H 

 
 VIA P. & O. 
 
 OF CALIF. LIBKABY, LOS AHGELTBS
 
 VIA P. & O 
 
 BY 
 
 JANE STOCKING 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 1914
 
 COPYRIGHT. 1914, 
 
 BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 Published, March. 1914
 
 TO 
 MY THREE SISTERS 
 
 2133015
 
 VIA P. & O.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 Shanghai, June 16th. 
 
 Very well, my dearest sister, it shall 
 be as you say. 
 
 The mystery as you call it shall be 
 cleared, and all that you want to know, 
 even to the worst, you shall know. 
 After I read your letter, I sat thinking 
 for a long time (it is past midnight now) 
 and I came to a decision; and that was 
 to tell you the truth. I could, of course, 
 go on, as I have in the past six years, 
 writing you scrappy, superficial letters 
 trying to keep out of them, all that 
 would hint that things are not well with 
 me. I thought I had fooled you, 
 not fooled you, I hate that word, but 
 blinded you to the real condition of 
 things, but evidently my art wasn't up 
 to my desire, and somewhere between
 
 2 VIA P. & O. 
 
 the lines my sorry face must have 
 showed itself. And so, partly because 
 I see that I can't blind you any more, I 
 will tell you the truth; partly also be- 
 cause I too have suddenly seen where 
 I was blind before, and have realised 
 that what you caJl the mystery, must 
 be far worse for you to bear than any 
 truth could be and that you are suffer- 
 ing far more from all your imagination 
 tells you is wrong with me, than you 
 will when you know all that I have to 
 tell. Of course no word of any trouble 
 must ever reach the Aunts. If they 
 brought us up, as you and I have some- 
 times thought, somewhat unlovingly, 
 they at least did their full duty towards 
 us, and it would be a poor return now 
 to disturb their gentle spinstered life 
 with any knowledge of "unseemly'* 
 trouble in the family. 
 
 There is one thing I ask in return for 
 frankness on my part, and that is, that
 
 VIA P. & O. 3 
 
 if my letters are to be dirges, you will 
 let yours continue to be the songs of 
 happiness they have always been. If I 
 am not to spare you one detail of my 
 misery, will you on your side give 
 every detail of your happiness? You 
 might perhaps think that it hurts me 
 to hear of all that you have, when I am 
 so poor in these same things, but oh, 
 Patty dear, don't think it. It has been 
 all that I have had to comfort me 
 through all these hard years the one 
 thing that has saved to me my faith 
 in life. Tell me everything about your 
 happy days; and, oh, make the days 
 very long. To know you happy and be- 
 loved, among all the sweet and gracious 
 things of life, has put me to sleep many 
 a time smiling, when otherwise I 
 wouldn't have slept at all. Oh, my 
 dearest, heap your letters full of joy. 
 Your husband, your blessed babes, your 
 garden, your dogs, they all help. Some-
 
 4 VIA P. & O. 
 
 times after reading one of your letters, 
 after the long two weeks ' wait, I feel as 
 though I had buckled on a suit of 
 armour, or swallowed a whole bottle of 
 tonic. 
 
 Well, here I have written pages and 
 have told you nothing. I'm too tired to 
 begin to-night and it makes no differ- 
 ence for it is ten days before the Eng- 
 lish mail goes, and before that I shall 
 have written you a short book. And 
 that reminds me to tell you, dear, to 
 be careful, very careful, not to let it 
 show in your answer that I am telling 
 you the truth. I hardly know what 
 would happen should Karl find it out. 
 
 He talks a great deal about a wife's 
 loyalty to her husband, and has strong 
 and frequently expressed ideas of what 
 it should be. If he found out that mine 
 had died, I don't believe he would ever 
 let me have another letter from you. 
 That sounds absurd, doesn't it, but it
 
 VIA P. & O. 5 
 
 would be quite possible in this country 
 where the master is the master and serv- 
 ants know but one law, and that his 
 will. 
 
 You see Karl knows nothing of the 
 sacredness of private correspondence. 
 My letters usually reach me opened 
 our mail both coming and going goes 
 through the office, as it is the safest 
 way, in this land of primitive postal ar- 
 rangements. These real letters to you 
 I shall of course mail with my own 
 hands. So, dearest, use as much caution 
 as though we were mediaeval prisoners 
 instead of free-born Americans. And 
 now I must go to bed, but before I stop 
 just this word to cheer you before you 
 go further in the book. It will sound 
 strange, after the gloom of the story 
 so far, but it is true. / am not un- 
 happy, I am always lonely, sometimes 
 afraid, sometimes weary and bored, but 
 real sadness, miserable sadness that
 
 6 VIA P. & O. 
 
 comes from a breaking heart, that, thank 
 the Good God, has gone, never to come 
 back. No, I am not unhappy, I am 
 often quite cheerful and I'm not un- 
 happy. 
 Good-night, dear blessing of a sister. 
 
 June 17th. 
 
 I woke this morning my dearest, with 
 but two feelings in my body. I mean 
 body, not mind, for I don't believe I 
 have one any more. I don't think at all. 
 I just have feelings of different kinds. 
 Well, my first feeling was that I couldn't 
 write you to-day, or any other day, as 
 I promised last night, and my second 
 feeling was, that it was very, very warm. 
 
 It was only six, but already the sun 
 pierced the green shutters of my room 
 in thousands of shafts of burning light ; 
 I never knew the sun to find out the 
 weak places in a blind as it does here.
 
 VIA P. & O. 7 
 
 These last few days have been a fore- 
 taste of what the summer is to be, I 
 suppose, and how am I to bear it, for 
 I hate the heat so much. "Well, it's a 
 small matter, and the mention of it 
 shows me how easy it is to form a habit 
 of whining. I shall get through the 
 summer of course as the rest of 
 Shanghai does, and already I am in a 
 better frame of mind, and am beginning 
 to plan how I can make things more 
 comfortable during the hot weather, 
 both for Karl and myself. There is 
 habit again asserting itself, for how can 
 I have a frame to my mind, when I have 
 just confessed that I haven't one? I 
 know when you read this you will say 
 "Bosh," I wish she would stop trying to 
 be smart good old American smart I 
 mean and begin whatever she has to 
 say. But you must let me get at it in 
 my own way. It was only after reread- 
 ing your letter twice, that I have cour-
 
 8 VIA P. & O. 
 
 age enough to keep my promise which 
 is already in black and white to break 
 the silence of these six years and tell 
 you the secret of my unhappiness. 
 There I Just the way in which I have 
 written those lines makes me feel quite 
 ill. Silence secret how dreadfully 
 melodramatic it sounds, when I don't 
 really feel like that at all, and look at 
 the situation, even if I can't write of 
 it in a very matter of fact way. 
 
 So, dear heart, if my words sound 
 lurid, remember it is because they carry 
 their association with them, and as I 
 know no other word for silence, and no 
 other word for secret, I must use them 
 and their kind. 
 
 I will begin at the beginning, so that 
 you shall understand fully, but first I 
 want to tell you how your letter got to 
 me. I thank heaven that you under- 
 stood my hints which I always feared 
 to make plainer, because I didn't know
 
 VIA P. & O. 9 
 
 then that there was to be plain speak- 
 ing between us about sending any pri- 
 vate letter in some private fashion. 
 Karl never gives me my letters un- 
 opened, not that he is interested in them 
 apparently, but because it has become a 
 habit with him to open them at 
 the office, glance over them I suppose, 
 and toss them to me when he gets home. 
 Somebody once said something about an 
 opened letter being like a peach with 
 the bloom rubbed off. My feeling about 
 it is less poetic, but more forcible. 
 
 Well, your letter of introduction to 
 Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby together with 
 their cards, I found when I came in 
 from my drive the day before yesterday. 
 I immediately sent them an invitation 
 to dine the next evening, fearing that 
 they might be going on to Japan at 
 once, and also because I couldn't wait, 
 to see some one who had seen you and 
 the beloved children, only six weeks ago.
 
 10 VIA P. & O. 
 
 I didn't attempt to get any one to meet 
 them, because all the nice people are 
 away for the summer, and because I 
 knew I could talk more about you if we 
 were alone. They came, and before 
 dinner Mr. Willoughby asked me to 
 show him the garden, and would not be 
 put off, though I told him what the 
 mosquitoes would do to him. So he and 
 I went out into the dusk, leaving Karl 
 to make himself agreeable, as he can do 
 better than any one I know, to a pretty 
 woman. When we had come to the 
 furthest corner of our compound Mr. 
 W. pulled out your dear letter and said, 
 "Mrs. Ford asked me to put this into 
 your hands. I think it is something she 
 would like you to read alone." I 
 couldn't say anything, I just took it, and 
 slipped it into the neck of my gown. It 
 was pretty bulky but fortunately my 
 clothes are loose, and there it lay all 
 evening so cheeringly. I knew even be-
 
 VIA P. & O. 11 
 
 fore I got to my room and devoured it 
 that it held more comfort than I have 
 had in years! Mrs. "Willoughby is a 
 pretty little thing, quite undeniahly 
 stupid, as of course you know. How I 
 plied them both with questions during 
 dinner. Karl was on his good be- 
 haviour, and didn't show how bored he 
 was with the conversation, which was al- 
 most entirely about you and the chil- 
 dren. 
 
 All was going very smoothly until 
 Mrs. Willoughby turned to her husband 
 and said, "Billy, where is the letter Mrs. 
 Ford gave you for Mrs. Freiheitf " My 
 heart stood still. I saw myself obliged 
 to either burn that precious letter un- 
 read, or hand it over to Karl the mo- 
 ment they had gone. However, Mr. 
 "Willoughby answered serenely, 
 
 "Why, I presented it yesterday when 
 we called," and before she had time to 
 finish something she was murmuring
 
 12 VIA P. & O. 
 
 about "I didn't mean that" he had 
 started off on a story about a fight be- 
 tween the first and second officer of 
 their steamer in which a lady was 
 vaguely concerned and it riveted Karl's 
 attention at once. 
 
 I have an idea that Mrs. Willoughby 
 received a kick perhaps too hasty to be 
 gentle, for she sat rather cross looking 
 and silent for some time. 
 
 There, darling, that's the way in 
 which your letter came to me. I have 
 spun it out as long as I could and now 
 I must really begin. 
 
 When I left America you were not 
 quite out of your teens, and I just in my 
 twenties. It seems far more than seven 
 years ago. 
 
 My marriage was for you a great pic- 
 nic, wasn't it? A beautiful, legitimate 
 occasion for new clothes for us both, for 
 shopping to our hearts' content, for ex- 
 citement and pleasures which we had
 
 VIA P. & O. 13 
 
 never had in our quiet lives. The Aunts 
 certainly did all they could for us. They 
 ardently wished for my happiness, and 
 that they had never had the same kind 
 of happiness themselves, made them the 
 more eager in their gentle way to fur- 
 ther mine. That I was to marry a Ger- 
 man and go away with him to a .far- 
 away land, dismayed them no more than 
 it did me. They looked well to his cre- 
 dentials of course, but finding that he 
 was well to do and was therefore not 
 marrying me for my modest fortune, they 
 felt their duty done. They never coun- 
 selled delay, nor the test of time. They 
 never said to me one word of what mar- 
 riage really is. How in the world could 
 they! 
 
 As you have since married and love 
 the man you married (how curious that 
 we both married out of America, you in 
 England, I in Asia) you know now, 
 though you did not then, all that it
 
 14 VIA P. & O. 
 
 meant to me. The heights and depths 
 and dreams of it all come back to me in 
 a flood, if I only shut my eyes and re- 
 member. But I don't do that, not any 
 more, and I only remind you of how 
 much I loved Karl, because if I don't 
 tell you how I loved him, you won't un- 
 derstand how unhappy I have been, and 
 if you don't understand how unhappy I 
 have been, you won't be able to realise 
 how far from unhappy I am now, and 
 that, after all, is the real reason for this 
 letter. Oh, dear, how I hate writing it 
 all. 
 
 I arrived in Japan one day and we 
 were married the next as you know. 
 Karl was handsomer even than when I 
 had seen him last. You remember that 
 we used to call him the beautiful man, 
 that summer at Baden. I wore my 
 lovely wedding dress, far too gorgeous 
 for a quiet wedding, and the veil just 
 as you had pinned it, and found your lit-
 
 VIA P. & O. 15 
 
 tie note tucked into its folds, to be read 
 on my wedding day. It seems a thou- 
 sand years ago. It was April, the 
 month of all months in Japan, just 
 when the blossoms were beginning to 
 bloom, and the country in her most be- 
 witching dress. Our honeymoon we 
 spent in rickshaws, travelling through a 
 country that was fairyland to me. We 
 stopped sometimes in foreign hotels, 
 but more often in Japanese inns, sleep- 
 ing like real Japanese on the matted 
 floors, eating their food and wearing for 
 the fun of it kimonos and tabi. Our 
 evenings we would spend sometimes 
 afloat, on the Inland Sea, under a moon 
 that was more wonderful than any moon 
 I had ever seen, or again on some little 
 pleasure dock, built over a running 
 stream, and lit with thousands of paper 
 lanterns. Here we would sip our tea, 
 and eat rice cakes and midzuame, and 
 listen to the distant twang of some
 
 16 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Geisha's samisen. It was a charmed 
 life, and the glow in Karl's eyes was 
 the spell that worked the charm! 
 
 It was almost three months before we 
 got to Kido and our own small house. 
 Youth and love in the quaintest of set- 
 tings, that was my portion, and I trod 
 the world as though it belonged to me. 
 There wasn't much to do in K. but I 
 made for myself a life that was very 
 full and happy. I made a few friends, 
 but they entered not at all into my real 
 life. This was made up of my piano, 
 my birds (I had canaries and parra- 
 keets and a thrush), my little house; 
 the beautiful outside world, and above 
 and beyond everything else my love for 
 Karl. 
 
 If I could have died then at the end of 
 five months, how well it would have been 
 for me; and how sad every one would 
 have thought it
 
 VIA P. & O. 17 
 
 "And only married five months," they 
 would have said. 
 
 If Karl left me for a day or two now 
 and then I knew it was on business and 
 that it was impractical for me to go 
 with him. I spent the time in planning 
 surprises for him. I searched the shops 
 for some little piece of brass or copper 
 for he was making a collection I 
 spent hours trying to teach the cook to 
 make the things he liked, or I sewed 
 away on a centrepiece, or something 
 that would make his home a little more 
 attractive and that I could do with my 
 own hands. 
 
 For I loved then to sit and sew, put- 
 ting into every stitch a thousand 
 thoughts of him, as I suppose a mother 
 does when she sews little things for her 
 baby. I couldn't make his clothes, so 
 I had to be content with sofa cushions 
 for his dear head to rest on or the
 
 18 VIA P. & O. 
 
 fashioning of lampshades to shade his 
 eyes. As for his socks, I indulged in 
 orgies of sentiment over his socks! I 
 look back at it all with wonder and 
 scorn at my foolishness, but there was 
 no flaw to those few months, and I sup- 
 pose that is more than many a poor 
 woman has claimed from life. 
 
 No doubt I let him see it, probably I 
 bored him dreadfully with it all, but I 
 was blinded by the inner light of my own 
 great passion. And don't think dearest 
 that it was a physical passion only. I 
 believed him to be the highest, the 
 noblest, the most generous, the most 
 charming man in the world. 
 
 And this last I still concede, for in 
 pure charm of personality, when he 
 chooses to exert it, I have never known 
 his equal in either man or woman. I 
 sometimes think that the mixture in his 
 blood accounts for it; as it does for his 
 curiously handsome face. Do you re-
 
 VIA P. & O. 19 
 
 member his swarthy skin and aquiline 
 nose that he gets from a Spanish an- 
 cestor, and the steel blue eyes that are 
 such surprise beneath his black lashes'? 
 I won't write more of that time, it isn't 
 good for me even to think of it. If you 
 have any further curiosity to know how 
 near to the realms of heaven and idiocy 
 a woman can come, in the days of her 
 love, read over, as you say you have 
 kept them all, some of my letters of that 
 time they ought to tell you. 
 
 "Well, my fairyland began to change 
 its character not suddenly, but grad- 
 ually; I never can remember dates, and 
 months, but it was about the time that 
 the chrysanthemums burst into red and 
 golden balls in all the gardens of Japan. 
 I loathe chrysanthemums. 
 
 I don't know just how my first misgiv- 
 ings came to me, nor my first doubt that 
 Karl was true to me. They came per- 
 haps from watching the life about me,
 
 20 VIA P. & O. 
 
 the easy morals of the East. I saw the 
 lives of the men about us and I began 
 to speculate and grow jealous of Karl's 
 past and from suspicion of his past, it 
 was but a step to suspicion of the pres- 
 ent. I had so much time to give to it. 
 Karl was often away, for days at a 
 time, and when at home he was at the 
 office all day, and very soon after we 
 were settled in the little house, he be- 
 gan to go out regularly to the club in 
 the evenings. 
 
 The ostensible reason of these even- 
 ings was poker which he adores. They 
 were called evenings, but they ended 
 only with the dawn. 
 
 When this hell of suspicion first took 
 hold of me, I had but one idea, and that 
 was to know the truth. It seemed to me 
 that if I could only know the truth, it 
 would stop the agony, and then when at 
 last I did know it, how I longed myself
 
 VIA P. & O. 21 
 
 back in the days when there was still a 
 blessed doubt to cling to. 
 
 You know, dear, if you have read any 
 books on Japan and of course you have 
 (Henry Norman's "Keal Japan" gives 
 a good picture of it) that in each Japa- 
 nese town, there is a certain quarter, 
 where in long rows of little houses be- 
 hind wooden bars looking out upon the 
 street, sit evening after evening, Japa- 
 nese girls, gaily dressed, gaily painted, 
 gaily lighted by gay paper lanterns, and 
 if the books say truly, with sad hearts. 
 Well, in our small port, this quarter of 
 painted faces and sad hearts lay below 
 us on the right, for our bungalow was 
 on a hill, and far below us on the left 
 lay the club. 
 
 I had only one means of finding out 
 what I longed to know. Probably there 
 were others but they did not occur to 
 me. I am afraid I showed little intelli-
 
 22 VIA P. & O. 
 
 gence at that time. There were so 
 many things that I might have done, and 
 so much that I might have spared my- 
 self. 
 
 Oh, the hours, Patty the hours I 
 have watched and listened, have lain 
 wide eyed in bed, or paced the little 
 balcony outside of my room, and from 
 which I could see plainly the long road 
 down the hill, and its final turning. 
 The floor of that little balcony was worn 
 as smooth as glass, and I used sometime 
 to wonder if any other such stockinged 
 anguish as mine had given it its satin 
 surface. 
 
 Our bungalow was on the main road, 
 running through the town, from the 
 water's edge to the hills, and hundreds 
 of rickshaws made their way up and 
 down both day and night. It was easy 
 of course to distinguish as I lay in bed, 
 between those going up and those go- 
 ing down, and in time my ears became
 
 VIA P. & O. 23 
 
 so sharp that I could tell the rickshaw 
 of a foreigner, from that of a native, for 
 the foreigners almost invariably, and 
 Karl always, used two Kurumaya, and 
 made better speed. 
 
 So all through those miserable lonely 
 nights, two and sometimes three in a 
 week, I lay there in the dark, listening 
 and listening, and then when I heard a 
 rickshaw coming up with brisker, more 
 purposeful gait than usual, I would 
 spring out of bed, run to the balcony and 
 crouch there at the railing watching 
 for it to appear at the cross-roads and 
 then if it turned and came up our road 
 I waited with heart beating, ears and 
 eyes strained in the darkness until it 
 stopped at our gate or made its way up 
 the hill. 
 
 Oh, my sister, those nights! How 
 many thousands of times I wonder, did 
 I spring to that balcony and crouch 
 there. I never had any sensation of
 
 24 VIA P. & O. 
 
 cold or fatigue. There were but two 
 words in my mind right or left. 
 
 One night as I watched, a centipede 
 must have dropped from the eaves to 
 my arm, for there next morning was the 
 long evil-looking mark, but I knew noth- 
 ing of it when it happened. Then at 
 last when his rickshaw had stopped at 
 our gate, if it had come from the left, 
 I would crawl back to bed to sleep ex- 
 haustedly but if it had turned from 
 the right I would lie open eyed wonder- 
 ing and wondering. Where had he been, 
 where had he come from? And then at 
 last after all that watching, and spying 
 I learned the truth in quite a simple 
 way, and my life's happiness collapsed 
 like a pricked balloon. 
 
 One day when I had been married 
 nearly a year, a Japanese woman hold- 
 ing a child by the hand, came to our 
 door asking for "O'Donoson." I sat 
 reading where I could both see and hear
 
 VIA P. & O. 25 
 
 her and I knew enough Japanese by this 
 time to understand her quite well. One 
 of those impulses that make all the dif- 
 ference in life, sometimes the difference 
 of life and death, came to me, and I went 
 to the door and questioned her. There 
 was not a moment's doubt in my mind 
 when I saw her and the blue-eyed child 
 with her, and I turned to Boy, who had 
 been with Karl several years, and said, 
 "Is that Master's child?" I said it 
 quietly and naturally, just as a docile 
 
 and Japanese wife might have 
 
 spoken, and he said "yes" and added 
 that there was soon to be another. I 
 told him to tell her to go to Master at 
 the office if she wanted something, and 
 I went back and took up my book, and 
 read quite half a page, before I realised 
 what had happened to me. 
 
 I can't tell you of the time after that. 
 I remember almost nothing but a con- 
 fused blur of misery.
 
 26 VIA P. & O. 
 
 During the first few days of my know- 
 ing the truth, Karl was very kind to me. 
 I never forget that. I have many de- 
 tached memories of kind words and 
 proffered pettings. I do remember 
 quite distinctly one afternoon, how 
 many days after my misery began I 
 don't know, sitting with Karl on the 
 sofa in our little sitting-room (leaning, 
 I suppose, against one of the ridiculous 
 results of needlework and sentiment) 
 my head on his shoulder, and for the 
 first time in many days, the smarting 
 tears in my eyes. As far as my memory 
 serves, that was the very last time my 
 head ever did lie on his shoulder, or 
 my hand in his. Think of it, Patty, in 
 six long years to come no nearer to 
 your own husband than a rare perfunc- 
 tory kiss can draw two cold faces. Of 
 course, it is my own choice, but what 
 other choice have I? 
 
 I do remember (and it does me good
 
 VIA P. & O. 27 
 
 to remember) that he strove to be kind. 
 If he told me I mustn't mind that all 
 men were by nature polygamists, I know 
 quite well that what he intended was to 
 comfort and soothe. 
 
 It's curious and I can't explain it, but 
 his kindness and his sympathy did help 
 me. I had no abhorrence of him at all. 
 It seemed as though he, the offender, 
 was quite outside the whole matter, and 
 was simply acting the part of kindness 
 to a fellow creature. It was my love 
 that was hurt, and wounded and dying, 
 something within myself but it had lit- 
 tle to do with him. 
 
 Any heroine in a book would have 
 had brain fever a generation ago, 
 or nervous prostration in our day, 
 but I got not a moment's change of ag- 
 ony. 
 
 I suppose I acted rationally, I did 
 everything in a blur of feelings. I re- 
 member seeing people, paying calls, or-
 
 28 VIA P. & O. 
 
 dering the meals, and then without re- 
 membering how I came there I would 
 find myself face downward on the floor. 
 It seemed as though it were the only 
 thing to do. 
 
 It was at this time that I learned to 
 know the real Karl; or to be more ac- 
 curate Karl's real ideas, and convic- 
 tions. He adhered strongly to his be- 
 lief that there was no wrong in what he 
 had done; he confessed that it would 
 be impossible for him to remain true 
 to one or even two women, and that he 
 had never tried to achieve what would 
 have been to him a needless privation. 
 He was sorry for my pain, and he could 
 understand my jealousy, but he assured 
 me that it would pass and that I would 
 in time become so accustomed to the 
 situation that I would forget it. 
 
 He admitted that the woman and 
 child were a mistake. It was always a 
 pity he said, to fetter oneself with ties
 
 VIA P. & O. 29 
 
 of that kind. But he admitted his re- 
 sponsibility and said he would always 
 take care of them. 
 
 I can explain his attitude only by the 
 fact that he is a product of this godless 
 East. Though German by birth, Karl 
 is really no more German than I am he 
 is a cosmopolitan of the most finished 
 kind. He was born in Shanghai, and 
 played as a boy with children of all na- 
 tions. When his German father and 
 Spanish mother died, he was only nine 
 and was sent back to Europe to spend 
 his boyhood in school; at eighteen he 
 came back to take charge of the business 
 in Japan, and Japan stamped upon him 
 at that impressionable age, her code of 
 morals. 
 
 For weeks, while my door remained 
 locked, we talked of this dreadful topic. 
 We talked of nothing else. Poor Karl 
 tried to get away from it, but I gave 
 Itim no peace. We quarrelled violently
 
 30 VIA P. & O. 
 
 and bitterly. Could I have made Mm 
 see my point of view made him admit 
 his fault, things might have been differ- 
 ent in the end, but he was true to his 
 own simple code, and it was my attitude 
 that seemed to him selfish and incompre- 
 hensible. 
 
 My torture that he should have chil- 
 dren that were not mine, he did not un- 
 derstand at all. But you will, Patty 
 darling. You will know what it meant 
 to be childless in such a case. 
 
 When I learnt through Boy that the 
 second child had been born, I thought 
 I should go mad. But I didn't. I sent 
 her a basket of things to eat, and that 
 night I told Karl that I had sent it. I 
 hoped the great magnanimity of my con- 
 duct would rouse in him a feeling of ad- 
 miration for me, and a sense of his own 
 unworthiness, but all he said was "I 
 wouldn't bother, she probably doesn't 
 like foreign food,"
 
 VIA P. & O. 31 
 
 It makes me laugh as I write that. I 
 really think it was rather comic. 
 
 Karl's greatest strength lies in his 
 ability to put others in the wrong and I 
 could never make him see that his lying 
 was any worse than my spying, and so 
 strongly did he contend this, that some- 
 times I believed it myself, and felt con- 
 tempt for myself that I should ever have 
 doubted him and so found out the truth. 
 
 Can you explain this ? Am I right in 
 thinking it a curious situation, that I 
 should often have felt myself the 
 culprit ; or are many wives in a like state 
 of subjection? 
 
 For a time I thought of going home, 
 but only for a time. You were about to 
 be married, and I could not throw a 
 shadow on your happiness. And I 
 never felt quite sure of the Aunts' 
 sympathy. I was not quite sure that 
 they would not agree with Karl that a 
 wife's place under all circumstances is
 
 32 VIA P. & O. 
 
 with her husband and that only a 
 coward runs away from the first un- 
 pleasantness of life. 
 
 Well, dearest, I have come almost to 
 an end. 
 
 After months of quarrelling, Karl and 
 I came to an agreement. I promised 
 never again to mention his mode of life, 
 as long as he would respect my wishes. 
 Neither of us has broken his compact, 
 and we have lived as far apart as the 
 poles. 
 
 Whether it has cost him anything I 
 don't know, but I know what it has cost 
 me. 
 
 I suppose all fierce passions must 
 wear themselves out in time, and so my 
 jealousy and my curiosity and my 
 power to suffer are all used up, as you 
 would use up a spool of thread, and 
 there is not a needleful left. I am calm 
 and indifferent to most things and I 
 live from minute to minute, without ap-
 
 VIA P. & 0. 33 
 
 prehension for the future, or regret over 
 the past, as a sensible woman should. 
 Of course I am not quite made of stone 
 yet; I have my moods, but when once 
 you know real suffering little things 
 don't matter. 
 
 The rest of our six years in Japan 
 passed monotonously. I saw many sea- 
 sons come and go first the azaleas 
 crimsoned the hills, then the cherry 
 blossoms swept over the land (they can- 
 not compare with our apple orchards 
 that no one makes any fuss about), then 
 the iris and the great pink lotus would 
 bloom in their fields of mud and slime, 
 while the sun shone in a copper sky, and 
 the foreign population went abroad 
 disguised in sun helmets and blue 
 glasses; and then the chrysanthemums 
 would flaunt their orange and white and 
 fill the air with their bitter smell. And 
 then winter, with grey skies and cold 
 winds and cold houses and stupid din-
 
 34 VIA P. & O. 
 
 ner parties and stupid dances. With, 
 all my heart I welcomed this change to 
 Shanghai, when Karl's uncle died and 
 left the business in his hands. I 
 thought there would be more to do here, 
 but so far it is even duller than Japan. 
 The place is empty now, and very hot, 
 far hotter than Japan was at this sea- 
 son, and it is ugly too, but I welcome 
 that. I am so glad that I need no longer 
 look at beauty and hate it. 
 
 And we have just finished with the 
 rainy season and it has rained and 
 rained. Even England doesn't really 
 know what wet rain means. 
 
 The only thing that has helped me to 
 bear it, has been to watch the coolies at 
 work on the road wielding a pickaxe in 
 one hand and holding an umbrella in 
 the other! That has been my only di- 
 version. Now, sweet sister, I must go 
 to bed. Good-night and good-bye.
 
 VIA P. & O. 35 
 
 I shall close my eyes with thoughts of 
 you and the children. 
 
 CABOLA. 
 
 June 22nd. 
 
 To-morrow the P. & 0. must take this 
 bulky letter to you, dear. I have not 
 written for more than a week, because 
 between the heat and my broken nights, 
 my temper and nerves are none of the 
 best, and I have sworn that now you 
 know the truth, I will not torment you 
 with the boring details of my life. 
 
 Last night Karl came home early, and 
 so I slept well, for I have never been able 
 to cure myself of the silly habit of lying 
 awake until I hear him come in. Karl 
 said this morning, "You better begin to 
 break these servants in, for as soon as 
 people come back we'll have to give 
 some dinners." "We have been having
 
 36 VIA P. & O. 
 
 trouble with the servants! How fa- 
 miliar that sounds. Cooks seem to be 
 the difficulty. Our Boy is excellent, and 
 has done his best to get us a good one, 
 but the season is dull, and all the good 
 ones seem to be taking a holiday. 
 
 The last one we had was quite a 
 novice, and had learned foreign cooking! 
 I should think by hearsay. Of the na- 
 ture of puddings he had little real 
 knowledge. He knew that they were 
 made in a pudding dish, the silver rim 
 was always nicely adjusted, but as to 
 the making of them, I fancy he must 
 have acted on instructions something 
 like these : 
 
 "Takee some fashion thing, corn 
 starch, corn meal, puttee one two egg, 
 little milk, makee beat long time, puttee 
 stove one-half hour." It doesn't sound 
 at all a bad recipe as I write it down, 
 and possibly the directions were even 
 more explicit, and it was merely the na-
 
 VIA P. & 0. 37 
 
 ture of the ingredients that he forgot. 
 At any rate the first night he gave us 
 sweetened vermicelli, the second night, 
 sweet potato mashed and beaten up with 
 an egg or two and nicely garnished with 
 parsley, and the third night we had a 
 luscious looking thing made of oatmeal, 
 with a layer of whipped cream on top, 
 and little lines and blobs of currant 
 jelly in a very pretty interweaving pat- 
 tern. I was really grateful to him for 
 this last effort, for Karl caring nothing 
 for puddings anyway laughed heartily, 
 and I laughed too, and it was the first 
 real laugh we have had together in many 
 a long day. 
 
 Still we could not let it pass, and so 
 Karl told Boy to take it back to its 
 creator and tell him that it was too late 
 for that morning's breakfast and too 
 soon for the next, and next day there 
 was a new cook, waiting book in hand 
 for orders.
 
 38 VIA P. & O. 
 
 With this one I thought I would see 
 what a little guidance would do, and so 
 when he said, "What thing wanchee 
 pudding," I put my head in my hands 
 and gave myself over to reflection. 
 
 My thoughts rioted amid visions of 
 iced dainties, Peches Melba, Cafes 
 parfaits, wonderful candied masses of 
 glistening sugar. I saw ice cream hens 
 sitting on ice cream eggs, I saw startled 
 looking ice cream hares, whose feet and 
 tail were slowly melting in a nest of 
 spun sugar. My vision culminated in a 
 three-storied tower of delicate pistache 
 tone, crowned with a wreath of pink 
 sugar roses, and containing among other 
 wonders succulent marrons. 
 
 Eeally I must have a good deal of im- 
 agination, or was it only the ghost of 
 some creation of Mr. Sherry 's in days 
 gone by, that I am flattering myself was 
 my own conception. 
 
 Well, I came back to earth again in a
 
 VIA P. & 0. 39 
 
 minute and said, "What thing can 
 makee?" to which he answered, "Bice 
 pudding, custard pudding and ice 
 water." 
 
 After quite a long verbal combat in 
 pidgin English, which I am only just 
 beginning to acquire, I found that he 
 meant water ice, and this I hailed with 
 joy, and we have had water ice every 
 day since, and that must be quite a 
 week ago. 
 
 It is always flavoured with lemon be- 
 cause the other fruits are dangerous this 
 time of year, and of oranges there are 
 none just now. It's monotonous, but 
 an improvement on oatmeal this hot 
 weather. I don't think however that I 
 consider this cook "broken in" for din- 
 ner parties. 
 
 I suppose you wonder what we eat 
 besides water ice. Much the same as at 
 home, barring the fruit. 
 
 The fish is good, especially an
 
 40 VIA P. & O. 
 
 etherealised kind of shad called the 
 samli. Beef and mutton are plentiful 
 and chickens are small but good. Bam- 
 boo shoots are delicious and I order 
 them every day. They are a little like 
 celery roots, but crisper, and with a 
 flavour unlike anything I can think of. 
 I am very fond of them, though my eco- 
 nomical soul does revolt sometimes when 
 I realise that I am eating countless 
 embryo chairs and tables, barrel hoops, 
 and walking sticks. I take comfort, 
 however, in the thought that I may be 
 sparing the world an occasional spotted 
 etagere. You know the kind of speckled 
 horror I mean, called a "whatnot" and 
 made presumably for the purpose of sup- 
 porting polished conch shells. I always 
 feel sorry for conch shells, so far from 
 home, and obliged to submit to an un- 
 natural high polish. 
 
 As to the rest of the household my 
 'amah is a fat, comfortable creature, who
 
 VIA P. & 0. 41 
 
 is, or at least looks, as clean as wax. 
 She takes care of my clothes, mends and 
 buttons me up the back, and used to 
 brush my hair, but she irritated me so 
 by her efforts to ingratiate herself by 
 repeated admiration of my long locks, 
 that I had to give it up. 
 
 She would have been surprised, poor 
 fat thing, had she known how often I 
 longed to kick her. Her duties certainly 
 are not arduous, and what she does with 
 her time when she is not working, I have 
 no more idea than you have. 
 
 It sounds affected to say I don't know 
 how many servants there are, nor the 
 names of any of them. I know the Boy 
 of course almost intimately. He is my 
 mouthpiece and regulator of all the do- 
 mestic machinery. Then there is No. 2 
 boy, a No. 1 and No. 2 coolie, and several 
 other creatures who lurk somewhere in 
 the dusk of the Chinese quarters and do 
 the rough work of the house. "We have
 
 42 VIA P. & O. 
 
 four mafoos, the first and second I know, 
 for they sit on the box on my daily drive 
 the other two I should not know any 
 more than I know the difference between 
 our four white, straight-backed, nasty- 
 tempered, little Chinese ponies. 
 
 One thing I did enjoy, the choosing 
 of liveries, for the mafoos. I spent quite 
 a day looking over books of samples and 
 finding a combination I like, for Mafoo 
 liveries are always of two colours and 
 my mafoos look very cool and smart 
 in tan linen with green sashes and green 
 tassels on their bowl-shaped straw hats, 
 and this winter they are to have dark 
 green gowns with lighter green sash and 
 trimmings. 
 
 CAEOLA 
 
 June 29th. 
 
 Just hot, dear, and I have nothing to 
 say. I breakfasted on fresh figs, said
 
 VIA P. & O. 43 
 
 to be dangerous, but, oh, so good, icy 
 cold and covered with a purplish bloom. 
 
 I did my housekeeping which consisted 
 of telling Boy there would be ' ' one piece 
 gentlemen for dinner" and since then I 
 have been reading a stupid novel. I 
 took my drive to the end of the Bubbling 
 Well Road, and now I am waiting for 
 Karl and our guest whom I believe is 
 literary. 
 
 LATEB 
 
 Now, of course, dear, to a logical mind 
 there is nothing in the world to suggest 
 a connection between literary taste and 
 travelling for a new kind of printing 
 machine. Karl pointed this out quite 
 clearly after our guest had gone. None 
 the less, that is what my mind did and 
 I was quite prepared to enjoy the even- 
 ing and hear some talk of new books or 
 new plays, or even old ones. The even- 
 ing was very disappointing. Our guest 
 had little conversation, and but two an-
 
 44 VIA P. & O. 
 
 swers. When he understood any of my 
 illuminating remarks he said, "Correct 
 Mrs. Freiheit," and when he didn't he 
 said, * ' What say ! " It has been a dread- 
 fully hot day. 
 
 June 30th. 
 
 The last day of June! June! the 
 month of roses. I've always had a feel- 
 ing for June, because it's my month I 
 suppose and its name means to me still, 
 roses and singing birds and brooks and 
 ferns that grew beside them ; and yet it 
 is years since I saw a daisy field or 
 heard a robin sing. I should like to re- 
 christen the months as long as I live in 
 China for they are all so out of char- 
 acter. Just picture to yourself a May 
 without blossoms, and a June without 
 roses. July without the firecrackers, 
 and August without the sea! Perhaps 
 you think we have the sea here because 
 we are a port and men of war call on us
 
 VIA P. & O. 45 
 
 in passing well, the sea is fourteen 
 miles away, and we get to it by the mud- 
 diest and ugliest river I have ever seen. 
 It has no shores such as other rivers 
 have, but where the water ends, begins 
 a flat brown mud, that reaches away and 
 away, as far as any one can see, without 
 a tree or shrub or a blade of grass. And 
 then the sea itself when you come to it 
 is brown for a hundred miles out towards 
 Japan. It's the great Yangtze Eiver 
 that brings all this mud with it to the 
 ocean, and its mouth is only twenty miles 
 further north than the opening of our 
 own river. Why doesn't the supply of 
 mud give out I wonder, for it has been 
 washing down here since the beginning 
 of Chinese History and that is. older than 
 the oldest Bible legend. 
 
 July 5th. 
 
 Dearest, I have met an interesting 
 human being and of all things a Mis-
 
 46 VIA P. & O. 
 
 sionary. Her name is Edwarda Grey, 
 but she should have been called Brun- 
 hilde. She brought letters from Aunt 
 Patricia and has been here just a week. 
 I wonder how long it will take the climate 
 or something else to take the snap out 
 of her ! 
 
 At present she is full of it, of colour 
 and health and enthusiasm. She is a 
 medical Missionary, attached to a hos- 
 pital, where they treat only Chinese 
 women, somewhere out past the native 
 city. She was tremendously surprised 
 that I knew nothing of her hospital, or 
 the other doctors or "the work" as she 
 called it. As if one could keep track of 
 all the Missionaries and their doings! 
 I lacked the courage to tell her that she 
 was the very first Missionary I had ever 
 met. She came in one wilting afternoon, 
 looking as cool in white linen as 
 though she were in Bar Harbor, her 
 crispy hair curling tight, and colour, real
 
 VIA P. & O. 47 
 
 colour, in her cheeks. She is not pretty, 
 but her splendid teeth, and her straight 
 carriage make her striking. 
 
 As we sipped our iced tea, I said quite 
 innocently, as I have heard every white 
 man and woman in the Far East say, "I 
 don't believe in Foreign Missions!" 
 My dear, she got right up out of her 
 chair and towered above me (it was then 
 I thought of Brunhilde) and said in a 
 voice that would have been splendid in 
 a stage heroine, "You don't believe in 
 Foreign Missions, and you live here !" 
 
 I felt cowed and frightened, but I gave 
 her with as much spirit as I could, all 
 the arguments against missions that I 
 had ever heard. I never had argued 
 about it before all the people I know 
 are of the same mind. 
 
 "You do great harm," I said; "you 
 thrust our religion upon these people, 
 stir up unmerited antagonism to all 
 foreigners, and cause most of the race-
 
 48 VIA P. & O. 
 
 feeling against us." She didn't answer 
 and I gathered strength. 
 
 1 ' How absurd it is, " I said, ' ' to teach a 
 lot of creeds and claim for each one that 
 it is the only true belief." Still no an- 
 swer and I began to warm to my sub- 
 ject. Then, I said, ' ' Suppose you do con- 
 vert a heathen now and then. "What 
 good does it do ? He 's no more truthful 
 or honest than he was that has been 
 proved, and I won't insult you by sup- 
 posing that you think he can't be saved 
 unless he believes as we do. You don't 
 believe, do you, that the Creator is de- 
 pending on the efforts of a handful of 
 well-intentioned but inadequate people 
 to save four hundred million souls, and 
 that the ridiculously small number you 
 do convert are the only ones who are 
 to get a good chance in the next world?" 
 
 At first I thought she was going to 
 rise out of her chair again but she kept 
 her seat, and her silence with an effort,
 
 VIA P. & 0. 49 
 
 and after a very long pause said, " When 
 will you come out to the hospital?" I 
 hate people who argue that way. It has 
 all the effect of having had the last word, 
 when really they haven't offered one 
 word in their own defence. 
 
 "When it's cooler," I said. She said 
 something that sounded like "Pish" and 
 added that to see the hospital would 
 make me forget the heat. But I didn't 
 promise to go any sooner. It's hard 
 enough to get away from Chinese smells 
 in this heat without going in search of 
 them. 
 
 Before she left, Dick Mannerly came 
 in he is a nice young Englishman whom 
 I like, and who has been to see me sev- 
 eral times, almost the only man I know 
 here. He is extremely good to look at, 
 a big Norseman in type, with a cleft 
 chin, at which I sometimes look and think 
 it would be nice to be young again. He 
 was much interested in Edwarda. She
 
 50 VIA P. & O. 
 
 is his first Missionary too. His face 
 looked as though he had said "Good 
 God'* when I introduced her as Dr. 
 Grey. 
 
 The conversation jerked and pulled 
 this way and that and I couldn't help 
 smiling once or twice. "I am very 
 sorry," he said, "that you should see 
 Shanghai in the summer. It is stupid 
 with so few people here.'* 
 
 "Few people," she said; "why, there 
 are four million. ' ' I wonder if it would 
 be harder to persuade Dick Mannerly 
 that the Chinese are people or Ed- 
 warda that they are not? 
 
 When he offered to see her to her 
 carriage or rickshaw she said calmly, 
 
 "Thank you, I am walking." This 
 time his face looked as though he had 
 said "Great Jupiter." 
 
 No one walks in Shanghai in summer, 
 not even the factory girls. I wish you 
 could see them as they pass my windows
 
 VIA P. & 0. 51 
 
 early and late, four and five on each side 
 of the big wheelbarrows, laughing, chat- 
 ting, flirting with the wheelbarrow coolie 
 as he staggers and perspires under his 
 load. 
 
 July 15th. 
 
 Every day at five I leave the house 
 and drive on the Bubbling Well Eoad. 
 It is a distance of about two miles to the 
 Well itself and every inch of those miles 
 I know by heart. It's a pretty name, I 
 think, and before I had seen the Well it 
 called up a vision of a sparkling pool, 
 ringed about with steps, guarded by a 
 great stone dragon, at whose feet floated 
 water lilies, and great shining leaves. I 
 don't know where I got this Arabian 
 Nights idea. You can't imagine any- 
 thing more unlike the reality. To see it 
 at all you must get out of the carriage 
 and go to the side of the road, and hang 
 over a wide stone coping, and there far
 
 52 VIA P. & O. 
 
 below is a black oily liquid on the sur- 
 face of which a bubble breaks now and 
 then, as though some drowning crea- 
 ture were gasping its last in the greasy 
 depths. I've never seen more than three 
 bubbles in five minutes. I Ve timed them 
 on particularly stupid afternoons. 
 
 Well, after you pass the Bubbling 
 Well, you come to an open space, shaded 
 by some fine big trees. Here the Bub- 
 bling Well Eoad ends, and with it all 
 shade, and the Jessfield Road to the 
 right and the Sicawei Eoad to the left, 
 crawl out into the open sunshine, through 
 cotton fields and grave mounds and oc- 
 casional Chinese hovels and wander on 
 and on until one of them comes to an end 
 at a creek, and the other, no; I don't 
 know where the other ends, and what do 
 you care anyway. This open space is my 
 favourite place in all Shanghai and here 
 we always stop to allow the pony to get 
 his breath. We stop before an opening
 
 VIA P. & 0. 53 
 
 in the trees through which you can get 
 a vista across cotton fields to some 
 woods beyond, and these when the sun 
 gets low, take on a bluish tone, and by 
 squinting my eyes can be made to look 
 like far distant hills. It is even possible 
 to forget for a minute that this is Shang- 
 hai, and that there isn't a hill nearer 
 than Hankow. 
 
 Another person has found this favour- 
 ite place of mine. It is a woman who 
 rides a cream-coloured pony and is al- 
 ways alone. She comes nearly every day 
 and sits looking out across the cotton. 
 Perhaps she too is homesick for the sight 
 of mountains and blue water. She has 
 a sad, beautiful face and masses of yel- 
 low hair and deep blue eyes. She is so 
 exquisitely fair, that the flush of her 
 cheeks when she first stops, warm from 
 her exercise, is like a deep wild rose, and 
 as she sits there resting, the flush fades 
 until she is like a pale wild rose. She
 
 54 VIA P. & O. 
 
 wears a linen habit and her figure is the 
 loveliest I have ever seen, just one slim 
 graceful line from her head to the tip of 
 her riding boots. She sits her horse too, 
 as though she had known something bet- 
 ter than a Chinese pony. I haven't an 
 idea who she is. I shall meet her, I sup- 
 pose, some day. As to women, she and I 
 are almost alone in Shanghai. Almost 
 all the wives and daughters have gone to 
 cooler places. There are just a few left, 
 who for some reason have preferred to 
 face the heat with their husbands rather 
 than to leave them to swelter alone. 
 
 And then of course there are the demi- 
 mondaines, dozens of them. They never 
 go, or if they ever do, they are replaced 
 by others so that always, this Bubbling 
 Well Koad, the one drive in Shanghai, is 
 infested with them. They drive in the 
 smartest victorias, wear quite the smart- 
 est hats, gowns and parasols, and their 
 maf oos are trigged out in lively combina-
 
 VIA P. & O. 55 
 
 tions of blue and yellow, tan, orange grey 
 and red. 
 
 They have hard, bold faces and it hurts 
 me always to meet them. It's a side of 
 life that I try to turn my thoughts away 
 from, but how can I when I am constantly 
 face to face with it? When they come 
 clattering by, laughing and talking, I 
 can't help wondering whether Karl 
 knows them, and whether they know me, 
 and are either laughing at or pitying 
 me. 
 
 You'll think it's jealousy, Patty, but it 
 isn't I know what that is you see. No, 
 it is an undefinable hurt they inflict. 
 They make me cringe, and I wish I could 
 call out to them and tell them that I 
 don't share my husband with any one, 
 and that he belongs far, far more to them 
 than to me. 
 
 I have been scribbling while I waited 
 for Karl to come to dinner. It's long 
 past eight now, so I suppose he won't
 
 56 VIA P. & O. 
 
 come. It's a dreadfully hot evening. It 
 must mean typhoon, I think. 
 
 July 18th. 
 
 A typhoon has blown for three days, 
 and now at last we have quiet. I had 
 an adventure this morning. Perhaps 
 adventure is a big word for it, but all 
 things are comparative, and to me it had 
 all the excitement that a trip to Europe 
 might have in a life less monotonous 
 than mine. It both interested and 
 cheered me, and yet it was the mere fact 
 of speaking a few words to a rational 
 human being of my own race. 
 
 After three days of shut-inness, on 
 account of the storm, I longed to get out, 
 and so, contrary to all custom, I ordered 
 the carriage early this morning, as soon 
 as Karl left for the office, and drove into 
 town, having a wish to see what the wind 
 had done to the little craft in the har-
 
 VIA P. & 0. 57 
 
 bour. The English Gardens lie at the 
 water 's edge between the harbour and 
 the Foochow Creek. At the entrance I 
 left the carriage and walked through 
 them. The harbour was swept as clean 
 as a wetted slate, not a junk nor a sam- 
 pan to be seen. I walked to the end of the 
 garden where the Foochow Creek cuts 
 into the land, and there they all were, 
 huddled like frightened children between 
 its. shores, and as far as I could see yon 
 might have crossed the creek anywhere 
 on their decks. 
 
 The Gardens were a sorry sight. 
 Trees were down, shrubs were battered 
 and the flower beds were flat. I liked the 
 sense of wreckage, and I realised that 
 had Shanghai been blown flat on its face 
 I should not have cared. I sat down on 
 a bench with my back toward China and 
 my face toward the Pacific Ocean, and 
 after I had been there a few minutes I 
 heard a "chug chug" and there coming
 
 58 VIA P. & O. 
 
 down the river, the only floating thing 
 on that wide harbour, was a steam launch 
 carrying people and mail to some 
 steamer which has been waiting for them 
 these three days. Something in the fact 
 that I was watching people who were go- 
 ing home to America, perhaps to Eng- 
 land, within a few miles of you, was too 
 much for me. I hardly ever cry, but I 
 couldn't help it then, and I let the tears 
 run down. There were a few Chinese 
 gardeners about, picking up things, but 
 I noticed no one else, as I stared after 
 the launch, until a man stopped in front 
 of me and said in a deep kind voice, 
 "You are in some trouble, can I help 
 you ? " I had hard work to answer, but I 
 managed to choke out, "No, thank you. 
 No, thank you; I'm only homesick," and 
 he walked away. In a minute he was 
 back again, and said, "There's only one 
 way to cure that. I know for I've tried ; 
 and it's occupation," and then he was off
 
 VIA P. & 0. 59 
 
 again with long strides. I watched him 
 until he was out of sight. He stopped 
 to speak to one of the gardeners 
 seemed to give him some orders, stooped 
 over a flower bed and shook his head 
 as though sorry for its battered looks 
 and disappeared. 
 
 I can imagine Karl's horror if he knew 
 that I had cried in a public place, and 
 had been caught at it, but oh, the kind- 
 ness in that man's nice English voice, 
 and the sympathy in his steady grey 
 eyes. I can't be sorry that he saw me. 
 I hope I didn't look very ugly. But the 
 remedy he spoke of, where am I to get 
 that? I don't suppose he would call 
 fancy work an occupation or house- 
 keeping in a house where many servants 
 do their work like well-oiled machines, 
 and where "old custom" is the only law 
 to which they bow their pigtailed heads. 
 
 Occupation for a woman, in China 
 Good Heavens !
 
 60 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Still July date uncertain. 
 
 Beally, dearest, there is nothing to 
 write about. My days are endless repe- 
 titions. In the mornings I try "occupa- 
 tion." I read a little, sew a little, play a 
 little on the piano, which has a very 
 damp tone this weather, and try to kill 
 the time in some way. It passes not im- 
 possibly, and it is only sometimes that I 
 realise and regret the necessity for kill- 
 ing rather than living these last years of 
 my youth. Every afternoon after my 
 nap I drive, and every afternoon I look 
 for a little while out towards those bluish 
 hills, and when my half-closed eyes are 
 tired of their part in the deception, I 
 say "home," and the two mafoos who 
 have been flicking the flies from my 
 pony with what looks like part of its 
 own long white tail, jump to the box and 
 we trot home. 
 
 To-day the fair girl was there again,
 
 VIA P. & O. 61 
 
 sitting her pony with her usual grace. 
 She sat not two yards distant, but kept 
 her face from me toward the open. I 
 saw Dick Mannerly and Edwarda Grey 
 crossing toward the Well, and I called 
 and beckoned to them, and they came 
 and sat with me for a little while. After 
 they had gone I chanced to look up at 
 the girl and her face was white and 
 drawn as though some storm of emotion 
 or pain had gripped her. I started to 
 leave the carriage and go to her, but be- 
 fore I had my foot on the step, she 
 whipped up her pony and cantered away 
 on the Jessfield Eoad. I wondered if 
 she could know Dick. He neither bowed 
 to her nor looked at her. I haven't seen 
 my friend of the English Gardens since. 
 It's absurd to say that I miss a man I 
 barely know and yet I do so want to hear 
 his voice and see those kind grey eyes 
 again. They were very comforting.
 
 62 VIA P. & O. 
 
 July 25th. 
 
 Far better not to write you, dearest, 
 than to try and make a letter out of noth- 
 ing, and yet I must write. I have grown 
 to depend on and enjoy this way of 
 spending some of the hours of the day. 
 It does me good to talk to you, brings 
 me near to you, and the children, and to 
 cheerful things. But for news, one day 
 is like another. Heat and damp or sun- 
 light such sunlight! I wish I could 
 bottle some of it and send it to you for 
 November. And monotony, and the 
 same circle of thought. I saw that 
 phrase in a book and it expresses exactly 
 the movement of my mind. My 
 thoughts go in so perfect a circle that I 
 could almost tell you the hour of the day 
 by the matters that are holding my 
 brain. I try hard to escape from it, 
 especially when I drive I try to devise 
 new and interesting pictures in my mind 
 you and the children are always in
 
 VIA P. & O. 63 
 
 them and I take you with me and to- 
 gether again we travel to all the places 
 we went to in our youth. I am sorry 
 that they are so few. We revisit muse- 
 ums and picture galleries, and I make 
 a mental list of all the pictures I can 
 remember. I sit again through plays 
 and operas, try to remember the airs 
 and fit them to the characters, and then 
 just as I am losing myself in the "Bride 
 of Lammermoor" or "Lohengrin," 
 along comes a carriage with red and 
 tan liveries, or perhaps orange and blue, 
 and the faces in it smile at each other 
 and stare, it seems to me with mockery 
 in their eyes, and then I am back again 
 in that dreadful circle. 
 
 If only there was some place to drive 
 except on that awful road. 
 
 July 
 
 Something did happen to-day. Karl 
 knocked on my door before I was up and
 
 64 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 coming to the foot of my bed, said he 
 thought I was looking seedy and that I 
 ought to go away for a time. He pro- 
 posed that I take a run over to Japan 
 for a month. I was touched and pleased 
 that he should have so much thought for 
 me and I thanked him really enthusias- 
 tically, but I said no. It may have been 
 my vanity, but it seemed to me that he 
 was glad that I didn't want to go. I 
 can't really understand why, as long as 
 he proposed it, he should seem relieved 
 and more cheerful when I had withstood 
 all his urging. I can't be sure whether 
 it was imagination or not, for all he 
 said was, "Well, suit yourself," and 
 went off to the office. I was quite excited 
 over the incident. Karl has not been in 
 my room for years but he walked in 
 just as naturally as though it were a 
 common occurrence. That's like Karl, 
 he never makes a fuss about things. All 
 he does, he does as though there could
 
 VIA P. & O. 65 
 
 be no question about it. There lies Ms 
 strength, I suppose. 
 
 I have no desire to go to Japan. I am 
 a fool I know, but I have not yet got 
 to that philosophical height where I can 
 think of Japan without resentment. 
 Japan took from me all I had in life, 
 and I can't forgive it. And the fact that 
 I loved its beauty, that its charm went 
 so deep into me before I found it all 
 an illusion, makes it worse. As I think 
 of it now, the blue water, the hills, the 
 beautiful grotesque pines, the masses of 
 blossom and flower all seem to me but 
 the setting of a terrible and agonising 
 dream. 
 
 Life blossomed for me there like one 
 of Japan's own cherry trees, with a lying 
 promise of sweet fruit, and brought forth 
 as do its cherry trees only a handful of 
 dried pips. Oh, my dear, how foolish 
 you were to ask me to write honestly. 
 You see the result. Just an unavailing
 
 66 VIA P. & O. 
 
 effort to put a few pessimistic groans 
 into fine language. 
 
 August 6th. 
 
 Patty dear I have seen him again! 
 My friend of the English Gardens. I 
 was driving and he was walking and I 
 overtook him and he looked around and 
 smiled and bowed, and of course I smiled 
 and bowed too. Unconventional, I sup- 
 pose, but oh, how nice and natural. I 
 don't know his name, but I know him. 
 He is tall and kind has grey eyes and 
 a soft heart he put out sympathetic 
 thoughts to me and I took them and was 
 comforted then why not bow. We 
 shall meet of course when some one 
 comes back to introduce us. Shanghai 
 society isn 't large. I have taken to smil- 
 ing too at the little Wild Kose. She 
 looks as though she needed some one to 
 smile at her. Her face is very sad 
 lately, and the droop of her pretty figure
 
 VIA P. & O. 67 
 
 comes from something besides the heat, 
 I am sure. When first I smiled and 
 nodded she seemed surprised, but her 
 answering smile was so sweet, and 
 showed such a pretty row of teeth that 
 had it not been particularly hot, and I 
 particularly limp, I would have left the 
 carriage and gone to speak to her. I 
 haven't had a chance since as soon as 
 she sees me she smiles, touches up the 
 pony and is gone. It seems almost as 
 though she didn't want to meet me, yet 
 her smile is so sweet, so almost appeal- 
 ing that I can't believe it. She must 
 be shy, I think. 
 
 August 
 
 I think Dick Mannerly must be de- 
 cidedly in love with Edwarda. They 
 have been to see me several times and I 
 meet them walking or riding together 
 very often. Edwarda doesn't ride well. 
 She is learning, but she goes at it in her
 
 68 VIA P. & O. 
 
 usual masterful way, and I have a feel- 
 ing when I see her that she will either 
 learn, or kill the pony. 
 
 I should not care to have a doctor for 
 a daughter hut then if you call a girl 
 Edwarda, what can you expect? I al- 
 ways feel that names have some influ- 
 ence on their owners. I've always 
 wished that I had a simpler one. Could 
 a woman be a sentimental "slop over" 
 if she were called Jane Grey or Kate 
 Ford or Mary Jones? 
 
 I've asked Dr. Edwarda and Dick to 
 dinner next Sunday evening. Karl is 
 going up country. I doubt whether I 
 would have seen so much of Edwarda if 
 Dick had not taken such a fancy to her. 
 I am fond of that boy, and he has seemed 
 to adopt me as a mother so I must 
 mother him, and her too, apparently. 
 Her brisk ways are too nearly brusque 
 to make much appeal to me. I like soft 
 women and strong men. Did I ever tell
 
 VIA P. & 0. 69 
 
 you how I first met Dick? It was dur- 
 ing the first few days after we arrived 
 in Shanghai at a dance given at the 
 Hotel, in honour of some French man-of- 
 war then in port. I met numbers of 
 men, the French Consul being, I remem- 
 ber, particularly nice and attentive (he 
 has been away ever since) and at about 
 eleven o'clock I was dancing with Dick 
 when I suddenly grew dizzy and faint 
 and felt I must go home. I sent several 
 messages to Karl, but he was playing 
 cards, and sent back word he could not 
 come. Dick was kindness itself, got 
 my wraps while I waited on the ve- 
 randah, and insisted on seeing me home. 
 I had not ordered the carriage until 
 twelve, and there was not a rickshaw in 
 sight. Dick proposed sending a coolie 
 to find one, but I knew that we could 
 probably pick one up on the other side 
 of the bridge near the English Gardens, 
 which was only a little way. It was a
 
 70 VIA P. & O. 
 
 wonderful moonlight night, and as we 
 crossed the bridge we stopped to look 
 over the rail, at the swift dark water 
 that was rushing into the Foochow 
 Creek. 
 
 Moonlight turns even muddy water 
 into black and silver ! As we stood there 
 I saw that below us a big coal junk was 
 caught against a stone pillar of the 
 bridge and several men and women on 
 her deck were running about in the wild- 
 est excitement. What happened was 
 this, but why it happened I don't even 
 now know clearly. 
 
 The big Ulo at the stern of the junk, 
 must have been held fast in the mud, or 
 wedged in some way, against the bridge. 
 It seems to have acted as a lever against 
 the inrushing tide, and suddenly without 
 warning, that I could see, one end of the 
 junk rose high out of the water, and the 
 whole thing with a great sound of crash- 
 ing, screaming timber, turned turtle.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 71 
 
 As it went over, two men and a woman 
 sprang from its deck to some foothold 
 underneath the bridge (it was too dark 
 to see clearly) and the men came scram- 
 bling over the rail, while a Chinaman 
 and my friend Mannerly caught at the 
 woman and dragged her up too. The 
 poor creature gave cries that were terri- 
 ble to listen to and fell crouching to the 
 ground rocking herself to and fro. I 
 felt that there might be others who were 
 caught in the hold of the junk or were 
 being dragged by the tide into the creek. 
 Her house, perhaps her children had 
 been swept away in an instant, and I 
 could do nothing for her. 
 
 The two men ran up and down the 
 bridge, peering into the water at 
 their upturned boat which, once free of 
 the bridge, floated quickly away. I 
 knelt beside the woman saying things in 
 English which of course she could not 
 understand. I begged Mannerly to find
 
 72 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 some one who could talk her language, 
 but there was no one. The few Chinese 
 near us spoke another dialect, and after 
 the first few minutes of excitement went 
 their way. 
 
 At last I had an inspiration. I took 
 off a heavy bracelet, of soft Chinese gold, 
 worth a fortune to a poor Chinese 
 woman, and slipped it into her hand. 
 This she understood. She gasped as 
 she looked at it, clutched it, looked 
 around to see if her companions were 
 looking and thrust it into her bosom. 
 Then she went on with her moaning. 
 Whether she mourned husband or chil- 
 dren, or only a load of coal, I shall never 
 know, but I hope that my bangle may 
 help her. Perhaps you wonder that I 
 didn't do something for her, or stay by 
 her until some help came, as I should 
 have done by a woman of my own race. 
 But what could I do? Though all that 
 she had loved perhaps lay floating upside
 
 VIA P. & O. 73 
 
 down, I could get no idea from my brain 
 to hers save through the bangle. Truly, 
 with this terrible barrier of no language 
 between us, these people are less compre- 
 hensible than dogs. 
 
 I was trembling with the horror of it 
 as we started off again in search of a 
 rickshaw, and in trying to comfort my- 
 self a little made one of those hackneyed 
 phrases that death and disaster must be 
 so tired of hearing as they take their 
 departure. 
 
 "Well, perhaps after all it's the best 
 that can happen to them or to any of 
 us, especially if there were children 
 drowned ; no doubt they are spared much 
 suffering. ' ' 
 
 Evidently Dick found no lack of orig- 
 inality in my remark. He looked dread- 
 fully startled. He said, "Oh, by Jove, 
 Mrs. Freiheit, don't be so pessimistic." 
 
 "It isn't pessimism," I answered. 
 "Of course life holds a good deal for all
 
 74 VIA P. & O. 
 
 of us, the poorest and richest but I am 
 hoping for much better things in the next 
 world." 
 
 "Oh, that's all very well, but this is 
 life and the other is death you know." 
 
 So evidently the young man enjoys 
 himself where he is I 
 
 August 18th. 
 
 Dick Mannerly finds himself very 
 much at home among women. I do not 
 believe it would embarrass him to be the 
 only man at the biggest kind of feminine 
 party. 
 
 So I took no trouble to find another 
 man for my dinner. I am glad I didn't 
 for it left him free to wrangle with Ed- 
 warda, and it amused me to listen to 
 them. They disagree about everything 
 on earth, besides their opinion of heaven. 
 Dick cannot reconcile himself to Ed- 
 warda being a Missionary, a doctor and
 
 VIA P. & O. 75 
 
 a dissenter, nor to the fact that she de- 
 votes her life to taking care of these 
 1 'confounded heathen." At the same 
 time he evidently admires tremendously 
 her good health, her pink cheeks, her 
 curly hair and her whole brisk person- 
 ality. Even in this damp weather, there 
 is electricity in the air where she is. 
 They look well together, for he is a hand- 
 some giant with his dimpled chin, and 
 blue eyes that look, I fancy, far more in- 
 telligent than they really are. They can 
 look a good many other things as well, 
 and I wonder whether all her common 
 sense will be proof against his admira- 
 tion. I doubt if he wants to marry her. 
 To him no doubt with generations of 
 English traditions behind him, her aims 
 seem very plebeian indeed. In some way 
 I must warn her if I can. At present 
 she seems safe enough. She laughs at 
 him and snubs him in a way that I fancy 
 is quite new to him and perhaps part of
 
 76 VIA P. & O. 
 
 her charm. But that cleft chin! Even 
 I immune feel its spell. 
 
 They both arrived before I was quite 
 ready, and I caught this bit of conver- 
 sation as I came downstairs. 
 Dick "Did you like the flowers I sent 
 
 you? I had a most confounded time 
 
 finding them in this hole." 
 Edwarda "It was very kind of you, but 
 
 I really do not care very much for 
 
 orchids. I sent them to the wards.'* 
 Dick (very eagerly). "What flowers 
 
 do you like! I'll get anything that 
 
 grows in this beastly climate. What 
 
 are your favourites?'' 
 
 I waited a moment outside the door 
 so that Edwarda might tell him her 
 choice without interruption. She took a 
 long time about it, and my mind was 
 plunging in masses of midsummer flow- 
 ers, as I supposed hers was. The sweet 
 breath of sweet peas came to me. I 
 smelt heliotrope and honeysuckle, saw
 
 VIA P. & O. 77 
 
 lilies of the valley, drooping their pretty 
 heads, roses without number, and the 
 tiny blue eyes of forget-me-nots; I was 
 quite eager to know what her determined 
 mind had settled upon as her favourite 
 flower. I've never been able to decide 
 that big question for myself, I love them 
 all so much. Then I heard her answer. 
 What do you think it was ? 
 
 Geraniums ! 
 
 At dinner we talked of the respective 
 merits of our two countries and Dick was 
 rather severe with America. "Have you 
 ever been there?" said Edwarda, keep- 
 ing her temper well in hand. 
 
 1 1 Bather not, " said Dick. " I Ve taken 
 jolly good care to avoid it. Why, my 
 father travelled there when he was a 
 young man, and he's told me many a 
 time that he could not even get a pair of 
 boots decently blacked!" Edwarda did 
 not answer, and thinking perhaps that 
 he had really wounded our pride by this
 
 78 VIA P. & O. 
 
 painful exposition of our national un- 
 fitness, he became magnanimous. He 
 straightened himself a little and smiled 
 in a large generous way. " However 
 though America has no greater critic 
 than I, she also has no greater friend.*' 
 Then Edwarda looked up very sweetly 
 and said, 
 
 "Does America know?" 
 
 Dick had the grace to join a little in 
 my laughter, but I don't think he quite 
 saw where the joke lay. 
 
 I sent Edwarda home in the carriage, 
 despite her protest that she could go 
 alone, in a stray rickshaw through those 
 teeming Chinese streets, and past the 
 lonely bit of road beyond the native town 
 that leads out to her hospital. 
 
 As she left, she put her hands on my 
 shoulders, and tall as I am she looks 
 down on me. 
 
 "You look ill, what's the matter with 
 you?"
 
 VIA P. & O. 79 
 
 "Heat," I said. 
 
 " Nonsense, it's no hotter than New 
 York. "What you need is something to 
 do. You women that lead idle, luxurious, 
 useless lives always get ill for nothing. 
 Come out to the hospital, and I'll give 
 you some work, and show you some real 
 illness." 
 
 She is a little bit hard, but perhaps she 
 is right. If I had something to do ex- 
 cept think about myself, I might feel 
 better. I'll go out to the hospital as 
 soon as it is cooler. 
 
 August 28th. 
 
 I've been in bed ten days, sweetest 
 sister. It was only a touch of fever. I 
 am much better. 
 
 My bed has been covered with mat- 
 ting, the sheet stretched over it, and at 
 night the mosquito netting drops around 
 it, and inside I have my candle and book, 
 and I have spent fairly comfortable and
 
 80 VIA P, & O. 
 
 independent nights in my little net 
 house. My amah is ill and away, and 
 so Boy has taken care of me, and I am 
 growing into a very grateful affection 
 for him, and his careful silent attention 
 to my wants. 
 
 Imagine your butler waiting on you 
 while you were in bed! The idea is 
 dreadful, but this is so different. Boy 
 isn't a man at all, though his name im- 
 plies the hope that he may some day be- 
 come one. He is just a moving, intelli- 
 gent machine, coming and going quietly 
 on those soft padded shoes, a model of 
 silence and discretion, and his blue linen 
 gown and his pigtail give just the touch 
 of femininity which makes the situation 
 comfortable. 
 
 September 15th. 
 
 Patty love I have not been able to 
 write for a week or more. Just as I 
 was getting better, the fever got me
 
 VIA P. & 0. 81 
 
 again and I have been quite ill; one day 
 shivering and burning up alternately, 
 and the next so weak that I could not 
 lift my head. 
 
 The doctor has been very good to me. 
 He is an old resident and does not un- 
 derstand how any one can wish to live 
 anywhere but in Shanghai. 
 
 He insists that in time I will come to 
 love it, and that as soon as people come 
 back, I will find life as full, as vivid 
 and interesting as anywhere in the 
 world. 
 
 He tells me much good-natured gossip 
 about the inhabitants. He told me too 
 the name of my friend of the English 
 Gardens. " David Jerrold," he said 
 when I described him. ' ' The finest man 
 in China ! ' ' Then he went on in staccato 
 sentences. ' ' He 's head of Jerrold & Co., 
 oldest tea house in the country. Used 
 to have an international influence in the 
 old days, and still the biggest and solid-
 
 82 VIA P. & O. 
 
 est business in the East. Came to Mm 
 from his grandfather. He's a widower 
 wife never was out here died nearly 
 twenty years ago. Jerry must be nearly 
 forty-five. Don't know why he never 
 married again. Doesn't care very much 
 for women never knew him to have a 
 flirtation, and Shanghai is a hard place 
 not to flirt in" the doctor here made 
 a wry face, as though he knew himself 
 something of this particular difficulty. 
 "Cares more about books and that place 
 of his out on the Sicawei Eoad. Got 
 a wonderful farm out there and a 
 kitchen garden where he grows every- 
 thing. Wish you could taste some of his 
 fruit. Jerry is president of the club 
 and head of the municipal council and 
 has a finger in every deal out here.'* 
 The doctor stopped here and I thought 
 that was all, but he went on in a softer 
 tone, " Jerry has sent many a sick chap 
 home, out of his own pocket and pulled
 
 VIA P. & O. 83 
 
 many a stranded chap out of a hole. 
 The finest gentleman in China!" 
 
 There! wasn't I right about the kind 
 eyes? How he must have loved that 
 wife of his to "care little about women" 
 all these years. Not even a flirtation, 
 in a place where flirtations are so diffi- 
 cult to avoid ! And yet she had to die, 
 with all that great love to hold her. 
 Poor, poor woman and poor man. Dr. 
 Mac says Mr. Jerrold has asked for me 
 several times; said he had noticed I 
 wasn't driving and knew I must be ill. 
 So he must have asked and found out 
 who I was. 
 
 To-morrow I am to go out for the first 
 time. 
 
 September 17th. 
 
 Another discomfort has been added to 
 life. For nearly a week past a hurdy- 
 gurdy somewhere near enough to be 
 heard from every room in the house has
 
 84 VIA P. & O. 
 
 been playing from two o'clock in the 
 afternoon until ten. I think I'm wrong 
 about it being a hurdy-gurdy. It's a 
 steam organ I am sure no human 
 muscles could drive the thing so inces- 
 santly. The first two days of it I didn't 
 mind, but I have had no nap since it 
 started, and no way to get beyond its 
 noise until my drive. Boy is much dis- 
 tressed at my discomfort " Belong 
 Chinese play garden, where pony go all 
 time round," was his answer to my 
 grumbling question. I suppose he 
 means a merry-go-round. I hope some 
 one is finding it merry. I'm not. 
 
 September ~L8th. 
 
 Yesterday, dearest, driven out by the 
 merry-go-round's merry music, and hat- 
 ing the idea of the Bubbling Well Eoad, 
 I went into town at 2.30 the very hot- 
 test hour of the day, and tried to amuse
 
 VIA P. & 0. 85 
 
 myself by finding a bracelet to replace 
 my old one. The Maloo lay a broad 
 white band of shimmering dusty heat 
 fringed with Chinese shops and Chinese 
 smells. In the middle of the road these 
 last are not overpowering, but draw up 
 close to the sidewalk and they close 
 round you, each it seems, occupying its 
 allotted space before its birthplace, not 
 mingling and permeated, and lost in the 
 pungent smell of opium which is the 
 basic odour of China, but distinct and in- 
 dividual. Once you know the smell of 
 China, you can recognise it, they say, a 
 hundred miles off the coast. Dr. Mc- 
 Intyre says it comes to him as soon as he 
 sees the yellow of the Yangtze water, 
 mingling with the grey of the China 
 Sea. It is better than roses in his nos- 
 trils he says. Well, to me it is very 
 nauseating, but I prefer the native end 
 of Shanghai's main thoroughfare to the 
 other end, which tries to look like an
 
 86 VIA P. & O. 
 
 English country lane and is full of hor- 
 rid thoughts. 
 
 There were not even many Chinese out 
 at 2.30 on a broiling day and the Sikh 
 policemen were so surprised to see a 
 foreign lady out at that time, that some 
 of them forgot to salute. 
 
 I did not really want a bracelet, but 
 it gave me an excuse to go into Hong 
 Shee's, a big silver shop, where I could 
 spend half an hour of the long after- 
 noon in looking at a great deal of ugly 
 Chinese silver and a few pieces of exqui- 
 site jade. Hong Shee, the worst opium 
 smoker in Shanghai, with a face and 
 hands the colour of parchment, waited 
 on me himself. I found a bangle, and 
 ordered for you a gold chain with jade 
 ornaments, queer little figures of im- 
 possible beasts, or grotesque faces. If 
 there were much to tempt me I should 
 become wildly extravagant, as a way of 
 spending the time.
 
 VIA P. & O. 87 
 
 As I came out of the shop, there was 
 my friend I like to call him my friend 
 standing at the step of the carriage, 
 talking to my mafoo. He turned and 
 spoke to me in the most natural way in 
 the world. "It's madness for you to be 
 out at this hour, Mrs. Freiheit, without 
 even a sun helmet or dark glasses. 
 That parasol is no good at all. Please 
 go home." 
 
 "I can't," I answered. 
 
 "Why not?" and so I told him about 
 the merry go round. At this he turned 
 to the Mafoo and asked him something 
 in Chinese. The Mafoo answered volu- 
 bly and in a minute Mr. Jerrold turned 
 to me again and said: 
 
 "Will you be patient just one day 
 more, and I'll see what can be done about 
 it?" 
 
 Of course I said I would, and so he 
 helped me into the carriage and I came 
 home.
 
 88 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Patty, did you ever hear of such a 
 knight errant ? Does he do anything ex- 
 cept hunt up people's troubles and try 
 to cure them? 
 
 You may think me a fool if you must, 
 but you have no idea how his speaking 
 to me brightened my day. Just those 
 few ordinary words made such a differ- 
 ence. And we have never even been in- 
 troduced. 
 
 It was easy to go home, and to bear 
 with the hurdy-gurdy. And the thought 
 of those grey eyes made it possible to 
 face the Bubbling "Well Eoad bravely, 
 and so at five o 'clock I ordered the Maf oo 
 to go out to the resting place. I was 
 anxious to see if the Wild Eose would 
 be there after all these weeks. There 
 she was, sitting her horse with her usual 
 grace. She did not turn her head from 
 our vista, until my carriage stopped and 
 then she turned and smiled a really ra- 
 diant smile, touched up her horse and
 
 VIA P. & 0. 89 
 
 was off. I had the queerest feeling, as 
 though she had been waiting for me all 
 these weeks, and was surprised and re- 
 lieved to see me again. That's nonsense 
 of course, but anyway, her smile had 
 pleasure in it, and I only hope my an- 
 swering smile was half as sweet. I must 
 speak to her soon. If only she did not 
 always ride away, as soon as I come. 
 
 September 15th. 
 
 The music has stopped. I wonder 
 what magic he used? 
 
 September 16th. 
 
 Your letters by the German mail got 
 to me this morning and all day I have 
 been deep in them. Oh, those children, 
 how my heart and arms ache for them. 
 I shall spend the day to-morrow trying 
 to find something to send them. There 
 are no Chinese toys, apparently Chinese
 
 90 VIA P. & O. 
 
 children do not play, as their Japanese 
 cousins do, for in Japan you can buy an 
 armful of beautiful, perishable, bright- 
 coloured, paper toys for ten sen. Well^ 
 if I can buy one, I shall send the boys a 
 Chinese dragon one of the great col- 
 oured pasteboard things, with jointed 
 tails, that it takes a dozen natives to 
 carry at their funerals ; and some of the 
 paper money, in long strips of gilt and 
 silver that they use to enrich the souls 
 of the dead. If they really believe, and 
 of course they do, that they can so easily 
 procure wealth in the world to come, I 
 should think it would be a great tempta- 
 tion to the poverty-stricken or financially 
 embarrassed Chinaman to buy himself 
 for two sen a million taels worth of fu- 
 ture ease and comfort and promptly go 
 to glory. Perhaps they do. Oh, if only 
 you had a little girl. I would send her 
 bangles of gold or jade, wonderful seed 
 pearl head dresses, studded with coral
 
 VIA P. & O. 91 
 
 disks, and rolls and rolls of satins and 
 brocades. I don't quite know what she 
 would do with them, but you could put 
 them away, and when she was old 
 enough she could dress up in them, as 
 we used to in those old party dresses, 
 that hung in the cedar closet years ago. 
 
 September 17th. 
 
 Thank you, my dearest, for the pretty 
 handkerchiefs, and for the letter tucked 
 away in their folds. It was clever of 
 you to think of that way of sending it, 
 and yet it made me tremble. I hope 
 you won't do it again, or write another 
 letter that Karl could not see. Don't 
 think I am afraid. I am afraid of noth- 
 ing, save the ruffling of the comparative 
 peace that has come in these last years. 
 It would anger Karl terribly if he knew 
 that I was writing these long and open 
 letters to you. I keep them locked safely
 
 92 VIA P. & O. 
 
 until I can mail them myself. But your 
 letter was good to get. It was sweet and 
 comforting and just exactly what I ex- 
 pected in answer to my first true letter. 
 I knew you would say, "Come home'* 
 and say it insistently and to the exclu- 
 sion of all else. 
 
 But I can't come home I don't sup- 
 pose you will understand my reasons. 
 Perhaps they can hardly be called good 
 reasons at all. Perhaps it is only pride 
 that holds me here. I know quite well 
 that I owe Karl no duty, and yet and 
 yet, I am going to stay by him, yes, a3 
 far as I can see, forever. I am not go- 
 ing to humiliate him or cheapen him in 
 the eyes of the world by leaving him. 
 This is not generosity, Patty. It 's pride ; 
 the kind called false I believe, but false 
 or not, it's the only real satisfaction left 
 me. To be generous and accept noth- 
 ing in return, that is the only triumph I 
 can know, and though there might be a
 
 VIA P. & 0. 93 
 
 question as to how much I give, at least 
 there is no doubt that I take nothing, 
 not even the bread I eat, for since the 
 day when Karl explained to me that a 
 woman owed more allegiance to her hus- 
 band than he to her, because he sup- 
 ported her, I have never taken a penny 
 of his money, and every month I have 
 one moment of perfect satisfaction when 
 I sign and send to the office my check for 
 exactly one half of the month's expense. 
 It takes about a third of my income, and 
 no other means of spending it could I 
 possibly find, that would afford me this 
 one moment of real contentment. Now, 
 dear, never again ask me to go home. 
 Some day when Karl takes a holiday I 
 shall go with him, until then, I must 
 stay. 
 
 September 
 
 patty what you think I am sniffing 
 
 and snuffing at, as I write? A big bowl
 
 !94 VIA P. & O. 
 
 of honeysuckle. It came to me to-day, a 
 basket of it, without a name or message, 
 and I don't know who sent it. Mr. 
 Jerrold perhaps at any rate let me tell 
 you why it makes me feel a little foolish, 
 in spite of its delicious perfume and the 
 memories it calls up. Yesterday at a 
 certain point of the Bubbling Well Eoad 
 we found a gang of coolies at work, 
 mending some of its many holes, and the 
 mafoo made a detour, down a little lane, 
 where I had never driven before, and 
 which for a hundred yards or so skirted 
 a high stucco wall, behind which were 
 tall trees, and I fancy the house of some 
 rich Chinaman. Hanging over this wall 
 at its furthest end were long trails of 
 honeysuckle, and at the risk of being 
 seen, arrested and imprisoned, I got out 
 and picked some. Indeed, I picked a 
 goodly lot, and I buried my face in it, 
 and closed my eyes, and in shutting out
 
 VIA P. & 0. 95 
 
 the light, China no longer existed, and 
 I was back again in the days of our 
 childhood, playing on the wooden seat 
 around the old apple tree, where the 
 honeysuckle smothered seat and tree, 
 and its perfume sweetened our play. I 
 heard the distant roar of the ocean, beat- 
 ing on the New Hampshire shore. I 
 heard the cows mooing, and could 
 see old Michael, and hear the clink of 
 tin pails as he went to milk them. I 
 heard bees buzzing and I heard you 
 laugh, your high sweet trill of childish 
 joy. When at last I raised my face and 
 opened my eyes, we were back on the 
 Bubbling Well Eoad, and I had been 
 smelling a handful of honeysuckle with 
 my eyes shut, quite publicly for about 
 half a mile. 
 
 And this morning a basket of it who 
 from? Boy says the Chinese call it gold 
 and silver flower.
 
 96 VIA P. & O. 
 
 September 29th. 
 
 The heat has really broken, and for 
 the first time there is real freshness in 
 the air. I have no news; nothing has 
 happened. I have seen no one, spoken 
 to no one. Karl and I do speak occa- 
 sionally at dinner, but it can hardly be 
 called conversation, and I have for re- 
 freshment of my soul just two smiles a 
 day. My daily drive is coming to be a 
 pleasure rather than the pain it used to 
 be. Bed and tan liveries seem power- 
 less to hurt me, after I have smiled back 
 into those grave kind eyes, that meet me 
 always either coming or going on my 
 drive. And in the wistful fleeting 
 glance of little Wild Eose I find some- 
 thing so appealing that it warms my 
 solitary heart through and through. 
 Unlike the protecting look which the grey 
 eyes seem to have, the blue eyes of this 
 fair-haired girl seem to be asking for 
 help.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 97 
 
 I suppose it sounds to you rather fool- 
 ish to be reading so much meaning into 
 the glances of two perfect strangers, but 
 that is the compensation for being so 
 much alone. One begins to make a 
 world for oneself and people it as it suits 
 one. 
 
 October 6th. 
 
 Oh, it has been deliciously cool to-day 
 and last night I slept under a double 
 blanket. 
 
 I must begin to think of some warm 
 clothes. Oh, for your help and a fashion 
 book or two. 
 
 October 9th. 
 
 Dr. Mclntyre has asked me to dinner 
 and I have said yes, surely for myself, 
 provisionally for Karl, who knows no 
 law save his own inclination. Fortu- 
 nately in this land of many men and few 
 women, it doesn't much matter. There
 
 98 VIA P. & O. 
 
 are always too many men anyway, and 
 so if at the last moment I send a chit to 
 say that Mr. Freiheit can't come, nobody 
 cares. You know what a chit book is, 
 don 't you ? It 's the little blank book that 
 the coolie carries with the note, and in 
 which the recipient puts either his ini- 
 tials, or a brief answer. My old Japa- 
 nese chit book is full of such entries as 
 these. 
 
 Mrs. Colvin Jones a note Answer 
 So very sorry he can't come but come 
 yourself. 
 
 Mrs. Hazard-Hazard. A note. An- 
 swer So sorry! don't fail us yourself. 
 
 I have a new chit book here. My old 
 one was not quite full, but I did not want 
 to send it, with its past history of in- 
 numerable "sorrys" all over Shanghai. 
 And here I must tell you that there is 
 no code of honour which prevents your 
 running through the pages of your 
 neighbour's chit book, as you ponder
 
 VIA P. & O. 99 
 
 your answer. How else indeed would you 
 know who had been invited to the dinner 
 you are thinking of accepting! How 
 else can you find out whether your in- 
 vitation is dated a day or two later than 
 the others, showing that you were asked 
 to "fill in" in which case of course a 
 proper pride forces you to decline! 
 Even honour must have its basis in rea- 
 son. 
 
 I have been looking back through the 
 pages of my old Japanese book. Just at 
 random here are some answers. 
 
 "Will call as soon as possible." 
 
 That's from the doctor. 
 
 "A thousand apologies will arrange 
 it at once." 
 
 That's from the English Consul, and I 
 don't remember at all what it was that 
 he was apologising and arranging for. 
 
 And here is another. 
 
 "You bet your sweet life I will." 
 
 You won't have much difficulty in
 
 100 VIA P. & O. 
 
 guessing that that was from the Ameri- 
 can Consul. 
 
 And then there are hundreds in Karl's 
 writing, which say, "No, dining at the 
 club." 
 
 It's almost a little life history in itself. 
 I remember that Mrs. Colvin Jones' 
 pages were almost entirely filled with 
 the name of the English Consul. That 
 friendship was what is known as an 
 "affair" and of such long standing that 
 it had taken on the semblance and re- 
 spectability of marriage. To have 
 asked one of them to dinner without the 
 other, would have been to insult them 
 both. 
 
 Mrs. Hazard-Hazard, on the other 
 hand, one of whose seven children had 
 always just swallowed a button, or been 
 bitten by a centipede, had a book quite 
 immodestly filled with the name of the 
 doctor. If only the questions as well as 
 the answers had been given it would
 
 VIA P. & 0. 101 
 
 have made a fairly complete nursery 
 guide. 
 
 Now, I must see what can be worn at 
 the doctor's dinner next week. 
 
 October IQth. 
 
 Boy brought me a tailor this morning. 
 He was a very grand personage, dressed 
 in dark blue brocade, and to my un- 
 trained eye he might have been a man- 
 darin. I felt uncomfortable in asking 
 him to do anything so trivial as to take 
 a few reefs in an old evening gown. 
 
 Everything has got so big for me ; no, I 
 mean, I have got so small for every- 
 thing, that a good deal of altering is 
 necessary. I put on an old blue crepe 
 and then sent for the tailor, and stand- 
 ing before the glass I told him what I 
 wanted done and held out to him some 
 pins. He stood with much majesty be- 
 side me, fanning himself with a little
 
 102 VIA P. & O. 
 
 black fan, and disdained my pins, and 
 taking a pinch of blue crepe between his 
 finger and thumb at my waist line and 
 another pinch at my hips said, 
 "Wanchee take out about two inch. 
 My see. Can do." 
 
 Then he bowed himself out, and my 
 blue crepe neatly folded was entrusted 
 to his care. 
 
 Can any one contend after that that 
 the foreigner does not trust the native? 
 
 Wild Eose looked quite ill to-day, and 
 her eyes were very sad. I tried again to 
 speak to her, but she cantered off. 
 
 October 17th. 
 
 I went to the Doctor's dinner alone. 
 As Karl was not home by half-past 
 seven, I sent my invariable note of 
 apology, and followed it in ten minutes' 
 time, wearing my blue crepe which fits 
 perfectly. With an eye like that pinless
 
 VIA P. & O. 103 
 
 tailor's, a man could make his mark in 
 a dozen professions, from painting to 
 pitching on a baseball nine. 
 
 Mrs. Mclntyre is just back from Ja- 
 pan. She spent the summer in Myan- 
 oshita. She is a dear Scotch body 
 as great a gossip as her husband and of 
 the same good-natured type. 
 
 She had brought back with her in- 
 numerable carved wooden frames lac- 
 quer boxes and painted gauze fans for 
 all this trumpery Japanese stuff I have 
 a great abomination. I was looking at 
 them with her, trying to say something 
 polite about them when in came my 
 friend of the grey eyes, and, Patty dear, 
 old and staid as I am, my heart gave a 
 great jump at the sight of him. Mrs. 
 Mclntyre started forward to introduce 
 him, but he held out his hand so nicely 
 to me and said, "Oh, Mrs. Freiheit and 
 I are old friends," and gave my hand 
 a firm shake.
 
 104 VIA P. & O. 
 
 My dear it's ridiculous I know, but 
 I was happy from that moment, and I 
 forgot the nasty little Japanese curios, 
 and thought of nothing but the sound of 
 his voice. 
 
 There were no other guests except two 
 English globe trotters, who had crossed 
 on Mrs. Mclntyre's steamer from 
 Nagasaki. 
 
 Their talk was all of Japan and its 
 delights. The doctor and his wife 
 joined in their enthusiasm and they all 
 insisted on envying me because I lived 
 there nearly seven years. They must 
 have felt the half heartedness of my re- 
 sponse, for they appealed to Mr. Jer- 
 rold for sympathy, and of course I ex- 
 pected to hear more eulogies, but he only 
 said, "No, I'm not very keen on Japan, 
 it's a trifling sort of country." 
 
 Patty, I could have hugged him then 
 and there. 
 
 While the others were talking he
 
 VIA P. & 0. 105 
 
 turned to me and asked if I was fond 
 of reading. I said yes, and told him the 
 names of some books I had just finished. 
 His smile as he answered was so sweet 
 that it took from the words the slight 
 harshness they might otherwise have 
 had. 
 
 "I didn't mean novels," he said, "I 
 meant real reading. ' ' 
 
 "But, aren't novels reading?" I asked. 
 
 "The good ones are," he said. "The 
 very best of reading but then the good 
 ones are so pitiably few." 
 
 Then I told him that I had no books 
 and got what I could from the circulat- 
 ing library, and he promised to send me 
 some of his own. 
 
 Have I told you how he looks, this 
 friend of mine ! Not handsome not in 
 the least his features are too rugged 
 and too spare for beauty. His face has 
 strength and kindness and deep lines 
 that I think sorrow has put there. The
 
 106 VIA P. & O. 
 
 shape of his head is good and his hair 
 is thin and very shiny and looks as 
 though it had been almost brushed away. 
 
 He is tall and stoops a little, but I 
 think it is the stoop that comes from 
 much thinking, for he is full of vigour 
 and decision in all his movements. It 
 isn't the stoop of age. 
 
 His hands are beautiful long and 
 strong. The hands of a scholar you 
 would say, if you didn't know him to be 
 a business man. But it is his voice that 
 has the greatest charm for me, so deep 
 and yet so clear that I heard it all 
 through dinner no matter who else was 
 talking. I thanked him for stopping the 
 hurdy-gurdy, and he said that it was 
 nothing his duty merely as head of the 
 municipal council to see that it was 
 taken where it would not annoy any one. 
 The doctor told me later, that Mr. Jer- 
 rold had given to the owners, free of
 
 VIA P. & 0. 107 
 
 rent, a piece of land which belongs to 
 him far out on the Zinza Eoad, as the 
 quickest means of getting them to move. 
 
 Thank heaven, I did not thank him for 
 the honeysuckle, for he did not send it. 
 I mentioned honeysuckle casually and he 
 said he had not seen any for a long 
 time. Had forgotten what it looked 
 like. 
 
 And we did not speak of the English 
 Garden, nor of typhoons, nor of tears, 
 nor of occupation. But I thought con- 
 stantly of that day. I wonder if he did. 
 
 October 
 
 Oh, thank you, dearest, for your won- 
 derful letters. Oh, Patty, if you knew 
 what it means to me to get such happy 
 letters. It makes life seem so cheerful 
 a thing that to-day I am actually gay and 
 light hearted and ready to sing I I shut
 
 108 VIA P. & O. 
 
 my eyes and there I am among you all, 
 having tea with you on the lawn, in the 
 shadow of the yew hedge. The children 
 are hegging for cake, and while you say 
 1 ' No " I surreptitiously slip bits of icing 
 into their mouths. You see I must win 
 their love quickly, for I am there such 
 a minute of time. I kiss their curls 
 and their soft little necks and something 
 in me that hurts is comforted. After 
 all they are nearly mine. And then they 
 hear their father coming and scamper 
 off to meet him, and come back, each 
 dragging him by a hand, and you go to 
 meet them, and kiss him, and ask if he 
 is very tired and brush a little dust from 
 his coat, and just here I had to open my 
 eyes and I was back in China again 
 your letters in my hand, but oh, so much 
 better for that little visit. It was so 
 real to me, that I have just caught my- 
 self hoping that the icing wouldn't make 
 the children ill !
 
 VIA P. & O. 109 
 
 October 25M. 
 
 I can only write a few lines, for the 
 mail goes to-night. No news, not a line 
 of news, but the season has begun, al- 
 most every one is back for the winter, 
 and I have been receiving and return- 
 ing calls, and answering dinner invita- 
 tions. How I wish I could refuse them 
 all. How I hate to begin in this new 
 place that old practice of sending Karl's 
 apologies at the last minute. 
 
 I am just in from my drive and have 
 had my two smiles. The weather is 
 beautiful now. Clear with a blue mist 
 in the distance and my vista has taken 
 on a real violet tone, and the Wild Eose 
 and I love it dearly. She was pale to- 
 day, almost a white rose. I saw Ed- 
 warda and Dick stride self-engrossedly 
 past the Bubbling Well. She looks as 
 brisk, as self-possessed, as confident as 
 ever. But that cleft chin was not given 
 him for nothing. Well, we shall see.
 
 110 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Good-bye, my dear one. My arms are 
 around you and the children. 
 
 CAEOLA. 
 
 November 1st. 
 
 I am sick at heart, Patty dear sick 
 at heart and very nearly literally sick 
 too. Disturbed and distressed, dis- 
 gusted and degraded. Besides, I am sad 
 too because one of the small pleasures 
 of life has been taken from me. A hor- 
 rid chattering drive with Mrs. Mclntyre 
 is the cause of it all; but of course I 
 must have learnt the truth from some 
 one in time. I have told you that Mrs. 
 Mclntyre is a harmless gossip, much in- 
 terested in her neighbours, and without, 
 I do believe, a malicious thought in her 
 mind. As we passed carriage after car- 
 riage, she nodded and smiled and would 
 then give me a snap-shot history of its
 
 VIA P. & 0. ill 
 
 occupants. Even when we passed one 
 of those gorgeous equipages that I have 
 told you about, she said quite uncon- 
 cernedly : 
 
 " Those people have changed their 
 liveries. They used to he brown and 
 salmon." 
 
 I said nothing. I didn't know any 
 one ever mentioned "those people." 
 Then as we came in sight of the resting 
 place I saw Wild Eose's slender back 
 and cream-coloured pony ahead of us, 
 and pointed her out, glad that at last I 
 should know who she was. Oh, Patty 
 dear, she is one of them. One of " those 
 people" and who of all men should she 
 belong to but Dick Mannerly. 
 
 Oh, this hideous world, how I loathe 
 it. I wish I could shut my eyes and 
 ears and never open them again ; at least 
 not in this dreadful land, where such 
 things are, and I must know them.
 
 112 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Mrs. Mclntyre was surprised that I 
 should not know all about it. -Every 
 one does. 
 
 This girl, an American, who had been 
 an actress, came here three years ago 
 with a Eussian Prince who deserted her, 
 and she went to Mannerly. She lives 
 in a house, over near the French quar- 
 ter, a new, shambling, untidy part of the 
 settlement, inhabited by Portuguese, and 
 shop keepers, and the poor white trash 
 of this Shanghai world. 
 
 And to think that I thought her sweet, 
 have grown to look for her smile, to feel 
 glad when she seemed bright, and sad 
 for her when she seemed sad. 
 
 Oh, Patty, I am crying I loved her 
 beauty. I loved the droop of her pretty 
 mouth, the exquisite curve from her 
 shoulder to her hip, and the misty blue 
 of her eyes. I was sure she had a soul, 
 and that when I came to know her we 
 would have much to talk about, and now !
 
 VIA P. & O. 113 
 
 Well, that's over. An illusion gone 
 and no doubt it's my own fault, for be- 
 ing, as Karl says, "so damned sym- 
 pathetic and emotional." More and 
 more I see that it doesn't do to give my 
 affections the least leeway. Better be 
 a wooden woman, than suffer such re- 
 pulsion as I am suffering now. 
 
 Probably it is my duty to warn Ed- 
 warda, or to prepare her for what may 
 be a shock to her some day. 
 
 Well, I won't. Surely she is strong 
 enough and self-confident enough to take 
 care of herself, and it's no business of 
 mine anyway. 
 
 As the girl, whose name Mrs. Mcln- 
 tyre says, is Nanette Ward, cantered 
 past us, she averted her head and I was 
 thankful for that. Mrs. Mclntyre said 
 quite calmly, the doctor's wife in her 
 coming to the fore, " Mannerly ought to 
 send her away for a bit. She's looking 
 very seedy."
 
 114 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 1 'Does Dr. Mclntyre look after her?" 
 I managed to blurt out. 
 
 " Mercy no he wouldn't go near such 
 a woman a young Parsee doctor looks 
 after the lot of them.' ' 
 
 November 2nd. 
 
 I can't write to-day, dearest. I don't 
 feel like it. I was getting better and 
 quite cheerful, and then yesterday's 
 drive brought up all that old circle of 
 ideas. The hateful thoughts about 
 those people, the exasperating, half- 
 formed, bitter jealousy of them. Not 
 for myself, but for my kind. I'm not 
 going to drive to-day. I can't face them 
 all. 
 
 November 4th. 
 Nothing, dearest. 
 
 November 8th. 
 
 Still nothing. Oh, if I could just hug 
 the children for one minute.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 115 
 
 November 15th. 
 
 My dear, I determined not to write 
 again until I should have something to 
 say. Yesterday I had no hope that that 
 would be before Christmas. When I 
 woke this morning, I looked forward to 
 as blank and empty a day as any I have 
 spent in the last few years. As far as 
 I knew there were before me only such 
 boring restless hours as any that I have 
 tried to fill week after week with trifling 
 interests. Well, marvels of marvels. I 
 have had a most entrancing day. I got 
 up early this morning, dressed and went 
 to my housekeeping. It consisted of 
 telling the cook that there would be no 
 one for dinner and to have anything he 
 liked. As I was going over yesterday's 
 account to see that he had not squeezed 
 us more than a fair amount, in came 
 Edwarda, brisk, red cheeked, and com- 
 pelling. 
 
 "You probably hate to be routed out
 
 116 VIA P. & O. 
 
 in the morning," she said, "but you 
 must come. I had to come into town 
 for something we needed at the hospital 
 and I'm going to take you back with me. 
 Surely it's cool enough now. Get your 
 things on and I'll order the carriage," 
 and with that she rang the bell, gave the 
 order for the carriage to come at once, 
 then sat down and drew a bit of knitting 
 from her pocket. It is her laudable but 
 very irritating boast that she never 
 wastes time. 
 
 There is no gainsaying such methods 
 as those and I was soon ready, indeed I 
 hurried with hat, gloves, and veil, with 
 a feeling I have not had since Mademoi- 
 selle used to call to us "Depechez Mes- 
 demoiselles, depechez." Perhaps that 
 air of command is part of her charm for 
 Mannerly. Perhaps he likes to be 
 bossed. Weak people generally do. 
 
 We didn't mention Mannerly 's name 
 and I was glad. I could not have
 
 VIA P. & O. 117 
 
 brought myself to speak of him without 
 effort. We drove through endless slums 
 and Edwarda seemed unconscious of the 
 vile sights and vile smells, though she 
 said some scathing things about Chinese 
 ignorance of the first principles of 
 cleanliness and sanitation. I can't tell 
 you how funny her attitude toward 
 China is. She is quite contemptuous of 
 its age, its learning, its traditions and 
 its art. I feel differently about it dis- 
 like the life here as I must, still China 
 vast unknowable China, full of great 
 overcrowded cities teeming with life, of 
 barren plains, of unsealed mountains, of 
 rivers whose source it would take 
 months and months to reach great si- 
 lent vague China fills me with awe. I 
 never cease to marvel either at her age 
 her literature (the best of it written be- 
 fore the days of Christ) or most wonder- 
 ful of all her unchanging face. Every- 
 thing here, Patty, is as it was centuries
 
 118 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 ago. When I see a Chinese cobbler cob- 
 bling a shoe, I know that when America 
 was peopled with savages, a Chinese 
 shoe was exactly as it is now, and if we 
 could see a cobbler of that day, we would 
 see the same methods, same tools, same 
 materials, and same combination of col- 
 our. And more than that, probably the 
 cobbler's thoughts are very much the 
 same to-day as they were then. I said 
 this to Edwarda as she drove out, and 
 told her of the curious appeal it makes to 
 my imagination to realise that as far as 
 appearances go, we might in these Chi- 
 nese streets be living in the reign of Ku- 
 bla Kahn. Think of that, and then think 
 how many times the style and methods 
 of making shoes have changed in our 
 lands since then, for Kubla Kahn lived 
 about the time of Henry IV (I've been 
 reading some Chinese history lent me 
 by Mr. Jerrold). Think of the buskin 
 shoe of that day and then think of our
 
 VIA P. & O. 119 
 
 shoes to-day, of our Walkenphasts, and 
 our Sorosis. Think of our high shoes 
 and low shoes, our oxford ties, our Gib- 
 sons, our French heels and Spanish 
 heels (you see I read the American ad- 
 vertisements). Think of the factories 
 where they are made, the noise, the fa- 
 tigue, the hum of machinery, the factory 
 problems, the clash of Capital and La- 
 bour and then come back and look at my 
 Chinese cobbler cobbling in the sun 
 with the quietest industry in the world 
 as his father and hundreds of great 
 grandfathers have done before him. 
 Truly doesn't it give you an immense 
 awe of the restraint of China ? ' ' Bah, ' ' 
 said Edwarda, "it's time they woke up." 
 
 After leaving the slums we came to an 
 open country road, wandering appar- 
 ently quite aimlessly through fields 
 dotted with Chinese graves and of har- 
 vested cotton. 
 
 Just outside the hospital compound is
 
 120 VIA P. & O. 
 
 a little pond in which some ducks were 
 swimming, and really, Patty, that's the 
 most homelike sight I've seen in seven 
 years. 
 
 The hospital is a collection of ugly 
 stucco buildings held together by a high 
 stucco wall but after half an hour in 
 the company of the busy women in it, 
 you forget its ugliness, and even the 
 white walls and stone floors and rows of 
 cheap iron beds begin to look homelike 
 and inviting. Edwarda pushed me as 
 we entered toward a fine-looking woman 
 of fifty or so, whose kind deep-set eyes 
 twinkled behind glasses. 
 
 "Dr. Simmonds," she said, "I've 
 brought Mrs. Freiheit out. She's a 
 lazy, luxurious woman, with plenty of 
 time and money, and she ought to help 
 us." 
 
 It was hardly a flattering introduc- 
 tion, and I think Dr. Simmonds felt its
 
 VIA P. & 0. 121 
 
 tactlessness more than I did, for she put 
 her hand on my shoulder and said 
 
 "My dear, we want your sympathy, 
 that's all. Come and see some of our 
 patients." 
 
 She was making her first round of the 
 day, having already that morning 
 amputated a girl's foot, and brought a 
 baby into the world. 
 
 Oh, Patty, I never spent such a morn- 
 ing. We went from bed to bed, the pa- 
 tients being all women, of course, and 
 their stolid faces lighted up, and they 
 groaned and smiled as the case might be, 
 and told their symptoms, while Dr. 
 Simmonds held their wrists, and read 
 their charts and patted their shoulders 
 just as if they had been white and 
 Christian. And then we went into the 
 maternity ward, and I held that tiny 
 new born thing, that was tied up like a 
 bundle in a wadded square of red and
 
 122 VIA P. & O. 
 
 yellow calico. I kissed its little yellow 
 wrinkled cheek, and it felt just like a 
 flower beneath my lips. Oh, Patty, you 
 can't know how I felt toward it. I 
 seemed to hear still the fluttering wings 
 of the angels who had brought it. 
 
 I asked about the mother and found 
 that she was very, very poor, and in dis- 
 grace as well, for this was her fourth 
 girl and she has no boys. Dr. Sim- 
 monds let me send her some money, 
 which she said might help the fate of the 
 new baby. 
 
 Another patient, a girl of seventeen, 
 may die. Ah Fu is her name, and she 
 has run away from her husband, and 
 was found dying of starvation and ex- 
 haustion about ten miles from here. A 
 Chinese Samaritan brought her in, but 
 it may be too late, for she had eaten 
 nothing but roots and grasses for two 
 weeks. She has spoken very little, but 
 Dr. Simmonds has gathered part of her
 
 VIA P. & O. 123 
 
 story. She is a third wife and without 
 children (a terrible disgrace, but not, I 
 should think, irrevocable at seventeen) 
 and such get little kindness in a 
 Chinese household, especially if the first 
 wife and mother-in-law have ugly tem- 
 pers. They fear at the hospital that 
 the family may find her, for it is unwise 
 to antagonise the natives and violate 
 their sense of justice. Poor Ah Fu. 
 
 The best of my day was the lunch 
 hour. It seems that the sick mothers 1 
 may bring their older children, boys or 
 girls, and they are fed, amused and 
 taken care of by the Chinese helpers. 
 To-day the wards were very full, some 
 of the helpers were away, and no one 
 to feed these tiny ones their bowls of 
 rice and boiled cabbage. I volunteered, 
 and oh, what a time I had. At first they 
 were very shy, but soon the bigger ones 
 began to eat stolidly and very noisily 
 with chop sticks, while I fed the tiny
 
 124 VIA P. & O. 
 
 ones with a spoon. The boys were 
 dressed in straight frocks of bright 
 colours, with black satin caps on their 
 heads, from which protruded little stiff 
 embryo pigtails, and the little girls 
 wore coloured ribbon in their double 
 braids and bangles on their fat brown 
 wrists. 
 
 Oh, funny little moon-faced things, 
 what were you born for? Is it possible 
 that God has planned a destiny for you 
 all and that even the little superfluous 
 girl born this morning has a place in 
 the scheme? 
 
 After lunch, which I took with the 
 staff, a good lunch, served in a simple 
 New England fashion (I wish they knew 
 how they achieved both the atmosphere 
 and the doughnuts) I went up to Ed- 
 warda's room. It looks like the room of 
 a college boy. The walls were covered 
 with* coloured pennants and sporting 
 posters and her window sill was filled
 
 VIA P. & 0. 125 
 
 with pots of bright scarlet geraniums. 
 I suppose Dick sent them. I have been 
 trying to think of a word to describe 
 Edwarda. I have found one, and 
 though I don't know whether it can be 
 correctly used to describe a person, it 
 fits Edwarda in my mind exactly. 
 
 She is the most succinct person I ever 
 knew. 
 
 November 20th. 
 
 I have just spent another wonderful, 
 full, busy day at the hospital. They 
 were still short handed, and they let me 
 feed the children, and also a tiny baby 
 whose mother had just died. I longed 
 to adopt it and take it home. 
 
 What fun it would be to wash and 
 dress it and take care of it. What 
 funny greedy little mouths they have. 
 Can you picture Karl's face if I took it 
 home! 
 
 Ah Fu is a little better. Dr. Sim-
 
 126 VIA P. & O. 
 
 monds thinks that she will live. They 
 are beginning to be worried, for a man 
 came yesterday inquiring for a run- 
 away girl. The wife of the head man 
 of his village. Her name he said was 
 Ah Ching. "No such name on the 
 books," said Dr. Simmonds. Of course 
 Ah Fu may have given a wrong name. 
 Dr. Simmonds says it will avoid com- 
 plications if they do not ask her. 
 
 The man, however, was not satisfied. 
 He was seen again at the gates last 
 evening. 
 
 November 25th. 
 
 Our first dinner went off well. Karl, 
 who takes an interest in our social debut 
 and who, no matter how casual he may 
 be in the matter of other people's din- 
 ners, is punctilious as to his own was 
 home in good time and in good temper. 
 He liked my arrangement of flowers and 
 said I was "undoubtedly clever at that
 
 VIA P. & 0. 127 
 
 sort of thing." This was because I had 
 not draped around a heavy silver bowl 
 of Chinese workmanship, a dozen or 
 more yards of cobwebby silk, the in- 
 variable Shanghai table arrangement. 
 I was the more determined to shun this 
 particular silk when I learned that it is 
 a Chinese funeral decoration, and I 
 didn't want my dinner to even remotely 
 resemble a funeral. Most of the dinners 
 I have been to here have had just that 
 suggestion. We were twenty in all I 
 can't remember some of them even now. 
 The women were all English, rather 
 badly dressed, with soft voices, masses 
 of fuzzy fringe and innumerable hoop 
 rings. Why do English women never 
 have anything but hoop rings? I con- 
 sulted Mrs. Mclntyre about precedence. 
 This is an important matter as you 
 know, and guidance is necessary in a 
 new port. She carefully studied my 
 list, and then placed the French Consul
 
 128 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 on my right (the French Consul is the 
 victorious and courageous combatant of 
 a dozen duels) and to my great delight, 
 Mr. Jerrold on my left. She gave Karl 
 the wife of the Commissioner of Cus- 
 toms, on his right, and the wife of the 
 Hong Kong Shanghai Bank on his left. 
 (The Bank himself didn't come.) She 
 put herself modestly about midway be- 
 tween us. 
 
 The talk was almost entirely of 
 ponies, stocks and the coming races, and 
 if you think for an instant that I mean 
 anything so interesting as the human 
 races, you are mistaken. 
 
 My left-hand neighbour was rather 
 quiet. I am beginning to see that this 
 is a habit with him. I had to talk, of 
 course, a good deal to Monsieur Four- 
 chon, and when I could finally turn with 
 much relief to Mr. Jerrold, he said quite 
 simply, 
 
 "What is your Christian namer*
 
 VIA P. & O. 129 
 
 when I told Mm he repeated it several 
 times. 
 
 "Carola Freiheit what a happy 
 name! With such a name you should 
 sing like a lark," he said; "do you?" 
 
 "No," I answered, "I don't fit my 
 name in any way at all. ' ' And then, as 
 I felt that sounded rather hitter, a tone 
 which for Karl's sake, and my own 
 pride's sake, perhaps the latter only, I 
 do my best to avoid, I said the first 
 thing that occurred to me. , 
 
 "Your question had a very Chinese 
 flavour. Would you like to ask my age 
 next?" 
 
 "Yes," he said, "what is it?" And 
 when I said twenty-nine, he looked very 
 intently at me for a minute and then 
 said, 
 
 "Indeed, I thought you were older." 
 I laughed. I wasn't a bit hurt. His 
 grey eyes looked so kindly into mine, 
 with such evident interest that I don't
 
 130 VIA P. & O. 
 
 care if he thought I was fifty. And 
 then, Patty, he began to talk to me of 
 the books he had lent me, and of others 
 to come. He spoke of Emerson as my 
 countryman, and when I told him that 
 my grandfather had known Emerson, he 
 murmured, "What a privilege what a 
 privilege ! ' ' and just then from the other 
 end of the room I heard a voice saying 
 with much warmth: 
 
 "I tell you, on a wet track, Corkscrew 
 doesn't stand a chance. " 
 
 Oh, Patty, he is different from the 
 others, this friend of mine. 
 
 November 26th. 
 
 Patty, I am a weak creature. I have 
 always secretly feared it. To-day 
 proves it beyond a doubt. I have 
 avoided the Bubbling Well Eoad for 
 many days. I have been walking in- 
 stead usually down on the Bund, and
 
 VIA P. & O. 131 
 
 through the English Gardens. Some- 
 times I meet Mr. Jerrold and we talk 
 of things that lie beyond these yellow 
 waters. 
 
 We ask each other all kinds of thrill- 
 ing questions. 
 
 "What is your religion? What do 
 you believe ! " I asked once. 
 
 "A little of all religion," he said, 
 "and all of none," and then wanted to 
 know my beliefs. 
 
 Sometimes he talks politics and I lis- 
 ten. He believes in a moderate kind of 
 socialism. He hates injustice in all 
 things. The only thing we never talk 
 of is love. And yet I know that love is 
 no negligible thing to him for once in 
 discussing a book in which a man had 
 set himself a difficult task and had 
 accomplished it, he said 
 
 "You see he was spurred by the 
 strongest motive power in the world. 
 A man's passion for a woman."
 
 132 VIA P. & O. 
 
 I wanted to go back to the Bund to- 
 day but I had to pay some calls on the 
 Zinza Eoad, and so perforce we turned 
 in the direction of the sluggish bubbles. 
 I had paid my calls and on the way back, 
 my mafoo, who would not be a China- 
 man if he were not a slave to habit, 
 stopped at the resting place and there 
 was Nanette Ward. She was within ten 
 feet of my carriage, on her cream pony, 
 but with a changed and piteous face, 
 and then and there, Patty, some inner 
 door of understanding seemed to open 
 in my brain and I had an insight into 
 that girl's heart and mind. She looked 
 at me, and her eyes were full of shame 
 and anguish. This is the day she has 
 been dreading, the day when I would 
 know the truth and no longer smile at 
 her. She dropped her eyes, and when 
 she lifted them, it was to look out on the 
 little open space to the trees beyond 
 which we have both loved, and her
 
 VIA P. & 0. 133 
 
 eyes were full of tears. I could not 
 help watching her. I could not help 
 the sudden rush of pity and remorse 
 that came to me. I understood so 
 clearly the appeal that has always been 
 in her look. I longed for one impulsive 
 moment to jump out to run to her and 
 to hold out my hands. But there it was, 
 the barrier between my kind and hers, 
 and I lacked the courage to cross it. 
 However, I waited for her to look at me 
 again. I knew that she must if neither 
 of us moved, and in a moment she did, 
 and then, my dear, I smiled and nodded 
 to her, and at the sight of her wan sur- 
 prised look and the gentleness and the 
 timidity of her answering smile, as 
 though she could hardly believe that I 
 was acting in the old friendly way, my 
 eyes, too, filled with tears, and there we 
 sat for a moment more, looking at each 
 other through a mist. Of course it was 
 a ridiculous position. I find it a little
 
 134 VIA P. & O. 
 
 ludicrous as I look back on it now, but 
 I didn't laugh then, no, not even when 
 she pulled a little handkerchief from 
 her pocket and wiped her eyes and blew 
 her nose before she trotted away. 
 
 Patty, Patty, isn't it a dreadful 
 world? That girl doesn't belong where 
 she is. I know it. Some misfortune, 
 some great mistake has put her there, 
 and now it is too late. Why should 
 there be this sympathy between us, for 
 there certainly is a bond that links us, 
 no matter how wide the gulf between. 
 
 Perhaps in some previous life we were 
 sisters just as you and I. Perhaps 
 but what is the good of wondering about 
 it? There it is. I feel nearer to her, 
 more akin to her, than to any woman I 
 have met here, and yet we have never 
 spoken to each other, only looked to- 
 gether at the same poor little view, and 
 smiled in our loneliness and exile. 
 
 And between us is that high wall made
 
 VIA P. & 0. 135 
 
 of social convention, and the dictates of 
 men, which she may not try to climb, and 
 I will not. 
 
 Well, one thing my afternoon has done 
 for me. It has taken much of the bit- 
 terness out of that one and only driv- 
 ing place. Had she thrown back her 
 head and stared at me defiantly, as do 
 the others, it would have been different. 
 
 As it is I can smile at her again, and 
 I shall go to the Bubbling Well Eoad 
 sometimes, for the purpose of doing it. 
 
 We have had a telephone put in. 
 They are uncommon here in private 
 houses, and just why Karl wants one 
 in the house I don't know. 
 
 Probably because it will be easier to 
 telephone than to send a chit. 
 
 November 30^. 
 
 My child, such an excitement ! When 
 I reached the hospital to-day Dr. Sim-
 
 136 VIA P. & O. 
 
 monds took me into her own particular 
 study and shut the door. Her face was 
 very grave and she said she wanted 
 help. 
 
 It is about little Ah Fu, the runaway 
 wife, who walked forty weary miles to 
 escape sufferings, which must have been 
 unthinkable to cause a Chinawoman to 
 revolt. 
 
 She is almost well now, and must soon 
 leave the hospital, and how to get her 
 away and where to take her is the prob- 
 lem. They feel quite sure at the hos- 
 pital that her family have a suspicion of 
 her whereabouts, for a man thought to 
 be either her husband or her brother-in- 
 law has stationed himself for the past 
 week at the hospital gate, and when he 
 leaves it he posts another man in his 
 place. He will not tell his business to 
 the gate man, but says he is waiting. 
 Patience is the Chinaman's long suit, 
 and there he may stay a month or a
 
 VIA P. & O. 137 
 
 year. There is only this one gate out 
 of the compound which is enclosed in a 
 ten-foot stucco wall, and through this 
 gate Ah Fu must pass, or else climb the 
 wall, the thought of which made Dr. 
 Simmonds smile. Fortunately, Ah Fu 
 has natural feet had she not had she 
 could never have escaped. So you see 
 that " golden lilies" as the Chinese call 
 the poor little maimed members, are a 
 wise barbarity as well as a grace, from 
 the Chinaman's standpoint. 
 
 All this Dr. Simmonds and I talked 
 over, and finally I proposed that Ah Fu 
 come to me as an amah. My old fat 
 amah left me a week ago, and I have 
 not got another, and although it is 
 usually customary for the "boy" to sup- 
 ply the household servants, still it is not 
 an unheard of thing for one foreign 
 woman to recommend an amah to an- 
 other. I can pretend that I have 
 got Ah Fu through a friend. Dr. Sim-
 
 138 VIA P. & O. 
 
 monds was so grateful and the only 
 trouble now is to get her through the 
 gate without the knowledge of the man 
 who waits. "We have decided that I 
 shall wait for the first rainy day, so 
 that I can bring the brougham and that 
 I shall take her away with me. How 
 I am to conceal from the servants where 
 she comes from I don't know. There 
 are no cabs for hire in Shanghai or we 
 might change from one to another as 
 they do in detective tales. I shall think 
 it out carefully and arrange some 
 plan. Help I must, for much hangs on 
 it. The hospital might lose the confi- 
 dence of the neighbourhood if it became 
 known that they had harboured and wil- 
 fully concealed a runaway wife. There 
 is no sympathy extended to that class 
 of criminal. You can easily see that all 
 the wives would be running away if it 
 were made easy, and for the doctors to 
 go counter to the Chinese sense of jus-
 
 VIA P. & O. 139 
 
 tice might bring them into all kinds of 
 trouble. 
 
 It's easy for missionaries to incur 
 suspicion in China (why, I myself, have 
 doubted their sincerity) and many a 
 man has had to flee for his life, or lose 
 it, on the mere suspicion of having eaten 
 Chinese babies I 
 
 December 2nd. 
 
 We dined last night with the Com- 
 missioner of Customs. I had the happi- 
 ness of sitting next to Mr. Jerrold and 
 I told him all my difficulty about Ah Fu. 
 
 He looked very grave indeed and 
 warned me at once to talk in a way that 
 the Chinese boys, moving like blue-robed 
 ghosts behind us, could not understand. 
 It is so hard for me to consider them 
 at all, to remember that they are any- 
 thing but well-trained, placid servants. 
 Mr. Jerrold and Dr. Simmonds seem 
 never to forget that they are very hu-
 
 140 VIA P. & O. 
 
 man and they credit them with a curi- 
 osity as great as our own. 
 
 "Be careful," he said; "within a foot 
 of you may be the open ears of the 
 lady's husband's cousin." 
 
 Then he went on to urge me to have 
 nothing to do with the matter, saying 
 that I was in no way responsible, but 
 after I had told him again that I must 
 help Dr. Simmonds and that I had de- 
 termined to make it impossible for Ah 
 Fu to be taken back to her suffering he 
 looked very quietly at me for a few sec- 
 onds and then said he would help me. 
 After dinner, while I was sitting at the 
 piano, he came to me again. We could 
 talk much more freely for there were no 
 listeners. Again he said he thought it 
 would be better to leave Ah Fu's destiny 
 alone. 
 
 "It's a serious, sometimes even a dan- 
 gerous thing, to meddle in a Chinaman's 
 affairs," he said; "we don't know who
 
 VIA P. & O. 141 
 
 Ah Fu is. From the fact that she is be- 
 ing so persistently watched, I feel sure 
 she is the wife of a man of property and 
 possibly influence. She may even be a 
 petty Mandarin's wife, with heaven 
 knows what affiliations with our own 
 Shanghai merchants. You don 't want to 
 involve your husband or his business in 
 any unpleasantness." 
 
 As he spoke of Karl, I looked over at 
 him, where he stood smoking by the man- 
 telpiece, very evidently bored. I sup- 
 pose he was wondering how soon I 
 would make a move, so that he could be 
 off to the club, or to whatever amuse- 
 ment he had planned for himself after 
 the boredom of a dinner party. He 
 looked very handsome, the fire lighting 
 up his profile, which is like some won- 
 derful cameo in the beauty of its lines. 
 
 What a delight his face used to be to 
 my eyes until Quite suddenly, I found 
 myself very angry I couldn't help it.
 
 142 VIA P. & O. 
 
 I turned back to those kind grey eyes 
 that were looking rather stern and ob- 
 stinate and I said, much more ve- 
 hemently than I wanted to 
 
 "I'm going to save her even if she's 
 only a Chinawoman. I am going to give 
 her quiet and peace. I am going to 
 show her that there is kindness in the 
 world, and that a woman isn't a hunted 
 beast for men to trap and torture. I 
 don't care what the risk is I am going 
 to give that woman a taste of freedom ! ' ' 
 
 I wish I had said it more quietly. 
 Why couldn't I have just argued it out 
 on humanitarian grounds like any other 
 philanthropic project ? 
 
 I'm afraid my voice sounded like the 
 cry of a hurt woman who longed to cure 
 somebody else's hurt, because she 
 couldn't cure her own. 
 
 I don't know what it is. I cannot act 
 with him as I do with others. The bar- 
 riers have a way of falling down with-
 
 VIA P. & 0. 143 
 
 out warning. My pride seems to dis- 
 solve when he looks at me; I have the 
 feeling of wanting to complain. 
 
 December IQth. 
 
 Ah Fu's fate has been decided by the 
 Gods the Gods being Mr. Jerrold and 
 your sister, and now that it is all over, 
 and she is safely on her way to Japan. 
 I must tell you about it, my dearest. 
 
 It has been no easy thing to accom- 
 plish. 
 
 Without Mr. Jerrold 's help I should 
 have been quite powerless to save her, 
 and as it was I don't know how near 
 we came to failing. If I were not glad 
 for Ah Fu 's sake, I should still be thank- 
 ful for my own, that her affairs seemed 
 to require my meddling fingers, for, 
 Patty dear, it has brought me near, and 
 I have looked deep into the kindest and 
 most generous heart in the world.
 
 144 VIA P. & O. 
 
 As I sat here thinking before I began 
 this letter, I realised that it is not every 
 sister to whom another could write the 
 very inside of her mind. 
 
 So many would misunderstand, or 
 worse than that, would not believe. But 
 between you and me there is our com- 
 pact of truth; so you know that I am 
 showing you every nook and cranny of 
 my heart ; and that there exists nothing 
 in these nooks and crannies that I do 
 not tell you of. I have seen much of 
 Mr. Jerrold in this affair of Ah Fu. 
 It has been a bothersome thing to ar- 
 range, and all the planning even to the 
 smallest detail has been his. 
 
 He is so good, so good and so clear 
 headed. I don't know which quality I 
 love him most for. 
 
 There, that is the word I am afraid 
 you will jump at, and tremble over, and 
 hope is a mistake on my part and a meant 
 for "like." But it is not a mistake, I
 
 VIA P. & O. 145 
 
 do love him, but not in a way you need 
 fear. He is my friend, and I never 
 knew the value of that word before. 
 
 It isn't heart love, Patty, it's head 
 love. 
 
 I can't say like about a man to whom 
 I feel such gratitude, such warmth, such 
 real affection as I do toward him. 
 
 Remember, I am not a baby! I am 
 twenty-nine, and I have seen a good deal 
 of men, and women and the world ; and 
 I know a great deal, far more than I 
 want to remember now, about love. I 
 know, too, that often when we think our- 
 selves most wise, we are really most 
 foolish, and so I have tried to look 
 squarely and like an outsider at this 
 feeling of mine for David Jerrold and 
 this is what I find. I admire him with 
 all my mind. I like to be with him. I 
 love to hear him talk. It seems to me 
 that he knows everything but there 
 isn't a heart throb in it all.
 
 146 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 Did I not know so very well what the 
 other love is, I wouldn't be so sure; but 
 a woman who has lived five glorious 
 months, when the sound of a voice, or 
 the fall of a foot, could send all the 
 blood to her heart, is in no danger of 
 making a mistake. What he feels to- 
 wards me, I don't know. I think it is 
 a mixture of pity and kindness. He 
 treats me sometimes with a humorous 
 gentleness and sometimes with a seri- 
 ousness that is almost stern. It is quite 
 impossible for me to act when I am with 
 him. My role of normally happy wife 
 drops from me in the most unexpected 
 ways. I have never said to him one 
 direct word about my life, but I know 
 that he guesses, though I have no idea 
 how much. I think he feels an almost 
 fatherly feeling for me there is nearly 
 twenty years' difference in our ages 
 and oh, I can't explain any more. I 
 must just say in plain English there
 
 VIA P. & O. 147 
 
 isn't any man and woman feeling be- 
 tween us. 
 
 Well, dear, I have never come quite 
 so near to excitement and a sense of 
 danger and mystery as I did during 
 these three days when we abducted Ah 
 Fu. 
 
 Without Mr. Jerrold's grave view of 
 the thing I should have thought very lit- 
 tle about it. I would have gone about 
 it much too openly, and landed myself 
 perhaps, 'and certainly Karl, in some 
 kind of unpleasantness. Even as it is, 
 it is uncomfortable to know that the 
 servants may suspect some kind of 
 mystery, but Mr. Jerrold says, what 
 they suspect isn't important it's what 
 they know that might do damage and 
 I don't think they know anything. 
 
 On Tuesday I went to the hospital and 
 told them that our plans were made and 
 that on the next day I would come for 
 Ah Fu. Now that the poor thing is up
 
 148 VIA P. & O. 
 
 and about, she is a wan looking creature 
 indeed, with a face almost as expres- 
 sionless as the rest of her race. Per- 
 haps when she gets really strong some 
 animation may come back to her. 
 There must be character beneath her 
 stolid looks for it meant both courage 
 and intelligence to do what she did. I 
 took a general survey of her figure, for 
 she was to make her escape in my 
 clothes, and I wanted to know what to 
 bring. 
 
 Does it not seem ridiculous? I could 
 not take her directly to my house from 
 the hospital in either native or foreign 
 dress, and some place where she could 
 change back into her own clothes had 
 to be found. Mr. Jerrold found the 
 place, as he seems to find everything I 
 need quite easily, and arranged with 
 Tom Brooks who lives in a bungalow 
 off the Maloo, and is looked after 
 by one servant only, because he dislikes
 
 VIA P. & 0. 149 
 
 the natives, to let us stop there as 
 though to tea, and send his servant off 
 on some errand. 
 
 I took Ah Fu straight there from the 
 Hospital, and dismissed my carriage, 
 and Mr. Jerrold came for us in his and 
 took us home. Tom Brooks was of 
 course in the secret no one else was to 
 know of it. If any one saw two foreign 
 ladies go into a bachelor 's house, and one 
 foreign lady and one native woman come 
 out, it certainly may have looked queer 
 but I think the darkness covered our 
 exit, and no one I suppose bothers much 
 about what happens in bachelor houses 
 anyway. Had we been able to find some 
 woman's house to go to, it would have 
 been better, but every woman of our 
 acquaintance has a household of at least 
 a dozen servants. I wish you could 
 have been with me when we dressed 
 Ah Fu. Dr. Simmonds and I superin- 
 tended the job, and quite often we had to
 
 150 VIA P. & O. 
 
 stop and sit on the floor and rock to and 
 fro in our merriment. Ah Fu didn't 
 mind our laughing in the least, and in- 
 deed when I think how unreservedly and 
 completely she gave herself into our 
 hands I find something more pathetic 
 than funny about it. We were rather 
 sketchy about the undergarments 
 stockings and shoes were essential, but 
 Ah Fu's form was not designed for my 
 armour, and so they (the armour) were 
 discarded altogether, and under my long 
 ulster it didn't matter, although my old 
 rain skirt and an old silk blouse bulged 
 and sagged underneath in a dreadful 
 manner. 
 
 Her hair we did as we could; such 
 straight, coarse, unmanageable hair. It 
 took packages of hairpins to hold it all. 
 As I approached Ah Fu with a hat pin, 
 I saw something that was almost dis- 
 may in her eyes, but only for a moment,
 
 VIA P. & O. 151 
 
 and I think had it been a carving knife, 
 and I had made a pass at her head with 
 it she would have showed no more emo- 
 tion than that briefly dismayed glance. 
 We put a heavy green veil over her face 
 and pulled a pair of gloves on her slim 
 yellow hands. Beautiful hands they 
 are, with long almond-shaped nails. Al- 
 most all Orientals have these lovely 
 hands and arms. No matter how round 
 and heavy their faces, nor how squat 
 their bodies, their hands are modelled 
 on delicate lines. I think the Creator 
 when he invented the type, made the 
 head first and then so regretted its 
 ugliness, that he added the slender 
 hands as a compensation. I never for- 
 get the rows and rows of pretty hands 
 and arms that pick the stems from 
 the tea leaves in the big tea gar- 
 dens in Japan. What wrist move- 
 ment ; it reminded me of a pair of hum-
 
 152 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 ming birds darting their little heads un- 
 erringly in and out of a mass of honey 
 flowers. 
 
 Well, her hands covered, there was my 
 automaton, with whom I could not ex- 
 change a syllable, ready to walk out with 
 me into the unknown. Of course it had 
 been explained to her by Dr. Simmonds, 
 who speaks a dozen Chinese dialects, 
 that I would take care of her; that she 
 was to do just as I said (if she could by 
 any chance guess what it was) and that 
 when we got to my house, she was to 
 learn from my boy the duties of amah. 
 I had told the boy that I was expecting 
 that afternoon an untrained amah, who 
 had been recommended to me. Ah Fu, 
 we knew, could be trusted to give an ac- 
 count of herself which would not endan- 
 ger her safety. Her name we knew was 
 fictitious, and her prevarications, as Dr. 
 Simmonds said, however at variance 
 with Christian teaching, were absolutely
 
 VIA P. & 0. 153 
 
 necessary. Dr. Simmonds is always a 
 woman first and a missionary after- 
 wards. Edwarda, on the contrary, when 
 she learned that Ah Fu's escape was by 
 means of lies and subterfuge washed 
 her hands of the whole affair, for which 
 I was very thankful. Edwarda 's tal- 
 ents lie in the operating room, not in 
 the sick room. 
 
 We passed the gates and through a 
 little knot of Chinamen, without inci- 
 dent. Ah Fu crouching back as far as 
 she could in her corner. It is needless 
 to say that we drove in silence. Once, 
 feeling how alone and frightened she 
 must be, I took her hand and patted it. 
 She left it apathetically in mine, but per- 
 haps she felt some comfort from my 
 dumb show of sympathy. 
 
 Tom Brooks himself opened his door 
 for us, as we had arranged, and Ah Fu 
 who had her bundle of clothes under my 
 ulster was quickly back again in her
 
 154 VIA P. & O. 
 
 proper shape and my clothes wrapped 
 in a small bundle I carried under the 
 ulster which I put on. 
 
 Truly I think I would have made a 
 splendid conspirator. We did not wait 
 long for Mr. Jerrold, and were soon 
 squeezed tight into his brougham, I sit- 
 ting in the middle. Now that the fatal 
 step has been taken he talks no more of 
 danger and unpleasantness, but laughs 
 at me and calls me "Mrs. Philan- 
 thropy." I enjoyed the short dark half 
 hour of our drive home. There was a 
 sense of satisfaction in having accom- 
 plished my end, and besides that the 
 sense of security and peace that I al- 
 ways have in his presence. He dropped 
 us at our compound gate, thinking it bet- 
 ter not to come in, and I sent Ah Fu 
 round to the back door. After seeing 
 from a distance that she was safely in- 
 side, I rang my own bell and entered as 
 though I had walked home, as I often do.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 155 
 
 I assigned Ah Fu a room in our part 
 of the house, and I think now it was a 
 mistake, and may have roused the 
 curiosity and antagonism of the other 
 servants; but I could not send her into 
 the servants ' quarters to which many 
 Chinese have access every day. 
 
 Next day I gave her some mending 
 to do, which she did earnestly but 
 abominably, and I began to feel that in 
 return for my pains I was to have a 
 very unskilful amah. For two days all 
 was quiet, but the third morning, as soon 
 as she came into my room I saw that 
 she was in distress. Her stolid face was 
 drawn and she had a hunted look in her 
 round black eyes. 
 
 Of course I could not ask Boy to inter- 
 pret her trouble so again I could only 
 pat her hand and run to the telephone 
 and ask Dr. Simmonds to come to our 
 aid. She came to lunch and once in my 
 room with the door shut, Ah Fu poured
 
 156 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 forth a torrent of guttural sounds, which 
 all meant that in peeking through the 
 curtains of her room she had seen her 
 brother-in-law at our gate seated on a 
 stool waiting. He was probably wait- 
 ing to question the servants, and as they 
 would be unable to give him any clear 
 account of the only female servant in 
 the house, his suspicions would be con- 
 firmed, or perhaps he would wait until 
 he had caught a glimpse of her, and the 
 idea of having him there as long as I 
 kept Ah Fu housed, possibly all winter, 
 was very unpleasant. It was a dilemma, 
 and I had but one idea, and that was to 
 ask Mr. Jerrold's advice and help again. 
 I could not telephone him the circum- 
 stances, so I wrote it all out hurriedly, 
 and sent it off by a coolie, and in half 
 an hour he rang me up. 
 
 Well, as a conspirator, I am obliged 
 to give him first place! In just a few 
 minutes he had decided on his plan. He
 
 VIA P. & O. 157 
 
 asked me what we were doing that even- 
 ing and finding that Karl was going to a 
 stag dinner at the German Consulate 
 said he had a box for some private 
 theatricals and asked if I and the lady 
 staying with me would give him the 
 pleasure of our company. He asked us 
 to be ready and waiting in the lower 
 hall at 8.30 and that he would call for 
 us. He said that as my friend seemed 
 to have rather a cold he thought it 
 would be well for her to wrap up, as it 
 was going to be a damp night ; he asked 
 if she had a warm ulster, she could wear, 
 and I said she had. It was all he dared 
 to say, he told me afterwards, to show 
 that he wanted Ah Fu in foreign clothes, 
 for he was talking in an office sur- 
 rounded by both Chinese and English 
 clerks. He told me also to ask Ed- 
 warda, whom I didn't want in the least,, 
 to join us at the theatre; of course we 
 had to have some one else. It gave me
 
 158 VIA P. & O. 
 
 just a little pang to think that perhaps 
 he admires her, but I don't believe he 
 does after all. 
 
 At eight thirty we stood ready in the 
 dimly lighted hall. Ah Fu again in her 
 ridiculous foreign outfit, looking like a 
 little girl dressed for a charade. Her 
 own bundle of clothes she clasped tightly 
 under her coat as before; and some 
 money I had given her was tucked away 
 in some inner pocket or contrivance of 
 her own Chinese undergarments. As 
 we waited there she looked so wan and 
 white that I made her sit down, and she 
 drooped on the edge of a big carved chair 
 with about as much shape and purpose 
 as a half-filled laundry bag, ready for 
 the wash. I would have given any one 
 of my possessions to have been able to 
 speak to her in her own dreadful tongue. 
 I can't tell you how piteous and ridicu- 
 lous she looked starting again into the 
 unknown, in her bundle of ill-fitting
 
 VIA P. & O. 159 
 
 clothes. When I heard the carriage 
 drive into the compound, I didn't wait 
 for a ring at the door, but opened it my- 
 self, and drew Ah Fu out with me, and 
 hurried her into the brougham. Mr. 
 Jerrold said not a word until we were 
 out of the Bubbling Well Eoad, and then 
 he said 
 
 ' ' You are a clever little philanthropist ; 
 that's just what I hoped you would do 
 not let your Boy come to the door." 
 
 "I'm learning from you," I said; 
 " please tell us where we are going." 
 
 "To Japan," he answered. 
 
 "What, all of us?" I asked, and he 
 laughed and then he sighed and said : 
 
 "No, I wish we were. You and I are 
 just going to the dock, to see this lady 
 safely on board the tug, which is to take 
 her to the Arabic, whose Captain is a 
 friend of mine, and who will see her 
 safely into the hands of some mission- 
 aries he knows in Kobe. There she will
 
 160 VIA P. & O. 
 
 stay until you have further planned her 
 destiny. If I might offer a little advice 
 on so important a subject, I should let 
 them send her to school in Japan, con- 
 vert her to Christianity, if they see fit, 
 and if possible into a self-supporting 
 member of society. There are some 
 good Missionary schools in Japan and 
 they are always glad of raw material. 
 But it may be that you have planned a 
 more brilliant future for her." 
 
 He loves to tease me, and he has every 
 right to, for it was I who insisted on res- 
 cuing her, much against his advice ; and 
 it was he who has done the rescuing, 
 every bit of it. 
 
 "I know," I said; "I'm very much 
 ashamed. It was my obstinate plan, and 
 you have done all the work, every bit of 
 planning and arranging. I could have 
 done nothing without you." He took 
 this quite seriously. He is so often sud-
 
 VIA P. & O. 161 
 
 denly serious when we have been laugh- 
 ing. 
 
 "You are quite wrong. The motive 
 power in this whole affair has been your 
 kind heart. The rest has been mechani- 
 cal movement that that motive power set 
 in motion. I've always believed that 
 kindness is one of the strong forces in 
 nature. It achieves and achieves, where 
 unkindness can do little more than ob- 
 struct. If this poor creature gets a 
 chance at happiness, if life ever becomes 
 to her something more than bewilder- 
 ment and pain, if in time she finds that 
 a large part of the world snaps its fingers 
 at Chinese mothers-in-law, if she ever 
 finds that freedom and peace that you 
 have planned for her, it will be your 
 heart that did it, not my manoeuvring.'* 
 
 "You've taken all the risk," I said. 
 "Won't you take a little of the glory?" 
 After a long minute of silence he an-
 
 162 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 swered "Yes, I'll be very glad to take 
 it ... at your hands!'* 
 
 We found a bosun or a mate, at any 
 rate a foreigner on the wharf, ready to 
 take Ah Fu in charge, and David gave 
 him some instructions. I saw him hand 
 the man an envelope to be given to the 
 stewardess and I heard him say: 
 
 "This Chinese woman has a first class 
 passage, and I wish her to be treated 
 like an English lady!" 
 
 I wonder what the bosun-man thought 
 of this curious way of treating a native 
 woman all he said was, "Very good, 
 sir, I understand; thank you, sir." Mr. 
 Jerrold gave Ah Fu fifty yen, a fortune 
 for her, and as we stood there on the 
 little wharf, the black waters stretching 
 out on every side, and the swinging lan- 
 terns throwing unsteady shadows, she 
 lost much of her lethargy and clung to 
 me. 
 
 She clung to my hands and raised them
 
 VIA P. & O. 163 
 
 to her face, and pressed them to her lips 
 and cheeks, though she didn't kiss them. 
 I did my best to comfort her, but with 
 that dumb wall between us, there was 
 little to do. I told her again and again 
 that it would be all right, that she would 
 be taken care of and made happy, and 
 then at last the tug whistle blew, and 
 that is enough to frighten a civilised 
 creature, and I'm ashamed to say I 
 jumped, at which she clung to me quite 
 terrified. It sounds very bald as I write 
 it, but you don't know, Patty dear, how 
 it affected me. And to think that there 
 are millions of poor women in China in 
 just such ignorance and misery, with the 
 understanding of a seven-year-old child. 
 She was helped into the launch, and it 
 puffed off, and I saw perhaps the last 
 that I shall ever see of Ah Fu. I don't 
 know whether she looked out at the re- 
 ceding shore, or whether her poor head 
 was low in unutterable anguish, but I
 
 164 VIA P. & O. 
 
 stood a long time at the end of the dock 
 and waved my handkerchief. Dark as 
 it was I thought that perhaps she could 
 see the little flash of white, and would 
 know that I had not deserted her until 
 she was out of sight. I couldn't help a 
 few tears for her, and it was some min- 
 utes before I could get rid of the signs 
 of them. 
 
 We found the play well along when 
 we got to the theatre, and Edwarda and 
 Mannerly already in the box. The 
 play was a French farce, badly trans- 
 lated, in which husbands and wives get 
 dreadfully mixed up. I didn't feel in 
 the humour to be amused by it, so I let 
 my eyes stray to Edwarda 's profile, and 
 that set me thinking what an infinitive 
 variety there is, in human expression. 
 
 Edwarda 's profile is well worth look- 
 ing at. It shows a short aggressive 
 nose, a cheek of softest pink, a heavily 
 marked brow, and a mass of live crinkly
 
 VIA P. & O. 165 
 
 hair, that grows low on her forehead and 
 ends in little curls on her neck. 
 
 I have always thought that if I ever 
 wrote a book I would give my heroine 
 curly hair. I don't know a greater con- 
 venience for an author than to have a 
 curly headed heroine, for it gives him 
 practically carte blanche with her des- 
 tiny. He can do almost anything with 
 her. He can get her up in the early 
 dewy morning when the hero is almost 
 sure to be abroad and the rest of the 
 world hasn't yet had time to curl its 
 hair. He can souse her with rain, which 
 is also useful for it gives the hero an 
 opportunity of wrapping her warmly in 
 his own mackintosh, or he can shipwreck 
 her, if such extreme methods are neces- 
 sary, knowing all the time that the 
 damper she is the neater and prettier 
 she will look. 
 
 Well, looking at Edwarda's hair I com- 
 pletely changed my mind. Not that I
 
 166 VIA P. & O. 
 
 don't admire Edwarda's hair. I do, for 
 I can't help it but it seems to be part 
 of her positiveness, and her positiveness 
 is very tiring to me. 
 
 I suspect that much of her charm for 
 Mannerly lies in her difference to little 
 Wild Rose. 
 
 The siren change has called to him, 
 and answer her he must as must all 
 men I suppose when they hear her 
 voice. I'm not blaming them it's man 
 nature I am told (Karl told me, years 
 ago) but it is sad when there's a woman 
 in the boat with them whom they leave to 
 shipwreck and to death. 
 
 Edwarda is tall with broad shoulders 
 and slim hips ; and as straight as a young 
 pine tree. Her brown eyes snap and 
 sparkle as she talks, and her straight 
 red lips can draw themselves into very 
 forbidding lines, when any of her theo- 
 ries are questioned. She is always per- 
 fectly confident that she is right. She
 
 VIA P. & O. 167 
 
 believes steadfastly in her own opinions, 
 her own ability, her own judgment, her 
 own taste in dress. If she has ever been 
 assailed by any doubt at all of the world 
 she lives in, or the world to come, she 
 gives no sign of it. She is one of those 
 people whose belongings are always per- 
 fect. Let her become possessed of any- 
 thing and it immediately takes on a vir- 
 tue it never had before. Her religion is 
 the only one; her relations more satis- 
 factory than any one else's; her profes- 
 sion the most ennobling, and her home 
 superior in every way to other homes. 
 If she took smallpox to-morrow, I am 
 sure she would find qualities in it that 
 would eclipse the illnesses of other peo- 
 ple. 
 
 Her attitude towards Mannerly seems 
 to me to have in it a trace of de- 
 fiance perhaps she feels for him an in- 
 terest that his blue eyes and his cleft 
 chin coerce an interest she would
 
 168 VIA P. & O. 
 
 rather withhold. She has confessed to 
 me that she finds him rather frivolous. 
 However, that doesn't matter in the 
 least, that or any other failing he may 
 have, for should she ever accept him, he 
 will be transformed in a twinkling into 
 the perfect man. Can you imagine a 
 greater difference than between Ed- 
 warda and Wild Rose, as I see her day 
 after day, her whole slender body droop- 
 ing on her pony's back, the corners of 
 her lovely mouth drooping also, and her 
 blue eyes, often swimming in tears, fixed 
 on a distant ragged line of trees f I have 
 never spoken a word to this girl but I 
 know her to be weak, or she would not be 
 sitting a China pony, in a country far 
 from all she has loved, shame struck be- 
 fore me. 
 
 There you have the two women. I 
 know much of one, all to her advantage, 
 little of the other, all to her disadvan- 
 tage, and yet if I were a man, and were
 
 VIA P. & O. 169 
 
 choosing one of them for life, it would 
 not be to the strong one that I would give 
 my love and strength and protection. 
 
 All this may sound very dreadful to 
 you, very shocking. I can hardly ex- 
 plain it myself, for I have so hated and 
 feared the kind of woman she is, and 
 yet I have none of these feelings toward 
 her. 
 
 Edwarda got herself very nimbly into 
 her rickshaw when we came out, and 
 from Mannerly 's hurried good-bye, I 
 fancied he followed her at a discreet dis- 
 tance to see that she got safely home. I 
 am quite sure she is the only white 
 woman in Shanghai that would go about 
 alone at night in a rickshaw. I have to 
 admire her courage. David took me 
 home. I don't remember that we said a 
 word, but oh, Patty, what it is to sit be- 
 side him, and feel the comfort of his 
 presence. That's the word for it. I 
 have not found it before. He sheds com-
 
 170 VIA P. & O. 
 
 fort about him and serenity, and I have 
 the feeling that I could put my head 
 down on his shoulder and go to sleep and 
 it would be all right. Poor Patty ! what 
 very uncomfortable feelings I am giving 
 you with my outrageous admissions. 
 
 December 13th. 
 
 A wet and stormy day. 
 
 I have not been out of the house, and 
 I have read until my eyes are tired. 
 
 There's a stir of some kind in this 
 household that I do not understand. The 
 servants are upset. Even Boy the im- 
 perturbable shows a ruffled surface. 
 There is nothing to be seen from his 
 face, but he has hovered about me in 
 quite an unusual way for two days, as 
 though he wanted to speak to me. Once 
 when he was dusting the library un- 
 necessarily, a thing one of the coolies 
 usually does, I tried to help him out and
 
 VIA P. & O. 171 
 
 asked if anything was the matter, but 
 he only mumbled something and went. 
 
 December 
 Well, no wonder they are perturbed. 
 The whole household is it seems on the 
 verge of some dreadful calamity, and 
 only Karl and I in ignorance of it. Poor 
 Karl who it seems is the chief victim. 
 The morning after Ah Fu 's abduction, 
 Boy brought me my early tea and said 
 briefly, "Ah Fu have go." I didn't act 
 any particular surprise, it's such an 
 everyday thing for Chinese servants to 
 leave without warning. If their par- 
 ticular position is a vital one, such as 
 cook or house boy, they leave a substi- 
 tute, but in all cases they come and go 
 as noiselessly as snow. So I pretended 
 only a mild interest and told him to find 
 me another amah. He didn't say an- 
 other word about the matter.
 
 172 VIA P. & O. 
 
 This morning he came to me, his yel- 
 low face showing real signs of distress 
 and poured out a flood of pidgin English, 
 which just for the fun of it, I must try 
 to reproduce. 
 
 "After Ah Fu have go-everyday one 
 piecee man come this side, he talkee me, 
 he brother have lose wife. He say we 
 makee hide this house. My talkee he, 
 no havee makee hide this house. Every- 
 day he talkee me very bad talk. Every- 
 day my talkee he get out. 
 
 ' * To-day he come, tellee me, last night 
 have go Joss house, have makee write 
 plenty bad thing, makee every man this 
 house ca tehee sick have makee (and 
 here his eyes became more furtive and 
 frightened than they had been) write 
 master name, one piece paper have burn 
 paper. Before one year master must 
 make die." 
 
 Do you get the sense of it misfor- 
 tunes of some kind are to fall upon the
 
 VIA P. & O. 173 
 
 household, and Karl is with true Chinese 
 justice to suffer the extreme penalty of 
 dying before the year is out, just be- 
 cause he is the master. The Chinaman, 
 you see, always strikes at what our 
 papers call the man higher up, because 
 in this feudal country, the fall of the 
 master, involves the fall of the under- 
 lings. I wanted to laugh but I didn't 
 dare show any levity, so I said very 
 sternly : 
 
 " Foreign Joss belong very strong, 
 more strong than Chinese Joss. He no 
 let Chinaman hurt foreign man and for- 
 eign man servants." As he still seemed 
 dubious I added, "To-morrow I go for- 
 eign Joss house. I talkee foreign Joss," 
 and this seemed to give him much com- 
 fort. 
 
 So to-morrow I shall have myself 
 driven to Church with as much circum- 
 stance as I can muster, and then I shall 
 in very truth ask the foreign Joss to
 
 174 VIA P. & O. 
 
 guard Karl from any evil consequences 
 of what may have been great foolishness 
 on my part. 
 
 I begin to think it would have been 
 better to let Ah Fu go back to her own 
 life. What right had I to meddle? 
 What does one brow-beaten woman more 
 or less matter in China? Oh, for Ed- 
 warda's supreme belief in her judgments 
 and decision. 
 
 Of course it's ridiculous: the threat of 
 a superstitious heathen and his little 
 piece of paper, but I'm depressed. 
 
 December 15th. 
 
 I didn't get to church after all. 
 
 Karl didn't slam the front door until 
 6 :30 this morning, and I, fool that I am, 
 didn't close my eyes until I heard it 
 slam. So I was worn with sleeplessness 
 and headache, and at Church time I was 
 fast asleep.
 
 VIA P. & O. 175 
 
 There is no service to-night so I can 't 
 go, and I'm feeling ridiculously nervous 
 about the whole thing. I'm getting 
 superstitious as Boy, and I feel as 
 though I had neglected an important pre- 
 caution. To-morrow, dear Patsy, is mail 
 day, I must finish this long, long letter. 
 I'm afraid you'll go to sleep over it, 
 but oh, the pleasure it is to me to write 
 to you. 
 
 It takes you all my love my thoughts 
 my prayers everything. 
 
 CABOLA. 
 
 December 2Qih 
 
 How mercifully time takes the edge 
 from everything. Patty, when I put 
 away my wedding dress, a good many 
 years ago, I did it with all the grief I 
 might have felt at the burial of a friend. 
 It soothed me to indulge in a great deal 
 of sentimental misery over the proceed-
 
 176 VIA P. & O. 
 
 ing. I put the dried remains of my wed- 
 ding bouquet with it, and sewed them up 
 in a strong muslin bag and thought I 
 would never see them again. I remem- 
 ber calling it the burial of my happiness, 
 and I cried over it God knows what bit- 
 ter tears ! 
 
 Well, to-day I got it out again to wear 
 to a Fancy Dress Ball! I ripped open 
 the linen bag, threw the dust of the wed- 
 ding bouquet into the scrap basket and 
 shook out the long folds of the dress 
 without a quiver. There wasn't the 
 sign of a tear drop about it, and thanks 
 to the dismal care with which I had put 
 it away, it looks as fresh as the day I 
 wore it. Lucky for me that I insisted 
 on a Venetian wedding dress, rather 
 than what would have been fashionable, 
 full skirt and balloon sleeves, for I can 
 step into it with almost no alteration, 
 and by stealing a few beads here and 
 there, and sewing them to a little round
 
 VIA P. & O. 177 
 
 cap of white satin I am ready for the 
 ball on the fifteenth of January. It is 
 to be a big general thing at the Town 
 Hall, and Karl insists that we go. No 
 tailor would make anything now, all far 
 too busy, and so without my wedding 
 dress I should have been badly off. 
 
 Mr. Jerrold has been away. 
 
 I have missed him. 
 
 December 22nd. 
 
 There is such a Christmasy feeling in 
 the air, and some of the shops have 
 really pretty toys in them. I couldn't 
 resist buying some dolls. This morn- 
 ing I shall send them to one of the office 
 men. He married a native woman, but 
 I dare say his little girls have enough 
 English blood in them to enjoy a doll. 
 
 Curious, isn't it, that Chinese children 
 have no toys to speak of, and so few 
 games and Japan so full of childish
 
 178 VIA P. & O. 
 
 mirth and amusement. Oh, if I could 
 only be at your Christmas ! 
 
 Patty, what is it like to fill little stock- 
 ings to bulging point, and trim a tree at 
 night with closed doors and much mys- 
 tery. Oh, Patty, if only if only. 
 
 December 23rd. 
 
 I wish you could see our Christmas 
 presents, my dear ! They have been ar- 
 riving for the last two days, many of 
 them on their own legs, some carried by 
 the most obsequious coolies, who of 
 course get a Kumsha for their pains; 
 and all so attractive that I am gloating 
 over them like a child. 
 
 A sheep is the best luck present that 
 can be given. We have now three in the 
 compound, bleating very plaintively. 
 Turkeys come next in luckiness, and we 
 have six gobbling and dragging their 
 feathers in that indignant way they have.
 
 VIA P. & O. 179 
 
 I am sure they are furious to learn that 
 their ultimate fate is to be eaten by a 
 foreign devil. 
 
 Then we have baskets and baskets of 
 oranges, such pretty open baskets, that 
 show the fruit inside; lovely blue and 
 white jars of ginger, little tubs of dried 
 lychees and many boxes of tea; and all 
 these things are tied with bright coloured 
 strings under which are slipped little 
 arrow-shaped pieces of paper, bright 
 with red and gold paint and black letter- 
 ing, the sign of a present. 
 
 And then, Patty dear, hold your breath 
 for you are going to have most of 
 them eight beautiful rolls of silk, satin 
 and brocade. The hospital will have to 
 help us eat the lambs and the turkeys. I 
 am as pleased as a child over the whole 
 thing. I had no idea that Christmas in 
 China would be so festive. And all these 
 things are from people whose names I 
 don't even know, compradors, office men
 
 180 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 and merchants. Of course Christmas 
 means nothing to them, their own festi- 
 val is their New Year that comes some 
 time in February. I waxed quite senti- 
 mental over the kindly spirit of these 
 gifts this morning and said to Karl that 
 it ought to teach us a lesson in kindness 
 to strangers in a foreign land but he 
 said there was no " damned kindness in 
 it, just business," but he could not spoil 
 my pleasure in it. 
 
 We have had many invitations for 
 Christmas dinner, but I said no to all, 
 even to Mr. Jerrold. I could not face the 
 possibility of going perhaps alone at the 
 last moment. Christmas is a day when 
 it would be hard to plead business for 
 Karl if he suddenly decided that he 
 would rather play cards at the club. 
 
 Christmas Eve. 
 
 It has felt like Christmas to-day. The 
 foreign part of Shanghai is gay with
 
 VIA P. & 0. 181 
 
 greens and red paper flowers. There 
 has even been a snap in the air that felt 
 like snow. I wish it would snow. It 
 would be soothing to see a soft white 
 blanket laid over the ugliness of Shang- 
 hai. I am thinking of you and the chil- 
 dren imagining your preparations and 
 their excitement. I hope the box got to 
 them in time so that Aunt Carola may 
 have a little place in their happiness. 
 You will be thinking of me I know. 
 
 I suppose Wild Eose is alone too. 
 Mannerly is I know to dine with Ed- 
 warda at the Mclntyres. 
 
 What a pity we two lonely women 
 could not spend our Christmas Eve to- 
 gether. 
 
 What a thought! Imagine what the 
 Aunts would say could they bring them- 
 selves to conceive of such a thing. I 
 wish I could send her a few flowers and 
 a friendly message. But it wouldn't do, 
 would it? Dear me, the things that
 
 182 VIA P. & O. 
 
 won't do and that seem so eminently 
 doable to me! 
 
 Christmas Morning. 
 
 I came down to find a big basket of 
 red roses from Mr. Jerrold, and from 
 the French Consul a round bouquet 
 whose every flower is wired to a tooth- 
 pick, the whole encircled with a paper 
 fringe. I've never seen one before, ex- 
 cept in valentines and it's given me more 
 joy than I can say. I put it in Karl's 
 place for breakfast, but he didn't find 
 it very funny, and said it was damned 
 French impertinence. I went to Church 
 and walked home, exchanging a dozen 
 Merry Christmases and I can't make 
 out why "Merry Christmas" and "The 
 same to you" never sounds stupid or 
 trite. It's always as if one heard it for 
 the first time. 
 
 In the afternoon I went to the Paper 
 Chase. I had to drive a long way, for
 
 VIA P. & O. 183 
 
 it was far out in the country, and then I 
 had to walk a good distance, and as I 
 made my way over the broken ground 
 of the cotton furrows, Mr. Jerrold over- 
 took me and steered me to a good place 
 on a high Chinese grave, near the finish. 
 All Shanghai was in that field, for the 
 Christmas hunt is the hunt of the year. 
 I saw Edwarda and beckoned her and 
 she joined us on our mound which 
 directly overlooked a nasty wide gully, 
 the last jump; Mr. Jerrold said some- 
 body would come off there and somebody 
 did. After a long, long wait, we saw 
 horses and riders in the distance, and 
 they came streaming over the field to- 
 wards us, Mannerly 's pink coat lead- 
 ing. As he jumped I shut my eyes of 
 course, and so I don't know how it hap- 
 pened, but I heard some screams from 
 women, a confused grunt from the men, 
 and Edwarda and Mr. Jerrold had run 
 down the slope of our grave, and in an-
 
 184 VIA P. & O. 
 
 other second we were all three kneeling 
 over Mannerly 's muddy form. He 
 wasn't hurt, only dazed for a few mo- 
 ments, and Edwarda took command of 
 the situation of course. He tried to get 
 to his feet, but she held him down with 
 her strong arms, insisting that he lie 
 still until she made an examination of 
 his injuries. He had none, but as he 
 was forced to lie still every one came 
 crowding about, thinking no doubt that 
 he was dead. It wasn't until he 
 laughed, a perfectly sound laugh, that 
 Edwarda let him get to his feet. I of- 
 fered them a lift home ajid he accepted, 
 saying he felt a bit shaken but I think 
 he wasn't shaken at all, but wanted the 
 drive home with Edwarda. As for her, 
 she was plainly disappointed that he 
 hadn't even a dislocated finger she could 
 bind up. As we walked away I saw 
 Wild Eose at the fringe of the crowd. 
 Her face was white, her lips trembling,
 
 VIA P. & O. 185 
 
 and as usual her eyes fixed on some dis- 
 tant point. Perhaps, she had thought 
 him dead too, for a few agonising min- 
 utes. No doubt she had longed to slip 
 from her horse and run to his side and 
 lift his head into her arms. And she 
 couldn't. Surely she had a right and 
 yet she couldn 't. What a terrible world 
 it is. 
 
 To-night at dinner I had a great sur- 
 prise. On my plate was a Chinese jewel 
 box of blue and yellow brocade, and in 
 it a ring, a single pearl, as big as an over- 
 ripe pea. A wonderful globe of creamy 
 white and pink. 
 
 I looked up at Karl with my mouth 
 open, and he asked me if I liked it. 
 Eeally, Patty, I have never been at such 
 a loss in my life. It is years since he 
 has given me a present and such a pres- 
 ent. It is really magnificent, and must 
 have cost, I am sure, more than he can 
 afford and there I sat without a word.
 
 186 VIA P. & O. 
 
 If only I could have run around and 
 kissed him for it, as such a pearl de- 
 served, but the kiss that such a pearl 
 deserves isn't in my makeup. Instead 
 I got some foolish tears in my eyes, God 
 knows why, and then I stammered some 
 thanks, and my admiration of it, and 
 put it on my finger, and looked at it and 
 all the time I couldn't look up at Karl 
 because of the tears, and when at last I 
 did look up, he was looking glum and 
 disgruntled. He was evidently disap- 
 pointed in my acceptance of his Christ- 
 mas present. And indeed I don't won- 
 der it wasn't gracious or pleasing in 
 any way. 
 
 And even now I am wondering what it 
 can mean, as I sit writing to you and 
 watch it gleam on my hand. 
 
 I don't mean that I don't love it ; what 
 woman wouldn't love such a wonder? 
 
 I've been trying to analyse the giv- 
 ing of presents they seem to come from
 
 VIA P. & O. 187 
 
 four sources. From kindness or love, 
 or interest or habit. 
 
 The habit died out between us long 
 ago. I haven't given Karl anything for 
 years, not since I made him a red heart 
 of satin, filled with his favourite orris 
 root, and which I meant him quite seri- 
 ously, and without any sense of being 
 ridiculous, to understand was my own 
 heart that I was giving him for the 
 millionth time. And Karl hasn't re- 
 membered a fete date for years either. 
 So it could not be habit. There is no 
 love between us, kindliness, is at a low. 
 ebb, and as for interest, what could Karl 
 have to gain from me ? 
 
 Karl had told me he was going to 
 spend the evening at home, but he went 
 out after all. I don't blame him, for the 
 evening was hanging interminably. I 
 exhausted my praises of the ring, and 
 there was nothing else to talk about. 
 So here I sit, Patty darling, talking of it
 
 188 VIA P. & O. 
 
 all to you, the gleam of the lamp play- 
 ing on my beautiful pearl, and into the 
 velvety hearts of David Jerrold's roses 
 and the angry slam of the front door 
 still ringing in my ears. 
 
 The day after Christmas. 
 
 Oh, there are good things in life, Patty. 
 One of them was to heap the carriage 
 with baskets of oranges and lychees and 
 ginger, and take them out to the hos- 
 pital this morning. 
 
 The pleasure in those stolid baby faces 
 when they each had their laps heaped 
 full, and a Christmas card and an 
 orange in each hand. "We sat them 
 round in a ring and gave them their 
 presents, and they never moved during 
 the ceremony they may be sitting there 
 still for all I know. I never saw chil- 
 dren that stayed put as these Chinese 
 children do.
 
 VIA P. & O. 189 
 
 The hospital looked more cheerful 
 than ever. It's always cheerful to me, 
 despite its whitewashed walls and stone 
 floors, its smell of carbolic and its suf- 
 fering women. It's the spirit of the 
 place that looks out from behind Dr. Sim- 
 monds' spectacles, and puts cheer and 
 courage into the whole place. Edwarda 
 is an excellent doctor the other doctors 
 are good women, and all love their work, 
 but Dr. Simmonds does her work I think 
 from the love of God, and that perhaps 
 is why the sick women long for her smile 
 and the dying ones ask to hold her hand. 
 On my way home I stopped for a mo- 
 ment at the resting place. No Wild 
 Eose to-day, but David came swinging 
 along, and stopped to talk a minute. He 
 ordered me out of the carriage and told 
 me to walk home. Another man would 
 have said, "You look pale," but he said, 
 "You look yellow," and then he added, 
 and there was a wistful look in his eyes,
 
 190 VIA P. & O. 
 
 "I'd like to walk back with you, but this 
 place is peopled with fools." 
 
 January 7th. 
 
 Patty give me your clever little wits 
 a few minutes, and tell me why David 
 sometimes seems to avoid me. 
 
 I have often thought he did, and then 
 when after a few days of mere bows and 
 smiles he does stop at my carriage wheel 
 or sit for half an hour on the little front 
 seat, with his long legs hanging out on 
 the step, I begin to think that I must 
 have imagined it. I am sure of it now 
 however. It is a week since he has 
 spoken to me until to-day, and then for 
 a moment only, and only about books. 
 I see him every day striding along on his 
 way from his office to his house. Doesn 't 
 he like me, as much as I like him, or is 
 he afraid of getting me talked about? 
 This last idea seems absurd in a place
 
 VIA P. & O. 191 
 
 where every married woman has one 
 particular and several general admirers. 
 However, I hope he has some such 
 chivalrous idea. It's better than having 
 to believe that he doesn't care about 
 speaking to me every day as I care about 
 it. Indeed it's necessary to me. It 
 makes my day cheerful, or the reverse. 
 My one friend means so much to me. 
 
 To-day when I saw him turning a cor- 
 ner ahead of me I called "man, man" 
 (which interesting as it sounds is only 
 the Chinese for stop) so sharply that the 
 Maf oo awakened suddenly from his doze, 
 pulled the pony back on his haunches, 
 dislodged the number two mafoo pre- 
 maturely from his seat, and brought us 
 to a standstill rather more acutely than 
 was comfortable, but it had the effect I 
 desired, for David could not mistake the 
 fact that I had stopped on purpose to 
 speak to him. 
 
 Patty, I've never seen a face that
 
 192 VIA P. & O. 
 
 lights np as his does. His whole soul 
 seems to shine in his grey eyes, while 
 he holds my hand, and sometimes for a 
 silly minute I could almost imagine, . . . 
 Oh, well, never mind. 
 
 We talked as usual of the books he 
 had sent me. I told him those I had 
 read and those I had discarded. 
 
 "You are trying hard to educate me,'* 
 I said. 
 
 "God forbid," he answered, "I'm try- 
 ing to interest you." 
 
 We talked of a wonderful book he lent 
 me, the correspondence of Emerson and 
 Carlyle, covering some twenty years. 
 Oh, Patty! how I longed to be clever, 
 when he asked me what had struck me 
 most in these wonderful letters. They 
 are full of deep thoughts; of exquisite 
 language, the very inside of two great 
 minds. Carlyle is aloof from all the 
 small interests of life, egotistical, dys- 
 peptic, great with tragic greatness.
 
 VIA P. & O. 193 
 
 Emerson lovable, tender engrossed in 
 spite of his work in the lives about him, 
 great without a hint of gloom. But what 
 struck me most, was just this In one 
 letter Emerson tells with much sup- 
 pressed joy of the birth of his second 
 child, a daughter. One can see how he 
 would love to expound on the theme, but 
 he generously does not, his insight no 
 doubt showing him how small will be 
 Caryle's interest in such an everyday 
 affair. 
 
 In Carlyle's answer, he sends his love 
 to the "mischievous boys." Now one is 
 a girl and is only two weeks old 
 (imagine a mischievous baby of two 
 weeks) but this seems to be Carlyle's 
 only conception of childhood, and 
 through all their long correspondence, 
 Caryle never applies any other adjective 
 to the Emerson children. I felt ashamed 
 when I had to admit that this lack of in- 
 terest, and also Carlyle's feverish de-
 
 194 VIA P. & O. 
 
 mand for a recipe for corn bread, such as 
 lie had eaten in America, were what 
 struck me most but David was de- 
 lighted with what he called my astute 
 commentaries "The most human thing 
 in the whole book," he said "and yet it 
 escaped me." 
 
 Then he asked me how I had liked Sir 
 Eichard Calmady, and when I told him 
 it had made me cry for two days, he said, 
 
 "Damn the book." 
 
 Patty, I believe I look dowdy in the 
 clothes I have now. I am going to send 
 you a draft, and I want you just as soon 
 as you can, to get me some pretty frocks 
 and hats. I want the prettiest things 
 you can get, and I don't care what you 
 spend. 
 
 I want two evening dresses. You 
 know what suits me, but remember I'm 
 not twenty-one, as I was when last you 
 saw me. Blue used to be becoming and 
 yellow too, and please have them very
 
 VIA P. & O. 195 
 
 delicious looking. Then I want a car- 
 riage dress, and at least six hats, and one 
 of them covered with roses, red roses, 
 for alack it will be hot weather by the 
 time they get here. And some pretty 
 slippers and stockings. I'll send you an 
 old slipper for size, and some scarfs and 
 jabots and anything you think is pretty 
 and becoming. 
 
 I've let my clothes go for so long, and 
 cared so little, and worn the productions 
 of Chinese and Japanese tailors, and I 
 am suddenly terribly conscious that I 've 
 lost all smartness, and a woman of 
 twenty-nine must be careful how she 
 dresses, mustn't she? 
 
 I'm dining out to-night. How I wish 
 I had something pretty to wear. 
 
 January 
 
 David has talked to me more than once 
 of the laws of compensation and I be-
 
 196 VIA P. & O. 
 
 gin to find it, now that I look for it, in all 
 kinds of little ways that I never should 
 have noticed before. 
 
 The Scarths ' dinner last night was an 
 example of the law, for did I not all 
 through its semi-German, semi-Scotch 
 dulness, have the realisation of David's 
 presence, even though far, far away at 
 the other end of a sixteen-foot table. 
 
 Mr. Scarth's Scotch blood and Mrs. 
 Scarth's German blood have combined 
 to make a curiously heavy result in their 
 six daughters. 
 
 After dinner we played a game (their 
 word, not mine) that some one has 
 evolved from consequences and the al- 
 bums in which years ago we were invited 
 to set down our most intimate tastes and 
 aversions. Pieces of paper were handed 
 around ; and we wrote down our answers 
 to a number of questions read out by 
 one of the daughters. We signed our 
 names, folded our little slips, and then
 
 VIA P. & O. 197 
 
 they were read aloud by David Jerrold, 
 and we guessed their respective authors, 
 and the best guesser got a prize. The 
 questions, were, most of them, answered 
 jocosely, how jocosely you will see when 
 I tell you that "tulips" as the answer 
 to "What flower do you prefer?" was 
 considered a very subtle and amusing 
 double entendre. Well, I did my best. 
 I forget most of my answers, but they 
 weren't any funnier or half as subtle as 
 "tulips." 
 
 For some reason, absence of mind, I 
 suppose, when I came to the question 
 "What do you hate most?" I forgot to 
 be funny and put down the truth "Wait- 
 ing" and was quite ashamed of the seri- 
 ousness of my answer, when read aloud 
 among such aversions as "pigs' feet." 
 
 And now comes the compensation for 
 that stupid game. 
 
 On my breakfast tray lay a note in 
 David's hand, and in it were these lines.
 
 198 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 Serene I fold my hands and wait, 
 Nor care for wind, nor tide, nor sea. 
 I rave no more 'gainst time or fate 
 For lo ! my own shall come to me. 
 
 I stay my haste, I make delays, 
 For what avails this eager pace; 
 I stand amid eternal ways 
 And what is mine shall know my face. 
 
 Asleep, awake, by night or day 
 The friends I seek, are seeking me. 
 No wind can drive my bark astray 
 Nor change the tide of destiny. 
 
 What matter if I stand alone 
 I wait with joy the coming years 
 My heart shall reap, where it has sown 
 And garner up its fruit of tears. 
 
 The waters know their own and draw 
 The brook that springs on yonder heights 
 So flows the good with equal law 
 Unto the soul of pure delights. 
 
 The stars come nightly to the sky 
 The tidal wave unto the sea 
 Nor time, nor space, nor deep nor high 
 Can keep my own from me. 
 
 JOHN BURROUGHS.
 
 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Dear law of compensation if you would 
 always work as promptly. 
 
 January 16th. 
 
 Patty, have I ever described to you the 
 French Consul? 
 
 I am sure I haven't and that will 
 prove to you that I have never given him 
 one thought, and how he could presume, 
 how he could dare to say. . . . Wait! 
 I'll tell it from the beginning. The 
 French Consul has a blond beard, which 
 parts in the middle with what I am sure 
 he considers a very graceful sweep. A 
 mild blue eye, a smallish waist, and very 
 pointed shoes, are other points I have 
 noticed about him. 
 
 His clothes look too tight and his 
 gloves are of lemon yellow. Do I make 
 myself clear? I have danced with him 
 often, and talked with him whenever we 
 meet. He always praises my accent, and
 
 200 VIA P. & O. 
 
 I feel it is good practice for my stale 
 French. 
 
 I have never thought about him for 
 two consecutive minutes until last night. 
 
 Last night we went to the Fancy Dress 
 Ball. 
 
 My dress looked well, so well that I 
 was amazed at my reflection, and the 
 little cap was becoming too, and I did 
 my hair low, like the pictures of Desde- 
 mona. 
 
 Karl was resplendent in a borrowed 
 English uniform. I have never seen 
 him more beautiful. He looked very 
 keenly at me when he helped me with 
 my cloak, and began to say something 
 and then didn't. It isn't often that Karl 
 denies himself the pleasure of speaking 
 when he wants to. 
 
 Perhaps he didn't like the dress, but 
 I don't care, at all, for every one else 
 did. 
 
 He and I danced the first dance to-
 
 VIA P. & O. 201 
 
 gether. Some customs die hard, and he 
 is the best dancer I know. I remember 
 when we were engaged, how important 
 it seemed that our steps should suit each 
 other so perfectly. David asked me for 
 two dances, but as he dances very badly, 
 we agreed to sit them out. He wore his 
 red hunting coat, pink coat I believe I 
 ought to call it; " Costume enough" he 
 said, and so we sat out our first dance. 
 He guessed quite easily that I was try- 
 ing to look like Desdemona. I told him 
 that I was wearing my wedding dress 
 and he looked so sadly and so intently at 
 it that I fancied he must be thinking of 
 his own wife in her wedding dress, dead 
 so many years ago. I danced a great 
 many times, and finally found myself 
 sitting with the French Consul, in a little 
 out-of-the-way corner of the big room, 
 tucked in behind palms and a screen 
 where we could watch the dancing. 
 Patty, I don't know how long the man
 
 VIA P. & O. 
 
 had been talking in the same strain be- 
 fore I woke up. I had not been listening 
 to him at all. I was watching Edwarda 
 as the Goddess of Liberty talking to 
 David, and wondering if he found her 
 very attractive. I remember him say- 
 ing as we sat down, " Vous etes en grande 
 beaute, ce soir, Madame," but a French 
 compliment means so little that I paid 
 no further attention. As Edwarda and 
 David passed out of my vision, I heard 
 the words "Ma Cherie," ma bien aimee" 
 and realised that I was being made love 
 to. I ought to have got up then with dig- 
 nity. A properly shocked woman would 
 have done so, but I wasn't at all shocked. 
 It has happened to me before in these 
 eight years, for you can understand that 
 in a community that numbers fifty men to 
 every woman, each woman must take her 
 share of love-making when the mood 
 happens to capture her partner. It 
 doesn't seem quite fair not to! So I
 
 VIA P. & O. 203 
 
 didn't leave then when I might have 
 done so, and in another minute I could 
 not have moved to save my life, for he 
 was talking and talking very fast, not 
 of his own feelings, which are his own 
 business, but of mine. He was talking 
 of my unhappy married life, of my lone- 
 liness, of my need for companionship, of 
 my need for love and consolation, and 
 oh, horrors upon horrors, he was offering 
 me all these needs of mine in his own 
 person. 
 
 It was hearing my carefully guarded 
 secret dragged out into the daylight it 
 was hearing myself talked of as ' ' f emme 
 incomprise," "femme malheureuse, " 
 that made me sit like a stone, while that 
 bearded, perfumed absurdity talked on. 
 What worries me now is whether he 
 thinks to-day that I liked it. I might 
 have sat there all evening, had not David 
 passed alone. When I saw him the spell 
 that held me there like a dumb fool was
 
 204 VIA P. & O. 
 
 broken, and I almost ran to him, and 
 took his arm and said that I wanted a 
 glass of water. I wanted awfully to cry, 
 but as I couldn't I laughed, and after I 
 had laughed a minute, David said, 
 
 "No, you don't want a glass of water, 
 you want to go home and I'll take 
 you." 
 
 So he led me out of that crowded 
 room, got my wraps, called my carriage, 
 and ordering his own to follow, he got 
 in with me. But that wasn't the end of 
 that adventurous evening. It was a 
 horrible night, wet and windy, but the 
 brougham was snug, and David wrapped 
 the fur rug tight about me. We were 
 driving the nastiest of our four nasty- 
 tempered ponies, the one that has a trick 
 of running away at times, and as we left 
 the Maloo and got on the Bubbling Well 
 Koad, our pace grew faster and faster; 
 so that David leaned forward to look 
 through the glass and said, "Freiheit
 
 VIA P. & O. 205 
 
 shouldn 't let you drive behind that pony 
 at night and with only one mafoo." 
 
 He had hardly said it when we 
 swerved across the road (I suppose the 
 pony shied), the back wheel struck some- 
 thing and caught ; I heard the mafoo cry 
 out, and jump to the ground, and in an- 
 other second, the pony was kicking the 
 dashboard into splinters, and David had 
 thrown his arm around me and was 
 pressing my face into the fur of his coat. 
 I don't know how many times the pony 
 kicked, but every time I thought his 
 heels must come through the glass and 
 strike us. At last he kicked himself 
 free, and I heard him pounding down 
 the road, and the mafoo in full cry after 
 him. Then I lifted my head, and though 
 I did not feel frightened, when I began 
 to speak my teeth chattered. "Oh," I 
 said, "how ridiculous to be left sitting 
 here alone in the dark. ' ' 
 
 David didn't take away his arm, but
 
 VIA P. & O. 
 
 he let me go a little and said, "Forgive 
 me for smothering you, but I was afraid 
 his heels would reach the glass, and a fly- 
 ing piece might strike your beautiful 
 eyes." 
 
 "Oh," I said, and it was true "I 
 thought you did it, so I could not 
 scream." 
 
 "Bless your heart no; you could have 
 screamed as much as you wanted to, it 
 would only have frightened the pony a 
 little more, that's all. Sit still," he 
 went on, "my trap will soon be along, 
 and I'll take you home in that." So we 
 sat there in the dark, and though I didn 't 
 want to, I could not help being conscious 
 of his gentle arm that held me as you 
 would hold a child. I don't believe he 
 realised it at all. 
 
 When we heard his trap coming we 
 lowered the window and hailed it, and 
 leaving my stranded brougham in charge 
 of his second mafoo we were soon at
 
 VIA P. & O. 207 
 
 home. David came in after me, and go- 
 ing straight into the dining room ahead 
 of me he poured some brandy into a 
 glass and put it in my hand and told 
 me to drink it when I got to bed. 
 
 1 'And go to bed, right away will 
 you?" he added. 
 
 Then he stood at the bottom of the 
 stairs watching me until I was at the 
 top, and at the top I waved my hand to 
 him and said good-night, and after I 
 closed the door I heard the front door 
 close. 
 
 Patty, I don't know what you think, 
 but I think that gentleness and thought- 
 fulness and courtesy are the most allur- 
 ing qualities a man can possess. 
 
 I am awfully glad he thinks my eyes 
 beautiful. 
 
 January 
 
 Patsy, I have been too gay to write. 
 Yes, really gay, inside and out. I have
 
 208 VIA P. & O. 
 
 been out every night for two weeks, and 
 I am really enjoying it, as I never 
 thought I could again. 
 
 Several times I have had the good for- 
 tune to go in to dinner with Mr. Jerrold, 
 but whether it's a dance or a dinner, he 
 comes to talk to me always. He never 
 stays long, but he never forgets me. 
 
 Karl made an awful fuss about the 
 accident the night of the dance. I don't 
 know quite how I was to blame, but he 
 thinks so and almost makes me think 
 so, but I don't care. 
 
 This is a poor letter, dear, but it's just 
 to tell you that I'm well, awfully well. 
 
 February 17th. 
 
 Oh, Patty, Patty, how am I to tell you 
 and how am I not to tell you I can't 
 keep it to myself any longer, but where 
 am I to get the words to make you un- 
 derstand? Have you noticed how little
 
 VIA P. & O. 209 
 
 I have been writing lately. I can't 
 write unless I write truly? I gave you 
 my promise about that, and I cannot 
 break it. 
 
 Oh, Patty, will you despise me, or fear 
 for me, or be happy for me or what? 
 
 I hope the last, for I am happy myself, 
 happy as I never dreamed possible. 
 Happy with the sweetest sort of con- 
 tented happiness. 
 
 Last Autumn, I remember writing you, 
 that between David and me, there was no 
 man and woman feeling. It was true 
 then, and is still perhaps for him, but for 
 me it is no longer true. For me the 
 whole face of the world has changed. I 
 think I began to know it the night my 
 pony ran away. Oh, Patty, am I made of 
 clay only? Is there something gross 
 about me? It was his touch that woke 
 me. Not his big mind, nor his kindly 
 ways, just his touch. That night when 
 he put his arms around me, my heart
 
 210 VIA P. & O. 
 
 beat so wildly that I thought he would 
 feel it under his hand, and since that 
 night I have been a different woman, a 
 woman who loves a man who isn't her 
 husband. If you are going to blame me, 
 Patty, be glad for me too, just a little 
 bit. I know it isn't right, I know it is 
 perfectly hopeless, and yet I would not 
 give it up, no, not even for my lost happi- 
 ness of years ago, for it is better than 
 that ever was. 
 
 The man I love is big, and good and 
 upright and gentle. Surely I need not 
 blush to love such a man. At first I 
 had days of doubts. I thought perhaps 
 my imagination was playing me a trick 
 but I know better now. 
 
 If a woman knows, without looking, in 
 just what part of a crowded room a man 
 is standing, and to whom he is talking 
 she loves him ; and I always know about 
 David. Poor little sister! Are you 
 shuddering and wringing your hands,
 
 VIA P. & O. 211 
 
 and wondering what will happen to me ! 
 Don't! for nothing will happen. I will 
 go on year after year, happier in my 
 heart, and a better woman in my 
 thoughts for this big love within me. 
 And year after year David and I will 
 meet, and talk of books, and people and 
 things, and he will never guess what is 
 in my heart, and I shall never want to 
 know what is in his. 
 
 You shall be my safety valve, poor, pa- 
 tient Patty. 
 
 March llth. 
 
 God hates me, Patty he does, he 
 does. Don't cry out don't say I blas- 
 pheme; don't say anything until you 
 hear. David is going away. He is go- 
 ing home to England, and I must go on 
 living in Shanghai without him. 
 
 Oh, Patty, why must it be ? Why must 
 everything I love be taken away? Was
 
 212 VIA P. & O. 
 
 I so very wicked to love him? I didn't 
 want to. I didn't ask for it. It came to 
 me. And I didn't mean to make ill use 
 of it. I meant to keep it hidden, to let 
 it sweeten the bitter places in my heart. 
 I asked nothing not even in my inmost 
 secret sonl. Not a look from him save 
 the kindly one he gives to all the world, 
 nor a word, save his thoughts on books, 
 and his gentle, courteous comment on 
 the day's events. 
 God hates me. He must hate me. 
 
 March 
 
 I can't let him see my misery. I try 
 to act when with him, as though I found 
 the world a very cheerful place. I have 
 laughed when there is nothing to laugh 
 at. I have talked of my plans for the 
 summer as though this summer were just 
 as important as any other summer. To-
 
 VIA P. & O. 213 
 
 day I said, "I think I will take a house at 
 Wei Hai Wei." I've never thought of 
 doing it for a minute so I'm becoming 
 a liar in my wretchedness. But he must 
 not know; must not suspect that next 
 summer isn't quite as interesting to me 
 as these next two weeks before he leaves. 
 So I laugh, a great deal of thin laughter, 
 and the charm and the naturalness of 
 our companionship is gone. 
 
 I dare not be natural. His eyes look 
 so deeply into mine that I dare not let 
 him read them. He has asked me to 
 spend a day with him on his houseboat 
 before he goes. He will get the doctor 
 and his wife to come too. 
 
 "Spring is here," he said. "I want 
 to show you what Spring can do even in 
 China. Will you spend a day with me ? " 
 
 A day! when I would like to spend 
 every day with him, and every minute of 
 every day. "Yes, I'll come," I said.
 
 214 VIA P. & O. 
 
 March 20th. 
 
 Spring is Spring, Patty even in 
 China! 
 
 The same things happen here as in 
 other lands, if one's eyes aren't too blind 
 with weeping to see them. 
 
 Shanghai is still brown and grey, 
 but ten miles up a little creek, that 
 opened into the muddy Whangpoo the 
 marsh grass is waving its' bright new 
 stalks, the willows on the banks are a 
 mist of tender green, and live things 
 jumped and splashed in the water as we 
 moved. 
 
 Birds twittered and talked of love, and 
 the nest that love was urging them to 
 build for the housing of love's fulfilment. 
 
 The doctor and his wife were on the 
 dock before me, and David waiting for 
 us on the deck of his boat, and it was 
 not quite nine when we pushed off into 
 the stream. For a mile or two, until we 
 came to the mouth of the little creek we
 
 VIA P. & 0. 215 
 
 wanted, we were pulled by a noisy, smok- 
 ing tug, but once between its narrow 
 banks, the big ulo swayed and squeaked, 
 the coolies' bodies bending until they 
 touched the deck, in the long, strong 
 sweep which makes the big oar cut the 
 water. It is not a rapid means of mo- 
 tion, and how typical of China! 
 
 The sky was pale, pale blue, and there 
 was no wind. All morning we slid 
 smoothly between those narrow green 
 banks, sometimes passing a native vil- 
 lage, where yellow-faced children called 
 to us and then scampered along beside 
 us, as any children would have done, and 
 men and women stared at us from black 
 doorways, leading into caverns of dirt 
 and evil smells. 
 
 Sometimes we passed under high 
 arched bridges, high enough to let the 
 big sailing junks pass under, when they 
 come back to their harbour after a toss- 
 ing on the sea. At noon we anchored
 
 216 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 and had lunch in the dearest cabin you 
 ever saw done in blue and white cotton 
 crepe, with blue and white Chinese bowls 
 from which to eat our luncheon. 
 
 And then the doctor and his wife said 
 they must have their daily snooze, and 
 so we left them the cabin and went on 
 deck. David put our chairs as far for- 
 ward as they could be put, and brought 
 rugs and pillows and made me comfort- 
 able. 
 
 We talked and we talked. After tea, 
 which we had on deck, the Mclntyres 
 went below again to play piquet. Yes, 
 I know it was Sunday, dear, and they are 
 Scotch Presbyterians, but China has 
 wrought her invariable transformation, 
 and now they play cards on Sunday in- 
 stead of going to Church. 
 
 And then, Patty, when David and I 
 had settled again in our chairs, the sun 
 sank, and as the sky turned pink and 
 amethyst, and palest of pale blue, he be-
 
 VIA P. & O. 217 
 
 gan to tell me what I have so longed to 
 know he told me about his life. He 
 told it very simply and briefly and so I 
 will try and tell it to you. 
 
 Twenty years ago, when he was 
 twenty-one years old he married a 
 woman a little older than he was, a 
 woman exquisitely beautiful. Before a 
 year was over she had run away from 
 him with another man, and in another 
 year she was dead. For three years he 
 wandered over the world. He never 
 stayed more than a few days in one place. 
 Something drove him on and on. He 
 called it something but anguish I sup- 
 pose would be the best word to describe 
 it oh, how well I know that longing to 
 move, to move, and never to rest. 
 
 At first his hand was against every 
 man's. The world was to him an evil 
 place full only of lies and suffering. 
 This lasted for nearly three years. 
 Then something (again he called it some-
 
 218 VIA P. & O. 
 
 thing, but I know it was his big nature 
 and great heart) caused a change in him, 
 and gradually he came again to see that 
 there was truth and beauty and happi- 
 ness in the world. In thankfulness that 
 all bitterness had gone out of him he 
 made a vow. He vowed that he would 
 never so far as lay in his power harm 
 either man or woman. He vowed that 
 another man's wife should always be as 
 sacred to him as his own had been. As 
 he told me this, he did not look at me, 
 but straight off into the darkening 
 water ; and when finally he turned to me 
 he said "Child, child, don't cry for that 
 old sorrow. It isn't worth one of your 
 tears. I didn't tell you to make you sad, 
 but because I wanted you to understand. 
 We have been great friends, haven't we? 
 I have never had a woman friend be- 
 fore." 
 
 After that we sat silent for a long 
 time, while I swallowed my tears, and
 
 VIA P. & O. 219 
 
 then I asked because I wanted so much 
 to know, "How did you find peace at 
 \ last?" and he answered 
 
 "In work, in books, and in that vow I 
 made." 
 
 March 27th. 
 
 Two days ago, Patty, I went to the 
 steamer to see him off. Don't be 
 alarmed, there is nothing unusual in 
 that. Everybody goes to see everybody 
 off here. Sometimes one goes just for 
 the pleasure of standing for a few min- 
 utes on boards what will soon be leav- 
 ing this dreadful country. However, 
 even if it had been unusual I should have 
 gone just the same. I could no more 
 help going than the sun can help setting. 
 
 All was confusion on board and though 
 several times I saw his tall figure, it 
 seemed impossible to get to him. There 
 were many people I knew going, and I 
 said many good-byes, and laughed much
 
 220 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 thin laughter. At last he came to me, 
 and took me off to the end of the boat, 
 where there was a little quiet, and there 
 I said good-bye to him. I don't know 
 what I did say, Patty, the words all came 
 in such a rush. I told him what his go- 
 ing away meant. What loneliness and 
 desolation. He did not stop me, he let 
 me say it all, but just once when my 
 voice caught in my throat he said, ' * Oh, 
 don't, my darling, don't." There, that 
 is all. 
 
 He has gone, and I must live my life 
 without him and find peace if I can, in 
 books and in work, and in a vow I have 
 made and which, please God, I shall keep 
 as he has kept his. But, Patty, let me say 
 just this one thing, and then never again 
 shall I hurt or shock you. It would have 
 seemed quite natural to me, and it would 
 have been to follow the craving of my 
 mind and body to go with him then. It 
 would have seemed more natural to me
 
 VIA P. & O. 221 
 
 than to have come back to this house 
 that is my home, and to Karl who is my 
 husband. Such things are, Patty, such 
 things are, and I understand much now 
 where I once condemned. I have just 
 one more thing to tell you. The morn- 
 ing after he left, there came to me a 
 basket of pansies and a book of verses. 
 The book fell open where a marker lay, a 
 slip of paper with a date on it, and the 
 date was that of his sailing, and on the 
 page between two pencilled crosses were 
 these lines. 
 
 A FAREWELL 
 
 "With all my will, but much against my heart, 
 
 We two now part, 
 
 My very dear 
 
 Our solace is, the sad road lies so clear 
 
 It needs no art, 
 
 With faint, averted feet, 
 
 And many a tear, 
 
 In our opposed paths to persevere, 
 
 Go thou to East, I West, 
 
 We will not say
 
 222 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 
 
 There's any hope, it is so far away, 
 But, 0, my Best. 
 
 When the one darling of our widowhood 
 
 The nurseling grief, 
 
 Is dead, 
 
 And no dews blur our eyes, 
 
 To see the peach bloom come in evening skies, 
 
 Perchance we may, 
 
 Where now this night is day, 
 
 And even through faith of still averted feet, 
 
 Making full circle of our banishment, 
 
 Amazed meet; 
 
 The bitter journey to the bourne so sweet 
 
 Seasoning the termless feast of our content 
 
 With tears of recognition never dry. 
 
 COVENTBY PATMOEE. 
 
 "Ap.rU 
 
 Karl has been acting so strangely. 
 He has been staying at home much more 
 frequently during the last month, and 
 for a week past has spent every even- 
 ing at home reading. His reading is 
 the most disjointed and nervous thing
 
 VIA P. & O. 223 
 
 you ever knew. Every little while he 
 closes his book with a bang that makes 
 me jump, gets up to hunt for another, 
 fusses about the room, and destroys all 
 sense of peace. 
 
 Last night after he had banged hia 
 book two or three times, with a noise like 
 a pistol shot, I couldn't bear it any 
 longer, and I said I would have to go to 
 bed if he did it again. I expected his 
 usual answer to a protest of that kind. 
 
 "You haven't the nerves of a hare. 
 "Why can't you get over jumping like a 
 singed kitten?" or else his even more 
 usual and quite conclusive answer to all 
 protests the slam of the front door; 
 but neither came and he said meekly he 
 would try to remember not to do it again. 
 Karl meek ! it positively frightens me. 
 
 There is in his restlessness a sugges- 
 tion of restrained desire. 
 
 It reminds me of those days so long 
 ago, in our early months together, when
 
 224 VIA P. & O. 
 
 his old life was calling to him, and he 
 had not yet shaken himself free of his 
 life with me. 
 
 Then, as now, he would pace the floor, 
 read in jerky fits and starts, and slam 
 his book to in just the same violent way. 
 
 Then I did all I could to amuse him. 
 I played to him and sang to him (no, 
 Patty, not enough to drive him from the 
 house), played cards with him, talked 
 to him. But it wasn't any use. Karl 
 had ceased to love me, and Japan, al- 
 luring, dainty, multicoloured Japan was 
 calling him back to her, and finally he 
 went. But what in the world is calling 
 him now, and why doesn't he go f 
 
 I no longer play or sing I don't even 
 talk to him. 
 
 May 2nd. 
 
 A very radiant, proud and flushed 
 Dick burst in upon me this afternoon to
 
 VIA P. & O. 225 
 
 tell me that the dearest and best girl 
 in the world, fete., etc., had promised, 
 etc., etc. I shook his hand. I listened 
 to his rhapsodies, which were boyishly 
 incoherent, I gave him tea, I tried to 
 match his enthusiasm and all the time 
 my heart was throbbing and throbbing 
 for little Wild Rose. 
 
 Silly, perhaps, for what do I know of 
 her? She may not love him, but I don't 
 believe that. 
 
 If once his blue eyes had looked love 
 if once that tanned boyish face, and that 
 dimple in his chin had belonged to a 
 woman, she couldn't give him up with- 
 out a heartbreak well, heartache any- 
 way. I make that concession to her 
 type. 
 
 The only cloud on his horizon how- 
 ever is that he has to go away on busi- 
 ness for a few days, but the engagement 
 is to be announced before he leaves.
 
 226 VIA P. & O. 
 
 May 4th. 
 
 Oh, Patty, I'm beginning to be afraid 
 of Karl's restlessness. I'm beginning 
 to suspect the meaning of his evening 
 struggles with Emerson, Carlyle and 
 Swedenborg. Last night he brought me 
 another gift, no pearl this time, but a 
 diamond pin of old workmanship, which 
 he picked up here at an auction. It is 
 lovely and of course I like it and per- 
 haps in time I shall get over the curious 
 half-shamed feeling I have in wearing 
 it. When he gave it to me, looking 
 very fixedly at me, my impulse was to 
 refuse it, with the hauteur proper to the 
 refusal of something which enfolds an 
 insult, but a little common sense came 
 to me just in time, and I was able to 
 accept it with all the delight which its 
 beauty caused me. Thought showed me 
 my first impulse in an appalling light. 
 Have I gone so far, that a present from 
 my husband feels like an insult. Is my
 
 VIA P. & O. 227 
 
 heart really so far, so very far away, 
 nearly at Brindisi by this time? 
 
 I wonder how soon you will see him. 
 He promised he would go to see you at 
 once. 
 
 May 8th. 
 
 Oh, I am very frightened, Patty. 
 Karl has made it perfectly plain. He 
 wants to go back to the old days ; begin 
 all over again and be happy. Oh, what 
 am I to do? We had a terrible con- 
 versation ; the most terrible I have ever 
 had. I felt my face flushing and my 
 heart beating. It seemed to me that 
 we outraged all decency in speaking of 
 our old life. 
 
 Karl said things like this "I'll ad- 
 mit I've been in the wrong, but I have 
 changed. I'm tired of the life I have 
 lived. I want to settle down and be 
 in my own home. I want you to love 
 me as you used to; I know you don't
 
 228 VIA P. & O. 
 
 now, but you will again if you'll let your- 
 self. I have never ceased to love you. 
 Appearances ought not to count in all 
 cases. Women never understand men 
 and their feelings and temptations. 
 Anyway the past is the past. I'm older 
 than I was when I was married, and this 
 Eastern life is hell, unless a man has a 
 real home to live in." 
 
 My answers were halting and vague 
 and only given to gain time. I dared 
 not tell Karl the truth, the truth that a 
 year ago I might have listened, that then 
 there might still have been for me some 
 music in his voice, some sweet compel- 
 ling music that might have made me for- 
 get these years I have lived alone. 
 That a year ago, if I had heard him say, 
 "I love you," it might have brought to 
 me some feeling other than fear and 
 disgust. I dare not tell him that I love 
 another man and the thought of belong- 
 ing to any man except the man I love,
 
 VIA P. & O. 229 
 
 fills me with horror. I dare not tell him 
 for I am quite sure he would kill me for 
 it. 
 
 I did say that I no longer loved him, 
 but he answered that he would teach me 
 all over again. This brought to me so 
 clearly the sight and smell of Cherry 
 'Blossoms, the flavour of those far-off 
 days when he first taught me that my 
 head swam. 
 
 "What of our compact," I said. "I 
 have never broken it I've never ques- 
 tioned or intruded. . . ." 
 
 He interrupted me very vehemently 
 at that, and was most flattering in his 
 admiration of the way I had kept my 
 side of our bargain. He said he never 
 would have made it, if he had thought 
 me capable of keeping it! 
 
 Then he went on to say that he had 
 a pretty clean record for the past year, 
 that he thought he deserved some con- 
 sideration for that that it was woman's
 
 230 VIA P. & O. 
 
 alienable right to forgive and forget, 
 one of her greatest privileges in fact, 
 and a great deal more of the same kind 
 of thing. 
 
 In the end I asked for time, and I 
 have promised that when he comes back 
 from his country trip, for which he 
 leaves to-morrow, I will answer him. I 
 can tell you now, as it is so long ago, 
 that when first this sort of discussion 
 took place between us, years ago, my an- 
 swer to Karl's arguments was a pistol. 
 Karl knew I could shoot, and I told him 
 that I would use it for myself, or for 
 him, or for us both, unless he respected 
 my wishes. It always brought the in- 
 terview to an end. I don't think Karl 
 a coward, but I suppose he realised that 
 an hysterical woman is capable of any 
 folly, and the game wasn't worth the 
 risk. I have that pistol still, but I 
 didn't remind him of it. The days of 
 melodrama are over. I am no longer
 
 VIA P. & O. 231 
 
 an hysterical girl, but a woman, who 
 must order her life with calmness and 
 wisdom, and see to it that no tragedies 
 touch it. 
 
 My answer now will be to go away. 
 But where am I to go? I can't go to 
 you, for David is in England. He might 
 think I was following him No, he 
 wouldn't think that, but I should know 
 I was following him. Europe is too 
 near England, America and the Aunts, 
 and their questions'? No, I can't face 
 that Australia might do will have to 
 do; I don't know a soul there, but I can 
 find a travelling companion of some sort, 
 maid or something, and spend a year 
 there, or until Karl promises to renew 
 our compact forever. 
 
 May 9th. 
 
 I have taken passage on a boat that 
 leaves for Sydney next Monday. There 
 is no earlier one. Karl said he would
 
 232 VIA P. & O. 
 
 be gone a week. Will lie be back Sun- 
 day night or Monday morning? It 
 makes little difference. I shall sail on 
 that boat whether he is back or not. 
 
 I shall go without saying good-bye to 
 any one except my friends at the hos- 
 pital and "Wild Eose. I have plenty of 
 money to my credit, and another draft 
 due next month. I arranged about a 
 letter of credit to-day. 
 
 PS. Edwarda's engagement to Dick 
 has been announced. Poor Wild Eose! 
 
 May IQth. 
 
 I am filled with a wild idea; so wild 
 that when it came into my head I 
 laughed aloud, but I couldn't laugh it 
 away. There it stayed all night, and I 
 couldn't sleep. By turns I raged at my- 
 self for a fool, and went on making my 
 foolish plans. 
 
 This afternoon I shall go to the rest-
 
 VIA P. & 0. 233 
 
 ing place, I shall get out, and go up to 
 Wild Eose, take her hand and ask her 
 to go out with me to Australia. She 
 will come, I know she will. It will be 
 the beginning of a new life for her. No 
 one will know she is with me, until we 
 get to a land where her frailties are un- 
 known. She will follow me on the next 
 steamer and I will wait for her in Hong 
 Kong. I shall have my companion, 
 and she will have the chance of a new 
 birth. 
 
 May \ttlti. 
 
 God, Patty dear, had no need of my 
 poor human meddling in His plan for 
 little Wild Eose. 
 
 While I was planning for her a new 
 birth in this world, he was planning for 
 a new birth in the next. She is dead, 
 Patty, and when she died, I held her 
 hand in mine. This seems so natural
 
 234 VIA P. & O. 
 
 now as to need no explanation, but I 
 realise that to you it will sound as 
 though I told you I had jumped the 
 whole width of the China Sea in one 
 jump. 
 
 Well, you shall see how it happened. 
 On Tuesday I drove out to the resting 
 place, sure of finding Wild Rose, with 
 her back to the road, and her eyes on 
 our distant trees. But she wasn't there, 
 and after waiting an hour I went home 
 half relieved that I had yet another day 
 before the telling of my plan, for it was 
 going to be no easy thing, this asking a 
 strange woman, to whom I had never 
 spoken a word, to go with me to 
 Australia. I didn't for a second give 
 up my plan, but I was glad of the re- 
 spite of a day. I dined at home and 
 alone, and after dinner I got out my ac- 
 counts, for there was, .and is still, much 
 to be done. I feel it would be very un-
 
 VIA P. & O. 235 
 
 fair to leave Karl suddenly responsible 
 for the whole maintenance of this house 
 and stable, where he has had but half. 
 I know very little of his affairs, and it 
 might be difficult for him to meet the 
 whole expense. So I was going over the 
 whole of the last year methodically, so 
 I could know about how much to leave 
 for my share of the next six months, and 
 I had just finished when Boy knocked, 
 came in hurriedly and asked if his 
 friend might use our telephone. Our 
 telephone is the only one in just this part 
 of Shanghai, and it hangs in the hall, 
 just outside of the library where I was 
 sitting. Of course I gave permission, 
 and began putting my books away. I 
 heard the man ring the bell, call a num- 
 ber, talk a minute or two in Chinese and 
 then in voluble and excited pidgin Eng- 
 lish he said, 
 "My missee have make shoot herself.
 
 236 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Please come very quick. I think makee 
 die. My missee name belong Missee 
 Nanette Ward. She live No. 11 Honan 
 Koad." 
 
 He was telephoning for a doctor and 
 his Missee had shot herself, and his 
 Missee was Nanette Ward. It was all as 
 plain as day. I stood perfectly still un- 
 til I heard both the boys run down the 
 hall, talking their terrible language as 
 they went. Then Patty, I assure you I 
 didn't give one thought to what I was 
 about to do, I did it from impulse, but 
 an impulse as impossible to disobey as 
 the one that causes us to sit bolt upright 
 in bed at the boom of the fire bell at 
 night. 
 
 I ran upstairs, pulled a cloak from my 
 wardrobe, ran down, opened the door 
 for myself, and was out in the road in 
 a minute. In another minute I had 
 hailed a passing rickshaw and said to 
 him "11 Honan Koad."
 
 VIA P. & O. 237 
 
 The house wasn't far from our house. 
 I had thought of her always living in 
 some remote part of the town. Mrs. 
 Mclntyre had told me she was near the 
 French settlement, but it wasn't so. In 
 less than three minutes, hy several wind- 
 ing alleys we came to a bungalow, shut 
 in by a high stucco wall. It was very 
 dark, with only the rickshaw man's lan- 
 tern to show me the path to the door. I 
 didn't ring, but tried the handle and the 
 door opened, and a light streamed from 
 a half -open door at the end of the hall. 
 There was not a soul in sight and im- 
 pulse still leading me I pushed that door 
 open and was in the room. I will try to 
 tell you about it as I saw it afterward, 
 as I sat through the night, for the mo- 
 ment I saw nothing but a white face, 
 and a mass of yellow hair, and a crim- 
 son spot on the bosom of a white gown. 
 The room was a room of luxury; the 
 room of a woman who loved soft
 
 238 VIA P. & O. 
 
 cushions, padded floors, shaded lights 
 and flowers, but it was the room of a 
 lady. There was nothing cheap in it, 
 and nothing ugly. The curtains of old 
 rose Chinese brocade, the old rose 
 carpet, and the black wood furniture, 
 were perfect. It might have been the 
 room of a duchess, set in some night- 
 mare in a Chinese bungalow, on a 
 squalid Shanghai street. 
 
 In the corner an old amah was 
 crouching, rocking to and fro, and wail- 
 ing as she rocked. I went to the bed, 
 and kneeling down I felt one of her lit- 
 tle hands. She was not dead. Her 
 hand was warm and the pulse ticked 
 feebly. I didn't know what to do. I 
 had thought her dead, and she was alive, 
 and perhaps yet to be saved if I could 
 do the right thing in those precious mo- 
 ments. I looked around for brandy, 
 and then some half -forgotten warning 
 that stimulants were bad for bleeding
 
 VIA P. & O. 239 
 
 came into my mind. So I dared do 
 nothing, except to take a fold of her soft 
 nightgown and press it to the little hole 
 which I uncovered, and from which the 
 blood oozed gently and steadily. So I 
 waited for that doctor who had been 
 telephoned for. In a little while he 
 came, a little dark Parsee I have often 
 seen driving about the town. I gave 
 him my place as he came in, and if he 
 thought one way or another about my 
 being there, he gave no sign. I stood 
 on the other side of the bed and watched 
 him. He looked closely at the little hole, 
 felt the pulse and shook his head. 
 Then he pulled lint and bandages from 
 his little bag and bent over her. He 
 worked over her for a little while gave 
 her a few drops of something from a 
 bottle, and kept his finger almost con- 
 stantly on her wrist. He shook his 
 head too almost every minute and finally 
 he looked up at me and said,
 
 240 VIA P. & O. 
 
 "She cannot live internal hem- 
 orrhage." 
 
 "You won't go away!" I said, and he 
 answered : 
 
 "No, I will wait." 
 
 Suddenly he left her side and began 
 looking for something. I knew what it 
 was, and I knew too where it was. 
 Where could it be but beside the bed 
 where her hand had let it drop. Hisi 
 foot touched it as he went back to her 
 side, and he picked it up the little 
 shining thing and laid it on a table. It 
 fascinated me. I could feel it there all 
 the night as we sat waiting in a silence 
 only broken now and then by something 
 he did for her. 
 
 His swarthy fingers looked quite black 
 on her white wrist ; I held her other hand 
 so limp and soft and young and I tried 
 to pray for her. I tried but I couldn't. 
 All that would come was an immense 
 regret that my plan had been too late.
 
 VIA P. & O. 
 
 That God's plan, if it was Ms, had taken 
 from her a second chance in this world 
 that had treated her so badly. I looked 
 at her, beautiful still, even with grey 
 lips, and closed blue eyelids, and I 
 thought of the hour of her birth, when 
 perhaps her mother hearing that she had 
 a little daughter began to plan for her 
 a radiant future. She died at four 
 o'clock without having opened her eyes. 
 But I like to think that the pressure of 
 my hand gave to her some comfort 
 some sense of human nearness. 
 
 It was not until he had covered her 
 face that the little doctor turned to me 
 with some wonder and speculation in 
 his eyes. We went out into the hall 
 shutting the door behind us. The amah 
 had long since taken herself off, and we 
 rang for the boy and the doctor gave 
 him many orders. Then he turned to 
 me. It didn't particularly matter to me 
 what he thought of my presence there,
 
 242 VIA P. & 0. 
 
 but I had to think of Karl's view of the 
 case, and the gossip of Shanghai, so I 
 told the truth plainly, just how I hap- 
 pened to be there. Then I made the 
 plea that I thought would have the most 
 weight. 
 
 "Under the circumstances,*' I said, 
 "I think my husband would prefer 
 that no one should know I had been 
 here." 
 
 "Certainly, Mrs. Freiheit," he an- 
 swered. "It shall be of professional 
 secrecy," and then he called me a rick- 
 shaw. I am glad Dick was away. 
 "Would I have sent for him would the 
 servants have sent for him had he been 
 there.' I don't know. Anyway the 
 poor fellow was spared much. 
 
 This morning a little package was 
 brought to me. In it was a box and a 
 letter. In the box was a gold medal, a 
 medal given for valour in our Civil 
 War on it were engraved a name and
 
 VIA P. & O. 243 
 
 date. The name is a name of the South, 
 a good name, and this was the letter : 
 
 Dear and beautiful lady: 
 
 You will forgive me for writing this, for 
 when you receive it I shall be dead, and 
 death wipes out everything. 
 
 You are the only woman who has smiled! 
 at me in many years. Will you please ac- 
 cept and keep, in memory of those smiles, 
 the only treasure I have. It was my 
 father's, and I beg that you will never let 
 any one know that the name upon it was once 
 mine. 
 
 Everything is over, and I cannot begin 
 again. There is no life for me, but one life, 
 and I have no courage left for it. 
 
 If, where I am going it is possible to pray, 
 I shall pray that some day you will be happy. 
 
 NANETTE WARD. 
 
 Oh, how I wish, how I wish that she 
 might have lived, or that she might have 
 known that I held her hand as she died. 
 
 I came in from the simple ceremony 
 that disposed forever of Nanette Ward, 
 to find Edwarda waiting for me.
 
 244 VIA P. & O. 
 
 The funeral, at which the little doctor 
 and I were the only mourners, was in 
 the Chapel set in the middle of the 
 foreign cemetery. We are still for- 
 eigners in China even after the earth 
 has taken us back. 
 
 The doctor had let me know the day 
 and hour as I had asked him. Little 
 Wild Rose was to be cremated, 'and as 
 we listened to the solemn words of the 
 service, we two, who are perfect 
 strangers to her and to each other, and 
 only there because by chance, we had 
 watched her die, I heard the sound of 
 the shovel grating against the coal, 
 which was later to change her poor soft 
 little body into clean white ashes. I 
 liked the sound, I liked the idea. It 
 was such a definite and satisfactory 
 solution of the life of a besmirched Wild 
 Rose. 
 
 It was a tearful, defiant, overwrought 
 Edwarda who waited for me.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 245 
 
 Shanghai of course is ringing with the 
 news of this tragedy, and at the hos- 
 pital they are bringing much pressure 
 to bear to make Edwarda break her en- 
 gagement. To those Puritan women 
 there is but one thing to do in the face 
 of such a scandal To wash one's 
 hands of all connection with it. 
 
 Dick is on his way back from Tien- 
 tsin, in response to a wire from Ed- 
 warda. Poor thing, she could do little 
 but repeat, "Oh, what shall I do, what 
 shall I do?" When she was a little 
 quieter we talked. 
 
 "How can I bear it?" she said. 
 "How could he deceive me so how 
 could he be so vile? They all tell me I 
 must break it off but I can't, I can't 
 give him up, oh, tell me, what am I to 
 do?" It was curious to hear Edwarda 
 asking my advice, and to see her proud 
 confident head bowed on her hands. 
 
 "I wouldn't give him up," I said.
 
 246 VIA P. & O. 
 
 "I would stick to him closer than ever. 
 I'd help him to bear it and forget it if 
 you can. It will be hard to make him 
 forget it. Probably he didn't mean to 
 deceive you. It was a hard position, a 
 hard thing to tell you. Probably he 
 meant to, in time." 
 
 "I think he did try to tell me," she 
 said, "but I would not understand. 
 Besides I don't believe it was his fault. 
 He is such a boy. Any bold designing 
 woman ..." I could not stand that so I 
 stopped her short. 
 
 "Now, Edwarda," I said, "you know 
 nothing at all about the woman." 
 
 "Dick is not a boy. He is a man, and 
 quite responsible for his actions. For 
 the sake of your future happiness, don't 
 tempt him to wriggle out of it on any 
 such plea as that. 
 
 "Admit his fault, and then forgive it. 
 Besides I'm not quite sure that you have 
 anything to forgive. His fault wasn't
 
 VIA P. & O. 247 
 
 against you. It was against himself 
 and against her. It all happened long 
 before he knew you, and for you he de- 
 serted her." 
 
 " Deserted her! Why she was 
 only . . ." 
 
 "Yes, yes, I know (I couldn't bear 
 her to say the word) but she may have 
 had a heart for all that. I don't believe 
 she was hard or wicked. I believe she 
 must have suffered a great deal." I 
 couldn't help a tear coming to my eyes. 
 Edwarda stared at me. 
 
 "Why," she said, "she was a bad 
 woman. You talk as though she were 
 just like anybody else. You talk al- 
 most as if you had known her." 
 
 "No," I said, "I didn't know her. 
 But, Edwarda, I'm going to ask you a 
 favour, and it's for your sake as well as 
 Dick's." 
 
 "If, when Dick gets back, you speak 
 of her, as I suppose you must, speak of
 
 248 VIA P. & O. 
 
 her gently. Don't rant against her. 
 Don't call her bad or designing. It 
 isn't for the sake of the poor thing. 
 You can't hurt her now. It's for your 
 own sake. I can't explain exactly, but 
 I have an instinctive feeling that Dick 
 will love you better, and be grateful to 
 you, if when you talk of her, you do it 
 in gentleness and charity. And, Ed- 
 warda dear, promise me still another 
 thing. Talk of this whole thing but 
 once. Let him say all he has to say. 
 Say all you have to say, even if you have 
 to sit up all night, but once you are 
 finished with the thing never, never 
 speak of it again. 
 
 "You know how confusing it is to read 
 two books at a time; well, shut and be 
 done with this book before you open the 
 book of your new life. Don't even leave 
 that old book on the shelf when you and 
 Dick marry, burn it. ' '
 
 VIA P. & O. 249 
 
 When I had finished preaching at her 
 and she had gone, I realised how very 
 little right I have to be giving such ad- 
 vice. "Admit Dick's fault and forgive 
 it," I preached, but I can't admit Karl's 
 fault and forgive it. 
 
 I am so tired, Patty dear, and there 
 is so much still to be done, and so much 
 packing ahead of me. 
 
 Sunday Evening, May 15 th. 
 The slam of the front door is echoing 
 through the house. Perhaps it is the 
 last time I shall ever hear it. It is late, 
 Patty, but I must write this to you to- 
 night. I may not have another oppor- 
 tunity. Usually one can see one day 
 ahead. To-night I cannot. I don't 
 know what to-morrow will bring. Karl 
 came home this evening. I was arrang- 
 ing papers here in the library when he
 
 250 VIA P. & O. 
 
 came. I have packed a small box of 
 things which I shall send to you. My 
 will, your letters, and a few books. 
 
 Karl came in, and his eyes were glow- 
 ing with the look I fear so much. 
 
 I stood up and held out my hand, and 
 he drew me into his arms, and kissed me 
 on the lips. 
 
 Six years ago, how my heart would 
 have beat from such a kiss. To-night 
 every nerve in my body seemed to 
 writhe in an effort to draw away from 
 him, but I stood quite still. 
 
 Then he threw himself into a chair, 
 and said, 
 
 "I'm a day ahead of my time, Carola 
 but I couldn't stand it another minute, 
 and I tell you that I made those damned 
 coolies sweat, to get me here to- 
 night. 
 
 "Are you a little glad to see me?" 
 
 His eyes seemed to burn, and his 
 beautiful face was flushed. "Yes," I
 
 VIA P. & O. 251 
 
 said, ''I'm glad you are back, so that I 
 can say good-bye to you. 
 
 "I'm leaving to-morrow on the Bel- 
 gian for Australia. I am taking an 
 amah with me, and when I get to 
 Sydney I shall advertise for a com- 
 panion to travel with me. 
 
 "I may be back in six months, or I 
 may not. It depends on you." 
 
 Then the storm broke. I can't tell 
 you about it. There is no time. Karl 
 swore I should not go. He said I was 
 his wife and he would find the means 
 to prevent me. He told me in one 
 breath that he could not live without 
 me, and in the next that I was a damned 
 fool. 
 
 His language would have frightened 
 any woman not inured to mighty oaths. 
 
 It lasted two hours and oh, I am so 
 tired, Patty dear. Can he really pre- 
 vent my going? I don't know, and if he 
 can, what then?
 
 252 VIA P. & O. 
 
 Am I to go back to hysteria and 
 flourish, my little pistol? I don't know, 
 I can't see a day ahead. 
 
 If I only knew that the front door 
 would slam every evening as it did to- 
 night. . . . 
 
 I am going to bed now, I shall send 
 this letter out by Boy, to be sure that 
 it is posted before I sleep. 
 
 If I go I shall send you a cable from 
 Hong Kong, and give you the name of my 
 bankers. If I don't go, if I am kept a 
 prisoner oh, dear, how childish I am. 
 We are not living in the Middle Ages. 
 If Ah Fu could run away surely I can; 
 but oh, for David's help! 
 
 In a day or two you will see him his 
 vessel is due in Brindisi to-day, and he 
 said that within three days he would go 
 to see you. He promised me that and 
 also that he would Write me at once and 
 tell me of you and the children. 
 
 I shall probably never get that letter.
 
 VIA P. & O. 253 
 
 Karl would not trouble to send it on to 
 me. I wish I could have waited until 
 it came. Perhaps, Patty, you could tell 
 him, that it's not likely to have reached 
 me. Perhaps he would write again; 
 just once. It would be a comfort to me 
 to have a letter of his to carry about 
 with me in a strange land. 
 
 Do this for me if you can. 
 
 Good night, sweet sister. You and 
 the children are probably in the garden 
 as I write. 
 
 Kiss them for Aunt Carola. 
 
 Cable to Mrs. Ford. 
 
 May 16th. 
 Karl died suddenly last night. 
 
 CAROLA. 
 
 May 18th. 
 My dear Mrs. Ford: 
 
 I regret that it is my painful duty to convey 
 to you the sad and distressing particulars of 
 Mr. Freiheit's tragic and untimely death
 
 254 VIA P. & O. 
 
 the news of which has already been cabled you. 
 Mrs. Freiheit has entrusted me with this task, 
 asking me to give you in detail such particu- 
 lars as we have of the sad manner of his taking 
 off. Mrs. Freiheit, I must begin by saying, is 
 rallying from the shock of this sudden blow, 
 but is still too prostrated to be allowed to make 
 the effort of writing. She seems most extra- 
 ordinarily anxious that you should have all the 
 particulars without delay, and it was not un- 
 til I had given her this assurance that she con- 
 sented to let me undertake the task. 
 
 Mrs. Freiheit 's courage has been extraor- 
 dinary, her devotion to her husband was well 
 known, and her grief and prostration at his 
 death was extremely painful to witness. She 
 seems to blame herself in some way, but this 
 is part of the terrific shock she has sustained. 
 Mr. Freiheit met his death during a fight be- 
 tween some Russian and Japanese sailors 
 which took place on the Bund during the early 
 morning hours of the 16th inst. It was one of 
 the many insignificant fracases which occur 
 so frequently that no attention, no official at- 
 tention, is given them. The sailors as a rule 
 break a few heads, and then withdraw to their 
 ships. On this occasion the fighting took place 
 a block or two from the Shanghai club, and the
 
 VIA P. & O. 255 
 
 noise attracting attention, several men who 
 were playing cards went out to see what was 
 going on. When within twenty feet of the 
 fight, it is said, a large stone dislodged from 
 the road bed struck Mr. Freiheit and he sank 
 to the ground. No one knows who threw the 
 missile, and in the consternation that fol- 
 lowed, the sailors stopped their brawling and 
 all fled towards the water and embarked. Mr. 
 Freiheit was unconscious and was imme- 
 diately carried to his house, two gentlemen 
 preceding him in order to warn Mrs. Frei- 
 heit of his condition. I was called up, 
 and dressing hurriedly, arrived at the house 
 only a short time after he was brought 
 in. Your sister's fortitude, while he still 
 lived, was remarkable. She bore up won- 
 derfully, giving me such aid as I required, 
 but when it became my sad duty to tell 
 her that he could not possibly survive, the 
 skull being badly fractured, her anguish be- 
 came intense, and I had much ado to quiet her. 
 After he had passed away, she insisted on be- 
 ing left alone with him, and though I was 
 obliged to comply, I remained in the next 
 room, and would not allow the intervening 
 door to be closed. I was then able to watch 
 her, for her grief was of the extreme kind
 
 256 VIA P. & O. 
 
 which made me fear for her actions. She re- 
 mained with him during the night and until 
 twelve the following day, though I used every 
 means from time to time to induce her to leave 
 his side. Nature in the end came to my aid, 
 for Mrs. Freiheit fainted, and we were able 
 to carry her from the room. 
 
 Immediately after the funeral Airs. Mc- 
 Intyre and I insisted on taking Mrs. Freiheit 
 to our own house. We are extremely fond of 
 her. Her charm and her kindness having en- 
 deared her to us both and we will keep her 
 with us until she is able to sail for home. It 
 is well that we took her all her servants de- 
 serted her on the day following the tragedy. 
 It seems there was some superstitious idea 
 among them that Mr. Freiheit was to die 
 within the year. 
 
 I regret the shock and sorrow which this 
 news must bring to you, but pray be assured, 
 dear Madam, that Mrs. Freiheit is surrounded 
 by friends who are sincerely attracted to her. 
 
 Miss Edwarda Grey has been constantly at 
 her side, and so far as lies in our power she 
 shall not lack for sympathy and help. 
 
 Sincerely and in deepest sympathy, 
 
 DONALD MC!NTYBE.
 
 VIA P. & 0. 257 
 
 Cable to Mrs. Freiheit. 
 Shanghai. 
 
 Courage what steamer do you take ? 
 
 DAVID. 
 
 Cable to David Jerrold, Esq. 
 The Travellers Club, London. 
 
 Sailing via P. & 0. June first. 
 
 CAEOLA. 
 
 Cable to Mrs. Freiheit. 
 Shanghai. 
 
 Your sister and I will meet you at Brindisi. 
 
 DAVID. 
 
 THE END