look parched and 
 withered. 
 
 To-night more than ever Mrs. Rigb'y real- 
 ised that the marriage of David and Matilda 
 would alter her own life, and that not for the
 
 264 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 better. Why, in old days David would of 
 course have come in to see his sister on his way 
 from the station, and that even in the now for- 
 gotten time when Rosaleen was mistress of the 
 Brew House. To-day her brother had evi- 
 dently gone straight to Matilda Wellow. . . . 
 
 But Mrs. Rigby reminded herself that, 
 taken as a whole, her garden was incomparably 
 fresher and greener than were those of her 
 neighbours on either side ; and as to David and 
 Tiddy, she now told herself, almost speaking 
 the words aloud in her anxiety to make them 
 true, that she was pleased very pleased 
 with the way everything was going on. 
 
 Thus she was glad that the rather absurd se- 
 crecy, so insisted on by her brother, would 
 come to an end to-morrow. Of course a few 
 old friends had been told in confidence of the 
 engagement but considering that this was 
 so, the secret had been very well kept. It was 
 not as if David were a real widower; Mrs. 
 Rigby could not help hoping that he would be 
 spared some of the silly remarks, the foolish 
 congratulations, which fall to the ordinary en- 
 gaged man. It must be bad enough for him, 
 so the sister told herself, to put up with Tiddy's 
 sentimental raptures. Still, it was a comfort
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 265 
 
 to know that Matilda Wellow was well aware 
 that she was in luck's way ! How Tiddy stud- 
 ied David in everything any other man 
 would have been spoilt! 
 
 For the first time, a smile, not a very kind 
 smile, came over Mrs. Rigby's shrewd, rather 
 hard face. 
 
 During the last month, Matilda had actu- 
 ally given up eating potatoes and butter, be- 
 cause some fool had told her that in that way 
 she might hope to regain the youthful slender- 
 ness of her figure! As for David, his be- 
 trothed's little attentions evidently touched 
 him, and no one could say that he was not an 
 attentive lover. Think of the ring he had 
 sent Tiddy, the ruby ring which had ar- 
 rived yesterday morning, and which must 
 have cost so Matt, who was learned in such 
 things, declared not a penny less than 
 501 
 
 The exact date of the wedding would prob- 
 ably be fixed to-night, for it had been arranged 
 that the marriage was to follow very soon 
 after the announcement of the engagement. 
 There was no reason for delay. Mrs. Rigby 
 had herself chosen the 3rd of August as the 
 best date, and she had little doubt that she
 
 266 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 would be able to persuade Dave and Tiddy 
 that no other day would suit them so well. 
 
 Suddenly her quick ears caught the sound 
 of footsteps treading down the path to the 
 left, a path hidden from the place where she 
 was now sitting, and a slight frown came over 
 her face. Mrs. Rigby liked her husband to 
 come straight in to her from the office; but 
 lately, he had taken to the tiresome habit of 
 going out by the back way, into the gar- 
 den, and then suddenly popping round on 
 her. 
 
 She looked out expectantly, but the sound 
 of footsteps died away. It must have been 
 one of the maids going down to the extreme 
 end of the garden in search of some kitchen 
 stuff. 
 
 Mrs. Rigby again took up her work and be- 
 gan sewing diligently. Yes, the marriage 
 should take place quite quietly on the 3rd of 
 August. Everything was ready in fact, 
 there was nothing left to wait for. Even 
 Tiddy's wedding gown and headgear had 
 come home. 
 
 David had showed himself oddly interested 
 in this wholly feminine question of his bride's 
 attire. 
 
 He had actually been to the trouble of
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 267 
 
 choosing the material of which Tiddy's wed- 
 ding gown was to be made; a white and grey 
 stripe, a thin, gauzy stuff not nearly substan- 
 tial enough or so Mrs. Rigby had thought 
 for the purpose to which it was destined. And 
 then he had persuaded Matilda to go to a new 
 dressmaker, a Frenchwoman who had been 
 lady's maid to one of his grand county ac- 
 quaintances, and who had just set up for her- 
 self in Market D ailing. More wonderful 
 still, David had made a rough drawing from 
 some old picture that had taken his fancy of 
 the hat he desired Matilda to wear on her wed- 
 ding day! It was a white hat trimmed with 
 long grey feathers, quite unlike Tiddy's usual 
 style. . . . 
 
 Suddenly looking up, Mrs. Rigby felt a 
 thrill of something like superstitious fear, for 
 there, making her way round the corner from 
 the summer-house, came, walking very slowly, 
 a woman at once like and unlike Matilda Wei- 
 low, clad in a silvery-looking gown and wear- 
 ing a white hat trimmed with long grey 
 feathers. 
 
 As the figure advanced down the path, it 
 took unmistakable shape and substance; here, 
 without a doubt, was Matilda wearing what 
 were to be her wedding garments, and, as Mrs.
 
 268 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Rigby suddenly became aware, a Matilda 
 quite unlike her usual homely self ! 
 
 Who would have thought that simply leav- 
 ing off potatoes and butter for a month would 
 have made such a change 1 Or was that 
 change due to the art of the French dress- 
 maker? The silvery-flounced skirt fell in 
 graceful, billowy folds to the ground, for Miss 
 Wellow was not even holding up her gown, as 
 a more sensible woman would have done. The 
 muslin kerchief edged with real lace, outlined 
 the wearer's still pretty shoulders, and the hat 
 well, the hat was certainly becoming, espe- 
 cially now that Tiddy's cheeks were flushed 
 as well they might be, considering what a fool 
 the woman was making of herself! 
 
 Mrs. Rigby felt rather cross at having been 
 so startled ; she got up, and walked out to meet 
 her guest, determined not to be drawn into any 
 praise of the becoming hat and gown. 
 
 " I hope David won't keep us waiting 
 long," she said tartly. " I suppose he thought 
 that he must put on his dress suit," and her 
 expression showed clearly that in the matter 
 of overdressing there was not much to choose 
 between her brother and the woman who was 
 to become his wife. 
 
 " David will not be here to-night, Kate. He
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 269 
 
 came, but he has gone away again back to 
 London." 
 
 Miss Wellow spoke in a low, collected voice, 
 and certain little irritating mannerisms with 
 which she usually punctuated her words were 
 absent. Perhaps it was the quiet, expression- 
 less way in which she made her surprising 
 statement that caused Mrs. Rigby, as she 
 afterwards averred to her husband, at once to 
 feel that something was wrong. 
 
 " Gone back to London? " the sister re- 
 peated. "Why, whatever has he done that 
 for? What business took him back to Lon- 
 don, to-day? " and she looked searchingly at 
 the other's flushed face. 
 
 " Kate," said Miss Wellow, again speaking 
 in the soft, emotionless voice which was so un- 
 like her own, " I have got to tell you something 
 which I fear will upset you and make you 
 very angry with poor David. Kate he has 
 gone back to Rosaleen." 
 
 Mrs. Rigby withdrew her eyes quickly from 
 Matilda Wellow's face. She did not then 
 realise that the words which had just been 
 spoken would for ever spoil to her this fra- 
 grant, familiar corner of her garden. All she 
 felt now was a fierce, instinctive wish to get 
 under shelter, to hear whatever shameful
 
 270 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 thing had to be heard within four walls, and 
 so she put out her right hand and pushed her 
 visitor before her into the sitting-room. 
 
 Then, keeping her back to the window, she 
 forced Miss Wellow to turn round. 
 
 " Now tell me the truth," she commanded, 
 "and Tiddy above all, don't let yourself be 
 upset, and don't get hysterical I I know what 
 it is you and David have had some silly quar- 
 rel. I saw from the first that you were mak- 
 ing yourself too cheap! He can't go back to 
 Rosaleen; he divorced her and she's with an- 
 other man. Besides, David is my brother! He 
 wouldn't dare do such a wicked thing! You 
 have no right, Tiddy, to accuse him of such 
 shameful behaviour! " She spoke with quick, 
 savage decision. 
 
 But Miss Wellow faced her with a strange, 
 untoward courage " I won't have you speak 
 so of him of David, I mean! " she exclaimed 
 passionately, " you're his sister and ought to 
 take his part I " 
 
 Then her voice broke, and with a touch of 
 her old feebleness she added, " If you had 
 heard him telling me about it, even you, Kate, 
 who are so hard, would maybe have understood 
 and felt sorry for him. I felt very sorry for 
 him "
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 271 
 
 "You!" said Mrs. Rigby, with what 
 appeared to the other withering contempt, 
 
 " He put it very beautifully," continued 
 Miss Wellow ; her voice was now almost inaud- 
 ible, but Mrs. Rigby caught the word and re- 
 peated it with terrible irony: 
 
 " Beautifully! " she said," beautifully! " 
 
 Matilda shrank back as though she feared 
 the other was about to strike her, but Mrs. 
 Rigby did not see the gesture. 
 
 " And did he tell you when he proposes to 
 
 bring " she made a scarcely perceptible 
 
 pause and then shot out the words " his bride 
 home. If it's to-morrow, I'll make Matt take 
 me away to-night! " 
 
 " He's not going to bring her home," said 
 Matilda, quietly. " He's never coming back 
 himself; they are going right away out of 
 England." 
 
 " A good thing too! " said Mrs. Rigby. 
 
 "He says that will be more respectful to 
 me; he has considered my feelings, Kate he 
 has indeed." 
 
 "Has he? Why " she suddenly held 
 
 up a warning finger, for there was a sound of 
 footsteps in the passage; the sound stopped 
 outside the door, and both women instinctively
 
 272 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 held their breath, united by a common fear of 
 servants' gossip. 
 
 There was a long pause, and then the handle 
 of the door was slowly turned, and Mr. Rigby 
 came into the room, his ruddy colour gone, or 
 rather lying in curious streaks across his face, 
 a nervous smile hovering over his lips. 
 
 He shut the door behind him and looked, 
 with a world of interrogation and anxiety in 
 his eyes, at his wife. 
 
 " You needn't smile," she said sharply; " this 
 is no smiling matter! " 
 
 His eyes fell; instinctively he turned to the 
 other, the weaker vessel. But the reproof 
 which Mrs. Rigby had just addressed to her 
 husband penetrated Miss Wellow's brain. 
 
 " I'm afraid I do look rather silly ! " she said 
 nervously, " wearing this dress, I mean. But, 
 you see, knowing that now I shall never wear 
 it, I thought I would put it on to-night." 
 
 The odd collocation of her words passed un- 
 noticed ; indeed, Mr. Rigby, even had he wished 
 to answer her, was not given time to do so, for 
 his wife had turned on him and was avenging 
 in his person the heaped-up wrongs of her sex. 
 
 "It's all your fault, Matt! You were al- 
 ways against David going to London from the 
 first, and you ought to have prevented his do-
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 273 
 
 ing so! But no you stood aside and did 
 nothing! I suppose you guessed he might 
 meet that that " her lips snapped to- 
 gether, she would not soil them by uttering 
 the word which to her mind alone described 
 Rosaleen. 
 
 As her husband did not answer, suspicion 
 grew into certainty. 
 
 " Did you know that she was there? Did 
 you think he would see her? " she demanded. 
 
 Mr. Rigby looked mildly at his Kate. " I 
 didn't know anything, but I did just think it 
 possible," he said. 
 
 But his triumph, if triumph it was, was 
 short-lived. 
 
 "Why didn't you tell me then? A decent 
 woman would never have thought of such a 
 thing, but men have such disgusting minds ! " 
 cried his wife sharply. She added suspi- 
 ciously, " But how did you learn what's hap- 
 pened? Did David write to you?" 
 
 " He came into the office on his way back to 
 the station," said Mr. Rigby, briefly. " And, 
 Kate I've promised to see to things for him. 
 Rosy will join them " he gave a little cough 
 " the day after to-morrow, and they will all 
 sail for South Africa as soon as matters can be 
 settled up. It's better so, my dear."
 
 274 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Suddenly Miss Wellow bent down. Her 
 hand fumbled blindly among the soft, volumi- 
 nous flounces of her skirt. 
 
 " I've got something here," she said in a 
 muffled voice, " that I want you to give Rosy, 
 Matt. But though I know it's there, I can't 
 find the pocket ; you know I had one put in be- 
 cause David once said that he didn't like a wo- 
 man without a pocket in her dress. I've found 
 it here it is ! " she took a step forward, and 
 standing close to her old friend, thrust into his 
 unresisting hand a small hard substance. He 
 looked down and saw it was the ruby ring. 
 " You can give this to the child," she said 
 breathlessly, " I don't want to see her again 
 with love from Auntie Tiddy." 
 
 But this was more than Mrs. Rigby could 
 stand. 
 
 " Well, it's a good thing," she exclaimed to 
 her husband, " that Tiddy takes it like that ! 
 No man would ever have dared to treat me so ! 
 But as long as she doesn't care still, she 
 needn't take David's part against his own sis- 
 ter, who has the right " 
 
 But what right David's sister had was never 
 explained, for Miss Wellow suddenly swayed 
 forward; she would have fallen to the ground 
 had not Mr. Rigby caught her.
 
 SHAMEFUL BEHAVIOUR? 275 
 
 "Why, she's fainted!" he said pitifully; 
 " she does care more than you think, Kate. 
 But she will come round soon too soon," he 
 muttered to himself. 
 
 It was the same night, or rather the next 
 morning, for the dawn was beginning to make 
 its grey way into the bed-chamber of Mr. and 
 Mrs. Rigby ; it threw into dim relief the large, 
 almost square four-poster, under the chintz- 
 covered canopy of which the husband and wife 
 lay, rigid as if carved in stone. 
 
 " Kate," said Matt, " are you awake? " 
 
 He could just see her head lying on the other 
 pillow beside him. Her still abundant hair 
 was loosened and gave her a look of youth. 
 Tears had made a furrow down her cheeks. 
 
 "Yes," said Mrs. Rigby, "I am awake, 
 Matt. What is it you want? " 
 
 "I'm afraid, my dear, that you are very 
 much upset." There were understanding, 
 sympathy, ay, and tenderness expressed in the 
 way Mr. Rigby uttered the homely word. 
 
 His wife, for the first time in their twenty- 
 five years of married life, felt a responsive 
 thrill. For the first time she was unfaithful to 
 Nat Bower. 
 
 " It's of you I'm thinking," she whispered.
 
 276 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " I've been trying all night to forget David, 
 my poor little David, but it's terrible to me to 
 think that you, Matt, married into a family 
 that could be guilty of such shameful behav- 
 iour!"
 
 VI 
 THE DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE
 
 THE DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 
 
 JAMES TAPSTER was eating his solitary, well- 
 cooked dinner in his comfortable and handsome 
 house, a house situated in one of the half -moon 
 terraces which line and frame the more aristo- 
 cratic side of Regent's Park, and which may 
 indeed be said to have private grounds of their 
 own, for each resident enjoys the use of a key 
 to a portion of the Park entitled locally " The 
 Enclosure." 
 
 Very early in his life Mr. Tapster had made 
 up his mind that he would like to live in Cum- 
 berland Crescent and now he was living there ; 
 very early in his life he had decided that no one 
 could order a plain yet palatable meal as well 
 as he could himself, and now for some months 
 past Mr. Tapster had given his own orders, 
 each morning, to the cook. 
 
 To-night Mr. Tapster had already eaten his 
 fried sole, and he was about to cut himself off 
 a generous portion of the grilled under-cut 
 before him, when he heard the postman's steps 
 hurrying round the Crescent. He rose with a 
 certain quick deliberateness, and going out into 
 
 279
 
 280 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 the hall, opened the front door just in time to 
 avoid the rat-tat-tat. Then, the one letter he 
 had expected duly in his hand, he waited till 
 he had sat down again in front of his still 
 empty plate before he broke the seal and 
 glanced over the typewritten sheet of note- 
 paper. 
 
 SHORTERS COURT, THROGMORTON ST., 
 
 November 4>th, 190 . 
 DEAR JAMES, 
 
 In reply to your letter of yesterday's date, I have 
 been to Bedford Row and seen Greenfield, and he 
 thinks it probable that the decree will be made abso- 
 lute to-day; in that case you will have received a wire 
 before this letter reaches you. 
 
 Your affect, brother, 
 
 WM. A. TAPSTER. 
 
 In the same handwriting as the signature 
 were added two holograph lines : " Glad you 
 have the children home again. Maud will be 
 round to see them soon." 
 
 Mr. Tapster read over once again the body 
 of the letter, and there came upon him an in- 
 stinctive feeling of intense relief; then, with a 
 not less instinctive feeling of impatience, his 
 eyes travelled down again to the postscript 
 " Maud will be round to see them soon." 
 
 Well, he would see about that ! But he did
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 281 
 
 not exclaim, even mentally, as most men feel- 
 ing as he then felt would have done, " I'll be 
 damned if she will!" knowing the while that 
 Maud certainly would. 
 
 His brother's letter, though most satisfac- 
 tory as regarded its main point, put Mr. Tap- 
 ster out of conceit with the rest of his dinner; 
 so he rang twice and had the table cleared, 
 frowning at the parlour-maid as she hurried 
 through her duties, and yet not daring to re- 
 buke her for having neglected to answer the 
 bell the first time he rang. 
 
 After a pause, he rose and turned towards 
 the door but, no, he could not face the large, 
 cheerless drawing-room upstairs; instead, he 
 sat down by the fire, and set himself to con- 
 sider his future, and, in a more hazy sense, 
 that of his now motherless children. 
 
 But very soon, as generally happens to 
 those who devote any time to that least profita- 
 ble of occupations, Mr. Tapster found that his 
 thoughts drifted aimlessly, not to the future 
 where he would have them be, but to the past 
 that past which he desired to forget, to 
 obliterate from his memory. 
 
 Till rather more than a year ago few men 
 of his age he had then been sixty, he was now 
 sixty-one enjoyed a pleasanter and, from his
 
 282 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 own point of view, a better-filled life than 
 James Tapster. How he had scorned the 
 gambler, the spendthrift, the adulterer, in a 
 word, all those whose actions bring about their 
 own inevitable punishment! He had always 
 been self-respecting and conscientious, not a 
 prig, mind you, but inclined rather to the seri- 
 ous than to the flippant side of life, and so in- 
 clining he had found contentment and great 
 material prosperity. 
 
 Not even in those days to which he was now 
 looking back so regretfully had Mr. Tapster 
 always been perfectly content; but now the 
 poor man sitting alone by his dining-room fire, 
 only remembered what had been good and 
 pleasant in his former state. He was aware 
 that his brother William and William's wife, 
 Maud both thought that even now he had 
 much to be thankful for; his line of business 
 was brisk, scarcely touched by foreign competi- 
 tion, his income increasing at a steady rate of 
 progression, and his children were excep- 
 tionally healthy. 
 
 But, alas! now that, in place of a pretty 
 little Mrs. Tapster on whom to spend easily- 
 earned money, his substance was being squan- 
 dered by a crowd of unmanageable and yet 
 indispensable thieves, for so Mr. Tapster
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 283 
 
 voicelessly described the five servants whose 
 loud talk and laughter were even now float- 
 ing up from the basement below, he did not 
 feel his financial stability so comfortable a 
 thing as he had once done. 
 
 His very children, who should now be, as he 
 told himself complainingly, his greatest com- 
 fort, had degenerated from two sturdy, well- 
 behaved little boys and a charming baby girl, 
 into three unruly, fretful imps, setting him at 
 defiance, and terrorising their two attendants, 
 who, though carefully chosen by their Aunt 
 Maud, did not seem to manage them as well 
 as the old nurse who had been an ally of the 
 ex-Mrs. Tapster. 
 
 Looking back at the whole horrible affair, 
 for so in his own mind Mr. Tapster justly 
 designated the divorce case in which he had 
 figured as the successful petitioner, he won- 
 dered uneasily if he had done quite wisely 
 wisely, that is, for his own repute and comfort. 
 
 He knew very well that had it not been for 
 William or rather for Maud he would never 
 have found out the dreadful truth. Nay, 
 more; he was dimly aware that but for them, 
 and for their insistence on it as the only proper 
 course open to him, he would never have taken 
 action. All would have been forgiven and
 
 284 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 forgotten had riot William and more espe- 
 cially Maud said he must divorce Flossy, if 
 not for his own sake, ah ! what irony ! then for 
 that of his children. 
 
 Of course he felt grateful to his brother 
 William and to his brother's wife for all they 
 had done for him since that sad time. Still, in 
 the depths of his heart, Mr. Tapster felt en- 
 titled to blame, and sometimes almost to hate, 
 his kind brother and sister. To them both- 
 er rather to Maud he really owed the break- 
 up of his life, for, when all was said and done, 
 it had to be admitted (though Maud did not 
 like him to remind her of it) that Flossy had 
 met the villain while staying with the William 
 Tapsters at Boulogne. Respectable London 
 people should have known better than to take 
 a furnished house at a disreputable French 
 watering-place a place full of low English! 
 
 Sometimes it was only by a great exercise 
 of self-control that he, James Tapster, could 
 refrain from telling Maud what he thought of 
 her conduct in this matter, the more so that she 
 never seemed to understand how greatly she 
 and William had been to blame. 
 
 On one occasion Maud had even said how 
 surprised she had been that James had cared 
 to go away to America, leaving his pretty
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 285 
 
 young wife alone for as long as three months. 
 Why hadn't she said so at the time, then? Of 
 course, he had thought that he could leave 
 Flossy to be looked after and kept out of mis- 
 chief by Maud and William. But he had 
 been in more than one sense, alas! bitterly 
 deceived. 
 
 Still, it's never any use crying over spilt 
 milk, so Mr. Tapster got up from his chair 
 and walked round the room, looking absently, 
 as he did so, at the large Landseer engraving 
 of which he was naturally proud. If only he 
 could forget put out of his mind for ever 
 the whole affair! Well, perhaps with the 
 Decree being made Absolute would come ob- 
 livion. 
 
 He sat down again before the fire. Staring 
 at the hot embers, he reminded himself that 
 Flossy, wicked, ungrateful Flossy, had disap- 
 peared out of his life. This being so, why 
 think of her? The very children had at last 
 left off asking inconvenient questions about 
 their mamma 
 
 By the way, would Flossy still be their 
 mamma after the Decree had been made Ab- 
 solute? so Mr. Tapster now suddenly asked 
 himself. He hesitated perplexed. 
 
 But yes, the Decree being made Absolute
 
 286 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 would not undo, or even efface, that fact. 
 The more so, though surely here James Tap- 
 ster showed himself less logical than usual 
 the more so that Flossy, in spite of what Maud 
 had always said about her, had been a loving 
 and, in her own light-hearted way, a careful 
 mother. But though Flossy would remain 
 the mother of his children odd that the Law 
 hadn't provided for that contingency she 
 would soon be absolutely nothing, and less 
 than nothing, to him, the father of those chil- 
 dren. Mr. Tapster was a great believer in 
 the infallibility of the Law, and he subscribed 
 whole-heartedly to the new reading, " What 
 Law has put asunder, let not man join to- 
 gether." 
 
 To-night Mr. Tapster could not help look- 
 ing back with a certain complacency to his 
 one legal adventure. Nothing could have 
 been better done, or more admirably con- 
 ducted, than the way the whole matter had 
 been carried through. His brother William, 
 and William's solicitor, Mr. Greenfield, had 
 managed it all so very nicely. True, there had 
 been a few uncomfortable moments in the wit- 
 ness-box, but everyone, including the Judge, 
 had been most kind. 
 
 As for his Counsel, the leading man who
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 287 
 
 makes a specialty of these sad aff airs, not even 
 James Tapster himself could have put his own 
 case in a more delicate and moving fashion. 
 "A gentleman possessed of considerable for- 
 tune,'* so had he been justly described, and 
 Counsel, without undue insistence on irrele- 
 vant detail, had drawn a touching and a 
 true picture of Mr. Tapster's one romance, 
 his marriage eight years before to the twenty- 
 year-old daughter of an undischarged bank- 
 rupt. Even the Petitioner had scarcely seen 
 Flossy's dreadful ingratitude in its true colours 
 till he had heard his Counsel's moderate com- 
 ments on the case. 
 
 This evening Mr. Tapster saw Flossy's 
 dreadful ingratitude terribly clearly, and he 
 wondered, not for the first time, how his wife 
 could have had the heart to break up his happy 
 home! 
 
 Why, but for him and his offer of marriage, 
 Flossy Ball that had been his wife's maiden 
 name would have had to have earned her own 
 living ! And as she had been very pretty, very 
 " fetching," she would probably have married 
 some good-for-nothing young fellow of her 
 own age lacking the means to support a wife in 
 decent comfort, such a fellow, for instance, as 
 the wretched " Co." in the case. While with
 
 288 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Mr. Tapster why, she had had everything 
 the heart of woman could wish for, a good 
 home, beautiful clothes, and the being waited 
 on hand and foot. A strange choking feeling 
 came into his throat as he thought of how good 
 he had been to Flossy, and how very bad had 
 been her return for that kindness. 
 
 But this this was dreadful ! He was actu- 
 ally thinking of her again, and not, as he had 
 meant to do, of himself and his poor, mother- 
 less children. Time enough to think of Flossy 
 when he had news of her again. If her lover 
 did not marry her and from what Mr. Green- 
 field had discovered about him, it was most 
 improbable that he would ever be in a position 
 to do so she would certainly reappear on the 
 Tapster horizon; Mr. Greenfield said "they" 
 always did. In that case, it was arranged that 
 William should pay her a weekly allowance. 
 Mr. Tapster, always, as he now reminded him- 
 self sadly, ready to do the generous thing, had 
 fixed that allowance at three pounds a week 
 a sum which had astonished, in fact quite stag- 
 gered, Mr. Greenfield's head clerk, a very de- 
 cent fellow, by the way. 
 
 " Of course, it shall be as you wish, Mr. Tap- 
 ster, but you should think of the future and of 
 your children. A hundred and fifty pounds a
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 289 
 
 year is a large sum; you may feel it a tax, sir, 
 as years go on " 
 
 "That is enough," Mr. Tapster had an- 
 swered, kindly but firmly; "you have done 
 your duty in laying that side of the case before 
 me. I have, however, decided on the amount 
 named ; should I see reason to alter my mind, 
 our arrangement leaves it open to me at any 
 time to lower the allowance." 
 
 But though this conversation had taken 
 place some months ago, and though Mr. Tap- 
 ster still held true to his generous resolve, as 
 yet Flossy had not reappeared. 
 
 Mr. Tapster sometimes told himself that if 
 he only knew where she was, what she was do- 
 ing, whether she was still with that young 
 fellow, for instance, he would think much less 
 about her than he did now. Only last night, 
 when going for a moment into the night nur- 
 sery, poor Mr. Tapster now only enjoyed his 
 children's company when he was quite sure 
 that they were asleep, he had had an extraor- 
 dinary, almost a physical, impression of Flos- 
 sy's presence; he certainly had felt a faint 
 whiff of her favourite perfume. Flossy had 
 been fond of scent, and though Maud always 
 said that the use of scent was most unladylike, 
 he, James, did not dislike it.
 
 290 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 With sudden soreness Mr. Tapster now re- 
 called the one letter Flossy had written to him 
 just before the actual hearing of the divorce 
 suit. 
 
 It had been a wild, oddly-worded appeal to 
 him to take her back, not as Maud had at 
 once perceived on reading the letter because 
 she was sorry for the terrible thing she had 
 done, but simply because she was beginning to 
 hanker after her children. Maud had de- 
 scribed the letter as shameless and unwomanly 
 in the extreme; and even William, who had 
 never judged his pretty young sister-in-law as 
 severely as his wife had always done, had ob- 
 served sadly that Flossy seemed quite unaware 
 of the magnitude of her offence against God 
 and man. 
 
 Mr. Tapster, who prided himself on his 
 sharp ears, suddenly heard a curious little 
 sound he knew it for that of the front door 
 being first opened and then shut again, ex- 
 tremely quietly. He half rose from his chair 
 by the fire, then sat down again, heavily. 
 
 By Maud's advice he always locked the area 
 gate himself, when he came home each evening. 
 But how foolish of Maud such a sensible 
 woman too, to think that servants and their
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 291 
 
 evil ways could be circumvented so easily! Of 
 course, the maids went in and out by the front 
 door in the evening, and the policeman a most 
 respectable officer standing at point duty a few 
 yards lower down the road must be well 
 aware of these disgraceful " goings on." 
 
 For the first two or three months of his 
 widowerhood (how else could he term his pres- 
 ent peculiar wifeless condition?) there had 
 been a constant coming and going of servants, 
 first chosen, and then dismissed, by Maud. At 
 last she had suggested that her brother-in-law 
 should engage a lady housekeeper, and the 
 luckless James Tapster had even interviewed 
 several applicants for the post after they had 
 been chosen sifted out, as it were by Maud. 
 Unfortunately they had all been each more or 
 less of his own age ; and plain very plain ; 
 while he, naturally enough, would have pre- 
 ferred to see something young and pretty 
 about him again. 
 
 It was over this housekeeper question that 
 he had at last escaped from Maud's domestic 
 thraldom, for his sister-in-law, offended by his 
 rejection of each of her candidates, had de- 
 clared that she would take no more trouble 
 about his household affairs! Nay, more; she 
 had reminded him with a smile which she had
 
 292 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 honestly tried to make pleasant, that there is, 
 after all, no fool like an old fool about 
 women! This insinuation had made Mr. Tap- 
 ster very angry, and straightway he had en- 
 gaged a respectable cook-housekeeper, and, al- 
 though he had soon become aware that the 
 woman was feathering her own nest, James 
 Tapster, as you will have divined ere now, was 
 fond of good workaday phrases, yet she had 
 a pleasant, respectful manner, and kept rough 
 order among the younger servants. 
 
 Mr. Tapster's sister-in-law only now inter- 
 fered where his children were concerned. 
 Never having been herself a mother, she had, 
 of course, been able to form a clear and un- 
 prejudiced judgment as to how children, and 
 especially as to how little boys, should be phys- 
 ically and mentally trained. 
 
 As yet, however, Maud had not been very 
 successful with her two nephews and infant 
 niece, but this was doubtless owing to the fact 
 that there had been something gravely amiss 
 with each of the five nurses who had been suc- 
 cessively engaged by her during the last year. 
 
 The elder of Mr. Tapster's sons was six 
 and the second four ; the youngest child, a lit- 
 tle girl named unfortunately Flora after her 
 mother, was three years old. There had been
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 293 
 
 a fourth, Flossy's second baby, also a girl, who 
 had only lived one day. All this being so, was 
 it not strange that a young matron who had 
 led, for some four years out of the eight years 
 her married life had lasted, so wholly womanly 
 and domestic an existence as had fallen to the 
 lot of Flossy, should have been led astray by 
 the meretricious allurements of unlawful love? 
 Maud's striking thought and phrase this. 
 
 And yet Flossy, in spite of her frivolity, had 
 somehow managed the children far better than 
 Maud was now able to do. At the present 
 time, so Mr. Tapster admitted to himself with 
 something very like an inward groan, his two 
 sons possessed every vice of which masculine 
 infancy is capable. They had become so he 
 was told by their indignant nurses the terror 
 of the well-behaved children who shared with 
 them the pleasures of the Park Enclosure, 
 where they took their daily exercise; and Baby, 
 once so sweet and good, was now very fretful 
 End peevish. 
 
 Again the train of Mr. Tapster's mournful 
 thoughts was disturbed by a curious little 
 sound that of someone creeping softly down 
 the staircase leading from the upper floors. 
 
 Once more he half rose from his chair, only
 
 294 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 to fall heavily back again with a look of impo- 
 tent annoyance on his round, whiskered face. 
 Where was the use of his going out into the 
 hall and catching Nurse on her way to the 
 kitchen? Maud had declared, very early in 
 the day, that there should be as little communi- 
 cation as possible between the kitchen and the 
 nursery; but Mr. Tapster sometimes found 
 himself in secret sympathy with the two 
 women whose disagreeable duty it was to be 
 always with his three turbulent children. 
 
 Mr. .Tapster frowned and stared gloomily 
 into the fire; then he suddenly pulled himself 
 together rather sharply, for the door behind 
 him had slowly swung open. This was intol- 
 erable! The parlour-maid had again and 
 'again been told that, whatever might have 
 been the case in her former places, no door in 
 Mr. Tapster's house was to be opened without 
 the preliminary of a respectful knock. 
 
 Fortified by the memory of what had been 
 a positive order, he turned round and nerved 
 himself to deliver the necessary rebuke ; but in- 
 stead of the shifty-eyed, impudent-looking wo- 
 man he had thought to see, there stood close to 
 him, so close that he could almost have touched 
 her Flossy, his wife, or rather the woman 
 who, though no longer his wife, had still, as he
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 295 
 
 had been informed to his discomfiture, the 
 right to bear his name. 
 
 A very strange feeling, and one so compli- 
 cated that it sat uneasily upon him, took in- 
 stant possession of Mr. Tapster anger, sur- 
 prise, and relief warred with one another in 
 his heart. 
 
 Then he began to think that his eyes must 
 be playing him some curious trick, for the 
 figure at which he was staring remained 
 strangely still and motionless. 
 
 Was it possible that his mind, dwelling con- 
 stantly on Flossy, had evoked her wraith? 
 But, no; looking up in startled silence at the 
 still figure standing before him, he realised 
 that not so would memory have conjured up 
 the pretty, bright little woman of whom he 
 had once been proud. Flossy still looked 
 pretty, but she was thin and pale, and there 
 were dark rings round her eyes ; also her dress 
 was worn, her hat curiously shabby. 
 
 As Mr. Tapster stared up at her, noting 
 these things, one of her hands began playing 
 nervously with the fringe of the dining-table 
 cover, and the other sought the back of what 
 had once been one of her dining-room chairs. 
 
 As he watched her making these slight move- 
 ments, nature so far reasserted itself that a
 
 296 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 feeling of poignant regret, of pity for her as 
 well as, of course, a much larger share of pity 
 for himself came over James Tapster. 
 
 Had Flossy spoken then, had she pos- 
 sessed the intuitive knowledge of men which is 
 the gift of so many otherwise unintelligent 
 women, the whole of Mr. Tapster's future, 
 to say nothing of her own, might have been 
 different, and, it may be suggested, happier. 
 
 But the moment of softening and mansue- 
 tude slipped quickly by, and was succeeded by 
 a burst of anger, for Mr. Tapster suddenly 
 became aware that Flossy's left hand, the lit- 
 tle thin hand resting on the back of the chair, 
 was holding two keys which he recognised at 
 once as his property. The one was a replica 
 of the latch-key which always hung on his 
 watch-chain, while the other and larger key, 
 to which was attached a brass tab bearing the 
 name of Tapster and the address of the house, 
 gave access to the Enclosure Garden opposite 
 Cumberland Crescent. 
 
 Avoiding her eager, pitiful look, Mr. Tap- 
 ster set himself to realise, with a shrewdness 
 for which William and Maud would never 
 have given him credit, what Flossy's posses- 
 sion of those two keys had meant during the 
 last few months.
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 297 
 
 This woman, who both was and was not Mrs. 
 Tapster, had retained the power to come freely 
 in and out of his house ! She had been able to 
 make her way, with or without the connivance 
 of the servants, into his children's nursery at 
 any hour of the day or night convenient to her- 
 self. With the aid of that Enclosure key she 
 had no doubt often seen the children during 
 their daily walk ! In a word, Flossy had been 
 able to enjoy all the privileges of motherhood 
 while having forfeited all those of happy wife- 
 hood! 
 
 His mind hastened heavily on what a fool 
 he must have looked before his servants, how 
 they must have laughed to think that he was 
 being so deceived and taken in! Why, even 
 the policeman who stood at point duty outside 
 must have known all about it! 
 
 Small wonder that Mr. Tapster felt ex- 
 tremely incensed ; small wonder that his heart, 
 hardening, solidifying, expelled any feeling of 
 pity provoked by Flossy's sad and downcast 
 appearance. 
 
 " I must request you," he said, .in a voice 
 which even to himself sounded harsh and need- 
 lessly loud, " to give up those keys which you 
 hold in your hand. You have no right to their 
 possession, and I grieve to think that you took
 
 298 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 advantage of my great distress of mind not to 
 return them with the things of which I sent 
 you a list by my brother William. I cannot 
 believe " and now Mr. Tapster lied as only 
 the very truthful can lie on occasion " I can- 
 not believe, I say, that you have taken advan- 
 tage of my having overlooked them, and that 
 you have ever before to-night forced yourself 
 into this house! Still less can I believe that 
 you have taught our my children to deceive 
 their father!" 
 
 Even when uttering his first sentence he had 
 noticed that there had come over Flossy's face 
 which was thinner, if quite as pretty and 
 youthful-looking as when he had last seen it 
 an expression of obstinacy which he had once 
 well known and always dreaded. It had been 
 Flossy's one poor weapon against her hus- 
 band's superior sense and power of getting his 
 own way, and sometimes it had vanquished him 
 in that fair fight which is always being waged 
 between the average husband and wife. 
 
 "You are right," she cried passionately; 
 " I have not taught the children to deceive you ! 
 I have never come into this house until I felt 
 sure that they were asleep and alone, though 
 I've often wondered that they never woke up 
 and knew that their own mother was there!
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 299 
 
 But more than once, James, I've felt like go- 
 ing after that Society which looks after badly- 
 treated children for the last nurse you had 
 for them was so cruel ! If she hadn't left you 
 soon I should have had to do something. I 
 used to feel desperate when I saw her shake 
 Baby in her pram; why, one day, in the En- 
 closure, a lady spoke to her about it, and 
 threatened to tell her her mistress " 
 
 Flossy's voice sank to a shamed whisper. 
 The tears were rolling down her cheeks; she 
 was speaking in angry gasps, and what she 
 said actually made James Tapster feel, what 
 he knew full well he had no reason to feel, 
 ashamed of himself. 
 
 "That is why" she went on "that is 
 why I have, as you say, forced myself into 
 your house, and why, too, I have now come 
 here to ask you to forgive me to take me 
 back just for the sake of the children." 
 
 Mr. Tapster's mind was one that travelled 
 surely if slowly. He saw his chance and 
 seized it. 
 
 " And why," he said impressively, " had that 
 woman the nurse, I mean no mistress? 
 Tell me that, Flossy. You should have 
 thought of all that before you behaved as you 
 did!"
 
 300 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 " I didn't know I didn't think " 
 
 Mr. Tapster finished the sentence for her. 
 " You didn't think," he observed impressively, 
 " that I should ever find you out." 
 
 Then there came over him a morbid wish to 
 discover to learn from her own lips why 
 Flossy had done such a shameful and extraor- 
 dinary thing as to be unfaithful to her marriage 
 vow. 
 
 " Whatever made you behave so? " he asked 
 in a low voice. " I wasn't unkind to you, was 
 I ? You had a nice, comfortable home, hadn't 
 you?" 
 
 " I was mad," she answered with a touch of 
 sharp weariness. " I don't suppose I could 
 ever make you understand, and yet" she 
 looked at him deprecatingly " I suppose, 
 James, that you too were young once, and 
 and mad? " 
 
 Mr. Tapster stared at Flossy. What ex- 
 traordinary things she said ! Of course he had 
 been young once; for the matter of that he 
 didn't feel old not to say old even now. But 
 he had always been perfectly sane she knew 
 that well enough! As for her calling herself 
 mad, that was a mere figure of speech. Of 
 course, in a sense she had been mad to do what 
 she had done, and he was glad that she now
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 801 
 
 understood this, but her saying so simply 
 begged the whole question, and left him no 
 wiser than he was before. 
 
 There was a long, tense silence between 
 them. Then Mr. Tapster slowly rose from his 
 armchair and faced his wife. 
 
 " I see," he said, "that William was right. 
 I mean, I suppose I may take it that that 
 young fellow has gone and left you? " 
 
 " Yes," she said, with a curious indifference, 
 " he has gone and left me. His father made 
 him take a job out in Brazil just after the case 
 was through." 
 
 "And what have you been doing since 
 then? " asked Mr. Tapster suspiciously. 
 " How have you been living? " 
 
 " His father gives me a pound a week.'* 
 Flossy still spoke with that curious indiffer- 
 ence. " I tried to get something to do " she 
 hesitated, then offered the lame explanation, 
 " just to have something to do, for I've been 
 awfully lonely and miserable, James. But I 
 don't seem to be able to get anything." 
 
 " If you had written to Mr. Greenfield or to 
 William, they would have told you that I had 
 arranged for you to have an allowance," he 
 said, and then again he fell into silence. . . . 
 
 Mr. Tapster was seeing a vision of himself
 
 302 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 magnanimous, forgiving, taking the peccant 
 Flossy back to his heart, and becoming once 
 more, in a material sense, comfortable ! If he 
 acceded to her wish, if he made up his mind to 
 forgive her, he would have to begin life all over 
 again, move away from Cumberland Crescent 
 to some distant place where the story was not 
 known, perhaps to Clapham, where he had 
 spent his boyhood. 
 
 But how about Maud? How about Wil- 
 liam? How about the very considerable ex- 
 pense to which he had been put in connection 
 with the divorce proceedings? Was all that 
 money to be wasted? 
 
 Mr. Tapster suddenly saw the whole of his 
 little world rising up in judgment, smiling 
 pityingly at his folly and weakness. During 
 the whole of a long and of what had been, till 
 this last year, a very prosperous life, Mr. Tap- 
 ster had always steered his safe course by what 
 may be called the compass of public opinion, 
 and now, when navigating an unknown sea, he 
 could not afford to throw that compass over- 
 board, so 
 
 "No," he said. "No, Flossy. It would 
 not be right for me to take you back. It 
 wouldn't do." 
 
 " Wouldn't it? " she asked piteously.
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 303 
 
 " Oh! James, don't say no like that, all at once! 
 People do forgive each other sometimes. I 
 don't ask you to be as kind to me as you were 
 before ; only to let me come home and see after 
 the children ! " 
 
 But Mr. Tapster shook his head. The chil- 
 dren! Always the children! He noticed, 
 even now, that she didn't say a word of want- 
 ing to come back to him; and yet he had been 
 such a kind, nay, if Maud were to be believed, 
 such a foolishly indulgent, husband. 
 
 And then Flossy looked so different. Mr. 
 Tapster felt as if a stranger were standing 
 there before him. Her appearance of poverty 
 shocked him. Had she looked well and pros- 
 perous, he would have felt injured, and yet her 
 pinched face and shabby clothes certainly re- 
 pelled him. So again he shook his head, and 
 there came into his face a look which Flossy 
 had always known in the old days to spell final- 
 ity; when he again spoke she saw that her 
 knowledge had not misled her. 
 
 " I don't want to be unkind," he said pon- 
 derously. " If you will only go to William, or 
 write to him if you would rather not go to the 
 office," Mr. Tapster did not like to think that 
 anyone once closely connected with him should 
 " look like that " in his brother's office," he
 
 304 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 will tell you what you had better do. I'm 
 quite ready to make you a handsome allow- 
 ance in fact, it's all arranged. You need not 
 have anything more to do with that fellow's 
 father an Army Colonel, isn't he? and his 
 pound a week ; but William thinks, and I must 
 say I agree, that you ought to go back to your 
 maiden name, Flossy, as being more fair to 
 
 me." 
 
 " And am I never to see the children again? " 
 she asked. 
 
 " No ; it wouldn't be right for me to let you 
 do so." 
 
 He hesitated, then added, " They don't miss 
 you any more now," with no unkindly intent 
 he concluded, " soon they'll have forgotten you 
 altogether." 
 
 And then, just as Mr. Tapster was hesitat- 
 ing, seeking for a suitable and not unkindly 
 sentence of farewell, he saw a very strange, al- 
 most a desperate, look come over Flossy's face, 
 and, to his surprise, she suddenly turned and 
 left the room, closing the door very carefully 
 behind her. 
 
 He stared after her. How very odd of her 
 to say nothing I And what a queer look had 
 come over her face! He could not help feel- 
 ing hurt that she had not thanked him for what
 
 he knew to be a very generous and unusual 
 provision on the part of an injured husband. 
 . . . Mr. Tapster took a silk handkerchief out 
 of his pocket and passed it twice over his face, 
 then once more he sought and sank into the 
 armchair by the fire. 
 
 Even now he still felt keenly conscious of 
 Flossy 's nearness. What could she be doing? 
 Then he straightened himself and listened. 
 
 Yes, it was as he feared; she had gone up- 
 stairs upstairs to look at the children, for 
 now he could hear her coming down again. 
 How obstinate she was how obstinate and 
 ungrateful! Mr. Tapster wished he had the 
 courage to go out into the hall and face her in 
 order to tell her how wrong her conduct was. 
 Why, she had actually kept the keys those 
 keys that were his property! 
 
 Suddenly he heard her light footsteps hurry- 
 ing down the hall; now she was opening the 
 front door, it slammed, and again Mr. Tap- 
 ster felt pained to think how strangely indif- 
 ferent Flossy was to his interests. Why, what 
 would the servants think, hearing the front 
 door slam like that? 
 
 But still, now that it was over, he was glad 
 the interview had taken place, for henceforth 
 or so at least Mr. Tapster believed the
 
 306 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Flossy of the past, the bright, pretty, prosper- 
 ous Flossy of whom he had been so proud, 
 would cease to haunt him. 
 
 He remembered with a feeling of relief that 
 she was going to his brother William ; of course 
 she would then, among greater renunciations, 
 be compelled to return the two keys, for they 
 that is, his brother and himself would have 
 her in their power. They would not behave 
 unkindly to her far from it; in fact, they 
 would arrange for her to live with some quiet, 
 religious lady in a country town a few hours 
 from London. Mr. Tapster had not evolved 
 this scheme for himself; it had been done in a 
 similar case one of those cases which, in the 
 long ago, when he was still a single man, had 
 aroused his pitying contempt for husbands 
 who allow themselves to be deceived. 
 
 Then Mr. Tapster began going over each in- 
 cident of the strange little interview, for he 
 wanted to tell his brother William exactly 
 what had taken place. 
 
 His conscience was quite clear except with 
 regard to one matter, and that, after all, 
 needn't be mentioned to William. He felt 
 rather ashamed of having asked the question 
 which had provoked so wild an answer so un- 
 expected a retort. 
 
 Mad? What had Flossy meant by asking
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 307 
 
 him if he had ever been mad? No one had 
 ever used the word in connection with James 
 Tapster before save once. Oddly enough, 
 that occasion also had been connected with 
 Flossy in a way ; for it had happened when he 
 had gone to tell William and Maud of his en- 
 gagement. 
 
 It was on a fine day nine years ago come this 
 May, and he had found William and William's 
 wife walking in their garden on Haverstock 
 Hill. His kind brother, as always, had been 
 most sympathetic, and had even made a suit- 
 able joke Mr. Tapster remembered it very 
 sadly to-night concerning the spring and a 
 young man's fancy; but Maud had been really 
 disagreeable. She had said, " It's no use talk- 
 ing to you, James, for you're mad quite 
 mad! " He had argued the matter out with 
 her good-temperedly, and William had sup- 
 ported him in pointing out that he was doing 
 an eminently sane thing in marrying Flossy 
 Ball. But Maud again and again had ex- 
 claimed, in her determined, aggravating voice, 
 " I say you are mad. They don't let lunatics 
 marry and just now you are a lunatic, 
 James 1 " 
 
 Strange that he should remember all this to- 
 night; for, after all, it had nothing to do with 
 the present state of affairs.
 
 308 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 Mr. Tapster felt rather shaken and nervous ; 
 he pulled out his repeater watch; but, alas! it 
 was still very early only ten minutes to nine. 
 He couldn't go to bed yet. Perhaps he would 
 do well to join a club. He had always 
 thought rather poorly of men who belonged to 
 clubs, most of them were idle, lazy fellows; 
 but still, circumstances alter cases. 
 
 Suddenly he began to wish that Flossy had 
 remained a little longer. 
 
 He thought of all sorts of things improv- 
 ing, kindly remarks he would have liked to 
 say to her. He blamed himself for not hav- 
 ing offered her any refreshment; she would 
 probably have refused to take anything, but 
 still, it was wrong on his part not to have 
 thought of it. A pound a week for every- 
 thing! No wonder she looked half starved. 
 Why, his own household bills, exclusive of wine 
 or beer, had worked out, since he had had this 
 new expensive housekeeper, at something like 
 fifteen shillings a head a fact which he had 
 managed to conceal from Maud, who " did " 
 her William so well on exactly ten shillings 
 and nine-pence all round ! 
 
 It struck nine from the neighbouring church 
 where Mr. Tapster had sittings, but where he
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 309 
 
 seldom was able to go on Sunday mornings, for 
 he was proud of being among those old-fash- 
 ioned folk who still regard Sunday as essen- 
 tially a day of rest, and there came a sudden 
 sound of hoarse shouting from the road out- 
 side. 
 
 Though he was glad of anything that broke 
 the oppressive silence with which he felt en- 
 compassed, Mr. Tapster found time to tell 
 himself that it was disgraceful that vulgar 
 street brawlers should invade so quiet a resi- 
 dential thoroughfare as Cumberland Crescent. 
 But order would soon be restored, for the 
 sound of a policeman's whistle cut sharply 
 through the air. 
 
 The noise, however, continued. He could 
 hear the tramp of feet hurrying past his house, 
 and then leaving the pavement for the other 
 side of the road. What could be the matter? 
 Something very exciting must be going on just 
 opposite his front door that is, close to the 
 Enclosure railings. 
 
 Mr. Tapster got up from his chair, and 
 walked in a leisurely way to the wide window; 
 he drew aside the thick red rep curtains, and 
 lifted a corner of the blind. 
 
 Then, through the slightly foggy haze, he 
 saw that which greatly surprised him and made
 
 310 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 him feel actively indignant, for a string of peo- 
 ple, men, women, and boys, were hurrying into 
 the Enclosure garden that sacred place set 
 apart for the exclusive use of the nobility and 
 gentry who lived in Cumberland Crescent and 
 the adjoining terraces. 
 
 What an abominable thing! Why, the 
 grass would be all trampled down; and these 
 dirty people, these slum folk who seem to 
 spring out of the earth when anything of a dis- 
 agreeable or shameful nature is taking place 
 a fire, for instance, or a brawl might easily 
 bring infectious diseases on to those gravel 
 paths where the little Tapsters and their like 
 run about playing their innocent games. Some 
 careless person had evidently left the gate un- 
 locked, and the fight, or whatever it was, must 
 be taking place inside the Enclosure ! 
 
 Had this been an ordinary night, Mr. Tap- 
 ster would have gone back to the fire, but now 
 the need for human companionship was so 
 strong upon him that he stayed at the window, 
 and went on staring at the curious shadow- 
 filled scene. 
 
 Soon he saw with satisfaction that something 
 like order was to be restored. A stalwart 
 policeman in fact, his friend the officer who 
 was always at point duty some yards from his
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 811 
 
 house now stood at the gate of the Enclosure, 
 forbidding any further passing through. 
 
 Mr. Tapster tried in vain to see what was 
 going on inside the railings, but everything be- 
 yond the brightly-lighted road was wrapped in 
 grey darkness. Someone suddenly held up 
 high a flaming torch, and the watcher at the 
 window saw that the shadowy crowd which had 
 managed to force its way into the Park hung 
 together, like bees swarming, on the further 
 lawn through which flowed the ornamental 
 water. With the gleaming of the yellow, 
 wavering light there had fallen a sudden hush 
 and silence, and Mr. Tapster wondered un- 
 easily what those people were doing there, and 
 what it was they were pressing forward so 
 eagerly to see. 
 
 Then he realised that it must have been a 
 fight after all, for now the crowd was parting 
 in two, and down the lane so formed Mr. Tap- 
 ster saw coming towards the gate, and so in a 
 sense towards himself, a rather pitiful little 
 procession. Someone had evidently been in- 
 jured, and that seriously, for four men, bear- 
 ing a sheep-hurdle on which lay a huddled 
 mass, were walking slowly towards the 
 guarded gate, and he heard distinctly the 
 gruffly uttered words : " Stand back, please-
 
 312 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 stand back there! We're going to cross the 
 road." 
 
 The now large crowd suddenly swayed for- 
 ward; indeed, to Mr. Tapster's astonished 
 eyes, they seemed to be actually making a rush 
 for his house; and a moment later they were 
 pressing round his area railings. 
 
 Looking down on the upturned faces below 
 him, Mr. Tapster was very glad that a stout 
 pane of glass stood between himself and the 
 sinister-looking men and women who seemed 
 to be staring up at him, or rather at his win- 
 dows, with faces full of cruel, wolfish curiosity. 
 
 He let the blind fall to gently. His interest 
 in the vulgar, sordid scene had suddenly died 
 down; the drama was now over; in a moment 
 the crowd would disperse, the human vermin 
 but Mr. Tapster would never have used, even 
 to himself, so coarse an expression would be 
 on their way back to their burrows. But be- 
 fore he had even time to rearrange the curtains 
 in their right folds, there came a sudden, loud, 
 persistent knocking at his front door. 
 
 Mr. Tapster turned sharply round, feeling 
 justly incensed. Of course he knew what it 
 was, some good-for-nothing urchin finding a 
 vent for his excited feelings. While it was 
 quite proper that the police should have hur-
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 313 
 
 ried on with their still burden to the nearest 
 hospital or workhouse infirmary, they should 
 have left at least one constable to keep order. 
 His parlourmaid, who was never in any hurry 
 to open the door she had once kept him wait- 
 ing ten minutes when he had forgotten his 
 latch-key would certainly take no notice of 
 this unseemly noise, but he, James Tapster, 
 would himself hurry out and try and catch the 
 delinquent, take his name and address, and 
 thoroughly frighten him. 
 
 As he reached the door of the dining-room 
 Mr. Tapster heard the front door open open, 
 too, and this was certainly very surprising, 
 from the outside! In the hall he saw that it 
 was a policeman in fact, the officer on point 
 duty close by who had opened his front door, 
 and apparently with a latch-key. 
 
 In the moment that elapsed before the con- 
 stable spoke, Mr. Tapster's mind had had time 
 to formulate a new theory. How strange he 
 had never heard that the police have means of 
 access to every house on their beat ! The fact 
 surprised but did not alarm him, for our hero 
 was one of the great army of law-abiding citi- 
 zens in whose eyes a policeman is no human be- 
 ing, subject to the same laws, the same tempta- 
 tions and passions which afflict ordinary hu-
 
 314 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 manity. No, no ; in Mr. Tapster's eyes a con- 
 stable could do no wrong, although he might 
 occasionally stretch a point to oblige such a 
 man as was Mr. Tapster himself. 
 
 But what was the constable saying speak- 
 ing, as constables always do to the Mr. Tap- 
 sters of this world, in respectful and subdued 
 tones? 
 
 " Can I just come in and speak to you, sir? 
 There's been a sad accident your lady fallen 
 in the water; we found these keys in her 
 pocket, and then someone said she was Mrs. 
 Tapster," and the policeman held out the 
 two keys which had played a not unimportant 
 part in Mr. Tapster's interview with Flossy. 
 
 " A man on the bridge saw her go in/' went 
 on the policeman, " so she wasn't in the water 
 long something like a quarter of an hour 
 for we soon found her. I suppose you would 
 like her taken upstairs, sir? " 
 
 " No, no," stammered Mr. Tapster, " not 
 upstairs. The children are upstairs." 
 
 Mr. Tapster's round, prominent eyes were 
 shadowed with a great horror and an even 
 greater surprise. He stood staring at the man 
 before him, his hands clasped in a wholly un- 
 conscious gesture of supplication. 
 
 The constable gradually edged himself back-
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 815 
 
 wards into the dining-room. Realising that 
 he must take on himself the onus of decision, 
 he gave a quiet look round. 
 
 " If that's the case," he said firmly, " we 
 had better bring her in here. That sofa that 
 you have there, sir, will do nicely, for her to be 
 laid upon while they try to bring her round. 
 We've got a doctor already " 
 
 Mr. Tapster bent his head ; he was too much 
 bewildered to propose any other plan; and 
 then he turned turned to see his hall invaded 
 by a strange and sinister quartette. It was 
 composed of two policemen and of two of 
 those loafers of whom he so greatly disap- 
 proved; they were carrying a hurdle, from 
 which Mr. Tapster quickly averted his 
 eyes. 
 
 But though he was able to shut out the sight 
 he feared to see, he could not prevent himself 
 from hearing certain sounds those, for in- 
 stance, made by the two loafers, who breathed 
 with ostentatious difficulty as if to show they 
 were unaccustomed to bearing even so com- 
 paratively light a burden as Flossy drowned. 
 
 There came a sudden short whisper-filled 
 delay; the doorway of the dining-room was 
 found to be too narrow, and the hurdle was 
 perforce left in the hall.
 
 316 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 An urgent voice, full of wholly unconscious 
 irony, muttered in Mr. Tapster's ear: "Of 
 course you would like to see her, sir," and he 
 felt himself being propelled forward. Mak- 
 ing an effort to bear himself so that he should 
 not feel afterwards ashamed of his lack of 
 nerve, he forced himself to stare with dread- 
 filled yet fascinated eyes at that which had just 
 been laid upon the leather sofa. 
 
 Flossy's hat the shabby hat which had 
 shocked Mr. Tapster's sense of what was 
 seemly had gone; her fair hair had all come 
 down, and hung in pale, gold wisps about the 
 face already fixed in the soft dignity which 
 seems so soon to drape the features of those 
 who die by drowning. Her widely-opened 
 eyes were now wholly emptied of the anguish 
 with which they had gazed on Mr. Tapster in 
 this very room less than an hour ago. Her 
 mean brown serge gown, from which the water 
 was still dripping, clung closely to her limbs, 
 revealing the slender body which had four 
 times endured, on behalf of Mr. Tapster, the 
 greatest of woman's natural ordeals. But 
 that thought, it is scarcely necessary to say, 
 did not come to add an extra pang to those 
 which that unfortunate man was now suffer- 
 ing; for Mr. Tapster naturally thought ma-
 
 DECREE MADE ABSOLUTE 317 
 
 ternity was in every married woman's day's 
 work and pleasure. 
 
 It might have been a moment, for all that he 
 knew, or it might have been an hour, when at 
 last something came to relieve the unbearable 
 tension of Mr. Tapster's feelings. He had 
 been standing aside helpless, aware of and yet 
 not watching the efforts made to restore 
 Flossy to consciousness. 
 
 The doctor raised himself and straightened 
 his cramped shoulders and tired arms. With 
 a look of great concern on his face he ap- 
 proached the bereaved husband. 
 
 "I'm afraid it's no good," he said; "the 
 shock of the plunge in the cold water probably 
 killed her. She was evidently in poor health, 
 and and ill-nourished. But, of course, we 
 shall go on for some time longer, and " 
 
 But whatever he had meant to say re- 
 mained unspoken, for a telegraph boy, with the 
 impudence natural to his kind, was forcing his 
 way into and through the crowded room. 
 
 "James Tapster, Esquire?" he cried in a 
 high, childish treble. 
 
 The master of the house held out his hand 
 mechanically. He took the buff envelope and 
 stared down at it, sufficiently master of himself
 
 318 STUDIES IN WIVES 
 
 to perceive that some fool had apparently 
 imagined Cumberland Crescent to be in South 
 London; before his eyes swam the line, "De- 
 layed in transmission." Then, opening the en- 
 velope, he saw the message for which he had 
 now been waiting so eagerly for some days, but 
 it was with indifference that he read the words : 
 
 er The Decree has been made Absolute."
 
 A 000110628 5