Godfrey departed to the observatory where he often worked in summer, feeling very sore and full of reflections. He had not really meant to kiss Juliette, at least he thought not, and it was unthinkable that she meant to kiss him, since, so far as he was aware, no young woman ever wanted to do such a thing, being, every one of them, doubtless, as unapproachable and frigid as the topmost, snowy peak of the Alps. (Such was, and always remained his attitude, where the other sex was concerned, one not without inconvenience in a practical world of disillusions.) No, it was that confounded flower which brought about this pure accident—as though Nature, which designs such accidents, had not always a flower, or something equally serviceable, up her sleeve.

Moreover, had it not been for that accursed pair, sent, doubtless, to spy on him by Madame Riennes, the accident would never have mattered; at least not much. He could have apologized suitably to Juliette, that is, if she wanted an apology, which she showed no signs of doing until she saw the two men. Indeed, at the moment, he thought that she seemed rather amused.

He thought of searching out Brother Smith and Professor Petersen, and explaining to them exactly what had happened in full detail, and should they still continue their ribald jests, of punching their heads, which as a manly young fellow, he was quite capable of doing. Reflection showed him, however, that this course might not be wise, since such adventures are apt to end in the police-court, where the flower, and its fruit, would obtain undue publicity. No, he must leave the business alone, and trust that Juliette would be merciful. Supposing that she were to tell Madame that he had tried to kiss her, though probably she would not mention that he had actually succeeded!

The mere idea made him feel cold down the back. He felt sure that Madame would believe the worst of him; to judge from their conversations, ladies, good as they all were, invariably did seem to believe the worst in such affairs. Should he throw himself upon the mercy of the Pasteur? Again, no. It would be so hard to make him comprehend. Also, if he did, he might suggest that the altar was the only possible expiation. And—and, oh! he must confess it, she was very nice and sweet, but he did not wish to marry Juliette and live with her all his life.

No, there was but one thing to be done: keep the burden of his secret locked in his own breast, though, unfortunately, it was locked as well in those of Juliette and of two uninvited observers, and probably would soon also be locked in the capacious bosom of Madame Riennes. For the rest, towards Juliette in the future, he would observe an attitude of strictest propriety; never more should she have occasion to complain of his conduct, which henceforth would be immaculate. Alas! how easy it is for the most innocent to be misjudged, and apparently, not without reason.

This reflection brought something to Godfrey's mind which had escaped it in his first disturbance, also connected with a flower. There came before him the vision of a London square, and of a tall, pale girl, in an antique dress, giving a rose to a man in knight's armour, which rose both of them kissed simultaneously. Of course, when he saw it he had ruled out the rose and only thought of the kisses, although, now that he came to think of it, a rose is of a much thicker texture than a lily. As he had witnessed that little scene, and drawn his own conclusions, so others had witnessed another little scene that afternoon, and made therefrom deductions which, in his innocent soul, he knew to be totally false. Suppose, then, that his deductions were also false. Oh! it was not possible. Besides, a barrier built of rose leaves was not sufficient, which again, with perfect justice, he remembered was exactly what Brother Smith and Professor Petersen had thought of one composed of lily petals.

There for the time the matter ended. Juliette reappeared on the morrow quite cured of her headache, and as gay and charming as ever. Possibly she had confided in her mamma, who had told her that after all things were not so terrible, even if they had been seen.

At any rate, the equilibrium was restored. Godfrey acted on his solemn resolutions of haughtiness and detachment for quite an hour, after which Juliette threw a kitten at him and asked what was the matter, and then sang him one of her pretty chansonettes to the accompaniment of a guitar with three strings, which closed the incident. Still there were no more flower hunts and no new adventures. Tacitly, but completely, everything of the sort was dropped out of their relationship. They remained excellent friends, on affectionate terms indeed, but that was all.

Meanwhile, owing to his doubts arising out of a singular coincidence concerned with flowers and kisses, Godfrey gradually made up his mind to write to Isobel. Indeed, he had half composed the epistle when at the end of one of his brief letters his father informed him that she had gone to Mexico with her uncle. So it came about that it was never posted, since it is a kind of superstition with young people that letters can only be delivered at the place where the addressee last resided. It rarely occurs to them that these may be forwarded, and ultimately arrive. Nor, indeed, did it occur to Godfrey that as Isobel's uncle was the British Minister to a certain country, an envelope addressed to her in his care in that country probably would have reached her.

She was gone and there was an end; it was of no use to think more of the matter. Still, he was sorry, because in that same letter his father had alluded casually to the death of Lady Jane, which had caused Hawk's Hall to be shut up for a while, and he would have liked to condole with Isobel on her loss. He knew that she loved her mother dearly, and of this gentle lady he himself had very affectionate remembrances, since she had always been most kind to him. Yet for the reasons stated, he never did so.



About a fortnight after the flower episode a chance came Godfrey's way of making an Alp-climbing expedition in the company of some mountaineers. They were friends of the Pasteur who joined the party himself, but stayed in a village at the foot of the mountains they were to climb, since for such exercise he had lost the taste. The first two expeditions went off very successfully, Godfrey showing himself most agile at the sport which suited his adventurous spirit and delighted him. By nature, notwithstanding his dreamy characteristics, he was fearless, at any rate where his personal safety was concerned, and having a good head, it gave him pleasure to creep along the edge of precipices, or up slippery ice slopes, cutting niches with an axe for his feet.

Then came the third attempt, up a really difficult peak which had not yet been conquered that year. The details of the expedition do not matter, but the end of it was that at a particularly perilous place one of the party lost his head or his breath and rolled from the path.

There he lay half senseless, on the brink of a gulf, with a drop of a thousand feet or more beneath him. As it happened, they were climbing in lots of three, each of which lots was roped together, but at some distance between the parties, that with the guide being a good way ahead.

Godfrey was leading his party along the track made by the other, but their progress was not very rapid owing to the weakness of the man who had fallen who, as it afterwards transpired, suffered from his heart, and was affected by the altitude. The climber behind Godfrey was strong and bold; also, as it chanced at the moment of the fall, this man's feet were planted upon a lump of projecting rock, so firmly that by throwing himself forward against the snow slope, grasping another lump of rock with his left hand and bearing on to the alpenstock with his right, he was able to sustain the weight of their companion. But the rope which bound them together, though strong, was thin; moreover, at the point where most of the strain came it rested on a knife-like edge of ice, so sharp that there was momentarily danger of its fraying through as the movements of the weight beneath rubbed it against the edge.

When a shout and the stoppage warned Godfrey of what had happened, he turned round and studied the position. Even to his inexperienced eye it was obvious that a catastrophe was imminent. Now there were two things which might be done; one was to stay in his place and help to bear the strain of the swinging body, for almost immediately the fainting man slipped from the ledge, and hung above the gulf. The other was to trust to number two to hold his weight, and go to his assistance in the hope of being able to support him until the guide could return to the first party. As by a flash-like working of the mind Godfrey weighed these alternatives, his quick eye saw what looked like a little bit of fluff appear from the underside of the rope, which told him that one at least of the strands must have severed upon the edge of ice. Then almost instinctively he made his choice.

"Can you hold him?" he said swiftly to number two, who answered, "Yes, I think so," in a muffled voice.

"Then I go to help him."

"If you slip, I cannot bear you both," said the muffled voice.

"No," answered Godfrey, and drawing the sheath knife he wore, deliberately cut the rope which joined him to number two.

Then he scrambled down to the ledge without much difficulty, reaching it, but just in time, for now the razor blade of the ice had cut half through the rope, and very soon the swinging of the senseless weight beneath must complete its work. This ledge, being broad, though sloping, was not a particularly bad place; moreover, on it were little hummocks of ice, resulting from snow that had melted and frozen again, against one of which Godfrey was able to rest his left shoulder, and even to pass his arm round it. But here came the rub. He could not get sufficient grip of the thin rope with his right hand beyond the point where it was cut, to enable him to support even half the weight that hung below. Should it sever, as it must do very shortly, it would be torn from his grasp.

What then could be done? Godfrey peered over the edge. The man was swinging not more than two feet below its brink, that is to say, the updrawn loop of his stout leather belt, to which the rope was fastened, was about that distance from the brink, and on either side of it he hung down like a sack tied round the middle, quite motionless in his swoon, his head to one side and his feet to the other.

Could he reach and grasp that leather belt without falling himself, and if so, could he bear the man's weight and not be dragged over? Godfrey shrank from the attempt; his blood curdled. Then he pictured, again in a mind-flash, his poor companion whirling down through space to be dashed to pulp at the bottom, and the agony of his wife and children whom he knew, and who had wished to prevent him from climbing that day. Oh! he would try. But still a paralysing fear overcame him, making him weak and nervous. Then it was in Godfrey's extremity that his imagination produced a very curious illusion. Quite distinctly he seemed to hear a voice, that of Miss Ogilvy, say to him:

"Do it, Godfrey, at once, or it will be too late. We will help you."

This phantasy, or whatever it was, seemed to give him back his nerve and courage. Coolly he tightened the grip of his left arm about the knob of ice, and drawing himself forward a little, so that his neck and part of his chest were over the edge, reached his right hand downwards. His fingers touched the belt; to grasp it he must have another inch and a half, or two inches. He let himself down that distance. Oh! how easy it seemed to do so—and thrust his fingers beneath the belt. As he closed them round it, the rope parted and all the weight that it had borne came upon Godfrey's arm!

How long did he support it, he often wondered afterwards. For ages it seemed. He felt as though his right arm was being torn from the socket, while the ice cut into the muscles of his left like active torture. He filled himself with air, blowing out his lower part so that its muscles might enable him to get some extra hold of the rough ground; he dug his toes deep into the icy snow. His hat fell from his head, rested for a moment in a ridiculous fashion upon the swinging body beneath, then floated off composedly into space, the tall feather in it sticking upwards and fluttering a little. He heard voices approaching, and above them the shouts of the guide, though what these said conveyed no meaning to him. He must loose his hold and go too. No, he would not. He would not, although now he felt as though his shoulder-joint were dislocated, also that his left arm was slipping. He would die like a brave man—like a brave man. Surely this was death! He was gone—everything passed away.



Godfrey woke again to find himself lying upon a flat piece of snow. Recollection came back to him with a pang, and he thought that he must have fallen.

Then he heard voices, and saw faces looking at him as through a mist, also he felt something in his mouth and throat, which seemed to burn them. One of the voices, it was that of the guide, said:

"Good, good! He finds himself, this young English hero. See, his eyes open; more cognac, it will make him happy, and prevent the shock. Never mind the other one; he is all right, the stupid."

Godfrey sat up and tried to lift his arm to thrust away the flask which he saw approaching him, but he could not.

"Take that burning stuff away, Karl, confound you," he said.

Then Karl, a good honest fellow, who was on his knees beside him, threw his arms about him, and embraced him in a way that Godfrey thought theatrical and unpleasant, while all the others, except the rescued man, who lay semi-comatose, set up a kind of paean of praise, like a Greek chorus.

"Oh! shut up!" said Godfrey, "if we waste so much time we shall never get to the top," a remark at which they all burst out laughing.

"They talk of Providence on the Alps," shouted Karl in stentorian tones, while he performed a kind of war-dance, "but that's the kind of providence for me," and he pointed to Godfrey. "Many things have I seen in my trade as guide, but never one like this. What? To cut the rope for the sake of Monsieur there," and he pointed to number two, whose share in the great adventure was being overlooked, "before giving himself to almost certain death for the sake of Monsieur with the weak heart, who had no business on a mountain; to stretch over the precipice as the line parted, and hold Monsieur with the weak heart for all that while, till I could get a noose round him—yes, to go on holding him after he himself was almost dead—without a mind! Good God! never has there been such a story in my lifetime on these Alps, or in that of my father before me."

Then came the descent, Godfrey supported on the shoulder of the stalwart Karl, who, full of delight at this great escape from tragedy, and at having a tale to tell which would last him for the rest of his life, "jodelled" spontaneously at intervals in his best "large-tip" voice, and occasionally skipped about like a young camel, while "Monsieur with the weak heart" was carried in a chair provided to bear elderly ladies up the lower slopes of the Alps.

Some swift-footed mountaineer had sped down to the village ahead of them and told all the story, with the result that when they reached the outskirts of the place, an excited crowd was waiting to greet them, including two local reporters for Swiss journals.

One of these, who contributed items of interest to the English press also, either by mistake, or in order to make his narrative more interesting, added to a fairly correct description of the incident, a statement that the person rescued by Godfrey was a young lady. At least, so the story appeared in the London papers next morning, under the heading of "Heroic Rescue on the Alps," or in some instances of, "A Young English Hero."

Among the crowd was the Pasteur, who beamed at Godfrey through his blue spectacles, but took no part in these excited demonstrations. When they were back at their hotel, and the doctor who examined Godfrey, had announced that he was suffering from nothing except exhaustion and badly sprained muscles, he said simply:

"I do not compliment you, my dear boy, like those others, because you acted only as I should have expected of you in the conditions. Still, I am glad that in this case another was not added to my long list of disappointments."

"I didn't act at all, Pasteur," blurted out Godfrey. "A voice, I thought it was Miss Ogilvy's, told me what to do, and I obeyed."

The old gentleman smiled and shook his head, as he answered:

"It is ever thus, young Friend. When we wish to do good we hear a voice prompting us, which we think that of an angel, and when we wish to do evil, another voice, which we think that of a devil, but believe me, the lips that utter both of them are in our own hearts. The rest comes only from the excitement of the instant. There in our hearts the angel and the devil dwell, side by side, like the two figures in a village weather-clock, ready to appear, now one and now the other, as the breath of our nature blows them."

"But I heard her," said Godfrey stubbornly.

"The excitement of the instant!" repeated the Pasteur blandly. "Had I been so situated I am quite certain that I should have heard all the deceased whom I have ever known," and he patted Godfrey's dark hair with his long, thin hand, thanking God in his heart for the brave spirit which He had been pleased to give to this young man, who had grown so dear to one who lacked a son. Only this he did in silence, nor did he ever allude to the subject afterwards, except as a commonplace matter-of-course event.

Notwithstanding the "jodellings" which continued outside his window to a late hour, and the bouquet of flowers which was sent to him by the wife of the mayor, who felt that a distinction had been conferred upon their village that would bring them many visitors in future seasons, and ought to be suitably acknowledged, Godfrey soon dropped into a deep sleep. But in the middle of the night it passed from him, and he awoke full of terrors. Now, for the first time, he understood what he had escaped, and how near he had been to lying, not in a comfortable bed, but a heap of splintered bones and mangled flesh at the foot of a precipice, whence, perhaps, it would have been impossible ever to recover his remains. In short, his nerves re-acted, and he felt anything but a hero, rather indeed, a coward among cowards. Nor did he wish ever to climb another Alp; the taste had quite departed from him. To tell the truth, a full month went by before he was himself again, and during that month he was as timid as a kitten, and as careful of his personal safety as a well-to-do old lady unaccustomed to travel.



CHAPTER XI

JULIETTE'S FAREWELL

When Godfrey returned to the Maison Blanche, wearing a handsome gold watch, which had been presented to him with an effusive letter of thanks by the gentleman whom he had rescued and his relatives, he found himself quite a celebrity. Most of the Pasteur's congregation met him when he descended from the diligence, and waved their hats, but as he thanked heaven, did not "jodel."

Leaving the Pasteur to make some acknowledgment, he fled to the house, only to find Madame, Juliette, a number of friends, to say nothing of Jean, the cook and the servant girl, awaiting him there. Madame beamed, and looked as though she were about to kiss him; the fresh and charming Juliette shook his hand, and murmured into his ear that she had no idea he was so brave, also that every night she thanked the Bon Dieu for his escape; while the others said something appropriate—or the reverse.

Once more he fled, this time to his bedroom. There upon his dressing-table lay two letters, one from his father and one addressed in a curious pointed hand-writing, which he did not know. This he opened at once. It was in French, and ran, as translated:

"Ah! Little Brother,—I know all that has happened to you, nor did your godmother need to wait to read about it in the journals. Indeed, I saw it in my crystal before it happened; you with the man hanging to your arm and the rest. But then a cloud came over the crystal, and I could not see the end. I hoped that he would pull you over the edge, so that in one short minute you became nothing but a red plum-pudding at the bottom of the gulf. For you know that the sweetest-tempered fairy godmother can be made cross by wicked ingratitude and evil treatment. Do not think, little Brother, that I have forgiven you for bringing that old pasteur-fool to insult and threaten me. Not so. I pray the speerits night and day to pay you back in your own coin, you who have insulted them also. Indeed, it was they who arranged this little incident, but they tell me that some other speerit interfered at the last moment and saved you. If so, better luck next time, for do not think you shall escape me and them. Had you been true to us you should have had great good fortune and everything you desire in life, including, perhaps, something that you desire most of all. As it is, you shall have much trouble and lose what you desire most of all. Have you been kissing that pretty Mademoiselle again and trying to make her as bad as her mother? Well, I hope you will, because it will hurt that old fool-pasteur. Wherever you go, remember that eyes follow you, mine and those of the speerits. Hate and bad luck to you, my little Brother, from your dear godmamma, whose good heart you have so outraged. So fare ill till you hear from me again, yes and always. Now you will guess my name, so I need not sign it.

"P.S.—Eleanor also sends you her hate from another sphere."

This precious epistle, filled with malignity, reaching him in the midst of so many congratulations, struck upon Godfrey like a blast of icy wind at the zenith of a summer day. To tell the truth also, it frightened him.

He had tried to forget all about Madame Riennes and now here she was stabbing him from afar, for the letter bore a Venice postmark. It may be foolish, but few of us care to be the object of a concentrated, personal hate. Perhaps this is due to the inherited superstitions of our race, not long emerged from the blackness of barbarism, but at least we still feel as our forefathers did; as though the will to work evil had the power to bring about the evil desired. It is nonsense, since were it true, none could escape the direst misfortune, as every one of us is at some time or another the object of the hate or jealousy of other human beings. Moreover, as most of us believe, there is a being, not human, that hates us individually and collectively, and certainly would compass our destruction, had he the power, which happily he has not, unless we ourselves give it to him.

Godfrey comforted himself with this reflection, also, with another; that in this instance the issue of his peril had been far different from what his enemy desired. Yet, with his nerves still shaken both by his spiritualistic experiences, and by those of the danger which he had passed, the letter undoubtedly did affect him in the way that it was meant to do, and the worst of it was that he could not consult his friend and guide, the Pasteur, because of the allusion to the scene with Juliette.

Throwing it down as though it were a venomous snake, which indeed, it was, he opened that from his father, which was brief. It congratulated him coldly on his escape, whereof Mr. Knight said he had heard, not in the way that he would have expected, from himself, but through the papers. This, it may be explained, was not strange, since the account was telegraphed long before Godfrey had time to write. As a matter of fact, however, he had not written, for who cares to indite epistles to an unsympathetic and critical recipient? Most people only compose letters for the benefit of those who like to receive them and, by intuition, read in them a great deal more than the sender records in black and white. For letter-writing, at its best, is an allusive art, something that suggests rather than describes. It was because Godfrey appreciated this truth in a half unconscious fashion, that he did not care to undertake an active correspondence with his father. It is the exception also, for young men to care to correspond with their fathers; the respective outlooks, and often, the respective interests, are too diverse. With mothers it is different, at any rate, sometimes, for in their case the relationship is more intimate. In the instance of the male parent, throughout the realm of nature, it is apt to have an accidental aspect or to acquire one as time goes by.

The letter went on to request that he would climb no more Alps, since he had been sent to Switzerland, to scale not mountains, but the peaks of knowledge. It added, with that naive selfishness from which sometimes even the most pious are not exempt, "had you been killed, in addition to losing your own life, which would not so much have mattered, since I trust that you would have passed to a better, you would have done a wrong to your family. In that event, as you are not yet of age, I believe the money which your friend left to you recently, would have returned to her estate instead of going to benefit your natural heirs."

Godfrey pondered over the words "natural heirs," wondering who these might be. Coming finally to the conclusion that he had but one, namely his father, which accounted for the solicitude expressed so earnestly in the letter, he uttered an expletive, which should not have passed his youthful lips, and threw it down upon the top of that of Madame Riennes.

After this he left the room much depressed, and watching his opportunity, for the merry party in the salon who had gathered to greet him were still there drinking heavy white wine, he slipped through the back door to walk in the woods. These woods were lonely, but then they suited his mood. In truth, never had he felt more alone in his life. His father and he were utterly different, and estranged, and he had no other relatives. In friends he was equally lacking. Miss Ogilvy, whom he had begun to love, was dead, and a friend in heaven is some way off, although he did think he had heard her voice when he was so near to joining her.

There remained no one save the Pasteur, of whom he was growing truly fond, so much so, that he wished that the old gentleman had been appointed to be his father according to the flesh. The rest of the world was a blank to him, except for Isobel, who had deserted him.

Besides, some new sentiment had entered into his relations with Isobel, whereby these were half spoiled. Of course, although he did not altogether understand it, this was the eternal complication of sex which curses more than it blesses in the world; of sex, the eating fire that is so beautiful but burns. For when that fire has passed over the flowers of friendship, they are changed into some new growth, that however gorgeous it may be, yet always smells of flame. Sex being the origin of life is necessarily also the origin of trouble, since life and trouble are inseparable, and devours the gentle joys of friendship, as a kite devours little singing birds. These go to its sustenance, it is true, and both are birds, but the kite is a very different creature from the nightingale or the lark. One of the great advantages of matrimony, if it endures long enough, is that when the sex attraction, which was its cause, has faded, or practically died, once more it makes friendship possible.

Perhaps the best thing of the little we have been told about heaven, is that in it there will be no sex. If there were, it is doubtful whether it could remain heaven, as we define that state, since then must come desires, and jealousies, and selfishness, and disappointment; also births and deaths, since we cannot conceive sex-love without an object, or a beginning without an end. From all of which troubles we learn that the angels are relieved.

Now this wondrous, burning mantle of sex had fallen on Godfrey and Isobel, as he had learned when he saw her with the knight in armour in the garden, and everything was changed beneath its fiery, smothering folds, and for him there was no Isobel. His friend had gone, and he was left wandering alone. His distress was deep, and since he was too young to mask his feelings, as people must learn to do in life, it showed itself upon his face. At supper that night, all of the little party observed it, for he who should have been gay, was sad and spoke little. Afterwards, when the Pasteur and Godfrey went to the observatory to resume their astronomical studies, the former looked at him a while, and said:

"What is the matter, Godfrey? Tell me."

"I cannot," he replied, colouring.

"Is it so bad as that then? I thought that perhaps you had only received a letter, or letters."

"I received two of them. One was from my father, who scolds me because I was nearly killed."

"Indeed. He seems fond of scolding, your father. But that is no new thing, and one to which you should be used. How about the other letter? Was it, perchance, from Madame Riennes?"

"It is not signed, but I think so."

"Really. It is odd, but, I too, have had a letter from Madame Riennes, also unsigned, and I think, after reading it, that you may safely show me yours, and then tell me the truth of all these accusations she makes concerning you and Juliette."

Now Godfrey turned crimson.

"How can I?" he murmured. "For myself I do not care, but it seems like betraying—someone else."

"It is difficult, my boy, to betray that which is already well known, to me, among others. Had this letter, perchance, something to do with an expedition which you two young people made to search for flowers, and nothing else? Ah! I see it is so. Then you may safely show it to me, since I know all about that expedition."

So Godfrey produced the epistle, for at the moment he forgot that it contained allusions to Madame also, and holding it gingerly between his thumb and finger, handed it to him. The Pasteur read it through without showing the slightest emotion.

"Ah!" he said, when he had finished, "in her way she is quite magnificent, that old witch. But, surely, one day, unless she repents, she will be accommodated with some particular hell of her own, since there are few worthy to share it with her. You see, my boy, what she says about Madame. Well, as I think I told her, that dear wife of mine may have had her foolish moments, like most others, if all the truth were known. But note this—there is a great difference between those who have foolish moments, of whatever sort, and those who make it their business to seek such moments; further, between those who repent of their errors and those who glory in, and try to continue them. If you have any doubt of that study the Bible, and read amongst others, of David, who lived to write the Psalms, and of Mary Magdalene, who became a saint. Also, although this did not occur to that tiger of a woman, I may have known of those moments, and even done my best to help my wife out of them, and been well rewarded"—here his kind old face beamed like the sun—"oh! yes, most gloriously rewarded. So a fig for the old witch and her tales of Madame! And now tell me the truth about yourself and Juliette, with a mind at ease, for Juliette has told it to me already, and I wish to compare the stories."

So Godfrey told him everything, and a ridiculous little tale it was. When he had finished the Pasteur burst out laughing.

"You are indeed sinners, you two," he said, "so great, that surely you should stand dressed in white sheets, one on either side of the altar, with the crushed flower in the middle. Ah! that is what I regret, this flower, for it is very rare. Only once have I found it in all my life, and then, as there was no lady present, I left it where it grew. Hearken, all this is a pack of nonsense.

"Hearken again, Godfrey. Everybody things me an old fool. How can it be helped with such a face as mine, and these blue spectacles, which I must wear? But even an old fool sees things sometimes. Thus, I have seen that Madame, who had once plenty of money to play with, and longs, poor dear, for the fine things of life, is very anxious that her Juliette should make a good marriage. I have seen, too, that she has thought of you, whom she thinks much richer than you are, as a good match for Juliette, and has done her best to make Juliette think as she does, all of which is quite natural in her, and indeed, praiseworthy, especially if she likes and respects the young man. But, my boy, it is the greatest nonsense. To begin with, you do not, and never will, care for Juliette, and she does not, and never will, care for you. Your natures, ah! they are quite different. You have something big in the you, and Juliette—well, she has not. Marriage with her would be for you a misery, and for Juliette a misery also, since what have you in common? Besides, even if it were otherwise, do you think I would allow such a thing, with you so young and in my charge? Bah! be good friends with that pretty girl, and go hunt for flowers with her as much as you like, for nothing will ever come of it. Only, bet no more in kisses, for they are dangerous, and sparks sometimes set fire to haystacks."

"Indeed, I will not," exclaimed Godfrey with fervour.

"There, then, that trouble is finished." (Here, although he did not know it, the Pasteur was mistaken.) "And now, as to the rest of this letter. It is malignant, malignant, and its writer will always seek to do you ill, and perhaps, sometimes succeed. It is the price which you must pay for having mixed with such a person who mixes with the devil, though that was no fault of yours, my boy. Still, always, always in the world we are suffering from the faults of others. It is a law, the law of vicarious sacrifice, which runs through everything, why, we do not know. Still, be not afraid, for it is you who will win at the last, not she. For the rest, soon you will go away from here, since the year for which you came is almost finished, and you must turn your mind to the bigger life. I pray you when you do, not to forget me, for, my boy, I, who have no son, have learned to love you like a son, better perhaps, than had you been one, since often I have observed that it is not always fathers and sons that love each other most, frequently the other way, indeed.

"Also I pray another thing of you—that if you think I have any wisdom, or any little light in the lamp of this ugly, old body of mine, you will always take me for a counsellor, and write to me concerning your troubles, (as indeed, you must do, for remember I am your trustee of this property,) and perhaps pay attention to the advice I may give. And now let us get to our stars; they are much more amusing than Madame Riennes. It is strange to think that the same God who made the stars also made Madame Riennes. Truly He is a charitable and tolerant God!"

"Perhaps the devil made her," suggested Godfrey.

"It may be so, it may be so, but is it not said in the Book of Proverbs, I believe, that He makes both good and evil for His own infinite ends, though what these may be, I, worm that I am, cannot pretend to understand. And now to our stars that are far away and pure, though who knows but that if one were near to them, they would prove as full of foulness as the earth?"



The Pasteur was right when he said that Madame Riennes would not cease from attempts to do evil to Godfrey, and therefore wrong when he added that the trouble she had caused was finished. Of this, that young man was made painfully aware, when a fortnight or so later another letter from his father reached him. It informed him that Mr. Knight had received an anonymous communication which stated that he, Godfrey, was leading an evil life in Lucerne, also that he was being entrapped into a marriage with Mademoiselle Boiset, whom he had been seen embracing behind some rocks. The letter ended:

"Lacking proof, I do not accept these stories as facts, although, as there is no smoke without fire, I think it probable that there is something in them and that you are drifting into undesirable companionships. At any rate I am sure that the time has come for you to return home and to commence your studies for the Church. I have to request, therefore, that you will do this at once as I am entering your name at my own college for the next term and have so informed the trustees under Miss Ogilvy's will, who will no doubt meet the expense and give you a suitable allowance. I am writing to the Pasteur Boiset to the same effect. Looking forward to seeing you, when we can discuss all these matters in more detail, —I am, your affectionate father, "Richard Knight."

In dismay Godfrey took this letter to the Pasteur. For the last thing Godfrey wished to do was to leave Kleindorf and the house in which he was so welcome and so well treated, in order to return to the stony bosom of Monk's Acre Abbey.

"I have also received a letter," said Monsieur Boiset; "it seems that you and I always receive disagreeable letters together. The last were from the witch-woman Riennes, and these are from your father. He has an unpleasant way of writing, this father of yours, although he is a good man, for here he suggests that I am trying to trap you for a son-in-law, wherein I see the fat finger of that witch Riennes, who has so great a passion for the anonymous epistle. Well, if he had said that I wished to trap you for a son, he would have shot nearer to the bulls'-eye, but for a son-in-law, as you know, it is not so. Still, you must go; indeed, it is time that you went, now that you talk French so well, and have, I hope, learnt other things also, you to whom the big world opens. But see, your father talks of your entering the Church. Tell me, is this so? If so, of course, I shall be happy."

"No," said Godfrey, shaking his head.

"Then," replied the Pasteur, "I may say that I am equally happy. It is not everyone that has a call for this vocation, and there are more ways of doing good in the world than from the floor of a pulpit. Myself, I have wondered sometimes—but let that be; it is the lot of certain of us, who think in our vanity that we could have done great things, to be obliged to do the small things, because God has so decreed. To one He gives the ten talents, to the other only one talent, or even but a franc. Whatever it be, of it we must make the best, and so long as we do not bury it, we have done well. I can only say that I have tried to use my franc, or my fifty centimes, to such advantage as I could, and hope that in some other place and time I may be entrusted with a larger sum. Oh! my boy, we are all of us drawn by the horses of Circumstance, but, as I believe, those horses have a driver who knows whither he is guiding us."

A few days later Godfrey went. His last midday meal at the Maison Blanche, before he departed to catch the night train for Paris, was rather a melancholy function. Madame, who had grown fond of him in her somewhat frivolous way, openly dropped tears into her soup. Juliette looked sad and distraite, though inwardly supported by the knowledge that her distant cousin, the notary Jules, was arriving on the morrow to spend his vacation at the Maison Blanche, so that Godfrey's room would not be without an occupant. Indeed, in her pretty little head she was already planning certain alterations in the arrangement of the furniture, to make it more comfortable to the very different tastes of the new comer.

Still, she was truly sorry to lose her friend the Hibou, although she had not been able to fulfil her mother's wish, and make him fall in love with her, or even to fall in love with him herself. As she explained to Madame Boiset, it was of no use to try, since between their natures there were fixed not only a great gulf, but several whole ranges of the Alps, and whereas the Hibou sat gazing at the stars from their topmost peak, she was picking flowers in the plain and singing as she picked them.

The Pasteur did not make matters better by the extremely forced gaiety of his demeanour. He told stories and cracked bad jokes in the intervals of congratulating Godfrey at his release from so dull a place as Kleindorf. Godfrey said little or nothing, but reflected to himself that the Pasteur did not know Monk's Acre.

At last the moment came, and he departed with a heavy heart, for he had learned to love these simple, kindly folk, especially the Pasteur. How glad he was when it was over and he had lost sight of the handkerchiefs that were being waved at him from the gate as the hired vehicle rolled away. Not that it was quite over, for the Pasteur accompanied him to the station, in order, as he said, to take his last instructions about the Villa Ogilvy, although, in truth, Godfrey had none to give.

"Please do what you think best," was all that he could say. Also, when several miles further on, they came to a turn in the road, there, panting on a rock, stood Juliette, who had reached the place, running at full speed, by a short cut through the woods. They had no time to stop, because the Pasteur thought that they were late for the train, which, as a matter of fact, did not leave for half-an-hour after they reached the station. So they could only make mutual signals of recognition and farewell. Juliette, who looked as though she were crying, kissed her hand to him, calling out:

"Adieu, adieu! cher ami," while he sought refuge in the Englishman's usual expedient of taking off his hat.

"It is nothing, nothing," said the Pasteur, who had also noted Juliette's tear-swollen eyes, "to-morrow she will have Jules to console her, a most worthy young man, though me he bores."

Here, it may be added, that Jules consoled her so well, that within a year they were married, and most happily.

Yet Godfrey was destined never to see that graceful figure and gay little face again, since long before he revisited Lucerne Juliette died on the birth of her third child. And soon, who thought of Juliette except perhaps Godfrey, for her husband married again very shortly, as a worthy and domestic person of the sort would do. Her children were too young to remember her, and her mother, not long afterwards, was carried off by a sudden illness, pneumonia, to join her in the Shades. Except the Pasteur himself none was left.

Well, such is the way of this sad world of change and death. But Godfrey never forgot the picture of her standing breathless on the rock and kissing her slim hand to him. It was one of those incidents which, when they happen to a man in his youth, remain indelibly impressed upon his mind.

At the station there were more farewells, for here was the notary, who had managed Miss Ogilvy's Swiss affairs and now, under the direction of Monsieur Boiset, attended to those of Godfrey. Also such of the servants were present as had been kept on at the Villa, while among those walking about the platform he saw Brother Josiah Smith and Professor Petersen, who had come evidently to see the last of him, and make report to a certain quarter.

The Pasteur talked continually, in his high, thin voice, to cover up his agitation, but what it was all about Godfrey could never remember. All he recollected of the parting was being taken into those long arms, embraced upon the forehead, and most fervently blessed.

Then the train steamed off, and he felt glad that all was over.



CHAPTER XII

HOME

About forty-eight hours later Godfrey arrived duly at the little Essex station three miles from Monk's Acre. There was nobody to meet him, which was not strange, as the hour of his coming was unknown. Still, unreasonable as it might be, the contrast between the warmth and affection that had distinguished his departure, and the cold vacuum that greeted his arrival, chilled him. He said a few words to the grumpy old porter who was the sole occupant of the platform, but that worthy, although he knew him well enough, did not seem to realise that he had ever been away. During the year in which so many things had happened to Godfrey nothing at all had happened to the porter, and therefore he did not appreciate the lapse of time.

Leaving his baggage to be brought by the carrier's cart, Godfrey took the alpenstock that, in a moment of enthusiasm, the guide had given him as a souvenir of his great adventure, and started for home. It was a very famous alpenstock, which this guide and his father before him had used all their lives, one that had been planted in the topmost snows of every peak in Switzerland. Indeed the names of the most unclimbable of these, together with the dates of their conquest by its owners, sometimes followed by crosses to show that on such or such an expedition life had been lost, were burnt into the tough wood with a hot iron. As the first of these dates was as far back as 1831, Godfrey valued this staff highly, and did not like to leave it to the chances of the carrier's cart.

His road through the fields ran past Hawk's Hall, of which he observed with a thrill of dismay, that the blinds were drawn as though in it someone lay dead. There was no reason why he should have been dismayed, since he had heard that Isobel had gone away to somewhere in "Ameriky," as Mrs. Parsons had expressed it in a brief and illspelt letter, and that Sir John was living in town. Yet the sight depressed him still further with its suggestion of death, or of separation, which is almost as bad, for, be it remembered, he was at an age when such impressions come home.

After leaving the Hall with its blinded and shuttered windows, his quickest road to the Abbey House ran through the churchyard. Here the first thing that confronted him was a gigantic monument, of which the new marble glittered in the afternoon sun. It was a confused affair, and all he made out of it, without close examination, was a life-sized angel with an early-Victorian countenance, leaning against the broken stump of an oak tree and scattering from a basket, of the kind that is used to collect nuts or windfall apples, on to a sarcophagus beneath a profusion of marble roses, some of which seemed to have been arrested and frozen in mid-air. He glanced at the inscription in gold letters. It was "To the beloved memory of Lady Jane Blake, wife of Sir John Blake, Bart., J.P., and daughter of the Right Hon. The Earl of Lynfield, whose bereaved husband erected this monument—'Her husband ... praiseth her.'"

Godfrey looked, and remembering the gentle little woman whose crumbling flesh lay beneath, shivered at the awful and crushing erection above. In life, as he knew, she had been unhappy, but what had she done to deserve such a memorial in death? Still, she was dead, of that there was no doubt, and oh! the sadness of it all.

He went on to the Abbey, resisting a queer temptation to enter the church and look at the tomb of the Plantagenet lady and her unknown knight, who slept there so quietly from year to year, through spring, summer, autumn and winter, for ever and for ever. The front door was locked, so he rang the bell. It was answered by a new servant, rather a forbidding, middle-aged woman with a limp, who informed him that Mr. Knight was out, and notwithstanding his explanations, declined to admit him into the house. Doubtless she thought that a young man, wearing a foreign-looking hat and carrying such a strange long stick, must be a thief, or worse. The end of it was that she slammed the door in his face and shot the old-fashioned bolts.

Then Godfrey bethought him of the other door, that which led into the ancient refectory, which was now used as a schoolroom. This was open, so he went in and, being tired after his long journey, sat himself down in the chair at the end of the old oak table, that same chair in which Isobel had kissed him when he was a little boy. He looked about him vaguely; the place, of course, was much the same as it had been for the last five hundred years, but, as he could see from the names on the copybooks that lay about, the pupils who inhabited it had changed. Of the whole six not one was the same.

Then, perhaps for the first time, he began to understand how variable is the world, a mere passing show in which nothing remains the same, except the houses and the trees. Even these depart, for a cottage with which he had been familiar from his earliest infancy, as he could see through the open door, was pulled down to make room for "improvements," and the great old elm, where the rooks used to build, had been torn up in a gale. Only its ugly stump and projecting roots were left.

So he sat musing there, very depressed at heart, till at length Mrs. Parsons came and discovered him in a half-doze. She, too, was somewhat changed, for of a sudden age had begun to take a hold of her. Her hair was white now, and her plump, round face had withered like a spring apple. Still, she greeted him with the old affection, for which he felt grateful, seeing that it was the first touch of kindness he had known since he set foot on English ground.

"Dear me, Master Godfrey!" she said, "hadn't I heard that you were coming, I could never have been sure that it was you. Why, you've grown into a regular young gentleman in those foreign parts, and handsome, too, though I sez it. Who could have guessed that you are your father's son? Why, you'd make two of him. But there, they say that your mother was a good-looking lady and large built, though, as I never set eyes on her, I can't say for sure. Well, you must be tired after all this travelling in steamships and trains, so come into the dining-room and have some tea, for I have got the key to the sideboard."

He went, and, passing through the hall, left his alpenstock in the umbrella-stand. In due course the tea was produced, though for it he seemed to have little appetite. While he made pretence to eat the thick bread and butter, Mrs. Parsons told him the news, such as it was. Sir John was living in town and "flinging the money about, so it was said, not but what he had got lots to fling and plenty to catch it," she added meaningly. His poor, dear lady was dead, and "happy for her on the whole." Miss Isobel had "gone foreign," having, it was told, quarrelled with her father, and nothing had been heard of her since she went. She, too, had grown into a fine young lady.

That was all he gathered before Mrs. Parsons was obliged to depart to see to her business—except that she was exceedingly glad to see him.

Godfrey went up to his bedroom, which he found unprepared, for somebody else seemed to be sleeping there. While he was surveying it and wondering who this occupant might be, he heard his father in the hall asking the parlour-maid which of the young gentlemen had left that "ridiculous stick" in the stand. She replied that she did not know, whereupon the hard voice of his parent told her to take it away. Afterwards Godfrey found it thrown into the wood-house to be chopped up for firewood, though luckily before this happened.

By this time a kind of anger had seized him. It was true that he had not said by what train he was coming, for the reason that until he reached London he could not tell, but he had written that he was to arrive that afternoon, and surely some note might have been taken of the fact.

He went downstairs and confronted his father, who alone amid so much change seemed to be exactly the same. Mr. Knight shook him by the hand without any particular cordiality, and at once attacked him for not having intimated the hour of his arrival, saying that it was too late to advise the carrier to call at the station for his baggage and that a trap would have to be sent, which cost money.

"Very well, Father, I will pay for it myself," answered Godfrey.

"Oh, yes, I forgot!" exclaimed Mr. Knight, with a sneer, "you have come into money somehow, have you not, and doubtless consider yourself independent?"

"Yes, and I am glad of it, Father, as now I hope I shall not be any more expense to you."

"As you have begun to talk business, Godfrey," replied his father in an acid manner, "we may as well go into things and get it over. You have, I presume, made up your mind to go into the Church in accordance with my wish?"

"No, Father; I do not intend to become a clergyman."

"Indeed. You seem to me to have fallen under very bad influences in Switzerland. However, it does not much matter, as I intend that you shall."

"I am sorry, but I cannot, Father."

Then, within such limits as his piety permitted, which were sufficiently wide, Mr. Knight lost his temper very badly indeed. He attacked his son, suggesting that he had been leading an evil life in Lucerne, as he had learned "from outside sources," and declared that either he should obey him or be cast off. Godfrey, whose temper by this time was also rising, intimated that he preferred the latter alternative.

"What, then, do you intend to do, young man?" asked Mr. Knight.

"I do not know yet, Father." Then an inspiration came to him, and he added, "I shall go to London to-morrow to consult my trustees under Miss Ogilvy's will."

"Really," said Mr. Knight in a rage. "You are after that ill-gotten money, are you? Well, as we seem to agree so badly, why not go to-night instead of to-morrow; there is a late train? Perhaps it would be pleasanter for both of us, and then I need not send for your luggage. Also it would save my shifting the new boy from your room."

"Do you really mean that, Father?"

"I am not in the habit of saying what I do not mean. Only please understand that if you reject my plans for your career, which have been formed after much thought, and, I may add, prayer, I wash my hands of you who are now too old to be argued with in any other way."

Godfrey looked at his father and considered the iron mouth cut straight like a slit across the face, the hard, insignificant countenance and the small, cold, grey eyes. He realised the intensity of the petty anger based, for the most part, on jealousy because he was now independent and could not be ordered about and bullied like the rest of the little boys, and knew that behind it there was not affection, but dislike. Summing up all this in his quick mind, he became aware that father or not, he regarded this man with great aversion. Their natures, their outlook, all about them were antagonistic, and, in fact, had been so from the beginning. The less that they saw of each other the better it would be for both. Although still so young, he had ripened early, and was now almost a man who knew that these things were so without possibility of doubt.

"Very well, Father," he said, "I will go. It is better than stopping here to quarrel."

"I thought you would, now that your friend, Isobel, who did you so much harm with her bad influence, has departed to Mexico, where, I have no doubt, she has forgotten all about you. You won't be able to run after her money as you did after Miss Ogilvy's," replied Mr. Knight with another sneer.

"You insult me," said Godfrey. "It is a lie that I ran after Miss Ogilvy's money, and I will never forgive you for saying such a thing of me in connection with Isobel," and turning he left the room.

So did his father, for Godfrey heard him go to his study and lock the door, doubtless as a sign and a token.

Then Godfrey sought out Mrs. Parsons and told her everything. The old woman was much disturbed, and wept.

"I have been thinking of late, Master Godfrey," she said, "that your father's heart is made of that kind of stone which Hell is paved with, only with the good intentions left out—it's that hard. Here you are come back as fine a young man as a body can wish to see, of whom his begetter might well be proud, though, for the matter of that, there is precious little of him in you—and he shuts the door in your face just because you won't be a parson and have come into fortune—that's what rankles. I say that your mother, if she was a fool when she married him, was a wise woman when she died. Parson or not, he will never go where she is. Well, it's sad, but you'll be well out of this cold house, where there's so much praying but not a spark of love."

"I think so," said Godfrey with a sigh.

"I think so, too, for myself, I mean. But, look here, my boy, I only stopped on looking after this dratted pack of young gentlemen because you were coming home again. But, as you ain't, I'm out of it; yes, when the door shuts on you I give my month's notice, which perhaps will mean that I leave to-morrow, for he won't be able to abide the sight of me after that."

"But how will you live, Nurse, till I can help you?"

"Lord bless you, dear, that's all right. I've been a careful woman all my life, and have hard on L500 put away in the Savings Bank, to say nothing of a bit of Stock. Also, my old brother, who was a builder, died last year and left me with a nice little house down in Hampstead, which he built to live in himself, but never did, poor man, bit by bit when he was short of business, very comfortable and in a good neighbourhood, with first-rate furniture and real silver plate, to say nothing of some more Stock, yes, for L1,000 or more. I let it furnished by the month, but the tenant is going away, so I shall just move into it myself, and perhaps take in a lodger or two to keep me from being idle."

"That's capital!" said Godfrey, delighted.

"Yes, and I tell you what would be capitaller. Mayhap you will have to live in London for a bit, and, if so, you are just the kind of lodger I should like, and I don't think we should quarrel about terms. I'll write you down the address of that house, the Grove as it is called, though why, I don't know, seeing there isn't a tree within half a mile, which I don't mind, as there are too many about here, making so much damp. And you'll write and let me know what you are going to do, won't you?"

"Of course I will."

"And now, look here. Likely you will want a little money till you square up things with your trustee people that the master hates so much."

"Well, I had forgotten it, but, as a matter of fact, I have only ten shillings left, and that isn't much when one is going to London," confessed Godfrey.

"I thought so; you never were one to think much of such things, and so it's probable that you'll get plenty of them, for it's what we care about we are starved in, just to make it hot for us poor humans. Take your father, for instance; he loves power, he does; he'd like to be a bishop of the old Roman sort what could torture people who didn't agree with them. And what is he? The parson of a potty parish of a couple of hundred people, counting the babies and the softies, and half of them Dissenters or Salvation Army. Moreover, they can't be bullied, because if they were they'd just walk into the next chapel door. Of course, there's the young gentlemen, and he takes it out of them, but, Lord bless us! that's like kicking a wool sack, of which any man of spirit soon gets tired. So, you see, he is sick-hearted, and will be more so now that you have stood up to him; and, in this way or that, it's the same with everyone, none of us gets what we want, while of what we don't want there's always plenty."

While the old lady held forth thus in her little room which, although she did not know it, had once been the penitential cell of the Abbey, wherein for hundreds of years many unhappy ones had reflected in a very similar vein, she was engaged in trying key after key upon a stout oak chest. It was part of the ancient furniture of the place, that indeed in former days had served as the receptacle for hair shirts, scourges and other physical inducements to repentance and piety.

Now it had a different purpose and held Mrs. Parsons' best dresses, also, in a bandbox, an ornament preserved from her wedding-cake, for once in the far past she was married to a sailor, a very great black-guard, who came to his end by tumbling from a gangway when he was drunk. Among these articles was a tin tea-canister which, when opened, proved to be full of money; gold, silver and even humble copper, to say nothing of several banknotes.

"Now, there you are, my dear, take what you like," she said, "and pay it back if you wish, but if you don't, it might have been worse spent." And she pushed the receptacle, labelled "Imperial Pekoe," towards him across the table, adding, "Drat those moths! There's another on my best silk."

Godfrey burst out laughing and enjoyed that laugh, for it was his first happy moment since his return to England.

"Give me what you like," he said.

So she extracted from the tea-tin a five-pound note, four sovereigns and a pound's worth of silver and copper.

"There," she said, "that will do to begin with, for too much money in the pocket is a temptation in a wicked place like London, where there's always someone waiting to share it. If it's wanted there's more where that came from, and you've only to write and say so. And now you have got the address and you've got the cash, and if you want to catch that last train it's time you were off. If I took the same to-morrow night, why, it wouldn't surprise me, especially as I want to hear all you've been a-doing in those foreign parts, tumbling over precipices and the rest. So good-bye, my dear, and God bless you. Lord! it seems only the other day that I was giving you your bottle."

Then they kissed each other and, having retrieved his alpenstock from the stick-house, Godfrey trudged back to the station, where he picked up his luggage and departed for London. Arriving at Liverpool Street rather late, he went to the Great Eastern Hotel, and after a good meal, which he needed, slept like a top. His reception in England had been bitter, but the young soon shake off their troubles, from which, indeed, the loving kindness of his dear old nurse already had extracted the sting.

On the following morning, while breakfasting at a little table by one of the pillars of the big dining-room, he began to wonder what he should do next. In his pocket he had a notebook, in which, at the suggestion of the Pasteur, he had set down the address of the lawyers who had written to him about his legacy. It was in a place called the Poultry, which, on inquiry from the hall-porter, he discovered was quite close by the Mansion House.

So a while later, for the porter told him that it was no use to go to see lawyers too early, he sallied forth, and after much search discovered the queer spot called the Poultry, also the offices of Messrs. Ranson, Richards and Son. Here he gave his name to a clerk, who thrust a very oily head out of a kind of mahogany box, and was told that Mr. Ranson was engaged, but that, if he cared to wait, perhaps he would see him later on. He said he would wait, and was shown into a stuffy little room, furnished with ancient deed-boxes and a very large, old leather-covered sofa that took up half the place. Here he sat for a while, staring at a square of dirty glass which gave what light was available, and reflecting upon things in general.

While he was thus engaged he heard a kind of tumult outside, in which he recognised the treble of the oily-headed clerk coming in a bad second to a deep, bass voice. Then the door opened and a big, burly man, with a red face and a jovial, rolling eye, appeared with startling suddenness and ejaculated:

"Damn Ranson, damn Richards, or damn them both, with the Son thrown in! I ask you, young man"—here he addressed Godfrey seated on the corner of the sofa—"what is the use of a firm of lawyers whom you can never see? You pay the brutes, but three times out of four they are not visible, or, as I suspect, pretend not to be, in order to enhance their own importance. And I sent them a telegram, too, having a train to catch. What do you think?"

"I don't know, Sir," Godfrey answered. "I never came to a lawyer's office before, and I hope I shan't again if this is the kind of room they put one into."

"Room!" ejaculated the irate gentleman, "call it a dog kennel, call it a cesspool, for, by heaven, it smells like one, but in the interests of truth, young man, don't call it a room."

"Now that you mention it, there is a queer odour. Perhaps a dead rat under the floor," suggested Godfrey.

"Twenty dead rats, probably, since I imagine that this hole has not been cleaned since the time of George II. We are martyrs in this world, Sir. I come here to attend to the affairs of some whippersnapper whom I never saw and never want to see, just because Helen Ogilvy, who was my first cousin, chooses to make me a trustee of her confounded will, in which she leaves money to the confounded whippersnapper, God knows why. This whippersnapper has a father, a parson, who can write the most offensive letters imaginable. I received one of them this morning, accusing the whippersnapper of all sorts of vague things, and me and my fellow trustee, who is at present enjoying himself travelling, of abetting him. I repeat, damn Ranson, Richards and Son; damn the parson, damn Helen—no, I won't say that, for she is dead—and especially damn the whippersnapper. Don't you agree with me?"

"Not quite, Sir," said Godfrey. "I don't mind about Ranson, Richards and Son, or anybody else, but I don't quite see why you should damn me, who, I am sure, never wished to give you any trouble."

"You! And who the Hades may you be?"

"I am Godfrey Knight, and I suppose that you are my trustee, or one of them."

"Godfrey Knight, the young man whose father gives us so much trouble, all at our own expense, I may remark. Well, after hearing so much of you on paper, I'm deuced glad to meet you in the flesh. Come into the light, if you can call it light, and let me have a look at you."

Godfrey stepped beneath the dirty pane and was contemplated through an eyeglass by this breezy old gentleman, who exclaimed presently:

"You're all right, I think; a fine figure of a young man, not bad looking, either, but you want drilling. Why the devil don't you go into the army?"

"I don't know," answered Godfrey, "never thought of it. Are you in the army, Sir?"

"No, not now, though I was. Commanded my regiment for five years, and then kicked out with the courtesy title of Major-General. Cubitte is my name, spelt with two 't's' and an 'e,' please, and don't you forget that, since that 'e' has been a point of honour with our family for a hundred years, the Lord knows why. Well, there we are. Do you smoke?"

"Only a pipe," said Godfrey.

"That's right; I hate those accursed cigarettes, still they are better than nothing. Now sit down and tell me all about yourself."

Godfrey obeyed, and somehow feeling at ease with this choleric old General, in the course of the next twenty minutes explained many things to him, including the cause of his appearance in that office.

"So you don't want to be a parson," said the General, "and with your father's example before your eyes, I am sure I don't wonder. However, you are independent of him more or less, and had better cut out a line for yourself. We will back you. What do you say to the army?"

"I think I should rather like that," answered Godfrey. "Only, only, I want to get out of England as soon as possible."

"And quite right, too—accursed hole, full of fog and politicians. But that's not difficult with India waiting for you. I'm an Indian cavalry officer myself, and could put you up to the ropes and give you a hand afterwards, perhaps, if you show yourself of the right stuff, as I think you will. But, of course, you will have to go to Sandhurst, pass an entrance examination, and so forth. Can you manage that?"

"Yes, Sir, I think so, with a little preparation. I know a good deal of one sort or another, including French."

"All right, three months' cramming at Scoones' or Wren's, will do the trick. And now I suppose you want some money?"

Godfrey explained that he did, having only L10 which he had borrowed from his old nurse.

Just then the oily-headed clerk announced that Mr. Ranson was at liberty. So they both went in to see him, and the rest may be imagined. The trustees undertook to pay his expenses, even if they had to stretch a point to do so, and gave him L20 to go on with, also a letter of introduction to Scoones, whom he was instructed to see and arrange to join their classes. Then General Cubitte hustled off, telling him to come to dine at an address in Kensington two nights later and "report himself."

So within less than an hour Godfrey's future career was settled. He came out of the office feeling rather dazed but happier than when he went in, and inquired his way to Garrick Street, where he was informed that Mr. Scoones had his establishment. He found the place and, by good luck, found Mr. Scoones also, a kindly, keen, white-haired man, who read the letter, made a few inquiries and put him through a brief examination.

"Your information is varied and peculiar," he said, "and not of the sort that generally appeals to Her Majesty's examiners. Still, I see that you have intelligence and, of course, the French is an asset; also the literature to some extent, and the Latin, though these would have counted more had you been going up for the Indian Civil. I think we can get you through in three months if you will work; it all depends on that. You will find a lot of young men here of whom quite seventy per cent. do nothing, except see life. Very nice fellows in their way, but if you want to get into Sandhurst, keep clear of them. Now, my term opens next Monday. I will write to General Cubitte and tell him what I think of you, also that the fees are payable in advance. Good-bye, glad you happened to catch me, which you would not have done half an hour later, as I am going out of town. At ten o'clock next Monday, please."

After this, not knowing what to do, Godfrey returned to the Great Eastern Hotel and wrote a letter to his father, in which, baldly enough, he explained what had happened.

Having posted it in the box in the hall, he bethought him that he must find some place to live in, as the hotel was too expensive for a permanence, and was making inquiries of the porter as to how he should set about the matter when a telegram was handed to him. It ran: "All up as I expected. Meet me Liverpool Street 4.30.—Nurse."

So Godfrey postponed his search for lodgings, and at the appointed hour kept the assignation on the platform. The train arrived, and out of it, looking much more like her old self than she had on the previous day, emerged Mrs. Parsons with the most extraordinary collection of bundles, he counted nine of them, to say nothing of a jackdaw in a cage. She embraced him with enthusiasm, dropping the heaviest of the parcels, which seemed to contain bricks, upon his toe, and in a flood of language told him of the peculiar awfulness of the row between his father and herself which had ensued upon his departure.

"Yes," she ended, "he flung my money at my head and I flung it back at his, though afterwards I picked it up again, for it is no use wasting good gold and silver. And so here I am, beginning life again, like you, and feeling thirty years younger for it. Now, tell me what you are going to do?"

Then they went and had tea in the refreshment room, leaving the jackdaw and the other impediments in charge of a porter, and he told her.

"That's first-rate," she said. "I always hated the idea of seeing you with a black coat on your back. The Queen's uniform looks much better, and I want you to be a man. Now you help me into a cab and by dinner time to-morrow I'll be ready for you at my house at Hampstead, if I have to work all night to do it. Terms—drat the terms. Well, if you must have them, Master Godfrey, ten shillings a week will be more than you will cost me, and I ought to give you five back for your company. Now I'll make a start, for there will be a lot to do before the place is fit for a young gentleman. I've never seen it but twice, you know."

So she departed, packed into a four-wheeled cab, with the jackdaw on her lap, and Godfrey went to Madame Tussaud's, where he studied the guillotine and the Chamber of Horrors.

On the following morning, having further improved his mind at the Tower, he took a cab also, and in due course arrived at Hampstead with his belongings. The place took some finding, for it was on the top of a hill in an old-fashioned, out of the way part of the suburb, but when found proved to be delightful. It was a little square house, built of stone, on which the old builder had lavished all his skill and care, so that in it everything was perfect, with a garden both in front and behind. The floors were laid in oak, the little hall was oak-panelled, there were hot and cold water in every room, and so forth. Moreover, an odd man was waiting to carry in his things, and in one of the front sitting-rooms, which was excellently furnished, sat Mrs. Parsons knitting as though she had been there for years.

"Here you are," she said, "just as I was beginning to get tired of having nothing to do. Lord! what a fuss we make about things before we face 'em. After all they ain't nothing but bubbles. Blow them and they burst. Look here, Master Godfrey," and she waved her hand about the sitting-room. "Pretty neat, ain't it? Well, I thought it would be all of a hugger-mugger. But what did I find? That those tenants had been jewels and left everything like a new pin, to say nothing of improvements, such as an Eagle range. Moreover, the caretaker is a policeman's wife and a very nice woman always ready to help for a trifle, and that man that brought in your boxes is a relative of hers who does gardening jobs and such-like. Now, come and see your rooms," and she led him with pride into a capital back apartment with a large window, in fact an old Tudor one which the builder had produced somewhere, together with the panelling on the walls.

"That's your study," she said, "bookshelves and all complete. Now, follow me," and she took him upstairs to a really charming bedroom.

"But," said Godfrey, surveying these splendours, "this must be the best room in the house. Where do you sleep?"

"Oh! at the back there, my dear. You see, I am accustomed to a small chamber and shouldn't be happy in this big one. Besides, you are going to pay me rent and must be accommodated. And now come down to your dinner."

A very good dinner it was, cooked by the policeman's wife, which Mrs. Parsons insisted on serving, as she would not sit at the table with him. In short, Godfrey found himself in clover, a circumstance that filled him with some sadness. Why, he wondered, should he always be made so miserable at home and so happy when he was away? Then he remembered that famous line about the man who throughout life ever found his warmest welcome at an inn, and perceived that it hid much philosophy. Frequently enough homes are not what fond fancy paints them, while in the bosom of strangers there is much kindliness.



CHAPTER XIII

THE INTERVENING YEARS

Now we may omit a great deal from Godfrey's youthful career. Within a few days he received a letter from his father forwarded to him from the hotel, that was even more unpleasant than the majority of the paternal epistles to which he was accustomed. Mr. Knight, probably from honest conviction and a misreading of the facts of life, was one of those persons who are called Pacifists. Although he never carried out the doctrine in his own small affairs, he believed that nations were enjoined by divine decree to turn the other cheek and indeed every portion of their corporate frame to the smiter, and that by so doing, in some mysterious way, they would attain to profound peace and felicity. Consequently he hated armies, especially as these involved taxation, and loathed the trade of soldiering, which he considered one of licensed murder.

The decision of his son to adopt this career was therefore a bitter blow to him, concerning which he expressed his feelings in the plainest language, ending his epistle by intimating his strong conviction that Godfrey, having taken the sword, was destined to perish by the sword. Also he pointed out to him that he had turned his back upon God Who would certainly remember the affront, being, he remarked, "a jealous God," and lastly that the less they saw of each other in future—here he was referring to himself, not to the Divinity as the context would seem to imply—the better it would be for both of them.

Further there was a postscript about the disgraceful conduct of the woman, Mrs. Parsons, who, after receiving the shelter of his house for many years, had made a scene and departed, leaving him in the lurch. His injunction was that under no circumstances should he, Godfrey, have anything more to do with this violent and treacherous female who had made him a pretext of quarrel, and, having learned that he had money, doubtless wished to get something out of him.

Godfrey did not answer this letter, nor did his father write to him again for quite a long while.

For the rest, on the appointed Monday he presented himself at Garrick Street, and began his course of tuition under the general direction of the wise Mr. Scoones, "cramming" as it was called. This, indeed, exactly describes the process, for all knowledge was rejected except that which was likely to obtain marks in the course of an examination by hide-bound persons appointed to ascertain who were the individuals best fitted to be appointed to various branches of the Public Service. Anything less calculated to secure the selection of suitable men than such a system cannot well be imagined. However, it was that which certain nebulous authorities had decreed should prevail, and there was an end of it, although in effect it involved, and still involves, the frequent sacrifice of those qualities and characteristics which are essential to a public servant, to others that are quite the reverse. For instance, to a parrot-like memory and the power of acquiring a superficial acquaintance with much miscellaneous information and remembering the same for, say, six months.

Although he hated the business and thought with longing of his studies, stellar and other, in the Kleindorf observatory, Godfrey was quite clever enough to collect what was needed. In fact, some three months later he passed his examination with ease about half-way up the list, and duly entered Sandhurst.

He found the establishment at Garrick Street just such a place as its owner had described. In it were many charming but idle young men, often with a certain amount of means, who were going up for the Diplomatic Service, the Foreign Office, the Indian Civil, or various branches of the army. Of these a large proportion enjoyed life but did little else, and in due course failed in their competitive encounters with the examiners.

Others were too stupid to succeed, or perhaps their natural talents had another bent, while the remainder, by no means the most brilliant, but with a faculty for passing examinations and without any disturbing originality, worked hard and sailed into their desired haven with considerable facility, being of the stuff of which most successful men are made. For the rest, there was the opportunity, and if they did not avail themselves of it Scoones' was not to blame. It was, and perhaps still remains, a most admirable institution of its sort, one, indeed, of which the present chronicler has very grateful recollections.

Among the pupils studying there was a young man named Arthur Thorburn, an orphan, with considerable expectations, who lived with an aunt in a fine old house at Queen Anne's Gate. He was a brilliant young man, witty and original, but rash and without perseverance, whom his guardians wished to enter the Diplomatic Service, a career in which, without doubt, had he ever attained to it, he would have achieved a considerable failure. In appearance he was of medium height, round-faced, light-haired, blue-eyed, with a constant and most charming smile, in every way a complete contrast to Godfrey. Perhaps this was the reason of the curious attachment that the two formed for each other, unless, indeed, such strong and strange affinities have their roots in past individual history, which is veiled from mortal eyes. At any rate, it happened that on Godfrey's first day at Scoones' he sat next to Arthur Thorburn in two classes which he attended. Godfrey listened intently and made notes; Arthur caricatured the lecturer, an art for which he had a native gift, and passed the results round the class. Godfrey saw the caricature and sniggered, then when the lectures were over gravely reproved the author, saying that he should not do such things.

"Why not?" asked Arthur, opening his blue eyes. "Heaven intended that stuffy old parrot" (he had drawn this learned man as a dilapidated fowl of that species) "to be caricatured. Observe that his nose is already half a beak. Or perhaps it is a beak developing into a nose; it depends whether he is on the downward or upward path of evolution."

"Because you made me laugh," replied Godfrey, "whereby I lost at least eighteenpennyworth of information."

"A laugh is worth eighteenpence," suggested Arthur.

"That depends upon how many eighteenpences one possesses. You may have lots, some people are short of them."

"Quite true. I never looked at it in that way before. I am obliged to you for putting it so plainly," said Arthur with his charming smile.

Such was the beginning of the acquaintance of these two, and in some cases might have been its end. But with them it was not so. Arthur conceived a sincere admiration for Godfrey who could speak like this to a stranger, and at Scoones' and as much as possible outside, haunted him like a shadow. Soon it was a regular thing for Godfrey to go to dine at the old Georgian house in Queen Anne's Gate upon Sunday evenings, where he became popular with the rather magnificent early-Victorian aunt who thought that he exercised a good influence upon her nephew. Sometimes, too, Arthur would accompany Godfrey to Hampstead and sit smoking and making furtive caricatures of him and Mrs. Parsons, while he worked and she beamed admiration. The occupation sounds dull, but somehow Arthur did not find it so; he said that it rested his overwrought brain.

"Look here, old fellow," said Godfrey at length, "have you any intention of passing that examination of yours?"

"In the interests of the Diplomatic Service and of the country I think not," replied Arthur reflectively. "I feel that it is a case where true altruism becomes a duty."

"Then what do you mean to do with yourself?"

"Don't know. Live on my money, I suppose, and on that of my respected aunt after her lamented decease which, although I see no signs of it, she tells me she considers imminent."

"I don't wonder, Arthur, with you hanging about the house. You ought to be ashamed of yourself. A man is made to work his way through the world, not to idle."

"Like a beetle boring through wood, not like a butterfly flitting over flowers; that's what you mean, isn't it? Well, butterflies are nicer than beetles, and some of us like flowers better than dead wood. But, I say, old chap, do you mean it?"

"I do, and so does your aunt."

"Let us waive my aunt. Like the poor she is always with us, and I, alas! am well acquainted with her views, which are those of a past epoch. But I am not obstinate; tell me what to do and I'll do it—anything except enter the Diplomatic Service, to lie abroad for the benefit of my country, in the words of the ancient saying."

"There is no fear of that, for you would never pass the examination," said the practical Godfrey. "You see, you are too clever," he added by way of explanation, "and too much occupied with a dozen things of which examiners take no account, the merits of the various religious systems, for instance."

"So are you," interrupted Arthur.

"I know I am; I love them. I'd like to talk to you about reincarnation and astronomy, of which I know something, and even astrology and the survival of the dead and lots of other things. But I have got to make my way in the world, and I've no time. You think me a heavy bore and an old fogey because I won't go to parties to which lots of those nice fellows ask me. Do you suppose I shouldn't like the parties and all the larks afterwards and the jolly actresses and the rest? Of course I should, for I'm a man like others. But I tell you I haven't time. I've flouted my father, and I'm on my honour, so to speak, to justify myself and get on. So I mean to pass that tomfool examination and to cram down a lot of stuff in order to do so, which is of no more use to me than though I had swallowed so much brown paper. Fool-stuff, pulped by fools to be the food of fools—that's what it is. And now I'm going to shove some spoonfuls of it down my throat, so light your pipe, and please be quiet."

"One moment more of your precious time," interrupted Arthur. "What is the exact career that you propose to adorn? Something foreign, I think—Indian Civil Service?"

"No, as I have told you a dozen times, Indian Army."

"The army has points—possibly in the future it might give a man an opportunity of departing from the world in a fashion that is generally, if in error, considered to be decent. India, too, has still more points, for there anyone with intelligence might study the beginnings of civilisation, which, perhaps, are also its end. My friend, I, too, will enter the Indian Army, that is if I can pass the examination. Provide me at once with the necessary books and, Mrs. Parsons, be good-hearted enough to bring some of your excellent coffee, brewed double strong. Do not imagine, young man, who ought, by the way, to have been born fifty years earlier and married my aunt, that you are the only one who can face and conquer facts, even those advanced by that most accursed of empty-headed bores, the man or the maniac called Euclid."

So the pair of them studied together, and by dint of private tuition in the evening, for at Scoones' where his talent for caricature was too much for him, Arthur would do little or nothing, Godfrey dragged his friend through the examination, the last but one in the list. Even then a miracle intervened to save him. Arthur's Euclid was hopeless. He hated the whole business of squares and angles and parallelograms with such intensity that it made him mentally and morally sick. To his, as to some other minds, it was utter nonsense devised by a semi-lunatic for the bewilderment of mankind, and adopted by other lunatics as an appropriate form of torture of the young.

At length, in despair, Godfrey, knowing that Arthur had an excellent memory, only the night before the examination, made him learn a couple of propositions selected out of the books which were to be studied, quite at hazard, with injunctions that no matter what other propositions were set he should write out these two, pretending that he had mistaken the question. This Arthur did with perfect accuracy, and by the greatest of good luck one of the two propositions was actually that which he was asked to set down, while the other was allowed to pass as an error.

So he bumped through somehow, and in the end the Indian Army gained a most excellent officer. It is true that there were difficulties when he explained to his aunt and his trustees that in some inexplicable manner he had passed for Sandhurst instead of into the Diplomatic Service. But when he demonstrated to them that this was his great and final effort and that nothing on earth would induce him to face another examination, even to be made a king, they thought it best to accept the accomplished fact.

"After all, you have passed something," said his aunt, "which is more than anyone ever expected you would do, and the army is respectable, for, as I have told you, my grandfather was killed at Waterloo."

"Yes," replied Arthur, "you have told me, my dear Aunt, very often. He broke his neck by jumping off his horse when riding towards or from the battlefield, did he not? and now I propose to follow his honoured example, on the battlefield, if possible, or if not, in steeplechasing."

So the pair of them went to Sandhurst together, and together in due course were gazetted to a certain regiment of Indian cavalry, the only difference being that Godfrey passed out top and Arthur passed out bottom, although, in fact, he was much the cleverer of the two. Of the interval between these two examinations there is nothing that need be reported, for their lives and the things that happened to them were as those of hundreds of other young men. Only through all they remained the fastest of friends, so much so that by the influence of General Cubitte, as has been said, they managed to be gazetted to the same regiment.

During those two years Godfrey never saw his father, and communicated with him but rarely. His winter vacations were spent at Mrs. Parsons' house in Hampstead, working for the most part, since he was absolutely determined to justify himself and get on in the profession which he had chosen. In the summer he and Arthur went walking tours, and once, with some other young men, visited the Continent to study various battlefields, and improve their minds. At least Godfrey studied the battlefields, while Arthur gave most of his attention to the younger part of the female population of France and Italy. At Easter again they went to Scotland, where Arthur had some property settled on him—for he was a young man well supplied with this world's goods—and fished for salmon and trout. Altogether, for Godfrey, it was a profitable and happy two years. At Sandhurst and elsewhere everyone thought well of him, while old General Cubitte became his devoted friend and could not say enough in his praise.

"Damn it! Sir," he exclaimed once, "do you mean to tell me that you never overdraw your allowance? It is not natural; almost wrong indeed. I wonder what your secret vices are? Well, so long as you keep them secret, you ought to be a big man one day and end up in a very different position to George Cubitte—called a General—who never saw a shot fired in his life. There'll be lots of them flying about before you're old, my boy, and doubtless you'll get your share of gunpowder—or nitro-glycerine—if you go on as you have begun. If I weren't afraid of making you cocky, I'd tell you what they say about you down at that Sandhurst shop, where I have an old pal or two."

Shortly after this came the final examination, through which, as has been said, Godfrey sailed out top, an easy first indeed—a position to which his thorough knowledge of French and general aptitude for foreign languages, together with his powers of work and application, really entitled him. All his friends were delighted, especially Arthur, who looked on him as a kind of lusus naturae, and from his humble position at the bottom of the tree, gazed admiringly at Godfrey perched upon its topmost bough. The old Pasteur, too, with whom Godfrey kept up an almost weekly correspondence, continuing his astronomical studies by letter, was enraptured and covered him with compliments, as did his instructors at the College.

All of this would have been enough to turn the heads of many young men, but as it happened Godfrey was by nature modest, with enough intelligence to appreciate the abysmal depths of his own ignorance by the light of the little lamp of knowledge with which he had furnished himself on his journey into their blackness. This intense modesty always remained a leading characteristic of his, which endeared him to many, although it was not one that helped him forward in life. It is the bold, self-confident man, who knows how to make the most of his small gifts, who travels fastest and farthest in this world of ours.

When, however, actually he received quite an affectionate and pleased letter from his father, he did, for a while, feel a little proud. The letter enclosed a cutting from the local paper recording his success, and digging up for the benefit of its readers an account of his adventure on the Alps. Also, it mentioned prominently that he was the son of the Rev. Mr. Knight, the incumbent of Monk's Abbey, and had received his education in that gentleman's establishment; so prominently, indeed, that even the unsuspicious Godfrey could not help wondering if his father had ever seen that paragraph before it appeared in print. The letter ended with this passage:

"We have not met for a long while, owing to causes to which I will not allude, and I suppose that shortly you will be going to India. If you care to come here I should like to see you before you leave England. This is natural, as after all you are my only child and I am growing old. Once you have departed to that far country who knows whether we shall ever meet again in this world?"

Godfrey, a generous-hearted and forgiving person, was much touched when he read these words, and wrote at once to say that if it were convenient, he would come down to Monk's Abbey at the beginning of the following week and spend some of his leave there. So, in due course, he went.