ALBERT SEMELS 
 
 2/10 SWET 
 
 ftP F&5K. II, M.
 
 
 " He dragged me onto the roof and pointed
 
 THE WORKS OF 
 
 E. PHILLIPS 
 OPPENHEIM 
 
 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 MCKINLAY, STONE & MACKENZIE 
 
 NEW YORK
 
 Copyright, 1903, 
 BY E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM. 
 
 Copyright, ipoj, 
 BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 
 
 All rightt rttcrvtd 
 
 Tenth Printing
 
 Stack 
 Annex 
 
 PR 
 
 Contents 
 
 PART I. 
 
 CHAPTER *AG 
 
 I. Mr. Kingston Brooks, Political Agent ... i 
 
 II. The Bullsom Family at Home 6 
 
 III. Kingston Brooks has a Visitor 16 
 
 IV. A Question for the Country 25 
 
 V. The Marquis of Arranmore 35 
 
 VI. The Man who went to Hell ...... 44 
 
 VII. A Thousand Pounds 53 
 
 VIII. Kingston Brooks makes Inquiries .... 60 
 
 IX. Henslow speaks out 68 
 
 X. A Tempting Offer 76 
 
 XI. Who the Devil is Brooks? 85 
 
 XII. Mr. Bullsom gives a Dinner-party .... 94 
 
 XIII. Charity the "Crime" 105 
 
 XIV. An Awkard Question 117 
 
 XV. A Supper-party at the " Queen's " . . . 130 
 
 XVI. Uncle and Niece 139 
 
 XVII. Fifteen Years in Hell 148 
 
 XVIII. Mary Scott pays an Unexpected Call . . . 158 
 
 XIX. The Marquis Mephistopheles 167 
 
 XX. The Confidence of Lord Arranmore . . . 176 
 
 PART II. 
 
 I. Lord Arranmore's Amusements . . . . 188 
 
 II. The Heckling of Henslow 200
 
 vi CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PACK 
 
 III. Mary Scott's Two Visitors 209 
 
 IV. A Marquis on Matrimony 219 
 
 V. Brooks enlists a Recruit 229 
 
 VI. Kingston Brooks, Philanthropist 239 
 
 VII. Brooks and his Missions . 250 
 
 VIII. Mr. Bullsom is Staggered 259 
 
 IX. Ghosts 269 
 
 X. A New Don Quixote 277 
 
 PART III. 
 
 I. An Aristocratic Recruit 286 
 
 II. Mr. Lavilette interferes 294 
 
 III. The Singular Behaviour of Mary Scott . . . 302 
 
 IV. Lord Arranmore in a New Role 309 
 
 V. Lady Sybil lends a Hand 319 
 
 VI. The Reservation of Mary Scott 328 
 
 VII. Father and Son 337 
 
 VIII. The Advice of Mr. Bullsom 346 
 
 IX. A Question and an Answer 356 
 
 X. Lady Sybil says " Yes " 365 
 
 XI. Brooks hears the News 372 
 
 XII. The Prince of Sinners speaks out . . . . 379
 
 A Prince of Sinners 
 
 PART I 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MR. KINGSTON BROOKS, POLITICAL AGENT 
 
 ALREADY the sweepers were busy in the de- 
 serted hall, and the lights burned low. Of the 
 great audience who had filled the place only half- 
 an-hour ago not one remained. The echoes of their 
 tumultuous cheering seemed still to linger amongst 
 the rafters, the dust which their feet had raised hung 
 about in a little cloud. But the long rows of benches 
 were empty, the sweepers moved ghostlike amongst 
 the shadows, and an old woman was throwing tea- 
 leaves here and there about the platform. In the com- 
 mittee-room behind a little group of men were busy 
 with their leave-takings. The candidate, a tall, some- 
 what burly man, with hard, shrewd face and loosely- 
 knit figure, was shaking hands with every one. His 
 tone and manner savoured still of the rostrum. 
 
 " Good-night, sir ! Good-night, Mr. Bullsom ! A 
 most excellent introduction, yours, sir! You made 
 my task positively easy. Good-night, Mr. Brooks. 
 A capital meeting, and everything very well arranged. 
 Personally I feel very much obliged to you, sir. If
 
 2 A PRINCE OE SINNERS. 
 
 you carry everything through as smoothly as this 
 affair to-night, I can see that we shall lose nothing by 
 poor Morrison's breakdown. Good-night, gentlemen, 
 to all of you. We will meet at the club at eleven 
 o'clock to-morrow morning. Eleven o'clock pre- 
 cisely, if you please." 
 
 The candidate went out to his carriage, and the 
 others followed in twos and threes. A young man, 
 pale, with nervous mouth, strongly-marked features 
 and clear dark eyes, looked up from a sheaf of letters 
 which he was busy sorting. 
 
 ' " Don't wait for me, Mr. Bullsom," he said. 
 " Reynolds will let me out, and I had better run 
 through these letters before I leave." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom was emphatic to the verge of gruff- 
 ness. 
 
 " You '11 do nothing of the sort," he declared. " I 
 tell you what it is, Brooks. We 're not going to let 
 you knock yourself up. You 're tackling this job in 
 rare style. I can tell you that Henslow is delighted." 
 ' " I 'm much obliged to you for saying so, Mr. 
 iBullsom," the young man answered. " Of course 
 the work is strange to me, but it is very interesting, 
 and I don't mean to make a mess of it." 
 
 " There is only one chance of your doing that," 
 Mr. Bullsom rejoined, " and that is if you overwork 
 yourself. You need a bit* of looking after. You've 
 got a rare head on your shoulders, and I 'm proud to 
 think that I was the one to bring your name before 
 the committee. But I 'm jolly well certain of one 
 thing. You 've done all the work a man ought to 
 do in one day. Now listen to me. Here 's my car- 
 riage waiting, and you 're going straight home with
 
 me to have a bite and a glass of wine. We can't afford 
 to lose our second agent, and I can see what 's the mat- 
 ter with you. You 're as pale as a ghost, and no won- 
 der. You 've been at it all day and never a break." 
 
 The young man called Brooks had not the energy 
 to frame a refusal, which he knew would be resented. 
 He took down his overcoat, and stuffed the letters 
 into his pocket. 
 
 " You 're very good," he said. " I '11 come up for 
 an hour with pleasure." 
 
 They passed out together into the street, and Mr. 
 Bullsom opened the door of his carriage. 
 
 "In with you, young man," he exclaimed. " Home, 
 George! " 
 
 Kingston Brooks leaned back amongst the cushions 
 with a little sigh of relief. 
 
 " This is very restful," he remarked. " We have 
 certainly had a very busy day. The inside of elec- 
 tioneering may be disenchanting, but it 's jolly hard 
 work." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom sat with clasped hands in front of him 
 resting upon that slight protuberance which denoted 
 the advent of a stomach. He had thrown away the 
 cigar which he had lit in the committee-room. Mrs. 
 Bullsom did not approve of smoking in the covered 
 wagonette, which she frequently honoured with her 
 presence. 
 
 " There 's nothing in the world worth having that 
 has n't to be worked for, my boy," he declared, good- 
 humouredly. 
 
 " By other people ! " Brooks remarked, smiling. 
 
 " That 's as it may be," Mr. Bullsom admitted. 
 " To my mind that 's where the art of the thing comes
 
 4 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 in. Any fool can work, but it takes a shrewd man 
 to keep a lot of others working hard for him while 
 he pockets the oof himself." 
 
 " I suppose," the younger man remarked, thought- 
 fully, " that you would consider Mr. Henslow a 
 shrewd man ? " 
 
 " Shrewd ! Oh, Henslow 's shrewd enough. 
 There's no question about that!" 
 
 "And honest?" 
 
 Mr. Bullsom hesitated. He drew his hand down 
 his stubbly grey beard. 
 
 " Honest ! Oh, yes, he 's honest ! You 've no 
 fault to find with him, eh? " 
 
 " None whatever," Brooks hastened to say. " You 
 see," he continued more slowly, " I have never been 
 really behind the scenes in this sort of thing before, 
 and Henslow has such a very earnest manner in speak- 
 ing. He talked to the working men last night as 
 though his one desire in life was to further the differ- 
 ent radical schemes which we have on the programme. 
 Why, the tears were actually in his eyes when he 
 spoke of the Old Age Pension Bill. He told them 
 over and over again that the passing of that Bill was 
 the one object of his political career. Then, you 
 know, there was the luncheon to-day and I fancied 
 that he was a little flippant about the labour vote. It 
 was perhaps only his way of speaking." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom smiled and rubbed the carriage win- 
 dow with the cuff of his coat. He was very hungry. 
 
 " Oh, well, a politician has to trim a little, you 
 know," he remarked. " Votes he must have, and 
 Henslow has a very good idea how to get them. 
 Here we are, thank goodness."
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, POLITICAL AGENT 5 
 
 The carriage had turned up a short drive, and de- 
 posited them before the door of a highly ornate villa. 
 Mr. Bullsom led the way indoors, and himself took 
 charge of his guest's coat and hat. Then he opened 
 the door of the drawing-room. 
 
 " Mrs. Bullsom and the girls," he remarked, ur- 
 banely, " will be delighted to see you. Come in! "
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME 
 
 THERE were fans upon the wall, and much bric- 
 a-brac of Oriental shape but Brummagem 
 finish, a complete suite of drawing-room furniture, 
 incandescent lights of fierce brilliancy, and a pianola. 
 Mrs. Peter Bullsom, stout and shiny in black silk and 
 a chatelaine, was dozing peacefully in a chair, with the 
 latest novel from the circulating library in her lap; 
 whilst her two daughters, in evening blouses, which 
 were somehow suggestive of the odd elevenpence, 
 were engrossed in more serious occupation. Louise, 
 the elder, whose budding resemblance to her mother 
 was already a protection against the over-amorous 
 youths of the town, was reading a political speech in 
 the Times. Selina, who had sandy hair, a slight 
 figure, and was considered by her family the essence 
 of refinement, was struggling with a volume of 
 Cowper, who had been recommended to her by a 
 librarian with a sense of humour, as a poet unlikely to 
 bring a blush into her virginal cheeks. Mr. Bullsom 
 looked in upon his domestic circle with pardonable 
 pride, and with a little flourish introduced his guest. 
 " Mrs. Bullsom," he said, "this is my young friend, 
 Kingston Brooks. My two daughters, sir, Louise and 
 Selina."
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME 7 
 
 The ladies were gracious, but had the air of being 
 taken by surprise, which, considering Mr. Bullsom's 
 parting words a few hours ago, seemed strange. 
 
 " We 've had a great meeting," Mr. Bullsom re- 
 marked, sidling towards the hearthrug, and with his 
 thumbs already stealing towards the armholes of his 
 waistcoat, " a great meeting, my dears. Not that I 
 am surprised ! Oh, no ! As I said to Padgett, when 
 he insisted that I should take the chair, ' Padgett/ I 
 said, ' mark my words, we 're going to surprise the 
 town. Mr. Henslow may not be the most popular 
 candidate we 've ever had, but he 's on the right side, 
 and those who think Radicalism has had its day in 
 Medchester will be amazed.' And so they have been. 
 I 've dropped a few hints during my speeches at the 
 ward meetings lately, and Mr. Brooks, though he 's 
 new at the work, did his best, and I can tell you the 
 result was a marvel. The hall was packed simply 
 packed. When I rose to speak there was n't an empty 
 place or chair to be seen." 
 
 " Dear me ! " Mrs. Bullsom remarked, affably* 
 " Supper is quite ready, my love." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom abandoned his position precipitately, 
 and his face expressed his lively satisfaction. 
 
 " Ah ! " he exclaimed. " I was hoping that you 
 would have a bite for me. As I said to Mr. Brooks 
 when I asked him to drop in with me, there's sure 
 to be something to eat. And I can tell you I 'm about 
 ready for it." 
 
 Brooks found an opportunity to speak almost for 
 the first time. He was standing between the two 
 Misses Bullsom, and already they had approved of 
 him. He was distinctly of a different class from the
 
 8 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 casual visitors whom their father was in the habit of 
 introducing into the family circle. 
 
 " Mr. Bullsom was kind, enough to take pity on an 
 unfortunate bachelor," he said, with a pleasant smile. 
 " My landlady has few faults, but an over-love of 
 punctuality is one of them. By this time she and her 
 household are probably in bed. Our meeting lasted 
 a long time." 
 
 " If you will touch the bell, Peter," Mrs. Bullsom 
 remarked, " Ann shall dish up the supper." 
 
 The young ladies exchanged shocked glances. 
 " Dish up." What an abominable phrase ! They 
 looked covertly at their guest, but his face was im- 
 perturbable. 
 
 " We think that we have been very considerate, 
 Mr. Brooks," Selina remarked, with an engaging 
 smile. " We gave up our usual dinner this evening 
 as papa had to leave so early." 
 
 Mr. Brooks smiled as he offered his arm to Mrs. 
 Bullsom a courtesy which much embarrassed her. 
 
 " I think," he said, " that we shall be able to show 
 you some practical appreciation of your thoughtful- 
 ness. I know nothing so stimulating to the appetite 
 as politics, and to-day we have been so busy that I 
 missed even my afternoon tea." 
 
 " I 'm sure that we are quite repaid for giving 
 up our dinner," Selina remarked, with a backward 
 glance at the young man. " Oh, here you are at 
 last, Mary. I did n't hear you come in." 
 
 " My niece, Miss Scott," Mr. Bullsom announced. 
 " Now you know all the family." 
 
 A plainly-dressed girl with dark eyes and unusu- 
 ally pale cheeks returned his greeting quietly, and
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME 9 
 
 followed them into the dining-room. Mrs. Bullsom 
 spread herself over her seat with a little sigh of 
 relief. Brooks gazed in silent wonder at the gilt- 
 framed oleographs which hung thick upon the walls, 
 and Mr. Bullsom stood up to carve a joint of beef. 
 
 " Plain fare, Mr. Brooks, for plain people," he 
 remarked, gently elevating the sirloin on his fork, 
 and determining upon a point of attack. " We don't 
 understand frills here, but we 've a welcome for our 
 friends, and a hearty one." 
 
 " If there is anything in the world better than 
 roast beef," Brooks remarked, unfolding his ser- 
 viette, " I have n't found it." 
 
 " There 's one thing," Mr. Bullsom remarked, 
 pausing for a moment in his labours, " I can give 
 you a good glass of wine. Ann, I think that if you 
 look in the right-hand drawer of the sideboard you 
 will find a bottle of champagne. If not I '11 have to 
 go down into the cellar." 
 
 Ann, however, produced it which, considering 
 that Mr. Bullsom had carefully placed it there a 
 few hours ago, was not extraordinary and Brooks 
 sipped the wine with inward tremors, justified by 
 the result. 
 
 " I suppose, Mr. Brooks," Selina remarked, turn- 
 ing towards him in an engaging fashion, " that you 
 are a great politician. I see your name so much in 
 the papers." 
 
 Brooks smiled. 
 
 " My political career," he answered, " dates from 
 yesterday morning. I am taking Mr. Morrison's 
 place, you know, as agent for Mr. Henslow. I have 
 never done anything of the sort before, and I have
 
 io A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 scarcely any claims to be considered a politician at 
 all." 
 
 " A very lucky change for us, Brooks," Mr. Bull- 
 som declared, with the burly familiarity which he 
 considered justified by his position as chairman of 
 the Radical committee. " Poor Morrison was past 
 the job. It was partly through his muddling that 
 we lost the seat at the last election. I 'd made up 
 my mind to have a change this time, and so I told 
 'em." 
 
 Brooks was tired of politics, and he looked across 
 the table. This pale girl with the tired eyes and 
 self-contained manner interested him. The differ- 
 ence, too, between her and the rest of the family 
 was puzzling. 
 
 " I believe, Miss Scott," he said, " that I met you 
 at the Stuarts' dance." 
 
 "I was there," she admitted. "I don't think I 
 danced with you, but we had supper at the same 
 table." 
 
 " I remember it perfectly," he said. " Was n't it 
 supposed to be a very good dance?" 
 
 She shrugged her shoulders. 
 
 " I believe so," she answered. " There was the 
 usual fault too many girls. But it was very pretty 
 to watch." 
 
 " You do not care for dancing, yourself, perhaps?" 
 he hazarded. 
 
 " Indeed I do," she declared. "But I knew scarcely 
 any one there. I see a good deal of Kate sometimes, 
 but the others I scarcely know at all." 
 
 " You were in the same position as I was, then," 
 he answered, smiling.
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME il 
 
 " Oh, you you are different," she remarked. "I 
 mean that you are a man, and at a dance that means 
 everything. That is why I rather dislike dances. We 
 are too dependent upon you. If you would only let 
 us dance alone." 
 
 Selina smiled in a superior manner. She would 
 have given a good deal to have been invited to the 
 dance in question, but that was a matter which she 
 did not think it worth while to mention. 
 
 " My dear Mary ! " she said, " what an idea. I 
 am quite sure that when you go out with us you need 
 never have any difficulty about partners." 
 
 " Our programmes for the Liberal Club Dance and 
 the County Cricket Ball were full before we had been 
 in the room five minutes," Louise interposed. 
 
 Mary smiled inwardly, but said nothing, and Brooks 
 was quite sure then that she was different. He 
 realized too that her teeth were perfect, and her 
 complexion, notwithstanding its pallor, was faultless. 
 She would have beep strikingly good-looking but for 
 her mouth, and that was it a discontented or a 
 supercilious curl? At any rate it disappeared when 
 she smiled. 
 
 " May I ask whether you have been attending a 
 political meeting this evening, Miss Scott ? " he 
 asked. " You came in after us, I think." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " No, I have a class on Wednesday evening." 
 
 " A class ! " he repeated, doubtfully. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom, who thought he had been out of the 
 conversation long enough, interposed. 
 
 " Mary calls herself a bit of a philanthropist, you 
 see, Mr. Brooks/' he explained. " Goes down into
 
 12 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Medchester and teaches factory girls to play the 
 piano on Wednesday evenings. Much good may it 
 do them." 
 
 There was a curious gleam in the girl's eyes for 
 a moment which checked the words on Brooks' lips, 
 and led him to precipitately abandon the conversation. 
 But afterwards, while Selina was pedalling at the 
 pianola and playing havoc with the expression-stops, 
 he crossed the room and stood for a moment by her 
 chair. 
 
 " I should like you to tell me about your class," 
 he said. "I have several myself of different sorts." 
 
 She closed her magazine, but left her finger in 
 the place. 
 
 " Oh, mine is a very unambitious undertaking," 
 she said. " Kate Stuart and I started it for the girls 
 in her father's factory, and we aim at nothing higher 
 than an attempt to direct their taste in fiction. They 
 bring their Free Library lists to us, and we mark them 
 together. Then we all read one more serious book at 
 the same time history or biography and talk 
 about it when we meet." 
 
 " It is an excellent idea," he said, earnestly. " By 
 the bye, something occurs to me. You know, or 
 rather you don't know, that I give free lectures 
 on certain books or any simple literary subject on 
 tWednesday evenings at the Secular Hall when this 
 electioneering isn't on. Couldn't you bring your 
 girls one evening? I would be guided in my choice 
 of a subject by you." 
 
 " Yes, I should like that," she answered, " and I 
 think the girls would. It is very good of you to 
 suggest it."
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME 13 
 
 Louise, with a great book under her arm, deposited 
 her dumpy person in a seat by his side, and looked 
 up at him with a smile of engaging candour. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks," she said, " I am going to do a 
 terrible thing. I am going to show you some of my 
 sketches and ask your opinion." 
 
 Brooks turned towards her without undue en- 
 thusiasm. 
 
 " It is very good of you, Miss Bullsom," he said, 
 doubtfully ; " but I never drew a straight line in my 
 life, and I know nothing whatever about perspective. 
 My opinion would be worse than worthless." 
 
 Louise giggled artlessly, and turned over the first 
 few pages. 
 
 " You men all say that at first," she declared, " and 
 then you turn out such terrible critics. I declare I 'm 
 afraid to show them to you, after all." 
 
 Brooks scarcely showed that desire to overcome 
 her new resolution which politeness demanded. But 
 Selina came tripping across the room, and took up 
 her position on the other side of him. 
 
 " You must show them now you 've brought them 
 out, Louise," she declared. " I am sure that Mr. 
 Brooks' advice will be most valuable. But mind, if 
 you dare to show mine, I '11 tear them into pieces." 
 
 " I was n't going to, dear," Louise declared, a 
 little tartly. " Shall I begin at the beginning, Mr. 
 Brooks, or " 
 
 " Oh, don't show those first few, dear," Selina 
 exclaimed. " You know they 're not nearly so good 
 as some of the others. That mill is all out of 
 drawing." 
 
 Mary, who had been elbowed into the background,
 
 I 4 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 rose quietly and crossed to the other end of the 
 room. Brooks followed her for a moment with re- 
 gretful eyes. Her simple gown, with the little piece 
 of ribbon around her graceful neck, seemed almost 
 distinguished by comparison with the loud-patterned 
 and dressier blouses of the two girls who had now 
 hemmed him in. For a moment he ignored the wait- 
 ing pages. 
 
 " Your cousin," he remarked, " is quite unlike any 
 of you. Has she been with you long? " 
 
 Louise looked up a little tartly. 
 
 " Oh, about three years. You are quite right when 
 you say that she is unlike any of us. It does n't seem 
 nice to complain about her exactly, but she really is 
 terribly trying, isn't she, Selina?" 
 
 Selina nodded, and dropped her voice. 
 
 " She is getting worse," she declared. " She is 
 becoming a positive trouble to us." 
 
 Brooks endeavoured to look properly sympathetic, 
 and considered himself justified in pursuing the 
 conversation. 
 
 " Indeed ! May I ask in what way ? " 
 
 " Oh, she has such old-fashioned ideas," Louise 
 said, confidentially. " I 've quite lost patience with 
 her, and so has Selina ; have n't you, dear ? She 
 never goes to parties if she can help it, she is posi- 
 tively rude to all our friends, and the sarcastic things 
 she says sometimes are most unpleasant. You know, 
 papa is very, very good to her." 
 
 " Yes, indeed," Selina interrupted. " You know, 
 Mr. Brooks, she has no father and mother, and she 
 was living quite alone in London when papa found 
 her out and brought her here and in the most
 
 THE BULLSOM FAMILY AT HOME 15- 
 
 abject poverty. I believe he found her in a garret. 
 Fancy that ! " 
 
 " And now," Louise continued, " he allows her for 
 her clothes exactly the same as he does us and look 
 at her. Would you believe it, now ? She is like that 
 nearly every evening, although we have friends drop- 
 ping in continually. Of course I don't believe in 
 extravagance, but if a girl has relations who are 
 generous enough to give her the means, I do think 
 that, for their sake, she ought to dress properly. I 
 ;hink that she owes it to them, as well as to herself." 
 
 " And out of doors it is positively worse," Selina 
 whispered, impressively. " I declare," she added, 
 with a simper, " that although nobody can say that 
 I am proud, there are times when I am positively 
 ashamed to be seen out with her. What she does 
 with her money I can't imagine." 
 
 Brooks, who was something of a critic in such 
 matters, and had recognized the art of her severely 
 simple gown, smiled to himself. He was wise enough, 
 however, not to commit himself. 
 
 " Perhaps," he suggested, " she thinks that absolute 
 simplicity suits her best. She has a nice figure." 
 
 Selina tossed her much-beaded slipper impatiently. 
 
 " Heaven only knows what Mary does think," she 
 exclaimed, impatiently. 
 
 " And Heaven only knows what I am to say about 
 these," Brooks groaned inwardly, as the sketch-book 
 fell open before him at last, and its contents were 
 revealed to his astonished eyes.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS HAS A VISITOR 
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS was twenty-five years old, 
 strong, nervous, and with a strenuous desire to 
 make his way so far as was humanly possible into 
 the heart of life. He was a young solicitor recently 
 established in Medchester, without friends save those 
 he was now making, and absolutely without interest 
 of any sort. He had a small capital, and already the 
 beginnings of a practice. He had- some sort of a 
 reputation as a speaker, and was well spoken of by 
 those who had entrusted business to him. Yet he was 
 still fighting for a living when this piece of luck had 
 befallen him. Mr. Bullsom had entrusted a small 
 case to him, and found him capable and cheap. 
 Amongst that worthy gentleman's chief characteris- 
 tics was a decided weakness for patronizing younger 
 and less successful men, and he went everywhere with 
 Kingston Brooks' name on his lips. Then came the 
 election, and the sudden illness of Mr. Morrison, who 
 had always acted as agent for the Radical candidates 
 for the borough. Another agent had to be found. 
 Several who would have been suitable were unavail- 
 able. An urgent committee meeting was held, and 
 Mr. Bullsom at once called attention to an excellent 
 little speech of Kingston Brooks' at a ward meeting 
 on the previous night. In an hour he was closeted
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS HAS A VISITOR 17 
 
 with the young lawyer, and the affair was settled. 
 Brooks knew that henceforth the material side of his 
 career would be comparatively easy sailing. 
 
 He had accepted his good fortune with something 
 of the same cheerful philosophy with which he had 
 seen difficulty loom up in his path a few months ago. 
 But to-night, on his way home from Mr. Bullsom's 
 suburban residence, a different mood possessed him. 
 Usually a self-contained and somewhat gravely- 
 minded person, to-night the blood went tingling 
 through his veins with a new and unaccustomed 
 warmth. He carried himself blithely, the cool night 
 air was so grateful and sweet to him that he had 
 no mind even to smoke. There seemed to be no 
 tangible reason for the change. The political ex- 
 citement, which a few weeks ago he had begun to feel 
 exhilarating, had for him decreased now that his 
 share in it lay behind the scenes, and he found him- 
 self wholly occupied with the purely routine work of 
 the election. Nor was there any sufficient explana- 
 tion to be found in the entertainment which he had 
 felt himself bound to accept at Mr. Bullsom's hands. 
 Of the wine, which had been only tolerable, he had 
 drunk, as was his custom, sparingly, and of Mary 
 Scott, who had certainly interested him in a manner 
 which the rest of the family had not, he had after all 
 seen but very little. He found himself thinking with 
 fervour of the desirable things in life, never had the 
 various tasks which he had set himself seemed so easy 
 of accomplishment, his own powers more real and 
 alive. And beneath it all he was conscious of a vague 
 sense of excitement, a nervous dancing of the blood, 
 as though even now the time were at hand when he
 
 i8 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 might find himself in touch with some of the greater 
 forces of life, all of which he intended some day to 
 realize. It was delightful after all to be young and 
 strong, to be stripped for the race in the morning of 
 life, when every indrawn breath seems sweet with the 
 perfume of beautiful things, and the heart is tuned to 
 music. 
 
 The fatigue of the day was wholly forgotten. 
 He was surprised indeed when he found himself 
 in the little street where his rooms were. A small 
 brougham was standing at the corner, the liveries 
 and horse of which, though quiet enough, caused him 
 a moment's surprise as being superior to the ordinary 
 equipages of the neighbourhood. He passed on to the 
 sober-fronted house where he lived, and entering 
 with his latch-key made his way to his study. Im- 
 mediately he entered he was conscious of a man 
 comfortably seated in his easy-chair, and apparently 
 engrossed in a magazine. 
 
 He advanced towards him inquiringly, and his 
 visitor, carefully setting down the magazine, rose 
 slowly to his feet. The young man's surprise at find- 
 ing his rooms occupied was increased by the appear- 
 ance of his visitor. He was apparently of more than 
 middle age, with deeply-lined face, tall, and with an 
 expression the coldness of which was only slightly 
 mitigated by a sensitive mouth that seemed at once 
 cynical and humorous. He was of more than ordi- 
 nary height, and dressed in the plainest dinner garb 
 of the day, but his dinner jacket, his black tie and the 
 set of his shirt were revelations to Brooks, who dealt 
 only with the Medchester tradespeople. He did not 
 hold out his hand, but he eyed Brooks with a sort
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS HAS A VISITOR ig> 
 
 of critical survey, which the latter found a little 
 disconcerting. 
 
 "You wished to see me, sir?" Brooks asked. "My 
 name is Kingston Brooks, and these are my rooms." 
 
 " So I understood," the new-comer replied imper- 
 turbably. " I called about an hour ago, and took the 
 liberty of awaiting your return." t 
 
 Brooks sat down. His vis-a-vis was calmly select- 
 ing a cigarette from a capacious case. Brooks found 
 himself offering a light and accepting a cigarette him- 
 self, the flavour of which he at once appreciated. 
 
 " Can I offer you a whisky-and-soda?" he inquired. 
 
 " I thank you, no," was the quiet reply. 
 
 There was a short pause. 
 
 " You wished to see me on some business connected 
 with the election, no doubt? " Brooks suggested. 
 
 His visitor shook his head slowly. He knocked the 
 ash from his cigarette and smiled whimsically. 
 
 " My dear fellow," he said, " I have n't the least 
 idea why I came to see you this evening." 
 
 Brooks felt that he had a right to be puzzled, and 
 he looked it. But his visitor was so evidently a gen- 
 tleman and a person of account, that the obvious 
 rejoinder did not occur to him. He merely waited 
 with uplifted eyebrows. 
 
 " Not the least idea," his visitor repeated, still 
 smiling. " But at the same time I fancy that before 
 I leave you I shall find myself explaining, or en- 
 deavouring to explain, not why I am here, but why 
 I have not visited you before. What do you think 
 of that?" 
 
 " I find it," Brooks answered, " enigmatic but 
 interesting."
 
 20 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Exactly. Well, I hate talking, so my explanation 
 will not be a tedious one. Your name is Kingston 
 Brooks." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Your mother's name was Dorothy Kenneir. She 
 was, before her marriage, the matron of a home in 
 the East End of JLondon, and a lady devoted to 
 philanthropic work. Your father was a police-court 
 missionary." 
 
 Brooks was leaning a little forward in his chair. 
 These things were true enough. Who was his visitor ? 
 ' " Your father, through over-devotion to the phil- 
 anthropic works in which he was engaged, lost his 
 reason temporarily, and on his partial recovery I 
 understand that the doctors considered him still to 
 be mentally in a very weak state. They ordered him 
 a sea voyage. He left England on the Corinthia 
 fifteen years ago, and I believe that you heard nothing 
 more of him until you received the news of his death 
 probably ten years back." 
 
 " Yes ! Ten years ago." 
 
 " Your mother, I think, lived for only a few months 
 after your father left England. You found a guar- 
 dian in Mr. Ascough of Lincoln's Inn Fields. There 
 my knowledge of your history ceases." 
 
 " How do you know these things? " Brooks asked. 
 
 " I was with your father when he died. It was 
 I who wrote to you and sent his effects to England." 
 
 "You were there in Canada?" 
 
 " Yes. I had a dwelling within a dozen miles of 
 where your father had built his hut by the side of 
 the great lake. He was the only other Englishman 
 within a hundred miles. So I was with him often."
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS HAS A VISITOR 21 
 
 " It is wonderful after all these years," Brooks 
 exclaimed. " You were there for sport, of course? " 
 
 "For sport!" his visitor repeated in a colourless 
 tone. 
 
 " But my father what led him there? Why did 
 he cut himself off from every one, send no word home, 
 creep away into that lone country to die by himself? 
 It is horrible to think of." 
 
 :< Your father was not a communicative man. He 
 spoke of his illness. I always considered him as a 
 person mentally shattered. He spent his days alone, 
 looking out across the lake or wandering in the 
 woods. He had no companions, of course, but there 
 were always animals around him. He had the look 
 of a man who had suffered." 
 
 " He was to have gone to Australia," Brooks said. 
 " It was from there that we expected news from him. 
 I cannot see what possible reason he had for changing 
 his plans. There was no mystery about his life in 
 London. It was one splendid record of self-denial 
 and devotion to what he thought his duty." 
 
 " From what he told me?' his fiis-a-vis continued, 
 handing again his cigarette-case, and looking steadily 
 into the fire, " he seems to have left England with the 
 secret determination never to return. But why I do 
 not know. One thing is certain. His mental state 
 was not altogether healthy. His desire for solitude 
 was almost a passion. Towards the end, however, 
 his mind w r as clear enough. He told me about your 
 mother and you, and he handed me all the papers, 
 which I subsequently sent to London. He spoke of 
 no trouble, and his transition was quite peaceful." 
 
 " It was a cruel ending," Brooks said, quietly.
 
 22 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " There were people in London whom he had be- 
 friended who would have worked their passage out 
 and faced any hardships to be with him. And my 
 mother, notwithstanding his desertion, believed in 
 him to the last" 
 
 There was a moment's intense silence. This visitor 
 who had come so strangely was to all appearance a 
 man not easily to be moved. Yet Brooks fancied that 
 the long white ringers were trembling, and that the 
 strange quiet of his features was one of intense self- 
 repression. His tone when he spoke again, however, 
 was clear, and almost indifferent. 
 
 " I feel," he said, " that it would have been only 
 decently courteous of me to have sought you out 
 before, although I have, as you see, nothing whatever 
 to add to the communications I sent you. But I have 
 not been a very long time in England, and I have a 
 very evil habit of putting off things concerning which 
 there is no urgency. I called at Ascough's, and 
 learned that you were in practice in Medchester. I 
 am now living for a short time not far from here, 
 and reading of the election, I drove in to-night to 
 attend one of the meetings I scarcely cared which. 
 I heard your name, saw you on the platform, and 
 called here, hoping to find you." 
 
 " It was very kind," Brooks said. 
 
 He felt curiously tongue-tied. This sudden up- 
 heaval of a past which he had never properly under- 
 stood affected him strangely. 
 
 " I gathered from Mr. Ascough that you were left 
 sufficient means to pay for your education, and also 
 to start you in life," his visitor continued. " Yours 
 is considered to be an overcrowded profession, but
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS HAS A VISITOR 23 
 
 I am glad to understand that you seem likely to make 
 your way." 
 
 Brooks thanked him absently. 
 
 " From your position on the platform to-night I 
 gather that you are a politician?" 
 
 " Scarcely that," Brooks answered. " I was for- 
 tunate enough to be appointed agent to Mr. Henslow 
 owing to the illness of another man. It will help me 
 in my profession." 
 
 The visitor rose to his feet. He stood with his 
 hands behind him, looking at the younger man. And 
 Brooks suddenly remembered that he did not even 
 know his name. 
 
 " You will forgive me," he said, also rising, " if 
 I have seemed a little dazed. I am very grateful to 
 you for coming. I have always wanted more than 
 anything in the world to meet some one who saw my 
 father after he left England. There is so much 
 which even now seems mysterious with regard to his 
 disappearance from the world." 
 
 " I fear that you will never discover more than you 
 have done from me," was the quiet reply. " Your 
 father had been living for years in profound solitude 
 when I found him. Frankly, I considered from the 
 first that his mind was unhinged. Therein I fancy 
 lies the whole explanation of his silence and his volun- 
 tary disappearance. I am assuming, of course, that 
 there was nothing in England to make his absence 
 desirable." 
 
 " There was nothing," Brooks declared with con- 
 viction. " That I can personally vouch for. His life 
 as a police-court missionary was the life of a militant 
 martyr's, the life of a saint. The urgent advice of his
 
 24 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 physicians alone led him to embark upon that voyage ; 
 I see now that it was a mistake. He left before he had 
 sufficiently recovered to be safely trusted alone. By 
 the bye," Brooks continued, after a moment's hesi- 
 tation, " you have not told me your name, whom I 
 have to thank for this kindness. Your letters from 
 Canada were not signed." 
 
 There was a short silence. From outside came the 
 sound of the pawing of horses' feet and the jingling 
 of harness. 
 
 " I was a fellow-traveller in that great unpeopled 
 world," the visitor said, " and there was nothing but 
 common humanity in anything I did. I lived out 
 there as Philip Ferringshaw, here I have to add my 
 title, the Marquis of Arranmore. I was a younger 
 son in those days. If there is anything which I have 
 forgotten, I am at Enton for a month or so. It is an 
 easy walk from Medchester, if your clients can spare 
 you for an afternoon. Good-night, Mr. Brooks." 
 
 He held out his hand. He was sleepy apparently, 
 for his voice had become almost a drawl, and he 
 stifled a yawn as he passed along the little passage. 
 Kingston Brooks returned to his little room, and 
 threw himself back into his easy-chair. Truly this 
 had been a wonderful day.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A QUESTION FOR THE COUNTRY 
 
 FOR the first time in many years it seemed certain 
 that the Conservatives had lost their hold upon 
 the country. The times were ripe for a change of 
 any sort. An ill-conducted and ruinous war had 
 drained the empire of its surplus wealth, and every 
 known industry was suffering from an almost para- 
 lyzing depression Medchester, perhaps, as severely 
 as any town in the United Kingdom. Its staple 
 manufactures were being imported from the States 
 and elsewhere at prices which the local manufacturers 
 declared to be ruinous. Many of the largest factories 
 were standing idle, a great majority of the remainder 
 were being worked at half or three-quarters time. 
 Thoughtful men, looking ten years ahead, saw the 
 cloud, which even now was threatening enough, grow 
 blacker and blacker, and shuddered at the thought of 
 the tempest which before long must break over the 
 land. Meanwhile, the streets were filled with un- 
 employed, whose demeanour day by day grew less 
 and less pacific. People asked one another helplessly 
 what was being done to avert the threatened crisis. 
 The manufacturers, openly threatened by their dis- 
 charged employees, and cajoled by others higher in 
 authority and by public opinion, still pronounced
 
 26 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 themselves helpless to move without the aid of legis- 
 lation. For the first time for years Protection was 
 openly spoken of from a political platform. 
 
 Henslow, a shrewd man and a politician of some 
 years' standing, was one of the first to read the signs 
 of the times, and rightly to appreciate them. He had 
 just returned from a lengthened visit to the United 
 States, and what he had seen there he kept at first 
 very much to himself. But at a small committee 
 meeting held when his election was still a matter of 
 doubt, he unbosomed himself at last to some effect. 
 
 " The vote we want," he said, " is the vote of those 
 people who are losing their bread, and who see ruin 
 and starvation coming in upon them. I mean the 
 middle-class manufacturers and the operatives who 
 are dependent upon them. I tell you where I think 
 that as a nation we are going wrong. We fixed once 
 upon a great principle, and we nailed it to our mast 
 for all time. That is a mistake. Absolute Free 
 Trade, such as is at present our national policy, was 
 a magnificent principle in the days of Cobden but 
 the times have changed. We must change with them. 
 That is where the typical Englishman fails. It is a 
 matter of temperament. He is too slow to adapt him- 
 self to changing circumstances." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. These were omi- 
 nous words. Every one felt that they were not lightly 
 spoken. Henslow had more behind. A prominent 
 manufacturer, Harrison by name, interposed from 
 his place. 
 
 " You are aware, Air. Henslow," he said, " that 
 many a man has lost an assured seat for a more 
 guarded speech than that. For generations even a
 
 A QUESTION FOR THE COUNTRY 27 
 
 whisper of the sort has been counted heresy es- 
 pecially from our party." 
 
 " Maybe," Henslow answered, " but I am reminded 
 of this, Mr. Harrison. The pioneers of every great 
 social change have suffered throughout the whole of 
 history, but the man who has selected the proper 
 moment and struck hard, has never failed to win his 
 reward. Now I am no novice in politics, and I am 
 going to make a prophecy. Years ago the two po- 
 litical parties were readjusted on the Irish question. 
 Every election which was fought was simply on these 
 lines it was upon the principle of Home Rule for 
 Ireland, and the severance of that country from the 
 United Kingdom, or the maintenance of the Union. 
 Good ! Now, in more recent times, the South African 
 war and the realization of what our Colonies could do 
 for us has introduced a new factor. Those who have 
 believed in a doctrine of expansion have called them- 
 selves ' Imperialists,' and those who have favoured 
 less wide-reaching ideals, and perhaps more attention 
 to home matters, have been christened ' Little Eng- 
 landers.' Many elections have been fought out on 
 these lines, if not between two men absolutely at 
 variance with one another on this question, still on 
 the matter of degree. Now, I am going to prophesy. 
 I say that the next readjustment of Parties, and the 
 time is not far ahead, will be on the tariff question, 
 and I believe that the controversy on this matter, 
 when once the country has laid hold of it, will be the 
 greatest political event of this century. Listen, gen- 
 tlemen. I do not speak without having given this 
 question careful and anxious thought, and I tell you 
 that I can see it coming."
 
 28 
 
 The committee meeting broke up at a late Hour 
 in the afternoon amidst some excitement, and Mr. 
 Bullsom walked back to his office with Brooks. A 
 fine rain was falling, and the two men were close 
 together under one umbrella. 
 
 "What do you think of it, Brooks?" Bullsom 
 asked anxiously. 
 
 " To tell you the truth, I scarcely know," the 
 younger answered. " Ten years ago there could 
 have been but one answer to-day well, look 
 there." 
 
 The two men stood still for a moment. They were 
 in the centre of the town, at a spot from which the 
 main thoroughfares radiated into the suburbs and 
 manufacturing centres. Everywhere the pavements 
 and the open space where a memorial tower stood 
 were crowded with loiterers. Men in long lines stood 
 upon the kerbstones, their hands in their pockets, 
 watching, waiting God knows for what. There 
 were all sorts, of course, the professional idlers and 
 the drunkard were there, but the others there was 
 no lack of them. There was no lack of men, white- 
 faced, dull-eyed, dejected, some of them actually with 
 the brand of starvation to be seen in their sunken 
 cheeks and wasted limbs. No wonder that the swing- 
 doors of the public-houses, where there was light and 
 warmth inside, opened and shut continually. 
 
 " Look," Brooks repeated, with a tremor in his 
 tone. " There are thousands and thousands of them 
 and all of them must have some sort of a home to 
 go to. Fancy it one's womankind, perhaps chil- 
 dren and nothing to take home to them. It's such 
 an old story, that it sounds hackneyed and common-
 
 A QUESTION FOR THE COUNTRY 29 
 
 place. But God knows there 's no other tragedy on 
 His earth like it." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom was uncomfortable. 
 
 " I 've given a hundred pounds to the Unemployed 
 Fund," he said. 
 
 " It 's money well spent if it had been a thousand," 
 Brooks answered. " Some day they may learn their 
 strength, and they will not suffer then, like brute 
 animals, in silence. Look here. I 'm going to speak 
 to one of them." 
 
 He touched a tall youth on the shoulder. 
 
 " Out of work, my lad? " he asked. 
 
 The youth turned surlily round. 
 
 " Yes. Looks like it, don't it? " 
 
 " What are you? " Brooks asked. 
 
 " Clicker." 
 
 " Why did you leave your last place? " 
 
 " Gaffer said he 's no more orders could n't 
 keep us on. The shop 's shut up. Know of a job, 
 guv'nor?" he asked, with a momentary eagerness. 
 " I 've two characters in my pocket good 'uns." 
 
 " You 've tried to get a place elsewhere? " Brooks 
 asked. 
 
 " Tried ? D' ye suppose I 'm standing here for fun ? 
 I 've tramped the blessed town. I went to thirty 
 factories yesterday, and forty to-day. Know of a 
 job, guv'nor? I 'm not particular." 
 
 "I wish I did," Brooks answered, simply. "Here's 
 half-a-crown. Go to that coffee-palace over there and 
 get a meal. It 's all I can do for you." 
 
 " Good for you, guv'nor," was the prompt answer. 
 " I can treat my brother on that. Here, Ned," he 
 caught hold of a younger boy by the shoulder, " hot 
 coffee and eggs, you sinner. Come on."
 
 30 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 The two scurried off together. Brooks and his 
 companion passed on. 
 
 " It is just this," Brooks said, in a low tone, " just 
 the thought of these people makes me afraid, posi- 
 tively afraid to argue with Henslow. You see he 
 may be right. I tell you that in a healthily-governed 
 country there should be work for every man who is 
 able and willing to work. And in England there 
 is n't. Free Trade works out all right logically, but 
 it 's one thing to see it all on paper, and it 's another 
 to see this here around us and Medchester is n't 
 the worst off by any means." 
 
 Bullsom was silent for several moments. 
 
 "I tell you what it is, Brooks," he said. "I'll 
 send another hundred to the Unemployed Fund 
 to-night." 
 
 " It 's generous of you, Mr. Bullsom," the young 
 lawyer answered. " You '11 never regret it. But 
 look here. There 's a greater responsibility even than 
 feeding these poor fellows resting upon us to-day. 
 They don't want our charity. They 've an equal right 
 to live with us. What they want, and what they have 
 a right to, is just legislation. That 's where we come 
 in. Politics is n't a huge joke, or the vehicle for any 
 one man's personal ambition. We who interest our- 
 selves, however remotely, in them, impose upon our- 
 selves a great obligation. We Ve got to find the 
 truth. That 's why I hesitate to say anything against 
 Henslow's new departure. We 're off the track now. 
 I want to hear all that Henslow has to say. We must 
 not neglect a single chance whilst that terrible cry is 
 ever in our ears." 
 
 They parted at the tram terminus, Mr. Bullsom
 
 A QUESTION FOR THE COUNTRY 31 
 
 taking a car for his suburban paradise. As usual, he 
 was the centre of a little group of acquaintances. 
 
 " And how goes the election, Bullsom? " some one 
 asked him. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom was in no hurry to answer the ques- 
 tion. He glanced round the car, collecting the atten- 
 tion of those who might be supposed interested. 
 
 "I will answer that question better," he said, "after 
 the mass meeting on Saturday night. I think that 
 Henslow's success or failure will depend on that." 
 
 "Got something up your sleeve, eh?" his first 
 questioner remarked. 
 
 " Maybe," Mr. Bullsom answered. " Maybe not. 
 But apart from the immediate matter of this elec- 
 tion, I can tell you one thing, gentlemen, which may 
 interest you." 
 
 He paused. One thumb stole towards the armhole 
 of his waistcoat. He liked to see these nightly com- 
 panions of his hang upon his words. It was a proper 
 and gratifying tribute to his success as a man of 
 affairs. 
 
 " I have just left," he said, " our future Member." 
 
 The significance of his speech was not immediately 
 apparent. 
 
 " Henslow ! Oh, yes. Committee meeting this 
 afternoon, wasn't it?" some one remarked. 
 
 " I do not mean Henslow," Mr. Bullsom replied. 
 " I mean Kingston Brooks." 
 
 The desired sensation was apparent. 
 
 "Why, he's your new agent, isn't he?" 
 
 " Young fellow who plays cricket rather well." 
 
 " Great golfer, they say ! " 
 
 " Makes a good speech, some one was saying." 
 
 " Gives free lectures at the Secular Hall."
 
 32 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Rather a smart young solicitor, they say ! " 
 
 Mr. Bullsom looked around him. 
 
 " He is all these things, and he does all these 
 things. He is one of these youngsters who has the 
 knack of doing everything well. Mark my words, 
 all of you. I gave him his first case of any impor- 
 tance, and I got him this job as agent for Henslow. 
 He 's bound to rise. He 's ambitious, and he 's got 
 the brains. He '11 be M.P. for this borough before 
 we know where we are." 
 
 Half-a-dozen men of more or less importance made 
 a mental note to nod to Kingston Brooks next time 
 they saw him, and Mr. Bullsom trudged up his avenue 
 with fresh schemes maturing in his mind. In the 
 domestic circle he further unburdened himself. 
 
 " Mrs. Bullsom," he said, " I am thinking of 
 giving a dinner-party. How many people do we 
 know better than ourselves ? " 
 
 Mrs. Bullsom was aghast, and the young ladies, 
 Selina and Louise, who were in the room, were 
 indignant. 
 
 " Really, papa," Selina exclaimed, " what do you 
 mean ? " 
 
 " What I say," he answered, gruffly. " We 're 
 plain people, your mother and I, at any rate, and 
 when you come to reckon things up, I suppose you '11 
 admit that we 're not much in the social way. There 's 
 plenty of people living round us in a sight smaller 
 houses who don't know us, and would n't if they 
 could and I 'm not so sure that it 's altogether the 
 fault of your father and mother either, Selina," he 
 added, breaking ruthlessly in upon a sotto-voce re- 
 mark of that young lady's.
 
 A QUESTION FOR THE COUNTRY 33 
 
 " Well, I never ! " Selina exclaimed, tossing her 
 head. 
 
 " Come, come, I don't want no sauce from you 
 girls," he added, drifting towards the fireplace, and 
 adopting a more assured tone as he reached his 
 favourite position. " I 've reasons for wishing to 
 have Mr. Kingston Brooks here, and I 'd like him to 
 meet gentlefolk. Now, there's the Vicar and his 
 wife. Do you suppose they'd come?" 
 
 " Well, I should like to know why not," Mrs. 
 Bullsom remarked, laying down her knitting, " when 
 it 's only three weeks ago you sent him ten guineas 
 for the curates' fund. Come indeed ! They'd better." 
 
 " Then there 's Dr. Seventon," Mr. Bullsom con- 
 tinued, " and his wife. Better drop him a line and 
 tell him to look in and see me at the office. I can 
 invent something the matter with me, and I 'd best 
 drop him a hint. They say Mrs. Seventon is exclu- 
 sive. But I '11 just let him know she 's got to come. 
 Now, who else, girls ? " 
 
 " The Huntingdons might come if they knew 
 that it was this sort of an affair," Selina remarked^ 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 " And Mr. Seaton," Louise added. " I 'm sure 
 he 's most gentlemanly." 
 
 " I don't want gentlemanly people this time," Mr. 
 Bullsom declared, " I want gentle-people. That 's 
 all there is about it. I let you ask who you like to 
 the house, and give you what you want for subscrip- 
 tions and clothes and such-like. You 've had a free 
 'and. Now let 's see something for it. Half-a-dozen 
 couples '11 be enough if you can't get more, but I 
 won't have the Nortons, or the Marvises, or any of 
 
 3
 
 34 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 that podgy set. You understand that ? And, first of 
 all, you, Selina, had better write to Mr. Brooks and 
 ask him to dine with us in a friendly way one night 
 the week after next, when the election is over and 
 done with." 
 
 "In a friendly way, pa?" Selina repeated, doubt- 
 fully. " But we can't ask these other people whom 
 we know so slightly like that and, besides, Mr. 
 Brooks might not dress if we put it like that." 
 
 " A nice lot you know about gentle-people and 
 their ways," Mr. Bullsom remarked, with scorn. " A 
 young fellow like Brooks would tog himself out for 
 dinner all right even if we were alone, as long as 
 there were ladies there. And as for the dinner, you 
 don't suppose I 'm such a mug as to leave that to 
 Ann. I shall go to the Queen's Hotel, and have 'em 
 send a cook and waiters, and run the whole show. 
 Don't know that I shan't send to London. You get 
 the people! I'll feed 'em!" 
 
 " Do as your father says, Selina," Mrs. Bullsom 
 said, mildly. " I 'm sure he 's very considerate." 
 
 " Where 's Mary ? " Mr. Bullsom inquired. " This 
 is a bit in her line." 
 
 Selina tossed her head. 
 
 " I 'm sure I don't know why you should say that, 
 papa," she declared. " Mary knows nothing about 
 society, and she has no friends who would be the least 
 use to us." 
 
 " Where is she, anyway? " Mr. Bulsom demanded. 
 
 No one knew. As a matter of fact she was having 
 tea with Kingston Brooks.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE MARQUIS OF ARRANMORE 
 
 THEY had met almost on the steps of his office, 
 and only a few minutes after he had left Mr. 
 Bullsom. Brooks was attracted first by a certain 
 sense of familiarity with the trim, well-balanced 
 figure, and immediately afterwards she raised her 
 eyes to his in passing. He wheeled sharply round, 
 and held out his hand. 
 
 " Miss Scott, is n't it? Do you know I have just 
 left your uncle? " 
 
 She smiled a little absently. She looked tired, and 
 her boots and skirt were splashed as though with 
 much walking. 
 
 " Indeed ! I suppose you see a good deal of him 
 just now while the election is on?" 
 
 " I must make myself a perfect nuisance to him," 
 Brooks admitted. " You see the work is all new to 
 me, and he has been through it many times before. 
 Are you just going home?" 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " I have been out since two o'clock," she said. 
 
 " And you are almost wet through, and quite tired 
 out," he said. " Look here. Come across to Mellor's
 
 36 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 and have some tea with me, and I will put you in a 
 car afterwards." 
 
 She hesitated and he led the way across the 
 street, giving her no opportunity to frame a refusal. 
 The little tea-place was warm and cosy. He found 
 a comfortable corner, and took her wet umbrella and 
 cape away. 
 
 " I believe," he said, sitting down opposite her, 
 " that I have saved your life." 
 
 " Then I am not sure," she answered, " that I feel 
 grateful to you. I ought to have warned you that I 
 am not in the least likely to be a cheerful companion. 
 I have had a most depressing afternoon." 
 
 " You have been to your tailor's," he suggested, 
 " and your new gown is a failure or is it even 
 worse than that ? " 
 
 She laughed dubiously. Then the tea was brought, 
 and for a moment their conversation was interrupted. 
 He thought her very graceful as she bent forward and 
 busied herself attending to his wants. Her affinity 
 to Selina and Louise was undistinguishable. It was 
 true that she was pale, but it was the pallor of refine- 
 ment, the student's absence of colour rather than the 
 pallor of ill-health. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks," she said, presently, " you are busy 
 with this election, and you are brought constantly 
 into touch with all classes of people. Can you tell 
 me why it is that it is so hard just now for poor 
 people to get work? Is it true, what they tell me, 
 that many of the factories in Medchester are closed, 
 and many of those that are open are only working 
 half and three-quarter time?" 
 
 " I am afraid that it is quite true, Miss Scott," he
 
 THE MARQUIS OF ARRANMORE 37 
 
 answered. " As for the first part of your question, 
 it is very hard to answer. There seem to be so many 
 causes at work just now." 
 
 " But it is the work of the politician surely to 
 analyze these causes." 
 
 " It should be," he answered. " Tell me what has 
 brought this into your mind." 
 
 " Some of the girls in our class," she said, " are 
 out of work, and those who have anything to do 
 seem to be working themselves almost to death to 
 keep their parents or somebody dependent upon them. 
 Two of them I am anxious about. I have been trying 
 to find them this afternoon. I have heard things, Mr. 
 Brooks, which have made me ashamed sick at heart 
 ashamed to go home and think how we live, while 
 they die. And these girls they have known so 
 much misery. I am afraid of what may happen to 
 them." 
 
 " These girls are mostly boot and shoe machinists, 
 are they not ? " 
 
 " Yes. But even Mr. Stuart says that he cannot 
 find them work." 
 
 " It is only this afternoon that we have all been dis- 
 cussing this matter," he said, gravely. " It is serious 
 enough, God knows. The manufacturer tells us that 
 he is suffering from American competition here 
 and in the Colonies. He tells us that the workpeople 
 themselves are largely to blame, that their trades 
 unions restrict them to such an extent that he is 
 hopelessly handicapped from the start. But there 
 are other causes. There is a terrible wave of depres- 
 sion all through the country. The working classes 
 have no money to spend. Every industry is flagging,
 
 38 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 and every industry seems threatened with competi- 
 tion from abroad. Do you understand the principles 
 of Free Trade at all ? " 
 
 " Not in the least. I wish I did." 
 
 " Some day we must have a talk about it. Henslow 
 has made a very daring suggestion to-day. He has 
 given us all plenty to think about. We are all agreed 
 upon one thing. The crisis is fast approaching, and 
 it must be faced. These people have the right to 
 live, and they have the right to demand that legisla- 
 tion should interfere on their behalf." 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 " It is a comfort to hear you talk like this," she 
 said. " To me it seems almost maddening to see so 
 much suffering, so many people suffering, not only 
 physically, but being dragged down into a lower 
 moral state by sheer force of circumstances and their 
 surroundings, and all the time we educated people 
 go on our way and live our lives, as though nothing 
 were happening as though we had no responsi- 
 bility whatever for the holocaust of misery at our 
 doors. So few people stop to think. They won't 
 understand. It is so easy to put things behind 
 one." 
 
 " Come," he said, cheerfully, " you and I, at least, 
 are not amongst those. And there is a certain duty 
 which we owe to ourselves, too, as well as to others 
 to look upon the brighter side of things. Let us 
 talk about something less depressing." 
 
 " You shall tell me," she suggested, " who is going 
 to win the election." 
 
 " Henslow ! " he answered, promptly. 
 
 " Owing, I suppose "
 
 THE MARQUIS OF ARRANMORE 39 
 
 " To his agent, of course. You may laugh, Miss 
 Scott, but I can assure you that my duties are no 
 sinecure. I never knew what work was before." 
 
 " Too much work," she said, " is better than too 
 little. After all, more people die of the latter than 
 the former." 
 
 " Nature meant me," he said, " for a lazy man. 
 I have all the qualifications for a first-class idler. 
 And circumstances and the misfortune of my opinions 
 are going to keep me going at express speed all my 
 life. I can see it coming. Sometimes it makes me 
 shudder." 
 
 " You are too young," she remarked, " to shrink 
 from work. I have no sympathy to offer you." 
 
 " I begin to fear, Miss Scott," he said, " that you 
 are not what is called sympathetic." 
 
 She smiled and the smile broke into a laugh, as 
 though some transient idea rather than his words had 
 pleased her. 
 
 " You should apply to my cousin Selina for that," 
 she said. " Every one calls her most delightfully 
 sympathetic." 
 
 " Sympathy," he remarked, "is either a heaven-sent 
 joy or a bore. It depends upon the individual." 
 
 " That is either enigmatical or rude," she answered. 
 " But, after all, you don't know Selina." 
 
 " Why not? " he asked. " I have talked with her 
 as long as with you and I feel that I know you 
 quite well." 
 
 " I can't be responsible for your feelings," she said, 
 a little brusquely, " but I 'm quite sure that I don't 
 know you well enough to be sitting here at tea with 
 you even."
 
 40 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " I won't admit that," he answered, " but it was 
 very nice of you to come." 
 
 " The fact of it was," she admitted, " my headache 
 and appetite were stronger than my sense of the con- 
 ventions. Now that the former are dissipated the 
 latter are beginning to assert themselves. And so " 
 
 She began to draw on her gloves. Just then a car- 
 riage with postilions and ladies with luggage came 
 clattering up the street. She watched it with dark- 
 ening face. 
 
 " That is the sort of man I detest," she said, mo- 
 tioning her head towards the window. " You know 
 whose carriage it is, don't you ? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " No, I did not know that any one round here 
 drove with postilions." 
 
 " It is the Marquis of Arranmore. He has a place 
 at Enton, I believe, but he is only here for a few 
 months in the year." 
 
 Brooks started and leaned eagerly forward. 
 
 " Why do you hate him ? " he asked. " What has 
 he done?" 
 
 " Did n't you hear how he treated the Mayor 
 when he went out for a subscription to the Unem- 
 ployed Fund ? " 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 " No ! I have heard nothing." 
 
 " Poor old Mr. Wensome went out all that way 
 purposely to see him. He was kept waiting an hour, 
 and then when he explained his errand the Marquis 
 laughed at him. ' My dear fellow/ he said, ' the 
 poor people of Medchester do not interest me in the 
 least. I do not go to the people who are better off
 
 THE MARQUIS OF ARRANMORE 41 
 
 than I am and ask them to help support me, nor do 
 I see the least reason why those who are worse off 
 than I am should expect me to support them.' Mr. 
 Wensome tried to appeal to his humanity, and the 
 brute only continued to laugh in a cynical way. He 
 declared that poor people did not interest him. His 
 tenants he was prepared to look after outside his 
 own property he did n't care a snap of the fingers 
 whether people lived or died. Mr. Wensome said it 
 was perfectly awful to hear him talk, and he came 
 away without a penny. Yet his property in this 
 country alone is worth fifty thousand a year." 
 
 " It is very surprising," Brooks said, thoughtfully. 
 " The more surprising because I know of a kind 
 action which he once did." 
 
 "Sh! they're coming here!" she exclaimed. 
 "That is the Marquis." 
 
 The omnibus had pulled up outside. A tall foot- 
 man threw open the door, and held an umbrella over 
 the two ladies who had descended. The Marquis 
 and two other men followed. They trooped into the 
 little place, bringing with them a strange flavour of 
 another world. The women wore wonderful furs, 
 and one who had ermine around her neck wore a 
 great bunch of Neapolitan violets, whose perfume 
 seemed to fill the room. 
 
 " This is a delightful idea," the taller one said, 
 turning towards her host. " An eight-mile drive 
 before tea sounded appalling. Where shall we sit, 
 and may we have muffins?" 
 
 " There is nothing about your youth, Lady Sybil, 
 which I envy more than your digestion," he an- 
 swered, motioning them towards a table. " To be
 
 '42 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 able to eat muffins with plenty of butter would be 
 unalloyed bliss. Nevertheless, you shall have them. 
 No one has ever called me selfish. Let us have tea, 
 and toast, and bread-and-butter and cakes, and a 
 great many muffins, please, young lady," he ordered. 
 " And will you send out some tea to my servants, 
 please? It will save them from trying to obtain 
 drinks from the hotel next door, and ensure us a 
 safe drive home." 
 
 " And don't forget to send out for that pack of 
 cards, Arranmore," the elder lady said. " We are 
 going to play bridge driving home with that won- 
 derful little electric lamp of yours." 
 
 " I will not forget," he promised. " We are to be 
 partners, you know." 
 
 He was on the point of sitting down when he saw 
 Brooks at the next table. He held out his hand. 
 
 " How do you do, Mr. Brooks ? " he said. " I am 
 glad to see that you are going to get your man in." 
 
 " Thank you," Brooks answered, rising and wait- 
 ing for his companion, who was buttoning her gloves. 
 " I was afraid that your sympathies would be on the 
 other side." 
 
 " Dear me, no," the Marquis answered. " My 
 enemies would tell you that I have neither sym- 
 pathy nor politics, but I assure you that at heart I 
 am a most devout Radical. I have a vote, too, and 
 you may count upon me." 
 
 " I am very glad to hear it," Brooks answered. 
 " Shall I put you down on the list 'to be fetched'?" 
 
 The Marquis laughed. 
 
 " I '11 come without," he declared. " I promise. 
 Just remind me of the day."
 
 THE MARQUIS OF ARRANMORE 43 
 
 He glanced towards Mary Scott, and for a mo- 
 ment seemed about to include her in some forth- 
 coming remark. But whatever it might have been 
 it was never made. She kept her eyes averted, and 
 though her self-possession was absolutely unruffled 
 she hastened her departure. 
 
 " I am not hurrying you, Mr. Brooks ? " she asked. 
 
 " Not in the least," he assured her. 
 
 He raised his hat to the Marquis and his party, 
 and the former nodded good-humouredly. There 
 was silence until the two were in the street. Then 
 one of the men who had been looking after them 
 dropped his eye-glass. 
 
 " I tell you what," he said to his vis-a-vis. 
 " There 's some chance for us in Medchester after 
 all. I don't believe Arranmore is popular amongst 
 the ladies of his own neighbourhood." 
 
 The Marquis laughed softly. 
 
 " She has a nice face," he remarked, " and I should 
 imagine excellent perceptions. Curiously enough, too, 
 she reminded me of some one who has every reason 
 to hate me. But to the best of my belief I never saw 
 her before in my life. Lady Caroom, that weird- 
 looking object in front of you is a teapot and those 
 are teacups. May I suggest a use for them ? "
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE MAN WHO WENT TO HELL 
 
 THE Hon. Sydney Chester Molyneux stood 
 with his cue in one hand, and an open tele- 
 gram in the other, in the billiard-room at Enton. 
 He was visibly annoyed. 
 
 " Beastly hard luck," he declared. " Parliament 
 is a shocking grind anyway. It is n't that one ever 
 does anything, you know, but One wastes such a lot 
 of time when one might have been doing something 
 worth while." 
 
 " Do repeat that, Sydney," Lady Caroom begged, 
 laying down her novel for a moment. " It really 
 sounds as though it ought to mean something." 
 
 " I could n't ! " he admitted. " I wish to cultivate 
 a reputation for originality, and my first object is to 
 forget everything I have said directly I have said it, 
 in case I should repeat myself." 
 
 " A short memory," Arranmore remarked, " is a 
 politician's most valuable possession, isn't it?" 
 
 " No memory at all is better," Molyneux answered. 
 
 " And your telegram ? " Lady Caroom asked. 
 
 " Is from my indefatigable uncle," Molyneux 
 groaned. " He insists upon it that I interest my- 
 self in the election here, which means that I must 
 go in to-morrow and call upon Rochester." 
 
 The younger girl looked up from her chair, and 
 laughed softly.
 
 THE MAN WHO WENT TO HELL 45 
 
 " You will have to speak for him," she said. 
 "How interesting! We will all come in and hear 
 you." 
 
 Molyneux missed an easy cannon, and laid down 
 his cue with an aggrieved air. 
 
 "It is all very well for you," he remarked, dis- 
 mally, " but it is a horrible grind for me. I have 
 just succeeded in forgetting all that we did last ses- 
 sion, and our programme for next. Now I 've got 
 to wade through it all. I wonder why on earth 
 Providence selected for me an uncle who thinks it 
 worth while to be a Cabinet Minister?" 
 
 Sybil Caroom shrugged her shoulders. 
 
 " I wonder why on earth," she remarked, " any 
 constituency thinks it worth while to be represented 
 by such a politician as you. How did you get in, 
 Sydney?" 
 
 " Don't know," he answered. " I was on the right 
 side, and I talked the usual rot." 
 
 " For myself," she said, " I like a politician who 
 is in earnest. They are more amusing, and more 
 impressive in every way. Who was the young man 
 you spoke to in that little place where we had tea ? " 
 she asked her host. 
 
 " His name is Kingston Brooks," Arranmore an- 
 swered. " He is the agent for Henslow, the Radical 
 candidate." 
 
 " Well, I liked him," she said. " If I had a vote 
 I would let him convert me to Radicalism. I am 
 sure that he could do it." 
 
 " He shall try if you like," Arranmore remarked. 
 " I am going to ask him to shoot one day." 
 
 " I am delighted to hear it," the girl answered.
 
 46 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " I think he would be a wholesome change. You are 
 all too flippant here." 
 
 The door opened. Mr. Hennibul, K.C., inserted 
 his head and shoulders. 
 
 " I have been to look at Arranmore's golf-links," 
 he remarked. " They are quite decent. Will some 
 one come and play a round ? " 
 
 " I will come/' Sybil declared, putting down her 
 book. 
 
 " And I," Molyneux joined in. " Hennibul can 
 play our best ball." 
 
 Lady Caroom and her host were left alone. He 
 came over to her side. 
 
 " What can I do to entertain your ladyship? " he 
 asked, lightly. " Will you play billiards, walk or 
 drive? There is an hour before lunch which must 
 be charmed away." 
 
 " I am not energetic," she declared. " I ought to 
 walk for the sake of my figure. I 'm getting shock- 
 ingly stout. Marie made me promise to walk a mile 
 to-day. But I 'm feeling deliciously lazy." 
 
 " Embonpoint is the fashion," he remarked, " and 
 you are inches short of even that yet. Come and sit 
 in the study while I write some letters." 
 
 She held out her hands. 
 
 " Pull me up, then! I am much too comfortable 
 to move unaided." 
 
 She sprang to her feet lightly enough, and for a 
 moment he kept her hands, which rested willingly 
 enough in his. They looked at one another in silence. 
 Then she laughed. 
 
 " My dear Arranmore," she protested, " I am not 
 made up half carefully enough to stand such a criti-
 
 47 
 
 cal survey by daylight. Your north windows are 
 too terrible." 
 
 " Not to you, dear lady," he answered, smiling. 
 " I was wondering whether it was possible that you 
 could be forty-one." 
 
 " You brute," she exclaimed, with uplifted eye- 
 brows. " How dare you ? Forty if you like for 
 as long as you like. Forty is the fashionable age, 
 but one year over that is fatal. Don't you know that 
 now-a-days a woman goes straight from forty to 
 sixty? It is such a delicious long rest. And be- 
 sides, it gives a woman an object in life which she 
 has probably been groping about for all her days. 
 One is never bored after forty." 
 
 "And the object?" 
 
 " To keep young, of course. There 's scope for 
 any amount of ingenuity. Since that dear man in 
 Paris has hit upon the real secret of enamelling, we 
 are thinking of extending the limit to sixty-five. 
 Lily Cestigan is seventy-one, you know, and she told 
 me only last week that Mat Harlowe you know 
 Harlowe, he 's rather a nice boy, in the Guards 
 had asked her to run away with him. She 's known 
 him three months, and he 's seen her at least three 
 times by daylight. She 's delighted about it." 
 
 " And is she going? " Arranmore asked. 
 
 " Well, I 'm not sure that she 'd care to risk that," 
 Lady Caroom answered, thoughtfully. " She told 
 him she 'd think about it, and, meanwhile, he 's just 
 as devoted as ever." 
 
 They crossed the great stone hall together the 
 hall which, with its wonderful pillars and carved 
 dome, made Enton the show-house of the county.
 
 48 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Arranmore's study was a small octagonal room lead- 
 ing out from the library. A fire of cedar logs was 
 burning in an open grate, and he wheeled up an 
 easy-chair for her close to his writing-table. 
 
 " I wonder," she remarked, thoughtfully, " what 
 you think of Syd Molyneux?" 
 
 " Is there anything to be thought about him?" 
 he answered, lighting a cigarette. 
 
 "He's rather that way, isn't he?" she assented. 
 " I mean for Sybil, you know." 
 
 " I should let Sybil decide," he answered. 
 
 " She probably will," Lady Caroom said. " Still, 
 she's horribly bored at having to be dragged about 
 to places, you know, and that sort of thing, just be- 
 cause she is n't married, and she likes Syd all right. 
 He's no fool!" 
 
 " I suppose not," Arranmore answered. " He 's 
 of a type, you know, which has sprung up during 
 my absence from civilization. You want to grow 
 up with it to appreciate it properly. I don't think 
 he's good enough for Sybil." 
 
 Lady Caroom sighed. 
 
 " Sybil 's a dear girl," she said, " although she 's 
 a terrible nuisance to me. I should n't be at all 
 surprised either if she developed views. I wish 
 you were a marrying man, Arranmore. I used to 
 think of you myself once, but you would be too 
 old for me now. You 're exactly the right age for 
 Sybil." 
 
 Arranmore smiled. He had quite forgotten his 
 letters. Lady Caroom always amused him so well. 
 
 " She is very like what you were at her age," he 
 remarked. " .What a pity it was that I was such a
 
 THE MAN WHO WENT TO HELL 49 
 
 poverty-stricken beggar in those days. I am sure 
 that I should have married you." 
 
 " Now I am beginning to like you," she declared, 
 settling down more comfortably in her chair. " If 
 you can keep up like that we shall be getting posi- 
 tively sentimental presently, and if there 's anything 
 I adore in this world especially before luncheon 
 it is sentiment. Do you remember we used to 
 waltz together, Arranmore?" 
 
 " You gave me a glove one night," he said. " I 
 have it still." 
 
 " And you pressed my hand and it was in 
 the Setons' conservatory how bold you were." 
 
 " And the next day," he declared, in an aggrieved 
 tone, " I heard that you were engaged to Caroom. 
 You treated me shamefully." 
 
 " These reminiscences," she declared, " are really 
 sweet, but you are most ungrateful. I was really 
 almost too kind to you. They were all fearfully 
 anxious to get me married, because Dumesnil always 
 used to say that my complexion would give out in a 
 year or two, and I wasted no end of time upon you, 
 who were perfectly hopeless as a husband. After all, 
 though, I believe it paid. It used to annoy Caroom 
 so much, and I believe he proposed to me long be- 
 fore he meant to so as to get rid of you." 
 
 " I," Arranmore remarked, " was the victim." 
 
 She sat up with eyes suddenly bright. 
 
 " Upon my word," she declared, " I have an idea. 
 It is the most charming and flattering thing, and it 
 never occurred to me before. After all, it was not 
 eccentricity which caused you to throw up your work 
 at the Bar and disappear. It was your hopeless 
 
 4
 
 50 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 devotion to me. Don't disappoint me now by deny- 
 ing it. Please don't! It was the announcement of 
 my engagement, wasn't it?" 
 
 " And it has taken you all these years to find it 
 out?" 
 
 " I was shockingly obtuse," she murmured. " The 
 thing came to me just now as a revelation. Poor, 
 dear man, how you must have suffered. This puts 
 us on a different footing altogether, doesn't it?" 
 
 "Altogether," he admitted. 
 
 " And," she continued, eyeing him now with a 
 sudden nervousness, " emboldens me to ask you a 
 question which I have been dying to ask you for 
 the last few years. I wonder whether you will an- 
 swer it." 
 
 " I wonder ! " he repeated. 
 
 A change in him, too, was noticeable. That won- 
 derful impassivity of feature which never even in his 
 lighter moments passed altogether away, seemed to 
 deepen every line in his hard, clear-cut face. His 
 mouth was close drawn, his eyes were suddenly colder 
 and expressionless. There was about him at such 
 times as these an almost repellent hardness. His 
 emotions, and the man himself, seemed frozen. Lady 
 Caroom had seen him look like it once before, and 
 she sighed. Nevertheless, she persevered. 
 
 " For nearly twenty years," she said, " you disap- 
 peared. You were reported at different times to be 
 in every quarter of the earth, from Zambesia to Pekin. 
 But no one knew, and, of course, in a season or two 
 you were forgotten. I always wondered, I am won- 
 dering now, where were you ? What did you do with 
 yourself ? "
 
 THE MAN WHO WENT TO HELL 51 
 
 " I went down into Hell/' he answered. " Can't 
 you see the marks of it in my face ? For many years 
 I lived in Hell for many years." 
 
 " You puzzle me," she said, in a low tone. " You 
 had no taste for dissipation. You look as though 
 life had scorched you up at some time or other. But 
 how? where? You were found in Canada, I know, 
 when your brother died. But you had only been 
 there for a few years. Before then ? " 
 
 "Ay! Before then?" 
 
 There was a short silence. Then Arranmore, who 
 had been gazing steadily into the fire, looked up. She 
 fancied that his eyes were softer. 
 
 " Dear friend," he said, " of those days I have 
 nothing to tell even you. But there are more awful 
 things even than moral degeneration. You do me 
 justice when you impute that I never ate from the 
 trough. But what I did, and where I lived, I do not 
 think that I shall ever willingly tell any one." 
 
 A piece of burning wood fell upon the hearthstone. 
 He stooped and picked it up, placed it carefully in its 
 place, and busied himself for a moment or two with 
 the little brass poker. Then he straightened himself. 
 
 " Catherine," he said, " I think if I were you that 
 I would not marry Sybil to Molyneux. It struck 
 me to-day that his eyeglass-chain was of last year's 
 pattern, and I am not sure that he is sound on the 
 subject of collars. You know how important these 
 things are to a young man who has to make his own 
 way in the world. Perhaps, I am not sure, but I 
 think it is very likely I might be able to find a hus- 
 band for her." 
 
 " You dear man," Lady Caroom murmured. " I
 
 52 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 should rely upon your taste and judgment so 
 thoroughly." 
 
 There was a discreet knock at the door. A ser- 
 vant entered with a card. Arranmore took it up, 
 and retained it in his fingers. 
 
 " Tell Mr. Brooks," he said, " that I will be with 
 him in a moment. If he has ridden over, ask him 
 to take some refreshment." 
 
 " You have a visitor," Lady Caroom said, rising. 
 " If you will excuse me I will go and lie down until 
 luncheon-time, and let my maid touch me up. These 
 sentimental conversations are so harrowing. I feel 
 a perfect wreck." 
 
 She glided from the room, graceful, brisk and 
 charming, the most wonderful woman in England, 
 as the Society papers were never tired of calling her. 
 Arranmore glanced once more at the card between 
 his fingers. 
 
 "Mr. Kingston Brooks." 
 
 He stood for a few seconds, motionless. Then he 
 rang the bell. 
 
 " Show Mr. Brooks in here," he directed.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 A THOUSAND POUNDS 
 
 BROOKS had ridden a bicycle from Medchester, 
 and his trousers and boots were splashed with 
 mud. His presence at Enton was due to an impulse, 
 the inspiration of which he had already begun seri- 
 ously to doubt. Arranmore's kindly reception of 
 him was more than ordinarily welcome. 
 
 " I am very glad to see you, Mr. Brooks," he said, 
 holding out his hand. " How comes it that you are 
 able to take even so short a holiday as this? I pic- 
 tured you surrounded by canvassers and bill-posters 
 and journalists, all clamouring for your ear." 
 
 Brooks laughed, completely at his ease now, thanks 
 to the unspoken cordiality of the other man. He 
 took the easy-chair which the servant had noiselessly 
 wheeled up to him. 
 
 " I am afraid that you exaggerate my importance, 
 Lord Arranmore," he said. " I was very busy early 
 this morning, and I shall be again after four. But 
 I am allowed a little respite now and then." 
 
 " You spend it very sensibly out of doors," Arran- 
 more remarked. " How did you get here? " 
 
 " I cycled," Brooks answered. "It was very pleas- 
 ant, but muddy." 
 
 " What will you have ? " Lord Arranmore asked. 
 "Some wine and biscuits, or something of that sort?"
 
 54 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 His hand was upon the bell, but Brooks stopped 
 him. 
 
 " Nothing at all, thank you, just now." 
 
 " Luncheon will be served in half-an-hour," the 
 Marquis said. "You will prefer to wait until then?" 
 
 " I am much obliged to you," Brooks answered, 
 " but I must be getting back to Medchester as soon 
 as possible. Besides," he added, with a smile, " I 
 am afraid when I have spoken of the object of my 
 visit you may feel inclined to kick me out." 
 
 " I hope not," Arranmore replied, lightly. " I was 
 hoping that your visit had no object at all, and that 
 you had been good enough just to look me up." 
 
 " I should not have intruded without a purpose," 
 Brooks said, quietly, " but you will be almost justi- 
 fied in treating my visit as an impertinence when I 
 have disclosed my errand. Lord Arranmore, I am 
 the secretary for the fund which is being raised in 
 Medchester for the relief of the Unemployed." 
 
 Arranmore nodded. 
 
 " Oh, yes," he said. " I had a visit a few days 
 ago from a worthy Medchester gentleman connected 
 with it." 
 
 "It is concerning that visit, Lord Arranmore, that 
 I have come to see you," Brooks continued, quietly. 
 " I only heard of it yesterday afternoon, but this 
 morning it seems to me that every one whom I have 
 met has alluded to it." 
 
 The Marquis was lounging against the broad man- 
 telpiece. Some part of the cordiality of his manner 
 had vanished. 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Lord Arranmore, I wondered whether it was not
 
 A THOUSAND POUNDS 55 
 
 possible that some mistake had been made," Brooks 
 said. " I wondered whether Mr. Wensome had alto- 
 gether understood you properly " 
 
 " I did my best to be explicit," the Marquis mur- 
 mured. 
 
 " Or whether you had misunderstood him," Brooks 
 continued, doggedly. " This fund has become abso- 
 lutely necessary unless we wish to see the people 
 starve in the streets. There are between six and 
 seven thousand operatives and artisans in Medches- 
 ter to-day who are without work through no fault 
 of their own. It is our duty as citizens to do our 
 best for them. Nearly every one in Medchester has 
 contributed according to their means. You are a 
 large property-owner in the town. Cannot you con- 
 sider this appeal as an unenforced rate? It comes 
 to that in the long run." 
 
 The Marquis shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I think," he said, " that on the subject of charity 
 Englishmen generally wholly misapprehend the situ- 
 ation. You say that between six and seven thousand 
 men are out of work in Medchester. Very well, I 
 affirm that there must be a cause for that. If you 
 are a philanthropist it is your duty to at once inves- 
 tigate the economic and political reasons for such a 
 state of things, and alter them. By going about and 
 collecting money for these people you commit what 
 is little short of a crime. You must know the de- 
 moralizing effect of charity. No man who has ever 
 received a dole is ever again an independent person. 
 Besides that, you are diverting the public mind from 
 the real point of issue, which is not that so many 
 thousand people are hungry, but that a flaw exists
 
 56 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 in the administration of the laws of the country so 
 grave that a certain number of thousands of people 
 who have a God-sent right to productive labour 
 haven't got it. Do you follow me?" 
 
 " Perfectly," Brooks answered. "You did not talk 
 like this to Mr. Wensome." 
 
 " I admit it. He was an ignorant man in whom 
 I felt no interest whatever, and I did not take the 
 trouble. Besides, I will frankly admit that I am in 
 no sense of the word a sentimentalist. The distresses 
 of other people do not interest me particularly. I 
 have been poor myself, and I never asked for, nor 
 was offered, any sort of help. Consequently I feel 
 very little responsibility concerning these unfortu- 
 nate people, whose cause you have espoused." 
 
 "May I revert to your first argument?" Brooks 
 said. " If you saw a man drowning then, instead of 
 trying to save him you would subscribe towards a 
 fund to teach people to swim? " 
 
 " That is ingenious," Lord Arranmore replied, 
 smiling grimly, " but it does n't interest me. If I 
 saw a man drowning I should n't think of interfering 
 unless the loss of that man brought inconvenience 
 or loss to myself. If it did I should endeavour 
 to save him not unless. As for the fund you 
 speak of, I should not think of subscribing to it. 
 It would not interest me to know that other people 
 were provided with a safeguard against drowning. 
 I should probably spend the money in perfecting 
 myself in the art of swimming. Don't you see that 
 no man who has ever received help from another is 
 exactly in the same position again ? As an individual 
 he is a weaker creature. That is where I disagree
 
 A THOUSAND POUNDS 57 
 
 with nearly every existing form of charity. They 
 are wrong in principle. They are a debauchment." 
 
 " Your views, Lord Arranmore," Brooks said, "are 
 excellent for a model world. For practical purposes 
 I think they are a little pedantic. You are quite right 
 in your idea that charity is a great danger. I can 
 assure you that we are trying to realize that in 
 Medchester. We ask for money, and we dispense 
 it unwillingly, but as a necessary evil. And we are 
 trying to earnestly see where our social system is at 
 fault, and to readjust it. But meanwhile, men and 
 women and children even are starving. We must 
 help them." 
 
 " That is where you are wholly wrong, and 
 where you retard all progress," Arranmore re- 
 marked. " Can't you see that you are continually 
 plugging up dangerous leaks with putty instead of 
 lead? You muffle the cry which but for you must 
 ring through the land, and make itself heard to 
 every one. Let the people starve who are without 
 means. Legislation would stir itself fast enough 
 then. It is the only way. Charity to individuals is 
 poison to the multitude. You create tliD criminal 
 classes with your charities, you blindfold states- 
 men and mislead political economists. I tell you 
 that the more you give away the more distress you 
 create." 
 
 Brooks rose from his seat. 
 
 " Charity is older than nations or history, Lord 
 Arranmore," he said, " and I am foolish enough to 
 think that the world is a better place for it. Your 
 reasoning is very excellent, but life has not yet be- 
 come an exact science. The weaknesses of men and
 
 58 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 women have to be considered. You have probably 
 never seen a starving person." 
 
 Lord Arranmore laughed, and Brooks looked across 
 the room at him in amazement. The Marquis was 
 always pale, but his pallor just then was as unnat- 
 ural as the laugh itself. 
 
 " My dear young man/' he said, " if I could show 
 you what I have seen your hair would turn grey, and 
 ;your wits go wandering. Do you think that I know 
 nothing of life save its crust ? I tell you that I have 
 been down in the depths, aye, single-handed, there 
 in the devil's own cauldron, where creatures in the 
 shape of men and women, the very sight of whom 
 would turn you sick with horror, creep like spawn 
 through life, brainless and soulless, foul things who 
 would murder one another for the sake of a crust, 
 or Bah! What horrible memories." 
 
 He broke off abruptly. When he spoke again his 
 tone was as usual. 
 
 " Come," he said, " I must n't let you have this 
 journey for nothing. After all, the only luxury in 
 having principles is in the departing from them. I 
 will give you a cheque, Mr. Brooks, only I beg you 
 to think over what I have said. Abandon this dol- 
 ing principle as soon as it is possible. Give your 
 serious attention to the social questions and imper- 
 fect laws which are at the back of all this distress." 
 
 Brooks felt as though he had been awakened from 
 a nightmare. He never forgot that single moment 
 of revelation on the part of the man who sat now 
 smiling and debonair before his writing-table. 
 
 " You are very kind indeed, Lord Arranmore," he 
 said. " I can assure you that the money will be most
 
 A THOUSAND POUNDS 59 
 
 carefully used, and amongst my party, at any rate, 
 we do really appreciate the necessity for going to the 
 root of the matter." 
 
 Arranmore's pen went scratching across the paper. 
 He tore out a cheque, and placing it in an envelope, 
 handed it to Brooks. 
 
 " I noticed," he remarked, thoughtfully, " that a 
 good many people coming out of the factories hissed 
 my carriage in Medchester last time I was there. I 
 hope they will not consider my cheque as a sign of 
 weakness. But after all," he added, with a smile, 
 " what does it matter ? Let us go in to luncheon, 
 Brooks." 
 
 Brooks glanced down at his mud-splashed clothes 
 and boots. 
 
 " I must really ask you to excuse me," he began, 
 but Arranmore only rang the bell. 
 
 " My valet will smarten you up," he said. " Here, 
 Fritz, take Mr. Brooks into my room and look after 
 him, will you. I shall be in the hall when you come 
 down." 
 
 As he passed from the dressing-room a few minutes 
 later, Brooks paused for a moment to look up at the 
 wonderful ceiling above the hall. Below, Lord Ar- 
 ranmore was idly knocking about the billiard balls, 
 and all around him was the murmur of pleasant 
 conversation. Brooks drew the envelope from his 
 pocket and glanced at the cheque. He gave a little 
 gasp of astonishment. It was for a thousand pounds.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS MAKES INQUIRIES 
 
 AT luncheon Brooks found himself between Sybil 
 Caroom and Mr. Hennibul. She began to talk 
 to him at once. 
 
 " I want to know all about your candidate, Mr. 
 Brooks," she declared. " You can't imagine how 
 pleased I am to have you here. I have had the feeling 
 ever since I came of being shut up in a hostile camp. 
 I am a Radical, you know, and these good people, 
 even my mother, are rabid Conservatives." 
 
 Brooks smiled as he unfolded his serviette. 
 
 " Well, Henslow is n't exactly an ornamental can- 
 didate," he said, " but he is particularly sound and a 
 man with any amount of common-sense. You should 
 come and hear him speak." 
 
 " I 'd love to," she answered, " but no one would 
 bring me from here. They are all hopeless. Mr. 
 Molyneux there is going to support Mr. Rochester. 
 If I was n't sure that he 'd do more harm than good, 
 I would n't let him go. But I don't suppose they '11 
 let you speak, Sydney," she added. " They won't if 
 they 've ever heard you." 
 
 Molyneux smiled an imperturbable smile. 
 
 " Personally," he said, " I should prefer to lend 
 my moral support only, but my fame as an orator is
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS MAKES INQUIRIES 61 
 
 f 
 
 too well known. There is not the least chance that 
 
 they will let me off." 
 
 f Sybil looked at Brooks. 
 
 I " Did you ever hear such conceit? " she remarked, 
 
 in a pitying tone. " And I don't believe he 's ever 
 
 opened his mouth in the House, except to shout 
 
 ' Hear, hear ' ! Besides, he 's as nervous as a kitten. 
 
 Tell me, are you going to return Mr. Henslow ? " 
 
 " I think so," Brooks answered. " It is certain to 
 be a very close contest, but I believe we shall get a 
 small majority. The Jingo element are our greatest 
 trouble. They are all the time trying to make people 
 believe that Conservatives have the monopoly of the 
 Imperial sentiment. As a matter of fact, I think that 
 Henslow is almost rabid on the war question." 
 
 " Still, your platform to use an Americanism," 
 Mr. Hennibul interposed, " must be founded upon 
 domestic questions. Medchester is a manufacturing 
 town, and I am given to understand is suffering se- 
 verely. Has your man any original views on the 
 present depression in trade ? " 
 
 Brooks glanced towards the speaker with a smile. 
 
 " You have been reading the Medchester Post! " 
 he remarked. 
 
 The barrister nodded. 
 
 " Yes. It hinted at some rather surprising rev- 
 elation." 
 
 " You must read Henslow's speech at the mass 
 meeting to-morrow night," Brooks said. " At present 
 I must n't discuss these matters too much, especially 
 before a political opponent," he remarked, smiling at 
 Mr. Molyneux. " You might induce Mr. Rochester 
 to play our trump card."
 
 2 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " If your trump card is what I suspect it to be," 
 Mr. Hennibul said, " I don't think you need fear that. 
 Rochester would be ready enough to try it, but some 
 of his supporters would n't listen to it." 
 
 The conversation drifted away from politics. 
 Brooks found himself enjoying his luncheon amaz- 
 ingly. Sybil Caroom devoted herself to him, and he 
 found himself somehow drawn with marvellous 
 facility into the little circle of intimate friends. 
 Afterwards they all strolled into the hall together 
 for coffee, and Arranmore laid his hand upon his 
 arm. 
 
 " I am sorry that you will not have time to look 
 round the place," he said. " You must come over 
 again before long." 
 
 " You are very kind," Brooks said, dropping his 
 voice a little. " There are one or two more things 
 which I should like to ask you about Canada." 
 
 " I shall always be at your service," Lord Arran- 
 more answered. 
 
 " And I cannot go," Brooks continued, " without 
 thanking you " 
 
 " We will take that for granted," Arranmore in- 
 terrupted. " You know the spirit in which I gave it. 
 It is not, I fear, one of sympathy, but it may at any 
 rate save me from having my carriage windows 
 broken one dark night. By the bye, I have ordered a 
 brougham for you in half-an-hour. As you see, it is 
 raining. Your bicycle shall be sent in to-morrow." 
 
 " It is very kind of you indeed," Brooks declared. 
 
 " Molyneux has to go in, so you may just as well 
 drive together," Arranmore remarked. " By the bye, 
 do you shoot?"
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS MAKES INQUIRIES 63 
 
 " A little," Brooks admitted. 
 
 " You must have a day with us. My head keeper is 
 coming up this afternoon, and I will try and arrange 
 something. The election is next week, of course. 
 We must plan a day after then." 
 
 " I am afraid that my performance would scarcely 
 be up to your standard," Brooks said, " although it 
 is very kind of you to ask me. I might come and 
 look on." 
 
 Arranmore laughed. 
 
 " Hennibul is all right," he said, " but Molyneux 
 is a shocking duffer. We '11 give you an easy place. 
 We have some early callers, I see." 
 
 The butler was moving towards them, followed by 
 two men in hunting-clothes. 
 
 " Sir George Marson and Mr. Lacroix, your lord- 
 ship," he announced. 
 
 For a second Arranmore stood motionless. His 
 eyes seemed to pass through the man in pink, who 
 was approaching with outstretched hand, and to be 
 fastened upon the face of his companion. It chanced 
 that Brooks, who had stepped a little on one side, was 
 watching his host, and for the second time in one day 
 he saw things which amazed him. His expression 
 seemed frozen on to his face something underneath 
 seemed struggling for expression. In a second it 
 had all passed away. Brooks could almost have per- 
 suaded himself that it was fancy. 
 
 " Come for something to eat, Arranmore," Sir 
 George declared, hungrily. " My second man 's gone 
 off with the sandwich-case hunting on his own, I 
 believe. I '11 sack him to-morrow. Here 's my friend 
 Lacroix, who says you saved him from starvation
 
 64 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 once before out in the wilds somewhere. Awfully 
 sorry to take you by storm like this, but we 're twelve 
 miles from home, and it's a God-forsaken country 
 for inns." 
 
 " Luncheon for two at once, Groves," Lord Arran- 
 more answered. " Delighted to meet you again, Mr. 
 Lacroix. Last time we were both of us in very differ- 
 ent trim." 
 
 Lady Caroom came gliding up to them, and shook' 
 hands with Sir George. 
 
 " This sounds so interesting," she murmured. 
 " Did you say that you met Lord Arranmore in 
 his exploring days?" she asked, turning to Mr. 
 Lacroix. 
 
 " I found Lord Arranmore in a log hut which he 
 had built himself on the shores of Lake Ono," La- 
 croix said, smiling. " And when I tell you that I 
 had lost all my stores, and that his was the only 
 dwelling-place for fifty miles around, you can imagine 
 that his hospitality was more welcome to me then 
 even than to-day." 
 
 Brooks, who was standing near, could not repress 
 a start. He fancied that Lord Arranmore glanced in 
 his direction. 
 
 Lady Caroom shuddered. 
 
 " The only dwelling-house for fifty miles," she 
 repeated. " What hideous misanthropy." 
 
 " There was no doubt about it," Lacroix declared, 
 smiling. " My Indian guide, who knew every inch 
 of the country, told me so many times. I can assure 
 you that Lord Arranmore, whom I am very pleased 
 to meet again, was a very different person in those 
 days."
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS MAKES INQUIRIES 65 
 
 The butler glided up from the background. 
 " Luncheon is served in the small dining-room, 
 Sir George," he announced. 
 
 Molyneux and Brooks drove in together to Med- 
 chester, and the former was disposed for him 
 to be talkative. 
 
 " Queer thing about Lacroix turning up," he re- 
 marked. " I fancy our host looked a bit staggered." 
 
 " It was enough to surprise him," Brooks an- 
 swered. " From Lake Ono to Medchester is a long 
 way." 
 
 Molyneux nodded. 
 
 " By Jove, it is," he affirmed. " Queer stick our 
 host. Close as wax. I 've known him ever since he 
 dropped in for the title and estates, and I 've never 
 yet heard him open his mouth on the subject of his 
 travels." 
 
 "Was he away from England for very long?" 
 Brooks asked. 
 
 " No one knows where he was," Molyneux replied. 
 " Twenty years ago he was reading for the Bar in 
 London, and he suddenly disappeared. Well, I have 
 never met a soul except Lacroix to-day who has seen 
 anything of him in the interval between his disap- 
 pearance and his coming to claim the estates. That 
 means that for pretty well half a lifetime he passed 
 completely out of the world. Poor beggar ! I fancy 
 that he was hard up, for one thing." 
 
 To Brooks the subject was fascinating, but he had 
 an idea that it was scarcely the best of form to be 
 discussing their late host with a man who was com- 
 
 5
 
 -66 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 paratively a stranger to him. So he remained silent, 
 and Molyneux, with a yawn, abandoned the subject. 
 
 " Where does Rochester hang out, do you know? " 
 he asked Brooks. " I don't suppose for a moment I 
 shall be able to find him." 
 
 " His headquarters are at the Bell Hotel," Brooks 
 replied. " You will easily be able to come across him, 
 for he has a series of ward meetings to-night. I am 
 sorry that we are to be opponents." 
 
 " We shan't quarrel about that," Molyneux an- 
 swered. " Here we are, at Medchester, then. Better 
 let him put you down, and then he can go on with 
 me. You 're coming out to shoot at Enton, are n't 
 you?" 
 
 " Lord Arranmore was good enough to ask me," 
 Brooks answered, dubiously, " but I scarcely know 
 whether I ought to accept. I am such a wretched 
 shot." 
 
 Molyneux laughed. 
 
 "Well, I couldn't hit a haystack," he said, "so 
 you need n't mind that. Besides, Arranmore is n't 
 keen about his bag, like some chaps. Are these your 
 offices? See you again, then." 
 
 Brooks found a dozen matters waiting for his at- 
 tention. But before he settled down to work he 
 wrote two letters. One was to the man who was 
 doing his work as Secretary to the Unemployed 
 Fund during the election, and with a brief mention 
 of a large subscription, instructed him to open sev- 
 eral relief stations which they had been obliged to 
 close a few days ago. And the other letter was to 
 Victor Lacroix, whom he addressed at Westbury 
 Park, Sir George Marson's seat.
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS MAKES INQUIRIES 67 
 
 "DEAR SIR, 
 
 " I should be exceedingly obliged if you 
 would accord me a few minutes' interview on a purely 
 personal matter. I will wait upon you anywhere, ac- 
 cording to your convenience. 
 
 "Yours faithfully, 
 
 " KINGSTON BROOKS."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 HENSLOW SPEAKS OUT 
 
 THE bomb was thrown. Some ten thousand 
 people crowded together in the market-place 
 at Medchester, under what seemed to be one huge 
 canopy of dripping umbrellas, heard for the first 
 time for many years a bold and vigorous attack 
 upon the principles which had come to be consid- 
 ered a part of the commercial ritual of the country. 
 Henslow made the best of a great opportunity. He 
 spoke temperately, but without hesitation, and con- 
 cluded with a biting and powerful onslaught upon 
 that class of Englishmen who wilfully closed their 
 eyes to the prevailing industrial depression, and en- 
 deavoured to lure themselves and others into a sense 
 of false security as to the well-being of the country 
 by means of illusive statistics. In his appreciation 
 of dramatic effect, and the small means by which an 
 audience can be touched, Henslow was a past master. 
 Early in his speech he had waved aside the umbrella 
 which a supporter was holding over him, and regard- 
 less of the rain, he stood out in the full glare of the 
 reflected gaslight, a ponderous, powerful figure. 
 
 " No one can accuse me," he cried, " of being a 
 pessimist. Throughout my life I have striven per- 
 sonally, and politically, to look upon the brightest
 
 HENSLOW SPEAKS OUT 6g 
 
 side of things. But I count it a crime to shut one's 
 eyes to the cloud in the sky, even though it be no 
 larger than a man's hand. Years ago that cloud was 
 there for those who would to see. To-day it looms 
 over us, a black and threatening peril, and those who, 
 ostrich-like, still hide their heads in the sand, are the 
 men upon whose consciences must rest in the future 
 the responsibility for those evil things which are even 
 now upon us. Theories are evil things, but when 
 theory and fact are at variance, give me fact. Theo- 
 retically Free Trade should I admit it make us 
 the most prosperous nation in the world. As a mat- 
 ter of fact, never since this country commenced to 
 make history has our commercial supremacy been in 
 so rotten and insecure a position. There is n't a 
 flourishing industry in the country, save those which 
 provide the munitions of war, and their prosperity 
 is a spasmodic, and I might almost add, an undesir- 
 able thing. Now, I am dealing with facts to-night, 
 not theories, and I am going to quote certain unas- 
 sailable truths, and I am going to give you the im- 
 mediate causes for them. The furniture and joinery 
 trade of England is bad. There are thousands of 
 good hands out of employment. They are out of 
 work because the manufacturer has few or no orders. 
 I want the immediate cause for that, and I go to 
 the manufacturer. I ask him why he has no orders. 
 He tells me, because every steamer from America is 
 bringing huge consignments of ready-made office and 
 general furniture, at such prices or such quality that 
 the English shopkeepers prefer to stock them. Con- 
 sequently trade is bad with him, and he cannot find 
 employment for his men. I find here in Medchester
 
 70 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 the boot and shoe trade in which you are concerned 
 bad. There are thousands of you who are willing to 
 work who are out of employment. I go to the manu- 
 facturer, and I say to him, ' Why don't you find em- 
 ployment for your hands ? ' ' For two reasons/ he 
 answers. ' First, because I have lost my Colonial 
 and some of my home trade through American com- 
 petition, ancf secondly, because of the universally de- 
 pressed condition of every kindred trade throughout 
 the country, which keeps people poor and prevents 
 their having money to spend.' Just now I am not 
 considering the question of why the American can 
 send salable boots and shoes into this country, al- 
 though the reasons are fairly obvious. They have 
 nothing to do with my point, however. We are 
 dealing to-night with immediate causes! 
 
 " And now as to that depression throughout the 
 country which keeps people poor, as the boot manu- 
 facturer puts it, and prevents their having money 
 to spend. I am going to take several trades one 
 by one, and ascertain the immediate cause of their 
 depression " 
 
 He had hold of his audience, and he made good 
 use of his advantage. He quoted statistics, showing 
 the decrease of exports and relative increase of im- 
 ports. How could we hope to retain our accumu- 
 lated wealth under such conditions? and finally 
 he abandoned theorizing and argument, and boldly 
 declared his position. 
 
 " I will tell you," he concluded, " what practical 
 means I intend to bring to bear upon the situation. 
 I base my projected action upon this truism, which 
 is indeed the very kernel of my creed. I say that
 
 HENSLOW SPEAKS OUT 71 
 
 every man willing and able to work should have work, 
 and I say that it is the duty of legislators to see that 
 he has it. To-day there are one hundred thousand 
 men and women hanging about our streets deterio- 
 rating morally and physically through the impossi- 
 bility of following their trade. I say that it is time 
 for legislators to inquire into the cause of this, and 
 to remedy it. So I propose to move in the House of 
 Commons, should your votes enable me to find my- 
 self there, that a Royal Commission be immediately 
 appointed to deal with this matter. And I propose, 
 further, to insist that this Commission be composed 
 of manufacturers and business men, and that we 
 dispense with all figure-heads, and I can promise 
 you this, that the first question which shall engage 
 the attention of these men shall be an immediate re- 
 vision of our tariffs. We won't have men with 
 theories which work out beautifully on paper, and 
 bring a great country into the throes of commercial 
 ruin. We won't have men who think that the laws 
 their fathers made are good enough for them, and 
 that all change is dangerous, because Englishmen 
 are sure to fight their way through in the long run 
 a form of commercial Jingoism to which I fear 
 we are peculiarly prone. We don't want scholars or 
 statisticians. We want a commission of plain busi- 
 ness men, and I promise you that if we get them, 
 there shall be presented to Parliament before I meet 
 you again practical measures which I honestly and 
 firmly believe will start a wave of commercial pros- 
 perity throughout the country such as the oldest 
 amongst you cannot remember. We have the crafts- 
 men, the capital, and the brains all that we need
 
 72 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 is legislation adapted to the hour and not the last 
 century, and we can hold our own yet in the face of 
 the world." 
 
 Afterwards, at the political club and at the com- 
 mittee-room, there was much excited conversation 
 concerning the effect of Henslow's bold declaration. 
 iThe general impression was, this election was now 
 assured. A shouting multitude followed him to his 
 hotel, popular sentiment was touched, and even those 
 who had been facing the difficulty of life with a sort 
 of dogged despair for years were raised into enthu- 
 siasm. His words begat hope. 
 
 In the committee-room there was much excitement 
 and a good deal of speculation. Every one realized 
 that the full effect of this daring plunge could not 
 be properly gauged until after it had stood the test 
 of print. But on the 'whole comment was strikingly 
 optimistic. Brooks for some time was absent. In 
 the corridor he had come face to face with Mary 
 Scott. Her eyes flashed with pleasure at the sight 
 of him, and she held out her hand frankly. 
 
 " You heard it all ? " he asked, eagerly. 
 
 " Yes every word. Tell me, you understand 
 these things so much better than I do. Is this an 
 election dodge, or is he in earnest? Was he speak- 
 ing the truth?" 
 
 " The honest truth, I believe," he answered, lead- 
 ing her a little away from the crowd of people. " He 
 is of course pressing this matter home for votes, but 
 he is very much in earnest himself about it." 
 
 " And you think that he is on the right track ? "
 
 HENSLOW SPEAKS OUT 73 
 
 " I really believe so," he answered. " In fact I 
 am strongly in favour of making experiments in the 
 direction he spoke of. By the bye, Miss Scott, I 
 have something to tell you. You remember telling 
 me about Lord Arranmore and his refusal to sub- 
 scribe to the Unemployed Fund ? " 
 
 "Yes!" 
 
 " He has been approached again the facts have 
 been more fully made known to him, and he has sent 
 a cheque for one thousand pounds." 
 
 She received the news with a coldness which he 
 found surprising. 
 
 " I think I can guess," she said, quietly, " who the 
 second applicant was." 
 
 " I went to see him myself," he admitted. 
 
 ' You must be very eloquent," she remarked, with 
 a smile which he could not quite understand. " A! 
 thousand pounds is a great deal of money." 
 
 " It is nothing to Lord Arranmore," he answered. 
 
 " Less than nothing," she admitted, readily. " I 
 would rather that he had stopped in the street and 
 given half-a-crown to a hungry child." 
 
 " Still it is a magnificent gift," he declared. 
 " We can open all our relief stations again. I be- 
 lieve that you are a little prejudiced against Lord 
 Arranmore." 
 
 "I?" She shrugged her shoulders. "How should 
 I be? I have never spoken a word to him in my; 
 life. But I think that he has a hard, cynical face, 
 and a hateful expression." 
 
 Brooks disagreed with her frankly. 
 
 " He seems to me," he declared, " like a man who 
 has had a pretty rough time, and I believe he had
 
 74 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 in his younger days, but I do not believe that he is 
 really either hard or cynical. He has some odd 
 views as regards charity, but upon my word they 
 are logical enough." 
 
 She smiled. 
 
 "Well, we'll not disagree about him," she de- 
 clared. " I wonder how long my uncle means to 
 be." 
 
 "Shall I find out?" he asked. 
 
 " Would it be troubling you ? He is so excited that 
 I dare say he has forgotten all about me." 
 
 Which was precisely what he had done. Brooks 
 found him the centre of an animated little group, 
 with a freshly-lit cigar in his mouth, and every ap- 
 pearance of having settled down to spend the night. 
 He was almost annoyed when Brooks reminded him 
 of his niece. 
 
 " God bless my soul, I forgot all about Mary," he 
 exclaimed with vexation. " She must go and sit 
 somewhere. I shan't be ready yet. Henslow wants 
 us to go down to the Bell, and have a bit of 
 supper." 
 
 " In that case," Brooks said, " you had better allow 
 me to take Miss Scott home, and I will come then 
 to you." 
 
 " Capital, if you really don't mind," Mr. Bullsom 
 declared. " Put her in a cab. Don't let her be a 
 bother to you." 
 
 Brooks found her reluctant to take him away, but 
 he pleaded a headache, and assured her that his work 
 for the night was over. Outside he led her away 
 from the centre of the town to a quiet walk leading 
 to the suburb where she lived. Here the streets
 
 HENSLOW SPEAKS OUT 75 
 
 seemed strangely silent, and Brooks walked hat in 
 hand, heedless of the rain which was still sprinkling. 
 
 " Oh, this is good," he murmured. " How one 
 wearies of these crowds." 
 
 " All the same," she answered, smiling, " I think 
 that your place just now is amongst them, and I 
 shall not let you take me further than the top of the 
 hill." 
 
 Brooks looked down at her and laughed. 
 
 " What a very determined person you are," he 
 said. " I will take you to the top of the hill and 
 then we will see."
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 A TEMPTING OFFER 
 
 THE small boy brought in the card and laid it 
 on Brooks' desk with a flourish. 
 
 " He 's outside, sir in Mr. Barton's room. Shall 
 I show him in? " 
 
 Brooks for a moment hesitated. He glanced at a 
 letter which lay open upon the desk before him, and 
 which he had read and re-read many times. The 
 boy repeated his inquiry. 
 
 " Yes, of course," he answered. " Show him in 
 at once." 
 
 Lord Arranmore, more than usually immaculate, 
 strolled in, hat in hand, and carefully selecting the 
 most comfortable chair, seated himself on the other 
 side of the open table at which Brooks was working. 
 
 "How are you, Brooks?" he inquired, tersely. 
 " Busy, of course. An aftermath of work, I suppose." 
 
 " A few months ago," Brooks answered, " I should 
 have considered myself desperately busy. But after 
 last week anything ordinary in the shape of work 
 seems restful." 
 
 Lord Arranmore nodded. 
 
 " I must congratulate you, I suppose," he remarked. 
 " You got your man in." 
 
 " We got him in all right," Brooks assented. "Our 
 majority was less than we had hoped for, though."
 
 A TEMPTING OFFER 77 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " It was large enough," he answered, " and after all 
 it was a clear gain of a seat to your party, was n't it ? " 
 
 " It was a seat which we Radicals had a right to," 
 Brooks declared. " Now that the storm of Imperial- 
 ism is quieting down and people are beginning to 
 realize that matters nearer home need a little atten- 
 tion, I cannot see how the manufacturing centres can 
 do anything save return Radicals. We are the only 
 party with a definite home policy." 
 
 Lord Arranmore nodded. 
 
 " Just so," he remarked, indifferently. " I need n't 
 say that I did n't come here to talk politics. There 
 was a little matter of business which I wished to put 
 before you." 
 
 Brooks looked up in some surprise. 
 
 " Business ! " he repeated, a little vaguely. 
 
 :< Yes. As you are aware, Mr. Morrison has had 
 the control of the Enton estates for many years. He 
 was a very estimable man, and he performed his 
 duties so far as I know quite satisfactorily. Now that 
 he is dead, however, I intend to make a change. The 
 remaining partners in his firm are unknown to me, 
 and I at once gave them notice of my intention. 
 Would you care to undertake the legal management 
 of my estates in this part of the world? " 
 
 Brooks felt the little colour he had leave his cheeks. 
 For a moment he was quite speechless. 
 
 " I scarcely know how to answer, or to thank you, 
 Lord Arranmore," he said at last. " This is such a 
 surprising offer. I scarcely see how you can be in 
 earnest. You know so little of me." 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders.
 
 78 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Really," he said, " I don't see anything very sur- 
 prising in it. Morrisons have a large practice, and 
 without the old man I scarcely see how they could 
 continue to give my affairs the attention they require. 
 You, on the other hand, are only just starting, and 
 you would be able to watch over my interests more 
 closely. Then although I cannot pretend that I 
 am much influenced by sentimental reasons still, 
 I knew your father, and the strangeness of our few 
 years of life as neighbours inclines me to be of ser- 
 vice to you provided I myself am not the sufferer. 
 As to that I am prepared to take the risk. You see 
 mine is only the usual sort of generosity the sort 
 which provides for an adequate quid pro quo. Of 
 course, if you think that the undertaking of my affairs 
 would block you in other directions do not hesitate 
 to say so. This is a matter of business between us, 
 pure and simple." 
 
 Brooks had recovered himself. The length of Lord 
 Arranmore's speech and his slow drawl had given 
 him an opportunity to do so. He glanced for a 
 moment at the letter which lay upon his desk, and 
 hated it. 
 
 " In an ordinary way, Lord Arranmore," he an- 
 swered, " there could be only one possible reply to 
 such an offer as you have made me an immediate 
 and prompt acceptance. If I seem to hesitate, it is 
 because, first I must tell you something. I must 
 make something in the nature of a confession." 
 
 Lord Arranmore raised his eyebrows, but his face 
 remained as the face of a Sphinx. He sat still, and 
 waited. 
 
 " On the occasion of my visit to you," Brooks con-
 
 A TEMPTING OFFER 79 
 
 tinned, " you may remember the presence of a certain 
 Mr. Lacroix ? He is the author, I believe, of several 
 books of travel in Western Canada, and has the 
 reputation of knowing that part of the country ex- 
 ceedingly well." 
 
 Brooks paused, but his visitor helped him in no 
 way. His face wore still its passive expression of 
 languid inquiry. 
 
 " He spoke of his visit to you," Brooks went on, 
 " in Canada, and he twice reiterated the fact that 
 there was no other dwelling within fifty miles of 
 you. He said this upon his own authority, and upon 
 the authority of his Indian guide. Now it is only a 
 few days ago since you spoke of my father as living 
 for years within a few miles of you." 
 
 Lord Arranmore nodded his head thoughtfully. 
 
 " Ah ! And you found the two statements, of 
 course, irreconcilable. Well, go on ! " 
 
 Brooks found it difficult. He was grasping a paper- 
 weight tightly in one hand, and he felt the rising 
 colour burn his cheeks. 
 
 " I wrote to Mr. Lacroix," he said. 
 
 " A perfectly natural thing to do," Lord Arran- 
 more remarked, smoothly. 
 
 " And his answer is here ! " 
 
 " Suppose you read it to me," Lord Arranmore 
 suggested. 
 
 Brooks took up the letter and read it. 
 
 "TRAVELLERS' CLUB, December 10. 
 " DEAR SIR, 
 
 " Replying to your recent letter, I have not the 
 slightest hesitation in reaffirming the statement to which
 
 8o A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 you refer. I am perfectly convinced that at the time of 
 my visit to Lord Arranmore on the bank of Lake Ono, 
 there was no Englishman or dwelling-place of any sort 
 within a radius of fifty miles. The information which 
 you have received is palpably erroneous. 
 
 " Why not refer to Lord Arranmore himself ? He 
 would certainly confirm what I say, and finally dispose 
 of the matter. 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " VICTOR LACROIX." 
 
 " A very interesting letter," Lord Arranmore re- 
 marked. "Well?" 
 
 Brooks crumpled the letter up and flung it into 
 the waste-paper basket. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore," he said, " I made this inquiry 
 behind your back, and in a sense I am ashamed of 
 having done so. Yet I beg you to put yourself in 
 my position. You must admit that my father's dis- 
 appearance from the world was a little extraordinary. 
 He was a man whose life was more than exemplary 
 it was saintly. For year after year he worked 
 in the police-courts amongst the criminal classes. 
 His whole life was one long record of splendid de- 
 votion. His health at last breaks down, and he is 
 sent by his friends for a voyage to Australia. He 
 never returns. Years afterwards his papers and par- 
 ticulars of his death are sent home from one of the 
 loneliest spots in the Empire. A few weeks ago you 
 found me out and told me of his last days. You see 
 what I must believe. That he wilfully deserted his 
 wife and son myself. That he went into lonely 
 and inexplicable solitude for no apparent or possible 
 reason. That he misused the money subscribed by
 
 A TEMPTING OFFER 8r 
 
 his friends in order that he might take this trip to 
 Australia. Was ever anything more irreconcilable? " 
 
 " From your point of view perhaps not," Lord 
 Arranmore answered. " You must enlarge it." 
 
 " Will you tell me how ? " Brooks demanded. 
 
 Lord Arranmore stifled a yawn. He had the air 
 of one wearied by a profitless discussion. 
 
 " Well," he said, " I might certainly suggest a few 
 things. Who was your trustee or guardian, or your 
 father's man of business?" 
 
 " Mr. Ascough, of Lincoln's Inn Fields." 
 
 " Exactly. Your father saw him, of course, prior 
 to his departure from England." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Well, is it not a fact that instead of making a 
 will your father made over by deed of gift the whole 
 of his small income to your mother in trust for you? " 
 
 " Yes, he did that," Brooks admitted. 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Think that over," he remarked. " Does n't that 
 suggest his already half-formed intention never to 
 return?" 
 
 "It never struck me in that way," Brooks answered. 
 
 "Yet it is obvious," Lord Arranmore said. " Now, 
 I happen to know from your father himself that he 
 never intended to go to Australia, and he never in- 
 tended to return to England. He sailed instead by 
 an Allan liner from Liverpool to Quebec under the 
 name of Francis. He went straight to Montreal, and 
 he stayed there until he had spent the greater part of 
 his money. Then he drifted out west. There is his 
 history for you in a few words." 
 
 A sudden light flashed in Brooks' eyes. 
 
 6
 
 82 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " He told you that he left England meaning never 
 to return? Then you have the key to the whole 
 thing. Why not? That is what I want to know. 
 Why not?" 
 
 " I do not know," Lord Arranmore answered, 
 coolly. " He never told me." 
 
 Brooks felt a sudden chill of disappointment. 
 Lord Arranmore rose slowly to his feet. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks," he said, " I have told you all that I 
 know. You have asked me a question which I have 
 not been able to answer. I can, however, give you 
 some advice which I will guarantee to be excellent 
 some advice which you will do well to follow. Shall 
 I go on?" 
 
 "If you please!" 
 
 " Do not seek to unravel any further what may 
 seem to you to be the mystery of your father's dis- 
 appearance from the world. Depend upon it, his 
 action was of his own free will, and he had excellent 
 reasons for it. If he had wished you to know them 
 he would have communicated with you. Remember, 
 I was with your father during his last days and 
 this is my advice to you." 
 
 Brooks pointed downward to the crumpled ball of 
 paper. 
 
 " That letter ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I scarcely see its significance," he said. " It is 
 not even my word against Lacroix'. I sent you all 
 your father's papers, I brought back photographs 
 and keepsakes known to belong to him. In what pos- 
 sible way could it benefit me to mislead you ? " 
 
 The telephone on Brooks' table rang, and for a
 
 A TEMPTING OFFER 83 
 
 moment or two he found himself, with mechanical 
 self-possession, attending to some unimportant ques- 
 tion. When he replaced the receiver Lord Arran- 
 more had resumed his seat, but was drawing on his 
 gloves. 
 
 " Come," he said, " let us resume our business talk. 
 I have made you an offer. What have you to say ? " 
 
 Brooks pointed to the waste-paper basket. 
 
 " I did a mean action," he said. " I am ashamed 
 of it. Do you mean that your offer remains open? " 
 
 " Certainly," Lord Arranmore answered. " That 
 little affair is not worth mentioning. I should prob- 
 ably have done the same." 
 
 " Well, I am not altogether a madman," Brooks 
 declared, smiling, " so I will only say that I accept 
 your offer gratefully and I will do my very best 
 to deserve your confidence." 
 
 Lord Arranmore rose and stood with his hands 
 behind him, looking out of the window. 
 
 " Very good," he said. " I will send for Ascough 
 to come down from town, and we must meet one 
 day next week at Morrisons' office, and go into mat- 
 ters thoroughly. That reminds me. Busher, my 
 head bailiff, will be in to see you this afternoon. 
 There are half-a-dozen leases to be seen to at once, 
 and everything had better come here until the arrange- 
 ments are concluded." 
 
 " I shall be in all the afternoon," Brooks answered, 
 still a little dazed. 
 
 " And Thursday," Lord Arranmore concluded, 
 " you dine and sleep at Enton. I hope we shall have 
 a good day's sport. The carriage will fetch you at 
 6.30. Good-morning."
 
 84 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Lord Arranmore walked out with a little nod, but 
 on the threshold he paused and looked back. 
 
 " By the bye, Brooks," he said, " do you remember 
 my meeting you in a little tea-shop almost the day 
 after I first called upon you ? " 
 
 " Quite well," Brooks answered. 
 
 :< You had a young lady with you." 
 
 " Yes. I was with Miss Scott." 
 
 Lord Arranmore's hand fell from the handle. His 
 eyes seemed suddenly full of fierce questioning. He 
 moved a step forward into the room. 
 i "Miss Scott? Who is she?" 
 
 Brooks was hopelessly bewildered, and showed it. 
 \ "" She lives with her uncle in Medchester. He is 
 a builder and timber merchant." 
 j Lord Arranmore was silent for a moment. 
 
 " Her father, then, is dead ? " he asked. 
 
 " He died abroad, I think," Brooks answered, " but 
 I really am not sure. I know very little of any of 
 them." 
 | Lord Arranmore turned away. 
 
 " She is the image of a man I once knew," he re- 
 marked, " but after all, the type is not an uncommon 
 one. You won't forget that Busher will be in this 
 afternoon. He is a very intelligent fellow for his 
 class, and you may find it worth your while to ask 
 him a few questions. Until Thursday, then." 
 
 " Until Thursday," Brooks repeated, mechanically.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 WHO THE DEVIL IS BROOKS? 
 
 be tired," declared Sydney Molyneux, sink- 
 ing into a low couch, " to be downright dead 
 dog-tired is the most delightful thing in the world. 
 Will some one give me some tea?" 
 
 Brooks laughed softly from his place in front of 
 the open fire. A long day in the fresh north wind 
 had driven the cobwebs from his brain, and brought 
 the burning colour ,to his cheeks. His eyes were 
 bright, and his laughter was like music. 
 
 " And you," he exclaimed, " are fresh from elec- 
 tioneering. Why, fatigue like this is a luxury." 
 
 Molyneux lit a cigarette and looked longingly at 
 the tea-tray set out in the middle of the hall. 
 
 " That is all very well," he said, " but there is a 
 wide difference between the two forms of exercise. 
 In electioneering one can use one's brain, and my 
 brain is never weary. It is capable of the most stupen- 
 dous exertions. It is my legs that fail me sometimes. 
 Here comes Lady Caroom at last. Why does she look 
 as though she had seen a ghost ? " 
 
 That great staircase at Enton came right into the 
 hall. A few steps from the bottom Lady Caroom had 
 halted, and her appearance was certainly a little un- 
 usual. Every vestige of colour had left her cheeks. 
 Her right hand was clutching the oak banisters, her
 
 86 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 eyes were fixed upon Brooks. He was for a moment 
 embarrassed, but he stepped forward to meet her. 
 
 " How do you do, Lady Caroom? " he said. " We 
 are all in the shadows here, and Mr. Molyneux is 
 crying out for his tea." 
 
 She resumed her progress and greeted Brooks 
 graciously. Almost at the same moment a footman 
 brought lamps, and the tea was served. Lady Caroom 
 glanced again with a sort of curious nervousness at 
 the young man who stood by her side. 
 
 " You are a little earlier than we expected," she 
 remarked, seating herself before the tea-tray. " Here 
 comes Sybil. She is dying to congratulate you, Mr. 
 Brooks. Is Arranmore here?" 
 
 " We left him in the gun-room," Molyneux an- 
 swered. " He is coming directly." 
 
 Sybil Caroom, in a short skirt and a jaunty hat, 
 came towards Brooks with outstretched hand. 
 
 " Delightful ! " she exclaimed. " I only wish that 
 it had been nine thousand instead of nine hundred. 
 [You deserved it." 
 
 Brooks laughed heartily. 
 
 " Well, we were satisfied to win the seat," he 
 declared. 
 
 Molyneux leaned forward tea-cup in hand. 
 
 " Well, you deserved it," he remarked. " Our old 
 man opened his mouth a bit, but yours knocked him 
 silly. Upon my word, I did n't think that any one 
 man had cheek stupendous enough to humbug a 
 constituency like Henslow did. It took my breath 
 away to read his speeches." 
 
 "Do you really mean that?" asked Brooks. 
 
 " Mean it ? Of course I do. What I can't under-
 
 WHO THE DEVIL IS BROOKS? 87 
 
 stand is how people can swallow such stuff, election 
 after election. Does n't every Radical candidate get 
 up and talk in the same maudlin way has n't he 
 done so for the last fifty years? And when he gets 
 into Parliament is there a more Conservative person 
 on the face of the earth than the Radical member 
 pledged to social reform ? It 's the same with your 
 man Henslow. He'll do nothing! He'll attempt 
 nothing! Silly farce, politics, I think." 
 
 Lady Caroom laughed softly. 
 
 " I have never heard you so eloquent in my life, 
 Sydney," she exclaimed. " Do go on. It is most 
 entertaining. When you have quite finished I can 
 see that Mr. Brooks is getting ready to pulverize 
 you." 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 " Lady Sybil tells me that Mr. Molyneux is not 
 to be taken seriously," he answered. 
 
 Molyneux brought up his cup for some more tea. 
 
 " Don't you listen to Lady Sybil, Brooks," he 
 retorted. " She is annoyed with me because I have 
 been spoken of as a future Prime Minister, and she 
 rather fancies her cousin for the post. Two knobs, 
 please, and plenty of cream. As a matter of fact I 
 am in serious and downright earnest. I say that 
 Henslow won his seat by kidding the working classes. 
 He promised them a sort of political Arabian Nights. 
 He '11 go up to Westminster, and I 'm open to bet 
 what you like that he makes not one serious practical 
 effort to push forward one of the startling measures 
 he talked about so glibly. I will trouble you for the 
 toast, Brooks. Thanks ! " 
 
 " He is always cynical like this," Sybil murmured,
 
 88 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " when his party have lost a seat. Don't take any 
 notice of him, Mr. Brooks. I have great faith in Mr. 
 Henslow, and I believe that he will do his best." 
 
 Molyneux smiled. 
 
 " Henslow is a politician/' he remarked, " a pro- 
 fessional politician. What you Radicals want is Eng- 
 lishmen who are interested in politics. Henslow 
 knows how to get votes. He 's got his seat, and 
 he'll keep it till the next election." 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 " Henslow has rather a platform manner," he said, 
 " but he is sound enough. I believe that we are on 
 the eve of important changes in our social legislation, 
 and I believe that Henslow will have much to say 
 about them. At any rate, he is not a rank hypocrite. 
 We have shown him things in Medchester which he 
 can scarcely forget in a hurry. He will go to West- 
 minster with the memory of these things before him, 
 with such a cry in his ears as no man can stifle. He 
 might forget if he would but he never will. We 
 have shown him things which men may not forget.'' 
 
 Lord Arranmore, who had now joined the party, 
 leaned forward with his arm resting lightly upon 
 Lady Caroom's shoulder. An uneasy light flashed in 
 his eyes. 
 
 " There are men," he said, " whom you can never 
 reach, genial men with a ready smile and a prompt 
 cheque-book, whose selfishness is an armour more 
 potent than the armour of my forefather there, Sir 
 Ronald Kingston of Arranmore. And, after all, 
 why not? The thoroughly selfish man is the only 
 person logically who has the slightest chance of 
 happiness."
 
 .WHO THE DEVIL IS BROOKS? 89 
 
 " It is true," Molyneux murmured. " Delightfully 
 true." 
 
 " Lord Arranmore is always either cynical or para- 
 doxical," Sybil Caroom declared. " He really says 
 the most unpleasant things with the greatest appear- 
 ance of truth of any man I know." 
 
 ' This company," Lord Arranmore remarked 
 lightly, " is hostile to me. Let us go and play 
 pool." 
 
 Lady Caroom rose up promptly. Molyneux 
 groaned audibly. 
 
 " You shall play me at billiards instead," she de- 
 clared. " I used to give you a good game once, and 
 I have played a great deal lately. Ring for Annette, 
 will you, Sybil ? She has my cue." 
 
 Sybil Caroom made room for Brooks by her 
 side. 
 
 " Do sit down and tell me more about the election," 
 she said. " Sydney is sure to go to sleep. He always 
 does after shooting." 
 
 " You shall ask me questions," he suggested. 
 " I scarcely know what part of it would interest 
 you." 
 
 They talked together lightly at first, then more 
 seriously. From the other end of the hall came the 
 occasional click of billiard balls. Lady Caroom and 
 her host were playing a leisurely game interspersed 
 with conversation. 
 
 "Who is this young Mr. Brooks?" she asked, 
 pausing to chalk her cue. 
 
 "A solicitor from Medchester," he answered. "He 
 was Parliamentary agent for Henslow, and I am 
 going to give him a management of my estates."
 
 90 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " He is quite a boy," she remarked. 
 
 " Twenty-six or seven," he answered. " How well 
 you play those cannons." 
 
 " I ought to. I had lessons for years. Is he a 
 native of Medchester ? " 
 
 Lord Arranmore was blandly puzzled. She fin- 
 ished her stroke and turned towards him. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks, you know. We were talking of 
 him." 
 
 " Of course we were," he answered. " I do not 
 think so. He is an orphan. I met his father in 
 Canada." 
 
 " He reminds me of some one," she remarked, in a 
 puzzled tone. " Just now as I was coming down- 
 stairs it was almost startling. He is a good-looking 
 boy." 
 
 " Be careful not to foul," he admonished her. 
 " You should have the spider-rest." 
 
 Lady Caroom made a delicate cannon from an awk- 
 ward place, and concluded her break in silence. Then 
 she leaned with her back against the table, chalking 
 her cue. Her figure was still the figure of a girl 
 she was a remarkably pretty woman. She laid her 
 slim white fingers upon his coat-sleeve. 
 
 " I wonder," she said, softly, " whether you will 
 ever tell me." 
 
 " If you look at me like that," he answered, smil- 
 ing, " I shall tell you a great many things." 
 
 Her eyes fell. It was too absurd at her age, but her 
 cheeks were burning. 
 
 " You don't improve a bit," she declared. " You 
 were always too apt with your tongue." 
 
 " I practised in a good school," he answered.
 
 WHO THE DEVIL IS BROOKS? 91 
 
 " Dear me," she sighed. " For elderly people what 
 a lot of rubbish we talk." 
 
 He shivered. 
 
 " What a hideous word," he remarked. " You 
 make me feel that my chest is padded and my hair 
 dyed. If to talk sense is a sign of youth, let us 
 do it." 
 
 " By all means. When are you going to find me a 
 husband for Sybil ? " 
 
 " Well is there any hurry? " he asked. 
 
 " Lots ! We are going to Fernshire next week, and 
 the place is always full of young men. If you have 
 anything really good in your mind I don't want to 
 miss it." 
 
 He took up his cue and scored an excellent break. 
 She followed suit, and he broke down at an easy 
 cannon. Then he came over to her side. 
 
 " How do you like Mr. Brooks? " he asked, quietly. 
 
 " He seems a nice boy," she answered, lightly. 
 
 He remained silent. Suddenly she looked up into 
 his face, and clutched the sides of the table. 
 
 " You you don't mean that ? " she murmured, 
 suddenly pale to the lips. 
 
 He led her to a chair. The game was over. 
 
 " Some day," he whispered, " I will tell you the 
 whole story." 
 
 " Even to think of these things," Sybil said, softly, 
 " makes us feel very selfish." 
 
 " No one is ever hopelessly selfish who is conscious 
 of it," he answered, smiling. " And, after all, it 
 would not do for every one to be always brooding 
 upon the darker side of life."
 
 92 
 
 " In another minute," Molyneux exclaimed, wak- 
 ing up with a start, " I should have been asleep. 
 Whatever have you two been talking about ? It was 
 the most soothing hum I ever heard in my life." 
 
 " Mr. Brooks was telling me of some new phases 
 of life," she answered. " It is very interesting, even 
 if it is a little sad." 
 
 Molyneux eyed them both for a moment in thought- 
 ful silence. 
 
 " H'm ! " he remarked. " Dinner is the next phase 
 of life which will interest me. Has the dressing-bell 
 gone yet?" 
 
 " You gross person," she exclaimed. " You ate 
 so much tea you had to go to sleep." 
 
 " It was the exercise," he insisted. 
 
 " You have been standing about all day. I heard 
 you ask for a place without any walking, and where 
 as few people as possible could see you miss your 
 birds." 
 
 " Your ears are a great deal too sharp," he said. 
 " It was the wind, then." 
 
 " Never mind what it was," she answered, laugh- 
 ing. " You can go to sleep again if you like." 
 
 Molyneux put up his eyeglass and looked from one 
 to the other. He saw that Sybil's interest in her 
 companion's conversation was not assumed, and for 
 the first time he appreciated Brooks' good looks. He 
 shook off his sleepiness at once and stood by Sybil's 
 side. 
 
 " Have you been trying to convert Lady Sybil ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " It is unnecessary," she answered, quickly. " Mr. 
 Brooks and I are on the same side."
 
 WHO THE DEVIL IS BROOKS? 95 
 
 He laughed softly and strolled away. Lord Arran- 
 more was standing thoughtfully before the marking- 
 board. He laid his hand upon his arm. 
 
 " I say, Arranmore," he asked, " who the devil i& 
 Brooks?"
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 
 
 OD bless my soul ! " Mr. Bullsom exclaimed. 
 " Listen to this." 
 
 Mrs. Bullsom, in a resplendent new dress, looking 
 shinier and fatter than ever, was prepared to listen 
 to anything which might relieve the tension of the 
 moment. For it was the evening of the dinner-party, 
 and within ten minutes of the appointed time. Mr. 
 Bullsom stood under the incandescent light and read 
 aloud 
 
 " The shooting-party at Enton yesterday consisted 
 of the Marquis of Arranmore, the Hon. Sydney Moly- 
 neux, Mr. Hennibul, K.C., and Mr. Kingston Brooks. 
 Notwithstanding the high wind an excellent bag was 
 obtained." 
 
 "What! Our Mr. Kingston Brooks?" Selina 
 exclaimed. 
 
 " It 's Brooks, right enough," Mr. Bullsom ex- 
 claimed. " I called at his office yesterday, and they 
 told me that he was out for the day. Well, that 
 licks me." 
 
 Mary, who was reading a magazine in a secluded 
 corner, looked up. 
 
 " I saw Mr. Brooks in the morning," she remarked. 
 " He told me that he was going to Enton to dine and 
 sleep."
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 95 
 
 Selina looked at her cousin sharply. 
 
 "You saw Mr. Brooks ?" she repeated. "Where ?" 
 
 " I met him," Mary answered, coolly. " He told 
 me that Lord Arranmore had been very kind to 
 him." 
 
 " Why did n't you tell us? " Louise asked. 
 
 " I really did n't think of it," Mary answered. " It 
 did n't strike me as being anything extraordinary." 
 
 " Not when he 's coming here to dine to-night; ' 
 Selina repeated, " and is a friend of papa's ! Why, 
 Mary, what nonsense." 
 
 " I really don't see anything to make a fuss about," 
 Mary said, going back to her magazine. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom drew himself up, and laid down the 
 paper with the paragraph uppermost. 
 
 " Well, it is most gratifying to think that I gave 
 that young man his first start," he remarked. " I 
 believe, too, that he is not likely to forget it." 
 
 " The bell ! " Mrs. Bullsom exclaimed, with a little 
 gasp. " Some one has come." 
 
 " Well, if they have, there 's nothing to be fright- 
 ened about," Mr. Bullsom retorted. " Ain't we ex- 
 pecting them to come ? Don't look so scared, Sarah ! 
 Take up a book, or something. Why, bless my soul, 
 you 're all of a tremble." 
 
 " I can't help it, Peter," Mrs. Bullsom replied, 
 nervously. " I don't know these people scarcely a bit, 
 and I 'm sure I shall do something foolish. Selina, 
 be sure you look at me when I 'm to come away, 
 and " 
 
 "Mr. Kingston Brooks." 
 
 Brooks, ushered in by a neighbouring greengrocer, 
 Centered upon a scene of unexpected splendour. Selina
 
 96 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 and her sister were gorgeous in green and pink re- 
 spectively. Mr. Bullsom's shirt-front was a thing to 
 wonder at. There was an air of repressed excitement 
 about everybody, except Mary, who welcomed -him 
 with a quiet smile. 
 
 " I am not much too early, I hope," Brooks 
 remarked. 
 
 " You 're in the nick of time," Mr. Bullsom assured 
 him. 
 
 Brooks endeavoured to secure a chair near Mary, 
 which attempt Selina adroitly foiled. 
 
 " We 've been reading all about your grandeur, 
 Mr. Brooks," she exclaimed. " What a beautiful day 
 you must have had at Enton." 
 Brooks looked puzzled. 
 
 " It was very enjoyable," he declared. " I wanted 
 to see you, Miss Scott," he added, turning to Mary. 
 " I think that we can arrange that date for the lec- 
 ture now. How would Wednesday week do ? " 
 " Admirably ! " Mary answered. 
 " Do you know whom you take in, Mr. Brooks? " 
 Selina interrupted. 
 
 Brooks glanced at the card in his hand. 
 " Mrs. Seventon," he said. " Yes, thanks." 
 Selina looked up at him with an arch smile. 
 " Mrs. Seventon is most dreadfully proper," she 
 said. u You will have to be on your best behaviour. 
 Oh, here comes some one. What a bother ! " 
 
 There was an influx of guests. Mrs. Bullsom, re- 
 duced to a state of chaotic nervousness, was pushed 
 as far into the background as possible by her daugh- 
 ters, and Mr. Bullsom, banished from the hearth 
 where he felt surest of himself, plunged into a con-
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 97 
 
 versation with Mr. Seventon on the weather. Brooks 
 leaned over towards Mary. 
 
 " Wednesday week at eight o'clock, then," he said. 
 " I want to have a chat with you about the subject.'' 
 
 " Not now," she interposed. " You know these 
 people, don't you, and the Huntingdons? Go and 
 talk to them, please." 
 
 Brooks laughed, and went to the rescue. He won 
 Mrs. Bullsom's eternal gratitude by diverting Mrs. 
 Seventon' s attention from her, and thereby allowing^ 
 her a moment or two to recover herself. Somehow or 
 other a buzz of conversation was kept up until the 
 solemn announcement of dinner. And when she was 
 finally seated in her place, and saw a couple of nimble 
 waiters, with the greengrocer in the back, looking cool 
 and capable, she felt that the worst was over. 
 
 The solemn process of sampling doubtful-looking 
 entrees and eating saddle of mutton to the tune of a 
 forced conversation was got through without disaster. 
 Mrs. Bullsom felt her fat face break out into smiles. 
 Mr. Bullsom, though he would like to have seen every- 
 body go twice for everything, began to expand. He 
 had already recited the story of Kingston Brooks' 
 greatness to both of his immediate neighbours, and in 
 a casual way mentioned his early patronage of that 
 remarkable young man. And once meeting his eye 
 he raised his glass. 
 
 " Not quite up to the Enton vintage, Brooks, eh ? 
 but all right, I hope." 
 
 Brooks nodded back, and resumed his conversation.. 
 Selina took the opportunity to mention casually to 
 her neighbour, Mr. Huntingdon, that Mr. Brooks was 
 a great friend of Lord Arranmore's, and Louise, on 
 
 7
 
 98 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 her side of the table, took care also to disseminate 
 the same information. Everybody was properly im- 
 pressed. Mr. Bullsom decided to give a dinner-party 
 every month, and to double the greengrocer's tip, and 
 by the time Selina's third stage whisper had reached 
 her mother and the ladies finally departed, he was 
 in a state of geniality bordering upon beatitude. 
 There was a general move to his end of the table. 
 Mr. Bullsom started the port, and his shirt-front grew 
 wider and wider. He lit a cigar, and his thumb found 
 its way to the armhole of his waistcoat. At that 
 moment Mr. Bullsom would not have changed places 
 with any man on earth. 
 
 " What sort of a place is Enton to stay at, Brooks, 
 eh?" he inquired, in a friendly manner. "Keeps 
 it up very well, don't he, the present Marquis ? " 
 
 Brooks sighed. 
 
 " I really don't know much about it," he answered, 
 " I was only there one night." 
 
 "Good day's sport?" 
 
 " Very good indeed," Brooks answered. " Lord 
 Arranmore is a wonderful shot." 
 
 " A remarkable man in a great many ways, Lord 
 Arranmore," Dr. Seventon remarked. " He disap- 
 peared from London when he was an impecunious 
 young barrister with apparently no earthly chance of 
 succeeding to the Arranmore estates, and from that 
 time till a few years ago, when he was advertised for, 
 not a soul knew his whereabouts. Even now I am 
 told that he keeps the story of all these years abso- 
 lutely to himself. No one knew where he was, or how 
 he supported himself." 
 
 " I can tell you where he was for some time, at any
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 99 
 
 rate," Brooks said. " He was in Canada, for he met 
 my father there, and was with him when he died." 
 
 " Indeed," Dr. Seventon remarked. " Then I 
 should say that you are one of the only men in Eng- 
 land to whom he has opened his lips on the subject. 
 Do you know what he was doing there ? " 
 
 " Fishing and shooting, I think," Brooks answered. 
 " It was near Lake Ono, right out west, and there 
 would be nothing else to take one there." 
 
 " It was always supposed too that he had spent 
 most of the time in a situation in New York," Mr. 
 Huntingdon said. 
 
 " I know a man," Mr. Seaton put in, " who can 
 swear that he met him as a sergeant in the first 
 Australian contingent of mounted infantry sent to 
 the Cape." 
 
 " There are no end of stories about him," Dr. Sev- 
 enton remarked. " If I were the man I would put 
 a stop to them by telling everybody exactly where I 
 was during those twenty years or so. It is a big slice 
 of one's life to seal up." 
 
 " Still, there is not the slightest reason why he 
 should take the whole world into his confidence, is 
 there?" Brooks expostulated. "He is not a public 
 man." 
 
 " A peer of England with a seat in the House of 
 Lords must always be a public man to some extent," 
 Mr. Huntingdon remarked. 
 
 " I am not sure," Brooks remarked, " that the lives 
 of all our hereditary legislators would bear the most 
 searching inquiry." 
 
 "That's right, Brooks," Mr. Bullsom declared. 
 " Stick up for your pals."
 
 ioo A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Brooks looked a little annoyed. 
 
 " The only claim I have upon Lord Arranmore's 
 acquaintance," he remarked, " is his kindness to my 
 father. I hope, Dr. Seventon, that you are going to 
 press the matter of that fever hospital home. I have 
 a little information which I think you might make 
 use of." 
 
 Brooks changed his place, wine-glass in hand, and 
 the conversation drifted away. But he found the 
 position of social star one which the Bullsoms were 
 determined to force upon him, for they had no sooner 
 entered the drawing-room than Selina came rushing 
 across the room to him and drew him confidentially 
 on one side. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks," she said, " do go and talk to Mrs. 
 Huntingdon. She is so anxious to hear about the 
 Lady Caroom who is staying at Enton." 
 
 " I know nothing about Lady Caroom," Brooks 
 replied, without any overplus of graciousness. 
 
 Selina looked at him in some dismay. 
 
 "But you met her at Enton, didn't you?" she 
 asked. 
 
 " Oh, yes, I met her there," Brooks answered, im- 
 patiently. " But I certainly don't know enough of 
 her to discuss her with Mrs. Huntingdon. I rather 
 wanted to speak to your cousin." 
 
 Selinas thin little lips became compressed, and for 
 a moment she forgot to smile. Her cousin indeed! 
 Mary, who was sitting there in a plain black gown 
 without a single ornament, and not even a flower, 
 looking for all the world like the poor relation she 
 was! Selina glanced downwards at the great bunch 
 of roses and maidenhair fern in her bosom, at the
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 101 
 
 fancy and beaded trimming which ran like a night- 
 mare all over her new gown, and which she was 
 absolutely certain had come from Paris ; at the heavy 
 gold bracelets which concealed some part of her thin 
 arms; she remembered suddenly the aigrette in her 
 hair, such a finish to her costume, and her self-con- 
 fidence returned. 
 
 " Oh, don't bother about Mary now. Mrs. Hunt- 
 ingdon is dying to have you talk to her. Please do 
 and if you like I will give you one of my roses 
 for your button-hole." 
 
 Brooks stood the shock gallantly, and bowed his 
 thanks. He had met Mrs. Huntingdon before, and 
 they talked together for a quarter of an hour or so. 
 
 " I wish I knew why you were here," was almost 
 her first question. " Is n't it all funny? " 
 
 " Mr. Bullsom has always been very decent to me," 
 he answered. " It is through him I was appointed 
 agent to Mr. Henslow." 
 
 " Oh, business ! I see," she answered, shrugging 
 her shoulders. " Same here. I 'm a doctor's wife, 
 you know. Did you ever see such awful girls! and 
 who in the name of all that 's marvellous can be their 
 dressmaker? " 
 
 " Bullsom is a very good sort indeed," Brooks 
 answered. " I have a great respect for him." 
 
 She made a little face. 
 
 " Who 's the nice-looking girl in black with her 
 hair parted in the middle? " she asked. 
 
 " Mr. Bullsom' s niece. She is quite charming, and 
 most intelligent." 
 
 "Dear me!" Mrs. Huntingdon remarked. "I 
 had no idea she had anything to do with the family.
 
 102 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Sort of a Cinderella look about her now you mention 
 it. Could n't you get her to come over and talk to 
 me ? I 'm horribly afraid of Mrs. Bullsom. She '11 
 come out of that dress if she tries to talk, and I know 
 I shall laugh." 
 
 " I 'm sure I can," Brooks answered, rising with 
 alacrity. " I '11 bring her over in a minute." 
 
 Mary had just finished arranging a card-table when 
 Brooks drew her on one side. 
 
 "About that subject!" he began. 
 
 " We shall scarcely have time to talk about it now, 
 shall we?" she answered. "You will be wanted to 
 play cards or something. We shall be quite content 
 to leave it to you." 
 
 " I should like to talk it over with you," he said. 
 " Do tell me when I may see you." 
 
 She sat down, and he stood by her chair. 
 
 " Really, I don't know," she answered. " Per- 
 haps I shall be at home when you pay your duty 
 call." 
 
 " Come and have some tea at Mellor's with me 
 to-morrow." 
 
 She seemed not to hear him. She had caught 
 Mrs. Seventon's eye across the room, and rose to her 
 feet. 
 
 " You have left Mrs. Seventon alone all the even- 
 ing," she said. " I must go and talk to her." 
 
 He stood before her a little insistent. 
 
 " I shall expect you at half-past four," he said. 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " Oh, no. I have an engagement." 
 
 " The next day, then." 
 
 " Thank you ! I would rather you did not ask me.
 
 MR. BULLSOM GIVES A DINNER-PARTY 103 
 
 I have a great deal to do just now. I will bring the 
 girls to the lecture." 
 
 " Wednesday week," he protested, " is a long way 
 off." 
 
 " You can go over to Enton," she laughed, 
 " and get some more cheques from your wonderful 
 friend." 
 
 " I wonder," he remarked, " why you dislike Lord 
 Arranmore so much." 
 
 " Instinct perhaps or caprice," she answered, 
 lightly. 
 
 " The latter for choice," he answered. " I don't 
 think that he is a man to dislike instinctively. He 
 rather affected me the other way." 
 
 She was suddenly graver. 
 
 " It is foolish of me," she remarked. " You will 
 think so too, when I tell you that my only reason is 
 because of a likeness." 
 
 " A likeness ! " he repeated. 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " He is exactly like a man who was once a friend 
 of my father's, and who did him a great deal of harm. 
 My father was much to blame, I know, but this 
 man had a great influence over him, and a most 
 unfortunate one. Now don't you think I 'm 
 absurd?" 
 
 " I think it is a little rough on Lord Arranmore," 
 he answered, " don't you? " 
 
 " It would be if my likes or dislikes made the slight- 
 est difference to him," she answered. " As it is, I 
 don't suppose it matters." 
 
 "Was this in England?" he asked. 
 
 She shook her head.
 
 104 'A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " No, it was abroad in Montreal. I really must 
 go to Mrs. Seventon. She looks terribly bored." 
 
 Brooks made no effort to detain her. He was 
 looking intently at a certain spot in the carpet. The 
 coincidence it was nothing more, of course was 
 curious.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 CHARITY THE " CRIME " 
 
 THERE followed a busy time for Brooks, the 
 result of which was a very marked improve- 
 ment in his prospects. For the younger Morrison and 
 his partner, loth to lose altogether the valuable Enton 
 connection, offered Brooks a partnership in their firm. 
 Mr. Ascough, who was Lord Arranmore's London 
 solicitor, and had been Brooks' guardian, after careful 
 consideration advised his acceptance, and there being 
 nothing in the way, the arrangements were pushed 
 through almost at once. Mr. Ascough, on the morn- 
 ing of his return to London, took the opportunity 
 warmly to congratulate Brooks. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore has been marvellously kind to 
 me," Brooks agreed. " To tell you the truth, Mr. 
 Ascough, I feel almost inclined to add incomprehen- 
 sibly kind." 
 
 The older man stroked his grey moustache 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore is eccentric," he remarked. 
 " Has always been eccentric, and will remain so, I 
 suppose, to the end of the chapter. You are the one 
 who profits, however, and I am very glad of it." 
 
 " Eccentricity," Brooks remarked, " is, of course, 
 the only obvious explanation of his generosity so far
 
 106 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 as I am concerned. But it has occurred to me, Mr. 
 Ascough, to wonder whether the friendship or con- 
 nection between him and my father was in any way a 
 less slight thing than I have been led to suppose." 
 
 Mr. Ascough shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore," he said, " has told you, no 
 doubt, all that there is to be told." 
 
 Brooks sat at his desk, frowning slightly, and 
 tapping the blotting-paper with a pen-holder. 
 
 " All that Lord Arranmore has told me," he said, 
 " is that my father occupied a cabin not far from his 
 on the banks of Lake Ono, that they saw little of each 
 other, and that he only found out his illness by acci- 
 dent. That my father then disclosed his name, gave 
 him his papers and your address. There was merely 
 the casual intercourse between two Englishmen com- 
 ing together in a strange country." 
 
 " That is what I have always understood," Mr. 
 Ascough agreed. " Have you any reason to think 
 otherwise ? " 
 
 " No definite reason except Lord Arranmore's 
 unusual kindness to me," Brooks remarked. " Lord 
 Arranmore is one of the most self-centred men I ever 
 knew and the least impulsive. Why, therefore, he 
 should go out of his way to do me a kindness I cannot 
 understand." 
 
 " If this is really an enigma to you," Mr. Ascough 
 answered, " I cannot help you to solve it. Lord 
 Arranmore has been the reverse of communicative to 
 me. I am afraid you must fall back upon his lord- 
 ship's eccentricity." 
 
 Mr. Ascough rose, but Brooks detained him. 
 
 " .You have plenty of time for your train," he said.
 
 CHARITY THE "CRIME" 107 
 
 " Will you forgive me if I go over a little old ground 
 with you for the last time?" 
 
 The lawyer resumed his seat. 
 
 " I am in no hurry," he said, " if you think it 
 worth while." 
 
 " My father came to you when he was living at 
 Stepney a stranger to you." 
 
 " A complete stranger," Mr. Ascough agreed. " I 
 had never seen him before in my life. I did a little 
 trifling business for him in connection with his 
 property." 
 
 " He told you nothing of his family or relatives? " 
 
 " He told me that he had not a relation in the 
 world." 
 
 "You knew him slightly, then?" Brooks con- 
 tinued, " all the time he was in London ? And when 
 he left for that voyage he came to you." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "He made over his small income then to my mother 
 in trust for me. Did it strike you as strange that 
 he should do this instead of making a will?" 
 
 " Not particularly," Mr. Ascough declared. " As 
 you know, it is not an unusual course." 
 
 " It did not suggest to you any determination on 
 his part never to return to England ? " 
 
 "Certainly not." 
 
 " He left England on friendly terms with my 
 mother?" 
 
 " Certainly. She and he were people for whom I 
 and every one who knew anything of their lives had 
 the highest esteem and admiration." 
 
 " You can imagine no reason, then, for my father 
 leaving England for good ? "
 
 io8 A PRINCE OF. SINNERS 
 
 "Certainly not!" 
 
 " You know of no reason why he should have aban- 
 doned his trip to Australia and gone to Canada ? " 
 
 "None!" 
 
 " His doing so is as inexplicable to you as to 
 me?" 
 
 " Entirely." 
 
 " You have never doubted Lord Arranmore's story 
 of his death?" 
 
 "Never. Why should I?" 
 
 " One more question," Brooks said. " Do you 
 know that lately I have met a traveller a man 
 who visited Lord Arranmore in Canada, and who 
 declared to his certain knowledge there was no other 
 human dwelling-house within fifty miles of Lord 
 Arranmore's cabin ? " 
 
 " He was obviously mistaken." 
 
 "You think so?" 
 
 " It is certain." 
 
 Brooks hesitated. 
 
 " My question," he said, " will have given you 
 some idea of the uncertainty I have felt once or 
 twice lately, owing to the report of the traveller 
 Lacroix, and Lord Arranmore's unaccountable kind- 
 ness to me. You see, he is n't an ordinary man. He 
 is not a philanthropist by any means, nor in any way 
 a person likely to do kindly actions from the love of 
 them. Now, do you know of any facts, or can you 
 suggest anything which might make the situation 
 clearer to me? " 
 
 " I cannot, Mr. Brooks," the older man answered, 
 without hesitation. " If you take my advice, you will 
 not trouble yourself any more with fancies which seem
 
 CHARITY THE "CRIME" 109 
 
 to me pardon me quite chimerical. Accept Lord 
 Arranmore's kindness as the offshoot of some senti- 
 mental feeling which he might well have entertained 
 towards a fellow-countryman by whose death-bed he 
 had stood in that far-away, lonely country. You may 
 even yourself be mistaken in Lord Arranmore's char- 
 acter, and you can remember, too, that after all what 
 means so much to you costs him nothing is prob- 
 ably for his own advantage/' 
 
 Brooks rose and took up his hat. 
 
 " I am very much obliged to you, Mr. Ascough," 
 he said. " Yours, after all, is the common-sense 
 view of the affair. If you like I will walk up to 
 the station. I am going that way. . . ." 
 
 So Brooks, convinced of their folly, finally dis- 
 carded certain uncomfortable thoughts which once or 
 twice lately had troubled him. He dined at Enton 
 that night, and improved his acquaintance with Lady 
 Caroom and her daughter, who were still staying 
 there. Although this was not a matter which he 
 had mentioned to Mr. Ascough, there was some- 
 thing which he found more inexplicable even than 
 Lord Arranmore's transference of the care of his 
 estates to him, and that was the apparent encourage- 
 ment which both he and Lady Caroom gave to the 
 friendship between Sybil and himself. They had 
 lunched with him twice in Medchester, and more 
 often still the Enton barouche had been kept wait- 
 ing at his office whilst Lady Caroom and Sybil 
 descended upon him with invitations from Lord 
 Arranmore. After his talk with Mr. Ascough he 
 put the matter behind him, but it remained at times 
 an inexplicable puzzle.
 
 I io A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 On the evening of this particular visit he found 
 Sybil alone in a recess of the drawing-room with a 
 newspaper in her hand. She greeted him with ob- 
 vious pleasure. 
 
 " Do come and tell me about things, Mr. Brooks," 
 she begged. " I have been reading the local paper. 
 Is it true that there are actually people starving in 
 Medchester ? " 
 
 " There is a great deal of distress," he admitted, 
 gravely. " I am afraid that it is true." 
 
 She looked at him with wide-open eyes. 
 
 " But I don't understand," she said. " I thought 
 that there were societies who dealt with all that sort 
 of thing, and behind, the the workhouse." 
 
 " So there are, Lady Sybil," he answered, " but 
 you must remember that societies are no use unless 
 people will subscribe to them, and that there are a 
 great many people who would sooner starve than 
 enter the workhouse." 
 
 " But surely," she exclaimed, " there is no difficulty 
 about getting money if people only understand." 
 
 He watched her for a moment in silence sud- 
 denly appreciating the refinement, the costly elegance 
 which seemed in itself to be a part of the girl, and 
 yet for which surely her toilette was in some way 
 also responsible. Her white satin dress was cut and 
 fashioned in a style which he was beginning to ap- 
 preciate as evidence of skill and costliness. A string 
 of pearls around her throat gleamed softly in the 
 firelight. A chain of fine gold studded with opals 
 and diamonds reached almost to her knees. She 
 wore few rings indeed, but they were such rings as 
 he had never seen before he had come as a guest
 
 CHARITY THE "CRIME" ill 
 
 to Enton. And there were thousands like her. A 
 momentary flash of thought carried him back to the 
 days of the French Revolution. There was a print 
 hanging in his room of a girl as fair and as proud 
 as this one, surrounded by a fierce rabble mad with 
 hunger and the pent-up rage of generations, tearing 
 the jewels from her ringers, tearing even, he thought, 
 the trimming from her gown. 
 
 " You do not answer me, Mr. Brooks," she re- 
 minded him. 
 
 He recovered himself with a start. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Lady Sybil. Your question 
 set me thinking. We have tried to make people 
 understand, and many have given most generously, 
 but for all that we cannot cope with such distress as 
 there is to-day in Medchester. I am secretary for 
 one of the distribution societies, and I have seen 
 things which are enough to sadden a man for life, 
 only during the last few days." 
 
 "You have seen people really hungry?" she 
 asked, with something like timidity in her face. 
 
 He laughed bitterly. 
 
 " That we see every moment of the time we spend 
 down amongst them," he answered. " I have seen 
 worse things. I have seen the sapping away of char- 
 acter men become thieves and women worse to 
 escape from starvation. That, I think, is the greatest 
 tragedy of all. It makes one shudder when one thinks 
 that on the shoulders of many people some portion 
 of the responsibility at any rate for these things must 
 rest." 
 
 Her lips quivered. She emptied the contents of a 
 gold chain purse into her hands.
 
 H2 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " It is we who are wicked, Mr. Brooks," she said, 
 " who spend no end of money and close our ears to 
 all this. Do take this, will you; can it go to some 
 of the women you know, and the children? There 
 are only five or six pounds there, but I shall talk to 
 mamma. We will send you a cheque." 
 
 He took the money without hesitation. 
 
 " I am very glad," he said, earnestly, " that you 
 have given me this, that you have felt that you 
 wanted to give it me. I hope you won't think too 
 badly of me for coming over here to help you spend 
 a pleasant evening, and talking at all of such mis- 
 erable things." 
 
 " Badly ! " she repeated. " No ; I shall never be 
 able to thank you enough for telling me what you 
 have done. It makes one feel almost wicked to be 
 sitting here, and wearing jewelry, and feeling well 
 off, spending money on whatever you want, and to 
 think that there are people starving. How they 
 must hate us." 
 
 " It is the wonderful part of it," he answered. " I 
 do not believe that they do. I suppose it is a sort 
 of fatalism the same sort of thing, only much less 
 ignoble, as the indifference which keeps our rich 
 people contented and deaf to this terribly human 
 cry." 
 
 " You are young," she said, looking at him, " to 
 be so much interested in such serious things." 
 
 " It is my blood, I suppose," he answered. " My 
 father was a police-court missionary, and my mother 
 the matron of a pauper hospital." 
 
 "They are both dead, are they not?" she asked, 
 softly.
 
 CHARITY THE "CRIME" 113 
 
 " Many years ago," he answered. 
 
 Lady Caroom and Lord Arranmore came in to- 
 gether. A certain unusual seriousness in Sybil's 
 face was manifest. 
 
 ' You two do not seem to have been amusing your- 
 selves," Lady Caroom remarked, giving her hand to 
 Brooks. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks has been answering some of my 
 questions about the poor people," Sybil answered, 
 " and it is not an amusing subject." 
 
 Lord Arranmore laughed lightly, and there was a 
 touch of scorn in the slight curve of his fine lips and 
 his raised eyebrows. He stood away from the shaded 
 lamplight before a great open fire of cedar logs, and 
 the red glow falling fitfully upon his face seemed to 
 Brooks, watching him with more than usual close- 
 ness, to give him something of a Mephistopheles 
 aspect. His evening clothes hung with more than 
 ordinary precision about his long slim body, his 
 black tie and black pearl stud supplied the touch of 
 sombreness so aptly in keeping with the mirthless, 
 bitter smile which still parted his lips. 
 
 " You must not take Mr. Brooks too seriously 
 on the subject of the poor people," he said, the 
 mockery of his smile well matched in his tone. 
 " Brooks is an enthusiast one, I am afraid, of 
 those misguided people who have barred the way 
 to progress for centuries. If only they could be 
 converted ! " 
 
 Lady Caroom sighed. 
 
 " Oh, dear, how enigmatic ! " she exclaimed. " Do 
 be a little more explicit." 
 
 " Dear lady," he continued, turning to her, " it is 
 8
 
 ii4 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 not worth while. Yet I sometimes wonder whether 
 people realize how much harm this hysterical philan- 
 thropy this purely sentimental f addism, does ; how 
 it retards the natural advance of civilization, throws 
 dust in people's eyes, salves the easy conscience of 
 the rich man, who bargains for immortality with a 
 few strokes of the pen, and finds mischievous occu- 
 pation for a good many weak minds and parasitical 
 females. Believe me, that all personal charity is a 
 mistake. It is a good deal worse than that. It is a 
 crime." 
 
 Sybil rose up, and a little unusual flush had stained 
 her cheeks. 
 
 " I still do not understand you in the least, Lord 
 Arranmore," she said. " It seems to me that you 
 are making paradoxical and ridiculous statements, 
 which only bewilder us. Why is charity a crime? 
 That is what I should like to hear you explain." 
 
 Lord Arranmore bowed slightly. 
 
 " I had no idea," he said, leaning his elbow upon 
 the mantelpiece, " that I was going to be inveigled 
 into a controversy. But, my dear Sybil, I will do 
 my best to explain to you what I mean, especially 
 as at your age you are not likely to discover the 
 truth for yourself. In the first place, charity of any 
 sort is the most insidious destroyer of moral charac- 
 ter which the world has ever known. The man who 
 once accepts it, even in extremes, imbibes a poison 
 from which his system can never be thoroughly 
 cleansed. You let him loose upon society, and the 
 evil which you have sown in him spreads. He is 
 like a man with an infectious disease. He is a 
 source of evil to the community. You have relieved
 
 CHARITY THE "CRIME" 115 
 
 a physical want, and you have destroyed a moral 
 quality. I do not need to point out to you that the 
 balance is on the wrong side." 
 
 Sybil glanced across at Brooks, and he smiled back 
 at her. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore has not finished yet," he said. 
 " Let us hear the worst." 
 
 Their host smiled. 
 
 " After all," he said, " why do I waste my breath? 
 From the teens to the thirties sentiment smiles. It 
 is only later on in life that reason has any show at 
 all. Yet you should ask yourselves, you eager self- 
 denying young people, who go about with a healthy 
 moral glow inside because you have fed the poor, or 
 given an hour or so of your time to the distribu- 
 tion of reckless charity you should ask yourselves: 
 What is the actual good of ministering to the out- 
 ward signs of an internal disease? You are simply 
 trying to renovate the outside when the inside is 
 filthy. Don't you see, my dear young people, that 
 to give a meal to one starving man may be to do 
 him indeed good, but it does nothing towards pre- 
 venting another starving man from taking his place 
 to-morrow. You stimulate the disease, you help it 
 to spread. Don't you see where instead you should 
 turn to the social laws, the outcome of which is 
 that starving man ? You let them remain unharmed, 
 untouched, while you fall over one another in frantic 
 efforts to brush away to-day's effect of an eternal 
 cause. Let your starving man die, let the bones 
 break through his skin and carry him up him and 
 his wife and their children, and their fellows to 
 your House of Commons. Tell them that there are
 
 ii6 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 more to-morrow, more the next day, let the millions 
 of the lower classes look this thing in the face. I 
 tell you that either by a revolution, which no doubt 
 some of us would find worse than inconvenient, or 
 by less drastic means, the thing would right itself. 
 You, who work to relieve the individual, only post- 
 pone and delay the millennium. People will keep 
 their eyes closed as long as they can. It is you 
 who help them to do so." 
 
 " Dinner is served, my lord," the butler announced. 
 
 Lord Arranmore extended his arm to Lady Caroom. 
 
 " Come," he said, " let us all be charitable to one 
 another, for I too am starving."
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 
 
 " 'VT'OU think they really liked it, then? " 
 
 "How could they help it? It was such a 
 delightful idea of yours, and I am sure all that you 
 said was so simple and yet suggestive. Good-night, 
 Mr. Brooks." 
 
 They stood in the doorway of the Secular Hall, 
 where Brooks had just delivered his lecture. It 
 seemed to him that her farewell was a little abrupt. 
 
 " I was going to ask," he said, " whether I might 
 not see you home." 
 
 She hesitated. 
 
 " Really," she said, " I wish you would not trouble. 
 It is quite a long way, and I have only to get into a 
 car." 
 
 " The further the better," he answered, " and be- 
 sides, if your uncle is at home I should like to come 
 in and see him." 
 
 She made no further objection, yet Brooks fancied 
 that her acquiescence was, to some extent, involun- 
 tary. He walked by her side in silence for a moment 
 or two, wondering whether there was indeed any way 
 in which he could have offended her. 
 
 " I have not seen you," he remarked, " since the 
 evening of your dinner-party." 
 
 "No!"
 
 ii8 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " You were out when I called." 
 
 " I have so many things to do just now. We 
 can get a car here." 
 
 He looked at it. 
 
 " It is too full," he said. " Let us walk on for a 
 little way. I want to talk to you." 
 
 The car was certainly full, so after a moment's 
 hesitation she acquiesced. 
 
 "You will bring your girls again, I hope?" he 
 asked. 
 
 " They will come I have no doubt," she answered. 
 " So will I if I am in Medchester." 
 
 " You are going away ? " 
 
 " I hope so," she answered. " I am not quite 
 sure." 
 
 "Not for good?" 
 
 "Possibly." 
 
 " Won't you tell me about it ? " he asked. 
 
 "Well I don't know!" 
 
 She hesitated for a moment. 
 
 " I will tell you if you like," she said, doubtfully. 
 " But I do not wish anything said about it at present, 
 as my arrangements are not complete." 
 
 " I will be most discreet," he promised. 
 
 " I have been doing a little work for a woman's 
 magazine in London, and they have half promised 
 me a definite post on the staff. I am to hear in a 
 few days as to the conditions. If they are satisfac- 
 tory that is to say, if I can keep myself on what 
 they offer I shall go and live in London." 
 
 He was surprised, and also in a sense disappointed. 
 It was astonishing to find how unpleasant the thought 
 of her leaving Medchester was to him.
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 119 
 
 " I had no idea of this," he said, thoughtfully. " I 
 did not know that you went in for anything of the 
 sort." 
 
 " My literary ambitions are slight enough," she 
 answered. " Yet you can scarcely be surprised that 
 I find the thought of a definite career and a certain 
 amount of independence attractive." 
 
 He stole a sidelong glance at her. In her plainly- 
 made clothes and quiet hat she was scarcely, perhaps, 
 a girl likely to attract attention, yet he was conscious 
 of certain personal qualities, which he had realized 
 and understood from the first. She carried herself 
 well, she walked with the free graceful movements 
 of a well-bred and healthy girl. In her face was an 
 air of quiet thought, the self-possession of the woman 
 of culture and experience. Her claim to good looks 
 was, after all, slight enough, yet on studying her he 
 came to the conclusion that she could if she chose 
 appear to much greater advantage. Her hair, soft 
 and naturally wavy, was brushed too resolutely back ; 
 her smile, which was always charming, she suffered 
 to appear only at the rarest intervals. She suggested 
 a life of repression, and with his knowledge of the 
 Bullsom menage he was able to surmise some glim- 
 mering of the truth. 
 
 "You are right," he declared. "I think that I 
 can understand what your feeling must be. I am 
 sure I wish you luck." 
 
 The touch of sympathy helped her to unbend. She 
 glanced towards him kindly. 
 
 " Thank you," she said. " Of course there will be 
 difficulties. My uncle will not like it. He is very 
 good-natured and very hospitable, and I am afraid
 
 120 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 his limitations will not permit him to appreciate ex- 
 actly how I feel about it. And my aunt is, of course, 
 merely his echo." 
 
 " He will not be unreasonable," Brooks said. " I 
 am sure of that. For a man who is naturally of an 
 obstinate turn of mind I think your uncle is wonder- 
 ful. He makes great efforts to free himself from all 
 prejudices." 
 
 " Unfortunately," she remarked, " he is very down 
 on the independent woman. He would make house- 
 keepers and cooks of all of us." 
 
 " Surely," he protested, with a quiet smile, " your 
 cousins are more ambitious than that. I am sure 
 Selina would never wear a cooking-apron, unless it 
 had ribbon and frilly things all over it." 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 " After all, they have been kind to me," she said. 
 " My mother was the black sheep of the family, and 
 when she died Mr. Bullsom paid my passage home, 
 and insisted upon my coming to live here as one of 
 the family. I should hate them to think that I am 
 discontented, only the things which satisfy them do 
 not satisfy me, so life sometimes becomes a little 
 difficult." 
 
 " Have you friends in London? " he asked. 
 
 "None! I tried living there when I first came 
 back for a few weeks, but it was impossible." 
 
 " You will be very lonely, surely. London is the 
 loneliest of all great cities." 
 
 " Why should I not make friends? " 
 
 " That is what I too asked myself years ago when 
 I was articled there," he answered. " Yet it is not 
 so easy as it sounds. Every one seems to have their
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 121 
 
 own little circle, and a solitary person remains so 
 often just outside. Yet if you have friends and 
 tastes London is a paradise. Oh, how fascinat- 
 ing I used to find it just at first before the chill 
 came. You, too, will feel that. You will be content 
 at first to watch, to listen, to wonder! Every type 
 of humanity passes before you like the jumbled-up 
 figures of a kaleidoscope. You are content even to 
 sit before a window in a back street and listen. 
 What a sound that is the roar of London, the 
 voices of the street, the ceaseless hum, the creaking 
 of the great wheel of humanity as it goes round and 
 round. And then, perhaps, in a certain mood the 
 undernote falls upon your ear, the bitter, long-drawn- 
 out cry of the hopeless and helpless. When you have 
 once heard it, life is never the same again. Then, 
 if you do not find friends, you will know what 
 misery is." 
 
 They were both silent for a few minutes. A car 
 passed them unnoticed. Then she looked at him 
 curiously. 
 
 " For a lawyer," she remarked, " you are a very 
 imaginative person." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " Ah, well, I was talking just then of how I felt in 
 those days. I was a boy then, you know. I dare 
 say I could go back now to my old rooms and live 
 there without a thrill." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " What one has once felt," she murmured, " comes 
 back always." 
 
 " Sometimes only the echo," he answered, " and 
 that is weariness."
 
 122 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 They walked for a little way in silence. Then she 
 spoke to him in an altered tone. 
 
 " I have heard a good deal about you during the 
 last few weeks," she said. " You are very much to 
 be congratulated, they tell me. I am sure I am very 
 glad that you have been so fortunate." 
 
 " Thank you," he answered. " To tell you the 
 truth, it all seems very marvellous to me. Only a 
 few months ago your uncle was almost my only 
 client of importance." 
 
 " Lord Arranmore was your father's friend though, 
 was he not? " 
 
 " They came together abroad," he answered, " and 
 Lord Arranmore was with my father when he died 
 in Canada." 
 
 She stopped short. 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 " In Canada, on the banks of Lake Ono, if you 
 know where that is," he answered, looking at her 
 in surprise. 
 
 She resumed her usual pace, but he noticed that 
 she was pale. 
 
 " So Lord Arranmore was in Canada?" she said. 
 " Do you know how long ago ? " 
 
 "About ten years, I suppose," he answered. "How 
 long before that I do not know." 
 
 She was silent for several minutes, and they found 
 themselves in the drive leading to the Bullsom villa. 
 OBrooks was curious. 
 
 " I wonder," he asked, " whether you will tell me 
 why you are interested in Lord Arranmore and 
 Canada?" 
 
 " I was born in Montreal," she answered, " and I
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 123 
 
 once saw some one very much like Lord Arranmore 
 there. But I am convinced that it could only have 
 been a resemblance." 
 
 " You mentioned it before when we saw him in 
 Mellor's," he remarked. 
 
 " Yes, it struck me then/' she admitted. " But I 
 am sure that Lord Arranmore could not have been the 
 person whom I am thinking about. It is ridiculous of 
 me to attach so much importance to a mere likeness." 
 
 They stood upon the doorstep, but she checked him 
 as he reached out for the bell. 
 
 " You have seen quite a good deal of him," she 
 said. " Tell me what you think of Lord Arranmore." 
 
 His hand fell to his side. He stood under the gas- 
 bracket, and she could see his face distinctly. There 
 was a slight frown upon his forehead, a look of 
 trouble in his grey eyes. 
 
 " You could not have asked me a more difficult 
 question," he admitted. " Lord Arranmore has been 
 very kind to me, although my claim upon him has 
 been of the slightest. He is very clever, almost fan- 
 tastic, in some of his notions; he is very polished, 
 and his manners are delightful. He would call him- 
 self, I believe, a philosopher, and he is, although it 
 sounds brutal for me to say so, very selfish. And 
 behind it all I have n't the faintest idea what sort of 
 a man he is. Sometimes he gives one the impression 
 of a strong man wilfully disguising his real character- 
 istics, for hidden reasons ; at others, he is like one of 
 those brilliant Frenchmen of the last century, who 
 toyed and juggled with words and phrases, es- 
 teeming it a triumph to remain an unread letter 
 even to their intimates. So you see, after all," he
 
 124 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 wound up, " I cannot tell you what I think of Lord 
 Arranmore." 
 
 " You can ring the bell," she said. " You must 
 come in for a few minutes." 
 
 Their entrance together seemed to cause the little 
 family party a certain amount of disturbed surprise. 
 The girls greeted Brooks with a great show of pleas- 
 ure, but they looked doubtfully at Mary. 
 
 " Did you meet at the front door? " Selina asked. 
 " I thought I heard voices." 
 
 Brooks was a little surprised. 
 
 " Your cousin brought her class of factory girls to 
 my lecture to-night at the Secular Hall." 
 
 Selina's eyes narrowed a little, and she was silent 
 for a moment. Then she turned to her cousin. 
 
 " You might have told us, Mary," she exclaimed, 
 reproachfully. " We should so much have liked to 
 come, should n't we, Louise? " 
 
 " Of course we should," Louise answered, snap- 
 pishly. " I can't think why Mary should go off with- 
 out saying a word." 
 
 Mary looked at them both and laughed. 
 
 " Well," she said, " I have left the house at pre- 
 cisely the same time on Wednesday evenings all 
 through the winter, and neither of you have said 
 anything about coming with me." 
 
 " This is quite different," Selina answered, cut- 
 tingly. " We should very much have enjoyed Mr. 
 Brooks' lecture. Do tell us what it was about." 
 
 " Don't you be bothered, Brooks," Mr. Bullsom 
 exclaimed, hospitably. " Sit down and try one of 
 these cigars. We 've had supper, but if you 'd like 
 anything "
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 125 
 
 " Nothing to eat, thanks," Brooks protested. " I '11 
 have a cigar if I may." 
 
 " And a whisky-and-soda, then," Mr. Bullsom in- 
 sisted. " Say when ! " 
 
 Brooks turned to Selina. Mary had left the room. 
 
 " You were asking about the lecture," he said. 
 " Really, it was only a very unpretentious affair, and 
 to tell you the truth, only intended for people whose 
 opportunities for reading have not been great. I am 
 quite sure it would not have been worth your while 
 to come down. We just read a chapter or so from 
 A Tale of Tivo Cities, and talked about it." 
 
 " We should have liked it very much," Selina de- 
 clared. " Do tell us when there is another one, will 
 you?" 
 
 " With pleasure," he answered. " I warn you, 
 though, that you will be disappointed." 
 
 " We will risk that," Selina declared, with a smile. 
 " Have you been to Enton this week ? " 
 
 " I was there on Sunday," he answered. 
 
 " And is that beautiful girl, Lady Sybil Caroom, 
 still staying there?" 
 
 " Yes," he answered. " Is she very beautiful, by 
 the bye?" 
 
 " Well, I thought men would think so," Selina said, 
 hastily. " I think that she is just a little loud, don't 
 you, Louise ? " 
 
 Louise admitted that the idea had occurred to her. 
 
 "And her hair isn't it badly dyed?" Selina 
 remarked. " Such a pity. It 's all in patches." 
 
 " I think girls ought not to make up in the street, 
 either," Louise remarked, primly. " A little powder 
 in the house is all very well " (Louise had a nose
 
 126 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 which gave her trouble) " but I really don't think 
 it looks respectable in the street." 
 
 " I suppose," Selina remarked, " you men admire 
 all that sort of thing, don't you? " 
 
 " I really had n't noticed it with Lady Sybil," 
 Brooks admitted. 
 
 Selina sighed. 
 
 " Men are so blind," she remarked. " You watch 
 next time you are close to her, Mr. Brooks." 
 
 " I will," he promised. " I '11 get her between me 
 and a window in a strong north light." 
 
 Selina laughed. 
 
 "Don't be too unkind," she said. "That's the 
 worst of you men. When you do find anything out 
 you are always so severe." 
 
 " After all, though," Louise remarked, with a side- 
 long glance, " it must be very, very interesting to 
 meet these sort of people, even if one does n't quite 
 belong to their set. I should think you must find 
 every one else quite tame, Mr. Brooks." 
 
 " I can assure you I don't," he answered, coolly. 
 " This evening has provided me with quite as pleasant 
 society as ever I should wish for." 
 
 Selina beamed upon him. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Brooks, you are terrible. You do say 
 such things ! " she declared, archly. 
 
 Louise laughed a little hardly. 
 
 " We must n't take too much to ourselves, dear," 
 she said. " Remember that Mr. Brooks walked all 
 the way up from the Secular Hall with Mary." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom threw down his paper with a little 
 impatient exclamation. 
 
 " Come, come! " he said. " I want to have a few
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 127 
 
 words with Brooks myself, if you girls '11 give me a 
 chance. Heard anything from Henslow lately, eh ? " 
 
 Brooks leaned forward. 
 
 " Not a word ! " he answered. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom grunted. 
 
 " H'm ! He 's taken his seat, and that 's all he does 
 seem to have done. To have heard his last speech 
 here before polling time you would have imagined 
 him with half-a-dozen questions down before now. 
 He 's letting the estimates go by, too. There are 
 half-a-dozen obstructors, all faddists, but Henslow, 
 with a real case behind him, is sitting tight. 'Pon 
 my word, I 'm not sure that I like the fellow." 
 
 " I ventured to write to him the other evening," 
 Brooks said, " and I have sent him all the statistics 
 we promised. He seems to have regarded my letter 
 as an impertinence, though, for he has never an- 
 swered it." 
 
 " You mark my words," Mr. Bullsom said, doub- 
 ling the paper up and bringing it down viciously upon 
 his knee, " Henslow will never sit again for Med- 
 chester. There was none too much push about him 
 last session, but he smoothed us all over somehow. 
 He '11 not do it again. I 'm losing faith in the man, 
 [Brooks." 
 
 Brooks was genuinely disturbed. His own sus- 
 picions had been gathering strength during the last 
 few weeks. Henslow had been pleasant enough, but 
 a little flippant after the election. From London he 
 had promised to write to Mr. Bullsom, as chairman 
 of his election committee, mapping out the course of 
 action which, in pursuance of his somewhat daring 
 pledges, he proposed to embark upon. This was more
 
 128 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 than a month ago, and there had come not a single 
 word from him. All that vague distrust which 
 Brooks had sometimes felt in the man was rekindled 
 and increased, and with it came a flood of bitter 
 thoughts. Another opportunity then was to be lost. 
 For seven years longer these thousands of pallid, 
 heart-weary men and women were to suffer, with no 
 one to champion their cause. He saw again that sea 
 of eager faces in the market-place, lit with a sudden 
 gleam of hope as they listened to the bold words of 
 the man who was promising them life and hope and 
 better things. Surely if this was a betrayal it was an 
 evil deed, not passively to be borne. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom had refreshed himself with whisky- 
 and-water, and decided that pessimism was not a 
 healthy state of mind. 
 
 " I tell you what it is, Brooks," he said, more 
 cheerfully. " We must n't be too previous in judging 
 the fellow. Let's write him civilly, and if nothing 
 comes of it in a week or two, we will run up to 
 London, you and me, eh? and just haul him over the 
 coals." 
 
 " You are right, Mr. Bullsom," Brooks said. 
 " There is nothing we can do for the present." 
 
 " Please don't talk any more horrid politics," 
 Selina begged. " We want Mr. Brooks to give us a 
 lesson at billiards. Do you mind?" 
 
 Brooks rose at once. 
 
 " I shall be charmed ! " he declared. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom rose also. 
 
 " Pooh, pooh ! " he said. " Brooks and I will have 
 a hundred up and you can watch us. That '11 be 
 lesson enough for you."
 
 AN AWKWARD QUESTION 129 
 
 Selina made a little grimace, but they all left the 
 room together. In the hall a housemaid was speaking 
 at the telephone, and a moment afterwards she laid 
 the receiver down and came towards them. 
 
 " It is a message for Mr. Brooks, sir, from the 
 Queen's Hotel. Lord Arranmore's compliments, and 
 the ladies from Enton are at the theatre this evening, 
 and would be glad if Mr. Brooks would join them at 
 the Queen's Hotel for supper at eleven o'clock." 
 
 Brooks hesitated, but Mr. Bullsom spoke up at 
 once. 
 
 " Off you go, Brooks," he said, firmly. " Don't 
 you go refusing an invitation like that. Lord Arran- 
 more is a bit eccentric, they say, and he is n't the sort 
 of man to like refusals. You 've just got time." 
 
 " They had the message two hours ago, and have 
 been trying everywhere to find Mr. Brooks," the 
 housemaid added. 
 
 Selina helped him on with his coat. 
 
 " Will you come another evening soon and play 
 billiards with us ? " she asked, dropping her voice a 
 little. 
 
 " With pleasure," Brooks answered. " Do you 
 mind saying good-bye to your cousin for me? I am 
 sorry not to see her again."
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 A SUPPER-PARTY AT THE " QUEEN'S " 
 
 BROOKS was shown into a private room at the 
 Queen's Hotel, and he certainly had no cause 
 to complain of the warmth of his welcome. Lady 
 Sybil, in fact, made room for him by her side, and 
 he fancied that there was a gleam of reproach in 
 her eyes as she looked up at him. 
 
 " Is Medchester really so large a place that one 
 can get lost in it?" she asked. "Lord Arranmore 
 has been sending messengers in every direction ever 
 since we decided upon our little excursion." 
 
 " I telephoned to your office, sent a groom to your 
 rooms and to the club, and at last we had given you 
 up," Lord Arranmore remarked. 
 
 " And I," Sybil murmured, " was in a shocking 
 bad temper." 
 
 " It is very good of you all," Brooks remarked, 
 cheerfully. " I left the office rather early, and have 
 been giving a sort of lecture to-night at the Secular 
 Hall. Then I went up to have a game of billiards 
 with Mr. Bullsom. Your telephone message found 
 me there. You must remember that even if Med- 
 chester is not a very large place I am a very unim- 
 portant person." 
 
 " Dear me, what modesty," Lady Caroom re- 
 marked, laughing. " To us, however, you happened 
 to be very important. I hate a party of three."
 
 A SUPPER-PARTY AT THE " QUEEN'S " 131 
 
 Brooks helped himself to a quail, and remembered 
 that he was hungry. 
 
 "This is very unusual dissipation, isn't it?" he 
 asked. " I never dreamed that you would be likely 
 to come into our little theatre." 
 
 " It was Sybil's doings," Lady Caroom answered. 
 " She declared that she was dull, and that she had 
 never seen A Message from Mars. I think that all 
 that serious talk the other evening gave her the 
 blues." 
 
 " I am always dull in the winter when there is no 
 hunting," Sybil remarked. " This frost is abomin- 
 able. I have not forgotten our talk either. I feel 
 positively wicked every time I sip champagne." 
 
 " Our young philanthropist will reassure you," 
 Arranmore remarked, drily. 
 
 Lady Caroom sighed. 
 
 " I wonder how it is," she murmured, " that one's 
 conscience and one's digestion both grow weaker as 
 one grows old. You and I, Arranmore, are content 
 to accept the good things of the earth as they come 
 to us." 
 
 " With me," he answered, " it is the philosophy of 
 approaching old age, but you have no such excuse. 
 iWith you it must be sheer callousness. You are in 
 an evil way, Lady Caroom. Do have another of 
 these quails." 
 
 " You are very rude," she answered, " and ex- 
 tremely unsympathetic. But I will have another 
 quail."' 
 
 " I do not want to destroy your appetite, Mr. 
 Brooks," Lady Sybil said, " but this is if not a 
 farewell feast, something like it."
 
 132 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 He looked at her with sudden interest. 
 
 :< You are going away ? " he exclaimed. 
 
 " Very soon," she assented. " We were so com- 
 fortable at Enton, and the hunting has been so good, 
 that we cut out one of our visits. Mamma developed 
 a convenient attack of influenza. But the next one 
 is very near now, and our host is almost tired of 
 us." 
 
 Lord Arranmore was for a moment silent. 
 
 " You have made Enton," he said, " intolerable for 
 a solitary man. When you go I go." 
 
 " I wish you could say whither instead of when," 
 Lady Caroom answered. " How bored you would 
 be at Redcliffe. It is really the most outlandish place 
 we go to." 
 
 " Why ever do we accept, mamma? " Sybil asked. 
 " Last year I nearly cried my eyes out, I was so dull. 
 Not a man fit to talk to, or a horse fit to ride. The 
 girls bicycle, and Lord Redcliffe breeds cattle and 
 talks turnips." 
 
 " And they all drink port after dinner," Lady 
 Caroom moaned ; " but we have to go, dear. We 
 must live rent free somewhere during these months 
 to get through the season." 
 
 Sybil looked at Brooks with laughter in her eyes. 
 
 "Aren't we terrible people?" she whispered 
 " You are by way of being literary, are n't you ? 
 You should write an article on the shifts of the 
 aristocracy. Mamma and I could supply you with 
 all the material. The real trouble, of course, is that 
 I don't marry." 
 
 " Fancy glorying in your failure," Lady Caroom 
 .said, complacently. " Three seasons, Arranmore,
 
 A SUPPER-PARTY AT THE "QUEEN'S" 133 
 
 have I had to drag that girl round. I Ve washed 
 my hands of her now. She must look after herself. 
 A girl who refuses one of the richest young men 
 in England because she did n't like his collars is 
 incorrigible.'' * 
 
 " It was not his collars, mother," Sybil objected. 
 " It was his neck. He was always called ' the 
 Giraffe.' He had no head and all neck the most 
 fatuous person, too. I hate fools." 
 
 " That is where you lack education, dear," Lady 
 Caroom answered. " A fool is the most useful per- 
 son for a husband." 
 
 Sybil glanced towards Brooks with a little sigh, 
 and, catching a glimpse of his expression, burst out 
 laughing. 
 
 " Mother, you must really not let your tongue 
 run away with you. Mr. Brooks is believing every 
 word you say. You need n't," she murmured in a 
 discreet undertone. " Mother and I chaff one an- 
 other terribly, but we 're really very nicely-behaved 
 persons for our station in life." 
 
 " Lady Caroom has such a delightfully easy way 
 of romancing," Brooks said. 
 
 Sybil nodded. 
 
 " It 's quite true," she answered. " She ought to 
 write the prospectuses for gold mines and things." 
 
 Arranmore smiled across the table at Brooks. 
 
 " This," he said, " is what I have had to endure 
 for the last six weeks. Do you wonder that I am 
 getting balder, or that I set all my people to work to- 
 night to try and find some one to suffer with me? " 
 
 " He '11 be so dull when we 've gone," Lady Caroom 
 sighed.
 
 134 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " You 've no idea how we 've improved him," Sybil 
 murmured. " He used to read Owen Meredith after 
 dinner, and go to sleep. By the bye, where are you 
 going when we leave Enton ? " 
 
 Lord Arranmore hesitated. v 
 
 " Well, I really am not sure," he said. " You have 
 alarmed me. Don't go." 
 
 Lady Caroom laughed. 
 
 " My dear man," she said, " we must ! I dare n't 
 offend the Redcliffes. He 's my trustee, and he '11 
 never let me overdraw a penny unless I 'm civil to 
 him. If I were you I should go to the Riviera. 
 iWe '11 lend you our cottage at Lugiano. It has been 
 empty for a year." 
 
 " Come and be hostess," he said. " I promise you 
 that I will not hesitate then." 
 
 She shook her head towards Sybil. 
 
 "How can I marry that down there?" she de- 
 manded. " No young men who are really respect- 
 able go abroad at this time of the year. They are 
 all hunting or shooting. The Riviera is thronged 
 with roues and invalids and adventurers, and we 
 don't want any of them. Dear me, what sacrifices 
 a grown-up daughter does entail. This coming sea- 
 son shall be your last, Sybil. I won't drag you 
 round again. I 'm really getting ashamed of it." 
 
 " Is n't she dreadful? " Sybil murmured to Brooks. 
 " I hope you will come to Enton before we leave." 
 
 " It is very kind of you, Lady Sybil," Brooks said, 
 " but you must remember that I am not like most 
 of the men you meet. I have to work hard, espe- 
 cially just now." 
 
 " And if I were you I would be thankful for it,"
 
 A SUPPER-PARTY AT THE "QUEEN'S" 135 
 
 she said, warmly. " From our point of view, at any 
 rate, there is nothing so becoming to a man as the 
 fact that he is a worker. Sport is an excellent thing, 
 but I detest young men who do nothing else but shoot 
 and hunt and loaf about. It seems to me to destroy 
 character where work creates it. All the same, I hope 
 you will find an opportunity to come to Enton and say 
 good-bye to us." 
 
 Brooks was suddenly conscious that it would be 
 no pleasant thing to say good-bye to Lady Sybil. 
 He had never known any one like her, so perfectly 
 frank and girlish, and yet with character enough un- 
 derneath in her rare moments of seriousness. More 
 than ever he was struck with the wonderful likeness 
 between mother and daughter. 
 
 " I will come at any time I am asked," he answered, 
 quietly, " but I am sorry that you are going." 
 
 They had finished supper, and had drawn their 
 chairs around the fire. Arranmore was smoking a 
 cigarette, and Brooks took one from his case. The 
 carriage was ordered in a quarter of an hour. Brooks 
 found that he and Sybil were a little apart from the 
 others. 
 
 " Do you know, I am sorry too," she declared. 
 "Of course it has been much quieter at Enton than 
 most of the houses we go to, and we only came at 
 first, I think, because many years ago my mother 
 and Lord Arranmore were great friends, and she 
 fancied that he was shutting himself up too much. 
 But I have enjoyed it very much indeed." 
 
 He looked at her curiously. He was trying to 
 appreciate what a life of refined pleasure which she 
 must live would really be like how satisfying
 
 136 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 whether its limitations ever asserted themselves. 
 Sybil was a more than ordinarily pretty girl, but 
 her face was as smooth as a child's. The joie de 
 vivre seemed to be always in her eyes. Yet there 
 were times, as he knew, when she was capable of 
 seriousness. 
 
 " I am glad," he said, " Lord Arranmore will miss 
 you." 
 
 She laughed at him, her eyebrows raised, a chal- 
 lenge in her bright eyes. 
 
 " May I add that I also shall ? " he whispered. 
 
 " You may," she answered. " In fact, I expected 
 it. I am not sure that I did not ask for it. And 
 that reminds me. I want you to do me a favour, if 
 you will." 
 
 " Anything I can do for you," he answered, " you 
 know will give me pleasure." 
 
 She laughed softly. 
 
 " It is wonderful how you have improved," she 
 murmured. " I want you to go and see Lord Arran- 
 more as often as you can. We are both very fond 
 of him really, mamma especially, and you know that 
 he has a very strange disposition. I am convinced 
 that solitude is the very worst thing for him. I saw 
 him once after he had been alone for a month or 
 two, and really you would not have known him. He 
 was as thin as a skeleton, strange in his manner, and 
 he had that sort of red light in his eyes sometimes 
 which always makes me think of mad people. He 
 ought not to be alone at all, but the usual sort of 
 society only bores him. You will do what you can, 
 won't you? " 
 
 " I promise you that most heartily," Brooks de-
 
 A SUPPER-PARTY AT THE "QUEEN'S" 137 
 
 clared. " But you must remember, Lady Sybil, that 
 after all it is entirely in his hands. He has been most 
 astonishingly kind to me, considering that I have no 
 manner of claim upon him. He has made me feel at 
 home at Enton, too, and been most thoughtful in 
 every way. For, after all, you see I am only his 
 man of business. I have no friends much, and those 
 whom I have are Medchester people. You see I am 
 scarcely in a position to offer him my society. But 
 all the same, I will take every opportunity I can of 
 going to Enton if he remains there." 
 
 She thanked him silently. Lady Caroom was on 
 her feet, and Sybil and she went out for their wraps. 
 Lord Arranmore lit a fresh cigarette and sent for his 
 bill. 
 
 " By the bye, Brooks," he remarked, " one does n't 
 hear much of your man Henslow." 
 
 " Mr. Bullsom and I were talking about it this 
 evening," Brooks answered. " We are getting a 
 little anxious." 
 
 " You have had seven years of him. You ought 
 to know what to expect." 
 
 " The war has blocked all legislation," Brooks said. 
 " It has been the usual excuse. Henslow was bound 
 to wait. He would have done the particular measures 
 which we are anxious about more harm than good if 
 he had tried to force them upon the land. But now 
 it is different. We are writing to him. If nothing 
 comes of it, Mr. Bullsom and I are going up to see 
 him." 
 
 Arranmore smiled. 
 
 " You are young to politics, Brooks," he remarked, 
 " yet I should scarcely have thought that you would
 
 138 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 have been imposed upon by such a man as Henslow. 
 He is an absolute fraud. I heard him speak once, and 
 I read two of his speeches. It was sufficient. The 
 man is not in earnest. He has some reason, I sup- 
 pose, for wishing to write M.P. after his name, but 
 I am perfectly certain that he has not the slightest 
 idea of carrying out his pledges to you. You will 
 have to take up politics, Brooks." 
 
 He laughed a little consciously. 
 
 " Some day," he said, " the opportunity may come. 
 I will confess that it is amongst my ambitions. But 
 I have many years' work before me yet." 
 
 Lord Arranmore paid the bill, and they joined the 
 women. As Brooks stood bareheaded upon the pave- 
 ment Arranmore turned towards him. 
 
 " We must have a farewell dinner," he said. "How 
 would to-morrow suit you or Sunday ? " 
 
 " I should like to walk over on Sunday, if I might," 
 Brooks answered, promptly. 
 
 " We shall expect you to lunch. Good-night." 
 
 The carriage drove off. Brooks walked thought- 
 fully through the silent streets to his rooms.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 UNCLE AND NIECE 
 
 MR. BULLSOM was an early riser, and it 
 chanced that, as was frequently the case, 
 on the morning following Brooks' visit he and Mary 
 sat down to breakfast together. But when, after a 
 cursory glance through his letters, he unfolded the 
 paper, she stopped him. 
 
 " Uncle," she said, " I want to talk to you for a 
 few minutes, if I may." 
 
 " Go ahead," he answered. " No fear of our being 
 interrupted. I shall speak to those girls seriously 
 about getting up. Now, what is it ? " 
 
 " I want to earn my own living, uncle," she said, 
 quietly. 
 
 He looked over his spectacles at her. 
 
 "Eh?" 
 
 " I want to earn my own living," she repeated. 
 " I have been looking about for a means of doing 
 so, and I think that I have succeeded." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom took off his spectacles and wiped 
 them carefully. 
 
 " Earn your own living, eh !" he repeated. "Well ! 
 Go on!" " 
 
 Mary leaned across the table towards him. 
 
 " Don't think that I am not grateful for all you 
 have done for me, uncle," she said. " I am, indeed.
 
 140 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Only I have felt lately that it was my duty to order 
 my life a little differently. I am young and strong, 
 and able to work. There is no reason why I should 
 be a burden upon any one." 
 
 She found his quietness ominous, but she did not 
 flinch. 
 
 " I am not accomplished enough for a governess, 
 or good-tempered enough for a companion," she 
 continued, " but I believe I have found something 
 which I can do. I have written several short stories 
 for a woman's magazine, and they have made me a 
 sort of offer to do some regular work for them. 
 What they offer would just keep me. I want to 
 accept." 
 
 " Where should you live? " he asked. 
 
 "In London!" " 
 
 "Alone?" 
 
 " There is a girls' club in Chelsea somewhere. I 
 should go there at first, and then try and share 
 rooms with another girl." 
 
 " How much a week will they give you? " 
 
 " Twenty-eight shillings, and I shall be allowed 
 to contribute regularly to the magazine at the usual 
 rates. I ought to make at least forty shillings a 
 week." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom sighed. 
 
 " Is this owing to any disagreement between you 
 and the girls?" he asked, sharply. 
 
 " Certainly not," she answered. 
 
 " You ain't unhappy here ? Is there anything we 
 could do? I don't want to lose you." 
 
 Mary was touched. She had expected ridicule or 
 opposition. This was more difficult.
 
 UNCLE AND NIECE 141 
 
 " Of course I am not unhappy," she answered. 
 " You and aunt have been both of you most gen- 
 erous and kind to me. But I do feel that a busy 
 life and I 'm not a bit domestic, you know 
 would be good for me. I believe, uncle, if you 
 were in my place you would feel just like me. If 
 you were able to, I expect you 'd want to earn your 
 own living." 
 
 " You shall go! " he said, decidedly. " I '11 help 
 you all I can. You shall have a bit down to buy 
 furniture, if you want it, or an allowance till you 
 feel your way. But, Mary, I 'm downright sorry. 
 No, I 'm not blaming you. You 've a right to go. 
 I I don't believe I 'd live here if I were you." 
 
 " You are very good, uncle," Mary said, gratefully. 
 " And you must remember it is n't as though I were 
 leaving you alone. You have the girls." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom nodded. 
 
 ; ' Yes," he said, " I have the girls. Look here, 
 Mary," he added, suddenly, looking her in the face, 
 " I want to have a word with you. I 'm going to 
 talk plainly. Be honest with me." 
 
 " Of course," she murmured. 
 
 " It 's about the girls. It 's a hard thing to say, 
 but somehow I 'm a bit disappointed with them." 
 
 She looked at him in something like amazement. 
 
 " Yes, disappointed," he continued. " That 's the 
 word. I 'm an uneducated man myself any fool 
 can see that but I did all I could to have them 
 girls different. They 've been to the best school in 
 Medchester, and they 've been abroad. They 've had 
 masters in most everything, and I 've had 'em taught 
 riding and driving, and all that sort of thing, prop-
 
 142 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 erly. Then as they grew up I built this 'ouse, and 
 came up to live here amongst the people whom I 
 reckoned my girls 'd be sure to get to know. And 
 the whole thing 's a damned failure, Mary. That 's 
 the long and short of it." 
 
 " Perhaps a little later on " Mary began, 
 
 hesitatingly. 
 
 " Don't interrupt me," he said, brusquely. " This 
 is the first honest talk I 've ever had about it, and 
 it 's doing me good. The girls 'd like to put it down 
 to your mother and me, but I don't believe it. I 'm 
 ashamed to say it, but I 'm afraid it 's the girls them- 
 selves. There 's something not right about them, but 
 I 'm blessed if I know what it is. Their mother and 
 I are a bit vulgar, I know, but I Ve done my best to 
 copy those who know how to behave and I believe 
 we 'd get through for what we are anywhere without 
 giving offence. But my girls ought n't to be vulgar. 
 It 's education as does away with that, and I 've filled 
 'em chock-full of education from the time they were 
 babies. It 's run out of them, Mary, like the sands 
 through an hour-glass. They can speak correctly, 
 and I dare say they know all the small society tricks. 
 But that is n't everything. They don't know how to 
 dress. They can spend just as much as they like, 
 and then you can come into the room in a black 
 gown as you made yourself, and you look a lady, 
 and they don't. That 's the long and short of it. 
 The only decent people who come to this house are 
 your friends, and they come to see you. There 's 
 young Brooks, now. I 've no son, Mary, and I 'm 
 fond of young men. I never knew one I liked as I 
 like him. My daughters are old enough to be mar-
 
 UNCLE AND NIECE 143 
 
 ried, and I 'd give fifty thousand pounds to have him 
 for a son-in-law. And, of course, he won't look at 
 'em. He sees it. He '11 talk to you. He takes no 
 more notice of them than is civil. They fuss round 
 him, and all that, but they might save themselves the 
 pains. It 's hard lines, Mary. I 'm making money 
 as no one knows on. I could live at Enton and afford 
 it. But what 's the good of it? If people don't care 
 to know us here, they won't anywhere. Mary, how 
 was it education did n't work with them girls? Your 
 mother was my own sister, and she married a gentle- 
 man. He was a blackguard, but hang it, Mary, if I 
 were you I 'd sooner be penniless and as you are than 
 be my daughters with five thousand apiece." 
 
 There was an embarrassed silence. Then Mary 
 faced the situation boldly. 
 
 " Uncle," she said, " you are asking my advice. 
 Is that it?" 
 
 " If there 's any advice you can give, for God's 
 sake let 's have it. But I don't know as you can 
 make black white." 
 
 " Selina and Louise are good girls enough," she 
 said, " but they are a little spoilt, and they are a 
 little limited in their ideas. A town like this often 
 has that effect. Take them abroad, uncle, for a year, 
 or, better still, if you can find the right person, get 
 a companion for them a lady and let her live 
 in the house." 
 
 " That 's sound ! " he answered. " I '11 do it." 
 
 " And about their clothes, uncle. Take them up 
 to London, go to one of the best places, and leave 
 the people to make their things. Don't let them in- 
 terfere. Down here they 've got to choose for them-
 
 144 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 selves. They would n't care about taking advice here, 
 but in London they 'd probably be content to leave it. 
 Take them up to town for a fortnight. Stay at one 
 of the best hotels, the Berkeley or the Carlton, and 
 let them see plenty of nice people. And don't be dis- 
 couraged, uncle." 
 
 " Where the devil did you get your common-sense 
 from ? " he inquired, fiercely. " Your mother had n't 
 got it, and I '11 swear your father had n't." 
 
 She laughed heartily. 
 
 " Above all, be firm with them, uncle," she said. 
 " Put your foot down, and stick to it. They '11 obey 
 you." 
 
 "Obey me? Good Lord, I'll make 'em," Mr. 
 Bullsom declared, vigorously. " Mary, you 're a 
 brick. I feel quite cheerful. And, remember this, 
 my girl. I shall make you an allowance, but that 's 
 nothing. Come to me when you want a bit extra, 
 and if ever the young man turns up, then I 've got 
 a word or two to say. Mind, I shall only be giving 
 you your own. My will 's signed and sealed." 
 
 She kissed him fondly. 
 
 " You 're a good sort, uncle," she said. " And 
 now will you tell me what you think of this letter? " 
 
 " Read it to me, dear," he said. " My eyes are n't 
 what they were." 
 
 She obeyed him. 
 
 "41, BUCKLESBURY, LONDON, E. C. 
 
 " DEAR MADAM, 
 
 " We have received a communication from our 
 agents at Montreal, asking us to ascertain the where- 
 abouts of Miss Mary Scott, daughter of Richard Scott, 
 at one time a resident in that city.
 
 UNCLE AND NIECE 145 
 
 " We believe that you are the young lady in question, 
 and if you will do us the favour of calling at the above 
 address, we may be able to give you some information 
 much to your advantage. 
 
 " We are, dear madam, 
 " Yours respectfully, 
 
 " JONES AND LLOYD/' 
 
 Mr. Bullsom stroked his chin thoughtfully. 
 
 " Sounds all right," he remarked. " Of course 
 you'll go. But I always understood that your father's 
 relations were as poor as church mice." 
 
 " Poorer, uncle ! His father my grandfather, 
 that is was a clergyman with barely enough to 
 live on, and his uncle was a Roman Catholic priest. 
 Both of them have been dead for years." 
 
 " And your father well, I know there was 
 nothing there," Mr. Bullsom remarked, thoughtfully. 
 
 " You cabled out the money to bring me home," 
 Mary reminded him. 
 
 " Well, well ! " Mr. Bullsom declared. " You must 
 go and see these chaps. There 's no harm in that, at 
 any rate. We must all have that trip to London. I 
 expect Brooks will be wanting to go and see Henslow. 
 We '11 have to give that chap what for, I know." 
 
 Selina sailed into the room in a salmon-coloured 
 wrapper, which should long ago have been relegated 
 to the bath-room. She pecked her father on the cheek 
 and nodded to Mary. 
 
 "Don't you see Mr. Brooks, dear?" her father 
 remarked, with a twinkle in his eye and something 
 very much like a wink to Mary. 
 
 Selina screamed, and looked fearfully around the 
 room. 
 
 10
 
 146 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 "What do you mean, papa?" she exclaimed. 
 " There is no one here." 
 
 " Serve you right if there had been," Mr. Bullsom 
 declared, gruffly. " A pretty state to come down in 
 the morning at past nine o'clock." 
 
 Selina tossed her head. 
 
 " I am going to dress directly after breakfast," she 
 remarked. 
 
 " Then if you '11 allow me to say so," her father 
 declared, " before breakfast is the time to dress, and 
 not afterwards. You 're always the same, Selina, 
 underdressed when you think there 's no one around 
 to see you, and overdressed when there is." 
 
 Selina poured herself out some coffee and yawned. 
 
 "La, papa, what do you know about it?" she 
 exclaimed. 
 
 " What my eyes tell me," Mr. Bullsom declared, 
 sternly. " You 've no allowance to keep to. You 've 
 leave to spend what you want, and you 're never fit to 
 be seen. There 's Mary there taking thirty pounds a 
 year from me, and won't have a penny more, though 
 she 's heartily welcome to it, and she looks a lady at 
 any moment of the day." 
 
 Selina drew herself up, and her eyes narrowed a 
 little. 
 
 " You 're talking about what you don't understand, 
 pa," she answered with dignity. " If you prefer Mary's 
 style of dress " she glanced with silent disparage- 
 ment at her cousin's grey skirt and plain white blouse 
 " well, it 's a matter of taste, is n't it? " 
 
 " Taste ! " Mr. Bullsom replied, contemptuously. 
 " Taste ! What sort of taste do you call that beastly 
 rug on your shoulders, eh ? Or your hair rolled round
 
 UNCLE AND NIECE 147 
 
 and just a pin stuck through it? Looks as though it 
 had n't been brushed for a week. Faugh ! When 
 your mother and I lived on two pounds a week she 
 never insulted me by coming down to breakfast in 
 such a thing." 
 
 Selina eyed her father in angry astonishment. 
 
 " Thing indeed ! " she repeated. " This wrapper 
 cost me four guineas, and came from Paris. That 
 shows how much you know about it." 
 
 "From Paris, did it?" Mr. Bullsom retorted, 
 fiercely. " Then up-stairs you go and take it off. 
 You girls have had your own way too much, and 
 I 'm about tired of it." 
 
 " I shall change it after breakfast," Selina said, 
 doubtfully. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom threw open the door. 
 
 " Up-stairs," he repeated, " and throw it into the 
 rag-bag." 
 
 Selina hesitated. Then she rose, and with scarlet 
 cheeks and a poor show of dignity, left the room. 
 Mr. Bullsom drew himself up and beamed upon 
 Mary. 
 
 " I '11 show 'em a bit," he declared, with great 
 good-humour. " I may be an ignorant old man, but 
 I 'm going to wake these girls up." 
 
 Mary struggled for a moment, but her sense of 
 humour triumphed. She burst out laughing. 
 
 " Oh, uncle, uncle," she exclaimed, " you 're a 
 wonderful man." 
 
 He beamed upon her. 
 
 " You come shopping with us in London," he 
 said. " We '11 have some fun."
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 
 
 EALLY," Lady Caroom exclaimed, " Enton 
 is tne cosiest large house I was ever in. Do 
 throw that Bradshaw away, Arranmore. The one 
 o'clock train will do quite nicely." 
 
 Lord Arranmore obeyed her literally. He jerked 
 the volume lightly into a far corner of the room and 
 came over to her side. She was curled up in a huge 
 easy-chair, and her face caught by the glow of the 
 dancing firelight almost startled him by its youth. 
 There was not a single sign of middle age in the 
 smooth cheeks, not a single grey hair, no sign of 
 weariness in the soft full eyes raised to his. 
 
 She caught his glance and smiled. 
 
 "The firelight is so becoming!" she murmured. 
 
 " Don't go ! " he said. 
 
 "My dear Arranmore. The Redcliffes would never 
 forgive me, and we must go some time." 
 
 " I don't see the necessity," he answered, slowly. 
 " You like Enton. Make it your home." 
 
 She raised her eyebrows. 
 
 " How improper ! " 
 
 " Not necessarily," he answered. " Take me too." 
 
 She sat up in her chair and regarded him steadily. 
 
 " Am I to regard this," she asked, " as an offer of 
 marriage?"
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 149 
 
 " Well, it sounds like it," he admitted. 
 
 " Dear me. You might have given me a little more 
 notice," she said. " Let me think for a moment, 
 please." 
 
 Perhaps their thoughts travelled back in the same 
 direction. He remembered his cousin and his play- 
 fellow, the fairest and daintiest girl he had ever seen, 
 his best friend, his constant companion. He remem- 
 bered the days when she had first become something 
 more to him, the miseries of that time, his hopeless 
 ineligibility the separation. Then the years of 
 absence, the terrible branding years of his life, the 
 horrible pit, the time when night and day his only 
 prayer had been the prayer for death. The self- 
 repression of years seemed to grow weaker and 
 weaker. He held out his hands. But she hesitated. 
 
 " Dear," she said, " you make me very happy. It 
 is wonderful to think this may come after all these 
 years. But there is something which I wish to say to 
 you first." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " You are very, very dear to me now as you are 
 but you are not the man I loved years ago. You 
 are a very different person indeed. Sometimes I am 
 almost afraid of you." 
 
 " You have no cause to be," he said. " Indeed, you 
 have no cause to be. So far as you are concerned I 
 have never changed. I am the same man." 
 
 She took one of his hands in hers. 
 
 " Philip," she said, " you must not think hardly of 
 me. You must not think of me as simply afflicted 
 with the usual woman's curiosity. I am not curious 
 at all. I would rather not know. But remember that
 
 150 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 for nearly twenty years you passed out of my life. 
 You have come back again wonderfully altered. You 
 do not wish to keep the story of those years for ever 
 a sort of Bluebeard's chamber in our lives? " 
 
 " Not I," he answered. " I would have you do as 
 I have done, rip them out page and chapter, annihilate 
 them utterly. What have they to do with the life 
 before us? To you they would seem evil enough, to 
 me they are thronged with horrible memories, with 
 memories which, could I take them with me, would 
 poison heaven itself. So let us blot them out for ever. 
 Come to me, Catherine, and help me to forget." 
 
 She looked at him with strained eyes. 
 
 " Philip," she said, " I must understand you. I 
 must understand what has made you the man you 
 are." 
 
 " Fifteen years in hell has done it," he answered, 
 fiercely. " Not even my memory shall ever take me 
 back." 
 
 " If I marry you," she said, " remember that I 
 marry your past as well as your future. And there 
 are things which need explanation." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " You have been married." 
 
 " She is dead." 
 
 " You have a son." 
 
 He reeled as though he had been struck, and 
 the silence between them was as the silence of 
 tragedy. 
 
 " You see," she continued, " I am bound to ask you 
 to lift the curtain a little. Fate or instinct, or what- 
 ever you may like to call it, has led me a little way. 
 I am not afraid to know. I have seen too much of
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 151 
 
 life to be a hard judge. But you must hold out your 
 hand and take me a little further." 
 
 " I cannot." 
 
 She held him tightly. Her voice trembled a little. 
 
 " Dear, you must. I am not an exacting woman, 
 and I love you too well to be a hard judge of anything 
 you might have to tell me. Ignorance is the only 
 thing which I cannot bear. Remember how greatly 
 you are changed, you are almost a stranger to me in 
 some of your moods. I could not have you wander- 
 ing off into worlds of which I knew nothing. Sit 
 down by my side and talk to me. I will ask no 
 questions. You shall tell me your own way, and what 
 you wish to leave out leave it out. Come, is this 
 so hard a task ? " 
 
 He seemed frozen into inanition. His face was 
 like the cast of a dead man's. His voice was cold and 
 hopeless. \ 
 
 11 The key," he said, " is gone. I shall never seek 
 for it, I shall never find it. I have known what 
 madness is, and I am afraid. Shall we go into the 
 hall? I fancy that they are serving tea." 
 
 She looked at him, half terrified, half amazed. 
 
 " You mean this as final ? " she said, deliberately. 
 " You refuse to offer any explanation, the explana- 
 tion which common decency even would require of 
 these things? " 
 
 " I expected too much," he answered. " I know it 
 very well. Forgive me, and let us forget." 
 
 She rose to her feet. 
 
 " I do not know that you will ever regret this," she 
 said. " I pray that you may. . . ." 
 
 To Brooks she seemed the same charming woman
 
 152 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 as usual, as he heard her light laugh come floating 
 across the hall, and bowed over her white fingers. 
 But Sybil saw the over-bright eyes and nervous 
 mouth and had hard work to keep back the tears. 
 She piled the cushions about a dark corner of the 
 divan, and chattered away recklessly. 
 
 " This is a night of sorrows," she exclaimed, pour- 
 ing out the tea. " Mr. Brooks and I were in the midst 
 of a most affecting leave-taking when the tea came. 
 Why do these mundane things always break in upon 
 the most sacred moments? " 
 
 " Life," Lady Caroom said, helping herself reck- 
 lessly to muffin, " is such a wonderful mixture of the 
 real and the fanciful, the actual and the sentimental, 
 one is always treading on the heels of the other. The 
 little man who turns the handle must have lots of 
 fun." 
 
 " If only he has a sense of humour," Brooks 
 interposed. " After all, though, it is the grisly, 
 ugly things which float to the top. One has to 
 probe always for the beautiful, and it requires our 
 rarest and most difficult sense to apprehend the 
 humorous." 
 
 Lord Arranmore stirred his tea slowly. His face 
 was like the face of a carved image. Only Brooks 
 seemed still unconscious of the shadow which was 
 stalking amongst them. 
 
 " We talk of life so glibly," he said. " It is a pity 
 that we cannot realize its simplest elements. Life is 
 purely subjective. Nothing exists except in our point 
 of view. So we are continually making and marring 
 our own lives and the lives of other people by a word, 
 an action, a thought."
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 153 
 
 Dear me ! " Lady Caroom murmured. " How- 
 ever shall I be able to play bridge after tea if you all 
 try to addle my brain by paradoxes and subtle sayings 
 beforehand ! What does Arranmore mean ? " 
 
 He put down his cup. 
 
 " Do not dare to understand me," he said. " It 
 is the most sincere unkindness when one talks only 
 to answer. And as for bridge remember that this 
 is a night of mourning. Bridge is far too frivolous 
 a pursuit/' 
 
 "Bridge a frivolous pursuit?" Sybil exclaimed. 
 " Heavens, what sacrilege. What ought we to do, 
 Lord Arranmore? " 
 
 " Sit in sackcloth and ashes, and hear Brooks lec- 
 ture on the poor," he answered, lightly. " Brooks is 
 a mixture of the sentimentalist and the hideous pessi- 
 mist, you know, and it is the privilege of his years to 
 be sometimes in earnest. I know nothing more de- 
 pressing than to listen to a man who is in earnest." 
 
 " You are getting positively light-headed," Sybil 
 laughed. " I can see no pleasure in life save that 
 which comes from an earnest pursuit of things, good 
 or evil." 
 
 " My dear child," Lord Arranmore answered, 
 " when you are a little older you will know that to 
 take life seriously is a sheer impossibility. You may 
 think that you are doing it, but you are not." 
 
 " There must be exceptions," Sybil declared. 
 
 " There are none," Lord Arranmore answered, 
 lightly, " outside the madhouse. For the realization 
 of life comes only hand in hand with insanity. The 
 people who have come nearest to it carry the mark 
 with them all their life. For the fever of knowledge
 
 154 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 will scorch even those who peer over the sides of 
 the cauldron." 
 
 Lady Caroom helped herself to some more tea. 
 
 " Really, Arranmore," she drawled, " for sheer and 
 unadulterated pessimism you are unsurpassed. You 
 must be a very morbid person." 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " One is always called morbid," he remarked, "who 
 dares to look towards the truth." 
 
 " There are people," Lady Caroom answered, "who 
 look always towards the clouds, even when the sun is 
 shining." 
 
 " I am in the minority," Lord Arranmore said, 
 smiling. " I feel myself becoming isolated. Let us 
 abandon the subject." 
 
 " No, let us convert you instead," Sybil declared. 
 " We want to look at the sun, and we want to take 
 you with us. You are really a very stupid person, you 
 know. Why do you want to stay all alone amongst 
 the shadows? " 
 
 Arranmore smiled faintly. 
 
 " The sun shines,"" he said, " only for those who 
 have eyes to see it." 
 
 " Blindness is not incurable," she answered. 
 
 " Save when the light in the eyes is dead," he 
 answered. " Come, shall we play a game at four- 
 handed billiards?" 
 
 It resolved itself into a match between Lady 
 Caroom and Lord Arranmore, who were both players 
 far above the average. Sybil and Brooks talked, but 
 for once her attention wandered. She seemed listen- 
 ing to the click of the billiard-balls, and watching the 
 man and the woman between whom all conversation
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 155 
 
 seemed dead. Brooks noticed her absorption, and 
 abandoned his own attempts to interest her. 
 
 " Your mother and Lord Arranmore," he re- 
 marked, " are very old friends." 
 
 " They have known one another all their lives," 
 she murmured. " Lord Arranmore has changed a 
 good deal though since his younger days." 
 
 Brooks made no reply. The girl suddenly bent her 
 head towards him. 
 
 " Are you a judge of character ? " she asked. 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " Scarcely. I have not had enough experience. It 
 is a fascinating study." 
 
 " Very. Now I want to ask you something. What 
 do you think of Lord Arranmore? " 
 
 Her tone betokened unusual seriousness. His light 
 answer died away on his lips. 
 
 " It is very hard for me to answer that question," 
 he said. " Lord Arranmore has been most unnec- 
 essarily kind to me." 
 
 "His character?" 
 
 " I do not pretend to be able to understand it. I 
 think that he is often wilfully misleading. He does 
 not wish to be understood. He delights in paradoxy 
 and moral gymnastics." 
 
 " He may blind your judgment. How do you per- 
 sonally feel towards him ? " 
 
 " That," he answered, " might be misleading. He 
 has shown me so much kindness. Yet I think I 
 am sure that I liked him from the first moment 
 I saw him." 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " I like him too. I cannot help it. Yet one can be
 
 156 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 with him, can live in the same house for weeks, even 
 months, and remain an utter stranger to him. He has 
 self-repression which is marvellous never at fault 
 never a joint loose. One wonders so much what 
 lies beyond. One would like to know." 
 
 "Is it wise?" he asked. "After all, is it our 
 concern ? " 
 
 " Not ours. But if you were a woman would you 
 be content to take him on trust? " 
 
 " It would depend upon my own feelings," he 
 answered, hesitatingly. 
 
 "Whether you cared for him?" 
 
 "Yes!" 
 
 She beat the floor with her foot. 
 
 " You are wrong," she said, " I am sure that 
 you are wrong. To care for one is to wish ever to 
 believe the best of them. It is better to keep apart 
 for ever than to run any risks. Supposing that 
 unknown past was of evil, and one discovered it. 
 To care for him would only make the suffering 
 keener." 
 
 " It may be so," he admitted. " May I ask you 
 something? " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " You speak of yourself? " 
 
 Her eyes met his, and he looked hastily downwards. 
 
 " Absurd," she murmured, and inclined her head 
 towards the billiard-table. " They have been at- 
 tached to one another always. Come over here to the 
 window, and I will tell you something." 
 
 They walked towards the great circular window 
 which overlooked the drive. As they stood there 
 together a four-wheeled cab drove slowly by, and a
 
 FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL 157 
 
 girl leaned forward and looked at them. Brooks 
 started as he recognized her. 
 
 " Why, that must be some one for me," he ex- 
 claimed, in a puzzled tone. " Whatever can have 
 happened to old Bullsom ? " 
 
 She looked at him politely bewildered. 
 
 " It is the niece of a man whom I know very well in 
 Medchester," he exclaimed. " Something must have 
 happened to her uncle. It is most extraordinary."
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 MARY SCOTT PAYS AN UNEXPECTED CALL 
 
 BROOKS met the butler entering the room with a 
 card upon his salver. He stretched out his hand 
 for it mechanically, but the man only regarded him in 
 mild surprise. 
 
 " For his lordship, sir. Excuse me." 
 
 The man passed on. Brooks remained bewildered. 
 Lord Arranmore took the card from the tray and 
 examined it leisurely. 
 
 " Miss Mary Scott," he repeated aloud. " Are you 
 sure that the young lady asked to see me? " 
 
 " Quite sure, your lordship," the servant answered. 
 
 "Scott. The name sounds familiar, somehow!" 
 Lord Arranmore said. " Have n't I heard you men- 
 tion it, Brooks? " 
 
 " Miss Scott is the niece of Mr. Bullsom, one of my 
 best clients, a large builder in Medchester," Brooks 
 answered. " Why " 
 
 He stopped suddenly short. Arranmore glanced 
 towards him in polite unconcern. 
 
 " You saw her with me at Mellor's, in Medchester. 
 You asked me her name." 
 
 Lord Arranmore bent the card in his forefinger, 
 and dropped his eyeglass. 
 
 " So that is the young lady," he remarked. " I 
 remember her distinctly. But I do not understand
 
 AN UNEXPECTED CALL 159 
 
 what she can want with me. Is she by any chance, 
 Brooks, one of those young persons who go about 
 with a collecting-card who want money for mis- 
 sions and that sort of thing? If so, I am afraid she 
 has wasted her cab fare." 
 
 " She is not in the least that sort of person," Brooks 
 answered, emphatically. " I have no idea what she 
 wants to see you about, but I am convinced that her 
 visit has a legitimate object." 
 
 Lord Arranmore stuck the card in his waistcoat 
 pocket and shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " You are my man of affairs, Brooks. I commis- 
 sion you to see her. Find out her business if you can, 
 and don't let me be bothered unless it is necessary." 
 
 Brooks hesitated. 
 
 " I am not sure that I care to interfere that my 
 presence might not be likely to cause her embarrass- 
 ment," he said. " I have seen her lately, and she made 
 no mention of this visit." 
 
 Lord Arranmore glanced at him as though 
 surprised. 
 
 " I should like you to see her," he said, suavely. 
 " It seems to me preferable to asking her to state her 
 business to a servant. If you have any objection to 
 doing so she must be sent back." 
 
 Brooks turned unwillingly away. As he had ex- 
 pected, Mary sprang to her feet upon his entrance into 
 the room, and the colour streamed into her cheeks. 
 
 "You here!" she exclaimed. 
 
 He shook hands with her, and tried to behave as 
 though he thought her presence the most natural thing 
 in the world. 
 
 " Yes. You see I am Lord Arranmore's man of
 
 160 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 affairs now, and he keeps me pretty hard at work. 
 He seems to have a constitutional objection to doing 
 anything for himself. He has even sent me to - 
 to " 
 
 " I understand," she interrupted. " To ascertain 
 my business. Well, I can't tell it even to you. It is 
 Lord Arranmore whom I want to see. No one else 
 will do." 
 
 Brooks leaned against the table and looked at her 
 with a puzzled smile. 
 
 "You see, it's a little awkward, isn't it?" he 
 declared. " Lord Arranmore is very eccentric, and 
 especially so upon this point. He will not see stran- 
 gers. Write him a line or two and let me take it 
 to him." 
 
 She considered for a moment. 
 
 " Very well. Give me a piece of paper and an 
 envelope." 
 
 She wrote a single line only. Brooks took it back 
 into the great inner hall, where Lord Arranmore had 
 started another game of billiards with Lady Caroom. 
 
 " Miss Scott assured me that her business with you 
 is private," he announced. " She has written this 
 note." 
 
 Lord Arranmore laid his cue deliberately aside and 
 broke the seal. It was evident that the contents of 
 the note consisted of a few words only, yet after 
 once perusing them he moved a little closer to the 
 light and re-read them slowly. Then with a little 
 sigh he folded the note in the smallest possible com- 
 pass and thrust it into his waistcoat pocket. 
 
 " Your young friend, my dear Brooks," he said, 
 taking up his cue, " does me the honour to mistake
 
 AN UNEXPECTED CALL 161 
 
 me for some one else. Will you inform her that I 
 have no knowledge of the person to whom she alludes, 
 and suggest as delicately as you choose that as 
 she is mistaken an interview is unnecessary. It is, 
 I believe, my turn, Catherine." 
 
 " You decline, then, to see her? " Brooks said. 
 
 Lord Arranmore turned upon him with a rare 
 irritation. 
 
 "Have I not made myself clear, Brooks?" he 
 said. " If I were to keep open house to all the young 
 women who choose to claim acquaintance with me I 
 should scarcely have a moment to call my own, or a 
 house fit to ask my friends to visit. Be so good as 
 to make my answer sufficiently explicit." 
 
 " It is unnecessary, Lord Arranmore. I have come 
 to ask you for it yourself." 
 
 They all turned round. Mary Scott was coming 
 slowly towards them across the thick rugs, into which 
 her feet sunk noiselessly. Her face was very pale, and 
 her large eyes were full of nervous apprehension. 
 But about her mouth were certain rigid lines which 
 spoke of determination. 
 
 Sybil leaned forward from her chair, and Lady 
 Caroom watched her approach with lifted eyebrows 
 and a stare of well-bred and languid insolence. Lord 
 Arranmore laid down his cue and rose at once to 
 meet her. 
 
 " You are Lord Arranmore," she said, looking at 
 him fixedly. " Will you please answer the question 
 in my note? " 
 
 He bowed a little coldly, but he made no remark 
 as to her intrusion. 
 
 " I have already," he said, " given my answer to
 
 162 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Mr. Brooks. The name which you mention is al- 
 together unknown to me, nor have I ever visited the 
 place you speak of. You have apparently been mis- 
 led by a chance likeness." 
 
 " It is a very wonderful one," she said, slowly, 
 keeping her eyes fixed upon him. 
 
 He shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I regret," he said, " that you should have had 
 your journey for nothing. I can, I presume, be of 
 no further use to you." 
 
 " I do not regret my journey here," she answered. 
 " I could not rest until I had seen you closely, face 
 to face, and asked you that question. You deny then 
 that you were ever called Philip Ferringshaw ? " 
 
 " Most assuredly," he answered, curtly. 
 
 " That is very strange," she said. 
 
 "Strange?" 
 
 " Yes. It is very strange because I am perfectly 
 certain that you were." 
 
 He took up his cue and commenced chalking it in 
 a leisurely manner. 
 
 " My dear young lady," he said, " you are, I under- 
 stand, a friend of Mr. Brooks, and are therefore 
 entitled to some amount of consideration from me. 
 But I must respectfully remind you that your presence 
 here is, to put it mildly, unsought, and that I do not 
 find it pleasant to be called a liar under my own roof 
 and before my friends." 
 
 " Pleasant ! " she eyed him scornfully ; " nor did 
 my father find it pleasant to be ruined and murdered 
 by you, a debauched gambler, a common swindler." 
 
 Lord Arranmore, unruffled, permitted himself to 
 smile.
 
 AN UNEXPECTED CALL 163 
 
 " Dear me," he said, " this is getting positively 
 melodramatic. Brooks, for her own sake, let me beg 
 of you to induce the young woman to leave us. In 
 her calmer moments she will, I am sure, repent of 
 these unwarranted statements to a perfect stranger." 
 
 Brooks was numbed for the moment speechless. 
 Sybil had risen to her feet as though with the inten- 
 tion of leaving the room. But Lord Arranmore inter- 
 posed. If he were acting it was marvellously done. 
 
 " I beg," he said, " that you will none of you desert 
 me. These accusations of Miss Scott, I believe 
 are unnerving. A murderer, a swindler and a rogue 
 are hard names, young lady. May I ask if your 
 string of invectives is exhausted, or is there any 
 further abuse which you feel inclined to heap upon 
 me?" 
 
 The girl never flinched. 
 
 " I have called you nothing," she said, " which you 
 do not deserve. Do you still deny that you were in 
 Canada in Montreal sixteen years ago?" 
 
 " Most assuredly I do deny it," he answered. 
 
 Brooks started, and turned suddenly towards Lord 
 Arranmore as though doubtful whether he had heard 
 rightly. This was a year before his father's death. 
 The girl was unmoved. 
 
 " I see that I should come here with proofs," she 
 exclaimed. " Well, they are easy enough to collect. 
 You shall have them. But before I go, Lord Arran- 
 more, let me ask you if you know who I am." 
 
 " I understand," Lord Arranmore answered, " that 
 you are the daughter or niece of a highly respectable 
 tradesman in Medchester, who is a client of our young 
 friend here, Mr. Brooks. Let me tell you, young
 
 164 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 lady, that but for that fact I should not tolerate 
 your presence here." 
 
 " I am Mr. Bullsom's niece," the girl answered, 
 " but I am the daughter of Martin Scott Cartnell ! " 
 
 It seemed to Brooks that a smothered exclamation 
 of some sort broke from Lord Arranmore's tightly- 
 compressed lips, but his face was so completely in the 
 shadow that its expression was lost. But he himself 
 now revealed it, for touching a knob in the wall a 
 shower of electric lamps suddenly glowed around the 
 room. He leaned forward and looked intently into 
 the face of the girl who had become his accuser. She 
 met his gaze coldly, without flinching, the pallor of 
 her cheeks relieved by a single spot of burning colour, 
 her eyes bright with purpose. 
 
 " It is incredible," he said, softly, " but it is true. 
 You are the untidy little thing with a pigtail who used 
 always to be playing games with the boys when you 
 ought to have been at school. Come, I am glad to 
 see you. Why do you come to me like a Cassandra 
 of the Family Herald? Your father was my com- 
 panion for a while, but we were never intimate. I 
 certainly neither robbed nor murdered him." 
 
 " You did both," she answered, fiercely. " You 
 were his evil genius from the first. It was through 
 you he took to drink, through you he became a gam- 
 bler. You encouraged him to play for stakes larger 
 than he could afford. You won money from him 
 which you knew was not his to lose. He came to 
 you for help. You laughed at him. That night he 
 shot himself." 
 
 " It was," Lord Arranmore remarked, " a very 
 foolish thing to do."
 
 AN UNEXPECTED CALL 165 
 
 " Who or what you were before you came to Mon- 
 treal I do not know," she continued, " but there you 
 brought misery and ruin upon every one connected 
 with you. I was a child in those days, but I remember 
 how you were hated. You broke the heart of Durran 
 Lapage, an honest man whom you called your friend, 
 and you left his wife to starve in a common lodging- 
 house. There was never a man or woman who 
 showed you kindness that did not live to regret it. 
 You may be the Marquis of Arranmore now, but you 
 have left a life behind the memory of which should 
 be a constant torture to you." 
 
 "Have you finished, young lady?" he asked, coldly. 
 
 " Yes, I have finished," she answered. " I pray 
 Heaven that the next time we meet may be in the 
 police-court. The police of Montreal are still looking 
 for Philip Ferringshaw, and they will find in me a 
 very ready witness." 
 
 " Upon my word, this is a most unpleasant young 
 person," Lord Arranmore said. " Brooks, do see her 
 off the premises before she changes her mind and 
 comes for me again. You have, I hope, been enter- 
 tained, ladies," he added, turning to Sybil and Lady 
 Caroom. 
 
 He eyed them carelessly enough to all appearance, 
 yet with an inward searchingness which seemed to 
 find what it feared. He turned to Brooks, but he and 
 Mary Scott had left the room together. 
 
 "The girl was terribly in earnest," Lady Caroom 
 said, with averted eyes. " Were you not a little 
 cruel to her, Arranmore? Not that I believe these 
 horrid things, of course. But she did. She was 
 honest."
 
 166 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. He was 
 looking out of the window, out into the grey windy 
 darkness, listening to the raindrops splashing against 
 the window-pane, wondering how long Brooks would 
 be, and if in his face too he should see the shadow, 
 and it seemed to him that Brooks lingered a very long 
 time. 
 
 " Shall we finish our game of billiards, Catherine? " 
 he asked, turning towards her. 
 
 " Well I think not," she answered. " I am a 
 little tired, and it is almost time the dressing-bell 
 rang. I think Sybil and I will go up-stairs." 
 
 They passed away he made no effort to detain 
 them. He lit a cigarette, and paced the room im- 
 patiently. At last he rang the bell. 
 
 " Where is Mr. Brooks? " he asked. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks has only just returned, my lord," the 
 man answered. " He went some distance with the 
 young lady. He has gone direct- to his room." 
 
 Lord Arranmore nodded. He threw himself into 
 his easy-chair, and his head sank upon his hand. He 
 looked steadfastly into the heart of the red coals.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE MARQUIS MEPHISTOPHELES 
 
 " T AM so sorry," she said, softly, "our last evening 
 
 J. is spoilt." 
 
 He shook his head with an effort at gaiety. 
 
 " Let us conspire," he said. " You and I at least 
 will make a struggle." 
 
 " I am afraid," she said, " that it would be hope- 
 less. Mother is an absolute wreck, and I saw Lord 
 Arranmore go into the library just now with that 
 terrible white look under his eyes. I saw it once 
 before. Ugh!" 
 
 " After all," he said, " it only means that we 
 shall be honest. Cheerfulness to-night could only be 
 forced." 
 
 She laughed softly into his eyes. 
 
 " How correct ! " she murmured. " You are im- 
 proving fast." 
 
 He turned and looked at her, slim and graceful in 
 her white muslin gown, her fair hair brushed back 
 from her forehead with a slight wave, but drooping 
 low over her ears, a delicate setting for her piquant 
 face. The dark brown eyes, narrowing a little 
 towards the lids, met his with frank kindliness, her 
 mouth quivered a little as though with the desire to 
 break away into a laugh. The slight duskiness of 
 her cheeks she had lived for three years in Italy
 
 i68 
 
 and never worn a veil pleased him better than the 
 insipidity of pink and white, and the absence of 
 jewelry she wore neither bracelet nor rings 
 gave her an added touch of distinction, which rest- 
 less youth finds something so much harder to wear 
 than sedate middle age. The admiration grew in 
 his eyes. She was charming. 
 
 The lips broke away at last. 
 
 " After all," she murmured, " I think that I shall 
 enjoy myself this evening. You are looking all sorts 
 of nice things at me." 
 
 " My eyes," he answered, " are more daring than 
 my lips." 
 
 " And you call yourself a lawyer ? " 
 
 "Is that a challenge? Well, I was thinking that 
 you looked charming." 
 
 " Is that all ? I have a looking-glass, you know." 
 
 " And I shall miss you very much." 
 
 "Ah!" 
 
 She suddenly avoided his eyes, but it was for a 
 second only. Yet Brooks was himself conscious of 
 the significance of that second. He set his teeth hard. 
 
 " The days here," he said, slowly, " have been very 
 pleasant. It has all been such a different life for 
 me. A few months ago I knew no one except a few 
 of the Medchester people, and was working hard to 
 make a modest living. Sometimes I feel here as 
 though I were a modern Aladdin. There is a sense 
 of unreality about Lord Arranmore's extraordinary 
 kindness to me. To-night, more than ever, I cannot 
 help feeling that it is something like a dream which 
 may pass away at any moment." 
 
 She looked at him thoughtfully.
 
 THE MARQUIS MEPHISTOPHELES 169 
 
 " Lord Arranmore is not an impulsive person," 
 she said. " He must have had some reason for be- 
 ing so decent to you." 
 
 " Yes, as regards the management of his affairs 
 perhaps," Brooks answered. " But why he should 
 ask me here, and treat me as though I were his 
 social equal and all that sort of thing well, you 
 know that is a puzzle, isn't it?" 
 
 " Well, I don't know," she answered. " Lord 
 Arranmore is not exactly the man to be a slave to, 
 or even to respect, the conventional, and your being 
 what you are, naturally makes you a pleasant com- 
 panion to him and his guests. No, I don't think 
 that it is strange." 
 
 " You are very flattering," he said, smiling. 
 
 " Not in the least," she assured him. " Now-a- 
 days birth seems to be rather a handicap than other- 
 wise to the making of the right sort of people. I 
 am sure there are more impossibilities in the peerage 
 than in the nowueaux riches. I know heaps of people 
 who because their names are in Debrett seem to think 
 that manners are unnecessary, and that they have a 
 sort of God-sent title to gentility." 
 
 Brooks laughed. 
 
 " Why," he said, " you are more than half a 
 Radical." 
 
 " It is your influence," she said, demurely. 
 
 " It will soon pass away," he sighed. "To-morrow 
 you will be back again amongst your friends." 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 " Why do one's friends bore one so much more 
 than other people's ? " she exclaimed. 
 
 " When one thinks of it," he remarked, " you must
 
 170 A PRINCE OF. SINNERS 
 
 have been very bored here. Why, for the last fort- 
 night there have been no other visitors in the house." 
 
 " There have been compensations," she said. 
 
 " Tell me about them ! " he begged. 
 
 She laughed up at him. 
 
 " If I were to say the occasional visits of Mr. 
 Kingston Brooks, would you be conceited ? " 
 
 " It would be like putting my vanity in a hothouse," 
 he answered, " but I would try and bear it." 
 
 "Well, I will say it, then!" 
 
 He turned and looked at her with a sudden serious- 
 ness. Some consciousness of the change in his mood 
 seemed to be at once communicated to her. Her eyes 
 no longer met his. She moved a little on one side 
 and took up an ornament from an ormolu table. 
 
 " I wish that you meant it," he murmured. 
 
 "I do!" she whispered, almost under her breath. 
 
 Brooks suddenly forgot many things, but Nemesis 
 intervened. There was the sound of much rustling 
 of silken skirts, and Lady Caroom's poodle, followed 
 by herself, came round the angle of the drawing-room. 
 
 " My dear Sybil," she exclaimed, " do come and 
 tie Balfour's ribbon for me. Marie has no idea of 
 making a bow spread itself out, and pink is so becom- 
 ing to him. Thanks, dear. Where is our host? I 
 thought that I was late." 
 
 Lord Arranmore entered as she spoke. His evening 
 dress, as usual, was of the most severely simple type. 
 To-night its sombreness was impressive. With such 
 a background his pallor seemed almost waxen-like. 
 He offered his arm to Lady Caroom. 
 
 " I was not sure," he said, with a lightness which 
 seemed natural enough, " whether to-night I might
 
 THE MARQUIS MEPHISTOPHELES 171 
 
 not have to dine alone whilst you poor people sat 
 and played havoc with the shreds of my reputation. 
 Groves, the cabinet Johannesburg and the '84 Heid- 
 sieck though I am afraid," he added, looking down 
 at his companion, " that not all the wine in my cellar 
 could make this feast of farewells a cheerful one." 
 
 " Farewell celebrations of all sorts are such a mis- 
 take," Lady Caroom murmured. " We have been 
 so happy here too." 
 
 " You brought the happiness with you," Lord 
 Arranmore said, " and you take it away with you. 
 Enton will be a very dull place when you are 
 gone." 
 
 "Your own stay here is nearly up, is it not?" 
 Lady Caroom asked. 
 
 " Very nearly. I expect to go to Paris next week 
 at latest the week after, in time at any rate for 
 Bernhardt's new play. So I suppose we shall soon 
 all be scattered over the face of the earth." 
 
 " Except me," Brooks interposed, ruefully. " I 
 shall be the one who will do the vegetating." 
 
 Lady Caroom laughed softly. 
 
 " Foolish person ! You will be within two hours 
 of London. You none of you have the slightest idea 
 as to the sort of place we are going to. We are a 
 day's journey from anywhere. The morning papers 
 are twenty-four hours late. The men drink port 
 wine, and the women sit round the fire in the draw- 
 ing-room after dinner and wait and wait and 
 wait. Oh, that awful waiting. I know it so well. 
 And it is n't much better when the men do come. 
 They play whist instead of bridge, and a woman in 
 the billiard-room is a lost soul. Our hostess always
 
 172 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 hides my cue directly I arrive, and pretends that it 
 has been lost. By the bye, what a dear little room 
 this is, Arranmore. We haven't dined here before, 
 have we? " 
 
 Lord Arranmore shook his head. He held up his 
 wineglass thoughtfully as though criticizing the clear- 
 ness of the amber fluid. 
 
 " No ! " he said. " I ordered dinner to be served 
 in here because over our dessert I propose to offer 
 you a novel form of entertainment." 
 
 " How wonderful," Sybil said. " Will it be very 
 engrossing? Will it help us to forget?" 
 
 He looked at her with a smile. 
 
 " That depends," he said, " how anxious you are 
 to forget." 
 
 She looked hastily away. For a moment Brooks 
 met her eyes, and his heart gave an unusual leap. 
 Lady Caroom watched them both thoughtfully, and 
 then turned to their host. 
 
 " You have excited our curiosity, Arranmore. You 
 surely don't propose to keep us on tenterhooks all 
 through dinner? " 
 
 " It will give a fillip to your appetite." 
 
 " My appetite needs no fillip. It is disgraceful to 
 try and make me eat more than I do already. I am 
 getting hideously stout. I found my maid in tears 
 to-night because I positively could not get into my 
 most becoming bodice." 
 
 " If you possess a more becoming one than this," 
 Lord Arranmore said, with a bow, " it is well for 
 our peace of mind that you cannot wear it." 
 
 " That is a very pretty subterfuge, but a subter- 
 fuge it remains," Lady Caroom answered. " Now
 
 THE MARQUIS MEPHISTOPHELES 173 
 
 be candid. I love candour. "What are you going to 
 do to amuse us ? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " Do not spoil my effect. The slightest hint would 
 make everything seem tame. Brooks, I insist upon 
 it that you try my Johannesburg. It was given to 
 my grandfather by the Grand Duke of Shleistein. 
 Groves ! " 
 
 Brooks submitted willingly enough, for the wine 
 was wonderful. Sybil leaned over so that their heads 
 almost touched. 
 
 " Look at our host," she whispered. " What does 
 he remind you of ? " 
 
 Brooks glanced across the table, brilliant with its 
 burden of old silver, of cut-glass and hothouse flowers. 
 Lord Arranmore's face, notwithstanding his ready 
 flow of conversation, seemed unusually still and 
 white the skin drawn across the bones, even the 
 lips pallid. The sombreness of his costume, the 
 glitter in his eyes, the icy coldness of his lack of 
 colouring, though time after time he set down his 
 wineglass empty, were curiously impressive. Brooks 
 looked back into her face, his eyes full of question. 
 
 " Mephistopheles," she whispered. " He is abso- 
 lutely weird to-night. If he sat and looked at me 
 and we were alone I should shriek." 
 
 Lord Arranmore lifted a glass of champagne to 
 the level of his head and looked thoughtfully around 
 the table. 
 
 " Come," he said, "a toast to ourselves. Singly? 
 Collectively. Lady Caroom, I drink to the delightful 
 memories with which you have peopled Enton. Sybil, 
 may you charm society as your mother has done.
 
 174 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Brooks, your very good health. May your entertain- 
 ment this evening be a welcome one." 
 
 " We will drink to all those things," Lady Caroom 
 declared, " with enthusiasm. But I am afraid your 
 good wishes for Sybil are beyond any hope of real- 
 ization. She is far too honest to flourish in society. 
 She will probably marry a Bishop or a Cabinet Min- 
 ister, and become engrossed in theology or politics. 
 You know how limiting that sort of thing is. I am 
 in deadly fear that she may become humdrum. A 
 woman who really studies or knows anything about 
 anything can never be a really brilliant woman." 
 
 "You " 
 
 " Oh, I pass for being intelligent because I parade 
 my ignorance so, just as Sophie Mills is considered 
 a paragon of morality because she is always talking 
 about running off with one of the boys in her hus- 
 band's regiment. It is a gigantic bluff, you know, 
 but it comes off. Most bluffs do come off if one 
 is only daring enough." 
 
 " You must tell them that up at Redcliffe," Lord 
 Arranmore remarked. 
 
 Sybil laughed heartily. 
 
 " Redcliffe is the one place where mother is dumb," 
 she declared. " Up there they look upon her as a 
 stupid but well-meaning person. She is absolutely 
 afraid to open her mouth." 
 
 " They are so absurdly literal," Lady Caroom 
 sighed, helping herself to an infinitesimal portion of 
 a wonderful savoury. " Don't talk about the place. 
 I know I shall have an attack of nerves there." 
 
 " Mother always gets nerves if she may n't talk/' 
 Sybil murmured.
 
 THE MARQUIS MEPH1STOPHELES 175 
 
 " You 're an undutiful daughter," Lady Caroom 
 declared. " If I do talk I never say anything, so 
 nobody need listen unless they like. About this enter- 
 tainment, Arranmore. Are you going to make the 
 wineglass disappear and the apples fly about the room 
 a la Maskelyne and Cook? I hope our share in it 
 consists in sitting down." 
 
 Arranmore turned to the butler behind his chair. 
 
 " Have coffee and liqueur served here, Groves, and 
 bring some cigarettes. Then you can send the ser- 
 vants away and leave us alone." 
 
 The man bowed. 
 
 " Very good, your lordship." 
 
 Lord Arranmore looked around at his guests. 
 
 " The entertainment," he said, " will incur no 
 greater hardship upon you than a little patience. I 
 am going to tell you a story."
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE CONFIDENCE OF LORD ARRANMORE 
 
 THE servants had left the room, and the doors 
 were fast closed. Lord Arranmore sat a little 
 forward in his high-backed chair, one hand grasping 
 the arm, the other stretched flat upon the table before 
 him. By his side, neglected, was a cedar-wood box 
 of his favourite cigarettes. 
 
 "I am going," he said, thoughtfully, " to tell you 
 a story, of whom the hero is myself. A poor sort 
 of entertainment perhaps, but then there is a little 
 tragedy and a little comedy in what I have to tell. 
 And you three are the three people in the world to 
 whom certain things were better told." 
 
 They bent forward, fascinated by the cold direct- 
 ness of his speech, by the suggestion of strange things 
 to come. The mask of their late gaiety had fallen 
 away. Lady Caroom, grave and sad-eyed, was listen- 
 ing with an anxiety wholly unconcealed. Under the 
 shaded lamplight their faces, dominated by that cold 
 masterly figure at the head of the table, were almost 
 Rembrandtesque. 
 
 " You have heard a string of incoherent but suffi- 
 ciently damaging accusations made against me to-day 
 by a young lady whose very existence, I may say, was 
 a surprise to me. It suited me then to deny them. 
 Nevertheless they were in the main true."
 
 The announcement was no shock. Every one of 
 the three curiously enough had believed the girl. 
 
 " I must go a little further back than the time of 
 which she spoke. At twenty-six years old I was an 
 idle young man of good family, but scant expecta- 
 tions, supposed to be studying at the Bar, but in 
 reality idling my time about town. In those days, 
 Lady Caroom, you had some knowledge of me." 
 
 " Up to the time of your disappearance yes. I 
 remember, Arranmore," she continued, her manner 
 losing for a moment some of its restraint, and her 
 eyes and tone suddenly softening, " dancing with you 
 that evening. We arranged to meet at Ranelagh the 
 next day, and, when the next day came, you had 
 vanished, gone as completely as though the earth had 
 swallowed you up. For weeks every one was asking 
 what has become of him. And then I suppose 
 you were forgotten." 
 
 " This," Lord Arranmore continued, " is the hard- 
 est part of my narrative, the hardest because the most 
 difficult to make you understand. You will forgive 
 my offering you the bare facts only. I will remind 
 you that I was young, impressionable, and had views. 
 So to continue ! " 
 
 The manner of his speech was in its way chillingly 
 impressive. He was still sitting in exactly the same 
 position, one hand upon the arm of his high-backed 
 chair, the other upon the table before him. He made 
 use of no gestures, his face remained as white and 
 emotionless as a carved image, his tone, though clear 
 and low, was absolutely monotonous. But there was 
 about him a subtle sense of repression apparent to all 
 of them. 
 
 12
 
 178 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " On my way home that night my hansom 
 knocked down an old man. He was not seriously 
 hurt, and I drove him home. On the way he stared 
 at me curiously. Every now and then he laughed 
 unpleasantly. 
 
 " ' I have never seen any one out of your world 
 before/ he said. ' I dare say you have never spoken 
 to any one out of mine except to toss us alms. Come 
 and see where I live.' 
 
 " He insisted, and I went. I found myself in a 
 lodging-house, now pulled down and replaced by one 
 of Lord Rowton's tenement houses. I saw a hun- 
 dred human beings more or less huddled together 
 promiscuously, and the face of every one of them 
 was like the face of a rat. The old man dragged 
 me from room to room, laughing all the time. He 
 showed me children herded together without distinc- 
 tion of sex or clothing, here and there he pointed 
 to a face where some apprehension of the light was 
 fighting a losing battle with the ghouls of disease, 
 of vice, of foul air, of filth. I was faint and giddy 
 when we had looked over that one house, but the old 
 man was not satisfied. He dragged me on to the 
 roof and pointed eastwards. There, as far as the 
 eyes could reach, was a blackened wilderness of 
 smoke-begrimed dwellings. He looked at me and 
 grinned. I can see him now. He had only one 
 tooth, a blackened yellow stump, and every time he 
 opened his mouth to laugh he was nearly choked 
 with coughing. He leaned out over the palisading 
 and reached with both his arms eastward. 
 
 " ' There,' he cried, frantically, ' you have seen 
 one. There are thousands and tens of thousands of
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S CONFIDENCE 179 
 
 houses like this, a million crawling vermin who were 
 born into the world in your likeness, as you were 
 born, my fine gentleman. Day by day they wake 
 in their holes, fill their lungs with foul air, their 
 stomachs with rotten food, break their backs and 
 their hearts over some hideous task. Every day they 
 drop a little lower down. Drink alone keeps them 
 alive, stirs their blood now and then so that they can 
 feel their pulses beat, brings them a blessed stupor. 
 And see over there the sun, God's sun, rises every 
 morning, over them and you. Young man ! You see 
 those flaring spots of light? They are gin-palaces. 
 You may thank your God for them, for they alone 
 keep this horde of rotten humanity from sweeping 
 westwards, breaking up your fine houses, emptying 
 your wine into the street, tearing the silk and laces 
 from your beautiful soft-limbed women. Bah ! But 
 you have read. It would be the French Revolution 
 over again. Oh, but you are wise, you in the West, 
 your statesmen and your philanthropists, that you 
 build these gin-palaces, and smile, and rub your 
 hands and build more and spend the money gaily. 
 You build the one dam which can keep back your 
 retribution. You keep them stupefied, you cheapen 
 the vile liquor and hold it to their noses. So they 
 drink, and you live. But a day of light may come.' " 
 
 Lord Arranmore ceased speaking, stretched out his 
 hand and helped himself to wine with unfaltering 
 fingers. 
 
 " I have tried," he continued, " to repeat the exact 
 words which the old man used to me, and I do not 
 find it so difficult as you might imagine, because at 
 that time they made a great impression upon me.
 
 i8o ' A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 But I cannot, of course, hope to reproduce to you 
 his terrible earnestness, the burning passion with 
 which every word seemed to spring from his lips. 
 Their effect upon me at that time you will be able 
 to judge when I tell you this that I never re- 
 turned to my rooms, that for ten years I never set 
 foot west of Temple Bar. I first joined a small 
 society in Whitechapel, then I worked for myself, 
 and finally I became a police-court missionary at 
 Southward Police-Court. The history of those years 
 is the history of a slowly-growing madness. I com- 
 menced by trying to improve whole districts I ended 
 with the individual." 
 
 Brooks' wineglass fell with a little crash upon the 
 tablecloth. The wine, a long silky stream, flowed 
 away from him unstaunched, unregarded. His eyes 
 were fixed upon Lord Arranmore. He leaned 
 forward. 
 
 " A police-court missionary ! " he cried, hoarsely. 
 
 Lord Arranmore regarded him for a moment in 
 silence. 
 
 " Yes. As you doubtless surmise, I am your father. 
 Afterwards you may ask me questions." 
 
 Brooks sat as one stupefied, and then a sudden 
 warm touch upon his hand sent the blood coursing 
 once more through his veins. Sybil's fingers lay for 
 a moment upon his. She smiled kindly at him. Lord 
 Arranmore' s voice once more broke the short silence. 
 
 " The individual was my greatest disappointment," 
 he continued. " Young and old, all were the same. 
 I took them to live with me, I sent them abroad, I 
 found them situations in this country, I talked with 
 them, read with them, showed them the simplest
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S CONFIDENCE 181 
 
 means within their reach by means of which they 
 might take into their lives a certain measure of beau- 
 tiful things. Failure would only make me more 
 dogged, more eager. I would spend months some- 
 times with one man or boy, and at last I would 
 assure myself of success. I would find them a situ- 
 ation, see them perhaps once a week, then less often, 
 and the end was always the same. They fell back. 
 I had put the poison to sleep, but it was always there. 
 It was their everlasting heritage, a gift from father 
 to son, bred in the bone, a part of their blood. 
 
 " In those days I married a lady devoted to chari- 
 table works. Our purpose was to work together, but 
 we found it impracticable. There was, I fear, little 
 sympathy between us. The only bond was our work 
 and that was soon to be broken. For there came 
 a time, after ten breathless years, when I paused to 
 consider." 
 
 He raised his glass to his lips and drained it. The 
 wine was powerful, but it brought no tinge of colour 
 to his cheeks, nor any lustre to his eyes. He con- 
 tinued in the same firm, expressionless tone. 
 
 " There came a night when I found myself think- 
 ing, and I knew then that a new terror was stealing 
 into my life. I made my way up to the roof of the 
 house where that old man had first taken me, and I 
 leaned once more over the palisading and looked east- 
 wards. I fancied that I could still hear the echoes 
 of his frenzied words, and for the first time I heard 
 the note of mockery ringing clearly through them. 
 There they stretched the same blackened wilder- 
 ness of roofs sheltering the same horde of drinking, 
 filthy, cursing, parasitical creatures; there flared the
 
 182 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 gin-palaces, more of them, more brilliantly lit, more 
 gorgeously decorated. Ten years of my life, and 
 what had I done? What could any one do? The 
 truth seemed suddenly written across the sky in let- 
 ters of fire. I, a poor human creature, had been 
 fighting with a few other fanatics against the invio- 
 lable, the unconquerable laws of nature. The hideous 
 mistake of all individual effort was suddenly revealed 
 to me. We were like a handful of children striving 
 to dam a mighty torrent with a few handfuls of clay. 
 Better a thousand times that these people rotted and 
 died in their holes, that disease should stalk through 
 their streets, and all the evil passions born of their 
 misery and filth should be allowed to blaze forth that 
 the whole world might see, so the laws of the world 
 might intervene, the great natural laws by which 
 alone these things could be changed. I looked down 
 at myself, then wasted to the bone, a stranger to the 
 taste of wine or tobacco, to all the joys of life, a 
 miserable heart-broken wretch, and I cursed that old 
 man and the thought of him till my lips were dry 
 and my throat ached. I walked back to my miser- 
 able dwelling with a red fire before my eyes, mut- 
 tering, cursing that power which stood behind the 
 universe, and which we call God, that there should 
 be vomited forth into the world day by day, hour 
 by hour, this black stream of human wretchedness, 
 an everlasting mockery to those who would seek for 
 the joy of life. 
 
 " They took me to the hospital, and they called my 
 illness brain-fever. But long before they thought me 
 convalescent I was conscious, lying awake and plot- 
 ting my escape. With cunning I managed it. Of
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S CONFIDENCE 183 
 
 my wife and child I never once thought. Every 
 trace of human affection seemed withered up in my 
 heart. I took the money subscribed for me with a 
 hypocrite's smile, and I slunk away from England. 
 I went to Montreal in Canada, and I deliberately 
 entered upon a life of low pleasures. Pardon 
 me!" : 
 
 He bent forward and with a steady hand read- 
 justed the shade of a lamp which was in danger of 
 burning. Lady Caroom leaned back in her chair 
 with an indrawn sobbing breath. The action at 
 such a moment seemed grotesque. His own cool- 
 ness, whilst with steady fingers he probed away 
 amongst the wounded places of his life, was in itself 
 gruesome. 
 
 " My money," he continued, " was no large sum, 
 but I eked it out with gambling. The luck was 
 always on my side. It 's quite true that I ruined 
 the father of the young lady who paid me a visit 
 to-day. After a somewhat chequered career he was 
 settling down in a merchant's office in Montreal 
 when I met him. His luck at cards was as bad as 
 mine was good. I won all he had, and more. I 
 believe that he committed suicide. A man there was 
 kind to me, asked me to his house I persuaded 
 his wife to run away with me. These are amongst 
 the slightest of my delinquencies. I steeped myself 
 in sin. I revelled in it. I seemed to myself in some 
 way to be showing my defiance for the hidden powers 
 of life which I had cursed. I played a match with 
 evil by day and by night until I was glutted. And 
 then I stole away from the city, leaving behind a 
 hideous reputation and not a single friend. Then a
 
 1 84 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 new mood came to me. I wanted to get to a place 
 where I should see no human beings at all, and escape 
 in that way from the memories which were still like 
 a clot upon my brain. So I set my face westwards. 
 I travelled till at last civilization lay behind. Still I 
 pushed onward. I had stores in plenty, an Indian 
 servant who chanced to be faithful, and whom I saw 
 but twice a day. At last I reached Lake Ono. Here 
 between us we built a hut. I sent my Indian away 
 then, and when he fawned at my feet to stay I kicked 
 him. This was my third phase of living, and it was 
 true that some measure of sanity came back to me. 
 Oh, the blessed relief of seeing the face of neither 
 man nor woman. It was the unpeopled world of 
 Nature uncorrupted, fresh, magnificent, alive by 
 day and by night with everlasting music of Nature. 
 The solitudes of those great forests were like a won- 
 derful balm. So the fevers were purged out of me, 
 and I became once more an ordinary human being. 
 I was content, I think, to die there, for I had plenty 
 to eat and drink, and the animals and birds who 
 came to me morning and evening kept me from even 
 the thought of loneliness. The rest is obvious. I 
 lost two cousins in South Africa, an uncle in the 
 hunting-field. A man in Montreal had recognized 
 me. I was discovered. But before I returned I 
 killed Brooks, the police-court missionary. This girl 
 has forced me to bring him to life again." 
 
 It was a strange silence which followed. Brooks 
 sat back in his chair, pale, bewildered, striving to 
 focus this story properly, to attain a proper compre- 
 hension of these new strange things. And behind 
 all there smouldered the slow burning anger of the
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S CONFIDENCE 185 
 
 child who has looked into the face of a deserted 
 mother. Lady Caroom was white to the lips, and 
 in her eyes the horror of that story so pitilessly told 
 seemed still to linger. 
 
 Lord Arranmore spoke again. Still he sat back in 
 his high-backed chair, and still he spoke in measured, 
 monotonous tones. But this time, if only their ears 
 had been quick enough to notice it, there lay behind 
 an emotion, held in check indeed, but every now and 
 then quivering for expression. He had turned to 
 Lady Caroom. 
 
 " Chance," he said, " has brought together here at 
 the moment when the telling of these things has be- 
 come a necessity, the two people who have in a sense 
 some right to hear them, for from each I have much 
 to ask. Sybil is your daughter, and from her there 
 need be no secrets. So, Catherine, I ask you again, 
 now that you know everything, are you brave enough 
 to be my wife? " 
 
 She raised her eyes, and he saw the horror there. 
 But he made no sign. She rose and held out her 
 hand for Sybil. 
 
 " Arranmore," she said, " I am afraid." 
 
 He looked down upon his plate. 
 
 " So let it be, then," he said. " It would need a 
 brave woman indeed to join her lot with mine after 
 the things which I have told you. At heart, Cath- 
 erine, I am almost a dead man. Believe me, you 
 are wise." 
 
 He rose, and the two women passed from the 
 room. Then he resumed his former seat, and atti- 
 tude, and Brooks, though he tried to speak, felt his 
 tongue cleave to the roof of his mouth, a dry and
 
 i86 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 nerveless thing. For in these doings there was 
 tragedy. 
 
 " There remains to me you, Philip Kingston, my 
 son," Lord Arranmore said, in the same measured 
 tone. " You also have before you the story of 
 my life, you are able from it to form some sort of 
 idea as to what my future is likely to be. I do not 
 wish to deceive you. My early enthusiasms are 
 extinct. I look upon the ten or twenty years or so 
 which may be left to me of life as merely a space of 
 time to be filled with as many amusements and new 
 sensations as may be procurable without undue 
 effort. I have no wish to convert, or perhaps per- 
 vert you, to my way of thinking. You live still in 
 Utopia, and to me Utopia does not exist. So 
 make your choice deliberately. Do you care to 
 come to me? " 
 
 Then Brooks found words of a sort. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore," he said, " forgive me if what 
 I must say sounds undutiful. I know that you have 
 suffered. I can realize something of what you have 
 been through. But your desertion of my mother and 
 me was a brutality. What you call your creed of life 
 sounds to me hideous. You and I are far apart, and 
 so far as I am concerned, God grant that we may 
 remain so." 
 
 For the first time Lord Arranmore smiled. He 
 poured out with steady hand yet another glass of 
 wine, and he nodded towards the door. 
 
 " I am obliged to you," he said, " for your candour. 
 I have met with enough hypocrisy in life to be able 
 to appreciate it. Be so good as to humour my whim 
 and to leave me alone."
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S CONFIDENCE 187 
 
 Brooks rose from his seat, hesitated for a single 
 moment, and left the room. Lord Arranmore leaned 
 back in his high-backed chair and looked round at 
 the empty places. The cigarette burned out between 
 his fingers, his wine remained untasted. The even- 
 ing's entertainment was over.
 
 PART II 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 
 
 domestic virtues," Lord Arranmore said 
 softly to himself, " being denied to me, the 
 question remains how to pass one's time." 
 
 He rose wearily from his seat, and walking to the 
 window looked out upon St. James's Square. A soft 
 rain hung about the lamp-posts, the pavements were 
 thick with umbrellas. He returned to his chair with 
 a shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 " The only elucidation from outside seems to be 
 a change of climate," he mused. " I should prefer 
 to think of something more original. In the mean- 
 time I will write to that misguided young man in 
 Medchester." 
 
 He drew paper and pen towards him and began to 
 write. Even his handwriting seemed a part of the 
 man cold, shapely, and deliberate. 
 
 " MY DEAR BROOKS, 
 
 " I have been made acquainted through Mr. 
 Ascough with your desire to leave the new firm of 
 Morrison and Brooks, and while I congratulate you very 
 much upon the fact itself, I regret equally the course of 
 reasoning which I presume led to your decision. You 
 will probably have heard from Mr. Ascough by this
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 189 
 
 time on a matter of business. You are, by birth, Lord 
 Kingston of Ross, and the possessor of the Kingston 
 income, which amounts to a little over two thousand a 
 year. Please remember that this comes to you not 
 through any grace or favour of mine, but by your own 
 unalienable right as the eldest son of the Marquis of 
 Arranmore. I cannot give it to you. I cannot withhold 
 it from you. If you refuse to take it the amount must 
 accumulate for your heirs, or in due time find its way 
 to the Crown. Leave the title alone by all means, if you 
 like, but do not carry quixotism to the borders of 
 insanity by declining to spend your own money, and 
 thereby cramp your life. 
 
 " I trust to hear from Mr. Ascough of your more 
 reasonable frame of mind, and while personally I agree 
 with you that we are better apart, you can always rely 
 upon me if I can be of any service to you. 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " ARRANMORE." 
 
 He read the letter through thoughtfully and folded 
 it up. 
 
 " I really don't see what the young fool can kick 
 about in that," he said, throwing it into the basket. 
 "Well, Hennibul, how are you?" 
 
 Mr. Hennibul, duly ushered in by a sedate butler, 
 pronounced himself both in words and appearance fit 
 and well. He took a chair and a cigarette, and looked 
 about him approvingly. 
 
 " Nice house, yours, Arranmore. Nice old-fash- 
 ioned situation, too. Why don't you entertain?" 
 
 " No friends, no inclination, no womankind ! " 
 
 Mr. Hennibul smiled incredulously. 
 
 " Your card plate is chock-full," he said, "and there 
 are a dozen women in town at least of your connec-
 
 190 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 tions who 'd do the polite things by you. As to 
 inclination well, one must do something." 
 
 " That 's about the most sensible thing you have 
 said, Hennibul," Arranmore remarked. " I 've just 
 evolved the same fact out of my own consciousness. 
 One must do something. It 's tiresome, but it 's quite 
 true." 
 
 "Politics?" 
 
 " Hate 'em ! Not worth while anyway." 
 
 " Travel." 
 
 " Done all I want for a bit, but I keep that in 
 reserve." 
 
 " Hunt." 
 
 " Bad leg, but I do a bit at it." 
 
 " Society." 
 
 " Sooner go on the County Council." 
 
 " City." 
 
 " Too much money already." 
 
 " Write a book." 
 
 " No one would read it." 
 
 " Start a magazine." 
 
 " Too hard work." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul sighed. 
 
 " You 're rather a difficult case," he admitted. 
 " You 'd better come round to the clubs and play 
 bridge." 
 
 " I never played whist and I 'm bad-tempered." 
 
 " Bit of everything then." 
 
 Lord Arranmore smiled. 
 
 " That 's what it '11 end in, I suppose." 
 
 " Pleasant times we had down at Enton," Mr. 
 Hennibul remarked. " How 's the nice young law- 
 yer Brooks his name was, I think ? "
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 191 
 
 " All right, I believe." 
 
 "And the ladies?" 
 
 " I believe that they are quite well. They were in 
 Scotland last time I heard of them." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul found conversation difficult. 
 
 " I saw that you were in Paris the other week," 
 he remarked. 
 
 " I went over to see Bernhardt's new play," Arran- 
 more continued. 
 
 "Good?" 
 
 " It disappointed me. Very likely though the fault 
 was with myself." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul looked across at his host shrewdly. 
 
 "What did you see me for?" he asked, sud- 
 denly. " You 're bored to death trying to keep up 
 a conversation." 
 
 Lord Arranmore laughed. 
 
 " Upon my word, I don't know, Hennibul," he 
 answered. " For the same old reason, I suppose. 
 One must see some one, do something. I thought 
 that you might amuse me." 
 
 " And I 've failed," Hennibul declared, smiling, 
 " Come to supper at the Savoy to-night. The two 
 new American girls from the Lyric and St. John 
 Lyttleton are to be there. Moderately respectable, 
 I believe, but a bit noisy perhaps." 
 
 Arranmore shook his head. 
 
 " You 're a good fellow, Hennibul," he said, " but 
 I 'm too old for that sort of thing." 
 
 Hennibul rose to his feet. 
 
 "Well," he said, "I've kept the best piece of 
 advice till last because I want you to think of it. 
 Marry!"
 
 192 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Lord Arranmore did not smile. He did not im- 
 mediately reply. 
 
 " You are a bachelor! " he remarked. 
 
 " I am a man of a different disposition," Hennibul 
 answered. " I find pleasure in everything every- 
 thing amuses me. My work is fascinating, my play- 
 time is never long enough. I really don't know where 
 a wife would come in. However, if ever I did get a 
 bit hipped, find myself in your position, for instance, 
 I can promise you that I 'd take my own medicine. 
 I 've thought of it more than once lately." 
 
 " Perhaps by that time," Lord Arranmore said, 
 " the woman whom you wanted to marry would n't 
 have you." 
 
 Hennibul looked serious for a moment. A new 
 idea had occurred to him. 
 
 " One must take one's chances ! " he said. 
 
 " You are a philosopher," Arranmore declared. 
 "" Will you have some tea or a whisky-and-soda? " 
 
 " Neither, thanks. In an abortive attempt to pre- 
 serve my youth I neither take tea nor drinks between 
 meals. I will have one of your excellent cigarettes 
 and get round to the club. Why, this is Enton over 
 again, for here comes Molyneux." 
 
 The Hon. Sydney Molyneux shook hands with 
 both of them in somewhat dreary fashion, and em- 
 barked upon a few disjointed remarks. Hennibul 
 took his leave, and Arranmore yawned openly. 
 
 " What is the matter with you, Sydney ? " he 
 asked. " You are duller than ever. I am positively 
 not going to sit here and mumble about the weather. 
 How are the Carooms ? Have you heard from them 
 lately?"-
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 193 
 
 " They are up in Yorkshire," Molyneux announced, 
 " staying with the Pryce- Powells. I believe they 're 
 all right. I 'm beastly fit myself, but I had a bit of 
 a facer last week. I er I wanted to ask you a 
 question." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " About that fellow Brooks I met at your place 
 down at Enton. Lawyer at Medchester, isn't he? 
 I thought that he and Sybil seemed a bit thick 
 somehow. Don't suppose there could have been 
 anything in it, eh ? He 's no one in particular, I 
 suppose. Lady Caroom would n't be likely to listen 
 to anything between Sybil and him?" 
 
 Arranmore raised his eyebrows. 
 
 " Brooks is a very intelligent young man," he said, 
 " and some girls are attracted by brains, you know. 
 I don't know anything about his relations with Sybil 
 Caroom, but he has ample private means, and I be- 
 lieve that he is well-born." 
 
 " Fellow 's a gentleman, of course," Molyneux de- 
 clared, " but Lady Caroom is a little ambitious, is n't 
 she? I always seemed to be in the running all right 
 lately. I spent last Sunday with them at Chelsom 
 Castle. Awful long way to go, but I 'm fond of 
 Sybil. I thought she was a bit cool to me, but, like 
 a fool, I blundered on, and in the end I got a 
 facer." 
 
 " Very sorry for you," Arranmore yawned. 
 
 " What made me think about Brooks was that she 
 was awfully decent to me before Enton," Molyneux 
 continued. " I don't mind telling you that I 'm hard 
 hit. I want to know who Brooks is. If he 's only a 
 country lawyer, he 's got no earthly chance with Lady 
 
 13
 
 194 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Caroom, and Sybil 'd never go against her mother. 
 They 're too great pals for that. Never saw them so 
 thick." 
 
 " Was Lady Caroom quite well ? " Arranmore 
 asked, irrelevantly. 
 
 " Well, now you mention it," Molyneux said, " I 
 don't think she was quite in her usual form. She 
 was much quieter, and it struck me that she was 
 aging a bit. Wonderful woman, though. She and 
 Sybil were quite inseparable at Chelsom more like 
 sisters than anything, 'pon my word." 
 
 Lord Arranmore looked into the fire, and was 
 silent for several minutes. 
 
 " So far as regards Brooks," he said, " I do not 
 think that he would be an acceptable son-in-law to 
 Lady Caroom, but I am not in the least sure. He is 
 by no means an insignificant person. If he were 
 really anxious to marry Sybil Caroom, he would be 
 a rival worth consideration. I cannot tell you any- 
 thing more." 
 
 " Much obliged to you I 'm sure. I shall try again 
 when they come to town, of course." 
 
 Arranmore rose up. 
 
 " I am going down to Christie's to see some old 
 French manuscripts," he said. " Is that on your 
 way?" 
 
 Molyneux shook his head. 
 
 " Going down to the House, thanks," he answered. 
 41 1 '11 look you up again some time, if I may." 
 
 They walked out into the street together. Arran- 
 more stepped into his brougham and was driven off. 
 At the top of St. James's Street he pulled the check- 
 string and jumped out. He had caught a glimpse
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 195 
 
 of a girl's face looking into a shop window. He 
 hastily crossed the pavement and accosted her, hat 
 in hand. 
 
 " Miss Scott, will you permit me the opportunity 
 of saying a few words to you ? " 
 
 Mary turned round, speechless for more than a 
 minute or two. 
 
 " I will not detain you for more than a minute or 
 two. I hope that you will not refuse me." 
 
 " I will listen to anything you have to say, Lord 
 Arranmore," she said, " but let me tell you that I 
 have been to see Mr. Ascough. He told me that he 
 had your permission to explain to me fully the reasons 
 of your coming to Montreal and the story of your 
 life before." 
 . "Well?" 
 
 She hesitated. He stood before her, palpably anx- 
 iously waiting for her decision. 
 
 " I was perhaps wrong to judge so hastily, Lord 
 Arranmore," she said, " and I am inclined to regret 
 my visit to Enton. If you care to know it, I do not 
 harbour any animosity towards you. But I cannot 
 possibly accept this sum of money. I told Mr. As- 
 cough so finally." 
 
 " It is only justice, Miss Scott," he said, in a low 
 tone. " I won the money from your father fairly in 
 one sense, but unfairly in another, for I was a good 
 player and he was a very poor one. You will do me 
 a great, an immeasurable kindness, if you will allow 
 me to make this restitution." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " If my forgiveness is of any value to you, Lord 
 Arranmore," she said, " you may have it. But I 
 cannot accept the money."
 
 196 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 "You have consulted no one?" 
 
 " No one." 
 
 " You have a guardian or friends ? " 
 
 " I have been living with my uncle, Mr. Bullsom. 
 He has been very kind to me, and I have " 
 
 "Mary!" 
 
 They both turned round. Selina and Mr. Bullsom 
 had issued from the shop before which they stood. 
 Both were looking at Lord Arranmore with curiosity, 
 in Selina' s case mixed with suspicion. 
 
 " Is this your uncle? " he asked. " Will you intro- 
 duce me ? " 
 
 Mary bit her lip. 
 
 " Uncle, this is Lord Arranmore," she said. " Mr. 
 Bullsom, my cousin, Miss Bullsom." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom retained presence of mind enough to 
 remove a new and very shiny silk hat, and to extend 
 a yellow, dog-skinned gloved hand. 
 
 " Very proud to meet your lordship," he declared. 
 "I I was n't aware " 
 
 Lord Arranmore extricated his hand from a some- 
 what close grasp, and bowed to Selina. 
 
 " We are neighbours, you know, Mr. Bullsom," he 
 said, " at Medchester. I met your niece there, and 
 recognized her at once, though she was a little slip of 
 a girl when I knew her last. Her father and I were 
 in Montreal together." 
 
 " God bless my soul," Mr. Bullsom exclaimed, in 
 much excitement. " It 's your lawyers, then, who 
 have been advertising for Mary ? " 
 
 Lord Arranmore bowed. 
 
 " That is so," he admitted. " I am sorry to say that 
 I cannot induce your niece to look upon a certain
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 197 
 
 transaction between her father and myself from a 
 business-like point of view. I think that you and I, 
 Mr. Bullsom, might come to a better understanding. 
 Will you give me an appointment? I should like to 
 discuss the matter with you." 
 
 " With the utmost pleasure, my lord," Mr. Bullsom 
 declared heartily. " Can't expect these young ladies 
 to see through a business matter, eh ? I will come to 
 your lordship's house whenever you like." 
 
 " It would be quite useless, uncle," Mary inter- 
 posed, firmly. " Lord Arranmore has already my; 
 final answer." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom was a little excited. 
 
 "Tut, tut, child!" he exclaimed. "Don't talk 
 nonsense. I should be proud to talk this matter over 
 with Lord Arranmore. We are staying at the Metro- 
 pole, and if your lordship would call there to-morrow 
 and take a bit of lunch, eh, about one o'clock if it 
 is n't too great a liberty." 
 
 Selina had never loved her father more sin- 
 cerely. Lord Arranmore smiled faintly, but good- 
 humouredly. 
 
 " You are exceedingly kind," he said. " For our 
 business talk, perhaps, it would be better if you would 
 come to St. James's House at, say, 10.30, if that is 
 convenient. I will send a carriage." 
 
 " I '11 be ready prompt," Mr. Bullsom declared. 
 " Now, girls, we will say good-afternoon to his lord- 
 ship and get a four-wheeler." 
 
 Selina raised her eyes and dropped them again in 
 the most approved fashion. Mr. Bullsom shook hands 
 as though it were a sacrament; Mary, who was 
 annoyed, did not smile at all.
 
 198 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " This is all quite unnecessary, Lord Arranmore," 
 she said, while her uncle was signalling for a cab. 
 " I shall not change my mind, and I am sorry that 
 you spoke to uncle about it at all." 
 
 " It is a serious matter to me, Miss Scott," Lord 
 Arranmore said, gravely. " And there is still an- 
 other point of view from which I might urge it." 
 
 " It is wasted time," she declared, firmly. 
 
 Selina detached herself from her father, and stood 
 by Lord Arranmore' s side. 
 
 " I suppose you are often in London, Lord Arran- 
 more?" she asked shyly. 
 
 " A great deal too often," he answered. 
 
 " We read about your beautiful parties at Enton," 
 she said, with a sigh. " It is such a lovely place." 
 
 " I am glad you like it," he answered, absently. 
 " I see your uncle cannot find a four-wheeler. You 
 must take my carriage. I am only going a few 
 steps." 
 
 Mary's eager protest was drowned in Selina's shrill 
 torrent of thanks. Lord Arranmore beckoned to his 
 coachman, and the brougham, with its pair of strong 
 horses, drew up against the pavement. The footman 
 threw open the door. Selina entered in a fever for 
 fear a cab which her father was signalling should, 
 after all, respond to his summons. Mr. Bullsom 
 found his breath taken away. 
 
 " We could n't possibly take your lordship's car- 
 riage," he protested. 
 
 " I have only a few steps to go, Mr. Bullsom, 
 and it would be a kindness, for my horses are never 
 more than half exercised. At 10.30 to-morrow 
 then."
 
 LORD ARRANMORE'S AMUSEMENTS 199 
 
 He stood bareheaded upon the pavement for a 
 moment, and Selina's eyes and smile had never 
 worked harder. Mary leaned back, too angry to 
 speak. Selina and Mr. Bullsom sat well forward, 
 and pulled both windows down.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE HECKLING OF HENSLOW 
 
 "^"inVHE long and short of it is, then, Mr. Henslow, 
 
 J_ that you decline to fulfil your pledges given 
 at the last election ? " Brooks asked, coldly. 
 
 " Nothing of the sort," Mr. Henslow declared, 
 testily. " You have no right to suggest anything of 
 the sort." 
 
 "No right!" 
 
 " Certainly not. You are my agent, and you ought 
 to work with me instead " 
 
 " I have already told you," Brooks interrupted, 
 " that I am nothing of the sort. I should not dream 
 of acting for you again, and if you think a formal 
 resignation necessary, I will post you one to-morrow. 
 I am one of your constituents, nothing more or less. 
 But as I am in some measure responsible for your 
 presence here, I consider myself within my rights 
 in asking you these questions." 
 
 " I 'm not going to be hectored ! " Mr. Henslow 
 declared. 
 
 " Nobody wants to hector you ! You gave certain 
 pledges to us, and you have not fulfilled one of them." 
 
 " They won't let me. I 'm not here as an inde- 
 pendent Member. I 'm here as a Liberal, and Sir 
 Henry himself struck out my proposed question and 
 motion. I must go with the Party."
 
 THE HECKLING OF HENSLOW, 201 
 
 " You know quite well," Brooks said, " that you 
 are within your rights in keeping the pledges you 
 made to the mass meeting at Medchester." 
 
 Henslow shook his head. 
 
 " It would be no good," he declared. " I 've 
 sounded lots of men about it. I myself have not 
 changed. I believe in some measure of protection. 
 I am a firm believer in it. But the House would n't 
 listen to me. The times are not ripe for anything of 
 the sort yet." 
 
 " How do you know until you try? " Brooks pro- 
 tested. " Your promise was to bring the question 
 before Parliament in connection with the vast and 
 increasing number of unemployed. You are within 
 your rights in doing so, and to speak frankly we in- 
 sist upon it, or we ask for your resignation." 
 
 " Are you speaking with authority, young man ? " 
 Mr. Henslow asked. 
 
 " Of course I am. I am the representative of the 
 Liberal Parliamentary Committee, and I am empow- 
 ered to say these things to you, and more." 
 
 " Well, I '11 do the best I can to get a date," Mr. 
 Henslow said, grumblingly, " but you fellows are 
 always in such a hurry, and you don't understand 
 that it don't go up here. We have to wait our time 
 month after month sometimes." 
 
 " I don't see any motion down in your name at all 
 yet," Brooks remarked. 
 
 " I told you that Sir Henry struck it through." 
 
 " Then I shall call upon him and point out that he 
 is throwing away a Liberal seat at the next election," 
 Brooks replied. " He is n't the sort of man to en- 
 courage a Member to break his election pledges,"
 
 202 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " You '11 make a mess of the whole thing if you do 
 anything of the sort," Henslow declared. " Look 
 here, come and have a bit of dinner with me, and talk 
 things over a bit more pleasantly, eh? There's no 
 use in getting our rags out." 
 
 " Please excuse me," Brooks said. " I have ar- 
 ranged to dine elsewhere. I do not wish to seem dic- 
 tatorial or unreasonable, but I have just come from 
 Medchester, where the distress is, if anything, worse 
 than ever. It makes one's heart sick to walk the 
 streets, and when I look into the people's faces I seem 
 to always hear that great shout of hope and enthusi- 
 asm which your speech in the market-place evoked. 
 You see, there is only one real hope for these people, 
 and that is legislation, and you are the man directly 
 responsible to them for that." 
 
 " I '11 tell you what I '11 do! " Mr. Henslow said, 
 in a burst of generosity. " I '11 send another ten 
 guineas to the Unemployed Fund." 
 
 " Take my advice and don't," Brooks answered, 
 dryly. " They might be reminded of the people 
 who clamoured for bread and were offered a 
 stone. Do your duty here. Keep your pledges. 
 Speak in the House with the same passion and 
 the same eloquence as when you sowed hope in 
 the heart of those suffering thousands. Some 
 one must break away from this musty routine 
 of Party politics. The people will be heard, Mr. 
 Henslow. Their voice has dominated the fate 
 of every nation in time, and it will be so with 
 ours." 
 
 Mr. Henslow was silent for a few minutes. This 
 young man who would not drink champagne, or be
 
 THE HECKLING OF HENSLOW 203 
 
 hail-fellow-well-met, and who was in such deadly 
 earnest, was a nuisance. 
 
 " I tell you what I '11 do," he said at last. " I '11 
 have a few words with Sir Henry, and see you to- 
 morrow at what time you like." 
 
 " Certainly," Brooks answered, rising. " If you 
 will allow me to make a suggestion, Mr. Henslow, I 
 would ask you to run through in your memory all 
 your speeches and go through your pledges one by 
 one. Let Sir Henry understand that your constituents 
 will not be trifled with, for it is not a question of 
 another candidate, it is a question of another party. 
 You have set the ball rolling, and I can assure you 
 that the next Member whom Medchester sends here, 
 whether it be you or any one else, will come fully 
 pledged to a certain measure of Protection." 
 
 Mr. Henslow nodded. 
 
 " Very well," he said, gloomily. " Where are you 
 staying? " 
 
 " At the Metropole. Mr. Bullsom is there also." 
 
 " I will call," Mr. Henslow promised, "at three 
 o'clock, if that is convenient." 
 
 Brooks passed out across the great courtyard and 
 through the gates. He had gone to his interview with 
 Henslow in a somewhat depressed state of mind, and 
 its result had not been enlivening. Were all politics 
 like this? Was the greatest of causes, the cause of 
 the people, to be tossed about from one to the other, 
 a joke with some, a juggling ball with others, never 
 to be dealt with firmly and wisely by the brains and 
 generosity of the Empire? He looked back at the 
 Houses of Parliament, with their myriad lights, their 
 dark, impressive outline. And for a moment the de^
 
 204 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 pression passed away. He thought of the freedom 
 which had been won within those walls, of the gigantic 
 struggles, the endless, restless journeying onward 
 towards the truths, the great truths of the world. All 
 politicians were not as this man Henslow. There 
 were others, more strenuous, more single-hearted. 
 He himself and his heart beat at the thought 
 why should he not take his place there ? The thought 
 fascinated him, every word of Lord Arranmore's 
 letter which he had recently received, seemed to stand 
 out before him. His feet fell more blithely upon the 
 pavement, he carried himself with a different air. 
 Here were ample means to fill his life, means by 
 which he could crush out that sweet but unhappy 
 tangle of memories which somehow or other had 
 stolen the flavour out of life for the last few weeks. 
 
 At the hotel he glanced at the clock. It was just 
 eight, and he was to accompany the Bullsoms to the 
 theatre. He met them in the hall, and Selina looked 
 with reproach at his morning clothes. She was wear- 
 ing a new swansdown theatre cloak, with a collar 
 which she had turned up round her face like a frame. 
 She was convinced that she had never looked so well 
 in her life. 
 
 " Mr. Brooks, how naughty of you," she exclaimed, 
 shaking her head in mock reproach. " Why, the play 
 begins at 8.15, and it is eight o'clock already. Have 
 you had dinner? " 
 
 " Oh, I can manage with something in my room 
 while I change," he answered cheerily. " I 'm going 
 to take you all out to supper after the theatre, you 
 know. Don't wait for me I '11 come on. His 
 Majesty's, isn't it?"
 
 THE HECKLING OF HENSLOW 205 
 
 " I '11 keep your seat/' Selina promised him, low- 
 ering her voice. " That is, if you are very good and 
 come before it is half over. Do you know that we 
 met a friend of yours, and he lent us his carriage, 
 and I think he 's charming." 
 
 Brooks looked surprised. He glanced at Mary, and 
 saw a look in her face which came as a revelation to 
 him. 
 
 " You don't mean " 
 
 "Lord Arranmore!" Selina declared, triumphantly. 
 " He was so nice. He would n't let us come home in 
 a cab. He positively made us take his own carriage." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom came hurrying up. 
 
 " Cab waiting," he announced. " Come on, girls. 
 See you later, then, Brooks." 
 
 Brooks changed his clothes leisurely, and went into 
 the smoking-room for some sandwiches and a glass 
 of wine. A small boy shouting his number attracted 
 his attention. He called him, and was handed a 
 card. 
 
 "Lord Arranmore!" 
 
 " You can show the gentleman here," Brooks 
 directed. 
 
 Arranmore came in, and nodded a little wearily to 
 Brooks, whom he had not seen since the latter had 
 left Enton. 
 
 " I won't keep you," he remarked. " I just wanted 
 a word with you about that obstinate young person, 
 Miss er Scott." 
 
 Brooks wheeled an easy-chair towards him. 
 
 " I am in no great hurry," he remarked. 
 
 Arranmore glanced at the clock. 
 
 " More am I," he said, " but I find I am dining with
 
 206 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 the Prime Minister at nine o'clock. It occurs to me 
 that you may have some influence with her." 
 
 " We are on fairly friendly terms," Brooks ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 " Just so. Well, she may have told you that my 
 solicitors approached her, as the daughter of Martin 
 Scott, with the offer of a certain sum of money, which 
 is only a fair and reasonable item, which I won from 
 her father at a time when we were not playing on 
 equal terms. It was through that she found me 
 out." 
 
 " Yes, I knew as much as that." 
 
 " So I imagined. But the hot-headed young woman 
 has up to now steadily refused to accept anything 
 whatever from me. Quite ridiculous of her. There 's 
 no doubt that I broke up the happy home, and all 
 that sort of thing, and I really can't see why she 
 should n't permit me the opportunity of making some 
 restitution." 
 
 " You want her to afford you the luxury of salving 
 your conscience," Brooks remarked, dryly. 
 
 Lord Arranmore laughed hardly. 
 
 " Conscience," he repeated. " You ought to know 
 me better, Brooks, than to suppose me possessed of 
 such a thing. No; I have a sense of justice, that is 
 all a sort of weakness for seeing the scales held 
 fairly. Now, don't you think it is reasonable that 
 she should accept this money from me? " 
 
 " It depends entirely upon how she feels," Brooks 
 answered. " You have no right to press it upon her 
 if she has scruples. Nor have you any right to try 
 and enlist her family on your side, as you seem to be 
 doing."
 
 THE HECKLING OF HENSLOW, 207 
 
 " Will you discuss it with her? " 
 
 11 1 should not attempt to influence her," Brooks 
 answered. 
 
 " Be reasonable, Brooks. The money can make 
 no earthly difference to me, and it secures for her 
 independence. The obligation, if only a moral one, 
 is real enough. There is no question of charity. Use 
 your influence with her." 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 " I have great confidence in Miss Scott's own judg- 
 ment," he said. " I prefer not to interfere." 
 
 Arranmore sat quite still for a moment. Then he 
 rose slowly to his feet. 
 
 " I am sorry to have troubled you," he said. " The 
 world seems to have grown more quixotic since I 
 knew it better. I am almost afraid to ask you whether 
 my last letter has yet received the favour of your 
 consideration." 
 
 Brooks flushed a little at the biting sarcasm in 
 Arranmore' s tone, but he restrained himself. 
 
 " I have considered the matter fully," he said ; 
 " and I have talked it over with Mr. Ascough. There 
 seems to be no reason why I should refuse the income 
 to which I seem to be entitled." 
 
 Lord Arranmore nodded and lit a cigarette. 
 
 " I am thankful," he said, dryly, " for so much 
 common-sense. Mr. Ascough will put you in posses- 
 sion of a banking account at any moment. Should 
 you consider it well intrusive on my part if I 
 were to inquire as to your plans? " 
 
 Brooks hesitated. 
 
 " They are as yet not wholly formed," he said, 
 " but I am thinking of studying social politics for
 
 208 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 some time here in London with the intention of 
 entering public life." 
 
 " A very laudable ambition," Lord Arranmore 
 answered. " If I can be of any assistance to you, I 
 trust that you will not fail to let me know." 
 
 " I thank you," Brooks answered. " I shall not 
 require any assistance from you." 
 
 Lord Arranmore winced perceptibly. Brooks, who 
 would not have believed him capable of such a thing, 
 for a moment doubted his eyes. 
 
 " I am much obliged for your candour," Lord 
 Arranmore said, coldly, and with complete self- 
 recovery. " Don't trouble to come to the door. 
 Good-evening." 
 
 Brooks was alone. He sat down in one of the big 
 easy-chairs, and for a moment forgot that empty stall 
 next to Selina. He had seen the first sign of weakness 
 in a man whom he had judged to be wholly and en- 
 tirely heartless.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 MARY SCOTT'S TWO VISITORS 
 
 " T AM sure," he said, " that Selina would consider 
 J_ this most improper." 
 
 " You are quite right," Mary assured him, laugh- 
 ing. " It was one of the first things she mentioned. 
 When I told her that I should ask any one to tea I 
 liked she was positively indignant." 
 
 " It is hard to believe that you are cousins," he 
 remarked. 
 
 " We were brought up very differently." 
 
 He looked around him. He was in a tiny sitting- 
 room of a tiny flat high up in a great building. Out 
 of the window he seemed to look down upon the Ferris 
 wheel. Inside everything was cramped but cosy. 
 Mary Scott sat behind the tea-tray, and laughed at 
 his expression. 
 
 " I will read your thoughts," she exclaimed. " You 
 are wondering how you will get out of this room 
 without knocking anything over." 
 
 " On the contrary," he answered, " I was wonder- 
 ing how I ever got in." 
 
 " You were really very clever. Now do have some 
 more tea, and tell me all the news." 
 
 " I will have the tea, if you please," he answered, 
 " and you shall have the news, such as it is."
 
 2io A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " First of all then," she said, "I hear that you are 
 leaving Medchester, giving up your business and 
 coming to live in London, and that you have had 
 some money left you. Do you know that all this 
 sounds very mysterious ? " 
 
 " I admit it," he answered, slowly stirring his tea. 
 " Yet in the main it is true." 
 
 " How nice to hear all about it," she sighed, con- 
 tentedly. " You know I have scarcely had a word 
 with you while my uncle and cousins were up. Selina 
 monopolized you most disgracefully." 
 
 He looked at her with twinkling eyes. 
 
 " Selina was very amusing," he said. 
 
 " You seemed to find her so," she answered. " But 
 Selina is n't here now, and you have to entertain me. 
 You are really going to live in London ? " 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 " I have taken rooms ! " 
 
 " Delightful. Whereabouts ? " 
 
 " In Jermyn Street ! " 
 
 " And are you going to practise? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " No, I shall have enough to live on. I am going 
 to study social subjects and politics generally." 
 
 " You are going into Parliament ? " she exclaimed, 
 breathlessly. 
 
 " Some day, perhaps," he answered, hesitatingly. 
 " If I can find a constituency." 
 
 She was silent for a moment. 
 
 " Do you know, I think I rather dislike you," she 
 said. " I envy you most hideously." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " What an evil nature! "
 
 MARY SCOTT'S TWO VISITORS 211 
 
 " Well, I 've never denied it. I 'm dreadfully en- 
 vious of people who have the chance of doing things, 
 whose limitations are not chalked out on the black- 
 board before them." 
 
 " Oh, well, you yourself are not at Medchester 
 now," he reminded her. " You have kicked your 
 own limitation away. Literature is as wide a field 
 as politics." 
 
 " That is true enough," she answered. " I must 
 not grumble. After Medchester this is elysium. But 
 literature is a big name to give my little efforts. I 'm 
 just a helper on a lady's threepenny paper, and be- 
 tween you and me I don't believe they think much of 
 my work yet." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " Surely they have n't been discouraging you ? " 
 
 " No, they have been very kind. But they keep on 
 assuring me that I am bound to improve, and the way 
 they use the blue pencil ! However, it 's only the 
 journalist's part they go for. The little stories are 
 all right still." 
 
 " I should think so," he declared, warmly. " I 
 think they are charming." 
 
 " How nice you are," she sighed. " No wonder 
 Selina did n't like going home." 
 
 He looked at her in amused wonder. 
 
 " Do you know," he said, " you are getting posi- 
 tively frivolous. I don't recognize you. I never saw 
 such a change." 
 
 She leaned back in her chair, laughing heartily, her 
 eyes bright, her beautiful white teeth in delightful 
 evidence. 
 
 " Oh, I suppose it 's the sense of freedom," she
 
 212 
 
 exclaimed. " It 's delightful, is n't it ? Medchester 
 had got on my nerves. I hated it. One saw nothing 
 but the ugly side of life, day after day. It was hid- 
 eously depressing. Here one can breathe. There 's 
 room for every one." 
 
 ;< The change agrees with you ! " 
 
 " Why not. I feel years younger. Think how 
 much there is to do, and see, even for a pauper like 
 myself picture galleries, the shops, the people, the 
 theatres." 
 
 He looked at her thoughtfully. 
 
 '" Don't think me a prig, will you? " he said, " but 
 I want to understand you. In Medchester you used 
 to work for the people it was the greater part of 
 your life. You are not giving that up altogether, are 
 you? " 
 
 She laughed him to scorn. 
 
 "Am I such a butterfly? No, I hope to get some 
 serious work to do, and I am looking forward to it. 
 I have a letter of introduction to a Mrs. Capenhurst, 
 whom I am going to see on Sunday. I expect to learn 
 a lot from her. I was very, very sorry to leave my 
 own girls. It was the only regret I had in leaving 
 Medchester. By the bye, what is this about Mr. 
 Henslow?" 
 
 " We are thinking of asking him to resign," Brooks 
 answered. " He has been a terrible disappointment 
 to us." 1 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " I am sorry. From his speeches he seemed such 
 an excellent candidate." 
 
 " He was a magnificent candidate," Brooks said 
 ruefully, " but a shocking Member. I am afraid what
 
 MARY SCOTT'S TWO VISITORS 213 
 
 I heard in the City the other day must have some 
 truth in it. They say that he only wanted to be able 
 to write M.P. after his name for this last session to 
 get on the board of two new companies. He will 
 never sit for Medchester again." 
 
 " He was at the hotel the other day, was n't he ? " 
 Mary asked, "with you and uncle? What has he 
 to say for himself? " 
 
 " Well, he shelters himself behind the old fudge 
 about duty to his Party," Brooks answered. " You 
 see the Liberals only just scraped in last election be- 
 cause of the war scandals, and their majority is too 
 small for them to care about any of the rank and 
 file introducing any disputative measures. Still that 
 scarcely affects the question. He won his seat on 
 certain definite pledges, and if he persists in his pres- 
 ent attitude, we shall ask him at once to resign." 
 
 " You still keep up your interest in Medchester, 
 then?" 
 
 " Why, yes ! " he answered. " Between ourselves, 
 if I could choose, I would rather, when the time 
 comes, stand for Medchester than anywhere." 
 
 " I am glad ! I should like to see you Member for 
 Medchester. Do you know, even now, although I 
 am so happy, I cannot think about the last few 
 months there without a shudder. It seemed to me 
 that things were getting worse and worse. The peo- 
 ple's faces haunt me sometimes." 
 
 He looked up at her sympathetically. 
 
 " If you have once lived with them," he said, " once 
 really understood, you never can forget. You can 
 travel or amuse yourself in any way, but their faces 
 are always coming before you, their voices seem
 
 214 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 always in your ears. It is the one eternal sadness of 
 life. And the strangest part of it is, that just as you 
 who have once really understood can never forget, 
 so it is the most difficult thing in the world to make 
 those people understand who have not themselves 
 lived and toiled amongst them. It is a cry which you 
 cannot translate, but if once you have heard it, it will 
 follow you from the earth to the stars." 
 
 " You too, then," she said, " have some of the old 
 aim at heart. You are not going to immerse yourself 
 wholly in politics ? " 
 
 " My studies," he said, " will be in life. It is not 
 from books that I hope to gain experience. I want 
 to get a little nearer to the heart of the thing. You 
 and I may easily come across one another, even in 
 this great city." 
 
 " You," she said, " are going to watch, to observe, 
 to trace the external only that you may understand 
 the internal. But I am going to work on my hands 
 and knees." 
 
 " And you think that I am going to play the 
 dilettante? " 
 
 " Not altogether. But you will want to pass from 
 one scheme to another to see the inner workings of 
 all. I shall be content to find occupation in any 
 one." 
 
 " I shall be coming to you," he said, " for infor- 
 mation and help." 
 
 " I doubt it," she answered, cheerfully. " Never 
 mind! It is pleasant to build castles, and we may 
 yet find ourselves working side by side." 
 
 He suddenly looked at her. 
 
 " I have answered all your questions," he said.
 
 MARY SCOTT'S TWO VISITORS 215 
 
 " There is something about you which I should like 
 to know." 
 
 " I am sure you shall." 
 
 " Lord Arranmore came to me when I was staying 
 at the Metropole with your uncle and cousin. He 
 wished me to use my influence with you to induce you 
 to accept a certain sum of money which it seemed that 
 you had already declined." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Of course I refused. In the first place, as I told 
 him, I was not aware that I possessed any influence 
 over you. And in the second I had every confidence 
 in your own judgment." 
 
 She was suddenly very thoughtful. 
 
 " My own judgment," she repeated. " I am 
 afraid that I have lost a good deal of faith in that 
 lately." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " I have learned to repent of that impulsive visit of 
 mine to Enton." 
 
 "Again why?" 
 
 " I was mad with rage against Lord Arranmore. 
 I think that I was wrong. It was many years ago, 
 and he has repented." 
 
 Brooks smiled faintly. The idea of Lord Arran- 
 more repenting of anything appealed in some measure 
 to his sense of humour. 
 
 " Then I am afraid that I did him some great 
 harm in "accusing him like that openly. He has 
 seemed to me since like an altered man. Tell 
 me, those others who were there they believed 
 me?" 
 
 " Yes."
 
 216 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " It did him harm with the lady, the handsome 
 woman who was playing billiards with him?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Was he engaged to her? " 
 
 " No ! He proposed to her afterwards, and she 
 refused him." 
 
 Her eyes were suddenly dim. 
 
 " I am sorry," she said. 
 
 " I think," he said, quietly, " that you need not be. 
 You probably saved her a good deal of unhappiness." 
 
 She looked at him curiously. 
 
 "Why are you so bitter against Lord Arranmore?" 
 she asked. 
 
 " I ? " he laughed. " I am not bitter against him. 
 Only I believe him to be a man without heart or 
 conscience or principles." 
 
 "That is your opinion really?" 
 
 "Really! Decidedly." 
 
 " Then I don't agree with you," she answered. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Simply that I don't." 
 
 " Excellent ! But you have reasons as well as 
 convictions ? " 
 
 " Perhaps. Why, for instance, is he so anxious for 
 me to have this money? That must be a matter of 
 conscience? " 
 
 " Not necessarily. An accident might bring his 
 Montreal career to light. His behaviour towards you 
 would be an excellent defence." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " He is n't mean enough to think so far ahead for 
 his own advantage. Villain or paragon, he is on a 
 large scale, your Lord Arranmore."
 
 MARY SCOTT'S TWO VISITORS 217 
 
 " He has had the good fortune," Brooks said, 
 with a note of satire in his tone, " to attract your 
 sympathies." 
 
 " Why not ? I struck hard enough at him, and he 
 has borne me no ill-will. He even made friends with 
 Selina and my uncle to induce me to accept his 
 well, conscience money." 
 
 " I need not ask you what the result was," Brooks 
 said. " You declined it, of course." 
 
 She looked at him thoughtfully. 
 
 " I refused it at first, as you know," she said. 
 " Since then, well, I have wavered." 
 
 He looked at her blankly. 
 
 " You mean that you have contemplated ac- 
 cepting it? " 
 
 " Why not? There is reason in it. I do not say 
 that I have accepted it, but at any rate I see nothing 
 which should make you look upon my possible accept- 
 ance as a heinous thing." 
 
 He was silent for a moment. 
 
 " May I ask you then what the position is? " 
 
 " I will tell you. Lord Arranmore is coming to me 
 perhaps this afternoon for my answer. I asked him 
 for a few days to think it over." 
 
 " And your decision is it ready? " 
 
 " No, I don't think it is," she admitted. " To tell 
 you the truth, I shall not decide until he is actually 
 here until I have heard just how he speaks of it." 
 
 He got up and stood for a moment looking out of 
 the window. Then he turned suddenly towards her 
 with outstretched hand. 
 
 " I am going Miss Scott. Good-afternoon." 
 
 She rose and held out her hand.
 
 218 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 "Aren't you a little abrupt?" she asked. 
 
 " Perhaps I am. I think that it is better that I 
 should go away now. There are reasons why I do 
 not want to talk about Lord Arranmore, or discuss 
 this matter with you, and if I stayed I might do both. 
 Will you dine with me somewhere on Friday night? 
 I will come and fetch you." 
 
 " Of course I will. Do be careful how you walk. 
 About 7.30." 
 
 " I will be here by then," he answered. 
 
 On the last flight of stone steps he came face to 
 face with Lord Arranmore, who nodded and pointed 
 upwards with his walking-stick. 
 
 "How much of this sort of thing?" he asked, 
 dryly. 
 
 " Ten storeys," Brooks answered, and passed out 
 into the street. 
 
 Lord Arranmore looked after him watched him 
 until he was out of sight. Then he stood irresolute 
 for several moments, tapping his boots. 
 
 " Damned young fool ! " he muttered at last ; and 
 began the ascent.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 dear Miss Scott," Lord Arranmore said, 
 settling himself in the most comfortable 
 of her fragile easy-chairs, and declining tea. " I can- 
 not fail to perceive that my cause is hopeless. The 
 united efforts of myself and your worthy relatives 
 appear to be powerless to unearth a single grain of 
 common-sense in your er pardon me singu- 
 larly obstinate disposition." 
 
 A subdued smile played at the corners of her 
 mouth. 
 
 "I am delighted that you are convinced, Lord 
 Arranmore," she said. " It will save us both a good 
 deal of time and breath." 
 
 " Well as to that I am not so sure," he answered, 
 deliberately. " You forget that there is still an im- 
 portant matter to be decided." 
 
 She looked at him questioningly. 
 
 " The disposal of the money, of course," he said. 
 
 " The disposal of it ? But that has nothing to do 
 with me ! " she declared. " I refuse to touch it to 
 have anything to do with it." 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " You see," he explained, " I have placed it, or 
 rather my solicitors have, in trust. Actually you may 
 decline, as you are doing, to have anything to do
 
 220 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 with it legally you cannot avoid your responsibil- 
 ities. That money cannot be touched without your 
 signature." 
 
 She laughed a little indignantly. 
 
 " Then you had better withdraw it from trust, or 
 whatever you call it, at once. If it was there until I 
 was eighty I should never touch it." 
 
 " I understand that perfectly," Lord Arranmore 
 said. " You have refused it. Very well ! What are 
 we going to do with it? " 
 
 " Put it back where it came from, of course," she 
 answered. 
 
 " Well," he said, " by signing several papers that 
 might be managed. In that case I should distribute it 
 amongst the various public-houses in the East End to 
 provide drinks for the thirstiest of their customers." 
 
 " If you think that," she said, scornfully, " a repu- 
 table use to make of your money " 
 
 He held out his hand. 
 
 " My dear Miss Scott. Our money ! " 
 
 " The money," she exclaimed. " I repeat, the 
 money. Well, there is nothing more to be said 
 about it." 
 
 " Will you sign the papers which authorize me to 
 distribute the money in this way?" 
 
 She thought for a moment. 
 
 "No; I will not." 
 
 " Exactly. You would be very foolish and very 
 untrue to your principles if you did. So you see, this 
 sum is not to be foisted altogether upon me, for there 
 is no doubt that I should misuse it. Now I believe 
 that if you were to give the matter a little considera- 
 tion you could hit upon a more reasonable manner of
 
 A MARQUIS ON MATRIMONY 221 
 
 laying out this sum. Don't interrupt me, please. My 
 own views as to charity you know. You however 
 look at the matter from an altogether different point 
 of view. Let us leave it where it is for the moment. 
 Something may occur to you within the next few 
 months. Don't let it be a hospital, if you can help it 
 something altogether original would be best. Set 
 your brain to work. I shall be at your service at any 
 moment." 
 
 He rose to his feet and began slowly to collect his 
 belongings. Then their eyes met, and she burst out 
 laughing he too smiled. 
 
 " You are very ingenious, Lord Arranmore," she 
 said. 
 
 " It is my conscience," he assured her. " It is out 
 of gear to the tune of three thousand." 
 
 " I don't believe in the conscience," she answered. 
 " This is sheer obstinacy. You have made up your 
 mind that I should be interested in that money some- 
 how, and you can't bear to suffer defeat." 
 
 " I am an old man," he said, " and you are a young 
 woman. Let us leave it where it is for a while. I 
 have an idea of the sort of life which you are planning 1 
 for yourself. Believe me, that before you have lived 
 here for many months you will be willing to give 
 years of your life, years of your labour and your 
 youth, to throw yourself into a struggle which with- 
 out money is hopeless. Remember that there was a 
 time when I too was young. I too saw these things 
 as you and Brooks see them to-day. I do not wish to 
 preach pessimism to you. I fought and was worsted. 
 So will you be. The whole thing is a vast chimera, 
 a jest of the God you have made for yourself. But
 
 222 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 as long as the world lasts the young will have to buy 
 knowledge as I have bought it. Don't go into 
 the fray empty-handed it will only prolong the 
 suffering." 
 
 " You speak," she protested, gently, " as though it 
 were impossible to do good." 
 
 " It is absolutely and entirely impossible to do good 
 by any means which you and Brooks and the whole 
 army of your fellow-philanthropists have yet evoked," 
 he answered, with a sudden fierce note in his tone. 
 " Don't think that I speak to you as a cynic, one who 
 loiters on the edge of the cauldron and peers in to 
 gratify cravings for sensation. I have been there, 
 down in the thick of it, there where the mud is as 
 black as hell bottomless as eternity. I was young 
 as you mad with enthusiasm. I had faith, 
 strength, belief. I meant to cleanse the world. I 
 worked till the skin hung on my bones. I gave all 
 that I had youth gifts money. And, do you 
 know what I was doing? I was swimming against 
 the tide of natural law, stronger than all mankind, 
 unconquerable, eternal. There wasn't the smallest 
 corner of the world the better for my broken life. 
 There was n't a child, a man, or a woman content to 
 grasp my hand and climb out. There were plenty 
 who mocked me. But they fell back again. They 
 fell back always." 
 
 " Oh, but you can't tell that," she cried. " You 
 can't be sure." 
 
 " You can be as sure of it as of life itself," he 
 answered. " Come, take my advice. I know. I can 
 save you a broken youth a broken heart. Keep 
 away from there." -
 
 A MARQUIS ON MATRIMONY 
 
 * < 
 
 He pointed out of the window eastwards. 4 
 
 " You can be charitable like the others, subscribe to 
 societies, visit the sick, read the Bible, play at it as 
 long as you like but keep away from the real 
 thing. If you feel the fever in your veins fly. Go 
 abroad, study art, literature, music anything. 
 Only don't listen to that cry. It will draw you 
 against your will even. But not you nor the whole 
 world of women, or the world full of gold, will ever 
 stop it. It is the everlasting legacy to the world of 
 outraged nature " 
 
 He went swiftly and silently, leaving her motion- 
 less. She saw him far down on the pavement below 
 step into his brougham, pausing for a moment to light 
 a cigarette. And half-an-hour later he walked with 
 elastic tread into Mr. Ascough's office. 
 
 Mr. Ascough greeted him with an inquiring smile. 
 Lord Arranmore nodded and sat down. 
 
 " You were quite right," he announced. " The 
 tongues of men or of angels would n't move her. 
 Never mind. She's going to use the money for 
 charity." 
 
 " Well, that 's something, at any rate," Mr. As- 
 cough remarked. 
 
 " The eloquence," Lord Arranmore said, lazily, 
 "which I have wasted upon that young woman would 
 entrance the House of Lords. By the bye, Ascough, 
 I am going to take my seat next week." 
 
 " I am delighted to hear it, your lordship." 
 
 "Yes, it's good news for the country, isn't it?" 
 Lord Arranmore remarked. "I have not quite de- 
 cided what my particular line shall be, but I have no 
 doubt but that the papers will all be calling me a
 
 224 A PRINCE OF SINNERS. 
 
 I y<fcW . ,.. , 
 
 welcome addition to that august assembly before 
 
 long. I believe that 's what 's the matter with me. 
 
 I want to make a speech. Do you remember me at 
 
 the Bar, Ascough ? Could n't keep me down, could 
 
 they?" 
 
 . Mr. Ascough smiled. 
 
 " You were rather fond of being on your feet ! " 
 he admitted. 
 
 Lord Arranmore sighed regretfully. 
 
 " And to think that I might have been Lord High 
 Chancellor by now," he remarked. " Good-bye, 
 Ascough." 
 
 Later, at the reception of a Cabinet Minister, Lord 
 Arranmore came across Hennibul talking with half- 
 a-dozen other men. He detached himself at once. 
 
 " This is odd," he remarked, with a whimsical 
 smile. " What the dickens are you doing in this 
 respectable household, Arranmore? You look like 
 a lost sheep." 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I 've decided to go in for something," he said ; 
 " politics or society or something of that sort. What 
 do you recommend ? " 
 
 " Supper ! " Mr. Hennibul answered, promptly. 
 
 " Come on then," Lord Arranmore assented. 
 " One of those little tables in the far room, eh ? " 
 
 " The pate here is delicious," Mr. Hennibul said ; 
 "but for Heaven's sake leave the champagne alone. 
 There 's some decent hock. You '11 excuse my point- 
 ing out these little things to you, but, of course, you 
 don't know the runs yet. I '11 give you a safe tip 
 while I 'm about it. The Opposition food is beastly,
 
 A MARQUIS ON MATRIMONY 225 
 
 but the wine is all right Pommery and Heidsieck, 
 most of it, and the right years. The Government 
 food now is good, but the wine, especially the cham- 
 pagne, is positively unholy." 
 
 " One should eat then with the Government, and 
 drink with the Opposition," Lord Arranmore re- 
 marked. 
 
 "Or, better still," Mr. Hennibul said, "do both 
 with the Speaker. By the bye, did you know that 
 they are going to make me a judge?" 
 
 " I heard that your friends wanted to get rid of 
 you ! " Arranmore answered. 
 
 " To make yourself obnoxious thoroughly ob- 
 noxious," Mr. Hennibul murmured, " is the sure 
 road to advancement." 
 
 " That 's right, give me a few tips," Lord Arran- 
 more begged, sipping his wine. 
 
 " My dear fellow, I don't know what you 're going^ 
 in for yet" 
 
 " Neither do I. What about the stage? I used to 
 be rather good at private theatricals. Elderly Wynd- 
 hamy parts, you know." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul shook his head. 
 
 " Twenty years too late," he declared. " Even the 
 suburbs turn up their noses at a lord now." 
 
 " I must do something," Arranmore declared, 
 meditatively. 
 
 " Don't see the necessity," Hennibul remarked. 
 
 Lord Arranmore lifted his glass and looked 
 thoughtfully at the wine for a moment. 
 
 " Ah, well," he said, " you were born lazy, and I 
 was born restless. That is the reason you have done, 
 something, and I haven't." 
 
 15
 
 226 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " If you want my advice my serious advice," the 
 K. C. said, quietly, " you will make yourself a nui- 
 sance to that right woman, whoever she is, until she 
 marries you if only to get rid of you." 
 
 " All sorts of things in the way," Lord Arran- 
 more declared. " You see, I was married 
 abroad." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul looked up quickly. 
 
 "Nonsense!" 
 
 " Quite true, I assure you." 
 
 "Is she alive?" 
 
 " No but her son is." 
 
 "Great Heavens. Why, he's Lord Kingston?" 
 
 " Of course he is." 
 
 "How old is he?" 
 
 " Twenty-eight or somewhere thereabouts." 
 
 "What is he doing? Where is he? Why don't 
 we know him ? " 
 
 " He does n't approve of me," Lord Arranmore 
 said, " Fact, really ! We are scarcely on speaking 
 terms." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Says I deserted his mother. So I did! Played 
 the blackguard altogether. Left 'em both to starve, 
 or next door to it ! " 
 
 Mr. Hennibul fetched out his handkerchief and 
 dabbed his forehead. 
 
 " You are serious, Arranmore ? " 
 
 " Rather ! You would n't expect me to be friv- 
 olous on this hock." 
 
 " That young man must be talked to," Mr. 
 Hennibul declared. " He ought to be filling his 
 proper place in the world. It 's no use carrying on
 
 A MARQUIS ON MATRIMONY 227 
 
 a grudge against his own father. Let me have a try 
 at him." 
 
 " No ! " Lord Arranmore said, quietly. " I am 
 obliged to you, Hennibul, but the matter is one which 
 does not admit of outside interference, however 
 kindly. Besides, the boy is right. I wilfully deserted 
 both him and his mother, and she died during my 
 absence. My life, whilst away from them, was the 
 sort one forgets or tries to and he knows about 
 it. Further, when I returned to England I was two 
 years before I took the trouble to go and see him. 
 I merely alluded to these domestic matters that you 
 might not wholly misjudge the situation." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul went on with his supper in silence. 
 Lord Arranmore, whose appetite had soon failed him, 
 leaned back in his chair and watched the people in 
 the further room. 
 
 " This rather puts me off politics," he remarked, 
 after a while. " I don't like the look of the 
 people." 
 
 " Oh, you '11 get in for the select crushers," Mr. 
 Hennibul said. " This is a rank and file affair. You 
 must n't judge by appearances. But why must you 
 specialize? Take my advice. Don't go in specially 
 for politics, or society, or sport. Mix them all up. 
 Be cosmopolitan and commonplace." 
 
 " Upon my word, Hennibul, you are a genius," 
 Arranmore declared, " and yonder goes my good 
 fairy." 
 
 He sprang up and disappeared into the further 
 room. 
 
 " Lady Caroom," he exclaimed, bending over her 
 shoulder. " I never suspected it of you."
 
 228 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 She started slightly she was silent perhaps for 
 the fraction of a second. Then she looked up with 
 a bright smile, meeting him on his own ground. 
 
 " But of you," she cried, " it is incredible. Come 
 at once and explain."
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 BROOKS ENLISTS A RECRUIT 
 
 BROOKS had found a small restaurant in the 
 heart of fashionable London, where the ap- 
 pointments and decorations were French, and the 
 waiters were not disposed to patronize. Of the cook- 
 ing neither he nor Mary Scott in those days was a 
 critic. Nevertheless she protested against the length 
 of the dinner which he ordered. 
 
 "I want an excuse," he declared, laying down the 
 carte, " for a good long chat. We shall be too late 
 for the theatre, so we may as well resign ourselves 
 to an hour or so of one another's society." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " A very apt excuse for unwarrantable greediness," 
 she declared. " Surely we can talk without eating? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " You do not smoke, and you do not drink 
 liqueurs," he remarked. " Now I have noticed that 
 it is simply impossible for one to sit before an empty 
 table after dinner and not feel that one ought to 
 go. Let the waiter take your cape. You will find 
 the room warm." 
 
 " Do you remember," she asked him, " the first 
 night we dined together?" 
 
 He looked at her with twinkling eyes.
 
 230 A PRINCE OF SINN1RS 
 
 " Rather ! It was my introduction to your uncle's 
 household. Selina sat on my left, and Louise on my 
 right. You sat opposite, tired and disagreeable." 
 
 " I was tired and I am always disagreeable." 
 
 " I have noticed it," he agreed, equably. " I hope 
 you like oysters." 
 
 " If Selina were to see us now," she remarked, 
 with a sudden humorous smile, " how shocked she 
 would be." 
 
 " What a little far-away world it seems down 
 there," he said thoughtfully. " After all, I am 
 glad that I have not to live in Medchester all my 
 life." 
 
 " You have been there this afternoon, have n't 
 you?" 
 
 " Yes. Henslow is giving us a lot of trouble. I 
 am afraid we shall lose the seat next election." 
 
 " Do you mind ? " 
 
 " Not much. I am no party politician. I want to 
 see Medchester represented by a man who will go 
 there with a sense of political proportion, and I don't 
 care whether he calls himself Liberal, or Radical, or 
 Conservative, or Unionist." 
 
 " Please explain what you mean by that," she 
 begged. 
 
 " Why, yes. I mean a man who will understand 
 how enormously more important is the welfare of 
 our own people, the people of whom we are making 
 slaves, than this feverish Imperialism and war cant. 
 Mind, I think our patriotism should be a thing wholly 
 understood. It need n't be talked about. It makes 
 showy fireworks for the platform, but it 's all unne- 
 cessary and to my mind very undignified. If only
 
 BROOKS ENLISTS A RECRUIT 231' 
 
 people would take that for granted and go on to 
 something worth while." 
 
 " Are things any better in Medchester just now? " 
 she asked. 
 
 " On the surface, yes, but on the surface only. 
 More factories are running half-time, but after all 
 what does that mean ? It 's slow starvation. A man 
 can't live and keep a family on fifteen shillings a 
 week, even if his wife earns a little. He can't do 
 it in a dignified manner, and with cleanliness and 
 health. That is what he has a right to. That is 
 what the next generation will demand. He should 
 have room to expand. Cleanliness, air, fresh food. 
 Every man and woman who is born into the world 
 has a God-given right to these, and there are mil- 
 lions in Medchester, Manchester, and all the great 
 cities who are denied all three." 
 
 " So all Henslow's great schemes, his Royal Com- 
 missions, his Protection Duties, his great Housing 
 Bill, have come to nothing then ? " she remarked. 
 
 " To less than nothing," he answered, gloomily. 
 " The man was a fraud. He is not worth attempt- 
 ing to bully. He is a puppet politician of a type that 
 ought to have been dead and buried generations ago. 
 Enoch Strone is our only hope in the House now. 
 He is a strong man, and he has hold of the truth." 
 
 "Have they decided upon Henslow's successor?" 
 she asked. 
 
 " Not yet," he answered. 
 
 She looked up at him. 
 
 " I heard from uncle this morning," she said, smil- 
 ing meaningly. 
 \ He shook his head.
 
 232 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 ^ 
 
 " Well, it was mentioned," he said, " but I would 
 not hear of it. I am altogether too young and in- 
 experienced. I want to live with the people for a 
 year or two first. That is why I am glad to get to 
 London." 
 
 "With the people?" she asked, "in Jermyn 
 Street?" 
 
 He laughed good-humouredly. 
 
 " I have also lodgings in the Bethnal Green Road," 
 he said. " I took possession of them last week." 
 
 "Anywhere near Merry's Corner?" she asked. 
 
 " What do you know about Merry's Corner? " he 
 exclaimed, with uplifted eyebrows. " Yes, my rooms 
 are nearly opposite, at the corner of the next street." 
 
 " I 've been down there once or twice lately," she 
 said. " There 's a mission-hall just there, and a girl 
 named Kate Stuart gave me a letter to go three times 
 a week." 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 " I know the place. Week-night services and hymn- 
 singing and preaching. A cold, desolate affair alto- 
 gether. I 'm thankful I went in there, though, for 
 it 's given me an idea." 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 " I 'm going to start a mission myself." 
 
 " Go on." 
 
 " On a new principle. The first thing will be that 
 there will be no religious services whatever. I won't 
 have a clergyman connected with it. It will be in- 
 tended solely for the benefit of the people from a 
 temporal point of view." 
 
 " You are going a long way," she said. " What 
 about Sundays ? "
 
 BROOKS ENLISTS A RECRUIT 233 
 
 " There will be a very short service for the mis- 
 sion helpers only. No one will be asked from out- 
 side at all. If they come it will be as a favour. 
 Directly it is over the usual week-day procedure will 
 go on." 
 
 " And what is that to be? " 
 
 Brooks smiled a little doubtfully. 
 
 " Well," he said, " I 've got the main idea in my 
 head, but all the details want thinking out. I want 
 the place to be a sort of help bureau, to give the 
 people living in a certain street or couple of streets 
 somewhere to go for advice and help in cases of 
 emergency. There will be no money given away, 
 under any consideration only food, clothing, and, 
 if they are asked for, books. I shall have half-a- 
 dozen bathrooms, and the people who come regularly 
 for advice and help will have to use them and to 
 keep their houses clean. There will be no distinc- 
 tion as to character. We shall help the drunkards 
 and the very worst of them just the same as the 
 others if they apply. If we get enough helpers there 
 will be plenty of branches we can open. I should 
 like to have a children's branch, for instance one 
 or two women will take the children of the neigh- 
 bourhood in hand and bathe them every day. As we 
 get to know the people better and appreciate their 
 special needs other things will suggest themselves. 
 But I want them to feel that they have some place 
 to fall back upon. We shall be frightfully hum- 
 bugged, robbed, cheated, and deceived at first. I 
 fancy that after a time that will wear itself out." 
 
 " It is a fascinating idea," she said, thoughtfully, 
 " but to carry it out in any way thoroughly you
 
 234 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 want a great many helpers and a great deal of 
 money." 
 
 " I have enough to start it," he said, " and when 
 it is really going and improving itself I shall go out 
 and ask for subscriptions big ones, you know, from 
 the right sort of people. You can always get money 
 if you can show that it is to be well spent." 
 
 " And what about the helpers? " 
 
 " Well, I know of a few," he said, " who I think 
 would come in, and there is one to whom I would 
 have to pay a small salary." 
 
 " I could come in the afternoons," she said. 
 
 " Capital ! But are you sure," he said, after a mo- 
 ment's hesitation, " that it is quite fair to yourself? " 
 
 " Oh, I can manage with my morning's salary," 
 she answered, laughing. " I shan't starve. Besides, 
 I can always burn a little midnight oil." 
 
 A waiter stood at their table for a moment, deftly 
 carving some new dish, and Brooks, leaning back in 
 his chair, glanced critically at his companion. In his 
 judgment she represented something in womankind 
 essentially of the durable type. He appreciated her 
 good looks, the air with which she wore her simple 
 clothes, her large full eyes, her wide, gently-humorous 
 mouth, and the hair parted in the middle, and rip- 
 pling away towards her ears. A frank companion- 
 able woman, whose eyes had never failed to look into 
 his, in whom he had never at any time seen a single 
 shadow of embarrassment. It occurred to him just 
 at that moment that never since he had known her 
 had he seen her interested to the slightest degree in 
 any man. He looked back at her thoughtfully. She 
 was young, good-looking, too catholic in her views
 
 BROOKS ENLISTS A RECRUIT 235 
 
 of life and its possibilities to refuse in any way to 
 recognize its inevitable tendencies. Yet he told him- 
 self complacently as he sipped his wine and watched 
 her gazing with amused interest at the little groups 
 of people about the place, that there must be in her 
 composition a lack of sentiment. Never for a second 
 in their intercourse had she varied from her usual 
 good-natured cheerfulness. If there had been a 
 shadow she had brushed it away ruthlessly. Even 
 on that terrible afternoon at Enton she had sat in 
 the cab white and silent she had appealed to him 
 in no way for sympathy. 
 
 The waiter retreated with a bow. She shot a swift 
 glance across at him. 
 
 " I object to being scrutinized," she declared. " Is 
 it the plainness of my hat or the depth of my wrinkles 
 to which you object? " 
 
 "Object!" he repeated. 
 
 " Yes. You were looking for something which 
 you did not find. You were distinctly disappointed. 
 Don't deny it. It is n't worth while." 
 
 " I won't plead guilty to the disappointment," he 
 answered, " but I '11 tell you the truth. I was think- 
 ing what a delightfully companionable girl you were, 
 and yet how different from any other girl I have ever 
 met in my life." 
 
 " That sounds hackneyed the latter part of it," 
 she remarked, " but in my case I see that it is not 
 intended to be a compliment. What do I lack that 
 other girls have? " 
 
 " You are putting me in a tight corner," he de- 
 clared. " It is n't that you lack anything, but nearly 
 all the girls one meets some time or other seem to
 
 236 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 expect from one nice little speeches or compliments, 
 just a little sentiment now and then. Now you seem 
 so entirely superior to that sort of thing altogether. 
 It is a ridiculously lame explanation. The thing's 
 in my head all right, but I can't get it out. I can 
 only express it when I say that you are the only girl 
 I have ever known, or known of, in my life with whom 
 sex would never interfere with companionship." 
 
 She stirred her coffee absently. At first he thought 
 that she might be offended, for she did not look up 
 for several moments. 
 
 " I 'm afraid I failed altogether to make you under- 
 stand what I meant," he said, humbly. " It is the 
 result of an attempt at too great candour." 
 
 Then she looked up and smiled at him graciously 
 enough, though it seemed to him that she was a little 
 pale. 
 
 " I am sure you were delightfully lucid," she said. 
 " I quite understood, and on the whole I think I 
 agree with you. I don't think that the sentimental 
 side of me has been properly developed. By the bye, 
 you were going to tell me about that pretty girl I 
 saw at Enton Lady Caroom's daughter, was n't 
 she?" 
 
 His face lit up she saw his thoughts go flitting 
 away, and the corner of his lips curl in a retrospec- 
 tive smile of pleasure. 
 
 " Sybil Caroom," he said, softly. " She is a 
 very charming girl. You would like her, I am sure. 
 Of course she 's been brought up in rather a 
 frivolous world, but she 's quite unspoilt, very sym- 
 pathetic, and very intelligent. Isn't that a good 
 character? "
 
 BROOKS ENLISTS A RECRUIT 237 
 
 " Very," she answered, with a suspicion of dry- 
 ness in her tone. " Is this paragon engaged to be 
 married yet? " 
 
 He looked at her, keenly surprised by the infusion 
 of something foreign in her tone. 
 
 " I I think not," he answered. " I should like 
 you to meet her very much. She will be coming to 
 London soon, and I know that she will be interested 
 in our new scheme if it comes to anything. We will 
 take her down and give her a few practical lessons 
 in philanthropy." 
 
 " Will she be interested? " Mary asked. 
 
 " Immensely," he answered, with confidence. "Lady 
 Caroom is an awfully good sort, too." 
 
 Mary remembered the well-bred insolence of Lady 
 Caroom's stare, the contemplative incredulity which 
 found militant expression in her beautiful eyes and 
 shapely curving lips, and for a moment half closed 
 her eyes. 
 
 " Ah, well," she said, " that afternoon was rather a 
 terrible one to me. Let us talk of something else." 
 
 He was profuse at once in apologies for his own 
 thoughtlessness. But she checked him almost at the 
 outset. 
 
 "It is I who am to blame for an unusual weak- 
 ness," she said. " Let us both forget it. And don't 
 you find this place hot? Let us get outside and 
 walk." 
 
 They found a soft misty rain falling. The com- 
 missionaire called a hansom. She moved her skirts 
 to make room for him. 
 
 " I am going down to Stepney to see a man who 
 I think will be interested in my scheme," he said.
 
 238 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " When may I come down again and have tea with 
 you?" 
 
 " Any afternoon, if you will drop me a line the 
 night before," she said, " but I am not very likely to 
 be out, in any case. Thank you so much for my 
 dinner. My aunt seemed to think that I was com- 
 ing to London to starve. I think I feel fairly safe 
 this evening, at any rate." 
 
 The cab drove off, skirting the gaily-lit crescent 
 of Regent Street. The smile almost at once died 
 away from her lips. She leaned forward and looked 
 at herself in one of the oblong mirrors. Her face 
 was almost colourless, the skin seemed drawn closely 
 round her eyes, giving her almost a strained look. 
 For the rest, her hair, smoothly brushed away from 
 her face, was in perfect order, her prim little hat was 
 at exactly the right angle, her little white tie alone 
 relieved the sombreness of her black jacket. She 
 sighed and suddenly felt a moistening of her hot 
 eyes. She leaned far back into the corner of the 
 cab.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 
 
 " T T is my deliberate intention," Lord Arranmore 
 
 J, said, leaning over towards her from his low 
 chair, " to make myself a nuisance to you." 
 
 Lady Caroom smiled at him thoughtfully. 
 
 " Thank you for the warning," she said, " but I 
 can take care of myself. I do not feel even obliged 
 to deny myself the pleasure of your society." 
 
 " No, you won't do that," he remarked. " You 
 see, so many people bore you, and I don't." 
 
 " It is true," she admitted. " You pay me nothing 
 but unspoken compliments, and you devote a con- 
 siderable amount of ingenuity to conceal the real 
 meaning of everything you say. Now some people 
 might not like that. I adore it." 
 
 "Catherine, will you marry me?" 
 
 " Certainly not ! I 'm much too busy looking after 
 Sybil, and in any case you 've had your answer, my 
 friend." 
 
 " You will marry me," he said, deliberately, " in 
 less than two years perhaps in less than one. 
 Why can't you make your mind up to it ? " 
 
 " You know why, Arranmore," she said, quietly. 
 "If you were the man I remember many years
 
 240 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 ago, the man I have wasted many hours of my life 
 thinking about, I would not hesitate for a moment. 
 I loved that man, and I have always loved him. 
 But, Arranmore, I cannot recognize him in you. If 
 these terrible things which you have suffered, these 
 follies which you have committed, have withered 
 you up so that there remains no trace of the man I 
 once cared for, do you blame me for refusing you? 
 I will not marry a stranger, Arranmore, and I not 
 only don't know you, but I am a little afraid of 
 you." 
 
 He sighed. 
 
 " Perhaps you are right," he said, softly. " I be- 
 lieve that the only thing I have carried with me from 
 the beginning, and shall have with me to the end, is 
 my love for you. Nothing else has survived." 
 
 Her eyes filled with tears. She leaned over to 
 him. 
 
 " Dear friend," she said, " listen ! At least I will 
 promise you this. If ever I should see the least little 
 impulse or action which seems to me to come from 
 the Philip I once knew, and not Lord Arranmore, 
 anything which will convince me that some part, 
 however slight, of the old has survived, I will come 
 to you." 
 
 He sighed. 
 
 " You alone," he said, " might work such a 
 miracle." 
 
 " Then come and see me often," she said, with a 
 brilliant smile, " and I will try." 
 
 He moved his chair a little nearer to her. 
 
 " You encourage me to hope," he said. " I re- 
 member that one night in the conservatory I was
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 241 
 
 presumptuous enough to take your hand. His- 
 tory repeats itself, you see, and I claim the prize, for 
 I have fulfilled the condition." 
 
 She drew her hand away firmly, but without undue 
 haste. 
 
 " If you are going to be frivolous," she said, " I 
 will have all the callers shown in. You know very 
 well that that is not what I mean. There must be 
 some unpremeditated action, some impulse which 
 comes from your own heart. Frankly, Arranmore, 
 there are times now when I am afraid of you. You 
 seem to have no heart to be absolutely devoid 
 of feeling, to be cold and calculating even in your 
 slightest actions. There, now I have told you just 
 what I feel sometimes, and it does n't sound nice, 
 does it? " 
 
 " It sounds very true," he said, wearily. " Will 
 you tell me where I can buy a new heart and a fresh 
 set of impulses, even a disposition, perhaps? I 'd be 
 a customer. I 'm willing enough." 
 
 " Never mind that," she said, softly. " After all, 
 I have a certain amount of faith. A miracle may 
 happen at any moment." 
 
 Sybil came in, dressed in a fascinating short skirt 
 and a toque. Her maid on the threshold was carry- 
 ing a small green baize box. 
 
 " I am going to Prince's, mother, just for an hour, 
 with Mrs. Huntingdon. How do you do, Lord 
 Arranmore ? You '11 keep mother from being dull r 
 won't you ? " 
 
 " It is your mother," he said, " who is making me 
 dull." 
 
 " Poor old mummy," Sybil declared, cheerfully, 
 16
 
 242 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Never mind. Her bark 's a good deal worse than 
 her bite. Good-bye, both of you." 
 
 Lord Arranmore rose and closed the door after 
 her. 
 
 " Sybil is a remarkably handsome young woman," 
 he said. "Any signs of her getting married yet?" 
 
 Lady Caroom shook her head. 
 
 " No ! Arranmore, that reminds me, what has 
 become of Mr. Brooks? " 
 
 Lord Arrajimore smiled a little bitterly. 
 
 " He is in London." 
 
 " I have never seen him, you must remember, since 
 that evening. Is he still unforgiving?" 
 
 " Yes ! He refuses to be acknowledged. He is 
 taking the bare income which is his by law it comes 
 from a settlement to the eldest son and he is study- 
 ing practical philanthropy in the slums." 
 
 " I am sorry," she said. " I like him, and he would 
 be a companion for you." 
 
 " He 's not to be blamed," Lord Arranmore said. 
 " From his point of view I have been the most scan- 
 dalous parent upon this earth." 
 
 Lady Caroom sighed. 
 
 " Do you know," she said, " that he and Sybil were 
 very friendly? " 
 
 " I noticed it," he answered. 
 
 " She has asked about him once or twice since we 
 got back to town, and when she reads about the 
 starting of this new work of his at Stepney she will 
 certainly write to him." 
 
 " You mean " 
 
 " I mean that she has sent Sydney to the right- 
 about this time in earnest. She is a queer girl, reti-
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 243 
 
 cent in a way, although she seems such a chatterbox, 
 and I am sure she thinks about him." 
 
 Lord Arranmore laughed a little hardly. 
 
 " Well," he said, " I am the last person to be con- 
 sulted about anything of this sort. If he keeps up 
 his present attitude and declines to receive any- 
 thing from me, his income until my death will be only 
 two or three thousand a year. He might marry on 
 that down in Stepney, but not in this part of the 
 world." 
 
 " Sybil has nine hundred a year/' Lady Caroom 
 said, " but it would not be a matter of money at all. 
 I should not allow Sybil to marry any one concerning 
 whose position in the world there was the least mys- 
 tery. She might marry Lord Kingston of Ross, but 
 never Mr. Kingston Brooks." 
 
 " Has Mr. Brooks given any special signs of 
 devotion?" Lord Arranmore asked. 
 
 " Not since they were at Enton. I dare say he has 
 never even thought of her since. Still, it was a con- 
 tingency which occurred to me." 
 
 " He is a young man of excellent principles," Lord 
 Arranmore said, dryly, " taking life as seriously as 
 you please, and I should imagine is too well balanced 
 to make anything but a very safe husband. If he 
 comes to me, if he will accept it without coming to 
 me even, he can have another ten thousand a year and 
 Enton." 
 
 " You are generous," she murmured. 
 
 " Generous ! My houses and my money are a 
 weariness to me. I cannot live in the former, and I 
 cannot spend the latter. I am a man really of simple 
 tastes. Besides, there is no glory now in spending
 
 244 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 money. One can so easily be outdone by one's grocer, 
 or one of those marvellous Americans." 
 
 " Yet I thought I read of you last week as giving 
 nine hundred pounds for some unknown tapestry at 
 Christie's." 
 
 " But that is not extravagance," he protested. 
 " That is not even spending money. It is exchanging 
 one investment for another. The purple colouring 
 of that tapestry is marvellous. The next generation 
 will esteem it priceless." 
 
 " You must go ? " she asked, for he had risen. 
 
 " I have stayed long enough," he answered. " In 
 another five minutes you will yawn, and mine would 
 have been a wasted visit. I should like to time my 
 visits always so that the five minutes which I might 
 have stayed seem to you the most desirable five 
 minutes of the whole time." 
 
 " You are an epicurean and a schemer," she de- 
 clared. " I am afraid of you." 
 
 He bought an evening paper on his way to St. 
 James's Square, and leaning back in his brougham, 
 glanced it carelessly through. Just as he was throw- 
 ing it aside a small paragraph at the bottom of the 
 page caught his attention. 
 
 A NOVEL PHILANTHROPIC DEPARTURE. 
 
 THE FIRST BUREAU OPENED TO-DAY. 
 
 INTERVIEW WITH MR. KINGSTON BROOKS. 
 
 He folded the paper out, and read through every 
 line carefully. A few minutes after his arrival home 
 he re-issued from the house in a bowler hat and a
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 245 
 
 long, loose overcoat. He took the Metropolitan and 
 an omnibus to Stepney, and read the paragraph 
 through again. Soon he found himself opposite the 
 address given. 
 
 He recognized it with a little start. It had once 
 been a mission hall, then a furniture shop, and later 
 on had been empty for years. It was brilliantly lit 
 up, and he pressed forward and peered through the 
 window. Inside the place was packed. Brooks and a 
 dozen or so others were sitting on a sort of slightly- 
 raised platform at the end of the room, with a desk 
 in front of each of them. Lord Arranmore pulled 
 his hat over his eyes and forced his way just inside. 
 Almost as he entered Brooks rose to his feet. 
 
 " Look here," he said, " you all come up asking the 
 same question and wasting my time answering you 
 all severally. You want to know what this place 
 means. Well, if you '11 stay just where you are for a 
 minute, I '11 tell you all together, and save time." 
 
 " Hear, hear, guv'nor," said a- bibulous old coster- 
 monger, encouragingly. " Let 's hear all about it." 
 
 "So you shall," Brooks said. "Now listen. I dare 
 say there are a good many of you who go up in the 
 West End sometimes, and see those big houses and 
 the way people spend their money there, who come 
 back to your own houses here, and think that things 
 are n't exactly dealt out square. Is n't that so ? " 
 
 There was a hearty and unanimous assent. 
 
 " Well," Brooks continued, " it may surprise you 
 to hear that a few of us who have a little money up 
 there have come to the same conclusion. We 'd like 
 to do our little bit towards squaring things up. It 
 may not be much, but lots more may come of it."
 
 246 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 A modified but a fairly cordial assent. 
 
 " We have n't money to give away not much of 
 it, at any rate," Brooks continued. 
 
 " More bloomin' tracks," the costermonger inter- 
 rupted, and spat upon the floor. " Fair sickens me, 
 it does." 
 
 " As for tracts," Brooks continued, calmly, " I 
 don't think I 've ever read one in my life, and I don't 
 want to. We have n't such a thing in the place, and I 
 should n't know where to go for them, and though 
 that gentleman down there with a herring sticking 
 out of his pocket seems to have done himself pretty 
 well already, I 'd rather stand him a glass of beer than 
 offer him such a thing." 
 
 A roar of laughter, during which a wag in the 
 crowd quietly picked the costermonger' s pocket of 
 the fish with a deftness born of much practice, and 
 sent it flying over the room. It was promptly re- 
 turned, and found a devious way back to its owner in 
 a somewhat dusty and mauled condition. 
 
 " There is just one thing we have to ask for and 
 insist upon," Brooks continued. " When you come 
 to us for help, tell us the truth. If you 've been drunk 
 all the week and have n't earned any money, well, we 
 may help you out with a Sunday dinner. If you 've 
 been in prison and won't mind owning up to it, we 
 shan't send you away for that reason. We want your 
 women to come and bring us your children, that we 
 can have a look at them, tell us how much you all 
 make a week between you, and what you need most 
 to make you a bit more comfortable. And we want 
 your husbands to come and tell us where they work, 
 and what rent they pay, and if they have n't any work,
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 247; 
 
 and can't get it, we '11 see what we can do. I tell you 
 I don't care to start with whether you're sober and 
 industrious, or idle, or drunkards. We'll give any 
 one a leg-up if we can. I don't say we shall keep that 
 up always, because of course we shan't. But we '11 
 give any one a fair chance. Now do you want to ask 
 any questions? " 
 
 A pallid but truculent-looking young man pushed 
 himself to the front. 
 
 " 'Ere, guv'nor ! " he said. " Supposing yer was to 
 stand me a coat I ain't 'ad one for two months 
 should I 'ave to come 'ere on a Sunday and sing 
 bloomin' hymns? " 
 
 " If you did," Brooks answered him, " you 'd do it 
 by yourself, and you 'd stand a fair chance of being 
 run out. There 's going to be no preaching or hymn- 
 singing here. Those sorts of things are very well in 
 their way, but they 've nothing to do with this show. 
 I 'm not sure whether we shall open on Sundays or 
 not. If we do it will be only for the ordinary busi- 
 ness. Now let 's get to work." 
 
 " Sounds a bit of orl right, and no mistake," 
 the young man remarked, turning round to the 
 crowd. " I 'm going to stop and 'ave a go for that 
 coat." 
 
 A young man in a bright scarlet jersey pushed him- 
 self to the front, followed by a little volley of chaff, 
 more or less good-natured. 
 
 " There 's Salvation Joe wants a new trombone." 
 
 " Christian Sail 's blown a hole in the old one, eh, 
 Joe?" 
 
 Breathless he reached Brooks' side. The sweat 
 stood out in beads upon his forehead. He seemed not
 
 248 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 to hear a word that was said amongst the crowd. 
 Brooks smiled at him good-humouredly. 
 \ "Well, sir," he said, "what can I do for you?" 
 "I happened in, sir, out of curiosity," the young 
 man said, in a strange nasal twang, the heritage of 
 years of outdoor preaching; " I hoped to hear of one 
 more good work begun in this den of iniquity and to 
 clasp hands with another brother in God." 
 
 " Glad to see you," Brooks said. " You '11 remem- 
 ber we 're busy." 
 
 " The message of God," the young man answered, 
 " must be spoken at all times." 
 
 "Oh, chuck 'im out!" cried the disgusted coster- 
 monger, spitting upon the floor. " That sort o' stuff 
 fair sickens me." 
 
 The young man continued as though he had not 
 heard. 
 
 " Such charity as you are offering," he cried, "is 
 corruption. You are going to dispense things for 
 their carnal welfare, and you do nothing for their 
 immortal souls. You will not let them even shout 
 their thanks to God. You will fill their stomachs and 
 leave their souls hungry." 
 
 The costermonger waved a wonderful red hand- 
 kerchief, and spat once more on the floor. Brooks 
 laid his hand upon the young man's shoulder. 
 
 " Look here, my young friend," he said, " you 're 
 talking rot. Men and women who live down here in 
 wretchedness, and who are fighting every moment of 
 their time to hang on to life, don't want to be talked 
 to about their souls. They need a leg-up in the world, 
 and we 've come to try and give it to them. We 're 
 here as friends, not preachers. We '11 leave you to
 
 KINGSTON BROOKS, PHILANTHROPIST 249 
 
 look after their souls. You people who 've tried to 
 make your religion the pill to go with your charity 
 have done more harm in the world than you know 
 of." 
 
 The young man was on fire to speak, but he had no 
 chance. They hustled him out good-naturedly 
 except that the costermonger, running him down the 
 room, took his cap from his head and sent it spinning 
 across the road. Lord Arranmore left the hall at 
 the same time, and turned homewards, walking like 
 a man in a dream.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 BROOKS AND HIS MISSIONS 
 
 then, please," Brooks said, dipping his 
 pen in the ink. 
 
 A lady of ample proportions, who had been stand- 
 ing since the commencement of the proceedings with 
 her hand tightly grasping the leg of Brooks' table, 
 gave a final shove of discomfiture to a meek-faced 
 girl whom she had suspected of an attempt to super- 
 sede her, and presented herself before the desk. 
 
 " I 'm first," she declared, firmly ; " been 'ere for 
 four mortal hours." 
 
 " What is your name, please? " Brooks asked. 
 
 " Mrs. Robert Jones, No. 4, St. Mary's Court, 
 down Fennell Street leastways you go that way 
 from 'ere. I 'm a widow woman with four children, 
 and lost me husband on the railway. What I wants 
 is a suit of clothes for my Tommy, he 's five-and-'arf, 
 and stout for his years, and a pair of boots for Selina 
 Ann. And I 'm not a saying," she continued, blandly, 
 " as me having waited 'ere so long, and this being a 
 sort of opening ceremony, as a pound of tea for my- 
 self would n't be a welcome and reasonable gift. And 
 if the suit," she concluded, breathlessly, " has double- 
 seated breeches so much the better." 
 
 Brooks maintained the most perfect composure, 
 although conscious of a suppressed titter from behind.
 
 BROOKS AND HIS MISSIONS 251 
 
 He commenced to write rapidly in his book, and Mrs. 
 Jones, drawing her shawl about her, looked around 
 complacently. Suddenly she caught the ripple of 
 mirth, which some of Brooks' helpers were powerless 
 to control. Her face darkened. 
 
 " Which is little enough to ask for," she declared, 
 truculently, " considering as it 's four mortal hours 
 since I first laid hold of the leg of that table, and 
 neither bite nor sup have I had since, it not being 
 my habit," she continued, slowly, and staring intently 
 at the hang of her neighbour's skirt, " to carry bottles 
 in my pocket." 
 
 Brooks looked up. 
 
 " Thank you, Mrs. Jones," he said. " I have en- 
 tered your name and address, and I hope we shall see 
 you again soon. This young lady," he indicated 
 Mary, " will take you over to our clothes department, 
 and if we haven't anything to fit Tommy you must 
 come again on Wednesday, when we shall have a 
 larger supply." 
 
 " I '11 take the nearest you Ve got to-day," she de- 
 cided, promptly. " Wot about the tea? " 
 
 " We shall be glad to ask you to accept a small 
 packet," Brooks answered. " By the bye, have you 
 a pension from the railway company? " 
 
 " Not a penny, sir," she declared, " and a burning 
 shame it is." 
 
 " We must see into it," Brooks said. " You see 
 that gentleman behind me ? " 
 
 " Him with the squint ? " she asked, doubtfully. 
 
 Brooks bent over his book. 
 
 " Mr. Fellows, his name is," he said. " He is one 
 of our helpers here, and he is a lawyer. You can tell
 
 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 him all about it, and if we think you have a claim we 
 will try and see what we can do for you. Now, if 
 you please, we must get on. Come in any time, Mrs. 
 Jones, and talk to us. Some one is, always here. 
 .What is your name, please?" 
 
 "Amy Hardinge!" 
 
 There was a howl of derision from the rear. The 
 girl, pallid, with large dark eyes, a somewhat tawdry 
 hat and torn skirt, turned angrily around. 
 
 " Who yer shouting at, eh ? There ain't so many 
 of yer as knows yer own names, I dir say, and 'Ar- 
 dinge 's as good as any other. Leave a body be, 
 won't yer ? " 
 
 She turned round to Brooks, and disclosed a most 
 alarming rent in her gown. 
 
 " Look 'ere, guv'nor," she said, " that 's my name, 
 and I 'as a back room behind old Connel's fish-shop 
 next door but one to 'ere. If yer want to give away 
 things to them as wants 'em, wot price a new skirt 
 'ere, eh?" 
 
 A woman from the rear leaned over to Brooks. 
 
 " The 'ussy," she said. " Don't you take no notice 
 of 'er, sir. We all knows 'er and precious little 
 good there is ter know." 
 
 Miss Hardinge was not unreasonably annoyed. 
 She turned round with flashing eyes and belligerent 
 attitude. 
 
 " Who the 'ell asked you anything? " she exclaimed. 
 " Can't yer keep your bloomin' mouths closed ? " 
 
 A pale-faced little man pushed his way through the 
 throng. He was dressed in a semi-clerical garb, and 
 he tapped Brooks on the shoulder. 
 
 " Can you favour me with one moment's private
 
 BROOKS AND HIS MISSIONS 253 
 
 conversation, sir ? " he said. " My name is John 
 Deeling, and I am a minister of the Gospel. The 
 Mission House in Fennell Street is my special charge." 
 
 " Glad to know you, Mr. Deeling," Brooks an- 
 swered, " but I can't spare any time for private con- 
 versation now. Can't you speak to me here? " 
 
 Mr. Deeling looked doubtfully at the girl who 
 stood still before the desk, silent, but breathing hard. 
 A sullen shade had fallen upon her face. She looked 
 like a creature at bay. 
 
 "It is concerning this unfortunate young person." 
 
 " I can assure you," Brooks said, dipping his pen 
 in the ink, " that no recommendation is necessary. 
 I shall do what I can for her." 
 
 " You misapprehend me, sir," Mr. Deeling said, 
 with some solemnity. " I regret to say that no 
 recommendation is possible. That young person is 
 outside the pale of all Christian help. I regret to 
 speak so plainly before ladies, sir, but she is a notori- 
 ous character, a hardened and incurable prostitute." 
 
 Brooks looked at him for a moment fixedly. 
 
 " Did I understand you to say, sir r that you were 
 a minister of the Gospel ? " he asked. 
 
 "Certainly! I am well known in the neighbour- 
 hood." 
 
 " Then if you take my advice," Brooks said, 
 sternly, " you will take off those garments and break 
 stones upon the street. It is to help such unfortunate 
 and cruelly ill-used young women as this that I and 
 my friends have come here. Be off, sir. Miss Har- 
 dinge, this young lady will take you to our clothes 
 store in the inner room there. I hope you will permit 
 us to be of some further use to you later on."
 
 254 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 The girl, half dazed, passed away. Mr. Deeling, 
 his face red with anger, turned towards the door. 
 
 " You may call it a Christian deed, sir," he ex- 
 claimed, angrily, " to encourage vice of the worst 
 description. We shall see what the bishop, what the 
 Press, have to say about it." 
 
 " I don't care a snap of the fingers what you, or 
 the bishop, or the Press have to say," Brooks re- 
 joined, equably; " but lest there should be those here 
 who agree with your point of view, let them hear this 
 from me at once, to prevent misunderstanding. We 
 are here to help to the best of our ability all who need 
 help, whatsoever their characters. They are equally 
 welcome to what we have to offer, whether they be 
 thieves, or prostitutes, or drunkards, or respectable 
 men and women. But if I were asked what really 
 brought me here, for what class of people in the world 
 my sympathy and the sympathies of my friends have 
 been most warmly kindled, I should say, for such as 
 that young woman who has just presented herself here. 
 If she asks for them, she will have from us food and 
 clothes and the use of our baths and reading-rooms 
 whenever she chooses, and I will guarantee that not 
 one of my women friends here who come in contact 
 with her will ask a single question as to her mode of 
 life, until she invites their confidence. If you think 
 that she is responsible for her present state, you and 
 I differ if you think that one shadow of blame rests 
 upon her, we differ again. And if there are any more 
 like her in the room, let them come out, and they shall 
 have all that they ask for, that it is within our power 
 to give." 
 
 " Hear, hear, guv'nor! "
 
 BROOKS AND HIS MISSIONS 255 
 
 " That 's ginger for 'im." 
 
 " Out of this, old white choker. There 's beans 
 for you." 
 
 They let him pass through. On the threshold he 
 turned and faced Brooks again. 
 
 " At least," he said, " I can promise you this. 
 God's blessing will never be upon your work. I doubt 
 whether you will be allowed to continue it in this 
 Christian country." 
 
 Brooks rose to his feet. 
 
 " Mr. Deeling," he said, " you and your mission 
 system of work amongst the poor have been fighting 
 a losing battle in this country for fifty years and more. 
 A Christian country you call it. Go outside in the 
 streets. Look north and south, east and west, look 
 at the people, look at their children, look at their 
 homes. Is there one shadow of improvement in this 
 labyrinth of horrors year by year, decade by decade? 
 You know in your heart that there is none. There- 
 fore if new means be chosen, do not condemn them 
 too rashly. Your mission houses, many of them, 
 have been nothing but breeding-places for hypocrisy. 
 It is time the old order was changed. Now, sir, you 
 are next. What can we do for you ? " 
 
 A weary-looking man with hollow eyes and ner- 
 vously-twitching fingers found himself pushed before 
 the desk. He seemed at first embarrassed and half 
 dazed. Brooks waited without any sign of impa- 
 tience. When at last he spoke, it was without the 
 slightest trace of any Cockney accent. 
 
 "I I beg your pardon, sir ! I ought not perhaps 
 to intrude here, but I don't know who needs help 
 more than I do."
 
 256 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " He 's orl right, sir," sung out the costermonger. 
 J " He is a bit queer in the 'ead, but he 's a scholar, and 
 fair on his uppers. Speak up, Joe." 
 
 " You see, my friends are willing to give me a 
 character, sir," the man remarked, with a ghost of 
 a smile. " My name is Edward Owston. I was clerk 
 at a large drapery firm, Messrs. Appleby, Sons, and 
 Dawson, in St. Paul's Churchyard, for fourteen 
 years. I have a verified character from them. They 
 were obliged to cut down their staff, owing to foreign 
 competition, and I have never succeeded in ob- 
 taining another situation. There is nothing against 
 me, sir. I would have worked for fifteen shillings a 
 week. I walked the streets till my boots were worn 
 through and my clothes hung around me like rags. 
 It was bad luck at first afterwards it was my 
 clothes. I have been selling matches for a month 
 it has brought me in two shillings a week." 
 
 " How old are you? " Brooks asked. 
 
 "Thirty-four, sir." 
 
 Brooks nearly dropped his pen. 
 
 "What?" he exclaimed. 
 
 " Thirty-four, sir. It is four years since I lost my 
 situation." 
 
 The man's hair was grey, a little stubbly grey 
 beard was jutting out from his chin. His eyes were 
 almost lost in deep hollows. Brooks felt a lump in 
 his throat, and for a moment pretended to be writing 
 busily. Then he looked up. 
 
 " We shall give you a fresh start in life, Edward 
 Owston," he said. " Follow this gentleman at my 
 left. He will find you clothes and food. To-morrow 
 you will go to a cottage which belongs to us at
 
 BROOKS AND HIS MISSIONS 257 
 
 Hastings for one month. Afterwards, if your story 
 is true, we shall find you a suitable situation if 
 it is partially true, we shall still find you something 
 to do. If it is altogether false we cannot help you, 
 for absolute truth in answering our questions is the 
 only condition we impose." 
 
 The man never uttered a word. He went out lean- 
 ing upon the arm of one of Brooks' assistants. An- 
 other, who was a doctor, after a glance into the man's 
 face, followed them. When he returned, after about 
 twenty minutes' absence, he leaned forward and whis- 
 pered in Brooks' ear 
 
 " You '11 never have to find a situation for that 
 poor fellow. A month 's about all he 's good for." 
 
 Brooks looked round shocked. 
 
 " What is it drink? " he asked. 
 
 The doctor shook his head. 
 
 " Not a trace of it. Starvation and exhaustion^ 
 If I had n't been with him just now he 'd have been 
 dead before this. He fainted away." 
 
 Brooks half closed his eyes. 
 
 " It is horrible ! " he murmured. 
 
 The costermonger was next. Brooks looked 
 around the room and at the clock. 
 
 "Look here," he said. "If I sit here till to- 
 morrow I can't possibly attend to all of you. I tell 
 you what I '11 do. If you others will give place to 
 those whose cases are really urgent, I '11 be here at 
 seven to-morrow morning till seven at night, and the 
 next day too, if necessary. It 's no good deputing, 
 any one else to tell me, because however many 
 branches we open and I hope we shall open a 
 great many I mean to manage this one myself, 
 
 17
 
 258 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 and I must know you all personally. Now are you 
 all agreeable ? " 
 
 " I am for one," declared the costermonger, moving 
 away from before the desk. " I ain't in no 'urry. 
 I 've 'ad a bit o' bad luck wi' my barrer, all owing 
 to a plaguing drunken old omnibus-driver, and horl 
 I want is a bit o' help towards the security. Josh Auk 
 wants it before he '11 let me out a new one. To- 
 morrow 's horl right for me." 
 
 " Well, I expect we '11 manage that," Brooks re- 
 marked. " Now where are the urgent cases?" 
 
 One by one they were elbowed forward. Brooks' 
 pen flew across the paper. It was midnight even 
 then before they had finished. Brooks and Mary 
 Scott left together. They were both too exhausted 
 for words. 
 
 As they crossed the street Mary suddenly touched 
 his arm. 
 
 " Look ! " she whispered. 
 
 A girl was leaning up against the wall, her face 
 buried in her hands, sobbing bitterly. They both 
 watched her for a moment. It was Amy Hardinge. 
 
 " I will go and speak to her," Mary whispered. 
 
 Brooks drew her away. 
 
 " Not one word, even of advice," he said. " Let us 
 keep to our principles. The end will be surer." 
 
 They turned the corner of the street. Above the 
 shouting of an angry woman and the crazy song of 
 a drunken man the girl's sobs still lingered in their 
 -ears.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 MR. BULLSOM IS STAGGERED 
 
 MR. BULLSOM looked up from his letters 
 with an air of satisfaction. 
 
 " Company to dinner, Mrs. Bullsom!" he declared. 
 
 " Some more of your silly old directors, I sup- 
 pose," said Selina, discontentedly. " What a nui- 
 sance they are." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom frowned. 
 
 " My silly old directors, as you call 'em," he an- 
 swered, " may not be exactly up to your idea of re- 
 finement, but I would n't call 'em names if I were 
 3'ou. They 've made me one of the richest men in 
 Medchester." 
 
 " A lot we get out of it," Louise grunted, dis- 
 contentedly. 
 
 " You get as much as you deserve," Mr. Bullsom 
 retorted. " Besides, you 're so plaguing impatient. 
 You don't hear your mother talk like that." 
 
 Selina whispered something under her breath which 
 Mr. Bullsom, if he heard, chose to ignore. 
 
 " I 've explained to you all before," he continued, 
 " that up to the end of last year we 've been holding 
 the entire property over a million pounds' worth, 
 between five of us. Our time 's come now. Now, 
 look here I '11 listen to what you 've got to say 
 all of you. Supposing I 've made up my mind
 
 260 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 to launch out. How do you want to do it? You 
 first, mother." 
 
 Mrs. Bullsom looked worried. 
 
 " My dear Peter," she said, " I think we 're very 
 comfortable as we are. A larger household means 
 more care, and a man-servant about the place is a 
 thing I could never abide. If you felt like taking 
 sittings at Mr. Thompson's as well as our own 
 chapel, so that we could go there when we felt we 
 needed a change, I think I should like it sometimes. 
 But it seems a waste of good money with Sundays 
 only coming once in seven days." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom shook with good-humoured laughter. 
 
 " Mother, mother," he said, " we shall never 
 smarten you up, shall we, girls? Now, what do 
 you say, Selina? " 
 
 " I should like a country house quite ten or fifteen 
 miles away from here, lots of horses and carriages, 
 and a house in town for the season," Selina declared, 
 boldly. 
 
 "And you, Louise?" 
 
 " I should like what Selina has said." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom looked a little grave. 
 
 " The house in London," he said, " you shall have, 
 whether I buy it or only hire it for a few months at 
 a time. If we have n't friends up there, there are 
 always the theatres and music-halls, and lots going 
 on. But a country house is a bit different. I thought 
 of building a place up at Nicholson's Corner, where 
 the trams stop. The land belongs to me, and there 's 
 room for the biggest house in Medchester." 
 
 Selina tossed her head. 
 
 " Of course," she said, " if we have to spend all
 
 MR. BULLSOM IS STAGGERED 261 
 
 our lives in this hateful suburb it does n't much mat- 
 ter whether you stay here or build another house, no 
 one will come to see us. We shall never get to know 
 anybody." 
 
 " And supposing you go out into the country," 
 Mr. Bullsom argued. " How do you know that you 
 will make friends there ? " 
 
 " People must call," Selina answered, " if you 
 subscribe to the hounds, and you must get made a 
 magistrate." 
 
 " We have lived here for a good many years," 
 Mr. Bullsom said, " and there are very superior 
 people living almost at our doors whom even you 
 girls don't know to bow to." 
 
 Selina tossed her head. 
 
 " Superior, you call them, do you ? A silly stuck-up 
 lot, I think. They form themselves into little sets, 
 and if you don't belong, they treat you as though you 
 had small-pox." 
 
 " The men are all pleasant enough," Mr. Bullsom 
 remarked. " I meet them in the trams and in busi- 
 ness, and they 're always glad enough to pass the 
 time o' day." 
 
 " Oh, the men are all right," Selina answered. 
 " It 's easy enough to know them. Mr. Wensome 
 trod on my dress the other day, and apologized as 
 though he 'd torn it off my back, and the next day 
 he gave me his seat in the car. I always acknowl- 
 edge him, and he 's glad enough to come and talk, 
 but if his wife 's with him, she looks straight ahead 
 as though every one else in the car were mummies." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom cut the end of a cigar thoughtfully, 
 and motioned Louise to get him a light.
 
 262 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " You see, your mother and I are getting on in 
 life," he said, " and it 's a great thing to ask us to 
 settle down in a place where there 's no slipping off 
 down to the club in the evening, and no chance of a 
 friend dropping in for a chat. We 've got to an age 
 .when we need some one to talk to. I ain't going to 
 say that a big house in the country is n't a nice thing 
 to have, and the gardens and that would be first- 
 class. But it 's a big move, and it ain't to be decided 
 about all in a hurry." 
 
 " Why, father, there 's the shooting," Selina ex- 
 claimed. " You 're fond of that, and men will go 
 anywhere for really good shooting, and make their 
 wives go, too. If you could get a place with plenty 
 of it, and a fox-covert or two on the estate, I 'm 
 perfectly certain we should be all right." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom looked still a little doubtful. 
 
 "That's all very well," he said, "but I don't 
 want to bribe people into my house with shooting 
 and good cooking, and nursing their blooming foxes. 
 That ain't my idea of making friends." 
 
 " It 's only breaking the ice just at first," Selina 
 argued. " Afterwards I 'm sure you 'd find them 
 friendly enough." 
 
 " I tell you what I shall do," Mr. Bullsom said, 
 deliberately ; " I shall consult the friend I 've got 
 coming to dinner to-night." 
 
 Selina smiled contemptuously. 
 
 " Pshaw ! " she exclaimed. "What do any of them 
 know about such things?" 
 
 " You don't know who it is," Mr. Bullsom replied, 
 mysteriously. 
 
 The girls turned towards him almost simultane- 
 ously.
 
 MR. BULLSOM IS STAGGERED 263 
 
 "Is it Mr. Brooks?" 
 
 Mr. Bullsom nodded. Selina flushed with pleasure 
 and tried to look unconscious. 
 
 " Only the day before yesterday," Mr. Bullsom 
 said, " as chairman of the committee, I had the 
 pleasure of forwarding to Brooks a formal invita- 
 tion to become the parliamentary candidate for the 
 borough. He writes to me by return to say that he 
 will be here this afternoon, as he wishes to see me 
 personally." 
 
 " I must say he has n't lost much time," Louise 
 remarked, smiling across at Selina. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom grunted. 
 
 " I don't see how he could do much less," he said. 
 " After all, though every one admits that he 's a 
 clever young chap and uncommonly conscientious, 
 he 's not well known generally, and he has n't the 
 position in the town or anywhere which people gen- 
 erally look for in a parliamentary candidate. I may 
 tell you, girls, and you, mother, that he was selected 
 solely on my unqualified support and my casting 
 vote." 
 
 "I hope," Mrs. Bullsom said, "that he will be 
 properly grateful." 
 
 " I 'm sure it 's very good of you, pa," Selina de- 
 clared, affably. She liked the idea of Brooks owing 
 so much to her father. 
 
 " There 's no young man," Mr. Bullsom said, 
 " whom I like so much or think so much of as Mr. 
 Brooks. If I 'd a son like that I 'd be a proud man. 
 And as we 're here all alone, just the family, as it 
 were, I '11 go on to say this," Mr. Bullsom continued, 
 his right thumb finding its way to the armhole of his
 
 264 'A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 waistcoat. " I 'm going to drop a hint at the first 
 opportunity I get, quite casually, that whichever of 
 you girls gets married first gets a cheque from me 
 for one hundred thousand pounds." 
 
 Even Selina was staggered. Mrs. Bullsom was 
 positively frightened. 
 
 " Mr. Bullsom ! " she said. " Peter, you ain't got 
 as much as that ? Don't tell me ! " 
 
 " I am worth to-day," Mr. Bullsom said, solemnly, 
 " at least five hundred thousand pounds." 
 
 " Peter," Mrs. Bullsom gasped, " has it been come 
 by honest ? " 
 
 Mr. Bullsom smiled in a superior way. 
 
 " I made it," he answered, " by locking up forty 
 thousand, more than half of what I was worth, for 
 five years. But I knew what I was about, and so 
 did the others. Mason made nearly as much as I 
 did." 
 
 Selina looked at her father with a new respect. 
 He rose and brushed the ashes of his cigar from his 
 waistcoat. 
 
 " Now I 'm off," he declared. " Brooks and I will 
 be back about seven, and I shall try and get him to 
 sleep here. Fix yourselves up quiet and ladylike, you 
 girls. Good-bye, mother." 
 
 " We have about an hour before dinner," Mr. 
 [Bullsom remarked, sinking into his most comfort- 
 able chair and lighting a cigar. " Just time for a 
 comfortable chat. You '11 smoke, Brooks, won't 
 you?" 
 
 Brooks excused himself, and remained standing 
 upon the hearthrug, his elbow upon the mantelpiece.
 
 MR. BULLSOM IS STAGGERED 265 
 
 He hated this explanation he had to make. How- 
 ever, it was no good in beating about the bush. 
 
 " I am going to surprise you very much, Mr. 
 Bullsom," he began. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom took the cigar from his mouth and 
 looked up with wide-open eyes. He had been 
 preparing graciously to wave away a torrent of 
 thanks. 
 
 "Eh?" 
 
 " I am going to surprise you very much," Brooks 
 repeated. " I cannot accept this magnificent offer of 
 yours. I cannot express my gratitude sufficiently to 
 you, or to the committee. Nothing would have made 
 me happier than to have been able to accept it. But 
 I am absolutely powerless." 
 
 " You don't funk it? " Mr. Bullsom asked. 
 
 " Not I. The fact is, there are circumstances con- 
 nected with myself which make it inadvisable for me 
 to seek any public position at present." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom' s first sensations of astonishment 
 were augmented into stupefaction. He was scarcely 
 capable of speech. He found himself wondering 
 idly how heinous a crime a man must commit to be 
 branded ineligible. 
 
 " To explain this to you," Brooks continued, " I 
 am bound to tell you something which is only known 
 to two people in the country. The Marquis of Ar- 
 ranmore is my father." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom dropped his cigar from between his 
 fingers, and it lay for a moment smouldering upon 
 the carpet. His face was a picture of blank and 
 hopeless astonishment. 
 
 " God bless my soul ! " he exclaimed, faintly.
 
 266 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " You mean that you you, Kingston Brooks, the 
 lawyer, are Lord Arranmore's son ? " 
 
 Brooks nodded. 
 
 " Yes ! It 's not a pleasant story. My father de- 
 serted my mother when I was a child, and she died 
 in his absence. A few months ago, Lord Arran- 
 more, in a leisurely sort of way, thought well to 
 find me out, and after treating me as an acquaint- 
 ance for some time a sort of probationary period, 
 I suppose he told me the truth. That is the 
 reason of my resigning from the firm of Morrison 
 and Brooks almost as soon as the partnership deed 
 was signed. I went to see Mr. Ascough and told 
 him about your offer, and he, of course, explained 
 the position to me." 
 
 " But," Mr. Bullsom paused as though striv- 
 ing to straighten out the matter in his own mind, 
 " but if you are Lord Arranmore's son there is no 
 secret about it, is there? Why do you still call 
 yourself Mr. Brooks?" 
 
 Mr. Bullsom, whose powers of observation were 
 not remarkably acute, looking steadily into his visi- 
 tor's face, saw there some signs of a certain change 
 which others had noticed and commented upon dur- 
 ing the last few months a hardening of expres- 
 sion and a slight contraction of the mouth. For 
 Brooks had spent many sleepless nights pondering 
 upon this new problem which had come into his life. 
 
 " I do not feel inclined," he said, quietly, " for 
 many reasons, to accept the olive-branch which it 
 has pleased my father to hold out to me after all 
 these years. I have still some faint recollections of 
 the close of my mother's life hastened, I am sure,
 
 MR. BULLSOM IS STAGGERED 267 
 
 by anxiety and sorrow on his account. I remember 
 my own bringing up, the loneliness of it. I remem- 
 ber many things which Lord Arranmore would like 
 me now to forget. Then, too, my father and I are 
 as far apart as the poles. He has not the least sym- 
 pathy with my pursuits or the things which I find 
 worth doing in life. There are other reasons which 
 I need not trouble you with. It is sufficient that for 
 the present I prefer to remain Mr. Brooks, and to 
 lead my own life." 
 
 " But you won't be offended, but I want to 
 understand. The thing seems such a muddle to me. 
 You 've given up your practice how do you mean 
 to live?" 
 
 " There is an income which comes to me from the 
 Manor of Kingston," Brooks answered, " settled on 
 the eldest sons of the Arranmore peerage, with 
 which my father has nothing to do. This alone is 
 comparative wealth, and there are accumulations 
 also." 
 
 " It don't seem natural," Mr. Bullsom said. " If 
 you '11 excuse my saying so, it don't sound like 
 common-sense. You can live on what terms you 
 please with your father, but you ought to let people 
 know who you are. Great Scott," he added, with a 
 little chuckle, " what will Julia and the girls say ? " 
 
 " You will understand, Mr. Bullsom," Brooks said, 
 hastily, " that I trust you to preserve my confidence 
 in this matter. I have told you because I wanted you 
 to understand why I could not accept this invitation 
 to contest the borough, also because you were one of 
 my best friends when I was here. But you are the 
 only person to whom I have told my secret."
 
 268 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Mr. Bullsom sighed. It would have been such a 
 delightful disclosure. 
 
 " As you wish, of course," he said. " But my 
 it don't seem possible! Lord Arranmore's son the 
 Marquis of Arranmore ! Gee whiz ! " 
 
 " Some day, of course," Brooks said, " it must 
 come out. But I don't want it to be yet awhile. 
 If that clock is right had n't I better be going 
 up-stairs? " 
 
 Mr. Bullsom nodded. 
 
 " If you '11 come with me," he said, " I '11 show 
 you your room."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 GHOSTS 
 
 BROOKS, relieved that his explanation with Mr. 
 Bullsom was over, was sufficiently entertaining 
 at dinner-time. He sat between Selina and Louise, 
 and made himself agreeable to both. Mr. Bullsom 
 for half the time was curiously abstracted, and for 
 the remainder almost boisterous. Every now and 
 then he found himself staring at Brooks as though 
 at some natural curiosity. His behaviour was so 
 singular that Selina commented upon it. 
 
 " One would think, papa, that you and Mr. Brooks 
 had been quarrelling," she remarked, tartly. " You 
 seem quite odd to-night." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom raised his glass. He had lately im- 
 proved his cellar. 
 
 " Drink your health, Brooks," he said, looking 
 towards him. " We had an interesting chat, but 
 we didn't get quarrelling, did we?" 
 
 " Nor are we ever likely to," Brooks answered, 
 smiling. " You know, Miss Bullsom, your father 
 was my first client of any importance, and I shan't 
 forget how glad I was to get his cheque." 
 
 " I 'm very pleased that he was useful to you," 
 Selina answered, impressively. " Will you tell me 
 something that we want to know very much?"
 
 270 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 "Certainly!" 
 
 " Are you really not coming back to Medchester 
 to live?"" 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 " No. I am settling down in London. I have 
 found some work there I like." 
 
 " Then are you the Mr. Brooks who has started 
 what the Daily Courier calls a ' Whiteby's Charity 
 Scheme ' in the East End ? " 
 
 " Quite true, Miss Bullsom. And your cousin is 
 helping me." 
 
 Selina raised her eyebrows. 
 
 " Dear me," she said, " I had no idea that Mary 
 had time to spare for that sort of thing, had you, 
 father?" 
 
 " Mary can look after herself, and uncommonly 
 well too," Mr. Bullsom answered. 
 
 " She comes mostly in the evening," Brooks ex- 
 plained, " but she is one of my most useful helpers." 
 
 " It must be so interesting to do good," Louise 
 said, artlessly. " After dinner, Mr. Brooks, will 
 you tell us all about it ? " 
 
 " It seems so odd that you should care so much 
 for that sort of thing," Selina remarked. "As a 
 rule it is the frumpy and uninteresting people who 
 go in for visiting the poor and doing good, is n't 
 it ? You seem so young, and so oh, I don't think 
 I 'd better go on." 
 
 " Please do," Brooks begged. 
 
 " Well, you won't think I was trying to flatter, 
 will you, but I was going to say, and too clever for 
 that sort of thing." 
 
 Brooks smiled.
 
 GHOSTS " 271 
 
 " Perhaps," he said, " the reason that social re- 
 form is so urgently needed in so many ways is for 
 that very reason, Miss Bullsom that the wrong 
 sort of person has been going in for it. Looking 
 after the poor has meant for most people handing 
 out bits of charity on the toasting-fork of religion. 
 And that sort of thing does n't tend to bridge over 
 the gulf, does it? " 
 
 " Toasting-fork ! " Selina giggled. " How funny 
 you are, Mr. Brooks." 
 
 " Am I? " he answered, good-humouredly. "Now 
 let me hear what you have been doing since I saw 
 you in town." 
 
 Selina was immediately grave not to say scorn- 
 ful. 
 
 " Doing ! What do you suppose there is to do- 
 here? " she exclaimed, reproachfully. " We 've been 
 sitting still waiting for something to happen. But 
 have you said anything to Mr. Brooks yet, 
 papa? " 
 .. Mr. Bullsom shook his head. 
 
 " Have n't had time," he answered. " Brooks had 
 so much to say to me. You knew all about our land 
 company, Brooks, of course? You did a bit of con- 
 veyancing for us." 
 
 " Of course I did," Brooks answered, " and I told 
 you from the first that you were going to make a 
 lot of money by it." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom glanced around the room. The two 
 maid-servants were at the sideboard. 
 
 " Guess how much." 
 
 Brooks shook his head. 
 
 "I never knew your exact share," he said.
 
 272 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " It 's half a million," Mr. Bullsom said, pulling 
 down his waistcoat, and squaring himself to the table. 
 " Not bad, eh, for a country spec? " 
 
 " It 's wonderful," Brooks admitted. " I congrat- 
 ulate you heartily." 
 
 " Thanks," Mr. Bullsom answered. 
 
 " We want papa to buy a house in the country, and 
 go to town for the season," Selina said. " So long 
 as we can afford it I am dying to get out of Med- 
 chester. It is absolutely the most commercial town 
 I have ever been in." 
 
 " Your father should stand for Parliament him- 
 self," Brooks suggested. 
 
 It is really possible that Mr. Bullsom, being a 
 man governed entirely by one idea at a time, 
 had never seriously contemplated the possibility 
 of himself stepping outside the small arena of 
 local politics. It is certain at any rate that 
 Brooks' words came to him as an inspiration. 
 He stared for a moment into his glass then 
 at Brooks. Finally he banged the table with the 
 flat of his hand. 
 
 " It 's an idea! " he exclaimed. " Why not? " 
 
 " Why not, indeed ? " Brooks answered. " You 'd 
 be a popular candidate for the borough." 
 
 " I 'm chairman of the committee," Mr. Bullsom 
 declared ; " I '11 propose myself. I 've taken the chair 
 at political dinners and meetings for the last twenty 
 years. I know the runs, and the people of Medchester 
 know me. Why not, indeed? Mr. Brooks, sir, you're 
 a genius." 
 
 " You 'ave given him something to think about," 
 Mrs. Bullsom murmured, amiably. " I 'd be willing
 
 GHOSTS 273 
 
 enough but for the late hours. They never did agree 
 with Peter did they? He's always been such a 
 one for his rest." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom's thumbs made their accustomed 
 pilgrimage. 
 
 " In the service of one's country," he said, " one 
 should be prepared to make sacrifices. The cham- 
 pagne, Amy. Besides, one can always sleep in the 
 morning." 
 
 Selina and Louise exchanged glances, and Selina, 
 as the elder, gave the project her languid approval. 
 
 " It would be nice for us in a way," she remarked. 
 " Of course you would have a house in London then, 
 papa, and being an M.P. you would get cards for us 
 to a lot of ' at homes ' and things. Only I wish you 
 were a Conservative." 
 
 " A Liberal is much more fashionable than he 
 was," Brooks assured her, cheerfully. 
 
 " Fashionable ! I know the son of a Marquis, a 
 Lord himself, who 's a Liberal, and a good one," Mr. 
 Bullsom remarked, with a wink to Brooks. 
 
 " Well, my dears," Mrs. Bullsom said, making an 
 effort to rise, and failing at the first attempt, " shall 
 we leave the gentlemen to talk about it over their 
 wine? " 
 
 " Oh, you sit down again, mother," Selina directed. 
 " That sort of thing 's quite old-fashioned, is n't it, 
 Mr. Brooks ? We 're going to stay with you. You 
 can smoke. Ann, bring the cigars." 
 
 Mrs. Bullsom, who was looking forward to a nap 
 in a quiet corner of the drawing-room, obeyed with 
 resignation written large on her good-natured, some- 
 what flushed face. But Mr. Bullsom, who wanted 
 
 18
 
 274 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 to revert to the subject which still fascinated him, 
 grunted. 
 
 " Hang these new ideas," he said. " It 's you 
 they 're after, Mr. Brooks. As a rule, they 're off 
 before I can get near my cigar-box." 
 
 Selina affected a little consciousness, which she felt 
 became her. 
 
 " Such foolishness, papa. You don't believe it, do 
 you, Mr. Brooks ? " 
 
 "Am I not to, then?" he asked, looking down 
 upon her with a smile. Whereupon Selina's con- 
 sciousness became confusion. 
 
 " How stupid you are," she murmured. " You can 
 believe just what you like. What are you looking at 
 over in the corner of the room? " 
 1 " Ghosts," he answered. 
 
 Yet very much as those images flitted at that mo- 
 ment through his brain, so events were really shaping 
 themselves in that bare clean-swept room into which 
 his eyes had for a moment strayed away. Mary Scott 
 was there, her long apron damp with soap-suds and 
 her cheeks red with exertion, for she had just come 
 from bathing twelve youngsters, who, not being used 
 to the ordeal, had given trouble. There were other 
 of his helpers too, a dozen of them up to their eyes 
 in work, and a long string of applicants patiently 
 waiting their turn. The right sort too the sort 
 from underneath pale-faced, hollow-eyed, weary, 
 yet for a moment stirred from their lethargy of suf- 
 fering at the prospect of some passing relief. There 
 was a young woman, hollow-cheeked, thin herself 
 as a lath, eager for work or chance of work for her 
 husband that morning out of hospital, still too deli-
 
 GHOSTS 275 
 
 cate to face the night air and the hot room. He knew 
 shorthand, could keep books, typewrite, a little slip 
 about his character, but that was all over and done 
 with. A bank clerk with 90 a year, obliged to wear 
 a silk hat, who marries a penniless girl on his summer 
 holiday. They must live, both of them, and the gold 
 passed through his fingers day by day, an endless 
 shower. The magistrates had declined to sentence 
 him, but the shame and he was never strong. 
 Brooks saw the card made out for that little cottage 
 at Hastings, and enclosed with the railway ticket 
 Owston was picking up fast there and smiled 
 faintly. He saw the girl on her breathless way home 
 with the good news, saw her wet face heaven turned 
 for the first time for many a month. There were 
 men and women in the world with hearts then. They 
 were not all puppets of wood and stone, even as those 
 bank directors. Then, too, she would believe again 
 that there might be a God. 
 
 Ghosts ! They were plentiful enough. There was 
 the skin-dresser his fingers still yellow with the 
 dye of the pith. Things were bad in Bermondsey. 
 The master had gone bankrupt, the American had 
 filched away his trade. No one could find him work. 
 He was sober enough except at holiday time and an 
 odd Saturday a good currier there might be a 
 chance for him in the country, but how was he to get 
 there? And in any case now, how could he? His 
 wife had broken down, lay at home with no disease 
 that a hospital would take her in for, sinking for want 
 of good food, worn out with hard work, toiling early 
 and late to get food for the children until her man 
 should get a job. There was the workhouse, but it
 
 276 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 meant separation, perhaps for ever, and they were 
 man and wife, as much needed the one by the other, 
 perhaps more, as their prototype in the world of 
 plenty. Again Brooks smiled. He must have seen 
 Flitch, a capital chap Flitch, making up that parcel in 
 the grocery department and making an appointment 
 for three days' time. And Merton, too, the young 
 doctor, as keen on the work as Brooks himself, but 
 paid for his evenings under protest, overhears the 
 address why, it was only a yard or two. He would 
 run back with the man and have a look at his wife. 
 He had some physic he felt sure it was just what 
 she wanted. So out into the street together, and no 
 wonder the yellow-stained fingers that grasped the 
 string of the parcel shook, and the man felt an odd 
 lump in his throat, and a wave of thankfulness as he 
 passed a flaring public-house where half-an-hour ago 
 he had almost plunged madly in to find pluck for the 
 river devil's pluck. The woman. Nothing the 
 matter with her but what rest and good food would 
 cure. Another case for that little cottage. Lucky 
 there were others being made ready. 
 
 " What sort of ghosts, Mr. Brooks? " Selina asked, 
 a little more sharply. 
 
 He started, and withdrew his eyes at last. 
 
 "Ah, Miss Bullsom," he answered, "just the ghosts 
 we all carry with us, you know, the ghosts of our 
 thoughts, living and dead, good and evil." 
 
 " How funny you are, Mr. Brooks," she exclaimed.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 A NEW DON QUIXOTE 
 
 BROOKS reached London the next evening to find 
 himself famous. The evening papers, one of 
 which he had purchased en route, were one and all dis- 
 cussing his new charitable schemes. He found himself 
 held up at once to ridicule and contempt praised 
 and blamed almost in the same breath. The Daily 
 Gazette, in an article entitled " The New Utopia," 
 dubbed him the " Don Quixote of philanthropy " ; 
 the St. James's made other remarks scarcely so flatter- 
 ing. He drove at once to Stepney, and found his 
 headquarters besieged by a crowd which his little staff 
 of helpers was wholly unable to cope with, and half- 
 a-dozen reporters waiting to snatch a word with him. 
 Mary watched his entrance with a little sigh of relief. 
 
 " I 'm so glad you have come," she exclaimed. " It 
 is hard to send these people away, but do you know, 
 they have come from all parts of London? Neither 
 Mr. Flitch nor I can make them understand that we 
 can only deal with cases in the immediate neighbour- 
 hood. You must try." 
 
 Brooks stood up at once. 
 
 " I am very sorry," he said, " if there has been any 
 misunderstanding, but I want you all to remember
 
 278 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 this. It is impossible for us to deal with any cases 
 to-night unless you are residents of the immediate 
 neighbourhood. The list of streets is on the front 
 door. Please do not present yourselves before any of 
 the desks unless you lodge or live in one of them." 
 
 There was a murmur of disappointment, and in the 
 background a few growls. 
 
 " I hope before very long," Brooks continued, " that 
 we shall have a great many more branches open, and 
 be able to offer help to all of you. But at present we 
 cannot make any exceptions. Will every one except 
 our neighbours please help us by leaving the room." 
 
 For the most part he was obeyed, and then one of 
 the reporters touched him on the shoulder. 
 
 " Good-evening, Mr. Brooks. I am representing 
 the Evening Courier. We should be glad to know 
 what your ideas are as to the future of this new de- 
 parture of yours, and any other information you might 
 care to give us. There are some others here, I see, 
 on the same errand. Any exclusive information you 
 cared to place at my disposal would be much valued, 
 and we should take especial pains to put your case 
 fairly before the public." 
 
 Brooks smiled. 
 
 " Really," he said, " it seems as though I were on 
 my defence." 
 
 The reporter took out his pencil. 
 
 " Well, you know," he said, " some of the estab- 
 lished charitable institutions are rather conservative, 
 and they look upon you as an interloper, and your 
 methods as a little too broad." 
 
 " Well," Brooks said, " if it is to be war between 
 us and the other charitable institutions you name,
 
 A NEW DON QUIXOTE 279 
 
 I am ready for it, but I cannot talk to you now. As 
 you see, I have an evening's work before me." 
 
 " When can you spare me half-an-hour, sir? " 
 
 "At midnight my rooms, 10, Jermyn Street" 
 
 The reporter closed his book. 
 
 " I don't wish to waste your time, sir," he answered. 
 " If you are not going to say anything to the others 
 before then I will go away." 
 
 Brooks nodded. The reporters whispered together. 
 
 " May we stay and watch for a few minutes? " one 
 of them asked. 
 
 Brooks agreed, and went on with his work. Once 
 more the human flotsam and jetsam, worthy and un- 
 worthy, laid bare the sore places in their lives, some- 
 times with the smooth tongue of deceit, sometimes 
 with the unconscious eloquence of suffering long pent 
 up. One by one they found their way into Brooks' 
 ledgers as cases to be reckoned out and solved. And 
 meanwhile nearly all of them found some immedfete 
 relief, passing out into the night with footsteps a little 
 less shuffling, and hearts a little lighter. The night's 
 work was a long one. It was eleven o'clock before 
 Brooks left his seat with a little gesture of relief and 
 lit a cigarette. 
 
 " I must go and get something to eat," he said. 
 " Will you come, Miss Scott? " 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " I have to make out a list of things we want for 
 my department," she said. " Last night they were 
 nearly all women here. Don't bother about me. Mr. 
 Flitch will put me in an omnibus at London Bridge. 
 You must see those reporters. You 've read the even- 
 ing papers, have n't you ? "
 
 280 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Brooks nodded. 
 
 ' Yes. I knew we should have opposition. This 
 is n't even the beginning of it. It won't hurt us." 
 
 Nevertheless Brooks was anxious to be properly 
 understood, and he talked for a long time with the 
 reporter, whom he found awaiting him in Jermyn 
 Street a pleasant young fellow just back from the 
 war, with the easy manner and rattling conversation 
 of his order. 
 
 " You ought to call in and have a chat with the 
 chief, Mr. Brooks," he said. " He 'd be delighted to 
 hear your views personally, I 'm sure, and I believe 
 you 'd convert him. He 's a bit old-fashioned, you 
 know, that is for a sub believes in the orthodox 
 societies, and makes a great point of not encouraging 
 idleness." 
 
 " I 'd be glad to some time," Brooks answered. 
 " But I can tell you this. If we can get the money, 
 and I haven't asked for a penny yet, nothing in the 
 shape of popular opinion is going to stop us. Idleness 
 and drunkenness, deceit and filthy-mindedness, and 
 all those vices which I admit are like a pestilence 
 amongst these people, are sins which we are respon- 
 sible for, not them, and, of course, we must suffer 
 to some extent from them. But we 've got to grapple 
 with them. We shall be taken advantage of, and 
 grossly deceived continually. I know of one or two 
 cases already. We expect it count upon it. But 
 in the end we shall come out on the top. If we are 
 consistent the thing will right itself." 
 
 " You are a young man to be so interested in phil- 
 anthropic work, Mr. Brooks." 
 
 " Every one seems to consider philanthropy the
 
 A NEW DON QUIXOTE 281 
 
 pursuit of the old," Brooks answered. " I don't know 
 why, I am sure." 
 
 " And may I ask if that is a sample of your daily 
 correspondence? " he asked, pointing to the table. 
 
 Brooks looked at the enormous pile of letters and 
 shook his head. 
 
 " I have never had more than twenty letters at a 
 time in my life," he answered. " There seems to be 
 almost as many thousands there. It is, I suppose, a 
 result of the Press booming our modest little show. 
 I can scarcely feel as grateful as I should like to. 
 Have another pipe, will you or a cigar ? I think 
 unless there 's anything else you 'd like to ask I 'd 
 better begin on these." 
 
 " Nothing more, thanks," the pressman answered ; 
 " but if I might I 'd like to stay while you open a few. 
 There might be something interesting. If you '11 
 forgive my remarking it, there seem to be a good 
 many reoristered letters. I understood that you had 
 not appealed to the public for subscriptions." 
 
 " Neither have I," Brooks answered, stretching out 
 his hand. " If there is money in these it is entirely 
 unsolicited." 
 
 He plunged into a correspondence as various as 
 it was voluminous. There were letters of abuse, 
 of sympathy, of friendship, of remonstrance, of re- 
 proof. There were offers of help, money, advice, 
 suggestions, and advertisements. There were small 
 sums of money, and a few larger ones. He was 
 amused to find that a great many people addressed 
 him as an infidel the little mission preacher had 
 certainly been busy, and everywhere it seemed to 
 be understood that his enterprise was an anti-Chris-
 
 282 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 tian one. And finally there was a long packet, marked 
 as having been delivered by hand, and inside with- 
 out a word of any sort, or a single clue as to its 
 sender a bank-note for one thousand pounds. 
 
 Brooks passed it over to his companion, who saw 
 the amount with a little start. 
 
 " A thousand pounds not even registered in 
 a plain envelope. And you have no idea from whom 
 it came? " 
 
 " None whatever," Brooks answered. 
 
 The pressman folded it up silently, and passed it 
 back. He looked at the huge pile of correspondence 
 and at Brooks his dark thoughtful face suddenly 
 lit up with a rare gleam of excitement. In his own 
 mind he was making a thumb-nail sketch of these 
 things. There was material for one of those broad, 
 suggestive articles which his editor loved. He wished 
 Brooks good-night. 
 
 " I 'm much obliged for all you 've tol t d me," he 
 said. " If you don't mind, I 'd like to drop in now 
 and again down at Stepney. I believe that this is 
 going to be rather a big thing for you." 
 
 Brooks smiled. 
 
 " So do I," he answered. " Come whenever you 
 like." 
 
 Brooks sank into an easy-chair, conscious at last 
 of a more than ordinary exhaustion. He looked at 
 the pile of newspapers at his feet, the sea of corre- 
 spondence on the table his thoughts travelled back 
 to the bare, dusty room in Stepney, with its patient, 
 white-faced crowd of men and women and children. 
 Perhaps, after all, then he had found his life's work 
 here. If so he need surely regret no longer his lost
 
 A NEW DON QUIXOTE 283 
 
 political opportunities. Yet in his heart he knew that 
 it had been from the House of Commons he had 
 meant to force home his schemes. To work outside 
 had always seemed to him to be labouring under a dis- 
 advantage, to be missing the true and best opportunity 
 of impressing upon the law-makers of the country 
 their true responsibilities. But of that there was no 
 longer any hope. Of the House of Lords he thought 
 only with a cold shiver. No, political life was denied 
 to him. He must do his best for the furtherance of 
 his work outside. 
 
 He fell asleep to awake in the cold grey of the 
 morning, stiff and cramped, and cold to the bone. 
 Stamping up and down the room in a vigorous at- 
 tempt to restore his lost circulation, he noticed as he 
 passed the corner of the table a still unopened letter 
 addressed to him in a familiar handwriting. He took 
 it over to the window, and, glancing at the faintly- 
 sketched coronet on the back, turned it over and broke 
 the seal. 
 
 "ST. JAMES'S HOUSE, LONDON. 
 " Thursday. 
 
 " MY DEAR BROOKS, 
 
 " I have read with an amusement which I am 
 sure you will not fail to share, the shower of con- 
 demnation, approval, and remonstrance which by your 
 doings in Stepney you appear to have brought down 
 upon your head. The religious element especially, you 
 seem to have set by the ears. I sat within hearing 
 of our premier bishop last night at dinner, and his 
 speculations with regard to you and your ultimate aims 
 were so amusing that I passed without noticing it my 
 favourite entree. 
 
 " You will have observed that it is your anonymity
 
 284 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 which is the weapon of which your antagonists make 
 most use. Why not dissipate it and confound them? 
 A Mr. Brooks of unknown antecedents might well be 
 supposed capable of starting a philanthropic work for 
 his own good; the same suspicion could never fall on 
 Lord Kingston Ross, a future marquis. You will notice 
 that I make no appeal to you from any personal motive. 
 I should suggest that we preserve our present relations 
 without alteration. But if you care to accept my sug- 
 gestion I would propose that you nominate me trustee 
 of your society, and I will give, as a contribution to its 
 funds, the sum of five thousand pounds." 
 
 Brooks looked down the long street, quiet and 
 strangely unfamiliar in the dawning light, and for 
 a moment he hesitated. The letter he held in his hand 
 crushed up into a shapeless ball. It would make 
 things very easy. And then a rush of memories. 
 He swung round and sat down at his desk, drawing 
 paper and ink towards him. 
 
 " DEAR LORD ARRANMORE," he wrote, " I am much 
 obliged to you for the suggestion contained in your 
 letter, but I regret that its acceptance would involve the 
 carrying out on my part of certain obligations which I 
 am not at present prepared to undertake. We will, 
 therefore, if you please, allow matters to remain on this 
 footing. 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " KINGSTON BROOKS." 
 
 Bareheaded he stole out into the street, and breathed 
 'freely only when he heard it drop into the pillar-box.
 
 A NEW DON QUIXOTE 285 
 
 For only he himself knew what other things went with 
 the rejection of that offer. 
 
 He crept up-stairs to lie down for a while, and on 
 the way he laughed softly to himself. 
 
 " What a fool she would think me ! " he muttered. 
 "What a fool I am!"
 
 PART III 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 AN ARISTOCRATIC RECRUIT 
 
 AN early spring came with a rush of warm west 
 wind, sunshine, and the perfume of blossoming 
 flowers. The chestnuts were out at the Park fully a 
 week before their time, and already through the great 
 waxy buds the colour of the coming rhododendrons 
 was to be seen in sheltered corners of the Park. 
 London put out its window boxes, and remembered 
 that it had, after all, for two short months a place 
 amongst the beautiful cities of the world. 'Bus con- 
 ductors begun to whistle, and hansom cab drivers to 
 wear a bunch of primroses in their coats. Kingston 
 Brooks, who had just left his doctor, turned into the 
 Park and mingled idly with the throng of people. 
 
 For the first time for many months he suffered his 
 thoughts to travel over a wider range than usual. 
 The doctor's words had been sharp and to the point. 
 He must have instant change change, if not of 
 scene, at least of occupation. Scarcely to be wondered 
 at, Brooks thought to himself, with a faint smile, 
 when he thought of the last twelve months, full to 
 the brim of strenuous labour, of ceaseless striving 
 with a herculean task. Well, he was in smoother 
 waters now. He might withdraw his hand for a
 
 AN ARISTOCRATIC RECRUIT 287 
 
 while, if necessary. He had gone his way, and held 
 his own so far against all manner of onslaught. Just 
 then he heard himself called by name, and, looking 
 up, found himself face to face with Sybil Caroom. 
 
 "Mr. Brooks! Is it really you, then, at last?" 
 
 He set his teeth hard, but he could not keep the 
 unusual colour from his cheeks. 
 
 " It is really I, Lady Sybil. How do you do?" 
 
 Sybil was charming in a lilac-coloured dress and 
 hat as fresh and dainty as her own complexion. She 
 looked straight into his eyes, and told him that he 
 ought to be ashamed of himself. 
 
 " Oh, it 's not the least use your looking as though 
 you were going to edge away every moment," she 
 declared, laughing. " I am going to keep you for 
 quite a long time, and make you tell me about every- 
 thing." 
 
 " In which case, Lady Sybil," her escort remarked, 
 good-humouredly, " you will perhaps find a better 
 use for me at some future time." 
 
 " How sweet of you," she answered, blandly. " Do 
 you know Mr. Brooks ? Mr. Kingston Brooks, Lord 
 Bertram. Mr. Brooks is a very old friend, and I 
 have so many questions I want to ask him." 
 
 Lord Bertram, a slim, aristocratic young man, 
 raised his hat, and glanced with some interest at 
 the other man. 
 
 " The Mr. Kingston Brooks of the East End ? 
 Lavvy's friend?" he asked, politely. 
 
 Brooks smiled. 
 
 " I am afraid," he said, " that I am the person who 
 is being exposed is n't that the word ? I warn 
 you, Lady Sybil, that I am a questionable character."
 
 288 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " I will take the risk/' she answered, gaily. 
 
 " I think you may safely do so," Lord Bertram 
 answered, raising his hat. " Good-morning, Lady 
 Sybil morning, Mr. Brooks ! " 
 
 She led him towards the chairs. 
 
 " I am going to take the risk of your being in an 
 extravagant frame of mind," she said, " and make 
 you pay for two chairs up here, on the back row. 
 Now, first of all, do you know that you look shock- 
 ingly ill?" 
 
 " I have just come from my doctor," Brooks an- 
 swered. " He agrees with you." 
 
 "I am glad that you have had the sense to 
 go to him," she said. " Tell me, are you just 
 run down, or is there anything more serious the 
 matter ? " 
 
 " Nothing serious at all," he answered. " I have 
 had a great deal to do, and no holiday during the 
 past year, so I suppose I am a little tired." 
 
 " You look like a ghost," she said. " You have 
 been overworking yourself ridiculously. Now, will 
 you be so good as to tell me why you have never 
 been to see us? " 
 
 " I have been nowhere," he answered. " My work 
 has claimed my undivided attention." 
 
 " Nonsense," she answered. " You have been liv- 
 ing for a year within a shilling cab ride of us, and 
 you have not once even called. I really wonder that 
 I am sitting here with you, as though prepared to 
 forgive you. Do you know that I have written you 
 three times asking you to come to tea ? " 
 
 He turned a very white face upon her. 
 
 " Won't you understand," he said, " that I have
 
 AN ARISTOCRATIC RECRUIT 289 
 
 been engrossed in a work which would admit of no 
 distraction ? " 
 
 " You could find time to go down to Medchester, 
 and make speeches for your friend Mr. Bullsom," 
 she answered. 
 
 " That was different. I was deeply indebted to 
 Mr. Bullsom, and anxious to see him returned. That, 
 too, was work. It is only pleasures which I have 
 denied myself." 
 
 " That," she remarked, " is the nicest in fact, 
 the only nice thing you have said. You have changed 
 since Enton." 
 
 " I have been through a good deal," he said, 
 wearily. 
 
 She shuddered a little. 
 
 " Don't look like that," she exclaimed. " Forgive 
 me, but you made me think do you remember that 
 night at Enton, when Lord Arranmore spoke of his 
 work amongst the poor, how the hopelessness of it 
 began to haunt him and weigh upon him till he 
 reached the verge of madness. You had something 
 of that look just now." 
 
 He smiled faintly. 
 
 " Believe me, it was fancy," he answered, earnestly. 
 " Remember, I am a little out of sorts to-day. I am 
 not discouraged ; I have no cause to be discouraged. 
 A good many of the outside public misunderstand 
 my work, and Mr. Lavilette thinks I make money 
 out of it. Then, of course, all the organized charities 
 are against me. But in spite of all I am able to go 
 on and increase day by day." 
 
 " It is wonderful," she declared. " I read every- 
 thing in the papers about you and I get the monthly 
 
 '9
 
 290 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 reports, for of course I am a subscriber so is 
 mother. But that brings your shameful neglect 
 of us back into my mind. I wrote to you begging to 
 be allowed to inspect one of your branches, and all 
 I got back was a polite reply from your secretary to 
 the effect that the general public even subscribers 
 were never allowed in any of the branches as 
 sightseers, and that all I could see was the stores 
 and general arrangements, for which he enclosed a 
 view-card." 
 
 " Well," Brooks said, " you don't think that poor 
 people who come to you for help should be exposed 
 to the casual inspection of visitors who want to see 
 how it is done, do you? I have always been very 
 particular about that. We should not allow the 
 Prince of Wales in the room whilst we were dealing 
 with applicants." 
 
 " Well, you might have written yourself, or come 
 and seen us," Sybil declared, a little irrelevantly. 
 "Why couldn't I be an occasional helper?" 
 
 " There is not the slightest reason why you should 
 not," he answered. " We have seventeen hundred on 
 the books, but we could always do with more, es- 
 pecially now we are opening so many more branches. 
 But, you know, we should expect you to come some- 
 times, and how would Lady Caroom like that ? " 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 " You know how much mother and I interfere 
 with one another," she answered. " Besides, I have 
 several friends who are on your list, and who are 
 sent for now and then Edie Gresham and Mary 
 Forbrooke." 
 
 "It is rough work," he said; "but, of course, if
 
 AN ARISTOCRATIC RECRUIT 291 
 
 you like, my secretary shall put your name down, 
 and you will get a card then telling- you what week 
 to come. It will be every afternoon for a week, you 
 know. Then you are qualified, and we might send 
 for you at any time if we were short." 
 
 " I should come," she said. 
 
 A coach passed by, with its brilliant load of women 
 in bright gowns and picture hats, and two or three 
 immaculate men. They both looked up, and followed 
 it with their eyes. 
 
 " Lord Arranmore," Sybil exclaimed, " and that 
 is the Duchess of Eversleigh with him on the box. 
 It doesn't seem the same man, does it?" 
 
 Brooks smiled a little bitterly. 
 
 " The same man," he repeated. " No ! " 
 
 They were silent for a few moments. Then 
 Sybil turned towards him with a little impetuous 
 movement. 
 
 " Come," she said, " let us talk about yourself 
 now. What are you going to do?" 
 
 "To do?" he repeated, vaguely. "Why " 
 
 " About your health, of course. You admitted a 
 few minutes ago that you had been to see your 
 doctor." 
 
 " Why I suppose I must ease up a little." 
 
 "Of course you must. When will you come and 
 dine quietly with us in Berkeley Square, and go to 
 the theatre?" 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " It is kind of you," he said, "but " 
 
 " When will you come and have tea with me, 
 then?" 
 
 He set his teeth. He had done his best.
 
 292 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 *_ 
 
 " Whenever you choose to ask me/' he answered, 
 with a sort of dogged resignation. 
 
 She looked at him half curiously, half tenderly. 
 
 " You are so much changed," she murmured, 
 " since those days at Enton. You were a boy then, 
 although you were a thoughtful one now you are 
 a man, and when you speak like that, an old man. 
 Come, I want the other Mr. Brooks." 
 
 He sat quite still. Perhaps at that moment of 
 detachment he realized more keenly than ever the 
 withering nature of this battle through which he 
 had passed. Indeed, he felt older. Those days at 
 Enton lay very far back, yet the girl by his side 
 made him feel as though they had been but yester- 
 day. He glanced at her covertly. Gracious, fresh, 
 and as beautiful as the spring itself. What demon 
 of mischief had possessed her that she should, with 
 all her army of admirers, her gay life, her host of 
 pleasures, still single him out in this way and bring 
 back to his memory days which he had told himself 
 he had wholly forgotten? She was not of the world 
 of his adoption, she belonged to the things which he 
 had forsworn. 
 
 " The other Mr. Brooks," he murmured, " is dead. 
 He has been burned in the furnace of this last won- 
 derful year. That is why I think I fear it is no 
 use your looking for him and you would not wish 
 to have a stranger to tea with you." 
 
 " That," she said, " is ingenious, but not convinc- 
 ing. So you will please come to-morrow at four 
 o'clock. I shall stay in for you." 
 
 " At four o'clock," he repeated, helplessly. 
 
 Lady Caroom waved to them from the path.
 
 AN ARISTOCRATIC RECRUIT 293 
 
 " Sybil, come here at once," she exclaimed, " and 
 bring Mr. Brooks with you. Dear me, what trouble- 
 some people you have been to find. I am very glad 
 indeed to see you again." 
 
 She looked Brooks in the face as she held his hand, 
 and with a little start he realized that she knew. 
 
 " You most quixotic of young men," she exclaimed, 
 "come home with us at once, and explain how you 
 dared to avoid us all this time. What a ghost you 
 look. I hope it is your conscience. Don't pretend 
 you can't sit with your back to the horse, but get in 
 there, sir, and James, the little seat and make 
 yourself as comfortable as you can. Home, James! 
 Upon my word, Mr. Brooks, you look like one of 
 those poor people whom you have been working for 
 in the slums. If starvation was catching, I should 
 think that you had caught it. You must try my 
 muffins." 
 
 Sybil caught his eye, and laughed. 
 
 "Mother hasn't altered much, has she?" she 
 asked.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 MR. LAVILETTE INTERFERES 
 
 "TT7HAT is this Kingston Brooks' affair that 
 
 VV Lavilette has hold of now?" yawned a 
 man over his evening papers. " That fellow will 
 get into trouble if he does n't mind." 
 
 " Some new sort of charity down in the East 
 End," one of the little group of club members re- 
 plied. " Fellow has a lot of branches, and tries to 
 make 'em a sort of family affair. He gets a pile of 
 subscriptions, and declines to publish a balance-sheet. 
 Lavilette seems to think there 's something wrong 
 somewhere." 
 
 " Lavilette 's such a suspicious beggar," another 
 man remarked. " The thing seems all right. I know 
 people who are interested in it, who say it 's the most 
 comprehensive and common-sense charity scheme of 
 the day." 
 
 " Why does n't he pitch into Lavilette, then ? 
 Lavilette 's awfully insulting. Brooks the other day 
 inserted an acknowledgment in the papers of the 
 receipt of one thousand pounds anonymous. You 
 saw what Lavilette said about it ? " 
 
 "No. What?" 
 
 " Oh, he had a little sarcastic paragraph de- 
 clined to believe that Brooks had ever received a
 
 MR. LAVILETTE INTERFERES 295 
 
 thousand pounds anonymously challenged him to 
 give the number of the note, and said plainly that 
 he considered it a fraud. There's been no reply 
 from Brooks." 
 
 " How do you know ? " 
 
 "This week's Verity. Here it is!" 
 
 " We have received no reply from Mr. Kingston 
 Brooks up to going to press with respect to our remark 
 concerning the thousand pounds alleged to have been 
 received by him from an anonymous giver. We may 
 add that we scarcely expected it. Yet there is another 
 long list of acknowledgments of sums received by Mr. 
 Brooks this morning. We are either the most credulous 
 nation in the world, or there are a good many people 
 who don't know what to do with their money. We 
 should like to direct their attention to half-a-dozen 
 excellent and most deserving charities which we can 
 personally recommend, and whose accounts will always 
 stand the most vigorous examination." 
 
 " H'm ! That 's pretty strong," the first speaker 
 remarked. " I should think that that ought to stay 
 the flow of subscriptions." 
 
 Lord Arranmore, who was standing on the hearth- 
 rug smoking a cigarette, joined languidly in the 
 conversation. 
 
 " You think that Brooks ought to take some notice 
 of Lavilette's impudence, then?" 
 
 " Well, I 'm afraid his not doing so looks rather 
 fishy," the first speaker remarked. " That thousand 
 pounds note must have been a sort of a myth." 
 
 " I think not," Lord Arranmore remarked, quietly. 
 " I ought to know, for I sent it myself."
 
 296 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Every man straightened himself in his easy-chair. 
 There was a little thrill of interest. 
 
 " You 're joking, Arranmore." 
 
 " Not I ! I 've sent him three amounts anony- 
 mously." 
 
 " Well, I 'd no idea that sort of thing was in your 
 line," one of the men exclaimed. 
 
 " More it is," Arranmore answered. " Personally, 
 I don't believe in charity in any modern applica- 
 tion of it at any rate. But this man Brooks is a 
 decent sort." 
 
 '' You know who Brooks is, then? " 
 
 " Certainly. He was my agent for a short time 
 in Medchester." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul, who was one of the men sitting 
 round, doubled his copy of Verity up and beat the 
 air with it. 
 
 " I knew I 'd heard the name," he exclaimed. 
 " Why, I Ve met him down at Enton. Nice-look- 
 ing young fellow." 
 
 Arranmore nodded. 
 
 " Yes. That was Brooks." 
 
 Mr. Hennibul's face beamed. 
 
 " Great Scott, what a haul !" he exclaimed. "Why, 
 you 've got old Lavilette on toast you 've got him 
 for suing damages too. If this is why Brooks has 
 been hanging back just to let him go far enough 
 by Jove, he 's a smart chap." 
 
 " I don't fancy Brooks has any idea of the sort," 
 Lord Arranmore answered. " All the same I think 
 that Lavilette must be stopped and made to climb 
 down." 
 
 Curiously enough he met Brooks the same after- 
 noon in Lady Caroom's drawing-room.
 
 MR. LAVILETTE INTERFERES 297 
 
 " This is fortunate," he remarked. " I wished for 
 a few minutes' conversation with you." 
 
 " I am at your service," Brooks answered, quietly. 
 
 The room was fairly full, so they moved a little 
 on one side. Lord Arranmore for a moment or two 
 studied his son's face in silence. 
 
 " You show signs of the struggle," he remarked. 
 
 " I have been overworked," Brooks answered. "A 
 week or two's holiday is all I require and that I 
 am having. As for the rest," he answered, looking 
 Lord Arranmore in the face, " I am not discouraged. 
 I am not even depressed." 
 
 " I congratulate you upon your zeal." 
 
 " You are very good." 
 
 " I was going to speak to you," Lord Arranmore 
 continued, " concerning the paragraph in this week's 
 Verity, and these other attacks which you seem to 
 have provoked." 
 
 Brooks smiled. 
 
 " You too ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 "I also ! " Lord Arranmore admitted, coolly. 
 " You scarcely see how it concerns me, of course, 
 but in a remote sense it does." 
 
 " I am afraid that I am a little dense," Brooks 
 remarked. 
 
 " I will not embarrass you with any explanation," 
 Lord Arranmore remarked. " But all the same I 
 am going to surprise you. Do you know that I am 
 very much interested in your experiment?" 
 
 Brooks raised his eyebrows. 
 
 "Indeed!" 
 
 " Yes, I am very much interested," Lord Arran- 
 more repeated. " I should like you to understand
 
 298 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 that my views as to charity and charitable matters 
 remain absolutely unaltered. But at the same time 
 I am anxious that you should test your schemes 
 properly and unhampered by any pressure from out- 
 side. You are all the sooner likely to grow out of 
 conceit with them. Therefore let me offer you a 
 word of advice. Publish your accounts, and sue 
 Lavvy for a thousand pounds." 
 
 Brooks was silent for a moment. 
 
 " My own idea," he said, slowly, " was to take no 
 notice of these attacks. The offices where the finan- 
 cial part of our concern is managed are open to our 
 subscribers at any time, and the books are there for 
 their inspection. It is only at the branches where 
 we do not admit visitors." 
 
 " You must remember," Lord Arranmore said, 
 " that these attacks have been growing steadily dur- 
 ing the last few months. It is, of course, no concern 
 of mine, but if they are left unanswered surely your 
 funds must suffer." 
 
 " There have been no signs of it up to the present," 
 Brooks answered. " We have large sums of money 
 come in every day." 
 
 "This worst attack," Lord Arranmore remarked, 
 " only appeared in this week's Verity. It is bound 
 to have some effect." 
 
 Brooks shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I do not fear it," he answered, calmly. " As a 
 matter of fact, however, I am going to form a coun- 
 cil to take the management of the financial organiza- 
 tion. It is getting too large a thing for me with all 
 my other work. Is there anything else you wished 
 to say to me? "
 
 MR. LAVILETTE INTERFERES 299 
 
 The eyes of the two men met for a moment 
 both unflinchingly. Perhaps they were each search- 
 ing for something they could not find. 
 
 " There is nothing else. Don't let me detain you." 
 
 Brooks, who was the leaving guest, stepped quietly 
 away, and Lord Arranmore calmly outstayed all the 
 other callers. 
 
 " Your manners," Lady Caroom told him, as the 
 last of her guests departed, " are simply hoydenish. 
 AVho told you that you might sit out all my visitors 
 in this bare- faced way ? " 
 
 ' You, dear lady, or rather your manner," he an- 
 swered, imperturbably. " It seemed to me that you 
 were saying all the time, ' Do not desert me ! Do not 
 desert me ! ' And so I sat tight." 
 
 " An imagination like yours," she declared, " is 
 positively unhealthy. Arranmore, what an idiot you 
 are." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Oh, you know all about it and one hears! Are 
 you tired of your life? " 
 
 " Very, very tired of it ! " he answered. " Is n't 
 everybody ? " 
 
 "Of course not. Neither are you really. It is only 
 a mood. Some day you will succeed in what you 
 seem trying so hard to do, and then you will be sorry 
 and perhaps some others ! " 
 
 " If one could believe that," he murmured. 
 
 " Two months ago," she continued, " every one 
 was saying that you had made up your mind to end 
 your days in the hunting-field. All Melton was talk- 
 ing about your reckless riding, and your hairbreadth 
 escapes."
 
 300 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Both shockingly exaggerated," he said, under his 
 breath. 
 
 " Perhaps; but apart from the papers I have seen 
 people who were out and who have told me that you 
 rode with absolute recklessness, simply and purely 
 for a fall, and that you deserved to break your neck 
 a dozen times over. Then there was your week in 
 Paris with Prince Comfrere, and now your supper- 
 parties are the talk of London." 
 
 " They are justly famed," he answered, gravely, 
 " for you know I brought home the chef from Voil- 
 lard's. I am sorry that I cannot ask you to one." 
 
 " Don't be ridiculous, Arranmore. Why do you 
 do these things? Does it amuse you, give you any 
 satisfaction?" 
 
 " Upon my word I don't know," he answered. 
 
 " Then why do you do it? " 
 
 " Because," he said slowly, " there is a shadow 
 which dogs me. I am always trying to escape and 
 it is always hard on my heels. You are a woman, 
 Catherine, and you don't know the suffering of the 
 most intolerable form of ennui loneliness." 
 
 "And do you?" she asked, looking at him with 
 softening eyes. 
 
 " Always. It rode with me in the turnkey frill 
 and sometimes perhaps it lifted my spurs why not? 
 And at these suppers you speak of, well, they are all 
 very gay it is I only who have bidden them, who 
 reap no profit. For whosoever may sit there the 
 chair at my side is always empty." 
 
 " You speak sadly," she said, " and yet " 
 
 "Yet what?" 
 
 " To hear you talk, Arranmore, with any real feel-
 
 MR. LAVILETTE INTERFERES 301 
 
 ing about anything is always a relief," she said. 
 " Sometimes you speak and act as though every 
 emotion which had ever filled your life were dead, 
 as though you were indeed but the shadow of your 
 former self. Even to know that you feel pain is bett^ 
 than to believe you void of any feeling whatever." 
 
 " Then you may rest content," he told her quietly, 
 " for I can assure you that pain and I are old friends 
 and close companions." 
 
 ' You have so much, too, which should make 
 you happy which should keep you employed and 
 amused," she said, softly. 
 
 " ' Employed and amused.' ' His eyes flashed 
 upon her with a gleam of something very much like 
 anger. " It pleases you to mock me ! " 
 
 " Indeed no ! " she protested. " You must not say 
 such things to me." 
 
 " Then remember," he said, bitterly, " that sym- 
 pathy from you comes always very near to mockery. 
 It is you and you alone who can unlock the door 
 for me. You show me the key but you will not 
 use it." 
 
 A belated caller straggled in, and Arranmore took 
 his leave. Lady Caroom for the rest of the afternoon 
 was a little absent. She gave her visitors cold tea, 
 and seriously imperilled her reputation as a charming 
 and sympathetic hostess.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 THE SINGULAR BEHAVIOUR OF MARY SCOTT 
 
 THE looking-glass was, perhaps, a little merci- 
 less in that clear north light, but Mary's sigh 
 as she looked away from it was certainly unwar- 
 ranted. For, as a matter of fact, she had improved 
 wonderfully since her coming to London. A certain 
 angularity of figure had vanished the fashionable 
 clothes which Mr. Bullsom had insisted upon ordering 
 for her did ample justice to her graceful curves and 
 lithe buoyant figure. The pallor of her cheeks, too, 
 which she had eyed just now with so much dissatis- 
 faction, was far removed from the pallor of ill-health ; 
 her mouth, which had lost its discontented droop, 
 was full of pleasant suggestions of humour. She 
 was distinctly a very charming and attractive young 
 woman and yet she turned away with a sigh. She 
 was twenty-seven years old, and she had been uncon- 
 sciously comparing herself with a girl of eighteen. 
 
 She drew down one of the blinds and set the tea- 
 tray where she could sit in the shadow. She was 
 conscious of having dressed with unusual care she 
 had pinned a great bunch of fragrant violets in her 
 bosom. She acknowledged to herself frankly that 
 she was anxious to appear at her best. For there 
 had come to her, in the midst of her busy life a
 
 SINGULAR BEHAVIOUR OF MARY SCOTT 303 
 
 life of strenuous endeavour mingled with many small 
 self-denials a certain sense of loneliness of in- 
 sufficiency a new thing to her and hard to cope 
 with in this great city where friends were few. And 
 last night, whilst she had been thinking of it, came 
 this note from Brooks asking if he might come to 
 tea. She had been ashamed of herself ever since. 
 It was maddening that she should sit waiting for his 
 coming like a blushing schoolgirl the colour ready 
 enough to stream into her face at the sound of his 
 footstep. 
 
 He came at last a surprise in more ways than 
 one. For he had abandoned the blue serge and low 
 hat of his daily life, and was attired in frock coat and 
 silk hat his tie and collar of a new fashion, even 
 his bearing altered at least so it seemed to her 
 jealous observation. He was certainly looking better. 
 There was colour in his pale cheeks, and his eyes 
 were bright once more with the joy of life. Her 
 dark eyes took merciless note of these things, and 
 then found seeing at all a little difficult. 
 
 " My dear Mary," he exclaimed, cheerfully he 
 had fallen into the way of calling her Mary lately 
 " this is delightful of you to be in. Do you know 
 that I am really holiday-making?" 
 
 " Well," she answered, smiling, " I imagined that 
 you were not on your way eastwards." 
 
 "Where can I sit? May I move these?" He 
 swept aside a little pile of newspapers and books, and 
 took possession of the seat which she had purposely 
 appropriated. " The other chairs are so far off, and 
 you seem to have chosen a dark corner. Eastwards, 
 no. I have been at the office all the morning, and we
 
 304 ^ A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 have bought the property in Poplar Grove and the 
 house in Bermondsey. Now I have finished for the 
 day. Doctor's orders." 
 
 " If any one has earned a holiday," she said, quietly, 
 " you have. There is some cake on the table there." 
 
 " Thanks. Well, it was hard work at first. How 
 we stuck at it down at Stepney, did n't we ? Six in 
 the morning till twelve at night. And then how we 
 rushed ahead. It seems to me that we have been 
 doing nothing but open branches lately." 
 
 " I wonder," she said, " that you have stood it so 
 well. Why don't you go away altogether for a time ? 
 You have such splendid helpers now." 
 
 " Oh, I 'm enjoying myself," he answered, lightly, 
 " and I don't care to be out of touch with it all." 
 
 " You enjoy contrasts," she remarked. " I saw 
 your name in the paper this morning as one of Lady 
 Caroom's guests last night." 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 " Yes, Lady Caroom has been awfully good to me, 
 and I seem to have got to know a lot of pleasant 
 people in an incredulously short time." 
 
 " You are a curious mixture," she said, looking at 
 him thoughtfully. 
 
 "Of what?" he asked, passing his cup for some 
 more tea. 
 
 " Of wonderful self-devotion," she answered, " and 
 a genuine and natural love of enjoyment. After all, 
 you are only a boy." 
 
 " I fancy," he remarked, smiling, " that my years 
 exceed yours." 
 
 " As a matter of fact they don't," she answered, 
 " but I was not thinking of years, I was thinking of
 
 SINGULAR BEHAVIOUR OF MARY SCOTT 305 
 
 disposition. You have set going the greatest char- 
 itable scheme of the generation, and yet you are so 
 young, so very young." 
 
 He laughed a little uneasily. In some vague way 
 he felt that he had displeased her. 
 
 " I never pretended," he said, " that I did not 
 enjoy life, that I was not fond of its pleasures. It 
 was only while my work was insecure that I made 
 a recluse of myself. You, too," he said, " it is time 
 that you slackened a little. Come, take an evening 
 off and we will dine somewhere and go to the theatre." 
 
 How delightful it sounded. She felt a warm rush 
 of pleasure at the thought. They would want her 
 badly at Stepney, but 
 
 " This evening ? " she asked. 
 
 " Yes. No, hang it, it can't be this evening. I 'm 
 dining with the Carooms nor to-morrow evening. 
 Say Thursday evening, will you ? " 
 
 Something seemed suddenly to chill her momen- 
 tary gush of happiness. 
 
 " Well," she said, " I think not just yet. We have 
 several fresh girls, you know it is a bad time to be 
 away. Perhaps you will ask me later on." 
 
 He laughed softly. 
 
 " What a funny girl you are, Mary. You 'd really 
 rather stew in that hot room, I believe, than go any- 
 where to enjoy yourself. Such women as you ought 
 to be canonized. You are saints even in this life. 
 What can be done for you in the next ? " 
 
 Mary bit her lip hard, and she bent low over the 
 tea-cups. In another moment she felt that her self- 
 control must go. Fortunately he drifted away from 
 the subject. 
 
 20
 
 306 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Very soon," he said, " we must all have a serious 
 talk about the future. The management is getting 
 too big for me. I think there should be a council 
 elected something of the sort must be done, and 
 soon." 
 
 " That," she remarked, " is what Mr. Lavilette 
 says, is n't it?" 
 
 He looked at her with twinkling eyes. 
 
 " Oh, you need n't think I 'm being scared into 
 it," he answered. " All the same, Lavvy 's right 
 enough. No one man has the right to accept 
 large subscriptions and not let the public into his 
 confidence." 
 
 " Lavilette does n't believe in our anonymous sub- 
 scriptions, does he?" she asked. 
 
 " No ! He 's rather impudent about that, is n't he ? 
 I suppose I ought really to set him right. I should 
 have done so before, but he went about it in such an 
 offensive manner. Well, to go on with what I was 
 saying. You will come on the council, Mary ? " 
 
 "I? Oh, surely not!" 
 
 " You will ! And, what is more, I am going to 
 split all the branches up into divisions, and appoint 
 superintendents and manageresses, at a reasonable 
 salary. And you," he concluded, " are going to be 
 one of the latter." 
 
 She shook her head firmly. 
 
 " No ! I must remain my own mistress." 
 
 " Why not ? I want to allot to you the work 
 where you can do most good. You know more 
 about it than any one. There is no one half so suit- 
 able. I want you to throw up your other work 
 come into this altogether, be my right hand, and let
 
 SINGULAR BEHAVIOUR OF MARY SCOTT 307 
 
 me feel that I have one person on the council whom 
 I can rely upon." 
 
 She was silent for a moment. She leaned back in 
 her chair, but even in the semi-obscurity the extreme 
 pallor of her face troubled him. 
 
 " You must remember, too," he said, " that the 
 work will not be so hard as now. Lately you 
 have given us too much of your time. Indeed, I 
 am not sure that it is not you who need a holiday 
 more than I." 
 
 She raised her eyes. 
 
 " This is what you came to say to me? " 
 
 " Yes. I was anxious to get your promise." 
 
 There was another short silence. Then she spoke 
 in dull even tones. 
 
 " I must think it over. You want nr- whole time, 
 and you want to pay me for it." 
 
 " Yes. It is only reasonable, and we can afford 
 it. I should draw a salary myself if I had not a 
 little of my own." 
 
 She raised her eyes once more to his mercilessly, 
 and drew a quick little breath. Yes, it was there 
 written in his face the blank utter indifference of 
 good-fellowship. It was all that he had come to ask 
 her, it was all that he would ever ask her. Suddenly 
 she felt her heart throbbing in quick short beats her 
 cheeks burned. They were alone even her little 
 maid had gone out. Why was he so miserably in- 
 different? She stumbled to her feet, and suddenly 
 stooping down laid her burning cheeks against his. 
 
 " Kingston," she said, " you are so cruel and 
 I am so lonely. Can't you see that I am miserable? 
 Kiss me!"
 
 308 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Brooks sat petrified, utterly amazed at this self- 
 yielding on the part of the last woman in this world 
 whom he would ever have thought capable of any- 
 thing of the sort. 
 
 " Kiss me at once." 
 
 He touched her lips timorously. Then she sprang 
 away from him, her cheeks aflame, her eyes on fire, 
 her hair strangely ruffled. She pointed to the door. 
 
 " Please go quickly." 
 
 He picked up his hat. 
 
 "But, Mary! I " 
 
 "Please!" 
 
 She stamped her foot. 
 
 "But " 
 
 " I will write. You shall hear from me to-morrow. 
 But if you have any pity for me at all you will go 
 now this moment." 
 
 He rose and went. She heard him turn the handle 
 of the door, heard his footsteps upon the stone stairs 
 outside. 
 
 She counted them idly. One, two, three, four 
 now he was on the next landing. She heard them 
 again, less distinctly, always less distinctly. Then 
 silence. She ran to the window. There he was upon 
 the pavement, now he was crossing the road on his 
 way to the underground station. She tore at her 
 handkerchief, waved it wildly for a moment and 
 then stopped. He was gone and she. The hot 
 colour came rushing painfully into her cheeks. She 
 threw herself face downwards upon the sofa.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 LORD ARRANMORE IN A NEW R6LE 
 
 "fT^HE epoch-making nights of one's life," Mr. 
 Hennibul remarked, " are few. Let us sit 
 down and consider what has happened." 
 
 " A seat," Lady Caroom sighed. " What luxury ! 
 But where?" 
 
 " My knowledge of the geography of this house," 
 Mr. Hennibul answered, " has more than once been 
 of the utmost service to me, but I have never appre- 
 ciated it more than at this moment. Accept my arm, 
 Lady Caroom." 
 
 They made a slow circuit of the room, passed 
 through an ante-chamber and came out in a sort of 
 winter-garden looking over the Park. Lady Caroom 
 exclaimed with delight. 
 
 " You dear man," she exclaimed. " Of course I 
 knew of this place is n't it charming ? but I had 
 no idea that we could reach it from the reception- 
 rooms. Let us move our chairs over there. We can 
 sit and watch the hansoms turn into Piccadilly." 
 
 " It shall be as you say," he answered. "I wonder 
 if all London is as excited to-night as the crowd we 
 have just left." 
 
 " To me," she murmured, " London seems always 
 imperturbable, stonily indifferent to good or evil. I 
 believe that on the eve of a revolution we should
 
 310 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 dine and go to the theatre, choose our houses at 
 which to spend the evening, and avoid sweet cham- 
 pagne with the same care. You and I may know 
 that to-night England has thrown overboard a na- 
 tional policy. Yet I doubt whether either of us will 
 sleep the less soundly." 
 
 " Not only that," he said, " but the Government 
 have to-day shown themselves possessed of a pene- 
 tration and appreciation of mind for which I for one 
 scarcely gave them credit. They have made me a 
 peer." 
 
 She looked at him with an amused smile. 
 
 " They make judges and peers for two reasons," 
 she remarked. 
 
 " That, Lady Caroom, is unkind," he said. " I 
 can assure you that throughout my career I have 
 never made a nuisance of myself to any one. In 
 the House I have been a model member, and I have 
 always obeyed my whip in fear and trembling. At 
 the Bar I have been mildness itself. The St. James's 
 Gazette speaks of my urbanity, and the courtesy with 
 which I have always conducted the most arduous 
 cross-examination. You should read the St. James's 
 Gazette, Lady Caroom. I do not know the biograph- 
 ical editor, but it is easy to predict a future for him. 
 He has common-sense and insight. The paragraph 
 about myself touched me. I have cut it out, and I 
 mean to keep it always with me." 
 
 " The Press," she said, " have all those things cut 
 and dried. No doubt if you made friends with that 
 young man he would let you read your obituary no- 
 tice. I have a friend who has corrected the proofs 
 of his already."
 
 LORD ARRANMORE IN A NEW ROLE 311 
 
 Hennibul smiled. 
 
 " My cousin Avenill, the police magistrate," he 
 said, " actually read his in the Times. He was bath- 
 ing at Jersey and was carried away by currents, and 
 picked up by a Sark fishing-smack. They took him 
 to Sark, and he was so charmed with his surround- 
 ings and the hospitality of the people that he quite 
 forgot to let anybody know where he was. When 
 he read his obituary notice he almost decided to re- 
 main dead. He declared that it was quite impossible 
 to live up to it." 
 
 " Our charity now-a-days," she remarked, "always 
 begins with the dead." 
 
 " Let me try and awaken yours towards the liv- 
 ing ! " he said. 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 "Are you smitten with the Brooks' fever?" she 
 asked. 
 
 " Mine is a fever," he answered, " but it has noth- 
 ing to do with Brooks. I would try to awaken your 
 charity on behalf of a perfectly worthy object, myself 
 vide the St. James's Gazette" 
 
 " And what do you need from me more than you 
 have?" she asked. "Haven't you the sole posses- 
 sion of my society, the right to bore me or make me 
 happy, perhaps presently the right to feed me ? " 
 
 " For a few minutes," he answered. 
 
 " Don't be so sure. It may be an hour." 
 
 " I want it," he said, " for longer." 
 
 Something in his tone suddenly broke through the 
 easy lightness of their conversation. She stole a 
 swift side-glance at him, and understood. 
 
 " Come," she said, " you and I are setting every
 
 312 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 one here a bad example. This is not an occasion 
 for tete-a-tetes. We should be doing our duty and 
 talking a little to every one. Let us go back and 
 make up for lost time." 
 
 She rose to her feet, but found him standing in 
 the way. For once the long humorous mouth was 
 set fast, his eyes were no longer full of the shadow 
 of laughter, his tone had a new note in it, the note 
 which a woman never fails to understand. 
 
 " Dear Lady Caroom," he said, " I was not alto- 
 gether jesting." 
 
 She looked him in the eyes. 
 
 " Dear friend," she answered, " I know that you 
 were not, and so I think that we had better go 
 back." 
 
 He detained her very gently. 
 
 " It is the dearest hope I have in life," he said, 
 softly. " Do not let me run the risk of being mis- 
 understood. Will you be my wife?" 
 
 She shook her head. There were tears in her eyes, 
 but her gesture was significant enough. 
 
 " It is impossible," she said. " I have loved an- 
 other man all my life." 
 
 He offered her his arm at once. 
 
 " Then I believe," he said, in a low tone, " in the 
 old saying that a glimpse of paradise is sufficient 
 to blind the strongest man. . . ." 
 
 They passed into the reception-room, and came 
 face to face with Brooks. She held out her hand. 
 
 " Come, you have no right here," she declared. 
 " You are not even a Member of Parliament." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 "What about you?"
 
 LORD ARRANMORE IN A NEW ROLE 313 
 
 " Oh, I am an inspiration! " 
 
 " I don't believe," he said, " that you realize in the 
 least what is going to happen." 
 
 " I do! " she answered. " I am going to make you 
 relieve Lord Hennibul, and take me to have an ice." 
 
 They moved off together. Hennibul stood look- 
 ing after them for a moment. Then he sighed and 
 turned slowly away. 
 
 " If it 's Arranmore," he said to himself, " why on 
 earth does n't he marry her ? " 
 
 Lady Caroom was more silent than usual. She 
 complained of a headache, and Brooks persuaded her 
 to take champagne instead of the ice. 
 
 "What is the matter with you to-night?" she 
 asked, looking at him thoughtfully. "You look like 
 a boy with a dash of the bridegroom." 
 
 He laughed joyously. 
 
 " You should read the evening papers you would 
 understand a little the practical effect of our new 
 Tariff Bill. Mills in Yorkshire and Lancashire are 
 being opened that have been shut down for years; 
 in Medchester, Northampton, and the boot-centres 
 the unemployed are being swept into the factories. 
 Manufacturers who have been struggling to keep 
 their places open at all are planning extensions 
 already. The wages bill throughout the country 
 will be the largest next week that has been paid 
 for years. Travellers are off to the Colonies with 
 cases of samples every manufacturing centre is 
 suddenly alive once more. The terrible struggle for 
 existence is lightened. Next week," Brooks con- 
 tinued, with an almost boyish twinkle in his eyes, 
 " I shall go down to Medchester and walk through
 
 3H A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 the streets where it used to make our hearts ache 
 to see the unemployed waiting about like dumb 
 suffering cattle. It will be a holiday a glorious 
 holiday." 
 
 " And yet behind it all," she remarked, watching 
 him closely, " there is something on your mind. 
 What is it?" 
 
 He looked at her quickly. 
 
 " What an observation." 
 
 "Won't you tell me?" 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " It is only one of the smallest cupboards," he said. 
 " The ghost will very soon be stifled." 
 
 She sighed. 
 
 " Did you see Lord Arranmore this evening? " 
 
 " Yes. He was talking to the duke just now. 
 What of him?" 
 
 " I have been watching him. Did you ever see a 
 man look so ill ? " 
 
 " He is bored," Brooks answered, coldly. " This 
 sort of thing does not amuse him." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " He is always the same. He has always that 
 weary look. He is living with absolute recklessness. 
 It cannot possibly last long." 
 
 " He knows the price," Brooks answered. " He 
 lives as he chooses." 
 
 " I wonder," she murmured. " Sometimes I won- 
 der whether we do not misjudge him you and I, 
 Kingston. For you know we have been his judges. 
 You must not shake your head. It is true. You 
 have judged him to be unworthy of a son, and I 
 I have judged him to be unworthy of a wife. You
 
 LORD ARRANMORE IN A NEW ROLE 315 
 
 don't think that we could possibly have made a 
 mistake that underneath there is a little heart left 
 eaten up with pride and loneliness ? " 
 
 " I have never seen," Brooks answered, "the slight- 
 est trace of it." 
 
 " Nor I," she answered. " Yet I knew him when 
 he was young. He was so different, and annihilation 
 is very hard, is n't it? Supposing he were to die, and 
 we were to find out afterwards? " 
 
 " You," he said, slowly, " must be the judge of 
 your own actions. For my part I see in him only 
 the man who abandoned my mother, who spent the 
 money of other people in dissipation and worse than 
 dissipation. Who came to England and accepted 
 my existence after a leisurely interval as a matter 
 of course. I have never seen in any one of his ac- 
 tions, or heard in his tone one single indication 
 of anything save selfishness so incarnate as to 
 have become the only moving impulse of his 
 life. If ever I could believe that he cared for 
 me, would find in me anything save a convenience, 
 I would try to forget the past. If he would even 
 express his sorrow for it, show himself capable 
 of any emotion whatsoever in connection with 
 anything or any person save himself, I would 
 be only too thankful to escape from my ridiculous 
 position." 
 
 Then they were silent for a moment, each occupied 
 with their own thoughts, and Lord Arranmore, pale 
 and spare, taller than most men there, notwithstand- 
 ing a recently-acquired stoop, came wearily over to 
 them. 
 
 " Dear me," he remarked, " what gloomy faces
 
 316 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 and I expected to see Brooks at least radiant. Am I 
 intruding? " 
 
 " Don't be absurd, Arranmore," she said kindly. 
 " Why don't you bring up that chair and sit down ? 
 You look tired." 
 
 He laughed a little hardly. 
 
 " I have been tired so long," he said, " that it has 
 become a habit. Brooks, will you think me guilty 
 of an impertinence, I wonder ? I have intruded upon 
 your concerns." 
 
 Brooks looked up with his eyes full of questioning. 
 
 " That fellow Lavilette," Arranmore continued, 
 " seemed worried about your anonymous subscrip- 
 tion. I was in an evil temper yesterday afternoon, 
 and Ferity amused me. So I wrote and confounded 
 the fellow by explaining that it was I who sent the 
 money the thousand pounds you had." 
 
 " You ? " Lady Caroom exclaimed, breathlessly. 
 
 "You sent me that thousand pounds?" Brooks 
 cried. 
 
 They exchanged rapid glances. A spot of colour 
 burned in Lady Caroom's cheeks. She felt her heart 
 quicken, an unspoken prayer upon her lips. 
 
 Brooks, too, was agitated. 
 
 " Upon my word," Lord Arranmore remarked, 
 coldly, " I really don't know why my whim should 
 so much astound you. I took care to explain that I 
 sent it without the slightest sympathy in the cause 
 merely out of compliment to an acquaintance. It 
 was just a whim, nothing more, I can assure you. I 
 think that I won it at Sandown or something." 
 
 " It was not because you were interested in this 
 work, then ? " Lady Caroom asked, fearfully.
 
 LORD ARRANMORE IN A NEW ROLE 317 
 
 " Not in the slightest/' he answered. " That is 
 to say, sympathetically interested. I am curious. I 
 will admit that. No more." 
 
 The colour faded from Lady Caroom's cheeks. 
 She shivered a little and rose to her feet. Brooks' 
 face had hardened. 
 
 " We are very much obliged to you for the 
 money," he said. " As for Lavilette, I had not 
 thought it worth while to reply to him." 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Nor should I in your place," he answered. "My 
 position is a little different, of course. I am posi- 
 tively looking forward to my next week's Verity. 
 You are leaving now, I see. Good-night ! " 
 
 " I have kept Mr. Brooks away from his friends," 
 she said, looking at him. " Will you see me to my 
 carnage ? " 
 
 He offered her his arm with courtly grace. They 
 passed down the crowded staircase together. 
 
 " You are looking ill, Philip," she said, softly. 
 " You are not taking care of yourself." 
 
 " Care of myself," he laughed. "Why, for whom? 
 Life is not exactly a playground, is it? " 
 
 " You are not making the best of it ! " 
 
 " The best ! Do you want to mock me ? " 
 
 " It is you," she whispered, " who stand before a 
 looking-glass, and mock yourself. Philip, be a man. 
 Your life is one long repression. Break through 
 just once! Won't you?" 
 
 He sighed. 
 , " Would you have me a hypocrite, Catherine? " 
 
 She shook her head. Suddenly she looked up at 
 him.
 
 3 i8 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Philip, will you promise me this ? If ever your 
 impulse should come if you should feel the desire 
 to speak, to act once more as a man from your heart 
 you will not stifle it. Promise me that." 
 
 He looked at her with a faint, tired smile. 
 
 " Yes, I promise," he answered.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 LADY SYBIL LENDS A HAND 
 
 BROOKS glanced at the card which was brought 
 in to him, at first carelessly enough, afterwards 
 with mingled surprise and pleasure. 
 
 " Here is some one," he said to Mary Scott, "whom 
 I should like you to meet. Show the young lady in,"" 
 he directed. 
 
 Some instinct seemed to tell her the truth. 
 
 "Who is it?" she asked quickly. "I am very- 
 busy this morning." 
 
 " It is Lady Sybil Caroom," he answered. "Please 
 don't go. I should like you to meet her." 
 
 Mary looked longingly at the door of communica- 
 tion which led into the further suite of offices, but 
 it was too late to think of escape. Sybil had already 
 entered, bringing into the room a delicious odour of 
 violets, herself almost bewilderingly beautiful. She 
 was dressed with extreme simplicity, but with a 
 delicate fastidiousness which Mary at any rate was 
 quick to appreciate. Her lips were slightly parted 
 in a natural and perfectly dazzling smile. She came 
 across to Brooks with outstretched hand and laugh- 
 ter in her eyes. 
 
 " Confess that you are horrified," she exclaimed. 
 " I don't care a bit. I 've waited for you to take
 
 320 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 me quite long enough. If you won't come now I 
 shall go by myself." 
 
 " Go where? " he exclaimed. 
 
 " Why, to one of the branches I don't care 
 which. I can help for the rest of the day." 
 
 He laughed. 
 
 " Well, let me introduce you to Miss Scott," he 
 said, turning round. " Mary, this is Lady Sybil 
 Caroom. Miss Scott," he continued, turning to the 
 younger girl, " has been my right hand since we first 
 started. If ever you do stand behind our counter it 
 will have to be under her auspices." 
 
 Sybil turned courteously but wi'th some indiffer- 
 ence towards the girl, who was standing by Brooks' 
 chair. In her plain black dress and white linen collar 
 Mary perhaps looked more than her years, especially 
 by the side of Sybil. As the eyes of the two met, 
 Sybil saw that she was regarded with more than 
 ordinary attention. She saw, too, that Mary was 
 neither so plain nor so insignificant as she had at 
 first imagined. 
 
 " I am sure you are very much to be congratulated, 
 Miss Scott," she said. " Mr. Brooks' scheme is a 
 splendid success, is n't it ? You must be proud of 
 your share in it." 
 
 " My share," Mary said, in quiet, even tones, " has 
 been very small indeed. Mr. Brooks is alone re- 
 sponsible for it. The idea was his, and the organi- 
 zation was his. We others have been no more than 
 machines." 
 
 " Very useful machines, Mary," Brooks said, with 
 ; a kind glance towards her. " Come, we must n't any 
 of us belittle our share in the work."
 
 LADY SYBIL LENDS A HAND 321 
 
 Mary took up some papers from the desk. 
 
 " I think," she said, " that if you have no more 
 messages for Mr. Flitch I had better start. We are 
 very busy in Stepney just now." 
 
 " Please don't hurry," Brooks said. " We must 
 try and manage something for Lady Sybil." 
 
 Mary looked up doubtfully. 
 
 " Unless you ask Lady Sybil to look on," she 
 said, " I don't quite see how it is possible for her to 
 come." 
 
 " Lady Sybil knows the conditions," Brooks an- 
 swered. " She wants to have a try as a helper." 
 
 Mary raised her eyebrows slightly. 
 
 " The chief work in the morning is washing chil- 
 dren," she remarked. " They come to us in a per- 
 fectly filthy condition, and we wash about twenty 
 each, altogether." 
 
 Sybil laughed. 
 
 " Well, I 'm not at all afraid of that," she declared. 
 " I could do my share. I rather like kiddies." 
 
 " The other departments," Mary went on, " all 
 need some instruction. Would you think it worth 
 while for one day? If so, I should be pleased to do 
 what I can for you." 
 
 Sybil hesitated. She glanced towards Brooks. 
 
 " I don't want to give a lot of unnecessary trouble, 
 of course," she said. " Especially if you are busy. 
 But it might be for more than one day. You have 
 a staff of supernumerary helpers, have n't you, whom 
 you send for when you are busy? I thought that I 
 might be one of those." 
 
 " In that case," Mary answered, " I shall be very 
 glad, of course, to put you in the way of it. I am
 
 .322 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 going to my own branch this morning at Stepney. 
 Will you come with me?" 
 
 " If you are sure I shan't be a nuisance," Sybil 
 answered, gratefully. "Good-bye, Mr. Brooks. I 'm 
 awfully obliged to you, and will talk it all over at 
 the Heneages' to-night." 
 
 The two girls drove off in Sybil's brougham. 
 Mary, in her quiet little hat and plain jacket, seemed 
 to her companion, notwithstanding her air of refine- 
 ment, to be a denizen of some other world. And 
 between the two there was from the first a certain 
 amount of restraint. 
 
 " Do you give up your whole time to this sort of 
 work ? " Sybil asked, presently. 
 
 " I do now," Mary answered. " I had other em- 
 ployment in the morning, but I gave that up last 
 week. I am a salaried official of the Society from 
 last Monday." 
 
 Sybil stole a swift side-glance at her. 
 
 " Do you know, I think that it must be a very 
 satisfactory sort of life," she said. 
 
 Mary's lips flickered into the faintest of smiles. 
 
 "Really!" 
 
 " Oh, I mean it," Sybil continued. " Of course, 
 I like going about and enjoying myself, but it is 
 hideously tiring. And then after a year or two 
 of it you begin to realize a sort of sameness. 
 Things lose their flavour. Then you have odd times 
 of serious thought, and you know that you have 
 just been going round and round in a circle, that 
 you have done nothing at all except made some 
 show at enjoying yourself. Now that is n't very 
 satisfactory, is it ? "
 
 LADY SYBIL LENDS A HAND 323 
 
 " No," Mary answered, " I don't suppose it is." 
 
 " Now you," Sybil continued, " you may be dull 
 sometimes, but I don't suppose you are, and when- 
 ever you leave off and think well, you must al- 
 ways feel that your time, instead of having been 
 wasted, has been well and wholesomely spent. I 
 wish I could have that feeling sometimes." 
 
 Despite herself, Mary felt that she would have to 
 like this girl. She was so pretty, so natural, and so 
 deeply in earnest. 
 
 " There is no reason why you should n't, is there?" 
 she said, more kindly than she had as yet spoken. " I 
 can assure you that I very often have the blues, and 
 I don't consider mine by any means the happiest sort 
 of life. But, of course, one feels differently a little 
 if one has tried to do something and you can if 
 you like, you know." 
 
 Sybil's face was perfectly brilliant with smiles. 
 
 " You think that I can ? " she exclaimed. " How 
 nice of you. I don't mind how hard it is at first. 
 I may be a little awkward, but I don't think I 'in 
 stupid." 
 
 " You think this sort of work is the sort you would 
 like best?" 
 
 " Why, yes. It seems so practical, you know," 
 Sybil declared. " You must be doing good, even if 
 some of the people don't deserve it. I don't know 
 about the washing, but I don't mind it a bit. Do 
 you think it will be a busy morning? " 
 
 " I am sure it will," Mary answered. " A number 
 of the people are getting to work again now, since 
 the Tariff Revision Bill passed, and they keep coming 
 to us for clothes and boots and things. I shall give
 
 324 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 you the skirts and blouses to look after as soon as 
 the washing is over." 
 
 " Delightful," Sybil exclaimed. " I am sure I can 
 manage that." 
 
 " And on no account must you give any money to 
 any one," Mary said. " That is most important." 
 
 " I will remember," Sybil promised. . . . 
 
 Two hours later she broke in upon her mother 
 and half-a-dozen callers, her hat obviously put on 
 without a looking-glass, her face flushed, and 
 her hair disordered, and smelling strongly of dis- 
 infectant. 
 
 " Some tea, mother, please," she exclaimed, nod- 
 ding to her visitors. " I have had one bun for 
 luncheon, and I am starving. Can you imagine 
 what I have been doing ? " 
 
 No one could. Every one tried. 
 
 "Skating!" 
 
 "Ping-pong!" 
 
 " Getting theatre-tickets at the theatre ! " 
 
 She waved them aside with scorn. 
 
 " I have washed fourteen children," she declared, 
 impressively, " fitted at least a dozen women with 
 blouses and skirts, and three with boots. Besides a 
 lot of odd things." 
 
 Lord Arranmore set down his cup with a little 
 shrug of the shoulders. 
 
 " You have joined Brooks' Society? " he remarked. 
 
 " Yes ! I have been down at the Stepney branch 
 all the morning. And do you know, we 're disin- 
 fected before we leave." 
 
 " A most necessary precaution, I should think," 
 Lady Caroom exclaijned, reaching for her vinai-
 
 LADY SYBIL LENDS A HAND 325 
 
 grette, " but do go and change your things as 
 quickly as you can." 
 
 " I must eat, mother, or starve," Sybil declared. 
 " I have never been so hungry." 
 
 A somewhat ponderous lady, who was the wife of 
 a bishop, felt bound to express her disapprobation. 
 
 " Do you really think, dear," she said, " that you 
 are wise in encouraging a charity which is not in any 
 way under the control of the Church? " 
 
 "Oh, isn't it?" Sybil remarked. "I'm sure I 
 did n't know. But then the Church has n't anything 
 quite like this, has it? Mr. Brooks is so clever and 
 original in all his ideas." 
 
 The disapprobation of the bishop's wife became 
 even more marked. 
 
 " The very fact," she said, " that the Church has 
 not thought it wise to institute a charitable scheme 
 upon such er sweeping lines, is a proof, to my 
 mind, that the whole thing is a mistake. As a mat- 
 ter of fact, I happen to know that the bishop strongly 
 disapproves of Mr. Brooks' methods." 
 
 " That's rather a pity, isn't it?" Sybil asked, 
 sweetly. "The Society has done so much good, and 
 in so short a time. Every one admits that." 
 
 " I think that the opinion is very far from univer- 
 sal," the elder lady remarked, firmly. " There 
 appears to be no discrimination shown whatever 
 in the distribution of relief. The deserving and 
 the undeserving are all classed together. I could 
 not possibly approve of any charity conducted 
 upon such lines, nor, I think, could any good 
 churchwoman." 
 
 " Mr. Brooks thinks/' Sybil remarked, with her
 
 326 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 mouth full of cake, " that it is the undeserving who 
 are in the greatest need of help." 
 
 " One could believe anything," the bishop's wife 
 said stiffly, " of a man who adopted such principles 
 as that. And although I do not as a rule approve 
 of Mr. Lavilette or his paper, I am seriously in- 
 clined to agree with him in some of his strictures 
 upon Mr. Brooks." 
 
 Sybil laughed softly. 
 
 " I had n't read them," she remarked. " Mother 
 does n't allow the man's paper in the house. Do 
 you really mean that you have it at the palace, Mrs. 
 Endicott?" 
 
 The bishop's wife stiffened. 
 
 " Mr. Lavilette has at times done great service to 
 the community by his exposure of frauds of all sorts, 
 especially charitable frauds," she said. " It is pos- 
 sible that he may shortly add to the number." 
 
 Lord Arranmore shook his head slowly. 
 
 " Mr. Lavilette," he said, " has also had to pay 
 damages in one or two rather expensive libel cases. 
 And, between you and me, Mrs. Endicott, if our 
 young friend Brooks chose to move in the matter, 
 I am afraid Mr. Lavilette might have to sign the 
 largest cheque he has ever signed in his life for law 
 costs." 
 
 The bishop's wife rose with an icy smile. 
 
 " I seem to have found my way into Mr. Brooks' 
 headquarters," she remarked. " Lady Caroom, I 
 shall hope to see you at the palace shortly." 
 
 " Poor me," Sybil exclaimed, as their visitor 
 departed. " She only asked you, mummy, so 
 as to exclude me. And poor Mr. Brooks! I
 
 LADY SYBIL LENDS A HAND 327 
 
 wish he 'd been here. What fun we should have 
 had." 
 
 " Oh, these Etrusians," Lord Arranmore mur- 
 mured. " I thought that a bishop was very near 
 heaven indeed, all sanctity and charity, and that a 
 bishop's wife was the concentrated essence of these 
 things plus the wings." 
 
 Sybil laughed softly. 
 
 " Sanctity and charity," she repeated, " and Mrs. 
 Endicott. Oh!"
 
 THE RESERVATION OF MARY SCOTT 
 
 THE two girls were travelling westwards on the 
 outside of an omnibus, in itself to Sybil a most 
 fascinating mode of progression, and talking a good 
 deal spasmodically. 
 
 " It 's really too bad of you, Miss Scott," Sybil 
 declared. " Now to-day, if you will come, luncheon 
 shall be served in my own room. We shall be quite 
 cosy and quiet, and I promise you that you shall not 
 see a soul except my mother whom I want you to 
 know." 
 
 Mary shook her head. 
 
 " Don't think me unkind," she said. " I really 
 must not begin visiting. I have only just time for a 
 hurried lunch, and then I must look in at the office 
 and get down to Bermondsey." 
 
 " You might just as well have that hurried lunch 
 with me," Sybil declared. " I '11 send you anywhere 
 you like afterwards in the carriage." 
 
 " It is very kind of you," Mary answered, " but my 
 visiting days are over. I am not a social person at 
 all, you know. My role is usefulness, and nothing 
 else." 
 
 " You are too young to talk like that," Sybil said. 
 
 " I am ten years older than you are," Mary re- 
 minded her.
 
 THE RESERVATION OF MARY SCOTT 329 
 
 " You are twenty-eight," Sybil answered. " I 
 think it is beautiful of you to be so devoted to this 
 work, but I am quite sure a little change now and 
 then is wholesome." 
 
 " In another ten years I may think of it," Mary 
 said. " Just now I have so much upon my hands that 
 I dare not risk even the slightest distraction." 
 
 " In another ten years," Sybil said, " you will find 
 it more difficult to enlarge your life than now. I 
 can't believe that absorption in any one thing is nat- 
 ural at your age." 
 
 Mary looked steadfastly down at the horses. 
 
 " We must all decide what is best for ourselves," 
 she said. " I have not your disposition, remember." 
 
 " Nothing in the world," Sybil said, " would con- 
 vince me that it is well for any girl of your age to 
 crowd everything out of her life except work, how- 
 ever fine and useful the work may be. Now you have 
 admitted that except for Mr. Brooks and the people 
 you have met in connection with his work you have 
 no friends in London. I want you to count me a 
 friend, Miss Scott. You have been very kind to me, 
 and made everything delightfully easy. Why can't 
 you let me try and repay it a little? " 
 
 " I have only done my duty," Mary answered, 
 quietly. " I am supposed to show new helpers what 
 to do, and you have picked it up very quickly. And 
 as for the rest don't think me unkind, but I have 
 no room for friendships in my life just now." 
 
 " I am sorry," Sybil answered, softly, for though 
 Mary's tone had been cold enough, she had never- 
 theless for a single moment lifted the curtain, and 
 Sybil understood in some vague manner that there
 
 330 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 were things behind into which she had no right to 
 inquire. 
 
 The two girls parted at Trafalgar Square, and 
 Sybil, still in love with the fresh air, turned blithely 
 westward on foot. In the Haymarket she came face 
 to face with Brooks. 
 
 He greeted her with a delightful smile. 
 
 " You alone, and walking," he exclaimed. " What 
 fortune. May I come?" 
 
 " Of course," she answered. " You know where I 
 have come from, I suppose?" 
 
 He glanced at her plain clothes and realized that 
 the odour of disinfectants was stronger even than the 
 perfume of the handful of violets which she had just 
 bought from a woman in the street. 
 
 " Stepney ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 " Quite right. I had a card last evening, and was 
 there at nine o'clock this morning. I suppose I look 
 a perfect wreck. I was dancing at Hamilton House 
 at three o'clock." 
 
 He looked towards her marvelling. Her cheeks 
 were prettily flushed, and she walked with the de- 
 lightful springiness of perfect health. 
 
 " I have never seen you look better," he answered. 
 
 " And you," she remarked, glancing in amusement 
 at his blue serge clothes, which, to tell the truth, 
 badly needed brushing. " What are you doing in the 
 West End at this time in the morning? " 
 
 " I have been to Drury Lane," he answered, " with 
 some surveyors from the County Council. There is a 
 whole court there I mean to get condemned. Then I 
 looked in at our new place there, but there was such a 
 howling lot of children that I was glad to get away. 
 How they hate being washed ! "
 
 THE RESERVATION OF MARY SCOTT 331 
 
 i 
 
 " Don't they ! " she exclaimed, laughing. " I had 
 the dearest, naughtiest little girl this morning, and, 
 do you know, when I got her clean, her own brothers 
 and sisters did n't know her again. I 'm so glad I 've 
 seen you, Mr. Brooks. I want to ask you something." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " About Miss Scott. She 's been so good to me, 
 and I like her awfully. We 've just come up on the 
 omnibus together." 
 
 " She has been my right hand from the very first," 
 Brooks said, slowly. " I really don't see how I could 
 have done without her. She is such a capital organ- 
 izer, too." 
 
 " I know all that," Sybil declared. " She 's won- 
 derful. I don't want, of course, to be inquisitive," 
 she went on, after a moment's hesitation, " but she 
 interests me so much, and it was only this morning 
 that I felt that I understood her a little bit." 
 
 Brooks nodded. 
 
 " She is a very reserved young woman," he 
 said. 
 
 " Yes, but is n't there some reason for it ? " Sybil 
 continued, eagerly. " I have asked her lots of times 
 to come and see me. She admits that she has no 
 friends in London, and I wanted to have her come 
 very much. You see, I thought she would be sure to 
 like mother, and if she does n't care for society, we 
 might go to the theatre or the opera, and it would be 
 a little change for her, would n't it ? " 
 
 " I think it is very kind of you indeed," Brooks 
 said. 
 
 " Well, she has always refused, but I have been 
 very persistent. I just thought that she was perhaps
 
 332 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 a little shy, or found it difficult to break through her 
 retirement people get like that, you know, when 
 they live alone. So this morning I really went for 
 her, and I happened to be looking, and I saw some- 
 thing in her face which puzzled me. It stopped my 
 asking her any more. There is something under- 
 neath her quiet manner and self-devotion. She has 
 had trouble of some sort." 
 
 " How do you know ? " he asked. 
 
 " A girl can always tell," Sybil answered. " Her 
 self-control is wonderful, but she just let it slip for 
 a moment. She has some trouble, I am sure. I 
 thought perhaps you might know. Is n't there any- 
 thing we could do? I am so sorry for her." 
 
 Brooks was very grave, and his face was curiously 
 pale. 
 
 " Are you quite sure? " he asked. 
 
 "Certain!" 
 
 They walked on in silence for a few moments. 
 
 " You have asked me a very difficult question," he 
 said at last. " She has had a very unhappy sort of 
 life. Her father and mother died in Canada her 
 father shot himself, and her mother died of the shock. 
 She went to live with an uncle at Medchester, who 
 was good to her, but his household could scarcely 
 have been very congenial. I met her there she 
 was interested in charitable works then, and she came 
 to London to try and attain some sort of indepen- 
 dence. At first she had a position on a lady's mag- 
 azine which took up her mornings, but we have just 
 induced her to accept a small salary and give us all 
 her time." 
 
 " That seems like a comprehensive sketch of her
 
 THE RESERVATION OF MARY SCOTT 335 
 
 life," Sybil remarked, thoughtfully, " but are you sure 
 that you have not missed anything out ? " 
 
 " So far as I know," he answered, gravely, " there' 
 is nothing new to tell." 
 
 They walked the rest of the way to Berkeley Square 
 in absolute silence. 
 
 " You will come in to lunch ? " she said. 
 
 He looked down at his clothes. 
 
 " I think not," he answered. 
 
 " We are almost certain to be alone," she said. 
 " You have n't seen mother for a long time." 
 
 He suffered himself to be persuaded, and almost 
 immediately regretted it. For there were a dozen 
 people or more round the luncheon-table, and he 
 caught a glimpse of more than one frock coat. Fur- 
 ther, from the dead silence which followed their en- 
 trance, it seemed more than probable that he himself 
 had formed the subject of conversation. 
 
 Lady Caroom greeted him as kindly as ever, and 
 found a place for him by her side. Brooks, whose 
 self-possession seldom failed him, smiled to himself 
 as he recognized the bishop, who was his vis-a-vis. 
 Hennibul, however, from a little lower down nodded 
 to him pleasantly, and Lord Arranmore spoke a few- 
 words of dry greeting. j 
 
 " Your friend Bullsom," he remarked, " has soort 
 distinguished himself. He made quite a decent speech 
 the other night on the Tariff Bill." 
 
 " He has common-sense and assurance," Brooks 
 answered. " He ought to be a very useful man." 
 
 Lord Hennibul leaned forward and addressed 
 Arranmore with blank surprise on his face. 
 
 " You don't mean to say that you read the de-
 
 334 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 bates in the House of Commons, Arranmore?" he 
 exclaimed. 
 
 Lord Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Since the degeneration of English humour," he 
 remarked, " one must go somewhere for one's 
 humour." 
 
 " I should try the House of Lords, then," a smart 
 young under-secretary remarked under his breath, 
 with a glance at the bishop. " There is more hidden 
 humour in the unshaken gravity of the Episcopal 
 Bench than in both Houses of Parliament put 
 together." 
 
 " They take themselves so seriously," Sybil mur- 
 mured. 
 
 " To our friend there," the younger man contin- 
 ued, " the whole world 's a congregation and, by 
 Jove, here comes the text." 
 
 For the bishop had deliberately cleared his throat, 
 and leaning forward addressed Brooks across the 
 table. 
 
 " I believe," he said, " that I have the pleasure of 
 speaking to Mr. Brooks Mr. Kingston Brooks ? " 
 
 " That is my name," Brooks answered civilly, won- 
 dering what avalanche was to be hurled upon him. 
 
 " Would you consider a question, almost a personal 
 question, from a stranger an impertinence when 
 the stranger is twice your age? " the bishop asked. 
 
 " By no means," Brooks answered. " On the con- 
 trary, I should be delighted to answer it if I can." 
 
 " These aspersions which Mr. er Lavilette 
 has been making so freely in his paper against your 
 new departure I mean against the financial man- 
 agement of it do you propose to answer them ? "
 
 THE RESERVATION OF MARY SCOTT 335 
 
 " Well," Brooks said, " I have not altogether made 
 up my mind. Perhaps your lordship would permit 
 me since you have mentioned the matter to 
 ask for your advice." 
 
 The bishop inclined his head. This was by no 
 means the truculent sort of young man he had 
 expected. 
 
 " You are very welcome to it, Mr. Brooks," he an- 
 swered. " I should advise you most earnestly to at 
 once justify yourself, not to Mr. Lavilette, but to 
 the readers of his paper whom he may have influ- 
 enced by his statements. One charitable institution, 
 however different its foundation, or its method of 
 working, or its ultimate aims, leans largely upon an- 
 other. Mr. Lavilette's attack, if unanswered, may 
 affect the public mind with regard to many other or- 
 ganizations which are grievously in need of support." 
 
 " If that is your opinion," Brooks said, after a 
 moment's hesitation, " I will take the steps you sug- 
 gest, and set myself right at once." 
 
 "If you can do that thoroughly and clearly," the 
 bishop said, " you will render a service to the whole 
 community." 
 
 " There should not be much difficulty," Brooks re- 
 marked, helping himself to omelette. " I never ap- 
 pealed for subscriptions, but directly they began to 
 come in I engaged a clerk and a well-known firm of 
 auditors, through whose banking-account all the 
 money has passed. They have been only too anxious 
 to take the matter up." 
 
 " I am more than pleased at your decision, Mr. 
 Brooks," the bishop said, genially. " I rejoice at it. 
 You will pardon my remarking that you seem very
 
 336 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 young to have inaugurated and to carry the whole 
 responsibility of a work of such magnitude." 
 
 "The work," Brooks answered, "has largely grown 
 of itself. But I have an excellent staff of helpers." 
 
 " The sole responsibility though rests with you." 
 
 " I am arranging to evade it," Brooks answered. 
 " I am going to adopt commercial methods and in- 
 augurate a Board of Directors." 
 
 The bishop hesitated. 
 
 " Again, Mr. Brooks," he said, " I must address a 
 suggestion to you which might seem to require an 
 apology. You have adopted methods and expressed 
 views with regard to your scheme which are in them- 
 selves scarcely reconcilable with the point of view 
 with which we churchmen are bound to regard the 
 same question. But if you thought it worth while 
 before finally arranging your Board to discuss the 
 whole subject with me, it would give me the greatest 
 pleasure to have you visit me at the palace at any time 
 convenient to yourself." 
 
 " I shall consider it a great privilege," Brooks an- 
 swered, promptly, " and I shall not hesitate to avail 
 myself of it." 
 
 The little party broke up soon afterwards, but 
 Lady Caroom touched Brooks upon his shoulder. 
 
 " Come into my room for a few minutes," she 
 said. " I want to talk with you."
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 FATHER AND SON 
 
 " I A O you know," Lady Caroom said, motioning 
 
 L/ Brooks to a seat by her side, " that I feel very 
 middle-class and elderly and interfering. For I am 
 going to talk to you about Sybil." 
 
 Brooks was a little paler than usual. This was one 
 of those rare occasions when he found his emotions 
 very hard to subdue. And it had come so suddenly. 
 
 " After we left Enton," Lady Caroom said, 
 thoughtfully, " I noticed a distinct change in her. 
 The first evidences of it were in her treatment of 
 Sydney Molyneux. I am quite sure that she pur- 
 posely precipitated matters, and when he proposed 
 refused him definitely." 
 
 " I.do not think," Brooks found voice to say, " that 
 she would ever have married Sydney Molyneux." 
 
 " Perhaps not," Lady Caroom admitted, " but at 
 any rate before our visit to Enton she was quite con- 
 tent to have him around she was by no means 
 eager to make up her mind definitely. After we left 
 she seemed to deliberately plan to dispose of him 
 finally. Since then I am talking in confidence, 
 Kingston she has refused the Duke of Atherstone." 
 
 Brooks was silent. His self-control was being se- 
 verely tested. His heart was beating like a sledge- 
 hammer he was very anxious to avoid Lady 
 Caroom' s eyes. 
 
 22
 
 338 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Atherstone," she said, slowly, " is quite the most 
 eligible bachelor in England, and he is, as you know, 
 a very nice, unaffected boy. There is only one pos- 
 sible inference for me, as Sybil's mother, to draw, 
 and that is that she cares, or is beginning to think 
 that she cares, for some one else." 
 
 " Some one else? Do you know whom? " Brooks 
 asked. 
 
 " If you do not know," Lady Caroom answered, " I 
 do not." 
 
 Brooks threw aside all attempt at disguise. He 
 looked across at Lady Caroom, and his eyes were very 
 bright. 
 
 "I have never believed," he said, "that Sybil would 
 be likely to care for me. I can scarcely believe it 
 now." 
 
 Lady Caroom hesitated. 
 
 " In any case," she said, " could you ask her to 
 marry you ? You must see that as things are it would 
 be impossible ! " 
 
 " Impossible ! " he muttered. " Impossible ! " 
 
 " Of course," she answered, briskly. " You must 
 be a man of the world enough to know that. You 
 could not ask a girl in Sybil's position to share a bor- 
 rowed name, nor would the other conditions permit 
 of your marrying her. That is why I want to talk 
 to you." 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " Is there any immediate chance of your recon- 
 ciliation with the Marquis of Arranmore?" 
 
 " None," Brooks answered. 
 
 " Well, then," Lady Caroom said, " there is no im- 
 mediate chance of your being in a position to marry
 
 FATHER AND SON 339 
 
 Sybil. Don't look at me as though I were saying 
 unkind things. I am not. I am only talking com- 
 mon-sense. What is your income?" 
 
 " About two thousand pounds, but some of that 
 half, perhaps more goes to the Society." 
 
 " Exactly. It would be impossible for you to 
 marry Sybil on the whole of it, or twice the whole 
 of it." 
 
 " You want me then," Brooks said, " to be recon- 
 ciled to my father. Yet you you yourself will not 
 trust him." 
 
 " I have not expressed any wish of the sort," Lady 
 Caroom said, kindly. " I only wished to point out 
 that as things are you were not in a position to ask 
 Sybil to marry you, and therefore I want you to 
 keep away from her. I mean this kindly for both of 
 you. Of course if Sybil is absolutely in earnest, if 
 the matter has gone too far, we must talk it all over 
 again and see what is to be done. But I want you to 
 give her a chance. Keep away for a time. Your 
 father may live for twenty-five years. If your rela- 
 tions with him all that time continue as they are now, 
 marriage with a girl brought up like Sybil would be 
 an impossibility." 
 
 Brooks was silent for several moments. Then he 
 looked up suddenly. 
 
 " Has Lady Sybil said anything to you which 
 led you to speak to me ? " 
 
 Lady Caroom shook her head. 
 
 " No. She is very young, you know. Frankly, I 
 do not believe that she knows her own mind. You 
 have not spoken to her, of course ? " 
 
 "No!"
 
 340 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " And you will not ? " 
 
 " I suppose," Brooks said, " that I must not think 
 of it." 
 
 " You must give up thinking about her, of course," 
 Lady Caroom said, " until " 
 
 "Until what?" 
 
 " Until you can ask her if ever you do ask her 
 to marry you in your proper name." 
 
 Brooks set his teeth and walked up and down the 
 little room. 
 
 " That," he said, " may be never." 
 
 "Exactly," Lady Caroom agreed. "That is why 
 I am suggesting that you do not see her so often." 
 
 He stopped opposite her. 
 
 " Does he does Lord Arranmore know anything 
 of this?" 
 
 .She shook her head. 
 
 *" Not from me. He may have heard whispers. To 
 tell you the truth, I myself have been asked questions 
 during the last few days. You have been seen about 
 a good deal with Sybil, and you are rather a mystery 
 to people. That is why I felt compelled to speak." 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 "I see!" 
 
 " You must not blame me," she went on, softly. 
 " You know, Kingston, that I like you, that I would 
 give you Sybil willingly under ordinary circum- 
 stances. I don't want to speak to her if I can help it. 
 And, Kingston, there is one thing more I must say 
 to you. It is on my mind. It keeps me awake at 
 night. I think that it will make an old woman of 
 me very soon. If if we should be wrong? " 
 
 " There is no possibility of that," he answered,
 
 FATHER AND SON 341 
 
 sadly. " Lord Arranmore is candour itself, even in 
 his selfishness." 
 
 " His face haunts me/' she murmured. " There is 
 something so terribly impersonal, so terribly sad 
 about it. He looks on at everything, he joins in 
 nothing. They say that he gambles, but he never 
 knows whether he is winning or losing. He gives 
 entertainments that are historical, and remains as cold 
 as ice to guests whom a prince would be glad to wel- 
 come. His horse won that great race the other day, 
 and he gave up his place on the stand, just before 
 the start, to a little girl, and never even troubled to 
 watch the race, though his winnings were enormous. 
 He bought the Frivolity Theatre, produced this new 
 farce, and has never been seen inside the place. What 
 does it mean, Kingston? There must be suffering 
 behind all this terrible suffering." 
 
 " It is a law of retribution," Brooks said, coldly. 
 " He has made other people suffer all his life. Now 
 perhaps his turn has come. He spends fortunes try- 
 ing to amuse himself and cannot. Are we to pity him 
 for that?" 
 
 " I have heard of people," she said, looking at him 
 intently, " who are too proud to show the better part 
 of themselves, who rather than court pity or even 
 sympathy will wear a mask always, will hide the good 
 that is in them and parade the bad." 
 
 " You love him still?" he said, wonderingly. 
 
 " Kingston, I do. If I were a brave woman I 
 would risk everything. Sometimes when I see him, 
 like a Banquo at a feast, with his eyes full of weari- 
 ness and the mummy's smile upon his lips, I feel that 
 I can keep away no longer. Kingston, let us go to
 
 342 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 him, you and I. Let us see if we can't tear off the 
 mask." 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 " He would laugh at us ! " 
 
 "Will you try?" 
 
 He hesitated. 
 
 " No ! But, Lady Caroom, you have no such debt 
 of bitterness against him as I have. I cannot advise 
 you I would not dare. But if there is a spark of 
 soul left in the man, such love as yours must fan it 
 into warmth. If you have the courage risk it." 
 
 Brooks left without seeing Sybil again, and turned 
 northward. In Pall Mall he heard his name called 
 from the steps of one of the great clubs. He looked 
 up and found Lord Arranmore leisurely descending. 
 
 " A word with you, Brooks," he said, coolly, " on 
 a matter of business. Will you step inside?" 
 
 Brooks hesitated. It was beginning to rain, and 
 neither of them had umbrellas. 
 
 " As you will," he answered. " I have an appoint- 
 ment in half-an-hour." 
 
 " I shall not detain you ten minutes," Lord Arran- 
 more answered. " There is a comfortable s-trangers' 
 room here where we can chat. Will you have any- 
 thing?" 
 
 " Nothing to drink, thanks," Brooks answered. 
 " A cigarette, if you are going to smoke." 
 
 Lord Arranmore pushed his cigarette-case across 
 the small round table which stood between their easy- 
 chairs. The room was empty. 
 
 " You will find these tolerable. I promised to be 
 brief, did I not? I wished to speak for a moment
 
 FATHER AND SON 343 
 
 upon a subject which it seems to me might require a 
 readjustment of our financial relations." 
 
 Brooks looked up puzzled but made no remark. 
 
 " I refer to the possibility of your desiring to 
 marry. Be so good as not to interrupt me. I have 
 seen you once or twice with Sybil Caroom, and there 
 has been a whisper but after all that is of no con- 
 sequence. The name of the young lady would be no 
 concern of mine. But in case you should be con- 
 templating anything of the sort, I thought it as well 
 that you should know what the usual family arrange- 
 ments are." 
 
 " I am sorry," Brooks said, " but I really don't 
 understand what you mean by family arrangements." 
 
 " No ! " Lord Arranmore remarked, softly. " Per- 
 haps if you would allow me to explain it is your 
 own time which is limited, you know. The eldest 
 son of our family comes in, as you have been told, on 
 his twenty-first birthday, to two thousand pounds a 
 year, which income you are now in possession of. On 
 his marriage that is increased to ten thousand a year, 
 with the possession of either Enton or Mangohfred. 
 In the present case you could take your choice, as I 
 am perfectly indifferent which I retain. That is all 
 I wished to say. I thought it best for you to under- 
 stand the situation. Mr. Ascough will, at any time, 
 put it into legal shape for you." 
 
 " You speak of this arrangement," Brooks said, 
 slowly, " as though it were a corroboration of the 
 settlement upon the eldest son. This scarcely seems 
 possible. There can be no such provision legally." 
 
 " I scarcely see," Lord Arranmore said, wearily, 
 " what that has to do with it. The ten thousand
 
 344 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 pounds a year is, of course, not a legal charge upon 
 the estates. But from time immemorial it has been 
 the amount which has been the admitted portion 
 of the eldest son upon marriage. It is no gift from 
 me. It is the income due to Lord Kingston of Ross. 
 If you wish for any future explanation I must really 
 refer you to Mr. Ascough. The discussion of busi- 
 ness details is by no means a favourite occupation of 
 mine." 
 
 Brooks rose to his feet. His eyes were fixed 
 steadily, almost longingly upon Lord Arranmore's. 
 His manner was not wholly free from nervousness. 
 
 " I am very much obliged to you, Lord Arran- 
 more," he said. " I quite understand that you are 
 making me the offer of a princely settlement out of 
 the Arranmore estates to which I have no manner of 
 claim. It is not possible for me to accept it." 
 
 There was a moment's silence. A great clock in 
 the corner ticked noisily. A faint unusual colour 
 stole into Lord Arranmore's cheeks. 
 
 " Accept it ! I accord you no favour, I offer you 
 no gift. The allowance is, I repeat, one which every 
 Lord Kingston has drawn upon his marriage. Per- 
 haps I have spoken before it was necessary. You 
 may have had no thoughts of anything of the sort? " 
 
 Brooks did not answer. 
 
 " I have noticed," Lord Arranmore continued in 
 measured tones, " an intimacy between you and Lady 
 Sybil Caroom, which suggested the idea to me. I 
 look upon Lady Sybil as one of the most charming 
 young gentlewomen of our time, and admirably suited 
 in all respects to the position of the future Mar- 
 chioness of Arranmore. I presume that as head of
 
 FATHER AND SON 345 
 
 the family I am within my rights in so far expressing 
 my opinion? " 
 
 " Marriage," Brooks said, huskily, " is not possible 
 for me at present." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " I cannot accept this money from you. The terms 
 on which we are do not allow of it." 
 
 There was an ominous glitter in Lord Arranmore's 
 eyes. He, too, rose to his feet, and remained facing 
 Brooks, his hand upon the back of his chair. 
 
 " Are you serious ? Do you mean that ? " 
 
 " I do ! " Brooks answered. 
 
 Lord Arranmore pointed to the door. 
 
 " Then be off," he said, a note of passion at last 
 quivering in his tone. " Leave this room at once, 
 and let me see as little of you in the future as possible. 
 If Sybil cares for you, God help her! You are a 
 damned obstinate young prig, sir. Be off! " 
 
 Brooks walked out of the club and into the street, 
 his ears tingling and his cheeks aflame. The world 
 seemed topsy-turvy. It was long indeed before he 
 forgot those words, which seemed to come to him 
 winged with a wonderful and curious force.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 
 
 AT no time in his life was Brooks conscious of 
 so profound a feeling of dissatisfaction with 
 regard to himself, his work, and his judgment, as 
 during the next few weeks. His friendship with 
 Mary Scott, which had been a more pleasant thing 
 than he had ever realized, seemed to him to be prac- 
 tically at an end, he had received a stinging rebuke 
 from the one man in the world whose right to admin- 
 ister it he would have vigorously denied, and he was 
 forced to admit to himself that his last few weeks 
 had been spent in a fool's paradise, into which he 
 ought never to have ventured. He had the feeling 
 of having been pulled up sharply in the midst of 
 a very delightful interlude and the whole thing 
 seemed to him to come as a warning against any 
 deviation whatsoever from the life which he had 
 marked out for himself. So, after a day of indeci- 
 sion and nerveless hesitation, he turned back once 
 more to his work. Here, at any rate, he could find 
 absorption. 
 
 He formed his Board without figure-heads, 
 wholly of workers. There was scarcely a name 
 which any one had ever heard of before. He had 
 his interview with the bishop, who was shocked at 
 his views, and publicly pronounced his enterprise
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 347 
 
 harmful and pauperizing, and Ferity, with the names 
 of the Board as a new weapon, came for him more 
 vehemently than ever. Brooks, at last goaded into 
 action, sent the paper to his solicitors and went 
 down to Medchester to attend a dinner given to 
 Mr. Bullsom. 
 
 It was at Medchester that he recovered his spirits. 
 He knew the place so well that it was easy for him 
 to gauge and appreciate the altered state of affairs 
 there. The centre of the town was swept clean at 
 last of those throngs of weary-faced men and youths 
 looking for a job, the factories were running full 
 time there seemed to his fancy to be even an added 
 briskness in the faces and the footsteps of the hurry- 
 ing crowds of people. Later on at the public dinner 
 which he had come down to attend, he was amply 
 assured as to the sudden wave of prosperity which 
 was passing over the whole country. Mr. Bullsom, 
 with an immense expanse of white shirt, a white 
 waistcoat and a scarlet camellia in his button-hole, 
 beamed and oozed amiability upon every one. Brooks 
 he grasped by both hands with a full return to his 
 old cordiality, indulgence in which he had rather 
 avoided since he had been aware of the social gulf 
 between them. 
 
 " Brooks," he said, " I owe this to you. It was 
 your suggestion. And I don't think it 's turned out 
 so badly, eh ? What do you think ? " 
 
 " I think that you have found your proper sphere," 
 Brooks answered, smiling. " I can't think why you 
 ever needed me to suggest it to you." 
 
 " My boy, I can't either," Mr. Bullsom declared. 
 " This is one of the proudest nights of my life. Do
 
 348 A PRINCE OF SINNERS - 
 
 you know what we 've done up there at Westmin- 
 ster, eh ? We Ve given this old country a new lease 
 of life. How they were all laughing at us up their 
 sleeve, eh! Germans, and Frenchmen, and Yankees. 
 It 's a horse of another colour now. John Bull has 
 found out how to protect himself. And, Brooks, my 
 boy, it 's been mentioned to-night, and I 'm a proud 
 man when I think of it. There were others who did 
 the showy part of the work, of course, the speech- 
 making and the bill-framing and all that, but I was 
 the first man to set the Protection snowball rolling. 
 It was n't much I had to say, but I said it. A glass 
 of wine with you, Sir Henry? With pleasure, sir! " 
 
 " I wonder how long it will last," Brooks' neigh- 
 bour remarked, cynically. " The manufacturers are 
 like a lot of children with a new toy. What about 
 the Colonies? What are they going to say about 
 it?" 
 
 " We have no Colonies," Brooks answered, smil- 
 ing. " You are only half an Imperialist. Don't 
 you know that they have been incorporated in the 
 British Empire? " 
 
 " Hope they '11 like it," his neighbour remarked, 
 sardonically. " Plenty of glory and a good price 
 to pay for it. What licks me is that every one seems 
 to imagine that this Tariff Bill is going to give the 
 working-classes a leg-up. To my mind it 's the capi- 
 talist who 's going to score by it." 
 
 " The capitalist manufacturer," Brooks answered. 
 " But after all you can't under our present conditions 
 dissociate capital and labour. The benefit of one will 
 be the benefit of the other. No food stuffs are taxed, 
 you know."
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 349 
 
 His neighbour grunted. 
 
 " Pity Cobden's ghost can't come and listen to the 
 rot those fellows are talking," he remarked. " We 
 shall see in a dozen years how the thing works." 
 
 The dinner ended with a firework of speeches, and 
 an ovation to their popular townsman and mem- 
 ber, which left Mr. Bullsom very red in the face 
 and a little watery about the eyes. Brooks and he 
 drove off together afterwards, and Mr. Bullsom 
 occupied the first five minutes or so of the jour- 
 ney with a vigorous mopping of his cheeks and 
 forehead. 
 
 " A great night, Brooks," he exclaimed, faintly. 
 " A night to remember. Don't mind admitting that 
 I 'm more than a bit exhausted though. Phew ! " 
 
 Brooks laughed, and leaning forward looked out 
 of the windows of the carriage. 
 
 " Are we going in the right direction? " he asked. 
 " This is n't the way to ' Homelands.' " 
 
 Mr. Bullsom smiled. 
 
 " Little surprise for you, Brooks ! " he remarked. 
 " We found the sort of place the girls were hanker- 
 ing after, to let furnished, and we 've took it for a 
 year. We moved in a fortnight ago." 
 
 " Do I know the house? " Brooks asked. 
 
 " It 's Woton Hall," Mr. Bullsom remarked, im- 
 pressively. " Nice old place. Dare say you remem- 
 ber it." 
 
 " Remember it ! Of course I do," Brooks an- 
 swered. "How do the young ladies like it?" 
 
 Mr. Bullsom laid hold of the strap of the carriage. 
 The road was rough, the horses were fresh, and Miv 
 Bullsom' s head had felt steadier.
 
 350 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Well/' Mr. Bullsom said, " you 'd think to hear 
 'em we 'd stepped straight into heaven. We 're close 
 to the barracks, you know, and I 'm blest if half the 
 officers have n't called already. They drop in to 
 luncheon, or dinner, or whatever 's going on, in the 
 most friendly way, just as they used to, you know, 
 when Sir Henry lived there, him as took wine with 
 me, you remember. Lord, you should hear Selina 
 on the military. Can't say I take to 'em much my- 
 self. I '11 bet there '11 be one or two of them hang- 
 ing about the place to-night. Phew ! " 
 
 Mr. Bullsom mopped his forehead again. The car- 
 riage had turned in at the drive, and he glanced 
 towards Brooks a little uneasily. 
 
 " Do I look as though I 'd been going it a bit?" 
 he asked. " Since Selina 's got these band-box young 
 men hanging around she 's so mighty particular." 
 
 Brooks leaned forward and rescued Mr. Bullsom's 
 tie from underneath his ear. 
 
 " You 're all right," he said, reassuringly. " You 
 must n't let the girls bully you, you know." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom sat bolt upright. 
 
 " You are quite right, Brooks," he declared. " I 
 will not. But we took on the servants here as well, 
 and they 're a bit strange to me. After all, though, 
 I 'm the boss. I '11 let 'em know it, too." 
 
 A footman threw open the door and took Brooks' 
 dressing-case. A butler, hurrying up from the back- 
 ground, ushered them into the drawing-room. Mr. 
 Bullsom pulled down his waistcoat and marched in, 
 whistling softly a popular tune. Selina and Louise, 
 in elaborate evening gowns, were playing bridge with 
 two young men.
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 351 
 
 Seliha rose and held out her hand to Brooks a 
 little languidly. 
 
 " So glad to see you, Mr. Brooks," she declared. 
 " Let me introduce Mr. Suppeton, Captain Meyton ! " 
 
 The two young men were good enough to acknowl- 
 edge the introduction, and Brooks shook hands with 
 Louise. Selina was surveying her father with up- 
 lifted eyebrows. 
 
 "Why, father, where on earth have you been?" 
 she exclaimed. " I never saw anybody such a 
 sight. Your shirt is like a rag, and your collar 
 too." 
 
 " Never you mind me, Selina," Mr. Bullsom an- 
 swered, firmly. " As to where I 've been, you know 
 quite well. Political dinners may be bad for your 
 linen, and there may be more healths drunk than is 
 altogether wise, but a Member of Parliament has to 
 take things as he finds 'em. Don't let us interrupt 
 your game. Brooks and I are going to have a game 
 at billiards." 
 
 One of the young men laid down his cards. 
 
 " Can't we join you ? " he suggested. " We might 
 have a game of pool, if it is n't too late." 
 
 " You are soon tired of bridge," Selina remarked, 
 reproachfully. " Very well, we will all go into the 
 billiard-room." 
 
 The men played a four-handed game. Between 
 the shots Selina talked to Brooks. 
 
 "Were you surprised?" she asked. "Had you 
 heard?" 
 
 " Not a word. I was astonished," he answered. 
 
 " You had n't seen it in the papers either ? Most 
 of them mentioned it in the county notes."
 
 352 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " I so seldom read the newspapers," he said. "You 
 like it, of course? " 
 
 Selina was bereft of words. 
 
 " How we ever existed in that hateful suburb," she 
 whispered under her breath. " And the people round 
 here too are so sociable. Papa being a member makes 
 a difference, of course. Then the barracks is n't 
 it delightful having them so close? There is always 
 something going on. A cricket match to-morrow, I 
 believe. Louise and I are going to play. Mrs. 
 Malevey she 's the Colonel's wife, you know 
 persuaded us into it." 
 
 "And your mother?" Brooks asked a minute or 
 two later. 
 
 Selina tossed her head. 
 
 " Mother is so foolish," she declared. "She misses 
 the sound of the trams, and she actually calls the 
 place dead alive, because she can't sit at the windows 
 and see the tradesmen's carts and her neighbours go 
 by. Is n't it ridiculous ? " 
 
 Brooks hesitated. 
 
 " I suppose so," he answered. " Your mother can 
 have her friends out here, though. It really is only 
 a short drive to Medchester." 
 
 " She won't have them oftener than I can help," 
 Selina declared, doggedly. " Old Mrs. Mason called 
 the other day when Captain Meyton and Mrs. Male- 
 vey were here. It was most awkward. But I don't 
 know why I tell you all these things," she declared, 
 abruptly. " Somehow I always feel that you are 
 quite an old friend." 
 
 Selina' s languishing glance was intercepted by one 
 of her admirers from the barracks, as she had in-
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 353 
 
 tended it to be. Brooks went off to play his shot 
 and returned smiling. 
 
 "I am only too happy that you should feel 
 so," he declared. " Your father was very kind 
 to me." 
 
 " Is n't it almost a pity that you did n't stay in 
 Medchester, Mr. Brooks ? " Selina remarked, with a 
 faint note of patronage in her tone. " Papa is so 
 much more influential now, you know, and he was 
 always so fond of you." 
 
 "It is rather a pity," Brooks remarked, with 
 twinkling eyes. " One can't foresee these things, 
 you know." 
 
 Selina felt it time to bestow her attention else- 
 where, and the game soon came to an end. The 
 girls glanced at the clock and reluctantly withdrew. 
 
 " Remember, Miss Bullsom, that we are relying 
 upon you to-morrow," the younger of the two offi- 
 cers remarked, as he opened the door. " Two o'clock 
 sharp but you lunch with Mrs. Malevey first, don't 
 you?" 
 
 " We shan't forget," Selina assured him, graciously. 
 " Good-night." 
 
 The two young men left soon afterwards. Mr. 
 Bullsom mixed himself a whisky-and-soda, and stood 
 for a few minutes on the hearthrug before retiring. 
 
 " You 're not up to the mark, Brooks, my boy," 
 he said, kindly. 
 
 Brooks shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " I am about as usual," he answered. 
 
 Mr. Bullsom set down his glass. 
 
 " Look here, Brooks," he said, " you Ve given me 
 many a useful piece of advice, even when you used 
 
 23
 
 354 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 to charge me six and eightpence for it. I 'm going 
 to turn the tables. One does n't need to look at you 
 twice to see that things aren't going altogether as 
 they should do with you. See here! Are you sure 
 that you 're not cutting off your nose to spite your 
 face, eh?" 
 
 " Perhaps I am," Brooks answered. " But it is 
 too late to draw back now." 
 
 " It is never too late," Mr. Bullsom declared, 
 vigorously. " I 've no fancy for weathercocks, but 
 I have n't a ha'porth of respect for a man who 
 ain't smart enough to own up when he 's made a 
 mistake, and who is n't willing to start again on a 
 fresh page. You take my advice, Brooks. Be rec- 
 onciled with your father, and let 'em all know who 
 you are. I 've seen a bit of Lord Arranmore, and 
 I '11 stake my last shilling that he 's not a bad 'un at 
 heart. You make it up with him, Brooks. Come, 
 that 's a straight tip, and it 's a good one." 
 
 Brooks threw away his cigarette and held out his 
 hand. 
 
 " It is very good advice, Mr. Bullsom," he said, 
 " under any ordinary circumstances. I wish I could 
 take it. Good-night." 
 
 Mr. Bullsom grasped his hand. 
 
 " You 're not offended, my boy ? " he asked, anx- 
 iously. 
 
 " Not I," Brooks answered, heartily. " I 'm not 
 such an idiot." 
 
 " I don't want to take any liberties," Bullsom said, 
 " and I 'm afraid I forget sometimes who you are, 
 but that 's your fault, seeing that you will call your- 
 self only Mr. Kingston Brooks when you 're by
 
 THE ADVICE OF MR. BULLSOM 355 
 
 rights a lord. But if you were the Prince of Wales 
 I 'd still say that my advice was good. Forgive your 
 father anything you Ve got against him, and start 
 afresh." 
 
 " Well, I '11 think about it," Brooks promised.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 
 
 BROOKS returned to London to find the annual 
 exodus already commenced. Lady Caroom and 
 Sybil had left for Homburg. Lord Arranmore was 
 yachting in the Channel. Brooks settled down to 
 work, and found it a little wearisome. 
 
 He saw nothing of Mary Scott, whose duties now 
 brought her seldom to the head office. He began to 
 think that she was avoiding him, and there came upon 
 him about this time a sense of loneliness to which he 
 was sometimes subject. He fought it with hard work 
 early and late, till the colour left his cheeks and 
 black lines bordered his eyes. They pressed him 
 to take a holiday, but he steadily declined. Mr. 
 Bullsom wrote begging him to spend a week-end at 
 least at Woton Hall. He refused this and all other 
 invitations. 
 
 One day he took up a newspaper which was chiefly 
 concerned with the doings of fashionable people, and 
 Lady Caroom's name at once caught his eye. He 
 read that her beautiful daughter Lady Sybil was quite 
 the belle of Homburg, that the Duke of Atherstone 
 was in constant attendance, that an interesting an- 
 nouncement might at any moment be made. He 
 threw aside the paper and looked thoughtfully out 
 into the stuffy little street, where even at night the
 
 A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 357 
 
 air seemed stifling and unwholesome. After all, was 
 he making the best of his life? He had started a 
 great work. Hundreds and thousands of his fellow- 
 creatures would be the better for it. So far all was 
 well enough. But personally was this entire self- 
 abnegation necessary ? was he fulfilling his duty 
 to himself? was he not rather sacrificing his future 
 to a prejudice an idea? In any case he knew that 
 it was too late to retract. He had renounced his 
 proper position in life, it was too late for him now to 
 claim it. And there had gone with it Sybil. After 
 all, why should he arrogate to himself judgment? 
 The sins of his father were not his concern. It was 
 chiefly he who suffered by his present attitude, yet 
 he had chosen it deliberately. He could not draw 
 back. He had cut himself off from her world he 
 saw now the folly of his ever for a moment having 
 been drawn into it. It must be a chapter closed. 
 
 The weeks passed on, and his loneliness grew. 
 One day the opening of still another branch brought 
 him for a moment into contact with Mary Scott. She 
 too was looking pale, but her manner was bright, even 
 animated. She seemed to feel none of the dejection 
 which had stolen away from him the whole flavour 
 of life. Her light easy laugh and cheerful conversa- 
 tion were like a tonic to him. He remembered those 
 days at Medchester. After all, she was the first 
 woman whom he had ever looked upon as a comrade, 
 whom he had ever taken out of her sex and considered 
 singly. 
 
 She spoke of his ill-looks kindly and with some 
 apprehension. 
 
 " I am all right," he assured her, " but a little dull.
 
 358 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 Take pity on me and come out to dinner one night 
 this week." 
 
 They dined in the annexe of a fashionable restau- 
 rant practically out of doors a cool green lawn for 
 a carpet and a fountain playing close at hand. Mary 
 wore a white dinner-gown, gossamer-like and airy. 
 Her rich brown hair was tastefully arranged, her 
 voice had never seemed to him so soft and pleasant. 
 All around was the hum of cheerful conversation. A 
 little world of people seemed to be there whose philos- 
 ophy of life after all was surely the only true one, 
 where hearts were light with the joy of the moment. 
 The dinner was carefully served, the wine, which in 
 his solitude he had neglected, stole through his veins 
 with a pleasant warmth. Brooks felt his nerves relax, 
 the light came back to his eyes and the colour to his 
 cheeks. Their conversation grew brighter almost 
 gay. They both carefully avoided all mention of their 
 work it was a holiday. The burden of his too care- 
 fully thought out life seemed to pass away. Brooks 
 felt that his youth was coming to him a little late, but 
 with delicious freshness. 
 
 He smoked a cigarette and sipped his coffee, glanc- 
 ing every now and then at his companion with ap- 
 proving eyes. For Mary, whose dress was so sel- 
 dom a matter of moment to her, chanced to look her 
 best that night. The delicate pallor of her cheeks 
 under the rich tone of her hair seemed quite apart 
 from any suggestion of ill-health, her eyes were 
 wonderfully full and soft, a quaint pearl orna- 
 ment hung by a little gold chain from her slen- 
 der, graceful neck. A sort of dreamy content came 
 over Brooks. After all, why should he throw him-
 
 A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 359 
 
 self in despair against the gates of that other world, 
 outside which he himself had elected to dwell? 
 It was only madness for him to think of Sybil. 
 While Lord Arranmore lived he must remain King- 
 ston Brooks and for Kingston Brooks it seemed 
 that even friendship with her was forbidden. He 
 could live down those memories. They were far 
 better crushed. He thought of that moment in 
 Mary's sitting-room, that one moment of her self- 
 betrayal, and his heart beat with an unaccustomed 
 force. Why not rob her of the bitterness of that 
 memory? He looked at the white hand resting for 
 a moment on the table so close to his, and a sudden 
 impulse came over him to snatch it up, to feel his 
 loneliness fade away for ever before the new light in 
 her face. 
 
 " Let us go and sit on the other side of the lawn," 
 he said, leaning over towards her. " We can hear the 
 music better." 
 
 They found a quiet seat where the music from the 
 main restaurant reached them, curiously mingled with 
 the jingling of cab bells from Piccadilly. Brooks 
 leaned over and took her hand. 
 
 " Mary," he said, " will you marry me? " 
 
 She looked at him as though expecting to find in his 
 face some vague sign of madness, some clue to words 
 which seemed to her wholly incomprehensible. But 
 he had all the appearance of being in earnest. His 
 eyes were serious, his fingers had tightened over hers. 
 She drew a little away, and every vestige of colour had 
 vanished from her cheeks. 
 
 " Marry you? " she exclaimed. 
 
 He bent over her, and he laughed softly in the
 
 360 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 darkness. A mad impulse was upon him to kiss her, 
 but he resisted it. 
 
 " Why not? Does it sound so dreadful? " 
 
 She drew her fingers away slowly but with deter- 
 mination. 
 
 " I had hoped," she said, " that you would have 
 spared me this." 
 
 " Spared you ! " he repeated. " I do not under- 
 stand. Spared you ! " 
 
 She looked at him with flashing eyes. 
 
 " Oh, I suppose I ought to thank you," she said, 
 bitterly. " Only I do not. I cannot. You were 
 kinder when you joined with me and helped me 
 to ignore that hateful moment. That was much 
 kinder." 
 
 " Upon my honour, Mary," Brooks declared, ear- 
 nestly, " I do not understand you. I have not the 
 least idea what you mean." 
 
 She looked at him incredulously. 
 
 " You have asked me to marry you," she said. 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Because I care for you." 
 
 "Care for me? Does that mean that you love 
 me?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 She noted very well that moment's hesitation. 
 
 " That is not true," she declared. " Oh, I know. 
 You ask me out of pity because you cannot forget. 
 I suppose you think it kindness. I don't! It is 
 hateful!" 
 
 A light broke in upon him. He tried once more to 
 take her hand, but she withheld it. 
 
 " I only half understand you, Mary," he said,
 
 A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 361 
 
 earnestly, " but I can assure you that you are mis- 
 taken. As to asking you out of pity that is ridicu- 
 lous. I want you to be my wife. We care for the 
 same things we can help one another and I seem 
 to have been very lonely lately." 
 
 " And you think," Mary said, with a curious side- 
 glance at him, " that I should cure your loneliness. 
 Thank you. I am very happy as I am. Please forget 
 everything you have said, and let us go." 
 
 Brooks was a little bewildered and manlike a 
 little more in earnest. 
 
 " For some reason or other," he said, " you seem 
 disinclined to take me seriously. I cannot understand 
 you, Mary. At any rate you must answer me differ- 
 ently. I want you to be my wife. I am fond of you 
 you know that and I will do my best to make 
 you happy." 
 
 " Thank you," Mary said, hardly. " I am sorry, 
 but I must decline your offer absolutely. Now, 
 let us go, shall we? " 
 
 She would have risen, but he laid his hand firmly 
 upon her shoulder. 
 
 " Not till I have some sort of explanation," he said. 
 " Is it that you do not care for me, Mary? " 
 
 She turned round upon him with colour enough in 
 her cheeks and a strange angry light burning in her 
 eyes. 
 
 " You might have spared me that also," she ex- 
 claimed. " You are determined to humiliate me, to 
 make me remember that hateful afternoon in my 
 rooms oh, I can say it if I like when I kissed 
 you. I knew then that sooner or later you would 
 make up your mind that it was your duty to ask
 
 362 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 me to marry you. Only you might have done it by 
 letter. It would have been kinder. Never mind. 
 You have purged your conscience, and you have got 
 your answer. Now let us go." 
 
 Brooks looked at her for a moment amazed 
 beside himself with wonder and self-reproach. 
 
 " Mary," he said, quietly, " I give you my word 
 that nothing which I have said this evening has the 
 least connection with that afternoon. I give you 
 my word that not for a moment have I thought 
 of it in connection with what I have said to you 
 to-night." 
 
 She looked at him steadfastly, and her eyes were 
 full of things which he could not understand. 
 
 " When did you make up your mind to ask me 
 this?" 
 
 He pointed to the little table where they had been 
 sitting. 
 
 " Only a few minutes ago. I confess it was an 
 impulse. I think that I realized as we sat there how 
 dear you had grown to me, Mary how dull life 
 was without you." 
 
 " You say these things to me," she exclaimed, 
 " when all the time you love another woman." 
 
 He started a little. She smiled bitterly as she saw 
 the shadow on his face. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " 
 
 " I mean," she said, deliberately, " that you love 
 Sybil Caroom. Is it not true? " 
 
 His head drooped a little. He had never asked 
 himself even so much as this. He was face to face 
 now with all the concentrated emotions which lately 
 had so much disturbed his life. The problem which
 
 A QUESTION AND AN ANSWER 363 
 
 he had so sedulously avoided was forced upon him 
 ruthlessly, with almost barbaric simplicity. 
 
 " I do not know," he answered, vaguely. " I have 
 never asked myself. I do not wish to ask myself. 
 Why do you speak of her ? She is not of our world, 
 the world to which I want to belong. I want to 
 forget her." 
 
 " You are a little mad to-night, my friend," Mary 
 said. " To-morrow you will feel differently. If Sybil 
 Caroom cares for you, what does it matter which 
 world she belongs to? She is not the sort of girl to 
 be bound by old-fashioned prejudices. But I do not 
 understand you at all to-night. You are not yourself. 
 I think that you are a little cruel." 
 
 " Cruel ? " he repeated. 
 
 Her face darkened. 
 
 " Oh, it is only natural," she said, with a note of 
 suppressed passion in her low tone. " It is just the 
 accursed egotism of your sex. What right have you 
 to make us suffer so to ask me to marry you and 
 sit by my side and wonder whether you care for 
 another woman? Can't you see how humiliating it 
 all is? It is an insult to ask a woman to marry you 
 to cure your loneliness, to make you a home to settle 
 your indecision. It is an insult to ask a woman to 
 marry you for any reason except that you care for 
 her more than any other woman in the world, and 
 can tell her so trustfully, eagerly. Please to put me 
 in a cab at once, and never speak of these things 
 again." 
 
 She was half-way across the lawn before he could 
 stop her, her head thrown back, carrying herself 
 proudly and well, moving as it seemed to him with
 
 364 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 a sort of effortless dignity wholly in keeping with 
 the vigour of her words. He obeyed her literally. 
 There was nothing else for him to do. His slight 
 effort to join her in the cab she firmly repulsed, hold- 
 ing out her hand and speaking a few cheerful words 
 of thanks for her evening's entertainment. And when 
 the cab rolled away Brooks felt lonelier than ever.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 LADY SYBIL SAYS " YES " 
 
 THE carriage plunged into the shadow of trie 
 pine-woods, and commenced the long uphill 
 ascent to Saalburg. Lady Caroom put down her 
 parasol and turned towards Sybil, whose eyes were 
 steadfastly fixed upon the narrow white belt of road 
 ahead. 
 
 " Now, Sybil," she said, " for our talk." 
 
 " Your talk," Sybil corrected her, with a smile. 
 " I 'm to be listener." 
 
 " Oh, it may not be so one-sided after all," Lady 
 Caroom declared. " And we had better make haste, 
 or that impetuous young man of yours will come 
 pounding after us on his motor before we know 
 where we are. What are you going to do about 
 him, Sybil?" 
 
 " I don't know." 
 
 " Well, you '11 have to make up your mind. He 's 
 getting on my nerves. You must decide one way or 
 another." 
 
 Sybil sighed. 
 
 " He 's quite the nicest young man I know of his 
 class," she remarked. 
 
 " Exactly," Lady Caroom assented. " And though 
 I think you will admit that I am one of the least 
 conventional of mothers, I must really say I don't
 
 366 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 think that it is exactly a comfortable thing to do to 
 marry a man who is altogether outside one's own 
 circle." 
 
 " Mr. Brooks," Sybil said, " is quite as well bred 
 as Atherstone." 
 
 " He is his equal in breeding and in birth," Lady 
 Caroom declared. " You know all about him. I 
 admit," she continued, " that it sounds like a page 
 out of a novel. But it is n't. The only pity is from 
 one point of view that it makes so little difference." 
 
 " You think," Sybil asked, " that he will really keep 
 his word that he will not be reconciled with Lord 
 Arranmore? " 
 
 " I am sure of it, my dear," Lady Caroom an- 
 swered. " Unless a miracle happens, he will continue 
 to be Mr. Kingston Brooks for the next ten or fifteen 
 years, for Lord Arranmore's lifetime, and you know 
 that they are a long-lived race. So you see the situ- 
 ation remains practically unaltered by what I have 
 told you. Mr. Kingston Brooks is a great favourite 
 of mine. I am very fond of him indeed. But I very 
 much doubt even if he should ask you whether 
 you would find your position as his wife particularly 
 comfortable. You and I, Sybil, have no secrets from 
 one another. I wish you would tell me exactly how 
 you feel about him." 
 
 Sybil smiled a little ruefully. 
 
 " If I knew exactly," she answered, " I should 
 know exactly what to do. But I don't. You know 
 how uninteresting our set of young men are as a 
 rule. Well, directly I met Mr. Brooks at Enton I felt 
 that he was different. He interested me very much. 
 Then I have always wanted to do something useful,
 
 LADY SYBIL SAYS "YES" 367 
 
 to get something different into my life, and he found 
 me exactly the sort of work I wanted. But he has 
 never talked to me as though he cared particularly 
 though I think that he does a little." 
 
 " It is easy to see," Lady Caroom remarked, " that 
 you are not head over ears in love." 
 
 " Mother," Sybil answered, " do you believe that 
 girls often do fall head over ears in love? If Mr. 
 Brooks and I met continually, and if he and his 
 father were reconciled, well, I think it would be quite 
 easy for me very soon to care for him a great deal. 
 If even now he had followed me here, was with us 
 often, and showed that he was really very fond of 
 me, I think that I should soon be inclined to return 
 it perhaps even I don't know to risk marry- 
 ing him, and giving up our ordinary life. But as it 
 is I like to think of him, I should like him to be here ; 
 but I am not, as you say, head over ears in love with 
 him." 
 
 " And now about Atherstone? " Lady Caroom said. 
 
 " Well, Atherstone has improved a great deal," 
 Sybil answered, thoughtfully. " There are a great 
 many things about him which I like very much. He 
 is always well dressed and fresh and nice. He enjoys 
 himself without being dissipated, and he is perfectly 
 natural. He is rather boyish perhaps, but then he is 
 young. He is not afraid to laugh, and I like the way 
 he enters into everything. And I think I like his 
 persistence." 
 
 " As his wife," Lady Caroom said, " you would 
 have immense opportunities for doing good. He has 
 a great deal of property in London, besides three 
 huge estates in Somerset."
 
 368 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " That is a great consideration," Sybil said, ear- 
 nestly. " I shall always be thankful that I met Mr. 
 Brooks. He made me think in a practical way about 
 things which have always troubled me a little. I 
 should hate to seem thoughtless or ungrateful to him. 
 Will you tell me something, mother ? " 
 
 " Of course." 
 
 " Do you think that he cares at all ? " 
 
 " I think he does a little ! " 
 
 " Enough to be reconciled with his father for my 
 sake?" 
 
 " No ! Not enough for that," Lady Caroom 
 answered. 
 
 Sybil drew a little breath. 
 
 " I think," she said, " that that decides me." 
 
 The long ascent was over at last. They pulled up 
 before the inn, in front of which the proprietor was 
 already executing a series of low bows. Before they 
 could descend there was a familiar sound from behind, 
 and a young man, in a grey flannel suit and Panama 
 hat, jumped from his motor and came to the carriage 
 door. 
 
 " Don't be awfully cross ! " he exclaimed, laughing. 
 " You know you half promised to come with me this 
 afternoon, so I could n't help having a spin out to see 
 whether I could catch you up. Won't you allow me, 
 Lady Caroom? The step is a little high." 
 
 " It is n't any use being cross with you," Sybil 
 remarked. " It never seems to make any impression." 
 
 "I am terribly thick-skinned," he answered, "when 
 I don't want to understand. Will you ladies have 
 some tea, or come and see how the restoration is 
 getting on ? "
 
 LADY SYBIL SAYS "YES" 369 
 
 " We were proposing to go and see what the Ger- 
 man Emperor's idea of a Roman camp was," Sybil 
 answered. 
 
 " Oh, you can't shake me off now, can you, Lady 
 Caroom?" he declared, appealing to her. "We'll 
 consider it an accident that you found me here, if 
 you like, but it is in reality a great piece of good 
 fortune for you." 
 
 " And why, may I ask? " Sybil inquired, with up- 
 lifted eyebrows. 
 
 " Oh, I 'm an authority on this place come here 
 nearly every day to give the director, as he calls 
 himself, some hints. Come along, Lady Caroom. 
 1 ! 11 show you the baths and the old part of the outer 
 wall." 
 
 Lady Caroom very soon had enough of it. She 
 sat down upon a tree and brought out her sketch- 
 book. 
 
 " Give me a quarter of an hour, please," she begged, 
 " not longer. I want to be home for tea." 
 
 They strolled off, Atherstone turning a little ner- 
 vously to Sybil. 
 
 " I say, we 've seen the best part of the ruins," he 
 remarked. " The renovation 's hideous. Let 's go in 
 the wood and I '11 show you a squirrel's nest." 
 
 Sybil hesitated. Her thoughts for a moment were 
 in confusion. Then she sighed once and turned 
 towards the wood. 
 
 " I have never seen a squirrel's nest," she said. " Is 
 it far?" 
 
 Lady Caroom put her .sketch away as she heard 
 their approaching footsteps, and looked up. Ather- 
 
 24
 
 370 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 stone's happiness was too ridiculously apparent. He 
 came straight over to her. 
 
 " You '11 give her to me, won't you ? " he exclaimed. 
 " 'Pon my word, she shall be the happiest woman in 
 England if I can make her so. I 'm perfectly certain 
 I 'm the happiest man." 
 
 Lady Caroom pressed her daughter's hand, and 
 they all turned to descend the hill. 
 
 " Of course I 'm charmed," Lady Caroom said. 
 " Sybil makes me feel so elderly. But I don't know 
 what I shall do for a chaperon now." 
 
 Atherstone laughed. 
 
 " I 'm your son-in-law," he said. " I can take you 
 out." 
 
 Sybil shook her head. 
 
 " No, you won't," she declared. " The only woman 
 I have ever been really jealous of is mother. She 
 has a way of absorbing all the attention from every 
 one when she is around. I 'm not going to have her 
 begin with you." 
 
 " I feel," Atherstone said, " like the man who 
 married a twin said he never tried to tell the 
 difference, you know, when a pal asked him how he 
 picked out his own wife." 
 
 " If you think," Sybil said, severely, " that you 
 have made any arrangements of that sort I take it 
 all back. You are going to marry me, if you behave 
 yourself." 
 
 He sighed. 
 
 " Three months is a beastly long time," he said. 
 
 Lady Caroom drove back alone. The motor 
 \ whizzed by her half-way down the hill Sybil hold- 
 ing her hat with both hands, her hair blowing about,
 
 LADY SYBIL SAYS "YES" 371 
 
 and her cheeks pink with pleasure. She waved her 
 hand gaily as she went by, and then clutched her hat 
 again. Lady Caroom watched them till they were 
 out of sight, then she found herself looking stead- 
 fastly across the valley to the dark belt of pine-clad 
 hills beyond. She could see nothing very clearly, and 
 there was a little choking in her throat. They were 
 both there, father and son. Once she fancied that at 
 last he was holding out his arms towards her she 
 sat up in the carriage with a little cry which was half 
 a sob. When she drove through the hotel gates it 
 was he who stood upon the steps to welcome her.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 BROOKS HEARS THE NEWS 
 
 UNCHANGED ! Her first eager glance into his 
 face told her that. Waxen white, his lips 
 smiled their courteous greeting upon her, his tone was 
 measured and cold as ever. She set her teeth as she 
 rose from her seat, and gathered her skirts in her 
 hand. 
 
 " You, too, a pilgrim?" she exclaimed. "I thought 
 you preferred salt water." 
 
 " We had a pleasant fortnight's yachting," he an- 
 swered. " Then I went with Hennibul to Wiesbaden, 
 and I came on here to see you." 
 
 " Have you met Sybil and Atherstone? " she asked 
 him. 
 
 " Yes," he answered, gravely. 
 
 " Come into my room," she said, " and I will give 
 you some tea. These young people are sure to have 
 it on the terrace. I will join you when I have got 
 rid of some of this dust." 
 
 He was alone for ten minutes. At the end of that 
 time she came out through the folding-doors with the 
 old smile upon her lips and the old lithesomeness in 
 her movements. He rose and watched her until she 
 had settled down in her low chair. 
 
 " So Sybil is going to marry Atherstone ! "
 
 BROOKS HEARS THE NEWS 373 
 
 "Yes. He really deserves it, doesn't he? He is 
 a very nice boy." 
 
 Arranmore shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " What an everlasting fool Brooks is," he said, in 
 a low tone. 
 
 " He keeps his word," she answered. " It is a 
 family trait with you, Arranmore. You are all stub- 
 born, all self-willed, self-centred, selfish ! " 
 
 " Thank you ! " 
 
 " You can't deny it." 
 
 " I won't try. I suppose it is true. Besides, I want 
 to keep you in a good humour." 
 
 "Do tell me why!" 
 
 " If Sybil is going to be married you can't live 
 alone." 
 
 " I won't admit that, but what about it ? Do you 
 know of a nice respectable companion?" 
 
 " Myself." 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " You may be nice," she answered, " but you cer- 
 tainly are n't respectable." 
 
 " I am what you make me," he answered, in a low 
 tone. " Catherine! A moment ago you accused me 
 of stubbornness. What about yourself?" 
 
 "I?" 
 
 " Yes, you. You have been the one woman of my 
 life. You are free, you know that there is no other 
 man who could make you happy as I could, yet you 
 will not come to me for the sake of an idea. If I 
 am heartless and callous, an infidel, an egotist, what- 
 ever you choose, at least I love you. You need never 
 fear me. You would always be safe." 
 
 She shook her head.
 
 374 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " Arranmore," she said, " this is so painful to me. 
 Do let us cease to discuss it. I have tried so hard to 
 make you understand how I feel. I cannot alter. It 
 is impossible ! " 
 
 " You tempt me," he cried, " to play the hypocrite." 
 
 " No, I do not, Arranmore," she answered, gently, 
 " for there is no acting in this world which would 
 deceive me." 
 
 " You do not doubt that I should make you a good 
 husband?" 
 
 " I believe you would," she answered, " but I dare 
 not try it." 
 
 " And this is the woman," he murmured, sadly, 
 " who calls me stubborn." 
 
 Tea was brought in. Afterwards they walked in 
 the gardens together. The band was playing, and 
 they were surrounded on all sides by acquaintances. 
 A great personage stopped and talked to them for a 
 while. Lady Caroom admitted the news of Sybil's 
 engagement. After that every one stopped to express 
 pleasure. It was not until the young people appeared 
 themselves, and at once monopolized all attention, 
 that Arranmore was able to draw his companion away 
 into comparative solitude. 
 
 " Do you by any chance correspond with Brooks ? " 
 he asked her. 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 " No ! " she answered. " I was thinking of that. 
 I should like him to know from one of us. Can't you 
 write him, Arranmore?" 
 
 " I could," he answered, " but it would perhaps 
 come better from you. Have you ever had any con- 
 versation with him about Sybil?"
 
 BROOKS HEARS THE NEWS 375 
 
 " Once," she answered, " yes ! " 
 
 " Then you can write it will be better for you 
 to write. I should like to ask you a question if I 
 may." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Have you any idea whether the news will be 
 in any way a blow to him ? " 
 
 " I think perhaps it may," she admitted. 
 
 Arranmore was silent. She watched him half 
 eagerly, hoping for some look, some expression of 
 sympathy. She was disappointed. His face did not 
 relax. It seemed almost to grow harder. 
 
 " He has only himself to blame," he said, slowly. 
 " But for this ridiculous masquerading his chance 
 was as good as Atherstone's. Quixoticism such as 
 his is an expensive luxury." 
 
 She shivered a little. 
 
 " That sounds hard-hearted," she said. " He is 
 doing what he thinks right." 
 
 Then Lord Arranmore told her what he had told 
 Brooks himself. 
 
 " My son is quite a model young man," he said, 
 " but he is a prig. He thinks too much about what 
 is right and wrong, about what is due to himself, and 
 he values his own judgment too highly. However, 
 I have no right to complain, for it is he who suffers, 
 not I. May I dine at your table to-night? I came 
 over alone." 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 They were interrupted a few minutes later by 
 Sybil and Atherstone, and a small host of their 
 friends. But in consequence of Lord Arran- 
 more's visit to Homburg, Brooks a few days
 
 376 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 later received two letters. The first was from 
 Lord Arranmore. 
 
 "HITTER'S HOTEL. 
 "DEAR MR. BROOKS, 
 
 " The news which I believe Lady Caroom is 
 sending you to-day may perhaps convince you of the 
 folly of this masquerading. I make you, therefore, the 
 following offer. I will leave England for at least five 
 years on condition that you henceforth take up your 
 proper position in society, and consent to such arrange- 
 ments as Mr. Ascough and I may make. In any case 
 I was proposing to myself a somewhat extensive scheme 
 of travel, and the opportunity seems to me a good one 
 for you to dispense with an incognito which may lead 
 ;-ou some day into even worse complications. I trust 
 that for the sake of other people with whom you may be 
 brought into contact you will accept the arrangement 
 which I propose. 
 
 " I remain, 
 
 "Yours faithfully, 
 
 " ARRANMORE." 
 
 The other letter was from Lady Caroom. 
 
 R ITTER S HOTEL. 
 
 " MY DEAR ' MR. BROOKS/ 
 
 " I want to be the first to tell you of Sybil's 
 engagement to the Duke of Atherstone, which took 
 place this afternoon. He has been a very persistent 
 suitor, and he is a great favourite, I think, deservedly, 
 with every one. He will, I am sure, make her very 
 happy. 
 
 " I understand that you are still in London. You 
 must find this weather very oppressive. Take my 
 advice and don't overwork yourself. No cause in the
 
 BROOKS HEARS THE NEWS 377 
 
 world, however good, is worth the sacrifice of one's 
 health. 
 
 " I hope that my news will not distress you. You 
 realized, of course, that your decision to remain known, 
 or rather unknown, as Kingston Brooks, made it at 
 some time or other inevitable, and I hope to see a good 
 deal of you when we return to town, and that you will 
 always believe that I am your most sincere friend, 
 
 " CATHERINE CAROOM." 
 
 Brooks laid the two letters down with a curious 
 mixture of sensations. He knew that a very short 
 time ago he might have considered himself broken- 
 hearted, and he knew that as a matter of fact he was 
 nothing of the sort. He answered Lady Caroom's 
 letter first. 
 
 " 27, JERMYN STREET, W. 
 
 " DEAR LADY CAROOM, 
 
 " It was very kind of you to write to me, and to 
 send me the news of Sybil's engagement so promptly. 
 I wish her most heartily every happiness. After all, it 
 is the most suitable thing which could have happened. 
 
 " You are right in your surmise. After our conver- 
 sation I realized quite plainly that under my present 
 identity I could not possibly think of Lady Sybil except 
 as a very charming and a very valued friend. I was, 
 therefore, quite prepared for the news which you have 
 sent me. 
 
 " I am going for a few days' golf and sea-bathing into 
 Devonshire, so don't waste too much sympathy upon me. 
 My best regards to Lady Sybil. Just now I imagine 
 that she is overwhelmed with good wishes, but if she 
 will add mine to the number, I can assure you and her 
 that I offer them most heartily. 
 
 " Yours most sincerely, 
 
 "KINGSTON BROOKS.
 
 378 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " P.S. Have you heard that your friend the Bishop 
 is going to bring a Bill before the House of Lords which 
 is to exterminate me altogether?" 
 
 Lady Caroom sighed for a moment as she read the 
 letter, but immediately afterwards her face cleared. 
 
 " After all, I think it is best," she murmured, " and 
 Atherstone is such a dear."
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE PRINCE OF SINNERS SPEAKS OUT 
 
 THE bishop sat down amidst a little murmur of 
 applause. He glanced up and saw that his 
 wife had heard his speech, and he noted with satis- 
 faction the long line of reporters, for whose sake he 
 had spoken with such deliberation and with occasional 
 pauses. He felt that his indictment of this new chari- 
 table departure had been scathing and logical. He 
 was not altogether displeased to see Brooks himself 
 in the Strangers' Gallery. That young man would 
 be better able to understand now the mighty power 
 of the Church which he had so wantonly disregarded. 
 
 But it was not the bishop's speech which had filled 
 Brooks with dismay, which had made his heart grow 
 suddenly cold within him. For this he had been pre- 
 pared but not for the adversary who was now 
 upon his feet prepared to address the House. At 
 least, he said to himself, bitterly, he might have been 
 spared this. It was Lord Arranmore, who, amidst 
 some murmurs of surprise, had risen to address the 
 House pale, composed, supercilious as ever. And 
 Brooks felt that what he could listen to unmoved from 
 the Bishop of Beeston would be hard indeed to bear 
 from this man. 
 
 The intervention of Lord Arranmore so early in 
 the debate was wholly unexpected. Every one was 
 interested, and those who knew him best prepared
 
 380 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 themselves for a little mild sensation. The bishop 
 smiled to himself with the satisfaction of a man who 
 has secured a welcome but unexpected ally. Lord 
 Arranmore's views as to charity and its dispensation 
 were fairly well known. 
 
 So every one listened at first with curiosity, 
 afterwards with something like amazement. The 
 bishop abandoned his expression of gentle tolerance 
 for one of manifest uneasiness. It seemed scarcely 
 credible that he heard aright. For the Marquis of 
 Arranmore's forefinger was stretched out towards 
 him a gesture at once relentless and scornful, and 
 the words to which he was forced to listen were not 
 pleasant ones to hear. 
 
 " It is such sentiments as these," the Marquis of 
 Arranmore was saying and his words came like 
 drops of ice, slow and distinct " such sentiments 
 as these voiced by such men as the Lord Bishop of 
 Beeston in such high places as this where we are now 
 assembled, which have created and nourished our 
 criminal classes, which have filled our prisons and our 
 workhouses, and in the future if his lordship's the- 
 ology is correct will people Hell. And as for the 
 logic of it, was ever the intelligence of so learned 
 and august a body of listeners so insulted before? Is 
 charity, then, for the deserving and the deserving 
 only? Are we to put a premium upon hypocrisy, to 
 pass by on the other side from those who have fallen, 
 and who by themselves have no power to rise ? This 
 is precisely his lordship's proposition. The one great 
 charitable institution of our times, founded upon a 
 logical basis, carried out with a devotion and a self- 
 sacrifice beyond all praise, he finds pernicious and
 
 THE PRINCE OF SINNERS SPEAKS OUT 381 
 
 pauperizing, because, forsooth, the drunkard and 
 criminals are welcome to avail themselves of it, be- 
 cause it seeks to help those who save for such help 
 must remain brutes themselves and a brutalizing 
 influence to others." 
 
 There was a moment's deep silence. To those who 
 were watching the speaker closely, and amongst them 
 Brooks, was evident some sign of internal agitation. 
 Yet when he spoke again his manner was, if possible, 
 more self-restrained than ever. He continued in a 
 low clear tone, without any further gesture and 
 emotion. 
 
 " My lords, I heard a remark not intended for my 
 ears, upon my rising, indicative of surprise that I 
 should have anything to say upon such a subject as 
 this. Lest my convictions and opinions should seem 
 to you to be those of an outsider, let me tell you this. 
 You are listening to one who for twelve years lived 
 the life of this unhappy people, dwelt amongst them 
 as a police-court missionary one who was driven 
 even into some measure of insanity by the horrors he 
 saw and tasted, and who recovered only by an igno- 
 minious flight into a far-off country. His lordship the 
 Bishop of Beeston has shown you very clearly how 
 little he knows of the horrors which seethe beneath 
 the brilliant life of this wonderful city. He has 
 brought it upon himself and you that one who does 
 know shall tell you something of the truth of these 
 things." 
 
 There was an intense and breathless silence. This 
 was an assembly amongst whom excitement was a 
 very rare visitant. But there were many there now 
 who sat still and spellbound with eyes riveted upon
 
 382 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 the speaker. To those who were personally ac- 
 quainted with him a certain change in his appearance 
 was manifest. A spot of colour flared in his pale 
 cheeks. There was a light in his eyes which no one 
 had ever seen there before. After years of self-re- 
 pression, of a cynicism partly artificial, partly inevi- 
 table, the natural man had broken out once more, 
 stung into life by the smooth platitudes of the great 
 churchman against whom his attack was directed. 
 He was reckless of the fact that Lady Caroom, 
 Brooks, and many of his acquaintances were in the 
 Strangers' Gallery. For the motion before the House 
 was one to obtain legal and ecclesiastical control over 
 all independent charities appealing to the general 
 public for support, under cover of which the Church, 
 in the person of the Bishop of Beeston, had made a 
 solemn and deliberate attack upon Brooks' Society, 
 Brooks himself, its aims and management. 
 
 As the words fell, deliberately, yet without hesi- 
 tation, from his lips, vivid, scathing, forceful, there 
 was not one there but knew that this man spoke of 
 the things which he had felt. The facts he marshalled 
 before them were appalling, but not a soul doubted 
 them. It was truth which he hurled at them, truth 
 before which the Bishop sat back in his seat and felt 
 his cheeks grow paler and his eyes more full of 
 trouble. A great deal of it they had heard before, 
 but never like this never had it been driven home 
 into their conscience so that doubt or evasion was 
 impossible. And this man, who was he? They 
 rubbed their eyes and wondered. Ninth Marquis of 
 Arranmore, owner of great estates, dilettante, sports- 
 man, cynic, latter-day sinner or an apostle touched
 
 THE PRINCE OF SINNERS SPEAKS OUT 383 
 
 with fire from Heaven to open men's eyes, gifted for 
 a few brief minutes with the tongue of a saintly De- 
 mosthenes. Those who knew him gaped like children 
 and wondered. And all the time his words stung 
 them like drops of burning rain. 
 
 " This," he concluded at last, " is the Hell which 
 burns for ever under this great city, and it is such 
 men as his lordship the Bishop of Beeston who can 
 come here and speak of their agony in well-rounded 
 periods and congratulate you and himself upon the 
 increasing number of communicants in the East End 
 who stands in the market-place of the world with 
 stones for starving people. But I, who have been 
 down amongst those fires, I, who know, can tell you 
 this : Not all the churches of Christ, not all the reli- 
 gious societies ever founded, not all the combined la- 
 bours of all the missionaries who ever breathed, will 
 quench or even abate those flames until they go to 
 their labours in the name of humanity alone, and free 
 themselves utterly from all the cursed restrictions and 
 stipulations of their pet creed. Starving men will 
 mock at the mention of a God of Justice, men who 
 are in torture body and soul are scarcely likely to 
 respond to the teachings of a God of Love. Save the 
 bodies of this generation, and the souls of the next 
 may be within your reach." 
 
 They thought then that he had finished. He paused 
 for an unusually long time. When he spoke again 
 he seemed to have wholly regained his usual com- 
 posure. The note of passion had passed from his 
 tone. His cheeks were once more of waxen pallor. 
 The deliberately-chosen words fell with a chill sar- 
 casm from his lips.
 
 384 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 " His lordship the Bishop of Beeston/' he said, 
 " has also thought fit, on the authority, I presume, of 
 Mr. Lavilette and his friends, to make slighting ref- 
 erence to the accounts of the Society in question. As 
 one of the largest subscribers to that Society, may I 
 be allowed to set at rest his anxieties ? Before many 
 days the accounts from its very earliest days, which 
 have all the time been in the hands of an eminent firm 
 of accountants, will be placed before the general pub- 
 lic. In the meantime let me tell you this. I am will- 
 ing to sign every page of them. I pledge my word 
 to their absolute correctness. The author of this 
 movement has from the first, according to my certain 
 knowledge, devoted a considerable part of his own 
 income to the work. If others who are in the enjoy- 
 ment of a princely stipend for their religious labours " 
 he looked hard at the bishop " were to imitate 
 this course of action, I imagine that there are a good 
 many charitable institutions which would not now be 
 begging for donations to keep them alive." 
 
 He sat down without peroration, and almost im- 
 mediately afterwards left the House. The first read- 
 ing of the bishop's Bill was lost by a large majority. 
 
 Arranmore sat by himself in his study, and his face 
 was white and drawn. A cigarette which he had lit 
 on entering the room had burnt out between his 
 fingers. This sudden upheaval of the past, coming 
 upon him with a certain spasmodic unexpectedness, 
 had shaken his nerves. He had not believed himself 
 capable of anything of the sort. The unusual ex- 
 citement was upon him still. All sorts of memories
 
 THE PRINCE OF SINNERS SPEAKS OUT 385 
 
 and fancies long ago buried, thronged in upon him. 
 So he sat there and suffered, striving in vain to crush 
 them, whilst faces mocked him from the shadows, 
 and familiar voices rang strangely in his ears. He 
 scarcely heard the softly-opened door. The light 
 footsteps and the rustling of skirts had their place 
 amongst the throng of torturing memories. But his 
 eyes surely his eyes could not mock him. He 
 started to his feet. 
 
 "Catherine!" 
 
 She did not speak at once, but all sorts of things 
 were in her eyes. He ground his teeth together, 
 and made one effort to remain his old self. 
 
 ' You have come to offer your sympathy. How 
 delightful of you. The bishop got on my nerves, you 
 know, and I really am not answerable for what I said. 
 Catherine ! " 
 
 She threw her arms around his neck. 
 
 " You dear ! " she exclaimed. " I am not afraid 
 of you any more. Kiss me, Philip, and don't talk 
 nonsense, because I shan't listen to you." 
 
 Brooks drove up in hot haste. The butler stopped 
 him respectfully. 
 
 " His lordship is particularly engaged, sir." 
 
 " He will see me," Brooks answered. " Please 
 announce me Lord Kingston of Ross ! " 
 
 " I beg your pardon, sir," the man stammered. 
 
 " Lord Kingston of Ross," Brooks repeated, cast- 
 ing off for ever the old name as though it were a 
 disused glove. " Announce me at once." 
 
 It was the Arranmore trick of imperiousness, and 
 25
 
 386 A PRINCE OF SINNERS 
 
 the man recognized it. He threw open the study door 
 with trembling ringers, but he was careful to knock 
 first. 
 
 " Lord Kingston of Ross." 
 
 He walked to his father with outstretched hand. 
 
 " You were right, sir," he said, simply. " I was a 
 prig!" 
 
 They stood for a moment, their hands locked. It 
 was a silent greeting, but their faces were eloquent. 
 Brooks looked from his father to Lady Caroom and 
 smiled. 
 
 " I could not wait," he said. " I was forced to 
 come to you at once. But I think that I will go now 
 and pay another call." 
 
 He stood outside on the kerb while they fetched 
 him a hansom. The fresh night wind blew in his 
 face, cool and sweet. From Piccadilly came the faint 
 hum of traffic, and the ceaseless monotonous beat of 
 hurrying footsteps. The hansom pulled up before 
 him with a jerk. He sprang lightly in. 
 
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