JLAND ARS. 
 VILLIERS
 
 rflS 
 
 l>
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS
 
 Mr and Mrs Villiers 
 
 BY 
 HUBERT WALES 
 
 Author of "The Yoke" 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THE STUYVESANT PRESS 
 
 1908
 
 Copyright, 1908, by 
 
 THE STUYVESANT PRESS 
 
 NBW YOBK
 
 FORTHCOMING PUBLICATION 
 
 The Tree of Knowledge 
 
 By 
 
 A Woman 
 
 There could be no excuse for giving to the world 
 this diary of disillusion but the fact that it is a 
 record of actual experience. 
 
 Both the professed critic and the amateur of let- 
 ters will recognise that no one could have written so 
 vivid a log of a shipwrecked life but the woman 
 who had lived it. No one but Marie Bashkirtseff 
 could have given us the famous "Journal." Here 
 we have a self -revelation even more valuable to the 
 psychologist. Marie Bashkirtseff's existence was a 
 series of poses. She posed to herself even more 
 than to others. The woman who dissects her soul 
 in these vibrant pages is, so far as can be judged, 
 entirely frank. 
 
 This is not her only merit, for her delight in the 
 color and flexibility of language lends an exotic 
 charm which, like the scent of orchids, fatigues and 
 delights the sense. Here we have set naked before 
 us the nature of a woman steeped in the poisonous 
 juices that distil from the fruit of the Tree of 
 
 2138768
 
 Knowledge. She is abnormal, a decadent, a 
 "sport," even. Yet she represents only the extreme 
 of a type of women which the conditions of the age 
 tend to produce. Her motto is the motto of Magda, 
 lo sono io; her desires, Pleasure and Experience, if 
 possible, combined. Seeing that she has no stand- 
 ards of right and wrong, it would be inaccurate to 
 call her immoral. She is literally non-moral. Mo- 
 rality is to her nothing but a convention ; Religion, 
 merely a frame of mind. 
 
 Her diary is "not for little people nor for fools." 
 It is a document to be studied with scientific curi- 
 osity by those whose interest lies in sounding the 
 hidden depths of human character. Women will 
 understand the writer best those, at any rate, who 
 understand themselves. These will judge her less 
 harshly than men. 
 
 READY MAY FIRST 
 
 The Tree of Knowledge 
 
 I2mo, $1.50 
 
 THE STU YVES ANT PRESS 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 43 WEST ZJTH STREET, NEW YORK
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 The enthusiastic reception accorded THE YOKE 
 augurs well for the immediate popularity of MR. 
 AND MRS. VlLLIERS. 
 
 In this story, as in THE YOKE, certain phases 
 of the sex-problem are considered: difficulties not 
 infrequently encountered in the married state. 
 
 Man is naturally the aggressor in the connubial 
 relations. His desires and passions are more posi- 
 tive than woman's. Women of unusual mental and 
 physical charms are often found renitent and lack- 
 ing in the disposition which makes for perfect con- 
 jugal happiness. Such women have little difficulty 
 in marrying, although entirely unfitted for the mar- 
 riage relation. Mrs Filliers is a woman of this 
 type. 
 
 The story is a fair and legitimate study of oppo- 
 site temperaments. It is intensely realistic, and the 
 difficult problem, which is by no means rare in real 
 life, has been handled with dignity and with such 
 restraint as not to offend. 
 
 FRANKLIN FOSTER,
 
 Mr and Mrs Villiers 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MR AND MRS NORMAN VILLIERS had come to 
 be regarded by their neighbours at Weybridge, and 
 by their relatives and acquaintance in other parts 
 of the world, as a couple who found the path of 
 matrimony unusually free from thorns. Without 
 being given to effusive displays of tenderness, their 
 demeanour one to the other was always kindly 
 affectionate, their mutual conversation always 
 courteous and charged with quiet esteem. Not the 
 most intimate of their friends could point to an 
 instance of any domestic jar which had served, even 
 momentarily, to interrupt the easy flow of their 
 conjugal intercourse. 
 
 This general estimate, for all that, was far in- 
 deed from reaching the truth. A rift had separated 
 them on the day of their marriage a rift unsus- 
 pected even by Marjorie Villiers herself. It had 
 
 1
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 widened and continued to widen, month on month 
 and year on year, until, at the time when we make 
 their acquaintance, it had become a fissure, which 
 yawned between them, deep, broad, and hardly to 
 be bridged. 
 
 The existence of this secret cause of disunion 
 had been kept by Norman Villiers, during the 
 eight years of his marriage, closely locked within 
 his own soul. He was a man from whose appear- 
 ance the possession of this quality of reserve, even 
 in a marked degree, would have been supposed. 
 Not that he was morose, or peculiarly imperturb- 
 able; his clean-shaven face merely indicated com- 
 plete self-reliance. Other points in his general as- 
 pect distinguished him from his fellows. He was 
 thirty-five, tall, and proportionately muscular, by 
 no means ill-looking, but, as we see him sitting in 
 his study one evening in late October, somewhat 
 unkempt and untidy. He was wearing morning 
 dress though he had dined some hours previously, 
 his shirt-cuffs and his trousers were both slightly 
 frayed at the edges, and his black hair was too 
 long and insufficiently brushed. The assured 
 searching light in his eyes indicated an intellectual 
 man ; the papers on the desk beside him particular-
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 ised a literary one. He had begun life as a journal- 
 ist, but had drifted latterly into the calmer waters of 
 creative work. The success of his first novel had been 
 mainly responsible for the change; the two others 
 which had subsequently issued from his pen, with- 
 out achieving the brilliant results he had possibly 
 hoped for, had done much to establish him on a 
 firm basis in the public favour. 
 
 To-night, however, he was not writing. He had 
 drawn a low chair before the fire and was seated in 
 it, smoking and staring into the blaze. As he 
 finished a cigar, he threw the stump into the grate 
 and took another from a box beside him, without 
 apparently being conscious of his act. Norman 
 Villiers, indeed, had come to a crisis in his life; 
 his thoughts were far from his bodily surroundings. 
 Not that he was now engaged in the throes of 
 mental conflict, debating the chances of two diver- 
 gent paths. That was over: his Rubicon was 
 crossed, though his boats remained still intact be- 
 hind him. He had no thoughts of returning, how- 
 ever. A decision once formed, his principle was 
 to abide by it rigidly. He was merely waiting to 
 continue his march and to watch the issue. 
 
 As he smoked, he was dimly conscious of certain 
 3
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 familiar sounds in the house. Someone passed the 
 door with a tray and returned; he heard a slight 
 jingle of silver as a maid carried the table plate 
 upstairs. Then came a short period of silence, to 
 be followed by the rasp and jar of closing windows 
 and a subdued murmur of voices as the servants 
 ascended the stairs on their way to bed. A longer 
 pause succeeded. It seemed longer than it really 
 was to Villiers; for though he did not stir from 
 his easy position before the fire, and kept a cigar 
 still wedged between his lips, he was now listening 
 intently for the sound which would terminate it. 
 It came as the clock on the mantelpiece pointed to 
 eleven. The drawing-room door opened and shut, 
 and a skirt rustled across the hall. The next 
 moment his wife looked into the room. She held 
 some books in her hand and had gathered up the 
 front of her dress to go upstairs. "Don't be late, 
 dear," she said almost mechanically; and he 
 answered, without turning his head, as he had 
 answered no more falsely a hundred times be- 
 fore, "No, dear"; and then the door closed and the 
 skirt rustled away again. A very simple incident; 
 but it was sufficient to bring a lump into Norman's 
 throat and to strike deep at the foundation of the 
 
 4
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 resolve he had believed so impregnably established. 
 For the brief moment that his wife had remained 
 in the room the future course of his life and hers 
 had hung in the balance. 
 
 You would not have remarked on his face any 
 sign of the severe mental struggle he had passed 
 through. It still retained the same thoughtful, al- 
 most rapt, expression as he gazed into the flames. 
 He waited calmly until he heard a bedroom door 
 click on the floor above, then he threw the remains 
 of his last cigar into the fire and rose from his 
 seat. He went round the house, extinguished all 
 the lights that were still burning, and returned 
 to the study. A spirit-stand stood upon a small 
 table, and from this he carefully mixed himself a 
 glass of weak whisky-and-water, which he placed 
 upon his desk. He was actuated more by habit than 
 inclination ; his use of alcohol was of the slightest, 
 and often he worked through the small hours to 
 find his modicum still untasted at the end. Hav- 
 ing seated himself at the desk, he collected the 
 litter of papers upon it and placed them in a neat 
 heap at the side; then he turned up the lamp, took 
 out a clean sheet and began to write on it in pencil. 
 Apparently he found his task a difficult one, for 
 
 5
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 he wrote slowly and with frequent erasures and 
 interlineations. Once, with a slight indication of 
 irritability, he scrawled out the entire jumble of 
 lines and began again beneath them. It occupied 
 him two hours to complete a draft to his satisfac- 
 tion. At the end of that time he had filled three 
 sheets of sermon-paper with close pencilled lines. 
 He took a turn about the room with the paper in 
 his hand, and then sat down once more and made 
 a fair copy of it in ink. This he placed in an en- 
 velope, sealed, and addressed to his wife. 
 
 His task finished, he returned to his place by 
 the fire, and stirred the dying embers into a blaze. 
 He remained long leaning over it, mechanically 
 prodding the charred coals, deeply lost in thought. 
 The flames, as they flickered and fell, threw his 
 features into relief. They were difficult to read. 
 There was intellect in the brow, gentleness in the 
 eyes, dignity in the nose, but something in the 
 slightly accentuated lips which served in a measure 
 to mar the harmony of the whole. An observer 
 who might have been watching him as he sat would 
 have known that he saw a capable man, he 
 would have known that he saw a benevolent and 
 a just man; whether he saw a completely good man 
 
 6
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 he would have been left in doubt. Presently he 
 rose and cautiously opened the door, throwing a 
 stream of yellow light into the hall. He listened 
 intently for a few moments, and then picked up 
 the letter he had written and took it into the din- 
 ing-room. He dropped it in a prominent position 
 on the mantelpiece. As he re-crossed the hall to 
 the study a small clock on a cabinet tinkled 
 twice. 
 
 The lateness of the hour appeared to surprise 
 him, and henceforth his movements quickened. 
 Going to the front door, he opened it and looked 
 out. It was a clammy night; heavy banks of cloud 
 rolled slowly and incessantly over a glimmering 
 moon; a slight breeze was moving, and a feel of 
 impending rain was in the air. Apparently satis- 
 fied by his survey, Villiers presently re-entered his 
 room and proceeded to an examination of his book- 
 shelves. After some hesitation, he selected several 
 volumes and carried them out of the house and 
 along one of the grass margins which bordered the 
 path, eventually depositing them beside the gate. 
 He went back for a second load, and then for 
 another and another. It took him some time to 
 make a selection for this purpose, but his move- 
 
 7
 
 ments throughout were swift and noiseless. In 
 due course there were three tall piles standing by 
 the gate. Villiers assured himself that they were 
 sufficiently hidden from the eyes of any belated 
 pedestrian by a screen of shrub, and then returned 
 finally to the house and closed the door behind 
 him. 
 
 It was now three o'clock, but his night's work 
 was still far from complete. He removed his shoes 
 and stealthily ascended to the dressing-room where 
 he slept. Here he packed a bag with some clothes, 
 and a few minutes later emerged again upon the 
 corridor. The house was completely still; even 
 the slight ticking of the hall clock was now too dis- 
 tant to break the silence. He listened some mo- 
 ments at the door of a neighbouring room, and 
 then, with the utmost caution, turned the handle 
 and went in. It was faintly illumined by a shaded 
 night-light. At the further end two little girls of 
 six and seven were asleep in two little cribs. Vil- 
 liers lighted a candle and carried it towards them, 
 screening the flame with his hand. As the beam 
 fell over the beds they stirred slightly, but did not 
 awake. He stood long watching them, listening 
 to their even breathing. One lay with a small, 
 
 8
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 soft arm outside the bed-clothes. This he gently 
 covered, and then kissed them each in turn without 
 breaking their sleep. A door communicating with 
 an adjoining apartment was near the cribs and 
 stood ajar. Norman looked at this and moved 
 a step towards it, then hesitated, and finally turned 
 and went out by the same at which he had entered. 
 He extinguished the candle and descended once 
 more to the ground floor, carrying his bag. 
 
 Entering one of the front rooms, he drew aside 
 the window-blind and stood for some moments 
 looking out. The signs of increasing restless anx- 
 iety were beginning to manifest themselves upon 
 his usually calm face. His ears were straining to 
 catch some expected sound, and this caused him 
 to start at the smallest interruption of the univer- 
 sal silence the creak of a piece of furniture, the 
 fall of a cinder in the hearth. He glanced re- 
 peatedly at the clock on the mantelpiece, and paced 
 the room at intervals with stealthy but uneasy tread, 
 biting his underlip till the blood showed beneath 
 the skin. A little after four the noise for which 
 he was waiting broke into the stillness. A rumble 
 of wheels became audible in the distance, and pres- 
 ently a closed fly drew up at the gate. 
 
 9
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Villiers put on his hat and overcoat, and, taking 
 his bag, went quietly out of the house, closing the 
 door with a latch-key to avoid a jar. He assisted 
 the driver to pack the books inside the vehicle. 
 Then he placed his bag upon the top of them and 
 seated himself in the small space that still re- 
 mained. These preparations occupied but a very 
 few minutes. The coachman was apparently aware 
 of his destination, for he closed the door without 
 speaking to Villiers, and mounting the box, 
 wrapped a horse-rug about his knees and started 
 on his journey. The wheels crunched loudly on 
 the heavy road, then slowly creaked and rumbled 
 into the distance and died away. The breeze blew 
 fitfully, the moon still gleamed through drifting 
 cloud, and beneath it, darkly outlined, lay the sleep- 
 ing house, all unconscious that its master had left 
 it and would not return. 
 
 10
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE next morning dawned misty and overcast. 
 Marjorie Villiers looked from her window, as she 
 dressed, upon sodden patches of garden, dripping 
 with condensing vapour. Possibly the cheerless 
 scene affected her spirits; at any rate, there was 
 observable in her manner, as she moved to and fro, 
 some sign of irritability. One of the children in 
 the adjoining room was resenting its nurse's minis- 
 trations, and occasionally burst in upon her with 
 a petulant complaint, which served further to ruffle 
 her equanimity. The child was chidden and sent 
 away; then recalled and kissed; to be chided again; 
 and again forgiven on a subsequent outbreak. 
 These interruptions prolonged her toilet beyond its 
 usual limits, so that it was considerably after half- 
 past eight when she finally descended the stairs. 
 
 Though approaching thirty, she retained the tall, 
 slim figure of her girlhood. A soft, oval face and 
 deep, dark eyes indicated a loving and lovable dis- 
 
 11
 
 position, an indication so strongly marked as to 
 clothe her aspect of itself with a peculiar charm. 
 No stranger, on seeing her for the first time, would 
 have pronounced her a pretty woman, or even have 
 admitted the fact on its being suggested to him; 
 for somehow she failed to make the most of the 
 attractions she undoubtedly possessed. Her dark- 
 brown hair was drawn loosely back from her fore- 
 head without wave or curl ; her grey morning gown 
 was of the simplest workmanship and material. 
 Unaffected, quietly religious, both by nature and 
 training, she gave small thought to human artifices 
 to improve the handiwork of her Maker. Never- 
 theless, her features, if a trifle pointed, were good 
 ones; her form, though slightly inclined to stoop, 
 graceful and elegant. Many a woman with fewer 
 natural advantages has gained a reputation for 
 beauty. 
 
 When she entered the dining-room, the two 
 children were already seated at their breakfast. 
 Her husband's absence caused her no surprise; it 
 was his custom to take his morning meal at a later 
 hour than the rest of the family. She took in at 
 a glance the arrangements which had been made 
 to satisfy the bodily needs of her offspring. 
 
 12
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 "Sybil," she exclaimed sharply to the younger, 
 "why are you eating sausage? You know you are 
 not allowed it. Nurse, why has Miss Sybil been 
 given sausage?" 
 
 The nurse's reply was inarticulate, but appar- 
 ently expostulatory, and she was summarily dis- 
 missed. Marjorie, with her own hands, removed 
 the offending delicacy, opened an egg and placed 
 it in front of Sybil, dried her protesting tears, and 
 at last seated herself behind the coffee-pot and took 
 up her letters. As she did so, she glanced auto- 
 matically at the clock on the mantelpiece. Her at- 
 tention was at once arrested by the note which stood 
 there. She recognised her husband's handwriting, 
 and a look of perplexity, of incredulity came into 
 her face, changing slowly to vague alarm, and then 
 to definite dread. She sprang quickly from her 
 seat, snatched at the letter and tore open the en- 
 velope with trembling fingers. She read the open- 
 ing lines, and could read no more. Her whole 
 frame quivered, her lips uttered a half-choked cry 
 of pain, and she clutched at the nearest object for 
 support. Her face had blanched and her eyes held 
 a look of mute anguish. 
 
 The two children had ceased eating and were 
 13
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 gazing at her with solemn surprise. They knew 
 well enough that something was wrong, and pres- 
 ently one of them slipped from her chair and ran 
 to the object of her concern. She wrapped her tiny 
 arms as far as they would go around her skirts and 
 clung to her appealingly. 
 
 "Mummy! mummy!" she cried, "kiss me." It 
 was the only means which her childish intelligence 
 suggested to bring back to the familiar features 
 their natural look. 
 
 Marjorie took no notice at first, but, after a time, 
 the child's repeated calls and plaintive appeals to 
 be kissed broke a way into her brain and reawak- 
 ened her numbed faculties. She smoothed, half 
 mechanically, the glossy curls, and then stooped 
 and kissed the little upturned anxious face. 
 
 "Go and sit down, darling," she said. "Mother 
 is not very well. Nurse shall give you your break- 
 fast." 
 
 She recalled the nurse, and giving the children 
 into her charge, went into an adjoining room. This 
 was Norman's study. The fire had been lighted 
 for him; his newspaper was placed upon the table; 
 even his boots, glossily polished, stood near his 
 favourite chair. Marjorie had a sudden wild hope 
 
 14
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 that, somehow, the letter was a mistake, a hoax, 
 that presently he would come down the stairs and 
 greet her with his customary morning kiss and 
 hasty, kindly word. The next moment her glance 
 fell on the depleted book-shelves, and the little 
 beam faded before it had warmed her. She sat 
 down, spread out the letter upon the desk at which 
 it had been written, and forced herself to read it 
 from the first word to the last. Its contents were 
 these : 
 
 "My DEAR MARJORIE, I use no more inti- 
 mate form of address, not because I think of you 
 less affectionately than I have always done, but be- 
 cause, in the light of what I am going to write, it 
 would seem an impertinence which you would have 
 a right to resent. Before you read this I shall have 
 left you slunk away like a coward in the night. 
 The fact that I am able to do so will, I hope, con- 
 vince you how little there is to regret in my worth- 
 less bones. 
 
 "I am going because I find it no longer possible 
 to endure life in the conditions which you have 
 tacitly laid down. We have been married eight 
 years, but during that time, except in a very im- 
 
 15
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 perfect sense in the early years, we have not been 
 man and wife. We have lived in complete physical 
 disunion. Of late I have rarely referred to the 
 subject: it is one which was clearly distasteful to 
 you, and I was unwilling to wound your delicacy. 
 So it is possible that you may have grown into the 
 belief that our mode of life was as acceptable to 
 me as it was to yourself. It has not been .so. Do 
 not think I am seeking to .blame you. It is a dif- 
 ference of temperament, of constitution, of what 
 you will. You have been made in one mould and 
 I in another, and they are both extremes. I think, 
 dear, you are very little lower than the angels, as 
 I am hardly higher than the beasts. Mentally and 
 morally you are the best helpmeet a man could have ; 
 physically you could never mate with such as I am. 
 No one could wish for a sister, a friend, more 
 sweet, more unselfish, more continually thoughtful 
 and long-suffering. As such, I esteem you, I rev- 
 erence you, I admire you; as such, if you will be- 
 lieve me, Marjorie, I love you. But the animal 
 remains in me and will not be quelled. I do not 
 need a sister, a friend, a housekeeper; I need a 
 wife, and a wife I must and will have. 
 
 "Perhaps you are thinking that, at least, I could 
 16
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 have told you all this before taking an irrevocable 
 step. You may feel that, in that case, you would 
 have promised to be to me such as I desired. It 
 would have been useless. You cannot alter your 
 nature, dear. It was given you for some other end 
 than wifehood, some higher end. I do not doubt 
 that, at any time during our marriage, under 
 pressure, out of kindness of heart and your affec- 
 tion, you would have sacrificed yourself to my 
 wishes. It is a sacrifice I would accept from no 
 woman, least of all from you. 
 
 "What more need I say? Until recently I have 
 been faithful to you. Accident made me so: I 
 encountered no opportunity to be otherwise. When 
 the opportunity came, I took it, as a starving man 
 takes meat. To that food I return ; I could refrain 
 no more than a hungry beggar for whom a banquet 
 is prepared. I do not think you will despise me 
 for this, as I deserve to be despised; I think you 
 will blame yourself, who are unblamable. But, 
 as time passes, I hope you will be able to forget 
 the very mortal piece of clay to whom you were 
 canonically joined. I shall not forget you. I 
 shall remember you always as the purest and most 
 perfect of God's creatures I have ever known or can 
 
 17
 
 MR AND MRS riLLlERS 
 
 know. As long as I live, the thought of you will 
 be to me an elevating and ennobling influence, a 
 sheet-anchor to save me from drifting utterly in the 
 waters of human folly. 
 
 "You know, of course, that the action I am 
 taking entitles you to a divorce, or will do so at the 
 expiration of some legal period. If you decide to 
 apply for it, the suit will not be defended. This 
 will enable you to obtain your freedom with a mini- 
 mum of publicity. 
 
 "I am going to enclose you a cheque for 250, 
 and to pay a similar sum into your account every 
 six months while you remain my wife. This, with 
 your own means, will permit you to live as you 
 have done hitherto. 
 
 "Forget me, Marjorie. I am unworthy an 
 instant's thought, a moment's pain. Only give me 
 credit for sincerity when I say that I am still, no 
 less than of yore, your affectionate husband, 
 
 "NORMAN VlLLIERS." 
 
 Marjorie folded the letter, replaced it in the 
 envelope, and hid it in her bosom. Her heart was 
 brimming, but as yet she refused to permit it to run 
 over. There was an appearance to be maintained, 
 
 18
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 cost her what it might. She left the room without 
 looking to right or left. She dared not trust her- 
 self to glance at any one of the familiar objects it 
 contained. The papers on the desk, the pens, the 
 jar of tobacco, the boots waiting for their owner, 
 would have spoken with an eloquence too great for 
 her fortitude. She entered the room where the 
 children were finishing breakfast, spoke kindly to 
 them, replied to their clamorous speeches, and told 
 the nurse she must see them warmly clad before 
 they went out into the raw atmosphere. After- 
 wards she visited the kitchen and gave her custom- 
 ary household directions. 
 
 When all this had been accomplished with stoical 
 calmness, she went upstairs to her room. The 
 maid who was dusting it came out as she entered. 
 Marjorie gave her some instructions which would 
 occupy her elsewhere, and closed the door. Then, 
 at last, she cast herself upon the bed and burst 
 into an overwhelming flood of heart-drawn tears. 
 Her whole frame was racked and shaken by the 
 power of the deep sorrow that convulsed her. After 
 a time the violence of this first outburst spent itself, 
 and then, for over an hour, she continued to weep 
 softly, her face hidden in the pillow. Her trouble 
 
 19
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 had come upon her with such stunning, blinding 
 suddenness ! She found it hardly possible at first 
 to realise all that it meant. She had grown so 
 accustomed to her quiet life with Norman, to his 
 constant presence in the house as a buttress to take 
 the brunt of her little vexations and to share the 
 weight of her little anxieties, that now she remem- 
 bered almost with a shock of surprise that this was 
 her husband, her lover, the man into whose keep- 
 ing she had given her heart aye, and who would 
 keep it, whatever betode, while it beat within her. 
 He had somehow become strangely different to her 
 eyes since first he had sought her love;but,as she lay 
 sobbing quietly on the bed, the later mechanical life 
 was obliterated and the memory of these early days 
 gushed warm from her heart: how her pulse had 
 quickened at the sound of his footsteps; how she 
 had avoided him because there was none whose 
 company she so much desired; how, when he en- 
 tered a room which she shared with others, she 
 knew, though he never glanced her way, that he 
 had instantly recognised her presence and was 
 thinking only of her; how at last, when she was 
 quite, quite sure of her place in his thoughts, she had 
 looked into his face and permitted her eyes to tell 
 
 20
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 their tale. And this it was who was gone; not the 
 buttress, not the quiet man of letters, but her early 
 love, her heart's desire, the most precious posses- 
 sion that the world held for her. And at the gap- 
 ing desolateness of that thought, the warm tears 
 flooded afresh incontrollably, and she strained the 
 wet pillow to her face with a long, low cry of im- 
 measurable tribulation. 
 
 Her sharpest pang came from the belief she felt 
 in her own entire culpability. She did not for an 
 instant question the force of every word which 
 Norman had written. He had left her because she 
 had failed in her duty as a wife, because she had 
 proved herself insufficient, because and this dis- 
 tracted her sorely, for the apparent divine injus- 
 tice she lacked the power to be sufficient. Her 
 own loss was not the worst of the results which 
 followed: that she had deserved, that she would 
 bear, though her heart bled without ceasing. What 
 harrowed her, what pointed the needles of self- 
 reproof with torturing keenness was the thought 
 that by her failure she had driven him into evil : the 
 deadly fear that this first step, by removing him 
 from every straightening influence, might lead him
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 to further extravagance and end in his ruin 
 physical, moral, and eternal. 
 
 One little ray of hope there was to comfort her. 
 That was the sentence in Norman's letter in which 
 he said that the remembrance of her would save 
 him from "drifting utterly." She rested in its 
 warmth, and after a time it brought her some relief 
 from the pain of her self-chastisement. Her deep 
 sobs slowly ceased, and then she rose from the bed 
 and sank on her knees beside it. She prayed to 
 her Maker, as rarely ever she had prayed before, 
 that the husband whom she loved, and who had 
 gone from her, might be saved from utter drifting.
 
 CHAFFER III 
 
 WHEN Marjorie rose from her knees she was 
 again composed, and, moreover, had decided upon 
 the immediate course of action she would take. 
 She bathed her swollen eyes, and presently pinned 
 a neat hat on her head, adding a veil to hide the 
 still evident traces of her recent outbreak of weep- 
 ing. A jacket and gloves were next put on, a small 
 railway time-table was consulted, various drawers 
 were unlocked and locked again, various small 
 articles disposed in their places within them, and 
 thus finally prepared for a short journey, she left 
 the room and descended to the ground floor. 
 
 She informed the servants that their master had 
 left home and would not return for the present, and 
 that she herself was going to town. Then she 
 went out of the house and walked to the station, 
 nodding with her accustomed quiet courtesy to such 
 of her neighbours as chanced to meet her in the 
 road. She took a return ticket for Waterloo, and en-
 
 tered a train which presently arrived, seating her- 
 self in a corner of an empty compartment. Crushed 
 and stunned by the blow she had sustained, she felt 
 the need, as she had rarely felt it before, of human 
 sympathy and support. Her parents were both 
 dead, but she was not, fortunately, without those 
 to whom she could apply in her extremity. Her 
 only sister had married, years before, a flourishing 
 City man, and now occupied a substantial mansion 
 in Hampstead. To this house Marjorie drove on 
 her arrival at Waterloo. 
 
 She paid off the cab at the door and rang the bell. 
 Mrs Baker was in. Mrs Baker was, in fact, 
 lunching, and Marjorie entered her presence with- 
 out the formality of announcement. Marion Baker 
 was four years older than her sister, not quite so 
 tall, but more symmetrically proportioned, and 
 without the occasional droop that characterised 
 Marjorie; a sensible and thoroughly capable 
 woman, with a sweet disposition and attractive ex- 
 terior. She was distinguished by a native harmony 
 of manner which instantly charmed: no one could 
 fail to be struck by the unstudied elegance and 
 grace of all her movements. She possessed the rare 
 faculty of dressing well without giving the impres- 
 
 24
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 sion that her clothes had received elaborate care 
 in the preparation. Though they always became 
 her, they were never glaringly new. As she came 
 to meet Marjorie, there was genuine surprised joy 
 at the unexpected visit both in her voice and her 
 smile. 
 
 "Marjorie!" she exclaimed. "How sweet of 
 you ! I was just beginning to wonder whether star- 
 vation or a solitary lunch were preferable?" 
 
 Marjorie did not speak. She went quickly up 
 to her sister and put both her hands into those 
 which the latter had extended. 
 
 "Something is wrong? Something has hap- 
 pened?" said Marion, as she kissed her. Her con- 
 cern was manifest in the changed tone. 
 
 "Yes, dear." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 Marjorie found the sympathetic touch of her 
 sister's encircling arms almost too great for her 
 hardly regained composure. She waited before 
 replying : "It is about Norman," she said. 
 
 "He is ill dead?" Acute alarm was in the 
 sudden query. 
 
 "No, dear." 
 
 25
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Marion breathed a sigh of relief. "Then the 
 worst is light in that case. Tell me, dear." 
 
 "He has left me," said Marjorie, simply. 
 
 The elder woman made no immediate comment. 
 Her gaze was fixed thoughtfully on the other's face. 
 "I hardly understand you," she said, at last. "It 
 seems incredible. Come and sit down. You are 
 looking so thin and pale, child. Drink some wine." 
 She hastily poured out a glass from a decanter. 
 "What did you have for breakfast? Nothing? 
 I thought so. You must eat a good lunch, and not 
 another word about Norman until it is finished. 
 Afterwards we will go upstairs and talk." 
 
 Marjorie had no appetite, but she allowed her- 
 self to be persuaded by her sister to swallow the 
 food she was so sadly in need of. It did her good ; 
 a faint tinge of colour came into her cheeks; and 
 presently she was permitted by her hostess to con- 
 sider the meal at an end. They left the table and 
 went into a small room on the second floor which 
 Marion used partly as a workroom and partly as 
 a boudoir. There was an air of comfort over all 
 it contained, from the cheerful blaze on the hearth 
 to the scattered needlework and knick-knacks.
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 They seated themselves in two low chairs before 
 the fire. Marion took her sister's hand. 
 
 "There, dear," she said, "you look better now. 
 I was afraid you were going to faint. Now tell 
 me about Norman. What do you mean when you 
 say he has left you?" 
 
 "I mean he has gone away," replied Marjorie, 
 "and doesn't intend to return, and he says I can 
 get a divorce." 
 
 "But when did he go? And how do you know 
 he won't return?" 
 
 "He told me so in a letter he left on the mantel- 
 piece." Marjorie spoke quietly, almost as if she 
 were repeating a lesson. "He went last night. I 
 spoke to him on my way to bed, and he answered 
 as usual, but when I came down this morning he 
 was gone." 
 
 "But there must be something more," urged 
 Marion. She waited with judicial calmness for the 
 end of the story before committing herself to an 
 opinion upon it. "Did he say nothing else? You 
 always seemed to get on so well. Did he give no 
 reason for leaving you in this extraordinary way?" 
 
 "Yes," said Marjorie, in a low tone, "he did." 
 
 Her sister waited for the sequel, but as the pause 
 27
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 remained unbroken, she interjected quietly, "Well, 
 dear?" 
 
 "I hardly know how to tell you," said Marjorie. 
 
 The elder woman looked at her with sudden 
 surprise in her calm eyes. "Why, Marjorie, you 
 have no confession to make, surely?" 
 
 "Oh, no." 
 
 "Then it shouldn't be hard to tell." 
 
 "It is very." 
 
 "Will you show me the letter?" 
 
 "Oh, no, no!" 
 
 "Then you must contrive to make me under- 
 stand, dear, somehow. I won't be dull." 
 
 Marjorie twisted the rings on her sister's fingers. 
 She found it sorely difficult to frame a set of words 
 for her purpose. "You remember, Marion," she 
 said at last, speaking slowly, "that for the last six 
 years Norman and I have had different rooms?" 
 
 "Is it so long as that?" said Marion. Again she 
 waited; again there was a pause, which she was 
 obliged to break. "Yes, dear; go on." 
 
 "That is the reason," said Marjorie. 
 
 Marion understood. She saw her sister's trouble, 
 but did not shock her by a blunt announcement of 
 her knowledge. Now, however, that the clue was 
 
 28
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 in her hands, she quickly extracted the remaining 
 threads. 
 
 "Which of you first suggested living in that 
 way?" she asked. 
 
 ""Neither, I think," said Marjorie. "We drifted 
 into it. It suited me, and I thought it suited him." 
 
 "Really, it didn't?" 
 
 "I know now that it didn't." 
 
 "But, surely, you must have known before? 
 Did he never mention it?" 
 
 "He used to sometimes." 
 
 "And you refused?" 
 
 "I left the subject." 
 
 The facts were out, and Marion summed up 
 with judicial impartiality. "You made him live 
 without you for six years, when all the time he was 
 pining for the wife he had married?" 
 
 Marjorie made no attempt at extenuation. 
 "Yes," she said, humbly, hardly above her breath. 
 
 "You were very thoughtless, Marjorie; you were 
 almost cruel." 
 
 The words were expected, and yet they made 
 their object wince slightly when they fell. "I 
 know," she said simply. "You can't reproach me 
 more than I reproach myself. I am worse than 
 
 29
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 cruel : I have driven him into wickedness, and his 
 sins must rest upon me." 
 
 "No," said Marion, quietly; "you were to blame 
 for the manner in which you treated Norman, but 
 nothing could justify his leaving you as he did. 
 Why, if he objected to the kind of life he was 
 leading, didn't he come and tell you so?" 
 
 "He said that I couldn't become different at will, 
 that we were made in opposite moulds; and, be- 
 sides, he wouldn't mention a subject which he knew 
 I disliked." 
 
 Marion's serene face lighted in a sudden smile of 
 amusement. "Oh, my dear Marjorie, you can't put 
 forward such an excuse as that. He was your 
 husband, and we must allow our husbands a little 
 more license than other people, poor creatures; 
 they are so very human." 
 
 "I can't," said Marjorie, firmly. "The least al- 
 lusion to horrid, low kind of things makes me feel 
 as if a snake were creeping down my back." 
 
 There was no mistaking the genuineness of the 
 sentiment she expressed. Its truth vibrated through 
 every word she uttered and startled even her sister. 
 
 The latter watched her some moments in 
 30
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIERS 
 
 thoughtful silence. "Marjorie, you had no right 
 to marry," she affirmed at last. 
 
 "But I loved him," said Marjorie, with surprised 
 expostulation. 
 
 Her ultra-delicacy, viewed in the light of the 
 consequences to which it had led, was slightly irri- 
 tating to Marion. She was purposely less careful 
 than before to save her sister's susceptibilities. 
 "Yes," she answered, a little tartly, "but husbands 
 won't live on love; they are much too mortal." 
 
 The slight rebuke took Marjorie by surprise. 
 Her fortitude was as yet too insecurely established 
 to meet an unexpected demand upon it. She 
 bowed her head, and the tears began to fall softly 
 on her lap. 
 
 Marion took her hand again and gently stroked 
 it. "Don't cry, dear," she said, kindly; "I didn't 
 intend to be harsh. When you married, our 
 mother was dead, and I was too inexperienced to 
 be of much use to you, so you had no one to talk 
 to you. You made mistakes, as you could hardly 
 help doing, and you have had to pay a heavy price 
 for them. We must see that you are better pre- 
 pared for the future," she went on, cheerily, "when 
 this trouble is all over and you can make a new 
 
 31
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 start. I don't think it can be long before that 
 happens; two such good people were not put into 
 the world to quarrel." 
 
 She waited until her sister's tears ceased to fall, 
 and then proceeded: "You must have noticed, 
 sometimes, couples who appear to go on living in 
 a perpetual honeymoon, whose original feelings for 
 one another what is the verse? 'Time cannot 
 stale, nor custom wither'? You have seen such 
 marriages, Marjorie?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," answered Marjorie. She was dabbing 
 her eyes with a small cambric handkerchief. "Yours 
 with James is one ; I have often thought so." 
 
 Marion blushed slightly. "I was not thinking 
 of that," she said. "Because I was going to say 
 next that the wives in such cases are wise women 
 who know that their happiness will not be achieved 
 by concealing their natural infirmities in the foolish 
 belief that insensibility is virtue. The most vir- 
 tuous woman is one who is exceedingly sensible, 
 but who has fought and overcome herself. For 
 those who have been through that fire and come 
 out unscathed there is no honour too high. But 
 they are necessarily not wives. A wife's business, 
 if she is wise, is to retain her husband's love and 
 
 32
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 to keep at bay the quiet affection into which it so 
 often degenerates." 
 
 "Why keep it at bay?" asked Marjorie. "If it 
 is true affection, it is enough." 
 
 "It is not enough," said Marion, "as your own 
 case has proved. A great many pretty things have 
 been said and written about love being everlasting 
 and unchanging and so on. So it is, perhaps, in 
 the sleepy, unemotional stage, but in that stage it 
 is always dangerous a loose rope that may stand a 
 strain or may not. You must keep the flame bright 
 enough to forge steel links. But a flame needs to 
 be constantly fed. The fuel by which it burns at 
 first is not inexhaustible, and unless it is replenished 
 and kept replenished, the fire will go out." 
 
 "I think I know what you mean," said Marjorie, 
 without looking up. 
 
 "Man is a difficult cattle to deal with," pro- 
 ceeded Marion. "He won't be beholden. If, as 
 has happened in your case, there is nothing to give 
 him except out of charity, don't let him know it. 
 Humour him. You will be amply repaid, 
 Marjorie." 
 
 Marjorie shivered a little. "That would be like 
 acting a lie," she said. 
 
 33
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Would the reverse be acting a lie? When you 
 first fell in love with Norman, did you show him 
 your true feelings, or did you do all you could to 
 appear indifferent?" 
 
 Marjorie's pale face broke into a half smile. 
 "Two blacks don't make a white, dear." 
 
 "How can we satisfy this little tyrant of a con- 
 science?" said Marion, with a quaint air of forbear- 
 ance. "Look at the case in another way. Is it 
 better that Norman should receive the feigned en- 
 dearments of his wife or the real ones of another 
 woman?" 
 
 The shaft struck home. Marjorie clasped her 
 two hands tightly together and bent towards her 
 sister, her grey eyes wide and appealing. "Oh, 
 how am I to find him?" she cried, helplessly. 
 
 Marion did not answer at once. She looked 
 thoughtfully into the sweet, eager face before her, 
 and enclosed it between her palms. "Do you really 
 want to find him ?" she asked at last. "Would you 
 take him back if you did?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, yes!" cried Marjorie. "I would do 
 anything, I would devote my life to him, to make 
 up for the wrong I have done." 
 
 34
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "But the little snake will always be there : I saw 
 it a moment ago." 
 
 "I won't mind," said Marjorie, bravely. "I will 
 endure anything for his sake; I will hide it, crush 
 it, kill it." 
 
 Marion looked at her with tender solicitude. 
 "Poor little bird!" she said, softly. "With your 
 nature, how did you come to love such a man?" 
 
 Marjorie fired up. "He has everything to make 
 me love him. He is honourable and just and kind 
 and generous and noble. He has a mind far above 
 mine. His only sins are those to which I have 
 driven him. He never did a mean action in his 
 life. He is not a bad man, Marion, and you have 
 no right to hint it." 
 
 "I didn't intend to hint it," said Marion, quietly. 
 "I think he is all or nearly all you say. But he 
 has a kink in his nature, which makes him the very 
 opposite of our demure little Marjorie." 
 
 Marjorie made no response. She gazed pen- 
 sively into the glowing fire. "What am I to do, 
 Marion?" she said, presently. "In all the world 
 what chance is there of finding him?" 
 
 "The world is not so large as it seems," replied 
 Marion. "He must have left an address of some 
 
 35
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 kind with someone. He can't have cut himself off 
 completely from every living creature he was ever 
 connected with. James will know what to do, he 
 always does." 
 
 Marjorie started slightly at the name. This was 
 a new recipient of her secret, the necessity of whose 
 participation in it had temporarily been forgotten. 
 
 "Yes, of course James must know," she said, 
 after a pause, answering her own thoughts. "But, 
 Marion, need you tell him all ? Need you tell him 
 why Norman went away?" 
 
 "It will be difficult for him to help you unless I 
 do," replied Marion, after a moment's reflection. 
 "You see, when he has found Norman, he will 
 have to go and see him and talk to him and try 
 to persuade him to return ; and how is he to do that 
 unless he understands the reasons which made him 
 leave you?" 
 
 Marjorie recognised the force of this argument. 
 It was obvious that, if she was to be re-united to 
 her husband, someone must undertake the post of 
 intermediary, and her brother-in-law seemed to be 
 the person naturally qualified to do so. Therefore, 
 though she shrank from the necessity, she put no 
 restrictions on her sister's discretion. 
 
 36
 
 She remained with Marion to tea, and then re- 
 turned home. No entreaties could induce her to 
 stay longer. Her children would need her, and 
 they must now be her first care. Though she 
 yearned for the continued support of her sister's 
 steady, tranquil nature, her mother-love drew her 
 even more strongly to the lonely mites who 
 awaited her. So Marion saw her into a hansom. 
 
 "Try not to worry, dear," were her parting 
 words. "James shall find him."
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE fly in which we left Norman Villiers and 
 his books a covered barouche of somewhat anti- 
 quated pattern -was called upon to make a con- 
 siderable journey. It rolled on steadily through- 
 out the night over miry roads. Just as dawn was 
 breaking the outskirts of London were reached. 
 Some distance, however, still remained to be trav- 
 elled. The driver turned northward and drove 
 through silent by-streets and awakening thorough- 
 fares to Marylebone. Here, after receiving sundry 
 directions from his fare, which he augmented by 
 inquiries of bystanders on his own account, he drew 
 up before the door of a small bookseller. A youth 
 who was taking down the shutters interrupted the 
 whistled strains of a popular melody to look at 
 the early arrival with mild surprise. He touched 
 his cap to Villiers as the latter alighted, answered 
 a question as to his master's accessibility, and then 
 returned to his work and his whistling. Norman 
 
 38
 
 entered the shop and exchanged a few words with 
 the proprietor, who left his breakfast for the pur- 
 pose, with the result that the books were removed 
 from the cab and stored in the bookseller's back 
 
 I 
 
 premises. This done, Villiers emerged again upon 
 the street and paid off his driver. Standing on the 
 pavement with his bag in his hand, he watched the 
 vehicle creak slowly away and rumble into the dis- 
 tance, until finally it disappeared round a bend. 
 Then he turned and walked briskly in the opposite 
 direction. 
 
 In a few minutes he hailed a hansom and drove 
 to the First Avenue Hotel. He engaged a room 
 there and ordered some breakfast. After the meal 
 he went upstairs, removed his outer clothes, and lay 
 down upon his bed. He was considerably ex- 
 hausted by the tedious night journey, and quickly 
 fell asleep. About one o'clock he got up and 
 dressed, using a little more care than was his cus- 
 tom. Then he lunched and went out of the hotel. 
 
 He had chosen his quarters with a view of 
 avoiding chance acquaintance, and he was there- 
 fore somewhat annoyed to be recognised, just after 
 he had left the building, by a short, muscular man, 
 with close-cropped black hair and a slightly Jewish 
 
 39
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 cast of countenance, who was hurrying along Hoi- 
 born. There was a cheerful light in his eye, a beam 
 of human kindness, which assured you at once of 
 a man to be trusted. This was Mr. Thornton, the 
 junior member of the publishing house of Clarke, 
 Thornton & Co. He accounted it among his pro- 
 fessional achievements that he had "discovered" 
 Villiers. The latter, on this occasion, met his genial 
 advance with slight reserve. 
 
 "What, Villiers 1" said the publisher, briskly. 
 "One doesn't often meet you in this part of the 
 world. Have you lost your way, old fellow?" 
 
 "Not if this is anywhere in the neighbourhood 
 of Bedford Row," replied Norman, quietly. "I 
 am on my way to see my solicitors." 
 
 "Come along, then." The two men turned and 
 walked west together. "What's the trouble? You 
 are not quite up to the mark to-day, Villiers." 
 
 "A little pensive," answered Villiers, "nothing 
 more." 
 
 "Nothing wrong, I hope? All well at home?" 
 
 "Perfectly," said Villiers, "when I left them." 
 
 "I'll tell you what you want," said Thornton, 
 with conviction; "you're down on your luck. I'm 
 going to Newmarket the day after to-morrow to 
 
 40
 
 see the Cambridgeshire. You must pack up and 
 come with me. No trouble; just a couple of nights; 
 plenty of fun ; and home again as fit as a fiddle." 
 
 Villiers smiled slightly. "You've an excellent 
 heart, Thornton," he said, "but your logic is de- 
 plorable. Because you happen to find watching 
 horse-racing an exhilarating form of amusement, 
 you assume that it would necessarily have a similar 
 effect upon me." 
 
 "And so it would." 
 
 "On the contrary, I think it would depress me." 
 
 "Not it. Come and try; I'll answer for the 
 good results." 
 
 "No," said Villiers, still smiling. "I appreciate 
 your kindness, my dear Thornton, but I am not in 
 the least likely to visit a race-meeting. From what 
 I can gather, you wait half an hour for half a 
 minute of disappointment, and then repeat the 
 process." 
 
 "Well, if you won't come," said Thornton, good- 
 humouredly, "I'll do the next best thing for you. 
 I'm stretching a point, because I can see you want 
 something to give you a fillip. I have this informa- 
 tion from a quarter I would trust with a hundred- 
 pound note." 
 
 41
 
 The two had stopped at the corner of Bedford 
 Row. Thornton laid his forefinger on the sleeve 
 of Villiers' coat. " 'Masterman Ready' is the 
 horse, my dear boy. It is going to win." 
 
 ' 'Masterman Ready,' " said Villiers, repeating 
 the name mechanically. 
 
 ' 'Masterman Ready,' " said Thornton, firmly. 
 
 "Well, and if it actually should win, what then ? 
 Tell me precisely what you expect me to do with 
 this piece of information?" 
 
 "Do with it?" The publisher was aghast. "Go 
 to your man, get the longest price he'll give you, 
 and put on every halfpenny you have to spare not 
 all your fortune, because the horse might break his 
 neck." 
 
 "My man," remarked Norman, "would take a 
 little finding, I fancy." 
 
 "You can safely back it, Villiers," proceeded the 
 other, without noticing the commentary. "To tell 
 the truth, I've a few more pounds on it myself than 
 I should care to lose." 
 
 "Well, I won't add to your responsibility by 
 entrusting it with anything of mine," said Villiers. 
 "I once betted half-a-crown and lost, and I have 
 never given myself a chance to lose another." 
 
 42
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Thornton laughed heartily. "Then I'm afraid 
 you'll have to take to drink, old fellow. But if 
 ever you should get it into your head to write a 
 sporting novel, don't send it to us." 
 
 "That reminds me," said Villiers. "I was in- 
 tending to come and see you this afternoon. My 
 whereabouts will be a little uncertain for the next 
 few weeks, so if you should find it necessary to 
 communicate with me, direct me to the care of my 
 solicitors, will you?" He wrote some words on a 
 slip of paper and passed it to Thornton. "That is 
 the address." 
 
 The publisher looked at the slip and put it in 
 his pocket. "A little trip, is it?" he said. "Local 
 colour? Oh, you novelists!" 
 
 "A very respectable body, I believe," said 
 Villiers, lightly. 
 
 "They've two ideas, my dear boy royalties and 
 advertisements. And that brings us to business. 
 We must have something out before long, or we 
 shall lose our public. How goes the new novel?" 
 
 "Slowly," said Villiers, "but, I hope, satisfac- 
 torily. I can let you have the first half of the MS. 
 at any time." 
 
 "No use. We can do nothing with it now. until
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 the spring. Keep it going and send us the whole 
 bundle together." He moved away a few steps. 
 "And remember," he added, "it must run to a hun- 
 dred thousand. They are beginning to tire of pica 
 and margins." 
 
 Villiers started to cross the street. "They're 
 continually tiring of something," he said, laughing. 
 "They'll tire of novels directly." 
 
 "Not they," said Thornton. "Good-bye, old 
 fellow. Keep up your spirits. And take my ad- 
 vice: just have a sovereign on 'Masterman 
 Ready.' ' He whipped round with a cheery nod 
 and walked briskly away towards Oxford Street. 
 
 His sunny spirits had to some extent infected 
 Villiers. The latter continued to smile as he made 
 his way up Bedford Row. His face re-assumed its 
 wonted thoughtful expression, however, as he ap- 
 proached the offices of Messrs Markham, Flood 
 & Spindle, his solicitors. He entered the clerks' 
 office and asked for Mr Spindle. Mr Spindle was 
 in, but he was engaged. Would Mr Villiers call 
 again or take a seat? Mr Villiers would take a 
 seat, and did so accordingly. After waiting twenty 
 minutes he was ushered into the presence of the 
 lawyer. 
 
 44
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Mr Spindle was the junior member of his firm, 
 but the one upon whose shoulders rested the main 
 conduct of its business. He was a tall, keen man 
 of forty, with a heavy brown moustache and slight- 
 ly protruding eyes of the same colour eyes which 
 pierced you sufficiently without the addition of the 
 glass which he occasionally screwed into one of 
 them to focus his object more effectually. He was 
 standing on the centre of his hearthrug to receive 
 Norman. 
 
 "Good-day, Mr Villiers," he said, the instant 
 the latter appeared in the doorway. "What can I 
 do for you? More trouble with the American 
 copyrights?" 
 
 Villiers was not a client whose business was apt 
 to be particularly remunerative, and Mr Spindle 
 accordingly thought that the present conversation 
 might be satisfactorily concluded without changing 
 from the perpendicular. Norman had no such 
 view, however. He knew that the interview would 
 be charged for, and he intended to obtain a reason- 
 able equivalent. He placed his hat on one chair 
 and seated himself in another. "No," he answered, 
 deliberately, "none that I am aware of, Mr Spindle. 
 
 45
 
 AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 My present errand is unconnected with my literary 
 work." 
 
 The solicitor, after some shuffling, was obliged 
 to follow his client's example. He took an upright 
 seat near his desk and looked uncomfortable. A 
 chair with him was an article of the merest tem- 
 porary convenience. Doubtless he occasionally 
 rested ; but for one unacquainted with his domestic 
 life it was difficult to conceive him in repose. 
 
 "Ha !" he asserted, "then you want me to draw 
 your will?" He took a sheet of paper from a 
 pigeon-hole and pulled it towards him. 
 
 "Not even that," replied Villiers, quietly. 
 
 "At any rate," said Mr Spindle, with a con- 
 traction of the features that was intended to be a 
 smile, "you don't wish me to guess conundrums." 
 
 The remark was saved from asperity merely by 
 the fact that Villiers was a client. The latter was 
 quite unruffled. 
 
 "I shall occupy your time only a very few mo- 
 ments, Mr Spindle," he said. "I wish to consult 
 you in reference to my position matrimonially, or, 
 rather, to inform you of it, in view of eventualities. 
 I have left my wife." 
 
 Mr Spindle cocked the glass in his eye. A keen 
 46
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 interest suddenly lighted his face. He scented a 
 lucrative action at law. "I am sorry, Mr Villiers," 
 he said. 
 
 He did not look sorry; neither did Villiers feel 
 the need of his sympathy. "My action is purely 
 voluntary," he remarked. 
 
 "Precisely. I intended to express regret that 
 your marriage had not proved to be a satisfactory 
 one." 
 
 "My wife is above me, infinitely," explained 
 Norman. "I cannot attain her level." 
 
 The solicitor's intent glare gave way moment- 
 arily to an unsympathetic smile. "You are not 
 the first man to make that discovery, Mr Villiers," 
 he said. "Is the estrangement likely to be perma- 
 nent?" 
 
 "It must be." 
 
 "Do you anticipate divorce proceedings?" 
 
 "I think it possible." 
 
 Mr Spindle was beginning to treat Norman 
 with consideration. "In that case you desire us 
 to undertake the conduct of the defence." 
 
 "There will be no defence." 
 
 Mr Spindle dropped his eye-glass. His opinion 
 of Villiers, as a man, stood precisely where it had 
 
 47
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 stood before. As a client his value had sunk almost 
 cent, per cent. He quickly closed the interview. 
 
 "Then, if a petition is filed, you wish us merely 
 to watch the proceedings on your behalf and to 
 keep you informed?" 
 
 "If you will do so." 
 
 "That shall be done." Mr Spindle rose. 
 
 Norman also rose and took his hat. "In the 
 meantime," he said, "until my plans are more 
 settled, you will perhaps be good enough to for- 
 ward any letters that may arrive?" 
 
 "Certainly. Will you give me an address?" 
 
 Villiers handed him an envelope. "I need not 
 say that this is in professional confidence?" 
 
 "Of course. Can I be of use to you in any other 
 way?" 
 
 "None, I think," said Villiers. 
 
 Mr Spindle opened the door. "Cheerless 
 weather; but what can we expect?" said he. 
 "Good-day, Mr Villiers, good-day. Mister er 
 Johnson!" And Norman, as he descended the 
 stairs, heard an unfortunate clerk, fearful of a 
 moment's delay, hurrying down with the great 
 man's letters for signature. 
 
 After leaving his solicitors' office Villiers visited 
 48
 
 MR AND MBS VILLIERS 
 
 a hairdresser's, and then took a tour of the shops 
 in a hansom, making several small purchases, all 
 articles of attire, which he conveyed back with him 
 to the hotel. About seven o'clock he went up to 
 his room to dress. In half an hour he re-appeared, 
 wearing a long fawn overcoat over his evening 
 clothes, and called for a cab. He was now com- 
 pletely transformed from the slovenly Villiers 
 whose acquaintance we originally made. Well 
 groomed, well dressed, from his glossy silk hat to 
 his polished boots, as he stood for a moment on the 
 steps of the hotel waiting for his cab, one might 
 have searched London in vain for a more acceptable 
 sample of a representative Englishman. 
 
 The hansom drew to the curb, and Villiers en- 
 tered it. "Albany Mansions, Sloane Street," he 
 said to the driver. 
 
 The latter nodded and threaded his way across 
 the street. Then he flicked his horse and drove 
 quickly out of sight amid the maze of traffic.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 "ALBANY MANSIONS" was a considerable red- 
 brick building in the neighbourhood of Sloane 
 Street, divided into suites of apartments something 
 in the system of flats. Each suite, however, com- 
 prised only two rooms and a lobby, and the whole 
 group was worked by a staff of servants under the 
 management of a caretaker and his wife, who oc- 
 cupied the basement. The former was a superan- 
 nuated soldier, sunburnt and erect, who bore on his 
 broad chest, with pardonable pride, several tokens 
 of his services to his country. He was standing at 
 the main entrance of the building when Villiers ar- 
 rived in his cab. Raising his hand to the salute as 
 the latter alighted, he stepped across the pavement 
 to meet him. 
 
 "Well, Stevens," said the novelist, "here I am; 
 well up to time, you see." 
 
 "We're all ready for you, sir," said Stevens. 
 "We've lit a bit of fire in the sitting-room." 
 
 50
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "That's right. Has the remainder of the furni- 
 ture arrived?" 
 
 "Yes, sir; the last lot came in yesterday. I had 
 it put where you said, sir." 
 
 "Well done ! I've left my things at the hotel, so 
 I shall not sleep here to-night. To-morrow I hope 
 to get finally installed." 
 
 "Very good, sir." 
 
 "1 hope Mrs Stevens will not find me a trouble- 
 some tenant. I think my habits are tolerably reg- 
 ular." 
 
 "Oh, God bless you, sir!" said Stevens, "we're 
 used to anything. We have them here that keeps 
 all hours, day and night." 
 
 "I expect you have," said Villiers, laughing. 
 He was passing on his way to the steps when 
 Stevens stopped hinu 
 
 "Let me see, sir, have you the key?" 
 
 "No," said Villiers, turning with a slightly con- 
 scious laugh, "neither I have." 
 
 The commissionnaire brought out a bunch. 
 "No. n," said he, removing one of them. "That's 
 it, sir." 
 
 "Thank you, Stevens, thank you." Villiers took 
 the key and returned to the stairs. He whistled a 
 
 51
 
 few bars of an air as he went up. It was not a 
 habit of his; he was merely anxious to convince 
 himself that the slight piece of forgetfulness had 
 left him undisturbed. 
 
 No. 1 1 was on the second floor, and here Nor- 
 man came to a halt. He made no attempt to enter 
 it, however. He put away the key which the care- 
 taker had' given him and took another from his 
 pocket. This he inserted in the lock of No. 12, 
 turned it, and went in. He crossed the lobby and 
 passed through the inner door beyond. A soft 
 light fell upon him from a fire and shaded 
 candles. He had entered a room furnished 
 with considerable taste and elegance, clearly no 
 bachelor's apartment. A round table in the centre 
 was spread with a dainty supper for two, glass and 
 silver gleaming amid flowers and appetising con- 
 fections on a snowy cloth. 
 
 In a low chair before the fire was seated the 
 owner of the room, a woman in evening dress. She 
 was not only beautiful in an artistic sense, but at- 
 tractive in the highest degree in a human one. The 
 firelight touched her cheek with a soft blush and 
 struck on a few shining strands in the abundant 
 mass of dark hair which covered her head. She 
 
 52
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 was gazing pensively into the blaze with eyes dark 
 and deeply glowing, screened by long lashes, like 
 shaded pools. Her gown was of soft black lace, 
 which threw her pearly skin into striking contrast 
 and displayed her symmetrical contours at their 
 highest advantage. 
 
 This was Miss Rosamond Hope, a lady who 
 turned the vanities of her sisters to account, and 
 had attained a position of some mark in the jour- 
 nalistic world by contributing articles on dress to 
 various periodicals under various pseudonyms. She 
 shared with a spectacled lady artist on the top 
 storey the distinction of being the only members 
 of the gentler sex to occupy rooms in this building. 
 
 She did not rise when Villiers entered, nor even 
 alter her position. "The wanderer has returned, I 
 presume?" she said, still looking into the fire. 
 
 Norman crossed the room to the place where she 
 was sitting; and then suddenly she looked up, and 
 a wonderful light gleamed from her eyes into his. 
 Villiers stretched out both his hands; she placed 
 her own in them, and he drew her up to him. 
 
 "This time to stay, Rosamond," he said. He 
 took her in his arms and kissed her on the lips, 
 kissed and kissed again, closely, passionately, kissed 
 
 53
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIERS 
 
 the breath from her lungs, almost the life from her 
 heart. 
 
 "Oh, dear!" she exclaimed, as she extricated her- 
 self, panting, from the embrace, "what a mighty 
 man you are sometimes!" 
 
 "Sometimes?" said Norman, smiling. "Always." 
 
 "Boaster!" She flicked his cheek lightly with 
 her finger. "You know what happens to 
 boasters?" 
 
 Villiers laughed. Then he glanced at the supper 
 table. "But how am I to return all this munificent 
 hospitality?" he said. 
 
 "Very easily," said Rosamond; "by promising 
 to appreciate it. It is not munificent; and, besides, 
 I don't need any return." Then she added: "You 
 know that, don't you, dear?" 
 
 "I know there is no one to compare with you in 
 the world," said Villiers, irrelevantly. 
 
 "Then, as you are the greatest stranger, you must 
 take this incomparable person in to supper. Shall 
 we leave the drawing-room and go into the 
 salle-a-manger?" 
 
 "Mind the steps, Miss Hope," said Norman, 
 offering Rosamond his arm. 
 
 They seated themselves at the table, side by side. 
 54
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Oh, this won't do!" exclaimed Rosamond. "I 
 never heard of the greatest stranger holding the 
 hostess's hand." 
 
 "It is an admirable innovation, all the same," 
 said Norman. 
 
 "But how am I to eat?" 
 
 "Use the other one." 
 
 "Eat with the left hand!" protested Rosamond, 
 "when you have no further use for the one in your 
 possession but to squeeze it most unmercifully." 
 
 "Sweet fingers !" said Villiers, kissing them as 
 they lay in his palm. "Have I maltreated them 
 very badly?" 
 
 "Terribly," said Rosamond, holding up the five 
 pink victims for his inspection. "And since you 
 evidently need something to occupy you, I think 
 I'll make you the butler. Butler, open the cham- 
 pagne." 
 
 Norman removed the wire from the cork. Then 
 he took the bottle in his hand and went behind 
 Rosamond's chair. "Champagne, madam?" 
 
 "No well-trained butler," said she, "ever asks a 
 lady if she will have champagne; and certainly," 
 she added, "he never kisses the back of her neck." 
 
 "In this case," said Norman, repeating the of-
 
 fence, "any butler would be exonerated, on account 
 of the exceptional temptation." 
 
 Rosamond burst out laughing. "I should like 
 to see how you would look if your own brother 
 much less servant made that excuse. Con- 
 sider yourself dismissed." 
 
 Villiers filled her glass and his own, and then sat 
 down. He held up the golden wine and looked 
 across it into her glowing, smiling face. "To your 
 eyes, Rosamond, to your lips!" 
 
 He drank the contents of the glass and put it 
 down. There was a moment's pause. "Your turn, 
 sweetheart," said Norman. " l La reine boit'f 
 What is your toast?" 
 
 Slowly she raised her glass. "To to " He 
 was looking into her eyes, and she into his. Their 
 faces drew closer as they gazed, and closer still; 
 mechanically the glass returned to the table ; at last 
 the two pairs of lips met, and clung together, and 
 seemed that they never would separate. 
 
 With long breaths they fell apart. "And some 
 fools think they have kissed !" said Norman. 
 
 There was some food on his plate, which he had 
 not tasted. "Why don't you eat?" said his hostess. 
 
 "No appetite," he said, laughing. He left his 
 56
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 seat and went to a Chesterfield couch which stood 
 near the wall. "Come here, Rosamond!" 
 
 She obeyed him with an assumption of petulance. 
 "Imperator, why should you exercise your despotic 
 sway to interfere with my supper?" 
 
 "Because you need supper no more than I do," 
 said Villiers; "because, if you tried to force another 
 morsel down that dainty throat, it would choke 
 you." 
 
 She laughed lightly. "Since when has this start- 
 ling incapacity to eat afflicted me?" 
 
 "Since a moment ago." 
 
 She laughed again. "Prove it," she cried; 
 "prove it. I defy you." 
 
 For answer he folded her closely in his arms, and 
 kissed her with burning lips on hair and eyes and 
 mouth, on neck and shoulders, on every little space 
 which her evening bodice left open to his ravages. 
 
 Suddenly, withdrawing partly from his embrace, 
 she dropped her head on the back of the couch. 
 "Oh!" she sighed. 
 
 He took her gently into his clasp again and 
 looked into her face. "Well, little tyrant, is it 
 proved? is it?" 
 
 67
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Her eyes were lowered, and she nervously 
 pressed the arm that encircled her. 
 
 "Sweet Rosamond!" said Norman. He raised 
 her tenderly, and, holding his arm about her, sup- 
 ported her within it from the room.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 NEARLY an hour had elapsed when they re- 
 turned. Rosamond was pinning a small brooch in. 
 her bodice. 
 
 "Why, how clumsy you are!" she exclaimed, 
 turning to Norman with a bright glance. "Let 
 me valet you." Standing in front of him, she 
 loosened with her slim fingers the ends of his cravat 
 and then neatly re-tied it, finishing with a light tap 
 on his cheek. "You should be ashamed to show 
 such incompetence." 
 
 They seated themselves at the table and resumed 
 their supper. Rosamond was in excellent spirits, 
 and upon her devolved the major share of the con- 
 versation. 
 
 "Why so glum?" she said, blithely, to her com- 
 panion at length; "prithee, why so quiet?" 
 
 "Am I quiet?" said Norman. "If so, it is in- 
 excusably rude of me with such a hostess and such 
 a supper." 
 
 59
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Then the indictment is proved, I'm afraid," she 
 answered, smiling. "I know what it is," she added, 
 after a pause, looking into his face, "you are think- 
 ing of your wife?" 
 
 Villiers had a momentary impulse to turn away 
 the charge with a flippant rejoinder, but he changed 
 his mind. "Yes," he admitted, frankly, "I was." 
 
 Rosamond sighed slightly. "It is always the 
 
 same." 
 
 "Why do you sigh, dear?" 
 
 "You love her still, Norman?" 
 
 "I love her," said Villiers, "as an artist would 
 love a perfectly executed statue, as every man with 
 unblunted perceptions must love a noble-minded 
 woman whose goodness he knows through and 
 through." 
 
 "And yet you were not happy with her?" 
 
 "She was not intended to make a man happy 
 not, at least, such a man as I am. My marriage 
 with her was a long, constantly present, gnawing 
 disappointment." 
 
 "Am I a disappointment, Norman?" said Rosa- 
 mond, softly. "Do I make you happy?" 
 
 It was flagrant fishing, but Villiers rose to the 
 bait. His eyes glowed with sudden fire, his whole 
 
 60
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 being expanded. "Happy!" he reiterated, "happy! 
 Rosamond, you can have no conception what your 
 love means to me. For another hour, for one more 
 such hour as I have passed with you, I would go 
 through fire and pestilence, I would go through 
 hell itself." 
 
 "Hush! Hush!" His vehemence almost 
 startled her. "Don't look at me like that, dear," 
 she said; "you frighten me. I know what you 
 mean, and I feel for you truly, deeply. Poor 
 Norman," she added, taking his hand and stroking 
 it softly, "you have lived in purgatory." 
 
 "Will you always be the same, I wonder?" said 
 Norman. "Won't a time come, before long, when 
 you will tire of me?" 
 
 She raised his hand and pressed it to her cheek. 
 "No," she answered, softly, "you need not fear 
 that." 
 
 "Never, dear?" 
 
 "Never." She kissed his hand and let it go. 
 "Besides," she added, "we shall have no chance to 
 tire of one another if we live apart as we have 
 agreed to." 
 
 "That is a subject I intended to speak to you 
 about, Rosamond," said Villiers. "This arrange- 
 
 61
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 ment is admirable in many ways, but it has struck 
 me that a time might come when it would be better 
 that you should appear to be married." 
 
 "That time hasn't come yet," said she, "and 
 I don't think it will. We won't meet trouble half- 
 way." 
 
 "But why are you so anxious that we should 
 live separate lives? I should like to be with you 
 constantly." 
 
 Rosamond smiled a little intolerantly. "Of 
 course," she said, "you are improvident, like all 
 your sex. There are many things we should like 
 to do constantly, but we don't do them, because we 
 know they would pall if we did. Let me ask you 
 a question." 
 
 "As many as you like." 
 
 "When you came into this room to-night and 
 saw me sitting here, did your heart beat faster?" 
 
 "Of course." 
 
 "Did it beat faster even when you were coming 
 up the stairs?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Would it do that, do you think, if you had 
 lived in the same house with me and grown used 
 
 62
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 to my continual presence at your side, say for six 
 months?" 
 
 "I cannot conceive," said Norman, "that it 
 would ever do anything else." 
 
 "You men are intolerably stupid in understand- 
 ing human nature," said Rosamond; "you can 
 never see beyond the present. Let me tell you, 
 sir, that it certainly would not. You might be 
 pleased to see me quietly, unemotionally pleased 
 but no more." 
 
 "Don't hint it, Rosamond." 
 
 "But you know what I mean?" 
 
 "Oh, yes." 
 
 "That is not enough, is it?" 
 
 "No," said Norman, "that is not enough." 
 
 "And so we must live apart and see each other 
 merely sometimes. The sum total of happiness, if 
 people only understood it, is having something good 
 to look forward to. Without that, even though 
 things are going well with us, life is colourless and 
 vapid. Why, if we lived together," she added, 
 with a slight laugh, "we might as well be married." 
 
 Norman looked at her curiously. "Does that 
 explain why you have not married?" he asked. 
 
 "Partly. The prize, if you win it, is a very small 
 63
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 one, and the stake is enormous a homely, negative 
 kind of happiness is the best it has to offer. But 
 even if it were otherwise, I have never met anyone 
 to whom I would resign my freedom absolutely, 
 irrevocably for life." 
 
 "Not to me, Rosamond?" 
 
 "No," she answered. "I love you, Norman, I 
 think you are necessary to my happiness, but even 
 if you were free I would not marry you." 
 
 Norman took her hand. "Don't say that, sweet- 
 heart," he pleaded. "It is just possible, if my wife 
 if I were divorced " 
 
 "Oh, you bold man," cried Rosamond, "would 
 you try the experiment again? What would happen 
 if we were to marry? In less than a year we should 
 peer at one another through a fern from each end 
 of a long table and talk about the weather and our 
 neighbours." 
 
 "I could talk about Nebuchadnezzar with you," 
 said Norman, "and not be bored." 
 
 "You would refuse to dress for dinner," she con- 
 tinued, "and I should read a novel in the drawing- 
 room afterwards till I fell asleep." 
 
 "Sleeping beauty," said Norman; "I would 
 wake you with a kiss." 
 
 64
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "But what if I were snoring?" said Rosamond. 
 
 Norman shuddered. "Don't speak of it," he 
 said; "you couldn't." 
 
 She laughed brightly. "No woman can until she 
 is married. Can you think of anything worse?" 
 
 "No," admitted Norman. 
 
 She laughed again. "I am only showing you 
 the pleasures of a home life," she said. "Granting 
 I didn't do that, I should wake in a bad temper 
 and tell you I had been working all day and wanted 
 to rest. I have been working to-day," she added, 
 inconsequently. 
 
 "But you don't want to sleep." 
 
 "We are not married," said she. "Oh, no," she 
 concluded, "I will keep my latch-key and go and 
 come as I choose, and Norman Villiers shall be an 
 cccasional privileged visitor, as long as he considers 
 it worth his while to make himself agreeable." 
 
 "Which will be always," said Norman. He left 
 his seat and bent over to kiss her. 
 
 "It will be longer, at any rate," said she, putting 
 up her lips to meet his, "than if the law had bound 
 us hand and foot." 
 
 Villiers remained an hour or two later, and then 
 65
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 went back to his hotel. He returned on the fol- 
 lowing morning, bringing with him his personal be- 
 longings. This time he entered his own suite. It 
 was precisely similar in shape and design with that 
 occupied by Rosamond, and was furnished with a 
 considerable degree of bachelor comfort. Two 
 easy chairs and a couch, a solid oak table, a pair of 
 long bookcases and a thick carpet formed the prin- 
 cipal contents of the sitting-room, in addition to 
 his writing-table. Norman spent the morning ar- 
 ranging the furniture to his liking and hanging the 
 pictures. In the afternoon he paid a visit to the 
 Marylebone bookseller, and returned with his li- 
 brary and with numerous additional books which 
 he had been obliged to purchase. He dined alone 
 that night. Afterwards he brought from his bag 
 a substantial bundle of manuscript and some clean 
 sheets of sermon-paper, which he placed upon the 
 writing-table. He sat down before it and took up 
 a pen. After reading more than once the last two 
 or three pages he had written, he lost touch of the 
 subject and gazed with a pensive, somewhat ab- 
 stracted expression about the room, at the bright, 
 new furniture, at the pictures he had just hung, at 
 
 66
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 the fire flickering in the hearth. He sighed, and 
 again read the last of his previous work. Then he 
 got up and poked the fire and lighted a pipe. 
 Finally he dipped his pen in the ink and began to 
 wite.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 IT was ten minutes to seven, on the evening of 
 Marjorie's conversation with her sister, when Mr 
 James Baker walked up to the door of his Hamp- 
 stead residence and let himself in with his latch- 
 key. He was of the genial, open, optimistic order 
 of beings florid and clean-shaven, save for a thin 
 growth of light side-whisker though by no means 
 to be accredited with the comfortable dulness of 
 wit frequently associated with those adjectives. An 
 occasional, but decided, compression of his well- 
 moulded lips and the kindly gleam in his good- 
 humoured eyes effectually dispersed any such im- 
 pression. He had not yet reached, but was fast ap- 
 proaching, that period of his existence when he 
 would have to admit his figure to be beyond re- 
 demption. At present it still afforded him some 
 concern: he still paid periodical visits to Conti- 
 nental baths, in the recurring hope that they would 
 enable him to resume that lightness and elasticity 
 
 68
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 of form which he had enjoyed at a date not yet 
 sufficiently remote to reconcile him entirely to its 
 loss. A capable man of business in the City, a 
 keen sportsman on his native Yorkshire heath, al- 
 
 
 
 ways cheerful, always courteous, J. J. Baker was 
 popular wherever he chose to go. 
 
 He placed his hat on the rack, and had succeeded 
 in pinioning his arms in the sleeves of his overcoat, 
 in his efforts to remove it, when his wife ran down 
 the stairs to his assistance. 
 
 "I didn't hear you come in, dear," she said; 
 "you are early to-night." 
 
 She released his left arm, receiving in return an 
 affectionate kiss on the right cheek, over her hus- 
 band's shoulder. 
 
 "Now the other one," said James; whether the 
 sleeve or the cheek he did not specify. At any 
 rate, she extricated his right arm also, and was re- 
 warded by the complementary salute on the left 
 cheek. 
 
 Marion followed her husband to his dressing- 
 room. She herself had already dressed had pur- 
 posely done so, in order to be able to talk to him 
 in the half-hour's interval before the dinner-gong 
 placed them at the mercy of the receptive ears of 
 
 69
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 the servants. It was an occasional practice of hers 
 with which James was well acquainted. Accord- 
 ingly, as he poured out his hot water, he prepared 
 himself to give an attentive ear to the story of 
 some hitch in the domestic machinery. 
 
 "If she wants to give the cook notice," he said 
 to himself, "I shall stick up for her; her vol-au- 
 vent Toulouse is not to be lightly discarded." 
 
 Pursuing this line of thought, he was already 
 evolving a small mollifying speech, which, while 
 freely accepting all her premises, fully sharing her 
 consequent very natural annoyance, should yet ven- 
 ture to diverge ever so slightly from her conclu- 
 sions, when her voice interrupted his meditations. 
 
 "Marjorie has been here to-day," she said. 
 
 "Really," said James, from the soap-suds; "and 
 how is our little Marjorie?" 
 
 "Our little Marjorie," replied his wife, "is in 
 very serious trouble, James." 
 
 James assimilated this information while he 
 scrubbed his face with a big towel, imparting an 
 even warmer glow to his beneficent countenance. 
 By such-like manoeuvres he was firmly under the im- 
 pression that he had succeeded, through life, in con- 
 cealing the natural tenderness of his heart from the 
 
 70
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 observation of his fellow-creatures, and particular- 
 ly from that of his wife. 
 
 He threw the towel over the rack. "The chil- 
 dren?" he asked. 
 ' "No." 
 
 "Not Norman?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Again James made no immediate comment. 
 This time the collar of his shirt showed exasperat- 
 ing recalcitrance. "We had better send Percival 
 out," he said, presently. "I've no faith in local 
 men." 
 
 Marion smiled an affectionate, sympathetic 
 smile partly at the quaint inutility of the sugges- 
 tion in existing circumstances, partly at her hus- 
 band's strenuous efforts to force himself into a tem- 
 per. "It is not illness, dear," she said, quietly. "It 
 may be less unfortunate than that, it may be much 
 more; I can't say at present. Norman has gone 
 away." 
 
 James, as has been said, was no fool. The last 
 words simple enough in themselves at once car- 
 ried their full weight to his mind; but he was so 
 utterly unprepared for them that at first he could 
 only repeat, "Gone away?" 
 
 71
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Marion made no comment; and presently he 
 added: "It's so astonishingly sudden 1 They ap- 
 peared to me to get on uncommonly well together. 
 Is it a mutual arrangement?" 
 
 "Marjorie had no wish for it." 
 
 "Then he has deserted her?" 
 
 "Yes, I suppose it amounts to that," said 
 Marion; "but the word sounds harsh. He has 
 provided for her quite as well as he was in a po- 
 sition to do." 
 
 The concluding sentence which a superficial 
 mind might have heralded as bearing an element of 
 alleviation had precisely the opposite effect upon 
 James. It broke upon him with almost a greater 
 shock than the original announcement. For it car- 
 ried a suggestion of forethought and preparation, 
 of completeness and irrevocableness in the whole 
 thing, which was vastly disquieting; and excluded, 
 definitely and decidedly, the encouraging theory of 
 a sudden freak, to be subsequently regretted and 
 forgiven, upon which his mind had been hopefully 
 fixing. 
 
 "Huml" he said, at length. "It's a deucedly 
 serious situation, Marion; there's very little doubt 
 about that. I'm afraid it looks as if our little friend 
 
 72
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 was in for something more than her fair share of 
 tribulation for some time to come. Poor little 
 Marjoriel Poor little innocent Marjoriel" He 
 gave a savage pull at the cravat he was attempting 
 to tie. "Confound the man! the tie!" he cor- 
 rected, hastily, throwing the offending garment 
 on the floor. "I beg your pardon, Marion." 
 
 "You needn't," said Marion, smiling, "you said 
 nothing." 
 
 "I intended to," said James. He dragged out a 
 drawer and rummaged in the interior. "I believe 
 these ties are specially constructed to undermine 
 the moral sense and drive you eventually into the 
 regions below." 
 
 "Let me tie it, dear," said Marion, gently. She 
 took the tie from his hand and placed herself in 
 front of him. 
 
 "At present," proceeded her husband, as he sub- 
 mitted comfortably to the ministrations of her fair 
 hands, "I hardly know enough to decide what is 
 best to be done. Norman isn't the man to be 
 brow-beaten. We must get something tangible to 
 work on. Do you know anything of the woman?" 
 he asked, abruptly. "Of course there is a woman 
 concerned?" 
 
 .73
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "I think there is," replied Marion. ("There!" 
 she interjected parenthetically, surveying her handi- 
 work. "A trained valet couldn't have done it bet- 
 ter, I'm sure.") "Yes, I think there is certainly 
 a woman, James; but Marjorie knows nothing of 
 her existence. Everything has been a blinding 
 shock to the poor child." 
 
 James proceeded leisurely to fill his pockets with 
 various small articles from the dressing-table. "I 
 feel uncommonly like groping in the dark," said 
 he. "You are not keeping anything back, my 
 dear? When was it that he cut off in this extraor- 
 dinary way?" 
 
 "Last night." 
 
 "Without explanation ? Come, little woman" 
 James had a habit of calling his wife "little 
 woman," though, to be sure, the epithet was not 
 singularly appropriate, seeing that she was almost 
 as tall as himself "you must treat me candidly 
 if I'm to be of any use. Was there a scene? Did 
 he have no conversation with her before he went 
 away? How does she know about this monetary 
 provision? How does she know he doesn't intend 
 to return?" 
 
 Marion hesitated. "He left a letter," said she. 
 74
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Oh!" The deep vowel came from James's 
 healthy lungs with satisfying fulness. 
 
 "The difficulty between them," Marion con- 
 tinued, after an appreciable pause, "is a delicate one 
 and quite personal. Marjorie was very anxious to 
 avoid its being known even to you. But I really 
 don't see how you can help her if you are kept in 
 the dark. What do you think yourself?" 
 
 James was quite free from any idle curiosity. 
 He took a moment or two to consider the question, 
 and then replied: "That depends a good deal 
 upon what she wishes me to do." 
 
 "Well, in the first place," said Marion, "she 
 hasn't an idea at present where he is. I told her 
 I knew you would manage to find out somehow, 
 and then that you would go and see him." 
 
 "I foresee a pleasant interview," said James, 
 drily. 
 
 "It won't be anything else if you are there," 
 said Marion, promptly. "You always make every- 
 thing pleasant." 
 
 James flushed slightly with pleasure. Then he 
 took her soft, white hands, and looked at them as 
 they lay, sparkling with diamonds, in his palms. 
 He pressed them to his lips. "If the world was 
 
 75
 
 composed of fond little indulgent wives," said he, 
 "that would be an easy thing to do. ... He 
 might be in America." 
 
 "Never mind; you would go." 
 
 "But what would become of the business?" 
 
 "You would manage," said Marion, without 
 hesitation. 
 
 She was not "managing" her husband, as the 
 phrase is. Every word she uttered was the simple 
 expression of her thoughts, founded on her perfect 
 confidence, not only in his capability, but in his good- 
 ness of heart. Capable and self-reliant herself, if 
 occasion needed, she had plumbed the depth of her 
 husband's nature, and was content to repose in what 
 she found there. 
 
 James laughed. "Well, we'll go into that when 
 the time comes," he said. "But, at any rate, I can't 
 pretend to be able to argue with a man without a 
 nodding acquaintance with the point of difference 
 between us, so I am afraid the secret will have to 
 come out. Examine the keyhole, my dear, and 
 then tell me the little difficulty." He took up a 
 brush and comb, and, turning to the glass, addressed 
 himself to the never satisfactory task of making a 
 little go a long way. 
 
 76
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 It took him some minutes to complete the pro- 
 cess, and by the time he had finished his wife had 
 not spoken. He turned round. Marion was de- 
 cidedly blushing. 
 
 ""Good gracious!" said James. An amused 
 smile gradually invaded his face. 
 
 "Don't laugh at me, James," said Marion, half 
 apologetically. "It's really very difficult. Oh, 
 you dear old stupid !" she added, "can't you guess?" 
 
 "Looking at your very pretty embarrassment, 
 my dear," said James, "I could possibly make a 
 tolerable shot at the general nature of the difficulty. 
 But why, in the name of fortune, this violent 
 estrangement?" A merry twinkle shot into his 
 good-humoured eyes. "Rather the reverse of the 
 ordinary way of things," he added, wickedly. 
 
 Marion blushed again; but this time she came 
 up to him and laid her two hands on his shoulders. 
 "James, dear," she said, "supposing I were very, 
 very virtuous?" 
 
 "You couldn't be more virtuous than you are, 
 little woman," said James, quietly. 
 
 "Well then, supposing I supposing I were less 
 human than than I am?" she finished, and sud- 
 denly cast down her eyes. 
 
 77
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 James raised her head and kissed her. "I under- 
 stand," he said. Then, suddenly, almost with a 
 laugh, "Perfectly preposterous!" he exclaimed. 
 
 "Don't judge him hastily," said Marion. "Let 
 us be quite fair. Wait till you have heard every- 
 thing." 
 
 Then she told him. If she had formed an 
 opinion herself, it was not apparent in her nar- 
 rative. She related the facts quite simply and im- 
 partially, without omission and without exaggera- 
 tion. That may seem to us, theoretically, a suf- 
 ficiently easy thing to do. But if you feel any 
 doubt of its practical difficulty, reader, take the 
 history of any disagreement within your knowledge, 
 public or private, and endeavour to explain it with- 
 out betraying on which side your own sympathies 
 lie. 
 
 James heard her through without remark. Then 
 he repeated, deliberately, his previous comment: 
 "Perfectly preposterous !" He took a clean hand- 
 kerchief from a drawer and turned down the light, 
 and then condescended to supplement that observa- 
 tion with another, equally explicit: "A pair of 
 noodles!" 
 
 78
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 JAMES followed his wife down to the dining- 
 room. Their tete-a-tete dinner was never an oc- 
 casion of much spontaneity between them. To- 
 night it was peculiarly the reverse. The presence 
 of the maid closed the door to the only topic they 
 could either of them pretend to take an interest in. 
 It is curious to remark that, whereas the members 
 of a party of four or five allow their tongues a 
 laxity, before servants, to the point of glaring in- 
 discretion, as soon as the numbers are reduced to 
 two the presence of an attendant pair of ears acts 
 as a dead bar upon any interchange of ideas beyond 
 the merest commonplace. It was, therefore, not 
 until they were left alone, and James had turned 
 his chair to the fire, a glass of Burgundy at his 
 elbow, a cigar between his lips, his shirt-front bulg- 
 ing in a post-prandial parabolic curve, that they 
 were at liberty to follow their inclinations in the 
 choice of a subject for discussion. 
 
 79
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Marion rose from her seat and poured water 
 into the vases of flowers which stood on the table. 
 The process bringing her to her husband's end of 
 the board, she replenished his glass from the de- 
 canter, the latter directing the precise limit of the 
 operation with a virtuous forefinger. He laboured 
 under the singular hallucination, in the face of con- 
 siderable discouragement, that he was in the habit 
 of drinking one half-glass of Burgundy after din- 
 ner. His wife, however, had no illusions either as 
 to its generous measure or its steady repetition. 
 Accordingly, the virtuous forefinger passed un- 
 heeded. 
 
 He raised the broad V-shaped glass to his lips 
 with affectionate deliberation. "A wonderful 
 wine!" he said. (He said it every night.) "If 
 Norman had been built on that, instead of on weak 
 tea and weaker whisky-and-water, we should have 
 had none of these monkey tricks." He passed his 
 hand vaguely over the decanters. "What are you 
 drinking, my dear?" 
 
 Marion was drinking nothing, and said so, as 
 she always did. To-night, however, he pressed the 
 point. "You are not looking quite yourself, little 
 woman; this business has worried you." He re- 
 
 80
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 moved the stopper from the port decanter. "A 
 glass of this '78 is the best medicine in the world 
 for you." 
 
 Marion repudiated the necessity with a smile, 
 but she allowed him to fill her glass, and then drew 
 a footstool to the hearth and sat down upon it, 
 breaking the coal into a brighter flame. It must 
 be confessed that James's reflections on her appear- 
 ance seemed to have singularly little to justify 
 them. As she sat by the fire in her dinner-gown 
 of pale yellow, relieved here and there by ribbons 
 of a deeper shade, her dark hair coiled abundantly 
 on her head, her shapely neck and shoulders, 
 flooded in the warm light, rising with almost stately 
 grace from the laces at her bosom, a soft under- 
 glow of colour in her smooth cheeks, she conveyed 
 the impression of one whose desirable exterior was 
 the product, not only of excellent health at the 
 moment, but of the absence of any serious lapse 
 from it during the thirty-odd years of her ex- 
 istence. 
 
 "I shouldn't have taken Norman to be that sort 
 of a man," proceeded James, reflectively. "Some 
 of my very best stories have often fallen flat in his 
 neighbourhood." 
 
 81
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Perhaps it was too serious a matter with him 
 to joke about," said Marion, quietly. 
 
 James looked at her with mild surprise. "Why, 
 my dear," he said, "I'm inclined to think that you 
 lean to the side of this home-wrecker." 
 
 
 
 "No," said Marion, "not quite that. But I 
 think Marjorie is a little goose to ruin her happi- 
 ness in this way. She is so desperately fond of 
 him all the time that makes it almost exasperat- 
 ing. She is breaking her heart for him; I believe 
 she loves him just as much as it is possible for a 
 woman to love a man." 
 
 "Supposing," said James, slowly, "I don't say 
 there is a great chance of it, I don't think there is 
 but supposing we could induce him to come back 
 to her, would she be different?" 
 
 "I don't know," said Marion; "I doubt it. I 
 know she would try." 
 
 "It occurs to me," said James, "if you will for- 
 give the blasphemy, my dear, that when the Creator 
 made Marjorie, he overlooked the fact that she 
 would have to pass through this world on her way 
 to the next." 
 
 He carefully broke the ash from his cigar, then 
 added, drily: "It is almost as unfortunate as to be 
 
 88
 
 ME AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 furnished, like many of us, with paraphernalia of 
 too exclusively mundane utility." 
 
 Marion shook her head in smiling denial of the 
 remark's personal application. Then suddenly she 
 looked up. "Can you find him, James?" 
 
 "In the course of time," said James, "I think so, 
 decidedly. Unless he intends to relinquish his ca- 
 reer, he must keep in touch somewhere. I will 
 make some inquiries to-morrow. If I can't trace 
 him myself, I must employ someone who can." 
 
 "That is really a detail," he proceeded, presently. 
 "The important point to consider is, what is to 
 be done afterwards. To begin with, I take it for 
 granted that Marjorie isn't thinking of divorce?" 
 
 "Oh, no." 
 
 "She would take him back again?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "In any case? Whatever has happened?" 
 
 "Whatever has happened," said Marion. 
 
 "Very well, then we'll take a cheerful view," said 
 James, blithely. "If we can get them to make up 
 the quarrel, this little breeze may help them to 
 understand one another in the future, which they 
 evidently haven't succeeded in doing hitherto. Con- 
 
 83
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 stitutional difference is all moonshine, in my opin- 
 
 ion." 
 
 Marion looked at him gravely and shook her 
 head. "It is real, James," she said. 
 
 James indulged in a good-humoured unbelieving 
 laugh, and helped himself to his third half-glass 
 of Burgundy. "Have it as you will," he said. 
 "We must do the best we can, in any case, to get 
 this runaway back to the nest. If we fail " 
 
 "Yes?" said Marion. 
 
 "If we fail," he said off-handedly, almost de- 
 fiantly, "we shall have to make the future as bright 
 as we can for Marjorie. We can't let her mope 
 out the rest of her life in solitude," the last as if 
 refuting a contrary assertion. 
 
 "No, dear," said Marion, quietly. How well 
 she knew this husband of hers! 
 
 "You admit that yourself the thing's obvious. 
 Then I really see no reason for the life of me I 
 can see no reason" his temper was decidedly ris- 
 ing "why, in that case, she shouldn't come here 
 with the children permanently to live! There's 
 room enough, in all conscience!" He savagely 
 flicked the ash from his cigar, and stuck it back 
 into the corner of his mouth. 
 
 84
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 There was a pause, during which Marion 
 avoided the wrathful gaze of her lord and master 
 which, by-the-by, was directed to the chimney- 
 piece. Then, slowly, she crept from her place and 
 slid between his knees, wound her soft arms round 
 his substantial waist, and rested her cheek upon the 
 aforesaid parabolic curve of his shirt-front, press- 
 ing it back into place. And if James could have 
 looked into her face, he would have known that her 
 eyes were glistening and that just then it would 
 have been difficult for her to speak. 
 
 But he was not very conveniently situated to look 
 into her face; and so it happened that, after his 
 surprise had evaporated, he burst into a sudden 
 hearty roar of laughter. "Of all the incomprehen- 
 sible, illogical little women!" he exclaimed. "If 
 ever I forget myself and let you have a glimpse of 
 my infernal temper, you treat me as if I had been 
 paying you pretty compliments by the hour. It's 
 not a very sound policy, my dear, because it tempts 
 me to become the deuce of an irascible bear." His 
 hand wandered caressingly over as much of his wife 
 as he could reach; and presently she returned to 
 her seat by the fire. 
 
 85
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 There was a considerable interval of silence. 
 Then James said suddenly: "Where is she now?" 
 
 "Marjorie? She has gone home." 
 
 "Home?" The word sounded strange. 
 
 "To Weybridge. I couldn't keep her, dear," 
 Marion went on. "You see, there are the children 
 to be considered. Now especially she wouldn't 
 leave them." 
 
 "Send for her to-morrow," said James, emphati- 
 cally, "nurse, children, the whole lot of them. She 
 can't stay in that house alone after what has hap- 
 pened. I shall be glad to have them. I'm fond 
 of children." 
 
 "You are not," said Marion. 
 
 "My dear 1" 
 
 "They get on your nerves and upset you. 
 You're not used to them." 
 
 "I fancy I've got a wife," said James, "who 
 pampers my nerves a great deal more than is good 
 for them." 
 
 The wife in question smiled a flat denial of the 
 accusation, her calm eyes looking straight into his; 
 and eventually it was agreed that Marjorie and her 
 children should be invited to stay with them, at 
 any rate until something had been arranged a 
 
 86
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 phrase which they were both willing, for the pres- 
 ent, to leave conveniently vague. 
 
 At half-past ten Marion rose, gave a small yawn, 
 and announced her intention of going to bed. She 
 picked up two or three books from a side table, 
 kissed her husband, and went towards the door. 
 On her way she turned suddenly a quick blush on 
 her face came rustling back to him, and kissed 
 him again. 
 
 "Don't be long," she said. Then she went.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 AT eleven o'clock on the following morning, in 
 pursuit of his undertaking to "make some in- 
 quiries," James Baker ascended the not conspicu- 
 ously snowy steps of the publishing house of 
 Clarke, Thornton & Co. He was slightly ac- 
 quainted with Thornton had met him once or 
 twice at Villiers' house and was admitted without 
 delay to the invigorating presence of that gentle- 
 man. The latter rose, as he entered, from a desk 
 whose hopeless disarray had frequently worried the 
 susceptible nerves of Villiers, and greeted him 
 heartily. Heartiness was spontaneous with him 
 and difficult to control. Nothing caused him 
 greater distress than the necessity, too often forced 
 upon him by his position, to brush the pleasing 
 bloom of fresh enthusiasm from some misguided 
 aspirant to literary distinction. No such unpleas- 
 ant duty appeared to be foreshadowed on the pres- 
 ent occasion, and he was therefore free to give full 
 expansion to his natural amiability. 
 
 88
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "This is real good luck, Mr Baker. Upon my 
 soul, I'm delighted! You're one of the people 
 one sees too little of. You find me in rather a 
 mess, I'm afraid. But sit down, do" removing a 
 pile of papers from an easy-chair and dropping 
 them on the floor. "Now what can I do for you? 
 Have you brought me a volume of sonnets?" 
 
 The perfect security indicated by his beaming 
 countenance, as he put the last inquiry, appealed 
 suddenly and irresistibly to James's sense of 
 humour. 
 
 "No, I haven't," he answered, with a frank burst 
 of laughter; "but I should like to see how you'd 
 take it if I had." 
 
 The publisher was delighted. His hearty laugh 
 responded to James's with vigorous enjoyment. 
 "Fairly had!" he cried. "You leave me without 
 a loophole! To be honest, Mr Baker, we don't 
 publish poetry; and, in your ear, I may add that 
 I've more than a doubt whether I know good from 
 bad." 
 
 "Then we shan't quarrel on the subject," said 
 James. He took the easy-chair. "I haven't come 
 to add to your professional embarrassments, Mr 
 
 89
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Thornton, or to your accumulation of " A glance 
 at the prevailing disorder. 
 
 "Litter," said Thornton, "litter." 
 
 "Nor to waste your time," proceeded James, 
 blandly; "though, on that point, appearances may 
 be against me. My errand is rather a peculiar one. 
 I want to know if you can tell me what has become 
 of Villiers?" 
 
 "What?" exclaimed Mr Thornton. 
 
 "Just what I say. He has vanished." 
 
 "Good lord!" said the publisher. 
 
 His face had changed. "You are not altogether 
 surprised?" said James, watching him. 
 
 "Not quite that. I knew it, but I didn't see it 
 if you grasp the distinction. You don't, I hope, 
 fear ?" His voice dropped. 
 
 "Suicide? Not in the least," said James. 
 
 "That's a relief! You startled me. Villiers is 
 an inscrutable being at times." 
 
 "Undoubtedly," replied his relative, with con- 
 viction. "What do you know?" 
 
 "Precious little, I'm sorry to say." He started 
 to rummage in his pigeon-holes. "Practically noth- 
 ing. I ran across him yesterday in the street 
 somewhere in Holborn." 
 
 90
 
 "The deuce you did!" said James. "If he was 
 in London yesterday, the probability is that he's 
 not very far from London to-day." 
 
 "I wouldn't even say that. He told me he was 
 going away. But he was vague, decidedly. Now, 
 why did I get the idea of the Mediterranean?" 
 He stopped his search and pressed the tips of his 
 fingers to his brow. "Ah! He hinted at local 
 colour; and we've got into the habit of going to the 
 South with him." 
 
 James was inclined to think that the local colour 
 was not particularly likely to have a determining 
 influence upon his brother-in-law's movements for 
 the present; but he kept the opinion to himself. 
 
 "He struck me as being a bit off colour," pro- 
 ceeded the publisher, resuming his quest among the 
 pigeon-holes; "nothing definite but hardly up to 
 the mark. And he gave me the address of his so- 
 licitors. Dear me ! I seem to have mislaid it." 
 
 "I know them," said James: "Markham, Flood 
 & Spindle. Spindle is the active man. I must go 
 and see him." 
 
 "No good," said Thornton, with a decided, but 
 sympathetic, shake of his head; "professional confi- 
 dence." 
 
 91
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Oh, yes, I know all about that," said James, 
 with a laugh. He rose, not without a perceptible 
 effort, from the easy-chair. "But we live in mov- 
 ing times, Mr Thornton, and to my mind the only 
 sound policy is to keep going straight on, what- 
 ever gets in the way. In matters of business I'll 
 undertake to say that, nine times out of ten, the 
 frontal attack will capture the position two or three 
 days before the flanking movement crawls out of 
 the mountains." 
 
 "Unless it gets mixed up with the barbed wire," 
 commented the publisher, smiling. 
 
 "That's likely enough in this case," agreed 
 James. "But because you probably won't get what 
 you want by asking for it, doesn't alter the fact 
 that you certainly won't if you don't." 
 
 "You'll start at fifty to one," said Thornton, 
 with brisk enjoyment, as he shook hands, "rather 
 than scratch the brute?" 
 
 "Every time," said James; and, as he descended 
 the stairs, he was followed for two flights by the 
 publisher's hearty laughter. 
 
 When he had said that he knew the firm of 
 Markham, Flood & Spindle, James used the ex- 
 pression in the sense that he knew who they were. 
 
 92
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 He had no personal acquaintance with any of the 
 partners. However, when he approached the of- 
 fices and came plump into a gentleman who was 
 emerging from the door at a pace which tempted 
 you to look for his registered number, he knew 
 sufficient of Mr Spindle by report to hazard the 
 inquiry that he was addressing the owner of that 
 name. Mr Spindle stopped dead, the monocle 
 flashed to his eye, and for two seconds the whole 
 of Mr Baker's person came under a penetrating 
 scrutiny. Then the solicitor set off again at the 
 same rate as before, conveying by a quick, but not 
 discourteous, gesture that James was at liberty to 
 accompany him if he wished, an invitation which 
 the latter accepted at some personal inconvenience. 
 Yes, he was Mr Spindle. At the moment he 
 was exceedingly busy. Would his interlocutor be 
 so good as to favour him with his name and the 
 nature of his business? Indeed! He was glad to 
 make Mr Baker's acquaintance. Yes, he was in 
 possession of Mr Villiers' present address, but he 
 regretted he was not at liberty to disclose it. He 
 should be happy, however, to forward any letters 
 which Mr Baker might wish to send. He might 
 add that he was not unprepared to be approached 
 
 93
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 by the family of Mrs Villiers. He was fully in- 
 structed; and Mr Baker would understand him if 
 he were to suggest that, for the purpose of any fu- 
 ture communication, it would be more regular if he 
 were to avail himself of the medium of his solici- 
 tors. 
 
 Whereupon Mr Spindle dropped his eye-glass, 
 wished him a curt good-morning, and darted across 
 the street, leaving James with rather the impres- 
 sion that a hurricane had passed over him and re- 
 moved his top canvases. 
 
 But he felt not the least aggrieved. On the con- 
 trary, his heart warmed with a sympathetic glow 
 of admiration. "Sound man of business !" he com- 
 mented mentally, as he stopped to recover his 
 breath, and watched the solicitor's rapidly retreat- 
 ing figure. "Doesn't waste time when a thing 
 has no money in it. Wish I had him to travel in 
 Lancashire." And he thought, with a twinge of 
 regret, of the conscientious but somewhat cumbrous 
 methods of the elderly man of affairs (whom he 
 would not for the world have deserted) who, for 
 more than a generation, had solemnly steered his 
 family barque through legal waters.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 NEVERTHELESS, in this particular instance, 
 James was fain to confess that the frontal attack 
 had signally failed, and by the time he took his 
 way back to Hampstead, the details of an indubi- 
 table and insidious flanking movement were already 
 fermenting in his brain. 
 
 It was the furtherance of this design which was 
 responsible for the fact that, when Marion arrived 
 home a few minutes after her husband, she found 
 him scanning his book-shelves with an expression 
 of considerable perplexity and concern. And, 
 indeed, it was no easy matter, as he was beginning 
 to find out, to select, from his motley collection of 
 sporting novels and out-of-date biographies and 
 gazetteers, any volumes which might reasonably 
 pass muster as being of immediate and urgent ne- 
 cessity to Villiers. 
 
 His wife's greeting chased away the furrows on 
 his face and re-established its accustomed serenity. 
 
 95
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 She was dressed in furs, and the chill outside air 
 had given her a colour: certainly, from her little 
 sable toque to the tips of her pointed shoes, a far 
 more desirable object to look upon than a flat block 
 of dull morocco and faded cloth, even to a man of 
 literary tastes, which James was not. 
 
 "Why, you're late, little woman," said he. 
 "Have you been to Weybridge?" 
 
 "I've been there all day." 
 
 "How did you find her?" 
 
 "Resigned," said Marion, "but very sorrowful, 
 poor child. James, I am beginning to feel very 
 angry with Norman. I don't think he has behaved 
 rightly, whatever his excuse. Perhaps he didn't 
 know how much she would feel it." 
 
 "Rightly I" exclaimed James. He was amazed. 
 "He has behaved abominably." 
 
 "It is the loss of him which hurts her so much," 
 proceeded Marion. "His probable unfaithfulness 
 she hardly thinks about. If he had stayed with 
 her, I think she could have forgiven that gladly." 
 
 James considered it incumbent upon him to be 
 shocked. "My dear!" he said. 
 
 "I am perfectly serious, James. In the circum- 
 stances knowing what she knows now I think 
 
 96
 
 she could have beer, content, I think she could even 
 have been glad, that it should be so." 
 
 This was beyond everything. James had all the 
 middle-class respect for accepted tenets, and his 
 wife's present observations seriously jarred upon it. 
 That married couples should occasionally fail to 
 agree, should occasionally separate and form new 
 attachments, was a condition of human affairs 
 which he was sufficiently man-of-the-world to accept 
 without blinking. But that a man should live with 
 his wife and be unfaithful with her consent! 
 Gracious heavens ! it would be a living scandal ! 
 Against which his stolid soul revolted unspeakably. 
 
 He cleared his throat judiciously: a sure indica- 
 tion that he had apprehended a necessity to instil 
 into his wife's crude ideas some corrective wisdom 
 from the deeper wells of his masculine intelligence. 
 
 But Marion knew the symptoms and made haste 
 to intercept him. She tapped him on the shoulder 
 with the handle of her umbrella. "Don't look so 
 solemn," she said. "You men have a very rigid 
 standard of social ethics, and you pat one another 
 on the back a great deal in consequence, and think 
 you are very wise and virtuous; but that doesn't 
 make it infallible in every case. Because macaroni 
 
 97
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 cheese is a generally wholesome food," she added, 
 mischievously, "it doesn't follow that it is the best 
 nutriment for a man with a liver." 
 
 "It all depends upon the way it's made," said 
 James, with lofty affectation of impersonal com- 
 ment. "By-the-by, we haven't had any lately." 
 
 "We haven't," said Marion. She began to 
 smile; then she caught his eye and the smile broke 
 into a laugh ; and finally they both laughed together 
 happily, joyously, like two children. 
 
 "Did you tell her to pack up and come here?" 
 said James. 
 
 "Yes; they are coming on Friday. It is all 
 rather difficult to arrange. The servants, for in- 
 stance whether they are to be dismissed. None 
 of the neighbours know anything as yet." 
 
 "And need not," said James, with decision. 
 "Unless Norman goes back there, neither shall 
 Marjorie. Then their tongues can wag with as 
 little profit as usual, and with less harm. As for 
 the servants, put them on board wages for the pres- 
 ent. We must do everything we can to make things 
 cheerful for our little lady take her to theatres, 
 drive her about, try to turn her thoughts. I'm be- 
 ginning to doubt very shrewdly whether we shall 
 
 98
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 succeed in inducing this husband of hers to see the 
 error of his ways." 
 
 "You thought so before." 
 
 "I think so more now. There seems to have 
 been a confounded deliberation about all his plans. 
 I've been to see Thornton to-day nice fellow 
 Thornton ! He said Norman had told him he was 
 going away and had left his solicitors' address for 
 letters. He seemed to think he intended to go to 
 the Mediterranean, though I can't say I saw much 
 in his reasoning. Then I went and saw Spindle 
 smart man, Spindle ! He knows exactly how every- 
 thing stands the whereabouts of Norman in- 
 cluded. Uncommonly little he doesn't know, I 
 should say." 
 
 "Of course he didn't tell you?" said Marion. 
 
 "No, he didn't tell me," said James. "But I 
 haven't done with him yet." His genial counte- 
 nance broadened, and Marion caught an indubi- 
 table smile. 
 
 "What are you going to do?" said she. 
 
 "Trick him," replied James, with delight. 
 ' 'Smart man, Spindle !' " said Marion, laugh- 
 ing. 
 
 "Yes, my dear," returned James, with com- 
 99
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 posure; "but I've discounted the smartness and I 
 fancy I can still show a margin of profit. We may 
 not be able to run Norman to earth all at once, but 
 I see a fair chance of getting on his track. To be- 
 gin with, we can communicate with him any mo- 
 ment we like, through Spindle. Now, if we send 
 a letter for him, whether he is in London or 
 Kamtchatka, it will be dropped into the nearest 
 pillar-box, and we shall be no wiser." 
 
 "Yes, I see," said Marion. "So you want to 
 send something bulky and then watch the office?" 
 
 "Of course !" said James. "I'd double the screw 
 of a clerk who could grasp things as quickly as 
 you. It will teach us something, at any rate. If 
 he's in the country, they'll send it by parcel post or 
 by rail; if he's abroad, they won't forward it at all, 
 I should say, without special instructions from 
 him ; if he's in London, it will probably be delivered 
 by hand." 
 
 "It may be successful," said Marion; "but it 
 seems rather mean." 
 
 "Is it?" said James. "Perhaps it is." His face 
 clouded. 
 
 "But I think we'll do it," said Marion, suddenly, 
 laughing. 
 
 100
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Then it's not mean," said James, with decision. 
 "Books are the best things for the purpose. I 
 think you had better go out to Weybridge again 
 to-morrow and bring two or three of his own." He 
 waved his hand contemptuously to his own shelves : 
 "There's nothing here." 
 
 "Neither is there there," said Marion, smiling; 
 "he has taken them." 
 
 "What hasn't he done in the way of cold-blooded 
 preparation?" said James, resignedly. "Well, we 
 must take the best of the material here. If we 
 wrap them up in brown paper, it won't be of vast 
 consequence, after all, what the books are about." 
 He pricked up his ears at a sound from the hall. 
 "What's that? Good gracious, my dear, do you 
 know that dinner is going in?" He bolted from 
 the room and up the stairs, taking two steps at a 
 time, a method of ascewt which he only adopted on 
 occasions of singular urgency. 
 
 Later in the evening the parcel was made up. 
 As Marion tied the string she suddenly gave vent 
 to a ripple of laughter. 
 
 "What's the matter?" said James. 
 
 "I'm wondering what Norman will think when 
 he opens it," said she. 
 
 101
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Afterwards James wrote a note to Mr Spindle 
 and slipped it under the string. Then he stood 
 up, the fingers of one hand touching the completed 
 parcel, and looked across at his wife. 
 
 "You must understand, my dear," said he, "that 
 I take no part that I take not one step in bring- 
 ing these two together again upon any such terms 
 as you hinted at this afternoon." 
 
 Marion raised her eyes and looked deep into 
 his, and a soft light of sympathy the sympathy 
 that is born of years of mutual understanding 
 gradually flooded and filled her own. Without 
 speaking, she placed a hand on each of his shoulders 
 and kissed him on the mouth. 
 
 On the following day James had an interview 
 with his office-boy in his private room, resulting in, 
 the transfer of the brown-paper parcel to the cus- 
 tody of that eminent being. No news of its sub- 
 sequent fortunes reached him up to the time he left 
 the City. But in the evening, as he and Marion 
 were sitting at dessert, a maid entered to say that 
 a young man from the office had called to see him. 
 
 James looked across at his wife. "Show him in," 
 he said. 
 
 "In here, sir?" said the maid, with some surprise. 
 102
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Yes," replied James, "in here." 
 
 The maid went on her errand. A few moments 
 later a callow youth of seventeen, who appeared to 
 find his new environment somewhat overpowering, 
 was' impelled, rather than shown, into the room. 
 The door was closed behind him, and he stood just 
 within it, twisting his cap in his hands. 
 
 James interviewed him while he cracked his nuts. 
 "That you, Chambers?" he said. He was sitting 
 with his back to the door. 
 
 "Yes, sir," replied Chambers. 
 
 "Come further in; I can't hear you." 
 
 The youth raised his eyes and took a hasty glance 
 at his surroundings. The glance comprehended lit- 
 tle beyond Marion's white neck and shoulders, seen 
 across a vivid array of fruit and flowers; and his 
 step forward compressed itself within the most 
 modest of limits. 
 
 "Had a pleasant afternoon?" proceeded James. 
 
 "Not over and above, sir," replied Chambers, 
 truthfully. 
 
 "Did you deliver the parcel?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "And what happened?" 
 
 "I waited about best part o' the afternoon, sir," 
 103
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Cold, was it?'* 
 
 "A bit nippy," said Chambers. 
 
 "Did you see anything more of the parcel?" 
 
 "Yes, sir," said the boy; "there was a young man 
 come out of the office, about tea-time, carrying 
 of it." 
 
 "Sure it was the same one?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "What did he do?" 
 
 "He called a cab and got in." 
 
 "Oh!" This was an eventuality which James 
 hadn't thought of. "And what did you do?" 
 
 "I went after him, sir." 
 
 "On foot?" . 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Why didn't you take a cab?" 
 
 "Hadn't got no money, sir." 
 
 "A sound reason," pronounced James. He 
 poured out his first half-glass of Burgundy. "Get 
 on, my boy. I want to know where you went." 
 
 "We turned down Oxford Street," said Cham- 
 bers. "It was middlin' full, so they didn't get on 
 so fast but what I could keep up with 'em. We 
 went about 'arf a mile, and then we turned to the 
 
 104
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 left through a lot o' little streets. I had to be 
 slippy round the corners, sir." 
 
 "So you would," said James. 
 
 "And the reg'lar runners, sir, wot was 'anging 
 about, they larfed at me, cos there wasn't no 
 luggage." 
 
 "Very impolite," said James. 
 
 "We come out somewhere near 'yde Park 
 Corner," proceeded the youth, "and I followed 'em 
 down Knightsbridge, and then they turned to the 
 left again. They didn't lose no time, sir, when 
 they was clear of the traffic, and I was pretty near 
 losing sight of 'em, when they pulled up before a 
 great red 'ouse." 
 
 James tasted the Burgundy to hide his satisfac- 
 tion. "Yes," he said; "what then?" 
 
 "I was a bit blowed, sir." 
 
 "So you sat on a step to get your breath back?" 
 
 "No, sir, it was agin an area railing." 
 
 "Bless the boy!" exclaimed James. "Did you 
 take the address of the house?" 
 
 "Yes, sir," cried Chambers, with sudden anima- 
 tion, "like wot you told me, sir." 
 
 James held out his hand for the slip of paper 
 105
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 which the youth extracted from his pocket. He 
 glanced at it and placed it beneath his plate. 
 
 "Well, Chambers, have you got a young 
 woman ?" 
 
 Chambers sheepishly admitted the fact "Down 
 Brixton way, sir," he added, as if the neighbour- 
 hood brought some extenuation. 
 
 "You've no right to, at your age." He threw 
 him a sovereign. "Take her into the country to- 
 morrow and tell her she's a young fool, like your- 
 self. That'll do, my boy, that'll do!" He held up 
 his hand as the youth was beginning to stammer his 
 thanks. "Close the door behind you." 
 
 Before he could obey this injunction, however, 
 Marion had risen, had snatched a pile of fruit from 
 the table and poured it into his arms. "Take 
 these," she said, beaming with smiles, "take them 
 home with you. They will give you your supper 
 downstairs. And if ever you should happen to be 
 in trouble, come and tell me." 
 
 Never had Chambers been so near so fine a lady, 
 never had he known one so gracious. The per- 
 fume of her presence intoxicated him, the sweetness 
 of her smile completely scattered whatever rem- 
 nants of self-possession he still retained. Marion 
 
 106
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 opened the door for him, gently checked the stut- 
 tering phrases that were rising to his lips, and left 
 him to descend to the basement in a daze of happi- 
 ness, from which, it is to be feared, he emerged 
 with a very serious rival to the Brixton young lady 
 installed in his heart. 
 
 Marion came quickly back, her sweet face 
 flushed and smiling, and seated herself unceremo- 
 niously on her husband's knee. 
 
 "Oh!" said James. 
 
 She administered a smart tap to his cheek. "I'm 
 not so heavy as that," she said. 
 
 James was bubbling with self-satisfaction. "My 
 dear, I'm inclined to think I've missed my voca- 
 tion ; I ought to have gone into the private inquiry 
 business." 
 
 "Or the boy should," said Marion. "You made 
 a mistake in not remembering he might want money 
 for a cab." 
 
 "So I did," said James, truthfully. "It might 
 have been awkward." His face fell. The success 
 of his scheme had pleased him, as such little things 
 have a way of pleasing, for their wheedling sug- 
 gestion of qualities to our credit other than those 
 we have grown accustomed to the possession of. 
 
 107
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 Marion felt a gush of compunction for her rather 
 ruthless demolishment of the little card-house he 
 had been tentatively building, and as some com- 
 pensation she dropped her soft cheek on his shoul- 
 der. The minutes passed while it rested there. 
 James was not a man who wore his heart on his 
 sleeve, but this sort of thing was secretly exceed- 
 ingly pleasant to him. Probably he didn't quite 
 realise how completely his life was filled by this 
 one woman, how infinite would be the vacuum were 
 she withdrawn from it. 
 
 Presently he raised his hand and gently smoothed 
 her hair. The intimate position was gradually pro- 
 ducing in him a very conscious heart-hunger for 
 some soft avowal. But he was a bad fisher; and 
 it was with considerable shamefacedness that he 
 finally dropped his line : 
 
 "So you are not quite tired of your fat old hus- 
 band?" 
 
 "You are not fat," said Marion, valiantly, 
 lifting her head. 
 
 "You still love him a bit?" 
 
 The white arms went round his neck. "Ever so 
 much," said Marion. 
 
 108
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 "She is coming, my own, my sweet; 
 
 Were it ever so airy a tread, 
 My heart would hear her and beat, 
 
 Were it earth in an earthy bed ; 
 My dust would hear her and beat, 
 
 Had I lain for a century dead ; 
 Would start and tremble under her feet, 
 
 And blossom in purple and red." 
 
 THERE was no slipshod slurring of the lines, no 
 lifeless incapacity to feel them. Every syllable 
 told, every word rang with the full force of the 
 poet's meaning in Rosamond's clear soprano. The 
 last notes hung in the air, vibrating, when she 
 ceased. 
 
 "How that man must have felt those lines when 
 he wrote them !" said Norman. 
 
 Rosamond closed the piano. "He knew it," she 
 said. 
 
 "Lord, yes!" said Norman. 
 
 She crossed the room and sat down beside him, 
 then slipped her hand into his. "So do we. Nor- 
 man," she said, softly. 
 
 109
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Norman did not answer immediately. His ears 
 were still filled with the song, and his mind was 
 wandering along a train of thought induced by it. 
 "I wonder?" he said, at last. 
 
 Rosamond looked up, a little startled. "Why?" 
 she said. "Why do you wonder?" 
 
 "Have we ever quite got there?" said Norman, 
 slowly. 
 
 She snuggled closely in to him, as if to shelter 
 herself from even the suggestion of a doubt on the 
 subject. "Oh, yes," she said, "yes." 
 
 Norman gave a little dry laugh. He was still 
 following his own thoughts. "Of course, the mere 
 fact that one questions," he said, "is an answer in 
 the negative." He put his arm caressingly round 
 her. "We love one another very dearly, sweet- 
 heart; we couldn't get along without one another; 
 but it isn't quite" he waved his hand towards the 
 piano "that." 
 
 Rosamond was silent for a few moments. Then 
 suddenly, with a ripple of laughter, she stretched her 
 beautiful form across him and took his head be- 
 tween her hands. Her smiling lips were very close 
 to his. "Oh, very well, dear old boy, since you 
 have it so, perhaps it isn't quite that. But 
 110
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 it's something very much like it, so much like it 
 that I never want anything else." 
 
 "Really, Rosamond?" said Norman. "Really?" 
 
 "Really and really." The dark eyes looked at 
 him with bewitching gravity as she repeated the 
 words with emphasis. Then she drew his face to 
 her own and kissed him, lingeringly, on the lips. 
 
 It was early afternoon, and they were sitting in 
 Rosamond's room. Villiers had come across after 
 lunch, a thing he had done, notwithstanding the 
 first evening's prohibition, every day since his ar- 
 rival. Besides that, he had spent three whole 
 evenings, out of seven, in Rosamond's society, so 
 that the original intention to live upon terms of in- 
 frequent association seemed, up to the present, only 
 distantly likely to be fulfilled. To-day, however, 
 Villiers felt an inclination to write. He attempted 
 to rise from the corner of the couch where Rosa- 
 mond had imprisoned him. 
 
 "Let me go, dear," he said, "I must get back 
 to work." 
 
 "Bother work!" said Rosamond. She didn't 
 move an inch. "You're always working." 
 
 "My dear little girl, do you know how much I've 
 done since I've been here? Ten sheets. Think of 
 
 111
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 it. Perhaps fifteen hundred words. What a record 
 for a week's work of a full-grown man !" 
 
 "What does it matter? You've been turning 
 out books for the last four years as hard as you can. 
 Is there to be no respite? From the bottom of a 
 page to the top of another. Is there to be no end 
 to it ever?" 
 
 "Not now, at all events," said Norman. "Up to 
 the present I have been writing from inclination 
 at any rate, not entirely from necessity. But now 
 it will take the whole of my private means, and 
 the royalties from my previous books, to pay the 
 allowance I am going to make Marjorie. So I 
 shall have to buckle-to, you see, Rosamond," he 
 concluded, smiling, "unless I want to starve." 
 
 "You won't do that," said she. "Your name is 
 a continual feast. Any rotten little tales you like 
 to write will be accepted by the magazines and well 
 paid for." 
 
 "Yes, it is easy to prostitute one's name in that 
 way," said Norman, "until it isn't worth the paper 
 it's written on." 
 
 "Dearest, I do so want you to stay," said Rosa- 
 mond, softly, returning to the attack. "I've noth- 
 ing on earth to do until five o'clock, when I have 
 
 112
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 to go and look at the dresses at Lady Clifford's 'At 
 Home.' I've been counting on it got all my stuff 
 done; all the week I've meant to have this after- 
 noon for you." 
 
 But Norman still made a struggle. "Don't look 
 at me like that," he said. "I can't resist it. 
 Heaven knows, I want to stay. And I really 
 mustn't. I can never do any decent work unless 
 I'm wound up to it, and just at present I feel in 
 the vein. I oughtn't to miss the chance. At least 
 half a dozen pages are rioting in my head at this 
 moment, clamouring to be written. If I stay with 
 you now, they'll sink into the limbo hopelessly, 
 irretrievably." 
 
 "Poor little pages!" said Rosamond. "You 
 make me feel quite pathetic. Let us erect a monu- 
 ment to them in kisses and champagne the little 
 pages that never were written. Doesn't it make 
 you feel sad?" 
 
 "Rosamond, you are almost cruel." 
 
 "Oh, no," she said, softly, "you know that isn't 
 true." She was smoothing his cheeks between her 
 hands. "But I foresee that this work is going to 
 be a serious rival, and I must have a clear under- 
 standing with it. I don't grudge it so many hours 
 
 113
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIERS 
 
 a day five, six, seven, I won't be stingy; but I 
 won't let it make any arbitrary rules as to which 
 those hours are to be, and I won't allow it to cross 
 my threshold and flaunt itself in my face, as it is 
 doing now." She waved her hand across his eyes. 
 "I never let my work cast its shadow before, as you 
 do," she proceeded; "I don't worry about it, in and 
 out of season; I just sit down when it happens to 
 be convenient, and get it done with. I write when 
 / like, not when it likes." 
 
 Norman didn't answer at once. He hadn't been 
 listening to her very closely. He came back slowly 
 from a tentative excursion into the realms of his 
 imagination. "I couldn't write like that, dear," 
 he said, then. "Probably it wouldn't be worth 
 reading, if I could." 
 
 Rosamond burst into a delighted peal of 
 laughter. "Of all the abominably tactless, hope- 
 less, idiotic things to sayl" she cried. "You can't 
 refuse to stay now. It will take you at least the rest 
 of the afternoon to make your peace." She 
 leaned heavily upon him. He could feel the beat 
 of her heart through the warm bosom which 
 caressed him with its weight. Her luminous eyes 
 
 114
 
 wore a look infinitely appealing. "Stay," she 
 breathed. 
 
 "Of course I shall stay," cried Norman, almost 
 impatiently. "No man of flesh and blood or 
 stone, or iron, or ice, for that matter could do 
 anything else when you ask like that. Of course I 
 shall stay. I believe if an angel from heaven came 
 down supposing they make them masculine he 
 would stay, if you asked in that way." 
 
 Rosamond sprang up with a cry of delight, like 
 a happy child, as pleased by the tribute to her 
 charms as with the success of her appeal. "Then 
 don't dare to run away while I change my gown," 
 she exclaimed. "I won't be long." 
 
 Why a woman must necessarily change her dress 
 after lunch is one of those things which to a mere 
 man can never be satisfactorily demonstrated. 
 
 She betook herself into the adjoining room, 
 leaving open the communicating door, so that she 
 could shout intermittent observations through the 
 aperture. Norman had occasional glimpses of her 
 as she crossed the field of his vision, framed by 
 the doorway, in various stages of deshabille. He 
 hardly noticed her. Little things were beginning 
 to knock at the door of his private tabernacle 
 
 115
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 somewhat sharply. He had never attempted to de- 
 ceive either himself or others with the idea that he 
 had been endowed with any especial capacity for 
 personal rectitude. He found himself with a some- 
 what exceptional constitution to deal with, but 
 hitherto he had contrived to preserve his self- 
 respect; he had done nothing to carry him below 
 his own standard of the behaviour demanded of 
 him. Even his treatment of his wife appeared to 
 him to be justified by the particular circumstances 
 which had brought it about. Now he perceived a 
 difference. The stimulus to work was still upon 
 him. He felt the call of the fair white sheets, 
 waiting for him in his room across the landing, as 
 he had not felt it since the momentous step had been 
 taken which brought him to Albany Mansions. He 
 knew that this afternoon, whose hours were to be 
 dedicated to the worship of that exacting goddess 
 whose claims are never satisfied, could have pro- 
 duced the best that was in him. And he began to 
 realise, dimly as yet, whither he was sinking. 
 
 "The cigarettes are in the little cabinet under the 
 window," Rosamond called out. 
 
 Villiers got up. He shook himself free of his 
 thoughts, almost physically, as a dog shakes water 
 
 116
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 from its back. Having given the go-by to his con- 
 science, he undertook to do it handsomely. 
 
 "And if you want some champagne," shouted 
 Rosamond again, dragging pins from her hair and 
 digging them in again, "there's a bottle or two 
 somewhere. Hunt about for it." 
 
 Norman lighted a cigarette and proceeded to 
 move leisurely about the room. The course of his 
 perambulations brought him to Rosamond's Shera- 
 ton bureau, which was lying open, littered with 
 papers. He picked up a long sheet of proof and 
 glanced at it casually. Something held his atten- 
 tion and he read on, his whole face gradually as- 
 suming an expression of comic perplexity. 
 
 He was so employed when Rosamond, smiling 
 and radiant, came back into the room, humming 
 the refrain of a ballad. She was now attired in a 
 loose crepe-de-chine tea-gown of palest grey. And 
 it was easy to see that she had disencumbered her- 
 self of those conventional barbarities, corsets. 
 
 "Why do you write in this wonderful way, 
 Rosamond?" said Norman, without looking up, 
 and with a gleam of unmistakable enjoyment some- 
 where in the recesses of his eyes. 
 
 Rosamond resented this calm investigation of 
 117
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 her private papers much less than the quite inci- 
 dental fact, resulting from it, that her undeniably 
 exquisite aspect in the grey gown had for the mo- 
 ment passed without notice. "Put down that 
 paper," she commanded. She made a snatch at 
 the slip. 
 
 Norman held it out of her reach, laughing. "I 
 suppose you really do understand the meaning of 
 words?" with chaffing semi-diffidence. 
 
 "Put it down," cried Rosamond, again; but she 
 was smiling. 
 
 "I mean," continued Norman, ruthlessly, "you 
 realise that a dress which is made of substantial 
 quantities of muslin, lace, silk-brocade and other 
 odds and ends isn't exactly 'created,' and cannot, 
 without considerable torture, even be said to be 
 'expressed'? And it's rather an original notion, 
 isn't it, to talk of a blouse as a 'theme'?" He 
 threw down the slip. "What language is it, 
 sweetheart? It isn't English not even jour- 
 nalese." 
 
 "Modistese," said Rosamond, with a laugh, "I 
 suppose. I have to do it. The shops like it." 
 
 "What of that? You've nothing to do with the 
 shops." 
 
 118
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Oh, haven't I? If you compare my puffs with 
 the advertisement pages, you may come to a differ- 
 ent conclusion." 
 
 "Is there anything honest in the world?" said 
 Norman, sententiously. 
 
 "Most noble Caesar, are your books honest?" 
 
 Norman climbed down leisurely. "No," he 
 admitted, when he reached the bottom, "not quite." 
 
 "You daren't make them honest. You have to 
 write what the public is willing to read." 
 
 "Not quite that," said Norman, "rather what a 
 noisy section of the public is willing to let the rest 
 read." 
 
 "It comes to the same thing. We all have to 
 cut our coat to the cloth in the end. But some of 
 us are rather superior sometimes." She smiled at 
 him with a delicious suggestion of triumph, and 
 gave him a playful flick with her hand. "Is the 
 door fastened?" 
 
 "Yes," replied Norman. 
 
 Rosamond seated herself in a corner of the 
 couch. "And have you turned the card to 'Out'?" 
 
 Norman had done that also. 
 
 "Then pass the cigarettes, and let us enjoy our- 
 selves." 
 
 119
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Norman obeyed the injunction, and then lighted 
 another himself. He took the opposite corner of 
 the couch, and Rosamond immediately availed her- 
 self of the fact to place her dainty feet upon his 
 lap. The novelist dutifully slipped his fingers 
 through the open front of one of the pointed shoes 
 and lightly stroked the top of her instep. It was 
 a form of homage which Rosamond found particu- 
 larly soothing. 
 
 "If you get tired of doing that one, Norman," 
 she said, sweetly, dropping her head on the cushion 
 and blowing a cloud of smoke into the air, "you 
 can do the other." 
 
 Two hours later, as Rosamond was descending 
 the stairs on her way to Lady Clifford's "At 
 Home," she met a pleasant-featured gentleman of 
 comfortable build coming up, who was apparently 
 finding the steep ascent by no means to his taste. 
 She gave him a glance as she passed, and he gave 
 her two. But that was not an exceptional experi- 
 ence with Rosamond. 
 
 120
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 VILLIERS returned to his room feeling much as a 
 dog may be assumed to feel when it creeps back to 
 its kennel after a night's foraging; and the knowl- 
 edge that such was his mental attitude a knowl- 
 edge impressed upon him in especially uncompro- 
 mising terms when he opened his door and saw the 
 orderly preparation for work increased its acute- 
 ness. There was an atmosphere, a perfume in 
 Rosamond's room, which to some extent drugged 
 his moral sense and restrained his conscience from 
 obtruding comments too flagrantly crude. But in 
 the appearance of his own possessions, the evi- 
 dences of his individuality and his work the half- 
 dozen written pages (the ink long dry) spread 
 upon his table, the little pad of fresh sheets care- 
 fully cut and margined to the left of his blotting- 
 pad, the heavy books of reference crowding the 
 shelves and overflowing upon the floor (from 
 amongst which, it might be observed, James's
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 three sporting novels detached themselves, with al- 
 most plaintive insistence, like notes of interroga- 
 tion) in all this there was nothing to cast a sooth- 
 ing gloss upon realities, and to hide him from the 
 white, penetrating rays of his self-despite. 
 
 He could not work. That was out of the ques- 
 tion. The spell of the soft goddess was too near 
 him; the purple glamour of her rites still flushed 
 his brain with too giddy an actuality. He went to 
 the windows and threw them wide open. The 
 room was not close", but he felt the need of air. 
 Out into the raw November atmosphere he thrust 
 head and shoulders. Where was he drifting? If 
 these wasted hours were to be taken as a sample of 
 what was likely to happen in the future and he 
 conceived little prospect of anything else if Rosa- 
 mond's influence continued to be exercised as it had 
 been that afternoon to what length of time could 
 he look forward before self-respect became a thing 
 of the past and sound work an impossibility? He 
 saw his talents made increasingly subservient to 
 her humours, himself a mere plaything to minister 
 to her whims, as and when the fancy took her. And 
 against that destiny the whole moral nature of the 
 man rebelled passionately rebelled while recog- 
 
 188
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 nising the galling and humiliating truth that it was 
 linked to a physical weakness which could make 
 such rebellion impotent. 
 
 Against Rosamond herself he launched no unjust 
 reproaches. Individuals calling themselves men, 
 at moments of their lives corresponding with that 
 which Norman was passing through, are sometimes 
 guilty of reproach of that kind. For such miserable 
 cowardliness there is no word in the English lan- 
 guage sufficiently contemptuous. Norman knew 
 that his enemy was not Rosamond, but was chained 
 up within himself, and would accompany him wher- 
 ever he chose to go; that he had himself only to 
 reckon with, and that the future course of his life, 
 in all probability, lay in the issue of that struggle. 
 
 Presently he drew in his head and closed the 
 casement. The sun had already sunk out of the 
 cold sky, leaving but a faint yellow afterglow, 
 veiled to Norman by the smoke hanging heavily 
 over intervening chimney-pots. The room had 
 dusked since he turned away, so he switched on 
 the electric light. He noticed, as he did so, that 
 someone was shuffling in the lobby and fumbling 
 for the handle of the door. Thinking it was the 
 
 123
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 maid with tea, he pulled it open, and confronted 
 James, blinking at him. 
 
 "That you, Norman?" said he, cheerily. "Glad 
 I haven't climbed those steps for nothing. But 
 what a cave of the winds you live in, man! Shut 
 some of those windows. Look at your fire, it's 
 smoking atrociously." 
 
 Norman scrutinised the genial figure of his 
 brother-in-law with considerable displeasure. 
 
 "How have you got here?" he said. "I left no 
 address." Then suddenly a light broke upon him, 
 and his features relaxed into a partly contemptuous 
 smile. "I see; this explains those ridiculous 
 books?" 
 
 "Perfectly true," said James, blandly. "They 
 are books I value, I assure you, but, rather than 
 that you should feel any grievance on the subject, 
 I'll treat you squarely and make you a present of 
 them." He strode into the room and proceeded 
 calmly to remove his overcoat, which he afterwards 
 placed upon a chair, together with his hat and um- 
 brella. Then he selected another, of comfortable 
 aspect, and seated himself in it with a shiver. 
 "The windows, Norman ; do look to the windows."
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Villiers closed the remaining casements and drew 
 the curtains over them. 
 
 "After all," he said, "I suppose some such in- 
 terview as this was inevitable in the long run, and 
 it may be as well to get it over. Though, for my 
 part," he added, crossing the room and breaking 
 the recalcitrant fire into a blaze, "for my part, I 
 fail to see how it is going to be profitable to anyone 
 concerned." 
 
 "We will talk of that in a moment," said James. 
 He was dragging at his collar and giving vent to 
 a series of guttural sounds indicative of some 
 laryngeal discomfort. "This sulphur has got into 
 my throat," was the explanation he volunteered. 
 "Have you such a thing as a whisky-and-soda ?" 
 
 Norman smiled. It was impossible to remain 
 long in James's society without being infected by 
 his innate good-humour. "Yes, I think I can do 
 that for you," said he. He produced a decanter 
 and a syphon from a cupboard, and placed them, 
 together with a tumbler, in convenient proximity 
 to his visitor's elbow. 
 
 The latter helped himself. "Same old brand!" 
 said he with a wry face, when he tasted it; "no 
 
 125
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 wrinkles on it. You should pack it away for ten 
 years, Norman, and then ask me to sample it." 
 
 Norman laughed outright at that. He sat down, 
 facing his relative across a corner of the table. 
 
 "You are one of the most wonderful men I 
 know, James," said he. "You come here, pre- 
 sumably, to say a number of unpleasant things, and 
 you start by making yourself comfortable with a 
 whisky-and-soda ; or, at least, as comfortable as the 
 inferior quality of the whisky will permit." 
 
 "Which proves, I hope," said James, quietly, 
 "that I haven't the least intention to say anything 
 unpleasant." He replaced his glass on the table. 
 "I have come simply to ask you to return to your 
 wife, Norman. You have made the little thing 
 very unhappy." 
 
 "That does credit to your heart," said Norman. 
 "Of course you don't seriously suppose that I have 
 deliberately taken a step of this nature to go back 
 upon it within a fortnight?" 
 
 "I suppose nothing," said James. "I only ask 
 you to look at the matter from the point of view of 
 that poor girl." 
 
 "Heavens knows I have done that," said Nor- 
 man, earnestly. "If she suffers, it is because she 
 
 126
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 placed me on a pedestal which time will make clear 
 to her I had no right to occupy. She, too, will 
 realise before long the madness of such a union as 
 ours." 
 
 "Nothing mad about it," said James. "I never 
 knew a couple better suited to one another." 
 
 "As to that," replied Norman, quietly, "I think 
 I can claim to be in the better position to judge." 
 
 "I know what you have in your mind," said 
 James; "to my thinking, an absurdly insufficient 
 reason." 
 
 "Insufficient!" He repeated the word with 
 amazed emphasis. "Insufficient ! I leave my wife 
 because I find her deficient in the first essential of 
 marriage, in all that makes marriage, is marriage, 
 in the one supreme function for which marriage 
 was ordained; and you call that an insufficient 
 reason?" 
 
 James took another pull at the whisky. "Don't 
 overstate it," he said; "one of the functions." 
 
 "What are the others? In what else does the 
 married state differ from the single state?" 
 
 "We marry for companionship," said James, 
 "for sympathy." 
 
 127
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Obtainable at a more moderate quotation than 
 indissoluble union. What else?" 
 
 James had not expected to be cross-examined. 
 It had never occurred to him to dissect the causes 
 of his own connubial content. Now that he was 
 invited to do so, he was perhaps for the first time 
 dimly aware of the essential base upon which the 
 whole edifice was erected; but this was clearly not 
 the time to lay emphasis upon that perception. He 
 faithfully recounted the lighter boons which flowed 
 to him from the estate of marriage. 
 
 "You want someone," he said, "to nurse you 
 when you're sick, to look pretty at the head of your 
 table when you have your friends to dine, and to 
 write your private letters." 
 
 Norman smiled, a smile with the faintest tinge 
 of sadness in it. "You are very well suited, James," 
 he said. 
 
 "I am," said James, loyally. "Besides that, you 
 want someone to look after your house and to 
 manage your servants." 
 
 "Yes. You can hire a housekeeper to do all 
 that; they're not expensive." 
 
 "If it comes to that, you can " He thought 
 better of it and stopped. 
 
 128
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "I'm glad you didn't say it," said Norman. 
 
 "All the same," said James, "it's a fair argument 
 on the line you are following." 
 
 "Is it?" said Norman. "It may be fair, but it's 
 not an argument. It's a platitude to say that the 
 woman who can be bought isn't worth having; it 
 is almost as true to say that the man who would 
 buy her isn't worth hanging." 
 
 "That's the sort of remark I should have ex- 
 pected you to make a month ago," said James. 
 "I'm willing to confess that this affair runs con- 
 trary to all my preconceived ideas about you, Nor- 
 man. I've always looked upon you as one of the 
 steadiest men I know. You don't drink " 
 
 "I'm not a teetotaller," said Norman, "by any 
 means." 
 
 "You don't show an intelligent interest in the 
 subject," said James, flatly. "You don't bet, never 
 let your tongue run away with you, never tell shady 
 stories, never gamble at cards " 
 
 "I don't actively object," said Norman, "if the 
 game's bad enough It's the very worst reflection 
 on the quality of a game, reduces it at once to the 
 level of pitch-and-toss." 
 
 "You've never been loose or wild," added 
 129
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 James; "behaved like a model citizen all your life 
 up to now. If anyone had asked me, I should have 
 said a man without vices. And yet you suddenly 
 bolt in front of the guns like an old retriever that 
 no one ever thought of holding!" 
 
 He emptied his glass, and then expounded the 
 simile: "Show yourself incapable of grasping the 
 most elementary of moral obligations." 
 
 "Do you regard it as a moral obligation to live 
 with a wife who has no wish for a husband?" 
 
 "She has a wish," said James, "a very decided 
 one." 
 
 "For a companion," corrected Norman. "The 
 only obligation I can see is to provide her with a 
 home, or with the means to secure one. That 1 
 am continuing to do." 
 
 "You can talk around the point as much as you 
 like," said James, "it doesn't alter the fact, to me, 
 that it's the plain duty of a man to live with the 
 woman he has married." 
 
 "And if, as in my case, the wife is no wife?" 
 
 "He must grin and bear it," said James, without 
 hesitation. 
 
 "Probably that is what I should have done," 
 said Norman, "had Providence seen fit to provide 
 
 130
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 me with your physical system instead of my own. 
 Like most Englishmen, you have the luck to possess 
 a moderate temperament, otherwise you couldn't 
 talk as you do." 
 
 "Very likely," said James. 
 
 Norman leaned his arms on the table and looked 
 steadily across at his brother-in-law. "Do you 
 know that that is an inestimable blessing, which 
 you should fall down on your knees and thank 
 God for every day of your life?" 
 
 "My dear Norman !" said James. 
 
 "It leads you to reach a good many false con- 
 clusions. You are an excellent type of a class, 
 James," Norman proceeded, "a numerous class 
 which believes that all difficulties such as mine are 
 capable of solution by the moral stiffening of the 
 human race. Never was a greater mistake. They 
 spring from immutable natural laws and not from 
 vice, and no amount of educative measures, based 
 on systematic violent opposition to those laws, can 
 have the smallest chance of permanent effect. Look 
 at your streets, for example." 
 
 "My streets!" said James, mildly. "I wish 
 they were." 
 
 "You have been hammering away at them," 
 131
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 continued Norman, "with very laudable persever- 
 ance, for the last two or three generations, without 
 improving them in the slightest. That is because 
 you decline to recognise the patent truth that these 
 things have to be. They have been since the days 
 of Abraham, and unless you are prepared to make 
 a revolutionary change in your social system, they 
 will continue till the world's end. You will never 
 make any progress until you get that fundamental 
 fact driven deep into your stolid heads." 
 
 James was not particularly concerned. It can- 
 not be said that these were questions to which he 
 had given much thought. 
 
 "Oh!" he interjected, without enthusiasm. "Well, 
 since it appears to please you to abuse my head, 
 I'll allow you to continue to abuse my stomach." 
 He stretched out his hand to the decanter. 
 
 "I'm going to have some tea," said Norman. 
 "Won't you wait for it?" 
 
 James helped himself. "My dear Norman," 
 said he, with pained expostulation, "the whisky's 
 not so bad as that." 
 
 132
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 NORMAN rang the bell, and presently tea was 
 brought in and placed upon the table. He poured 
 cut a cup and stirred the sugar in it. Then, hav- 
 ing munched a piece of buttered toast, he took up 
 the thread of his remarks. 
 
 " 'Raising the tone' is the phrase," he said. 
 "That is to be the panacea for all unruly affections. 
 Well, here am I, a man who, through the gradual 
 developing process of centuries, has come out, I 
 suppose, in a tolerably advanced state of moral and 
 intellectual culture. How has that affected me in 
 its bearing on the primitive instincts? It has made 
 them the more galling, in so far as it has enabled 
 me to recognise their baseness in relation to the 
 qualities of the mind, and it has increased their 
 severity in proportion as this very refinement has 
 obliged their resistance." 
 
 "But you have not resisted them," said James. 
 
 "I resisted them until a month, ago, James. But 
 133
 
 MB AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 that is really the point of the story. Possibly my 
 case is exceptional, possibly I have reached no such 
 delicacy of perception as I suggested; but I think 
 you will find, if you drive it hard enough, that there 
 must come a time when this moral culture, however 
 highly tempered, can do no more." 
 
 He spoke very quietly even with a little sad- 
 ness. Usually his manner was inclined to be au- 
 thoritative; now his fine face was turned upon 
 James with an expression that contained almost an 
 appeal. There began, slowly and indistinctly, to 
 grow upon the latter some conception of the 
 struggle he had gone through. He was conscious 
 of a faint veering of his point of view. 
 
 "Don't suppose I can't feel for you, Norman," 
 he said, kindly. "The luck has been against you, 
 I admit; you've drawn a good card, but it doesn't 
 happen to suit your hand. But that doesn't entitle 
 you to throw it away and pick up another. You 
 must play the game." 
 
 "Yes," said Norman, rather bitterly, "the long 
 game. You are well up in the rules. They are all 
 set out in the ethical code of the class we have been 
 speaking of. It recognises, grudgingly, that nature 
 has seen fit to implant in her children certain un- 
 
 134.
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 desirable proclivities, and it prescribes marriage. 
 It airily disregards the fact that marriage, as a rule, 
 is out of the question until a full decade after these 
 proclivities have become inconveniently turbulent; 
 but that is beside the point. It tells you to marry 
 to make your one pick and it gives you certain 
 sapient advice. It says, 'It's a serious business; 
 look carefully at the backs of the cards (certainly 
 they are much alike) ; but on no account peep at 
 the faces.' And then, when you've drawn your 
 card, and find it the wrong one, and ask blankly 
 what is to happen next, it tells you to 'play the 
 game.' It's a hard game, but you set your teeth 
 and begin to play it. And later on, perhaps, when 
 some other cards that would have done very much 
 better happen to lie exposed on the table, it takes 
 them up and flaunts them in your face and says, 
 'You didn't know they were there; / took care of 
 that; you've had your chance; play the game.' ' 
 
 "I fancy I've heard something like that before," 
 said James, "from people who didn't like the look 
 of their helping of fortune. The system on which 
 the affairs of the world are conducted mayn't be 
 the best for everybody, but it suits the majority, 
 and it has held water for nineteen hundred years." 
 
 135
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Yes," said Norman; "if a thing has proved on 
 the whole endurable, it will have to do. That is 
 the philosophy. A trifle slipshod, perhaps, but it 
 saves trouble." 
 
 James was wise enough not to continue the dis- 
 cussion. He knew that, in arguing with a man who 
 takes an extreme view upon any question, you run 
 a risk of spoiling a good case and have no chance 
 of improving a bad one. It has never occurred to 
 you to analyse your own attitude of benevolent 
 neutrality towards existing conditions, whereas 
 you are dealing with an opponent who has 
 made a study of his subject and has all the points 
 at his finger ends. 
 
 "I'm not going to argue about it," he said, "I 
 didn't come here for that. Whether the system is 
 right or wrong, you've got to face it; and so has 
 she, poor thing. And however I may feel for you, 
 I feel a hundred times more for her. I've just left 
 her, remember or, rather, I left her this morn- 
 ing when I went to the City." 
 
 "Is she in your house?" interrupted Norman, 
 sharply. 
 
 "Yes, she is," said James, defiantly. 
 
 "Permanently?" 
 
 136
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "No; until you return." 
 
 Norman ignored the insinuation. "I don't wish 
 her to be a burden upon anyone," he said. "There 
 is no reason for that." 
 
 "Burden!" cried James, wrathfully. "Surely 
 my wife can have her own sister to stay with her?" 
 
 "Yes, yes," said Norman, soothingly. He didn't 
 understand his relative so well as Marion did. "I 
 don't intend to say anything to hurt you, James. I 
 only want you to understand that Marjorie is in a 
 position to provide for herself." 
 
 James consented to be mollified. "No doubt," 
 he said. "But just at present she is making us a 
 visit, so I've seen a good deal of her, and I want 
 you to be quite clear about this whatever she may 
 have made you put up with in the past, she is pay- 
 ing for now. She knew I was coming here when I 
 left her this morning, and I wish you had seen the 
 look in her face instead of me. I've seen nothing 
 else all day. I see it now." 
 
 Norman made no immediate comment. He rose 
 and poked the fire; then crossed to his writing- 
 table and made some inconsiderable re-arrangement 
 of the papers. At length he returned to his seat. 
 He was plainly moved. 
 
 137
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "I hardly realised this," he said. "I thought her 
 attachment had become methodical a matter of 
 habit nothing more." 
 
 James pressed his advantage. "That's likely 
 enough," he said. "In the old days she was too 
 contented to see very far into the deeper side of 
 existence. She moved quietly about, taking the 
 good things that came in her way pretty much as 
 a matter of course. And inclined to be a trifle stub- 
 born, perhaps, when little things didn't please her. 
 It's all very different now. That poor child has 
 awakened to realities with a vengeance. You've hit 
 her uncommonly hard, Norman." 
 
 "James, I haven't," cried Norman, with appeal in 
 his face. "I've taken away from her an unworthy 
 block of humanity who was never fit to mate with 
 her and never could be." 
 
 James shook his head. "You'd better come and 
 try and persuade her of that," he said. "At present, 
 I'll undertake to say, she thinks of you, not less, 
 but a good deal more than on the day you married 
 her. And she was tolerably happy that day, wasn't 
 she? Don't you remember, when I sat on my hat 
 in the vestry, and Marion refused to drive home 
 with me?" 
 
 138
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Well done, James ! The little reminiscence was 
 an inspiration. Norman's features brightened with 
 almost boyish delight. "Yes," he exclaimed, with 
 sudden gaiety, "and Marjorie had to ask you to 
 kiss her." 
 
 "So she did," said James, not the least abashed. 
 "Well, that's an order a woman won't tackle unless 
 she's in moderate fettle, eh?" 
 
 "Ask Marion," said Norman, with a smile. He 
 turned his eyes and looked into the fire, and there 
 was a pause. 
 
 James rose and stood with his back to the hearth. 
 
 "Look here, Norman," he said, "you are both of 
 you too good for one to care to see you make a mess 
 of your lives. Make it up. Come back to her. 
 She's ready to take you, and she'll overlook any- 
 thing that has happened in the interval. These 
 delicate misunderstandings have a way of growing 
 very big, when it only needs a little plain speaking 
 to put them right. You've cleared the air. I'll go 
 so far to say that the lesson may do her no harm. 
 It's not an easy thing to say, but I think you'll find 
 she'll make an effort." 
 
 The last sentence was a tactical mistake. Nor- 
 139
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 man's face set. "Upon that point," he said, "you 
 must allow me to judge." 
 
 James attempted to cover his error. "Oh, you 
 mustn't be too exacting," he said, genially. "The 
 women are different from us." 
 
 "So I thought," said Norman, "for eight years." 
 
 "You don't think so any longer?" 
 
 "This cumulated refinement that we were speak- 
 ing of," said Norman, "is responsible for many 
 things: among others, for the profound conceal- 
 ment of the truth, almost startling once it is re- 
 alised, that the world is throbbing with women 
 good, cultured, pure women for whom these nat- 
 ural laws have as deep and intense a meaning as 
 they have for me." 
 
 "Your first opinion," remarked James, "was 
 founded upon one woman; your second, I take it, 
 is founded upon another. Probably both are 
 wrong." 
 
 "No," said Norman, "both are right. Men, 
 as a whole, are made in a mould; women run to 
 extremes." 
 
 James returned to the charge. "Come back to 
 her, Norman," he said again. 
 
 But the moment for that appeal to succeed if it 
 140
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 had ever existed had passed. Too strong a light 
 had now been thrown on the white dividing line, 
 the permanent, ineradicable difference. 
 
 "I cannot, James," said Norman, simply. "Even 
 if I had the wish to retrace my steps, you probably 
 realise that conditions have arisen in the meantime 
 which make it no longer possible." 
 
 "Fiddlesticks!" said James, somewhat impa- 
 tiently. "You left your wife." 
 
 "With whom I had no such tie," said Norman, 
 quietly. 
 
 "Oh, come, my dear fellow, what does it amount 
 to?" James glanced round the room. "You are 
 evidently alone here. Before I came, I rather ex- 
 pected to find " he hesitated " well, what I 
 haven't found." 
 
 Norman looked at him with a little surprise. 
 "You don't suppose " he began. 
 
 James held up his hand. "I want to know 
 nothing," he said, firmly; "I make no inquiries. 
 It's enough for me that there's no sign of any par- 
 ticularly definite arrangement nothing necessarily 
 lasting, I mean nothing that can't be arranged." 
 
 "Pecuniarily?" said Norman, flashing. 
 
 "No, no; I said arranged." 
 141
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "James, I have the greatest respect for you," said 
 Norman, quietly; "but on this subject we shall 
 never agree. We approach it from too widely dis- 
 similar standpoints. I conceive I have contracted 
 a very decided obligation, and it cannot be 'ar- 
 ranged.' " 
 
 There was finality in his tone. James crossed 
 the room and picked up his overcoat. Norman 
 helped him on with it in silence. Suddenly James 
 turned round and faced him again. He was more 
 moved than he cared to suppose himself capable 
 of being. 
 
 "Before I go, Norman," he cried, "think again. 
 It's for your own happiness as well as hers; it's for 
 your own good as well as hers; I'm convinced of it. 
 Upon my soul, when I think of that child's face, I 
 could almost kneel to you. For heaven's sake, 
 make an effort, man ; don't sink without a struggle. 
 She's your own wife, and she loves you; if she 
 didn't know it before, she knows it now and, 
 damn it all ! I don't believe she'll ever forget it." 
 
 Norman's face lost its sternness. He was plainly 
 very much touched by the other's earnestness. 
 
 "You are one of the best fellows that ever lived, 
 James," he said. "You are entitled to sniff when I
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 say it to you, but it is none the less true, that it in- 
 volved a considerable wrench to cut myself off, as I 
 have done, from you and Marion. I hate to be on 
 the other side of the fence from you. But there I 
 am, and there I must remain. I fought it all out 
 a month ago, and now there is added this other 
 circumstance that we were speaking of, to divide 
 me even more widely from Marjorie. Don't think 
 I am indifferent to her happiness. Very far indeed 
 from that. If it had been possible to separate one's 
 higher from one's lower nature the mental and 
 spiritual from the physical frame I should never 
 have left her; but nothing can persuade me 
 knowing her as I do that it can achieve her hap- 
 piness to be linked to a man of my nature, unless 
 he lives such a life as is unbearable to him. I think 
 she ought to divorce me, James. I don't suggest 
 it for my sake, but for her own. She is entitled to 
 her freedom; and there must be many men in the 
 world in fact, I know there are who could value 
 fully, and without distraction, that gentle soul of 
 hers. As for me, I have made my bed I don't 
 say I'm glad, I don't say I'm sorry but I intend 
 to lie upon it." 
 
 143
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 JAMES BAKER was consistently a well-dressed 
 man. He couldn't have been Marion's husband 
 and anything else. A natural instinct towards 
 neatness had been judiciously fostered by his spouse, 
 until an orderly and well-turned-out appearance had 
 become as essential to his happiness as his morn- 
 ing paper. To what extent self-respect and a pass- 
 able exterior may be inter-dependent is perhaps 
 not sufficiently recognised. As over-dressing de- 
 notes mental feebleness, so a slovenly and careless 
 habit of clothes is not infrequently the outward and 
 visible sign of moral deterioration. 
 
 The exceptional glossiness of his silk hats was a 
 point upon which James especially prided himself. 
 As he leaned forward in the hansom which was 
 taking him home after his interview with Norman, 
 his gloved hands hanging loosely over the doors, 
 a particularly exquisite specimen of that eccentric 
 
 144
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 form of head-dress, set at just a fraction of a 
 jaunty angle, came into conspicuous prominence, 
 and could fairly have challenged comparison with 
 the shiniest of its brethren which were passed on 
 the way. 
 
 It cannot be said that he was in any way sur- 
 prised by the failure of his mission. He had 
 founded no great hopes upon it. Nevertheless, he 
 alighted from the cab at his own door with con- 
 siderable misgiving. That there was a quarter in 
 which hopes were founded, and very high ones, 
 he was painfully conscious. It occurred to him, 
 now, that his discouragement of them might have 
 been more decided than it had been. He remem- 
 bered that the anxious face looking up at him had 
 led him to parent an appreciably more optimistic 
 view than his real feelings warranted. 
 
 Moreover, it appeared increasingly likely that it 
 would fall to his own lot to disperse those hopes. 
 That was a task he had privately assigned to 
 Marion ; but neither the sound of his latch-key, nor 
 that of his subsequent movements not, on this oc- 
 casion, it must be owned, very strenuously subdued 
 brought the customary greeting of the familiar 
 figure. He even whistled unconcernedly a few bars 
 
 145
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 from one of the airs of a musical comedy, but that 
 also proved ineffective. 
 
 "Where is your mistress?" he asked a maid who 
 was crossing the hall. 
 
 "She is upstairs, sir, with Mrs Villiers," replied 
 the maid. 
 
 "In her boudoir?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 This explained matters. Not the most persever- 
 ing shuffling, not any whistle which the most gen- 
 erous interpreter could suppose to be taking place 
 for the enjoyment of the whistler, could penetrate 
 to that remote apartment. James ascended the 
 four flights of stairs which led to it and opened the 
 door. 
 
 The two sisters were seated before the fire, a 
 small table between them, upon which were strewn 
 various feminine articles needles, scissors, strands 
 of coloured silk, a thimble, loose odds and ends 
 of cambric. Each had a piece of embroidery in 
 her hands. Looking at Marjorie as she bent over 
 her work, James wondered as he had wondered 
 once or twice since the estrangement how she had 
 come, in the first instance, to attract such a man 
 as Norman. Her dark-brown hair was drawn 
 
 146
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 rather tightly back, leaving an unnecessary depth 
 of forehead exposed and emphasising its narrow- 
 ness. Coupled with her thin lips and somewhat 
 too pointed nose, this gave her, in her present atti- 
 tude, an aspect almost of primness. It was not 
 until she raised her eyes, and you saw through 
 their soft depths into her clear soul, and, especially, 
 not until she spoke, and you came under the spell 
 of her voice its innate refinement, its unconscious 
 sweetness and gentleness that you realised, not 
 only the beauty of her character, but the charm of 
 her presence. 
 
 She half rose as James entered, flushed, then 
 turned pale again and sat perfectly still. He 
 crossed the room and occupied a chair next her. 
 
 He took the work from her hand and examined 
 it. "Well, little Marjorie," he said, "I've seen the 
 dragon." 
 
 Marjorie didn't look up. "Is he happy?" she 
 said. 
 
 James was glad of the respite. He smiled jocu- 
 larly. "You beat me the first time," he said. "I 
 didn't ask him." 
 
 "Did he seem happy?" said Marjorie. 
 
 "Well, that's rather a difficult question to an- 
 147
 
 MB AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 swer," replied James. "I can't say he did and I 
 can't say he didn't. Perhaps, on the whole," he 
 added, slowly, "not quite." 
 
 Marjorie suddenly looked into his face. "What 
 makes you say that?" 
 
 "Really, I don't know that I can precisely ex- 
 plain," said James. "Small hints, perhaps; nothing 
 more. It's only an impression." He was still 
 weakly avoiding the inevitable plunge. "Does he 
 strike you as the kind of man who is exactly capable 
 of seeming happy?" 
 
 Marjorie offered no opinion. "Is he alone?" 
 was her next question quite quietly; but she 
 looked down again. 
 
 "I saw no one else," replied James. "He is liv- 
 ing by himself in a small flat. Mind you, I don't 
 intend to say there's no one in the background." 
 He took her hand and stroked it. "But we knew 
 that, didn't we? We knew that, you and I?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Marjorie, without emotion. 
 
 "And Marjorie, my dear," James continued, 
 gently, "I think we shall have to try to get used 
 to the idea that he is not coming back. He has 
 no ill-will towards us, to any of us quite the re- 
 verse. Our interview was perfectly friendly; we 
 
 148
 
 talked the whole thing over from beginning to end. 
 I put it to him, very plainly, that, in my opinion, 
 he was behaving in a way in which he had no 
 shadow of right to behave ; but, for all that, I gave 
 him to understand that, on our side, we were will- 
 ing to make allowances and to start afresh. Well, 
 I'm sorry to say it was no use; he talked about us 
 all with a great deal of regret, but it appears to suit 
 him to live differently, he thinks it's best for every- 
 body concerned, and when Norman Villiers makes 
 up his mind " 
 
 He stopped. Softly, without any parade, with- 
 out any breaking appeal to sympathy, the tears 
 were falling, one by one, on Marjorie's lap. It was 
 as if she had said that she expected no sympathy, 
 that she felt she called for none, but that she could 
 not but weep. It was infinitely touching. 
 
 James rose and crossed the room, and became 
 intently absorbed in a picture of cupids gambolling 
 about a figure of Flora. How near he came him- 
 self, at that moment, to some regrettable weakness 
 it would never be safe to ask him. All that could 
 be seen from the back was that he clenched his fists 
 viciously. And, under his breath, he appeared to 
 address some remarks to Flora, upon the subject 
 
 119
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 of Villiers, which would probably have considerably 
 astonished that ethereal young damsel's little white 
 ears. 
 
 The emergency of a woman's tears, it must be 
 admitted, is one which the masculine temperament 
 is singularly unfitted to face. But, though James 
 had found it necessary to beat a hasty and igno- 
 minious retreat, Marjorie was not left without sup- 
 port. Marion crossed quietly in front of the table 
 and sat down beside her. She gathered the droop- 
 ing form into her arms and laid the bowed head 
 upon her bosom. Marion could do nothing with- 
 out grace, and her manner now was full of it. She 
 didn't tell Marjorie not to cry; she refrained from 
 dabbing her eyes with officious and irritating cam- 
 bric; neither did she think it necessary to worry 
 her ears with any, possibly true, but not immediate- 
 ly consolatory, reflections upon the subject of the 
 ultimate benefit of present tribulation. Lightly 
 soothing the soft brown hair, quite quietly, yet with 
 infinite solace and tenderness in every touch, she 
 was content to hold this stricken sister in her arms, 
 while she wept silently, unchecked and unchided, 
 from her poor troubled heart. 
 
 After a while she said gently: "Give him time, 
 150
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 dear. James says he doesn't seem to be quite 
 happy even now, and he has only been away from 
 you a little more than a week. Sooner or later he 
 must tire of this new life and realise what he has 
 lost. Then he will be very lucky if you are still 
 ready to forgive him." 
 
 "I don't care what he has done," cried Marjorie, 
 almost passionately, her voice choked in the lace 
 ruffles of her sister's bodice, "or what he does, I'll 
 wait for ever, if he'll only, only come back." 
 
 Marion softly pressed back her forlorn little 
 head and continued to stroke it in silence. Pres- 
 ently she said, as if in answer to her own thoughts, 
 "So much depends upon this other woman. You 
 didn'f see her, James?" she added, turning to her 
 husband. 
 
 James came back to the fireplace. "Not that I 
 know," he said. "I met one coming down the stairs 
 as I was going up. It occurred to me that she 
 might have been to see Norman." 
 
 "What was she like?" 
 
 "Uncommonly handsome," said James. 
 
 "Perhaps you were right, then. Was she I 
 hate the word a lady?" 
 
 "She wasn't loud or flashy, if that's what you
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 mean," said James. "Stylishly dressed, but in good 
 taste. Yes, I should say so, certainly." 
 
 Marion was silent for a time. "I'm sorry," she 
 said, at length. "It will take him longer to tire. 
 But he will tire; he will come back. He must." 
 James said nothing, and she added, rather sharply, 
 "Don't you think so, James?" 
 
 James had no intention to commit himself to an 
 opinion, however. His optimism of the morning 
 had never been very real, and his visit to Norman 
 had operated destructively upon such little sub- 
 stance as it possessed. That optimism, moreover, 
 had proved too severe a handicap, when it subse- 
 quently came to be falsified, to be lightly assumed 
 again. He was silent, therefore, endeavouring to 
 express to Marion, by a rather pathetically blank 
 expression of countenance, that her interrogatory 
 should not be pressed. 
 
 He could have plumped out a direct negative 
 with less damaging effect. The pause on the ques- 
 tion beat steadily into Marjorie's brain and bore 
 to it, with dumb intensity, the stunning compre- 
 hension of her absolute loss. A rush of pain 
 overwhelming, uncontrollable flooded through 
 her. She sprang to her feet, choking back the sobs, 
 
 152
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 her wide eyes stricken and imploring, the staunched 
 tears still wet on the lashes and on her cheeks : 
 
 "Oh, James never? Never?" 
 
 It was more than James could bear. "Yes, 
 there's one way," he cried, fiercely, "I can go and 
 carry him here. And if you say the word, I'll do it" 
 
 153
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 MARJORIE did not call upon James to carry his 
 formidable threat into practice. On the other 
 hand, it cannot be said that she turned with a con- 
 scious effort to "face the music." She continued to 
 live, since live she must that was all. She looked 
 forth upon a world drab, featureless, blank. Her 
 daily life became a routine, without energy and 
 without colour. Meals with her, at this time, were 
 a periodic ceremony and nothing more. To poor 
 James it grew to be a matter of almost painful con- 
 cern to watch her knife and fork pecking for afew 
 minutes, with obvious and distracting inutility, 
 among the food on her plate, only to be laid quietly 
 down when the effort had lasted as long as polite- 
 ness demanded hardly a morsel eaten and the 
 plate carried away. He would make careful and 
 lengthy dives into some dish in front of him, in 
 search of an especial tit-bit, and dab it tentatively 
 but hopefully on her plate, when found; which 
 
 154
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Marjorie, in order to please him, would almost 
 choke herself in the heroic endeavour to eat. 
 There was no conscious listlessness about her; but 
 a heavy extraneous weariness settled on her and 
 pervaded all her actions. Her occasional valiant 
 efforts to join cheerfully and naturally in conver- 
 sation were almost sadder than her silence; her 
 cheeks became pinched and pale; and she came 
 down every morning with eyes which had plainly 
 slept little and wept much. 
 
 But she was far from attempting to inflict her 
 sorrows upon others ; she uttered no complaints ; the 
 subject of her troubles was never referred to unless 
 directly introduced from outside. She attended to 
 the welfare and the clothing of her two little girls; 
 sent them daily on their accustomed walks with 
 their nurse; listened to their chatter, talked to them, 
 played with them, sympathetically, but without 
 spirit. It was a quality of her temperament as per- 
 haps it is with many of us that she was unable to 
 appraise the full value of a good in secure posses- 
 sion. Norman had seemed little to her until his place 
 was left empty. Now, though she bore to her chil- 
 dren all that wonderful mother-love that is given to 
 women, their presence at her side could not coun- 
 
 155
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 terbalance it could hardly alleviate her loss. 
 Sometimes she would seize one or other of them in 
 a sudden spasm of affection, and leave the startled 
 little face wet with her tears. The next moment 
 she would put it gently aside and return to her man- 
 ner of settled sadness. 
 
 During this time James and Marion did all in 
 the power of mortals to turn her thoughts. She 
 understood the kindness which prompted those ef- 
 forts and did her utmost to respond. The struggle 
 required, however, invariably reacted in a depres- 
 sion of her spirits even below their normal level. 
 And the single, steadfastly present idea could not 
 be exorcised even for a moment. Between the acts 
 at a theatre, walking in Regent Street, driving 
 through the Strand, in a Bond Street tea-room, 
 when she was not absorbed, she was furtively scan- 
 ning the people about her, with half-frightened 
 hope, in search of one familiar figure. It became 
 by degrees her one distraction, all that raised her 
 out of the dead level of a drab existence that 
 trembling hope of catching a glimpse in the crowd, 
 at some moment in the course of months, of years, 
 of a clear-featured, thoughtful, resolute face. 
 What she would do if her search should prove suc- 
 
 156
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 cessful probably she hardly knew herself. It was 
 at such times that Marion endeavoured to instil 
 into her the doctrine of the fish in the sea. It was 
 a doctrine which found in Marjorie, it must be 
 said, a singularly unfavourable soil to take root in. 
 It was, perhaps, unfortunate for Marjorie at this 
 period that she had never been enthusiastically ab- 
 sorbed by the, usually, feminine distraction of 
 frocks and frou-frous. She accompanied Marion 
 upon her shopping excursions in the West End, 
 but her interest in the subject, at the best of times 
 spasmodic and evanescent, was not now to be pro- 
 voked by the most alluring display of modistic de- 
 lights. Her method of clothing herself had always 
 been of the simplest which is not to say the most 
 economical. Any article of attire which happened 
 to attract her wandering fancy of the moment she 
 bought recklessly, irrespective of price. If it 
 suited her afterwards, she wore it; if as generally 
 happened it didn't, she discarded it at once and 
 without a qualm. And usually she chose to wear 
 habitually the most unbecoming of her purchases. 
 It was a method which involved an amount of 
 wanton waste which had always jarred considerably 
 upon Norman's nerves, and it did not even possess 
 
 157
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 the saving virtue of being able to afford her a trivial 
 outlet for her thoughts, now that they were run- 
 ning too persistently in one consuming channel. 
 
 Poor Marjorie! She did all in her power to 
 keep her troubles to herself and to be the least pos- 
 sible nuisance to those about her; but, for all that, 
 it must be confessed that the effect of her presence 
 on the Baker household was emphatically the re- 
 verse of invigorating. Possibly there is no more 
 depressing influence than the constant society of one 
 for whom life has lost its savour and the earth its 
 raison d'etre. Even Marion's calm nature began 
 to be affected by the unchanging atmosphere of sub- 
 dued melancholy in which she lived. As for James, 
 it appeared to him, as the days went on, that the 
 hearty appetite he enjoyed was decidedly offensive; 
 his post-prandial cigar and half-glass of Burgundy 
 became things to be indulged in apologetically and 
 in retreat, after the ladies had retired to the draw- 
 ing-room. He arrived at the conclusion, in short, 
 that a state of affairs had been reached for which 
 a remedy must somehow be found. 
 
 In these circumstances, his mind turned to that 
 curative agent in whose universal beneficent powers 
 
 158
 
 MR AND MRS F1LLIERS 
 
 the sturdy British character reposes unshakable 
 faith, in spite of steady rebuffs the medical man. 
 
 "She had better see someone," he said to Marion, 
 a fortnight after his visit to Norman. 
 
 "A doctor?" said Marion. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Marion shook her head. "I'm afraid there is 
 no doctor with power to cure Marjorie's ailment," 
 said she. 
 
 They were sitting in James's smoke-room, after 
 Marjorie had gone to bed. 
 
 "Then there's nothing for it but to take the bull 
 by the horns," said James. "Things can't go on 
 as they are. She is wasting away before our eyes." 
 
 "Do you mean she ought to divorce him?" said 
 Marion. 
 
 "Yes," said James, "and forget him." 
 
 Marion bent forward and looked into the fire, 
 resting her chin on her hands. "She may divorce 
 him," she said, presently, "though I doubt it; but 
 she will never forget him." 
 
 "It will help her to do it, at all events," said 
 James. "Once do away with the formal tie and 
 get her out of her present false position, and she 
 will be able to face the world again on equal terms. 
 
 159
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Put a clean sheet of paper in front of her, and in 
 time she may feel inclined to write upon it." 
 
 "You may be right, dear," said Marion; "but 
 isn't that rather like cutting a tangle "which it is 
 too much trouble to unravel ? I can't help thinking 
 that when two people are genuinely attached to one 
 another as Marjorie is, in this case, and prob- 
 ably Norman, too, at the bottom of his heart 
 there ought to be some other way." 
 
 "There ought to be, I daresay," said James, 
 drily, "but there isn't." 
 
 "Supposing Marjorie went to see him herself?" 
 
 "It would be painful to both of them," said 
 James, after pondering the point; "and I don't see 
 what good would be likely to come of it." 
 
 "Norman's pride may stand in his way," said 
 Marion. "However much he desired it, he couldn't 
 return to Marjorie now, unless she asked him. 
 They have been separated nearly a month by this 
 time. And a month can work wonders occasion- 
 ally," she added, smiling. "Remember how hor- 
 ribly tired of me you always are when you go up to 
 Yorkshire for the shooting in August, but I've be- 
 come quite a nice person by the beginning of Sep- 
 tember." 
 
 160
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Almost livable with," said James, laughing. 
 
 "An annual tonic of healthy separation," said 
 Marion, "is as essential to the happiness of most 
 married people as the month in Switzerland or at 
 Brighton is to their health." 
 
 "Possibly true, my dear," said James; "but I 
 hardly fancy the remedy would be drastic enough 
 in the present case." 
 
 "At any rate, it's one they were not in the habit 
 of trying," said Marion. 
 
 "And the situation is complicated," James added, 
 "by what Norman called 'other circumstances.' ' 
 
 "Yes, of course; Marjorie knows that; it is not 
 a bar." 
 
 "So she believes," said James. "Marjorie is 
 tingling to her finger-tips with personal delicacy; 
 but I'm half-inclined to think that, upon a point of 
 abstract morals, Norman's is the sounder judgment 
 of the two." 
 
 "It is the man's judgment," said Marion, "which 
 comes from reason; Marjorie's is the woman's, 
 which comes from the heart." 
 
 "We must talk it over with her plainly in the 
 morning," said James, finally. "This state of drift 
 must be put an end to somehow. It's not good for 
 
 161
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIEES 
 
 her, and it's not good for him; and," he added 
 honestly, partly to himself, "it's not good for us." 
 
 When James arrived downstairs on the follow- 
 ing morning the two ladies were already seated at 
 breakfast. He wished them a cheery good-morn- 
 ing and took his place. Three or four letters stood 
 by his plate, which he proceeded leisurely to open 
 and read. He was not guilty of intentional rude- 
 ness; probably he would have found some difficulty 
 in realising that his action could be so characterised, 
 had it been pointed out to him. This is one of the 
 minor discourtesies of life, not requiring, one would 
 suppose, pre-eminently keen perceptions to appre- 
 ciate, yet failing of appreciation by a very large 
 number of men and women who would indignantly 
 resent any suspicion of their breeding. 
 
 Having completed the perusal of the letters and 
 made some comments upon their contents to 
 Marion comments which could not interest nor 
 even be understood by M'arjorie he placed them 
 back in their envelopes and laid them in a little pile 
 at his side. Then he turned to his sister-in-law 
 with a kindly, but graver expression than was habit- 
 ual with him. 
 
 162
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Mariorie, my dear," he said, quietly, "I think 
 the time has come when this question of your re- 
 lations to your husband will ha.ve to be faced." 
 
 Marjorie hardly knew what to expect. She 
 looked up with an expression partly of alarm, partly 
 of challenge. "I don't understand," she said. 
 
 "It is simply this, my dear," explained James, 
 as gently as he could. "There are a couple of plain 
 truths staring us in the face, which won't appear 
 any different however long we look at them: he 
 has deserted you, in the first place; and, in the 
 second, it is of no use attempting to shut our eyes 
 to the fact that he has evidently not remained 
 faithful." 
 
 Marjorie turned red, and then white. "Need we 
 talk of that, James?" she said, quickly. It was 
 not that her pride was wounded by his assertion 
 she had accepted the fact long ago, and become 
 used to it but simply that her susceptibility rose 
 in arms against reference to such a subject by a 
 man. 
 
 James did not misunderstand her; and it gave 
 him the first direct glimpse he had yet had of the 
 nature of that which Norman had found un- 
 bearable. 
 
 163
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "No," he answered, "we needn't, Marjorie; ex- 
 cept to say that those two facts in conjunction give 
 you a legal right to divorce." 
 
 "I will never divorce him," cried Marjorie, ve- 
 hemently, almost in tears, "never!" 
 
 James put down his knife and fork, and cleared 
 his throat. His present task was one which he rel- 
 ished as little as any that could have been given him. 
 
 "Now, my dear," he said, gravely, "I want you 
 to try to look at this matter calmly and dispassion- 
 ately. Don't suppose I can't understand how diffi- 
 cult that is for you to do; still, I ask you to do it, 
 if you can. There is a principle involved which is 
 quite apart from any personal sentiment and incli- 
 nation whatever. In my opinion I urge it upon 
 you as a plain man who takes a plain view it is 
 your duty to- take this step." 
 
 "I can't, James," cried Marjorie, almost wildly, 
 "I can't. It's all I have of him now all, all. 
 Don't ask me to give up even that." The tears 
 were in her eyes and her voice was choked. "He is 
 my husband," she wailed an infinite tenderness in 
 the word "my husband I" 
 
 There seemed a danger that she would go into 
 hysterics. James resumed his breakfast to allow 
 
 164
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 her time to recover. After a few minutes she fur- 
 tively wiped the tears from her eyes and returned 
 to the occupation, which James's first words had 
 interrupted, of breaking the toast on her plate into 
 little pieces. She glanced at her sister with secret 
 appeal in her eyes. But Marion knew that she was 
 in no danger of being treated with undue harshness, 
 and for the moment she wisely refrained from join- 
 ing in the discussion. 
 
 "What is the alternative?" said James. 
 
 "I can wait," Marjorie said. 
 
 "You can drift, you can pine, you can wear your- 
 self to skin and bone, perhaps into the grave. Is 
 it fair to yourself? Is it fair to your children?" 
 
 "I shall not die," said Marjorie, quietly. 
 
 "Is it fair to Norman?" 
 
 "Oh!" there was actual physical pain in the in- 
 terjection. 
 
 James had not the heart to press the point. In 
 his view, moreover, it was not the argument which 
 should carry most weight, though, doubtless, it 
 would work the most potently with her. 
 
 "It is the principle that I want you to look at, 
 Marjorie," said he. "What is to come of this 
 waiting?" 
 
 165
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Oh, I don't know," said Marjorie, wearily. 
 "He may want me some time. Why are you so 
 hard on me, James? If you take hope from me, 
 what have I to live for?" 
 
 "If I seem hard," said James, "it is only that I 
 wish your good and nothing else. I won't press 
 you one inch beyond where your own sense is will- 
 ing to take you, when you realise the facts. You 
 want to go on waiting, in the hope that, some time 
 or other, he may think better of it and come back 
 to you ?" 
 
 "Yes," said Marjorie. 
 
 "Well, then, my dear, I ask you to look at it in 
 this way: Is it right? Is it moral?" 
 
 James's own sturdy, British opinion upon the 
 subject was evident; but Marjorie only opened her 
 eyes a little wider and looked at him. She plainly 
 failed to reach his gist. 
 
 "Is he to be allowed," continued James, "to sow 
 wild oats at- this period of his life to any extent he 
 chooses, and then to come back to you and say, 
 'Marjorie, I've had enough of it; I want you to 
 take me back again'?" 
 
 Marjorie lost James's ethical point in the leaping 
 hope of the proposition it contained. Her eyes 
 
 166
 
 brightened, a soft colour flushed her cheeks, the 
 whole of her poor, wan face became pathetically 
 illumined. "Oh, James, do you think he will?" 
 The words dropped, on the gentle cadence of her 
 winning voice, with irresistible sweetness and ap- 
 peal. 
 
 James grunted. "There's not much doubt about 
 the answer you would give him, if he did," he said. 
 
 "Don't urge her any more, James," said Marion, 
 breaking in quietly, at last. "She can't do it yet. 
 After all, he didn't appear to you to be leading a 
 wildlife, did he?" 
 
 "No, he didn't," James was obliged to admit. 
 "He was barely comfortable, for that matter. 
 When I got there the windows were all open and 
 the room was full of smoke. Norman isn't a man 
 who lets much be seen on the surface, but there's 
 a pretty strong under-current, unless I'm very much 
 mistaken." 
 
 "Let us hope you are," said Marion. It ap- 
 peared to her to be an opinion that need not have 
 been volunteered. She refilled her husband's coffee- 
 cup, which had recently arrived in her neighbour- 
 hood. "Marjorie, dear, would you like to go and 
 see him?" 
 
 167
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 A crimson flush of startled joy flooded Mar- 
 jorie's face, and the tears again started to her 
 eyes. Apparently it was a possibility which had not 
 even occurred to her hitherto. She could not speak. 
 
 Marion gave her time. "Well, dear?" she said, 
 presently. 
 
 "I think it would annoy him," said Marjorie, 
 pathetically. 
 
 That was more than James could stand. 
 
 "Norman's feelings in the matter are entirely 
 beside the point, my dear," he. said. "The whoie 
 question is whether such an interview wouldn't be 
 unlikely to unsettle you and leave the future more 
 difficult to face than ever? supposing nothing 
 came of it," he almost forgot to add. 
 
 "Oh, I would risk that I would bear that," 
 said Marjorie. 
 
 "But that is just what we don't want, dear," said 
 Marion. "It grieves us to see you suffering." 
 
 "Besides that," said James, "it is not a politic 
 frame of mind to get into, if you are to go and see 
 Norman. You would have to show him that he 
 has made a mistake." He smiled at her kindly. 
 "Just at present I'm afraid the plant for that pur- 
 
 168
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 pose has got a trifle out of order. You've run your- 
 self down with worry and grown peaky and thin." 
 
 "Marjorie can look nice," said Marion. 
 
 "Yes; the trouble is," said James, "that she re- 
 fuses to look her best." 
 
 "I will look my best," put in Marjorie, almost 
 breathlessly; "I'll put on my cream cloth." 
 
 This was a gown which Marjorie had originally 
 bought for a wedding, which had suited her indubi- 
 tably, but which she had never been known to wear 
 since. 
 
 "Yes, and the beaver hat that goes with it," sup- 
 plemented Marion, "trimmed with ostrich plumes. 
 She will be well dressed, James," she added, calmly. 
 
 "If you say so, my dear," remarked James, "I 
 haven't a doubt about it." 
 
 Marion looked at her sister. "It would make 
 you happier to go, dear?" she asked. 
 
 Marjorie raised her eyes and returned the look 
 without speaking; then, half-timidly, stretched out 
 her hand. 
 
 "Take her, James," said Marion, holding the 
 hand. 
 
 "Eat well and drink well, for the next week," 
 169
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 said James, "and if the roses have come back by 
 that time, we'll think about it. ... Pass the 
 Cavendish marmalade, if Marion has left any." 
 
 170
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 JAMES was one of that numerous and excellent 
 class which "has" its Saturday afternoons; whose 
 members cease to be commercial machines and be- 
 come human beings, with social duties to perform, 
 human passions to recognise, personal needs and 
 wants to supply, for one half-day in the week. 
 Ever since he was a boy James had been accus- 
 tomed to a half-holiday on Saturday. He had now 
 reached a position where a half -holiday or a holi- 
 day of any kind was a matter entirely within his 
 own controlj but it suited him generally to remain 
 faithful to Saturday; and so a Saturday it was that 
 he nominated for Marjorie's visit to her husband. 
 On this occasion, however, he extended the prescrip- 
 tive limits of his weekly leisure by adding the morn- 
 ing. He had no intention to make a third at the in- 
 terview ; all he set himself was to bring his charge to 
 the place of meeting in as sound a condition, men- 
 
 171
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 tally and physically, to fight her own battle, as he 
 had it in him to do. 
 
 Marjorie, in the meantime, had faithfully done 
 her best to obey his injunctions. But eating and 
 drinking is pathetically little a matter of the will, 
 and pathetically much a matter of temperament and 
 external conditions. Still, the excitement engen- 
 dered by the prospect of her visit had acted bene- 
 ficially on her spirits and roused her from the 
 lethargy into which she had seemed to be in danger 
 of sinking. If the "roses" could not be said to 
 have returned to her cheeks, at least there was an 
 underglow in her general air which it had previ- 
 ously lacked, and when she came down on the morn- 
 ing of the fateful Saturday, arrayed in the cream 
 cloth, James surveyed her appearance without dis- 
 satisfaction. 
 
 "But can't you manage something different about 
 the hair?" he suggested, a little diffidently, at the 
 conclusion of his scrutiny, "something like Marion 
 has it?" 
 
 And, indeed, there was a very marked contrast 
 between her soft stretch of fluffy brown hair, 
 brushed plainly back, and the smooth coils that bil- 
 lowed in graceful abundance about Marion's head. 
 
 172
 
 On this point, however, Marjorie was obdurate. 
 "I've always worn it like this," she said, simply; 
 "I can't change it now. Besides, I shall have my 
 hat on." 
 
 This was the cream beaver with ostrich plumes. 
 It was donned an hour or two later, and James had 
 no longer any excuse for criticism. Marjorie, as 
 she had promised to be, was at her best. The 
 simple, retreating figure we have become accus- 
 tomed to had disappeared, and one very different 
 stood in its place. Without ostentation, she was 
 quietly conscious of herself and of the dignity of 
 her sex, delicately elegant, unassuming, yet perfect- 
 ly assured. Beneath her calm exterior, however, she 
 was sheltering considerable mental excitement, a 
 fact which James recognised. 
 
 "Give me your hand," he said. 
 
 The right was already gloved, so she held out 
 the left, and for a moment he clasped the long, thin 
 fingers in his palm. 
 
 "Trembling," he pronounced. He dropped her 
 hand. "The Carlton, I think," he said, "and 
 Clicquot '92." 
 
 To the Carlton they went. And let it be said at 
 once that, if we have conveyed the impression that 
 
 173
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Marjorie would find herself in these circumstances 
 anything in the nature of a fish out of water, we 
 have completely misled our readers. It was never, 
 with her, a question of what she could be, but of 
 what she would. As she preceded James to their 
 table, she was more at her ease even than he, who 
 had trodden these same halls many a time and oft. 
 She threaded her way quietly along, carrying her- 
 self at the full height of her tall figure, breeding 
 and grace in every movement. Not Marion her- 
 self could have excelled her. More than two or 
 three pairs of eyes were turned to follow her as she 
 passed. 
 
 "Nice-looking woman the old boy has with him," 
 said one carefully groomed young gentleman to an 
 equally exquisite companion of the other sex. 
 "Wonder what he's after?" 
 
 Why a man who is still in the neighbourhood of 
 forty must necessarily become "old" because his 
 figure shows a tendency to run away with him is a 
 question which James, who had overheard the re- 
 mark, would have liked to have had satisfactorily 
 answered. 
 
 "Thought so," commented the immaculate 
 174.
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 youth, out of the profundity of his wisdom, when 
 the champagne was placed on James's table. 
 
 He was a trifle disappointed to find that 
 Marjorie steadily declined to drink more than a 
 single glass, in spite of James's pressure; though 
 the action of the latter, in repeatedly urging it upon 
 her, was one which the wisdom aforesaid found 
 ridiculously easy to construe. 
 
 After lunch they sat for half an hour in the 
 Palm Court, while James smoked a cigar, which 
 he was careful to take from his own case, thereby 
 saving 75 per cent., and possibly securing a better 
 article. No more generous, open-handed creature 
 than James breathed, but he was also a business 
 man and he disliked waste. Had Marjorie been 
 masculine and a smoker, she would have paid the 
 additional 75 per cent, and then probably have 
 thrown away three-quarters of the cigar. 
 
 James was not satisfied with her state. He could 
 see that the arm which raised her coffee-cup was 
 not quite steady. He would have been far better 
 pleased had she been willing to draw the line at 
 lunch a little less rigorously. Such a concession, as 
 he touchingly pointed out to her at the time, would 
 have been beneficial to both of them, since no one 
 
 175
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 knew better than himself that the extra glasses 
 which her abstemiousness had compelled him to 
 drink would not be left out of the account in the 
 subsequent settlement with his digestion. To dis- 
 tract her thoughts, he encouraged her to talk about 
 their neighbours and to make conjectures as to 
 their probable relationships. It is a profitless but 
 entertaining form of speculation, which who has 
 not indulged in? 
 
 Near them were seated a couple of opposite 
 sex, need it be stated? who appeared at the dis- 
 tance of a few yards to be very innocent and very 
 amiable and very young. His cheek was as smooth 
 as a schoolboy's, and her eyes were as round as a 
 baby's. Yet, if you could have gone quite close to 
 them, Marjorie, you would have noticed that the 
 hair of each was tinged with grey; and if they had 
 happened to look up, you would probably have 
 come to the conclusion that both had a working 
 acquaintance with the ways of the world they lived 
 in. He had a book in his hand evidently a new 
 one in which, at the moment when James and 
 Marjorie first noticed them, he was writing in pen- 
 cil. She was watching him earnestly too earnestly 
 for it to be quite real. He gave her the 
 
 176
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 book when he had finished writing, and for 
 some minutes they looked intently at one another 
 and talked of very momentous things, to judge 
 from the expression of their countenances. Then 
 suddenly she snatched the paper cover from the 
 book and began to write in it in her turn. 
 
 "Now she is writing," said Marjorie. "How 
 funny they are! I wonder what it's all about?" 
 
 "Playing 'consequences,' probably," said James, 
 reclining pleasantly in his chair and emitting a thick 
 cloud of smoke. "About their mark, I should say. 
 They look as if they'd got out of the nursery by 
 mistake. She isn't sure what 'she said to him' ' 
 (as the lady hesitated) . "Come, Miss Grave Eyes, 
 write 'You really mustn't' and have done with it." 
 
 James's supposition was very wide of the mark, 
 however. The book is the British Barbarians, and 
 he has just written her name in it. She is now 
 hastily committing some of her own verses to the 
 somewhat flimsy paper of the loose cover she 
 said she always jotted them down on odd scraps in 
 that way. (A clean sheet of foolscap on an orderly 
 desk is obviously anathema to the poetic tempera- 
 ment.) But the verses are certainly not without 
 rhyme, nor, for the matter of that, without reason. 
 
 177
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Perhaps, as she is so absorbed, she will not resent 
 it if we glance over her shoulder and take down 
 the first two stanzas : 
 
 " I know not whence he came : 
 
 I only know 
 That things are not the same ; 
 
 Nor gloom, nor glow, 
 Nor summer's flowery meads, 
 
 Nor winter's snow. 
 
 * I know not why he came : 
 
 I only know 
 Life holds a loftier aim, 
 
 Above, below, 
 The whole world is become 
 
 Diviner so." 
 
 When she had completed her task she handed 
 the cover to her companion. He read the verses, 
 made a few polite comments, ventured diffidently 
 to suggest the practical difficulties attending a 
 "loftier aim below," was informed, equally politely, 
 that the aimer and not the aim was "below," 
 thought better of an impulse to inquire if the same 
 reading applied to "above," then carefully folded 
 the paper and slipped it in his pocket where he 
 found it a fortnight later, the next time he put on 
 the coat. 
 
 "They seem to be getting on very well," said 
 178
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 Marjorie. "I wonder if they are married, or going 
 to be?" 
 
 Yes, Marjorie, they are married, but not to one 
 another; and if they were, they would quarrel in 
 a fortnight, as they have already done with their 
 present partners. 
 
 "Oh, dear, this is very ridiculous," said Mar- 
 jorie, suddenly, "all this guessing. Do you suppose 
 other people are doing the same thing about us?" 
 
 The small distraction, nevertheless, had done her 
 good. She was more like herself than James had 
 seen her for some time. To be herself, however, 
 was not enough; she must be above herself, or be- 
 low, if the task that lay before her was to be under- 
 taken with any prospect of success. He determined 
 to subject her mental attitude to rather a searching 
 test. 
 
 "Very likely," he said. "I heard a man, as we 
 came in, say he thought the old boy had got hold 
 of a nice-looking woman." 
 
 Marjorie drew in her breath. For a moment 
 the inclination to be shocked, to be horrified, gripped 
 her. James saw it. Then, instead, "Ohl" she ex- 
 claimed real indignation in her voice "you are 
 not at all old. I think you look very nice, James." 
 
 179
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Well done," said James. He pressed out his 
 cigar in the ash-tray. "Now let us get a cab and 
 
 go." 
 
 When they reached Albany Mansions, they were 
 told that Villiers was out. The commissionnaire, on 
 being asked if they could wait, showed them into 
 a small apartment on the ground floor, barely fur- 
 nished with three hard chairs and a square table a 
 room which he was accustomed to use himself in 
 the intervals of his duties. This wait was unfor- 
 tunate. Marjorie sat on one of the straight chairs, 
 her hands in her muff, all her lately found spirit 
 slowly oozing through her finger-tips. James tried 
 hard at first to keep the conversation flowing upon 
 the easy lines of the Palm Court. But the environ- 
 ment was no longer benevolent; no dramas were 
 working out on every hand. Marjorie could only 
 see the heavy drop-curtain which would shortly lift 
 upon the second act of her own drama. She could 
 not respond. Even the effort to talk at all was con- 
 siderable. After a time James realised this. He 
 gave up the attempt, picked up a slightly crumpled 
 copy of the Daily Mail that was lying on the table, 
 and instantly became imbued with the idea that the 
 world was coming to an end. 
 
 180
 
 They had been waiting nearly half an hour, 
 when they heard a hansom draw up to the curb 
 outside. Immediately afterwards several other 
 slight sounds penetrated to the little room. There 
 was a slight ripple of woman's laughter, and a sil- 
 very voice called out, "Don't forget the parcels, 
 Norman." A skirt swept past the door, followed 
 by a man's footsteps, and then, gradually, silence. 
 
 Marjorie sat perfectly motionless, though her 
 heart was beating as if it would choke her. 
 
 After a lapse of a few seconds the door was 
 opened, and a uniformed head and shoulders ap- 
 peared in the aperture. 
 
 "Mr Villiers has gone upstairs, sir," said the 
 commissionnaire. 
 
 James took Marjorie's hand. It felt chill and 
 lifeless even through her glove. He gave it a 
 friendly pressure. 
 
 "Now, run up, little Marjorie," he said: "Num- 
 ber eleven on the second floor. Keep your heart 
 high. And good luck to you I" 
 
 181
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE last thing in the world thatMarjorie desired 
 was to catch her husband in the society of the com- 
 panion with whom she had heard him go upstairs. 
 She disliked scenes, she felt herself to be incapable 
 of rising to a great situation, and more potent 
 cause than either she was acutely anxious to avoid 
 distressing Norman. So she crept up the steps, 
 listening as she went. Passing the first-floor rooms, 
 a sudden shout of laughter brought her to a dead 
 halt, her heart thumping. The noise subsided, and 
 she went on again. The ascent was not a long one, 
 and she made it slowly, yet when she reached the 
 second floor she was panting as from strong exer- 
 tion. A sickly weakness came over her, and she 
 was obliged to lean upon the banister for support. 
 And she could not still her heart. Yet, even then, 
 she did not regret having come. She had strung 
 herself to the point of this interview to make this 
 
 182
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 bid for her life's happiness and she intended to 
 carry it through, cost her what it might. 
 
 After a few moments she felt equal to go on. 
 The latch of No. 1 1 was fixed the door was even 
 slightly ajar so she pushed it open and went in. 
 She found herself in a small lobby and almost in 
 total darkness. For some seconds she could hear 
 nothing but the beating of her own heart. After- 
 wards several slight sounds successively reached her 
 ears the creak of a chair, a rustle of papers, a 
 low cough. Then she realised with a deep thank- 
 fulness, a deep joy, overwhelming every other feel- 
 ing, that only a thin door now separated her from 
 the man who, for the last five weeks, had scarcely 
 been absent from her thoughts for a single moment, 
 day or night. 
 
 Very gently she turned the handle of the door 
 and went inside. Norman was seated at a table 
 with his back to her. He was not writing, though 
 his papers were spread out in front of him. He 
 was leaning back in his chair with a small book in 
 his hands, of which he was quickly, almost angrily, 
 turning the leaves. Marjorie knew the book, and 
 she knew the state of mind that called it into use. 
 How often had she not seen him sitting in precisely 
 
 183
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 the same attitude, occupied in precisely the same 
 way? his vigorous brain, teeming with unwritten 
 stores, held in temporary and galling bondage by 
 a single elusive word. 
 
 He heard her step, and mistook it. "Rosa- 
 mond," he said, still twirling the leaves of the 
 synonym dictionary, "what is the word which sug- 
 gests a tone of command, but gives some idea of 
 injustice or harshness? Not 'arbitrary,' and not 
 'arrogant,* and not 'imperative' something 
 quicker, sharper; I've used it often." 
 
 "I think it's 'peremptory' you mean, Norman," 
 said Marjorie, gently. 
 
 Norman started then slowly rose from his seat 
 and turned to face her. It was characteristic of 
 him that, before speaking, he bent down and made 
 a note of the word. 
 
 "I am sorry you have done this, Marjorie," he 
 said. 
 
 He noticed the change in her appearance, and his 
 first feeling was one of unreasoning gratification; 
 to be followed almost immediately by acute regret, 
 as he realised its purpose. For, in spite of all her 
 fine feathers, he saw the Marjorie he had known 
 tender, retreating, pure-souled, loving, loyal, cap- 
 
 184
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 able of opening and expanding among things lovely 
 and of good report, but ready to shrink into tearful 
 seclusion before a single harsh word or rough 
 phrase or untimely jest. And he saw, besides, the 
 brave determination to hide unhideable nature, and 
 to become such as she thought he would wish. 
 Marjorie could be nothing but herself. She had 
 been herself at the Carlton in that environment 
 she had dilated ; she was herself now, but drooping, 
 overstrained, beneath her resolute fight to be other- 
 wise. The sight of her went to Norman's heart. 
 
 Something of this showed in his face. The look 
 of distress that came into it was as fraught with 
 disheartening meaning to poor Marjorie as a 
 judge's severest frown to a prisoner in the dock. 
 All James's careful measures, all her own heroic 
 resolutions, had failed at the first moment they 
 were put upon trial. And beneath the bitter dis- 
 appointment that the knowledge carried with it her 
 fortitude gave way. Tears started to her eyes, and 
 the faint sickliness again oppressed her. She 
 swayed slightly and laid a hand heavily upon a 
 table near her. 
 
 "You are not well. You are ill," cried Norman, 
 sudden anxiety in his voice. He crossed the space 
 
 185
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 between them, and supported her, very gently, to a 
 low chair near a window. Then he opened the 
 casement and let the cold breeze play upon her. 
 "It is too much for you. You should not have 
 come, dear." 
 
 The last word was not uttered mechanically, but 
 quite earnestly. It dropped upon Marjorie's ears 
 like a note of melody. 
 
 But she gave no sign that she had noticed it. "It 
 is very stupid of me," she said. "I can't under- 
 stand it. I shall be all right in a minute or two." 
 
 She closed her eyes, and Norman stood watching 
 her. Presently a slight colour returned to her 
 cheeks, and she lifted her lids again. But she did 
 not immediately speak. Without appearing to ob- 
 serve him, she was conscious, on her side also, of 
 a change in her husband since she had seen him 
 last. His eyes were duller and his skin more 
 opaque, and there was an indefinite suggestion of 
 heaviness in his air which had not been there be- 
 fore. Quite naturally her eyes sought his, eyes 
 which, without any design to work upon his feel- 
 ings, but because she could not help it, were filled 
 with all the pent-up wretchedness of the last five 
 weeks. 
 
 186
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIERS 
 
 "Norman," she said, simply, "I can't do with- 
 out you. Why have you left me?" 
 
 Norman was half leaning, half sitting upon the 
 table, staring into the fire. "We won't talk of that, 
 Marjorie," he said, "it will only distress you." 
 
 "Oh, but you must let me talk of it," she cried, 
 almost piteously. "That is why I have come." 
 
 Villiers looked at her eager, distressful face, and 
 then looked away again. "I think you know quite 
 well why I left you," he said. 
 
 "Yes," she replied. She bent her eyes to her 
 muff, and a slight flush mounted to her cheeks. "I 
 didn't understand." 
 
 "And that is the whole kernel of it," said he, 
 still looking into the fire. "It is because you didn't 
 understand, and never could understand, because 
 you are too what shall I call it? too immaculate 
 ever to understand, that we cannot unite." 
 
 Marjorie paused. The next thing was very 
 hard to say. But she made a struggle and said it, 
 hardly above her breath: "It would be different 
 now." 
 
 "It would have been different at any time, had 
 you known. I don't doubt that, Marjorie," said 
 Norman. 
 
 187
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 She looked up with quick hope; but he stopped 
 her before she could speak, suddenly turning his 
 glance full upon hers. 
 
 "Oh, don't you realise," he cried, "don't you 
 know me well enough to be sure that it could give 
 me no gratification to martyr you? Or that I could 
 do otherwise than loathe myself if I did?" 
 
 "But but I am your wife," she said. 
 
 "Oh, yes, I know that I am invested by Church 
 and State with plenary powers to immolate you, 
 and that you are a willing victim. If I had been a 
 savage, we might have continued to live together. 
 I don't say you would have been happy." 
 
 "What do you want me to say?" cried Marjorie, 
 helplessly. "I will be all I can, dear." 
 
 "I know, I know. It is not a matter of your 
 own volition. Things are what they are, and 
 nothing can alter them. Apart from everything 
 else, do you think it would be right for us to live 
 together in such conditions?" 
 
 "Yes," said Marjorie, without hesitation; "we 
 are married." 
 
 "But don't you see, can't you realise, that rela- 
 tions such as those are not only physically vapid, 
 but morally wrong, unless entirely reciprocal?" 
 
 188
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "I don't know," said Marjorie, rather piteously. 
 "I only know I want you." 
 
 "You want me and yet " He pulled a chair 
 from under the table and sat upon it. "What a 
 curious, complex nature yours is, Marjorie ! I wish 
 I could understand it. Now, supposing I am 
 putting a hypothetical case supposing I were to 
 live next door, and came in to see you and talk to 
 you, say, two or three times a week, would that 
 do?" 
 
 "No," said Marjorie; "I should want to know 
 you were there" 
 
 "But I should be there next door accessible 
 at any time and willing to help you." 
 
 Marjorie shook her head. "It wouldn't be the 
 same thing," she said. "I should want to feel I 
 had you in the house, to rely upon and make me 
 feel safe." 
 
 "Well, we will imagine another case," said Nor- 
 man. "Say a great number of people lived together 
 in a large house, you and I among others. We 
 should meet every day in the ordinary course, at 
 meals and so on; and I should always be available 
 for advice, whenever you thought it worth asking 
 for." 
 
 189
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "No, no," cried Marjorie; "I want to have a 
 right upon you that no one else has." 
 
 "To my support?" said Norman. "You have 
 that." 
 
 "No, no, no!" Marjorie was almost impatient 
 with him. "Something much more personal than 
 that. Can't you understand?" 
 
 "I don't think you understand yourself, Mar- 
 jorie," said Norman, quietly. "I can see you are 
 conscious of a desire to stand in some peculiar re- 
 lationship to me. What relationship, I don't think 
 you know. Certainly not that usually involved by 
 marriage. Do you mean what people call a 'kin- 
 ship of souls'? But that doesn't require personal 
 contact or even propinquity." 
 
 "Oh, how cold you are!" cried Marjorie. At 
 last she found herself, and her words came quickly 
 on a flood of emotion. "Besides all that, besides 
 having you near me to protect and advise and be 
 good to me, I should want you sometimes to talk 
 to me as you used to talk, and and " Suddenly 
 she slipped from her seat and knelt before him, 
 spreading her arms upon him: " and I should 
 want you sometimes to to " she bent her head 
 " to kiss me, Norman." 
 
 190
 
 MR AND MRS F1LLIERS 
 
 He strained away from her as far as the chair 
 would permit. "You don't know what you are 
 doing," he cried, hoarsely. He was very deeply 
 moved. "Get up! Get up!" 
 
 "I do," said Marjorie, passionately. "I do know, 
 and I don't care." She snatched his hand and 
 pressed it to her hot cheek, and the tears fell upon 
 it and bedewed it. "You are mine mine." 
 
 He lifted her very gently and placed her back 
 in the chair, then turned and strode several times 
 up and down the room a habit of his when he 
 was strongly stirred. After a time he came to a 
 standstill near her, and looked down upon her with 
 an expression in which distress and esteem were 
 mingled with an emotion deeper than either. 
 
 "What can I say to you, Marjorie?" he said. 
 "Beside you, I am only a brute beast, not worthy 
 to bend down and kiss the hem of your dress. At 
 this moment I am drawn to you almost irresistibly. 
 Yet, even if " he hesitated " even if there were 
 nothing else, and we were to resume our old life, 
 I know that in a few months a few weeks, per- 
 haps it would all have to be gone through again. 
 We cannot change we who are made as I am. 
 Don't I know that? People sometimes wonder 
 
 191
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 what they would ask if they were to be granted a 
 wish. If I could have one. wish gratified, I should 
 choose to be deprived of all " 
 
 "I know what you mean," said Marjorie, hastily. 
 "You needn't explain." 
 
 The words slipped from her lips without 
 thought. The next moment she could have bitten 
 her tongue out. 
 
 "Believe me," said Norman, quietly, "I was go- 
 ing to choose a phrase which should have trenched 
 the very least upon your delicacy." 
 
 "Oh, what have I said? I didn't mean that." 
 Marjorie's tears began to flow afresh. "Oh, why 
 can't you be cruel to me?" she wailed piteously. 
 "Why can't you beat me, anything, make me hate 
 you? Then life might be bearable without you. 
 But, all the time, you are so just and so gentle, and 
 I know it and I love you for it." She bowed her 
 face into her open palms, and he could see her 
 slight shoulders moving silently. 
 
 It was more than he could bear. He dropped 
 on one knee before her, quietly removed the two 
 pathetically slender hands and pressed them be- 
 tween his own. 
 
 "Don't talk like that, dear," he said. "You live 
 192
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 so near heaven yourself that you can't realise what 
 I am. If you knew how I have lived during these 
 weeks since I left you, you would understand that 
 I am a man not to be loved by one such as you, 
 but to be despised and detested." 
 
 She freed one hand and frantically dashed the 
 tears from her face. "That is my fault," she cried, 
 hotly, "not yours. That is my sin, not yours." 
 
 "Hush, hush!" said Norman. "You couldn't 
 sin if you tried." 
 
 "It isn't any good trying to make me believe 
 that," she answered, still wiping the tears. "The 
 whole of my life, since I married you, has been a 
 sin a sin of selfishness and thoughtlessness." 
 
 "No," said Norman, gravely, "you must not 
 think that. We were oil and water put into a 
 bottle together, and we didn't mix, and never could 
 mix." 
 
 "I didn't try to mix." 
 
 "You did all you could," said Norman. 
 
 "Yes, I was ready to be martyred, with a bad 
 grace. Oh, I know. And all those years you suf- 
 fered, and didn't even scold me." 
 
 Norman rose to his feet with a light, good- 
 humoured laugh. "Why, I might as well have 
 
 193
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 scolded the moon," he said, brightly, "because it 
 didn't shine red." 
 
 He went over to the writing-table for a cigarette. 
 When he returned to the mantelpiece to find a 
 match, Marjorie had risen too. Her hands were 
 clasped low down in front of her, and her face was 
 turned up to his, an expression of the utmost stress 
 in her eyes. 
 
 "I can't go on living without you," she said. "It 
 would break my heart. I haven't been a good wife. 
 Perhaps you are right perhaps I can't be. Nor- 
 man, I won't mind" her voice suddenly dropped 
 "whom you know." 
 
 Norman stopped in the act of lighting his cig- 
 arette and turned his eyes upon her. "Marjorie I" 
 
 "Yes, I mean that," said Marjorie, quietly. "As 
 long as you are justified." 
 
 Norman threw the match into the fire. The 
 cigarette was not lighted, and he didn't light it. 
 This was a possibility, it must be said to his credit, 
 which had not even occurred to him hitherto. Now 
 that it was brought to his mind, and by Marjorie 
 herself, he could not fail to perceive its subtle al- 
 lurement. It flashed across him that Rosamond 
 might probably be induced to agree ; indeed, it was 
 
 191
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 scarcely an expansion of the terms she herself had 
 originally laid down for their intercourse. His 
 present life, he was beginning to see more clearly 
 every day, was good neither for himself nor his 
 work. His mental stamina was gradually dete- 
 riorating under the perfumed influence of the too 
 gracious daughter of Uranus and the sea. In the 
 quiet, unexciting atmosphere surrounding Marjorie 
 he knew he would become capable of better and 
 more work, with advantage to his general welfare. 
 If he had been an immoral man he would have ac- 
 cepted her offer. But, in spite of its fair promise, 
 its innocuous suggestion, there was that at the back 
 of him which fiercely rejected such a solution of his 
 present difficulties. He could not have argued the 
 point ; he could only see it feel it. 
 
 "No," he said, at last, firmly, "the position 
 would be outrageous, unthinkable." 
 
 "Why?" said Marjorie. "I shouldn't know. I 
 shouldn't ask. And you would be happy." 
 
 "Would you?" said Norman. 
 
 She hesitated. "Much more than I am now," 
 she said. 
 
 "But can't you see," he said, "it would be im- 
 moral grossly?" 
 
 195
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 The eyes that were looking at him widened just 
 perceptibly. 
 
 "Oh, I know," he said; "you think I have a 
 poor enough title to talk upon that subject. But, 
 all the same, there is a difference, Marjorie. I 
 can't explain it. I know it. A double life espe- 
 cially one accepted and acknowledged is a contra- 
 vention of every code, written and unwritten. And 
 at least, as the position is, you are not involved by 
 it, your pure soul is free from taint." 
 
 Marjorie said nothing for a time. She bent her 
 eyes upon the fire. Then she looked up. "I can't 
 argue with you, Norman. You know I never 
 could. But I think, perhaps, it might save you 
 from worse." 
 
 "That is my look-out," said Norman. "You 
 must not stain yourself to rescue me. You can 
 feel," he added, gently, "that this would be to stain 
 yourself?" 
 
 Once more Marjorie hesitated. "Yes," she said, 
 slowly, in a low voice; and then again, after another 
 pause, "yes." 
 
 "And yet," said Norman, "it is less repugnant 
 to you than the ordinary relations of wifehood." 
 
 Marjorie turned her eyes upon him with such a 
 196
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 look as a wounded deer might give which has re- 
 ceived a wanton lash from a whip. 
 
 "Forgive me," said Norman at once, humbly: 
 "it was thoughtless." 
 
 "But not any more than these years of omission 
 have stained me," Marjorie went on, quickly. "I 
 owe some return for that. And I accept it will- 
 ingly, for your sake and mine. To save you from 
 what you said in your letter, from 'drifting utterly,' 
 for your good, body and soul, and because I love 
 you." 
 
 Norman made no movement. He had leant his 
 elbows on the mantelpiece and pressed his hands to 
 his head. To Marjorie, who had bowed herself to 
 so extreme a point of wifely humility and generos- 
 ity, it seemed hardly credible that he could decline 
 the proffered gift. 
 
 Slowly she drew herself up and looked deeply at 
 his averted face, with an expression of mingled pain 
 and pride. "Norman, you can't refuse? You 
 can't" 
 
 She came to an abrupt silence. The outer door 
 had opened and closed, there was a swish of skirts 
 in the lobby, and she heard the same silvery laugh 
 that had reached her ears below. Norman sprang 
 
 197
 
 MR AND MBS VILLIEES 
 
 towards the door. He was too late. It opened, 
 and Rosamond entered, in the freshest of gowns 
 and happiest of moods. 
 
 She had a slim morocco-covered volume in her 
 hand, and she was talking as she came in. "Here's 
 the Sigea, Norman. She's terribly wicked, but 
 vastly exciting. You must " She stopped as she 
 caught sight of Marjorie. 
 
 There was an interval of strained silence. Nor- 
 man went up to her, took the book from her hand, 
 and locked it in a cupboard. Then he turned 
 around. 
 
 "Rosamond, this is my wife," he said. 
 
 198
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 INSTINCTIVELY Marjorie had drawn slightly 
 away from Rosamond. Which was rather inconsist- 
 ent of you, little Marjorie. You are ready to fall 
 into the arms of the man ; from the woman your 
 sister, the weaker vessel you draw aside. You are 
 fond of declaiming against what you call "man's 
 law," which has an easier judgment for erring man 
 than erring woman ; it is you, the women, who make 
 the law, and see that it is fulfilled. 
 
 Seeing Marjorie's movement, a natural instinct 
 of protection took Norman to Rosamond's side. 
 
 "I can't talk to you now, Rosamond," he said, 
 gently. "You are not in a hurry, are you?" 
 
 "Oh, dear, no," said Rosamond, lightly. "I'd 
 no idea there was anyone with you. So sorry. 
 You'll come across, won't you?" 
 
 She turned with a soft rustle, smiling brightly, 
 and would have left the room, had not Marjorie 
 unexpectedly intervened. 
 
 199
 
 "Please don't go," she said. "I would rather 
 you stayed. I want to talk to you." 
 
 She could hardly have said why she did it. It 
 was an impulse. Something in the easy familiarity 
 of Norman's tone and of Rosamond's response 
 its suggestion of camaraderie impressed her sud- 
 denly with the conviction that unless she could en- 
 list this woman's co-operation she would fail in her 
 object. 
 
 Rosamond stopped quickly, in surprise. "To 
 me?" she said. 
 
 "Marjorie, you understand?" said Norman, 
 hastily, a note of anxiety in his voice. 
 
 "Yes," said Marjorie, quietly, "I understand. I 
 know. That is why I want you didn't properly 
 introduce us," she added, with a nervous laugh. 
 
 "Don't let us have a scene," said Norman, "it 
 can do no good." 
 
 She looked at him with rather surprised re- 
 proach. "Oh, Norman, did I ever make a scene?" 
 Then, quickly turning to Rosamond, "Please, what 
 can I call you ?" she said. 
 
 Rosamond seemed to be slightly tickled. "I 
 have sometimes wondered," she said. "My name 
 is Rosamond Hope." 
 
 200
 
 MB AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Marjorie looked puzzled. "I seem to have 
 heard it before," said she. "I wonder where?" 
 She paused and reflected. "I can't think," she 
 said, finally. 
 
 "Perhaps Marion could tell you," said Norman. 
 
 "Marion?" Marjorie repeated the name slowly. 
 "Oh, yes," she cried, suddenly, "I remember. You 
 write," she said to Rosamond. 
 
 "I babble about dress," said Rosamond, smiling. 
 "I don't think Norman would call it writing. The 
 other day, in fact, he was decidedly scathing on 
 the subject. Weren't you, Norman?" 
 
 "We discussed a few peculiarities of style," said 
 Norman, with a laugh. 
 
 But the laugh was unnatural. The whole situa- 
 tion, indeed, was strained and difficult to keep up. 
 Norman searched his brain desperately for some 
 means of ending it. Then suddenly Marjorie broke 
 through the ice. 
 
 "How lovely you are !" she said, gravely, look- 
 ing at Rosamond. "I don't wonder Norman is 
 fond of you." 
 
 Rosamond blushed with pleasure and embarrass- 
 ment. A compliment from a woman is worth ten 
 from a man especially from a woman standing in 
 
 201
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 such a relation as Marjorie. No one knew that 
 better than Rosamond. 
 
 "If I were an artist," continued Marjorie, almost 
 enthusiastically, "I should want to paint you." 
 
 She sat down beside the table. A quick rush of 
 spontaneity made Rosamond pull a chair from 
 under it and do the same. She put her elbows on 
 the cloth and looked intently at Marjorie across a 
 corner. 
 
 "Mrs. Villiers, why don't you hate me?" she 
 said. 
 
 "Why should I?" said Marjorie. "You are 
 wiser than I am. Why should I hate you for that?" 
 
 "But we we have made you unhappy." 
 
 "I have made myself unhappy," said Marjorie. 
 
 Rosamond said nothing for a moment or two. 
 Possibly it had sometimes occurred to her that, by 
 some such accident as had actually happened, she 
 would eventually meet Norman's wife; possibly she 
 had pictured in her mind what such an interview 
 would be like. Never, never had her imagination 
 painted such a scene as this. Never had she sup- 
 posed that she would look into a pair of quiet eyes 
 and become conscious of herself and her shortcom- 
 ings as at no time before, would listen to a gentle 
 
 2C3
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 voice, whose unreproaching sadness would beat into 
 her heart and move her to a deep gush of self- 
 reproof. 
 
 "I wish I had known you before," she said, sud- 
 denly. 
 
 Marjorie widened her eyes in that almost child- 
 like way of hers when anything puzzled her. 
 "Why?" she said. 
 
 "Because it might have been different," said 
 Rosamond. "Oh, what a muddling place this 
 world is! Norman, what can we do?" 
 
 Norman was standing by the fireplace. "I don't 
 think I quite understand what you mean," he said. 
 "We can do nothing. We can't put back the hands 
 of the clock. The die has been cast and we must 
 abide by it, for good or ill." 
 
 And could any of the three honestly have said 
 that it was for good? Marjorie's heart was break- 
 ing; Norman, deep in his inner self, was conscious 
 that the life he was leading was inimical to all that 
 was best in him ; even Rosamond, now that she had 
 met Marjorie, felt the stinging stab of remorse. 
 
 Yet, such is the frailty of human nature, that 
 Norman, gripped by sudden after-thought, added 
 hastily: "You couldn't part now, Rosamond?" 
 
 203
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "I don't know," said Rosamond. "Oh, no, no!" 
 she burst out. She looked almost beseechingly at 
 Marjorie. "Mrs Villiers, I couldn't, I couldn't. 
 Why have you come like this?" she went on, hur- 
 riedly. "If you had been vicious, scathing, I 
 wouldn't have minded. I would have defied you. 
 But you are kind and you are unhappy. You 
 make me feel as if such a wicked person as I must 
 be, should never have been allowed to be born." 
 
 "You mustn't speak like that," said Norman, 
 quickly. "The only blame is mine." 
 
 She threw him a quick glance of gratitude. "I 
 knew you would say that," she said. "But I've 
 lost any illusion I may have had upon that point; 
 it's not yours, it's mine." 
 
 "It is mine," said Marjorie, quietly. Rosa- 
 mond's evident sincerity appealed to her strongly, 
 as anything true always did, however she might 
 personally be affected. "I don't deceive myself, 
 Miss Hope, any more than you say you do not. 1 
 was saying something to Norman when you came 
 in which I don't want to unsay now that I've met 
 you. Perhaps," she added, giving Rosamond a 
 glance of generous acknowledgment, "if I hadn't 
 said it before, I should now. Will you try to 
 
 204
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 understand me with very little explanation? 1 
 don't want to part you altogether." 
 
 Rosamond looked at her a long time without 
 speaking. "What do you mean by 'altogether'?" 
 she said at last, in low, rather tense tones. 
 
 Marjorie lifted her eyes with such a pathetic ap- 
 peal for understanding that Rosamond would not 
 press her. 
 
 "I think I think I understand," she said. 
 
 Again Marjorie said nothing. 
 
 "Have you thought what that would mean?" 
 asked Rosamond, very earnestly. 
 
 "Yes," replied Marjorie, quite firmly, but in a 
 low voice, "and for Norman's sake and mine 
 even even for yours I will agree." 
 
 At the first blush it strikes the mind as some- 
 what of a curious discrepancy that the essential re- 
 pugnance of this proposal, so fair and reasonable 
 on the surface, should at once have been discernible 
 by both Norman and Rosamond, and yet not by 
 Marjorie. Her very innocence, indeed, concealed 
 it from her. 
 
 Rosamond still kept her eyes fixed gravely upon 
 her. "Do you think such a position would be bear- 
 
 205
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 able for either of us?" she said, "particularly for 
 you?" 
 
 "Why for me?" said Marjorie, rather sharply. 
 This repeated suggestion of an inability to appreci- 
 ate her own purpose as it affected herself, coming 
 first from Norman and then from Rosamond, was 
 humiliating and irritating. A call for self-assertion 
 took sudden hold upon her. "Why should I 
 mind?" she went on, quickly, almost in the tone of 
 a fretful child. "What should I lose? I always 
 thought it was the worst part of being married." 
 
 Rosamond gasped. "Part of being married!" 
 she said. 
 
 Marjorie saw Norman smile involuntarily. He 
 was not smiling at her, but at Rosamond's astonish- 
 ment His wife's peculiar outlook had so long been 
 a commonplace to him that her quaint expressions 
 had lost their piquancy. If we should be less 
 courteous and feel inclined to laugh at our little 
 Marjorie, it might not be amiss to consider how 
 far she was singular, to reflect to what extent Nor- 
 man's "cumulated refinement" has tended to ob- 
 scure the real nature of marriage. How many 
 women not only go to the altar, but continue in a 
 greater or less degree to the end of their days, under 
 
 206
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 the impression that the essential is a religious or 
 quasi-religious ceremony, accompanied by such dis- 
 play of merriment and jubilation as means and in- 
 clination may dictate, and that everything else is 
 incidental and subordinate, including the rather flut- 
 tering contingency of the resolution of private 
 doubts upon a subject which has hitherto afforded 
 some speculative interest! Among other "parts" 
 may be cited, the having a house of your own, the 
 furnishing of it, the being able to call yourself 
 "Mrs" and wear a plain gold hoop, and the oppor- 
 tunity of spending more time than would otherwise 
 be considered quite nice in the society of a man who 
 is agreeable to you. 
 
 Rosamond recovered from her astonishment and 
 suddenly laughed brightly. "And I suppose the 
 next worst would be the remembrance of the 
 wedding-cake?" said she. 
 
 It was spoken with the utmost frankness. But 
 there is nothing much more unpleasant than to feel 
 you are being made fun of, however good-humour- 
 edly. Marjorie had that mortifying consciousness 
 which comes from the conviction that you have been 
 tacitly relegated to an inferior plane in the con- 
 versation. It aroused all the latent fighting quali- 
 
 207
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 ties she had in her. Searching her brain for a 
 means of defence, a thought suddenly flashed 
 across it. She rose from her seat quietly, but with 
 that unaggressive dignity which no one knew bet- 
 ter how to command, and took a step towards 
 Norman. 
 
 "What is that book you locked away?" she de- 
 manded. 
 
 "Nothing you would understand, Marjorie," he 
 said, gently. 
 
 The light dismissal of her request only made her 
 the more determined. Furthermore, it clothed the 
 book in her overwrought mind with disproportion- 
 ate importance, outside her original intention in 
 seeking it. It became the "open sesame" to her 
 happiness. She felt that if she could prove she was 
 as little afraid of it as her rival, she could get her 
 husband back. 
 
 "I want to see it," she said, still calmly. 
 
 "It's out of the question," replied Norman, in 
 the same tone as before. 
 
 There was a suggestion of patronage, of superi- 
 ority in his voice unintentional, no doubt which 
 exasperated Marjorie beyond endurance. The ig- 
 nominy of being refused what was freely permitted 
 
 208
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 to another she the wife, the life partner, the bone 
 of his bone spoke to her, urged her, stirred her to 
 the depths. 
 
 "I don't care," she cried. "If Miss Hope can 
 see it, I can. I am your wife, Norman. I will. I 
 insist." 
 
 Norman still neglected to take her quite 
 seriously. "No, Marjorie," he said. "You haven't 
 a notion what you are asking. Why, that book 
 would make each particular one of your hairs to 
 stand on end." 
 
 Oh, Norman, could you find no other tone in 
 which to save this tender wife of yours? 
 
 The half-chaffing smile was still on his lips, when 
 suddenly a swish of skirts Marjorie had rushed 
 past him to the cupboard. 
 
 "Stop her!" cried Rosamond, frantically, who 
 was at the other side of the room. 
 
 Norman sprang to the cupboard. He was not 
 quick enough. The key was in the lock. Marjorie 
 had turned it and the book was in her hand. More 
 than that, without an instant's pause in a flash 
 she had darted to the window and flung open the 
 casement. Her eyes were blazing. 
 
 209
 
 "If either of you come near me," she cried, stand- 
 ing there, "I will throw myself out." 
 
 She would have done. She was outside herself. 
 Her ostrich plumes waving in the keen air, she was 
 more like a picturesque fury than the quiet Mar- 
 jorie we have known. Neither Norman nor Rosa- 
 mond dared move. They stood watching her, help- 
 less, as they might have watched a child with a 
 loaded firearm. Marjorie raised the book. 
 
 "Mrs Villiers, for heaven's sake, don't," said 
 Rosamond, her clear voice charged with a very pain 
 of earnestness. 
 
 "I never asked anything in my life so fervently 
 as I now implore you to put down that book," said 
 Norman. He was serious enough now. The 
 muscles in his face were straining, it needed the ut- 
 most effort of his will to keep himself stationary. 
 
 Marjorie took not the least notice of either of 
 them. Indeed, the insinuation contained in the ap- 
 peals only fanned her purpose. 
 
 She gave a short hysterical laugh. "I'm such a 
 namby-pamby piece of crockery, am I," she said, 
 "that a few sheets of paper and ink must shiver me 
 to pieces?" She laughed again. "Come, little 
 book, come and shiver me." She opened it at the 
 
 210
 
 title-page. " 'The Dialogues of Luisa Sigea'," she 
 read. "How very exciting! Is my hair all right, 
 Norman ? 'The Skirmish Tribadicon,' what 
 does that mean ? 'Fabric The Duel Frolics and 
 Sports.' What a boring book !" 
 
 She spoke nearly naturally, but not quite. The 
 nervous tension beneath was just perceptible. 
 Then, with an air of indifference scarcely exagger- 
 ated she turned haphazard to a page in the mid- 
 dle of the volume and began reading down it. The 
 silence was oppressive. Norman and Rosamond 
 hardly breathed. It was not for long. Slowly at 
 first, then more quickly, then with a great rush, the 
 whole of her face and neck and ears flooded crim- 
 son. It faded almost in a moment and left her 
 deathly white. She uttered a low moan, like a child 
 in pain. Then, without ostentation, as was every- 
 thing connected with her, her knees gave way be- 
 neath her and she sank quietly to the ground, un- 
 conscious. 
 
 Norman lifted her gently in his arms and laid 
 her on a couch. Rosamond fetched some eau-de- 
 cologne and bathed her brow and lips with it. 
 
 g 
 
 After a few minutes she slowly opened her eyes. 
 "What has happened?" she said, vaguely. She 
 
 211
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 closed her eyes again, with a tired sigh. "Yes 
 I I remember." 
 
 She remembered: and she understood. With 
 unclouded mental vision she saw at last in all its 
 black vacuity the unbridgable abyss that divided 
 her from her husband. And she sank beneath the 
 realisation. The big hopes and longings she had 
 brought with her, the life's happiness she had come 
 to fight for, all were beaten down beneath an over- 
 powering desire for rest. 
 
 "James is downstairs," she said, wearily. "He 
 will take me home." 
 
 212
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 BETWEEN four and five months later, on a bright 
 afternoon towards the end of April, Norman 
 Villiers was making his way slowly down Picca- 
 dilly. He stopped listlessly now and then to look 
 in a shop window; then, finding himself engrossed 
 in careful scrutiny of a stand of diamond rings or 
 the embossed back of a silver hair-brush, he gave 
 himself an impatient shrug and went on again. 
 More than once a man hurrying eastward nearly 
 collided with him, and apologised. On each occa- 
 sion Villiers looked back at the strenuous pedes- 
 trian with considerable resentment, though the 
 fault was his own. To have it suggested, if it be 
 only by a brushing shoulder, that you are not part 
 of the vigorous stream of life, but only a straw 
 upon its surface, is not pleasant. He was wearing 
 a dark flannel suit and straw hat neither of them 
 conspicuously tidy. He did not harmonise and 
 
 213
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 he was conscious of the fact and resented it with 
 the signs of spring, the freshness and new life and 
 hope about him. 
 
 And yet there was every reason, on the surface, 
 why his mental attitude should have been entirely 
 the reverse, why, indeed, he should have been 
 among the brightest and most chirrupy of the 
 products of spring. This was one of those red- 
 letter days which usually bring satisfaction to the 
 most hardened of literary men, and which in his 
 own case had always done so in former times ; when, 
 after months of work, his manuscript, freshly 
 typed, neatly packed, spick-and-span, had been 
 finally delivered into the hands of his publishers. 
 He had been accustomed to use an agent as inter- 
 mediary for this purpose. To-day, however, he 
 had taken the manuscript himself, partly because 
 he had come to the conclusion that the agent did 
 little which he couldn't do himself; and partly be- 
 cause he had learnt through experience to respect 
 Thornton, as an honourable, straightforward man 
 of business, who was not waiting to trip and snare 
 him at every turn. He knew that an author who 
 was compelled to deal with publishers who required 
 watching like a sharper on a racecourse had much
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 better lay down his pen and take to other means 
 of livelihood. 
 
 On the present occasion, however, there were 
 several reasons to operate against the undivided 
 sway of genial content in his mind. To begin with, 
 he was not satisfied with his work at all events, 
 with the latter part of it. Frequently it had been 
 done against the grain, by the mere force of his 
 will, when he was painfully aware that he was not 
 in a condition to produce ; often in the teeth of the 
 depressing conviction that he was not gripping, that 
 he was writing what would be yawned over and 
 found boring. He had known what it was to look 
 back at his sheets and to feel the sickening droop 
 which comes from the thought, "This is all the 
 uttermost commonplace, and why anyone should 
 take the trouble to read it I haven't the faintest 
 idea." At those times, it was only the knowledge 
 of what he had in him, of what had been hall- 
 marked as containing at least a substantial propor- 
 tion of gold, which kept him going. 
 
 In addition to that, circumstances had rendered 
 it necessary for him to make Thornton a distasteful 
 and, to him, rather humiliating request. 
 
 "I should be glad if you could arrange to go
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 through it as soon as possible," he had said, when 
 handing over the manuscript; "and, if you are sat- 
 isfied, perhaps you wouldn't object to let me have a 
 small cheque on account." 
 
 Thornton had raised his eyebrows in evident sur- 
 prise. "Certainly, my dear fellow," he had replied. 
 "It's a trifle unusual, but we should be willing to 
 do it in your case. There's nothing wrong, I hope ? 
 You got your draft for two hundred in February?" 
 
 Villiers had replied in the affirmative. He had 
 not added that the two hundred, with an additional 
 fifty, had been placed to his wife's credit on the 
 25th of April, and that in the meantime he shared 
 the common need of humanity to sustain life by 
 food and shelter. That phrase, it may be remarked 
 parenthetically, covered practically the whole of 
 his personal expenses. Rosamond, from first to 
 last, had not accepted a single present from him, 
 and continued steadfastly to decline to do so. She 
 did not doubt his motives in offering them. Simply 
 she would not place herself in a position which 
 could be open even to the chance of misconstruc- 
 tion. All that was patent to Thornton, however, 
 was that his client, in some way or other, had man- 
 aged to get through two hundred pounds in a 
 
 216
 
 MB AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 couple of months. That, combined with his knowl- 
 edge of the latter's usually temperate habits, had 
 caused him considerable perplexity, and also some 
 quite genuine anxiety on the novelist's personal ac- 
 count. And as the publisher was not a man whose 
 face was the least inscrutable, these private senti- 
 ments had been perfectly discernible by Villiers. 
 
 Lastly, as affecting his present state of mind, 
 Norman's health at this time was by no means 
 good. The strain of serving two masters his 
 work and his passion during the last six months 
 had not been a light one, and had not been imposed 
 upon his constitution without leaving its mark. He 
 could not have said precisely what ailed him, nor 
 perhaps would have admitted definite indisposition 
 at all. Yet there were a few symptoms, some writ- 
 ing on the wall, which, if he could not interpret, 
 at least he was obliged privately to recognise. 
 Normally a person of equable temper, of late the 
 least trifle had been apt to cause him senseless ner- 
 vous irritation ; his appetite, to his disgust, had be- 
 come spasmodic and peculiar; he found, too, that 
 any sudden exertion left him breathing hard and 
 set his heart beating up into his mouth; and his 
 brain, usually so vigorous, occasionally alarmed 
 
 217
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 him by running into a dead blank and refusing to 
 answer to his call. On the whole, therefore, it was 
 not perhaps to be wondered at that he was less 
 elated by the completion of his manuscript than 
 might have been expected, nor that he walked down 
 Piccadilly with the indifferent air of a man to whom 
 the world presents no interest and no allurement. 
 
 He was so proceeding when he suddenly caught 
 sight of Marion. Clad in a fresh spring gown of 
 soft heliotrope, she was crossing the pavement to 
 get into her brougham. Norman instinctively 
 made a movement to conceal himself in the stream 
 of pedestrians until she should have driven away. 
 In this he was not successful. Marion had already 
 noticed him and was waiting at the door of her car- 
 riage until he came up. 
 
 "Why did you try to avoid me?" were her first 
 words, uttered quite severely, as he approached. 
 
 When he removed his hat, Norman remembered 
 that his hair had not been cut for two months and 
 was straggling loosely from the central parting. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," he said, "I have no ex- 
 cuse, except that I felt untidy." 
 
 She examined him perfectly frankly. "You
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 should not be untidy, Norman, in Piccadilly, in 
 April." 
 
 The crisp air had given each of her cheeks a soft 
 flush. Norman thought he had never seen her look 
 more deliciously feminine and winning. He but- 
 toned up his coat, which did not hang well, from 
 the bottom, and furtively attempted to brush some 
 mud from his left trouser-leg, the souvenir of a 
 passing hansom. Also he held himself upright, 
 which he was annoyed to realise sharply he had not 
 been doing hitherto. 
 
 "Where are you going?" she demanded next. 
 
 He was about to say "Home," then changed his 
 mind, and was framing a vague generality, when he 
 abruptly scouted the unnecessary subterfuge, and 
 replied plainly, "I am going back to Albany Man- 
 sions." 
 
 "Will you let me come with you a little way?" 
 said Marion. "It is a long time since we met, and 
 I want to talk to you." 
 
 Without waiting for a reply, she gave directions 
 to her coachman to meet her at Hyde Park Corner, 
 and turned westward by his side. 
 
 "I want to talk to you about Marjorie," she 
 amplified. 
 
 219
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Is she still with you?" Norman asked. 
 
 "Well, just at present we have sent her away to 
 Folkestone," said Marion. "James insisted upon 
 her seeing Dr Percival, and he prescribed change 
 of air. Do doctors ever prescribe anything else?" 
 she asked lightly. 
 
 "Is she ill?" said Norman, with a twinge. 
 
 "James says so. Dr Percival doesn't know." 
 
 "What do you say?" looking into her face. 
 
 "I don't think she is ill at present," said Marion. 
 "I think she may be, unless we can give her an 
 interest in life." 
 
 It was difficult to pursue the thread. Norman 
 took up another. "Wouldn't it be more con- 
 venient," he said, "if she were to take a small house 
 of her own, or at least a flat?" 
 
 "Oh, we are very comfortable," said Marion. 
 "The house is large enough. And James gets on 
 wonderfully well with the children." 
 
 There was no underlying rebuke in her tone. 
 Nevertheless, Norman found the information very 
 far from palatable. That someone else was board- 
 ing and lodging his children, would perhaps, later 
 on, see to their education, and in the meantime was 
 "getting on wonderfully well" with them, was a 
 
 220
 
 particularly nauseous pill he had not thought to be 
 called upon to swallow. 
 
 But he took a big gulp and swallowed it. "It is 
 very good of James," he said. 
 
 "Besides," added Marion, "it is better not to 
 think of any permanent arrangement until matters 
 are settled." 
 
 "Do you mean ?" He stopped. 
 
 "Yes," said Marion; "she is going to take di- 
 vorce proceedings." 
 
 Norman received the information quite quietly. 
 "I think that is best," he said, "for us both." 
 
 "So James thinks," said Marion. "I think, per- 
 haps, at the bottom of her mind not of her heart 
 she does so herself. She thinks you will marry 
 Miss Hope?" 
 
 "If Miss Hope will marry me" said Norman. 
 
 She looked at him with calm gravity. "Surely?" 
 she said. 
 
 "I'm not so sure," said he. 
 
 The point was not of immediate concern. For 
 the present, he had noticed that Marion had again 
 pointedly left herself out of the reckoning. And 
 he was beginning to realise, as he had often done 
 before, that it was her opinion which counted most 
 
 221
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 with him. So again he pressed her: "But what 
 do you think, Marion?" 
 
 "I can't be sure," she said. "It is you yourself 
 who make the difficulty. If I could see inside you 
 I could be sure. Otherwise I can't be." 
 
 He offered no comment, and she laid her hand 
 on his arm. "Norman," she said, kindly, "I don't 
 think you are happy I'm sure you are not well." 
 
 Again he was silent. 
 
 "It is not too late still," she said, earnestly. 
 
 This time she deliberately waited for his reply. 
 
 "A second mistake," he said, at last, slowly, "had 
 I made one, would not neutralise the first." 
 
 "If you can say to me honestly," said she, "that 
 you are happy and content, and can look forward 
 to the future without misgiving, I should agree 
 with James that divorce is best for Marjorie as well 
 as for you." 
 
 "That is rather a lot to say," said Norman. 
 "But of this I am absolutely certain I am less fitted 
 now, even than before, to make Marjorie happy, 
 or to be made happy by her." 
 
 "Very well," said Marion, seeing the futility of 
 further discussion, "I won't argue with you. But 
 I am sorry, Norman, for my own sake as well as 
 
 222
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 for others. I have always been proud of you as a 
 brother-in-law; and I like you." She stood still as 
 they reached the park gates. "More than that," 
 she added, "if it is the least comfort to you to know 
 it, I haven't blamed you." 
 
 The brougham was waiting and she got into it, 
 and Norman closed the door. She put a small 
 gloved hand through the window. Norman had 
 not expected it. He took it in his own, bare- 
 headed. Then, moved by a sudden impulse, he 
 bent his head and pressed it to his lips. The next 
 moment he was striding along .towards 'Knights- 
 bridge, feeling slightly ashamed of his action. 
 
 He had not expected it. That fact forced itself 
 steadily, ominously, further and further into recog- 
 nition as he walked home. Why had he not ex- 
 pected it? Reason offered no adequate explana- 
 tion, especially when Marion's concluding words 
 were considered. Why, then? Why? Why? 
 Why? Every beat of his feet on the pavement 
 rapped out the monosyllable. He would not an- 
 swer. He shook himself angrily and walked faster, 
 declining to vouchsafe a reply to the pertinacious 
 little questioner who had perched in the corner of 
 his brain. Perhaps we, having no personal interest 
 
 223
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 in the matter, and being graciously filled with that 
 sweet wisdom which springs from conscious recti- 
 tude, may be forgiven a suspicion that the process 
 begun on the day when he had assisted Rosamond 
 to erect a monument to the "little pages" had since 
 made somewhat rapid strides. 
 
 When he reached Albany Mansions he ascended 
 the four flights of stairs to his rooms with a heavy 
 tread, and at once dropped into an easy-chair. He 
 was not surprised that he was tired; he had become 
 accustomed to be so after less exercise than he had 
 taken that day. It was among the minor charac- 
 ters in that writing on the wall, which had already 
 lost its novelty, and was beginning, through fa- 
 miliarity, to lose its admonition. He dozed lightly 
 for half an hour, then got up, feeling somewhat 
 revived, tidied his hair before a small ornamental 
 mirror, and crossed the landing to Rosamond's 
 room. 
 
 He found her seated before the fire, reading a 
 novel. He sometimes wondered when she did her 
 "stuff!" He hardly remembered having caught 
 her in the act. Yet that she managed to fill five or 
 six substantial columns of close type weekly he had 
 the best of reason for knowing.
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "When do you get through your work, Rosa- 
 mond?" he asked, in a half-chaffing tone. 
 
 "When I feel inclined," said Rosamond. She 
 laid the book on her lap. 
 
 "Which evidently isn't just at present," said 
 Norman, smiling, and at the same time appropriat- 
 ing a comfortable chair in reasonable proximity to 
 hers. 
 
 "No, I'm lazy this afternoon," said Rosamond. 
 She looked at him a little anxiously. "You look 
 tired, dear. What have you been doing?" 
 
 "I went to see Thornton," said Norman, "and 
 I walked back. It oughtn't to tire me. I don't 
 think I've been very fit lately. Rosamond," he 
 added, quietly, "I have some news." 
 
 "Yes?" said Rosamond. 
 
 "Marjorie is going to divorce me." 
 
 Rosamond's face gave no indication how the 
 information affected her. For several minutes she 
 gazed into the fire without speaking. At last she 
 looked up. "Are you glad?" she said. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "We can marry." 
 
 Rosamond shook her head. "That is all you 
 225
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 think about," she said, with a short laugh; "jump- 
 ing out of one pan into another." 
 
 "Aren't you glad?" said Norman. 
 
 "I think it is noble of her," replied Rosamond. 
 
 "Of Marjorie?" 
 
 "You stupid man, do you think she wants to di- 
 vorce you ? Do you think she loves you one atom 
 less now than she ever did? Don't you under- 
 stand that she is doing this because she thinks that 
 to marry me would mean your happiness? that she 
 is deliberately taking her heart and burying it for 
 your sake?" 
 
 Norman took up a paper-knife from a table be- 
 side him and bent it in his hands. His face had be- 
 come inscrutable. 
 
 "Why do you say all this?" he asked, at length. 
 "Do you want me to go back to her?" 
 
 "No!" said Rosamond. "How can I? But I 
 think no gentler, more unselfish woman lives." 
 
 "I have said that to you often," said Norman. 
 
 "Yes; well, now I agree with you." 
 
 There was a long pause. 
 
 Presently Norman said: "Rosamond, are you 
 still determined not to marry?" 
 
 "Of course," said Rosamond. "We are happy 
 226
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 at present. Why should we change? Unless 
 Yes. Well, in that case, perhaps. One must ac- 
 knowledge Mrs Grundy if you meet her in the 
 street, though I've no intention to call upon her." 
 
 "It would be returning good for evil," said Nor- 
 man, with a laugh. 
 
 "If the elderly lady occasionally practised that 
 virtue herself," said Rosamond, "the argument 
 would have more weight. I wonder if the misery 
 that is endured to avoid giving her the least shadow 
 of uneasiness ever does cause her a twinge of com- 
 punction?" 
 
 "You and I were born two thousand years too 
 late," said Norman, smiling. "We don't under- 
 stand the world of to-day, and assuredly the world 
 of to-day doesn't understand us. We ought to have 
 lived in the days of Augustus and the Latin poets. 
 
 'Adspicies occulos tremulo fulgore micentes ; 
 Ut sol in liquida saspe refulgat aqua,' " 
 
 he quoted. "What a beautiful couplet! And who 
 knew its truth better than Ovid?" 
 
 "I daresay," said Rosamond; "but I must take 
 your word for it, unless you will condescend to 
 translate." 
 
 Norman laughed. "He advises his reader," he 
 227
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 said, "to 'watch her eyes, glowing with a tremulous 
 light, just as the sunbeams are often reflected by a 
 limpid pool.' ' 
 
 "Very pretty," said Rosamond, "but rather 
 meaningless without the context." 
 
 "I think you can guess the context," said Nor- 
 man. 
 
 Rosamond said nothing; until presently: "And 
 so Ovid knew it was true?" 
 
 "Oh, didn't he!" 
 
 A soft blush stole into her cheeks, and she looked 
 into the fire. "Do you know, Norman ?" 
 
 His eyes lighted. "Yes yes yes !" he cried. 
 
 Rosamond uttered a low laugh, happy and 
 musical. She dropped her head on the back of 
 her chair, smiling. "Then come and give me a 
 kiss," she said. 
 
 228
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 EVERY Sunday morning James Baker allowed 
 himself what he called half an hour's indulgence. 
 That is to say, he arose at half-past eight instead 
 of at eight. Marion, having no inclination to fol- 
 low his example, frequently availed herself of this 
 half hour especially since Marjorie's advent had 
 limited their opportunities of private converse to 
 impart to her spouse's recumbent form, while she 
 dressed, such things as it was good for him to hear, 
 and, more commonly, to extract from him such 
 other things as she deemed it desirable should be 
 brought to her cognisance. She was moved to ad- 
 vance her outposts in the latter direction on the 
 Sunday morning the next but one after her meet- 
 ing with Norman. Marjorie, in the meantime, had 
 returned to them. James himself had suggested 
 it. The Folkestone visit had given her additional 
 time for brooding, and the seaside air had bene- 
 fited her as much as it ever benefits those whose 
 
 229
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 malady proceeds from sentiment and emotion. He 
 knew, besides, that, now that divorce proceedings 
 were to be set in motion, the lawyers would need 
 her on the spot to assist them. It was perhaps not 
 remarkable, therefore, that Marion should find it 
 convenient to talk things over in the connubial 
 secrecy afforded by the Sunday morning's indul- 
 gence. 
 
 She was engaged, when the spirit prompted her, 
 in an operation involving a much be-frilled gar- 
 ment, which demanded that James should dis- 
 creetly veil his eyes. He not only did that, but 
 obligingly turned round to face the opposite direc- 
 tion, so obligingly that Marion was impelled to 
 make a small grimace behind his back, from 
 which, perhaps, we might infer that she would not 
 necessarily have been finally inexorable had he 
 proved to be in a recalcitrant humour. 
 
 "What did Mr Elliot say?" she asked. 
 
 Mr Elliot, it should be mentioned, was the elder- 
 ly family lawyer, to whom James had paid a visit 
 on the previous morning. 
 
 "Why, a great deal more than I cared to hear," 
 said James. "It seems there will have to be two 
 trials. And Marjorie will have to write a letter to 
 
 230
 
 Norman, which can be read out in Court, asking 
 him politely to return to her. I don't pretend to 
 understand it. To have to ask to be given a thing 
 one day, in order to be privileged to ask to have 
 it taken away the next, seems a strange state of af- 
 fairs to my mind. But that's what he says." 
 
 "It will take some time, I expect," said Marion. 
 
 "It wouldn't be lawyers' work if it didn't," 
 grunted James. 
 
 "And it will be rather costly, I'm afraid. Luck- 
 ily, Marjorie hasn't been spending much lately; but 
 she will want all she has afterwards." 
 
 Shades of justice! Was ever such an insinua- 
 tion ? James was naturally incensed. His business 
 integrity, not to say his sense of honour, was as- 
 sailed. 
 
 "I suppose I can be permitted to pay my own 
 lawyer?" he demanded, hotly. 
 
 It was a proposition which Marion could not 
 allow to pass, however. 
 
 "I don't think you are called upon to do that, 
 dear," she said, gently. 
 
 This was so flagrant that James was driven to 
 hunch himself wrathfully round, forgetting the 
 delicate operation that was proceeding. "I beg
 
 your pardon, my dear," he said, quickly, and turned 
 back again. 
 
 "Well?" said Marion. 
 
 James fixed a chest of drawers with a vicious 
 stare. "I was going to say," he vouchsafed, "that 
 what I am called upon to do is my own private 
 concern, as a man of business, and I won't have any 
 interference with It." 
 
 Marion shuffled into a petticoat. Then she went 
 quietly around to the other side of the bed and knelt 
 down beside it, resting her arms upon the mattress, 
 thus interposing an effectual and very attractive 
 screen between the chest of drawers and her hus- 
 band's ireful gaze. 
 
 "Why will you persist in being so generous?" 
 she said earnestly. "Don't you understand that it 
 makes me uncomfortable to know you are doing 
 all this for my sister? I feel as if it were a penalty 
 you had incurred by marrying me. You have had 
 her five months with us, and put up with the noise 
 of the children, but I can't let you burden yourself 
 with her law costs. It would be different if she 
 couldn't afford it. In that case I would accept it 
 humbly and be grateful as I am, as it is," she 
 concluded. 
 
 232
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 James was slightly appeased. His wife's gentle 
 tones and sweet winning face were two arguments 
 which he found it very difficult to resist. 
 
 "I'm not in the least generous the word is pre- 
 posterous," he grumbled. "I've employed Elliot 
 for this business, and the man who calls the tune 
 must pay the piper. If Marjorie isn't satisfied with 
 him, she is at liberty to go somewhere else." 
 
 Marion flicked him lightly on the cheek with her 
 hand. "Don't talk like that, you old humbug." 
 
 "The costs will be no great matter," proceeded 
 James, still rather surlily: "Norman will have to 
 pay most of them." 
 
 "How much?" 
 
 "A few pounds," said James, vaguely. 
 
 "A few hundreds?" 
 
 "Stuff and nonsense !" said James. 
 
 Marion said no more. She put a soft arm round 
 his neck and kissed him warmly, twice, upon the 
 lips. Then she got up. 
 
 "What have you arranged with Mr Elliot?" she 
 asked, after a time. 
 
 "I've promised to take Marjorie to see him to- 
 morrow morning," said James. 
 
 "Oh!" a trifle nervously. 
 233
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "You think there will be a scene?" 
 
 "I'm afraid so." 
 
 "Perhaps it's not such a bad thing, after all," 
 remarked James, "that this trial for restitution has 
 to precede the other. It will get her used to the 
 appearance of the Court and the general atmos- 
 phere. The atmosphere, by the by, unless it has 
 very much improved since the last time I served 
 on a jury, is the worst in Europe." 
 
 Marion threw aside the smooth towel with which 
 she had been ruthlessly scrubbing her smoother 
 neck, and suddenly uncoiled a big sheaf of hair and 
 dropped it down on her back. 
 
 "I'm not quite satisfied that we are acting for 
 the best, even yet," she said. "Norman is not 
 happy." 
 
 "How do you know that?" said James. 
 
 "He almost admitted it. Besides, I could see 
 it." 
 
 "Well, I don't know that we need consider him," 
 said James. "He has chosen his own course." 
 
 "Yes, but if he is not happy, it may mean that 
 he still cares for Marjorie, though he mayn't quite 
 realise it, perhaps." 
 
 204
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "If he does, she is still waiting for him, I be- 
 lieve," said James. 
 
 His callous tone may have deceived himself; it 
 certainly didn't deceive Marion. 
 
 "And yet it almost seems it is the only thing to 
 be done," she proceeded, without acknowledging 
 his observation. "There is a perverseness in the 
 way fate has dealt with these two good people 
 which is quite heart-rending. Their lives have 
 been spoilt by converging. If they had not met, 
 they might each have been happy. Having met, 
 it seems that nothing can make them happy." 
 
 James could find no reply to this which could 
 conceal, even from himself, that he recognised its 
 truth with considerable misgiving, so he was fain 
 to keep silent. 
 
 "It's after half-past eight, dear," said Marion, 
 presently. 
 
 Her recumbent spouse had been drowsily watch- 
 ing her while, with two shapely arms upraised, she 
 arranged her plentiful dark brown hair. 
 
 "Do you know, Marion, my dear," he said, 
 lazily, "it sometimes occurs to me that you are an 
 uncommonly pretty woman?" 
 
 Marion blushed and laughed. Then she went 
 235
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 up to her lord and master and made a tug at the 
 bed-clothes. 
 
 "Get up, lazy-bones," she said. 
 
 On the following morning, having been pre- 
 pared for the visit to the lawyer, Marjorie came 
 downstairs cold and pale, but for the present quite 
 calm, even stately in her rigorous self-repression. 
 She ate her breakfast or pretended to eat it in 
 silence. 
 
 "My dear, we are not going to the dentist," said 
 James, with the commendable design of lightening 
 the situation. "Mr Elliot is the dullest old gentle- 
 man I ever met." 
 
 Marjorie made a heroic, but pathetically unsuc- 
 cessful, effort to respond in the same spirit. James 
 saw that it was beyond her power and left her in 
 peace. After breakfast she went quietly upstairs 
 to put on her hat, and as quietly returned. She 
 was dressed very simply in dark grey and was wear- 
 ing a veil. How different from the brave figure in 
 cream and ostrich plumes who had gone out on her 
 errand of hope four months ago ! 
 
 She sat down, without speaking, in a chair before 
 the small fire in the heurth, thaf was failing beneath 
 
 236
 
 the warm May sunshine; and put her toes on the 
 fender. When the maid opened the front door and 
 whistled up a cab, James saw a slight shudder go 
 through her and her clasped hands grip more 
 tightly. A few moments later they heard that quick 
 clatter and jingle which is* the peculiar production 
 of the London hansom, followed, as it drew up, 
 by silence, broken by an intermittent and unim- 
 portunate jingle, as the horse occasionally shook its 
 head. 
 
 James put on his gloves and took his polished 
 silk hat from Marion, which the latter had been 
 tenderly smoothing with a velvet pad. He went 
 into the hall and held open the front door. 
 
 "Now, Marjorie, my dear," he said, lightly, 
 "ladies first except when you're hanging them." 
 
 But the hansom quietly waiting at the gate ap- 
 peared suddenly to focus for Marjorie all the 
 troubles that lay ahead of her, to stand as a con- 
 crete and definite pledge of the reality of that 
 which she had undertaken to go through. She 
 drew back, clinging helplessly to Marion. 
 
 "I can't! I can't!" she wailed. 
 
 James closed the door again. 
 
 "You must understand, Marjorie," he said, 
 237
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 quietly, "that there is no question of divorce as 
 yet. You are merely going to ask the Court to 
 order Norman to return to you." 
 
 "But I don't want to," cried Marjorie, between 
 wild sobs. "They are happy together. I don't 
 want to part them." 
 
 "Norman will know that. He'll understand 
 perfectly well that it's only a legal device to enable 
 you to set him free afterwards." 
 
 But Marjorie by this time scarcely heard him. 
 In a frenzy of despair, she was calling piteously on 
 her sister for protection, clutching impetuously at 
 anything within her reach, as though James had a 
 design to carry her off by main force. 
 
 "Hold her a moment, Marion," he said. 
 
 He went into the dining-room and came back 
 with some brandy-and-water a trifle stiffer than he 
 was accustomed to take it himself. Marjorie was 
 beginning to laugh. He took her by the shoulders, 
 handing the glass to Marion. 
 
 "Stop!" he said. 
 
 The unaccustomed severity of his voice fright- 
 ened Marjorie into quietude. Then he commanded 
 her in the same tone to drink the brandy. She 
 obeyed meekly. It made her cough and choke, and 
 
 238
 
 MR AND MRS V1LL1ERS 
 
 sent water to her eyes. But the good spirit did its 
 work, and burned up into her cheeks; and when 
 she got back her breath, the sudden shock of it 
 forced her to utter a natural laugh. 
 
 "That's better," said James. 
 
 In a few moments she had recovered control of 
 herself. 
 
 "I'm ready, James," she said, with pathetic hu- 
 mility. "I'm sorry." 
 
 She walked quite calmly to the cab and got in. 
 
 "There's no need to be sorry for that, my dear," 
 said James, cheerily, as he took his seat beside her. 
 "Some women indulge in hysterics for an hour at 
 a stretch." 
 
 Privately, he asked himself, with a slight shiver, 
 "If she is like this now, what on earth will happen 
 in Court?" 
 
 But James didn't quite know Marjoric.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 ONE afternoon about the time Marjorie was 
 making her pilgrimage to the lawyer, Norman re- 
 turned to his rooms to find a visitor waiting for 
 him. This was Mr Thornton. He jumped up 
 with evident relief as Norman entered. 
 
 "Ah, my dear fellow," he said, briskly, "I'm 
 glad you've come. I was just going to write to 
 you on a sheet of your own sermon-paper. They 
 told me downstairs you were in, but when I got up 
 here, not a sign of you." 
 
 "I was in one of the other suites," Norman re- 
 plied, not without a just perceptible note of em- 
 barrassment. 
 
 "That explains it," said Mr Thornton. 
 
 It occurred to him, being a man whose head had 
 been screwed on without any indecision, that pos- 
 sibly it might explain one or two other things, in- 
 cluding the speedy disappearance of the two hun- 
 
 240
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 dred pounds. But upon that point, as we know, 
 he was wrong. 
 
 "Sit down, won't you?" said Norman, a little 
 listlessly. He had a suspicion what was coming. 
 "Have you come about the book?" 
 
 He dropped into a chair himself, and rested his 
 elbow on the arm and his cheek on his knuckles, 
 looking across at his visitor with a lack of interest 
 in his face, which was partly assumed and partly 
 the result of the colourless view of life that had 
 lately grown upon him. 
 
 "Yes," said Thornton, resuming his seat, "I 
 want to talk it over with you, Villiers. It's better 
 than trusting to letters, isn't it?" He picked up a 
 parcel from the floor beside him. "Hayling had 
 it to read, and his opinion was that it wasn't up to 
 your level. So I've been through it myself every 
 word of it." He leaned forward in his chair, clasp- 
 ing his hands on the parcel. "I'm sorry, my dear 
 fellow, but I'm bound to say I agree with him." 
 
 "I'm not surprised," said Norman, without 
 showing any emotion, though the words hit him 
 hard. "I wasn't satisfied myself." 
 
 "I'm thankful to hear you say that," said Thorn- 
 ton. "Don't suppose I'm condemning the book 
 
 241
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 wholesale. If it had been written by a new man, 
 I should think a great many times before I lost him 
 for all time by sending it back. You don't mis- 
 understand me?" 
 
 "Not in the least," said Norman, a little gloom- 
 ily. "All the same whether I'm written out or 
 not I can't say, but I fancy it's the best I can do 
 to-day." 
 
 "Not a bit of it," said Thornton, cheerily. "We 
 all have our ups and downs. Never a writer yet 
 who didn't occasionally sink below himself, even 
 in his published work." He began to untie the 
 string of the parcel. "Besides, I'm not even com- 
 plaining of the book as a whole. Up to a point I 
 recognise you. It's only in the second half that it 
 loses its grip." He took the manuscript from its 
 wrapper and rapidly turned the pages, scanning the 
 text with keen eyes. "Now, I should say that it's 
 about here that you fall away." He laid his sturdy 
 forefinger, within- a few sentences, upon the point in 
 the narrative which should have been followed by 
 those "little pages" which the soft goddess had 
 buried for ever in the limbo of forgotten things. 
 
 "Good lord!" said Norman. 
 
 "What's the matter?" looking up sharply. 
 242
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "A coincidence," replied Norman, "nothing 
 more. What do you want me to do?" 
 
 "This is the position, my dear fellow," said 
 Thornton, turning a friendly glance upon the nov- 
 elist. "We are willing to bring this out in its pres- 
 ent form, upon the old terms, if you press us. 
 Your reputation will guarantee us against loss. We 
 don't want to kill the goose, but at any rate it 
 would leave us an egg to pay the funeral expenses. 
 On the other hand, I strongly urge you not as 
 your publisher, but as your friend not to 
 press us." He tapped the manuscript with his fin- 
 ger. "Your name would sell this; but, afterwards, 
 it wouldn't sell the next. Take my word for it." 
 
 "What is the alternative?" said Norman, 
 quietly. "Do you want me to alter it?" 
 
 "There's nothing to alter," said Thornton. 
 "The general plan is sound enough, and I don't 
 quarrel with any particular passage. It's simply 
 that this latter part is not living it's not moving. 
 You know what I mean?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Norman, hopelessly enough. 
 
 He knew, in addition, that it was the most 
 damning indictment that could be brought against 
 an imaginative writer. A technical fault, some.
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 slackness of phrase, looseness of style, could be 
 attacked with reasonable hope of remedy; but 
 that indefinite, indefinable something which gives 
 reality to creative work, which removes it from 
 the domain of academic composition and breathes 
 throbbing life into it, which comes unsought, un- 
 known, and which, in spite of Carlyle's dictum, not 
 any capacity for taking pains can acquire if that 
 had gone, what hope remained? 
 
 Thornton watched the novelist, as he sat staring 
 gloomily in front of him, closely and with not a 
 little concern. He noticed the change in him, and 
 he found it difficult, in the face of that change, to 
 say what he had come to say. The fact that his 
 lot had been cast in lines where the performance of 
 ungrateful tasks was .almost part of his daily work, 
 had not made them less so. He carefully divided 
 the manuscript on his knee into two about equal 
 halves. One he placed upon the table; the other 
 he held out to Villiers. His vigorous face ex- 
 pressed deep earnestness, and even some emotion. 
 
 "Half measures are no good, Villiers," he said. 
 "Burn it." 
 
 Norman turned pale. "Do you know what that 
 means?" he said. 
 
 244
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Months of work," said Thornton. "Three, 
 four, five. I'm not talking lightly, my dear fellow. 
 I've watched your career since you first started this 
 sort of work, and I take as much interest in it as 
 any man living perhaps a trifle more. It's my 
 firm belief that, if you can keep true to yourself, 
 you ought to go very far. I tell you honestly, I 
 would rather bring out two ordinary failures than 
 give that book to the world with your name on it." 
 
 Norman took the manuscript and turned the 
 pages abstractedly. Suddenly he threw it into a 
 corner. "I won't burn it," he said. "That's too 
 big a dose to swallow all at once. But it shall lie 
 there, and unless I die or go mad, I'll have another 
 shot." 
 
 "Bravo!" cried Thornton, with genuine enthusi- 
 asm, springing up from his chair. "There's noth- 
 ing takes you so far in this world as pluck." 
 
 "Except cheek," said Norman. 
 
 "No, no; cheek starts you, but pluck carries you 
 through. You'll do it, my boy. Give yourself a 
 fair chance; that's all you want." He waved his 
 hand at the pile in the corner. "That wasn't 
 written" he was going to say "in happy condi- 
 tions," and he would have liked to have done so, 
 
 245
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 would have liked, moreover, to throw out a 
 friendly hint that a return to the environment in 
 which his previous books had been produced might 
 benefit his work; but Norman's face offered no en- 
 couragement to an incursion into his private affairs, 
 so the publisher concluded the sentence "when' you 
 felt in the vein for it." 
 
 "Perhaps not," said Norman, "but if you wait 
 for the vein, you may wait for ever sometimes." 
 
 Thornton picked up his hat. "There's just one 
 other thing before I go, Villiers," he said. "The 
 last time I saw you, you hinted that money matters 
 were a trifle out of gear. I'm sorry for that. Can 
 we do anything for you? Would you like some 
 reading? 
 
 In his brusque kind-heartedness, the publisher 
 had put the matter a little less delicately than he 
 might have done. Norman's pride was instantly 
 up in arms. 
 
 "Many thanks," he said, almost coldly. "There 
 is no necessity for that." 
 
 "Just as you like, my dear fellow," said Thorn- 
 ton, without abating a jot of his goodwill. "It 
 struck me it might be a temporary help." He 
 moved briskly to the door. "I got the MS. of a 
 
 246
 
 novel this morning from a well-known barrister, 
 writing anonymously. I should really like your 
 opinion. Won't you let me send it to you? No? 
 Very well. Good-bye, old fellow. Mix work and 
 play judiciously. We must have the book ready 
 for the autumn season, remember." 
 
 He had barely gone when Villiers realised his 
 mistake; if, indeed, it can be said that he had not 
 realised it throughout, and deliberately let his pride 
 ride rough-shod over his prudence. When neces- 
 sity makes its first insidious, unwelcome advances, 
 we are most of us tempted to take the high horse; 
 it is only when it has become a constant compan- 
 ion that we are able to humble ourselves and look 
 it demurely in the face. 
 
 Norman saw, when it was too late, that he was 
 no longer in a position to give himself airs upon 
 the subject of his financial position. Thornton's 
 verdict on his novel, and the consequent postpone- 
 ment of the revenues to be derived from it, would 
 be a very serious handicap. During the next two 
 or three weeks it was borne in upon him, with in- 
 creasing conviction, that the time was probably not 
 far distant when he would be compelled to eat 
 humble pie offered with a far less considerate hand
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 than by his publisher. It added to his annoyance 
 that the reading of MSS. was a task which of it- 
 self contained nothing derogatory, to which he 
 had no aversion, and which he felt himself peculiar- 
 ly fitted to undertake. Once or twice he was al- 
 most brought to the point of writing to Thornton, 
 asking for permission to change his mind. But it 
 is difficult to eat your words with dignity; and to 
 do it otherwise he was not yet sufficiently reduced. 
 
 Matters were so far pressing, however, that for 
 the moment the resumption of the novel was out 
 of the question. He wrote two or three stories 
 for popular magazines, which did his reputation no 
 good. Moreover, the income derivable from this 
 source was, to say the least, casual and intermittent. 
 Also, the field was limited, as he began to discover. 
 Nevertheless, with the idea of steadying his returns, 
 he wrote to two editors, suggesting a series of stories 
 upon a subject which he did not name, and of 
 which, to be quite truthful, he had not, at the mo- 
 ment of writing, the faintest idea. 
 
 At the same time, he found it possible and 
 prudent to make some reduction of his by no means 
 extravagant domestic expenditure. For instance, 
 since he was rarely dressed before ten, and his ap- 
 
 248
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 petite showed no signs of becoming less spasmodic, 
 it was an obvious economy, as well as a convenience, 
 to blend breakfast and lunch in a single meal. In 
 no respect, for that matter, was there any indica- 
 tion of an improvement in his health: indeed, it 
 grew steadily worse. There were days when the 
 writing on the wall was expressed in letters so large 
 as to alarm him. He had little faith in medical 
 men; and the price of their advice was a matter 
 which had now to be seriously taken into account. 
 At last, however, after an attack of palpitation 
 which left him almost prostrate, he consulted one, 
 and was given a tonic and recommended a change 
 of air. 
 
 During this time, it must be said to his credit, he 
 was not once tempted to reduce his allowance to his 
 wife. He regarded that, to all intents and pur- 
 poses, as money which did not belong to him and 
 over which he had no control. As for Marjorie 
 herself, it would never occur to her to imagine him 
 in want. She assumed a sufficiency of means, in 
 herself and those about her, as a matter of course, 
 like light and darkness and the procession of the 
 seasons. Norman was well aware of this happy 
 outlook of hers, and it was his knowledge of it and 
 
 249
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 his anxiety to save her, as far as lay in his power, 
 the shock of disillusionment, which had weighed 
 with him, almost more than anything else, to fix her 
 allowance at the utmost limit of his disposable in- 
 come. 
 
 He continued to see Rosamond daily or ought 
 we to say nightly? Indeed, as the days went on, 
 he got into the habit of slipping across the landing 
 that divided their suites with greater and greater 
 frequency. For he found that her society was the 
 only thing which relieved him for a time from the 
 depressing companionship of his own thoughts. 
 What though those thoughts returned with more 
 stinging insistence after each visit? Was not the 
 opiate constantly at hand to be re-administered? 
 What though the effective dose became larger? 
 Was there a hint as yet that the supply was ex- 
 haustible? 
 
 He had few other distractions in these days: an 
 occasional visit to his club, a hand at bridge at 
 fivepence a hundred, if he was needed to make up, 
 a humble seat now and then at a good instrumental 
 concert. His circle of friends was not a large one. 
 He made them slowly, but stuck loyally to those 
 he found sympathetic. Lately, however, he had 
 
 850
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 seen less even of these. It was not their fault, but 
 his own. He did not analyse his reasons; indeed, 
 it came upon him in the nature of a shock, one day, 
 to awake to the fact that he was gradually allowing 
 them to slide ; much as it had done when he realised 
 that he was not prepared for Marion to offer him 
 her hand. 
 
 The ordinary froth of the social whirlpool he 
 had never taken the least trouble to cultivate. To 
 a man of original mind there is nothing more irri- 
 tating than the society and conversation of people 
 of the unimaginative, orthodox stamp, people who 
 accept the views of their fathers upon every sub- 
 ject under the sun, who have been "taught to 
 think," and who think accordingly. In his cynical 
 moods, which, to do him justice, were not frequent, 
 he used to say that one only met two types in casual 
 social intercourse : those with bodies and no brains, 
 and those with brains and no bodies; and that the 
 second were the worst. Indubitably, if it is possible 
 to conceive anything more boring than a talkative 
 person without intellect, it is one whose intellect 
 is unleavened by human nature. 
 
 While upon the subject of Norman's personal 
 tastes and habits, we may conclude by admitting 
 
 251
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 that he was not what is called a "sportsman." That 
 is to say, he took no pleasure in any form of recrea- 
 tion involving cruelty. I don't know if it has oc- 
 curred to you, reader, but it has sometimes oc- 
 curred to me, that this civilisation of ours is really 
 rather a superficial business, a matter of "cumu- 
 lated refinement," when so large a proportion of 
 humanity is never quite happy unless it is killing 
 something. It may be a fox to hunt, a bird to 
 shoot, a salmon to play, a hare to course, but some- 
 thing there must be to kill, perhaps to torture and 
 kill, to secure the earthly peace of great numbers of 
 reasonably humane, large-hearted men; and of a 
 few let it be written small women. Our per- 
 ceptions will fine in time, no doubt; even to the 
 point of recognising that a fox running into a farm- 
 house scullery to escape its pursuers is not neces- 
 sarily a humorous incident, or an ideal subject for a 
 comic Christmas illustration, and that that strained 
 beast has not rushed for protection to the haunts 
 of its natural enemies until it has endured the last 
 agonies of mortal fear. 
 
 252
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 ALL days were much alike to Norman at this 
 time. One morning, however, a little more than a 
 fortnight after Thornton's visit, he found two let- 
 ters waiting for him which were of sufficient im- 
 portance to distinguish the day from its fellows. 
 The first was from one of the magazine editors to 
 whom he had written, politely thanking him for 
 his offer to write a series of stories, but regretting 
 that his arrangements for the year were already 
 fully made. Villiers threw it aside it reminded 
 him of his first tentative efforts in journalism 
 and took up the second. It was from Mr Spindle, 
 intimating that he wished to have some conversa- 
 tion with him, and expressing the hope that his 
 client might find it convenient to call upon him at 
 an early date. 
 
 All dates were convenient to Norman just now. 
 The blow of Thornton's judgment on his novel, 
 
 253
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 coming on top of his previous depression of mind, 
 and combining with his indifferent health, had 
 driven him into a listless, aimless habit of life, from 
 which he had almost given up the attempt to rouse 
 himself. Accordingly, he picked up his hat and 
 sallied forth there and then to visit the solicitor. 
 It was noticeable that, as he walked through the 
 streets, he kept a defensive eye on the alert against 
 chance acquaintances; and once, on perceiving the 
 approach of a man he knew slightly, he affected to 
 be engrossed by the contents of a shop-window 
 containing an interesting selection of children's 
 undergarments. 
 
 He found Mr Spindle in what was for him quite 
 a genial mood. His greeting was still cursory, but 
 appreciably more human than usual. He invited 
 Norman to be seated, and accommodated himself, 
 as was his custom, with the edge of a chair, leaning 
 one elbow on the arm and the other on his desk. 
 It sometimes occurred to Norman to wonder if he 
 took his meals sitting on the edge of a chair. Cer- 
 tainly it was impossible to conceive him disposed 
 in one with any approach to comfort. He picked 
 up from his desk a small sheaf of papers pinned 
 together, 
 
 254,
 
 "Well, Mr Villiers," he said, "the other side has 
 moved." 
 
 "The other side" was Marjorie. That Norman 
 understood. 
 
 "I am quite prepared to hear that," said he. 
 
 "But possibly you don't appreciate the legal 
 process that will be necessary," said Mr Spindle. 
 "A suit for divorce on the petition of the wife is 
 apt to be a tedious proceeding." 
 
 He continued to look contented. His face was 
 one which was incapable of expressing any feeling 
 upon a matter in his mind other than as it affected 
 himself, even when he attempted it which on the 
 present occasion he did not. Brisk and business- 
 like in detail as he was, a tedious legal proceeding 
 was not a matter to which he had any professional 
 objection. 
 
 "Yes?" said Norman. 
 
 "To begin with," explained the solicitor, "Mrs 
 Villiers is bringing an action against you for resti- 
 tution of conjugal rights." 
 
 Norman could not restrain rather a grim smile. 
 The irony appeared almost grotesque. 
 
 "She will obtain an order," proceeded the law- 
 yer, "which you will not obey; and that will con- 
 
 255
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 stitute legal desertion, and entitle her to proceed 
 against you for divorce on the grounds, of course, 
 of desertion and adultery." 
 
 He said it in the same tone in which he had asked 
 his client to take a seat. 
 
 "In regard to the latter," he added, "I under- 
 stand there is at present no evidence beyond your 
 own admission. The Court will decline to act upon 
 that without corroboration." He cocked his eye- 
 glass and was it a smile that accompanied the 
 action, or only a contortion of his features required 
 to screw the monocle more effectually into position ? 
 "A few days at Brighton at this time of year would 
 be a pleasant holiday," he said. 
 
 "I must be assured," said Norman, firmly, "that 
 no name will be dragged into this case except my 
 own." 
 
 "No doubt that can be avoided." 
 
 "It must be avoided," said Norman. "Other- 
 wise I can take no step." 
 
 "It is a question for the other side," said Mr 
 Spindle. "They are not likely to press it. You 
 must understand I am not asking you to take any 
 step." 
 
 256
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Quite so," said Norman. "I gather from what 
 you have been saying that there will be two trials?" 
 
 "Precisely." 
 
 Norman hesitated. "Can you give me an idea 
 of the probable cost?" 
 
 Mr Spindle did not like the question. It sav- 
 oured of an economical spirit which was not grate- 
 ful to him. 
 
 "The costs on our side," he said, "as the case is 
 undefended, will not be considerable. Those of 
 Mrs Villiers, of course, will be somewhat heavier." 
 
 "I shall have to pay them?" 
 
 "Oh, yes." 
 
 Norman had an idea that Mr Spindle might have 
 to whistle a little longer than he would find to his 
 taste. 
 
 "When is the action likely to be heard?" he 
 asked. 
 
 Mr Spindle meditated. "The business of the 
 Division is a good deal congested at present," he 
 said, "but, with luck, we ought to get it through 
 before the recess." 
 
 "That is?" 
 
 "Before August." 
 
 "And the divorce?" 
 
 257
 
 "Oh," said Mr Spindle, vaguely,, "hardly this 
 year, I'm afraid." 
 
 He had risen. Evidently he considered the in- 
 terview at an end : his mind had already flown to 
 other subjects. 
 
 "I think that is all I can tell you at present, Mr 
 Villiers," he said. "I will keep you informed of 
 developments." 
 
 His client was scarcely out of the door before he 
 had whistled up a tube beside his desk and was 
 listening impatiently with his ear on the aperture. 
 
 Turning out of Bedford Row, Villiers descended 
 into the billiard-rooms of the First Avenue Hotel. 
 As he passed through the first room, he heard his 
 name uttered in a low tone by a stranger, an ex- 
 perience frequent enough at one time, but not com- 
 mon of late. Formerly it had been wont to cause 
 him slight, unreasoning annoyance; to-day it gave 
 him distinct pleasure. It recalled the days of his 
 early success. A perceptible thrill ran through 
 him, and he went on into the principal room with 
 his head higher and something of his old confident 
 bearing. The condemned half of his book should 
 be done again, and done well. He ordered a cup 
 of coffee and some biscuits, and for an hour sat 
 
 258
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 and watched a game of billiards, feeling more spirit 
 in him than he had done for weeks. Ambition, 
 pride, self-respect returned upon him with a gush : 
 he longed to get back among his fair sheets, his 
 fingers ached to clutch the pen fingers that shook 
 as they raised the coftee-cup. 
 
 The exaltation continued during the drive home 
 on the top of a 'bus; but it received something of 
 a cold douche when he reached his room, in the 
 shape of a letter from the second of his editors. 
 That gentleman, like his confrere, regretted that he 
 was not at present in a position to enter into nego- 
 tiations upon the subject of a series of stories, but 
 added that he should at all times be most happy 
 to consider contributions from Mr Villiers; and, 
 to acquaint him with the character of matter re- 
 quired, he had pleasure in enclosing a form of di- 
 rections to authors, for his guidance. The form in 
 question was a small printed slip, to this effect: 
 
 "Authors are courteously informed that only 
 stories conforming to the following requirements 
 
 can be considered for publication in the 
 
 Magazine. The scene should be laid in Great 
 Britain, at the present day. The hero should be 
 
 259
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 tall, good-looking, and not over thirty years of age. 
 He should preferably be clean shaven, or, at least, 
 wear only a moustache. The heroine should be 
 under twenty-five and of attractive appearance. It 
 is essential that the character, antecedents, and per- 
 sonal habits of each be beyond reproach : nothing in 
 the nature of a 'past' can be entertained. The plot 
 should avoid subjects of a questionable or debatable 
 nature. In dealing with vice, the author should 
 confine himself to murders, burglaries, assaults, and 
 other similar forms accepted as unobjectionable by 
 the public. Problems of sex, in any guise, are in- 
 admissible. If it is necessary to touch upon relig- 
 ion, the characters should be made to attend the 
 Church of England as a matter of course, and not 
 in such a way as could suggest controversy. It is 
 preferable that the story should move among peo- 
 ple of good social position." 
 
 Norman crumpled this interesting document in 
 his hand and threw it into the waste-paper basket. 
 He wondered if he would ever sink so low as that. 
 For the moment, however, it effected a heavy de- 
 pression of his mental barometer, reacting upon the 
 exceptional exhilaration of the last hour or two. 
 
 260
 
 He was again face to face with the squalid and de- 
 testable question of ways and means. How much 
 he had depended upon contributing this magazine 
 matter he had not appreciated until the facility was 
 denied. It was now almost four o'clock, and he 
 suddenly realised that he was very tired. He sank 
 wearily into a low chair and closed his eyes. It 
 appeared only for a moment or two; but when he 
 opened them again, Rosamond was standing over 
 him. He had not heard her enter. 
 
 She sat down on the arm of his chair and rumpled 
 her hand through his hair. "Do you know, Nor- 
 man," she said, gently, "I'm beginning to get quite 
 anxious about you. You've not been the least like 
 yourself lately. There is something on your 
 mind?" 
 
 Norman said nothing. 
 
 "Tell me," said Rosamond, a deeper note of ten- 
 derness in her voice; "tell me. Perhaps I can help 
 you." 
 
 "What use to burden you with my troubles?" 
 said Norman, taking the hand that lay on her lap. 
 "Your pretty shoulders were not built for that." 
 
 She pressed his head close in to her. "Trust me, 
 dear." There was a wonderful charm almost a 
 
 261
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 caress in Rosamond's soft utterance of words of 
 endearment. She gave a sudden gay laugh. "Was 
 I ever afraid to take 'the white man's burden' ?" 
 
 Her spirits were infectious. Norman put an arm 
 round her waist. "Dear little girl," he said, "you 
 would cheer the most confirmed hypochondriac that 
 ever breathed." 
 
 "At any rate, I should try," said Rosamond. "I 
 hate melancholy people." 
 
 "Then I won't be melancholy, for your sake," 
 said Norman, with sudden briskness. "Perhaps 
 it's as well you should know," he added. "It may 
 save you misunderstanding things. The truth is, 
 Thornton's rejection of the book has been a blow 
 to me in more ways than one. At present I don't 
 see my way very clearly on the practical side of 
 life." 
 
 "Do you mean you are hard up?" said Rosa- 
 mond, plainly. 
 
 Norman nodded. 
 
 "What does that matter? You've got a gold 
 mine here." She tapped his head. "You can draw 
 a draft on sermon-paper that will be cashed at sight 
 by any office that uses printing-ink." 
 
 "I've tried that" said Norman: "I've been liv- 
 262
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 ing on it for the last month. But it's a casual and 
 unsatisfactory business. Besides, it needs a new 
 and brilliant idea every time you put pen to paper; 
 and ideas are not very exuberant with me just now, 
 let alone brilliant ones. And I'm afraid, old girl, 
 that the drafts you speak of by no means pass for 
 coin of the realm in every quarter. I've had two 
 letters from magazine editors to-day, declining me 
 anything in the nature of continuous work of this 
 sort. Still," he added, with a dry laugh, "I'm not 
 entitled to say that there's no market for my work." 
 He rummaged in the waste-paper basket for the 
 "Directions to Authors," smoothed out the creases, 
 and handed it to her. "That is one of the things 
 I'm asked to produce." 
 
 Rosamond read the paper, and her face flushed 
 hotly. She crushed it in her little hand and flung 
 it into the grate. 
 
 "How dare he !" she cried. 
 
 "There is no personal disparagement implied," 
 said Norman, mildly. "If Fielding were alive and 
 were to send a tale dealing with realities to that 
 magazine, it would be refused." 
 
 Rosamond said nothing more for a few minutes. 
 263
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 She picked abstractedly at some loose threads on 
 the sleeve of Norman's coat. 
 
 "Dearest," she said softly, at last, "you mustn't 
 let things of this sort worry you. Except that we 
 are not conventional, and don't intend to be, you 
 and I are one. And I'm making a splendid income 
 far more than I can possibly spend over eight 
 hundred a year." 
 
 The words had the effect of an electric shock 
 upon Norman. He sprang to his feet. 
 
 "No!" he cried, fiercely. "No! I'll die, I'll rot 
 beneath ten feet of clay, before it comes to that, 
 Rosamond." 
 
 Rosamond was considerably startled. "What 
 have I said?" she asked, in surprise. "Why have 
 you suddenly flown into such a passion ?" 
 
 "Oh, forgive me, dear," said Norman, recover- 
 ing himself. "I don't mistake your sweet, loving 
 generosity and kindness, Heaven knows. It is the 
 dearest and truest offer you could make to me, and 
 from my heart I thank you. But you know your- 
 self you fed it as much as I do how impossible 
 it is for me to accept it. You have always refused 
 to take the smallest present from me. How can I, 
 
 264
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 then, not merely do that, but become dependent 
 upon you for the very means of existence?" 
 
 "But if I were starving, I would let you provide 
 for me," pleaded Rosamond. 
 
 "I doubt it," said Norman, looking at her close- 
 ly. "Besides, I'm not starving" he laughed a 
 little bitterly "not quite." 
 
 Rosamond moved towards him and laid a white 
 hand on each of his shoulders. Then, stretching 
 up, she brought her mouth to his and held it there. 
 
 "Darling!" she murmured, speaking close to his 
 lips. "I love you for refusing. I love you for get- 
 ting angry. It seems we can't defy conventions. 
 The world is not old enough. As soon as you are 
 divorced, I will marry you." 
 
 Norman felt the lingering touch of her lips long 
 after she had gone, and the light warmth of her 
 breath, and the soft caress of her bosom as it had 
 pressed against him. Later on, during the evening, 
 the effect of that sweet opiate wore off, and he re- 
 turned upon himself with a shudder. Whatever 
 faint mist had hitherto blurred the reflection he saw 
 in his mental mirror was now wiped away. All 
 his life he had looked upon no position as more un- 
 speakably contemptible than that which would have 
 
 265
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 been his had he accepted Rosamond's offer. The 
 only man whom he had ever declined to shake 
 hands with was one whom he knew to occupy it. 
 
 The whole sordid business of gold and its equiva- 
 lents, in connection with the tenderest and most 
 exquisite of human relations, had always repelled 
 him exceedingly. He heartily despised the woman 
 who will take a kiss if it is accompanied by a pres- 
 ent of commensurate magnitude; and he had little 
 respect for the vast army of men who do the other 
 sex the scant honour of supposing that the way to 
 their hearts lies through their cupidity. And now, 
 who was he, to respect or condemn, to criticise or 
 cavil? These were but the ripples on the surface 
 compared with the depths he had looked into. The 
 cup of degradation, brimming with full measure, 
 if he had not drunk, at least had been held to his 
 lips till its sickly odour filled his nostrils. 
 
 He paced up and down his room in a torment of 
 self-chastisement. He must get back back to his 
 old life, to his old self. And the way lay through 
 three hundred manuscript pages. He made a 
 feverish calculation. By slogging work he had 
 sometimes done ten pages in a day. Thirty days, 
 
 2C6
 
 at that rate, and it was finished. And he could live 
 for a month! 
 
 The fit hot on him, he lighted his table-lamp and 
 switched off the electric light; then went to a cup- 
 board the same from which Marjorie had ex- 
 tracted the Sigea and took out the earlier, ap- 
 proved half of his manuscript. He threw it on the 
 table and eagerly, hurriedly read through the last 
 chapter. It was good; it was up to his standard: 
 he would see that he didn't fall away. Then he 
 took a clean sheet of paper. His pen stuck and 
 spluttered in it. He threw away the sheet and took 
 another, and with trembling fingers wrote "Chap- 
 ter XVI." across the top of it. 
 
 267
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 Six hours later, at two o'clock in the morning, 
 Norman closed the door of No. 1 2 and crept across 
 the landing to his own suite. The lamp had been 
 smoking in his room, and the air was filled with 
 the fumes of burnt oil. Except that it was covered 
 with black smuts, the sheet on his table still con- 
 tained nothing but the "Chapter XVI." at the top. 
 
 He placed his arms on the mantelpiece and leant 
 heavily upon it, covering his eyes with his hands, 
 partly to ease his aching head, partly to shut out 
 his reflection in the mirror. Shall we condemn him 
 as he stood there broken, spiritless, physically ill, 
 with haggard eyes, untidy hair, clothes cursorily 
 and carelessly adjusted, all his high aspirations of 
 six hours ago vanished into choking oil fumes? If 
 we do, it will not be with half the fervour that he 
 condemned himself. He wondered if anyone, since 
 the world began, had hated himself with the ab- 
 sorbing strength that he did at that moment. 
 
 268
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 After a time he turned round and mixed him- 
 self some whisky-and-water, considerably stronger 
 than he was accustomed to take it. His temperate 
 use of alcohol at least had left him with the power 
 to respond normally to the stimulant. The blood 
 stirred in his veins; the depression on his spirit 
 slightly lifted. What was he to do next? He could 
 not sleep. Still less could he remain in that cheer- 
 less room, with its chilling reproach in every article 
 his eyes rested upon. He took his hat and de- 
 scended the stairs. Without any definite purpose 
 in his mind, he quietly unbolted the main door and 
 let himself out. The night was fine; a few stars 
 shone above the long lines of roofs. His footsteps 
 sounded hollow in the pervading stillness. 
 
 He turned north, through Kensington Gore, up 
 Netting Hill to Paddington. He wandered aim- 
 lessly into the great station almost silent now 
 then out again, and eastward along the Uxbridge 
 Road. At the Marble Arch his steps once more 
 took him northward, along the Euston Road, and 
 up into Islington and Holloway. He knew not 
 and cared not where he went. At times his mind 
 ran riot, in a frenzy of self-hatred, alternating with 
 periods of intense gloom, when he would walk for 
 
 269
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 a mile or more with his brain a dull, dead blank; 
 feeling nothing, knowing nothing, striding mechani- 
 cally on, on. 
 
 Some hours, it seemed to him, after he started, 
 he found himself in Gray's Inn Road, facing south. 
 The street was familiar, and he looked at his watch. 
 It had stopped. He went on, across Holborn and 
 the Strand, and, just as dawn was breaking, came 
 out on the Embankment. Here he halted and leant 
 heavily upon the parapet. A solitary policeman, 
 moving slowly along, turned his light on him and 
 passed on. Oh, how tired he was ! He looked into 
 the thick stream. Many had found rest there. His 
 brain stirred, moved. Many! Many! 
 
 He had found his way to this spot by the purest 
 chance, without any thought of suicide. The 
 temptation came upon him unexpectedly, but with 
 tremendous force. One moment it had not touched 
 him; the next he was struggling in its spell, striv- 
 ing with all his might to close his ears to its subtly 
 honeyed suggestions. Down in that slowly moving 
 water there was no pain, only peace, peace and 
 oblivion. And, surely, what else mattered? Why 
 go on with the struggle? Why be subject, of your 
 own free choice, to these violent human passions 
 
 270
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 that led to nothing but misery, both in the resist- 
 ance and in the gratification? Who was there to 
 regret him? Rosamond? For a few weeks, per- 
 haps. Marjorie? He was lost to Marjorie in 
 any case, and she would be happier a widow than 
 divorced. He clung to the parapet. For the mo- 
 ment he seemed to be in the power of some external 
 compelling force greater than his own. 
 
 At last, with a violent effort, he mastered him- 
 self and turned away. Who were they these poor 
 creatures who had gone before? Distraught serv- 
 ant-girls, frenzied lovers half mad from their birth. 
 Not such as he a man of the world, of intellect. 
 A great writer! He held himself erect. A man 
 who had moved the hearts, and stirred the blood, 
 and swayed the minds of thousands of his fellow- 
 men. No, he was not going to throw up the 
 sponge. He could still get back. One day had 
 been lost, only one. "Thirty days hath September, 
 April, June and November." Not May; and it 
 was May now : he could still do it in a month. He 
 turned his flagging steps westward, homeward. 
 
 Passing through Pimlico, he met several groups 
 of labourers starting for their work, with basses 
 slung over their shoulders. He did not wish him- 
 
 271
 
 MR AND MRS VILL1ERS 
 
 self in their place a cultured mind, however 
 harassed, even by reason of that very culture, can- 
 not deliberately wish itself debased but he looked 
 at them with some feeling akin to envy, as they 
 hunched vigorously on their way, loudly proclaim- 
 ing the paucity of their vocabulary by the monot- 
 onous and distressing, but not blasphemous, use of 
 a single inappropriate adjective. Not one of them, 
 probably, could write a grammatical sentence, but 
 they were cheerful and contented; each of their 
 days was rounded off, sufficient, complete. Life 
 for them contained no weary straining after 
 phrases, no lying awake in bed turning sentences 
 sentences that got wilder as the brain got wearier 
 no daily disappointment of unsatisfied ideals. Their 
 work was done by time, and when the time was 
 over, whatever had been born of it, peace, content, 
 a day's work done; no worrying the night through 
 that the corner of the brick was slightly out of 
 plumb. Far other conditions applied to him. His 
 was piece-work, and piece-work demanding always 
 to be turned out of the finest temper under the piti- 
 less surveillance of his own mind, which was task- 
 master and workman in one, but whose critical fac- 
 ulty exceeded its productive, and which, illogically, 
 
 272
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 refused to be appeased by the utmost it could itself 
 accomplish. It seemed to him, just then, that it 
 would be a lighter task to lay bricks on mortar for 
 ever than to write fifty thousand words in a month. 
 Fagged out, he reached his rooms about seven 
 o'clock and flung himself down on his bed, dressed 
 as he was. He slept uneasily until the afternoon. 
 About half-past six he rang for some dinner. It 
 was the first food he had touched that day; but he 
 was not hungry. He sometimes wondered if he 
 should ever be hungry again. Subsequently he sat 
 down at his writing-table. The smutted sheet was 
 still on the blotting-pad, all smeared now from a 
 housemaid's offices. He crushed it rather viciously 
 into a ball and dropped it with relief into the waste- 
 paper basket. 
 
 With infinite labour he wrote a page. Then he 
 compared it with the corresponding page of the 
 previous manuscript. With sickening depression 
 he realised that it was worse than before. What 
 was more, he knew that it must be worse. He was 
 not fit to work. Suddenly it came over him that 
 he was going to be ill. Something was thumping 
 at the back of his head and his eyes felt like lead. 
 
 He glanced at the clock. It was after ten. It 
 273
 
 MR AND MRS riLLIERS 
 
 had taken him two hours and a half to write a single 
 page. Two hours and a half! And a page worse 
 than the rejected of his friend Thornton! God, 
 what was he coming to? He had not drawn the 
 curtains, and the window in front of him reflected 
 the room and himself, out of faintly luminous 
 blackness, patterned in diamonds. He rested his 
 elbows on the table and his cheeks in his hands and 
 stared out, out into the future. 
 
 He turned at the sound of a footstep. The door 
 had opened and closed, and Rosamond had entered. 
 
 274
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 ROSAMOND was wearing a soft dressing-gown of 
 that delicate shade of mauve which she herself 
 would have described as "conceived in its tenderest 
 distress." It was slightly open at the front, reveal- 
 ing the frillings of her night-dress. She looked 
 very lovely: her dark hair, caught up in a big bunch 
 behind her head, contrasting with her white, firm 
 throat; a bright glow in her soft eyes, a slight ac- 
 cess of colour in her smooth cheeks. 
 
 "Working again !" she said, with simulated im- 
 patience. "Always working!" 
 
 "I've only just begun," said Norman, in a spirit- 
 less tone. "I was out all night." 
 
 "What were you doing?" 
 
 "Walking," said Norman, "walking walking 
 walking." 
 
 "What a ridiculous thing to do in the middle of 
 the night!" She gave a quick little laugh. "Where 
 did you walk to? Come make room. I want 
 you to nurse me." 
 
 275
 
 Norman pushed his chair back obediently, but 
 with an effort that made his head throb more 
 violently and started a drumming in his ears. Rosa- 
 mond squeezed between him and the table and 
 perched upon his knee. He put his arm round her 
 half mechanically, with a slight sigh, more of 
 physical weariness than of content. But at the 
 touch of her supple form, innocent of corset, sepa- 
 rated from his arm only by the softest and thinnest 
 of coverings, the blood leapt to his cheek; and 
 Rosamond knew it. Ill as he was, worn out body 
 and spirit, his nerves flagged, jaded, almost 
 atrophied, lost to all feeling but that ceaseless thud- 
 ding in his head, the sense of sex still answered to 
 the call upon it, still jumped at the spur, like an 
 outridden horse. 
 
 She nestled close in to him happily. "Where did 
 you walk to?" she asked again, resting her cheek 
 upon his thick hair. 
 
 "Oh, I hardly know," said Norman. "I went 
 to lots of stations St Pancras, King's Cross." 
 
 "Good gracious, why?" 
 
 "To see the trains start," said Norman, dully: 
 "the night expresses. It's rather interesting." 
 
 "You went from here to St Pancras in the middle 
 276
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 of the night to see the trains start!" Rosamond 
 laughed incredulously, and gave his head an affec- 
 tionate, scolding shake between her soft palms. She 
 little knew what pain it caused him. "You must 
 think of a better reason than that, old boy." 
 
 Then, apparently fancying she might be mis- 
 understood, she clasped her arms tenderly about 
 him and held him close. "Oh, I trust you, dear." 
 And again there was that exquisite low caress in 
 the last word. 
 
 Norman said nothing. He wondered rather 
 vaguely why this gentle expression of her faith in 
 him touched him so little. He knew he was glad 
 must be glad and yet somehow the power to feel 
 it was not in him. Rosamond lazily picked up the 
 sheet of paper from his blotting-pad and read it 
 through. 
 
 "What is this youVe been writing?" she asked in 
 a tone of surprise. "You dear old donkey, it's 
 awful rubbish." 
 
 "Yes," said Norman, wearily, "it's very bad." 
 
 "You must never laugh at my modistese again," 
 she went on merrily, "if this is how you have taken 
 to write yourself." 
 
 277
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Is it as bad as that?" said he, without the least 
 intention to be offensive. 
 
 Again she shook that poor head. "Wretch!" 
 she exclaimed. "At any rate, tell me what you 
 mean by 'expecionally' ?" 
 
 "Have I written that? 'Exceptionally,' I sup- 
 pose." 
 
 "Or 'especially'? Shall I alter it?" She took 
 Norman's pen in her hand, still sitting on his knee, 
 and bent over the table. "Quickly, which is it to 
 be?" 
 
 "Either," said Norman, listlessly. Why couldn't 
 he think? What was the context? Heavens! 
 what was the book about? 
 
 " 'Especially,' then." She made the correction. 
 "It will save the compositor a tremendous lot of 
 anxiety, won't it?" 
 
 She nestled back into his arms. "You're not up 
 to it, Norman," she said, gently. "What's the 
 good of trying to write when you're so tired? 
 You'll only make yourself ill." 
 
 "I don't feel very fit," said Norman, putting his 
 hand to his head. 
 
 "Of course you don't." She caressed him softly. 
 "You've worn yourself out. How stupid of you 
 
 278
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 to walk about all night ! I wouldn't write fiction if 
 it made me do things of that kind." She gave a 
 little laugh. "Doing dress isn't very lofty, per- 
 haps, but it lets you sleep at night." 
 
 "I couldn't do dress," said Norman, quite seri- 
 ously. "Men don't wear dresses. And what they 
 do wear they find out about somehow, without read- 
 ing it in the papers." 
 
 Rosamond pressed his head into the laces of her 
 bosom. "Rest there, tired head," she said; 
 then blushed and laughed a little, and added softly, 
 "for the present." 
 
 Norman felt easier so. That rush of blood to 
 the head at the first touch of Rosamond had 
 not been suffered with impunity. Every vein in it 
 was now beating like a sledge-hammer. But Rosa- 
 mond's bosom was soft, and it soothed him to rest 
 it there. If that could have been his eternal pillow, 
 from which his throbbing head would not lift 
 again, he would peacefully, gladly have accepted it 
 as such. 
 
 But Rosamond had no such thoughts. It must 
 be said, in justice to her, that she had no' concep- 
 tion how ill he was. 
 
 "You are always so cheerless here," she said, 
 279
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 looking round; "a horrid lamp, and no fire, and no 
 nice chairs. Let us go into my room and be com- 
 fortable. You shall have some champagne to pick 
 you up." 
 
 Norman raised his head, startled back to realities 
 by a sudden anxiety, a sudden remembrance. "Oh, 
 not to-night, dear," he said, quickly pleading. "I 
 must get on. I can't stop. I've only thirty days. 
 'Thirty days hath September ' ' 
 
 "Why! what on earth are you talking about?" 
 said Rosamond, half laughing, but with a percep- 
 tible note of latent concern. "Work, you old goose ! 
 You're no more fit to work than well, than I am 
 just now." She pressed her cheek to his face. The 
 laugh overcame the concern and took that moving 
 note, partly joyous and partly shy, which is 
 woman's highest tribute and man's sweetest privi- 
 lege. 
 
 Norman had lost the thread of his thoughts and 
 was wearily striving to pick it up again. 
 
 "What a solemn old stupid you are to-night!" 
 cried Rosamond. 
 
 Suddenly she sprang from him with a gay, chaff- 
 ing ripple of laughter. "Come," she said. 
 
 280
 
 Norman slowly turned in his chair; his head 
 lifted; his breath came fast. 
 
 Rosamond, mercy! mercy! 
 
 There was a pause. Norman's hand moved un- 
 certainly to his eyes. He no longer felt his head 
 it had dulled into painlessness but the action 
 of turning had cast a black mist over his eyes, hid- 
 ing everything. Then, slowly, the mist moved, 
 swayed, opened; and he saw Rosamond like a pic- 
 ture thrown by limelight on a screen superb; 
 standing at her full height; her head held slightly 
 back; the attitude moulding in relief every line and 
 curve of her beautiful figure. The laces at her 
 throat had fallen away, revealing the vale of her 
 bosom. Her arms were hanging a little forward 
 and open, the palms turned to the front. She 
 stretched them towards him. Then she smiled. 
 "Come," she said again, a melting softness in the 
 lingering tone. 
 
 Perhaps then, at last, Rosamond knew. Perhaps 
 in that final moment in those vaguely moving 
 hands the consciousness of what she was doing 
 broke upon her. She must have realised it before, 
 had not the lamp-shade been so tilted as to cast the 
 light upon the manuscript and off Norman's face. 
 
 281
 
 At any rate, she retreated a step and put up her 
 hands to keep him back. 
 
 It was too late. Norman had already risen his 
 face pale, his hands trembling, a heavy perspiration 
 thick on his brow. For an instant he clung to the 
 chair-back for support, then pushed it away with 
 such force that it fell with a crash on the floor. In 
 two strides he crossed the space that separated him 
 from Rosamond, and for a moment clasped her, 
 strained her in his arms. A moment only. The 
 next he had tottered and fallen forward, almost 
 dragging her with him, and lay huddled on the 
 pale green carpet, blood pouring from his mouth. 
 
 Oh, man, man! keep away your meddling, of- 
 ficious hands! Leave these things to God. His 
 eternal justice is sure. 
 
 282
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 AND His eternal mercy. 
 
 For six weeks Norman Villiers hung on the,brink 
 of the unknown. Most of those heavy days were 
 passed in darkness; but from time to time there came 
 gleams of semi-consciousness, during which he had 
 fleeting glimpses of passing events and of some 
 people who interested him. There was a tall man 
 with a big nose he saw occasionally, who wore 
 glasses and couldn't keep his long, hard fingers off 
 him. He had a quiet voice. He knew him well 
 enough; he was one of his old schoolmasters; but 
 evidently he didn't appreciate the fact that he was 
 no longer dealing with a boy, who could be 
 squashed and ignored. It was rather absurd. He 
 should have to tell him some day. 
 
 And now and then a beautiful woman came, with 
 dark hair and soft dark eyes, who wore pretty 
 dresses and generally had some flowers. He 
 seemed to have known her long ago. He couldn't 
 
 283
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 quite remember who she was. And then there were 
 two nurses in uniform, who hung about him a good 
 deal and occasionally rather worried him. 
 
 Sometimes they appeared to be nurses; at other 
 times they seemed to be friends he had known in 
 the past and forgotten, or had thought to be dead. 
 One the elder of the two who had a kind face 
 and soft hands, particularly troubled him at first, 
 because of the strange familiarity of her features 
 and ways. He felt inclined to laugh, one day, 
 when he remembered that they were his mother's, 
 and that he hadn't recognised her. She, too, he had 
 supposed to be dead. She was very gentle, his 
 mother. Strange that he had thought her dead ! 
 He was very glad to find he was wrong, because he 
 had sometimes feared that he hadn't returned her 
 loving acts and thoughts as he should have done, 
 and now he could make up for it. But why would 
 she persist in answering him as though he were a 
 child still, talking stupidly? Didn't she know he 
 was a famous man? Hadn't she heard? He 
 would make her understand. Then hands were 
 placed over him, and he was pressed back upon his 
 pillows, and the darkness returned. 
 
 But at last there came a day a bright morning 
 284
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIEES 
 
 in July when he opened sane eyes and looked 
 about him. It was his own room at Albany Man- 
 sions that his eyes fell upon a soft breeze stirring 
 the curtains at the open windows and not the bare 
 little bedroom he had occupied for three years at 
 school, nor yet a certain heavily hung apartment 
 of an old country-house, of odd shape and creepy 
 suggestion, in which he had once slept a night. 
 Though there was every indication that someone 
 had recently been with him, for the moment he was 
 alone. But even as he was weakly wondering who 
 it could have been, there was a quick rustle of 
 skirts and the door opened. 
 
 Rosamond came in like a beam of sunshine, in a 
 light summer gown, with a big basket of roses in 
 her hand. She walked straight across to the win- 
 dow, without looking at him, and began to arrange 
 the flowers in a bowl of water standing on the table 
 beneath it. Presently she chanced to look round 
 and met his eyes watching her. She stood quite 
 still, two roses held between the fingers of her right 
 hand. Startled gladness, hope, were in her look, 
 but she spoke a little fearfully. 
 
 "Norman, do you know me? Do you know me, 
 dear?" 
 
 285
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 "Of course, I know you," said Norman. "Could 
 I ever forget you, Rosamond?" 
 
 His voice was weak, and somehow the sentiment 
 didn't ring quite true ; but the words were rational 
 enough and uttered perfectly calmly. 
 
 Rosamond took a quick step towards him; her 
 hand went to her heart. "Oh, I'm glad," she said, 
 "so glad, so thankful 1" 
 
 She drew a chair to his bedside and sat down. 
 
 "What beautiful roses!" said Norman. He 
 stretched out a thin hand to her. "How good you 
 have been to me I" 
 
 "I haven't," said Rosamond. She took the hand 
 in her left; the right still held the two roses. "I've 
 been to see you occasionally and brought you 
 flowers. That's all." 
 
 Norman looked at some needlework and an 
 open book which were lying on a small table by the 
 window. 
 
 She followed the direction of his glance. "They 
 belong to one of the nurses. I wasn't born to be a 
 sister of charity, Norman," she said, rather con- 
 tritely. "I'm afraid I like well men very much 
 better than sick ones." 
 
 A sudden thought had flashed through Norman. 
 286
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 He gripped her hand with all the feeble strength 
 he had left. "Who has paid for the nurses?" he 
 asked, sharply. "Who has paid for everything?" 
 
 Rosamond was silent. 
 
 He struggled wildly to raise himself, his face 
 burning. "Rosamond! Rosamond!" 
 
 She put her hands upon his shoulders and easily 
 forced him back upon the pillows. 
 
 "Don't be so angry," she said, softly. "You'll 
 make yourself ill again. I couldn't let you die. 
 And you'll be able to pay me back when you're bet- 
 ter and can work. Besides, it was really to save 
 myself having to nurse you. I don't like nursing." 
 
 "You couldn't have done that in any case," said 
 Norman, weakly, pressing his head into the pillow. 
 He had no strength to struggle. "I've been much 
 too bad, I know that. I fancy I've been a bit de- 
 lirious at times. You've brought me back to life, 
 dear. For that I am your debtor always, after the 
 money has been repaid. If I'm going to get bet- 
 ter," he added, with a tired sigh. 
 
 "Of course, you'll get better," said Rosamond, 
 quickly. "You're better now." 
 
 "More or less," said Norman, smiling faintly. 
 "How long have I been unconscious?" 
 
 287
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "Nearly six weeks," she replied. 
 
 "As long as that! It seems only a few days. 
 What a nuisance I must have been! What does 
 the doctor say about me?" he asked suddenly. 
 
 "That you're to keep quiet and get well," said 
 Rosamond. She began rather hastily to straighten 
 the coverings upon him. 
 
 "Yes, I know that," said Norman, not to be put 
 off. "What else?" 
 
 Rosamond didn't answer for a moment or two. 
 Then she took his hand again and looked at him 
 calmly. "He says if you are careful you may live 
 to be an old man " 
 
 "Yes?" 
 
 "That's all," said Rosamond, firmly. 
 
 "It's not all," said Norman. "Didn't he say, 
 by any chance, that I had broken down too badly to 
 travel above the legal pace again?" 
 
 "He thinks you may always be " 
 
 "A semi-invalid?" said Norman. 
 
 Rosamond said nothing, and after a pause Nor- 
 man added: "Well, we have lived, dear. I don't 
 repine. I've had my day." 
 
 Rosamond bowed her head. "It was my fault," 
 
 she said. 
 
 288
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 "No, no." He stroked her hand with one 
 whiter than hers. "I ate too much of the cake, it 
 was so good, and it has given me indigestion." He 
 tried to laugh, but the effort was too great, and he 
 settled himself wearily upon the pillows. 
 
 There was a long silence. A nurse came in and, 
 finding her patient conscious, gave him some food 
 out of a spoon. He took it meekly. Then, caution- 
 ing Rosamond not to let him talk too much, she left 
 them alone again. 
 
 Rosamond had something to say, however, which 
 she thought would conduce to the ultimate benefit 
 of his health far more than present silence. She 
 fondled his hand for a few moments. 
 
 "Norman, may I write to your wife?" she said 
 abruptly. 
 
 A trembling hope flickered for a moment in Nor- 
 man's heavy eyes and then died out again, like the 
 distant flash of a search-light on the sea. 
 
 Rosamond saw it and it gave her a stab, but she 
 stuck bravely to her purpose. "Don't think I'm 
 suggesting it because I'm tired of you and want to 
 get rid of you now that you're ill," she went on 
 quickly; "though it looks like it," she added, with 
 a laugh that was half a sob. "It's not that, dear." 
 
 289
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 She snatched up his wasted hand and pressed it 
 closely, tenderly, to her lips. "Night after night, 
 and day after day, since you've been ill, I've 
 thought about you about you both and the 
 future. And she is still willing to take you back." 
 
 "How do you know that?" said Norman, 
 quickly. 
 
 She shook her head at him a little wistfully. 
 "You're very willing to go, dear," she said. "I've 
 no reason for knowing, except the feminine one: 
 because I do. But you can trust it in this case; 
 it's founded on observation, and intuition, and on 
 something else, perhaps, that it isn't necessary to 
 mention." Again that little laugh that was caught 
 in her throat. "I assure you, it's quite a sound 
 
 one." 
 
 Norman sank back with a sigh he had strained 
 a little upward. "She has not been here, then, or 
 written?" 
 
 "I don't think she knows." 
 
 He closed his eyes wearily and then opened them 
 again. "I can't ask her, Rosamond," he said; "it's 
 out of the question. What have I to offer?" He 
 looked at his hands. "A wreck : a husband to nurse, 
 more or less, for the rest of his life. Besides, she 
 
 290
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 is suing for divorce. Has anything been done? 
 Has the case been heard?" 
 
 "Yes, the case has been heard," said Rosamond, 
 "and an order has been made against you for resti- 
 tution of conjugal rights." She checked a sigh, and 
 added brightly: "Really, Norman, I think you 
 ought to obey the order of the Court." 
 
 "That is only a legal fiction," said Norman. "I 
 rejected her when I was well and prosperous. I 
 can't ask her to take the remains of me now an 
 invalid who could be nothing but a burden." 
 
 Rosamond said no more. He was too weak to 
 be further urged just then. Already the strain of 
 the conversation had plainly told upon his small 
 reserve of strength. 
 
 The two roses she had been holding in her hand 
 when she first found him conscious had fallen on 
 the bed. One was deep pink, with very large 
 smooth petals; the other, a delicate shell-pink tea- 
 rose. Rosamond picked them up again. 
 
 "Where did you get all these marvellous roses?" 
 said Norman, looking from her to the bowl. "I 
 never saw such beauties." 
 
 "I had to go to the Temple Show yesterday," 
 she replied, "to look at the dresses; so I bought 
 
 291
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 them for you; they took a first prize. I don't 
 wonder." She pressed the two in her hand to her 
 face. "I love them. Especially this." She held 
 up the larger, deep-coloured one. " 'Mrs W. J. 
 Grant/ Isn't she magnificent? You shall have 
 her beside you." 
 
 She took a glass from the mantelpiece and filled 
 it with water; then placed it, with the rose in it, on 
 a small table at his bedside. 
 
 "I'm going to steal the other one," she an- 
 nounced, "and wear it to celebrate your recovery. 
 What is it called?" She looked at the name on it. 
 ' 'Maman Cochet.' Oh, mamma, you're very 
 pretty; much too pretty, mammal" 
 
 She pinned it in her bodice. 
 
 "And now for a pilgrimage of the shops," she 
 said, with a small grimace. "Oh, how I hate 
 them !" 
 
 She turned at the door to look back at him 
 brightly. "Be good. Obey the nurses. And no 
 more attempts to sit up, please." She included the 
 glowing rose in a final smiling glance. " 'Mrs W. 
 J. Grant' is my substitute till I return." 
 
 293
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 AFTER Rosamond left him Norman slept for 
 some hours. When he awoke late in the afternoon, 
 he was aware, even before his eyes were quite open, 
 that there was someone in the room a woman 
 seated by the window, bending over some work. He 
 supposed it was Rosamond. 
 
 Was it Rosamond? Slight, sloping shoulders 
 demurely bent, brown hair pulled back from a thin, 
 white brow to a big roll behind, a small pointed 
 profile, two earnest eyes calmly intent upon their 
 work? Norman looked and looked, and his heart 
 beat an answer to the question. He waited in 
 silence, drinking long, grateful drafts from the 
 spring of renewed life and hope, almost afraid the 
 figure would look up and break the spell. 
 
 At last he spoke. "Is that Marjorie?" he said, 
 in a voice that was still the ghost of what it had 
 been, "or an angel from heaven?"
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 Marjorie got up. "It's not an angel, Norman," 
 she said, "so I suppose it must be Marjorie." 
 
 "How good of you to come !" was all he could 
 say. 
 
 "Of course I've come," said Marjorie. "I should 
 have come long ago if I'd known. I only heard 
 this morning. Mr Thornton found out by acci- 
 dent and wrote and told James. He pretended he 
 wanted him to go and play golf, and mentioned 
 your illness as a sort of something to fill up. I al- 
 ways liked Mr Thornton," she added, inconse- 
 quently. 
 
 "So did I," said Norman. 
 
 Marjorie bent over him to smooth his pillows, 
 keeping her face hidden. "We must see more of 
 him when you're better," she said. 
 
 There was scarcely a perceptible change in her 
 voice. Norman could not speak. And when Mar- 
 jorie had at length completed the adjustment of the 
 pillows, which appeared to have got into rather 
 troublesome disarray, she saw tears standing in each 
 of his eyes. Her heart leapt : she could have sung, 
 shouted. One would have guessed it as little, as 
 that she had prolonged her previous manipulation 
 for his comfort because she dreaded to seek in his
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 face the answer to the most momentous question of 
 her life. Now that the field was won after so many 
 weary months, she danced on her joy, played with 
 it, with a face which reflected but the faintest gleam 
 of that inward revel. 
 
 "Norman, the Court has ordered you to return 
 to me," she said, severely. "Do you know that?" 
 
 Norman admitted that an echo of such a sentence 
 had reached his ears. 
 
 "Do you intend to obey it? It's a serious affair 
 to disobey the Court, you know." 
 
 He stretched out his two thin hands to her. 
 "Marjorie, Marjorie, will you let me obey it, after 
 all?" 
 
 She dropped on her knees by his bedside. "I 
 would let you," she said, softly, "if fifty years had 
 gone past since you went away, and you were an 
 old man with furrows on your face" she traced 
 the hypothetical lines with her finger "and all 
 this hair was white." She tenderly brushed the 
 straggling strands from his forehead and then, 
 bending over, touched it softly with her lips. 
 
 "But you know," said Norman, "you know, 
 dear, you are doing a wretched bad deal with for- 
 tune. She offers you freedom and a fresh start, and 
 
 295
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 you come back to an invalid. The doctor says I 
 shall always be pretty much of a crock." 
 
 "What do I care?" cried Marjorie. She spread 
 her arms over him. "I shall give up my life to 
 nursing you and taking care of you and bringing 
 you back to health." 
 
 Norman laid his hand on her head. "I think it 
 was an angel that came," he said softly. 
 
 They talked for a long time in low tones. They 
 had such a lot to say. It was a conversation in re- 
 gard to which it is only possible to record, from the 
 far corner of the room to which we have discreetly 
 retreated, that it was punctuated with a good many 
 "hushes" from Marjorie, when her husband 
 showed signs of unduly exerting himself. She 
 knew he ought not to be talking at all, but those 
 eight months had been such heavy ones, and how 
 could she help it? 
 
 At last she jumped up, struck by a sudden 
 thought, blank contrition on her face, which hardly 
 admitted the smile beneath. "Oh, dear, I've for- 
 gotten all about James and the children ! He was 
 going to take them for a drive and then call for 
 me." She went to the window and put her head 
 
 296
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 out. "There they are ! Poor darlings, I wonder 
 how long they've been waiting?" 
 
 "Does that include James?" said Norman, with 
 a smile. 
 
 Marjorie hurried to the door and down the steps. 
 A cab was drawn up outside, and James was stand- 
 ing on the pavement talking to the commissionnaire. 
 
 "I want you to go and get me some things," she 
 said, breathlessly. "I'm not going back." 
 
 Then James did an astonishing thing. He took 
 her whole-heartedly in his arms and kissed her. 
 Which was rather embarrassing to poor Marjorie, 
 seeing that he hadn't so honoured her since her 
 wedding day, particularly as the cabman was 
 glancing over his shoulder, and the commission- 
 naire wasn't glancing over his shoulder at all, but 
 staring straight at them. 
 
 "A bottle of '63 to-night," he said, joyously; 
 "and it's your fault if I suffer for it." 
 
 "Oh, dear, I hope you won't," said Marjorie, 
 almost with genuine concern. "I want the chil- 
 dren." 
 
 The two little ladies were sitting side by side on 
 the small seat of the cab, with their backs to the 
 horse, their diminutive toes dangling; quietly talk- 
 
 297
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 ing together in that wonderful, serious way that 
 children have of talking when left to themselves, 
 and now and then digging inquisitive, speculative 
 fingers into sundry parcels that strewed their laps 
 and the seat opposite. A drive with Uncle James 
 was an event which obviously contained many in- 
 teresting possibilities. 
 
 "What are all those parcels?" said Marjorie. 
 
 "Groceries," said James, mendaciously: "odds 
 and ends for Marion. Can't you keep that whip 
 still?" he yelled to the cabman, who was harmlessly 
 flicking his horse. "Is the poor beast never to be 
 free from it, even when he's standing still?" 
 
 Marjorie got the children out of the cab and ran 
 upstairs with them, holding one by each hand. Her 
 own steps felt so light that she forgot their small 
 feet; and so, by the time they reached the second 
 floor, the little people were sadly out of breath. 
 She hugged them in turn to make up for her 
 thoughtlessness, straightened their hats, and then 
 took them with her into Norman's room. 
 
 They ran towards him joyfully. 
 
 "Oh, Daddy!" cried the elder. "Poor Daddy! 
 Good Daddy!" 
 
 "No, darlings," said the invalid, quietly, taking 
 298
 
 MR AND MRS FILLIERS 
 
 a hand of each. "Poor Daddy, if you will have it 
 so, but not good Daddy as long as you live." 
 
 Marjorie didn't let them stay long. After a few 
 minutes she took them down again, chattering 
 volubly, and packed them in the cab with James 
 a happy party. During the drive home the latter 
 employed the intervals of congratulating himself 
 upon his success in bringing about a joyful denoue- 
 ment with which he had had nothing whatever to 
 do, in working himself into an ungovernable rage, 
 with which adequately to meet the situation which 
 he foresaw when the children triumphantly opened 
 their parcels before Marion. 
 
 After she had seen the cab drive away Marjorie 
 ascended the stairs again; but this time without 
 hurry, peacefully, with a deep content in her heart. 
 It gave her a shock to remember it was the same 
 flight she had mounted with such different feelings 
 seven months before, clad in the cream cloth gown 
 and ostrich plumes which had proved so sadly in- 
 efficacious. 
 
 Norman found it very delicious, when she re- 
 turned to his room, to renew acquaintance with her 
 easy, tranquil method of going about the affairs 
 of life; to observe the unobtrusive but confident air 
 
 299
 
 MR AND MRS VILLIERS 
 
 which which she assumed control of the sick-room, 
 giving orders to the nurses quietly and as a matter 
 of course, as if she had engaged them herself. 
 Thinking of the nurses, it crossed his mind, with a 
 private chuckle, that he should have to ask her to 
 draw him a considerable cheque before long. He 
 knew precisely how she would do it: with as little 
 concern and as little question as she would write 
 an order for the stores; and that an hour or two 
 afterwards it would occur to her to ask him what 
 it was for. 
 
 In much the same way, it did, presently, occur 
 to her to refer to another subject. 
 
 "What a splendid lot of roses you've got!" she 
 said. "Where did they come from?" 
 
 Norman made no response; and perhaps she 
 guessed. At any rate, she didn't press the ques- 
 tion. 
 
 "I don't like imperial pink," she said, glancing 
 at the large flower by his bedside. "It's not at all 
 soothing. I'll get you another to look at." 
 
 She dipped her fingers among the perfumed mass 
 in the bowl, and, after a little hesitation, picked out 
 a pure white tea. 
 
 "Isn't it lovely?" she said, holding it up. "It 
 300
 
 MR AND MRS V1LLIERS 
 
 has its name on it: 'Innocente Pirola.' What an 
 appropriate one!" 
 
 Norman watched her in silence while she took 
 away the pink rose and put the white one in its 
 place. 
 
 THE END
 
 THE YOKE 
 
 BY HUBERT WALES 
 
 London Daily Chronicle. "The story is extremely 
 well written, the characterisation admirable. Mr. 
 Wales sees some things that other men fail to see, 
 and says a good many things about which other men 
 maintain a strict reserve." 
 
 ,-: x 
 
 London Daily Telegraph. "Some people may con- 
 sider the book 'unpleasant,' but, however that may be, 
 it is a fair and legitimate study of temperaments, the 
 working put of a problem by no means rare in real 
 life. If it had been badly done it would certainly 
 have been an unpleasant book, but it is well done." 
 & J* 
 
 The Taller. "What I said about 'Mr. and Mrs. 
 Villiers' some months ago I repeat about 'The Yoke.' 
 But the latter is more than a 'notable book'; it is 
 one of striking skill, both in plot and characterisa- 
 tion, and assures Mr. Hubert Wales that front-rank 
 place among contemporary novelists for which he 
 has made so bold a bid. There is no inane idealism 
 about 'The Yoke.' Its intense human interest will 
 be the key to its success." 
 
 jit j* 
 
 London Times. "It is a strong and poignant story; 
 it can be recommended because of its obvious sin- 
 cerity." 
 
 J* * 
 
 Bystander "Mr. Hubert Wales's object is 
 
 straightforward psychology, and he gives us emo- 
 tions in original combinations. Mr. Wales shows 
 marked power in his treatment of the various cli- 
 maxes." 
 
 Jt j* 
 
 Aberdeen Press. "Mr. Wales is a clever chef. 
 What might have been an extremely unpleasant 
 book he has transformed, by his extreme lucid naive 
 style, his wit, powers of observance, and his grace- 
 ful air, into a remarkably interesting one one that 
 leaves no bad taste in the mouth."
 
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