MRS HARDEN 
 
 ROBERT HICHENS
 
 BY 
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "THE GARDEN OF ALLAH," "THE GREEN 
 
 CARNATION," "BELLA DONNA," "THE CALL 
 
 OF THE BLOOD," ETC., ETC. 
 
 NEW XHr YORK 
 
 GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
 
 Copyright, 1919, 
 My George H. Dor an Company 
 
 Printed in the United Stat&s of America
 
 MRS MARDEN 
 
 2229115
 
 MRS MARDEN 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 BEFORE the great war broke out Mrs Marden 
 had been, or had seemed to most of her ac- 
 quaintances to be, a decidedly worldly woman. 
 She was good-looking in a dark and rather 
 disturbing way, with brilliant observant eyes, 
 a clear white complexion and quantities of jet 
 black hair. She was fairly clever on hap- 
 hazard lines, could be entertaining, cared very 
 much for clothes, society and change, and spent 
 a great deal of money chiefly on herself and her 
 only son, Ronald. Her husband had died when 
 Ronald was ten, and she had never seemed to 
 regret him very much, though it was supposed 
 that she had married for love. She always 
 showed great affection for her boy, who was 
 handsome, gay and joyous, and of whom she 
 was obviously proud. But even her closest 
 friends thought her a decidedly frivolous 
 woman, and few, or none, suspected her of 
 having any great depth of character, or any 
 
 7
 
 8 MRS HARDEN 
 
 intensity of emotion. Many a mother is proud 
 of a handsome and popular son. Why not 
 Evelyn Marden? Ronald did her credit. Of 
 course she was fond of him. It would have 
 been odd if she had not been. 
 
 Both mother and son took life easily, gaily. 
 Ronald, after his schooling, entered the Grena- 
 dier Guards. He was a first-rate horseman, a 
 splendid dancer, an accomplished flirt, and a 
 very kind and affectionate son. His Mother 
 and he were good comrades. They had a simi- 
 lar taste for gaiety and all the good things of 
 life, a similar distaste for serious thought and 
 for what they called " the solemnities ". Neither 
 had any strong feeling for religion, any interest 
 in the deep problems of life. Both were butter- 
 flies. Both energetically lived for the day, and 
 both thoroughly enjoyed their light and suc- 
 cessful existences. 
 
 Then the great war broke upon the world and 
 the Guards were ordered to France. 
 
 The day for Ronald's departure came. He 
 was in high spirits, full of an almost animal 
 expectation of new excitements and marvellous 
 experiences. The sense of impending danger 
 did not trouble his spirit. It really did not 
 occur to him that death might be awaiting Jilrn 
 out there on the other side of the water. He
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 9 
 
 had the curious, and wholly unreasonable feel- 
 ing, common to many men in the flush of their 
 youth, that others might die but not he. 
 
 When the time drew near for him to say 
 good-bye to his Mother he saw for the first time 
 tears in her eyes. 
 
 " Are you afraid ? " he asked her. 
 
 " Of course I am ! " she said, almost crossly 
 and as if she were half ashamed. 
 
 ' You needn't be. I know I shall come back 
 all right." 
 
 " How can you know? " she said. 
 
 " I just feel it in my bones. I'm convinced 
 of it. One knows such things." 
 
 ' That's all nonsense, Ronald. We can't look 
 into the future." 
 
 : ' I've never wanted to. Have you? " 
 
 " I don't know that I've ever thought much 
 about it till now. But a war like this makes 
 one think." 
 
 " Look here, Mother, if you turn so awfully 
 serious all of a sudden you'll give me the creeps. 
 Do you want to unnerve me? " 
 
 His still laughing eyes sought hers. 
 
 " Bid me good-bye gaily and it will be a good 
 omen. I believe fear brings beastly things on 
 a man. Most of the fellows are wild to be off. 
 There's precious little weeping and gnashing of
 
 10 MRS HARDEN 
 
 teeth in the regiment, I can tell you. You 
 don't want me to be an exception, do you? " 
 
 " Of course not. But you musn't expect a 
 woman to rejoice at such a time as this. It 
 wouldn't be natural." 
 
 " Now do buck up, Mother, or I shall have 
 a bad memory of you to take away with me." 
 
 Perhaps this half smiling threat struck home 
 to Mrs Marden. Anyhow she seemed to fall 
 in with her son's humour and she managed 
 to bid him good-bye almost gaily. His absolute 
 certainty that he would come out of " it " all 
 right certainly cheered her up. She said to her- 
 self, " Perhaps somehow he knows. Such a 
 conviction may be founded on fact, conveyed to 
 him Heaven alone can tell how. I mustn't be 
 a fool. A coward dies a thousand deaths. So 
 what's the good of being a coward?" 
 
 And she saw him off without tears. 
 
 But when he was gone she felt, as she would 
 have expressed it, horrible. Suddenly all the 
 pleasant things on which she had till now de- 
 pended for enjoyment were as nothing to her. 
 A sense almost of anger, at any rate of injury, 
 possessed her. She did not know what to do. 
 It was no use sitting at home and " grousing ". 
 On the other hand when she went about she 
 felt like a lost dog. The effort to seem gay
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 11 
 
 * 
 
 fatigued her soul. Besides gaiety was slipping 
 out of London. She realised abruptly how little 
 her companions in pleasure meant to her. She 
 longed to " hang on " to something, but there 
 was nothing at hand to hang on to. 
 
 She took a feverish interest in the war and 
 read five or six London papers a day. But 
 what she read only deepened her misery. For 
 doom seemed approaching from Germany with 
 elemental steps. And the Guards were in the 
 thick of the struggle. 
 
 Many women whom she knew, and who had 
 always seemed to be butterflies like herself, had 
 taken suddenly to going to church. She thought 
 she would go to church. If she was anything 
 she supposed she was a Protestant. So she went 
 to a Protestant church. She knelt, she made a 
 half-hearted effort to pray. But all the time 
 she was on her knees, with her face in her 
 hands, something within her kept saying, " What 
 is the good of this sort of thing? " She had not 
 the slightest feeling of any nearness to God, 
 of being in communication with anyone. That 
 there was some mysterious Power which had 
 brought the earth on which she lived, and all 
 those other worlds which she knew nothing of, 
 into being, she vaguely believed. But she 
 really could not believe that this Power had
 
 12 MRS HARDEN 
 
 ears to hear anything she might say, or a heart 
 to bother about her. She thought of the 
 millions of men and women in Asia China 
 especially; she did not know why in Africa, 
 America, and elsewhere, and she thought, " Of 
 course it's absolute nonsense to imagine that 
 He, or It, can attend to individuals, or know 
 anything whatever about them. The idea is 
 ridiculous." And her brain blankly rejected it. 
 Some hymns were sung. Her literary sense 
 she had a good deal of light-hearted interest 
 in the arts condemned them. They were un- 
 doubtedly puerile as literature. And the music 
 to which they were set she liked the modern 
 school in music, Poldowski, Cyril Scott, Scria- 
 bine, Delius seemed to her terribly " tuney " 
 and banal. Then a clergyman mounted into 
 the pulpit. He was a tall, ascetic looking man, 
 with a cadaverous face, lantern jaws and earnest 
 but melancholy eyes. As Mrs Marden looked 
 up at him she felt that he was the sort of man 
 she would never be able to " get on with " in 
 private life. While he was giving out his text 
 she was thinking how she would feel if she had 
 to sit next him at a dinner. She was sure their 
 attempts at conversation with each other would 
 prove a fiasco. Still, there he was, a clergyman, 
 one who had chosen the profession of trying
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 13 
 
 to help others in moments of difficulty or dis- 
 tress; one who no doubt believed thoroughly 
 in all the things she had never been able to 
 believe in. She might get something from him. 
 He might open a door for her, enable her to 
 pass into some chamber where comfort awaited 
 her. She was determined to listen to him. And 
 she did listen. 
 
 He preached about the war. He said that 
 it was a " visitation " sent to the world because 
 of the world's wickedness. He declared that 
 Europe had earned a great war, that indeed it 
 was overdue, as the evil of the times " cried to 
 Heaven ". Warming to his theme he spoke of 
 gluttony, the passion for dress, bridge parties, 
 the loosening of the marriage tie, the craze for 
 pleasure, motoring on the Sabbath, beauty 
 shows, cigarette smoking, prostitution, the wor- 
 ship of games, racing with its attendant evil of 
 betting on the horses, the Tango " but that's 
 gone out long ago," thought Mrs Marden in 
 her pew music halls, and other horrors. " I 
 have never set foot in a music hall," he said. 
 
 " But I am told " and there followed a 
 
 torrent of hearsay. 
 
 ' This is no good to me," thought Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 Nevertheless she continued to listen.
 
 14 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Having set out the list of those things which 
 cried to Heaven for punishment, among which 
 were a good many indulged in from time to time 
 by Mrs Marden she had, for instance, danced 
 the Tango when it was in fashion, and had 
 frequently played bridge and motored on the 
 Sabbath the Preacher proceeded to a con- 
 sideration of what he called " God's Justice ". 
 He illustrated this by a reference to the earth- 
 quake at Messina which so horrified the world 
 some years ago. Many people, he said, had 
 asked how God could allow such a disaster; 
 some had even had their faith shaken by it. But 
 though he himself the music hall over again 
 had never set foot in Messina he had been 
 " credibly informed " that before the earth- 
 quake it had been the wickedest city in the 
 whole of Europe. Mrs Marden, who knew both 
 Paris and Messina as well as her London- 
 could not help smiling at this announcement. 
 " Poor dear little Messina! " she thought. And 
 again the voice within her said " This is no good 
 to me ". From that moment her attention 
 began to wander. Nevertheless she was often 
 looking at the Preacher. She found herself as 
 it were musing over his peculiar features, dwell- 
 ing on, almost dallying with mentally of 
 course his long thin nose, his sunken cheeks,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 15 
 
 his jutting forehead and earnest, melancholy 
 eyes. And so this was a clergyman! She felt 
 sure he was a very good man. There was some- 
 thing in his expression and even in his manner 
 which informed her of that. He looked self- 
 denying. He was certainly not a glutton. She 
 felt as she gazed quite positive that he had 
 never danced the Tango, even when it was no 
 longer in fashion, that he had never betted on a 
 horse, or entered himself as a candidate for a 
 prize in a beauty show. He had done none 
 of these things, he was a good man. But, in 
 her view, he was an impossible man, too peculiar, 
 too unlike ordinary men, such as she knew, to 
 be able to judge of them. And as for women 
 she felt convinced he was a celibate. (As a 
 matter of fact he was.) Anyhow she knew, 
 like Ronald, in her " bones ", that he did not 
 understand women. Towards the end of the 
 sermon, detaching her mind for a moment from 
 the Preacher's physique, she caught the words, 
 " we must welcome this war. We must take it 
 joyfully as a lesson which will lead us to a 
 higher knowledge of our responsibilities, to a 
 deeper sense of our sins, to a fuller realisation 
 of what is required of us." 
 
 " Oh dear! " she thought. " .Why did I come 
 here?"
 
 16 MRS HARDEN 
 
 The service closed with a hymn in which the 
 rhyming was obviously faulty and the tune, 
 according to Mrs Marden's view, vulgarly 
 hilarious. Meanwhile a collection was " taken 
 up " by several elderly men of lugubrious aspect, 
 who looked towards the horizon while the bag 
 went from hand to hand. Mrs Marden gave 
 two shillings and presently retired in a repent- 
 ant frame of mind; that is, she repented of 
 having gone to church. 
 
 Having from this moment decided that she 
 was not, and could not be religious, she looked 
 about her for some other form of solace. Many 
 of the women whom she knew were taking up 
 " war work ". Some were collecting subscrip- 
 tions for various funds, some were preparing 
 themselves to be nurses in hospitals, some were 
 scrubbing floors and carrying up and down 
 stairs plates and glasses and cups, some were 
 learning to drive motors. One woman she knew 
 had taken a man's place in an office. Several 
 were working busily among fugitive Belgians, 
 placing them out in private houses, finding occu- 
 pations for them. Finally Mrs Marden decided 
 to take in some Belgians. She screwed her 
 courage to the sticking point and took in three, 
 an elderly fat man and his two daughters. But 
 this experiment was not a success. Her guests,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 17 
 
 who spoke only Flemish, did not seem con- 
 tented or grateful. They were ill at ease in 
 her house, complained of the food in a language 
 which no one understood, were untidy in the 
 bedrooms, and evidently bored to death at her 
 efforts to entertain them. Finally one of them, 
 the youngest daughter, was seized with the 
 German measles. She had to be removed in an 
 ambulance to a hospital. The other two then 
 requested to be placed in more congenial sur- 
 roundings, and eventually evaporated to 
 Shepherd's Bush. (Mrs Marden lived in Hans 
 Place.) 
 
 So ended this little experiment, in distraction. 
 
 The war went on. Ronald was still all right 
 and his Mother began to lose some of her fear 
 for him. He wrote to her that he had " a 
 charmed life ". She was buoyed up by hope for 
 him. No doubt he would come out of it safely. 
 
 Nevertheless she was often conscious of a 
 secret undercurrent of anxiety and uneasiness. 
 She felt constantly " worried ", and, when she 
 looked in the glass, saw little lines here and 
 there on her face which troubled her. ' War is 
 terribly ageing," she said to herself. " I must 
 do something to distract my mind." The ques- 
 tion was what to do. She did not feel herself 
 fitted for hospital work. Driving a motor was
 
 18 MRS HARDEN 
 
 not in her line. The attitude involved in scrub- 
 bing floors was too undignified for a woman 
 of her age. She wished very much that some- 
 thing would turn up. 
 
 It did. 
 
 War matinees began to be the fashion. A 
 friend of Mrs Marden's got up one at the 
 Palace Theatre and asked Mrs Marden whether 
 she would take charge of the programme sellers, 
 who were to be pretty and fashionable girls of 
 society and well known actresses. 
 
 "But how am I to take charge of them?" 
 she enquired. 
 
 " Oh, all you have to do is to put on your 
 last new gown, your smartest hat, come to the 
 theatre in good time, assemble all the sellers 
 together, tell each one where to go, and see that 
 they keep busy. Map out the theatre on paper. 
 Some must stay in the foyer and near the en- 
 trance. Others take the boxes, others the stalls, 
 dress circle, upper boxes, pit, gallery. Tell 
 them all to get as much money as ever they 
 can, and to go especially for the men. There's 
 going to be an album sold, with photographs 
 and autographs. You might sell copies of it 
 yourself. Wander about the stalls in the inter- 
 vals, smile and look charming. Wheedle people. 
 Don't be humble. That's no good at all. Be
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 19 
 
 determined. Look surprised if they only give 
 the exact price of the album, and keep on say- 
 ing, 'But it's for the soldiers,, you know!' 
 It's really quite easy." 
 
 ' Very well! " said Mrs Marden. 
 
 And she went off to Lucille's and ordered 
 a new gown. She also looked in at a shop in 
 South Molton Street and bought a triumphant 
 hat. 
 
 And she made a success of it. She was both 
 fascinating and practical. Nothing escaped her 
 observant eyes. No one eluded her clutches. 
 She spurred the pretty girls to their work. She 
 was charmingly sympathetic to the actresses. 
 And her wanderings among the stalls brought 
 in a rich harvest. Wheedling, she discovered, 
 came natural to her. Even elderly ladies- 
 difficult propositions these fell ready victims 
 to her smiles and persistence. 
 
 " Evelyn Marden's a find," said the friend 
 who had got up the matinee. 
 
 And Mrs Marden was started on her career. 
 She had found the war work that suited her. 
 At almost every really fashionable matinee she 
 was in charge of the programme sellers. And 
 her name appeared in large letters on the 
 programmes and was announced beforehand in 
 the papers. She had the pleasure of reading
 
 20 MRS HARDEN 
 
 again and again in the Daily Telegraph, " Mrs 
 Marden will be in charge of the programme 
 sellers, among whom will be Lady Mariana 
 Danvers " and then followed a long list of 
 popular names. 
 
 She began to feel herself quite a celebrity. 
 That was not unpleasant. And then she had to 
 keep on replenishing her wardrobe. She couldn't 
 of course wear the same hat and gown at two 
 matinees in succession. 
 
 She began really to enjoy herself and to feel 
 she was a useful woman. She talked of " my 
 work " and when she was starting for Drury 
 Lane, or His Majesty's, or the St. James's, 
 would say, " Well, I must be off to my work. 
 The war doesn't give me much rest nowadays." 
 
 Ronald was well and hadn't had a scratch. 
 Life in wartime was not such a bad thing after 
 all. It was nice to be useful, pleasant to have 
 found one's niche. It gave one quite a little 
 thrill to put on a new gown, that suited one 
 perfectly, and a hat that took off at least five 
 years from one's age, and to start out in the 
 motor to do one's bit. 
 
 " Ronald is working in his way, and I am 
 working in mine," Mrs Marden said to herself 
 with an agreeable sense, of self-satisfaction. 
 
 One day a Royal Princess who " ran " a
 
 21 
 
 hospital for wounded soldiers, and who was 
 in difficulties for funds, resolved to get up a 
 monster matinee at the Coliseum, and, to Mrs 
 Marden's great delight, got her secretary to 
 write a note begging to know whether Mrs 
 Marden would be so very kind as to give her 
 clever and invaluable assistance as organiser 
 of the programme sellers. 
 
 "H.R.H.," ran the note, "has heard how 
 wonderful you are in your efforts for the war 
 charities, and would be very grateful for your 
 services if quite convenient to you." 
 
 Of course it was quite convenient to Mrs 
 Marden, and she went at once to Reville and 
 Rossiter's to see about a gown for the 
 occasion. 
 
 The day of the Princess's matinee was one 
 of her greatest triumphs in the good cause. The 
 theatre was crammed. Two Queens and seven 
 Princesses were present, and Mrs Marden was 
 presented to them all. Her hat was really the 
 smartest in the theatre, and as she wandered 
 along the stalls, wheedling money from the 
 purses of the aristocracy and the charitable 
 snobs who filled them, it could be seen by almost 
 everyone. That was one of the rewards of the 
 ardent worker, and surely no one could grudge 
 it to her. A really enormous sum was taken
 
 22 MRS HARDEN 
 
 for programmes and albums. The Princess 
 was graciously satisfied, and on going away 
 one of the two Queens said to Mrs Marden as 
 she was dropping her curtsey, " How clever you 
 are! You know how to take people." 
 
 Mrs Marden drove home to Hans Place quite 
 intoxicated with charity. It had gone to her 
 head like strong wine drunk in a revel. 
 
 She was accompanied by a friend, no other 
 than Lady Mariana Danvers, the most popular 
 programme seller in London. 
 
 When they reached the house they went into 
 the drawing-room to have tea and cigarettes and 
 to talk it all over. 
 
 " It really is extraordinary how the war has 
 brought people out, isn't it, Mari? " said Mrs 
 Marden, as she sank into a deep armchair, after 
 taking off her hat almost carelessly in the in- 
 toxication and looking at her hair in the glass. 
 " I never knew what I had in me till the guns 
 began to go. And the more I work the more 
 energetic I feel. I shouldn't mind having a 
 matinee every day in the week. And you are 
 untiring too. I don't know what I should do 
 without you. How much did you make to-day? " 
 
 ' Twenty pounds more than anyone else," 
 said ' Mari ' with a negligent air. ' There were 
 a lot of funny people from the Midlands in
 
 23 
 
 the stalls. Poor dears! I think I took their 
 last halfpennies." 
 
 "Did they know who you were?" 
 
 " Oh yes. They live on the picture papers. 
 What minds they must have! I heard one 
 of them a man of course saying ' Isn't she 
 a corker? ' as I trod on his toes on my way to 
 the stage box. Those are the people to get 
 money from. I can recognise them at a glance 
 now." 
 
 'War develops us all wonderfully!" said 
 Mrs Marden. " I never felt so alive as I do 
 now. But I want to talk to you about the 
 matinee at the Alhambra. Don't you think 
 it would be a good idea if we were all in 
 Watteau dresses and powder for it? You would 
 look quite wonderful in powder, such a dainty 
 rogue! And it suits me remarkably well. To 
 distinguish me from the programme sellers I 
 thought of carrying " 
 
 At this moment the butler opened the door 
 and came in with a salver on which lay a 
 telegram. 
 
 " I shouldn't wonder if it's from the Princess," 
 said Mrs Marden, as she took it. " She told 
 me she might want to see me to-night about the 
 takings. I daresay she wishes me to dine 
 at "
 
 24 MRS HARDEN 
 
 While speaking she had opened the telegram 
 and looked at it. She did not finish her 
 sentence, but sat quite still with it in her hand 
 and her eyes fixed on it. 
 
 "Any answer, Ma'am?" said the butler. 
 
 " No no answer," said Mrs Marden. 
 
 He went out. She got up and stood still by 
 the tea table. There was something strangely 
 rigid in her attitude. 
 
 " Is it bad news? " said Lady Mariana. 
 
 4 Yes. My boy has been killed in action. 
 
 "Oh Evelyn how awful!" 
 , "Yes, isn't it?" 
 
 "My dear shall I go?" 
 
 " Yes, please." 
 
 " But can't I do- 
 
 "No. It's official from the War Office. 
 Good-bye, Mari." She pressed the bell. 
 
 "Hanson, will you call a cab?" 
 
 Her friend looked at her hard, then, without 
 going near her, turned away and went out of 
 the room.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 WHEN she was left alone Mrs Harden stood 
 for a moment looking at the telegram. She 
 felt dull and weak but not actively miserable. 
 Her mind was scarcely working at all, but she 
 was conscious of a strange and unusual feeble- 
 ness of body. This had come upon her abruptly 
 when she read the telegram. She said to her- 
 self, " Ronald has gone disappeared from me 
 for ever. I shall never see him again. I shall 
 never hear his voice. We shall never have 
 another talk, never laugh at a joke together, 
 never dine at a restaurant and visit a theatre 
 together again." She said this, but she did not 
 thoroughly realise its truth. It was as if she 
 were telling herself something in order to make 
 herself believe it. But her mind was reluctant 
 or stupid, and refused to grasp anything. The 
 feebleness of body increased upon her, and she 
 took hold of the mantelpiece, leaned against it, 
 then sat down in an armchair. Several re- 
 membrances were jumbled confusedly in her 
 mind; the Watteau project for the Alhambra 
 matinee, Mari getting money out of the funny 
 
 25
 
 MRS MARDEN 
 
 people from the Midlands, her own wanderings 
 along the stalls of the Coliseum, the Queen's 
 remark to her when she made her curtsey. 
 
 Then she seemed to quit the theatrical scene 
 and to be in church, looking up at the melan- 
 choly clergyman. She heard again, mentally, 
 his words : " We must welcome the war ". And 
 then she seemed to hear Ronald saying, " I have 
 a charmed life ". It was all very absurd. 
 Ronald, the clergyman, Lady Mariana in 
 powder and a Watteau dress stood together 
 and looked at her. Presently she heard a voice 
 saying, " Ronald is working in his way and 
 I am working in mine ". It was her own voice. 
 But Ronald was not working. His work was 
 over. 
 
 She glanced about the drawing-room, and her 
 eyes fell on her hat, which she had laid down 
 on a small table of inlaid wood near the window. 
 She looked at it steadily. It was a large hat 
 large hats suited her black and green in 
 colour, turned up at one side, with an aigrette 
 in the front. She thought it looked grotesque, 
 almost monstrous. It was too large for any 
 woman. It was meretricious, flamboyant. It 
 was an ugly, ridiculous thing. Why did people 
 wear hats at all? There was no sense in it. She 
 almost began to laugh as she looked at it. Then
 
 27 
 
 she felt angry, enraged. Somehow she con- 
 nected the hat with Ronald in her mind. He 
 had been fighting while she had been buying 
 hats that ridiculous hat among them. He had 
 been dying while she had been dressing up. 
 He had been dying how? How had he died? 
 The telegram did not tell her. But anyhow he 
 was dead and there was the hat lying on the 
 table, a symbol of the way in which she had 
 done her bit. 
 
 Suddenly she felt a great loathing of herself. 
 It was unreasonable, no doubt, but she was not 
 a reasonable being at this moment. She looked 
 at her war life and she hated it. She could 
 no longer comprehend how she had been able 
 to lead it while her boy was fighting in France. 
 And she had written to him about it, had 
 described her activities; had made the most of 
 them. And he had responded with generous 
 praise of her. He had written " It's good to 
 hear you are hard at work ". Hard at work 
 in that hat! 
 
 She got up and went towards the hat. She 
 intended to do something she was not sure 
 what but at this moment the butler opened 
 the door. She stood still. He came in to 
 clear away the tea. As he was about to go 
 out of the room with it he said,
 
 MRS MARDEN 
 
 ' You will be at home to dinner, Ma'am? " 
 " I shall be at home, but I don't want any 
 
 dinner to-night." 
 
 The man looked astonished. 
 
 " I've had bad news, Hanson," she said. 
 
 " Mr Ronald has been killed in France." 
 
 The tray shook in the butler's hands and the 
 
 china rattled. 
 
 "Oh Madam!" he said. "Oh, I'm very 
 
 grieved ! I was fond of Mr Ronald ! " 
 
 ' Thank you, Hanson. Well, we must bear 
 
 these things somehow." 
 
 " Yes, Madam. I'm very sorry- 
 He paused. Then he ejaculated, 
 " Shocking! Shocking! " in what seemed to 
 
 his mistress a voice strangely human, strangely 
 
 unlike a butler's voice. 
 
 And then he went out very slowly, stooping 
 
 more than usual over the tray. 
 
 " Poor Hanson! " thought Mrs Marden. " I 
 
 had no idea he was fond of Ronald." 
 
 She felt very sorry for the man. He was 
 
 probably in the servants' hall by now and was 
 
 telling the other servants all about it. 
 
 A clock on the chimney piece struck the half 
 
 hour after six. The sound reminded her of 
 
 the passage of time, but not of its swiftness, of 
 
 its slowness. A gigantic vacancy stretched be-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 29 
 
 fore her life. She had really loved nobody 
 in the world but Ronald. Evidently she was a 
 woman with a small heart: there had only been 
 room in it for one human being. That was 
 bad luck for her now. It meant that she had 
 no one to turn to. And she knew such shoals 
 of people. The posts brought her quantities of 
 letters and notes. Swarms of visitors came to 
 her door. When she went about she was per- 
 petually nodding and smiling, stopping to say 
 a few words to one or another. And all this 
 had meant practically nothing. What on earth 
 was she going to do? 
 
 The room presently began to grow dim. The 
 hat on the table became a dark shape. Night 
 was gathering London into its blackness. 
 
 " Well, we must bear these things somehow." 
 She had said that to Hanson. The question 
 was how. How was she going to bear this 
 particular thing? What was she going to do? 
 She did not even know how she was to manage 
 to get through this evening. And then there 
 would be the night. Well, she had better go 
 upstairs and take off her smart gown, the gown 
 which had gone with the hat. 
 
 She could not bring herself to touch the hat. 
 So she left it lying on the table and went slowly 
 upstairs. She shivered when she came to her
 
 30 MRS HARDEN 
 
 bedroom. As she opened the door she heard 
 someone moving about inside. It was her 
 maid, Henriette. As she went in the maid 
 turned sharply, 
 
 " Ah ! ma pauvre Madame " she began. 
 
 But Mrs Marden interrupted her. 
 
 " Merci, Henriette. C'est triste mais il n'y 
 a rien a faire. Vous pouvez vous en aller." 
 
 " Mais, Madame me permettra " 
 
 " Je n'ai besoin de rien. Je veux etre seule." 
 
 When the maid was gone Mrs Marden locked 
 herself into the room. She took off her gown 
 and put on a silk dressing gown and slippers. 
 Then she lay on a sofa at the foot of the bed 
 and shut her tearless eyes. She had not the 
 least inclination to weep. She was quite mistress 
 of herself. Indeed she felt if anything calmer 
 than usual, abnormally calm. It was easy to 
 her to lie perfectly still with her head on the 
 large cushion. 
 
 As she lay there she wondered why it was 
 that she had not missed Ronald more while he 
 had been away. She had often missed him. 
 Many times she had worried about him terribly. 
 Nevertheless she had been able to enjoy her 
 activities, to be proud of her poor little suc- 
 cesses, to throw herself with ardour into her 
 work. Her hours with the dressmakers had
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 31 
 
 been pleasant hours. In the theatres she had 
 been conscious of excitement, of many an agree- 
 able thrill of gratified vanity. That very after- 
 noon for quite a long time she had not thought 
 of Ronald at all. That was a simple fact. It 
 surely ought to have meant indifference. And 
 yet it had not. Her heart must have been 
 with her boy all the time since she cared really 
 for nobody else. She had " counted " on his 
 return. That was it. His absolute confidence 
 had infected her. And now this was the end. 
 But it was the beginning, too. That was the 
 terrible thing. It was the beginning of her 
 new life. She was born that evening into a 
 new existence, that of the woman who has no 
 child. Everything must be different for her 
 henceforth as long as she lived. 
 
 More than one woman whom she knew had 
 lost a son in the war. She remembered writing 
 letters of sympathy to Lady Terrerton, to Milli- 
 cent Ashton, to Enid Vaux, and some others. 
 She had even attended a memorial service at 
 St. Martin's-in-the-Fields for the Terrertons' 
 boy, who had been rather a pal of Ronald's. 
 And now a similar disaster had come upon her. 
 After the memorial service Diana Terrerton had 
 written her a letter in which had occurred these 
 words: "I feel Willie is near me still. I am
 
 32 MRS HARDEN 
 
 often conscious of his presence and of his 
 desire to communicate with me. This is a 
 greater comfort than you can imagine. At the 
 very moment of his death I seemed to see him 
 standing beside me like a shadow, with his eyes 
 fixed on mine. I knew he had passed over 
 before the telegram came. But we are still 
 together. He knows everything I do. We are 
 not really separated. I am convinced that there 
 is no such thing as separation for those as 
 closely united by love as Willie and I have 
 always been." 
 
 Mrs Marden recalled all the sense of that 
 letter while she lay still on the sofa. When 
 she had received it she had thought that Lady 
 Terrerton was the dupe of her desire, like so 
 many others. She had not believed that there 
 was " anything in it ". Men did not often 
 think such things probably because they had 
 masculine hearts. Once she had talked to 
 Ronald about communication with the dead 
 and he had begged her not to get among those 
 who went " in for that unutterable rot ". 
 
 Ronald had not come to her at the moment 
 of his death. Till she had received the telegram 
 from the War Office she had felt exactly as 
 usual. No message had been conveyed to her 
 telepathically.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 33 
 
 She tried to be quite sincere with herself, 
 and presently she knew that she did not as yet 
 realise Ronald's death. She was horribly aware 
 of it and yet somehow she had not got hold of 
 it as a definite, dreadful fact. The reality of 
 the difference in her life was not at all fully 
 apprehended by her. Even Hanson had seemed 
 more moved by the news than she had been. 
 And he was only the butler. 
 
 She tried to realise Ronald's death more fully. 
 Remembering Lady Terrerton's letter she 
 tried to think of her son as translated to 
 another world, as no longer the prisoner of the 
 body, but able to do what the soul in the body 
 cannot do. Was he, perhaps, with her now 
 unseen, unheard, impalpable? Did he know 
 she was half stunned by the blow she had re- 
 ceived, and did he wish to comfort her? She 
 tried to feel him in the room with her, but 
 she did not succeed. Nothing came of her 
 effort. In church she had said to herself, " I 
 am not religious and I can't be religious. Now 
 she said, " I am not imaginative and I can't 
 be imaginative. And that sort of thing is all 
 imagination. People are determined to be- 
 lieve that there is no separation brought about 
 by death. They must create comfort for them- 
 selves. But death is really complete separa-
 
 34 MRS HARDEN 
 
 tion. Ronald and I are in two different worlds 
 if there is another world. We can never get 
 near to each other." 
 
 Really she felt that her boy was in France 
 with earth heaped over him. But even this 
 she felt with a certain vagueness. 
 
 Night fell. The fire crackled on the hearth 
 and threw leaping shadows on the wall. Pres- 
 ently there was a soft knock on the door. Mrs 
 Marden heard it but did not answer. It was 
 repeated twice. Then there was an odd little 
 sound, then silence. 
 
 After a few minutes she sat up, leaned for- 
 ward and looked towards the door. Two let- 
 ters, or notes, had been pushed under it and 
 lay on the carpet. She got up and opened 
 them. Both had come by hand. One was 
 from the Duchess of Brancaster, Lady Mari- 
 ana's mother. The other was from Lady 
 Terrerton. 
 
 " My dearest Evelyn, Stella Brancaster has 
 just told me " 
 
 It was quite a long letter. Mrs Marden 
 did not read it. Nor did she read the Duchess's 
 note. She put both down on her dressing- 
 table, made up the fire, undressed and got 
 into bed. She felt unusually cold in her body, 
 and pulled the eiderdown up to her chin.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 35 
 
 And then she lay there with her eyes wide 
 open. 
 
 After a long time she heard two more gentle 
 knocks, and then the voice of Henriette say, 
 "Madame! Madame!" She held her breath. 
 Silence again! The silence of the long night! 
 She was in her big bed and Ronald was closed 
 up in a box hidden under French earth. She 
 had not uttered a prayer. Was she an un- 
 natural mother? No tears, no prayers. Only 
 one thing marked the day as a special occasion. 
 She had had no dinner. That was her only 
 tribute to Ronald's great sacrifice. Well, that 
 was not her fault. She could not be other than 
 she was. 
 
 She thought, nevertheless, about prayer. But 
 she still had the feeling which had obsessed her 
 in church. It was impossible for her to imagine 
 a Being who had the capacity to be aware of 
 the existence of each individual in the swarm- 
 ing world, of a Being who sowed the firma- 
 ment with worlds and who yet could pay at- 
 tention to a woman in bed in Hans Place. Did 
 anyone really believe that, with never an as- 
 sailing doubt, never a moment when the inner 
 voice said, " But that is simply impossible. My 
 reason, even my instinct, rejects it! " Did that 
 melancholy looking clergyman believe it? Did
 
 36 MRS HARDEN 
 
 the Bishop of London, the Archbishop of West- 
 minster believe it? 
 
 " And yet I have heard that they sometimes 
 pray for rain," she thought. 
 
 Suddenly she remembered the controversy 
 about the angels of Mons. And she said to 
 herself, " People will believe anything even 
 soldiers." " People " but she was not in that 
 crowd. She had never before felt herself to be 
 so truly individual as she did to-night, so defin- 
 itely and absolutely separated from all her 
 fellow beings, and especially from her fellow 
 Mothers. She knew she was outside of that 
 fellowship of mourners. If she mourned she 
 would mourn in her own way. If! She was 
 scarcely mourning now. 
 
 The fire began to burn low. The shadows 
 contracted, vanished finally. It was deep in 
 the night, but she felt no inclination to sleep. 
 Yet she was not fidgety. She did not turn on 
 the pillow. She lay almost as still as Ronald 
 was lying in France. And the emptiness of 
 the world came upon her and flooded over her. 
 She lay in the void, living in deadness. That 
 was her feeling, that she was uselessly alive in 
 deadness. 
 
 With the morning came the necessity for 
 activity of some kind. Again knocks sounded
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 37 
 
 at her door; and this time she got up and 
 opened. Henriette was there looking very 
 anxious and enquiring, with a tray holding 
 tea and bread and butter. 
 
 "Has Madame slept?" she asked. 
 
 " I've had quite a good night." 
 
 She got back into bed and drank the tea and 
 ate the bread and butter, on Henriette's ac- 
 count. For it seemed to her a useless thing to 
 do. Meanwhile Henriette did things about 
 the room. Presently she approached the bed 
 and asked, in an unnatural sort of voice, 
 
 ' What gown will Madame wear this morn- 
 ing?" 
 
 " Oh something black, I suppose," said Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 The maid's thin bird-like face looked momen- 
 tarily shocked. She murmured something about 
 the necessity of Madame getting some " mourn- 
 ing." 
 
 ' Yes, I shall have to think about that," 
 said Mrs Marden. " Put out anything black 
 and then you can leave me." 
 
 Henriette obeyed, and finally left the room 
 with a backward glance that suggested fear. 
 Then Mrs Marden read the two missives that 
 had arrived the night before. Apparently the 
 morning's post was not in yet or, if it was,
 
 38 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Henrietta in her perturbation had forgotten 
 to bring it. 
 
 The Duchess of Brancaster's note was 
 simply a short, but very kind, almost tender, 
 note of condolence, not stereotyped, truly sym- 
 pathetic, and with even a touch of originality. 
 But Lady Terrerton's letter was very long, 
 covering several sheets. Mrs Marden read it 
 slowly and carefully, and then re-read it. 
 
 It was an offer of help. Lady Terrerton 
 told Mrs Marden that she could help her 
 wonderfully, bring light into the darkness of 
 bereavement, show her the way to reunion with 
 the son who had just exchanged this earth 
 life for a higher existence on another plane. 
 
 " I suffered indescribable anguish when my 
 boy was killed," she wrote. " No words can 
 tell you what I went through. Life was in- 
 supportable and I longed for death. It 
 seemed to me utterly impossible that my misery 
 could ever know any alleviation. But this 
 lasted only a very short time. Very soon, as 
 I believe I wrote to you, I had the feeling that 
 Willie was still near me and was trying to 
 get into communication with me. He seemed 
 to be silently urging me to do something. At 
 first I could not tell what it was. But I spoke 
 of it to a dear friend, an occultist, and she
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 39 
 
 was able to put me in the right way. I cannot 
 explain it all by letter but I beg you to come 
 to see me or let me come and see you. It 
 only requires patience, and a strong effort made 
 with the right people and in the right surround- 
 ings, and a bridge can be formed between this 
 earth life and the life on another plane in 
 which our dear ones are now as vital as, and 
 far more happy than, they ever were with us. 
 Do, dearest Evelyn, take my words seriously 
 even though you are bowed down with misery. 
 Going to church is no use. I have tried it. 
 Clergymen cannot help you any more than 
 they helped me. But there is a way to peace, 
 even to happiness, and I have found it." 
 
 Mrs Marden laid the letter down at last and 
 thought of Ronald. Of course she realised what 
 Lady Terrerton meant. Since her boy's death 
 she had disappeared from society and Mrs 
 Marden had never seen her. But she had 
 heard vaguely that Lady Terrerton was given 
 over to " occult practices ", and had heard 
 people speak of her as a " poor dear thing ", 
 who had become quite crazed about " that 
 ridiculous spiritualism ". 
 
 And that sort of thing was just what Ronald 
 had hated and laughed at when he had been 
 alive. She herself knew very little more about
 
 40 MRS HARDEN 
 
 it than he did. She had never felt the slight- 
 est interest in anything of that kind. The 
 other world had never bothered her, and she 
 had never bothered about the other world. This 
 world had been quite enough for her and for 
 Ronald. And even now, when she thought 
 of her boy, and, in imagination, called him up 
 before her, with his tall straight figure, his 
 merry eyes, and his rather impertinent gay 
 expression, the expression of one who was 
 ready for anything in the way of fun and 
 larkiness, she could scarcely imagine that he 
 was out of it. She could scarcely conceive of 
 him as quite still, quite grave, quite silent. 
 
 " Even though you are bowed down with 
 misery," Lady Terrerton had written. 
 
 But she was not bowed down with misery. 
 She wondered at herself. Would the acute 
 anguish ever come to her? Would the tears 
 never gather in her eyes, the sobs never rise 
 in her throat? 
 
 Presently she got up, made her toilet, put 
 on the black gown, took the two letters and 
 went downstairs. It was half past nine. She 
 telephoned to her sister to tell her the news. 
 Then she went into the dining-room mechan- 
 ically to breakfast and found Hanson there. 
 He looked at her with a sort of submissive and
 
 ROBERT HICHEXS 41 
 
 deprecating curiosity. She bade him good 
 morning and sat down at the oval table on 
 which several letters were lying. As she ate 
 something she didn't exactly know what 
 she looked at them. They were written by 
 people who didn't know, and were about war 
 matinees and kindred subjects. As she read 
 them she felt almost sickened. Two were about 
 the matinee at the Alhambra. And there was 
 a letter from the Princess's secretary thanking 
 her for what she had done on the previous 
 day, and asking her to go with H.R.H. to 
 visit the " wounded men for whom you have 
 worked so hard." 
 
 When Mrs Marden had finished them she 
 got up from the breakfast table. 
 
 Since she had begun her successful war 
 work she had engaged a secretary, who came 
 in generally for an hour or two in the morn- 
 ings and helped her with her correspondence. 
 She remembered now that this girl, Miss King, 
 was due in Hans Place at eleven o'clock that 
 morning. She had not thought of putting 
 her off, so of course she would come. Better 
 so! She could deal with the morning's letters 
 and also let people know that her employer 
 would be unable to help at any more matinee 
 performances. Meanwhile Mrs Marden de-
 
 42 MRS MARDEN 
 
 cided to write to the Duchess of Brancaster 
 and to Lady Terrerton. 
 
 The answer to the Duchess was soon finished. 
 It expressed Mrs Marden's gratitude and sense 
 of her great loss, and was written mechanically. 
 While the pen moved over the paper she felt 
 cold and detached, and oddly impersonal. 
 
 'What is the good of all these letters? " she 
 thought. 'What is gained by them? Why 
 do we have to write them? " 
 
 And it seemed to her that life was largely 
 made up of actions which were wholly unneces- 
 sary, that the web of civilisation was full of 
 threads which merely complicated the fabric, 
 without adding to its beauty or even to its 
 strength. 
 
 After addressing the letter to the Duchess 
 Mrs Marden took another sheet of paper and 
 prepared to answer Lady Terrerton. But this 
 was a more difficult task and she hesitated be- 
 fore beginning. Lady Terrerton's letter was 
 evidently written straight from the heart; and 
 was a warm gush of feeling which had flowed 
 over paper. There was in it a touching sin- 
 cerity, a complete absence of all reserve. The 
 eagerness to help a sister in misery was ap- 
 parent in almost every line. It was impossible 
 not to be touched by such a letter, and Mrs
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 43 
 
 Marden was in some degree touched by it. But 
 she said to herself, " Diana Terrerton is the 
 victim of an illusion and she wants to hand 
 on her illusion to me. That's no good." There 
 was a curious obstinacy lurking in her nature 
 that day, something dull, hard, resistant. The 
 softness of grief was far away from her. 
 
 Well, she must answer Diana Terrerton some- 
 how, and get it over. She tried to think clearly 
 of Ronald. What would he have wished her to 
 answer to such a letter? She could almost 
 hear him saying, " For God's sake don't 
 have anything to do with all that rubbish, 
 Mother." And her lips formed the words, 
 "I won't." 
 
 She wrote, therefore, and refused Lady Ter- 
 rerton's offer of help. " I don't believe in 
 such things," she wrote. " I think the dead 
 should be left in peace." 
 
 Then it occurred to her that if, as she felt 
 certain, there was " nothing in it " the dead 
 were left in peace, whatever Lady Terrerton and 
 those of similar credulity did in an endeavour 
 to disturb them. But never mind ! Let it go ! 
 Her letter was fairly long and as kind and 
 grateful as she could make it. She had just 
 finished it when Miss King was announced. 
 
 Miss King was a woman of twenty eight, who
 
 44 MRS HARDEN 
 
 looked about twenty two, although she was not 
 made up in any obvious way. Her hair was 
 not dyed; her face was not painted; her eye- 
 lashes and eyebrows were not " touched up ". 
 " She powders her face and then rubs it off," 
 had been Mrs Marden's silent verdict on first 
 seeing her. Yet she looked six years younger 
 than she was. She had a nice trim figure that 
 somehow faintly suggested masculinity, the 
 maleness of a neat boy. And her dress and 
 manners, even her attitudes, had often made 
 Mrs Marden think of a boy. She wore a white 
 collar, a tie and cuffs, short, close skirts, black 
 brogues with spats over them, small severe 
 hats. Her gaze was direct and her voice 
 sounded practical. Mrs Marden knew noth- 
 ing whatever of her private life. Her Christian 
 name was Emily. Mrs Marden was acquainted 
 with Miss King, but had never had anything to 
 do with Emily. 
 
 " Good morning, Miss King," said Mrs 
 Marden, as the secretary entered the room. 
 
 " Good morning, Mrs Marden," said Miss 
 King. 
 
 She walked up to the writing-table. 
 
 " I am very sorry indeed," she said, " to hear 
 what has happened. Please allow me to say 
 how grieved I am for you. You have always
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 45 
 
 been very kind to me. I feel the deepest sym- 
 pathy." 
 
 ' Thank you. I am sure you do. Did the 
 butler tell you? " 
 
 ' Yes. I don't know whether you wish me 
 to stay." 
 
 " I do, please. Whatever happens to us 
 there are things that have got to be done. 
 I wonder why! " 
 
 "Why!" 
 
 ' Yes; I wonder what is the good of it all." 
 
 Miss King looked down at her spats. 
 
 " So do I sometimes," she said. 
 
 Mrs Marden got up from the writing-table 
 to give Miss King her place. 
 
 When the secretary had sat down Mrs 
 Marden hesitated for a moment, then she said, 
 
 " Has this war made any difference in your 
 feelings about things, Miss King? " 
 
 ' Yes ; a good deal." 
 
 Mrs Marden sat down in an armchair near 
 the table. 
 
 " In what sort of way? " 
 
 " I don't know that I could quite explain." 
 
 * You haven't I don't want to be intrusive, 
 but have you suffered any loss in this war? " 
 
 " Oh yes. The man I was going to marry 
 was killed two months ago."
 
 46 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Mrs Marden felt tremendously astonished; 
 she scarcely knew why. It had never occurred 
 to her that Miss King might have a lover, be 
 engaged. She had imagined her living with a 
 girl friend, in a little flat, perhaps; cooking 
 nice little dishes on a gas stove; smoking cigar- 
 ettes, being thoroughly independent. She had 
 thought of Miss King as a rather modern type 
 of working girl, who would have another girl 
 for a " pal ", and would not bother her head 
 about men. There were plenty of such girls, 
 she understood. 
 
 " I am sorry," she said. " I had no idea 
 what was he ? " 
 
 " A dentist. He joined up on the first day 
 the call for men came." 
 
 ' That was very fine of him." 
 
 " Oh yes. But he was that sort of man." 
 
 " Have you have you ever wished he had 
 not been? " 
 
 " Two or three times at night." 
 
 Suddenly Mrs Marden felt tears in her eyes. 
 She was very surprised, and wondered vaguely 
 where they had come from, and what had 
 brought them. 
 
 " But never in day time," continued Miss 
 King. " One can't always be responsible for
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 47 
 
 one's feelings. I think he would forgive me for 
 my few treacheries." 
 
 "Treacheries?" 
 
 " To his ideals, I mean." 
 
 "A dentist with ideals!" thought Mrs Mar- 
 den. " How strange it all is! " 
 
 " I wish," she said, " if it is not hurting you 
 too much you would tell me something." 
 
 " Certainly," said Miss King. 
 
 ' When you had the news of when the news 
 came did you feel it terribly? Did it seem to 
 strike you down? " 
 
 " Oh no. I mind it much more now, more 
 every day, I think." 
 
 A dull sensation of apprehension flowed 
 slowly upon Mrs Marden. 
 
 " Grief is a thing that grows," continued 
 Miss King, " at least that is my experience." 
 
 "Is it?" 
 
 " Of course I mean real grief such as some 
 people seem quite incapable of." 
 
 ' Yes I see. I daresay you are right. Do 
 you live alone ? " 
 
 " Quite alone in rooms." 
 
 Mrs Marden was silent. At last Miss King 
 said, 
 
 ' What do you wish me to do this morning, 
 Mrs Marden? "
 
 48 MRS HARDEN 
 
 With an effort Mrs Harden came out of 
 her apparent inertia. She dealt with the let- 
 ters of the day and directed Hiss King to write 
 to various people explaining why she was 
 unable to carry out her work in connection with 
 the theatres. A reply to the Princess's sec- 
 retary expressed her regret at being prevented 
 from visiting the hospital at present, and her 
 satisfaction that she had been able to do some- 
 thing for the wounded soldiers before being 
 obliged to give up everything on account of the 
 loss of her only son. 
 
 This was the last note to be written. When 
 it was finished Hrs Harden said to Hiss 
 King, 
 
 ' Will you give it me to read over? " 
 
 Hiss King handed over the note and Hrs 
 Harden read it carefully. Then she said, 
 
 ' 'Obliged to give up everything' did you 
 give up when when your trouble came ? " 
 
 " Oh no." 
 
 "Not even for a little while?" 
 
 " Not even for a day. I have to earn my 
 living, you see." 
 
 ' Yes. I wonder what I had better do." 
 
 Hiss King was silent. 
 
 ' What I have been doing seems to me so 
 .absurd now," continued Hrs Harden.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 49 
 
 " Somebody must do it, I suppose," said 
 Miss King. 
 
 ' Yes ; that's true. I had promised to help 
 at several more matinees. Do you think I ought 
 to do so in spite of what has happened? Do 
 you think my son would have wished it?" 
 
 " I can't tell that- 
 
 " No ; of course not. I suppose these let- 
 ters had better go to the post." 
 
 " Very well." 
 
 Mrs Marden gave back a note, and Miss 
 King put it in an envelope and addressed it. 
 
 " Is there nothing more ? " she asked. 
 
 " No, I don't think so. But please come 
 to-morrow. I I'm afraid I shall have a great 
 many letters of condolence. I wish people 
 wouldn't think themselves obliged to send them. 
 Of course it is kind, but ' 
 
 She stopped. Then suddenly, with a change 
 of manner, she exclaimed, 
 
 " Oh, how foolish my sort of life seems now! 
 I cannot bear to think of it. But I'm not 
 fit for anything else. I don't know what I 
 am going to do now, how I am going to live. 
 Miss King, do tell me, how do you manage to 
 get along? " 
 
 "How?" 
 
 ' Yes; do you go to church? "
 
 50 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Sometimes." 
 
 " Does it do you any good? " 
 
 " I don't know whether it does.'* 
 
 " I mean do you believe all that is said in 
 church? " 
 
 " Oh no. But does anyone? " 
 
 " That's just what I have thought. Do 
 even clergymen really believe all they tell us? 
 Can they?" 
 
 " I don't know. It's very difficult to answer 
 for other people, isn't it? " 
 
 " Of course. I heard a clergyman say that 
 we ought to welcome this war." 
 
 ' Well, I doubt if anyone can do that sin- 
 cerely." 
 
 " Some people go to spiritualists instead of 
 going to church. Do you believe in all 
 that?" 
 
 " I know nothing about it. My the man I 
 was engaged to went to have his hand read be- 
 fore he left England." 
 
 " Was he told anything? " 
 
 ' Yes ; that he would come back safely." 
 
 ' It's all utter nonsense!" said Mrs Marden. 
 There was a long pause. Then Miss King 
 said, 
 
 ' You have nothing more for me to do 
 to-day?"
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 51 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Then I suppose I had better be going." 
 
 She got up, with her boyish air. 
 
 " I do hope you will find comfort somehow," 
 she said. 
 
 " Thank you." 
 
 Mrs Harden held out her hand. 
 
 "And I hope you will," she said. 
 
 "I always try to make the best of things." 
 
 " I suppose I shall have to do the same." 
 
 When Miss King had gone Mrs Harden 
 telephoned to a dressmaker and ordered some 
 mourning. Then she sat down to read the 
 papers. She did not know what else to do. 
 
 But she was soon interrupted. The tele- 
 phone sounded frequently. Lady Mariana had 
 been spreading the news of Ronald Marden's 
 death, and kind friends were enquiring. Notes 
 of condolence began to come in. Some people 
 called to enquire. And Mrs Marden's sister 
 came around to see her and to do what she 
 could to help her. 
 
 The energies of sympathy were set in active 
 motion, and Mrs Harden was obliged to cope 
 with them. And all the time she was doing 
 her best to " keep a brave face " to the world 
 she was thinking, 
 
 " Oh, what is the good of all this? "
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 " OF course you will have a memorial ser- 
 vice for dear Ronald," said Mrs Marden's sister, 
 who was not married, to her three days later. 
 
 "Do you think I ought to, Annie?" said 
 Mrs Marden. 
 
 Annie, who was very religious, a high church 
 Protestant, looked painfully surprised. 
 
 " I think it is a question of feeling," she 
 said. " And then people will expect it. You 
 see, dear, there cannot be a funeral over here. 
 And surely you would wish to pay a last 
 tribute to Ronald's memory. He has behaved 
 so nobly and laid down his life for his country." 
 
 ' Yes. He gave all he had to give. But 
 the arrangements " she paused. 
 
 After an instant of silence she continued, 
 
 " Annie, perhaps I shall shock you very 
 much, but the truth is I am not a religious 
 woman. It isn't my fault." 
 
 Annie, who was small and pale, with blue 
 eyes that looked withered, said, 
 
 "But you believe, don't you?" 
 
 "I'm not at all sure that I do." 
 
 52
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 53 
 
 " Of course I know that you don't feel quite 
 as I do about these things, but still 
 
 " I daresay you are right. Where shall I 
 have it? " 
 
 " St. Martin's-in-the-Fields is very central." 
 
 ' Yes ; that's true. I might have it there." 
 
 " Lady Terrerton had a memorial service 
 for her boy." 
 
 "Yes. I will have one for Ronald." 
 
 " Shall I see about it, dear? " 
 
 " No, Annie. I will look after it all. Ought 
 I to go to it myself? " 
 
 "If you think you can bear to. Lady 
 Terrerton went." 
 
 " Yes, I know." 
 
 " I have met Madame Antoinette Sims. 
 Perhaps she would sing a solo at it. Shall I 
 ask her? " 
 
 " It would be very kind of her. Very well. 
 I'll get Miss King to help me with all the 
 arrangements." 
 
 "And I'll help you too. I know just how 
 you feel." 
 
 "No, you don't. Nobody does," thought 
 Mrs Marden. 
 
 The memorial service for Ronald was ar- 
 ranged. It took place on a foggy morning, 
 and Mrs Marden attended it. She drove to
 
 54 MRS HARDEN 
 
 the church with her sister. As she got out of 
 the car and ascended the steps the fog seemed 
 to be walking with her, dulling her senses, 
 laying a soft, clammy hand on her heart. The 
 church held a large congregation. There were 
 many more women than men. As Mrs Mar- 
 den walked to her place all eyes were turned 
 towards her. She entered the front pew and 
 knelt down. People thought she was praying, 
 but she was not. Presently she got up. A 
 printed form of the service had been provided. 
 She took it in her hand and looked carefully 
 at it. 
 
 " I wonder if Miss King is here," she thought. 
 " She did not have a memorial service for her 
 lover. But then people like that don't have 
 to, I suppose. And it makes no difference." 
 
 The service began. It was really rather beau- 
 tiful and touched many people. Mrs Marden, 
 however, listened to it with a sense of almost 
 cold detachment until, after a short pause, the 
 organist played a prelude, and from the gal- 
 lery, high up and behind her, a great contralto 
 voice, firm, resonant, yet pathetic, began to 
 sing a new setting of Newman's " Lead, 
 Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom." 
 
 The words, the music, the great voice, which 
 was supported by, and blended with, the deep
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 55 
 
 and soft glories of the organ, pushed a way 
 down into something which was part of her, 
 or which was perhaps her her soul. First her 
 intellect said, " These are noble words." Then 
 her heart said, " They came from a beautiful, 
 loving, trusting heart." Then somebody else 
 said, " Oh, my boy, my boy ! " And she be- 
 gan to weep. Tears streamed from her eyes 
 and over her face. Her body shook, and sud- 
 denly she longed to be alone with her mother- 
 hood. It was terrible to be in public, sur- 
 rounded by all these people, who knew nothing 
 of her grief, whom she wished to know nothing 
 of it. If she could only be by herself with that 
 voice and with the memory of her baby boy, 
 for whom she had suffered, and whom she had 
 lost! She sat down very quietly. She was 
 wearing a veil which she had pushed up when 
 she looked at the form of prayer. Now she 
 pulled it down. The great voice continued. 
 Presently she heard it almost murmuring be- 
 hind her, with an intimate, indeed a secret, 
 humanity; a sort of withdrawn confidence. 
 ' Which I have loved long since 
 
 And lost awhile." 
 
 "But is it, can it be so?" she thought, 
 " He believed it. Newman believed it. He 
 could never have written that if he had not
 
 56 MRS HARDEN 
 
 believed it. But I am so different. And the 
 belief of even a great man proves nothing at 
 all." 
 
 She was able to think that in the midst 
 of her tears, as if her intellect were still quite 
 aloof from her heart which was rent and her 
 soul which was yearning. 
 
 " Is there a morn? Or is this life in the 
 night all?" 
 
 The organ died away. And presently the 
 service continued. She knelt no more. She 
 just sat still with her veil hiding her face 
 till all was over. Then her sister touched 
 her. 
 
 " Darling Evelyn dear, we must go." 
 
 She got up, picked up her black gloves 
 which she had taken off at the beginning of 
 the service, and went out of the pew. The 
 congregation standing watched her going while 
 the organist played an arrangement of an 
 Agnus Dei by Bach. But just as she was 
 nearing the church door a thin woman in black, 
 with a white ravaged face and dark eyes that 
 looked as if they had wept many tears, stepped 
 quickly out of the last pew on her left, and 
 took gently hold of her arm. 
 
 It was Lady Terrerton. 
 
 went out of the church together. Un-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 57 
 
 der the portico Lady Terrerton said, in an earn- 
 est husky voice, that was tremulous with feel- 
 ing, 
 
 " Forgive me, Evelyn! I couldn't help it. I 
 want you to come and see me, or to let me 
 come and see you. Our boys were friends." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Will you come?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Promise me ! I can help you. I must 
 help you. We ought to hand on our blessings 
 in these awful times. It is wicked not to." 
 
 " Our blessings? " 
 
 ' Yes, yes. Oh, you will be so happy pres- 
 ently! Come to me to-morrow." 
 
 " Perhaps." 
 
 "No, no " 
 
 " Anyhow I will come soon." 
 
 Then she went down to her car and was 
 driven away in the fog. 
 
 After that service things were altered for Mrs 
 Marden. She had wept at last after the days 
 and the nights of dry and tearless waiting. 
 The unnatural stunned feeling left her. She 
 entered into her grief. She who had seemed 
 strong, almost hard, to those about her, who 
 had astonished and perturbed her servants by 
 her self-possession, her activity, who had sat
 
 58 MRS HARDEN 
 
 reading the papers as usual, dealing with her 
 letters, who had stood at the telephone person- 
 ally answering enquiries, who had seen several 
 intimate acquaintances and spoken quietly to 
 them of her loss, who, with Miss King's help, 
 had arranged all the details of the memorial ser- 
 vice, was now what is called " a broken woman." 
 She shut herself up in her house. She would 
 not see even her sister. She refused to meet 
 Miss King, and wrote on a piece of paper, 
 " Please deal with all letters in the way you 
 think best. But don't ask me what to do. 
 I cannot attend to anything. Refuse me to 
 everybody. Say I am ill." Her only conso- 
 lation was solitude, the knowledge that no 
 one would look at her, that she would not have 
 to make any effort, or act any part. (Her 
 meals were put on the table and she would 
 not have Hanson in the room when she ate 
 them. The servants, except Henriette, only 
 caught occasional glimpses of her. And to 
 Henriette she scarcely spoke except to give 
 necessary orders. 
 
 So things continued for more than a week. 
 During that time a letter came from Ronald's 
 Colonel. It gave details of his death and 
 burial. He had been shot through the head 
 and had died instantaneously. His body had
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 59 
 
 not fallen into the enemy's hands, and had 
 been buried near the field of battle. The 
 funeral service had been read. All had been 
 done in due order. The Colonel wrote warmly 
 of Ronald, and dwelt specially on his cheerful- 
 ness of spirit. 
 
 " His gaiety was unconquerable," he wrote. 
 " It seemed part of his nature and was never 
 damped by untoward circumstances. It cheered 
 us all up and gave courage to his men. Those 
 who saw him die say that he died with a smile 
 on his lips. I can well believe it. We miss 
 him terribly. He was the very spirit of youth. 
 As to his courage well, he never seemed to 
 realise the possibility of death." 
 
 How like Ronald that was the not realising ! 
 He had thought death could not take him, and 
 she had come to think the same. They had 
 been as blind children, both of them. " Not 
 for me death! Not for me agony! All the 
 bad things for others, all the joys and the good 
 things for us! " 
 
 And so she was only suited to live in the 
 shining and not in the blackness. She had de- 
 veloped only that part of her which was fitted 
 for the light side of life, and had never given 
 any thought to a preparation of the soul against 
 the evil day. Therefore she was a woman with-
 
 60 MRS HARDEN 
 
 out moral armour and now she was pitiable 
 even in her own eyes. 
 
 In the nakedness of her desolation a strange 
 and hideous desire sometimes obsessed her. She 
 wished that she could believe in a God as many 
 people, perhaps most people, did; in a per- 
 sonal, attentive God, keeping an eternal watch 
 over individuals, presiding over their lives, al- 
 lowing everything that happened to them to 
 happen, in order that she might hate Him for 
 depriving her of the only human being whom 
 she was able to love. It seemed to her in her 
 misery that most people who were religious 
 worshipped God because they were afraid of 
 Him, like savages seeking to propitiate a power- 
 ful and malign Being, who could if He wished 
 overwhelm them with disaster and who was 
 capable of doing this if the whim took Him. 
 The words " Thy will be done " expressed, 
 she thought, a grovelling attitude of mind with 
 which she could never be in sympathy. She 
 preferred what many think the supreme blas- 
 phemy of Omar Khayyam, in which man's for- 
 giveness of God is alluded to. There was 
 something tremendous in that, something proud, 
 defiant, and unconquerably fearless. But both 
 the resignation and the blasphemy presupposed 
 a conception of the mysterious Creator which
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 61 
 
 she had not and was certain she could never 
 have. Yet why was it that Newman's hymn 
 had broken down all the barriers and made 
 her understand the true meaning of her loss? 
 Why had she at last begun to weep when she 
 had heard it? Who could believe in a Kindly 
 Light in the midst of this war, in angel faces 
 smiling and all the rest of it? All that was sheer 
 sentimentalism ; beautifully expressed, no doubt, 
 because the man who wrote it happened to 
 possess an exquisite literary gift, and sincerely 
 to believe in what he was expressing. She was 
 angry with herself for having been moved by 
 words which she told herself now were all 
 nonsense. There must be, she thought, a core 
 of folly in her as there was in most people 
 whom she knew. Humanity has always 
 stretched out its hands to idols, laid offerings 
 before altars to which no Presence ever draws 
 near. 
 
 She was crudely rebellious in her agony and 
 had nothing to rebel against because of her 
 agnosticism. She was like one who wishes to 
 deal a blow and is confronted by an atmosphere. 
 During all these days she felt savagely alone. 
 She knew that multitudes of women in Bel- 
 gium, France, England in Germany too 
 were mourning for their dead sons, but she
 
 62 MRS HARDEN 
 
 felt no sisterhood with them, no companion- 
 ship of grief. She was certain that there was 
 no other woman miserable as she was miserable. 
 Others found consolation. She was positive 
 of that. They still had children left to them, 
 or they had husbands, or friends whom they 
 really cared for, or religious beliefs; or they 
 were spiritualists like Lady Terrerton; or they 
 had shallow hearts and were incapable of feeling 
 deeply. Miss King's words were often in her 
 mind, " Grief is a thing that grows . . . Of 
 course I mean real grief such as some people 
 seem quite incapable of." She felt her grief 
 growing steadily within her, like a disease 
 almost that was eating up the tissues of her 
 soul. 
 
 Ronald and she had been such comrades. 
 There had been a peculiar bond fastening them 
 together; they had found nothing to condemn in 
 each other and they had both drunk in hap- 
 piness from the same sources. If she had found 
 her happiness in church and he had found his 
 in the music halls, it wouldn't have been the 
 same. They had been butterflies together in 
 the sunshine. They had loved each other in 
 laughter. How often they had laughed to- 
 gether! What a link their merriment had been! 
 Melancholy had seemed preposterous to both
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 63 
 
 of them. Ronald had often said to her, " I 
 hate people who are always down on their 
 luck! " And she had agreed with him. Neither 
 of them had ever got on with very sensitive 
 people, or with those who took life as a 
 solemn business. 
 
 And yet beneath all the gaiety, the zest, the 
 joy of life, she had, unknown to herself, been 
 carrying about in her this tremendous capacity 
 for suffering and had never suspected it! Her 
 ignorance of herself had been almost incredible. 
 What else was there in her of which she knew 
 nothing? She was afraid of herself as of a 
 stranger with whom she was forced to live in 
 a horrible intimacy. 
 
 She had never been physically a passionate 
 woman, and her love for her husband had not 
 been deep. She had liked him, appreciated 
 him, got on with him quite well, but his death 
 had not left her desolate. She had been pre- 
 pared for it. He had had a rather long, but 
 not painful illness and had died at Cannes 
 peacefully. Ronald had been with them, a boy 
 of ten. And, because of Ronald, she had not 
 felt left alone. The child had been much more 
 to her than the father, who had always been 
 a delicate man, with quiet, literary tastes, de- 
 void of exuberance and inclined to be rather
 
 64 MRS HARDEN 
 
 astonished at it. Ronald had had her nature, 
 not his father's. But could he ever have suf- 
 fered as she did now? 
 
 Sometimes she wondered, thinking of her- 
 self as dead, of him as alive without her. 
 
 A cataract of strange, often apparently of 
 disconnected thoughts flowed through her mind 
 in these days and nights. For her mind was 
 violently alive now, and seemed to have fastened 
 teeth in her like an indomitable beast. In her 
 grief she was tremendously egoistic, and this 
 fact made her finally aware that she believed 
 Ronald was only decay, all of him. If she 
 had had any genuine instinct telling her that 
 he was alive in some other world, she could 
 not have been such an egoist. For then she 
 must have concerned herself about him, about 
 the possible conditions of his existence, about his 
 happiness or the reverse, about his remote ac- 
 tivities, about his feelings for her. She must 
 have wondered whether he had any knowledge 
 of what she was now undergoing. 
 
 She could not do this, because she thought 
 of him as now only matter mouldering to dust 
 in a grave in France, and could not think 
 otherwise of him. 
 
 ' I am and he is not." 
 
 That, and she came to know it, was her
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 65 
 
 actual conviction. So she sat, or lay awake, 
 alone with her suffering and stared perpetually 
 at it and at herself. 
 
 One day Miss King sent up a message by 
 Henrietta begging to see her if it were only 
 for a moment. 
 
 "Please ask Miss King what it is about," 
 said Mrs Marden. " I don't want to see 
 anyone." 
 
 " But Madame cannot live always like this ! " 
 said the maid. " If Madame 
 
 " Please go to Miss King at once, Henriette! " 
 Mrs Marden interrupted. 
 
 Henriette went out pinching her thin lips 
 together. She came back in a few minutes. 
 
 " It is about Miladi Terrerton, Madame." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Miladi keeps writing and telephoning. This 
 morning she has telephoned to say she must 
 see Madame, that she will call at three o'clock. 
 Miss King has replied that Madame is unwell, 
 but Miladi says she quite comprehends but 
 will come nevertheless. Miss King 
 
 " Ask Miss King to come up." 
 
 " Bien, Madame." 
 
 The maid went away and left Mrs Marden 
 wondering. She was wondering why she had 
 so brusquely decided to see Miss King and
 
 66 MRS HARDEN 
 
 what she was going to say to her about Lady 
 Terrerton. She remembered of course the 
 scene under the portico of St. Martin's-in-the- 
 Fields. She had not thought about it seriously 
 till this moment, though Lady Terrerton's spir- 
 itualistic practices had been in her mind when 
 it had dwelt upon the consolations other 
 women found in their sorrows. But now she 
 did begin to think seriously of Lady Terrer- 
 ton and her desire to hand on her blessings. 
 Poor woman! How earnestly she had spoken! 
 How eager she had looked! She had meant 
 what she said. That was certain. There could 
 be nothing selfish in this persistence of hers. 
 She must believe devoutly that she had made a 
 great discovery. She must be anxious to be 
 a good friend. Mrs Marden felt faintly grate- 
 ful to her. 
 
 There was a tap at the door. 
 
 " Come in! " said Mrs Marden. 
 
 Miss King walked in. She looked just as 
 usual, just as neat, composed, precise and yet 
 boyish. But when she saw Mrs Marden she 
 stopped. 
 
 ;< Perhaps you " she said. 
 
 Then quickly recovering herself, she came 
 forward. 
 
 " Good morning, Mrs Marden."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 67 
 
 " Good morning. Why did you stop at the 
 door?" 
 
 " I wasn't sure you wanted to see me." 
 
 " But I had asked you to come up." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I know why you stopped. You were 
 startled at my appearance. Wasn't that it? " 
 
 ' You don't look as well as I should like to 
 see you." 
 
 ' You mean that I have lost my looks, that 
 I have aged terribly in these last few days. 
 Well, I know it and I don't mind. I don't 
 care what I look like. I'm not living for other 
 people now. It isn't worth while. They're 
 no good to me, so why should I bother about 
 them? I have found out that people you 
 can't really care for are quite useless to you 
 except when you are playing about. And I've 
 done with all that." 
 
 " I understand what you mean. But surely 
 some day " 
 
 " Miss King, I'm one of the unfortunate peo- 
 ple who are capable of real grief. I wish I 
 wasn't. It's a curse to be like that, but there 
 it is." 
 
 Miss King was silent. 
 
 " Now please tell me about Lady Terrerton." 
 
 "She seems determined to see you whether
 
 68 MRS HARDEN 
 
 you wish it or not. It doesn't seem kind or 
 delicate, but really I think she means it very 
 kindly. She has written you know you told 
 me I was to open all letters ' 
 
 " Yes, of course." 
 
 " It is all about her son. She says he comes 
 to her, talks to her, that he is alive and happy 
 in the other world. It is all very strange, but 
 she evidently believes it." 
 
 Miss King paused. 
 
 "Yes?" said Mrs Marden. 
 
 " She wishes to help you as she has been 
 helped." 
 
 " How? " 
 
 " She says she must see you. I said I was 
 afraid she couldn't through the telephone. She 
 replied that she considered it her duty to see 
 you, whether you wished it or not, and that 
 she would come to-day at three. She asked 
 me to tell you this personally. I had told 
 her I hadn't seen you since since the service." 
 
 " No." 
 
 " At last I said I would try to see you. I 
 hope you will forgive me. I didn't know what 
 I had better do." 
 
 Mrs Marden sat without saying anything 
 for a minute; then, looking at Miss King, she 
 said,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 69 
 
 " I think you're a very sensible girl, Miss 
 King." 
 
 Miss King blushed slightly, perhaps at be- 
 ing called a girl. 
 
 " I don't know," she said. 
 
 ' Tell me, if you were in my place would you 
 go, into this with Lady Terrerton? " 
 
 " Yes, I think I should." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 ' Well, we know so very little that I think 
 we ought to examine into things for ourselves, 
 things that may be important to us, I mean. It 
 seems to me a mistake to deny possibilities. 
 Perhaps I don't make myself quite clear, 
 but " 
 
 " Oh yes, you do. But if you were certain a 
 thing was all nonsense delusion would you 
 waste your time over it? " 
 
 "Not if I were really certain, if I had ex- 
 amined into it for myself and knew there was 
 no truth in it." 
 
 " I see ; you would do that first." 
 
 "Yes, I think I should." 
 ' Thank you. You can tell Lady Terrerton 
 I will see her when she comes." 
 
 ; * Very well. Good morning, Mrs Mar den. 
 I am sorry I had to disturb you." 
 
 " Perhaps it was a good thing. I don't know.
 
 70 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Life is so hideous. I can't think how you go 
 on as you do. You must have an iron will, 
 or enormous courage, or something. What is 
 it? Perhaps you have hope? Religion means 
 something to you? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "How much?" 
 
 " I cannot believe that the whole human race 
 has been given an instinct which is founded 
 on nothing and leads nowhere." 
 
 "What instinct?" 
 
 ' Well, that there is something else for us 
 besides this life." 
 
 ' The whole human race ! But " 
 
 " I think the exceptions are really very 
 few." 
 
 " But people will believe in what they want 
 to ,have." 
 
 "You think it's that?" 
 
 "Yes, I think it's that." 
 
 She said no more, and Miss King, after 
 waiting a moment, went quietly out of the 
 room. 
 
 Soon after three o'clock Henriette came to 
 Mrs Marden to say that Lady Terrerton had 
 called and was in the drawing-room. 
 
 'I'll come to her in a moment," said Mrs 
 Marden.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 71 
 
 When the maid had gone out she looked at 
 herself in the glass. She had not forgotten 
 Miss King's pause of astonishment on enter- 
 ing the room where she was that morning. 
 Grief had certainly altered her appearance. In 
 some subtle, peculiar way it had roughened her 
 face, made her look almost rugged. Formerly 
 she had had a smooth face with very few lines 
 in it, humorous observant eyes, a gay, perhaps 
 slightly sarcastic mouth. There had been a 
 touch of Ronald's impudence in her expression, 
 the not unpleasant impudence that is born of a 
 light heart and excellent health. Now she 
 looked what women sometimes call "battered ", 
 very much older, but also much more expres- 
 sive. There was in her eyes an almost fierce 
 self-consciousness, about her mouth an intense 
 bitterness. It was strange to be looking like 
 that. If Ronald could see her now he would be 
 astonished, he would scarcely recognise her. She 
 could imagine him saying to her, " Why, 
 Mother, what on earth has happened to you? 
 You must have been grousing like the very 
 devil to look like that!" 
 
 She turned away from the mirror and went 
 downstairs. 
 
 When she came into the drawing-room Lady 
 Terrerton, who was standing, came towards
 
 72 MRS HARDEN 
 
 her, gazed at her with eyes that took in all 
 the changes in her face, then kissed her. 
 
 "Poor Evelyn! I know I know! But I 
 had to come, whether you wished to see me or 
 not." 
 
 " But I do wish to see you, though it will be 
 no use." 
 
 'Wait! You don't know. Some day you 
 will bless me for my persistence. You are in 
 the darkness like so many others. But I 
 shall show you how to reach out to the light." 
 
 Mrs Marden twisted her dry lips. At that 
 moment she was pitying her friend, and even 
 in her grief she felt superior to Lady Terrerton. 
 ' They sat down together on a sofa and Lady 
 Terrerton said, 
 
 " Do you believe I am a sincere woman? " 
 
 " Yes, I do." 
 
 "And you know how I loved Willie?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 '* We were wrapped up in each other. He 
 told me everything. Many mothers are al- 
 most strangers to their sons. They know less 
 about them really than many other women and 
 than their pals. Of course they may guess things. 
 Mothers have strong instincts. But their sons 
 wish to keep them more or less in the dark; and 
 they often succeed in doing it. I know that."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 73 
 
 " I daresay they do." 
 
 ' Willie was not like that. I knew his faults. 
 He didn't mind my knowing them although he 
 reverenced me. I am going to tell you some- 
 thing to prove to you how deeply in earnest I 
 am and how sincere in my wish to help you. I 
 have never got on with my husband. We don't 
 understand each other; we don't suit each other 
 at all. Probably you have never suspected 
 this?" 
 
 " No. I thought you got on very well." 
 
 " He doesn't care for me," said Lady Terrer- 
 ton simply. " I bore him." 
 
 Mrs Marden was silent. 
 
 "So you see Willie was everything to me, 
 absolutely everything, because I am not a 
 woman who could ever try to find consolation 
 with a lover. Now you understand just what 
 my loss was. It could not have been greater." 
 
 " I see that." 
 
 " It was quite as great as yours." 
 
 " I suppose I daresay it was." 
 
 Mrs Marden said that, but she was unable 
 really to believe it. 
 
 " And yet I can bear it bravely. I can even 
 be happy in spite of it. I am happy." 
 
 She said the last words with deep conviction, 
 smiling.
 
 74, MRS MARDEN 
 
 " Doesn't that tell you something? I am very 
 happy. I would not have Willie back on earth 
 with me." 
 
 When Lady Terrerton said that Mrs Mar- 
 den felt that a gulf yawned between them, that 
 it was useless to go on with the conversation, 
 but she only said, 
 
 ' That is very wonderful." 
 
 ' The whole of our existence is a wonder. 
 We are marvels and our destiny is beyond 
 measure marvellous. Now, dear, I want you 
 to listen to me. Never mind if you think I am 
 talking nonsense. Only listen. Only try to 
 realise that hitherto you have lived in the dark. 
 Only try to be as a little child." 
 
 " I can't be that, I'm afraid." 
 
 ' Yes, you can. There is very little difference 
 between a child's ignorance and ours on this 
 plane. Willie says so." 
 
 Mrs Marden's body stiffened at this remark, 
 but she said, 
 
 " I will listen to what you have to say." 
 
 " And don't be the spirit that denies. That 
 is all I ask." 
 
 " I will try not to be." 
 
 She leaned back on the sofa, folded her hands, 
 and listened. 
 
 When Lady Terrerton went away, perhaps an
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 75 
 
 hour later, Mrs Marden had promised to go 
 to her house on the following afternoon to 
 meet a certain medium called Peter Orwyn. 
 
 She knew she would keep her promise, though 
 she felt no real interest in the matter. But 
 Lady Terrerton's deep earnestness had touched 
 her, and she had not forgotten Miss King's 
 advice. Miss King was a very sensible 
 woman; and perhaps she was right, perhaps it 
 was foolish to deny that things could be when 
 one had never studied them, examined into them. 
 And nothing really mattered now one way 
 or the other. The fabric of life was crash- 
 ing down all about her. Death and destruc- 
 tion were in the air, under the waters, on the 
 broad surface of the earth. There was noth- 
 ing stable anywhere. An era was passing 
 away. She wished she could pass away pain- 
 lessly with it, but probably she would live to 
 be an old woman. Useless people, people 
 without hope or desjre often lived to be old, 
 and the ardent and young and desirous were 
 cut off like Ronald. 
 
 On the following day she started for 
 Berkeley Square, where Lady Terrerton lived, 
 in a dull condition of mind. She walked there. 
 When she was entering the cosy square she 
 thought of Ronald's contempt for all occult
 
 76 MRS MARDEN 
 
 practices. But there was no Ronald now. He 
 would not know what she was doing. She 
 felt quite certain of that. 
 
 When she went into Lady Terrerton's draw- 
 ing-room she found her hostess there with a 
 middle-aged man who was introduced to her 
 as " my dear friend Mr Peter Orwyn."
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 MR ORWYN was broad-shouldered, thick-set, 
 with a powerful red face, earnest dark eyes, a 
 heavy iron-grey moustache and iron-grey hair 
 carefully brushed and parted in the middle of 
 his head. He was well dressed in a braided 
 morning coat and dark striped trousers. His 
 hands were large and capable, his movements 
 slow and controlled. He looked, Mrs Marden 
 thought, like a quiet prosperous business man, 
 a manufacturer, or cotton-spinner, someone who 
 had many men under him, who was accustomed 
 to control people and manage affairs. There 
 was a sensible, honest look in his eyes. He 
 spoke in a melodious deep voice, rolling his 
 r's. He was obviously not quite what is gen- 
 erally called a gentleman. On the other hand, 
 there was nothing vulgar or genteel about him. 
 His manner was simple, straightforward, un- 
 selfconscious, and he had no air of wishing to 
 make a tremendous impression on those he was 
 with. 
 
 After a few words Lady Terrerton said, 
 
 " I am going away for five minutes, Evelyn. 
 
 77
 
 78 MRS MARDEN 
 
 I want you to have a little talk alone with Mr 
 Orwyn." 
 
 And she went out of the room. When the 
 door was shut behind her Mrs Marden said, 
 
 " Of course Lady Terrerton has told you 
 about what has happened to me? " 
 
 ' Yes, she has. I understand from her that 
 you have none of her knowledge, that you have 
 never tried to put yourself in communication 
 with the spirits of the departed." 
 
 " I never have, I don't believe such communi- 
 cation is possible. Please don't think I am 
 rude in saying so." 
 
 " I like your sincerity. You have never 
 made any study of spiritualism, I suppose, never 
 read much about it, never come in contact with 
 any mediums? " 
 
 " No, never. My boy laughed at that kind 
 of thing when he thought of it at all, which was 
 very seldom." 
 
 " Quite so, quite so. I have two sons, Mrs 
 Marden." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " One is still at school. The other is in the 
 army in France." 
 
 " And do they believe in spiritualism? " 
 
 " The younger one does. The other he is a 
 great athlete does not. He is very much
 
 79 
 
 held in the body. But he's a fine fellow and 
 brave as a lion." 
 
 " But then do forgive me what does he 
 think about you?" 
 
 " He just takes me as his old Dad. He 
 knows I love him and have always done my 
 best by him. That's enough for him." 
 
 " I suppose he thinks you are self -deceived? " 
 
 "That's about it, I should say. But I'm 
 not. All over London I have brought comfort 
 to the bereaved." 
 
 " Do you think you have a special gift, 
 some extraordinary faculty which enables you 
 to to serve as a means of communication be- 
 tween the living and the dead ? " 
 
 " There are no dead," said Peter Orwyn 
 firmly. " Your son is not dead. You are living 
 in an illusion like many others. Do you mean 
 to tell me that you have never felt that you 
 have something in you which is a free thing, 
 which illness can't injure, which accident can't 
 destroy, which is independent of the body? 
 What are you suffering in at this moment? Is 
 it in anything physical? Is it in the brain? 
 Is it in the heart that organ which a surgeon 
 can take out of your body and put back again 
 without killing you? I say no! You're suf- 
 fering in your soul, your eternal spirit, the
 
 80 MRS HARDEN 
 
 part of you which is unable to be handled, 
 which is unable to die, and knows it." 
 
 Mrs Marden was silent. At that moment 
 she was trying to examine herself. Was she 
 conscious of having something within her which 
 could not be killed, a flame which nothing could 
 extinguish? She realised that she could not 
 imagine not being. She certainly felt as if 
 she would and must persist. Yet she also 
 felt that nothing of Ronald persisted. 
 
 " I cannot see why we should not cease,'* 
 she said, after the long pause. ' We are a 
 miserable race after all. Look at what we 
 are doing now, destroying each other merci- 
 lessly. Why should such creatures as we are 
 go on and on for ever ? " 
 
 " Have you always felt like that? " 
 
 " No," she said truthfully. " Till my boy was 
 killed I thoroughly enjoyed life, and thought 
 I was fond of people. I looked upon everything 
 differently then." 
 
 As she spoke the sense of her misery flowed 
 upon her, and the robust looking man sitting 
 with her and gazing earnestly at her, seemed 
 suddenly remote. 
 
 " And you will change again." 
 
 She heard his deep voice speaking melodi- 
 ously.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 81 
 
 " This is only a passing shadow falling across 
 your destiny. You are being educated; that's 
 all." 
 
 " Could you speak like that if your eldest 
 son had been killed ? " said Mrs Harden, with 
 sudden sharp penetration. 
 
 She saw an odd look, like something shrinking 
 or cowering, come into his eyes as she spoke. 
 It vanished almost instantly. 
 
 " I think it is much easier to preach conso- 
 lation to others than to find it ourselves, when 
 we need it," she continued. 
 
 " I do not preach it, I bring it," said Mr 
 Orwyn firmly. " I have brought it to Lady 
 Terrerton. I am prepared to bring it to you, 
 on one condition." 
 
 "What is that?" 
 
 " Merely that you do not deliberately fight 
 against me. I don't ask you to believe without 
 proof. But I do ask vou to be ready to accept 
 proof." 
 
 " I think I hope I am a reasonable woman," 
 said Mrs Marden. 
 
 " No doubt. Now let me ask you a question. 
 Do you believe in the efficacy of prayer? " 
 
 " I'm afraid I don't." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " How can there be a Being who allows, or
 
 82 MRS HARDEN 
 
 disallows, anything the death of a soldier in 
 battle, for instance merely because someone in 
 England, or elsewhere, doesn't pray or does 
 pray about it? " 
 
 "I don't know. But I believe prayer works 
 wonders." 
 
 ' Then I think it's very hard on the soldier 
 who has no one to pray for him." 
 
 ' I pray for my son. Did you never pray for 
 yours ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but I never had any real feeling that 
 my doing so was any good." 
 
 ' Then why did you do it ? You were moved 
 by an inward impulse I suppose? " 
 
 " I don't know exactly why I did it." 
 
 1 I do. You did it because your soul knew 
 far more than your brain." 
 
 ' Well, when I went to church I thought it 
 was all nonsense, and I think so still." 
 
 ' Will you come to a sitting with me ? " 
 
 "Yes; I will do that." 
 
 " I will tell you a few names of people who 
 have sat with me and been convinced that I 
 have the power to open up a means of com- 
 munication with those who have passed out of 
 this world." 
 
 He mentioned several names of well known 
 people, both men and women. Two of the
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 83 
 
 former were scientists of repute. Another was 
 a famous writer. One of the women was a 
 distinguished poetess. 
 
 " Do you think such people are likely to be 
 deceived?" he asked her. 
 
 " I don't know. I think crowds of soldiers 
 were deceived in the retreat from Mons." 
 
 " Ah ! You mean about the presence of 
 protecting angels?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 ' Well, you must judge for yourself. I 
 am sure I shall convince you." 
 
 " I should be very glad if you could." 
 
 ' That is the right frame of mind," he said 
 very earnestly. 
 
 At this moment Lady Terrerton re-entered 
 the room, and shortly afterward Mr Orwyn 
 said good-bye and went away. 
 
 As soon as he had gone Lady Terrerton 
 eagerly asked Mrs Marden what she thought 
 of him. 
 
 " I think he has an honest sort of face," 
 she said. 
 
 " He's absolutely sincere, absolutely." 
 
 " But I suppose he takes money for what 
 he does? " 
 
 ' Yes. Is that a crime? " 
 
 " No. But still "
 
 84 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Clergymen take money for being clergy- 
 men. The Archbishop of Canterbury has fif- 
 teen thousand a year and two palaces. The 
 Pope has the Vatican and Peter's pence. Do 
 we blame them?" 
 
 " I don't want to blame anyone, but the 
 money question makes me very suspicious about 
 the whole thing." 
 
 " Dear, I think that's unreasonable. Every- 
 one has to live." 
 
 "Has Mr Orwyn always been a medium?" 
 
 "No; he was once a Baptist Minister, in 
 Lancashire I believe. Then he was led to join 
 the Salvation Army. When he discovered his 
 powers he gave everything up to devote him- 
 self to their development. He is very far from 
 being rich." 
 
 " He told me he had two sons." 
 
 ' Yes, and he adores them, especially the 
 eldest, who is fighting." 
 
 " I know." 
 
 " How do you know? " 
 
 Mrs Marden knew by the look she had seen 
 in Peter Orwyn's dark eyes, but she only 
 said, 
 
 :< He told me his eldest son was a very fine 
 fellow." 
 
 " He isn't a bit afraid for him."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 85 
 
 ' Why should he be if he is as sincere 
 as you say? If there is no such thing as death, 
 as he says he believes, fear must be impossible 
 to him." 
 
 "Ah! but there's the separation." 
 
 " Mr Orwyn has no right to be afraid as 
 others are afraid," said Mrs Marden obstinately. 
 " If I had his faith, the whole of life would be 
 changed for me, and I with it. But I could 
 never have it." 
 
 Lady Terrerton looked deeply distressed, al- 
 most piteous. 
 
 ' Then you refuse " 
 
 " No, I will come to a sitting." 
 
 ' To-morrow at eight. That's all I ask of 
 you." 
 
 "Am I to come here?" 
 
 " No. We will go to Mr Orwyn's house in 
 Hornton Street, Kensington. His number is 
 eleven B. But I'll call for you about half past 
 seven." 
 
 ' Very well. But I know it is all non- 
 sense, and my boy had such a contempt for. 
 that kind of thing." 
 
 " Evelyn, believe me, he has no contempt 
 now. He understands now. Our eyes are 
 veiled, but he sees clearly at last." 
 
 Mrs Marden looked at her friend with a sort
 
 86 MRS HARDEN 
 
 of deep wonder. It was impossible to doubt 
 Lady Terrerton's sincerity. And Peter Orwyn 
 looked and seemed sincere too. How strange 
 the diversities of human belief were! And 
 human follies, how various they were, and yet 
 how some forms of folly persisted through the 
 ages! 
 
 " What is it, Evelyn? " 
 
 " Nothing." 
 
 " But you look so strange ! " 
 
 " Do I ? I was only thinking that if we 
 hadn't a sense of humour some of us would 
 go mad." 
 
 "A sense of humour! But what has that 
 got to do with these profound and marvellous 
 truths?" 
 
 " I could hardly explain, dear. Good-bye and 
 thank you for all your goodness to me." 
 
 On the following evening Mrs Marden felt 
 specially miserable, almost desperate in her 
 misery. A longing to remain shut up alone 
 possessed her. She was afraid of exposing her 
 wretchedness to the eyes of others almost as 
 if it were a poor deformed body undressed. 
 And when she was told that Lady Terrerton 
 was waiting for her in a taxicab she was seized 
 by an almost overpowering reluctance to go 
 with her to Hornton Street. But she over-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 87 
 
 came it by a great effort of her will and went 
 down. 
 
 " Of course we shall be alone, with Mr 
 Orwyn," she said to her friend as they drove 
 away. 
 
 " No, dear " 
 
 " But I can't meet strangers. Please stop 
 the cab. I must go back.'* 
 
 Lady Terrerton took her hand and held it 
 tightly. 
 
 " Evelyn, there must be a circle." 
 
 "A circle?" 
 
 " Mr Orwyn obtains his power from it. He 
 needs help. There will only be two other 
 people." 
 
 "Who are they?" 
 
 "Mr Cyril Hammond- 
 
 "Do you mean Hammond the essayist? " 
 
 " Yes. You will like him." 
 
 " Oh, I don't care for anybody now." 
 
 ' That will pass. The other sitter will be 
 Arthur Burnley, Endsley's brother. Surely 
 you know him? " 
 
 " I've just met him. But I hate meeting 
 people now. I thought we should be alone or 
 I wouldn't have come." 
 
 " Dear, we are forced to have the right con- 
 ditions. Otherwise we should get no results.
 
 88 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Mr. Orwyn requires more help than some 
 mediums do." 
 
 Mrs Marden said no more, but when the cab 
 stopped before a small house in Hornton Street 
 she got out with slow reluctance. Her limbs 
 seemed heavy and weak, and a sort of nausea 
 of sorrow was upon her. She had never before 
 felt such acute and helpless agony at her loss, 
 such impotence, such a sense of being a victim 
 of the unknown, as she felt at that moment. 
 She was physically affected and found it diffi- 
 cult to mount the flight of stairs which led to the 
 first floor, and when she reached the landing she 
 whispered to Lady Terrerton. 
 
 " Oh, I wish I hadn't come, I wish I hadn't 
 come ! " 
 
 "Hush, dear!" said Lady Terrerton, gently 
 pressing her arm. ' You will feel differently 
 very soon." 
 
 They entered a narrow, simply furnished 
 drawing-room, running from the front to the 
 back of the house. In it Mr Orwyn was waiting 
 for them with two men. He wore the braided 
 morning coat and the striped trousers, and 
 looked red, earnest and quietly powerful as on 
 the preceding day. After welcoming them in a 
 hushed way, he said to Mrs Marden, 
 
 "Do you know our two friends?"
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 89 
 
 " I know Mr Burnley," said Mrs Marden, in 
 a scarcely audible voice. 
 
 And she shook hands with a long-faced, acute 
 looking man, about thirty years old, whose small 
 sunken brown eyes seemed to pierce whatever 
 they glanced at. 
 
 " This is Mr Hammond Mrs Marden." 
 
 Mrs Marden bowed to a round-faced, round- 
 headed man, with grey hair, large widely open 
 grey eyes and a pouting energetic mouth, who 
 bowed in return with an air of grave formality. 
 Then Lady Terrerton greeted the two men 
 with her quick eager manner, which was full of 
 nervous intensity. 
 
 " Mrs Marden sits to-night for the first time,'* 
 said Mr Orwyn, in his deep melodious voice. 
 " She comes among us not as a convinced be- 
 liever but with an open mind. The cur- 
 tains " he turned towards Mrs Marden " are 
 drawn as you see. The windows behind them 
 are shut. I shall now lock the only door in 
 the room, so that no one from outside can dis- 
 turb us. We are going to sit round that table." 
 
 He locked the door, then pointed to a good 
 sized round table which stood in the centre 
 of the floor at the back of the room. On it lay 
 a tambourine, a rattle and a concertina. 
 
 " There is the cabinet."
 
 90 MRS HARDEN 
 
 With one large hand he indicated some thin 
 curtains which, hung on a brass rod, concealed 
 an angle of the room. 
 
 "As you can see, there is nothing in the 
 cabinet but a chair." 
 
 And he went over to the curtains and pulled 
 them back, disclosing an ordinary kitchen chair. 
 
 ' The preparations, as you see, are very 
 simple," he added, still addressing himself to 
 Mrs Marden. 
 
 1 Yes," she said, almost in a whisper. 
 
 She was thinking, " And very absurd ! '* 
 tragically, not with any sense of humour. The 
 sight of the rattle, the concertina and the tam- 
 bourine with its bells made her feel almost 
 sick. How Ronald would have laughed at it 
 all! But she hated it, because he was falling 
 into decay somewhere in France, and she was 
 in this room with these people because of just 
 that. She looked at Arthur Burnley and Mr 
 Hammond with miserable piercing eyes, that 
 asked them silently, " Do you two men, clever, 
 educated, worldly-wise, both of you do you 
 believe that this childish paraphernalia will 
 be made use of by the spirit hands of men who 
 have fallen bathed in blood to save England? 
 Do you believe that this thick-set, red-faced man 
 in a braided coat and striped trousers is able
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 91 
 
 to call back the dead to eleven B Hornton 
 Street?" They gave no answer to her silent 
 question, only looked grave, self-possessed, well- 
 bred and devoid of all sarcasm. Arthur Burn- 
 ley's curious eyes glittered in the electric light 
 from their deep-sunken sockets, and Cecil Ham- 
 mond's pouting mouth opened, then closed firmly 
 as if he decided that silence was the wisest policy 
 at that moment. 
 
 Lady Terrerton's ravaged face had a pas- 
 sionate, hungry expression that was almost ter- 
 rible in its vividness. A sort of greedy ma- 
 ternity stared out of her burning eyes. Mrs 
 Marden looked at her with pity, and yet was 
 almost ashamed for her. She was exposing 
 something that ought not to be seen by these 
 men who were enclosed with her in this narrow, 
 locked-up chamber. 
 
 ' There is something frightful in longing 
 when it goes about naked," thought Mrs Mar- 
 den. And she tried to bring on her own face 
 an expression of vacant indifference. 
 
 " Now! " said Peter Orwyn. 
 
 And he turned out all the lights except one, 
 a lamp with a red shade, which stood on a tiny 
 table in a corner of the front part of the room, 
 close to the window which looked on to the 
 street.
 
 92 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Immediately the room became mysterious, the 
 faces of those in it more significant, more 
 mental. Arthur Burnley's eyes gleamed with 
 light like a cat's. Cecil Hammond's energetic 
 mouth suggested inexorable firmness. Lady 
 Terrerton's pale features resembled those of a 
 mask modelled and painted to represent famine. 
 And the red face of Peter Orwyn seemed to 
 gain in power suddenly. 
 
 ' We will begin now," said Orwyn. 
 
 He sat down heavily in front of the round 
 table. 
 
 ' You might sit by me," he said to Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 She took the chair on his left. Arthur 
 Burnley sat at his right by Lady Terrerton. 
 Hammond sat between the two women. 
 
 " Place your hands lightly on the table," 
 said Orwyn in a low voice to Mrs Marden. 
 
 She obeyed. The others followed her ex- 
 ample and the sitting began. 
 
 For perhaps ten minutes there was a pro- 
 found silence. 
 
 During the silence a change took place in 
 Mrs Marden. Her feeling of bitter ridicule 
 faded gradually away and was replaced by 
 a sensation of expectation, which seemed to 
 her rather physical than mental. Her body
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 93 
 
 seemed to be expecting something while her 
 mind brooded vaguely on the horrors of the 
 war. Then she felt, or thought she felt, the 
 personalities of those sitting with her as if they 
 were gaining in strength, in meaning, as if they 
 were setting up a definite communication with 
 hers. Finally, however, this feeling about all 
 of them except Peter Orwyn flickered out in 
 her, like an expiring flame, and she was con- 
 scious only of the medium as a force powerful 
 and increasing in power, spreading, filling the 
 room. She seemed to feel him in her hands 
 which tingled, then in the whole of her body. 
 
 After a while the usual table-turning and 
 rappings took place. These did not interest her 
 at all. On the contrary, they irritated her and 
 seemed to get in the way of something which 
 she wished to know more of, and which was 
 interfered with by them. Messages purported 
 to come for Lady Terrerton and Arthur Burn- 
 ley. Several were from " Willie," according 
 to the table. Finally the table for an instant 
 rose from the ground without apparently being 
 touched by any of them. Then the curtains of 
 the cabinet swayed violently as if blown by a 
 wind, and there were rappings in various parts 
 of the room. 
 
 After all this Peter Orwyn seemed to fall
 
 94 MRS HARDEN 
 
 into a deep sleep. He breathed loudly, pain- 
 fully. His eyes closed. Drops of perspiration 
 rolled down his red face. Then Arthur Burnley, 
 who evidently knew what ought to be done on 
 such occasions, got up softly, turned out the 
 one lamp, plunging the room in complete black- 
 ness, and returned to his place. The medium 
 moved uneasily in the dark, trembled and 
 groaned as if in pain. Presently he began to 
 speak, at first in an almost inaudible voice. 
 Finally he said, " Mother! " twice loudly. 
 
 'Who is it?" said Lady Terrerton eagerly 
 in the dark. 
 
 " Mother, I was wrong I know the truth 
 now! " said the voice, which was quite unlike 
 Peter Orwyn's. 
 
 It sounded like a young voice, not a child's 
 but a young man's voice, typical of well-bred 
 young England. It suggested to Mrs Marden 
 the public school, Sandhurst, even the Guards. 
 She could not imagine Peter Orwyn speaking 
 like that. After a pause this voice said. 
 
 ' You are doing the right thing. Keep on ! 
 I can't say any more now. I haven't enough 
 strength somehow. But I'm- " 
 
 The voice had become much fainter. After 
 a half second of silence the word " Ronald " 
 was just audible. Then the medium shivered,
 
 95 
 
 rolled in his chair, breathed heavily for two or 
 three minutes. A dead silence succeeded. It 
 was broken by Orwyn's deep voice saying, 
 
 " Please turn on the light." 
 
 Burnley obeyed. When the lamp was lit 
 Mrs Harden saw that Orwyn's earnest eyes 
 were fixed upon her. 
 
 "Did anything come?" he asked. 
 
 " Yes, yes! " said Lady Terrerton. " It was 
 wonderful! " 
 
 Mrs Marden said nothing. 
 
 Orwyn got up. He seemed tired and pre- 
 occupied. 
 
 " I must have some water," he said. 
 
 And going over to the door, he unlocked it 
 and went out of the room. Then they all rose 
 from the table and moved about. Mrs Marden 
 found herself with Cecil Hammond near the 
 window looking to Hornton Street. 
 
 "Do you believe in all this? " she asked him, 
 not looking at him, 
 
 " I think it is worthy of investigation," he 
 said, noncommittally. " Orwyn undoubtedly 
 possesses some strange power. He has proved 
 that to me. I don't pretend to understand what 
 it is. But several people say he has spoken to 
 them with voices which they recognised as the 
 voices of dead relations or friends."
 
 96 MRS HARDEN 
 
 As he spoke she raised her eyes to his and 
 saw in them a question. But she did not 
 answer it. She longed to go away, to be alone 
 in her own house. But evidently there was 
 something more to come and she was tied to 
 Lady Terrerton to-night. After some more un- 
 easy conversation Peter Orwyn returned, look- 
 ing calmer. He again locked the door and said, 
 ' We will sit once more. There seems a 
 great deal of power to-night." 
 
 As he said the last words he looked, as if 
 enquiringly, at Mrs Mar den. 
 
 " I wish you to tie me up," he continued, 
 turning to Burnley and Hammond. 
 
 And going to a bureau, he opened a drawer 
 and produced some lengths of strong cord. 
 
 Burnley and Hammond then quickly arid 
 deftly tied his arms tightly to his sides, and 
 fastened his legs firmly together at the ankles 
 and also above the knees, while he sat in his 
 chair by the round table. Then they resumed 
 their places. Arthur Burnley took his seat last 
 after turning out the lamp. 
 
 This time no voices spoke, but the con- 
 certina was played, the rattle sounded, and the 
 tambourine seemed to float about the room, 
 for they heard its bells above their heads, some- 
 times near, sometimes apparently at a distance.
 
 97 
 
 Lights also flashed in the darkness high up near 
 the ceiling, and again there were rappings. 
 
 When the electric lights were switched on 
 Orwyn was found in his chair, still firmly 
 bound, breathing heavily and streaming with 
 perspiration. He looked like a man who had 
 been making a strong physical effort. 
 
 Arthur Burnley and Hammond unbound 
 him. Without saying a word he got up, went 
 to a sofa, and sat down, holding his head with 
 both hands and resting his elbows on his knees. 
 He did this very naturally and un-selfcon- 
 sciously, almost as if he were alone in the 
 room. Meanwhile they all remained silent. 
 Lady Terrerton looked at Mrs Marden, but the 
 latter kept her eyes fixed on the ground. Ham- 
 mond drew aside one of the curtains and opened 
 a window, letting in the cool night air. Arthur 
 Burnley lit a cigarette. 
 
 Presently Peter Orwyn raised his head. 
 
 " I'm afraid I can't sit for materialisations 
 to-night," he said, speaking slowly like a weary 
 man. " I'm tired. We have had a new friend 
 with us, and it seems to me that I've been 
 used by a new and very powerful, very urgent, 
 personality. I have a sense of struggle. It 
 may be easier another time. I can't try any 
 more to-night."
 
 98 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " We'll go, dear Mr Orwyn, we'll go ! " said 
 Lady Terrerton. " I quite understand. It's 
 been very wonderful. You must rest now." 
 
 " Presently," he said, " I should like Mrs 
 Marden to remain behind for a few moments, if 
 she will." 
 
 "But how shall I get home? I came with 
 Lady Terrerton," said Mrs Marden. 
 
 " Perhaps Mr Burnley won't mind seeing me 
 home," said Lady Terrerton. 
 
 " I shall be delighted," said Arthur Burnley. 
 
 " My taxi can stay for you, Evelyn." 
 
 " Very well. Thank you," said Mrs Marden. 
 
 She did not know whether she wished to stay 
 or not, but she did not feel inclined to make 
 any effort just then. And to refuse would have 
 required an effort on her part. 
 
 When the others had gone she said to Peter 
 Orwyn, 
 
 ' Why did you wish me to stay?" 
 
 " I wanted to ask you whether there was any 
 manifestation which seemed in any way con- 
 nected with you," he replied. ' When I am 
 in a trance I know nothing. Some mediums, I 
 believe, are partially conscious, have some idea 
 of what is happening, of how they are being 
 used. I am not. I am as one dead for the 
 time. Did anyone come for you? "
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 99 
 
 " But you said just now you had a sense of 
 struggle. How could that be if you were totally 
 unconscious ? " 
 
 " It's difficult to explain. When I came to 
 I felt it. I had a feeling of having been rent." 
 
 " Oh yes." 
 
 " Did anyone come for you? " he repeated. 
 
 " How can I say? " 
 
 He looked steadily at her. 
 
 " Did you hear any voices you recognised? " 
 
 After a pause she replied, 
 
 " I wish to be perfectly truthful." 
 
 " Of course, of course." 
 
 " I did hear a voice which was not unlike 
 the voice of someone I I have been closely 
 connected with. But it only said a very few 
 words." 
 
 " It might say more another time. You 
 seemed to bring power." 
 
 " How can I bring power? " 
 
 " It is all as much of a mystery to me as 
 it can be to you, Mrs Marden. I am a poor 
 ignorant man. I don't pretend to understand 
 these mysteries." 
 
 ' Why should you be picked out to be used 
 by the dead? " 
 
 '* I could not tell you. ' The greatest scientists 
 could not tell you."
 
 100 MRS HARDEN 
 
 He was silent. At last he said, 
 
 " Will you come again? " 
 
 " If you'll allow me I will let you know." 
 
 " Certainly. I should like to be the means 
 of helping you as I have helped others." 
 
 " Thank you." 
 
 They parted without any mention of money. 
 Peter Orwyn went down to the street door 
 with Mrs Marden and helped her into the wait- 
 ing taxicab. Just before the cab drove away 
 she looked at him from the darkness of the 
 interior. She could see his face and broad 
 figure distinctly, for the night was not very 
 dark. There was nothing mysterious about 
 him. Certainly he made no effort to look un- 
 usual. There was even something that sug- 
 gested honesty in his businesslike costume, neat, 
 well cut, carefully brushed and tended. A stock- 
 broker dressed in much the same way. As she 
 looked he bowed, in a simple sort of manner 
 without pomposity. Then the cab drove off. 
 
 What was this man? Either he was a rascal, 
 a clever trickster making money out of the 
 misery of yearning and credulous people, or 
 he was a being with peculiar, not yet understood 
 powers, of which he himself knew very little, 
 a being not unique perhaps, but exceptional, 
 with strange faculties, with an organisation quite
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 101 
 
 unlike that of most of his fellows. He neither 
 looked nor seemed at all like a rascal. Even 
 Mrs Marden's naturally strong prejudice 
 against those whom she had always thought of 
 as vulgar frauds did not enable her to dislike 
 Orwyn, or to hold him in contempt. But the 
 floating tambourine, the whining concertina, 
 suggesting sailors having a jollification in a 
 public house the blatant rattle, the rappings, 
 the lights what else but trickery could have 
 produced the childish phenomena of the night? 
 She dismissed them from her mind as absurd, 
 contemptible, even disgusting, and thought of 
 the so-called messages which had come. Those 
 from " Willie " had been ordinary, not silly, 
 not common, but such as it would be very easy 
 to invent. ' Willie " had spoken or Orwyn had 
 spoken comfortable words to Lady Terrerton, 
 had touched on his happiness, his activities, the 
 necessity of the sacrifice of all the young fellows 
 who had given their bodies to the grave for their 
 country. It would not be at all difficult for a 
 very ordinary mind to think of such messages. 
 
 And then there had been the voice! It 
 certainly had resembled the voice of Ronald. 
 When first it had spoken in the dark saying 
 ''Mother!" urgently, Mrs Marden had with 
 difficulty kept silent and motionless. For a
 
 102 MRS HARDEN 
 
 moment she had felt that Ronald was with 
 her, had something of vital importance to say 
 to her, and when the voice had spoken again 
 it had still seemed akin to the voice of her 
 boy. But now she said to herself that young 
 officers, like public school boys, like Oxford 
 undergraduates, are imitative. She had often 
 noticed this passion for imitation in them and 
 laughed at it gaily. Ronald and his comrades 
 had dressed in the same sort of way, had worn 
 their hats, when in mufti, at a similar angle, 
 had cut their moustaches to the same length, had 
 affected the same kind of gait. They had even 
 all stared with an expression typical of the 
 regiment in their young eyes, and their voices, 
 their intonations, their ways of drawling, of 
 clipping their words, had been absurdly alike. 
 Other people besides herself had heard arid 
 could recognise at once the young Guardsman's 
 special way of speaking. Many people with 
 even a moderate gift of mimicry no doubt could 
 easily imitate it. Peter Orwyn might be a 
 clever mimic, capable of reproducing the 
 Guardsman's typical voice. Was she going to 
 be such a fool as to be taken in by a trick of 
 that kind? 
 
 And yet a clever man like Hammond be- 
 lieved that Peter Orwyn possessed some strange
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 103 
 
 power, which was worthy of investigation. And 
 he had told her that several people had affirmed 
 their belief that from Orwyn's lips had is- 
 sued the voices of their dead relations and 
 friends. 
 
 "But people will believe anything!" Mrs 
 Marden said to herself, repeating the words 
 that were becoming almost a formula in her 
 mind. " One cannot take their evidence as 
 truth. Nobody's word on such matters can be 
 implicitly trusted. One must investigate and 
 judge for oneself." 
 
 And then abruptly, as if in a hurry, her 
 mind added, " But there's nothing in it all. 
 It is all trickery, nonsense, a means of making 
 money." 
 
 Making money! But she had not paid Peter 
 Orwyn anything. Well, she would arrange 
 about that with Lady Terrerton. 
 
 When she was shut in at home, she sat up 
 for a long while by the fire in her bedroom. 
 The " sitting " had acted upon her nervous 
 system. She felt painfully and unnaturally 
 alert, bristling with a sort of feverish vitality. 
 And there came to her a great longing to apply 
 some drastic test to Peter Orwyn. She did not 
 believe in him. That was impossible. And yet 
 somehow she did not feel that he was a dis-
 
 104 MRS MARDEN 
 
 honest rascal. Possibly he possessed some ex- 
 traordinary faculties which were purely physi- 
 cal, and which enabled him to levitate inani- 
 mate objects, and to cause rappings on walls 
 and pieces of furniture. Possibly, when self- 
 hypnotised, he was moved to speak with odd 
 voices and could not help himself. And from 
 those sitting with him he might easily draw 
 suggestions. She, for instance, had of course 
 been thinking about Ronald that evening and 
 might have conveyed to Orwyn some of her 
 knowledge of Ronald. And then Orwyn might 
 have been moved to speak as he did. The words 
 had been quite ordinary, just the sort of thing 
 that anyone might have invented on the spur 
 of the moment. It was the voice which had 
 impressed her and which now she could not get 
 out of her mind. 
 
 Suddenly she realised that the seance in which 
 she had just taken part had meant more to her 
 than the service which she had attended in 
 the early days of the war. She had come away 
 from the church with a strong feeling of de- 
 tachment from Protestantism. But had she 
 come away from Hornton Street with an 
 equally strong feeling of detachment from 
 spiritualism? In church she had said to her- 
 self, " This is no good to me," and her brain
 
 ROBERT HICHEXS 105 
 
 had rejected the teachings of the church and 
 any belief in the efficacy of prayer. Now again 
 she said, to herself, of spiritualism this time, 
 "This is no good to me!" But she did not 
 repent of having gone to Hornton Street as 
 she had repented of having gone to church. 
 That marked a subtle difference between two 
 states of unbelief. She had never wished to 
 test the melancholy clergyman who had said, 
 " We must welcome the war." But she did 
 wish to test Peter Orwyn. 
 
 As she sat by the fire in the dead of the 
 night alone terribly alone in the silent house, 
 which would never again be the home of her 
 boy, her woman's mind sought for a means 
 by which Peter Orwyn might be tested, a 
 means by which she could prove whether he 
 really believed that the so-called dead still lived, 
 still concerned themselves about those whom 
 they had loved while on earth, still were able 
 to speak to them, or whether he was a trickster 
 throwing dust in the eyes of the credulous for 
 the sake of mere money-making. And presently 
 she knew she had found the means. Love is 
 drastically sincere. Find in any human being 
 a deep love and you find at the same time 
 absolute sincerity. Peter Orwyn loved his 
 soldier son deeply. Mrs Marden knew that.
 
 106 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Orwyn might be tested through his love for 
 his son. 
 
 She looked into the fire and remembered the 
 fleeting expression of agony which she had seen 
 in his eyes when she had spoken of the possi- 
 bility of his boy being killed in the war as 
 Ronald had been killed. Had she perhaps al- 
 ready applied the test to Orwyn and had it 
 proved him to be insincere as a spiritualist? 
 She could not be certain. For there was some 
 sense in what Lady Terrerton had said to her 
 about the natural human dread of physical 
 separation from a loved one. She had appeared 
 to condemn it, perhaps, but she had known at 
 once that it held truth. Yet, if Orwyn were 
 sincere in the belief which he proclaimed and 
 which he tried to put into others, he could not 
 tremble for his son's safety as the atheist, or 
 even as the agnostic, must tremble for the safety 
 of a loved one exposed to incessant danger. 
 
 " If his eldest son were to be killed I should 
 very soon know whether Orwyn is a fraud or 
 genuine," Mrs Marden said to herself. 
 
 She shuddered as she realised that for a 
 moment she had almost wished another to suffer 
 as she suffered. But she longed to know the 
 truth of Peter Orwyn. Whether she would 
 go to him again she had not decided.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 107 
 
 A clock on the chimney-piece chimed once. 
 
 She had been sitting up by the fire for more 
 than two hours. How quickly the time had 
 gone by! She got up and went towards the 
 bed. Then for a moment she hesitated. She 
 was considering whether she would kneel down 
 and try to pray. But suddenly the whine of 
 the medium's concertina, the tinkle of the tam- 
 bourine's bells, were again in her ears. She did 
 not kneel, but quickly switched off the light 
 and got into bed. 
 
 And there she lay still and thought of the 
 voice, i
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 MRS MARDEN did visit Peter Orwyn again. 
 She felt that she was weak even foolish in doing 
 so. She was secretly almost ashamed of herself. 
 But life gaped before her like the void, black, 
 horrible, empty, and anything that for an hour 
 or two distracted her thoughts, diverted her 
 mind from lonely self -contemplation was a little 
 help to her. 
 
 The second time she visited Hornton Street 
 the same sitters were present with her, and the 
 manifestations which took place were very simi- 
 lar to those at the first seance. But they were 
 supplemented by two more definite exhibitions 
 of the powers of the medium. 
 
 Peter Orwyn entered the cabinet, and pres- 
 ently against the darkness immediately in front 
 of it a luminous face became visible. It was 
 not very distinct and was surrounded by white 
 wrappings. The complexion was colourless. 
 No hair was shown except upon the upper 
 lip, where there was a darkness like a closely 
 clipped very short moustache such as soldiers 
 wear. The eyes looked like two vague hollows 
 
 108
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 109 
 
 in the head. At first no words came from the 
 pale and vaguely defined lips. 
 
 "It's Willie!" Lady Terrerton exclaimed, 
 in a voice half choked with emotion. 
 
 But the face turned in Mrs Marden's direc- 
 tion and a whispering voice breathed " Ronald ". 
 
 The face remained visible at an altitude of 
 perhaps some five feet ten inches above the 
 floor for about a minute after the voice had 
 spoken and then vanished. 
 
 For a long time they sat in a silence which 
 was broken at last by a faint sound like a 
 prolonged and tremulous sigh. This was fol- 
 lowed by a soft rustling as of drapery, and then 
 Mrs Marden felt something like a very small, 
 very soft hand brushing her cheek lightly. She 
 sat quite still, holding her breath. The hand, 
 if it were a hand, touched her twice and surely 
 with tenderness as a child touches its mother. 
 There was a rustling noise succeeded by a sigh. 
 Then a little wind seemed to stir in the room 
 and to die away gently. 
 
 Soon afterwards Orwyn's deep voice asked 
 for the lights to be switched on and the sitting 
 was at an end. 
 
 On this occasion Orwyn did not invite Mrs 
 Marden to stay behind when the others pre- 
 pared to go, and she went downstairs with Lady
 
 110 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Terrerton and the two men. She had come in 
 her own car, a large one, and she asked her com- 
 panions if they would go back with her to 
 Hans Place, to take coffee. 
 
 " I should like to have a little talk with you 
 about what has happened to-night," she said, in 
 explanation of her invitation. " It's not much 
 after ten o'clock. But perhaps you have other 
 things to do." 
 
 " I'm afraid I must go home," said Lady 
 Terrerton, with a sort of tremulous stiffness 
 which surprised Mrs Marden. " I feel very 
 tired to-night. It was a very fatiguing sitting, 
 I think. The power seemed dissipated some- 
 how. I felt as if there were struggling forces 
 at work. Good-night, Evelyn. Good-night, Mr 
 Burnley Mr Hammond." 
 
 And she got abruptly into the taxicab which 
 was waiting for her and drove away. 
 
 The two men said they would go to Hans 
 Place, and they went there with Mrs Marden. 
 They said very little on the way, and what they 
 did say had no relation to the sitting just 
 ended. 
 
 Hanson opened the door and did not succeed 
 in hiding an expression of surprise when he 
 saw the two visitors with his mistress. 
 
 " I want coffee for three in the library, please,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 111 
 
 Hanson. And bring some cigars from the 
 cabinet." 
 
 " Yes, Ma'am." 
 
 The " cabinet " contained several brands of 
 cigars selected by Ronald and had not been 
 touched since his death. 
 
 " Do take off your coats," continued Mrs 
 Marden to the two men. "I'll just leave my 
 things in my room." 
 
 She opened the library door and went quickly 
 upstairs. 
 
 When Burnley and Hammond were together 
 in the library the latter said, 
 
 " Lady Terrerton was very upset to-night." 
 
 " Yes," said Burnley. 
 
 He put one foot on the fender and looked 
 into the fire. 
 
 " Of course she's a mass of nerves," he added. 
 
 " How absurd human beings are even in the 
 most intense moments!" observed Hammond, 
 raising his crescent-shaped eyebrows. 
 
 Burnley half turned and shot a penetrating 
 glance at him. 
 
 'To-night for instance?" he asked. 
 
 ' Yes, to-night. Of course you realised that 
 Lady Terrerton was jealous of our hostess. 
 That was why she wouldn't come here with us." 
 
 " She may really have been tired."
 
 112 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " She was horribly jealous." 
 
 " But it was she who brought Mrs Marden 
 to Orwyn." 
 
 " And probably now she wishes she hadn't. 
 My God, Burnley, how absurd we all are! " 
 
 He lifted his small hands in a gesture that 
 was almost despairing. ' We fight over every- 
 thing, even over the other world." 
 
 The sound of someone coming down the stairs 
 was audible, and Hammond's face suddenly as- 
 sumed its usual expression of energetic and self- 
 possessed gravity. 
 
 Mrs Marden came into the room looking pre- 
 occupied and tense. She had taken off her hat 
 and fur coat. She wore a plain black gown 
 high to the throat. Her hair was slightly dis- 
 ordered. Evidently she had not looked into the 
 glass after removing her hat. 
 
 " Do sit down," she said, shutting the door. 
 
 Her guests obeyed. 
 
 " It's a pity Lady Terrerton couldn't come 
 too," she went on, sitting on a big sofa and 
 quickly arranging a cushion behind her. " I'm 
 in deep mourning and see scarcely anyone. But 
 I wanted very much to speak to you all about 
 Mr Orwyn. We cannot remain strangers if we 
 sit together, I think. It seems to me unnatural. 
 There is something to me almost shameless in
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 113 
 
 our sitting together without knowing anything 
 of each other's real sentiments and opinions, 
 without in fact " 
 
 She broke off and looked at them both with 
 intensity. 
 
 " Do you understand what I mean, how I 
 feel about it? " she asked them. 
 
 " I think I do," said Burnley. 
 
 " Our intimacy so far has been rather like the 
 intimacy of castaways adrift in a boat on the 
 ocean, who knew little of each other on board 
 ship," said Hammond. 
 
 At this moment Hanson came in with coffee 
 on a tray and two sorts of cigars. 
 
 ' The cigars are good, I know," said Mrs 
 Harden. " Ronald, my boy, chose them and 
 he was a fine judge." 
 
 She saw Hanson's pale eyes fixed mourn- 
 fully upon her. When he had left the room 
 she gave her guests coffee. 
 
 "Do smoke!" she said. 
 
 The two men lighted their cigars. 
 
 Mrs Marden, who had made a great effort in 
 going to Hornton Street a second time and sit- 
 ting with strangers for she scarcely knew 
 Arthur Burnley was now carried on, as if by 
 its impetus, into a determined unreserve which 
 astonished herself.
 
 114 MRS HARDEN 
 
 * You spoke of castaways on the ocean, Mr 
 Hammond," she said. ' Well, I am one. That 
 is why Lady Terrerton made me come to Mr 
 Orwyn's house, that is the explanation of my 
 joining in these practices. My boy, who was 
 everything to me, was killed in France the 
 other day. I don't care really for anyone else. 
 I have no religion. My occupation till he died 
 was pleasure. It's true I did some so-called 
 work. I managed the programme and souvenir 
 selling at most of the smart charity matinees. 
 But pleasure was my life. Now I do nothing. 
 Your word castaway covers me. But you and 
 you, Mr Burnley, why do you go to Mr 
 Orwyn's? I daresay I am indiscreet to-night, 
 but I can't help it. I think we ought to know 
 each other's real opinions about the medium and 
 what happens. Of course Diana Terrerton be- 
 lieves in everything. But you two?" 
 
 " I study movements," said Hammond. 
 ' There is at present a movement of our world 
 towards occultism. All over London now there 
 are ' circles ', One hears of Lord Arborough's 
 * circle ', of Mrs Enthoven's ' circle ', and so 
 on. The religions at least this is my opinion; 
 it may be wrong are toppling down. Thou- 
 sands who never before dreamed of doubting 
 what their pastors and masters told them was
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 115 
 
 true are sceptical now. The influence of the 
 Bishops is derisory. The clergy clutch at the 
 skirts of those who are fleeing from them. 
 Meanwhile proprietors of weekly papers and 
 writers of sexual romances discover God for 
 the first time, and, raising themselves upon tip- 
 toe, bawl out the marvellous event to the public. 
 Can one stand aside and say there is nothing 
 in this unorthodox human impulse towards the 
 unseen? Is it merely superstition taking the 
 place of religion, a kicking out of the priests 
 to make room for the mediums? Is it neurosis 
 seeking for some alleviation of its misery in 
 change? I think that there is something else 
 besides folly in almost every human manifesta- 
 tion. Why should this widespread movement 
 towards spiritualism be an exception to the 
 general rule? Was Crookes a fool? Are 
 Lodge, Doyle, and other men of their calibre 
 fools? They certainly are not. This war, which 
 is doing so many strange things for the world, 
 is turning frivolous and hitherto materially 
 minded men and women towards the beyond. I 
 turn with them. Euripides said, ' Who knows 
 if life be not death and death be not life ? ' 
 And I say, too who knows ? " 
 
 "And you, Mr Burnley, what do you say?" 
 asked Mrs Marden.
 
 116 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Arthur Burnley took his cigar from his mouth 
 and knocked off the ash slowly. 
 
 " I believe in spiritualism," he said. " But 
 not because of the war. I have believed in it 
 for years." 
 
 ' Then you think Peter Orwyn an abso- 
 lutely genuine and sincere man? " 
 
 " I do." 
 
 Mrs Marden looked towards Hammond who 
 was sipping his coffee. 
 
 "And what do you think of him?" said 
 Hammond. 
 
 " I I can't believe in it all. But I am 
 naturally a sceptic, I think. Probably I have 
 no imagination." 
 
 Hammond smiled. 
 
 " I didn't mean it sarcastically," she said. 
 " But imagination seems to me to help people 
 very often over difficult ground. And this is 
 very difficult ground to me." 
 
 "Yes?" said Burnley, in an encouraging 
 voice. 
 
 " Soon after the war broke out when I was 
 in great anxiety about my boy," she continued, 
 " I went to church." 
 
 " Did it help you? " said Burnley. 
 
 " Not at all. I felt that I was wasting my 
 time. I'm unable to believe that prayer can
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 117 
 
 alter or bring about things. And in much the 
 same way I'm unable to believe that Mr 
 Orwyn can cause spirits to come to Hornton 
 Street." 
 
 ' Then you think Orwyn is an abominable 
 impostor?" said Hammond. 
 
 " He doesn't seem to be that at all, and that's 
 the confusing part for me. There seems to 
 me something simple and genuine in Peter 
 Orwyn." 
 
 'There is!" said Burnley. "I have known 
 him a long time and I respect him." 
 
 :< What do you think about him, Mr 
 Hammond? " 
 
 ' The longer I live, the more I am puzzled 
 by human nature," he answered. " I like Peter 
 Orwyn, but I couldn't tell you half, or a 
 quarter, of what is in him, good or bad. Some 
 of him, I am sure, is quite genuine. Tell me, 
 Mrs Marden " his eyes had a penetrating 
 look as they gazed at her " do you feel about 
 these sittings just as you did about church, that 
 they are simply a waste of time? " 
 
 " I don't think I feel quite the same." 
 
 "What's the difference?" 
 
 " I am more interested in the sittings than I 
 was in the church service." 
 
 "But how can you be interested at all if you
 
 118 MRS MARDEN 
 
 have no belief at all in the genuine character of 
 the manifestations?" 
 
 " There there is something in them, perhaps, 
 something purely physical, or something that 
 comes from the subconscious mind." 
 
 "Ah!" said Burnley. "People nearly al- 
 ways begin by saying that. I did. I was sure 
 the whole thing could be explained, that every- 
 thing that happened could be referred to us 
 human beings, had to do merely with powers 
 in ourselves which we didn't understand. 
 Thought reading, self-hypnotism. I went 
 through it all. Anything rather than believe 
 that spirits can communicate with us! It's very 
 strange how we struggle against what might be 
 our greatest consolations. Physical starvation 
 demands to be fed, but spiritual starvation, 
 which is ten times worse, very often refuses the 
 food which is brought by the ministering angels. 
 Go on, Mrs Marden, only go on. Be ob- 
 stinate and some day you will be thank- 
 ful." 
 
 " Please tell me one thing," she said. " Have 
 you ever lost anyone by death, anyone whom 
 you loved ? " 
 
 ' Yes," he said, looking down. 
 
 " And you, Mr Hammond ? " she asked. 
 
 "No," he replied. "But I have suffered
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 119 
 
 from the losses of my friends. I have known 
 the sorrows of others." 
 
 This conversation made a greater impres- 
 sion upon Mrs Marden than the convictions and 
 assertions of Lady Terrerton. Hammond and 
 Arthur Burnley differed no doubt in their out- 
 looks, regarded Orwyn and his manifestations 
 from different standpoints. Hammond was the 
 curious enquirer, Burnley the convinced believer. 
 But from both men came to her an impulse 
 driving her n. And she went on. 
 
 Enquiry brought her the information from 
 Lady Terrerton that each visit to Orwyn cost 
 a guinea. She sent him at once a cheque for 
 two guineas. While she was writing it doubts 
 assailed her again. She had plenty of money, 
 but this payment disgusted her, disgusted some- 
 thing delicate in her soul. But she thought 
 of church and the bag going round while the 
 sidesmen or whatever they were called looked 
 at the horizon. All food, whether destined for 
 stomach or spirit, must be paid for, it seemed. 
 She did not condemn the Archbishop of Canter- 
 bury and the Pope of Rome; she had no right 
 to condemn Peter Orwyn. As Lady Terrerton 
 had said people must live, and taxation, already 
 very high, was likely to go higher. But she
 
 120 MRS HARDEN 
 
 wished Peter Orwyn didn't make a profession 
 of occultism. 
 
 She told Miss King what had happened in 
 Hornton Street in detail. Miss King listened 
 with deep interest and without interrupting 
 her. 
 
 ' What's your opinion about it, Miss King? " 
 Mrs Marden asked, when she had finished. 
 
 " One thing strikes me." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 ' When the face appeared Lady Terrerton 
 thought it was her son." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Did you think it was like your son's face ? " 
 
 ' There was a suggestion of of a young 
 soldier in it, I think. But I could not have 
 recognised it. And I'm sure Lady Terrerton 
 couldn't." 
 
 " And the voice which spoke to you on both 
 occasions? " 
 
 " I certainly thought it resembled my son's 
 way of speaking. But but the voices and the 
 ways of speaking of young officers are very 
 much alike, I think. In fact I know they are." 
 
 She paused, then added, 
 
 " I'm not so credulous as Lady Terrerton. 
 Do you know it seems almost incredible but I 
 am sure she is angry with me because the face
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 121 
 
 which came was not for her. Oh, how absurd 
 it all is! One feels positively ashamed." 
 
 Suddenly she began to laugh then stopped. 
 
 " Oh, what wretched paltry creatures we 
 are ! " she ex^aimed. " Even in our sorrows 
 we are ridiculous. We are ridiculous in every- 
 thing. Human dignity! Is there such a thing? 
 Where is it then? " 
 
 " I think there is a good deal of it to be 
 found on the battlefields of France," said Miss 
 King in her clear quiet voice. " And also on 
 the seas." 
 
 Mrs Marden's white cheeks, where lines were 
 beginning to show, flushed. 
 
 " If I can arrange it will you come one night 
 to a sitting with Peter Orwyn ? " she said. 
 
 'Yes; I should like to very much." 
 
 " He can know nothing about you." 
 
 " Oh no. I never heard of him till you 
 told me." 
 
 " I'll try to manage it later on. I think you 
 have a very clear head and good judgment. 
 Lady Terrerton would believe anything, and 
 perhaps I am too much the other way. I don't 
 know. It's difficult to be perfectly balanced, 
 especially in these awful times." 
 
 Several weeks went by. The cult for occult- 
 ism, as most people called it, increased rapidly
 
 122 MRS HARDEN 
 
 in London. It was almost impossible to take 
 up a popular newspaper without finding some 
 mention of it. There were prosecutions of 
 fortune-tellers and hand-readers; a woman who 
 read fates in a crystal ball was heavily fined; a 
 man who kept a prayer shop was exposed in 
 the columns of the most widely read paper in 
 England. Controversies arose between those 
 who believed in New Thought, in protective 
 prayer, paid for at so much an hour, in spirit- 
 ualism, hand-reading, crystal-gazing, fortune- 
 telling by cards, and those who were bitterly 
 contemptuous of both new faiths and ancient 
 superstitions. Scientists, physicians, clergymen, 
 soldiers, and of course many women took part in 
 the clamour, which proved at least one thing, 
 that an enormous number of people was seeking 
 solace from the agony of the war not in ortho- 
 dox religion but in what the unbelievers called 
 " mystery mongering ". And among these 
 seekers there were women and men of all 
 classes, of all types of intellect, of all degrees 
 of education. Sorrow, fear, anxiety, longing, 
 abolished artificial differences, created a De- 
 mocracy of desire, in which the eternal child 
 that dwells in the toughest fighting man, the 
 most complex woman, showed its eager face 
 plainly and made its voice clearly heard.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 123 
 
 Prosecutions, attacks, the diatribes of medical 
 men, Catholic Priests, Protestant Clergymen, 
 had no effect on the increasing band of those 
 who were reaching out vaguely, or frantically, 
 with trembling wonder, or imperious determina- 
 tion, or mystical reverence, or mere crass super- 
 stition, towards regions where war and death 
 and torture were not, or were supposed not to 
 be the human intellect probably not being able 
 to conceive of another world tormented as ours 
 is tormented. Ridicule cannot kill faith, and 
 superstition is scarcely less tough in fibre than 
 faith, though the one is sublime and the other 
 absurd. So, as the horrors of the war increased 
 the adherents of occultism grew in number. 
 Doctors gravely declared that neurosis was 
 spreading like an epidemic. Acute social ob- 
 servers found that at least two thirds of the 
 people they came in contact with were no 
 longer completely sane. The clergy feared 
 that the power of the Church was totter- 
 ing. 
 
 And there were men who talked of a new 
 religion which would grow up on a basis not 
 of faith but of ascertained facts. 
 
 And Mrs Harden? In the midst of the 
 turmoil she had almost stealthily advanced along 
 the mysterious path.
 
 124 MRS MARDEN 
 
 From Lady Terrerton she had become es- 
 tranged through no fault of hers. Her poor 
 friend once so anxious to hand on her blessings 
 to a sister in misfortune, had evidently mis- 
 calculated her powers of unselfishness. They 
 did not, it seemed, extend beyond the limits of 
 this world. This fact quickly became obvious 
 in subsequent sittings which took place in Horn- 
 ton Street. On more than one occasion Lady 
 Terrerton was unable to control her bitterness 
 when manifestations occurred which had nothing 
 to do with her, but apparently everything to do 
 with Mrs Marden. It was evident that grief 
 and the effort to assuage it in seances had pro- 
 duced in her a disagreeable form of hysteria. 
 And finally she refused to " sit " any more in 
 the company of Mrs Marden, whom she in- 
 directly accused of laying claim to messages, 
 and even to materialisations, which were ob- 
 viously intended for herself. 
 
 The whole matter was painful and also 
 ridiculous. It was impossible for anyone with 
 a sense of humour to argue or protest about it. 
 Mrs Marden did neither. She quietly said she 
 would not join Lady Terrerton's " circle " in 
 Hornton Street again, and drove home scarcely 
 knowing whether to weep or to laugh over poor 
 human nature.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 125 
 
 On that evening she resolved to give up the 
 whole thing. She felt painfully disgusted and 
 humiliated by the scene she had passed through. 
 It seemed to bring Peter Orwyn, all that hap- 
 pened through him or by means of him, and all 
 those who sat with him, into contempt. Mrs 
 Mar den's sense of humour laughed certainly, 
 but the laugh was bitter; and her self-respect 
 writhed almost abjectly. She said to herself 
 that she had been a fool and that now her folly 
 had been chastised not with whips but with 
 scorpions. Well, she had had her lesson. Now 
 there was an end of it. She was thankful to be 
 released from the compulsion of practices which 
 were detestable because really they made a 
 mock of the deepest longings, the most yearn- 
 ing aspirations of suffering humanity. She 
 thanked Diana Terrerton for having brought 
 her to her senses. 
 
 But presently she found that she missed the 
 evenings in Hornton Street. The seances had 
 taken place twice a week, on Tuesdays and 
 Fridays. When these nights recurred Mrs 
 Marden, thinking of the circle in Peter Orwyn's 
 house, felt jealous. She sat alone in Hans 
 Place wondering what was happening in that 
 narrow upstairs room with the locked door. A 
 strange feeling of desertion, of much greater,
 
 126 MRS HARDEN 
 
 almost unbearable loneliness, took possession 
 of her. She realised that she felt the loss of 
 her boy much more now that she no longer 
 visited Hornton Street. And this made her 
 realise something else, that the sittings had 
 meant more to her than she had ever allowed 
 even to herself. Then she thought minutely 
 and steadily of all that had happened in the 
 series of sittings, and presently she knew what 
 it was that she missed now that she had broken 
 away from the circle. 
 
 It was a voice, the voice which had spoken 
 out of the dark at her first sitting, and which 
 had said at least a few words at every succeed- 
 ing sitting. Gradually she had come to care 
 for this voice, to wait for it anxiously through 
 the other demonstrations. And many times she 
 had spoken to it, had carried on brief dialogues 
 with it. And each time this voice had seemed to 
 her to resemble more closely the voice of her 
 dead boy. She had never acknowledged a belief 
 that this voice was indeed her boy's, or that what 
 it said came from him in another world. The 
 most that she had ever allowed was that the 
 whole matter was very strange and that she was 
 unable to understand it. And she had been 
 completely sincere. For she had never even to
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 127 
 
 herself, in her most intense moments of longing, 
 said, " I believe Ronald comes back to me 
 through Peter Orwyn." 
 
 Ronald was dead. He must be dead, all of 
 him. Or if he were not all dead then what- 
 ever was left of him and surely there could be 
 nothing was utterly remote. Nevertheless she 
 missed terribly the seances in Hornton Street, 
 missed hearing that voice in the dark, missed 
 her conversations with it. 
 
 Why? 
 
 Perhaps she, too, was one of those many 
 women who find comfort in nonsense. Once 
 she had found comfort in wearing new hats 
 and selling souvenirs in theatres. She thought 
 she was utterly changed now. But was she 
 essentially changed? Or was she still a fool, 
 only a fool in a different way? 
 
 In those conversations the voice had told her 
 various things, but there had been nothing deep, 
 nothing mystical, in what it had said. The 
 mind shown had been quite ordinary. But then 
 Ronald's had been quite an ordinary mind! 
 The voice had really talked much as a young 
 man of Ronald's type might have talked when 
 something had made him unusually serious, when 
 fate had removed his ordinary pleasures and
 
 128 MRS HARDEN 
 
 activities from him. And she thought now 
 it was perhaps just that ordinariness which had 
 impressed her. 
 
 Evidently she must have been impressed or 
 she could not now feel as she did, feel this 
 intense longing to go back to Hornton Street. 
 
 Peter Orwyn did not communicate with her. 
 She did not see Lady Terrerton any more. 
 Cecil Hammond and Arthur Burnley had 
 dropped out of her life as abruptly as they had 
 come into it. 
 
 Loneliness increased upon her. But the 
 obstinacy which was part of her for some time 
 prevented her from yielding to her desire. She 
 was fighting what she called (to herself) her 
 own folly. 
 
 "I won't be one of the silly women!" she 
 said to herself. " I may have been silly when 
 I was happy, but I won't be silly in my 
 misery." 
 
 And she tried to go on somehow. She began 
 to see a few people. She went about a little. 
 Now and then she attended a concert. But she 
 never went to a theatre. Various friends who 
 thought she was " getting over " her loss tried 
 to persuade her to take up again her " work " at 
 the matinees. She was even asked to appear 
 as " The Mother " in a war pageant at a great
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 129 
 
 music hall. But she refused all these requests. 
 She couldn't go back to her former way of life. 
 But she seemed unable to go forward into any 
 other way of life that was worth living. So 
 she simply stagnated. 
 
 At last, however, she could hold out no longer. 
 The desire to see Peter Orwyn again over- 
 powered her, and, still contemptuous of her own 
 folly, she wrote him a note asking him to come 
 and see her in Hans Place. He answered 
 politely fixing a time. She immediately sent 
 for Miss King, and begged her to come and 
 meet him. 
 
 " I always intended to take you to a seance, 
 but somehow it never came off," she said. 
 " Lady Terrerton was so difficult about every- 
 thing. But I think you are very clear-sighted. 
 I want you to come and meet Mr Orwyn 
 and to tell me exactly what you think of 
 him." 
 
 Miss King said she would be glad to come. 
 
 " I'll see him first for a few minutes," said 
 Mrs Marden. " Come at a quarter to five on 
 Friday. He's coming about half past four." 
 
 On the Friday when Peter Orwyn walked 
 into the room with his rather heavy tread Mrs 
 Marden felt almost painfully strung up and 
 excited.
 
 130 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Orwyn greeted her with his usual quiet, 
 earnest, and yet matter-of-fact manner and 
 made no allusion to the break in their inter- 
 course. He did not ask her why she had sent 
 for him or show any eagerness in meeting her 
 again. 
 
 After a few commonplace remarks Mrs 
 Marden enquired about his soldier son. 
 
 " He's been made Captain," said Peter Orwyn 
 impressively. " He joined as a simple private 
 and has worked his way up." 
 
 " How splendid ! You must be proud of 
 him." 
 
 :< I am indeed. I pray for him every day and 
 have no fear at all for his safety." 
 
 " I came to feel rather like that about my 
 boy," said Mrs Marden. " And yet he was 
 killed." 
 
 ' Whatever happens to Harry I shall not be 
 disturbed or distressed," said Orwyn firmly. 
 " Even if he were to be killed I should not lose 
 him." 
 
 Mrs Marden sat looking fixedly at him. She 
 was remembering her thought by the fire about 
 the test. This man looked very sincere. And 
 surely if he were not sincere he could not speak 
 like that about one whom he certainly loved and 
 who must be often in danger.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 131 
 
 " You would lose his bodily presence for so 
 long as you lived on earth," she said. " Is 
 that nothing? " 
 
 " It is a great deal. And yet how very little 
 when we remember that the spirit is what we 
 love in anyone, and that the spirit is not lost to 
 us." 
 
 She was silent and moved her hands restlessly. 
 He said nothing more and sat still looking at 
 her. 
 
 " Mr Orwyn, I want to come to Hornton 
 Street again," she said at length, with a sort 
 of half-ashamed reluctance. 
 
 "Why?" he asked. 
 
 " I have nothing to do and I miss the sit- 
 tings." 
 
 " Do you look upon them as a form of 
 diversion then?" he said, she thought rather 
 severely. 
 
 " I miss them. That is all I can say. Will 
 you allow me to come again? " 
 
 " I don't know why I should have any ob- 
 jection. I wish to be helpful. But to tell the 
 truth, Mrs Marden, I don't quite understand 
 your attitude towards me." 
 
 ' I wish to sit with you again ; but not with 
 Lady Terrerton of course after what hap- 
 pened."
 
 132 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Yes, yes. She was carried away, poor 
 lady." 
 
 " I wish you to allow me to bring a friend, 
 a Miss King. She is coming here in a moment." 
 
 " Is she a believer? " 
 
 " She has never been to a sitting. She be- 
 lieves in a future life." 
 
 Orwyn made no comment on this but said, 
 after a slight pause, 
 
 " My impression is that you believe much 
 more than you admit to yourself, Mrs Marden. 
 I think you are one of those who struggle 
 against their own tendencies to believe, even 
 perhaps against their own secret convictions 
 as if those convictions were enemies." 
 
 ' Why do you think so? " she said, reddening. 
 
 " I know it is so ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 " How can you know? " 
 
 " Because, with your type of character and 
 brain, if it were not so you would not wish 
 to have anything more to do with me. If you 
 really thought me an impostor you would have 
 done with me long ago, and quite rightly. 
 Something obstinate, something perverse in you, 
 tries not to believe, but you do believe." 
 
 He spoke with powerful authority, looking 
 steadily at her. 
 
 " I cannot believe that spirits play the con-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 133 
 
 certina," she said. " Why should they do such 
 a thing? " 
 
 " As a means of making known their pres- 
 ence." 
 
 " But I don't want to be convinced of it in 
 such a way." 
 
 " What is it that draws you back to the 
 sittings then? " 
 
 She looked down. The flush was still on her 
 face. 
 
 " It's a a voice," she murmured. 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I miss it. I seem more lonely without it." 
 
 " It must be the voice of your son," he said, 
 with deep gravity. ' Thank God, if I have 
 been enabled to be the channel through which 
 it has uttered words of comfort to you." 
 
 " I don't say it is. I don't know at all 
 but I want to hear it again. I " 
 
 Before she could say anything more Miss 
 King was announced. 
 
 Mrs Marden saw Orwyn cast a penetrating 
 glance at the secretary as she came in. He was 
 surely a shrewd judge of character, she thought. 
 She introduced him to Miss King and they 
 talked together for a few minutes. Peter Orwyn 
 was rather communicative, but Mrs Marden 
 noticed that Miss King, while seemingly frank
 
 134 MRS HARDEN 
 
 and friendly in manner and words, gave no 
 information about herself, her circumstances, 
 her private affairs, to the medium. When he 
 spoke of his sons she listened with sympathy 
 but no mention of relations or friends came 
 from her. She was evidently on her guard. 
 
 Presently Orwyn's curious profession was al- 
 luded to and Mrs Marden asked if a sitting 
 could be arranged for her and Miss King. 
 Orwyn looked rather dubious. 
 
 " I don't know I don't think there would 
 he enough power," he said. " I should need a 
 fourth person to complete the circle. Perhaps 
 Mr Burnley would come. You would have no 
 objection, I suppose?" 
 
 "No," said Mrs Marden. "I like Mr 
 Burnley." 
 
 " Very well. I will see if I can arrange it." 
 
 And he turned the conversation to the sub- 
 ject of the war. It seemed to Mrs Marden that 
 he was perhaps trying to discover whether Miss 
 King had suffered any loss through it. He 
 did not ask her any questions, or show any 
 curiosity, but he gave Miss King two or three 
 openings for information which she did not take 
 advantage of. 
 
 When he had said good-bye and gone away 
 Mrs Marden said,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 135 
 
 "Do you like him?" 
 
 " I think I do." 
 
 "Does he inspire you with confidence?" 
 
 " He looks a genuine sort of man." 
 
 " I noticed that you were very careful not 
 to tell him anything about yourself. That was 
 wise of you. Did you think he was trying to 
 find out anything? " 
 
 " I don't know that he was. But I daresay 
 people do often tell mediums a good deal, 
 perhaps almost unconsciously. From what I 
 have heard a good many hand-readers learn 
 from their clients almost as much as they tell 
 them." 
 
 " I wonder if I am a fool to begin again," 
 said Mrs Marden. " But oh, Miss King, one 
 does long so to catch on to something! " 
 
 She got up and moved restlessly about the 
 room. 
 
 " I would give anything to be convinced that 
 my boy is still alive somewhere!" she ex- 
 claimed. ' That he still thinks of me, wants 
 me. I want him so terribly." 
 
 Suddenly she broke down and cried. 
 
 ' Without any belief, any hope, such grief 
 as mine is unbearable," she said, desperately 
 through her tears. "And yet I don't want 
 to be deceived. But sometimes I would give
 
 136 MRS HARDEN 
 
 anything almost not to have that cold some- 
 thing in the brain which resists what might 
 be consolation. He says I secretly do be- 
 lieve, but that I am perverse and fight against 
 my own convictions. I wonder if I do? " 
 
 She gazed almost hungrily at Miss King. 
 Her tear-stained face looked quite old. The 
 secretary got up, took her hand gently and 
 kissed her. 
 
 " Something will come to give you help," 
 she said. " I am sure of that. And perhaps 
 it will come when you least expect it, and 
 from the last quarter where you would be 
 likely to look for it. That often happens. 
 Sometimes a very little thing, what seems a 
 mere trifle, brings about a great change in 
 & human being. So it may be with you. But 
 I wish you would pray for it." 
 
 " He says he prays." 
 
 "Mr Orwyn?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I shall pray for you," said Miss King. 
 " It may do no good. I can't tell. But when 
 I look at you I feel I must do it." 
 
 Mrs Marden squeezed her hand almost con- 
 vulsively and then hurried out of the room.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 SOME weeks later Mrs Marden felt that 
 the great change spoken of by Miss King 
 had come to her, though not perhaps from 
 the last quarter where she was likely to look 
 for it. Arthur Burnley had told her to be 
 obstinate, to go on. She had obeyed him. 
 She had been obstinate in sitting with Peter 
 Orwyn when she was sceptical, doubtful, won- 
 dering, when finally she was wavering be- 
 tween unbelief and belief. And at last she 
 had been rewarded. Gradually in repeated 
 sittings her desire to believe had grown in 
 strength till it had become almost an ob- 
 session. Each time the lights were switched 
 off in Orwyn's narrow room, and darkness 
 swallowed up the medium and his compan- 
 ions, she said to herself silently, but with 
 urgency, " I want to believe, I want to be- 
 lieve." Each time the young soldier-like voice 
 spoke she listened to it more acutely, strain- 
 ing her ears, asking herself, " Is it his voice? 
 Could it be the voice of some other young 
 
 137
 
 138 MRS HARDEN 
 
 soldier, of any typical young soldier? Or 
 has it the individual, the absolutely personal 
 quality which only my boy's voice had? " And 
 she strove to find testing questions to ask 
 it. She spoke to it of small matters known 
 only to Ronald and herself, and several times 
 she obtained replies containing allusions to 
 intimate things, little jokes, little happenings 
 in which Ronald and she had shared. 
 
 One night an absurd memory rose in her 
 mind. 
 
 She had gone with Ronald to Covent Gar- 
 den to see a performance of the Russian bal- 
 let. The ballet was " Thamar." Two elderly 
 ladies, evidently sisters, had sat just in front 
 of them, and during the barbaric terrors of 
 the very un-English story so fiercely brought 
 out by the incomparable company, had con- 
 tinually made comments described by Ronald 
 as " priceless ". At the close of the ballet 
 when Karsavina, raising her weary form on 
 the great pile of cushions, had gazed with her 
 dark and lustful eyes towards the ravine where 
 travellers passed by her castle, had lifted her- 
 self up, raised her white arm, and waved slowly 
 the beckoning handkerchief, one of the sisters 
 had exclaimed to the other, 
 
 ' Where is her sense of shame, Mary? Why
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 139 
 
 the other one has hardly had time to get 
 cold yet, and there she is at it again! " 
 
 ' You may well ask ! " the other had re- 
 plied. " Now if you or I were to use our 
 handkerchiefs for any such purposes we should 
 soon have to answer to the police. Nice doings, 
 I must say! " 
 
 And thereupon the two had risen and 
 trampled virtuously in the direction of Bow 
 Street. 
 
 And then Mrs Marden and Ronald had 
 given themselves up to laughter. 
 
 With this memory in her mind Mrs Mar- 
 den said to the voice, 
 
 " Do you remember what happened when 
 we went to the Russian ballet together to 
 see 'Thamar'?" 
 
 There was a short silence. Then the laugh 
 came out of the darkness, the hearty laugh of 
 a young man. 
 
 " Shall I ever forget it? " said the voice. 
 And again the laugh sounded through the 
 room. 
 
 At that moment Mrs Marden was convinced. 
 Something within her said, " That laugh was 
 Ronald's. It is Ronald's voice that speaks. 
 He does come. He does talk to me. It 
 isn't all nonsense. It isn't imagination! I'm
 
 140 MRS HARDEN 
 
 not being tricked and I'm not tricking my- 
 self." 
 
 The change within her, which she thought 
 had taken place abruptly, was tremendous, 
 like a blow, shattering mercilessly the resist- 
 ance of that cold thing in her brain, shattering 
 her perversity, breaking down the barriers 
 which she had set up, or which had been set 
 up by her own temperament without her will 
 being concerned in the matter, between her- 
 self and the happiness she had never thought 
 to possess. It was as if what had been ice 
 suddenly melted and warm streams gushed 
 forth. She was physically affected as people 
 often are who undergo what is called con- 
 version. She trembled; her heart beat vio- 
 lently; her hands and her head were hot as 
 if fever had taken hold of her. 
 
 She did not tell Peter Orwyn what had 
 happened to her that night. Possibly, how- 
 ever, he divined it. She thought those dark 
 steady eyes of his could look deep into peo- 
 ple. He was not a very well educated man, 
 but he was naturally intelligent, and had seen 
 many human beings stirred by emotion. He 
 surely could not miss the almost wild move- 
 ment of her soul. But in truth she cared 
 very little either way just then.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 141 
 
 She went away from Orwyn's house with 
 Miss King and Arthur Burnley. It was late 
 springtime now. 
 
 " Let us walk home," she said. 
 
 " But I ought to take the train at the 
 High Street Station," said Miss King. 
 
 " Come home with me and I'll put you 
 up for the night," said Mrs Marden. 
 
 But I've got nothing with me! " 
 
 " I'll give you all you need. Do come. I 
 want you to-night." 
 
 " Thank you. Then I will come." 
 
 They walked on down the quiet street and 
 turned the corner into the busier High Street 
 of Kensington. Because it was wartime the 
 lamps were darkened. In a gloom that was 
 sombre, almost sinister, the taxicabs went 
 carefully by. Pedestrians, most of them with 
 anxious, preoccupied faces there had been 
 many air raids on London trod cautiously 
 through the blackness going to houses which 
 might be smashed to pieces at any moment. 
 There was the uneasiness of war in the at- 
 mosphere although the enemy was on the 
 other side of the sea. 
 
 Mrs Marden had often felt the war dark- 
 ness of London at night like a heavy load 
 laid upon her individually and bending her
 
 142 MRS HARDEN 
 
 towards the abyss. A nausea of depression 
 had come upon her many times as she made 
 her way home from Peter Orwyn's. For gen- 
 erally she had been conscious of a strong 
 reaction after the sittings, which had marked 
 the physical excitement engendered by them. 
 To-night the war darkness was there but it no 
 longer pressed her down. She seemed able 
 to pierce through it and to catch a glimpse 
 of something beyond. Formerly she had 
 looked .at the shadow pedestrians moving 
 through the obscure London ways with a feel- 
 ing of abject pity which had included her- 
 self. They were doomed and she too was 
 doomed. That had been her thought. Now 
 she saw them as travellers passing onwards 
 through temporary darkness towards eventual 
 light, and though pity did not utterly die in 
 her it was mitigated. For she felt, as she 
 supposed all truly religious people felt, that 
 the misery of life, like the blackness of night, 
 would end in a brilliance, in joy, in dawn. 
 What a marvellous difference that feeling made, 
 changing the whole world in a moment! She 
 remembered Peter Orwyn's words, " You are 
 being educated; that's all." She had heard 
 them with a sense of almost bitter contempt, 
 even of impotent anger, without any belief
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 143 
 
 in their truth. But he had known more than 
 she had. And even Diana Terrerton had 
 known more, in spite of her pitiable hysteria. 
 Suddenly Mrs Harden was passionately grate- 
 ful to Lady Terrerton; she had wanted to 
 hand on her blessings and she had done it. 
 
 " I must tell her! " Mrs Marden said to her- 
 self. "To-morrow I'll tell her." 
 
 She was walking between her two com- 
 panions in silence. Now she looked at Miss 
 King. As she did so Miss King looked at 
 her and said, 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " I feel happy to-night. And it's it's so 
 extraordinary to feel happy again. I never 
 thought- 
 She stopped speaking; she could not go 
 on. Tears had come into her eyes. She 
 turned towards Arthur Burnley. He was 
 walking with his eyes looking straight ahead, 
 apparently immersed in thought. After tak- 
 ing a moment to regain complete control of 
 her emotion she said, 
 
 " Mr Burnley, you were right." 
 
 His keen eyes searched her for an instant 
 in the obscurity. Then he said, 
 
 4 You have got rid of your scepticism!" 
 
 " Yes."
 
 144 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " It was a disease in you. Now you're 
 sound." 
 
 "But why has it gone so suddenly? I 
 can't understand." 
 
 ' We never can. We aren't meant to. I 
 don't know why. We are as ignorant in our 
 joy as we are in our misery. But, mind, I 
 don't say I agree with you." 
 
 ' What do you mean? " 
 
 " About the suddenness. I think you have 
 been very slowly drawn along to the truth. 
 That's often the way. We travel towards a 
 goal without being aware that we are moving. 
 The soul isn't like the body. It's finer, but 
 duller, too. It's deceived, or it deceives it- 
 self, much oftener than the body is deceived, 
 or deceives. I've felt your progress and I'm 
 not a bit surprised. But then I've trodden 
 the same path as you have." 
 
 Miss King had been listening to this con- 
 versation intently. Now she said, 
 
 " I'm very thankful for you, Mrs Marden." 
 
 There was something in her tone which went 
 to her friend's heart. Mrs Marden and she 
 had of course many times discussed all that 
 had happened in Hornton Street, and Miss 
 King's invariable conclusion about the mani- 
 festations had been that she couldn't make up
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 145 
 
 her mind what their origin was. She, like 
 Mrs Marden, was unable to believe that Or- 
 wyn was a charlatan. She liked him; she 
 thought him sincere. But on the other hand 
 she thought it probable that he was self-de- 
 ceived about his own powers and capacities. 
 She had a methodical mind, and was by na- 
 ture very thorough in everything she under- 
 took. She applied her brains with a sort of 
 calm and unhumourous energy to the task in 
 hand, whatever it was. And she had done this 
 to the Hornton Street task, noting carefully 
 everything that occurred with a still determin- 
 ation not to be " carried away ", yet with- 
 out any of the obstinacy which led Mrs Mar- 
 den often to resistance and distrust of im- 
 pressions. In her leisure hours, when the 
 day's work was done, and she was alone in 
 her little rooms, she had read several stand- 
 ard works dealing with occultism, psychical 
 research and the strange powers of the sub- 
 conscious mind. One of them, written by a 
 brilliant and logical American, had greatly 
 impressed her. And, though always open- 
 minded and indeed anxious to believe, she was 
 inclined to think that Orwyn was a genuine 
 man with genuine powers possessed by very 
 few people, who perhaps, indeed probably,
 
 146 MRS HARDEN 
 
 mistook the nature of his own powers, and 
 attributed to released spirits occurrences which 
 in reality had their origin in mysterious, but 
 purely human, energies which he knew noth- 
 ing of. Since she had joined in the sittings there 
 had been few of those manifestations which 
 have been laughed at by the incredulous world 
 for years, which have been reproduced by con- 
 jurers and exposed by clever and cynical men 
 to the delight of sensation lovers. The in- 
 struments of music had lain hidden in Peter 
 Orwyn's bureau. The luminous faces had not 
 been visible. But the table had turned and 
 risen from the floor; rappings had been audible; 
 lights had flashed; voices had spoken; and 
 Peter Orwyn had several times written auto- 
 matically. When apparently entranced he had 
 also answered questions addressed to him by 
 the sitters. All this had deeply interested Miss 
 King, but she had never felt convinced, she did 
 not feel convinced now, that spirit agencies had 
 been at work using the medium. On the other 
 hand she did not feel positive that such agen- 
 cies could have had nothing to do with the 
 manifestations. 
 
 One thing, however, she had specially re- 
 marked; and that was that scarcely anything 
 which occurred seemed to have any reference
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 147 
 
 to herself. So far as she was aware Peter 
 Orwyn still knew nothing whatever about her 
 except that she was the secretary, and now the 
 friend, of Mrs Marden. She had never been 
 tempted to depart from the rigid reserve about 
 her private life which she had shown when she 
 had first made Orwyn's acquaintance. She 
 liked him; she had always been friendly, even 
 cordial, to him; but she had never told him 
 anything. Had this reserve of hers had any- 
 thing to do with the medium's reserve to- 
 wards herself, displayed by the absence of 
 reference to her life and her longings from 
 the revelations in Hornton Street? 
 
 She had often wondered about this; she 
 wondered about it now. 
 
 As they walked on together, skirting Ken- 
 sington Gardens and the Park, Mrs Marden 
 and Burnley talked together, and Miss King 
 now and then joined in. But that night for 
 the first time she felt a little " out of it " with 
 these two, as a sceptic may feel when in com- 
 pany with ardent believers. She was glad, 
 she was even thankful, at the change in her 
 friend, but she could not help wishing she 
 shared it. 
 
 Burnley walked with them as far as Hans 
 Place and then said good-night. He refused
 
 148 MRS HARDEN 
 
 to enter the house. As he shook hands with 
 Miss King he said to her, 
 
 " Miss King, I like your sincerity. You 
 neither rush forward into things, nor hold back 
 from them. You will never be a victim." 
 
 "A victim, Mr Burnley!" she said, blush- 
 ing slightly. 
 
 " Either of credulity or scepticism. I think 
 three quarters of the world are the victims of 
 one or the other. Good-night, Mrs Marden. 
 This has been a great night ! " 
 
 He shook her hand warmly. 
 
 " Getting to truth it's like warming cold 
 hands at a fire, isn't it? " 
 
 " Yes," she said. 
 
 He took off his hat and walked away into the 
 darkness. 
 
 As the two women went into the house Mrs 
 Marden said, 
 
 " He's right about you, Emily. Are you 
 still doubtful?" 
 
 " I still feel as I have always felt. But 
 I am thankful for the change in you." 
 
 :f I can scarcely understand it. It's all come 
 so suddenly." 
 
 " No, I don't think so. I've been expecting 
 it for some time." 
 
 Mrs Marden stood still in the hall.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 149 
 
 "Have you gone on praying about me?" 
 
 "Yes." * 
 
 " Can it be that? Have I been wrong, 
 perhaps, in all my disbeliefs? " 
 
 There was deep enquiry in her eyes as she 
 looked at her friend. 
 
 ' To-night everything seems different," she 
 added. " It's so wonderful to feel sure that 
 Ronald is alive. Tell me, are you convinced 
 that the man you loved is alive somewhere?" 
 
 ' Yes. But I was convinced of that before 
 I went to Mr Orwyn's." 
 
 " And going has made no difference at all 
 to you?" 
 
 " None at all about anything of that kind." 
 
 " It was an instinct that told you? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " And I had no such instinct and yet now 
 I believe. How utterly different you and I 
 must be ! " 
 
 c Yes, I suppose we are." 
 
 That evening they sat together for a long 
 time before going to bed. Miss King listened 
 with the liveliest sympathy to Mrs Marden's 
 expression of the new-found happiness, and 
 yet, strangely, perhaps, all the time they were 
 sitting together she felt that she, unconverted 
 by Peter Orwyn, was more firmly anchored
 
 150 MRS HARDEN 
 
 to truth than her friend now converted. No 
 one had come to her in Peter Orwyn's room; 
 no voice had spoken to her. The man whom she 
 loved and had lost had given her no sign that 
 he was now anything but the dust of what had 
 once been a humble hero. But within her, 
 far down in the depth of her, she held a 
 certainty that the life given so readily, almost 
 indeed with eagerness, for a man's native land, 
 had not been lost but found when the body 
 fell. And she knew that no event in her own 
 life could rob her of this certainty or destroy 
 it in her. Was Mrs Marden, even now, as 
 safe as she was; she who did not need the 
 strange happenings at any seance to make her 
 believe? Some words from the Bible came into 
 her mind : ' Blessed are they who have not 
 seen and yet have believed ". She could not 
 help at that moment applying them to herself, 
 and drawing a mental comparison between 
 Thomas and Mrs Marden, who having heard 
 had at last come to belief. Mrs Marden had a 
 great deal more of most of the things thought 
 desirable by the average man and woman than 
 she, humble Emily King, had. And now this 
 conviction that she had spoken with the dead, 
 had had a direct proof of the after existence 
 was added to her. Yet Emily King felt
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 151 
 
 herself to be the richer, the more fortunate 
 of the two women linked in intimacy by mis- 
 fortune. So great is it not to need proof! 
 So great is it to guide your course by the 
 stars instead of by the lights men can kindle 
 and men can put out! 
 
 It was in the summer of that year that 
 Peter Orwyn's name became notorious in the 
 newspapers. Cecil Hammond was the origina- 
 tor of the campaign which caused such heart- 
 burning and anger in spiritualistic circles. He 
 was as he had said a keen student of the 
 various movements of his time, and was not 
 to be deterred by sarcasm or even by ridicule 
 from going deeply into any subject that en- 
 gaged the attention of his hungry mind. But 
 he was a man who could be as ruthless as he 
 was intellectually inquisitive, and there was 
 nothing he hated so much as being made a 
 fool of. There was a good deal of conceit in 
 his composition, and if his conceit were injured 
 he was capable of being very disagreeable, at 
 times even dangerous. 
 
 Mrs Marden had not seen Hammond again 
 since her sittings with Lady Terrerton had 
 come to lan end, but his view of Orwyn had 
 never led her to expect that he would, in the 
 common phrase, " turn against " him. Con-
 
 152 MRS HARDEN 
 
 sequently she was both surprised and shocked 
 when one day Burnley told her that Hammond 
 had become the sworn enemy of those who 
 practised spiritualism, and especially of Peter 
 Orwyn. 
 
 "Why?" she asked. 
 
 " He has come to the conclusion that Orwyn 
 is a charlatan and a danger to society," said 
 Burnley. " Hammond knows all sorts of peo- 
 ple. Some time ago he made the acquaintance 
 of Larrington." 
 
 "Larrington! do you mean the famous con- 
 jurer? " 
 
 ' Yes. And Larrington, it seems, has con- 
 vinced him that Orwyn's manifestations can 
 all be reproduced by ingenious trickery!" 
 
 ' They can't. There can be no trick which 
 could cause voices which we know to speak 
 to us." 
 
 " Of course not. But Hammond is deter- 
 mined to get up a campaign against the whole 
 thing, and especially against Orwyn." 
 
 "Does Mr Orwyn know?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Is he how does he take it? " 
 
 " He seems quite undisturbed so far as He 
 personally is concerned. But he seems vexed 
 and anxious on account of his son."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 153 
 
 " Captain Orwyn? " 
 
 ' Yes. His son has done, and is doing, 
 splendidly in the war, and it would be hard 
 on him to have his father publicly held up 
 to contempt. You know what it is in a regi- 
 ment. I'm disgusted with Hammond, but 
 there's no stopping him, I'm afraid." 
 
 He looked at her, and she saw by his ex- 
 pression that he was considering something 
 with which his mind connected her. 
 
 " I can't stop him," he said. 
 
 " Do you think anyone else could ? " 
 
 " I wonder." 
 
 "Lady Terrerton 
 
 " Oh no! He thinks her a fool." 
 
 " Probably he thinks all women are fools." 
 
 " He's too clever for that." 
 
 "What is it?" she asked. 
 
 ' Well, Orwyn wondered whether you could 
 do something. You were a long time in being 
 convinced, but he did convince you. That 
 might possibly weigh with Hammond." 
 
 " I'll see Mr Hammond," she said with de- 
 cision. " I owe everything to Mr Orwyn. He 
 has changed my whole life. I would try any- 
 thing for him. And I know what he feels for 
 his son. Where does Mr Hammond live? " 
 
 Burnley told her.
 
 154 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " I'll do my utmost to stop him," she said. 
 
 She wrote to Cecil Hammond that day and 
 asked him to come and see her. She was 
 quite frank about her reason for wishing to 
 meet him again. He answered politely by 
 return of post fixing an hour for a call, and 
 punctually to the moment he walked into her 
 drawing-room. 
 
 "I'm glad to meet you again, Mr Ham- 
 mond," she said, greeting him cordially. 
 
 He smiled. 
 
 " That's good of you! Especially as I'm 
 afraid we are now in opposite camps." 
 
 " I think you and I can even be in opposite 
 camps without being personal enemies," she said 
 lightly. 
 
 His observant eyes were fixed upon her, 
 and she noticed an expression of surprise flit 
 over his clever face. 
 
 " You are wondering," she said. " I know 
 why." 
 
 "Why then?" 
 
 " Because I am looking so much happier 
 than I was when you saw me last.*' 
 
 " Perhaps that is it." 
 
 She sat down not far from a window. 
 
 "I can bear the light on me now," she 
 said. " That means a good deal."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 155 
 
 He sat near her. 
 
 " You know why I want to have a talk 
 with you," she continued. " It's about Mr 
 Orwyn. You have become his enemy." 
 
 " Hardly that." 
 
 " His opponent then." 
 
 " I'm the opponent of all flagrant insin- 
 cerity," he said inflexibly. 
 
 ' That's a man's part, I think. But now 
 tell me something. And please be sincere 
 yourself. Do you think me a fool ? " 
 
 "My dear Mrs Marden! " 
 
 "No, no! Do you?" 
 
 " I do not." 
 
 " Really I am not as determined to believe 
 all I should like to believe as Diana Terrerton 
 is." 
 
 "Oh Lady Terrerton!" He paused. "I 
 know that," he added. 
 
 " She and I are friends again," said Mrs 
 Marden. " I am grateful to her." 
 
 " She is a very kind, foolish woman. And 
 that's to her credit!" 
 
 1 Yes. I wish you would tell me why you 
 are determined to attack Mr Orwyn." 
 
 " I will. It's because I have become con- 
 vinced that he makes money by trickery." 
 
 " How have you become convinced? "
 
 156 MRS HARDEN 
 
 He replied by another question. 
 
 " How have you become convinced that the 
 manifestations he produces are genuine, are 
 what he claims that they are ? " 
 
 She hesitated for a moment. 
 
 " It's very difficult to explain in a sensible 
 way," she said. " I think I almost resisted my 
 own inclination to believe. I hated so many of 
 the manifestations. They seemed to me ridicu- 
 lous. I even told Mr Orwyn so." 
 
 "What did he say to that?" 
 
 ' Well, he didn't say much. But those 
 manifestations ceased." 
 
 "Ah!" 
 
 " He didn't bring out the tambourine and 
 those other things. He didn't enter the cab- 
 inet." 
 
 ' You mean you didn't sit any more for mani- 
 festations? " 
 
 " No, we didn't." 
 
 " Very accommodating of Mr Orwyn ! Now 
 let me tell you something before you go on. 
 Larrington, the conjurer, is an acquaintance 
 of mine. I have got to know him very well 
 lately. He has reproduced for me in private 
 everything Orwyn does at the seances; the feats 
 of levitation, the appearances, the floating tam- 
 bourine, the flashing lights, the rappings on
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 157 
 
 pictures and furniture, the touching hands 
 everything. And not only that. Under the 
 seal of secrecy he has shown me exactly how 
 all these things are done." 
 
 " Mr Larrington cannot have reproduced 
 everything Mr Orwyn accomplishes, no, that 
 is the wrong word I mean everything that 
 happens at the seances. What convinced me 
 was a voice." 
 
 "Oh the voices!" 
 
 He spoke with a strong note of contempt. 
 
 " Mr Hammond, do you mean to tell me 
 you can't recognise the voice of anyone you 
 care for?" 
 
 ' Voices are often very much alike." 
 
 ' Wouldn't you recognise even my voice, 
 which you haven't heard very often, in the dark? 
 Can't we recognise voices even when they speak 
 through the telephone not always but very 
 often?" 
 
 ' Your voice, Mrs Marden, happens to be 
 very distinctive, as Ellen Terry's voice is, 
 but as only comparatively few voices are. And 
 they, I have remarked, are usually the voices 
 of women. Take actors, for instance. I know 
 the English stage pretty well, but I doubt if 
 I should be certain to recognise with my eyes 
 shut the voices of the actors I have heard again
 
 158 MRS HARDEN 
 
 and again. I will make one exception. Charles 
 Wyndham had a voice so peculiar that I think 
 I could have been practically certain it was 
 his if I had heard it without seeing him." 
 
 " But the voice of somebody one one loves ! " 
 
 " I don't think love is always accurate in 
 its perceptions. Besides forgive me you 
 heard a voice with me several times without 
 being convinced." 
 
 ' Yes, I know. But I always thought it 
 like my boy's voice." 
 
 * The voices of young soldiers are extraor- 
 dinarily alike. Haven't you noticed that? If 
 you belonged to any club they frequent such 
 as the Bath Club for instance you would 
 certainly have remarked it." 
 
 " I have remarked it. I thought exactly as 
 you do. I was very reluctant to believe. I 
 think I even fought against a growing con- 
 viction that I was listening to to my son's 
 voice." 
 
 " May I ask how you became convinced ? " 
 
 " It seemed to be quite sudden. One night 
 I knew!" 
 
 " But what made you know? That's the 
 point." 
 
 " It wasn't desire. Or I should have known, 
 or thought I knew, much sooner."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 159 
 
 Hammond pursed his firm lips. 
 
 " Why does one know a thing suddenly? " 
 she said. "How can I explain? Light seerns 
 to break on one. Conviction comes like a 
 thief in the night." 
 
 " It seems to have been as abrupt as St. 
 Paul's conversion," he observed, with a faint 
 smile. " But then conversion sometimes shakes 
 a crowd at a revival meeting, doesn't it? 
 And I'm afraid that doesn't prove very much." 
 
 ' You think I'm a victim of hysteria, per- 
 haps?" 
 
 " Oh, I wouldn't say that. But I have 
 come to the conclusion that seances are very 
 unwholesome, that they act noxiously upon the 
 body in many cases, and through the body in- 
 fluence the mind. These mediums, I'm sure, 
 are aware of that, count upon it as a point in 
 their favour. Most evil things breed best in 
 the dark." 
 
 " I know my son has spoken to me," she 
 said simply. 
 
 " I am sure you are quite genuine in your 
 conviction." 
 
 " But that doesn't convince you at all." 
 
 " I'm afraid it doesn't." 
 
 '' I don't know why it should really. But 
 I thought I ought to tell you."
 
 160 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Has this voice ever said anything extra- 
 ordinary to you? Has it ever given you what 
 you might consider an absolute proof of iden- 
 tity?" 
 
 " It has spoken of things only my son arid 
 I knew." 
 
 " But you knew them! " 
 
 ' You think Mr Orwyn is a thought-reader? " 
 
 " There are scientific men, I understand, 
 who deny the possibility of telepathy. But I 
 have convinced myself that telepathy is possi- 
 ble, and that many of these mediums are 
 thought-readers. The same thing may be 
 said of all successful hand-readers, I believe. 
 Has that voice ever told you anything about 
 your son which you did not know, and which 
 you were afterwards able to ascertain was 
 true in every particular? " 
 
 After a pause she said, 
 
 " I don't think I don't remember that it 
 has." 
 
 " Then it hasn't. Now if I were you I 
 should try to get such a proof, but I am 
 afraid you never will. And now tell me, 
 what do you think about all these demon- 
 strations of Orwyn's which a conjurer can re- 
 duplicate in every particular?" 
 
 " I suppose even a genuine manifestation
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 161 
 
 might in some cases be imitated by means 
 of a trick." 
 
 " Then you don't think that that part of 
 Orwyn's performance, or whatever you like 
 to call it, was accomplished by trickery?" 
 
 "I don't know. How can I know? But 
 I do know that Mr Larrington could not 
 bring to my ears the voice of my son, or 
 to my my heart the certainty that he was 
 speaking to me. No conjurer could ever do 
 that." 
 
 " I see you are really of the faith," said 
 Hammond. ' Well, I ought not to be sur- 
 prised. Nothing in human beings ought to 
 surprise us. An atheist turns believer. A 
 monk flees the monastery and preaches the 
 negation of God. I have known the case of 
 a Roman Catholic mother who became a 
 Protestant, abjuring the errors of Rome. She 
 brought up her daughter as a Protestant. At 
 the age of sixteen that daughter verted to 
 the religion the mother had renounced. Law- 
 rence Oliphant, one of the cleverest men of his 
 time, became a follower of the Prophet Harris. 
 Hundreds of thousands believe in Mrs Eddy 
 more than they believe in the Bible. The mul- 
 titudes of members of ' The League of the 
 Silver Star ' look to a lively little Indian in
 
 162 MRS HARDEN 
 
 tweeds, who may be seen lunching at Claridge's, 
 as the reincarnation of the Christ. Even Mark 
 Twain could not kill Christian Science and I 
 shall certainly not be able to kill spiritualism. 
 But the fight is the thing that counts, not the 
 victory." 
 
 ' Then you are determined to attack Mr 
 Orwyn?" 
 
 "I am." 
 
 " I want you not to attack him." 
 
 " Because you believe in him? " 
 
 "He has brought a great happiness into my 
 life." 
 
 " I can see that." 
 
 " But you want to take it from me? " 
 
 " I have no wish to hurt you personally. 
 Why should I ? The whole thing is not a ques- 
 tion of individuals but simply of what is truth 
 and what is fraud. Besides if what you be- 
 lieve is true and what I believe is false, how 
 can any attack of mine do any harm to you? 
 My experience tells me that any attack upon 
 truth merely brings it more clearly into the 
 light. Therefore if I attack Peter Orwyn and 
 he is genuine his position will be strengthened. 
 I am sure you see that." 
 
 " I think you know how to argue much 
 better than I do."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 163 
 
 Cecil Hammond crossed his legs looking 
 pleased with himself, but he said politely, 
 
 " I really don't think so, Mrs Harden, I 
 really don't think so. You know very well how 
 to stand up for your friends." 
 
 " I don't want to argue," she said earnestly. 
 " I wish to make an appeal to you. We differ, 
 I know, about Peter Orwyn, but I'm sure we 
 shall agree about the debt we owe to the men 
 who are fighting for us, to our soldiers in 
 France." 
 
 Hammond's eyebrows went up. 
 
 "Our soldiers!" he said. "I'm afraid I 
 don't see what they have to do with this 
 question." 
 
 " Mr Orwyn has a soldier son. He joined 
 the forces as a Private. He has behaved 
 gallantly. He has done so well that recently 
 he has been made a Captain." 
 
 " That's all to his credit. I have nothing 
 against him." 
 
 " Of course not. Mr Orwyn, I know, is 
 devoted to this son of his." 
 
 " I daresay he is. But Orwyn's private 
 life >' 
 
 " I don't ask you to consider Peter Orwyn. 
 But don't you see how cruelly any scandal in 
 which his name was involved must fall upon
 
 164 MRS HARDEN 
 
 this young fellow who is doing his very best 
 for his country, and for all of us? for you 
 and me among the rest? It would shame him 
 in the regiment, among his comrades, among the 
 men he has to lead and look after. I think it 
 absolutely wrong, ungrateful for any one cf 
 us who lives in comfort and safety far away 
 from the dangers of this hideous war to do 
 anything that might strike at the fair fame, 
 the authority of any soldier who is fighting our 
 battles, and risking his life every day, every 
 hour for us. I am sure you couldn't wish to 
 do such a thing. When I think of my own 
 boy, of all the boys who have died, and are 
 dying now at this very moment for us, I do 
 feel that we owe it to them to be very care- 
 ful of their honour and fair fame. Though 
 we can't fight we can at least hold our tongues 
 if to speak out certain things would bring 
 misery and perhaps even shame upon them. 
 I am sure Peter Orwyn has been a devoted 
 Father and is beloved by his son. I daresay 
 even the money he earns is earned rather for 
 his children than for himself." 
 
 Cecil Hammond's smooth and rather plump 
 cheeks had slowly reddened during this appeal 
 to his feelings. He had uncrossed his legs and 
 leaned forward, looking down at the carpet.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 165 
 
 But now he looked up, and in a hard voice, 
 speaking more loudly than was his custom, 
 he said, 
 
 " May I put a question to you? " 
 
 " Yes do." 
 
 " Has Mr Orwyn asked you to make this 
 appeal to my feelings?" 
 
 It was Mrs Marden's turn to redden. 
 
 " He has not personally asked me," she said. 
 
 " But he has indirectly? " 
 
 " I know it would distress him very much if 
 he were to be the cause of injuring his son 
 at such a moment as this, just as the boy is 
 rising so honourably to the height of his noblest 
 possibilities." 
 
 " He wanted you to approach me," said 
 Hammond. 
 
 She said nothing. 
 
 Hammond sat as if in deep thought for two 
 or three minutes. Then he raised his head, 
 pushed forward his round chin almost aggres- 
 sively, and said with determination, 
 
 :< I'm very sorry, but I can't give in to you 
 in this matter. This rage for spiritualism is 
 doing a lot of harm in London. Ask the 
 nerve doctors if it isn't. Swarms of impostors 
 and charlatans are coining money out of the 
 folly and the emotion of the public. These
 
 166 MRS MARDEN 
 
 people are a positive danger to the community, 
 and Peter Orwyn is one of the worst of them. 
 You spoke just now of the money he earned 
 for his children. But do you mean to tell me 
 that if a man is good to his family that ex- 
 cuses him for gaining money by false pre- 
 tences? Is every criminal to go scot free if 
 he happens to have a son in the army? " 
 
 " Mr Orwyn is not a criminal." 
 
 " In my opinion he's a swindler, and I mean 
 to go for him." 
 
 'What are you going to do?" 
 
 " I'm going to attack him in the papers. 
 If he's genuine he can prosecute me for libel. 
 But I'm quite ready to take the risk of that. 
 And Larrington is going to repudiate all his 
 manifestations at St Patrick's Hall for the 
 benefit of the public." 
 
 Mrs Marden got up, and Hammond followed 
 her example. 
 
 " Very well, Mr Hammond," she said quietly 
 and with no emotion. " I have done my best. 
 I think you are wrong in the line you are 
 taking. But we have different views, and I 
 suppose I have no right to complain of yours. 
 Mr Burnley 
 
 " Arthur Burnley is a fanatic," interrupted 
 Hammond. " You have only got to look at his
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 167 
 
 eyes to see that. Even if Orwyn were pub- 
 licly to confess himself a trickster Burnley 
 wouldn't believe it. But you would." 
 
 He said no more, but shook her by the hand 
 and left her.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 HAMMOND'S attack on Peter Orwyn and the 
 spiritualists was not long in coming. It ap- 
 peared in one of the most widely read London 
 newspapers, informed the public that Larring- 
 ton, the famous conjurer, had undertaken to 
 reproduce at St Patrick's Hall Peter Orwyn's 
 so-called spirit manifestations, and challenged 
 the medium to come forward on the stage to 
 give a test seance under the severest possible 
 conditions, and in the presence of a committee 
 of six eminent men, whose names were given, 
 and who were quite willing to be convinced of 
 the presence of spirits, if Orwyn, or anyone else, 
 could convince them. Two of these men were 
 famous physicians, one was a writer, one a 
 prominent clergyman, and the remaining two 
 were members of Parliament. In the event 
 of Orwyn's not choosing to take up this chal- 
 lenge Hammond invited him to bring an action 
 for libel against his assailant. 
 
 The day after the appearance of the article 
 Mrs Harden paid a visit to Hornton Street 
 and asked if she could see Peter Orwyn. The 
 little maid, who was looking rather scared, 
 said she didn't know, but would see. 
 
 168
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 169 
 
 "Then Mr Orwyn is at home?" said Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 " Yes, Mum," said the maid, " but there's 
 been so many after him to-day, gentlemen from 
 the papers and photograffers. Oh he has been 
 worritted. They want his likeness for the 
 Daily Mirror, Mum, and I don't know what 
 all." 
 
 " I'm his friend. I daresay he'll see me. Just 
 ask him." 
 
 "Yes, Mum, I know." 
 
 She disappeared but soon came back and 
 invited Mrs Marden to come up. 
 
 Mrs Marden was shown into the drawing- 
 room where she was alone for a few minutes. 
 She sat by the window looking towards the 
 back part of the room where stood the round 
 table at which she had so often sat in dim 
 light or in darkness. In the bright sunshine 
 the room looked very commonplace. There was 
 no mystery about it. It was rather bare, clean, 
 and without any pretence of luxury, any sug- 
 gestion of possible hiding-places. It looked 
 like the room of a man moderately well off and 
 quiet unpretentious. Mrs Marden thought it 
 almost touching in its simplicity. 
 
 In this narrow chamber what emotions she 
 had felt, what disgust, what weariness, what
 
 170 MRS HARDEN 
 
 trembling anxiety and hope, finally what in- 
 tensity of joy! Now she sat and stared at 
 it, and remembered Hammond's strange words 
 about Arthur Burnley and herself. If Orwyn 
 were to confess himself a trickster Hammond 
 had said that Burnley wouldn't believe him, 
 and then, fixing his grey eyes upon her, had 
 added" But you would! " 
 
 Of course she would! She couldn't do other- 
 wise. She was no fanatic. But oh, what an 
 agony it would be to have her belief wrenched 
 from her! Something seemed to clutch at her 
 heart strings at the mere thought of it. Such 
 a thing would be like the coming of death to 
 her. 
 
 The coming of death! She thought of her 
 own death, far off no doubt. For she had 
 always been a remarkably healthy woman, and 
 no dangers of battlefields were waiting for her. 
 Again she looked at the table with its polished 
 surface and its rounded pedestal. Then she 
 got up, went over to it, and stood beside it, 
 touching it with the fingers of her right hand. 
 If she were dead and had left behind her on 
 the earth someone who loved her and wanted 
 her terribly could Peter Orwyn summon her 
 here? How could that be? How was such a 
 mystery accomplished? For a moment, while
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 171 
 
 she thought almost coldly, with a sort of austere 
 severity, her own belief astonished herself. In 
 the shades of the night all things seem so 
 much more possible than in the broad sun- 
 light with the motes dancing in through the 
 open windows. And yet she believed. Her 
 long fingers tapped on the slippery wood. 
 Her eyes were bent down. But presently she 
 raised them. It happened that she was stand- 
 ing exactly opposite to a long narrow mirror 
 of very poor design, which was nailed to the 
 distempered wall. She saw all the upper 
 part of her figure and her face in it. She 
 looked. Then she moved away from the 
 table, went to the mirror, stood before it and 
 looked again, not at her face but at her 
 body. 
 
 ' Why how thin I am ! " she thought. 
 
 And she examined herself closely. 
 
 She had always had a beautiful figure, but 
 it had been rather voluptuous than fine drawn. 
 There had been nothing sylph-like about it. 
 Grief, she had noticed, had changed her face. 
 But she had never before noticed that her 
 body had been changed. Now she was almost 
 startled. She had certainly been losing flesh 
 lately. Even her gown did not fit her prop- 
 erly. It was too loose on her.
 
 172 MRS HARDEN 
 
 "Why hasn't Henriette said anything?" she 
 thought. 
 
 And then suddenly she remembered that one 
 day the maid had begun to say something to 
 her about a gown being too large for her, and 
 that she had exclaimed, rather crossly, 
 
 " Oh, don't worry me any more about clothes ! 
 I am sick of clothes! I don't care how I look 
 now." 
 
 So no doubt Henriette had noticed. 
 
 Well, it was natural enough! Ronald's 
 death had brought lines in her face, had stolen 
 away much of her beauty. Now she knew that 
 it had ravaged her figure also. But what did 
 that matter? She no longer lived for the 
 world and the world's opinion. She had 
 travelled away from the masquerade. 
 
 But she still stood there and looked at her 
 figure, and there was something of astonish- 
 ment in her eyes. 
 
 She heard the door opened and turned quickly 
 round. Peter Orwyn came in. He looked 
 tired and, she thought, harassed, but he 
 greeted her with his usual quiet self-posses- 
 sion. 
 
 " I'm so sorry, so disgusted about this at- 
 tack on you," she said quickly. " I don't know 
 why Mr Hammond is so bitter, but I think
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 173 
 
 he's a conceited man, and I suppose he hon- 
 estly believes he has been taken in." 
 
 ' Yes, I daresay he does. It's kind of you 
 to come. Sit down, Mrs Marden." 
 
 ' Thank you. I wanted to show you my 
 sympathy." 
 
 " I know." 
 
 " And something else. I wanted to ask 
 you what you are going to do." 
 
 Peter Orwyn placed his large capable hands 
 on his broad knees. 
 
 " I shall do nothing," he said firmly. 
 
 "Nothing?" 
 
 'Why what would you have me do?" 
 
 " I don't quite know. But surely such an 
 attack in such a paper requires some answer." 
 
 ' Would you expect me to appear on a 
 conjurer's platform before a gaping audience 
 and try to bring the departed as witnesses that 
 I am not a swindler? I couldn't do that." 
 
 " No, of course not." 
 
 " My task is to use my poor powers as a 
 comforter of the bereaved. I am a witness to 
 a great truth. Am I to go upon a platform and 
 let sceptical men tie me up as if I were a 
 malefactor? Am I to enter into a contest with 
 an entertainer? Am I to be given just so 
 many minutes to establish communication with
 
 174 MRS HARDEN 
 
 the world beyond our world? My own pow- 
 ers are a complete mystery to myself. They are 
 not like the powers of a conjurer who practises 
 his tricks, as a dancer practises steps, as a singer 
 practises a part in an opera. Such people 
 know exactly what they can do, and they can 
 be sure of doing it at any time. I can't. I 
 don't even want to. People like Mr Hammond 
 are earthbound. We mustn't blame them, they 
 can't help it. Those who are in touch with 
 great mysteries are always at a disadvantage 
 in a contest with purely practical people. The 
 mystic lives with God, but can he hold his own 
 in an argument with the village doctor? Prob- 
 ably, I might almost say certainly not. It 
 is better for him to be silent. He knows, but 
 it is not given to him to make everyone else 
 know." 
 
 He paused. She noticed that drops of per- 
 spiration glistened on his forehead. He drew 
 out from the breast pocket of his braided coat 
 a large handkerchief and wiped them away. 
 
 " I absolutely understand," she said. ' You 
 are right, I'm sure. And you won't prosecute 
 Mr Hammond for libel?" 
 
 " How can I ? To win my case, to prove that 
 I am not a swindler, I should have to give an 
 exhibition in a court of law."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 175 
 
 " But you could bring witnesses." 
 
 " Do you think an English Judge and Jury 
 would be convinced by them? Besides, Mr 
 Larrington declares he will do by means of 
 tricks what I do here in this room." 
 
 " But he can't do certain things. He can't 
 do what has convinced me." 
 
 ;< It would be no use to prosecute," said 
 Orwyn, " and Mr Hammond knows that. 
 Otherwise he would never have challenged me 
 to do it." 
 
 " But then if you do nothing I mean 
 you will be discredited." 
 
 Again the glistening drops stood out on the 
 medium's red forehead. 
 
 " Not among those whom I have helped, 
 I hope," he said. 
 
 As he spoke his dark eyes rested upon Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 ' You, Lady Terrerton, Mr Burnley and 
 many others you know what I am? You 
 especially, Mrs Marden, I can appeal to in this 
 painful moment, for you were very hard to con- 
 vince. You thought me a charlatan at one 
 time, didn't you? " 
 
 " I was doubtful for a long time." 
 
 " But you are doubtful no longer. 
 
 " No. But may I be perfectly candid? "
 
 176 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Oh yes." 
 
 " Those things Larrington says he will re- 
 produce " 
 
 "Well well?" 
 
 " I've never been convinced about them." 
 
 " What do you mean? " 
 
 " May they not be brought about by some 
 peculiar physical power which might be imi- 
 tated?" 
 
 " I don't know. All I know is that they 
 happen. What makes them happen I could not 
 tell you. My belief is that in my case they are 
 produced by spirit agencies. But I couldn't 
 prove it. And after all the greatest among us 
 live by faith not by works. That is my comfort. 
 The Mr Hammonds will always think faith 
 to be folly, but that does not make it folly." 
 
 " No. But I hate your being discredited. I 
 tried I did my best to stop it." 
 
 " I know, I know. And for the sake of my 
 son, now Captain, I could have wished 
 
 Suddenly his large face was contorted. It 
 twitched for a moment painfully. 
 
 " I'm afraid in the regiment," he said, " that 
 all this the holding of his Father up to ridicule 
 and contempt will will ' 
 
 His deep and strong voice was overclouded 
 with huskiness, and he could not continue.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 177 
 
 "Dear Mr Orwyn! " Mrs Marden said. 
 
 Impulsively she laid her hand on one of his; 
 it was hot and she felt it trembling. 
 
 " That's what troubles me too! " she said. " I 
 told Mr Hammond how you loved your boy. 
 I tried to make him see " 
 
 "Never mind! Never mind! Harry is 
 respected by everyone. He fights like a lion. 
 He's afraid of nothing. All his comrades are 
 loyal to him. Even if they laugh at his Father 
 they won't dare to laugh at him." 
 
 He straightened up in his chair and threw 
 his head back. It was evident to Mrs Marden 
 that he was making a violent effort to reassure 
 himself, to drive away fears which beset him. 
 
 " Don't you think perhaps for Harry's sake 
 you ought to make some answer to Mr Ham- 
 mond? " said Mrs Marden. " I'm sure all those 
 who believe in you will come forward. I would 
 for one. I would gladly write and acknowledge 
 publicly what has convinced me. And so would 
 others surely." 
 
 But Orwyn shook his head. 
 
 " I have thought it all carefully over," he 
 said, " and I have resolved to let it alone. Any 
 protest from me would only make things worse. 
 I should be drawn into a controversy. And I'm 
 no controversialist. But of course if any of
 
 178 MRS HARDEN 
 
 those whom I have helped towards consolation 
 care to do anything I shall be deeply grateful. 
 But I shan't ask them. I shan't ask anyone to 
 stand up for me." 
 
 At this moment there was a tap at the door 
 and the little maid came in and said, 
 
 " If you please, Sir, there's a gentleman from 
 ' The News of the World ' wants to see you 
 very particular." 
 
 Again Orwyn's face was contorted by a 
 spasm. 
 
 " I cannot see anyone. I have nothing to 
 say," he exclaimed. 
 
 Mrs Marden got up and bade him good-bye 
 quickly. When she reached the front door she 
 came upon a very tall and rather impressive 
 young man, who looked at her with sharp curi- 
 osity. 
 
 " Are you from the ' News of the World '.? " 
 she said. 
 
 ' Yes," he said, taking off his hat. 
 
 " Mr Orwyn can't see you 
 
 " No, Sir," said the little maid from behind. 
 
 " But if you care to walk a little way with 
 me I will gladly tell you something about 
 Mr Orwyn which I think may interest 
 you." 
 
 The young man looked keenly alert.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 179 
 
 " That's just what we want," he said. " Our 
 readers 
 
 And he strode away with Mrs Marden while 
 the little maid stared after them with her cap 
 on one side. 
 
 When he found that he could not draw Peter 
 Orwyn into the open Hammond redoubled his 
 attacks. He had wished to provoke a con- 
 troversy and, though Orwyn was silent, he 
 succeeded almost beyond his hopes. Orwyn's 
 adherents, led by Mrs Marden for the young 
 man from " The News of the World " knew his 
 business thoroughly testified in print to the 
 faith that was in them. Lady Terrerton, Arthur 
 Burnley, and many others, wrote to the papers 
 to tell of their experiences in Hornton Street. 
 And the supporters of Hammond held them up 
 to ridicule. The world became aware of the 
 extraordinary number of adherents the be- 
 lievers in spiritualism had gained during the 
 war. They were now quite evidently a com- 
 pact body, numbering earnest people of all 
 classes, who were ready to proclaim them- 
 selves members of something not unlike a new 
 religion. Their strong energy and determina- 
 tion invigorated Hammond. He enlisted not 
 only clergymen but several prominent doctors 
 under his banner; the former to denounce the
 
 180 MRS HARDEN 
 
 modern falling away from the great truths of 
 divinely revealed religion, the latter to proclaim 
 the dangers to health which lay in wait for 
 those who gave themselves to the pernicious ex- 
 citement of seances. 
 
 Peter Orwyn became a sort of symbol. His 
 name was on the lips of every sensation-lover. 
 It became known in the trenches of France. 
 Captain Orwyn wrote home to his Father about 
 the " infernal dust-up ", as he described it, which 
 was being made with the family name. His 
 letter was warm-hearted and affectionate, but 
 it was obvious that he was stung to the quick 
 by the scandal of which his Dad was the centre. 
 He told his Father in blunt soldiers' language 
 that the war had set him more than ever against 
 all the Tommy-rot indulged in by some of the 
 people who stayed at home. * War," he wrote, 
 " makes one think. It knocks all the nonsense 
 out of one. Some chaps it turns to religion, 
 others to just the reverse. But we out here 
 admire the women who are doing things, work- 
 ing for the country, the nurses, the munition 
 makers, the girls who are taking men's places 
 in offices and banks to set them free to be 
 soldiers, who are driving motors, working lifts, 
 acting as 'bus conductors, scrubbing the floors 
 of the wards, taking the tickets and carrying
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 181 
 
 the luggage at the stations, toiling in the can- 
 teens, or sweating on the land, not the idlers 
 who sit in the dark listening to table rappings 
 and spirit voices. Good Lord, Dad, what good 
 does that do to the country? Do give it up, 
 for Christ's sake! You know how I always 
 hated it. But now I simply can't stand it. 
 Suppose I was to stop a bullet, as I may any 
 day, do you think a table in Hornton Street 
 or anywhere else'd bring me back after I'd once 
 gone West? If you'd seen as many die as I 
 have you'd know different. I've lost two of my 
 closest pals, the best that ever breathed, and 
 I tell you they've gone gone right away, and 
 wherever they are they're not coming back to 
 this dirty world of bloody business. God rest 
 their souls, say I, and I wish they may be better 
 off than we are." 
 
 Peter Orwyn's large hands shook when he 
 read the letter and moisture came into his big 
 dark eyes. Then he laid the letter down and 
 sat still for a long time. He was a widower. 
 He had lost his wife after the birth of their 
 second boy. He was a man with a strong power 
 and a strong need of affection; and although 
 he was very fond of his younger son the elder 
 was the real pride of his life. The day when 
 Harry had become an officer had been a great
 
 182 MRS HARDEN 
 
 day for him, and Harry's promotion to a 
 Captaincy had shaken him with something like 
 exultation. And now he had become almost 
 a shame to his son. His heart burned within 
 him. 
 
 It happened that the day on which Harry's 
 letter arrived was the day selected by the con- 
 jurer, Larrington, for the first performance 
 of his reproduction at St. Patrick's Hall of 
 Peter Orwyn's spiritualistic manifestations. 
 Orwyn knew this. Now he took up " The Daily 
 Telegraph " and looked down its columns for 
 Larrington's advertisement. He soon came to 
 it and read his own name. In the paper was 
 printed a challenge to him to come to the hall 
 and see the performance. " Peter Orwyn is 
 invited to be present and to reproduce, if he 
 can, under test conditions Mr Larrington's 
 tricks." At the top of the advertisement and 
 also at the bottom the following words were 
 printed in large letters, 'Will he come?" 
 Orwyn looked at them for a long time then, 
 with an almost violent gesture, he tore the paper 
 in half and flung it into the empty grate. 
 
 On that same day, though not at the same 
 time, Mrs Marden also read Larrington's ad- 
 vertisement in the " Telegraph." In the morn- 
 ing she had received a short note from Cecil
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 183 
 
 Hammond containing an enclosure. The note 
 invited her to come to St Patrick's Hall to see 
 the " performance ". The enclosure was a ticket 
 admitting two people to the stalls. On reading 
 Hammond's note she had at once made up her 
 mind not to go. But she had not thrown the 
 ticket away. And now she held it in her hand 
 and looked at it and then again at the ad- 
 vertisement. 
 
 Something was tempting her to go to St 
 Patrick's Hall. Her advocacy of Peter Orwyn's 
 bona fides had been warm and genuine. All 
 the controversy about him had not shaken her 
 faith in him in regard to herself and the voice 
 which had spoken to her. But she had always 
 wondered about the more material of his mani- 
 festations. Could he possibly be a trickster 
 sometimes, at other times be a genuine and 
 marvellous medium? If so, he had lied to her. 
 She hated to think that. She could not really 
 think it. " And again she reverted to the con- 
 viction that certain phenomena were produced, 
 in his case, by mysterious physical means which 
 he did not comprehend. She wondered whether 
 Larrington would really be able to reproduce 
 accurately all these phenomena. She would like 
 to ascertain that for herself. She hardly knew 
 why. But she was very much tempted to go.
 
 184 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Presently Miss King came in to help her with 
 her letters. When the short morning's work 
 was finished Mrs Marden, almost in spite of 
 herself, told Miss King about Hammond's in- 
 vitation. 
 
 " Are you going? " said Miss King. 
 
 " I have a ticket for two. Shall we go? " 
 
 " But as you are absolutely convinced what 
 would be the use?" 
 
 " Larrington cannot of course do all that 
 Peter Orwyn does. I know that. Any tricks 
 he may be able to perform would not shake my 
 belief. It isn't that I am doubting. But I 
 suppose it is curiosity. I do feel inclined to go." 
 
 " I will come with you with pleasure if you 
 wish it." 
 
 Mrs Marden hesitated. 
 
 * The only thing is that if I do go it might 
 seem like a sort of treachery to Peter Orwyn," 
 she said. "What do you think? " 
 
 " It seems to me that you have a perfect 
 right to please yourself about it. But if I were 
 you I shouldn't do anything that was against 
 your own feeling." 
 
 " I scarcely understand why I want to go," 
 Mrs Marden said doubtfully. " Of course you 
 have never seen any of these material manifesta- 
 tions."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 185 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Before you began coming to Hornton Street 
 I had told Mr Orwyn how much I disliked them. 
 I have never understood how they were pro- 
 duced by him, I mean. But I can quite 
 imagine that a real mystery might in some 
 cases be imitated by a clever trickster a levita- 
 tion for instance." 
 
 ' Yes, it might be so, I daresay." 
 
 "Shall we go?" 
 
 " I can see you want me to say yes." 
 
 " Perhaps I do," said Mrs Marden, with a 
 faint smile. 
 
 " I don't think there can be any harm in 
 going," said Miss King. 
 
 " Then we will go." 
 
 They went. 
 
 The rather sombre hall was crowded with an 
 unusual audience. A great many of Ham- 
 mond's adherents were there, but also a good 
 many spiritualists. Then there were the lovers 
 of sensation, journalists, two or three editors, 
 several well known doctors, and various odd 
 looking men peculiarly dressed, with flexible 
 hands, expressive but hard faces, and swiftly 
 moving eyes. These were conjurers and magi- 
 cians of " the Halls ". Some of them had over- 
 dressed and heavily painted women with them,
 
 186 MRS MARDEN 
 
 who smiled meretriciously without reason, and 
 who had an air of shoddy celebrity. They were 
 probably the ladies whose profession it is to be 
 shut up in baskets and cabinets from which 
 they mysteriously evaporate, to be levitated 
 while apparently asleep, to be passed through 
 hoops, and to be made the receptacles of 
 vanished objects gathered from the public for 
 conjurers' purposes. There were also a good 
 many soldiers and several ladies in mourning. 
 
 Mrs Marden did not see Lady Terrerton or 
 Arthur Burnley. Cecil Hammond was in a 
 box with some friends. 
 
 After a few commonplace " turns " the cur- 
 tain was lowered for a moment and Hammond 
 and his friends left their box. Then after a 
 pause Hammond appeared before the curtain 
 and made a speech, in which he explained his 
 reasons for attacking Peter Orwyn and mediums 
 in general, and described how Larrington had 
 convinced him that there was nothing but trick- 
 ery in their " manifestations ". He dwelt upon 
 the wave of emotion a tidal wave of grief and 
 longing, he called it which had inundated 
 London because of the war, upon the nerve 
 disturbance caused by the air raids, and upon 
 the prevalence of hysteria, neurosis, acute 
 neurasthenia, and kindred complaints, among
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 187 
 
 all classes of people. He quoted the statements 
 of celebrated doctors in support of his conten- 
 tion that few of the dwellers in cities visited 
 by aircraft were in a perfectly normal condi- 
 tion. He also gave the opinions of several 
 clergymen on the mental state of their flocks. 
 And he finished up by saying that in the soul 
 and nerve misery of London the charlatans had 
 found the greatest opportunity of their lives. 
 They were war profiteers, making money out 
 of disease, ruthless exploiters of the grief which 
 should be sacred, and of the longings which cried 
 to Heaven for consolation. They were harpies 
 who fed upon the slain, those struck down in 
 the soul by the hand of Fate. It was time that 
 they were exposed, that their criminal cynicism 
 was put an end to, that they were driven off 
 from their prey the gullible public. Mr Lar- 
 rington, an honest man, who earned his living 
 by skill, and who made no pretence that his 
 skill was anything else, would show them that 
 he could do all that, and even more than, Peter 
 Orwyn and his fellow-tricksters one and all 
 of them could do. 
 
 At the end of his speech Hammond paused 
 for a moment and looked about the hall. 
 
 " I see here several of Peter Orwyn's ad- 
 herents," he said. "But I don't see Peter
 
 188 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Orwyn. We have invited him to come here, to 
 come upon the stage and prove under test 
 conditions that his feats are not accomplished 
 by trickery. Is he here? Is Mr. Orwyn here? 
 If so I invite him to come forward." 
 
 There was a long pause, during which many 
 of the audience turned their heads and looked 
 eagerly along the rows behind them. 
 
 " He is not here," said Hammond, in a 
 sarcastic voice. " Well, I didn't expect him. 
 It's no use waiting. So I will make way for 
 Mr Larrington." 
 
 And he walked off the stage. 
 
 After a moment the curtain drew up, show- 
 ing a stage hung with black. On it was a 
 table spread with the musical instruments used 
 by Peter Orwyn, a " cabinet ", and a row of 
 chairs. Fastened to the black draperies were 
 several frames covered with glass. A bell was 
 struck behind the scenes and then Larrington 
 appeared. Mrs Marden had never seen him 
 before, and she looked at him with a sort of 
 hostile interest. 
 
 He was a very thin lanky man of about 
 forty, with a long white face, a large pointed 
 nose, an effeminate mouth with pale flexible 
 lips turning down at the corners, meagre black 
 hair streaked forward to cover a partially bald
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 189 
 
 head, and small shining black eyes which glanced 
 swiftly, with keen self-possession over the audi- 
 ence. His hands had abnormally long and 
 square tipped fingers. He was dressed in a 
 braided morning coat and striped trousers, like 
 Peter Orwyn. He looked horrid but very 
 sharp, even clever, and he was obviously very 
 sure of himself. Advancing to the footlights, 
 with a rather mincing gait, in a thin, but pene- 
 trating voice, with common inflections, he 
 addressed the audience. 
 
 Rapidly, and with sarcastic emphasis, he in- 
 formed it of his first meeting with Mr Ham- 
 mond, and of how he convinced that eminent 
 gentleman that Orwyn and all his kind were 
 merely conjurers, more or less skilful, mas- 
 querading as men or women possessed of 
 supernormal powers. Over and over again, 
 he said, through the ages people of this kind 
 had been exposed, on the continent, here, and in 
 America, but the credulity of the human race 
 seemed to be limitless, and with each new genera- 
 tion new dupes were provided to fill the pockets 
 of the unscrupulous imitators of the well known 
 charlatans of the past. Even science itself some- 
 times fell an easy prey to these clumsy pre- 
 varicators, these awkward and half-fledged 
 magicians, not one of whom would he, Lar-
 
 190 MRS HARDEN 
 
 rington, consider competent to appear on his 
 stage even if they forsook their shibboleths 
 and were anxious to earn an honest living. 
 
 ' They know," he said piercingly, " that I 
 can beat them all at their own dirty game and 
 not one of them would dare to come near 
 me!" 
 
 He added that he had not only issued the 
 public challenge to Peter Orwyn, but that he 
 had also written to him privately inviting him 
 to come to the hall that day and give evidence 
 of his powers as a medium, and promising that 
 in the event of Orwyn's giving any convincing 
 proof that he could cause spirits to return to this 
 world he, Larrington, would publicly acknowl- 
 edge that his attack on the medium's bona fides 
 had been devoid of foundation, and would pay 
 five hundred pounds to any war charity in 
 which Orwyn was interested. 
 
 There was considerable applause at this point, 
 and Larrington greeted it with a sickly, but self- 
 satisfied smile. Then holding up his right hand 
 he continued. 
 
 Orwyn had made no public reply to the chal- 
 lenge, no private reply to the letter. He had 
 taken refuge in impenetrable silence. But 
 nevertheless he might have decided on a 
 dramatic appearance in their midst. He might
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 191 
 
 be even now in the hall. There was still time 
 for him to take up the challenge. 
 
 "Is Mr Orwyn here?" exclaimed the con- 
 jurer, with the theatrical emphasis of the ac- 
 complished showman. 
 
 There was a dead silence. 
 
 " Is he here ? " reiterated Larrington. " I 
 call upon Peter Orwyn, the medium of 11 B 
 Hornton Street, Kensington, to come up here, 
 and in the presence of the committee of eminent 
 men whom I have persuaded to assist me, to 
 give us a proof that he can do anything which 
 I cannot do equally well, or much better, by 
 means of pure trickery." 
 
 Again there was a silence. 
 
 " Mr Orwyn has wisely remained secluded 
 among his disciples in Hornton Street," said 
 Larrington, raising a laugh in the audience. " I 
 commend his prudence, and now, without 
 further delay, I will proceed to show you that 
 a poor earthbound conjurer, who is not ad- 
 mitted to any intercourse with other worlds 
 than this, can be quite as ingenious as the 
 modern Cagliostro." 
 
 Retreating a few steps, with a fixed smile on 
 his clean-shaven face, he made a gesture towards 
 the left side of the stage, and immediately the 
 committee of eminent men filed into view and
 
 192 MRS HARDEN 
 
 took their seats on the chairs placed ready for 
 them. Mr. Larrington named each one to the 
 audience in turn, and after a few more words 
 in explanation of what happened at the average 
 seance in Hornton Street or in any other 
 retreat where a medium succeeded in gathering 
 a few dupes around him the lights were slightly 
 lowered, the conjurer and the committee men 
 assembled themselves round the large table in 
 the centre of the stage and the seance began. 
 
 When it was over, and all Peter Orwyn's 
 more striking manifestations had been faith- 
 fully reproduced in full sight of the audience, 
 Larrington came forward once more. 
 
 " I hope you are satisfied," he said. 
 
 There was loud applause. 
 
 " I see or rather I hear that you are. But 
 Mr Hammond tells me that there are several 
 of Peter Orwyn's adherents present among us 
 to-day. Have any of them anything to say? 
 Are any of them dissatisfied? Are they con- 
 vinced that all Peter Orwyn can do I can do? 
 I'm sure we should be very glad to hear their 
 opinion." 
 
 There was a long pause. 
 
 Miss King looked at Mrs Marden, who was 
 sitting quite still gazing at the conjurer. There 
 was a stir in the audience. Several people
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 193 
 
 looked round. A small old man in the middle 
 of the stalls had risen to his feet. 
 
 ' Yes, Sir? " said Larrington, leaning for- 
 ward with a smile. ' What have you to say? " 
 
 :< I am not convinced," said the little old 
 man, in a quavering voice. 
 
 " No? And why is that, may I ask? " 
 
 " Mr Orwyn Mr Orwyn * 
 
 ' Yes, Sir? I am listening. We are all 
 listening to you." 
 
 " Mr Orwyn " repeated the little old man. 
 
 He took out a red pocket handkerchief, 
 passed it over his face, then put it to his eyes, 
 and sat down, or rather sank down in his seat, 
 
 A murmur ran through the audience almost 
 like a wind running through long grass. Several 
 people stood up to look at the man who had not 
 been convinced. But he said nothing more. He 
 was obviously overcome by his feelings and 
 was perhaps afraid now of his own temerity. 
 Larrington waited for a moment. But nothing 
 more happened, and at last he said, 
 
 " Gentlemen and ladies, I thank you for your 
 kind attention. If no one else has anything to 
 say I will not keep you any longer." 
 
 Again there was a pause. Then at a sign 
 from the conjurer the curtain was lowered and 
 the performance was at an end.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 As they went slowly out in the crowd Mrs 
 Harden said to Miss King, 
 
 " I want to speak to that poor little man 
 who stood up. Can you see him? " 
 
 " No," said Miss King. 
 
 " Perhaps we shall come across him at the 
 entrance. I want to find out whether he has 
 had a similar experience to mine. I feel almost 
 sure he has." 
 
 As the crowd began to split up and to flow 
 out into the darkness of London taking various 
 directions both Mrs Marden and Miss King 
 looked for the little man. But they could not 
 find him. Doubtless he had crept away carrying 
 his poor little secret with him. Mrs Marden 
 seemed disappointed at the failure of her search 
 for him. As she drove to Hans Place with 
 Miss King she scarcely said a word, and when 
 they were together in the room where she did 
 her business she was almost painfully preoccu- 
 pied. 
 
 :< I wish I hadn't gone ! " she said at last, 
 breaking away almost with violence from her 
 strained reserve. " I wish I had never set 
 
 194
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 195 
 
 eyes on Larrington. I'm sure he is a horrible 
 man. Compare his appearance with Mr 
 Orwyn's. Who wouldn't trust the latter rather 
 than the former? " 
 
 " I much prefer Mr Orwyn's face," said Miss 
 King. " But why are you sorry you went? " 
 
 " Well, Larrington has proved to me what ex- 
 traordinary things can be done by trickery. Of 
 course I knew conjurers were very clever, but 
 it all might have happened in Hornton 
 Street." 
 
 " But when it did happen there you disliked 
 it. You told me so." 
 
 ' Yes. I always hated that part." 
 
 "So it was not that sort of thing that con- 
 vinced you." j 
 
 " No. But don't you see " 
 
 She stopped. She was looking straight be- 
 fore her, and her brows frowned above her dark 
 eyes. 
 
 ' We are all of us made up of good and 
 bad," she said, in a low voice, as if following 
 up aloud a train of thought. " Straight one 
 minute, crooked the next, now truthful, now 
 deceptive. We aren't all of a piece are we?" 
 
 She looked at her friend. 
 
 " No, but I think many of us are more of 
 a piece than that."
 
 196 MRS HARDEN 
 
 "Than what?" 
 
 " Well, I think a straight man or woman 
 is straight right through more often than 
 not." 
 
 "Do you? and a deceitful, a crooked man?" 
 
 " It would be very difficult to me to trust 
 anyone ever who had once deliberately deceived 
 me." 
 
 " I think you are too drastic, Emily. I don't 
 think you allow enough for the temptations 
 that assail people." 
 
 " Perhaps not." 
 
 After a pause Miss King said, 
 
 " Of course I know you are thinking about 
 Mr Orwyn." 
 
 ' Yes. I suppose after what you have seen 
 to-day you think he is a fraud." 
 
 " But you forget he has never produced 
 most of those manifestations when I have been 
 there." 
 
 ' Well, I have seen them all," Mrs Marden 
 said with a sort of profound dejection. ' They 
 must be tricks! They must be tricks! But if 
 they are what is Peter Orwyn but a swindler 
 and a liar? " 
 
 An almost desperate look came into her lined 
 face. 
 
 " If the belief I came to in Hornton Street
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 197 
 
 were to be taken away from me I should be 
 finished! " she said. " There would be nothing 
 left to me, nothing. You see how I have altered 
 even as it is. I'm almost an old woman. Any 
 beauty I once had has gone. And even my 
 figure have you noticed how my figure has 
 altered lately?" 
 
 " I've noticed that you've been getting very 
 thin." 
 
 "Ah?" 
 
 'Will you do something if I ask you?" 
 
 "What* is it?" 
 
 '* Will you see a good doctor ? " 
 
 " A doctor! " Mrs Harden said as if startled. 
 " You don't think I'm ill, do you? " 
 
 " I don't think you look at all well." 
 
 " How can I be well when I suffer so much? " 
 Mrs Marden said, almost angrily. " Besides, 
 how can doctors minister to a mind diseased? 
 There's nothing the matter with me except 
 misery." 
 
 " But lately you have been so much happier. 
 And yet in spite of that I think you ought to 
 see a doctor." 
 
 ' But when I've nothing the matter with me! " 
 
 '' Perhaps you need a cure." 
 
 * The only cure for me is to be certain one 
 way or the other about Peter Orwyn."
 
 198 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " But you told me you knew it was your 
 son's voice that has .spoken to you. How could 
 Mr Orwyn imitate your son if he never knew 
 him?" 
 
 " I don't know. It seems impossible. But 
 if I have deceived myself? If I am one of the 
 fools ? I have longed to believe. That's danger- 
 ous. I know it by my observation of other 
 people. Nearly everyone I know well believes 
 what he or she wants to believe. Men wouldn't 
 believe this war was coming because they didn't 
 want to. And so it is in the opposite way. We 
 won't see what we don't want to see, and we 
 will see what we wish for." 
 
 " But we all have to face the inevitable. There 
 are things we can't escape from." 
 
 " The other afternoon I was alone in Peter 
 Orwyn's room in the sunlight," said Mrs 
 Marden. 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I went and stood by the table and touched 
 it. I thought ' If I were dead how could Peter 
 Orwyn bring me back from the other world to 
 speak to anyone who loved me ? ' The sun 
 streamed in at the windows and it seemed to 
 me that such a thing couldn't be. I looked in 
 the glass that day and noticed how thin I had 
 grown. A sort of cold, almost icy, reality was
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 199 
 
 with me just then, I think. And it seemed to 
 deny many things. Oh, how we poor creatures 
 struggle! Life tears us to pieces. We are 
 fighting in the sea for a plank to cling to. We 
 don't want to drown. That's it! We don't 
 want to drown." 
 
 ' There's something that seems to me 
 strange," said Miss King. " May I say what 
 it is?" 
 
 ' Yes, of course. You may say anything to> 
 me." 
 
 ' You have believed in Peter Orwyn in 
 spite of all those manifestations which never 
 convinced you, why is it that you can't have any 
 faith, any trust, in God? " 
 
 "God!" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "What do I know of God? I can't see 
 God. I can't get at God. I can't even con- 
 ceive what God is." 
 
 " But can't you feel God? " 
 
 "How?" 
 
 " In yourself? " 
 
 " I see injustice everywhere " 
 
 " And what makes you know it is injustice 
 and hate it?" 
 
 " I don't know." 
 
 " Well, I think it's God."
 
 200 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " But all the misery, the horrors of this 
 war 
 
 " And all the nobility, the heroism, the self- 
 lessness, the self-sacrificing love of country, the 
 readiness to give up everything for an idea, the 
 idea of country. Where has it all come from ? " 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 " I'm sure it comes from God every bit of it. 
 Every soldier boy who went of his own accord 
 to fight out there was just told to go by God. 
 That's what I think. And I think what they 
 call ' going West ' is just going to God." 
 
 Mrs Marden was silent. 
 
 " So I don't feel as if I really need Peter 
 Orwyn to show me anything, or prove any- 
 thing to me, though I'm interested, very much 
 interested sometimes, in the sittings." 
 
 " Emily," Mrs Marden said very simply, " I 
 wish I were like you." 
 
 Miss King blushed. 
 
 " I can't think why you wish that," she said. 
 
 " I'll tell you why. It's because you're so 
 real. You're like a little bit of rock without any 
 of rock's coldness." 
 
 Miss King blushed more deeply. 
 
 "How that man must have loved you!" 
 added Mrs Marden. ' But tell me if you 
 heard his voice, spoke to him, do you mean to
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 201 
 
 say that wouldn't make you more sure than 
 you are now that he exists somewhere?" 
 
 " No, I don't think it would. In fact it 
 wouldn't. Because when you are quite sure 
 of something you can't become more sure of it." 
 
 " I shall never believe like that, never. It 
 isn't in me. If it was what I have seen to-day 
 couldn't have upset me as it has." 
 
 'What are you going to do? Are you not 
 going to sit again? " 
 
 " I don't know what to do. I feel I feel 
 almost distracted to-day." 
 
 She went a little way off to a corner of the 
 room where there was a mirror and stared at 
 herself in it. 
 
 "I look horrible!" she said. "I must have 
 lost pounds in the last few weeks." 
 
 " Do take my advice and see a medical man." 
 
 " Perhaps I will. But I must see Mr Orwyn 
 first." 
 
 " Are you going to tell him about the per- 
 formance? " 
 
 " I think I must. I suppose he will be very 
 angry with me for having gone. But still 
 if only I were one of those who can shut their 
 eyes and just believe! But perhaps he will 
 make me believe. If only I could really test 
 him!"
 
 202 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " But you have tested him in a way." 
 
 " Not really. There's only one test I could 
 absolutely trust, that would make me know 
 absolutely whether he is genuine or not genu- 
 ine." 
 
 "What test is that?" 
 
 " It's rather horrible. You might almost 
 hate me for thinking of it. I thought of it long 
 ago." 
 
 " What is it? Can you tell me? " 
 
 " I wouldn't tell anyone else. If Captain 
 Orwyn were to be killed I'm sure I should know 
 whether Peter Orwyn believed the dead do re- 
 turn, or not." 
 
 " I hope he won't be killed," said Miss King 
 soberly. 
 
 " Don't imagine I could ever wish such a 
 thing." 
 
 " Of course I know you couldn't." 
 
 " It's only that then I should know. If he 
 were a fraud he couldn't keep it up any longer 
 then. He loves his son too much. And love 
 is terribly sincere in the great moments." 
 
 When Miss King had gone Mrs Marden sat 
 for a long while thinking about what she had 
 said. Miss King had brought home to her the 
 exact, as it were the inner, meaning of faith 
 as somehow it had never been brought home to
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 203 
 
 her before. She seemed now to be looking at 
 faith as one may look at some object of shining 
 mystery, at a jewel with wonderful lights, won- 
 derful depths in it, or at a fire with a still red 
 heart glowing marvellously, and offshoots of 
 leaping coloured flames. Faith was stranger 
 than any jewel or fire. Whence did it 
 come? Why did one possess it and another 
 not? 
 
 That, too, was one of the mysteries, one that 
 could not be touched by Larrington's long- 
 fingered hands. She hated to think of Lar- 
 rington. His attack upon Peter Orwyn had 
 seemed to her horribly coarse and almost like 
 an attack upon herself. Really it had been an 
 attack upon herself. She felt bruised and 
 weary, and full of acute apprehension. But 
 she had had her disaster and surely nothing 
 worse could fall upon her than that which had 
 fallen already. She had managed to bear that 
 blow without breaking under it; she could bea"r 
 anything else. But she didn't want to suffer 
 any more. She had had enough. She had 
 surely paid in the last few months for all her 
 years of happiness, those years which seemed 
 lost far away in the mists of the old world be- 
 fore the war. 
 
 She was terribly restless that day and felt
 
 204 MRS MARDEN 
 
 driven to some feverish activity. Should she put 
 on her hat, order a taxicab and go to see Peter 
 Orwyn? She wanted to go and yet she was 
 afraid to go. After much hesitation she told 
 Hanson to get her a cab, and went upstairs 
 to dress for going out. Jt was nearly seven 
 o'clock. Hanson came to tell her the cab was 
 at the door. She went out and got into it. 
 
 "Where shall I tell him to drive, Ma'am?" 
 said Hanson. 
 
 " I think I'll go to- 
 
 She was about to say Hornton Street, but 
 she suddenly changed her mind. 
 
 " He can drive on towards the Park. I'll 
 tell him myself presently." 
 
 " Very well, Ma'am." 
 
 The order was given and she drove off. 
 
 When she was nearing Hyde Park Corner 
 she leaned out and said to the man, 
 
 " Please go to St Martin's Church in Trafal- 
 gar Square." 
 
 "Right, Mum." 
 
 The man drove down Piccadilly. 
 
 When they reached the church, which is al- 
 ways open, Mrs Marden asked the man to wait, 
 got out and ascended the steps. She had 
 never been to the church since the day of the 
 memorial service for Ronald. She went in and
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 205 
 
 sat down in a pew not far from the door. There 
 were a few people scattered about, some sitting, 
 some kneeling and praying. One was a tall 
 young Colonial soldier with " Canada " on his 
 shoulder. He was not far from Mrs Harden. 
 She sat looking at him. Miss King's remarks 
 about the soldiers were in her mind. Probably 
 that young man was on leave. He might be 
 going to the front, she supposed, any day. Per- 
 haps he was starting almost immediately and 
 had come to the church to prepare. He was sit- 
 ting straight up, tall, rigid, his eyes turned 
 towards the chancel. But presently he knelt 
 down. She wondered if he was one of those 
 who was fated to "go West " before the war 
 was over. Then she wondered very much 
 what was in his mind, whether he thought, as 
 Miss King thought, that " going West " was 
 just going to God. She supposed he was pray- 
 ing. Following his example she knelt down too, 
 but she did not hide her face in her hands. She 
 just knelt and looked at the distant altar. And 
 she tried to " feel " God, she tried very hard 
 and with an intense desire to succeed in her 
 effort. For she was afraid and she longed to 
 get rid of her haunting fear. If she lost the 
 one belief she had she had not lost it yet; but 
 the events of the day had struck a hard blow
 
 206 MRS HARDEN 
 
 at it and could not replace it by another she 
 did not know what would happen to her. And 
 Miss King's few words had made a tremendous 
 impression upon her. It must be wonderful to 
 be so sure of the further existence that 
 no proof could make you more certain; it 
 must be wonderful not to want any proof. 
 " Seeing is believing " yes. But not even to 
 want to see, not even to want to hear that 
 makes the human being safe. If she were as 
 Emily King she could bear to hear Peter Orwyn 
 confess himself a trickster without even a 
 tremor. Such a confession would make no dif- 
 ference to her. 
 
 If only she could "feel" God! How little 
 Peter Orwyn and his truth or lies would matter 
 to her then! She would not even want to 
 test him if she were as Emily King was, as 
 probably that young Canadian soldier in front 
 of her was. 
 
 "Faith give me faith!" her soul cried out 
 almost desperately. ' Why should I not have 
 it when so many of the humblest, the poorest, 
 the most afflicted have it, when even young 
 soldiers in contact with the coarseness, the wick- 
 edness, the brutality, the hideous horrors of the 
 world have it, and cannot lose it? If the foul- 
 ness of war doesn't take it from them why
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 207 
 
 should I, who have been sheltered from all the 
 attacking forces of evil, why should I not be 
 able to have it? I will have it." 
 
 But faith did not come to her in the quiet 
 church. She did not feel God; she only felt 
 her own desperation. She cried out, and no 
 voice answered her. Or, if any voice answered 
 she was unable to hear it. 
 
 Presently the Canadian soldier rose from his 
 knees, got up, took his cap and came out of 
 his pew. As he drew near to Mrs Marden, 
 who was still on her knees, he looked at her. 
 He had large slate-coloured eyes with very long 
 dark lashes. As they rested on hers she felt a 
 strong impulse to speak to him. She got up 
 quickly and followed him out of the church. 
 Under the porch she came up with him. 
 
 "Are you going to France?" she said. 
 
 ' Yes," he replied, speaking with a strong 
 accent in a rather boyish voice. ' We are off 
 to-morrow morning." 
 
 She held out her hand. 
 
 " I wish you well," she said. 
 
 The young soldier took her hand without any 
 diffidence. He did not seem at all surprised by 
 her accosting him. 
 
 * Thank you," he said. " I hope we shall do 
 all that's expected of us."
 
 208 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " I am sure you will. I have had a son 
 fighting." 
 
 "Is he back now?" 
 
 " No he's he's gone West." 
 
 The soldier looked hard at her. There was 
 a very kind expression just then in his eyes. 
 
 " I'm sorry," he said. " But I expect he's 
 better off than some of us are. Not that I 
 want to go just yet. But it's all in the day's 
 work, and if my time comes, well, I shall 
 find myself with some of the best over 
 there." 
 
 He made a curious gesture. To Mrs Marden 
 it seemed half indifferent, half romantic. 
 
 " Good-bye," she said. " I shall think of you 
 when you've gone." 
 
 "That's good!" he returned. 
 
 He saluted her and went down the steps. 
 
 When he had disappeared in the throng of 
 people and vehicles which is generally passing 
 near the entrance to Charing Cross and the 
 Strand Mrs Marden paid off the chauffeur of the 
 taxicab and walked all the way to Hans Place. 
 She went through the Admiralty Arch, along 
 the Mall, skirted Buckingham Palace and 
 passed by Victoria Station. The news boards 
 were out near the Grosvenor Hotel. On one 
 she saw in huge letters,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 209 
 
 THE EVENING NEWS. LATE EDITION 
 
 Exposure of a Famous 
 
 Medium 
 
 She did not buy the paper. On another board 
 she saw, 
 
 Larrington's Attack 
 
 on 
 Peter Orwyn, the Medium. 
 
 At that moment she hated the world and felt 
 utterly disgusted with life. 
 
 For several days there was a good deal in 
 the papers about Larrington's performance and 
 conjuring versus spiritualism. Then the matter 
 died down, and some fresh sensation took its 
 place. A little girl was abducted, or a returned 
 soldier murdered his faithless wife with a ham- 
 mer or something happened which had fascina- 
 tion for the public. And there was always 
 the war for those who considered that more 
 important than the follies and crimes of their 
 neighbours. During those days Mrs Marden's 
 life seemed to her to be as it were in abeyance. 
 She lived in a lull; she moved in a still, brood- 
 ing, and yet curiously dead atmosphere; she did 
 very little. She seemed to be waiting, to be 
 obliged to wait, to be imprisoned in a pause.
 
 210 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Now and then she looked in the glass. And 
 each time she did so she thought her body was 
 thinner. Her face, too, was certainly getting 
 very thin; it was becoming almost sharp in its 
 outline. 
 
 " I shall look like a witch presently if this 
 goes on," she said to herself. 
 
 But she did not go to a doctor. It seemed 
 that the prison of the pause prevented her from 
 doing anything so definite as that. 
 
 But at last she did not know why the em- 
 bargo was silently removed. She woke up one 
 morning and felt a renewed sense of activity; 
 more than that she felt that the time had ar- 
 rived when she had to do a very definite, very 
 important thing. When she was dressed and 
 had breakfasted she knew what it was; she had 
 to see Peter Orwyn again that day. 
 
 About eleven o'clock she telephoned to Horn- 
 ton Street. Orwyn himself answered her. She 
 knew his deep voice at once. 
 
 " Can I come to see you to-day?" she asked. 
 "It's Mrs Marden." 
 
 " To see me? Do you mean for a sitting? " 
 said the deep voice. 
 
 She had not meant to ask for a sitting, but 
 now she hesitated. Before she spoke Orwyn 
 said,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 211 
 
 " I feeL unequal to a sitting to-day." 
 
 " I hope you are not ill ? " 
 
 " No. But I couldn't possibly sit to-day. 
 There would be no power." 
 
 Mrs Marden now thought there was some- 
 thing strange in the sound of the voice. 
 
 "Nothing has happened, I hope?" she said. 
 
 " No." 
 
 ' Then might I come this afternoon to pay 
 you a short visit? " 
 
 " Certainly if you wish it." 
 
 ' Thank you. I will come about five. Will 
 that do?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Good-bye till then." 
 
 " Good-bye, Mrs Marden." 
 
 She put the receiver up. 
 
 " I wonder what is the matter with Peter 
 Orwyn? " she thought. 
 
 The telephone seemed to have conveyed to her 
 not merely his voice but something else, some- 
 thing of his mind, of perturbation, of heavy 
 anxiety, something troubled. 
 
 ' What can be the matter? " she thought. 
 
 She had not seen Orwyn since Larrington's 
 exposure and attack. Perhaps they had pro- 
 duced a profound effect upon Orwyn. She 
 wondered.
 
 212 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Just after five she entered his house. 
 
 " How is Mr Orwyn? " she asked the little 
 maid who opened the door. 
 
 " Pretty much as usual, Mum, I think," said 
 the girl. ' 'E seems rather down to-day though. 
 But 'e's 'ad a deal to go through ain't 'e?" 
 
 "Yes, I know." 
 
 ' These is hodd times for heverybody, Mum." 
 
 " Yes indeed." 
 
 Her cap was still on one side. Mrs Marden 
 wondered whether that fact implied a coquettish 
 tendency in the girl, or merely carelessness per- 
 sistently taking one form. 
 
 " Mr Horwyn's waiting for you, Mum." 
 
 The medium met them at the door of the 
 drawing-room. Mrs Marden at once noticed 
 a change in him. The steady earnest look had 
 gone out of his eyes and was replaced by a 
 brooding anxiety which suggested a harassed 
 mind. He was fidgety and made unusual ges- 
 tures. His large hands were continually in 
 movement. Even his voice seemed changed, less 
 firm, less resonant than it generally was. 
 
 "I hope you're not ill?" she said to him. 
 
 "Oh no. Why should I be ill? I'm never 
 ill." 
 
 11 I'm afraid all this horrid fuss in the papers 
 has worried you."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 213 
 
 " Oh no, not at all. We who have unusual 
 faculties and powers must expect to be mis- 
 understood by ordinary people. A blind man 
 is always more popular than a man who can 
 see further than others do. I'm not at all dis- 
 turbed, not at all. Since all these attacks upon 
 me more people have sought me out than ever 
 before. After Larrington's so-called exposure 
 of me I had many telegrams expressing belief 
 in me. They're coming in still. I had two this 
 morning. That's a great consolation." 
 
 " It must be," she said uncomfortably. 
 
 There was something in Orwyn's look and 
 manner that day which made her feel ill at 
 ease. 
 
 Moved to abruptness by her discomfort she 
 said, 
 
 " I went to see Larrington's performance." 
 
 Peter Orwyn started, and made an odd flut- 
 tering movement with his hands. 
 
 " Indeed! " he said. 
 
 " Yes. I felt I must go." 
 
 ' Why not? You had a perfect right to go." 
 
 " Mr Orwyn I don't want to hurt you, but 
 do please be perfectly frank with me." 
 
 " Frank! What about? Why shouldn't I be 
 frank?" 
 
 " Mr Larrington of course couldn't do didn't
 
 214 MRS HARDEN 
 
 even attempt to do all you can, all you have 
 done in my presence." 
 
 Orwyn threw back his head and straightened 
 his body. 
 
 " Of course he couldn't. You needn't tell me 
 that, Mrs Marden." 
 
 ' What he did was to reproduce exactly 
 all the manifestations I told you once I didn't 
 care about." 
 
 "Exactly. Just so! Just so!" 
 
 "Are those manifestations tricks?" 
 
 " Mr Larrington is only a conjurer. He 
 doesn't pretend to be anything else that I'm 
 aware of. Of course all he does is trickery, 
 clever trickery." 
 
 "No but when you do them?" 
 
 " Eh? " 
 
 Orwyn stared hard at her with a dull look, 
 as if he didn't understand what she meant. 
 
 Almost desperately she continued, 
 
 " Please don't be angry ! I feel I must 
 thoroughly understand. It all means so much 
 to me now. Are not certain things you do 
 the things L/arrington can imitate tricks, 
 and are not the other manifestations what you 
 say they are? I want you to tell me. I think 
 we all I mean most of us are a mixture of 
 sincerity and insincerity. I daresay I am.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 215 
 
 Perhaps the way you get power is by throw- 
 ing those who sit with you into a state of 
 conviction, and perhaps you can only get them 
 into that state by preparing the way by cer- 
 tain startling manifestations. You may think 
 that justifies you in in I could understand 
 if it were so." 
 
 "Really, Mrs Mar den! are you accusing 
 me ?" 
 
 " No, no. I'm asking you, begging you 
 to be frank with me." 
 
 She paused. Orwyn was silent. 
 'Why did you refuse to sit to-day?" she 
 suddenly asked. 
 
 " I'm not very I felt I couldn't." 
 
 "Why was that?" 
 
 He got up from his chair. 
 
 " I'm very sensitive to influences," he said. 
 ' There are bad influences about to-day." 
 
 "Bad influences!" 
 
 " Hostile to me. For hours I have felt 
 them. I've been up all night. I'm pass- 
 ing through a black patch." 
 
 She stared at him. The peculiar sensation 
 she had felt when he spoke to her through 
 the telephone was with her again, but now 
 deepened. It came to her from him; it flowed 
 into her out of him. At that moment she
 
 216 MRS HARDEN 
 
 knew that there was something abnormal in 
 this man, that he was not as most other men 
 were. Before she could say anything there 
 was a knock at the door. 
 
 Orwyn turned towards it, looked at the door, 
 but said nothing. 
 
 There was another knock. 
 
 Still he said nothing. 
 
 " I'll open it," said Mrs Marden. 
 
 Orwyn looked at her and nodded. She 
 went to the door and opened it. The little 
 maid was outside. 
 
 " There's a telegram for Mr Orwyn, Mum," 
 she said. 
 
 " Please give it to me." 
 
 The maid gave Mrs Marden the telegram 
 and went downstairs. 
 
 " It's for you," said Mrs Marden, going 
 to the medium. 
 
 Orwyn did not hold out his hand for the 
 telegram. 
 
 " I know," he said hoarsely. " I know what 
 is in it." 
 
 :e But it's probably another of those 
 
 "No, it isn't," he said, in a loud angry 
 voice. 
 
 'Would you like me to open it?" 
 
 Without making any reply he turned and
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 217 
 
 walked to the window in the back wall of the 
 room behind the round table. 
 
 Mrs Marden stood for a moment holding 
 the telegram. Then almost mechanically she 
 opened it and read it. 
 
 It was from the War Office and announced 
 the death of Captain Orwyn in action.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 As Mrs Marden looked at the telegram 
 she realised that Fate had given Peter Orwyn 
 and his sincerity or insincerity into her hands. 
 It was within her power now to apply the 
 test of which she had thought so often. And, 
 thinking this, she looked up from the tele- 
 gram. Orwyn was standing close to the win- 
 dow. One of his large hands grasped the 
 window ledge firmly. The skin about his 
 knuckles was stretched, and whiter than the 
 skin of the rest of his hand. His bulky form 
 was held upright, but his head was bent. As 
 Mrs Marden looked at him she remembered 
 the telegram she had received, which had 
 stopped her midway in her chatter about the 
 Alhambra matinee, which had changed all life 
 for her in a moment. Perhaps feeling her 
 eyes upon him Orwyn half turned towards 
 her and his eyes met hers. 
 
 " It's bad news," she said. 
 
 " I know," said Orwyn, still staring at her 
 and keeping hold of the window ledge. " I've 
 felt it coming. That's why I couldn't go to 
 bed last night. What does it say? " 
 
 Mrs Marden opened her lips to read out 
 
 218
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 219 
 
 the telegram, but the remembrance of the 
 similar message to her a few months ago again 
 surged into her mind. It was almost as if 
 Time had rolled back and she was once more 
 receiving her blow. All over England no 
 doubt such telegrams were being handed into 
 the homes boys had left for ever; all over Eng- 
 land people who loved were tearing open the 
 sinister envelopes and reading the end of their 
 hopes and fears. For an instant she was over- 
 whelmed by the horror of war and no words 
 came to her lips. 
 
 " It's about my son, isn't it? " said Orwyn. 
 
 ' Yes," she said, with difficulty. 
 
 " Is he wounded? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 "Is he dead?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Ah! Was he killed in action?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "When was he killed?" 
 
 " It doesn't say." 
 
 She went nearer to Orwyn holding out the 
 telegram. But Orwyn moved away. 
 
 " No I don't want it," he said. 
 
 " I'm sorry terribly sorry." 
 
 She put the telegram down on the table at 
 which she had so often sat with the medium.
 
 220 MRS HARDEN 
 
 She did this mechanically, without thinking what 
 she was doing, but when her fingers touched 
 the wood she remembered, and she looked at 
 Orwyn sharply with a piercing scrutiny. 
 
 " I said just now I was terribly sorry for 
 you," she said abruptly, driven to speak in 
 spite of herself, driven by the feeling of the 
 wood beneath her finger tips. ' But why should 
 I be? Your boy was a splendid fellow. But 
 you haven't lost him, have you? You can 
 bring him back." 
 
 Unconsciously she tapped the wood, tapped 
 it loudly several times, turning her fingers 
 inwards so that they struck it with the nails. 
 
 " Here here you can force him to come. 
 You have brought other boys back here, Lady 
 Terrerton's son, and my Ronald. So you can 
 bring your own boy. Isn't that very wonder- 
 ful? Aren't you thankful to God to-day for 
 the power he has put into you? Doesn't it 
 draw out the sting of Death? Just this piece 
 of wood and you, with two or three others 
 to create power, or to help you in developing 
 power, and the gulf is bridged! What you 
 have done for others you will be able to do 
 for yourself now. What you have done for 
 me you can do for yourself. You have helped 
 me. Let me help you. Promise me that when
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 221 
 
 you summon your own son I shall be sitting 
 beside you." 
 
 While she spoke Orwyn gazed at her with- 
 out moving his body. But his face moved. 
 His mouth twitched violently. 
 
 Then Orwyn came away from the window. 
 He came slowly up to the table, and stood 
 there opposite to Mrs Harden, who was still, 
 though she did not know it, tapping on the 
 wood. 
 
 "Don't do that," he said. 
 
 She frowned, but she did not stop. 
 
 "Don't don't I tell you!" 
 
 "Why not? Why shouldn't I ?" 
 
 " It's a lie." 
 
 "What is?" 
 
 " I can't bring him back." 
 
 There was the sound of impotent despair in 
 his voice. 
 
 "Why not? My boy came." 
 
 " No." 
 
 'But he did! He spoke to me. I heard 
 his voice. He spoke of things only he and 
 I knew." 
 
 :< I tell you I can't bring them back," 
 Orwyn said, almost savagely. ' They're gone. 
 No one can call them back. Harry's gone, 
 I tell you, gone where no one can reach him."
 
 222 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Again his mouth twitched, and he threw up 
 his head with a convulsive movement that was 
 full of violence. 
 
 "But you told me- 
 
 " And I tell you now it's a lie. He knew. 
 Harry knew he wrote only the other day. 
 When they've gone West it's all over they 
 can never come back." 
 
 Both his hands swept out, and he began to 
 sob loudly, though there were no tears in his 
 eyes. 
 
 "Oh go away! Leave me!" he muttered. 
 
 Again he lifted his hands almost threaten- 
 ingly. Mrs Marden turned and went out of 
 the room, followed by the sound of those ugly, 
 terrible sobs. 
 
 She stumbled down the narrow stairs, 
 struggled blindly with the door handle and 
 at last opened the door. The sunlight streamed 
 in upon her from the warm, quiet street. A 
 nurse girl, wheeling a baby in a perambula- 
 tor, went by just as she came out upon the 
 pavement. She saw the baby's large light 
 eyes regarding her with a shallow look of in- 
 fantile observation. The nurse girl glanced 
 at her, gave the perambulator a jerk and hur- 
 ried on. In the distance she heard the sound 
 of a child beginning to cry. She had left
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 223 
 
 Orwyn's door wide open, but she did not know 
 it. Not till she got into Kensington High 
 Street did she recover herself sufficiently to 
 take any thought for her appearance, her man- 
 ner, the way she was walking. 
 
 She felt at this moment no more pity for 
 Peter Orwyn. She was incapable of pity for 
 anyone. Wherever she looked she seemed to 
 see Cecil Hammond's energetic and satirical 
 face, and she seemed to hear his voice say- 
 ing, " Burnley wouldn't believe . . . but you 
 would!" 
 
 After walking a few steps along the High 
 Street she turned back and got into an omni- 
 bus at the corner near the Church. A small 
 boy sat next to her. Two old women were 
 opposite. The boy was sucking something, 
 a bullseye perhaps. He looked radiantly cheer- 
 ful and pleasantly gluttonous. The old women 
 were talking to each other in worn-out voices 
 about bargains. One of them had bought 
 some " remnants " at Barker's and was con- 
 sulting the other about how it would be 
 best to use them. Mrs Marden heard her 
 say, 
 
 " Cherry colour suits me better than green. 
 You remember that bonnet " 
 
 The other remembered.
 
 224 MRS HARDEN 
 
 At Hyde Park Corner the omnibus stopped 
 and Mrs. Marden got out. The small boy 
 was sucking another bullseye and looked at 
 her with an expression which suggested a 
 wink. 
 
 She walked into the Park and sat down on 
 a green chair. The sun was less strong now. 
 Evening was approaching. She thought of the 
 Canadian soldier, of the melancholy clergyman, 
 then of Miss King. And suddenly she resolved 
 to go to Miss King's rooms. She had never 
 yet seen them, but she knew where they were, 
 in a small street not far from the British 
 Museum in Bloomsbury. She got up, walked 
 across the Park to the Marble Arch and suc- 
 ceeded in finding a taxicab. 
 
 When she reached Miss King's number she 
 rang the bell. 
 
 An elderly woman opened the door and said 
 that Miss King had just come in. 
 
 " Please ask if she will see Mrs Marden." 
 
 In a moment Miss King came to the door, 
 looking rather earnestly surprised. 
 
 "May I come in?" said Mrs Marden. 
 
 "Of course do! I'll get you some tea." 
 
 " No, I don't want anything." 
 
 " But I'm just going to have tea myself. 
 I'm on the third floor I'm afraid."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 225 
 
 " I don't mind stairs," said Mrs Harden. 
 
 But she ascended them slowly, surprised at 
 her own feebleness. Evidently the shock she 
 had received in Hornton Street had weak- 
 ened her body for the moment. Or had she 
 often felt rather tired of late? She asked her- 
 self that vaguely as she went up. 
 
 ' This is my little room," said Miss King, 
 opening a door painted dark green. 
 
 ' How nice and simple it is ! " said Mrs 
 Marden. "And what a quantity of books!" 
 
 ' When I have time I go a good deal to 
 the second-hand bookshops. You look tired." 
 
 " I am very tired." 
 
 "Sit here and I'll make the tea." 
 
 She drew forward a basket chair with a 
 chintz covered cushion. 
 
 " I won't be a minute." 
 
 She went away through some folding doors. 
 
 " So Emily and her belief live here! " thought 
 Mrs Marden. " How wonderfully clean and 
 neat it is. But of course Emily's room would 
 be." 
 
 The sight of the many books touched her. 
 She knew that Miss King was poor. Very 
 soon her friend came back with tea and bis- 
 cuits on a Japanese tray. She set it down 
 on a round table of wicker work.
 
 226 MRS HARDEN 
 
 * You'll soon feel refreshed," she said, giv- 
 irig Mrs Marden a cup. 
 
 "I'm afraid not but I am glad to have 
 it." 
 
 After quite a long silence she said, 
 
 " Of course you can see something has hap- 
 pened." 
 ' "Yes." 
 
 " It's this Captain Orwyn has been killed 
 in the war." 
 
 "Oh poor, poor Mr Orwyn!" said Miss 
 King, with an accent of deep, almost tender 
 pity. 
 
 " I it's awful, but I don't feel any sor- 
 row for him just now. I was with him when 
 the telegram came. I read it and told him 
 the news. He made me. He was expecting 
 it." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " I don't know. But I suppose he isn't 
 like most people." 
 
 ' You mean he had a premonition ? " 
 
 " I suppose he had." 
 
 " That often happens I believe." 
 
 "It didn't to me. After I had told Mr 
 Orwyn I said to him that now he would be 
 able to call his son back as he called mine. 
 And then he said he said "
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 227 
 
 She closed her eyes, opened them and went 
 on, 
 
 " That he couldn't do that because those who 
 had gone West never returned." 
 
 "He told you that!" 
 
 ' Yes. He said it spiritualism was all lies, 
 nothing but lies. And then he asked me told 
 me to leave him. He began sobbing, not 
 crying. I couldn't stay. I took an omnibus. 
 Then I sat in the Park, and then I thought 
 I would come here. You see Mr Hammond 
 and Larrington were right." 
 
 "My dear!" said Miss King, putting out 
 her hand. "My dear!" 
 
 "It is rather terrible to have been such a 
 fool. And even now I can't quite under- 
 stand. But I couldn't ask he was sobbing." 
 
 "Poor man!" 
 
 " And am not I poor now? " 
 
 " It's all horrible, both for you and for 
 him. If only I could get you to see " 
 
 ' You can't. I am not made that way. I 
 am one of the foolish women who litter the 
 world." 
 
 "No, indeed!" 
 
 ' Yes, I am. We are no use to anyone, 
 except to those who make money out of our 
 folly. It would be better if there were none of
 
 228 MRS HARDEN 
 
 us left. We ought to be put in the front 
 line like the Belgian women to serve as 
 shields to the fighting men." 
 
 "Don't dear!" 
 
 " Emily, I wish I could die to-day. I am 
 sick of myself. If I had done anything! But 
 my work began and ended with buying hats 
 and selling programmes." 
 
 'Why not begin to do something now?" 
 
 "What could I do? What can a fool 
 do? Besides I feel so tired and played 
 out." 
 
 That will pass. You have had a shock." 
 
 ' Yes. Will you come with me to Hans 
 Place?" 
 
 " Of course I will." 
 
 " I'm afraid to be alone to-night. It has 
 made me feel almost ill." 
 
 " I am going to take you to a doctor to- 
 morrow," said Miss King, with sudden de- 
 cision. 
 
 " I wish he would tell me I was going to 
 die." 
 
 "Hush! Shall I put on my things now, 
 or would you rather rest here first ? " 
 
 " Let's go, or I mayn't be able to go at 
 all. I feel like a thing made of water." 
 
 Miss King dressed, packed a handbag, got
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 229 
 
 a taxi, and took Mrs Marden back to Hans 
 Place. 
 
 When they were there Mrs Marden seemed 
 so tired and weak that Miss King insisted on 
 her going to bed. Mrs Marden gave in to 
 her after a poor little protest. When she was 
 in bed with her friend sitting by her she 
 said, 
 
 ' This is almost like a repetition of the day 
 when my telegram came. I locked myself in 
 then. I went to bed and lay awake all night 
 trying to think things out. But that's no good. 
 It would be better for some of us if we couldn't 
 think at all. But even then life was worth 
 more to me than it is now." 
 
 "Why was that, dear?" 
 
 " I had no belief then, but I had never had 
 one. Now I have believed and been betrayed." 
 
 She sat up on her pillows, stretching out 
 her thin arms along the coverlet. 
 
 " Oh, Emily, how can Peter Orwyn look 
 as he does and be as he is? How can any 
 man set himself to the tricking of poor women 
 and men who are yearning for consolation? " 
 
 :< I don't know. But people are so strange. 
 Perhaps he thinks it is better to console with 
 lies than not at all." 
 
 "But the money! And even now I can't
 
 230 MRS HARDEN 
 
 understand. I think he really has some strange 
 powers which most of us haven't got. I have 
 felt them. I even felt them to-day." 
 
 " I think that too." 
 
 " Perhaps- 
 
 For a moment her eyes shone and she seemed 
 about to utter a torrent of eager words. But 
 the impulse must have died, for she fell back 
 on the pillows, and only said, 
 
 "No no." 
 
 Then, after a pause, she added, 
 
 " An end comes to the folly of even the 
 greatest fool. He has told me himself what 
 he is." 
 
 Later that night, after they had had some 
 food together in Mrs Marden's bedroom, Miss 
 King tried earnestly to comfort her friend. 
 She was wonderfully frank and uncovered the 
 secrets of her own heart. She even offered 
 up her love for the man she had lost as a 
 sacrifice on the altar of friendship by telling 
 it, showing what it had been what it still was 
 in her life. The love of a typist for a young 
 dentist yes, and the love of a girl who was 
 true as steel for a man who must have been 
 worthy of it. Mrs Marden walked that night 
 on the bedrock of reality, and the firmness of 
 it seemed very wonderful beneath her feet.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 231 
 
 And then, passing on from things temporal 
 to things eternal, very simply, very naturally 
 and without any self-consciousness, Emily 
 King tried to tell of her soul experience. That 
 was much more difficult. For every woman on 
 earth can reveal the meaning of love to her 
 somehow, if she really wishes to, but not every 
 woman can tell truly and clearly the mysteri- 
 ous processes of the spirit in connection not 
 with a man but with God. And Emily King 
 was not a great mistress of language. Nor 
 had she a powerful intellect. But she tried 
 her best, moved by an intense desire to bring 
 comfort to a stricken human creature, by a 
 supreme longing to replace Mrs Marden's de- 
 stroyed belief in the Hornton Street medium 
 with another belief which she held closely as 
 her greatest treasure the belief in an over- 
 ruling love which regards each individual on 
 the swarming earth, which sees the light at 
 the end of the darkest path, which knows the 
 value of tears, which allows everything that 
 happens for some mighty reason, which does 
 not explain yet, as an astronomer does not 
 explain to an infant the movements of the stars 
 because the receptacle is too small to contain 
 the contents of his knowledge. 
 
 She failed in her attempt, and she felt that
 
 232 MRS HARDEN 
 
 great impotence which has been felt by many 
 of the saints and the mystics. Her vision could 
 not be seen by the eyes of her friend, and she 
 said to herself, " It's my fault." And there 
 she was wrong. It was no fault of hers. At 
 last she desisted. She, too, felt very tired and 
 now almost confused. Her mind seemed all 
 tangled up. 
 
 ' I'm very stupid at explaining what I feel," 
 she said. 
 
 " No, Emily, it isn't that. But there are 
 things we can't hand on to anyone, and I 
 think they are the most valuable things." 
 
 "Do you think all I cling to is an illusion?" 
 asked Miss King. 
 
 " I don't know. But thousands of people 
 have died happily on the breast of illusion. 
 I'm certain of that." 
 
 And then Miss King said a thing that 
 sounded to herself hard as she said it. 
 
 " My dear, I may be wrong but it seems 
 to me there is something in you which almost 
 fights to be unhappy." 
 
 ' Then it's my nature and I can't help it." 
 
 11 Perhaps not. Have you ever heard of a 
 poem called ' The Hound of Heaven ' ? " 
 
 ' Yes, of course. But I have never read it. 
 Why do you ask ? "
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 233 
 
 But Miss King did not say. What she did 
 say was, 
 
 " I think one of the most awful things in 
 life is that we can do so little for other peo- 
 ple." 
 
 Next morning Mrs Marden looked terribly 
 ill, Miss King thought, and she declared her 
 decision to make her friend see a doctor at 
 once. But Mrs Marden refused. Since the 
 events of the previous day her native obsti- 
 nacy seemed to have grown stronger, to have 
 taken on something of almost hard defiance. 
 Her misery had progressed to an almost brutal 
 stage, and she did not trouble to perhaps 
 she could not conceal that from her friend. 
 
 " I am perfectly well in body," she said. " I 
 am certain I shall live to be a very old woman. 
 You must go off to your work, Emily. Don't 
 bother about me any more. I don't know why 
 I have afflicted you with all my absurd misery. 
 Ronald always hated what he called ' pulling 
 women '. I've done with all that. As I've 
 got to go on I shall find something to do. 
 Then at last I may get hold of some self- 
 respect." 
 
 " Just now you're not fit to do anything." 
 
 " I will very soon prove to you that you're 
 wrong, Emily."
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 MRS MAKDEN immediately began to look about 
 for some war work to do. She wished it to 
 be hard, even disagreeable, for something in 
 her desired morbidly an increase of misery. 
 As she had now nothing of happiness to look 
 for, as every door to happiness was shut and 
 barred against her, she was resolved to try 
 and lose herself in its opposite, to drink the 
 last drop of the cup of sorrow. She was full 
 of the defiance of the doomed. The whole ex- 
 pression of her face had hardened. Even her 
 manner had become cold and obdurate. Bitter- 
 ness enveloped her like a garment. 
 
 She sought work and she found it in a hos- 
 pital for wounded soldiers established in the 
 West End by some women she knew. Nurs- 
 ing of course she was unfitted for. She knew 
 nothing about it. And she said so frankly. 
 But there are other things to be done in a 
 hospital, things that almost anyone can do< 
 but that most people want not to do. She was 
 set to wash up plates, dishes, cups and saucers, 
 to clean knives and forks, to carry up trays, 
 
 234
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 235 
 
 She even swept floors, dusted, and scrubbed. It 
 was a new experience. She found it a hard 
 and monotonous one, but she persevered. 
 Sometimes, while she was doing these menial 
 duties, she thought of her dead boy. He had 
 praised her for selling programmes. What 
 would he have said to her now if he had been 
 still alive? He might, perhaps, have been almost 
 shocked to see his formerly gay, and once 
 beautiful, Mother immersed in the activities 
 of a servant. On the other hand he might 
 have admired her for unselfishness. She won- 
 dered dully which it would have been. Any- 
 how it didn't matter. For now nothing mat- 
 tered. She toiled on. In the mornings she 
 was up early. In the evenings she returned 
 home late, tired out, even sometimes exhausted. 
 Then she generally went straight to bed. But, 
 as she did not sleep very well, she read a good 
 deal at night. Remembering Miss King's 
 question she studied " The Hound of Heaven ". 
 Her literary sense made her know it was beau- 
 tiful in its mystic elaboration; but she dis- 
 missed it as the outpouring of a poet not in 
 touch with the realities of life. Then she 
 read philosophy. (Novels no longer interested 
 her.) She tried Herbert Spencer and was 
 bored. Then she read " The Martyrdom of
 
 236 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Man " by Reade. This interested her, and 
 much of it chimed in with her mood of bit- 
 terness. Even the title of the book had a 
 vague fascination for her. For are not all 
 men and women the martyrs of life, she 
 thought? Finally she got hold of Haeckel's 
 "The Riddle of the Universe". This fasci- 
 nated her by its definiteness, its outspoken con- 
 tempt for the follies of men. She read the 
 chapter on the immortality of the soul again 
 and again with a sort of bitter relish. Here at 
 least there was no folly. Haeckel did not lie 
 drowsing on the breast of illusion. He con- 
 futed many assertions that are freely and loudly 
 made by the determined believers in immor- 
 tality, among them one made by Emily King 
 long ago when she and Mrs Marden had first 
 talked rather intimately together. Miss King 
 had said that the whole human race had im- 
 planted in it an instinct that there is another 
 life beyond this life. From Haeckel Mrs 
 Marden learnt that the dogma of a personal 
 immortality is not an original idea of the hu- 
 man mind, and that many of the earliest races 
 of men had no belief in either immortality or 
 in a God. Such a belief, therefore had not 
 been impbnted in man but had been gradu- 
 ally acquired by man. She did not tell Miss
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 237 
 
 King of her discovery. Even in her bitter- 
 ness she had no desire to harm the happiness 
 of her friend. But she was confirmed by 
 Haeckel in her conviction that men believed 
 they must have eventually what they longed 
 to have, merely because they longed to have 
 it. And hence, no doubt, the general belief 
 in immortality and in reunion with lost loved 
 ones. 
 
 But though she accepted with bitter eager- 
 ness so much of Haeckel's teaching, especially 
 his " necessity of emotion " doctrine, she re- 
 volted against his apparently quite genuine 
 dislike of the idea of personal immortality com- 
 bined with reunion with loved ones released 
 from the shackles of the flesh. His joy in 
 the idea of eternal sleep after a life vigorously 
 and thoroughly lived she could not share. And 
 his dissection of the difficulties of after rela- 
 tionships in another world, with its touches 
 of sardonic humour, seemed to sear her heart 
 like a red hot iron. She knew that she had 
 a horror of eternal sleep, of ceasing to be; she 
 knew that she still, in her complete hopelessness, 
 longed almost desperately to be reunited with 
 Ronald. Could Haeckel have ever really loved 
 anyone? She couldn't believe it. If he had he 
 could surely never have written certain pages.
 
 238 MRS MARDEN 
 
 It was torture to long without hope. Yet she 
 would not have lost her longing even if she 
 could. She felt that she would be less with- 
 out it, a monster instead of a woman, a 
 mother. 
 
 One evening, quite unexpectedly, Arthur 
 Burnley called on her. She had not seen him 
 nor heard from him since Larrington's ex- 
 posure of Orwyn. And when he was shown 
 in she was conscious of a slight stir of interest 
 such as she had not felt for a long time. 
 
 Burnley looked surprised when he saw her. 
 His penetrating eyes rested on her face with 
 an intense scrutiny for a moment. 
 
 Then he said, 
 
 "I'm sorry. I did not know you were ill." 
 
 "But I'm not ill," she said. 
 
 " You I'm glad to hear that." 
 
 There was no conviction in his voice, and 
 he still looked at her with a sort of pitiful in- 
 tensity. 
 
 " I'm only tired. I'm always very tired at 
 night because of my work. I'm really working 
 now at a hospital, scrubbing, cleaning up all 
 that sort of thing." 
 
 "Well, don't do too much," he said. 
 
 She was wondering about Burnley and 
 Peter Orwyn, wondering whether Burnley
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 239 
 
 knew what she knew. Since the day of Orwyn's 
 confession to her she had heard nothing about 
 him. 
 
 " Isn't it tragic about Captain Orwyn? " 
 said Burnley. " I wanted to ask you whether 
 you have heard anything of our poor friend 
 Peter." 
 
 "No, nothing." 
 
 " You know he's left London? " 
 
 " No, I didn't know that." 
 
 * That abominable, that scandalous attack 
 engineered by Hammond, followed by the death 
 of his son, must have broken him up, I sup- 
 pose. Anyhow he's gone. I can't get his ad- 
 dress. He doesn't answer my letters. Have 
 you written to him? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 Burnley looked surprised. 
 
 " I saw him after his son's death," said Mrs 
 Harden. 
 
 "Really! How did the poor fellow take 
 it?" 
 
 " I was with him when the telegram from 
 the War Office came." 
 
 Burnley looked keenly interested. 
 
 " I read it and told him the news." 
 
 Burnley kept his fiercely bright eyes fixed 
 upon her but said nothing.
 
 240 MRS MARDEN 
 
 " He had been expecting it, I think. He 
 had had a premonition of evil." 
 
 "Ah! He knew! He would have known. 
 Orwyn would certainly have known. A won- 
 derful psychic such as he is." 
 
 " Mr Orwyn may be what is called psychic," 
 said Mrs Marden, in a hard cold voice. " But 
 he is an impostor." 
 
 Burnley suddenly reddened. 
 
 "Mrs Marden! Surely the contemptible 
 trickery of Larrington hasn't taken you in ? " 
 
 "It isn't that!" 
 
 " Do you mean then that Cecil Hammond's 
 abominable materialistic articles " 
 
 But she interrupted him. 
 
 " Mr Orwyn told me himself that the whole 
 thing spiritualism was nothing but imposture 
 lies, all lies." 
 
 "Orwyn told you! Forgive me please. 
 But really I cannot believe it." 
 
 " He told me he couldn't summon the dead." 
 
 " Summon is perhaps hardly the word. 
 But- 
 
 " I said to him that he must be thankful for 
 his own power, because now he would be able 
 to hold communication with his dead son. Then 
 he told me the truth, that he was impotent, a
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 241 
 
 sham, a deceiver. He told me that those who 
 ,are dead can never come back never." 
 
 She spoke with hard, with pitiless decision. 
 
 "So you see you and I have been fools! " 
 she added. 
 
 Burnley looked very angry. He moved his 
 lips as if about to say something, then closed 
 them and frowned. She could see that he 
 was making a strong effort to contain his in- 
 dignation. He got up, went to a table and 
 fingered some books which were lying there. 
 One of them was Haeckel's " Riddle of the Uni- 
 verse ". He looked at it, turned a page or 
 two, then took it up and, apparently, read a 
 few words. 
 
 " So you've been reading Haeckel? " he said. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Do you like it?" 
 
 ' Yes. It's deeply interesting and wonder- 
 fully reasonable, I think." 
 
 " Reasonable! " he said. " Well, I think it's 
 pernicious." 
 
 He shut the book and put it down. 
 
 " I'm very sorry for you," he said. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 ' Because I think I know you are easily 
 deceived."
 
 242 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " I have been certainly, by Mr. Orwyn. 
 But I don't think I shall ever be deceived 
 again." 
 
 " I know Peter Orwyn is not an impostor." 
 
 " He says himself that he is." 
 
 ' You must have mistaken him. It is not 
 fair, it is not reasonable to judge a man when 
 he is stricken, when he is reeling under a blow. 
 He is not himself in such a moment." 
 
 " I beg your pardon. Such moments bring 
 out a man's real self in my opinion." 
 
 " Oh no ! People say the wildest things in 
 sorrow, in rage. They are untrue to them- 
 selves. It's in calm that we are our real selves, 
 when we are in possession of all our faculties." 
 
 " I don't think so." 
 
 ' Then we disagree. I am certain that poor 
 Orwyn was in such distress at the sudden loss 
 of his son that he disbelieved in, denied his 
 own powers. Probably at that moment he 
 genuinely felt that what he had done for others 
 he might be powerless to do for himself. And 
 so he condemned himself, said far more than was 
 true. I think that is the most natural thing 
 in the world. It would take much more than 
 that to shake my faith in him." 
 
 " Do you know what Cecil Hammond once 
 said to me about you? "
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 243 
 
 "Hammond! no! What did he say? How 
 could I know?" 
 
 " Of course you couldn't. It was foolish of 
 
 >5 
 
 me 
 
 "Tell me, please." 
 
 She hesitated, but the cruelty in her made 
 her go on. 
 
 " He said to me once that if Orwyn were 
 to confess himself a trickster you wouldn't be- 
 lieve it." 
 
 -Burnley reddened again, and his curious eyes 
 seemed for a moment to dart fire at her. 
 
 " I I have the greatest contempt for Ham- 
 mond," he said, in a low angry voice. " A 
 man who is in the hands of a common conjurer! 
 I am sorry you can be influenced by such a 
 materialistic fellow." 
 
 " I am not influenced. But I am influenced 
 by truth, by facts." 
 
 " Oh, Mrs Marden, believe me you don't 
 know what truth is!" 
 
 ' Which of us does, I wonder? " 
 
 He stood still for a moment more by the 
 table. Then he said, in a forced voice, 
 
 ' Well, I must be going. I hoped I am 
 very sorry about this. Please forgive me if I 
 have shown any anger, if I have been dis- 
 courteous. I feel very deeply about some things.
 
 244 MRS HARDEN 
 
 I I once lost by death a girl I was very fond 
 of. Peter Orwyn has helped me more than I 
 can say. He has helped me to face life with 
 hope. That is the explanation of anything 
 that may seem strange to you in me. I shall 
 try to seek him out. And I am quite sure I 
 shall find I was right about him. If I do 
 
 But she interrupted him. 
 
 "I know Mr Orwyn now," she said. " I 
 pity him, but nothing would ever make me be- 
 lieve in him again." 
 
 They said good-bye to each other like stran- 
 gers. 
 
 "Poor Mr Burnley!" thought Mrs Mar- 
 den, when he had gone, with a sort of acid 
 pity. 
 
 And then, mentally, she dismissed him out 
 of her life. 
 
 For a few days more she continued to work 
 at the hospital, but one evening, on returning 
 from it, she felt so thoroughly exhausted that 
 she lay down at once on the sofa in her sit- 
 ting-room, shut her eyes and remained quite pas- 
 sive. Just then she seemed to have come to 
 the end of her physical powers. She thought 
 of the morrow when again she would be due 
 at the hospital, and she knew that she would 
 be unable to go there. She would not have
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 245 
 
 the strength to do even the smallest thing. She 
 could not even wash glasses. Just lately she 
 had noticed a certain symptom which was not 
 normal, which proved to her that there was 
 something physically wrong with her. As she 
 was afraid of idleness, which meant in her case 
 a greater loneliness, she decided that she would 
 see a doctor, and on the following morning 
 she telephoned to say she could not go to the 
 hospital and sent for a general practitioner 
 whom she knew. 
 
 He came, asked her a good many questions, 
 made an examination, and then said, 
 
 ;< I think the best thing you can do is to go 
 to Doctor Layton of Harley Street." 
 
 " But surely you can prescribe for me. I 
 am quite ready to follow your advice." 
 
 " I don't feel quite sure about your case. 
 I should like to hear another opinion." 
 
 " But who is Doctor Layton? I've never 
 heard of him." 
 
 The doctor raised his eyebrows. 
 
 ' That shows how narrow the fame of some 
 of our most brilliant men is. Layton is a 
 great man." 
 
 " Is he a specialist? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "What for?"
 
 246 MRS MARDEN 
 
 " Oh well, I think he is the best man for 
 you. Now do take my advice and consult 
 him. Let me make an appointment for you. 
 I am sure he will be able to clear up any 
 doubts about vour condition." 
 
 w 
 
 " But I am not in pain. I have only been 
 losing weight, and 
 
 " Exactly ! We must try to stop you from 
 that. Well now I'll make an appointment and 
 let you know. Meanwhile keep perfectly 
 quiet. Don't do anything at all. 1*11 telephone 
 to you sometime to-day." 
 
 He got up, smiling. 
 
 ' Layton's a splendid man. You will like 
 him." 
 
 " I don't want to see him." 
 
 ' You really must see him," said the doctor, 
 with quiet authority. 
 
 Mrs Marden said nothing more. She felt 
 too tired to resist his will. 
 
 Later in the day he telephoned to say he 
 had made an appointment for her with Doc- 
 tor Layton at one o'clock on the following 
 morning, and gave his address. He added that 
 Layton was giving up his luncheon hour for 
 her, and asked her to be very punctual. 
 
 Mrs Marden went to Harley Street. She 
 did not feel nervous, though she rea sed that
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 247 
 
 her doctor must have taken a serious view 
 of her condition. But, as she felt no pain, she 
 didn't believe that she could be so ill as he 
 seemed to think. Probably, as he evidently 
 didn't know exactly what was the matter, as 
 he was puzzled, he imagined things might be 
 worse with her than she believed them to be. 
 And she knew, as he did not know, all the 
 mental misery which she had been enduring, 
 and which must naturally have pulled her down. 
 
 Dr Layton's house was very large. When 
 she entered it she saw many doors. It seemed 
 almost like a rabbit warren. When she gave 
 her name, the man servant looked into a big 
 book of appointments, and said, 
 
 ' Yes, Ma'am, I see you are down for one 
 o'clock. But I'm afraid you will have to wait 
 a little." 
 
 "That doesn't matter." 
 
 He looked doubtful for a moment, then pre- 
 ceded her down a passage and opened a door. 
 She saw a small room with a couch on which 
 an elderly woman was lying stretched out flat 
 on her back. 
 
 "Oh!" said the man servant, quickly shut- 
 ting the door. ' This way, Madam! That 
 room is occupied." 
 
 He opened another door, then shut it again.
 
 248 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Finally he showed Mrs Marden into a long, 
 narrow room, containing a sofa, a high, adjust- 
 able couch for medical examinations, and two 
 or three chairs. On a small table lay a few 
 papers and magazines. Some etchings hung on 
 the white papered walls. He handed her the 
 current number of ' The Tatler " and left 
 her. 
 
 She sat down and opened " The Tatler " 
 and began to read " The Letters of Eve ". The 
 style in which Eve wrote disgusted her at that 
 moment, and the matter of that week's letter 
 made her wonder about women. Did they 
 really feel interest in that sort of thing? Then 
 she remembered her own past life, her own 
 past interests, the fascination clothes had had 
 for her, her love of parties, of race meetings, 
 of matinees, of restaurants. Often her own name 
 had appeared in those letters of Eve and she 
 had been pleased to see it there. She had no 
 right to condemn such frivolous gossip, to sit 
 in judgment on those who still cared for the 
 life that meant nothing to her now. She turned 
 the pages and saw photographs of dancers in 
 gardens, of women and men snapshotted in the 
 Park, looking ridiculous with outstretched legs 
 and hanging arms, of small children selfcon- 
 sciously leaning against handsome self-conscious^
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 249 
 
 mothers, of girls making large eyes and finger- 
 ing ropes of pearls. 
 
 And that was life! She had been photo- 
 graphed with her rope of pearls. Who hadn't? 
 She shut up the record of contemporary exist- 
 ence and sat still waiting. All round her no 
 doubt were other little rooms with people wait- 
 ing in them. The remembrance of the middle- 
 aged woman lying flat on the couch came back 
 to her. She had looked as helpless and pathetic 
 as a little dog does when it turns on its back 
 and shows a tooth humbly. What was the 
 matter with her? 
 
 " And what is the matter with me? " 
 
 Well in a short time she would probably 
 know. 
 
 Soon after half past one the door opened 
 quickly and Doctor Layton came in. 
 
 He was a small, thick-set man, with a brown 
 complexion, energetic brown eyes and a large 
 powerful head. 
 
 "Mrs Marden?" he said, in a firm voice. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Sorry to have kept you waiting. Doctor 
 Simpson has told me about you." 
 
 He had taken her hand. Now he sat down 
 beside her and began to talk. But to her 
 surprise he did not ask her questions. He
 
 250 MRS MARDEN 
 
 talked about the war, labour difficulties and 
 matters of the day, as if he had unlimited time 
 at his disposal. Now and then he looked at 
 her in a casual sort of way. Presently he said, 
 
 " I believe you have been doing war work." 
 
 " Just lately I have. It seems to have 
 rather tired me out." 
 
 " I get a good many patients who tell me 
 the same story. Well now then 
 
 And he became the doctor. He began to 
 ask questions swiftly, and listened attentively 
 to her answers. Finally he said he must make 
 a complete examination. He sent for a nurse, 
 and went away for a few minutes while Mrs 
 Marden prepared herself for the examination 
 with the nurse's help. 
 
 " That will do, thank you." 
 
 He helped Mrs Marden up from the couch, 
 and while she was dressing he left the room 
 again, saying, 
 
 " I'll be back in a few minutes." 
 
 Before very long he returned and the nurse 
 went away. Mrs Marden guessed that in the 
 meanwhile he had been seeing another patient. 
 He brought a book with him, sat down and 
 wrote in it with a fountain pen. At last he 
 looked up and met Mrs Mar den's eyes.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 251 
 
 " Well? " she said. " What is the verdict? " 
 
 He looked at her for a moment in silence, 
 and in that moment she was sure he was 
 reading and summing up her character. 
 
 " Do you live alone ? " he asked. 
 
 ' Yes. I had a son but he was killed in the 
 war." 
 
 'Yes yes!" he muttered, moving his pow- 
 erful head. " Death has become almost a com- 
 monplace in these days to many who used to 
 think of it very differently. So many of the 
 finest have gone." 
 
 ;< I suppose Death always seems commonplace 
 to a doctor," she said. 
 
 " It doesn't to me somehow." 
 
 He leaned forward towards her with a 
 very gentle, yet very masculine look in his 
 eyes. 
 
 " I am not going to mince my words," he 
 said. " I don't believe in that. You have come 
 to me alone and it is my duty to tell you the 
 simple truth. You are in a very dangerous 
 condition." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 Then he told her. 
 
 " But but surely but I have felt no pain, 
 only sometimes great weakness." 
 
 ' That is quite natural. And you have of
 
 252 MRS HARDEN 
 
 course been losing weight rapidly for a con- 
 siderable time." 
 
 ' Yes. But I thought that was owing to 
 all I had gone through to my son's death." 
 
 " No. Your physical condition was the 
 cause of it." 
 
 After an instant she said, 
 
 "What can be done?" 
 
 " I doubt very much if anything can be 
 done now. The malady has been going on 
 for some time. It has made great progress. 
 I wish very much you had come to me earlier." 
 
 " But then " she paused. 
 
 ' There is one man who might possibly be 
 able to do something. I wish you to see him. 
 His name is Stanton Jayne. He is the first 
 operator in London for cases such as yours. 
 We must get his opinion and abide by it. 
 When could you see him ? " 
 
 " Now if you like." 
 
 " I shall have to make arrangements with 
 Jayne. And to-day I literally have not a 
 moment. But I shall try to arrange for him 
 to come here to-morrow morning. Could you 
 be here again at one? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " One moment. I'll try to get Jayne on the 
 telephone."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 253 
 
 Again he went out of the room. 
 
 Mrs Harden sat quite still waiting for his 
 return. She felt astounded but vague. She 
 was scarcely able to believe that Doctor Lay- 
 ton was right in his diagnosis. The absence of 
 pain made her almost incredulous. And yet 
 his look, his words, his whole manner proved 
 his absolute certainty that he could not be 
 wrong. 
 
 " It's very strange ! " she thought. 
 
 Strange strange! The word clung to her 
 mind. She applied it to herself and to life. 
 
 " I am strange life is strange." 
 
 She looked about the room, thought again 
 of the middle-aged woman lying flat on the 
 couch, thought of Ronald, Orwyn, Miss King, 
 the table in Hornton Street. 
 
 " And I shall be among them perhaps al- 
 most directly," she thought. " Among those 
 whom people try to summon by sitting in the 
 darkness at tables ! " 
 
 Doctor Layton came back. 
 
 :< I've got on to Jayne. He will be here to 
 see you at one o'clock to-morrow." 
 
 Mrs Marden stood up. 
 
 "I will come then. Please, what do I owe 
 you? " 
 
 " Three guineas, please."
 
 254 MRS MARDEN 
 
 She took out the money and put it in his 
 hand. And she thought that action, too, was 
 strange. At that moment she seemed to be 
 paying at the turnstile for Death. 
 
 " Keep up your heart," said the doctor, in a 
 much less professional voice. ' There may be 
 a chance." 
 
 "I wonder!" she said. "Still, I suppose 
 it is worth trying." 
 
 " Certainly it is, or I should not advise it." 
 
 " Thank you." 
 
 As she was about to part from him some- 
 thing irresistible moved her to say to him, 
 
 "Doctor Layton, tell me something; do you 
 believe that there is any life after this ? " 
 
 " I used to when I was a young man." 
 
 "And now?" 
 
 " Now I doubt very much if there is. Still 
 I may have got away from the truth as I have 
 gone on. Science seems to me to deny that 
 there is any other life for us but this. But 
 there is something in many human beings 
 which seems to give science the lie. Many 
 dying people have puzzled me." 
 
 "Puzzled you?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 He looked straight before him, as if into 
 some vast distance.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 255 
 
 " Some of them seem to see and perhaps 
 they do see what science seems to deny. It 
 may be so." 
 
 " Thank you. I only wanted to know what 
 you thought. I hope you will forgive me 
 for asking." 
 
 He gripped her hand. 
 
 " Forgive you ! We doctors are supposed 
 by some of our patients to have pretty hard 
 hearts. You see we must learn to govern our- 
 selves. Otherwise we could scarcely continue 
 in our profession. But the man beneath the 
 doctor often goes so far as to weep a tear 
 or two, believe me. I shall be keeping you in 
 my mind." 
 
 " Thank you." 
 
 And that was all. 
 
 During the rest of that day Mrs Marden 
 was alone. She went home, sat down and tried 
 to realise thoroughly what had happened. She 
 even tried to feel death in her. She thought 
 of course about Ronald, and the desire for 
 death which she had expressed to Miss King. 
 Now it seemed very probable that that desire 
 would soon be gratified. So that, even if 
 Ronald had gone scathless in the war, she 
 and he would have been separated in a very 
 short time. If she had happened to be what
 
 256 MRS HARDEN 
 
 is called " a believer " perhaps now she would 
 have been able to rejoice in the thought of 
 a speedy reunion with her boy. She wondered. 
 Then she wondered what Miss King would think 
 of the news, what she would say when she 
 heard it. She knew that Miss King was 
 fond of her. She would leave her some money, 
 would add some words to the will made long 
 ago. But that will left almost everything she 
 possessed to Ronald. A new will would have 
 to be made. 
 
 Was Death in her really? She knew that 
 even great doctors sometimes made bad mis- 
 takes. Well she would be quite certain to- 
 morrow. She realised that, even now, she 
 did not feel like one under sentence of death. 
 It seemed to her just then impossible that 
 she was going to die very soon, that the house 
 which had contained her so long was going to 
 be left without a mistress, that Henriette, Han- 
 son, and the other servants would have to 
 seek new service. 
 
 Presently Hanson brought in her tea. She 
 remembered his obvious grief at Ronald's death, 
 and wondered whether he would be equally 
 sorry if she were to die. As he was about to 
 leave the room she said, 
 
 "Hanson!"
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 257 
 
 "Yes, Ma'am ?" 
 
 " Tell me do you think I look ill? " 
 
 The butler looked very much embarrassed. 
 
 " Poor Mr Ronald's death has pulled you 
 down, Ma'am, I think." 
 
 " No, it isn't that." 
 
 "Ma'am?" 
 
 " I am very ill." 
 
 "Oh, Ma'am, I hope not!" 
 ' Well, Hanson, we can't live for ever." 
 
 Hanson now looked acutely shocked. 
 
 " I'm sure, Ma'am, I hope you have a great 
 many years before you," he said. 
 
 After a pause he added, 
 ' We couldn't do without you, Ma'am, 
 really." 
 
 ' Would you be sorry if I were to die? " 
 
 " Oh, Ma'am, please don't say such a thing! 
 I don't like to hear it. You ought to get about 
 more, Ma'am, if I may say so." 
 
 "How do you mean?" 
 
 " Go more among people, Ma'am, as you 
 used to. You were such a favourite with 
 everybody." 
 
 " There's not much in that." 
 
 "Ma'am?" 
 
 ' That will do, Hanson, thank you. You 
 needn't say anything to the other servants."
 
 258 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " Oh, Ma'am, I should never let any gos- 
 sip about you pass my lips." 
 
 He left the room quite shaken. Appar- 
 ently he was very human, as some doctors 
 were. Class-masks are often deceiving. How 
 strange was the nakedness under the clothes! 
 Perhaps Hanson really had a place in his 
 heart for his mistress, for the mother of Mr 
 Ronald of whom he had been " very fond ". 
 
 In the evening of that day Mrs Marden 
 played " patience " successfully. Then she 
 went up to bed. 
 
 Hitherto she had felt almost wonderfully 
 calm, considering what had happened that day. 
 But now, as she faced the night, she was 
 seized with panic. The quiet of the house, 
 the knowledge that all those in it, except her- 
 self, were probably sleeping, the thought of 
 their healthy bodies, whilst hers was obscurely 
 ravaged by an implacable disease, terrified and 
 angered her. She could not keep still. She 
 walked to and fro in the room. Waves of 
 heat seemed to roll over her. They were suc- 
 ceeded by a sensation of glacial cold. She 
 felt hideously alone, isolated absolutely from 
 every living creature, and from God, if there 
 were a God. Passages from Haeckel burned 
 their way through her memory. When she
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 259 
 
 had read them she had had no thought of 
 trying to learn them by heart. Yet apparently 
 her mind had tenaciously retained them without 
 her knowledge, and now used them as a weapon 
 to torment her. 
 
 " Among thoughtful physicians the convic- 
 tion that the existence of the soul came to an 
 end at death has been common for centuries " 
 . . . "It was the gigantic progress of bi- 
 ology in the present century that finally de- 
 stroyed the myth " . . . " Now, indeed, it 
 is rarely that an informed and honourable 
 biologist is found to defend the immortality 
 of the soul" . . . "It" i.e. the belief 
 in immortality " is not found in Buddhism, 
 the religion that dominates thirty per cent of 
 the entire human race." ' When we come 
 to analyse all the different proofs that have 
 been urged for the immortality of the soul, 
 we find that not a single one is consistent with 
 the truth we have learnt in the last few dec- 
 ades from physiological psychology and the 
 theory of descent." ..." All proofs . . . 
 are in a parlous condition; they are definitely 
 annulled by the scientific criticism of the last 
 few decades." . . . 
 
 How terrible memory is! She tried to think 
 of the Bible, to remember consoling passages
 
 260 MRS HARDEN 
 
 from that greatest of all books. But her mind, 
 obstinate as are all self-tormentors, swerved 
 away from it. Again the waves of heat rolled 
 over her, and almost frantically, she went to 
 the window, roughly pulled back the silk cur- 
 tains which concealed it, with a sharp tug sent 
 up the blind, and leaned out to breathe in the 
 night air. 
 
 Hans Place was deserted except for a po- 
 liceman, who was standing under a shrouded 
 lamp at a short distance away. Mrs Marden 
 longed to call out to him for help. How 
 mad he would think her! And perhaps she 
 was almost mad at this moment. She leaned 
 with both her thin arms on the window frame 
 and opened the front of her dressing gown. 
 
 Presently the policeman moved slowly away 
 with a heavy assured tread, and was taken by 
 the darkness of the night. After an interval 
 she heard a faint noise in the distance. It grew 
 rapidly louder. Two not bright lamps came in 
 sight. Then a large shut motor glided by just 
 beneath her and quickly disappeared. Perhaps 
 people she knew were in it, some of those among 
 whom she was a " favourite ". If they could 
 see their favourite, the seller of souvenirs, now! 
 
 After a long while she felt cooler, then 
 presently cold. She drew in. But she left the
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 261 
 
 blind up and the curtains drawn back. She 
 could not bear to be enclosed in a room with 
 no outlet which she could see. A room at night 
 is like a coffin sometimes. She did not lie down, 
 but she stopped walking about and forced her- 
 self to sit down in an armchair. And there she 
 remained the whole of the night, occasionally 
 getting up for a moment to drink a little cold 
 water, and to put eau de cologne on her fore- 
 head and hands. In the chill of the dawn she 
 got into bed. As she lay there she broke out 
 into a profuse perspiration. This was the day 
 when the final verdict would be pronounced 
 upon her. She writhed with a terror which 
 seemed now almost entirely physical. 
 
 "Evidently I am a coward!" she thought, 
 with a sense of profound humiliation. " I 
 never knew that before. I gave birth to a 
 hero, but I am a coward." 
 
 Well, Ronald would never know that. Late 
 in the dawn, and without any warning of 
 change, she suddenly fell fast asleep. 
 
 When she awoke she knew immediately that 
 she had to go to Harley Street that day to hear 
 her fate from the lips of Mr Jayne. 
 
 She got through the morning somehow, look- 
 ing perpetually at the moving hands of the 
 clock like a condemned criminal. Just after
 
 262 MRS HARDEN 
 
 half past twelve too soon no doubt she set 
 out for the doctor's house. 
 
 When she got there she said to the man 
 servant, 
 
 " Please don't show me into a wrong room 
 to-day." 
 
 He looked startled and very uncomfortable, 
 but he only said, with a certain stiffness, 
 r " No, Ma'am, certainly not." 
 
 And he took her to a large and handsome 
 waiting room, where three people were sitting 
 uneasily. She sat down there and picked up the 
 current number of " Punch ". 
 
 At a quarter past one two out of the three 
 people had left the room meanwhile the man 
 servant came for her, and she was shown into 
 a square, rather bright room, where Doctor 
 Lay ton was standing with a very tall fair man 
 of about thirty six, much younger than she 
 had expected. 
 
 " This is Mr Stanton Jayne Mrs Marden," 
 said Doctor Layton. 
 
 " Come to give me my death warrant, I 
 suppose," said Mrs Marden, with a smile. 
 
 " I hope not indeed," said the surgeon, bend- 
 ing to her. " My main business is the saving 
 of lives." 
 
 "Well, you must tell me whether you think
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 263 
 
 you can save mine. Not that it really matters 
 very much, for I am not of much use in the 
 world, and haven't a great deal to live for." 
 
 " Only Hanson! " went through her mind, as 
 she said this. 
 
 " I hope I may be able to save you for many 
 a long year," said the surgeon, gently but 
 firmly. " Now let us see." 
 
 A little later Mrs Marden listened to the 
 verdict. Mr Jayne said that he would have to 
 undertake an exploratory operation before he 
 could tell for certain whether a larger operation 
 could be effective in eliminating the dreadful 
 malady she was suffering from. 
 
 ' Is it worth while, really worth while for 
 me to undergo it?" she asked. 
 
 ' Yes, I think it is. But I cannot promise 
 that any further operation will be advisable, or 
 even possible." 
 
 " And will it be very severe? " 
 
 " Not very severe. And it will not take 
 very long." 
 
 ' Then I suppose I had better make up my 
 mind to it." 
 
 So it was settled. And Mrs Marden eventu- 
 ally left the house still ignorant whether she was 
 to die or to live.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 IT had been arranged that Mrs Marden should 
 go to a nursing home near Cavendish Square 
 for the preliminary operation which was to take 
 place three days later. Doctor Layton had 
 undertaken to settle everything. She had two 
 more days of freedom before her. On arriving 
 at her house she telephoned to her solicitor ask- 
 ing him to come to her as soon as possible 
 to draw up a new will. He came. She did 
 not tell him that she was in danger of death, 
 but simply that owing to the death of her son 
 it had become necessary to make a new disposi- 
 tion of her money and property. He quite 
 agreed that she ought to do this, and they went 
 together into all the details. 
 
 " I wish to sign the will immediately," she 
 said. ' When can it be ready? " 
 " How soon do you want it? " 
 " Not later than the day after to-morrow." 
 The lawyer looked at her with some curiosity. 
 " One never knows what may happen," she 
 said carelessly. " And I ought to have thought 
 of all this weeks ago." 
 
 " Exactly. Yes, yes, I quite understand." 
 
 264
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 265 
 
 But he went away still looking curious, and 
 with a manner rather oppressed. 
 
 When he had gone Mrs Harden considered 
 whether she should telephone to her sister. She 
 supposed that she ought to do so. But she 
 dreaded her sister's sorrow. Annie would prob- 
 ably cry, would begin to talk about religion, 
 would want her to see a clergyman. She de- 
 cided not to tell Annie. It might be unsisterly, 
 but she couldn't help that. Should she sum- 
 mon Miss King? She had not said a word to 
 her friend yet. Miss King did not know she 
 had seen any doctor. She would have to tell 
 her; she would tell her, but not now. She 
 would wait till to-morrow. But there was 
 someone she wanted to see, someone she felt she 
 must see, if possible. It was Peter Orwyn. 
 Arthur Burnley had told her that Orwyn had 
 gone away and had left no address. But 
 several days had elapsed since Burnley's visit 
 to her. Orwyn might have returned. She re- 
 solved to find out, and she went to the telephone 
 and asked for his number. In two or three 
 minutes she was put through to Hornton Street, 
 and heard a voice say, 
 
 "'Ello?" 
 
 "Who is that?" she asked. 
 
 " Mr Horwyn's servant. 'Oo his it, please? "
 
 266 MRS HARDEN 
 
 "Mrs Marden." 
 
 >Oo please?" 
 
 "Mrs Marden." 
 
 "Oh, Mrs Marding! Yes?" 
 
 " Is Mr Orwyn in London? " 
 
 "Yes, Mum. 'E's just come back." 
 
 " I wish to speak to him, please, if he's at 
 home." 
 
 " I'll tell 'im, Mum." 
 
 So he had returned! She waited with the 
 receiver in her hand. Presently she heard 
 Orwyn's voice saying, 
 
 " Do you want me, Mrs Marden? " 
 
 ' Yes. I want very much to see you." 
 
 After a perceptible pause the voice said, 
 
 "May I ask why?" 
 
 " I must see you. Don't refuse me. And 
 I want you, I beg you to come to me." 
 
 " I am not very well. I am not seeing anyone 
 at present." 
 
 " I quite understand. But I beg you to 
 come. I may not have a chance of ever seeing 
 you again." 
 
 ' You are going away? " 
 
 " I'm dangerously ill." 
 
 " What is that? " 
 
 " I am very ill, and I must speak to you. I'm 
 sure you won't refuse me. I have to go to a
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 267 
 
 nursing home almost immediately and I can't go 
 without seeing you. Will you come? " 
 
 " I'm very sorry very sorry! " 
 
 "Will you come?" 
 
 "But what could I do? I'm I'm quite 
 broken up. I'm unfit to be with anyone." 
 
 " No one will be here but myself. Do please 
 come." 
 
 Perhaps he felt the intensity of her voice even 
 through the telephone, for he said, 
 
 ' Very well. But I'm afraid I cannot help 
 you. I cannot help anyone really." 
 
 " I beg you to come." 
 
 " Very well, I will. But- 
 
 " Thank you. At once? " 
 
 " I will come as soon as possible." 
 
 " Thank you. I shall stay here. I shall ex- 
 pect you." 
 
 There were no further words from Orwyn, so 
 she put the receiver up. 
 
 An hour passed. He had not come. After 
 waiting for half an hour more she went again 
 to the telephone and enquired if Peter Orwyn 
 were in. She received the answer, from the 
 maid, that he had just left his house. 
 
 "Do you know where he is going?" she 
 asked. 
 
 " No, Mum, Mr Horwyn didn't say."
 
 268 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Mrs Harden hoped he was on his way to her, 
 but she felt no certainty. However she could 
 do nothing more. Again she sat down to wait. 
 It seemed to her that she was always waiting 
 now. But probably a definite end would be 
 put to all that very soon. The clumsy business 
 of life would perhaps be over for her in a short 
 time, possibly within a few days. If Orwyn 
 did not come to her now she resolved that she 
 would visit him on the morrow. He should not 
 escape her. She must see him. She would not 
 die without trying to clear up certain mysteries 
 which, since she had been with the doctors, had 
 hung about her mind like veils. Now she knew 
 what she carried within her she felt an importu- 
 nate necessity to get through to a little more 
 light before facing the great darkness. Hany 
 things, the greatest things, she could never 
 understand, but there were some things she 
 must try to understand. And at this moment 
 she knew she had within her a will which Orwyn 
 would not be able to resist if they met. She 
 did not mean to ask for his pity, but she was 
 resolved to be pitiless with him. She would 
 make him tell her the truth. 
 
 It was evening when at last Hanson came 
 to tell her that Hr Orwyn had called and wished 
 to see her.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 269 
 
 " Please show him in," she said. 
 
 When Orwyn entered she looked at him in 
 astonishment. He was almost incredibly 
 altered. The natural red of his large face was 
 mottled with patches of sallow white. His 
 mouth was drawn down; his broad body seemed 
 to have shrunk; his dark eyes had lost their 
 characteristic look of steady earnestness and 
 were now dull, furtive, and horribly distressed; 
 his hair was untidy with an irregular parting 
 evidently made by a shaking hand; his clothes 
 were dusty, and between his not very clean collar 
 and his tie there was a gap which showed his 
 collar stud. All the firmness and calm self- 
 possession were gone from his gait and manner. 
 And he looked much older, older by years, 
 than when she had first seen him in Lady Ter- 
 rerton's drawing-room. As Hanson went out 
 and shut the door they stood facing one another 
 altered both of them, noting, both of them, 
 the changes physical and mental which their 
 bodies and faces showed. 
 
 Orwyn did not hold out his hand to her and 
 she did not offer to take it. He was the first 
 to speak. 
 
 ' What is it? " he asked, in a heavy voice. 
 
 He cleared his throat.
 
 270 MRS MARDEN 
 
 " Why did you want to see me, Mrs 
 Harden? " 
 
 " Please sit down and I will tell you." 
 
 He dropped into a chair like a tired man. 
 
 " I'm sorry to hear you are ill," he said. 
 " I've been away. I didn't know." 
 
 " Nobody knows but you and the doctors. 
 My own sister doesn't know. I've told no one 
 but you." 
 
 She sat down. 
 
 " I want you to understand how ill I am. I 
 have a deadly disease. There's very little chance 
 of saving my life perhaps none at all. I shall 
 know about that this week. I am going to have 
 an operation to find out." 
 
 " I am very sorry, very sorry," said Orwyn, 
 with a sort of dull sincerity. " Misery every- 
 where it's almost unbearable. I don't know 
 how human beings bear what they do without 
 sinking under it. I have lost my Harry, and 
 now you are in mortal trouble." 
 
 He paused, seemed to think for a moment, 
 like a man making an effort to gather the forces 
 of his mind, and then said, 
 
 " Why have you sent for me to tell me this 
 grievous news? After what happened the other 
 day I can't understand it. I thought I should 
 never hear from you again. I have but few
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 271 
 
 friends and I know that now I cannot number 
 you among them." 
 
 " I have told you because I don't think you 
 will tell any untruths to a probably dying 
 woman, and because my mind is disturbed." 
 
 "What about?" 
 
 " I'll tell you. Since my last visit to you I've 
 seen Mr Burnley." 
 
 Orwyn shifted in his seat and looked down 
 on the ground. 
 
 " I told him what had happened between me 
 and you that day." 
 
 A dull flush went over Orwyn's mottled face. 
 He clasped his large hands together, then un- 
 clasped them. 
 
 " He wouldn't believe that what you had said 
 was true. He said you spoke under the in- 
 fluence of emotion, that you didn't know what 
 you were saying. He was very angry with me, 
 I think. We parted like strangers. Since then, 
 and since I have seen the doctors, I have felt 
 that perhaps there was something of truth in 
 what Mr Burnley said, that possibly both he 
 and I may have fallen into exaggeration. I 
 don't wish to be a fool, like so many women, 
 but I I don't wish to throw away anything 
 which might be of the least help to me now. 
 I do need help hope terribly. Am I wrong
 
 272 MRS HARDEN 
 
 in one thing? I suppose you have played tricks 
 to deceive me. You must have told me lies. 
 You have practically acknowledged that your- 
 self. But have you not really some strange 
 powers in you which you don't understand but 
 which you feel, know of? At times I have felt 
 them, or seemed to feel them, so strongly that 
 even now, after your own confession, I cannot 
 believe that you are just like other people, like 
 Mr Burnley, or myself, or Mr Hammond, or 
 even like Larrington. You must tell me, Mr 
 Orwyn, whether I am right or wrong. You 
 can't have the heart to refuse now, or to tell 
 a lie to a woman in my condition, who really 
 has nothing to cling to. But " suddenly she 
 spoke with a sharp, almost fiercely suspicious 
 voice " I want no consoling lies. I won't ac- 
 cept lies. I would rather die hopeless than die 
 clinging to nonsensical illusions." 
 
 She stopped. Then she said, 
 
 " I pitied Mr Burnley, though I daresay he 
 thought I laughed at him in my mind. But 
 is there any reason at all in his faith in you? 
 Have you any exceptional powers?" 
 
 Peter Orwyn lifted his head and met her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Yes," he said. 
 
 And, as he said it, to Mrs Marden his voice
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 273 
 
 sounded almost as deeply firm, as quietly as- 
 sured, as on the day when she had first heard 
 it. 
 
 "You have! What is their nature?" 
 
 " I don't understand them myself." 
 
 A spark of hope was kindled in Mrs Marden's 
 breast. 
 
 "But then that day do you mean you 
 denied your own powers? Was it as Mr Burn- 
 ley said? Were you so overwhelmed by the 
 death of your son that you talked at random? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " No." 
 
 Suddenly Mrs Marden felt a dreadful sensa- 
 tion of mortal weakness, as if vitality sank away 
 from her, like a wave that recedes. It seemed 
 almost like the approach of death. Orwyn, who 
 had his eyes now fixed upon her, got up, swiftly 
 for so heavy a man. 
 
 " What is it? " he said. " What can I do? " 
 
 She held out her thin arms to him. 
 
 " Help me to the sofa. Put me lying down." 
 
 He put his powerful arms round her, helped 
 her up from her chair, and almost carried her 
 to a sofa. She lay down on it, and he care- 
 fully placed a cushion under her head. 
 
 " Let me send for a doctor," he said. 
 
 " No no."
 
 274 MRS MARDEN 
 
 " Then let me- 
 
 " No. Sit by me. I shall be better in a 
 minute. I've never been like this before. But 
 I've had to go through a good deal 
 
 He sat down close beside her. She lay quite 
 still for a few minutes with her eyes shut. 
 Presently she opened them, and sat up, push- 
 ing herself up with the help of both hands, but 
 keeping her feet on the sofa. 
 
 "Now tell me!" she said. 
 
 " But you're not fit to- 
 
 c Yes, I am. I want to know. I must 
 know." 
 
 ' What do you wish to know? " 
 
 " I wish to know what led you to become a 
 medium." 
 
 " I can't tell you everything. It would take 
 too long," 
 
 " Tell me all you can." 
 
 " It began with my going to a friend, who 
 had been troubled with odd noises in his house. 
 He consulted me about them. I was a minister 
 then, a Baptist afterwards I joined the Salva- 
 tion Army." 
 
 " I know. Lady Terrerton told me." 
 
 " He wished me to exorcise whatever it was 
 that caused the noises. He was a superstitious 
 man. I tried. I went to the house and prayed.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 275 
 
 But the noises continued. Then someone ad- 
 vised my friend to ' sit ' and try to find out, 
 by sitting, who was in the house. He asked me 
 to sit with him. I had never done such a thing. 
 I knew nothing about such matters. But I 
 consented, and we sat, with two other people. 
 The very first time I sat I fell into a trance. 
 It was like going to sleep. I couldn't help it. 
 I was not aware of doing anything when I 
 was in the trance. But the noises in the house 
 ceased. To this day I don't know why. After 
 that, from time to time I sat with other people. 
 Sometimes I fell asleep, but often not. But 
 when I was awake I felt inclined to write. They 
 gave me paper and pencil. And I wrote a lot 
 of queer things. Sometimes I answered ques- 
 tions, and often correctly. Then I began to 
 answer mental questions. People began to 
 hear about me. One thing led to another, and 
 at last I I saw there was money in it." 
 
 She was silent. 
 
 " I had the two boys. I wanted to do the 
 best for them. I was a poor man " 
 
 "I understand." 
 
 ' The spiritualists got hold of me. I was 
 told I was a powerful medium. Eventually I 
 gave up everything to follow up that medium- 
 ship."
 
 276 MRS MARDEN 
 
 " And you took to trickery? " 
 
 " People wanted it. They aren't easily 
 satisfied. They want things that surprise 
 them. Truth by itself doesn't satisfy most 
 people." 
 
 "Poor things!" 
 
 " So I began to give them what they wanted." 
 
 " But what is genuine in the things you do? " 
 
 " I don't know myself what happens when I 
 fall into a trance." 
 
 " Do you sometimes pretend to be in a 
 trance when you are not ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Have you with me? " 
 
 ' Yes. It is only now and then that I feel 
 I must go off. Certain people help me. Others 
 seem to hold me back." 
 
 "Does Mr Burnley help you?" 
 
 ' Yes, very much. But I couldn't do certain 
 things when Mr Hammond was there." 
 
 " Did my friend, Miss King, help you or 
 hinder you? " 
 
 " I call her negative. She seemed shut up 
 and locked, like a box might be. I could never 
 get anything from her. But she wasn't quite 
 like Mr Hammond. He was antagonistic some- 
 how." 
 
 " Tell me about the voices please."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 277 
 
 " They come to me." 
 
 "What do you mean by that?" 
 
 " I feel I want to speak with different sorts 
 of voices, sometimes one, sometimes another." 
 
 "But that voice like my son's?" 
 
 " It came in my mouth after a while." 
 
 "Not at first?" 
 
 " I knew your son was in the Guards. Lady 
 Terrerton told me that before ever I saw you." 
 
 " Did you try to imitate a certain type of 
 voice?" 
 
 ' Well, I've met a lot of young soldiers, 
 Guardsmen some of them. In the war a sur- 
 prising lot of officers came to see me." 
 
 " I thought of that. For a long time I 
 thought just that," Mrs Harden said, in a tired 
 voice. " And then, by degrees, I began to 
 feel " 
 
 She looked hard at Orwyn. He answered the 
 question in her eyes. 
 
 ' You helped me," he said. " After a bit, 
 you seemed to be sending me the very voice." 
 
 * That's your power? " she said. ' You 
 have a wonderful faculty of stealing knowl- 
 edge from those who sit with you? " 
 
 ' That's what I think. It seems to come to 
 me from certain people, as if it was passed 
 out of them into me."
 
 278 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " It comes from them, not from the other 
 world." 
 
 " Ah! " said Orwyn heavily. 
 
 "Do you know what made me believe? It 
 was the way you laughed once. It was exactly 
 like my son's laugh." 
 
 " I shouldn't wonder," said Orwyn. " I 
 seemed to get very near to your mind." 
 
 " My subconscious mind, perhaps.*' 
 
 " That's it, in my belief." 
 
 " And that's how you seemed to know things 
 that only my son and I knew? " 
 
 ' That must be it. I don't think most people 
 have any idea how mind can flow into mind, 
 as it were. I have a power of receiving what 
 most people can't receive. And that enables 
 me to give out." 
 
 "So it's all purely natural mysterious but 
 natural." 
 
 " I suppose so." 
 
 " And you have pretended that it was what 
 people call supernatural? " 
 
 " I don't know what happens when I am 
 asleep." 
 
 " Have you ever gone into a real trance 
 when I have been with you? " 
 
 After a long pause of hesitation Orwyn 
 answered,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 279 
 
 " No. First Hammond, and then your friend, 
 Miss King, seemed to prevent it." 
 
 " That's all I wished to know. Thank you! " 
 she said quietly. 
 
 After a moment Orwyn got up. 
 
 " Shall I go? " he asked, standing by the sofa, 
 with his arms hanging down, and his head bent. 
 
 ' Yes, please. But I want to ask you some- 
 thing. I want you to give it up." 
 
 :< I have given it up. After Harry a little 
 before he died Harry wrote me a letter. He 
 wouldn't wish I couldn't do it now he might 
 know." 
 
 '* Then you think he still exists somewhere? " 
 
 " Oh yes. I'm a believer." 
 
 ' You spoke to me once about prayer." 
 
 ' Yes. I pray every day." 
 
 " And yet you have been how strange every- 
 thing is ! " 
 
 ' We are all mixed up of good and bad. But 
 I shall continue praying." 
 
 As he was about to go she said, 
 
 " Forgive me for asking but have you some- 
 thing to live on? " 
 
 " I have a little money put by. I shall find 
 something to do. I can work. Harry would 
 have been glad to see me working in another 
 way."
 
 280 MRS HARDEN 
 
 "Yes," she said. 
 Then he went away. 
 
 During the time that elapsed before the opera- 
 tion Mrs Marden felt much calmer than she 
 had expected to feel, indeed almost tranquil. 
 The interview with Orwyn had put an end to 
 her feverish unrest. Now she knew! It was 
 much better so. One can rest on knowledge, on 
 truth, even if it destroys hope, even if it slays 
 expectation. She thought about that, and was 
 surprised to find how much she valued truth 
 now that she was facing a big thing, a thing 
 from which there was no escape. She had for- 
 given Peter Orwyn, and had no longer any 
 feeling of bitterness towards him. And she 
 knew that he would keep his word, that he would 
 never again throw dust in the eyes of poor 
 people seeking for consolation in their troubles. 
 His assertion of belief had impressed her per- 
 haps more than she realised. She was quite cer- 
 tain he really believed that his dead son prob- 
 ably was able to know what he was doing. 
 Henceforth he would live for Harry, to win 
 Harry's approval or at any rate to avoid 
 Harry's condemnation. And yet he had told 
 her that once " they " had gone West they could 
 never come back. It was odd that he had been
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 281 
 
 able to pray all through that career of his, 
 that career of dishonesty and lies, and no doubt 
 to pray with sincerity. But almost everything 
 connected with human beings was mysterious. 
 Impossible to plumb the depths of even the 
 shallowest man, the most frivolous woman! 
 
 She sent for her sister. Annie came and 
 was told the news. She was shocked. For a 
 moment she was unable to express her feelings. 
 Then she cried, kissed her sister, and of course 
 begged her to see a clergyman. But Mrs 
 Harden gently refused. 
 
 "I want to be quiet," she said. "I don't 
 feel afraid any more. I was terrified one night. 
 I felt almost as if I were going mad with terror, 
 but that has all gone. I'm not even exactly 
 unhappy now." 
 
 "I don't understand!" 
 
 "Nor do I, Annie! But a sort of peace 
 has come to me. I've never felt anything just 
 like it before. Perhaps it is because I shall 
 soon share my boy's fate. Somehow the thought 
 of that seems to bring us nearer together." 
 
 ' You mean you feel you may be going to 
 join him? " 
 
 " No ; it isn't that. But I may soon be as 
 he is. And I suppose any sort of sharing 
 brings with it a feeling of nearness. If Ronald
 
 282 MRS HARDEN 
 
 had been blinded, as so many men have been in 
 the war, I think I should have hated being 
 able to see. Real love likes to share even mis- 
 fortunes, I think." 
 
 " Darling, I want you to live, but if that may 
 not be, I hope you will share the glory with 
 poor Ronald." 
 
 :< If you think Ronald is in glory how can 
 you call him poor? " 
 
 For a moment Annie looked rather confused 
 and uncomfortable. " Oh, I don't know," she 
 murmured. " One gets into the habit I sup- 
 pose when people are dead." 
 
 " Never mind, Annie." 
 
 "And you really won't see a clergyman? I 
 know one, Father Burch, who is most help- 
 ful." 
 
 " No, I would rather not. I want to think 
 for myself." 
 
 "How strange you are, dear!" 
 
 Mrs Marden could not help smiling. How 
 the sense of humour persists! It cannot die 
 even on the edge of the grave. 
 
 When Annie had gone Mrs Marden con- 
 sidered whether she should let Miss Xing know. 
 Since she had taken up the work at the hospital 
 she had given up having Miss King in the 
 mornings to go through the letters. They had
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 283 
 
 met only as friends. In a way she wanted to 
 see Emily. She was very fond of her; she 
 trusted her and respected her thoroughly. But 
 she now felt reluctant to see her. Solitude 
 seemed best just then, seemed almost necessary 
 to her. She had an instinct to avoid all in- 
 fluences. She did not want Miss King or any- 
 one to think for her, or even to put thoughts 
 into her mind. Eventually, she decided against 
 sending for Miss King. And she spent her re- 
 maining time in Hans Place alone. 
 
 Of course the servants all knew now. They 
 seemed very distressed. Evidently they had 
 got to like her. Henriette cried, but said she 
 knew her mistress would recover and be better 
 than she had ever been before. Hanson was 
 much upset by the whole thing, and showed it 
 in a respectful and unemphatic way. The butler 
 held the human being in decent control, but the 
 human being was obviously there. Mrs Marden 
 felt almost fond of Hanson. She told him she 
 had left him a handsome legacy in her will. 
 This seemed to upset him more than ever, and 
 when he thanked her for her consideration she 
 distinctly saw moisture in his pale eyes. 
 
 The solicitor came with the will. She signed 
 it, and made him write in a short codicil, which 
 was also witnessed and signed. By this she
 
 284 MRS HARDEN 
 
 left a small sum of money to Peter Orwyn of 
 11 B Hornton Street, Kensington, W. It was, 
 perhaps, her tribute to Harry. 
 
 When all was done she had one more night 
 in Hans Place. 
 
 She had fancied that perhaps her feeling of 
 panic would return now that she was drawing 
 so near to the operation which would decide 
 whether she had, or had not, a chance to live 
 on. She had feared its return. And when the 
 evening fell, and the summer darkness closed 
 in, she sat like one waiting for the arrival of a 
 guest. But that dreaded guest did not come. 
 She felt almost oddly simple and calm, and not 
 so lonely as usual. Her anguish about the loss 
 of Ronald was lessened in an extraordinary de- 
 gree. If he had been alive he would have been 
 suffering now. He had been tremendously fond 
 of her, though he had seldom, or never, shown 
 it in at all a sentimental way. His affection had 
 rather been demonstrated by comradeship, " pal- 
 liness ", by his readiness to go about with her, 
 to share his pleasures with her. She had never 
 had to " tout " for a dinner or a visit to the 
 theatre with Ronald. On the contrary he had 
 generally been the one who had suggested the 
 companionship in pleasure which had been such 
 a bond between them. It would have been hor-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 285 
 
 rible to see Ronald in mental pain. She was 
 spared that now. 
 
 As the evening drew on the sense of a 
 new nearness to Ronald, of which she had 
 spoken to her sister, increased within her, 
 and she began to be surprised by it, to ask her- 
 self why she should feel it so definitely. Even 
 when she had listened to the voice in Peter 
 Orwyn's room, believing that it was her son's 
 voice, she had not had a greater feeling of his 
 nearness to her than she had this evening; in- 
 deed, probably because now she was quite alone, 
 there was something more intimate in it she 
 fancied than when the voice had spoken. It 
 was almost as if Ronald were coming to the 
 house, or were actually in the house with her. 
 She sat like one who listens for a familiar foot- 
 step; she looked towards the door like one ex- 
 pecting it to open. Her body felt very weak 
 and tired but her mind, though still calm, was 
 alert. 
 
 Presently Henriette came, with a cautious 
 tread, to ask how she was feeling and whether 
 she wanted anything. Mrs Marden said, 
 
 " No, nothing, thank you, Henriette." 
 
 " Madame ought to have had someone with 
 her this evening," said the maid, in a sympa- 
 thetic voice.
 
 286 MRS MARDEN 
 
 Mrs Marden nearly said, :< I have," but 
 checked herself, wondering. 
 
 " I prefer to be alone," she said. " I am 
 quite contented as I am." 
 
 " Madame is very brave! " 
 
 Mrs Marden smiled. 
 
 ' These things aren't always so terrible as 
 we expect them to be." 
 
 "That is the good God!" said Henriette, 
 who was a pious Catholic, and she went out 
 looking relieved. She was certainly a devout 
 believer. So was Annie. And yet both of 
 them seemed more upset than she was, and 
 Annie had called Ronald " poor " when speak- 
 ing of him in glory. Good Christians were 
 sometimes rather difficult to understand thor- 
 oughly. They seemed to have a great aversion 
 for death. 
 
 Did she, or did she not, want to live on? She 
 certainly did not wish to suffer pain, but did 
 she wish to be saved by the surgeon? She 
 scarcely knew. But to-night she did not feel 
 any ardour for life, or any keen fear of death. 
 And Ronald seemed to have something to do 
 with that, too. She could not share life with 
 him if she lived. Perhaps, if she were to be 
 once more a strong, active woman, she would 
 again be tormented by her loss. It did not
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 287 
 
 torment her now. She looked again towards the 
 drawing-room door. She was very fanciful to- 
 night. 
 
 She recalled her interview with Orwyn. The 
 abrupt attack of physical weakness a dying 
 away of all her bodily powers it had seemed for 
 a moment which had prostrated her while he 
 was with her had been brought on, she felt sure, 
 entirely by the shock to her mind he had given 
 when he had denied the truth of Arthur Burn- 
 ley's assertion. Her physical malady had had 
 nothing to do with that. So she had really been 
 holding on still, however weakly, however 
 vaguely, to hope then. Orwyn had knocked 
 away the hope, and she had felt " This is the 
 end ". How was it that now, without any hope, 
 she felt as she did? She could not understand. 
 It was absolutely inexplicable. Did she, like 
 Haeckel, look forward to eternal sleep, to that 
 nothingness in which all the affections and de- 
 sires, all the sorrows, too, of humanity fall into 
 dust with the flesh? It seemed as if it must 
 be so. Yet she did not feel that it was so. For 
 she was aware of something like expectation, as 
 if there were still something for her, a future of 
 some kind. Nothingness did not seem to be 
 near her. She really had no consciousness of 
 drawing near to an end.
 
 288 MRS HARDEN 
 
 At last she got up to go to bed. She moved 
 slowly and feebly, and looked round the familiar 
 room as she went to the door; saying good-bye 
 to its evening intimacy. She opened the door 
 and switched off the lights. Then she went up 
 to Ronald's bedroom. She stayed there for a 
 few minutes just looking at it quite calmly. 
 Then she went to her room. Before she got into 
 bed she knelt for a little while by the bed, with 
 her hands over her face, not praying but wait- 
 ing. Nothing seemed to come to her, unless it 
 was perhaps a greater calmness. 
 
 " I suppose I am not such a coward as I 
 believed myself to be," she thought. 
 
 She was glad of that. She knew now that 
 she would behave quite decently that was a 
 favourite word of Ronald's in the nursing 
 home. The nurses, the doctors, would have no 
 reason to be ashamed for her, or to wonder 
 about her. From somewhere strength and self- 
 possession had certainly come to her. She knew 
 she would sleep that night. 
 
 And she slept well. 
 
 In the morning, when she awoke, the feeling 
 of calm had not left her. 
 
 When Mrs Marden recovered full conscious- 
 ness after the operation, and was able to under-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 289 
 
 stand what had happened, and to know that her 
 fate must now have been definitely decided by 
 the surgeon, she asked, without any anxiety, to 
 be told the truth about her condition. The 
 surgeon had already gone away, to perform 
 another operation, but Doctor Layton was with 
 her. He had also been away, leaving her with 
 another doctor who helped him in his work, but 
 had returned to the home to explain matters to 
 her, and to see how she was. 
 
 He sat down by the bed, and his brown eyes, 
 full of experience, looked at her with steady 
 kindness. There was a manly strength in their 
 gaze which seemed looking, not doubtfully, for 
 strength in her. 
 
 The nurse had left the room for a moment. 
 
 "Well?" she said. 
 
 She did not know whether her voice was 
 strong or weak. 
 
 " Do you feel quite easy?" he asked. 
 
 " I think so. The sickness has left me." 
 
 " You mustn't talk much." 
 
 " No. I don't want to. Just tell me." 
 
 !t It will not be necessary to perform another 
 operation." 
 
 After lying quite still in silence for a moment, 
 she said, 
 
 " I understand. It has gone too far."
 
 290 MRS HARDEN 
 
 He put one hand gently on hers. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Shall I be able to go home again? " 
 
 " Yes, later on." 
 
 ' Thank you. That is what I wanted to 
 know." 
 
 " I don't think you will suffer very much." 
 
 "I'm glad." 
 
 There was a gentle tap at the door. The 
 nurse had returned. 
 
 " I will go and speak to your sister," said the 
 doctor. " She is waiting downstairs." 
 
 " Annie ! She will cry. Tell her not to. 
 There is nothing to cry about. I think I knew 
 how it would be." 
 
 " Do you wish to see her for a moment? " 
 
 " No. But please tell her you don't wish it. 
 I want to be very quiet." 
 
 " I will tell her." 
 
 He was standing up by the bed looking down 
 at her. There seemed to be a deep question in 
 his eyes. 
 
 " It's strange," she almost whispered. " When 
 these things come they are not like what we 
 expect them to be." 
 
 He moved his head. 
 
 " That is so. I have noticed it many times." 
 
 Before he went out he said,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 291 
 
 " When you go home I shall come to see 
 you." 
 
 " Annie wants me to see a clergyman. But 
 I would rather talk to you." 
 
 Then she closed her eyes. As he went out 
 he let the nurse in. 
 
 When Mrs Marden went back to Hans Place 
 a nurse accompanied her to attend upon her 
 until the end came. It was doubtful how long 
 she would live. Doctor Layton said to her that 
 she might live for two, or even for three months, 
 but perhaps not so long. It was impossible to 
 be certain. The servants had been told of her 
 condition by Annie. But Miss King only knew 
 as yet that her friend had been ill and had 
 undergone a not very severe operation. It was 
 now, however, obviously necessary to tell her 
 the whole truth. Not to do so would be un- 
 friendly. And on the day after her return home 
 Mrs Marden wrote to Emily and asked her to 
 come. 
 
 When she arrived Mrs Marden was lying 
 down on the sofa in her bedroom. The nurse 
 had gone out to get some fresh air. Miss 
 King came in with an anxious look on her 
 face. 
 
 " What's the matter?" she asked, as she
 
 292 MRS HARDEN 
 
 came up to the sofa and took her friend's hand. 
 " Why didn't you tell me? " 
 
 " That I had taken your advice and consulted 
 a doctor? Something held me back, but not 
 any unfriendliness, Emily. I thought I would 
 wait till I was here, till I knew everything. I 
 had to tell my sister. Peter Orwyn was the 
 only other person who knew, except of course 
 the doctors. Sit down, Emily." 
 
 Miss King sat down by the sofa. 
 
 " You told Mr Orwyn, and not me! " 
 
 " I felt I must tell him, because I wished to 
 know exactly what he was. And I thought he 
 would be truthful to me when he knew my 
 condition." 
 
 " But are you very ill? Hasn't the operation 
 been successful? " 
 
 " It was only done to find out exactly what 
 was the matter, that is to find out how far 
 my malady had gone." 
 
 " What is the matter? " 
 
 Then Mrs Marden told her. 
 
 Miss King looked shocked, horrified even. 
 She turned pale, got up, walked to the window 
 and stood with her back to Mrs Marden. Mrs 
 Marden saw her feeling for something. Then 
 she took out a handkerchief and lifted it to her 
 face. When she turned round her eves
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 293 
 
 were red, and she looked as if she had a 
 bad cold. Her boyish look was gone. She 
 came back and sat down again, but she said 
 nothing. 
 
 " Peter Orwyn told me the truth, Emily. 
 You were quite right about him. He has 
 strange powers but Ronald never came." 
 
 Miss King looked down. Tears ran down over 
 her face. She began hurriedly to wipe them away. 
 Mrs Marden felt vaguely surprised at her grief. 
 She was quite unable to share it. 
 
 " I knew you were ill," Miss King said, " but 
 I didn't expect this." 
 
 " Nor did I. But isn't it odd I don't feel 
 as if I minded it." 
 
 " Are you in pain? " 
 
 " No. But I feel very weak often." 
 
 " Will it will it be long? " 
 
 ' The doctor thinks not very long." 
 
 '' I can scarcely believe it. I shall miss you 
 dreadfully. Oh, how selfish we are ! " 
 
 " I don't think you are a selfish woman." 
 
 'Yes, I am! Yes, I am! You are a great 
 deal to me and I dread losing you. Oh, I hope 
 you won't suffer! " 
 
 " Probably I shan't. I don't want to. It's 
 so ugly." 
 
 After a silence Mrs Marden said,
 
 294 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " My sister, Annie, very much wants me to 
 see a clergyman." 
 
 Miss King put away her handkerchief and 
 settled her collar and tie. She began to look 
 boyish again, and was evidently making a strong 
 effort to control her grief. 
 
 " Has it all this made any difference in 
 your outlook on certain things ? " she asked. 
 
 " Yes, I think it has, a great difference. But 
 I don't want a clergyman. I feel I must not 
 be interfered with. I don't seem to want any- 
 one's thoughts put into me. I think that is why 
 I didn't tell you before. I didn't want any 
 influence. I distrust influence." 
 
 "Dear, I shall not try to influence you. You 
 needn't be afraid of me." 
 
 " I know. And I am not afraid of you now." 
 
 "But what is the difference?" 
 
 ' Well, I feel very calm, and very simple." 
 
 "Only that?" 
 
 " I am not at all frightened. And I feel 
 much nearer to Ronald. I can't understand 
 why." 
 
 "Nothing else?" 
 
 " I don't feel a bit afraid of God, or as if I 
 had been a very evil woman, or as if I ought to 
 prepare especially for death and be dreadfully 
 sorry for things I have done. I regret having
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 295 
 
 been so useless all my life and wish I had done 
 more kindnesses to people and not thought so 
 much always about myself. But that's all." 
 
 " But don't you believe in the after life now? " 
 
 " I could scarcely say I do. It wouldn't be 
 quite true to say that. But I cannot feel as if 
 I were coming entirely to an end. But per- 
 haps no one can." 
 
 " If it is so, mustn't that mean something? " 
 
 " It may, I suppose. But I don't know. I 
 fancy we all have ideas feelings which are 
 born out of our desires." 
 
 ' Then you do want to go on living some- 
 where else? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " I know you will." 
 
 " My sister thinks poor Ronald is living in 
 glory." 
 
 " Poor! " 
 
 " She put it like that. Sometimes good 
 Christians seem very much afraid of death, 
 much more than I am. Would you like me 
 to see a clergyman, Emily? " 
 
 Miss King looked searchingly at her for a 
 moment and then said, 
 
 " No. I feel your instinct was right. You 
 will find the way for yourself with the help 
 I mean that you are not like most people.
 
 296 MRS HARDEN 
 
 There's something independent in you which 
 can't lean, which perhaps oughtn't to try to 
 lean. I can't help you, dear, and I daresay no 
 clergyman could. And I do love you for your 
 sincerity. I'm sure the greatest thing anyone 
 can do is to strive after absolute sincerity. And 
 you are absolutely sincere." 
 
 "So are you." 
 
 " I wish to be." 
 
 " I daresay Annie is, too, in her way. But 
 I think she has the sort of mind which wants 
 to be dressed by other people, and doesn't trust 
 its own taste. You understand me, but she 
 never could. Once I told her I wanted to think 
 things out for myself." 
 
 "What did she say?" 
 
 " She said, ' How strange you are, dear.' So 
 you see ! " 
 
 " It's much better to think them out for one- 
 self. But I hope you won't resist conviction." 
 
 " Perhaps I might have done that once, but 
 I don't think I should now." 
 
 " I only mean that after being so de- 
 ceived " 
 
 "By Peter Orwyn?" 
 
 ' Yes, you might distrust a belief even if you 
 seemed to feel it in you, or or coming to you." 
 
 : ' Emily, I'm quite sure that if such a belief
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 297 
 
 as you mean ever did come to me I should ac- 
 cept it without questioning, because no human 
 being would have anything to do with it. There 
 would be no intermediary no Peter Orwyn 
 who had helped me to be convinced. After my 
 experience with Mr Orwyn I could never be 
 really helped by a human being, because I dis- 
 trust all human beings now in a way; either 
 their good faith, or if not that, their good sense, 
 or their brain power, or their soul power. If a 
 clergyman were to come to me I should feel as 
 if he were another kind of medium with another 
 bag of tricks. It sounds horrid, I know. Some 
 people would think me almost blasphemous, I 
 daresay, but you know what I mean. If there 
 is a God who has any personal knowledge of 
 my existence and my trouble I want no inter- 
 mediary to come between Him and me. That's 
 non-Christian of course. I suppose I am not a 
 Christian. But " she raised herself slightly on 
 the sofa, and her eyes shone " I hate intermedi- 
 aries as much as some poor people hate the 
 middlemen. I don't want an intercessor. I 
 don't want any paraphernalia to remind me of 
 Orwyn's rattle and concertina. I'm listening 
 alone in a bare place. Probably I shall die with- 
 out hearing any voice. But I shall just go on 
 listening quite alone there. And as I told you
 
 298 MRS HARDEN 
 
 I have a strange feeling there of being not 
 far from Ronald." 
 
 "But then you do think he still has some 
 existence? " 
 
 " I couldn't say that even. It is merely a 
 feeling and seems to have nothing to do with 
 the mind. It's like a physical feeling." 
 
 ' That's very strange! " said Miss King. 
 
 She gazed at her friend with questioning eyes. 
 But Mrs Marden said, 
 
 " I don't think I can explain much more. 
 It's almost as if my body were aware of some- 
 thing that my mind knew nothing about. It's 
 rather like feeling someone is near you in the 
 dark when you can neither hear nor see him, 
 and when you have no reason to suppose he 
 is near. You seem to feel it with your 
 skin." 
 
 A faint smile went over her thin face, and 
 she added, 
 
 ' That doesn't sound very spiritual or very 
 mystic, does it? But that's just how I feel." 
 
 " I have never felt anything like that," said 
 Miss King, and then, as if by mutual consent 
 unexpressed in words, the two friends talked of 
 other things. 
 
 Miss King noted with growing surprise the 
 genuine calm which possessed Mrs Marden.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 299 
 
 It was not a seraphic calm such as is often 
 represented as coming to people not far from 
 'death. There was nothing celestial about it. 
 To Miss King it seemed like a curiously com- 
 plete self-possession of the soul, which made her 
 friend somehow almost new to her, as if, since 
 she had known she was ill, she had somehow 
 achieved authority. Miss King had never seen 
 anything quite like it before. And it struck 
 her as exceptionally strange in one who had no 
 definite religion to cling to, who had not even 
 any conviction that after the death of the body 
 life would persist on another plane. But she 
 did not express her surprise to her friend. By 
 nature she was reserved; generally she found 
 it not easy to tell. It was still less easy to ask. 
 At first Mrs Marden was able to go out in 
 a bath-chair, and she was sometimes drawn into 
 the Park, and stayed there under the trees for 
 awhile. It was fine summer weather and she 
 sat and watched the people go by. But she 
 made her chairman avoid the more fashionable 
 parts of the Park, where she would be likely 
 to see her friends and acquaintances. She was 
 not entirely forgotten by them, and there were 
 often enquiries made for her in Hans Place. 
 But she wished to be forgotten. She had no 
 longing for company. She, who had once lived
 
 300 MRS MARDEN 
 
 among people and had hated to be alone, now 
 preferred solitude. 
 
 One day, when she was sitting in her chair 
 under the trees, Cecil Hammond came in sight. 
 He was sauntering along and slowly approached 
 her. When he was almost close to her he sent 
 her a casual look. For a moment apparently 
 he did not recognise her, and seemed about to 
 go on. But as she returned his glance he looked 
 puzzled. She bowed. He took off his hat, 
 still looking puzzled. Then evidently he realised 
 who she was, and a momentary expression of 
 strong surprise came into his face. He stopped, 
 seemed to hesitate, then came up to her chair. 
 
 "Mrs Marden!" he said. 
 
 ' Yes, it is I. You didn't recognise me at 
 first did you? " Hammond looked very uncom- 
 fortable. 
 
 " I suppose it was because you are in a 
 chair." 
 
 " No, I don't think so." 
 
 " I heard you were ill. I was very sorry, but 
 but I hardly thought you would care for my 
 sympathy, and I was sure you wouldn't want to 
 see me." 
 
 'Won't you sit down for a minute?" she 
 said. 
 
 " Certainly, with pleasure."
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 301 
 
 He went to a little green seat, brought it 
 up to the side of her chair, and sat down. 
 
 " I hope you are getting stronger," he said. 
 
 " No, I shall never be any stronger, only 
 weaker. I'm dying, Mr Hammond." 
 
 " I am deeply grieved," he said. 
 
 And he looked as if he really meant it. 
 
 " I want to tell you something," she said. 
 
 ' You were quite right about Peter Orwyn. He 
 
 was a humbug, poor man, and he took me in 
 
 deliberately. He has confessed it to me. But I 
 
 can't feel that he is a really bad man." 
 
 After a moment of silence Hammond said, 
 
 " I am afraid finding out must have made 
 you very unhappy." 
 
 " No; not now. At first it did." 
 
 :< I am glad you have got over it." 
 
 :< I think I'm like you. I'm always glad to 
 rest upon truth." 
 
 "Are you resting upon truth now?" 
 
 " At any rate I don't think I'm clinging to 
 lies. You won't pursue Peter Orwyn any more, 
 will you? " 
 
 " Oh no. I've quite done with him. Besides 
 I understand he has given up all those prac- 
 tices." 
 
 ' Yes. His son has been killed." 
 
 " Why should that "
 
 302 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " He thinks that now his son might know 
 if he were to be insincere, to go on tricking 
 people." 
 
 " Oh, is that the reason? " said Hammond, 
 with a strong touch of sarcasm. 
 
 ' Yes," she said, earnestly. " It is that. 
 Peter Orwyn was a humbug who believed." 
 
 ' That spirits can come back to this earth? " 
 
 " No, but that they still exist somewhere, and 
 may know of our activities here." 
 
 " That is possible," said Hammond. " I 
 don't think science has ever proved the con- 
 trary. But then " 
 
 He stopped, looking at her sharply thin face 
 and now sunken eyes. 
 
 " I shall know very soon how it all is," she 
 said. 
 
 ' Yes, you will know. But you will never 
 come back to tell us the great secret." 
 
 At this moment a child ran past them giving 
 to the wind a pink bladder which she held 
 at the end of a string. The bladder floated up 
 bravely in the sun, and the child's face was 
 alight with triumph. As she ran by she gave 
 them a look out of her blue eyes that was like a 
 challenge to them to share in her joy and to 
 commend her for her capacity. When she had 
 gone, running through the sunlight towards the
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 303 
 
 flickering shadows of the trees, Hammond 
 said, 
 
 ' That child's eyes teh 1 me a great deal more 
 than all the spiritualists are able to tell me." 
 
 " What do they tell you? " she asked. 
 * That hope lies at the foundation of human 
 existence," he answered. ' We all fly our pink 
 balls. We all feel, when they tug at the string, 
 as if they had wings. Perhaps that's because we 
 ourselves have wings. The man who sets out to 
 destroy false hopes may have very real ones 
 himself." 
 
 " Have you? " 
 
 " Oh yes. But I don't know that I could even 
 explain them." 
 
 " Don't try to," she said. 
 
 She held out her thin hand to him. 
 
 " Good-bye, Mr Hammond. Once I think 
 I was angry with you. But now we can part 
 friends." 
 
 He had got up. He took off his hat as he 
 held her hand. 
 
 "Do you remember what I once said to you, 
 quoting Euripides? " he asked. 
 
 ' Who knows if life be not death and death 
 be not life?" 
 
 " It may be so." 
 
 " It may who knows? "
 
 304 MRS HARDEN 
 
 He bent down and looked into her eyes. 
 
 " Perhaps you will know before," he said, as 
 if almost startled by something. 
 
 Then he suddenly reddened, looked embar- 
 rassed, dropped her hand, and said, 
 
 " Good-bye. I'm glad to have seen you." 
 
 He put on his hat rather awkwardly, and 
 walked away, looking slightly self-conscious.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 As the days went by Mrs Marden began to feel 
 more definitely the rapid decline of her physical 
 strength. She was obliged to give up going out 
 in the bath-chair. But she still spent a part of 
 each day on the sofa in the drawing-room not 
 far from an open window. July was over and 
 the dull warmth of August lay over the City. 
 But London was still very full. People who 
 usually fled at the end of the " season " were 
 most of them doing war work, and there had 
 been no " season " that year. 
 
 The only visitors Mrs Marden saw, however, 
 were her sister, Miss King, her doctor and 
 Doctor Layton. 
 
 Annie came often and was increasingly dis- 
 tressed at Mrs Marden's state of body and mind. 
 She simply could not comprehend how any well 
 brought up, right minded woman, could draw 
 near to the gates of death without reaching out 
 for the spiritual consolations so liberally pro- 
 vided by the Church of England. Again and 
 again she spoke of dear Father Burch, who was 
 " so understanding, so broadminded ", so ready 
 to meet all doubts in the way and slay them! 
 
 305
 
 306 MRS HARDEN 
 
 She brought with her books such as bring con- 
 solation to many, books full of sentiment, hope, 
 gush, books of dreams, allegories, imaginary; 
 moments in Heaven; books, too, by American 
 authors almost bursting their covers with 
 " cheer " and full throated optimism, dealing 
 with the doings of sunshiny pious beings, who 
 revelled in their misfortunes, thanked God that 
 they were cripples, and welcomed the most dia- 
 bolical complaints with the loud Te Deums 
 which are never heard but in fiction. 
 
 ' They are such helpful books, dear! " she 
 would say, as she laid them on her sister's table. 
 
 " Are they true books? " Mrs Marden would 
 answer. 
 
 " I daresay they are. But we can hardly ex- 
 pect everything in a book to be founded on fact, 
 can we, dear? That would be asking too much." 
 
 Mrs Marden never read these books. Indeed 
 she read very little, and often lay for hours 
 quietly with her eyes wide open, scarcely moving 
 and seldom speaking. 
 
 Miss King came often to see her, and some- 
 times read aloud to her. Then she could lie 
 still without talking, and listen, or not listen, 
 as she pleased. But when the book was put 
 away, and they did talk, by a mutual tacit con- 
 sent they avoided any mention of those problems
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 307 
 
 of the soul which they had often discussed in the 
 past. Miss King believed that her dying friend 
 was still listening in a bare place quite alone. 
 She often wished that she could break in on the 
 loneliness, do something to make the bare place 
 blossom with flowers and thrill with the songs 
 of birds. The austere loneliness of her friend, 
 so near to the loneliness of death, roused in her 
 an ache of longing to be of some use, some 
 comfort. But she knew that in Mrs Marden's 
 peculiar condition of body and mind any human 
 attempt at consolation, any endeavour to in- 
 fluence, would be useless, would even be secretly 
 resented. The physical change in Mrs Marden 
 seemed to have given greater strength to the 
 obstinacy which had always been characteristic 
 of her. Sometimes Miss King's imagination 
 visualised her as a woman listening with her ear 
 to the ground, and one hand lifted in warning 
 lest any human voice should intrude on the 
 silence around her. 
 
 Mrs Marden had become fond of Doctor 
 Layton. He had a mind that interested her 
 deeply, and she was able to be quite unreserved 
 with him. The fact that he was a doctor, not a 
 clergyman, made her strangely at ease with 
 him. He would never try to lay a finger on her 
 soul. He, too, was unreserved with her.
 
 308 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Science, which he worshipped, had given him 
 much. But it had robbed him of the firm beliefs 
 of his youth. 
 
 " Science has a sharp sword," he once said to 
 Mrs Marden. " And it isn't afraid to slay." 
 
 He was a close student of humanity and some- 
 times spoke to her of the contradictions which 
 seem to exist between what science implies, and 
 what human beings imply, or seem to imply. 
 
 " Science," he said, " often conveys to me a 
 * No ' while human beings convey to me a 
 ' Yes '. It is as if science said, ' That cannot 
 be ', while human beings are saying, ' It is.' ' 
 
 And he told her some curious instances of 
 the abrupt changes in belief which had been 
 brought about in his experience by the ap- 
 proach of death, or by death. 
 
 One was a change in a noted scientific man, 
 who had had one child, a daughter whom he 
 had loved with intensity. For years he had 
 lived not only without any belief in a future 
 life, but openly denying that there could be any 
 life after death. He had indeed been almost 
 fanatical in his materialism, and had published 
 writings which had destroyed the beliefs of 
 many people. His daughter, while still quite 
 young, had been run over by a motor car, and 
 had died a few days after the accident. The
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 309 
 
 Father had seen her die. Ever since then he 
 had been a convinced believer in an after life. 
 
 "Why?" Mrs Marden asked. 
 
 "What was. his reason? It wouldn't have 
 been accepted by science, but it was enough 
 for the scientist. It was simply the look in his 
 child's eyes when she was dying." 
 
 " Could you be convinced by such a thing? " 
 
 " I might, perhaps, if I cared as he did. 
 Human affection is one of the greatest of the 
 mysteries." 
 
 ' Yes. It is odd that sometimes our eyes 
 seem to convey to people things messages 
 which our minds know nothing of." 
 
 * Yes? " said Doctor Layton, and waited. 
 
 She was thinking of Cecil Hammond's strange 
 look at her, and strange remark to her, just be- 
 fore he had bidden her good-bye in the Park. 
 But she said nothing more on that subject, and 
 Doctor Layton left it. He never persisted in 
 any conversation against Mrs Marden's inclina- 
 tion. And that was partly the reason of the 
 ease which she always felt in his company. 
 
 One day, when she was lying on the sofa in 
 the drawing-room quite alone, a thrill of pain 
 went through her. It w r as acute, like a thing 
 full of intense life, and seemed to her long, as 
 if it were stretched out, as elastic may be
 
 310 MRS HARDEN 
 
 stretched by strong hands till it almost splits. 
 She sat up quickly. Her cheeks flushed. The 
 blood went to her head. She was rilled with 
 intense apprehension. But as abruptly as it 
 had come the pain disappeared. 
 
 She felt as if she had been visited by some- 
 thing terrible, endowed with an unnaturally 
 vivid life, which had left her with a menacing 
 backward look at her and a promise to return 
 again. 
 
 So she was to suffer after all! She was 
 not to be spared the ugly agony of the body. 
 
 She put her hand on the bell, meaning to 
 summon the nurse. The horrible heat often 
 caused by pain persisted in her. She longed 
 to escape from her body, to burst out of it and 
 to run away, leaving it lying there with its 
 dreadful inhabitant, the disease which was ravag- 
 ing it. She meant to send for the doctor, to 
 ask for an opiate, for morphia, anything that 
 would keep away pain, or dull it, smother it. 
 But though her finger remained on the bell,, 
 touching it, she did not press it down. Some- 
 thing stopped her from doing that. At first 
 she did not know what it was, and she waited, 
 still thinking that she was going to sound the 
 bell. Then she took away her hand and lay 
 back on the sofa. Something said to her,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 311 
 
 " You are Ronald's Mother. You are not 
 going to be a coward." 
 
 The thrill of pain had seemed to carry a mes- 
 sage. She felt as if for an instant she had 
 heard a voice in the bare place. It had died 
 away. But she thought it would come again. 
 
 She knew of course that the pain had been 
 caused by something which the disease was doing 
 in her body, that its seat must be really in the 
 brain. Yet she could not rid herself of the 
 strange idea that it had conveyed a message. 
 Somehow she had seemed to feel God in it. 
 The thrill of it had been like an assertion: " You 
 belong to me and you cannot escape me." 
 
 She lay there pondering, looking back over 
 her past life. She had not found God in her 
 happiness, not even in her happiness with 
 Ronald. She had not found Him in Church, in 
 Hornton Street, in her war work at the hospi- 
 tal. She had not found Him in her grief at 
 the loss of her boy. Surely pain, a mere physical 
 horror, a thing wholly of the body, could not 
 bring her into any relation with God. Such an 
 idea seemed to her ridiculous. Nevertheless she 
 knew that the thrust of pain through her body 
 had been also like a thrust of mysterious knowl- 
 edge through her soul. 
 
 The agony did not return that day, and she
 
 312 MRS HARDEN 
 
 did not mention it to the nurse. But in the 
 night it came back and woke her from sleep. 
 And this time it stayed with her longer. She 
 suffered so much that she found herself praying 
 for strength and courage to bear it if it might 
 not be taken from her. Her prayer was in- 
 stinctive: at that moment she could not help 
 praying. And presently the pain faded 
 away. 
 
 Then she lay and wondered about her prayer. 
 It had been absolutely spontaneous like a sud- 
 den cry. And it had seemed as if the whole of 
 her was in it, all of herself which she knew about, 
 but also much else about which she had never 
 known anything till now, hidden things, mys- 
 teries, things that had slept till that moment, 
 and had wakened when she woke to the pain. 
 
 The nurse, who slept in an adjoining room, 
 came softly in perhaps subconsciously drawn to 
 the sick woman. 
 
 "Can't you sleep?" she asked. 
 
 " I have been asleep." 
 
 ' You're not in pain, are you? " 
 
 "No; not now." 
 
 " Have you been in pain? " 
 
 ' Yes. It woke me up." 
 
 The nurse, who was a middle-aged woman,
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 313 
 
 very kind and capable, looked full of sympathy. 
 
 " I felt it for the first time this afternoon," 
 said Mrs Harden. 
 
 "Why didn't you teU me?" 
 
 " It only lasted a moment then. Were you 
 expecting it? " 
 
 " Well, sometimes in cases like this there is 
 pain 
 
 She paused. 
 
 " Towards the end, you mean? " said Mrs 
 Mar den. 
 
 ' We never quite know when it will come. 
 I'll speak to the doctor about it to-morrow. 
 There are ways of easing it." 
 
 1 Yes, I know morphia." 
 
 " I can give you something now that will 
 help you to sleep again." 
 
 " No, I'd rather not have anything. I'm 
 quite comfortable. You go back, Nurse, and 
 sleep." 
 
 ' But I can stay with you." 
 
 " No, Nurse. I'm all right alone." 
 
 "I'll leave the door ajar into the dressing- 
 room. Then I can come in a moment if you 
 want me." 
 
 ." Thank you." 
 
 The nurse went softly away. She left the
 
 314 MRS HARDEN 
 
 door ajar, and from her bed Mrs Marden 
 could see a faint shining of light. Her own 
 room was in darkness. 
 
 Since she had had the pain she had felt she 
 was dying. Though she had known that be- 
 fore she had evidently not really felt it. She 
 was now like one who has been told of some- 
 thing and has believed it, but has suddenly 
 had her knowledge made vivid by actual sight 
 of the thing. 
 
 That made all the difference. 
 
 She now felt death within her definitely, 
 tremendously. She looked at the faint light 
 in the space between the door and the door- 
 way. In it, half shutting her eyes, and con- 
 sciously bringing her imagination into play, 
 she saw many of the activities of the past; 
 she saw herself as a wife, a young mother, a 
 widow with a boy growing to manhood, a gay, 
 pleasure-loving woman, at theatres, restau- 
 rants, dinners, at homes, at Newmarket and 
 Ascot, travelling abroad, at Aix, Monte Carlo, 
 in Egypt, Sicily, Rome; then parting from 
 Ronald with a smile when he went to France; 
 later selling souvenirs and programmes in 
 crowded theatres, with L/ady Mariana always 
 near her. She saw Hanson handing her a 
 telegram, Lady Terrerton at St-Martin's-in-
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 315 
 
 the-Fields, the Canadian soldier's slate-coloured 
 eyes. Then she saw a round table in a nar- 
 row room and Peter Orwyn and herself sit- 
 ting at it; she saw a concertina, a rattle, a 
 tambourine; last of all she saw the melancholy 
 clergyman looking down from a pulpit with 
 earnest, miserable eyes. 
 
 And all that had passed with almost in- 
 credible swiftness, the tale of her life! That 
 could not be all surely? She could not have 
 been created, a woman full of mysteries, of 
 capacities which even now she had hardly be- 
 gun to realise, only for that? Love could not 
 have been put into her only for that? It 
 would surely be too great an irony if, after liv- 
 ing such a life, she were to cease just when 
 she was beginning to understand something of 
 all that she held within her, just when she was 
 beginning to recognise her own possibilities, 
 just when she was beginning to pray. 
 
 Could the prayer she had uttered have been 
 forced from her by mere terror? Had it been 
 only an instinctive call for help ? She wondered. 
 If a doctor had been in the room she would 
 probably have called out to him. As there 
 had been no doctor she had called out to 
 God. 
 
 But the nurse had been within call.
 
 316 MRS HARDEN 
 
 Moved by an imperious need she began to 
 pray again. 
 
 She had not forgotten how, long ago, her brain 
 had utterly rejected the belief that any Being 
 could exist who was able to create multitudes 
 of worlds, and who was nevertheless also able 
 to pay attention to a woman in bed in Hans 
 Place. Her brain could not grasp such a con- 
 ception of Deity. But now something else 
 in her, perhaps made humble by the assaults 
 of pain, prayed, and presently she felt as if 
 Ronald knew of what she was doing and ap- 
 proved it. The sensation she had had in church 
 of the uselessness of prayer died away from 
 her. She felt as if she were being listened 
 to. 
 
 In the morning, although she had had but 
 little sleep, she was calm and at ease, though 
 very weak and tired. 
 
 " I shan't get up to-day," she said to the 
 nurse. " I don't think I shall ever get up 
 again." 
 
 The nurse looked at her gently and said, 
 
 * You must do just as you feel inclined. 
 I have telephoned to the doctor to come as 
 soon as possible." 
 
 When the doctor came, and was told, he 
 spoke of means of subduing the agony. Mrs
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 317 
 
 Harden questioned him about its cause. He 
 tried to evade any definite reply. But she 
 insisted, and finally he satisfied her curiosity. 
 
 " Do you expect the end to come soon? " 
 she asked. " I wish you to tell me. I'm not 
 afraid." 
 
 " I don't think your suffering will last very 
 long." 
 
 After a pause he added, 
 
 'Wouldn't you like to see a clergyman?" 
 
 ' You think it's time for me to have a visit 
 from a soul doctor? " she said, with a faint 
 smile. 
 
 The doctor he happened to be a good 
 churchman looked rather shocked. 
 
 ' You might like to prepare " he be- 
 gan. 
 
 " My sister, Annie, has been talking to you, 
 hasn't she?" Mrs Marden interrupted. 
 
 " She just mentioned that she had a great 
 friend- 
 
 "Was it Father Burch?" 
 
 " I believe that was the name." 
 
 " I don't want him. I don't think he 
 knows anything more about God than I 
 do." 
 
 " I'll send you some morphia. The nurse 
 knows how and when to administer it."
 
 318 MRS HARDEN 
 
 When he was about to leave her Mrs Mar- 
 den said to him, 
 
 "Are you afraid to die, Doctor?" 
 
 The doctor he was an elderly, large man, 
 with a dignified imposing manner, and an ac- 
 commodating smile looked embarrassed. 
 
 " I really ; ' he began, and paused. 
 
 " Death is a natural process," he said, pull- 
 ing himself together. ' We doctors are so 
 familiar with it that ' 
 
 "But your own death?" she said. 
 
 " I think about other people. It is my 
 business to think about them." 
 
 " Yes, of course. Good-bye, Doctor." 
 
 ' Your sister is in a very peculiar state of 
 mind," he said to Annie, who was waiting in 
 the drawing-room. " I advise you not to worry 
 her." 
 
 "What did she say?" 
 ' Well, she said she thought she knew as 
 much about God as Father Burch did." 
 
 " But Father Burch is a clergyman! " 
 
 " Yes, I know. Still that is what she thinks." 
 
 "Poor poor Evelyn!" said Annie, wring- 
 ing her hands. 
 
 As the disease in Mrs Marden progressed 
 the attacks of pain became frequent. One 
 night, when she was suffering severely, she was
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 319 
 
 given morphia. She had never taken mor- 
 phia before and its effect upon her was strange. 
 Just at first it seemed to be powerless, and 
 she feared that in spite of it the agony would 
 continue. But presently she felt an extraor- 
 dinary change in her condition. She seemed 
 to be two people. Two women seemed to 
 be lying side by side in the bed. Each of 
 these women was herself. In one of these 
 women the pain still persisted. She seemed 
 to be all body, flesh and blood with disease 
 in it. The other woman had a body but had 
 also something else quite independent of the 
 body, quite untouched by any disease. And she 
 lay there entirely at ease, peaceful, contented, 
 even happy, and knew of the pain in the other 
 woman but did not mind it at all. She didn't 
 mind it because her soul was immune. She 
 was released from the sensation of pain al- 
 though she was aware of pain still going on 
 in the body which lay beside hers. The 
 absolute consciousness of duality possessed 
 her. 
 
 When the effect of the morphia wore away 
 the two women were merged together and be- 
 came one. 
 
 The relief she had experienced had been very 
 wonderful. Nevertheless she refused to have
 
 320 MRS HARDEN 
 
 morphia again. For she felt that it interfered, 
 like a shut door, heavily padded, between her 
 and a voice which was speaking to her, and 
 which she wished to hear clearly. She was 
 now convinced of the absolute independence 
 of the soul. Perhaps she could not have de- 
 scribed this feeling. Certainly she could not 
 have argued about it. Had an atheist said to 
 her, " But what about morphia? When mor- 
 phia was injected into you didn't it get at 
 what you call your soul? Was not your whole 
 outlook entirely changed by it for the time ? " 
 She would not have known what to answer. 
 If she had told the plain truth she could only 
 have said, " I feel God in the pain as I have 
 ~^ver felt Him in anything else. But I also 
 t'eei that my soul is independent, is beyond 
 the pain, out of its reach. There is in me 
 something remote which is able to look on 
 at the pain, as someone who is health}^ may look 
 on at the agony of one who is dying. And 
 this something is aware of God as the sender 
 of pain." 
 
 The sense of rebellion which she had been 
 conscious of in her mental agony at the loss 
 of her boy, the desire to believe in a per- 
 sonal God so that she might be able to hate
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 321 
 
 Him, had died out of her utterly. She felt 
 that she was now in almighty hands and she 
 was now contented to be in them. She did 
 not say to herself, " I believe it is so ". She 
 said to herself, " I feel it is so." As she 
 had once said to Miss King about knowing 
 in the dark when someone was near, whom 
 it was impossible to see, or to hear, that she 
 seemed to feel it with her skin, so she seemed 
 to feel this with her skin. But she told her- 
 self imaginatively that it was the skin of her 
 soul which felt it, not the skin of her 
 body. 
 
 It was an extraordinary sensation, unrea- 
 sonable no doubt, inexplicable, but terrifically 
 vital. 
 
 And the pain seemed to be God claiming her, 
 thrusting His way towards her soul through 
 the body in which it was housed. 
 
 After each fresh attack of pain she felt 
 more intensely conscious of God, more intensely 
 aware of the freedom of the soul in the body. 
 
 ' The disease, wherever it penetrates, will 
 never be able to reach it," she said to her- 
 self. ' Therefore it cannot be killed when 
 the body is killed." 
 
 As her bodily powers rapidly declined she
 
 322 MRS MARDEN 
 
 was also conscious that she was making a 
 journey. Ronald no longer seemed to be near 
 her in the house. But she felt that she was 
 travelling towards the region whither he had 
 preceded her. 
 
 One day Mrs Harden said to the nurse, 
 
 " Please go to the telephone and beg Miss 
 King to come here at once. I must see her. 
 You know the number, don't you ? " 
 
 " Oh yes." 
 
 " Ask her not to delay." 
 
 " I will." 
 
 The nurse went towards the door, then 
 paused, 
 
 "Shall I send for your sister too?" she 
 asked. 
 
 " No. She was here this morning." 
 
 " Yes, I know. But she might like to come 
 again." 
 
 " She's my sister but no, I would rather 
 only see Miss King." 
 
 " Very well." 
 
 "Do you think me selfish, Nurse?" 
 
 "No; you must see the one you wish to 
 see." 
 
 " If I am selfish I can't help it." 
 
 The nurse went out.
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 323 
 
 Towards evening Miss King arrived and 
 came up to Mrs Marden's bedside. 
 
 " Sit down by me, Emily," said her friend 
 in a weak voice. 
 
 Miss King kissed her and sat down close 
 to the bed. 
 
 After a silence Mrs Marden said, 
 
 " I wish to tell you something." 
 
 "Yes dear?" 
 
 " I have left you some money in my will." 
 
 Miss King said nothing. She put up one 
 hand and settled her tie. Then she looked 
 towards the window. Her lips were com- 
 pressed, and her boyish face looked almost 
 stern. 
 
 " But that is not what I sent for you to tell 
 you." 
 
 " Please please " said Miss King, in 
 
 an odd, husky voice. 
 
 ' What I wanted to tell you is this. Once 
 you said to me I can't remember exactly 
 that perhaps some day I should get help or 
 enlightenment was it something like that 
 from the last quarter I should expect to get it 
 from. Well, I have got it." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I have got it from my disease." 
 
 " But how could you? "
 
 324 MRS HARDEN 
 
 " I scarcely know. But the pain I have 
 suffered has given it to me. I felt God really 
 for the first time in that. Isn't it strange?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 ' The pain has made me feel that I be- 
 long to God. I thought you would like to 
 know." 
 
 " I I am very thankful," said Miss King. 
 
 * Yes, it's a great mercy for me. You 
 don't need to suffer. But I did. Some of 
 us do, and I am one of them. I understand 
 now why people have different fates. Hap- 
 piness and health told me nothing. And my 
 sorrow about Ronald didn't tell me. But now 
 I know. Of course I don't really understand 
 anything with my mind, I mean. I still 
 wonder, in a way, how it all can be as it 
 is. I have no real conception of God even 
 now. But I just feel Him. And that is 
 quite enough." 
 
 ' Yes, yes, dear." 
 
 After a long silence Mrs Marden said, 
 
 " Once Mr Hammond said something to 
 me which I have never forgotten." 
 
 "What was that?" 
 
 " He quoted a saying. It was Euripides, 
 I think ' Who knows if life be not death and 
 death be not life'?"
 
 ROBERT HICHENS 325 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I know, Emily. Isn't that strange? " 
 
 Miss King did not leave the house that night. 
 When the clocks in the City had just struck 
 eleven Mrs Marden lived at last. 
 
 THE END.
 
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