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3 1924 075 726 996 



Sonia Married 



Sonia ^Married A Novel 

ty Stephen McKenna Author 0/ " Soniar 

"Midas and Son," "Ninety-Six Hours' Leave," "The 
Sixth Sense," "Sheila Intervenes^' and "The Reluctant 
Lover." 




LONDON: HUTCHINSON & CO. 

PATERNOSTER ROW 



CONTENTS 



CHAP. 

Epistle Dedicatory 
I. — An Arabian Night 
II. — The Open Door . 
Ill— SoNiA O'Rane 
IV. — The Door Closed 
V. — The Limits of Loyalty 
VI. — ^The Unwritten Law 
Vil. — The Door Reopened 
VIII. — Sanctuary . 



PAGE 

vii 
II 

44 
85 
130 
171 
217 
263 
306 



" As a clownish fellow was driving his cart along a deep miry lane, 
the wheel stuck so fast in the clay, that his horse could not draw it 
out. Upon this he fell a bawling and praying to Hercules to come and 
help him. Hercules, looking down from a cloud, bid him not to lie 
there like an idle, dastardly looby as he was, but get up and whip his 
horse, and clap his shoulder stoutly to the wheel, adding that this was 
the only way for him to obtain assistance." 

The Fables of jEsop : " Hercules and the Cartet." 



EPISTLE DEDICATORY 

TO WALTER FRANCIS ROCH 



My dear Roch, 

Ever since you read " Sonia " in manuscript, you 
have been the book's most generous critic. May I mark my 
gratitude for this and for a friendship older than "Sonia" 
by dedicating its successor to you ? Perhaps you remember 
openly doubting whether in fact the spiritual shock of war 
could so change and steady Sonia as to make her a fitting 
wife for any man, O'Rane most of all ; you may recollect 
my confessing that such a marriage of hysterical impiilse 
contained the seeds of instant disaster. 

Sequels are admittedly failures, but I look on this book 
less as a sequel than as an epilogue or footnote. Sonia was 
not to know happiness until she had suffered, and the sacrifice 
in the early days of war was to many a new and heady self- 
indulgence. It is the length of the war, the sickening repet- 
ition of one well-placed blow after another on the same 
bruised flesh that has tested the survivors. After a year 
of war O'Rane could have mustered many followers, when 
he murmured to himself, " I — all of us who were out there — 
have seen it. We can't forget. The coiurage, the cold, 
heart-breaking courage . . . and the smile on a d3^ng man's 
face. . . . We must never let it be forgotten ; we've earned 
the right. As long as a drunkard kicks his wife, or a child 
goes hungry, or a woman is driven through shame to disease 
and death. ... Is it a great thing to ask ? To demand of 
England to remember that the criminals and loafers and 
prostitutes are somebody's children, mothers and sisters ? 
And that we've all been saved by a miracle of suffering ? 



8 Epistle Dedicatory 

Is that too great a strain on our chivalry ? I'll go out if need 
be, but — but must we stand at street corners to tell what 
we've seen ? To ask the bystanders — and ourselves — 
whether we went to war to preserve the right of inflicting 
pain ? " 

After four years of war do you find many traces of 
O'Rane's crusading spirit ? Loring, he and a thousand others 
intrigued and pulled wires to be sent out before their turn ; 
since they lost their lives or eyes or limbs, we have seen 
their places filled by men who were first jeered and shamed, 
later pricked and driven into the army, under the amused 
gaze of their more fortunate fellows who had intrigued and 
pulled wires to be kept at home ! We have watched con- 
science being made a penal offence and persecution exalted 
into patriotism. We have seen self-denial, like self-sacrifice, 
made statutory ; and the comprehensive plea of war has 
excused the recrudescence of that feverish licence which 
many of us superstitiously felt the war had been sent to end. 
Financially, morally and politically we are living on the last 
few hundreds of our capital. And in pubUc life the war 
stepped in where honour feared to tread. 

I dedicate this book to you in sympathy, because we 
would both recapture, if we could, O'Rane's first fine, careless 
rapture. But there is little permanence in collective moral 
upheavals ; action and reaction are equal and opposite, and 
the same violence which transformed the world in 1914 has 
hastened the return to pre-1914 conditions. The House of 
Commons, as you know it, and the society outside the House 
of Commons, as I know it, are not going to legislate a new 
world into existence in the spirit of the Constituent Assembly. 
We have worked, like old Bertrand Oakleigh, through the 
phases of extravagant hope and premature pessimism ; 
we are tired and dispirited, chiefly anxious to end the strain, 
glad if we can curtail the slaughter, though we are growing 
used to this, but concerned more for securing the peace of the 
world in our life-time than for declaring any other dividend 
on the lives which have been expended. " We shall be dazed 
and bruised before an end is made, laddie, staggering like 
drunken men," as Dr. Burgess prophesied in " Sonia." " Per- 
adventure, if ye speak of the Promised Land, men will arise 
and stone you with stones, saying, ' Would to God we had 
died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when 
we sat by the fleshpots, and when we did eat bread to the 
full.' I am an old man, laddie, and old men and weary 



Epistle Dedicatory 9 

men, broken with the cares of this life, are fain to go back to 
the things they know." 

What is left to those who are weak or obstinate enough 
to feel that the things they know are capable of improvement 
and that man is essentially perfectible ? If a collective 
revival flicker to smoking extinction, can you attain the same 
results from the aggregate of individual efforts ? O'Rane, 
you will find, tries both extremes. 

Always cordially yours, 

Stephen McKenna. 

Lincoln's Inn, 1918. 



SONIA MARRIED 



CHAPTER ONE 

AN ARABIAN NIGHT 

" . . . Is it not singular, and almost touching, to see Paris City 
drawn out, in the meek May nights, in civic ceremony, which they call 
' Souper Fraternel,' Brotherly Supper ? . . . See it, O Night t With 
cheerfully pledged wine-cup, hobnobbing to the Reign of Liberty, 
Equality, Brotherhood, with their wives in best ribands, with their 
little ones romping round, the Citoyens, in frugal Love-feast, sit there. 
Night in her wide empire sees nothing similar. O my brothers, why is 
the reign of Brotherhood not come ? It is come, it shall have come, say 
the Citoyens frugally hobnobbing. — Ah me ! these everlasting stars, 
do they not look down 'like glistening eyes, bright with immortal pity, 
over the lot of man [ ' . . ." 

Thomas Carlyle : " French Revolution." 



AFTER twelve months in an Austrian internment camp, 
the roar and movement, the familiar smell and glare 
of London streets were stupefying. 

I had arrived in Vienna a week before the mobilization 
order was issued ; my mission was to secure the services 
of certain physicians and surgeons for a new hospital which 
I had in contemplation, and, though I was conscious of 
unwonted restlessness, though my young friends in the 
Chancery were kept working late, the recent ultimatum to 
Serbia could never, I felt, involve England in war. So time 
went by, the hotels emptied, but I preferred to trust my 

II 



12 Sonia Married 

own judgement and went on trusting it until war had been 
declared. I knew Vienna so well, I had lived there so long 
and made so many friends from my earliest days at the 
Embassy, that I am afraid I continued to trust my judgement 
and to back my luck even after I had become technically 
scheduled as an enemy alien ; and, when the reluctant 
authorities more in sorrow than anger placed me under 
surveillance, we all felt that a mistake had been made and 
that I should only have to ask for my release to obtain it. 
Was I not well over the most extravagant military age ? Was 
I not physically unfit to bear arms ? Could I not at any 
time have left Vienna with the Embassy Staff ? 

I was to find from August, 1914, until July, 1915, that the 
aspirations of the Litany for the well-being of prisoners and 
captives were neutralized by the reluctance of constituted 
authority to disturb the status quo. I was secure in my loose- 
box on a race-course five miles from Vienna ; wire entangle- 
ments discouraged my comings and goings, arc-lamps laid 
me bare to the vigilance of the sentries ; what good purpose 
could be served by setting me at large ? My brother made 
the one appearance of his life in the House of Lords to raise 
me as an issue and to urge the exchange of civilian prisoners ; 
memorials were presented to the Foreign Ofhce ; I am sorry 
to say that in the first convulsion of war I and my few thousand 
fellow prisoners did not matter. 

I was interned for a twelvemonth. And, writing now in the 
third year of the war, I doubt whether I shall ever make good 
the knowledge which was then withheld from me. The 
newspapers were censored or inspired for purposes of propa- 
ganda ; my colourless letters from England were enriched 
by half-page smears of indelible black. Between ignorance 
of what they might say and what I might receive, my correspon- 
dents confined themselves to business discussions and bald 
family history. My brother wrote of his son Archie's death 
in the retreat from Mons ; my niece Yolande Manisty told 
me that she and her husband had moved into my house 
in Pont Street and were attending to my affairs as best they 
might. A further letter brought me the shocking news of 
Deryk Lancing's death on the eve of war, with consequences 
to myself which I required many weeks to digest. . . . 
After that there were guarded and bewildered little notes 



An Arabian Night 13 

from Felix Manisty, who is a greater archaeologist than man 
of affairs ; there were voluminous technical enquiries from 
Hatherly, my solicitor, a weekly budget from Yolande and 
sporadic outbursts from friends who had heard of my intern- 
ment and felt constrained to write one letter to cheer my 
loneliness. 

In July, after a year of false starts, an exchange of prisoners 
was finally arranged ; in the last week of the month I returned 
deviously through Switzerland and France, landed in a most 
unrecognizable England, reported myself at an equally un- 
recognizable Foreign Office and then stood, much as I had 
stood forty years earlier with a crowd of other shy new boys 
at Eton, wondering what I was expected to do next. In 
the roar and movement, the smell and glare of London streets, 
I had ceased to have any property. The people were dif- 
ferent, there was an incredible number of soldiers about. 
And everyone seemed to have been getting on very satis- 
factorily without me. . . . 

I remember walking a few steps towards the House of 
Commons, but I did not know whether the House was sitting ; 
I turned back to Trafalgar Square with some idea of taking a 
train to Hampstead and visiting my office, but I had aban- 
doned it for twelve months. If I called on Hatherly in 
Lincoln's Inn Fields, I should be told that he was at Ripley 
Court ; if I went home, I should find that Yolande and Felix 
were both out. ... It was salutary, I am sure, to discover 
the measure of my importance, but it left me very lonely ; I 
felt for some reason that not only was I not wanted but that 
I had no right to be there. England seemed to have been 
taken over as a going concern by a new management, which 
was in a great hurry. . . . 

I passed through the Admiralty Arch and looked round 
me. New Zealanders and Australians, bronzed and big- 
boned in summer khaki. South Africans, with their hats 
pinched to a point, were strolling up and down the Strand, 
in twos and threes, gravely smoking cigarettes ; a slow- 
speaking Canadian enquired of me the way to Westminster 
Abbey ; in St. James' Park two brakes passed me filled 
with Indian troops, turbaned, silent and undemonstrative. 
I remember that certain German prints had described the 
British Army as a menagerie. . . . 



14 Sonia Married 

Through the Arch, I could see a stream of motor omnibuses 
hurrying into Trafalgar Square and displaying long posters 
in a red and white streak—" Lord Kitchener wants you," 
" Lend your strong right arm " ; on the Horse Guards' 
Parade recruits were waiting their turn by the long wooden 
sheds at the Downing Street end ; the finished soldier came 
swinging down the Processional Avenue to the music of a drum 
and fife band, watched a little wistfully by a knot of men, 
in service caps, blue jackets, loose red ties and grey trousers 
sometimes pinned emptily at ankle, knee or hip. Standing 
on the kerb, a girl of twenty in deep mourning completed 
scene and sequence. 

I was stiU gaping like a yokel, when I heard my name called 
and found my hand wrung by an officer in unfamiliar naval 
uniform ; and, though we had sat and voted side by side 
during his short term in the House, though I had shot with 
him a dozen times at his place in Ireland, I had to look twice 
before I recognized him as George Oakleigh. We stood shak- 
ing hands, laughing, talking both at once and shaking hands 
again until he suggested that I should come into his room at 
the Admiralty for a cigarette and a talk. George, whom I 
had known as a dilettante journalist and political wire-puller, 
explained-^parenthetically that he had for a year been one of 
innumerable auxiliary civil servants ; I did not need to be told 
that he was tired, over-worked and vaguely, sullenly bitter. 

" Fancy people going out and trying to slaughter one 
another on a day like this ! " he cried, looking with pink- 
lidded eyes at the sparse trees and scanty shade amid the 
white flood of sunshine. 

" Well, you'd go out, if you had the chance," I said. 

" And hate it like HeU all the time," he murmured reflec- 
tively, as he mechanically took a salute. "I've seen enough 
people in the casualty lists to realize that war is a dangerous 
occupation, Stornaway ; and I've met enough fellows home 
on leave. . . . You know Jim Loring's gone, by the way ? " 
His teeth grated together. " This — this is the very thing 
that my uncle Bertrand and I spent half a dozen years 
trying to avert ! Well, I must be getting back to work. If 
this war's done nothing else, at least it's cured me of the 
conventional twelve-to-three-with-two-hours-off-for-luncheon 
view of Government offices. With me it's nine-thirty to eight. 



An Arabian Night 15 

six daj^' holiday in twelve months and about one week-end 
in three." 

As I would not come into his office and waste his time there, 
we wasted it for a few moments more by the Cook monument. 
George tried to give me my bearings, interrupting himself to 
ask jerkily, " I suppose you've heard that Jack Summer- 
town's dead ? He was knocked out at the same time as 
your nephew. And Val Arden ? . . ." 

I had an additional tragedy in which Oakleigh did not 
share, for we were almost within sight of the house which 
poor Deryk Lancing had so proudly adorned ; on such 
another day he had taken me over it, room by room ; I had 
heard that he died on the very evening that war was declared, 
yet I suppose he only anticipated what would have come 
to anyone of his age in six months' time. 

" I suppose you can't imagine what all this looks like to a 
man who's seeing it for the first time," I said. " All this 
drilling and training. How many of these fellows wiU come 
back, d'you suppose ? And what are we going to get in 
return ? " 

He smiled wistfully. 

" A lasting peace, I hope. It can never happen again, 
you know." 

" I never thought it could happen this time," I said. 

" Well, this is going to prove that war is a failure. Perhaps 
we needed the proof. . . . You'll find that after the war people 
will begin to do what we — you and Bertrand and I and a 
thousand more — tried to make them do before — remove the 
incentive to war and the means of making war. There must 
be a general disarmament, the military machine must be 
broken. You'll find that Germany will be a confederated 
republic within twelve months — ^we can never make peace 
while there's a Hohenzollern at large. You know, Stornaway, 
this war's given us the opportunity of healing the sore 
places of Europe, and there's only one way to do it ; when the 
peace conference begins to sit, it has got to divide the world 
according to nationalities. Belgium and France will have 
to be cleaned up first of aU, and after that we must let the 
world go as it wants to go. Alsace-Lorraine will return 
to France ; you'll find north and south Germany separating ; 
Poland must be reconstituted ; Italy will get back the 



16 Sonia Married 

Trentino and Trieste, though, of course, that leaves Austria 
without a port. . . . But you'll find Austria-Hungary split- 
ting into a thousand pieces as soon as you apply the principle 
of nationality. I'm not sure about Constantinople, but I'm 
inclined to give it to Russia. . . . It's worth some sacrifice 
to clean up the international anomalies of the world and 
to make an end of war." 

" It's going to be a big business, George, and a long busi- 
ness," was aU that I could say. 

" We're in sight of doing it," he asserted. " The moment 
we get within range of Constantinople, Turkey goes out of 
the war ; she's on her last legs now. Then with Russia 
bursting in on the south-east and Italy pressing up from the 
South, Austria will be the next to go. People who know 
tell me she's on the verge of starvation. Then next spring 
we shall be bringing off a big offensive on the west, we're 
so frightfully handicapped now by lack of shells." He 
paused and looked at his watch. " By Jove, I must fly ! " 
he exclaimed. " When shall I see you again ? I'm dining 
with the Maurice Maitlands to-night and I happen to know 
that the Manistys are going to be there. Why don't you 
invite yourself ? You're a lion, you know ; and Connie 
Maitland wiU never forgive you, if anyone else catches hold 
of you first." 

Leaving him to hurry into the Admiralty, I went slowly 
on foot to Pont Street. England was an armed camp and 
munition factory, London a gigantic General Headquarters. 
And George, with his rimless eyeglasses enthusiastically 
askew and a normally pale face ecstatically flushed, was 
throwing corps here and divisions there, dividing the map of 
the world by the test of nationaUty. ... I felt giddy. 

There was no one at home when I reached Pont Street, 
and I explored the havoc of war as it had invaded the house 
of a man to whom personal comfort means much. My butler, 
footman and chauffeur had enlisted ; my car was wearing 
itself out in the service of an elderly general ; the ground- 
floor gave of&ce-room to a railway canteen organization ad- 
ministered by my niece, and the rest of the house, when not 
allocated to herself or her husband, provided temporary 
accommodation for derelict officers and nurses. Never have 
I felt less wanted. 



An Arabian Night ir 

" But, darling uncle, there's so little that we can do ! " 
Yolande exclaimed, trying to combine apology and self- 
defence. " I feel that if we don't pinch and scrape and slave. 
. . . And everyone's in the same boat. ... I bought one 
black frock when Archie was killed and I'm not going to 
buy another stitch till the war's over. I don't dine out once 
a month ; and then I don't usually have time to dress." 

She was looking a little thin and white-faced ; for some 
reason the auburn hair which I loved had been cropped 
short, but she was undaunted and self-reliant, one of a 
hundred-thousand women to whom the war was bringing 
that opporttmity for service for which they had so long pined. 

The emergence of my nephew Felix from a War Office car 
completed the sense of revolution and unreality. That least 
military of archaeologists was now arrayed in a staff captain's 
uniform, which accorded ill with his glasses and bald head, 
for duty behind a string of letters and a telephone extension 
at the War Office. 

" You'll get used to it in time," Yolande laughed, as we set 
out on foot for Eaton Place. 

My sense of not being wanted certainly evaporated in the 
warmth of Lady Maitland's greeting. One of her sons was 
home on leave from the Front, and the familiar, red-lacquer 
drawing-room was filling with a party of twenty-four, each of 
whom was acclaimed at a distance, introduced, epitomized 
and enlisted for charity or intrigue before he had fairly crossed 
the threshold. 

" Yolande ! My dear, I got your note and I've put off the 
committee till Friday," she cried, when our turn came and my 
niece surrendered to a resonant kiss on either cheek. " And 
dear Captain Manisty — there was something I wanted to see 
you about. . . . It'll come back to me. ^wt^Mr. Stornaway ! " 
She surveyed me for a moment with her handsome square 
head on one side, then turned to a little group behind her. 
" My dears, we all thought he was dead ! Mr. Stornaway, I 
want you all to myself, you're going to tell me all about 
your terrible hardships and, before you're a day older, you're 
going on my Prisoners of War Relief Committee." She turned 
again to explain me to the room. " This is Mr. Stornaway 
who's been interned in Austria all this time. He's going to 
tell us aU about it. . . , Mr. Stornaway, it's a scandal, we 



18 Sonia Married 

can't get the Government to act. Now here's Mr. Deganway 
— ^you know him ? — ^he's in the Foreign Office and he tells 
me that the question of the prisoners " 

She broke off to welcome two new arrivals with a surprised 
cry of " Lord Pentyre ! And my dear Sir Harry Mordaunt ! " 
as though she had not invited them. I shook hands with 
Maitland and was trying to see whom else I knew, when she 
returned and remorselessly introduced me to Vincent Grayle, 
with whom I have sat in the House for a dozen years. He weis 
leaning on a stick, and I learned in a galloping exchange of 
biography that he had had one knee shattered in the Antwerp 
expedition and was now at the War Office " cleaning up the 
mess made by the professional soldiers." 

" But what were you doing out there at all ? " I asked, 
clinging to him for a moment before Lady Maitland could 
present me to anyone else. We had been contemporaries, if 
not friends, at Eton and Trinity, which meant that he was 
past fifty. 

" Much too good a war to miss ! " he answered with a 
laugh, hobbling away to be introduced to a young bride in 
half-mourning who had already collected two young Maitlands, 
Pentyre, Deganway and George Oakleigh. 

" I expect you find everything a bit changed," said Maitland 
earnestly, glancing at his own iiniform and speaking as though 
the war were a secret in which he was doubtfully initiating me. 

" Grayle's much the same," I answered, looking enviously 
after the viking figure with the blue eyes, pink and white cheeks 
and corn-coloured hair. 

There was a moment's silence, as my hostess mentally 
called the roll, and I strolled away before her husband was 
ready with another platitude. 

" Eleanor Ross is always late ! " she complained. " Well, 
you haven't altered much, Mr. Stornaway." 

Nor had she, I answered. The war seemed only to have 
turned her tireless energy into new channels. Whereas she 
had once called for the heads of Nationalists, strike leaders 
and, indeed, anyone with whom she chanced to be in tem- 
porary disagreement, she would now, I gathered, be content 
with the pubHc execution of the Prime Minister, Mr. Ramsay 
Macdonald and Sir Ian Hamilton. She seemed the motive 
power of as many committees as ever ; her house was the 



An Arabian Night 19 

meeting-place of as many incongruities as before, and she 
was prepared to yoke the meanest of us to one or other of her 
charities. 

" We must have a talk about the Prisoners," she said, with 
one eye on the door. "The Government will do nothing; 
but what do you expect ? " 

Lowering her voice, she confided that three Ministers, of 
whom I knew one to be a bachelor, were married to German 
wives, while a fourth was discovered to have arms stacked 
in his cellar and a wireless installation on his roof. She told 
me, further, that we had had enough of these lawyer-poli- 
ticians, that the country needed a Man, because the yoimg 
shirkers that you met in the street were stealing the work 
of those who had patriotically enlisted ; the Press, she went 
on to say, was a public danger (only exceeded in imbecile 
virus by the Press Bureau), and it was high time that in 
the matter of war we sat at the feet of Germany. She 
barely had time to weaken her last effect by declaring the 
German military machine, for all its forty years' perfection, 
to be the greatest imposture in history, before the Duchess 
of Ross was announced. 

" Odious painted creature. And always late ! " Lady 
Maitland whispered to me, as she hurried forward with 
both hands outstretched. 

" You look giddy," Yolande murmured. 

" And what do you think of England after a year of war ? " 
Eleanor Ross cried over her shoulder, as we went down to 
dinner. 



11 

If Lady Maitland had invited a full account of my intern- 
ment and had then scampered away without waiting to hear 
it, I was not let off so easily by either of my neighbours at 
dinner. For the first three courses I told my tale to the 
Duchess of Ross, who spent the second three handing it on 
to the right, while I turned like an automaton and repeated 
my recitation to Lady Pent5Tre. As I might have foreseen, 
knowing their craving to be ahead of the world with any 
new thing, I was instantly committed to lunching with 

2* 



20 Sonia Married 

both (because each knew so many people who would be simply 
dying to meet me and hear all about it) ; and, if I bore my 
cross with resignation, it was because I knew that I was 
relieving someone else (he proved to be a submarine commander 
who had recently been awarded the Victoria Cross) — and that 
I should be relieved in my turn when a greater novelty pre- 
sented itself — (after three days an American Lusitania sur- 
vivor came to my rescue). 

I was beginning to get used to the noise and strangeness 
and to recover from my first bewilderment, when Lady 
Maitland rustled to her feet, and I was left at the mercy of a 
political argument carried on between my host and Grayle 
across my body. So far as I remember, it concerned the like- 
lihood of compulsory service, and I was only interested to 
find Grayle, the most lawless man of my acquaintance, 
pleading for more discipline, while a high-and-dry Tory Hke 
Maitland defended Ministers whom he had styled thieves and 
common sharpers at the time of the 1909 Budget and the 
Marconi enquiry. I had almost forgotten my poor little 
host's genius for picking up the hastier opinions and less 
profound catchwords of the uninformed. George caught 
my eye and winked, as Maitland thumped the table im- 
pressively, tugged at his moustache and talked — with a 
slightly shocked intonation — of " the brain and sinew of the 
Government, my dear Grayle." Young Pentyre, as surprise 
relaxed into boredom, moved next to me and began a rival 
conversation. 

" Who's the patriotic gentleman ? " he whispered. " And 
why's he so excited about the jolly old Government ? " 

" He's got a bee in his bonnet," George explained, " because 
he fancies he brought down the old Liberal lot and can't make 
out why he's not been given a job in the Coalition." 

" But who is he ? " Pentyre persisted. 

As I had known Grayle longer than anyone present, I took 
it upon myself to answer. 

We had first met nearly forty years ago as boys at Eton, 
soon drawing together in a common recognition, keenly 
felt and resented, that we were poorer than our fellows. My 
father had no business to send me there at all, but every 
male Stornaway always had gone to Eton, whether he could 
afford it or not. Grayle, the only son of a hard-drinking 



An Arabian Night 21 

Gloucestershire squire, who used to beat him unmercifully, 
was sent to school when he grew strong enough to resist 
parental castigation, with an idea, I suppose, that others 
by force of numbers would be able to continue the beatings. 
We worked our way up the school together, until Grayle 
was withdrawn in consequence of some trouble with a trades- 
man's daughter in Slough, and met again at Trinity, when the 
scandal was half forgotten. There I remained four years 
and Grayle four weeks. If I ever heard the full story of his 
subsequent final, cataclysmic quarrel with his father (they 
were separated, I know, by the stud-groom and a couple 
of strappers), I have forgotten the details ; the result of the 
quarrel was that Vincent disappeared, and the next time that 
I saw him was several years later in New York. I had gone 
up there from Washington and ran unexpectedly into Grayle's 
arms on Fifth Avenue ; he was accompanied by another 
Trinity man of my year — Guy Bannerman, a brilUant, shift- 
less Rabelaisian, whom Grayle with his startling streak of 
prodigal generosity had taken in hand and was prepared 
(as he consistently proved) to keep afloat. I remember how 
one of the loudest voices in the world suddenly silenced 
the drone of traffic by thundering : 

" It's the great anomaly of modern civiUzation. What 
are you going to do with them ? Theoretically they're your 
equal fellow-citizens, but they don't vote, they daren't 
enter a white man's hotel. I can't remember for the moment 
whether they're actually increasing in numbers " 

Then I knew, even without sight of the square-faced, 
bull-necked man with the familiar grey eyes, dusty hair and 
capacious, loose-Upped mouth, that Guy Bannerman had 
discovered America and was concerned to solve the negro 
problem. He was on his way to Klondike, where he heard 
that gold had been found, and he swore me impressively 
to secrecy. 

" Half New York knows about it aheady," I had to warn 
him. 

" How did they hear ? " he roared. 

" You've just told them." 

The three of us lunched together, and X found that Grayle, 
too, was bound for the gold-fields. Their methods of approach 
were notably different, for, while Guy Bannerman informed 



22 Sonia Married 

New York City that any fool could dig for gold and I retorted 
that every fool would, Grayle was compihng an exhaustive 
list of everything that a gold-digger could need or be drugged 
into thinking he needed. 

" One wants a pick and shovel, I suppose," Guy ventured, 
" and— and a pannikin." His conception of gold-digging 
impressed me as being literary. 

" And food, drink, lights, clothes, covering, cooking-gear, 

medicine " Grayle struck in ferociously. " No, we're 

not going to discover the North West Passage, but we're going 
to make these swine squeal — and the more squeals we knock 
out of them the better I shall be pleased. Tools, blankets 
— or rather, sleeping-bags. Tents. Tobacco. Mustn't forget 
tobacco. Bags for the gold. I suppose, if you've had a 
good day, you sleep with a revolver under your pillow ; and 
stand drinks all round, which involves the worst obtainable 
Calif ornian gooseberry. I'm going to supply the outfit, 
and they're going to dig the gold. Exploit, or be exploited. 
Care to come in with us, Stornaway ? Anything you like 
to put up, you know. ..." 

He could not persuade me to come and help him exploit, 
nor could he save Bannerman from being exploited, but the 
enterprise as he saw and planned it was a giant success even 
in the history of gold-rushes. I believe Aylmer Lancing 
supplied the capital ; Grayle reached Klondike a week after 
the rush had begun and only came east when it was starkly 
not worth his while to be left with a month's stores on his 
hands ; then the insalubrious shanty known as " Grayle's 
Hotel " was sold by private treaty, the stock-in-trade was 
put up to auction on a rising market and he returned to 
square his accounts with Lancing in New York. 

However much money he made, I dare swear that he re- 
turned with even more experience. For many months many 
thousands of the world's choicest blackguards had slept 
between his blankets, worked with his tools, eaten his food 
and sheltered beneath his roofs. Raving with his Califomian 
gooseberry champagne, a Pittsburg smelter had emptied 
one of his six-shooters into the scattering head of his partner ; 
Grayle sold the coffin and subsequently a coil of rope. He 
supplied jewellery and dresses to the women whom he had 
induced to follow the camp ; he peddled concertinas to the 



An Arabian Nignt 23 

musically-minded. Twice the store was looted, after a good 
day and a full dinner, which the looting party instinctively 
felt to have been insufficiently full. The first time he con- 
vened a pubUc meeting and asked if it was in the common 
interest to make him close down ; the second time he began 
to pack and only unpacked when the leader had been un- 
obtrusively Ijmched. As a study in contrasts, Guy Banner- 
man spent three months carrying the gold south and bringing 
back stores ; then he tired of the only work for which he was 
fit, pocketed his share of the profits and started digging. 
The profits were coaxed out of him by a woman whom he set 
himself to reclaim — without noticeable success — and, whereas 
the gold began to peter out within a month of Grayle's de- 
parture, Bannerman stayed on until his last dollar had passed 
to the new proprietor of " Grayle's Hotel." 

I met both adventurers in Venezuela, which they had to 
leave before their scheduled time, and again at Colon. Then 
I returned to England and got myself elected to the House 
of Commons for the Southdown division of Sussex ; I did not 
see Grayle again until the 1900 election brought him into 
the House, with Guy Bannerman faithfully running the 
election and later acting as secretary, shadow, press-cutting 
agency, collector of statistics, fact-finder and general par- 
liamentary devil. Then he went out to South Africa for 
the second half of the war. 

Having seen the man undisguised in two continents, I have 
always been a little surprised to find how little he was known 
here ; he can be a very entertaining ruffian, causing the usu- 
ally censorious to apologize and say " a blackguard, but at 
least he's not a hjrpocrite, you know " ; on the other hand, 
through the rose-tinted spectacles of middle-age I seem to 
look back on a House of Commons which would not have 
tolerated him ; perhaps we are more indulgent nowadays, 
perhaps no one took the trouble to compile a dossier, perhaps 
each man felt that his own turn might come next. 

Be that as it may, Grayle succeeded in entering a House 
that neither liked nor trusted him. Fishing in troubled 
waters for twelve years, he picked up a knowledge of his 
colleagues, even if he landed no fish ; speculation in countries 
too enterprising to be critical had made him rich enough 
to pay other people's debts and occasionally to compensate 



24 Sonia Married 

lost honour on behalf of some rising poHtician with a reputa- 
tion to preserve, but he never came into the open imtil the 
Marconi enquiry, when I discovered by the savagery of his 
attacks on the Government that he was now a newspaper 
proprietor. The war gave him his opportunity, and, accord- 
ing to the far from impartial statement of Bertrand Oakleigh, 
who liked an actionable story for its own sake, Grayle was one 
of the leaders in organizing the Unionist attack on the Liberal 
Government in 1915. 

All this and more I contrived to convey to Pentyre before 
Grayle had finished his cigar and signified his willingness to 
come upstairs. 

We were hardly inside the drawing-room before he had 
limped briskly to the sofa where the young bride who had 
been his neighbour at dinner was seated ; she smiled easily, 
ungratified but obviously conscious of his admiration, and in 
a moment they were splashing to the waist in vivacious 
badinage. I sought out my niece and tried to secure ten 
minutes' quiet discussion of my own affairs. 

In one of the first letters to reach me in my internment 
camp Yolande cautiously prepared me for bad news ; on the 
next page she announced young Deryk Lancing's death ; 
a week later I heard — ^in my loose-box and amid a smell of 
straw and whitewash — that the whole estate of some twenty 
odd millions had passed to me. I had known old Sir Aylmer 
Lancing, the boy's father, ever since I was transferred from 
Vienna to Washington, when he was in the fulness of his 
powers and Deryk was unborn. Indeed, he had hitched me 
out of the Diplomatic and given me a start with one of his 
own firms of contractors in South America, and there I had 
made enough money to retire in affluence when my health 
broke down in Panama. I had seen him, too, regularly and 
intimately for fifteen years after his stroke ; indeed I had 
induced my brother to sell him Ripley Court and I spent so 
much of my time there that it was sometimes hard to believe 
that the great, gaunt house had ever changed hands. Deryk 
I had known since he was a boy of eight or nine, brilliant 
and precocious, neurotic, impatient and inconsiderate, but 
winning and lovable with it all and filled with a blaze of 
promise. He had succeeded to the title and estate less than 
twelve months before he was killed ; he had just become 



An Arabian Night 25 

engaged rather romantically to a girl with whom he had long 
been in love ; and it was on the day when he had been shewing 
her the house which I persuaded him to buy and which was 
waiting for them both that he had fallen from the roof and 
been picked up dead and hideously broken. . . . 

I looked round the room, through the rich gleam of Lady 
Maitland's red lacquer, at Grayle, sitting with one leg per- 
manently stiff in front of him, Charles Maitland, already 
twice wounded, Pentjnre in his Guards uniform, waiting to 
go out, and my eyes came to rest on Yolande's black dress. 

" You would have thought the war had done enough 
damage without any extras of that kind," I said. 

" What are you going to do with all the money ? " she 
asked wonderingly. 

" I want time to think, Yolande," I said. " I feel a little 
bit dazed. It's so much the same — and yet so different. 
I know this room so well. Lady Maitland's the same fat, 
voluble, outrageous, delightful creature that she always was 
— ^and yet I seem to have dipped into another world. ..." 

We were still talking of ourselves and the family when a 
maid entered to say that a Mr. Jellaby wished to speak to 
Colonel Grayle on the telephone. I smiled in easy triumph 
as Grayle scrambled to his feet, for I have so often found 
Mr. Jellaby wishing to speak to me on the telephone, and poor 
Jellaby with tears in his voice has begged me to help keep a 
house or stand in readiness for a division or relieve guard 
after an all-night sitting. 

" If there's a division, I shall take you," Grayle threatened 
in retaliation for my smile, as he leaned down for his stick. 
" One of these Labour swine making trouble, I expect. We've 
all got to back the Government as long as it is the Govern- 
ment." 

It was a good guess, for he returned a moment later and 
dragged me to my feet with the announcement that Grim- 
thorpe, the A.S.E. man, was threatening to divide the House 
unless the Prime Minister gave an assurance that the National 
Registration Bill would never be made the basis of a system 
of conscription. 

" Infernal nuisance, but we shall have to go," he said. 
" You've got to start your duties some time, Stornaway, 
and you may as well keep me company and start them to- 



26 Sonia Married 

night. Only a formality, you know. Half the Cabinet's 
sworn not to graft conscription on to the Bill, and the other 
half's sworn it will. Beauty of coalition government ! " 

More from a desire to see what the House looked like than 
from any wish to support Grayle, I allowed myself to be 
taken away. As I shook hands with Lady Maitland, he 
stumped back to his sofa and roundly told the young bride 
that he proposed to come and call on her. 

" Haven't half finished our conversation," he said in a tone 
of authority, "so if you'll tell me your address " 

I chose to think that her manner hardened, as though she 
felt that Grayle was taking her for granted too much. 

" I'm hardly ever at home," she answered. " My Belgian 
refugee work " 

" Free in the evenings," he interrupted jerkily. "My 
only time for calling." 

She hesitated and, as I thought, sank her voice slightly, 
putting herself on the defensive. 

" You'd only be bored, you know," she warned him. " It 
isn't an ordinary house, and you won't meet any ordinary 
people." 

" Coming to see you," Grayle answered. 

" You clearly aren't wanted, Grayle," I said, taking him 
by the arm. " If you insist on dragging me to the House, 
let's start at once." 

He shook free of my hand and turned to her, as though he 
were delivering an ultimatum. 

" You don't want me to come ? " he demanded. 

" You won't be amused," she answered, this time in un- 
mistakable distress. 

" Where do you live ? " he asked relentlessly. 

" In Westminster." I was rather shocked by the way in 
which she allowed him to buUy her. " A house called ' The 
Sanctuary,' on the Embankment, just by the Tate Gallery." 

He repeated the name as we walked downstairs and whistled 
unsuccessfully for a taxi. On the steps I told him again 
that he had been making a nuisance of himself, for she was 
probably living in some modest boarding-house. Grayle 
would only murmur irrelevantly that she was a devilish 
pretty girl, an opinion evidently shared by George Oakleigh 
and the Maitland boys, who had surrounded her before Grayle 



An Arabian Night 27 

was out of the room. I cannot remember that her looks left 
any impression on me at this meeeting. 

The Sanctuary,' " he murmured for the third time, as we 
set off on foot for the House. " Didn't happen to hear 
what her name was, did you ? Never bother about names 
myself." 

" It would be inartistic," I said. 

We walked through Eaton Square in silence and along 
Buckingham Gate and Birdcage Walk to ParUament Square. 
As we approached the Palmerston monument, Grayle touched 
my arm, pointed ahead and quickened his limping pace ; an 
open-air meeting of two soldiers, nine loafers and one woman 
was being addressed by a shabbily-garbed young man who 
seemed to be on the worst possible terms with his audience ; 
Grayle, who has the nose of a schoolboy or a terrier for any 
kind of fight, clearly felt that this, like the war, was too 
good to miss. What went before I have, of course, no 
means of judging, but such fragments of vituperation as 
reached me suggested the wonder why a man, who cared 
nothing for his hearers, troubled to harangue an exasperated 
group, which was quite unconvinced by his reasoning. The 
speaker kept his temper ; his hearers had lost theirs from 
the outset, I should imagine, and this possibly amused him 
and justified the effort. 

" Go aht and fight yourself," cried one of the soldiers 
truculently, " before yer snacks at the men that 'ave been out 
there." 

" I should not der-ream of fighting," the lecturer answered 
with practised and very clear enunciation. 

" Precious sight too careful of yer dirty skin ! " 

The lectiirer laughed with maddening calm. 

" I value my life," he conceded, " but I happen to be 
brave enough to value my soul more. I do not choose to 
be the deluded instrument of Jvmkers here or elsewhere, 
and, had anyone thought you worth educating, you would 
not choose it either. My fine fellow, you were before the 
war — ^what ? A coal-heaver. But you had no quarrel 
with the coal-heavers of Germany, until your Junkers told 
you to fight ; you will again have no quarrel when your 
Junkers tell you to stop fighting. I wag a medical student 
once, I had no quarrel with the medical students of other 



28 Sonia Married 

nations, nor can I make a quarrel when a Junker tells me to 
hate, to be red and angry — if you could see how red and 
angry you look now ! — ^to stab and shoot and slash. If I 
have to kill, let me kill a Junker, who cannot maintain the 
peace of the world." He sank his voice with artistic pretence 
of talking to himself. " But I was educated, I have thought, 
I am not a dog to be whistled to heel or incited to fight other 
dogs." 

In the pause that followed Grayle put his lips to my ear 
and whispered behind his hand. 

" Get those two Tommies away," he begged. " Dust this 
fellow's jacket for him, but can't do it in uniform with moi, 
about." 

I gripped his arm firmly and tried to drag him away. The 
war seemed to have brought all Grayle's latent ferocity to 
the surface. 

" Don't be a fool ! " I whispered. 

" Not going to let a damned German agent talk sedition 
in my hearing ! " he cried. 

Even as he spoke, the decision was taken out of our hands. 
The soldier, rightly or wrongly described as a coal-heaver, 
stepped forward and called upon the lecturer to " take that 
back, will you ? " The lecturer smiled, folded his arms and 
said nothing, quietly waiting for the interruption to subside. 

" Take that back ! " repeated the soldier, with a new note 
of menace in his voice; and, when there was no answer, dealt 
a swinging open-handed blow to the lecturer's face. 

His victim staggered, recovered his balance and stood with 
lips tightly compressed and a print of angry scarlet on his 
cheek. One of the women had screamed ; two of the loafers 
cried, after deliberation, " Serve him right ! " 

" When opposed to truth," the lecturer continued, when 
he had satisfied himself that no second blow was coming, 
" violence is as ineffectual in the street as on the battlefield. 
You do not stifle truth by sending a man to Siberia, as I've 
seen men sent, though you may remove an undesirable 
prefect of police, as I have seen one removed, sky-high in 
Kiev, because — well, the truth was not in him. Nor is there 
truth in you ; there can be no truth in dogs who feed on bones 
flung from the table, dogs who rise up raw from their beating 
and give their lives to protect their masters." 



An Arabian Night 29 

This time there was no invitation to retract. The same 
soldier stepped quickly forward, threw his arm across his 
chest and flung the full weight of his body into a sweeping 
backhander. The lecturer was lifted off his feet and carried 
a yard back, where he struck the railings and fell in an in- 
vertebrate mass with one leg curled under him. The on- 
lookers craned forward uneasUy, glanced at one another and 
began to separate in silence, the more quickly when Grayle 
limped up and confronted the avenging soldier. 

" Clear out of this ! " he ordered abruptly. 

" 'E insulted the uniform, sir," came the husky justification 
compounded of alcohol, fear and regard for Grayle's red 
band and tabs. 

" I know all about that. Clear out and take your friends 
with you. He's not dead," he added a moment later, when 
we were alone, contemptuously exploring the body with his 
toe. " I don't suppose he's even badly hurt. I pro- 
pose to leave him here and tell one of the Bobbies at the 
House " 

There was a groan as the toe glided on to an injured part. 
I asked the man where he was hurt, and at soimd of my 
voice he opened his eyes, looked round for a moment and 
closed them again. I was as yet far from used to the dim 
light from the shrouded street-lamps and could only see that 
he looked a man between twenty and thirty, shockingly thin 
of body, with fair hair, dark blue eyes and a narrow face with 
high cheek bones. His air and costume were generally 
threadbare. More from policy than compassion Grayle 
relented somewhat. 

" I'll mount guard," he said. " Get hold of a Bobby and 
a stretcher." 



Ill 

To be involved, however innocently, in a street brawl is 
considerably more characteristic of Vincent Grayle than of 
myself. I think that he should have discontinued the habit 
at least when he reached the age of fifty, but I know well 
that he only regretted his late arrival. 

" They keep a stretcher at the House, don't they ? " he 



30 Sonia Married 

asked, as he bared his crop of yellow hair to the wind and lit 
a cigarette in preparation for his vigil by the recumbent 
agitator. " If not, telephone Cannon Row." 

I was starting on my way when I collided with a young 
man who had joined us unperceived. He was in evening 
dress with an overcoat across his arm and a sombre-eyed 
Saint Bernard at his side. 

" Some one hurt ? " he enquired, after waving away my 
apologies. " I thought I heard the word ' stretcher.' " 

" It was only a street row," Grayle explained callously. 
" This fellow thought fit to address an anti-recruiting meeting, 
and his points weren't very well taken." 

The young man wrinkled his forehead, laughed and, after 
a moment's thought, slipped his arms into the sleeves of his 
overcoat. 

" Didn't Doctor Johnson say that every man had the right 
to express his opinion and that everyone else had the right to 
knock him down for it ? " he drawled. Then abruptly, " Are 
you Colonel Grayle, by any chance ? " 

" I am," Grayle answered with a look of surprise. 

" I thought I recognized your voice. I collect voices and 
I heard you last week when the National Registration Bill 
was in Committee. Do you think it's possible to arrive at 
a taxi ? I live quite near here and I can take the patient 
home for treatment." 

"But why the deuce should you bother about him?" 
Grayle asked. 

The boy smiled to himself and shrugged his shoulders. 

"If we cast him off to a hospital, there'U be all sorts of 
silly questions," he explained. " And I'm a bit of an 
Ishmaelite myself. What's the extent of the damage ? " 

The injured man opened his eyes again and reduced his 
huddled limbs to some sort of order, not without occasional 
twinges of pain. He seemed nothing but skin and loose 
bones and might well have fainted from exhaustion rather 
than injury. 

" My left leg's done for," he announced. 

The stranger nodded sympathetically. 

" Can anyone see a taxi ? " he asked. " They've simply 
disappeared from the streets of London, like Sam WeUer's 
dead donkeys and postboys. Well, you men help him up 



An Arabian Night 31 

and give him a hoist on to my shoulders. I'm only a step 
from here." 

At a guess the sprawling figure was some inches taller and 
at least as heavy as the new-comer, but my suggestion that 
we should wait for a taxi or send for a stretcher was dis- 
regarded. 

" Perhaps I'm stronger than I look," he told me ; to the 
injured man he said, " Clasp your hands round my neck ; 
I'll try not to shake you, but it may come a bit painful. 
And one of you men look after the steering so that I don't 
tumble off the kerb or get nm over. The house is just by 
the Tate Gallery — a big sort of barn with a lamp over the 
door ; it's called ' The Sanctuary.' " 

Grayle started violently and looked at me, but I had 
appointed myself steersman and was heading for MiUbank 
in the wake of the sombre-eyed Saint Bernard. The young 
man's looks belied his strength, for he walked fast enough 
for Grayle to have difficulty in keeping pace and, as he 
walked, he told us that the expected division was a false alarm, 
and that the House was up. I hurried along by his side, feeling 
more and more that the whole evening had passed in a dream 
and that I should wake up to find myself back in my intern- 
ment camp. The noise and excitement had tired me into 
somnolence ; the darkened streets added to my feeling of 
tinreality. The dog with a cane and hat in his jaws, one 
young man with another yoimg man sprawling on his shoul- 
ders, Grayle pantiqg on one side and myself guiding the 
imconvincing procession on the other made up a picture whose 
reality I myself doubted more than once. 

And the house, when we reached it, was a large brick- 
and-timber warehouse, once the property of a wharfimger, 
before the Embankment was built, and quite unUke any- 
thing that I had expected— though in keeping with every- 
thing that night. I stood waiting for instructions, for there 
was a modem annexe, with a second door. I learned after- 
wards that Whaley, the Pre-Raphaelite, had used the place 
as a studio. 

" It's only about half furnished at present," our yoimg 
friend informed us, " and I expect you'll find it very untidy. 
We've not been married a month yet. The house was a 
wedding-present . ' ' 



82 Sonia Married 

I had guessed him to be the husband of the young bride 
whom we had met at dinner and could understand why his 
wife was unprepared for visitors. 

" We won't come in," I said, as we stopped under a wrought- 
iron lamp by a heavy oak door painted in white gothic 
characters with the name of the house. 

" Oh, you must ! " he cried. " I may want help. You 
just push the door — it isn't locked — and, if there's no light 
on, you'U find the switches to the right. Don't turn it on, 
though, till the door's shut, or someone will run me in for 
signalling to German aircraft." 

Grayle at least seemed to need no second invitation, and, 
when our host said that he might want help, I did not see my 
way to refuse the first. I confess, too, that I was amused 
and curious ; the boy was attractive, with mobile face, dark 
hair and big, black eyes ; I liked his quick smile and rather 
mischievous laugh, above all, I respected his good-nature 
in picking up a total stranger, who, so far as one can 
justify private acts of violence, had been most justifiably 
punished. 

We passed through the hall into a lofty room with long 
windows far up the walls above ten feet of oak panelling, 
rough-cut beams melting into the shadows of the roof and a 
block-floor half covered with rugs. On a dais to our right 
as we entered stood a long refectory table between two rows 
of heavily carved Spanish oak chairs ; at the far end was a 
grand piano ; low book-cases ran round the walls, there were 
three or four big oil-paintings above the panelling, and 
arranged in half-circles round the two fires were luxuriously 
large sofas and arm-chairs. I was a little reminded of a 
college hall, when I looked at the severe table on the dais, 
the black-beamed roof and panelled walls ; I thought of the 
perfect club smoking room, when I tried one of the chairs ; 
and the whole room, as I surveyed its warm, bright emptiness 
from the doorway, suggested a stage scene at the rise of the 
curtain. 

" It's rather joUy, isn't it ? " said my host, when I ex- 
pressed my admiration. " The bedrooms are all in the new 
part, but, when we're not asleep, we shall feed and work and 
live here. Personally I never want more than one room, 
and, if this one isn't big enough, I should like to know what 



An Arabian Night 38 

is. I'm sorry my wife isn't in, she could shew you round so 
much better ; but she's dining out to-night." 

He settled the injured man in comfort on a long sofa, and 
went to a telephone by the piano. While he waited for his 
call, we were invited to help ourselves from a side-table on 
the dais, where a generous choice of cake, sandwiches, fruit, 
' cold meat, cheese and drinks of many kinds awaited us. 
He hoped that we should find something to our taste ; people 
were apt to drop in at all hours, he assured us, so it was as 
well to have something handy. I poured myself out a 
brandy and soda and accepted one of his cigars. My young 
friend took for granted much that is not usually taken for 
granted, but I tried to harmonize with his mood and suc- 
ceeded better, I think, than Grayle, who walked slowly about 
the room, staring at the furniture and pictures, but not 
committing himself to criticism. My cigar was hardly alight 
when the flame-coloured silk curtain over the door was 
drawn aside, and a girl came in, looked round at us incuriously, 
and cut herself a slice of cake. As she prepared to eat it, 
she caught sight of the figure on the sofa and walked quickly 
up to our host, who murmured something and shook his 
head. Five minutes later the doctor arrived, and, while he 
began his examination, I announced that I must go home. 

" My wife will be back any minute now," our host pleaded, 
putting a repeater to his ear. " Are you sure you won't 
stay ? " 

" Let us come again in daylight," I said. " I'm really 
rather tired now. I've been travelling a lot lately." 

He bowed with smiling courtesy. 

" I won't keep you, but please come whenever you feel 
inclined to. You just push the door, as I explained " 

" Don't you ever lock it ? " asked Grayle, breaking sUence 
for the first time since we had set out from Parliament Square. 

The young man's black eyes smiled wonderingly. 

" Why should I ? " he asked. 

" Prevent things being stolen," Grayle answered. 

" Nobody's stolen anything yet — and we've been here 
a week. But, if anybody did steal, it would probably mean 
that he wanted it more than we did." 

" What's your objection to locking it ? " Grayle pursued. 

The boy stood with his hands in his pockets, swaying back- 

3 



84 Sonia Married 

wards and forwards from heel to toe, and smiling mis- 
chievously, with his luminous black eyes upon our faces. 

" It seems so inhospitable ! " he laughed, " and I love 
symbols." 

" But who d'you keep it open f or ? " I asked. 

He shrugged his shoulders and laughed. 

" Your friend, the doctor, his patient, that lady who 
came in a moment ago. You, if you wUl come again." 

" I shaU certainly come again," I said, as we shook hands. 

Walking along MiUbank, Grayle broke into an unexpected 
laugh. 

" I thought I'd met most kinds of lunacy," he remarked. 
" Fellow said he was in the House, didn't he ? I must look 
him up in the directory to-morrow, and see what their name 
is. ' The Sanctuary.' I suppose that's a symbol, too." 



IV 

A reputation for honesty is often embarrassing ; when 
coupled with efficiency, it is always disastrous. For five- 
and-twenty years I have reeled imder the name of a " good 
business man," and this has exposed me to attack by every 
impulsive woman and woolly-headed man who has wanted 
something done without quite knowing how to do it, who 
has wished money collected without quite knowing how to 
set about it, who has dragged his committee and himself 
knee-deep into the mire of stagnant insolvency without know- 
ing whether to go on or to struggle back. Then someone 
has said, " We must co-opt Mr. Raymond Stornaway." 

As the reputation has long ceased to be an honour and is 
now only a nuisance, I propose to affect no false modesty 
about it. Before the war I was always being made a governor 
of some new school or hospital, and my success is to be 
measured by the fact that I almost invariably got my own 
way in committee — (if I was not voted into the chair at 
once, I overwhelmed the chairman until he yielded place) — 
and as invariably I raised the funds which I had been 
appointed to find. Perhaps I hoped that, as everyone had 
comfortably survived my absence for a year, I should be 



An Arabian Night 85 

allowed a respite, but on the morrow of this Arabian Night 
of mine I was to discover that London contained as many 
voluble, sympathetic and unpractical women as ever, all 
convinced that they had only to form a committee of their 
friends, dispense with book-keeping, insert their photographs 
sn the illustrated papers, and stretch out both hands to a 
man who knew a man who had a friend on one of the daily 
papers. 

Lady Maitland rustled in, grey-haired and majestic, as I 
was finishing breakfast the first morning ; the Duchess of 
Ross starved me into submission before she would let me 
go down to luncheon ; and by night I was duly included in 
the Committees of the Belgian Relief Fund, the Emergency 
Hospital Fund and the Prisoners of War Relief Fund. The 
following day Moimtstuart, of the Treasury, wheedled me 
into the Deputy Commissionership of the War Charities 
Control Department, and I found myself after an interval 
of thirty years once more a Government servant, charged 
to see that the amateur enthusiasm of Eleanor Ross and 
her friends did not defraud the public too flagrantly and 
that a reasonable proportion of the money collected was, in 
fact, paid over to the objects for which it had been raised. 

Throughout August and the first half of September I set 
myself to learn my new duties, spending the morning in 
the St. James' Street Committee Rooms, and the afternoon 
at the Eaton Hotel, where my Department had been installed 
in a faded coffee-room enlivened by a sardonic portrait of 
Lord Beaconsfield in Garter robes and made business-like 
by rickety trestle tables, paste pots and letter trays, inter- 
necine telephones and japanned deed-boxes earmarked as 
His Majesty's property by a white crown and " G.R." It 
took me several bashful days to grow acclimatized to the 
epicene life of the office, but I discovered in time and with 
relief that the expensive young women with the Johnsonian 
capacity for conversation and tea were every whit as much 
frightened of me as I of them. The men afforded material 
for my insatiable interest in my fellow creatures ; we had a 
few journalists, a stockbroker or two, several college tutors, 
an elderly miscellany, which had retired some years before 
and was returning to active service for the duration of the 
war, two or three men rejected or invalided out of the army, 

3* 



36 Sonia Married 

and three or four whose reason for not being in the Army was 
not so obvious — a gathering which was partly patriotic, 
wholly impecunious and very different from the collection of 
unfledged naked intelligences which were distributed through 
the public offices of other days by the Civil Service Com- 
missioners. 

When I had subdued Lady Pentyre in the morning and 
ploughed through the familiar files in the afternoon, I devoted 
the evening to private business. A year's accumrdation of 
letters made a considerable pile, which was not reduced by 
the kindly friends who thought it necessary to congratulate 
me on my return ; nor was my leisure increased by those 
others who invited me to luncheon or dinner with a persistency 
that brooked no refusal. In time, however, I had read 
myself abreast of the periodical literature produced by the 
hospitals and schools ; in time, too, I began to tackle the 
Lancing inheritance and paid formal visits to Ripley Court 
and the house in Pall Mall to see that they were satisfactory 
to the War Office. So long as the war continued, I was not 
likely to be faced by poor Deryk Lancing's inability to dispose 
of the income of the Trust. 

A month shpped imperceptibly away before I had got rid 
of the arrears of work, and felt justified in taking on extra 
burdens. Then I paid my first visit to the House of Commons, 
and tried in one evening to get the temper of a House which 
I had left toiling acrimoniously in 1914 with the third pre- 
sentation of the Home Rule BUI. The Front Benches were 
pleasantly mingled in late-found amity, there was a solid, 
unquestioning Ministerial majority, but in place of an official 
opposition I found a curious collection of cliques not wholly 
satisfied with all the heroic remedies of the Government 
and fearful that criticism might be construed as factiousness. 
I was to find later that, with the abdication of the House of 
Commons, all control of administration fell gradually into 
the hands of the Press. 

The Smoking Room, which-^like the rest of London — 
moved in a regular cycle of elation and depression, optimism 
and despair, was in deep gloom my first night. The recruit- 
ing figures were shrmking daily, we could look for no help 
from America and what Lady Maitland called " that man 
Wilson's ' too proud to fight ' nonsense." Warsaw had 



An Arabian Night 37 

just fallen, and Russian Poland lay at the mercy of the 
enemy ; earlier in the week, too, we had experienced our 
first Zeppelin raid, and, while it was easy to count the 
casualties and demonstrate the 700,000 to i odds against 
any one of us being killed, we felt that something remained 
to be done, and that these birds of death, however exciting 
to watch, should not be allowed to fly to and fro at will, hover 
their destructive hour and depart unscathed. 

As I can do nothing with criticism which is afraid to 
materialize into action, I decided to leave the House early 
and, being at a loose end, to pay my promised call at " The 
Sanctuary." The fact that I had let a month go by without 
discovering my host's name disturbed me little in a house 
where so much was taken for granted, and I boldly pushed 
open the door, as I had been bidden, and looked into the 
long, warm room. By firelight it seemed empty at first ; 
then I heard voices and saw the disabled agitator sitting on a 
sofa with his leg up, talking to the girl whom I had seen on 
my last visit. As I hesitated by the door, she jumped up 
and made me welcome. 

" Leg not right yet, then ? " I said, as I joined them by 
the sofa. " By the way, my name's Raymond Stornaway." 

" Mine's Hilda Merryon," said the girl at once. 

I had not had much opportunity of observing her before, 
but I saw now that she was young and slight, with black hair 
and very pale, regular features. She had in her manner, too, 
something scornful, which I found immediately antagonistic. 

" Oh, I shall be here for weeks," said the young agitator, 
" if they'll keep me. We're tuberculous as a family, and the 
knee will probably turn out tuberculous. I'm Peter 
Beresford." 

My niece Yolande, who buys all modern poetry that she 
can find, tells me that I ought to have been certainly the 
wiser and perhaps the more impressed by this information ; 
and, if I had spent the last year in England instead of abroad, 
I might very well have read of Beresford's escapades with the 
police. Various people have from time to time contributed 
fragments of his biography. I believe that he started as the 
dreamy and eccentric son of a Lincolnshire family, and that 
on leaving school he had betaken himself to Moscow on a 
self-conscious literary holiday. Once there, he refused to 



38 Sonia Married 

come back. The sombre, intoxicating magic of Dostoevski 
had drawn him, Russia laid her spell upon him ; and, when 
funds from home were cut off, he starved and feasted, worked 
and slumbered for two years, until the woman with whom 
he was living forsook him. A violent reaction sent him to 
Cambridge, a strangely experienced and natively rebellious 
freshman, for he had written poetry and abandoned it, read 
medicine and abandoned it, mixed in revolutionary society 
and drifted under a haunting police surveillance which only 
relaxed when powerful friends urged his reluctant steps 
homeward. 

" No more public meetings for the present, then," I said. 

Anyone may call the words fatuous, but they were harmless 
and not ill-natured. I quote them because of their effect 
in lashing Beresford to a passion only describable as insane. 
I have never met anyone who knew him as a boy, I cannot 
say whether he was naturally neurotic or whether too early 
acquaintance with oppression had warped his mind, but I 
saw a good deal of him between this night and our last meet- 
ing and I have consistently felt from the moment of this 
encounter that he was separated from certifiable madness 
by a hair's breadth. He had all the suspicion, the sudden 
fury, the courage and the obstinacy of fanaticism, the whole 
streaked with morbidity. We talked long that night, and 
every chapter of his Russian Odyssey ended with the refrain, . 
" Alone of the beasts man delights in torturing his fellows ; " 
yet, when he described a meeting in Petersburg being 
broken up by a charge of Cossacks, I could have sworn that 
there was gloating in his tale of casualties, as with a man 
who will pay money to stare at physical deformity. Against 
this, his hatred of oppression was rooted in a poet's love of 
beauty. His quarrel with society in peace was that it made 
man a soul-stunted slave, and the countryside an industrial 
ash-heap, in war that it made him a disembowelled and 
screaming reproach of the Maker who fashioned him in His 
image. Beresford had a sense of colour, form and soimd 
which a man will never know unless he be born with it. 
Again and again it came out in his descriptions. And then 
I remembered his making a sarcastic and grotesquely in- 
effectual speech to a knot of drimken loafers. 

" Do you feel that the sort of thing you were saying the 



An Arabian Night 39 

other night does much good ? " I persisted, as he glared at 
me, breathing quickly. 

His sudden blaze of anger seemed to dab two spots of 
scarlet on his shining, prominent cheek-bones. 

" For you — no good ! " he cried. " I told these fools 
not to fight, I asked them what they were fighting for ! 
They didn't know. How should they ? But you know. 
Keep the dogs fighting one another, and they won't turn on 
you. But when your troops come back, the troops that 
you have drilled and taught to shoot, when they ask why their 
companions were killed " 

The girl relaxed the scornful attitude of aloofness, which 
she had preserved throughout the evening, to touch his arm 
warningly ; he coughed and went back to his cigarette. 

I laughed at him, partly because it was good for him and. 
partly to help me keep my own temper. 

" That stuff didn't go down the other night, and it won't 
go down with me. You've been talking quite sensibly so 

far " He bowed ironically. " You can't make war 

without killing people, and there would have been no peace 
or safety, if we'd stood out. Of course, if you want to see 
this coimtry or Russia treated as Belgium has been 
treated " 

He snorted contemptuously and told me, as an eye- 
witness, that the -Belgian atrocities could at their worst 
always be matched by the Russian atrocities in East Prussia. 
(" Alone of the beasts man delights in torturing his fellows.") 
But why strain at the gnat and swallow the camel ? The 
major atrocity was war ; and, the greater the war, the greater 
the atrocity. " The English were not too humane in South 
Africa. No. And South Africa was child's play, it didn't 
matter who won. You were less humane stUl in putting 
down the Indian Mutiny, where you were fighting for our 
lives. Germany is fighting for her life, she must fight how 
she can. A screen of women and children before the advanc- 
ing armies ? One husbands one's troops. The Zeppelin • 
attacks ? One always likes to undermine civilian moral, 
to make the whimperers at home yelp for peace on one's own 
terms — (and are not you high-minded English warring on 
civilians — ^women and children, too — ^by blockading Ger- 
many ?). This is a war of nations with all the nations' 



40 Sonia Married 

human and material resources poured into the scale. If you 
want to fight, fight to win ! Sink your hospital ships ! 
They will have to be replaced, and fewer troops, less food, less 
ammunition will be carried in consequence." 

He threw himself back exhausted and gave way to a fit 
of coughing which threatened to tear him in pieces. I looked 
at my watch and got up to go. 

" You should have preached this before the war," I 
suggested. 

" It wUl be before the next war," he gasped. " And war 
there will be ! I'm sick of this ' war-to-end- war ' clap- 
trap ! That's been thought in every war, it was thought 
when Europe was leagued against Napoleon, as it is now 
leagued against the Kaiser ! There will be war until the 
fools I addressed that night, those dogs who fight for tjhe 
masters that betray them, turn and tear their masters limb 
from limb. Yes. If they don't do that before the world is 
ripe for another vintage, if they wait till present memories 
have faded and another generation of old men sits in power 
to send young men to their death " 

His pity again became merged in imaginative blood-lust 
until he seemed to revel in the horror of his own description. 
Science was to be applied without mercy or discrimination. 
When the maximum of destruction had been effected in the 
field, the war would be carried behind the lines to those 
who made its continuance possible. There would be no 
quarter for prisoners, who might escape, nor for the wounded, 
who might recover and fight again. The nurses and doctors 
who dragged the wounded back to life and patched them into 
the semblance of men were making new soldiers ; it was not 
convenient that the enemy should be presented with new 
soldiers, so the war must be continued against these nurses 
and doctors. And against the countrymen, who raised food 
for the troops, and the artificers, who supplied them with 
arms, and the women, who came to take men's places on the 
farm and in the workshop, and the old men, who lent money 
to buy more guns and shells, and the young boys, who day by 
day drew nearer to the age when they, too, would be soldiers, 
and the last woman in the country, who, if she did nothing 
else, could bear a child to the last man. . . . 

Beresford's voice rose until it broke, and his words poured 



An Arabian Night 41 

out more and more quickly. The fellow had the impressive- 
ness which is born of conviction, and the girl by his side no 
longer attempted to restrain him, but a sound unheard by 
me stopped him abruptly, and he glanced over his shoulder 
with quick apprehension, as the door opened and closed. 
It was not the glance that I associate with an easy conscience, 
and I was suddenly sorry for the man. A moment later 
the hunted look left his face, as the flame-coloured curtain 
was drawn aside, and my host appeared in sight. There 
was the same whimsical smile in his big, black eyes that I 
had seen when we met before — mischievous, kindly and 
baffling. He threw his hat into a chair, and gave his cane 
to the Saint Bernard to carry ; as he came into the room 
I was struck by the lightness and grace of his movements. 
The atmosphere cleared of its electricity. 

" Only a small party to-night," he murmured. 

The girl on the sofa looked up quickly. 

" I'm here," she said, " and Mr. Beresford and " She 

hesitated and blushed to find that she had forgotten my name. 

" Raymond Stornaway," I supplemented. " You said I 
might come again." 

He turned and grasped my hand. 

" I've heard our friend, George Oakleigh, speak about 
you ! " he cried. " I didn't know, the other night, that it 
was you. Haven't you just been released from Austria ? 
My wife said something. . . . They're a funny people, the 
Austrians ; there's no pleasing them. Now, when they get 
hold of you, they simply won't let you go, but the last time 
I was in the country — officially — ^they escorted me over the 
frontier and hinted that they'd put a bullet in me, if I ever 
came back. And all because of a regrettable little disturbance 
in Vienna, when an Austrian officer said things about my 
father and myself, which I thought — and think still — a gentle- 
man does not say." 

As I looked at the animated, thin face, I was trying hard 
to remember where I had seen it before. At the mention of 
Vienna I saw again an open-fronted cafe on the Ring-Strasse, 
with white-aproned waiters bustling, gesticulating and 
shouting round a swaying mass of combatants ; in the heart 
of the struggle I saw a thin-faced, black-haired boy fighting 
like a tiger ; one arm hung limp and helpless by his side. 



42 Sonia Married 

or flapped horribly with the movements of his body, and his 
face was streaming with blood. I saw his companion bring 
down the lamp with a blow from a chair, I remember how 
infinitely more alarming and suggestive the cries, the groans 
and general tumult of the fight became in the darkness. It 
was no affair of mine, however, and I was far down the Ring- 
Strasse when the police cut their way into the melee with 
drawn swords. 

" I was in the cafe at the time," I told him. " You were 
there with Jack Summertown. I'm surprised that either 
of you got out alive." 

" You were there ? " he echoed with a burst of boyish 
laughter. " It was a great night. I've still got some of the 
marks ! I wondered who you were. ... Of course, we've 
got scores of friends in common. You know Bertrand Oak- 
leigh in the House ? Well, he lives here. The place in 
Princes Gardens is being used as a hospital, so George has a 
room at his Club and the old man stays with us. He gave 
us the house — he's always been astonishingly generous to 
me — but of course I couldn't accept it like that. I only let 
him give it me on condition that I was allowed to share it 
with others. Perhaps now my symbolism " 

He broke off with a laugh and asked whether the others 
had looked after me well. 

" I'm sorry my wife's not here," he said. " Let me see, 
she wasn't in the last time, either ; the fact is. Colonel Grayle 
telephoned to say that he'd been given a box for some theatre, 
and would we dine with him and go on ? I'd already pro- 
mised to dine at the House and I don't go to the play much, 
anyway, but she thought she'd like to go and she hasn't 
como in yet. To-night you've got to wait." 

It was half-past eleven, and I held out my watch to him, 
I -" "king my head. 

" Look at the time," I said. 

He took out the repeater that I had seen before and set 
it striking. 

" I set mine by Big Ben this evening," I told him. 

" Ah, but I can't see it. I — haven't the use of my eyes, 
you know. If you feel you must go, I will only remind you 
that the door will be open next time. I've got any amount 
to talk to you about, and my wife will be most frightfully 



An Arabian Night 43 

sorry to have missed you again. I rather gathered that you 
and Grayle and she had been dining in the same house that 
night, but you were at different ends of the table, and she 
didn't hear your name." 

" I don't yet know yours," I said. 

" David O'Rane," he answered. " There's no particular 
reason why you should, unless George has ever talked to you 
about me. Now, will you swear — on your honour — that 
you'll come again ? And it must be before I go away. Good- 
night ! " 



CHAPTER TWO 

THE OPEN DOOR 

" I was a baby when my mother died 
And father died and left me in the street. 
I starved there, God knows how, a year or two 
On fig-skins, melon-parings, rinds and stalks. 
Refuse and rubbish. . . . 

But, mind you, when a boy starves in the streets 
Eight years together, as my fortune was, 
Watching folk's faces to know who will fling 
The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he desires, 
And who will curse and kick him for his pains, — 
Which gentleman processional and fine, 
Holding a candle to the Sacrament, 
Will wink and let him lift a plate and catch 
The droppings of the wax to sell again. 
Or holla for the Eight and have him whipped, — 
How say I ? — nay, which dog bites, which lets drop 
His bone from the heap of ofial in the street, — 
Why, soul and sense of him grow sharp alike. 
He learns the look of things, and none the less 
For admonition from the hunger-pinch." 

Robert Browning : " Fra Lippo Lippi.' 



IT was not until I had introduced some little organization 
into my work that I had opportunity or justification 
for seeing my friends. I have reached an age when I like to 
go early to bed between two long days of work ; I never 
ceased to wonder, therefore, at the nervous vitality of some 
of the people whom I was meeting ; London was fuller than 
I had ever known it, the customary autumn exodus had 
ended with the war ; and, what with a few hundred officers 
home on leave and athirst for amusement, what with a few 



The Open Door 45 

thousand girls working in hospitals, canteens and Govern- 
ment offices, anyone who wanted distraction had not to 
look long for it. The restlessness which seized London 
every summer before the war seemed to have increased 
and become permanent, with an astounding new licence 
which I found hard to understand. I suppose the war broke 
down most of the old social conventions, but I sometimes 
wondered in the early days whether there was anything 
which the strictly brought up and closely chaperoned young 
girl of other days was now not allowed to do. . . . 

Young O'Rane carried me off to my first war party. After 
I had looked for him unsuccessfully for some weeks, we had 
been dining at the House and talking business and school 
politics, for the Governors of Melton School had lately co- 
opted me in place of Aylmer Lancing, and I had heard from 
George that O'Rane was temporarily on the stafE there. At 
ten o'clock he told me that he was due home for a house- 
warming, and plunged into a description of his domestic life 
with all the eagerness of a child — which is what he was — 
shewing a new toy. Old Bertrand Oakleigh had given them 
the house as a wedding present ; ever since his illness at the 
outbreak of war (no one was allowed to call it a stroke), the 
old man had needed some little attention ; what easier than 
to set a couple of rooms aside for him ? And the place 
was so big that you could give a shakedown to " most any- 
one " — and a meal. It was what O'Rane had always wanted 
to do — as in the Middle Ages (rather vaguely) ... I should 
hardly believe some of the people he'd had there even in 
five weeks. . . . People were such fun ; Beresford, for 
instance . . . full of good stuff, full of white-hot idealism 
which only needed to be directed. ..." And he's fallen in 
love with my wife, so she's gently taming him." 

He threw out his^sentences with jerky exuberance, passion- 
ately serious at one moment and laughing at himself and 
me the next. 

And that girl I had met, Hilda Merryon. ... A little 
throb of anger came into O'Rane's voice ; she had led a 
most awful life for about three years ; some brute had 
victimized her, and her sanctimonious devil of a father had 
turned her out of the house. . . . Now she was a new woman, 
though years must pass before she overcame her bitterness 



46 Sonia Married 

and hatred towards the world, and, when he went back to 
Melton, she was coming as a sort of secretary. . . . 

We had reached the house, and he threw open the door 
and stood aside to let me in. 

" I hardly felt this was a normal household when I was 
here before," I said. 

In the light of the hall I could see his black eyes gleaming 
with laughter. 

" You should hear old Oakleigh ! " he suggested. . . . 
" ' It's a phase, my dear boy. You'll grow out of it. You 
see the devil of a lot of strange things, if you live to be as 
old as I am.' " He paused to laugh at his own exquisite 
mimicry of Bertrand's disillusionized, pontifical manner and 
gruff, disparaging voice. " Well, he wouldn't eat a twelve- 
course dinner with a starving man opposite him. ... It 
makes life so much easier, if nobody thinks you're quite sane. 
Won't you go in ? " 

" Does your wife enter into the spirit of it ? " I asked, as 
I looked at the silk curtains bellying away from the white 
walls. 

He evaded the direct question almost apologetically. 

" It's a big change after the life she led before the 
war," he conceded; "but then the war itself is a big 
change." 

He had mentioned a party, but I was hardly prepared 
for the army of occupation which I found in the library. 
Every chair at the long table was filled, and the guests had 
overflowed and scattered throughout the room, bearing 
their plates and tumblers with them. Mrs. O'Rane jumped 
up from her place between Beresford and Deganway, making 
me welcome and apologizing for having missed me before. 

" This is such an irregular menage," she exclaimed in a 
clear, high voice, that dominated the clear, high voices 
around her. " David's at the House so much, and I spend 
my days serving out clothes to Belgian refugees, or finding 
them houses and work, or getting up concerts and things 
to raise money for them, but somebody's sure to be at home 
at some hour of the night. This is our house-warming, and 
of course David forgot all about it." She twisted her arms 
roimd her husband's neck and kissed him with an ecstasy 
that told me stabbingly of something that had been left 



The Open Door 47 

out of my life. " Admit yoj. did, sweetheart, or you won't 
get any supper." 

" / remembered ! I invited Mr. Stornaway," he protested. 
" And you're going to look after him, while I strum. You 
seem to have got some people here, Sonia. And there's a 
sort of hint that some of them have been smoking." 

The crowd, the heat, the babble of voices and the fog of 
tobacco smoke robbed me of resistance and individuality. 
Before I had been three minutes in the room, I was eating a 
meal which I did not need, drinking hock-cup, which I knew 
disagreed with me, and trying to carry on two conversations 
and at the same time to see who was already there and who 
was arriving. Lady Maitland introduced me volubly to a 
watchful-eyed, supercilious boy whose first play, she assured 
me, had taken London by storm. Had I seen it ? If not, I 
must go at once ; and she refreshed her memory of its name 
by reference to the author. When he escaped in bored 
embarrassment from his own biography, she explained loudly 
a second time that that was Eric Lane, the great coming 
dramatist, and confided as loudly that he was desperately 
in love with Babs, little Babs Neave, Barbara Neave, Lady 
Barbara Neave — ^it was no use my pretending that I didn't 
know her — and that Crawleigh was at his wits' end, because 
it was quite out of the question for them to marry ; but Babs 
was such an extraordinary girl that, if you opposed her, 
you might simply drive her into his arms. . . . Lady Mait- 
land shook her vigorous grey head with an air of concern 
and at once asked me to meet " both the silly children " at 
luncheon, because it would interest me. . . . 

Before the end of supper I was beginning to get my bearings 
and to resolve the unassimilated party into its elements. 
O'Rane was at the piano, surrounded by George Oakleigh, 
two shy and hero-worshipping pupils from Melton, Miss 
Hilda Merryon — ^still aloof and implacable — ^and Beresford. 
In the midcUe of the room I deduced from Sir Roger Dainton's 
presence a purely family gathering of Mrs. O'Rane's rela- 
tions ; their tongues were as busy as their eyes, and they 
looked slightly bewildered — as weU they might — and a trifle 
disapproving. 

On the dais Mrs. O'Rane ruled supreme. Even without 
the explanation which George strolled across to drawl into 



48 Sonia Married 

my ear, I placed her by her surroundings as belonging to a 
society with which I was very familiar before the war. 
Lady Sally Farwell sat on one side of her, giving an excellent 
and somewhat iU-natured imitation of Lady Barbara Neave, 
who, with young Eric Lane, was hardly out of ear-shot. 
Mr. Evelyn Staines, the romantic hero of half a hundred 
musical comedies at the Regency, sat on the other, looking 
out of humour, surprisingly unkempt and unexpectedly old. 
There was a youthful claque of young officers, two or three 
actresses, whose appearance the illustrated papers had made 
known to me, and a sprinkling of middle-aged nondescripts. 
Before the war I used to organize a good many charity 
bazaars, charity balls and charity matindes ; and Mrs. 
O'Rane's troupe was always much in evidence. She has 
since told me that she and Sally Farwell appeared in three 
duologues and two oriental ballets on my behalf, though I 
am ashamed to say that my neglect of details left me ignorant 
of my indebtedness. 

There were a dozen smaller groups, thrust into corners or 
wedged between the heavier furniture. I threaded my way 
in and out with a word here and a bow there, blinded by the 
smoke and deafened by the noise. All seemed to be enjoying 
themselves, however, and I was reasonably amused and 
interested. From time to time, when O'Rane began to sing 
or whistle to his own accompaniment, there was a rippling 
hush ; from time to time, again, he would break off with a 
sudden laugh and plunge into dance music, whereat most of 
us flattened ourselves against the walls, while Mrs. O'Rane 
and Mr. Evelyn Staines gave an exhibition of highly techni- 
cal stage dancing. 

" I don't quite fit your uncle Bertrand into this," I observed 
to George, when we found ourselves out of harm's way on the 
dais. 

" He looked in for a moment to offer Raney his blessing 
and a cheque. Fortunately he can't hear much from his 
end of the house," was the answer. 

Mrs. O'Rane ended a perilous series of movements with a 
more perilous leap on to her partner's shoulder, and was 
borne breathless and triumphant to the table for hock-cup. 

" George, are we shocking Mr. Stornaway ? " she asked 
across me. " I'm so sick of the war ! " 



The Open Door 49 

She jumped down and looked at me, breathing quickly 
through parted lips. Her dress was daring, and at this, my 
first unhurried sight of her at close quarters, I was as much 
fascinated as a man of my age had any right to be. The face 
was soft, appealing and warm, with long-lashed brown eyes, 
flushed cheeks like ripe apricots and a wistful mouth that 
drooped at the corners, when she was disappointed, and 
pouted over-quickly, when she did not at once get what she 
wanted. It was a wilful, impatient little face, exacting and 
rather obstinate, without very much depth of character, but 
amazingly mobile and young, capable of a child's ecstatic 
abandonment to happiness and of a melting tenderness when 
she looked at her husband's unseeing eyes and whimsical, 
self-protective smile. 

" In some ways it's extraordinarily like some of his omnium- 
gatherum parties at Oxford, Sonia," murmured George, 
as the tireless fingers at the piano passed from waltz to march 
and from march to Scandinavian boating-song, half as old 
as time. 

Mrs. O'Rane's big eyes swam. 

" As like as we can make it," she whispered tremulously ; 
and I was conscious of a new fascination. Though I have 
never seen a woman or man more perfectly put together, the 
head on the neck, the neck on the shoulders, the hands on the 
wrists or the wrists on the arms, there was something skin- 
deep and mechanical in her beauty — not necessarily reaching 
to the heart — until that moment. 

The softness passed as suddenly as it had come, and she 
awoke to a sense of her duties as hostess. 

" I want to introduce you to my mother, Lady Dainton," 
she told me. 

Under cover of the presentation she escaped and in another 
moment was darting with the movement of a dragon-fly 
in search of a partner for the savage Hawaiian dance which 
her husband had begun to play. This in turn she abandoned 
to give extravagant welcome to Sir Adolphus Erskine and to 
thank him for a string of pearls which she held out jubilantly 
for his admiring inspection. 

My next half -hour was more varied and less pleasant. I 
was introduced to Lady Dainton, who claimed acquaintance 
with my brother and insisted that we had met at one of 

4 



50 Sonia Married 

Aylmer Lancing's parties at Ripley Court ; I was introduced 
to her daughter-in-law, who had lately lost her husband and 
now engaged me in a sullen debate on compulsory service, 
with a view, so far as I could follow the poor creature's dis- 
traught reasoning, to securing that as many other women 
as possible should lose their husbands. I exchanged a few 
words with Roger Dainton about the state of parties in the 
House and, as I fancied that I had exhausted the family, 
found myself confronted once more by Lady Dainton, who led 
me into a corner, enquired how long I had known O'Rane and 
begged me to use whatever influence I possessed to bring this 
foUy to an end. Since my first sight of her I had watched a 
storm-cloud of disapproval banking up, but I could not 
imagine why its force should be expended on me. 

" I'm not narrow-minded, don't you know ? " she informed 
me, with majestic uncontradictability, " but this is the first 
time I've seen Sonia since she was married, and this — this 
bear-garden is what I find." 

There was no disputing the definition, but its application 
was limited, for she flung out her arm, until I feared it would 
leave its socket, in the direction of an arm-chair, where Beres- 
ford, shabbier than ever by contrast with the rather rich 
clothes around him, was holding forth with combative reson- 
ance on the hypocrisy of our fighting for the free development 
of the smaller nationalities, while we held our Indian Empire 
in unrepresentative thraldom. 

" It's not what Sonia's accustomed to ; it's not what she 
has a right to expect ! " exclaimed Lady Dainton, with rising 
indignation. " That — that creature has been mocking the 
people who've gone out and given their lives for their country, 
when half of us in the room are in mourning. As for the 
woman " 

" I really don't feel I can interfere," I interrupted diffi- 
dently. 

She sighed with an attempt at resignation. 

" I didn't know how weU you knew David," she said. 
" Of course, he's a delightful, gaUant, generous soul — nobody's 
fonder of him than I am — but he's so terribly impulsive, don't 
you know ? I really hoped that, when Sonia consented to 
marry him, she would — well — tame him a little. Dear David 
will pretend that everybody's like everybody else ; well, I 



The Open Door 51 

don't suppose either of us is a snob, Mr. Stornaway, but 
there an distinctions, don't you know ? We should be 
called old-fashioned, if we saii anything, but some of the 
people here to-night — of course. Soma's a wonderful actress, 
much cleverer than half the professionals you see, so she's got 
into rather a theatrical set — I suppose that's the modern 
spirit ; Eleanor Ross had a woman lunching with her to-day 
who six months ago — ^well, she wouldn't have dared. . . - 
But when it comes to turning a private house into a sort of 
mission-room. . . . One can carry democracy to excess, don't 
you know ? " 

The voice was rising again, and Mrs. O'Rane danced 
to my side and snatched me away on the plea that Lady 
Maitland wanted to fix a day for my meeting with Barbara 
Neave. 

" Was darling mother being tiresome ? " she asked sym- 
pathetically. " The casual-ward stunt, I suppose ? " 

" What do you feel about it yourself ? " I asked her. 

" About David's lame ducks ? Oh, he has his friends, and 
I have mine, and it's no one else's business." She looked 
round the crowded room and seemed to decide that she had 
been too brusque. " I don't know — yet, whether it will 
answer," she went on uncertainly. " David's always been a 
freak about money, he'd always give anything to anybody. 
Now he says that he'd be dishonoured if he took with one 
hand and refused with the other. . . . He's rather absurd, 
poor darling, because he wouldn't need to take anything from 
anybody, if he hadn't been so frightfully smashed up in the 
war. And if I don't mind. . . .■ It's really rather fim, how- 
ever mad it may seem. We've all of us gone mad since the 
war. Except David. You didn't know him, but he's almost 
sane compared with what he was before." She abandoned 
her pose of affected insincerity and turned to me with shining 
eyes. " You do love David, don't you ? " she asked. 

" My dear lady, I've only met him twice," I said. 

" Isn't that more than enough ? " Her expression changed 
restlessly ; and I remember wondering how long she would 
retain her looks, if she continued to live on her nerves like 
this. " Too many dam' dull Daintons here, you know. I 
made certain mother would think this sort of thing too 
Bohemian.^She'd like me to have a prim and proper little 

4* 



52 Sonia Married 

house in one of the streets about here and entertain the 
conventional people in the conventional way — simply wagging 
my tail, if I enticed an Under-Secretary here. Mother'd go 
miles for an Under-Secretary. Well, it's much more fun in- 
viting the amusing people, the people you like. I am rather a 
Bohemian, I've always led my own life. I do now ; darling 
David never tries to make me do anything or stop me doing 
anything ; he never wants to know what I've been doing. 
... All the same, David's ' duty to one's neighbour ' stunt. 
. . . Thank goodness ! he doesn't expect me to share my 
clothes with casual visitors ! " 

She stood with her eyes fixed thoughtfully and without 
complete comprehension on her husband's thin, mobile face. 
His own, black and arresting for all their sightlessness, were 
turned to the rafters and the shadows of the roof, as he €at 
with head bent back and fingers idly modulating. Then 
Lady Dainton came forward and took her leave ; the party 
broke up rapidly, and, by the time that I left, only Vincent 
Grayle remained, talking to his hostess, while Beresford trans- 
ferred himself to the other end of the room, ostentatiously 
turning his back and resting his injured leg on the edge of 
O'Rane's piano stool. 



II 

I left the grotesque party with the feeling that, contrary 
to all reasonable expectation, I had enjoyed myself immoder- 
ately. The enthusiasm survived the night, and at breakfast 
the following day I informed Yolande that I proposed to 
invite the O'Ranes to dine with us. Here, however, I was met 
with unforeseen opposition. I have no idea how the antagon- 
ism started, but at some period of their careers Yolande had 
decided that Mrs. O'Rane was of those who " do all the things 
one doesn't do," while Mrs. O'Rane has been known to dismiss 
my niece alliteratively as a " prig, prude and poseuse." 

" You'll regret it," Yolande told me frankly enough, 
sagaciously smoothing back a strand of auburn hair from her 
forehead. " She's very fascinating, but I've an instinct 
about her, and you'll find she's all superfluity and flashiness. 



The Open Door 53 

Any number of people have been in love with her, of course, 
but she'll grate on you. Ask any woman." 

One dinner, I felt, could not commit me very deeply, and 
it was my own house, although I was already debating the 
desirabiUty of moving into bachelor quarters and giving up 
my remaining rooms to the Canteen Executive. Yolande, 
however, was to be spared, in spite of me. 

Whether Mrs. O'Rane disapproved of her as strongly as she 
disapproved of Mrs. O'Rane, I am incompetent to say, but I 
was informed in terms of suitable regret that she was either 
dining out or having people to dine with her every night of 
the week ; was it possible, on the other hand, for me to come 
on one of the days when they were at home ? I had not yet 
finished that talk with David about Melton. . . . The 
reminder was perhaps inserted as a reason for not inviting 
Yolande. 

I chose my night and, within five minutes of entering the 
house, I should have confessed, had I been honest with myself, 
that Yolande was right. An air of tension greeted me, an 
interrupted controversy was at once resumed, and I found 
myself required by my hostess to arbitrate in a lovers' quarrel. 
The cause of dispute was the girl Hilda Merryon, whose 
career O'Rane had briefly sketched for my benefit ; fortu- 
nately she was not present at the time, but with O'Rane 
composed,^ pacific and unyielding in an arm-chair with his 
big St. Bernard beside him, Mrs. O'Rane flushed and aggrieved 
with one foot on the fender and one bare arm shielding her 
face from the fire, and Vincent Grayle, my fellow guest, 
directing and perhaps stimulating the controversy, I felt that 
we had enough disputants. 

" I'll put it to Mr. Stornaway ! " cried Mrs. O'Rane, as soon 
as our greetings were over. " Mr. Stornaway, we were only 
married in July, it's now the end of September, and I don't 
think David ought to go off and leave me for three months. 
It isn't necessary, I've asked him not to " 

O'Rane stroked the dog's head reflectively. 

" But you've told me you can't get away, Sonia," he said 
at length. " You've got your Belgian refugee work, you've 
got a string of engagements and you've got Beresford laid 
up for months yet. You admitted, too, you'd simply be at a 
loose end in Melton." 



54 Sonia Married 

" I should be with you." She tossed her head back until 
she was looking at him through half-closed eye-lids. " Of 
course, if you don't want me. . . ." 

" But, darling, your work here. . . ? " 

" Anybody can do that ! " Mrs. O'Rane interrupted un- 
guardedly. " That's not the point, though, and you know it 
isn't. I say you oughtn't to go. It's like setting a race-horse 
to pull a removal van." 

In the pause that followed, I wondered what opportimities 
for propaganda Lady Dainton had enjoyed since our meeting 
the week before. 

" I've promised to resign the moment I've paid back the 
money I owe," said O'Rane, with emphatic reasonableness. 

" The money was given you as a present." 

" But I can't take presents of that kind so long as I'm fit to 
work. Darling Sonia, you don't imagine I want to go away 
from you for three months, do you ? If you can come down 
without leaving your work here undone " 

" Oh, I should be in the way ! " she interrupted, with 
another toss of her head. " You've got your Hilda." 

She looked round the room, pointedly inviting us to follow 
the direction of her eyes and nodding at the tidy arrangement 
of books, the filing-cabinet, the half-hidden safe and neat 
library card-catalogue. I could see O'Rane blushing, as I 
myself began to blush, that such a scene should be enacted 
before comparative strangers. 

" You mustn't say things like that," he remonstrated 
gently ; then, with the lightness of affected inspiration, 
" We'll put it to Mr. Stornaway, as you suggest ! I'm com- 
mitted, sir, as I think in honour and certainly by an under- 
standing with the Headmaster, to go back to Melton on 
Thursday. You've met Miss Merryon ; I'm taking her with 
me to act as a sort of secretary. She'll have rooms in the 
town and will lend me the use of her eyes in the evenings ; — 
I was frightfully handicapped last term and had to take ad- 
vantage of the boys' good-nature. I know it's an unusual 
arrangement, but the circumstances are unusual. I got 
Burgess's approval " 

" Did you tell him anything about her past ? " Mrs. O'Rane 
broke in, tapping a gold slipper with scarlet heel against 
the fender. 



The Open Door 65 

O'Rane smiled dreamily. 

" I'm chiefly concerned with her future," he answered. 
Something in the voice and smile told me that he was spirit- 
ually as far removed from his wife as the mad from the sane. 

There was a long pause, which Grayle broke by shrugging 
his shoulders, sighing, shaking his head at Mrs. O'Rane 
with an expression of rueful sympathy and finally opening 
his cigarette-case with a muttered request for permission to 
smoke. 

" Of course, the world will say " he began. 

O'Rane laughed to himself. 

" I don't know that I've ever paid much attention to 
what the world says. But Mr. Stornaway is going to 
arbitrate." 

I looked at one disputant after another. Mrs. O'Rane's 
expression can best be described as mulish ; O'Rane was 
smiling, debonair and yet, I felt — ^it was the first time that 
I had felt it — ^unshakable. What part Grayle was playing 
I could not determine ; if he had been invited to arbitrate 
before my arrival, he had not been successful, and I wished 
that he would leave me to compose the quarrel uninterrupted. 

" If you've promised yourself to Dr. Burgess," I told 
O'Rane after consideration, " you can't disappoint him at 
forty-eight hours' notice. It's out of the question. You 
teU me that he approves of your taking Miss Merryon " 

" He'd do anything for me," O'Rane answered easily. 

" Even so, if I may put it bluntly, it's an imprudent thing 
to do. Surely the simplest and most natural solution, as 
well as the pleasantest for both, is for Mrs. O'Rane to accom- 
pany you. If you want work found for Miss Merryon, that 
ought not to be difficult in these times ; I'll pay any money 
for a competent shorthand- writer in my own ofi&ce." 

Neither O'Rane nor his wife offered any criticism, but 
Grayle considerately supplied the reason which both were 
hiding. 

" That was discussed, I think," he said, " but I gather 
Mrs. O'Rane has her hands pretty full with work here." 

" But you said anyone could do that," I reminded her. 
" And, as long as Bertrand's here, there'll be someone to look 
after Beresford." 

In addition to Bertrand there were two maids and a 



56 Sonia Married 

plenipotent housekeeper, for Mrs. O'Rane liked to boast of 
her domestic incompetence. Mine was the obvious solution, 
and I could see that she recognized it. There was a sup- 
pressed yawn — and a gain of three seconds. 

" If I died, someone would have to do my work," she 
admitted, " or it wouldn't be done. . . . But, Mr. Storn- 
away, David's a member of Parliament, his whole future is 
in the House ; isn't it ridiculous for him to waste his time 
teaching a pack of schoolboys ? " 

As she shifted her ground, I felt that my work was done. 

" I haven't got much future of any kind," I said, " but 
I'm a begging-letter- writer in the morning and a second- 
class clerk in a Government office the rest of the day. These 
are not normal times, Mrs. O'Rane, and he can't leave his 
chief stranded at the last moment without anyone to take 
his place. When he comes back at Christmas, there'll be an 
opportunity for reconsideration." 

O'Rane said nothing, and I was disappointed. I felt that, 
as he had got his own way, it would have been diplomatic 
and perhaps convincing to pretend that he was consenting to 
a compromise. Mrs. O'Rane looked at him out of the corner 
of one eye and pouted openly. 

" We might just as well not be married, if you don't want 
me," she said. 

" Come, come ! Mrs. O'Rane ! " I cried. 

I am afraid that the mild protest only inflamed her. 

" Well, he doesn't ! The other night we were talking 
about marriage. Peter Beresford says that any man who 
loves a woman may do anything to win her ; it doesn't 
make any difference whether she's married or not " 

O'Rane leaned forward and resumed his stroking of the 
dog's head. 

" Perhaps it makes a difference to the woman," he 
suggested. 

" Then David said," she went on, regardless of the inter- 
ruption, " that men and women weren't justified in spoiling 
each other's lives by clinging on when one was tired of the 
other." 

Every word was purposefully clear, and at the end she 
paused invitingly. O'Rane sprang up with a ring of laughter 
and held out his arms to receive her. 



The Open Door 57 

" Sweetheart ! " 

She made no movement until he had come a pace nearer ; 
then she stepped unrespondingly aside. O'Rane's hands 
met on the marble of the mantelpiece. 

" I — missed you," he said, with a little breathless laugh. 

I could not turn to see Grayle's face, but I was rigid with 
horror that such a trick should be played on a blind man. 
Gradually what she had done dawned on Mrs. O'Rane, and 
she threw her arms convulsively round her husband's neck. 

" God forgive me ! " she whispered. " Oh, my darling, 
I'm mad ! I don't know what I've been saying ! " 

I turned to Grayle and asked him for a cigarette. A 
moment later I heard a car stopping at the door, and Beres- 
f ord was helped into the house after his drive. 

From time to time throughout the meal (whenever, perhaps, 
Mrs. O'Rane was trying to make amends) my mind went 
back to the scene. The O'Ranes' outlook and temperament 
were so dissimilar that I could see no common ground 
between them. The outsider never knows why any two 
people marry and is content to believe in the existence of 
an affinity hidden from his view. These two were both so 
full of vitality, both so good-looking and, above all, both 
so young that I tried hard to resist a feeling of melancholy 
and to persuade myself that I had been an inadvertent 
eavesdropper at the oldest and most trumpery quarrel in 
the world rather than the witness of an inevitable breach. 
The long windows on either side of the room were warmly 
curtained in flame-coloured silk ; the two fires glowed com- 
fortingly on to their half-circles of chairs and sofas. Mrs. 
O'Rane, who could make a story out of nothing, poured out 
an endless stream of anecdotes against herself. When 
dinner was over and we left the dais for a distant view of 
high-hung chandeliers reflected softly in the gleaming 
surface of the long refectory table, I could not but be reminded 
of the Grail scene in Parsifal. 

The discordant note, the one persistently discordant note, 
was struck by Beresford. Alien in mind from the rest of us, 
he neither forgave nor forgot the contemptuous toe which 
had once searched his body for signs of breakage ; and after 
dinner he withdrew to a far divan and spent the evening 
conversing in whispers with Mrs. O'Rane, who sat by him 



58 Sonia Married 

on a footstool, while he played with her long amber necklace. 
The rest of us reverted to a wholly undergraduate disputation, 
led by O'Rane on the theme of my own unexpected fortune, 
and developed by me into a disquisition on education and 
the art of healing, though every question and view was put 
forward in the hope of making my host expound his own 
philosophy. 

" You can't get efficiency without organization," Grayle 
insisted, as we laid the lessons of the war to heart. " Nothing 
can hold together without discipline. Look at Germany." 

For myself, I have always regarded German organization 
as the over-advertised co-ordination of the largest number 
of second-rate intelligences, but the criticism was taken 
from me by Beresford, who interrupted his own conversation 
to inform the room at large that it was one thing to teach a 
man how to shoot and quite another to be sure that he did 
not end up by shooting his own officers. Mrs. O'Rane held 
up one finger and pursed her lips, only to let them break a 
moment later into a smile. 

" Efficiency is the gravest menace that the war holds over 
us," said O'Rane reflectively. " Whenever I've met it, it 
means being unkind — with Government sanction — ^to some- 
one weaker than yourself ; Jesus Christ would not have 
been tolerated by the Charity Organization Society', all the 
bourgeois press would have said that He was pampering the 
incompetent and maintaining the survival of the unfit. 
Efficiency frightens me." 

Whether he was speaking seriously or in paradox, he had 
struck a note of idealism which jarred on Grayle, who threw 
away his cigar half-smoked. 

" If we don't learn our lesson out of this war, we don't 
deserve to win it," he answered, reaching for his stick. 

" But what is the lesson ? " O'Rane asked, more of him- 
self than of us. " Do you men find that you think best at 
night ? " he went on reflectively. " There's less distraction 
. . . and I'm always thinking at night now. I would say 
that every man who comes out of this war alive is a reprieved 
man and that we don't deserve to win it unless we learn 
that the only crime in all the world is cruelty. ... If we 
can't affect others, we can at least affect ourselves. It's 
no use waiting for an Act of Parliament to make you humane ; 



The Open Door 59 

if you're prepared to jump into the river to save a child from 
drowning, you must be prepared to jump through a window 
to save it from starving." He shook his head and turned to 
me. " But how you're going to teach that, sir, even with 
your million a year to endow schools. . . . The Chiu-ch has 
had Peter's keys for nearly two thousand years, but how 
many of us would literally pick a man out of the street, turn 
on the hot water for him, lend him a razor and a rig-out, keep 
him in funds till his ship comes home ? . . ." As he paused, 
I looked beyond him to the sofa where Beresford lay idly 
fingering Mrs. O'Rane's amber beads. " Of course it's aU 
figurative and the gorgeous imagery of the East and that 
sort of thing, but I don't know how any man could remain 
a professing Christian for two minutes, if he didn't believe 
that Christ would bathe the feet of the first tramp on the 
road. That's far more important to the human race than 
the Crucifixion. . . . But, then, Christ was always poor, 
and you can't begin to be charitable until you've known 
what it means to be poor." His voice sank and grew silent. 
" I'm boring you, Grayle ! " he exclaimed penitently, as a 
boot creaked on the polished floor. 

" I must be getting home," was the answer, following hot- 
foot on an ill-suppressed yawn. " Boring me, indeed ? 
Enjoyed it all immensely." He got up and walked towards 
Mrs. O'Rane, to whom he bade an elaborate good-bye, while 
I followed slowly behind, wondering how such a woman 
ever came to marry such a man. " I shan't see you this 
side of Christmas, I suppose ? " 

She looked up a little negligently, without releasing 
Beresford's hand. 

" But I thought I was dining with you on Friday ? " 

" I understood you were going to Melton." 

Mrs. O'Rane's expression became blank. 

" I must think about this," she said. " Yes. I don't 
know how long it'll take me to tidy up things here. . . . Oh, 
I shall certainly be in London on Friday. David darling, 
you tmderstand that I can't possibly get away at a moment's 
notice — any more than you can." 

Her husband nodded. 

" Come whenever it suits you," he said, as he walked on 
ahead to open the door for us. 



60 Sonia Married 

Grayle lingered behind for a moment in the middle of the 
room. 

" You mustn't stay on my account," he said to Mrs. 
O'Rane. " It won't be a party, you know." 

There was a moment's silence ; then she laughed pro- 
vocatively and gave a mischievous, sideways glance at Beres- 
ford, which only Grayle and I saw. 

" Jealous ? " I heard. 

" Not a bit. I shouldn't like you to come, though, if you 
were simply going to be bored." 

" Oh, if you'd rather I didn't come, I won't." 

I passed into the street and out of earshot. As I shook 
hands with O'Rane, Grayle joined us, and we walked towards 
the House on the look-out for a taxi. He was silent at first 
and then started to discuss the evening communique from the 
Front. I could not help wondering whether he, too, in 
middle-aged company under the penetrating chill of an 
autumn mist realized that it was beneath his dignity to be 
flirting with O'Rane's young wife and doubly ridiculous to 
be taking it seriously and devoting an evening's ill-humour 
to the enterprise. 

" Do you care about dining on Friday ? " he asked me 
suddenly. " Mrs. O'Rane will be there, and I'll rope in some 
more people." 



Ill 

Ever since his return from South Africa, Grayle had 
occupied a small old house in Milford Square, with a bleak, 
discouraged garden bounded at the far end by a private 
garage. I always wondered how he confined himself in so 
small a space, for his turbulent flaxen head seemed to scrape 
every ceiling, and it was impossible for anyone to pass him 
on the stairs or in the doorway or corridor. When Guy 
Bannerman was required at the last moment, as now, to fill 
an unexpected gap, his loose-knit, centrifugal body seemed 
to take up every cubic foot of space not already appropriated 
to Grayle's use. But as a rule Guy was not allowed to leave 
the big work-room over the garage where he covered himself 
and his clothes in three different shades of ink and industri- 



The Open Door 61 

ously " got up " his master's subjects and wrote his master's 
speeches, while Grayle himself devoted his talents to culti- 
vating personal telationships or, as his enemies would say, 
to intriguing, from a superstition that, if he ever let slip 
a conspiracy, it might not return to him again. 

The party was small, the dinner perfectly cooked and 
served. This, at least, I had learned to expect from 
Grayle. 

Mrs. O'Rane was on one side of me, and I asked how soon 
she was going to Melton, as I had shortly to attend my first 
meeting of the governing body. To my surprise I heard 
that she was not going at present. 

" You see, there's my Belgian work," she explained, " and 
Peter can't walk yet, and I can't very well leave Mr. Oakleigh 
to the care of the servants. Besides I've got an awful lot of 
other things to do." She nodded across the table at Lady 
Barbara Neave. " Mr. Lane's written a duologue, and Babs 
and I are acting in it at the Regency. And I've got a stall 
at the Albert Hall in November and I'm sure to be wanted 
for the Imperial Hospital Fund tableaux. They can't get on 
without us, can they, Babs darling ? " Lady Barbara 
jerked her fair head quickly and returned to her conversation 
with young Lane. " David was quite right, too ; I should 
be at a loose end at Melton." 

Her reasons flowed easily, but they were not consistent with 
her earlier attitude. 

" I thought you'd fixed it up the other night," I said. 

" No. We had another talk after you'd gone. It's only 

three months, and, if he really wants me " She broke 

off, leaving me to surmise that she was engaging in a trial 
of strength with her husband. " This is quite a pre-war 
dinner, isn't it ? I love dining with Colonel Grayle ; he's 
one of the few people who hasn't got the war on the brain. 
I do get so tired of war-talk, war-economies, war-work. I 
wish the thing would end, but Colonel Grayle says it will 
never end wMe the present Government's in power ; and 
Peter says there'll be a revolution when it does end, so it's a 
cheerful look-out either way. Don't you think Peter's im- 
proved since he fell in love with me ? " She turned to look 
down the table with the rapid movement of an animal, and the 
lamps seemed to strike sparks of gold from her closely coiled 



62 Sonia Married 

brown hair. " It takes people different ways ; Colonel 
Grayle will hardly speak to me to-night, just because I invited 
him to dinner and then forgot all about it." 

" Mrs. O'Rane," I said, " may I tell you that you talk a 
great deal of nonsense ? " 

She darted a glance at me and then opened her eyes very 
wide, drawing down the corners of her mouth. 

" Ah, you're hating me now ! And I thought you were 
surrendering to my well-known charm. I have got an in- 
credible amount of charm, haven't I ? " 

" We were talking about Melton," I reminded her. 

" George — our friend George Oakleigh, I mean ; he's known 

me all my life " she went on, imperturbably munching 

salted almonds, " George says that, as part of his education, 
every man ought to marry me for just one month." 

" Actually you've been married two and a half, haven't 
you ? " I enquired. " Perhaps you haven't arrived at the 
full inwardness of George's criticism." 

She pouted like a child under reproof. 

" I suppose you both mean something horrid." Her eyes 
lit up mischievously. " I must tell George I've found an 
ally for him. He's always rather loved me, but he says quite 
definitely that he never wanted to marry me even for a 
week. He's always telling me so ; that's why we're such 
friends. I'm afraid you'll never even rather love me ; and 
I'm ready to take such a lot of trouble with you." 

Mrs. O'Rane's voice is faultlessly clear ; I noticed a lull in 
the conversation and discovered that she and I were per- 
forming a duologue for the diversion of our fellow-guests and the 
exasperation of our host. 

" Has George told you that you think about yourself 
too much ? " I asked, as a self-conscious murmur rose once 
more around us. 

" Oh, if you want a list of my bad qualities, go to your 
niece. I'm not such a success with serious people, and 
Yolande talks about ' Ministers,' when shemeans ' the Govern- 
ment,' and ' 25 George II.,' when she wants to quote some 
musty old law ; and she considers herself a political hostess 
because she once bribed the Committee of the Aborigines 
Protection Society to meet the Governor of the Seychelles 
at dinner. Yolande would start a salon on one poet and two 



The Open Door 63 

private secretaries ! Oh, I know she's your niece, but you 
can't help that." She paused to draw breath. " George 
only thinks that I'm second-rate." 

" I think that you're deliberately second-rate," I said. 
" Which is a pity. If you'd ever got to grips with life, if 
you'd suffered or been in love " 

" D'you mean that I'm not in love with David ? " 

" You're still trying on emotions in a room full of mirrors. 
By the way, we went through all this candour and self- 
absorption in the 'nineties, and I think people did it better 
then. If you'll take advice from a comparative stranger, 
twice your age, drop all this patter about this man and that 
being in love with you." 

Mrs. O'Rane became suddenly majestic. 

" You mean I'm behaving disloyally to David ? " she 
demanded. 

Her majesty was as superficial and unconvincing as every- 
thing else about her. 

" My dear young lady, if you must try these airs and 
graces, don't try them on me," I begged, watching curiously 
to see whether there was any criticism she woidd resent 
so long as it was focused on her. 

She turned slowly away with ever5^hing of affronted dignity 
except its essence, exactly as I had expected her to do. A 
moment later she turned to me again, but by that time 
Lady Maitland, whose vigorous head and neck always make 
me think of a lioness that has been rolling in French chalk, 
had first asked'me to find a place in my ofiice for her third 
boy, who was leaving school at Christmas and seemed too 
delicate for the army, though he was exceptionally quick 
at figures — ^just the man that the Treasury wanted — and 
then enquired what I knew of the young Beresford who was 
sta5ring at " The Sanctuary." She would like me to bring him 
to see her as soon as he was able to get out. He was a poet, 
she understood ; very wrong-headed about the war, but a 
good talker and interesting to meet. . . . She had a small 
party on Thursday ; that man Christie, who had been removed 
forcibly from the House for calling the Speaker a liar and 
refusing to withdraw, a ritualistic clergyman who was in 
conflict with the Court of Arches, an obscure traveller who 
had proceeded on foot from Loanda to Port Sudan, the 



64 Sonia Married 

managing director of the Broadway Music-hall and a novelist 
whose name she had forgotten. 

(I may here say that I went and was given the opportunity 
of stroking all the lions' necks twelve hours before the pro- 
letariat caught sight of them and of trying to explain Lady 
Maitland to several little knots of bewildered Scandinavian 
and Dutch delegates and some self-conscious and incorrup- 
tible Labour Members who had either resigned from the 
Ministry or hoped to get into it. What Lady Maitland thought 
of the lions they and we knew at once ; what the lions thought 
of Lady Maitland they had hardly time to formulate before 
being hurried away to tea at Ross House, dinner with old 
Lady Pentyre and supper at Mrs. Carmichael's. I have 
found it easier never to refuse anything to Lady Maitland, 
but I hesitate to reckon how many times in a political crisis 
I have been persuaded to lead political aspirants to school. 
When O'Shaunessy was returned as a Sinn Feiner and refused 
to take his seat, I, who had met him in America five and 
twenty years before, was deputed to bring him to luncheon 
and Federal Home Rule with the Carmichaels, dinner and a 
imited-Ireland-in-the-face-of-the-enemy with the Duchess of 
Ross. There was to have been a patient search for compromise 
at Lady Pentyre's next day, but O'Shaunessy shook his head 
at me over the brim of his tumbler and confided that these 
people gave you too much talk and too little to drink.) 

" You'd better get Mrs. O'Rane to bring Beresford," I 
said. " I hardly know him." 

" Some one must get hold of him before it's too late," 
Lady Maitland continued gravely, and I could see that he 
was going to be adopted, whether he liked it or not. " I 
hear he's got great ability, and it's all misdirected." 

" I'd never heard of him before," I confessed. " But then 
I don't read modern poetry." 

" I heard of him from our host — ^this is between ourselves, 
of course — there was some question of prosecuting him again 
for one of his pamphlets." She raised her voice to demand 
confirmation of Grayle, but he would only shake his head 
rather irritably at her want of discretion and say that it was 
not in the province of his department. " I must talk to dear 
Sonia about him," she went on, " and we'll arrange a little 
meeting." 



The Open Door 65 

Not only have I led promising statesmen by the hand, 
I have myself of late been alternately schooled and courted 
in a way that was hardly known to me before the war. It 
is partly due, I suppose, to the suspended animation of the 
Caucus, partly to the increased number of groups and their 
social backers. As Lady Maitland convoyed the other women 
to the drawing-room, Grayle threw his sound leg across the 
shattered knee and told me that he was not at all satisfied 
about our reinforcements. At that, after but five weeks 
in England, I knew what was coming. Guy Bannerman, 
with the deep, baying voice of a hound, supplied the dwindling 
figures of the daily returns, I criticized the waste of resources 
in men and ships on secondary fields of war, Grayle opined 
that the country would never appreciate that it was at war 
until every man was mobilized in the field, the shipyard or 
the shop, and Maitland took the safe but irritating and un- 
helpful line that Kitchener knew what he was about and 
that we must leave it to him. 

I preferred to move away and talk to young Lane about his 
new play, but Grayle quickly recalled me with an exhortation 
to join him and his friends in their effort to galvanize the 
Government to action. It was the first of a long series of 
appeals which terminated a year later with the unblushing 
bribe of an office which I had as little fitness or right to receive 
as Grayle to offer. I was content to take refuge in Maitland's 
advice to leave it to the Government (alternatively to " trust 
the P.M." ; a surprising political retrogression for a man of 
his antecedents), only adding that one Government should 
not have to shoulder single responsibility for the joint blunders 
of all the Allies. 

" It's something to cut your losses," said Grayle shortly and 
with an air of disappointment, " to drop a mistaken policy 
when it's proved to be mistaken. That's what I want to see 
done ; and that's what this gang of yours won't do. You 
watch out ; France and Russia will make a separate peace, 
if we don't pull our weight. Let's come upstairs." 

On entering the drawing-room, Guy Bannerman strolled 
to the fire and entered into conversation with Lady Barbara 
Neave. Left with a choice of Lady Maitland and Mrs. O'Rane, 
Grayle pulled up a chair beside Lady Maitland, while Mrs. 
O'Rane looked at him like a chess-player considering his 



66 Sonia Married 

opponent's last move, and then smilingly made room for me 
on the sofa by her side. 

" I thought you were never coming up," she said. " I'm 
going in a minute, but Lady Maitland tells me she wants to 
meet Peter, and I waited to find out if you'd come too. Any 
day next week." 

" I shall be delighted," I said. " Friday's my only free 
night." 

" Good. It will be just the four of us. Dear Sir Maurice 
is such a bore, poor darling ; I really can't invite him. 
Now I must go. Shall we say somewhere about eight ? " 

As she got up, I looked at my watch and found that, for all 
the excellence of the dinner and the time that we were charged 
with spending over our wine, it was not yet ten. The Mait- 
lands gave no hint of leaving, nor did Mrs. O'Rane vouchsafe 
a reason for her early departure. I saw her shaking hands 
with Grayle and heard him icily asking her to wait while he 
telephoned for a cab. With equal polite iciness of tone she 
assured him that she would find one in the Brompton Road. 
I saw her smiling mischievously to herself as she walked 
out of the room ; Grayle's smile, on his return, was mys- 
terious, and I surmised that another trial of strength was in 
progress. 

As we stood on the doorstep an hour later, I asked him if 
we were meeting at " The Sanctuary " the following week. 

" She said something about it," he answered, " but I shan't 
go." 

" You're too old for this sort of nonsense, Grayle,'' I told 
him. 

" What sort of nonsense ? " 

But before I could answer, a taxi crawled invitingly past 
the door. 



IV 

I have never been able to cope collectedly with a verbal 
invitation and I am now too old to acquire the art. Other- 
wise I should have found an excuse for leaving my intimacy 
with Mrs, O'Rane where it was. I had dined the first time 
at " The Sanctuary " for the sake of her husband ; he in- 



The Open Door 67 

terested me, baffled me, refused to let me get to grips with 
him, and I did not intend to be beaten. His wife, I felt, for 
all her surface fascination and vitality, was rather a waste 
of time. And her retinue of fashionable actresses, elderly 
men about town and Guards subalterns was intellectually 
too exotic for me. I determined that my second dinner with 
her should be my last. 

The door was unlocked when I arrived, and Beresford was 
in undisputed possession of the long, warm library, though 
several large boxes of chocolates, an earthenware jar of ex- 
pensive cigarettes, a parcel of books half out of their paper 
and string and a profusion of hot-house flowers dispelled any 
rash assumption that Mrs. O'Rane was being neglected by 
her admirers. And, whilst I waited for her, Beresford told 
me that the original party of four had multiplied itself by 
three. After a pause, in which he tried not to seem self- 
conscious, he asked whether I knew the O'Ranes well and 
rather wistfully volunteered his opinion that there was no 
real sympathy between them and that she was unhappy and 
imappreciated. 

" I sometimes wonder why she married him," he murmured. 

" Presumably because they were in love with each other," 
I said. 

He shook his head with judicial gravity and an air of pro- 
foimder knowledge than a middle-aged, unsympathetic man 
like me could hope to attain. 

" I don't think they're happy. I should like to see her 
happier, she's made such a difference in my life. Women 
mean something more to me, somehow, since I met her ..." 
he confided, with a boy's curious passion to discuss his 
emotional state with anyone who will listen. 

" She hasn't yet learned the difference between happiness 
and pleasure," I told him. 

The new tempestuous disorder which the room presented 
in O'Rane's absence — paper and string and half-opened 
parcels abandoned when a more pressing call made itself 
heard — struck me as being typical of the woman. And she 
was late for dinner, which I consider impoUte in a hostess. 

Beresford must have seen a hint of disapproval in my face. 

" Has it occurred to you that all this racket is deliberate, 
that she wants to live in the present . . . ? " 

5* 



68 Sonia Married 

He relapsed into silence and sat supporting his lean, long 
face with one hand. I felt that Mrs. O'Rane had civilized him 
to some purpose and that, unless he lapsed from civilization 
within the next quarter of an hour, Lady Maitland would find 
that her rebel-hunt had been in vain. I also felt that the 
sooner Mrs. O'Rane rejoined her husband, ceased dining with 
Grayle, going to the theatre with young Guardsmen and 
giving Beresford the idea that she was lonely, the better for 
all and especially for her. 

Deganway and Pentyre, who evidently knew Mrs. O'Rane's 
ways better than I did, arrived ten minutes later. We were 
still awaiting our hostess, when Lady Maitland sailed in and, 
dispensing with introductions, opened fire at a distance of 
twenty paces. 

" Darling Sonia not dressed yet ? But, then, no one's ever 
known her in time for anything. How do you do, Mr. Storna- 
way ? I suppose this is Mr. Beresford ? Now, Mr. Beresford, 
I want to have a long talk with you ; I hear you're a very 
original young man and I want to know why you're a pro- 
German." 

Thus encouraged, Beresford roused himself to demonstrate 
the difference between sympathy with German atrocities and 
antagonism to war and the system of government which made 
it possible. I, who have heard him for a moment haranguing 
street loafers and have myself engaged in ding-dong argument 
with him, little thought to see him so completely routed by 
the sonorous enquiries of Lady Maitland, who put a question, 
announced parenthetically that she was a woman with no 
nonsense about her and flung out a second question before 
he could answer the first. Deganway stood polishing his 
eyeglass and murmuring sagaciously : " Yes ! Yes ! That's 
what our good pacifists never condescend to explain." Pen- 
tyre lit a cigarette and confessed to hunger. Two more young 
officers, whose names I never heard and whom I have never 
met again, drifted in with a " Sonia not down yet ? " and also 
lit cigarettes. I was glad when Mrs. O'Rane arrived to end 
Beresford's agony. 

Without a word of apology for her lateness, she fluttered 
like a butterfly into our midst, brushed Lady Maitland's cheek: 
with her lips and pirouetted slowly on her toes like a ballet- 
dancer. 



The Open Door 69 

" How d'you like my new dress, children ? " she enquired. 
" Say you do or you don't, but please don't try to find reasons, 
or you're sure to go wrong. Peter's the only one here who 
knows anything about colour. Lady Maitland, and everything 
I wear has to meet with his approval." 

She stopped her pirouetting in front of his sofa and stood, 
panting slightly and with shining eyes, holding her skirt out 
on either side and curtseying low. Beresford appraised it 
slowly, his head on one side, fingering the stuff and taking 
in every detail from the gold and silver band round her hair 
to the silk stockings and gilt slippers. An embarrassed maid 
awaited her opportunity of announcing dinner ; Mrs. O'Rane 
threw her head back and smiled at me over her shoulder 
with parted lips. 

" Someone appreciates me," she laughed. For the first 
time I realized what her young and not very sinfid vanity 
must miss by never being able to hear a word of pride or 
praise from her husband. Sonia O'Rane always reminded me 
of a child who cannot build a castle in the sand without dragging 
someone by the wrist to come and admire it. " I don't 
think you did that night at Colonel Grayle's," she said to 
me. " In fact, it was very forgiving of me to ask you. I've 
never been so found fault with by anyone except David, and 
he's given it up since we married. I sometimes wonder 
whether it is because he thinks I'm perfect or only not worth 
bothering about now he's got me." 

" I only recall saying that you talked a great deal of non- 
sense," I put in. " I stand by that." 

" Well, that's a nice thing to say when I've refused three 
invitations from people who were just dying to hear me 
talk. However, I suppose I'm a cultivated taste." 

" And you only invited me in the hope of making me 
retract," I added. 

" Let's have some dinner," she suggested, avoiding my 
challenge. 

She spread out two gleaming white arms with the movement 
of a bird taking wing and waltzed to the table, calling to us 
over her shoulder to sort ourselves anyhow ; the order did not 
matter, as there were ten men and two women. As the others 
stood back for me to make my choice, I put myself on her 
left, with Lady Maitland on the other side. 



70 Sonia Married 

" When do you go to Melton ? " I asked conscientiously, 
as we settled to our places. 

She pointed a finger at Beresford. 

" I can't leave my ewe lamb yet," she answered. " D'you 
know, last night I was up with him until nearly three, consider- 
ing which I think I'm looking remarkably fresh to-night. . . . 
Besides, David hasn't aslted me to come. . . ." 

Her clear and slightly over-emphatic voice travelled dis- 
concertingly as far as Lady Maitland, who enquired with 
some surprise : 

" Does Mr. Beresford live here ? " She was answered with 
a mischievous nod. " My dear, you know I always say right 
out whatever's in my mind ; well, I don't think you ought 
to be doing that. With that blessed creature of a husband 
here " 

" But he hr ought Peter here and kept him here and finally 
lejt him here — whether I liked it or not, Peter dear. Besides, 
darling Lady Maitland, I have Mr. Oakleigh to chaperon me, 
and George drops in every few hours to see that I'm not 
disgracing his precious David. . . . George once said that I 
atoned for the number of my flirtations by the excellence 
of my technique," she went on irrelevantly. " I think 
he'd just fallen out of love with me and pretended that he 
never had been in love with me and never would be. You 
think I'm not good enough for David, don't you ? " she de- 
manded of me. " I think he got the wife he deserved, and 
he'U teU you that's the finest compliment anyone can pay 
him." 

" I'll ask him, if I remember. I'm going to Melton next 
week. Have you any message for him ? " 

She deliberated with one finger pressed to her lips. 

" Tell him — exactly what you think of me," she suggested 
with dancing eyes. " It'll amuse him much more than a 
message." 

" Are you going down to him this term ? " 

She shook her head. 

" I'm too busy, and he doesn't want me, or he'd have sent 
for me long ago. Not that I should have gone, of course. . . ." 
She glanced quickly round to satisfy herself that the others 
were absorbed in their own conversations, then lowered her 
voice and laid her hand on my sleeve. " Mr. Stornaway, 



The Open Door 71 

you do agree with me that it's absolute rot for him to be 
there, don't you ? Old Mr. Oakleigh's offered him any 
money he wants — again and again ; I've got five hundred a 
year from father ; he could wipe out what he calls his debts 
and live here with the utmost ease. And he ought to be in 
London, he ought to be in the House ; there are all sorts of 
jobs that he could get in the City. . . . If you want a message, 
teU him that he must choose Melton or me," she went on with 
a pout and a rising voice. " If he hasn't chucked Melton by 
Christmas, I shall chuck him. Tell him that I shall elope to 
Sloane Square — I don't believe anyone'?, ever eloped to 
Sloane Square, but it's the handiest place in the world ; even 
the Hounslow and Barking non-stop trains stop there — so 
sweet of them, I always think — I shall go there with Peter 
and live in his flat and star in revue — where I shall be an 
amazing draw, you know ; and Colonel Grayle^ would scowl 
at me from the stage box, and, darling Lady Maitland, you'd 
boom me and invite fashionable clergymen to meet me at 
lunch, and George would have his car at the stage door 
to take me home — I don't know that I shall wait till 
Christmas." 

She paused for lack of breath and looked delightedly round 
the table. My expression, I imagine, was bored. Lady Mait- 
land's perplexed ; only poor Beresford's was unaffectedly 
pained. 

" Mr. Stornaway's quite right," Lady Maitland said, when 
she had collected herself. " You talk a great deal of non- 
sense." 

" I mean it, though." 

" Rubbish, my dear." 

Yet I believe that both she and I felt a current of discontent 
running underneath the froth of nonsense. Perhaps we shewed 
it, perhaps Lady Maitland reconsidered her judgement, for, 
when Deganway sat down to play rag-time after dinner and 
Mrs. O'Rane kicked the rugs aside aad began dancing with 
Pentyre, she observed at impressive intervals : 

" Darling Sonia is always in such spirits. . . ." " I don't 
think it's quite the thing for a young man like that— quite 
good-looking, you know — to be living here ; Mr. O'Rane will 
have a great deal to answer for, if there's any unpleasantness, 
and you can give him that message from me. . . ." " TeU, 



72 Sonia Married 

him a husband's place is beside his wife. . . . But he must 
make her a home where she can live. I forget whether 
you were here that night — ^yes, you were ! Well, Lady 
Dainton's quite right. . . . Just like the casual-ward of a 
workhouse. ..." "Of course, her mother brought her up 
atrociously. . . ." " I really hope that she's going to have 
a family ; it would just make the difference." 

A week later I motored to Melton for the Governors' 
meeting. Town and school alike had become almost un- 
recognizable since my last visit three or four years earlier. 
Leagues of huts, miles of tents, acres of pickets stretched from 
the outskirts of Melton to the fringe of Swanley Forest ; the 
drowsy cathedral town was alive with thundering lorries, and 
the billeting officer's handiwork was visible at eight windows 
out of ten. My car crawled apprehensively through the 
crowded streets and up the hill to a school which was half 
as it had been founded three hundred years before, half as 
it had been converted into a military academy during the 
last fifteen months. Great Court echoed with the clatter 
and scrape of hobnailed boots, as the corps fell in and marched 
off to parade on the practice-ground ; one group of signallers 
on the steps of the headmaster's house waved frantically to 
another group by the entrance to Great School, and, as i 
wandered into the Cloisters to kill time before the hour of 
our meeting, the Green was filled with pigmy recruits, learning 
their squad-drill from a husky but intensely business-like 
young sergeant. Only a handful of obvious weaklings wore 
the old conventional straw hat, grey trousers and dark jacket, 
and the open door of the Common Room at Big Gate shewed 
not more than two-thirds of the staff in cap and gown. 

" War takes on a new horror and hopelessness when you 
know that the schools of France and Germany present the 
same sight," I said to Dr. Burgess. 

Our meeting was over, and he was conducting me round 
the unaging school buildings which I was thenceforth to 
hold in joint trust. The company drill on the practice- 
ground was giving way to a final parade, and we watched four 
hundred young soldiers from twelve to eighteen march erect 
and with set faces to the Armoury and from the Armoury to 
Great School for a lantern lecture on the Dardanelles expedi 
tion. A couple of dozen non-commissioned officers had fallen 



The Open Door 73 

out and were awaiting a course in map-reading with their 
commanding officer. 

" Thank Heaven ! it will all be over before most of these 
boys are old enough to go out and stop bullets," I added. 

Dr. Burgess stroked his long beard and shook a mournful 
head. " Some were yet in our midst when the appointed 
season came," he said, pointing to an already long Roll thumb- 
tacked to a wire-covered notice-board. " And they that 

have returned " He sighed deeply. " David O'Rane 

enjoins me to say that he is within." 

We shook hands at the door of a bachelor set of chambers 
in the Cloisters, and Dr. Burgess strode back to his house, 
murmuring mournfully into his beard. I knocked and 
entered to find O'Rane seated — as I might have expected 
to find a man with his physical dislike for chairs — ^in the 
middle of the floor, with the big, patient head of his Saint 
Bernard on his knees. Miss Merryon was writing at a table 
in the window, and a low wicker-work couch by the fire 
was timidly occupied by a flushed and disputatious male- 
factor. She welcomed me by name to give the cue before 
maMng an excuse to withdraw. I apologized to O'Rane 
for disturbing him, but he dismissed the boy and turned with 
a smile and sigh of relief. 

" We'd both had enough of it," he confessed. " That 
young man thought fit to play a practical joke on Miss 
Merryon, so I've been taking his moral education in hand, 
appealing to his self-interest." 

He felt for a box of cigarettes and threw them to me. 

" WeU ? " 1 said. 

" I remember getting held up at Bale some years ago," 
he explained. " I was on my way home from Italy and I 
missed the eleven o'clock connection to Paris. There were 
crowds of us there — some on our way back from Italy, like 
me, some from the winter sports in Switzerland — all ages 
and races, on every kind of business or pleasure. The next 
train to Paris left the following day, and we had to reconcile 
ourselves to an uncomfortable night. Well, I've tried so 
many varieties of discomfort that I'm hardened and philo- 
sopMcal ; I imagine most people would call these quarters 
uncomfortable, but they're nothing like what they were before 
Sonia took them in hand last summer." 



74 Sonia Married 

He waved proudly at a pair of massive, discoloured velvet 
curtairis, a bamboo overmantel and occasional table, wicker 
chairs half-buried in punt cushions, and a threadbare carpet 
tattooed by generations of burning matches. I put up with 
the same sort of thing at Trinity, but I was then nineteen 
and I had no wife to accommodate. Mrs. O'Rane, I imagine, 
was not schooled to discomfort. 

" I got a good deal of amusement and interest out of watch- 
ing the others," he went on. " The French were the worst 
— voluble, excited, indignant, grabbing the best places and 
all the food they could lay hands on in the buffet — the way 
they always behave when they're travelling ; the next 
worse were the Germans — they were ruder and more incon- 
siderate than the French, but not nearly so efficient. The 
Americans all set themselves to westernize Europe and started 
getting off protests by cable to Paris, ordering special trains 
and booking three times the accommodation available at 
any hotel. The English were bored, aloof, taking them- 
selves and their troubles very seriously and refusing to share 
them with anyone. Well, when the last bedroom had been 
snapped up, there were still enough of us benighted to over- 
crowd the waiting-rooms and buffet ; we were all suffering 
from a sense of grievance, and there wasn't enough food to 
go round. I got wedged into a corner with a plate of meat 
and looked on. One of the Englishmen commented loudly 
on the noise that a German made in eating soup. The com- 
ment was understood, so the German laid himself out to shew 
the sort of noise he could make when he tried. The English- 
man wrapped himself in a ferocious dignity, finished his meal 
and lit a cigar, sending a cloud of smoke in the face of one 
of the Italians. My attention was then attracted by a brawl 
in the middle of the buffet ; someone had imprudently left 
his seat to forage for food, and someone else had promptly 
bagged it. As they bickered and gesticulated and finally 
pushed each other about, and the onlookers took sides and 
joined in, I said to myself, ' Lord God ! this buffet is just like 
the world, and these fools are behaving just as we all behave, 
and we should all despise and laugh at ourselves as much as 
I'm laughing now, if we had any detachment, self-criticism, 
humour, logic or God's common sense.' " 

O'Rane's black eyes lit up at the memory of the scene. 



The Open Door 75 

" I was telling that story to our young friend," he con- 
tinued, with his baffling smile. " Chivalry ? Nothing doing. 
Moral sanctions and first causes ? Nothing doing. He didn't 
believe in God, he wasn't going to Hell, if he misbehaved 
himself, so why in the name of reason should he bother ? . . . 
But I think I fixed him over my Bale story. . . . We had a 
hideous night (it was too cold to go and sulk outside — which 
made the symbolism more perfect ; you can't sulk outside 
this world, unless you're prepared to cut your throat) ; and 
we might have made it quite tolerable, if only we'd had a 
little imagination and kindliness, if we'd struck an internat- 
ional bargain and surrendered the privilege of eating soup 
noisily in return for immunity from cigar smoke in the eyes, 
if the chairs had only been given to the women and old men, 
if someone had only lent a hand to a poor boy who was cough- 
ing himself sick with asthma. ..." He whistled reflectively 
between his teeth for a moment. " Life's like a club, sir ; 
there are rules and conventions and an endless mass of tradi- 
tion — ^the things we don't do ; but the rules were made so 
long ago, the conventions only aim at an irreducible minimum. 
Even so, it's better than treating the world like a company 
trading for profit, but we must modernize the rules. As 
you know, I always want to delete ' efficiency ' from the 
English language ; efficiency in the Bale buffet would have 
meant that an organized party of four, back to back, could 
have downed the rest, grabbed all the food and cleared the 
till. 

" Keep your temper. Never answer (that was why they spat and 
swore). 
Don't hit first, but move together (there's no hurry) to the door. 
Back to back, and facing outward while the linguist tells 'em how — 
' Nous sommes allong a notre batteau, nous ne voulong pas un row.' 
So the hard, pent rage ate inward, till some idiot went too far. . . < 
' Let 'em have it ! ' and they had it, and the same was serious war. 
Fist, umbrella, cane, decanter, lamp and beer-mug, chair and boot — 
Till behind the fleeing legions rose the long, hoarse yell for loot." 

O'Rane's luminous black eyes were gleaming with mischief. 
Remembering my first sight of him, when he fought for his 
life in a Vienna cafe, I wondered whether any wife, reinforced 
by any mother, could curb his restless yearning after action, 
were it blacking the eye of an oppressor or slinging a disabled 



7e Sonia Married 

man on to his shoulders. . . . For all his cosmopolitan 
spirit, I could not fit him into the Byzantine world in which 
Lady Dainton had brought up her daughter, nor into the 
merveilleuse society into which her daughter had gravitated. 

" It's — it's really only a very big club," he murmured. 

" Full of most undesirable members," I suggested. The 
Bale story, I felt, would be wasted on Vincent Grayle. 

" They're not acclimatized yet. Now, you'd open the door 
for the most undesirable member of the Eclectics, if he had 
a game leg, yet you laugh at me, if I pick up an injured man in 
the street and carry him home for treatment. God's name ! 
Where's the difference ? You're not acclimatized yet, you 
see. It's to your interest, too. . . . How is Beresford, by 
the way ? Sonia's the most undutiful wife in the way of 
writing ; I suppose it's natural enough, really ; she doesn't 
like having her letters to me read by anyone else." 

I never forgave the old men who advised and hampered 
me, pinning me to a career for which I was unsuited and 
quarrelling with me when I broke away from it. In my 
turn I have tried to refrain from advising and hampering the 
younger generation — only to find that the younger generation 
sometimes makes an astonishing fool of itself and that it 
is harder and harder to sit silent and unintervening when 
someone whom I like is on the verge of falling downstairs 
in the dark or of having his pocket picked. Commenting on 
the fact that he was at Melton, while his wife was in London, 
I warned O'Rane that, with their double portion of wilfulness 
and energy, he was taking unnecessary risks with his married 
life. 

" I've not got much to go on," I admitted, " but that 
supper-party you brought me to ..." 

" That was exceptional," he objected. " And they were 
Sonia's friends. You were the only one I invited." 

I reminded him of Beresford, Miss Merryon and perhaps 
three more obvious recipients of his charity. He coloured 
slightly and told me that it was an article of faith with him 
not to refuse help to anyone who asked. Then I could see 
that he was not being honest with himself, for he shifted his 
ground, concentrated on Beresford and asserted that his wife 
liked him to be in the house. 

" But do you think he ought to be there ? " I asked, follow- 



The Open Door 77 

ing him on to the ground which he had chosen. " They're 
both young, attractive ; your wife's a very fascinating and 
beautiful woman. She can take care of herself, of course. 
... It was, in fact, commented on at dirmer the other night." 

O'Rane wrinkled his nose in dissatisfaction. 

" He's company for Sonia," he said weakly. 

" You'd be company for her, if she came here or you went 
to live in London. Much better company, too," I added. 

My tone may have betrayed more than I intended to convey 
for O'Rane laughed. 

" You don't like her friends ? / don't care a great lot for 
some of them, but you must remember that she gave up a 
good deal to marry me — a very full life — and I can't give 
her much. What I can give her is the freest possible hand. 
That's why I haven't pressed her to come down here, though, 
God knows ! it's lonely enough without her. By Easter 
if not Christmas " 

" Won't you have given this up by Christmas ? " I asked. 

His face grew tired and perplexed, and he ran his fingers 
impatiently through his hair. 

" I don't know. I owe the devil of a lot of money ; and 
I should be damned body and soul, if I lived on charity when 
I could earn my own livelihood. We'll discuss it at Christ- 
mas- In the meantime, can you stay and dine with me in 
Common Room ? " 

His invitation was a reminder that I had already stayed 
perilously long, if I was to get back to London in time for a 
dinner engagement. 

" See me to my car," I said, as I put on my coat. " Look 
here, don't think I'm a mere busybody. You and your wife 
are such a pair of children that you mustn't mind a man 
twice your age telling you, if he thinks you're behaving 
foolishly. I strongly advise you to throw this over at Christ- 
mas. Now, not another word." 

O'Rane walked in sUence through the Cloisters with one 
hand on the Saint Bernard's collar. As we came into Great 
Court, he stopped abruptly. 

" Look here, sir ; understand one thing," he began. " If 
you think I mind, or that I'm not grateful to you for speaking 
like this, I shall never forgive you. But you say Sonia's 
to be trusted to take care of herself. That's enough. If 



78 Sonia Married 

she wasn't," — ^he shrugged his shoulders — " she wouldn't be 
worth keeping. If she fell in love with — who shall we say ? 
— ^Beresford, and ran away with him, in God's name d'you 
think I should want to stop her ? I admit I've only been 
married three months, but to me love's a thing of perfect, 
implicit trust. This is between ourselves, but last week 
George Oaldeigh came down for Founder's Day and dropped 
a hint that Sonia was lunching and dining out too much with 
— well, I suppose there's no harm in saying it — Grayle. As 
with you, someone had commented on it at dinner. I'm 
afraid I couldn't pump up the slightest indignation. Grayle's 
rather in love with her. So's Beresford. So's that squeaky 
tame cat, Deganway, of the Foreign Office. So's one of 
my boys here — George's cousin Laurie, who firmly believes 
that he brought me up to the scratch and made me propose 
— ^rather against my will. So's young Pentyre ; so's half 
the Brigade. If I wanted to be jealous, sir, I'm afraid I 
shouldn't have time. As it is, I'm so proud of Sonia that I 
glory in seeing other people proud of her, loving her. . . . 
As for stray comments at dinner — I don't say it's right and 
I don't say it's wrong, but she belongs to a very modern 
school which goes its own way without regarding stray 
comments at dinner. But so long as we agree that she's 
to be trusted " 

We had reached Big Gate, and he held out his hand to me 
with the mischievous smile which I was beginning to know so 
well and which always filled me with a sense of helplessness. 
As I looked at him with the October wind blowing through 
his black hair, I reflected that he must think me very old- 
fashioned to be surprised when a three-month-old wife boasted 
of the men who were in love with her, and her husband de- 
rived a reflected happiness from her successes. 

Driving back to London I felt that I was escaping mile by 
mile from a bemldering world of serious make-believe. 



My engagement that night was to dine with Harry Mere- 
field and to discuss something which, he said, he could explain 
better by word of mouth than in a letter. I was intrigued by 



The Open Door 79 

the invitation, because Merefield at this time was of con- 
siderable account in the Foreign Office. We dined at his 
club, and, as the only other person present was Barton, who 
had thrown up his work at Cambridge twelve months before 
and was now my official chief in the Treasury, I divined that 
they contemplated a deal in my person. The preliminaries 
were already settled, and, as we drank our sherry, Merefield 
confided that the Foreign Office wanted me to go out to 
America, ostensibly to raise money for the War Charities 
Fund, in reality to carry on a campaign of propaganda ; my 
knowledge of country and people would be invaluable, and 
our relations had reached a point where we could no longer 
afford to do nothing. Would I think over the proposal ? 

" If this Press agitation goes on . . ." he began grimly and 
lapsed into eloquent silence. 

I must confess that I have never been able to understand 
what function Ministers proposed that the Press should 
fulfil ; they set up a Bureau to control the supply of news 
and occasionally to restrain editorial comment, but their 
interest seemed to die when once the War Office had secured 
that direct military information was not to be disclosed, and 
that discussions and attacks should not take place round the 
head of this or that commander. Valiantly they feared 
nothing, despondently they hoped for nothing from a some- 
what despised organization which, despite their contempt, 
believed in its own power and was capable daily of placing 
the same view before every man and woman in the country 
untU a vague but obstinate conviction arose that " there must 
be something in it." The Press, with a little diplomatic 
flattery, might have become the handmaid of the Govern- 
ment ; with promptitude and vigour it could have been 
emasculated to the semblance of an official bulletin. Instead, 
Ministers treated it like an intrusive wasp, slapping at it with 
ineffectual petulance, ducking their heads and running away 
when it was angered, until Sir John Woburn and half a dozen 
of his fellows were left to suggest, condemn, support and 
attack, to push favourite Ministers and policies, to be in- 
spired by those same Ministers and to indulge in superficial 
criticism and the promulgation of half-truths which were 
harder to overtake and refute than a substantial, well-defined 
lie. Though never a Minister, I am afraid that I must accept 



80 Sonia Married 

my share of responsibility, for, when the House of Commons 
abrogated its duty of criticism, reform or remedy became 
possible only by a Press campaign. 

" I don't give Woburn credit for excessive modesty," said 
Merefield, " but it never occurs to him that his vile rags can 
have any effect abroad. Yet, if you say a thing often enough, 
it gets repeated. The French and the Russians are now begin- 
ning to ask what England's doing, what the Navy's thinking 
about and why we don't do more. . . . Wolff's Bureau itself 
couldn't have a greater success than Woburn in making the 
French believe that we're sacrificing them to preserve our own 
trade. We've given America about as much ragging as she'll 
stand, and I want you to sweeten things. You do know 
the country." 

I know enough of America to feel that she has always 
suffered, as Ireland suffers, from the characteristically English 
belief that because two people speak a similar language 
they must have an identical soul and that the Americans are 
a homogeneous Saxon race, estranged, indeed, from an equally 
homogeneous parent stock by a certain insolent independence 
imparted by General Washington to his turbulent followers, 
but Saxon in orientation and sympathy, essentially sound at 
heart. When Merefield asked me to go out, I knew that he 
could have found others better qualified for the work, but at 
least I was a man who never expected to find unanimity on the 
issues of European peace and war in New England, purest 
in Saxon blood and tradition, sensitive to every European 
repercussion and receptive of every thought-wave borne 
across the Atlantic ; in the Southern States, with their politi- 
cal concentration on the negro within their gates and the 
Mexican without ; in the North- West, watchful of Canadian 
encroachments ; in the Far West, with its eyes set on a 
Japanese peril ; in the Middle West, where the farmer of 
Illinois and Iowa lives and dies without coming nearer than at 
a thousand miles' distance to Pacific or Atlantic ; in scattered, 
unassimilated lumps of disaffected Ireland or duly prepared 
Germany. 

" They're getting tired of hearing what " America ' ought to 
do," Merefield continued. " People here won't see that there 
is no American people yet, hardly an American idea, only the 
vaguest groping after an American ideal. They've been snap- 



The Open Door 8i 

ping and snarling at Wilson over Belgium, over the Lusitania, 
over his Notes — as if he had a mixed population of a hundred 
and ten millions in his pocket I I want you to explain that 
it's only our fun. After all, they've got their own Wobums ; 
they'll understand." 

My American friends were too numerous to allow of my 
accepting Merefield's facile diagnosis and treatment. I 
knew then, as I had confirmed later, that the commonest 
feeling in the American mind was a quiet but affronted indig- 
nation at British ingratitude. Of the organizations, the funds 
and charities, the work of humanity and succour that had 
begun in America from the first day of war, not a word was 
said in our Press or speeches ; over the hardships and in- 
conveniences involved by our blockade, over the sense of 
grievance occasioned by our censorship of mails and cables, 
no sympathy was expressed or felt. When Russia was 
dependent on American munitions, when English credit in 
America was the hope and salvation of allied finance, we could 
find no more gracious form of acknowledgment than a sneer 
at a so-called proud nation which let its sons and daughters 
drown without protest and shirked the sacrifices of war in 
order to steal trade, to sell the means of destruction to others 
and to increase the ever-mounting accumulation of wealth. 
I am too old and cosmopolitan to have any right to be sur- 
prised, yet I always am, in fact, surprised by my country- 
men's abysmal want of imagination and international courtesy. 
I approached my mission with the most unfeigned reluctance. 

Merefield left me to think over his suggestion undisturbed, 
and before saying good-night I told him that, if he would give 
me a few weeks to order my affairs, I would gladly go for as 
long a time as the Foreign Office chose to keep me. Yolande 
and her husband had attended to my domestic requirements 
so admirably during my absence in Austria that I had no 
hesitation in entrusting them to her again and in surrendering 
the rest of my house for use as an office. My departmental 
work was gradually transferred to other shoulders, though at 
one moment I feared that the department itself was going to 
be extinguished. After dissipating numberless troops on 
secondary operations in every comer of the world except the 
western front, the Government found itself short of reinforce- 
ments for the great offensive which was to break the German 

6 



82 Sonia Married 

line in the spring of 1916. The flow of volunteers was drying 
up, and I heard much excited gossip about an immediate 
measure of conscription. Grayle, I remember, was very 
active and tried to commit me to an organized attack on the 
Government ; as, however, even he admitted that no one but 
the Prime Minister could carry a compulsory service bill, I 
told him that he must be content with anything he could get. 
My department, or the younger section of it, was saved by a 
comic-opera compromise whereby volunteers were encouraged 
to enlist on pain of being conscribed, if they held back. To 
introduce a democratic note and make the figures imposing, 
all my youngsters were invited to attest ; to ensure that the 
official machine continued in being, it was arranged that no 
government servant should be called to the colours without 
the leave of his departmental head. So, after a week's flutter, 
I was at liberty to go. 

There was no secret about the fact of my mission, and 
Bertrand Oakleigh arranged a little dinner at the House to 
wish me God-speed. I walked back with him to his rooms 
at " The Sanctuary " and looked into the library to see if 
there was anyone about. George was asleep on a sofa, but 
otherwise the room was deserted. 

" I'm waiting to see Sonia," he yawned, as I came in. 
" With any luck she's out at a dance and won't be back till 
about four. I've induced Beresford to clear out, but I don't 
want her to be frightened or wonder where he is." 

He broke off to yawn again. I asked him how he had con- 
trived the eviction, and the yawn shortened into a smile. 

" I didn't put it on the ground that he was falling in love 
with Sonia," he said, " because I suppose he knows that ; I 
just told him that — a comment had been made. . . . D'you 
know, after that dinner, dear Lady Maitland called on me at 
ten next morning at the Admiralty, telling me to use my 
influence ! And I may say that when Lady Maitland tells 
me to do a thing I do it. Well, Beresford is in the pulpy state 
where he'd cut his throat if he could protect Sonia's reputa- 
tion in any way, little knowing the evergreen hardiness of that 
same reputation, and he went off to his own flat. Sonia will 
probably be very indignant with me this evening, but she's 
made her Peter much too lamb-like to be seriously interested 
in him any longer. Anyway, if she isn't indignant with me 



The Open Door 83 

for one thing, she'll be indignant for another. And I seem 
to survive it comfortably. So that danger's over, though as a 
matter of fact there never was any danger. ..." He filled 
a pipe and lurched wearily round the room in search of 
matches. " The only danger for Sonia is from a man who'll 
bully her," he drawled. " When she was engaged to Jim 
Loring, he behaved like an extra lady's maid ; she might 
still be blowing hot and cold with Raney, if he hadn't shewn 
her very definitely who had the stronger will. It was at the 
very beginning of the war, and he was quite ruthless. . . . 
Last time he saw her, poor old Raney ..." 

" You know them both pretty well, don't you ? " I asked. 

" Yes. And the next question is, why did they marry ? 
I can't answer that. They were in love, but that's more a 
reason than an excuse. . . . Yes, I've known 'em both for 
years. And for years I've tried to restrain Sonia's destiny, 
when I saw it going to her head. Oh, by the way, Beresford's 
by no means my only success. I don't know whether Grayle's 
a friend of yours, but I dislike him — always did, when I was 
in the House with him — and the other day I thought it was 
time to interfere ; you couldn't stir a yard without running 
into them. This time I didn't bother about approaching the 
man — that would have been too great a waste of time — but 
I talked to Sonia until she promised never to have Grayle 
inside the house again and never to meet him of malice afore- 
thought. Which you will admit is a fairly comprehensive 
victory." 

He looked at his watch and walked impatiently to the 
writing-table. 

" Mrs. O'Rane seems to be a whole-time job," I commented. 

" She's all that," he grunted. " Mark you, I'm fond of her, 
in spite of herself. . . . But I'm fonder of Raney, and the 
pair of them seem^steering for disaster. ... I don't know, I 
may be all wrong. I'm a bachelor and I've never had to 
humour a woman. . . . Here, I've finished this. I'll walk 
with you as far as the club." 

As I latched the door behind me, I asked what he thought 
of the life which^O'Rane had decreed for " The Sanctuary," 
He smiled before^answering. 

" If you'd known Raney as long as I have, it would be just 
the thing|you'd' expect of him — all taken au grand serieux, 

6* 



84 Sonia Married 

too, of course. As for Sonia, she'd consent to'sleep in a doss- 
house, if she were doing it for the first time — a new experience, 
you know. She was prepared to put up with anything, I 
fancy, to get away from home and have a house of her own ; 
and she'd have cheerfully accepted half a room in a work- 
man's cottage, when she married Raney. After four or five 
months of it, I should think it's beginning to paU ; the cara- 
vanserai life wouldn't suit her for twenty-four hours in the 
day, she likes it for an hour after dinner — ^f or more new experi- 
ences. I think, I think you'll find Raney will have to drop 
it. . . . But I don't know. . . . There are five things that 
are too hard for me, and the way of a maid with a man is the 
hardest of them all." 



CHAPTER THREE 

SONIA O'eANE 

' Vanity induces men, more than reason, to act against inclination." 
The Duke de la Rochefoucald : " Maxims." 



I SAILED for America in December, 1915, on perhaps 
the most difficult mission that I have ever undertaken. 
It was not expected, of course, that the United States would 
enter the war against us or upset the diplomatic equilibrium 
in our favour without provocation and until the result of 
the elections had been seen. I went, as I have suggested, 
to counteract the German propaganda, which sought to make 
all at least equally responsible for the war, and also to remove 
some part of the bad impression which had been left by our 
more unbridled journalists and our less imaginative states- 
men. The moral approbation of America was too precious 
an asset to fritter away ; and the purchase of material 
depended on the goodwill of American financiers, the supply 
of munitions could be stopped as a diplomatic reprisal. 

It was perhaps unfortunate that my arrival coincided with 
an outburst of new interest in the Blockade, ending with the 
creation of a Blockade Ministry and the appointment of a 
Blockade Minister. (Harry Merefield used to shake his 
head over any new interest in the Blockade. " We always 
say that Germany must be defeated in the field, and I'm 
apprehensive when the soldiers tell me that they're counting 

85 



86 Sonia Married 

on our starving the brutes out.") I was asked, too, at more 
than one meeting, how the Government of Great Britain 
reconciled its passionate crusade in defence of small nation- 
alities with its no less passionate refusal to allow the Irish 
to control their own destinies. The dreary tale of the un- 
checked Ulster gun-running and the appeal to Germany 
was rehearsed for my benefit ; and my more law-abiding 
Irish audiences generated considerable heat over the presence 
of " the rebel Carson " in the Cabinet. 

But, if I found the work difficult, it gave me a respite from 
England, where I felt that I had been watching the machine 
at too close quarters. Since the day when I helped George 
Oakleigh to divide the world and secure a lasting peace, our 
nerves had worn thin ; we devoted too much time to seeing 
that other people went promptly about their duties ; and a 
deadly personal bitterness — embodied for me in Grayle, though 
I do not single him out for attack — ^poisoned our confidence 
in our own leaders. I was glad to feel the icy wind of the 
Atlantic lashing my face, blowing the cobwebs from my 
brain and the sou was 
courting disaster by the way he was treating her. He was 
in one of his most smiUng, most obstinate moods — ^steel and 
india-rubber. He said he couldn't slam his door in the 
face of anyone who wanted help. ' Very well ! ' I said ; 
' keep it open. You say "yes," she says "no," and there's 
not a square inch of ground for a compromise. One of you 
has to chmb down, and you won't ? ' 'If you like to put 
it Uke that,' says Raney, ' I won't.' ' Then make her,' I 
said. ' She'U do it, if you make her : she won't love you 
any the less and she'll respect you all the more, if you force 
her to obey you.' Raney was really upset. ' Old man ! you 
mustn't talk to me about Jorcing my wife to do things ! ' 
My dear Stornaway, that's the kind of imbecile we've got to 
deal with ! I warned him that, if he kept his door open 
against her will, she would walk out of it. 

" God knows, I never wanted to be a Cassandra, but I know 
that child so well ! Two days later Raney bumped into a 
young officer staggering along Victoria Street in an advanced 
state of intoxication ; Raney just had time to find out that 
the fellow was due to catch the leave-train at about seven 
next morning, when his new friend collapsed on the steps of 
the Army and Navy Stores and settled himself to a comfortable 
slumber. I don't suppose any of us would have left him 
there, with a fair prospect of being robbed or run in or dis- 



94 Sonia Married 

covered by the Provost-Marshal, to say nothing of losing the 
train and perhaps being court-martialled. Raney must needs 
put him in a cab, take, him home and expend time, ingenuity 
and hard-bought experience in making him sober. It must 
have been a gruesome night, but the fellow caught his train. 
It was the last straw for Sonia. The next day she wired from 
Northamptonshire, asking me to tell Raney that she was 
sta3?ing with the Pent5nres. That was a week ago; Raney 
has asked her — asked, mark you — to come back, and she 
won't budge. I dehberately cadged an invitation from 
Pentyre last week-end ; we spent Sunday with one scene 
after another, and her final message on Monday morning was 
that she would come back when he agreed to do what she 
asked ; otherwise she would be compelled to think that he, 
too, regarded the marriage as over. I spent most of Mopday 
night storming at Raney, and the present position is that 
neither wiU yield an inch and Raney won't exercise his 
authority. 

" You are probably sick and tired of them both by now, 
but you cannot be anything like as sick or tired as I am. . . ." 



II 

This was the last letter which I received before my return to 
England in the spring of 1916. The country, when I landed, 
reminded me strongly of a theatre before a first night ; every- 
one was waiting for the full deployment of the new armies, 
everyone expected the summer campaign to be the supreme 
test ; by now, too, almost everyone had son or brother under 
arms waiting in the line or rehearsing his share in the coming 
offensive. The tension produced a nervous irritability which 
manifested itself, so far as the House of Commons was con- 
cerned, in a mutinous demand for enlightenment, and one 
of my earliest duties was to be present, with a fine parade of 
mystery and importance, at the first secret session of the war. 
The one unvarying rule which I have been able to frame for 
the House of Commons is that it never fulfils expectations. 
Though the Press Gallery was conscientiously cleared, we were 
given neither fact nor figure that was not already in the 
possession of any well-informed journalist ; twenty- four hours 



Sonia O'Rane 95 

later the speeches were common property in every club, and 
the one thing new was the change in pyschology. The show 
of blind loyalty to the Government had broken down until 
the Government itself felt that something must be tried to 
restore confidence. I found that a man of Bertrand's tem- 
peramental independence was using Grayle's currency of 
speech. 

" Much good it's done ! " he growled, as we left the House 
together. " It's no use pointing to the number of men you've 
raised or the output of shells. The country's outgrown the 
phase of being content with good endeavours, it wants results, 
it's in the mood to say, ' You haven't beaten the Germans, 
and, if you don't do it pretty quickly, someone must be found 
who will.' Stroll home with me, if you've nothing better to 
do." 

" You're in your old quarters still ? " I asked. 

Bertrand laughed and then sighed. 

" When David asked me to come here, I accepted on an 
impulse," he confessed. " It was a phase of the early en- 
thusiasm ; I felt we'd got no business to go on living so 
extravagantly, when the boys out there were going through 
Hell's agonies and every penny was wanted to carry on this 
war and to reduce the load of human suffering. I suppose 
this dog's too old to be taught new tricks. If you find me 
staying on now, it's only to keep the peace." He stopped 
to relight his cigar, and, as he sheltered the match with his 
hands, I saw that his heavy, powerful face was morose and 
dissatisfied. " I've got a considerable love for David. He 
was a fool to marry the girl, of course, but a man doesn't marry 
or keep a mistress because it's wise, but because he wants 
to, because he can't help himself. . . . When she married 
him, I thought that the war had sobered her down, but these 
soupers Jraternels have made her restive, and she's reverted 
to type. I'm standing by to break up tite-d-tetes, and prevent 
her doing anything irrevocable before they've patched up their 
present quarrel and agreed on some possible way of life. 
If he weren't blind, she'd have left him three months ago. 
You know they've not met since Christmas ? " 

" Where are they ? " I asked. 

" Oh, she's here — with the usual tame cats to carry her off 
to lunch and dinner. She came back the day after David 



96 Sonia Married 

returned to Melton. . . . You can see it's a pleasant house 
to live in ! . . . Before the war I sat on a committee with her 
mother. Do you remember a phase when young men tried 
to grow side-whiskers ? Well, the drawing-room was always 
full of these hairy youths, immaculately dressed and simpering 
round her with boxes of sweets and flowers, which she very 
graciously accepted. Since the war these fellows have shaved 
and got into uniform, but it's the same old gang. I used to 
think nobody was injured ; she liked racketing about at 
restaurants and theatres, they were puffed up to be with her. 
The only man I drew the line at was Grayle ; he's much 
heavier metal." Bertrand paused to laugh with his old 
cynical relish. " I'm deuced old, but I've still got a very 
retentive memory, and everybody's always told me things. 
Well, I went through the mental rag-bag, I talked to, a few 
people, I made a few enquiries — particularly on the American 
chapter of his life — and the next time we met I became 
biographical at his expense. George tried and failed. Friend 
Grayle hasn't been here since. I tell you, I was getting sick 
of the business. She'd give a dinner party at eight, and Grayle 
would be here at half-past seven to talk to her alone, and, 
by Gad ! she'd be dressed and ready for him. I don't know 
whether they thought I was blind and deaf. . . . And it was 
the same when she dined at his house. I used to hear her 
coquetting and threatening to be late if he wasn't ' good ' 
— ^ugh . — , and he'd swear he wouldn't admit her, if she wasn't 
in time. It was all such poor stuff ! I shouldn't have minded 
so much, if there'd been any red blood in it, but she was ob- 
viously just keeping her hand in ; that woman would make 
sheep's eyes at the Shakespeare monument in Leicester 
Square sooner than nothing. ... So I spiked friend Grayle's 
guns, and she's had to content herself with Beresford. He's 
pretty harmless, but the devil of it is that she's ready to go 
wrong with any man when she loses control of her temper. 
If she weren't restrained by her husband's blindness . . . 
Good-night. I'm going straight to my room." 

As I had come to the door, I thought that I could do no 
harm by going in to see who was about. I found Beresford 
sitting up on a sofa with a block of paper on his lap. He 
looked exceedingly ill and perhaps not best pleased to see me. 

" You're back again, then ? " I said. " How's the knee ? " 



Sonia O'Rane 97 

" I'm only waiting till Sonia comes in," he answered. " My 
knee's much the same as it's been all along, very much the 
same as it always will be. The doctors are going to give me 
blood-tests or something. Of course, I didn't do it much 
good when I was in prison ; the doctor there was badly 
scared. He used to examine me each day to see how much 
longer I could hold out without food, and I used to see him 
looking grave every time he came to the knee, until I'm pre- 
pared to bet he told the authorities he wouldn't take the 
responsibility of keeping me there any longer. Then they let 
me out." His grey lips curled into a withering sneer. " God ! 
the authorities in this country deserve to lose their precious 
war ! D'you think that in Germany they'd allow me to write 
the pamphlets I do here ? D'you think, if they decided not 
to shoot me, they'd let me out of prison because they were 
afraid to force food down my throat ? The blessed innocents 
here said I might go, if I promised to drop my propaganda ; 
they brought in a pen and paper. Well, I'd been without 
water for four days, and my throat and mouth were so swollen 
that I couldn't speak. I couldn't write very elegantly, either, 
but I collected enough strength to scrawl, ' I'll see you in 
Hell first.' And then, if you please, I was let out. And now 
I'm improving the occasion." 

He collected a number of loose sheets and pinned them 
together. 

" As long as you think it does any good," I said, " the 
Archangel Gabriel wouldn't be able to stop you." 

" You don't think it's a good thing to keep people from 
slaughtering one another ? Dear man, d'you appreciate that, 
if Kitchener and Grey were in Potsdam at this moment with 
the unconditional surrender of Germany in their pocket, 
they couldn't get anything to compensate our present losses ? 
There's imbecile talk about security and a ' war-to-end-war,' 
but you won't have war when people understand, what it's 
like. That's what I'm trying to shew them." 

He threw himself back on the sofa and began reading 
what he had written. I got up to leave, only pausing to give 
him a message for Mrs. O'Rane. As I closed the door behind 
me, a taxi stopped at the corner twenty yards from " The 
Sanctuary " and a man m uniform stepped out and stretched 
one hand to somebody inside, holding the door open with 

7 



98 Sonia Married 

the other. His size alone, without the familiar mane of 
yellow hair, identified him for me as Grayle ; a moment later 
Mrs. O'Rane emerged and stood by him under the street lamp 
at the comer. Bertrand might keep Grayle as far away as the 
end of the street, but I felt that he had boasted prematurely. 

" You'll come in ? " I heard Mrs. O'Rane say, as her com- 
panion hesitated by the taxi. 

" Not to-night, thanks. It's rather late." 

I caught a light ripple of laughter. 

" You're not getting suddenly anxious about my reputation, 
are you ? " she asked. " You used to like coming in and 
talking to me ; and you know how I hate going to bed. Of 
course, if you don't want to " 

Grayle opened his case and took out a cigarette. 

" That cuts no ice, Sonia," he said. " Good-night, and J:hank 
you for coming. I shall see you to-morrow." 

" I don't think I shall come." 

" Oh, yes, you will." 

" If you're so afraid of being compromised " 

" You are coming to-morrow." 

She was silent, and, if it had been daylight, I would have 
staked my life that she was pouting suitably. 

" You used to say that to-morrow was a very long way off," 
she remarked irrelevantly. 

Grayle's voice became authoritative. 

" You are coming to-morrow, Sonia." 

No doubt it was the old small change of flirtation which had 
exasperated Bertrand, and I had already been made to hear 
more than I relished. Stepping into the circle of dim light, I 
bade her good evening and asked Grayle if he had finished 
with his taxi. 

" Hul-/o .' I didn't know you were back in England ! " 
she cried. " Have you been calling ? I wish I'd known. 
You've got to come back now." 

" I looked in for a moment," I said. " Now I must get 
home, though." 

" I'll give you a lift," Grayle volunteered. 

Mrs. O'Rane looked from one to the other of us, and her 
eyes and mouth hardened in an expression of pique. 

" My society seems rather at a discount to-night," she 
observed. 



Sonia O'Rane 99 

" You'll find Beresford waiting for you," I said. " I've 
been talking to him, but I've got to get home now." 

She turned to Grayle, and I will swear that she was watching 
to see if Beresford's name was a challenge. 

" I must get home, too," was all that he would say. " I 
shall see you to-morrow." 

" Oh, I meant to tell you. I can't come to-morrow," she 
answered with easy gravity, as though I had not heard every 
syllable of her earlier conversation. " Well, if you won't come 
in, I'll say good-night. Thanks for a most dehghtful evening." 

Grayle and I drove in silence for half of the way. Then he 
asked me abruptly how I had got on in America. 

For some weeks I continued to attend to my own work un- 
interrupted by the O'Ranes, but towards the end of the Easter 
term I had to make my way to Melton for the Governors' meet- 
ing. A note from O'Rane invited me to call before going back 
to London, and at the end of our business I invaded his rooms, 
to find him seated, as ever, cross-legged on the floor, with 
his head thrown back, lips parted and eyes seemingly fixed on 
the ceiling or on something beyond it. The room was crowded 
with what I could only call a cluster of boys sprawling on 
chairs and tables or precariously perched with linked arms 
on the broad mantelpiece. Some were conventionally 
dressed, some were in flannels, some in uniform ; the majority, 
however, preferred a motley of khaki breeches, puttees and 
vivid blazers. It was the end of a field-day, and a few of 
O'Rane's friends had dropped in to talk with him. After some 
moments it occurred to the boy nearest the door to ask if I 
wished to speak to Mr. O'Rane, and on that, to my regret, the 
seminar dissolved. 

As the last boy clattered into the. Cloisters, O'Rane felt for a 
box of cigarettes and asked me how I had got on in America. 

" George told me you were back," he said. " Have you 
been round to our place ? " 

" I went round there almost immediately," I told him. " I 
say, O'Rane—" 

Perhaps he guessed what was coming, for I was not allowed 
to finish my sentence. 

" Was Beresford there ? " he asked. 

I hesitated for what I should have thought was an im- 
perceptible moment, and O'Rane repeated his question. 

7* 



100 Sonia Married 

" As a matter of fact he was," I said. 

" Ah ! I wish I'd known that before. . . . Oh, now I see 
why you hesitated ! " He gave a buoyant laugh. " I can 
assure you that Beresford doesn't make me in the least jealous 
or in the least apprehensive. I'd trust him pretty well as far 
as I'd trust Sonia ; our outlook's so similar, we've got so much 
in common. Well, the authorities have got their eyes on him, 
and he'U find himself arrested again, if he isn't careful. And 
he's only alienating possible sympathizers with the stuff he's 
writing how. Did you read him on the typhus outbreak 
at Wittenburg ? " 

He jumped up and brought me a copy of The Watchman 
from his writing-table. Beresford's article made me very 
angry. A few days earlier my nephew Felix, dining with me 
at the Hyde Park Hotel, where I had now taken up my resi- 
dence, had given me a sickening account of the epidemic in the 
prisoners' camp ; a fuller and yet more sickening account had 
appeared in the Press, and from end to end of the country 
there burst a storm of indignation stronger than anything since 
the outcry against the atrocities in Belgium. At this moment 
and from this text Beresford, who saw red at the news of the 
mildest cruelty to man or animal, preached a cynical, superior 
sermon to prove that, if misguided fools went to war, this was 
the kind of thing they must expect. The object of the war was 
to kill, and the only reason why the Germans did not massacre 
their prisoners was that on balance their own losses might be 
greater. But in scientific warfare it was unjustifiable to 
expect German doctors and nurses to risk their lives for the 
sake of preserving the enemy's. The English might ; the 
English habitually boasted of picking up survivors after a 
naval engagement, but it was not war. 

" God knows I'm not in love with war," said O'Bane, as I 
flung the paper away, " but an article like that infuriates just 
the decent-minded people he's appealing to. Well, bad taste 
is not an indictable offence, but I had a hint dropped this 
week-end that made me think that Beresford had better go 
warily. We had a man dining in Common Room on Sunday 
whose job in life is to advise on people like him and the stuff 
they turn out. We got on to the Wittenburg article, and it 
came out that I knew the author. Well, there was nothing 
much the matter with that branch of the Intelligence Service ; 



Sonia O'Rane loi 

they knew all about Beresford, but they didn't want to give 
him a free advertisement and make a martyr of him, so they 
tried to get hold of him under the Military Service Act and stop 
his mouth that way. He was ordered to join up on a certain 
day, so he wrote a polite letter to say that he disapproved of 
war and did not propose to fight. When the day came, he was 
well and duly put in charge of a guard and marched off to the 
recruiting office to be presented to the army and turned into a 
soldier. Before that could be done, though, the doctors had 
their say. To cut it short, he was rejected rather more com- 
pletely than anyone's ever been rejected before — heart, lungs, 
knee. . . . One doctor told him that, if he didn't live in the 
open air and blow himself out with milk, he'd be dead in six 
months. That was a week ago. The army's been cheated of 
its prey, and my friend of Sunday night must find another 
means of stopping Beresford's mouth. What the fellow must 
understand is that they intend to catch him this time : their 
temper's none the better for the little rebuff at the recruiting 
office. I was meaning to come up and talk to him at the next 
Leave-Out, but I'm afraid he may put his head in the trap 
before I can get at him. That's why I asked you to come and 
see me ; I want you to take him in hand." 

After the Wittenburg article I was not inclined to raise 
a finger on Beresford's behalf. And so I told O'Rane. 

" But do you want him to die ? " he asked. " If they 
shove him in prison and he hunger-strikes again, you may 
never see him alive." 

" I think I could endure that," I said. " The man's mind 
is perverted." 

" Ah, then you mustn't treat him as if he were normal," 
O'Rane put in quickly. " I want you to go to him and tell 
him to drop the whole business. Lord knows, I've been up 
against authority in one form or another most of my life, 
but there's nothing heroic in getting shot, if you don't achieve 
anything by it. You can get him to see that, surely." 

By this time I confess I had become one of many who 
found it hard to refuse O'Rane anything ; perhaps it was 
because he never asked for himself. 

" I'll try — as a favour to you," I said. " Though I've no 
idea why I should want to do you a favour. O'Rane, you're 
making a considerable mess of your life." 



102 Sonia Married 

The expression on his face suddenly changed, and he 
became coiirteously unapproachable. 

" Do you think we shall do any good by discussing it ? " 
he asked. 

" Every day that you let slip makes it harder to mend the 
breach. This term's running out. What are you going to do 
in the holidays ? " 

" I'm going home." 

" To the sort of doss-house life that you led before ? " 

" I — suppose so." 

I put on my coat and started towards the door. 

" Your wife will leave you," I warned him. 

" I've told her — and I believe I told you — ^that I'd never 
keep her against her will." 

" My friend, you are making a great fool of yourself." 

O'Rane opened the door for me, and we passed into the 
Cloisters. 

" I didn't think we should do any good by discussing it," 
he said. 



Ill 

If I could have persuaded anyone else to carry O'Rane's 
warning to Beresford I would have done so, but old Bertrand 
and George had crossed to Ireland for a week's fishing, and, 
when I called on Mrs. O'Rane, in the hope of catching her for 
ten minutes in a serious mood, it was my ill-luck to choose the 
night before Pentyre went out to the Front. An impromptu 
dance was taking its noisy course, and the only satisfaction 
which I derived from the visit was my discovery that the 
estrangement was not yet common property. Indeed, Mrs. 
O'Rane was fortunate in that her behaviour, however out- 
rageous, was judged and condoned by a special standard. 
" That's so like darling Sonia," Lady Maitland and her like 
would say. I took the trouble to pump young Deganway, 
whom I personally dislike, but even his long nose had not 
scented a scandal. It never seemed to dawn on Sir Roger and 
Lady Dainton that anything was amiss ; they both dis- 
approved of O'Rane, they both felt, without taking the 
trouble to disguise their feelings, that Sonia had disappointed 



Sonia O'Rane 103 

their ambitions and was wasting her life ; but, with a curious 
timidity or survival of self-respect, Mrs. O'Rane never let her 
own relations see that eight months after her marriage she 
was in effect separated from her husband. 

Failing to transfer my burden to other shoulders, I drove 
one night to Sloane Square and ran Beresford to earth in his 
rooms at the top of a modest block of service flats. There 
was no lift, and I was out of breath and temper by the time 
that I had climbed eight flights of stairs and lost myself in an 
uncharted maze of stone-flagged passages. At last, with a 
stitch in my side, I found his name painted on a wall and 
leaned helplessly against the door, as I looked for the bell. 
The door 5delded imexpectedly, and I found myself stumbling 
into an unlighted passage, where a phosphorescent rectangle 
hinted at a second door. Groping for the handle, I knocked 
and entered. Beresford was lying in an arm-chair with the 
injured leg on a coffin-stool and a reading lamp on a rickety 
oriental table behind him. In semi-darkness the room was 
youthfully bizarre. There were low cases, filled with paper- 
labelled books, running round three walls, a window with a 
divan under it in the fourth, Japanese silk hangings above 
the book-cases and praying mats insecurely scattered on an 
over-polished floor. The furniture consisted of a red lacquer 
cupboard, chest and clock ; in one corner a Buddha smiled 
from behind folding doors with placid and baffling benevo- 
lence ; a discoloured Moorish lamp hung from the middle of 
the ceiling with the Hand of Welcome outstretched to support 
it ; a joss-stick in a porcelain vase on the mantelpiece 
smouldered fragrantly. 

At the creak of the door's opening Beresford raised himself 
abruptly in his chair and as quickly subsided. 

" Oh, it's you," he said. 

" I didn't see any bell, so I walked in," I told him. " Are 
you busy ? " 

Out of the corner of his eye he glanced at the table beside 
him. There was neither paper nor book to offer plausible 
protection. 

" I didn't look for this honour," he said with a slight sneer. 
" I was — as a matter of fact — thinking out an article — 
thing I've got to finish to-night, you know." I sniffed — 
disapprovingly, I fear — ^the close, rather sickly atmosphere 



104 Sonia Married 

and loosened my coat. " It's a few reflections on the anni- 
versary of the Lusitania," he went on, in a tone of challenge, 
" pabulum for thoughtful Yanks. Do you want to see me 
about anything in particular ? I — I've got to get this 
finished to-night." 

His theme gave me my cue, and I furnished him with a 
digest of my conversation with O'Rane. He heard me out 
impatiently, but without protest. 

" I'm sure it's very kind of you both," he said at length, 
" but I'm afraid it's no use. We should never have had this 
war, if a few other people had done what I'm doing instead of 
blathering about peace and disarmament in a sixpenny review, 
like young Oalcleigh, and throwing everything to the winds 
the moment war was declared. I appreciate your coming, all 
the same " 

He pulled himself upright and limped to the lacquer cup- 
board, from which he took out a writing-block and pad. I 
was ready and anxious to leave as soon as I had delivered 
myself of my message, but — ^petty as it may seem — I resented 
his hunting me out of his fiat quite so unceremoniously ; 
hitherto I had perched on the arm of a chair, I now lowered 
myself with an obstinacy unbecoming my age into its depths. 

" But surely you can see that it's no good trying to separate 
fighting dogs, when once they've got to work ? That's why 
George brought his paper to an end. You've got to wait for 
a decision of some kind." 

" We reached a decision when the Germans were checked 
at the Marne," he yawned, pulling back his sleeve to consult 
the watch on his wrist. 

" But that's over and done with. Any peace efforts now 
only have the effect of weakening our own endurance and 
making a German victory the one possible decision." 

" But you know as well as I do that there's going to be no 
military decision. If they couldn't break through our line, 
we can't break through theirs, and I want to stop this hideous 
slaughter on both sides. I want to make people see that they 
must get Wilson or the Pope to propose terms of arbitration." 
The pupils of his eyes suddenly dilated. " And that's what I 
shall go on saying. I'm not going to be persuaded by you, 
I can't be intimidated by the militarists and I won't share 
your responsibility for future bloodshed. I won't join in this 



Sonia O'Rane 105 

criminal nonsense about crushing Prussian militarism — 
humiliating Germany until you've made sure of another war 
in ten years' time. I think I've told you what the next war 
will be like." His voice had risen almost to a scream ; with 
an effort he controlled himself, snorted disgustedly and limped 
to the sofa where I had laid my hat and cane, considerately 
picking them up for me. 

I moved towards the door. As I did so, my ears caught 
the sound of a low whistle, followed in the ensuing silence 
by a light step and the rustle of silk clothes from the flagged 
passage outside the front door. At last I understood why it 
had been left open, why the industrious Beresford was un- 
occupied on my arrival, why he had given me so many 
encouragements to retire. An unexpected sense of male 
freemasonry made me sorry for him. There was but the one 
door to the room, and already the rustle had passed from the 
passage outside and was audible in the dark corridor where I 
had fumbled for the handle twenty minutes before. Beres- 
ford stared before him with tragic eyes and parted lips ; he 
grasped my wrist and let it fall again ; then the door opened, 
and I could hear a double quick intake of breath. 

Mrs. O'Rane was standing on the threshold in a black dress 
with an ermine coat open at the neck, an artificial pink rose 
in her hair and a cluster of them at her waist. One hand in a 
white glove circled with a platinum watch-bracelet rested on 
the finger-plate, and she smiled at Beresford demurely. The 
smile grew fixed and then faded when she saw who bore 
Beresford company ; with imfeigned admiration I saw her 
collecting herself and preparing an offensive. 

" Are you better ? " she asked, coming into the room as 
though she were paying an afternoon call. " Good evening, 
Mr. Stornaway. Peter's not been at all well, and I promised 
to come and talk to him. I hope I'm not interrupting you ; 
I'm rather before my time." She glanced at her watch, laid 
her hands on Beresford's shoulders and gently impelled 
him towards his chair. " Darling Peter, how often have I 
told you that you mustn't stand ? Sit down like a good boy, 
put your foot up and tell me how you got on with the 
doctor." 

She seated herself on the arm of his chair, waved me to 
another, and threw open her coat. 



106 Sonia Married 

" They took the blood-tests," said Beresford, gallantly 
trying to imitate her nonchalance. " I'm to lie up and not to 
work. ... At least, those are the orders." 

Bending over him, she touched his forehead with her lips. 

" And you're going to obey them," she said. 

Beresford shrugged his shoulders sullenly. 

" What good will it do ? " he demanded. 

" It will please me," she answered promptly. " Lady 
Maitland says that all I want is love, ten thousand a year and 
my own way. I don't want you to die, Peter mine." 

He looked at her and turned his head resignedly away. 

" I feel sometimes I've not got a great deal to live for," he 
sighed. 

She jumped up with a show of indignation. 

" You dare say that, when I've outraged Colonel Grayle.by 
leaving his party to come and sit with you ! Never again, 
my Peter ! If you think so little of having me here " 

" It would be better for him and more seemly for you to 
drop this kind of thing," I suggested. 

She looked at me with her head on one side and then swung 
slowly round to Beresford. 

" I believe he's right, you know, Peter. I come here, 
radiating sunniness, but I only seem to depress you. Shall I 
give you up, baby ? " 

" You think that wUl make me less depressed ? " he asked 
gloomily. 

" I feel I'm a bad habit." Her expression lost its smile and 
became charged with abrupt neurotic irritability. " You've 
had more of my time, more of my sweetness " 

" Do you think I don't appreciate that ? " 

" I ought never to have let you fall in love with me. Mr. 
Stornaway's quite right. It's all my fault, and the sponer I 
end it the better. Good-bye, Peter. It was a mistake, but 
I'm not ungrateful. When I was miserable, when I wanted 
sweetness " 

Beresford jerked himself erect and caught her arm, as she 
tried to get up. 

" You're not going ? " be begged. 

" Yes. And I'm never coming back." 

" God in Heaven ! Sonia ! Don't say that ! " 

For perhaps the fourth time that night I picked up my hat 



Sonia O'Rane 107 

and cane. However little I might care for Beresford, common 
humanity ordained that this kind of game should end. 

" This fellow's an invalid," I reminded her. " You're 
only making him worse by exciting him. You had better 
let me see you home. Taxis are few and far between, and I 
took the precaution of telling mine to wait." 

She turned her little platinum watch to the light and 
compared it with the clock on the mantelpiece. 

" I can get a train, you know," she told me, losing all her 
irritability and becoming matter-of-fact. " And I hate going 
to bed more than anything in the world except getting up. 
When we had a house in Rutland Gate my first season. Lord 
John Carstairs, who hved next door, always used to say that 
he knew it was time for breakfast when he heard my taxi 
bringing me home after a ball. So nice to feel that one some- 
times really does one's duty to one's neighbour ; it justifies 
the Church Catechism. He was very grateful about it and, 
whenever I lost my latchkey, he used to come down and help 
me in through the fanlight. Then there was a dreadful day 
when I got stuck on a piece of broken glass — father's bill for 
fanUghts was so heavy that we couldn't take a moor that 
year ; he always thought it was the suffragettes — and Lord 
John stood below in the divinest green silk pyjamas and an 
Austrian military cloak, I lay half-way through the fanlight, 
we exhausted every possible topic of conversation, including 
the Academy, and at last he proposed to me. I've never 
been so angry in my life ! If he'd proposed first and 
talked about the Academy afterwards, nobody could have 
minded." 

Having prattled herself into a good temper, she paused to 
take a cigarette from a gold case at her wrist. I reminded her 
that we had lost sight of the particular in the general. 

"It is late," I said. " Too late for you to be calling on 
young bachelors and far too late to be left unchaperoned." 

Her big brown eyes, usually soft and entreating, gave forth 
a glint of defiance. 

" Dear Mr. Stornaway ! if you knew how often I'd been to 
see Peter " 

" That makes it no better." 

" You think I'm not respectable," she exclaimed, with the 
slightest perceptible toss of the head. 



108 Sonia Married 

" I've other things to think about. If you want to call 
on Beresford, you can call in the day-time ; your only reason 
for choosing an hour of this kind is that you think there's 
something rather venturesome and improper about it. It's 
this sort of behaviour that led me on a famous occasion to tell 
you that you were second-rate." 

Possibly acting on a hint from George Oakleigh, I was begin- 
ning to share his experience that Mrs. O'Rane never resented 
a certain brutal candour of criticism. 

" You do hate me, don't you ? " she laughed. 

" I have no use for the second-rate." 

" And that disposes of me ! " She leant down and drew 
Beresford to her until his head was pillowed on her bosom. 
" Baby, you're in love with a second-rate woman. So are 
ever so many people more, I'm afraid. It doesn't speak 
highly for the first-rate intelligence of men, but then I take 
men as I find them." 

" Pardon me, you go out to look for them, Mrs. O'Rane," 
I said. 

" It's the same thing." 

" Not for a married woman." 

We had bantered hitherto without very much malice, but 
my reminder seemed to carry a sting. 

" I don't regard myself as a married woman," she said 
very deliberately. 

" I cannot remain out of bed to hear stuff of this kind ! " 
I exclaimed. " Melodrama is only excusable when it is con- 
vincing." 

" Don't you be too sure that you won't be convinced ! " 
she cried, springing up and facing me. The ermine coat, 
drooping half off her arms and back, fell to the ground and 
left her bare-shouldered and with heaving breast. The rose 
in her hair trembled, and two normally pale cheeks were lit 
each with a single spot of burning colour. The weakness 
that underlay the softness of her mouth had vanished, and 
her eyes, grown angry and hot, had lost their beauty. " WiU 
you come and see me, I wonder, when I'm living with Peter ? " 
she asked flauntingly. 

" I shall not," I answered. " I may say that this kind of 
talk " 

" But you wouldn't mind seeing him ? " she interrupted. 



Sonia O'Rane 109 

" This is all right in a man. David can go off with that 
woman " ^ 

" Good-night, Mrs. O'Rane," I said, holding out my hand. 

Like everyone else, I sometimes feel intuitively when people 
are speaking for effect. Mrs. O'Rane spoke purely for effect 
when she boasted of the times that she had been to call on 
Beresford ; she was still speaking for effect when I warned her 
against being melodramatic, yet sincerity crept in when she 
referred to her husband. I hardly knew whether to be glad 
or sorry. For her to be jealous of Hilda Merryon presupposed 
that she was not so indifferent to O'Rane as she pretended ; 
even to feign suspicion argued an unbalanced mind. 

" Good-night," I repeated, as she stood ostentatiously refus- 
ing to take my hand. " You had better let me see you home, 
though." 

" I'm not coming home. I won't be ordered about ! You 
advise me and find fault with me and insult me. . . . Mr. 
Stornaway, let me tell you this. You've been — poking your 
nose into my affairs for some time, so I'm sure you've a right 
to know everything. You side with David, and think every- 
thing he does is wonderful, perfect, magnificent. Well, I 
don't. I know I'm vain ; and I'm vain enough to think he's 
not treating me as I'm entitled to be treated. He'll be coming 
home in a fortnight. I wrote to him to-day and asked him 
if he wanted to see me. If he does, he can. If he wants me, 
and not the scourings of the London streets. ... If not, if 
he doesn't love me enough for that, I shaU look for someone 
who does." 

I ended my succession of unsuccessful starts and reached 
the door. Mrs. O'Rane strode after me with arms akimbo. 

" You don't believe it ! " she cried passionately. " You 
don't think I dare ! " 

" My dear young lady, in your present mood you're capable 
of most things," I said. " But Beresford and I are going to 
forget what you've been saying to-night, and I think you'll 
be glad to forget it too." 



110 Sonia Married 



IV 

One says rhetorically that one will forget a phrase or an 
episode, but my single glimpse of Mrs. O'Rane's temper had 
frightened forgetfulness away. I kept on telling myself that 
it was no business of mine, that my rule for thirty years had 
been to let the younger generation take care of itself un- 
trammelled ; yet, when George Oakleigh telephoned to me 
from the Admiralty, begging me to cancel other engagements 
and dine with him, I had to prepare myself for any kind of 
bad news. 

I could see, when he came into the club, that there was 
something on his mind, but we had no opportunity for private 
conversation during dinner, as Maurice Maitland attached 
himself to our table for first-hand news of the Irish rebellion. 
I had imagined that George, even with an Irish estate, an 
Irish upbringing and an unmixed Irish ancestry, was too 
much overlaid with his English associations to feel more 
than academically on Irish aspirations. To see him after a 
holiday in Ireland, where he had gone to fish and had never 
stirred nearer the county Kerry than Dublin, was to see a 
hillsman made suddenly mindful of the hills and of his own 
infancy. Forgotten ties of racial love and antagonism had 
been blown into life. There was no attempt to be judicial ; 
he had arrived too late for the rebellion (or I dare swear he 
would have had a hand in it), he was not concerned with the 
bloodshed which it had caused ; it was the sight and stories 
of the repression which made his blood boil and his voice 
ring. 

" So much for Skefiington ! " he cried. " And Casement 
prosecuted by Smith, who threatened exactly the same tac- 
tics before the war ! My God ! I wonder when you English 
think this will be forgotten ! You've seen the sentences ? 
One woman was carted off to penal servitude for life. ' For 
life,' one of her friends kept saying. ' But Ireland was free 
for three days,' answered the woman. We've a rare palate 
for phrases in Ireland. How soon do you imagine that phrase 
will be forgotten ? I'm seeing red at this moment. For two 
pins I'd join our young friend Beresford in any propaganda 
against this country that he cared to start." Then he caught 



Sonia O'Rane ill 

sight of Maitland's expression of shocked perplexity. " I 
mean it, General. When the Huns pretend to be amazed 
that the Belgians don't eat out of their hands, we're righteously 
disgusted at the hypocrisy of it. On my honour, you English 
are every bit as dense or hypocritical with us." 

" But the trouble is over now, surely ? " Maitland un- 
warily asked. 

" It will never be over in your lifetime or mine ! Redmond 
made the old blunder of trusting the English ; he promised a 
united front in Ireland when the war broke out, instead of 
holding the Government to ransom. And the Government 
responded by scrapping the Home Rule Act. You've lost 
Ireland, the Nationalist party's dead and damned, henceforth 
you'll have a swelling Sinn Fein army held down by Enghsh 
troops — cis in Poland, as in Alsace-Lorraine, as in north Italy 
before the liberation. And I don't envy you the job of making 
things sweet with America." 

Dinner was over before our discussion of Ireland, but, when 
Maitland left us to return to the War Office, the interruption 
changed the current of George's thoughts. I was not sorry, 
for I had endurfed two nights of Irish debate with Grayle, who 
saw in the rebellion fresh proof of Governmental incompetence 
and new need for a change, in which I was to assist him. 

" I didn't ask you here to listen to me tub-thumping," 
George began apologetically, when we were alone. " How 
lately have you seen anything of the O'Ranes ? " 

I told him of the meeting in Beresford's flat. 

George smiled wanly. 

" They'll kill poor old Bertrand between them," he said, 
" if they keep up this racket much longer. Raney wrote to 
say that he was coming home, as soon as term was over, and 
expected Sonia to be at ' The Sanctuary,' and a couple of 
days later the Merryon woman arrived with the greater part 
of the luggage cind a box or two of books. She hadn't come 
to stay, but he'd sent her up to verify a few references in his 
library for some work he was doing ; she was going back to 
help him finish off his exam, papers and reports, and they were 
coming up together in about a week's time. This took place 
yesterday. Now, I'll say at once that Raney's behaved like 
a psychological ostrich over that woman, and nobody but 
Raney would have thought it anything but outrageous for 



112 Sonia Married 

a man to let his wife stay in London and calmly accept the 
services of a secretary — ^in his wife's place, and against her 
wishes. She'd put her eyes on sticks for him, too. Miss 
Merryon would ; and, if Raney doesn't know it, you bet 
Sonia does. Well, I think it was partly jealousy ; Sonia was 
furious at the idea of anyone else being near her husband. 
Partly it was shame ; when the girl came in with Raney's 
belongings, arranging this, ordering that, verifying the other, 
you may be sure that Sonia knew very well that she was 
letting someone else do her job. And partly it was because 
she couldn't get her own way. The combined result was a 
first-class row, in which she said that the girl was Raney's 
mistress and told her that she wouldn't have her in the house. 
It wasn't mere words. She escorted her to the door, where 
the taxi-man was wrestling with the luggage, slammed, it 
behind her and pulled a chest against it. On the business 
principle of having everything in black and white, she then 
wrote a descriptive account of it all to Raney, which will no 
doubt be read aloud to him at breakfast to-morrow by Miss 
Hilda Merryon." 

He mopped his forehead and sent a waiter to fetch him some 
water. 

" And what are you doing ? " I asked. 

" What can I do ? Raney's not going to be told that this 
woman's his mistress ; he'll probably make Sonia apologize 
to them both — or try to ; and he certainly won't let her be 
turned out. I should think ... I don't know, but I should 
think that on the day he comes back Sonia will try to run 
away again, and, if he doesn't stop her by main force, by using 
aU the authority he's got and all the brutality he's capable of 
exhibiting, he'll lose her for good. Sonia's pretty well worked 
up, too. So am I. These young people are preparing an 
early grave for me ; it's getting on my nerves." 

" But her parents " I began. 

My unfinished suggestion was received with a silent smile 
which was, perhaps, the cruellest and most comprehensive 
criticism ever passed on Sir Roger and Lady Dainton. 

I was in the smoking-room at the House the following night 
talking to Vincent Grayle, when George's card was brought 
in, and I went out to see him. 

" I've just left ' The Sanctuary,' " he said, " and I thought 



Sonia O'Rane lis 

I'd report progress. Raney got her letter all right and sent 
very much the reply I should have expected. He's pretty 
well worked up now. Sonia' s got to apologize, and he orders 
her to receive Miss Merryon. It was an ultimatum, if there 
ever was one. Sonia — she was like I remember her the last 
time we met before she broke off her engagement with Jim 
Loring — every nerve tingling. She stalked to the telephone 
and rang up Beresford, informing me over her shoulder that 
she would not have that woman in the house, even if she had to 
bring friends in to turn her out. Fortunately Beresford was 
not at home. Then she rang up this place and tried to get 
hold of Grayle — ' Mrs. O'Rane. Most urgent.' Again, 
fortunately, the reply came back that Grayle was engaged " 

I looked at my watch and interrupted him to ask when 
the message had been sent. 

" Oh, this moment — half an hour ago. It was just before 
I left to come here. Well, we're likely to have the pretty 
scene of Raney driving up to the door and finding himself 
barricaded out by his own wife. Beresford can't do anything 
very active, but Grayle " 

" You needn't fear him," I said. 

When the telephone message was brought into the 
smoking-room, Grayle glanced at the paper and said that 
he was engaged. I did not know, of course, who was trying 
to speak to him, but the messenger repeated that the call 
was " most urgent." At this Grayle grew impatient and said 
again and very deliberately, " I — am — engaged." Then we 
resumed our interrupted conversation ; he was crossing to 
France almost immediately on a visit to General Headquarters 
and would be away for several days. He had promised to 
introduce a deputation of his constituents to one of the 
Ministers and wanted me to act for him in his absence. 

" She's gone just too far with him," I said, " and he's lost 
his temper. But there mustn't be a scene, whatever happens. 
You'd better tell O'Rane to see you before he goes home ; 
explain the state of mind she's in. . . . And, George, for the 
love of Heaven, get hold of Mrs. O'Rane and kixock some 
sense into her head — ^you say she'll stand a good deal from 
you. This is becoming frankly intolerable." 

Then we left the House ; he made his way to " The Sanc- 
tuary," while I drove home. Had we changed places, he 

8 



114 Sonia Married 

would have been more successful in his mission, for, as I 
paid off my driver, Mrs. O'Rane hurried up and engaged 
him. Whether she recognized me or not I cannot tell ; but 
I had nothing to say to her and I was at pains to avoid an 
encounter. She was in evening dress, I remember, walking 
eastwards along Knightsbridge, and I wondered suddenly 
whether she had been calling on Grayle in Milford Square. 
Then I remembered that Grayle was still at the House when 
I left. As the taxi drove away I asked myself, not for the 
first time, whether I had not enough work and worries of my 
own without having to play the double part of bland bachelor 
imcle and private detective. 

A week later O'Rane came up to London and called on 
George at the Admiralty. He was so far amenable to advice 
that he went alone to " The Sanctuary " and talked for an 
hour with his wife, though they parted without reaching 
a compromise and on the reiterated understanding that, if 
Miss Hilda Merryon set foot in " The Sanctuary," Mrs. O'Rane 
would leave and never return. I met him myself later in 
the day at the House and was relieved to find him preoccupied 
with other cares. He had called on Beresford and been 
privileged to hear the proofs of that indefatigable pam- 
phleteer's latest composition. It was entitled, I believe, 
" Letires de Cachet," and contained a bitter attack on petty 
tyranny and misuse of authority as practised by the army. 
O'Rane had tried to get the article withdrawn, but Beresford 
was inflamed and fanatical with memories of his own treat- 
ment in prison and of the attempt to silence his mouth by 
the exercise of military discipline. I fancy, too, that he was 
puffed up with his own initial victory and believed that, 
so far from seeking opportunity for another encounter, the 
agents of government were rubbing their bruises and keeping 
out of the way. 

" I couldn't move him an inch," O'Rane had to admit. 
" I'm sorry, for I don't want to see him killed. . . . And I 
— ^I must have been extraordinarily like him when I was a 
kid of about fifteen, and the whole world was a black dungeon 
of iniquity and injustice, and I had to keep hold of myself 
with both hands for fear of murdering someone. . . . The 
first time I talked to Beresford I agreed with most of what 
he said ; I could feel myself going white, if you understand 



Sonia O'Rane 115 

me ; we got emotionally drunk together. And then I saw 
that he wasn't going to do any more good than I should have 
done at fifteen, if I'd yielded to the impulse of killing a man. 
... I felt that, if someone could relieve the shadows a bit 
. . . I'm not giving in yet." 

We were interrupted by a division bell, and I gave him an 
arm to the lobby. Then Bertrand carried him off to dinner, 
and I made my way to the Berkeley, where I had promised 
to meet George and his cousin. Lady Loring. Arriving a 
few minutes before my time, I was smoking a cigarette in 
the hall when I caught sight of Grayle and crossed over to 
speak to him. He was scowling in an arm-chair facing the 
door, with his eyes impatiently fixed on his watch and an 
evening paper on his knees. 

" You've not started yet, then," I said. " If you're 
going to be in London to-morrow, I'll give you back your 
deputation." 

" I leave the first thing in the morning," he answered 
shortly. " What d'you make the time ? Five to eight ? 
On the stroke of eight I leave. I don't wait more than half 
an hour for any woman." 

He hesitated for a moment longer ; then pulled himself 
slowly erect and limped with the resolute fixity of ill-temper 
to the cloak-room. I picked up the paper and was beginning 
to read it, when he limped back with his coat and cap on, 
buttoning his gloves. 

" If Mrs. O'Rane turns up while you're here, give her that, 
will you ? " he said, throwing an open envelope on the table. 
" You might say that I've gone on." 
Protruding from the envelope was a theatre ticket. 
" Aren't you dining ? " I asked. 

" I had a whisky and soda while I was waiting," he an- 
swered. " Can't hang about indefinitely, you know. It's 
Eric Lane's new play. The thing starts at eight, of all ungodly 
hours, and I want to see some of the show." I thought it 
unnecessary to remind him that we had met at the identical 
theatre some ten days before. " If a woman can't have the 
decency to come in time — ah ! " 

He interrupted himself, as Mrs. O'Rane came in, stood 
looking round for a moment and hurried forward, smiling 
at two or three friends on the way. 

8* 



116 Sonia Married 

" You were very nearly late," she said, nodding at his 
cap. " If I'd had to wait— well, I suppose Mr. Stornaway 
would have taken pity on me, however much he hates me. 
The spectacle of a young, distressed female simply fainting 
for a cocktail — did you remember to order my special cock- 
tail ? " she asked Grayle. 

" You are late," he observed, without regard to her question. 

" I ? But that's too abominable ! If you're not going 
to be sweet to me, I shall go straight home and never speak 
to you ^ain. Late, indeed ! I didn't get home till after 
seven, but I had a hot bath and dressed and disposed of four 
people on the telephone, all by seven-thirty " 

" Dinner was ordered for seven-thirty," Grayle interrupted. 

Mrs. O'Rane puckered her lips mischievously and laid one 
finger on them to enjoin silence. 

" Are you listening to my story ? " she asked. " If you'd 
just be patient and not pretend you're working out the times 

for an infantry advance " She turned to me with a quick 

smile. " How long would you say it took to get here from 
' The Sanctuary,' Mr. Stornaway ? " 

" That depends how you go," I said. " It's no time in 
a taxi." 

She clapped her hands in delight. 

" That's what I always say ! When anyone finds fault 
with Westminster or the Embankment — fancy finding fault 
with the Enbankment ! It's like being compromised with 
the Albert Memorial. But people do, you know ; the Em- 
bankment, I mean ; they say it's not healthy — ^well, when 
they find fault, I always say : ' Ah, but it's so central. You 
can jump into a taxi and get anywhere in no time ! ' Just 
what you said, Mr. Stornaway. Well, as dinner was at half- 
past seven and it took me no time to get here, there was no 
point in leaving the house before half-past seven, was there ? " 

Grayle was nodding at each new development in her rather 
diffuse story, but there were hard, unamiable lines from nose 
to mouth, and I fancied that her smiles and tricks and ab- 
surdities were not amusing him. As she paused from want 
of breath, he took a step backward. 

" Don't go away, when I'm talking to you ! " she cried, 
catching him by the sleeve. " It's rude, to begin with — and 
you know you're always sorry after you've been rude to me. 



Sonia O'Rane 117 

Oh ! the times you've had to call with a taxi full of flowers ! 
I will say this for myself, I'm very forgiving ; and, in the 
second place, you're missing the real pathos of the story, 
what the Americans call the sob-stuff. I left home at seven- 
thirty, as I must have told you before, but you will keep 
interrupting ; I walked to the Houses of Parliament — no 
taxi ; I persevered down Whitehall — no taxi ; fainting with 
fatigue and weeping from sheer mortification, I dragged one 
foot after another — for the honour of England, you know 
— ^up the Haymarket — no taxi ; and, believe me or believe 
me not, as — you — like, I never saw a taxi till I got here. 
Then an angel-creature drove up and said : ' Taxi, miss ? ' 
and it was almost more than I could bear. I wanted to jump 
in and drive round and round the Park to shew people that 
there was just one taxi left in the world and that I'd got it. 
Nothing but the thought of this wretched play brought me here 
at all — ^the play and the cocktail ; you must admit that, 
if anyone ever deserved a cocktail, it's me. And, if you say 
you haven't ordered me one or that they're bad for me, I shall 
go home." 

She handed me her gloves and held out a bag to Grayle, 
as she began to take off her cloak. 

" Now, is that the whole story ? " he asked. 

" That's a synopsis," she said. " I can elaborate it, of 
course. Some of the people I met on the way " 

" I think we can dispense with that. Dinner was ordered 
for seven-thirty, and the play begins at eight. I was starting 
out as you came in, but I waited to hear if you had anything 
to say, any explanation to give. Stornaway has your ticket, 
and the table's that one in the first window. I may see you 
later." 

Mrs. O'Rane looked at him for a moment without under- 
standing ; then her mouth opened slowly. 

" Oh ! " she exclaimed. 

" Good-bye." 

" Come back this instant ! " 

Grayle turned his back on us with a perfunctory bow 
and limped away. 

" If you don't come back, I'll never speak to you again ! " 
she cried. 

Whether he heard her or not made no difference to his 



118 Sonia Married 

steady progress. As he reached the door, Mrs. O'Rane 
turned nonchalantly to me with a smile and a shrug. A mo- 
ment later she glanced casually over her shoulder to see if 
he was coming back. ... A moment later still, with amaze- 
ment in her eyes, she was hurrying after him into the street. 
When George Oakleigh arrived with his cousin at a quarter- 
past eight, he told me with some concern that he had for- 
gotten to book a table. We were very comfortably accommo- 
dated, however, in the first window. # 



For three weeks I endiu-ed an unsought holiday in bed 
with influenza at the Hyde Park Hotel. In my absence 
everything seemed to have gone on very much as before, 
and, when I met O'Rane at the House on the eve of his return 
to Melton, he told me that he too had spent the recess in 
London with his wife and that Miss Merryon had been packed 
off to the sea for a change of air. Outwardly all relations 
were amicable, but Bertrand told me afterwards that Mrs. 
O'Rane consistently displayed the guarded civility of a wife 
who has discovered her husband's infidelity, but decides to 
stay with him rather than create a scandal. 

" Are you going back to Melton, then ? " I asked O'Rane. 

" Yes. I haven't found anything else suitable so far. 
You see, I feel it must be war-work of some kind ; and it 
must be paid. I don't seem much nearer solvency than when 
I came back from France twelve months ago." 

I had a vision of " The Sanctuary," as I had seen it at the 
O'Ranes' house-warming, crammed to overflowing with their 
friends and his chance acquaintances. I knew something 
of his prodigal generosity and of his wife's no less prodigal 
extravagance ; and I could form no idea how they kept their 
heads above water. Bertrand, of comrse, contributed to the 
upkeep of the household ; O'Rane had his salary as a Member 
and some trifle from Melton ; his wife possessed a few hun- 
dreds of her own, eked out with chance gifts from admiring 
friends. Sir Adolphus Erskine, the great financier, would 
give her a set of furs or a pearl necklace. Lord Pennington 
woidd send her a case of champagne out of some unexpected 



Sonia O'Rane 119 

discovery at an auction, but this hardly helped to appease 
the tradesmen. 

" I don't know what you can expect," I said. 

O'Rane frowned in perplexity. 

" I made a lot of money and I saved a lot of money before 
the war," he said, " but I don't seem able to do it now. . . . 
When other people ... I know it's impracticable to go out 
and give a loaf to everyone who's hungry, but it's frightfully 
hard to refuse when you do in fact meet them. I daresay 
it's mad, but George and everyone will tell you that I've 
always been tolerably mad, and I'm afraid I've got much 
madder since the war." He gave one of his whimsical. Puck- 
like laughs and then added soberly, " Poor Sonia ! " 

" I hope you're in a state of grace," I said. " You know, 
a madman can be very cruel." 

He looked into my eyes, and I shivered ; for, though I 
knew him to be sightless, he seemed to be looking into my soul. 

" Sometimes I feel there's not room for compromise in this 
life," he said. 

" You are — thirty ? I'm afraid I'm a quarter of a century 
older, O'Rane." 

" Thank God I there's room for inconsistency," he laughed. 

I was at my office the following afternoon when George 
Oakleigh telephoned to say that his uncle wished to see me 
at once on a matter of urgency ; could I make it convenient 
to come round immediately ? I replied that it was 
exceedingly inconvenient, but that, if he could play truant 
from the Admiralty, I could absent myself equally well from 
my own department. 

" Thank God you can come ! " he exclaimed with dis- 
quieting fervour. " It's a bad business." 

I arrived at " The Sanctuary " to find aU silent and tense 
with expectant tragedy. Bertrand sprawled with slackened 
limbs on a long wicker chair, an untasted drink by his side 
and an imlighted cigar in his mouth. George was looking 
bleakly out of the window, with his right hand gripping his 
left wrist behind his back ; the afternoon sun exposed every 
line and wrinkle of his face, and I found him ten years older, 
effortless and numbed. 

" Tell me what's happened," I said, as I closed the door. 

Bertrand looked at me for a moment, though I could see 



120 Sonia Married 

that his attention was wandering, and then turned to his 
nephew. 

" You'd better go back to him," he suggested. " I don't 
think we've got anything more to say to each other." 

The second closing of the door was followed by a long 
silence. 

" Tell me what's happened, Bertrand," I repeated. 

" Oh, nothing ! " He gave a barking cough of mordant 
bitterness. " I told George it wasn't fair to drag you in when 
you had in fact been spared it. David came back un- 
expectedly this afternoon to find his wife in Beresford's 
arms." He buried his face in tremulous hands. " My God ! 
my God ! They've not been married a year ! And a blind 
man ! " 

When Bertrand is cynical I find him tiresomely cynical ; 
not content with condoning human depravity, he seems to 
take personal credit to himself for it. When he is humanly 
moved I find him imnerving. 

" Tell me the whole story," I said, " before I try to comment 
on it." 

" Comment on it ? " Bertrand echoed and sat silent, 
staring at a picture on the opposite wall. 

The story, when it came, was old and simple. The end of 
the holidays found the O'Ranes as undecided about the 
future as at the beginning ; it had been easier, I presume, 
not to discuss it, and no word had passed until the evening 
before. Then O'Rane had announced his approaching 
return to Melton, and from that the game, encounter, what 
you will, had developed automatically. His wife begged 
him not to go, hinted that he had promised to stay in London, 
and after the usual interchange was undecided whether she 
would keep him company. It depended. . . . There followed 
the expected debate on Miss Merryon. O'Rane was taking 
her to Melton whether his wife came or not, as he needed the 
services of a typist ; Mrs. O'Rane would not go, if " that 
woman " went, and, if O'Rane went with her alone, he knew 
the consequences. . . . 

" Then I went to bed," said Bertrand, pressing his hands 
to his head. " I imagine they must have had an unpre- 
cedented row, and this morning O'Rane went off to Waterloo, 
leaving his wife like a spitting cat. I slunk out of the house 



Sonia O'Rane 121 

as soon as possible ; I didn't want the quarrel at second" 
hand. Sometime this afternoon O'Rane came back. When 
he got to Waterloo, he felt that he couldn't part from his wife 
for three months on such a note. He came back to make 
friends, to see if they couldn't arrive at some modus vivendi. 
... He felt his way round the library ; it was deserted ; 
felt his way round the hall and found her umbrella in the 
stand ; went upstairs. Her door was locked, and he tapped 
on it, begging her to let him in. She shouted out that he 
wasn't to come in ; and he stood there minute after minute 
praying her to remember their love, to forgive him, to be 
reasonable, generous, to forget their wretched quarrel. 
Never a sound came from inside the room. He had worked 
himself up until he was sweating with emotion. When he 
stopped, there was utter silence. Then he heard a cough. . . ." 

Bertrand paused to sip the drink at his elbow. It was not 
Sonia's cough ; it was the bursting cough of a man who had 
been trying in a long agony of suffocation to repress it. At 
the sound something primitive and overmastering took 
possession of O'Rane. He stepped back and flung himself 
against the door, but it was old, and the weight of his body 
only wrung a hoUow groan from its solidity ; within all was 
still silent. Again and again he charged the door with his 
shoulder until one panel split and broke in, and the lock 
creaked in outrage. Insensible to physical pain, which was 
quickly maddening his brain, he took a last flying leap, which 
wrenched handle and lock from the wood-work and sent 
him to measure his length on the floor. 

The same imcanny silence greeted his entrance. He drew 
himself upright, rubbing his bruised shoulder, and embarked 
on what from Bertrand's account was truly the grimmest 
game of Blind Man's Buff. With the muscles of his back 
and arms braced to resist an attack, he advanced slowly, 
with arms outstretched and body bent, like a football player 
waiting to collar his man. In the first half of the room his 
groping hands touched only the familiar tables and chairs, 
but with every yard forward he was uncovering a retreat 
for the adversary. Retracing his steps, he kicked the door 
closed, pushed a bed against it and advanced once more 
towards the window. In the unbroken silence he had to 
keep stoj^ing suddenly for a half-heard sound of hurried 



122 Sonia Married 

breathing, but his own pulses were hammering so loudly 
that he could not trust his ears. Nearer and nearer to the 
window he crept, imtil an unnamed sense told him that he 
was within touch of a human body ; as he paused, there was 
a shiver, followed by a sharp intake of breath ; someone's 
nerves were breaking under the ordeal. The waving arms 
swept forward and closed on a woman's shoulders. 

" Sonia ! " he panted, and could say no more. 

For a moment longer the silence continued ; then from 
behind her came the foot-shufHe of the man whom she had 
been shielding. O'Rane's hands dropped, and he sprang 
beyond her, only to bark his knuckles on the wall, as his 
unseen quarry doubled and ran ; there was an instant's 
vague chase, the sound of a lame man sparing his injured 
leg, the squeak of rolling castors, as the bed was dragged 
back from the door, a scratching for the handle that was 
no longer there, and finally the echoing slam of the door 
itself. O'Rane sprawled once more on the floor, as his foot 
met a rucked billow of carpet ; the hurried limp grew distant 
and faded ; there followed the slam of a second door, and 
the house returned to its afternoon silence. 

What either found to say to the other neither Bertrand 
nor I had any means of guessing. 

" She's gone," he told me hollowly. " I saw her driving 
away as I came back from the House — ^just before we sent 
for you. O'Rane was standing in the middle of the libr^y 
like a — ^like a man in catalepsy. George came in a moment 
later, and we had the story as I've given it to you." He 
paused and breathed deeply. " I'm getting too old for this 
sort of thing, Stornaway ; my — ^my brain strikes work ^t 
a time like this, you must tell me what we've got to do. 
There'll be murder, if he ever gets his hands on Beresford, 
and we've got to stop that. I'd murder the fellow myself, 
if I could, but we can't have David hanging for him. And 
we must do something for David." 

With a quavering hand he picked up the tumbler from the 
table by his side and sipped its contents mechanically. His 
eyes were half-closed, and his mind at least was asleep with 
very exhaustion. My own worked feverishly with utter 
want of concentration. I told myself that I might have 
expected this after my surprise meeting in Beresford's flat, 



Sonia O'Rane 12s 

that it had been going on for Heaven knows how many weeks ; 
then that none of this was to the point, that O'Rane was in 
a bath of liquid fire, that something must be done ; lastly 
— ^yet my first thought and appreciation — that none of us 
knew what to do, that nothing could be done. 

I have no idea how long I stood staring at Bertrand's 
shrunken face and closed eyes. Death had left his finger- 
prints on the big, self-indulgent face when the old man had 
his stroke at the beginning of the war. I remember wondering 
how many more rounds he would survive. . . . Yet he had 
lived fully, powerfully and pleasurably for more than his 
allotted span ; young O'Rane was little more than thirty, 
and he had already undergone what would have broken men 
of less heroic spirit. 

Instinctively I moved towards the door, and at the slight 
sound Bertrand opened his eyes and asked what I was going 
to do. 

" God knows ! " I answered. 

Instinctively I foimd myself walking down the stairs which 
Beresford and O'Rane had descended so precipitously an 
hour or two before. The same strained air of expectancy 
hung over the passages and hall, and, when I pushed aside 
the curtain and entered the library, George started like a 
surprised criminal. The room was in twilight, and it took 
my eyes several moments to grow accustomed to the change 
from the sunset glow upstairs. Then I caught sight of 
O'Rane sprawling on the sofa, motionless and silent ; his 
hair was dishevelled, his clothes dusty on one side, and I 
could see white skin and a stain of blood through a rent in 
one trouser-knee. 

" It's — Stornaway," George explained. 

For a moment O'Rane seemed not to have heard ; then 
he said : 

" Thanks. Thanks to you both. Later on, perhaps. . . . 
Just now I'd rather " 

I exchanged glances with George, who shrugged his 
shoulders and rose silently to his feet. O'Rane collected 
himself and walked to the door, fortified by the routine of 
social convention, as though he were speeding a dinner- 
guest on his way. I passed by the flame-coloured curtain 
and turned the handle of the door, looking round to re- 



124 Sonia Married 

capture the vision seen one night when O'Rane caught his 
wife to his heart, while I looked on and envied them some- 
thing that had never been granted to me. There was no 
response to my pull, but, at the rattle, O'Rane stepped for- 
ward with a muttered apology, puUin^ a cumbrous key from 
his pocket and feeling for the lock with the fingers of his 
other hand. George and I passed into the street, the door 
closed behind us, and I caught the sound of rusty wards 
turning in an unaccustomed lock. George put his arm 
through mine and asked if I was going back to the House. 

" I shall dine at the club," I said ; and I wondered how 
either of us could speak so conventionally. 

We walked the length of Millbank in silence. 

" You'd have thought he had enough to put up with 
already, wouldn't you ? " George asked dispassionately ; 
then, with a tremor in his voice, " God in heaven ! it's a 
smash-up for Raney ! I didn't think she was capable of it ; 
I've known her all her life, I'd have sworn she'd have pulled 
up in time. ... Of course, she's always had to have people 
fluttering round her and paying her compliments, and I 
wasn't a bit surprised to find a boys' school of young Guardees 
hanging about the house the moment she'd moved into it. 
It was the same when she was engaged to Jim Loring — God 
knows she knocked a big enough hole in his life, you'd have 
thought there'd be some reactive effect on her. . . . But, 
on my soul, because she'd been doing it so long, I thought 
she could be trusted. I thought she really loved Raney, I 
thought he was the only person who could manage her. . . . 
He would treat her like a man. ' No one's ever let up on me. 
Trust people, and they'll repay your trust. . . .' All that 
balderdash. . . . It's succeeded amazingly well with men, 
he can do what he likes with them. But women must be 
fundamentally different. . . . We're both bachelors, of 
course. . . . But I always feel there; was a lot to be said for 
Petruchio. Raney loved her most kinds of ways, and she 
loved him on and off in some fashion for years ; he really 
only won her when he was frankly brutal to her — I had the 
story from both, so I know ; she was caught in Austria, like 
you, and he smuggled her back and shewed her pretty 
clearly who'd got the stronger personality. Then she 
married him after he'd gone blind, when aU our emotions 



Sonia O'Rane 125 

were in tatters ; and, having once married her, he seemed 
to think that mere love and trust were enough to keep her. 
I don't know ; I've never had to live with a woman ; I 
can't help feeling, though, that, just as he won her by main 
force, so he could only hope to keep her by main force. And 
he didn't even give her the ' mere love and trust ' I've been 
talking about : he trusted her all right, but I think the kind 
of practical Christianity that he tried to set up was too 
much to ask of anyone — ^let alone a spoilt darling like Sonia. 
. . . He's always been so infernally uncompromising, it's 
his strength and his weakness ; it's because he was un- 
compromising that he's kept alive, and it's because he's been 
uncompromising with her that he's brought this on himself." 

We had walked up Whitehall and were waiting for a gap 
in the traffic by the Admiralty Arch. 

" But this is all ancient history, George," I reminded him. 
" What are we going to do ? " 

" To soften the blow ? Nothing. We can't do anything. 
Soma's cleared out, I suppose she's gone off to join Beresford. 
Well, Bertrand thinks Raney's equal to murder, but you 
can trust Beresford to keep out of the way. ... I suppose 
there'U be a divorce. ... I honestly don't know what 
to do about Raney. He's my oldest and dearest friend, 
but I don't know more than the surface of him. . . . God I 
if I had Soma's throat in my two hands ! " He broke oft 
and pulled me roughly off the kerb, gripping my arm until 
we were half-way down Cockspur Street. " I've never been 
faced with this kind of thing, Stornaway. I suppose you must 
have been ? " 

" Nothing so bad as this," I was able to answer him. 

We walked on into Pall Mall without speaking. Then 
George gripped my arm again. 

"That poor devil alone in the dark with this— this to 
occupy his thoughts ! " 

I made no comment. I do not see what comment was 
possible. 

" I feel so hopelessly at sea ! " he exclaimed agitatedly. 
" Stornaway, you've had to pull people out of holes before ; 
can nothing be done ? Can't we get her to go back ? Would 
he receive her back ? Of course, we're all of us seeing red 
now, but somehow every hour that she spends with Beresford 



126 Sonia Married 

makes it harder to get her back ; if we could use Raney's 
love for her " 

" D'you want her to go back ? " I interrupted. 

" God knows what I want ! " he sighed. 

We had reached the steps of the County Club, and I told 
George to come in and have some dinner with me. Both of us 
were already engaged in different parts of London, but we 
wanted to hold together. 

" Come to Hale's," he said, shaking his head. " It's pretty 
well deserted since the war ; everybody's fighting. I can't 
risk meeting a crowd of people I know and having to pretend 
nothing's up." 

Leaving St. James' Square, we walked through King Street 
and entered the squat Regency house which had sheltered 
succeeding generations of London's exquisites for a hundred 
years. The coffee-room was deserted, and we had a choice 
of wine, food and service ; but I have never eaten a gloomier 
meal. Every few minutes George would say : " Look here, 
you know, something's got to be done about this ! " and I 
would reply, " Nothing can be done." Then we would 
attack a new course. Though we had chosen Hale's to be 
secure from interruption, I am not sure that we were not both 
a little relieved at the end of dinner when Vincent Grayle 
limped in with an evening paper under his arm and asked 
leave to join us for the short remainder of our meal. I can 
get on with him at a pinch ; George cannot ; but we shared 
a conamon need for diversion. 

" I've just this moment got back from France," Grayle said 
to explain his late arrival. " I've been having a lively week 
at G.H.Q., watching the professional soldiers losing the war 
for us." He summoned a waiter and truculently ordered 
dinner. " Anything happening in London ? " he asked. 

" Nothing much," I told him. " What news from the Front ?" 

" Everybody's very cheery, getting ready for the big push. 
They all seem quite sure that they're going to break through 
this time, and there's an amount of ammunition and reserves 
that really does put you in good heart when you think how 
the men out there were starving in the first part of the war — 
thanks to the gang we had running things on this side. Whether 
we've got the generals is another question ; if not, we must 
make a remarkably big clean sweep, politicians included." 



Sonia O'Rane 127 

He was evidently preparing one of his usual attacks, and, 
though I had welcomed the momentary diversion, neither 
George nor I wanted a political argument at such a time. 
With a trumped-up apology we went into the morning-room 
for coffee and liqueurs, leaving Grayle to his opinions and 
his evening paper. 

" We don't seem to have thought out anything very help- 
ful," sighed George, as he threw himself into a chair. " D'you 
think it's the least good going round to Beresford's place and 
forcing Sonia to go back ? " 

" Do you want her to go back, even if you can make her ? " 
I asked once more. " She's been sajdng for weeks that she 
regarded her marriage as at an end ; now she's proved it. 
Do you want to send her back on those terms ? And does 
O'Rane want to have her back ? " 

Geoi^e covered his face with his hands, shaking his head 
despairingly from side to side. 

" I — don't — ^know," he groaned. " And this must have 
howled poor old Raney over so much that I don't suppose 
he knows. Ordinarily — ^but it's absurd to use such a word 
... I can only say this ; he loved her so much, he loved her 
for so many years, he believed in her — or in some wonderful 
idealized conception of her by which he saw every kind of 
saintly quality where the rest of us only regarded her as a 
good-natured, but quite heartless, fascinating coquette — 
he thought of her and dreamed of her, she was so much a part 
of his life, the big part, the only thing that mattered. . . ." 
He paused, out of breath. " You'd have said that it would 
have been like cutting off his arms and legs, if he'd lost her, 
if she'd died or married Jim Loring or the other fellow she 
was engaged to. . . . But I don't know now. When you've 
given all that love and trust, when you've idealized anyone, 
and the whole conc^tion crumbles away . . . Stornaway, 
he's extraordinarily frank ; I fancy I know more of him than 
most people. Well, I do know how he loved that — strumpet ; 
I don't know, I can't say whether he'd love her still or whether 
he'd just want to strangle her and then cut his own throat. . . . 
But I think it's worth trying. We can at least give him 

a chance, we can keep his hands off her " He jumped 

up, leaving his coffee untasted. " I'm going to have a 
shot." 



128 Sonia Married 

" Shall I come with you ? " I asked. 

He was already half-way to the door. 

" I want everyone I can get ! " he threw back over his 
shoulder. 

We drove to Sloane Square, and in ten minutes' time I 
found myself once more mounting the stairs to Beresford's 
flat. The lower floors were silent and deserted, but, as we 
climbed higher, I heard voices and the tramp of heavy feet 
growing louder and more distinct with every ycird that we 
covered. As we rounded the corner of the passage, I stopped 
with a sickening sense of foreboding, when I found my path 
blocked by a policeman. For a moment no one spoke, and I 
fancied that we were being scrutinized with disfavour, even 
with suspicion. George, however, was too much preoccupied 
to be daunted. 

" Is Mr. Beresford at home, d'you know ? " he asked! The 
constable shook his head. " D'you happen to know where 
he is ? I have to see him on a matter of great urgency. If 
he's not in, I'll go in and wait till he comes back." 

He made a step forward, but the man shewed no sign of 
yielding. 

" Afraid I can't let you by, sir," he said. " No one's 
allowed in." 

I was assailed by a dreadful certainty that we had arrived 
too late. 

" Why not ? " I demanded, but my voice quavered too 
much to be effective. 

" Mr. Beresford's been arrested." 

" But, in God's name, what f or ? " 

" That's none of my business," was the answer. 

George was diving significantly into his trouser-pocket, 
but I felt that what lay before me was too serious for trifling 
with half-crowns. I handed the man my card and repeated 
my request. 

" It's not mere curiosity," I said. " If you don't tell me, 
there are others who will ; but I want to save time." 

I always have the letters " M.P." printed on my cards to 
impress Government departments, for throughout the public 
service there is an inherited dread that a question may be 
asked in the House ; the hierarchy from top to bottom makes 
it the first business of life to avoid such publicity. This 



Sonia O'Rane 129 

instinct of self-preservation, deeply-rooted as a horse's fear 
of a snake in the grass, led the constable to inform me 
promptly that Beresford had been arrested for issuing seditious 
literature ; his flat was at the moment being searched. 

My own sigh of relief was drowned by a deeper sigh from 
George. 

" When did this take place ? " he asked. 

" To-day, sir. I can't tell you the time ; I've only just 
come on duty." 

" Was there anyone there besides Mr. Beresford ? Is there 
anyone there now ? " 

" The inspector, sir, and two men." 

George thanked him and led me by the arm to the head of 
the stairs. 

" Thank God ! " he whispered. " You — you thought so, 
too ; I could see it in your face. Oh, Christ, if they were 
going to arrest the fellow, why couldn't they have done it 
sooner ? I don't know what to do now. At least — I must 
go back to ' The Sanctuary ' and see what's happened there." 
He dragged me downstairs and into our taxi at a pace which 
more than once threatened to break both our necks. " Where 
the devil can she have gone to, Stornaway ? She'd naturally 
come here. But when they arrested him ..." 

The shrouded lamp over " The Sanctuary " door was un- 
lighted when we arrived ; the door was locked against us, 
and, though I now remembered hearing the key turn when 
O'Rane shewed us out, the cherished little piece of his beloved 
childish symbolism was grown painfully familiar. 

" Come round to the other door," said George, and we were 
admitted and ushered into Bertrand's room. " Any news ? " 
he enquired gently. 

Someone had drawn the blinds, someone had brought in a 
tray of food ; otherwise the room was unchanged in aspect, 
and Bertrand seemed not to have moved since I left him 
stretched in the long wicker chair three hours earlier. 

" News ? " he repeated, opening his eyes and blinking at us. 
" David's gone back to Melton. Ah ! this is a bad business ! 
Give me a hand up, George ; I'm tired. I sometimes think 
I've lived too long." 



CHAPTER FOUR 

THE DOOR CLOSED 



" Proprium humani ingenii est, odisse quern teseris." 

Tacitus : " Agricola," C. 42. 

AS I write, the war has been in progress for two-and-a- 
half years, and it is beyond the wit of man to foretell 
how much longer it will continue, though there is the annual 
feeling that peace will come before the autumn. In August 
we shall reach the end of the three years which Lord Kitchener 
had in mind when he began his preparations, but I for one look 
forward to the summer of 1917 with greater apprehension 
than ever I felt a year ago. During 1916 I was the uncon- 
scious psychological victim of men like Grayle, who were so 
convinced of our predestined failure under the existing 
regime that they went some way towards convincing me. 
In June the field of war was extended by the Bulgarian 
inroads into Greece, and, though we talked still of the 
" Russian steam-roller," it was not until July that the Aus- 
trian counter-drive in Russia and Italy was checked. The 
New Army, which had been so grandly raised, went into 
action at the Somme and covered itself with immortal renown ; 
we did not quickly see how much had been spent and how 
little achieved : " Six hundred thousand casualties and an 
unbroken German front," as Grayle declared to me in the 
Smoking-Room at the House one night. 
Grayle's political sense was good in that from the break- 



The Door Closed 131 

down of the Somrae offensive he saw that the days of the 
Government were numbered. Ministers never recovered 
the prestige which they had lost in the Irish rising. The 
disastrous expedition to the Dardanelles was being discussed 
so widely and bitterly that an enquiry had to be instituted ; 
so with the no less disastrous expedition to Mesopotamia ; 
and, as more men were frittered away in Salonica, we began 
to wonder whether we should not have to hold a third enquiry, 
indeed, an enquiry into every subsidiary enterprise which 
every amateur strategist in the Cabinet undertook in any 
theatre of war. 

There were many who began at this time to swell Grayle's 
clamour for a change — a series of changes, indeed, simul- 
taneously in the Ministry which was weak enough to embark 
on this succession of costly failures and in the soldiers who 
failed to achieve success with such conditions of men, material 
and ammunition as the Germans had never equalled in the 
days when the balance tipped highest in their favour. I 
had, myself, always simulated rather a superior aloofness, 
for I felt that, as the war was a bigger and longer enterprise 
than my fellows would admit, so we must be prepared for 
greater failures in coping with it. Yet I can see now that I 
began to listen less impatiently to the critics. The War 
Of&ce at this time was in the charge of a distinguished soldier 
who had had the vision and courage to prophesy a long war 
and whose personality and reputation were of inestimable 
value in creating the armies which came to bear his name. 
Chiefly on newspaper [prompting the Government had made 
Lord Kitchener Secretary of State for War, and the country 
at large was reassured by the presence of an expert military 
brain in' the deplorably civilian councils of the Cabinet. There 
was a simple-minded faith, which expressed itself in Maurice 
Maitland's phrase, " Leave it to K." ; a volume of work 
which no single man could accomplish was thereupon trust- 
ingly concentrated in the hands of one who loved to hold 
as many strings as possible. Stagnation in the War Office 
gave way to chaos, until one function after another — recruit- 
ing, equipment and munitions — were withdrawn from his 
grasp and confided to others. Later the Staff control was 
separated from the political control, and Lord Kitchener 
gave no orders that were not countersigned by his Chief of 

9* 



132 Sonia Married 

Staff ; later still an effort was made in the Cabinet to deprive 
him of an office which he had ceased usefully to fill. He was 
sent to inspect the Eastern theatre of war ; he was sent 
also to Russia. . . . 

I am unlikely to forget a day when I was lunching with 
Bertrand at the Eclectic Club. Maitland sat down with a 
blank face and said : " I've got some bad news for you men. 
K.'s been drowned. He was going out to Russia, and his 
ship — the Hampshire — was sunk by a mine or torpedo — they 
don't know which, and the North Sea must be full of loose 
mines after this Jutland action. The sea was so rough that 
the escort had to turn back almost at once. ..." Some time 
passed before we could discuss Maitland's news, for Lord 
Kitchener had been so imposing an idol, so aloof and mys- 
terious — until you met him at close quarters, as I had done 
a few days before, when a deputation of us waited on him, 
and sought enlightenment on subjects which we could not 
discuss openly in the House — so well-established and un- 
shakable ; we never expected him to die in the middle of the 
war, certainly we never dreamed of a death so fortuitous, 
imnecessary, so much the freak of Providence. 

" Yet I'm not sure it's not the best thing for his reputation," 
Maitland said. " Felix opportunitate mortis, you know. 
There's a whole crop of failures to explain, and his prestige 
must have suffered. Don't you sometimes feel that we want 
a clean sweep, Stornaway ? . . . I'm a soldier myself, but 
it was a great mistake, whatever people may think, putting 
a soldier at the War Office. ..." 

The news was being cried in the streets, as I went back 
to my department ; half-way through the afternoon a 
messenger came into my room to say that all blinds in all 
Government offices were to be drawn ; that night, Yolande 
told me, was the worst she had known since the tidings reached 
her nearly two years before that her brother had been killed 
in the retreat from Mons. Wave after wave of men poured 
from the leave-trains and surged into her canteen, demanding 
confirmation of this story which was being whispered at the 
coast. And, when she told them or pointed to the official 
report, they still would not believe it. He was the man under 
whom they had enlisted. . . . 

Yet, when a civilian was once more at the head of the War 



The Door Closed 133 

Office I believe that a new embarrassment was substituted 
for the old. As the Somme campaign had failed to achieve 
a decision, men like Grayle openly resumed the criticism which 
they had suspended for a few months, and demanded the 
removal of the responsible Commander-in-Chief and the 
Chief of the General Staff. Thereupon two schools arose 
in the Press, the House and, I believe, the Cabinet ; the 
civilian backers of Sir William Robertson and Sir Douglas 
Haig pitted themselves against their civilian detractors ; 
individual commanders were surrounded by social cliques 
and supported by individual Ministers and papers. I was 
told by Grayle and by the section of the Press influenced by 
him that we wanted a reconstruction of the Ministry and of 
the Higher Command ; I was told by the Press Combine 
that Sir Douglas Haig was the one General of outstanding 
genius whom the war had brought to the siirface. 

Between the two I confess that I lost my temper. Even 
with South Africa and the Antwerp expedition to his credit, 
Grayle was no more fit to appoint or depose a Chief of Staff 
than I was to cast a play or select a prima donna. But I 
found it difficult to say who was better placed than either 
of us. Grayle certainly was a pragmatist. 

" Results ! results ! " he would declaim at me. " I want 
the contract put out to tender. Can you or can you not break 
the line ? What men and guns do you want ? Here they 
are ; you may have three months and, if you fail, no dignified 
home commands, but the completest breaking a man's ever 
had. Thaf s the way Napoleon would have done it ; that's 
the way the Germans would do it." 

Grayle was very active in the summer of 1916. I could 
see him drawing together and co-ordinating the scattered 
groups of disaffected critics, and my mind went back to George 
Oakleigh's account of the " Stunt Artists." There was the 
Liberal Ginger Group, the Conservative Ginger Group, the 
Mesopotamia Group, the Dardanelles Group, all firing occa- 
sional volleys into the arms and legs of the Ministry, none 
daring to fire at the head or heart. The apparently strongest 
man in the House at this time was Sir Edward Carson. Not 
content with criticism, he could force the Government to 
bring in a bill, modify a bill, or drop a bill. Glad, indeed, 
would Grayle have been to consolidate opposition under such 



134 Sonia Married 

leadership, but at this season unity was regarded as the first 
requisite ; no one was yet prepared to split the Government 
or the country into rival factions. 

If not active, I was at least very assiduous in my attendance 
during those summer months. I was assiduous, too, at my 
office and in my department. The last act of the O'Rane 
tragedy at which George and I had assisted hit me as hard 
as the death of a very dear friend. I had thought that I 
had outgrown other people's troubles ; I found that I was 
younger than I thought. When I met Bertrand or George, 
I shunned discussion of the subject ; when I went to Melton, 
I will say frankly that I avoided a meeting with O'Rane. 
During May I fancy that the others joined me in my con- 
spiracy of silence, and we were aided by events. I read one 
day that a certain Peter Beresford, described as an author, 
had been prosecuted for issuing a pamphlet entitled " Lettres 
de Cachet," which was calculated to undermine the loyalty, 
discipline and moral of the army ; the pamphlet was con- 
fiscated, and its author sentenced to a term of three months' 
imprisonment. Whether he repeated his hunger-strike or 
not, I had no means of knowing, as he passed out of my life 
on his arrest and only re-entered it many weeks later. 

Mrs. O'Rane had disappeared as completely and far more 
mysteriously. In the early months of the year, quite apart 
from deliberate meetings at her house or Grayle's or Lady 
Maitland's, I had caught sight of her at least once a week 
lunching or dining in a restaurant or chattering to one or 
other of her many admirers at a play. After the catastrophe, 
though I probably dined and lunched in as many of her 
favourite restaurants as before, I never met her. There was 
a vague assumption that she was in the country. One 
night, as I was smoking a cigarette in the entr'acte at some 
theatre, Gerald Deganway came up, screwed his eye-glass in 
place, squeaked a welcome and asked whether I had seen 
Sonia lately. I told him that I had not. He rather under- 
stood that she was staying with her people at Crowley Court. 
. . . After consultation with O'Rane, George transferred 
himself to Westminster to look after his uncle and to keep 
the household in commission. I believe that he forwarded 
letters to Melton and I have an idea that there was a second 
vague assumption that she was with her husband at the 



The Door Closed 135 

school. The ties and relationships in social life were so much 
disorganized by the war that no one was ever surprised by 
an unexpected meeting or a failure to meet ; everyone was 
too much occupied with his own business to care. 

I had convincing evidence of this one day when I received 
a call from Lady Dainton. She wished to equip Crowley 
Coiurt as a hospital for shell-shock cases — anyone could deal 
with ordinary wounds and operations ; there was no adequate 
scheme for treating these nervous derangements, and she 
felt that her house was unusually well adapted for the purpose. 
After we had thrashed out her proposal, I undertook to 
recommend my Emergency Fund Committee to make a grant. 
There our business ended, and, as I walked with her to the door, 
she looked at her watch. 

" It's no good," I remember her saying. " I hoped to leave 
time for a call on Sonia, but I shall only miss my train, if 
I try. It's really dreadful how driven we all are. I never 
have a moment for anything, don't you know ? This is the 
first time I've been in London for months, I've seen nothing 
of Sonia for I don't know how long — Ah, surely that taxi's 
disengaged ? I mustn't miss it. This petrol shortage is 
really the last straw. As if we hadn't enough discomfort 
before, don't you know ? " 

I returned to my desk with a pusillanimous sense of relief. 
The Daintons, then, neither knew nor suspected what had 
become of their daughter. The secret was in the' keeping 
of the O'Ranes, the two Oakleighs, Beresford and myself. 
Somehow the disaster seemed hardly so complete while there 
was no public scandal, and neither the Oakleighs nor I were 
likely to add that last touch. For the others I could not 
speak ; Mrs. O'Rane, or Beresford, or both might welcome a 
petition for divorce ; no one knew what was passing in 
O'Rane's mind. 

Before term was a month old, George went to Melton on 
a roving commission. 

" I would as soon spend a week-end with a well-bred 
block of ice," he confided to me on his return. " He was 
courteous, hospitable— nothing too much trouble to make 
me comfortable. We talked by the hour of fellows who'd 
been at school with us, things we'd done — you know, endless 
ridiculous anecdotes of how somebody's leg had been pulled. 



136 Sonia Married 

how we'd got into some appalling row together. As a rule 
I find school ' shop ' rather fun, but Raney might have been 
reciting the kings of England with their dates. He was 
utterly lifeless and mechanical ; never a smile. . . . When 
we went into Common Room for dinner, he played up and 
was a different man ; they chaffed At»i, and he chaffed them, 
and we dug out more school ' shop,' and he threw himself 
into it heart and soul. It was the same on Sunday, when a 
pack of his boys came and talked to him after evening chapel ; 
he didn't let them see there was anything up. It had been 
the same when the enigmatic Miss Merryon came in the morn- 
ing ; the usual smile. ... Of course he never came within 
a thousand miles of mentioning it. . . . When I left on 
Monday, I told him that I wanted to invite myself again 
before the end of the term, and then we did get to grips a 
bit. He shook hands and said : ' Look here, old man, it 
spoils your week-end and — I don't want to be ungracious — it 
doesn't do me any good. I've got to go through this alone.' " 

From George's sigh I felt that in this he was at one with 
O'Rane. 

But, if not more than six people knew what had happened, 
there were many who would be more curious to find out than 
Lady Dainton had shewn herself to be. It was easy enough 
for Bertrand, or George, or one of the servants to say that 
Mrs. O'Rane was away from London and then to hang up 
the receiver of the telephone, but it was a different matter 
as the weeks went by and as the more pertinacious enquirers 
called in person. I could sympathize with George. The 
only person likely to interrogate me was Grayle, and from the 
fact that he never mentioned Mrs. O'Rane's name I judged 
that they had quarrelled finally and finally parted on the 
night when I was privileged to meet them at the Berkeley. 
I had enough psychological curiosity to wonder what had 
happened when she hurried out into Piccadilly after him. 
Grayle had assuredly scored a game when he asserted himself 
and made her run after him ; but the game had been won 
when he was too tired to be desirous of winning it. 

My first tidings came to me at the end of May from my 
niece. She and her husband were dining with me one night 
at my hotel, and she asked me whether I had been at " The 
Sanctuary " lately. 



The Door Closed 137 

" I've been very busy," I told her. " And I believe Mrs. 
O'Rane's away." 

" She's not away," Yolande answered. " I saw her at 
Harrods' yesterday. That's what made me think of.it." 

Yolande, then, knew nothing of what had happened. 

" I wonder when she got back," I said as unconcernedly 
as I could. " Did she tell you ? " 

" We didn't speak." Yolande's expression became hostile. 
" I suppose I dislike her every bit as much as she dislikes 
me, but so far we've kept up appearances. I bowed to her 
yesterday, and she couldn't help seeing me, but for some 
reason best known to herself she thought fit to cut me." 

" She couldn't have seen you," I said. 

" She couldn't help seeing me," Yolande repeated. 



II 

Three days later I myself met Mrs. O'Rane in Hyde Park. 
Remembering Yolande's experience, I determined that she 
should not cut me and, as we had no opportunity of pretending 
not to have seen each other, I blocked her path, bowed and 
held out my hand to her. 

" I've not seen you for weeks," she said, with a composed 
smile. " You've not been to America again, have you ? " 

" I've been kept very busy at the House and in my depart- 
ment," I answered. " Have you been away ? " 

" For week-ends and things." She glanced collectedly 
round to assure herself that she was not being overheard. 
" Why did you buttonhole me like this, Mr. Stornaway ? " 

I suppose my real reason was that, if there had to be any 
cutting, it should not be by her ; and I had not made up my 
mind how to act when we found ourselves suddenly con- 
fronting each other at the park-gate. 

" When a man meets a woman he knows " I began. 

Mrs. O'Rane laughed with soft, repellent scorn. 

" As if you didn't know everything." 

" That is, I believe, an attribute of the Almighty," I replied. 

For a few moments she was absorbed in the task of digging 
with the end of her parasol round the edge of a prominent 
black pebble. As the dry earth crumbled, the pebble worked 



138 Sonia Married 

loose, and she was free to hit it away and look up at me 
again. 

" You know enough." 

" For what ? " I asked. 

She sighed and waved her hand across the dusty, unshaded 
walk. 

" For passing by on the other side." 

" Habit is sometimes very strong," I said. 

We stood looking at one another reflectively for a few 
minutes, each perhaps wondering why the other did not make 
an excuse to break away. I found her so self-possessed that 
it was difiicult to believe what I knew to be the truth. I 
have met unfaithful wives before, I have seen men and 
women living in many kinds of social outlawry, but with 
none of them did it seem to make so little difference as with 
Mrs. O'Rane. She was not defiant, she was hardly even 
callous ; and her manner was so natural that I felt the last 
six months might well have been blotted out of her hfe. 
Once she lowered her eyes to look at the little platinum watch ; 
then raised them again with a friendly smile. She was 
dressed with unostentatious distinction in a blue coat and 
skirt, with a high collar to the coat and a tight-fitting amber- 
coloured waistcoat with round, page-boy's buttons ; there 
was a high-crowned hat to match the coat, white gloves, 
grey stockings and black shoes with a pearl-coloured border. 
Though her eyes were tired and her cheeks a little pale, she 
looked wonderfully young and care-free. 

" You thought I wouldn't do it," she said at length, more 
to convict me of bad judgement, I think, than to defend her 
own conduct. " Men are so curious. . . . You all had the 
clearest warning, only you wouldn't take it. You wouldn't 
see that it was the only thing left for me to do." 

" And you are still of that mind ? You feel it was 
the right thing ? " 

" It depends what you mean by right," she answered 

slowly. " Most people would say it was wrong, but then most 

people are fools. And none of them could possibly know^ 

what I had to go through," she added, through her teeth. 

" They'll never know that," I said, " because you'll never 

be able to tell them. As long as you're happy " 

" I'm very happy," she interrupted. 



The Door Closed 139 

" And you think you'll continue to be ? " 

" No one can answer that. . . . I'm happier than I was. 
You, of course, think that I've behaved criminally. I only 
feel that we made a mistake. I thought David loved me, and 
he — didn't. I believe he thought he loved me. ... I made 
every possible allowance for him, I did everything a woman 
could do to make a success of our life, but you must have 
seen enough to know that he never gave our marriage a 
chance. I was ready to put up with everything until he 
humiliated me in my own house. Then it was time to admit 
we'd made a mistake and to get out of it as soon as possible." 
Her parasol was again at work on the hard-baked gravel. 
" If he'd hated me, if he'd enjoyed hurting me, he couldn't 
have done better. I never knew what men were capable of 
before." 

In my turn I looked at my watch and held out my hand. 

" I have not criticized you, Mrs. O'Rane," I said, " so I 
prefer not to assist in any criticism of your husband." 

Her lips curled into a sneer. 

" You haven't criticized me in words," she qualified. 

" I am trying to suspend judgement tiU I know the facts. 
You will admit that it requires prima Jade justification, 
when a young wife leaves a husband who worships her — I will 
cut out the offending phrase, if you like — Cleaves her Uind 
husband " 

I have only once seen Mrs. O'Rane's beauty of face wholly 
desert her. At the word " blind " her cheeks flushed, her 
eyes grew hot and the line of her mouth became broken and 
unsightly. Months before, Bertrand had told me that her 
husband's blindness was the one thing restraining her, and, 
though she had lashed herself into disregarding it, she evi- 
dently could not forget it. I could see that a passionate retort 
was maturing, but she pressed it back and took my hand. 

" Good-bye," she said. " Remember, I didn't ask you to 
speak to me. This is a matter between David and myself. 
You needn't think it was an easy thing to do, but I faced it, 
I've gone through the worst " 

" Not more than six people in the world know that you're 
not living with your husband," I put in. 

She hesitated, and I could see her lips compressing. 

" I'm ready for that, too," she assured me, valiantly enough. 



140 Sonia Married 

" Where are you living ? " I asked. 

" You must excuse me, if I don't answer that. Good-bye." 

As I walked on towards my office, I wondered what use I 
ought to make of my chance meeting. Yet how would O'Rane 
or George be benefited by knowing that she was living — was 
probably living — in London ? And this was all that I could 
tell them, save that, however great her provocation, however 
unheeding the passion which had possessed her and allowed 
her to receive a lover in her husband's house to punish her 
husband, she was not yet insensible to every twinge of 
conscience ; I had succeeded in once flicking her on the 
raw. 

Then I blamed myself for wasted opportunities ; if I had 
been less conventionally suave, less afraid of a noisy scene, I 
might have put many more questions, even if I received as 
few answers. Her life with O'Rane was over, but what was 
she going to put in its place ? He could divorce her, of course, 
and she could marry Beresford — when he came out of prison. 
I never felt, however, in the days before the catastrophe that 
she loved Beresford ; to be adored and admired by him was 
one thing ; but I never regarded him as more than a diver- 
sion, when no one else was by to flatter her. Even had the 
passion been there, I could not imagine her marrying such a 
man. The blue coat and skirt, the high-crowned hat and 
patent-leather shoes did not accord with a rusty sombrero, 
Harris tweeds and a loose, orange-coloured tie ; I recalled 
the bizarre, bachelor rooms off Sloane Square and, in 
exaggerated contrast, Mrs. O'Rane's ermine coat, as I had 
seen it when I surprised them there. In any day I dare 
swear that she could not. tell whether she had spent five 
pounds or five hundred ; but, if she did not know how much 
she squandered in a year, at least she could be sure that it 
was far more than she would ever get from Beresford. And, 
if she did not propose to marry him, where and how would 
she live ? Would she try to drag out a few more months or 
years as his mistress with the four or five hundred pounds a 
year which her father allowed her ? Where and how was she 
living now ? 

To a long list of idle questions I added one more and asked 
myself how I was to behave, if I met her again. It was not 
easy to avoid her at the second encounter, when I had forced 



The Door Closed 141 

myself upon her at the first ; it was certainly no easier to 
continue as O'Rane's friend and to meet his wife as though 
nothing had happened. 

An unsolved problem spoils my temper, and I was with 
difficulty even civil when a messenger came into my room to 
say that Lady Maitland wished to see me. She was shewn 
in and proceeded straight to the point. Was it true that 
under this ridiculous Military Service Act all men under forty 
were to be dragooned into the army ? I must remember 
how kind I had been in finding a position for her son in my 
office. Well, he had come home the previous evening and 
told her of a report that all young men were going to be taken. 
It made no difference that he had only been allowed to attest 
on condition that he could not be called up without the leave 
of his chief. That was all a scra-p of paper, apparently. 
Every case had to be submitted to the War Office, every man 
given a certificate of exemption or packed off with the roughest 
clerks and factory hands into the ranks. What was she to 
do ? It was intolerable. 

It argues, if not self-control, at least great gratitude for 
past hospitality that I did not remind Lady Maitland of the 
first dinner I ate on English soil after my release from Austria, 
when she deafened me with her denunciations of the young 
shirkers who stayed at home and allowed others to die for 
them. I was finding no fault with her boy, who might be all 
that she said ; I had seen him twice and pushed him hastily 
into a fool-proof room, where he read the Times and acted as 
precis-writer for one of my colleagues ; if he were unfit for 
the army, there was a chance that he might be rejected, 
though embittering experience taught me that it was only a 
chance. If he were passed as fit, the first girl in the street 
could take his place after a day's instruction, and the office 
would be rid of a young man who was doing no good to him- 
self o\ anyone else with the number of whiskies and sodas 
which he found time to consume on his way to the office, or 
with the cigarettes which he smoked all day when he had 
made his reluctant way thither. 

" Has he been medically examined ? " I asked Lady 
Maitland. 

" It would be a waste of time," she answered. " I tell 
you, that boy is admass of nerves." 



142 Sonia Married 

" Well, send him before a medical board with a letter from 
your own doctor," I suggested. 

To judge from her expression, my proposal was unexpected 
and inadequate. 

" Isn't the best thing for you to send a letter to the War 
Office ? " she asked. " Bertie tells me that his work is very 
technical." 

I was grown tired of that word, through many a " con- 
scription scare," and I resented its presence on the lips of 
Lady Maitland, who had been too free with her taunts ten 
months before, too disparaging of the volunteer army and 
too easily insistent on the conscription from which she was 
now trying to extricate her boy. 

" He had to learn it," I reminded her. " And, if he died 
to-morrow, somebody'd have to learn it in his place. If 
you want to move the War Office, surely your husband's 
the man to do it." 

" I don't like to bother him," she answered. 

As she walked to the door, I felt that I had lost a friend. 
It says much for her magnanimity that I was invited to the 
house within a week to be told that the War Office — without 
encouragement from Sir Maurice — had behaved most sensibly, 
reviewing the junior members of my department en bloc and 
granting them all certificates of exemption on the grounds of 
indispensability. 

" We seem drifting back to the old life very much," said 
George, pensively watching the bubbles break on the cham- 
pagne, when I told him, with some distaste, of my interview. 
" Here we are eating and drinking as usual, I'm always 
being invited to dances. . . . We're getting used to this 
infernal war, you know, Stornaway, and we shall lose it, if 
we can't put up as relatively good a show as the fellows who 
are being killed. I suppose we're too far away from the front 
even with an occasional air-raid to remind us." 

" I was glancing through my diary the other night," I 
told him. " There's hardly a reference to the war. The 
political situation, my own work " 

He laughed a little sadly. 

" If I kept a diary, I'm afraid I should find a good deal of it 
devoted to Raney and his wife." 

" I did," I told him. 



The Door Closed 143 

He looked up quickly and then lowered his head until the 
chin rested on his fists. 

" God ! that has been a tragedy ! " he groaned. " It's 
the biggest tragedy of my hfe, bigger than when Jim Loring 
was knocked out. Presumably it was all over with him in 
a few minutes, or hours, or days, at most. . . . But that poor 
devil Raney — he's some years younger than I am." 

" What is he doing ? " 

" He gives no hint. It's about as much as he can stand — 
the agony of it — without trying to analyse it, or think what 
he's going to do next. Did I tell you I went down there 
again ? Well, I did — in spite of what he said. I've a con- 
venient young cousin whose people are over in Ireland — 
Amy's brother, you met her at dinner with me at the 
Berkeley — and I can always legitimately go and see him. 
It was rather less of a success than my last visit. The first 
person I ran into was Lady Dainton, who asked me to shew 
her the way to Raney's quarters. She couldn't make it out, 
she said, that she'd written to Sonia about a concert at the 
hospital, written twice and had had no reply. Obviously 
she was away from home, but apparently it was nobody's 
business to forward letters." George smiled ruefully. " It 
was a hit for me, though she didn't know it. I send all letters 
to Raney, and Sonia's go in a special envelope, marked : 
' For filing only ; ' it was a formula he and I agreed on, so 
that Miss Merryon could just chuck them into a box unopened 
... I don't believe even she suspects, though it's bound to 
come out. . . . And she's in love with him, and that's 
supposed to sharpen a woman's intuition. . . . Well, I've 
no doubt Lady Dainton's letters were in the box with the 
rest, but that didn't bring her much nearer getting them 
answered. I felt I must really leave Raney to deal with her, 
so I said I'd promised to call on the Head and would come 
back later. ... By the way. Burgess sees there's something 
up ; he'd see there was something up, if you built a brick-wall 
round it. When I went into his study, he looked at me for 
about five minutes, stroking his beard between his thumb and 
first finger. ' He is thine own familiar friend, whom thou 
lovest,' he began, without any beating about the bush. 
' I know the whole story, sir,' I said. ' If I thought for a 
week, I couldn't think of anything worse. If I may make a 



144 Sonia Married 

suggestion, sir, the kindest thing you can do is not to notice 
anything.' Burgess stroked his beard a bit more ; then he 
said : ' The adder is not more deaf.' But I'm prepared to 
bet he's made a very shrewd guess." 

" Did you gather how O'Rane disposed of Lady Dainton ? " 
I asked. 

George shrugged his shoulders. 

" He had to say that Sonia wasn't at ' The Sanctuary ' 
and he had to admit that he didn't know her address at the 
moment. Fortunately Lady Dainton is so ready to think 
ill of him, and so very unready to think ill of her darling 
daughter that she liever dreamed or suspected what had 
happened. I don't know whether she went further than 
thinking that Sonia was staying with friends and that 
Raney wasn't sufficiently interested in her to discover her 
whereabouts ; perhaps she did, for she took the opportunity 
of saying that it was monstrous for him to desert his wife 
like this for three months at a time, but that, on her honour, 
he didn't deserve to have a wife, if she was to be condemned 
to the life he led at Melton or in London. Raney was smiling 
to himself and saying nothing, when I came in, so she turned 
her batteries on to me. As a rule she frightens me into agree- 
ing with anything she says, but this time I did pluck up 
courage to tell her that, in my opinion, when two people 
married, they must be left to work out their own salvation. 
There's a certain irony there, Stornaway — I was conscious of 
it at the time — when you think of the way you and Bertrand 
and I laboured to keep their boat from capsizing. She didn't 
appreciate the irony, though ; she only thought I was being 
rather rude. That didn't matter, so long as I got rid of her." 

He pushed away his plate, sighed and rose from the table. 

" Did you have any talk with O'Rane ? " I asked, as we 
went upstairs together. 

" That depends on your definition of talk," he answered, 
with a joyless smile. " We emitted words at each other. 
It — I don't mind telling you, Stornaway — ^it hurt hke sin to 
find that I couldn't get near him. I suppose it was a compli- 
ment to our friendship that he didn't try to cut jokes as he 
did when I dined with him in Common Room the last time, 
but it was an unfilling sort of compliment. . . . No, to offer 
him any kind of sympathy would have been to get myself 



The Door Closed 145 

pitched out of the room. I felt that. He was in a suit of 
mail. ... I should have thought — but then, I've not been 
through it and, please God ! I never shall. It did hurt, 
though, because there hasn't been much that we've kept from 
each other all these years." 

He laughed a little at his own sensibility. I thought for 
a moment and then told him of my meeting that day in 
Hyde Park. From behind their rimless glasses, his eyes were 
fixed unwaveringly on mine, and at the end he made no 
comment. 

" What line do you propose to take, if you meet her ? " I 
asked. 

His brows set in a forbidding frown, and, when he spoke, 
it was between closed teeth, and his voice trembled. 

" I think I told you, my instinct is to get her neck between 
my two hands and shake her as a terrier shakes a rat. I 
suppose that would be out of place in the more public parts 
of London, so I shall walk quietly past her. What induced 
you, knowing all you did " 

" I have no idea why I did it," I said, quite humbly. 

" Are you going to do it again ? " 

" My dear George, once more, I have no idea. I'm like 
O'Rane, in that I haven't been in the mood to analyse or 
make decisions. I've shirked them. I've deliberately tried 
to keep my mind occupied with other things, so that I shouldn't 
have to think about this miserable business. Most of us are 
doing that, I fancy." 

He was silent for many moments, and I fancied that he was 
visualizing my meeting in the light of an early summer morn- 
ing in Hyde Park with Sonia O'Rane, brown-eyed, red-lipped, 
redolent — to the senses — of purity and young freshness. 

" As long as that swine's under lock and key," he said at 
length, " she can't make a move. And, when he's out, they're 
bound to hold their hand till they see what Raney's going to 
do ; whether he's going to face a divorce — when I say ' face," 
it's on her account, of course. He'd stand anything for him- 
self, but I don't know that he'd let any damned two-and-one 
junior put questions to Sonia — I don't know, and he doesn't 
know. ..." He covered his face with his hands. " God 
in Heaven ! Stornaway ! I remember when I was the 
oldest fourth-year man and he was a freshman, and she was 

10 



146 Sonia Married 

nothing at all — a lovely little slip of a girl who'd been sent up 
for Commem. in place of a woman who'd failed us. Raney'd 
loved her ever since he'd first set those god-sent eyes of his on 
her, and they solemnly got engaged that night — ^when he was 
nineteen, and she a baby three years younger. . . ." The 
rising voice which was beginning to make our neighbours 
turn curiously round stopped of a sudden. " Sorry ! I'm 
apt to break out every time I think of that boy coming back 
from the front . . . and not letting it make that much differ- 
ence to him . . . and starting again at the bottom for God- 
knows-the-how-manyth-time — and then — this. . . . Well, 
Raney's not in a state to say whether he'll divorce her or not, 
what he will do, what he wants to do. You're quite right, 
we're none of us in a position to analyse. By the way, what 
do you propose to do, if you run into Beresford ? " 
" I don't see myself engaging him in conversation," I said. 



Ill 

As a false merit seems still to attach to frankness, let me 
record that, when I met Beresford some three weeks later, 
I bowed to him and subsequently went up and exchanged a 
few words. This meeting also took place in Hyde Park ; 
I was again making a slight detour for the sake of seeing 
the flowers and once more I turned in at Albert Gate and 
was nodding before I saw who had nodded to me. When I 
recognized Beresford, there was a moment's impulse to stalk 
away, but I am glad to say that I did not yield to it. 

He was sitting in a bath-chair, out of the wind and in the 
sun, alternately dozing and waking with a start to look at 
the flowers and then close his eyes again. I have seen sick 
men in various parts of the world, but I doubt if I ever saw 
one who was still alive and yet looked nearer death. All 
flesh had disappeared from his face, until the bones of jaw, 
temple and nose threatened to cut through the waxen skin ; 
his eye-lids were more vermilion than pink, with a per- 
manent dusty-grey shadow darkening the hollow sockets. 
One hand lay exposed outside the rug, so thin that it seemed 
as if the bones must grate together ; the other pressed pain- 
fully to his side whenever he began to cough. 



The Door Closed 147 

" Why, how do you do ? " he exclaimed in a weak whisper, 
bowing a second time, as his eye-lids flickered open, and he 
found me watching him. 

" You look remarkably ill," was all I could say. 

" I'm better than I have been. It was really rather a 
close shave this time. They evidently felt it was a point of 
honour not to be beaten again and they kept me there just 
twenty-four hours longer than I could conveniently stand. 
I wasn't conscious of anything — I hadn't been for some while 
before and I wasn't to be for some time after — ^but they had 
a bad scare. After doing their best to kill me for five days, 
they spent five weeks trying to keep me alive — so like war 
and peace, you know ; wasteful, irrational and utterly, 
utterly purposeless. In a few weeks' time I shall be where 
I was when last we met ; the Government will have kept 
me quiet for perhaps two months and will have expended a 
portion of a magistrate's time, ditto ditto prosecuting 
counsel and six weeks' bed, board, share of prison staff 
and really first-rate medical attention. No one could have 
been better treated, when once they were afraid they'd killed 
me." 

He tried to laugh, but only succeeded in making himself 
cough. As he shook and rocked, growing momentarily pink 
and then reverting to a deathlier white, as I watched that 
bag of tuberculous bones being held together by a nervous 
refusal to die, I shared the sense of waste which O'Rane 
had once expressed to me. An impulse came to me, and I 
acted on it before I could give myself time to be cautious 
and niggardly. 

" If I can get you out to South Africa, will you go ? " I 
asked him. 

He tried to speak before he had finished coughing, and the 
attack redoubled in violence. 

" That would be playing their game rather too much," he 
said with a skeleton's grin. 

" You're playing their game as quickly and more per- 
manently by staying here." 

" You mean I'm going to die ? Now, there you're wrong. 
Of course, I shall die some time, like everyone else, but I'm. 
actually getting better now. If you'd seen me a month 
ago ! " He looked round at the flowers with eyes that 

10* 



148 Sonia Married 

burned feverishly. " I've got so much to do, there's so much 
to live for ! Don't you feel you can't die, you won't die, 
when you see all the new leaves with that shade of green 
which seems only to last for a day before it becomes dark, 
dull, mature, dirty ? . . . And the first flowers — before 
we've had time to be sated with them. This is June, summer. 
. . . And long before that, the little pink, sticky buds burst- 
ing everywhere. . . . And those curious, fluffy things which 
you find on some shrubs and which seem to serve no purpose 
in Nature. ... I shall die in the autumn, when I do die ; 
I couldn't in the spring, when the whole world's renewing 
itself and there's so much to do. God ! there is so much to 
do!" 

He smiled to himself, and his eyes suddenly closed. It 
was more than time for me to be on my way, but the scrape of 
my heel on the gravel roused him, and he held out his hand. 

" It was kind of you — about South Africa, I mean — but 
I can't get away — for reasons which I needn't discuss. And 
in any event it isn't necessary ; I'm going to get well without 
that." 

I shook hands and turned my steps eastwards. There are 
few things more painful than the dying consumptive's belief 
that he will recover. Beresford called me back with a cry 
that brought on another fit of coughing. 

" I'm in my old quarters," he said. " You were rather — 
disgruntled by your last visit, I remember, but, if you've 
got over the shock and can ever spare a moment to call " 

This time I shook my head without hesitation or com- 
passion. I do not remember ever being more affronted. A 
chance encounter in the street might be excused me ; one 
may be pardoned for not upbraiding one's worst enemy, when 
he is as near his death-bed as Beresford was ; but it was 
another thing altogether to condone the past and acquiesce 
in the present. It was also what Mrs. O'Rane had virtually 
challenged me to do, when she lost her temper in Beresford's 
flat and asked whether I should continue to know her when 
she had come to live with him. 

" I shall not call," I said. " Good-bye." 

Thereafter I denied myself the walk from Albert Gate to 
Hyde Park Corner, and went to my office through Belgrave 
Square and the Green Park. 



The Door Closed 149 

I kept my own counsel about our meeting and went on 
with my own work, trying not to think of the O'Rane tragedy 
until it was brought to my notice by a chance encounter 
with O'Rane himself. I was deliberately not seeking his 
company, but I was pleased when he joined me in the Smoking 
Room at the House. 

" Your voice at least is quite unmistakable," he said, 
with his old smile. " So is Grayle's. The people who 
beat me are most of the Irish and a sprinkling of the Labour 
men — ^fellows who don't open their mouths from one end of 
the session to the other. And I'm here so little that it's 
slow work learning. Still, I'll back myself to be right ninety- 
five times out of a hundred, if I've heard a voice more than 
once. Do you know whether old Oakleigh is about ? " 

" I saw him here before dinner," I said. 

" I promised to walk home with him. Why don't you 
come along, too ? There's nothing of any interest on, and 
you can smoke in greater comfort at my place. Let's see 
if we can hunt him out." 

Bertrand had sat down late, and we found him finishing 
his coffee in an almost deserted dining-room. It was still 
light, however, when we got outside, and we strolled at an 
easy pace along Millbank to " The Sanctuary." I had not 
been there since the night nearly three months before, when 
O'Rane's life was broken in two. As we walked, I thought 
of the other night when Grayle and I met him for the first 
time, when, too, he had carried Beresford on his own back 
into the now empty house. He could not but be thinking 
of it himself, and I hardly knew whether to pity or admire 
him the more for his unembarrassed way of admitting us to 
his secret without suffering us to allude to it. 

Unlocking the door, he went ahead to turn on the lights, 
came back to relieve us of our coats and bade us help our- 
selves from the side-board, while he opened a box of cigars. 
Perhaps from nervousness he talked rather more than usual 
and shewed himself unnecessarily solicitous for our comfort ; 
otherwise we might have been sitting, as we occasionally 
sat ten months before, waiting for Mrs. O'Rane to come 
back from the theatre. ... I confess that I started — I 
believe we all started — ^when we heard a taxi draw nearer 
and nearer, turn out of Millbank and stop at the door. 



150 Sonia Married 

Bertrand and I were facing the room, and we both of us gave 
a quick glance over our shoulders. O'Rane continued talk- 
ing unconcernedly, only stopping when the curtain was 
pushed aside and George came in. 

" It's a great thing to have a place where you can be sure 
of a drink after licensed hours," he remarked contentedly. 
*' I've had no dinner and not much lunch ; and I've left the 
Admiralty this mon;ent. This war's got beyond the joke 
some people still think it. Don't mind me, Raney, I'm going 
to fend for myself and eat solidly for the next half-hour. 
What's the question before the House ? " 

He seated himself on the arm of my chair with a hunk of 
bread and cheese in one hand and a tumbler of whisky and 
soda in the other. We were talking of the way in which 
our original intervention on behalf of Belgian neutrality had 
been overlaid by the nationalist ambitions of Italy in South 
Austria, France in Alsace-Lorraine and by the frankly 
imperialist trend of Russia towards Constantinople and of 
ourselves towards Mesopotamia and in Africa and the Pacific. 

" It may have been wise, it may be necessary," said O'Rane 
dubiously. " Perhaps you couldn't bring Italy in without 
promising Trieste and the Trentino, perhaps you couldn't 
keep Russia in without promising Constantinople." 

Bertrand sighed and then yawned. 

" I wonder if we've not bitten off more than we can 
chew," he growled. " / went through the phase of ' crushing 
Prussian militarism,' cutting up the map of Europe with a 
pair of scissors. ... I hope nobody will put me up against 
a wall and shoot me, if I now doubt the possibility. I don't 
believe we can crush Prussian militarism." 

" We— can't ! " 

The words, spoken in a familiar, sneering drawl, came 
from behind me. Bertrand and I swung round in our chairs 
to face the door ; George leapt to his feet, letting fall his 
bread and cheese and discharging a torrent of whisky and 
soda into my lap. If the ghost of Peter Beresford had walked 
in to reinforce Bertrand at the point where their doctrines 
most nearly touched, he could not have dumbfounded us 
more. But it was not Beresford's ghost. The July night 
was descending so slowly that we were content with a single 
lamp in the middle of the room. In the gathering dusk 



The Door Closed I5i 

by the door, standing out against the orange glow of the 
door-curtain, I saw Beresford himself, leaning with one 
hand on a stick and grasping a shapeless soft hat with the 
other. He was as waxen of complexion and almost as 
cadaverous as when we met in the Park three weeks before, 
but he had made a spasmodic effort to seem collected on 
entering, and the sneer in his voice was reproduced by a 
suggestion of swaggering contempt in his attitude. 

I wondered helplessly and almost without anger why he 
had inflicted this outrage upon us. Trembling and speech- 
less, Bertrand propelled himself slowly to his feet ; speechless 
and breathing quickly, George took two steps forward. 
We were all too much preoccupied to look behind and see 
what O'Rane was doing, until I heard what I can only 
describe as a rattle in the throat ; Beresford's eyes opened 
wider, and he took a half-step back ; I turned my head in 
time to see O'Rane spring like an animal on its prey, both 
arms outstretched and both feet off the ground. There was 
a thud, as the two fell together, a gasp from Beresford, the 
noise of boots scuffling on polished boards, and then a silence 
only modified by laboured breathing. 

George was the first to move. 

" He'll kill him ! " he called back to us. " Help me 
separate them ! " 

As quickly as an old and a middle-aged man could move, 
Bertrand and I hurried to his assistance. O'Rane was 
straddling Beresford's body, pinning both arms to the floor 
with his knees and gripping his throat with both hands, 
until the eyes glared in the early stages of asphyxiation 
and the mouth fell open, gobbling hideously. The face was 
swollen and mulberry-coloured by the time that we could 
see it, and the first feeble resistance had given place to the 
dreadful placidity of physical exhaustion. 

" You fool, you're murdering him ! " George roared, 
slipping both hands inside O'Rane's collar and putting forth 
a reserve of strength which lifted assailant and assailed 
bodily from the ground. " Pull his hands away, you men ! " 

I caught O'Rane's left wrist in both hands, but the polished 
floor gave no purchase to my feet, and I might as well have 
tried to pluck a propeller from its shaft. His arms were like 
flexible, warm steel. When I planted my foot against his 



152 Sonia Married 

shoulder, it was like resting it on masonry that quivered 
slipperily, but never yielded. 

" Fingers, man, fingers ! " George shouted again. " Pull 
'em apart, twist 'em, hurt him ! " 

I take no pride in having followed his advice, save in so 
far as it saved the boy from the scaffold. Bertrand and I, 
each with our two hands, gripped O'Rane's third and fourth 
fingers, tugged and twisted until a stifled cry of pain broke 
from his lips. George was shaking him like a rat, and at last 
the grip relaxed and Beresford's head fell with a second 
thud on the floor. 

" Don't let go ! " cried George. " Now, Raney, will you 
swear on your honour not to touch him again ? " 

There was a sullen, long silence varied by the rip of rending 
clothes and the clatter of feet, as O'Rane made three un- 
successful plunges forward. 

" You're — hurting my — hand ! " he panted at length, 
with the whimper of a little child. 

George shook his head at me passionately. 

" Will you swear on your honour, Raney ? " 

" Let me — get at him ! " O'Rane sobbed. 

" We'll break your fingers off at the knuckles, if you don't 
swear ! " George returned through clenched teeth. 

There was a second silence, a last plunge. 

" I won't touch him," sighed O'Rane. 

We stepped back, panting and mopping our foreheads ; 
then Bertrand walked to the nearest chair and subsided into 
it ; I leaned against a sofa ; George stood for a moment, 
rocking from his late exertion, then pressed one hand to his 
heart and hurried into the street, covering his mouth with a 
handkerchief. O'Rane stood where we had relaxed our hold 
on him, bending and unbending his tortured fingers ; Beres- 
ford lay motionless and silent. 

George's reappearance with a request for brandy gal- 
vanized us all, but chiefly O'Rane, who walked up to him 
with outthrust lips, and cried : 

" You can clear out of this, George Oakleigh, and I don't 
advise you to come back here." 

" Don't be a fool, Raney," George answered wearily. 

" liyou hadn't put them up to it " 

" That's precisely why I did it. It was the only way of 



The Door Closed 153 

stopping you. Don't think I enjoyed it, old man." He 
caught O'Rane's right hand between his own two and patted 
it, as if he were caressing a woman. I learned afterwards 
that, in addition to losing his sight, O'Rane had been wounded 
in both hands. " Go and get some brandy — or wait, I'll 
get the brandy, while you lift Beresford on to a sofa. I've 
pulled my heart out of place." 

Between us we made a rough bed and tried to bring the 
unconscious man round. His heart was fluttering like a 
captive bird, and for longer than I cared to count there was 
no other sign of life. At last the eyes opened for a moment, 
and I saw George relax his labours and lead O'Rane to one 
side. 

" You'd better go to bed, old man," he said. " I'll report 
progress later, and we'll get him away as soon as we can. 
You'll only make things worse, if you're here when he comes 
round." 

To my surprise, O'Rane allowed himself to be led away, 
and George returned to share our vigil. A second and third 
time the eyes opened ; twice Beresford tried to raise himself 
and once his lips moved in soundless speech. 

" Don't try to talk," I said, as I gave him some water to 
drink. 

He closed his eyes, and a quarter of an hour passed before 
they opened again. 

" W-w-why ? " he stammered suddenly. 

" Don't—try — to — talk," I said again. 

" But w-why did he do that ? " Beresford persisted, with 
slow obstinacy. " Is he — m-m-mad ? " 

George, Bertrand and I stared at him and then at one 
another. 

" Don't try to talk yet," was all that I could find to say. 



IV 

Bertrand allowed himself to be sent to bed at midnight, but 
George and I took it in turns to watch by Beresford's side. 
We had a doctor in, but the danger was past before he arrived, 
and his only orders were that we must report any change. 
Until dawn we tried sleeping for an hour and watching for an 



154 Sonia Married 

hour, but, as an opal light came to warm the rafters on the 
west side of the room, George sacrificed his turn to sleep and 
joined me on the sofa. 

We looked at each other for some moments without speak- 
ing, both equally tired, dishevelled, unshaven and perplexed. 

" Well ? " I said at length. 

" Well ? " he echoed. " By the way, I promised to report 
progress to Raney ; and I never did. I don't see what we 
can say at present. We've got to clear this up before he comes 
down." 

" What do you think ?" 1 asked. 

George hesitated. 

" The fact of the fellow's coming here at all " he began 

slowly. 

I nodded. 

" We must wait till we can question him direct," he went 
on evasively. 

" But, if -we're right, he mustn't know," I put in. 

" Till everyone knows," sighed George. 

Beresford stirred restlessly, and the sound of a moan 
silenced us. 

" If " George began again in a whisper. I nodded. 

" God above ! if we hadtft managed to pull him off in time ! " 

I put my finger to my lips, as Beresford stirred again. 

" He's waking." 

We were sitting in a line with his head and outside his 
field of vision, unless he raised himself on his elbow, which 
at present he was incapable of doing. We saw his eyes open 
and close again, open and close again, the opening each time 
growing brisker than the faint closing, until he was strong 
enough to stare about him and take in two-thirds of the 
room. I saw wonder dawning in his face, as he found himself 
unexpectedly in familiar surroundings ; he carried his hand 
to his head in the effort to remember how he had got there ; 
then his fingers mechanically slid down to his throat, and I 
watched him gingerly exploring certain purple marks. 
Abruptly his eyes closed for another long quiescence, but he 
was gaining strength and at the next opening he dragged 
himself unsteadily to a sitting posture, clapped both hands 
to his temples and slowly turned his head until he had brought 
the whole room under observation. 



The Door Closed 15S 

" Where's Sonia ? " he demanded abruptly, looking at me 
with flickering eye-lids. 

" She's not here at the moment," I answered. 

He stared imcomprehendingly until a pain at the bruised 
back of his head made him wince and despatch one hand to 
assess the damage. 

" How long " He winced again. " How long have 

I been here ? " 

" Since last night," I told him. " You had a fall." 

He continued to stare at me without comprehension and 
then grew suddenly indignant. 

" Had a fall ? " he repeated. " I didn't have a fall. What 
d'you mean ? It's all coming back to me now. I was 
dining — I don't know where I was dining, but afterwards I 
thought I'd come round and see Sonia. . . . Why did O'Rane 
attack me like that ? Was he mad ? " 

George's foot pressed lightly against mine. 

" What do you mean — ' attack ' you ? " he asked with fine 
simulation of surprise. 

" He attacked me," Beresford persisted doggedly. " He 
knocked me down." His eyes closed once more. " Where's 
Sonia ? " he asked again. 

" She's staying with friends," George answered. " I say, 
I shouldn't talk too much, if I were you. You're looking 
rather cheap, and I hear you've been pretty bad." 

For the first time Beresford was able to twist his features 
into a malevolent grin. 

" I'm putting on weight again now," he boasted. " You'd 
look cheap, if you'd gone through what I have." 

" How long were you in prison ? " I asked. 

Beresford sighed and shook his head. 

" I don't know. I was unconscious for some days at the 
end. They arrested me on the third, the trial was on — I 
forget. . . "." He lowered himself till he was lying full length 
on the sofa. 

" They arrested you on the fourth, you say," I began with 
a glance at George. 

" The third. My birthday," he corrected me, caressing his 
bruised throat with one hand. " There was a ring at the 
bell, and I got out of bed and went to the door, expecting 
to find the postman. Instead of that, there was an inspector 



156 Sonia Married 

with a warrant. He asked whether I was Mr. Peter Beresford 
and read me the warrant. He wouldn't let me shave, I remem- 
ber ; I suppose he was afraid I might cut my throat ; and I 
was only allowed to have a bath on condition that he was in 
the room. I don't know which was the more em- 
barrassed. ..." 

He paused to laugh feebly, and I withdrew to the window 
and checked his date by my engagement book. George 
raised his eyebrows to me, and at my nod tiptoed to the door 
and made his way to O'Rane's room. 

" What happened, last night ? " Beresford demanded, 
covering his eyes with the hand that had been feeling his 
throat and rubbing his bruised head with the other. " Was 
everyone drunk ? " 

" I can't quite explain now," I said. 

Whether O'Rane had been to bed or not, he was washed 
and shaved, dressed and booted, when George went into his 
room at five o'clock. Beresford was reported out of danger, 
and after some hesitation George asked again to be given 
the fullest account of O'Rane's unexpected return two months 
before. 

" I'll tell you my reason now," he said, as O'Rane's ex- 
pression hardened. " I want to make certain — I'm advocatus 
didboli — I want your evidence that it was Beresford at all." 

" Evidence ? I heard him, she admitted it ! Who else 
could it be ? And he comes back here " 

" Steady on, Raney, this is no way to conduct a trial. 
I'm going to get Stornaway up here, if I can, and we're going 
into this very thoroughly." 

Beresford was sleeping so tranquilly that I left him without 
compimction. Upstairs the court of enquiry had been joined 
by Bertrand in pyjamas, dressing-gown and slippers ; George 
was sitting on the bed with a blotter and writing-pad on his 
knee, O'Rane walked to and fro with the noiseless tread of 
a cat. We were all grey-faced and haggard in the diamond, 
five-o'clock-in-the-morning light. I found myself a chair, 
and the proceedings opened with a repetition of the story 
which Bertrand had given me at second-hand. It was more 
temperate and less dramatic, as O'Rane told it two months 
after the events ; it was slightly fuller, but in no respect did 
it vary substantially from the earlier account. 



The Door Closed 157 

"I'm not a lawyer," George said at the end, looking up 
from his notes. " Whether you'd get a divorce on that — 
assuming you wanted one ..." he added quickly, as O'Rane's 
eyes narrowed. "We haven't finished yet, though. You 
say Sonia admitted it ? " 

O'Rane nodded and then seemed to repent his nod. 

" She didn't deny it," he said to correct himself. " I say, 
you fellows don't want me to go into this part of it, do you ? 
It's not very pleasant for me. I'll just tell you that I assumed 
it was Beresford." 

" Why did you assume it ? " I interrupted. 

" She was very intimate with him. She used to talk — I 
thought it was in joke, of course, a silly joke that I didn't 
like — she used to talk about going off and living with him, 
if we ever had a disagreement about anything. Besides, 
I'd heard him hopping out of here and down the stairs on one 
leg. I naturally assumed. . . . And she accepted it. I — 
I can't tell you what we said to each other, but it was never 
in doubt, it never has been in doubt till this moment." 

George pursed up his mouth and shook his head reflec- 
tively. 

" This is only telling us what the sergeant said," he ob- 
served. " However, let's get every shred of evidence before 
we let Beresford open." 

He looked enquiringly at his uncle, who shrugged his 
shoulders a little impatiently. 

" It's not evidence," Bertrand began. " I'm old-fashioned, 
I daresay I attach too much importance to trifles ; I can 
only give you what I've seen and heard." 

It was indeed not direct evidence, it was not even circum- 
stantial evidence. Mrs. O'Rane had been very intimate with 
Beresford ; when he was lying ill at " The Sanctuary," she 
would sit stroking his hand ; they sometimes remained 
together imtil a very late hour, and she thought nothing of 
kissing him good-night. On his side Beresford made no secret 
of his infatuation. 

" Neither made any secret of anything ! " growled Bertrand, 
thumping his fist on his knee. ..." I suppose it's the 
modern method ... I don't understand it. That's why I 
say my evidence is no use. If you get up and tell them 
they've no business to be kissing, they'll retort that it was 



158 Sonia Married 

all open and above-board, that I was present as often as 
not. . . . And it's true. I used to come in late fronx the 
House, I used to come in at all hours when I was on Special 
Constable duty ; there they were, billing and cooing, and not 
in the least embarrassed by me. You'd have said they rather 
liked an audience." 

The unhappy O'Rane was wincing at every sneer or word 
of disapproval. Two months before he would have turned 
it off with a laugh, as everyone else did, and protested that it 
was Soma's way and that we did not know Sonia. . . . But, 
if he could have been induced to speak frankly, he would 
probably have agreed with me that some of his wife's friends 
and a good deal of his wife's behaviour were meretricious. 

" I'd better add my testimony, while we're about it," I 
said. The boy winced again, and I could see him bracing 
himself. 

I told him how at his request I had called on Beresford to 
warn him against running his head any further into the trap 
which was being laid for him. I described his obvious 
anxiety to get rid of me, the embarrassment of our meeting, 
when Mrs. O'Rane came in, her light-hearted assurance that 
I should be really shocked, or something of the kind, if I 
knew how often she had visited her patient at such an hour. 
It was not pleasant work, but I spared O'Rane nothing that 
my memory retained. 

At the end George crumpled his notes into a ball and rose 
from the bed with a yawn of mental and physical exhaustion. 

" As I said, I'm not a lawyer," he observed. " If Raney 
were bringing a petition, there's a hundred-to-one chance in 
favour of his getting a decree ; I suppose there's a six-to-four 
chance on circumstantial evidence that you could bring 
the charge of misconduct home to Beresford." He paused 
to frown in perplexity, unconscious that the word "miscon- 
duct " had cut O'Rane like a lash across the face. " If it 
weren't for last night," he muttered. " It's — almost in- 
comprehensible. Unless he came to make a clean breast of 
it, to tell Raney to divorce her and be damned. . . ." 

O'Rane stopped short in his cat-like prowl and faced us. 

" The only thing is to see Beresford," he said. " You'd 
better come with me. I can tell something from his voice, 
but of course I can't see him. Watch his mouth, don't look 



The Door Closed 159 

at his eyes ; it's the mouth that gives a man away, when he's 
lying." 

The library was stale with cigar-smoke after our long vigil. 
Beresford was asleep, but the noise of our feet roused him, and 
he sat up blinking at O'Rane, who was a pace before the rest 
of us. 

" Why did you attack me last night ? " he demanded the 
moment that we were in sight. 

O'Rane came to a standstill with his hands in his pockets, 
swaying slightly from heel to toe. 

" We'll go into that in a moment, if you don't mind," was 
the answer. " What was your motive in coming here ? " 

I had Beresford under vigilant scrutiny, and his surprise 
was real or uncommonly well assumed. 

" To see Sonia, of course," he replied. " I didn't know you 
were at home. Do you usually try to murder people who 
come to see her ? " he demanded with weak truculence. " I 
know, of course, that you neglect her and ill-treat her your- 
self." 

O'Rane rocked contemplatively to and fro, nodding thought- 
fully to himself. 

" When did you last see my wife ? " he asked suddenly. 

" I can't tell you." 

" You've got to tell me, Beresford." 

" I'm afraid I can't. I spent six weeks in prison and I've 
had another fortnight getting convalescent. It was some 
time before that." 

" You have got to tell me the day, the hotur and the place." 

Beresford lay back with his mouth obstinately shut. 

" Come along ! " O'Rane cried. 

" I can't and I won't. It was some time shortly before I 
was arrested. If you want to find out any more, you can ask 
her.' 

I refreshed my memory with a glance at my pocket-book. 

" You were arrested on the third of May, you told me," I 
said. " Going back three weeks, I can definitely trace one 
occasion on which you met Mrs. O'Rane " 

Beresford's pale face suddenly flushed. 

" If you're going to drag in your foul-minded suspicions 
about that," he cried, " have the decency to wait till Soma's 
here." 



160 Sonia Married 

" I told you that Mrs. O'Rane was away," I reminded him. 
Then I took O'Rane by the arm. " I want to have a word 
with you." 

I was too tired to labour upstairs again, and we could be 
by ourselves outside. There was a haze over the river, rising 
almost before my eyes, as the sun climbed higher. A suc- 
cession of young factory girls hurried along the Embankment 
on their way to work ; one or two early carts rumbled over 
the cobble-stones in the neighbouring streets, and a chain 
of three black barges glided noiselessly towards Westminster 
Bridge. All else was still. I caught sight of my dusty 
boots, the cigar-ash on my waistcoat and a pair of grimy 
hands — the whole desecrating the clean clarity of the summer 
morning. 

" Well ? " said O'Rane. 

I put my arm through his and walked towards the river. ' 

"I'm prepared to bet that the last time Beresford saw your 
wife was when I spoiled their tete-d-tete in his rooms," I said. 
" He doesn't know I've told you already and he's in dread 
that I'm going to. Didn't you feel that ? And it's not that 
he's afraid of you — I don't think he's physically afraid of 
anyone — ; he doesn't want you to know that she was foolish 
enough to come to his rooms at such an hour." 

O'Rane disengaged his arm and rested his elbows on the 
parapet and his chin on his hands. 

" This was three weeks — ^before ? " he asked. 

" I don't believe he's met her since. I don't believe it 
was him." 

He shook his head slowly. 

" I couldn't see him, of course ; I've told you I didn't get 
near enough to touch him, but I heard him going across the 
room and down the stairs on one leg. You aren't in a mood 
then to weigh your suspicions very judicially ... I taxed 
Sonia with it. My God ! I can't go through it again, we 
were both of us out of our minds, I don't know what we said ! 
But I assumed it was Beresford — I remember I kept on using 
his name. She never denied it. If it wasn't Beresford . . . ? " 

" Let's first of all establish whether it was Beresford," I 
suggested. 

He hesitated a moment longer and then pulled himself 
abruptly erect, took my arm and walked quickly back to the 



The Door Closed 161 

house. Bertrand and George, a pair of strangely disre- 
putable figures, were dozing in arm-chairs ; Beresford had 
his eyes open and fixed on us the moment we were inside the 
room. 

" You wanted to know a few minutes ago why I attacked 
you," began O'Rane. " I'm going to tell you, but I should 
like to ask one question first. Are you aware that my wife 
is no longer here ? " 

" So Stornaway told me — twice," Beresford answered 
wearily. 

" Do you know she's — left me ? " 

" I'm not surprised. I'm only surprised she ever came 
back. I don't know why she ever married you." 

O'Rane paused to steady himself. 

" I believed until recently that she had left me for y^u," 
he went on. " Now you can understand, perhaps, why I 
behaved as I did last night. I can't offer any apology worth 
having." 

As he stopped speaking, he held out his hand almost 
timidly. Beresford stared at it contemptuously for a moment ; 
then his cheeks flushed, and he took it. 

" You can imagine I don't want this to go any further," 
said O'Rane, in a matter-of-fact voice. 

Beresford pulled him close to the couch. 

" I — I don't think I'm there yet," he whispered. " Say 
it all over again, will you ? Sonia's left you ? She used 
to say she was going to, but that was only to tease you." 

O'Rane's lips were quivering, and his voice trembled. 

" I'm afraid it's all grim earnest," he said. 

" She's left you ? O'Rane, she couldn't ! She loved 
you so much ! I — I often thought you didn't treat her 
properly, you were frightfully unsympathetic sometimes, but 
there was nothing you could do to force her to this ! " 

Bertrand roused himself to control the excitement of 
Beresford's voice, which was beginning to react on O'Rane. 

" Deal with realities, young man," he grunted. " The facts 
are as stated." 

Beresford disregarded him and turned to O'Rane. 

" But where is she ? " 

" We don't know." 

" You don't know who she's with ? " His face became 

II 



162 Sonia Married 

suddenly more hopeful. " You've no prooj that she's 
with anyone ? She went away once before, remember." 

A smothered sigh broke from O'Rane. 

" I think I may say positively that she's with someone. 
She's not merely staying with friends. I'm afraid I thought 
it was you and I must beg you to forgive me." 

He tried to smile and again held out his hand. 

" You needn't have thought it was me, O'Rane," said 
Beresford quietly. 

" No. But I only heard a lame man hopping away on one 
leg. And I was seeing red." 

" But you could both of you trust me ! If there' d been 
a moment's danger, I'd never have seen Sonia again. I'm 
not the only lame man in London. You might have picked 
on Grayle before me, if she hadn't hated him so much." 

O'Rane covered his eyes with his hand. 

" I thought of you both," he said. " When I heard the 
man going short on one leg, I felt certain that it must be 
one of you . . . It's extraordinary how quickly you think 
at a time like that. I remember wondering whether I should 
be equal to tackling Grayle, if it were him. . . . Then I knew 
it couldn't be, because he'd insulted Sonia in some restaurant, 
and they'd had a row. Besides, he was in France at the 
time. And so I decided that it must be you. I'm sorry. 
You couldn't expect me to behave quite — dispassionately, 
could you ? I'm only glad it has been cleared up. I'm 
afraid you'll have to stay with me again till we've patched up 
last night's damage. You can understand that for Sonia's 
sake this mustn't be talked about. When people want 
to know where she is, I — I usually say she's staying away 
and I — don't — quite know — when she's coming back ..." 



At the end of August I contrived a holiday for myself on 
the north coast of Cornwall, where Lady Pentyre had been 
good enough to offer me a house. Yolande and her husband 
accompanied me, and on a passing impulse I pressed O'Rane 
to join us. We could have given him society and some kind 
of mental distraction, but the House was still sitting, when I 



The Door Closed 163 

left London, and he made this an excuse for declining. In 
his place George came for a week, to be followed by several 
of Yolande's colleagues and friends, whom she invited — I am 
fairly sure — ^less for themselves than for the chance of giving 
an inexpensive holiday to some exceedingly tired women. 

It was a fortnight of pure enchantment. We rose at eight 
and walked over hot, spongy turf to the precipitous cliff-path 
which led us to our favourite bathing-place in our chosen 
bay. We bobbed and basked in a sea of liquid sapphire 
under a blazing sun and only left the water when hunger drove 
us home. Through long, happy mornings all four of us 
scrambled like children over the rocks, in and out of un- 
expected pools, slipping on treacherous bunches of seaweed 
and cutting our feet on the cones of a mollusc's shell. We 
were adways so wet and impresentable by luncheon-time that 
there was nothing for it but to bathe again and put on dry 
clothes, which made us late and ravenous, so that we gorged 
ourselves on dishes which were becoming unprocurable in 
London and then lay sleeping repletely or glancing at the 
papers untU it was time for another walk among the gorse and 
heather, a last descent to the foreshore where the Atlantic lay 
drowsy under the setting sun, creaming and lapping the black 
and dun rocks. 

The papers, when we mustered energy to read them, brought 
us better news each day. Pressing north and west, the Italian 
and Russian armies were taking their revenge for the damag- 
ing thrust which each had lately sustained, and Austria- 
Hungary, squeezed simultaneously on two sides, had to 
adopt the unwelcome and desperate expedient of handing 
over the eastern troops to German command. The pre- 
carious hold on Salonica was strengthened by the safe landing 
of reinforcements, and, before we left in September, Roumania 
had thrown in her lot with the Allies. 

Even London, where for two years the soldiers on leave 
■from any front had found individual self-depression and 
national self-depreciation flourishing most luxuriantly, became 
infected with brief optimism. In September a report from 
General Headquarters announced that an infantry advance 
had been assisted by a mysterious new mechanism that rolled 
its uncouth way imperviously through the rain of bullets and 
shrapnel which poured on to its armoured sides, some land 

IT* 



164 Sonia Married 

battleship which dropped unconcernedly into craters and 
climbed as unconcernedly over fortifications and chance 
debris of houses, an invention — the first of British initiative 
in the war — that bestrode enemy trenches and spattered a 
hail of death on either hand, a good-humoured steel giant 
that convulsed the troops until they held their sides and for- 
got to advance, a something, in fine, that the English soldier 
with his genius for happy and meaningless nicknames decided 
to call a " tank." 

Old Bertrand, who had a pretentious theory to explain each 
new set of facts, enunciated a new art of war with the text : 
" Machines versus Men " ; the rifleman to the savage with a 
spear in his hand was as the machine-gun to the rifleman — 
or the tank to the machine-gun. War had been revolutionized, 
and our old calculations of effectives and losses must go by the 
board. 

The mood of optimism passed as quickly as it had come. 
Hardly had we finished triumphing over German machine- 
guns with our tanks, overcoming the Zeppelin menace with 
our anti-aircraft guns — there was smart sport in October, 
amounting almost to a battue — when the autumn campaign 
ended, and we settled down to count the cost and prepare 
for a third winter. The figures of our losses made the Somme 
a Pyrrhic victory, and there was troubled wonder where the 
new drafts were to be found. Ireland, which had been 
left in suspect and timid neglect — like a dog which has snapped 
once and may snap again, but is quiet for the moment — 
became once more a public interest as a candidate for con- 
scription. And ships were mysteriously scarce. And food 
prices were exorbitant. And the Government was tired, 
lethargic, void of initiative. . . . 

" Thank God ! my duty as a citizen is done, when I've paid 
my taxes ! " Bertrand Oakleigh exclaimed one night at the 
House. " I'm glad I'm not a farmer, I'm glad I'm not mixed 
up with industry. I should be unpatriotic if I didn't double 
my output of foodstuffs and unpatriotic if I kept one potential 
piece of cannon-fodder to grow 'em ; I'm a pro-German if I 
manufacture for export to keep up the foreign exchanges — 
Victory versus Trade ! — and Lord knows what I am if I 
don't cheerfully pay taxes on a business I've had to close down. 
If I lose money, nobody sympathizes ; if I make any, I'm 



The Door Closed 165 

called a profiteer, and someone takes it away from me. . . . 
Curious how a phrase or an abusive nickname dispenses 
the people of this country from using such wits as a niggardly 
Providence has given them ! You've only to whisper some- 
thing about a ' hidden hand ' and a crowded meeting of 
City men will sit and hypnotize themselves into thinking that 
there's an active service of secret agents — with poor Haldane 
as Director General — quietly penetrating our social life and 
paralyzing our efforts in the war. Hidden hand ! Pacifist 
— ^they can't even throw their absurdities into decent English ! 
Profiteer ! We're so astonishingly petty as a nation ! I 
wonder if the same thing's being reproduced in all other 
countries — the old ' Nous sommes Irakis ' nonsense. . . . 
They're all governments of old men, too — and they're tired — 
and no one outside knows what they've had to go through — 
and everybody's nerves are snapping. I'm sometimes sur- 
prised that these fellows lasted so long, but I think their days 
are numbered. If you throw your mind back, you'll remember 
a phase when Asquith's worst political enemies said he was 
indispensable, the only Prime Minister, the one man who could 
hold the Government and the country together. You don't 
hear that now ; we've outgrown that phase. Now people 
are openly saying that he's not master in his own house, that 
we shall never win the war so long as he's in the saddle, that 
they'll turn him out the moment they can find someone to 
put in his place. . . . Lloyd George would be in power to-day, 
if his friends in Fleet Street could be sure that he wouldn't 
hanky-panky with the Army. ... To read the papers, you'd 
think it was the cumulative effect of reverses like GaUipoli 
and Mesopotamia ; the shortage of food, and the fact that 
we've done nothing to increase our home production, and our 
failure to grapple with submarines. It's deeper and blinder 
than that. . . . It's because the Government hasn't won the 
war that it will fall ; and any new Prime Minister will fall in 
exactly the same way, unless he can win it. Results ! results ! 
That mountebank Grayle is quite right ; he represents average, 
unthinking, third-rate, violent opinion, and that opinion's 
becoming articulate. As I've told you before, I don't think^a 
change will do any good, because we set ourselves too big'a 
task, we started on too high a moral plane. I suppose|I 
should be called a ' pacifist ' if I suggested that that phase 



166 Sonia Married 

was over and that we'd better moderate our tone before we're 
compelled to." 

The particular non-party War Committee headed by 
Grayle was waking to activity after its suspended animation 
during the summer campaign. In his paper, in conversation 
at the Club and still more in the Smoking Room of the House 
he was calling for more vigour in administration. . . . The 
House of Commons position was curious, he informed me ; 
if he could be sure of a certain number of votes — he would 
not trouble me with the figures — we could have a Ministry 
after our own heart. There followed an interval of perhaps 
five minutes, in which I allowed him to do all the talking. 
The Unionist members of the Coalition were sick and tired 
of this eternal " Wait and See " ; there would be a secession 
the moment that a better alternative Government had been 
sketched out ; you had only to call a Unionist party meeting 
and put it to 'em straight. But you didn't want to take an 
unnecessary toss, you couldn't afford to supply powder and 
shot to rags like the Daily News, which were always talking 
about an intrigue and saying that no Government could 
exist with the Germans in front and back-stabbers behind. . . ^ 

" Nothing's settled yet," he told me after considering 
academically the offices for which we were both fitted. " But, 
you know the constitutional theory : you're not justified in 
upsetting a Government unless you're prepared to go to 
Buckingham Palace and take on the job of forming a new 
Administration. Excuse me ! I want to have a word with 
Oakleigh." 

The following day I asked Bertrand under what guise the 
devil had appeared to him, but he had evidently been less 
patient. 

" Grayle went away with a flea in his ear," he grunted. 
" He's been worrying me so long that I had to stop it once and 
for all. God knows, I don't care about this Ministry ; I 
shouldn't have much faith in any Ministry formed out of the 
present House — the best talent's already on the Treasury 
Bench — and I don't believe in bringing in your supermen 
from outside — the House of Commons can't be learned in a 
night, and even a Government department needs study. 
What I object to in Grayle is his picking on me as one of his 
fifty or sixty new allies ; you can picture him buzzing round 



The Door Closed 167 

with his fellow-conspirators—' Shall we try Oakleigh and 
Stornaway ? They're solid, moderate, old members— highly 
respected. They don't add anything to the common stock, 
of course, but they carry more weight than the men who 
are always talking and playing an active part. We might 
try them, their names would look well on the prospectus 
—inspire confidence, you know.' " He chuckled maliciously. 
" I suppose I'm getting very old, but I can't stand young 
men's conceit in the way I once did. Grayle's like a boy just 
down from Oxford, doing everything for the first time and 
imagining that no one's ever done it before. Does he really 
think this is the first political intrigue in history ? I recom- 
mended him a course of Disraeli's novels — to improve his 
technique. Good God ! I was playing this game of detach- 
ing wobblers and -handing out offices that were not in my 
gift and mobilizing the solid, moderate, highly respected old 
members under Gladstone ! I toiled and schemed to keep 
the Liberal Party out of Rosebery's hands ; I was making 
new parties and pigeon-holing possible Cabinets all through 
the Morley-Harcourt days ; I was intriguing to keep C.-B. 
in command when the Liberal Leaguers intrigued to kick him 
into the Lords. I've been through it all ; and be hanged if 
I didn't do it better than Grayle ! " 

Perhaps my manner was too sympathetic. Certainly I 
was not to escape so easily as Bertrand had done, for Grayle 
met me leaving the House and offered to drop me on his way 
home. I accepted because I was nominally amicable with him, 
because I did not want a wet walk to my hotel and because 
I could not decently refuse. He talked persuasively the 
whole way home and was obviously chagrined when I did 
not invite him into my rooms. He rang me up at breakfast 
next day and tried to secure my presence at luncheon ; once 
at my ofiice in St. James' Street, once in my department, 
and once again, when I was tranquilly dining with the Mait- 
lands, I was called to the telephone with an apologetic but 
urgent request that I would arrange a time when Grayle 
could have five minutes' conversation with me. 

My position was simple and clear. I would be neither 
bribed nor buUied into any kind of office, I would give no 
blank cheque for the fiiture to Grayle or anyone else, but 
I should no doubt be found voting with him against the Govern- 



168 Sonia Married 

ment — or with the Government against him — as I had done 
in the past, judging every division on its merits. A note 
on my dressing-table informed me that Colonel Grayle had 
telephoned from the House at eleven. ... I picked up my 
hat, buttoned my coat again and turned my steps towards 
Milford Square ; a far more patient man might be excused 
for thinking that Grayle was making a nuisance of himself. 

The servant who opened the door informed me that Colonel 
Grayle was out. 

" I'll wait," I said. " I've got to see him." 

" But he's out of town, sir. He didn't say where he was 
going or when he'd be back. He very often goes away like that." 

The man was sleek of appearance and glib of speech, well- 
experienced, I thought, in shutting the door to people whom 
his master did not wish to see. But I did not fall within that 
category, and Grayle had plagued me sufficiently to justify 
reprisals. 

" When did he go away ? " I asked. 

" Before dinner, sir." 

" Ah, then he must have changed his plans," I said. " He 
telephoned to me from the House half an hour ago ; he's been 
trying to get hold of me all day, but this is the first oppor- 
tunity I've had. Is Mr. Bannerman in ? If so, I'll talk to 
him till Colonel Grayle comes in." 

" Mr. Bannerman has moved into rooms of his own," the 
servant told me, yielding ground reluctantly. 

I walked into Grayle's smoking-room and left the man to 
warn him that I was in effective occupation and that he must 
yield to the inevitable and come down to see me, if he were 
already at home, or submit to a few minutes of my company 
when he returned. A moment later I saw that he could not 
yet have come back from the House, as a pile of letters awaited 
him on the table and the whisky and soda set out for his re- 
freshment were untouched. " A model servant," I said to 
myself, " to have everything ready when you do not expect 
your master home." I mixed myself a drink and was pre- 
paring to light a cigar when I found that I was without 
matches. On going into the hall, I found my sleek, glib friend 
mounting guard, as though he expected me to slip out with 
my pockets full of silver. 

He produced a box of matches from his pocket and struck 



The Door Closed 169 

one for me. As I began to light my cigar, a taxi drove into 
the square and drew up opposite the house. 

" What name shall I tell Colonel Grayle ? " asked the ser- 
vant, as he held open the smoking-room door for me. 

Before I had time to answer, I heard a latch-key grating 
in the lock ; the servant moved forward and stopped irreso- 
lutely ; then the door opened to admit Mrs. O'Rane. Our 
eyes met for a moment, and for the first time since I had known 
her I saw her out of countenance. In another moment it 
was all over, for I had backed into the smoking-room and 
pushed the door closed. I heard her clear, rather high voice 
asking whether Colonel Grayle was home yet. The servant 
murmured something in reply, and I caught the sound of 
his footsteps growing fainter along the flagged passage. 
Mrs. O'Rane turned the handle and came in to me, once more 
self-possessed and in control of herself ; there was neither 
embarrassment nor defiance in her manner ; she greeted me 
as she had once before greeted me, when I first met her at 
" The Sanctuary." 

" I hope you've not been waiting long," she said. " Vin- 
cent's usually home by this time. There's not an all-night 
sitting or anything, is there ? " 

" Not so far as I know," I answered. " Mrs. O'Rane, I 
don't think I'U stay any longer." 

She looked at my newly-lighted cigar and untouched whisky 
and soda. 

" It's just as you like," she said. " It seems a pity to run 
away without seeing him, though. I presume you came to 
see him and not me ? " 

" I came to see him. I didn't know you were here." 

" But I've been here the whole time. Didn't you know 
that ? " 

" We didn't." 

" But where else was I likely to be ? " 

" Your husband never suspected that Grayle had any hand 
in it. I fancy you and Grayle did your best not to enlighten 
him. You let him think it was another man, and Grayle 
gave an alibi. I suppose it was all right ; I'm not versed in 
the ethics of the thing. ' ' 

I made a step towards the door, but Mrs. O'Rane was in 
my way. 



170 Sonia Married 

" Yes, I don't know why Vincent said that," she observed 
reflectively. " Unless he thought that nobody was ever 
going to know. . . . But I'm not quite so abandoned as that. 
I warned you all, I told you my old married life was over ; 
and I was free to start another. As for not enlightening any- 
body, it's not my business to correct all the mistakes people 
choose to make. . . . Now that you've been here, you can 
report everything you've seen. I'm not hiding anything, and 
you can say I'm not ashamed of what I've done, and I'm quite 
prepared for all the world to know. He can divorce me as 
soon as he likes." 

The discussion did not make me want to stay any longer in 
the house, and I had to ask her to let me pass. 

" You can tell him that," she added carelessly. 

" I don't know that he contemplates divorcing you," I 
said. " He's never mentioned the subject." 

" But he'll have to. He can't go on being nominally 
married to me, when I'm — well. . . ." 

" Are you sure you don't mean that your own position will 
be a shade less discreditable when Grayle marries you ? " I 
asked. " Frankly, you haven't been thinking of your hus- 
band very much, have you ? " 

She sighed impatiently. 

" You will keep on speaking of him as my husband." 

" He is." 

" Until he divorces me." 

" Unless he divorces you," I substituted. 



CHAPTER FIVE 

THE LIMITS OF LOYALTY 

" O knights and lords, it seems but little skill 
To talk of well-known things past now and dead. 

" God wot I ought to say, I have done ill. 
And pray you all forgiveness heartily ! 
Because you must be right, such great lords ; still 

" Listen, suppose your time were come to die. 
And you were quite alone and very weak ; 
Yea, laid a-dying, while very mightily 

" The wind was ruflSing up the narrow streak 
Of river through your broad lands running well ; 
Suppose a hush should come, then some one speak : 

" ' One of these cloths is heaven, and one is hell, 
Now choose one cloth for ever ; which they be, 
I will not tell you, you must somehow tell 

" ' Of your own strength and mightiness ; here, see ! ' 

" After a shivering half -hour you said : 
' God help ! heaven's colour, the blue ; ' and he said, ' Hell.' 
Perhaps you would roll upon your bed, 

" And cry to all good men that loved you well, 
' Ah, Christ ! ... if only I had known, known, known. ..." 

William Morris : " The Defence of Guenevere/ 



WHEN I first met Sir Aylmer Lancing, I was a very 
young and very impecunious member of the 
Diplomatic Service ; he was in early middle life and a 
millionaire many times over. It was a time of mental 

171 



172 Sonia Married 

green-sickness with me, when I had an undergraduate's mor- 
bid craving for ideas, something of an undergraduate's con- 
tempt, too, for those to whom ideas made no appeal. In 
describing Sir Aylmer as a man without ideas, I am saying 
something which he would have endorsed and interpreted 
to mean far more than I intended. He had no ideas outside 
his business, though within it he shewed a deliberate, dogged 
objectivity, the sublimation of common sense, which was 
staggering and irresistible as a battering-ram. I have met 
no one with whom the essential was so invariably the obvious. 
One day, when we were crossing together to America, I asked 
him what were the qualities which made most for success in 
any career. He answered, for all the world like the tritest 
of stage millionaires, " Always know what you want and go 
for it ; always be quite clear about what's going on in your 
own mind." 

Lancing left an estate of over twenty milUons ; I had made 
before the war about two hundred thousand pounds ; despite 
the difference, I boldly affirm that the first intellectual quality 
for success is an ability to know what is going on in other 
people's minds. Bertrand Oakleigh has the quality in a high 
degree. I made fun of him, indeed, over many years because 
he was so oracular. At his house in Princes Gardens, in the 
Smoking Room and at the Club he would sit looking up at the 
ceiling with a long black cigar jutting defiantly from under 
his heavy walrus moustache, always a little more profound 
and unhurried than the rest of us, always armed with a general 
principle, always ready with a philosophic theory, some- 
times paradoxical and usually pretentious. But, when he 
dropped what George once caUed his " sneers and graces," 
forgot to be prejudiced or pontifical, he was shrewdly intelli- 
gent. Had he been less indolent, less fond of gossip, less 
detached and content to be the amused spectator, he could 
have made a considerable political position for himself, for 
he had a rare faculty of hearing innumerable opinions on the 
same subject, melting them down, so to say, and producing 
a prophecy. But, as he grew older, he would not take the 
trouble to think for himself, or to ascertain what others were 
thinking. 

I went to him for advice on the results of my visit to Grayle's 
house in Milford Square. 



The Limits of Loyalty 173 

'' " Well, I take it that the one person we're interested in is 
David," he said, by way of giving me a lead. 

The remark was characteristic of his love for O'Rane, but 
I am afraid it was also indicative of his general aversion from 
women and of his dislike for Mrs. O'Rane in particular, a 
dislike which dated back to a time long anterior to her mar- 
riage. I was weakly ready to go farther and interest myself 
in her, too, if only on account of her youth and an obstinate 
belief that youth has a good title to happiness. 

" Well, we're looking for the best solution," I suggested, 
" not meting out justice. Grayle and Mrs. O'Rane are waiting 
for O'Rane to file a petition. That was her message. Now, 
O'Rane's never said whether he'll divorce her or not ; prob- 
ably he hasn't made up his mind, and certainly I don't know 
his views on divorce. She's in an impossible position — 
socially — as long as she lives with Grayle without marrying 
him ; and Grayle's position will be very uncomfortable as 
soon as the story gets about. It's enough to spoil his 
political career ; whereas he'U live it down, if there's a con- 
ventional divorce and he lies quiet for a few months. If 
O'Rane wants to take his revenge, he need only refuse to 
set her free." 

" He's not looking for revenge," said Bertrand oracularly. 

" Then you'd say — anyone would say — that the kindest 
and most generous thing he could do would be to divorce 
her. I'm only uncertain because I know something of Grayle ; 
I presume he'll marry her, but, when the honeymoon period's 
over, he'll make her supremely unhappy. Perhaps that's 
no more than she deserves, but, if O'Rane thought she'd be 
unhappy by marrying Grayle, conceivably he might exercise 
his power to prevent it." 

" Conceivably he might," Bertrand assented drily. 

" Well, those are the alternatives — to divorce or not to 
divorce. I'm amazed to find how weU the secret's been kept, 
but it can't be kept indefinitely. It happened to be me last 
night, but Tom, Dick or Harry might just as well have made 
the discovery. Any day now you may have a nauseating 
scandal. We none of us want that, and O'Rane does nothing 
to stop it." 

For a moment Bertrand dropped his omniscient manner and 
shrugged his shoulders with slow helplessness. 



174 Sonia Married 

" What do you suggest he can do ? " he asked. 

" Have the minor scandal of a divorce — I regard that as 
less bad than the common knowledge that she's been living 
for weeks, months, years with a man who's not her husband — 
get it over quickly and give people a chance of forgetting it. 
If he won't do that, let him see if he's got any power to keep 
them from living together. I don't think he has. Grayle 
has sufficient money, his position's not big enough to make 
him susceptible to blackmail " 

" You may take it that David's got no power," Bertrand 
interrupted. 

" Well, it's your turn," I said a little impatiently. 

Bertrand stroked his moustache and closed his eyes 
sleepily. 

" I'll answer your specific question. You know who she's 
living with and you can tell David or not, as — ^you — ^likte. 
It won't make a pennyworth of difference," he added cheer- 
fully. " You see, there's one thing you're leaving out, 
Stornaway, the only thing that matters. David wants her 
back. I could see that on the day 'itself, when he'd caught 
them, when she decamped. . . . Nothing on earth will make 
him divorce her — for purely selfish reasons, if you hke ; he 
can't and won't let her go. But I don't know that you'll 
do much good by putting a pistol of that kind at her head. 
I've known that young woman on and off for about ten years. 
I don't see her knocking at the door and saying, ' Oh, by the 
way, as I can't live with the man I want to, I've come back.' 
Your general question what to do I can't answer. At least, 
we can only go on waiting " 

" And praying that other people won't find out ? " I asked. 

" They wiU, I'm afraid. Well, Sonia's utterly reckless, 
I gather ; she doesn't care who knows. Grayle wouldn't 
have cared in the old days. When he was hving with her 
predecessor — ^you know, the wife of the man in the BraziUan 
Legation ; — Grayle' s so untidy in his amours ; they always 
overlap — it was common property, they went almost every- 
where together, she took the head of his table. Since those 
happy, careless times Grayle has discovered political ambi- 
tions. From the fact that not more than a handful of people 
know, I judge that Grayle wants to keep the thing quiet; 
I'm prepared to bet that Grayle would like best of all to be 



The Limits of Loyalty 175 

free of the whole tangle and, if he can't do that, he'd like the 
divorce to come on as quickly as possible. There's another 
thing you've left out. Do you suppose Grayle had con- 
templated a scandal, a divorce, the necessity of marrying the 
woman ? " 

" I don't suppose anyone in his position sits down and 
thinks it out in cold blood," I said. 

Bertrand opened his left eye and looked at me with a 
malicious smile ; then closed it and opened the right. 

" Some do, some don't," he answered. " That's been my 
experience. I don't much mind your healthy incontinent 
animal, but I hate your continent calculating man — the 
creature who regulates his passions by his fears. He's 
artificial, to start with, and* he's dangerous. Now, I sit here 
like the sailor's parrot. Grayle is becoming the calculating 
animal, Grayle for the first time in his life feels that he has 
a reputation to lose, Grayle is combining disreputable tastes 
with a decorous exterior." 

Bertrand paused to chuckle cynically. 

" Well ? " I said. 

" WeU ? Everybody seems to leave out one thing in his 
calculations, and Grayle was no exception. I put it to you 
a moment ago that he never contemplated the position he's 
in now ; I suggest that Grayle saw a very beautiful young 
woman and- decided, as you'd expect of him, that she was 
fair prey. He studied her carefully. She wasn't to be 
bought, because throughout her life she's been receiving 
everything and giving nothing in return ; she wasn't to be 
drugged, because her head's strong and her nature's cold ; 
she wasn't to be cajoled — Beresford was doing the chivalrous 
devotion business, and she treated him like a tame cat, which 
is what he was ; Grayle discovered that the only thing to 
do was to bully her. He went away, neglected her, snubbed 
her when they met — enough to mortify her without even 
suggesting he cared enough to try and hurt her — ^shewed 
her quite plainly that he could get on without her. Down 
she came with a run and began to make advances to him. 
He was too busy to waste time on her. She was piqued, she 
began to throw herself at him, until at last he got her into 
his power. ... I don't know who made her think she'd any 
cause to be jealous of Miss^Merryon ; it may have been 



176 Sonia Married 

Grayle, she may have evolved it for herself to excuse her 
leaving her husband ; certainly she lashed herself into think- 
ing it was all true, and that was Grayle's opportunity. But, 
once more, he never thought of anything more than a passing 
intrigue, which would have been easy enough with the 
husband away three months at a time. Unfortunately the 
husband turned up unexpectedly just as the intrigue began, 
and that lifted everything on to a much higher plane. Grayle 
cut and ran like a boy caught robbing an orchard — to be 
followed a couple of hours later by the woman." Once off 
the subject of O'Rane, Bertrand was enjoying himself 
prodigiously. " I would have given something to see his 
face when she arrived. Now, in my experience, there are 
mighty few crimes and cruelties that the female won't commit 
to protect the male — ^the male she's interested in — ; she'll 
lie and thieve — and we've probably both of us seen her fixing 
the blame on the wrong man, letting him be cited as co- 
respondent to save her lover. Well, Beresford was sacrificed 
to protect Grayle ; Grayle himself, who'd stayed behind in 
England to carry out the intrigue, used the excuse of his 
mission to the Front to cover his tracks. For two months 
and more he's contrived to keep the thing secret. Do you 
imagine he isn't ready — however much infatuated about her 
he may be or may have been — to get rid of her and start again 
unembarrassed ? When we talk about lifelong devotion, we 
none of us expect to be taken at our word." 

Bertrand opened his eyes to look at me, and I saw that he 
was shaken with noiseless chuckles of malice. I could not 
share in his merriment. 

" I don't see how this helps," I said. " She wants a divorce, 
he wants to get rid of her, and O'Rane — she won't come back 
to him, and, if she did, I can't conceive of his taking her 
back." 

" Then you don't know David, and you've not had much 
experience of young men in his state of mind," answered 
Bertrand with assurance. " In the meantime you can do 
nothing, and you'd better wait till the story begins to get 
round London. It may be weeks or it may be months, but 
that little scandal is not going to lie hid for ever." 

In spite of Bertrand there was one thing that I could do, 
and I did it when next I met O'Rane. It was intolerable, to 



The Limits of Loyalty 177 

my way of thinking, that he should be allowed to meet Grayle 
in ignorance of the blow which Grayle had dealt him. To 
do the fellow justice, I had never seen him seeking O'Rane's 
company, either before or after, but I could not stomach 
the idea that O'Rane might unsuspectingly join him at 
dinner, or even bid him good-night. I broke the news on 
my autumn visit to Melton. As soon as I approached the 
subject, O'Rane's face grew rigid ; when I had finished, he 
said, " Oh, that was it ? I see. Thank you." 

Our brief meeting took place in October, and I do not 
know whether O'Rane came more than once to London until 
the Christmas holidays. I did not see him, certainly, and 
I have never heard whether he ran across Grayle. About a 
week after our meeting, I happened to be dining with the 
Maitlands and once more found Grayle among my fellow- 
guests. Until that moment I had not tried to think what 
line of conduct I should follow on meeting him ; I do not 
yet know what is the conventional course. When Lady 
Maitland went to the drawing-room, however, and he moved 
unconcernedly into the chair next mine, I had no difficulty 
in arriving at a decision. Grayle was middle-aged, rich, of 
unimpaired physique ; he had tasted most kinds of enjoy- 
ment, his life. had been brutishly happy and brutally success- 
ful ; this last intrigue meant as little to him as a kiss 
snatched from an unreluctant dairymaid. It meant more 
to O'Rane. 

I waved away the decanter which Maurice Maitland was 
pressing upon me and asked if he would make my apologies 
to his wife and allow me to slip away unobserved to finish 
some work which I had been compelled to take home. A 
day or two later I entered the House as Grayle was leaving 
it. He turned back and requested the favour of three 
minutes' conversation with me. 

" I just want to understand," he began with an outward 
show of reason and an underlying menace. " I knew you 
knew, of course, but I didn't suspect you of so much melo- 
drama. Am I to take it that you don't want to meet me ? " 

I am afraid that the threatening high voice left me 
undaunted. 

" Grayle," I said, " you must admit you've been a pitiful, 
heartless cad over this." 

12 



178 Sonia Married 

" You don't want to meet me ? " he repeated. " I only 
want to be sure of my ground." 

" You remembered, of course, that O'Rane was blind^' " 
I went on. 

He dropped the menace and assumed an expression of 
mild perplexity. 

" I'm afraid I don't follow where you come in in all this," 
he said, running his fingers through his luxuriant flaxen hair. 
" I'm quite ready to meet O'Rane here or — elsewhere. If 
he likes to plead blindness as an excuse, he can." 

" And you will only plead it as an opportunity," I said. 
" Frankly, Grayle, I never want to see you or hear of you or 
speak to you again. And I wish I could find someone less 
fat and flabby to horse-whip you." 

So a forty years' acquaintance ended. We spoke as and 
when we foimd ourselves members of the same company, 
but I was only to meet him once again in private and only 
to hold private communication with him twice. Perhaps 
I was too busy to frequent the places where I was likely to 
see him ; perhaps, and more probably, he was living in 
comparative retirement. 

During October and November I was constrained to watch 
the fulfilment of Bertrand's prophecy. The fact that Mrs. 
O'Rane was living apart from her husband, if not the fact 
that she was living with someone else, could not be con- 
cealed indefinitely. I had entered their social group so 
recently that I could not count more than half a dozen or 
a dozen friends in common, but in the course of those two 
months I heard many references that indicated suspicion, 
or at least curiosity. Lady Maitland, I remember, shook 
her massive head and told me that it was a great pity for 
Colonel Grayle and Mrs. O'Rane to be still going about 
together so much ; she had hoped that all that nonsense 
was over. . . . Lady Pentyre had heard that there was 
some estrangement. . . . And one night, when I was dining 
at Bodmin Lodge, young Deganway, who prided himself on 
the range of his social information, peered knowingly through 
his eyeglass and asked our host whether the famous Mrs. 
O'Rane did not hail from his part of the country. I forget 
what answer Pebbleridge made, but Deganway started 
talking with fine mystery about a certain Member of Parlia- 



The Limits of Loyalty 179 

ment who should be nameless. . . . George Oakleigh inter- 
rupted him by asking if he knew her. 

" 1 do," he added significantly. 

" Well, but is it true ? " Deganway demanded resiliently. 

" I haven't heard the story yet," George answered. " I 
don't know that I particularly want to." 

His tone was not sufficiently discouraging to closure 
the discussion, and Pebbleridge observed that he had 
not heard the story either. I felt that it was time to 
intervene. 

" I've heard a story," I said. " If Deganway and I mean 
the same thing, there's nothing in it. She used to be rather 
a friend of yours, usen't she, Deganway ? " 

" Oh, I've known her for years," he answered imper- 
viously and impenitently. 

George and I walked part of the way home together along 
Knightsbridge. 

" It can't go on, you know," he exclaimed. " We had a 
frontal attack from Lady Dainton to-day. She called at 
' The Sanctuary ' on her way to Waterloo, and was mildly 
surprised to find me in possession and very fairly staggered, 
when I said Sonia was away and that I didn't know her 
address. Between us we managed to shut Deganway up 
to-night, but that story's being circulated by other people 
as well. I deny it, of course. . . . And I've seen Sonia 
with him three times in ten days." 

I wondered whether she was trying to force his hand — 
and her husband's. 

" Grayle's probably meeting the story, too," I said. " I 
wonder how he likes it." 

" He must have been through this sort of thing so many 
times ! " George sighed. 

" But I doubt if he wants to be the hero of a cause celebre 
at this moment," I suggested. " The political position is 
becoming very interesting." 

A few days before I had found myself at a political meeting 
in the City. We were assembled to demand a " ton-for-ton " 
policy of compensation for the merchant shipping which 
was being sunk by German submarines, and my seat on the 
platform was next to Guy Bannerman's. 

" Grayle couldn't come, so I'm representing him," he 

12* 



180 Sonia Married 

explained. " You may imagine his hands are pretty full at 
present." 

" I can well imagine it," I said, " though I don't go out of 
my way to meet him nowadays." Guy looked at me en- 
quiringly to see how much I knew. " The last time I was 
at Milford Square I was told that you'd moved into quarters 
of your own." 

Guy nodded abstractedly. 

" You know, I don't think you've heard the whole story," 
he said. 

" I've heard more than I want to," I replied, as I began to 
consult the programme of the afternoon's proceedings. 

" Ah, but only on one side. There was such provo- 
cation " 

I laid my hand on Guy's knee. ^ 

" That was good enough for her, but it won't do for me," 
I said. " I've no doubt Grayle worked it up very con- 
vincingly, but you're far too clever to be taken in by it, and 
not half clever enough to impose on me. We both of us know 
that it's impossible to say a single word for either of them. 
There we'd better leave it. It can't be undone now." 

We were interrupted by the chairman's introductory speech, 
but at the end of the meeting Guy took my arm and walked 
with me to Cannon Street Station. 

" I'm not trying to defend them," he said. " In a thing 
like this no outsider can give an opinion worth having. I'm 
only saying that you might be a bit more lenient, if you'd 
heard both sides." 

" It can't be undone now," I repeated. 

As we seated ourselves in the train, he asked me if I had 
any idea what O'Rane proposed to do. 

" Did Grayle tell you to find out ? " I enquired. 

" Of course he didn't," was the indignant rejoinder. 

" But he would be interested to know," I suggested. 
" Well, I can't help you, Guy. O'Rane has not told me ; 
he has not told anyone, so far as I am aware. Why don't 
you interview him on the subject ? " 

Though Guy is a friend, I could not help being a little 
brutal to him in manner ; I have always admired his loyalty 
to Grayle, but at this moment it was a quality which aUenated 
me from him. 



The Limits of Loyalty 181 

" It's no business of mine," said the faithful squire. " I 
don't know O'Rane, but I can't imagine any man sitting 
down under this sort of thing." 

" Is Grayle so desperately keen on a divorce ? " 
" I've never met anyone who went through the Divorce 
Court for Ime of the thing," he answered. 



11 

Half-way through November O'Rane returned to London 
for the mid-term Leave Out. I was apprised of his arrival 
by a telephone message begging me to cancel any other 
engagements and dine with him informally at " The 
Sanctuary." 

It was Saturday night, and I stayed in London to meet 
hiiii. George and Bertrand were his other guests, and we 
dined at one end of the long refectory table on the dais, with 
the rest of the room lit up only by the flicker of the two fires, 
which sent shapeless, indeterminate shadows dancing up and 
down the panelled walls. It is usually as easy to detect when 
a woman lives in a house, as when a house has been un- 
occupied for months. The library was perhaps tidier than 
Mrs. O'Rane used to leave it ; otherwise it was unchanged, 
but it had become indefinably masculine. O'Rane was as 
quiet and self-possessed as I had always found him, but 
now without the noticeable effort which I had observed at 
our last two or three meetings. As might be expected we 
talked throughout dinner of the war and of political changes 
in the House of Commons. Only when we were gathered 
round one fire with our coffee and cigars did he turn the 
conversation on to himself. 

" I must apologize for spoiling your week-end," he said, 
addressing himself to me, " I had to take the opportunity of 
seeing you when I could. AU three of you have been 
amazingly kind and amazingly discreet and sympathetic. 
It's — my funeral, of course, but I wanted you to be present. 
George, perhaps you're 'the best person " 

There was a silence of some moments, while George turned 
his cigar round in his mouth and stared at his boots. 



182 Sonia Married 

" I only know what you asked me to do, Raney," he began 
diffidently. And then to us : " O'Rane told me to fix up a 
meeting with Sonia. I went round to Milford Square last 
night and told her that he wanted to — discuss the future, 
I think I said. Grayle was present. She said she'd come, 
if he came with her ; and I arranged for half-past ten 
to-night." 

He stopped with obvious relief. O'Rane was standing 
with his back to the fire, rocking gently from heel to toe, 
with his hands in his trouser pockets. I saw him put his 
watch to his ear, touch the repeater and smile. 

" It's not ten yet," he said to Bertrand and me. " If you'd 
rather be out of it. . . . I got George to attend as my second 
and I wanted you two to be — well, to hear what we said 
and keep us cool. I've been thinking over this business 
pretty steadily for some months, and I feel it can't go ort. 
My idea about marriage — well, to begin with, people mustn't 
marry unless they feel they can't get on without each other. 
... If they find they've made a hopeless mistake, nothing 
to my way of thinking justifies spoiling two lives by keeping 
them coupled together. Sonia knows that, I've always told 
her so. . . . Well, no one could find anything to say for our 
present position, it's neither one thing nor the other. If 
Soma's made her choice " 

He broke off and shrugged his shoulders. Bertrand turned 
his eyes away from the boy's face and gazed slowly round 
the long, warm, softly-lighted room. George had dis- 
covered a spot of grease on the sleeve of his uniform and 
was industriously scraping it with the end of a wooden 
match. 

" Go on, O'Rane," I said as gently as I could. " We 
haven't got much time. She's coming here, and you're 
going to ask her what she means to do." 

He nodded almost gratefully. 

" Yes. If she tells me coolly and dispassionately — ^that's 
why I've got you men here ; I don't want a scene — ^that she'll 
be happier with Grayle " — I saw his underlip tremble before 
he could get out the name — " After all, it's her happiness 
. . . isn't it ? " 

There was another pause. 

" You'll set her free ? " I suggested. 



The Limits of Loyalty 183 

" I suppose so," he whispered. 

I looked at Bertrand, and he first shrugged his shoulders 
and then shook his head. The first gesture seemed to mean 
that he did not mind what was said, the second that he him- 
self did not propose to say it. 

" You will divorce her ? " I went on to O'Rane. " I only 
want you to see all sides of the question. It's not — ^pleasant, 
but if she wants it and you're ready to face it on both your 
accounts. . . . There will be a big scandal, O'Rane. She's 
very well known in society. And any Member of Parliament, 
even if he wasn't as notorious as Grayle. ... It will make 
good copy for the papers, I'm afraid." 

" I'd save Sonia front it, if I could," said O'Rane, moisten- 
ing his lips. " Of course, if Grayle doesn't mind " 

" I should think he'd mind very much," I interrupted. 
"If he doesn't want to appear in the Divorce Court just 
now — ^" 

"He should have thought of that before," said O'Rane 
grimly. Then he held out his hands in entreaty. " You 
don't suggest I can let it go on any longer ? Most people 
would say it had gone on too long, that if I'd had a spark of 

pride I can't ! Try to imagine if your wife. . . . 

Thinking of it night and day, night and day, forgetting for a 
moment when you're asleep and then waking up fresh to it 
every morning. ..." His hands stole up and pressed his 
temples as though they were bursting. " You lie for a 
moment wondering what it is that's hanging over you," he 
whispered, " and then you remember. . . . And you forget 
again for a moment, when you're working, or people are talk- 
ing to you . . . but you always know it's there . . . and it 
comes back — comes back with a stab in the middle of what- 
ever you're doing. . . . And they mustn't see. . . . God 
knows, a divorce won't alter things much, but at least it's a 
definite break ; I've given her up, I've got no claim, no 
rights. ... It can't go on any longer. Have — have all you 
men got something to smoke ? " 

He came quickly forward from the fireplace and touched 
his way to a table behind our chairs. Though his back 
was turned, I could see out of the corner of one eye 
that he was furtively wiping his forehead with the back of 
his hand. 



184 Sonia Married 

" If by any chance they don't want a divorce, will you insist 
on it ? " I went on unsparingly. 

" Of course not. Provided they separate. You don't 
imagine " 

" If they do ? If your wife asks you to forgive her and have 
her back ? " 

O'Rane had never smoked, I have been told, since his 
blindness ; he could no longer taste the tobacco, nor keep it 
alight. I observed him now putting a cigar in his mouth and 
chewing the end. 

" It's not very likely to arise," he said. 

" But if it did ? " 

" I'll wait till it arises." 

He came back to his old place on the hearth-rug, and we 
remained silent until the clock struck half-past ten. At the 
sound I could see the others growing tense and expectant, as I 
was doing. O'Rane had been whistling through his teeth, 
but he abandoned even this distraction. For myself, uncom- 
fortable as I knew us all to be, I could not help thinking that 
Mrs. O'Rane and Grayle could be hardly free from all feelings 
of embarrassment. To return to the house, which had been 
given as a wedding-present sixteen months before, accom- 
panied by the lover with whom she had left it, to meet her 
husband and discuss how he proposed to deal with her in- 
fidelity — the bare bones were enough, without clothing them 
in imagination. I pictured Mrs. O'Rane giving the familiar 
directions to the driver, tapping on the window when he lost 
himself in trying to take short cuts through the streets of 
Westminster, stopping him at the door and being helped out 
by Grayle. . . . And Grayle, for all his seasoning, had never, 
I was very sure, been led by the wife into her husband's house 
and presence. . . . 

I scribbled on an envelope and handed it to George : 

" Couldn't they have pitched on some other place ? " 

" I wanted a private room in an hotel — neutral ground," 
he wrote back. " Raney insisted on this. Moral effect, I 
suppose." 

As I crushed the paper into my pocket, I reflected that 
O'Rane was taking risks. The sight of the room and of him- 
self might act on his wife like the smell of blood on an animal. 

The clock struck again, and I exchanged glances with 



The Limits of Loyalty 185 

Bertrand. It was so characteristic of Mrs. O'Rane, even in 
my short acquaintance with her, that she should be late on 
such an occasion. 

" You did say to-night, didn't you ? " O'Rane asked, trying 
to keep his tone unconcerned. 

" I don't suppose they've been able to get a taxi," George 
answered. " It was raining before dinner." 

A moment later we grew tense and expectant once more 
at the sound of an engine. I heard the slam of a door and 
Grayle's voice saying : " Will you wait a bit ? " Then 
Bertrand, George and I rose from our chairs, as the flame- 
coloured curtain was drawn aside and Mrs. O'Rane walked 
composedly into the room, with Grayle in his staff imiform a 
pace behind. She narrowed her eyes and then raised her 
brows almost imperceptibly when she saw who was present. 

" I'm sorry if we've kept you all waiting," she said, as she 
slipped her arms out of her coat and handed it to Grayle. 

O'Rane swallowed. 

" Won't you sit down ? " he murmured. 

George and I each pulled an extra chair into the half-circle, 
and I watched Mrs. O'Rane settling herself. Presumably 
she must have started the evening pale, for her cheeks were 
slightly rouged — and I had not observed her to use rouge 
before. Her eyes, too, looked tired, as I had seen them at 
our chance meeting in Hyde Park several months before, but 
she was perfectly controlled, and I could trace no sign of 
nervousness or embarrassment. As though she were shewing 
herself off to young Beresford or any other of her admirers, 
I saw her look down at the pink dress which she was wearing, 
smooth a crease out of one glove, lift one transparent sleeve 
higher on to her shoulder and settle the folds, of her skirt. 
Grayle spent some moments laying her coat carefully across 
the back of a chair ; then dropped on to the end of a sofa, 
with his stiff leg rigid in front of him, and began peeling off 
his gloves and tossing them into his cap. He, at least, was 
not at ease ; and, when George picked up the cigar-box and 
offered it him, he stammered in his refusal. 

There was a moment more of silence, and then we turned 
slowly and with one accord towards O'Rane. As though he 
felt our eyes upon him, he tossed the cigar behind him into 
the fire and faced his wife. 



186 Sonia Married 

" I — George probably told you, Sonia — I'm spending the 
week-end in London. I thought we- might discuss things a 
bit." 

Mrs. O'Rane looked unhurriedly to left and right. 

" By all means," she acquiesced. "Do we want — quite 
all these ? " 

" I should have preferred to meet you alone. As Colonel 
Grayle said he was coming " 

" He had a right to come. Of course, if you prefer every- 
thing dragged up in public. ..." 

She shrugged her shoulders and began to play with the 
watch on her wrist. 

" I think everyone here is acquainted with most of the 
facts," said O'Rane. " But I'm not proposing to drag up 
anything that's happened. I asked you to come here because 
I wanted to talk about the future. I expect everyone will 
agree that the present position can't continue." 

He waited for a sign of assent. Mrs. O'Rane took off one 
glove and helped herself to a cigarette from the gold case at 
her wrist. 

" I told Mr. Stornaway that you were at liberty to divorce 
me," she said, with a glance in my direction. " I said I was 
willing to face it. I don't know whether you ever got the 
message." 

I decided to watch Grayle, but he was sitting with his head 
back, staring at the ceiling and occasionally blowing elongated 
smoke-rings. 

" The Divorce Court is — an unsavoury place," O'Rane 
observed. " I want you to believe, Sonia, that what I've 
always said is as true now as when I first said it. I put your 
happiness higher than anything in the world, I'm trying to 
leave myself out of this." 

Mrs. O'Rane looked once at her husband, and her eyes 
seemed to harden ; then she glanced without apparent 
purpose at the half of the room which was within her field 
of vision. I noticed for the first time that the flower-vases 
were empty ; I fancy that she noticed it, too. Her mouth 
began to purse, and I knew that O'Rane would have done 
better to hold his meeting elsewhere. 

" It's very kind of you," she said stiffly. " Isn't it rather 
late in the day for you to be thinking of my happiness ? 



The Limits of Loyalty 187 

When I lived herC' But you said you didn't want to go 

into what was past. The future's simply in your hands. 
I've told you I'm willing to face it. I don't believe in this 
modern business of the man always letting himself be divorced 
by the woman. I'm — ^willing — ^to face it. You've got your 
witnesses ; they'll stand by you, if anybody criticizes 
you." 

" But if I don't want to see you in the Divorce Court, 
Sonia ? " 

" I'm afraid that's one of the things you can't help." 

O'Rane's chin dropped on to his chest, and he began to 
pace up and down the ten-foot rug in front of the fire, with his 
hands plunged into his pockets and his fists so tightly clenched 
that the knuckles of either hand stood out in four sharp lumps 
against the sides of his trousers. Grayle still sat like a 
husband reluctantly dragged to hear a dull sermon ; Mrs. 
O'Rane set herself to light a second cigarette from the glowing 
stump of the first, leaning forward so that the ash should not 
scatter over the pink dress. A quarter past eleven struck, 
and I remembered that Bertrand and I gravely consulted our 
watches and pretended to compare them by the clock on the 
mantelpiece. 

At last O'Rane halted by Grayle's chair. 

" You're in this, too. Colonel Grayle," he said. " Once 
more we need concern ourselves only with the future. I 
should like to hear your views." 

Grayle brought his head forward with a sharp jerk. 

" It's her happiness we're considering," he agreed slowly, 
with his eyes on O'Rane's waist. " I — well, it's for her to 
say; I obviously can't tell you what will make her happiest ; 
she's the only person who can do that. You've not put for- 
ward any case for yourself ; I mustn't put forward any for 
myself. She must tell us both whether she's been happy 
enough these last months to want to go on. ... I may say — 
you haven't attacked me, so perhaps I don't need to defend 
myself — I may say that, when a woman's unhappily married, 
I don't regard her as being under any obligation to her 
husband ; she's free to start her life again ; and any man is 
free to share that life, if she sees fit. That — ^that's my 
theory, in case you feel there's any question of rights 
involved." 



188 Sonia Married 

His tone was becoming truculent, but O'Rane nodded 
gravely. 

" Yes. But we agreed to leave the past alone," he said. 
" I've knocked about a good bit the last thirty years and I 
can assure you that I never want to be put on my trial for 
anything. Let's stick to the future. Do you wish — my wife 
to go through the Divorce Court ? " 

I looked at Mrs. O'Rane to see if the offending word would 
rouse her, but she seemed not to have heard it. The hard 
composure of her entrance had broken down ; she seemed 
ready to faint with fatigue, and the patches of rouge on cheeks 
that were grown suddenly white gave her an absurd something 
of a Dutch doll's appearance. I fetched her a tumbler of 
soda-water, and her smile of thanks was the first human 
thing that I had seen about her that night. As she began to 
sip it, I saw her glance over the brim at Grayle. ' 

" I don't wish it," he said at length. " What — what else 
is possible ? " 

" You can say good-bye to her," O'Rane suggested quietly. 

Grayle looked up uncomprehendingly ; and Mrs. O'Rane's 
eyes flashed in sympathy. 

" Desert her, you mean ? " 

" It's hardly the word I should have chosen, but we needn't 
go into that. Colonel Grayle, neither you nor I want a 
scandal. By the mercy of God, there's only one man outside 
this room who knows what's been taking place all these months. 
We've agreed that my wife's happiness is the thing that we're 
both unselfishly seeking, we won't bandy rights and wrongs, 
or grievances or justifications — we won't even try to put our 
love for her into a scale. If you give me your word of honour 
that you'll never see or speak to my wife again, I will take no 
further steps ; I'm not trying to steal her away from you, 
so that I may get her back myseJf — she must determine her 
own happiness. You and I can at least spare her the un- 
happiness, the vulgarity, the morbid, sniggering curiosity of a 
public scandal. She can live in another part of the house, 
live away from me, let it be known confidentially that we 
somehow didn't manage to get on very well together. . . . 
Are you prepared to make that sacrifice for her happiness ? " 

Grayle lit another cigarette, coughed and fetched himself 
a syphon and tumbler. 



The Limits of Loyalty 189 

" You're begging the question," he said at length. " You 
can't define the conditions of Soma's happiness." 

" I know what will make her Mwhappy. That's good 
enough as a negative definition. " 

Mrs. O'Rane pushed her chair back a few inches and rose 
to her feet. She looked round for her coat and walked to the 
chair where Grayle had laid it. 

" I've said I'm ready to face everything and everybody," 
she said over her shoulder, as she slipped her arms into the 
sleeves. 

" But, please God ! you don't know what you're facing ! " 
O'Rane cried, with an outburst of emotion which he was no 
longer able to contain. " Grayle, you say you love her ! If 
you care a snap of the fingers for her, if you've any humanity, 
any decent feeling in the whole of your composition, if you 
hope for mercy in this world or the next, you've got your 
opportunity now ! The one thing you can do for her abiding 
happiness is to take my hand and swear you'll never see her 
again. You know it is ! You can walk out of this house and 
leave her so that no one wUl dare to say a word against her, 
for fear of being thrashed within an inch of his life. If she 
doesn't get on well with me, if we part by common consent, 
that's my fault ; everyone will say that I was always eccen- 
tric, that she was a fool to marry me, that I've spoiled her 
life. . . . Will you do that, Grayle ? Will you shew that 
what you call your love for her means something ? " 

As he ended, I heard a muffied banging on the front door. 
George hurried away, and a moment later there came the sound 
of an engine starting. 

" It was only the taxi-man," he explained, as he came back. 
" He's got a train to catch at Victoria, so I paid him off. 
We can telephone for another one when it's wanted." 

Mrs. O'Rane looked at her watch and frowned. 

" I wish you hadn't done that, George," she cried petu- 
lantly. " It was pouring when we came, and now we shall 
probably have to walk home. ... I don't see that there's 
anything more to be said. It's very kind of everyone to take 
so much trouble about me, but, if I'm prepared to go through 
with it, that ends the matter." 

" But you're talking about something you don't under- 
stand, Sonia ! " cried O'Rane. 



190 Sonia Married 

" Perhaps I understand better than you think," she 
answered. " It's just conceivable that Vincent and I both 
thought about the consequences beforehand. Good-bye." 

She turned to the door, and Grayle followed her. George 
moved mechanically forward to open it for them. Bertrand 
and I remained where we were, watching O'Rane smooth back 
a wisp of black hair that was glued to his forehead. 



Ill 

It was characteristic of O'Rane that he went back to 
Melton at the end of his leave without hinting to anyone what 
he was going to do. After his wife and Grayle left "^The 
Sanctuary," I waited for perhaps ten minutes to see whether 
he wanted my opinion or advice, but he made no reference 
to the scene at which we had all been present. All that he 
said to the Oakleighs was, " Well, I'm rather tired. I think 
I shall go to bed." He disappeared els quietly and suddenly 
as he had come ; perhaps we were to see him back in six weeks' 
time at the end of the term, but even this was uncertain. 

The advent of autumn, bringing with it the recognition 
that there must be another winter in the trenches, roused 
the country from the uncaring optimism or placid resignation 
in which the summer had been passed. In the London Press, 
at the Club, in the House and at private dinner tables, I 
found very general agreement that the war had entered 
upon a new phase. A timid minority earnestly confided to 
discreetly chosen audiences that the people who talked about 
a deadlock and a stalemate peace were proving right after 
all. With the exception of Beresford, who thought no opinion 
worth holding unless he shouted it from the house-tops, the 
new peace-school was obviously frightened of being called 
unpatriotic or Pro-German. Bertrand would shake his 
head gloomily and begin sentences half- jocularly with : " I 
suppose I shall be called the Hidden Hand next, but all I 
can say is . . ." Whatever it was, he said it in an undertone 
and made sure of his man before saying it. Others tried to 
avert personal attacks by discussing war and peace in the 



The Limits of Loyalty 191 

abstract, adducing uncertain historical parallels and wondering 
academically whether it was wise to aim at humiliating a 
great country too much ; were we not sowing the seeds of 
future wars ? 

The discussion seldom continued to be academic, and the 
peace school by its furtiveness and timidity invited perse- 
cution, as does the mild urchin at school who never stands 
up for himself and becomes a legitimate target for his fellows' 
kicks. Early in December there was much talk of the 
American " peace-kite." President Wilson had been re- 
elected, his hands were free, and for four years he could mould 
the policy of the United States without fear of an election. 
It was said that his patience was nearing its limits, that he was 
ready to break off diplomatic relations with Germany and 
that the " peace-kite " was a last attempt to arrive at terms 
of settlement before deciding to plunge his country into 
war. 

The rumours of peace discussions and possible terms pro- 
duced an immediate repercussion in London and developed a 
greater intensity of political feeling than had been known since 
the war began. There was said to be a peace-party in the 
Cabinet ; the blunders and catastrophes of more than two 
years were set down to the malevolence of Ministers who 
had been driven to war against their will and were only anxious 
for an immediate end, even if such an end meant victory for 
the enemy ; I heard once again Lady Maitland's confident 
assertion that the Government was in German pay. . . . 
There could be little academic discussion in such an atmosphere, 
and the one public attempt which I heard Bertrand make 
was literally shouted down. 

" All I say," he kept repeating one night at Ross House, 
" is that I see no reason why we should be successful in 1917, 
when we've failed in 1916. I may be wrong ; I don't pretend 
to have sufficient data. I only warn you that in six months' 
time you may have to accept worse terms than you could get 
now — with a balance of half a million or a million lives the 
wrong way. That's a big responsibility." 

"You'd let Germany keep all she's got," Lady Maitland 
asked, " as an instalment? " 

" Germany's broken, as it is," Bertrand answered. " She 
can never make good her losses and she'd gladly discuss 



192 Sonia Married 

terms. But, good Heavens ! even if we didn't accept the 
terms, there's surely no harm in discussing them ! " 

Maitland shook his head sagely. 

" When I'm dealing with the burglar who's collared my 
silver," he said, " I prefer not to argue until he's divested 
himself of what I believe is called the swag." 

" You may -prefer not to. Can you enforce your prefer- 
ence ? " Bertrand asked rather curtly. 

" Then let's go down fighting," Lady Maitland proposed 
valiantly. 

" With great submission, a live dog's better than a dead 
lion," said Bertrand. " I've so much faith in the potentialities 
of my country that I want to preserve her." 

Lady Maitland turned on him with unaffected ferocity. 

" If you make peace now, you'll disgrace her ! " she cried. 
" We shall never be able to hold up our heads again ! " 

Young Lady Loring, who was between Bertrand and me, 
was no less strong. 

" Uncle Bertrand, you can't be serious ! " she exclaimed. 
" We should be faithless to those who've died, if we didn't 
hold on. I — I would sooner have my husband killed a 
second time than go back on the dead ! " 

Her intensity of feeling caused a stir, followed by an em- 
barrassed pause. Maitland brought it to an end by shaking 
his head good-humouredly. 

" I say, Oakleigh, old man, if I may say so, you oughtn't 
to talk like that, you know. You're a man in a responsible 
position, people quote what you say. It produces a devilish 
bad impression." 

My instinctive sympathy is always with the minority, and 
I came mildly to Bertrand's support. 

" I agree with Oakleigh to this extent," I said. " All of 
us here are either women or men over military age. We 
ought to check the easy impulse to make other people fight 
to the bitter end." 

" You won't hear any peace-talk at the Front," interposed 
Maitland. " I've just come back from G.H.Q., you know." 

Bertrand gave a snort of impatience. 

" You won't find people lighting pipes in high-explosive 
factories," he answered. " It's against the rules. At the 
present time the policy of the war is dictated by people who 



The Limits of Loyalty 193 

can't conceivably be sent to carry it out. Stornaway's quite 
right. We fat old men sit at home and water the fields of 
Flanders with other people's blood. We say that, if they don't 
go on to the bitter end, there'll be another war in ten years. 
It's wrong, and we've been wrong every day we've gone on 
after we shewed the Germans that they couldn't overrun 
Europe at will. / went through the phase of dismember- 
ing Germany, deposing the Kaiser, commandeering the 
Fleet." 

There was an unfortunate note of intellectual superiority 
in his voice, as though he alone had waded through the depths 
and shallows of folly and was at last (and alone) on dry land. 
His reward was immediate interruption by a chorus from every 
quarter of the table at once. 

" Perhaps if you'd had a brother in solitary confinement 
for eight months because he called the guard a Schweinhund, 
which was the only word they'd given him a chance of 

learning " began little Agnes Waring on my left with 

considerable heat. 

" You wouldn't stir a finger to avenge Belgium ? " demanded 
Lady Maitland. 

" Oakleigh ! Oakleigh ! " her husband expostulated. 
" You're too old to fight yourself ; for God's sake don't damp 
the ardour of those who can, those who'll go on till they've 
dictated their own peace terms — in — Berlin," he ended 
proudly. 

As the chorus subsided for want of breath, Frank Jellaby, 
who was now one of the Liberal Whips in the Coalition, 
allowed his incisive, nasal drawl to rise and dominate the 
table. 

" The trouble about you, Oakleigh, is that you go through 
so many phases ; we poor, benighted folk can't keep up with 
you. There was a phase — quite a long one, for you — when 
any war with Germany was impossible, unthinkable. Didn't 
you run a paper to prove it ? When the war came, someone 
twitted you in the House, and you made a personal statement 
— and a pretty complete recantation. You've been wrong 
here, wrong there. ... If I may put it quite brutally, how 
are we to know you're not just as wrong now, how soon may 
we expect another personal statement ? " 

" Have all your prophecies been right ? " Bertrand enquired. 

13 



194 Sonia Married 

" What prophecies have I made ? " was the bland and 
temporarily safe rejoinder. 

It was the one articulate effort which I heard at this time 
to determine the limits of military effort. It was derided and 
drowned ; and from that — as we had to go on fighting — 
there was a short and easy road to criticism of present 
methods. 

" We've put our hands to the plough," said Maitland pla- 
catingly, when the ladies had left us. " We can't turn back, 
Oakleigh. And I'm afraid I believe that the biggest trial's still 
ahead of us." 

" And you're satisfied we shall come out of that any 
better ? " Bertrand answered. " Your experience of the war 
leads you to expect that ? God knows, the men don't lack 
courage or sticking-power, but can you find them general- 
ship ? " 

" We must go on till we do." 

Bertrand smoked for some moments in a reflective silence. 

" It's a curious thing," he observed at length, " that a war 
of this size hasn't thrown up a single soldier of first-rate 
genius." 

Maitland, for all that he had made the cleanest possible job 
of an Afghan raid and was now counter-initialling minutes 
in an extension of the War Office, took the criticism as 
personal. 

" That is precisely what the soldiers say of you politicians," 
he retorted. 

" The soldiers' job is to understand warfare and run a 
war," Bertrand propounded. 

" The statesman's job is to govern," Maitland retaliated. 
" That's just what the Cabinet doesn't do and just what you 
M.P.'s don't make it do." 

In the altercation which followed I hstened to Maitland 
and watched Jellaby. The first acted as a barometer to mark 
the variations of average, prejudiced, unthinking opinion ; 
it was the business of the second to follow the daily movement 
of the barometer. I did not need a second look at JeUaby 
to know that he was worried. He and I had talked in odd 
half-hours at the House about the possibility of attaining the 
objects for which we had entered the war ; when our prospects 
were far brighter, Jellaby had been more rationally despon- 



The Limits of Loyalty 195 

dent, and I chose to think that his attack on Bertrand was an 
inspired attempt to suggest that any consideration of peace 
was at present out of the question and that a hard-pressed 
Government had better use for its time and energies than 
debating-society resolutions. He made no defence or com- 
ment, however, when Maitland developed a damaging attack 
on the Cabinet, and I fancied that he could not speak without 
indiscretion. Whether the Press reflected the public or the 
public reflected the Press, there was a widespread feeling 
that an ungainly Cabinet of twenty-two talked incessantly 
and decided nothing, that countries were overrun and oppor- 
tunities thrown away, because no one acted in time, and that, 
paralyzing as this collective lethargy so often and so tragically 
proved, it was still no check on the spasmodic and mis- 
directed energy of individual members. Bertrand was one 
of a school which scented Press intrigue in every political 
development, but, as Grayle was credited with having said : 
" A Government which can't down Northcliffe can't down 
the Germans." 

Of Grayle I saw nothing at this time, though a fresh crop of 
rumours told me that he was engaged once more on the task 
which he had begun a year and a half before, after the battle 
of Neuve Chapelle. Watchful friends discovered him slipping 
in and out of the houses of Unionist Ministers ; there were 
tales of informal gatherings and chance week-end meetings 
at Brighton or on Shannon Wood golf-course. 

" He wants a new coalition under Lloyd George," Bertrand 
explained, " but the Tories aren't nibbling. You see, there's 
no popular cry that they can put up. George is at the War 
Office ; if he and they can't make their will effective, they'd 
better resign like Ccirson, they mustn't proclaim their own 
impotence by whimpering. But they can't resign on the 
groimd that the war's being mismanaged, because they're 
jointly and severally responsible for the mismanagement. 
There's no issue." 

Later on he talked to me with a mixture of resignation and 
disappointment . 

" If the Government falls, it will be simply because it 
doesn't know its own strength. It runs away every time 
anyone shakes a stick at it ; it never says : ' Turn us out and 
be damned ! ' Meanwhile its authority is being sapped daily. 

13* 



196 Sonia Married 

. . . It's the old complaint I brought against it for eight 
years before the war. Ministers are so high and mighty 
that they never remember who it is that keeps 'em in power. 
' Never explain, never complain ! ' It won't do ! For 
months the Press has been urging that something must' be 
done to raise fresh drafts after the Somme slaughter, that food 
prices must be controlled, that Ireland can't be left where she 
is. The Government goes about like Caesar's wife. . . . And 
everyone thinks it's doing nothing, and where should we be 
without Lord Northcliffe ? And give us a Man ! I don't 
know when or where the break will come, but I hear most 
ominous cracks." 

The break came — unexpectedly, so far as I was concerned 
— in the first week of December. I say " unexpectedly," 
because I have yet to discover why the Government did not 
fall three months earlier or endure until three months later. 
Bertrand, who took on a new lease of life when the days of 
crisis approached, told me that the point of cleavage was the 
question whether more troops should be sent to Salonica. 
True or false, this was obscured by an ultimatum in which 
the Secretary of State for War called for a Merovingian War 
Cabinet in which the Prime Minister was to have no 
place. 

As I walked home from my office, the contents bills bore the 
legend : " England's Strong Man to Go." George Oakleigh 
and one or two others were dining with me, and by the time 
that I was dressed the news was being shouted in the streets 
that the Government had resigned. I suppose that I am as 
near to an Independent as the caucuses and the House of 
Commons wiU allow, but, though I had opposed the old 
Liberal Administration in fully half of its measures, I felt 
a sentimental regret that the long rule was over. It closed an 
epoch to me at a time of life when I did not want to close 
epochs. 

" I had four years of it at the beginning," said George un- 
enthusiastically. " I'm afraid that in my youth and in- 
experience I hoped more of it than it was capable of giving. 
And I was rather glad to be out, when the war came along. 
Beresford's quite right, you know ; for seven or eight years 
the fate of this country was in the hands of three or four men 
who accepted our support and never gave us an inkling where 



The Limits of Loyalty I9r 

they were taking us. Are all political rank-and-filers treated 
as cavalierly as we've been ? It goes on right to the end. 
The Coalition came into existence without consulting the 
Liberal Party and now it's gone out — every bit as much on its 
own. You and I don't know why ; there was no vote, no trial 
of strength. Nobody can say how many supporters anyone 
else can claim ; there isn't even the usual man who's defeated 
the Government, for the King to send for. They have treated 
the party like dirt ! Now it remains to be seen whether an 
alternative Government can be formed." 

That night and for a day or two afterwards London was 
filled with a greater political excitement than I can ever 
remember at any other time. Bertrand told me that, in the 
interests of governmental and national unity, there had been 
a disposition to accept the terms of the ultimatum, but that a 
majority had decided that here at least a stand must be 
made. 

" Now you simply must tell me what's happening ! " young 
Deganway exclaimed when I met him dining late at the Club. 
" Bonar Law's been sent for, as you know, but I hear he's 
told the King he can't form a Government. That leaves only 
George. How much life do you give him ? Three weeks ? 
I want you to say three weeks, because I've got a fortnight 
bet on the other way with a man in the War Office and I'm 
rather inclined to hedge." 

The next day it was announced officially that Mr. Bonar 
Law was unable to form a Government and that the King 
had sent for the Secretary of State for War. There was 
fresh furious speculation how short a time would suffice to 
shew that he would fail, as his predecessor had failed, but 
the speculation was incommoded by the intrusion of fact. 
Bertrand informed me that the Prime Minister-Elect had 
struck a bargain with Labour, but that the Liberal and 
Unionist members of the Coalition were refusing to serve under 
a man who had slain his master. I next heard that the 
Unionist attitude was modified, that it was felt the King's 
Government must be carried on, that pressure had been 
brought. . . . 

" Of course, when once the rot sets in ! " cried George 
Oakleigh, when we met by the tape-machine at the Club. 
He was undisguisedly disappointed, which was interesting. 



198 Sonia Married 

For eight or nine years I had heard from him plain and bitter 
criticism of the Government, but the old faith in his political 
idols had survived unexpectedly to make him forget the 
war and become the most excited of partisans. No terms 
were too strong to describe the treachery which had laid the 
Government low ; his new-born good- will towards the dead 
Ministry was only exceeded by his blind antagonism to any 
alternative. " There was a day when Lloyd George could 
not get a man near him ; then the Tories began to rat and 
everyone tried to elbow his way in before his neighbour. . . . 
He'd got the liver in his pocket, everyone was afraid of being 
left out, the doors of the War Office weren't wide enough to let 
them all in. This latest development has rather disgusted 
me with politics. I shouldn't have minded if it had been an 
ordinary peace-time political intrigue. I suppose I've been 
hoping for a higher standard since the war . . . gratitude^ 
things of that kind. How are you going to vote, Stornaway ? 
Bertrand keeps saying that he must support the de facto 
Government. Is that your view ? " 

" I want to see the ie facto Government first," I said. 

" You've an intelligent anticipation here," he answered, 
handing me a copy of the Night Gazette. " Sir John Woburn 
can be relied on to have good stable information." 

The first page of the paper contained a streaming headline — 
" Do It Now " or " Wait and See ? " Underneath came 
an obviously inspired forecast of the new Ministry with the 
old Unionist and Labour members back in place as to some 
eighty per centum of their numbers ; the old Liberal office- 
holders were collectively abstaining, and their place in the 
party scale was filled by consequential nobodies and by the 
leaders of the Liberal " ginger group." 

" If they've got rid of the brains, at least they've kept the 
dead-heads," George observed. " I don't see stability or long 
life here, Stornaway. Everyone knows that Woburn and the 
Press Combine turned the Coalition out, and now, before a 
single man has been submitted to the King, the Press Com- 
bine's at work devouring its own child. The new Ministry's 
too much tarred with the brush of the old, Balfour and 
Robert Cecil and the less feather-brained are to be pushed out 
of their offices some time before they get into them. It's 
going to be a very clean sweep." 



The Limits of Loyalty 199 

^I heard later that the attack on the elder Unionist statesmen 
was abandoned on the day when the Unionist party threatened 
to withdraw its support from the new Coalition unless news- 
paper attacks on its members ceased immediately. 

" Is Grayle included ? " I asked as George drew an ex- 
pressive finger down the draft list. 

" He gets a new Ministry of Recruiting. At least, when I 
say that he gets it," George corrected himself, " this is quite 
imof&cial, of course. He's suggested for it." 

" I wonder if he'll get it," I said. 



IV 

In London, more even than in the fabled Indian bazaar, the 
secret of to-day is the thrice-told tale of to-morrow. The 
same few thousand men and women migrate so regularly 
from one to another of the same few hundred houses that, 
if you let fall a piece of gossip at limcheon in Chesterfield 
Gardens, it wiU have taken wing to Portman Square and Hans 
Place by tea-time and will set tongues wagging over the dinner- 
tables of Westminster, Pall Mall and Piccadilly. By Satur- 
day night the germ-carriers have spread themselves for a 
himdred miles to the west, north and south ; before the week- 
end is over, the news may reasonably be expected to have 
reached Paris and, in these latter days. General Head- 
quarters ; and there has probably been more than one sly 
hint in the personal columns of the Sunday papers. Lady 
Maitland hears the story that very day at luncheon from 
the Duchess of Ross, who has met Gerald Deganway the night 
before at the Opera ; he had been dining with Lady Pentyre, 
who had spent the week-end at Oxford with the Cutler- 
Blythes ; yoimg Haviland had come over to lunch on Sunday 
and had brought the story from All Souls'. . . . 

Deganway's name appeared most regularly in these lists, 
but I doubt if he had the wit to invent scandal ; he was 
content to collect and hand it on during the hours when his 
energies might have been more disastrously employed at 
the Foreign Office. It was from him that I first publicly 
heard even a rumour of Mrs. O'Rane's escapade ; George 



200 Sonia Married 

Oakleigh and I succeeded in stopping his mouth, and for a few 
more precarious weeks Milford Square sank back to its former 
insecure silence. Then the busy tongues got to work again, 
and within thirty-six hours I had heard six various accounts 
in as many places, starting with an early morning encounter 
in Hyde Park with my niece, who observed triumphantly, 
" Now I know why you haven't been talking about the great 
Sonia O'Rane the last few months." 

" How much do you know, Yolande ? " I asked. 

" I heard yesterday that she'd run away," was the answer. 
" I wasn't told who with ... I can't say I was surprised." 

At luncheon the name was supplied, unsupported by 
details, however. I was sitting next to Lady Pentyre, who 
welcomed me with even greater fervour than our old friend- 
ship warranted. 

" I've been longing to see you ! " she began eagerly. " You 
know Mrs. O'Rane, don't you ? And you know Colonel 
Grayle. Well, is it true. . . . ? " 

" Is what true ? " I asked, as she paused delicately. 

Her full question was inaudible, but I caught the words 
" chere amis." 

" Ask someone who knows them better," I suggested. " I've 
hardly seen either for months." 

There was less delicacy about Pebbleridge, when I dined 
with him ; less still about Frank Jellaby, when I met him at 
the Club. To the party organizer moral depravity is of 
interest only in so far as it contributes to damage a hostile 
cause. 

" Grayle's hardly chosen a fortunate moment for the double 
event," he observed gleefully. 

I made it a rule in these days never to admit knowledge 
of the facts until I had discovered how much my antagonist 
knew. The House of Commons on this occasion was better 
informed than Pont Street, the County Club or Eaton 
Place. 

" Well, you know, he's been living — for months, apparently 
— ^with Mrs. O'Rane ? I'm told O'Rane is bringing a petition. 
It will rather cook Grayle's goose, if this all comes out just 
when he's waiting to be sent for. It'll be a pretty bad case, 
from all accounts. You know O'Rane, don't you ? Well, 
he lost his sight early in the war, which won't get Grayle 



The Limits of Loyalty 201 

much sympathy ; and he was pretty newly married, which 
will appeal to the sentimental ; and the whole business seems 
to have been conducted without any regard for human 
decency. Grayle used to go to the house as a friend, have 
them to his house, meet O'Rane in the Smoking-Room . . . 
If he goes into the witness box, he'll be broken for all time, 
but, whether he goes in or not, he's dished himself for the 
present; even in war-time the Nonconformist Conscience 
wouldn't swallow a scandal of that kind. It's a bit ironical, 
isn't it ? Like Paxnell when he'd got Home Rule in the hollow 
of his hand. Grayle has done more to bring about this crisis 
than any six other men — including Northcliffe. He worked 
the Tories ; he could call for anything he liked ; and now 
you and I have only to wait for the story to get round a 
bit, and you'll find that Grayle's duties at the War Office 
are so important that he won't have time to attend the 
House, let alone taking a job." He laughed jubilantly. 
" Nemesis ! Nemesis ! " 

" // the story is true," I said. " Where did you hear it ? " 
" Oh, everybody's talking about it ! You don't suggest 
it's imtrue ? " 

" I agree that everybody's talking about it, though that 
by itself doesn't make it true. Indeed, I've heard so many 
versions that I'm beginning to get confused. You say that 
O'Rane is bringing a petition ? That's quite well-established ? 
If so, this is the most convincing version that I've heard since 
lunch, because I don't suppose he would act on mere sus- 
picion." 

Jellaby looked up to the ceiling and pinched his chin 
thoughtfully between thumb and finger. 

" I can give you my authority, I think. I was talking 
to several of the Lobby correspondents — ^it was that little 
man Palfrey, the fellow from the Night Gazette. He told me 
that Grayle had been sent for all right, but not to be sounded 
for an office. This story was going about, and they wanted 
to know if it was true. I don't know where Palfrey got 
his facts from, but he's usually very well informed. He 
told me quite definitely that O'Rane was applying for a 
divorce." 

I hardly knew whether to be surprised or not. When 
I last saw O'Rane, he did not seem to have made up his own 



202 Sonia Married 

mind. At first he had told us unmistakably that he would 
be driven to bring the marriage to an end, unless his wife 
and Grayle separated ; later, when she was for a moment 
once more in his house, he forgot to threaten and expended 
himself in pleading, with an appeal to Grayle which I should 
have been unable to resist, if I had been in his place. Her 
voice and bodily presence, the memories of the few weeks 
when they had lived together there seemed to have killed 
any feeling of resentment and of personal interest ; O'Rane 
was begging the two of them to spare him the necessity of an 
extreme step. He did not convince them, but, when I left, 
I was not sure that he had not convinced himself. 

Jellaby was about to leave me, when I called him back. 

" I want to ask a favour of you," I said. " Don't make 
party capital out of this — yet awMle, at least. I know all 
these people ; and I should like you to hold your hand for 
the present. If the story's true, if the case comes into court, 
it's public property for the world to discuss. But, until then, 
don't spread a story which may not be true and, true or not, 
must be tolerably unpleasant for young O'Rane." 

" But I'm not spreading it ! " Jellaby protested. " Every- 
body seems to have heard of it except you." 

" Everyone's heard of it at about fifteenth hand. Whether 
it's true or not is very simply tested by events. O'Rane's 
not lil<ely to let his wife go on living with Grayle, if that's 
what she's doing now ; if he takes action, you'll know 
your story's true; if he doesn't — well, for pity's sake don't 
even repeat such charges against a perfectly innocent 
woman." 

The epithet made Jellaby wag his head at me very know- 
ingly. 

" There's no smoke without fire, you know, Stornaway," 
he said. 

I cannot deal with debilitated minds which employ pro- 
verbs in place of arguments ; Jellaby remained unanswered. 

I had hardly got rid of him and ordered myself a glass of 
port wine, when a page-boy brought me a card and stated that 
Sir Roger Dainton was waiting in the hall and would like to 
see me for a moment. Now, I had been on nodding terms 
with Dainton a dozen years in and out of the House, but we 
had never attained greater intimacy, as I am temperamentally 



The Limits of Loyalty 203 

unable to suffer bores gladly. A call from such a man at 
nine o'clock in the evening could mean only one thing. 

" Ask him, with my compliments, if he will join me in a 
glass of wine," I said. 

Under his usual garb of awkward dif&dence and universal 
apology, I could see that my visitor was perplexed and 
worried. For several moments I entirely failed to check 
his flow of regret at disturbing my dinner ; when I silenced 
him with three interruptions and as many invitations to 
taste his wine and try some of my nuts, he planted his elbows 
impressively on the table, leaned forward, opened his lips 
and then flimg himself back and swept our corner of the 
Coffee-Room for eavesdroppers. 

" I hope there's nothing wrong," I said. 

He planted his elbows in position a second time and abruptly 
covered his face with his hands. 

" It's — incredible," he began. " My little girl — Sonia — 
you know Sonia ? Have you heard about it ? " 

" I don't know what you're referring to yet," I pointed out. 

" Soma's run away from her husband ! " he whispered 
imcomprehendingly. " She's gone off with another man. 
They say — ^they say David's going to divorce her." 

He lowered his hands, and the round, child's eyes, har- 
monizing perfectly with the chubby, boyish face, were as 
full of horror and incrediility as his voice had been. I knew, 
of course, that Dainton had lost his elder son in the first year 
of the war and I believe that the younger had been wounded 
at least twice ; this was the first time, however, that he 
had been flung against the sharp rocks of life, and he was 
as helplessly and bewilderedly scared and resentful as a 
child who has fallen among the breakers on a rugged coast. 

" You had better tell me all about it," I said. 

His stammering, self-interrupted narrative added nothing 
to the three sentences which he had already spoken. The 
blow had fallen that day at luncheon. Dainton found himself 
one of a large party which was for the most part unknown 
to him. Half-way through the meal he caught the soxmd 
of his daughter's name with some comment which would 
have been grotesque, if it had not been uttered with so much 
assurance. There followed the silence which drives home to a 
speaker that he has said something unpardonable and that 



204 Sonia Married 

he alone is unaware what it is. Dainton's neighbours rallied 
simultaneously and doused him with two conflicting jets of 
conversation, only to find that he was not listening and that, 
when they paused, he asked in an amazed whisper whether 
they had heard what was said. 

" I may not have caught it right," he explained hope- 
fully. 

But both denied that they had heard the words in 
question. 

When luncheon was over, an unknown woman with a 
scarlet face came up to him and apologized with tears in her 
eyes. What he must think . . . She wouldn't have done 
such a thing for the world . . . Really it was partly their 
hostess's fault for not introducing them properly. Honestly, 
she had no idea. . . . 

" I asked her to say it again," Dainton told me dully. 
" It was the very first I'd heard, the first I'd suspected. ... I 
can't believe it now — not Sonia . . . She — she said it was 
only a rumour, she couldn't vouch for it, but there was a 
report that David was going to " 

He paused to raise his glass, spilling the wine generously. 
" I didn't know what to do. I couldn't go about asking 
every Tom, Dick and Harry whether my daughter — ^When I 
got away from the office to-night I went round to her house 
to see if I could find out anything from Oakleigh or George — 
I could talk to them fairly freely ... I remember my wife 
told me, I forget when it was, that Sonia was away and that 
George had moved in there to look after his uncle ; neither 
of us ever dreamed then . . . They were both out, so I thought 
I'd come and bother you. I knew you were pretty intimate 
with them. I — quite frankly I want you to tell me if what 
that woman said was true." 

I did not find it easy to face Dainton's troubled, boyish 
eyes. 

" I'm afraid it is," I said. " She's left O'Rane, she did 
go off with another man. I'm sorry to say that your luncheon- 
party wasn't the only place where it was being discussed, 
and several people have told me that the petition's actually 
been filed." 

Dainton picked up a pair of nut-crackers and twisted them 
nervously open and shut. 



The Limits of Loyalty 205 

" This will Tdll Catherine," he muttered. " We've both 
of us always been so proud of her, she was always so wonderful, 
even when she was a little child . . . Stornaway, is this 
true ? Is there no doubt of any kind ? You don't know 
what she is to us ! " he cried fiercely, as though I had been 
responsible for the shipwreck of their pride. 

" There seems to be no doubt at all." 

" I wonder if I may have another glass of wine," he said 
absently. " I'm afraid I've spilt most of this." 

We must have sat for another hour in the deserted Coffee- 
Room, now silent as Dainton yielded inch by reluctant inch 
to the slow penetration of inevitable truth, now discussing 
explanations and canvassing expedients for retrieving a lost 
position. Beyond giving Grayle's name and mentioning 
that I had been present when an attempt was made to obviate 
divorce proceedings, I volunteered no details and did my 
best to give patient hearing to schemes which the rest of us 
had either rejected already or refused to consider. He would 
force Sonia to return to her husband, force O'Rane to take 
her back, force Grayle to give her up. . . . 

" There's no kind of force you can use," I had to tell him. 
" We've tried argument and entreaty, and that's failed." 

" Her mother can make her ! " 

" No one can make her ! " 

Dainton looked at me as though I had contrived the 
catastrophe and were pluming myself on its completeness. 

" But do you mean we've got to stand by and see our Sonia 
in the Divorce Court, to have her examined and cross- 
examined — our own child — with reporters scribbling it all 
down and everybody reading about it next day in the papers ? 
It's unthinkable, Stornaway, it's unthinkable ! " 

" Tell me any way of avoiding it, and you may count on 
any help I can give you. By all means see her yourself, or 
get Lady Dainton to see her. Of course, assuming that 
O'Rane has started proceedings, I don't know that you'll 
stop him. He's behaved with the greatest love and loyalty, 
and, if I may say so, your daughter outraged them when she 
went back with Grayle after we'd tried to persuade her. But 
get Lady Dainton to see her. It can do no harm, but I advise 
you not to build too great hopes on it. Your daughter's last 
words, pretty well, were that she'd thought it all over before- 



206 Sonia Married 

hand and was prepared to face everything. Conceivably 
she may be frightened when she's taken at her word, but I'm 
inclined to think it will only make her set her teeth the 
harder." 

Dainton looked at me dazedly, as though his mind had 
lagged a sentence and a half behind everything that I was 
saying, and he were trying to overtake me. With marked 
indecision he raised his glass, lowered it, raised it again and 
gulped down the last mouthful of wine. Then he rose to his 
feet and beckoned me to do the same. 

"•There's not a moment to lose," he said gravely. " I'm 
going round to see Sonia at once. If you'U shew me where 
the telephone is " 

I led him to one of the boxes by the porter's office and 
dawdled in front of the tape-machine while he searched for 
Grayle's number and awaited his call. There was httle news, 
but numerous prophets were helping the new Prime Minister 
with a wealth of conflicting suggestions to construct his 
Cabinet. I had not succeeded in finding Grayle's name 
mentioned more than once when Dainton emerged and led 
me to a sofa. 

" She's not in," he said. " I don't quite know what to do. 
I must tell my wife at the earliest possible moment. . . . 
My God, if she came up here and had it broken to her as I 
did to-day. ... I should like to catch the ir.io to-night 
. . . and I could go and see David to-morrow. Poor boy ! 
I'm not blaming him, but he can't understand what he's 
doing, what this means to us — Sonia ! If only I knew about 
it ! . . ." He turned to lay his hand timidly on my knee. 
" She seemed very determined, when you saw her ? " 

" Immovable," I answered. 

" You think she'd disregard her own father and mother ? 
Stornaway, you don't know what she is to us ! " 

His voice gave me the answer, but I saw no way of bringing 
home to him that he and his wife were less than nothing to 
her at this moment. 

" You can only try," I said. " I've seen her at ' The 
Sanctuary ' with O'Rane and Grayle, I've seen her in Milford 
Square by herself " 

He looked at his watch and turned to me excitedly. 

" Look here, I can't be in two places at once and I must 



The Limits of Loyalty 207 

get down to my wife. Will you — I've no claim on you ;1 I 
ask it, because I can't help myself — will you go to Sonia, 
insist on seeing her, tell her of our meeting to-night and beg 
her — in her mother's name — and mine " 

His faltering sentences lagged and halted until they stopped 
altogether. 

" If you wish me to," I said. 

" I can never thank you enough ! I pray you'll never be 
in a similar position, but if you are " 

" Don't build extravagant hopes on it," I warned him again. 

When I had seen him into a taxi, I drove to Milford Square 
with profound and momentarily increasing distaste for my 
mission. I felt instinctively that it was foredoomed to 
failure ; I knew that two hours after I had failed the Daintons 
would be staring blankly at each other, or pacing nervously 
up and down the room, refusing — despite my repeated warn- 
ing — ^to abandon hope imtil my failure had been confessed. 
And I knew that I must see Mrs. O'Rane alone — which Grayle 
would try to prevent — and make an emotional appeal — 
which I was ill-equipped for doing. . . . 

My taxi drew up at the door. I rang and enquired of my 
old, smooth-faced antagonist whether Mrs. O'Rane was at 
home. I was told that she was not. 

" Then I'U wait for her," I said, squeezing past him into the 
hall and taking off my coat and gloves. " Is Colonel 
Grayle in ? " 

" Not yet, sir. Mr. Bannerman's in the smoking-room." 

" I should like to see him," I said, " if he's not engaged." 

Guy dragged himself out of an arm-chair with a mixture 
of surprise and distrust. 

" Hullo ! what brings you here ? " he enquired. " I never 
expected to see you." ■••' 

" Well, I never expected to see you," I answered. " I 
thought you'd been banished." 

He looked at me with cautious absence of expression and 
then applied himself to treading a little mound of cigar-ash 
into the carpet. 

" Grayle ought to be in soon," he volunteered. " He said 
he wouldn't be late." 

" It was Mrs. O'Rane I came to see." '■ -^ •: 

Guy looked at me closely and raised his eyebrows slightly. 



208 Sonia Married 

Then he buried the lower half of his face in a tumbler of 
whisky and soda, glanced at me again over the brim, swallowed 
and set the glass down empty. 

" What d'you want with her, if I may ask ? " he enquired. 

Guy has a dual personality compounded of loyalty to his 
master and love for humanity at large. The combination is 
not an easy one to imagine, but he contrived at once to blend 
the qualities and yet keep them distinct. I told him frankly 
and fully of my conversation with Dainton. 

" I warned him that he was sending me on a fool's errand," 
I said. " But how could I refuse ? I'd submit to being 
sent on a dozen fool's errands each day, if I thought I could 
spare him — and his wife — and O'Rane — and his wiie " 

Guy raised his hand to interrupt me. 

" Look here, how much do you know ? " he asked, as I 
had been asking every second person that day. " Not the 
early part ; what I mean is, are you up to date ? " 

" Two or three people have told me that O'Rane's actually 
filed his petition," I said. " Is that true ? " 

" I don't know. Is that all you know ? " 

" My dear Guy, the whole of London's discussing the thing, 
I've heard an approach to the truth and most kinds of 
variants." 

" But is that all you know ? " he repeated. 

" I imagine so," I answered. 

Guy shrugged his shoulders helplessly. 

" Then you're not up to date," he said. " / got Dainton's 
enquiry on the telephone and I told him that she wasn't in. 
It was true — as far as it went. She's gone, Stornaway. I've 
not the faintest idea what happened, but there was — a big 
row of some kind — not the first, by any means, I may tell you 
— and she walked out of the house." 

" But Where's she gone to ? " I asked, as soon as I was 
sufficiently recovered from my surprise to ask anything. 

" I've no idea," he answered. 



The Limits of Loyalty 209 



I wanted to ask so many questions that I hardly knew where 
to begin, but Guy — with the best possible intentions — was 
not in a position to tell me anything worth hearing. Mrs. 
O'Rane, at the end of an hour-long altercation behind closed 
doors, had come into the hall, with a pearly-white face, 
collected a fur-coat and umbrella and walked into the Square. 

" She stopped for a moment on the top step and imfastened 
her latch-key — she used to carry it tied to her bag with a bit 
of ribbon ; I found it in my hand the next moment, and she 
was saying good-bye and telling me quite casually that she 
wasn't coming back. Grayle — he didn't even trouble to come 
out of the smoking-room. What it was about I can't say, but 
they must have had an unholy row." Guy looked at me 
dubiously, weighing my discretion. " I suppose, now that 
it's all over, there's no harm in saying that rows were the rule 
rather than the exception. . . . Right from the earliest days 
when she used to come and dine here, or he took her out. 
I don't know how either thought they could possibly live in 
the same house. Of course, she fascinated him," he conceded, 
with the j;usto of a Promenade habitue, " but she never cared 
for him. I'm as certain of that as I am of my own existence. 
She's a curious woman ; it used to make me go hot and cold 
sometimes to see and hear Grayle with her — he was cruel — 
but, the more he bullied her, the more she respected him. If 
he shewed her the sort of deference a man does shew a woman, 
he seemed to lose his grip. I don't know how much you saw 
of them before she came here, but she was playing cat and 
mouse with Grayle. Or trying to. He soon put a stop to 
that. He's had a good many ordinary affaires, but he was 
really fond of this woman, and, when he found that O'Rane 
was openly living with someone else " 

" That's well-established, is it ? " I interrupted. 

" I believe so. Well, he naturally wanted to protect 
Mrs. O'Rane. She treated it as a joke, until he swore he'd 
never see her again. (He was always saying it, but this time 
he meant it.) Then she got frightened. First she rang up— 
and he ignored her ; she wrote — and he didn't answer her 

14 



210 Sonia Married 

letters ; called — and he refused to see her. The next thing 
was complete surrender." Guy Bannerman spread out his 
hands and shrugged his shoulders. " You can't compound 
a common life of that sort of storm and sunshine. Grayle 
found that, if he wanted to get his way — well, he didn't actually 
take a stick to her, but it was the next best thing." 

Guy paused to sigh in perplexity, trying vainly to reconcile 
his idol's behaviour with his own romantic canons of chivalry. 

" Go on," I said. 

" Well, he was gradually breaking her spirit, killing all her 
charm ; and then I really think that he began to get tired of 
her. They were wearing each other out, and you couldn't 
expect her to be mewed up inside the house, and people were 
beginning to talk. . . . I've told you pretty well all I know." 

I digested Guy's story in silence until I heard the jingle of 
a hansom cab outside, followed by a word or two in Grayle's 
voice. A moment later he was standing in the doorway, 
scowling in surprise at seeing me there. 

" Hast thou found me, oh mine enemy ? " he sneered. 
" I seem to remember your giving it as your considered opinion 
that you never wanted to see me or speak to me again. I'm 
honoured by your visit, of course, but you can — just — clear 
—out ! " 

He pushed the door open to its widest extent and stood 
aside as though nothing would give him greater pleasure 
than to assist my departure with a kick. In his present mood 
he would have done it without much further provocation, but 
I am no more of a physical coward than my neighbour and 
I was not going to let him threaten me. 

" I came to see Mrs. O'Rane," I told him, without getting 
up. 

" Well, no doubt Bannerman's informed you that she's not 
here." 

" I want to know where she is. I may mention that I've 
seen her father to-night. He'd heard nothing till lunch-time, 
to-day, and, though it's no affair of his, I thought he was 
rather upset. He's gone down to Hampshire to break the 
news to his wife, and I promised to see if I could arrange a 
meeting with his daughter." 

Grayle walked to the sofa, picked up my coat and tossed 
it to me. 



The Limits of Loyalty 211 

^•- " I don't know where she is," he said shortly. " And I 
don't care." 

My hat followed the coat through the air and dropped on 
to my knees. 

" Dainton wants to stop the divorce," I said. " That must 
have a certain academic interest for you, Grayle. He's seeing 
O'Rane to-morrow morning." 

I looked in vain for any sign of pleasure, relief or concern. 

" I tell you, I don't know where she is," he repeated. " She 
left this place to-day — and — she's — ^not coming — ^back." 

" You mean you turned her out," I suggested. 

" Oh, I'm sick of this." He limped to my chair and caught 
my wrist in one hand, bending it back until I had to get up to 
prevent his breaking my arm off at the elbow. " As a matter 
of courtesy I told you she'd gone, and the best thing you can 
do is to follow her. You've found time to meddle with my 
affairs for a good many months, but I'm tired of it now ; it's 
got to end. I give you fair warning, Stornaway, that I am 
instructing my servants not to admit you, if you come here 
again ; and, by God ! if you try to force your way in, I'U 
thrash you out with a crop. Now — march ! " 

My exit was painless, though I wiU not pretend that it was 
dignified. I walked a few yards along the Brompton Road, 
wondering what to do next. It was futile to speculate where 
Mrs. O'Rane was gone ; she could not return to *' The 
Sanctuary," she could not go home to her parents ; after 
abandoning her husband and being abandoned by her lover 
within six months she could hardly — with her pride and temper 
— ask a friend to take her in. Any grandeur with which she 
had tried to invest her recklessness and infidelity at our last 
meeting was sorely draggled. And she was about thirty — 
a year or two more, a year or two less ; in the full bloom and 
beauty of her life, with some hundreds from her father to pay 
her hotel bills, debarred by the war even from hiding herself 
for a few months abroad. I stood stiU to wonder where she 
was at that moment, how she was facing the future. 

Then I turned down Sloane Street and made for the 
Underground station. I had meant to go home and, per- 
haps, to telephone to Dainton, but it could do no good, anf' 
I wanted to hold a council of war with the Oakleighs. It 
Sloane Square I met Beresford, hobbling along on a stick, 

14I' 



212 Sonia Married 

and made him turn round and keep me company. In some 
way I felt that he deserved to be present. Bertrand was in 
bed when we reached " The Sanctuary," but I found George 
reading a book, with his feet up on a sofa, and, when I told 
him that my business was urgent, we adjourned upstairs to 
the scene of more than one early morning session. I told them 
as shortly as I could of my interviews with Dainton, Banner- 
man and Grayle and left the facts to sink in. The ensuing 
silence was broken by Beresford, speaking more to himself 
than to the room. 

" The cad ! " he muttered. " Oh, my God ! the cad ! And 
you don't know where she is now ? " 

" No. I've given you all the facts." 

After the one outburst Beresford remained quiet, and the 
other three of us started a rambling debate to decide what 
we wanted done and what was practicable. Bertrand acted 
as chairman and put the questions. We agreed that for the 
sake of O'Rane and the Daintons the proceedings should be 
stopped, if possible ; it was established that Mrs. O'Rane 
and Grayle were unlikely to meet again, and, if we could get 
back to the terms discussed a few weeks earlier, it was still 
conceivable that the scandal might be suppressed. 

" But O'Rane doesn't know they've parted," I reminded 
Bertrand. " Someone must tell him. I'll go down, if 
necessary, as I had the news at first-hand. Of course, if 
he refuses and says they had their chance and missed it " 

" He won't refuse," said Bertrand. " You'll go ? I 
believe we can stop it even now. He's not particularly 
vindictive — he shewed that the other night ; and he'd sooner 
spare his wife than punish Grayle." He grimaced with 
disfavour. " Stornaway, I've never liked that man, but I 
didn't think he was capable of this." 

" Nor did she, poor soul ! " 

We had reached our decision, and, if I had to leave for 
the country by an early train, I wanted to get home to bed. 
George and his uncle were chewing the cud of my story, and I 
saw no end to that. I was putting on my coat, when Beres- 
ford begged me to stay a moment longer. 

" You're not leaving it at this, are you ? " he asked, with a 
white face. aJ .: 

" Have you anything to suggest ? " I asked. a 



The Limits of Loyalty 213 

" You're going to let Grayle ride off ? Merciful Christ I 
And I thought some of you were Sonia's friends ! " ^.v 

He struggled to his feet and in another moment, bumping 
past me, was half-way to the door. George sprang from his 
chair and had one foot planted solidly in the way before 
Beresford could reach the handle. 

" Here, where are you off to ?" he demanded. 

" Something's got to be done about Grayle," was the reply. 

" What do you mean ? " I asked, for Beresford had the 
voice, the eyes and the bearing of homicidal mania. 

"I'm going to have a word with him," he answered between 
clenched teeth. " Let me go ! " 

There was something pitifully incongruous between the 
purposeful language and the emaciated, consumptive speaker. 
Grayle, for all his unsound leg, could pluck him up by the 
ankles and crush in his head against the waJl like the shell 
of an egg. 

" Let's hear some more about it first," I said, taking his arm 
despite a quiver and jerk of protest. " I know Grayle fairly 
well, and, if you're going to match yourself against him in 
physical strength, you might just as well try to knock holes 
in the side of a battleship with your naked fists." 

Beresford wriggled against my grip. 

" I can have a go at spoiling him first," he cried. " After 
that, I don't mind what happens." 

Their motives were diiferent, but I was vividly reminded 
of the Cockney Huish preparing to advance, vitriol jar in 
hand, against the unerring rifle of Attwater. I looked over 
Beresford's head and lifted my eyebrows at Bertrand, who 
raised himself in bed and called him twice by name. 

" You mustn't do anything hasty," he urged, wagging his 
forefinger with great parade of reasonableness. " Any kind 
of attack on Grayle is bound to recoil on Sonia, and that's the 
last thing you want. I assure you that twenty-four hours 
after you'd gone for him " 

Beresford shook free of my arm and limped menacingly up 
to the bed. 

" You don't care a curse for her," he cried, " but you pretend 
to care for O'Rane. You're going to let Grayle break up 
O'Rane's life, take away Sonia from him, throw her out of 
doors " 



214 Sonia Married 

Bertrand spread out his hands with a gesture of bland 
expostulation. 

" My dear boy, we can't prevent it. It's done, and any act 
of private vengeance will hit David and Sonia hardest of all. 
Haven't we been scheming and contriving to prevent the 
divorce for that very reason ? We all know that it would 
dish Grayle's political career to be cited as a co-respondent 
at the present time ; it would keep him out of the Cabinet 
or compel him to resign. But I can tell you that it would 
dish the O'Ranes very much more completely. Dear boy, 
when we're hoping to close down one scandal, for Heaven's 
sake don't open up another." 

If not impressed, Beresford was at least interested and 
temporarily checked. He stood reflecting with a scowl on 
his face and his underlip thrust forward. 

" Is that — ^brute going to be taken into the Government ? " 
he asked. 

" According to the papers there's every possibility," 
Bertrand answered. " No one will ever know, but I choose 
to believe that he tired of Sonia from the moment when his 
plans were threatened by the possibility of a scandal." 

Beresford looked at him wonderingly and then turned to me. 

" Do you bear that out ? " he asked. " I don't know enough 
of public life to say if it's true. Do you mean that, if Grayle 
went into the Divorce Court, he'd be broken ? " 

The eagerness of his tone frightened us a little, for we 
thought that we had talked him out of danger. Bertrand 
assumed great determination of manner. 

" Grayle's not going into the Divorce Court, if we can 
help it," he said. 

" Grayle's going to be broken, if I can work it," was the 
retort. 

" But you can't. No one would support you more readily, 
if it were possible." 

Beresford dropped into his former chair without answering 
and propped his chin on his fists. Bertrand watched him 
uneasily ; George came back from the door and led me away 
to the window. Tentatively he asked me how far I thought 
the threat of proceedings could be used to block Grayle's path 
of office. 

" I don't know how far you can blackmail a man," George 



The Limits of Loyalty 215 

admitted. " Particularly a man like Grayle. It's only an 
idea. I've just thought of it. If we could make him sign 
an undertaking — something that we could use against him 
and that he couldn't turn and use against us. It all wants 
the devil of a lot of thinking out. . . . If Raney doesn't divorce 
Sonia now, when the offence is still fresh, I suppose he weakens 
his position ; he may not be able to get a divorce later, 
and then our barrier's kicked to matchwood. I'm not a 
lawyer ; perhaps Bertrand. . . ." 

We walked to the bed, where Bertrand was sitting with his 
eyes on us. I cannot say whether my friends have been more 
unfortunate than the generality, but one has bound himself 
by a similar undertaking not to play cards, two more not to 
enter certain cities, and four or five to resign certain positions 
and to live abroad. As a rule, however, a felony was being 
compounded, or the offence was one against honour wherein 
there was no statute of limitations. 

" It's mere bluff, and he'll beat you at that game," Bertrand 
said without hesitation. " What Grayle's done is to outrage 
public opinion, and the public has a short memory. You 
could break him now, but in two, three years' time people 
would say, ' This is very ancient history, we've heard her 
story, but not his ; probably he wasn't so much to blame 
as she makes out ; she couldn't live with one man, so it's 
conceivable that she couldn't live with another. But, any- 
way, it's ancient history.' In three years' time your man of 
the world would think none the worse of him ; and you 
can't tell how far she may have travelled in three years. 
Time's on his side." 

" But this is the opportunity of his political life," George 
persisted. " In three years' time it may have gone beyond 
hope of returning." 

" But he knows that David wouldn't sacrifice his wife to 
punish him. Haven't we talked ovirselves hoarse to find a 
way of stopping the proceedings ? Grayle's a level-headed 
fellow " 

" Hardly at this moment," I interrupted. 

Bertrand looked at me in some surprise. 

" Well, discuss it with David," he said unenthusiastically. 
" If he agrees, go to Grayle and try your luck. I never like 
brandishing weapons that I'm not prepared to use. I tell 



216 Sonia Married 

you it's an empty threat and that Grayle will see through it. 
You know, you're all carried away by some idea of poetic 
justice, you think you've got a pocket retribution packed up 
and ready for him ; you imagine that people are punished 
for their crimes in this world. I've outgrown that phase." 

The superfluous touch of cynicism flicked us all and Beresf ord 
most of all. 

" Somebody's going to punish that man," he cried. " I 
don't know who and I don't know how, but it's going to be 
done. I'll drop everything else and sacrifice all I've got to 
it." 

Bertrand sighed and lay back on his pillows. 

" Grayle's not worth it," he said. 

" But Sonia is ! " Beresf ord cried passionately. 



CHAPTER SIX 

THE UNWRITTEN LAW 



' She said, ' Be good with me ; I grow 

So tired for shame's sake, I shall die 
If you say nothing ; ' . . ." 



A. C. Swinburne : " The Leper." 



FOR a fugitive from justice London is either the best 
hiding-place in the world, or else the worst ; I have 
never had an opportunity of deciding, and Mrs. O'Rane's 
experience has not helped me. 

She left Milford Square in the first week of December ; 
in the middle of January her husband and friends gleaned 
their first news of her. So both succeeded and both failed. 

She has told me that her first action after leaving Grayle 
was to enter a tube station and to study a railway map of 
London. Her knees were trembling violently, and her brain 
was numbed so that she stared at names without reading them 
until something inside her head like the ticking of a watch, 
now silent, now intrusive, as her attention was captured or 
left free, warned her to concentrate her thoughts ; she had to 
get away, and time was being lost, time was being lost. . . . 
The " inner city " was ex hypothesi closed to her ; Chelsea, 
Kensington and Hampstead each contained a sprinkling of 
friends ; beyond them she spelled out the names of places 

217 



218 Sonia Married 

on the outer fringe through which she had passed on her way 
north, west or south from London. Willesden — you met 
Willesden on your way to Holyhead or the west of Scotland ; 
Wimbledon — that was an old friend, encountered every time 
that you went by the London and South Western to Melton ; 
Croydon — surely Croydon lay on the way to Dover ? But 
nobody lived there. . . . Certainly no woman in her senses 
journeyed to Croydon and inexplicably put up at an. hotel. 
What was one to do during the day ? Invent excuses to get 
away from the hotel between meals ? But one must not 
stray towards London. For three hours, morning and after- 
noon, one could walk between interminable rows of villas. . . . 

Yet why confine herself to London, when the whole of 
England lay before her ? She had only to drive to King's 
Cross, Euston, Waterloo, Paddington. . . . But she stood 
in a blouse, skirt and fur-coat ; and all her other clothes 
were at " The Sanctuary " or in Milford Square. She could 
buy others, of course, but her one prayer was to avoid meeting 
people. They were talking about her, they would stare past 
her when they met, or else — worthy souls ! — warn her for her 
good that Colonel Grayle's name was being coupled with 
hers — when he had flung her out of the house ! An hour 
before, she had her speeches ready ; she was nervously 
anxious, after the long strain of waiting, to defend herself 
and defy society in the same breath — ^but there was now 
nothing to defend. She had bought her last dress a fortnight 
ago at Worth's — and Grayle had accompanied her to the 
shop. . . . 

But the clothes were a trifle — ^though she would have to 
start from the beginning, buy a portmanteau, have it sent 
to — well, to her temporary headquarters, paying for her room 
in advance — assuming that the management would take her 
in — awaiting the brand-new trimk and the succession of 
parcels and milliners' boxes. There was not very much 
privacy about such an escape .... And, if you got your 
clothes and got away, you were compelled since the war to 
give your true name wherever you went ; anyone who chose 
to enquire of the police anywhere .... And you could not 
get even to Ireland without a permit. It was natural enough, 
but hard on her, when she was so bruised and beaten, when 
she wanted so desperately to hide. . . . 



The Unwritten Law 219 

No weakness or self-pity ! Back to the map, though it 
were but the map of London. All England might lie stretched 
in a welcoming expanse, but it was lamentably true that one 
knew very little of England. One had stayed in country 
houses here, there and everywhere ; one had gone to an hotel 
in Harrogate, an hotel in Brighton, perhaps three more ; 
one had never explored England like a Cook's tourist or a 
commercial .traveller. One's imagination would not venture 
beyond a familiar ring — ^Brighton, Harrogate, Oxford or 
London. 

She stared at the map until a furtive young man who had 
passed and repassed, slily trying to catch sight of her face, 
asked whether he could be of any assistance. The shock 
of being addressed by a strange voice and the need of col- 
lecting herself to answer it cleared her brain. 

" I want to get to — Euston," she said — and was surprised 
by the ease and assurance of her tone, steady and authoritative. 

" You change into the Hampstead Tube at Leicester 
Square," he told her. 

She waited until he had turned his back and then went 
upstairs to a public telephone and rang up Grayle's house. 
It was prostitution of her pride to communicate with the house 
even from a distance, but she had to have clothes. The 
butler answered the telephone, and, in the same steady, 
authoritative voice she asked him to send everything to the 
Grosvenor Hotel. There was no difficulty about engaging 
a room, if she could say that her luggage was coming later ; 
no difficulty about anything, if she kept her head. . . . And 
then she could look round at her leisure, though she would 
have to change her hotel next day, since she had revealed 
where she was going. 

The next thing ? Money. She drove to her bank, drew 
twenty pounds and enquired the balance. For some weeks 
she could be easy in her mind on the score of money. Of 
course, if her father heard anything and thought fit to stop 
paying her allowance. . . . The drive from the bank to the 
hotel was the worst ten minutes of her life. Hitherto-she had 
only wanted an asylum where she could shelter until she 
was strong enough to face the world disdainfully ; now she 
knew that she could never face the world and that she must 
prowl from one hiding-place to another, lingering apprehen- 



220 Sonia Married 

sively until she was identified and then wearily slinking 
away into greater seclusion. ... Of course her father would 
hear, everyone would hear. And it would give such pleasure 
to her enemies when they saw that they could put her out 
of countenance ! Everyone had enemies ; the most popular 
and beloved girl of her acquaintance had been prosecuted for 
some fraud over the insurance of jewellery, and a chorus of 
jubilation had gone up from these smooth-faced, false friends. 
And, when she herself had broken off her engagement with 
Jim Loring, the vilest things were said ; she heard them 
years later from other friends who wanted to make mischief. 
Women were contemptible creatures. And there would 
be a thunder of exultation at her downfall. They hated her, 
because she told them frankly that women bored her ; they 
were jealous, because she was admittedly one of the greatest 
beauties in London ; for years men had been falling in love 
with her and begging her to marry them ; she could have 
had her choice. . . . 

And now she had been turned out of her lover's house ! 
And the world would know it any day. Already her husband's 
solicitors had written to Grayle, asking for his solicitor's name 
and address. The letter had been on the buhl cabinet, and 
she had opened it in his presence. From the very first she 
had always opened his letters like that ; he had enjoyed it ; 
it had seemed to bring them closer. . . . But this time he 
was furious. That was the first of the big scenes which 
had ended with her leaving the house. . . . She did not know 
when the case would be heard, but the story would race 
round London ; and other stories would be reminiscently 
tacked on to it — her two broken engagements before she 
married ; it would be said that no man could endure her for 
more than six months. . . She found herself shaken with 
quivering, dry sobs. 

In the hall of the hotel a man bowed to her, and she tried 
not to see him, as though she had no right to be there. And, 
when the room had been allotted her, she hurried to it and 
locked herself in ; no one could stare at her there, no one 
could begin to speak and then recollect and break off. She 
looked at her watch, dreading the descent to the dining-room, 
though it was not yet four o'clock ; and suddenly she remem- 
bered that she had promised to dine with Lord Pentyre and 



The Unwritten Law 221 

go to a play. He was home on short leave, they had met at 
luncheon two days before, and she had chosen the restaurant 
and the theatre. . . . 

It was a test case. Since leaving " The Sanctuary " she 
had occasionally dined out with Grayle, occasionally met 
him by chance at other houses and often dined with him at 
home ; they had also dined separately with their respective 
friends, trying to reveal no outward change in their lives until 
it was forced upon them. Soon people would refuse to meet 
her, for, whatever else the altercation with Grayle had made 
clccir, they were being of a sudden universally discussed. 
Bobbie Pentyre had said something about bringing his 
mother, who had come to London for his leave and wanted to 
see as much of him as possible. If Lady Pentyre refused to 
come ... if her absence had to be laboriously explained. . . . 

The telephone meant questions. She wrote out a telegram 
and sent it down by the hand of her chambermaid ; then she 
lay down on the bed and tried first to make her mind a blank, 
but Grayle's voice was echoing in her ears ; then to surrender 
to her headache, but it absorbed only half her attention. If 
she could explain and cry to someone ... a man. . . . 
Staring dully at the clock, she told herself that now she would 
have been dressing, now telling the butler to get her a taxi ; 
now, when her dinner was brought in on a tray. Lord Pentyre 
would be waiting in the lounge at Claridge's ; another 
moment, and he would have been hurrying forward to shake 
her hand, order her a cocktail, offer her a cigarette. . . . 

The hotel would be filled with people that she knew and 
wanted to see — not that she cared about them, but because 
there was something friendly about knowing and being known. 
She loved living in a crowd. In her first season, when she 
came up from the country and was uncertain of herself, she 
could have cried with mortification when everyone else was 
so much at ease and she was left in the cold untU she spoke 
of comparative strangers by their Christian names, like the 
others, to pretend that she, too, had known them since she 
was a child. Instead of which. . . . She was extraordinarily 
attractive, her father never grudged money, her mother 
worked indefatigably ; and — ^there was no harm in saying it, 
when it was all over — she had been taken at her own valuation, 
s ocially boomed. . . . When she was engaged to Jim Loring 



222 Sonia Married 

— she could see it now — what a mesalliance the old marchioness 
must have thought her beloved boy was making ! It 
was all over now, but, when she dined with Bobbie Pentyre, 
she did rather like seeing two-thirds of the people bowing 
to her and knowing that the rest were whispering : " Isn't 
that Sonia Dainton ? Sonia O'Rane, I should say. Who's 
she with ? " In her first season some one would only have 
said : " Pentyre's got a very pretty girl with him." 

But it was all over — ^with that night. And how petty, 
when you were flung against realities ! To-morrow, if Pentyre 
dined at Claridge's, the idlers would nod to him and 
say to one another : " Pentyre reminds me. Usen't he 
to be rather lie with Sonia O'Rane ? Someone was saying 
at lunch ..." And it would all come out ! At least, it 
wouldn't. . . . She didn't care a damn, if anyone knew the 
truth, but, when they whispered and the women pretended 
not to be listening for fear it was improper — ^listening all the 
time till their ears flopped out of their heads . . . ! 

To-morrow ! She started guiltily. To-morrow they would 
be expecting her at ten for the Belgian Refugee committee. 
And she was lunching out with someone — her head ached too 
much to recollect who it was ; she had promised to lunch 
and dine out for a fortnight, as she always did ; luncheon 
was arranged for one o'clock at the Piccadilly Grill Room 
(so it must be some very young admirer !), because she had to 
go on to a charity performance at the Alhambra, where she 
was appearing in a tableau with Lady Sally FarweU and a 
crowd of other people — something eighteenth-centuryish, 
but she had never f ormd out precisely what they were supposed 
to represent. . . . And the day after she was starting a great 
housing scheme for the refugees in London, begging for un- 
occupied houses with one hand and superfluous furniture with 
the other, bringing the two together. That was the kind of 
war-work she liked. ... Sir Adolphus Erskine had promised 
her one of his cars, and she was going round to call on house 
agents in a new green and black hat with broad green ribbons 
at the back and a silk cloak bordered with Valenciennes lace. 
. . . Grayle had sat, beating a stick against his leg while she 
chose it. . . . 

That was all over, too. A bigger woman, she supposed, 
would have gone on her way unperturbed, refusing to be 



The Unwritten Law 223 

frowned out of existence and regally contriving to place 
everyone else in the wrong — The Second Mrs. Tanqueray 
in her rehabilitation. Though that was on the stage, of 
course ; she had never seen it in real life. . . . Anyway, she 
could not sit on a committee with Violet Loring and know 
that she was saying to herself, " I can't make out why Jim 
didn't see through her." Jim never had seen through her, 
he would have cut off his hand to marry her, cut off both hands 
when she broke the engagement. But Violet Loring would 
think that God had stepped in just in time to save him : 
" You're well out of it, my dear ! Rather even poor David 
than you." 

It was a liang time since she had concentrated her thoughts 
on David, but it was too late in the evening to fit him into his 
place. At least, it was only half-past nine, but she was too 
tired to think. It was not much use going- to bed, because 
she obviously could not sleep, but it would be something to 
turn the lights out. Undressing slowly, she discovered 
that she had not begun to unpack ; all the things that she 
did not want would be at the top, and all the things that she 
wanted at the bottom. It really was not worth it. . . . She 
climbed into bed, wondering for a moment why the sheets 
were so warm and discovering that she had not taken off her 
stockings. As she pulled the pillow into the nape of her neck, 
a comb pressed hard against her head, and she found that she 
had not brushed her hair. " I suppose a man's like this, when 
he goes to bed drunk," she told herself. Then her eyes 
closed, and she fell asleep. 

At two, five and seven she woke suddenly, wondering what 
the vague menace was that had frightened her. It stabbed 
her mind ; her heart quickened its beat, and she lay panting 
until gradually she passed into a waking dream. At nine 
she was roused by the chambermaid, who said that a gentle- 
man had called to know if Mrs. David O'Rane was staying 
in the hotel. He gave no name of his own, but hers was set 
out in printed capitals. 

" Mrs. David O'Rane," she murmured, taking the paper 
and trying at once to seem unconcerned and yet to identify 
the writing of the printed letters. " No, it can't be for me. 
Who did you say brought it ? " 

" He didn't give any name, ma'am." 



224 Sonia Married 

" But what was he like ? " she asked, conscious that she 
was speaking too quickly for perfect composure. 

" I didn't see him, ma'am. One of the porters brought 
it up. I'll enquire if you like." 

" Oh, it doesn't matter," Mrs. O'Rane answered. " I was 
only wondering . . . Mrs. David O'Rane. ... It can't 
be meant for me ..." 

It was well that she had registered without a Christian name, 
though she had been compelled to give " The Sanctuary " as 
her address — she had no other — her unknown visitor had ap- 
parently not troubled to carry his investigations so far. It was 
an escape ; it was also the first verbal lie that she had ever told. 

Then for the day's engagements. . . . Perhaps nothing 
would be known as yet ; but to-morrow or the next day it 
would be known, she would not be expected at her Committee ; 
at least, they would wait wondering whether to expect her 
or not. ... It was better to telegraph and say that she 
was slightly indisposed. . . . 

The past was closed as she left the telegraph ofhce. She 
had to dodge back, as she caught sight of Lady Loring and the 
Dowager walking away from the Cathedral, no doubt going 
through the Park on foot to kill time before their joint com- 
mittee meeting. She must get far away from all these asso- 
ciations and reminders ; and she must find something to do. 
All her life she was so restless, she had tried to do too much, 
she was always looking for new excitements ; motherly 
souls like Lady Maitland always told her that — and then asked 
her to sell flags outside the War Office. And with every man 
who fell in love with her there was a phase in which he im- 
plored her tenderly and unselfishly to take better care of her- 
self — and then robbed her of her afternoon rest in order to 
dine early and go to a play. People were wonderfully selfish 
at heart, especially those like David and Vincent, who made 
most parade of their unselfishness and devotion. . . . Even 
when she stayed away in the country and was supposed to 
be doing nothing, she was never happy without some diver- 
sion ; she could not sit down and read or wander about a gar- 
den or go for aimless, dreary walks ; she had always needed 
the stimulus of something to shew her off, to polish and sharpen 
her, something rival and competing, an audience. . . . 

It was not going to be easy to fill her endless day, her life 



The Unwritten Law 225 

of endless days. When war first broke out, she found that 
her world was come to an end, that the men were taking 
commissions and the women training themselves to nurse. 
She, too, had tried to nurse — and had given it up because 
the physical strain was too great. Then after her marriage 
she had collected these committees and acted and sung for 
charity, but there were very few things that she could do. 
And she had not learnt to do anything in the interval. A 
Government office might engage her, if she chose to furnish 
satisfactory references, on unskilled, mechanical work. She 
would go unrecommended, without qualifications. . . . No. 
That could be dismissed. She was not going to the Foreign 
Office, say, to have Gerald Deganway sniggering to his friends 
about her ; or to find herself unexpectedly carrying an armful 
of papers to Sir Harry Merefield, or Lord John Carstairs, 
who had been transferred from the Diplomatic. She knew 
people in all these offices. Before the war she had met them 
every night at dances. . . . 

Of course, a man like Sir Adolphus Erskine with his spider's 
web of commercial interests would find her work, but she was 
not going to take him into her confidence ; he had known her 
in her glory, when London was at her feet. If she had been 
in the mood to discuss herself or ask for sympathy, she would 
have gone the day before to Crowley Court and braved her 
mother. She had not gone, she would never go ; if she had 
brought this kind of thing on herself, she would go through 
with it single-handed. 

As soon as the Lorings were safely out of sight, she walked 
into Ashley Gardens on her way back to the hotel. Opposite 
the Cathedral a car, driven by a girl in livery, was awaiting 
its owner. Mrs. O'Rane suddenly decided to go up and speak 
to her. 

" I wonder if you'll give me some information," she began 
with a smile. " I want to know where you have to go to get 
taken on for a job like that." 

" Can you drive a car ? " the girl asked. 

"I've driven a Fiat and an Argyle and a Mercedes." 

" Repairs ? " the girl asked in a business-like voice. 

" I took the Mercedes up to Scotland single-handed once. 
I don't say I could take an engine down, but I'm equal to 
the ordinary things." 

15 



226 Sonia Married 

The girl considered. 

" The General^I drive for General Calverly, you know — " 
Mrs. O'Rane nodded and turned apprehensively to see whether 
the General was in sight. They had met a week before at 
dinner with the Duchess of Ross. " He was asking me 
the other day if I could find anyone for a friend of his, some 
man in the Admiralty. I suppose you know your way about 
London ? If you like to give me your address, I'll mention 
it to the General. Or, of course, you can go to the school 
where I went, get yourself tested and then choose for yourself 
when someone applies. It's the ' Emergency Motor Drivers ' 
in Long Acre. Aren't you Mrs. O'Rane ? " 

" I am. How did you know that ? " 

" I thought you must be," the girl answered with a laugh. 
" I've seen your photograph in the papers so much. The 
General will probably want you to come and drive for him." 

Mrs. O'Rane tried to seem pleased by the compliment 
when she was only thankful for the warning. 

" I'd better go to the school, I think," she said. " They 
may say I'm not good enough, and I don't like disappointing 
people. Thanks most awfully. Good-bye." 

She hurried away as a portly figure in uniform clattered 
down the steps, screwing an eye-glass in place, while his 
driver stiffened to attention. 



II 

On the morning after my council of war with the Oakleighs, 
I telegraphed to Dainton that I was motoring down and 
suggested that I should pick him up at Crowley Court and 
drive him into Melton for an interview with O'Rane. He 
must have guessed, I should have thought, that my mission 
overnight had failed, but I could see, when we met, that he 
and his wife were emptily hoping. Both were waiting at the 
door when I arrived ; both looked past me into the empty 
car as I got out. 

" You couldn't get her to come ? " Dainton enquired 
anxiously. " Ah ! " 

He was a flabby, ineffectual little man at the best of times, 



The Unwritten Law 227 

and the shock had made him pathetically more flabby. God 
knows ! It was not my tragedy, and I cannot boast that I 
am capable of an unusually brave show under affliction, 
but I wanted to make Dainton throw out his chest and hold 
his head up — and do some hard manual work and a few 
physical exercises. I wished, for her elevation, too, that his 
daughter could see the state to which she had reduced him ; 
she was not sufficiently clever or detached to realize how much 
his limp indulgence had contributed to her pampered, neurotic 
wilfulness, but the consequences were there for all to mark. 
Lady Dainton shewed no sign of weakness. She had not 
slept much, I dare swear, since her husband returned, but 
she was collected and equal to every demand. 

" I expect we shall find lunch waiting," she said, as I came 
in. " We can only give you cold comfort, I'm afraid. When 
we turned the house into a hospital, Roger and I only kept 
two rooms for ourselves, so, if you find my nurses running in 
to see me every two minutes, don't you know ? . . . I'm 
glad you were able to come, because we're spending your 
money here and I want you to see that we're spending it 
properly." 

A table had been laid for us in a room which from its 
Vanity Fair cartoons, gun-cases, " Badminton Library " 
and estate-maps, I judged to be Dainton's study. The ser- 
vants were hardly out of the room before he turned to me. 

" What happened ? " he demanded anxiously. " Catherine 
knows ever5rthing." 

" I'm afraid it's rather more and perhaps rather worse than 
either of you know," I warned him. " I called at the house, 
and she wasn't there. They'd had a quarrel, and she'd — 
left him. I've no idea where she is, though George Oakleigh 
was going to make all possible enquiries to-day. You've not 
seen O'Rane since last night ? " 

He shook his head, turning his face away abruptly so that 
I should not see it, and seemed unable to speak. 

" We thought it better to wait till we'd heard from you," 
explained Lady Dainton. " She's — left this man, you say ? 
I shall want a moment to consider this." 

I only broke a long silence because I observed her husband 
preparing to speak and knew that he would contribute nothing 
worth hearing. 

15* 



228 Sonia Married 

" As I see it, Lady Dainton," I said, " there's an element 
of hope. We can never set things as they were before, but 
we may prevent them from growing worse. On the one hand, 
O'Rane may now consent to stop proceedings. I've not 
seen him since he made up his mind to move, I can't say 
what decided him, but, if we're all agreed that we don't want 
the scandal of a divorce, you may be able to stop it. On 
the other hand, I've been thinking this over the whole way 
down and I'm not sure that a divorce isn't the necessary 
and the best thing for both of them, however painful it may 
be at the time. Quite clearly your daughter and O'Rane 
can never take up their old life ; you see, there are no children 
to keep them together, even in appearance ; they're both 
quite young, and I question whether it's fair on either to 
condemn them to their present state. O'Rane can't wake 
up in ten years' time and discover that it would be a good 
thing for both of them to resume their liberty." 
Neither spoke for some time. Then Lady Dainton said : 
" It's all come so suddenly, don't you know ? that one is 
quite bewildered and stupid. First a divorce and then an 
idea of stopping it and now an idea of not stopping it. . . . 
All of you have known about it so much longer. ... By 
the way, why did you never tell us, Mr. Stornaway ? I'm 

not reproaching you, of course, but as Sonia's mother " 

" I thought about it a great many times," I answered. 
" Our lips were really sealed by O'Rane. As long as he hoped 
to get her back, we wanted to spare you all knowledge of it ; 
we wanted to make it easier for her by keeping down the 
number of people who did know." 

" You didn't think that I could help to persuade her ? " 
Lady Dainton might say that she was not reproaching 
me, but her voice was the embodiment of reproach directed 
not only at me or the Oakleighs or O'Rane himself, but 
at our whole sex for presuming to interfere between mother 
and daughter. I could see that she was confident of her 
power to restore peace, if only we had not ignored her until 
it was too late. My nerves were in tatters, I could feel 
the blood rushing to my head and in my turn I began to grow 
impatient with her, not for myself or my sex, but for her 
aughter. If ever the sins of the fathers were visited on the 
children, poor Sonia O'Rane was being punished for the lax 



The Unwritten Law 229 

indulgence and pretentious ambition of her mother ; had she 
once been checked or chidden, had she been allowed to marry 
some man in her own walk of life instead of being fed with 
flattery and encouraged to look for what her mother considered 
a " good match," I should have been spared many months 
of worry and my present extremely painful interview. 

" With great respect, I don't think anyone could have 
persuaded her," I said. " She started with a preposterous 
but sincere belief that her husband was unfaithful to her, 
their life was fantastically impossible, both had strong wills, 
O'Rane was culpably trustful, and Grayle was a man who 
had been uniformly successful, as it is called, with women. 
You had all the ingredients of disaster there, though it's 
always a big thing for a woman to compound them. Once 
she'd done it, there was no recalling her. I've seen her twice 
since. Lady Dainton ; no power on earth would have sent 
her back to her husband, even if she'd wanted to go." 

She finished her meal in sUence, only shrugging her shoulders 
gently as if to suggest that, however wrong I might be, there 
was no profit in discussing the past. Dainton kept asking 
me what I thought O'Rane would do and what we must 
insist on his doing ; I retaliated each time by asking him 
whether he wanted a divorce or not ; and there was never 
any answer. 

I had warned O'Rane that I was coming, but he stiffened 
perceptibly when the Daintons came in with me. In a 
moment, however, he was as calm, dispassionate and lifeless 
as I had always Joimd him since the estrangement began. 
And then, for the third time, with the knowledge that our 
nerves were raw and quivering, I had to tell him of my visit 
to Milford Square and my meeting with Bannerman and 
Grayle. We talked as if we were solicitors attending a con- 
sultation with counsel, treating O'Rane, and O'Rane treating 
himself, as the lay client. 

" I saw she wasn't coming back to me," he explained, 
" so I thought the kindest thing was to let her lead her new 
life unembarrassed by ties with me. I could have let her 
bring the petition, I suppose, but I rather draw the line at 
that. I didn't see, however much I loved her, why I should 
get up and lie and say I'd been disloyal to her." 

The Daintons looked at me, as though they wanted me 



230 Sonia Married 

to be spokesman, and I reminded O'Rane of his offer to stay 
proceedings, if his wife and Grayle separated. 

He shrugged his shoulders and smiled mirthlessly. 

" It started as blackmail, I'm afraid. Afterwards I Mi 
want to spare her, if I could — I hoped she'd come back to 
me. When she refused. ..." 

" I was telling Lady Dainton," I said, " that, if you 
don't expect her to come back, you probably ought — ^in the 
interests of you both— to let the proceedings take their 
course. I know you don't like the idea of it — we none of 
us do — ^but you wouldn't like the idea of her being tied in 
any way for the rest of her life. Of course, this isn't a thing 
that you can decide off-hand, but, when you consider it, 
there's one factor you mustn't leave out, and that is Grayle." 

O'Rane raised his head slowly. 

" He doesn't come in now." 

" To this extent he does," I said. " If he's cited as co- 
respondent at the present time, he'll have to retire from 
public life. You and Dainton and I know that quite 
positively. " 

" I don't much mind who retires from public life," he 
interrupted with a thin-lipped smile. 

" But that man's quite capable of quarrelling with your 
wife — well, not to put too fine a point on it— to get rid of 
her, to avoid a scandal, to accept your terms. I believe he'd 
have accepted them that night. I confess I can't make up 
my own mind what to do. . . ." 

O'Rane's head drooped forward for a moment ; then he 
raised it and faced us. 

"I can't decide anything, either," he said. "My brain 
seems to have gone to pulp." 

One glance at him was enough. I got up, and he did the 
same. The Daintons looked at each other and at me, 
refusing to move, as though they could force a decision by 
staying there. I shook my head and opened the door into 
the Cloisters. 

" But — before we go " began Lady Dainton, half- 

rising. 

" The difficulty is that we don't know what we want," 
I pointed out. 

Sir Roger became stammeringly urgent. 



The Unwritten Law 231 

" We do know ! " he cried. " We want to avoid a scandal, 
we want to keep our poor Sonia from — you know, all the 
talk and the papers " 

" But after that ? " I asked. 

Lady Dainton slipped her hand through her husband's 
arm and led him through the door. I said good-bye to 
O'Rane, but he insisted on accompanying us to my car, and, 
when the Daintons were out of ear-shot, enquired whether 
the news had been a great blow to them. 

" I ask, because I should have thought they must have 
had some suspicion of it," he said. " People here don't 
say anything to me, of course, but I'm sure they know. 
There's a sort of — ^bedside manner about them ; you notice 
these things, if you're blind ; it's as if you were calling on a 
fellow in hospital, when he's had his leg off, and you're being 
awfully bright and not seeing any difference. ... Is it 
being discussed in London ? " 

" I'm afraid it is." 

He walked with his face averted. 

" What do they say ? " he asked, steadily enough. 

" That she's living with Grayle and that you're going to 
divorce her." 

O'Rane's pace slackened. 

" H'm. The first part's no longer true, the second part 
isn't true yet. Stornaway, you've been uncommon kind to 
me ; d'you feel disposed to throw good money after bad, 
and help me a bit more ? We've been discussing what's 
the best thing to do, and how we ought to treat Grayle and 
that sort of thing, but so far we haven't taken Sonia into 
account much. I want you to find her for me. Do anything 
you like and, when you've found her, discuss with her what 
she wants done. I'll — ^generally speaking, you may tell her 
I'll do anything. If I drop the petition now, and some time 
later on she wants to be free again — I don't like it, but I 
suppose it can be managed ; these things have been done 

before. ... As for Grayle " He shook his head wearily. 

" I feel our tariff of punishment in this world is so in- 
adequate. You can hang a man who commits a murder, 
but you can't hang him twice, when he murders two people. 
He's broken up our two lives pretty much — and I dare say 
we weren't the first ; if I could make him suffer as much 



232 Sonia Married 

as I'd suffered through him, we still couldn't cry ' quits.' 
If he'd loved Sonia — God in Heaven ! we all make mis- 
takes ! Think how ridiculously /«?£; people we have to choose 
from before we marry ! We may think it's the real thing, 
and afterwards find we were wrong ; I was prepared to think 
that with them, and if she was going to be happier with 
him. ..." He stopped abruptly and gripped my arm 
with fingers of steel. " Do you honestly think he behaved 
like this, because he was afraid of having his prospects 
injured by the scandal ? " 

" That's Bertrand's view," I answered. " He's a very 
fair ruffian, you know. He would always have an intrigue 
with a woman, if he thought there was anything to be got 
out of it ; it doesn't require a great stretch of imagination 
to assume the converse." 

We were approaching Big Gate, and he pulled gently at 
my arm to stop me. 

" If that's true, we can't leave it where it is," he sighed. 
" Grayle can't have it both ways. If he doesn't resign his 
seat in a week, I shall go on with the proceedings." 

" But if you decide to go on in any event ? " 

" Well, he's no worse off. He'll be in private life then, 
with no political career to bother about." 

" And if he refuses and you find you can't enforce the 
threat ? I mean, if your wife asks you not to ? " 

" I shall find some other way of breaking him. This is 
not a time for thinking about niceties of law." 

" He's not the man to surrender easily," I warned O'Rane. 

" I don't know that I am," he answered, and the muscles 
of his cheeks twitched. " Well, my solicitors are in com- 
munication with his " 

" But if he refuses to be bluffed ? " I persisted. 

" We'll try some other means," he repeated. " Will you 
be kind enough to convey my message — ^you're sure to see 
him at the House " 

" We're at some pains to avoid each other," I said. 

" But you could meet him for my sake — just to give him 
the message ? " O'Rane begged. 

I assented without more reluctance than was unavoidable 
and said good-bye. We drove in silence to Crowley Court, 
Sir Roger staring with troubled brown eyes out ;,of one 



The Unwritten Law 233 

window, and Lady Dainton, set and unrevealing, out of the 
other. At the door she offered me tea, but for a hundred 
reasons I wanted to get away as soon as possible. 

" For the present I suppose we can do nothing," she said, 
as we shook hands. " I rely on you to tell us when you 
have any news." For the first time she was unable to keep 
an expression of physical exhaustion out of her eyes. " I 
don't know what any of you are doing, of course ; what 
steps are being taken to find Sonia." 

" I'm making myself personally responsible," I promised 
her. 

Then I drove back to London and arranged with George 
to dine with me at the Club. After a restless night he had 
called at eighteen of the likeliest hotels in the hope of arriving 
at news of Mrs. O'Rane, for the comfort of her husband and 
parents. Someone of the same surname was staying at the 
" Grosvenor," but it was not Sonia. I described my visits 
to Crowley Court and Melton, and we concerted a plan for 
tracking her to her hiding-place. 

Two years and a quarter in the Government service had 
made George more of a " handy-man " than I have ever 
met before or since. He knew the right official in every 
department for hurrying through the most diverse business 
for the largest number of friends. If news were required of 
a prisoner-of-war, if cigars were wanted out of bond for the 
use of a neutral legation, if a German governess had to be 
repatriated, a passport obtained, naturalization papers 
taken out, export permits secured, George would triumph 
in the quickest possible time over the greatest possible 
obstacles. It was absurd, he told me, to advertise or insert 
cryptic messages in the " agony " column of the Times ; 
absurder still to employ detectives. For what other pur- 
pose did Hugh Mannerly and the Alien Control Department 
exist ? He telephoned to the Home Office forthwith, but 
Mr. Mannerly had pretermitted his control of aliens in the 
interests of dinner. 

" I'll get on to him to-morrow," he promised. " We'll 
have every hotel and boarding-house in London searched for 
her ; and, if she's not in town, we'll go to work in the country. 
It will take a day or two, but Hugh Mannerly is unfailing 
and perfectly discreet." 



234 Sonia Married 

After my tribute to George and his to Mannerly, I am sorry 
to record that the first tfiree days of the hunt were blank. 
It was ascertained, indeed, that Mrs. O'Rane had stayed at 
the Grosvenor, for the night, and that her address was 
fully inscribed in the Visitors' Book. (" Damned fool I was 
not to call for the book ! " George exclaimed. " I felt cer- 
tain it must be her and then, when they said it wasn't, I 
felt equally certain that it couldn't be.") Where she had 
gone from the hotel no one knew. 

" She's staying with friends somewhere in town," George 
decided, " or else she's gone out of London. I'll get Mannerly 
to work again outside. I've spoken to a friend of mine in 
the Permit Office, so she can't leave the country, and I've 
found out from Raney that she banks with Philpott's, in 
Victoria Street. Mannerly's told the manager to watch the 
account and report all lodgements and drawings ; if she 
deals by post, we may find out whereabouts she is and, if 
she comes to the bank in person, we can arrange for the 
manager to keep her there till we arrive." 

I confess that, however efficient George might be, I found 
him a little high-handed. 

" I'm the complete bureaucrat," he assented grimly, 
polishing his pipe on the sleeve of his uniform. " And I 
may tell you that, when I consider the opportunities for 
oppression afforded by the public service, I'm amazed at my 
own moderation. Anyone would start a revolution to- 
morrow, if he knew the black conspiracy against personal 
liberty which a few thousand of us are carrying out." 

Once again, after being promised the full sinister support 
of all the conspirators, I feel ungracious in having to record 
that the utmost efforts of Mr. Hugh Mannerly failed to 
produce any result. His department, let me say, was 
admirably organized, and a ridiculously short time passed 
before I was informed that no one giving the name of Sonia 
O'Rane or Mrs. David O'Rane was registered in any hotel 
or licensed lodging-house throughout England, Scotland or 
Wales. The manager of the Victoria Street branch of Phil- 
pott's Bank, with a disregard for the confidential relations 
between a bank and its customers which would have amazed 
me in peace-time, stated that Mrs. O'Rane had personally 
cashed a cheque for twenty pounds three days before, that 



The Unwritten Law 235 

her balance — unusually large, I imagined, for her — was one 
hundred and eighty-seven pounds fourteen shillings and 
five-pence, that no lodgements had been made since the 
beginning of the month, but that he would promptly report 
all future transactions so long as Mr. Mannerly desired him 
to do so. 

" I telegraphed to Dainton, after I'd been to see Hugh," 
George told me. " As we haven't struck oil so far, I thought 
it would be useful to apply a little more pressure. I imagine 
Sonia must be living now solely on her father's allowance, 
so I suggested that he should stop it and see what happened, 
when she's exhausted her present funds. It's funny about 
Hugh ; he's usually so good. ... A nuisance, too, because 
time's so important. You see Lloyd George is getting out 
his Ministry ? About two-thirds of the offices seem to be 
allocated with some certainty." 

" Have they foimd a place for Grayle yet ? " I asked. 

" He's mentioned for all sorts of places," was the answer. 

I felt that the Government might not want to include 
Grayle until he had cleared himself. People were still asking 
vaguely whether it was true about Grayle, but no one could 
find flesh wherewith to clothe the bones of the scandal. 
Grayle himself had not crossed my path since our warm 
parting in Milford Square ; indeed, everyone who button- 
holed me to discuss appointments or ask my view of the 
rumour admitted by implication that he had not seen Grayle. 
Someone — I cannot remember who — ^told me that he had 
left London on one of the surprise visits to G.H.Q., which 
with Grayle played the same part as the old " diplomatic 
chill " of other days. As the Government of the country 
and the conduct of the war were at a standstill, as members 
of both Houses were flocking back to Westminster from all 
quarters to join in the scramble for office, I found this 
explanation unconvincing. 

I was soon to find it baseless. In fulfilment of my promise, 
I sent a note by hand to Grayle's house, asking him to meet 
me on urgent business at a time and place to be arranged by 
him. My messenger, who had been instructed to enquire 
whether Grayle was at home, reported that he had received 
my note with his own hands, and had replied that there was 
no answer. 



236 Sonia Married 



III 

As Grayle would not come to see me, I had to go and 
see Grayle. 

I did not want to call in Milford Square unattended — 
for Grayle had said in his haste that he would thrash me out 
of the house with a crop, and I knew that he would only 
disappoint me from motives of prudence. Had he been 
accessible, I should have liked to have George at hand to 
ring the bell and, if necessary, to send for the police ; and, 
if prudence so far triumphed over natural impulse as to 
allow Grayle to discuss terms, George would once more be 
a useful witness to balance Bannerman. 

Failing George, I was at a loss to know whom to invite, 
for Bertrand was too old to be embroiled in such an under- 
taking. Beresford, of course, was in the secret, and I was 
wondering whether he would really conduce to the harmony 
of debate, when his card was brought in with a request for 
five minutes' conversation on private business. 

" I came to see if you'd had any news of Sonia," he began, 
as the door closed. " I've been on the look-out so far as my 
leg would let me. You see, in the old days, when we were 
together so much, I knew something of her haunts and habits. 
I haven't found a trace. At least, not of her." 

" What do you mean ? " I asked. 

He pulled forward a deed-box and rested his leg on it, 
smiling grimly to himself. 

" Do you remember the first and only time you honoured 
me with a call ? " he asked. " It was to say that the 
authorities were watching my articles very closely, one 
night when Sonia came to see me, and you naturally 
assumed " 

" Appearances were against you," I said, " and it was 
criminally foolish, anyway." 

" Well, well ! " He smiled with sardonic indulgence. 
" We won't waste time on that. Appearances have been 
pretty consistently against me before and after, until the night 
when O'Rane tried to strangle me. Has it ever occurred 



The Unwritten Law 237 

to you that appearances were fabricated against me ? We 
know that Grayle let you all think — and Sonia, too, but she'd 
lost her head. ... I find that the thing goes much further 
back. I never told you about my exploits when you were in 
America, did I ? " he went on, nursing his injured leg. " The 
first time they imprisoned me ? There isn't much to tell, 
but it's illuminating. I'd been writing for weeks in the 
Watchman — all above board and over my own name. You, 
no doubt, would call it pernicious stuff — or you would have, 
then ; people are coming round to my views a bit more now 
— I just told the truth. ..." His eyes suddenly flashed, 
reviving my sense that I was dealing with a man who might 
any day be certified insane. " The whole truth and nothing 
but the truth ! The magistrate nearly choked when bits of 
my articles were read aloud in court. . . . Well, all copy has 
to be in by Tuesday morning ; we go to press on Thursday, 
and the paper comes out on Friday. I had my usual two 
sets of proofs delivered on the Wednesday ; I corrected one 
and sent it back, the other I tore in two and threw into the 
waste-paper basket. The next day " 

" Where did this take place ? " I interrupted. 

"At ' The Sanctuary.' Didn't I say that ? The next 
day, when our housekeeper opened the office, he found an 
assortment of the police, with the usual warrants to search 
the place and confiscate anything that took their fancy. By 
the time they'd taken our ledgers, our subscribers' register, 
our letter-books, file copies and the whole of that week's 
issue, there wasn't much for the delivery vans, when they 
turned up at nine, and literally nothing at all for the editor 
and me at half-past ten, except two nice, kind gentlemen, who 
put us imder immediate arrest. Quick work, wasn't it ? 
You'd have thought that not a soul outside that office could 
have known for certain that I was even writing that week, 
still less that I'd written anything stronger than the usual 
articles. I suspected at the time, but I couldn't bring myself 
to beheve that Grayle would go to that length to get me out 
of the way ; I knew it bored him to see Sonia talking to me, 
but he had a fair slice of her time, and I didn't think then 
that he was more than flirting with her. Well, that was the 
first step." 

He paused to beg a cigarette. 



238 Sonia Married 

" Go on," I said, as I threw over my case. 

" Well, that broke down, because I did a hunger-strike, 
and they had to let me out. There was another misfire about 
the army " :--\- 

" I heard about that," I interrupted. 

" About the misfire ? I wonder if you did — ^the early part, 
I mean. Do you know that I attested in the old voluntary 
days ? Ah, I thought not. I kept that to myself — for fear 
of something patriotic," he added with a sneer. " Well, 
when the Derby recruiting scheme came on, there was enough 
hanky-panky to sicken you. I don't need to tell you that 
I'm not in love with war, or the idea of driving people out Uke 
sheep to be slaughtered, but, if you have it, let it hit all classes 
alike. From the very first, anyone who was strong enough 
to resist could be sure of getting off. The miners said they'd 
strike, if anyone tried to conscribe them ; the Civil Service 
decided for itself that no one could get on without it. Well, 
I thought this wanted shewing up, so I went along to Great 
Scotland Yard to collect evidence at first hand. I got it 
right enough. The first men I saw were a hulking lot with a 
crowd of papers in their hands to declare that they were in- 
dispensable to the satisfactory working of their departments — 
people like that young sot Maitland ; they'd been forbidden 
even to attest till that day, but the numbers weren't keeping 
up, so they were turned on to keep things going. (I beheve 
the police and the Merchant Marine were dragged in, too, just 
to give the thing a fillip.) The doctors hardly troubled to 
look at me before I was rejected ; which was a pity, because I 
wanted copy about the medical examination ; but rejected 
I was, fair and square, with a certificate and, I suppose, some 
record on their books. In time the Military Service BiU 
was passed, and I found myself called up. Now, it may have 
been an honest blunder. . . . It's certainly a damned odd 
coincidence." 

As he paused to laugh, I was more than ever struck by his 
likeness to a grinning skull with a wig on it. 

" But the coincidences were only just beginning," he went 
on. " It was a coincidence that someone should have been 
nosing round among my papers — I don't know who it was, I 
hardly ever lock anything, least of all my own front door. 
But I thought one night that things looked unusual ; I have 



The Unwritten Law 239 

my own taste in untidiness. Then someone let out to O'Rane 
that I was being watched once more. (If I didn't seem grate- 
ful that night, it was because you were devilishly in the way 
and weren't telling me anything I didn't know before.) Then 
came another warrant, another search cind another arrest. 
By one of these curious coincidences it was all on the day when 
O'Rane was due back at Melton, the day when by one last 
coincidence Grayle got back from France earlier than he'd 
been expected." Beresford raised his hand and brought it 
resoundingly down on the table. "^I can prove nothing ! " 
he cried. " I only say that this succession of coincidences — 
it's queer. And, if I was a nuisance to Grayle in the early 
days, he found me very useful later on. My God ! what 
would I not do to get level with that man ! Thank the Lord ! 
there's no Christian forgiveness about me. I'U leave that 
to people with more time on their hands. I've a great deal 
to get through in a very short space and I'd like to do him 
in once for myself and three times for Sonia. Is O'Rane 
taking any steps ? " 

" There are hmits to his powers of forgiveness," I answered 
reassuringly. " I'm calling on Grayle to-night to suggest 
that he should retire from the House." 

The same light of fanatical hatred came into Beresford's 
eyes. 

" I'd give something to be there ! " he cried. 

I looked at him and resumed the train of thought which 
his entrance had interrupted. I knew that he could control 
himself, if he tried, but I did not know whether he would 

" I was thinking of asking you, when you came in," I said. 
" You're in the secret, and I don't want to admit anyone else. 
You know what happens ! Everyone tells everyone else on 
condition that it doesn't go any further. But can you be 
trusted to behave yourself ? I want you as a witness, and 
you may have to call for help, if Grayle tries to fulfil his pro- 
mise of thrashing me out of the house. But you're not to 
speak, you're not to attempt any violence, you're not to bring 
even an umbrella with you. Frankly, you see, I'm not 
inviting you for your amusement, but for my convenience." 

I could see his teeth grating. 

" I expect I shall get my amusement out of it," he answered. 



240 Sonia Married 

" Of course, we may not be able to get into the house, but 
we'll go together. But you promise not to open your mouth, 
or raise a finger ? " 

Beresford pushed away the deed-box and held out his hand. 

" I promise," he said. 

It was a wet, starless night when we arrived in Milford 
Square at ten o'clock. I dismissed my taxi, rang the bell and 
waited. There was no answer, and I rang again. It was 
inconceivable that, to keep me out of the house, Grayle had 
disconnected the front-door bell, or given instructions that 
it was to be disregarded on principle. 

" I'm afraid I've brought you on a fool's errand," I said to 
Beresford, as I rang a third time. 

We looked to right and left for a second bell, an area door 
or any other promise of admission. Two interested maids 
from a neighbouring house joined our search-party, and a 
constable flashed his bull's-eye impartially on us all and asked 
if we had lost anything. 

" I'm trying to get into this house," I said, pointing to 
Grayle's door, " and I can't make anyone hear." 

He pondered for a moment, and then led us into the Bromp- 
ton Road. 

" There was a light in the studio, when I came on duty. 
You may be able to get in that way." 

We groped through a narrow passage to a wooden door set 
in a high brick wall. Over our heads I could see the outline 
of two windows, securely curtained, but with a phosphores- 
cent border. There was neither bell nor knocker to the door, 
but I battered resonantly on the thick, blistered panels with 
my umbrella. For perhaps two minutes there was no 
answering sound, and I banged again. This time I was re- 
warded by the slam of a door, the noise of feet on a stone 
passage, and the rasp of a heavy key. The door opened and 
my eyes, which were grown used by now to the darkness, 
recognized the massive outlines of Guy Bannerman. 

" Hullo ? Who are you ? What d'you want ? " he 
demanded sharply. 

I slipped the end of my umbrella into the doorway. 

" Is Grayle at home, Guy ? " I asked. " I'm Raymond 
Stornaway, if you don't recognize my voice. I have to see 
him on very important business." 



The Unwritten Law 241 

There can be few minor humiliations so disconcerting as to 
slam a door and find that it will not close. 

" You'll only ruin a good umbrella, Guy," I said. " Listen 
to reason, man. You remember our talk the last time I was 
here ? You know that Grayle's by way of being cited as a 
co-respondent ? " 

" Take your umbrella out ! " Guy whispered angrily, feel- 
ing for it with his foot, but not daring to detach either hand 
from the door. 

" I've come with a proposal from O'Rane," I said. 
The energetic foot relaxed its industry. 
" Grayle's given orders that you're not to be admitted," 
he said. 

" I know. And you're enough in his confidence to say 
whether he's likely to be interested by hearing O'Rane's 
proposal. I sent him a note this morning, but he didn't see 
fit to acknowledge it. If he's going to take the same line now, 
tell me at once, and I'll go away. If, on the other hand, he'll 
let us in and behave himself, we'll come. I may tell you, as 
I've already told Grayle, that I don't come to see him 
for any morbid pleasure which I may derive from our 
meetings ! " 

Discretion and discipline did battle within Guy's spirit, 
and at length he asked : " Who's ' us ? ' " 
" I have Beresford with me," I said. 
" I can't let him in," was the prompt reply. 
" Then we'U go home, Beresford," I said. " Good-night, 
Guy. Open the door a fraction of an inch so that I can get 
my umbrella out, there's a good fellow." 

He did as I asked him, though guardedly. I pulled at the 
umbrella, turned my back and started down the passage, 
followed reluctantly by Beresford. I walked briskly for fear 
of spoiling the effect, and, before I had gone ten yards, Guy 
was running heavily after me. 

" If you care to leave a message," he began, bringing a 
massive hand to rest on my shoulder. 
" I don't," I interrupted. 

" But, look here, Stornaway ! " 

I walked on and, omitting certain obvious intermediate 
stages, found Beresford and myself shortly afterwards en- 
sconced in arm-chairs before the fire in Bannerman's match- 

i6 



242 Sonia Married 

boarded, paper-strewn work-room over the garage at the end 
of Grayle's garden. Our surroundings were serviceable 
rather than sybaritic. Oil-cloth, a fur hearth-rug and a 
couple of Japanese mats covered the floor ; the walls were 
concealed, half by stout blue volumes of the Parliamentary 
Debates, half by a map of Canada, another of British South 
Africa and a third of the Western Front. A double writing- 
table stood in the middle of the room, with a sloping desk, an 
oil reading-lamp, and three numbered deed-boxes. There 
was a reek of petrol from a private and probably illegitimate 
pyramid of leaking tins, which had projected themselves 
upstairs from the garage. 

Guy produced some cigars and left us to take care of our- 
selves, while he reconnoitred the house. 

" I've let you in on my own responsibility," he said, , as 
he opened the door leading into the garden. " Whether he'U 
see you or not, I can't tell." 

" I think he will see us," I murmured to Beresford, when we 
were alone. 

I for one had satisfied my intellectual cravings for Canadian 
geography, when we heard steps approaching on the gravel. 
A moment later Grayle was framed, though he had to stoop 
for it, in the doorway. He looked at me with a frown which 
deepened at sight of Beresford. 

" Well ? " he demanded. 

" Good evening, Grayle," I said. " I've come with a 
message from O'Rane." 

" What are you doing here ? " he asked Beresford. 

The promise was honourably observed, and there was no 
answer. 

" I brought him as a witness in case you shewed any ten- 
dency to be violent," I said. " Grayle, O'Rane thinks that, 
the sooner you give up your seat in the House, the better. 
For what it's worth, I agree with him." 

He was still standing in the doorway with his fingers on the 
handle. Clearly he expected something more. 

" Is that all ? " he asked. 

" All," I said, as I got up from my chair. 

" Then what the heU d'you want to come here for, wasting 
my time ? " he thundered. " You told Bannerman you'd 
got a proposal to make ! " 



The Unwritten Law 243 

" O'Rane proposes that you should retire from public 
life," I explained. " I always think it's better to do a thing 
voluntarily than under compulsion." 

On that he left the doorway and came into the room. 

" This is a threat, is it ? " he asked, looking down on me 
with arms akimbo. 

" A forecast," I substituted. " I see from the papers that 
you may be invited to join the Government. You will never 
join the Government, Grayle, or, if you do, you'll leave it 
before you have time to find out where your office is. If 
you retire voluntarily, you may live to an honoured old age ; 
if you force O'Rane to go through with his petition, I'm afraid 
you'll have a very ugly fall." 

Grayle loosened his belt, though with too much deliberate 
preoccupation to suggest that he was about to use it as an 
argument in favour of our retirement ; then he unbuttoned 
his tunic, removed a bundle of papers from a woollen khaki 
waistcoat and transferred them to one of his outside breast- 
pockets. 

" Do you know your forecast does not strike me as exhaus 
tive ? " he observed, as he settled his belt iniplace once more. 
" As a preliminary, however, does O'Rane propose to go on 
with the divorce ? " 

" Frankly, I can't tell you," I said. " He would like to 
consult his wife's wishes. I make no bones about telling you, 
Grayle, that you get very little out of any proposed arrange- 
ment. If she wants a divorce, your — fair name, shall we call 
it ? — ^is smirched, whatever you do ; but I fancy, unless you 
find your Parliamentary duties too exacting for your en- 
feebled health — and that within one week from to-night — 
your fair name will be smirched, whether she wants a divorce 
or not. I can't say what's in her mind, of course, but, if 
you accept defeat at once, there's a fifty per cent, chance that 
you'll escape a scandal in which, when all's said and done, you 
don't cut a very gallant figure. By the way, I have to have 
your answer to-night." 

" My answer's ' no.' " 

It was given without hesitation and, so far as I could see, 
without bluff. I have been connected with large commercial 
enterprises long enough to be a tolerable judge. 

" I'll let O'Rane know at once," I said, getting up again and 

i6*- 



244 Sonia Married 

motioning Beresford to do the same. " It will be an un- 
savoury case, Grayle." 

I ■ " Which is presumably the reason he's so unwilling to go on 
with it," Grayle sneered. " But make no mistake who comes 
out of it worst. He hasn't bothered to think. Your proposal 
I reject with thanks, but I'll make another. You're quite 
right in thinking that I would sooner not be mixed up in these 
proceedings any more ; if O'Rane will give me a written under- 
taking to drop them here — and — now and never to revive 
them, we can let it rest at that." 

Beresford had not promised to refrain from laughter, and 
I excuse it as the only possible comment on the offer. 

" Come along," I said to him. " We're wasting the nation's 
time ; and the nation won't have the benefit of it much 
longer." 

Grayle shrugged his shoulders and led the way to the door 
on the lane. 

" So be it ! " he said. " Yet mine was a fairer bargain than 
yours. There was at least a quid pro quo." 

" I'm afraid I don't see it." 

" Then I'm afraid your principals haven't instructed you 
very thoroughly," he answered impatiently. " From your 
general tone to me, you evidently think that I've behaved 
very badly, that it was my fault, that the sympathy of the 
court will be entirely with O'Rane and his wife. It may be 
with O'Rane," he added meaningly. " I'll tell you at once 
that I propose to defend the action and, though it's only 
guess work, I shall be very much surprised if O'Rane gets a 
decree. ... If he likes washing his wife's dirty linen in public, 
that's his affair, but what seems to have been overlooked 
is the attitude of Mrs. O'Rane throughout. To begin with, 
I can call witnesses to prove that O'Rane repeatedly pro- 
claimed that he wouldn't raise a finger to keep his wife, if 
she preferred to risk her happiness with another man. She 
used to say she wouldn't stay with him, if she was unhappy ; 
I can produce witnesses who'll testify to that, too. Any 
pretence, therefore, that I burst in on a happily married 
couple and forced them apart is historically untrue. And 
this will come out in court. But what matters more from 
the point of view of Mrs. O'Rane's reputation is the evidence 
—I think you were with me, Stornaway, when she rang me 



The Unwritten Law 245 

up one night at the House. What you've overlooked in your 
haste to condemn me, what O'Rane's overlooked in his haste 
to save his wife's reputation is the part played by his wife. 
I'll accept fuU responsibility for my share of whatever's 
happened, but I'm afraid you'll find it won't ease your posi- 
tion. Mrs. O'Rane's letters to me, which will, of course, be 
read in court, prove that it was she and she alone " 

It was not difficult to imagine the end of the sentence. 
Grayle spoke with the bored indifference of a man who has 
had unwelcome attentions thrust upon him, who has tolerated 
them as long as he can, but who at last and at the risk of 
wounding an importunate mistress ... I never heard it, 
though, because Beresford, unpardonably if excusably for- 
getting his promise of silence and immobility, had twitched 
my umbreUa from my grasp and whirled it back-handed into 
Grayle's face with a cry of : 

" You cad ! you cad ! you bloody cad ! " 



IV 

The moment that the blow was struck I felt that lives 
would be lost before we parted. Beresford had come to the 
house clamorous for blood, I will admit at once that I had 
wrapped a taunt round every word that I had spoken, and for 
weeks Grayle had been in a state only describable as eruptive. 
I found time, however, with that curious detachment which 
a brain shews when it is working with twice its usual clarity 
and speed, to reflect what an absurd and incongruous trio 
we made ; Beresford dying of consumption, all skin and 
bones held together by will-power — ^lame, shabby, ill-groomed, 
with two blazing eyes in a parchment-coloured face ; Grayle 
towering over the pair of us, blue-eyed, pink-cheeked — with 
a thread of blood running from one corner of his mouth — 
yellow-haired, like some giant's child in uniform ; and, if 
I could have seen myself, I should have looked on a plump, 
middle-aged man with, I believe, a benevolent expression, 
a good many wrinkles on the forehead and round the eyes, and 
a thick crop of prematurely white hair. 

Beresford's action was so unexpected and sudden that we — 



246 Sonia Married 

and I include him — were temporarily paralysed. After the 
brief outburst there followed a silence in which we seemed 
to be waiting for the end of the world to be proclaimed. Then 
Grayle put his hand to his face and brought it away wet. 
I watched him raise his eyebrows at the sight, walk to the 
door opening on to the garden, turn the key and pocket it. 
(I suddenly remembered being bullied at Eton.) 

" He brought this on himself," he observed quietly to me ; 
and, before I had leisure to guess what he intended or see 
what he was doing, he had gripped Beresford by the collar, 
lifted him off his feet and was belabouring him with his stick 
until the ribs cracked like dry wood in a hot fire. At the end 
of six swift blows the stick broke in two, and he looked round 
for another weapon. A round oflfiice-ruler met our gaze at 
the same moment, and from opposite sides we pounced on 
it simultaneously and simultaneously caught hold of it. I 
had two hands to his one, however, and with a wrench I con- 
trived to twist it out of his grasp. 

" Drop him ! " I cried, but Grayle only looked round for 
means to renew the attack. " I'U break your arm, if you 
don't." 

His grip on Beresford, who was still dangling and writhing 
in the air with his face purple and his feet rapping out a 
tattoo on the oil-cloth, never relaxed. I raised the ruler 
above my head and brought it down on his forearm with aU 
the strength that I could muster. I had aimed at his wrist, 
but a plunge by Beresford spoiled my aim. Grayle gave some 
body-twist, which I was too much preoccupied to see, and an 
instant later I felt his powerful fingers inside my collar and my 
head being savagely bumped against Beresford's. Every 
other time my ear was crushed against his fleshless skull, and 
the pain was excruciating. I made ineffectual backward 
sweeps with the ruler, hitting Beresford as often as I hit 
Grayle ; I battered on his fingers and tried to drag them away 
from the coUar, but every effort that I made and every new 
injury that I inflicted made him the drunker with lust of 
battle. The side of my head felt bi;uised to pulp, and, when 
I put my hand up to protect it, Grayle only laughed like a 
maniac and changed his hold so that he could avoid the buffer 
and bang us on our unprotected brows. 

Beresford was limp and crowing, I breathless and sweating 



The Unwritten Law 247 

before it occurred to me to use my feet. Exploring for 
Grayle's shins with my heel, I made sure of my mark and 
lashed out and up as hard as I could kick. It is to be pre- 
sumed that I caught him on his injured knee, for I heard a 
gasp of pain, we were jerked abruptly backwards, and Grayle 
slowly subsided, like a wounded bull in the ring, dragging 
us on top of him. For a moment we lay motionless ; then 
I heard Beresford's struggles for breath beginning again 
with feverish, rumbling acceleration. He had fallen on the 
mat in front of the fire, and his face was pressed so close to 
the bars that the heat must have been blinding and insupport- 
able. I saw him trying to make a screen of his hands and 
heard a diabolical laugh from Grayle. The sound gave me 
new strength, and I tugged at my collar till it burst away 
from the stud and remained emptily in Grayle's hands while 
I struggled to my feet. 

I had always imagined that, however desperate my phght, 
I should refrain from some methods of warfare, yet now I 
struck again and again at the wounded knee, I kicked him 
in the wind, and, if this last had not sent him rolling and 
gasping on to his side, I believe I might have tried to gouge 
his eyes out. It was the only time that I had ever had to 
fight for my life ; the instinct to live was stronger and more 
resourceful than I had imagined. 

As Grayle's fingers relaxed, I pulled Beresford away from 
the fire and set him on his feet with his back to the wall. 
He was not seriously injured, despite the drubbing from 
Grayle's stick, and, as soon as he could breathe again, I saw 
him preparing to meet a fresh attack. My one hope was to 
escape before Baimerman broke down the locked door and 
redressed the balance in our numbers, before, too, Grayle 
had collected enough wind to resume hostilities. Without 
waiting for my hat and coat, I hurried to the door leading by 
the stone passage to the lane and flung it open, calling on 
Beresford to foUow me. As I turned on the threshold, he 
made no sign of moving. I called again, telling him that 
there was no time to be lost, for Grayle had taken his hands 
away from the pit of his stomach and was testing his legs 
before getting up. Beresford also saw that no time was to 
be lost, but, instead of making for the door, he threw himself 
on top of his antagonist and dug furiously in the pocket 



248 Sonia Married 

where Grayle had so ostentatiously secreted his bundle of 
papers. 

Though the struggle was resumed with more than all of its 
old fury, I remember having another interval of lucid detach- 
ment. I had intervened before, because Beresford was 
being murdered, but I had not come there to steal papers 
which did not belong to me and I could not come to his assist- 
ance again. 

" Break away ! " I roared at them, picking up my ruler 
again and hitting both impartially. 

I might as usefully have expended my energies on beating 
the floor. Both were too busily engaged to heed me until 
with a short-arm blow of well-nigh incredible force Grayle 
lifted his assailant into the air and dropped him again into the 
fireplace. Then he scrambled on to one knee and faced me. 

" Stay where you are, or I'll brain you ! " I cried. 

He dragged himself forward, and at that I struck. I was 
more frightened than I have ever been in my life before or 
since, for, if the phrase have a meaning, there was murder in 
Grayle's eyes at that moment. The ruler came down on the 
top of his head with an echoing crack, and his trunk reeled. 
I hit again, though my first blow was dyeing his hair crimson. 
This time a hand shot up in defence and grasped the ruler. 
I pulled until I had dragged him forward on his face, but he 
only added a second hand and twisted against me, as I had 
twisted against him three minutes earlier. It was a question 
of seconds before I was disarmed, and I contrived that, as 
he possessed himself of the weapon, I could spring to the far 
side of the writing-table, ready to feint and dodge when he 
began the attack. 

There was a second pause, a second silence. With the same 
movement we looked towards the fireplace, but Beresford 
was lying huddled and motionless. Grayle once more put 
his hand to his head, once more raised his eyebrows when he 
brought it away covered with blood. Dragging a chair by 
his side and using its back as a prop, he limped to the second 
door, pushed it close and locked it. 

" You brought this on yourself," he whispered in a voice 
that choked with rage. 

In equipment, physical power, training, endurance, even 
in length of reach, Grayle was my superior. His one weak 



The Unwritten Law 249 

point was the injured knee, and I concentrated my attack 
on that before he could reduce the distance between us. 
Picking up the first of the deed-boxes from the table, I raised 
it above my head and discharged it at his legs. It struck 
his feet, I believe ; certainly he staggered. Either the 
second was lighter or I was over-anxious not to throw short 
again, for this time I hit him in the chest and sent him stum- 
bling and cursing until his back met the door. He stooped 
as though he wovild return my fire, but evidently saw the 
wisdom of not replenishing my ammunition. I picked up 
the third box, waited until he was back in his old position 
and then let fly with all the strength that I could put into 
an overhand swing. The missile was too big and swift to 
avoid easily at so close a range, but Grayle contrived to make 
a bend in his body, the box flicked his tunic over one hip and 
slid along the floor until it bumped into its fellows at the 
door. 

" And now," said Grayle. " Bannerman's out of ear- 
shot, and even the fiendish noise you've been making won't 
bring anyone to save you. Before I've done with you, I 
think you'll be sorry you interfered quite so much." 

He dragged himself and his chair to the edge of the table 
and leaned upon it with his fists, gripping the ruler. The 
next moment I had sprung back, as he threw himself forward 
and aimed a blow at my head with the full reach and swing 
of his long body and arm behind it. The point of the ruler 
glanced off the welt of my boot and dented the oil-cloth. 
Grayle pulled himself back, rested his hands again on the 
table and waited, eyeing me reflectively. I was coming 
cautiously back to my place, when he projected himself 
suddenly to the right ; I jumped in the opposite direction, 
he stopped, and we gradually came back to our old positions. 
A moment later he dived to the left, but I had hardly to move, 
for he was throwing his weight on to a leg which would not 
bear it. The next plunge was to the right, and this time 
he made a half circle of the table until each of us was occupying 
the other's stance. With these tactics I could keep him at 
bay for as long as I liked ; and I have no doubt that he 
realized it. While he panted and looked round him, I turned 
my head for an instant to see whether he had left the key 
in the door. The one table-lamp, however, threw a yellow 



250 Sonia Married 

circle of quavering light over the middle of the room, and left 
the extremities in shadow. Whether Grayle divined my 
thoughts, whether he even noticed or understood my action, 
I cannot say, but the next moment I received a violent blow 
on the thighs and was hard put to it to keep my balance, 
as the table, furiously impelled by him, careered madly to- 
wards the door, pinning my legs and holding me, as though 
I were buried to the waist, to await his attack. 

He gave himself a moment to draw breath and enjoy 
his triumph. The murderous blow which had just missed 
me never left his intentions in doubt, but in that moment 
he gave me time to use the last and only weapon left to me. 
Snatching the big lamp, which flared afresh at my grasp, 
I raised it aloft and brought it with a crash and tinkle on to 
his head. For some time I could not understand what had 
happened, for the room seemed in darkness and yet brighter 
than before. By the dancing light of the fire I saw that 
Grayle had disappeared ; and the table yielded when I pushed 
against it. Then a blaze of yellow sprang up in front of me, 
cmd I caught sight of him lying on his back with a flood of 
burning oil spreading over his clothes, lapping the disorder 
of books and papers which we had tumbled on to the floor 
and licking the border of the Japanese mats. How much 
I had injured him with the lamp I could not see ; he was 
clasping his head with one hand and still gripping the ruler 
with the other. 

" Grayle, pull yourself together, man ! " I cried, as though 
by raising my voice I could penetrate his unconsciousness. 

In a moment the flames would be pouring over his neck 
and face ; in five minutes, if the petrol cans were reached, 
the whole lath-and-plaster shanty would be a roaring and 
crackling furnace. I had to extricate Beresford and Grayle 
or rouse them to extricate themselves — and I discovered that 
my body was trembling from the excitement of the duel 
and that my head was aching savagely. I had hardly found 
time to think of my injuries until then ; to think of anything, 
indeed, but the next thrust or parry ; I had no idea how 
long the engagement had lasted — and was astonished to find 
that less than twelve minutes had passed since Grayle first 
entered the room. 

" Pull yourself together ! " I cried again, looking for my 



The Unwritten Law 251 

overcoat to wrap round him and smother the flames. In the 
unevenly distributed light I could not see it. The oil was 
sinking into the closely-woven tunic instead of flaring itself 
out on the surface, and above the pungent smell of hot 
petroleum rose the more pungent smell of singeing cloth. 
I caught him by the arm and tried to drag him towards the 
door, but at my touch the body subconsciously grew rigid. 
I pulled again, and this time he opened his eyes, frowned 
imcomprehendingly at me and then stared at his blazing 
clothes with the stupid wonder of a drunken man trying 
to remember how he came to his present plight. 

" Water ! " I roared. " Where shall I find water ? " 
He looked up at me and the expression of wonder gave 
place to dawning recollection. In another moment his 
face was transformed. I was still holding one arm, and he 
allowed himself to be pidled to a sitting posture. Then, 
leaving the flames to shoot vertically on to his neck and face, 
he swung the ruler for a last blow on the side of my head. 
I remember that I saw it coming ; one's moods change so 
quickly that I was aghast to find Grayle still intent on murder 
when I had forgotten all that nonsense and only wanted 
to help him. It was so ungrateful. . . . And it was so 
incredible ! I did not even let go his arm or relax my 
efforts. . . . 

The ruler struck where my head was already soft and 
bruised from its late banging against Beresford's. I felt 
my knees slowly bending, my body gently collapsing. Five 
and thirty years before a party of second-year men had 
decided that no one's education was complete untU he had 
once at least had experience of intoxication. I was plied with 
a very great deal of liquor, very scientifically mixed ; and 
I remember watching for the danger-signals of on-coming 
inebriation. Throughout the evening I could think rationally 
and speak clearly ; I was neither excited nor noisy, neither 
elated nor depressed. I even played a game of whist, I 
believe, and won a few shillings from my host. The parting 
brandy and soda, however, hit me like a battering-ram ; 
I subsided on the ground with every muscle limp and, to my 
shame, crawled downstairs and across the court on hands 
and knees. When Grayle's ruler brought me down, the 
same partial paralysis of brain and body must have taken 



252 Sonia Married 

place. I remember lying on my back with my knees in the 
air ; I remember turning on one side and raising myself 
on my hands ; I remember crawling with vast preoccupation 
to the door, feeling for the key, turning it and, as I hope to 
be saved, noticing my skill in going down the short flight of 
steps on all fours without pitching forward on to my head 
in the passage. 

Outside in the lane I paused to take breath and test my 
strength. By leaning against the wall I could draw myself 
upright and follow a stumbling course into the Brompton 
Road. A girl walking by on a soldier's arm pointed at me 
and tittered ; an elderly woman paused to exclaim, " Dis- 
gusting ! " Otherwise no one took any interest in the 
absorbing story which I could have told him — the fight, the 
fire. . . I turned round, all but over-balancing, to see whether 
the wooden work-room was yet burned down ; to my amaze- 
ment, there was no sign of a single flame. Was that because 
you were not allowed to shew lights owing to the war ? There 
was a war ; someone had told me, or I had dreamed it — or 
else I was astonishingly drunk. . . . Was I really trying to 
crawl home from Mark Goldsworthy's rooms in King's ? 
If so, I must have been drunk for a very long time, for I 
had been dreaming all sorts of things — dreaming that I had 
gone down from Cambridge, that I had done this and that, 
that I was an elderly man. ... It had been so vivid, this 
life-story which I had dreamed in a few seconds, that I could 
see again the bluest water in the world, which I knew to be 
the Caribbean Sea, though no one could possibly have told 
me ; and the approach to Colon (what other name could 
it have ?) . . . 

Then I felt overpoweringly sick, but what else was to be 
expected when Mark Goldsworthy had laid himself out to 
make me drunk ? It was curious that I should have been 
dining with him that night, because I knew that he had been 
killed years later at Omdurman ; or would be. . . . Did he 
know ? It was an astounding piece of second-sight, if I 
knew the name of the battle before it took place. . . . And 
how dreadful for poor Mark, who had been at my tutor's ! 
He was going to be killed accidentally, shot in the back by 
one of his own men who had been wounded. I must never 
tell him, of course. . . . And how absurd it would all seem 



The Unwritten Law 253 

when I awoke, but at the moment it was so real that I could 
not help believing it. . . Could I or could I not get on to 
my feet before I came to the gate ? It would look so bad if 
I were found bestially drunk before I had been a week at 
Cambridge. Perhaps, if I hailed a taxi and got inside and 
curled myself up on the floor, we could drive out of college 
unseen. It was worth trying. . . . 

" Take me to the House of Commons, please," I said. 

The man stared at me and laughed insolently. I was so 
tired that I could hardly resent his manner. 

"I'll pay you now, if that's what you mean," I said ; and, 
feeling in my pocket, I took out two half-crowns and closed 
the discussion by entering the cab. He shrugged his shoulders, 
laughed again and pulled down the flag of his meter ; it was 
the last movement of which I was conscious until he opened 
the door and jerked out over his shoulder : 

" Here's the House of Commons." 

We were by the entrance to the yard. I got out and asked 
him how much the fare was. 

" You've paid me once," he answered, with a mixture of 
sympathy, cynical amusement and sluggish concern. 
" You've been knocking about a bit, you have." 

I turned away and walked unsteadily along Millbank. I 
suppose my brain was about three parts clear by now ; I 
no longer fancied myself to be leaving an undergraduate 
debauch of thirty-five years before. Somewhere and some- 
how that night I had met with severe physical injuries ; 
Grayle was involved in it — and Beresford — and a strong 
smell of singeing, but my head was aching too much to let me 
think consecutively. I wanted to lie down and close my 
eyes, I would have lain down on the pavement but for the 
rain (and I had lost hat, collar and coat at some point in this 
nightmare evening) . . . but for the rain and the risk of 
being thought drunk. Anyone but a fool would have turned 
the head of the taxi and driven home ; I knew the hotel — 
though I could not give it a name, and the number of my 
room ; but I could only think of one thing at a time and I 
longed before everything else to lie down on one of those 
long sofas in " The Sanctuary "... which was so near, too. 

Some time later I remember standing with my watch in 
my hand, trying to strike a match against a wet lamp-post. 



254 Sonia Married 

Later still George Oakleigh was bending over me and 
trying to carry me from the doorstep into the house. He 
was in pyjamas, an overcoat and slippers ; I cracked some 
feeble joke about his hair, which was unwontedly disordered ; 
then I saw that I was speaking in atrocious taste, because poor 
George had been in bed and asleep, and I had unfeelingly 
disturbed him. I apologized, and he said that it was of no 
consequence, but I had to apologize again and again, because 
I could not let him be so magnanimous and, moreover, I 
was not at all sure that he was accepting the apology. . . . 
He told me that I was ill and must not excite myself. To 
shew him that I was not iU, I struggled to my feet and walked 
into the house. 

" No bones broken," he muttered. " Lie down, while I 
get you some brandy. Is Matthews stiU your doctor ? " 

" I don't want a doctor, George," I said. " I shall be all 
right, when I've rested a bit." 

He gave me nearly half a tumbler of neat brandy. As I 
drank it, I experienced the most curious sensation of my 
life : as though a thick cloth had been tied round my brain, 
I now felt it being gently withdrawn. I saw the room 
steadily and could teU George not to look so anxious ; I 
remembered the forgotten chapters of the night, even to the 
last stumble when I fell on the doorstep and beat on the 
panels with my fists until I became unconscious. Piece by 
piece my memory reconstructed the changing scene ; I 
wondered what had happened to Grayle and Beresford, 
whether the fire had been put out, what people were 
thinking. . . . 

I was too warm and drowsy to wonder long, but I remember 
saying very distinctly and, as I thought, impressively : 

" Don't get a doctor to me, George ; and don't let anyone 
know I'm here." 

Then I dropped asleep. 



The Unwritten Law 255 



George came into the library next morning on his way 
to the Admiralty. I was awake, because after an hour or 
two of sleep, the physical exhaustion which made it possible 
gave place to physical discomfort which effectually banished 
it. My head had a collection of dull, throbbing pains, which 
played for a while, each by itself on its appointed spot, and 
then joined hands and danced in a ring with an initial kick- 
off under my swoUen right ear ; over the forehead they went 
and under the back of the eyes, scampering to the nape of 
the neck, drawing breath and toeing and heeling it to the 
starting place once more. I had a basin of water by my sofa 
and relays of handkerchiefs, which I dipped and spread 
over my temples, but by three o'clock my arms had stiffened 
until I could not bear to move them, and I spent the re- 
mainder of the night turning from side to back and from 
back to side, trying to find some surface of my body which 
did not feel as if the bones were running through the flesh. 

" I told Bertrand you were here," George said, " and the 
housekeeper, of course. But she won't say anything. How 
you got yourself into that condition " 

He broke off and smiled at my cuts and bruises. Later 
in the day, when I got a chance of looking at myself in a 
mirror, I could forgive his smile. 

" It's a long story, George," I said. " Leave it till my 
head feels a bit clearer. And, once more, don't tell anyone 
I'm here. At the present time I don't quite know what my 
civic status is, whether I'm a fugitive from justice or what. 
Have you seen the papers ? Is there anything that you can 
fit me into ? " 

" I only had time to read the war news," he answered, 
" Look here, I've given orders for a bed to be made up in 
Raney's room, and we'U shift you, as soon as you feel like 
moving. Is there anything else you'd care for ? " 

" The one thing I want is the papers," I said. 

They were brought me ten minutes later by Bertrand, who 
stroUed into the library, raised his eyebrows and withdrew 
his cigar long enough to give a short whistle of surprise. 



256 Sonia Married 

" You're a pretty sight," he chuckled. " George said you 
wanted these. I suppose you've been fighting the police 
and want to see if they're advertising a description of you." 

I hunted through the main news sheets, losing myself in 
columns of official communiques and unofficial Cabinet- 
making, before I was rewarded with a four-line paragraph : 

" Accident to Well-known M.P.," I read, and underneath 
the heading : 

" A fire broke out last evening in the house of Lieutenant- 
Colonel Vincent Grayle, M.P., in Milford Square. It is not 
known how the conflagration originated, and, at the time of 
going to press, it is not possible to gauge the amount of damage 
done. We regret to say that Colonel Grayle has sustained 
severe injuries, which might easily have proved fatal. His 
condition is critical, and it is feared that there may have 
been actual loss of life." 

I put my thumb against the paragraph, handed it to 
Bertrand and resumed my search. The Times and Morning 
Post contained no reference to the fire, but the late London 
edition of the Daily Gazette gave me plentiful reading matter 
and rich food for reflection. There was a title, sub-title, 
headings to the paragraphs, and a column and three-quarters 
of close, descriptive print. It opened promisingly with 
" Tragedy in M.P.'s House " and progressed, through 
" Mystery Fire in Milford Square," to an account which 
must have been supplied two-thirds by Bannerman and the 
rest by the constable who had directed me to the studio in 
the lane. Grayle's physical state or the delicacy of his 
position had kept him from contributing anything. 

The narrative, so far as I remember it, ran on these lines : 
Mr. Guy Bannerman, who acted as secretary to Colonel 
Grayle, had been reading in the smoking-room and went 
upstairs at about eleven o'clock. His bedroom looked on to 
a strip of garden, and, in making the window secure, he had 
observed that the curtains in the wooden loft over the garage 
were on fire. After telephoning to the fire brigade, he had 
seized a jug of water, hurried into the garden and tried to 
force his way into the loft. The door was locked on the 
inside, however, and he had to run back and round to a second 



The Unwritten Law 257 

door, opening on to a lane at right angles to the Brompton 
Road. The room, when at last he got into it, was a sea of 
fire. Some years earlier it had been roughly fitted up as a 
work-room and was filled with books, loose papers and maps. 
There was nothing to shew how the fire had started, nor how 
long it had been going on, but the papers on the floor, the 
table-cloth and curtains, several straw mats and a fur hearth- 
rug were blazing. However it had started, its destructive 
course had been materially assisted by the oil from a big 
lamp which had been overturned and broken. By the door 
the flames were fortunately less fierce than at the far end 
of the room, or Bannerman would have been unable to enter. 
He emptied his jug in front of him, ran down and refilled it 
from the garage, emptied, filled and emptied it again, until 
the fire had been driven back a few yards. It was now 
possible for the first time to see through the glare of the 
flames, and he was horrified to catch sight of Grayle's body, 
lying motionless half under the table. Dragging him to the 
door, he was about to carry him downstairs, when he observed 
a second body on the far side of the fire-place. Then he 
remembered that two men had called to see Colonel Grayle 
on business half an hour before ; he had assumed that they 
must have left before the fire broke out, as it was inconceivable 
that three men should have been unable to conquer the flames 
at the outset. 

After carrying Grayle into the garage, Bannerman returned 
for the second victim, whom he recognized as a young man 
named Beresford. Of the third there was no sign in the front 
half of the room, and he had to go for more water. The 
wooden walls had now caught fixe, the book-cases and chairs 
were smouldering, and the oilcloth had blistered and cracked 
and was smoking ominously. A very few minutes' work 
were to shew him that one man armed with one bedroom 
jug could not even keep the flames from spreading. He 
ran backwards and forwards drenching the floor with water, 
but never clearing a path sufficient to allow of his advancing 
more than a third of the way into the room. When the fire- 
engines arrived, the flames had eaten through the walls and 
were licking the wooden gables of the roof ; they had licked 
to so great effect that the first jet of water brought down a 
cascade of tiles and charred rafters. 

17 



258 Sonia Married 

While the hoses played, Bannerman looked to the men 
whom he had succeeded in carrying out. Grayle was alive 
and breathing faintly, though his clothes fell away in hand- 
fuls of black ash at the first touch", and his face and head 
were shockingly burnt and disfigured. Beresford gave no 
siga of life. His hair was singed and blackened where he had 
fallen on his face against the bars of the grate ; his clothes 
were as much charred as Grayle's, but his body was almost 
unmarked, save for a bruise over the heart, no doubt from 
contact with the point of the fender. Death was probably 
due to asphyxiation ; this was the unofficial opinion of the 
doctor, pending the inquest. Partial and temporary asphyx- 
iation, indeed, was the only explanation why the three men 
had not either put out the flames or escaped from the burning 
room. 

There remained the second visitor, and, as soon as the fire 
had been put out, Bannerman returned to the loft. By the 
light of a stable lantern, it was possible to make a cautious 
search. Three quarters of the roof had disappeared, burnt 
away or fallen in heaps of broken tiles and blackened timber 
on the floor or in the garden ; the walls on two sides, the 
floor at one end had disappeared equally. On what remained 
lay a pile of charred table legs and chair backs, broken glass 
and blistered deed-boxes, scorched books and odd, un- 
identified metal fastenings and joints, the whole dripping 
and lapped with sinister black water. Bannerman explored 
every inch of the wreckage and returned to the garage empty- 
handed. At the end, where the ceiling had fallen in, a smaller 
pile of wreckage reared itself fantastically on a platform of 
petrol cans. A revolving book-case and a fifing cabinet, 
charred but intact, were half buried imder broken tiles and 
blackened volumes of Parliamentary Debates ; a stout 
table leg and a small safe lay further away ; and there was 
the reeking half of a burnt fu rcoat. 

My interest in the Daily Gazette narrative quickened at 
this point. Mr. Bannerman had admitted Beresford and 
another (whose name was not given). They had tried the 
front door— unsuccessfully, because all the servants were 
out for the night. A constable had suggested their going 
round to the door in the lane ; they had entered ; there was 
no hint that one had left before the other. No doubt in a 



The Unwritten Law 259 

few hours negative proof would be forthcoming, but, until 
that appeared, or until a further examination could be 
made, it was possible that the second visitor had been a 
second victim. 

" I'm afraid we've seen the last of young Beresford," I 
said to Bertrand. 

" What's happened to him ? " he asked. 

" You haven't read this yet ? " I said. " Well, wait till 
George comes back at lunch-time, and I'll tell you th& whole 
story. I rather fancy that a good many people have seen the 
last of me. I say, Bertrand, have you ever been present at 
a cremation ? " 

He looked at me sorrowfully. 

" I should have thought you'd had enough trouble for one 
night," he said. 

" I have, I can assure you. But my career of crime is in 
its infancy — I'll explain all this at lunch ; I want to know 
what sort of fire it takes to consume a human body, so that 
there's no trace of flesh, blood, hair, bone, clothing " 

" God knows ! " he interrupted. " You'd better ring up 
Brookwood." 

" I don't think I'm likely ever to ring up anyone again," 
I said — ^rather rashly. 

Some while before his usual hour George hurried in with a 
scared expression and wondering, wide-open eyes. He was 
carrying the midday editions of two or three evening papers, 
and I saw that I should not have to explain much, after all. 
The only point of interest to me was that Colonel Grayle 
was not yet in a position to give any account of what had 
happened. 

" And, until he does," I told Bertrand and George, " I 
propose to keep quiet too. You see, there's unfortunately 
no doubt that he and I each tried to kill the other, and 
between us we've succeeded in killing Beresford, though I 
can't say for certain if it was asphyxiation or the blow on the 
heart. I'm responsible for that fire. When I see what 
story Grayle puts up, I shall be better able to decide." 

It was not going to be an easy explanation to frame, and 
the papers were already beginning to wonder how two, and 
perhaps three, grown men could be imprisoned in a room 
with two doors, one of them unlocked. If Bannerman could 

17* 



260 Sonia Married 

get in some time later, they could have got out some time 
earlier. I was only wondering why Bannerman had sup- 
pressed my name ; did Grayle think that he had two lives 
on his conscience ? 

The evening papers gave a better account of him, though 
he was still too weak to satisfy the curiosity of the reporters. 
They also reminded their readers of his political career and 
the possibility of his being included in the new Government. 

" Have you thought out your own position ? " Bertrand 
asked me uneasily, throwing aside his paper. 

" I don't know that I have," I answered. " I'd sooner 
leave Grayle to explain." 

" H'm. You came here, stayed here — as much knocked 
about as you please, raving, unconscious. But, when every- 
one in London's asking how the fire broke out, no one in the 
house can find a word to say." 

" If Grayle's unconscious, I'm unconscious," I answered. 
" He can invent the explanation of the fire, and I'll stand by 
what he says." 

Bertrand sat heavily on the foot of my bed with an ex- 
pression of obvious dissatisfaction. 

" Every hour you stay here " 

" I don't pretend that it's ideal," I interrupted. " But I 
shall wait for Grayle." 

I was not allowed to wait for Grayle. And, if neither 
Bertrand nor I were satisfied with my silence, we had no 
reason to be more satisfied when I broke it. Yet I hardly 
see how I could help myself and I am sure that on balance 
I do not regret my action. The morning papers next day 
added little to the established facts and wide-ranging guess- 
work of the evening before, though, as a humane man, I was 
glad to see that Colonel Grayle's progress was as satisfactory 
as could be expected. There was a brief report of the inquest 
on Beresford — death by misadventure, with asphyxiation 
as the immediate cause, unsatisfied wonder on the Coroner's 
part that such a fire could have taken place, coupled with 
regret that Colonel Grayle was not well enough to give 
evidence. Of greater interest to me was an obviously- 
inspired hint that a new department was to be formed for 
the control of recruiting and that Grayle was likely to be 
made its head. If the announcement lacked novelty, its 



The Unwritten Law 261 

setting did not ; for the first time Grayle's own paper — he 
subsidized it, if he did not in fact own the controlling majority 
of the shares — accepted responsibility for the forecast. 

I read the announcement about eleven in the morning. 
I thought over it for perhaps half an hour. Then an idea 
came to me, which I was powerless to resist. Without 
considering its effect on him or on myself, without thinking 
of anything but that I meant to do this, had to do this, I 
crawled out of bed and made my way painfully downstairs 
to the library. I was astonishingly weak in body and I 
have good reason now to think that I was a little light- 
headed at the time, but I am not looking for excuses. When 
I had made sure that I had the library to myself, I dragged 
two very stiff legs to the writing-table at the far end, sat 
down and asked for Grayle's number on the telephone. It 
was repeated to me, and I realized for the first time that I 
had not yet decided what to say. And, before I could collect 
my thoughts, a woman's voice was exclaiming rather 
impatiently : 

"Hullo? Yes? Hullo!" 

" I want to speak to Colonel Grayle," I said. 

" I'm sorry to say Colonel Grayle is ill." 

" It's essential that I should speak to him. Will you 
please have me put through to his room ? " 

There was a perceptible pause, and I chose to fancy that my 
voice had sounded impressive. 

" Er, who shall I say it is ? " she asked. 

" It will be enough, if you say that it's very urgent." 

" I don't know that he's well enough to speak. Are you 
sure you can't give me a message ? " 

" If he's well enough to take a message from you, he's well 
enough to listen to it from me. Please be as quick as you 
can." 

The pause this time was longer, there were mysterious 
metallic clicks and buzzes ; then a man's voice said : 

" Hullo ? " 

" Is that Grayle ? " I asked. 

" Yes. Who's speaking ? " 

As he had not recognized my voice, I could leave recog- 
nition or avowal to come later. 

" It's about this announcement, Grayle," I went on. 



262 Sonia Married 

" Who is speaking ?" he asked again, with growing 
irritation. 

" Your appointment, I mean. You know what will 
happen, if you take it ; you can't say you haven't been 
warned. I suggest that, before it's too late " 

Faintly, as though the sound were coming through cotton 
wool, I heard a muffled cry. I waited, but there was no 
other sound. 

" Grayle ? " I began again. 

But there was still no sound. 



CHAPTER SEVEN 

THE DOOR REOPENED 

"... Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, and stood 
at the door of the house of Elisha. 

And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in 
Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou 
shalt be clean. 

But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said. Behold, I 
thought, he will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the 
name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and 
recover the leper. 

Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all 
the waters of Israel ? May I not wash in them, and be clean ? . . ." 

II. Kings v, 9-12. 



WHEN a man has crossed the watershed of forty, his 
power of recuperation is sorrily reduced. Perhaps 
he succumbs less easily to illness or injury, the bruises may 
take longer to shew themselves, but they also take far longer 
to disappear. 

I found this literally and metaphorically true during the 
weeks when I lay at " The Sanctuary." After my one 
painful descent to the telephone, I returned to bed and 
stayed there for a month. One part of my body after another 
swelled and changed colour ; I was pitifully weak, and for 
the first time in my life my nerves seemed to have gone Ump. 
The memory of my fight with Grayle haunted me, I could 
not concentrate my mind on anything and I lacked the 
native buoyaney to want to get well. Bertraud and George 

263 



264 Sonia Married 

were obviously anxious, but even to oblige them I could 
not put forth strength which was not in me ; the weeks 
rolled by, and I remained a listless and, I am afraid, "an 
exacting and irritable invalid. 

As my name had not been published, as I could in fact 
plead serious ill-health at the time of the inquest on Beres- 
ford, I saw no purpose in thrusting myself on the public 
until I knew what explanation Grayle proposed to give. 
Curious enquirers were simply informed that I had met with 
an accident. In the early days we used to watch the bulletins 
of Grayle's health, and the formation of the new Government 
in parallel columns ; and the second made more rapid pro- 
gress than the first. The chief offices were allotted, one after 
another, and the minor positions down to the last Junior 
Lordship of the Treasury ; at the beginning it was occg.- 
sionally stated that " at one time Colonel Grayle's name was 
mentioned in coimection with " this or that or the other 
appointment ; gradually the references to him became rarer, 
until his own paper wrote his political epitaph and announced 
with conventional regret that, while the Prime Minister 
was believed to have been hoping to make use of his services, 
his present condition of health put the acceptance of any 
office out of the question. 

Bertrand smiled grimly, as he shewed me the paragraph, 
but I was impatiently waiting until Grayle's condition of 
health enabled him to give me a lead. It came at last 
through the medium of Bertrand, on a night when he had 
been dining at the House and had seen Grayle for the first 
time since the fire. I am a tolerably humane man and, 
though I had struck upon provocation and in defence of my 
own life, I regretted the state to which I had reduced my 
opponent. He now walked with two crutches and a sling 
for his foot in place of the one stick ; his head was generously 
bandaged, and, though a curious faint down was beginning 
to appear on the exposed portions of his scalp, he no longer 
wore a moustache, and his eyebrows were singed out of 
existence. 

r A circle of his friends was bombarding him with questions 
and comments from all sides at once : " You had a near 
shave," " Were you badly hurt ? " and then the inevitable 
enquiry : " How did it start ? " 



The Door Reopened 265 

Grayle began a roaming description of the garage and 
loft, its tinder-dry woodwork, its equipment of inflammable 
papers and the like. 

" There was a large quantity of petrol there, too," he 
explained confidentially, " but I don't want this talked 
about. I had no business to have it there ; it was too near 
the house ; the place — as we've amply shewn — was in no 
sense fire-proof. I should have the County Council or some 
other damned interfering body on my back if it came out ; 
I'm not claiming from the insurance company, as it is, for 
fear of too many questions. They let me down lightly at 
the inquest, because there was no one who could give evidence. 
So this is a secret session," he ended, with a laugh, as he 
began to hoist himself away towards a chair. 

One or two of his companions followed and relieved him 
of his crutches, as he sat down. 

" But how did it start ? " he was asked again. 

" The lamp was overturned," Grayle answered promptly. 
" You see, I got a message that this poor fellow Beresford — 
he was the deluded fanatic who was always getting locked up 
for seditious pamphlets, you know — that he wanted to see 
me on urgent business, so I went off, expecting to find that 
the fellow was in trouble again — I knew him slightly, you 
see ; we'd met at people's houses ; when I got there, we 
sat and talked a bit. Well, he was lame — ^like me. . . ." 

He paused and pulled at the bandage on his head. 

" Where had I got to ? " he asked a moment later. 

" You sat and talked," Bertrand put in from behind. 

Grayle turned round quickly and caught sight of him for 
the first time. 

" You're the very man I've been wanting to see ! " he 
exclaimed ; and then to the others, " Excuse me a minute." 

Bertrand pulled up a chair, as they withdrew. 

" You must be grateful to me for coming when I did," he 
began. " The story didn't seem to be going with much of a 
swing." 

" You can leave my explanation to take care of itself," 
Grayle answered shortly. 

" I felt I could make it a bit fuller," Bertrand explained. 

Grayle looked at him enquiringly. 

" I see. Well, you're at liberty to tell your tale, and I'll 



266 Sonia Married 

tell mine. Or we can both leave it where it is. I admit 
that some people aren't quite satisfied at present, but 1 
manage to get rid of them — as you've seen. If you want me 
even to drop a hint that there was an attempt at ? " 

His lips formed the word, but he did not utter it ; and the 
imexpected silence was surprisingly sinister. 

" It's no business of mine what lies you tell," Bertrand 
answered. " Is that all you wanted to say ? If so, I'll move 
along." 

In the week before Christmas, O'Rane returned from 
Melton to find me immovably billeted upon him. After the 
first greetings he sat silent and reflective. . I could see that 
he wanted to talk and did not know how to begin. The 
room was his wife's, and there were still marks by the lock, 
where he had burst it from the wood-work. God knows 
what his thoughts must have been ! As I looked at his 
slight figure, lazily reposing in a long chair, and at his self- 
possessed, unrevealing face, I found it hard to picture the 
scene when he broke in the door. And for the thousandth 
time since that day of tragedy I asked myself what had been 
left him in life and longed for him to ask at least for sym- 
pathy, if he knew that I could give him no more help. 

When he spoke, it was to make some comment on the 
war. The month-old rumour that the Cabinet had broken 
on the question of peace negotiations was still flourishing. 
Rather than face another winter in the trenches, the German 
Government was alleged to have made an offer to evacuate 
Belgium and northern France, with the alternative of a 
threat, in the event of the war's continuing, that every 
Neutral and Allied ship sailing under whatsoever flag would 
be sunk at sight without warning. A school that was faint- 
hearted in asserting itself, even if it were not faint-hearted 
in the prosecution of the war, whispered that we must not miss 
our market and — in Bertrand's phrase — ^refuse terms now 
that we should have to accept gratefully and after the loss 
of another half-million men in six months' time. The rival 
school of stalwarts proclaimed, with great show of reason, 
that Germany would talk of peace only at her own con- 
venience — or necessity — and that her needs were our 
opportunity. 

We went on to talk of the new Government and its prospect 



The Door Reopened 267 

of life. In the week before I was incapacitated political 
passion in London rose higher than I have ever known it. 
The old Government, tired and indolent, half-hearted and 
uncaring, was losing the war beyond hopes of recovery. 
The new Government had intrigued its way into place, selling 
its soul to Lord Northcliffe, as Faust sold his soul to the devil. 
... As a very independent member I was privileged to hear 
both opinions in approximately equal numbers and certainly 
with equal violence of expression. I described to O'Rane 
two characteristic meetings within five minutes of each other. 
I had been walking from my office to lunch at the County 
Club one day, when I stopped to observe an unusual number 
of cars and a considerable crowd of loafers outside the Reform 
Club. George Oakleigh came up from behind and asked what 
I was watching. 

" It's the party meeting," he explained. " Aren't you 
going ? " 

" Not invited, George," I said. " I'm left out of these 
pleasant little gatherings. What are they meeting about ? " 

" To hear a statement from Asquith. There'll be a vote 
of confidence, I suppose. He's still the leader of the Liberal 
Party ! " he proclaimed, with a note of challenge. 

" This partisan enthusiasm is new to you," I commented. 

Any hint of raillery was lost on him. 

" I daresay it is !" he cried. " I was a candid friend in the 
old '06 parliament ; I've voted against them a score of times, 
but, when I see how they held the country together in the first 
shock of the war, when I see what they did . . . And now 
to be turned out by a low Press conspiracy and a man who 
owes his political salvation to Asquith, a man who was pulled 
out of the gutter at the time of the Marconi scandal . . . 
when the whole party nearly split. My God ! talk about 
gratitude in pohtics ! " 

He hurried away, still most unwontedly explosive, and I 
followed more slowly. At the comer of St. James' Square 
I found Beresford, also watching the crowd. (It was our last 
meeting before he called on me in the afternoon of our tragic 
expedition.) 

" They're broken ! Their noses are in the dirt — and thank 
God for it ! " he cried, pointing excitedly across the road. 
" They were responsible I They dragged us into the war ; 



268 Sonia Married 

it was their war, their diplomacy ! Asquith, Haldane and 
Grey. And now they're in the gutter ! " 

I remember walking on to luncheon with both conceptions 
to digest as an appetizer. 

O'Rane and I talked long of political futures. The Govern- 
ment had resigned without challenge or defeat ; we may have 
felt that we ought to have been consulted, as a compliment to 
the unfailing support which we had given ; we might even 
dislike the new ministry's mode of birth, but we agreed in 
thinking that we must give the new management a trial before 
reverting to those who had failed to keep order in their own 
home. Suddenly O'Rane interrupted me with a question 
which shewed that his thoughts had been for some time at 
a distance from domestic politics. 

" Er — Stornaway," he said, with a noticeable nervousness. 
" You remember when you came to see me at Melton some 
weeks ago ? You were going to set enquiries on foot to find 
out where Sonia had got to." 

I told him what had been done and how we had failed. 
There had not been many days for me between giving my 
promise of help and involving myself in the encounter with 
Grayle, but George and his sleuth-hound colleague continued 
to ransack every resource suggested by friendship or profes- 
sional pique. And at the end of three weeks they were as 
near finding her as at the beginning. 

" She is either staying with friends or hiding away in 
rooms somewhere," I told O'Rane as my conclusion. " And 
I can't suggest any way of tracking her down. It's a waste 
of time to advertise ; she's hiding, because she doesn't want 
to be found. If I may advise you, wouldn't it be wiser to 
leave her where she is ? I take it that you've stopped pro- 
ceedings ? " 

" I've stopped proceedings," he answered, and his chin 
dropped forward on to his chest, so that I should not see the 
movements of his thin face. 

" Then there's nothing to discuss with her. If at any 
time in the future she or you want to regain your liberty, 
you can start out to get in touch with her then. Any question 
of stopping her allowance is mere persecution — and I don't 
even know that it's likely to be successful persecution. She 
drew a cheque for twenty pounds on the day she left Grayle ; 



The Door Reopened 269 

and she's not drawn a penny since. It'll take some time to 
exhaust her balance, and, if she finds that her quarterly 
cheque isn't being paid regularly, you know even better than 
I do that she'll starve or beg or work her fingers to the bone 
before she'll give in." 

O'Rane was long without answering. Then he dragged 
himself out of the chair, shook hands and bade me good- 
night. 

" I must have a look for her myself," he murmured, as 
though he were thinking aloud. 

" O'Rane, she's clearly avoiding you," I pleaded. " Will 
it do any good ? " 

" I must meet her ! " he cried tremulously. 

If I said a very brutal thing then, I said it because I thought 
that in the long run it was kindest. 

" Let me tell you one thing before you go," I begged him. 
" O'Rane, you're not facing realities, you know ; you're play- 
ing with the idea of reconciliations, you think that it's possible 
to get your wife back and to live with her again. My dear 
boy, you must use your imagination. Think of the mental 
process that took her away ; think what her experience has 
been ; think what her mental state must be now. She will 
never come back to you. And you couldn't live with her, 
even if she did." 

O'Rane went out of the room without answering by word 
or gesture. 

11 

On Christmas Day George came into my room after dinner. 
He betrayed considerable excitement and was carrying a stout 
red book in one hand. 

" I've tracked her down ! " he exclaimed, almost before the 
door was closed. 

" Tracked who down ? " I asked, without any great interest. 

" Sonia. I caught sight of her at the Savoy — outside 
the Savoy, rather — after lunch. The Maitlands were giving 
a party, and, as we came out into the court-yard, Gerald 
Deganway put up his eyeglass and dug me in the ribs. Then 
I saw her in some kind of livery or uniform, driving a car. 
She didn't see me, and I don't think she wanted to be seen. 



270 Sonia Married 

because she was sitting rather hunched up and with her face 
turned away. . . . Then an old general stumped out and told 
her where to go ; she said, ' Yes, sir,' turned the head of the 
car and drove away. I just had time to see the number, and 
I spent a useful hour or two this afternoon finding who it 
belonged to. Apparently the old boy calls himself Brigadier- 
General Sir Andrew Lampwood. Now we'll turn him up in 
' Who's Who.' " 

He dropped into a chair, filled a pipe and began to turn the 
pages. General Lampwood, I gathered from his fragmentary 
recital, had been educated at Eton and Sandhurst . . . had 
served in Egypt, India, Egypt again and South Africa . . . 
dispatches, medals, clasps ... a widower with two sons . . . 
one house in Wilton Crescent and another in Norfolk . . . 
Naval and Military, Turf, Ranelagh. . . . 

" Well, if Raney wants her, he knows where to find her," 
he ended. " I suppose you've never met this Lampwood ? 
No more have I." He shut the book with a snap and drummed 
with his knuckles on the binding. " No wonder we couldn't 
find her ; she's probably living in rooms near by, driving for 
him all day. . . . I'm sru-prised that nobody should have 
seen her till to-day ; she's so well-known, and it's the sort of 
thing the picture papers love to get hold of." He sniffed 
contemptuously. " ' Recruit to the Ranks of Society War- 
Workers ! ' . . , I suppose she can only just have felt that 
she must do something and have somewhere to live " 

" Do you find people still talking about her ? " I interrupted. 

" They always have and they always will." He lay back 
and smoked for a few moments in a reflective silence. " Ever 
since she came out. ... Of course, she's a really beautiful 
woman — always has been — and she's got a lot of glib society 
patter and she can make herself almost irresistible to most 
men. As she would say herself, her technique is perfect. 
And, if you never waste your energy on emotions, I suppose 
you're left with a tremendous lot for your precious technique. 
She can be so charming to everyone, when she likes, that she'll 
make a success of anything, from a sticky dinner to a charity 
bazaar. She was always a success, she knew it, she got tem- 
peramentally drunk on it^-imtil I think that the only thing 
she cared about was being admired, wanted, loved. . . . And 
now she's driving a car for a dug-out general. . . ." 



The Door Reopened 271 

" But what are people saying about her ? " I persisted. 

" Oh, the old scandal's been toned down to almost nothing. 
She was being seen about with Grayle too much, and Raney 
put his foot down and said it was to stop." He grinned 
maliciously. " Lady Pentyre told me at lunch to-day that 
it was perfectly abominable the way people went about 
inventing lies — and about a sweet girl like that ! It came so 
well from Lady Pentyre." 

He smoked in silence until O'Rane came in for the five 
minutes that he always spared me on his way to bed. George 
repeated what he had told me, and asked if there was anything 
that he could do. 

O'Rane listened without any change of expression and then 
said that he would write to Lady Dainton. 

" There's nothing more you'd like me to do ? " George asked 
again. 

There was a moment's hesitation, in which O'Rane's un- 
smiling face became graver. 

" Well, I can't do it for myself," he said and paused again. 
" I — I wonder if it would be possible for you to get a word 
with Sonia — find out what time she starts in the morning 
and then intercept her " 

" Well ? " George encouraged him. 

" I wouldn't bother you, if I could see," O'Rane resumed 
apologetically. " Tell her that if she wants anything " 

I felt that it was time to interfere. 

" She can go to her parents," I said. " O'Rane, we're all 
of us different men and women every day of our lives ; we're 
always changing, never the same. Some things change us 
more rapidly than others ; marriage, iUness, great prosperity 
or great disaster, the death of a friend — my dear boy, I'm 
only telling you what you know already. Because your name 
doesn't change, because you look the same and your hair 
doesn't turn white from illness or grief, you think that you're 
the same. You're not. And she's not. Since you parted, 
there have been changes and developments in both your souls 
which will prevent your ever coming together ageiin. You 
don't like me to say it, but you'll have to recognize it." 

The boy's eyes seemed to shine with reflected pain at every 
word. 

" But isn't there room for something new ? " he asked. 



272 Sonia Married 

" A man may love a woman with all his heart and soul, he 
may marry her, she may die ; in time he may marry again — 
without forgetting her, without transferring the affection he 
once gave her — ^leaving her in the place where she's always 
been since she died, but somehow creating a new love. Don't 
you think that when two people . . . separate, the husks of 
their love may die . . . their old love, I mean, they may 
even hate the memory of it, but in time perhaps a new one 
may be bom ? . . ." 

" Between the same people ? My friend, the memory of 
the separation, the reasons for it, will rise up like ghosts to 
keep them apart. You want her to come back ? " 

For the first time a wan smile lit up his thin face. 

" Do you wonder ? " 

" What can you give her that you didn't give her before ? " 
I persisted. 

He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. 

" I shouldn't like to think that a second chance is always 
thrown away." 

" And what inducement can you offer ? " I asked him 
brutally. 

He spread out his hands with a shrug. 

" What inducement did I offer before ? We've been in 
love with each other so long ! At one time she was actually 
engaged to another man. . . . But there was something con- 
stant and unchanging. She didn't forget him, or hate him, 
but in time she had adjusted herself and come back to the 
thing that had always been there, hidden and unchanged. . . . 
So now, isn't it possible that, when the last six months fall 
into their proper perspective, when the ghosts no longer rise 
up " 

" How many people have you known to marry a second time 
after they've been divorced ? " 

" But there's no reason why they shouldn't." 

" In fact they don't," I said. 

I believe that George delivered himself of his message within 
about three days. I believe, further, that he descended to 
bribe some smirking kitchen-maid and stood through a down- 
pour of rain to seize the opportunity. Mrs. O'Rane masked 
any surprise that she felt — I suppose that she must have been 
taking part in many unexpected meetings — thanked hirajor 



The Door Reopened 278 

troubling to come and transferred her attention to the wind- 
screen, as a choleric voice remarked : " Now, young man, 
when you've quite finished talking to my chauffeur ! " 

The meeting confirmed my own diagnosis. The play was 
ended, and, if I concerned myself with wondering what O'Rane 
and his wife would do with the remainder of their lives, I 
felt that this would be a new play, no continuation of the 
first. The brief scandal had flickered out as abruptly as it 
had flared up. Lady Maitland — my barometer and sounding- 
board — announced to Bertrand across the length of a con- 
siderable table that she had seen darling Sonia, who had really 
turned over a new leaf ; it was the best thing in the world ; 
she was taking the war seriously at last. 

" Do you know, that dear child is never off duty Sundays or 
week-days, night or day ? " she confided. " You try to get 
her to lunch or dine ; she'll tell you frankly that it's not the 
least use promising, because, if her General wants her, out 
she has to go, and she may be driving for him all night. I 
don't see how she can keep it up — not seeing anyone, you 
know, or doing anything, and after the life she hoi been lead- 
ing ! Of course, she was really very naughty about the way 
she did it — all in a night, you know — threw everybody over — 
I was running an entertainment on behalf of my society, 
and she simply spoilt one tableau. . . . But, then, that's so 
like darling Sonia." 

" She's less of a fool than I thought," was Bertrand's 
comment to me. " No awkward questions, nobody to meet 
her and ask them ! Can't live at home when she has to be 
ready with the car at a moment's notice. ... I hope General 
Sir Andrew Lampwood has broad shoulders. . . . She's snug 
and secure till the war's over, and God knows when that will 
be." 

I made no answer, for I was thinking of O'Rane. On New 
Year's Eve he had dined at home with George and Bertrand, 
and aU three came up to my room afterwards. We made a 
despondent party, for the endlessness of the war daunted us, 
as the third year added month to month with lengthening 
casualty lists and a growing sense that, when we had already 
failed so many times and in so many ways, there was no reason 
why we should not go on failing. Each one of us was far 
enough from reality ^to be conscious of helplessness and 

i8 



274 Sonia Married 

insufficiency ; I could not count the number of times that 
Bertrand had growled, " I've done with the House 1 I'm not 
going down there any more. What good can we do ? " ; the 
number of times, too, that he repented and saw the House 
as the one independent and courageous check on an imbecile 
and malign Government. Stripped of all mental elasticity 
and enthusiasm, George hated the Admiralty with a savage 
ferocity that was made no less by the easy youth which he had 
passed, uncontrolled, indisciplined and effortless. And 
underneath our nervous depression and irritability lay a 
despondent sense that the moral grandeur of the war had 
become obscured. 

" I suppose the pace was too hot," George observed gloomily. 
" But in those first weeks. . . . They may not have known 
what they were going out to face, but they went hke good 'uns ; 
and the people who stayed behind were ready for any sort of 
sacrifice of money, comfort, leisure. All the spiritual fervour 
seems to go now in trying to make other people do things, 
keeping other people up to the mark. . . . God ! I'm sick 
of the Press agitations, I'm sick of all this political intrigue, 
I suppose I'm sick of the war." 

O'Rane nodded, but made no answer. 

" I don't ask anyone to listen to me," George went on, with 
unwonted bitterness, " because I've been wrong all through. 
So have you, Bertrand. We were wrong before the war, when 
we said there couldn't be a war ; and we were wrong, when 
we started yapping about a ' war to end war.' We can't 
even make a dean job of this ; we can't make the Hun put 
up his hands and say he'll go back to the status quo, and as 
for dismembering Germany and deposing the Kaiser — we 
can't do it ! But when I remember my own tom-fool speeches 
at the beginning " 

" But we couldn't keep out of it, George," O'Rane inter- 
jected. 

" And precious little good we've done by going in. I 
suppose we have stopped Germany from dominating Europe, 
but, as for our own honour, we offered that up on the altar of 
necessity when we found that we were fighting a nation that 
meant to win if it darned well could. Our later policy's 
become frankly imperialistic ; there's no ethical connection 
between Belgian neutrality and the partition of Turkey and 



The Door Reopened 275 

Austria. I'm afraid I've taken a deuced long time to see 
it. . . ." He turned to me with a scornful smile. " Do you 
remember when you first came back to England ? When 
we met outside the Admiralty ? " 
" I've often thought of that conrt^ersation," I said. 
" Everything seemed to follow so naturally in those days," 
he sighed. " Disarmament, nationahty, a tribunal to arbi- 
trate between states. Raney, you were one of the most per- 
sistent optimists I've had the ill-luck to meet ; you're not 
going to pretend that the entire thing's not the most futile, 
gigantic waste . . . whole peoples in arms, hacking them- 
selves to death, and not a damned thing gained ! You don't 
think we're going to win this war ? " 

For the first time in six months I saw O'Rane roused to 
impersonal interest. 

" I don't know if anybody's going to win," he answered. 
" And, what's more, I don't greatly care." 

" If you were back in August, '14 ? " George asked, looking 
him in the eyes and then quickly turning away. 
" I'd go through it again," was the quiet reply. 
George got up and began to pace restlessly up and down the 
room. 

" The big thing about this war is quite independent of 
results," O'Rane explained. " It's the effect on the individual, 
the effort, the risk, the readiness to make sacrifice. I always 
hold that there's no room in life for compromise. You know 
that, don't you, George ? " He held out his hand and pulled 
George on to the arm of his chair. " From the days when 
we were at Melton together. You and dear old Jim Loring 
and Tom Dainton — dear God ! how this war has killed them 
off ! — you used to thrash me, you brutes, to make me see that 
I must compromise, but you never won. And always before 
the war I thought that compromise — what I call moral 
cowardice and spiritual slovenHness — was the only thing 
that people minded about. They didn't care. It wasn't their 
business ! If the world was cruel and licentious or base- 
minded, they always asked me to remember that human 
nature was human nature." He sprang up with a sudden 
wriggle, as though he were jerking an incubus from his 
shoulders. " As a nation we were contented with the second- 
fate— compromise, toleration, ease ; we were second-rate in 

18* 



27e Sonia Married 

life, art, politics, second-rate in humanity, in soul. . . . 
And then there came the war — and it was the big moment 
when we had to decide whether to fight our way through the 
flames, or to stand in distant security and explain to the 
reporters that there was a child, sure enough, in the top storey, 
but that it would be suicide to attempt a rescue, and what was 
the fire-brigade for, anyway. . . . We had to decide, we had 
to make up our minds that there was something big enough 
to suffer and sacrifice ourselves for. . . . All of us who went 
out there thought, rightly or wrongly, that we'd found some- 
thing that admitted of no compromise. . . . Even if you went 
out of bravado, hke poor Val Arden, so as not to be thought a 
funk. . . . What it was — I don't quite know. ..." he went 
on slowly. " I doubt if any of us know, and we certainly 
didn't at the time. Perhaps it was for the security of the 
people at home. ... I know I was seeing red, I'd have slit 
the throats of German women and children at that time — ^in 
revenge for what they did in Belgium. . . . But before that 
started, before war was declared . . . You remember that 
last week-end of the Saturnia regna, George ? When we 
walked up and down, up and down at Loring Castle, wonder- 
ing whether there was anjd;hing worth saving. . . . Well, 
whenever I catch myself feeling as you do now, I recall that 
about four million men voluntarily decided that there was 
something in life better than their own Hves, something 
that had to be preserved, something that ruled out all com- 
promise. That's the moral value of war. After all, what is 
it you do when you run into the flames and rescue the kiddie 
%om the top storey ? You save its Ufe, I admit, and that's 
something, if you value human life, but the child may die 
a week later of whooping-cough, it may grow into a drunkard, 
an imbecile, a criminal. What matters is that you've taken 
yourself, your own soul, and given it a value. . . . When this 
is all over, if we lose, if we're bankrupt and broken, if Germany 
enchains us Uke so many tribes of African blacks, it still 
doesn't matter to the men who refused to compromise, they've 
made themselves. . . . Yes, quite dehberately, I'd — ^go 
through it — all — again. . . . And, when the war's over, we 
can't afford to tolerate anything but the best ; we haven't 
been fighting for the second-rate. And we've got to prepare 
our own minds for that now, so that the material changes 



The Door Reopened 277 

follow automatically. You must start with the individual, 
your own relationship to the world in all its aspects. Hanging 
for sheep-stealing ceased automatically, when the public mind 
had prepared itself, stirred itself up to say, ' This has got to 
stop ' ; and the compromisers, the obscurantists, the vested 
interests daren't raise their heads. You think, perhaps, that 
I'm not the best person to decry the usefulness of com- 
promise " 

He stopped abruptly, and all the light and colour died out of 
his big eyes. 

Bertrand, whom I thought to be dozing, raised his head 
for a moment and lowered it again. 

" Didn't Saint Paul say something about being all things 
to all men ? " he asked gently. " Saint Paul was a great 
diplomatist, a great man of the world. You'd say he was a 
great compromiser, David, but at least he knew how to suit 
himself to his audiences, to make allowances for poor, despised 
human nature. And perhaps you'U even admit that he was 
not altogether unsuccessful and that Christianity would never 
have spread a hundred miles from Jerusalem but for him. I 
sometimes think he has been unduly neglected," he continued, 
with a yawn. " Christianity would have been a poor thing 
without him." 

" It would have been a poorer thing without Christ," O'Rane 
answered. " And there would have been no Christianity at 
all, if Christ had said that the Scribes and Pharisees were doing 
their best according to their hghts ... or that we must make 
allowances for Dives, because he had a great many calls on 
his charity and really couldn't investigate each one person- 
ally. Of course, there'd have been no Crucifixion. . . ." 

Ill 

The Christmas holidays passed rapidly, and I remember that 
O'Rane told me one Sunday night that he would be going 
back to Melton in another ten days' time. None of us cared 
to ask him how much longer he proposed to continue this 
makeshift life, teaching seventeen-year-olds for nine months 
in the year and learning procedure in the House of Commons 
during the remainder ; it was his means of trsdng to forget 
that his wife was in the same city, Uving within a mile or two 



278 Sonia Married 

of him, driving perhaps within a hundred yards of their house, 
or passing him in the street, elusive and unattainable. 

After George's glimpse and single meeting, we heard little 
of her. George told me that he had met " Sonia's General," 
as that no doubt gallant soldier came to be called, with 
unflattering disregard of earlier and more varied achieve- 
ments, that he was an agreeable fellow, that someone was 
putting him up for the Eclectic Club. They fell into conver- 
sation and discussed the prowess of the new driver ; the 
General had been taken completely by surprise. 

" If she'd said ' Sonia Dainton,' anyone would have known," 
he explained. " I'd forgotten she was married. She suits 
me uncommon well, — ^if she can stand the strain. ..." 

A day or two later Bertrand made the General's acquaint- 
ance and came home with the not very surprising news jthat 
Mrs. O'Rane had terminated her engagement. 

" I never supposed that phase would last long," he grunted. 
" Up early, back late, out in all weathers and thankful if 
you can snatch five minutes to munch a sandwich out of a 
paper bag. There'd be very Uttle of this boasted ' war-work ' 
done, Stornaway, if people weren't allowed to go about in 
uniform, and none at all, if the first condition of your employ- 
ment was that no one was allowed to know that you were 
doing war-work of any kind. / can see the oifices and hos- 
pitals jdelding up their social ornaments ! Well, Sonia 
O'Rane's at least honest about it. A week or two with only 
a livery and no one to admire her ! " 

" She's got no excuse now for living anywhere but at home," 
I commented. 

Bertrand grunted scornfully. 

" Give her credit for a little more contrivance than that ! 
She leaves her General at the end of the month, by which time 
her husband will be safely back in the country. But she hopes 
to take it up again, when she's a bit stronger. I had this from 
the General ; he shewed me her letter. Damned ill-written 
scrawl," he added, with the intolerance which ran away with 
him whenever his prejudices were aroused. " She'll recuper- 
ate by lunching and dining out and dancing and staying 
up till all hours ; and, the moment David comes back to 
London, she'll be well enough to go back to her precious work. 
You see if I'm not right." 



The Door Reopened 279 

This time, however, Bertrand's ingenuity and malice over- 
reached themselves, for we heard from Lady Maitland that 
Mrs. O'Rane was genuinely ill. 

" I used to see her every morning," she told George, " as 
I went to Harrod's, and nine times out of ten we had just a 
word together. Then I missed her, then I saw the car being 
driven by someone else. I hope it's nothing serious." 

The conversation took place at a luncheon-party where 
O'Rane was present. George took it upon himself to reassure 
her, but from the fact that Mrs. O'Rane had disappeared 
even more completely than after leaving Grayle, there was a 
risk in fabricating good or bad news about her. General 
Lampwood supphed her address, and one evening, when 
there was nothing better to do, George went round to her lodg- 
ings. They consisted of a bed-sitting-room in a street- off 
Wilton Crescent, conveniently near to the garage. She was 
in bed, and the landlady doubted whether visitors would be 
very welcome, as she was suffering a good deal of pain. 

" That decided me," George told me. " She hadn't actually 
said she woiddn't see anyone, because I'm pretty sure she didn't 
think it would be necessary. I gave her the surprise of her 
Ufe, when I marched in ; she couldn't imagine how I'd heard 
she was ill, how I'd found out her address. . . . She's now 
suffering from the most awful reaction after the racket of the 
last year. Nothing that I said or. did was right ; she was as 
lonely as a woman could be and at the same time resented my 
coming, resented my sajdng she looked rotten and ought to see 
a doctor. . . ." He frowned and shrugged his shoulders 
impatiently. " She needn't bother. She won't catch me 
going there a second time." 

Yet rather less than ten hours passed before he was caught 
going there a second time. Indeed, he can hardly have left 
the house before Mrs. O'Rane was writing in contrition : 
" DarHng George, do forgive me if I was snappy and un- 
gracious, but I did feel so rotten ! It was my own fault that 
nobody came to see me, because nobody knew where I was, 
but I felt so horribly neglected, I was so furious with every- 
body for not coming to see me that, when you came into the 
room, I laid mjreelf out to be hateful. . . . My dear, I did reaUy 
feel iller than I can tell you, so forgive me ! Sonia." 

" I suppose if I collect a few flowers . . ." George began 



280 Soma Married 

apologetically next morning. " I shan't be able to stay 
more than a moment, or I shall be so frightfully late at the 
ofi&ce. ... I might get my cousin Violet to look her up, of 
course." 

I was never told how he found Mrs. O'Rane on the occasion 
of his second visit, but in the evening young Lady Loring 
paid us an unexpected visit. I did not see her, but, when she 
had gone, George came into my room with an expression of 
worried perplexity. 

" Violet's been sitting most of the day with Sonia," he 
explained. " I wonder if you guessed. ... I confess I never 
thought of it for one moment. Sonia's going to have a child 
very shortly." 

I, too, was taken by surprise and needed a moment to 
arrange my thoughts. 

" You're sure of that ? " I asked. 

" She told Violet. The question is — what are we going to 
do with her ? She's got to be properly looked after and she's 
got to be moved out of her present pokey little room. ... I 
suppose it means a nursing home. Violet suggested taking 
her to Loring House, but that was more generous than 
practical. I'm afraid there's no doubt Sonia did behave very 
badly to Jim Loring, when she was engaged to him . . . and 
Violet knows it and doesn't forgive her . . . and Sonia 
doesn't forgive her for knowing it. You know what women 
are. Violet's got all the sweetness in the world, she thinks 
she doesn't bear a grudge ; she can call on Sonia in bed, 
make a fuss of her . . . but it's different to take her into her 
own house, particularly with the associations that house must 
have for Sonia. But I needn't labour the point ; the sugges- 
tion was turned down almost as soon as it was made. Well, 
she can't go to her mother, because Crowley Court's over- 
flowing with wounded soldiers ; and I don't know that she's 
overwhelmingly anxious to meet her mother. She can't come 
here, of course." 

He stood reflectively rubbing his chin. 

" Whose child is it going to be ? " I asked. 

" Grayle's the father. I suppose that, as Raney's taken up 

his present attitude " He left the sentence unfinished 

and began to fill a pipe. " Ye gods, what a sweet mess people 
can get themselves into ! " 



The Door Reopened 281 

" When's the event expected ? " 

" Pretty soon, I fancy. Violet didn't tell me the exact 
date, but she did give me to understand very plainly that 
Sonia mustn't be left by herself any longer. She was extra- 
ordinarily overwrought and hysterical, when I saw her, but 
for some reason or other I never imagined ... I say, Storn- 
away, if it had been Raney's child, if this had happened a year 
ago ? " 

" Nothing would have saved them," I answered, " though 
it might have kept them artificially together, making a hell 
of each other's hves, when they'd be far happier apart. 
O'Rane was more responsible than any man for the break-up 
of their Ufe ; Grayle was only the instrument. The tragedy 
began when they married." 
George smiled grimly. 

" I suppose even Ran&y will see it, when his wife gives birth 
to another man's child. . . . And then what ? Will he 
divorce her then ? Have we got to go through all this racket 

again ? In the meantime the nursing-home problem " 

He stopped guiltily, as the door opened and O'Rane came 
in to say good-night to me. 

" Who's been to call here ? " he asked George. " I met a 
car driving away." 

" It was Violet Loring." 

" Oh, I wish I'd known that ! When next you see her, 
you can tell her she's a rude pig not to have pulled up. She 
must have seen me." 

" She was in rather a hurry," George explained. " As a 
matter of fact, it was me she came to see." 

I suppose his voice betrayed uneasiness, or at least em- 
barrassment, for O'Rane turned to him with a quick sympathy. 
" Nothing wrong, I hope ? " he asked. " The boy's all 
right ? " 

" Oh, it wasn't that." George looked at me almost 
despairingly, but I could only shrug my shoulders and leave 
him to make up his own mind. " She came in to say that 
Soma's a bit seedy," he went on. " I — as a matter of fact, 
I saw her for a moment yesterday and, as she was rather 
off colour, I thought it would be a friendly act for Vi to look 
her up. I don't know if you heard Lady Maitland telling me 
at lunch the other day that she was a bit done up." 



282 Sonia Married 

O'Rane's face became rigid, and his voice was as set as his 
featiires. 

" I didn't hear anything about it. I — ^you ought to have 
told me, George. What's the matter with her ? " 

George looked at me again, without winning any more help 
than before. 

" I only saw her for a moment," he answered evasively. 
" She seemed rather overdone." 

" But who's looking after her ? " 

" Nobody much at present. That was what Violet came 
about. She'd been to see her and thought it would be more 
comfortable if she were moved into a nursing home." 

Nature must compensate the blind by developing their other 
senses. Though he could not see George's studiedly non- 
committal face, O'Rane divined something hidden from him 
in the easily reassuring voice. 

" Old man, I don't think that's the whole story, is it ? " he 
asked, with persuasive gentleness. " The nursing home rather 
gives you away. Has Sonia got to have an operation ? " 

" There's no suggestion of it ! Violet says it's nothing out 
of the ordinary." 

" Then why a nursing home ? " 

" Because she wants rather more attention than she's 
likely to get in her present quarters. But there's not the 
slightest need for you to worry yourself." 

O'Rane began to pace up and down the room, chewing his 
lips. 

" She must come here, of course," he said at length. 

This time I looked up at George. 

" You won't find that practicable, O'Rane," I said. 

" Why not ? " 

" She won't come." 

" Because of me, you mean ? I'll clear out, if she prefers 
it ; I should be clearing out in any event at the end of the 
week. But it's her home." 

" You can't bring her home by force." 

O'Rane's eyes lit up with sudden, burning passion. 

" If I had my sight, I'd bring her myself ! As I haven't, 
George is going to bring her for me. Yes, you are, Gedirge. 
You're going to take a car and have her carried into it and 
brought here. If she objects, you're going to make her. I'll 



The Door Reopened 283 

leave the house when she tells me to. You don't understand 
me, you wouldn't understand me, if you lived to be a thousand ; 
but I took an oath and I'm going to keep it. I swore in the 
sight of God that I would hold her in sickness and in health to 
love and to cherish till death parted us. I said it with her 
hand in mine ... in Melton Chapel . . . and I could feel 
her fingers trembling. It was a scorching July day, and I 
could feel the sun coming hot on my face. ... I'd never 
been at a wedding before, for some reason ; we'd rehearsed 
it, and Sonia'd told me how I had to stand and what I had to 
say. . . . And I kept repeating the words, as we came out 
into the Cloisters — ^it was cold as the grave, and I felt her 
shivering, as she leant on my arm. And then there was a 
word of command and a rattle, as the Corps presented 
arms. . . . And we came out into Great Court, and I could 
feel the sun again. And we were marched off to Little End, 
and I heard a lot of yelping, and something with a cold nose 
pressed against my hand, and Sonia gave a little choke and 
said that Pebbleridge had turned out the hounds in our 
honour. . . . And before we went to Burgess' house — ^the 
words were still running in my head — I whispered, ' I will 
love you, comfort you, honour and keep you in sickness and 
in health, forsaking all other.' I swore it then and I should 
be damned, if I went back on it. This is her first sickness 
since we were married, and I'm not going to leave her to go 
through it alone until she tells me to." 

His voice rang with excitement until the room echoed, and 
Bertrand came in with eyebrows raised. 

" You don't in the least understand, Raney," George began, 
in difficulty and distress. " You were quite right ; I hadn't 
told you the whole story " 

" I don't want to hear any more — yet," O'Rane interrupted. 
" I shouldn't be asking you to do this, if I could do it myself." 

" Was that necessary ? " George asked with a touch of 
stiffness and impatience. " I'll go whenever you want 
me to." 

" You must go now. Ring up Violet and tell her to meet 
you there in half an hour with her car ; you'll want a woman 
to help you. The rest of us will have our work cut out to get 
things ready here. Stornaway, I'm sorry to disturb you, 
but I shall have to find you a shake-down in some other part 



284 Sonia Married 

of the house ; this is Sonia's room. Don't waste a moment, 

George " 

" I suppose you know it's after eleven," George interrupted. 
" Move her to-night, if she's fit to move. Let Violet 
decide that." 

George looked from Bertrand to me and turned helplessly 
to the door. O'Rane had already rung my bell and was 
standing in the passage tattooing the floor with impatient 
foot and waiting for his housekeeper. I spread a bath-towel 
in the middle of the floor and began to pile on to it my exiguous 
personal effects, while Bertrand seated himself heavily in an 
arm-chair and begged for enlightenment. A moment later 
the front-door slammed, as George set out. 

For an hour we worked hard to make the house ready for 
Mrs. O'Rane. Bertrand's one comment, when I explain,ed 
the new commotion, was, " The boy's mad ! She won't 
come," and from time to time, when he was being urged and 
driven to a fresh task, he would remonstrate gently and warn 
O'Rane not to be disappointed. There was never any answer. 
By midnight our labours were complete : the bedrooms had 
been reshuffled and beds made, food and drink prepared. 
We met in the library with vague uncertainty what to do next. 

" You must tell me if it looks all right," O'Rane said to 
Bertrand. " I want it to look exactly as it was before. She 
always loved this room, and I believe it is a beautiful room." 

Bertrand glanced perfunctorily round and laid his hand 
clumsily on the boy's shoidder. 

" I told you before, David ; you're going to be terribly 
disappointed, if you think she's coming." 

" / would have undertaken to bring her ! " he cried. " We 
can trust George. And I don't suppose he'll even say where 
he's taking her." 

" If she doesn't know where she's coming," I interrupted, 
" you'd better keep out of the way till she says she'd like to 
see you." 

" I must welcome her," O'Rane answered. 

Bertrand and I exchanged glances and excused ourselves. 
As we turned at the door, O'Rane was standing with his watch 
to his ear. About three-quarters of an hour later I heard 
a car slowing down in the street outside. 

George has told me since that his cousin and he found their 



The Door Reopened 286 

patient far less difficult than they had feared. She was 
plunged in melancholy bordering on hysteria. Loneliness, 
pain and neglect had reduced her pride until she sat up in bed 
with her face contorted and tears trickling down her cheeks, 
reprcraching them for never coming to see her and bitterly 
proclaiming that she now knew how much trust to put in 
people when they said that they were her friends. George 
took her hand and explained that he had come to take her 
away where she would be tended and made happy. At once 
there was an indignant outburst ; she would not move, she 
was quite well ; if they would go away instead of bullying her, 
worrjdng her, threatening her, she would be all right in a 
moment. He let the storm spend itself and recaptured the 
hand that she had snatched away. 

" Violet's told me what's the matter with you," he whis- 
pered. " Unless you're very quiet and good, you'll injure 
yourself. And you are going to be quiet and good, aren't 
you ? " He was talking to her as though she were a child, 
and she responded by throwing her arms round his neck and 
weeping convulsively. " You're going to be very good, 
aren't you, Sonia ? And we're all going to take the greatest 
care of you. Violet's got her car here, and we're going to 
wrap you in a cloak and explain to your landlady that we're 
not really stealing the blankets, however much appearances 
may be against us, and we're going to take you away, and 
you're going to be in the midst of friends, and everybody's 
going to be kind and sweet to you, and you're going to forget 
how lonely and miserable you've been the last few days." 

He lifted her into a sitting position, while Lady Loring 
hunted for slippers and wrapped a cloak about her. 

" I don't deserve it ! " Mrs. O'Rane cried with sudden 
revulsion. " Why do you come here bothering me ? It's 
my fault, I knew perfectly well what I was doing ; I should 
never have done it, if he'd treated me properly, if he'd loved 
me. It was David's fault, you know it was ; and you come 
here bothering me when I'm ill . . ." 

George helped her out of bed and supported her across the 
room. From time to time she muttered, " Why don't you 
leave me alone ? It was his fault, but he could never do any 
wrong in your eyes ! " like a sobbing child in the last stages 
of a tornado of temper. He carried her into the car, while 



286 Sonia Married 

Lady Loring poured out a hurried explanation to the landlady. 
A deep drowsiness descended upon her as she felt herself 
being packed into a bed of cushions, while a bearskin rug 
was wrapped round her, but, as the engine started, she opened 
her eyes and enquired sleepily where she was being taken. 

" You're to go to sleep and not ask questions," said George. 
" Is that a promise ? Say it quite slowly : ' I — Sonia O'Rane 
— ^promise — that — I — ^wiU — go — ^to sleep — at — once — quite — 
quietly — and — will — not — ask — any — questions. ' ' ' She 
laughed weakly and began to repeat the words, only stumbling 
at her own surname. " Once again 1 " George ordered. " I 
— Sonia O'Rane — ^promise ..." She struggled half-way 
through the sentence and then dropped asleep with her head 
pressed against his shoulder. 

She was still sleeping when the car drew up at " The 
Sanctuary." The door stood open, George lifted her out and 
carried her across the pavement and into the house. The 
lights in the library were burning, and, as he carried her in 
with her head over his shoulder, she looked dully at the 
familiar book-cases and panelling, the high, shadowy rafters, 
the chairs and sofas and the preparations for a meal on the 
refectory table. He had borne her half-way across the room, 
when she recognized her surroundings and struggled violently 
to free herself. George had perforce to lay her on a sofa before 
she threw herself out of his arms. As he did so, O'Rane 
came up from behind. 

" I asked George to bring you here," he explained. " I 
thought you'd be more comfortable at home." 

She dragged herself to her feet and hurried uncertainly to 
the door. • 

" My dear, you can't go out in that state ! " said Lady 
Loring, as she laid restraining hands on her shoulders. 

" Let me go ! It was a trick ! You lied to me ! " 

O'Rane slipped forward and touched her wrist. 

" I thought you'd be more comfortable at home," he re- 
peated. " You won't find me in the way ; I'm going back to 
Melton. I was only staying to see that you had everything 
you wanted." 

" Let me go ! " she cried again, shaking his fingers off hey 
wrist. 

" No, I'm going. But isn't it more comfortable ? " 



The Door Reopened 287 

She looked stonily round, and her eyes came to rest on his 
face. 

" Oh, yes. It's more comfortable. Now may I go, 
please ? " 

" You had better stay. Let me help you upstairs, and 
then I'll leave the house. I was hoping you'd be glad to be 
back. And I'd waited so long." 

He smiled and held out his hands to her. She looked at 
him for a moment ; then her eyes closed, and she began to 
sway. 

" Take me home 1 " she whimpered, as George sprang 
forward to catch her. 

" You must stay here to-night." 

" I ask you to take me home ! " 

O'Rane put one arm under her shoulders, aijd the other 
under her knees. 

" It's too late now, and you're tired, darling," he whispered. 
" To-morrow, if you like. I'm just going to carry you up to 
bed, as I used to do at Crowley Court when you were twelve 
and I came over for the holidays. Do you remember ? And 
then I'll say good-night, and Violet will put you to bed and 
take care of you. Don't struggle, Sonia, sweetheart ! You 
can't hate me so much that you can't bear to let me touch 
you or carry you up a flight of stairs, when you're ill." 



IV 

As I kept deafly and pusillanimously to my room, I am 
far from sure what happened during the remainder of the 
night. O'Rane, I believe, carried his wife up to bed, left her 
in charge of Lady Loring and accepted from the tired butler 
at Loring House an arm-chair in the library for his own 
accommodation. Bertrand was already in bed, I heard 
George going to bed as the car started outside ; by two 
o'clock all was quiet. 

I remember that, when I was young enough to play baccarat 
for high stakes and impressionable enough to be embarrassed 
by a scene, I stayed in a house where certain unpleasantness 
took place at the card-table. The dispute and recriminations 



288 Sonia Married 

were bad enough, the night of reflection — after a dozen final 
councils adjourned from bedroom to bedroom — was worse, 
but worst of all was our uncertain meeting next day, when we 
stood whispering by the fire in the dining-room, peevishly 
waiting for breakfast and watching the door to see whether 
the cause of the unpleasantness would shew himself. Ber- 
trand, George and I stood whispering next morning with 
much the same embarrassment ; breakfast lay on the table, 
and none of us paid any attention to it. The time was early 
for me and late for George ; I have no idea of what hour 
Bertrand usually rose, but I remember he was soothing himself 
with the first cigarette I had ever seen him smoke, at intervals 
forgetting that it was not a cigar and trying to hold it 
between his teeth. 

Our attitude of vague expectancy was broken up by the 
arrival of Lady Loring in a creased, black evening dress with 
a travelling rug over her shoulders. Her eyelids were pink 
with fatigue and her arms mottled with cold. 

" We look a nice band of conspirators 1 " she exclaimed. 
" Now, will somebody tell me what it's all about ? " 

" How's Sonia ? " George asked. 

" She went to sleep the moment her head touched the 
pillow and she was sleeping like a child, whenever I looked at 
her. I think you're all needlessly alarmed about her, but 
then you're only men. I've been through it all, so I know 
exactly what it feels like to imagine you're being neglected. 
But what does anybody want me to do ? " 

She beckoned us to the table and sat down rather wearily, 
looking from one to another. 

" The trouble is, dear lady," Bertrand grunted, " that we 
don't know. I suppose you've heard that these two young 
idiots have had a disagreement ? Does that young woman 
upstairs know where she is ? " 

" She'll know the moment she wakes up. Is David 
here ? " 

" He said he'd beg a shake-down at your house, Violet," 
George interrupted. 

Lady Loring hummed dubiously. 

" To judge from her condition yesterday," she ventured, 
" she's hardly accountable for her actions. It's not to be 
wondered at, you know, when you think what she's been 



The Door Reopened 289 

through — and the way she's lived on her nerves for years. 
If you'll tell me what you want done, of course ..." 

It was easier to concentrate our attention on breakfast. 
George soon hurried away to his of&ce, Bertrand lighted a 
cigar and went off to a committee meeting, after stumping 
the library for half an hour, with the ends of his walrus 
moustache pulled into a circle, and murmuring at five-minute 
intervals, " What are two fat old men like us doing in this 
galley ? " A telephone message from O'Rane enquired how 
his wife was, and Lady Loring took the opportunity of 
arranging with her maid for a supply of clothes to be sent round. 
The conversation reminded me of her vigil, and I told her 
that, if she would lie down until luncheon, I would take a 
book, a chafing-dish and a bowl of bread and milk and sit 
outside Mrs. O'Rane's door in case she wanted anything. 
Half-way through the morning, O'Rane tiptoed upstairs for 
a change of linen ; Bertrand relieved guard whUe I went down 
and took a light meal with Lady Loring. It was not until 
three or four o'clock that I heard sounds of movement within 
the sick-room. 

I went in to find Mrs. O'Rane considerably altered since our 
last meeting, but more collected than I had anticipated. She 
asked for food and, when I had brought her the bowl of bread 
and milk, begged me to stay and talk to her. Her first question 
was who had brought her to " The Sanctuary," and, when 
I had told her, she lay back on the pillows with closed eyes, 
to avoid giving away any points. 

" I feel better than I did yesterday," she said at length. 
" I shall go back to my own rooms to-day." 

" You'll be wiser to stay here." 

She smiled rather sneeringly. 

" You think it's the simplest thing in the world for me to 
stay here." 

" The wisest," I corrected her. " Your husband's not 
here, by the way, and you can be sure of being well looked 
after." 

" Oh, don't say that again ! You think it's easy for'me to 
lie here and be looked after by people who despise me and 
hate me. . . ." 

I got up and lifted the tray from her bed. 

" I'm going to leave you now," I said. " Sleeping's much 

19 



290 Sonia Married 

better for you than talking, and I'm afraid I've got rather a 
faculty for getting on your nerves." 

Her lower Up at once feU and trembled with nervous con- 
trition. 

" I didn't mean to be rude, but I do feel so ill ! And you 
do all hate me I To bring me here ! " 

She gave a single breathless sob, and tears, began to well 
into her eyes and trickle down her cheeks. I pulled a chair 
to the bedside and took her hand. 

" The older I get," I said, " the greater disparity I find 
between the theory and practice of hating. Theoretically 
I hate no end of a lot of people, but, if I had the power of 
venting my hatred on them, I don't see myself using it 
much. As a matter of fact I had a talk with George 
the other night about you ; I said that the madcap life here 
was fantastically impossible, that your husband had himself 
to blame more than any other man for driving you out of 
the house " 

" That wasn't why I left him," she interrupted quickly. 

" You didn't leave him because you thought he was un- 
faithful to you." 

" I know he was. I had proofs." 

" Supplied by Grayle ? " I hazarded. She looked at me 
steadily without answering. " Well, when you've time, I 
should re-examine those proofs in the light of your general 
knowledge of your husband. If you're interested in my 
opinion of you . . ." — Her eyes Ht up eagerly. — "You'd sooner 
be insulted than ignored, wouldn't you ? " — Expectancy gave 
way to affected anger. — " Well, I don't hate you, but you were 
a little fool to marry such a man ; your instinct, your know- 
ledge of life, your knowledge of him ought to have made it 
impossible. Having married him and considering his afflic- 
tion, I blame you for not effacing yourself, obliterating your 

own individuality to stay with him. After that " I 

dropped her hand and strolled to the window. " You were 
young, entitled to make your own life ; it's not easy to justify, 
but it seems to follow almost naturally from the premises. 
It happens to have turned out a failure, but no one can hate 
you for an error of judgement, particularly when you've shewn 
that your instinct about men is unreliable ; you shewed it 
with O'Rane, I believe you shewed it before . . . and for^ 



The Door Reopened 291 

tunately pulled up before it was too late. I feel this so 
strongly that I told O'Rane it would be a tragedy, if you ever 
tried to come back to him, there'd be a second catastrophe 
worse than the first. . . . I'm afraid he's too much in love 
with you to use his imagination." 

She pressed the palms of both hands against her eyes. 

" I can't stay here," she exclaimed irrelevantly. " I've 
no right to turn David out." 

" You needn't worry about that. He's given you the right, 
and you're turning him out for less than a week. For the 
matter of that " 

Her face grew suddenly set and her eyes scornful. " I 
suppose, in spite of all the fine words, this is all a trick to try 
and force me back here ? " 

"I've not the least doubt that O'Rane hopes you'll return 
to him," I told her frankly ; " he probably will, even when he 
knows what's the matter with you — no, he doesn't know even 
that at present — ^but he's living in a fool's paradise." 

With another of her quick facial regroupings — ^which 
is the only phrase I can find to indicate the shortening of a 
line here, its lengthening there, the droop or lift of the corners 
of her mouth, the dilation of a pupil, the sudden gleam which 
turned her brown eyes almost golden, the tilt of the nose or 
the sudden birth of a dimple — she was smiling with her old 
demure self-confidence. 

" I'm vain enough to think I can make almost any man 
want to live with me," she said, darting a glance from beneath 
lowered eyelashes. 

" Come, that's more like yourself ! " I laughed. 

Thereupon the smiles and coquetry vanished as though I 
had struck her in the face. Yes, I had always hated her, 
always disapproved of her, regarded her as a flirt, taken 
everyone's side against her. There was no good in her, was 
there ? Nothing ever to be said in her defence ? . . . She 
lashed herself from one fury to another for ten minutes, only 
stopping from exhaustion and discouragement at my failure 
to answer. 

" / could make him lore me I " she panted in conclusion. 
" I shouldn't even need to make him, he's in love with me now. 
But / could make him happy. You think I can't. You 
think I can't 1 You know you think I can't ! " 

19* 



292 Sonia Married 

I laid my hand on hers ; she slapped at it petulantly, but 
without any great desire to hurt, I fancied. 

" Mrs. O'Rane " 

" Why don't you call me Sonia ? " she interrupted, with 
complete detachment from all that we had been discussing. 
" Everyone does. I suppose you prefer to keep — at a 
distance ! " 

And then I did a thing which stiU surprises me. I got up 
and sat on the edge of her bed. (There was a spring mattress, 
which I largely capsized, so that she was thrown half on her 
side.) I put one arm round her shoulders, drew her to me and 
kissed her on the forehead and both cheeks. I remember 
thinking at the time what an amazing thing it was to do, and 
the thought was confused with a knowledge that her face was 
dry and burning. She put her arms on my shoulders and 
returned the kiss ; quite dispassionately I noticed that her 
lips were crumpled and dry as brown paper. 

" Don't you think you're really rather a silly baby, Sonia ? " 
I Scdd. " If you could remember the times we've met, I 
should tell you frankly that for half of them I wanted to go 
away and keep at the farthest possible distance. For the 
other half " 

Her eyes brightened in anticipation of a compliment. 

" Well ? " 

" It doesn't matter now. Why won't you believe that 
everyone here wants to help you ? " 

" Because I don't see why they should. I didn't expect it, 
I don't ask for it ; I made up my mind at the time . . ." 

She choked and drew herself closer to me, sobbing quietly 
but inconsolably until I felt her arms relaxing and laid her ba,ck 
on the pillows, a pathetically disfigured and moist piece of 
something that was above all wonderfully youthful. 

" If you'll promise not to cry, I'll stay and talk to you," I 
said. " Otherwise " I must have made some un- 
conscious movement, for she clutched at my sleeve. " Do 
you promise ? Well, I'm only a man . . ." 

She pulled herself suddenly upright. 

" Where's David ? " she demanded. 

" At Loring House, I believe — only a man, as I was saying, 
but I can tell you that you'll wear yourself out, if you go on 
like this. You've got a great grievance against all of us, you 



The Door Reopened 298 

say we hate you and despise you ; wouldn't it be fairer not 
to say that till we've given you some better cause than you've 
had at present ? " 

Her teeth snapped like the cracking of a nut. Then the 
comers of her mouth drooped, and she began to cry again. 

" If you would hit me 1 " Her head fell back until I could 
see only a quivering throat and the under side of her chin. 
" My God ! what I've been through ! No one knows ! No 
one can ever know ! " 

I gave her some water to drink and asked leave to light a 
cigarette. 

" When I was a small boy," I said, " there was a big oak 
press in my bedroom which used to reflect the firelight until 
I thought that all manner of goblins were coming out to attack 
me. I never got rid of the idea until I was shewn inside it 
by daylight — ^I remember it was full of the drawing-room 
summer chintzes — then I never feared it again. Does it 
help you to talk about things, Sonia ? " 

Her face set itself again, but this time in resolution. For 
two hours I listened to the most terribly frank self-revelation 
that I am ever likely to hear. Like a sinner worked up to 
make confession, she told me of her life from the age of sixteen, 
when she had fallen romantically in love with O'Rane and 
when her mother had, quite properly, told her not to be 
ridiculous. For years she had been incited — I had almost 
written " excited " — to make a great match ; she had rushed 
into an engagement with an honoured title, half feeling all 
the time that she was pledged to the trappings of a man 
rather than to the man himself ; and, when the engagement 
ended, she had set herself, like a prisoner at the triangles, to 
shew that it did not hurt, that she was not going to allow her 
capacity for enjoyment to be killed ; and, when her own 
people looked askance at her, she had traded her charms 
among others who fawned on her and whom she despised. 
The outbreak of war found her unplaced — ^without mission 
or niche ; she had thrown herself into war-work — and 
broken down, she had lain useless, neglected and tacitly 
contemned until she met O'Rane, blind and icily self 
sufficient. 

Then she had married him in the delirium of self-immolation, 
only to find that his passionate idealism for the future was 



294 Sonia Married 

transmuted into a white-hot zest to perfect the present. He 
was prepared to practise the Sermon on the Mount in a tweed 
suit and soft hat. For a month she shared his life as she would 
have partaken of an impromptu midnight picnic in the Green 
Park. Then a homing instinct had rebelled against the 
promiscuous publicity of their life, she had felt that his love 
for her was diluted beyond taste by a vague devotion to man- 
kind. She had treasured slights where no slights were in- 
tended and vented irritabilities where none was justified. His 
smiling patience had evoked a sense of hopelessness, followed 
by a desire for self-assertion. They had quarrelled, and, 
rather than admit herself in the wrong, she had blindly 
groped for evidence against him which the heat of incon- 
vertible resentment would torture her into believing. Grayle 
had supplied it. . . . 

She told me -unreservedly of the conflicting influences upon 
her of three men at the same time. All were in love with her 
after their kind. O'Rane himself, most sympathetic with 
men and least understanding of women, gave her the keys 
and cheque-book of his life, imagining that undemonstrative, 
uncaressing fidelity would meet with like return ; Beresford 
offered a romantic devotion which posed her frigidly among 
mountain snows and would have sent him through fire to 
avenge an insult to his idealized conception. And Grayle 
had strode in, compelling and indifferent, slighting and 
frightening her alternately, at a time when she was instinc- 
tively yearning to be called to order, taken in hand, shaken 
and even beaten. 

" I was like the Punch picture of the woman in a thunder- 
storm," she laughed. " I wanted a man there just to tell me 
not to make a fool of myself. Poor David never, never ..." 

Grayle desired her until she felt safe in playing with him, 
then he neglected her until in pique she set out to try the 
temper of her charms ; ultimately he terrorized her into a 
surrender which neither blind trust nor deaf devotion could 
compass. 

She told me of her mood when she felt that Grayle was 
overpowering her, of her drunken willingness to believe what 
she knew was untrue. She described her parting with O'Rane 
as she might have described herself beating a child because she 
was out of temper and had to pretend that someone else was 



The Door Reopened 295 

in fault. I was given an unsparing account of her life in 
Milford Square, which she entered with an unsubstantial 
hope that she would find love and a quivering sense that she 
had come like a dog to be beaten. Not a day and night had 
passed before she found that she had outstayed her welcome, 
that she was pressing on him for all his life what he desired 
for an unoccupied afternoon. Their life together was like 
the record of wife-beating by a besotted husband, refined in 
method by the play of sarcastic wit on impressionable senses. 
At last there had come a day when he put into words the taunt 
that hitherto lacked only verbal clarity ; she riposted with the 
charge that he was discarding her to clear the way to his 
poUtical ambitions ; every hoarded grudge and bitterness 
was dragged into the light, unseemly reproaches were uttered 
with the knowledge that all were exaggerated and most with- 
out foundation ; a.nd. in a breathing-space both discovered 
that the articulation of such hidden and reserved acerbity 
made it impossible for them ever to Hve together again. 

She had walked into the street with his last scurrility 
stinging her ears and cheeks until she found herself tearlessly 
crying. It was no use crying, when she needed all her wits 
to decide her next move, all her composure to face it. A 
lodging for the night had to be found in some place where she 
would not be interrogated, and for long her mind wavered 
slowly from one to another of the neighbourhoods in which 
she had lived and which all the while she knew were the first 
for her to reject — Rutland Gate, Manchester Square, Curzon 
Street, Westminster. It was hard to think of anywhere else ; 
one needed a map, one of those easy maps that were pasted on 
the walls of Underground stations. . . . 

The long recital had exhausted her pent antagonism, 
and she described her experiences as General Lampwood's 
driver with humour and an occasional preening of her 
feathers. 

" One day I knew I was going to have a «hild," she threw 
out abruptly. " It — it made me quite Ul. Then — ^well, you 
know the rest. I'm not complaining, I never thought it was 
going to be easy or pleasant, but, if I had my time over 
again " 

" I think not, Sonia," I said. 

" I never expected a bed of roses," she answered haughtily. 



296 Sonia Married 

Then she suddenly covered her face with her hands. " You 
mean I'm not through with it yet ? Mr. Stornaway, is it- 
is it as bad as people say ? I'm not a coward, really ; I don't 
believe I should mind if I wanted, it, if I were praying for a 
child, if it was going to be a child I should love. . . . That 
was what made me iU. When I first knew and I remembered 
the awful day when he turned me out of the house ... I 
wanted to kill myself. There was a big motor lorry racing 
along Knightsbridge, and I made up my mind to step in 
front ... as if I hadn't heard it. I stood on the kerb and 
put one foot forward. . . . Oh, but I wanted to live so 
badly ! I couldn't, I simply couldn't ! It was hke tearing 
myself in two with my own hands. I just had time to think of 
next spring and all the early flowers coming up. . . . And 
then I knew that I should have to go through with it I " 

Her eyes closed, and she lay without speaking until I made 
sure that she was asleep. I was treading lightly to the door 
when she called out and asked to be supplied with paper and 
a pencil. 

" You're just in the mood to go to sleep," I protested. 

She shook her head obstinately. 

" I couldn't sleep, if I tried. You say David's at Loring 
House ? " 

" He spent last night there and looked in here this morning 
for clean clothes. I've no idea where he is now." 

She looked at me with the set, unrevesiling expression which 
I had seen once or twice already. 

" Let me know if he comes in to-morrow," she said. 

We had not to wait so long, for O'Rane, behind the pretext 
of packing books and clothes for his return to Melton, came in 
after dinner and examined me keenly on the condition of his 
wife. I mentioned that she had hinted at a desire to see him, 
or at least to know his whereabouts, and, for all his control 
of himself, O'Rane's face was transfigured. 

" I'm — ^here now," he said significantly. 

" That means I'm to go up and find out if she wants to see 
you and if Lady Loring will let her ? " 

There was a sound of voices, as I knocked at the door — 
the nurse mildly begging her patient to go to sleep, Sonia 
resolutely and not too petulantly protesting that she had just 
finished. I delivered myself of my message, while she sat 



The Door Reopened 297 

turning over a pile of manuscript and tr5dng to read it and 
listen to me at the same time. 

" Will you look at this ? " she said at length. 

She had written a condensed but pitiless version of the story 
which she had told me, starting with the day when she had 
chosen to believe that O'Rane was unfaithful to her and 
ending with the morning when she knew that she was going 
to bear Grayle a child. 

" It's not very legible," she commented casually. " My 
writing's not up to much at the best of times, but, when I'm 
in bed, it's hopeless." 

" I can read it," I said. 

" I want you to read it to David," she went on in the same 
tone. 

I raised my eyebrows, but said nothing. 

" Will you do that for me ? " she asked. 

" If you wish it." 

" Thank you very much. Now I think I shall go to sleep." 

I went downstairs and led O'Rane to the far end of the 
library. He stood with his hands in his pockets and his back 
to the fire, rocking in his old way from heel to toe. 

" Have you read it ? " he asked me, when I had explained 
his wife's request. 

" Yes." 

He held out his hand for the papers. 

" And you remember everything she said ? " 

" Pretty weU." 

He rocked in silence for a moment and then smiled whim- 
sically. 

" I suppose you could — forget it, if you tried ? " he sug- 
gested. " Perhaps it would help you to forget it, if we got 
rid of this. I usually bum myself when I start pla3nng with 
fire ; perhaps you wouldn't mind putting this in. Don't 
set the chimney alight, will you ? -" 



The next morning I again mounted guard, while Lady Loring 
rested. We had agreed that, if no change for the worse 
shewed itself, it would be quite unnecessary to continue 



298 Sonia Married 

this day and night attendance. Physically Sonia was quite 
normal, but her nerves were unstrung, and for a time it had 
certainly looked as if hysteria might develop into something 
graver. Two nights' untroubled sleep, the belated recogni- 
tion that she was among friends and, most of all, the relief 
of confession had braced her and built up her self-respect. 
When I went in to see her, she was still a httle defiant, but 
it was the defiance of courage. 

" Is David here ? " was her first question. 

" He. went back to Loring Honse when he'd finished his 
packing," I answered. 

Sonia looked at me in silence, and her eyes narrowed. 

" Oh 1 So that's it," she murmured at length. 

" What is what ? " I asked. 

She sighed carelessly. 

" You were right, and he was wrong, that's all. I was 
right, too. ... I knew that, when I left this house, I'd left 
David for good ; if I hadn't known it then, I knew it when 
— ^when we came here that night and he offered to drop the 
divorce, if I'd leave — you remember ? He thought he was 
somehow so differeflt from other men. . . . What did he 
actually say ? " 

" He didn't say anything, Sonia. I think you're on the 
wrong tack. He just asked if I'd read the letter and if 
I remembered it. I said ' Yes.' Then he smiled and begged 
me to forget it." 

" But didn't you read it to him ? " 

" He asked me to burn it." 

She looked at me for some moments without understanding, 
then pulled herself lower into the bed and half turned away, 
shading her eyes with her hand. I walked to the window 
and gave her nearly a quarter of an houx to order her thoughts. 
At the end I asked her why she had written the letter. 

" I felt I owed it to him," she said slowly. " I don't regret 
it, though I suppose it's a selfish sort of gratification. . . . 
If he'd left me alone, I should have said nothing, but when 
he went out of his way to have me brought here and looked 
after. . . . I — ^suppose it's very magnanimous to bum a 
letter of that kind without reading it, but I'd sooner have 
had him read it. If he comes here, I shall have to tell him 
... at least that I'm going to have a child. Please don't 



The Door Reopened 299 

think that I'm ranning away from what I've done ; I'm not 
trying to work on his feelings, I'm not tr3dng to make him 
take me back ; I couldn't go back, if he begged me, if his 
Ufe depended on it." 

" Then it doesn't matter much whether he reads the letter 
or not." 

Sonia nodded slowly. 

" I must see David, though." 

" It wiU upset you without doing him any good." 

She bit her lip to steady herself. 

" Perhaps it will cure him," she suggested. 

I was not present when they met ; I do not even know how 
long they were together. Some time before dinner O'Rane 
came into the library and sat down in front of the fire without 
speaking. From his haggard face I guessed that he had 
been taken as much by surprise as any of us. During dinner 
he roused himself with an effort, and I remember that we 
discussed the coming unrestricted submarine campaign, 
the danger of starvation, the inadequacy of our food control 
and the likelihood of finding America ranged on our side in 
the war. We talked very earnestly — I believe, very intelli- 
gently — as though we had a critical audience and were shewing 
our best form ; but it was wonderfully unengrossing. 

" It's just a year since I was in America," I remember 
beginning in preface to some new argument. 

" I say — she told you everything, didn't she ? " O'Rane 
interrupted. 

" Yes." 

He forced a smile. 

" It rather — ^brings it home to one, doesn't it ? " 

" And yet — ^is this any worse for you than when they were 
living together ? " 

" I was reaUy not thinking of myself for the moment. 
My God, Stornaway, if you were a woman and hated a man 
as she hates Grayle, how would you Uke to be feeling that he'd 
had anything to do with your child, how'd you like to go 
through all this hell of child-birth to bear him a child ? All 
your Ufe, even if you came to love it or at least to be kind to 
it, you'd always be reminded, wouldn't you ? You'd trace 
a likeness ; it would seem to get stronger and stronger. ... I 
wonder what we should do ? " 



800 Sonia Married 

" I imagine most women would try to stop the child being 
bom." 

O'Rane looked up qxiickly. 

" Sonia wouldn't." 

" Then I'm afraid she's got to accept this as her punish- 
ment." 

" Hers ? " he murmured. 

I made no answer, but my mind went back to the luncheon 
at Crowley Court, when Roger Dainton sat with drooping 
mouth and troubled brown eyes, wondering if he had heard 
aright that his own daughter was likely to be divorced, waiting 
to wake up from the bad dream. And I remembered Lady 
Dainton. She had an adequate allowance for maternal 
feeling, I doubt not, but on that day she was less moved by 
Soma's plight than by a sense of social failure, of a rare and 
delicate instrument broken — as if after twenty years' training 
the hand of the violinist was become paralysed. 

" It's a bit one-sided, isn't it ? " suggested O'Rane quietly. 

I still said nothing. Grayle was being punished in the one 
part of him that I knew to be capable of feehng, but perhaps 
the punishment did not stop there. For all I could teU he 
might in time know a pang of desire to see his own child. 
O'Rane's black eyes were sunk low in their sockets. 

" It's damnably all-embracing," I said. 

He pushed his chair back and returned to the fire, where 
he threw himself on a sofa. 

" D'you know where George is dining to-night ? " he asked. 
" I want to talk to him. ... I suppose you think me a 
great fool, Stornaway, for not seeing it before. I loved her 
so much, I love her so much still. . . . Anyone can manage 
a boat when the water's calm, it wouldn't have required much 
love just to live with Sonia while everything was sunny, 
but I was prepared to do so much more. . . . When I went 
down to Melton the night after she left me, I set my teeth 
and told myself that I must keep my head. I knew it wasn't 
a trifle, Uke a fit of bad temper, I knew it was a very big thing 
she'd done. And I haven't much use for the kind of man 
who blindly protests beforehand that he'll forgive his wife 
whatever she may do. . . . It isn't love, it isn't generosity ; 
it's just dam' folly. But I did feel that my love for Sonia 
would be a poor, cold thing, if it only lasted while everything 



The Door Reopened 80i 

was going well, if it wasn't strong enough to live through a 
bad storm. You won't exactly have to strain yourself to 
imagine what it was like thinking of her with Grayle. . . . 
I don't know that I can explain, it's all the Httle things, 
the little personal touches that I missed — even without being 
able to see her. She was such fun, she always enjoyed life 
and got so much out of it ; she made a story out of everything 
and she loved telling me everything she'd been doing and she 
knew I loved hearing about it. I missed that frightfully 
when I was alone at Melton, before she left me ; I used to 
feel quite jealous, when I thought of her going about with 
other people, being a success, when I wasn't there to hear 
about it afterwards. But I always knew that I should be 
with her again in a few months. Well, I felt that my love 
for her would be just like other people's love, if I didn't first 
of all mind like hell and then recognize that in spite of it all, 
in spite of it all . . . You saw me trying to get her away from 
him — for her own sake ; it honestly was ; I tried to keep 
myself in the background. You know I always hoped she'd 
come back. But now . . ." 

He drew his legs up imder him and sat with his chin on his 
fists. 

" What are you going to do ? " I asked. 

" That's what I wanted to see Geofge about. She must 
have the house as long as she wants it, and I'll try to persuade 
Violet to come and look after her regularly when the time 
draws near. Then, if she'd like to go on living here . . . 
You see, there's rather an important money question. I've 
got the freehold, so there's no rent to pay, but Bertrand runs 
the place. He won't stay on with her and without me, and 
I doubt if we can afford the upkeep by ourselves. I shall 
make myself responsible for Sonia, of course, but we shall 
have to cut things pretty fine. George is my trustee, and I 
wanted to discuss it with him. . . . As regards the child . . ." 
He paused, and I could see him furtively moistening his lips. 
" Something's got to be done about that. It will be Soma's 
child, and, whoever else is to blame, the kid mustn't suffer. 
If I make George trustee of a fund. . . . That gives him an 
official status, you see ; he'd have a voice in the upbringing 
of the child, the education — I don't trust a woman by 
herself ." 



802 Sonia Married 

" Are you — ^recognizing the child ? " I asked. 

" Certainly." He smiled for the iirst time. " Poor little 
devil ! It will have as much right to my name as I have. 
I daresay you know that my father ran away with someone 
else's wife ? Ever since the smash came — I'd never thought 
of it before — I've been wondering how the other man felt. 
Fellow called Raynter — ^he was at the Legation at Berne. 
My father ran away with her, and Raynter wouldn't divorce 
her. . . . I've never precisely liked being illegitimate, because 
it seemed a reflection on my father, but I always used to 
think there was a certain amount of romance about the whole 
thing. . . . Bertrand knew my mother ; he says she was one 
of the most beautiful women in Europe ; my father loved her, 
and they were frightfully happy for the little time that they 
lived together before I was bom. I — I thought it was. very 
fine and plucky of them. . . . But lately I've been wondering 
what Raynter thought of it all, what kind of life he had. 
I beUeve he loved my mother too, and it killed her when I 
was born ; I wonder what he thought of the man who'd 
killed his wife. ... I suppose you never met him in your 
diplomatic wanderings ? " 

" No. He left the service immediately after what you've 
been describing." 

" What happened to him ? " 

" I believe he took to drink," I said. 

O'Rane made a sound of disgust. 

" But perhaps it's just because it doesn't appeal to me . . ." 
he apologized. " I certainly did hope to be finished off in 
France after I'd lost my sight, but there's such a tenacity 
about Hfe. I'm glad I pulled through, even to be where I 
am and as I am now. Yes, I've been feeling that there may 
be rather more to say for Raynter and — I suppose — rather 
less — for my father." 

He fell to musing, and I smoked in silence until George 
came in. Then we had the discussion reopened ; Bertrand 
returned from the House at eleven, and I heard it a third 
time. If O'Rane hoped for advice or comfort, I am afraid 
he did not get it, though Bertrand did indeed tell him bluntly 
that he was burdening himself needlessly. 

" I could have got rid of it all by divorcing her," was the 
only answer. 



The Door Reopened 808 

" You're not responsible for the child." 

" Somebody's got to be." 

Bertrand sighed and held his peace, while George and 
O'Rane talked in undertones. 

" What are you going to do yourself ? " I asked. 

" I've hardly thought. You see, until four hours ago 
I'd always contemplated having Sonia as — as part of my Hfe. 
I've got to think things out afresh. . . . But there's plenty 
of time. For the present, of course, I'm going back to Melton. 
To-morrow." 

" Have you said good-bye to Sonia ? " George enquired. 
" I mean, have I got to explain all this to her ? " 

O'Rane hesitated in doubt. 

" I'm not quite sure. You see, she said she wanted to tell 
me something, and I went in, and then she told me that she 
was going to have a child. I can't say if I shewed anything 
— ^more than surprise, I mean. I said — I really don't know 
what I did say. We talked about how she was, and I said 
I hoped she was better, and was there anything that she 
wanted ? And she asked me when I was going back to 
Melton. ... I told her to let me know if there was anything 
I could do. . . . We didn't take any formal farewell, but I 
came away as soon as I could ; we weren't either of us enjojdng 
it very much." 

" You gather that she proposes to stay here ? " 

" I think so. And I should tell anyone who asks. This 
is the natural place for her to be, her friends may as well 
come to see her. I shall get over to Crowley Court as soon 
as I can and tell her parents . . . and I think the best thing 
I can do is to find work of some kind abroad. We've thrown 
dust in everyone's eyes for fairly long, but it can't go on 
indefinitely, if she's living here and I never come near the 
place. ... I don't know yet ; I haven't had time to think. 
I never thought that her having a child by someone else 
could suddenly make all the difference, but it has. I'm not 
angry with her, or aggrieved, or anything of that kind, but I've 
just discovered that she doesn't belong to me any more. 
I'd still do anything she asked me to do, but something's 
been killed, something's been taken away. ... If only some- 
one else were going to benefit by it ! I believe I could forgive 
Grayle, if he'd proved that he was making her happier than 



304 Sonia Married 

I'd done. . . . We haven't made much of a success, have 
we? " 

He smiled wistfully, and his face looked suddenly older, 
as if the accumulated strain of years had exhausted him. 
Bertrand took his arm and told him to go to bed. George 
and I got off our chairs and waited without knowing what 
to do. 

" Is Violet on duty ? " he asked. " If you're all going up, 
I'll come with you and see if Sonia wants anything." 

The bedroom door was ajar, and I saw Lady Loring reading 
a book. She raised one finger warningly, as O'Rane came 
into the room ; then remembered that he could not see the 
signal and touched his wrist. 

" Is she asleep ? " he whispered. 

" Yes." 

He felt his way to the bed and ran one hand lightly over 
the blankets until it reached the pillow. Then he bent slowly 
forward, listening to his own breathing, and kissed his wife 
on the forehead. 

" You'll look after her well, won't you, Violet ? " he said, 
as they came to the door. 

" Trust me, David," she whispered. " I'll do all I can, 
and we'll get in a regular nurse to-morrow." 

It may have been fatigue, but I thought that she was 
looking worried. 

" You told me this morning," I said, " that a nurse wasn't 
necessary any more for the present." 

" I didn't think so — then, but she's not quite so well to- 
night. We mustn't talk here, or we shall wake her. You 
didn't say anything to upset her, did you, David ? " 

" I hope not. What's been the matter ? " 

We came into the passage^ and George and Bertrand 
considerately whispered good-night and left us. I would 
have gone, too, but O'Rane had slipped his arm through 
mine. 

" She's so nervous and fanciful," Lady Loring explained, 
" that she makes herself quite ill. I suppose, never having 
been through it before. . . . To-night she was quite ridicu- 
lous. Didn't it sometimes happen in bad cases that the 
mother or the child had to be sacrificed ? Well, what hap- 
pened then ? And who decided ? She worked herself up 



The Door Reopened 805 

into the most pitiful state, imagining herself unconscious 
and at the mercy of a mere brutal man, who could order her 
to be killed." Lady Loring looked through the open door 
and smiled compassionately. " She's so afraid of d5dng, 
David, that it never occurs to her that this sort of thing is 
happening every hour of the day, and that it's the exception 
for anything to go wrong. I don't quite know what to do 
about her. ..." 

O'Rane stood for a moment without speaking ; then he 
disengaged his arm and said good-night to us. I heard him 
busying himself in the library for a few minutes ; the front 
door closed gently, and I caught the sound of footsteps, 
as he walked away. The next morning he telephoned to 
ask how his wife was. In the afternoon he called with a 
cab for his luggage, and drove to Waterloo without coming 
into the house. 



ft 20 



CHAPTER EIGHT 

SANCTUARY 



. . And I have waited long for the* 
Before I poured the wine ! ' 



RoBBRT Buchanan : " The Ballad of Judas Iscariot." 



THE winter months of 1917 passed sadly for anyone who 
was condemned to live in the depression of London. 
I was well enough to go back to work in February, but I 
stayed on at " The Sanctuary," because, with all its nerve- 
racking discomfort, I had not the heart to go away, when 
both Bertrand and George pressed me so warmly to remain. 
Three, they said, were less depressing than two, though I 
came to doubt it. For the tenth time, we seemed to be 
entering upon the last decisive phase of the war ; Germany 
had begun her unrestricted submarine campaign, it was 
inevitable that America should abandon her neutrality. 
(Since the Presidential election and with every day that 
brought intervention nearer, our Press became less scornful 
of the President ; it ceased to misquote and misinterpret 
phrases about a nation that was too proud to fight or a peace 
without victory.) But the race would be hotly contested. 
The submarine campaign at sea, a win-through-at-all-costs 
offensive on land had to put Germany in a position to dictate 
terms before the incalculable weight of American arms was 
thrown into the scale against her. 



Sanctuary 807 

Men wore grave faces in those days. Though few could 
give accurate figures of the tonnage which was being^sunk 
daily, or of the stocks of food on which we could depend, 
everyone knew that prices had soared until they had to be 
arbitrarily fixed by the Government ; everyone knew that 
already certain foods were unprocurable and that the priva- 
tions were unlikely to grow less. Meatless days and three- 
course dinners were but the beginning, and Bertrand, who was 
by now almost reconciled to the continuation of war in the hope 
that it would discredit the new Government, shook his head 
gloomily at me and wondered morosely how long the proud- 
stomached people of England would consent to go on short 
commons. 

And it was not only in food that the shortage was being 
felt. Omniscient critics, who had a figure and a date ready 
for every question, whispered that, since the Somme campaign, 
we were short of recruits to the extent of a hundred thousand 
men, and the whisper, growing in volume, was the signal 
for a campaign, half malicious, half patriotic, and wholly 
mischievous. The unessential industries must yield up 
their young men, the Civil Service must be purged of its 
indispensables, and, that not even one fish should slip through 
the meshes of the net, those who had been exempted, rejected 
or discharged from the army were required to present them- 
selves for re-examination. The campaign evoked one flash 
of opposition, not serious in itself, but of interest as a symptom 
of turbulent discontent ; mass meetings of discharged sol- 
diers, each with his silver badge, assembled to declare their 
intention of not being sent out again until others had done 
their share. 

" The wheel has swung the full circle now," said George 
one night. " I was up before a board to-day. The doctors 
seemed to feel that it was a personal score for them that 
my eyes weren't bad enough for me to be rejected; but, 
when they came to my heart, they were quite indignant. 
They couldn't pass me on that, but it was a personal grievance, 
and I shouldn't have been a bit surprised, if they'd tested me 
to see if I'd been chewing cordite. ... I suppose it's not to 
be wondered at ; I'm not as keen to go out as I was two and 
a half years ago ; I shouldn't be keen at all, if it wasn't for 
the feeUng that I'm left, that all my friends have been killed. 

20* 



308 Sonia Married 

. . . And they must get men from somewhere. This Russian 
revolution is a very fine and hopeful thing in itself, but 
the Russians are so much absorbed in it that they can't spare 
time to bother about the war, and the Germans are with- 
drawing the best part of their troops from the East. / don't 
know where you're going to get men from. The papers 
keep yapping about Ireland, but I wonder how many of their 
inspired leader-writers know anything about the country." 

It was one of many discussions, when George would come 
home late and tired from his office, Bertrand later and more 
tired from the House. 

" If Germany threw up the sponge to-morrow ! " George 
began one night, " what should we have gained ? The flower 
of our manhood's been destroyed, we're smashed financially, 
the money market of the world has shifted to New York, 
and we shall spend the rest of our days paying the interest 
on our debt, trying to repair the damage. ... I don't care 
to think of the labour troubles we're going to have when we 
try to get back to peace-time rates of wages, or when the men 
find that their jobs have been done as well or better in their 
absence by women. And what's it all for ? I get most 
infernally sceptical at times. As poor Beresford used to 
prove with chapter and verse, in every war of this kind 
there's always been a school of optimists to say that such 
a scourge will never be seen again. And it always is. . . . 
As for social or moral elevation, with the spirit of lynch- 
law and the methods of the press-gang. . . . It'U all be the 
same ! " 

" It can't be quite the same after so universal a shake- 
up," I objected. 

George shook his head wisely. 

" In the early days, when men of our class were enlisting 
as privates, even lately, when rankers were getting com- 
missions, I used to think that some of our social angles would 
be rubbed off, but just you have five minutes' talk with an 
Old Army officer about the ' temporary gentlemen ' in his 
battalion, who've been fighting side by side with him, mark 
you ! While you're on the desert island, your Admirable 
Crichton may come to the top, but once get him back in Lon- 
don with a drawing-room and a servants' hall ! . . . I agree 
in theory with people like Raney, who say we must get Value 



Sanctuary 309 

for the lives we're spending, but I can't do it ! Nobody can 
do it. The men out there who are paying the price want to 
forget about the whole thing, they'll come home at the end, 
as they come home now on leave, to attend to their own 
affairs, to enjoy themselves, to make up for lost time and 
recapture the years they've wasted in the trenches. And 
the people who've never been out have forgotten aU the old 
good resolutions ; they're as tired of the war as the soldiers, 
tired of drudgery, discomfort, economizing ; they want to 
forget it and enjoy themselves and get back to the old life. 
Frankly, Stornaway, it stiU makes you sick to hear of the 
way our prisoners are treated and that sort of thing, but you 
don't any longer regard this war as a crusade, do you ? 
There's too much eighteenth-century diplomacy about it, 
too many compensations, too much balance of power. It 
was one thing to send a forlorn hope to Belgium, one thing 
to say that the German military machine must be broken, 
but when it comes to conscribing men to coerce Greece or 
win Constantinople for Russia ... I wonder when the 
accursed thing wiU end ? " 

Bertrand roused himself to light a fresh cigar. From the 
angle at which he held it in his mouth, no less than from the 
way that he screwed up his eyes and peered into the shadows 
of the rafters, I prepared myself for a paradoxical and prob- 
ably pretentious generalization. 

" I sometimes feel that war is the new expression of our 
national activity," he began. " Don't the Rolls-Royce 
people build only for the Government ? Well, that's typical 
of a gigantic state-socialism which has grown up in a night ; 
you can't build a house or buy a suit of clothes until war- 
needs have been satisfied. Production, transport, distribu- 
tion have all been taken over ; you've an army of controllers 
directing the machine ; and in time we shall dress as we're 
told, eat the quantity of food we're allowed, move here and 
there, do this and that, as we're ordered. At one age we 
shall be drafted into the army, at another we shall be knocked 
on the head to save feeding ; there'll be birth-rate bonuses 
amounting to state-subsidized polygamy. . . . Everything 
that a man did in the old days for his own benefit or amuse- 
ment — his daily task, his career, his material output, his 
accumulation of wealth, his pioneer-work in developing and 



810 Sonia Married 

improving the world, his family-life even — will now be 
directed to feeding the war. I don't complain ; we're united 
in a labour gang of forty million souls, and our job is to turn 
out a better war than Gerinany. I don't see where it's going 
to stop and I don't see who's going to stop it. Not the 
soldiers, because they're shot if they disobey an order ; not 
the Government, because they're the Board of Directors." 

" You'll only stop it by a general strike at home," George 
anfiwered reflectively. 

Bertrand spread out his hands with a gesture of sweet 
reasonableness. 

" And who's going to carry through a general strike ? 
The people with small fixed incomes can't make themselves 
heard, and, for all the rise in prices, your industrial wage- 
earner has never been so prosperous ; besides, whenever 
prices become too high, the Government steps in and controls 
them, subsidizes producers. Again, it's not pleasant to be 
told that your sons and brothers are being killed because 
you won't turn out shells." 

George wriggled his shoulder-blades impatiently. 

" But, if you make it plain that you're not going to 
turn out shells, the killing stops automatically. If anyone 
would only come off the high horse and discuss concrete 
terms ! " 

Bertrand shrugged his shoulders and blew a scornful cloud 
of smoke. 

" But people Eire getting used to the killing," he objected. 
" Three years ago — take anyone you like, Jim Loring ; he 
could only die as the result of illness or an accident ; even if 
there were a war, he wasn't a soldier. And it came like a sort 
of icy grip at the heart. . . . Nowadays a man becomes a 
soldier, whether he likes it or not, at eighteen. They get 
mown down at twenty instead of dying in their beds at 
seventy. And, as we grow accustomed to it, on my soul ! 
George, we cease caring. People who come back from Paris 
tell me that there's a sort of hedonistic fatalism there — the 
restaurants never so full, money never so prodigally squan- 
dered. And anyone who knows anything knows that French 
credit in America is gone ! So it isn't the calm, undismayed 
spirit of the Spartans at Thermopylae ; it's hysteria, care- 
lessness. I've little doubt that with certain obvious differ- 



Sanctuary sii 

ences you'd find the same thing in Berlin ; assuredly you'd 
find it in Vienna. And we're getting it as badly." 

It was due to the house in which I lived, but I suddenly 
realized that for a twelvemonth my emotions and interest 
had strayed from battlefields where thousands of men were 
daily laying down their lives for conflicting ideals ; they were 
engrossed in the contemplation of a middle-aged bachelor, 
taking advantage of a blind man to carry off his wife. And 
Mrs. Tom Dainton, one of the earliest widows in the war, 
had married again. And Lady Maitland and her friends 
were wondering whether the risk of sudden death would nerve 
young Pentyre to marry Lady Sally Farwell. 

" You're not very encouraging, Bertrand," I said. 

" And yet, if you take a long view, you can see light," he 
rejoined unexpectedly. " The same scientific development 
which gives you chloroform gives you also poison-gas ; and, 
xmtil you can disarm the world and make one nation of it 
imder a single police, each war becomes more horrible than 
the last. At the same time international divisions and 
values may be becoming obsolete ; the stronghold of Gibraltar 
may be the target for long-range Spanish guns ; we may all 
of us thankfully throw down our weapons before we have to 
fight under changing conditions. You remember when war 
broke out, George ? You were going to stay with Jim 
Loring, and I went to Paddington with you ; we all shook 
our heads gravely and said, ' Thank God ! We're an island ! ' 
Well, insularity would have been a source of greater weakness 
than strength, if the perfection of submarine warfare had gone 
pari passu with the development of trench warfare ; and we 
may want to cry ' quits ' before the submarine makes any 
further progress. Or take aerial transit. With any luck, 
George, you'll live to see mail and passenger services through 
the air all over the world. Germany can't get to the Far 
East without the leave of Russia ; she can hardly get to 
America without sending her air-ships over someone else's 
territory. All these international barriers have changed their 
values." 

George looked at his watch and dragged himself to his feet. 

" I think I shall turn in. A discussion of this kind is very 
purifying for the soul, no doubt, but it doesn't get you any 
forrarder. Dear old Raney could usually be counted on to 



312 Sonia Married 

produce some Mark Tapley consolation at the end of the 
evening, but I doubt if even he's got any superabundance at 
the present time." 

Bertrand emptied his tumbler, and we moved slowly towards 
the door. 

" Have you heard anything of him since he went back ? " 
I asked. 

" He's written once or twice on business. I send him a line 
two or three times a week to say how Sonia's getting on and 
I'm going down there for the week-end pretty soon. You 
can't tell much from a dictated letter — or from him, if it comes 
to that," he added, with a sigh. 

It must have been two or three days after this night that 
Lady Loring came to me with a worried expression and the 
announcement that Sonia would have to keep her bed until 
after her confinement ; against this sentence the doctor allowed 
no appeal. Thereafter I found myself spending a consider- 
able portion of the day in the sick-room. Sonia had overcome 
her earlier antagonism and after her first unburdening of 
spirit was prepared to discuss herself and her history with a 
frankness that amazed me until George told me that it was 
one of her most unchanging characteristics and one that was 
not solely stamped upon her by a desire to talk about herself. 
At the end of a week I had received a full and most unflatter- 
ing account of her girlhood. 

" I was frightfully attractive, of course, but I must have 
been odious," she began engagingly. " Every other woman 
hated me, and I used to take it as a great compliment, but I 
don't think I should now. I want to be liked, I always did ; 
but I never took any trouble, I went out of my way to ex- 
asperate men. I don't know why people stood me — people 
like George, I mean, who didn't pretend to be in love with 
me. I must either have been a first-class flirt, or I must have 
been a genius, or else I must really have had qualities that 
I didn't recognize." 

I had a full history of her engagement to Loring, over whom 
her facile triumph had exasperated her, so that she picked 
quarrels day by day until the engagement was broken off, and 
she made, if not the match, at least the most widely discussed 
scandal of the year. 

There was another man called Claypole or Crabtree (as she 



Sanctuary 8ia 

always alluded to him as " Tony " I never entirely discovered 
his surname), to whom she had been engaged before Loring 
came on the scene. I had his history, too, sandwiched between 
accounts of the men whom she had not married, for one reason 
or another, and the rich Jews, like Sir Adolphus Erskine, whom 
she had fascinated and bled ; throughout she talked like an 
artless child describing her first ball. On some subjects she 
was inexorably reticent ; I never heard why she had fallen in 
love with O'Rane and married him, and in all the hours that 
I sat with her she never alluded a second time to the stages of 
her estrangement from her husband. An hour daily for a 
fortnight told me little, perhaps, about Sonia, but it shed a 
searching light on girls of the class to which she belonged. 



II 

As the days went by I found myself allowed to spend less 
and less time with Sonia. She had hypnotized herself into 
believing, as a matter of duty and necessity, that she was 
ill, tired and suffering, at a time when half the amount of 
persuasion would have made her feel that she had never been 
more comfortable in her life. It was hardly cowardice, for 
George had told me anecdotes of her endurance in the hunting- 
field which shewed that she was capable of supporting pain ; 
but the obsession made her a difiicult patient. 

" Only three weeks more," I used to be told ; " only a fort- 
night more." 

Then she began to count in days, and I saw her face lengthen 
and her eyes dilate, as though the Wild Ass's Skin were shrink- 
ing in her hand. She was morbidly curious to find out from 
Lady Loring how much unavoidable pain she would have to 
feel ; the doctor was questioned again and again, until he 
warned her that she was preparing the gravest consequences 
for her child and herself. And it was after he had gone that 
she whispered a terrible prayer that the baby might be born 
dead. 

When the conversation was reported to me, I felt that 
drastic steps would have to be taken, if she was to be kept 



314 Sonia Married 

from going mad herself and giving birth to an imbecile. I 
took George into my confidence and sent him for his week- 
end at Melton with a string of rhetorical questions and a 
bulletin which brought O'Rane the same night to London, 
where he stayed until Sunday evening, while his neglected 
guest billeted himself on the Headmaster and accepted the 
hospitality of the Common Room. I was by myself, dozing 
over a book, when the library door was flung open, a gigantic 
Saint Bernard ambled in and a drenched and breathless figure 
demanded if anyone was there. 

" What on earth brings ^om to London ? " I asked. 

" Sonia. I gathered from George ... I say, something's 
got to be done, you know." 

He stood with his eyes open and set on me, his lips parted 
to shew a gleam of white, and one hand mopping his coat, 
more, I think, for distraction than in any hope of drying it. 

" I don't quite know what you think you can do," I 
said dubiously. 

" If she's awake " he began eagerly. 

" You'd frighten her out of her wits," I interrupted. " And 
you can ask Lady Loring, if you don't believe me. What you 
can do — to-morrow morning — is to let it be known that you've 
come up — to lunch with a man or collect some books — and, 
if she'd care to see you, she can. But I think you've rather 
acted on an impulse, you know." 

" I couldn't stay down at Melton, if there was anything I 
could do by coming up." 

" I'm afraid that you'll find that there isn't." 

His underlip curled obstinately. 

" We'll see. I took a solemn vow that I'd see her 
through ..." 

I said nothing, remembering that he was Irish and a 
romantic ; his simple-minded talk of oaths and obligations 
belonged to another age and another land. 

In the morning I asked Lady Loring whether it would be 
prudent to let O'Rane see his wife. I was referred to Sonia 
herself, who received the news of her husband's presence 
without visible surprise and hesitated for what seemed five 
minutes before answering. Then she picked up a hand- 
glass from the table by her bedside, looked long at her reflec- 
tion and laid it down with a sigh ; there was a second spell of 



Sanctuary 813 

indecision before she told me that she was not well enough to 
see anyone. 

" I think she's gratified by your coming," I told O'Rane, 
" but she'd rather not have any visitors at present. It's not 
hostility to you, but a woman loses her looks to some extent 
at a time like this, and I think she's sensitive about it." 

" But she knows " He interrupted himself suddenly, 

and his voice became softly wistful. " D'you appreciate that 
I've never seen my wife since she was my wife ! " 

" I don't think she always does," I answered. " But the 
trouble in her mind won't be removed by your sitting and 
talking to her sweetly for half an hour, when she doesn't 
want to see you." 

O'Rane's normal composure was breaking down, but he 
recovered himself with an effort. 

" I might have been a rather more civil host to George, at 
this rate," he murmured. 

At dinner that night we talked of a subject which illness and 
other work had driven into the background. The war had 
shattered many of my fine boasts of what I would do, if I 
were a millionaire, and new outlets had to be found for the 
Lancing fortune. I had already decided that Ripley Court 
could be put to no better use than as a richly endowed haven 
of rest for those whom the war had made incapable of ever 
helping themselves again. There were men, I knew, concealed 
mercifully for themselves and the world from inquisitive 
or pitying spectators, who had marched into battle and re- 
turned from the operating-theatre blind and without limbs, 
mere trunks surmounted by sightless heads, yet — I was told 
— glad to be spared even such life as remained to them. 
They were to be my first care, and, when the last had died, 
there would still be sufficient incurable cripples without the 
adventitious aid of modern warfare to keep my hospital full. 
There was opportunity, too, for bringing comfort and resig- 
nation to the demented, the paralysed and the blind. As I 
saw O'Rane's interest quickening, I told him that I wanted 
him to be one of my trustees. 

He hesitated until I feared that he was going to refuse. 

" One of them ? " he asked in doubt. 

" I shall appoint several, but they must be all young men ; 
I want the best of their lives." 



316 Sonia Married 

" If I act," he answered slowly, " I should have to act alone. 
I'm in the early thirties still " 

" You would find it more than one man's work." 

" Ah, but I could give the whole of my life to it." I started 
to interrupt, but he raised his hand. " And, furthermore, I 
should allow you to impose no conditions ; the money would 
have to come to me as it came to you, and you would have to 

let me play ducks and drakes with it as I liked " He 

paused to laugh wistfully. " You've had admirable oppor- 
tunities of observing how satisfactorily I arrange my own 
affairs ; but I couldn't undertake the responsibility other- 
wise. You see, you might try to impose conditions that I 
didn't like ; and then my heart wouldn't be in the work. 
Or your conditions might become obsolete with the changing 
state of society, as has happened with every trust tha^ has 
been in existence for more than a hundred years. But, above 
all, you know that, if you want to help your fellow-creatures, 
you must do it at discretion and not by looking at a deed to 
see if you're allowed to. Do you know the story of Bertrand's 
fifty-pound note ? " 

" I don't think so." 

O'Rane's eyes lit up with laughter. 

" Get him to tell you the full saga ; I can only give you a 
synopsis. Years and years ago some man asked for a loan of 
five hundred pounds, and Bertrand, to cut the interview short, 
said he'd present him with fifty. The man said he didn't want 
it as a gift, wouldn't take it as a gift. 

Well, please yourself,' said Bertrand ; ' you call it a 
loan, and I'll call it a bad debt ; but I'm very busy, and you 
won't get any more. Good. morning.' 

" The man talked a good deal about impending ruin, hinted 
at suicide and told Bertrand that he would be responsible 
for turning an honest woman on the streets. Bertrand went 
on with his writing, and eventually the fellow pocketed the 
note and got up. 

" ' I hope to pay this back within three months,' he said 
stiffly. ' It's not what I expected, but I can't afford to refuse 
it.' 

" ' Don't pay it back to me,' said Bertrand, who was begin- 
ning to feel rather ashamed of himself. ' Hand it on to some- 
one else who's in a tight corner, and, when he's ready to pay it 



Sanctuary 8i7 

back, he can lend it to his next friend in distress.' Then a 
little bit of the old man peeped out, and he added, ' Remember, 
it's a loan ; you must tell the next man so and you've no idea 
how many men and women we shall save from ruin and 
suicide.' 

" Well, Bertrand never expected to hear another word, but 
a year or two later, he received a letter of thanks from a young 
barrister, whose wife had had to undergo an operation ; then 
from a doctor in Simderland, who hadn't known how to pay 
his rent ; then from a girl, who'd lost her father and wanted 
money to pay for learning shorthand and typing. The fifty 
poimds have been in circulation for about eighteen years, 
and from time to time Bertrand still gets a letter from some 
out-of-the-way corner of the world. ... Of course I'm living 
on charity now, but, when I was competing equally with my 
fellows, an odd fifty pounds might have come in very handy. 
That's what I mean by helping people at discretion." 

" There's a difference between fifty pounds and twenty-five 
million," I pointed out. 

O'Rane smiled to himself and then shook his head. 

" Not so much as you might think," he said. 

" I wonder how you'd use it." 

His face became slowly fixed and grim. 

" I wouldn't let any boy go through what I've had to face," 
be murmured. " It may be fortifying for the character, but 
that sort of thing can be overdone. The Spartan youth who 
allowed a fox to gnaw his vitals ended up, I have no doubt, 
with an immensely fortified character, but also with a griev- 
ously impaired set of vitals. You know, a boy without 
parents " 

He broke off and began to whistle to himself ; then remarked 
unexpectedly : 

" I wonder whether this will be a boy. . . . But, boy or girl, 
it must be an awful thing to he waiting for the birth of a child 
that you hate in advance, that's got to be hidden " 

He buried his face in his hands and sat without speaking. 

" Is that what's happening ? " I asked, for Sonia had never 
consulted me even in her most expansive moments. 

He nodded abruptly. 

" She doesn't want anyone to know that she's ill or why 
she's ill ; no one else does, and we trust all of you. As soon 



818 Sonia Married 

as the child's born, it's going to be smuggled away. ... It 
will be properly looked after, of course, and all that sort of 
thing, but it will never be allowed to know its own parents. 
All the arrangements have been made, and I gather that the 
doctor has been — most sympathetic and helpful." He smiled 
with scornful bitterness and sat for a minute without speaking. 
" I was surprised to find a woman like Violet touching the 
suggestion with the end of a pole ; she was a bit surprised, 
too, I fancy, because she sort of excused herself and hoped 
Sonia would relent later on, but it was absolutely necessary 
to humour her in every way at present. . . . That kind of 
thing always sticks in the throat of a man — like a woman who 
refuses to have a family at all. ... I don't know, I suppose 
I'm superstitious ; I should feel that, if I brought a child into 
the world Uke that — furtively, shamefacedly, wrappjng a 
blanket round it and carrying it out of the back door in 
the dead of night . . . Wouldn't you, too, Stornaway ? 
Wouldn't you feel that you were putting a curse on the poor 
little brute ? And I can't imagine a woman dehberately 
doing that to another woman's child — let alone her own. 
Picture the child — slater on — growing up. . . . Even if it 
never knows the manner of its birth, wouldn't you rather 
expect it to learn steahng in a Dickensian slum and to end up 
on the scaffold ? I suppose it's all very fanciful and morbid. 
. . . But the other seems so infernally unnatural. I thought 
it wasn't done. 1 thought a mother would no more treat her 
own baby hke that, whatever the provocation, than a man 
would hit a woman in the breast." 

At O'Rane's age I might have thought the same thing. 

" Doesn't anybody else know ? " I asked. 

" George may have told the Daintons ; / didn't," he an- 
swered, smoothing the wrinkles out of his forehead. " We 
shall all have to rack our brains before the time comes, God 
knows. Violet says I must make a point of being in the house, 
in case anything happens. If Sonia — dies, I mean, it would 
look funny my not being with her." 

" And if other people have to be told ? " 

O'Rane's nose came down on his upper hp in a withering 
sneer. 

" I suppose it means one or two trusty and competent 
nurses, and the child will be kept in another part of the house. 



Sanctuary 819 

And, later on, London air won't suit it, and it will be sent with 
a governess to the sea, educated abroad. . . . My God ! / 
was educated abroad ! " He coughed apologetically and 
relieved his feelings by pacing up and down in front of the 
fire. " Where had we got to ? " he asked absently. " Oh, 
yes ! Well, a boy like that — I assume for some reason it's 
going to be a boy — might owe the whole of his career, his life, 
his happiness and power of doing good entirely to a chance 
meeting with some man who chose to pay three hundred a 
year on his account for so many years. But it's the personal 
touchy the personal relationship that must be established ! " 
He swung round in his walk and faced me. " All my life 
I've wanted to be Prince Florizel ! " he cried. " I wanted to 
be able to lend a hand to distressed young Americans who 
found xmexpected dead bodies in their Saratoga trunks, I 
wanted to find comfortable and remunerative positions at 
my court for the conscience-stricken survivors of the Suicide 
Club. But with the untrammelled disposal of your estate " 

" Wouldn't it pall, if you didn't have to make the money 
before you gave it away ? " I asked. 

" I don't think my interest in human beings woiild ever 
pall," he answered. " There's such a devil of a lot of them, 
and they're all different. When I got into the House, I stood 
as a Tory, and George was rather oifended, because he said I 
was the most revolutionary nihihst he'd ever met. I could 
never call myself a democrat, though, because democrats 
deal in mobs, and I only see a mob as composed of individuals, 
all different, all absorbingly interesting — ^with bodies to be 
kicked and souls to be damned, if your preference lies that 
way. I can't deal with people as types. I can't classify 
them ; each one is much too real, too personal. And, if you're 
Uke that, you end up as a nihilist, because all government is 
based on generalizations, mostly inaccurate and wholly in- 
adequate. As we're finding out." He put his watch to his 
ear and Ustened. " I must be making my way to the station," 
he said. " I'm not taking an active party Une at present, 
but I seem to find a growing sense that the old governing classes 
haven't measured up, haven't made good in their own job. 
We've had three specimens since the war started. ... I 
always feel that in universal nihiUsm I should come to my 
own. Now I must fly. Forgive me for talking so much ! " 



320 Sonia Married 



in 

George returned to London the following day in a better 
temper than, I fear, would have been mine, if I had been in- 
vited to the country and abandoned by my host within an hour 
of my arrival. Melton week-end parties have long been 
famous, for Dr. Burgess has had through his hands perhaps 
a fifth of the younger statesmen and barristers, authors, clergy- 
men and soldiers of the day. Any old Meltonian can claim a 
bed, and it will be found for him in his old house, at the 
" Raven," or in lodgings ; he dines on Saturday night in 
Common Room as a matter of course^ and lunches with 
Burgess next day as a matter of right. Strangers from less 
fortunate foundations are jealously excluded, but I attended 
one dinner as a Governor and found a law officer on my right, 
a silk from the Commercial Court on my left and a twice- 
wounded Brigadier opposite me. The food was tolerable, the 
wine good ; the conversation indiscreetly well-informed. 
George told me that, when he was in the House, he could only 
find out what was going on by spending a week-end at his old 
school. 

" I had one bad moment on Sunday afternoon," he con- 
fessed, when I asked for news of O'Rane. " We'd all been 
lunching with the old man, and he asked me to stay behind. 
It was rather reminiscent of certain regrettable meetings in 
my extreme youth. ... I knew what he was going to talk 
about and I knew it would be no good for me to beat about 
the bush. The door had hardly closed before he put it to me 
what was the matter with Raney. I had to tell him every- 
thing ; you can't hide things from Burgess. For that reason 
I wasn't sorry that Raney had bolted here ; he'd never for- 
give me, if he guessed I'd given him away." 

" But it won't make any difference, will it ? " I asked. 

" Oh, Burgess has got too much of God's common-sense. 
But Raney can't stand being pitied. Burgess wiU only 
allude to it, if he convinces himself that it will do some good. 
I'm afraid I don't see how it can ; poor old Raney's just got 
to set his teeth once more and go through it single- 
handed. ..." 



Sanctuary 821 

A week later Bertrand, George and I were gossiping over a 
last cigar, when Lady Loring entered with a grave face. The 
doctor had that moment left after his evening visit to Sonia. 

" I think it's time we sent for David," she said, without 
preamble. 

" You're certain ? " I asked. " He's in the middle of 
term." 

" If we're keeping to our plan," she answered unenthusias- 
tically. " Any moment now " 

Bertrand stumped across the library to a writing-table. 

" I'll send him a wire," he said. " Time enough for ap- 
pearances, if he turns up in the course of to-morrow. How is. 
she ? " 

Lady Loring shrugged her shoulders carelessly and then 
turned quickly away. 

" She's all right — physically," she answered. " But if yott 
left a bottle of prussic acid within reach. . . . That's what 
frightens me so much. Until to-night she was so keen to go 
on living that she could face almost anything ; but to-night I 
believe she doesn't care about it any more. She wants to 
slip away and end everjrthing, get rid of all her difficul- 
ties. . . ." 



IV 

O'Rane arrived at " The Sanctuary " next day, half an hour 
after I had finished luncheon. This time his wife consented 
to see him, but only after some hesitation. 

" You mustn't go away ! " she whispered to me. " If you — 
if you see I'm getting tired, you know ..." 

O'Rane came into her room with a smile, kissed her hand and 
then felt for a chair, where he sat in silence for perhaps three 
minutes, until Lady Loring entered to say that it was time 
for her patient to rest. 

" I never asked how you were feeUng," he said, as he got 
up to go. 

" I'm all right — at present," Sonia answered. Then a 
shiver ran through her, communicating itself to her fingers, 
until I saw his hand tighten over them. 

" It's going to be all right, Sonia," O'Rane whispered. 

21 



322 Sonia Married 

She lowered her eyes and stared dully across the room. 

" It ca«7 be aU right." 

"I'll make it aU right." 

The corners of her mouth began to droop miserably. 

" Of course, if I die . . ." she began, with a catch in her 
breath. 

O'Rane dropped on to one knee and drew her two hands into 
his own. 

" It's much more fun Uving, sweetheart ! " he whispered. 
" And you're going to live, you're going to make whatever you 
like of your life. If you want me, I shall always be at hand, 
as I am now ; and, if you don't want me, I shall keep away. 
I owe you so much, my darhng ; you must give me the chance 
of pa5ang you back a Httle bit. When we married, I didn't 
give eith-er of us a fair trial, I forgot the Hfe you were accus- 
tomed to, I forgot that my own hfe wasn't hke everyone else's ; 
I just went ahead, doing everything that came natural to 
me, and it never occurred to me that I was making you un- 
happy. Forgive me, Sonia ! " 

She dragged one hand away and covered her eyes. 

" I don't know that I've got much to forgive," she mur- 
mmred, and I could see her Hps curving to a wistful smile. 

" I shouldn't have asked you, if I didn't need it. Sonia, 
you're going to be brave, aren't you ? " 

" Yes." 

" Promise ? " 

The lines of her throat tightened. 

" You know what my promises are worth, David." 

" If you promise, I know you'll keep it. And then I shall 
want another promise — ^two more, in fact. I want you to 
promise not to worry, and you must promise not to feel any 
pain. WiU you do that, sweetheart ? I've come up all the 
way from Melton, you know." 

She withdrew her hand, and I saw that her face had become 
suddenly pale and that her eyes were tightly closed. 

" I can't promise that, David. . . ." 

His voice caressed her, as though he were talking to a child. 

" I think you can, darhng. Do you remember when you 
sprained your ankle, skating at Crowley Court, and you 
started to cry with the pain, and I said I wouldn't carry you 
back to the house until you'd promised to stop cr5dng and not 



Sanctuary 323 

to let the ankle hurt any more ? You promised quickly 
enough then, emd it's much more important now. If you'll 
promise that now, I'll do an57thing you like." 

She smiled wistfully a second time, then drew his head down 
to her own and whispered something. I heard him say 
" You won't. I swear you won't, Sonia." Then he drew 
himself upright, waved his hand and walked to the door. 

I sat with him in the Ubrary, while he attacked a belated 
luncheon and phed me with questions about his wife. Her 
whispered request, he told me, was that she might, if possible, 
be kept from seeing the child when it was bom, and on this he 
hung a string of questions to find out what steps we had taken 
to secure the best doctors and nurses, when the birth was 
expected, whether anyone else knew. 

" PFe've told no one," I assured him, " since you asked us 
not to." 

" I told Burgess," he said. There was a long silence. " I 
— ^told him everything. ... I mean, one does with Burgess. 
I found it wasn't news to him. George had told him — weeks 
ago. . . . One does with Burgess," he repeated, smiUng. 

" What did he say ? " I asked. 

" He was rather helpful." 

" George told me that he wouldn't trouble to talk to you 
about it, unless he saw his way to help you," I said. 

O'Rane finished his meal and lay back in his chair. 

" I went in and told him that I wanted a day or two's leave, 
if he could possibly spare me ; I told him Sonia was going to 
have a child. ... He waited for some time and then said, 
' The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth ? ' 
Said it as if he meant it, too ; it was Uke trjdng to get extra 
leave in the old days ; as a rule he'd accept any excuse, how- 
ever bad, provided it was given in good faith ; I once got an 
extra half for the whole school, because it was so hot that, as I 
told him, we'd much prefer not to be working. . . . Well, I 
told him the whole truth — all about Sonia and myself, all 
about Grayle. . . ." He paused, as though breatlung hurt 
him, then smiled wearily. " It may have been good for my 
humihty of spirit, but I can't say it was very edifying for 
Burgess. ... I told him that Soma's been dancing in the 
shadow of a volcano, that we were always on the verge of an 
appaUing scandal and that it was more by luck than ans^thing 

21* 



324 Sonia Married 

else that it had been averted. I described to him how we'd 
smuggled her home and what we were going to do to keep the 
child away from her. . . . Have you ever told a long story 
and discovered at some point that it's falling extraordinarily 
flat, or that someone's shocked ? Burgess never said anything, 
and of course I couldn't see his face, but — I don't know whether 
you understand me — ^the silence seemed to become more 
intense at times. I felt that his eyes must be on me and I 
— not to put too fine a point on it — I began to feel rather 
frightened. ... If I could have seen. ... I knew from his 
voice, when he first spoke, that he was sitting down ; and I 
suddenly remembered a most awful row I'd had with him, 
when I was about sixteen. He sat there then with his back 
to the window, and I stood in front of him, arguing and argu- 
ing ; it was a Uttle matter of discipHne, and he'd decided to 
fire me out. . . . Well, I went through just the same thing 
this morning. I — I felt I was owning up ; and I'd have given 
anjrthing in the world to see his face. . . . You know how you 
spin out the explanation . . . and rather overdo it ; . . . 
you're too plausible and you feel the whole time that you're 
not getting it across. ... I went on and on . . . and finally 
I stopped short ; it wasn't any use, he knew ever5^hing — even 
if George hadn't told him. ... I became stiff and dignified 
and said once more, ' If you can shift the work round so that 

I can be away for a day or two ' Then I heard him 

scraping for a light — and sighing — and throwing the matches 
away. . . . God I until you're bUnd, you've no conception 
how many things you hear. You wouldn't notice the sound 
of a wooden match falhng in the grate, but I did ; and, though 
I've given up smoking because I can't taste tobacco, I felt a 
httle smarting at the back of my nostrils as Bru-gess got going 
with his pipe. '. . ." 

If ever a man talked to gain time, it was O'Rane at that 
moment. 

" What advice did he give you ? " I asked him at length. 

" He didn't give me any — advice. But, when I'd finished, 
he said he'd pull the time-table about and that I could stay 
away as long as I liked. I knew he'd say that. Well, in the 
ordinary course I should have said ' Thank you ' and cleared 
out, but I didn't find it easy to move. Burgess sat there, 
sucking at his pipe ; I stood there — and I felt a perfect fool. 



Sanctuary 325 

because I was beginning to blush. And the old man said, 
' Well, David O'Rane ? ' and I said, ' Well, sir ? ' And then 
there was another silence. And then he said, ' Thou hast 
no further need of me ' — ^you know the way he talks ? I 
did thank him then and was starting to the door, when he 
called out, ' Thou art at peace in thine own mind ? ' That 
rather stung me, and I told him that, all things considered, 
I didn't think I was wholly to blame ; and he answered 
rather enigmatically that, if I wasn't careful, I should be. 
I asked him what he meant." 

O'Rane left his chair and took up a famiUar position at the 
fire-place, resting his arm on the high chimney-piece and 
leaning his head on the back of his hand. 

" Burgess is a curious man," he resumed dispassionately. 
" I don't think he ever had any children of his own, but he's 
got — ^well, an extraordinarily human imagination. He 
began talking about this poor kiddie — ^who isn't bom yet — 
and pointing the contrast between his life and the life of 
any other boy, who'd have a father and a mother fussing 
round him, whenever he had a bit of wind in his poor little 
tummy, and playing with him and watching him, as he began 
to crawl and talk, and trying to make him understand that 
it wasn't the end of the world, when he was miserable trjdng 
to cut teeth. . . . The old man didn't spare me," said O'Rane, 
with a quivering laugh. " I had about twenty years of the 
boy's life compressed into twenty minutes ; the way he'd 
go to school, frightfully shy and with no one to see him 
through, no one to give him half a sovereign at mid-term ; 
and the way he'd get a remove or find himself in the eleven 
— ^with nobody to brag about it to ; and the way he'd go on 
to a pubhc school and work his way through the green- 
sickness period of dirty stories and foul language — without 
anyone to tell him that he was becoming rather a pitiable 
little object. . . . And the portentous age, when he'd be head 
of his house, and the time when he'd want to ask his father 
what Oxford used to be like in the prehistoric days. . . . 
After twenty minutes or so I told Burgess that I didn't see 
it was my look-out." 

" WeU ? " I said, as O'Rane hesitated. 

" I think it was damned unfair." he burst out, but the 
resentment in his tone was unconvincing. " Burgess was a 



326 , Sonia Married 

friend of my father, he knows all about me, I've told him 
every last thing about myself. ... I don't suppose even 
George knows, but the old man used to invite me to help 
tidy up his library, if I wasn't taking Leave-Out, and of course 
I was as happy as a clam ; and we used to talk, and I told 
him things that kept me awake half the night — but he always 
seemed to have forgotten them next day. Well, I suppose 
after my father died I did have rather a — crowded youth ; 
and Burgess asked me if I wanted to send my son through 
the same mill. 

" ' He's not my son,' I said. 

" ' Thy wife's son, laddie,' he answered." 

O'Rane turned wearily from the fire and began to pace 
up and down the room. 

" I told him ! " he exclaimed. " I said that, if it hadn't 
been for that, Sonia and I could have forgotten everything 
and come together again. You remember ? I was ready — 
oh, dear God in Heaven ! I was ready ! And then I heard 
that this had come between us, that there was going to be 
a permanent reminder, a permanent barrier, a permanent 
alien something in our lives. That was the first time I saw 
you were right, the first time I appreciated we could never 
forget and go on as if nothing had happened. My love for 
Sonia hasn't changed. If — ^if anything happened to the 
child . . . But as long as it's there ! I told Burgess that, 
though I agreed with him in principle, I was very sorry, 
but I couldn't help it. It was Grayle's business. He asked 
me if I thought Grayle was likely to accept his responsibilities ; 
I told him I saw no indication of it. He said nothing to that, 
and I made another bolt for the door. He called me back 
and asked what I proposed to do. I said I'd told him already. 

" He didn't stop me, and I got back to my rooms in the 
Cloisters. I began to pack a few things, but the whole time 
I was feeling that I hadn't explained properly and that Burgess 
rather despised me. I got extraordinarily excited and angry 
over it, until at last I left the packing alone and went back 
to his house to justify myself. The man shewed me at 
once into the library, and it was only when I got inside that 
I realized that all this time Burgess ought to have been 
taking the Sixth for Tacitus. Instead he was still in his 
chair, still sucking at his pipe. I fired away, full of indigna- 



Sanctuary 327 

tion, and went through the whole weary business from the 
beginning, just as I'd done before. He never interrupted 
me, never said a word till I'd finished. Then he told me 
pretty bluntly that he was only indirectly interested in me 
and that what he wanted to find out was why the child should 
be penalized, why I, who knew something of what it would 
have to go through, persisted in making it face the music 
for no fault of its own. I was pretty weU worked up, but I 
tried to be reasonable and asked him what he suggested I 
should do. He never hesitated a moment this time ! He 
told me it was my duty to treat the child as if he were my own 
son, never to let him or anyone else know what had happened 
before he was bom, but to devote myself to him as if he were 
— ^well, not my own son, not someone for whom I was natur- 
ally responsible, but someone who'd been entrusted to my 
care. He said, if I didn't — ^with the experience I'd got to 
back me . . . Somehow, the way he put it, Stornaway . . ." 

He brought his walk to a conclusion as abruptly as the 
sentence and dropped heavily on to a sofa, as though glad 
that a necessary task was finished, yet awaiting criticism 
from me and obviously prepared to argue as vehemently 
against me on one side as he had argued against Burgess on 
the other. 

" In practice, what do you propose to do ? " I asked. 

" I've been trying to think the whole way up from Melton. 
I suppose we shall have to behave as though the whole world 
knew Sonia was going to have a baby, it will have to be our 
child. And I suppose we shall hve like other people who are 
kept from divorcing each other because of their children. 
Nominally we shall share the same house, and I suppose 
things can be arranged so as to spare Sonia. . . . But Burgess 
has convinced me. We've no right to think of ourselves, 
or wash our hands of responsibility, or try to score off other 
people at the expense of the child. I've projmised her that 
she shall never see it. ... I don't know, I suppose this is 
one of the things that men and women are temperamentally 
incapable of seeing with the same eyes ; but, whoever the father 
was, whsitever the history, I should have imagined that any 
woman would fight for her child against all the powers of 
creation ; it was Uke a stab when Sonia first said she hoped 
the child would be bom dead, it was another stab when she 



328 Sonia Married 

begged me — begged me to promise. ... I promised right 
enough ; it was the only thing to do, but I can't let it rest 
at that. If she's well enough to talk, I want to make every- 
thing quite plain to her now ; otherwise I must explain 
afterwards. . . ." 

As we finished dinner. Lady Loring came down to say that 
Sonia was asking for her husband. I was not present, I am 
glad to say, at their interview, but it did not last more than 
five minutes, and at its end O'Rane looked in for a moment 
to say that he proposed to walk as far as the House of Com- 
mons for a breath of fresh air. Neither by word nor tone 
did he invite anyone to accompany him ; and on his return 
he went upstairs without coming into the hbrary. I called 
for a bulletin on ray own account before retiring for the night, 
and Lady Loring warned me that I must be prepared for 
anything at any moment. Sonia had worked herself from 
hysteria into something hardly distinguishable from delirium ; 
forgetting that she had already seen her husband, she had 
sent for him a second time and a second time implored him 
to spare her the sight of her own child ; Lady Loring, who 
had been on duty all day, was not allowed to rest, and, as I 
passed the door, the Ughts were burning and I caught the 
sound of voluble chatter. 

For an hour I tried to sleep, but the intermittent hum of 
voices, the creak of feet passing rapidly up and down the 
passage, still more the indefinable suspense kept rae awake. 
For another hour I tried to read, but I was always interrupting 
myself to Usten ; and at two o'clock I pulled a dressing-gown 
over my pyjamas and returned to the library. To my surprise 
Bertrand was dozing over a book, while George sat writing 
letters on his knee. Both looked up, bUnking with dull 
fatigue, as I came in. 

" I wonder how long this racket's going on ? " Bertrand 
growled, as he walked across to fetch himself a drink. " She'll 
kill herself at this rate. And — ^what — almighty fools — ^the 
three of us are ! To be here at all ! " 

" Has Raney come back yet ? " George asked me. " I 
was told he'd gone for a walk — ^Uke a wise man." 

" He was sitting outside her door, as I came down," I 
answered. 

Grumbling inarticulately, Bertrand went back to his book. 



Sanctuary 329 

George looked at me long enough to see that I was too tired 
to talk, then began a fresh letter. I prowled in front of the 
bookcases, trying to find something that I had the mental 
energy to read. It was shortly after four when O'Rane 
hurried silently into the room and telephoned for the doctor. 



Thirty hours — ^the fag-end of a broken night, a day and 
another night — ^passed before O'Rane appeared. The painful 
silence of the house was violated only by guardedly light 
steps and hushed voices. Bertrand and George took their 
meals at the club ; I stayed behind, neglecting my work 
and subsisting on tinned tongue, stale bread and cold water, 
to run errands, answer telephone calls and carry up trays 
of food to Lady Loring. At first I believed that poor Sonia 
was trying to hsrpnotize herself and intensify her own tortures, 
but in time a new gravity settled on the faces of the doctor 
and niurse. 

I had never before been in a house where a confinement 
was taking place ; I do not wish to repeat the experience. 
Whenever I carried up a meal. Lady Loring or the trained 
nurse would say vaguely, " I'm afraid she's having a bad 
time," but for the rest I was left to myself in the great silent 
library with my senses strained to catch any sound from the 
familiar white bedroom where I had spent so many days with 
Sonia, trying to distract her thoughts. O'Rane, from the 
moment when he telephoned for the doctor, had been with 
her. There was some ineffectual attempt to banish him 
from the room, but Lady Loring afterwards let him stay 
and admitted that his personality was keeping Sonia from the 
surrender which she sometimes seemed ready to make. 

When he came into the Ubrary at breakfast-time on the 
second day, his clothes were shapeless and dusty, his face 
unshaven and grey with fatigue. 

" The doctor says it's a boy," he told me hoarsely. " Is 
there any water in the room ? I've had nothing to eat or 
drink since first I went up there ; and then I must get some 
air into my lungs." 



330 Sonia Married 

He sighed and dropped limply on to a sofa. 

" How's Sonia ? " I asked him. 

" They can't say yet. She's doped. They've given her 
as much as they dare, as much as her heart will stand. . . . 
My God ! I'm glad I'm not a woman ! I can understand 
their having one child, because they don't know what's in 
store for them, but their courage in having a second ! . . ." 

I poured him out a cup of coffee and buttered him two 
slices of toast. 

" I woiddn't try to talk overmuch," I told him. 

" It's a bit of a relief to me," he answered with a smile. 

" All this time " He lifted his right hand above his head 

and began stiffly to open and shut the fingers. " I was 
gripping her wrist," he explained ; " I only let go twice, 
and the first time it was bruised purple, as if she'd shut it in 
a door. . . . And nobody said anything. . . . Sonia kept 
getting spasms of pain which made her moan or cry out, 
and her nerve gave way from time to time ; . . . and then I — 
I tried to hypnotize her ; I found that by repeating ' Sonia, 
Sonia, Sonia,' very distinctly and very low, I could capture 
her mind. . . . God ! how it got on my nerves ! " 

The first cup of coffee was followed by a second, which he 
gulped in scalding mouthfuls, asking at short intervals what 
the time was and how long he had already stayed away. 

" Violet and the nurse are pretty well beat out," he ex- 
plained ; "I want to pack them off for a bit of a rest while 
I moimt guard. And we've got to shift the boy before Sonia 
comes round. . . ." 

" You're not moving him — yet ? " 

" Only to another room. I — I promised her, you see." 

He bade me a hurried good-bye and disappeared upstairs 
until the middle of the afternoon. George came in after 
luncheon, put half a dozen breathless enquiries and returned 
hot-foot to his ofi&ce. Bertrand had a question in the House, 
but, as soon as he could get away, he came and demanded 
a full report. 

" You don't gather when the child's to be moved ? " he 

said, when I had done. " I This is an extraordinary 

business, Stornaway. I've lived a devil of a long time and 
I've done some pretty odd things and mixed with some 
pretty curious people and all that sort of thing, but I'm hanged 



Sanctuary 381 

if I've ever done anjrthing like this before. What are we all 
up to ? I feel I've been stampeded." 

" WeU, neither of us is doing ansrthing very active," I 
pointed out, looking at my cigar and book. 

" We're countenancing it. If you sat by and watched a 
drunken man making pipe-lights out of five-pound notes. . . . 
What have they decided to do ? I don't understand them ; 
I can't keep pace with them." 

In so far as I had been admitted to O'Rane's confidence, 
he had decided to keep the child in London, until it coiild 
be safely moved, and then send it with its nurse to a cottage 
which he had mysteriously acquired on the south coast. 
And there his plans for the time being had ended. 

" He's apparently committing himself to three households," 
Bertrand cried. " The first because his wife refuses to live 
with him, the second because he wants to make his friends 
believe that they are living together, the third because he 
requires a home for his wife's child, which in time will come 
to be regarded as his child. . . ." 

" I've got no influence over him," I said, in protest against 
his tone of injury. 

Bertrand shook his head gloomily. 

" When once he's made up his mind — it doesn't matter 
how fantastic a thing may be . . ." 

The door opened, and O'Rane came in to repeat his request 
of the morning for water and any food that was available. 
He had found time to shave and change his clothes, but I 
have never seen a man more utterly exhausted. 

" Is there any news ? " Bertrand asked. 

" She's doing — ^very fairly, I think," he answered with a 
drawl that was almost a stammer. " The effects — drug, 
you know — ^wearing off. She woke up a few moments. Now 
getting some natural sleep." 

I put a stiff dash of brandy into the water and watched 
O'Rane's grey cheeks colouring. 

" Did she seem comfortable ? " I enquired. 

" ' Comfortable ' ? " he repeated with a laugh. " The 
physical relief, you know. . . . Whatever happens now, she's 
free from pain, she's bound to feel better and better. . . . 
When I was wounded, there were times when I thought I 
couldn't bear it ; the nurses told me that I said quite clearly 



832 Sonia Married 

' It's no use hurting me any more ; I can't stand it.' Dear 
souls ! as if they could help it ! And one did stand it. But, 
when the pain began to abate, when you didn't have to keep 
yourself braced up against it, I went as limp as a rag. It 
was like the end of a long fever. . . . After that, whether I 
was asleep or awake, I always knew that the real hell was 
over. There might be little twinges in unexpected places, 
but the pain was over, over. And the feeling of weakness 
was so delicious ! Like an endless repetition of the glorious 
moment when you're just dropping off to sleep. . . . That's 
how Sonia is now." 

The next report came after dinner, when the doctor had 
concluded his evening visit and she had been put to sleep for 
the night. 

" She's had a frightful time," he told us, " and there's 
always the possibility of a relapse, but I know she's not going 
to relapse ; I'm not going to let her." 

" And the child ? " 

" Oh, he's aU right." 

The next morning O'Rane joined me at breakfast after a 
night's unbroken rest. Despite a mild protest from the 
nurse, he had insisted on staying in Sonia's room and had 
slept in his clothes on the floor for twelve hours on end. 

" She's had a wonderful night," he told me exultantly. 
" And the boy's doing magnificently. They seem to think 
it'll be reasonably safe to move him to-morrow. And then, 
if all's well with Sonia, I shall go back to Melton. I shall 
only want to talk to her, if I stay any longer ; and, as it is, 
if a board creaks or anyone touches the bed . . . That good 
angel Violet has promised not to go until everything's all 
right. Don't you think she's been wonderful ? Violet 
Loring, I mean. I'd got no sort of call on her." 

" I don't know that the baby upstairs has any great call 
on you," I answered. 

" We-eU, you can't open an account with a thing twenty- 
four hours old," he laughed. " I say, Stornaway, I had no 
idea that babies were so small. HuUo, that's Violet's step ! 
There's nothing wrong, is there ? " 

Lady Loring had come in to say that Sonia was asking 
for him. He hurried upstairs, leaving his breakfast unfinished, 
and did not return for a couple of hours. I asked him whether 



Sanctuary 838 

there was ansTthing amiss, for there was an unfamiliar frown 
on his face. 

" No, but it was curious . . ." he began hesitatingly. 
" You remember how she made me promise. . . . WeU, 
I went in and asked her how she was, and she said she was 
feeling better. . . . And then she asked about the child 
. . . wanted to know whether it was a boy or a girl . . . 
wanted to know how it was. ... It ended by my carr5?ing 
him in for her to see. ... I was in two minds whether to 
do it, because she was working herself up to a pitch of great 
excitement, but I thought it would only make things worse, 
if I refused. She wanted to see what he was like, you know, 
whether there was even the remotest resemblance. . . . She 
gave a sob, when I brought him in, and said, ' He's got my 
eyes.' . . . I'm afraid the whole thing excited her rather. 
She suddenly got the idea that she oughtn't to have asked 
me to bring him in. Poor mite ! he's not responsible for his 
own father, and I told her that if we started quarrelling over 
a thing Uke that . . . Another curious thing, Stornaway ; 
I have always imagined that I should hate the very existence 
of the child ; when I was first told what was the matter with 
Sonia, I felt that there was a sheet of fire between us. I 
don't feel that now ; I feel that Grayle has passed utterly 
out of our lives. As for punishing that poor, helpless Uttle 
creature. ... I suppose you hate babies, but I wish you'd 
have a look at this one and tell me what he's Hke. I've 
always thought what fun it would be to have a son and watch 
him growing up. ... I should have thought that Sonia, 
that any woman, after all she's gone through. . . . StiU, 
when you've been treated as Grayle treated her, when you've 
waited in dread and horror aU these weary months ..." 
He broke off in perplexity, which only lifted when he suddenly 
began to smile. " You will have a look at him, won't you ? 
And tell me what he's like. He's going to the coimtry 
to-morrow." 

After dinner that night I made my way to the bedroom 
which had been temporarily converted into a nursery. It 
was dark and empty, and I walked to the door of Sonia's 
room in search of Lady Loring. A low sound of voices pene- 
trated to the passage ; I knocked and went in to fimd O'Rane 
standing by the bed with a thickly-swathed child in his arms, 



334 Sonia Married 

while his wife lay with her hand in Lady Loring's, looking 
up at him. 

" I hope you're feeHng better," I said to Sonia. 

" David says you haven't even seen him yet," she pouted, 
disregarding my words. She stretched out her arms to the 
slumbering child. " Darling, you're being rather left out of 
all this, aren't you ? But if you will go to sleep when the 
loveUest things are being said about you . . . My blessed, 
I've waked you ! " 

There was a half-perceptible movement under the long 
shawl. O'Rane's arms began to rock gently. 

" Take him back, David," Sonia begged. " And then just 
come in for one moment to say good-night. I feel so feeble 
that I simply can't stand more." 

As he left the room. Lady Loring nodded to me, and I 
prepared to follow her. Sonia was l5nng with closed eyes, 
but, as I moved, she raised herself and beckoned with one 
hand. 

" Mr. Stornaway ! Just one moment before he comes 
back ! They want to take my baby away. I know I asked 
them to, but that was before . . . You won't let them, 
will you ? He's mine, mine ! David thinks I'm saying it 
because I ought to, because everybody would expect me to, 
but I'm not ! On my honour I'm not ! I'd go through 
it again rather than let them take my baby away." 

" He won't be taken away, if you want to keep him," I 
promised her. " Good night, my dear Sonia. Go straight 
off to sleep and don't worry about anything. If you want 
your child, David won't try to steal him. You're sure you 
want him ? " 

" David ? " 

" I meant the boy." 

A smile dawned on her tired face. 

" I want so much ! I always have. . . . Oh, I know you 
despise me, and you're quite right. I despise myself. But 
I must be loved, I can't get on without it. And I've been, 
oh ! so lonely ! " 

She gave a Httle sob. I felt a hand on my arm and turned 
to find Lady Loring shaking her head and pointing to the 
door. 

** TeU me anything I can do to help you, Sonia," I said, 



Sanctuary 335 

" and I'll do it. Now, good-night. You've got to go to sleep, 
and I shan't let David even say good-night to you." 

I met O'Rane in the passage and csirried him off to the 
library. 

" Lady Loring wants to get her off to sleep," I explained. 
" You and the child between you have rather excited her. 
If you will take my advice, you'U go back to Melton by the 
first train to-morrow. The two of you are wearing each 
other out. I'll do whatever's necessary here." 

" But I can't leave her yet." 

" You can and must. You've got your work to do. 
O'Rane, you may remember that I've advised you a good 
many times to face facts and end this business. In your 
greater wisdom you've always refused " 

" You never seemed to appreciate that I loved Sonia." 

" Indeed I did. But I thought we agreed that there were 
some tests which the greatest love in the world couldn't 
survive." 

He took up his stand by the fireplace, smiHng to himself 
and rocking gently from heel to toe with his hands in his 
pockets. 

" I thought so, too. But wouldn't it be a fair-weather 
love ? I treated Sonia badly, and she treated me worse. 
Until I married, I always thought that marriage was an easy, 
straightforward business ; you just fell in love, and there was 
an end of it. If I spoiled her hfe because / hadn't the imagina- 
tion, the consideration . . . I'm sorry, Stornaway, I can't 
discuss it. One's pride is rather involved. I always said 
that I loved her more than a man had ever loved a woman 
before ; if I can't prove it. . . . But I'm boring you." 

" I'm only tired. So are you, so's everyone. We'd better 
all go to bed. Promise me one thing. If you go in to say 
good-night to — ^your wife, don't stay more than a moment." 



THE END 



PRINTED AT THE 

CHAPEL BIVEB PBE9B, 

KINGSTON, SUBBBT, 



Messrs. Hutchinson & Co. 



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STEPHEN McKENNA 

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JEROME K. JEROME 

GILBERT FRANKAU 

BARONESS VON HUTTEN 

MRS. ALFRED SIDQWICK 

RAFAEL SABATINI 

UNA L. SILBERRAD 

UPTON SINCLAIR 

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PIERRE BENOIT 

a. B. BURGIN 

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AUTWOR OF " THE POINTING MAN;" 

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The heroine, Eunice Dampier, has a strange and eventful 
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the Parmeters is sketched with an able pen. Eunice is a 
real person with human faults and failings, as well as human 
charm and attraction. 

^ " S 



Hutchinson's New Novels. 6/9 Net. 
The Further Side of the Door 

By the author of " The Pointing IVIan" 

- The peculiar charm and ability to create, an atmosphere 
of niystery which mark the author of " The Pointing Man " 
are very evident in this new novel. It is a well woven tale 
of uncommon distinction and quality. Richard Ansell's 
^tory is one that may be the fate of many a man in these days. 
A story full of appeal and with a delightful current of romance. 

Odds and E^nds By b. ivi. croker 

Author of " Blue China," etc. 

Mrs. Croker's signature is a hall-mark of excellence of 
workmanship,' and that excellence is.maintained in this delight- 
ful collection of her storifiS, some grave, some gay, and all 
showing the. master hand. 

The reader will be delighted with the variety of subject 
and mood and the finish of style. While the. majority of the 
scenes are laid in her beloved' Ireland, India furnishes the 
background for some of the most amusing as well as tragic 
incidents. A book that every admirer of Mrs. Croker will 
welcome with enthusiasm. 

The Chinese Puzzle 

By IVlARiAN BOWER and LEON M. LION 
The Novel of the f&mous Play 

This remarl&ble story will make as strong an appeal in 
novel form as it has done as a play. 

There is tension throughout and clever characterization. 
All the persons in the tale are as vivid as on the stage, and 
the style is distinguished. 

The Level Track By curtis yorke 

Author of 
" Disentangled," " Joyce," " She Who Meant Well," etc. 
The Romance of Prudence Royton, who, from a humdrum, 
Cinderella-hke existence, is: suddenly thrown into the conflict- 
ing currents of wealth and matrimony. The story is character- 
istic of Curtis Yorke in its direct, vivid and arresting style, 
and will be one more favourite added to the long list of this 
popular writer's popular books. 
,6 



Hutchinson's New Novels. 6/9 Net. 

FIRST EDITION OF 60.000 COPIES 

The Lamp in the Desert 

By ETHEL M. DELL 

Author of " The Hundredth Chance," " The Bars 
of Iron," etc. 

A new novel by this most popular author is always an 
event. The scene of this powerful story is laid in the Indian 
hill country, and the story is replete with incident and re- 
markable characterisation. SteUa Denzil and her lover will 
take their places in the gallery of favourites which Miss Dell 
has given her admirers. 

My. Trifling Adventures 

By MRS. ALFRED SIDGWICK 

Author of " The Inner Shrine," " Anne Lulworth," etc. 

The innumerable admirers of this favourite novelist will 
welcome with delight the latest novel from her pen. Mrs. 
Sidgwick has a descriptive charm and a power of visualisation 
which never fail. She has brought all her powers to bear on 
this story of a young girl in strange and not altogether pleasant 
surroundings ; it is written with humour and a deep "under- 
standing of human' nature which will appeal to all who like 
to read about Life as it really is. 

Jimmy Higgins 

By UPTON SINCLAIR 

Author of " The Jungle," etc. 

This is the story of Jimmy Higgins, socialist, worker and 
sometime Mldier in the American Expeditionary . Forces. 
It is a character study written with aU Upton Sinclair's power 
and viriUty. The pictures he paints are drawn with a sweeping 
brush and in crude colours that rhake the lights and shadows 
distinct and impressive. " Jimmy Higgins" is a story^ that 
is sure to arouse great interest among the reading public all 
over the world. It is strong with the strength of the untamed 
spirit. 

7 _ 



Hutchinson's New Novels. 6/9 Net. 
Platonic Peter 

By MRS. HORACE TREMLETT 

Author of 

" Giddy Mrs. Goodyer," " Birds of a Feather," etc. 

Judy Bettington was the Mayoress of Midboro', a dazzling 
beauty in a Paris hat. - How she adopted Peter Barham as a 
friend, whether he was really so platonic as he should have 
been, and what Thomas the Mayor had to say about it, is aU 
told in the particularly entertaining, light-hearted style which 
Mrs. Tremlett has made quite her own. A most exhilarating 
story, with a smile on every page. 

The Scent Shop 

By PEGGY WEBLING 

Author of " In Our Street," etc. 

In her ninth and latest novel Miss Webling tells a quaint 
story of London life. She, uses her knowledge of the Uttle- 
known forms of fine labour, in this case the old and exquisite 
art of scent-making, to form a picturesque background for a 
delightful romance. Trhe characters are all entertaining, 
and are described in the author's most attractive manner. 

Peter Jackson. Cigar Merchant 

By GILBERT FRANKAU 

Author of " One of Them," etc. 
A romance of married life, a romance which resembles 
the life of many a couple. Strong and frank, a remarkable 
novel, is the opinion- of a balanced reader. It is a story which 
will especially appeal to all who have passed the first bloom 
of married life and see how Peter and his wife found them- 
selves and each other. A novel that will have a lasting success. 

Stone Walls By cecilia hill 

Author of " The Citadel," " Wings Triumphant." 
A novel that should 'enlarge this author's circle of readers. 
Both style and treatment bear out the promises made in the 
former books. The heroine Petra is drawn with the same 
" sure touch of affection and experience " (to quote the 
Times critic on the author's last novel), which characterizes 
tha work of this clever writer. 

C 8 . 



Hutchinson* s New Novels. 6/9 Net. 

Nearly a Million of this Favourite Author's Novel* have been 
already sold. 

The City of Palms 

By KATHLYN RHODES 

Author of 
" The Lure of the Desert," " The Desert Dreamers," etc. 
The action of the story passes in an oasis in the desert of 
Northern Africa, kn^wn to the Arabs as " The City of Palms." 
The chief characters are a young EngUshman, who lias settled 
down in the oasis, his young wife, and a man of hybrid 
nationaUty, half Pole, half Turk, whose, ill-will the English girl 
is unfortunate enough to incur. The threads of these three 
Uves become entangled, and the story is concerned chiefly with 
the intrigue set in motion by the Turk, in which the English- 
man runs the risk of losing both wife and land. 

A Villa in the South 

By DUNCAN SWAN 

Author of 
" Molyneux of Mayfair," " A Country House Comedy," etc. 

A delightfully entertaining book full of movement and 
telling the story of charming and likeable people. A novel 
written in Mr. Swan's most attractive style, with the ViUa 
Beauregarde as a fascinating background for an amusing 
society comedy. 

. Mr. Swan's talent is well-known to all lovers of goqd 
literature ; this novel is written with a lightness of touch and 
charm of style which are certain to enhance his reputation. 

The Little Soul 

By ELINOR MORDAUNT 

Author of 
" The Garden of Contentment," " A^ Ship of Solace," etc. 

Another novel that will deUght all admirers of Miss Mor- 
daunt's great gifts. Charles Hoyland is a remarkable 
character, drawn with great power and force. Philip McCabe 
and Diana Clayton, the foils to this driying power, are most 
charming and attractive people, whose careers will be followed 
with intense interest. The story ends on the note of hope, 
never absent from any picture of real life. 



Hutchinson 's New Novels. 6/9 Net. 

The Historical Nights' 
Entertainment Series I. 

By RAFAEL SABATINI 

Author of "The Snare," "The Barfner of the Bull," etc. 

In speaking of this series, Mr. Sabatini says, " I have set 
myself the task of reconstructing in the fullest possible detail and 
with all the colour available from surviving records a group of 
more or less famous events. I have selected for my purpose those 
which were in themselves bizarre and resultiiig from the interplay 
of human passions, and whilst relating each of these events in the 
form of a story, I compel that story scrupulously to follow the 
recorded facts and draw on my imagination merely, as one might, 
to fill in the outlines which histoi-y leaves grey," 

The Historical Nights' 
Entertainment Series II. 

By RAFAEL SABATINI 

Author of " The Snare, " " The Banner of the Bull," etc. 

" I have tried to reconstruct, in the fullest possible details, 
the most bizarre and famous events which have resulted from the 
interplay of human passions in history. How nearly I have 
approached success in this task— how far I have fallek short — my 
readers will discern." R. S. 

All Roads Lead to Calvary 

By JEROME K. JEROME 

Author of " Paul Kelver," " Tviro Men in a Boat," etc. 

" Her face has always been a woman's fortune. If shis's 
going to become a fighter, it will have to be her weapofl." 
Joan AUway finds this a truth though at times a bitter onfe, 
for she determines to fight for the right as she sees it, against 
the forces which strive to make iif e easy. Joan meets lifis 
with a high courage which nothing is able to damp, but the 
sojution of her problems must be found in the pages of Mr. 
Jerome's fascinating novel. 

10 



IMPORTANT FORTHCOMINU BOOKS 

The Dover Patrol — 
1915, 1916 (EL 1917 

By Admiral SIR REGINALD BACON, 

K.C.B., K.C.V.O., D.S.O 

With over one hundred illustrations, maps and plans. 
2 handsome voltfmes, 34«. net. 
The history of the Dover Patrol is one of the outstanding 
romances of the war, and Admiral Sir Reginald Bacon's forth- 
coming book sheds new light on the varied operations of the naval 
forces which he commanded for nearly three years. 

The occupation and fortification of the Belgian coast by the 
enemy, changed dramatically the strategical situation, throwing 
upon the Dover Patrol heavier responsibilities than Nelson, or any 
admiral who commanded these narrow waters in previous wars, 
"had had to bear. The enemy was in a position to threaten the 
left flank of the Allied armies besides menacing the enormous 
volume of sea traf^c passing through the straits. The Dover 
Patrol consequently^ had to. deny the use of these waters to the 
Germans, established on the Belg;i5,n Coast, while at the same 
time, rendering them safe for British shipping, and above all that, 
it had to protect the left flank of the Allied armies and safeguard 
the stream of storeships and transports passing across the Channel 
within seventy miles of the fortified bases of the enemy. 

Sir Reginald Bacon in this inportant book, which is very fully 
illustrated with charts and photographs, gives a detailed account 
of the work of the Dover Patrol, with its ships manned, not only 
by the Navy, but drawing their personnel l from all classes and 
composed of monitors, destroyers, submarines, drifters, trawlers, 
mine sweepers, motor boats and motor launches. He describes the 
ceaseless watch and ward, maintained for so long oS. the Belgian 
coast which was patrolled daily witjiin sight of Ostend and Zee- 
brugge ; a feat unparalleled in the war for hardihood and daring 
in view of the danger from mines ajid submarines. The methods 
^;v;he^eby , this work was accomplished and the precautions taken 
against loss form an interesting portion of the narrative. Admiral 
Bacon also gives some account of the landing of heavy guns at 
Dunkirk — ^great engineering achievements — and of the many 
bombardments carried out on the enemy's positions from the sea. 

The book will be regarded as thfe crowning vindication of the 
naval aptitudes of the British people, for the Dover Patrol was in 
the main an improvised force .created to meet a great national 
peril. 

If the Germans had dominated the Straits of Dover in the early 
months of the war, who could then have prophesied that the Allies 
would have triumphed ? 

II 



IMPORTANT FORTHCOMINQ BOOKS 

Westminster Cathedral 

and Its Architect By w. de uhopital 

WJth numerous Illustrations from Mr. Bentley'fi 

drawings including coloured plates, plans and 

reproductions from photographs. 

In 2 large handsome volumes, Crown 4-to, cloth gilt and gilt top, 
£3 3s. Od. net. 

The history of Westminster Cathedral, and of its architect, the late 
John Francis Bentley, will undoubtedly 'form one of the principal 
publishing features of the autumn season. Westminster Cathedral is 
acknowledged to be among the most important buildii'jgs of modern times, 
and as the Chief Cathedral of the Roman Catholic Church in the British 
Empire it has a further importance of the first mark. Bentley's own life, 
and the story- of how the great Byzantine cathedral grew into being from 
Cardinal Manning's first proposals, and how it fell to his successor^ 
Cardinal Vaughan, to initiate and carry out the work, has been told by 
the architect's daughter, Mrs. de I'Hopital, who has made full use of her 
father's papers. An important feature of the book is the illustrations, 
which comprise some full-page plates in colour froni Mr. Bentley's' water- 
colour drawings, and numerous illustrations in line and from photographs, 
besides many plans. 

The Madman By kahlil gibran 

"The William Blake of the Twentieth Century."— iJodiw. 

With three illustrations, 5s. net. 

: " The Madman " introduces to England the work of the greatest 
poet.of Arabia. The man of whom the great Rodin said " The world 
should expect much 'from this poet painter of Lebanon. He is the 
William Blake of the Twentieth Century." 

Kahlil'Gibran is as much the poet of the Near East as Tagore is of 
the East. In the opinion of many critics he is a fai^ greater poet than 
Tagore. Among the millions who read Arabic, Gibran — poet, painter, 
dramatist and critic — is considered the outstanding genius of the epoch. 

41st Year of Issue, 

The Year's Art. 1920 

Compiled by A. C. R. CARTER 

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 1919, together with information respecting 
the events of 1920. 

Over 600 pages -with illustrations 
Crown 8vo, cloth, 7s. 6d. net. 

12- 



IMPORTANT FORTHCOMING BOOKS 
The Peace Conference 

By Dp. E. J. DILLON 

Author of " The Eclipse of Russia " etc. 
In one large handsome volume, 21s, net. 
Dr. Dillon has been for so many years in the closest touch with 
the inmost circdes of European politics that his opportunities for 
collecting material for the work which bears this ^comprehensive 
title have been unrivalled. His two large volumes 'cover all the 
essential points of the vast conference and form a work which should 
be a permanent history of the events of these world shaking months. 
Dr. Dillon gives personal impressions of the leading delegates 
with special reference to their individual fitness to conduct their 
•parts in the negotiation for 'a world peace settlement. He gives 
a vast amount of hitherto unpublished information on the growth 
and development of the causes of dissension among the Associated 
Powers and the methods taken to arrange a settlement of these. 
He deals with the sincerity of the various national delegations in 
discussing the terms of a peace on an ideal basis as distinct from a 
peace on the old bases where national claims were paramount. He 
has much of supreme interest to say about the Italian situation, and 
the claims of America as regards the Monroe doctrine and as regards 
her German-American population. He discusses the probability 
of the permanence of the League of Nations, and touches with 
deft certainty on the indications and possibilities of the Japanese- 
and Chinese questions. A most valuable and interesting part of 
the book is the discussion of the " Fourteen " points as a basis 
for Peace, and their effect on the imperfectly developed and the 
undeveloped races and an examination of them from the -jjolitico- 
religious point of view. Other interesting chapters deal with the 
sources of information of which Dr. Dillon was able to make use, 
and the reception accorded this special information by the high 
parties in Paris. Dr. Dillon also has much of surpassing interest 
to tell of the inner history of the Peace Conference and the influences 
which affected the speed and trend of the settlement. 

It does not seem too much to claim that this work is unique 
in its source and in the variety of reliable information which is 
gathered into its covers. It should be studied by every thinking 
reader who wishes to know what really happened at Paris during 
those fateful months^vhen the peace of the world was being settled, 
we hope for all time. 

t3 



IMPORTANT PORTHCOMINQ BOOKS 
Memories of an Old Estonian — 

1860-1912 By GEORGE GREVILLE 

Author of " Society Recollections in Paris and Vienna," and " More Society Recollections." 

In demy 8vo, cloth gilt, 16«. net 

With numerous Illustrations 

In this fascinating volume the author has chiefly related 
his recollecticjis of Eton fifty years ago — the Eton of Dr. 
Hornby, and has added yet another volume to the chronicles 
of the great school. 

It is not easy to describe the varied contents of this 
book ; it suffices, however, to say that it contains much 
besides these early reminiscences. Mr. Greville supplies the 
reader from his apparently inexhaustible memories with 
abundant anecdotes and society sketches during the lattet 
half of Queen Victoria's reign. 

My Chinese Days 

By GULIELMA F. ALSOP 

With 8 Illustrations on art paper in one handsome volume, 
10s. 6d. net. 
With its background of Oriental colours, customs and mystery this 
is a fascinating volume of vignettes of Chinese life'by a woman physician. 
The author obtained the material for her sketches either from her own 
observations during her four years' work as a practising physician or she 
heard of them direct. She gives intimate pictures of the domestic life of 
the Chinese of all classes^ and tells of her many romantic, tragic and 
humorous experiences; 

Fields of Victory 

By MRS. HUMPHRY WARD 

In crown 8vo, with illustrations, coloured map and 
, large folding statistical chart, 7s. 6d. net. 

This is a book of paramount importance and of topical interest. It 
is a survey of the British Armies in the field and of Britain's part in the 
future Peace of the World. The author has visited the scenes of the ereat 
conflict, and gives us from the Fields of Viccory and from personal con- 
tact with the leading persons in the great drama, and prominent British 
and Allied representatives, who have put all available material and infor- 
mation at her' disposal, an abiding and inspiring picture of Great Britain's 
achievements in the past and of her aims and ideals for the future. 

14 



IMPORTANT FORTHCOMING BOOKS 

Gardens of Celebrities and 
Celebrated Gardens 

25.. net. By JESSIE MACGREGOR 

In one large handsome volume, with 20 beautiful coloured 
plates and exquisite pencil drawings by the Author 

A book ihat is likely to become a classic. The beautiful Water 
Colour paintings and delicate pencil drawings of some of the most famous 
Gardens in and around London, add greatly to the interest of the letter- 
press. Specjial permission was granted by Queen Alexandra to Miss 
Macgregor to make sketches in the precincts of Marlborough House. 
Miss Mac|;fegor, Who was a favourite pupil of Sir Frederick Leighton, has 
been a regular Exhibitor at the Royal Academy. The text gives a most 
exhaustive survey of London Gardens and their History, from the days of 
the Norman Conquest. Both by those who know and love their London 
md by many Americans and overseas Britons this unique book, with its. 
fascinating accounts of Hogarth House, Walpole House, the Chelsea 
Physicke Garden, and many other historical backgrounds will be read 
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The book is a veritable treasure house of Garden Lore. 

Sappho • A Rendering and an Authority; 

By H. DE VERE STAGPOOLt 

Half cloth gilt, 3i. 6cl. net. 

In this delightful volume Mr. Stacpoole has used all the charm of 
language which marks him as a descriptive writer of such high order. 
The music of his diction, rings in every line of this translation, which is 
vibrant with the spirit of the origuial. 

The Ruined Cities of Northern 
Africa By aagnar sturzenbecker 

With about 60 illustrations from pliotograplis printed 
on art paper. 

Detny Svo, oloth giltr 16s, net. 

Dr. Sturzenbecker's name is well known throughout Europe as one of 
the leading authorities on the ancient civilizations of North Africa, which 
he describes. The excavations have, on the whole, yielded greater 
treasures than Pompeii and Herculaneum, for they have concerned towns 
of great size and importance which for centuries have lain hidden under 
their sandy covering. 

«S 



Two New Volumes of 
HUTCHINSON'S NATURE LIBRARY. 

A new aeries oi books on Natural History and other 

kindred subjects^ written by experts in popular language, 

but with strict accuracy In every detail. 

Each -volume in large crown Svo, handsome cloth gilt, 7 s . 6 d . net, fully illustrated 

Bird Behaviour By frank finn.f.z.s. 

Author of *' Birds of the Countryside," etc. 

With 44 illustrations , on art pctper. 
Mr. Frank Finn is well known as one of our chief authori- 
ties on all that concerns bird-life. Those who are familiar 
-with his books are aware that he has made it a practice ■ only 
to write from personal obsei^vation. " Bird Behaviour," 
the subject of his new book, has never before received 
serious attention, but it is one in which Mr. Finn is 
thoroughly at home. Some of the points treated in the 
volume relate to the locomotion of birds, their nutrition and 
the reasons for their choice of particular foods — the care of 
the young, nests, migration, sensea.pf smell and sight. 

Insect Artisans and their Work 

By EDWARD STEP, F.L.S. 

Author of "Messmates," "Toadstools and Mushrooms of the Countryside," etc. 

With 54 illustrations, on art paper. 

From quite early days in the ^tudy of Entomology it has 

been generally known that certain Insects in the perfection 

of their industry might almost be accepted as the prototypes 

of the human artificer. Thus, the wasp was taken as the 

first papsr-maker, a certain wild bee as a mason, and another 

bee as a carpenter. 

OTHER VOLUMES ALREADY ISSUED 
PleSSmateS S a Book of strange Companiondiip* 

By EDWARD STEP, F.L.S. 

Author jof "The Romance of Wild Flowers," "Shell Life," etc. 

With 55 Illustrations from photoj^raphs, on art paper 

BY THE SAME AUTHOR 

The Infancy of Animals ^"■•^'•"'"' 

With 64- plates on art paper and numerous illustrations In tbe text 

The Courtship of Animals 

By W. P. PYORAFT, A.L S., F.Z.S. 

Zoological Department, British Museum. 
Author of " A History of Birds," " Story of Reptile Life," etc, 
With numerous Illustrations on an paper 

i6 



RECENT SUCCESSFUL BOOKS 
In the Morning of Time 

By CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS 

Author of " Red Fox," etc. 

With nine illustrations. In crown 8vo, cloth, 7: 6<1. net. 

The stories of this author dealing with the adventures 
of animals, of which " The Red Fox " is, perhaps, the best 
known, have for a tong time enjoyed great popularity. In 
-the present work, Mr. Roberts gives us a story of a man in 
primaeva;! times, and he introduces, descriptions of the strange 
scenery and monstrous fauna of the time. 

Indo-China and its 
Primitive People 

By CAPTAIN HENRY BAUDESSON 

With 60 illustrations from photographs by 
the Author. 

In demy 8vo, cloth gilt, 16*. net. 
In the course of his travels Captain Baudesson carefully 
observed the curious customs of the Moi and Chams; the un- 
cultured people of Indo-China, among whom he dwelt for 
many years. The story of his travels is presented in vivid 
language and is full of local and picturesque colour. Tigers 
and elephants were frequently encountered during the journey 
of the mission, and many members of the expedition were 
wounded by the poisoned arrows of the natives, while jungle 
fever and malaria made havoc among them. 

Old Days in 
Bohemian London 

Recollections of Clement Scott 

By MRS. CLEMENT SCOTT 

In demy 8vo. cloth gilt, with 16 illustrations, lOs. 6d. net. 

These recollections are something mpre than memoirs of one 
who probably knew his Bohemian London better than any living 
contemporary. Mr. Clement Scott was for many years Dramatic 
Critic to "The Daily Telegraph," and In this remarkable book, 
one finds references to and anecdotes, hitheito unpublished, of" 
most of the notabilities both Protean and those who have trodden 
the bigger stage of Life dOring the past twenty-five years 

«7 



RECENT SUCCESSFUL BOOKS 
Secrets of the Bosphorus |5?H.n 

Revealed by Ambassador MORGENTHAU 

CONSTANTINOPLE 1913-1916 

With 19 Illustrations on art paper. 

Published at the popular price of 8s. 6d. net. 

It is impossible to overrate the importance of this book. 

It contains amazing .. revelations concerning many obscure 

phases of the v-orld-war. A book that holds its place and 

continues to be in great demand. 

The Game of Diplomacy |3fti„ 

By a EUROPEAN DIPLOMAT 
With unique portraits of Illustrious Personages 

In demy 8vo, cloth gilt, 10s. 6d. net. 
Baron de Schelking, the author, was First Secretary at 
the Russian Embassy in Berlin for a number of years. His 
memoirs will rank as a historical document of the first import- 
ance. 

Indian Studies 2nd Edition 

By GENERAL SIR O'MOORE CREAGH, 
V.C, G.C..B., G.C.S.I, 
Former Commander-in-Chief in India 
' In demy 8vo, cloth gilt, 16s. net, 

A brilliant and exhaustive survey of India. 
The fruit of forty years' experience in India by a former 
Commander-in-Chief. 

One> of Them : A Novel in Verse 

By GILBERT FRANKAU 

In Cr. 8vo, with coloured Wrapper, 6s. 9d. net. 

God and Tommy Atkins 4th Edition 

• By Dr>. ALEXANDER IRVINE 

Author of " My Lady of the Chimney Corner," etc, 

3s. 6d. nit^ 
18 



Recent Successful Novels. 



Bach in cr. 8vo., cloth, 6s. 9d. net. 



THE ROLL CALL 

2nd Edition 

THE GREAT INTERRUPTION W. B. Maxwell 

2nd Edition 

UNDER BLUE SKIES 

2nd Edition 

BLUE CHINA 

2nd Edition 

THE OBSTINATE LADY 

2nd Edition 



By Arnold Bennett 



H. de Vere Stacpoole 
B. M. Croker 
W. E. Norris 



WiLD YOUTH 
LOOSE ENDS 
A GENTLE DESPOT 
THE ELSTONES 

2nd Edition 

AGAINST THE WINDS 

THE BLOND BEAST 

PAUL'S WIFE 

BIRDS OF A FEATHER Mrs. Horace Tremlett 

LOVE AND THE CRESCENT 

Mrs. A. C. Inchbold 

AN ENGLISH FAMILY Harold Begble 

3rd Edition 

19 



Sir Gilbert Parker 

Arnold Lunn 

G. B. Burgin 

Isabel C. Clarke 

Kate Jordan 

Robert A. Bennet 

Douglas Sladen 



3/6 Net Series 

OP 

FAMOUS NOVELS 

Each in cfomn 8vo, printed on good paper, cloth hound with most attractive 
picture^ wrapper in colours. 



NEW EDITIONS OF 



Ethel M. Deirs Great Novels 

The Hundredth Chance 

Now published for the first time in cheap form 

The 3ars of Iron 

(222n<l Thousand) ^ 



The Story of an African Farm 

By OLIVE SCHREINER 

A Classic which has delighted Hundreds of . Thousands of 
readers and will prove as acceptable to millions more. Olive 
Schreiner's masterpiece is ever new, ever interesting. . It is the 
acknowledged classic of South Africa. One of the greatest novels 
ever written. 

Queen of the Rushes 

By ALLEN RAINE 

Over Two Million copies of this famous author's books have 
already been sold. " Allen Raine " is the hall mark of^^all that is 
pure and wholesome ^ in literature. This -novel deals with her 
beloved Wales, of which she is at once the prophet %nd novelist. 

The Relentless Desert 

By KATHLYN RHODES 
• 

A novel of thrilling interest and intrigue by one of the most 
popular of modern novelists whose books are always in great, 
demand. A worthy edition of a book which will have a widely 
extended field' in its new form, 

30 



Hutchinson's 2/- Net Novels 

NEW VOLUMES AND NEW EDITIONS 
FOR AUTUMN 1919 

Each volutne hound, and with a most attractive pictorial wrapper 



YELLOW ENGLISH 

AUNT JANE AND UNCLE JAMES 

THE ARRIVAL OF ANTONY 

PEG THE RAKE 

KITTY THE RAG 

THE BAG OF SAFFRON 

KINGSMEAD 

A SPECKLED BIRD 

THE LOST CONTINENT 

KATE OF KATE HALL 

THE GREAT AGE 

THE INHERITANCE 

MAX 

THE DAWN OF ALL 

A WINNOWING 

LADY Q 

THE MONOMANIAC 

THE SENTIMENTALISTS 

PRISONERS 

ROYAL END 

EYES OF THE BLIND 



Dorota Flatau 

Dorothea Conyers 

Dorothea Conyers 

" Rita " 

" Rita " 

Baroness von Huttcn 

Baroness von Hutten 

Evans Augusta Wilson 

J. C. Cutcliffe Hyne 

Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler 

J. C. Snaith 

Una L. Silberrad 

Mrs. K. C. Thurston 

Robert Hugh Benson 

Robert Hugh Benson 

Mrs. Baillie Saunders 

Emile Zola 

Robert Hugh Benson 

Mary Cholmondeley 

Henry Harland 

W. P Willcocks 



Bound in Paper with Pictorial Cover, 116 net. 
THE CONFESSIONS OF A LONDON GIRL 



THE WORLD'S BEST GIRL 



By Elizabeth York 

Miller 

By Corslie Stanton and 
Heath Ho»ken 



Hutchinson's 2/- Novels 

Already Published. 



THE SNARE Br 

THE BANNER OF THE BULL 
THE TRAMPL^^NG OF THE LILIES 

THE SHAME OF MOTLEY 

ANTHONY WILDING 

THE WOLF 

THE TOLL BAR 

SANDS OF GOLD 

SHARROW 

CHIFFON'S MARRIAGE 

ST. ELMO 

THE COMBINED MAZE 

THE FILIBUSTERS 

A DASH FOR A THRONE 

BY RIGHT OF SWORD 

EVELYN'S STORY 

THE THREE BROTHERS 

BY WHAT AUTHORITY 

THE LIGHT INVISIBLE 

TWILIGHT 

THE PRINCESS OF NEW YORK 

THALASSA 

A WELSH SINGER 

THE TEMPLE OF LIES 

THE GREED OF CONQUEST 

THE GOLDEN SWORD 

THE WATCHMAN 

THE LION'S CLAWS 

THE WHITE YAWL 

THE SPY •■ 

THE AVALANCHE 

THE BUILDER 

GABRIELLE JANTHRY 

THE GIRLS AT HIS BILLET 

MISS MILLIONS' MAID 

THE COURTSHIP OF ROSAMUND FAYRE 

THE STRAYINGS OF SANDY 

THE DEVIL'S GARDEN 

TORN SAILS 

LITTLE BLUE PIGEON 

SHE WHO MEANT WELL 

A QUAKER WOOING 

A KING IN BABYLON 

PERSUASIVE PEGGY 

WHEN MICHAEL CAME TO TOWN 
THE SUNLIT HILLS 



Rafael Sabatini 
Rafael Sabatini' 
Rafael Sabatini 
Rafael Sabatini 
Rafael Ssbatini 
J. E. BuckroKO 
J. E. Buckrose 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Baroness von Hutten 
"Gyp" 

Evans Ausrusta Wilson 
May Sinclair 
Cutclif f e Kyno 
A. W. Ma-rchmont 
A. W. Marchmont 
Emma Jane Worboise * 
Eden Phillpotts 
Robort Huffh Benson 
Robert Hush Benson 
Frank Danby 
Cosmo Hamilton 
Mrs. Baillie Reynolds 
Allen Raine 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
3, B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
J. B. Harris-Burland 
Berta Ruck 
Berta Ruck 
Berta Ruck 
Dorothea Conyers 
W. B. Maxwell 
Allen Ralne 
A. G. Hales 
Curtis Yorke 
Mrs. Fred Reynolds 
Burton E. Stevenson 
Maravene Thompson 
Madame Albanesi 
Madam* Albanesi 



22 



Hutchinson's 2/- Novels alre&dy pvblisW— continued. 



HEARTS AND SWEETHEARTS By 

POPPIES IN THE CORN 

RICHARD RAYNAL. SOLITARY 

A MIRROR OF SHALLOT 

THE QUEEN'S TRAGEDY 

THE KING'S ACHIEVEMENT 

THE CONVENTIONALISTS 

AN AVERAGE MAN 

THE NECROMANCERS 

LORD OF THE WORLD 

THE COWARD 

COME RACK I COME ROPE I 

LONELINESS 

INITIATION 

ODDSFISHI 

NONE OTHER GODS ... 

OUR ADVERSARY 

MY LADY FRIVOL 

THE MIXED DIVISIONS 

THE EXPERIMENTS OF GANYMEDE BUNN 

TWO IMPOSTORS AND TINKER 

IN OLD MADRAS -f 

THE SERPENT'S TOOTH 

GIVEN IN MARRIAGE 

FROM CLUE TO CAPTURE ... 

HER MAD MONTH * 

MARGUERITE'S WONDERFUL YEAR •. 

TWO IN A^ TENT-AND JANE -- 

HILARY ON HER OWN 

PATRICIA PLAYS A PART 

CANDYTUFT-I MEAN VERONICA 

THE THIRD MISS WENDERBY 

AN UNDRESSED HEROINE 

THE VACILLATIONS OF HAZEL 

BY ORDER OF THE CZAR 

ADAMS CLAY 

THE GREEN PATCH 

MAGPIE 

THE LORDSHIP OF LOVE 

MARIA ••. 

MADEMOISELLE CELESTE 

"GOOD OLD ANNA' 

IN COTTON WOOL 

MRS. THOMPSON 

THE RAGGED MESSENGER 

THE ONE WHO LOOKED ON 

THE GREAT WHITE HAND 

THE ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL 

A BRIDE OF THE PLAINS 

PETTICOAT GOVERNMENT .. '•. - 

«3 



Madame Albanesi 
Madame Albanesi 
Robert Hus^ Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hurh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hush Benson 
Robert Hueh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
Robert Hugh Benson 
M. E. Braddon 
Rosa N. Carer 
R. W. Campbtell 
Dorothea Conyers 
Dorothea Conyers 
Mrs. B. M. Croker 
Mrs. B. M. Croker 
Mrs. B. M. Croker 
Dick Donovan 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
- Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes-Grundr 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes-Grundy 
Mabel Barnes- Grundy 
Joseph Hatton 
Cosmo Hamilton 
Baroness von Hutten 
Baroness von Hutten 
Baroness von Hutten 
Baroness von Hutten 
A. F. Knight 
Mrs. felloe Lowndes 
W. B. Maxwell 
W. B. Maxwell 
W. B. Maxwell 
F. F. Montresor 
J. E. Muddock 
Baroness Orczy 
Baroness Orczy 
Baroness Orczy 



Hutchinson's 2/- Novels already publhihed— continued. 



A TRUE WOMAN By 

MEADOWSWEET 

THE LEGION OF HONOUR 

THE MONEY MASTER 

THE GAMBLERS 

CONFESSIONS OF A LADIES' MAN 

THE UNDER- SECRETARY 

BY BERWEN BANKS 

THE MAN WHO WON 

THE WAX IMAGE 

THE STRAIGHT RACE 

THE DESERT DREAMERS 

THE WILL OF ALLAH 

SWEET LIFE 

, AFTERWARDS 

THE MAKING OF A SOUL 

THE LURE OF THE DESERT 

HALF A TRUTH 

THE BRIDGE OF KISSES 

THE LAD WITH WINGS 

HIS OFFICIAL FIANCEE 

LOVE AT ARMS 

LITANY LANE 

IN BLUE WATERS 

THE PEARL FISHERS ■■■ » 

THE BLUE HORIZON 

THE CHILDREN OF THE SEA 

CORPORAL JACQUES OF THE FOREIGN 

LEGION 

THE REEF OF STARS 

LITTLE COMRADE 

VIRGINIA OF THE RHODESIANS 

THE GRANDEST THING IN THE WORLD 

THE WEB OF THE SPIDER 

BOUNDARY HOUSE 

THE WIFE'S TRIALS 

THE LADIES' PARADISE 

THE MYSTERIES OF MARSEILLES 



Baroness Orczy 
Baroness Orczy 
Baroness Orczy 
JSir Gilbert Parker 
William Le Queux 
William Le Queux 
William Le Queux 
Allen Raine 
Mrs. Baillie Reynolds 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
Kathlyn Rhodes 
"Rita" 
Berta Ruck 
Berta Ruck 
Berta Ruck 
R4{ael Sabatini 
Margaret Baillie 

• Saunders 
H. -do Vere Stacpoo^.e 
H. de Vere Stacpoole 
H. de Vere Stacpoole 
H. de Vere Stacpoole 

H. de Vere Stacpoole 
H. de Vere Stacpoole 
Burton E. Stevenson 
Cynthia Stockley 
By the Authors of 

"Missins the Tide" 
H. B. Marriott Watson 
Peggy Webling 
Emma Jane Worboise 
Emile Zola 
Emile Zola 



In crown Svo. with Pictorial Cover, 1l3 uei- 
THE STRANGLEHOLD By Coralie Stanton and 



MISSING THE TIDE (Pages from the life 
of Margaret Carson) 



Heath Hosken 
By "One who knew her* 



24