UC-NRLF 
 
 B 3 322 37D 
 
 
BERKELEY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BNtVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
The Royal End 
 
 A ROMANCE 
 BY 
 
 HENRY HARLAND 
 
 Author of "The Cardinal s Snuff-Box"; "My Friend 
 Prospero," etc. 
 
 London: HUTCHINSON & CO. 
 Paternoster Row g%g g^J 1909 
 
ps 
 T 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 3 
 
 PART II 53 
 
 PART III . I03 
 
 PART IV I47 
 
 PART V I95 
 
 PART VI 243 
 
 PART VII 28; 
 
 468 
 
PART FIRST 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 1DALZATORE, by many coquetries, had 
 long been trying to attract their attention. 
 At last he had succeeded. 
 
 " You have an admirer," Ruth, with a 
 gleam, remarked to her companion. " Mercy, 
 how he s ogling you." 
 
 " Yes," answered Lucilla Dor, untroubled, 
 in that contented, caressing voice of hers, 
 while, her elbow on the table, with the 
 " languid grace," about which Ruth chaffed 
 her a good deal, she pensively nibbled a fig. 
 " The admiration is reciprocal. What a hand 
 some fellow he is ! " 
 
 And her soft blue eyes smiled straight into 
 Balzatore s eager brown ones. 
 
 Quivering with emotion, Balzatore sprang 
 up, and in another second would have bounded 
 to her side. 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Sit down, sir ; where are you going ? " 
 sternly interposed Bertram. Placed with his 
 back towards the ladies, he was very likely 
 unaware of their existence. 
 
 Balzatore sat down, but he gave his head a 
 toss that clearly signified his opinion of the re 
 straint put upon him : senselessly conventional, 
 monstrously annoying. And he gave Lucilla 
 Dor a look. Disappointment spoke in it, 
 homage, dogged tis a case for saying so- 
 dogged tenacity of purpose. " Never fear," 
 it promised, " I ll find an opportunity 
 yet." . 
 
 He found it, sure enough, some twenty 
 minutes later. 
 
 ii 
 
 Ruth and Lucilla had been dining at the 
 Lido, at the new hotel there, I forget its 
 name, the only decent hotel, in a sandy garden 
 near the Stabilimento. They had dined in 
 the air, of course, on the terrace, whence they 
 could watch the sunset burn and die over 
 Venice, and the moon come up out of the 
 Adriatic. Balzatore had been dining with 
 Bertram at a neighbouring table. 
 
 4 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 But now, her eyes intently lifted, as in prayer, 
 Lucilla began to adjust her veil. 
 
 " We can t stop here nibbling figs forever," 
 she premised, with the drawl, whimsically plain 
 tive, that she is apt to assume in her regretful 
 moods. " I think it s time to return to our 
 mosquitoes." 
 
 So they paid their bill, and set off, through 
 the warm night and the moonlight and the 
 silence, down the wide avenue of plane-trees 
 that leads from the sea to the lagoon. In the 
 moonlight and the silence, they were them 
 selves silent at first, walking slowly, feeling the 
 pleasant solemnity of things. Then, all at 
 once, Lucilla softly sighed. 
 
 " Poor Byron," she said, as from the depths 
 of a pious reverie. 
 
 " Byron ? " wondered Ruth, called perhaps 
 from reveries of her own. " Why ? " 
 
 " He used to come here to ride," explained 
 Lucilla, in a breaking voice. 
 
 I m afraid Ruth tittered. Afterwards they 
 were silent again, the silence of the night re 
 asserting itself, and holding them like music, 
 till, by and by, their progress ended at the 
 landing-stage where they had left their 
 gondola. 
 
 5 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " But what has become of the wretched 
 thing ? " asked Lucilla, looking blankly this 
 way and that. For the solitary gondola tied 
 up there wasn t theirs. She turned vaguely 
 to the men in charge of it, meditating en 
 quiries : when one of them, with the intuition 
 and the aplomb of his race, took the words 
 out of her mouth. 
 
 " Pardon, Lordessa," he said, touching his 
 hat. " If you are seeking the boatmen who 
 brought you here, they went back as soon as 
 they had put you ashore." 
 
 Lucilla eyed him coldly, distrustfully. 
 
 " Went back ? " she doubted. " But I told 
 them to wait." 
 
 The man shrugged, a shrug of sympathy, of 
 fatalism. " Ech ! " he said. "They could 
 not have understood." 
 
 Lucilla frowned, weighing credibilities ; then 
 her brow cleared, as in sudden illumination. 
 
 " But I did not pay them," she remembered, 
 and cited the circumstance as conclusive. 
 
 The man, however, made light of it. 
 " Ech ! " he said, with genial confidence. 
 " They belong to your hotel. You will pay 
 them to-morrow." 
 
 " And, anyhow, my dear," suggested Ruth, 
 6 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 intervening, " as they re nowhere in mortal 
 sight . . ." 
 
 " Don t you see that this is a trick ? " 
 Lucilla stopped her, in a heated whisper. 
 " What you call collusion. They re lurking 
 somewhere round a corner, so that we shall 
 have to engage these creatures, and be let in 
 for two fares." 
 
 " Dear me," murmured Ruth, admiring. 
 " Who would have thought them so imagina 
 tive ? " 
 
 Lucilla sniffed. " Oh, they re Italians," 
 she scornfully pointed out. " Ah, well, the 
 gods love a cheerful victim. You will do," she 
 said to the man. " Take us to the Brit 
 annia." And she motioned to Ruth to 
 place herself under the tent. 
 
 But the man, touching his hat again, stood, 
 very deferentially, with bent back, so as to 
 bar the way. 
 
 " Pardon, Lordessa," he said, " so many 
 excuses we are private ; " while his glance, 
 not devoid of vainglory, embracing himself 
 and his colleague, invited attention to the 
 spruce nautical liveries they were wearing, 
 and to the silver badges on their arms. 
 
 For a moment Lucilla Dor stared stonily 
 7 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 at him. " Bother ! " she pronounced, with 
 fervour, under her breath. Then her blue 
 eyes gazed, wide and wistful, at the moonlit 
 waters, beyond which the lamps along the 
 Riva twinkled pallid derision. " How are we 
 to get to Venice ? " she demanded helplessly 
 of the universe. 
 
 " We must go back for the night to the hotel 
 here, said Ruth. 
 
 " With no luggage ? Two women alone ? 
 Never heard of such a thing," scoffed Lu- 
 cilla. 
 
 " Well then," Ruth submitted, " I believe 
 the lagoon is nowhere very deep. We might 
 try to ford it." 
 
 " Oh, if you think it s a laughing matter ! " 
 Lucilla, with an ominous lilt, threw out. 
 
 Meanwhile the two gondoliers had been con 
 ferring together ; they conducted their con 
 ference with so much vehemence, one might 
 have fancied they were quarelling, but that 
 was only the gondolier of it ; and now, he 
 who had heretofore remained in the back 
 ground, stepped forward, and in a tone, all 
 Italian, of respectfully benevolent protection, 
 addressed Lucilla. 
 
 " Scusi, Madama, we will ask our Signore 
 8 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to let you eome with us. There is plenty of 
 room. Only, we must wait till he arrives." 
 
 " Ah," sighed she, with relief. But in a 
 minute, " Who is your Signore ? " caution 
 prompted her to ask. 
 
 " He is a signorino," the man replied, and 
 I m sure he thought the reply enlightening. 
 " He is very good-natured. He will let you 
 
 come." 
 
 And it happened just at this point, while 
 they stood there hesitating, that Balzatore 
 found his opportunity. 
 
 in 
 
 One heard a tattoo of scampering paws, a 
 sibilance of swift breathing ; and a cold wet 
 nose, followed by a warm furry head, was 
 thrust from behind under Lucilla s hand. 
 
 Startled, she gave an inevitable little femi 
 nine cry, and half turned round to recognise 
 her late admirer. " Hello, old fellow is this 
 you ? " she greeted him, patting his shoulder, 
 stroking his silky ears. " You take one rather 
 by surprise, you know. Yes, you are a very 
 beautiful, nice, friendly collie, all the same ; 
 and I never saw so handsome a coat, or so 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 splendid a tail, or such soulful poetic eyes. 
 I am very glad to renew your acquaintance." 
 
 Balzatore waved his splendid tail as if it were 
 a banner ; rubbed his jowl against Lucilla s 
 knee ; caracoled and pranced before her, to 
 display his graces ; cocked his head, and 
 blinked with self-satisfaction ; sat down on his 
 haunches, and, tongue lolling from his black 
 muzzle, panted exultantly, " There ! You see 
 how cleverly I have brought it off." 
 
 " Ecco. That is our Signore s dog," an 
 nounced the man who had promised inter 
 cession. " He himself will not be far be 
 hind." 
 
 At the word, appeared, approaching, the 
 tall and slender figure of Bertram, to whom, 
 in a sudden contrapuntal outburst, both gon 
 doliers began to speak Venetian. They spoke 
 rapidly, turbulently almost, with many modu 
 lations, with lavish gestures, vividly, feel 
 ingly, each exposed the ladies case. 
 
 Bertram, his grey eyes smiling (you know that 
 rather deep-in, flickering smile of goodwill of 
 theirs), removed his panama hat and said, in 
 perfectly English English, with the accent of 
 a man praying a particular favour, " I beg 
 you to let them take you to your hotel." 
 
 10 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The next instant, the gondoliers steadying 
 their craft, Lucilla murmuring what she could 
 by way of thanks, he had helped them aboard, 
 and, after a quick order to the men, was bowing 
 god-speed to them from the landing-stage, 
 while one hand, by the collar, held captive a 
 tugging, impetuous Balzatore. 
 
 " But you ? " exclaimed Lucilla, puzzled. 
 " Do you not also go to Venice ? " 
 
 " Oh, they will come back for me," said 
 Bertram, lightly. 
 
 She gave a slight movement to her head, 
 slight but decisive, a movement that implied 
 finality. 
 
 " We can t think of such a thing," in the tone 
 of an ultimatum she declared. " It s extremely 
 good of you to offer us a lift but we simply 
 can t accept it if it means inconvenience to 
 yourself." 
 
 And Bertram, of course, at once ceded the 
 point. 
 
 Bowing again, " Thank you very much," he 
 said. " I wasn t sure we shouldn t be in your 
 way." 
 
 He took his seat, keeping Balzatore restive 
 between his knees. 
 
 ii 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 IV 
 
 The gondoliers bent rhythmically to their 
 oars, the gondola went gently plump-plump, 
 plash-plash, over the smooth water, stirring 
 faint intermittent breezes ; far and wide the 
 lagoon lay dim and blue in a fume of moon 
 light, silent, secret, even somehow almost 
 sinister in its untranslatable suggestions ; and 
 before them rose the domes and palaces of 
 Venice, pale and luminous, with purple black 
 nesses of shadow, unreal, mysterious, dream- 
 compelling, as a city built of cloud. 
 
 " Perilous seas in faery lands forlorn," 
 Lucilla need I mention ? quoted to herself, 
 and if she didn t quote it aloud, that, I suppose, 
 was due to the presence of Bertram. She 
 and Ruth sat close together, with their faces 
 towards the prow, where, like a battle-axe 
 clearing their way of unseen foes, the ferro 
 swayed and gleamed ; he, sidewise, removed 
 a little to their left. And all three were mum 
 as strangers in a railway carriage. But, like 
 strangers in a railway carriage, they were no 
 doubt more or less automatically, subcon 
 sciously, taking one another in, observing, 
 classifying. " I wonder whether he s really 
 
 12 
 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 English," Lucilla thought. He spoke and 
 dressed like an Englishman, to be sure, yet so 
 many Italians nowadays do that ; and, with a 
 private gondola, he presumably lived in Venice; 
 and there was something in the aquiline 
 cut of his features ? in his pointed beard ? 
 that seemed foreign. " Anyhow, he s a gentle 
 man," she gratefully reflected ; and thereat, 
 her imagination taking wing, " Suppose he had 
 been an ogre or a bounder ? or a flamboyant 
 native lady-killer ? or a little fat oily cra-pand 
 de Juif ? Besides, he has nice eyes." 
 
 About the nationality of his guests, Bertram, 
 of course, could entertain no question, nor 
 about their place in the world ; in their 
 frocks, their hats, their poise of head, turn of 
 hand, in the general unself-conscious self- 
 assurance of their bearing, they wore their 
 social history for daws to peck at ; one s eye, as 
 it rested on them, instinctively supplied a 
 background of Mayfair, with a perspective of 
 country houses. A thing that teased him, how 
 ever, was an absurd sense that he had some 
 where seen Lucilla before, seen her, known 
 her, though he perfectly knew he hadn t. Her 
 youthfully mature beauty, her bigness, plump 
 ness, smoothness, her blondeur ; those decep- 
 
 13 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 tively child-like blue eyes of hers, with their 
 superficial effect of wondering innocence, 
 and their interior sparkle of observant, ex 
 perienced humour, under those improbably 
 dark and regular brows such delicate and 
 equal crescents as to avow themselves the 
 creation of her pencil ; the glossy abundance 
 of her light - brown hair ; her full, soft, 
 pleasure-loving mouth and chin, their affluent 
 good-nature tempered by the danger you 
 divined of a caustic wit in the upward perk 
 of her rather short nose ; the whole easy 
 going, indolent, sensuous sociable, comfort 
 able, indulgent watchful, critical, ironic 
 aura of the woman : no, he told himself, 
 she was not a person he could ever have 
 known and forgotten, she was too distinctly 
 differentiated an individual. Then how ac 
 count for that teasing sense of recognition ? 
 He couldn t account for it, and he couldn t 
 shake it off. 
 
 Of Ruth (egregious circumstance) he was 
 aware at the time of noticing no more than, 
 vaguely, that the young girl under Lucilla s 
 chaperonage was pretty and pleasant-looking ! 
 
 All three sat as mum as strangers in a railway 
 carriage, but I can t think it was the mumness 
 
 14 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of embarrassment. I can hardly imagine a 
 woman less shy than Lucilla, a man less shy 
 than Bertram ; embarrassment is an ill it were 
 difficult to conceive befalling either of them. 
 No, I conjecture it was simply the mumness 
 of people who, having said all that was es 
 sential, were sufficiently unembarrassed not 
 to feel that they must, nevertheless, bother 
 to say something more. And when, for ex 
 ample, Bertram, having unwittingly relaxed 
 his grip upon Balzatore s collar, that irrepress 
 ible bundle of life escaped to Lucilla s side and 
 recommenced his blandishments, they spoke 
 readily and easily enough. 
 
 " You mustn t let him bore you," Bertram 
 said, with a kind of tentative concern. 
 
 " On the contrary," said Lucilla, " he delights 
 me. He s so friendly, and so handsome." 
 
 " He s not so handsome as he thinks he is," 
 said Bertram. " He s the vainest coxcomb of 
 my acquaintance." 
 
 " Oh, all dogs are vain," said Lucilla ; 
 " that is what establishes the fellow-feeling 
 between them and us." 
 
 To such modicum of truth as this proposi 
 tion may not have been without, Bertram s 
 quiet laugh seemed a tribute. 
 
 15 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " I thought he was a collie," Lucilla con 
 tinued, in a key of doubt. " But isn t he rather 
 big for a collie ? Is he an Italian breed ? " 
 
 " He s a most unlikely hybrid," Bertram 
 answered. " He s half a collie, and half a 
 Siberian wolf-hound." 
 
 " A wolf-hound ? " cried Lucilla, a little 
 alarmed perhaps at the way in which she d 
 been making free with him ; and she fell back, 
 to put him at arm s length. " Mercy, how 
 savage that sounds ! " 
 
 " Yes," acknowledged Bertram ; " but he s 
 a living paradox. The wolf-hound blood has 
 turned to ethereal mildness in his veins. 
 And he s a very perfect coward. I ve seen him 
 run from a goose, and in the house my cat 
 holds him under a reign of terror." 
 
 Lucilla s alarm was stilled. 
 
 " Poor darling, did they abuse you ? No, 
 they shouldn t," she said, in a voice of deep 
 commiseration, pressing Balzatore s head to her 
 breast. 
 
 But the gondola, impelled by its two stalwart 
 oarsmen, was making excellent speed. They 
 had passed the sombre mass of San Servolo, 
 the boscage, silver and sable in moonlight 
 and shadow, of the Public Gardens ; and now, 
 
 16 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 with San Giorgio looming at their left, were 
 threading an anchored fleet of steamers and 
 fishing-smacks, towards the entrance of the 
 Grand Canal : whence, already, they could hear 
 the squalid caterwauling of those rival boat 
 loads of beggars, who, on the vain theory of 
 their being musicians, are suffered nightly, 
 before the congeries of hotels, to render the 
 hours hideous and hateful. 
 
 And then, in no time, they had reached the 
 water-steps of the Britannia, and a gold-laced 
 Swiss was aiding mesdames to alight. 
 
 " Good night and thank you so very 
 much," said Lucilla. " We should have had to 
 camp at the Lido if you hadn t come to our 
 
 rescue." 
 
 " I am only too glad to have been of the 
 slightest use," Bertram assured her. 
 
 " Good night," said Ruth with a little nod 
 and smile the first sign she had made him, 
 the first word she had spoken. 
 
 He lifted his hat. Balzatore, fore paws 
 on the seat, tail aloft, head thrust forward, 
 gave a yelp of reluctant valediction (or was 
 it indignant protest and recall ?). The ladies 
 vanished through the great doorway ; the 
 incident was closed. 
 
 c 17 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The incident was closed ; and, in a way, for 
 Bertram, as the event proved, it had yet to 
 begin. His unknown " guests of hazard " 
 had departed, disappeared ; but they had 
 left something behind them that was as real 
 as it was immaterial, a sense of fluttering 
 garments, of faint fleeting perfumes, of delicate 
 and mystic femininity. The incident was 
 closed, and now, as the strong ashen sweeps 
 bore him rapidly homewards between the 
 unseen palaces of the Grand Canal, it began 
 to re-enact itself ; and a hundred details, a 
 hundred graces, unheeded at the moment, 
 became vivid to him. Two women, standing 
 in a rain of moonlight, by the landing-stage 
 at the Lido, brightly silhouetted against the 
 dim lagoon ; the sudden tumultuous exordium 
 of his men ; his own five words with Lucilla, 
 and the high-bred musical English voice in 
 which she had answered him ; then their 
 presence, gracious and distinguished, there 
 beside him in the bend of the boat, their 
 cool, summery toilets, the entire fineness and 
 finish of their persons ; and the wide, moonlit 
 water, and the play of the moonlight on the 
 
 18 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ripples born of their progress, and the wide 
 silence, punctured, as in a sort of melodious 
 pattern, by the recurrent dip and drip of the 
 oars ; it all came back, but with an atmosphere, 
 a fragrance, but with overtones of suggestion, 
 even of sentiment, that he had missed. It all 
 came back, unfolding itself as a continuous 
 picture ; and what therein, of all, came back 
 with the most insistent clearness was the 
 appearance of the young girl who had so 
 mutely effaced herself in her companion s 
 shadow, and whom, at the time (egregious 
 circumstance), he had just vaguely noticed as 
 pretty and pleasant-looking. This came back 
 with insistent, with disturbing clearness, a 
 visible thing of light in his memory ; and he 
 saw, with a kind of bewilderment at his former 
 blindness, that her prettiness was a prettiness 
 full of distinctive character, and that if she 
 was " pleasant-looking" it was with a pleasant 
 ness as remote as possible from insipid sweet 
 ness. Even in her figure, which was so far 
 typical as to be slender and girlish, he could 
 perceive something that marked it as singular, 
 a latent elasticity of fibre, a hint, as it were, 
 of high energies quiescent ; but when he 
 considered her face, he surprised himself by 
 
 19 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 actually muttering aloud, " Upon my word, 
 it s the oddest face I think I have ever seen." 
 Odd and pretty ? Yes, pretty, or more than 
 pretty, he was quite confident of that ; yet 
 pretty notwithstanding an absolutely defiant 
 irregularity of features. Or stay irregularity ? 
 No, unconventionality, rather : for the 
 features in question were so congruous and 
 coherent with one another, so sequent in 
 their correlation, as to establish a regularity 
 of their own. The discreet but resolute 
 salience of her jaw and chin, the assertive 
 lines of her brow and nose, the crisp chiselling 
 of her lips, the size and shape of her eyes, and 
 over all the crinkling masses of her dark hair 
 unconventional as you will, he said, not 
 attributable to any ready-made category, 
 but everywhere expressing design, unity of 
 design. " High energies quiescent," he re 
 peated. " You discern them in her face as 
 in her figure ; a capacity for emotions and 
 enthusiasms ; a temperament that would 
 feel things with intensity. And yet," he 
 reflected, perpending his image of her with 
 leisurely deliberation, " what in her face 
 strikes one first, I think, what s nearest to the 
 surface, is a kind of sceptic humour, as if she 
 
 20 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 took the world with a grain of salt, and 
 were having a quiet laugh at it in the back 
 of her mind. And then her colouring," he 
 again surprised himself by muttering aloud. 
 But when could he have observed her colour 
 ing, he wondered, when, where ? Not in 
 the colour-obliterating moonlight, of course. 
 Where, then ? Ah, suddenly he remembered. 
 He saw her standing under the electric lamps 
 on the steps of the Britannia. " Good 
 night," she said, giving him a quick little nod, 
 a brief little smile. And he saw how red her 
 mouth was, and how red her blood, beneath 
 the translucent whiteness of her skin, and how 
 in the glow of her brown eyes there shone a 
 red undergleam, and how in her crinkling 
 masses of dark hair there were dark - red 
 lights. . . . 
 
 The incident was closed, in its substance, 
 really, as matter-of-fact a little incident as one 
 could fancy ; but the savour of it lingered, 
 persisted, kept recurring, and was sweet and 
 poignant, like a savour of romance. 
 
 " I suppose I shall never see them again," 
 was his unwilling but stoical conclusion, as 
 the gondola shot through the water-gate of 
 Ca Bertradoni. " I wonder who they are." 
 
 21 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 VI 
 
 He saw them again, however, no later than 
 the next afternoon, and learned who they were. 
 He was seated with dark, lantern-jawed, deep- 
 eyed, tragical-looking Lewis Vincent, under the 
 colonnade at the Florian, when they passed, 
 in the full blaze of the sun, down the middle 
 of the Piazza. 
 
 " Hello," said Vincent, in the light and 
 cheerful voice, that contrasted so surprisingly 
 with the dejected droop of his moustaches, 
 " there goes the richest spinster in England." 
 He nodded towards their retreating backs. 
 
 " Oh ? " said Bertram, raising interested 
 eyebrows. 
 
 " Yes the thin girl in grey, with the white 
 sunshade," Vincent apprised him. " Been 
 bestowing largesse on the pigeons, let us hope. 
 The Rubensy-looking woman with her is 
 Lady Dor a sister of Harry Pontycroft s. I 
 think you know Pontycroft, don t you ? 
 
 Bertram showed animation. " I know him 
 very well indeed we ve been friends for 
 years I m extremely fond of him. That s 
 his sister ? I ve never met his people. Dor, 
 did you say her name was ? ! 
 
 22 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Wife of Sir Frederick Dor, of Dortown, 
 an Irishman, a Roman Catholic, and a Unionist 
 M.P.," answered Vincent, and it seemed un 
 canny in a way to hear the muse of small-talk 
 speaking from so tenebrous a mien. " The 
 thin girl is a Miss Ruth Adgate American, I 
 believe, but domiciled in England. You must 
 have seen her name in the newspapers they ve 
 had a lot about her, apropos of one thing or 
 another ; and the other day she distinguished 
 herself at the sale of the Rawleigh collection, 
 by paying three thousand pounds for one of the 
 Karasai ivories record price, I fancy. She s 
 said to have a bagatelle of something like fifty 
 thousand a year in her own right." 
 
 " Really ? " murmured Bertram. 
 
 But he could account now for his puzzled 
 feeling last night, that he had seen Lucilla 
 before. With obvious unlikenesses for where 
 she was plump and smooth, pink and white, 
 Harry Pontycroft was brown and lined and 
 bony there still existed between her and her 
 brother a resemblance so intimate, so essential, 
 that our friend could only marvel at his failure 
 to think of it at once. Twas a resemblance 
 one couldn t easily have localised, but it was 
 intimate and essential and unmistakable. 
 
 23 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 u So that is Ponty s sister. I see. I under 
 stand," he mused aloud. 
 
 " Yes," said Lewis Vincent, stretching his 
 long legs under the table, while a soul in despair 
 seemed to gaze from his haggard face. " She 
 looks like a fair, fat, feminine incarnation 
 of Ponty himself, doesn t she ? Funny thing, 
 family likeness ; hard to tell what it resides 
 in. Not in the features, certainly ; not in the 
 flesh at all, I expect. In the spirit it s 
 metaphysical. One might know Lady Dor 
 anywhere for Pontycroft s sister ; yet ex 
 ternally she s as unlike him as a pat of butter 
 is unlike a walnut. But it s the spirit showing 
 through, the kindred spirit, the sister spirit ? 
 What ? You don t think so ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, I think you re quite right," 
 answered Bertram, a trifle perfunctorily per 
 haps. " By the by, I wish you d introduce 
 me to her." 
 
 " Who ? I ? " exclaimed Vincent, sitting 
 up and opening his deep eyes wide, with a 
 burlesque of astonishment that was plainly 
 intended to convey a sarcasm. " Bless your 
 soul, / don t know her. I know Pontycroft, 
 of course, as everybody does or as everybody 
 did, in the old days, before he came into his 
 
 24 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 kingdom. It isn t so easy to make his acquaint 
 ance nowadays. But Lady Dor flies with the 
 tippest of the toppest. And I, you see well, 
 I m merely a well-born English gentleman. 
 I ain t a duke, I ain t a Jew, and I ain t a 
 millionaire cheesemonger." 
 
 He leaned his brow on the tips of his long 
 slender fingers and gloomed blackly at the 
 marble table-top. 
 
 " I see," said Bertram with a not altogether 
 happy chuckle. " You mean that she s a 
 snob." 
 
 But Vincent put in a quick disclaimer. 
 " Oh, no ; oh dear, no. I don t know that 
 she s a snob any more than every one is in 
 England. I mean that she happens to belong 
 to the set that counts itself the smartest, just 
 as I happen not to. It s mostly a matter of 
 accident, I imagine. You fall where you 
 fall. She isn t to blame for having fallen 
 among the rich and great ; and she looks 
 like a very decent sort. But I say, if you 
 really want to meet her, of course it would be 
 the easiest thing in the world for you" 
 
 " Oh ? How ? " asked Bertram. 
 
 " Why," answered Vincent, with the in 
 flection and the gesture of a man expounding 
 
 25 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 the self-evident, " drop her a line at her hotel, 
 no difficulty in finding out where she s 
 staying ; at the Britannia, probably. Tell 
 her you re an old friend of her brother s, 
 and propose to call. I hope I don t need to 
 say whether she ll jump at the chance when she 
 sees your name." 
 
 Bertram laughed. 
 
 " Yes," he said. " I don t think I should 
 care to do that." 
 
 "Hum," said Vincent. " Of course," he 
 added after a minute, as a sort of envoi to his 
 tale, " rumour has it that Pontycroft and the 
 heiress are by way of making a match. Well, 
 why not ? It would be inhuman to let her 
 pass out of the family. Heigh ? and the 
 girl is really very pretty. Yes, I expect be 
 fore a great while we ll read in the Morning 
 Post that a marriage has been arranged." 
 
 " Hum," said Bertram. 
 
 And then the next afternoon he saw them 
 still again, and learned still more about them. 
 Mrs. Wilberton, the brisk, well-dressed, elderly- 
 handsome, amiably-worldly wife of the Bishop 
 of Lanchester, was having tea with him on his 
 balcony, when all at once she leaned forward, 
 waved her hand, and bestowed her most 
 
 26 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 radiant smile, her most gracious bow, upon 
 the occupants of a passing gondola. After 
 wards, turning to Bertram, her finely-modelled, 
 fresh-complexioned face, under its pompa 
 dour of grey hair, charged with mystery and 
 significance. " Do you know those women ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 Well, strictly speaking, he didn t know 
 them ; and his visitor s countenance was a 
 promise as well as a provocative to curiosity ; 
 so I hope he was justified in answering, " Who 
 are they ? " 
 
 The mystery and significance in Mrs. Wil- 
 berton s face had deepened to solemnity, to 
 solemnity touched with severity. She sank 
 back a little in her red-and-white cane arm 
 chair and slowly, solemnly shook her head. 
 " Ah, it s a sad scandal," she said, making her 
 voice low and impressive. 
 
 But this was leagues removed from any 
 thing that Bertram had bargained for. " A 
 scandal ? " he repeated, looking blank. 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton fixed him with solemn eyes. 
 
 " Have you ever heard," she asked, " of a 
 man, one of our great landowners, the head of 
 one of our oldest families, a very rich man, a 
 man named Henry Pontycroft ? " 
 27 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Bertram smiled, though there was anxiety 
 in his smile, though there was suspense. " I 
 know Henry Pontycroft very well," he an 
 swered. 
 
 " Do you ? " said she. " Well, the elder 
 of those two women was Henry Pontycroft s 
 sister, Lucilla Dor." 
 
 Her voice died away and she gazed at her 
 listener in silence, meaningly, as if this an 
 nouncement in itself contained material for 
 pause and rumination. 
 
 But Bertram was anxious, was in suspense. 
 " Yes ? " he said, his eyes, attentive and 
 expectant, urging her to continue. 
 
 " But it s the other," she presently did con 
 tinue, " it s the young woman with her. Of 
 course one has read of such things in the 
 papers one knows that they are done but 
 when they happen under one s own eyes, in 
 one s own set ! And she a Pontycroft ! The 
 other, the young woman with Lucilla Dor, 
 oh, it s quite too disgraceful." 
 
 Again Mrs. Wilberton shook her head, 
 this time with a kind of horrified violence, 
 causing the jet spray in her bonnet to dance 
 and twinkle, and again she sank back in her 
 chair. 
 
 28 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Bertram sat forward on the edge of his, 
 hands clasping its arms. " Yes ? Yes ? " he 
 prompted. 
 
 " She s an American," said Mrs. Wilberton, 
 speaking with an effect of forced calm. " Her 
 name is Ruth Adgate. She s an American 
 of worse than common extraction, but she s 
 immensely rich. It s really difficult to see 
 in what she s better than an ordinary adven 
 turess, but she has a hundred thousand pounds 
 a year. And she s bought the Pontycrofts 
 Henry Pontycroft and his sister she s bought 
 them body and soul." 
 
 Her voice indicated a full stop, and she 
 allowed her face and attitude to relax, as one 
 whose painful message was delivered. 
 
 But Bertram looked perplexed. An adven 
 turess ? Of worse than common extraction ? 
 That fresh young girl, with her prettiness, her 
 fineness ? His impulse was to cry out, " Allons 
 done ! " And then the Pontycrofts ? Frown 
 ing perplexity, he repeated his visitor s words : 
 " Bought the Pontycrofts ? I don t think 
 I understand." 
 
 " Oh, it s a thing that s done," Mrs. Wilber- 
 ton assured him, on a note that was like a wail. 
 " One knows that it is done. It s a part of 
 
 29 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 the degeneracy of our times. But the Ponty- 
 crofts ! One would have thought them above 
 it. And the Adgate woman ! One would have 
 thought that even people who are willing to 
 sell themselves must draw the line somewhere. 
 But no. Money is omnipotent. So, for 
 money, the Pontycrofts have taken her to 
 their bosoms ; presented her ; introduced 
 her to every one ; and they ll end, of course, 
 by capturing a title for her. Another inter 
 national marriage. Another instance of Ameri 
 can gold buying the due of well-born English 
 girls over their heads." 
 
 Bertram smiled, partly, it may be, at the 
 passion his guest showed, but partly from 
 relief. He had dreaded what was coming : 
 what had come was agreeably inconclusive 
 and unconvincing. 
 
 " I see," he said. " But surely this seems 
 in the last degree improbable. What makes 
 you think it ? " 
 
 " Oh, it isn t that /think it," Mrs. Wilberton 
 cried, with a movement that lifted the matter 
 high above the plane of mere personal opinion ; 
 " it s known, it s known." 
 
 But Bertram knitted his brows again. " How 
 can such a thing be known ? " he objected. 
 
 30 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " At most, it can only be a suspicion or an 
 inference. What makes you suspect it ? What 
 do you infer it from ? : 
 
 " Why, from the patent facts," said Mrs. 
 Wilberton, giving an upward motion to her 
 pretty little white-gloved hands. " They take 
 her everywhere. They ve presented her. 
 They ve introduced her to the best people. 
 She s regularly lancee in their set. I myself was 
 loth, loth to believe it. But the facts they ll 
 bear no other construction." 
 
 Bertram smiled again. " Yes," he said. 
 " But why should you suppose that they do 
 all this for money ? " 
 
 His question appeared to take the lady s 
 breath away. She sat up straight, lips parted, 
 and gazed at him with something like stupe 
 faction. " For what other earthly reason 
 should they do it ? " she was able, at last, in 
 honest bewilderment, to gasp out. 
 
 " One has heard of such a motive-power 
 as love," Bertram, with deference, submitted. 
 " Why shouldn t they do it because they like 
 the girl because she s their friend ? " 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton breathed freely, and in her 
 turn smiled. " Ah, my dear Prince," she 
 said, with a touch of pity, "you don t know 
 
 31 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 our English world. People in the Pontycroft s 
 position don t take up nameless young Ameri 
 cans for love. Their lives are too full, too 
 complicated. And it means an immense 
 amount of work, of bother you can t get a 
 new-comer accepted without bestirring your 
 self, without watching, scheming, soliciting, 
 contriving. And what s your reward ? Your 
 friends find you a nuisance, and no one thanks 
 you. There s only one reward that can meet 
 the case payment in pounds sterling from 
 your client s purse." 
 
 But Bertram s incredulity was great. "Harry 
 Pontycroft is himself rich," he said. 
 
 " Yes," Mrs. Wilberton at once assented, 
 " he s rich now. But he wasn t always rich. 
 There were those lean years when he was 
 merely his cousin s heir and that s a whole 
 chapter of the story. Besides, is his sister 
 rich ? Is Freddie Dor rich ? " 
 
 " Ah, about that of course I know nothing," 
 Bertram had with humility to admit. 
 
 " Freddie Dor is an Irish baronet, whose 
 
 sole fortune consists of an Irish bog. Then 
 
 where does Lucilla Dor get her money ? She 
 
 spends there s no limit to the extravagance 
 
 vith which she spends, to the luxury in which 
 
 32 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 she lives. She has a great house in town, a 
 great house in the country Lord Bylton s 
 place, Knelworth Castle she s taken it on a 
 lease. She has a villa near Florence. She 
 entertains like a duchess. She has a box at the 
 opera. She has motor - cars and electric 
 broughams you know what they cost. And 
 sables and diamonds, she has as many as an 
 Indian begum. Where does she get her 
 money ? " 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton eyed him with a kind of 
 triumphant fierceness. Bertram had an un 
 comfortable laugh. 
 
 " It s conceivable," he suggested, " that 
 her husband s bog produces peat. But I 
 should imagine, in the absence of other evi 
 dence, that her brother subsidises her." 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton stared at him for a second 
 doubtfully. " Of course you re not serious," 
 she said. " Brothers ? Brothers don t do 
 things on quite such a lavish scale." 
 
 " Oh, butPonty s different," Bertram argued. 
 " Ponty s eccentric. I could imagine Ponty 
 doing things on a scale all his own. Anyhow, 
 I don t see what there is to connect Lady Dor s 
 affluence with Miss Adgate." 
 
 " Ah," said Mrs. Wilberton, with an air of 
 33 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 being about to clench the matter, " the con 
 nection is unfortunately glaring. Lady Dor s 
 affluence dates precisely from the moment of 
 Miss Adgate s entrance upon the scene." And 
 with an air of having clenched the matter, 
 she threw back her head. 
 
 Bertram bent his brow, as one in troubled 
 thought. Then, presently, reviewing his im 
 pressions, " I never saw a nicer-looking girl," 
 he said. " I never saw a face that expressed 
 finer or higher qualities. She doesn t look in 
 the least like a girl with low ambitions, like 
 one who would try to buy her way into 
 society, or pay people to find her a titled 
 husband. And where, in all this, does Harry 
 Pontycroft himself come in ? I think you said 
 that she had bought them both, brother and 
 
 sister." 
 
 " Ah," cried Mrs. Wilberton, triumphing 
 again, " you touch the very point. Harry 
 Pontycroft was head over ears in debt to Miss 
 Adgate s father." 
 
 " Oh ? " said Bertram, his eyebrows 
 
 going up. 
 
 " It s wheels within wheels," said the lady. 
 " Miss Adgate s father was a mysterious 
 American who, for reasons of his own, had left 
 
 34 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 his country, and never went back. He never 
 went to his embassy, either : you can make 
 what you will of that. And even in Europe 
 he had no settled abode ; he lived in hotels ; 
 he was always flitting London, Paris, Rome, 
 Vienna. And wherever he went, though he 
 knew no one else, he knew troops of young 
 men young men, mark, and young men with 
 expectations. He wasn t received at his 
 embassy ; he wasn t received in a single decent 
 house ; he was an utter outcast and pariah ; 
 but he always managed to surround himself 
 with troops of young men who had expecta 
 tions. He was nothing more or less, in short, 
 than a money-lender. Yes, your nice-looking 
 girl with the face full of high qualities, whom 
 you think incapable of low ambitions, is just 
 the daughter of a common money-lender 
 nothing better than that. And Henry Ponty- 
 croft was one of his victims. This, of course, 
 was while Pontycroft was poor while his rich 
 cousin was alive and flourishing. And then, 
 when the old usurer had him completely in 
 his toils, he proposed a compact. If Ponty 
 croft would exert his social influence on 
 behalf of his daughter, and get her accepted 
 in the right circles, Adgate would forgive him 
 
 35 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 his debt, and pay him handsomely into the 
 bargain. The next one knew, Miss Adgate 
 was living with Lucilla Dor, like a member 
 of the family, and Lucilla was beginning to 
 spend money. Not long afterwards old Adgate 
 died, and his daughter came into his millions. 
 And so the ball goes on. They haven t en 
 snared a Duke for her yet, but that will only be 
 a question of time." 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton tilted her head a little to 
 one side, and smiled at poor Bertram with the 
 smile, satisfied yet benevolent, of one who had 
 successfully brought off a promised feat a 
 smile of friendly challenge to criticise or reply. 
 
 But Bertram had his reply ready. 
 
 " A compact," he said. " How can any 
 human being have any knowledge of such a 
 compact, except the parties to it ? Besides, 
 / know Harry Pontycroft I ve known him 
 for years, intimately. He would be utterly 
 incapable of such a thing. Sell his social 
 influence for money ? Worse still, sell his 
 sister s ? Old Adgate may have been a money 
 lender, and Harry Pontycroft may have owed 
 him money. But to get out of it by a proceed 
 ing so ignoble as that his character is the 
 negation of the very idea. And then, a titled 
 
 36 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 husband ! Surely, a girl of Miss Adgate s 
 beauty and wealth would need little assistance 
 in finding one, if she really cared about it. 
 And anyhow, to act as her matrimonial agent 
 that again is a thing of which Harry Ponty- 
 croft would be incapable. But, for my part, 
 I can t believe that Miss Adgate has any such 
 desire. She looks to me like a young woman 
 of mind and heart, with ideas and ideals, who 
 would either marry for love pure and simple, 
 or not at all." 
 
 His visitor s lips compressed themselves 
 but failed to hide her amusement. " Oh, 
 looks ! " she said. " Ideas, ideals ? What do 
 we know of the ideas and ideals of those queer 
 people ? Shylock s daughter. You may be 
 sure that whatever their ideals may be, they re 
 very different from any we re familiar with. 
 A young woman who never had a home, whose 
 childhood was passed in hotels" Mrs. Wilber- 
 ton shuddered. 
 
 " Yes," agreed Bertram, " that s sad to 
 think of. But Shylock s daughter even Shy- 
 lock s daughter married for love." 
 
 " If you come to that," Mrs. Wilberton 
 answered him, " it s as easy to love a peer as a 
 peasant." 
 
 37 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " By the bye," questioned Bertram, thinking 
 of Lewis Vincent, " if the Pontycrofts are 
 really as mercenary as all this would show 
 them to be, why doesn t Ponty marry her 
 himself ? He s not a peer, to be sure, but in 
 England the headships of some of your ancient 
 untitled families almost outrank peerages, do 
 they not ? " 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton s face resumed its look of 
 mystery. " Henry Pontycroft would be only 
 too glad to marry her if he could," she said. 
 " But alack-a-day for him, he can t, and for 
 the best of reasons. He is already married." 
 
 Bertram stared, frowning. 
 
 " Pontycroft married ? " he doubted, his 
 voice falling. " But since when ? It must be 
 very recent and it s astonishing I shouldn t 
 have heard." 
 
 " Oh no, anything but recent," Mrs. Wilber- 
 ton returned, a kind of high impersonal pathos 
 in her tone ; " and very few people know 
 about it. But it s perfectly true I have it on 
 the best authority. When he was quite a 
 young man, when he was still an undergradu 
 ate, he made a secret marriage with some 
 low person a barmaid or music-hall singer 
 or something. He hasn t lived with her for 
 
 38 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 years it seems she drank, and was flagrantly 
 immoral, and had, in short, all the vices of her 
 class and most people have supposed him to 
 be a bachelor. But there his wife remains, you 
 see, a hopeless impediment to his marrying 
 the Adgate millions." 
 
 " This is astounding news to me," said 
 Bertram, with the subdued manner of one 
 who couldn t deny that his adversary had 
 scored. But then, cheering up a little, " Why 
 doesn t he poison her ? " he asked. " Or, 
 better still, divorce her ? In a country like 
 England, where divorce is easy, why doesn t 
 he divorce her, and so be free to marry whom 
 he will ? " 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton gave him a glance of 
 wonder. 
 
 " Oh, I thought you knew," she murmured. 
 " The Pontycrofts are Roman Catholics one 
 of the handful of families in England who 
 have never recanted their Popish errors. But 
 I beg your pardon you are a Roman Catholic 
 yourself ? Of course. Well, surely, your 
 Church doesn t permit divorce." 
 
 Bertram laughed, mirthlessly, grimly even. 
 
 " Here is an odd confounding of scruples," 
 he said. " A man is low enough to take a girl s 
 
 39 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 money for acting as her social tout, but too 
 pious to divorce a woman who must be the 
 curse of his existence." 
 
 " Oh," replied Mrs. Wilberton, not without 
 a semblance of pride in the circumstance, 
 " our English Roman Catholics are very- 
 strict." 
 
 " I noticed," said Bertram, playing with his 
 watch-chain, " that you bowed very pleasantly 
 when they passed." 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton raised her hands. " I m 
 not a prig," she earnestly protested. " Don t 
 think I m a prig. This thing is known, but 
 it s not official. In England until a thing 
 becomes official, until it gets into the law- 
 courts, we treat it, for all practical purposes, 
 as if it didn t exist. Of course, I bowed to 
 them. . . . Lucilla Dor, besides being a Ponty- 
 croft, is a leader in the most exclusive set ; 
 and Miss Adgate, officially, is simply her 
 friend and protegee. And it isn t as if they 
 were the only persons about whom ugly tales 
 are told. If one began cutting one s acquaint 
 ances on that score, I don t know where one 
 could stop." 
 
 " Ugly tales," said Bertram, " yes. But this 
 particular ugly tale upon my word I can t 
 
 40 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 see a single reason why it should be believed. 
 The only scrap of evidence in support of it, 
 as far as I can make out, is the fact that Lady 
 Dor has a motor-car and a few furs and 
 diamonds. Well, she has also a rich and gener 
 ous brother. No : I will stake Miss Adgate s 
 face and Harry Pontycroft s honour against 
 all the ugly tales that Gath and Ashkelon 
 between them can produce. I don t believe 
 it, I don t believe it, and I can only wonder 
 that you do." 
 
 Mrs. Wilberton was gathering herself to 
 gether, evidently with a view to departure. 
 Now she rose, and held out her hand. 
 
 " Well, Prince," she said, laughing, " I must 
 congratulate you upon your faith in human 
 nature. In a man who has seen so much of 
 the world, such an absence of cynicism is 
 beautiful. I feel quite as if I had been playing 
 the part of what do you call him ? the 
 Devil s Advocate. But " she nodded gravely, 
 though perhaps there was a tinge of amuse 
 ment in her gravity " in this case I m afraid, 
 I m afraid, I m afraid that your charity is 
 mistaken." 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 VII 
 
 When he came back from having con 
 ducted her to the waterside, he was followed 
 by Balzatore and Rampicante. Rampicante 
 leaped upon his shoulder, rubbed his bristly 
 moustaches approvingly against his cheek, 
 curled his tail about his collar, and, sublimely 
 indifferent to any one s mood but his own, 
 purred an egoist s satisfaction. Balzatore sat 
 down before him, resting his long pointed 
 muzzle on his knee and looked up into his face 
 from alert, troubled, wistful eyes. " What is 
 the matter ? What is it that s worrying you ? " 
 they asked. For Balzatore knew that his 
 master was not happy. 
 
 No, his master was not happy. All round 
 him were the light, the lucent colour, the 
 shimmering warmth of Venice in early autumn, 
 woven together in a transparent screen of 
 beauty. The palaces opposite glowed pale 
 gold, pale rose, pale amethyst, in the sun ; 
 the water below was dull blue-green and 
 glassy, shot with changing reds and purples, 
 like dark mother-of-pearl ; the sky above was 
 like blue-royal velvet ; and where he sat, on his 
 marble balcony, amid its ancient, time-worn 
 
 42 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 carvings and traceries, all was cool blue 
 shadow. But I doubt if he saw any of these 
 things. What he saw was the face of Ruth 
 Adgate, that odd, pretty, witty, frank, clear face 
 of hers, those clear frank eyes, with their glint 
 of red, their hint of inner laughter. He saw 
 also the brown, lined, bony, good-humoured, 
 clever, wholesome face of Harry Pontycroft, 
 and the fair, soft, friendly face of Ponty s 
 sister. The .charge against these people was 
 very trifling, if you will : it implied no devasta 
 ting moral turpitude, but it was more igno 
 minious than far graver charges might have 
 been : it implied such petty aims, such sordid 
 doings. To buy " social influence " to sell 
 services that should in their nature be the 
 spontaneous offerings of kindness, frequently 
 indeed as one had heard of this branch of 
 commerce, what, when it came to an actual 
 transaction, could be on the part of buyer 
 and seller more contemptible ? Bertram vowed 
 in his soul, " No, I don t believe it, I won t 
 believe it." And yet, for all his firm unfaith, 
 he was not happy. A feeling of malaise, of 
 disgust, almost of physical nausea, possessed 
 him. Oh, why was every one so eager to rub 
 the bloom from the peach ? " The worst of 
 
 43 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 it is that Mrs. Wilberton is not a malicious 
 woman," he said. " She s worldly, frivolous, 
 superficial, anything you like, but not malicious. 
 If one could only dispose of her as malicious, 
 her words wouldn t stick." And again, by 
 and by, " After all, it s none of my business, 
 why should I take it to heart ? " But some 
 how he did take it to heart ; so that, at last, 
 " Bah ! " he cried, " I must go out and walk 
 it off I must get rid of the nasty taste of it." 
 
 He went out to walk it off, Balzatore 
 scouting a zig-zag course before him, down 
 narrow alleys, over slender bridges. He went 
 out to walk it off, and he walked into the very 
 arms of it. In the multitude of wayfarers 
 beggars, hawkers, soldiers, priests, and citizens ; 
 English tourists, their noses in Baedeker, 
 Dalmatian sailors, piratical - looking, swart- 
 skinned, wearing their crimson fezes at an 
 angle that seemed a menace ; bare-legged 
 boys, bare-headed girls (sometimes with hair 
 of the proper Venetian red) ; women in hats, 
 and women in mantillas in the vociferous, 
 many-hued multitude that thronged the Mer- 
 ceria, he met Stuart Seton. 
 
 Do you know Stuart Seton ? He is a small, 
 softly-built, soft-featured, pale, kittenish-look- 
 
 44 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ing man, with softly-curling hair and a soft 
 little moustache, with a soft voice and soft 
 languorous manners. A woman s man, you 
 guess at your first glimpse of him, a women s 
 pet ; a man whom women will fondle and 
 coddle, and send on errands, and laugh at to 
 his face, and praise to other men ; a man, for 
 he has the unhallowed habit of using scent, 
 who actually seems to smell of boudoirs. Bert 
 ram did not like him, and now, at their con 
 junction, stiffened instantly, from the fellow 
 mortal, into the great personage. 
 
 " I was on my way to call on you," said 
 Seton, softly, languidly. 
 
 " I am unfortunate in not being at home," 
 returned Bertram, erect, aloof. 
 
 " I wanted to get you to give me an evening 
 to dine," Seton explained. " I am at the 
 Britannia, and I have some friends there I d 
 like to present to you." 
 
 " Ah ? " said Bertram, his head very much 
 in the air. " Who are your friends ? " 
 
 " Only two," said Seton. " One is Lady Dor, 
 a charming woman, sister of Harry Pontycrof t, 
 and the other is Pontycroft s Faithful John 
 a very amusing gel named Adgate." 
 
 Faithful John ? The phrase was novel 
 45 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to Bertram, and struck him as unpleasant. 
 " Pontycroft s what ? " he asked, rather 
 brusquely. 
 
 " Yes," drawled Seton, undisturbed. " It s 
 quite the joke of the period, in England. She 
 is one of those preposterously rich Americans, 
 you know, hundred and fifty thousand a 
 year, and that sort of thing. Pooty too, and 
 clever, with a sense of humour. But she s 
 gone and fallen desperately in love with poor 
 old Harry Pontycroft, and when he s present, 
 upon my word, she eyes him exactly as a 
 hungry dog eyes a bone. Which must make 
 him feel a trifle queerish, seeing that he s 
 twenty years her senior, and by no means a 
 beauty, and not at all in the marrying line. 
 If he were, you can trust the British mamma 
 to have snapped him up long before this. So 
 she worships him from afar with a hopeless, un 
 dying flame. Poor old Ponty ! Most fellows, 
 of course, would think themselves in luck, but 
 Ponty has all the tin he knows what to do 
 with, and a wife would suit his book about as 
 well as a tame white elephant. He is dog-in- 
 the-manger in spite of himself. No others 
 need apply." 
 
 Bertram passed his hands across his brow, 
 46 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 asking the spirits of the air, I daresay, 
 where is truth ? He passed his hand across 
 his brow, while his lips uttered a kind of 
 guttural and enigmatic Mum-ph. 
 
 " There was Newhampton, for instance," 
 Seton complacently babbled on, " the little 
 Duke. Of course, with her supplies, she s had 
 more or less the whole unmarried peerage 
 after her, to pick and choose from ; but she 
 never turned a hair till Newhampton offered 
 himself. Then she regularly broke down, and 
 blew the gaff. A Duke ! Well, a Duke s a 
 Duke, and human nature couldn t stand it. 
 She told him with tears in her eyes that he d 
 given her the hardest day s work she d ever had 
 to do. For I d marry you like a shot, she 
 said, only I m unlucky enough to be in love 
 with another man. Pontycroft for a fiver, 
 said Newhampton, who s not such a fool as he 
 looks. And, by Jove, if she didn t coolly up 
 and tell him he was right ! But the fun of it 
 is that meantime Ponty s sister comes in for 
 the reversion. If not the rose, she s near the 
 rose, and she gets the golden dew. A private 
 portable millionaire, who loves you for your 
 brother and never shies at a bill, is a jolly 
 convenient addition to a Christian family." 
 
 47 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Bertram said nothing. He stood looking 
 down the exiguous thoroughfare, over the 
 heads of the passers-by, a cloud of preoccupa 
 tion on his brow. Lewis Vincent, Mrs. Wilber- 
 ton, and now this little cad of a Seton three 
 witnesses. But where was truth ? 
 
 " Anyhow," the little cad, never scenting 
 danger, in a minute went blandly on, " I hope 
 you ll give me an evening. Miss Adgate is 
 sure to amuse you, and Lady Dor is a person 
 you really ought to know." 
 
 " Thank you," said Bertram, deliberately 
 weighting his rudeness with a ceremonious 
 bow, " I don t think I should care to make 
 their acquaintance under your auspices." 
 
 And therewith he resumed his interrupted 
 walk, leaving Seton, open-mouthed, round- 
 eyed, to the enjoyment of a fine view of his 
 back. 
 
 By and bye, having (to cool his anger) 
 marched twice round the Piazza, he entered 
 San Marco, bidding Balzatore await his return 
 outside. In the sombre loveliness of one 
 of the chapels a rosary was being said. Among 
 the score or so of women kneeling there, he 
 saw, with a strange jump of the heart, Ruth 
 Adgate and Lady Dor. 
 
 4 8 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 He turned hastily away, not to spy upon 
 their devotions. But what he had seen some 
 how restored the natural sweetness of things. 
 And the vision of a delicate head bowed in 
 prayer accompanied him home. 
 
 49 
 
PART SECOND 
 
pONTYCROFT was really, as men go, a 
 tallish man, above, at any rate, what 
 they call the medium height, say five feet ten 
 or eleven. But seated, like a Turk or a tailor 
 as he was seated now on the lawn of Villa 
 Santa Cecilia, and as it was very much his 
 ridiculous custom to sit, with his head sunk 
 forward and his legs curled up beneath him, 
 making a mere torso of himself, he left you 
 rather with an impression of him as short. 
 That same sunken head, by the by, was a 
 somewhat noticeable head ; noticeably big ; 
 covered by a thick growth, close-cropped, of 
 fawn-coloured hair ; broad, with heavy bumps 
 over the thick fawn-coloured eyebrows ; the 
 forehead traversed by many wrinkles, vertical 
 and horizontal, deep almost as if they had 
 been scored with a knife. It was a white fore 
 head, but the face below, abruptly from the 
 hat-line, was as brown as sun and open air 
 could burn it, red-brown and lean, showing its 
 sub-structure of bone : not by any means a 
 handsome face ; nay, with its short nose, 
 
 53 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 perilously near a snub, its forward-thrust chin, 
 deeply-cleft in the middle, its big mouth 
 and the short fawn-coloured moustache that 
 bristled on the lip, decidedly a plain face ; yet 
 decidedly too, somehow, a distinguished, very 
 decidedly a pleasing face shrewd, humorous, 
 friendly ; capable, trustworthy lighted by 
 grey eyes that seemed always to be smiling. 
 
 They were certainly smiling at this moment, 
 as he looked off towards Florence, (where it lay 
 under a thin drift of pearl-dust in the sun- 
 filled valley), and spoke in his smiling masculine 
 voice. 
 
 " Up at the villa down in the city," he 
 said. " I never could sympathise with that 
 Italian person of quality. Surely, it s a thou 
 sand times jollier to be up at the villa. Then 
 one can look down upon the city, and admire 
 it as a feature of the landscape, and thank 
 goodness one isn t there." 
 
 Ruth s eyes (with the red glint in them) 
 laughed at him. She sat leaning back on a 
 rustic bench, a few yards away, under a mighty 
 ilex. She wore a frock of pale green muslin, 
 and her garden-hat had fallen on the ground 
 beside her, so that what breeze there was 
 could make free with her hair. 
 
 54 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " You are not an Italian person of quality, 
 you see," she said. " You are a beef-eating 
 Britisher, and retain a barbaric fondness for 
 the greenwood tree. You are like Peter Bell, 
 who never felt the witchery of the soft blue 
 sky. You have never felt the witchery of 
 brick and mortar." 
 
 Pontycroft, puffing his cigarette, regarded 
 her through the smoke with a feint of thought 
 ful curiosity. 
 
 " The worst thing about the young people 
 of your generation," he remarked, assuming 
 the tone of one criticising from an altitude, 
 " is that you have no conversation. Talk, 
 among you, consists exclusively of personali 
 ties gossip or chaff. Now, I was on the 
 point of drawing a really rather neat little 
 philosophical analogy ; and you, instead of 
 playing flint to steel, instead of encouraging 
 me with a show of intelligent interest, check 
 my inspiration with idle, personal chaff. Still, 
 hatless young girls in greenery-whitery frocks, 
 if they have plenty of reddish hair, add a very 
 effective note to the foreground of a garden ; 
 and I suppose one should be content with them 
 as they are." 
 
 Ruth ostentatiously " composed a face," 
 55 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 bending her head at the angle of intentness, 
 lifting her eyebrows, making her eyes big and 
 rapt. 
 
 " There," she said, taking a deep breath, 
 " I hope that is a show of intelligent interest. 
 Let me hear your really rather neat little 
 philosophical analogy." 
 
 " No," said Pontycroft, .with a melancholy 
 shake of the head, " that is only a show of the 
 irreverence of youth for age. What is the fun 
 of my being a hundred years your elder, if 
 you are not to treat me with proportionate 
 respect ? And as for my analogy (which, per 
 haps, on second thoughts, is not so neat as I 
 fancied), if I give it utterance, I shall do so 
 simply for the sake of clarifying it to myself. 
 It has reference to the everlasting problem of 
 evil. Human life is like a city ; and a city 
 seen from a distance " he waved his cigarette 
 towards Florence " is like human life taken 
 as a whole. Taken piecemeal, bit by bit, as it 
 passes, life dismays us, and terribly tries our 
 faith, by the Evil it presents : the pain, dis 
 ease, foul play, inequalities, injustices, what 
 you will : just as a city, when we are in its 
 streets, revolts us with its dirt, decay, squalor, 
 stagnant air, noise, confusion, and its sordid 
 
 56 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 population. But just as the city seen from a 
 distance, just as Florence seen from here, 
 loses all its piecemeal ugliness, and melts into 
 a beautiful and harmonious unity, so human 
 life viewed as a whole. . . . Well, you have 
 my analogy which, perhaps, after all, is 
 really rather banal. Ah me, I wish I could 
 marry you off. Why do you so systematically 
 refuse all the brilliant offers that I so tirelessly 
 contrive for you ? " 
 
 But Ruth seemed not to have heard his 
 question, though he underlined it by looking 
 up at her with a frown of grave anxiety. 
 
 " Unfortunately for us human beings," she 
 said, " no one has yet invented a process by 
 which we can live our life as a whole. It s all 
 very well to talk of viewing it, but we have to 
 live it ; and we have to live it piecemeal, 
 bit by bit." 
 
 "Well," demanded Pontycroft, cheerfully 
 inconsequent, " what can we ask better ? 
 Given health, wealth, and a little wisdom, 
 it s extremely pleasant to live our life piece 
 meal. It s extremely pleasant to take it bit 
 by bit, when the bits are sweet. And what, 
 for instance, could be a sweeter bit than 
 this ? " His lean brown hand described a 
 
 57 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 comprehensive circle. " A bright, crisp, cool, 
 warm September morning ; a big beautiful 
 garden, full of fragrant airs ; Italian sun 
 shine, and the shade of ilexes ; oleanders in 
 blossom ; cool turf to lie on, and a fountain 
 tinkling cool music near at hand ; then, 
 beyond there, certainly the loveliest prospect 
 in the world to feed our eyes Val d Arno, 
 with its olive-covered hills, its cypresses, its 
 white-walled villas, and Florence shining like 
 a cut gem in the midst. Add good tobacco to 
 smoke, and a simple child in white-green 
 muslin, with plenty of reddish hair, to try 
 one s analogies upon. What could man wish 
 better ? Why don t you get married ? Why 
 do you so perversely reject all the eligible 
 suitors that I trot out for your inspection ? " 
 
 Ruth s eyes laughed at him again. It was 
 a laugh of frank amusement, but I think there 
 was something dangerous in it too, a quick 
 flash of mockery, even of menace and defiance. 
 
 " Amang the train there is a swain I dearly 
 lo myseF," she lightly sang, her head thrown 
 back. " But you ve never trotted him out. 
 I don t get married detestable expression 
 because the only man I ve ever seriously 
 cared for has never asked me." She sighed 
 
 58 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 regretfully, resignedly ; and made him a 
 comical little face. 
 
 Pontycroft studied her for a moment. 
 Then, " Ho ! " he scoffed. " A good job, too. 
 I wasn t aware that you d ever seriously cared 
 for any one ; but if you have believe me, 
 he s the last man living you should think of 
 tying up with. The people we care for in our 
 calf-period are always the wrong people." 
 
 Ruth raised her eyebrows. " Calf-period ? 
 How pretty but how sadly misapplied. I m 
 twenty-four years old. Besides, the person 
 I care for is the right person, the rightest of 
 all right persons, absolutely the one rightest 
 person in the world." 
 
 " Who is he ? " Pontycroft asked carelessly, 
 lighting a fresh cigarette. 
 
 Still again Ruth s eyes laughed at him. 
 " What s his name and where s his hame I 
 dinna care to tell," again she sang. 
 
 " Pooh ! " said Pontycroft, blowing the 
 subject from him in a whiff of smoke. " He s 
 a baseless fabrication. He s a herring you ve 
 just invented to draw across the trail of my 
 inquiries. But even if he were authentic, he 
 wouldn t matter, since he s well-advised enough 
 not to sue for your hand. Have you ever 
 
 59 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 heard of a man called Bertrando Bertran- 
 doni ? " 
 
 " Bertrando Bertrandoni Phrebus ! what a 
 name ! " laughed Ruth. 
 
 " Yes," assented Pontycroft, " it s a trifle 
 cumbrous, also perhaps a trifle flamboyant. 
 So his English friends (he was educated in 
 England, and you d never know he wasn t 
 English) have docked it to simple Bertram. 
 Have you ever heard of him ? " 
 
 " I don t think so," said Ruth, shaking her 
 head. 
 
 " And yet he s a pretty well-known man," 
 said Pontycroft. " He writes every now and 
 then you ll see an article of his in one of the 
 reviews. He paints, too you ll see his pictures 
 at the Salon ; and plays the fiddle, and sings. 
 A jack-of -many- trades, but, by exception, 
 really rather a dab at em all. A sportsman 
 besides goes in for yachtin , huntin , fencin . 
 But over and above all that, a thorough good 
 sort and a most amusing companion a fellow 
 who can talk, a fellow who s curious about 
 things. Finally, a Serene and Semi-Royal 
 Highness." 
 
 " Oh ? " questioned Ruth, wondering. 
 
 " Ah," said Pontycroft, " you prick up 
 60 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 your pretty ears. Yes, a Serene and Semi- 
 Royal Highness. Has it ever struck you how 
 chuckle-headed saving their respect our 
 ancestors were ? I suppose they drank the 
 wrong sort of tea. Anyhow, they were mis 
 taken about nearly everything, and most of 
 their mistakes they elevated to the dignity of 
 maxims. Now, for example, they had a maxim 
 about Silence being golden, and another about 
 Curiosity being a vice. It s pitiful to think of 
 the enormous number of more or less tedious 
 anecdotes they laboriously imagined to illus 
 trate and enforce those two profound un 
 truths. Silence golden ? My dear, silence is 
 simply piggish. Your silent man is simply a 
 monstrous Egotist, who, in what should be the 
 reciprocal game of conversation, takes without 
 giving allows himself to be entertained, per 
 haps enriched, at his interlocuter s expense, 
 and is too soddenly self-complacent to feel 
 that he owes anything in return. Oh, I know, 
 you ll plead shyness for him you ll tell me 
 he doesn t speak because he s shy. In a certain 
 number of cases, I grant, that is the fact. 
 But what then ? Why, shyness is Egotism 
 multiplied by itself. Your shy person is a 
 person so sublimely (or infernally) conscious 
 61 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of his own existence and his own importance, 
 10 penetrated by the conviction that he is the 
 centre of the Universe and that all eyes arc 
 fixed upon him, and therewith so concerned 
 about the effect he may produce, the figure 
 he may cut, that he dare not move lest he 
 shouldn t produce an heroic effect or cut an 
 Olympian figure. And then, curiosity ! A 
 vice ? Look here. You are born, with eyes, 
 ears, and a brain, into a world that God 
 created. You have eyes, ears, and a brain, 
 and all round you is a world that God created 
 and yet you are not curious about it. A 
 world that God created, and that man, your 
 duplicate man, lives in ; a world in which 
 everything counts, small things as well as 
 big things the farthest planet and the trifling- 
 est affair of your next-door neighbour, the 
 course of Empire and the price of figs. But 
 no God s world, man s life they leave you 
 cold, they fail to interest you ; you glance 
 indifferently at them, they hardly seem worth 
 your serious attention, you shrug and turn 
 away. Tis a world that God created, and 
 you treat it as if it were a child s mud-pie ! 
 Good heavens ! And the worst of it is that 
 the people who do that are mightily proud of 
 
 62 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 themselves in their smug fashion. Curiosity 
 is Si vice and a weakness ; they are above it. 
 My sweet child, no single good thing has ever 
 happened to mankind, no single forward step 
 has ever been taken in what they call human 
 progress, but it has been primarily due to 
 some one s curiosity. He brought the word 
 out with a flourish, making it big. Then he 
 lay back, and puffed hard at his cigarette. 
 
 " Go on," urged Ruth demurely. " Please 
 don t stop. I like half-truths, and as for 
 quarter-truths, I perfectly adore them." 
 
 " Bertram," said Pontycroft, " is a fellow 
 who can talk, and a fellow who s curious about 
 things." 
 
 " I see," said Ruth. " And yet," she re 
 flected, as one trying to fit together incompat 
 ible ideas, " I think you let fall something 
 about his being a Serene and Semi-Royal 
 Highness." 
 
 " My dear," Pontycroft instructed her, 
 " there are intelligent individuals in all walks 
 of life. There are intelligent princes, there 
 are even intelligent scientific persons. The 
 Bertrandoni are the legitimate grand-dukes of 
 Altronde, the old original dynasty. They were 
 hurled from the throne, I don t know how 
 
 63 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 many years ago, in a revolution, and the actual 
 reigning family, the Ceresini, have been in 
 possession ever since. But Bertram s father is 
 the Pretender. He calls himself the Duke of 
 Oltramare, and lives in Paris lives there, I 
 grieve to state, in the full Parisian sense is 
 a professed viveur. I met him once, a hand 
 some old boy, military-looking, red-faced, 
 with a white moustache and imperial, and a 
 genially wicked eye. Anyhow, there s one 
 thing to his credit he had Bertram educated 
 at Harrow and Cambridge, instead of at one 
 of these soul-destroying Continental univer 
 sities. He and his Duchess never meet. She 
 and Bertram are supposed to live in Venice, 
 at the palace of the family, Ca Bertrandoni, 
 though as a matter of fact you ll rarely find 
 either of them at home. She spends most of 
 her time in Austria, where she was born a 
 Wohenhoffen, if you please ; there s no better 
 blood. And Bertram is generally at the other 
 end of the earth familiarizing himself with 
 the domestic manners of the Annamites, or 
 the religious practices of the Patagonians. 
 However, I believe lately he s dropped that 
 sort of thing given up travelling and settled 
 down." 
 
 6 4 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " This is palpitatingly interesting," said 
 Ruth. " Is it all apropos of boots ? " 
 
 Pontycroft put on his hat, and stood up. 
 
 " It s apropos," he answered, " of your im 
 mortal welfare. I had a note from Bertram 
 this morning to say he was in Florence, no 
 farther away than that. I m going down now 
 to call on him, and I ll probably bring him 
 back to luncheon. So tell Lucilla to have a 
 plate laid for him. Also put on your best 
 bib and tucker, and try to behave as nicely as 
 you can. For if you should impress him 
 favourably. . . . Ah me, I wish I could marry 
 you off." 
 
 " Ah me, I wish you could to the man I 
 care for," responded Ruth, with dreamy eyes, 
 and wistfulness real or feigned. 
 
 ii 
 
 " But I have already met them, your sister 
 and Miss Adgate," Bertram announced, with 
 an occult little laugh. Pontycroft looked his 
 surprise. 
 
 " Really ? They ve kept precious mum 
 about it. When ? Where ? " 
 
 " The other day at Venice," Bertram 
 F 65 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 laughed. " I even had the honour of escorting 
 them to their hotel in my gondola." 
 
 Pontycroft s face bespoke sudden enlighten 
 ment. 
 
 " Oho ! " he cried. " Then you re the 
 mysterious stranger who came to their rescue 
 when they were benighted at the Lido. 
 They ve told me about that. And oh, the 
 quantities of brain-tissue they ve expended 
 wondering who you were ! " 
 
 Bertram chuckled. 
 
 " But how," asked Pontycroft, the wrinkles 
 of his brow tied into puzzled knots, " how did 
 you know who they were ? : 
 
 " I saw them the next day when I was at the 
 Florian with Lewis Vincent, and he told me," 
 Bertram explained. 
 
 Pontycroft laughed, deeply, silently. "Thank 
 Providence I shall be present at the scene 
 that s coming. The man of the family brings 
 a friend home to luncheon, and lo, the ladies 
 recognise in him their gallant rescuer. It s 
 amazing how Real Life rushes in where Fiction 
 fears to tread. That scene is one which has 
 been banished from literature these thirty 
 years, which no playwright or novelist would 
 dare to touch ; yet here is Real Life blithely 
 
 66 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 serving it up to us as if it were quite fresh. 
 It s another instance and every one has seen 
 a hundred of Real Life sedulously apeing 
 ill-constructed and unconvincing melodrama." 
 
 Bertram, leaning on the window-sill, and 
 looking down at the yellow flood of the Arno, 
 again softly chuckled. 
 
 "Yes," he said; "but in this case I m 
 afraid Real Life has received a little adven 
 titious encouragement." He turned back 
 into the room, the stiff hotel sitting-room, 
 with its gilt-and-ebony furniture, its maroon- 
 and-orange hangings. "The truth is that 
 I ve come to Florence for the especial pur 
 pose of seeing you and of seeking this intro 
 duction." 
 
 " Oh ? " murmured Ponty, bowing. " So 
 much the better, then," he approved. "Though 
 I beg to observe," he added, " that this doesn t 
 elucidate the darker mystery how you knew 
 that we were here." 
 
 "Ah," laughed Bertram, "the unsleeping 
 vigilance of the Press. Your movements are 
 watched and chronicled. There was a para 
 graph in the Anglo-Italian Times. It fell 
 under my eye the day before yesterday, and 
 well, you see whether I have let the grass 
 
 67 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 grow. My glimpse of the ladies was ex 
 tremely brief, but it was enough to make me 
 very keen to meet them again. After all, I 
 have a kind of prescriptive right to know Lady 
 Dor isn t she the sister of one of my oldest 
 friends ? Miss Adgate," he spoke with re 
 spectful hesitancy, " I think I have heard, is 
 an American ? " 
 
 " Of sorts yes," Ponty answered. " But 
 without the feathers. Her father was a New 
 Englander, who came to Europe on the death 
 of his wife, when Ruth was three years old, 
 and never went back. So she s entirely a 
 European product." 
 
 His smiling eyes studied for a moment the 
 flowers and clouds and cupids painted in blue 
 and pink upon the ceiling. Then his theme 
 swept him on. 
 
 " He was a very remarkable man, her father. 
 I think he had the widest, the most all-round 
 culture of any man I ve ever known ; he was 
 beyond question the most brilliant talker. And 
 he was wonderful to look at, with a great old 
 head and a splendid tangle of hair and beard. 
 He was a man who could have distinguished 
 himself ten times over, if he would only have 
 done things written books, or what not. 
 
 68 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 But he positively didn t know what ambition 
 meant ; he hadn t a trace of vanity, of the 
 desire to shine, in his whole composition. 
 Therefore he did nothing except absorb know 
 ledge, and delight his friends with his magnifi 
 cent talk. He made me the executor of his 
 will, and when he died it turned out that he 
 was vastly richer than any one had thought. 
 Twenty odd years before, he had taken some 
 wild land in Wyoming for a bad debt, and 
 meanwhile the city of Agamenon had been 
 obliging enough to spring up upon it. So, 
 when Ruth attained her majority, I was able 
 to hand over to her a fortune of about thirty 
 thousand a year." 
 
 " Really?" said Bertram, and thought of 
 Mrs. Wilberton. This rhymed somewhat 
 faultily with the story of a money-lender. 
 Then, while Pontycroft, his legs curled up, 
 sat on the maroon -and -orange sofa, and 
 puffed his eternal cigarette, Bertram took a 
 turn or two about the room. He didn t want 
 to ask questions ; he didn t want to seem to 
 pry. But he did want to hear just as much 
 about Ruth Adgate as Pontycroft might be 
 inclined to tell. He didn t want to ask ques 
 tions, and yet, after a minute, as Pontycroft 
 
 69 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 simply smoked in silence, he ended by asking 
 one. 
 
 " I think Miss Adgate is of the Old 
 Religion ? " 
 
 " Yes her father was a convert, and a 
 mighty fervent and eloquent one, too," Ponty 
 replied nowise loth to pursue the subject. 
 " That was what first brought us together. 
 We were staying at the same inn in one of the 
 Protestant cantons of Switzerland, and on 
 Sunday morning all three of us tramped off 
 nine miles to hear Mass, Ruth being then about 
 ten. He was a man who never went in for 
 general society. He never went in for any 
 thing usual or conventional. His life was 
 extraordinarily detached. But he had his 
 own little group of friends, of old cronies 
 and young disciples, in pretty nearly every 
 town of Europe, so that he never needed to 
 be lonely. And he had a brother, an elder 
 brother, whom he was always going out to 
 America to see ; General Adgate, United 
 States Army, retired, residing at Oldbridge, 
 Connecticut. Every spring, every summer, 
 every autumn, old Tom Adgate made his plans 
 to go and visit the General, and then he put 
 the visit off. I think he d never really got 
 
 70 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 over his grief for the death of his wife, and 
 that he dreaded returning to the places that 
 were associated with her." 
 
 Bertram did not want to ask questions 
 yet now he asked another. 
 
 " But Miss Adgate herself has she never 
 been to America ? " 
 
 " No, she won t go," Pontycroft said. 
 " We ve urged her, pressed her to go, Lucilla 
 and I not to stop, of course but to see the 
 place, to faire acte de presence. Lucilla has 
 even offered to go with her. And the General 
 has written fifty times begging her to come 
 and stay with him at Oldbridge. She really 
 ought to go. It s her native country, and 
 she ought to make its acquaintance. But she 
 seems to have imbibed a prejudice against it. 
 She s been unfortunate in getting hold of some 
 rather terrible American newspapers, printed 
 in all the colours of the rainbow, in which the 
 London correspondents made her and her 
 affairs the subject of their prose. And then 
 she s read some American novels. I m bound 
 to confess that I can understand her shrinking 
 a bit, if American society is anything like what 
 American novelists depict. The people seem 
 entirely to lack manners, and the novelists 
 
 71 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 seem ingenuously oblivious of the deficiency. 
 They present the most unmitigated bounders, 
 and appear in all good faith to suppose they 
 are presenting gentlemen and ladies." 
 
 "Yes," agreed Bertram, smiling, "one has 
 noticed that." Then, thoughtful-eyed, pac 
 ing the floor, the world-traveller spoke : u But 
 America is very big, and very heterogeneous 
 in its elements, and the novelists leave a good 
 deal out. There s no such thing as American 
 society, there are innumerable different so 
 cieties, unassimilated, unaffiliated, and one 
 must pick and choose. Besides, Oldbridge 
 didn t you say is in New England ? New 
 England is an extraordinary little world apart, 
 as unlike the rest of the country as as a rural 
 dean is unlike a howling dervish. The rest of 
 the country is in the making, a confusion of 
 materials that don t match ; New England is 
 finished, completed ; and of a piece. Take 
 Boston, for instance, I really don t know a 
 more interesting town. It s pretty, it s even 
 stately ; it s full of colour and character ; it s 
 full of expression, it expresses its race and 
 its history. And as for society, Boston society 
 is as thoroughbred as any I have ever en 
 countered easy, hospitable, with standards, 
 
 72 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 with traditions, and at the same time with a 
 faint breath of austerity, a little remainder of 
 Puritanism, that is altogether surprising and 
 amusing, and in its effect rather tonic. No, 
 no, there s nothing to shrink from in New 
 England unless, perhaps, its winter climate. 
 It can t be denied that they sometimes treat 
 you to sixty degrees of frost." 
 
 Pontycroft blew a long stream of smoke, 
 " I ll ask you to repeat that sermon to Ruth 
 herself." 
 
 Bertram halted, guiltily hung his head. " I 
 beg your pardon my text ran away with me. 
 But why doesn t if Miss Adgate won t go to 
 America, why doesn t America come to her ? 
 Why doesn t General Adgate come to Europe ? " 
 
 Pontycrof t s brows knotted themselves again. 
 
 " Ah, why indeed ? " he echoed. " Hardly 
 for want of being asked, at any rate. Ruth 
 has asked him, my sister has asked him, I have 
 asked him. And it seems a smallish enough 
 thing to do. But in his way, I imagine he s 
 as unlike other folk as his brother was in his. 
 He s a bachelor wedded, apparently, to his 
 chimney-corner. There s no dislodging him 
 at least by the written word. So Ruth, 
 you see, is rather peculiarly alone in the 
 
 73 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 world, as I m afraid she sometimes rather 
 painfully feels. She has Lucilla and me, a 
 kind of honorary sister and brother, and in 
 England she has her old governess, Miss 
 Nettleworth, a cousin of Charlie Nettleworth, 
 who lives with her, and might be regarded as 
 a stipendiary aunt. And that s all, unless you 
 count heaps of acquaintances, and scores of 
 wise youths who d like to marry her. But 
 she appears to have devoted herself to spin- 
 sterhood. One and all, she refuses em as fast 
 as they come up. She s even refused a duke, 
 which is accounted, I suppose, the most heroic 
 thing a girl in England can do." 
 
 " Oh ? " said Bertram, in a tone that by 
 
 no means disguised his eagerness to hear more. 
 
 " Yes Newhampton," said Ponty. " As 
 he tells the story himself, there s no reason 
 why I shouldn t repeat it. His people 
 mother and sister had been at him for 
 months to propose to her, and at last (they 
 were staying in the same country house) he took 
 her for a walk in the shrubberies and did his 
 filial and fraternal duty. I m not sure whether 
 you know him ? The story isn t so funny 
 unless you do. He s a tiny little chap, only 
 about six-and-twenty, beardless, rosy-gilled 
 
 74 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 looks for all the world like a boy fresh from 
 Eton. By Jove, I thought my hour had 
 struck, says he. 4 I d no idea I should come out 
 of it a free man. Well, it shows that honesty 
 is the best policy, after all. I told her honestly 
 that my heart was a burnt-out volcano that 
 I hoped I should make a kind and affectionate 
 husband but that I had had my grande 
 "passion^ and could never love again ; if she 
 chose to accept me on that understanding 
 well, I was at her disposal. After which 
 I stood and quaked, waiting for my doom. 
 But she she simply laughed. And then she 
 said I was the honestest fellow she d ever 
 known, and had made the most original pro 
 posal she d ever listened to, which she wouldn t 
 have missed for anything ; and to reward me 
 for the pleasure I d given her, she would let 
 me off decline my offer with thanks. Yes, 
 by Jove, she regularly rejected me me, a 
 duke with the result that we ve been the 
 best of friends ever since. And so indeed 
 they have," concluded Ponty with a laugh. 
 
 Bertram laughed too and thought of Stuart 
 Seton. 
 
 " The Duchess-mother, though," Ponty went 
 on, " was inconsolable till I was fortunate 
 
 75 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 enough to console her. I discovered that she 
 had an immensely exaggerated notion of 
 Ruth s wealth, and mentioned the right 
 figures. Dear me, she cried, c in that case 
 Ferdie has had a lucky escape. He surely 
 shouldn t let himself go under double that. 
 But now " Ponty laughed again " observe 
 how invincible is truth. There are plenty of 
 people in England who ll tell you that they 
 were actually engaged, and that when it came 
 to settlements, finding she wasn t so rich as 
 he d supposed, Newhampton cried off." 
 
 Bertram had resumed his walk about the 
 room. Presently, " You know Stuart Seton, 
 of course ? " he asked, coming to a standstill. 
 
 " Of course," said Ponty. " Why ? " 
 
 " What do you think of him ? " asked 
 Bertram. 
 
 " A fine puss-gentleman that s all per 
 fume, " Ponty laughed. " Oh, he s a harm 
 less enough little beast, but it s a pity he oils 
 his hair." 
 
 " Hum," said Bertram, with an air of pro 
 found thought. 
 
 Ponty looked at his watch. 
 
 " I say," he cried, starting up ; " it s time 
 we were off." 
 
 76 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 in 
 
 There was, however, no such scene at Villa 
 Santa Cecilia as the man of the family (Pm 
 afraid with some malicious glee) had antici 
 pated. The ladies indeed recognised in his 
 friend their gallant rescuer, and no doubt 
 experienced the appropriate emotions, but 
 they made no violent demonstration of them. 
 They laughed, and shook hands, and bade 
 him welcome ; Bertram laughed a good deal, 
 too you know how easily he laughs ; and 
 that was all. Then they went in to luncheon, 
 during which meal, while the ball of conversa 
 tion flew hither, thither, he could observe 
 (and admire) Ruth Adgate to his heart s con 
 tent : her slender figure, her oddly pretty 
 face, her crinkling dark hair with its wine- 
 coloured lights, her brown eyes with their red 
 underglow, their covert laughter. " High 
 energies quiescent " his own first phrase 
 came back to him. " There s something 
 tense in her there s a spring there s a tense 
 chord. If it were touched well, one feels 
 how it could vibrate." A man, in other words, 
 felt that here was a woman with womanhood 
 in her. Tis a quality somewhat infrequently 
 
 77 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 met with in women nowadays, and, for men, 
 it has a singular interest and attraction. 
 
 Pontycroft, I am sorry to record it, be 
 haved very badly at table. He began by 
 stealing Ruth s bread ; then he played balanc 
 ing tricks sufficiently ineffectual with his 
 knife and fork, announcing himself as eleve de 
 Cinquevalli ; then, changing his title to eleve 
 du regrette Sludge, he produced a series of what 
 he called spirit-rappings, though they sounded 
 rather like the rappings of sole-leather against 
 a chair-round ; then he insisted on smoking 
 cigarettes between the courses "after the high 
 Spanish fashion," he explained ; and finally, 
 assuming the wheedling tone of a spoiled child, 
 he pleaded to be allowed to have his fruit be 
 fore the proper time. " I want my fruit 
 mayn t I have my fruit ? Ah, please let me." 
 
 " Patience, patience," said Lucilla, in her 
 most soothing voice, with her benignant smile. 
 " Everything comes at last to him who knows 
 how to wait." 
 
 " Everything comes at once to him who will 
 not wait," Ponty brazenly retorted, and lean 
 ing forward, helped himself from the crystal 
 dish, piled high with purple figs and scarlet 
 africani. 
 
 78 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 They returned to the garden for coffee, 
 and afterwards Ponty engaged his sister in a 
 game of lawn-golf, leaving Ruth and Bertram 
 to look on from the terrace, where Ruth 
 sat among bright-hued cushions in a wicker 
 chair, and Bertram (conscious of a pleasant 
 agitation) leaned on the lichen-stained marble 
 balustrade. 
 
 " Poor Lucilla," she said to him, the laughter 
 in her eyes coming to the surface, " she hates 
 it, you know. But I suppose Harry honestly 
 thinks it amuses her, and she s too good- 
 natured to undeceive him." 
 
 " There are red notes in her very voice," 
 said Bertram to himself. " Poor lady," he 
 said aloud. " Tis her penalty for having an 
 English brother. A game of one sort or 
 another is an Englishman s sole conception of 
 happiness. And that is the real explanation 
 of Anglo-Saxon superiority. Englishmen take 
 the most serious businesses of life as games 
 war, politics, commerce, literature, everything. 
 It s that which keeps them sane and makes 
 them successful." 
 
 Ruth looked doubtful. " Anglo-Saxon 
 superiority ? " she questioned. " Do you 
 believe in Anglo-Saxon superiority ? To be 
 
 79 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 sure, we re always thanking Heaven that we re 
 so much better than our neighbours ; but 
 apart from fond delusions, are we better ? >J 
 
 " You re at any rate fresher and lighter- 
 hearted," Bertram asseverated. " Englishmen 
 always remain boys. We poor Continentals, 
 especially we poor Latins, grow old and sad, 
 or else sour, or else dry and hard. We take 
 life either as a grand melodrama, or as a 
 monotonous piece of prose ; and it s all 
 because we haven t your English way of taking 
 it as a game the saving spirit of sport." 
 
 Ruth laughed a little. " Yes, and a good 
 many Englishwomen remain boys, too," she 
 added musingly. " How is that beautiful dog 
 of yours ? " she asked. " Have you brought 
 him with you to Florence ? : 
 
 " Balzatore ? No, I left him in Venice. 
 He s rather a stickler for his creature-comforts, 
 and the accommodations for dogs in Italian 
 trains are not such as he approves of." 
 
 Ruth opened wide her eyes. " Can they 
 be worse than the accommodations for human 
 beings ? " she wondered. 
 
 " All I can tell you," Bertram replied, " is 
 that I once took Balzatore with me to Padua, 
 and he howled conscientiously the whole way. 
 
 80 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 I have never known a human being (barring 
 babies) to do that, They shut him in a kind 
 of drawer, a kind of black hole, under the 
 carriage." 
 
 " Brutes," said Ruth, with a shudder. 
 " Don t you rather admire our view ? " she 
 asked, first glancing up at her companion, and 
 then directing her gaze down the valley. 
 
 " There never were such eyes," said Bertram 
 to himself. " There never was such a view," 
 he said to her. "With the sky and the clouds 
 and the sun and the haze, like gold turned 
 to vapour and the purple domes and pinnacles 
 of Florence. How is it possible for a town 
 to be at the same time so lovely and so 
 dull ? " 
 
 Ruth glanced up at him again. " Is Florence 
 Ml ? " 
 
 " Don t you think so ? " he asked, smiling 
 down. 
 
 " I m afraid I don t know it very well," she 
 answered. " The Ponte Vecchio seems fairly 
 animated and then there are always the 
 Botticellis." 
 
 " I dare say there are always the Botti 
 cellis," Bertram admitted, laughing. " But 
 the Ponte Vecchio doesn t count the people 
 G 81 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 there are all Jews. I was thinking of the Flor 
 
 entines." 
 
 " Ah, yes ; I see/ said Ruth. " They re 
 chiefly retired Anglo-Indians, aren t they ? " 
 
 " Well, isn t that," demanded Bertram, with 
 livelier laughter, " an entire concession of my 
 point ? " 
 
 " What are you people so silent about ? " 
 asked Pontycroft, coming up with Lucilla 
 from the lawn. Lucilla sank with an ouf of 
 thankfulness into one of the cushioned chairs. 
 Ponty seated himself on the balustrade, near 
 Bertram, and swung his legs. 
 
 " Never play lawn-golf with Lucilla," he 
 warned his listeners. " She cheats like every 
 thing. She even poked a ball into a hole with 
 her toe." 
 
 " A very good way of making it go in," 
 Lucilla answered. " Besides, if I cheated, it 
 was for two good purposes : first, to hurry up 
 the game, which would otherwise have lasted 
 till I dropped ; and then to show you how 
 much more inventive and resourceful women 
 are than men." 
 
 She fanned her soft face gently with her 
 pocket-handkerchief. 
 
 Ponty turned to Bertram. " Tell us the 
 82 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 latest secret tidings from Altronde. What 
 are the prospects of the rightful party ? J: 
 
 " Oh yes, do tell us of Altronde," said 
 Lucilla, dropping her handkerchief into her 
 lap, and looking up with eagerness in her soft 
 eyes. " I ve never met a Pretender before. Do 
 tell us all about it." 
 
 Bertram laughed. " Alas," he said, " there s 
 nothing about it. There are no tidings from 
 Altronde, and the rightful party (if there is 
 oen) has no prospects. And I am not a Pre 
 tender I am merely the son of a Pretender, 
 and my father maintains his pretensions merely 
 as a matter of form not to let them, in a 
 legal sense, lapse. He is as well aware as any 
 one that there ll never be a restoration." 
 
 " Oh ? " said Lucilla, her eyes darkening 
 with disappointment ; then, hope dying hard : 
 " But one constantly sees paragraphs in the 
 papers headed Unrest in Altronde, and they 
 seem to enjoy a change of ministry with each 
 
 new moon." 
 
 " Yes," admitted Bertram, " there s plenty 
 of unrest the people being exorbitant drinkers 
 of coffee ; and as every deputy aspires to be a 
 minister in turn, they change their ministry as 
 often as they have a leisure moment. Tis a 
 
 83 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 state very much divided against itself. But 
 there s one thing they re in a vast majority 
 agreed upon, and that is that they don t want 
 a return of the Bertrandoni." 
 
 " Were you such dreadful tyrants ? " ques 
 tioned Ruth, artlessly serious. 
 
 Pontycroft laughed aloud. 
 
 " There spoke the free-born daughter of 
 America," he cried. 
 
 " I m afraid we were, rather," Bertram 
 seriously answered her. " If History speaks the 
 truth, I m afraid we rather led the country 
 a dance." 
 
 " In that respect you couldn t have held a 
 candle to your successors," put in Ponty. 
 " The Ceresini really are a handful. Let 
 alone their extravagances, and their squabbles 
 with their wives I ve seen Massimiliano stag 
 gering-drunk in the streets of his own capital. 
 And then, if you drag in History, History never 
 does speak truth." 
 
 " I marvel the people stand it," said Lucilla. 
 
 " They won t stand it for ever," said 
 Bertram. " Some day there ll be a revolu 
 
 tion." 
 
 " Well ? But then ? Won t your 
 
 party come in ? " she asked. 
 
 84 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Then," he predicted, " after perhaps a 
 little interregnum, during which they ll try 
 a republic, Altronde will be noiselessly ab 
 sorbed by the Kingdom of Italy." 
 
 " History never speaks truth, and prophets 
 (with the best will in the world) seldom do," 
 said Ponty. " Believe as much or as little of 
 Bertram s vaticination as your fancy pleases. 
 In a nation of hot-blooded Southrons like the 
 Altrondesi, anything is possible. For my part, 
 I shouldn t be surprised if their legitimate 
 sovereign were recalled in triumph to-mor 
 
 row." 
 
 " Perish the thought," cried Bertram, throw 
 ing up his hand, " unless you can provide a 
 substitute to fill what would then become my 
 highly uncomfortable situation." 
 
 Ruth was looking curiously at Pontycroft. 
 " What has History been doing," she inquired, 
 " to get into your bad graces ? " 
 
 Pontycroft turned towards her, and made 
 a portentous face. 
 
 " History," he informed her in his deepest 
 voice, " is the medium in which lies are pre 
 served for posterity, just as flies are preserved 
 in amber. History consists of the opinions 
 formed by fallible and often foolish literary 
 
 85 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 men from the testimony of fallible, contra 
 dictory, often dishonest, and rarely dispassion 
 ate witnesses. The witnesses, either with 
 malice aforethought, or because their faculties 
 are untrained, see falsely, malobserve ; then 
 they make false, or at best, faulty records of 
 their malobservations. A century later comes 
 your Historian ; studies these false, faulty, 
 contradictory records ; picks and chooses 
 among em ; forms an opinion, the character 
 of which will be entirely determined by his 
 own character his temperament, prejudices, 
 kind and degree of intelligence, and so forth ; 
 and finally publishes his opinion under the 
 title of The History of Ballywhack. But the 
 history, please to remark, remains nothing 
 more nor less than an exposition of the private 
 views of Mr. Jones. And please to remark 
 further that no two histories of Ballywhack 
 will be in the least agreement except upon 
 unessentials. So that if Mr. Jones s history is 
 true, those of Messrs. Brown and Robinson 
 must necessarily be false. No, no, no ; if you 
 go to seek Truth in the printed page, seek it in 
 novels, seek it in poems, seek it in fairy tales 
 or fashion papers, but don t waste your time 
 seeking it in histories." 
 
 86 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 While the others greeted his peroration with 
 some laughter, Pontycroft lighted a cigarette. 
 
 " I m sure I d much rather seek it in fashion 
 papers," drawled Lucilla. " They re so much 
 lighter and easier to hold than great heavy 
 history books, and besides they sometimes 
 really give one ideas." 
 
 " But don t, above all things," put in Ruth, 
 " seek it in a small volume which I am prepar 
 ing for the press, and which is to be entitled, 
 The Paradoxes of Pontycroft" 
 
 IV 
 
 As Bertram walked back to Florence, down 
 the steep, cobble-paved lanes, between the 
 high villa walls, draped now with flowering 
 cyclamen, while glimpses of the lily-city came 
 and went before him, something like a phan 
 tom of Ruth Adgate floated by his side. Her 
 voice was in his ears, the scent of her garments 
 was in his nostrils ; he saw her face, her eyes, 
 her smiling red mouth, her fragile nervous 
 body. " I have never met a woman who 
 who moved me so troubled me so," he said. 
 " Is it possible that I am in love with her ? 
 Already ? " It seemed premature, it seemed 
 
 87 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 unlikely ; yet why couldn t he get her from 
 his mind ? 
 
 Be thou chaste as ice, pure as snow, thou 
 shalt not escape calumny. He thought as he 
 had thought again and again to-day, of Mrs. 
 Wilberton. " Just so certainly," he argued, 
 " as a woman is alone in the world, and 
 young, and good-looking, just so certainly 
 must slanderous tongues select her for their 
 victim. Add wealth, which trebles her con- 
 spicuousness, which excites a thousand envies, 
 and well, the Lord help her and those who 
 profess themselves her friends. That exquisite 
 young girl ! Her fine old father was a money 
 lender, and she is paying the Pontycrofts to 
 push her in society. Likely stories : Yet how 
 are you to prevent people telling and believ 
 ing them ? " 
 
 He raised his hands towards the blue em 
 pyrean, and let them fall heavily back beside 
 him, as one summoning angels and archangels 
 to mark the relentless logic of evil. And the 
 nine peasants who just then rattled past him 
 in a cart drawn by a single donkey, rolled 
 their eyes, and muttered among themselves, 
 " Another mad Inglese." 
 
 " But oh, ye Powers," he groaned, groaned 
 
 88 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 in the silence of his spirit, while audibly he 
 laughed with laughter that really was sar 
 donic, "if Ponty knew, if Ponty half sus 
 pected ! " Pontycroft was a man with magni 
 ficent capacities for anger. If Pontycroft 
 should come to know, as any day he might, 
 as some day he almost inevitably must, it 
 was not pleasant to picture the rage that 
 would fill him. And would it not extend, 
 that rage of his, "to us, his friends," Bertram 
 had to ask himself, "for not having put him 
 on his guard, for not having given him a 
 hint ? " Alas, it almost certainly would. 
 " What ! You, my friends, you heard the 
 beastly things people wer,e saying, and you 
 never warned me you left me in fatuous 
 ignorance of them ! " Yes ; bitter, scathing, 
 would be Pontycroft s reproaches ; and yet, 
 and yet Imagining a little the case of the 
 man who should undertake to convey that 
 warning, Bertram was conscious of a painful 
 inward chill. " It is not for me to do it 
 no, I should simply never have the courage." 
 The solution of the whole difficulty, of 
 course, would be her marriage. " She should 
 marry someone with a name and a position 
 a name and a position great enough in tliem- 
 
 89 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 selves to stifle scandal. If she should marry 
 -" Well, a Prince of the house of Bert- 
 randoni, for example. . . . But he did not 
 get so far as quite to say these words. At 
 the mere dim adumbration of the idea, he 
 stopped short, stood still, and waited for his 
 nerves to cease tingling, his heart to pound 
 less violently. 
 
 " Is it conceivable that I am in love with a 
 girl I ve only seen twice in my life ? And 
 what manner of likelihood is there that she 
 would have me ? She refuses everyone, Ponty 
 says ; and that odious little Stuart Seton says 
 she is in love with Ponty himself. No, I 
 don t suppose I have the ghost of a chance. 
 Still still she certainly didn t look or behave 
 as if she was in love with Ponty ; and that 
 odious little Seton is just an odious little 
 romancer ; and as for her refusing everyone, 
 
 tant va la cruche a V eau ! Anyhow, a 
 
 man may try, a man may pay his court. And 
 if But, good Heavens, I am forgetting my 
 mother. What would my mother say ? " 
 
 There were abundant reasons why the sud 
 den recollection of his mother should give 
 him pause. His mother was by no means 
 simply the Duchess of Oltramare, the consort 
 
 90 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of the Pretender to a throne. She was some 
 thing, to her own way of measuring, much 
 greater than this : she was an Austrian and 
 a WohenhofTen. Mere Semi-Royal Bertran- 
 doni, mere Dukes of Oltramare, mere Pre 
 tenders to the throne of Altronde, might 
 marry whom they would; lineage, blood, 
 quarterings, they might dispense with. But 
 to a WohenhofTen, to a noble of the noblesse 
 of Austria, lineage, blood, quarterings were 
 as essential as the breath of life. And Ruth 
 Adgate was an American. And have Ameri 
 cans quarterings ? A daughter-in-law without 
 them would, in all literalness, be less accept 
 able to his proud old Austrian WohenhofTen 
 of a mother, than a daughter-in-law without 
 her five senses or without hands and feet; 
 would be a thing, in fact, unthinkable. For 
 people without quarterings, to the mind of 
 your Austrian Wohenhoff ens, constitute an en 
 tirely separate, not order, not estate, an en 
 tirely separate Race, an alien species, no more 
 to be intermarried with than Esquimaux or 
 Zulus. 
 
 Yes, there were plenty of reasons why the 
 recollection of his mother should dash his 
 soaring fancies . But fancies are stubborn things 
 
 91 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 and by and bye they began anew to stir their 
 pinions. True, his mother was an Austrian and 
 a Wohenhoffen, yet at the same time she was 
 the smiling embodiment of good-humour and 
 good-nature, and she was the most sociable and 
 the most susceptible soul alive, she loved to be 
 surrounded by amusing people, she formed 
 the strongest friendships and attachments. 
 If she were at Florence now, for example, 
 and if the inhabitants of Villa Santa Cecilia 
 were presented to her, she would take each 
 of them to her heart. She would like Ponty- 
 croft, she would like Lucilla, above all she 
 would like Ruth ; she would like her for her 
 youth and freshness, for her prettiness, for her 
 gaiety, for everything. She would like her, 
 too, because she was a Catholic, the Duchess 
 of Oltramare being an exceedingly devout 
 daughter of the Church. And it would 
 never occur to her to ask whether she had 
 quarterings or not it would never occur to 
 her that so nice a person could fail to have 
 them. And then and then, when the ques 
 tion of quarterings did arise Well, even 
 Austrians, even Wohenhoffens, might perhaps 
 gradually be brought to accustom themselves 
 to new ideas. And then well, even to a 
 
 92 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Wohenhoffen, the fact that you possess a 
 handsome fortune will by no means lessen 
 your attractiveness. 
 
 " As I live," cried this designing son, " I ll 
 write to my mother to-night, and ask her to 
 come to Florence." 
 
 Of course, no sooner had Bertram left them, 
 than Pontycroft turned to the ladies, and 
 said, " Well ? " 
 
 " Well what ? " teased Ruth, trying to look 
 as if she didn t understand. 
 
 " Boo," said Pontycroft, making a face at 
 her. 
 
 " He s delightful," said Lucilla ; " so simple 
 and unassuming, and unspoiled. And so 
 romantic like one of Daudet s rois en exil. 
 And he has such nice eyes, and such a nice 
 slim athletic figure. Do you think it s true 
 that his people have no hope of coming to the 
 throne ? I ve felt it in my bones that we 
 should meet him again, ever since that night 
 at the Lido. I knew it was all an act of 
 Destiny. How wonderfully he speaks English 
 and thinks and feels it. He has quite the 
 English point of view he can see a joke. Oh, 
 
 93 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 I ve entirely lost my heart, and if I weren t 
 restrained by a sense of my obligations as a 
 married woman I should make the most 
 frantic love to him." 
 
 Ruth lay back in her chair, and shook her 
 head, and laughed. 
 
 "Oh, your swans, your swans, "she murmured. 
 
 " Dear Lady Disdain," said Ponty, regarding 
 her with an eye that was meant to wither, " it 
 is better that a thousand geese should be mis 
 taken for swans, than that a single swan should 
 be mistaken for a goose. Oh, your geese, 
 your geese ! " 
 
 " Dear Lord Sententious," riposted Ruth, 
 " what is the good of making any mistake at 
 all ? Why not take swans for swans, geese 
 for geese, and blameless little princelings for 
 blameless little princelings ? Yes, your little 
 princeling seemed altogether blameless, an 
 exceedingly well-meaning, well-mannered little 
 princeling, but I saw no play of Promethean 
 fire about his head, and when he spoke it 
 sounded as if any normally intelligent young 
 man was speaking." 
 
 " Had you expected," Pontycroft with lofty 
 sarcasm inquired, " that, like the prince in 
 Rose and Ring, he would speak in verse ? " 
 
 94 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 But next morning, in the most unexpected 
 manner, she totally changed her note. Ponty- 
 croft found her seated in the sun on the lawn. 
 It was a cool morning, and the sun s warmth 
 was pleasant. Here and there a dewdrop still 
 glistened, clinging to a spear of grass ; and 
 the air was still sweet with the early breath of 
 the earth. In her lap lay side by side an open 
 letter and an oleander-blossom. Her eyes, 
 Pontycroft perceived, were fixed upon the 
 horizon, as those of one deep in a brown 
 study. 
 
 " You mustn t mind my interrupting," he 
 said, as he came up. " It s really in your own 
 interest. It s bad for your little brain to let 
 it think so hard, and it will do you good to tell 
 me what it was thinking so hard about." 
 
 Slowly, calmly, Ruth raised her eyes to his. 
 " My little brain was thinking about Prince 
 Charming," she apprised him, in a voice that 
 sounded grave. 
 
 Pontycroft s wrinkled brow contracted. 
 
 " Prince Charming ? " 
 
 " The young Astyanax, the hope of Al- 
 tronde," she explained. " Your friend, Bert- 
 rando Bertrandoni. I was meditating his 
 manifold perfections." 
 95 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Pontycroft shook his head. " I miss the 
 point of your irony," he remarked. 
 
 " Irony ? " protested she, with spirit. " When 
 was I ever ironical ? He s perfectly delightful 
 so unassuming and unspoiled ; and so 
 romantic, like a king in exile. And with such 
 a nice thin figure, and such large sagacious 
 eyes. And he speaks such chaste and classic 
 English, and is so quick to take a joke. If I 
 weren t restrained by a sense of what s becom 
 ing to me as a single woman, I should make 
 desperate love to him." 
 
 Pontycroft shook his head again. " I still 
 miss the point," he said. 
 
 " I express myself blunderingly, I know," 
 said Ruth. " You see, it s somewhat embarrass 
 ing for a girl to have to avow such sentiments. 
 But really and truly and honestly, and all 
 jesting apart, I think he s an extremely nice 
 young man, quite the nicest that I ve met for 
 a long, long while." 
 
 " You sang a different song yesterday," 
 said Pontycroft, bewilderment and suspicion 
 mingled in his gaze. 
 
 " La nuit forte conseil" Ruth reminded 
 him. " I ve had leisure in which to revise my 
 impressions. He s a fellow who can talk, a 
 
 96 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 fellow who s curious about things. I hope 
 we shall see a great deal of him." She lifted 
 up her oleander, pressed it to her face, and 
 took a deep inhalation. " Bless its red fragrant 
 heart," she said. 
 
 " I never can tell when you are sincere," 
 Ponty hopelessly complained. 
 
 " Fm always sincere but seldom serious," 
 Ruth replied. " What s the good of being 
 serious ? Isn t levity the soul of wit ? Come, 
 come ! Life s grim enough, in all conscience, 
 without making it worse by being serious." 
 
 " I give you up," said Ponty. " You re 
 in one of your mystifying moods, and your 
 long-suffering friends must wait until it 
 passes." Then nodding towards the open 
 letter in her lap, " Whom s your letter from ? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " I don t know," said Ruth, smiling with 
 what seemed to him artificial brightness. 
 
 " Don t know ? Haven t you read it ? " he 
 demanded. 
 
 " Oh yes, I ve read it. But I don t know 
 whom it s from, because it isn t signed. It s 
 what they call anonymous," Ruth suavely 
 answered. " Now isn t that exciting ? " 
 
 " Anonymous ? " cried Ponty, bristling up. 
 H 97 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Who on earth can be writing anonymous 
 letters to a child like you ? What s it about ? " 
 
 " By the oddest of coincidences," said Ruth, 
 " it s about you" 
 
 " About me ? " Ponty faltered, a hundred 
 new wrinkles adding themselves to his aston 
 ished brow : " An anonymous letter to you 
 about me ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Ruth pleasantly. " Would you 
 care to read it ? " She held it up to him. He 
 took it. 
 
 Written in a weak and sprawling hand, 
 clearly feminine, on common white paper, it 
 ran, transliterated into the conventional spell 
 ing of our day, as follows : 
 
 " Miss Ruth Adgate, Madam. I thought 
 you might like to know that your friend, 
 H. Pontycroft, Esq. who passes himself off for 
 a bachelor is a married man, eighteen years 
 ago being married privately to a lady whose 
 father kept a public in Brighton of the name 
 of Ethel Driver. The lady lives at 18 Spring 
 Villas Beckenham Road Highgate off a mean 
 pittance from her husband who is ashamed 
 of her and long ago cast off. 
 
 " Yours, a sincere well-wisher." 
 98 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Pontycroft s wrinkles, as he read, concen 
 trated themselves into one frown of anger, 
 and the brown-red of his face darkened to 
 something like purple. At last he tore the 
 letter lengthwise and crosswise into tiny 
 fragments, and thrust them into the side 
 pocket of his coat. 
 
 " Let me see the envelope," he said, reach 
 ing out his hand. But there was nothing to 
 be got from the envelope. It was post 
 marked Chelsea, and had been addressed to 
 Ruth s house in town, and thence forwarded 
 by her servants. 
 
 " Who could have written it ? And why ? 
 Why ? " he puzzled aloud. 
 
 " The writer thought I c might like to 
 know, 3> said Ruth, quoting the text from 
 memory. " But, of course, it s none of my 
 business so I don t ask whether it is true." 
 
 " No, it s none of your business," Ponty 
 agreed, smiling upon her gravely, his anger no 
 longer uppermost. " But I hope you won t 
 quite believe the part about the pittance. 
 My solicitors pay all her legitimate expenses, 
 and if I don t allow her any great amount of 
 actual money, that s because she has certain 
 unfortunate habits which it s better for her 
 
 99 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 own sake that she shouldn t indulge too freely. 
 Well, well, you see how the sins of our youth 
 pursue us. And now shall we speak of some 
 thing else ? " 
 
 " Poor Harry," said Ruth, looking at him 
 with eyes of tender pity. " Speak of some 
 thing else ? Oh yes, by all means," she assented 
 briskly. " Let s return to Astyanax. When 
 do you think he will pay his visit of digestion? " 
 
 100 
 
PART THIRD 
 
TTE paid his visit of digestion as soon as, 
 A A with any sort of countenance, he could 
 he paid it the next afternoon ; and when 
 he had gone, Pontycroft accused Ruth of 
 having " flirted outrageously " with him. 
 
 Ruth, her head high, repudiated the charge 
 with a great show of resentment. " Flirted ? 
 I was civil to him because he is a friend of 
 yours. If you call that flirting, I shall know 
 how to treat him the next time we meet." 
 
 " Brava ! " applauded Ponty, gently clap 
 ping his hands. Then he knotted their bony 
 fingers round his knees, leaned back lazily, 
 and surveyed her with laughing eyes. " Beauty 
 angered, Innocence righteously indignant ! 
 You draw yourself up to the full height of 
 your commanding figure in quite the classic 
 style ; your glances flash like fierce Belinda s, 
 when she flew upon the Baron ; and I never 
 saw anything so haughty as the elevated perk 
 of your pretty little nosebud. But 
 
 How say you ? O my dove 
 
 103 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 let us not come to blows about a word. I don t 
 know what recondite meanings you may attach 
 to 6 flirting ; but when a young woman hangs 
 upon a man s accents, as if his lips were bright 
 Apollo s lute strung with his hair, and re 
 sponds with her own most animated conversa 
 tion, and makes her very handsomest eyes at 
 him, and falls one by one into all her most 
 becoming poses, and appears rapt into oblivion 
 of the presence of other people flirting is what 
 ordinary dictionary-fed English folk call it." 
 
 And he gave his head a jerk of satisfaction, 
 as one whose theorem was driven home. 
 
 Ruth tittered a titter that was an admis 
 sion of the impeachment. " Well ? What 
 would you have ? " she asked, with a play of 
 the eyebrows. " I take it for granted that you 
 haven t produced this young man without a 
 purpose, and I have never known you to pro 
 duce any young man for any purpose except 
 one. So the more briskly I lead him on, the 
 sooner will he come to to what, if I am not 
 mistaken " she tilted her chin at an angle 
 of inquiry " dictionary-fed English folk call 
 the scratch." 
 
 Pontycroft gave his head a shake of dis 
 approval. " No, no ; Bertram is too good a 
 
 104 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 chap to be trifled with," he seriously pro 
 tested. " You shouldn t lead him on at all, if 
 you mean in the end, according to what seems 
 your incorrigible habit, to put him off." 
 
 Ruth s eyebrows arched themselves in an 
 expression of simplicity surprised. 
 
 " Why should you suppose that I mean 
 anything of the sort ? " 
 
 Pontycroft studied her with a frown. " You 
 unconscionable little pickle ! Do you mean 
 that you would accept him ? : 
 
 " I don t know," she answered slowly, 
 reflecting. " He s a very personable person. 
 And he s a prince which, of course, rather 
 dazzles my democratic fancy. And I suppose 
 he s well enough off not to be after a poor girl 
 merely for her money. And well on the 
 whole don t you see ? well perhaps a poor 
 girl might go further and fare worse." 
 
 She pointed her stammering conclusion by 
 a drop of the eyelids and a tiny wriggle of the 
 shoulders. 
 
 " In fact, when you said you would die a 
 bachelor, you never thought you would live to 
 be married," Pontycroft commented, making 
 a face, slightly wry, the intention of which 
 wasn t clear. He felt about his pockets for his 
 105 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 cigarette case, lighted a cigarette, and smoked 
 half an inch of it in silence. " At any rate," 
 he went on, " here s news for your friends. 
 And what by the by what about deathless 
 Aphrodite ? The only man you ever really 
 cared for what becomes of that poor 
 devil ? " 
 
 A light kindled in Ruth s eyes ; not an 
 entirely friendly light ; a light that seemed 
 to threaten. But all she said was, " How do 
 you know that that poor devil isn t Bertram 
 Bertrandoni himself ? " 
 
 The gesture with which Pontycroft flicked 
 the ash from his cigarette proclaimed him a 
 bird not to be caught with chaff. 
 
 " Gammon," he said. " You d never seen 
 him." 
 
 " Never seen him ? " retorted Ruth, her 
 face astonished and reproachful. " You are 
 forgetting Venice. Why shouldn t I have lost 
 my young affections to him that night at 
 Venice ? You haven t a notion how romantic 
 it all was, with the moonlight and everything, 
 and Lucilla quoting Byron, and then Astyanax, 
 in a panama hat, dashing to our assistance like 
 a knight out of a legend. Isn t it almost a 
 matter of obligation for distressed females to 
 
 106 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 fall in love with the knights who dash to 
 their assistance." 
 
 "Hruff," growled Pontycroft, smoking," why 
 do you waste these pearls of sophistry on me ?" 
 
 Ruth laughed. 
 
 " All right," she unblushingly owned up. 
 " The only man I ve ever seriously cared for 
 isn t Bertrando Bertrandoni. But what then ? 
 Let us look at it as men of the world. What 
 has that poor devil got to do with the question 
 of my marriage ? You yourself told me that 
 he was the last man alive I should think of 
 leading to the altar. You said the persons we 
 care for in our calf-period are always the 
 wrong persons. And what some people say 
 carries double weight, because " that not 
 entirely friendly light flickered again in her 
 eyes for a second " because they teach by 
 example as well as precept." 
 
 And of course the words weren t out of 
 her mouth before she regretted them. 
 
 Pontycroft said nothing, made no sign. It 
 may be that his sun-burned skin flushed a 
 little, that the lines of his forehead wavered. 
 He sat with his homely face turned towards 
 Florence, and appeared to be considering the 
 effect of his cigarette-smoke on the view. 
 107 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Ruth waited, and the interval seemed long. 
 She looked guilty, she looked frightened, her 
 eyes downcast, her lips parted, a conscious 
 culprit, bowing her head to receive the blow 
 she had provoked. But no blow fell. She 
 waited as long as flesh and blood could stand 
 the suspense. At last she sprang up. 
 
 " Oh," she cried wildly, " why don t you 
 crush me ? Why don t you tell me I m a 
 beast ? Why don t you tell me you despise 
 me loathe me for being for being such a 
 cad ? Oh, Harry, I am so sorry." 
 
 She stood before him with tight-clasped 
 hands, her whole form rigid in an anguish of 
 contrition. To have taunted him with a thing 
 for which she should have greatly pitied him, 
 a secret she had no right even to know, a 
 grief, a shame, to which in decency she should 
 never remotely have alluded oh, it was 
 worse than brutal, it was cattish, treacherous, 
 it was base. 
 
 But he smiled up at her from calm eyes. 
 
 " What s the row ? " he asked. " What 
 are you sorry about ? You very neatly scored 
 a point, that s all. Besides, on the subject in 
 question, a fellow in the course of years will 
 have said so many stinging things to himself 
 
 1 08 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 as to have rendered him reasonably tough. 
 And now then " he gaily shifted his key 
 " since Bertram isn t the favoured swain, let us 
 hope he soon will be. It s every bit as easy to 
 fall in love with one man as with another, and 
 often a good deal easier. Come sit down 
 concentrate your mind upon Bertram s advan 
 tages and remember that words break no 
 bones." 
 
 Ruth s attitude had relaxed, her face had 
 changed, contrition fading into what looked 
 like disappointment, disillusion, and then like 
 a kind of passive bitterness. Pontycroft 
 waved his hand towards her chair. Automati 
 cally, absently, she obeyed him, and sat down. 
 
 " I must beg pardon," she said, with rather 
 a bitter little smile, " for my exhibition of 
 emotion. I had forgotten how Englishmen 
 hate such exhibitions. It is vulgar enough to 
 feel strong emotions a sort of thing that 
 should be left to foreigners and the lower 
 classes ; but to show them is to take an out- 
 and-out liberty with the person we show them 
 to, the worst possible bad form. Well, well ! 
 Words breaks no bones ; hearts, though, 
 sometimes, the poet added : but there again, 
 poets are vulgar-minded, human creatures, 
 109 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 born as a general rule at Camberwell, and what 
 can they know of the serene invulnerability of 
 heart that is the test of real good-breeding ? 
 Anyhow " her face changed again, lighting 
 up " what you say about its being often a 
 good deal easier to fall in love with one man 
 than with another is lamentably true that s 
 why we don t invariably love with reason. 
 Your thought has elsewhere found expression 
 in song how does it go ? Her eyes by this 
 time were shining with quite their wonted 
 mirthful fires, yet deep down in them I think 
 one might still have discerned a shadow of 
 despite, as she sang : 
 
 Rien n y fait, menace ou prire ; 
 
 L un parle bien, 1 autre se tait ; 
 Et c est Tautrc que je pref^re, 
 
 II n a rien dit, mais il me plait. 
 
 " Thajik goodness," cried the cheerful voice 
 of Lucilla. " Thank goodness for a snatch of 
 song." Plump and soft, her brown hair 
 slightly loosened, her fair skin flushed a little 
 by the warmth of the afternoon, she came, 
 with that " languid grace " which has been 
 noted, up the terrace steps, her arms full of 
 fresh-cut roses, so that she moved in the 
 centre of a nebula of perfume. " Only I wish 
 
 no 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 it had been a blackbird or a thrush. I ve 
 spent half an hour wandering in the garden, 
 and not a bird sang once. The silence was 
 quite dispiriting. A garden without birds is a 
 more ridiculous failure than a garden without 
 flow r ers. I think I shall give this villa up." 
 She shed her roses into a chair, and let herself, 
 languidly, gracefully, sink into another. 
 
 " Birds never do sing in the autumn do 
 they ? " questioned Ruth. 
 
 " That s no excuse," complained Lucilla. 
 " Why don t they ? Isn t it what they re 
 made for ? " 
 
 " Robins do," said Ponty, " they re singing 
 their blessed little hearts out at this very 
 
 moment." 
 
 " Where ? " demanded Lucilla eagerly, start 
 ing up. " I ll go and hear them." 
 
 "In England," answered her brother ; "from 
 every bush and hedgerow." 
 
 " G-r-r-r-h ! " Lucilla ejaculated, deep in 
 her throat, turning upon him a face that was 
 meant to convey at once a sense of outrage 
 and a thirst for vengeance, and showing her 
 pretty teeth. " Humbug is such a cheap 
 substitute for wit. Why don t other birds 
 sing ? Why don t blackbirds, thrushes ? " 
 in 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Because," Pontycroft obligingly explained, 
 " birds are chock-full of feminine human 
 nature. They re the artists of the air, and 
 you know the proverb every artist is at heart 
 a woman. June when they woo, December 
 when they wed, they sing just as women 
 undulate their hair to beguile the fancy of 
 the male upon whom they have designs. But 
 once he s safely married and made sure of, 
 the feminine spirit of economy asserts itself, 
 and they sing no longer. A quoi bon ? They 
 save their breath to cool their pottage." 
 
 " What perfect nonsense," said Lucilla," 
 curling a scornful lip. " It s a well-known 
 fact that only the male birds sing." 
 
 " Apropos of male and female," Ponty 
 asked, " has it never occurred to you that 
 some one ought to invent a third sex ? : 
 
 " A third ? " expostulated Ruth, wide-eyed. 
 " Good heavens ! Aren t there already two 
 too many ? : 
 
 " One is too many, if you like," Ponty dis 
 tinguished, uncoiling his legs and getting upon 
 his feet, " but two are not enough. There 
 should be a third, for men to choose their 
 sisters from. You women have always been 
 too good for us, and nowadays, with your higher 
 
 112 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 education, you re becoming far too clever. 
 See how Lucilla caught me out on a point in 
 natural history." 
 
 With which he retreated into the house. 
 
 ii 
 
 But a week or so later, Bertram having 
 found an almost daily occasion for coming to 
 Villa Santa Cecilia, " It really does begin to 
 look," Ponty said, in a tone that sounded 
 tentatively exultant, " as if at last we were 
 more or less by way of getting her off our 
 hands. Unberufen" he made haste to add, 
 zealously tapping the arm of his wicker chair. 
 
 " Oh ? " Lucilla doubted, her eyebrows 
 
 going up. Then, on reflection, " It certainly 
 looks," she admitted, " as if Prince Bertrandoni 
 were very much taken with her. But so many 
 men have been that, poor dears," she remem 
 bered, sighing, " and you know with what 
 fortune." 
 
 " Ah, but in this case I m thinking of her" 
 Ponty eagerly discriminated. " It s she who 
 seems taken with Prince Bertrandoni. I half 
 believe she s actually in love with him and, 
 anyhow, I wouldn t mind betting she d accept 
 him. Unbtrufen" 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Lucilla s soft face wondered. " In love 
 with him ? " she repeated. " Why should you 
 think that ? " 
 
 " Oh, reasons as plentiful as blackberries," 
 Ponty answered. " The way in which she 
 brightens up at his arrival, absorbs herself in 
 him while he s here, wilts at his departure, 
 and then, during his absence, mopes, pines, 
 muses, falls pensive at all sorts of inappropri 
 ate moments, as one whose heart is hugging 
 something secret and bitter-sweet. Of course, 
 I m only a man, and inexperienced, but I 
 should call these the symptoms of a maid in 
 love and evidences that she loves her love 
 with a B. However, in love or not, it s plain 
 she likes him immensely, and I ll bet a sovereign 
 she s made up her mind to marry him if he 
 asks her." 
 
 " Oh, he ll ask her fast enough," Lucilla 
 with confidence predicted. " It s only a ques 
 tion of her giving him a chance." 
 
 Ponty shook his wrinkled brow. " I wish 
 I were cocksure of that," he said. " You see, 
 after all, he s not as other men. On one side 
 he s a semi-royalty, and there are dynastic 
 considerations ; on t other side he s a Wohen- 
 hoffen, and, with every respect for the house 
 
 114 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of Adgate, I m doubting whether the Wohen- 
 hoffens would quite regard them as even 
 birthish. Of course, she has money, and 
 money might go a long way towards rose- 
 colouring their visions. Still, their vision is a 
 thing he d have to reckon with. No I m 
 afraid he may continue to philander, and let 
 f I dare not wait upon I would, unless she 
 gives him a good deal more than a mere chance 
 unless she gives him positive encouragement 
 unless, in fine, by showing the condition of 
 her own heart she sweeps the poor fellow off 
 his feet. You question whether she s in love 
 with him. Dear child, why shouldn t she be ? 
 Tis Italy, tis springtime, and whither should 
 a young girl s fancy turn ? Besides, she has 
 red hair." 
 
 " Springtime ? " protested Lucilla. " I 
 thought it was September." 
 
 " So it is," agreed her brother, flourishing 
 his cigarette. " But September in Italy is 
 proud-pied April under a pseudonym. The 
 April winds are passional for bachelors and 
 dames. Besides, she has red hair." 
 
 " Red hair ? " protested ; Lucilla. " Her 
 hair is brown." 
 
 " So it is," agreed her brother, with a 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 second flourish. " But the larger includes the 
 less. I did not say she was a red-haired woman. 
 A red-haired woman is red, a black-haired 
 woman is black, and there s an end on t ; 
 expect no mystery, no semi-tones, no am 
 biguities. I said she had red hair, and so she 
 has, since her hair is brown. A brown-haired 
 woman is everything, is infinite variety, is as 
 elusively multi-coloured as a dying dolphin. 
 A brown-haired woman s hair is red, black, 
 blue, green, purple, amber, with their thou 
 sand intermediates, according to mood and 
 tense. Oh, give me a brown-haired woman, 
 and surprises, improbabilities, perplexities, will 
 never be to seek. A brown-haired woman has 
 red hair, and red hair means a temperament 
 and a temper. No, I honestly think our 
 little brown-haired friend, in just so far as 
 her hair is red, is feeling foolish about Bertram, 
 and I look hopefully forward (unberufen) to the 
 day when her temper or her temperament will 
 get the better of her discretion, and let him 
 see what s what. Then (unberufen) his native 
 chivalry will compel him to offer her his hand. 
 Thank goodness she has money." 
 
 " It s very handsome of you," said Ruth, 
 for the first time coming into the conversa- 
 
 116 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 tion, though she had been present from its 
 inception, " it s very handsome indeed of you 
 to take so much interest in my affairs and to 
 discuss them so frankly before my face." 
 
 " It is handsome of us," agreed Pontycroft, 
 chucking his cigarette away, " and I am glad 
 you appreciate it. For we might be discussing 
 the weather, a vastly more remunerative 
 theme. Has it ever struck you how inept the 
 duffers are who taboo the weather as a subject 
 of conversation ? There s nothing else in the 
 physical universe so directly vital to man s 
 welfare as the weather, nothing on which his 
 comfort so immediately depends, and nothing 
 (to take a higher ground) that speaks such an 
 eloquent and varied language to his sense of 
 beauty. The music of the wind, the colours of 
 the sky, the palaces and pictures in the clouds ! 
 Yet duffers taboo it as a subject of conversa 
 tion. The weather is the physiognomy of 
 Heaven towards us, its smile or frown. What 
 else should we discuss ? Hello, here he 
 
 comes." 
 
 Bertram came up the garden path and 
 mounted the terrace. 
 
 " My mother," he announced, " is arriving 
 this evening from Vienna. I was wondering 
 117 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 whether you would lunch with us to-morrow, 
 to make her acquaintance." 
 
 " Oho," whispered Ponty in Ruth s ear, 
 " this really does look like business. Madame 
 Mere is coming to look you over." 
 
 in 
 
 I don t know how it is that certain people, 
 without doing or saying anything that can be 
 taken hold of, yet manage to convey to us a 
 very definite and constant sense that they 
 think themselves our betters. Oh, of course, 
 there are people who ostentatiously carry 
 their heads in the air, who openly swagger, 
 patronise, condescend, but those are not the 
 people I mean. I mean the people who are out 
 wardly all pleasantness and respectful courtesy, 
 and inwardly very likely all goodwill, and yet 
 and yet we are somehow never allowed 
 for an instant to forget that never do they 
 for an instant become unconscious of their 
 divinely appointed superiority. 
 
 " La Duchesse d Oltramare, nee Comtesse 
 de Wohenhoifen," to copy the legend from 
 her visiting-card, was rather a fat, distinctly 
 an amiable woman of fifty-something, very 
 
 118 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 smartly turned out in the matter of costume 
 by those who are surely the cleverest milliners 
 and dressmakers in the world, the Viennese. 
 She had a milk-white skin, with a little pink 
 in the scarcely wrinkled cheeks, and plump, 
 smooth, milk-white hands, with polished, rosy 
 nails. For the rest, her smiling mouth, the 
 gleam of her grey eyes, and something crisp 
 in the quality of her voice, seemed to connote 
 wit and a sense of humour. Her son had 
 described her to himself as the best-natured 
 and the most sociable being alive ; certainly 
 on the morrow, at luncheon, she was all 
 pleasantness, all cordiality even, to her son s 
 guests ; yet never, for an instant, could one of 
 them forget that she was perpetually con 
 scious of herself as a great personage, and of 
 them as relatively very small folk indeed. 
 I wish I could tell, I wish I could understand, 
 how the thing was done. Of patronage or 
 condescension of the sort, at any rate, that 
 could be formulated and resented there 
 wasn t any trace either in her talk or in her 
 manner ; nor of stiffness, pomposity, self- 
 importance. All pleasantness, all cordiality, 
 she seemed to take them at once into her 
 friendship, almost into her affection she 
 119 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 seemed to conceive (as Bertram had promised 
 himself she would) a particular liking for each 
 of them. And her talk was easy, merry, 
 vivacious, intimate. Yet yet yet 
 
 " I d give a thousand pounds," said Ponty- 
 croft, as they drove home, " for that woman s 
 secret. She knows how to appear the jolliest 
 old soul unhung and to make other people 
 feel like her fiddlers three." 
 
 " She s insufferable," said Lucilla irritably. 
 " I should think a Pontycroft and the wife 
 of an English baronet is as good as six foreign 
 duchesses. I should like to put her in her 
 place." 
 
 " A Pontycroft, as much as you will," con 
 curred her brother suavely, " but you re only 
 the wife of an Irish baronet, dear girl. No, 
 it s something subtle, unseizable. Every word, 
 look, gesture, hailed you as her friend and 
 equal, and all of them together delicately 
 kept you reminded that she was deigning 
 hugely to honour a nobody. It s sheer odylic 
 force." 
 
 " She ate like five," Lucilla went spitefully 
 on. " She was helped twice to everything. 
 And she emptied at least a whole bottle of 
 
 wine." 
 
 120 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Ah, well, as for that," Ponty said, " a 
 healthy appetite is a sign that its owner is 
 human at the red-ripe of the heart. You 
 didn t, by the by, do so badly yourself." 
 
 " And she consumed her food with an air" 
 Lucilla persisted, " with a kind of devotional 
 absorption, as if feeding herself was a religious 
 sacrifice." 
 
 " And I suppose you noticed also that she 
 called Ruth my dear ? " Ponty asked. 
 
 " Yes, as if she was a dairymaid," sniffed 
 Lucilla. " I wonder you didn t turn and 
 rend her." 
 
 " Oh, I liked her," Ruth replied. " You 
 see, we mere Americans are so inured to 
 being treated with affability and put at our 
 ease by our English cousins that we scarcely 
 notice such things in foreigners." 
 
 " Well, it s lucky you like her," said Ponty, 
 wagging his head, " for you re in a fair way to 
 see a good bit of her, if events move as they re 
 moving. The crucial question, of course, is 
 whether she liked you. If she did, I should 
 call the deal as good as done." 
 
 The " deal " seemed, at any rate, to advance 
 a measurable step when, on the following 
 afternoon, the Duchess called at the villa, 
 
 121 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 for the purpose, as Pontycroft afterwards put 
 it to Ruth, of " taking up your character." 
 
 " Dearest Lady Dor," she said, beaming 
 upon every one, and I wish I could render the 
 almost cooing loving-kindness of her intona 
 tion, " you will forgive me if I come like this 
 a Fimproviste ? Yes ? I was so anxious to 
 see you again, and when people are mutually 
 sympathetic, it is a pity to let time or eti 
 quette delay the progress of their friendship, 
 don t you think ? Oh, kind Mr. Pontycroft," 
 she purred, as Ponty handed her a cup of tea. 
 " Dear little Miss Adgate," as Ruth passed the 
 bread and butter. 
 
 They drank their tea in the great hall, and 
 afterwards, linking her arm familiarly in 
 Lucilla s, " Dearest Lady Dor," she pro 
 nounced, in the accents of one pleading for a 
 grace, " I am so anxious to see your beautiful 
 garden ! You will show it to me ? Yes ? 
 My son has told me so much about it." 
 
 And when she and Lucilla, under their 
 sunshades, were alone in the garden-paths, 
 " The outlook is magnificent," she vowed, 
 with enthusiasm. " You have Florence at 
 your feet. Superb. Oh, the lovely roses ! I 
 might pick one a little one ? Yes ? Ah, so 
 
 122 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 kind. I wanted to ask about your charming 
 little friend, that nice Miss Adgate." 
 
 " Oh ? " said Lucilla, in a tone of some 
 remoteness. 
 
 But the Duchess did not appear to notice 
 it. " Yes," she blithely pursued. " You don t 
 mind ? My son has told me so much about 
 her. She is an American, I think ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Lucilla. 
 
 The Duchess s eyes glowed with admiration. 
 
 " Your ilex trees are wonderful I have 
 never seen grander ones. I am really envious. 
 She has nice manners, and is distinguished- 
 looking as well as pretty. I believe she is also 
 how do you say in English tres bien do tee ? " 
 
 " She has about thirty thousand a year, I 
 believe," said Lucilla. 
 
 The Duchess stood still and all but gasped. 
 " Thirty thousand pounds ? Pounds ster 
 ling ? " Then she resumed her walk. " But 
 that is princely. That is nearly a million 
 francs." 
 
 " It is a decent income," Lucilla admitted. 
 
 " And she is also, of course, what you call 
 well born ? " the Duchess threw out, as if the 
 question were superfluous and its answer fore 
 gone. 
 
 123 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " She is what we call a gentlewoman," an 
 swered Lucilla. 
 
 " To be sure of course," said the Duchess, 
 " but but without a title ? " 
 
 " In England titles are not necessary to 
 gentility as I believe they are in Austria," 
 Lucilla mentioned. 
 
 " To be sure of course," said the Duchess. 
 " Her parents, I think, are not living ? : 
 
 " No they are dead," Lucilla redundantly 
 responded. 
 
 " Ah, so sad," murmured the Duchess, with 
 a sympathetic movement of her bonnet. 
 " But then she is quite absolute mistress of 
 her fortune ? What a responsibility for one 
 so young. And to crown all, she is a good 
 pious Catholic ? : 
 
 " She is a Catholic," said Lucilla. 
 
 " The house, from here, is really imposing 
 really signorile" the Duchess declared, con 
 sidering it through her silver-framed double 
 eyeglass. " There are no houses like these old 
 Florentine villas. Ah, they were a lovely race. 
 You see, my son is very much interested in her. 
 I have never known him to show so much 
 interest in a girl before. It is natural I should 
 wish to inform myself, is it not ? If you will 
 
 124 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 allow me, dear Lady Dor, to make you a con 
 fidence, I should be so glad to see him mar 
 ried." 
 
 "Yes," said Lucilla. "I suppose," she 
 hesitated, " I suppose it is quite possible for 
 him, in spite of his belonging to a reigning 
 house, to marry a commoner ? " 
 
 The Duchess looked vague. " A reigning 
 house ? " she repeated, politely uncompre 
 hending. 
 
 " The Bertrandoni-Altronde," Lucilla dis- 
 jointedly explained. 
 
 " Oh," said the Duchess, with a little toss of 
 the head. " The Bertrandoni do not count. 
 They have not reigned for three generations, 
 and they will never reign again. They have 
 no more chance of reigning than they have of 
 growing wings. The Altrondesi would not 
 have them if they came bringing paradise in 
 their hands. My husband s pretensions are 
 absurd, puerile. He keeps them up merely 
 that he may a little flatter himself that he is not 
 too flagrantly the inferior of his wife. No, 
 the Bertrandoni do not count. It is the 
 Wohenhoffens who count. The Wohenhoffens 
 were great lords and feudal chiefs in Styria 
 centuries before the first Bertrandoni won 
 
 125 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 his coat of arms. It was already a vast waiving 
 of rank, it was just not a mesalliance, when a 
 Wohenhoffen gave his daughter to a Bertran- 
 doni in marriage. If my son were a Wohen 
 hoffen in the male line, then indeed he could 
 not possibly marry a commoner. But he is, 
 after all, only a Bertrandoni. Even so, he 
 could not marry a commoner of any of the 
 Continental states he could not marry out 
 side the Almanach de Gotha. But in England, 
 as you say, it is different. There all are com 
 moners except the House of Peers, and a title 
 is not necessary to good noblesse. In any case, 
 it would be for the Wohenhoffens, not for 
 the Bertrandoni, to raise objections." 
 
 " I see," said Lucilla. 
 
 The Duchess, by a gesture, proposed a 
 return to the house. 
 
 " Thank you so much," she said, " for 
 receiving me so kindly, and for answering all 
 my tiresome questions. You have set my 
 mind quite at ease. Your garden is perfect 
 even more beautiful than my son had led me 
 to expect. And the view of Florence ! You 
 have children of your own ? Ah, daugh 
 ters. No, boys ? Ah, but you are young. 
 The proper thing for him to do, of course, as 
 
 126 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 she is without parents, would be to address 
 himself to your good brother ? " 
 
 " As it is not my brother whom he wishes 
 to marry," said Lucilla, " I should think the 
 proper thing might be for him to address the 
 young lady herself." 
 
 The Duchess laughed. " Ah, you English 
 are so unconventional," she said. 
 
 But after the Duchess had left them, and 
 Lucilla had reported her cross-examination, 
 " You see," said Ponty, with an odd effect of 
 discontent in the circumstance, " it is as I 
 told you the deal is practically done. Now 
 that mamma has taken up your character, and 
 found it satisfactory, it only remains for for 
 Mr. Speaker to put the question. Well," his 
 voice sounded curiously joyless, " I wish you 
 
 joy-" 
 
 " Thank you," said Ruth, who did not look 
 especially joyful. 
 
 There was a silence for a few minutes ; then 
 Ponty got up and strolled off into the garden ; 
 whither, in a few minutes more, Lucilla 
 followed him. 
 
 " What s the matter, Harry ? " she asked. 
 " You seem a bit hipped." 
 
 He gave her a rather forced smile. " I feel 
 127 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 silly and grown old," he said. " Suppose it s 
 all a ghastly mistake ? " 
 
 " A mistake ? " Lucilla faltered. 
 
 " Oh," he broke out, with a kind of gloomy 
 petulance, " it was all very well so long as it 
 hung fire. One joked about it, chaffed her 
 about it. Deep down in one s inside one 
 didn t believe it would ever really come to 
 anything. But now ? Marriage, you see, when 
 you examine the bare bones of it, is a damn 
 ably serious business. After all, it involves 
 sanctities. Suppose she doesn t care for 
 him ? " 
 
 Lucilla looked bewildered. " Dear me," she 
 said. " The other day you assured me that 
 she^did." 
 
 " Perhaps she does but suppose she doesn t? 
 I was talking in the air. Down deep one 
 didn t believe. But this official visit from 
 Mamma ! We re suddenly at grip with an 
 actuality. If she doesn t care for him by 
 Jove," he nodded portentously, " you and I 
 will have something to answer for. It s a 
 threadbare observation, but all at once it 
 glitters with pristine truth, that a woman who 
 marries a man without loving him sells her 
 soul to the devil." 
 
 128 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " If she doesn t love him, she won t accept 
 him. Why should she ? " said Lucilla. 
 
 " And the worst of selling your soul to the 
 devil," Pontycroft went morosely on, " is 
 that the sly old beggar gives you nothing for 
 it. Legends like Faust, where he gives beauty, 
 youth, wealth, unlimited command of the 
 pleasures of the world and the flesh, are based 
 upon entire misinformation as to his real way 
 of doing business. Look here ; the devil has 
 been acquiring souls continuously for the 
 past five thousand years. Practice has made 
 him a perfect dab at the process and he was 
 born a perfect Jew. You may be sure he doesn t 
 go about paying the first price asked not he. 
 He bides his time. He waits till he catches 
 you in a scrape, or desperately hard up, or 
 drunk, or out of your proper cool wits with 
 anger, pride, lust, whichever of the seven 
 deadly impulses you will, and then he grinds 
 you like a money-lender, or chouses you like 
 a sharper at a fair. Silver or gold gives he 
 none, at most a handful of gilded farthings. 
 And I know one man to whom he gave well, 
 guess. Nothing better than a headache the 
 next morning. Oh, trust the devil. He knows 
 his trade." 
 
 K 129 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Goodness gracious ! " said Lucilla, and eyed 
 her brother with perplexity. The wrinkles 
 of his brow were black and deep. " You 
 are in a state of mind. What has happened 
 to you ? Don t be a bird of evil omen. 
 There s no question here of souls or devils 
 it s just a question of a very suitable match 
 between young people who are fond of each 
 other. Come ! Don t be a croaker. I never 
 knew you to croak like this before." 
 
 " Hang it all," answered Ponty, " I never 
 had occasion. She s refused every one. Why 
 does she suddenly make up her mind to accept 
 this one ? Well, I only hope it isn t because 
 she thinks at last she has got her money s 
 worth of titular dignity. Her Serene Highness 
 the Princess ! " 
 
 " Goodness gracious ! " said Lucilla. " I 
 don t understand you. Would you wish her 
 to go on refusing people until she died an old 
 maid ? " 
 
 " I ll tell you one thing, anyhow but under 
 the rose," said Ponty. 
 
 " Yes ? " said Lucilla, with curiosity. 
 
 " I ll bet you nine and elevenpence three- 
 farthings that I can beat you at a game of 
 
 tennis." 
 
 130 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Oh," said Lucilla, dashed. But after a 
 moment, cheerfully, " Done," she assented. 
 " I don t want to win your money but any 
 thing to restore you to your normal self." 
 
 They set off for the tennis court. 
 
 IV 
 
 And then, all at once, out of the blue came 
 that revolution which, for nine days more or 
 less, made obscure little Altronde the centre 
 of the world s attention. 
 
 It happened, as will be remembered, when 
 the Grand Duke was at luncheon, entertaining 
 the officers of his guard ; and it must have 
 been a highly amusing scene. Towards the 
 end of the refection, Colonel Benedetti, con 
 trary to all usage and etiquette, rose and said, 
 " Gentlemen, I give you the Grand Duke." 
 Whereupon twenty gallant uniforms sprang to 
 their feet crying, " The Grand Duke ! the 
 Grand Duke ! " with hands extended towards 
 that monarch. Only each hand held, instead 
 of a charged bumper of champagne, a charged 
 revolver. 
 
 Massimiliano, according to his genial daily 
 custom, was already comfortably intoxicated, 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 but at this he fell abruptly sober. White, with 
 chattering teeth, " What do you mean ? 
 What do you want ? " he asked. 
 
 Colonel Benedetti succinctly explained, while 
 the twenty revolvers continued to cover his 
 listener. " Speaking for the army and people 
 of Altronde, I beg to inform Your Highness 
 that we are tired of you tired of your rule 
 and tired of your extravagant and disgusting 
 habits. I hold in my hand an Act of Abdica 
 tion, which Your Highness will be good enough 
 to sign." He thrust an elaborately engrossed 
 parchment under the Duke s nose, and offered 
 him a fountain pen. 
 
 " This is treason," said Massimiliano. " It 
 is also," was his happy anti-climax, " a gross 
 abuse of hospitality." 
 
 " Sign sign ! " sang one-and-twenty martial 
 voices. 
 
 " But I should read the document first. 
 Do I abdicate in favour of my son ? 
 
 " Your Highness has no legitimate son," 
 Benedetti politely reminded him, " and Al 
 tronde has no throne for a bastard. You ab 
 dicate in favour of Civillo Bertrandoni, Duke 
 of Oltramare, already our sovereign in the 
 rightful line." 
 
 132 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Massimiliano plucked up a little spirit. 
 " Bertrandoni the hereditary enemy of my 
 house ? That I will never do. You may 
 shoot me if you will." 
 
 " It is not so much a question of shooting," 
 said the urbane Colonel. " We cover Your 
 Highness with our firearms merely to ensure 
 his august attention. It is a question of per 
 petual imprisonment in a fortress and de 
 privation of alcoholic stimulants." 
 
 Massimiliano s jaw dropped. 
 
 "Whereas," the Colonel added, "in the 
 event of peaceful abdication, Your Highness 
 receives a pension of one hundred thousand 
 francs, and can reside anywhere he likes out 
 side the Italian peninsula in Paris, for ex 
 ample, where alcohol in many agreeable forms 
 is plentiful and cheap." 
 
 " Sign sign ! " sang twenty voices, with a 
 lilt of gathering impatience. 
 
 Of course poor Massimiliano signed, Civillo 
 forthwith was proclaimed from the palace 
 steps, and at five o clock that afternoon, amid 
 much popular rejoicing, he entered his capital. 
 He had happened, providentially, to be so 
 journing incognito in the nearest frontier town. 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 When next morning the news reached Villa 
 Santa Cecilia, by the medium of a dispatch 
 in the Fieramosca, we may believe it caused 
 excitement. 
 
 " But it can t be true," said Lucilla. " Only 
 two days ago the Duchess assured me in all 
 good faith, I m certain that her husband had 
 no more chance of regaining his throne than 
 he had of growing wings, and Bertram himself 
 has always scoffed at the idea." 
 
 " Yes," said Ponty. " But perhaps Bertram 
 and his mother were not entirely in the Pre 
 tender s confidence. This story, for a fake, 
 is surprisingly apropos of nothing, and sur 
 prisingly circumstantial. No, I m afraid it s 
 
 true." 
 
 He reread the dispatch, frowning, seeking 
 discrepancies. 
 
 " Oh, it s manifestly true," was his conclu 
 sion. " I suppose I ought to go down to the 
 Lung Arno, and offer Bertram our congratu 
 lations. And as for you " he bowed to Ruth, 
 " pray accept the expression of our respect 
 ful homage. Here, instead of an empty title, 
 
 134 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 is the reversion of a real grand-ducal crown. 
 And you a mere little American ! What 
 trifling results from mighty causes flow. A 
 People rise in Revolution that a mere little 
 American girl may adorn her brown-red hair 
 with a grand-ducal crown." 
 
 " The People don t appear to have had any 
 voice in the matter," said Lucilla, poring over 
 the paper. " It was just a handful of officers. 
 It was what they call a Palace Revolution." 
 
 " It was what the judicious call a Comic 
 Opera Revolution," said Ponty. " It was a 
 Palace version of Box and Cox." 
 
 He went down to the Lung Arno, and 
 found Bertram, pale, agitated, in the midst of 
 packing. 
 
 " Oh, for Heaven s sake, don t talk of con 
 gratulations," the troubled young man cried, 
 walking up and down the floor, and all but 
 wringing his hands, while his servant went 
 methodically on folding trousers and waistcoats. 
 " This may be altogether the worst thing that 
 could possibly have happened, so far as I m 
 concerned." 
 
 " I see you re packing," Pontycroft re 
 marked. 
 
 Yes we ve had a telegram from my 
 135 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 father ordering us to join him at once. We 
 leave at twelve o clock by a special train. My 
 dear chap, I m sick. I m in a cold perspira 
 tion. Feel my hands." His hands were in 
 deed cold and wet. He pressed one of them 
 to his side. " And there s something here that 
 weighs like a ton of ice. I can hardly breathe." 
 
 " The remedy indicated," said Ponty, " is 
 a brandy-and-soda." 
 
 Bertram s gesture pushed the remedy from 
 him. 
 
 " A single spoonful would make me drunk," 
 he said. " I m as nearly as possible off my 
 head already. I feel as if I were going out to 
 be hanged. If it weren t for my mother 
 some one s got to go with her upon my word, 
 I d funk it, and take the consequences." 
 
 " Allans done" Ponty remonstrated. kk A 
 certain emotion is what you must expect 
 it s part of the game. But think of your luck. 
 Think of your grandeurs. Think of the ex 
 perience, the adventure, that s before you. To 
 be a real, actual, practising Royalty, a Royal 
 Heir Apparent. Think of the new angle of 
 view from which you ll be able to look at life." 
 
 " Luck ? Don t speak of it," Bertram 
 groaned. " If I had known, if I had dreamed. 
 
 136 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 But we were kept in the dark absolutely. Oh, 
 it was outrageous of the old man. We had a 
 right at least to be warned, hadn t we ? Since 
 it involves our entire destinies ? Since every 
 one of our hopes, plans, intentions, great or 
 small, is affected by it ? We had a right to be 
 warned, if not to be consulted. But never a 
 word until this morning first the newspaper 
 and then his wire. Think of my mother 
 being left to learn the thing from a news 
 paper. And then his wire : Come at once to 
 Altronde. I feel like a conscript. I feel like 
 a man suddenly summoned from freedom to 
 slavery." 
 
 " You ll find your chains bearable you ll 
 find them interesting," Ponty said. " You 
 leave at noon by a special train. Is there any 
 way, meanwhile, in which I can be useful to 
 you ? " 
 
 " Yes no no. Unless you can devise some 
 way to get me out of the mess. The special 
 train is for my mother. In her own fashion 
 she s as much upset as I am. She could not 
 travel coram publico, poor lady." 
 
 " No, of course not. I hope you will make 
 her my compliments," said Ponty, rising. 
 
 " Thank you. And you will say good-bye 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to Lady Dor for us and and to Miss Adgate," 
 Bertram responded. But there was a catch in 
 his voice, and he grew perceptibly paler. " I 
 I," he stumbled, hesitated, " I will write to 
 you as soon as I know where I am." 
 
 Ponty went home thoughtful ; thoughtful, 
 but conscious of an elusive inward satisfaction. 
 This rather puzzled him. " It s the sort of 
 thing one feels when one has succeeded in 
 evading an unpleasant duty a sentiment of 
 snugness, safety, safety and relief. But what 
 unpleasant duty have I succeeded in evading ?" 
 he asked himself. Yet there it was the com 
 fortable sense of a duty shirked. 
 
 " I m in doubt whether to hail you as the 
 Queen Elect of Yvetot, or to offer you my 
 condolences upon the queering of your pitch," 
 he said to Ruth. " He loved and rode away. 
 He certainly loved, and he s as certainly riding 
 away at twelve o clock to-day, by a special 
 train. I supposed he would charge me with 
 a message for you but no none except a 
 commonplace good-bye. No promise, nothing 
 compromising, nothing that could be used as 
 evidence against him. However, he said he d 
 write as soon as he knew whether he was 
 standing on his head or on his heels. One 
 
 138 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 thing, though, you might do there s still 
 time. You might go to the railway station 
 and cover his flight with mute reproaches. 
 Perhaps the sight of your distraught young 
 face would touch his conscience. You might 
 get the necessary word from him before the 
 train started." 
 
 "Be quiet, Harry," said Lucilla. "You 
 shan t chaff her any longer. Prince Bertrandoni 
 is a man of honour and he s as good as pledged 
 to her already. This is a merely momentary 
 interruption. As soon as he s adjusted his 
 affairs to the new conditions, he ll come back." 
 
 " Ay, we know these comings back," an 
 swered Ponty, ominously. " But a wise fisher 
 man lands his fish while it s on the hook, and 
 doesn t give it a chance of swimming away and 
 coming back. I see a pale face at the window, 
 watching, waiting ; and I hear a sad voice 
 murmuring, He cometh not. 
 
 " You re intolerable," Lucilla cried out, 
 with an impatient gesture. " Ruth, don t pay 
 him the least attention." 
 
 " Oh, don t mind me," said Ruth. " I m 
 vastly amused. Faithful are the wounds of a 
 friend." 
 
 " There s just one element of hope," Ponty 
 139 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ended, " and that is that even to demi-semi 
 Royalty a matter of thirty thousand a year 
 must be a consideration." 
 
 A column from Altronde in the Fieramosca 
 of the morrow gave a glowing description of 
 Bertram s and his mother s arrival, which 
 Pontycroft translated at the breakfast table : 
 how the Grand Duke, in the uniform of a 
 general, met and tenderly embraced them as 
 they stepped from the train, and drove with 
 them in a " lando di gala " through streets 
 brilliant with flags and thronged by cheering 
 subjects, to the Palace, escorted by the self 
 same regiment of guards whose officers the 
 other day had so summarily cooked the goose 
 of Massimiliano. ".That is pretty and touch 
 ing," was Ponty s comment, " but listen to 
 this this is rich. The Grand Duke intro 
 duced them to his people, in a proclamation, 
 as my most dear and ever dutiful son, and my 
 beloved consort, the companion and consoler 
 of my long exile ! What so false as truth is ? 
 Well, there s nothing either true or false but 
 thinking makes it so. And the mayor and 
 corporation, in a loyal address, welcomed 
 Bertram as the * heir to the virtues as well as 
 to the throne of his august progenitor. His 
 
 140 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 august progenitor s virtues were jewels which, 
 during his career in Paris, at any rate, he 
 modestly concealed. However ! Oh, but here 
 here s something that really is interesting. 
 The festivities of the evening were termin 
 ated by a banquet, at which the Grand Duke 
 graciously made a speech. Listen to one of 
 the things he said : It has been represented 
 to me as the earnest aspiration of my people 
 that my solemn coronation should be cele 
 brated at the earliest possible date. But un 
 happily, the crown of my fathers has been 
 sullied by contact with the brows of a usurping 
 dynasty. That crown I will never wear. A 
 new, a virgin crown must be placed upon the 
 head of your restored legitimate sovereign. 
 And I herewith commission my dear son, whom 
 Heaven has endowed, among many noble gifts, 
 with the eye and the hand of an artist, to design 
 a crown which shall be worthy of his sire, him 
 self, and his posterity. Well, that will keep 
 Bertram out of mischief. I see him from here 
 see and hear him bending over his drawing- 
 board, with busy pencil, and whistling The 
 girl I left behind me. " 
 
 And then a servant entered bearing a tele 
 gram. 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " What will you give me," Ponty asked, 
 when he had opened and glanced at it, " if 
 I ll read this out ? " 
 
 " Whom s it from ? " asked LuciUa. 
 
 " The last person on earth that you d 
 expect," he answered. " Come, what will 
 you give ? " 
 
 " I believe it s from Prince Bertrandoni 
 himself," cried Lucilla, agog. " If it is, we ll 
 give you fits if you dorft read it out and at 
 once." She showed him her clenched fist. 
 
 " Very good. Under that threat, I ll read 
 it," remarked Ponty, and he read : " Arrived 
 safely, but homesick for dear Villa Santa 
 Cecilia. My mother joins her thanks to mine 
 for your constant kindness. Will write as 
 soon as an hour of tranquillity permits. Please 
 give my affectionate greetings to Lady Dor 
 and Miss Adgate, and beg them not to 
 forget their and your devoted Bertram." 
 
 " There ! " crowed Lucilla. " What did I 
 tell you ? " 
 
 Ponty looked up blankly. " What did you 
 tell me ? " 
 
 " That he would come back that this was 
 only a momentary interruption." 
 
 " Does he say anything about coming 
 142 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 back ? " Ponty asked, scrutinizing the straw- 
 coloured paper. " That must have missed my 
 eye." 
 
 " Boo," said Lucilla. " What does he mean 
 by the hope of an early reunion ? " 
 
 " A slip of the pen for blessed resurrection, 
 I expect," said Ponty. 
 
 " Boo," said Lucilla. " It s the message of 
 a man obviously, desperately, in love yearning 
 to communicate with his loved one but to 
 save appearances, or from lover-like timidity 
 perhaps, addressing his communication to a 
 third person. That telegram is meant ex 
 clusively for Ruth, and you re merely used as a 
 gooseberry. Oh, Ruth, I do congratulate you." 
 
 Ruth vaguely laughed. 
 
 143 
 
PART FOURTH 
 
quite a week wasn t it ? obscure 
 little Altronde held the centre of the 
 stage. The newspapers of France and Eng 
 land, as well as those of Italy, had daily para 
 graphs. Belated details, coming in like strag 
 glers after a battle, gave vividness to the story. 
 Massimiliano, at Paris, plaintively indignant, 
 overflowed in interviews. In interviews also, 
 in speeches, in proclamations, Civillo adum 
 brated, magniloquently, vaguely, his future 
 policy. There were " Character Sketches," re 
 miniscent, anecdotal, of Civillo, " By a life 
 long Friend," of Massimiliano, " By a Former 
 Member of his Household," etc. etc. There 
 were even character sketches of poor Bertram, 
 " By an Old Harrovian," " By One who knew 
 him at Cambridge," which I hope he enjoyed 
 reading. In the illustrated papers, of course, 
 there were portraits. And in some of the 
 weightier periodicals the past history of Al 
 tronde was recalled, a bleak, monotonous history, 
 little more than a catalogue of murders. . . . 
 
 147 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 With dagger thrusts and cups of poison, for 
 something like three long sad hundred years, 
 the rival houses of Bertrandoni and Ceresini 
 had played the game of give and take. Finally, 
 there were leading articles condemning the 
 revolution as an act of brigandage, hailing it 
 as a forward step towards liberty and light. 
 And then, at the week s end, the theme was 
 dropped. 
 
 We may believe that the newspapers were 
 read with interest at Villa Santa Cecilia, and 
 that to the mistress of that household, on the 
 subject of Altronde, they never seemed to 
 contain enough. 
 
 " It s almost as if we d had a hand in the 
 affair," she reflected ; " but these scrappy 
 newspaper accounts leave us with no more 
 knowledge than as if we were complete out 
 siders. Why don t they give more particulars ? 
 Why aren t they more intime ? " 
 
 " I ll tell you what," said Ponty, " let s go 
 there. It s only half a day s journey. There 
 we can study the question on the spot." 
 
 " Yes, and look as if we were running after 
 him. No, thank you," sniffed Lucilla. 
 
 " I dare say we should look a little like 
 accusing spirits, if he saw us," Ponty admitted. 
 
 148 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " But let s go in disguise. We can shave our 
 heads, stain our skins, wear elastic-sided boots 
 and pass ourselves off as an Albanian currant 
 merchant and his family travelling to improve 
 our minds in foreign politics." 
 
 " I see Ruth and myself," Lucilla yawned, 
 " swathed in embroideries and wearing elastic- 
 sided boots, and presently we should be 
 arrested as spies, and when our innocent 
 curiosity had been well aired by the press, we 
 should look to Bertram Bertrandoni more like 
 accusing spirits than ever." 
 
 " You women," growled Pontycroft, ex 
 tracting a cigarette from his cigarette case, 
 " are so relentlessly cautious ! You have no 
 faith in the unexpected ! That s why you ll 
 never know the supreme content of throwing 
 your bonnets over the mills, regardless of 
 consequences." 
 
 " The Consequences ! " Lucilla retorted, 
 " they re too obvious. We should be left 
 bareheaded, et voila tout!" 
 
 " Ah, well there you are," replied Ponty, 
 and touched a match to his cigarette. 
 
 Yes, we may believe that the newspapers 
 were read with interest at the Villa Santa 
 Cecilia and that they gave the man there 
 149 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 occasion for what his sister called " a pro 
 digious deal of jawing." 
 
 " Well, my poor Ariadne," he commiserated, 
 " ginger is still hot in the mouth, and Naxos 
 is still a comfortable place of sojourn. Our 
 star has been snatched from us and borne 
 aloft to its high orbit in the heavens ; we from 
 our lowly coigne of earth can watch and 
 unselfishly rejoice at its high destiny. Of 
 course, the one thing to regret is that you 
 didn t nail him when you had him. Nail the 
 wild star to its track in the half climbed 
 Zodiac," he advised, sententious. 
 
 And in spirit ripe for mischief, Ponty be 
 thought him of a long-forgotten poem, and 
 he went all the way down to Vieusseux to 
 procure a volume of the works of Words 
 worth. Henceforth, dreamily, from time to 
 time, he would fall to repeating favourite lines. 
 For nearly a day Ruth bore, with equanimity 
 tempered by repartee, a volley of verse : 
 
 " He was a lovely youth, I guess " 
 said Ponty, 
 
 " The panther in the wilderness 
 Was not so fair as he." 
 
 " I cannot dispute it. He was good-looking," 
 Ruth suavely returned. 
 
 150 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " But," this he let fall from the terrace an 
 hour later, to Ruth engaged below in snipping 
 dead leaves from Lucilla s clambering rose 
 bushes, 
 
 " But, when his father called, the youth 
 Deserted his poor bride, and Ruth 
 Could never find him more." 
 
 " Fathers make, like mothers, I imagine, a 
 poor substitute for brides," said Ruth. She 
 glanced at him with amusement. " Never, my 
 nurse used to tell me, is a good while. Did 
 that foolish youth find his bride ? " she added, 
 absorbed apparently in her occupation, " when 
 he came back to claim her ? As he did at 
 last, you may rest assured." 
 
 Pontycroft made no reply to this question, 
 but he placed his book on the table and pre 
 pared to descend the steps : 
 
 God help thee, Ruth," 
 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 " Such pains she had 
 That she in half a year went mad." 
 
 " I m sure she would have gone mad in 
 twenty-four hours if you had been by to 
 persecute the poor thing," answered Ruth. 
 She beat a hasty retreat towards the Pergola, 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 whither, she knew, Ponty s laziness would check 
 pursuit of her. 
 
 " When Ruth was left half desolate," Ponty, 
 casually, after luncheon, observed 
 
 " Her lover took another state. 
 And Ruth not thirty years old." 
 
 " Ruth, it seems to me, was old enough to 
 have known better," retorted his victim with 
 asperity. " You haven t scanned that last line 
 properly either. And Ruth not thirty years 
 old gives the correct lilt." Ruth sat down 
 to write her letters. She turned her back 
 with deliberation upon her tormentor, who 
 answered : " Oh, yes, thanks," and went off 
 murmuring and tattooing on his fingers, 
 
 " And Ruth not thirty years old. . . ." 
 
 ii 
 
 Towards five o clock of that day, Lucilla 
 and Ruth, spurred and booted hatted and 
 gloved from their afternoon s drive, appeared 
 for tea upon the terrace. Ponty without loss 
 of time opened fire : 
 
 " A slighted child, at her own will, 
 Went wandering over dale and hill 
 In thoughtless freedom bold/ 
 152 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Only that I can t wander, in thoughtless 
 freedom bold, over dale and hill in this fair false 
 landj of Italy," cried Ruth, exasperated, " I 
 should start at once for a fortnight s walking 
 tour. I feel an excessive desire to remove myself 
 from a deluge of poetic allusions which threatens 
 to get on my nerves. Moreover," she added 
 severely, " I quite fail to see their application." 
 
 She sat down, drew her gloves off with a 
 little militant air, and prepared to pour the tea 
 which the servant had placed upon a table at 
 her elbow. In the fine October weather the 
 terrace, provided with abundance of tables, 
 chairs and rugs, made, with its superb view 
 over Florence, the pleasantest of al fresco ex 
 tensions to the drawing-room. 
 
 "There, there, there, Ruthie ! " soothed 
 Pontycroft, " don t resent a little natural av 
 uncular chaff. / must play the fool or play the 
 devil. You wouldn t wish to suppress my 
 devouring curiosity, would you ? Here s a 
 situation brimful of captivating possibilities. 
 You wouldn t have me sit in unremunerative 
 silence, in sterile torpor before this case of a 
 little American girl, who, on any day of the 
 week, may be called to assume the exalted 
 role of Crown Princess of Altronde ? : 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Yes," frowned Ruth, " I should very much 
 like to suppress your devouring curiosity; I 
 should like extremely to reduce you to a state 
 of unremunerative silence, torpor, on that 
 verily sterile topic. And, moreover, so far as 
 I can see, the Royal Incident may now be 
 billeted closed, for weal or for woe." 
 
 " One can never be quite sure about these 
 Royal Incidents," her tormentor persisted, 
 " that s the lark about em they re never 
 closed. For sheer pig-headed obstinacy give 
 me a Crown Prince. Our friend Bertram is 
 capable of letting his Queen Mamma in for 
 a deal of trouble in view of present circum 
 stances, if she should, as she s likely to do 
 want now to marry him off to some Semi- 
 Royalty or German Grand Duchess or an 
 other." 
 
 " Si pub" riposted Ruth with hauteur, 
 " I withdraw myself in advance from the 
 competition. And I should like, please, to 
 be spared any more allusions to the sub- 
 ject." 
 
 But here Lucilla, who had been sipping her 
 tea and worshipping the view, interrupted 
 them : 
 
 " Do please cease from wrangling," she im- 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 plored. "Hold your breaths both of you 
 and behold!" 
 
 A haze all golden, an impalpable dust of 
 gold, filled the entire watch-tower of the 
 Heavens. Florence, twice glorified, lay bathed 
 in yellow light that filtered benignantly upon 
 roofs and gardens, played, glanced, upon 
 Duomo, Campanile, and Baptistry. The Arno 
 had become a way of gold. Webs of yellow 
 gauze, spun across the streets and reflected by 
 a thousand windows, made, among the many 
 gardens, a burnished background for the twigs 
 and branches of dark aspiring cypresses, glossy 
 leaved ilexes. 
 
 Ruth and Pontycroft held their breaths, 
 and, for a moment, there was a silence. 
 
 " I wonder," Lucilla said at length, she 
 gave a little soft sigh of satisfaction, " I won 
 der what Prince Bertrandoni has done with 
 Balzatore. . . . Taken him, do you suppose, 
 to reign over the dogs of Altronde ? I miss 
 that dog sadly." 
 
 " Balzatore ? Oh," said Ponty, " Balzatore 
 is throning it at the Palazzo Reale. . . . He 
 has a special attendant who waits on him, 
 sees to his bodily comforts ; prepares his food, 
 takes him for his walks, for of course Bert- 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ram is far too involved in Court functions, 
 too tied by etiquette and the fear of Anar 
 chists to go for long solitary rambles ; and 
 Balzatore bullies the servants, one and all, 
 you may be sure. Dogs, even the best of 
 em, are shocking snobs. In a measure Bal 
 zatore is enjoying himself. It hardly requires 
 a pen orth of imagination to be positive of 
 it. And," Pontycroft continued, " I hear that 
 the Palazzo Bertrandoni has been leased for 
 a number of years to an American painter. 
 By the way, it seems that Bertram s book 
 cases, which, saving your presences, I grieve 
 to state, were filled with very light literature 
 the writings of decadent poets, people who 
 begin with a cynicism " Pontycroft paused, 
 hesitated for the just word. 
 
 " A cynicism with which nobody ends ! " 
 Ruth interjected. 
 
 " Invaluable young thing ! Thanks awfully. 
 Who begin, as you say, with a cynicism with 
 which nobody ends, as you quite aptly infer. 
 Filled, too, I regret to state, with rare editions, a 
 trifle, well perhaps a bit eighteenth century 
 and with yellow paper-covered French novels. 
 These bookcases are expiating a life of frivolity 
 within the four walls of a Convent. They 
 
 156 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 were offered by Bertram s mother to some 
 Sisters of Charity whose temporal welfare she 
 looks after. The good nuns were glad to have 
 the shelves for their poor schools and have 
 packed them with edifying books. ... So it 
 happens that to-day they ornament both sides 
 of the Convent-Parloir, and thus it is that Bert 
 ram s bookshelves are atoning for the gay, wild, 
 extravagant, old days within convent walls." 
 
 Lucilla tittered. " Shall our end be as 
 exemplary ? " Ruth asked, pensive, " or will 
 it fade away into chill and nothingness like 
 the glory of this," she smiled at Ponty- 
 
 croft, " April afternoon ? B-r-r-r " She 
 
 gave a little shiver. 
 
 Pontycroft pulled himself to his feet. 
 
 "Tut, tut!" said he. He proffered two 
 white garments which lay over the back of a 
 chair to Ruth and to his sister. " What are 
 these melancholy sentiments ? Aren t you 
 contented ? Aren t you satisfied, aren t you 
 pleased here ? " he asked, and he eyed Ruth 
 inquisitorially. 
 
 " Oh yes, oh yes, I am," Ruth quickly 
 assured him. " But I do get, now and then, 
 tiresome conscientious scruples. In these 
 halcyon hours I wonder if it isn t my duty 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to go and have a look at my dear old uncle, 
 all alone there, in America." 
 
 " Ruth my dear Ruth ! " cried Lucilla. 
 " Why doesn t your dear old uncle come 
 and have a look at you ? I think it s his duty 
 to do so ; I ve thought so for many a day." 
 
 " Oh, he s bound to his fireside, I suppose," 
 Ruth answered, a touch of melancholy in her 
 voice. " He s wedded to his chimney corner, 
 his books. At seventy-two it s a bore, perhaps, 
 to go wandering into foreign parts." 
 
 " Foreign parts ! " Lucilla cried with some 
 scorn. " Are we Ogres ? Barbarians ? Do 
 we live in the Wilds of America ? " 
 
 " My dear infant, beware," cautioned Ponty- 
 croft, " beware of the rudiments in your 
 nature of that terrible New England instru 
 ment of torture, the Nonconformist Con 
 science. Despite your Catholic upbringing it 
 will, if you indulge it, I fear, lead you to 
 your ruin. The Nonconformist conscience, I 
 beg you to believe, makes cowards of us all. 
 Now I should suggest a much better plan, 
 and one I have always approved of. Let s 
 pack up our duds, as the saying goes, in your 
 country; let s return to sane and merry 
 England ; let us for the future and since the 
 158 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 pinch of Winter is at our heels, Summer in 
 the South and Winter in the North." 
 
 " England ? " gasped Lucilla and Ruth in 
 one breath. 
 
 " Why not ? " enquired the man of the 
 family. " You are, after all, never so com 
 fortable anywhere, in Winter, as in an English 
 Country House. Roaring fires, invisible hot- 
 water pipes ; cozy dark days, libraries full of 
 books, Mudie by post two hours away. Was 
 sailing and Christmas waits ; holly and mistle 
 toe, hey for an English winter, sing I ! Plum 
 pudding, mince pies, tenants to tip, neigh 
 bours, hospitalities." 
 
 " Ugh," Lucilla wailed, " Perish the awful 
 thought ! Neighbours calling in sensible, 
 slightly muddy boots (as your favourite author 
 too truthfully has it), in tweeds and short 
 skirts ; and for conversation Heaven defend 
 us ! The turnip crops, the Pytchley, penny 
 readings, and the latest gossip anent a next- 
 door neighbour. Night all the day night 
 again at night and whisky - and - soda at 
 eleven, day or night, eternally variegated by 
 that boring, semper - eternal Bridge. You ll 
 have to go without me," declared Lucilla 
 flatly. 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Have you generally Wintered in the North, 
 Summered in the South ? " Ruth queried with 
 a gleam. 
 
 " No No," replied Pontycroft reflec 
 tively, " no, but if one hasn t really tried 
 it since one s callow days the idea does 
 speak to one. It isn t all beautiful prattle," 
 he assured her, " but the idea does appeal 
 to one. As one grows old one prefers to be 
 comfortable. A pabulum of beauty is al 
 very well for young things like yourself here 
 and Lucilla who still hug the precious foolish 
 delusion that Beauty is Truth, Truth Beauty." 
 
 Pontycroft s indolent glance encompassed 
 Florence, that fair spectacle she presents, in 
 the aura of twilight, the exquisite hour, 
 Vheure exquise. Her amphitheatre of hills, 
 her white villas, even now charged with rose 
 by the evening glow, aglow her churches, 
 her gardens and black cypresses. " Yet this 
 is all too like," he commented, "the en 
 chanter s dream, at a puff ! . . . No ! Fact, 
 Fact, solid Fact is the desideratum ! Fact s 
 your miracle in a nutshell. What you and 
 Lucilla call Truth alters with every fresh dis 
 covery of man, his climate, education, point 
 of view. Man carries your Beauty in his 
 
 160 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 eye, ears, senses. But Fact, humanly speak 
 ing, Fact doesn t give you the least trouble. 
 There it is. Did it never occur to you 
 how splendidly reposeful a fact it is that 
 a turnip field s a turnip field, until you sow 
 beans to rejuvenate it ? And here s another, 
 equally comforting : The spider spins its web 
 from its own vitals. Ah, Facts spare one 
 such a deal of thinking, such a lot of en 
 thusiasm ! ... In your country, my dear 
 young thing," Pontycroft turned to Ruth, " in 
 your strange, weird, singular, incomprehen 
 sible country they sow buckwheat cakes when 
 the turf on the lawn s been killed by frosts ; 
 and when the buckwheat cakes have grown, 
 and blossomed they plough them back into 
 the earth, and sow their grass and in a month 
 you have your velvet robe again. In similar 
 manner the fact that a cozy English Winter s 
 a cozy English Winter is one agreeably worthy 
 your attention." 
 
 " This flummery of rose bushes," went on 
 Pontycroft, while his arm described a semi 
 circle, " this romance of nodding trees laden 
 with oranges ornamental to the landscape ; this 
 volubility -of heliotrope, mimosa, violets in 
 January, all, all in a conspiracy to lure one 
 
 M 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to sit out o doors and catch an internal, in 
 fernal chill," he sneezed ; " all this taken to 
 gether is not worth that one fine solid in 
 disputable British Fact, a comfortable English 
 Winter ! Uncompromising cold without, cheer 
 within." 
 
 " But it s not Winter yet," Lucilla argued 
 plaintively, " it s only October. Hadn t you 
 better apply the fact of an overcoat to what 
 you ve been telling us ? You ve plunged me 
 into anything but a state of cheer with your 
 sophistries this absurd juggling with the dole 
 ful joys of an English Winter ! " 
 
 "Apropos of the joys of an English Winter, 
 I wonder whether the post has come ? " said 
 Ruth, jumping up. " Pietro s delicacy about 
 disturbing us at tea Lucilla won t call mere 
 laziness. I ll send him for your overcoat," 
 she added, with a laughing nod, and vanished 
 through the French windows. 
 
 in 
 
 " Ah, you see ! " 
 
 Pontycroft after Ruth s departure ponder- 
 ated thus on the tone of significance, to his 
 sister. " Ah, ha ! You see. . . . She s eager 
 
 162 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 for news. She s expecting something. . . . 
 She s on the watch for every post." 
 
 " You re quite off the scent, Harry/ re 
 turned his sister languidly. Lucilla, it was 
 plain, was still disturbed by her brother s 
 chaff. 
 
 " It s her uncle s semi-annual missive she s 
 so eagerly on the lookout for. The child 
 nourishes a perfect hero-worship for the old 
 man ; she writes to him six times to his one. 
 His letters come with military precision, once 
 in a six month. They re invariably brief, and 
 they invariably wind up with this hospitable 
 apophthegm, Remember the string s on the 
 latchet of the door whenever you choose to 
 pull it. Whenever you care to look upon 
 your home in Oldbridge you will find a hearty 
 welcome from your affectionate uncle, then 
 a sabre thrust, his name, presumably." 
 
 Lucilla rose, with that languid grace she 
 was so famous for. She went to the edge of 
 the terrace and leaned upon the balustrade, 
 where she remained, silently taking in her fill 
 of the peaceful landscape. 
 
 163 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 IV 
 
 Ten minutes elapsed. 
 
 Pontycroft, in silence, smoked and wafted 
 the rings of his cigarette towards Florence. 
 And then Ruth reappeared. 
 
 She looked pale in the dusk, agitated. In 
 her hands were a couple of letters, she held 
 out one to Lucilla. 
 
 "Read it," her voice trembled, " Tell 
 me what I have done to be so insulted," she 
 commanded ; and then she turned away her 
 face, and suddenly she began to weep. Ponty 
 croft watched her in consternation. He had 
 never, in all the years he had known her, he 
 had never seen Ruth in tears. 
 
 Lucilla took the letter, blazoned with a gold 
 crown. She read down the page, she turned 
 over to the next, she read on to the end. 
 
 " May I see it ? May I see it, Ruth ? " 
 Pontycroft asked gently. 
 
 Ruth bowed her head. As Pontycroft read 
 she looked at him, her hands lying idly in her 
 lap; and she saw his face cloud as he read. 
 But he, having finished the communication, 
 fell silent for a moment. 
 
 164 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Poor Bertram ! " he let fall at last, drop 
 ping the letter upon the table. 
 
 " Poor Bertram ! " cried Ruth. She dabbed 
 her eyes, she made an immense, unsuccessful 
 effort to control herself, quell the ire in her 
 heart. 
 
 " Poor Bertram ! " she broke forth scorn 
 fully. " What have I done, what can I have 
 done, to be subjected to such an indignity ? 
 Did I lead him on ? If I had encouraged 
 him ! Lucilla, speak, speak the truth. You 
 both know I did nothing of the sort ! " And 
 Ruth stamped her foot. " Has the Heir 
 Apparent to that obscure little Principality 
 called Altronde had any encouragement from 
 me of any kind ? . . . Notwithstanding his 
 visits here, notwithstanding the amusement 
 you ve had at my expense ! " Ruth looked 
 wrathfully at Pontycroft. "And this, this 
 deliberate, this detestable, this cold-blooded 
 proposition. And you can say Poor Bert 
 ram ! " But then she fell to sobbing vio 
 lently. 
 
 Lucilla flew to her, folded protecting arms 
 about her. 
 
 " Ruth, dear, don t feel so. ... Darling ! 
 I don t wonder, I do not wonder ! . . . But 
 165 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 after all, for him, it is an impossible pre 
 dicament. He is to be pitied. You can do 
 nothing better than to feel sorry for him. 
 He s madly in love with you, that s too 
 evident. Presently you ll be able to laugh 
 at it, at him." 
 
 " Laugh at it ? " Ruth cried. " Ah, how 
 lightly it hits you ! Laugh at it ? ... I 
 shall never laugh at it, I shall never laugh at 
 it. I can shudder and wonder at the mon 
 strous pride it reveals, the arrogance of a little 
 Princeling called to reign over his obscure 
 little Principality." She drew herself up. 
 
 " Here is that dear old uncle of mine," said 
 she, tightening her clasp upon the letter she 
 still held in her hand, " My uncle, who 
 writes to me for the ninetieth time : The 
 string is on the latchet of the door, why not 
 come and pay a visit to your old home, have 
 a look at your ancestral acres ? " 
 
 "Oh," exclaimed Ruth rather hysterically, 
 " I will go and have a look at my ancestral 
 acres ! And these Wohenhoffens, these Bert- 
 random, who are they to fancy themselves 
 privileged to offer me a morganatic marriage 
 with their son ? But I execrate them ! I exe 
 crate everything they represent ! I, Ruth 
 
 1 66 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Adgate, to have been exposed to it ! " And 
 now, again, she began to sob. 
 
 Pontycroft looked exceedingly distressed. 
 
 " Child, child," he said, " you may believe 
 that Lucilla and I never remotely dreamed of 
 this denouement. I m not in the least sur 
 prised at your indignation, your horror, 
 but I am not in the least surprised, either, 
 that poor Bertram, in the tangle of his en 
 vironment, with his tradition, and impelled 
 by a hopeless passion (oh, my prophetic eye), 
 did what he could, has written offering you 
 the only honourable thing he could offer you, 
 a morganatic marriage. Absurd, outrageous 
 though this sounds to you, it is a legal mar 
 riage, and remember that the poor chap s in 
 a hole, a dreadful box. Shed rather a pity 
 ing tear upon his blighted young affections. 
 . . . He can t hope to have you, knew pro 
 bably how you d take his offer, but he gritted 
 his teeth and made it like the wholly decent 
 chap he is. 
 
 " And I would even wax pathetic," con 
 tinued Pontycroft, " when I think of him. 
 Could any fate be more depressing than his ? 
 Tout II never speak to him again ! While he, 
 poor fellow, is doomed to marry some sallow 
 167 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Grand Duchess for the sake of the Dynasty. 
 Farewell love, farewell comradry, farewell 
 all the nice, easy-going businesses of life. 
 Buck up and be a Crown Prince ! Become a 
 puppet, a puppet on exhibition to your 
 subjects. Whatever you like to do that s gay, 
 that s human, debonair, you ll have to do it 
 on the sly as though it were a sin, or overcome 
 mountains of public censure. In fact, whether 
 you please yourself or whether you don t the 
 majority will always find fault with you. 
 Poor Bertram, I say, poor old Bertram. . . . 
 His proud WohenhofTen of a mother is the 
 only member of that Royal trio, I fancy, who is 
 thoroughly pleased with the new order of 
 affairs, for Civillo will soon be making matters 
 hot for himself if he doesn t turn over a new 
 leaf." 
 
 Ruth dried her eyes. 
 
 You were quite right when you talked of 
 wintering in the North, Harry," she said at 
 length, still somewhat tremulous. " It doesn t 
 seem as though in the North this could possibly 
 have happened. I think you know," she took 
 Lucilla s hand, " I think I shall try wintering 
 
 1 68 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 in the North I ll accept my uncle s invita 
 tion ; I ll pull the string on the latchet, I ll go 
 and have a look at the old man and at my 
 bleak New England acres. After all," added 
 Ruth, with rather a wan smile, " I suppose 
 it s something to have acres, though one has 
 never realised the fact or thought of it before. 
 I haven t an idea what mine are like, but it 
 will be good to walk on them, to feel I ve 
 got them. Here I m always made to feel 
 such a plebeian. Yes, I m made to feel such 
 a plebeian. Oh no, not by you," Ruth clasped 
 Lucilla s hand and looked affectionately, a 
 trifle, too, defiantly towards Pontycroft, " but 
 they all seem to think, even the rather or 
 dinary ones, like Mrs. Wilberton and Stuart 
 Seton, an American exists to be patronised. 
 No pedigree. An American ! Well, who 
 knows, perhaps I have a pedigree. I ll go at 
 least where I can t be patronised, where they 
 know about me." 
 
 Pontycroft gave a laugh, which rang not 
 altogether gaily. 
 
 " In other words, Miss Adgate must have her 
 experience," he said. 
 
 " Miss Adgate s had all she wants of the old 
 world. She must be on with the new. Be- 
 169 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 sides, her pride s been wounded. ... A 
 prince has offered her matrimony, morgan 
 atic but honourable marriage. That won t 
 do for her. She s wounded in her feelings, 
 outraged by the suggestion, and she includes 
 the whole of Europe in her resentment. 0/>, 
 my dear young lady" said Pontycroft after 
 another moment s silence, " don t talk to me 
 of pride ! You Americans are the devil for 
 pride. Ruth, you ve been toadied to and you 
 fancy you ve been patronised. . . . Well, 
 well, have your experience. What great re 
 sults from little causes flow ! Prove to us that 
 you re not only as good but a great deal 
 better than any of us. We poor humble folk, 
 we ll submit to anything, if when you ve had 
 your experience and are satisfied, you ll come 
 back to us. But you don t mean it, you don t 
 mean it ! Or, if you go you ll return, you ll 
 not forsake your adopted country, your father s 
 friends, your s." 
 
 Ruth s eyes darkened. 
 
 " Haven t you always, both of you, been too 
 good to me ? " she cried, reproachfully. " Ever 
 since I was a little child, you and Lucilla, you 
 know that you two have been, ever shall be, in 
 my heart of hearts. But I must get away from 
 
 I/O 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 all this ; I must do something ! . . . I must 
 find myself ! " she cried. " Say what you 
 will, think what you like, this proposition is 
 too loathsome. It has opened my eyes to so 
 many things I had only felt, before ! It may 
 be all a question of wounded pride, as you 
 say, but I know it s the proper sort of pride. 
 I ve seen it now, the whole, whole, unfriendly 
 situation, in a flash. Lucilla," she pleaded, 
 " you ll sympathise with me ; you won t con 
 demn me if I go, you ll never think I love 
 you an ounce the less ? " 
 
 Lucilla stroked Ruth s hand. 
 
 " My dear," said she, " the thing s a sheer 
 incredible bolt out of the blue, incredible ! I 
 believe," she said, rounding upon her brother, 
 " I believe it s the outcome of Pontycroft s 
 foolish talk, the result of his passion for being 
 paradoxical or perish. Here we were having 
 our teas quite innocently in the garden, like 
 the dear nice people we are, perfectly happy, 
 absolutely content, as why shouldn t we be 
 in this paradise ? " Lucilla opened her blue 
 eyes wide upon the landscape and glanced ac 
 cusingly at Pontycroft. " But you ve pre 
 cipitated us into a mess," she said to him, 
 " with your ribald talk about wintering in our 
 
 171 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 water-soaked British Islands. Then comes a this 
 ridiculous letter, and, of course, Ruth can t 
 sit still under it. Yes, it is perhaps after all, a 
 wholesome notion of yours, Ruth, a visit to 
 your own country. It s the best bath you 
 can take to wash out the taste left by Bert 
 ram s well-meant but preposterous letter. 
 Besides," she laughed, " you ll come back to 
 us ! America can t gobble you up for ever. 
 But what shall we do without you ! And as 
 for Harry, I feel sorry for him. He ll find 
 no one to give him the change when he s in 
 the mood for teasing, no one to keep him in 
 his proper place. He ll become unbearable." 
 
 " Oh," fleered Pontycroft, " if Ruth forsakes 
 us I will go back to my native land ! I ll go 
 where I can toast my shins before my fireside 
 and experience the solid comforts of a British 
 Winter. . . . I ll go home to my duties, go 
 where I can worry my tenants, read Mudie 
 the livelong day; feel that I, too, am some 
 body ! " 
 
 Ruth smiled, rather forlornly. 
 
 " I want you to observe," Pontycroft with 
 mock contrition enlarged, "how one evil deed 
 begets a quantity of others a congeries of 
 miseries out of which, at last, good springeth 
 
 172 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 like the flowering beanstalk. In idle hour 
 (mark the magic potency of words), I speak 
 of wintering in the North. Now as you ve 
 been told more than once, idleness is the 
 parent of wickedness. Lucilla assures me that 
 in my paradoxical idleness I am a parent to 
 a quite unexpected degree. Now observe, 
 the offer of a morganatic marriage follows 
 speedily on the heels of my sin, the sin of 
 an idle paradox. Then Ruth becomes guilty 
 of the sin of anger tossing her pretty head 
 and stamping her pretty foot, she declares she 
 won t play in our yard any longer. She stamps 
 her pretty foot and announces she s going 
 back to her own New England apple orchard. 
 The rudiments of her Nonconformist, New 
 England conscience, thoroughly roused, her 
 thoughts fly towards home and her aged uncle. 
 In my remorse, I, in virtue not to be out 
 done, decide to go back to my duties. Lucilla, 
 conventionalised British matron that au fond 
 she is, spite of her protests, already, because 
 she must, assembles to her soul her list of social 
 obligations at Dublin, the frocks to plan, and 
 the dinner parties to give prior to the coming 
 out and Presentation at Court of her eldest 
 child. Home, home, home," murmured Ponty- 
 
 173 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 croft, " sweet home is the tune we ll all be 
 whistling within a month. Lucilla will carol 
 it from her bog because it isn t considered 
 polite to whistle in Ireland ; but I, from my 
 Saxon heath and Ruth from God s country 
 will imitate the blackbirds. Could any tune 
 be more acceptable to the Nonconformist 
 conscience ? Ruth, you perceive, already be 
 gins to dominate ! Columbia, Ruler of the sea 
 and wave see how she sends us about our 
 neglected and obvious affairs. High-ho for 
 Winter in the North," said Ponty. "But 
 meantime I m going to array myself for din 
 ner and here comes Pietro." 
 
 " Thank Heaven for the trivialities of life," 
 Lucilla put in with fervour. " Ruth, shall 
 we don our best gowns in honour of the un 
 expected ? Harry may dub this the call to 
 duty ; I know it s never anything so dull. I 
 know that the spirit of adventure he s hailed 
 has seized upon both of you, is lifting us all, 
 will-he nill-he, out of our beautiful dolce far 
 niente into something restless, violent, and 
 tiresome. As for me there s nothing, naught 
 left for me, poor me ! to do but to follow 
 your lead." 
 
 " Yes, by all means," Ruth lightly acquiesced. 
 174 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " We ll put our best frocks on ; and let us 
 hope the call to duty decked in purple and fine 
 linen, masquerading as the spirit of adventure, 
 may lead us up to consummations. . . ." She 
 broke off. " Devoutly to be wished for," she 
 whispered to herself under her breath. 
 
 VI 
 
 " If Pm to be made the arbiter of other 
 destinies when my own are more than I can 
 manage " (they were dallying over figs and 
 apricots at breakfast) " pray, you two good 
 people tell me, kindly, when shall we begin to 
 throw our bonnets over the mill ? In other 
 words, on what day and in what month do we 
 start in search of Winter in the North ? " 
 Ruth enquired, to a feint of cheerfulness and 
 little dreaming. 
 
 " Oh, to-morrow To-morrow, if you like," 
 jerked Pontycroft. " Wait not upon the order 
 of your going, but start at once." 
 
 " Start to-morrow ! " Lucilla cried, " start 
 to-morrow ? Impossible." 
 
 " Why impossible ? Nothing is impossible. 
 Ruth wants to go. She said so last night, 
 175 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 she more than hints it, to-day. What woman 
 wants, God wants." Oblivious to the truth 
 that a woman, his sister, panted to remain, 
 Pontycroft glanced at the newspaper at his 
 elbow. " A steamer sails from Genoa to 
 morrow afternoon, the Princess Irene. I ll go 
 down to Humbert s this moment as ever is," 
 he added, " and have them wire for a deck 
 cabin." 
 
 " No, no," protested Lucilla. " Why leave 
 all this loveliness at once ? Impossible ! Be 
 sides, we have people coming to dinner to 
 morrow," she remembered hopefully. " Thurs 
 day. The Newburys and young Worthington. 
 We can t put them off." 
 
 " We can, and we shall," asseverated Ponty. 
 " There s nothing so dreadful, Lucilla, as these 
 long superfluous drawn-out farewells, these 
 impending good-byes. Send Pietro, if you 
 like, to say we ve all responded to a call of 
 duty. Tell your friends in all charity, that 
 when duty calls the wise youth replies : I 
 worft? Why ? . . . Because he knows that 
 nine times out of ten duty is only what some 
 body else thinks he ought to be doing. But 
 tell them duty s only skin deep, by way of 
 advice. Tell them one s response to duty is 
 
 176 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 generally the mere weak living up to some 
 body else s good opinion of one. Say to 
 them : * Vanity, vanity, all is vanity. But 
 say that in this case it s otherwise we re not 
 wise, and we ve answered with one accord : 
 / mil. 9 Say to them that therein lies our 
 folly. We re exceedingly sorry sorry, but 
 we must be off. It shall be a seven days 
 wonder, Florence shall have something to 
 talk about. She needs brisking up. Ruth, 
 I m off to engage your passage. The sooner 
 you go, the sooner you ll come back to tell us 
 all about it, tell us whether the play was 
 worth the candle." 
 
 Ponty rang for his stick and his hat, lighted 
 the inevitable cigarette. 
 
 " Paolina will pack you up, Ruth, if she has to 
 keep busy until midnight," he directed, between 
 two puffs. " Lucilla, Pietro can help Maria 
 with your paraphernalia ; when I m back here 
 with our tickets he ll be half through the 
 packing. Lazy duffer though he be, once he 
 begins, he s rapid as radium." Ponty was 
 gone before either Lucilla or Ruth could pro 
 test. 
 
 They looked at one another. . . . What 
 ludicrous extravagance of sudden breaking 
 N 177 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 up ! This high-handed method of bringing 
 matters summarily to a climax struck them 
 both. Lucilla and Ruth broke into peals of 
 laughter. 
 
 The irresponsible sun glared into their 
 eyes played, flamboyant among the glass and 
 silverware of the breakfast table ; it winked in 
 prismatic rays from crystal angles of honey pots 
 and threw its splashes of blinding light over 
 the damask table cloth, borrowing rosy tints 
 from a mass of pink geranium in a bowl of 
 Nagasaki ware. It glanced at all the polished 
 surfaces of the old carved oak furniture; the 
 room was one flagrant and joyous outburst of 
 morning sunlight, the garden an invitation 
 to come out, come out and play, and enjoy life 
 from its inception ! Elusive, dewy, odorous 
 lovelinesses rested upon it, mounted from it, 
 entreated you to step under the trees, wander 
 among growing tender things, bathed all in 
 a dew and glister. And called to you to come 
 and loiter, and mark the passage of Aurora 
 and her maidens, hours ago. 
 
 " It s just a trifle odd to be swept off one s 
 feet in this whoop-and-begone-with-you man 
 ner," Ruth, with half a laugh, half a sob, 
 commented. " Maugre the thing s to be 
 
 178 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 sooner rather than later, Lucilla, I can t see 
 though why my going should mean yours, too ! " 
 
 " Dear infant," Lucilla answered, tenderly, 
 " don t worry. . . . Whatever should Ponty 
 and myself do here alone ? We d get on 
 one another s nerves in a week and part in a 
 temper. Since things have happened as they 
 have, things are better as they are ; leave 
 them to hammer out their own salvation. 
 Things, / find, are very like the little sheep 
 in Mother Goose. You let them alone and 
 they come home, wagging their tails behind 
 them. . . . But oh, oh, oh," sighed Lucilla, 
 " how I adore this ! How I would stay here 
 forever ! It is a blow," her voice was vibrant 
 of regret. ..." But, of course, Harry s 
 right, he s always right. Shall we obey 
 orders ? " 
 
 " Y es," said Ruth. She felt a tighten 
 ing at her heart, a sudden lump in her throat. 
 The glory of the October morning had all 
 at once departed. ... A decided glamour en 
 veloped the project of a visit to her uncle. 
 Moreover, her heart drew her to him. The 
 fine sense of an affront she must fly from had, 
 too, gathered strength in the night ; the in 
 dignity put upon her by Bertram s letter she 
 179 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 must resent. Her pride protested fiercely, she 
 must retaliate even though Ponty should ex 
 press to Bertram her thanks with refusal of 
 the honour conferred upon her. But now these 
 emotions were quelled by an unspeakable de 
 pression, a loneliness, a sense of isolation, of 
 dread, a dread of the Unknown. . . . The dread 
 swept her off her feet. Dread of something 
 more, too. . . . How was she, how was she, 
 Ruth Adgate, to live away from these two 
 people ? To-morrow would mark the beginning 
 of an ocean rolled up between her old life and 
 the new one she would be journeying towards. 
 To-morrow ! to-morrow ! To-morrow would 
 see the end, for how many, many dreary 
 months, of this beauty laden, gracious exist 
 ence ; the camaraderie of these two people 
 whom she had reason to love best in the 
 world, at whose side she had grown up, 
 Lucilla and Henry Pontycroft, whom she 
 understood, who understood her ! Instinc 
 tively, she felt she was electing for herself a 
 grimmer fate, a sterner life and land, than 
 any she had known, could dimly divine. . . . 
 
 Yes, the glory of the April morning had 
 departed into chill and nothingness. It might 
 have already been December though it was 
 
 180 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 only October, and Pontycroft had gone to 
 buy her ticket. The first, the irremediable 
 step was taken. She must put the best face 
 she could upon this adventure of her choice. 
 
 Lucilla, to whom Ruth and her thoughts 
 were transparent as flies in amber, put her 
 arms about her neck. 
 
 " Ruth," she whispered, " it s because he 
 can t bear the parting, the thought of it. It s 
 going to be a horrible break for him. What 
 we ll either of us do when you re no longer 
 within reach, when you are no longer part 
 of our daily life, I can t imagine. I can t 
 imagine any of it without you, and neither of 
 us will want this, without you." 
 
 Ruth s eyes glowed. Bending forward she 
 kissed Lucilla, and they marched away, arm-in 
 arm, to do their packing. 
 
 VII 
 
 " Parting is such sweet sorrow," sighed 
 Juliet. 
 
 But the girl of fourteen saw in the act an 
 excuse for endless impassioned kisses. The 
 world-worn poet Haraucourt better under 
 stood the disastrous effect of saying good-bye. 
 181 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Partir" he cries, " fest mourir un peu ! " 
 "To leave, to part, is to die a little." 
 Unless, indeed, death be a more desirable 
 state than life, as who in this world can 
 possibly affirm, or deny, except our Holy 
 Mother Church ? It were safer then, never to 
 leave, never to part. This is perhaps the true 
 course of wisdom, to live in the same spot, 
 content with the same people. They, after 
 all, are sure to be exceedingly like the people 
 one will find elsewhere ; and, ten to one, prove 
 to be verily rather nicer, as experience is apt 
 to show. Yet Juliet and Haraucourt are 
 agreed upon one point ; parting, whether to 
 the accompaniment of kisses or of death, a 
 little, parting is a sorrow. 
 
 The parting of their ways, to the three 
 occupants of Villa Santa Cecilia, was poignant. 
 To each, after his kind the next twenty-four 
 hours were inexpressibly distressing. Ponty 
 got through them stoically and worked off 
 some of his feelings in an unconscionable and 
 conscienceless number of cigarettes. Lucilla 
 wept and prayed. Ruth said very little and 
 directed her packing in a suffocation of heart 
 ache. 
 
 As the train passed out from the station at 
 182 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Florence, bearing her with Pontycroft towards 
 Genoa, Ruth s tears gushed like fountains of 
 water. Nor did she in the least try to conceal 
 her distress from Ponty who sat quietly re 
 garding the landscape from the other side of 
 the compartment. It had been arranged that 
 he should return for Lucilla, thus giving to 
 that lady a welcome day s grace, when Ruth 
 had been safely handed over to the Boling- 
 brokes, friends of Lucilla, a young Secretary 
 from the British Embassy in Rome and his 
 bride, on their way out, to Washington. Their 
 names Ponty had, with relief, discovc r . ed among 
 the list, at Humbert s of the ship s passengers. 
 The varied, finished, complex Tuscan land 
 scape passed all leisurely before their eyes ; the 
 olive groves, the orange-pink willows ; the white 
 streams romping under grey arches; the villages, 
 the mediaeval cytties, scattered by the way, the 
 rose-coloured or white monasteries and villas 
 on the sun-decked hillsides. From the little old 
 churches and campaniles of the plain, from the 
 convents perched far above them, innumerable 
 silvery peals of chimes came floating, in tune, 
 out of tune, it mattered not. As a matter 
 of fact, they were shockingly out of tune ; 
 the quality of the Tuscan air is, however, 
 183 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 so extraordinary an embellisher of sound as 
 well as of scene, that all sounds become har 
 monious, even as every scene arranges itself 
 into a primitive picture, thanks to this most 
 beautifying of mediums. 
 
 " How can I leave it, how can I leave it ? " 
 Ruth was saying to herself. 
 
 " You know, I think I m a goose," she let fall 
 at last, smiling at Pontycroft through her tears. 
 
 " My sweet child," said Pontycroft, " we 
 must aye live and learn ! And you re so young 
 that living and learning may still be supposed 
 to hold elements of interest. There s a lot 
 ahead of you that s new and strange, so dry 
 your pretty eyes, and Sursum Corda." 
 
 " My soul misgives me that the new and 
 strange will contain nothing approaching to 
 this," Ruth said, nodding her head towards 
 the window. " And I don t think I shall like 
 doing without it," she added plaintively. 
 
 " God s country," said Pontycroft, " won t 
 look like this, to be sure, nor give you a single 
 blessed one of these fine emotions, these 
 raptures. But after all, it s the first wrench 
 that costs, says the prophet, and since we re 
 not here entirely, he assures us, to amuse our 
 selves, a visit to God s country may prove a 
 
 184 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 salutary if bitter pill to a young lady surfeited 
 with the sweets of Europe." 
 
 " Dio mio," Ruth cried, " since when has 
 Pontycroft turned moralist ? " 
 
 " From the hour he was made to realise the 
 fatal effects of reckless paradox," Ponty an 
 swered, with mock solemnity. 
 
 They fell to chaffing one another as natur 
 ally as possible and the time flew. 
 
 " Genoa la Superba, Genoa la Superba ! How 
 perfectly, how radiantly the word describes 
 her fits her," murmured Ruth when, after a 
 succession of tunnels, in the early afternoon, 
 the sumptuous town burst upon them. The 
 dazzling town, her flashing panoply of palaces, 
 villas, gardens, churches, mounting up, and up 
 her hill, leaning firmly against the back 
 ground of blue skies, blue as the Virgin 
 Mary s robe. 
 
 " The imagination, the purpose, in those 
 lines of architecture, those formal gardens ! " 
 cried Ruth. " How daring, uncompromising, 
 beauty is in this land of Italy. And see, the 
 Mediterranean, all sparkle and laughter there 
 at her feet ! " She leaned forward ; then fell 
 back against the cushions, savouring with 
 heart as well as eyes the brilliant vision. 
 185 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The train hammered heavily into the 
 station. 
 
 " Ge no a ! Ge no a ! ?! The nasal 
 cry reverberated through the glass - covered 
 dome. There was noisy confusion of opening 
 carriage doors, of passengers descending, call 
 ing, embracing, greeting ; of porters running 
 hither and yon ; of trucks of luggage blocking 
 the way amid a commotion of officialdom. 
 
 Ruth stood quietly in the uproar, and gazed 
 upon it, and at Ponty s lank figure, while he 
 dealt with the business of the occasion. Her 
 heart was beating tumultuously. She felt a 
 violent impulse to run away and hide herself. 
 
 " The beginning of the end," she cried. 
 " It is the beginning of the end. Why have I 
 done this ? " 
 
 A moment later she had shaken hands with 
 the Bolingbrokes ; she was saying good-bye 
 to Pontycroft from the window of the carriage 
 which was to take her, with her new acquaint 
 ances, to the ship. 
 
 Ruth s sympathetic Italian maid, waiting 
 and watching in the background, in a hack 
 laden with luggage, murmured to herself : 
 " P over a, Poverella I " 
 
 1 86 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 VIII 
 
 Ruth, in a misery of wild light-headedness, 
 responded as well as she could to the civilities 
 of her two travelling companions, while they 
 drove through narrow, animated streets. They 
 reached the docks. There lay the massive ship, 
 its relentless black hulk resting abroadside, in 
 ominous expectation of some mysterious com 
 ing change. Ruth walked up the white gang 
 way. The turmoil, the excited crowd, the 
 stolid stewards, lolling, indifferent yet curi 
 ous sentinels, the ragged throng of emigrants 
 passing endlessly into the forecastle, the noise 
 of clanking wains and girders hoisting trunks 
 and freight into mid air, all, gave to her a sense 
 of doom, of the finality of things in chaos. . . . 
 Half an hour passed before she was able to go 
 to her room. Telegrams were handed to her, 
 even flowers, fruit ; thus rapidly does news 
 spread ; she had to talk with friends of the 
 Bolingbrokes come to bid them God-speed, 
 to look pleasant and pleased as everybody 
 else did. 
 
 But when at last Ruth closed the door of 
 her cabin behind her, she took a little step 
 forward and with a cry threw herself upon 
 
 187 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 the couch. Regardless of Paolina, who was 
 already opening bags and unfolding dresses, 
 she permitted herself the luxury of a passionate 
 outburst of grief. A tornado of pent misery 
 racked her ; she pressed her face into the 
 linen pillow to deaden the sound of her sobbing, 
 her hands against her breast. 
 
 " Signorina, Signorina, do not feel so badly, 
 cried the good Italian maid, dropping Ruth s 
 lace and beribboned morning gown and run 
 ning towards her. " Oh, do not weep. It is 
 very sad to have to leave our lovely Italian 
 land, so beautiful, so carina. But do not weep 
 so ! What will the Signora Dor say if I allow 
 you to make yourself ill ? Think ! It is I who 
 should be weeping. It is I who am leaving all 
 behind me, my country, my sister, my mother, 
 and yet I do not weep." But the tears belied 
 her words and welled from her eyes. 
 
 Ruth clasped the girl s hand affectionately. 
 She felt grateful for the warm Italian heart. 
 Paolina at least was there, to keep her recol 
 lected in the exquisite life she was forsaking. 
 Why she was forsaking it, now seemed to her 
 an absolutely incomprehensible riddle. For 
 the nonce she could remember not one of her 
 substantial reasons for doing so. 
 
 188 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Paolina withdrew the pins from Ruth s 
 hat, removed it from her hair and put it 
 away. 
 
 " You have crushed your pretty hat, Sig- 
 norina," she said, reproachfully. Then, very 
 much in the tone a mother would use to dis 
 tract a child : 
 
 "You did not see how pale the Signer 
 Pontycroft looked when he said good-bye," 
 she added, " and Maria told me the Sig- 
 nora had not slept the whole night, but kept 
 going constantly to your door and listening to 
 know whether you were asleep. They love you 
 very much. It must be good to be loved so 
 much," the girl continued wistfully. " That 
 must comfort you. And you will soon come 
 back to them, to Italy, when you have seen 
 your Signor uncle and your American home 
 for I am very sure they cannot live without 
 you." 
 
 " Oh, Paolina, I am so unhappy," Ruth said, 
 simply. " But leave me," she smiled to the 
 girl through her tears, " I will call you when 
 I feel better." 
 
 Paolina turned to go, then came back, lifted 
 Ruth s hand, kissed it. " I hope you will par 
 don me, Signorina," she added shyly, " Scusi, 
 
 189 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 if I say, we must always smile, it pleases God 
 better." 
 
 And Paolina left the room. 
 
 For a long while, Ruth, quite still, battled 
 with her feelings. A fresh passion of grief 
 overtook her. . . . When at last it had spent 
 itself, she drew her Rosary, which she carried 
 in the gold bag in her hand, from its sheath. 
 Slowly, the sweetness of the five decades passed 
 into her spirit, she felt comforted. Peace 
 filled her heart. There was only, now and 
 then, the ache, where before there had been 
 uncontrollable despair. She stood up, bathed 
 her face, rang for Paolina, and began re 
 moving the tortoise-shell pins from her hair. 
 
 " Paolina," she cried, as the maid entered 
 the room. " Paolina," she twisted her hair 
 again into its thick coil, " we are going to 
 enjoy ourselves now ! No more tears, no more 
 regrets. You are quite right. We must smile 
 to the good God if we wish Him to smile on 
 us ! Make haste and give me a short skirt and 
 a warm coat, and my cap and veil. I long to 
 get out and breathe the air and fill my eyes 
 with a sight of the shores of Italy." 
 
 At dinner and during the rest of the even 
 ing, as they steamed down the coast towards 
 
 190 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Naples, Ruth was an irresistible -precis of 
 smiles and vivacity. The Bolingbrokes were 
 captivated. 
 
 " Richard," the young Mrs. Bolingbroke 
 told her lord when they were alone together, 
 " that Miss Adgate is a most charmin girl. 
 What was that nonsense Mrs. Wilberton re 
 tailed about her runnin away from Henry 
 Pontycroft whom she s hopelessly in love with ? 
 She is in love with no man ! You can t deceive 
 me ! " Mrs. Bolingbroke cried gaily. " It s 
 easy to see from the fun she s positively 
 bubblin over with that her heart isn t weighted 
 by any hopeless passion. She s never been in 
 America before she says, and it s the great 
 adventure of her life. . . . She s goin to 
 visit an old uncle, whom she s never seen 
 but adores. Her childlike enjoyment of doin 
 it quite alone (she has her maid with her) 
 and her eagerness about it, is quite fascinatin . 
 Although she is so rich, she s evidently seen 
 very little of the world," said Mrs. Boling 
 broke, who happened to be a year Ruth s ju 
 nior, but had the feeling of knowing the world 
 thoroughly from within and from without. 
 
 " Yes," her husband answered guardedly ; 
 he remembered that a First Secretary must 
 191 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 show diplomatic reticence in his judgments, 
 even to his wife. " Yes, Miss Adgate does 
 seem rather a decent sort. I dare say the 
 story is all a fabrication. She does seem a 
 nice sort of unsophisticated young creature 
 and I dare say the story s all a fabrication. 
 Just the pretty charitable way people have 
 of talking. I can see no objection to your 
 enjoying as much of her society as you like, 
 Isabel." 
 
 Thus it happened that safe in her husband s 
 blessing upon the friendship, Mrs. Bolingbroke, 
 all unsuspected by Ruth, became her cham 
 pion. 
 
 192 
 
PART FIFTH 
 
A N Indian summer day, idle and tender, 
 lay over hills and woods, meadows, river. 
 The quaint little Old Town of Oldbridge, 
 set among apple orchards and gardens and 
 avenues of elms, received this last Benediction 
 of Nature with an agreeable ouf ! of respite 
 from imminent grim winter approaches. 
 
 It is difficult to account, by any utilitarian 
 motive on the part of our " brown and green 
 old Mother Earth," for her November caprice 
 of a New England Indian summer, though 
 I make no doubt the scientists will have some 
 prosaic reason to give which we are asked to 
 take upon faith. But since fruit, in New 
 England, is garnered in September, and the 
 toughest plants are burned to a crimson glory 
 by October frosts, no ripened fruit or renewal 
 of leaves defend the vagary. And so will-he 
 nill-he, we praise Heaven which made our 
 " bounteous mother " feminine forsooth ; we 
 gratefully credit the enchanted fortnight to 
 her bountiful illogical womanhood. 
 195 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The Old Town of Oldbridge, then, basking 
 under the Indian summer s morning blandish 
 ment while it sipped its mocha and partook of 
 grape-fruit towards eight of the clock, pushed 
 an agreeable ouf ! awake to agreeable titill- 
 ations of excitement. General Adgate s niece, 
 lovely and rich, admirable combination Miss 
 Adgate (Ruth Adgate, they already called her, 
 didn t she belong to them ?) had arrived. The 
 event, discreetly mentioned in the Oldbridge 
 Morning Herald, stared them in the face. 
 Some boasted a glimpse of her, the day before, 
 seated in the brougham beside her uncle ; 
 a pretty girl with reddish brown hair. Others 
 had seen of her nothing but her outward 
 manifestations on the luggage cart two 
 big brass-bound cork trunks, a cabin trunk, 
 precisely similar, a square hat-box, a dressing 
 case and a dark-eyed Italian maid. 
 
 The man of all work, Jo, brought this 
 luggage into the house, with the gardener s 
 assistance, and up to Ruth s rooms. Now he 
 wiped the perspiration from his face. Arms 
 akimbo, brows warped in puzzled frown, he 
 glared at the encumbrances. 
 
 "Well, I be durned!" he burst forth. 
 " Glad I ain t got any of them things to carry 
 
 196 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 round when I go a travelling. One carpet 
 bag s big enough for me, when I visit my 
 folks, to Falls Junction." 
 
 " Lucky you re glad," Martha, the efficient, 
 the tart, the very tart housemaiden snapped, 
 and put him instantly in his place. " Not 
 likely soon, we ll catch you towering it with a 
 valet and trunks." 
 
 ii 
 
 As to the unconscious subject of comment 
 and curiosity, Miss Ruth Adgate, Miss Adgate 
 was ecstatic. Her heart in its rapture wanted 
 to, did, engulf the house, and the land and the 
 hill, and the inmates of the Old Adgate place, 
 and the entire town of Oldbridge. Some 
 thing new, something strange had indeed 
 happened for her joy had begun to bubble 
 and ferment from the moment her foot passed 
 the threshold of the house. No from the 
 hour the train, on its sideline to Oldbridge, 
 had begun to move beside the river, bearing 
 her for thirty minutes from one little way- 
 station to another. 
 
 The sentiment of an autumnal New Eng 
 land landscape spread beneath clean thought 
 less blue skies, vistas of grey rocks and sedges 
 197 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 by the river at the one hand, where the 
 dark green savins, reminding her of cypresses 
 in Italy, sprang through the grey clefts ; and 
 across the river, hills, low, wooded, inter 
 spersed with green and brown and orange pas 
 tures, through which cropped the same vener 
 able grey New England rock, harmonious and 
 austere, this perspective, enchanting in its 
 tonic beauty, was grievously, alas ! debased 
 and disfigured. 
 
 Ignoble little wooden packing cases liberally 
 dotted by the way screamed with the crudest 
 colours, * the crudest rainbow scale disgorges 
 on the palate. Gigantic hoardings, flaunting 
 ridiculous local remedies and foods for every 
 prevalent disease or dyspeptic stomach in 
 solently stared at one ; the very backs and 
 sides of barns and packing cases were decorated 
 with their insignia ! 
 
 " They need a Thames Conservancy, a 
 County Council, something," Ruth protested 
 to her outraged sense of beauty, " to save this 
 splendid river, control such unpuritanical 
 abandonments to colour and commerce." 
 
 Miss Adgate, you perceive, was naively con 
 fident oh, serene British confidence ! that 
 taste governs the world, that the world rays 
 
 198 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 and rules so soon as the world discovers it is 
 acting in bad taste. 
 
 But these blemishes were, after all, insignifi 
 cant affairs details incidental to an untutored 
 modern public. What Miss Adgate s inward 
 vision vividly perceived through the windows 
 of the shabby long car with its soiled velvet 
 cushions, and air of unworldliness, which 
 pleased her, its smell of stale apples and 
 anthracite coal smoke which didn t please 
 her, was the land. The land without a flaw 
 of commerce ! Hidden lives that took her 
 blood back three hundred years, led her im 
 agination. 
 
 Undeniably, the effect of this country was 
 not one of abundance. ... It was not varied 
 and enhanced by a thousand fair human 
 touches ; the neglected land was uncouthly 
 rough. . . . Nor was it in the least suggestive 
 of the poetry, art, emotion, the loves, the 
 hates of nineteen hundred vanished sumptu 
 ous years. (One might have likened it rather 
 to the starved and simple beggar-maid waiting 
 for the King.) But it was hers, it was hers ! 
 . . . She was of it! . . . Miss Adgate was 
 deliciously cognisant that this fact filled her 
 heart to overflowing with sweet content. 
 
 TOO 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " This land saw my forbears ! . . . This 
 land for three hundred years gave them all 
 they asked of life. ... It opened its heart to 
 them, therefore I love it, therefore I love 
 it ! " she repeated softly to herself. " And if 
 this elation is patriotism the mere patriotism 
 dubbed Reflex Egotism by the cynics, well 
 poor dears ! What dear poor dears the cynics 
 be!" 
 
 Miss Ruth Adgate gave a pleased sigh and 
 turned her eyes again upon the view. They 
 fell upon a bit of grey rock, a group of 
 savins and scarlet barberry bushes loitering 
 beside a piece of water ... a composition 
 Diaz would have thankfully imprinted, for 
 reproduction, on his retina. The little pool, 
 from brink to brink, coyly reflected these 
 and the clear blue sky, and in the foreground 
 twenty feet of hoarding bore the legend : 
 
 " Try Grandpa Luther s Syrup of Winter- 
 green for your Baby s Tantrums." 
 
 Ruth fell back with rather a rueful laugh. 
 
 200 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 in 
 
 " Next station ? O Oldbridge," sang out 
 the cherubic faced conductor and Ruth s 
 heart began to palpitate. 
 
 " I will smile," she said, " I won t be ab 
 surd." And she fixed her gaze resolutely on 
 the landscape, arrested, at once, by some 
 subtle change in it. 
 
 Perceptibly, the meadows displayed a softer, 
 more velvety grass ; the trees grew, more 
 finely luxuriant, the cliffs rose boldly. A hint 
 of human intention, the touch of elegance, a 
 something thoroughbred, spoke aloud. . . . The 
 few last miles through which Miss Adgate 
 jolted gave symptoms of civilisation. 
 
 " 0-0-ldbridge ! " 
 
 The guard intoned it nasally, with complete 
 resignation, a twenty years fatiguing habit ; 
 and an intimation too, in his voice, that the 
 goal of human travel had been reached. The 
 train slackened. . . . One saw, spanning the 
 river, a black bridge latticing the green and 
 the blue ; one caught glimpses of a town, 
 white houses scattered up the slopes of 
 wooded hills. 
 
 2OI 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Several trim white yachts rested on the 
 water; small sailboats glided, hither and yon, 
 and little skiffs and slim rowboats floated 
 by to a leisurely motion, manned by a single 
 young oarsman, a girl seated hatless, in the bow. 
 The gay scene under the yellow sunlight, the 
 rippling, the smiling river, the warm waning 
 afternoon alive, sparkling, seemed an invita 
 tion to her full of promise. 
 
 " Come, Paolina," said Ruth, with inward 
 trepidation. " Come, Paolina." 
 
 Miss Adgate summoned her courage as the 
 train stopped with a jerk. 
 
 She passed heroic effort through the car to 
 the platform, while Paolina took the dressing- 
 case and followed, moved like her mistress and 
 as tremulous. 
 
 Ruth scanned the faces in the friendly 
 brick station. The white head, the features, 
 familiar from photograph presentment, were 
 not there ! But a hand, extended at the last 
 step to help her descend, caused her to turn. 
 Her arms in an instant had flung themselves 
 impulsively about a figure which stood at her 
 side. 
 
 " Uncle ! " cried Ruth. Her heart ceased 
 to pound, her nervousness gave way to an 
 202 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 immense inward satisfaction. Tears sprang 
 to her eyes but, what did it matter ? My 
 heroine would be less charming were she less 
 impressionable and one does not gather upon 
 every bush, an uncle in loco parentis. 
 
 " Well, well, my dear ! we ve got you here 
 at last, Ruth," said the tall, thin, old man. He 
 looked down at her fondly, a good face full of 
 kindly scrutiny. 
 
 " You ve brought belongings of sorts ? " 
 General Adgate enquired as he conducted 
 Ruth towards the carriage whilst the young girl 
 felt half a dozen pairs of curious eyes fixed 
 upon her. 
 
 " If that s your maid tell her there s a 
 seat for her in the luggage cart near Jobias," 
 said General Adgate. He handed his niece 
 into the brougham, Paolina received her in 
 structions, they drove off. 
 
 IV 
 
 And for a moment they sped in silence, up a 
 side street, into an open square of shops and 
 brick buildings, for all the world like the High 
 Street of any English Provincial town. 
 
 " But how English it looks !" Ruth exclaimed. 
 203 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Does it ? Why not ? " said General Adgate. 
 " However," he added, "we pride ourselves, 
 further on, that we re distinctively American." 
 
 The brick buildings surely enough dissolved 
 into avenues set with superb elms. Big com 
 fortable houses encircled by verandas, many 
 adorned with those fluted Corinthian columns, 
 mark in Oldbridge of the early nineteenth 
 century, all snugly set back among flower 
 gardens and lawns, emanated peace, prosperity, 
 good will. 
 
 " This place must be Arcady in summer. 
 . . . How charming it is," Ruth cried, de 
 lighted. " These gardens in flower, these trees 
 in leaf " 
 
 " It s not so bad," said General Adgate, 
 dryly. " Longfellow christened it the Rose of 
 New England." 
 
 "But ," he added, " we call this the 
 
 City of Oldbridge, a modern matter. You, 
 Ruth, belong to the Court End of the town 
 you are of what we call the Old Town." 
 
 Vastly amused at the distinction, a Yankee 
 Faubourg Saint Germain, Ruth plied him with 
 questions. In five minutes the agreeable news 
 that she, the last of the house of Adgate in 
 America, Ruth Adgate verily the salt of the 
 204 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 earth, tracing a clean English ancestry back 
 to the crusades, to mistier periods beyond, 
 here held her Yankee acres in grant first from 
 an English Sovereign, and, without a drop of 
 blood-shed from Indian Sachems, gave to 
 her humourous sense of proportion somewhat 
 to smile over. 
 
 On they went, under endless prospects of 
 arching elm trees, whose branches threw ob 
 lique attenuated shadows among the rays of the 
 descending sun. A few soft clouds at the hori 
 zon were tinted rosy and red. Then the very 
 blue, blue sky, suffused with violet and rose, 
 suddenly flared. Far and wide, from earth to 
 zenith, far and wide the sky burst into a 
 glorious scarlet conflagration. 
 
 The city lay behind, meadows stretched 
 broadly at either side, and to the right a 
 pretty line of hill and wood etched itself 
 against the blushing clouds. 
 
 " The beginning of your acres, my dear," 
 said the old man, bowing his head. " There 
 they lie, untouched, just as James the First 
 ceded them to your forefathers, just as the 
 Indian Sachems of the Mohegan Tribe con 
 firming the gift, withdrew from em. The 
 bit of wood there is known to this day as the 
 205 
 
THE TOYAL END 
 
 Wigwam and the last Indian hut in this State 
 disappeared when it was destroyed by fire a 
 hundred years ago/ 
 
 They had passed a road that wandered into 
 the woodland, they were rolling smartly by 
 stone walls that shut in a goodly reach of 
 close-cut lawn all seamed and scarred by grey 
 jutments of rock, which rising, mounting, 
 reached a hill through terraced gardens trimly 
 laid and skirting the summit. The carriage 
 took a sharp sweep upward into a gravelled 
 drive, rolled on a few paces, stopped abruptly 
 before a brown, rambling house, Miss Adgate 
 had reached the end of her journey. 
 
 " Welcome home," said General Adgate, as 
 he helped Ruth to alight. He bent down, 
 kissed her, and led her up the steps into the 
 house. 
 
 It was morning. It was nine of the clock. 
 Miss Adgate walked, alone, through a path that 
 penetrated to the Wigwam. Almost hidden 
 by a thicket of sweet fern, juniper, barberry 
 and briar which grew at either side, which 
 clung too affectionately to her skirts and 
 from which she had difficulty in disengaging 
 
 206 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 herself, the path, she thought, might have led 
 her to the Palace of The Sleeping Beauty. 
 
 It was morning, as I have said, and it was 
 the morning of her first day, and early abroad, 
 Miss Adgate strolled in a pleasant sort of 
 reverie, thinking of nothing, perhaps, or 
 thinking of a number of things. The Indian 
 summer sunshine filtered upon her through 
 half-bare branches not quite denuded of their 
 yellow and purple and scarlet leafage ; and 
 every now and then a leaf came fluttering 
 down in the light breeze. A squirrel, now 
 and then, darted out along a branch, paused 
 and like an Italian lizard, all a-gleam and a- 
 whisk, gleamed, whisked, and disappeared. 
 But Ruth knew two little black beadlike eyes 
 still watched her, as she went, from behind 
 the lattice-screen of twigs. 
 
 Every now and then she passed a formid 
 able, a monumental boulder; moss-grown; 
 covered with grey lichen ; dropped there by 
 some glacier, aeons since, unless Heaven, it 
 occurred to her, had placed it where it stood, 
 and why not ? for picturesque intent ? . . . 
 Every now and then a tardy bluejay flitted 
 by, lighted upon a branch and sent forth his 
 imperious cba, cha, cha / ... Or a wood- 
 207 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 pecker, in the distance, made his tapping 
 noise as he sounded the trees for his meal. 
 A dry twig would break, suddenly, come 
 tumbling head foremost down, down through 
 a rustle of leaves, and all these sounds struck 
 upon Miss Adgate s ears in her reverie, gave 
 her exquisite pleasure. She enjoyed the rom 
 ance and the solitude of this wild wood ; she 
 delighted in the knowledge that she was walk 
 ing safely through her own preserves ; and 
 treve de compliments, her uncle had left her 
 upon a brief good-bye after an early break 
 fast. Ruth burned to discover alone, he knew, 
 her domain General Adgate had divined it 
 without a hint. 
 
 " You ll want to take a walk this morning 
 through your woods, Ruth," said he. " Cross 
 the hill, you ll find a road to the right leading 
 by a brook, follow the road, it takes you 
 over the brook by a bridge and soon becomes 
 a path. No one will molest you, it s yours." 
 
 " What, the brook as well ? " queried she, 
 feeling, somehow, like a very little girl in his 
 presence. 
 
 " Yes, and the brook as well. You can t get 
 away from your preserves, they stretch on for 
 miles." 
 
 208 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 So it was that Miss Adgate, abroad at nine 
 o clock, happened to be off for a matutinal 
 stroll through paths wet and dewy, glad of her 
 freedom, glad to be alone in a new world, 
 surrender herself to the romance of a new 
 train of thought. 
 
 She came, presently, to a clearing in the 
 wood. The path ended, abruptly, at a flat 
 bed of rock which descended for some hundred 
 feet to another opening in the wood. There 
 were bayberry and barberry and fern along 
 the way, slashed scarlet by the frosts ; there 
 were fifty plants she promised to herself to 
 learn the names of, which gave forth strong, 
 sweet scents in the hot sun. Ruth sat down. 
 A swish, through the dry leaves, a stir of the 
 brown grass, told of the frightened escape of 
 some little living thing, and set her heart to 
 palpitating unaccountably with love for it. 
 
 Her mood had become a trifle exalted, her 
 perceptions quickened by her promenade. 
 Each insect, bird, bush she came upon began to 
 assume a personality ; claimed the privilege to 
 live upon her land. She was the suzerain of 
 their little lives ; she could have held a court 
 of justice ; she could have dispensed favours, 
 played their games, ruled them, thrown herself 
 p 209 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 into their griefs and joys, with heart and soul. 
 Seated here, in the warm sun, on the warm stone 
 checked with patches of green and brown club- 
 moss, she inhaled the crisp fragrance of the 
 bushes under the sun s kisses ; she looked afar, 
 on to the trees below and over their heads 
 at the vivid sky, and upon faraway violet 
 hills, and upon green and orange, brown and 
 guileless meadows. The world seemed good 
 and wonderful, and she felt exceedingly 
 content. 
 
 " The Ruth Adgate who spent twenty 
 years of her life in Europe is no more," she 
 thought, lightly. " The young person who 
 has tasted most of the sweets of European 
 civilisation, walked in marble halls, refused a 
 Duke, run away from the outrage offered her 
 dignity by the offer of a morganatic marriage 
 with a Crown Prince, the lovesick girl who 
 wandered through the moonlight at the Lido, 
 floated upon the silent lagoons of Venice, dis 
 coursed with wits in lovely gardens in Florence, 
 and herself the cause of wit in others, hung 
 upon their discourse that was quite another 
 person ! That was but an early incarnation, 
 never the real Miss Adgate. This is the real 
 Miss Adgate ! In spite of every influence to 
 
 310 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 the contrary, the product of her native 
 land." 
 
 Lucilla, Pontycroft Pontycroft, Lucilla ! 
 How far away they seemed. . . . Their names 
 stirred her heart as she pronounced them. 
 But even so was not this best ? The present 
 Miss Adgate in a short skirt, a blue, soft felt 
 hat, tip-tilted over her eyes, a stick in her 
 hand, her thoughts for all society ; Miss Adgate 
 with this hardy New England nature for back 
 ground, Ruth Adgate taking a solitary walk 
 upon her own land, with the feeling that good 
 will and satisfaction smiled at her because of 
 her presence there, was not this the Real person 
 who had found her true niche in the world ? 
 
 " How singular," she reflected. " The 
 transformation has taken place overnight. 
 It is almost as though I had been here for 
 ever ! And to-day I feel as though I had a 
 destiny as though Fate had something up her 
 sleeve here for me. I ve begun like one of 
 Henry Harland s heroines and I m convinced 
 that whatever the Powers are preparing for 
 me I shall accept it here, just as I accept 
 all this gratefully, gaily, without demur." 
 
 Ruth glanced at the violet hills and the 
 guileless meadows and a thrill passed through 
 
 211 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 her. She jumped up, a white hand held to 
 shade her face. 
 
 " Basta I I ve rested long enough, the 
 sun here is too hot," said Miss Adgate. " I 
 think I ll discover what lies beyond, in the 
 heart of that wood there," and off she started, 
 blushing at her emotion. 
 
 A company of crows in a distant field caw- 
 cawed, querulously, at her. Their raucous 
 voices fitted the rough woodland, the vigorous 
 autumn smells, the haze of the mellow 
 golden morning. She came again to the little 
 brown brook gurgling quietly over its bed of 
 brown stones and leaves and the fancy took 
 her to follow its course. Wet feet were of no 
 consequence, determined to see all of her pos 
 sessions Ruth skirted its purling side and 
 discovered presently that here the brook, 
 lifted from the earth by hand of artifice, 
 was confined to a long, shallow, wooden aque 
 duct, an aqueduct open to the air and to the 
 tracery of boughs above and to blue skies 
 reflected in the water. Through this conduit 
 the little brook bubbled and bounded, clear 
 as crystal ; icy cold to the touch as she dipped 
 her hand in and let the water run along her 
 wrist. 
 
 212 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Ah," thought the young lady, " this must 
 be our famous spring ! I ve reached the 
 headquarters of the Nile or I m very near 
 them." And through the trees in truth, she 
 perceived, further on, a rough hut, built to 
 protect the stream s source from inroads of 
 man and beasts. 
 
 She sat herself on a fallen tree trunk, leaned 
 back and gazed with half-closed eyelids into 
 the network of branches oaks, larches, birch, 
 hazel, maple, nearly bare of foliage. Here 
 again, the ground, checkered with green moss- 
 patches was interspersed with little plants, 
 "which must be all a-flower in the spring," 
 thought Ruth and she vowed that when spring 
 came she would return to pluck them. 
 
 Then presto ! . . . Without a note of 
 warning the agreeable independence of her 
 mood vanished. Lucilla, Pontycroft ! . . . 
 Her mind, her heart, her very soul yearned 
 for them. And a homesick longing for the 
 finished, for the humanly beautiful, the artis 
 tically beautiful, an intense craving and de 
 sire for a familiar European face smote her. 
 
 " But, " she puzzled, "would they, those 
 
 I want most to see, could they endure this wil 
 derness ? No not Lucilla ! Not Lucilla with 
 213 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 her love of luxury and her disdain of short 
 skirts." She laughed. Pontycroft ? Perhaps," 
 her heart fluttered. She knew he doted upon 
 old, formal gardens, well-clipped lawns ; had 
 delight in the glorious army of letters and of 
 art, that he found in the society too, of 
 princes, entertainment. Still, it might be 
 possible. . . . He would, at all events, have 
 some whimsical thing to say about it all. 
 She began to fancy that she heard his 
 voice. 
 
 " If he were here," Ruth told herself, " I 
 should ask him to interpret the horrid vision 
 I had last night." Ruth shivered as she re 
 called it ; rapidly she began an imaginary 
 conversation. 
 
 " I was lying in the big, carved, four-post 
 family bedstead in my bedroom," Ruth in 
 formed him. " I was half asleep and half 
 awake and I saw myself coming up the steps 
 into the house just as I did when I arrived. 
 As I came, the house door opened, quickly, 
 from within, and four people rushed towards 
 me, with open arms. One was my father. 
 He clasped me tenderly and said : 6 Wel 
 come, welcome home ! . . . Behind him, a 
 tall, large, old man clasped me in his arms 
 
 214 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 and he cried : Welcome, welcome home ! * 
 Then came another and with the same words 
 bade me welcome ; I felt very happy, and so 
 glad that I had come ! But running down 
 the stairs of the house arrived a tiny, meagre, 
 old lady, whose corkscrew curls bobbed at 
 either side her face. She cried : Welcome, 
 welcome ! in a shrill, high voice, seizing me 
 in her embrace. Welcome ! she cried again, 
 but look out ! We can bite ! And as she said 
 it her two sharp white teeth went through 
 my lips till I screamed with pain and started 
 up all a-tremble and then I fell back onto 
 the bed and shook for an hour." 
 
 " My sweet child ! " the sane amused voice 
 of Pontycroft made reply. " These old four- 
 post family bedsteads are dangerous affairs to 
 sleep in. Quant-a-moi, I ve always avoided 
 ? em. . . . I ll have nothing whatever to do 
 with them. If my great-aunt, from whom 
 I inherited Pontycroft, had not been of my 
 way o thinking I should have sold those at 
 Pontycroft to the old furniture dealer in the 
 village. Fortunately, that fearless lady lifted 
 the obloquy of the act from my shoulders by 
 disposing of them herself. One day, while 
 my uncle, her husband, scoured the high seas 
 215 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 under Nelson, she got rid of all the old 
 family four-posters. When he returned from 
 the war and asked what had become of em 
 she acknowledged she d discovered a prefer 
 ence for bronze beds and had sent to France 
 for a dozen. But he was far too thankful 
 to be at home again. c Peace now, at any 
 price, said he. And he never mentioned 
 four-posters to his lady-wife again, but slept 
 and snored contentedly, for forty odd years, 
 in a red-gold, steel enamelled affair, free of 
 family traditions. You d better follow my 
 aunt s example, Ruth. Send to Boston for a 
 nice new white enamelled bedstead with a 
 nice new wire mattress and let no more 
 family ghosts worry your ingenuous small 
 head." 
 
 " But, what did it mean ? After all, it 
 happened, or I m mad," Ruth laughing, 
 heard herself insist. 
 
 " Oh," said Pontycroft, he gave her one of 
 his droll glances " if you want your mid 
 night vision interpreted you must ask some 
 older sage, even, than I, to do it. I should 
 say, were it not too obvious to be true, that 
 apple pie with an under crust. . . ." 
 
 " Nonsense," interrupted Ruth. 
 216 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " The sort invented by your French ances 
 tress, Priscilla Mulline Alden (I ve heard she 
 was a rare cordon bleu)" went on Pontycroft, 
 unperturbed, " together with New England 
 brown bread but that s all too obvious to 
 be true . . . what are you laughing at ? " he 
 queried, artlessly. 
 
 " I m laughing at the Brown Bread," re 
 torted Ruth, and she laughed aloud, " there 
 wasn t any." 
 
 " There should have been," said Ponty, 
 with a deprecating lift of the eyebrows. 
 " It s de rigueur with baked beans." 
 
 " But your little story," he continued, 
 lighting his cigarette, " belongs probably to 
 those mysterious reflex actions of ancestry 
 acting on a sensitive nervous organisation. 
 You can t expect me to explain them. See, 
 though, that you do look out. Don t, mani 
 festly, offend your ancestors and they won t 
 offend you, and there s my interpretation." 
 
 Again Ruth laughed aloud, gleefully, at the 
 tones of Ponty s voice and again a little thrill 
 of pain and hope pierced her breast. She 
 looked at her watch. It was almost noon 
 and she turned towards home through the 
 glade, by the path along the brook. 
 217 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 VI 
 
 But the adventure of her walk had not come 
 to an end yet. 
 
 The path widened into a grass-grown road. 
 The day was so hot she regretted she hadn t 
 brought her sunshade, but she walked with 
 light buoyant steps, unreflecting, amused 
 by the antics of two blue, belated butterflies 
 who, not perished with the summer, con 
 vinced it had come back a little, danced ahead 
 of her chasing the shadows ; they fluttered to 
 the right and to the left, and came at last 
 to rest upon a withered mullen stalk a few 
 yards in advance of her. Ruth watched them 
 while they sought greedily, making a rapid tour 
 of the dried stem, for some lone flower upon 
 which to replenish their hungry attenuated 
 little stomachs. She almost held her breath, 
 as she paused to watch the quest and she 
 wished she might, by a wave of her stick, 
 restore fresh succulence to the weeds, when 
 
 " Halt, stop ! " cried a voice. 
 
 Instinctively, Ruth shrank back. 
 
 " There s a snake ahead of you there 
 just across the path. Don t move ! " cried 
 the voice. 
 
 218 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Miss Adgate stood perfectly still. She saw 
 a man run by her ; she heard the sharp report 
 of a gun. The smell of gunpowder filled her 
 nostrils and the terror of the sudden cry made 
 her feel sick. 
 
 " There he is ! " cried the owner of the 
 voice. 
 
 An excited young man presented upon the 
 muzzle of his gun a viscous two feet of snake, 
 an object that limply resembled the straight, 
 flat limb of a tree. " A copperhead. Tis 
 the only deadly dangerous beast in these harm 
 less woods. As I m alive, if you had put your 
 foot on him you would, indeed, have found 
 him deadly." 
 
 He extended the flabby thing for Ruth s 
 inspection, but the young lady looked away 
 her arm instinctively went out to clutch at 
 something. 
 
 " No cause for fright, Miss Adgate," said 
 the young chap. He proffered a hand to 
 steady her. " I m afraid I gave you a terrible 
 scare," he added, apologetic, and he looked 
 at her with concern, " but that was better 
 than the bite. You re quite white ; sit down 
 a moment. You ll soon feel better." 
 
 Ruth covered her face with her hands. 
 219 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Thank God ! " she said, with an involuntary 
 shudder, but she did not sit down. 
 
 " Are there many of those creatures in the 
 woods ? " she asked, but she felt ashamed of 
 her weakness. 
 
 " No, especially not at this time of year. 
 The warm sun brought this one out. You 
 should never walk about here in low shoes, 
 though, Miss Adgate." 
 
 " You know my name," Ruth said, surprised. 
 
 "I take it for granted you re General Adgate s 
 niece, having a walk through your woods. 
 The whole town knows you arrived last night," 
 answered the young man, with a bow, smiling 
 at her. 
 
 His smile was pleasant, he looked at her 
 with friendly interest. In shabby tweeds and 
 a pair of leggings, a game-bag slung over his 
 shoulder, he was evidently out for a day s 
 shooting. 
 
 " Don t think I m a trespasser, though I 
 can t show you my permit. But your uncle 
 and I are old friends," he vouchsafed. " I m 
 privileged, I must tell you, to shoot here when 
 I like. In fact, I rather fancy the quail you 
 sat down to at supper last night was the pro 
 duct of my game-bag." 
 
 220 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 It occurred to Ruth that this remark came 
 somehow with bad taste the speaker s eyes 
 shone, however, with so kindly a light she 
 hadn t the heart to resent it. 
 
 " You are a marvellous shot," was all she 
 said. 
 
 " I served under your uncle in the Cuban 
 War," the young man told her. " We had 
 sharp fighting then, Miss Adgate. But we re 
 well drilled, here in Oldbridge not a man 
 jack of us but can pick an ace on a play 
 ing card at fifty paces. That s all due to 
 your uncle who supervises the rifle-practice 
 at the Armoury, to say nothing of coaching 
 us in military tactics, which he s past master 
 
 in." 
 
 " Ah ! " said Ruth, interested. " I sup 
 posed he was the most peaceable of retired 
 military men." 
 
 " Peaceable and retired if you like. But in 
 times of peace, prepare for war. . . . The 
 way we are made to answer up to call on drill 
 nights would cause your blood to freeze, 
 Miss Adgate." 
 
 " Ma chef I thought I d come to a quiet, 
 sleepy New England town where all was love 
 and peace ! The day after I arrive I learn 
 
 221 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 I am in a hotbed of militarism," laughed 
 Ruth. 
 
 " You re right," the young man replied seri 
 ously, striding beside her. " General Adgate, 
 you see, has been through two wars. He re 
 ceived his brevet of General in the war between 
 the North and the South. He realises the im 
 portance of preparing for emergencies, now 
 that we ve taken our place among the nations. 
 He s a splendid chap. Not one of us but would 
 walk or fight our way to death for him. . . . 
 And it s always been so. Why, they tell this 
 story when he was just a Captain, in the War 
 of Secession. The enemy was pouring bomb 
 and shell into his entrenchments. He ordered 
 his soldiers on their bellies, and in the midst 
 of the cannonading up he got, stood, coolly 
 lighting a cigarette : Now, my men, said he, 
 rush for them ! The men rose in a body, 
 leapt the entrenchments, fell upon the enemy. 
 Of course the enemy was routed ! we cap 
 tured and brought back guns and ammuni 
 tion with cheers to camp. Then it was, I 
 believe, he was breveted General Adgate." 
 
 Ruth had a shiver of pride as she listened. 
 " But now," continued her informant, " worse 
 luck, in these cowardly moneyed times, there s 
 
 222 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 no fun to be got out of war ! You stand up, 
 of course, to be slaughtered wholesale. Now 
 the best shot has little hope of bringing 
 down his man there s nothing to practise on 
 but quail and partridge in the old General s 
 woods." 
 
 " And snakes," put in Ruth, laughing. 
 
 " Snakes," repeated the young fellow, with 
 a merry laugh. " Thrice blessed copper 
 heads ! " went his mental reservation, so 
 quickly is youth inflamed in America. " But a 
 bounty s on every one of these wretches, Miss 
 Adgate," he said aloud (and Ruth, fortunately, 
 perhaps, was not a mind reader.) "They ve 
 almost disappeared. Truth is, like the rest of 
 us, this one came out to welcome you, poor 
 devil, and he s met with a sad end ! Since 
 the new law a snake may not look at a lady." 
 
 They had reached, as they strolled, the foot 
 of the Adgate hill. As they neared the gate 
 the young man paused. 
 
 " I must bid you good-bye," said he, lifting 
 his hat, "it s long past noon, almost your 
 luncheon hour." 
 
 " Oh," Ruth suggested, " since you and my 
 uncle are friends won t you come in to us for 
 lunch ? You shall go back to your shooting, 
 233 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 your rescuing of damsels, when we ve refreshed 
 you. I dare say there s some of that quail 
 left," she added, with an occult smile. 
 
 " Miss Adgate," the young man visibly 
 struggled with temptation. . . . " Miss Adgate," 
 he looked into the pretty flushed face and he 
 felt himself smitten to the heart s core. 
 " That s very good of you ; I m afraid, though, 
 you don t know our New England customs. 
 You ve a hospitable, beautiful English habit, 
 but you ve not been here long enough to 
 know that we don t ask folk unexpected-like 
 to lunch ; not unless they re blood relatives or 
 bosom friends. Tradition, ceremony, conven 
 tion forbid it and a gorgon more awful still. 
 Her name is Maria-Jane ! " 
 
 "Oh! . . ." Ruth laughed. " But she s 
 paid for that ! It is part of her duty. . . ." 
 
 " Ah, dear Miss Adgate, you won t find it 
 easy. Love won t buy them, money won t 
 purchase them, though I dare say, you ll 
 have a way with you will make them see black 
 white. But if you risk asking me, I won t, 
 and for your sake accept though I m hor 
 ribly tempted to. Besides, think of it, tra 
 dition, ceremony, convention." 
 
 Ruth felt herself getting angry. Here was a 
 224 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 youth she didn t care twopence for, who had 
 done her more than a civility, but who pre 
 sumed to instruct her in a provincial code of 
 manners. She would show him she was 
 mistress of her household then be done with 
 him. 
 
 " What ceremony, what convention ? " she 
 demanded coldly. 
 
 " Oh," the young man replied undaunted, 
 " no one wants his neighbour to know he sits 
 down to a joint, a couple of vegetables and 
 apple pie for his midday meal. We make 
 such a lot of fuss here when we ask people to 
 eat with us." 
 
 " But that s precisely the staple of every 
 one s luncheon in England, from Commoner to 
 Lord," cried Ruth. " No one makes a secret of 
 it it s called the children s dinner. What 
 ever frills may be added, there or here, the 
 joint, the vegetables and the pudding, which 
 amounts to the pie, are invariably present and 
 the most patronised. I assure you it s the 
 luncheon every one ought to eat. And now," 
 she commanded, " open the gate and shut it 
 behind you, and be satisfied to partake of our 
 vegetables, our joint and our pudding without 
 further ado." 
 
 Q 225 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " I accept," said the delighted young fellow. 
 " But if General Adgate turns me out-o -doors, 
 I shall bend to the New England custom I 
 was brought up in and not hold you responsible 
 for my discomfiture." 
 
 They ascended the hill, over the softest, 
 greenest turf ; they went under the apple 
 trees despoiled of apples, passed through the 
 rustic gate, and entered the garden. To the 
 youth, the garden was all fragrant of blossoms 
 which must have burst into flower over night. 
 Such delusive things have a trick of happening, 
 in New England, to an old garden, to welcome 
 the desired person, and Ruth, though she 
 didn t suspect it, had already become the 
 desired person in the eyes of her victim. The 
 syringa tree under which they went spread for 
 them a miraculous white canopy ; the white 
 pinks threw forth aromatic scents which 
 penetrated by the door into the house as 
 Ruth brought her companion to General 
 Adgate, seated before a rousing wood fire 
 reading his newspapers in the drawing-room. 
 
 226 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 VII 
 
 Miss Adgate preceded her companion. 
 
 "Uncle," she boldly proclaimed, "I ve 
 brought a friend of yours to luncheon." 
 
 General Adgate looked up from his book. 
 " Why Rutherford ! glad to see you," he 
 said, shaking hands none too cordially. " So," 
 he smiled as he pushed a chair forward for 
 Ruth, " my niece waylaid you, did she ? " 
 
 " No," Ruth told him. " I was waylaid 
 by a serpent in our woods. Mr. Rutherford 
 happened by at the right moment to rescue 
 me." Then Ruth went to the ancient gilt 
 mirror above the fireplace and withdrew the 
 pins from her hat and rang for Paolina. 
 
 " So you saved the lady s life," General 
 Adgate chuckled. "Well done, Rutherford, 
 my son a plausible opening to the story to 
 please the matter-of-fact public. As though 
 the public were matter-of-fact ! Nothing is 
 really improbable enough for the public, pro 
 vided life s in the telling. We re ready to 
 swallow the most unconscionable lies ! But 
 though you ve lost no time in making the 
 opening ordinary, Rutherford, we shall see 
 what may be done to reward you." 
 227 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 "Oh," objected Rutherford, with happy 
 laughter, " you of all men should know it 
 the service of Beauty brings its own reward 
 to those lucky enough to serve it ? " 
 
 " Lunch is served, Miss," announced Martha 
 patly, putting her head in at the door. 
 
 " Oh, a plate, please, Martha, for this gentle 
 man," said Ruth. 
 
 A shade (was it a look of displeasure ?) crept 
 into Martha s face; the reply came meekly. 
 " Yes, Miss," she answered and disappeared. 
 
 Miss Adgate threw a gay glance at Ruther 
 ford, he returned it with one he meant to 
 make eloquent of his admiration. But Ruth 
 was saying, in that ravishing voice of hers : 
 " Shall we go in ? " She swept by him into 
 the low-ceilinged, white-panelled dining-room 
 with an air of dignity in her slim, young figure 
 which Rutherford thought suited it to per 
 fection. 
 
 VIII 
 
 Poor old Rutherford is fond of recalling 
 that memorable luncheon to this day. Ruth s 
 joyous soul frothed into fun which sounded at 
 times so exactly like Pontycrof t that he seemed 
 to be at her elbow. For a reason not hard to 
 228 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 seek, to sophisticated minds, General Adgate, 
 too, seemed in high spirits. Rutherford well 
 we know what infatuated young men are 
 excellent company because they laugh at a 
 word, could applaud the dullest saw. Neither 
 Ruth nor General Adgate spoke in saws ; by 
 a saw we mean the easy pert phrase, la fhrase 
 toute faite which passes so readily for wit in 
 any land. General Adgate was an accomplished 
 raconteur. He could tell a story with an 
 economy of language, a grace worthy the 
 subtlest story-writers ; the point, unexpected 
 when it came, brought the house down. Ruth 
 listened astonished, and led him on. Ruther 
 ford s haww-hawws, more appreciative than 
 musical, provided the essential base to the trio. 
 
 When lunch was over Ruth ordered coffee 
 to be served in the drawing-room. " You re a 
 daring creature ! I ve never had the courage 
 to ask Martha to do that," objected General 
 Adgate. 
 
 " But don t you always have coffee after 
 luncheon ? " she asked. 
 
 " Yes, but I must e en drink it where it s 
 brought to me, at table." 
 
 " Poor dear ! You see the advantage of 
 having a woman by who fears nothing." 
 229 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " I see the advantage of having a fair niece 
 to minister to my poor human wants," gallantly 
 responded the General. " And to make life 
 extremely worth while, hey Rutherford ? " 
 
 " Miss Adgate is an adorable hostess. If 
 I don t envy you as her uncle, General, it is 
 because I find her perfect as Lady of Barracks 
 Hill," said Rutherford. He said it with a 
 flush and with the fear upon him that he had 
 said too much. 
 
 But Martha just then had entered bearing 
 the coffee ; Ruth, indicating the Japanese tea- 
 table, took no notice of his speech. The 
 table, the shining silver Georgian service on 
 its silver tray were placed before her. 
 
 "Where did you get this old service, Uncle ? " 
 Ruth asked as she lifted the elongated, grace 
 ful coffee-pot by its ebony handle and began 
 to pour the coffee. 
 
 " Martha must have unearthed that from 
 the cupboard upstairs," answered her uncle. 
 " The salver has been put away for years. It 
 belonged to your great-grandmother. But 
 how did they manage to give it such a polish ? " 
 
 " Miss Adgate s maid helped me, sir," Martha 
 vouchsafed in her primmest voice. " We tried 
 that new powder. It took no time at all." 
 
 230 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 She left the room with her chin up as who 
 should say : " We know the proper thing to 
 do, when there s someone at hand who knows 
 we ought to know it." 
 
 " Well ! " exclaimed Rutherford, con 
 founded. 
 
 " Ruth s a mistress as gives satisfaction," 
 General Adgate laughed softly while Martha s 
 footsteps receded towards the kitchen. " I 
 believe, Rutherford, we ll be having our after 
 noon tea here yet, in the British fashion." 
 
 " Ma, da vero ! come si fa ?" cried Ruth, 
 lapsing into Italian in her surprise, " don t you 
 always have afternoon tea ? " 
 
 " We have tea, Miss Adgate," Rutherford 
 answered merrily, " tea with cold meat, 
 stewed fruit and cake at six o clock. Not a 
 minute later, mind you. Martha and Bridget 
 have something better to do than to be serving 
 even you all day. By seven of the clock one is 
 off with one s young man or running over to 
 mother s. . . . You need not inquire at what 
 hour we get back, we have the latch-key, and 
 your breakfast s generally served on time." 
 
 Ruth cast a wild look at General Adgate. 
 
 He bowed his diminished head : " I m afraid 
 it s true," he murmured. 
 231 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Is it a universal habit, in Oldbridge ? " 
 asked Ruth, her eyes dancing. 
 
 " It has to be the universal habit," answered 
 Rutherford. " We simply can t help ourselves. 
 We could get no one at all to wait upon us if 
 we didn t conform to it. The the and the 
 are the only people in town who are known 
 to have late dinners and that s because, hope 
 lessly Europeanised, they don t care what they 
 pay their girls, and keep a butler. Even they 
 are obliged to dine at seven ; besides," laughed 
 Rutherford, " late dinners ain t ealthy ! " 
 
 " After all," said Ruth, thoughtfully, " the 
 custom is primitive, not to say Puritan ; I 
 think it suits Oldbridge. Our forefathers 
 had to do with less service I suppose. And as 
 you say, late dinners airtt ealthy. But Paolina 
 shall give us our afternoon tea, at four, Uncle. 
 It will make her feel at home to serve it to 
 us. But aren t you famished for some music ? 
 I want to try the Steinway. This morning 
 when I came down I raised the lid and saw 
 the name." 
 
 She rose from her corner of the sofa and 
 seated herself at the piano. Oft have I tra 
 velled in those Realms of Gold! . . . Presently 
 she had started her two companions, travel- 
 
 232 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ling, journeying in those Realms of Gold 
 which Chopin opens to the least of musi 
 cians. Chopin s austerity of perfect beauty 
 wrought in a sad sincerity, entered the 
 New England drawing - room. To General 
 Adgate s ears the music seemed to lend 
 voice at last, give expression, at last, to 
 holy, self-repressed, patient lives, lives of 
 the dead and the gone particles of whose 
 spirit still clung, perhaps, to the panelled 
 walls, pervaded, perhaps, the air of the old 
 room. To Ruth, this incomplete New Eng 
 land world, which something more than her 
 self and less than herself was, for the nonce, 
 infatuated with, possessed by, which yet, 
 to certain of her perceptions, revealed itself 
 as a milieu approaching to semi-barbarism, 
 Oldbridge, melted away. At her own magic 
 touch, Italian landscapes, rich in dreams, rich 
 in love, abundant ; decked forth in fair 
 realities, intellectual joys, complete and vi 
 brant of absolute beauty, harmonious, sugges 
 tive, rose, took shape before her. 
 
 " / dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, among 
 pink fragrant oleanders," she repeated, smiling 
 to her thoughts as she played and forgot the 
 present. 
 
 233 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Rutherford, Rutherford, oh, of course 
 Rutherford found in those heavenly chords 
 and melodies what every lover finds in Chopin. 
 
 Ruth turned around upon her piano stool. 
 
 " Have you had enough ? " she asked, 
 smiling. 
 
 " Enough ? " exclaimed the lovesick youth. 
 " I, for one could never have enough." 
 
 " Toujours perdrix ! " said Ruth and lifted 
 up a warning finger. 
 
 " Play us something else, child," said her 
 uncle in a matter-of-fact tone intended to 
 disperse sentimentality. " Let us hear your 
 Russians and a little Schubert." 
 
 And so Ruth played the Valse Lente from 
 the Fifth Tschaikowsky Symphony and the 
 famous Rachmaninoff which, I believe, every 
 body plays, and finished at last with the 
 Fourth Fugue of the immortal Bach. 
 
 " There ! " she exclaimed, " I m tired." 
 
 " And so am I," said the transcriber, laying 
 down the pen. 
 
 234 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 IX 
 
 Young Rutherford bounded from his chair. 
 The tall clock in the hall, as though loth to 
 mark the passage of Time, Time, who had 
 been its friend for something more than a 
 hundred and fifty years, the steadfast old 
 clock began to mark three very slow, slow 
 notes. 
 
 " Miss Adgate, forgive me ! I suppose I 
 ought to go, you should be left to rest ! " he 
 held out his hand. " I ve never known any 
 pleasure comparable to this afternoon s. May 
 I come again ? The whole of Oldbridge shall 
 envy me to-day, I m too vain not to tell 
 them where I ve lunched. Good-bye, good 
 bye," he repeated. He gave Ruth a furtive 
 glance and flushed, very red. 
 
 " Good-bye, Rutherford," said General Ad- 
 gate. He smiled indulgence to the young 
 man who still malingered. " We ll see you 
 to-night," he reassured him, with a nod. 
 " Ruth, you re to make yourself splendid to 
 night. I m to take you to dine at the 
 Wether bys. They are giving a dinner party 
 in your honour, for knowing you were not 
 ridden yet with engagements I accepted for 
 
 235 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 you. There will be some sort of a reception 
 afterwards you d call it At Home wouldn t 
 you ? Everyone s coming. Everybody wants 
 to meet Miss Adgate." He laughed, as though 
 well pleased. 
 
 " I believe he s proud of me," thought 
 Miss Adgate, gratefully. 
 
 The door at last closed on Rutherford. 
 Niece and uncle stood together in the hall, 
 where the voice of the family time-piece, its 
 brass face marking the phases of the sun and 
 moon, underlined the pervading stillness of 
 the house with an austere, admonitative, 
 solemn " tick-tack ! " 
 
 " Ruth," said her uncle abruptly, " why did 
 you come to America ? : 
 
 " Why ? To see you, of course," Ruth said, 
 her tone one of innocent surprise, but she felt 
 a little guilty catch at her heart. 
 
 " Oh, me ! " her uncle said. " You young 
 witch, you never crossed the seas to look at 
 an old man. It was as much my business to 
 cross them to look after you. Come," said 
 he, with a look of raillery, " there was some 
 precipitating cause. You came in a hurry. 
 Something happened for you might have put 
 your journey off for another year. Some- 
 
 236 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 thing occurred, to induce you to come in 
 a hurry." 
 
 Ruth hesitated. She gave a light laugh 
 then she looked away. " Shall I really tell 
 you ? " she asked. 
 
 " The sooner you tell me," said the old 
 General, " the better, for then we ll under 
 stand one another." 
 
 " I left Europe," Ruth said, embarrassed, 
 " because because I wanted to see my 
 uncle and have a look at my ancestral acres ! " 
 she still prevaricated, yet dimpling with amuse 
 ment. 
 
 "Your ancestral acres!" repeated her 
 uncle, sceptically. " Well ? " he encouraged. 
 
 " Oh well because, if you must have 
 another reason still, well because well I 
 felt sore." 
 
 " Why ? " said General Adgate. 
 
 " Why ? " said Ruth with a persistent and 
 feminine reluctance to reveal her real self, 
 speak her true reasons : " Uncle, I wish 
 you wouldn t ask me ! " 
 
 " Out with it," said her uncle. 
 
 " Bertram, Crown Prince of Altronde, 
 wanted me to marry him morganatically. I 
 felt outraged, though they told me it would 
 237 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 be a legal marriage. Harry Pontycroft and 
 Lucilla sympathised with my disgust and 
 packed me off. And that is why." 
 
 The old man looked grave. " Damned 
 European whelps," he muttered. " No wonder 
 your Puritan ancestors shook that dust from 
 their souls. You did well," he said, patting 
 Ruth on the back. 
 
 Ruth went upstairs without another word. 
 The upper hall was lined with bookshelves 
 reaching to the ceiling. " I must add a 
 library to this dear place," she said to her 
 self while she sought for a book. She was 
 tired, she wanted to lie down, she wanted 
 to wash from her mind the impressions of the 
 day; she felt completely fagged. 
 
 General Adgate came upstairs behind her 
 while she was peering along the shelves of 
 calf-bound books. The shelves seemed to hold 
 only a monotonous row on row of histories 
 and works of philosophy. 
 
 " Take this," he said as he passed her, and, 
 pausing, he removed a book from an upper 
 shelf and handed it to her. 
 238 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 This was a volume of Governor Bradford s 
 History of New England. 
 
 " But," Ruth weakly objected, " I wanted 
 a novel ! " 
 
 " You ll find that more interesting than 
 any novel," General Adgate threw over his 
 shoulder as he proceeded on to his own apart 
 ments. 
 
 O Reflex Egotism ! Ruth found the book 
 more interesting than any novel. 
 
 239 
 
PART SIXTH 
 
* I HE Old Town of Oldbridge is rich of one 
 pleasant winding highway along whose 
 route are scattered its prettiest demesnes. 
 Time was, once, when this sun-spattered, tree- 
 bordered thoroughfare enjoyed its dream of 
 peace in drowsy quietude, under spreading 
 lindens and over-arching elms. To-day, how 
 ever, it stirs in its dream. 
 
 Yet its ancient houses stand placidly enough. 
 Comfortable and serene among park -like 
 meadows, life in them goes on with a simple 
 dignity and ease ; and if they are the some 
 time innocent cause of the sin of pride to the 
 families who inherit them, they are sources of 
 arcadian joys to the stranger within their gates. 
 For they are all spotless and restful and 
 fragrant of the breaths of several hundred 
 years of new-mown hay, rose-arbours, and 
 aromatic pinks, blown through the windows. 
 These old Colonial homes speak eloquently of 
 good life past, of still better life present to 
 come. 
 
 243 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The trolley-track and the pretty road keep 
 company a bit, together; they both turn to 
 the left and passing in all say twenty houses, 
 reach the Common and the Post Office, where 
 a dozen or so more hipped roofs, set among 
 quiet flower gardens and apple orchards lend 
 tradition and a quaint distinction to the really 
 lovely old Green. 
 
 The boys of Oldbridge have pre-empted 
 this Green, the most popular of Sports Clubs, 
 and here, after school, as their forbears did, 
 as their fathers and grandfathers did, here 
 they play and tumble and wrestle and 
 fight. From here they cross the road to 
 enter the Public School House, a red brick 
 building which, thirty years ago, supplanted 
 the Dames School, and which balances the 
 old brick Meeting House at the further 
 end. 
 
 f The haunt, trysting-place, council chamber 
 where every mischievous plot is hatched, 
 such is the Common. Whence the eternal 
 Boy, lured by near-flowing waters of the 
 Mantic joins his pals upstream for a swim, 
 plays uproarious pranks there, ties a chap s 
 clothes into a hard knot on the bank and 
 when he comes dripping out in search of 
 
 244 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 them chants, in raucous chorus : " Chaw raw 
 beef the beef is tough ! " 
 
 In Winter, the frozen River Mantic makes 
 an unrivalled skating ground ; and the Old- 
 bridge Boy still builds his ice-fortress on the 
 Common, stocks it (ammunition of snow-balls) 
 and leads his regiment to victory. Here he 
 coasts or hitches his sledge to a huge one 
 fleetly passing, gets a glorious ride comes 
 home, nose and fingers frost-bitten, exceeding 
 argumentative ; talking in loud imperious 
 voice ; in truth a very dog of wintry joys. 
 
 Too often, after supper, the Boy of Old- 
 bridge takes delectable but stolen interest in 
 the conversation of the village Post Master 
 and his cronies. By the door in Summer 
 round the stove in Winter, he and they dis 
 cuss the politics of the hour to many hoary 
 anecdotes between. Pastime sternly pro 
 hibited by parents requiring infinite dis 
 cretion ! Thus one steals with muffled tread 
 down by back stairs, one issues forth by back 
 windows, one whistles to one s fides achates 
 and off. 
 
 Miss Adgate, who to her regret had never 
 been a small boy, never would be, was none 
 the less of opinion that boys are the most 
 245 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 amusing imps and she soon exercised her op 
 portunity for making the acquaintance of a 
 New England lad, Master Jack Enderfield, the 
 twelve-year-old son of Mrs. Enderfield, who 
 lived in the Enderfield House on the Common. 
 Mr. Enderfield, after preaching to his world 
 for fifteen years, had left it, with, he feared 
 on his death-bed, little advantage to its soul. 
 He had gone leaving a library full of theo 
 logical tracts and treatises, of philosophic 
 books and pamphlets, a comfortable fortune 
 inherited from collateral great-aunts, and a 
 son, Jack. Jack was blond, blue-eyed, curly 
 haired, of an enquiring expansive nature to 
 wards those in whom he felt confidence, and 
 a diverting person. Having met Miss Adgate 
 at his mother s, when she returned the lady s 
 call he considered himself entitled to drop in 
 when he liked at Barracks Hill. 
 
 " She s got such stunning hair, mother, and 
 such white hands. . . . And when she talks 
 it makes a fellow feel good. She uses such 
 pretty words and her voice is low and round. 
 And she listens to a man and draws him 
 
 out." - 
 
 L"But, my dear, it may not be convenient 
 for Miss Adgate to receive you so often," said 
 
 246 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Mrs. Enderfield. " Miss Adgate has other 
 people to see, other things to do." 
 
 " Oh, she has always time to see me," re 
 plied Jack, with a wave of the hand. " She 
 told Martha to say she was out the other day 
 when the Wetherbys called. She took me up 
 to her sitting room and showed me a lot of 
 jolly European things and gave me this paper 
 knife." Jack drew from an inside pocket, 
 offering it for inspection, a Venetian filagree 
 paper knife wrapped in soiled and crumpled 
 tissue paper. 
 
 The maternal heart could not withstand 
 such obvious proof of favouritism towards her 
 idol. Though warned not to wear his wel 
 come out, Jackie descended frequently upon 
 Barracks Hill, but this, though it concerns, 
 runs ahead, of the story. 
 
 ii 
 
 Miss Adgate received calls for a month; 
 paid them was dined was less wined than 
 vastly cocktailed, in simple or elaborate New 
 England fashion. She returned these hospital 
 ities and she discovered that Oldbridge New 
 and Oldbridge Old held agreeable people. If 
 247 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 they treated her a little as an Egeria she 
 accepted the role without fuss and gave to 
 modesty its due. 
 
 Some of these new acquaintances, of a 
 pretty taste in letters, on far more than 
 nodding terms with art, had, after years spent 
 abroad fallen like herself alack, upon a day! 
 Alack the day on which we come to the dis- 
 putably sage conclusion that East, West. . . . 
 We know, we learn too late, sometimes alas, 
 the fatal rest! And they had cast behind 
 them the dust of the East, and they had 
 turned Westward with a very lively sense of 
 the superior enchantments of Europe. But 
 once at home a devout appreciation of the 
 sweet repose ( tis the just phrase), an imper 
 ceptible abandonment to that soothing peace 
 which hovers insidious over a New England 
 homestead, ah, ye rewards of Virtue ! these 
 had quietly engulfed in sodden well-being, 
 the finer European impressions. 
 
 Miss Adgate a little later, perceived that 
 these wise people settled ere long unblush- 
 ingly to New Englandism, never again intended 
 to budge. They had accepted, deliberately, the 
 prose of life. And Miss Adgate, enamoured 
 of New England, still kept her head enough 
 
 248 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to wonder, with some dismay, whether she, 
 too, if she stayed here, she, too, would end by 
 looking upon Oldbridge New and Oldbridge 
 Old as the be-all and end-all of existence ! 
 So many things spoke here to her heart. Her 
 tender spirit basked here, all day, in good 
 will. But wasn t Oldbridge just a trifle lack 
 ing in effervescence ? And yes didn t Old- 
 bridge take itself a bit solemnly ? Ah, yes ! 
 And yes it had a distressing tendency to 
 be very serious about everything. To none 
 of these states of mind had Ruth been 
 initiated, and every good Catholic knows 
 that mirth is from God, dullness from the 
 Devil. 
 
 Miss Adgate, who had hitherto lived on the 
 plane of an impersonal, if somewhat facetious 
 consideration of public matters, of wit, 
 persiflage; Miss Adgate found when it came 
 to small gossip that she was an irritated 
 listener. Carping criticism made her yawn, 
 she became dumb, had nothing to say. It 
 is indeed a stupid trade ! Moreover her soul 
 had ever disported in innocent folly, in gaiety 
 and witty conversation. She soon attracted 
 those who cared for the same light stuff and 
 Barracks Hill became, ere long, the centre of 
 249 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 a coterie of frolic, music, and laughter, where 
 personalities except in the ways of honest 
 chaff were tabooed and no one s affairs, 
 wonder of wonders ! were commented upon 
 behind his back. 
 
 in 
 
 But, after all, Barracks Hill it was, " poetic, 
 historic Barracks Hill," which spoke to her 
 fancy, held her heart ! 
 
 This house and the hill of this house were 
 suggestive ; packed full of romance. Ruth, 
 whose temper was a charming compound of 
 mirth love and poesy, Ruth who had the 
 soul of a poet in the body of a fair woman, 
 Ruth now fell deep in love with reverie. 
 She spent long days in a singular sort of 
 trance. Lingering in a room she pondered 
 its messages wandering upon the hill, she 
 dreamed and mused. The room mysteriously 
 unburdened itself of long pent emotions, 
 joys and woes ; the hill unfolded its soul, 
 opened wide its heart to her ; and lonely 
 desolate ghosts the ghosts of monotonous, 
 innocent, happy, sorry lives confided in her 
 told her their tales of pain; disclosed to 
 
 250 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 her their rapture of hope, their mysteries of 
 birth and love and aspiration their tragedy 
 of denial and of death. 
 
 Ruth hearkened to invisible messengers. As 
 she came and went in the still house, they 
 floated towards her light as down, intangible, 
 so perceptible, in the quiet house, and 
 through the corridors. But Love s very breath 
 greeted her on the hill. . . . Love met her 
 there, with exuberance by day ; Love wept 
 there, in her heart bitter tears by night. 
 Yes, a secret sadness brooded at the core of 
 those ghostly souls. But a musical refrain, 
 a simple entreaty seemed ever in the air and 
 its contra-puntal burden : " Love, love and 
 laughter ! Give us love and laughter ! " they 
 implored conquered her heart. 
 
 " They hope in me ! " Ruth thought, won 
 dering and wide-eyed. . . . They have con 
 fidence in me ! The old place believes in me ; 
 it trusts me, it knows that I love it ; it knows 
 I reverence them. ... It knows, they know, 
 how my spirit would wish to cull those un 
 fulfilled desires, every one they long to lighten 
 themselves of, and bring each one to its frui 
 tion if I can. Yes, each of you dear ghosts, 
 you who have been lonely so long and friend- 
 
 251 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 less you know I ll execute your bidding if I 
 
 can." 
 
 And, every day, at the little Catholic Parish 
 Church, Ruth said a Rosary for the house and 
 for the souls that had passed through it. And 
 she visited the house, from attic to cellar. She 
 was convinced that on one occasion she saw a 
 veritable ghost who, smiling at her, passed 
 across the attic. She discovered there, at all 
 events, some fine old pieces of furniture, white 
 with dust ; and she caused these to be cleansed 
 and polished and placed in the rooms. 
 
 IV 
 
 One fine December morning Ruth walked 
 with Miranda on the hill. She was beginning 
 to have projects. 
 
 " Miranda ! " said she, " Heaven knows 
 where you picked the name up," mused 
 Ruth. " Dear kitten, I believe I ll invite 
 my European friends here ! The fashion is in 
 Europe to come and have a look at America. 
 I ll keep open house, and you and I and 
 General Adgate shall receive the most famous 
 people in Europe at Barracks Hill. And 
 we ll show them what they ought to be 
 252 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 curious about, what they ve seen only in 
 books, we ll show them a beautiful old New 
 England town enriched from all sources yet 
 keeping its distinct New England flavour. 
 And I ll give to Oldbridge the enlivening 
 experience," she said with a gleam, " of hob- 
 bing and of nobbing with every light-minded 
 modern who doesn t take life s trivialities 
 solemnly; with every human of talent who 
 cultivates the sweet tonic spirit of levity." 
 
 Miranda listened, his chrysoprase eyes 
 widened contracted blazed with intelligent 
 sympathy. 
 
 " I m with you, if it s anything that has to 
 do with fun," he loudly purred. 
 
 Miranda was not a kitten Miranda was a 
 sleek, a superb tortoise-shell cat. A cat of 
 the masculine persuasion who could have 
 counted six or seven summers if a day. 
 General Adgate had, in " a tonic spirit of 
 levity," christened him at his birth Miranda 
 it may be because the Master of Barracks 
 Hill had likened himself that day to Prospero. 
 Be this as may be, Miranda had kept his 
 youth ; his idea of beer and skittles was still 
 to play at any game he could find a play 
 mate for ; he, at least, was all for sociability. 
 253 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 And it was his friendly habit to follow Ruth, 
 running along the wall of the terrace at her 
 left as she paced the hill. Now, when she 
 addressed him, he drew himself lazily, along 
 the warm stones, stretched himself infinitely, 
 clawed the rough stones deluged in December 
 sunshine, and assuming an irresistible attitude 
 as she spoke, pricked his ears. Then, with a 
 bound made across the turf to an apple-tree, 
 mad for a frolic. He ran up its grey side, 
 lichen-covered, paused, looked down, and 
 jeered at her over his shoulder. 
 
 " Why don t you follow me ? " he taunted. 
 Took, the next moment, his leap over her 
 head, landed at her feet, was scuttling de 
 liriously through wheel ruts, grass-grown, 
 passage of last year s cartwheels. Burrowing 
 under accumulations of brown crackling leaves, 
 flattening himself lengthwise, poking out a 
 pink nose at her, he showed a pair of ques 
 tioning, mischievous eyes. 
 
 " Send out your invitations," counselled he, 
 "but first, catch me! " 
 
 Ruth plunged to a great rustle of dry leaves, 
 
 and light and irresponsible as they Miranda 
 
 darted to a sheltering juniper. Ruth tried to 
 
 seize him useless vanity, for he was quick- 
 
 254 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 silver. Up another tree ere she could lay 
 hands on him, he, perhaps not disdainful of a 
 little petting, and at all events Bon Prince, 
 finally relented ; he allowed her at last to 
 have her way, come close and take him in her 
 arms. 
 
 "You re a duck," said Ruth, laughing, 
 scratching his ears, laying her cheek against 
 his fur all glossy and fragrant of wood odours. 
 " Such a mercurial duck ! You make me feel 
 thrice welcome here. I believe you are the 
 spirit of the place. Yes the little friendly 
 spirit of the house who attracts and keeps 
 those who love it for its good who uses 
 every wile, too, and coquetry to do so." 
 
 Miranda at her words slipped struggling 
 through Ruth s arms to earth, arched his back, 
 rubbed himself against her skirts, purred loud 
 and long circling round her, tail in air and 
 as who should say : " Yes, yes, no doubt. But 
 let us waste no time in sentiment," and away 
 he bounded to a remoter corner of the hill. 
 
 " Of course ! he s showing me the place," 
 she cried. In genuine enjoyment of the sport 
 she ran, eyes brimming with laughter, after 
 the clever fellow as he trotted on ; he be 
 guiled her here and he beguiled her there; 
 2 55 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 he discovered nooks to her full of interest and 
 variety. And as she abandoned herself to the 
 game, played and romped with him, it oc 
 curred to her once again that this, all this 
 was not all this verily part of a sort of terres 
 trial Paradise ? 
 
 Here, the chimneys of the house just vis 
 ible below, here, aloof in a beautiful world, 
 she stood on the brow of her hill among 
 gnarled fine old apple trees. She went up to 
 one, she laid her cheek against it. 
 
 * Yes, I can understand what a sight you 
 were in the Garden of Eden," she whispered. 
 "In Spring, when your rosy blossoms are out, 
 in Autumn when you are hung with ripe 
 red and golden fruit ! And, yes Henry 
 Pontycroft s prophecy is fulfilled. . . . Here 
 is Eve, sulking in her native apple orchard ! " 
 
 " Dcrrier chez mon pere, 
 Vole, vole mon coeur, vole 
 Derrier chez mon pre 
 Y a un pommier doux 
 Tout doux et you ! " 
 
 " If Adam, or if Pontycroft were here . . ." 
 she sighed, " I should be vastly tempted tout 
 doux et you, to tempt either of them. Oh, 
 256 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 see how the rosy horizon is caught in its net 
 woven of grey leafless branches ! The sky is 
 a sumptuous Prussian blue and how it fades 
 at the zenith to palest azure ! All the Royal 
 colour is broken up by bold white clouds, and 
 this ah, this is far too fair a sight for one 
 pair of eyes to revel in alone. This cries, 
 aloud, for Adam ! " 
 
 Ruth looked about her. At her feet, oddly 
 enough, curiously enough, a red firm apple, 
 forgotten there, untouched by frosts, at 
 her feet lay a fine red pippin. She picked it 
 up, she smiled, she wondered. . . . 
 
 " But but there s only you old Puss ! 
 Here, catch it," she cried to Miranda, who 
 came running towards her, scenting the game 
 he loved. With a gentle toss Ruth threw the 
 apple along the turf and left Miranda to the 
 ecstatic enjoyment of patting it, pushing it 
 and rolling over it for quite eleven minutes. 
 
 Miss Adgate had Miranda s approbation for 
 inoculating Oldbridge with levity. She con 
 sulted General Adgate : 
 
 " Anything you like, Ruth. Anything you 
 s 257 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 like to keep you here contented." And he 
 was not in the least fired by her schemes and 
 had nothing further to say. But Miss Adgate 
 sat down at this and scribbled fifty notes, 
 selecting her first guests from all the worlds 
 held in the one London World the men, the 
 women she liked, whose work she liked ; the 
 people who could be irrelevant at a pinch, 
 amused, amusing. She invited them to visit 
 her at Barracks Hill during the coming Sum 
 mer, and in time she received effusive accept 
 ances to her invitations. 
 
 VI 
 
 "The Oldbridge Industrial Exhibits opens 
 to-morrow night," General Adgate, tenta 
 tively, said one day. " Do you care to go ? 
 You ll find all your friends. The Light In 
 fantry Band will play to us. It s rather 
 jolly." 
 
 If New England days in old New England 
 houses are fruitful (to young women of "high 
 faculties quiescent"), if they are fecund in 
 long, poetic dreams, if life in Oldbridge does 
 offer limitless advantage for the building of 
 castles in the air none can deny that it has, 
 
 258 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 too, its own artless way of playing up to the 
 leading lady. 
 
 " I wouldn t be left out for all the planets," 
 protested Ruth. " I m curious to know what 
 the Oldbridge Industries are." 
 
 " In that case " answered her uncle. 
 
 He went off smiling, she could not conceive 
 why. 
 
 " Miss Adgate was a sight for the gods," 
 vowed Rutherford. " Brown velvet, sables, 
 to suit her brown hair with a red glint in it, 
 and eyes ! " 
 
 Miss Adgate doubtless was a sight for the 
 gods, when (conducted by her uncle) she went 
 the following evening to the Oldbridge In 
 dustrial Exhibits. As she was led first by young 
 Rutherford, then by young Milman, then by 
 young Massington, then by young Leffingwell, 
 and then by young Wetherby through a 
 crowd of friends, to every stall and counter 
 of the big illuminated hall, as each of these 
 young men explained, volubly, minutely, each 
 exhibit little was left, we may believe, of 
 Oldbridge Industry which Ruth had not at the 
 end fathomed, become well acquainted with. 
 Pausing at one stall and at another, she ordered 
 with reckless discrimination, rugs, lawnmowers, 
 239 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 carpenter s tools, muslins, silks, furniture ; and 
 a surfeit of glass blown by a little glass-blower 
 who had quite a local reputation for his de 
 signs ; linens, too, and rugs of delicate colour 
 dyed and woven in the neighbourhood upon a 
 hand-loom a hundred years of age. The 
 tools might do for Jobias. He had confided 
 to Paolina that his stock was getting rusty ; 
 the mowers, asked the piratical salesman, are 
 not lawnmowers forever getting out of order ? 
 
 These, Ruth s purchases, she destined for the 
 new wing. She was furnishing the old Morris 
 House, too. The Morris House General Ad- 
 gate had, to her joy, just presented her with. 
 This had been the home of a maternal great- 
 grandmother. From its portals, that lady 
 with the patient eyes (whose portrait, painted 
 by one Jarvis, hung in the drawing-room) 
 having taken Admiral Richard Adgate for 
 better or for worse under the Puritan mar 
 riage service read by Parson Ebenezer Alls- 
 worthy, that lady had tripped across the 
 hill to come and reign at Barracks Hill. 
 
 The Morris House ! Miss Adgate destined 
 
 it for her Summer overflow of guests. It is 
 
 is a quaint and picturesque spot, all nooks 
 
 and cupboards, within; of panelled walls and 
 
 260 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 broad brick fireplaces. As its gardens over 
 look the purling brook and the Wigwam, it 
 was, thought she, well suited to the purpose 
 she intended and it is in fact deserving of 
 far more attention that this passing word can 
 say for it. 
 
 VII 
 
 On New Year s Day, Miss Adgate woke to 
 a blizzard. 
 
 The New Year in Oldbridge is feasted in 
 that old-time pleasant fashion which has long 
 ago passe de mode in New York, which is 
 regarded with disfavour at Boston and in other 
 New England towns. But Oldbridge per 
 severes in welcoming the New Year, for this 
 smacks of ancientry, and, in sooth, the custom 
 is a genial one. Tis well known that in Paris, 
 every hostess, mistress of a salon, is deluged 
 with cards and flowers and bonbons from Bois- 
 sier on the New Year. At Rome, too, on the 
 New Year, and in Vienna and Berlin, is it not 
 considered courteous for a young man, not 
 alone to leave his card, but to call wherever 
 he has received a welcome ? The servants 
 of the houses he frequents, a hint to the wise, 
 261 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 never allow him to forget his obligations ; 
 they pass at his lodgings betimes on the New 
 Year and receive for their Buorf Anno a sub 
 stantial Buono Mano. Oldbridge is, there 
 fore, wholly in touch with the most modern 
 capitals when it hospitably celebrates the New 
 Year. 
 
 As Ruth, accompanied by Paolina, passed, 
 by meadows all sparkling and white with 
 hoar-frost, from the New Year s Midnight 
 Mass at the Parish Church, the stars in a 
 clear sky scintillated with suspicious brilliancy. 
 The usual eager nipping air of a New England 
 Autumn had until then condensed into just 
 an occasional flurry of snow or it had subdued 
 its edge ; the days were often warm enough 
 to sit beside open windows. The American 
 Winter had not begun to show its teeth. But 
 from her bed to-day Ruth saw the flakes 
 descend small, dry, to the rumour of low 
 complaints, murmurs in the chimney. The 
 flakes had a stealthy, a persistent look. Ruth, 
 though, was very sure the storm would prove 
 the hitherto pretty diversion of a w r hitened 
 landscape and trees, of a rapid thaw under 
 warm sun, and Miss Adgate adored these 
 snow falls ! She had never, she thought, 
 
 262 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 seen anything comparable to the white still 
 beauty of the country and the wood, the 
 gentian blueness of the sky when the snow 
 had ceased, the clouds had emptied sack and 
 the sun burst forth. When this happened 
 she would put on a pair of high rubber boots, 
 take a stick and start for a walk. And when, 
 in her walk, she came across the marks of 
 little feet along the snow, squirrel tracks, 
 mole tracks, the tracks of birds, quail, the 
 larger ones of woodchucks, of foxes, little 
 existences living to themselves which she 
 could never know, never fathom her mind 
 would travel off into endless reveries and 
 speculations. 
 
 But her role to-day was that of hostess and 
 there would be no going out to-day after the 
 snowfall. Miss Adgate shortly after breakfast 
 sauntered into the kitchen to see how matters 
 there were progressing. 
 
 Before her, on the kitchen table, an array 
 of angel cake, nut cake, pound cake, orange 
 cake, maple-sugar cake lacked the supreme 
 touch, and waited to be frosted. Spread 
 upon a crackled Coalport dish a quantity of 
 thin, brown, crisp, sugar wafers invited ap 
 petite. These wafers were from a recipe 
 263 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 handed down in the Adgate family. Ruth 
 knew the original, had seen it in Priscilla 
 Mulline Alden s neat cramped little Hugue 
 not handwriting; it was carefully preserved 
 among the most curious of the Adgate 
 relics. 
 
 Martha, Ellen, busy preparing endless 
 edible New England subtleties in the buttery, 
 Margaret stirring an icing for the cake, 
 General Adgate expected, he had promised 
 to come in an hour to brew his famous 
 punch, the ingredients for which were mel 
 lowing and combining in the dining-room. 
 Everything was, then, well under way, each 
 aide-de-camp was at his post ; the commander- 
 in-chief felt she might safely mount to her 
 dressing-room to let Paolina put on the robes 
 of state. 
 
 Now it must be known that Paolina had 
 taken to her new life with unexpected 
 cheerfulness ; and the reason was shortly to 
 be disclosed. 
 
 " Signorina," Paolina began timidly, while 
 she dressed her mistress s hair in a high 
 French twist, placed a bow of pale blue 
 ribbon fetchingly to the left of the coil, poised 
 it there like a butterfly with wings outspread, 
 264 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Signorma would you be very angry if 
 I confided to you, something ? " 
 
 " It depends upon what the something is, 
 Paolina," said Ruth absently, giving her atten 
 tion to the becoming effect of the bow. 
 
 " Oh, Signorina ! " sighed Paolina. Suddenly 
 she clasped her hands ; she held them out 
 before her, dropped to her knees. " Oh ! 
 Signorina ! Jobias has asked me to marry 
 him ! " 
 
 " Jobias has asked you to marry him?" 
 repeated Ruth in astonishment. Then she 
 began to laugh laughed in merry peals of 
 musical laughter, her head thrown back, her 
 face a ripple of mirth. 
 
 But Paolina was quite offended. 
 
 " Signorina," she said, and she rose with 
 dignity, " why should it make you laugh to 
 learn that Jobias has asked me to marry 
 him ? " 
 
 " Forgive me, Paolina," Ruth said ; " it is 
 not that Jobias has asked you to marry him that 
 makes me laugh it is the tone in which you 
 break the news to me." Then, gravely : i( And 
 what did you say to him, Paolina, when he 
 asked you to marry him ? " 
 
 " Signorina, I said I would have to ask you. 
 265 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 I said that you were a mother to me, and 
 that I would have to get your consent." 
 
 " So," said Ruth, " you really think of 
 accepting him ? " 
 
 " I esteem him," said Paolina, " I think he 
 is a good man. He has saved up two thousand 
 dollars. He has a nice house across the river 
 which he lets out, and of which he reserves 
 for himself one room. I think my own 
 mother would be pleased with the match, 
 if you approve, Signorina." 
 
 " But do you realise," said Ruth, " that if 
 you marry Jobias you cannot see your mother 
 again ? It costs a deal of money to cross 
 the ocean. Jobias could not take you he 
 would have his work to do." 
 
 " Oh, Signorina, but you would take us ! I 
 would not leave you, Jobias said I need not. 
 But when you marry (Jobias says you will 
 surely marry, before long) " Paolina nodded 
 her head several times sagaciously " then 
 your husband will want a valet, and Jobias 
 says he will be glad to put himself at your 
 excellencies services. And then, you will go 
 abroad for the wedding tour, and you will 
 want to take us. I can then go to my mother 
 and receive her blessing." 
 
 266 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Ruth caught her breath. " Thus are our 
 lives arranged for us," she thought, smiling, 
 " and by whom ? " For half an instant she 
 was silent. Somewhere, among the recesses of 
 memory, Ruth tried to recall such a conver 
 sation. She remembered she had read it, 
 why, it was in one of Corvo s witty tales. . . . 
 So does history repeat itself. What the 
 romancer invents women and men enact. 
 
 But just then, crisis of Paolina s life, the 
 knocker at the front door went rat-tat. 
 
 " Good gracious, and I m not dressed yet. 
 Put my dress on quickly, Paolina, we ll finish 
 our talk at some other time," Ruth exclaimed. 
 
 Paolina ran to the bed, lifted the pale blue 
 chiffon gown inlaid with yellow lace passed it 
 dexterously, delicately, over Ruth s head, and 
 began with her adroit, rapid fingers to lace the 
 bodice. Martha knocked at the door : " Master 
 Jack Enderfield is in the drawing-room, Miss," 
 she said in her precise voice. Ruth glanced at 
 the clock the hands pointed to ten. 
 
 " Tell Master Jack Enderfield I ll be down 
 directly," she said. Ruth, standing before the 
 cheval glass, gave a light pat here to her gown, 
 a touch there to her coiffure Martha lingered 
 a minute to take the vision in. 
 267 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Yes, Miss/ she said, closed the door, and 
 was gone. 
 
 Then Ruth descended the stairs in a frou 
 frou of skirts, wafting an odour of violets as 
 she went along ; and she greeted Master Jack 
 Enderfield at the drawing-room door with that 
 radiant grace the young man seemed so well 
 able to appreciate. 
 
 VIII 
 
 " I thought I d come early," Jack explained, 
 as he stood before the wood-fire in a man-of- 
 the-world attitude : " I knew that when the 
 crowd began there d be no chance for me." 
 
 " I m delighted you came early," said Ruth. 
 " Won t you sit down ? 
 
 Jack sat down. He plunged at once into 
 the subject which was on his mind. 
 
 " It s all nonsense, this talk about a Re 
 public," he began. " We d have been much 
 better off if we d stuck to England. Oh, we 
 mightn t have been so rich," he made a large 
 gesture, " but we d have been nicer." 
 
 " Jack, these sentiments on the New Year 
 for a child of Liberty, a son of the Revolu 
 tion ! " Ruth reproved. 
 
 268 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " It s not my fault, Miss Adgate, if I m a 
 son of the Revolution, and I don t believe in 
 Liberty. I wish my double great-grandfather 
 hadn t come over here and married my 
 double great - grandmother." Master Jack 
 stuck his hands doggedly in his pockets and 
 glowered at the fire. 
 
 " Oh, cheer up," laughed his young hostess. 
 " Accept the inevitable, Jack, make the best of 
 it ! But what can have happened to-day to 
 make you think ill of Liberty and the Revo 
 lution ? " 
 
 " It s very well for you to sit there, Miss 
 Adgate, sit and poke fun at me in your soft 
 voice and your beautiful gown," Jack said, 
 flushing. " But you know as I do, that this 
 this country is rotten it s going to the 
 dogs, nothing ll save it ! " 
 
 " My dear Jack," accused Ruth, " you ve 
 been reading the newspapers ! " Miss Adgate 
 never would, for her part, so much as look at 
 an American newspaper ; she got all her news 
 by way of England, in the Morning Post. 
 
 "The demoralisation s in the air, Miss 
 Adgate, the newspapers only tell what s hap 
 pening. But our nation has the impertinence 
 to go on, like a rooster on a wall, flapping its 
 269 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 wings in the world s face and screeching, 
 Admire me ! Don t I behave pretty ? No," 
 continued Jack impressively, with a look of 
 uncanny wisdom in his blue eyes, " No I m 
 going to skip this country as soon as I can get 
 out of it. Here in quiet old Oldbridge, we re 
 not so bad, though we do like to play a game 
 among ourselves ; proud of being old and 
 aristocratic and so forth, and we expect if 
 we re good we ll get to Heaven ; some of us, 
 though, don t remember Charity s the only 
 way to get to Heaven ! But the whole 
 country s talking Choctaw, with a hare lip 
 and only a few of us, like your uncle and old 
 Mrs. Leffingwell and Mr. Massington, know 
 what a good Anglo-Saxon Ancestry implies. 
 The rest of us cackle like the aforesaid barn 
 yard fowl. 
 
 " Miss Adgate," went on Jack, briskly, "no 
 wonder ! See how we mix affably with the 
 riff-raff who haven t a language. People who 
 are told by the blooming Constitution of this 
 land that they re as good as you and me and 
 make uncouth noises according. This I m-as- 
 good-as-you idea is all rot. They re not as 
 good as you and they re not as good as me. I 
 am better than the Butcher s boy, who hasn t 
 270 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 brains enough to know his own foolish business 
 and forgets to bring my meat. I am better 
 than Ezekiel, who won t black my boots. 
 Damn him," said the boy wildly, " why 
 shouldn t he black my boots ? Let him do 
 his honest work, like a man ; become a useful 
 member of society if he wants to get to be my 
 equal ! Not spend his days shirking and com 
 plaining through his nose." 
 
 " Dear, dear Jackie ! Have a glass of lemon 
 ade, have a cake ! America s not so bad if you 
 can rise above it . . ." soothed Miss Adgate 
 with, perhaps, a grain of malice. She rang for 
 refreshments. 
 
 " She s the sweetest, prettiest, dearest thing 
 in Oldbridge," the boy thought as he followed 
 Ruth s movements with adoring eyes. 
 
 " Miss Adgate, am I accountable for what 
 my double great-grandfather did ? " Jack asked 
 suddenly. " I think he played me a low trick. 
 He was one of these Cavalier people who stuck 
 to Charles the Second. The King, after he d 
 come to the throne, offered him the Chan 
 cellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster. But 
 the idiot refused it ! He d tasted blood, he 
 said. He knew Court life, found it dull ! 
 He wanted one of adventure, something like 
 371 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 the dance he d been leading with Charles. 
 c Give me land, Sire, in Virginia, he said. 
 6 I ll go out there and extend your Majesty s 
 importance. 
 
 " Miss Adgate, be should have stuck to Merry 
 England. And pray, what did his great-grand 
 son do ? Married a Northerner, became wife- 
 ridden, dropped his title, sold his lands, went 
 to New England, settled right here in Old- 
 bridge, his wife s town ; and equipped a regi 
 ment and fought. I m glad to say he got killed, 
 at Lexington. But not without leaving pos 
 terity, of which you see before you the last 
 indignant remnant." 
 
 " And you, you find you re reverted to the 
 state of mind of the Cavalier before he for 
 sook England," Ruth said thoughtfully. " Jack, 
 you ve a homesick hankering to go back 
 there ? " 
 
 " Yes, Miss Adgate," cried the boy. " And, 
 I ll tell you a still greater secret " 
 
 Jack paused. 
 
 " est une journee de confidences" thought 
 Ruth, "well ? " she encouraged. 
 
 " Miss Adgate, we re not aristocratic," Jack 
 declared in a low voice. " We ve just become 
 low-down Provincials. But when I m a man I 
 272 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 mean to go and claim our lands and titles and 
 our position in Devon. I m the rightful heir ! 
 My father kept the Enderfield Tree in an old 
 desk in the drawing-room. It s there, at this 
 moment, in a tin tube, on parchment. I ve 
 often brought it out when my mother s at 
 church and had a good look at it." 
 
 " Try a chocolate," interposed Ruth sooth 
 ingly; but the image of the Enderfield tree 
 in a tube made her laugh as she offered the 
 lacquered box, inlaid with mother of pearl, 
 which she kept filled for these occasions. 
 
 " You re a Catholic, Miss Adgate," presently 
 observed the youthful aristocrat when he had 
 permitted Ruth s sweets to be thrust upon him. 
 
 "Yes," said Ruth urbanely. And " I 
 wonder whether Jack is preparing to rend the 
 Faith," she thought. 
 
 " Well," Jack announced with deliberation, 
 " I mean to be a Catholic when I m done 
 with all this." He swept the present away 
 with his hand. 
 
 " Ah ? " said Ruth, surprised. " Why ? " 
 
 " Oh, it s the only Faith for a Gentleman," 
 
 the boy answered. " For a gentleman and a 
 
 scholar," he emendated. " You see we re all 
 
 compounded too much of human nature 
 
 T 273 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 and we re all too much given to thinking. 
 Yet our thinking leads nowhere, in the end 
 the flesh and the devil do what they like with 
 us. We may sit with our heads between our 
 hands, we may try to reconcile our human 
 nature with idealism until we re ready for 
 the madhouse, and we ll get to the madhouse, 
 but we won t have solved the problem. 
 Now a man wants to be decent, and the 
 Catholic Faith (I got Mary to tell me a lot 
 about it, and I ve read about it in some of 
 my father s books), while it makes allowances 
 for human nature and treats it in the most 
 sympathetic way, does know how to keep it 
 within bounds. Why, it s a regular school of 
 Saints ! And it honestly recognises that we re 
 mortal ; inheritors of original sin as the spark 
 flies upward. Yet if we go and confess our 
 sins and try to feel sorry for em, we receive 
 the grace of the Sacrament of Penance and 
 Absolution, and we can then receive the 
 Blessed Sacrament. And when we receive the 
 Blessed Sacrament our souls are developed and 
 fed from God Himself and enabled to domin 
 ate our bodies." 
 
 " I see you ve been well instructed," said 
 Ruth, astonished at this boy s clear exposition. 
 
 274 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " I got Mary to tell me a lot about the 
 Catholic Faith, and I ve read Bellarmine and 
 Saint Augustine and a lot of my father s books," 
 repeated the boy, a little wearily. " But what 
 I like best," he said brightening again, " is 
 that the Church is down on divorce." 
 
 " What hasn t this singular boy reflected 
 upon," thought Ruth. 
 
 " In a few years I m going to take the money 
 my father left me, marry, and go abroad and 
 be a writer, Miss Adgate," declared Jack. 
 
 " Ah, that might not be a bad idea. Have 
 you selected the young lady ? " Ruth enquired. 
 
 " I ve been looking about, among the girls 
 here," Jack answered, " but I don t find any 
 I can fall in love with," he added plaintively. 
 " They re all rather silly and superficial. I 
 should like to find someone like you," he 
 declared with abrupt enthusiasm. " Someone 
 who s pretty, someone who s a soft sweet 
 voice, thinks about things, likes to read, that 
 sort of thing. Yes," he said, gazing at her, 
 " if you were younger or I older, I should like 
 you to marry me, I should ask you to marry 
 me." 
 
 " But no divorce," Ruth threatened merrily. 
 
 " No divorce ? No of course not ! " said 
 275 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Jack in sober disgust. When once we re mar 
 ried it s for better for worse. I shall say that 
 from the first. Don t we always have to live 
 with people we quarrel with at first ? Look 
 at my mother and Mary. She was for flouncing 
 that girl from the house the first week, and 
 Mary gave notice, day after she got in. Then 
 they shook down and my mother thinks Mary s 
 a treasure and Mary d cut her hand off for my 
 mother. She would for me, told me so. 
 Gives me all the cream and pie I want, never 
 tells when I come in late from the Post Office. 
 No, the sooner you find out you re tied to the 
 person you love by a hard knot for life, the 
 sooner you realise that marriage is a Sacra 
 ment, the sooner if you ve got an ounce of 
 sense and the Catholic Faith to help you 
 you learn to shake down and be happy. Be 
 sides, my wife shall be in love with me and 
 she ll do exactly as I like," declared Master 
 Jack Enderfield. 
 
 IX 
 
 A gay jingle-jangle, the concord of sleigh- 
 bells, the muffled piaffering of horses hoofs 
 and the door-knocker went again rat-tat. . . . 
 Voices sounded in the hall, Rutherford and 
 276 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Robert Leffingwell entered the room, Jack s 
 tete-a-tete was interrupted. 
 
 " Good - bye, Miss Adgate," said Jack, 
 abruptly. He cast a scowl of dislike at the 
 jovial face of Rutherford. Before Ruth could 
 make reply Jack was out the front door, and 
 his friend had a glimpse of a pair of boyish 
 legs leaping the offset. 
 
 " Splendid way of getting rid of obstacles," 
 Rutherford said as he followed Miss Adgate s 
 eyes, " but what an odd boy it is ! We re in 
 for a blizzard,Miss Adgate," added he, and he 
 approached the fire and cheerfully rubbed his 
 hands. 
 
 " A Blizzard ! " cried Ruth. She ran to 
 the window, followed by her two guests. 
 
 For a moment Ruth and the two young 
 men watched the flakes descend. . . . They 
 seemed to fall, fall, from limitless Niagaras of 
 snow, from regions without the world, whose 
 fountain-heads, beyond the skies, might be 
 situate in those wastes of storm and cloud, 
 where a Teutonic Mythology places its gods. 
 The trees swayed gently, but even as Ruth 
 watched them they had begun to bend in 
 torture under a furious gale. Clouds of snow 
 rose and fell like the billows of the sea. . . . 
 277 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 The temperature capriciously dropped to far 
 below zero. Had not Jobias been prepared 
 for this by previous knowledge, the house 
 might have become uninhabitable. But Jobias 
 knew his business and stood by the furnace. 
 All that day and evening he watched it, fed 
 it ; and left his post from time to time only 
 to replenish with fresh baskets of logs the 
 voracious fireplaces in the drawing-rooms, cast 
 ing above the baskets of wood a paternal 
 smile, an indulgent glance upon those idle 
 ones gathered round the flames. 
 
 Sledges, meantime, drove up. Guests de 
 parted, guests arrived, unruffled by stress of 
 weather. All, rather, were most obviously 
 exhilarated by it. Ruth s friends were in the 
 maddest spirits. Punch flowed, quips, cranks, 
 peals of laughter made the house resound. 
 The Blizzard adding, at it always does, a fresh 
 elixir, more oxygen to the already super 
 charged New England atmosphere, Ruth, too, 
 felt unaccountably elated. Her eyes sparkled 
 while the winds howled and hooted, and bullied 
 and tore ; the unassuaged tempers of five 
 thousand demons seemed about to take their 
 fill of hate upon an innocent, well-meaning 
 world, but a rosy colour bloomed in Miss 
 
 278 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Adgate s usually pale cheeks. She had never 
 appeared to such advantage; she had never 
 looked so lovely, appeared so brilliant, nor 
 been so amusing. Rutherford, as though the 
 storm had gone to his head, Rutherford watch 
 ing her covertly, vowed he could throw him 
 self at her feet before the roomful, and Ruth s 
 intuitions warned her ; she had a feminine 
 inkling of danger. She chatted and she 
 laughed from her corner by the table laden 
 with excellent things to eat ; but she kept 
 Rutherford at arm s length the while her 
 fancy began to draw a picture of Pontycroft, 
 standing it beside Rutherford. For the first 
 time, she perceived that General Adgate re 
 called Pontycroft in a measure. Tall, thin, 
 spare, his aquiline features were like Ponty- 
 croft s, his bearing was that of a distinguished 
 man. " He has Harry Pontycroft s air of 
 knowing that he knows," reflected Ruth softly ; 
 tenderly to her soul she quoted a line Ponty 
 croft long ago had ironically applied to him 
 self : 
 
 "He who Knows that he Knows, follow 
 him." 
 
 Pontycroft loved to discourse for the pleasure 
 of holding forth, General Aldgate was reti- 
 279 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 cent. His voice was low, well modulated ; 
 one could not have helped listening to it, or 
 to what he said ; even though this had not been 
 wise or witty if often touched with irony. 
 
 Rutherford, of medium stature, had the 
 neck of a bull. His skin, originally clear, was 
 yet ensanguined by exposure to wind and 
 weather ; he liked an out-of-door life and 
 since he was heir to a fortune and detested the 
 counting house, his life went in hunting, shoot 
 ing, and fishing. He had a shock of black hair, 
 clear black eyes, rather an attractive habit of 
 darting a keen glance at his interlocutor as he 
 spoke a glance that seemed to grasp all there 
 was to see, hidden or upon the surface, in a 
 flash. But his voice was nasal, his words 
 rushed, spluttered to be free ; they issued 
 chopped in two and left the idea unf ormulated. 
 It required some familiarity with the American 
 vernacular to understand him. 
 
 " And he, a college man ! " scoffed Miss 
 Adgate. 
 
 But at that instant while Ruth indulged, 
 I grieve to acknowledge it, the spirit of 
 mockery a thunderous crash broke the unison 
 of lively voices. The score of people in the 
 rooms flew to the windows. There, tossed to 
 
 280 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 earth, abased from glory, prone upon the 
 ground imploring boughs lifted to heaven, a 
 wreck there lay the monster Adgate elm, one 
 of the hoary elms in the carriage sweep. It 
 lay there as neatly cut as with a scimitar. 
 The splendid tree was literally slashed in twain 
 by the Blizzard s invisible weapon, the pros 
 trate thing loomed, portentous, to twenty 
 pairs of eyes. 
 
 With the rest, Ruth stared at the fallen 
 King. There was a lump in her throat. . . . 
 No one spoke. . . . Every man and woman 
 in the room had waxed intimate with that 
 old tree, had come to man s or woman s 
 estate beside it ; they had played under it, 
 insensibly had come to love it, as a part of 
 themselves, as a piece of their pleasant, happy 
 lives. This comrade and landmark was, too, 
 one of the pardonable vanities of Oldbridge. 
 
 " Praise Heaven it wasn t the roof," said, 
 at length, the Master of Barracks Hill. He 
 knew, though, he would have preferred to 
 have it the roof. A roof may be replaced. 
 His niece even, did not suspect the passion of 
 attachment any plant or tree upon his land 
 could stir in him upon occasion. 
 
 281 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Perseveringly the snowflakes descended. 
 They continued to fall, fall, fall, for another 
 thirty-six hours. The wind next morning, 
 though, had stopped, and debris of yesterday s 
 storm had been removed. A trackless white 
 garment of snow spread to the furthest reaches 
 of Barracks Hill. 
 
 " This is all very weird," said Ruth to 
 Miranda, as, side by side, they sat and gazed 
 on leagues and leagues of the white silence. 
 " Miranda, this is all very well Blizzards 
 are very stirring ; simple homely pleasures are 
 very pleasing, this landscape is very beautiful, 
 but, " Ruth suppressed a yawn. 
 
 " Besides, why will young men make geese 
 of themselves ? One can t get away from him, 
 Miranda ; a Blizzard even, does not keep him 
 away ! Miranda ! If there s an object, my 
 dear kitten, I detest, it s a sentimental young 
 
 man." 
 
 " Uncle," said Ruth, nonchalantly, to 
 General Adgate that evening after supper, as, 
 with Miranda purring snugly beside her, the 
 282 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 three sat together in the drawing-room, " I 
 have an invitation from the Bolingbrokes, in 
 Washington. They want me to come to them 
 for a visit. Would you would you miss me 
 very much ? " she coaxed, and she went to him 
 and laid a caressing hand on the old man s 
 cheek "would you mind, very much, if I 
 were to accept ? " 
 
 " Mind, my dear ? " General Adgate 
 looked at her. " Who am I to say mind ? 
 You are your own mistress. Miss you ? 
 That s another pair of sleeves." 
 
 " But suppose I bring them back with me, 
 I mean the Bolingbrokes," laughed she. 
 " They re such dears. . . . You d fall in love 
 with her, the sauciest sprite in Christendom. 
 And he ll welcome the occasion to talk in 
 ternational Politics with you ! I believe," 
 Ruth teased, she drew up the Empire settle 
 before the fire, she took Miranda to her knees 
 and sat down again ; " I believe that it s 
 my Duty to go to go fetch them to 
 play with you." With a final nod of decision 
 Miss Adgate placed two small, elaborately shod 
 feet, in a pair of high-heeled, steel-embroidered 
 Florentine shoes, upon the fender ; she began, 
 with equal decision, to remove the wrappers 
 283 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 from The Athenceum, The Saturday Review 
 and a couple of Morning Posts. 
 
 " Go my dear," said the old man gently. 
 
 " Dear me ! I feel like a brute," thought 
 Miss Adgate. " What will he do if I return 
 to England ? Oh, why will people get fond 
 of people ! " 
 
 Miranda purred. . . . The fire responded ; 
 a crisp, little musical crepitation ; the flames 
 licked the wood, the logs consumed them 
 selves, in a cadenced song of happy Death and 
 blessed Eternity. Punctured by this music 
 silence entered, cozily, warmly descended 
 upon the New England drawing-room. 
 
 284 
 
PART SEVENTH 
 
JV/TISS ADGATE accepted the Boling- 
 ^ brokes invitation. She spent six weeks 
 of gaiety in Washington. Indeed it was re 
 freshing to live in the world again, to mix with 
 people of the world ; to have cogent reasons 
 for dressing exquisitely every night for dinner, 
 to be taken in to dinner by a facetious attache, 
 by, even, a complacent, redundant railway 
 magnate ; or, happy compromise, by a Member 
 of the Cabinet, for it is well known that a 
 Cabinet Minister may be amusing. Through 
 the interchange of frivolities and banter one 
 could rise, not to more important matters, 
 is anything much more important to the world 
 than the light touch and a witty conversation ? 
 But Miss Adgate found refreshment in living 
 again among people whose thoughts were 
 sometimes occupied by questions impersonal, of 
 more or less consequence to the world s history. 
 Someone possessed of a grain of humour has 
 assured us that the " World is a good old 
 Chum." 
 
 287 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Miss Adgate found the world at Washington 
 a very good old chum during those six weeks. 
 " In all but the aesthetic sense," she reflected, 
 " America is an interesting land to live in." 
 Plentiful wherever she went, tittle - tattle, 
 supplemented by her own observations, helped 
 her to form an idea of how this unwieldy 
 bulk of a nation calling itself The United 
 States of America was being rescued from 
 fatuous chaos, a mass of political corruption 
 and a superfluity of wealth, and lifted into an 
 arrogant, resolute Power. But a Power whose 
 outlook was as far removed from the simple 
 hardy traditions of Puritan America as Earth 
 is from Heaven. 
 
 An oligarchy of able men, a handful, 
 chosen, directed, inspired by a man yet abler, 
 more audacious than they, these were mould 
 ing, had already changed the destiny, the 
 policy of the United States. 
 
 Miss Adgate recognised the efforts of the 
 Man at the Helm. He had followed a fixed 
 idea, and the idea was the Greater Glory of his 
 Country ; he had secured with his henchmen 
 indisputable prestige to the Nation, and, 
 thanks to his star, his tenacity, his temerity, 
 America, feared to-day if not honoured, was 
 288 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 powerful. But not alas approved of ! " Damn 
 approval ! " (the worm will turn, the watch 
 word passed through the land). " We are our 
 selves." 
 
 The " ourselves " went very far. This at 
 least was the modest, unexpressed opinion of 
 Miss Adgate, it was shared, apparently, by 
 the Man at the Helm. He lectured the Nation 
 like a father. The Nation knowing itself to 
 be unwholesome, inchoate, something ruthless, 
 listened meekly. 
 
 " But," Ruth reflected from the vantage 
 of a calm and sympathetic observation : " So 
 many religions, no Faith ! Where every man, 
 in disobedience to Christ, chooses to be his 
 own Pope. Yet the Holy Father has dedi 
 cated America to Our Lady of the Immacu 
 late Conception. . . . But the very elements 
 in America, so violent and so ferocious, the 
 burning Summers, the cruel Winters, the 
 appalling cataclysms of Nature, if these are 
 reproduced in the violent characters of the 
 people, inclined to rape and rapine on a big 
 or a little scale at what end, left to its own 
 devices, will the American character issue ? 
 Will it," she wondered, " become, inflated 
 with power, the great Master Robber of the 
 u 289 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 World ? Or will it perish utterly, hoist by its 
 own petard ? : 
 
 " Jerusalem ! Jerusalem / Convertere ad 
 Dominum Dcum" . . Mournful and tender, 
 in the melodious, yearning, touching accents 
 of Tenebrae, the phrase filled her ears. 
 
 " No man at the Helm," she sorrowfully said 
 to herself, " shall save us for more than his few 
 years of tenure. The race cries for direction, 
 a sane outlet to its emotions. The sole influ 
 ence which holds anarchy at bay is Holy 
 Mother Church, wise men tell us. Yes, the 
 Divine Authority ! . . The sweet miracle of 
 the Catholic Faith may save our people from 
 ending as a nation of brutes ; may open to us 
 the gates of Humility and show to us the road 
 to the < Greater Glory of God. " 
 
 And then, Miss Adgate woke with a start 
 from her musings. She shook her pretty head. 
 She returned to the practice of light banter 
 and witty causerie, the only efficacious methods 
 within reach, she reflected, of furthering the 
 millennium her fancy painted for her native 
 land. 
 
 ii 
 
 " My little dear Ruth," Lucilla wrote, 
 " we re coming on the most important mission 
 290 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 to America. Namely, to see you. Yes, and 
 haven t I a bagful of news for your Royal 
 Highness ! 
 
 " We sail by the Ceiric on the fifteenth of 
 April, Harry can t leave until then. To con 
 fess the truth, he is in Altronde. Civillo, of 
 course you ve seen it by the papers, Civillo 
 is gone to a greater Principality, Bertram is 
 King. 
 
 " I want to see you oh ! And Ruth, I burn 
 with curiosity to look on that New England 
 of yours. Harry, I m convinced, is prepared 
 to settle there. He says, so pathetically, that 
 at his time of life he feels the need of plant 
 ing cabbages and that the Upper Gardener 
 at Pontycroft gives notice when he tries to. 
 He s heard that in New England gardeners 
 are kind, don t mind a bit ; they just let you 
 plant, right down ; are affable ; make you 
 settle right down and become one of em. 
 But Harry says, too, he pines at first hand 
 to solve the inwardness of a land destined to 
 dominate us all. 
 
 " Ruth, between you and me, in confidence, 
 if America is to be the future of Europe 
 well then I m glad I shall be dead. 
 
 " But between you and me, my dear, what 
 291 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Henry Pontycroft wants is not so much to 
 plant cabbages neither is it to study politics. 
 . . What he truly-ruly wants is a glimpse of 
 the Young Person. He s missed you ! Ah ! I 
 have news. Your devoted, LUCILLA." 
 
 Over this flippant missive Ruth grew hot, 
 then cold, then faint. And she sat, for a 
 long moment in a state of emotional upheaval, 
 of senseless vacuity the while her head whirled 
 and her heart went thump, thump, thump ! 
 It was an entire quarter of an hour before 
 this commotion subsided, and left her with 
 soft flutterings at her throat. 
 
 " They re coming, they re coming, they re 
 coming ! He s coming. . . I shall hear his 
 voice, I shall see him. Oh, what has happened ? 
 Is it possible that he s free ? Oh, my God, 
 my God, help me to wait," she cried. She 
 began to cry and to sob like a little child. She 
 craved, wanted, longed for, unendurably, over 
 whelmingly, that he should take her in his 
 arms, caress and fondle her, and, like a veritable 
 little girl pat her cheek and soothe her, let her 
 unburden her woes, let her lie, her head in 
 his breast, while he said to her, " There, little 
 child, there, don t cry." And it was in Ponty- 
 crof t s voice that the words fell upon her ears, 
 292 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 and it was on Harry Pontycroft s breast that 
 she dried her eyes. And they were Ponty 
 croft s eyes into which her eyes smiled, when, 
 presently, mocking him through her tears, but 
 in oh, such heaven of bliss ! she repeated the 
 trite refrain of the tritest, the most foolish of 
 Ballads. 
 
 " In God s hands ! " said Ruth; she dried 
 her eyes. " Like everything else. . . ." 
 
 She put her hat and jacket on and went for 
 a walk. When she reached the house an hour 
 later, she had found her peace, and though 
 her eyes were singularly bright and her manner 
 curiously vivacious, this contributed the more 
 to her success of the evening at the Boling- 
 brokes . 
 
 " Ruth " Mrs. Bolingbroke rushed at her, 
 enfolded her in an impetuous hug, " you re 
 delicious ! Stay in Washington. Stay in 
 Washington for ever " 
 
 " Come to Barracks Hill with me," answered 
 the young lady. " I must be flitting almost 
 
 at once." 
 
 " No, no, no. . . ." protested Mrs. Boling 
 broke. But it was peaceably arranged at last 
 that the Bolingbrokes, having a conge at Easter, 
 should come, then, to Barracks Hill. 
 293, 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 And so, on the fifteenth day of March, 
 Ruth bade farewell to Washington and tra 
 velled back to Oldbridge. 
 
 in 
 
 One long month and one entire week to 
 wait. If Time was interminable, Miss Adgate 
 resolved to make Time bear fruit. She took 
 herself in hand. She tried to quell the little 
 tremors of joy which kept welling up in her 
 throat when she thought of the end of those 
 five weeks. 
 
 " They ll probably not come. They ll 
 change their minds. If they do come it s 
 more than likely some nonsense of Lucilla s ! 
 . . . Well. . . . Besides I ve other businesses 
 to attend to," the lady said with a most deter 
 mined air. 
 
 As the least profitless way of passing those 
 interminable days, Ruth set herself to the task 
 of enhancing the natural beauties of Barracks 
 Hill. She caused paths to be cut through the 
 woods ; she enlarged the flower gardens ; she 
 prepared the Morris House for her June 
 visitors. As to the library and the music- 
 room they had long since been ready for occu 
 pation. And in the interim of labour Miss 
 294 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 Adgate gave a series of children s parties, 
 calling Jackie Enderfield to her assistance. 
 Her invitations vested in that young gentle 
 man s hands, he became cock-of-the-walk 
 among the girls and boys of Oldbridge and 
 Rutherford was thus kept at bay. Yet not 
 withstanding these spartan derivatives, Ruth 
 walked on clouds, smiling at love. 
 
 " She breathes roses and lilies," Miss 
 Deborah Massington declared with enthusiasm. 
 
 Eighty, thereabout, Miss Deborah was sister 
 to Mrs. Leffingwell and her junior by ten years. 
 
 " She has charm," Mrs. Leffingwell answered, 
 discreetly, while they watched Ruth s erect 
 young buoyant figure disappear beyond the 
 lindens. " She makes one feel that everything s 
 all right better to come. I wonder . . ." 
 
 Ruth liked an hour spent in these ladies 
 bow-window ; gay and fragrant window, all 
 vivid of sunshine, filled with blossoming ger 
 anium and heliotrope. While she entertained 
 them with tales of Italy, which they could 
 never hear enough about, Ruth Adgate re 
 flected that the lives of her grandmothers 
 must have been just such quiet, such repressed, 
 contented lives as these. 
 
 Mrs. Leffingwell and Miss Massington, types 
 19$ 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of New England s most exquisite product 
 the old lady. The old lady who, with all her 
 gentle unworldliness, is a patrician to her 
 finger tips. As the perfume of rose-leaves is 
 preserved in a fine porcelain jar so the hushed 
 fragrance of these temperate lives emanates, 
 yet stays, to the end. White, ethereal, peace 
 ful and pictorially the replicas of Whistler s 
 mother, these two ladies were waited upon by 
 a black servant, whose gorgeous head-gear was 
 the red, blue, and yellow bandanna. Each 
 lady had her window in the low-ceilinged, 
 white-panelled drawing-room ; each was clad 
 in good black silk; on each white head a cap 
 reposed of fine Honiton lace and their gowns 
 were finished with a transparent lace collar 
 and cuffs. Both ladies were slightly deaf ; 
 both were omnivorous readers, both were eager 
 listeners ; both had the sense of humour ; and 
 both were indulgent amused lookers-on at the 
 small games of life which they were no longer 
 privileged to take part in ; and if gracious 
 patience be a virtue these ladies may well be 
 considered beautiful products of a fast vanish 
 ing Puritan tradition. 
 
 Easter fell on the twenty-third of April. 
 The Bolingbrokes arrived at Barracks Hill the 
 296 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 day before Easter, but on the morning of their 
 arrival came a disastrous piece of news. 
 Almost the whole of Ruth s fortune had been 
 swept out of existence overnight in one of 
 those cataclysmic melodramas which melo 
 dramatic Nature loves to enact in the United 
 States. On Good Friday, the twenty-first of 
 April, nineteen hundred and eight, the town of 
 Wyoming was annihilated by a tornado. The 
 merry monster chose the small hours before 
 midnight, when, giving rein to his pranksome 
 cubfulness, he swept men, women, children 
 into Eternity with hardly a warning. . . . 
 The mines they formed the raison d etre of 
 the town caved in, flooded by a water spout. 
 The entire district was reduced to desolation. 
 
 Seated at breakfast, in the crispest of white 
 morning confections, Ruth became informed 
 of this and of her losses through the medium of 
 the Oldbridge Morning Herald, whose items she 
 was reading aloud, a concession, to her uncle. 
 
 General Adgate, far more than his lovely 
 niece, was affected by the news. Had he not 
 enjoyed vicariously the sense of her wealth ? 
 It had tickled his fancy as well as his family 
 pride to see her squander with a lavish hand, 
 without so much as a thought of the value 
 297 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of money. It had pleased his sense of the 
 incongruous that notwithstanding the obvious 
 joy she took in opening her fingers, in letting 
 the gold slide through them, she had acqui 
 esced in, nay adopted, many of the Spartan 
 habits of New England ; New England which 
 has never been purse-proud because she has 
 never, until lately, had very much money in 
 her purse. Ruth, indeed, had all she could 
 do to cheer General Adgate. 
 
 " If all is lost, save honour," she consoled, 
 " / have still some investments in England by 
 the mercy of which I shall not be poverty 
 stricken. I ve as much as three thousand 
 safe pounds a year coming from there, you 
 old darling," she cooed. " Harry Pontycroft 
 invested it for me long ago. That ought to 
 be enough for any woman with economical 
 tastes," she assured him. " And I ve a lot in 
 the bank, Heaven knows how much ! I ve 
 never spent anything like my income for I had 
 nothing which seemed worth spending it 
 upon, since, ugh ! I detest automobiles, and 
 you know it. We can still keep open house 
 this summer and never trouble." 
 
 Of a truth, Miss Adgate experienced relief, 
 why ? she did not try to fathom at the 
 
 298 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 thought of her diminished fortunes. She 
 might, possibly, this blithe adventuress, or 
 had she not been expecting guests, she might, 
 even, have tried to persuade General Adgate 
 to lead her to the scene of the disaster. I 
 doubt, though, if she would have succeeded. 
 
 A fat cheque went instead by the Red Cross 
 Society to the relief of the sufferers. And lo ! 
 the diminishing days were dwindled to a pin 
 point. 
 
 IV 
 
 When Mrs. Bolingbroke heard that Henry 
 Pontycroft and Lucilla Dor were on the sea, 
 bound for America, she could not contain 
 herself. 
 
 " Good gracious, Ruth, what are they comin 
 for ? " she exclaimed, wide-eyed, gazing at Ruth. 
 
 " Don t know," said Ruth, putting her nose 
 into a bowlful of fresh roses from Ruther 
 ford s hot-houses. " Oddly enough, to see 
 me, perhaps ? " she added, laughing, and she 
 made an effort to look her friend squarely and 
 jocosely in the face. 
 
 " Richard," said Mrs. Bolingbroke penetra- 
 
 tedly to her husband, " Ruth Adgate is either 
 
 the most consummate actress or the most 
 
 innocent dove the good God has ever, in His 
 
 299 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 ability, wrought from the dust of which we 
 are made. If the Pontycrofts are on the sea 
 it s for some extraordinary reason. Ruth either 
 suspects that reason, or she doesn t. But she 
 looked at me with those clear guileless eyes of 
 hers, when she mentioned their coming, and I, 
 for one, can imagine any man telling her he d 
 burn Troy Town for such a glance. Yet 
 there s that Mr. Rutherford crazily in love 
 with her, I m told, a splendid match as 
 Americans go. She could marry him and his 
 money to-morrow if she liked. And since 
 she s so daft about New England, she could 
 send him into politics and have quite a life. 
 It will be interesting to see how the Ponty 
 crofts will act when they find the sources of 
 her income are swept away." 
 
 " That s not a proper remark for you to 
 make, my dear," replied the Honourable 
 Richard Bolingbroke, in a tone of unexpected 
 severity. " Henry Pontycroft s a sensitive, 
 quixotic, high-minded, honourable English 
 gentleman. He s rich, moreover. Money 
 plays no part in his coming. Lady Dor I ve 
 known since I was a boy. She was a delightful 
 girl, just as now she s a charming woman. 
 They ll be admirable additions to the house 
 
 300 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 party, and that s all that concerns you or me. 
 Pontycroft will keep us in roars of laughter 
 and I m curious to meet him in New England. 
 You may be sure he ll like this wonderful old 
 place. He ll feel all the arid romance of this 
 aristocratic passionate bleak land. Who knows ? 
 He may be the Prince come to wake it, human 
 ise it, with a kiss. Oldbridge will not have 
 looked upon his like it won t have heard any 
 thing to compare with him, either, in its three 
 hundred years of existence ; never will again ; 
 I hope it may make the best of its opportunity 
 to give him a royal welcome." 
 
 " I feel crushed," pouted Mrs. Bolingbroke. 
 " How should I, who ve never met Henry 
 Pontycroft know he s the paragon of wit and 
 chivalry ? " 
 
 " That s precisely what Henry Pontycroft 
 is," her husband answered gravely, " He is the 
 paragon of wit and chivalry ! " 
 
 These young folk were pacing side by side 
 in the moonlit garden after the excellent New 
 England repast, called supper ; while Miss Ad- 
 gate and her uncle were busy with callers, upon 
 the veranda. The night was the first of a long 
 series of warm May nights, the moon hung, 
 majestic and round, over the fringes of wood 
 301 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 termed the Wigwam. A rustic bench stood 
 invitingly under the big syringa, now a per 
 fumed canopy of white. As they stood on 
 the upper terrace it was easy to distinguish 
 descending terraces marked by rows of silvery 
 budding irises swollen or in bloom. . . . The 
 magic smells of white and purple lilac were 
 touched with a whiff of apple blossoms from the 
 hill and beyond below the Mantic gleamed 
 in the moonlight amid trees all a feathery, 
 spring incrustation of minute green foliage. 
 
 " This is a divine spot," said Bolingbroke, 
 suddenly kissing his wife, " but we must 
 rejoin the others." 
 
 Lucilla Dor and Harry Pontycroft arrived 
 the following day and were installed in the 
 Morris House at the other side of the hill, 
 where two neat Irish girls waited upon them 
 under the enlightening, tempered instruction 
 of Pontycroft s man and of Lucilla s maid. 
 
 Spring was abroad in her witchery. She 
 had come with a rush, with a good will, with an 
 abundance, * and all of a sudden-like as 
 she has, after many days of dallying, a way of 
 doing in New England. She had been coy; 
 she had flirted ; she had tantalised a day here, 
 302 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 a day there with dewy warmth of soft blue 
 skies, her robes diaphanous April cloud. Then 
 she had veiled her face, vexed for one knew 
 not what offences, had turned her coldest 
 shoulder, shed her most frigid tears. She 
 had looked forth, wreathed again in smiles, 
 while she put wonder-working fingers to shrubs 
 and branches . . . and again she had withdrawn 
 herself in deepest greyest dudgeon. 
 
 But now, she was come, come. The birds 
 were building and calling and fluttering, in all 
 the emotion, the refreshing joy of an ever- 
 renewed bridalhood. A young male wren who 
 had discovered a bird-house, fixed on the off- 
 chance of so happy an event as to entice him 
 there by Jobias, to the top of a rustic pole in 
 the rose garden tore his throat open in the 
 rapture of telling the world what a place for a 
 nest he had found, and how sweet she was. 
 
 " Shameless uxorious creature," Ponty said, 
 as he came over the hill and paused to listen 
 to him. 
 
 Unaccountably enough, Ruth, as he came 
 into the garden, Ruth issued from the house 
 dressed in white ; dressed in white, without a 
 hat, a watteau sunshade in her hand. 
 
 " Good morning, my pretty maid," said 
 Pontycroft, " you re not going a-milking in 
 303 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 that costume, are you ? " He eyed her 
 sharply with the quizzical glint she knew well. 
 
 " Good morning," Ruth answered, in per 
 fect composure. Yet at the anticipation of 
 seeing Pontycroft alone, she had many times 
 felt the earth quake under her, " I m going 
 to call upon Lucilla," she vouchsafed. 
 
 " Oh, Lucilla s knocked up. I came with a 
 message from her. She wants me to say she s 
 had her breakfast in bed and won t rise until 
 luncheon. Lucilla s tired from the journey. 
 You two women must have talked yourselves 
 weary, if a mere man may judge of such matter. 
 Oh, the hour at which I caught sight of Paolina 
 conducting you over the hill last night ! " said 
 Ponty. 
 
 " It was a beautiful moonlit night," said 
 Ruth, inhaling the morning air with delight, 
 " and so, why not ? r 
 
 " Why not, indeed," he agreed. " What a 
 surprise it was, though, to find the Boling- 
 brokes here. He s a decent chap." 
 
 " Yes, I like them very much," Ruth said, 
 absently. 
 
 " And your uncle," Ponty proceeded, " I like 
 
 him very much," he paraphrased. " We held an 
 
 uproarious pow-wow in the library, the three 
 
 of us, last night, while you women discussed 
 
 304 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 chiffons in the music-room. By-the-bye, that 
 was rather a nice thing that somebody played," 
 and Ponty hummed the first bars of the Valse 
 Lente. " You were the musician, I suspect." 
 
 " I suppose so," Ruth said, negligently. 
 
 They were standing beside the flight of stone 
 steps whichleads fromthe rose-garden to the hill. 
 
 " Where are the Bolingbrokes ? " enquired 
 Pontycroft. 
 
 " Gone for the day, with the Wether bys, on 
 their yacht. It s a party of twelve and they 
 expect to come back by moonlight." 
 
 " And why, pray, were not the rest of us 
 included ? " he asked. 
 
 Ruth began to laugh. " They did include 
 the rest of us," she answered. " What is the 
 use of beating about the bush in this fashion ? 
 You ve something to tell me, I hear. Say it." 
 
 And leaving Pontycroft to consider her 
 suggestion Ruth ran up the steps and fled 
 lightly over the carpet woven of white saxi 
 frage and violets thickly strewn among the 
 turf, to the bench under the big oak at the 
 summit of the hill. Here she sat herself, 
 opened her blush-rose sunshade and defiantly 
 watched Pontycroft stroll towards her. 
 
 He followed. He stood, deliberating before 
 her for a moment. Then, bending a knee : 
 x 305 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Your Royal Highness, will your Royal 
 Highness accept the Crown of Altronde from 
 the hands of the King s unworthy Ambassa 
 dor? " he asked. 
 
 Ruth caught her breath. 
 
 " What do you mean ? " she queried, in a 
 most violent disappointment of surprise. 
 
 " Your gracious Majesty," answered Ponty- 
 croft, " I mean, that I am come all the way 
 from Europe and from a certain small but 
 not-to-be-sneezed-at Principality called Alt 
 ronde in order to ask you to wear with King 
 Bertram, the ermine and the purple. ... If 
 we must put it bluntly, the King implores you 
 to share his throne, his heart and his crown. " 
 
 " Oh," Ruth said, " how very absurd." 
 
 " Not at all absurd," said Pontycroft ; he 
 still knelt, one knee to earth. 
 
 " And he looks every inch Ambassador and 
 not in the least ridiculous," Ruth thought 
 smiling to herself, " in this superlatively ridicu 
 lous posture." 
 
 " The Queen Mama is more than anxious 
 to welcome you with wide - open arms," 
 continued Pontycroft. 
 
 " Ah ? " Ruth slightly raised her eyebrows. 
 
 " Yes. It s true she kicked a bit," said 
 Ponty. r He got to his feet and with his hand- 
 
 306 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 kerchief flapped a straw or two from his 
 knee. " But Bertram made a devil of a row ; 
 there was no standing it she explained to me 
 with tears in her eyes. The Queen Mama 
 has had to capitulate, and Bertram s counting 
 these very moments as ever are, pining to hear 
 you have accepted him. Pm to go de ce pas to 
 the telegraph office and wire yes so soon 
 as you ve made your haughty little mind up 
 that you ll have him." 
 
 "Ah," Ruth said. " It is very interesting " 
 
 But suddenly she felt her heart leap into 
 her throat. She trembled, yet she spoke reso 
 lutely. " Harry," she said, " Harry you ve told 
 me something startling and not very import 
 ant. But why don t you tell me that the 
 woman who wrote the letter is dead ? " 
 
 An unaccountable stillness fell for an instant 
 over the landscape. Ruth left her bench under 
 the oak and walked off, walked away to where 
 the rocks come cropping up along the brow 
 of the hill. The panorama spread before her 
 was one of fresh, palely verdant meadows and 
 woods ; the Mantic, turbulent from spring 
 freshets, was bordered with trees in the early 
 paleness of their green leaves ; the green frail 
 rondures of the Wigwam foliage in delicate 
 and varied shades, these were dappled with 
 307 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 sunlight and blue sky. A far panoply of purple 
 hills, marking the borderland, shutting away 
 the boisterous outer world as by a charmed 
 circle, enclosed the small, the joyous world of 
 the little inland town, the valley and the seven 
 hills of Oldbridge. 
 
 Pontycroft approached mechanically, slowly. 
 He stood by Ruth s side, he looked off with 
 her at this exquisite efflorescence of spring in 
 the new world. 
 
 " It s a beautiful view," he said, in a matter- 
 of - fact tone, " Europe could scarcely do 
 better. . . . And so Lucilla told you ? " he 
 queried, carelessly. " Put not thy trust in 
 woman. She vowed by her most sacred vows 
 she d never say a word until I told her to." 
 
 " I dare say I wormed it out of her," Ruth 
 replied, laughing, and, it was too apparent, 
 she was laughing at him. 
 
 " I don t quite gather what it is that makes 
 you so merry this morning," said Pontycroft ; 
 " unless it is this heavenly Spring day, and 
 that s enough for twenty hopes and fears to 
 rap and knock and enter in our souls. . . . But 
 please do recollect that while you loiter, con 
 sidering the indisputably lovely landscape, 
 there s a chap in Altronde waiting impatient s 
 no word for it for a wire. Kindly give your 
 
 308 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 attention to the Royal Incident, the real ques 
 tion of actuality, for a moment, and let me be 
 off as soon as possible to the Post Office." 
 
 " Long ago, I seem to remember," Ruth said, 
 slowly, " long ago, I seem to hear myself saying 
 in a garden in Florence, that the Royal Incident 
 was closed. It is closed. I haven t changed my 
 mind, on the contrary. If you must of your 
 will leave my hill at this perfect hour and 
 and be sending messages to the other side of 
 the world then, you needs must ! But pray 
 remember your own favourite saw, that op 
 portunity comes once in a lifetime. Jobias 
 goes home at noon, can t he take your message ? 
 If Prince, I beg his pardon, King, if Bertram 
 has to live in suspense for a few hours, let that 
 be my little revenge. If it feed nothing else, 
 it will feed my revenge, " laughed Ruth. 
 
 Having given expression to this heartless 
 sentiment, she began to tread, cautiously, 
 among the flowers the saxifrage, the violets, 
 the little green-golden buttercups between, 
 her light steps responding with love to what she 
 was pleased to think was their caress. From 
 the plain and from the woods mounted gentle 
 homely sounds, the hautbois of the New 
 England Spring the blows of a distant axe, 
 the felling of trees, a carpenter s hammer tap- 
 309 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 tapping, and children s cries resounding as 
 they romped at play; all mounted together, 
 in a joyous choiring, with birds songs and 
 twitterings which fell about them from every 
 tree far and near ; the earth, the sky musical, 
 alive with carols and thanksgiving. 
 
 " I bring a garland for your head of flowers 
 fresh and fair," Ruth hummed, pacing a little 
 ahead of Pontycroft, and her foot rhythmi 
 cally touched ground at each stress of the song. 
 
 " I had, once, a double double grandmother, 
 my friend Jack Enderfield is fond of saying," 
 said Ruth, as she continued her walk to the 
 measure of the verse. " A great, great, so great 
 Meregrand ! She was French. Her name was 
 Priscilla. Priscilla Mulline. She s rather a per 
 son in New England History you ll forgive 
 my mentioning her. When the man she cared 
 for came, as emissary from the man she didn t 
 care for, to ask her to marry him do you 
 remember what she answered ? " Ruth kept 
 her eyes fixed upon the tips of her toes, and 
 they, like little mice, little white mice, went in 
 and out, below the flounces of her gown. 
 
 Pontycroft gasped, took a step towards her. 
 But his lean and bony face, which for a moment 
 had betrayed him, assumed again the look of 
 disillusion.;^ 
 
 310 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " Oh," he rejoined, " the foolish girl made 
 hash of her future, perpetrated a mot which, no 
 doubt, she lived to repent. A mot which one 
 of your American poets has quite suitably 
 recorded. By it, Miss Priscilla Mulline lost 
 her chance of making a very good match. She 
 lost her golden opportunity. She cut off her 
 chances of having a jolly good time in a big, 
 jolly world." 
 
 " You re abominable," Ruth said, and per 
 mitted herself two actions very much at vari 
 ance, she stamped her foot and she smiled 
 obliquely at the object of her wrath. " You re 
 abominable. I want you to tell me what she 
 answered." 
 
 " Oh, you ve forgotten it ? " said he. " I ve 
 well-nigh forgotten it myself. ... I believe, 
 though, she did ask the chap Alden why the 
 deuce (pardon the expletive) he didn t speak 
 for himself. Am I right ? " 
 
 "Well, why didn t he?" enquired Ruth, 
 impatiently. 
 
 " Because he was a duffer, I suppose," 
 said Ponty, with a fine effect of ending the 
 discussion. " But now, my dear young one, 
 be serious. Here s your chance. . . ." Ponty- 
 croft s voice became argumentative. " I ve 
 crossed the ocean to lay a crown at your feet. 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 A crown from which you may get considerable 
 fun and splendour. Bertram s rich, you re 
 rich. You are, both of you, handsome, 
 virtuous, clever, and at the mating age. You 
 can make of your little Principality, your 
 Kingdom, the centre of the enlightenment and 
 art of Europe. Find me a philosopher, an 
 artist, or a man of wit who doesn t appreciate 
 a King ! Under your wise encouragement 
 Art, at last, will come into her own. . . . Oh, 
 think of the poor devils of hangers-on of 
 Genius you ll be able to lift from Purgatories 
 of obscurity into the light ! " 
 
 " You ve made one trifling mistake," inter 
 rupted Ruth ; " there s something I have not 
 told you, an element you must omit from the 
 equation of that Castle in Altronde you are 
 building for me. I m not rich. . . . The 
 Town of Wyoming, let me tell you, is no 
 more. My millions, and a good thing too 
 have collapsed. They ve shrunken to the few 
 thousands you invested, ages ago, do you re 
 member ? in British Consols ? On them I 
 shall run this dear old place, I shall dress, 
 modestly " 
 
 " Ruth, Ruth, Ruth ! " interrupted Ponty- 
 croft, aghast. 
 
 " Yes, it alljDccurred about a week ago while 
 312 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 you were at sea, and that, I suppose, is why 
 you didn t hear of it. These accidents, here 
 in America, happen so often. Marconi didn t 
 find the item of sufficient importance, I dare 
 say, to give it a place." 
 
 "Well. . . . Here s a kettle of fish! 
 Whew ! " whistled Pontycroft. " You young 
 limb of mischief, why didn t you tell me ? 
 Ow//" cried he, with a great pant of relief. 
 " O#/, poor Bertram ! He has no luck." 
 
 They had been sauntering, backwards and 
 forward, over a grassy road which runs up 
 hill and down dale through the green-sward 
 planted with apple trees. Pontycroft leaned, 
 now, against a tree. He gazed at Ruth with 
 out a word. A rosy-tipped cluster of apple 
 blossoms nodded just above his head. He 
 reached up, plucked it ; and offered it to the 
 lady with the crimson sunshade who stood in 
 the sunlight before him. 
 
 " Oh, Fairy Godmother ! Feel my heart, " 
 Ruth whispered, under her breath. " I should 
 like to show you my Riviera," she said hastily, 
 reddening under his gaze, and she stuck the 
 apple blossoms into her belt. 
 
 Ruth skirted the grey rocks which crop 
 above the brow of the hill to the left. She 
 led Pontycroft down a green bank to a patch 
 313 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of brighter green nestling for quite a distance 
 under the shelter of the overhanging cliffs. 
 Here were eglantine, here were violets in pro 
 fusion ; Solomon s seal, red and purple colum 
 bine ; and the purple liverwort, and a shower 
 of those frail white wind-flowers called anem 
 ones, although in no wise do they resemble 
 their European cousins. Young ferns, pale green 
 fronds, sprang vigorously from the clefts in the 
 rocks, juniper and barberry bushes and a savin 
 lent here and there a hardy note and an added 
 shelter to the scattering of spring blossoms. 
 
 " It s so exclusive here," laughed Ruth, 
 taking a lichen-covered seat formed in the 
 grey stone. " These canny flowers have dis 
 covered the place for themselves after the 
 habit of the land. ... Sit down," she in 
 vited him. She crossed her hands in her lap, 
 she looked towards him ; a mischievous light 
 glanced bewitchingly in her dark eyes. 
 
 " Dear child," Pontycroft began he was 
 trying, very hard, to resume his paternal air. 
 
 " Please don t dear child me any more I 
 haven t brought you here for that," petulantly 
 cried Ruth. " I won t have you for a father 
 and I ve already got an uncle, and I don t think 
 you d make, for me, a satisfactory brother." 
 
 " Miss Adgate," said Pontycroft, he possessed 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 himself of one of her hands, and examining it 
 carefully (it was, as we know a very white 
 hand with slim and rosy fingers), " Miss Ad- 
 gate, I have a proposition to make to you. 
 Since my schemes, since all my weary plottings 
 and plannings for a Royal End for you, do, it 
 seems, gang aft agley, though, and mark my 
 words, Bertram is no stickler for lucre ; but 
 since they ve been knocked flat on the head by 
 a blow of chance, let me suggest that we make a 
 fresh start, let us consider a new alliance for you. 
 
 " Here," he said he laid a large bony hand 
 tightly, as though afraid of its escape, over the 
 little hand he held in his, " here is a novel, 
 international situation, a situation, free, thank 
 goodness, of any blessed complications. Shall 
 you and I," he lifted the hand to his lips 
 again, he touched his lips tenderly to each 
 finger-tip, and Ruth looked on shall you and 
 I get married ? Shall we run this dear place 
 together ? Shall we love it, live in it ? I had 
 dreamed, for you, infant, of a royal end. What 
 will you ? Heaven mercifully disposes. . . . 
 But I had dreamed for you a Royal End ! " 
 
 " I do not like being proposed to in this 
 manner," said Ruth, rounding upon him with 
 a smiling face. 
 
 " Oh, my dear, blessed angel little Ruth ! " 
 315 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 cried Pontycroft, letting himself go. " Ruth 
 . . . Hopelessly, hopelessly, denied me found 
 at last. Little Lady Precious Ruth ! Ruth 
 whom I love, Ruth whom I dote on Ruth 
 whom I ve worshipped ever since she was a tod 
 dling child in her father s house . . . Ruth ! " 
 
 Miss Adgate could feel the beating of Ponty- 
 croft s heart as she stayed against his side. 
 
 " Shall we live here together ? " he asked 
 presently. " You you of course you love 
 this old place ! I love it because you do. And 
 Thou, singing beside me in the Wilderness ! It 
 needs us, doesn t it ? This peaceful Wilder 
 ness, this New England Garden of Eden ! " 
 
 " Eden, from which William Rutherford 
 has killed the snake," laughed Ruth blinking a 
 crystal tear that rolled down her cheek. 
 
 " Rutherford ? " Pontycroft frowned, " who 
 is William Rutherford ? " 
 
 " Oh, nobody. No one in particular," Ruth 
 hastened to reply. " A mere mighty hunter 
 before the Lord." And Pontycroft did not 
 pursue the subject of William Rutherford. 
 
 " But," said Ruth a trifle anxiously, in a 
 moment, " we must go abroad from time to 
 time ? We could never forsake Pontycroft. 
 
 " Oh, hang Pontycroft. Lucilla shall have 
 it for her kids." 
 
 316 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " I want it for mine," said Ruth. Then she 
 looked away and blushed crimson and then 
 she laughed. 
 
 " What is the motto, Harry, of your house ? " 
 she queried, irrelevantly. " I ve forgotten." 
 
 " It once was," Pontycroft said, and he 
 smiled at her : " Super mare., super fluvia." 
 
 " Once ? " said Ruth, a little shyly, " once ? 
 And now ? " 
 
 " Constantly now, henceforth," he whispered 
 with a throbbing of the heart. . . . " But will 
 your uncle be pleased at all this ? " he enquired. 
 
 "My uncle ? " said Ruth, waking from a 
 reverie. " Oh he would have liked me to 
 marry Rutherford, I imagine. But if you re 
 awfully nice to him, and if you let him see 
 how infatuated you are with Barracks Hill 
 he ll end, I know, by giving me and you his 
 blessing. But I won t give up England and I 
 want Italy, too, Venice, Rome ! " wilfully 
 persisted Ruth. 
 
 " You precious little piece of covetous cos 
 mopolitanism ! Haven t you learned that if in 
 Heaven, may be, it is given us to be every 
 where in this life : One Paradise, one Eden ? 
 In this world one Eden shall suffice, for things 
 learned on earth may or may not be practised 
 in Heaven ; but love is, ever was, the language 
 317 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 of repetition. In this life the lesson is to be 
 contented with a single Paradise." 
 
 " Oh," exclaimed Miss Adgate, laying her 
 hand on Ponty s mouth. " Oh, middle-aged 
 sentiment . . . not in the Catechism. Don t, 
 I beg, say it again ! " 
 
 He seized the hand, he pressed his lips to 
 it, he pressed it against his breast. 
 
 " Even an infant like you," he whispered, 
 " let alone a world-worn chap like the man 
 you propose to take as a husband, can t stand 
 perpetual motion." 
 
 " Very well," Ruth compromised, " shall we 
 alternate with a year in England, one here, one 
 in Italy, Jobias.and Paolina to pack for us. 
 That will make it easy." 
 
 " Ah," laughed Pontycroft, " you shall see ! 
 The pendulum is bound to narrow its oscilla 
 tions ! We ll earn a well-needed rest, here." 
 
 Oh me ! " sighed Ruth, " ah me ! " cried 
 Ruth. " In that event how charmed our ances 
 tors will be. But, I forgot ! You haven t 
 heard the story." Ruth told it gaily and 
 waited, curious to see what Harry Pontycroft 
 would say. 
 
 " Dear young one, these old four-posters," 
 he began " are the most dangerous things to 
 sleep in," and Ruth was seized with laughter. 
 
 318 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 " But I ll never sell them to the nearest 
 dealer in old bric-a-brac. Rather," she con 
 cluded, " we ll do as you advised, we ll take 
 the greatest care not to offend our forbears. 
 
 But " her forefinger went up impressively, 
 
 " but a destiny was in preparation for us I 
 felt it, Harry, on the very day after I reached 
 here. Harry, I felt, I knew, Destiny had some 
 thing up her sleeve. The day I went for a 
 walk alone," said Ruth, with a serious air. 
 " It is a delicious destiny ... to be married in 
 the little Parish church by that Saint of a 
 Priest and to live here, forever afterwards ! " 
 (with a malicious nod,) " with a break now and 
 then to Europe." 
 
 " Moreover and because journeys end in 
 lovers meeting, we ll probably have a June 
 wedding," Pontycroft unexpectedly suggested, 
 wise in his generation. 
 
 "A June wedding! . . . I ve built better 
 than I knew," exclaimed Ruth. " I ve asked a 
 house party of friends, friends of yours, 
 Lucilla s and mine, to come here in June. 
 Let them haste to the wedding I ll have 
 Jackie Enderfield for page and he shall carry 
 my train." 
 
 " Another admirer," Ponty said resigned. 
 
 " The merest bit of a boy of twelve. With- 
 319 
 
THE ROYAL END 
 
 out him, without my uncle, these wits like as 
 not had perished utterly. Jack when he s a 
 man intends to marry a woman with a low 
 voice and a red glint in her hair. He will turn 
 Catholic with my consent and go abroad and 
 write. He doesn t believe either in Divorce- 
 in other words, you perceive he is an intel 
 lectual. But," she said, rising, " we ve for 
 gotten oh, we ve forgotten to send that mes 
 sage by Jobias to poor King Bertram ! We 
 shall have to take it ourselves." 
 
 Henry Pontycroft and Ruth descended the 
 hill along the violet-sprinkled road. 
 
 " Ruth," he urged, as they went their way, 
 "for conscience sake, consider, consider, little 
 Ruth," he said, " ah, consider. ... It is not yet 
 too late, infant, and I had dreamed for Ruth 
 Adgate of a Royal End ! " 
 
 " Ah," Miss Adgate replied ; a little happy 
 sigh escaped from her lips ; she looked down 
 at the apple blossoms in her belt, strange to 
 say, the apple blossoms were fresh as though 
 just plucked. 
 
 " Harry," she replied, with a little quizzical 
 look, " I, too, had dreamed for Ruth Adgate of 
 a Royal End. . . . Both our dreams have 
 come true ! Love is the Royal End" 
 
 WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PRINTERS, PLYMOUTH 
 
34, 35 6 36, Paternoster Row, 
 
 London, February, 1909. 
 
 Messrs. Hutchinson & Co/s 
 
 Preliminary 
 Announcements 
 
 For the Spring of 1909 
 
 Mr. Pope 
 
 A Chronicle of his Life 
 and Work 
 
 By GEORGE PASTON 
 
 Author of " Sidelights on the Georgian Period," etc. 
 
 In two volumes, demy 8vo, with photogravures and other 
 illustrations, 245. net 
 
 This book is based on the correspondence of the poet, published 
 and unpublished, on the autobiographical passages in his poems, 
 and on the allusions to him in contemporary letters and pamphlets, 
 whether complimentary or the reverse. His friendships and his 
 quarrels are fully dealt with, while a summary is given of his 
 principal works, with illustrative extracts. The author has 
 discovered a considerable number of unpublished letters, some of 
 which are given in full, while the most interesting passages are 
 quoted from others. There will be about 24 illustrations, including 
 portraits of the poet and many of his friends. Alexander Pope was 
 perhaps the most celebrated literary man of his time, and George 
 Paston has earned a reputation for model eighteenth-century 
 biographies. It is therefore confidently expected that this new work 
 will prove eminently successful. 
 
The Life of 
 Frederick the Great 
 
 By THOMAS CARLYLE 
 
 Abridged and Edited by EDGAR SANDERSON, M.A. 
 
 (Sometime Scholar of Clare College, Cambridge.) 
 
 Author of "The History of the World from the Earliest Historical Time," 
 
 "History of the British Empire," The British Empire in the 
 
 Nineteenth Century," "Outlines of the World s History," 
 
 etc. 
 
 With an Introduction by ROGER INGPEN 
 
 In crown 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, 55. net 
 With portrait and map 
 
 Carlylc s Life of Frederick the Great has been described by a 
 wag as a " great book," which it certainly is in more ways than 
 one. It is undoubtedly the most remarkable of Carlyle s achieve 
 ments, and its dimensions alone entitle it to a place among the 
 greatest monuments of literary industry. But for this very 
 reason the book is practically sealed to all save those who enjoy 
 ample leisure. 
 
 Mr. Sanderson has accomplished the great, one might almost 
 say gigantic, feat of compressing the five huge royal octavo 
 tomes of Carlyle into a single volume. His chief task has been 
 to clear away the vast forest of extraneous matter that sur 
 rounded Frederick the early history of Germany, contemporary 
 events, and numerous appendices and original documents and 
 to give us a portrait in Carlyle s own picturesque words of the 
 Soldier-king to whom Germany owes its present power and 
 prosperity, and who bequeathed to his country such a fine 
 example of personal courage and political wisdom. 
 
 4 
 
Louis XVI and 
 Marie Antoinette 
 
 By Lieut. .Col. ANDREW C. P. HAGGARD, D.S.O. 
 
 Author of " Sidelights on the Court of France," etc. 
 
 In two volumes, demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with 
 photogravure plates and other illustrations, 245. net 
 
 Colonel Haggard s new book is devoted to the history of 
 Louis XVI and his Queen, Marie Antoinette. The author describes 
 their careers from the time of marriage when little more than 
 children, until their deaths on the scaffold, within nine months of 
 each other, omitting nothing of interest that in any way affected the 
 unfortunate King and Queen. The celebrated affair of the diamond 
 necklace (an amazing story that always bears re-telling) is related 
 in detail, as also are the subsequent events of the Revolution, the 
 approach of which was undoubtedly hastened by the scandals of 
 this cause cttebre. Colonel Haggard does not omit references to 
 the various love affairs with which Marie Antoinette has, rightly or 
 wrongly, been credited. 
 
 Richard Savage 
 
 A Mystery in Biography 
 
 By STANLEY V. MAKOWER 
 
 Author of " Perdita," " The Mirror of Music," etc., etc. 
 
 In one volume, demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with 
 photogravure and other illustrations, i6s. net 
 
 This book reflects in the extraordinary life of Richard Savage, 
 poet and pamphleteer, of the first half of the eighteenth century, 
 the eternal struggle between noble aims and commercial necessity. 
 It describes minutely not only the dramatic episodes, but also the 
 inner aspirations, the triumphs and the failures, the heights and the 
 depths, reached by a character which has never ceased to awaken 
 curiosity and compassion since it inspired Dr. Johnson with the 
 most widely significant of all his studies in contemporary 
 personalities. 
 
A NEW AND POPULAR EDITION OF 
 
 DR. MAX LENZ S 
 MOST IMPORTANT WORK 
 
 Napoleon 
 
 Translated from the German by FREDERIC WHYTE 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION 
 And with 50 full page Illustrations and portraits 
 
 In small demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, 6s. net 
 
 OPINIONS OF THB PRESS 
 
 " Dr. Lenz writes of Napoleon with greater comprehension than any other 
 biographer whose work we can recall. To this scholarly German student, who has 
 mastered every detail in the history of the period in which the Corsican played his 
 part, Napoleon is not a mere adventurer, he is a man of destiny. Dr. Lenz is too 
 discriminating to fall into the common error of hero worship. Napoleon himself is 
 the subject of analysis. It is of vivid interest to follow Dr. Lenz in his explanations 
 of the forces which drove Napoleon from one great military adventure to another, 
 and to observe how kings, emperors and statesmen plotted against him. Dr. Lenz 
 may be warmly congratulated on producing a book which has the charm of freshness 
 though its theme is well worn. The translation is admirable and the portraits.and 
 illustrations have been selected with much care and discrimination." Pall Mall 
 Gazette. 
 
 This is one of the most masterly studies of Napoleon which have appeared in 
 English. Probably it is the very best short book upon its subject which we have in 
 this country. Written by a German, translated by an Englishman with all the 
 spontaneous force of an original author, it gives a vivid, complete and yet 
 discriminating view of a man whose commentators have hitherto been passionately 
 hostile or passionately adulatory and consequently obscure. In this remarkable book 
 Dr. Lenz is ruthless but fair, sorrowful but just." Tribune. 
 
 " A narrative of facts concisely stated and carefully compressed. The work is 
 highly reliable, well arranged, and complete, dealing witto every side of the life and 
 work of Napoleon ; and the general view taken is that wlilch is coming to b accepted 
 among historians of any importance." Oiitlook. 
 
 " One of the fairest and most suitable general introductions to the Napoleonic 
 literature which has recently appeared. It is shorter and fairer than Dr. Rose s 
 important work, and it is also more generally trustworthy than Dr. Kielland s recent 
 eulogy." Daily News. 
 
 "Translated by a master in the art of translation, a life of Napoleon from his 
 birth to the end, which includes every phase of the marvellous career except the 
 purely personal, of which we know enough from contemporary and subsequent 
 memoirs. We have a thoroughly capable and comprehensive biography of handy 
 size and length, which will serve as an excellent introduction to the study of 
 Napoleon s life and times. The author is wonderfully impartial, has a remarkable 
 power of condensation, the summing up of Napoleon s work is terse, just and 
 eloquent. We do not remember a better book than this considering its length and its 
 scope, and the fact that it includes the Emperor s whole career. A last word of 
 praise must be given to the excellent translation into live and good English." Daily 
 Telegraph. 
 
The Romance of a 
 Great Career 
 
 The Story of the Life of Sir fiobert Hart 
 
 Told by his Niece 
 JULIET BREDIN 
 
 In crown 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, 
 6s. net 
 
 With a photogravure plate and thirty-two other Illustrations of 
 exceptional interest. 
 
 Perhaps there is no one living who has been so long in the public 
 eye and yet of whose personality so little is known as Sir Robert 
 Hart. He has spent much the larger part of a long life in China 
 where he held a unique position which gave him unusual opportunities 
 and power to act for good or ill on most momentous occasions ; 
 indeed, it might be said that for over half a century he has been 
 more or less closely concerned with every great event that has 
 happened in that most interesting country. There must be many 
 thousands of Englishmen and Englishwomen who are curious to 
 know the life story of this remarkable man, who never seems to have 
 revealed himself, and this record written by one who has had every 
 opportunity of studying him and his work will therefore be eagerly 
 desired. It is not too much to say that there is enough material 
 in the book for a volume double its size, but dealing as it does 
 with essentials only, there is not a page that will not be read with 
 the greatest interest. 
 
 7 
 
The American Egypt 
 
 By CHANNING ARNOLD and 
 FREDERICK J. FROST 
 
 In one handsome demy 8vo volume, cloth gilt and gilt top, 
 1 6s. net 
 
 With numerous illustrations 
 
 This volume, unique in being the first book written by 
 Englishmen on the country, describes in graphic and picturesque 
 style a tour made by the authors in Yucatan, the easternmost 
 portion of the Republic of Mexico. Perhaps the greatest problem 
 remaining for archaeology to solve is the origin of the remarkable 
 building civilization found existing in Central America at the 
 Conquest. In their description of Yucatan, where this civilization 
 reached its high-water mark, the authors review the whole problem 
 and venture on a novel and ingenious solution. The book, which is 
 freely illustrated, gives a vivid picture of Yucatan, its peoples and 
 scenery. On its eastern coast a ruthless war of extermination is 
 being waged by Mexico against the Indians. The authors visited 
 this district, and draw a terrible picture of the inhumanity of the 
 campaign. 
 
 Compiled by A. C. R. CARTER 
 
 The Year s Art, 1909 
 
 Thirtieth Year of Issue 
 
 A concise Epitome of all matters relating to the Arts of Painting, 
 Sculpture, Engraving, and Architecture, and to Schools of Design 
 which have occurred during the year 1908, together with infor 
 mation respecting the events of the year 1909 
 
 In crown 8vo, cloth, 35. 6d. net 
 550 pages of letterpress, with full=page illustrations 
 
 " Absolutely indispensable to all who are interested in art. 
 It is, in fact, the artist s Whitaker." Tribune. 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 Each in crown 8vo, cloth gilt 
 
 Kingsmead 
 
 By THE BARONESS VON HUTTEN 
 
 Author of " Pam," "The Halo," etc. 
 
 " Kingsmead " tells the story of a young man s first love. 
 Tommy, Earl of Kingsmead, will be remembered as the little 
 brother of Brigit, the heroine of "The Halo," and in "Kingsmead" 
 he has reached the age of three-and-twenty a delightful, dreamy, 
 honest hearted boy, trying to play Providence to a friend, blundering 
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 like sentiment and tenderness in a novel will like " Kingsmead," 
 and it is safe to say that everyone will love the quaint little hero of 
 the book. 
 
 The Royal End 
 
 By HENRY HARLAND 
 
 Author of "The Cardinal s Snuff-Box, " "My Lady Paramount," 
 My Friend Prospero," etc. 
 
 "The Royal End" is the last and only remaining unpublished 
 novel of the late Mr. Henry Harland. Fastidious writer that he 
 was, the present story is equal, if not superior, in merit to his best 
 work. The hero and heroine of this tale are of the regular Harland 
 types, while his charming gift of portraying character, his delicate 
 irony, and his finished style, whether it is employed in description 
 or dialogue, are all present in a delightful Italian and New England 
 setting. 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 As it Happened 
 
 By ASHTON HILLIERS 
 
 Author of " Memoirs of a Person of Quality," etc. 
 
 A story of action, dealing with a period (1778-9) rarely 
 trespassed upon by the novelist. England, inarticulately 
 resenting the misrule of King George the Deplorable, is blunder 
 ing from defeats to surrenders, yet saving what may be saved 
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 process. There is love in the piece, and war, as through intrigue 
 and cannon-smoke we follow the fortunes of an English girl. 
 
 A Simple Savage 
 
 By G. B. BURQIN 
 
 Author of "The Shutters of Silence," " Peggy the Pilgrim," etc. 
 
 There is rather a novel and fantastic note in Mr. G. B. 
 Burgin s new story, " A Simple Savage." The Spirit of the 
 Air and the Spirit of the Stars, looking down upon London, are 
 appalled by the want of sincerity in men and women. They 
 throw a feather to earth, letting it fall where it will. The 
 feather has the power of making the woman on whom it falls 
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 plications in Mr. Burgin s virile and interesting story. 
 
 10 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The Three Brothers 
 
 By EDEN PHILLPOTTS 
 
 Author of "The Mother," "The Whirlwind," etc. 
 
 In Mr. Eden Phillpotts s new story he once more writes of 
 Devonshire, and draws his characters and life from Dartmoor. 
 Although the setting may be the same, his stories (as in the present 
 case) are always fresh and original, and full of distinction. Many 
 characters are introduced into a very full book, which principally 
 concerns itself with the careers of three brothers and their 
 families. There is incident in plenty, with humour and tragedy, 
 while numerous love affairs are involved. 
 
 Our Adversary 
 
 By M. E. BRADDON 
 
 Author of " Lady Audley s Secret," "The Rose of Life," 
 " In High Places," etc. 
 
 This important book by such an old favourite as Miss Braddon 
 is sure of a big reception. Her readers will find it up to the level 
 of her best work, and a wonderful achievement for one who has been 
 before the public so long. The novel is of full length but the 
 reader s interest is sustained throughout. 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The Mystery of 
 The Myrtles 
 
 By EDGAR JEPSON 
 
 Author of " Lady Noggs, Peeress," " Lady Noggs Intervenes," etc. 
 
 In "The Mystery of the Myrtles," Sir George Vine, 
 a young English baronet, tells a thrilling story of mystery 
 and horror. After five years of big game hunting in wild 
 lands he returns to his home, a great house in a London 
 suburb, to find that The Myrtles, the house next it, is 
 acquiring an evil and uncanny reputation. This is 
 damaging to his own property and he sets himself to clear 
 up the mystery. The atmosphere of the garden of The 
 Myrtles seems charged with a paralysing and inexplicable 
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 arrives at the conclusion that the garden of The Myrtles 
 is the scene of dreadful rites and horrible crimes. But 
 he has fallen in love with Crystal Warrender, the daughter 
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 He resolves, however, to break up the gang of devil- 
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 His path to discovery, prevention, and vengeance lies 
 through nerve-racking horror and peril. The story is 
 full of thrills, genuine thrills. But the thrilling horror 
 is continually relieved by the charm of a delightful love 
 story. 
 
 12 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 A Young Man Married 
 
 By SYDNEY C. GRIER 
 
 Author of "The Warden of the Marches," "The Power of the Keys," etc. 
 
 The story deals with the later stages of the Peninsular War, 
 from the fall of Badajoz to the battle of Vitoria. It is written in 
 the form of a series of episodes in the married life of a young 
 British officer, Arthur Cinnamond, and his Spanish bride. The 
 violent efforts of her family to separate the pair are crowned with 
 success in the course of the retreat from Madrid, but after many 
 trials Dona Rosita and her husband are eventually reunited. The 
 story will appeal to both men and women and must add to the 
 Author s reputation, well established as it is. 
 
 Where Billows Roll 
 
 By ALLEN RAINE 
 
 Author of "A Welsh Singer," "Torn Sails," etc. 
 
 The lamented death of so popular a writer as Allen Raine can 
 but result in a greatly increased interest being shown in such work 
 as she left unpublished. The present is a full-length novel a sweet 
 and romantic story with the scenes in Wales, and with a strong love 
 interest and a touch of mysticism. There are dramatic situations, 
 a tangle to unravel, for love does not run smoothly, and many 
 characters, of whom some will endear themselves to the reader, and 
 with it all is a story in which the reader will be absorbed, 
 
 13 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The Straw 
 
 By R. RAMSAY 
 
 Author of "The Key of the Door," etc. 
 
 The scene of this story is laid in Leicestershire, in 
 the hunting countries of the Belvoir and the Quorn ; and 
 the action takes place amidst the music of hounds and 
 among hunting people. The hero, Gay, is putting up a 
 good fight against hard times, and scouts an unworthy 
 proposal that he should patch his fortunes by marrying 
 for money. But later, when on a mad expedition with 
 two or three other hunting-men, a practical joke that 
 simulates a midnight burglary in the house of a sporting 
 neighbour, he finds a girl who, mistaking him for a man in 
 real desperation, forgets her terror in compassion, and 
 offers him her jewels. He falls in love with her, but 
 discovers too late that she is the unknown heiress whose 
 acquaintance he had refused to make, and that she had 
 been pursuaded to promise to give herself and her riches 
 to save a ruined scamp. From this beginning the story 
 is carried on, through scenes of comedy running into 
 tragedy to its dramatic conclusion. There is plenty of 
 incident, a freshness in the handling and characters at 
 once typical and individual, and the author writes as from 
 first-hand knowledge. Of the author s last novel, "The 
 Key of the Door," Country Life said : " One of the most 
 humorous and lively books that have appeared this year: 
 dialogue witty and natural ; character drawing acute ; 
 management of situations adroit in the extreme; it 
 contains some fine descriptions of hunting and a vivid 
 picture of county society, while the whole book is written 
 with vivacity and dash." 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The House called 
 Hurrish 
 
 By "RITA" 
 
 Author of "Peg the Rake," "Souls," "The Sinner," etc. 
 
 This is a long and important new novel, in which, like 
 " Peg the Rake," and others of her successful books, 
 "Rita" deals with the fortunes of an Irish family. The 
 story is something weird and thrilling and of absorbing 
 interest. It is undoubtedly one of the writer s best efforts, 
 and more than maintains her reputation as a writer of 
 excellent fiction. 
 
 Green Ginger 
 
 By ARTHUR MORRISON 
 
 Author of "Tales of Mean Streets," "The Chronicles of Martin Hewitt," etc. 
 
 This is a volume of stories by a famous writer, whose 
 short stories have earned for him a great reputation. 
 Humour has been a conspicuous feature of much of his 
 work (his farce, "That Brute Simmons," founded on a story 
 in his first volume, is perhaps the most successful one-act 
 play for many years), but the fact has not always been 
 sufficiently recognised. In this volume none but humorous 
 stories are included, and they range from the simply 
 straightforwardly humorous to the broadly farcical, but 
 all are marked by the cleverness one expects from this 
 writer. It is likely to prove one of his most popular 
 books. 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 Other Things 
 than Love 
 
 By "HANDASYDE" 
 
 Author of " For the Week End," "The Four Gardens," etc. 
 
 Lord George Bentinck is evidently the prototype of the central 
 character in this book, but whereas the one gave up his Turf career- 
 to devote himself to a closer study of the Corn Laws, the other 
 sacrifices all his racing ambition to Tariff Reform. Incidentally, 
 the power of the modern plutocrat is shown in his usurpation of all 
 the old aristocratic standards. The name of the book, it may be 
 added "Other Things than Love "is in part a paradox, as the 
 inference to be drawn is that there are no " other things ! " 
 
 The Bargain 
 
 By THEODORA WILSON-WILSON 
 
 Author of " Bess of Hardendale," " Langbarrow Hall," etc. 
 
 A story of love. " On the oath of a gentleman, Ara dc Montfort, 
 I would be good to you always. John Tredethy dropped her hand 
 suddenly. She stood quite still, looking at her hand as though 
 something strange had happened to it." Ara, not seventeen, 
 romantic and proudly sensitive, had broken from her boarding 
 school, to discover her idealized father, lately returned from India, 
 dying in a wayside inn. Ara understood one thing by "The Bargain." 
 Tredethy, an Indian Judge, another. The scenes are laid in 
 Westmorland, London and Cornwall, and Ara finds in "Bess of 
 Hardendale," a true friend. 
 
 16 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The Conversion of 
 Con Cregan 
 
 and Other Stories 
 
 A Volume of Stories of a Humorous and Sporting 
 character 
 
 By DOROTHEA CONYERS 
 
 Author of "The Strayings of Sandy," of which an 8th Edition is now at press 
 
 Mrs. Conyers has earned for herself such a reputation by 
 her humorous sporting novels that these stories from her pen 
 will be welcomed. They have been specially selected by her 
 from the many she has written, and with a view of making a 
 complete series and harmonious volume. Much of her best 
 work has been put into them. 
 
 St. Martin s Summer 
 
 By RAFAEL SAB ATI N I 
 
 Author of "The Trampling of the Lilies," "The Shame of Motley," etc. 
 
 Mr. Sabatini s new romance is, as the title will suggest to 
 the imaginative, the story of a man to whom the zests of 
 youth come late in life. The action takes place in Dauphiny, 
 in the early part of the seventeenth century, and the author has 
 set out to portray a domestic tragi-comedy of those days rather 
 than of a drama of historical bearing. But the domesticity, 
 after all, is that of a chateau in a remote province where the 
 feudal system was still excessively alive, and the narrative is 
 quick with the tramp of armed men, the turbulence of strife, 
 and the throbbing of tempestuous passions. For swiftness, 
 vigour and graphic power, no less than for the intensity of the 
 purely human interest, no earlier book of Mr. Sabatini s has 
 approached the standard of " St. Martin s Summer," 
 
 17 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 A Flight from 
 Siberia 
 
 By WACLAW SIEROSZEWSKI 
 
 A Remarkable Polish Novel 
 
 The publishers have pleasure in presenting this novel, 
 which has had extraordinary success in Russia. The 
 writer s work is being compared with that of Sienkiewicz, 
 and seems likely to be quite as popular. He is being as 
 largely read in Germany as in Russia. " A Flight from 
 Siberia " is a fine piece of literature, and its English 
 rendering is a brilliant piece of work. The story is simply 
 of prolonged preparations for escape by a little band of 
 the banished, including a woman, their unsuccessful first 
 efforts, then their big plunge, ending in disaster, when, 
 after great risks and hardships, they felt safe and free. 
 It is, however, the spirit of the book which counts, and 
 every one who takes it up will be struck by the wonderful 
 way in which the writer realises his characters and their 
 life and surroundings. It is a fascinating book which 
 should be widely read. The author has written some very 
 gruesome stories, but this is not to be counted among them, 
 although there is real pathos in it. 
 
 18 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 A False Position 
 
 By Mrs. BAILLIE REYNOLDS 
 
 Author of "The Man who Won," "A Dull Girl s Destiny," etc. 
 
 Admirers of Mrs. Baillie Reynolds s work will be interested 
 to know that this story was one of her earliest efforts. It will, 
 we think, be found to contain the germ of what she has since 
 made her theory of life the paramount importance of truth and 
 honour, and the ultimate triumph of good. The false position 
 is that of a young girl who, strong in the belief that she, having 
 loved in vain, has left life s illusions behind her, consents to go 
 through the form of marriage with a man who requires a house 
 keeper. On the very threshold of her new life a totally 
 unexpected turn of circumstances induces her to tell a falsehood 
 to this man. The consequences of this "foolish, timorous 
 untruth " are shown in the story. With the exception of verbal 
 corrections, and the elimination of some " padding," the story is 
 now given in its original form. 
 
 The Mystery of 
 Frances Farrington 
 
 By ELIZABETH BANKS 
 
 Author of "The Autobiography of a Newspaper Girl," etc. 
 
 This is a bright, light, readable novel by a writer whose book, 
 " The Autobiography of a Newspaper Girl," was a pronounced 
 success. This new volume has snap and a piquant charm. 
 Margaret, the heroine, is beautiful, very smart, original, and 
 ambitious. She is engaged to Sam Blackmore, whom a lawyer 
 tries to ruin. Margaret is known as a light comedy writer and 
 dramatist, but has a second personality as Frances Farrington, 
 a serious writer hence the mystery. There are complications: 
 fate plays into her hands, and the wind-up is a sensational Court 
 of Justice farce, in which Margaret, arraigned by the lawyer for 
 the murder of Frances Farrington, manages to make things hum 
 and comes out triumphant. 
 
 19 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 A New Novel 
 
 By BERYL FABER 
 
 AND 
 
 COSMO HAMILTON 
 
 Author of "Adam s Clay," "The Blindness of Virtue," etc. 
 
 This story centres itself in one day in the lives of four intimate 
 friends, two married couples. It is an amusing comedy, in which to 
 give her husband a lesson Viola, one of the two women who are 
 both really in love with their husbands, begins a flirtation with 
 Peg s husband, and Peg retaliates by taking up the running with 
 the other man. A game of cross-purposes follows, each couple 
 going one better than the other, until a climax is reached by Peg 
 taking quite an extreme measure after both husbands have had a 
 very bad time. 
 
 The Alternative 
 
 By A. F. SLADE 
 
 Author of A Wayside Weed," "Mary Neville," etc- 
 
 A marriage is brought about between Keith and Kate by an 
 intriguing mother, and Kate is unhappy. Finding her lover Lyell ill 
 she determines to nurse him. The husband finds her, and to free 
 herself from her yoke Kate falsely accuses herself of an intimacy 
 with Lyell. Her husband refuses to believe her, and she goes back 
 to endure. A child is born, and there is a woman in the background 
 whose son is Keith s. Kate does her best, but there is a big duel 
 between husband and wife. With such a situation it need hardly be 
 said that this story is an uncommon one. It will make a special 
 appeal to feminine readers, and is in every way worths- to rank with 
 the author s very remarkable novel, " A Wayside \Veed." 
 
 20 
 
New 6s. Novels 
 
 The Doctor Wife 
 
 By COLJJETTE YVER 
 
 Translated by ANNA, COMTESSE DE BREMONT 
 
 This is a translation of a novel very popular in France under 
 the title of " Princesses de Science." It tells the story of a young 
 French doctor who, falling in love with a medical student, a gifted 
 and beautiful woman with a brilliant medical future, wishes her to 
 become the devoted wife of the hearth ; but she loves her work, 
 and they part. Fernand, however, gives in. They marry, and a 
 child is born, only to die soon, and Therese resumes her old life. 
 There is an ever-growing estrangement, and Fernand is consoled by 
 the devoted friendship of another woman ; but the story closes on 
 a note of hope. There are other women doctors in the story, 
 which deals with a question of the hour and is full of human interest. 
 It also gives us an instructive picture of certain phases of Parisian 
 life to-day. 
 
 A Fetish of Truth 
 
 By EILEEN FITZGERALD 
 
 Author of "The Heart of a Butterfly," etc. 
 
 Stephen Allardyce, a man of strong character but of humble 
 parentage, goes to seek fortune in America, where he meets a man 
 of his own name a wastrel of good birth, who holds an intro 
 duction to a big American firm. Stephen buys this of him and 
 introduces himself. He becomes successful, and charges himself 
 with the welfare of the wastrel s children left in England. He goes 
 home a millionaire, and questions arise as to his relationship to the 
 children. He enters Society and engages himself to a lady of birth. 
 But troubles arise, and he ultimately returns to America ; but the 
 ending is a happy one. The story is dramatic, there is much 
 worldly wisdom in it, and the characters are clear-cut studies. The 
 many readers of the author s earlier book, " The Heart of a 
 Butterfly," will feel assured that the Society life is well done, and 
 it may be said that this story will be found equally pleasing. 
 
 21 
 
THE MOST FASCINATING AUTO 
 BIOGRAPHY FOR MANY YEARS 
 
 And one of the most popular books of the moment 
 
 The Story of My Life 
 
 By ELLEN TERRY 
 
 In one handsome demy 8vo volume, cloth gilt, 6s. net 
 WITH 4 PHOTOGRAVURE PLATES AND 7O OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 A SUPERB WORK AT A POPULAR PRICE 
 
 15,000 copies of the English Edition 
 alone have already been printed 
 
 A SPECIAL EDITION, limited to 1 ,OOO copies, In foolscap 4to (8j; x6|"), 
 
 white binding, with extra photogravure plates and additional 
 
 illustrations, i is. net for copies signed by the 
 
 Author, limited in number to 250; 
 
 unsigned i6s. net 
 
 ONLY A FEW OF THE SIGNED COPIES REMAIN UNSOLD 
 
 OPINIONS OF THE PRESS 
 
 " Surprisingly good ; the book is for the most part delightfully written; good 
 6tories abound; unaffected, unpretentious. Miss Terry s story of her life is one of 
 the happiest efforts in autobiography issued for many a long day." Standard. 
 
 " Miss Terry s countless lovers will treasure her book as a fresh expression of 
 the most winning and delightful personality that appeared on the English stage 
 during t-he Nineteenth Century. It has none of the magnificent postures of the 
 Bernhardt memoirs, but it is a hundred times richer in humanity and charm." 
 Daily News. 
 
 " We were surprised to find Miss Terry the author of so good and so delightful 
 a book as this frank, impulsive, generous characteristic story of her life. The 
 book is both delightful to read and a very valuable document." Times- 
 
 " There is a charm about these memoirs which is not easily defined except in 
 terms of the author s own personality. Like Ellen Terry herself, they are full of 
 high spirits and sensibility. They reveal a vitality of exceptional exuberance, a 
 temper that through sixty years has remained sunny and unspoilt, a sense of humour, 
 constantly, if almost unconsciously in exercise, and a joy in living which no 
 experience of sadness, no warning of time has been able to subdue. Candid almost 
 to the point of indiscretion, they have the piquancy of good conversation of a 
 woman s conversation, apt in its very inconsequence, intimate in its reserves, 
 strangely shrewd even in its too expansive moments. Throughout the book we seem 
 to be listening to private talk of the actress." Athenceum. 
 
 " Those playgoers who are glad to have owned her sway in the past will find 
 renewed delight in this narrative. For Ellen Terry has imparted to her book much 
 of the enchantment and the grace and the charm which have distinguished her ever 
 since she saw the first sunset out of that lonely attic window in early childhood. 
 To the playgoer, too, it is a book that will bring back a thousand pleasant memories." 
 Daily Mail. 
 
 "This book is ridiculously cheap. We do not mean only that it contains 
 sufficient matter, literary and photographic, for two volumes at 24s. We intend to 
 suggest that it contains far more than six shillingsworth of delightful stories. " 
 Evening Standard 
 
 22 
 
The following important WORKS OF FICTION will be published 
 before the end of the year. Each in oloth gilt, 6s. 
 
 The Necromancers 
 
 By ROBERT HUGH BENSON 
 
 Author of "The Conventionalists." The Light Invisible," etc. 
 
 This novel will be of full-length, and will it is hoped be ready 
 for the Spring. 
 
 Seymour Charlton 
 
 By W. B. MAXWELL 
 
 Author of "The Guarded Flame," "Vivien," etc. 
 
 Mr. Maxwell in this story traces the mental development of 
 a man who, after trifling with life for many years, emancipates 
 himself from frivolity and wins happiness by an honest, steadfast 
 love. In his progress towards higher things he is assailed by 
 temptations, and does not always succeed in resisting them. The 
 book is a long one, dealing with \aried social worlds. A here are 
 numerous principal characters, and innumerable types of modern 
 existence are introduced to the reader s consideration. 
 
 Romance at Random 
 
 By H. B. MARRIOTT. WATSON 
 
 Author of "A Midsummer Day s Dream," "The Web of the Spider," etc. 
 
 Describing the adventures of a young nobleman about Town 
 in the author s happiest vein. 
 
 23 
 
SOME NOTABLE 6s. NOVELS 
 
 NOW IN GREAT DEMAND 
 
 The Elusive Pimpernel 
 
 By THE BARONESS ORCZY 
 
 Author of " The Scarlet Pimpernel," " Beau Brocade," etc. 
 
 A 6th large Edition is now ready. 
 
 " We must congratulate the Baroness Orczy on having in the Elusive 
 Pimpernel managed to sustain the interest of those who had been raised to a fever 
 pitch of excitement by the previous adventures of the resourceful hero." Morning 
 Post. 
 
 A Spirit in Prison 
 
 By ROBERT HICHENS 
 
 Author of " The Garden of Allah," " The Call of the Blood," etc. 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 " As one reads the work every page seems to throb with reality. There is fine, 
 even brilliant, workmanship in this book." Morning Post. 
 
 The Conventionalists 
 
 By ROBERT HUGH BENSON 
 
 Author of "The Light Invisible," "The Sentimentalists," etc. 
 
 3rd Edition 
 
 " It is a fine book and a true book. It has sincerity, and a quite extraordinary 
 gift for vivifying superficialities. It should certainly be a novel of the year." 
 Standard. 
 
 Lady Noggs Intervenes 
 
 By EDGAR J EPSON 
 
 Author of " Lady Noggs, Peeress." 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 "There are few novels which make the reader ask for more, but this is one of 
 " Truth. 
 
 24 
 
SOME NOTABLE 6s. NOVELS 
 
 NOW IN GREAT DEMAND 
 
 Aunt Jane and 
 Uncle James 
 
 By DOROTHEA CONYERS 
 
 Author of "The Strayings of Sandy," now in its 8th Edition. 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 " Mrs. Conyers certainly manages to keep her readers alive through another racy 
 Irish story. The characters are amusing and clever, full of perception and that kind 
 of humour in which the author has proved herself an adept. The plot is original, 
 the subtlety of the humour and the occasional touches of genuine emotion will 
 recommend it to those who enjoyed The Strayings of Sandy. "Morning Post. 
 
 The Supreme Test 
 
 By Mrs. BAILLIE REYNOLDS 
 
 Author of " The Man who Won," " A Dull Girl s Destiny," etc, 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 " A story that cannot fail to materially advance her reputation, although her 
 popularity has made of late quite remarkable strides." Standard. 
 
 The Blindness of 
 Virtue 
 
 By COSMO HAMILTON 
 
 Author of "Adam s Clay," etc. 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 " Mr. Cosmo Hamilton has written a delightful book. An eminently enjoyable 
 novel." Da ily Chronicle. 
 
 The Mayoress s 
 Wooing 
 
 By Mrs. BAILLIE SAUNDERS 
 
 Author of " Saints in Society." 
 
 2nd Edition 
 
 " One of the most clever and entertaining books published this season, a 
 penetrating and well-considered study ; it has all the elements of a successful novel, 
 a good plot, a capital love story, a delightful heroine, many strongly drawn and 
 definite characters, and a hero with a personality that will fascinate all feminine 
 readers. The book is simply packed from end to end with shrewd and original 
 remarks upon men and manners." Standard. 
 
 25 
 
RECENT BIOGRAPHICAL WORKS 
 
 NOW BEING FREELY READ 
 
 The Empress Josephine 
 
 Napoleon s Enchantress 
 
 By PHILIP W. SERGEANT 
 
 In two volumes, demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with photogravure* and other 
 illustrations, 24s. net 
 
 " His exceedingly entertaining biography of the Empress Josephine, one of the 
 most scheming and fascinating of the many remarkable feminine figures on the 
 brilliant -anvas of the First Empire. She appeals strongly to one as presented to us 
 by Mr Sergeant s vivid and mpartial pen. There is so much tha interests ; n hese 
 two admirable olumes. They ill be read with interest even by hose who ordinarily 
 find history dull. Mr. Sergeant is never for a momen" tedious ; he makes us 
 sympathise with thib strange creature. This is a book that will have a long life. It 
 is one which having been once read will not soon be forgotten." World. 
 
 A Georgian Pageant 
 
 By F. FRANKFORT MOORE 
 
 In one volume, demy 8vo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with photogravure plate and 
 other illustrations, 1 6s. net 
 
 " Exceedingly interesting, stimulating and illuminating ; his very interesting and 
 vivacious book ; readers will find themselves fully absorbed in the scenes and 
 characters." Justin McCarthy in the Daily Chronicle. 
 
 " This: is a delightful book, written with imagination and fancy ; we step back 
 into the eighteenth century with an ease which is a surprise to ourselves." 
 Standard. 
 
 " Mr. Moore brings before us a lively picture of the times. He gives us 
 excellent reading A more interesting book of light history has not coma our way 
 for a long time. 1 Daily Mail. 
 
 Queen Anne and Her Court 
 
 By P. F. WILLIAM RYAN 
 
 In two volumes, demy Svo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with photogravure plates 
 and other illustrations, 248. net 
 
 The Times says : " Mr. Ryan is a writer of spirit, wit and culture ; he can be 
 humorous, eloquent, romantic. He does not digress into the irrelevant. He knows 
 the seciet a secret not. to be defined or taught of luring a reader on from 
 paragraph to paragraph. The author does make and keep Queen Anne the central 
 figure of the narrative." 
 
 Lauzun : Courtier and Adventurer 
 
 The Life of a Friend of Louis XIV 
 By M. F. SANDARS 
 
 In two volumes, demy Svo, cloth gilt and gilt top, with photogravure plates 
 and other illustrations, 248* net 
 
 The Westminster Gazette says : " Was there among all the striking figures 
 at the Court of the Grand Monarque a single one so fascinating, so contemptible, so 
 like a sprite to-day, a demon to-morrow, and a courtier and charmer all the time, as 
 Lauzun. Miss Sanders approaches her subject in just the right spirit. She has an 
 amused and tolerant smile for the hero of her book, and tells the story of his 
 chequered life, so puny and cat-like in appearance, so brilliant and vivid a personality, 
 to dominate the scene all through^ In fact, the Lauzun of this book is a being 
 interestingly alive and human." 
 
 26 
 
SIR HARRY JOHNSTON S LATEST BOOK ON AFRICA 
 
 George Grenf ell and the Congo 
 
 The Life and Work of a Great Traveller 
 
 A History and Description of the CONGO INDEPENDENT STATE AND 
 ADJOINING DISTRICTS OF CONGOLAND, together with some Account 
 of the Native Peoples and their Languages, the Fauna and Flora ; and 
 similar Notes on THE CAMEROONS AND THE ISLAND OF FERNANDO 
 PO, the whole Founded on the Diaries and Researches of the late 
 Rev. GEORGE GRENFELL, B.M.S., F.R.G.S., on the Records of the 
 BAPTIST MISSIONARY SOCIETY, and on Additional Information 
 contributed by the AUTHOR, by the Rev. LAWSON FORFEITT, 
 Mr. EMILE TORDAY, and others. 
 
 In two large volumes, cloth gilt and gilt top, 30s. net 
 
 With 496 illustrations, 2 photogravure plates, and 
 14 maps 
 
 The Times says : " Sir Harry Johnston has undoubtedly added 
 one more to the already considerable list of standard works on 
 Africa of which he is the author. His book is a contribution to 
 human knowledge as valuable as any he has yet published." 
 
 THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ART BOOK OF THE SEASON 
 
 A FINE ART EDITION OF GOETHE S GREAT CLASSIC 
 
 FAUST 
 
 In one handsome volume, 7x 10%, cloth gilt and gilt top, 15s. net 
 
 With 30 full-page coloured plates, reproduced by an expensive process 
 
 on a pure uncoated paper, with permanent inks, from original 
 
 paintings, and many decorations by WILLY POGANY 
 
 A large-paper edition, limited to 250 copies 
 
 Specially bound in vellum and gold, with an additional coloured 
 plate, each copy numbered and signed by the artist, 2 2s. net 
 
 The AthencBum says : " We think the publishers were justified in their use of 
 Hayward s prose translation. Mr. Pogany s drawings are of interest and merit. 
 They show that the artist possesses considerable originality, a striking sense of 
 colour, and a capacity for dealing effectively with a 4 variety of subjects and situations. 
 Even when his work fails to please us we must admit that it is seldom insignificant." 
 
 27 
 
NEW I/. NET BOOKS 
 
 Each in crown 8vo, cloth, with illustrated cover 
 NEW VOLUME 
 
 A Welsh Singer 
 
 336*7i thousand 
 By ALLEN RAINE 
 
 NOW READY 
 
 Tommy and Co. 
 
 By JEROME K. JEROME 
 
 A White Man 
 
 By EDWIN MILTON ROVLE and J. O. FAVERSHAM 
 
 The Soul Market England s own Jungle 
 
 By OLIVE CHRISTIAN MALVERY 
 
 (Mrs. Archibald Mackirdy) 
 With 15 illustrations 
 
 NEW VOLUMES 
 
 Each in crown 8vo, coloured paper cover 
 
 The Heart of a Child 
 
 By I 
 
 Author of 
 
 Fair Margaret 
 
 By H. 
 
 Author of " ! 
 
 The Strayings of Sandy 
 
 Ai 
 
 The City 
 
 By FREDERIC CARREL 
 
 " A novel of such power as to stand well in comparison with Zola s " L Argent." 
 Its subject is the same, but Mr. Carrel s treatment of it is more expert than 
 M. Zola s." Illustrated London News. 
 
 28 
 
 By FRANK DAN BY 
 
 Author of " Pigs in Clover," etc. 
 
 By H. RIDER HAGGARD 
 
 Author of " King Solomon s Mines," etc. 
 
 By DOROTHEA CONYERS 
 
 Author of "Three Girls and a Hermit." 
 
 Ready in August 
 
HUTCHINSON S 6d. NOVELS 
 
 A Series of COPYRIGHT NOVELS by the 
 leading Authors, clearly and well printed 
 
 OVER SEVEN MILLIONS SOLD 
 New Volumes for 1909 
 
 188 Neither Storehouse Nor Barn Allen Raine 
 
 189 The Mystery of Court Regina Charles Garvice 
 
 190 A Son of Erin Annie S. Swan 
 
 191 Souls "Rita" 
 
 192 The Devil s Due G. B. Burgin 
 
 193 Paid For Charles Garvice 
 
 194 An Amateur Adventuress F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 195 Dufferin s Keep Evelyn Everett-Green 
 
 196 The Adventure of the Broad Arrow ... Morley Roberts. 
 
 197 Love and the Poor Suitor Percy White 
 
 198 A Girl of Spirit Charles Garvice 
 
 199 Cloth versus Silk Dorothea Conyers 
 
 200 Love at Arms Rafael Sabatini 
 
 201 A Man of No Family C. C. and E. M. Mott 
 
 202 Where Love Leads Charles Garvice 
 
 203 The World in the Church Mrs. j. H. Riddell 
 
 204 The Masqueraders "Rita" 
 
 205 The Idol-Maker Adeline Sergeant 
 
 206 At Love s Cost Charles Garvice 
 
 207 Campion Court Emma Jane Worboise 
 
 203 In a Silver Sea B. L. Farjeon 
 
 209 The Compromise Dorothea Gerard 
 
 210 Cruel London Joseph Hatton 
 
 211 The Girls of Faversham Florence Marryat 
 
 212 Judy and the Philosopher Tom Gallon 
 
 213 Surperfluous Sisters Evelyn Everett-Green 
 
 214 The Belles of Vaudroy G. B. Burgin 
 
 215 Bess Of Hardendale Theodora Wilson-Wilson 
 
 216 Tangled Wedlock Bdgat jepson 
 
 217 The House Of Cards Lady Troubridge 
 
 218 Raoul: Gentleman of Fortune H. C. Bailey 
 
 219 An American Woman Annie S. Swan 
 
 220 A Dull Girl s Destiny Mrs. Baillie-Reynolds 
 
 221 The Guardians of Panzy Dolf Wyllarde 
 
 222 The Marauis Charles Garvice 
 
 29 
 
HUTCHINSON S 6d. NOVELS 
 
 ALREADY PUBLISHED 
 
 180 The Adventures of Police-Constable 
 
 Vane, M.A Alice and Claude Askew 
 
 173 Love for an Hour is Love for Ever Amelia Barr 
 
 132 The Rose of Life Miss M. E. Braddon 
 
 90 Was it a Sin? Anna, Comtesse de Bremont 
 
 140 The Wood End J. E. Buckrose 
 
 95 The Marble City G. B. Burgin 
 
 94 Life s Trivial Round Rosa N. Carey 
 
 50 Mollie s Prince Rosa N. Carey 
 
 146 My Lady Frivol Rosa N. Carey 
 
 143 Sir Charles Danvers Mary Cholmondeley 
 
 125 The Danvers Jewels Mary Cholmondeley 
 
 162 Prisoners Mary Cholmondeley 
 
 166 The Thorn Bit Dorothea Conyers 
 
 56 The Village Blacksmith Darley Dale 
 
 97 The Grand Duke Carlton Dawe 
 
 86 The Summit House Mystery L. Dougall 
 
 106 The Secret of Wold Hall Evelyn Everett-Green 
 
 174 Married in Haste 
 105 Samuel Boyd of Catchpole Square 
 121 The House of White Shadows 
 7 Bread and Cheese and Kisses ... 
 51 The Last Tenant 
 
 Evelyn Everett-Green 
 B. L. Farjeon 
 B. L. Farjeon 
 B. L. Farjeon 
 B. L. Farjeon 
 
 120 The Sacred Nugget B. L. Farjeon 
 
 186 The Stumbling Block Justus Miles Forman 
 
 187 A Secret Inheritance B. L. Farjeon 
 
 169 Miser Farebrother B. L. Farjeon 
 
 55 The Splendid Porsenna Mrs. Hugh Fraser 
 
 135 A Corner of the West Edith Henrietta Fowler 
 
 113 Kate of Kate Hall Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler 
 
 and A. L. Felkin 
 
 82 Place and Power Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler 
 
 11 The Farringdons Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler 
 
 172 In Subjection Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler 
 
 138 Aunt Phipps Tom Gallon 
 
 142 Kiddy Tom Gallon 
 
 107 Meg the Lady Tom Gallon 
 
 75 The Dead Ingleby Tom Gallon 
 
 13 The Girl Behind the Keys Tom Gallon 
 
 12 Peplow s Paperchase Tom Gallon 
 
 160 The Cruise of the Makebelieves Tom Gallon 
 
 151 Heart for Heart Charles Garvice 
 
 123 Linked by Fate Charles Garvice 
 
 81 Love Decides Charles Garvice 
 
 122 Love, the Tyrant Charles Garvice 
 
 155 Kyra s Fate Charles Garvice 
 
 168 Nell of Shorn Mills Charles Garvice 
 
 184 Olivia and Others Charles Garvice 
 
 185 The Story of a Passion Charles Garvic 
 
 77 Silvia s Lovers Mrs. Gaskell 
 
 145 The House of Riddles Dorothea Gerard 
 
 161 The Three Essentials Dorothea Gerard 
 
 15 Chiffon s Marriage "Gyp" 
 
 157 Adam s Clay Cosmo Hamilton 
 
 165 The Way of the Spirit H.| Rider Haggard 
 
 181 Love Rules the Camp Lieut. -Col. Andrew C. P. 
 
 Haggard 
 
 67 Bitter Sweets Joseph Hatton 
 
 16 By Order of the Czar Joseph Hatton 
 
 112 When Greek meets Greek Joseph Hatton 
 
 164 Clytie Joseph Hatton 
 
 139 Double Harness Anthony Hope 
 
 76 The Lost Continent Cutcliffe Hyne 
 
 109 Patricia: A Mother "Iota" 
 
 30 
 
HUTCHINSON S 6d. NOVELS 
 
 ALREADY PUBLISHED 
 
 134 Paul Kelver Jerome K. Jerome 
 
 19 The Cavaliers S. R. Keightley 
 
 52 The Pikeman S. R. Keightley 
 
 74 In the Czar s Dominion Le Voleur 
 
 21 By Right of Sword A. W. Marchmont 
 
 96 In the Name of a Woman A. W. Marchmcnt 
 
 129 The Greatest Gift A. W. Marchmont 
 
 170 The Web of the Spider H. B. Marriott Watson 
 
 128 For Ever and Ever Florence Marryat 
 
 102 Love s Conflict Florence Marryat 
 
 65 Too Good for Him Florence Marryat 
 
 171 Gerald Estcourt Florence Marryat 
 
 101 My Lady Greensleeves Helen Mathers 
 
 108 The Story of a Sin Helen Mathers 
 
 137 The One Who Looked On F. F. Montresor 
 
 88 A Nest of Linnets F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 26 I Forbid the Banns F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 69 Phyllis of Philistia F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 149 Shipmates in Sunshine F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 66 The Secret of the Court F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 148 The White Causeway F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 29 They Call It Love F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 154 The Artful Miss Dill F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 183 The Marriage Lease F. Frankfort Moore 
 
 130 The Great White Hand J. E. Muddock 
 
 30 A Rising Star David Christie Murray 
 
 79 A Rogue s Conscience ... David Christie Murray 
 
 144 Twenty -five Years in Seventeen Prisons " No. 7," 
 
 99 Franks, Duellist Ambrose Pratt 
 
 62 The Successor Richard Pryce 
 
 100 Confessions of a Ladies Man William Le Queux 
 
 47 Of Royal Blood William Le Queux 
 
 110 Secrets of the Foreign Office William Le Queux 
 
 54 The Seven Secrets William Le Queux 
 
 32 The Under-Secretary William Le Queux 
 
 159 Whosoever Loveth William Le Queux 
 
 33 A Welsh Singer Allen Raine 
 
 59 A Welsh Witch Allen Raine 
 
 46 By Berwen Banks Allen Raine 
 
 35 Garthowen Allen Raine 
 
 98 Hearts of Wales Allen Raine 
 
 68 On the Wings of the Wind Allen Raine 
 
 117 Queen of the Rushes Allen Raine 
 
 34 Torn Sails Allen Raine 
 
 167 A Lady of the Regency Mrs. Stepney Rawson 
 
 141 The Man Who Won Mrs. Baillie-Reynolds 
 
 78 Above Suspicion Mrs. J. H. Riddell 
 
 126 A Life s Assize Mrs. J. H. Riddell 
 
 127 The Rich Husband Mrs. J. H. Riddell 
 
 103 The Ruling Passion Mrs. J. H. Riddell 
 
 163 Austin Friars Mrs. J. H. Riddell 
 
 38 An Old Rogue s Tragedy ... "Rita" 
 
 104 A Vagabond Lover Rita" 
 
 71 A Woman of Samaria Rita 1 
 
 39 Good Mrs. Hypocrite Rita 
 
 40 Peg the Rake Rita 
 
 116 The Jesters Rita 
 
 60 The Lie Circumspect Rita 
 
 115 The Silent Woman Rita 
 
 84 The Sinner Rita 
 
 153 Kitty the Rag Rita 
 
 178 Queer Lady Judas Rita 
 
 89 The Way of a Man Morley Roberts 
 
 179 A Son of Empire Morley Roberts 
 
HUTCHINSON S 6d. NOVELS 
 
 ALREADY PUBLISHED 
 
 177 The Trampling of the Lilies 
 
 114 Reparation 
 
 73 Roger Vanbrugh s Wife 
 
 93 The Sixth Sense 
 
 176 The Man Stealers 
 
 119 The Son of Gad 
 
 63 The Eternal Quest 
 
 156 A Victory Won 
 
 150 Made in His Image 
 
 Ill The Gambler 
 
 131 Her Grace s Secret 
 
 147 Starvecrow Farm 
 
 91 The Grip of the Bookmaker 
 
 182 The Heart of the Dancer 
 
 136 The Yellow Van 
 
 124 Evelyn s Story 
 
 87 The Wife s Trials 
 
 175 Lottie Lonsdale 
 
 64 Alain Tangier s Wife 
 
 83 A Love Episode (with 94 illustrations) 
 
 ALSO 
 
 52 Marie Corelli: The Writer and 
 Woman .. 
 
 the 
 
 Rafael Sabatini 
 
 Adeline Sergeant 
 
 Adeline Sergeant 
 
 Adeline Sergeant 
 
 M. P. Shiel 
 
 J. A. Steuart 
 
 J. A. Steuart 
 
 Annie S. Swan 
 
 Guy Thorne 
 
 Mrs. Katherine Cecil Thurston 
 
 Violet Tweedale 
 
 Stanley Weyman 
 
 Percy White 
 
 Percy White 
 
 Richard Whiteing 
 
 Emma Jane Worboise 
 
 Emma Jane Worboise 
 
 Emma Jane Worboise 
 
 J. H. Yoxall 
 
 Emile Zola 
 
 T. F. G. Coates and R. S. 
 Warren Bell 
 
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 FOR SIXPENCE." 
 
 Always well-informed, ever up-to-date, and never dull, 
 
 THE LADY S REALM 
 
 has held its own for over twelve years against all comers. 
 
 Its List of Contributors is the strongest that any magazine, 
 English or American, could furnish, including, as it does, the 
 most Popular Authors. 
 
 Special Features are made of the Stories, and the Articles 
 are all contributed by the best-informed writers. 
 
 The Illustrations in the Magazine are of the highest class, 
 its artistic contributors including the foremost illustrators of 
 the present day. 
 
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14 DAY USE 
 
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 SEP 20 1969 1* 
 
 
 
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