{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_14253/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_14253","id":"gutenberg_14253","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14253","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Novels","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Fiction"],"text":"FLAMES\n\n                           BY ROBERT HICHENS\n\n                  AUTHOR OF THE GARDEN OF ALLAH, ETC.\n\n\n\n\nCOPYRIGHT, 1897, BY HERBERT S. STONE & CO.\n\nThis edition published July, 1906, by Duffield & Company\n\n\n\n\nBOOK I--VALENTINE\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE SAINT OF VICTORIA STREET\n\n\nRefinement had more power over the soul of Valentine Cresswell than\nreligion. It governed him with a curious ease of supremacy, and held\nhim back without effort from most of the young man's sins. Each age\nhas its special sins. Each age passes them, like troops in review, before\nit decides what regiment it will join. Valentine had never decided to\njoin any regiment. The trumpets of vice rang in his ears in vain, mingled\nwith the more classical music of his life as the retreat from the\nbarracks of Seville mingled with the click of Carmen's castanets. But he\nheeded them not. If he listened to them sometimes, it was only to wonder\nat the harsh and blatant nature of their voices, only to pity the poor\ncreatures who hastened to the prison, which youth thinks freedom and old\nage protection, at their shrieking summons. He preferred to be master of\nhis soul, and had no desire to set it drilling at the command of painted\nwomen, or to drown it in wine, or to suffocate it in the smoke at\nwhich the voluptuary tries to warm his hands, mistaking it for fire.\nIntellectuality is to some men what religion is to many women, a trellis\nof roses that bars out the larger world. Valentine loved to watch the\nroses bud and bloom as he sat in his flower-walled cell, a deliberate and\nrejoicing prisoner. For a long time he loved to watch them. And he\nthought that it must always be so, for he was not greatly given to moods,\nand therefore scarcely appreciated the thrilling meaning of the word\nchange, that is the key-word of so many a life cipher. He loved the\npleasures of the intellect so much that he made the mistake of opposing\nthem, as enemies, to the pleasures of the body. The reverse mistake is\nmade by the generality of men; and those who deem it wise to mingle the\nsharply contrasted ingredients that form a good recipe for happiness\nare often dubbed incomprehensible, or worse. But there were moments at\na period of Valentine's life when he felt discontented at his strange\ninability to long for sin; when he wondered, rather wearily, why he was\nrapt from the follies that other men enjoyed; why he could refuse,\nwithout effort, the things that they clamoured after year by year with\nan unceasing gluttony of appetite. The saint quarrelled mutely with his\nholiness of intellectuality, and argued, almost fiercely, with his cold\nand delicate purity.\n\n\"Why am I like some ivory statue?\" he thought sometimes, \"instead of like\na human being, with drumming pulses, and dancing longings, and voices\ncalling forever in my ears, like voices of sirens, 'Come, come, rest in\nour arms, sleep on our bosoms, for we are they who have given joy to all\nmen from the beginning of time. We are they who have drawn good men from\ntheir sad goodness, and they have blessed us. We are they who have been\nthe allegory of the sage and the story of the world. In our soft arms the\nworld has learned the glory of embracing. On our melodious hearts the\nhearts of men have learned the sweet religion of singing.' Why cannot\nI be as other men are, instead of the Saint--the saint of Victoria\nStreet--that I am?\"\n\nFor, absurdly enough, that was the name his world gave to Valentine.\nThis is not an age of romance, and he did not dwell, like the saints of\nold centuries, in the clear solitudes of the great desert, but in what\nthe advertisement writer calls a \"commodious flat\" in Victoria Street.\nNo little jackals thronged about him in sinful circle by night. No school\nof picturesque disciples surrounded him by day. If he peeped above his\nblinds he could see the radiant procession of omnibuses on their halting\nway towards Westminster. The melodies of wandering organs sang in his\nascetic ears, not once, nor twice, but many times a week. The milk-boy\ncame, it must be presumed, to pay his visit in the morning; and the\nsparrows made the air alive, poising above the chimneys, instead of the\nwild eagles, whose home is near the sun. Valentine was a modern young\nman of twenty-four, dealt at the Army and Navy Stores, was extremely\nwell off, and knew everybody. He belonged to the best clubs and went\noccasionally to the best parties. His tailor had a habitation in\nSackville Street, and his gloves came from the Burlington Arcade. He\noften lunched at the Berkeley and frequently dined at Willis's. Also\nhe had laughed at the antics of Arthur Roberts, and gazed through a pair\nof gold-mounted opera-glasses at Empire ballets and at the discreet\njuggleries of Paul Cinquevalli. The romance of cloistered saintliness\nwas not his. If it had been he might never have rebelled. For how often\nit is romance which makes a home for religion in the heart of man,\nromance which feathers the nest of purity in which the hermit soul\ndelights to dwell! Is it not that bizarre silence of the Algerian waste\nwhich leads many a Trappist to his fate, rather than the strange thought\nof God calling his soul to heavenly dreams and ecstatic renunciations? Is\nit not the wild poetry of the sleeping snows by night that gives to the\nSt. Bernard monk his holiest meditations? When the organ murmurs, and he\nkneels in that remote chapel of the clouds to pray, is it not the\nreligion of his wonderful earthly situation and prospect that speaks to\nhim loudly, rather than the religion of the far-off Power whose hands he\nbelieves to hold the threads of his destinies? Even the tonsure is a\npsalm to some, and the robe and cowl a litany. The knotted cord is a mass\nand the sandal a prayer.\n\nBut Valentine had been a saint by temperament, it seemed, and would be a\nsaint by temperament to the end. He had not been scourged to a prayerful\nattitude by sorrow or by pain. Tears had not made a sea to float him to\nrepentance or to purity. Apparently he had been given what men call\ngoodness as others are given moustaches or a cheerful temper. When his\ncontemporaries wondered at him, he often found himself wondering still\nmore at them. Why did they love coarse sins? he thought. Why did they\nfling themselves down, like dogs, to roll in offal? He could not\nunderstand, and for a long time he did not wish to understand. But one\nnight the wish came to him, and he expressed it to his bosom friend,\nJulian Addison.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nA QUESTION OF EXCHANGE\n\n\nMost of us need an opposite to sit by the hearth with us sometimes, and\nto stir us to wonder or to war. Julian was Valentine's singularly\ncomplete and perfect opposite, in nature if not in deeds. But, after all,\nit is the thoughts that are of account rather than the acts, to a mind\nlike Valentine's. He knew that Julian's nature was totally unlike his\nown, so singularly unlike that Julian struck just the right note to\ngive the strength of a discord to the chord--that often seemed a common\nchord--of his own harmony. Long ago, for this reason, or for no special\nreason, he had grown to love Julian. Theirs was a fine, clean specimen\nof friendship. How fine, Valentine never rightly knew until this evening.\n\nThey were sitting together in Valentine's flat in that hour when he\nbecame serious and expansive. He had rather a habit of becoming serious\ntoward midnight, especially if he was with only one person; and no desire\nto please interfered with his natural play of mind and of feeling when he\nwas with Julian. To affect any feeling with Julian would have seemed like\nbeing on conventional terms with an element, or endeavouring to deceive\none's valet about one's personal habits. Long ago Julian and he had, in\nmind, taken up their residence together, fallen into the pleasant custom\nof breakfasting, lunching, and dining on all topics in common. Valentine\nknew of no barriers between them. And so, now, as they sat smoking, he\nexpressed his mood without fear or hesitation.\n\nThe room in which they were was small. It was named the tentroom, being\nhung with dull-green draperies, which hid the ceiling and fell loosely to\nthe floor on every side. A heavy curtain shrouded the one door. On the\nhearth flickered a fire, before which lay Valentine's fox-terrier, Rip.\nJulian was half lying down on a divan in an unbuttoned attitude.\nValentine leaned forward in an arm-chair. They were smoking cigarettes.\n\n\"Julian,\" Valentine said, meditatively, \"I sometimes wonder why you and\nI are such great friends.\"\n\n\"How abominable of you! To seek a reason for friendship is as inhuman as\nto probe for the causes of love. Don't, for goodness' sake, let your\nintellect triumph over your humanity, Valentine. Of all modern vices,\nthat seems to me the most loathsome. But you could never fall into\nanything loathsome. You are sheeted against that danger with plate\narmour.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\"\n\n\"But you are. It sometimes seems to me that you and I are like Elijah and\nElisha, in a way. But I am covetous of your mantle.\"\n\n\"Then you want me to be caught from you into heaven?\"\n\n\"No. I should like you to give me your mantle, your powers, your nature,\nthat is, and to stay here as well.\"\n\n\"And send the chariot of fire to the coach-house, and the horses of fire\nto the nearest stables?\"\n\n\"Exactly!\"\n\n\"Well, but give me a reason for this rascally craving.\"\n\n\"A reason! Oh, I hate my nature and I love yours. What a curse it is to\ngo through life eternally haunted by one's self; worse than being married\nto an ugly and boring wife.\"\n\n\"Now you are being morbid.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm telling you just how I feel.\"\n\n\"That is being morbid. Recording to some people who claim to direct\nSociety.\"\n\n\"The world's County Council, who would like to abolish all the public\nbars.\"\n\n\"And force us to do our drinking in the privacy of our bedrooms.\"\n\n\"You would never do any drinking, Valentine. How could you, the Saint of\nVictoria Street?\"\n\n\"I begin to hate that nickname.\"\n\nAnd he frowned slowly. Tall, fair, curiously innocent-looking, his\nface was the face of a blonde ascetic. His blue eyes were certainly not\ncold, but nobody could imagine that they would ever gleam with passion or\nwith desire as they looked upon sin. His mouth seemed made for prayer,\nnot for kisses; and so women often longed to kiss it. Over him, indeed,\nintellectuality hung like a light veil, setting him apart from the uproar\nwhich the world raises while it breaks the ten commandments. Julian, on\nthe other hand, was brown, with bright, eager eyes, and the expression of\none who was above all things intensely human. Valentine had ever been,\nand still remained, to him a perpetual wonder, a sort of beautiful\nmystery. He actually reverenced this youth who stood apart from all the\nmuddy ways of sin, too refined, as it seemed, rather than too religious,\nto be attracted by any wile of the devil's, too completely artistic to\nfeel any impulse towards the subtle violence which lurks in all the\nvagaries of the body. Valentine was to Julian a god, but in their mutual\nrelations this fact never became apparent. On the contrary, Valentine\nwas apt to look up to Julian with admiration, and the curious respect\noften felt by those who are good by temperament for those who are\ncompletely human. And Julian loved Valentine for looking up to him,\nfinding in this absurd modesty of his friend a crowning beauty of\ncharacter. He had never told Valentine the fact that Valentine kept\nhim pure, held his bounding nature in leash, was the wall of fire that\nhedged him from sin, the armour that protected him against the assaults\nof self. He had never told Valentine this secret, which he cherished\nwith the exceeding and watchful care men so often display in hiding\nthat which does them credit. For who is not a pocket Byron nowadays?\nBut to-night was fated by the Immortals to be a night of self-revelation.\nAnd Valentine led the way by taking a step that surprised Julian not a\nlittle. For as Valentine frowned he said:\n\n\"Yes, I begin to hate my nickname, and I begin to hate myself.\"\n\nJulian could not help smiling at the absurdity of this bemoaning.\n\n\"What is it in yourself that you hate so much?\" he asked, with a decided\ncuriosity.\n\nValentine sat considering.\n\n\"Well,\" he replied at length, \"I think it is my inhumanity, which robs me\nof many things. I don't desire the pleasures that most men desire, as you\nknow. But lately I have often wished to desire them.\"\n\n\"Rather an elaborate state of mind.\"\n\n\"Yet a state easy to understand, surely. Julian, emotions pass me by. Why\nis that? Deep love, deep hate, despair, desire, won't stop to speak to\nme. Men tell me I am a marvel because I never do as they do. But I am not\ndriven as they are evidently driven. The fact of the matter is that\ndesire is not in me. My nature shrinks from sin; but it is not virtue\nthat shrinks: it is rather reserve. I have no more temptation to be\nsensual, for instance, than I have to be vulgar.\"\n\n\"Hang it, Val, you don't want to have the temptation, do you?\"\n\nValentine looked at Julian curiously.\n\n\"You have the temptation, Julian?\" he said.\n\n\"You know I have--horribly.\"\n\n\"But you fight it and conquer it?\"\n\n\"I fight it, and now I am beginning to conquer it, to get it under.\"\n\n\"Now? Since when?\"\n\nJulian replied by asking another question.\n\n\"Look here, how long have we known each other?\"\n\n\"Let me see. I'm twenty-four, you twenty-three. Just five years.\"\n\n\"Ah! For just five years I've fought, Val, been able to fight.\"\n\n\"And before then?\"\n\n\"I didn't fight; I revelled in the enemy's camp.\"\n\n\"You have never told me this before. Did you suddenly get conversion, as\nSalvationists say?\"\n\n\"Something like it. But my conversion had nothing to do with trumpets and\ntambourines.\"\n\n\"What then? This is interesting.\"\n\nA certain confusion had come into Julian's expression, even a certain\nechoing awkwardness into his attitude. He looked away into the fire and\nlighted another cigarette before he answered. Then he said rather\nunevenly:\n\n\"I dare say you'll be surprised when I tell you. But I never meant to\ntell you at all.\"\n\n\"Don't, if you would rather not.\"\n\n\"Yes, I think I will. I must stop you from disliking yourself at any\ncost, dear old boy. Well, you converted me, so far as I am converted;\nand that's not very far, I'm afraid.\"\n\n\"I?\" said Valentine, with genuine surprise. \"Why, I never tried to.\"\n\n\"Exactly. If you had, no doubt you'd have failed.\"\n\n\"But explain.\"\n\n\"I've never told you all you do for me, Val. You are my armour against\nall these damned things. When I'm with you, I hate the notion of being a\nsinner. I never hated it before I met you. In fact, I loved it. I wanted\nsin more than I wanted anything in heaven or earth. And then--just at the\ncritical moment when I was passing from boyhood into manhood, I met you.\"\n\nHe stopped. His brown cheeks were glowing, and he avoided Valentine's\ngaze.\n\n\"Go on, Julian,\" Valentine said. \"I want to hear this.\"\n\n\"All right, I'll finish now, but I don't know why I ever began. Perhaps\nyou'll think me a fool, or a sentimentalist.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\"\n\n\"Well, I don't know how it is, but when I saw you I first understood\nthat there is a good deal in what the parsons say, that sin is beastly\nin itself, don't you know, even apart from one's religious convictions,\nor the injury one may do to others. When I saw you, I understood that\nsin degrades one's self, Valentine. For you had never sinned as I had,\nand you were so different from me. You are the only sinless man I know,\nand you have made me know what beasts we men are. Why can't we be what\nwe might be?\"\n\nValentine did not reply. He seemed lost in thought, and Julian continued,\nthrowing off his original shamefacedness:\n\n\"Ever since then you've kept me straight. If I feel inclined to throw\nmyself down in the gutter, one look at you makes me loathe the notion.\nPreaching often drives one wrong out of sheer 'cussedness,' I suppose.\nBut you don't preach and don't care. You just live beautifully, because\nyou're made differently from all of us. So you do for me what no\npreachers could ever do. There--now you know.\"\n\nHe lay back, puffing violently at his cigarette.\n\n\"It is strange,\" Valentine said, seeing he had finished. \"You know, to\nlive as I do is no effort to me, and so it is absurd to praise me.\"\n\n\"I won't praise you, but it's outrageous of you to want to feel as I and\nother men feel.\"\n\n\"Is it? I don't think so. I think it is very natural. My life is a dead\ncalm, and a dead calm is monotonous.\"\n\n\"It's better than an everlasting storm.\"\n\n\"I wonder!\" Valentine said. \"How curious that I should protect you.\nI am glad it is so. And yet, Julian, in spite of what you say, I would\ngive a great deal to change souls with you, if only for a day or two.\nYou will laugh at me, but I do long to feel a real, keen temptation.\nThose agonizing struggles of holy men that one reads of, what can they\nbe like? I can hardly imagine. There have been ascetics who have wept,\nand dashed themselves down on the ground, and injured, wounded their\nbodies to distract their thoughts from vice. To me they seem as madmen.\nYou know the story of the monk who rescued a great courtesan from her\nlife of shame. He placed her in a convent and went into the desert. But\nher image haunted him, maddened him. He slunk back to the convent, and\nfound her dying in the arms of God. And he tried to drag her away, that\nshe might sin only once again with him, with him, her saviour. But she\ndied, giving herself to God, and he went out cursing and blaspheming.\nThis is only a dramatic fable to me. And yet I suppose it is a\npossibility.\"\n\n\"Of course. Val, I could imagine myself doing as that monk did, but for\nyou. Only that I could never have been a monk at all.\"\n\n\"I am glad if I help you to any happiness, Julian. But--but--oh! to feel\ntemptation!\"\n\n\"Oh, not to feel it! By Jove, I long to have done with the infernal thing\nthat's always ready to bother me. Fighting it is no fun, Val, I can tell\nyou. If you would like to have my soul for a day or two, I should love to\nhave yours in exchange.\"\n\nValentine smoked in silence for two or three minutes. His pure, pale,\nbeautiful face was rather wistful as he gazed at the fire.\n\n\"Why can't these affairs be managed?\" he sighed out at length.\n\n\"Why can't we do just the one thing more? We can kill a man's body. We\ncan kill a woman's purity. And here you and I sit, the closest friends,\nand neither of us can have the same experiences, as the other, even for\na moment. Why isn't it possible?\"\n\n\"Perhaps it is.\"\n\n\"Why? How do you mean?\"\n\n\"Well, of course I'm rather a sceptic, and entirely an ignoramus. But\nI met a man the other day who would have laughed at us for doubting.\nHe was an awfully strange fellow. His name is Marr. I met him at Lady\nCrichton's.\"\n\n\"Who is he?\"\n\n\"Haven't an idea. I never saw or heard of him before. We talked a good\ndeal at dessert. He came over from the other side of the table to sit by\nme, and somehow, in five minutes, we'd got into spiritualism and all that\nsort of thing. He is evidently a believer in it, calls himself an\noccultist.\"\n\n\"But do you mean to tell me he said souls could be exchanged at will?\nCome, Julian?\"\n\n\"I won't say that. But he set no limit at all to what can be done. He\ndeclares that if people seriously set themselves to develop the latent\npowers that lie hidden within them, they can do almost anything. Only\nthey must be en rapport. Each must respond closely, definitely, to the\nother. Now, you and I are as much in sympathy with one another as any\ntwo men in London, I suppose.\"\n\n\"Surely!\"\n\n\"Then half the battle's won--according to Marr.\"\n\n\"You are joking.\"\n\n\"He wasn't. He would declare that, with time and perseverance, we could\naccomplish an exchange of souls.\"\n\nValentine laughed.\n\n\"Well, but how?\"\n\nJulian laughed too.\n\n\"Oh, it seems absurd--but he'd tell us to sit together.\"\n\n\"Well, we are sitting together now.\"\n\n\"No; at a table, I mean.\"\n\n\"Table-turning!\" Valentine cried, with a sort of contempt. \"That is for\nchildren, and for all of us at Christmas, when we want to make fools of\nourselves.\"\n\n\"Just what I am inclined to think. But Marr--and he's really a very\nsmart, clever chap, Val--denies it. He swears it is possible for two\npeople who sit together often to get up a marvellous sympathy, which\nlasts on even when they are no longer sitting. He says you can even\nsee your companion's thoughts take form in the darkness before your\neyes, and pass in procession like living things.\"\n\n\"He must be mad.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. I don't know. If he is, he can put his madness to you very\nlucidly, very ingeniously.\"\n\nValentine stroked the white back of Rip meditatively with his foot.\n\n\"You have never sat, have you?\" he asked.\n\n\"Never.\"\n\n\"Nor I. I have always thought it an idiotic and very dull way of wasting\none's time. Now, what on earth can a table have to do with one's soul?\"\n\n\"I don't know. What is one's soul?\"\n\n\"One's essence, I suppose; the inner light that spreads its rays outward\nin actions, and that is extinguished, or expelled, at the hour of death.\"\n\n\"Expelled, I think.\"\n\n\"I think so too. That which is so full of strange power cannot surely die\nso soon. Even my soul, so frigid, so passionless, has, you say, held you\nback from sins like a leash of steel, And I did not even try to forge the\nsteel. If we could exchange souls, would yours hold me back in the same\nway?\"\n\n\"No doubt.\"\n\n\"I wonder,\" Valentine said thoughtfully. After a moment he added, \"shall\nwe make this absurd experiment of sitting, just for a phantasy?\"\n\n\"Why not? It would be rather fun.\"\n\n\"It might be. We will just do it once to see whether you can get some of\nmy feelings, and I some of yours.\"\n\n\"That's it. But you could never get mine. I know you too well, Val.\nYou're my rock of defence. You've kept me straight because you're so\nstraight yourself; and, with that face, you'll never alter. If anything\nshould happen, it will be that you'll drag me up to where you are. I\nshan't drag you down to my level, you old saint!\"\n\nAnd he laid his hand affectionately on his friend's shoulder.\n\nValentine smiled.\n\n\"Your level is not low,\" he said.\n\n\"No, perhaps; but, by Jove, it could be, though. If you hadn't been\nchucked into the world, I often think the devil must have had me\naltogether. You keep him off. How he must hate you, Val. Hulloh!\nWhat's that?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Who's that laughing outside? Has Wade got a friend in to-night?\"\n\n\"Not that I know of. I didn't hear anything.\"\n\nValentine touched the electric bell, and his man appeared.\n\n\"Any one in with you to-night, Wade?\" he asked.\n\nThe man looked surprised.\n\n\"No, sir; certainly not, sir.\"\n\n\"Oh! Don't sit up; we may be late to-night. And we don't want anything\nmore, except--yes, bring another couple of sodas.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\nHe brought them and vanished. A moment later they heard the front door\nof the flat close. The butler was married and slept out of the house.\nValentine had no servant sleeping in the flat. He preferred to be alone\nat night.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nEPISODE OF THE FIRST SITTING\n\n\n\"Now, then,\" said Valentine, \"let us be absurd and try this sitting.\nShall we clear this little table?\"\n\n\"Yes. It's just the right size. It might do for three people, but\ncertainly not for more.\"\n\n\"There! Now, then.\"\n\nAnd, as the clock struck twelve, Valentine turned off the electric\nlight, and they sat down with their hands upon the table. The room was\nonly very dimly illuminated by the fire on the hearth, where Rip slept\non, indifferent to their proceedings.\n\n\"I suppose nothing could go wrong,\" Julian said, after a moment of\nsilence.\n\n\"Wrong!\"\n\n\"Yes. I don't know exactly what Marr meant, but he said that if\nunsuitable people sit together any amount of harm can result from it.\"\n\n\"What sort of harm?\"\n\n\"I don't know.\"\n\n\"H'm! I expect that is all nonsense, like the rest of his remarks.\nAnyhow, Julian, no two people could ever hit it off better than you\nand I do. Wait a second.\"\n\nHe jumped up and drew the curtain over the door. Wade had pulled it back\nwhen he came in.\n\n\"I must have that curtain altered,\" Valentine said. \"It is so badly\nhung that whenever the door is opened, it falls half way back, and\nlooks hideous. That is better.\"\n\nHe sat down again.\n\n\"We won't talk,\" he said.\n\n\"No. We'll give the--whatever it is every chance.\"\n\nThey were silent.\n\nPresently--it might have been a quarter of an hour--Julian said suddenly:\n\n\"Do you feel anything?\"\n\n\"'M--no,\" Valentine answered, rather doubtfully.\n\n\"Sure?\"\n\n\"I think so.\"\n\n\"You can't merely think you are sure, old chap.\"\n\n\"Well, then--yes, I'll say I am sure.\"\n\n\"Right,\" rejoined Julian.\n\nAgain there was a silence, broken this time by Valentine.\n\n\"Why did you ask me?\" he said.\n\n\"Oh! no special reason. I just wanted to know.\"\n\n\"Then you didn't?\"\n\n\"Didn't what?\"\n\n\"Feel anything?\"\n\n\"No; nothing particular.\"\n\n\"Well, what do you mean by that?\"\n\n\"What I say. I can't be sure it was anything.\"\n\n\"That's vague.\"\n\n\"So was my--I can't even call it exactly sensation. It was so very\nslight. In fact, I'm as good as sure I felt nothing at all. It was a mere\nfancy. Nothing more.\"\n\nAnd then again they were silent. The fire gradually died down until the\nroom grew quite dark. Presently Valentine said:\n\n\"Hulloh! here is Rip up against my foot. He is cold without the fire,\npoor little beggar.\"\n\n\"Shall we stop?\" asked Julian.\n\n\"Yes; I vote we do--for to-night.\"\n\nValentine struck a match, felt for the knob of the electric light, and\nturned it on. Julian and he looked at each other, blinking.\n\n\"Think there's anything in it?\" asked Julian.\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Valentine. \"I suppose not. Rip! Rip! He is cold. Did\nyou ever see a dog shiver like that?\"\n\nHe picked the little creature up in his arms. It nestled against his\nshoulder with a deep sigh.\n\n\"Well, we have made a beginning,\" he said, turning to pour out a drink.\n\"It is rather interesting.\"\n\nJulian was lighting a cigarette.\n\n\"Yes; it is--very.\" he answered.\n\nValentine gave him a brandy and soda; then, as if struck by a sudden\nthought, asked:\n\n\"You really didn't feel anything?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Nor I. But then, Julian, why do we find it interesting?\"\n\nJulian looked puzzled.\n\n\"Hang it! I don't know,\" he answered, after an instant of reflection.\n\"Why do we? I wonder.\"\n\n\"That is what I am wondering.\"\n\nHe flicked the ash from his cigarette.\n\n\"But I don't come to any conclusion,\" he presently added, meditatively.\n\"We sit in the dark for an hour and a quarter, with our hands solemnly\nspread out upon a table; we don't talk; the table doesn't move; we hear\nno sound; we see nothing; we feel nothing that we have not felt before.\nAnd yet we find the function interesting. This problem of sensation is\nsimply insoluble. I cannot work it out.\"\n\n\"It is awfully puzzling,\" said Julian. \"I suppose our nerves must have\nbeen subtly excited because the thing was an absolute novelty.\"\n\n\"Possibly. But, if so, we are a couple of children, mere schoolboys.\"\n\n\"That's rather refreshing, however undignified. If we sit long enough,\nwe may even recover our long-lost babyhood.\"\n\nAnd so they laughed the matter easily away. Soon afterwards, however,\nJulian got up to go home to his chambers. Valentine went towards the\ndoor, intending to open it and get his friend's coat. Suddenly he\nstopped.\n\n\"Strange!\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"What's the row?\"\n\n\"Look at the door, Julian.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Don't you see?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"The curtain is half drawn back again.\"\n\nJulian gave vent to a long, low whistle.\n\n\"So it is!\"\n\n\"It always does that when the door is opened.\"\n\n\"And only then, of course?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\n\"But the door hasn't been opened.\"\n\n\"I know.\"\n\nThey regarded each other almost uneasily. Then Valentine added, with a\nshort laugh:\n\n\"I can't have drawn it thoroughly over the door when Wade went away.\"\n\n\"I suppose not. Well, good-night, Val.\"\n\n\"Good-night. Shall we sit again tomorrow?\"\n\n\"Yes; I vote we do.\"\n\nValentine let his friend out. As he shut the front door, he said to\nhimself:\n\n\"I am positive I did draw the curtain thoroughly.\"\n\nHe went back into the tentroom and glanced again at the curtain.\n\n\"Yes; I am positive.\"\n\nAfter an instant of puzzled wonder, he seemed to put the matter\ndeliberately from him.\n\n\"Come along, Rip,\" he said. \"Why, you are cold and miserable to-night!\nMust I carry you then?\"\n\nHe picked the dog up, turned out the light, and walked slowly into his\nbedroom.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE SECOND SITTING\n\n\nOn the following night Valentine sat waiting for Julian's arrival in\nhis drawing-room, which looked out upon Victoria Street, whereas the\nonly window of the tentroom opened upon some waste ground where once\na panorama of Jerusalem, or some notorious city, stood, and where\nbuilding operations were now being generally carried on. Valentine\nvery seldom used his drawing-room. Sometimes pretty women came to tea\nwith him, and he did them honour there. Sometimes musicians came. Then\nthere was always a silent group gathered round the Steinway grand piano.\nFor Valentine was inordinately fond of music, and played so admirably\nthat even professionals never hurled at him a jeering \"amateur!\" But\nwhen Valentine was alone, or when he expected one or two men to smoke,\nhe invariably sat in the tentroom, where the long lounges and the\nshaded electric light were suggestive of desultory conversation, and\nseemed tacitly to forbid all things that savour of a hind-leg attitude.\nTo-night, however, some whim, no doubt, had prompted him to forsake his\nusual haunt. Perhaps he had been seized with a dislike for complete\nsilence, such as comes upon men in recurring hours of depression, when\nthe mind is submerged by a thin tide of unreasoning melancholy, and sound\nof one kind or another is as ardently sought as at other times it is\navoided. In this room Valentine could hear the vague traffic of the dim\nstreet outside, the dull tumult of an omnibus, the furtive, flashing\nclamour of a hansom, the cry of an occasional newsboy, explanatory of\nthe crimes and tragedies of the passing hour. Or perhaps the eyes of\nValentine were, for the moment, weary of the monotonous green walls of\nhis sanctum, leaning tent-wise towards the peaked apex of the ceiling,\nand longed to rest on the many beautiful pictures that hung in one line\naround his drawing-room. It seemed so, for now, as he sat in a chair\nbefore the fire, holding Rip upon his knee, his blue eyes were fixed\nmeditatively upon a picture called \"The Merciful Knight,\" which faced\nhim over the mantelpiece. This was the only picture containing a figure\nof the Christ which Valentine possessed. He had no holy children, no\nMadonnas. But he loved this Christ, this exquisitely imagined dead,\ndrooping figure, which, roused into life by an act of noble renunciation,\nbent down and kissed the armed hero who had been great enough to forgive\nhis enemy. He loved those weary, tender lips, those faded limbs, the\nsacred tenuity of the ascetic figure, the wonderful posture of benign\nfamiliarity that was more majestic than any reserve. Yes, Valentine loved\nthis Christ, and Julian knew it well. Often, late at night, Julian had\nleaned back lazily listening while Valentine played, improvising in a\nlight so dim as to be near to darkness. And Julian had noticed that the\nplayer's eyes perpetually sought this picture, and rested on it, while\nhis soul, through the touch of the fingers, called to the soul of music\nthat slept in the piano, stirred it from sleep, carried it through\nstrange and flashing scenes, taught it to strive and to agonize, then\nhushed it again to sleep and peace. And as Julian looked from the picture\nto the player, who seemed drawing inspiration from it, he often mutely\ncompared the imagined beauty of the soul of the Christ with the known\nbeauty of the soul of his friend. And the two lovelinesses seemed to\nmeet, and to mingle as easily as two streams one with the other. Yet the\nbeauty of the Christ soul sprang from a strange parentage, was a sublime\ninheritance, had been tried in the fiercest fires of pity and of pain.\nThe beauty of Valentine's soul seemed curiously innate, and mingled with\na dazzling snow of almost inhuman purity. His was not a great soul that\nhad striven successfully, and must always strive. His was a soul that\neasily triumphed, that was almost coldly perfect without effort, that\nhad surely never longed even for a moment to fall, had never desired\nand refused the shadowy pleasures of passion. The wonderful purity of\nhis friend's face continually struck Julian anew. It suggested to him\nthe ivory peak of an Alp, the luminous pallor of a pearl. What other\nyoung man in London looked like that? Valentine was indeed an unique\nfigure in the modern London world. Had he strayed into it from the\nfragrant pages of a missal, or condescended to it from the beatific\nvistas of some far-off Paradise? Julian had often wondered, as he looked\ninto the clear, calm eyes of the friend who had been for so long the\nvigilant, yet unconscious guardian of his soul.\n\nTo-night, as Valentine sat looking at the Christ, a curious wonder at\nhimself came into his mind. He was musing on the confession of Julian, so\nlong withheld, so shyly made at last. This confession caused him, for the\nfirst time, to look self-consciously upon himself, to stand away from his\nnature, as the artist stands away from the picture he is painting, and to\nexamine it with a sideways head, with a peering, contracted gaze. This\nthing that protected a soul from sin--what was it like? What was it? He\ncould not easily surmise. He had a clear vision of the Christ soul, of\nthe exquisite essence of a divine individuality that prompted life to\nspring out of death for one perfect moment that it might miraculously\nreward a great human act of humanity. Yes, that soul floated before him\nalmost visibly. He could call it up before his mind as a man can call up\nthe vision of a supremely beautiful rose he has admired. And there was a\nscent from the Christ soul as ineffably delicious as the scent of the\nrose. But when Valentine tried to see his own soul, he could not see it.\nHe could not comprehend how its aspect affected others, even quite how it\naffected Julian. Only he could comprehend, as he looked at the Christ,\nits imperfection, and a longing, not felt before, came to him to be\nbetter than he was. This new aspiration was given to him by Julian's\nconfession. He knew that well. He protected his friend now without\neffort. Could he not protect him more certainly with effort? Can a soul\nbe beautiful that never strives consciously after beauty? A child's\nnature is beautiful in its innocence because it has never striven to be\ninnocent. But is not an innocent woman more wonderful, more beautiful,\nthan an innocent child? Valentine felt within him that night a distinct\naspiration, and he vaguely connected it with the drooping Christ, who\ntouched with wan, rewarding lips the ardent face of the merciful knight.\nAnd he no longer had the desire to know desire of sin. He no longer\nsought to understand the power of temptation or the joy of yielding to\nthat power. A subtle change swept over him. Whether it was permanent, or\nonly passing, he could not tell.\n\nA tingling cry from the electric bell in the passage told of Julian's\narrival, and in a moment he entered. He looked gay, almost rowdy, and\nclapped Valentine on the shoulder rather boisterously.\n\n\"Why on earth are you in here?\" he exclaimed. \"Have you been playing?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Are you in an exalted state of mind, that demands the best parlour for\nits environment?\"\n\n\"Hardly.\"\n\n\"But why then have you let out the fire in the den and enthroned yourself\nhere?\"\n\n\"A whim, Julian. I felt a strong inclination to sit in this room\nto-night. It seems to me a less nervous room than the other, and I\nwant to be as cold-blooded as possible.\"\n\n\"O, I see! But, my dear fellow, what is there nervous about the tent?\nDo you imagine ghosts lurking in the hangings, or phantoms of dead Arabs\nclinging, like bats, round that rosette in the roof? You got it up the\nNile, didn't you?\"\n\n\"Yes. Where have you been?\"\n\n\"Dining out. And, oddly enough, I met Marr again, the man I told you\nabout. It seems he is in universal request just now.\"\n\n\"On account of his mystery-mongering, I suppose.\"\n\n\"Probably.\"\n\n\"Did you tell him anything about our sitting?\"\n\n\"Only that we had sat, and that nothing had happened.\"\n\n\"What did he say?\"\n\n\"He said, 'Pooh, pooh! these processes are, and always must be, gradual.\nAnother time there may be some manifestation.'\"\n\n\"Manifestation! Did you ask him of what nature the manifestation was\nlikely to be? These people are so vague in the terms they employ.\"\n\n\"Yes, I asked him; but I couldn't get much out of him. I must tell you,\nVal, that he seemed curiously doubtful about my statement that nothing\nhad happened. I can't think why. He said, 'Are you quite sure?'\"\n\n\"Of course you answered Yes?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\nValentine looked at him for a moment and then said:\n\n\"You didn't mention the--the curtain by any chance?\"\n\n\"No. You thought you had left it only partially drawn, didn't you?\"\n\nValentine made no reply. His face was rather grave. Julian did not\nrepeat the question. He felt instinctively that Valentine did not\nwish to be obliged to answer it. Oddly enough, during the short silence\nwhich followed, he was conscious of a slight constraint such as he had\ncertainly never felt with Valentine before. His gaiety seemed dropping\nfrom him in this quiet room to which he was so often a visitor. The\nrowdy expression faded out of his face and he found himself glancing\nhalf furtively at his friend.\n\n\"Valentine,\" he presently said, \"shall we really sit to-night?\"\n\n\"Yes, surely. You meant to when you came here, didn't you?\"\n\n\"I don't believe there is anything in it.\"\n\n\"We will find out. Remember that I want to get hold of your soul.\"\n\nJulian laughed.\n\n\"If you ever do it will prove an old man of the sea to you,\" he said.\n\n\"I will risk that,\" Valentine answered.\n\nAnd then he added:\n\n\"But, come, don't let us waste time. I will go and send away Wade.\nClear that little table by the piano.\"\n\nJulian began removing the photographs and books which stood on it,\nwhile Valentine went out of the room and told his man to go.\n\nAs soon as they heard the front door close upon him they sat down\nopposite to each other as on the previous night.\n\nThey kept silence and sat for what seemed a very long time. At last\nJulian said:\n\n\"Val!\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Let us go back into the tentroom.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Nothing will ever happen here.\"\n\n\"Why should anything happen there?\"\n\n\"I don't know. Let us go. The fire is burning too brightly here. We ought\nto have complete darkness.\"\n\n\"Very well, though I can't believe it will make the slightest\ndifference.\"\n\nThey got up and went into the tentroom, which looked rather cheerless\nwith its fireless grate.\n\n\"I know this will be better,\" Julian said. \"We'll have the same table as\nlast night.\"\n\nValentine carefully drew the green curtain quite over the door and\ncalled Julian's attention to the fact that he had done so. Then they\nsat down again. Rip lay on the divan in his basket with a rug over him,\nso that he might not disturb them by any movement in search of warmth\nand of companionship.\n\nThe arrangements seemed careful and complete. They were absolutely\nisolated from the rest of the world. They were in darkness and the\nsilence might almost be felt. As Julian said, they were safe from\ntrickery, and, as Valentine rejoined in his calm _voix d'or_, they\nwere therefore probably also safe from what Marr had mysteriously\ncalled \"manifestations.\"\n\nDead, dumb silence. Their four hands, not touching, lay loosely on\nthe oval table. Rip slept unutterably, shrouded head and body in his\ncosy rug. So--till the last gleam of the fire faded. So--till another\ntwenty minutes had passed. The friends had not exchanged a word, had\nscarcely made the slightest movement. Could a stranger have been\nsuddenly introduced into the black room, and have remained listening\nattentively, he might easily have been deceived into the belief that,\nbut for himself, it was deserted. To both Valentine and Julian the\nsilence seemed progressive. With each gliding moment they could have\ndeclared that it grew deeper, more dense, more prominent, even more\ngrotesque and living. There seemed to be a sort of pressure in it which\nhandled them more and more definitely. The sensation was interesting\nand acute. Each gave himself to it, and each had a, perhaps deceptive,\nconsciousness of yielding up something, something impalpable, evanescent,\nfluent. Valentine, more especially, felt as if he were pouring away from\nhimself, by this act of sitting, a vital liquid, and he thought with a\nmental smile:\n\n\"Am I letting my soul out of its cage, here and now?\"\n\n\"No doubt,\" his common sense replied; \"no doubt this sensation is the\nmerest fancy.\"\n\nHe played with it in the darkness, and had no feeling of weariness.\n\nNearly an hour had passed in this morose way, when, with, it seemed,\nappalling abruptness, Rip barked.\n\nAlthough the bark was half stifled in rug, both Valentine and Julian\nstarted perceptibly.\n\n\"'Sh!\" Valentine hissed to the little dog. \"'Sh! Rip! Quiet!\"\n\nThe response of Rip was, with a violent scramble, to disentangle himself\nfrom his covering, emerging from which he again barked with shrill and\npiercing vehemence, at the same time leaping to the floor. By the sound,\nwhich he could locate, Valentine felt certain that the dog had gone over\nto the door.\n\n\"What on earth is he barking at?\" Julian said in the darkness.\n\n\"I can't imagine. Hush, Rip! S-sh!\"\n\n\"Val, turn on the light, quick! You're nearest to it.\"\n\nValentine stretched out his hand hastily, and in a flash the room sprang\ninto view. He was right. Rip was crouched--his front legs extended along\nthe floor, his hind legs standing almost straight--close to the door,\nand facing it full. His head was down, and moving, darting this way and\nthat, as if he were worrying the feet of some person who was trying to\nadvance from the door into the centre of the room. All his teeth showed,\nand his yellow eyes were glaring fiercely.\n\nJulian, who had thrown a hasty and searching glance round the room when\nthe light was turned on, sprang forward and bent down to him.\n\n\"Rip! Rip!\" he said. \"Silly! What's the matter? Silly dog!\" and he began\nto stroke him.\n\nEither this action of his, or something else not known by the young men,\nhad an effect on the terrier, for he suddenly ceased barking, and began\nto snuffle eagerly, excitedly, at the bottom of the door.\n\n\"It's as if he were mad,\" said Julian, turning round. \"Hulloh, Val! What\nthe devil's come to you?\"\n\nFor he found Valentine standing up by the table with an expression of\ndeep astonishment on his face.\n\nHe pointed in silence to the door.\n\n\"By Jove! that curtain again!\" said Julian, with an accent of amazement.\n\"I'm damned!\"\n\nThe curtain was, in fact, drawn back from the door. Valentine struck a\nmatch and put it to a candle. Then he opened the door. Rip immediately\ndarted out of the room and pattered excitedly down the passage, as if\nsearching for something, his sharp nose investigating the ground with a\nvehement attention. The young men followed him. He ran to the front door,\nthen back into Valentine's bedroom; then, by turns, into the four other\napartments--bedroom, drawing-room, bathroom and kitchen--that formed the\nsuite. The doors of the two latter were opened by Valentine. Having\ncompleted this useless progress, Rip once more resorted to the passage\nand the front door, by which he paused, whimpering, in an uncertain,\nalmost a wistful attitude.\n\n\"Open it!\" said Julian.\n\nValentine did so.\n\nThey looked out upon the broad and dreary stone steps, and waited,\nlistening. There was no sound. Rip still whimpered, rather feebly. His\nexcitement was evidently dying away. At last Valentine shut the door,\nand they went back again to the tentroom, accompanied closely by the\ndog, who gradually regained his calmness, and who presently jumped of\nhis own accord into his basket, and, after turning quickly round some\nhalf-dozen times, composed himself once more to sleep.\n\n\"I wish, after all, we had stayed in the other room by the fire,\" Julian\nsaid. \"Give me some brandy.\"\n\nValentine poured some into a glass and Julian swallowed it at a gulp.\n\n\"We mustn't have Rip in the room another time,\" he added. \"He spoilt the\nwhole thing.\"\n\n\"What whole thing?\" Valentine asked, sinking down in a chair.\n\n\"Well, the sitting. Perhaps--perhaps one of Marr's mysterious\nmanifestations might have come off to-night.\"\n\nValentine did not reply at first. When he did, he startled Julian by\nsaying:\n\n\"Perhaps one of them did come off.\"\n\n\"Did?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"What was Rip barking at?\"\n\n\"There's no accounting for what dogs will do. They often bark at\nshadows.\"\n\n\"At shadows--yes, exactly. But what cast a shadow to-night?\"\n\nJulian laughed with some apparent uneasiness.\n\n\"Perhaps a coming event,\" he exclaimed.\n\nValentine looked at him rather gravely.\n\n\"That is exactly what I felt,\" he said.\n\n\"Explain. For I was only joking.\"\n\n\"I felt, perhaps it was only a fancy, that this second sitting of ours\nbrought some event a stage nearer, a stage nearer on its journey.\"\n\n\"To what?\"\n\n\"I felt--to us.\"\n\n\"Fancy.\"\n\n\"Probably. You didn't feel it?\"\n\n\"I? Oh, I scarcely know what I felt. I must say, though, that squatting\nin the dark, and saying nothing for such an age, and--and all the rest of\nit, doesn't exactly toughen one's nerves. That little demon of a Rip\nquite gave me the horrors when he started barking. What fools we are! I\nshould think nothing of mounting a dangerous horse, or sailing a boat in\nrough weather, or risking my life as we all do half our time in one way\nor another. Yet a dog and a dark room give me the shudders. Funny, Val,\nisn't it?\"\n\nValentine answered, \"If it is a dog and a dark room.\"\n\n\"What else can it possibly be?\" Julian said with an accent of rather\nunreasonable annoyance.\n\n\"I don't know. But I did draw the curtain completely over the door\nto-night. Julian, I am getting interested in this. Perhaps--who\nknows?--in the end I shall have your soul, you mine.\"\n\nHe laughed as he spoke; then added:\n\n\"No, no; I don't believe in such an exchange; and, Julian, I scarcely\ndesire it. But let us go on. This gives a slight new excitement to life.\"\n\n\"Yes. But it is selfish of you to wish to keep your soul to yourself.\nI want it. Well, _au revoir_, Val; to-morrow night.\"\n\n\"_Au revoir_.\"\n\nAfter Julian had gone Valentine went back into the drawing-room and stood\nfor a long while before the \"Merciful Knight.\" He had a strange fancy\nthat the picture of the bending Christ protected the room from the\nintrusion of--what?\n\nHe could not tell yet. Perhaps he could never tell.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE THIRD SITTING\n\n\n\"Isn't it an extraordinary thing,\" Julian said, on the following evening,\n\"that if you meet a man once in London you keep knocking up against him\nday after day? While, if--\"\n\n\"You don't meet him, you don't.\"\n\n\"No. I mean that if you don't happen to be introduced to him, you\nprobably never set eyes on him at all.\"\n\n\"I know. But whom have you met to-day?\"\n\n\"Marr again.\"\n\n\"That's odd. He is beginning to haunt you.\"\n\n\"I met him at my club. He has just been elected a member.\"\n\n\"Did he make any more inquiries into our sittings?\"\n\n\"Rather. He talked of nothing else. He's an extraordinary fellow,\nextraordinary.\"\n\n\"Why? What is he like?\"\n\n\"In appearance? Oh, the sort of chap little pink women call Satanic;\nwhite complexion showing blue where he shaves, big dark eyes rather\nsunken, black hair, tall, very thin and quiet. Very well dressed. He\nis that uncanny kind of a man who has a silent manner and a noisy\nexpression. You know what I mean?\"\n\n\"Yes, perfectly.\"\n\n\"I think he's very morbid. He never reads the evening papers.\"\n\n\"That proves it absolutely. Does he smoke?\"\n\n\"Always. I found him in the smoking-room. He showed the most persistent\ninterest in our proceedings, Val. I couldn't get him to talk of anything\nelse, so at last I told him exactly what had happened.\"\n\n\"Did you tell him that we began to sit last night in a different room?\"\n\n\"Yes. That was curious. Directly I said it he began making minute\ninquiries as to what the room was like, how the furniture was placed,\neven what pictures hung on the walls.\"\n\n\"The pictures!\"\n\n\"Yes. I described them.\"\n\n\"All of them?\"\n\n\"No, one or two; that favorite of yours, 'The Merciful Knight,' the\nTurner, those girls of Solomon's with the man playing to them, and--yes,\nI think those were all.\"\n\n\"Oh!\"\n\n\"He said, 'You made a great mistake in changing your venue to that room,\na great mistake.' Then I explained how we moved back to the tentroom in\nthe middle of the sitting, and all about Rip.\"\n\n\"Did he make any remark?\"\n\n\"One that struck me as very quaint, 'You are _en route_.'\"\n\n\"Enigmatic again. He was playing the wizard.\"\n\n\"He spoke very gravely.\"\n\n\"Of course. Great gravity is part of the business.\"\n\n\"Afterwards he said, 'Turn that dog out next time.'\"\n\n\"And that was all?\"\n\n\"I think so.\"\n\nValentine sat musing. Presently he said:\n\n\"I should rather like to meet this Marr.\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't think--I fancy--\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"I'd as soon you didn't.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"I don't think you'd get on. You wouldn't like him.\"\n\n\"For what reason?\"\n\n\"I don't know. I've a notion he's something exceptional in the way of a\nblackguard. Perhaps I am wrong. I haven't an idea what sort of a\nreputation he has. But he is black, Valentine, not at all your colour.\nOh! and, by the way, he doesn't want to meet you.\"\n\n\"How charming of him!\"\n\n\"I had half suggested it, I don't know why, and he said, 'Thanks! Thanks!\nChance will bring us together later on if we ought to meet.' And now I\nam glad he wasn't keen. Shall we begin? Put Rip into your bedroom, as he\nadvised. Besides, I can't stand his barking.\"\n\nValentine carried the little dog away. When he came back he shut the\ntentroom door and was about to draw the curtain over it. But Julian\nstopped him.\n\n\"No, don't,\" Julian said.\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"I would rather you didn't. I hate that curtain. If I were you I would\nhave it taken down altogether.\"\n\nValentine looked at him in surprise. He had uttered the words with an\nenergy almost violent. But even as Valentine looked Julian switched off\nthe electric light and the leaping darkness hid his face.\n\n\"Come now. Business! Business!\" he cried.\n\nAnd again they sat with their hands loosely on the table, not touching\neach other.\n\nValentine felt that Julian was being less frank with him than usual.\nPerhaps for this reason he was immediately conscious that they were\nnot so much in sympathy as on the two former occasions of their sittings.\nOr there might have been some other reason which he could not identify.\nIt is certain that he gradually became acutely aware of a stifling sense\nof constraint, which he believed to be greatly intensified by the\nsurrounding darkness and silence. He wondered if Julian was conscious\nof it also, and at moments longed to ask. But something held him back,\nthat curious something which we all feel at times like a strong hand\nlaid upon us. He made up his mind that this discomfort of his soul,\nunreasonably considerable though it was, must be due solely to Julian's\nabrupt demeanour and obvious desire to check his curiosity about\nthe drawing of the curtain. But, as the moments ran by, his sense of\nuneasiness assumed such fantastic proportions that he began to cast\nabout for some more definite, more concrete, cause. At one instant he\nfound it in the condition of his health. The day had been damp and\ndreary, and he had suffered from neuralgia. Doubtless the pain had\nacted upon his nervous system, and was accountable for his present and\nperpetually increasing anxiety. A little later he was fain to dismiss\nthis supposition as untenable. His sense of constraint was changing into\na positive dread, and not at all of Julian, around whom he had believed\nthat his thoughts were in flight. Something, he knew not at all what,\ninterposed between him and Julian, and so definitely that Valentine felt\nas if he could have fixed the exact moment in which the interposition\nhad taken place, as one can fix the exact moment in which a person enters\na room where one is sitting. And the interposition was one of great\nhorror,--entirely malignant, Valentine believed.\n\nHe had an impulse to spring up from the table, to turn on the light,\nand to say, \"Let us make an end of this jugglery!\" Yet he sat still,\nwondering why he did so. A curiosity walked in his mind, pacing about\ntill he could almost fancy he heard its footsteps. He sat, then, as one\nawaiting an arrival, that has been heralded in some way, by a telegram,\na message, a carrier-pigeon flown in at an open window. But the herald,\ntoo, was horrible. What then would follow it? What was coming? Valentine\nfelt that he began to understand Marr's queer remark, \"You are _en\nroute_.\" At the first sitting he had felt a very vague suggestion of\nimmoderate possibilities, made possibilities by the apparently futile\nposition assumed at a table by himself and Julian. To-night the vague\nseemed on march towards the definite. Fancy was surely moving towards\nfact.\n\nWith his eyes wide open Valentine gazed in the direction of Julian,\nsitting invisible opposite to him. He wondered how Julian was feeling,\nwhat he was thinking. And then he remembered that strange saying of\nMarr's, that thoughts could take form, materialize. What would he give\nto witness that monstrous procession of embodied brain-actions trooping\nfrom the mind of his friend! He imagined them small, spare, phantom-like\nthings, fringed with fire, as weapon against the darkness, silent-footed\nas spirits, moving with a level impetus, as pale ghosts treading a sea,\nonward to the vast world of clashing minds, to which we carelessly\ncast out our thoughts as a man who shoots rubbish into a cart. The\nvagrant fancies danced along with attenuated steps and tiny, whimsical\ngestures of fairies, fluttering their flame-veined wings. The sad\nthoughts moved slowly with drooped heads and monotonous hands, and\ntears fell forever about their feet. The thoughts that were evil--and\nJulian had acknowledged them many, though combatted--were endowed with\na strangely sinister gait, like the gait of those modern sinners who\nexpress, ignorantly, in their motions the hidden deeds their tongues\ndecline to speak. The wayward thoughts had faces like women, who kiss\nand frown within the limits of an hour. On the cheeks of the libertine\nthoughts a rosy cloud of rouge shone softly, and their haggard eyes\nwere brightened by a cunning pigment. And the noble thoughts, grand\nin gesture, godlike in bearing, did not pass them by, but spoke to them\nserene words, and sought to bring them out from their degradation. And\nthere was no music in this imagined procession which Valentine longed\nto see. All was silent as from the gulf of Julian's mind the inhabitants\nstole furtively to do their mission. Yes, Valentine knew to-night that\nhe should feel no wonder if thought took form, if a disembodied voice\nspoke, or a detached hand moved into ripples of the air. Only he was\nirritated and alarmed by the abiding sense of some surrounding danger,\nwhich stayed with him, which he fought against in vain. His common sense\nhad not deserted him. On the contrary, it was argumentative, cogent in\nexplanation and in rebuke. It strove to sneer his distress down with\nstinging epithets, and shot arrows of laughter against his aimless\nfears. But the combat was, nevertheless, tamely unequal. Common sense\nwas routed by this enigmatic enemy, and at length Valentine's spirits\nbecame so violently perturbed that he could keep silence no longer.\n\n\"Julian,\" he said, with a pressure of chained alarm in his voice,\n\"Julian!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Julian replied, tensely.\n\n\"Anything wrong with you?\"\n\n\"No, no. Or with you?\"\n\n\"Nothing definite.\"\n\n\"What then?\"\n\n\"I will confess to you that to-night I feel--I feel, well, horribly\nafraid.\"\n\n\"Of what?\"\n\n\"I have no idea. The feeling is totally unreasonable. That gives it an\ninexplicable horror.\"\n\n\"Ah! then that is why you joined your left hand with my right five\nminutes ago. I wondered why you did it.\"\n\n\"I! Joined hands!\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I haven't moved my hand.\"\n\n\"My dear Val! How is it holding mine then?\"\n\n\"Don't be absurd, Julian; my hand is not near yours. Both my hands are\njust where they were when we sat down, on my side of the table.\"\n\n\"Just where they were! Your little finger has been tightly linked in mine\nfor the last five minutes. You know that as well as I do.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\"\n\n\"But it is linked now while I am speaking.\"\n\n\"I tell you it isn't.\"\n\n\"I'll soon let you know it too. There! Ah! no wonder you have snatched it\naway. You forget that my muscles are like steel, and that I can pinch as\na gin pinches a rabbit's leg. I say, I didn't really hurt you, did I? It\nwas only a joke to stop your little game.\"\n\n\"I tell you,\" Valentine said, almost angrily, \"your hand has never once\ntouched mine, nor mine yours.\"\n\nHis accent of irritable sincerity appeared suddenly to carry conviction\nto the mind of Julian, for he sprang violently up from the table, and\ncried, in the darkness:\n\n\"Then who the devil's in the room with us?\"\n\nValentine also, convinced that Julian had not been joking, was\nappalled. He switched on the light, and saw Julian standing opposite\nto him, looking very white. They both threw a rapid glance upon the\nroom, whose dull green draperies returned their inquiry with the\ncomplete indifference of artistic inanimation.\n\n\"Who the devil's got in here?\" Julian repeated, with the savage accent of\nextreme uneasiness.\n\n\"Nobody,\" Valentine replied. \"You know the thing's impossible.\"\n\n\"Impossible or not, somebody has found means to get in.\"\n\nValentine shook his head.\n\n\"Then you were lying?\"\n\n\"Julian, what are you saying? Don't go too far.\"\n\n\"Either you were, or else a man has been sitting at that table between\nus, and I have held his hand, the hand of some stranger. Ouf!\"\n\nHe shook his broad shoulders in an irrepressible shudder.\n\n\"I was not lying, Julian. I tell you so, and I mean it.\"\n\nValentine's eyes met Julian's, and Julian believed him.\n\n\"Put your hands on the table again,\" Julian said.\n\nValentine obeyed, and Julian laid his beside them, linking one of his\nlittle fingers tightly in one of Valentine's, and at the same time\nshutting his eyes. After a long pause he grew visibly whiter, and hastily\nunlinked his finger.\n\n\"No, damn it, Val, I hadn't hold of your hand. The hand I touched was\nmuch harder, and the finger was bigger, thicker. I say, this is ghastly.\"\n\nAgain he shook himself, and cast a searching glance upon the little room.\n\n\"Somebody has been in here with us, sitting between us in the dark,\" he\nrepeated. \"Good God, who is it?\"\n\nValentine looked doubtful, but uneasy too.\n\n\"Let us go through the rooms,\" he said.\n\nThey took a candle, and, as on the previous night, searched, but in\nvain. They found no trace of any alien presence in the flat. No book,\nno ornament, had been moved. No door stood open. There was no sound of\nany footsteps except their own. When they came to Valentine's bedroom,\nRip leaped to greet them, and seemed in excellent spirits. He showed\nno excitement until he had followed them back into the tentroom. But,\narrived there, he suddenly stood still, raised one white paw from the\nground, and emitted a long and dreary howl. The young men stared at him,\nand then at each other.\n\n\"Rip knows somebody has been here,\" Julian said.\n\nValentine was much more uncomfortably impressed by the demeanour of\nthe dog than by Julian's declaration and subsequent agitation. He had\nbeen inclined to attribute the whole affair to a trick of his friend's\nnerves. But the nervous system of a fox-terrier was surely, under such\ncircumstances as these, more truth-telling than that of a man.\n\n\"But the thing is absolutely impossible,\" he repeated, with some\ndisturbance of manner.\n\n\"Is anything that we can't investigate straight away absolutely\nimpossible?\"\n\nValentine did not reply directly.\n\n\"Here is a cigarette,\" he said. \"Let us sit down, soothe our nerves,\nand talk things over calmly and openly. We have not been quite frank\nwith each other about these sittings yet.\"\n\nJulian accepted Valentine's offer with his usual readiness. The fire was\nrelit with some difficulty. Rip was coaxed into silence.\n\nPresently, as the smoke curled upward with its lazy demeanour, the\nhorror that had hung like a thin vapour in the atmosphere seemed to\nbe dissipated.\n\n\"Now I think we are ourselves again, and can be reasonable,\" Valentine\nbegan. \"Don't let us be hysterical. Spiritualists always suffer from\nhysteria.\"\n\n\"The sceptics say, Val.\"\n\n\"And probably they are generally right. Now--yes, do drink some more of\nthat brandy and soda. Now, Julian, do you still believe that a hand held\nyours just now?\"\n\nJulian answered quietly, showing no irritation at the question:\n\n\"I simply know it as surely as I know that I am sitting with you\nat this moment. And,--look here, you may laugh at me as much as you.\nlike,--although I supposed the hand to be yours, until you denied it\nI had previously felt the most curious sensation.\"\n\n\"Of what?\"\n\n\"Well, that something was coming, even had actually come, into the room.\"\n\nValentine answered nothing to this, so Julian went on.\n\n\"I thought it was a trick of the nerves, and determined to drive it\naway, and I succeeded. And then, just as I was internally laughing at\nmyself, this hand, as if groping about in the dark, was first laid on\nmine, full on it, Val, and then slid off onto the table and linked its\nlittle finger tightly in mine. I, of course, supposed the hand was yours,\nand this finger was crooked round mine for fully five minutes, I should\nsay. After you spoke, thinking that you were trying to deceive me for a\njoke, I caught the hand in mine, and pinched it with all my strength\nuntil it was forcibly dragged away.\"\n\n\"Strange,\" Valentine murmured.\n\n\"Deucedly strange! and, what's more, diabolically unpleasant.\"\n\n\"I wonder what that fellow, Marr, would say to this.\"\n\n\"Marr! By Jove, is this one of the manifestations which he spoke about so\nvaguely?\"\n\n\"It seems like it.\"\n\n\"But describe your sensations. You say you felt horribly afraid. Why was\nthat?\"\n\n\"I can't tell. That, I think, made part of the horror. There was a sort\nof definite vagueness, if you can imagine such a seeming contradiction,\nin my state of mind. But the feeling is really indescribable. That it\nwas more strange and more terrible than anything I have known is certain.\nI should like to ask Dr. Levillier about all this.\"\n\n\"Levillier--yes. But he would--\"\n\n\"Be reasonable about it, as he is about everything. Dear, sensible, odd,\nsaintly, emotional, strong-headed, soft-hearted little doctor. He is\nunique.\"\n\nThey talked on for some time, arriving at no conclusion, until it\nseemed they had talked the whole matter thoroughly out. Yet Valentine,\nwho was curiously instinctive, had, all the time, a secret knowledge\nthat Julian was keeping something from him, was not being perfectly\nfrank. The conviction pained him. At last Julian got up to go. He\nstood putting on his overcoat.\n\n\"Good-night,\" he said.\n\n\"Good-night, Julian.\"\n\n\"Now--is this to be our last sitting?\"\n\nValentine hesitated.\n\n\"What do you wish?\" he asked at length.\n\n\"What do you?\"\n\n\"Well, I--yes, I think I would rather it was the last.\"\n\nJulian caught his hand impulsively.\n\n\"So would I. Good-night.\"\n\n\"Good-night.\"\n\nJulian went out into the hall, got as far as the front door, opened it,\nthen suddenly called out:\n\n\"Valentine!\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Come here for a moment.\"\n\nValentine went, and found him standing with his hand on the door, looking\nflushed and rather excited.\n\n\"There is one thing I haven't told you,\" he began.\n\n\"I knew that.\"\n\n\"I guessed you did. The most horrible sensation I have had. During our\nsitting to-night--don't be vexed--an extraordinary apprehension of--well,\nof you, came over me. There! Now I have told you.\"\n\nValentine was greatly astonished.\n\n\"Of me?\" he said.\n\n\"Yes. There was a moment when the idea that I was alone with you made my\nblood run cold.\"\n\n\"Good heavens!\"\n\n\"Do you wish I hadn't told you?\"\n\n\"No, of course not. But it is so extraordinary, so unnatural.\"\n\n\"It is utterly gone now, thank God. I say, we have resolved that we won't\nsit again, haven't we?\"\n\n\"Yes; and what you have just told me makes me hate the whole thing. The\ngame seems a game no longer.\"\n\nWhen the door had closed upon Julian, Valentine sat down and wrote a\nnote.\n\nHe addressed it to--\n\n\"Doctor Hermann Levillier,\n\"Harley Street, W.,\"\n\nand laid it on his writing-table, so that it might be posted early the\nnext morning.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nA CONVERSATION AT THE CLUB\n\n\nDoctor Levillier was not a materialist, although he concerned himself\nmuch with the functions of the body, and with that strange spider's\nweb of tingling threads which we call the nervous system. The man who\nsweeps out the temple, who polishes the marble steps and dusts the\npainted windows, may yet find time to bend in prayer before the altars\nhe helps to keep beautiful, may yet find a heart to wonder at the spirit\nwhich the temple holds as an envelope holds a letter. Reversing the\nprocess of mind which seems to lead so many medical students to atheism,\nDr. Levillier had found that the more he understood the weaknesses, the\nnastinesses, the dreary failures, the unimaginable impulses of the flesh,\nthe more he grew to believe in the existence, within it, of the soul. One\nday a worn-out dyspeptic, famous for his intellectual acquirements over\ntwo continents, sat with the little great doctor in his consulting-room.\nThe author, with dry, white lips, had been recounting a series of sordid\nsymptoms, and, as the recital grew, their sordidness seemed suddenly to\nstrike him with a mighty disgust.\n\n\"Ah, doctor,\" he said. \"And do you know there are people thousands of\nmiles away from Harley Street who actually admire me, who are stirred\nand moved by what I write, who make a cult and a hero of me. They say I\nhave soul, forsooth. But I am all body; you know that. You doctors know\nthat it is only body that we put on paper, body that lifts us high, or\ndrags us low. Why, my best romances come straight from my liver. My\npathos springs from its condition of disorder, and my imaginative force\nis only due to an unnatural state of body which I can deliberately\nproduce by drinking tea that has stood a long while and become full of\ntannin. When my prose glows with fiery beauty, the tea is getting well\nhold of my digestive organs, and by the time it has begun to prove its\npower by giving me a violent pain in the stomach, I have wrung from it\na fine scene which will help to consolidate my fame. When a man wins\nthe Victoria Cross, his healthy body has done the deed, unprompted by\nanything higher. Good air, or a muscular life, has strung his nerves\nstrongly so that he can't, even if he would, appreciate danger. On the\nother hand, when a man shows funk, turns tail and bolts, and is dubbed a\ncoward, it's his beastly body again. Some obscure physical misfortune is\nthe cause of his disgrace, and if he'd only been to you he would have won\nthe Cross too. Isn't it so? How you doctors must laugh at mystics, and at\nthose who are ascetics, save for sake of their health. Why, I suppose\neven the saint owes his so-called goodness to some analyzable proceeding\nthat has gone on in his inside, and that you could diagnose. Eh?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier was writing a prescription in which bismuth was an item.\nHe glanced up quietly.\n\n\"The more I know of the body, the more I think of and believe in the\npower of the soul,\" he said. \"Have that made up. Take it three times a\nday and come to me again in a fortnight. Good-morning.\"\n\nIndeed, this little man was writing prescriptions for the body and\nthinking prescriptions for the soul all day long. Within him there\ndwelt a double mind, the mind of a great doctor and the mind of a great\npriest, and these two minds linked hands and lived as friends. The one\nnever strove against the other. There was never a moment of estrangement.\nAnd if there were frequent arguments and discussions between the two,\nthey were the arguments and discussions that make friendship firmer,\nnot enmity more bitter. And, as Dr. Levillier very well knew, it was\noften the mind of the priest within him that gave to him his healing\npower over the body. It was the mind of the priest that had won him\ntestimonial clocks and silver salvers from grateful patients. Often as\nhe sat with some dingy-faced complainant, listening to a recital of\nsickness or uttering directions about avoidance of green meat, sauces,\npastry, and liquids, till the atmosphere seemed that of a hospital, a\npastry-cook's shop and a bar combined, he was silently examining the\npatient's soul, facing its probable vagaries, mapping out the tours it\nhad taken, scheming for its welfare. And, perhaps, after the dietary was\narranged and the prescription was written, he would say carelessly:\n\n\"Do you read much? What do you read? Ah! such and such books. Yes, very\ninteresting. Do you know this book which has struck me greatly? No? Allow\nme to lend it to you. Good-bye.\"\n\nAnd the patient departed, ignorant that he had received a pill for his\nsoul from the priest as well as a pill for his body from the doctor.\n\nIn appearance Dr. Levillier was small, slight, and delicate looking.\nHis complexion was clear and white. His eyes were blue. What hair he\npossessed was rather soft, fluffy and reddish, with a dash of light\nbrown in it. He wore neither beard nor moustache, was always very neatly\nand simply dressed, and was remarkable for his polished boots, said to be\nthe most perfectly varnished in London. Although he must have been nearly\nfifty-five, he had never married, and some people declared that he had\nthe intention of starting a new \"order\" of medical celibates, who would\nbe father-confessors as well as physicians, and who would pray for the\nsouls of their patients after tending their bodily needs.\n\nFor some years Valentine had been very intimate with the doctor, whom he\nadmired for his intellect and loved for his nature. So now he resolved to\nlay the case of the sittings with Julian before him and hear his opinion\nof the matter. In all their conversations Valentine could not remember\nthat they had ever discussed spiritualism or occultism. As a rule, they\ntalked about books, painting, or music, of which Dr. Levillier was a\ndevoted lover. Valentine's note asked the doctor to dine with him that\nnight at his club. The messenger brought back an acceptance.\n\nThey dined at a corner table and the room was rather empty. A few men\nchatted desultorily of burlesques, horses, the legs of actresses, the\nchances of politics. The waiters moved quietly about with pathetic masks\nof satisfied servitude. Valentine and the doctor conversed earnestly.\n\nAt first they spoke of a new symphony composed by a daring young\nFrenchman, who had striven to reproduce vices in notes and to summon\nup visions of things damnable by harmonic progressions which frequently\ndefied the laws of harmony. Levillier gently condemned him for putting\na great art to a small and degraded use.\n\n\"His very success makes me regret the waste of his time more deeply,\nCresswell,\" he said. \"He is a marvellous painter in sound. He has\nimproved upon Berlioz, if it is improvement to cry sin with a clearer,\nmore determinate voice. Think what a heaven that man could reproduce\nin music.\"\n\n\"Because he has reproduced a hell. But do you think that follows? Can\nthe man who wallows with force and originality soar with force and\noriginality too?\"\n\n\"I believe he could learn to. The main thing is to possess genius in\nany form, the genius to imagine, to construct, to present things that\nseize upon the minds of men. But to possess genius is only a beginning.\nWe have to train it, to lead it, to coax it even, until it learns to be\nobedient.\"\n\n\"Genius and obedience. Don't the two terms quarrel?\"\n\n\"They should not. Obedience is a very magnificent thing, Cresswell, just\nas to have to struggle, to be obliged to fight, is a very magnificent\nthing.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Valentine answered, thoughtfully. \"I believe you are right. But,\nif you are right, I have missed a great deal.\"\n\n\"How do you deduce that?\"\n\n\"In this way. I have never had to be obedient. I have never had to\nstruggle.\"\n\n\"Surely the latter,\" the little doctor said, fixing his clear, kind\neyes on Valentine's face. \"I don't think, in all my experience, that\nI have ever met a man who lived a fine, pure life without fixing the\nbayonet and using the sword at moments. There must be an occasional\n_m\u00eal\u00e9e_.\"\n\n\"Indeed not; that is to say,\" Valentine rather hastily added, \"as regards\nthe pure life. For I cannot lay claim to anything fine. But I assure you\nthat my life has been pure without a struggle.\"\n\n\"Without one? Think!\"\n\n\"Without one. Perhaps that is what wearies me at moments, doctor, the\ncompleteness of my coldness. Perhaps it is this lack of necessity to\nstruggle that has at last begun to render me dissatisfied.\"\n\n\"I thought you were free from that evil humour of dissatisfaction,\nthat evil humour which crowds my consulting-rooms and wastes away the\nvery tissues of the body.\"\n\n\"I have been, until quite lately. I have been neither pessimist nor\noptimist--just myself, and I believe happy.\"\n\n\"And what is this change? and what has it led to?\"\n\n\"It was to tell you that I asked you here to-night.\"\n\nThey had finished dinner, and rose from the table. Passing through the\nhall of the club, they went into a huge high room, papered with books.\nValentine led the way to a secluded corner, and gave the doctor a cigar.\nWhen he had lit it and settled himself comfortably, his rather small\nfeet, in their marvellously polished boots, lightly crossed, his head\nreposing serenely on the back of his chair, Valentine continued,\nanswering his attentive silence.\n\n\"It has led to what I suppose you would call an absurdity. But first,\nthe change itself. A sort of dissatisfaction has been creeping over me,\nperhaps for a long while, I being unconscious of it. At length I became\nconscious. I found that I was weary of being so free from the impulse\nto sin--to sin, I mean, in definite, active ways, as young men sin. It\nseemed to me that I was missing a great deal, missing the delight sin is\nsaid to give to natures, or at least missing the invigorating necessity\nyou have just mentioned, the necessity to fight, to wage war against\nimpulses.\"\n\n\"I understand.\"\n\n\"And one night I expressed this feeling to Julian.\"\n\n\"To Addison?\" the doctor said, an expression of keen interest sliding\ninto his face. \"I should much like to know how he received it.\"\n\n\"He said, of course, that such a dissatisfaction was rather monstrous.\"\n\n\"Was that all?\"\n\n\"No. He told me he considered temptation rather a curse than otherwise,\nand then he surprised me very much.\"\n\n\"He told you a secret?\"\n\n\"Why, yes.\"\n\n\"The secret of your great influence over his life?\"\n\n\"You knew of this secret, then?\"\n\n\"He didn't tell it to me. Long ago I divined it. Addison is a very\ninteresting fellow to a doctor, and the fact of his strong friendship\nwith you has made him more interesting even than he would otherwise\nhave been. His physique is tremendous. He has a quite unusual vitality,\nand stronger passions by far than most Englishmen. I confess that my\nknowledge of human nature led me to foresee a very troubled and too\nvehement future for him. My anticipation being utterly falsified led\nme naturally to look round for the reason of its falsification. I very\nsoon found that reason in you.\"\n\n\"I had never suspected it.\"\n\n\"Your lack of suspicion was not the least reason of the influence you\nexercised.\"\n\n\"Possibly. He told me of the strength of his evil impulses, of how he\nhated their assaults, and of how being with me enabled him to conquer\nthem. Apparently the contemplation of my unnatural nature is an armour\nto him.\"\n\n\"It is.\"\n\n\"Well, I continued to bewail my condition, which he envied, and it ended\nin our sitting down, in jest, to make an experiment to try to exchange\nour souls.\"\n\n\"What means did you take?\"\n\nAnd then Valentine told Dr. Levillier the exact circumstances of the\nthree sittings, without embellishment, without omission of any kind.\nHe listened with keen attention, and without attempting interruption\nor intruding comment. When Valentine had finished he made no remark.\n\n\"What do you think of it, doctor?\"\n\n\"Of what part of it?\"\n\n\"Of any part. Do you attach any importance to it?\"\n\n\"I do, certainly.\"\n\n\"I thought you would laugh at the whole thing.\"\n\n\"Why should I? Why should I laugh at any circumstances which strongly\naffect men whom I know, or, indeed, any men?\"\n\n\"But then, tell me, do you believe in some strange, unseen agency? Do you\nbelieve that Julian absolutely held the hand of some being dwelling in\nanother sphere, some being attracted to us, or, say, enabled to come to\nus by such an action as our sitting at a table in the dark?\"\n\n\"No. I don't believe that.\"\n\n\"You attribute the whole thing to bodily causes?\"\n\n\"I am inclined to attribute it to the action and reaction of mind and\nbody, undoubtedly. If you had sat in the light, for instance, I don't\nthink Addison would have felt that hand. The hand is indeed the least of\nthe circumstances you have related, in my opinion. The incidents of the\ndog and of the curtain are far more mysterious. You are positive the door\nwas securely shut?\"\n\n\"Quite positive.\"\n\n\"Could you, after having drawn the curtain, have allowed your hand to\nslip slightly back, pulling the curtain with it?\"\n\n\"I don't think so. I feel sure not.\"\n\n\"You know we all constantly make involuntary motions--motions that our\nminds are quite unaware of.\"\n\n\"I do feel sure, nevertheless. And the dog? What do you say to that?\"\n\n\"I don't know what to say. But dogs are extraordinarily sensitive. I do\nnot think it beyond the bounds of possibility that the tumult of your\nnerves--for there was tumult; you confess it--communicated itself to\nhim.\"\n\n\"And was the cause of his conduct?\"\n\n\"Yes. In the course of my career I have been consulted by a great many\npatients whose nervous systems have been disastrously upset by the\npractices you describe, by so-called spiritualism, table-turning, and\nso forth. One man I knew, trying to cultivate himself onto what he\ncalled 'a higher plane,' cultivated himself into a lunatic asylum,\nwhere he still remains.\"\n\n\"Then you consider spiritualism--?\"\n\n\"I have too much respect for the soul, too much belief in its great\ndestiny, Cresswell, to juggle with it, or to play tricks with it. When\none meets a genius one does not want to have a game at puss-in-the-corner\nwith him. One is rather anxious to hear him talk seriously and display\nhis mind. When I come into contact with a soul, I don't want to try to\ndetach it from the home in which a divine power has placed it for a time.\nI glory in many limitations against which it is the prevailing fashion\nto fight uselessly. The soul can do all its work where it is--in the\nbody. The influence you exercise over your friend Addison convinces me\nof the existence of spirits, things which will eventually be freed from\nthe body, more certainly than any amount of material manifestations,\nsights, sounds, apparent physical sensations. Why should we not be\nsatisfied with remaining, for a time, as we are? I consider that you and\nAddison were ill-advised in making this--no doubt absurd--experiment.\nSupposing it to be absurd, the _raison d'\u00eatre_ of the sittings is gone at\nonce. Supposing it not to be--\"\n\n\"Yes. What, then?\"\n\n\"Then the danger is great. Imagine yourself with Addison's soul or\nnature, him with yours. To what might not you be led? How do you know\nthat your nature in him would exert any control over his nature in you?\"\n\n\"Why should it not?\"\n\n\"There comes in the power of the body, which is very great. I believe,\nas you know, absolutely in the existence of the soul, and in its immortal\ndestiny; but that does not blind me to the extraordinary influence, the\nextraordinary kingship, which a mere body, a mere husk and shell, as some\ngood people call it--I don't feel with them--can obtain not only over\nanother body, but, strangely, over the soul which is in that body. Your\ninfluence over Addison has been, and is, immense. Do you imagine that it\nis simply your nature which governs him?\"\n\n\"I suppose so.\"\n\n\"Your mere appearance may have an immense deal to do with the matter.\nYou have the look, the expression, of one who has not sinned. It is\npartly that which keeps Addison from giving the reins to his impulses.\nI consider that if it were possible for your nature to change secretly\nand for your face to remain unchanged, if you sinned perpetually and\nretained your exact appearance, and if Addison did not know you sinned,\nyou could still be his guardian, while, really, yourself far worse in\nevery way than him.\"\n\n\"But surely that fights against your theory that the existence of a soul\nis proved by such an influence as I possess over Addison?\"\n\n\"Not at all. I said if it were possible for the body not to express the\nsoul, if--but that's just the difficulty, it is not possible. The body\nmanifests the soul. Supposing it were not so, the power of evil, the\ndevil, if you choose to name it and imply a personal existence for it,\nmight have hold of the world even more tightly than now. Just conceive,\nunder such conditions, how you might lure Addison to destruction if you\ndesired to do so. Looking at you, and seeing the same face in which he\nhas learned to see what he thinks entire goodness, he would be unable to\nbelieve that any action you could suggest and take part in could be evil.\nYou could wreck his future with a perfect ease. But, as things are, did\nyour nature change and become malignant, your face would change too, and\nyou might quickly cease to exercise a strong influence over Addison. He\nmight even, having now been unconsciously trained into a curious\nintegrity, learn to hate and to despise you. You remember our\nconversation to-night about that symphony?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I said that the soul which could reproduce hell should be able to\nreproduce heaven.\"\n\n\"I know.\"\n\n\"Well, my boy--for you are a boy to me--the reverse of that might happen\nalso.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But I don't quite see.\"\n\n\"The application--to you?\"\n\n\"To me?\"\n\n\"Yes, to you, Cresswell. You have been given a strangely perfect nature.\nAs you say, you seem to have nothing to do with the matter. You have even\nbeen inclined to rebel against your gift. But, take my advice. Cherish\nit. Don't play with it, as you have been playing. Remember, if you lose\nheaven, the space once filled by heaven will not be left empty.\"\n\n\"Ah! now I see. You think that I--\"\n\n\"Might swing from a great height to an equally great depth. That has\nbeen my experience--that the man who is once extreme is always extreme,\nbut not always in the same way. The greatest libertines have made the\ngreatest ascetics. But, within my own experience, I have known the\nreverse process to obtain. And you, if you changed, might carry Addison\nwith you.\"\n\n\"But then, doctor, you do believe in these manifestations?\"\n\n\"Not necessarily. But I believe that the minds of men are often very\ncarefully, very deftly, poised, and that a little push can send them one\nway or the other. Have you ever balanced one billiard-ball on the top of\nanother?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Then you know that a breath will upset it and send it rolling.\nBe careful. Your mind, your very nature, may be poised like that\nbilliard-ball. Addison's may be the same. Indeed, I feel sure\nAddison's is. That curious dread of you which overcame him at your\nlast sitting is a sign of it. The whole thing is wrong--bad for body\nand for mind.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. Well, we have definitely agreed to give it up.\"\n\n\"That's well. Eleven o'clock! I must be going. Are you doing anything\nto-morrow night?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"I have got a box for this new play at the Duke's Theatre. Will you\ncome?\"\n\n\"With pleasure.\"\n\n\"I will ask Addison also.\"\n\nThey put on their overcoats, and walked a little way along Pall Mall\nbefore they parted. Near the Atheneaum they passed a tall, thin man,\nwho was coming in the opposite direction. He turned round as they went\nby, and stood directly regarding them till they were out of sight.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE REGENT STREET EPISODE\n\n\nThe things we do apparently by chance often have a curious applicability\nto the things we have thought. John the Baptist was sent to prepare the\nway of the Lord. These thoughts are the John the Baptists of the mind,\nand prepare the way for facts that often startlingly illustrate them.\nIt is as if our thoughts were gradually materialized by the action of the\nmind; as if, by the act of thinking, we projected them.\n\nWhen Doctor Levillier got a box for the first night of the new play at\nthe Duke's Theatre, and when he invited Valentine and Julian to make up\nhis party, he had no idea what the subject of the piece was, no notion\nthat it would have anything to do with the conversation which took place\nbetween him and Valentine at the club. But the plot applied with almost\namazing fidelity to much that he had said upon that occasion. The play\nwas a modern allegory of the struggle between good and evil, which has\nbeen illustrated in so many different ways since the birth of the Faust\nlegend. But the piece had a certain curious originality which sprang\nfrom the daring of the author. Instead of showing one result of the\nstruggle, a good man drawn gradually down, or a bad man drawn gradually\nup, he set forth, with a great deal of detail, a great deal of vividness,\na modern wobbler, a human pendulum, and simply noted down, as it were,\nhis slow swinging backwards and forwards. His hero, an evil liver, a\nmodern man of wrath in the first act, dominated by a particular vice,\nwas drawn, by an outside personal influence, from the mire in which\nhe was wallowing, to purity, to real elevation. But his author, having\nled him up to the pinnacle, had no intention of leaving him there,\nblessed by the proclaimed admiration of the gods in the gallery. In the\nsucceeding acts he introduced a second personal influence, exerted this\ntime on the side of evil, and permitted it to act upon his central figure\nsuccessfully. The man fell again into the mire, and was left there at the\nconclusion of the piece, but hugging a different sin, not the sin he had\nbeen embracing when the curtain rose upon the first act. This dramatic\nscheme took away the breath of the house for a moment, but only for a\nmoment. Then the lungs once more did their accustomed duty, and enabled\na large number of excited persons to hiss with a wonderful penetration.\nTheir well-meant efforts did not have the effect of terrorizing the\nauthor. On the contrary, he quickly responded to the hostile uproar,\nand, coming forward in a very neat Jaeger suit, a flannel shirt, and a\npair of admirably fitting doeskin gloves, bowed with great gravity and\nperfect self-possession. The hisses thereupon suddenly faded into\npiercing entreaties for a speech, in which a gallery lady with a powerful\nsoprano voice became notorious as the leader. But the Jaeger author was\nnot to be prevailed upon. He waved the doeskin gloves in token of adieu,\nand retreated once more into the excited obscurity of the wings, where\nhis manager was trembling like an aspen, in the midst of a perspiring\ncompany. The lights were turned down. The orchestra burst into a tuneful\njig, and the lingering audience at length began to disperse.\n\nDr. Levillier, Julian, and Valentine left their box in silence. It\nseemed that this odd play, which dared to be natural, had impressed\nthem. They walked into the vestibule without a word, and, avoiding many\nvoluble friends who were letting off the steam as they gathered their\ncoats and hats from a weary lady in a white cap, they threaded their way\nthrough the crowd and emerged into the street. Just as they reached the\nportico, Julian suddenly started and laid his hand on Valentine's arm.\n\n\"What is it?\" asked Valentine, looking round.\n\n\"Ah! you're just too late. He's gone!\"\n\n\"He--who?\"\n\n\"Marr.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" Valentine said, showing considerable interest; \"I wish I had seen\nhim. Where was he sitting?\"\n\n\"I haven't an idea. Didn't know he was in the theatre.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier made an exception to his rule of being in bed by twelve\no'clock that night, and accepted Valentine's invitation to sup in\nVictoria Street. He had always been greatly drawn to Valentine, attracted\nby the latter's exceptional clarity of character, and he was scarcely\nless interested in Julian. Nor did the considerable difference between\nhis age and the ages of the two youths in any way interfere with their\npleasant intercourse. For Levillier had a heart that was ageless. The\ncorroding years did not act as acid upon it. All his sympathies were as\nkeen, all his power of enjoyment was as great, as when he had been a\ndelightfully gay and delightfully pleasant boy at school. Youth always\nloved him, and age always respected him. He possessed the great secret\nof a beautiful life. He was absolutely genuine, and he meant nothing\nbut good to all with whom he was brought into contact.\n\nThe three friends spoke but little as they went back to the flat, but\nwhen they had sat down to supper, and Dr. Levillier had expressed his\ncomplete satisfaction with the champagne that Valentine's butler had\npolitely insinuated into his glass, the silence took to itself wings\nand lightly departed. They talked of the play, and it appeared that\nthey were all impressed by it, but in slightly different ways, and for\ndifferent reasons. Valentine, who was intensely, but sometimes almost\ncoldly, artistic, appreciated it, he said, because it did not obviously\nendeavour to work out a problem or to teach a lesson. It simply, with\na great deal of literary finish and dramatic force, stated a curiously\nhuman character, showed the nature of a man at work, and left him,\nafter some scenes of his life, still at work upon his own salvation or\ndestruction, not telling the audience what his end would be, scarcely\neven trying to imply his innate tendency one way or the other. This\nsatisfied Valentine. This had made him feel as if he had seen a block\ncut out of life.\n\n\"I do not want to learn what becomes of that man,\" he said. \"I have\nknown him, good and bad. That is enough. That satisfies me more than\nthe sight of a thousand bombastic heroes, a thousand equally bombastic\nvillains. Life is neither ebony nor ivory. That man is something to my\nmind forever, as Ibsen's 'Master Builder' is something. I can never\nforget the one or the other.\"\n\n\"Your life is ivory, Val,\" Julian said.\n\nHe had liked the play because the violent struggle between good and evil\nwoke up many responsive memories in his mind. The hero of the play had\nbeen shown feeling precisely as Julian had often felt. That was enough.\nHe did not very much care for the brilliant artifice, which Valentine had\nremarked with so much pleasure. He did not specially note the peculiar\neffect of nature produced by the simplicity and thoughtful directness\nof the dialogue. He only knew that he had seen somebody whose nature\nwas akin to his own nature, although placed in different, perhaps more\ndramatic, circumstances.\n\nDr. Levillier combined, to some appreciable extent, the different joys\nof his two companions, and obtained another that was quite his own. He\nhad seen two horses running in double harness that night, the body and\nmind of the hero, and had taken delight in observing what had practically\nescaped the definite notice of his companions, the ingenuity and subtlety\nwith which the author, without being obtrusive or insistent, had\ndisplayed their _liaison_; the effect of each upon the other, their\nanswering excursions and alarums, their attempts at separate _amours_,\n_amours_ that always had an inevitable effect upon the one which the\nother had, for the moment, endeavoured to exclude from its life. The\ndoctor in him and the priest in him had both enjoyed a glorious evening\nof bracing activity. As they discussed the piece, and each advanced his\nreason of pleasure, the doctor expanded into a sort of saintly geniality,\nwhich was peculiarly attractive even to sinners. And when supper was\nover, and they strolled into the drawing-room to smoke and to make music,\nhe sank into a chair, stretched out his polished boots with a sigh, and\nsaid:\n\n\"And people say there is so little joy in life!\"\n\nJulian laughed at the satisfied whimsicality of his exclamation and of\nthe expression which shadowed it.\n\n\"Light up, doctor,\" he cried. \"You are a boon to this modern world. For\nyou see all the sorrows of life, I suppose, and yet you always manage to\nconvey the impression that the joys win the battle after all.\"\n\nValentine had gone over to the piano and was dreamily opening it. He did\nnot seem to hear what they were saying. The doctor obeyed the injunction\nto light up. He was one of the hardest and most assiduous toilers in\nall London, and he appreciated a good cigar and a comfortable arm-chair\nmore than some men could appreciate Paradise, or some women appreciate\nlove.\n\n\"And I believe that joy will win the battle in the end,\" he said, with a\npuff that proved successful.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"I see evidences of it, or think I do. The colour will fade out of bad\nacts, Addison, but the colour of a good act is eternal. A noble deed will\nnever emulate a Sir Joshua Reynolds--never. Play to us, Cresswell.\"\n\n\"Yes, but I wish you to talk. I want to improvise to-night. The murmur of\nyour conversation will help me.\"\n\nJulian sat down by the doctor. He, too, looked very happy. It was a\npleasant hour. Sympathy was in that pretty room, complete human sympathy,\nand a sympathy that sprang from their vitality, avoiding the dusky\ndumbness of the phlegmatic. Valentine sat down at the piano and began\ngently to play. The smoke from the cigars curled away towards the\nwatching pictures; the room was full of soft music.\n\n\"Yes, Addison,\" Doctor Levillier continued, in a low voice, \"I am\nperpetually sitting with sorrow, communing with disease. That\nconsulting-room of mine is as a pool of Bethesda, only not all who come\nto it, alas! can be healed. I sit day by day in my confessional--I like\nto call it that; perhaps I was meant to be a priest--and I read the\nstories of the lives of men and of women, most of them necessarily, from\nthe circumstances which bring them to me, sad. And yet I have a belief\nin joy and its triumph which nothing can ever shake, a belief in the\nfinal glory of good which nothing can ever conquer.\"\n\n\"That's fine, doctor. But do you know why you have it?\"\n\n\"I daresay that question is difficult to answer. I often seek for my\nreasons, Addison, and I find many, though I can hardly say which is\nthe best, or whether any quite explains the faith that is always in me.\n_Apropos_ of this evening, by the bye, I long ago found one of my reasons\nin the theatre, the theatre which some really good men hate and condemn.\"\n\n\"What was that?\"\n\n\"Oh, a very simple one. I believe that men in the mass express eternal\ntruths more readily, more certainly, than men as individuals. Put a lot\nof bad men, or--we won't call them bad, why should we?--loose, careless,\nthoughtless men, together in the pit of a theatre. Many of them, perhaps,\ndrink, and are rendered cruel by drink. Many of them care nothing for\nmorality, and have wounded, in the worst way, the souls of women. Many\nof them show incessant hardness in most of the relations of life. What,\nthen, is it, that makes all these individuals respond so directly, so\ncertainly, to every touch of goodness, and gentleness, and unselfishness,\nand purity, and faith, that is put before them upon the stage? I think it\nmust be that eternal truth--the rocks of good that lie forever beneath\nthe wild seas of evil. Those men don't know themselves; don't know that\nit is all useless for them to try to hide the nobility which has been put\ninto them, to thrust it down, and, metaphorically, to dance on it. They\ncan't get rid of it, do what they will. I like to think of goodness as\nthe shadow of evil through life, the shadow that, at death, or perhaps\nlong after death, becomes the substance.\"\n\n\"You think we cannot kill the good that is in us?\"\n\n\"Not quite. But I think we can go near to killing it, so near that it\nwill take longer to recover and to be itself again, longer far than the\nmost relapsing typhoid patient.\"\n\n\"And have you other reasons for your belief?\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But some of them are difficult to define, and would carry no\nconviction to any one but myself. There is one in this very room with\nus.\"\n\nJulian glanced up, surprised.\n\n\"What is that, doctor?\" he said.\n\n\"You ought to know better than I,\" Levillier answered.\n\nHe was looking at Valentine, who, apparently quite unconscious of their\npresence, was still playing rather softly. Julian followed his eyes.\n\nThe light in the room was dim, a carefully manufactured twilight. It is\nstrange how many things, and how slight, stir, control, influence in one\ndirection or another, the emotions. Light and the absence of light can\ndivert a heart as easily as the pressing of a button can give a warship\nto the sea. Twilight and music can change a beast into a man, a man into\nan angel, for the moment. Long after that evening was dead, both Julian\nand Doctor Levillier anxiously, and in their different ways analytically,\nconsidered it. They submitted it to a secret process of probing, such as\nmany men enforce upon what they imagine to be great causes in their\nlives. That hour became an hour of wonder, an hour of amazement, viewed\nin the illumination of subsequent events. They found in it a curious\nclimax of misunderstanding, a culmination of all deceptive things.\n\nAnd yet, in that hour they only watched a young man of London, a modern\nintellectual youth, playing in a Victoria Street drawing-room upon a\nSteinway grand piano.\n\nThey were sitting sideways to Valentine, and a little behind him.\nTherefore he could not easily see them unless he slightly turned his\nhead. But they could observe him, and, obeying Doctor Levillier's mute\ninjunction, Julian now did so.\n\nValentine was gazing straight before him over the top, of the piano, and\nhis eyes seemed to be fixed upon the dim figure of Christ in the picture\nof \"The Merciful Knight.\" Was he not playing to the picture, playing to\nthat figure in it? And did not his musical imagination seek to reproduce\nin sound the vision of the life of that mailed knight who never lived and\ndied? The purity of his expression, always consummate, was to-night more\npeculiar, more unearthly, than before in any place, at any moment. And,\nas mere line can convey to the senses of man a conception of a great\nvirtue or of a great vice, the actual shape of his features, thus seen in\nprofile, was the embodiment of an exquisitely ascetic purity, as much an\nembodiment as is a drop of water pierced by a sunbeam. This struck both\nDoctor Levillier and Julian, and the doctor was amazed anew at the silent\ndecree that the invisible shall be made visible in forms comprehensible\nto the commonest minds. Sin would surely flee from a temple sculptured\nin such a shape as the body of Valentine, as a vampire would flee from\nthe bloodless courts of the heaven of the Revelation. Lust cannot lie\nat ease on a crystal couch, or rest its dark head upon a pillow of pale\nivory. And the message of this strange, unearthly youth now given in\nmusic, and to the air and the dust--for Valentine had lost knowledge\nof his friends--was crystalline too. In his improvisation he journeyed\nthrough many themes of varying characters. He hymned the knight's\ntemptation no less than his triumph. But purity was in the hymn even\nat the hour of temptation, and sang like a bird in every scene of the\nlife,--a purity classical, detached, so refined as to be almost\nphysically cold.\n\n\"I understand you,\" Julian whispered to the little doctor. \"Yes, you\nare right. He is a great reason why what you think may be true. And\nyet\"--here Julian lowered his voice to a breath, lest he might disturb\nthe player--\"he is not religious, as--as--well, as you are. Forgive the\nallusion--.\"\n\n\"Are the angels religious?\" said Doctor Levillier. \"Why should you\nrefrain, my dear boy? But you are right. There is a curious\nunconsciousness about Cresswell--about Valentine--which seems to\nexclude even definite religious belief as something in a way\nself-conscious, and so impossible to him. There is an extraordinary\nstrain of the child in Cresswell, such as I conceive to be in unearthly\nbeings, who have never had the power to sin. And the best-behaved,\nsweetest child in the world might catch flies or go to sleep during\nthe Litany or a sermon. This very absence of controversial or dogmatic\nreligion gives Valentine much of his power, seems positively to lift him\nhigher than religionists of any creed.\"\n\n\"You think--you think that perhaps it is something in him of which he is\nunconscious which does so much for me?\"\n\n\"Perhaps it is.\"\n\nValentine now glided into an accompaniment, and began to sing. And\nthe doctor and Julian ceased to talk. Valentine certainly did not sing\nwith such peculiar skill as he showed in playing, but he had a charming\nvoice which he used with great ease, and he never sang a single note,\nor phrased a passage, without complete intelligence and understanding\nof his composer. Only he lacked power. This scarcely interfered with the\npleasure he could give in a drawing-room, and to-night both Levillier and\nJulian were rather in a mood for supreme delicacy than for great passion.\nThey listened with silent pleasure for a time. Then Levillier said:\n\n\"Do you remark how wonderfully the timbre of Cresswell's voice expresses\nthe timbre of his mind? The parallel is exact.\"\n\nJulian nodded.\n\n\"That is his soul written in sound,\" the doctor added.\n\nIt was at this point that Valentine ceased and got up from the piano.\n\n\"I must smoke too,\" he said. \"No, not a cigar, I'll have a cigarette\nto-night.\"\n\n\"You are fond of that picture, Cresswell?\" said Doctor Levillier as\nValentine sat down.\n\n\"'The Merciful Knight'? Yes, I love it. Have you told Julian your opinion\nof our sittings, doctor?\"\n\n\"No. He didn't ask me for it.\"\n\n\"I should be glad to have it, all the same,\" Julian said.\n\n\"Well, my opinion is entirely adverse to your proceedings,\" Levillier\nsaid, with his usual frankness.\n\n\"You are, in fact, at the opposite pole from Marr,\" Julian answered.\n\n\"Marr! Who is Marr? I never heard of him.\"\n\n\"Nor I, until the other evening,\" Julian said. \"But now I see him every\nday. He was at the theatre to-night. I saw him as we came out.\"\n\n\"What is he, a spiritualist? A professional?\"\n\n\"Oh dear, no! He calls himself an occultist. He goes out in society a\ngreat deal, apparently. I met him at dinner first. Since then he has\ntaken the keenest interest in my sittings with Valentine.\"\n\n\"Indeed! You know him, Cresswell?\"\n\nValentine shook his head, and Julian laughed.\n\n\"The fun of it is that Marr doesn't wish to know Valentine,\" he said.\n\n\"Why?\" the doctor asked.\n\nJulian told him the words Marr had used in reference to Valentine, and\ngave a fairly minute description of Marr's attitude towards their\nproceedings. Levillier listened with great attention.\n\n\"Then this man urges you to go on with your sittings?\" he said when\nJulian had finished.\n\n\"Scarcely that. But he certainly seems anxious that we should.\"\n\n\"You have both resolved to give them up, haven't you?\"\n\n\"Certainly, doctor,\" Valentine replied.\n\n\"Does Marr know that?\" Levillier asked of Julian.\n\n\"No. I haven't seen him to speak to since our final sitting.\"\n\nThe little doctor sat in apparent meditation for two or three minutes.\nThen he remarked, with abruptness:\n\n\"Addison, will you think me an impertinent elderly person if I give you a\npiece of advice?\"\n\n\"You--doctor! Of course not. What is it?\"\n\n\"Well, you young fellows know me, know that I am not a mere\nsentimentalist or believer in every humbug that is the fashion of\nthe moment. But one thing I do firmly believe, that certain people\nare born with a power to command, or direct others, which amounts to\nforce. The world doesn't completely recognize this. The law doesn't\nrecognize, perhaps ought not to recognize it. Some call it hypnotism.\nI call it suggestion.\"\n\nHe paused, as if he had finished.\n\n\"But your advice, doctor?\" Julian said, wondering.\n\n\"Oh, h'm! I don't mean to give it to you, after all.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier became enigmatic.\n\n\"Because I have just remembered that to warn is often to supply a cause\nof stumbling,\" he said.\n\nDr. Levillier and Julian drove together as far as the latter's\nchambers that evening, and, after bidding Julian good-night, the doctor\ndismissed the cab and set out to walk to Harley Street. He proceeded\nat a leisurely pace along Piccadilly, threading his way abstractedly\namong the wandering wisps of painted humanity that dye the London night\nwith rouge. Occasionally a passing man in evening dress would bid him\ngood-night, for he was universally known in the town. But he did not\nreply. With his firm round chin pressed down upon his fur coat, and his\neyelids lowered, he moved thoughtfully. The problem of the relations\nexisting between youth and life eternally fascinated him. He pondered\nover them now. What a strange, complicated _liaison_ it was, sometimes\nso happy, sometimes so disastrous, always, to him, pathetic. Youth sets\nup house with life as a lover sets up house with his mistress, takes an\nattic near the stars, or builds a mansion that amazes the street-urchins.\nAnd they dwell together. And youth strives in every way to know his\nmistress. He tests her, tries her, kisses and cuffs her, gives her\npresents, weeps at her knees. And at first she is magical, and a wonder,\nand a dream, and eternity. And then, perhaps, she is a faded creature,\nand terrible as a lost girl whom one has known in innocence. She is grim\nand arid. She fills youth with a great horror and with a great fear. He\ndare not kiss her any more. And then, perhaps, at last he prays, \"Deliver\nme from this bondage!\" And he thinks that he knows his mistress. But,\nhappy or sad, does he ever quite know her? Is she not always a mystery,\nthis life, a sphinx who jealously guards a great secret?\n\nHis evening with the two boys, for so the doctor called them in his\nthoughts, had set him musing thus definitely. Was there not a wonder\nand a secret in their dual life of friendship? For is not the potent\ninfluence of one soul over another one of the marvels of time? The\ndoctor loved Valentine as a human saint loves another saint. But he\nloved Julian as a saint loves a sinner. Not that he named Julian sinner,\nbut it was impossible to be with him, observantly, sensitively, and not\nto feel the thrill of his warm, passionate humanity, which cried aloud\nfor governance, for protection. Julian could be great, with the greatness\nonly attained by purged humanity, superior surely to the peaceful purity\nof angels. But he could be a castaway, oh! as much a castaway as the\nfainting shipwrecked man whom the hoarse surf rolls to the sad island of\na desert sea.\n\nWithout Valentine what might he not have been? And the little doctor\nlet his imagination run loose until his light eyes were dim with absurd\ntears. He winked them away as he turned into Regent Street. The hour\nwas nearly two, and the great curved thoroughfare was rather deserted.\nThose few persons who were about had a curious aspect of wolves. Their\neyes were watchful; their gait denoted a ghastly readiness for pause,\nfor colloquy. Poor creatures! What was their _liaison_ with life? A\nthing like a cry for help in the dark. The doctor longed to be a\nmiracle-worker, to lift up his hands, just there where he was by the\nNew Gallery, and to say, \"Be ye healed!\" He had a true love for every\nhuman thing. And that love sometimes seared his heart, despite his\nfervent faith and hope.\n\nBut now, as he pursued his way, a physical sensation intruded itself upon\nhis mind, and gradually excluded all his reflections. A sense of bodily\nuneasiness came upon him, of a curious irritation and contempt, mingled\nwith fear. He at first ascribed it to the coffee he had imprudently\ndrunk at Valentine's flat, and to the strength of the two cigars he had\nsmoked, or to some ordinary, trifling cause of diet. But by the time he\ncrossed Oxford Street, and was in the desert of Vere Street, he felt\nthat there was a reason for his distress, outside of him.\n\n\"I am being followed,\" he said to himself. \"I am being followed, and by\nsome utterly abominable person.\"\n\nHe went by the Chapel, and struck across to the right, not looking behind\nhim, but analyzing his feelings. Being strongly intuitive, he had no need\nto turn his head. He knew now for certain the cause of his uneasiness.\nSome dreadful human being was very near to him, full of hateful thoughts,\nsinister recollections, possibly evil intentions. Something, the very\nvibrations of the night air, it might be, carried, as a telegraph wire\nconveys a message, the soul-aroma of this human being to the doctor. As\nhe walked on, not hurrying, he mutely diagnosed the heart of this unseen\nbeing. It seemed full of deadly disease. Never had he suspected man or\nwoman of such wickedness as he divined here; never had he felt from any\nof his kind such a sick repulsion as from this unseen monster who was\njourneying steadily in his steps. Doctor Levillier was puzzled at the\ndepth of the horror which beleaguered him. He remembered once driving a\nstaid, well-behaved horse in a country lane. The animal ambled forward\nat a gentle pace, flicking its ears lazily to circumvent the flies,\napparently at ease with its driver and with the world. But suddenly it\nraised its head, drew the air into its distended nostrils, stopped,\nquivered in every limb, and then, with a strange cry, bolted like a\nmad thing. Far away a travelling menagerie was encamping. It had scented\nthe wild animals.\n\nDoctor Levillier felt like that horse. A longing to bolt for his life\ncame upon him. He had an impulse to cry out, to run forward, to escape\nout of the atmosphere created by this evil nature, this deadly life. He\ncould have crept like a coward into the shadow of one of the areas of\nHenrietta Street, and sheltered there till the thing went past. And, just\nbecause he had this almost overmastering desire to flee, he stood still,\npaused abruptly, and, without turning his head, listened. At a distance,\nand he judged, round the corner of the street he heard the sound of a\nquickening footstep advancing in his direction. He waited, under the\nobligation of exerting all his powers of self-control; for his limbs\ntrembled to movement, his heart beat to the march, and every separate\nvein, every separate hair of his body, seemed crying out piercingly to\nbegone. The footstep approached. Doctor Levillier heard it turning the\ncorner.\n\n\"Now,\" thought he, \"this person will see me waiting here. Will he come\non? Will he pass me? And if he does, shall I be able to await, to endure\nthe incident?\"\n\nAnd he listened, as a scout might listen in the night for sounds of the\nhidden enemy. Upon turning the corner, the footsteps advanced a pace or\ntwo, faltered, slackened, stopped. For an instant there was silence.\nThe doctor knew that the man had been struck by his attentive figure, and\nwas pausing to regard it, to consider it. What would be the result of the\ninspection? In a moment the doctor knew. The footsteps sounded again,\nthis time in retreat.\n\nOn this the impulse of the doctor to flee changed, giving way to a\nstrict desire and determination. He was resolved to interview this\nnight-wanderer, to see his face. A greedy anxiety for view, for\nquestion, of this person came upon him. He, too, wheeled round, and\nfollowed hastily in pursuit. The man had already escaped from his sight\ninto Vere Street, and the doctor broke into a soft run until he reached\nthe corner, skirting which, the man was immediately in his view, but\nat a considerable distance from him. As the doctor sprang upon the\npavement the man turned round, and, evidently observing that he was\npursued, quickened his steps impulsively. The doctor was now absolutely\ndetermined to address him, and began openly to run. And he was not far\nfrom coming up with the fellow when he suddenly whistled a passing\nhansom, bounded in, and thrust up the trapdoor in the roof. The direction\ngiven was sufficiently obvious, for the cabby glanced round at the\ndoctor, lifted his whip, brought it down with a sweep over the horse's\nloins, and the cab disappeared down Oxford Street at a rocking gallop.\n\nThe doctor paused. He was breathing hard, and the perspiration stood upon\nhis face. His disappointment was absurdly keen, and for an instant he had\neven some idea of hailing another cab, and of following in pursuit. But,\nupon reflection, he deemed it more reasonable to return upon his steps,\nand to seek his bed in Harley Street. This accordingly he did, wondering\nwhat had moved him so strangely, and wondering, also, not a little, at\nthe abrupt flight of the unknown person. In the brief and distant view\nof him, which was all that the doctor had obtained, he judged him to be\ntall, spare, and pale of countenance, with the figure of a gentleman.\nThe aspect of his face had not been revealed before the shelter of the\ncab concealed him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nPAUSE\n\n\nIt chanced that for three or four days after the night of the theatre\nexpedition Valentine and Julian did not meet. They were rarely apart\nfor so long a period, and each was moved to wonder at this unwonted\nabstinence of their friendship. What was the cause of it? Each found it\nin a curious hesitation that enveloped him, and impelled him to avoidance\nof the other. Valentine went about as usual. He looked in at White's,\ndined out, rode in the park, visited two theatres, lived the habitual\nLondon life which contents so many and disgusts not a few. But he did\nnot ask Julian to share any of these well-worn doings, and at first he\ndid not acknowledge to himself why he did not do so. He sought, more\ndefinitely than ever before, to gain amusement from amusements, and\nthis definite intention, of course, frustrated his purpose. His power\nof pleasure was, in fact, clogged by an abiding sense of dissatisfaction\nand depression. And it was really his eventual knowledge of this\ndepression's cause that led him to bar Julian out from these few days\nof his life. All that he did bored him, and the more decidedly because\nhe came to know that there was something which did not bore, which even\nexcited him, something which he had resolved to give up. He was, in\nfact, strangely pursued by an unreasonable desire to fly in the face of\nDoctor Levillier's advice, and of his own secondary antagonistic desire,\nand to sit again with Julian. Everything in which he sought to find\ndistraction, lacked savour. As he sat watching a ballet that glittered\nwith electricity, and was one twinkle of coloured movement, he found\nhimself longing for the silence, the gloom, the live expectation of\nthe tentroom, night, and Julian. At White's the conversation of the men\nstruck him as even more scrappy, more desultorily scandalous, than usual.\nHis morning ride was an active _ennui_, an _ennui_ revolving, like a\nhorse in a circus, round and round the weariness of the park.\n\nYet he had made up his mind quite fully that it would be better not\nto sit any more. It was not merely Doctor Levillier's urgency that\nhad impressed him thus. A personal conviction had gradually forced\nitself upon him that if anything resulted from such apparently imbecile\nproceedings it would certainly not be of an agreeable nature. But, too,\nthis very sense that a secret danger might be lurking against him and\nJulian, if only they would consent together to give it power by the\nunited action of sitting, spurred him on to restless desire. It is\nnot only the soldier who has a bizarre love of peril. Many of those\nwho sit at home in apparent calmness of safety seek perils with a\nmaniacal persistence, perils to the intricate scheme of bodily health,\nperils to the mind. More human mules than the men of the banner and the\nsword delight in journeying at the extreme edge of the precipice. And\nValentine now had to the full this secret hankering after danger. As he\nknew it, he despised himself for it, for this attitude of the schoolboy\nin which he held himself. Until now he had believed that he was free\nfrom such a preposterous and morbid bondage, free on account of his\nconstitutional indifference towards vice, his innate love of the brooding\ncalms of refinement and of the upper snowfields of the intellect. The\ndiscovery of his mistake irritated him, but the irritation could not\nconquer its cause, and each day the longing to sit once more grew upon\nhim until it became almost painful. It was this longing which occasioned\nValentine's avoidance of Julian. He knew that if they were together he\nwould yield to this foolish, witless temptation, and at any rate try to\npersuade Julian into an act which might be attended with misfortune, if\nnot with disaster. And then Valentine's profound respect for Doctor\nLevillier, a respect which the doctor inspired without effort in every\none who knew him, was a chain almost of steel to hold the young man back\nfrom gratification of his longing. Valentine never sought any one's\nadvice except the little doctor's, and he had a strong feeling of the\nobligation laid upon him by such sought advice. To ask it and to reject\nit was a short course to insult.\n\nHe resolved to avoid Julian until this gripping desire was shaken from\nthe shoulders of his mind.\n\nOnce or twice he tacitly wondered whether Julian was also the prey of\nthis desire, but then he felt certain that his friend could not be so\nafflicted. Had he been, Julian would surely have found a swift occasion\nto call. But he did not call. His feet did not turn their accustomed\nway to Victoria Street. And it did not occur to Valentine that Julian\nmight be immersed in the same sort of struggle as himself. He thought he\nknew Julian well enough to be sure that he would not have joined issue\nwith such an enemy without instant consultation. A council of war would\ncertainly have been convened.\n\nSo Valentine believed himself lonely in his feeling. One night he\nreturned from the theatre and a succeeding supper party at half-past\ntwelve, let himself into the flat with a latchkey, threw off his coat\nand stood before the fire. His usually smooth, white forehead was\npuckered in a frown. He contemplated the inevitable hours of bed\nwith dissatisfaction. When a man has allowed a vice to obtain dominion\nover him there are moments when an enforced abstinence from it, even\nof only a few hours, seems intolerably irksome. So Valentine felt now.\nIt seemed to him that he must sit again; that he could not go to bed,\ncould not rest and sleep, until he gratified his desire. Yet what was he\nto do? He thought at first of starting out, late as the hour was, to\nJulian's rooms. But that would be ridiculous, more especially after\ntheir mutual resolution. Julian might refuse, would probably, in any\nevent, wish to refuse, the request which he came to make. Valentine\nstrove sincerely to dismiss the desire from his mind, but his effort\nwas entirely vain. Presently he went into his bedroom with the intention\nof forcing himself to go, as usual, to bed. He began to undress slowly,\nand had taken off his coat and waistcoat when he felt that he must\nresume them; that he must remain, unnecessarily, up. He allowed the\nmental prompting to govern him, and hardly had he once more fully attired\nhimself when the electric bell in the passage rang twice. Valentine went\nto the door, opened it, and descended the flight of stone steps to the\nmain door of the house, which was locked at night. Julian was standing\noutside on the pavement.\n\n\"You are still up, then,\" he exclaimed. \"That's good. May I come in?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course. Where have you been to-night?\"\n\nThey were going up, their footsteps echoing hoarsely in the dim light.\n\n\"Nowhere.\"\n\n\"Then what made you turn out so late?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" Julian said, with an elaborate carelessness; \"I don't know. I\nthought we were becoming strangers, I suppose. And suddenly I resolved\nto look you up.\"\n\n\"I see,\" Valentine said, wondering why Julian was lying.\n\nBy this time they were in the flat and had shut the door behind them.\n\n\"Why haven't you been near me?\" Julian said.\n\n\"Why haven't you been near me?\"\n\n\"Oh--well--do you want to know really?\"\n\n\"Yes; if you have got a definite reason.\"\n\n\"To tell the truth, I have; but it is such an absurd one.\"\n\nJulian looked at Valentine and then added, with a decidedly forced laugh:\n\n\"You'll be awfully surprised when I tell you what it is, Val. I want\nto sit again.\"\n\n\"Now I know why I stopped undressing just now,\" said Valentine. \"I must\nhave had a sense that you were coming. Were you thinking very hard of me\nto-night and of our sittings?\"\n\n\"Rather! It is the oddest thing, but even since we had that talk with\nthe doctor and agreed to give the whole thing up, I've been perfectly\nmiserable. I haven't enjoyed a single thing I've done since that night.\"\n\n\"Nor I,\" said Valentine.\n\n\"What! you have been as bad? And without having Marr continually at your\nelbow!\"\n\n\"Marr again!\"\n\n\"Again! Yes, I should think so. That chap has taken a fancy to me,\nI suppose. Anyhow, directly I walk into the club, morning, noon, or\nnight, up he comes. He must live there. And the first thing he says is,\n'Have you gone on with your sittings? You should, you should.' To-day\nhe changed his formula and said, 'You must,' and when I was going away,\nhe looked at me in a damned odd way and remarked in his low, toneless\nvoice, 'You will.' I declare I almost think he must have a sort of\ninfluence over me, for I couldn't go to bed for the life of me, and\nhere I am. By the way, Marr seems to have a sort of power of divination.\nLast night, when I happened to see him, he began talking about doctors,\nand, by Jove, didn't he abuse them! He says they stand more in the way\nof the development of the spiritual forces in man than any other body\nof people. He denounced them all as low materialists, immersed in the\ntinkering of the flesh. 'What does the flesh matter?' he said. 'It is\nnothing. It is only an envelope. And the more tightly it is fastened\ntogether, the more it stifles the spirit. I would like to catch hold\nof some men's bodies and tear them in pieces to get at their souls.'\nVal, as he made that cheerful remark, he looked more like a homicidal\nmaniac than anything I ever saw.\"\n\n\"I suppose you didn't stand up for the doctors?\"\n\n\"But I did--for our little man. D'you think I wasn't going to say a word\nfor him?\"\n\n\"What! you mentioned his name to this chap?\"\n\n\"Certainly. Why not?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" Valentine said, hesitatingly.\n\n\"What objection could there possibly be?\"\n\n\"None, of course--none. I simply had a quite unreasonable feeling that I\nwished you hadn't. That is all.\"\n\nAnd then Valentine relapsed into silence, the silence some men keep when\nthey are needlessly, uselessly irritated. The mention of Marr's name had\neffected him oddly. He now felt a perverse desire not to sit, not comply\nwith the rather impertinent prediction of this dark-featured prophet\nwhom he had never seen. To carry out this prediction would seem like\nan obedience to a stranger, governing, unseen, and at a distance. Why\ndid this man concern himself in the affairs of those over whom he had\nno sovereignty, with whom he had no friendship?\n\n\"Julian,\" Valentine said at last, abruptly, \"I wish you would promise me\nsomething.\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"To drop this fellow, Marr. He has nothing to do with us, and it is a\ndecided impertinence, this curiosity he shows in our doings. Don't\nanswer any more of his questions. Tell him to keep his advice to himself.\nAnd if you really believe he is obtaining an influence over you, avoid\nhim.\"\n\n\"You talk as if you disliked him.\"\n\n\"I feel as if I hated him.\"\n\n\"A man you have never even seen?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Well, I don't take to him, and I have seen him. I will drop him as much\nas I can. I promise you that.\"\n\n\"Thank you, old boy.\"\n\nJulian fidgetted about rather uneasily, touching the ornaments on the\nmantelpiece, opening and shutting his silver cigarette-case with a click.\nIt was obvious that he felt restless and dissatisfied. Then he said:\n\n\"Well, are we going to--\"\n\n\"Surely you don't mean to say that you came here to-night to persuade\nme into doing again what we both decided not to do any more?\" asked\nValentine.\n\n\"I came to try,\" Julian replied with decision.\n\nHe looked at Valentine and then added:\n\n\"And do you know I have been thinking, especially to-day, that you were\nof the same mind as I.\"\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"That you wanted to sit again as much as I did.\"\n\n\"But I don't know Marr,\" Valentine said, with unusual sarcasm.\n\nJulian flushed red, like a man who has been stung.\n\n\"Perhaps he influences you through me, though,\" he said with a laugh.\n\n\"What nonsense, Julian! If I thought he had anything to do with the\nmatter, I would never sit again. But he can have nothing to do with it.\"\n\n\"Of course not. So will you sit? You want to give in. I know that.\"\n\n\"I do\"\n\n\"I was sure of it.\"\n\n\"At the same time, remember the doctor's advice.\"\n\n\"Oh, doctors are always against that sort of thing.\"\n\n\"Julian, I have a strong feeling that, should we ever get any\nmanifestation at all, it will be inimical, even deadly, to one or both\nof us. Each time we have sat a sensation of distress has taken hold of\nme, and each time with greater force.\"\n\n\"Nerves!\"\n\n\"Well, then, the hand which you say you held was nerves?\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But that is just it. I must know, or at least try to know. It\nis inevitable. We can't stop now, Val, whether we are standing on the\nthreshold of good, or evil, or--nothing at all. We have got to go on.\nBesides, you and I have not effected an exchange.\"\n\n\"Of souls? No. Perhaps it is an imbecile proceeding to try.\"\n\n\"No matter.\"\n\n\"Or a dangerous proceeding.\"\n\n\"You are temporizing, and the night is running away as hard as it can.\nCome, now, will you do what I want--yes or no?\"\n\nAfter a long hesitation, Valentine slowly answered:\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nAnd absurdly, as he said it, he felt like a man who tosses the dice for\nlife or death.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE FOURTH SITTING\n\n\nThey turned the light off and sat down in silence. Then Julian said:\n\n\"Keep your hands well away from mine, Val.\"\n\n\"I will.\"\n\nThey had not been sitting for five minutes before Valentine felt that the\natmosphere was becoming impregnated with a certain heaviness of mystery,\nwith a certain steady and unyielding dreariness hanging round them like a\ncloud. They were once again confronted by a strange reality. Surely they\nwere. Valentine felt it, silently knew it.\n\nIn this blackness he seemed at length to step forward and to stand upon\nthe very threshold of an abyss, beyond which, in vague vapours, lay\nthings unknown, creatures unsuspected hitherto. From this darkness\nanything might come to them, angel or devil, nymph or satyr. So, at\nleast, he dreamed for a while, giving his imagination the rein. Then,\nin a revulsion of feeling, he jeered at his folly, mutely scolded his\nnerves for spurring him to such flagrant imbecilities.\n\n\"This is all nonsense,\" he told himself, \"all fancy, all a world created,\npeopled, endowed with life by my desirous mind, which longs for a new\nsensation. I will not encourage this absurdity. I will be calm, cold,\nobservant, discriminating. This is the same darkness in which every\nnight I sleep, with no sense of being surrounded by forms which I cannot\nsee, pressed upon by the denizens of some other sphere, not that in which\nI breathe and live.\"\n\nHe deliberately detached himself from his mood of keen expectation, and\nardently resolved to anticipate nothing. And at this moment the table\nbegan to shift along the carpet, to twist under their hands, to rap, to\ntremble, and to pulsate, as if breath had entered into it. Like some live\nanimal it stirred beneath their pressing fingers.\n\n\"It is beginning,\" Julian whispered.\n\n\"Animal magnetism,\" Valentine murmured.\n\n\"Yes, of course,\" Julian replied. \"Shall I ask--\"\n\n\"Hush!\" Valentine interrupted.\n\nJulian was silent.\n\nFor some time the table continued its stereotyped performances. Then\nit tremblingly ceased, and stood, mere dead furniture of every day, wood\non which lay the four hands made deliberately limp. A long period of\nunpopulated silence ensued, and through that silence, very gradually,\ncame again to Valentine a growing sense of anxiety. At first he fought\nagainst it as most men, perhaps out of self-respect, fight against the\nentrance of fear into their souls. Then he yielded to it, and let it\ncrawl over him, as the sea crawls over flat sands. And the sea left no\ninch of sand uncovered. Every cranny of Valentine's soul was flooded.\nThere was no part of it which did not shudder with apprehension. And\noutwards flowed this invisible, unmurmuring tide, devouring his body,\ntill the sweat was upon his face and his strained hands and trembling\nfingers were cold like ice, and his knees fluttered as the knees of\npalsied age, and his teeth clicked, row against row, and his hairs\nstirred, and his head, under its thatch, tingled and burned and throbbed.\nEvery faculty, too, seemed to stand straight up like a sentinel at its\npost, staring into dust clouds through which rode an approaching enemy.\nEyes watched, ears listened, brain was hideously alert. The whole body\nkept itself tense, stiff, wary. For Valentine had a secret conviction\nat this moment that he was about to be attacked. By what? He was hardly\nmaster of himself enough to wonder. His thoughts no longer ran free.\nThey crept like paralyzed things about his mind, and that despite the\nunnatural vitality of his brain. It was as if he thought intensely,\nviolently, and yet could not think at all, as a man terrified may stare\nwith wide open eyes and yet perceive nothing, lacking for a moment the\nfaculty of perceiving. So Valentine waited, like some blind man with\nglaring eyeballs. And then, passing into another stage of sensation, he\nfound himself vehemently and rapidly discussing possibilities of terror,\nforming mental pictures of all the things, of all the powers, that we\ncannot see. He embodied, materialized, the wind, the voice of the sea,\nthe angry, hot scent of certain flowers, of the white lily, the tuberose,\nthe hyacinth. He created figures for light, for darkness, for a wail, for\na laugh, and set them in array all around him in the blackness. But none\nof these imagined figures could cause the horror which he felt. He drove\naway the whole pack of them with a silent cry, a motionless dismissing\nwave of his hands. But there might be other beings round us, condemned\nto eternal invisibility lest the sight of them should drive men mad. We\ncannot see them, he thought. As a rule, we have no sensation of these\ngaunt neighbours, no suspicion of their approach, of their companionship.\nWe do not hear their footsteps. We are utterly unconscious of them. Yet\nmay there not be physical or mental paroxysms, during which we become\nconscious of them, during which we know, beyond all power of doubt, that\nthey are near us, with us? And, in such paroxysms, is it not possible for\nthem to break through the intangible and yet all-powerful barriers that\ndivide them from us, and to touch us, caress us, attack us? Valentine\nbelieved that he was immersed in such a paroxysm, and that the barriers\nwere in process of being broken down. He seemed actually to hear the\nfaint cry of an approaching being, the dim uproar of its violent efforts\nto obtain its sinister will, and gain the power to make itself known to\nhim by some ghastly and malignant deed. He was unutterably afraid.\n\n\"The hand again!\" Julian suddenly cried. \"Valentine, is it yours? Why\ndon't you answer? I say, is it yours?\"\n\n\"No,\" Valentine forced himself, with difficulty, to reply.\n\n\"For God's sake then--the light!\"\n\nValentine felt for it, but his hand shook and did not find the button.\n\n\"Make haste, Val. What are you doing? Ah!\"\n\nThe room sprang into view, and Julian's eyes, with a furious, sick\neagerness, sought his hands.\n\n\"Valentine,\" he exclaimed hoarsely, \"I see nothing, but I've got hold of\nthe hand still. I've got it tight. Put your hand here--that's it--under\nmine. Now d'you feel the thing?\"\n\nJulian's hand, contracted as if grasping another, was in the air, about\nan inch, or an inch and a half, above the surface of the table. Valentine\nobediently thrust his hand beneath it. He now shook his head.\n\n\"I feel nothing,\" he said. \"There is nothing.\"\n\n\"Then am I mad?\" said Julian. \"I'm holding flesh and blood. I'll swear\nthat. Yes, I can feel the fingers twitching, the muscles, the bones. I\ncan even trace the veins. What does this mean?\"\n\n\"I can't tell.\"\n\n\"You look very strange, Valentine. You are certain you see and feel\nnothing?\"\n\n\"Nothing whatever,\" Valentine forced himself to answer calmly.\n\n\"We'll see this through,\" said Julian with a sort of angry determination.\n\"I won't be frightened by a hand. We'll see it through. Out with the\nlight.\"\n\nValentine turned it off. The action was purely mechanical. He had to\nperform it, whether he would or no.\n\n\"Don't speak,\" he whispered to Julian in the darkness. \"Don't speak,\nwhatever happens, till I ask you to speak.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Don't; don't!\"\n\n\"All right.\"\n\nThey sat still.\n\nAnd now the horror that had possessed Valentine so utterly began to\nfade away, making its exit from his body and soul with infinitesimally\nsmall steps. At length it had quite gone, and its place was taken by a\nnumb calm, level and still at first, then curiously definite, almost\ntoo definite to be calm at all. Gradually this calm withdrew into\nexhaustion, an exhaustion such as dwells incessantly with the anemic,\nwith those whose hearts beat feebly and whose vitality flickers low to\nfading. That was like a delicious arrival of death, of death delicate\nand serene, ivory white and pure, death desirable, grateful. Valentine\nindeed believed that he was dying, there in the darkness beside his\nfriend, and, impersonally as it seemed, something of him, his brain\nperhaps, seemed to be floating high up, as a bird floats over the sea,\nand listening, and noting all that he did in this crisis. This attentive\nspirit heard a strange movement of his soul in its bodily prison, heard\nhis soul stir, as if waking out of sleep, heard it shift, and rise up\nslowly, noted its pause of hesitation. Then, as the vitality of the body\nebbed lower, there grew in the soul an excitement that aspired like a\nleaping flame. It was as if a madman, prisoned in his narrow cell in a\nvast asylum, secluded with his company of phantoms, heard the crackling\nof the fire that devoured his habitation, and was stirred into an\nignorant and yet tumultuous passion. As the madman, with a childish,\nincreasing uneasiness, awed by the sinuous approach of the unseen fire,\nmight pace to and fro, round and round about his cell, so it seemed to\nthis poised, watching faculty of Valentine that his soul wandered in\nits confined cell of the body, at first with the cushioned softness\nof an animal, moving mechanically, driven by an endless and unmeaning\nrestlessness, then with an increasing energy, a fervour, a crescendo of\nendeavour. What drove his soul? Surely it was struggling with an unseen\npower. And the steady diminuendo of his bodily forces continued, until\nhe was a corpse in which a fury dwelt. That fury was the soul. He had a\nstrange fancy that he, unlike all the rest of humanity, would die, yet\nstill retain his spirit in its fleshy prison, and that the spirit\nscreamed and fought to be free on its wayward pilgrimage to heaven or\nhell. All its brother and sister spirits had fled, since the beginnings\nof time, from their bodies at the crisis of dissolution, had gone to\npunishment or to reward. His soul alone was to meet a different fate,\nwas to be confined in a decaying body, to breathe physical corruption,\nand to be at home in a crumbling dwelling to which no light, no air,\ncould ever penetrate. And the soul, which knows instinctively its eternal\n_m\u00eatier_, rebelled with a fantastic violence. And still, ever, the body\ndied. The pulses ceased from beating. The warm blood was mixed with snow\nuntil it grew cold and gradually congealed in the veins. The little door\nof the heart swung slower and slower upon its hinges, more feebly--more\nfeebly. And then there came a supreme moment. The soul of Valentine, with\na frantic vehemence, beat down at last its prison door, and, even as his\nbody died, escaped with a cry through the air.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"Valentine, did you hear that strange cry?\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"Valentine, what was it? I never heard any sound like that before, so\nthin and small, and yet so horribly clear and piercing; neither like the\ncry of a child nor of an animal, nor like the wail that could come from\nany instrument. Valentine, now I see a little flame come from where you\nare sitting. It's so tiny and faint. Don't you see it? It is floating\ntoward me. Now it is passing me. It's beyond. It's going. There, it has\nvanished. Valentine! Valentine!\"\n\n\n\n\nBOOK II--JULIAN\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE TRANCE\n\n\nGaining no reply to his call, Julian grew alarmed. He sprang up from\nthe table and turned on the electric light. Valentine was leaning back\nnervelessly in his chair. His face was quite pale and cold. His lips were\nslightly parted. His eyes were wide open and stared before him without\nexpression. His head hung far back over the edge of his chair. He looked\nexactly like a man who had just died, and died in a convulsion. For\nthough the lips were parted, the teeth set tightly together grinned\nthrough them, and the hands were intensely contracted into fists. Julian\nseized Valentine in his arms, lifted the drooping body from the chair\nand laid it out at length on the divan. He put a pillow under the head,\nwhich fell on it grotesquely and lay sideways, still smiling horribly at\nnothing. Then he poured out a glass of brandy and strove to force some\nof it between Valentine's teeth, dashed water in the glaring eyes, beat\nthe air with a fan which he tore from the mantelpiece. All was in vain.\nThere came no sign of returning life. Then Julian caught Valentine's\nhands in his and sought to unclench the rigid, cold fingers. He laid\nhis hand on the heart of his friend. No pulsation beat beneath his\nanxious touch. Then a great horror overtook him. Suddenly he felt a\nconviction that Valentine had died beside him in the dark, had died\nsitting up in his chair by the table. The cry he had heard, so thin, so\nstrange and piercing, the attenuated flame that he had seen, were the\nvoice and the vision of the flying soul which he had loved, seeking its\nfinal freedom, _en route_ to the distant spheres believers dream of and\nsceptics deny.\n\n\"Valentine! Valentine!\" he cried again, with the desperate insistence of\nthe hopeless. But the cold, staring creature upon the green divan did not\nreply. With a brusque and fearful movement Julian shut the eyelids. Would\nthey ever open again? He knelt upon the floor, leaning passionately over\nhis friend, or that which had been his friend. He bent his head down on\nthe silent breast, listening. Surely if Valentine were alive he would\nshow it by some sign, the least stir, breath, shiver, pulse. There was\nnone. Julian might have been clasping stone or iron. If he could only\nknow for certain whether Valentine were really dead. Yet he dared not\nleave him alone and go to seek aid. Suddenly a thought struck him. In the\nhall of the flat was a handle which, when turned in a certain direction,\ncommunicated with one of those wooden and glass hutches in which sleepy\nboy-messengers harbour at night. Julian sprang to this handle, set the\ncommunicator in motion, then ran back into the tentroom. His intention\nwas to write a note to Dr. Levillier. The writing-table was so placed\nthat, sitting at it, his back would be turned to that silent figure on\nthe divan. A shiver ran over him at the bare thought of such a blind\nposture. No, he must face that terror, once so dear. He caught up a\npen and a sheet of note paper, and, swerving round, was about to write,\nholding the paper on his knee, when the electric bell rang. The boy had\nbeen very quick in his run from the hutch. Julian laid down the paper and\nwent to let the boy in. His knees shook as he descended the dark, echoing\nstairs and opened the door. There stood the messenger, a rosy-faced\nurchin of about twelve, with rather sleepy brown eyes.\n\n\"Come up,\" Julian said, and he hurried back to the flat, the little boy\nviolently emulating his giant stride up the stairs and arriving flushed\nand panting at the door. Julian, who was entirely abstracted in his\nagitation, made for the tentroom without another word to the boy, seized\npen and paper and began to write, urgently requesting Dr. Levillier to\ncome at once to see Valentine. Abruptly a childish voice intruded itself\nupon him.\n\n\"Lor', sir,\" it said. \"Is the gentleman ill?\"\n\nJulian glanced up and found that the little boy had innocently followed\nhim into the tentroom, and was now standing near him, gazing with a\nround-eyed concern upon the stretched figure on the divan.\n\n\"Yes,\" Julian replied; \"ill, very ill. I want you to go for a doctor.\"\n\nThe boy approached the divan, moved apparently by the impelling curiosity\nof tender years. Julian stopped writing and watched him. He leaned down\nand looked at the face, at the inertia of hands and limbs. As he raised\nhimself up from a calm and close inspection he saw Julian staring at him.\nHe shook his round bullet head, on which the thick hair grew in an\nunparted stubble.\n\n\"No, I don't think he's ill, sir,\" he remarked, with treble conviction.\n\n\"Then why does he lie like that?\"\n\n\"I expect it's because he's dead, sir,\" the child replied, with grave\nserenity.\n\nThis unbiased testimony in favour of his fears came to Julian's mind like\na storm.\n\n\"How do you know?\" he exclaimed, with a harsh voice.\n\n\"Lor', sir,\" the boy said, not without a certain pride, \"I knows a corpse\nwhen I sees it. My father died come a fortnight ago. See that?\"\n\nAnd he indicated, with stumpy finger, the black band upon his left arm.\n\n\"Well, father looked just like the gentleman.\"\n\nJulian was petrified by this urchin's intimacy with death. It struck\nhim as utterly vicious and terrible. A horror of the rosy-faced little\ncreature, with good-conduct medals gleaming on its breast, came over him.\n\n\"Hush!\" he said.\n\n\"All right, sir; but you take my word for it, the gentleman's dead.\"\n\nJulian finished the note, thrust it into an envelope, and addressed it to\nthe doctor.\n\n\"Run and get a cab and take that at once to Harley Street,\" he said.\n\nThe boy smiled.\n\n\"I like cab-riding,\" he said.\n\n\"And,\" Julian caught his arm, \"that gentleman is not dead. He's alive,\nI tell you; only in a faint, and alive.\"\n\nThe boy looked into Julian's face with the pitying grin of superior\nknowledge of the world.\n\n\"Ah, sir, you didn't see father,\" he said.\n\nThen he turned and bounded eagerly down the stairs, in a hurry for the\ncab-ride.\n\nLoneliness and desolation descended like a cloud over Julian when he had\ngone, for the frank belief of the boy, who cared nothing, struck like an\narrow of truth to his heart, who cared everything. Was Valentine indeed\ndead? He would not believe it, for such a belief would bring the world in\nruins about his feet. Such a belief would people his soul with phantoms\nof despair and of wickedness. Could he not cry out against God in\nblasphemy, if God took his friend from him? The tears rushed into his\neyes, as he sat waiting there in the night. As before a drowning man,\nscenes of the last five years flashed before him, painted in vital\ncolours,--scenes of his life with Valentine,--then scenes of all that\nmight have been had he never met Valentine, never known his strange\nmastering influence. Could that influence have been given only to be\nwithdrawn? Of all the inexplicable things of life the most inexplicable\nare the abrupt intrusions and disappearances of those lovely\nmanifestations which give healing to tired hearts, to the wounded\nsoldiers of the campaign of the world. Why are they not permitted to\nstay? Bitterly Julian asked that question. Of all the men whom he knew,\nonly Valentine did anything for him. Must Valentine, of all men, be the\none who might not stay with him? The rest he could spare. He could not\nspare Valentine. He could not. The impotence of his patience tortured him\nphysically, like a disease. He sprang up from his chair. He must do\nsomething at once to know the truth. What could he do? He had no\nknowledge of medicine. He could not tabulate physical indications, and\nhe would not trust to his infernal instinct. For it was that which cried\nto him again and again, \"Valentine is dead.\" What--what could he do?\n\nA thought darted into his mind. Dogs are miraculously instinctive. Rip\nmight know what he did not certainly know, might divine the truth. He ran\ninto Valentine's bedroom.\n\n\"Rip,\" he cried; \"Rip!\"\n\nThe little dog sprang from its lonely sleep and accompanied Julian\nenergetically to the tentroom. Observing Valentine's attitude, it sprang\nupon the couch beside him, licked his white face eagerly, then, gaining\nno response, showed hesitation, alarm. It began to investigate the body\neagerly with its sharp nose, snuffing at head, shoulders, legs, feet.\nStill it seemed in doubt, and paused at length with one fore foot planted\non Valentine's breast, the other raised in air.\n\n\"Even Rip is at fault,\" Julian said to himself. But as the words ran\nthrough his mind, the little dog grew suddenly calmer. It dropped the\nhesitating paw, again licked the face, then nestled quietly into the\nspace between Valentine's left breast and arm, rested its chin on the\nlatter, and with blinking eyes prepared evidently for repose. A wild\nhope came again to Julian.\n\n\"Valentine is not dead,\" he said to himself. \"He is in some strange\nhypnotic trance. Presently he will recover from it. He will be well.\nThank God! Thank God! I will watch!\"\n\nAnd so he kept an attentive and hopeful vigil, his eyes always upon\nValentine's face, his hand always touching Valentine's. Already life\nseemed blossoming anew with an inexplicable radiance. Valentine would\nspeak once more, would come back from this underworld of the senses.\nAnd Julian's hand closed on his cold hand with a warm, impulsive\nstrength, as if it might be possible to draw him back physically to\nconsciousness and to speech. But there was no answer. And again Julian\nwas assailed with doubts. Yet the dog slept on happily, a hostage to\npeace.\n\nJulian never knew how long that vigil lasted. It might have been five\nminutes, or a lifetime. The vehemence of his mental debate slew his\npower of observation of normal things. He forgot what he was waiting\nfor. He forgot to expect Dr. Levillier. Two visions alternated in glaring\ncontrast before the eyes of his brain--life with Valentine, and life\nwithout him. It is so we watch the trance, or death,--we know not\nwhich,--of those whom we love, with a greedy, beautiful selfishness.\nThey are themselves only in relation to us. They live, they die, in that\nwonderful relation. To live is to be with us; to die, to go away from us.\nThere are women who love so much that they angrily expostulate with the\ndying, as if indeed the dying deliberately elected to depart out of their\narms. Do we not all feel at moments the \"You could stay with me, if only\nyou had the will!\" that is the last bitter cry of despairing affection?\nJulian, sitting there, while Valentine lay silent and the dog slept by\nhis breast, saw ever and ever those two lives, flashing and fading like\nlamps across a dark sea, life with, life without, him. The immensity of\nthe contrast, the millions of airy miles between those two life-worlds,\nappalled him, for it revealed to him what mighty issues of joy and grief\nhung upon the almost visionary thin thread of one little life. It is\nghastly to be so idiotically dependent. Yet who, at some time, is not?\nAnd those who are independent lose, by their power, their possible\nParadise. But such a time of uncertainty as that which Julian must now\nendure is a great penalty to pay for even the greatest joy, when the\njoy is past. He had his trance of the mind. He was hypnotized by his\nignorance whether Valentine were alive or dead. And so he sat motionless,\nmaking the tour of an eternity of suffering, of wonder, of doubt, and\nhope, and yet, through it all, in some strange, indefinite way, numb,\nphlegmatic, and actually stupid.\n\nAt last the bell rang. Dr. Levillier had arrived. He was struck at once\nby Julian's heaviness of manner.\n\n\"What is it? What is the matter?\" he asked.\n\n\"I don't know. You tell me.\"\n\n\"He is fainting--unconscious?\"\n\n\"Unconscious, yes.\"\n\nThey were in the little hall now. Doctor Levillier narrowly scrutinized\nJulian. For a moment he thought Julian had been drinking, and he took him\nby the arm.\n\n\"No; it is fear,\" he murmured, releasing him, and walking into the\ntentroom.\n\nJulian followed with a loud footstep, treading firmly. Each step said to\nDeath, \"You are not here. You are not here.\"\n\nHe stood at a little distance near the door, while Levillier approached\nValentine and bent over him. Rip woke up and curled his top lip in a\nterrier smile of welcome. The doctor stroked his head, then lifted\nValentine's hand and held the wrist. He dropped it, and threw a glance\non Julian. There was a scream of interrogation in Julian's fixed eyes.\nDoctor Levillier avoided it by dropping his own, and again turning his\nattention to the figure on the divan. He undid Valentine's shirt, bared\nthe breast, and laid his hand on the heart, keeping it there for a long\ntime.\n\n\"Fetch me a hand-glass,\" he said to Julian.\n\nMechanically, Julian went into the bedroom, and groped in the dark upon\nthe dressing-table.\n\n\"Well, have you got it? Why don't you turn up the light?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" Julian answered, drily.\n\nDoctor Levillier saw that anxiety was beginning to unnerve him. When the\nglass was found the doctor led Julian back to the tentroom and pushed him\ngently down in a chair.\n\n\"Keep quiet,\" he said. \"And--keep hoping.\"\n\n\"There is--there is--hope?\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\nThen the doctor held the little glass to Valentine's lips. The bright\nsurface was not dimmed. No breath of life tarnished it to dulness. Again\nthe doctor felt his heart, drew his eyelids apart, and carefully examined\nthe eyes, then turned slowly round.\n\n\"Doctor--doctor!\" Julian whispered. \"Why do you turn away? What are you\ngoing to do?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier made a gesture of finale, and knelt on the floor by\nValentine. His head was bowed. His lips moved silently. Julian saw that\nhe was praying, and sprang up fiercely. All the frost of his senses\nthawed in a moment. He seized Levillier by the shoulders.\n\n\"Don't pray!\" he cried out; \"don't pray. Curse! Curse as I do! If he's\ndead you shall not pray. You shall not! You shall not!\"\n\nThe little doctor drew him down to his knees.\n\n\"Julian, hush! My science tells me Valentine is dead.\"\n\nJulian opened his white lips, but the doctor, with a motion, silenced\nhim, and added, pointing to Rip, who still lay happily by his master's\nside:\n\n\"But that dog seems to tell me he is alive; that this is some strangely\ncomplete and perfect simulation of death, some unnatural sleep of the\nsenses. Pray, pray with me that Valentine may wake.\"\n\nAnd, kneeling by his friend, with bent head, Julian strove to pray. The\nanswer to that double prayer pierced the two men. It was so instant, and\nso bizarre, fighting against probability, yet heralding light, and the\nend of that night's pale circumstances.\n\nRip, relapsing quickly from his perfunctory smile on the doctor, had\nagain fallen asleep with an evident exceeding confidence and comfort,\nsnoring his way into an apparent peace that passed all understanding. But\nscarcely had the doctor spoken, giving Julian hope, than the little dog\nsuddenly opened its eyes, shifted round in its nest of arm and bosom,\nsmelt furtively at Valentine's hand. Then it turned from the hand to the\nside of its master, investigated it with a supreme anxiety, pursued its\nsearch as far as the white, strict face and bared bosom. From the face\nit recoiled, and with a piercing howl like the scream of a dog run over\nby a cart, it sprang away, darted to the farthest corner of the room,\nand huddled close against the wall in an agony of terror.\n\nJulian turned cold. He believed implicitly that the trance at that very\nmoment had deepened into death, and that the sleepless instinct of the\ndog had divined it partially while he slept, and now knew it and was\nafraid. And the same error of belief shook Dr. Levillier. A spasm crossed\nhis thin, earnest face. No death had ever hurt him so sharply as this\ndeath hurt him. He saw Julian recoil in horror from the divan, and he\ncould say nothing. For he, too, felt horror.\n\nBut in this moment of despair Valentine's hands slowly unclenched\nthemselves, and the fingers were gradually extended as by a man\nstretching himself after a long sleep.\n\nThe doctor saw this, but believed himself a victim of a delusion, tricked\nby the excitement of his mind into foolish visions. And Julian had turned\nquite away, trembling. But now Valentine moved slightly, pressed his\nelbows on the cushions that supported him, and half sat up, still with\nclosed eyes.\n\n\"Julian,\" Dr. Levillier said in a low, summoning voice,--\"Julian, do you\nsee what I see? Is he indeed alive? Julian.\"\n\nThen Julian, turning, saw, with the doctor, Valentine sit up erect, open\nhis eyes and gaze upon his two friends with a grave, staring scrutiny.\n\n\"Valentine, Valentine, how you frightened me! How you terrified me!\"\nJulian at last found a voice to exclaim. \"Thank God, thank God! you are\nalive. Oh, Valentine, you are alive; you are not dead.\"\n\nValentine's lips smiled slowly.\n\n\"Dead,\" he answered. \"No; I am not dead.\"\n\nAnd again he smiled quietly, as a man smiles at some secret thought\nwhich tickles him or whips the sense of humour in him till, like an\nobeying dog, it dances.\n\nDr. Levillier, having regained his feet, stood silently looking at\nValentine, all his professional instinct wide awake to note this\napparent resurrection from the dead.\n\n\"You here, doctor!\" said Valentine. \"Why, what does this all mean?\"\n\n\"I want you to tell me that,\" Levillier said. \"And you,\" he added, now\nturning towards Julian.\n\nBut Julian was too much excited to answer. His eyes were blazing with joy\nand with emotion. And Valentine seemed still to be informed with a\ncurious, serpentine lassitude. The life seemed to be only very gently\nrunning again over his body, creeping from the centre, from the heart, to\nthe extremities, gradually growing in the eyes, stronger and stronger, a\ndawn of life in a full-grown man. Dr. Levillier had never seen anything\nquite like it before. There was something violently unnatural about it,\nhe thought, yet he could not say what. He could only stand by the broad\ncouch, fascinated by the spectacle under his gaze. Once he had read a\ntale of the revivifying of a mummy in a museum. That might have been like\nthis; or the raising of Lazarus. The streams of strength almost visibly\ntrickled through Valentine's veins. And this new life was so vigorous,\nso alert. It was as if during his strange sleep Valentine had been\ncarpentering his energies, polishing his powers, setting the temple\nof his soul in order, gaining almost a ruthlessness from rest. He\nstretched his limbs now as an athlete might stretch them to win the full\nconsciousness of their muscular force. When the doctor took hold of his\nhand to feel his pulse the hand was hard and tense like iron, the fingers\ngripped for a moment like thin bands of steel, and the life in the blue\neyes bounded, raced, swirled as water swirls in a mill-stream. Indeed,\nDr. Levillier felt as if there was too much life in them, as if the cup\nhad been filled with wine until the wine ran over. He put his fingers\non the pulse. It was strong and rapid and did not fluctuate, but beat\nsteadily. He felt the heart. That, too, throbbed strongly. And while he\nmade his examination Valentine smiled at him.\n\n\"I'm all right, you see,\" Valentine said.\n\n\"All right,\" the doctor echoed, still possessed by the feeling that there\nlurked almost a danger in this apparently abounding health.\n\n\"What was it all?\" Julian asked eagerly. \"Was it a trance?\"\n\n\"A trance?\" Valentine said. \"Yes, I suppose so.\"\n\nHe put his feet to the floor, stood up, and again stretched all his\nlimbs. His eyes fell upon Rip, who was still in the corner, huddled up,\nhis teeth showing, his eyes almost starting out of his head.\n\n\"Rip,\" he said, holding out his hand and slapping his knee, \"come here!\nCome along! Rip! Rip! What's the matter with him?\"\n\n\"He thought you were dead,\" said Julian. \"Poor little chap. Rip, it's all\nright. Come!\"\n\nBut the dog refused to be pacified, and still displayed every symptom of\nangry fear. At last Valentine, weary of calling the dog, went towards it\nand stooped to pick it up. At the downward movement of its master the dog\nshrank back, gathered itself together, then suddenly sprang forward with\na harsh snarl and tried to fasten its teeth in his face. Valentine jumped\nback just in time.\n\n\"He must have gone mad,\" he exclaimed. \"Julian, see what you can do with\nhim.\"\n\nCuriously enough, Rip welcomed Julian's advances with avidity, nestled\ninto his arms, but when he walked toward Valentine, struggled to escape\nand trembled in every limb.\n\n\"How extraordinary!\" Julian said. \"Since your trance he seems to have\ntaken a violent dislike to you. What can it mean?\"\n\n\"Oh, nothing probably. He will get over it. Put him into the other room.\"\n\nJulian did so and returned.\n\nDoctor Levillier was now sitting in an arm-chair. His light, kind\neyes were fixed on Valentine with a scrutiny so intense as to render\nthe expression of his usually gentle face almost stern. But Valentine\nappeared quite unconscious of his gaze and mainly attentive to all that\nJulian said and did. All this time the doctor had not said a word. Now\nhe spoke.\n\n\"You spoke of a trance?\" he said, interrogatively.\n\nJulian looked as guilty as a cribbing schoolboy discovered in his dingy\nact.\n\n\"Doctor, Val and I have to crawl to you for forgiveness,\" he said.\n\n\"To me--why?\"\n\n\"We have disobeyed you.\"\n\n\"But I should never give you an order.\"\n\n\"Your advice is a command to those who know you, doctor,\" said Valentine,\nwith a sudden laugh.\n\n\"And what advice of mine have you put in the corner with its face to the\nwall?\"\n\n\"We have been table-turning again.\"\n\n\"Ah!\"\n\nDoctor Levillier formed his lips into the shape assumed by one whistling.\n\n\"And this has been the result?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Julian cried. \"Never, as long as I live, will I sit again. Val, if\nyou go down on your knees to me--\"\n\n\"I shall not do that,\" Valentine quietly interposed. \"I have no desire to\nsit again now.\"\n\n\"You both seem set against such dangerous folly at last,\" said the\ndoctor. \"Give me your solemn promise to stick to what you have said.\"\n\nAnd the two young men gave it, Julian with a strong gravity, Valentine\nwith a light smile. Julian had by no means recovered his usual gaiety.\nThe events of the night had seriously affected him. He was excited and\nemotional, and now he grasped Valentine by the arm as he exclaimed:\n\n\"Valentine, tell me, what made you give that strange cry just before\nyou went into your trance? Were you frightened? or did something--that\nhand--touch you? Or what was it?\"\n\n\"A cry?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"It was not I.\"\n\n\"Didn't you hear it?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nJulian turned to the doctor.\n\n\"It was an unearthly sound,\" he said. \"Like nothing I have ever heard or\nimagined. And, doctor, just afterward I saw something, something that\nmade me believe Valentine was really dead.\"\n\n\"What was it?\"\n\nJulian hesitated. Then he avoided directly replying to the question.\n\n\"Doctor,\" he said, \"of course I needn't ask you if you have often been at\ndeathbeds?\"\n\n\"I have. Very often,\" Levillier replied.\n\n\"I have never seen any one die,\" Julian continued, still with excitement.\n\"But people have told me, people who have watched by the dying, that at\nthe moment of death sometimes a tiny flame, a sort of shadow almost,\ncomes from the lips of the corpse and evaporates into the air. And they\nsay that flame is the soul going out of the body.\"\n\n\"I have never seen that,\" Levillier said. \"And I have watched many\ndeaths.\"\n\n\"I saw such a flame to-night,\" Julian said. \"After I heard the cry, I\ndistinctly saw a flame come from where Valentine was sitting and float up\nand disappear in the darkness. And--and afterwards, when Valentine lay so\nstill and cold, I grew to believe that flame was his soul and that I had\nactually seen him die in the dark.\"\n\n\"Imagination,\" Valentine said, rather abruptly. \"All imagination. Wasn't\nit, doctor?\"\n\n\"Probably,\" Levillier said. \"Darkness certainly makes things visible that\ndo not exist. I have patients who are perfectly sane, yet whom I forbid\never to be entirely in the dark. Remove all objects from their sight, and\nthey immediately see non-existent things.\"\n\n\"You think that flame came only from my inner consciousness?\" Julian\nasked.\n\n\"I suspect so. Shut your eyes now.\"\n\nJulian did so. Doctor Levillier bent over and pressed his two forefingers\nhard on Julian's eyes. After a moment,\n\n\"What do you see?\" he asked.\n\n\"Nothing,\" Julian replied.\n\n\"Wait a little longer. Now what do you see?\"\n\n\"Now I see a broad ring of yellow light edged with ragged purple.\"\n\n\"Exactly. You see flame-colour.\"\n\nHe removed his fingers and Julian opened his eyes.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said. \"But that cry. I most distinctly heard it.\"\n\n\"Imitate it.\"\n\n\"That would be impossible. It was too strange. Are the ears affected by\ndarkness?\"\n\n\"The sense of hearing is intimately affected by suspense. If you do not\nlisten attentively you may fail to hear a sound that is. If you listen\ntoo attentively you may succeed in hearing a sound that is not. Now, shut\nyour eyes again.\"\n\nJulian obeyed.\n\n\"I am going to clap my hands presently,\" said the doctor. \"Tell me as\nsoon as you have heard me do so.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier made no movement for some time. Then he softly leant\nforward, extended his arms in the air, and made the motion of clapping\nhis hands close to Julian's face. In reality he did not touch one hand\nwith the other, yet Julian cried out:\n\n\"I heard you clap them then.\"\n\n\"I have not clapped them at all,\" Levillier said.\n\nJulian expressed extreme surprise.\n\n\"You see how very easy it is for the senses to be deceived,\" the doctor\nadded. \"Once stir the nervous system into an acute state of anticipation,\nand it will conjure up for you a veritable panorama of sights, sounds,\nbodily sensations. But throw it into that state once too often, and the\npanorama, instead of passing and disappearing, may remain fixed for a\ntime, even forever, before your eyes, your ears, your touch. And that\nmeans recurrent or permanent madness. Valentine, I desire you most\nespecially to remember that.\"\n\nHe uttered the words weightily, with very definite intention. Valentine,\nwho still seemed to be in an unusually lazy or careless mood, laughed\neasily.\n\n\"I will remember,\" he said.\n\nHe yawned.\n\n\"My trance has made me sleepy,\" he added.\n\nThe doctor got up.\n\n\"Yes; bed is the best place for you,\" he said.\n\n\"And for us all, I suppose,\" added Julian. \"Though I feel as if I could\nnever sleep again.\"\n\nThe doctor went out into the hall to get his coat, leaving the friends\nalone for a moment.\n\n\"I am still so excited,\" Julian went on. \"Dear old fellow! How good it is\nto see you yourself again. I made up my mind that you were dead. This is\nlike a resurrection. Oh, Val, if you had been dead, really!\"\n\n\"What would you have done?\"\n\n\"Done! I don't know. Gone to the devil, probably.\"\n\n\"Do you know where to find him?\"\n\n\"My dear boy, he is in every London street, to begin with.\"\n\n\"In Victoria Street, even. I was only laughing.\"\n\n\"But tell me, what did you feel?\"\n\n\"Nothing. As if I slept.\"\n\n\"And you really heard, saw, nothing?\"\n\n\"Nothing.\"\n\n\"And that hand?\"\n\nValentine smiled again, and seemed to hesitate. But then he replied,\nquietly:\n\n\"I told you I could not feel it.\"\n\n\"I did, until I heard that dreadful cry, and then it was suddenly drawn\naway from me.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier appeared in the doorway with his overcoat on, but Julian\ndid not notice him. Again his excitement was rising. He began to pace up\nand down the room.\n\n\"My God!\" he said, vehemently, \"what would Marr say to all this? What\ndoes it mean? What can it mean?\"\n\n\"Don't let us bother too much about it.\"\n\n\"Excellent advice,\" said Levillier, from the doorway.\n\nJulian stood still.\n\n\"Doctor, I can understand your attitude,\" he said. \"But what an amazing\nbeing you are, Val. You are as calm and collected as if you had sat and\nheld converse with spirits all through your life. And yet something has\ngoverned you, has temporarily deprived you of life. For you were to all\nintents and purposes dead while you were in that trance.\"\n\n\"Death is simply nothing, and nothingness does not excite or terrify one.\nI never felt better than I do at this moment.\"\n\n\"That's well,\" said Levillier, cheerfully.\n\nJulian regarded Valentine's pure, beautiful face with astonishment.\n\n\"And you never looked better.\"\n\n\"I shall sleep exquisitely to-night, or rather this morning,\" Valentine\nsaid.\n\nAs he spoke he drew away the heavy green curtain that hung across the\nwindow. A very pale shaft of light stole in and lit up his white face.\n\nIt was the dawn, and, standing there, he looked like the spirit of the\ndawn, painted against the dying night in such pale colours, white, blue,\nand shadowy gold, a wonder of death and of life.\n\nIn the silence Dr. Levillier and Julian gazed at him, and he seemed a\nmystery to them both, a strange enigma of purity and of unearthliness.\n\n\"Good-bye, Cresswell,\" Levillier said at last.\n\n\"Good-bye, doctor.\"\n\n\"Good-bye, Valentine.\"\n\nJulian held out his hand to grasp his friend's, but Valentine began\nlooping up the curtain and did not take it. In his gentlest voice he said\nto Julian:\n\n\"Good-bye, dear Julian, good-bye. The dawn is on our friendship, Julian.\"\n\n\"Yes, Valentine.\"\n\nValentine added, after a moment of apparent reflection:\n\n\"Take Rip away with you just for to-night. I don't want to be bitten in\nmy sleep.\"\n\nAnd when Julian went away, the little dog eagerly followed him, pressing\nclose to his heels, so close that several times Julian could not avoid\nkicking him.\n\nAs soon as the flat door had closed on his two friends, Valentine walked\ndown the passage to the drawing-room, which was shrouded in darkness. He\nentered it without turning on the light, and closed the door behind him.\nHe remained in the room for perhaps a quarter of an hour. At length the\ndoor opened again. He emerged out of the blackness. There was a calm\nsmile on his face. Two of his fingers were stained with blood, and to one\na fragment of painted canvas adhered.\n\nWhen Valentine's man-servant went into the room in the morning and drew\nup the blinds, he found, to his horror, the picture of \"The Merciful\nKnight\" lying upon the floor. The canvas hung from the gold frame in\nshreds, as if rats had been gnawing it.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE PICCADILLY EPISODE\n\n\nDoctor Levillier and Julian bade each other good-bye on the doorstep.\nThe doctor hailed a hansom, but Julian preferred to walk. He wished to be\nalone, to feel the cold touch of the air on his face. The dawn was indeed\njust breaking, ever so wearily. A strong wind came up with it over the\nhousetops, and Victoria Street looked dreary in the faint, dusky, grey\nlight, which grew as slowly in the cloudy sky as hope in a long-starved\nheart. Julian lived in Mayfair, and he now walked forward slowly towards\nGrosvenor Place, making a deliberate detour for the sake of exercising\nhis limbs. He was glad to be out under the sky, glad to feel the breeze\non his face, and to be free from the horror of that little room in which\nhe had kept so appalling a vigil. The dull lines of the houses stretching\naway through the foggy perspective were gracious to his eyes. His feet\nwelcomed the hard fibre of the pavement. They had learned in that night\nalmost to shudder at the softness of a thick carpet. And all his senses\nbegan to come out of their bondage and to renew their normal sanity. Only\nnow did Julian realize how strenuous that bondage had been, a veritable\nslavery of the soul. Such a slavery could surely only have been possible\nwithin the four walls of a building. An artificial environment must be\nnecessary to such an artificial condition of feeling. For Julian now\ngradually began to believe that Dr. Levillier was right, and that he had\nsomehow allowed himself to become unnaturally affected and strung up. He\ncould believe this in the air and in the dawn. For he escaped out of\nprison as he walked, and heard the dirty sparrows begin to twitter as\nthey sank to the brown puddles in the roadway, or soared to the soot that\nclung round the chimneys which they loved.\n\nAnd yet he had been communing with death, had for the first time\ncompletely realized the fact and the meaning of death. What a demon\nof the world it was, sly, bitter, chuckling at its power, the one\nthing, surely, that has perfect enjoyment of all the things in the\nscheme of the earth. What a trick it had played on Julian and on\nValentine. What a trick! And as this idea struck into Julian's mind he\nfound himself on the pavement by the chemist's shop that is opposite to\nthe underground railway station of Victoria. His eyes fell on the hutch\nof the boy-messengers, and he beheld through the glass shutter three\nheads. He crossed the road and tapped on the glass. A young man pulled\nit up.\n\n\"Want to send a message, sir?\"\n\n\"No. I wish to speak to one of your boys, if the one I mean is here. Ah,\nthere he is.\"\n\nJulian pointed to his little Hermes of the midnight, who was crouched\nwithin, uneasily sleeping, his chin nestling wearily among the medals\nwhich his exemplary conduct had won for him. The young man shook the\nchild by the shoulder.\n\n\"Hulloh, Bob!\" he yelled. \"Here's a gentleman wants to speak to yer.\"\n\nBob came from his dreams with a jerk, and stared upon Julian with his big\nbrown eyes. Presently he began to realize matters.\n\n\"Want another doctor, sir? It ain't no manner of good,\" he remarked\nairily, beginning to search for his cap, and to glow in the prospect of\nanother cab-ride.\n\n\"No,\" said Julian. \"I stopped to tell you that you were wrong. The\ngentleman is quite well again.\"\n\nHe put his hand into his pocket and produced half a crown.\n\n\"There's something for your mistake,\" he said.\n\nBob took it solemnly, and, as Julian walked on, called after him:\n\n\"It wasn't my fault, sir; it was father's.\"\n\nHe had more desire to shine as an intellectual authority on great\nmatters of dissolution than to respect the departed. Julian could not\nhelp smiling at the child's evident discomfiture as he pursued his way\ntowards Grosvenor Place. On one of the doorsteps of the big houses that\ndrive respect like a sharp nail into the hearts of the poor passers-by,\na ragged old woman was tumultuously squatting. Her gin-soddened face\ncame, like a scarlet cloud, to the view from the embrace of a vagabond\nblack bonnet, braided with rags, viciously glittering here and there\nwith the stray bugles which survived from some bygone era of comparative\nrespectability. Her penetrating snores denoted that she was oblivious\nof the lounging approach of the policeman, whose blue and burly form\nwas visible in the extreme distance. Julian stopped to observe her\nreflectively. His eye, which loved the grotesque, was pleased by the\nbedragglement of her attitude, by the flat foot, in its bursting boot,\nwhich protruded from the ocean of her mud-stained petticoats, by the\nwisps of coarse hair wandering in the breeze above her brazen wrinkles.\nPoor soul! she kept a diary of her deeds, even though she could perhaps\nonly make a mark where her signature should have been. Julian stared at\nher very intently, and as he did so he started violently, for across the\nhuman background which her sleeping dissipation supplied there seemed to\nfloat the vague shadow, suggestion, call it what you will, of a tongue of\nflame.\n\nHe walked hastily on, angrily blaming his nerves. As he passed the\npoliceman he fancied he noticed that the man glanced at him with a\ncertain flickering suspicion. Was horror legibly written in his face?\nhe wondered uneasily, confessing to himself that even in the dawn and\nthe lap of Grosvenor Place a horror had again seized him. What did this\nshadow which he had now twice seen portend? Surely his nerves were not\npermanently upset. He was at first heartily ashamed of himself. Near St.\nGeorge's Hospital, gaunt and grey in the morning, he stopped again, bent\nhis left arm forcibly, and with his right hand felt the hard lump of\nmuscle, that sprang up like a ball of iron under his coat sleeve. And\nas he felt it he cursed himself for the greatest of all fools. Thin,\nmeagre little men of the town, tea-party men whose thoughts were ever\non their ties and their moustaches, no doubt gave themselves up readily\nto disturbances of the nerves. But Julian had always prided himself on\nbeing an athlete, able to hold his own in the world by mere muscular\nforce, if need be. He had found it possible to develop side by side brain\nand biceps, each to an adequate end. It had seemed grand to him to hold\nthese scales of his being evenly, to balance them to a hair. Those scales\nhung badly now, lopsidedly. One was up in the clouds. He resolved that\nthe other should correct it. After a cold bath and a sleep he would go\nround to Angelo's and have an hour's hard fencing. Cold water, the\nEnglishman's panacea for every ill, cold steel, the pioneer's Minerva,\nwould tonic this errant brain of his and drill it into its customary\nobedience. So he said to himself.\n\nAnd yet as he walked there came to him a notion that this little shadow\nof a flame was still his companion; that this night just passed, this\nday just begun, were the birthnight and the birthday of this small,\nghostlike thing which had come into being to bear him company, to haunt\nhim. Yes, as he walked, followed always closely by Rip, and saw the tall\niron gates of the Park, Apsley House, the long line of Piccadilly, all\nuncertain, gentle, reduced to a whimsical mildness of aspect in the\nhalf-light of the dawning, he again recalled the fact, which he had\nmentioned that night to Doctor Levillier, of people watching an invalid\nwho had seen, at the precise moment of dissolution, the soul escaping\nfurtively from its fleshy prison like a flame, which was immediately\nlost in the air. Surely, wandering souls, if indeed there were such\nthings, might still retain this faint semblance of a shape, a form. And\nif so, they might perhaps occasionally conceive a fantastic attachment\nto a human being, and companion him silently as the dog companions his\nmaster. He might have such a companion, whose nature he could not\ncomprehend, whose object in seeking him out he could not guess. Perhaps\nit felt affection toward him; perhaps, on the other hand, enmity. A\nlover, or a spy--it might be either. Or it might have no definite\npurpose, but simply drift near him in the air, as some human beings\ndrift feebly along together through life, because they have long ago\nloved each other, or thought each other useful, or fancied, in some\nmoment of madness, that God meant them for each other. It might be an\naimless, dreary soul, unable to be gone from sheer dulness of purpose--a\nsoul without temperament, without character.\n\nAs this thought crossed Julian's mind he happened to glance at the front\nof a shop on his left, and against the iron shutters the flame was dimly\nbut distinctly outlined. He stopped at once to look at it, but even as he\nstopped it was gone. Then he sternly brought himself back from the vague\nregions of fancy, and was angry that he had permitted himself to wander\nin them like a child lost in the forest. He bent down and patted Rip,\nand sought to wrench his mind from its wayward course, and to thrust it\nforcibly into its accustomed groove of healthy sanity. Yet sanity seemed\nto become abruptly commonplace, a sort of whining crossing-sweeper,\nchattering untimely, meaningless phrases to him. To divert himself\nentirely he paused beside a peripatetic coffee-stall, presided over\nby a grey-faced, prematurely old youth, with sharp features and the\nglancing eyes of poverty-stricken avarice.\n\n\"Give me a cup of coffee,\" he said.\n\nThe youth clattered his wares in excited obedience.\n\nWhile he was pouring out the steaming liquid there drifted down to Julian\nthrough the grey weariness of the morning a painted girl of the streets,\ncrowned with a large hat, on which a forest of feathers waved in the weak\nand chilly breeze. Julian glanced at her idly enough and she glanced back\nat him. Horror, he thought, looked from her eyes as if from a window. As\nshe returned his gaze she hovered near him in the peculiar desultory way\nof such women, and Julian, glad of any distraction, offered her a cup of\ncoffee. She drew nearer and accepted it.\n\n\"And a bun, my dear,\" she hinted to the sharp-featured youth.\n\n\"And a bun,\" echoed Julian, seeing his doubtful pause of hesitation.\n\nThe bun came into view from a hidden basket, and the meal began,\nJulian, Rip, and the lady of the feathers forming a companionable group\nupon the kerb. The lady's curious and almost thrilling expression, which\nhad seemed to beacon from some height of her soul some exceptional and\ndreary deed, faded under the influence of the dough and currants. A smile\noverspread her thin features. She examined Julian with a gracious\ninterest.\n\n\"It's easy to see you've been makin' a night of it, Bertie,\" she remarked\ncasually at length, in the suffocated voice of one divided between desire\nof conversation and love of food.\n\n\"You think so?\" said Julian.\n\n\"Think so, dear, I'm sure so! Ask me another as I _don't_ know; do\ndarlin'.\"\n\nJulian took another draught from the thick coffee-cup that held so\namazingly little.\n\n\"And what about yourself?\" he said. \"Why are you out here so early?\"\n\nThe lady of the feathers cast a suspicious glance upon him. Then the\nhorror dawned again in her eyes.\n\n\"I'm afraid to go home,\" she said. \"Yes, that's a fact.\"\n\n\"Afraid--why?\" Julian spoke abstractedly. In truth he merely talked to\nthis floating wisp of humanity to distract his mind, and thought of her\nas a strange female David of the streets sent to make a cockney music\nin his ears that his soul might be rid of its evil spirit.\n\n\"Never you mind why,\" the lady answered.\n\nShe shivered suddenly, violently, as a dog just come out of water.\n\n\"Have another cup?\" Julian said.\n\n\"And a bun, dearie,\" the lady again rejoined. She shook her head till all\nthe feathers danced.\n\n\"Never you mind why,\" she said, reverting again to his vagrant question.\n\"There's some things as don't do to talk about.\"\n\n\"I'm sure I've no wish to pry into your private affairs,\" Julian rejoined\ncarelessly.\n\nBut again he noticed the worn terror of her face. Surely that night she,\ntoo, had passed through some unwonted experience, which had written its\nsign-manual amid the paint and powder of her shame.\n\nThe lady stared back at him. Beneath her tinted eyelids the fear seemed\nto grow like a weed. Tears followed, rolling over her cheeks and mingling\nwith the coffee in her cup.\n\n\"Oh dear,\" she murmured lamentably. \"Oh, dear, oh!\"\n\n\"What's the matter?\" said Julian.\n\nBut she only shook her head, with the peevish persistence of weak\nobstinacy, and continued vaguely to weep as one worn down by chill\ncircumstance.\n\nJulian turned his eyes from her to the coffee-stall, in which the\nsharp-featured youth now negligently leant, well satisfied with the\ncustom he had secured. Behind the youth's head it seemed to Julian that\nthe phantom flame hung trembling, as if blown by the light wind of\nthe morning. He laid his hand on the lady's left arm and unconsciously\nclosed his fingers firmly over the flesh, while, in a low voice, he\nsaid to her:\n\n\"Look there!\"\n\nThe lady of the feathers stopped crying abruptly, as if her tears were\nsuddenly frozen at their source.\n\n\"Where, dearie?\" she said jerkily. \"Whatever do you mean?\"\n\n\"There where the cups are hung up. Don't you see anything?\"\n\nBut the lady was looking at him, and she now dropped her cup with a crash\nto the pavement.\n\n\"There's a go,\" said the sharp-featured youth. \"You're a nice one, you\nare!\"\n\nWithout regarding his protest, the lady violently wrenched her arm from\nJulian's grasp and recoiled from the stall.\n\n\"Le-go my arm,\" she babbled hysterically. \"Le-go, I say. I can't stand\nany more--no, I can't.\"\n\n\"I'm not going to hurt you,\" said Julian, astonished at her outburst.\n\nBut she only repeated vehemently:\n\n\"Let go, let me go!\"\n\nBacking away, she trod the fallen coffee-cup to fragments on the\npavement, and began to drift down Piccadilly, her face under the\nfeathers set so completely round over her shoulder, in observation of\nJulian, that she seemed to be promenading backwards. And as she went\nshe uttered deplorable wailing sounds, which gradually increased in\nvolume. Apparently she considered that her life had been in imminent\ndanger, and that she saved herself by shrieks; for, still keeping her\nface toward the coffee-stall, she faded away in the morning, until\nonly the faint noise of her retreat betokened her existence any longer.\n\nThe sharp-featured youth winked wearily at Julian from the midst of his\ngrove of coffee-cups.\n\n\"Nice things, women, sir,\" he ejaculated. \"Good ayngels the books calls\n'm. O Gawd!\"\n\nJulian paid him and walked away.\n\nAnd as he went he found himself instinctively watching for the fleeting\nshadow of a flame, trying to perceive it against the grey face of a\nhouse, against the trunk of a tree, the dark green of a seat. But the\nlight of the mounting morning grew ever stronger and the flame-shaped\nshadow did not reappear.\n\nJulian reached his chambers, undressed abstractedly and went to bed.\nBefore he fell asleep he looked at Rip reposing happily at the foot of\nthe bed, and had a moment of shooting wonder that the little dog was so\ncompletely comfortable with him. That it had flown at its master, who\nhad always been kind to it, whom it had always seemed to love hitherto,\npuzzled Julian.\n\nBut then so many things had puzzled him within the last few days.\n\nHe stroked Rip with a meditative hand and lay down. Soon his mind began\nto wander in the maze whose clue is sleep. He was with Valentine, with\nDoctor Levillier, with the sharp-featured youth and the lady of the\nfeathers. They sat round a table and it was dark; yet he could see. And\nthe lady's feathers grew like the beanstalk of Jack the Giant-killer\ntowards heaven and the land of ogres. Then Julian climbed up and up till\nhe reached the top of the ladder. And it seemed to him that the feather\nladder ended in blue space and in air, and that far away he saw the\noutline of a golden bar. And on this bar two figures leaned. One seemed\nan angel, one a devil. Yet they had faces that were alike, and were\nbeautiful. They faded.\n\nJulian seemed vaguely to hear the sharp-featured youth say, \"Good\nayngels! O Gawd!\"\n\nWas that the motto of his sleep?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nA DRIVE IN THE RAIN\n\n\nWhen Julian returned from Angelo's the next morning he found lying\nupon the breakfast table a note, and, after the custom of many people,\nbefore opening it he read the address on the envelope two or three\ntimes and considered who the writer might be. It struck him at once\nthat the writing ought to be familiar to him and capable of instant\nidentification. The name of his correspondent was literally on the tip of\nhis mind. Yet he could not utter it. And so at last he broke the seal.\nBefore reading the note he glanced at the signature: \"Valentine.\"\n\nJulian was surprised. He knew now why he had seemed to remember, yet had\nnot actually remembered, the handwriting. Regarding it again, he found it\ncuriously changed from Valentine's usual hand, yet containing many points\nof resemblance. After a while he came to the conclusion that it was like\na bad photograph of the original, imitating, closely enough, all the main\npoints of the original, yet leaving out all the character, all the\ndelicacy of it. For Valentine's handwriting had always seemed to Julian\nto express his nature. It was rather large and very clear, but delicate,\nthe letters exquisitely formed, the lines perfectly even, neither\ndepressed nor slanting upwards. This note was surely much more coarsely\nwritten than usual. And yet, of course, it was Valentine's writing.\nJulian wondered he had not known. He read the note at last:\n\n\"DEAR JULIAN,\n\n\"I am coming over to see you this afternoon about five, and shall try and\npersuade Rip to restore me to his confidence. I hope you will be in. Are\nyou tired after last night's experiences? I never felt better.\n\n\"Ever yours,\n\"VALENTINE.\"\n\n\"And yet,\" Julian thought, \"I should have guessed by your writing that\nyou were in some unusual frame of mind, either tired, or--or--\" he looked\nagain, and closely, at the writing,--\"or in a temper less delightfully\ncalm and seraphic than usual. Yes, it looks actually a bad-tempered hand.\nValentine's!\" Then he laughed, and tossed the note carelessly into the\nfire that was crackling upon the hearth. Rip lay by it, quietly\nsleeping.\n\nPunctually at five o'clock Valentine appeared. Rip was still lying\nhappily before the fire, but directly the dog caught sight of its master\nall the hair along the middle of its back bristled on end, and it showed\nevery symptom of acute distress and fury. Julian was obliged to put it\nout of the room.\n\n\"What can have come over Rip, Valentine?\" he said, as he came back. \"This\nsudden hatred of you is inexplicable.\"\n\n\"Absolutely,\" Valentine answered. \"But it is sure to pass away. There was\nsomething uncanny about that trance of mine which frightened the little\nbeggar.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But the oddest thing is, that while you were insensible Rip lay\nwith his head upon your arm as contented as possible. It was only just as\nyou began to show signs of life that he seemed to turn against you. I\ncan't understand it.\"\n\n\"Nor I. Have you seen Marr to-day?\"\n\n\"No. I haven't been to the club. I am so glad you don't know him.\"\n\nValentine laughed. He was lying back in a big chair, smoking a cigarette.\nHis face was unclouded and serene, and he had never looked more entirely\nhealthy. Indeed, he appeared much more decisively robust than usual.\nJulian noticed this.\n\n\"Your trance seems positively to have done you good,\" he said.\n\n\"It certainly has not done me harm. My short death of the senses has\nrested me wonderfully. I wonder if I am what is called a medium.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't be surprised if you are,\" Julian said. \"But I don't think I\ncould be surprised at anything to-day. Indeed, I have found myself\ndwelling with childish pleasure upon the most preposterous ideas, hugging\nthem to my soul, determining to believe in them.\"\n\n\"Such as--what?\"\n\n\"Well, such as this.\"\n\nAnd then Julian told Valentine of his curious notion that some wandering\nsoul was beginning to companion him, and described how he had thought he\nsaw it when he was gazing at the old woman in Grosvenor Place, and again\nwhen he was with the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"But,\" Valentine said, \"you say you were staring very hard at the old\nwoman?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"That might account for the matter of the first appearance of the flame\nin daylight. If you look very steadily at some object, a kind of slight\nmirage will often intervene between you and it.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But I have seen this shadow of a flame when I was not thinking\nof it or expecting it.\"\n\n\"When?\"\n\n\"Just now. As you came into the room I saw it float out at that door.\"\n\n\"You are sure?\"\n\n\"I believe so. Yes, I am.\"\n\n\"But why should this soul, if soul it be, haunt you?\"\n\n\"I can't tell. Perhaps, Val, you and I ought not to have played at\nspiritualism as we should play at a game. Perhaps--\"\n\nJulian paused. He was looking anxious, even worried.\n\n\"Suppose we have not stopped in time,\" he said.\n\nValentine raised his eyebrows.\n\n\"I don't understand.\"\n\nJulian was standing exactly opposite to him, leaning against the\nmantelpiece and looking down at him.\n\n\"We ought never to have sat again after our conversation with the\ndoctor,\" Julian said. \"I feel that to-day, so strongly. I feel that\nperhaps we have taken just the one step too far,--the one step in the\ndark that may be fatal.\"\n\n\"Fatal! My dear Julian, you are unstrung by the events of the night.\"\n\nBut the calm of Valentine's voice did not seem to sway Julian. He\ncontinued:\n\n\"Valentine, now that I am with you, I am attacked by a strange idea.\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"That last night may have its consequences; yes, even though we strive to\nforget it, and to forget our sittings. If it should be so! If anything--\"\n\nHe was curiously upset, and did not seem able to-day to take the\ninfluence of Valentine's mood. Indeed, this new anxiety of his was\nonly born in Valentine's presence, was communicated apparently by him.\n\n\"Everything one does has its following consequence,\" Julian said.\n\n\"It is the fashion to say so. I do not believe it. I believe, on the\ncontrary, that we often do things with a special view to the doctrine of\nconsequence, and that our intentions are frustrated by the falseness of\nthe doctrine. Suppose I kiss a woman. I may do so with intention to make\nher love me, or, on the other hand, to make her hate me. The chances are\nthat she does neither the one nor the other. She simply forgets all about\nsuch a trifle, and we go on shaking hands politely for the rest of our\nnatural lives. Julian, the memories of most people are like winter\ndays--very short.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. But there is some hidden thing in life whose memory is\neverlasting. All the philosophers say so, especially those who are\ninclined to deny the Deity. They put their faith in the chain of cause\nand effect. What we have done,--you and I, Valentine,--must have an\neffect of some sort.\"\n\n\"It will have a very bad effect upon you, I can see,\" said Valentine,\nsmiling, \"unless you pull yourself together. Come, this is nonsense.\nWe have sat once too often, and the consequence followed, and is over:\nI went into a trance. I have fortunately come out of it, so the penalty\nwhich you so firmly believe in has been paid. The score is cleared,\nJulian.\"\n\n\"I suppose so.\"\n\n\"I have no doubt of it. Let us forget the whole matter, since to remember\nit seems likely to affect those devils that make the hell of the physical\nman--the nerves. Let us forget it. Where are you dining to-night?\"\n\n\"Nowhere in particular. I have not thought about it,\" Julian said, rather\nlistlessly.\n\n\"Dine with me then.\"\n\n\"Yes, Valentine.\"\n\nJulian hesitated, then added:\n\n\"But not in Victoria Street, if you don't mind.\"\n\n\"At the Savoy then; or shall we say the Berkeley?\"\n\n\"Very well,--the Berkeley.\"\n\n\"At eight o'clock. Good-bye till then. I must ask you to give the shelter\nof your roof to Rip till he returns to a more reasonable frame of mind\nabout me.\"\n\nWhen Valentine had gone Julian put on his coat, and walked down to the\nclub, ostensibly to look at the evening papers, really because he had\na desire to see Marr. His intention, if he did meet the latter, was to\nquestion him closely as to the consequences which might follow upon a\nsitting, or series of sittings, undertaken by two people for some reason\nunsuited to carry out such an enterprise together. That Marr would be\nin the club he felt no shadow of doubt. Apparently the club had for Marr\nall the attraction that induces the new member to haunt the smoking and\nreading rooms of his freshly acquired home during the first week or two\nof its possession. He was incessantly there, as Julian had had reason to\nknow.\n\nBut to-day proved to be an exception. Julian explored the club from end\nto end without finding the object of his search. Finally he went to the\nhall-porter.\n\n\"Is Mr. Marr in the club to-day?\"\n\n\"No, sir; he has not been in at all since yesterday afternoon.\"\n\n\"Oh, thanks.\"\n\nJulian felt strongly, even absurdly, disappointed, and found himself\nwishing that he possessed Marr's private address. He would certainly have\ncalled upon him. However, he had no idea where Marr lived, so there was\nnothing to be done. He went back to his rooms, dressed for dinner, and\nwas at the Berkeley by five minutes past eight. The restaurant was very\ncrowded that night, but Valentine had secured a table in the window, and\nwas waiting when Julian arrived. The table next to theirs was the only\none unoccupied in the room.\n\nThe two friends sat down and began to eat rather silently in the midst of\nthe uproar of conversation round them. Valentine seemed quite unconscious\nof the many glances directed towards him. He never succeeded in passing\nunnoticed anywhere, and although he had never done anything remarkable,\nwas one of the best-known men in town merely by virtue of his unusual\npersonality.\n\n\"There's the Victoria Street Saint,\" murmured a pretty girl to her\ncompanion. \"What a fortune that man could make on the stage.\"\n\n\"Yes, or as a pianist,\" responded the man, rather enviously. \"His looks\nwould crowd St. James's Hall even if he couldn't play a note. I never can\nunderstand how Cresswell manages to have such a complexion in London. He\nmust take precious good care of himself.\"\n\n\"Saints generally do. You see, we live for time, they for eternity. We\nonly have to keep the wrinkles at bay for a few years, but they want to\nlook nice on the Judgment Day.\"\n\nShe was a little actress, and at this point she laughed to indicate\nthat she had said something smart. As her laugh was dutifully echoed\nby the man who was paying for the dinner, she felt deliriously clever\nfor the rest of the evening.\n\nPresently Julian said:\n\n\"I went to the club this afternoon.\"\n\n\"Did you?\"\n\n\"Yes. I wanted to have a talk with that fellow Marr.\"\n\nValentine suddenly put down the glass of champagne which he was in the\nact of raising to his lips.\n\n\"But surely,\" he began, with some appearance of haste. Then he seemed to\ncheck himself, and finished calmly:\n\n\"You found him, I suppose?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"I thought he was perpetually there, apparently on the lookout for you.\"\n\n\"Yes, but to-day he hadn't been in at all. Perhaps he has gone out of\ntown.\"\n\n\"Ah, probably.\"\n\nAt this moment two men entered the restaurant and strolled towards the\ntable next to that at which Valentine and Julian sat. One of them knew\nJulian and nodded as he passed. He was just on the point of sitting\ndown and unfolding his napkin when a sudden thought seemed to strike him,\nand he came over and said to Julian:\n\n\"You remember that dinner at Lady Crichton's, where we met the other\nnight?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Startling bit of news to-night, wasn't it? Damned sudden!\"\n\nJulian looked puzzled.\n\n\"What--is Lady Crichton ill, then?\"\n\n\"Lady Crichton! No. I meant about that poor fellow, Marr.\"\n\nJulian swung round in his seat and regarded the man full in the face.\n\n\"Marr! Why, what is it? Has he had an accident?\"\n\n\"Dead!\" the other man said laconically, arranging the gardenia in his\ncoat, and taking a comprehensive survey of the room.\n\n\"Dead!\" Julian repeated, without expression. \"Dead!\"\n\n\"Yes. Well, bye-bye. Going on to the Empire!\"\n\nHe turned to go, but Julian caught his arm.\n\n\"Wait a moment. When did he die?\"\n\n\"Last night. In the dead of the night, or in the early morning.\"\n\n\"What of?\"\n\n\"They don't know. There's going to be an inquest. The poor chap didn't\ndie at home, but in a private hotel, in the Euston Road, the 'European.'\nHe's lying there now. Funny sort of chap, but not bad in his way. I\nexpect--\"\n\nHere the man bent down and murmured something into Julian's ear.\n\n\"Well, see you again presently. 'In the midst of life,' eh?\"\n\nHe lounged away and began applying his intellect to the dissection of a\nsardine.\n\nJulian turned round in his chair and again faced Valentine. But he did\nnot go on eating the cutlet in aspic that lay upon his plate. He sat\nlooking at Valentine, and at last said:\n\n\"How horribly sudden!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Valentine answered sympathetically. \"He must have had a weak\nheart.\"\n\n\"I dare say. I suppose so. Valentine, I can't realize it.\"\n\n\"It must be difficult. A man whom you saw so recently, and I suppose\napparently quite well.\"\n\n\"Quite. Absolutely.\"\n\nJulian sat silent again and allowed the waiter to take away his plate\nwith the untouched cutlet.\n\n\"I didn't like the man,\" he began at last. \"But still I'm sorry,\ndamned sorry, about this. I wanted to see him again. He was an awfully\ninteresting fellow, Val; and, as I told you, might, I believe, in time\nhave gained a sort of influence over me,--not like yours, of course,\nbut he certainly had a power, a strength, about him, even a kind of\nfascination. He was not like other people. Ah--\" and he exclaimed\nimpatiently, \"I wish you had met him.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"I scarcely know. But I should like you to have had the experience. And\nthen, you are so intuitive about people, you might have read him. I could\nnot. And he was a fellow worth reading, that I'm certain of. No, I won't\nhave any mutton. I seem to have lost my appetite over this.\"\n\nValentine calmly continued his dinner, while Julian talked on about Marr\nrather excitedly. When they were having coffee Valentine said:\n\n\"What shall we do to-night? It is only a quarter past nine. Shall we go\nanywhere?\"\n\n\"Oh no, I think not--wait--yes, we will.\"\n\nJulian drank his coffee off at a gulp, in a way that would have made him\nthe despair of an epicure.\n\n\"Where shall we go, then?\"\n\nJulian answered:\n\n\"To the Euston Road. To the 'European.'\"\n\n\"The 'European'!\"\n\n\"Yes, Valentine; I must see Marr once more, even dead. And I want you\nto see him. It was he who made the strangeness in our lives. But for him\nthese curious events of the last days would not have happened. And isn't\nit peculiar that he must have died just about the time you were in your\ntrance?\"\n\n\"I do not see that. The two things were totally unconnected.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. I suppose so. But I must know how he died. I must see what he\nlooks like dead. You will come with me?\"\n\n\"If you wish it. But we may not be admitted.\"\n\n\"I will manage that somehow. Let us go.\"\n\nValentine got up. He showed neither definite reluctance nor excitement.\nThey put on their coats in the vestibule and went out into the street.\nWhile they had been dining the weather, fine during the day, had changed,\nand rain was falling in sheets. They stood in the doorway while the\nhall-porter called a cab. Piccadilly on such a night as this looked\nperhaps more decisively dreary than a rain-soaked country lane, or\nstorm-driven sand-dunes by the sea. For wet humanity, with wispy hair\nand swishing petticoats, draggled with desire for shelter, is a piteous\nvision as it passes by.\n\nValentine and Julian regarded it, turning up their coat collars and\ninstinctively thrusting their hands deep into their pockets. Two soldiers\npassed, pursued by a weary and tattered woman, at whom they laughingly\njeered as they adjusted the cloaks over their broad shoulders. They were\nhurrying back to barracks, and disregarded the woman's reiterated\nexclamation that she would go with them, having no home. A hansom went\nby with the glass down, a painted face staring through it upon the yellow\nmud that splashed round the horse's feet. Suddenly the horse slipped and\ncame down. The glass splintered as the painted and now screaming face\nwas dashed through it. A wet crowd of roughs and pavement vagabonds\ngathered and made hoarse remarks on the woman's dress as she was hauled\nout in her finery, bleeding and half fainting, her silk gown a prey to\nthe mud, her half-naked shoulders a hostage to the wind. Two men in\nopera-hats, walked towards their club, discussing a divorce case, and\ntelling funny stories through the rain. A very small, pale, and filthy\nboy stood with bare feet upon the kerbstone, and cried damp matches.\n\n\"How horrible London is to-night,\" Julian said as he and Valentine got\ninto their cab.\n\n\"Yes. Why add to our necessary contemplation of its horrors? Why go on\nthis mad errand?\"\n\n\"I want you to see Marr,\" Julian replied, with a curious obstinacy. He\npushed up the trap in the roof.\n\n\"Drive to the European Hotel, in the Euston Road,\" he said to the cabman.\n\"D' you know it?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" the cabman said. He was smiling on his perch as he cracked\nhis whip and drove towards the Circus.\n\nThe glass had been let down and the two friends beheld a continuously\nblurred prospect of London framed in racing raindrops and intersected\nby the wooden framework of the movable shutter. It was at the same time\nfantastic and tumultuous. The glare of light at the Circus shone over\nthe everlasting procession of converging omnibuses, the everlasting mob\nof prostitutes and of respectable citizens waiting to mount into the\nvehicles whose paint proclaimed their destination. Active walkers darted\ndexterously to and fro over the cobblestones, occasionally turning\nsharply to swear at a driver whose cab had bespattered their black\nconventionality with clinging dirt. The drivers were impassively\ninsulting, as became men placed for the moment in a high station of\nlife. At the door of the Criterion Restaurant an enormously fat and\nwhite bookmaker in a curly hat and diamonds muttered remarks into the\near of an unshaven music-hall singer. A gigantic \"chucker-out\" observed\nthem with the dull gaze of sullen habit, and a beggar-boy whined to them\nin vain for alms, then fluttered into obscurity. Fixed with corner stones\nupon the wet pavement of the \"island\" lay in an unwinking row the\ncontents bill of the evening papers, proclaiming in gigantic black or\nred letters the facts of suicide, slander, divorce, murder, railway\naccidents, fires, and war complications. Dreary men read them with\ndreary, unexcited eyes, then forked out halfpence to raucous youths\nwhose arms were full of damp sheets of pink paper. A Guardsman kissed\n\"good-bye\" to his trembling sweetheart as he chivalrously assisted her\ninto a Marylebone 'bus, and two shop-girls, going home from work, nudged\neach other and giggled hysterically. Four fat Frenchmen stood in the\nporch of the Monico violently gesticulating and talking volubly at the\ntops of their voices. Two English undergraduates pushed past them with\na look of contempt, and went speechlessly into the caf\u00e9 beyond. A lady\nfrom Paris, all red velvet and white ostrich-tips, smoothed her cheek\nwith her kid glove meditatively, and glanced about in search of her fate\nof the dark and silent hours. And then--Valentine and Julian were in the\ncomparative dimness of Shaftesbury Avenue--a huge red cross on a black\nbackground started out of the gloom above a playhouse. Julian shuddered\nat it visibly.\n\n\"You are quite unstrung to-night, Julian,\" Valentine said. \"Let us turn\nthe cab round and go home.\"\n\n\"No, no, my dear fellow; I am all right. It is only that I see things\nto-night much more clearly than usual. I suppose it is owing to something\nphysical that every side of London seems to have sprung into prominence.\nOf course I go about every day in Piccadilly, St. James's Street,\neverywhere; but it is as if my eyes had been always shut, and now they\nare open. I can see London to-night. And that cross looked so devilishly\nironical up there, as if it were silently laughing at the tumult in the\nrain. Don't you feel London to-night, too, Valentine?\"\n\n\"I always feel it.\"\n\n\"Tragically or comically?\"\n\n\"I don't know that I could say truly either. Calmly or contemptuously\nwould rather be the word.\"\n\n\"You are always a philosopher. I can't be a philosopher when I see\nthose hordes of women standing hour after hour in the rain, and those\nboys searching among them. I should be one of those boys probably but\nfor you.\"\n\n\"If you were, I doubt whether I should feel horrified.\"\n\n\"Not morally horrified, I dare say, but intellectually disgusted. Eh?\"\n\n\"I am not sure whether I shall permit my intellect quite so much\nlicense in the future as I have permitted it in the past,\" Valentine\nsaid thoughtfully.\n\nHis blue eyes were on Julian, but Julian was gazing out on Oxford Street,\nwhich they were crossing at that moment. Julian, who had apparently\ncontinued dwelling on the train of thoughts waked in him by the sight\nof the painted cross, ignored this remark and said:\n\n\"It is not my moral sense which shuddered just now, I believe, but my\nimagination. Sin is so full of prose, although many clever writers have\nrepresented it as splendidly decorated with poetry. Don't you think so,\nVal? And it is the prose of sin I realized so vividly just now.\"\n\n\"The wet flowers on the waiting hats, the cold raindrops on the painted\nfaces, the damp boots trudging to find sin, the dark clouds pouring a\nbenediction on it. I know what you mean. But the whole question is one\nof weather, I think. Vanity Fair on a hot, sweet summer night, with a\nhuge golden moon over Westminster, soft airs and dry pavements, would\nmake you see this city in a different light. And which of the lights is\nthe true one?\"\n\n\"I dare say neither.\"\n\n\"Why not both? The smartest coat has a lining, you know. I dare say\nthere are velvet sins as well as plush sins, and the man who can find\nthe velvet is the lucky fellow. Sins feel like plush to me, however,\nand I dislike plush. So I am not the lucky fellow.\"\n\n\"No, Valentine; you are wrong. I'm pretty sure all virtue is velvet and\nall vice is plush. So you stick to velvet.\"\n\n\"I don't know. Ask the next pretty dressmaker you meet. Bloomsbury\nis a genteel _inferno_ on a wet night.\"\n\nThey traversed it smoothly on asphalt ways. All the time Valentine was\nwatching Julian with a fixed and narrow scrutiny, which Julian failed to\nnotice. The rows of dull houses seemed endless, and endlessly alike.\n\n\"I am sure all of them are full of solicitors,\" said Valentine.\n\nPresently in many fanlights they saw the mystic legend, \"Apartments.\"\nThen there were buildings that had an aged air and sported broken\nwindows. Occasionally, on a background of red glass lit by a gas-jet\nfrom behind, sat the word \"Hotel.\" A certain grimy degradation swam in\nthe atmosphere of these streets. Their aspect was subtly different from\nthe Bloomsbury thoroughfares, which look actively church-going, and are\nfull of the shadows of an everlasting respectability which pays its\nwater rates and sends occasional conscience-money to the Chancellor of\nthe Exchequer. People looked furtive, and went in and out of the houses\nfurtively. They crawled rather than pranced, and their bodies bore\nthemselves with a depression that seemed indiscreet. Occasionally men\nwith dripping umbrellas knocked at the doors under the red glass, and\ndisappeared into narrow passages inhabited by small iron umbrella-stands.\nNight brooded here like a dyspeptic raven with moulting tail-feathers\nand ragged wings. But London is eloquent of surprises. The cab turned\na corner, and instantly they were in a wide and rain-swept street, long\nand straight, and lined with reserved houses, that shrank back from the\npublicity of the passing traffic at the end of narrow alleys protected\nby iron gates. Over many of these gates appeared lit arches of glass on\nwhich names were inscribed: \"Albion Hotel,\" \"Valetta Hotel,\" \"Imperial\nHotel,\" \"Cosmopolitan Hotel,\"--great names for small houses. These houses\nhad front doors with glass panels, and all the panels glowed dimly with\ngas.\n\nThe cab flashed by them, and Julian read the fleeting names, until his\neyes were suddenly saluted with \"European Hotel.\"\n\nViolently the cabman drew up. The smoking horse was squeezed upon its\nhaunches, and its feet slithered harshly along the stones. It tried to\nsit down, was hauled up by the reins, and stood trembling as the right\nwheel of the cab collided with the pavement edge, and the water in the\ngutter splashed up as if projected from a spray.\n\n\"Beg pardon, gents. I thought it was a bit further on,\" said the cabby,\nleering down cheerfully. \"Nice night, sir, ain't it?\"\n\nHe shook the reluctant drops of moisture from his waterproof-shrouded\nhat, and drove off.\n\nValentine opened the damp iron gate, and they walked up the paved alley\nto the door.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE EUSTON ROAD EPISODE\n\n\nOpening the door, they found themselves in a squalid passage. A room on\nthe left was fronted by a sort of counter, above which was a long window\ngiving onto the passage, and as the shrill tinkle of a bell announced\ntheir entrance this window was pushed up, and the large red face and\nfurtive observant eyes of a man stared upon them inquiringly.\n\n\"Do you require a room for the night?\" he asked, in a husky voice,\ninvaded by a strong French accent. \"Because--\"\n\n\"No,\" interrupted Julian.\n\nThe man nodded, and, strange to say, with apparent content.\n\n\"There is trouble in my house,\" he said. \"I am unlucky; I come to England\nfrom my country to earn an honest living, and before two years, I have\nthe police here last night.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Julian, \"I know.\"\n\n\"What? You know it? Well, it is not my fault. The gentleman come last\nnight with a lady, his wife, I suppose. How am I to know? He ask for a\nroom. He look perfectly well. I give them the room. They go to bed. At\nfour o'clock in the morning I hear a bell ring. I get up. I go on the\nlanding to listen. I hear the bell again. I run to the chamber of the\nlady and gentleman. The lady is gone. The gentleman falls back on the bed\nas I come in and dies. Mon Dieu! It is--\"\n\nHe suddenly paused in his excited narrative. Valentine had moved his\nposition slightly and was now standing almost immediately under the\ngas-lamp that lit the glass door.\n\n\"You--you are relation of him?\" he said. \"You come to see him?\"\n\n\"I have come to see him, certainly,\" said Valentine. \"But I am no\nrelation of his. This gentleman,\" and he pointed to Julian, \"knew him\nwell, and wished to look at him once more.\"\n\nThe landlord seemed puzzled. He glanced from Valentine to Julian, then\nback again to Valentine.\n\n\"But,\" he began, once more addressing himself to the latter, \"you are\nlike--there is something; when the poor gentleman fell on the bed and\ndied he had your eyes. Yes, yes, you are relation of him.\"\n\n\"No,\" Valentine said; \"you are mistaken.\"\n\n\"I should think so,\" exclaimed Julian. \"Poor Marr's face was as utterly\ndifferent from yours, Valentine, as darkness is different from light.\"\n\n\"No, no; it is not the eyes of the gentleman,\" the landlord continued,\nleaning forward through his window, and still violently scrutinizing\nValentine,--\"it is not the eyes. But there is something--the voice, the\nmanner--yes, I say there is something, I cannot tell.\"\n\n\"You are dreaming, my friend,\" Valentine calmly interposed. \"Now, Julian,\nwhat do you want to do?\"\n\nJulian came forward and leant his arm on the counter.\n\n\"I am the poor gentleman's great friend,\" he said. \"You must let me see\nhim.\"\n\nThe landlord held up his fat hands with a large gesticulation of refusal.\n\n\"I cannot, sir. To-morrow they remove him. They sit on the poor\ngentleman--\"\n\n\"I know,--the inquest. All this is very hard upon you, an honest man\ntrying to make an honest living.\"\n\nJulian put some money into one of the agitated hands.\n\n\"My friend and I only wish to see him for a moment.\"\n\n\"Monsieur, I cannot. I--\"\n\nJulian insinuated another sovereign into his protesting fingers. They\ntook it as an anemone takes a shrimp, and made a gesture of abdication.\n\n\"Well, if Monsieur is the friend of the poor gentleman, I have not the\nheart, I am tender-hearted, I am foolish--\"\n\nHe disappeared muttering from the window, and in a moment appeared\nat a door on the left, disclosing himself now fully as a degraded,\nflaccid-looking, frouzy ruffian of a very low type, flashily dressed,\nand of a most unamiable expression. Taking a candlestick from a dirty\nmarble-topped slab that projected from the passage-wall, he struck a\nmatch, lit the candle, and preceded them up the narrow flight of stairs,\nhis boots creaking loudly at every step. On the landing at the top a\nsmart maid-servant with a very pale face reconnoitered the party for\na moment with furtive curiosity, then flitted away in the darkness to\nthe upper regions of the house.\n\nThe landlord paused by a door numbered with a black number.\n\n\"He is in here,\" he whispered hoarsely. \"Tomorrow they sit on him. After\nthat he go from me. Mon Dieu! I am glad when he is gone. My custom he\nis spoilt. My house get a bad name, and like a dog they hang him. Mon\nDieu!\"\n\nHe opened the door stealthily, forming \"St!\" with his fat, coarse lips.\n\n\"I light the gas. It is all dark.\"\n\n\"No, no,\" Julian said, taking the candle from him, \"I will do that. Go\ndown.\"\n\nHe motioned him away, and entered the room, followed by Valentine, at\nwhom the landlord again stared with a greedy consideration and curiosity,\nbefore turning to retreat softly down the narrow stairs.\n\nThey found themselves in a good-sized room, typically of London. It was\nfull of the peculiar and unmistakable metropolitan smell, a stale odor\nof the streets that suggests smuts to the mind. Two windows, with a\nlong dingy mirror set between them, looked out towards the Euston Road.\nVenetian blinds and thin white curtains looped with yellow ribbon\nshrouded them. On a slab that stuck out under the mirror was placed a\nbundle of curling-pins tied with white tape, a small brush and comb,\nand a bottle of cherry-blossom scent. Near the mirror stood a narrow\nsofa covered with red rep. Upon this lay a man's upturned top-hat, in the\ncorner of which reposed a pair of reindeer gloves. A walking-stick with\na gold top stood against the wall, in a corner by the marble mantlepiece.\nIn the middle of the room lay a small open portmanteau, disclosing a\ndisorder of shirts, handkerchiefs, and boots, a cheque-book, a bottle\nof brandy, and some brushes. By the fireplace there was a vulgar-looking\narm-chair upholstered in red. The room was full of the faint sound of\nLondon voices and London traffic.\n\nJulian went straight up to the gas chandelier and lit all three jets.\nHis action was hurried and abrupt. Then he set the candle down beside\nthe bundle of curling-pins, and turned sharply round to face the bed.\nThe room was now a glare of light, and in this glare of light the broad\nbed with its white counterpane and sheets stood out harshly enough. The\nsheets were turned smoothly down under the blue chin of the dead man,\nwho lay there upon his back, his face with fast-shut eyes dusky white,\nor rather grey, among the pillows. As Julian looked upon him he\nexclaimed:\n\n\"Good God, it isn't Marr! Valentine, it isn't Marr!\"\n\n\"Not?\"\n\n\"No. And yet--wait a moment--\"\n\nJulian came nearer to the bed and bent right down over the corpse. Then\nhe drew away and looked at Valentine, who was at the other side of the\nbed.\n\n\"Oh, Valentine, this is strange,\" he whispered, and drawing a chair\nto the bedside, he sank down upon it. \"This is strange. What is it\ndeath does to a man? Yes; this is Marr. I see now; but so different,\nso altered! The whole expression,--oh, it is almost incredible.\"\n\nHe stared again upon the face.\n\nIt was long in shape, thin and swarthy, very weary looking, the face of\na man who had seen much, who had done very many, very various things.\nNo face with shut eyes can look, perhaps, completely characteristic.\nYet this face was full of a character that seemed curiously at war with\nthe shape of the features and with the position of the closed eyes,\nwhich were very near together. Julian, in describing Marr to Valentine,\nhad pronounced him Satanic, and this dead face was, in truth, somewhat\nMephistophelean. An artist might well have painted it upon his canvas as\na devil. But he must have reproduced merely the features and colouring,\nthe blue, shaven cheeks, and hollow eye-sockets; for the expression of\nhis devil he would have been obliged to seek another model. Marr, dead,\nlooked serene, kind, gentle, satisfied, like a man who has shaken himself\nfree from a heavy burden, and who stretches himself to realize the sudden\nand wonderful ease for which he has longed, and who smiles, thinking,\n\"That ghastly thrall is over. I am a slave no longer. I am free.\" The\ndead face was wonderfully happy.\n\nJulian seemed entirely fascinated by it. After his last smothered\nexclamation to Valentine, he sat, leaning one arm upon the head of the\nbed, gazing till he looked stern, as all utterly ardent observers look.\n\nValentine, too, was staring at the dead man.\n\nThere was a very long silence in the room. The rain leaped upon the tall\nwindows on each side of the mirror and ran down them with an unceasing\nchilly vivacity. Lights from the street flickered through the blinds to\njoin the glare of the gas. All the music of the town wandered round the\nhouse as a panther wanders round a bungalow by night. And the thin stream\nof people flowed by on the shining pavement beyond the iron railing of\nthe narrow garden. They spoke, as they went, of all the minor things of\nlife, details of home, details of petty sins, details of common loves and\ncommon hopes and fears, all stirring feebly under umbrellas. And close\nby these two friends, under three flaring gas-jets, watched the unwinking\ndead man, whose face seemed full of relief. Presently Julian, without\nlooking up, said:\n\n\"Death has utterly changed him. He is no longer the same man. Formerly\nhe looked all evil, and now it's just as if his body were thanking God\nbecause it had got rid of a soul it had hated. Yes, it's just like that.\nValentine, I feel as if Marr had been rescued.\"\n\nAs he said the last words Julian looked up across the barrier of the bed\nat his friend. His lips opened as if to speak, but he said nothing; for\nhe was under the spell of a wild hallucination. It seemed to him that\nthere, under the hard glare of the gas-lamps, the soul of Marr spoke,\nstared from the pure, proud face of Valentine. That was like a possession\nof his friend. It was horrible, as if a devil chose for a moment to lurk\nand to do evil in the sanctuary of a church, to blaspheme at the very\naltar. Valentine did not speak. He was looking down on the dead serenity\nof Marr, vindictively. A busy intellect flashed in his clear blue eyes,\nmeditating vigorously upon the dead man's escape from bondage, following\nhim craftily to the very door of his freedom, to seize him surely, if it\nmight be.\n\nThis is what Julian felt in his hallucination, that Valentine was\npursuing Marr, uselessly, but with a deadly intention, a deadly hatred.\n\n\"Valentine!\" Julian cried at last.\n\nValentine looked up.\n\nAnd in an instant the spell was removed. Julian saw his friend\nand protector rightly again, calm, pure, delicately reserved. The\ndeath-chamber no longer contained a phantom. His eyes were no longer\nthe purveyors of a terrible deception to his mind.\n\n\"Oh, Valentine, come here,\" Julian said.\n\nValentine came round by the end of the bed and stood beside him.\n\nJulian examined him narrowly.\n\n\"Never stand opposite to me again, Valentine.\"\n\n\"Opposite to you! Why not?\"\n\n\"Nothing, nothing. Or--everything. What is the matter with this room?\nand me? and you? And why is Marr so changed?\"\n\n\"How is he changed? You know I have never seen his face before.\"\n\n\"You do not see it now. He has gone out of it. All that was Marr as I\nknew him has utterly gone. Death has driven it away and left something\nquite different. Let us go.\"\n\nJulian got up. Valentine took up the candle from its place beside the\ncurling-pins and lifted his hand to the gas-chandelier. He had turned\nout one of the burners, and was just going to turn out the two others\nwhen Julian checked him.\n\n\"No; leave them. Let the landlord put them out. Leave him in the light.\"\n\nThey went out of the room, treading softly. A little way up the\nstaircase that led from the landing to the upper parts of the house\na light flickered down to them, and they perceived the pale face of\nthe housemaid diligently regarding them. Julian beckoned to her.\n\n\"You showed the gentleman--the gentleman who is dead--to his room last\nnight?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir. Oh, sir, I can't believe he's really gone so sudden like.\"\n\n\"Then you saw the lady with him?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course. Oh--\"\n\n\"Hush! What was she like?\"\n\nThe housemaid's nose curled derisively.\n\n\"Oh, sir, quite the usual sort. Oh, a very common person. Not at all like\nthe poor gentleman, sir.\"\n\n\"Young?\"\n\n\"Not to say old, sir. No; I couldn't bring that against her. She wore a\nhat, sir, and feathers--well, more than ever growed on one ostrich, I'll\nbe bound.\"\n\n\"Feathers!\"\n\nA vision of the lady of the feathers sprang up before Julian, wrapped\nin the wan light of the early dawn. He put several rapid questions to\nthe housemaid. But she could only say again that Marr's companion had\nbeen a very common person, a very common sort of person indeed, and\nflashily dressed, not at all as she--the housemaid--would care to go out\nof a Sunday. Julian tipped her and left her amazed upon the dim landing.\nThen he and Valentine descended the stairs. The landlord was waiting in\nthe passage in an attentive attitude against the wall. He seemed taken\nunawares by their appearance, but his eyes immediately sought Valentine's\nface, still apparently questioning it with avidity. Julian noticed this,\nand recollected that the man had insisted on a likeness existing between\nMarr and Valentine. Possibly that fact, although apparently unremembered,\nhad remained lurking in his mind, and was accountable for his own curious\ndeception. Or could it be that there really was some vague, fleeting\nresemblance between the dead man and the living which the landlord saw\ncontinuously, he only at moments? Looking again at Valentine he could\nnot believe it. No; the landlord was deceived now, as he had been in\nthe death-chamber above stairs.\n\n\"May we come into your room for a moment?\" Julian asked the man. \"I want\nto put to you a few questions.\"\n\n\"But certainly, sir, with pleasure.\"\n\nHe opened the side door and showed them into his sanctum beyond the\nglass window. It was a small, evil-looking room, crowded with fumes of\nstale tobacco. On the walls hung two or three French prints of more than\ndoubtful decency. A table with a bottle and two or three glasses ranged\non it occupied the middle of the floor. On a chair by the fire the Gil\nBias was thrown in a crumpled attitude. One gas-burner flared, unshaded\nby any glass globe. Julian sat down on the Gil Bias. Valentine refused\nthe landlord's offer of a chair, and stood looking rather contemptuously\nat the inartistic improprieties of the prints.\n\n\"Did you let in the gentleman who came last night?\" asked Julian.\n\n\"But, sir, of course. I am always here. I mind my house. I see that only\nrespect-\"\n\n\"Exactly. I don't doubt that for a moment. What was the lady like,--the\nlady who accompanied him?\"\n\n\"Oh, sir, very chic, very pretty.\"\n\n\"Didn't you hear her go out in the night?\"\n\nThe landlord looked for a moment as if he were considering the\nadvisableness of a little bluster. He stared hard at Julian and\nthought better of it.\n\n\"Not a sound, not a mouse. Till the bell rang I slept. Then she is gone!\"\n\n\"Would you recognize her again?\"\n\n\"But no. I hardly look at her, and I see so many.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, no doubt. And the gentleman. When you went into his room?\"\n\n\"Ah! He was half sitting up. I come in. He just look at me. He fall back.\nHe is dead. He say nothing. Then I--I run.\"\n\n\"That's all I wanted to know,\" Julian said. \"Valentine, shall we go?\"\n\n\"By all means.\"\n\nThe landlord seemed relieved at their decision, and eagerly let them\nout into the pouring rain. When they were in the dismal strip of garden\nJulian turned and looked up at the lit windows of the bedroom on the\nfirst story. Marr was lying there in the bright illumination at ease,\nrelieved of his soul. But, as Julian looked, the two windows suddenly\ngrew dark. Evidently the economical landlord had hastened up, observed\nthe waste of the material he had to pay for, and abruptly stopped it.\nAt the gate they called a cab.\n\n\"No; let us have the glass up,\" Julian said; \"a drop of rain more or less\ndoesn't matter. And I want some air.\"\n\n\"So do I,\" said Valentine. \"The atmosphere of that house was abominable.\"\n\n\"Of course there can be no two opinions as to its character,\" Julian\nsaid.\n\n\"Of course not.\"\n\n\"What a dreary place to die in!\"\n\n\"Yes. But does it matter where one dies? I think not. I attach immense\nimportance to where one lives.\"\n\n\"It seems horrible to come to an end in such a place, to have had that\nwretched Frenchman as the only witness of one's death. Still, I suppose\nit is only foolish sentiment. Valentine, did you notice how happy Marr\nlooked?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Didn't you? I thought you watched him almost as if you wondered as I\ndid.\"\n\n\"How could I? I had never seen him before.\"\n\n\"It was curious the landlord seeing a likeness between you and him.\"\n\n\"Do you think so? The man naturally supposed one of us might be a\nrelation, as we came to see Marr. I should not suppose there could\nbe much resemblance.\"\n\n\"There is none. It's impossible. There can be none!\"\n\nThey rattled on towards Piccadilly, back through the dismal\nthoroughfares, towards the asphalt ways of Bloomsbury. Presently\nJulian said:\n\n\"I wish I had seen Marr die.\"\n\n\"But why, Julian? Why this extraordinary interest in a man you knew so\nslightly and for so short a time?\"\n\n\"It's because I can't get it out of my head that he had something to do\nwith our sittings, more than we know.\"\n\n\"Impossible.\"\n\n\"I am almost certain the doctor thought so. I must tell him about Marr's\ndeath. Valentine, let us drive to Harley Street now.\"\n\nValentine did not reply at once, and Julian said:\n\n\"I will tell the cabman.\"\n\n\"Very well.\"\n\nJulian gave the order.\n\n\"I wonder if he will be in,\" Julian said presently. \"What is the time?\"\n\nHe took out his watch and held it up sideways until the light of a\ngas-lamp flashed on it for a moment.\n\n\"Just eleven. So late? I am surprised.\"\n\n\"We were a good while at the 'European.'\"\n\n\"Longer than I thought. Probably the doctor will have come in, even if\nhe has been out dining. Ah, here we are!\"\n\nThe cab drew up. Julian got out and rang the bell in the rain.\n\n\"Is Doctor Levillier at home?\"\n\n\"No, sir. He is out dining. But I expect him every moment. Will you come\nin and wait?\" said the man-servant, who knew Julian well.\n\n\"Thanks; I think I will. I rather want to see him. I will just ask Mr.\nCresswell. He's with me to-night.\"\n\nJulian returned to the cab, in which Valentine was sitting.\n\n\"The doctor will probably be home in a few minutes. Let us go in and wait\nfor him.\"\n\n\"Yes, you go in.\"\n\n\"But surely--\"\n\n\"No, Julian,\" Valentine said, and suddenly there came into his voice a\nweariness, \"I am rather tired to-night. I think I'll go home to bed.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" Julian said. He was obviously disappointed. He hesitated.\n\n\"Shall I come too, old chap? You're sure--you're certain that you are not\nfeeling ill after last night?\"\n\nHe leant with his foot on the step of the cab to look at Valentine more\nclosely.\n\n\"No; I am all right. Only tired and sleepy, Julian. Well, will you come\nor stay?\"\n\n\"I think I will stay. I want badly to have a talk with the doctor.\"\n\n\"All right. Good-night.\"\n\n\"Good-night!\"\n\nValentine called his address to the cabman, and the man whipped up his\nhorse. Just as the cab was turning round Valentine leaned out over the\nwooden door and cried to Julian, who was just going into the house:\n\n\"Give my best regards to the doctor, Julian.\"\n\nThe cab disappeared, splashing through the puddles.\n\nJulian stood still on the doorstep.\n\n\"Who said that, Lawler?\" he asked.\n\nThe servant looked at him in surprise.\n\n\"Mr. Valentine, sir.\"\n\n\"Mr. Valentine?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"Of course, of course. But his voice, didn't--didn't you notice-\"\n\n\"It was Mr. Valentine's usual voice, sir,\" Lawler said, with increasing\nastonishment.\n\n\"I'm upset to-night,\" Julian muttered.\n\nHe went into the house and Lawler closed the street door.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE HARLEY STREET EPISODE\n\n\nJulian was a favourite in Harley Street, so Lawler did not hesitate\nto show him into the doctor's very private room,--a room dedicated to\nease, and to the cultivation of a busy man's hobbies. No patient ever\ntold the sad secrets of his body here. Here were no medical books, no\nappliances for the writing of prescriptions, no hints of the profession\nof the owner. Several pots of growing roses gravely shadowed forth the\ndoctor's fondness for flowers. A grand piano mutely spoke of his love\nfor music. Many of the books which lay about were novels; one, soberly\ndressed in a vellum binding, being Ouida's \"Dog of Flanders.\" All the\nphotographs which studded the silent chamber with a reflection of life\nwere photographs of children, except one. That was Valentine's. The\nhearth, on which a fire flashed, was wide and had two mighty occupants,\nRupert and Mab, the doctor's mastiffs, who took their evening ease,\npillowing their huge heads upon each other's heaving bodies. The ticking\nclock on the mantelpiece was an imitation of the Devil Clock of Master\nZacharius. There were no newspapers in the room. That fact alone made it\noriginal. A large cage of sleeping canaries was covered with a cloth. The\nroom was long and rather narrow, the only door being at one end. On the\nwalls hung many pictures, some of them gifts from the artists. Some\nfoils lay on an ottoman in a far corner. The doctor fenced admirably,\nand believed in the exercise as a tonic to the muscles and a splendid\ndrill-sergeant to the eyes.\n\nAs Julian came into the room, which was lit only by wax candles, he could\nnot help comparing it with the room he had just left, in which the body\nof Marr lay. The atmosphere of a house is a strange thing, and almost as\ndefinite to the mind as is an appearance to the eye. A sensitive nature\ntakes it in like a breath of fetid or of fresh air. The atmosphere of the\nEuropean Hotel had been sinister and dreary, as of a building consecrated\nto hidden deeds, and inhabited mainly by wandering sinners. This home of\na great doctor was open-hearted and receptive, frank and refined. The\nsleeping dogs, heaving gently in fawn-coloured beatitude, set upon it the\nbest hall-mark. It was a house--judging at least by this room--for happy\nrest. Yet it was the abode of incessant work, as the great world knew\nwell. This sanctum alone was the shrine of lotos-eating. The doctor\nsometimes laughingly boasted that he had never insulted it by even so\nmuch as writing a post-card within its four walls.\n\nJulian stroked the dogs, who woke to wink upon him majestically,\nand sat down. Lawler quietly departed, and he was left alone. When\nhe first entered the house he had been disappointed at the departure\nof Valentine. Now he felt rather glad to have the doctor to himself\nfor a quiet half-hour. A conversation of two people is, under certain\ncircumstances, more complete than a conversation of three, however\ndelightful the third may chance to be. Julian placed Valentine before\nall the rest of the world. Nevertheless, to-night he was glad that\nValentine had gone home to bed. It seems sometimes as if affection\ncontributes to the making of a man self-conscious. Julian had a\nvague notion that the presence of his greatest friend to-night might\nrender him self-conscious. He scarcely knew why. Then he looked at the\nmastiffs, and wondered at the extraordinary difference between men and\nthe companion animals whom they love and who love them. What man,\nhowever natural, however independent and serene, could emulate the\nmajestic and deliberate _abandon_ of a big dog courted and caressed\nby a blazing fire and a soft rug? Man has not the dignity of soul to\nbe so grandly natural. Yet his very pert self-consciousness, the fringed\npetticoats of affectation which he wears, give him the kennel, the\ncollar, the muzzle, the whip, weapons of power to bring the dog to\nsubjection. And Julian, as he watched Rupert and Mab wrapped in large\nlethargic dreams, found himself pitying them, as civilized man vaguely\npities all other inhabitants of the round world. Poor old things! Sombre\nagitations were not theirs. They had nothing to aim at or to fight\nagainst. No devils and angels played at football with their souls. Their\n_liaisons_ were clear, uncomplicated by the violent mental drum-taps that\nset the passions marching so often at a quickstep in the wrong direction.\nAnd Julian knelt down on the hearth-rug and laid his strong young hands\non their broad heads. Slowly they opened their veiled eyes and blinked.\nOne, Rupert, struck a strict tail feebly upon the carpet in token of\nacquiescence and gratified goodwill. Mab heaved herself over until she\nrested more completely upon her side, and allowed an enormous sigh to\nrumble through her monotonously. Julian enjoyed that sigh. It made him\nfor the moment an optimist, as a happy child makes a dreary old man\nshivering on the edge of death an optimist. Dogs are blessed things.\nThat was his thought. And just then the door at the end of the room\nopened quietly, and Doctor Levillier came in, with a cloak on and his\ncrush-hat in his hand.\n\n\"I am glad to see you, Addison,\" he said.\n\nThe dogs shook themselves up onto their legs and laid their heads against\nhis knees.\n\n\"Lawler, please bring my gruel.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"Addison, will you have brandy or whisky?\"\n\n\"Whisky, please, doctor.\"\n\nLawler took his master's cloak and hat, and the doctor came up to the\nfire.\n\n\"So Valentine has gone home to bed?\" he said.\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"He's all right, I hope?\"\n\n\"Yes. Indeed, doctor, I thought him looking more fit than usual to-day,\nmore alive than I have often seen him.\"\n\n\"I noticed that last night, when he revived from his trance. It struck me\nvery forcibly, very forcibly indeed. But you--\" and the doctor's eyes\nwere on Julian's face--\"look older than your age to-night, my boy.\"\n\nHe sat down and lit a cigar. The mastiffs coiled themselves at his feet\nrapturously. They sighed, and he sighed too, quietly in satisfaction.\nHe loved the one hour before midnight, the hour of perfect rest for him.\nPutting his feet on Rupert's back, he went on:\n\n\"Last night's events upset you seriously, I see, young and strong though\nyou are. But the most muscular men are more often the prey of their\nnervous systems than most people are aware. Spend a few quiet days. Fence\nin the morning. Ride--out in the country, not in the Park. Get off your\nhorse now and then, tie him up at a lych-gate and sit in a village\nchurch. Listen to the amateur organist practising 'Abide with me,' and\nthe 'Old Hundredth,' on the Leiblich Gedacht and the Dulciana, with the\nbourdon on the pedals. There's nothing like that for making life seem a\nslow stepper instead of a racer. And take Valentine with you. I should\nlike to sit with him in a church at twilight, when the rooks were going\nhome, and the organ was droning. Ah, well, but I must not think of\nholidays.\"\n\n\"Doctor, I like your prescription. Yes; I am feeling a bit out of sorts\nto-night. Last night, you see--and then to-day.\"\n\n\"Surely, Addison, surely you haven't been sitting--but no, forgive me.\nI've got your promise. Well, what is it?\"\n\nJulian replied quickly:\n\n\"That man I told you about, Marr, is dead.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier looked decidedly startled. Julian's frequent allusions\nto Marr and evident strange interest in the man, had impressed him as it\nhad impressed Valentine. However, he only said:\n\n\"Heart disease?\"\n\n\"I don't know. There is going to be an inquest.\"\n\n\"When did he die?\"\n\n\"Last night, or rather at four in the morning; just as Valentine came out\nof his trance, it must have been. Don't you remember the clock striking?\"\n\n\"Certainly, I do. But why do you connect the two circumstances?\"\n\n\"Doctor, how can you tell that I do?\"\n\n\"By your expression, the tone of your voice.\"\n\n\"You are right. Somehow I can't help connecting them. I told Valentine\nso to-night. He has been with me to see Marr's body.\"\n\n\"You have just come from that deathbed now?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nJulian sketched rapidly the events of the European Hotel, but he left\nto the last the immense impression made upon him by the expression of\nthe dead man.\n\n\"He looked so happy, so good, that at first I could not recognize him,\"\nhe said. \"His face, dead, was the most absolutely direct contradiction\npossible of his face, alive. He was not the same man.\"\n\n\"The man was gone, you see, Addison.\"\n\n\"Yes. But, then, what was it which remained to work this change in the\nbody?\"\n\n\"Death gives a strange calm. The relaxing of sinews, the droop of limbs\nand features, the absolute absence of motion, of breathing, work up an\nimpression.\"\n\n\"But there was something more here,--more than peace. There was a--well,\na strong happiness and a goodness. And Marr had always struck me as an\natrociously bad lot. I think I told you.\"\n\nThe doctor sat musing. Lawler came in with the tray, on which was a\nsmall basin of gruel and soda-water bottles, a decanter of whisky,\nand a tall tumbler. Julian mixed himself a drink, and the doctor,\nstill meditatively, took the basin of gruel onto his knees. As he\nsipped it, he looked a strange, little, serious ascetic, sitting\nthere in the light from the wax candles, his shining boots planted\ngently on the broad back of the slumbering mastiff, his light eyes\nfixed on the fire. He did not speak again until he was half way through\nhis gruel. Then he said:\n\n\"And you know absolutely nothing of Marr's past history?\"\n\n\"No; nothing.\"\n\n\"I gather from all you have told me that it would be worthy of study. If\nI knew it I might understand the startling change from the aspect of evil\nto the aspect of good at death. I believe the man must have been far less\nevil than you thought him, for dead faces express something that was\nalways latent, if not known, in the departed natures. Ignorantly, you\npossibly attributed to Marr a nature far more horrible than he ever\nreally possessed.\"\n\nBut Julian answered:\n\n\"I feel absolutely convinced that at the time I knew him he was one of\nthe greatest rips, one of the most merciless men in London. I never felt\nabout any man as I did about him! And he impressed others in the same\nway.\"\n\n\"I wish I had seen him,\" Doctor Levillier said.\n\nAn idea, suggested by Julian's last remark, suddenly struck him.\n\n\"He conveyed a strong impression of evil, you say?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"How? In what way, exactly?\"\n\nJulian hesitated.\n\n\"It's difficult to say,\" he answered. \"Awfully difficult to put such a\nthing into words. He interested me. I felt that he had a great power of\nintellect, or of will, or something. But in every way he suggested a bad,\na damnably bad, character. A woman said to me once about him that it was\nlike an emanation.\"\n\n\"Ah!\"\n\nThe doctor finished his gruel and put down the basin on the table beside\nhim.\n\n\"By the way, where did Marr live? Anywhere in my direction? Would he, for\ninstance, go home from Piccadilly, or the theatres, by Regent Street?\"\n\n\"I don't know at all where he lived.\"\n\n\"Have you ever seen him with animals,--with dogs, for instance?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"If he had been as evil as you suppose, any dog would have avoided him.\"\n\n\"Well, but dogs avoid perfection too.\"\n\n\"Hardly, Addison.\"\n\n\"But Rip and Valentine!\"\n\nThe remark struck the doctor; that was obvious. He pushed his right foot\nslowly backwards and forwards on Rupert's back, rucking up the dog's\nloose skin in heavy folds.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said; \"Rip is rather an inexplicable beggar. But do you mean\nto tell me he hasn't got over his horror of Valentine to-day?\"\n\n\"This afternoon he was worse than ever. If Valentine had touched him,\nI believe he would have gone half mad. I had to put him out of the room.\"\n\n\"H'm!\"\n\n\"Isn't it unaccountable?\"\n\n\"I must say that it is. Dogs are such faithful wretches. If Rupert and\nMab were to turn against me like that I believe it would strike at my\nheart more fiercely than the deed of any man could.\"\n\nHe bent down and ran his hand over Rupert's heaving back.\n\n\"The cheap satirist,\" he said, \"is forever comparing the fickleness\nof men with the faithfulness of animals, but I don't mean to do that.\nI have a great belief in some human natures, and there are many men\nwhom I could, and would, implicitly trust.\"\n\n\"There is one, doctor, whom we both know.\"\n\n\"Cresswell. Yes. I could trust him through thick and thin. And yet his\nown dog flies at him.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier returned to that fact, as if it puzzled him so utterly\nthat he could not dismiss it from his mind.\n\n\"There must be some curious, subtle reason for that,\" he said; \"yet with\nall my intimate and affectionate knowledge of dogs I cannot divine it.\nWatch Rip carefully when he is not with Cresswell. Look after his health.\nNotice if he seems natural and happy. Does he eat as usual?\"\n\n\"Rather. He did to-day.\"\n\n\"And he seems contented with you?\"\n\n\"Quite.\"\n\n\"Well, all I can say is, that Rip doesn't seem to possess a dog nature.\nHe is uncanny.\"\n\n\"Uncanny,\" Julian said, seizing on the word. \"But everything has become\nuncanny within the last few days. Upon my word, when I look back into\nthe past of, say, a fortnight ago, I ask myself whether I am a fool,\nor dreaming, or whether my health is going to the deuce. London seems\ndifferent. I look on things strangely. I fancy, I imagine--\"\n\nHe broke off. Then he said:\n\n\"By Jove, doctor, if half the men I know at White's could see into my\nmind they would think me fitted for a lunatic asylum.\"\n\n\"It doesn't matter to you what half the men, or the whole of the men at\nWhite's think, so long as you keep a cool head and a good heart. But it\nis as you say. You and Valentine have run, as a train runs into the Black\nCountry, into an unwholesome atmosphere. In a day or two probably your\nlungs, which have drawn it in, will expel it again.\"\n\nHe smiled rather whimsically. Then he said:\n\n\"You know, Addison, men talk of their strength, and are inclined to\ncall women nervous creatures, but the nerves play tricks among male\nmuscles. Yes, you want the foils, the bicycle, the droning organ, and\nthe village church. I advise you to go out of town for a week. Forget\nMarr, a queer fish evidently, with possibly a power of mesmerism. And\ndon't ask Valentine to go away with you.\"\n\nThe last remark surprised Julian.\n\n\"But why not?\" he asked.\n\n\"Merely because he is intimately connected with the events that have\nturned you out of your usual, your right course. I see that your mind\nis moving in a rather narrow circle, which contains, besides yourself,\ntwo people only, Marr and Cresswell.\"\n\n\"Darkness and light. Yes, it's true. How rotten of me,\" Julian exclaimed,\nlike a schoolboy. \"I'm like a squirrel in a cage, going round and round.\nThat's just it. Valentine and Marr are in that cursed circle of our\nsittings, and so I insanely connect them with one another. I actually\nbegan to think to-night that Marr died, poor fellow, because--well--\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Oh, it's too ridiculous, that his death had something to do with our\nlast sitting. Supposing, as you say, he had a hypnotic power of any kind.\nCould--could its exercise cause injury to his health?\"\n\nBut the doctor ignored the question in his quiet and yet very complete\nand self-possessed manner.\n\n\"Marr and Cresswell never met,\" he said. \"It is folly to connect them\ntogether. It is, as you said,\" and he laughed, \"rotten of you. Go away\nto-morrow.\"\n\n\"I will, you autocratic doctor. What fee do I owe you?\"\n\n\"Your friendship, my boy.\"\n\nDr. Levillier sat lower in his chair, and they smoked in silence, both\nof them revelling in the warm peace and the ease of this night-hour.\nSince he had come into the Harley Street house Julian had been much\nhappier. His perturbation had gradually evaporated until now scarcely\na vestige of it remained. The little doctor's talk, above all the sight\nof his calm, thoughtful face and the aspect of his calm, satisfied room,\ngave the _coup de gr\u00e2ce_ to the uneasiness of a spurious and ill-omened\nexcitement. When the power of wide medical knowledge is joined to the\npower of goodness and of umbrageous intellectuality, a doctor is, among\nall men, the man to lay the ghosts that human nature is perpetually at\nthe pains to set walking in their shrouds to cause alarm. All Julian's\nghosts were laid. He smoked on and grew to feel perfectly natural and\ncomfortable. The dogs echoed and emphasized all the healing power of\ntheir small and elderly master. As they lay sleeping, a tangle of\nlarge limbs and supine strength, the fire shone over them till their\nfawn-coloured coats gleamed almost like satin touched with gold. The\ndelightful sanctity of unmeasured confidence, unmeasured satisfaction,\nsang in their gentle and large-hearted snores, which rose and fell\nwith the regularity of waves of the sea. Now and then one of them\nslowly stretched a leg or expanded the toes of a foot, as if intent on\npresenting a larger surface of sensation to the embrace of comfort and\nof affection. And they, so it seemed to Julian, kept the pleasant silence\nnow come into existence between him and the doctor alive. That silence\nrested him immensely. In it the two cigars diminished steadily, steadily\nas the length of a man's life, but glowing to the very end. And the grey\nashes dropped away of their own accord, and Julian's mind shed its grey\nashes too and glowed serenely. The dogs expanded their warm bodies on the\nhearth, and his nature expanded in a vague, wide-stretching generosity\nof mute evening emotion.\n\n\"How comfortable this is, doctor,\" he murmured at last.\n\n\"Yes. It's a good hour,\" the doctor replied, letting the words go slowly\nfrom his lips. \"I wish I could give to all the poor creatures in this\ncity just one good hour.\"\n\nThey smoked their cigars out.\n\n\"I ought to go,\" Julian said lazily.\n\n\"No. Have one more. I know it is dangerous to prolong a pleasure. It\nloses its savour. But I think, Addison, to-night, you and I can get no\nharm from the experiment.\"\n\nHe handed Julian the cigar-box.\n\n\"We won't stir up the dogs for another half-hour,\" he added, looking at\ntheir happiness with a shining satisfaction. \"Here are the matches. Light\nup.\"\n\nJulian obeyed, and they began the delightful era of the second cigar,\nand sank a little deeper down, surely, into serenity and peace.\nOccasional coals dropping into the fender with a hot tick, tick,\nchirrupped a lullaby to the four happy companions. And the men learnt\na fine silence from the fine silence of the dogs.\n\nHalf way through the second cigar Rupert shifted under his master's\npatent-leather boots and raised his huge head. His eyes blinked out\nof their sleep, then ceased to blink and became attentive. Then his\nears, which had been lying down on each side of his head in the suavest\nattitude which such features of a dog can assume, lifted themselves up\nand pointed grimly forward as he listened to something. His flaccid legs\ncontracted under him, and the muscles of his back quivered. Mab, less\nreadily alert, quickly caught the infection of his attention, rolled over\nout of her sideways position and couched beside him. The movement of the\ndogs was not congenial to the doctor. Rupert's curious back, alert under\nhis feet, communicated an immediate sense of disquiet to the very centre\nof his being. He said to Julian:\n\n\"The acuteness of animal senses has its drawbacks. These dogs must have\nheard some sound in the street that is entirely inaudible to us. Well,\nRupert, what is it? Lie down again and go to sleep.\"\n\nStooping forward he put his hand on the dog's neck, and gave him a push,\nexpecting him to yield readily, and tumble over onto the warm rug to\nsleep once more. But Rupert resisted his hand, and instead, got up, and\nstood at attention. Mab immediately followed his example.\n\n\"What are they after, doctor?\" said Julian.\n\nAs he spoke a bell rang in the house.\n\n\"Nemesis for prolonging the pleasure,\" Levillier said. \"A summons to a\npatient, no doubt.\"\n\nAs if in reply to the twitter of the bell, Rupert sprang forward and\nbarked. He remained beside the door, waiting, while Mab barked too,\nnearer the fire. The bell sounded again, and the footstep of Lawler,\nwho always sat up as late as his master, was heard on the stairs from\nthe servants' part of the house. It passed them on its errand to the\nfront door, but during its passage the excitement of the two dogs\nrapidly increased. They began to bark furiously and to bristle.\n\n\"I never saw them like this before,\" the doctor said, not without\nanxiety.\n\nAs he spoke Lawler opened the hall door. They heard the latch go and\nthe faint voice of somebody in colloquy with him. For the dogs were\nnow abruptly silent, but displayed the most curious savage intentness,\nshowing their teeth, and standing each by the door as if sentinels\non guard. The colloquy ceasing, steps again sounded in the hall, but\nmore than Lawler's. Evidently the man was returning towards the room\naccompanied by somebody from the street. The doctor was keenly observing\nthe mastiffs, and just as Lawler's hand struck upon the handle of the\ndoor to turn it, he suddenly called out sharply:\n\n\"Lawler, you are not to open the door!\"\n\nAnd as he called, the doctor ran forward between the two dogs and caught\ntheir collars in his two hands. They tugged and leaped to get away, but\nhe held on. The surprised voice of the obedient Lawler was heard on the\nhither side of the door, saying:\n\n\"I beg your pardon, sir.\"\n\nThe doctor said hastily to Julian:\n\n\"These dogs will tear the person who has just come into the house to\npieces if we don't take care. Catch on to Mab, Addison.\"\n\nJulian obeyed, and the dog was like live iron with determination under\nhis grasp.\n\n\"Some one is with you, Lawler,\" the doctor said. \"Does he wish to see\nme?\"\n\n\"If you please, sir, it is Mr. Cresswell, Mr. Valentine come back for Mr.\nAddison.\"\n\nJulian felt himself go suddenly pale.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE STRENGTH OF THE SPRING\n\n\nRather reluctantly, Julian acted on the advice of Doctor Levillier and\nwent out of town for a week on the following day. He took his way to\nthe sea, and tried to feel normal in a sailing-boat with a gnarled and\ncorrugated old salt for his only companion. But his success was only\npartial, for while his body gave itself to the whisper of the ungoverned\nbreezes, while his hands held the ropes, and his eyes watched the subtle\nproceedings of the weather, and his ears listened to the serial stories\nof the waves, and to the conversational peregrinations of his Ancient\nMariner about the China Seas in bygone days, his mind was still in\nLondon, still busily concerned itself with the very things that should\nnow undergo a sea change and vanish in ozone. Recent events oppressed\nhim, to the occasional undoing of the old salt, well accustomed to the\nseasick reverence of his despairing clients on board the _Star of the\nSea_. When the mind of a man has once fallen into the habit of prancing\nin a circle like a circus horse, it is difficult to drive it back into\nthe public streets, to make it trot serenely forward in its ordinary\nways. And Julian had with him a ring-master in the person of the ignorant\nRip. Whenever his eyes fell on Rip, curled uneasily in the bottom of the\nswinging boat, he went at a tangent back to Harley Street, and the\nstrange finale of his evening with the doctor.\n\nIt had been a curious tableau divided by a door. Levillier and he stood\non one side tugging mightily at the intent mastiffs, which strained at\ntheir collars, dropping beads of foam from their grinning jaws, savages,\ninstead of calm companions. On the other side, in the hall, Lawler and\nValentine paused in amazement, and a colloquy shot to and fro through the\nwooden barrier. On hearing the name of Valentine mentioned by the butler,\nthe doctor had cast an instant glance of unbounded amazement upon Julian.\nAnd Julian had returned it, feeling in his heart the dawning of an\ninexplicable trouble.\n\n\"Is anything the matter?\" Valentine's voice had asked.\n\n\"No,\" said the doctor in reply. \"But please go into the dining-room. We\nwill come to you there. And Lawler--\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"When you have shown Mr. Cresswell to the dining-room, be careful to shut\nthe door, and to keep it shut till I come.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\nThe butler's well-trained voice had vibrated with surprise and Julian had\nfound himself mechanically smiling as he noted this. Then the footsteps\nof servant and visitor had retreated. Presently a door was heard to shut.\nLawler returned, and was passing discreetly by, to wonder, in his pantry,\nif his master had gone mad, when the doctor again called to him.\n\n\"Go downstairs, Lawler, and in a moment I shall bring the dogs to you.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\nThe butler's voice was now almost shrill with scarcely governable\nastonishment, and his footsteps seemed to tremble uneasily upon the\nstairs as he retired. Then the doctor went to a corner of the room\nand took down from a hook a whip with a heavy thong.\n\n\"I haven't had to use this since they were both puppies,\" he said, with\na side glance at the dogs. \"Now, Addison, keep hold of Mab and go in\nfront of me down the servants' stairs. If the dogs once get out of hand\nwe shall have trouble in the house to-night.\"\n\nThe door was opened, and then a veritable affray began. The animals\nseemed half mad. They tore at their collars, and struggled furiously\nto break loose, snarling and even snapping, their great heads turned in\nthe direction of the dining-room. The doctor, firmest as well as kindest\nof men, recognized necessity, and used the whip unsparingly, lashing the\nanimals through the door to the servants' quarters, and down the stairs.\nIt was a violent procession to the lower regions. Julian could not get it\nout of his head. Entangled among the leaping dogs on the narrow stairway,\nhe had a sense of whirling in the eddies of a stream, driven from this\nside to the other. His arms were nearly pulled out of their sockets. The\nshriek of the lash curling over and around the dogs, the dim vision of\nthe doctor's compressed lips and eyes full of unaccustomed fire, the\ndamp foam on his hands as he rocked from one wall to the other, amid a\ndull music of growls, and fierce, low barks, came back to him now as he\ntrimmed the sails to catch the undecided winds, or felt the tiller leap\nunder his hold. Each moment he had expected to be bitten, but somehow\nthey all tumbled together unhurt into Lawler's pantry, where they found\nthat factotum standing grim and wire-strung with anticipation. Beyond the\npantry were the dogs' night quarters, and they were quickly driven into\nthem and shut up. But they still bounded and beat against the door, and\npresently began to howl a vain chorale.\n\n\"Lord, Lord, sir! what's come to them?\" Lawler exclaimed.\n\nHis fat face had become as white as a sheet, and the doctor was scarcely\nless pale as he leaned against the dresser, whip in hand, drawing panting\nbreaths.\n\n\"I can't tell. They will be all right in a minute.\"\n\nHe pulled himself up.\n\n\"Go to bed now if you like, Lawler,\" he said, rather abruptly. \"Come,\nAddison.\"\n\nThey regained the hall, and made their way to Valentine. He was sitting\nby the dining-table in a watchful attitude, and sprang hastily up as they\ncame in.\n\n\"My dear doctor,\" he said, \"what a pandemonium! I nearly came to your\nassistance.\"\n\n\"It's very lucky you didn't, Cresswell,\" the doctor answered, almost\ngrimly.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Because if you had you might chance to be a dead man by this time.\"\n\nOut on the sea, under the streaming clouds that fled before the wind,\nJulian recalled the strange terseness of that reply, and the perhaps\nstranger silence that followed it. For Valentine had made no comment,\nhad asked for no explanation. He had simply dropped the subject, and\nthe three men had remained together for a few minutes, constrained and\nill at ease. Then the doctor had said:\n\n\"Let us go back now to my room.\"\n\nValentine and he assented, and got upon their feet to follow him, but\nwhen he opened the door there came up from the servants' quarters the\nhalf-strangled howling of the mastiffs. Involuntarily Dr. Levillier\npaused to listen, his hand behind his ear. Then he turned to the\nyoung men, and held out his right hand.\n\n\"Good-night,\" he said. \"I must go down to them, or there will be a\nsummons applied for against me in the morning by one of my neighbours.\"\n\nAnd they let themselves out while he retreated once more down the stairs.\n\nThe drive home had been a silent one. Only when Julian was bidding\nValentine good-night had he found a tongue to say to his friend:\n\n\"The devil's in all this, Valentine.\"\n\nAnd Valentine had merely nodded with a smile and driven off.\n\nNow, in the sea solitude that was to be a medicine to his soul, Julian\nwent round and round in his mental circus, treading ever the same\nsaw dust under foot, hearing ever the same whip crack to send him\nforward. His isolation bent him upon himself, and the old salt's hoarse\nmurmurings of the \"Chiney\" seas in no way drew him to a healthier\noutlook. Why Valentine returned for him that night he did not know.\nThat might have been merely the prompting of a vagrant impulse. Julian\ncursed that impulse, on account of the circumstances to which it directly\nled; for there was a peculiar strain of enmity in them which had\naffected, and continued to affect, him most disagreeably. To behold\nthe instinctive hostility of another towards a person whom one loves is\noffensively grotesque to the observer, and at moments Julian hated the\ndoctor's mastiffs, and even hated the unconscious Rip, who lay, in a\ncertain shivering discomfort and apprehension, seeking sleep with the\ndetermination of sorrow. There are things, feelings, and desires, which\nshould surely be kicked out of men and dogs. Such a thing, beyond doubt,\nwas a savage hatred of Valentine. What prompted it, and whence it came,\nwere merely mysteries, which the dumbness of dogs must forever sustain.\nBut what specially plunged Julian into concern was the latent fear that\nDr. Levillier might echo the repulsion of his dogs and come to look\nupon Valentine with different eyes. Julian's fine jealousy for his\nfriend sharpened his faculties of observation and of deduction, and\nhe had observed the little doctor's dry reception of Valentine after\nthe struggle on the stairs, and his eager dismissal of them both to the\nstreet door on the howling excuse that rose up from the basement. Such\na mood might probably be transient, and only engendered by the fatigue\nof excitement, or even by the physical exhaustion attendant upon the\npreservation of Valentine from the rage of Rupert and Mab. Julian told\nhimself that to dwell upon it, or to conceive of it as permanent, was\nneither sensible nor acute, considering his intimate knowledge of the\ndoctor's nature, and of his firm friendship for Valentine. That he did\ncontinue most persistently to dwell upon it, and with a keen suspicion,\nmust be due to the present desolation of his circumstances, and to the\nvain babble of the blue-coated Methuselah, whose intellect roamed\nincessantly through a marine past, peopled with love episodes of a\nsomewhat Rabelaisian character.\n\nAt the end of five days Julian abruptly threw up the sponge and returned\nto London, abandoning the old salt to the tobacco-chewing, which was his\nonly solace during the winter season, now fast drawing to a close. He\nwent at once to see Valentine, who had a narrative to tell him concerning\nMarr.\n\n\"You have probably read all about Marr in the papers?\" he asked, when he\nmet Julian.\n\nThe question came at once with his hand-grasp.\n\n\"No,\" Julian said. \"I shunted the papers, tried to give myself up\nentirely to the sea, as the doctor advised. What has there been?\"\n\n\"Oh, a good deal. I may as well tell it to you, or no doubt Lady Crichton\nwill. People exaggerate so much.\"\n\n\"Why--what is there to exaggerate about?\"\n\n\"The inquest was held,\" Valentine answered. \"And every effort was made\nto find the woman who came with Marr to the hotel and evaporated so\nmysteriously, but there was no one to identify her. The Frenchman had\nnot noticed her features, and the housemaid, as you remember, was a\nfool, and could only say she was a common-looking person.\"\n\n\"Well,\" Julian said, rather eagerly, \"but what was the cause of death?\"\n\n\"That was entirely obscure. The body seemed healthy--at least the various\norgans were sound. There was no obvious reason for death, and the verdict\nwas, simply, 'Died from failure of the heart's action.'\"\n\n\"Vague, but comprehensive.\"\n\n\"Yes; I suppose we shall all die strictly from the same cause.\"\n\n\"And that is all?\"\n\n\"Not quite. It appears that a description of the dead man got into the\npapers and that he was identified by his wife, who read the account in\nsome remote part of the country, took the train to town, and found that\nMarr was, as she suspected, the man whom she had married, from whom she\nhad separated, and whose real name was Wilson, the Wilson of a notorious\nnewspaper case. Do you remember it?\"\n\n\"What, an action against a husband for gross cruelty, for incredible,\nunspeakable inhumanity--some time ago?\"\n\n\"Yes. The wife got a judicial separation.\"\n\n\"And that is the history of Marr?\"\n\n\"That is, such of his history as is known,\" Valentine said in his calm\nvoice.\n\nWhile he had been speaking his blue eyes had always been fixed on\nJulian's face. When Julian looked up they were withdrawn.\n\n\"I always had a feeling that Marr was secretly a wretch, a devil,\" Julian\nsaid now. \"It seems I was right. What has become of the wife?\"\n\n\"I suppose she has gone back to her country home. Probably she is happy.\nHer first mate chastised her with whips. To fulfil her destiny as a woman\nshe ought now to seek another who is fond of scorpions.\"\n\n\"Women are strange,\" Julian said, voluptuously generalizing after the\nmanner of young men.\n\nValentine leaned forward as if the sentence stirred some depth in his\nmind and roused him to a certain excitement.\n\n\"Julian,\" he exclaimed, \"are you and I wasting our lives, do you think?\nSince you have been away I have thought again over our conversation\nbefore we had our first sitting. Do you remember it?\"\n\n\"Yes, Valentine.\"\n\n\"You said then I had held you back from so much.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"And I have been asking myself whether I have not, perhaps, held you\nback, held myself back, from all that is worth having in life.\"\n\nJulian looked troubled.\n\n\"From all that is not worth having, old boy,\" he said.\n\nBut he looked troubled. When Valentine spoke like this he felt as a man\nwho stands at a garden gate and gazes out into the world, and is stirred\nwith a thrill of anticipation and of desire to leap out from the green\nand shadowy close, where trees are and flowers, into the dust and heat\nwhere passion hides as in a nest, and unspoken things lie warm. Julian\nwas vaguely afraid of himself. It is dangerous to lean on any one,\nhowever strong. Having met Valentine on the threshold of life, Julian\nhad never learned to walk alone. He trusted another, instead of trusting\nhimself. He had never forged his own sword. When Siegfried sang at his\nanvil he sang a song of all the greatness of life. Julian was notably\nstrong as to his muscles. He had arms of iron, and the blood raced in\nhis veins, but he had never forged his sword. Mistrust of himself was\nas a phantom that walked with him unless Valentine drove it away.\n\n\"I thought you had got over that absurd feeling, Val,\" he said. \"I\nthought you were content with your soul.\"\n\n\"I think I have ceased to be content,\" said Valentine. \"Perhaps I have\nstolen a fragment of your nature, Julian, in those dark nights in the\ntentroom. Since you have been away I have wondered. An extraordinary\nsensation of bodily strength, of enormous vigour, has come to me. And\nI want to test the sensation, to see if it is founded upon fact.\"\n\nHe was sitting in a low chair, and as he spoke he slowly stretched his\nlimbs. It was as if all his body yawned, waking from sleep.\n\n\"But how?\" Julian asked.\n\nAlready he looked rather interested than troubled. At Valentine's words\nhe too became violently conscious of his own strength, and stirred by the\nwonder of youth dwelling in him.\n\n\"How? That is what I wish to find out by going into the world with\ndifferent eyes. I have been living in the arts, Julian. But is that\nliving at all?\"\n\nJulian got up and stood by the fire. Valentine excited him. He leaned one\narm on the mantelpiece. His right hand kept closing and unclosing as he\ntalked.\n\n\"Such a life is natural to you,\" he said. \"And you have made me love it.\"\n\n\"I sometimes wonder,\" responded Valentine, \"whether I have not trained\nmy head to slay my heart. Men of intellect are often strangely inhuman.\nBesides, what you call my purity and my refinement are due perhaps to my\ncowardice. I am called the Saint of Victoria Street because I live in a\nsort of London cloister with you for my companion, and in the cloister\nI read or I give myself up to music, and I hang my walls with pictures,\nand I wonder at the sins of men, and I believe I am that deadly thing,\na Pharisee.\"\n\n\"But you are perfectly tolerant.\"\n\n\"Am I? I often find myself sneering at the follies of others, at what I\ncall their coarsenesses, their wallowing in the mire.\"\n\n\"It is wallowing.\"\n\n\"And which is most human, the man who drives in a carriage, or the man\nwho walks sturdily along the road, and gets the mud on his boots, and\nlets the rain fall on him and the wind be his friend? I suspect it is\na fine thing to be out unsheltered in a storm, Julian.\"\n\nJulian's dark eyes were glowing. Valentine spoke with an unusual, almost\nwith an electric warmth, and Julian was conscious of drawing very near to\nhim tonight. Always in their friendship, hitherto, he had thought of\nValentine as of one apart, walking at a distance from all men, even from\nhim. And he had believed most honestly that this very detachment had\ndrawn him to Valentine more than to any other human being. But to-night\nhe began suddenly to feel that to be actually side by side with his\nfriend would be a very glorious thing. He could never hope to walk\nperpetually upon the vestal heights. If Valentine did really come down\ntowards the valley, what then? Just at first the idea had shocked him.\nNow he began almost to wish that it might be so, to feel that he was\nshaking hands with Valentine more brotherly than ever before.\n\n\"Extremes are wrong, desolate, abominable, I begin to think,\" Valentine\nwent on. \"Angel and devil, both should be scourged--the one to be purged\nof excessive good, the other of excessive evil, and between them, midway,\nis man, natural man. Julian, you are natural man, and you are more right\nthan I, who, it seems, have been educating you by presenting to you for\ncontemplation my own disease.\"\n\n\"Well, but is natural man worth much? That is the question! I don't\nknow.\"\n\n\"He fights, and drinks, and loves, and, oftener than the renowned\nphilosopher thinks, he knows how to die. And then he lives thoroughly,\nand that is probably what we were sent into the world to do.\"\n\n\"Can't we live thoroughly without, say, the fighting and the drinking,\nVal?\"\n\nValentine got up, too, as if excited, and stood by the fire by Julian's\nside.\n\n\"Battle calls forth heroism,\" he said, \"which else would sleep.\"\n\n\"And drinking?\"\n\n\"Leads to good fellowship.\"\n\nThis last remark was so preposterously unlike Valentine that Julian could\nnot for a moment accept it as uttered seriously. His mood changed, and he\nburst out suddenly into a laugh.\n\n\"You have been taking me in all the time,\" he exclaimed, \"and I actually\nwas fool enough to think you serious.\"\n\n\"And to agree with what I was saying?\"\n\nValentine still spoke quite gravely and earnestly, and Julian began to be\npuzzled.\n\n\"You know I can never help agreeing with you when you really mean\nanything,\" he began. \"I have proved so often that you are always right\nin the end. So your real theory of life must be the true one: but your\nreal theory, I know, is to reject what most people run after.\"\n\n\"No longer that, I fancy, Julian.\"\n\n\"But, then, what has changed you?\"\n\nValentine met his eyes calmly.\n\n\"I don't know,\" he said. \"Do you?\"\n\n\"I? How should I?\"\n\n\"Perhaps this change has been growing within me for a long while. It\nis difficult to say; but to-night my nature culminates. I am at a point,\nJulian.\"\n\n\"Then you have climbed to it. Don't you want to stay there?\"\n\n\"No mere man can face the weather on a mountain peak forever, and life\nlies rather in the plains.\"\n\nValentine went over to the window and touched the blind. It shot up,\nleaving the naked window, through which the gas-lamps of Victoria Street\nstared in the night.\n\n\"I wish,\" he said, \"that we, in England, had the flat roofs of the East.\"\n\nHe thrust up the glass, and the night air pushed in.\n\n\"Come here, Julian,\" he said.\n\nJulian obeyed, wondering rather. Valentine leaned a little out on the\nsill and made Julian lean beside him. It was early in the night and\nthe hum of London was yet loud, for the bees did not sleep, but were\nstill busy in their monstrous hive. There was already a gentleness of\nspring among the discoloured houses. Spring will not be denied, even\namong men who dwell in flats. The cabs hurried past, and pedestrians\nwent by in twos and threes or solitary; soldiers walking vaguely, seeking\ncheap pleasures, or more gaily with adoring maidens; tired business men;\njourneying towards Victoria Station; a desolate shop-girl, in dreary\nvirtue defiant of mankind, but still unblessed; the Noah's ark figure of\na policeman, tramping emptily, standing wearily by turns, to keep public\norder. Lights starred here and there the long line of mansions opposite.\n\n\"I often look out here at night,\" Valentine said, \"generally to wonder\nwhy people live as they do. When I see the soldiers going by, for\ninstance, I have often marvelled that they could find any pleasure\nin the servants, so often ugly, who hang on their arms, and languish\npersistently at them under cheap hats and dyed feathers. And I gaze at\nthe policeman on his beat and pity him for the dead routine in which he\nstalks, seldom varied by the sordid capture of a starving cracksman, or\nthe triumphant seizure of an unmuzzled dog. The boys selling evening\npapers seem to me imps of desolation, screaming through life aimlessly\nfor halfpence; and the cabmen, creatures driving for ever to stations,\nyet never able to get into the wide world. And yet they are all living,\nJulian; that is the thing: all having their experiences, all in strong\ntouch with humanity. The newspaper-boy has got his flower-girl to give\nhim grimy kisses; and the cabman is proud of the shine on his harness;\nand the soldier glories in his military faculty of seduction, and in\nhis quick capacity for getting drunk in the glittering gin-palace at the\ncorner of the street; and the policeman hopes to take some one up, and to\nbe praised by a magistrate; and in those houses opposite intrigues are\ngoing on, and jealousy is being born, and men and women are quarrelling\nover trifles and making it up again, and children--what matter if\nlegitimate or illegitimate?--are cooing and crying, and boys are waking\nto the turmoil of manhood, and girls are dreaming of the things they dare\nnot pretend to know. Why should I be like a bird hovering over it all?\nWhy should not I--and you--be in it? If I can only cease to be as I have\nalways been, I can recreate London for myself, and make it a live city,\nfearing neither its vices nor its tears. I have made you fear them,\nJulian. I have done you an injury. Let us be quiet, and feel the rustle\nof spring over the gas-lamps, and hear the pulsing of the hearts around\nus.\"\n\nHe put his arm through Julian's as they leaned out on the sill of the\nwindow, and to Julian his arm was like a line of living fire, compelling\nthat which touched it to a speechless fever of excitement. Was this man\nValentine? Julian's pulses throbbed and hammered as he looked upon the\nstreet, and he seemed to see all the passers-by with eyes from which\nscales had fallen. If to die should be nothing to the wise man, to live\nshould be much. Underneath, two drunken men passed, embracing each other\nby the shoulders. They sang in, snatches and hiccoughed protestations of\neternal friendship. Valentine watched their wavering course with no\ndisgust. His blue eyes even seemed to praise them as they went.\n\n\"Those men are more human than I,\" he slowly said. \"Why should I condemn\nthem?\"\n\nAnd, as if under the influence of a spell, Julian found himself thinking\nof the wandering ruffians as fine fellows, full of warmth of heart and\ngenerous feeling. A boy and girl went by. Neither could have been more\nthan sixteen years old. They paused by a lamp-post, and the girl openly\nkissed the boy. He sturdily endured the compliment, staring firmly at\nher pale cheeks and tired eyes. Then the girl walked away, and he stood\nalone till she was out of sight. Eventually he walked off slowly, singing\na plantation song: \"I want you, my honey; yes, I do!\" Valentine and\nJulian had watched and listened, and now Valentine, moving round on the\nwindow-ledge till he faced Julian, said:\n\n\"That is it, Julian, put in the straightforward music-hall way. People\nare happy because they want things; yes, they do. It is a philosophy of\nlife. That boy has a life because he wants that girl, and she wants him.\nAnd you, Julian, you want a thousand things--\"\n\n\"Not since I have known you,\" Julian said.\n\nHe felt curiously excited and troubled. His arm was still linked in\nValentine's. Slowly he withdrew it. Valentine shut down the window and\nthey came back to the fire.\n\n\"You know,\" Valentine said, \"that it is possible for two influences to\nwork one upon the other, and for each to convert the other. I begin to\nthink that your nature has triumphed over mine.\"\n\n\"What?\" Julian said, in frank amazement. The Philistines could not have\nbeen more astounded when Samson pulled down the pillars.\n\n\"I have taught you, as you say, to die to the ordinary man's life,\nJulian. But what if you have taught me to live to it?\"\n\nJulian did not answer for a moment. He was wondering whether Valentine\ncould possibly be serious. But his face was serious, even eager. There\nwas an unwonted stain of red on his smooth, usually pale cheeks. A\ncertain wild boyishness had stolen over him, a reckless devil danced\nin his blue eyes. Julian caught the infection of his mood.\n\n\"And what's my lesson?\" Julian said.\n\nHis voice sounded thick and harsh. There was a surge of blood through\nhis brain and a prickly heat behind his eyeballs. Suddenly a notion took\nhim that Valentine had never been so magnificent as now,--now when a new\nfierceness glittered in his expression, and a wild wave of humanity ran\nthrough him like a surging tide.\n\n\"What's my lesson, Valentine?\"\n\n\"I will show you, this spring. But it is the lesson the spring teaches,\nthe lesson of fulfilling your nature, of waking from your slumbers, of\nfinding the air, of giving yourself to the rifling fingers of the sun, of\nyielding all your scent to others, and of taking all their scent to you.\nThat's the lesson of your strength, Julian, and of all the strength of\nthe spring. Lie out in the showers, and let the clouds cover you with\nshadows, and listen to the song of every bird, and--and--ah!\" he suddenly\nbroke off in a burst of laughter, \"I am rhapsodizing. The spring has got\ninto my veins even among these chimneypots of London. The spring is in\nme, and, who knows? your soul, Julian. For don't you feel wild blood in\nyour veins sometimes?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes.\"\n\n\"And humming passions that come to you and lift you from your feet?\"\n\n\"You know I do.\"\n\n\"But I never knew before that they might lift you towards heaven.\nThat's the thing. I have thought that the exercise of the passions\ndragged a man down; but why should it be so? I have talked of men\nwallowing in the mire. I must find out whether I have been lying when\nI said that. Julian, this spring, you and I will see the world, at any\nrate, with open eyes. We will watch the budding and blossoming of the\nsouls around us, the flowers in the garden of life. We will not be\nindifferent or afraid. I have been a coward in my ice prison of\nrefinement. I keep a perpetual season of winter round me. I know it.\nI know it to-night.\"\n\nJulian did not speak. He was carried away by this outburst, which\ngained so much, and so strange, force by its issue from the lips and\nfrom the heart of Valentine. But he was carried away as a weak swimmer\nby a resistless torrent, and instinctively he seemed to be aware of\ndanger and to be stretching out his arms for some rock or tree-branch\nto stay his present course. Perhaps Valentine noticed this, for his\nexcitement suddenly faded, and his face resumed its usual expression\nof almost cold purity and refinement.\n\n\"I generally translate this sort of thing into music,\" he said.\n\nAt the last word Julian looked up instinctively to the wall on which the\npicture of \"The Merciful Knight\" usually hung. For Valentine's music was\ninseparably connected in his mind with that picture. His eyes fell on a\ngap.\n\n\"Val,\" he exclaimed, in astonishment, \"what's become of--\"\n\n\"Oh, 'The Merciful Knight'? It has gone to be cleaned.\"\n\n\"Why? It was all right, surely?\"\n\n\"No. I found it wanted cleaning badly and I am having it reframed. It\nwill be away for some time.\"\n\n\"You must miss it.\"\n\n\"Yes, very much.\"\n\nThe last words were spoken with cutting indifference.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nJULIAN VISITS THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\nFrom that night, and almost imperceptibly, the relations existing between\nValentine and Julian slightly changed. It seemed to Julian as if a door\npreviously shut in his friend's soul opened and as if he entered into\nthis hitherto secret chamber. He found there an apparent strange humanity\nwhich, as he grew accustomed to it, warmed him. The curious refined\nsaintliness of Valentine, almost chilly in its elevation, thawed gently\nas the days went by, but so gently that Julian scarcely knew it, could\nscarcely define the difference which nevertheless led him to alter his\nconduct almost unconsciously. One great sameness, perhaps, gave him a\nsensation of safety and of continuity. Valentine's face still kept its\nalmost unearthly expression of intellectuality and of purity. When Julian\nlooked at him no passions flamed in his blue eyes, no lust ever crawled\nin the lines about his mouth. His smooth cheeks never flushed with\nbeaconing desire, nor was his white forehead pencilled with the shadowy\nwriting that is a pale warning to the libertine. And yet his speech about\nthe spring that night, as they leaned out over Victoria Street, had\nevidently not been a mere reckless rhapsody. It had held a meaning and\nwas remembered. In Valentine there seemed to be flowering a number of\nfaint-hued wants, such wants as had never flowered from his nature\nbefore. The fig-tree that had seemed so exquisitely barren began to put\nforth leaves, and when the warm showers sang to it, it sang in tremulous\nreply.\n\nAnd the spring grew in London.\n\nNever before had Julian been so conscious of the growth of the year as\nnow. The spring stirred inside him, as if he were indeed the Mother\nEarth. Tumults of nature shook him. With the bursting of the crocus,\nthe pointing of its spear of gold to the sun, a life gathered itself\ntogether within him, a life that held, too, a golden shaft within its\ncolour-stained cup. And the bland scent of the innumerable troops of\nhyacinths in Hyde Park was a language to him as he strolled in the sun\ntowards the Row. Scents speak to the young of the future as they speak\nto the old of the past; to the one with an indefinite excitement, to the\nother with a vague regret. And especially when he was in the company of\nValentine did Julian become intensely alive to the march of the earth\ntowards summer, and feel that he was in step with it, dragooned by the\nsame music. He began to learn, so he believed, what Valentine had called\nthe lesson of his strength, and of all the strength of the spring. His\nwild blood leaped in his veins, and the world was walking with him to a\nlarge prospect, as yet fancifully tricked out in mists and crowned with\nclouds.\n\nThe spring brought to Valentine an abounding health such as he had never\nknown before, a physical glory which, without actually changing him, gave\nto him a certain novelty of aspect which Julian felt without actually\nseeing. One day, when they were out riding together in the Park, he said:\n\n\"How extraordinarily strong you look to-day, Val.\"\n\nValentine spurred his horse into a short gallop.\n\n\"I feel robust,\" he said. \"I think it is my mind working on my body. I\nhave attained to a more healthy outlook on things, to a saner conception\nof life. For years you have been learning from me, Julian. Now I think\nthe positions are reversed. I am learning from you.\"\n\nJulian pressed his knees against his horse's sides with an iron grip,\nfeeling the spirited animal's spirited life between them. They were now\non a level with the Serpentine and riding parallel to it. A few vigorous\nand determined bathers swam gaily in the pale warmth of the morning sun.\nTwo boys raced along the grassy bank to dry themselves, whooping with\nexultation, and leaping as they ran. A man in a broad boat, ready to save\nlife, exchanged loud jokes with the swimmers. On a seat two filthy\nloafers watched the scene with vacant eyes. They had slept in the Park\nall night, and their ragged clothes were drenched with dew.\n\n\"I could race with those boys,\" Valentine said. \"But not so long ago I\nwas like the men on the bench. I only cared to look on at the bathing of\nothers. Now I could swim myself.\"\n\nHe sent his horse along at a tremendous pace for a moment, then drew him\nin, and turned towards Julian.\n\n\"We are learning the lesson of the spring,\" he said.\n\nAs he spoke a light from some hidden place shot for an instant into his\neyes and faded again. Julian laughed gaily. The ride spurred his spirits.\nHe was conscious of the recklessness created in a man by exercise.\n\n\"I could believe that you were actually growing, Val,\" he said, \"growing\nbefore my eyes. Only you're much too old.\"\n\n\"Yes; I am too old for that,\" Valentine said.\n\nA sudden weariness ran in the words, a sudden sound of age.\n\n\"The truth is,\" he added, but with more life, \"my nature is expanding\ninside my body, and you feel it and fancy you can see the envelope echo\nthe words of the letter it holds. You are clever enough to be fanciful.\nGently, Raindrop, gently!\"\n\nHe quieted the mare as they turned into the road. Just as they were\npassing under the arch into the open space at Hyde Park corner a woman\nshot across in front of them. They nearly rode over her, and she uttered\na little yell as she awkwardly gained the pavement. Her head was crowned\nwith a perfect pyramid of ostrich feathers, and as she turned to bestow\nupon the riders the contemptuous glance of a cockney pedestrian, who\ndemands possession of all London as a sacred right, Julian suddenly\npulled up his horse.\n\n\"Hulloh!\" he said to the woman.\n\n\"What is it?\" asked Valentine, who was in front.\n\n\"Wait a second, Val. I want a word with this lady.\"\n\n\"Rather compromising,\" Valentine said, laughing, as his eyes took in with\na swift glance the woman's situation in the economy of the town.\n\nThe woman now slowly advanced to the railing, apparently flattered at\nbeing thus hailed from horseback. Her kinsmen doubtless always walked.\n\n\"Don't you remember me?\" Julian said.\n\nShe was in fact the lady of the feathers, with whom he had foregathered\nat the coffee-stall in Piccadilly. The lady leaned her plush arms upon\nthe rail and surveyed him with her tinted eyes.\n\n\"Can't say as I do, my dear,\" she remarked. \"What name?\"\n\n\"Never mind that. But tell me, have you ever had a cup of coffee and a\nbun in Piccadilly early in the morning?\"\n\nThe mention of the bun struck home to the lady, swept the quivering\nchords of her memory into a tune. She pushed her face nearer to Julian\nand stared at him hard.\n\n\"So it is,\" she said. \"So it is.\"\n\nFor a moment she seemed inclined to retreat. Then she stood her ground.\nHer nerves, perhaps, had grown stronger.\n\n\"I should like to know you,\" Julian said.\n\nThe lady was obviously gratified. She tossed her head and giggled.\n\n\"Where do you live?\" Julian continued.\n\nThe lady dived into the back part of her skirt, and, after a long and\npassionate pursuit, ran a small purse to earth. Opening it with\ndeliberation, she extracted a good-sized card, and handed it up to\nJulian.\n\n\"There you are, dearie,\" she said.\n\nOn the card was printed, \"Cuckoo Bright, 400 Marylebone Road.\"\n\n\"I will come at five this afternoon and take you out to tea,\" said\nJulian.\n\n\"Right you are, Bertie,\" the lady cried, in a voice thrilling with pride\nand exultation.\n\nJulian rode off, and she watched him go, preening herself against the\nrail like some gaudy bird. She looked up at a policeman and laughed\nknowingly.\n\n\"Well, copper,\" she said; \"how's that, eh?\"\n\nThe policeman was equal to the occasion.\n\n\"Not out,\" he answered, with a stiff and semi-official smile. \"Move\nalong.\"\n\nAnd Cuckoo Bright moved as one who walked on air.\n\nJulian had joined Valentine, who had observed the colloquy from afar,\ncontrolling with some difficulty the impatience of his mare, excited by\nher gallop.\n\n\"You know that lady?\" he asked, still laughing, with perhaps a touch of\ncontempt.\n\n\"Very platonically. We met at a coffee-stall in Piccadilly as I was going\nhome after your trance. She was with me when I saw that strange flame.\"\n\n\"When you imagined you saw it.\"\n\n\"If you prefer it, Val. I am going to see her this afternoon.\"\n\n\"My dear fellow--why?\"\n\n\"I'll tell you,\" Julian answered gravely. \"I believe she is the woman\nwho went to the 'European' with Marr, who must have been with Marr when\nhe was taken ill, and who fled. I have a reason for thinking so.\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"I'll tell you later, when I have talked to her.\"\n\n\"Surely you don't suspect the poor creature of foul play?\"\n\n\"Not I. It's sheer curiosity that takes me to her.\"\n\n\"Oh.\"\n\nThey rode on a step or two. Then Valentine said:\n\n\"Are you going to take her out? She's--well, she is a trifle\nunmistakable, Julian.\"\n\n\"Yes, I know. You are right. She's not for afternoon wear, poor soul.\nWhat damned scoundrels men are.\"\n\nValentine did not join in the sentiment thus forcibly expressed.\n\nBetween four and five that afternoon Julian hailed a cab and drove to\nMarylebone Road. The houses in it seemed endless, and dreary alike, but\nat length the cab drew up at number 400, tall, gaunt and haggard, like\nthe rest. Julian rang the bell, and immediately a shrill dog barked with\na piping fury within the house. Then the door was opened by an old woman,\nwhose arid face was cabalistic, and who looked as if she spent her\nexistence in expecting a raid from the police.\n\n\"Is Miss Cuckoo Bright at home?\"\n\n\"Miss Bright! I'll see.\"\n\nThe old dame turned tail, and slithered, flat-footed, to a room opening\nfrom the dirty passage. She vanished and Julian heard two gentle voices\nmuttering. The old woman returned.\n\n\"This way, sir!\" she said, in a voice that perpetually struggled to get\nthe whip-hand of an obvious bronchitis.\n\nA moment more and Julian stood in the acute presence of the lady of\nthe feathers. At first he scarcely recognized her, for she had discarded\nher crown of glory and now faced him in the strange frivolity of her\nhatless touzled hair. She stood by the square table covered with a green\ncloth, that occupied the centre of the small room, which communicated by\nfolding doors with an inner chamber. A pastile was burning drowsily in a\ncorner, and the shrill dog piped seditiously from its station on a black\nhorsehair-covered sofa, over which a woolwork rug was thrown in easy\n_abandon_. Julian extended his hand.\n\n\"How d'you do?\" he said.\n\n\"Pretty bobbish, my dear,\" was the reply; but the voice was much less\npert than he remembered it, and looking at his hostess, Julian perceived\nthat she was considerably younger than he had imagined, and that she was\nactually--amazing luxury!--a little shy. She had a box of safety-matches\nin her hand, and she now struck one, and applied it to a gas-burner. The\nday was dark.\n\n\"Pleased to see you,\" she added, with an attempt at a hearty and\nuntutored air. \"Jessie, shut up.\"\n\nJessie, the dog, of the toy species, and arched into the shape of a note\nof interrogation, obeyed, lay down and trembled into sleep. The gaslight\nrevealed the details of the sordid room, a satin box of sweetmeats on the\ntable, a penny bunch of sweet violets in a specimen-glass, one or two\nyellow-backed novels, and a few photographs ranged upon the imitation\nmarble mantelpiece. There was one arm-chair, whose torn lining indecently\nrevealed the interior stuffing, and there were three other chairs with\nwooden backs. The lady of the feathers did not dwell in marble halls,\nunless, perhaps, imaginatively.\n\n\"You've got cosey quarters,\" Julian said, amiably lying.\n\n\"Yes, they're not bad, but they do cost money. Sit down, won't you!\"\n\nThe lady shoved the one arm-chair forward, and after a polite skirmish,\nJulian was forced to take it. He sat down, disguising from his companion\nhis sudden knowledge that the springs were broken. She, on her part, laid\nhold of Jessie, dumped the little creature into her lap, and assumed an\nair of abrupt gentility, pursing her painted lips, and shooting sidelong\nglances of inquiry at the furniture. Julian could not at once explain his\nerrand. He felt that caution was imperative. Besides, the lady doubtless\nexpected to be entertained at Verrey's or possibly even at Charbonnel's.\nBut Julian had resolved to throw himself upon the lady's hospitality.\n\n\"It's an awful day,\" he said.\n\nThe lady assented, adding that she had not been out.\n\n\"We are very cosey here,\" Julian continued, gazing at the small fire that\nwas sputtering in the grate.\n\nThe lady looked gratified. She felt that the meagre abode which she must\nname home had received the hallmark of a \"toff's\" approval.\n\n\"Now I am going to ask you something,\" Julian said. \"Will you let me\nhave tea with you to-day, and--and--come out with me some evening to\nthe Empire or somewhere, instead?\"\n\nThe lady nodded her fringed head.\n\n\"Certainly, my dear,\" she responded. \"Proud to give you tea, I'm sure.\"\n\nSuddenly she bounced up, scattering Jessie over the floor. She promenaded\nto the door, opened it and yelled:\n\n\"Mrs. Brigg! Mrs. Brigg!\"\n\nThe expostulating feet of the old person ascended wearily from the lower\ndepths of the house.\n\n\"Lord! Lord! Whatever is it now?\" she wheezed.\n\n\"Please bring up tea for me and this gentleman.\"\n\nThe lady assumed the voice of a sucking dove.\n\n\"Tea! Why, I thought you'd be out to--\"\n\nThe lady shot into the passage and shut the door behind her. After a\nmoment she put her head in and said to Julian:\n\n\"I'll be back in a minute. She's in a rare tantrum. I must go down and\nhelp her. Pardon.\"\n\nAnd she vanished like a flash.\n\nJulian sat feeling rather guilty. To distract himself he got up and\nlooked at the photographs on the mantelpiece. Most of them were of men,\nbut there were two or three girls in tights, and there was one of a\nstout and venerable woman, evidently highly respectable, seated in an\narm-chair, with staring bead-like eyes, but a sweet and gentle mouth. Her\nhair was arranged in glossy bands. Her hands held a large book, probably\na Bible. Julian looked at her and wondered a little how she chanced to be\nin this _gal\u00e8re_. Then he started and almost exclaimed aloud. For there,\nat the end of the mantelpiece, was a cabinet photograph of Marr. He was\nright then in his suspicion. The lady of the feathers was also the lady\nat the \"European.\"\n\n\"Sorry to keep you waiting,\" said a voice behind him.\n\nThere was a clatter of crockery. His hostess entered bearing a tray,\nwhich held a teapot, cups, a large loaf of bread, and some butter, and a\nmilk-jug and sugar-basin. She plumped it down on the table.\n\n\"Mrs. Brigg _wouldn't_ make toast,\" she explained. \"And I didn't like to\nkeep you.\"\n\n\"Let's make some ourselves,\" said Julian, with a happy inspiration.\n\nHe felt that to perform a common and a cosey act must draw them together,\nand awaken in the lady's breast a happy and progressive confidence. She\nwas evidently surprised at the suggestion.\n\n\"Well, I never!\" she ejaculated. \"You are a queer one. You are taking a\nrise out of me now!\"\n\n\"Not at all. I like making toast. Give me a fork. I'll do it, and you sit\nthere and direct me.\"\n\nShe laughed and produced the fork from a mean cupboard which did duty as\na sideboard.\n\n\"Here you are, then. 'Cut it pretty thick. It ain't so high class, but it\neats better. That's it. Sit on this stool, dear.\"\n\nShe kicked an ancient leather one to the hearth, and Julian, tucking his\nlong-tailed frock coat under him, squatted down and thrust forward the\nbread to the bars of the grate. The lady opened the lid of the teapot and\nexamined the brew with an anxious eye.\n\n\"It's drawin' beautiful,\" she declared. \"Well, I'm d--\" she caught\nherself up short. \"Well this is bally funny,\" she said. \"Turn it,\ndearie.\"\n\nJulian obeyed, and they began to talk. For the ice was broken now,\nand the lady was quite at her ease, and simple and human in her\nhospitalities.\n\n\"This is better than the bun,\" Julian said.\n\n\"I believe you, dear. And yet that bun did me a deal of good that\nmornin'.\"\n\nHer voice became suddenly reflective.\n\n\"A deal of good.\"\n\n\"Are you often out at such a time?\"\n\n\"Not I. But that night I'd--well, I didn't feel like bein' indoors.\nThere's things--well, there, it don't matter. That toast's done, dearie.\nBring it here, and let me butter it.\"\n\nJulian brought it, and cut another slice from the loaf. He toasted while\nthe lady buttered, a fine division of labour which drew them close\ntogether. Jessie, meanwhile, attracted by these pleasant preparations,\nhovered about, wriggling in pathetic anxiety to share the good things of\nlife.\n\n\"Anything wrong that night?\" Julian said, carelessly.\n\nThe lady buttered, like an angry machine.\n\n\"Oh no, dearie,\" she said. \"Make haste, or the tea'll be as black as\ncoal. Jessie, you're a pig! I do spoil her.\"\n\nJulian called the little dog to him. She came voraciously, her minute and\nrat-like body tense with greed.\n\n\"She's a pretty dog,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes,\" the lady rejoined proudly. \"She's a show dog. She was give to\nme, and I wouldn't part with her for nuts, no, nor for diamonds neither.\nWould I, Jessie? Ah, well, dogs stick to you when men don't.\"\n\nShe was trying to be arch, but her voice was really quivering to tears,\nand in that sentence rang all the tragedy of her poor life. Julian looked\nacross at her as she sat by the tray, buttering now almost mechanically.\nShe was naturally a pretty girl, but was growing rapidly haggard, and was\nbadly made up, rouged in wrong places consumptively, powdered everywhere\ndisastrously. Her eyes were pathetic, but above them the hair was\ndreadfully dyed, and frizzed into a desolate turmoil. She had a thin\nyoung figure and anxious hands. As he looked Julian felt a profound pity\nand a curious manly friendship for her. She had that saddest aspect of a\nhuman being about whom it doesn't matter. Only it matters about every\nliving creature so much.\n\nThe lady caught his eye, and extended her lips in a forced smile.\n\n\"You never know your luck!\" she cried. \"So it don't do to be down on it.\nCome on, dearie. Now then for the tea.\"\n\nShe poured it out, and Julian drew up to the table. Already he felt oddly\nat home in this poor room, with this poor life, into which he longed to\nbring a little hope, a little safety. Jessie sprang to his knees, and\nthence, naughtily, to the table, snuffling towards the plate of toast.\nThe lady drew it away and approached it to her nose by turns, playfully.\n\n\"She is a funny one,\" she said. \"Is your tea right, dearie?\"\n\n\"Perfect,\" said Julian. \"Is my toast right?\"\n\n\"Right as ninepence, and righter.\"\n\nShe munched.\n\n\"I like you,\" she said. \"You're a gentleman.\"\n\nShe spoke naturally, without coquetry. It was a fine experience for her\nto be treated with that thing some women never know--respect. She warmed\nunder it and glistened.\n\n\"We must be friends,\" Julian said.\n\n\"Pals. Yes. Have some more sugar?\"\n\nShe jumped two lumps into his cup, and laughed quite gaily when the\ntea spouted over into the saucer. And they chatted on, and fed Jessie\ninto joy and peace. Gradually Julian drew the conversation round to the\nphotographs. The lady was expansive. She gave short histories of some\nof the men, summing them up with considerable shrewdness, kodaking their\ncharacters with both humour and sarcasm. Julian and she progressed\nalong the mantelpiece together. Presently they arrived at the old lady\nwith the Bible.\n\n\"And this?\" Julian said.\n\nThe lady's fund of spirits was suddenly exhausted.\n\n\"Oh, that,\" she said, and a sort of strange, suppressed blush struggled\nup under the rouge on her face. \"Well, that's mother.\"\n\n\"I like her face.\"\n\n\"Yes. She thinks I'm dead.\"\n\nThe lady turned away abruptly.\n\n\"I'll just carry the tray down to Mrs. Brigg,\" she said, and she\nclattered out with it, and down the stairs.\n\nJulian heard her loudly humming a music-hall song as she went, the\nrequiem of her dead life with the old woman who held the Bible on her\nknees. When she returned, her mouth was hard and her eyes were shining\nominously. Julian was still standing by the mantelpiece. As she came in\nhe pointed to the photograph of Marr.\n\n\"And this?\" he asked. \"Who's this?\"\n\nThe lady burst into a shrill laugh of mingled fear and cunning.\n\n\"That's the old gentleman!\"\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"What I say,--the old gentleman, Nick, the devil, if you like it.\"\n\n\"Now you are trying to take a rise out of me.\"\n\n\"Not I, dear,\" she said. \"That's the devil, sure enough.\"\n\nEither the tea and toast had rendered her exuberant, or the thought\nof the old woman who believed her to be dead had driven her into\nrecklessness. She continued:\n\n\"I'd been with him that night I met you, and I was frightened, I tell\nyou. I'd been mad with fright.\"\n\n\"Why? What had he done to you?\"\n\nJulian strove to conceal his eager interest under a light assumption of\ncarelessness.\n\n\"Done!--never mind. It don't do to talk about it.\"\n\nShe laid her thin hand on his arm, as if impelled to be confidential.\n\n\"Do you believe in people being struck?\" she said.\n\n\"Struck! I don't understand.\"\n\n\"Struck,\" she repeated superstitiously. \"Down, from up there?\"\n\nHer eyes went up to the ceiling, like the child's when it thinks of\nheaven.\n\n\"Was he?\" Julian asked.\n\nShe nodded, pursing her red lips.\n\n\"That's what I think. It came so sudden. Just when I was going to\nscream somethin' seemed to come over him, like madness it was. He seemed\nlistening. Then he says, 'Now--now!' And he seemed goin' right off. He\nstared at me and didn't seem to know me. Lord, I was blue with it, I tell\nyou, dear! I was that frightened I just left him and bunked for it, and\nnever said a word to anybody. I ran downstairs and got out of the house,\nand I daren't go home. So I just walked about till I met you.\"\n\nShe sighed.\n\n\"I did enjoy that coffee, I tell you straight, but when you began about\nseein' things, I couldn't stow it. My nerves was shook. So off I trotted\nagain.\"\n\nJulian put a question to her.\n\n\"Do you know what has become of him?\"\n\n\"Not I. He'll never get in here again. Mrs. Brigg won't let him. She\nnever could abide him.\"\n\nShe shook her shoulders in an irrepressible shudder.\n\n\"I wish he was dead,\" she said. \"I never go out but what I'm afraid I\nshall meet him, or come back late but what I think I shall find him\nstandin' against the street door. I wish he was dead.\"\n\n\"I knew him. He is dead.\"\n\nShe looked at him, at first questioning, then awe-stricken.\n\n\"Then he was struck? Lord!\"\n\nHer red mouth gaped.\n\n\"It was in the papers,\" Julian said, \"At the European Hotel.\"\n\n\"That was the place. Lord! I never see the papers. Dead is he? I am\nglad.\"\n\nHer relief was obvious, yet almost shocking, and Julian could not\nquestion her good faith. She had certainly not known. He longed to find\nout more about her relations with Marr, and his treatment of her, but\nshe shied away from the subject. Obviously she really loathed and\ndetested the remembrance of him.\n\n\"But why do you keep his photograph?\" Julian asked at last.\n\nThe lady seemed puzzled.\n\n\"I dunno,\" she said at last. \"I don't seem as if I could burn it. But if\nhe is gone--dead, I mean--really--\"\n\n\"He is.\"\n\n\"I know.\"\n\nShe sat thoughtfully. Then she said:\n\n\"He didn't look a fellow to die. It seems funny. No; he didn't look it.\"\n\nAnd then she dropped the subject, and nothing would induce her to\nreturn to it. Presently they heard a church clock strike. It chimed\nseven. Julian was astonished to find that time had gone so quickly.\n\n\"I must be going,\" he said.\n\nThe lady looked at him with an odd, half-impudent, half-girlish, and\nwistful scrutiny.\n\n\"I say,\" she began, and stopped.\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"I say--why ever did you come?\"\n\nThe short question that expressed her wondering curiosity might well have\ndriven any thoughtful man into tears. And Julian, young and careless as\nhe often was, felt something of the terror and the pain enshrined in it.\nBut he did not let her see this.\n\n\"I wanted to have a talk with you,\" he answered.\n\n\"A talk; you like a talk with me?\"\n\n\"Yes, surely.\"\n\nShe still stared at him with pathetic eyes. He had stood up.\n\n\"Oh,\" she said. \"Well, dearie, I'm glad.\"\n\nJulian took up his hat.\n\n\"I'm going out too,\" she said.\n\n\"Are you?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nShe threw a sidelong glance at him, then added hardily, although her\npainted lips were suddenly quivering:\n\n\"I've got to go to work.\"\n\n\"I know,\" Julian said. \"Well, I will wait till you are ready and drive\nyou wherever you want to go.\"\n\n\"_Want_ to go,\" she began, with a little, shrill, hideous laugh. Then,\npulling herself up, she added in a subdued voice:\n\n\"Thank you, dearie. I won't be long.\"\n\nShe opened the folding doors and passed into the inner room,\naccompanied by Jessie. Julian waited for her. He found himself\nlistening to her movements in the other room, to the creak of wood,\nas she pulled out drawers, to the rustle of a dress lifted from a\nhook, the ripple of water poured from a jug into a basin. He heard the\nwhole tragedy of preparation, as this girl armed herself for the piteous\nbattle of the London streets. And then his ears caught the eager patter\nof Jessie to and fro, and a murmured expostulation from her mistress.\nEvidently the little dog had got hold of some article of attire and was\nworrying it. There was a hidden chase and a hidden capture. Jessie was\nscolded and kissed. Then the sitting-room slowly filled with the scent\nof cherry-blossom. A toothbrush in action was distinctly audible. This\ntragedy had its comic relief, like almost all tragedies. Julian sighed\nand smiled, but his heart was heavy with the desolate and sordid wonder\nof life, as his mind heard--all over London--a thousand echoes of the\nbedchamber music of the lady of the feathers.\n\nThe folding doors opened wide and she appeared, freshly painted and\npowdered, crowned once again with the forest of ostrich tips, and holding\nthe struggling Jessie in her arms.\n\n\"Jessie must go to basket,\" she said, and she dropped the dog into a tiny\nbasket lined with red flannel, and held up a warning finger.\n\n\"Naughty--go bials!\" she cried. \"Go bials, Jessie.\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"Bials--by-bye. She don't like bein' left. Well, dearie, we've had a nice\ntime.\"\n\nSuddenly she put her hands on Julian's shoulders and kissed his mouth.\n\n\"I wish there was more like you,\" she whispered.\n\nHe kissed her too, and put his arms around her.\n\n\"If I give you something, will you--will you stay at home to-night, just\nto-night, with Jessie?\" he said.\n\nBut she drew away and shook her head.\n\n\"I won't take it.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I won't. No--we're pals--not--not the other thing. You're the only one\nI've got--of that kind. I won't spoil it--no, I won't.\"\n\nHer decision was almost angry. Julian did not persist.\n\n\"I'll come again,\" he said.\n\nShe looked at him wistfully.\n\n\"Ah--but you won't,\" she answered.\n\n\"I will.\"\n\nHe spoke with energy. She nodded.\n\n\"I'd like you to.\"\n\nThen they went out into the evening and hailed a hansom.\n\n\"Put me down at the Piccadilly end of Regent Street,\" said the lady of\nthe feathers.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS VISITS VALENTINE\n\n\nJulian was curiously touched by his interview in the Marylebone Road, and\nhe did not fail to recount it to Valentine, whose delicate imagination\nwould, he felt certain, feel the pity and the pain of it.\n\nBut Valentine did not respond to his generous emotion.\n\n\"I thought she looked a very degraded young person,\" he said, distantly.\n\"And not interesting. The woman who is falling is interesting. The woman\nwho has reached the bottom, who has completely arrived at degradation, is\ndull enough.\"\n\n\"But she is not utterly degraded, Val. For I know that she can see and\nunderstand something of the horror of her own condition.\"\n\nValentine put his hand on Julian's shoulder.\n\n\"I know what you are thinking,\" he said.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"That you would like to rescue this girl.\"\n\nA dull blush ran over Julian's face.\n\n\"I don't know that I had got quite so far as that,\" he said. \"Would it be\nabsurd if I had?\"\n\n\"I am not sure that it would not be wrong. Probably this girl lives the\nlife she is best fitted for.\"\n\n\"You surely don't mean--\"\n\n\"That some human beings are born merely to further the necessities\nof sin in the scheme of creation? I don't know that. Nature, in certain\ncountries, demands and obtains pernicious and deadly snakes to live in\nher bosom. Man demands and obtains female snakes to live in his bosom.\nAre not such women literally created for this _m\u00e9tier_? How can one\ntell?\"\n\n\"But if they are unhappy?\"\n\n\"You think they would be happy in purity?\"\n\n\"I believe she would.\"\n\nValentine smiled and shook his head.\n\n\"I expect her sorrows are not caused by the loss of her virtue, but\nmerely by her lack of the luxuries of life. These birds always want\ntheir nests to be made of golden twigs and lined with satin.\"\n\nBut Julian remained unconvinced.\n\n\"You don't know her,\" he said. \"Why, Valentine, you have never known such\na woman! You! The very notion is ridiculous.\"\n\n\"I have seen them in their Garden of Eden, offering men the fruit of the\ntree of knowledge.\"\n\n\"You mean?\"\n\n\"At the 'Empire.'\"\n\n\"Ah! I have half promised to take her there one night.\"\n\n\"Shall I come with you, Julian?\"\n\nJulian looked at him to see if he was in earnest as he made this\nunutterable proposition. Valentine's clear, cold, thoughtful blue\neyes met his eager, glowing, brown, ones with direct gravity.\n\n\"You mean it, Val?\"\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"You will be seen at the 'Empire' with her?\"\n\n\"Well--would not you?\"\n\n\"But you are so different.\"\n\n\"Julian, you remember that night when we leaned out over London, when we\nsaw what are called common people having common experiences? I said then\nthat they, at any rate, were living.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"You and I will try to live with them.\"\n\n\"But, Valentine--you--\"\n\n\"Even I may learn to feel the strength of the spring if I order my life\nrather differently in the future. We three, you, I, the girl, will go one\nnight to the Garden of Eden, where the birds wear tights and sing comic\nsongs in French, and the scent that comes from the flowers is patchouli,\nand silk rustles instead of the leaves of the trees. We will go there on\nboat-race night. Ah, the strength of the spring! On boat-race night it\nbeats with hammering pulses among the groves of the Garden of Eden.\"\n\nJulian was surprised at this outburst, which sounded oddly deliberate,\nand was apparently spoken without real impulse. He was surprised, but,\non consideration, he came to the conclusion that Valentine, having\nsilently debated the question of his own life, had resolved to make a\ndefinite effort to see if he could change the course of it. Julian felt\nthat such an effort must be useless. He knew Valentine so intimately, he\nthought,--knew the very groundwork of his nature,--that that nature was\ntoo strong to be carved into a different, and possibly grotesque, form.\n\n\"Are you an experimentalist, Val?\" he asked.\n\nValentine threw a rapid glance on him.\n\n\"I? I don't understand. Why should I experiment upon you?\"\n\n\"No; not on me, but on yourself.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see what you mean. No, Julian; I prefer to let fate experiment\nupon me.\"\n\n\"At the 'Empire'?\"\n\n\"If fate chooses.\"\n\n\"I think you ought to know Cuckoo--\"\n\n\"Is that her name?\"\n\n\"Yes, Cuckoo Bright, before our meditated expedition.\"\n\nValentine seemed struck by this idea.\n\n\"So that we may all be at our ease. A capital notion. Julian, sit down,\nwrite a note asking her to come to tea on Thursday, in the flat. I will\nshow her my pictures, and you shall talk to her of Huxley and of Herbert\nSpencer.\"\n\nJulian regarded Valentine rather doubtfully.\n\n\"Are you malicious?\" he said, with a hesitating note in his voice.\n\n\"Malicious--no!\"\n\n\"You won't chaff her?\"\n\n\"Chaff a lady who wears more feathers than ever 'growed on one ostrich,'\nand who was the _intime_ of the mysterious Marr? Julian, Julian!\"\n\nThen, seeing that Julian still looked rather uncomfortable, Valentine\nadded, dropping his mock heroic manner:\n\n\"Don't be afraid. We will give the lady one good hour.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" Julian cried, struck by the expression, \"that's what the doctor\nwished to give to every poor wretch in London.\"\n\n\"We don't ask the doctor to our tea,\" Valentine replied, with a sudden\ncoldness.\n\nThe invitation was conveyed to the lady of the feathers, and in due\ncourse an answer was received, a mosaic of misspelling and obvious\ngratification.\n\n\"My dear,\" ran the missive, \"I will com. I shall be pleased to see you\nagane, but I thorght I shoold not. Men say--oh yes, I shall com back--but\nnot many does, and I thorght praps you was like the all the rest. Your\nfriend is very good to assk me, and I am,\n\n\"Yr loving,\n\"Cuckoo.\"\n\nValentine read the letter without comment and ordered an elaborate tea.\nJulian read it, and wondered whether he was a fool because he felt\ntouched by the misspelt words, as he had sometimes felt touched when\nhe saw some very poor woman attired in her ridiculous \"best\" clothes.\n\nThe tea-time had been fixed for five o'clock, and Julian intended, of\ncourse, to be in Victoria Street with Valentine to receive the expected\nguest, but Cuckoo Bright threw his polite plans out of gear, and\nValentine was alone when, at half-past four, the electric bell rang,\nand, a moment later, Wade solemnly showed into the drawing-room a\nstriking vision, such as had never \"burst into that silent sea\" of\nartistic repose and refinement before.\n\nThe lady undoubtedly wore what seemed to be her one hat, and the effect\nof it, at all times remarkable, was amazingly heightened by its proximity\nto the quiet and beautiful surroundings of the room. As a rule, it merely\ncried out. Now it seemed absolutely to yell bank-holiday vulgarity and\nimpropriety at the silent pictures. But her gown decidedly exceeded it in\nuproar, being of the very loudest scarlet hue, with large black lozenges\nscattered liberally over it. From her rather narrow shoulders depended a\nblack cape, whose silk foundation was suffocated with bugles. A shrill\nscent of cherry-blossom ran with her like a crowd, and in her hand she\ncarried an umbrella and a plush bag with a steel snap. Her face, in the\nmidst of this whirlpool of finery, peeped out anxiously, covered as it\nwas with a smear of paint and powder, and when she saw Valentine standing\nalone to receive her, her nervous eyes ranged uncomfortably about in\nobvious quest of an acquaintance and protector.\n\n\"I am sorry that Mr. Addison has not come yet,\" Valentine said, holding\nout his hand. \"I expect him every minute. Won't you come and sit down?\"\n\nAn ironical courtesy vibrated in his voice. The lady grew more obviously\nnervous. She looked at Valentine through the veil which was drawn tightly\nacross her face. His appearance seemed to carry awe into her heart, for\nshe stood staring and attempted no reply, allowing him to take her hand\nwithout either protest or response.\n\n\"Won't you sit down?\" he repeated, smiling at her with humourous\ncontemplation of her awkward distress.\n\nThe lady abruptly sat down on a sofa.\n\n\"Allow me to put a cushion at your back,\" Valentine said. And he passed\nbehind her to do so. But she quickly shifted round, almost as if in fear,\nand faced him as he stood with his hand on the back of the sofa.\n\n\"No,\" she said, in a hurry; \"I don't know as I want one, thanks.\"\n\nShe half got up.\n\n\"Have I come right?\" she asked uneasily. \"Is this the house?\"\n\n\"Certainly. It's so good of you to come.\"\n\nThe words did not seem to carry any comfort to the lady. She passed the\ntip of her tongue along her painted lips and looked towards the door.\n\n\"Pray, don't be alarmed,\" Valentine said, sitting down on a chair\nimmediately opposite to her.\n\n\"I ain't. But--but you're not the friend, are you?\"\n\n\"I am; and the _ami des femmes_ too, I assure you. Be calm.\"\n\nHe bent forward, looking closely into her face. The lady leaned quickly\nback and uttered a little gasp.\n\n\"What is the matter?\" Valentine asked.\n\n\"Nothin', nothin',\" the lady answered, returning his glance as if\nfascinated into something that approached horror. \"When's he comin'?\nWhen's he comin'?\"\n\n\"Directly. But I trust you will not regret spending a few minutes alone\nin my company. What can I do to make you happy?\"\n\n\"I'm all right, thank you,\" she said, almost roughly. \"Don't bother about\nme.\"\n\n\"Who could help bothering about a pretty woman?\" Valentine answered\nsuavely, and approaching his chair a little more closely to her. \"Do\nyou know that my friend Addison can talk of nobody but you?\"\n\n\"Oh!\"\n\n\"Nobody. He raves about you.\"\n\n\"You're laughing,\" the lady said, still uncomfortably.\n\n\"Not at all. I never laugh.\"\n\nAs he made this last remark, Valentine slowly frowned. The effect of\nthis change of expression upon the lady was most extraordinary. She\nleaned far back upon the sofa as if in retreat from the face that stared\nupon her, mechanically thrusting out her hands in a faltering gesture of\nself-defence. Then, planting her feet on the ground and using them as a\nlever, she succeeded in moving the sofa backwards upon its castors, which\nran easily over the thick carpet. Valentine, on his part, did not stir,\nbut with immovable face regarded her apparent terror as a man regards\nsome spectacle neither new nor strange to him, silently awaiting its\neventual closing tableau. What this would have been cannot be known, for\nat this moment the bell rang and the butler was heard moving in the hall.\nThe frown faded from Valentine's face, and the lady sprang up from the\nsofa with a violent, almost a passionate, eagerness. Julian entered\nhastily.\n\n\"Why was you late?\" Cuckoo Bright cried out, hastening up to him\nand speaking almost angrily. \"Why was you late? I didn't think--I\ndidn't--oh!\"\n\nHer voice sounded like the voice of one on the verge of tears. Julian\nlooked astonished.\n\n\"I am very sorry,\" he began. \"But I didn't know you would be here so\nsoon.\"\n\nHe glanced from the lady to Valentine inquiringly, as much as to say:\n\n\"How have you been getting on?\"\n\nValentine's expression was gay and reassuring.\n\n\"I have been entertaining your friend, Julian,\" he said. \"But she has\nbeen almost inconsolable in your absence. She was standing up because I\nwas just about to show her the pictures. But now you are here, we will\nhave tea first instead. Ah, here is tea. Miss Bright, do come and sit by\nthe fire, and put your feet on this stool. We will wait upon you.\"\n\nSince the entrance of Julian, his manner had entirely changed. All the\nirony, all the mock politeness, had died out of it. He was now a kind and\ndelicately courteous host, desirous of putting his guests upon good terms\nand gilding the passing hour with a definite happiness. Cuckoo Bright\nseemed struck completely dumb by the transformation. She took the chair\nhe indicated, mechanically put her feet up on the stool he pushed\nforward, and with a rather trembling hand accepted a cup of tea.\n\n\"Do you take sugar?\" Valentine said, bending over her with the\nsugar-basin.\n\n\"No, no,\" she said.\n\n\"Oh, but I thought you loved sweet things,\" Julian interposed. \"Surely--\"\n\n\"I won't have none to-day,\" she ejaculated, adding with an endeavour\nafter gentility; \"thank you, all the same,\" to Valentine.\n\nHe offered her some delicious cakes, but she was apparently petrified by\nthe grandeur of her surroundings, or by some hidden sensation of shyness\nor of shame, and was refusing to eat anything, when Julian came to the\nrescue.\n\n\"Oh, but you must,\" he said. \"Have some of these sugar-biscuits.\"\n\nShe took some from him and began to sip and munch steadily, but still in\nsilence. Julian began to fear that the festival must be a dire failure,\nfor her obvious and extreme constraint affected him, and he was also\nseized with an absurd sense of shyness in the presence of Valentine, and,\ninstead of talking, found himself immersed in a boyish anxiety as to\nValentine's attitude of mind towards the girl. He looked at Cuckoo in the\nfirelight as she mutely ate and drank, and was all at once profoundly\nconscious of the dreary vulgarity of her appearance, against which even\nher original prettiness and her present youth fought in vain. Her hat\ncast a monstrous shadow upon the wall, a shadow so distorted and\nappalling that Julian almost grew red as he observed it, and felt that\nValentine was probably observing it also. He wished poor Cuckoo had left\nthe crying scarlet gown at home, and those black lozenges, which were\nsuited to the pavement of the hall of a financier. Everything she had\non expressed a mind such as Valentine must become acquainted with in\namazement, and have intercourse with in sorrow. The pathetic side of\nthis preposterous feathered and bugled degradation he would fail to see.\nJulian felt painfully certain of this. All the details of the woman would\noffend him, who was so alive to the value of fine details in life. He\nmust surely be wondering with all his soul how Julian could ever have\ncontemplated continuing the intercourse with Cuckoo which had been begun\nfor a definite purpose already accomplished. Yet Julian's feeling of\nfriendship towards this rouged scarecrow with the pathetic eyes and\nthe anxious hands did not diminish as he blushed for her, but rather\nincreased, fed, it seemed, by the discordant trifles in which her soul\nmoved as in a maze. He was so much in the thrall of thought that he had\nbecome quite unconscious of the awkwardness of the brooding silence, when\nhe heard Valentine's voice say:\n\n\"Are you fond of art, Miss Bright?\"\n\nThe question sounded as if addressed to some society woman at home in\nMelbury Road. Addressed to Cuckoo it was entirely absurd, and Julian\nglanced at Valentine to deprecate the gay sarcasm which he suspected.\nBut Valentine's face disarmed him, it was so gravely and serenely polite.\n\n\"Eh?\" said Cuckoo.\n\n\"Are you fond of art? or do you prefer literature?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" she said nervously.\n\n\"Or perhaps music?\"\n\n\"I like singing,\" she said. \"And the organs.\"\n\n\"Do sing us something, Val,\" Julian said, to create a diversion.\n\nBut Valentine shook his head.\n\n\"Not to-day. I have got a cold in my throat.\"\n\n\"Well, then, play something.\"\n\nBut Valentine did not seem to hear the last request. He had turned again\nto Cuckoo, who visibly shied away from him, and clattered the teacup and\nsaucer, which she held like one alarmed.\n\n\"Music is a great art,\" he said persuasively. \"And appeals essentially to\none's emotions. I am certain now that you are emotional.\"\n\n\"I don't know, I'm sure,\" she said, with an effort at self-confidence.\n\n\"You feel strongly, whether it be love or hate.\"\n\nThis last remark seemed to reach her, even to stir her to something more\ndefinite than mere _mauvaise honte_. She glanced quickly from Julian to\nValentine.\n\n\"Love and hate,\" she responded. \"Yes, that's it; I could feel them both.\nYou're right there, my d--, I mean yes.\"\n\nAnd again she looked from one young man to the other. She had put up\nher veil, which was stretched in a bunched-up mass across her powdered\nforehead, and Julian had an odd fancy that in the firelight he saw upon\nher haggard young face the rapid and fleeting expression of the two\nviolently opposed emotions of which she spoke. Her face, turned upon\nhim, seemed to shine with a queer, almost with a ludicrous, vehemence\nof yearning which might mean passion. This flashed into the sudden frown\nof a young harridan as her eyes travelled on to Valentine. But the frown\ndied quickly, and she looked downcast, and sat biting her thin lips, and\ncrumbling a biscuit into the tiny blue and white china plate upon her\nknee.\n\n\"And do you give way to your impulses?\" Valentine continued, still very\ngravely.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Do you express what you feel?\"\n\nA flash of childish cunning crept into her eyes and mouth, giving her the\naspect of a _gamin_.\n\n\"No; I ain't such a fool,\" she answered. \"Men don't like to be told the\ntruth. Do they, now?\"\n\nThe question went to Julian.\n\n\"Why not?\" he asked\n\n\"Oh, they like to be fooled. If you don't fool them, they fool you.\"\n\n\"A sufficiently clear statement of the relations of the sexes through all\ntime,\" said Valentine. \"Have you ever studied Schopenhauer?\"\n\n\"Ah, now, you're kiddin' me!\" was her not inappropriate answer.\n\nShe was getting a little more at her ease, but she still stole frequent\nfurtive glances at Valentine from time to time, and moved with an\nuncomfortable jerk if he bent forward to her or seemed about to come near\nto her. He seemed now really interested in her personality, and Julian\nbegan to wonder if its very vulgarity came to him with a charm of\nnovelty.\n\n\"Kidding?\" Valentine said, interrogatively.\n\n\"Gettin' at me! Pullin' my leg! Oh, I know you!\" cried Cuckoo. \"I'm up to\nall them games. You don't get a rise out of me.\"\n\n\"The lady speaks in parables,\" Valentine murmured to Julian. \"I assure\nyou,\" he added aloud, \"I am speaking quite seriously.\"\n\n\"Oh, seriously be hanged!\" said Cuckoo, recklessly. \"You're a regular\nfunny feller. Oh yes. Only don't try to be funny with me, because I'm up\nto all that.\"\n\nShe seemed suddenly bent on turning the tables on one whom she\napparently regarded as her adversary. Some people, when they do\nmake an effort of will, are always carried forward by the unwonted\nexertion into an almost libertine excess. Miss Bright's timidity was\nnow developing into violent impudence. She tossed her head till the\ngigantic shadow of the sarcophagus that crowned it aspired upon the\nwall almost to the ceiling. She stuck her feet out upon the stool\naggressively, and her arms instinctively sought the akimbo position\nthat is the physical expression of mental hardihood in vulgar natures.\n\n\"Go along!\" she said.\n\nValentine pretended to take her at her word. He got up.\n\n\"Where shall I go? I am your slave!\"\n\nShe laughed shrilly.\n\n\"Go to blazes if you like.\"\n\nValentine crossed to the door, and, before Julian had time to speak,\nopened it and quietly vanished. Julian and Cuckoo were left staring at\none another. The latter's impudence had suddenly evaporated. Her face was\nworking as if she was astonished and afraid.\n\n\"What's he after? What's he after, I say?\" she ejaculated. \"Go and see.\"\n\nBut Julian shook his head.\n\n\"It's all right. He has only done it for a joke. He will be back\ndirectly.\"\n\n\"Yes, but--but.\"\n\nShe seemed really frightened. Julian supposed she realized her rudeness\nvaguely, and imagined she had made an abominable _faux pas_. Acting on\nthis supposition, he said reassuringly:\n\n\"He didn't mind your chaff. He knew you were only joking.\"\n\n\"Lord, it isn't that,\" she rejoined with trembling lips. \"But what's he\ngoin' to do?\"\n\n\"Do?\"\n\n\"Yes. Go and see. Hark!\"\n\nShe held up her hand and leaned forward in a strained attitude of\nattention. But there was no sound in the flat. Then she turned again\nto Julian and said:\n\n\"And he's your friend. Well, I never!\"\n\nThe words were spoken with an extraordinary conviction of astonishment\nthat roused Julian to keen attention.\n\n\"Why, what do you mean?\" he asked.\n\n\"He's a wicked fellow,\" she said with a snatch of the breath. \"A real\ndownright wicked fellow, like Marr. That's what he is.\"\n\nJulian was amazed.\n\n\"You don't know what you are saying,\" he answered.\n\nBut she stuck to her guns with the animation of hysteria.\n\n\"Don't I, though? Don't I? A girl that lives like me has to know, I tell\nyou. Where should I be if I didn't? Tell me that, then. Why, there's men\nin the streets I wouldn't speak to; not for twenty pounds, I wouldn't.\nAnd he's one of them. Why didn't you come? Why ever did you let me be on\nmy own with him? He's a devil.\"\n\n\"Nonsense,\" Julian said brusquely.\n\nShe laid her hand on his, and hers was trembling.\n\n\"Well, then, why's he gone off all sudden like that?\"\n\n\"Only for a joke. Wait, I'll fetch him back.\"\n\nCuckoo Bright looked frankly terrified at the idea.\n\n\"No,\" she cried; \"don't. I'm goin'. I'm off. Help me on with my cloak,\ndearie. I'm off.\"\n\nJulian saw that it was useless to argue with her. He put the cloak round\nher shoulders. As he did so he was standing behind her, with his face to\nthe fireplace. The leaping flames sprang from the coals in the grate, and\ntheir light was reflected on the wall, near the door, but only, of\ncourse, to a certain height. Julian's eyes were attracted to these\nleaping flames on the wall, and he saw one suddenly detach itself from\nthe shadows of its brethren, take definite shape and life, develop while\nhe looked from shadow into substance, float up on the background of the\nwall higher and higher, reach the ceiling and melt away. As it faded the\ndrawing-room door opened and Valentine reappeared.\n\nMiss Bright started violently, and caught at her cloak with both hands.\nValentine came forward slowly.\n\n\"You are not going already, surely,\" he said.\n\n\"I must, I must,\" she ejaculated, already in movement towards the hall.\n\n\"But I have just been to get you a box of sugar plums.\"\n\nHe held a satin box in his hand and began to open it. But she hurried on\nwith a nod.\n\n\"Good-bye. Sorry, but I can't stop.\"\n\nShe was in the hall and out of the flat in the twinkling of an eye,\nfollowed by Julian. Valentine remained in the drawing-room.\n\n\"Lord, I am glad to be out of it,\" said the lady when she had gained the\nstreet and stood panting on the pavement.\n\nJulian hailed a hansom and put her into it. She gazed at him as if she\nwas almost afraid to part from him.\n\n\"You'll--you'll come and see me again,\" she said, wistfully.\n\n\"Yes, I'll come,\" he answered.\n\n\"For God's sake, don't bring him, dearie,\" she said, with an upward lift\nof her feathered head towards the block of mansions.\n\nThen she drove off into the darkness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS WASHES HER FACE\n\n\nIt was at this point in his career that Julian, just for a time, began\nkeenly to observe Valentine, and to wonder if there were hidden depths in\nhis friend which he had never sounded. The cause of the dawning of this\nconsideration lay in Cuckoo's strange assertion and fear of Valentine,\nprimarily, but there were other reasons prompting him to an unusual\nattitude of attention, although he might not at first have been able to\nname them. He could not believe that there was any change in Valentine,\nbut he fancied that there might be some side of Valentine's nature which\nhe did not fully understand, which others vaguely felt and wrongly\ninterpreted. For it was the instinctive creatures in whom Valentine's\npresence now seemed to awake distrust, and surely an instinct may be\ntoo violent, or move in a wrong direction, and yet be inspired by some\nsubtlety in the character that awakens it, and prompts it, and drives it\nforward. Julian thought that he found a reason for Cuckoo's aversion in\nValentine's lofty refinement, which would naturally jar upon her nature\nof the streets. For her pathos, her better impulses, which had touched\nhim and led him to sympathy with her, were perhaps only stars in a mind\nthat must be a dust-heap of horrible memories and coarse thoughts. To\nprotect Valentine from even the most diminutive shadow of suspicion,\nJulian was ready silently to insist that Cuckoo was radically bad,\nalthough he really knew that she was rather a weak sacrifice than an\neager sinner.\n\nHer declaration that Valentine was evil carried complete conviction of\nits sincerity. Indeed, her obvious fear of him proved this. And this fear\nof a woman reminded Julian of the fear exhibited towards Valentine by\nRip, a terror which still continued, to such an extent, indeed, that the\nlittle dog was now never permitted to be in the presence of its master.\n\n\"You are rather an awe-inspiring person, Valentine,\" Julian said one day.\n\nValentine looked surprised.\n\n\"I never knew it,\" he answered. \"Who is afraid of me?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know--well, Rip, for one, and--and that girl, Cuckoo, for\nanother.\"\n\n\"Why is she afraid?\"\n\n\"I can't imagine.\"\n\n\"I could soon put her at her ease, and I will do so.\"\n\nHe went over to the mantelpiece and took up an envelope that was lying\nthere. From it he drew a slip of coloured paper.\n\n\"This will be the talisman,\" he said. \"Have you forgotten that Saturday\nis boat-race day?\"\n\n\"What, you have really got a box for the 'Empire'?\"\n\n\"Yes; and I mean to invite Miss Bright.\"\n\nJulian exclaimed with his usual frankness:\n\n\"Why the devil do you think of asking her?\"\n\n\"Because I am certain she will be amusing company on such an occasion.\"\n\n\"That's your real reason?\"\n\n\"Yes. She will come, of course?\"\n\nJulian looked rather doubtful.\n\n\"I don't know,\" he said. \"She may.\"\n\n\"She must, Julian. Here is a note I have written to her. Do give it to\nher yourself. I can't be thought a bogey. She must come and learn that\nI am harmless.\"\n\nAs he said this Valentine's fingers unconsciously twisted the note they\nheld so strongly that it was torn to shreds.\n\n\"Why, you have torn it up,\" Julian said, in surprise.\n\n\"Oh yes.\"\n\nValentine paused, then added:\n\n\"You had better ask her by word of mouth. Persuade her to come.\"\n\n\"I will try.\"\n\nThe lady of the feathers did indeed require a good deal of persuasion.\nWhen first Julian made the proposition her face shone with gratification,\nfor he gave the invitation without mentioning Valentine's name. But then\nthe clouds came down. The lady remembered him suddenly, and said:\n\n\"Are we two going alone, dearie?\"\n\n\"Well--it's a big box, you see. We should be lost in it.\"\n\n\"Oh.\"\n\nShe waited for further explanation, an obvious anxiety in her eyes.\n\n\"My friend Cresswell is coming with us. It's his box.\"\n\nThe gratification died away from the painted face. Cuckoo shook her head\nand pursed her lips in obvious and absurd disapprobation.\n\n\"Then I don't think I'll go. No; I won't.\"\n\nAnd upon this Julian had to launch forth over a sea of expostulation and\nprotest. Cuckoo possessed all the obstinacy of an ignorant and battered\nnature, taught by many a well-founded distrust, to rely upon its own\nfeebleness, rather than upon the probably brutal strength of others. She\nwas difficult to move, although she had no arguments with which to defend\nher assumption of the mule's attitude. At last Julian grew almost angry\nin defence of Valentine.\n\n\"Half the women in London would be proud to go with him,\" he said hotly.\n\n\"Not if they knew as much about men as I do,\" she answered.\n\n\"But you know nothing whatever about him. That's just the point.\"\n\n\"Ah, but I feel a lot,\" she said, with an expressive twist of her thin,\nrather pretty face. \"He's bad, rank bad. That's what he is.\"\n\nJulian was suddenly seized with a desire to probe this outrageous\ninstinct to its source, believing, like many people, that the stream\nof instinct must flow from some hidden spring of reason.\n\n\"Now, look here,\" he said, more quietly. \"I want you to try to tell me\nwhat it is in him that you dislike so much.\"\n\n\"It's everything, dearie.\"\n\n\"No; but that's absurd. For instance, it can't be his looks.\"\n\n\"It is.\"\n\n\"Why, he's wonderfully handsome.\"\n\n\"I don't care. I hate his face; yes, I do.\"\n\nJulian impatiently pitied her as one pities a blind man who knocks up\nagainst one in the street. But he thought it best to abandon Valentine's\nappearance to its unhappy fate of her dislike, and sailed away on another\ntack.\n\n\"My friend likes you,\" he said, as he thought, craftily.\n\nCuckoo tossed her head without reply.\n\n\"He said he would rather go with you on Saturday than with any one in\nLondon.\"\n\nThis last remark seemed to produce a considerable effect upon the girl.\n\n\"Did he, though?\" she asked, one finger going up to her under lip,\nreflectively. \"Really, truly?\"\n\n\"Really, truly.\"\n\n\"What should he want with me? He's--he's not one of the usual sort.\"\n\n\"Valentine usual! I should think not.\"\n\n\"And he wants me to go?\"\n\nCertainly she was impressed and flattered.\n\n\"Yes, very much.\"\n\nJulian found himself again wondering, with Cuckoo, mightily at\nValentine's vagary of desire. She touched his hand with her long,\nthin fingers.\n\n\"You'll stay with me all the time?\"\n\n\"Why, of course.\"\n\n\"You won't leave me? Not alone with him, I mean.\"\n\n\"No; don't be so absurd.\"\n\nA new hesitation sprang into her face.\n\n\"But what am I to go in?\" she said. \"He--he don't like my red.\"\n\nSo her awe and dislike prompted her to a desire of pleasing Valentine\nafter all, and had led her shrewdly to read his verdict on her poorly\nsmart gown. Julian, pleased at his apparent victory, now ventured on a\ncareful process of education, on the insertion of the thin edge of the\nwedge, as he mutely named it.\n\n\"Cuckoo,\" he said, \"let me give you a present,--a dress. Now,\" as she\nbegan to shake her tangled head, \"don't be silly. I have never given you\nanything, and if we are to be pals you mustn't be so proud. Can you get\na dress made in three days,--a black dress?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said. \"But black! I shall look a dowdy.\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Oh, but I shall,\" she murmured, dismally. \"Colours suits me best. You\nsee I'm thin now; not as I was when I--well, before I started. Ah, I\nlooked different then, I did. I don't want to be a scarecrow and make\nyou ashamed of me.\"\n\nJulian longed to tell her that it was the rouge, the feathers, the\nscarlet skirt, the effusive bugles, that made a scarecrow of her. But he\nhad a rough diplomacy that taught him to refrain. He stuck to his point,\nhowever.\n\n\"I shall give you a black dress and hat--\"\n\n\"Oh, my hat's all right now,\" she interposed. \"Them feathers is\nbeautiful.\"\n\n\"Splendid; but I'll give you a hat to match the dress, and a feather boa,\nand black suede gloves.\"\n\n\"But, dearie, I shall be a trottin' funeral, that I shall,\" she\nexpostulated, divided between excitement and perplexity.\n\n\"No; you'll look splendid. And Cuckoo--\"\n\nHe hesitated, aware that he was treading on the divine quicksand of\nwoman's prejudices.\n\n\"Cuckoo, I want you to make a little experiment for my sake.\"\n\n\"Whatever is it, dearie?\"\n\n\"Just on that one night take--take all that off.\"\n\nWith an almost timid gesture, and growing boyishly red, he indicated the\nart decoration, pink and pale, that adorned her face.\n\nPoor Cuckoo looked completely flabbergasted.\n\n\"What?\" she said uncertainly; \"don't you like me with it?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Well, but, I don't know.\"\n\nSuch an experiment evidently struck her as portentous, earth-shaking. She\nstared into the dingy glass that stood over the mantelpiece in Marylebone\nRoad.\n\n\"I shall look a hag,\" she muttered, with conviction. \"I shall.\"\n\n\"You never had it, before you started.\"\n\nHer eyes grew round.\n\n\"Ah, that was jolly different, though,\" she said.\n\n\"Try it,\" he urged. \"Go and try it now, then come and show me.\"\n\n\"I don't like to.\"\n\nThe idea reduced her almost to shyness. But she got up falteringly, and\nmoved towards the bedroom. When she was by the folding door she said:\n\n\"I say.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"I say, you won't laugh at me?\"\n\n\"Of course not.\"\n\n\"You won't--honour?\"\n\n\"Honour!\"\n\nShe disappeared. And there was the sound of many waters. Julian listened\nto it, repeating under his breath that word of many meanings, that\npanorama-word, honour. Among thieves, among prostitutes, among murderers,\nrebels, the lost, the damned of this world, still does it not sing, like\na bird that is too hopeful of some great and beautiful end ever to be\nquite silent?\n\nJulian waited, while Cuckoo washed away her sin of paint and powder, at\nfirst nervously, then with a certain zest that was almost violent, that\nsplashed the water on floor and walls, and sent the shivering Jessie\nbeneath the bed for shelter. Cuckoo scrubbed and scrubbed, then applied a\ntowel, until her skin protested in patches. Finally, and with a disturbed\nheart, she approached the sitting-room. Her voice came in to Julian while\nshe remained hidden:\n\n\"I say--\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I know you will laugh.\"\n\n\"Honour, Cuckoo, honour.\"\n\n\"Oh, all right.\"\n\nAnd she came in to him, hanging her head down, rather like a child\namong strangers, ashamed, poor thing, of looking respectable. Julian was\nastonished at the change the water had wrought. Cuckoo looked another\nwoman, or rather girl, oddly young, thin, and haggard certainly, and the\nreverse of dashing, but pretty, even fascinating, in her shyness. As he\nlooked at her and saw the real red of nature run over her cheeks in waves\nof faint rose color, Julian understood fully all that the girl gives up\nwhen she gives up herself, and the wish--smiled at by Valentine--came to\nhim again, the wish to reclaim her.\n\n\"Ah!\" he said. \"Now you are yourself.\"\n\nHe took her hand, and drew her in front of the mirror, but she refused to\nlift up her eyes and look at her reflection.\n\n\"I'm a scarecrow,\" she murmured, twisting the front of her gown in her\nfingers. Her lips began to twitch ominously. Julian felt uncomfortable.\nHe thought she was going to cry.\n\n\"You are prettier than ever,\" he said. \"Look!\"\n\n\"No, no. It's all gone--all gone.\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"My looks, dearie. I could do without the paint once. I can't now.\"\n\nSuddenly she turned to him with a sort of vulgar passion, that suspicion\nof the hard young harridan, typical of the pavement, which he had\nobserved in her before.\n\n\"I should like to get the whole lot of men in here,\" she said, \"and--and\nchew them up.\"\n\nShe showed her teeth almost like an animal. Then the relapse,\ncharacteristic of the hysterical condition in which she was, came.\n\n\"Never you treat me like the rest,\" she said, bursting into sobs; \"never\nyou try anythin' on. If you do I'll kill myself.\"\n\nThis outburst showed to Julian that she was capable of a curious depth\nof real sentiment that gave to her a glimpse of purity and the divinity\nof restraint. He tried to soothe her and quickly succeeded. When she had\nrecovered they went out together to see about the making of the new\nblack dress, and before they parted he had persuaded Cuckoo to face the\n\"Empire\" multitude on the fateful evening without her panoply of paint\nand powder. She pleaded hard for a touch of black on the eyes, a line of\nred on the lips. But he was inexorable. When he had gained his point he\ncomforted her anxiety with chocolates, a feat more easy than the soothing\nof her with reasoning could have been.\n\nWhen he told Valentine of the success of his embassy, Valentine simply\nsaid:\n\n\"I am glad.\"\n\nJulian did not mention the episode of the washing, the preparation of the\nblack gown, or the promise wrung from the lady of the feathers. The\nresult springing from these three events was to come as a surprise to\nValentine on boat-race night.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE DANCE OF THE HOURS\n\n\nEven so huge a city as London, full of so many varying personalities and\nclashing interests, assumes upon certain days of the year a particular\nand characteristic aspect, arising from a community of curiosity, of\nexcitement, or of delight felt by its inhabitants. Such days are Derby\nday and boat-race day. On the latter more especially London is leavened\nby a huge mob of juveniles from the universities, and their female\nadmirers from the country, who cast a pleasant spell over the frigid\nindifference of town-bred dullards, and wake even the most vacuous of the\nPiccadilly loungers into a certain vivacity and boyishness. The cabmen\nblossom cheerily in dark and light blue favours. The butcher-boys are\npartisans. Every _gamin_ in the gutter is all for one boat or for the\nother, and dances excitedly to know the result. London, in fact, loses\nseveral wrinkles on boat-race day, and smiles itself into a very pleasant\nappearance of briskness and of youth. As a rule, Julian went to see the\nrace and to lunch with his friends at Putney or elsewhere, without either\nabnormal experience of excitement or any unusual vivacity. He was\nnaturally full of life, and had hot blood in his veins, loved a\nspectacle, and especially a struggle of youth against youth. But no\nboat-race day had ever stirred him as this one did--found him so\nattentive to outside influence, so receptive of common things. For\nJulian had recently been half-conscious that he was progressing, and with\nincreasing rapidity, though he knew not in what exact direction. Simply,\nhe had the feeling of motion, of journeying, and it seemed to him that he\nhad been standing comparatively still for years. And this boat-race day\ncame to him like a flashing milestone upon the road of life. He felt as\nif it held in its hours a climax of episodes or of emotions, as if upon\nit either his body or his mind must prepare to undergo some large\nexperience, to meet the searching eyes of a face new and unfamiliar.\n\nPossibly the reason of his own excitement lay in the excitement of\nanother, in the curious preparations, which he had oddly shared, for the\ntransformation of the unmistakable into the vague. For the transformation\nof Cuckoo Bright had been preparing apace, and Julian was looking forward\nlike a schoolboy to the effect which her novel respectability of\nappearance would have upon Valentine. The rouge-box lay lonely and\nuntouched in a drawer. Even the powder-puff suffered an unaccustomed\nneglect. The black gown had been tried on and taught to fit the thin\nyoung figure, and a hat--with only one feather--kept company with the\ndiscarded sarcophagus which had given to Cuckoo her original nickname.\nAnd Cuckoo herself was almost as excited as Francine when she received\nher muff. She had not seen Valentine since the day of the tea-party,\nyet her attitude of mind had undergone a change towards him, bent to it\nprobably by her vanity. Ever since Julian had given her the invitation to\nthe Empire she had displayed a furtive desire to meet him again, and was\nperpetually talking of him and asking questions about him. Nevertheless\nher fear of him had not died away. Even now she sometimes exclaimed\nagainst him almost with vehemence, and made Julian renew his promise not\nto leave her during the evening. But Julian could see that she longed, as\nwell as dreaded, to meet him again. After all, had he not picked her out\nfrom all the girlhood of London as one to whom he wished, to do honour?\nHad he been the Minotaur, such a fact must have made her look upon him\nwith desirous interest.\n\nWhen the great day arrived poor Cuckoo had to struggle with a keen and a\nsore temptation. She longed to deck herself out in her usual borrowed\nplumage, to take the habitual brilliant complexion out of the accustomed\ndrawer, to crown her frizzed head with feathers, and to look noisily\ndashing--her only idea of elegance and grace. Never before had she so\ndesired to create an impression. Yet she had given Julian her most solemn\npromise, and she intended to keep it. As she slowly attired herself,\nhowever, she wondered very much why he was so set upon denuding her of\nher accustomed magnificence. Her mind was entirely unable to grasp his\nconception of beauty and of attractiveness. She thought all men preferred\nthe peony to the violet. To-night it was very certain that she would be\nno peony, scarcely even a violet. Her new gown had been expensive, but it\nwas terribly simple, and the skirt hung beautifully, but was surely most\ndirefully sombre. Nevertheless, it rustled with a handsome sound, a\nmelody of wealth, when she had put it on and promenaded about her dingy\nbedroom, with Jessie at her heels, pretending to worry it playfully. The\nblack bodice had some trimming. But it was all black. Cuckoo wished it\nhad been scarlet, or, at the least, orange--something to catch the eye\nand hold it. When she was fully attired, and was staring into her glass,\nbetween two boldly flaring gas-jets, she nearly resolved to break her\npromise to Julian. She even went so far as to paint her lips and eyes,\nand was charmed with the effect against the black. But then with a sudden\nfury she sponged her pale face clean, threw the new feather boa round her\nthroat, and, without daring to glance again at her funereal image, turned\nout the gas, and went into the sitting-room. As usual, her last act was\nto ensconse the pensive Jessie in the flannel-lined basket, and to give\nher a kiss. To-night, as she did so, she let a tear fall on the little\ndog's head. She scarcely knew why she cried. Perhaps the quiet gown, the\nlack of paint and powder, the prospect of kind and even respectful\ntreatment from at least Julian, if not from Valentine, gave to her heart\na vision of some existence in which Piccadilly Circus had no part.\n\nJessie shivered as she felt the tear, and licked the face of her mistress\neagerly. Then Cuckoo rustled forth, avoiding Mrs. Brigg, who might be\nheard laboriously ascending the kitchen stairs to view her in her gala\nattire. In the twinkling of an eye she was out in the street, and Mrs.\nBrigg returned, swearing gustily, to the lower regions.\n\nCuckoo was to join the young men in their box, of which she had received\nthe number. She took a cab to the Empire, and was there in excellent\ntime. As she paid the man, she saw several women going noisily in,\ndressed in bright colours and gigantic hats. She looked at them, and\nfelt terribly mean and poor, and it was with no trace of her usual airy\nimpudence that she asked her way of the towering attendant in uniform who\nstood at the bottom of the carpeted staircase.\n\nJulian and Valentine were already there. They turned round as she came\nin, and stood up to receive her. Julian took her hand, but Valentine\nhesitated for a moment. Then he said:\n\n\"Is it--can it be really Miss Bright?\"\n\n\"Sure enough it is,\" Cuckoo answered, with an effort after liveliness.\n\nBut her eyes were fixed on his. She had seen a curious expression of\nmingled annoyance and contempt flit across his face as she came in.\nWhy, why had she allowed Julian to over-persuade her? She was looking\nhorrible, a scarecrow, a ghost of a woman. She was certain of it. For\na moment she felt almost angry with Julian for placing her in such a\nbitter position. But he was glowing with a consciousness of successful\ndiplomacy, and was delighted with her neat black aspect, and with her\nsmart, though small, hat. He was indeed surprised to find how really\npretty she still was when she allowed her true face to be seen, and was\nonly wishing that she had made a little less of her hair, which was more\nvigorously arranged even than usual. He glanced to see Valentine's\nsurprise.\n\n\"You are so altered,\" the latter continued. \"I scarcely recognized you.\"\n\nCuckoo's lips tightened.\n\n\"Altered or not, it's me, though,\" she said.\n\nValentine did not reply to this. He only made her come to the front of\nthe box, and placed a chair for her. She sat down feeling like a dog just\nwhipped. The young men were on each side of her, and the band played an\noverture. Cuckoo peered out over the bar of the box, shifting ever so\nlittle away from the side on which Valentine sat. In his presence all her\noriginal and extreme discomfort returned, with an added enmity caused by\nher secret certainty that he thought her looking her worst. She peered\nfrom the box and strove to interest herself in the huge crowd that\nthronged the house, and in her own dignified and elevated position in it.\nFor Valentine had taken one of the big boxes next the stage on the\nfirst tier, and Cuckoo had never been in such a situation before. She\ncould survey the endless rows of heads in the stalls with a completeness\nof bird's-eye observation never previously attained. What multitudes\nthere were. Endless ranks of men, all staring in the same direction,\nall smoking, all with handkerchiefs peeping out of their cuffs, and gold\nrings on their little fingers. Some of them looked half asleep, others,\nwho had evidently been dining, threw themselves back in their stalls,\nroaring with laughter, and leaning to tell each other stories that must\nsurely have teemed with wit. Most of them were young. But here and there\nan elderly and lined figure-head appeared among them, a figure-head\nthat had faced many sorts of weather in many shifting days and nights,\nand that must soon face eternity--instead of time. Yet at the gates of\ndeath it still sipped its brandy and soda, smiled over a French song\nwith tired lips, and sat forward with a pale gleam dawning in its eyes\nto reconnoitre the charms of a _ballet_. And if it looked aside at youth\nand was pierced by the sword of tragedy, yet it was too well bred or too\nconventional to let even one of the world around witness the wound. There\nis much secret bravery in social life. But these elderly figure-heads\nwere fewer than usual to-night. Youth seemed to have usurped the\nplaying-grounds of pleasure, to have driven old age away into the\nshadows. With flag flying, with trumpet and drum, it gaily held the\nfield. The lady of the feathers, Valentine, and Julian leaned out from\ntheir box as from the car of a balloon and saw below them a world of\nyouth hand in hand with the world of pleasure the gods offer to youth as\nwine. It was yet early in the evening, and the hours were only tripping\nalong, as women trip in the pictures of Albert Moore. They had not begun\nto dance, although the band was playing a laughing measure from an opera\nof Auber that foams with frivolity. Men kept dropping in, cigar in mouth,\nwalking to their seats with that air of well-washed and stiff composure\npeculiar to British youth, grim with self-consciousness, but affecting\nthe devil-may-care with a certain measure of success. Some of them\nescorted ladies, but by far the greater number were in couples, or in\nparties of three or four. The rose of health, or, in many cases, of\nrepletion, sat enthroned upon their cheeks; on the upper lips of many the\nmoustaches were budding delicately. These were just getting up on the box\nand gripping the reins for the great coach-drive. Little wonder if the\nveins in their eager hands stood out. Little wonder if they flourished\nthe whip with an unnecessary vehemence. But for them, too, so far the\nhours were only tripping, a slow and a dainty measure, a formal minuet.\nAnd they were but watching. Only later would they rise up and join the\ngreat dance of the hours, large, complicated, alluring, through whose\nmeasures the feet of eventual saints have trod, whose music rings in the\nears of many who, long after, try to pray and to forget. Some who were\nwith women made conversation jocosely, putting on travesties of military\nairs, and a knowingness of expression that might have put the wisdom of\nthe Sphinx to shame. Nor did they hesitate to appear amorous in the\npublic eye. On the contrary, their attitudes of attention were purposely\nassumed silently to utter volumes. They lay, to all intents and purposes,\nat the feet of their houris, as Samson lay shorn at the feet of Delilah.\nIn loud young voices they told the secrets of their hearts, until even\nthe clash of the music could scarcely keep them hidden. And Delilah,\nwho had shorn the locks of so many Samsons, and who had heard so many\nsecrets, gave ear with a clever affectation of interested surprise that\ndeceived these gay deceivers and set them high on the peaks of their own\nestimation. Two or three family parties, one obviously French, seemed out\nof place, indecently domestic in the midst of such a throng, in which\nmatrimony was a Cinderella before the ball, cuffed in curl-papers rather\nthan kissed in crystal slippers. They sat rather silent. One consisted of\na father, a mother and two daughters, the latter in large flowered hats.\nThe father smoked. The mother looked furtive in a bonnet, and the two\ndaughters, with wide open eyes, examined the flirtations around them as a\nchild examines a butterfly caught in a net. One of them blushed. But she\ndid not turn away her eyes. Nor were her girlish ears inactive. Family\nlife seemed suddenly to become dull to her. She wondered whether it were\nlife at all. And the father still smoked domestically. He knew it all.\nThat was the difference. And perhaps it was his knowledge that made him\nserenely content with domesticity and the three women who belonged to\nhim. Two boys, who had come up from a public school for the race, and had\nforgotten to go back, sat at the end of a row in glistening white collars\nand neat ties, almost angrily observant of all that was going on around\nthem. For them the dance of the hours was already begun, and already\nbecome a can-can. They watched it with an eager interest and excitement,\nand the calm self-possession with which some of the men near them made\njokes to magnificently dressed women with diamond earrings struck them\ndumb with admiration. Yet, later on, they too were fated to join in the\ndance, when the stars affected to sleep on the clouds and the moon lay\nwearily inattentive to the pilgrims of the night, like an invalid in a\nblue boudoir. On the thick carpet by the wall attendants stood loaded\nwith programmes. One of them, very trim and respectable, in a white cap,\nwas named Clara and offered a drink by an impudent Oxonian. She giggled\nwith all the vanity of sixteen, happily forgetful of her husband and\nof the seven children who called her mother. Yet the dance of the hours\nwas a venerable saraband to her, and she often wished she was in bed as\nshe stood listening to the familiar music. In the enclosure set apart for\nthe orchestra the massed musicians earned their living violently in the\nmidst of the gaily dressed idlers, who heard them with indifference, and\nsaw them as wound-up marionettes. The drummer hammered on his blatant\ninstrument with all the crude skill of his tribe, producing occasional\nterrific noises with darting fists, while his face remained as immovable\nas that of a Punchinello. A flautist piped romantically an Arcadian\nmeasure, while his prominent eyes stared about over the chattering\naudience as if in search of some one. Suddenly he gave a \"couac.\" He had\nseen his sweetheart in the distance with a youth from Christ Church. The\nconductor turned on the estrade in the centre of the orchestra and\nscowled at him, and he hastened to become Arcadian once again, gazing at\nhis flute as if the devil had entered into it. In a doorway shrouded with\nheavy curtains two acting managers talked warily, their hands in retreat\nbehind their coat-tails. They surveyed the house and mentally calculated\nthe amount of money in it, raising their eyes to the more distant\npromenade, at the back of which large hats covered with flowers and\nfeathers moved steadily to and fro. One of them curled his lips and\nmurmured the word \"Chant.\" Then they both laughed and strolled out to\nthe bar. More men passed in. Many could not get seats, and these stood,\nsmoking and exchanging remarks in the broad space between the stalls and\nthe wall. Some of them leaned nonchalantly against it and criticised the\nappearance of the seated audience, or nodded to acquaintances. Others\ngathered round the bar, and a few looked at the drop-curtain as if they\nthought their ascetic glances would cause it to roll up and disappear.\nThe overture at length ended. The stage was disclosed, and a man came\nforward with a smirk, and a wriggle of gigantic feet, to sing a song.\n\nBut Cuckoo Bright, Valentine, and Julian, from their balloon-car, still\nsurveyed the world. Cuckoo had heard the man before. She was no stranger\nto the upper regions of the Empire, but the fascination of knowing\nherself watched and commented on from the stalls was a new experience,\nand she wished to make the most of it. Forgetting that she was not\npainted and powdered, she stretched herself into view and believed she\nwas creating a sensation. So absorbed was she in the grand effort of\nbeing seen, that when Valentine drew his chair a little closer to her\nshe did not notice it. One of her hands lay on her lap, the other being\non the ledge of the box supporting her chin. She returned eagerly the\nglances of the stalls. The hand that was in her lap felt another hand\nclose on it. Instinctively Cuckoo turned towards Julian, ready to smile.\nBut Julian was gazing absorbed at the crowd, and half abstractedly\nlistening to the song of the man in the huge, distorted boots. It was\nValentine who held her hand. She tried to draw it away. He merely\ntightened his grip on it and continued sitting in silence, not even\nlooking towards her. And as he held her hand a sense of helplessness came\nover Cuckoo. Even through his kid glove she could feel the burning heat\nof his palm, of the fingers that clutched hers with the strength of an\nathlete. She gazed towards him through the new black veil that was drawn\nover her face, and it seemed even to her limited intelligence that the\nman who was so brutally holding her against her will could not be the man\nat whom she was now looking. For Valentine, whose profile was set towards\nher, was pale, calm, almost languid in appearance. His blue eyes were\nglancing quietly over the multitude, with an air of indifferent\nobservation. His lips were slightly parted in a sort of dawning smile,\nand his whole attitude was that of a man lazily at ease and taking his\npleasure in a desultory mood. Yet the hand on Cuckoo's knees was vicious\nin its grasp. This startling and silent contradiction threw her into a\ncomplete panic, but she did not dare to say anything in protest. She\nsat silently trembling, and drawing her lips together in growing\nperturbation, till Julian happened to turn towards them. Then Valentine's\nfingers relaxed their grasp quietly, and slipped away. At the same time\nhe moved with an air of energy, and broke into gay conversation. His\nlanguor vanished. His blue eyes sparkled. Julian was astonished at his\nintense vivacity. He laughed, made jokes, became absolutely boyish.\n\n\"Why, Val, how gay you are!\" Julian said.\n\n\"Every one is gay to-night.\"\n\nHe was interrupted by a roar of laughter. The man in the boots was\nbecoming immoderately whimsical. His feet seemed to have escaped from\ncontrol, and to be prancing in Paradise while he looked on in Purgatory.\n\n\"Every one is gay.\"\n\nAs Valentine repeated the words, and the huge theatre laughed like one\nenormous person, Julian felt again the strange thrill of overmastering\nexcitement that had shaken him on the night when he and Valentine had\nleaned out of the Victoria Street window. The strength of the spring\nand of his long tended and repressed young instincts stirred within\nhim mightily. Scales fell from his eyes. From the car of the balloon\nhe gazed down, and it seemed to him that they--Valentine, Cuckoo,\nand himself--were drifting over a new country, of which all the\ninhabitants were young, gay, careless, rightly irresponsible. The\nrows of open-mouthed, laughing faces called to him to join in their\nmirth,--more, to join in their lives, and in the lives of the pirouetting\nhours. He moved in his chair as if he were impelled to get up and leave\nhis seat. And as he moved a voice whispered in his ear:\n\n\"Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die.\"\n\nWas it Valentine's voice? He turned round hastily, curiously perturbed.\n\n\"Val, was that you? Did you speak to me?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nJulian looked at Cuckoo. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes shone with\ndancing excitement.\n\n\"Did you, Cuckoo?\"\n\n\"Not I, dearie. I say, ain't he funny to-night?\"\n\nThen the voice must have spoken in his own brain. He listened for it and\nfancied he could hear it again and again, driving him on like a phantom\nfate. But the voice was in timbre like the voice of Valentine, and he\nfelt as if Valentine spoke with a strange insistence and reiteration.\nHis heart, his whole being, made answer to the whisper.\n\n\"To-morrow we die. It is true. Ah, then, let us--let us eat and let us\ndrink.\"\n\nThe man in the boots wriggled furiously into the wings, and the curtain\nrose on the ballet. Wenzel had ascended to the conductor's platform amid\nloud applause. The first weary melodies of \"Faust\" streamed plaintively\nfrom the orchestra, and a gravity came over the rows of faces in the\nstalls. Julian's face, too, was grave, but his excitement and his sense\nof his own power of youth grew as he looked on. The old Faust appeared,\nheavy with the years and with the trouble of useless thought, and Julian\nfelt that he could sneer at him for his venerable age. As he watched the\nphilosopher's grandiloquent pantomime of gesture, like a mist there\nfloated over him the keen imagination of the hell of regret in which the\nold age, that never used to the full its irrevocable youth, must move,\nand a passion of desire to use his own youth rushed over him as fire\nrushes over a dry prairie. Even a sudden anger against Valentine came to\nhim,--against Valentine for the protection he had given through so many\nyears. For had he not been protecting Julian against joy? and does not\nthe capacity for joy pass away with a tragic swiftness? As Faust was\ntransformed into youth, and the ballet danced in the market-place, Julian\nturned to Valentine and said:\n\n\"We will live to-night.\"\n\nValentine laughed.\n\n\"You look excited.\"\n\n\"I feel excited. Don't you?\"\n\nValentine answered:\n\n\"I may presently. We mustn't stay in here all the evening.\"\n\nThere was a knock at the door of the box. An attendant appeared to ask\ntheir orders. Valentine spoke some words to him, and in a few minutes he\nbrought three long drinks to the box. Julian drank his mechanically. His\neyes were always on the ballet. The betrayal of poor Margaret had now\nbeen accomplished and the soldiers were returning from the wars. Beyond\nthe wall of the garden the tramp of their feet was heard, a vision of the\ntops of their passing weapons was seen. The orchestra played the fragment\nof a march. Cuckoo sipped her brandy and soda, and gazed sometimes at the\nstage indifferently, often at the audience eagerly, and then at Julian.\nWhen her eyes were on Julian's face a light came into them that made her\nexpression young, and even pure. A simplicity hovered about her lips, and\na queer dawning of something that was almost refinement spoke in her\nattitude. But if she chanced to meet the eyes of Valentine her face was\nfull of fear.\n\nAnd now the last great scene of the pageant approached, and the two\nschoolboys leant forward in their stalls in a passion of greedy\nexcitement. Julian happened to see them, and instead of smiling at their\nfrankly lustful attitudes with the superiority of the drilled man over\nthe child, he was conscious of an eager sympathy with their vigour of\nenjoyment and of desire. His nature retrograded and became a schoolboy's\nnature, with the whole garden of life flowering before its feet. Suddenly\nthere came to him the need of touching something human. He stole his arm\nclosely around Cuckoo's waist. She glanced at him surprised. But his eyes\nwere turned away to the stage. Valentine pushed his chair a little\nbackwards. He was watching them, and when he saw the movement of Julian's\narm, he laughed to himself. The classical Sabbath sprang into view, and\nit seemed to be just then that the feet of the hours first began to move\nin the opening steps of their great dance of that night. Was it the\nmagnificent Cleopatra that gave them the signal? Or did Venus herself\nwhisper in their ears that the time for their _f\u00eate_ was come at length,\nthat the paid vagaries of the stage demanded companionship, and that the\naudience, too, must move in great processions, whirl in demon circles,\nrise up in heart to the clash of cymbals, bow down before the goddesses\nof the night, the women who gave to modern men the modern heaven that\nthey desire in our days? The stage was a waving sea of scarlet, through\nwhich one white woman floated, like a sin with pale cheeks in the midst\nof the rubicund virtues. She was, perhaps, not beautiful, but she was\nprovocative and alluring, and her whiteness made her as voluptuous as\ninnocence is when it moves through the habitations of the wicked. Julian\nwatched her come to Faust and win him from the scarlet dancers and from\nthe arms of Cleopatra, and the strange rejuvenation of this philosopher\nwho had been old, and known decaying faculties, and the flight of the\nheart from the warm closes of the summer to the white and iron winter\nplains, filled him with sympathy. It must be easy to use your youth after\nyou have known the enforced reserve of age. For age is a bitter lesson.\nThe dance grew more wild and rattling. The _frou-frou_ of the swinging\nscarlet skirts filled the great house with sound as the glitter of\nspangles filled it with a shimmering light. Faust was surrounded by\nfluttering women moving in complicated evolutions with a trained air of\nreckless devilry. And Julian gave himself to the illusion created by the\nskill of Katti Lanner, ignoring entirely the real care of the dancers,\nand choosing to consider them as merely driven by wild impulse, vagrant\ndesires of furious motion, and the dashing gaiety of keen sensual\nsensation. They danced to fire a real Faust, and he was Faust for the\nmoment. His arm closed more firmly round the waist of Cuckoo, and he\ncould feel the throbbing of her heart against the palm of his hand. He\ndid not look at her, and so he did not see the dawning anxiety with which\nshe was beginning furtively to regard him. Entirely engrossed with the\nstage spectacle, the movement of his arm had been entirely mechanical,\nprompted by the hardening pressure of excitement in his mind. If he had\nactually crushed Cuckoo and hurt her he would have been unconscious that\nhe was doing it.\n\nAnd Valentine all this time leaned back in his chair, that stood in the\nshadow of the box, and looked at the enlaced figures before him with an\nunvarying smile.\n\nContrast and surprise are the essence of the successful \"spectacle.\"\nJust as the scarlet dervish whirl was at its height the character of\nthe music changed, slackened, softened, died from the angrily sensuous\ninto an ethereal delicacy. The stage filled with clouds that faded in\ngolden light, and a huge and glittering stairway rose towards the painted\nsky. On either side of it hung in the blue ether guardian angels with\noutstretched wings, and between their attentive ranks stood the radiant\nfigure of the purified Margaret, at whose white feet the red crowd of\nwomen, even the majestic Cleopatra and pale voluptuous Venus, sank\nabashed. Harps sounded frostily, suggesting that crystal heaven of St.\nJohn, in which the beauties we know in nature are ousted by unbreathing\njewels, the lifeless pearl and chrysolite. The air filled with thin and\nwintry light, that deepened, and began to glow, through lemon to amber\nand to rose. The angels swam in it, and then the huge stairway leading\nup to heaven shone with the violence of a gigantic star. Faust fell in\nrepentance before the girl he had ruined and failed to ruin, the girl who\nbent as if to bless him upon this fiery ascent to heaven. And Julian,\nabsorbed, devoured the wide and glowing scene with his eyes, which were\nattracted especially by the living flames that were half veiled and half\nrevealed beneath the feet of Margaret. The music of the orchestra rippled\nfaintly, and then it seemed to Julian that, as if in answer, there\nrippled up from the golden stairs and from the hidden company of flames\nthat faint, thin riband of shadowy fire which had already so strangely\nbeen with him in the dawn and in the dusk. It came from beneath the\npausing feet of the girl who blessed Faust, and trembled upwards slowly\nabove her glittering hair. Julian felt a burning sensation at his heart,\nas if the tiny fire found its way there. He turned round sharply,\nwithdrawing his arm from Cuckoo's waist with an abruptness that startled\nher.\n\n\"Valentine!\" he exclaimed in a whisper. \"There; now you see it.\"\n\nValentine leaned to him.\n\n\"See what?\"\n\n\"The flame. It's no fancy. It's no chimera. Look, it is mounting up\nbehind Margaret. Watch it, Valentine, and tell me what it is.\"\n\n\"I see nothing.\"\n\nJulian stared into his eyes, as if to make certain that he really spoke\nthe truth. Then Valentine asked of Cuckoo:\n\n\"Miss Bright, can you see this flame of which Julian speaks?\"\n\nCuckoo answered, with the roughness that always came to her in the\ncompany of alarm:\n\n\"Not I. There ain't nothing, no more than there was that day when I had\nthe coffee.\"\n\nShe added to Julian, reproachfully:\n\n\"You've been drinkin'. Now, dearie, you have.\"\n\nSuddenly his two companions became intolerable to Julian. He thought them\nstupid, boorish, dense, devoid of the senses of common humanity, not to\nsee what he saw, not to feel as he felt,--that this vague flame had a\nmeaning and a message not yet interpreted, perhaps not even remotely\ndivined. With an angry exclamation he sprang to his feet, turning once\nmore to the stage. And as the curtain fell, he distinctly saw the flame\nglowing like a long and curiously shaped star above the head of Margaret.\n\nAnd this man and woman would not see it! A sudden enmity to them both\ncame to him in that moment. He abruptly opened the door of the box, and\nwent out without another word to either of them. Cuckoo's voice shrilly\ncalling to him to stop did not affect his resolution and desire to escape\nfrom them if only for a moment.\n\nOut in the corridor at the back of the dress circle people were beginning\nto circulate, relieved from the tension of examining the ballet. Julian\nwas instantly swallowed up in a noisy crowd, hot, flushed, loud-voiced,\nbright-eyed. Masses of excited young men lounged to and fro, smoking\ncigarettes, and making fervent remarks upon the gaily dressed women, who\nglided among them observantly. From the adjoining bar rose the music of\npopping corks and flowing liquids. The barmaids were besieged. Clouds of\nsmoke hung in the air, and the heat was terrific. Julian felt it clinging\nto him as if with human arms as he slowly walked over the thick carpet,\nglancing about him. Humanity touched him on every side. At one moment an\nelderly woman, with yellow hair and a fat-lined face, enveloped him in\nher skirts of scarlet and black striped silk. The black chiffon that\nswept about her neck and heaving shoulders fluttered against his face.\nHer high-heeled boots trod on his. He seemed one with her. Then she had\nvanished, and instantly he was in the arms of a huge racing-man, who wore\ngigantic pink pearls in his shirt front, and bellowed the latest slang to\na thin and dissipated companion. It seemed to Julian that he was kicked\nlike a football from one life to another, and that from each life he drew\naway something as he bounded from it, the fragment of a thought, the\nthrill of a desire, the indrawn breath of a hope. Like a machine that\nwinds in threads of various coloured silks, he wound in threads from the\nvarious coloured hearts about him,--red, white, coarse, and fine. And,\nhalf-unconsciously, was he not weaving them into a fabric? Never before\nhad he understood the meaning of a crowd, that strange congregation of\npassions and of fates which speaks in movements and is melodious in\nattitudes, which quarrels in all its parts, silently, yet is swayed\nthrough and through by large impulses, and as an intellect far more keen\nand assertively critical than the intellect of any one person in it. And\nnow, when Julian began to feel the meaning of this surging mob of men and\nwomen, the hours danced, and he and all the crowd danced with them. And\nthe music that accompanied and directed the feet through the figures of\nthat night's quadrille was the music of words and of laughter, of hissing\nenticements and of whispered replies. Irresistible was the performance\nof the hours and of the crowd that lived in them. Julian knew it when the\ndance began, marvelled at it for a little when the dance was ended. There\nwas contagion in the air, furtive, but strong as the contagion of\ncholera,--the contagion of human creatures gathered together in the\nnight. Only the youth who dwells--like Will-o'-the-Mill--forever by the\nlonely stream in the lonely mountain valley escapes it entirely. Aged\nsaints look backward on their lives, and remember at least one night\nwhen it seized them in its embrace; and even the purest woman, through\nits spell, has caught sight of the vision behind the veil of our\ncivilization, and although she has shrunk from it, has had a moment of\nwonder and of interest, never quite effaced from her memory.\n\nOn every side the Oxford and Cambridge boys laughed and shouted, pushed\nand elbowed. They had begun to cast off restraint, and the god that is\nrowdy on a rowdy throne compelled them to their annual obeisance at his\nfeet. Some of them moved along singing, and interrupting their song with\nshouts. Friends, when they met in the crowd, yelled shrill recognitions\nat each other, and nicknames sang in the air like noisy birds. Rows of\nmen linked arms, and, striding forward, compelled the throng to yield\nthem difficult passage, swinging this way and that to make their progress\nmore comprehensive. The attendants, standing by the wall like giants,\ncalmly smiled on the growing uproar, into which they darted now and then\nwith a sudden frenzy of dutiful agility to eject some rude wit who had\ntransgressed their code of propriety. The very spirit of lusty youth was\nin this crowd of hot, careless, blatant, roving youths, mad to find\nthemselves away from the cool and grey Oxford towers, and from the vacant\nbanks of the Cam, in passionate Leicester Square, fired by the scarlet\nballet, and the thunder of the orchestra, and the sight of smart women.\nSudden emancipation is the most flaming torch to human passions that\nexists in the world. It flared through all that mob, urging it to\nconflagration, to the flames that burst up in hearts that are fresh and\nardent, and that so curiously confuse joy with wickedness.\n\nFlames! flames! The word ran in Julian's mind, and in his breast flames\nsurely burned that night, for, when he suddenly ran against Valentine and\nCuckoo in the throng, he caught Valentine by the arm and said:\n\n\"Val, you were right just now. There was no flame; there could have been\nno flame where Margaret stood. She was too pure. What can fire have to do\nwith snow? Cuckoo, I was a fool. Catch hold of my arm.\"\n\nHe pulled her arm roughly through his, never noticing how pale the girl's\nface was, how horror-stricken were her eyes. He wanted to bathe himself,\nand her, and Valentine, in this crowd that influenced him and that he\nhelped to influence. He felt as the diver feels, who, when he plunges,\nhas a sacred passion for the depths. There are people who have an ardour\nfor going down comparable to the ardour felt by those who mount. Tonight\nsuch an ardour took hold of Julian.\n\nValentine fell in with it, seeing the humour of his friend, and Cuckoo,\nprisoned between the two men, did not attempt to resist them. As they\nmoved on Valentine said, in a voice he made loud that it might be heard:\n\n\"Now, you feel the strength of the spring, Julian. Is it not better than\nall my teachings of asceticism?\"\n\n\"Yes, by ----, it is.\"\n\nAnd as he made that answer, Julian, for the first time, forgot to look\nup to Valentine, and felt a splendid equality with him, the equality\nthat men of the same age and temper feel when they are bent on the same\npursuit. How can one of two Bacchanals stoop in adoration of the other,\nwhen both are bounding in the procession of Silenus? Valentine fell from\nhis pedestal and became a comrade instead of a god. He was no longer the\nchaperon of the dancing hours, but their partner. And a new fire shone in\nhis blue eyes, an unaccustomed red ran over his cheeks, as he heard\nJulian's answer to his question. From that moment he ceased to play what,\nit seemed, had been but a part, the empty ivory _r\u00f4le_ of saint. For\nJulian was no longer conscious or observant of him, no longer able to\nwonder at his abrupt transformation. In a flash he cast off his habitual\nrestraint and passed from the reserve of thought to the rowdyism of act.\n\nHe chattered unceasingly, dressing his English in all the slang\nembroidery of the day. He laughed and chaffed, exchanged repartees with\nthe flowing multitude through which they passed, stopped to speak to the\nflaunting women and loaded them with extravagant compliments, elbowed\nloungers out of his way, and made the most personal remarks on those\naround him. Two men went by, and one of them exclaimed, with a surprised\nglance at Valentine:\n\n\"I'm damned! Why, there goes the Saint of Victoria Street.\"\n\n\"Saint!\" said the other; \"I should think devil the more appropriate name.\nThat chap looks up to anything.\"\n\n\"Ah, well; when a saint turns sinner--,\" answered the first speaker, with\na laugh.\n\nValentine heard the words and burst into a roar of laughter. He drew\nCuckoo to the left and Julian followed. They passed under an archway into\nthe bar, which was crowded with men, drinking and talking at the tops of\ntheir voices. Valentine called for drinks in a voice so loud and\nauthoritative that the barmaid hurried to serve him, deserting other\ncustomers, who protested vainly. He forced Cuckoo to drink, and Julian\nneeded no urging. Clinking glasses noisily with them, he gave as a toast:\n\n\"To the dance of the hours!\"\n\nThese words, uttered with almost strident force, attracted attention even\namid the violent hubbub that was raging, and several young men pressed\nround Valentine as he stood with his back against the counter of the bar.\nThey raised their glasses, too, half in ridicule, and shouting in chorus,\n\"To the dance of the hours!\" drained them to this toast, which they could\nnot comprehend. Valentine dashed his glass down. It broke and was\ntrodden under foot. The barmaid protested. He threw her a sovereign. The\nyoung men gathered round, broke theirs in imitation, and Julian,\nsnatching Cuckoo's from her, flung it away. As he did so, Valentine\nthrust another, filled with champagne, into her hand, and again cried\nout the toast.\n\n\"What the deuce does he mean by it?\" one youth called out. \"The dance of\nthe hours; what's that?\"\n\n\"The dance of the hours! The dance of the hours!\" echoed other voices,\nand glasses were drained wildly. There was something exciting in the mere\nsound of the words that seemed to set brains jigging, and feet moving,\nand the world spinning and bowing. For if Time itself danced, what could\nthe most Puritan human being do but dance with it? Seeing the crowd round\nValentine, men who were drinking at the other end of the bar joined it,\nand the toast passed quickly from mouth to mouth. Uttered by every\nvariety of voice, with every variety of accent, it filled the stifling\natmosphere, and tickled many an empty brain, like the catchword political\nthat can set a nation behind one astute wire-puller. Boys yelled it, men\nmurmured it, and an elderly woman in a plush gown and yellow feathers\nscreamed it out in a piercing soprano that would have put many a\ntrumpet-blast to shame. Glasses were emptied and filled again in its\nhonour. Yet nobody knew what it meant, and apparently nobody cared,\nexcept the Oxford boy who had already expressed his desire to be better\ninformed on the subject. He had gradually edged his way through the\nthrong until he was close to Valentine, at whom he gazed with a sort of\ntipsy reverence.\n\n\"I say, you chap,\" he cried. \"What are we drinking to--eh? What the\ndevil's the dance of the hours?\"\n\nValentine brought his glass down on the counter.\n\n\"What is it?\" he exclaimed. \"Why, the greatest dance in the world, the\ndance that youth sends out the invitations for, and women live for, and\nold men die with longing for. We set the hours dancing in the night,\nwe--all who are gay and careless, who love life in the greatest way, and\nwho laugh at death, and who aren't afraid of the devil. The devil's only\na bogey to frighten old women and children. What do the hours care for\nhim? Not a snap. It's only cowards who fear him. Brave men do what they\nwill, and when the hours dance they dance with them, and drink with them\nall the night through. Who says there'll be another morning? I don't\nbelieve it. Curse the sunshine. Give me the night and the dancing hours!\"\n\nThe youth gave a yell, which was echoed by some of his rowdy companions,\nand by the two little schoolboys who had joined the throng in a frenzy of\nchildish excitement, which they thought manly.\n\n\"The dancing hours! The dancing hours!\" they cried, and one who was with\na girl suddenly caught her round the waist and broke into wild steps.\nOthers joined in. The confusion became tremendous. Glasses were knocked\nover. Whiskies and sodas were poured out in libations upon the carpet.\nThe protests of the barmaids were unheeded or unheard. Julian whirled\nCuckoo into the throng, and Valentine, snapping his long white fingers\nlike castanets, stamped his feet as if to the measure of a wild music.\nAgainst the wall some loungers looked on in contemptuous amusement, but\nby far the greater number of men present were young and eager for any\nabsurdity, and not a few were half tipsy. These ardently welcomed\nanything in the nature of a row, and the romp became general and noisy.\nMen danced awkwardly with one another, roaring the latest music-hall\ntunes at the pitch of their voices. The women screamed with laughter,\nor giggled piercingly as they were banged and trodden on in the tumult.\nThe noise, penetrating to the promenade, drew the attention of the\naudience, many of whom hurried to see what was going on, and the block\nround the archways quickly became impenetrable. One or two of the\ngigantic chuckers-out forced their way into the throng and seized the\ndancers nearest to them, but they were entirely unable to stay the\nridiculous impulse which impelled this mob of young human beings to\ncapering and yelling. Indeed they merely increased the scuffle, which\nrapidly developed towards a free fight. Hats were knocked off, dresses\nwere torn. The women got frightened and began to scream. The men swore,\nand some lost their tempers and struck out right and left. Valentine\nwatched the scene with laughing eyes as if he enjoyed it. Especially he\nwatched Julian, who, with scarlet face and sparkling eyes, still forced\nCuckoo round and round in the midst of the tumult. Cuckoo was white, and\nseemed to be half fainting. Her head rested helplessly against Julian's\nshoulder, and her eyes stared at him as if fascinated. Her dress was\ntorn, and her black veil hung awry. If she danced with the hours it was\nwithout joy or desire.\n\nBut suddenly police appeared. The dancers, abruptly realizing that a joke\nwas dying in a disaster, ceased to prance. Some violently assumed airs of\nindifference and of alarming respectability. Many sinuously wound their\nway out to the promenade. A few, who had completely lost their heads,\nhustled the police, and were promptly taken into custody. Julian would\nhave been among these had it not been for the intervention of Valentine,\nwho caught him by the shoulder, and drew him and Cuckoo away.\n\n\"No; you mustn't end to-night in a cell,\" he said in Julian's ear. \"The\ndancing hours want you still. Julian, you are only beginning your real\nlife to-night.\"\n\nJulian, like a man in an excited dream, followed Valentine to the bottom\nof the broad stairs, on, through the blooming masses of flowers, to the\nentrance. Two or three cabs were waiting. Valentine put Cuckoo into one.\nShe had not spoken a word, and was trembling as if with fear.\n\n\"Get in, Julian.\"\n\nJulian obeyed, and Valentine, standing on the pavement, leaned forward\nand whispered to him:\n\n\"Take her home, Julian.\"\n\nSuddenly Julian shouted Cuckoo's address to the cabman hoarsely.\n\nThe cab drove away.\n\nValentine walked slowly towards Piccadilly Circus, whistling softly,\n\"I want you, my honey; yes, I do.\"\n\n\n\n\nBOOK III--THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\nThe thin afternoon light of an indefinite spring day shone over the\nMarylebone Road. A heavy warmth was in the air, and the weather was\npeculiarly windless, but the sun only shone fitfully, and the street\nlooked sulky. The faces of the passers-by were hot and weary. Women\ntrailed along under the weight of their parcels, and men returned from\nwork grimmer than usual, and wondering almost with a fretfulness of\npassion why they were born predestined to toil. The cabmen about Baker\nStreet Station dozed with nodding heads upon their perches, and the\nomnibus conductors forgot to chaff, and collected their tolls with a\nmechanical deliberation. At the crossings the policemen, helpless in\ntheir uniforms of the winter, became dictatorial more readily than on\ncooler days. Some sorts of weather incline every one to temper or to\ndepression. The day after the boat-race lay under a malign spell. It\nseemed to feel all the weariness of reaction, and to fold all men and\nwomen in the embrace of its lassitude and heavy hopelessness.\n\nAt number 400, Jessie whined pitifully in her basket, and her arched back\nquivered perpetually as her minute body expanded and contracted in the\neffort of breathing. Her beady eyes were open and fixed furtively upon\nher mistress, as if in inquiry or alarm, and her whole soul was whirling\nin a turmoil set in motion by the first slap she had ever received in\ngravity at the hands of Cuckoo. Jessie's inner nature was stung by that\nslap. It knocked her world over, like a doll hit by a child. Her universe\nlay prone upon its back.\n\nAnd Cuckoo's? She was sitting in the one arm-chair with her thin hands\nfolded in her lap. She wore the black dress given to her by Julian, but\nshe did not look prepared to go out, for her hair was standing up over\nher head in violent disorder, her cheeks were haggard and unwashed, and\nher boots--still muddy from the previous night's promenading--stood\nin a corner near the grate in the first position, as if directed by\na dancing-mistress. Cuckoo was neither reading nor working. She was\nsimply staring straight before her, without definite expression. Her\nface indeed wore a quite singularly blank look and her mouth was slightly\nopen. Her feet, stuck out before her, rested on the edge of the fender,\nshoeless, and both her general appearance and attitude betokened a\ncomplete absence of self-consciousness, and that lack of expectation of\nany immediate event which is often dubbed stupidity. The lady of the\nfeathers sitting in the horsehair-covered chair in the cheap sitting-room\nwith the folding doors looked indeed stupid, pale, and heavy. Fatigue lay\nin the shadows of her eyes, but something more than ordinary fatigue\nhovered round her parted lips and spoke in her posture. A dull weariness,\nin which the mind took part with the body, held her in numbing captivity.\nShe had only broken through it in some hours to repulse the anxious\neffort of Jessie to scramble into the nest of her lap. That slap given,\nshe had again relapsed without a struggle into this waking sleep.\n\nThe sun came out with a sudden violence, and an organ began to play a\nfrisky tune in the street. Jessie whined and whimpered, formed her mouth\ninto the shape of an O, and, throwing up her head, emitted a vague and\nsmothered howl. Below stairs, Mrs. Brigg, who was afflicted with a\ncomplaint that prompted her to perpetual anxious movement, laboured about\nthe kitchen, doing nothing in particular, among her pots and pans. The\noccasional clatter of them mingled with the sound of the organ, and with\nthe suffocated note of Jessie, in a depressing symphony. The sun went in\nagain, and some dust, stirred into motion by a passing omnibus, floated\nin through the half-open window and settled in a light film upon the\nphotograph of Marr. Presently the organ moved away, and faded gradually\nin pert tunes down the street. Jessie's nervous system, no longer played\nupon, ceased to spend its pain in sound, and a London silence fell round\nthe little room. Then, at length, Cuckoo shifted in her chair, stretched\nher hands in her lap, and sat up slowly. The inward expression had not\nfaded from her eyes yet, for, leaning forward, she still stared blankly\nbefore her, looking, as it seemed, straight at Marr's photograph.\nGradually she woke to a consciousness of what she was looking at, and\nputting up one hand she took the photograph from its place, laid it in\nher lap, and, bending down, gazed at it long and earnestly. Then she\nshook her head as if puzzled.\n\n\"I don't know,\" she murmured; \"I don't know.\"\n\nEncouraged by the sound of her mistress's voice, Jessie stepped from\nher basket and gingerly approached, snuffling round Cuckoo's feet, and\nwriggling her body in token of anxious humility. Cuckoo picked her up and\nstroked her mechanically, but still with her eyes on the photograph. Two\ntears swam in them. She dashed the photograph down. It lay on the carpet,\nand was still there when a knock at the door was succeeded by the\nentrance of Julian.\n\nHe, too, looked pale and rather weary, but excited.\n\n\"Cuckoo,\" he said.\n\nShe sat still in the chair, looking at him.\n\n\"Well?\" she said, and closed her lips tightly.\n\nHe came a step or two forward into the little room, and put his hat and\nstick down on the table.\n\n\"You expected me to come, didn't you?\"\n\n\"I don't know as I did.\"\n\nHer eyes were on Jessie now, and she stroked the little dog's back\nsteadily up and down, alternately smoothing and ruffling its short coat.\nJulian came over and stood by the mantelpiece.\n\n\"I told you I should come.\"\n\n\"Did you?\"\n\n\"Don't you remember?\"\n\nShe shifted round in the chair till he could only see her shoulder, and\nthe side of her head and neck, on which the loose hair was tumbling in\nugly confusion. Sitting thus she threw back at him the sentence:\n\n\"I don't want to remember nothing. I don't want to remember.\"\n\nJulian stood hesitating. He glanced at Cuckoo's hair and at the back of\nher thin hand moving to and fro above the little contented dog.\n\n\"Why not?\" he said.\n\nAt first she made no answer to this question, and seemed as if she had\nnot heard it, but presently it appeared that her silence had been caused\nby the effect of consideration, for at length she said, still retaining\nher aloof attitude:\n\n\"I don't want to remember, because it's like a beastly dream, and when I\nremember I know it ain't a dream.\"\n\nJulian said nothing, and suddenly Cuckoo turned round to him, and took\nher hand from Jessie's back.\n\n\"I say. You were mad last night. Now, weren't you?\"\n\nThe words came from her almost pleadingly, and her eyes rested on\nJulian's insistently, as if demanding an affirmative.\n\n\"He'd made you mad,\" she continued.\n\n\"He,\" said Julian. \"Who?\"\n\n\"Your friend.\"\n\n\"Valentine! He had nothing to do with it.\"\n\n\"It was all his doing.\"\n\nHer voice grew shrill with feeling.\n\n\"He's a devil,\" she said. \"I hate him. I hate him worse than I hate\nthat copper west side of Regent Street. And I hate you, too,--yes, I\ndo,--to-day.\"\n\nThe tears gathered in her eyes and began to fall, tears of rage and shame\nand regret, tears of one who had lost a great possession. Julian looked\nembarrassed and pained, almost guilty, too. He put out his hand and tried\nto take Cuckoo's. But she drew hers away and went on crying. She spoke\nagain with vehemence.\n\n\"I told you what I wanted you to be; yes, I did,\" she exclaimed. \"Yes,\nI told you. You said you only come here to talk to me.\"\n\n\"It was true.\"\n\n\"No; it wasn't. You're just like all the others. And I did so want to\nhave a pal. I've never had one.\"\n\nWith the words the sense of her desolation seemed to strike her with\nstunning force. She leaned her head against the back of the chair, and\ncried bitterly, catching at the horsehair with violent hands, as if she\nlonged to hurt something, to revenge her loss even upon an object without\npower of feeling. Julian sprang up and went over to the window. He looked\nout onto the road and watched the people moving by in the fitful sunshine\nbeyond the dirty railings. That day, he, too, was in a tumult. He felt\nlike a monk who had suddenly thrown off his habit, broken his vows, and\ncome forth into the world. The cell and the cloister were left behind,\nwere things to be forgotten, with the grating of the confessional and the\ndim routine of service and of asceticism. He had been borne on by the\nwave of a brilliant, a violent hour, away from them. Let the angelus bell\nring; he no longer heard it. Let the drone of prayers and praises rise in\na monotonous music by day and by night; he no longer had the will to heed\nthem. For there was another music in his ears. Soon it would be in his\nheart. Imagine a Trappist suddenly transported from the desert of his\nlong silence to a gay _plage_ on which a brass band was playing. Julian\nwas that Trappist in mind. And though he knew Cuckoo was sobbing at his\nback, and though his heart held a sense of pity for her trouble, yet he\nheard her grief with a strange cruelty, at which he wondered, without\nbeing able to soften it. That afternoon it seemed to him useless for\nanybody to cry. No grief was quite worth tears. The violence of life was\npresent with him, gave him light and blinded him at the same time. He\nfound delight in the thought of violence, because it held action in its\ngrasp. Even cruelty was worth something. Was he cruel to Cuckoo?\n\nHe turned from the window and looked at her, with the observation of a\nnature not generally his own. He noted the desolation of her hair, and he\nnoted, too, that she wore the gown he had given to her. Would she have\nput it on if she had hated him as she said she did? Somehow it scarcely\nseemed to suit her to-day. It looked draggled, and as if it had been up\nall night, he thought. The black back of it heaved as Cuckoo sobbed, like\na little black wave. Was the eternal movement of the sea caused by some\nhorrible, inward grief which, though secret, must come thus to the eye of\nGod and of the world? Julian found himself wondering in an unreasonable\nabstraction as he contemplated the crying girl. Then suddenly his mind\nswerved to more normal paths; he was seized by the natural feeling of a\nman who has made a woman weep, and had the impulse to comfort.\n\n\"Don't cry, Cuckoo,\" he said, coming over to her and sitting on the edge\nof her chair. \"You must not. Let us say I was mad last night. Perhaps I\nwas. Men are often mad, surely. To-day I'm sane, and I want you to\nforgive me.\"\n\nHe put his arm round her shoulder. She glanced up at him. Then, with the\nodd penetration that so often gilds female ignorance till it dazzles and\ndistracts, she said quickly:\n\n\"You don't mean what you say; you don't really care.\"\n\nJulian was taken aback by her sharpness, and by the self-revelation that\nimmediately stabbed him.\n\n\"You mustn't say that,\" he began. But she stopped him on the instant.\n\n\"You don't care; you think it's nothing. So it ought to be to me, I\nknow.\"\n\nThat had perhaps actually been his thought, the thought of a mind\nunimaginative to-day, because deadened by the excitement of action.\nBut if it was his thought he hastened to deny it.\n\n\"You know I don't think of you in that way,\" he said.\n\n\"You will now. You do.\"\n\nThat was the scourge that had lashed her all through this weary day of\nmiserable reaction; that now stung her to a passion that was like the\npassion of purity. As she made this statement there was a question in\nher eyes, but it was a question of despair, that scarcely even asked for\nthe negative which Julian hastened to give. He was both perplexed and\ntroubled by the unexpected violence of her emotion, and blamed himself\nas the cause. But, though he blamed himself, his regret for what was\nirrevocable had none of the poignancy of Cuckoo's. For a long time he\nhad gloried in living in a cloister with Valentine. Now he had left the\ncloister, he did not look back to it with the curious pathos which so\noften gathers like moss upon even a dull and vacant past. He did not,\nfor the moment, look back at all. Action had lifted scales from his eyes,\nhad stirred the youth in him, had stung him as if with bright fire, and\ngiven him, at a breath, a thousand thoughts, visions, curiosities. A\nsense of power came to him. He did not ask whether the power made for\nevil or for good. Simply, he was inclined to glory in it, as a man\nglories in his recovered strength when he wakes from a long sleep\nfollowing fatigue. Cuckoo, with feeble hands, seemed tugging to hold back\nthis power, with feeble voice seemed crying against it as a deadly thing.\nAnd Julian, though he strove to console her, scarcely sympathized with\nher fully. He could not, if he would, be quite unhappy to-day. Only in\nCuckoo's grief he began to read a curious legend. In her tears there was\na passion, in her anger a vehemence that could only spring from the\ndepths of a nature. Julian began to suspect that through all her sins\nand degradations this girl, his lady of the feathers, had managed to\nkeep shut one door, though all the others had been ruthlessly opened.\nAnd beyond this door was surely that holy of holies, an unspoiled woman's\nheart. From what other dwelling could rush forth such a passion for a\nman's respect, such a fury to be rightly and chivalrously considered? As\nhe half vaguely realized something of the true position of Cuckoo and of\nhimself, Julian felt stirred by the wonder of life, in which such strange\nblossoms flower out of the very dust. He looked at Cuckoo with new eyes.\nShe looked back at him with the old ones of a girl who loves.\n\nAs he looked she stopped crying. Perhaps the sudden understanding in his\ngaze thrilled her. He put out his hand to touch hers, and again repeated\nhis negative, but this time with greater conviction.\n\n\"I do not think of you in that way. I never shall,\" he said.\n\nHer face was still full of doubt, and thin with anxiety. She was not\nreassured, that seemed apparent; for in her ignorance she had a strange\nknowledge of life, and especially a strange intuition which guided her\ninstincts as to the instinctive proceedings of men.\n\n\"They always do,\" she murmured. \"Why should you be different?\"\n\n\"All men aren't alike,\" he said, pretending to laugh at her.\n\n\"Yes, in some things, though,\" she contradicted. \"They all think dirt of\nyou for doing what they want.\"\n\nSeeing how unsatisfied she was, and how restlessly her anxiety paced up\nand down, Julian resolved on more plain-speaking.\n\n\"Look here, Cuckoo,\" he said, and his voice had never sounded more\nboyish, \"last night I was drunk. Last night I woke up, and I'd been\nasleep for years.\"\n\n\"Eh?\" she interrupted, looking puzzled, but he went on:\n\n\"I was emancipated, and I was mad. Mind, I didn't mean to do you any\nwrong, but if you have thought of me in a different way, I'm sorry.\nTell me what you want me to be to you, and in future I'll be it.\"\n\nHope and eagerness sprang up in her eyes then.\n\n\"I say,\" she began,\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"You promise?\"\n\n\"I promise.\"\n\nThe dull blood rose in her tired face.\n\n\"I want just a--just a friend,\" she said, as if almost ashamed.\n\nJulian smiled.\n\n\"Not a lover,\" he said, with a fleeting air of gallantry. She shrank\nvisibly from the word, and hurriedly went on:\n\n\"Not I. I've had too much of love.\" The last word was spoken with a\nviolence of contempt. \"I want a man as likes me, just really likes me,\nas he might another man. See?\"\n\n\"And you'll not love him?\"\n\nHis eyes searched hers with a gaiety of inquiry that was almost laughter.\nCuckoo looked away.\n\n\"I'll not love him either,\" she said steadily. \"I'll just like him too.\"\n\nSeeing her earnestness and obvious emotion, Julian dropped his gently\nquizzing manner, and became earnest, too, in his degree.\n\n\"Then it's a bargain,\" he said. \"You and I are to like each other\nthoroughly, never anything more, never anything less. Like two men, eh?\"\n\nShe began at last to look relieved and happier.\n\n\"Yes, like that,\" she said. \"Ain't it--ain't it truer than the other\nthing? There's something beastly about love; that's what I always think.\"\n\nAnd she spoke with the sincerest conviction. When Julian left her that\nday, he shook hands with her by the door; she stood after he had done it\nas if still half expectant.\n\n\"There's a man's good-bye to a man,\" he said. \"Better sort of thing than\na man's good-bye to a woman, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Rather!\" she said hastily, and moved back into the sitting-room.\nShe stepped on something, and bent down to pick it up. It was Marr's\nphotograph.\n\n\"What's that?\" Julian asked.\n\n\"Nothing,\" she said, concealing it. She had a foolish fancy that even\nthe photograph of the creature she had feared and hated might spoil that\ngood-bye of theirs. Yet even as it was, when Julian had gone she still\nseemed unsatisfied.\n\nShe was a woman after all, and woman is most feminine in her farewells.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nVALENTINE SINGS\n\n\nWhen Valentine heard of the scene in Marylebone Road he smiled.\n\n\"How extraordinary women are,\" he said. \"A man might give his life to\nthem, I suppose, yet never understand them.\"\n\n\"It would be rather jolly--making that gift, I mean,\" said Julian.\n\n\"You think so? Since last night.\"\n\n\"I want to talk to you about that, Valentine, d'you blame me?\"\n\n\"Not a bit.\"\n\n\"Only wonder at me?\"\n\n\"I don't even say that.\"\n\n\"No; but of course you must wonder at me.\"\n\nJulian spoke almost wistfully, and as if he wanted Valentine to sweep\naway the suggestion. Last night they had been comrades. To-day, in the\nlight and in the calm of afternoon, Valentine seemed much more remote,\nand Julian felt for the first time a sense of degradation. He was\nuneasily conscious that he might have fallen in Valentine's esteem. But\nValentine reassured him.\n\n\"I don't wonder at you, either, Julian; I simply envy you, and\nmetaphorically sit at your feet.\"\n\n\"That's absurd.\"\n\n\"Not quite; and I may not always be sitting there, for I believe I have\nreally got a little bit of your soul. Last night I seemed to feel it\nstirring within me, and I liked its personality.\"\n\n\"You did seem different last night,\" Julian said, looking at Valentine\nwith a keen interest. \"Can it be possible that those sittings of ours\nhave really had any effect?\"\n\n\"On me they have; not on you. You haven't caught my coldness, but I have\ngained something of your warmth. Doesn't that perhaps show that mine was,\nafter all, the wrong nature?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" Julian said doubtfully; \"you look the same.\"\n\n\"Do I? Exactly?\"\n\nValentine spoke with a sort of whimsical defiance, as if almost daring\nJulian to answer, Yes. And Julian, too, seemed suddenly doubtful whether\nhe had stated what was the fact. He looked closely at Valentine.\n\n\"Do you think your face has changed? Do you mean to say that?\" he asked.\n\n\"I only fancied there might be a little more humanity in it, that was\nall.\"\n\n\"Once or twice I have thought I noticed something,\" Julian said, still\ndoubtfully; \"but I believe it's imagination. It doesn't stay.\"\n\n\"When it does, I suppose I shall be able thoroughly to appreciate all\nyour temptations. Don't you begin to think now it's good to have them.\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" Julian said. But he was conscious that there had come\na change in his attitude of mind towards temptation. Some men glory in\nresisting temptation, others in yielding to it. Hitherto Julian had not\nbeen able to range himself in either of these two opposed camps. He had\nmerely hated his faculty for being tempted. Did he entirely hate it now?\nHe could not say so to himself, whatever he might say to others, but\nsomething kept him from making confession of the truth to Valentine. So\nhe professed ignorance of his own exact state of feeling; really, had he\nanalyzed his reticence, it sprang from a fine desire to give forth no\nbreath that might tarnish the clear mirror of Valentine's nature. He\nwould not admit a change that might make his friend again fall into the\nabsurd dissatisfaction which he had combated on the night of their first\nsitting in the tent-room. While they talked the afternoon had fallen into\na creeping twilight. In the twilight the front door bell rang.\n\n\"Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door,\" Valentine\nsaid, quoting Poe. \"It must be the doctor.\"\n\nJulian reddened suddenly.\n\n\"I hope not,\" he said.\n\n\"What?\" Valentine cried. \"You don't want our little doctor?\"\n\n\"Somehow not--to-day.\"\n\nThe door opened and Doctor Levillier entered. Valentine greeted him\nwarmly. They had not met since the night of the affray with the mastiffs.\nIn Julian's manner there was a touch of awkwardness as he shook hands\nwith the doctor. Levillier did not seem to notice it. He looked very\ntired and rather depressed.\n\n\"Cresswell,\" he said, \"I have come to you for a tonic.\"\n\n\"Doctor coming to patient!\"\n\n\"Doctors take medicine oftener than you may suppose. I'm in bad spirits\nto-day. I've been trying to cure too many people lately. It's hard work.\"\n\n\"It must be. Sit down and forget. Imagine the world beautifully incurable\nand your occupation consequently gone.\"\n\nThe doctor sat down, saying:\n\n\"My imagination stops short at that feat.\"\n\nHe kept silence for a moment, then he said:\n\n\"You know what I want.\"\n\n\"No,\" Valentine answered. \"But I'll do anything. You know that.\"\n\n\"I want your music.\"\n\nValentine suddenly became unresponsive. He didn't speak at first, and\nboth Julian and the doctor glanced at him in some surprise.\n\n\"Oh, you want me to be David to your Saul,\" he said at length.\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Do, Val,\" said Julian. \"I should like it too.\"\n\nValentine, who was sitting near the doctor, looked down thoughtfully on\nthe carpet.\n\n\"I'm not in the mood to-day,\" he said slowly.\n\n\"You are always in the mood enough to cheer and rest me,\" Levillier said.\n\nHe had driven all the way from Harley Street for his medicine, and it was\nobvious that he meant to have it. But Valentine still hesitated, and a\ncertain slight confusion became noticeable in his manner. Moving the toe\nof his right boot to and fro, following the pattern of the carpet, he\nglanced sideways at the doctor, and an odd smile curved his lips.\n\n\"Doctor,\" he said, \"d'you believe that talents can die in us while we\nourselves live?\"\n\n\"That's a strange question.\"\n\n\"It's waiting an answer.\"\n\n\"Well, my answer is, No; not wholly, unless through the approach of old\nage, or the development of madness.\"\n\n\"I'm neither old nor mad.\"\n\nLevillier and Julian both looked at Valentine with some amazement.\n\n\"Are you talking about yourself?\" the doctor asked.\n\n\"Certainly.\"\n\n\"Why? What talent is dead in you?\"\n\n\"My talent for music. Do you know that for the last few days I've been\nable neither to sing nor play?\"\n\n\"Val, you're joking,\" exclaimed Julian.\n\n\"I am certainly not,\" he answered, and quite gravely. \"I am simply\nstating a fact.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier seemed unable to appreciate that he was speaking\nseriously.\n\n\"I have come all this way to hear you sing,\" he said. \"I have never asked\nyou in vain yet.\"\n\n\"Is it my fault if you ask me in vain now?\"\n\nValentine looked him in the face and spoke with a complete sincerity.\nThe doctor returned the glance, as he sometimes returned the glance of\na patient, very directly, with a clear and simple gravity. Having done\nthis he felt completely puzzled.\n\n\"The talent for music has died in you?\" he asked.\n\n\"Entirely. I can do nothing with my piano. I have even locked it.\"\n\nAs he spoke he went over to it and pulled at the lid to show them that he\nwas speaking the truth.\n\n\"Where's the key?\" asked the doctor.\n\n\"Here,\" said Valentine, producing it from his pocket.\n\n\"Give it to me,\" said the doctor.\n\nValentine did so and the doctor quietly opened the piano, drew up the\nmusic-stool, and signed to Valentine to sit down.\n\n\"If you mean what you say, the explanation must simply be that you are\nsuffering from some form of hysteria,\" he said, rather authoritatively.\n\"Now sing me something. No; I won't let you off.\"\n\nValentine, sitting on the stool, extended his hands and laid the tips of\nhis long fingers upon the keys, but without sounding them.\n\n\"You insist on my trying to sing?\" he asked.\n\n\"I do.\"\n\n\"I warn you, doctor, you will be sorry if I do. My voice is quite out of\norder.\"\n\n\"No matter.\"\n\n\"Go on, Val,\" cried Julian, from his arm-chair. \"Anybody would think you\nwere a young lady.\"\n\nValentine bent his head, with a quick gesture of abnegation.\n\n\"As you will,\" he said.\n\nHe struck his hand down upon the keys as he spoke. That was the strangest\nprelude ever heard. In their different ways Doctor Levillier and Julian\nwere both intensely fond of music, both quickly stirred by it when it\nwas good, not merely classical, but extravagant, violent, and in any way\ninteresting. Each of them had heard Valentine play, not once only, but a\nhundred times. They knew not simply his large _r\u00e9pertoire_ of pieces and\nsongs through and through, but also the peculiar and characteristic\nprogressions of his improvisations, the ornaments he most delighted in,\nthe wildness of his melancholy, the phantasy of his gaieties; and they\nknew every tone of his voice, which expressed with an exquisite realism\nthe temperament of his soul. But now, as Valentine's hands powerfully\nstruck the keys, they both started and exchanged an involuntary glance of\nkeen surprise. The first few bars gave the lie to Valentine's assertion\nthat he could no longer play. A cataract of notes streamed from beneath\nhis fingers, and of notes so curiously combined, or following each other\nin such a fantastic array, that they seemed arranged in the musical\npattern by an intelligence of the strangest order. It is often easy for a\ncultivated ear to detect whether a given composition has sprung from the\nbrain of a Frenchman, a German, a Hungarian, a Russian. The wildness\nof Bohemia, too, may be identified, or the vague sorrow of that northern\nmelody which seems an echo of voices heard amid the fiords or in pale\nvalleys near the farthest cape of Europe. And then there is that large\nand lofty music of the stars and the spheres, of the mightiest passions\nand of the deepest imaginings, that is of no definite country, but seems\nto be of its own power and beauty, and not of the brain and heart of any\none man. It exists for eternity, and its creator can only wonder and\nworship before it, far from conceit as God was when He said, \"Let there\nbe light.\" Such music, too, is recognized on the instant by the men who\nhave loved and studied the secrets of the most divine of the arts, for\nprofound genius can utter itself as easily in five notes as in fifty.\nBut the prelude now played by Valentine was neither the great music that\nis of all time and of all countries, nor the music that is of any one\ncountry. It was not even distinctively northern or southern in character,\nimpregnated with the mystery of the tuneless, wonderful East, or with the\npeculiar homeliness that stirs Western hearts. Both the doctor and Julian\nfelt, as they listened, that it was music without an earthly home,\nwithout location, devoid of that sense of relation to humanity which\nlinks the greatness of the arts to the smallness of those who follow\nthem. Eccentric the music was, but the eccentricity of it seemed almost\ninhuman, so unmannerly as to be beyond the range of the most uncouth man,\nin advance of the invention of any mind, however coarse and criminal.\nThat was the atmosphere of this prelude, excessive, unutterable, crude,\nsombre vulgarity of a detached and remote kind. As Levillier listened to\nit amazed, he found that he did not instinctively connect the vulgarity\nwith any human traits, or translate the notes into acts within his\nexperience. He was simply conscious of being brought to the verge of some\nsphere in which the sordidness attained by our race would be sneered at\nas delicacy, in which our lowest grovellings of the pigsty would be as\nlofty flights through the skies. And the hideous eccentricity of the\nmusic, its wanton desolation, deepened until both Levillier and Julian\nwere pale under its spell, shrank from its ardent, its merciless and\nlambent sarcasm against all things refined or beautiful. The prelude was\nas fire and sword, as plague and famine, as plunder and war, as all\ninstruments that lay waste and that wound, a destroying angel before\nwhose breath the first-born withered and the very sun shrivelled into a\nheap of grey ashes.\n\nAs Doctor Levillier leaned forward, moved by an irresistible impulse, and\nstretched out his hand to enforce silence from this blare of deplorable\nmelody, Valentine looked up at him, into his eyes, and began to sing. The\ndoctor's movement was arrested, his hand dropped to his side, he remained\ntense, frigid, his eyes fastened on Valentine's like a man mesmerised. At\nfirst he knew that he was wondering whether his brain was playing him a\ntrick, whether his sense of hearing had, by some means, become impaired,\nso that he heard a voice, not dimly, as is the case with the partially\ndeaf, but wrongly, as may be the case with the mad, or with those who\nhave suffered under a blow or through an injury to the brain. For this\nvoice was not Valentine's at all, but the voice of a stranger, powerful,\nharsh, and malignant. It rang through the room noisily. A thick\nhoarseness dressed it as in disease, and at moments broke it and crushed\nit down. Then it would emerge as in a sigh or wail, pushing its way up\nwith all the mechanical power of the voice of a wild animal, and mounting\nto a desperate climax, sinister and alarming. So unlike ordinary singing\nwas the performance of this voice that, after the first paralysis of\nsurprise and disgust had passed away from the doctor and Julian, they\nboth felt the immediate necessity of putting a period to this deadly\nsong, to which no words gave the faintest touch of humanity. They knew\nthat it must attract and rivet the attention of others in the mansions,\neven possibly of passers-by in the street. The doctor withdrew his gaze\nfrom Valentine's at length, and turned hastily to Julian, whom he found\nregarding him with a glance almost of horror.\n\n\"Stop him,\" Julian murmured.\n\n\"You!\" answered Levillier.\n\nAnd then each knew that the other was in some nervous crisis that\nrendered action almost an impossibility. And while they thus hesitated\nthere came a loud, repeated, and unsteady knock at the door. Julian\nopened it. Valentine's man was standing outside, pale and anxious.\n\n\"Good God, sir,\" he ejaculated. \"What is it? What on earth is the\nmatter?\"\n\nThe man's exclamation broke through Julian's frost of inaction. He\nwhispered to Wade:\n\n\"It's all right,\" pushed him out and shut the door. Then he went straight\nup to the piano, seized Valentine's hands and dragged them from the\nkeyboard.\n\nThe silence was like a sweet blow.\n\n\"I said my voice was out of order,\" Valentine said, simply and with a\nsmile.\n\n\"You did not say you had another voice, the voice of--of a devil,\" Julian\nsaid, almost falteringly, for he was still shaken by his distress of the\nsenses, into a mental condition that was almost anger.\n\nDr. Levillier said nothing. More sensitive to musical sounds than Julian,\nhe dared not speak, lest he should say something that might stand like a\nfixed gulf to eternally separate him from Valentine. He knew the future\nthat stretches out like a spear beyond one word. So he sat quietly with\nhis eyes on the ground. His lips were set firmly together. Valentine\nturned to observe him.\n\n\"Doctor, you're not angry?\" he asked.\n\nThe doctor made no reply.\n\n\"You know I warned you,\" Valentine went on. \"You brought this thing on\nyourself.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Levillier.\n\nBut Julian interposed.\n\n\"No Valentine,\" he exclaimed. \"For, of course, it is all a trick of\nyours. You didn't want to sing. We made you. This is your revenge, eh?\nI didn't know you had it in you to be so--so beastly and cantankerous.\"\n\nValentine shook his head.\n\n\"It's no trick. It's simply as I said. My talent for music is dead. You\nhave been listening to the voice of its corpse.\"\n\nDr. Levillier looked up at length.\n\n\"You really mean that?\" he said, and there was an awakening within him of\nhis normal ready interest in all things.\n\n\"I mean it absolutely.\"\n\n\"That is the only event in which I can forgive the torture you have been\ninflicting upon me.\"\n\n\"That is the true event.\"\n\n\"But it's not possible,\" Julian said. \"It's not conceivable. Surely,\ndoctor, you would not say--\"\n\nThe doctor interrupted him.\n\n\"I cannot believe that Cresswell would deliberately commit an outrage\nupon me,\" he said. \"And it would be an outrage to sing like that to a\ntired man. Weeks of work would not fatigue me as I am fatigued by\nCresswell's music.\"\n\nJulian was silent and looked uneasy. Valentine repeated again:\n\n\"I couldn't help it. I am sorry.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier ignored the remark. His professional interest was\nbeginning to be aroused. For the first time he felt convinced that some\nvery peculiar and bizarre change was dawning over the youth he knew so\nwell. He wanted to watch it grow or fade, to analyze it, to study it, to\nbe aware of its exact nature. But he did not want to put either Valentine\nor Julian upon the alert. So he spoke lightly as he said:\n\n\"But I shall soon get the better of my fatigue, even without the usual\nmedicine. Cresswell, take my advice, give your music a rest. Lock your\npiano again for a while. It will be better.\"\n\nValentine shut down the lid on the instant, and turned the little key in\nthe lock.\n\n\"Adieu to my companion of many lonely hours!\" he said with a half\nwhimsical pensiveness. Then, as if in joke, he held out his hand with the\nkey in it, to the doctor.\n\n\"Will you take charge of this hostage?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" the doctor replied.\n\nQuite gravely he took the key and put it into his pocket.\n\nAnd so it was that silence fell round the Saint of Victoria Street.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE FLIGHT OF THE BATS\n\n\nJulian had resolved to keep his compact with the lady of the feathers. He\nhad learned partially to understand the curious and beautiful attitude\nwhich her mind had assumed towards him, polluted as it must be by the\nterror and working out of her fate, by many dreary actions, and by many\nvile imaginings. But although he held to his promise he did not, after\nthat night of crisis, resume his former career of asceticism tempered by\nwinds of temptation which could never blow his casement open. There are\nmen who can vary the fine monotony of virtue by an occasional deliberate\nerror, and who return from such an excursion into dangerous by-paths\ndrilled and comforted, as it appears, for further journeying along the\nmain road of their respectability. But Julian was not such a man. He\nresembled rather the morphia victim, or the inebriate, who must at\nall hazards abstain from any indulgence, even the smallest, in drug\nor draught, lest the demon who has such charm for him clasp him in\nimperturbable arms, and refuse with the steadfastness of a once-tricked\nVenus ever to let him go again.\n\nValentine's empire of five years was broken in one night.\n\nAt first Julian was scarcely conscious that his descent was not\nmomentary, but rather tending to the permanent. Certainly, at the first,\nhe was inclined to have the schoolboy outlook upon it, and the schoolboy\noutlook is as a glance through the wrong end of a telescope, dwindling\ngiant sins to the stature of pigmies, and pigmy sins to mere points of\ndarkness which equal nothingness. But, strangely enough, it was his\ninterview with the weeping Cuckoo, that Magdalen of the streets, which\ndrove the schoolboy to limbo, and set virtue and vice for the moment\nrightly on the throne and in the gutter. Despite his comparatively dull\nmood and tendency to a calm of self-satisfaction in the Marylebone Road,\nJulian could not be wholly unmoved by the passion of Cuckoo's regret, nor\nentirely unaware that it was a passion in which he must have some share,\nwhether now or at some more distant time, when the thrall of recently\nmoved senses was weakened, and the numbness really born of excitement\nmelted in the quiet expansion of a manly and a reasonable calm. His\nunderstanding of her passion, none too definite at first, gave him a\nmoment's wonder, both at her and at himself. It seemed strange that the\nshattered influence of Valentine should be of less account to him who had\nknown and loved it than to her who had never known it. It seemed stranger\nstill that the streets--those wolves which tear one by one the rags of\ngood from human nature, till it stands naked and tearless beneath the\nlamps, which are the eyes of the wolves--stranger that those streets\nshould have left to one of their children a veil so bridal and so\nbeautiful as that which hung round Cuckoo when she wept. Julian was\nalmost driven to believe that sin and purity can dwell together in one\nwoman, yet never have intercourse. Yet he knew that to be impossible. The\nfact remained that the tarnished Cuckoo, in the first moments of regret,\nwas more conscious of his sin for him than he was conscious of it for\nhimself; that she led him, with her dingy hands, to such repentance as he\nexperienced, and that she, too, guarded him against repetition of the\nsin, so far as she was concerned. Julian considered these circumstances;\nand there was a time when they were not without effect upon him, and\nwhen, with the assistance of a word from Valentine, they might have\nworked upon him an easy salvation. But Valentine did not speak that word.\nHis peculiar purity had saved Julian in the past by its mere existence.\nIts presence was enough. That _satis_ was dead now. Julian did not ask\nwhy. Nor did he find himself troubled by its decease. There is nothing\nlike action for making man unobservant. Julian was no longer a ship in\ndock, nor even a ship riding at anchor. The anchor was up, the sails were\nset, the water ran back from the vessel's prow.\n\nCuckoo was not conscious of this. Sometimes she was subtle by intuition;\noften she was not subtle at all. When she understood Julian's nature for\nthe moment, it was because his nature was, for the moment, in close\nrelation to hers. Her fate was affected by it, or its passages of arms\nclashed near her heart. Then intuition, woman's guardian, had eyes and\nears, saw and heard with a distinctness that was nearly brilliant. But\nwhen Julian's nature wandered, and the wanderings did not bring it where\nhers was dwelling, her observation slept soundly enough. So she was not\nconscious at first of Julian's gentle progress in a new direction.\nWhether Valentine was conscious of it did not immediately appear, for\nJulian said nothing. For five years he had not had a secret from\nValentine. Now he had to have one. He ranked Valentine with Doctor\nLevillier as too good to be told of the evil thing. When he had had\ntemptations and resisted them he had told Valentine of them frankly. Now\nhe had temptations, and was beginning not to resist them; he kept silence\nabout them. This silence lasted for a little while, and then Valentine\nswept it away, involuntarily it seemed, and by means of action, not of\nwords.\n\nOne day Julian met a man at his club, a lively, devil-may-care soldier of\nfortune in the world. The man came to where he was sitting and said:\n\n\"So, Addison, your god has fallen from his pedestal. He's only a Dagon\nafter all.\"\n\nJulian looked at him ignorantly.\n\n\"What god?\" he asked.\n\n\"Your saint has tumbled from his perch. I never believed in him.\"\n\nHe was of the species that never believes in anything except vice and the\n_Sporting Times_.\n\nJulian rejoined:\n\n\"I don't understand you.\"\n\n\"Cresswell,\" said the man.\n\nJulian began to wonder what was coming, and silently got ready for the\ndefence, as he always did instinctively when Valentine was the subject of\nattack.\n\n\"What have you got to say about Cresswell?\" he asked curtly.\n\n\"My dear chap, now don't you get your frills out. Nothing that I should\nmind being said about me, I assure you. Only Cresswell will soon lose his\nnickname if he goes on as he's going now.\"\n\n\"I'm in the dark.\"\n\n\"That's what he likes being, if what they say is true. Quite a\nnight-bird, I'm told.\"\n\n\"You'd better be more explicit.\"\n\nBut the man glanced at Julian's face and seemed to think better of it. He\nmoved off muttering:\n\n\"Damned rot, minding a little chaff. And when we're all in the same boat\ntoo.\"\n\nJulian sat pondering over his veiled remarks. They surprised him, but at\nfirst he was inclined to consider them as meaningless and unfounded as so\nmuch of the gossip of the clubs. Men like Valentine must always be a\ntarget for the arrows of the cynical. Julian had heard his sanctity\nlaughed at in billiard-rooms and in bars many times, and had simply felt\nan easy contempt for the laughers, who could not understand that any\nnature could be finer than their own. But to-day his own faint change of\nlife--as yet in its gentle beginnings--led him presently to wonder,\nliterally for the first time, whether there was a side of Valentine's\nlife that was not merely a side of feeling, but of action, and that he\nknew nothing of. If it were so, Julian felt an inward conviction that the\nvery nearest weeks of the past had seen its birth. He remembered once\nmore Valentine's idle remark about his weariness of goodness, and\nwondered whether--in violation of his nature, in violent revolt against\nhis own nobility--he was living at last that commonplace, theatrical\npuppet-play of the world, a double life.\n\nValentine a night-bird! What did that mean?\n\nAnd then Julian thought of the great wheeling army of the bats, whose\nevolutions every night of creation witnesses. In the day they do not\nsleep, but they are hidden. Their wings are folded so closely as to be\ninvisible. Nobody could tell that they ever flew through shadowy places,\nseeking that which never satiates, although it may transform, the\nappetite. Nobody could tell how the twilight affects them when it comes;\nhow, in their obscurity, they have to keep a guard lest the involuntary\nfluttering of a half-spread pinion betray them. And then when the\ntwilight, the blessed one of the twin twilights, one in course towards\nday, one in course towards night, has deepened and has died, they can\ndare to be themselves, to spread their short wings, and to flutter on\ntheir vagrant and monotonous courses. It is a great though secret\narmy--the army of the bats. It scours through cities. No weather will\nkeep it quite restful in camp. No darkness will blind it into immobility.\nThe mainspring of sin beats in it as drums beat in a Soudanese fantasia,\nas blood beats in a heart. The air of night is black with the movement of\nthe bats. They fly so thickly round some lives that those lives can never\nsee the sky, never catch a glimpse of the stars, never hear the wings of\nthe angels, but always and ever the wings of the bats. Nor can such lives\nhear the whisper of Nature and of the sirens who walk purely with Nature.\nThe murmur of the bats drowns all other sounds, and makes a hoarse and\nmonotonous music. And the eyes of the bats are hungry, and the breath of\nthe bats is poisonous, and the flight of the bats is a charade of the\ntragedy of the flight of the devils in hell.\n\nHow could Valentine be one of the bats? It seemed to Julian that if\nValentine tried to join them they would fall upon him, as certain birds\nwill fall upon one who is not of their tribe, and kill him. And yet?\n\nYet Julian began to know that he had been aware of a change in Valentine.\nHe had believed it to be momentary. Perhaps it was not momentary. Perhaps\nValentine was concealing his new mode of life from some strange idea of\nchivalry towards Julian. As Julian pondered he grew excited. He began to\nlong to tell Valentine now what he had not liked to tell him before.\nSuddenly he got up and hastened out of the club. He drove to Victoria\nStreet. But Valentine was not at home.\n\n\"I suppose Mr. Cresswell goes out every night Wade?\" he asked the man,\nafter a moment of hesitation.\n\nWade looked very much astonished at such a question coming from Julian.\n\n\"Yes, sir. At least, most nights,\" Wade answered.\n\n\"I see,\" Julian said.\n\nHe stood a minute longer. Then he turned away, after an abrupt:\n\n\"Say I called, will you?\"\n\nWade looked after him as he went down the stairs, with the raised\neyebrows of the confidential butler.\n\nThat night was warm and gentle, with a full moon riding in clear heavens.\nThe season was growing towards its full height, and the streets were\nthronged with carriages till a late hour. There is one long pavement that\nis generally trodden by many feet at every time of the year, and in\nalmost every hour of the wheeling twenty-four. It is the pavement on\nwhich the legend of London's disgrace is written in bold characters of\ndefiance. Men from distant lands, having made the pilgrimage to our\nMecca, the queen, by right of magnitude at least, of the world's cities,\nstare aghast upon the legend, almost as Belshazzar stared upon the\nwriting on the wall. Colonists seeking for the first time the comfortable\nembrace of that mother country which has been the fable of their\nchildhood and the dream of their laborious years of maturity, gaze with\nwithering hearts at this cancer in her bosom. Pure women turn their eyes\nfrom it. Children seek it that they may learn in one sharp moment the\nknowledge of good and evil. The music of the feet on that pavement has\ncalled women to despair and men to destruction; has sung in the ears of\ninnocence till they grew deaf to virtue, and murmured round the heart of\nlove till it became the heart of lust. And that pavement is the\ncamping-ground of the army of the bats. On wet nights they flit drearily\nthrough the rain. In winter they glide like shadows among the revealing\nsnows. But in the time of flowers and of soft airs, when the moon at the\nfull swims calmly above the towers of Westminster, and the Thames rests\nrocked in a silver dream among the ebony wharves and barges, the\nflight of the bats is gay and their number is legion. And their circle is\njoined by many who are but recruits, or as camp-followers, treading in\nthe track of those whose names are on the roll-call.\n\nThe lady of the feathers rarely failed to join the evening flight of the\nbats. Her acquaintance with Julian, even her curious passion for his\nrespect and distant treatment, had not won her to different evenings, or\nto a new mode of life. But her feeling for Julian led her to ignore now\nthe fact of this fate of hers. She chose to set him aside from it, to\nkeep him for a friend, as an innocent peasant-girl might keep some\nrecluse wandering after peace into her solitude. Julian was to be the\none man who looked on her with quiet, habitual eyes, who touched her\nwith calm, gentle hand, who spoke to her with the voice of friendship,\ndemanding nothing, and thought of her with a feeling that was neither\ngreed nor contempt. And that one fatal night in which Cuckoo's private\nand secluded heart was so bitterly wounded she put out of her\nrecollection with a strength of determination soldier-like and almost\nfierce. It lay in the past, but she did not treat the past as a woman\ntreats a drawer full of old, used things, opening it in quiet moments\nand turning over its contents with a lingering and a loving hand. She\nshut it, locked it almost angrily, and never, never looked into it.\nJulian was to be her friend of leisure, never associated in any way with\nher tragic hours. All other men were the same, stamped with a similar\nhall-mark. He only was unstamped and was beautiful.\n\nOn this evening of summer, Cuckoo, as usual, joined the flight of the\nbats with a tired wing. The heat tried her. Her cheeks were white as\nivory under their cloud of rouge. Her mouth was more plaintive even than\nusual, and her heart felt dull and heavy. As she got out of the omnibus\nat the Circus one of her ankles turned, and she gave an awkward jump that\nset all the feathers on her hat in commotion, and made the newspaper boys\nlaugh at her scornfully. They knew her by sight, and joked her every\nevening when she arrived. At first--that was a long while ago--she had\nresented their remarks, still more their shrewd unboyish questions, and\nhad answered them with angry bitterness. But--well, that was a long while\nago. Now she simply recovered her footing, paused a moment on the\nkerbstone to arrange her dress, and then drifted away into the crowd\nslowly, without even glancing at her nightly critics, who were aware of\na new bow on her gown, recognized with imperturbable _sang-froid_ the\nchange in a trimming or the alteration of a waist-belt.\n\nSlowly she walked along. Piccadilly bats fly slowly. The moon went up.\nShe had not met her fate. In the throng she saw Valentine pass. He looked\nat her with a smile. She turned her eyes hastily away. She had met him on\nseveral evenings of late, but had never told Julian so, for she began to\nunderstand now his reverence for Valentine, and a new-born, ladylike\ninstinct taught her not to hurt that reverence. Valentine disappeared.\nHe had not tried to speak with her. Once, on encountering her, he had\npaused, but Cuckoo glided behind two large Frenchwomen and escaped with\nthe adroitness of a snake in the grass. Apparently he recognized her\nmovement as one of retreat, and was resolved to leave her alone, for he\nhad never followed her since that day, although he always lifted his hat\nwhen he saw her. The crowd grew thicker. It was very heterogeneous, but\nCuckoo did not thread it with the attention of a psychologist, or examine\nit with the pains of a philosopher of the dark hours. She stared\nlistlessly at the faces of the men, and if they stared back at her,\nsmiled mechanically with a thin and stereotyped coquetry, moving on\nvacantly the while in a sort of dream, such as a tired journalist may\nfall into as he drives his pen over the paper, leaving a train of\nfamiliar words and phrases behind it. There are many dreamers like Cuckoo\non the thin riband of that pavement, moving in a maze created by\neverlasting custom, beneath their flowers, half senseless to life, and\nyet alive to the least human notice, behind the stretched barriers of\ntheir veils. She walked from the Circus to Hyde Park corner and back\nagain; then turned, with an ever-growing lassitude, to repeat the\ndesolate experience. By this time the playhouses had vomited their\npatrons into the night, and locomotion was becoming more difficult.\nSometimes there was a block, and Cuckoo found herself \"hung up,\" as she\ncalled it, squashed in a mass of people, all intent on some scheme of\ntheir own, and resentful of the enforced interruption to their movement.\nThen, by some unknown and mysterious means, the human knot was untied,\nand all the atoms murmured on again through the ocean of the town. And\nstill Cuckoo was alone, and still the mechanical smile came and went upon\nher lips, and her feet seemed to grow heavier and heavier, till they were\nas cannon-balls to be lifted and dragged by her protesting muscles. And\nstill her senses seem to become more and more drugged by the familiarity\nof it all, the familiarity of smile, of tired limbs, of incessant slow\nmotion, of staring faces and watchful eyes; the familiarity of the cabs\nrolling home towards Knightsbridge and farther Kensington, with a dull,\nharsh noise; the familiarity of personal, intense loneliness and longing\nfor quiet; the familiarity of the knowledge that quiet could only be\nearned by failure, and that failure meant lack of food, debt, and deeper\ndegradation.\n\nAt last--perhaps it was owing to the unusual heat of the night--Cuckoo\nbecame so over-fatigued that she was scarcely conscious what she was\ndoing. Her smile was utterly devoid of meaning, and had she been suddenly\nasked, she could not have told whether she was at the Regent Street\nend of Piccadilly, at Hyde Park Corner, or midway between the two.\nOnce more there was a block. The people were pressed, or surged of\ntheir own will, together, and Cuckoo found herself leaning against\nsome stranger. This sudden support gave to her an equally sudden\nknowledge of the extent to which she was fatigued, and when the block\nceased and the stranger--unconscious that he was being used as a species\nof pillow--moved away, Cuckoo almost fell to the ground. Stretching\nout her hands to save herself, she caught hold of a man's arm, and as\nshe did so her eyes moved to his face. It was Julian, and, before her\ngrasp had time to fix all his attention on her, Cuckoo saw why he was in\nPiccadilly. In an instant all her lassitude was gone; all the fatigue, so\npassionless and complete, vanished. An extraordinary warmth, that of\nfire, not of summer, swept into her heart. She stood still and trembled,\nas if from the accession of the abrupt strength that flows from an energy\npurely nervous.\n\n\"Hulloh, Cuckoo!\" Julian said.\n\nShe nodded at him. He looked down at her, not quite knowing what to say,\nfor he knew, by this time, that she objected to any hint from him on the\nsubject of her proceedings of the night. That was ignored between them,\nand when they met the situation was that of a lodger in the Marylebone\nRoad holding friendly intercourse with a dweller in Mayfair, nothing more\nand nothing less.\n\n\"Taking a stroll?\" Julian said at last. \"Isn't it a lovely night?\"\n\n\"Yes. I say, I'm tired,\" she answered.\n\n\"Shall I take you somewhere?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes, do,\" she said.\n\nThey moved towards the Circus.\n\n\"Where shall we go?\" Julian said. \"Have you any pet place?\"\n\n\"I don't know--oh, the Monico,\" she replied.\n\nThe restaurant was right in front of them. They dodged across to the\nisland, thence to the opposite pavement, and passed in silently. The\nouter hall was thronged with people. So was the long inner room, and\nfor a moment they stood in the doorway looking for a table. At length\nJulian caught sight of an empty one far down under the clock at the end.\nThey made their way to it and sat down.\n\n\"What will you have?\" Julian asked Cuckoo.\n\nShe considered, sinking back on the plush settee.\n\n\"A glass of stout, I think, and--\"\n\n\"And a bun,\" he interposed, smiling in recollection of their first\ninterview.\n\nBut Cuckoo did not smile or seem to recognize the allusion.\n\n\"Please, I'll have a sandwich,\" she said.\n\nJulian ordered it, the stout, a cup of coffee and a liqueur brandy for\nhimself. While the waiter was getting the things he noticed Cuckoo's\nextreme and active gravity, a gravity which seemed oddly to give her\nquite a formidable appearance under her feathers. Despite the obvious\nweariness written on her face, there was somehow a look of energy about\nher, the aspect of a person full of intention and purpose.\n\n\"Why, Cuckoo,\" he said, \"you look like a young judge about to deliver a\nsentence on somebody.\"\n\nAnd indeed that was just how her expression and pose behind the\nmarble-topped table affected him. Just then the waiter brought the\nstout and the other things. Cuckoo removed her cheap kid gloves, took\nthe tumbler in her thin fingers and sipped at it. After a sip or two\nshe put the glass down, and said to Julian:\n\n\"I say.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"What are you about to-night?\"\n\nThe question came from her painted lips very sternly. It seemed\naddressed by one who had a right to condemn, and who was going to\nexercise that right. Julian was astonished by her tone, and had an\ninstant's inclination to resent it. But then he thought that there was\nnothing in the words themselves, and that the odd manner probably sprang\nsimply from fatigue or some other womanish, undivined cause. So he\nanswered:\n\n\"Just taking a stroll. It's so fine,\" and began to drink his coffee.\n\nBut Cuckoo quickly showed that her manner meant all that it had seemed to\nsay.\n\n\"That ain't it,\" she said, with emphatic excitement, though she spoke in\na low voice because of the people all round them. \"You know it ain't.\"\n\nJulian was just lighting a cigarette. The match was flaming in his hand.\nHe let it go out as he looked at her.\n\n\"What do you mean?\" he asked. \"What's the matter?\"\n\n\"What are you doin'?\" she retorted. \"That's what I want to know. Not as I\nneed to ask, though,\" she added, bitterly.\n\nJulian was distinctly taken aback by the emotion in her manner, and the\npassion that she tried to keep quiet in her voice. He flushed rather red,\na boyish trick which he could never quite get over.\n\n\"I don't know what you're talking about,\" he said, lighting another\nmatch, and this time making it do its office on his cigarette.\n\nCuckoo tossed her head in a way that was not wholly free from vulgarity,\nbut that was certainly wholly unconscious and expressive of real feeling.\n\n\"Oh yes, you do,\" she rejoined. Then after a moment's silence, she added,\nwith bitter emphasis, and a movement of her hand in the direction of the\ndoor:\n\n\"You out in that crowd, and doing the same as all of them?\"\n\nAs she said the words tears started under her blackened eyelashes.\nIf Julian had been taken aback before she spoke the last sentence, he\nwas ten times more astonished now. The whole situation struck him as\nunexampled, and but for something so passionate in the girl's manner\nthat it overrode the natural feeling of the moment, his sense of humour\nmust have moved him to a smile. It was strange indeed to sit at midnight\nunder the electric moons of the Monico, and to be passionately condemned\nfor dissipation by a girl with a painted face, dyed hair, and that\nterribly unmistakable imprint of the streets. But Julian could not smile.\nSomething in Cuckoo's demeanour, something so vehement and so unconscious\nas to be not far from dignity, impressed him and took him well beyond the\ngates of laughter.\n\n\"Why--but you were out in the crowd too,\" he said.\n\n\"I!\" she said sharply, and with a touch of scathing contempt for\nherself, yet impatient, too, of any introduction of her entity into the\ndiscussion; \"of course I've got to be there. What's that to do with it?\"\n\n\"Really, Cuckoo,\" Julian began, but she interrupted him.\n\n\"I ain't you,\" she said.\n\n\"No, of course, but--\"\n\n\"I'm different. It's nothing to me where I go of a night, or what I do.\nBut you ain't got to be there. You needn't go, need you?\"\n\n\"Nobody need,\" he said. \"But--\"\n\n\"Then what d'you do it for?\" she reiterated, still in the same tone of\none sitting on high in condemnation, and moved by her own utterance to an\nincreasing excitement. This time she paused for a reply, and set her\nrouged lips together with the obvious intention of not speaking until\nJulian had plainly put forward his defence. Strange to say, her manner\nhad impressed him with a ridiculous feeling that defence of some kind was\nactually necessary. It was a case of one denizen of the dock putting on\nthe black cap to sentence another. Julian glanced at Cuckoo before he\nmade any reply to her last question. If he had had any intention of not\nanswering it at all, of calmly disposing, in a word or two, of her right\nto interrogate him on his proceedings, her fixed and passionate eyes\nkilled it instantly. He moved his coffee-cup round uneasily in the\nsaucer.\n\n\"Men do many things they needn't do, as well as women,\" he began. \"I must\nhave my amusements. Why not?\"\n\nAt the word \"amusements\" she drew in her breath with a little hiss of\ncontempt. Julian flushed again.\n\n\"You're the last person,\" he began, and then caught himself up short. It\nmust be confessed that she was very aggravating, and that the position\nshe took up was wholly untenable. Having checked himself, he said\nmore calmly:\n\n\"What's the good of talking about it? I live as other men do, naturally.\"\n\n\"Are you a beast too, then?\" she asked.\n\nShe still kept her voice low, and the sentence came with all the more\neffect on this account.\n\n\"I don't see that,\" Julian exclaimed, evidently stung. \"Women are always\nready to say that about men.\"\n\nCuckoo broke into a laugh. She picked up her glass, and drank all that\nwas in it. Putting it down empty, she laughed again, with her eyes on\nJulian. That sound of mirth chilled him utterly.\n\n\"Why d'you laugh?\" he said.\n\n\"I don't know--thinkin' that you're to be like all the rest, I suppose,\"\nshe answered. \"Like all them brutes out there, and him too.\"\n\n\"Him,\" said Julian. \"Whom are you speaking of?\"\n\nShe had not meant to say those last words, and tried to get out of an\nanswer by asking for something more to drink.\n\n\"Chartreuse,\" she said, with the oddest imaginable accent.\n\nJulian ordered it hastily, and then immediately repeated his question.\n\n\"Never mind,\" Cuckoo replied. \"It don't matter.\"\n\nBut he was not to be denied.\n\n\"D'you mean Valentine?\" he asked.\n\nShe nodded her head slowly. Although Julian had half suspected that\nValentine might be there this confirmation of his suspicion gave him a\ndecided shock.\n\n\"Oh, he was just walking home from some party,\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"P'raps.\"\n\n\"I'm certain of it.\"\n\n\"He don't matter,\" she said with a hard accent.\n\nShe drank the chartreuse very slowly, and seemed to be reflecting, and\na change came over her face. It softened as much as a painted face can\nsoften under dyed hair.\n\n\"Dearie,\" she said, \"it makes me sick to see you like the rest.\"\n\n\"I never pretended to be anything different.\"\n\n\"But you was different,\" she asserted. \"I know you was different.\"\n\nHow could she have divined the change in Julian that one night of the\nEmpire had wrought?\n\n\"I say,\" she went on, and her voice was trembling with eagerness, \"you've\ngot to tell me somethin'.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"That night I--I--it wasn't me made you different, was it?\"\n\nAnd as she spoke Julian knew that it was she. Perhaps a fleeting\nexpression in his face--telling naked truth as expressions may, though\nwords belie them--made her understand, for her cheeks turned grey beneath\nthe paint on them.\n\n\"I wish I'd killed myself long ago,\" she said in a whisper.\n\n\"Hush!\" he exclaimed, cursing his tell-tale features. \"I'm not different;\nand if I was you could have nothing to do with it.\"\n\nShe said no more, but he saw by her brooding expression that she clung to\nher intuition, and knew what he denied.\n\nThe hands of the clock fixed on the wall above their heads pointed to the\nhalf-hour after midnight. The pale and weary waiters were racing to and\nfro clearing the tables, dodging this way and that with trays, stealing\nalong with arms full of long-stemmed, thick tumblers, eager for rest. The\nelectric moons gave a sudden portentous wink.\n\n\"Time!\" a voice cried.\n\nPeople began to get up and move out, exchanging loud good-nights. The\nlong room slowly assumed an aspect of desertion and greedy desolation.\n\n\"We must go,\" Julian said.\n\nCuckoo woke out of that reverie, which seemed so chilly, so terrible\neven. She glanced at Julian, and her eyes were again full of tears. He\nwas standing, and he bent down to her with his two hands resting upon the\nmarble of the table. He bent down and then suddenly stooped lower, lower,\nalmost glaring into her eyes. She went back in her seat a little, half\nfrightened.\n\n\"What's it?\" she murmured.\n\nBut Julian only remained fixedly looking into her eyes. In the pool of\nthe tears of them he saw two tiny shadowy flames, flickering, as he\nthought, but quite clear, distinct, unmistakable. And there came a thick\nbeating in his side. His heart beat hard. Each time he had seen the\nvision of the flame he had been instantly impressed with a sense of\nstrange mystery, as if at the vision of some holy thing, a flame upon a\nprayer-blessed altar, a flame ascending from a tear-washed sacrifice.\nAnd now he saw this thing that he fancied holy burning behind the tears\nin Cuckoo's eyes!\n\nCuckoo got up.\n\n\"Come on,\" she said, abruptly.\n\nJulian followed her out of the caf\u00e9.\n\nThe dream of the moon was with them as they came to the entrance, clear\nas a quiet soul, directly above them in a clear sky. Julian looked up at\nit, but Cuckoo looked, with eyes that were almost sullen, at the night\npanorama of the Circus. They waited a moment on the step. Julian was\nlighting a cigar, and many other voluble men, most of them French or\nItalian, were doing likewise. Having lighted it, and given a strong puff\nor two, Julian said to Cuckoo:\n\n\"Shall I drive you home?\"\n\n\"I ain't going home yet,\" she replied doggedly. \"Are you?\"\n\nHe hesitated.\n\n\"Are you, or aren't you?\" she reiterated.\n\nWhile she spoke, in her voice that was often a little hoarse, a young\nvoice with a thread in it, he realized that somehow she--painted sinner\nas she was--had managed to make him ashamed of himself. Or was it that an\nawe had come to his soul with that strange flame? In any case his mood\nhad risen from the old night mood of a young man to something higher,\nsomething that could not be satisfied in the sordid way of the world.\n\n\"I think I shall go home,\" he said.\n\n\"Right,\" she answered, and for the first time there was an accent of\npleasure in her voice.\n\n\"But I'll walk a little way with you first,\" he added.\n\nTogether they crossed the Circus and mingled with the humming mob at the\ncorner of Regent Street. They pushed their way towards Piccadilly with\ndifficulty, for numbers of people at this hour do not attempt to walk,\nbut stand stock still, despite the cry of the policeman, staring at the\npassers-by, or talking and laughing with the women who throng the\npavement. Having elbowed their way along as far as the St. James\nrestaurant, they began to move with a little more ease, and could have\ntalked as they went, but apparently neither of them felt conversational.\nJulian was comparing the vision of the moon with the vision of the\nstreet, a comparison no doubt often made even by young men in London on\nstill nights of summer, suggestive to most people, perhaps, of much\nthe same thoughts--yet a comparison to thrill, as all the wild and\neternal contrasts of life thrill. And Julian was thinking, too, rather\nsombrely of himself. Cuckoo walked on beside him, looking straight before\nher. Quite unconsciously, with the unconsciousness of a mechanical toy,\nexpressive at the turning of a key in its interior, she had assumed her\nthin, invariable, professional smile. It came to her face in a flash when\nthe pavement of Piccadilly came to her feet. She did not know it was\nthere.\n\nThe moon looked down on it, yet, if Julian had been able to see, perhaps\nthe little flame still flickered in those eyes which had been full of\ntears. But a little beyond St. James's Hall their silent progress was\narrested, for they both saw Valentine pass them swiftly in the crowd.\nHe saw them, too, but did not attempt to speak to them. With a smile at\nJulian he walked on. Julian gazed after him, then turned to Cuckoo.\n\n\"And you saw him here to-night before I met you?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"How long ago?\"\n\n\"Two hours, I dare say.\"\n\nAfter that Julian ceased to think of the vision of the moon. But\npresently he noticed that Cuckoo was walking more slowly.\n\n\"You're tired?\" he said.\n\nShe nodded.\n\n\"Have you been out all the evening?\"\n\nShe nodded again.\n\n\"Take a cab and go home. I'll pay the man.\"\n\n\"No; I can't go yet.\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"I can't,\" she repeated, and a mulish look of obstinacy came into her\nface.\n\nJulian guessed the miserable reason.\n\n\"Let me--\" he began, and in a moment his hand would have been in his\npocket. She stopped him.\n\n\"I told you as I never would, not from you,\" she said. \"And I wouldn't,\nall the more since--since that night.\"\n\nThen, after an instant, she added:\n\n\"But you'd better leave me to myself now.\"\n\nAnd then Julian realized that his presence and company were ruining her\nchance. That thought turned him sick and dull.\n\n\"I can't,\" he began almost desperately.\n\nShe gave with her hand a little twitch at his.\n\n\"I say,\" she whispered, and she spoke to him as if to Jessie in the tiny\nflannel-lined basket, \"Go bials! will you?\"\n\n\"But you?\" he said, and there was something that was half a sob in his\nvoice.\n\n\"I can't. But you--go bials.\"\n\nAnd then, to please her, he held up his hand and hailed a hansom. Getting\nin he gave the direction of his rooms, loud enough for her to hear. She\nstood at the edge of the pavement and nodded at him as she heard it.\n\nThen she turned away, and Julian saw the feathers in her big hat waving,\nas she joined once more the flight of the bats.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE FLAME IN A WOMAN'S EYES\n\n\n\"That girl loves you,\" Valentine had said, when Julian told him of\nCuckoo's strange fragmentary sermon in the Monico, and of its effect upon\nhimself.\n\nValentine spoke without any emotion or sympathy, and the absence of\nfeeling from his voice seemed almost to bring a certain slight vexation\ninto his manner. The love of Cuckoo, perhaps naturally, was to his fine\nnature a thing of no account, or even of ill account. At least, his look\nand manner faintly said so to Julian.\n\n\"But if she loves me,\" Julian said, and a certain wonder came into his\nheart at the thought, \"surely she wouldn't behave to me as she does,\nturning me from a lover into a friend, and keeping me almost angrily in\nthe latter relation.\"\n\n\"Perhaps not,\" Valentine said languidly.\n\nNo doubt he understood what Julian did not entirely understand, the\nsubtleties of such a nature as Cuckoo's, a nature hammered out thin by\ncruel circumstance, drilled till it found the unspeakable ordinary and\nthe loathsome inevitable, worn as a stone by dropping water till the\nwater, ceasing to fall, must have left a loneliness of surprise. Julian\ndid not fully realize that Cuckoo's life might well lead her to display\nreal affection, if she possessed it, by ways the reverse of those\nnaturally sought and gloried in by pure and protected women. To give is\nthe act natural to the love of such women. It is at least their impulse,\nalthough restrained within strict limits, perhaps, by exigencies of\nconscience or of religion. But to give is the impulse, giving being the\nunusual act, the strange new act in them. Cuckoo's profession being an\nordered routine of giving, how could she show her love better than by\nwithholding? To be to Julian as she was to all men could prove nothing,\neither to him or to herself. To be to him as she was not to any other man\nwhom she knew must mean something, argue something. So, at least, dimly\nand without mental self-consciousness, her mind reasoned rather\ninstinctively, for the lady of the feathers was, above all things,\ninstinctive. Instead of logic, ethics, morals, the equipment of sage,\nphilosopher, good women, she had instinct only. Instinct told her the\nsecret meaning of reticence in her relations with Julian. When she said\ngood-bye to him, the hand-shake that passed between them had become\nsomething more to her than a kiss. She kissed so many whom she hated, so\nmany who were dolls of vice to her, who were walking sins, incarnate lust\nshadows, scarcely men. To be to Julian what another woman might have been\nwould be to seem to make him as all those dolls of horrible London. So\nCuckoo set him apart by her relations towards him, as she had previously\nset him apart in her heart. She pushed the chair of her beloved from the\nheart where the dolls sat night after night warming their expressive\nhands at the cheap and ever-burning fire. She pushed it out into a circle\nof cold that was the only sacred thing she could supply. The world and\nher situation in it had bereft her of the power of even proving the\nsimplicity of love by simplicity of natural action. She had to find a new\nway to show an old worship. She found it in refusal, where others find it\nin assent.\n\nBut, after all, she was a woman, and perhaps she wished Julian to be an\nanchorite. That was what Valentine meant when, after Julian's account of\nCuckoo's anger on finding him in Piccadilly, he simply said:\n\n\"That girl loves you.\"\n\nThe sentence stirred Julian to a surprise warmer than seemed reasonable,\nfor he had really known that Cuckoo had some feeling for him. But he had\nalways at the back of his mind the idea, common to so many, that such a\ngirl as Cuckoo could not be capable of the real love, the love ascetic,\nnot the love Bacchanalian. Love among the roses is easy, but not many\ncan welcome love among the nettles; and, moreover, Julian, despite his\nknowledge of the thorny paths along which Cuckoo walked habitually, along\nwhich all her poor sisterhood walked incessantly, had not entirely\ndisabused himself of the fallacy that a life such as hers was, in some\nvague, undefined and indefinable way, a life of pleasure. Even when we\nknow a thing to be, we often cannot feel it to be. Knowledge in the mind\ndoes not inevitably bring to the birth sensation in the heart, or even\nthe mental apprehension, half reasonable and half emotional, on the base\nand foundation of which it is comparatively easy to ground acts that\nindicate an understanding.\n\nFrom Valentine's remark Julian understood him to mean that Cuckoo's\nanger was entirely caused by jealousy, not at all by a fine desire of\nprotecting some one stronger than herself from that which she knew so\nwell through her own original weakness. Yet that was what Julian had\nbeen led to believe, not by any hint of Cuckoo's, but by something\nwithin himself.\n\n\"I don't see why she should love me,\" he said, presently.\n\n\"You're well off, Julian,\" Valentine rejoined.\n\nAlmost for the first time in his life Julian felt angry with Valentine.\n\n\"You don't know her at all,\" he said, hotly.\n\n\"I know her class.\"\n\nJulian looked at him, and his anger died, as his mind sailed off on a new\ntack.\n\n\"Her class! Then you must have been studying it lately, Val. Not long ago\nyou could not have studied it. Your nature would not have let you.\"\n\n\"That is true enough.\"\n\n\"Were you studying it when we met you the other night?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"With what result?\" Julian asked with eager curiosity.\n\n\"That I understand something I never understood before--the charm of\nsin.\"\n\nJulian was greatly surprised at this deliverance of his friend, who\nuttered it in his coldly pure voice, looking serenely high-minded and\neven loftily intellectual.\n\n\"You find the charm of sin in Piccadilly?\"\n\n\"I begin to find it everywhere, in every place in which human beings\ngather together.\"\n\n\"You no longer feel yourself aloof from the average man, then?\"\n\nValentine pressed his right hand slowly upon Julian's shoulder.\n\n\"No longer,\" he answered quietly. \"Julian, you and I are emerging\ntogether from the hermitage in which we have dwelt retired for so long.\nI always thought you would emerge some day. I never thought I should. But\nso it is. Don't think that I am standing still while you are travelling.\nIt is not so.\"\n\nThe strength of his hand's grip upon Julian's shoulder seemed to indicate\na violence of feeling which the tones of his voice did not imply. Julian\nlistened, and then said, in a hesitating, irresolute manner:\n\n\"Yes, I see, Val; but I say, where are we travelling? or, at least,\nwhere shall we travel if we don't pull up, if we keep on? That's the\nthing, I suppose.\"\n\nAs he spoke he did not tell himself that it was nothing less than the\ndisconnected and ungrammatical remarks of the lady of the feathers which\nprompted this consideration, this prophetic movement of his mind. Yet so\nit was. And when Valentine replied he, the saint, was fighting against\nher, the sinner, and surely in the cause of evil. For he said lightly:\n\n\"After all, do human souls travel? I often think they are like eyes\nlooking at a whirling zoetrope. It is the zoetrope that travels.\"\n\n\"You think souls don't go up or down?\"\n\n\"I think that none of us knows really much about souls, and that, after\nall, it is best not to bother ourselves too much about them.\"\n\n\"Marr thought a great deal about them. I used to fancy that as some\nmaniacs have been known to murder people in order to tear out their\nhearts, he could have murdered them to tear out their souls.\"\n\nValentine took his hand from Julian's shoulder.\n\n\"Marr is dead and forgotten,\" he said almost sternly.\n\n\"I can't quite forget him, Val; and I still feel as if he had had\nsome influence over both of us. We have changed since those days of\nthe sittings, since that night of your trance and his death.\"\n\nJulian was looking at Valentine in a puzzled way while he spoke.\nValentine met his eyes calmly.\n\n\"If I have changed,\" he said slowly, \"it cannot be in essentials. Look at\nme. Is my face altered? Is my expression different?\"\n\n\"No, Valentine.\"\n\nJulian said the words with a sort of return to confidence and to greater\nhappiness. To look into the face of his friend set all his doubts at\nrest. No man with eyes like that could ever fall into anything which was\nreally and radically evil. Valentine perhaps was playing with life as a\nboy plays with a dog, making life jump up at him, dance round him, just\nto see the strength and grace of the creature, its possibilities of quick\nmotion, its powers of varied movement. Where could be the harm of that?\nAnd what Valentine could do safely he began to think he might do safely\ntoo. He gave expression to his thought with his usual frankness.\n\n\"You mean you are beginning to play with life?\" he said.\n\n\"That is it exactly. I am putting life through its paces. After all, no\nman is worth his salt if he shuts himself up from that which is placed in\nthe world for him to see, to know, and perhaps--but only after he has\nseen and known it--to reject. To do that is like living in the midst of\na number of people who may be either very agreeable or the reverse, and\ndeclining ever to be introduced to them on the ground that they must all\nbe horrible and certain to do one an infinity of harm.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, I see. Then you think that Cuckoo is jealous of me?--that that\nwas all she meant?\"\n\nJulian again returned to the old question. Valentine replied:\n\n\"I feel sure of it. Women are always governed by their hearts. So much so\nthat my last sentence is a truism, scarcely worthy the saying. Besides,\nmy dear Julian, what would it matter if she were not? What could the\nattitude of such a woman on any subject under the sun matter to you?\"\n\nThe words were not spoken without intentional sarcasm. They stung Julian\na little, but did not lead him, from any sense of false shame, to a\nfeeble concealment of his real feeling.\n\n\"It does seem absurd, I dare say,\" he said. \"But she's--well, she's not\nan ordinary woman, Val.\"\n\n\"Let us hope not.\"\n\n\"No; you don't understand. There's something strong about her. What she\nsays might really matter, I think, to a cleverer man than I. She knows\nmen, and then, Valentine, there's something else.\"\n\nHe stopped. There was a queer look of mystery in his face.\n\n\"Something else! What is it? What can there be?\"\n\n\"I saw the flame as if it was burning in her eyes.\"\n\nValentine made an abrupt movement. It might have been caused by surprise,\nannoyance, anger, or simply by the desire to fidget which overcomes every\none, not paralyzed, at some time or another. His action knocked over a\nchair, and he stooped to pick it up and set it in its place before he\nspoke. Then he said:\n\n\"The flame, you say! What on earth is your theory about this\nextraordinary flame? You seem to attach a strange importance to it. Yet\nit can only be the fire of a fancy, a jet from the imagination. Tell me,\nhave you any theory about it, honestly? and if so, what is it?\"\n\nJulian was rather taken aback by this very sledgehammer invitation.\nHitherto the flame, and his thought of it, had seemed to have the pale\nvagueness and the mystery of a dream. When the flame appeared, it is\ntrue, he was oppressed by a sense of awe; but the awe was indefinite,\nblurred, resisting analysis, and quite inexplicable to another.\n\n\"I did not say I had any theory about it,\" he answered.\n\n\"But then, why do you consider it at all? And why seem to think that\nits supposed presence in the eyes of a woman makes that woman in any\nway different from others?\"\n\n\"But I did not say I thought so,\" Julian said, rather hastily. \"How you\njump to conclusions to-day!\"\n\n\"You implied it, and you meant it. Now, didn't you?\"\n\n\"Perhaps I may have.\"\n\n\"This is all too much for me,\" Valentine said, showing now a very unusual\nirritation. He even began to pace up and down the room with a slow, soft\nfootstep, monotonous and mechanical in its regularity. As he was walking\nhe went on:\n\n\"I do really think, Julian, that it is a mistake to allow any fancy to\nget upon your nerves. You know what the doctor thought about this flame.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"And you know what I think.\"\n\n\"Do I?\"\n\n\"Yes, that it is a mere chimera. But my opinion on such a subject has no\nparticular value. The doctor is different. He is a great specialist. The\nnerves have been his constant study for years. If this vision continues\nto haunt you, you really ought to put yourself definitely into his\nhands.\"\n\n\"Perhaps I will,\" said Julian.\n\nHe spoke rather seriously and meditatively. Valentine, possibly because\nhe was in the sort of peculiarly irritable frame of mind that will\nsometimes cause a man to dislike having his tendered advice taken, seemed\nadditionally vexed by this reply, or at any rate struck by it. He paused\nin his walk, and seemed for an instant as if he were going to say\nsomething sharply sarcastic. Then suddenly he laughed.\n\n\"After all,\" he exclaimed in a calmer voice, \"we are taking an absurdity\nmighty seriously.\"\n\nBut Julian would not agree to this view of the matter.\n\n\"I don't know that we are,\" he said.\n\n\"You don't know!\"\n\n\"That is an absurdity. No, Valentine, I don't; I can't think that it is.\nI saw it in Cuckoo's eyes only once, and that was--just--\"\n\n\"Tell me just when you saw it.\"\n\nThe words came from Valentine's lips with a pressure, a hurry almost of\nanxiety. He seemed curiously eager about the history of this chimera. But\nJulian, eager too, and engrossed in thoughts that moved as yet in a maze\nfull of vapors and of mists, did not find time to notice it.\n\n\"I noticed it just after, or when, she was begging me to go home.\"\n\n\"Like a good boy,\" Valentine hastily interposed. \"Because her jealousy\nprompted her to hate the thought of your having any pleasure in which she\ndid not share. Oh, you noticed the flame then. Did it, too, tell you to\ngo home?\"\n\nHe spoke rather harshly and flippantly, and apparently put the question\nwithout desire of an answer, and rather with the intention of ridicule\nthan for any other reason. But Julian took it seriously and replied to\nit.\n\n\"Somehow I felt as if, perhaps, it did wish to speak some message to me,\nand that the message came, or might come, through her.\"\n\nHe spoke slowly, for indeed it was this action of words that was\nbeginning to make clear to himself his own impression, so vague and so\nunpresentable before. As he thus traced it out, like a man following the\nblurred letters of an old inscription with the point of his stick, and\ngradually coming at their meaning, his excitement grew. He said, speaking\nwith a rising emphasis of conviction:\n\n\"I'm not a mere fool. There is--there is something in all this; I feel\nit; I cannot be simply imagining. There is something. But I'm like a man\nin the dark. I can't see what it is; I can't tell. But you, Valentine,\nyou, with your nature, so much better than I am, with so much deeper\nan insight, how is it you don't see this flame? Unless,\"--and here\nJulian struck his hand violently on the table,--\"unless it comes, as\nit seemed to come that night in the darkness, from you. If it's part\nof yourself--but then\"--and his manner clouded again--\"how can that be?\"\n\n\"How indeed?\" said Valentine, who had been watching him all through this\noutburst with a scrutiny that seemed almost uneasy, so narrow and so\ndetermined was it.\n\n\"Julian, listen to me; you trust me, don't you, and think my opinion\nworth something?\"\n\n\"Worth everything.\"\n\n\"Well, I believe you're getting into an unnatural, if you weren't a man\nI should say a hysterical--habit of mind. If you can't throw it off by\nyourself, I must help you to do so.\"\n\n\"Perhaps you're right. But how will you help me?\"\n\nValentine seemed to think and consider for a moment. Then he exclaimed:\n\n\"I'll tell you. By making you join with me in putting this life, this\nold life--new enough to both of us--through its paces. Why should each\nof us do it alone? We are friends. We can trust one another. You know me\nthrough and through. You know the--chilliness I'll call it--of my nature,\nmy natural bookishness--my bias towards contemning people too readily,\nand avoiding what all men ought to know. And I know you. Without you I\nbelieve I should never go any distance. Without me you might go too far.\nTogether we will strike the happy medium. For us life shall go through\nall his paces, but he shall never lame us with a kick, like a vicious\nhorse, or give us a furtive bite when we're not looking. Men carry such\nbites and kicks, the wounds from them, to their graves. We'll be more\ncareful. But we'll see the great play in all--all its acts. And, when\nwe've seen it, we'll be as we were, only we'll be no longer blind. And\nwe'll never forget our grand power of rejecting and refusing.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Julian. \"Perhaps I haven't that power.\"\n\n\"But I have.\"\n\n\"Yes, you have.\"\n\n\"And I'll share my power with you. We are friends and comrades. We ought\nto share everything.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" exclaimed Julian, carried away. \"Yes, by Jove, yes!\"\n\n\"And as to this flame--\"\n\n\"Ah!\"\n\n\"We'll soon know if it's a vision or a reality. But it's a vision. You\nsaw it in a woman's eyes.\"\n\n\"I'll swear I did.\"\n\n\"Then that proves it's a fraud. The flame in a woman's eyes never burnt\ntrue yet--never, Julian, since the days of Delilah.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nJULIAN FEARS THE FLAME\n\n\nAlthough Cuckoo knew well that Julian carried out his intention of going\nhome after he left her in Piccadilly, the fact of his being there, of his\nmaking one of that crowd, that slowly-moving crowd, troubled her.\nValentine and Julian had argued the question of her real feeling about\nthe matter. Cuckoo did not argue it. She never deliberately thought to\nherself, \"I feel this or that. Why do I feel it?\" She knew as much about\nastronomy as introspection, and that was simply nothing at all. Instead\nof diving into the depths of her mind and laboriously tracing every\nlabelled and tabulated subtlety to its source, she sat in the squalid\nMarylebone Road sitting-room, with the folding doors open into the\nbedroom to temper the heat of summer with draughts from the frigid zone\nof the back area, and babbled her sensations to Jessie, who riggled in\nresponse to every passing shadow that stole across the heart of her\nmistress.\n\nJessie had learned much about Julian in these latter days. Into her\npricked and pointed ear, leaf-shaped and the hue of India-rubber, had\nbeen whispered a strange tale of the dawning of love in a battered heart,\nof the blossoming of respect in a warped mind. She had heard of the\nmeeting in Piccadilly, of the meal at the Monico, of the farewell on the\nkerbstone. And she alone knew--or ought to have known--the mingling of\nintense jealousy and of a grander feeling that burned in Cuckoo's breast\nwhenever she thought of Julian's life, the greater part of it that lay\nbeyond her knowledge, her sight, or keeping.\n\nFor the lady of the feathers, in most things a strange mixture, had never\ndriven two more contrasted passions in double harness than those which\nshe drove around the circle of which Julian was the core, the centre. One\nwas a passion of jealousy; the other a curious passion of protection.\nEach backed up the other, urged it to its work. It would have been a hard\ntask, indeed, to tell at first which was the greater of the two. Cuckoo\nneither knew nor cared. She did not even differentiate the two passions\nor say to herself that there were two. That was not her way. She felt\nquickly and strongly, and she acted on her feelings with the peculiar and\nalmost wild promptitude that such a life as hers seems to breed in\nwoman's nature. It is the French lady of the feathers who scatters\nvitriol in the streets of Paris, the Italian or Spanish lady of the\nfeathers who snatches the dagger from her hair to stab an enemy. The wind\nof Cuckoo's feelings blew her about like a dancing mote, and the feelings\nawakened by Julian were the strongest her nature was capable of.\n\nOnly Jessie knew that at present, unless indeed Valentine had divined it,\nas seemed possible from his words to Julian.\n\nAnd these twin passions were fed full by the peculiar circumstances of\nCuckoo's relation to Julian, and by the depth of her knowledge concerning\na certain side of life.\n\nShe went home, that night of their meeting, very late, and in the\nweariness of the morning succeeding it, and of many following mornings,\nshe began to brood over the change in Julian that she had intuitively\ndivined. Her street-woman's instinct could not be at fault with a boy.\nFor Julian was little more than a boy. She knew that when she first met\nhim, when they made toast together on the foggy afternoon that she could\nnever forget, Julian was unshadowed by the darkness that envelopes the\nsteps of so much human nature. Lively, bright, full of youth, strength,\nenergy, as he was, Cuckoo knew that then he had been free from the\nbondage of sense which demands and obtains the sacrifice of so many lives\nlike hers. And she knew that now he was not free from that bondage, and\nthat she, by an irony of fate, had, with her own hands, fastened the\nfirst fetter upon him.\n\nValentine had plotted that.\n\nCuckoo's belief said so; but surely her curious instinct against\nValentine must have tricked her here!\n\nIt was this knowledge of her unwilling action against Julian's peace that\nfirst woke in her the strong protective feeling towards him, a feeling\nalmost akin to the maternal instinct. It was her strange love for him\nthat prompted the fiery antagonism against his relations with others that\ncould only be called jealousy. And though one of her passions was noble,\nthe other pitiable, they could but work together for the same end, aim at\na similar salvation.\n\nYet how could any salvation for a man come out of that dreary house in\nthe Marylebone Road, from that piteous rouged agent of the devil?\n\nCuckoo never stopped to ask such a question as that. She was a girl, and\nshe began to understand love. She had no time to stop. And each passing\nday soon began to give fresh vitality to the vision of Julian's need.\n\nBetween him and her there had sprung up on the ruins of one night's folly\na tower of comradeship. Its foundations were not of sand. Even Cuckoo,\ndespite her ceaseless jealously, felt that. But, after all, she had only\ncome into his life as a desolate waif drifts into a settled community.\nShe was neither of his class, his understanding, or his education. She\nwas in the gutter; in the gutter to an extent that no man, as women feel\nat present, can ever be. And though through her inspiration he had not to\ncome into the gutter to find her and to be with her, yet she sometimes\nwrithed with the thought that he was so far above her. Nevertheless, her\nposition never once tempted her, in the struggle that the future quickly\nbrought with it, to shrink from effort, to fail in fight, to despair in\nendeavour for him.\n\nThere are flames that burn the dross from humanity and reveal the gold.\nThere are flames in the eyes and in the hearts of women.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJulian's visits to Cuckoo were irregular but fairly frequent. He always\ncame in the afternoon, an hour or two before the psychological moment of\nher start out for the evening's duty. Sometimes he would take her out to\ntea at a small Italian restaurant near Baker Street Station. More often\nthey would make tea together in the little sitting-room, with the\necstatic assistance of Jessie. And Rip, Valentine's dog, generally made\none of the party. He and Jessie got on excellently together, and devoutly\nshared the scraps that fell from the Marylebone Road table. The first\ntime that Julian brought Rip to number 400, Cuckoo fell in love with him.\n\n\"Why, you never said you had a dog,\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"Rip's not mine,\" Julian answered.\n\n\"Isn't he? Whose is he?\"\n\n\"Valentine's.\"\n\n\"Then why d'you have him with you?\" asked Cuckoo, suddenly and rather\nroughly pushing away Rip, who was swirling in her lap like a whirlpool.\n\n\"Oh, he's taken a stupid dislike to Valentine,\" Julian answered\nthoughtlessly. \"He won't stay with him.\"\n\nIn a moment Cuckoo had caught the little dog back.\n\n\"That's funny,\" she said.\n\n\"Yes, isn't it?\" said Julian.\n\nThen, seeing her thoughtful gaze, and the odd way in which she suddenly\ncaressed the dog, he was angry with himself for having told her anything\nabout the matter.\n\n\"Rip's a little fool,\" he said. \"Perhaps Jessie will take a dislike to\nyou some day, Cuckoo.\"\n\n\"Not she, never!\" said Cuckoo, with conviction. And, after that, she\ncould never spoil Rip enough.\n\nThese visits and teas ought to have been pleasant functions, bright\noases in the desert of Cuckoo's life, but a cloud fell over them at\nthe beginning and deepened as the days went by. For Cuckoo, with her\nsharpness of the _gamin_ and her quick instinct of the London streets,\nwas perpetually watching for and noting the signs in Julian's face,\nmanner, or language, that fed those two passions of jealousy and of\nprotection within her. And, at first, she allowed Julian to see what\nshe was doing.\n\nOne day, as they sat at the table in the middle of the room, Julian said\nto her:\n\n\"I say, Cuckoo, why d'you look at me like that?\"\n\n\"Like what?\"\n\n\"Why d'you stare at me? Anything wrong?\"\n\n\"I wasn't staring at you,\" she asserted. \"The sun gets in my eyes if I\nlook the other way.\"\n\n\"I'll draw the blind down,\" he said.\n\nHe got up from the table and shut the afternoon sun out. The tea-tray,\nthe photographs, the little dogs, they two, were plunged in a greenish\ntwilight manufactured by the sun with the assistance of the Venetian\nblind.\n\n\"There,\" Julian said, sitting down again, \"now we shall all look\nghostly.\"\n\n\"But if I do take a fancy to look at you, why shouldn't I, then?\" Cuckoo\nasked.\n\n\"I don't mind,\" he laughed. \"But you didn't seem pleased with me, I\nthought.\"\n\n\"Rot!\"\n\n\"Oh! you were pleased, then?\"\n\n\"I don't say as I was, or wasn't.\"\n\n\"You're rather like the Sphinx.\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"Enigmatic.\"\n\nShe didn't understand, and looked rather cross.\n\n\"I told you I wasn't looking at you,\" she exclaimed pettishly.\n\n\"Then you told a lie,\" Julian said, with supreme gravity. \"Think of that,\nCuckoo.\"\n\n\"And what would you ever tell me but lies if I was to ask you things?\"\nshe rejoined quickly.\n\nJulian began to see that there was something lurking in the background\nbehind her show of temper. He wondered what on earth it was.\n\n\"Why should I tell you lies?\" he said.\n\n\"Oh! to kid me. Men like that. You're just like the rest, I suppose.\"\n\n\"I suppose so.\"\n\nShe seemed vexed at his assent, and went on:\n\n\"Now, aren't you, though?\"\n\n\"I say, yes.\"\n\n\"Well, you usen't to be,\" she exclaimed, with actual bitterness of\naccent and of look. \"That's just why I was lookin' at you,--for I was\nlookin',--makin' out the difference.\"\n\n\"I'm just the same as I was,\" Julian said, and he spoke with quite\nsincere conviction.\n\n\"No, you ain't.\"\n\nHaving uttered this very direct contradiction, Cuckoo proceeded with\ngreat energy:\n\n\"You've been lettin' him do it. I know you have.\"\n\nJulian was completely puzzled.\n\n\"What do you mean?\" he asked, with a real desire for information.\n\n\"You know well enough. He's leadin' you wrong.\"\n\nJulian reddened with a sudden understanding. Her words touched him in\nhis sorest place. In the first place, no man likes to think he has been\ndoing a thing because he has been led by some one else. In the second,\nJulian had grown ardently to dislike Cuckoo's unreasoning antipathy to\nValentine. Originally, and for some time, he had believed that she would\nget over it. Finding later that there was no chance of that, he had once\ntold her that he could not hear Valentine abused. Since that day she had\nbeen careful not to mention his name. But now her bitterness against him\npeeped out once more, and seemed even to have been gathering force during\nthe interval.\n\n\"Cuckoo, you're talking great nonsense,\" he said, forcing himself to\nspeak quietly.\n\nBut she was in one of her most mulish moods, and was not to be turned\nfrom the subject or silenced.\n\n\"No, I ain't,\" she said. \"Where was you last week? You didn't come in\nonce.\"\n\n\"I was in Paris.\"\n\nCuckoo's brow clouded still more. Her knowledge of Paris was not\nintimate, and, indeed, was confined to stories dropped from the lips of\nmen who had been there for short periods, and for purposes the reverse of\ngeographical or artistic. Julian's mention of the French capital drove a\nsword into her.\n\n\"With him?\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"Yes, with Valentine.\"\n\n\"Oh, what did you do there?\"\n\nShe spoke with angry insistence, and Julian could not help thinking of\nValentine's remark, \"That girl loves you.\" It seemed indeed that Cuckoo\nmust have some deep and wholly personal reason prompting her to this\nstrange demonstration of vexation.\n\n\"I can't tell you everything,\" Julian answered.\n\n\"Oh, you can't kid me over that. I know well enough what men go to Paris\nfor!\" she rejoined, with almost hysterical bitterness.\n\nJulian was silent. It was curious, but this girl stirred his conscience\nfrom its sleep, as once Valentine alone could stir it. But by how\ndifferent a method! The stillness and calm of one who was sinless were\nreplaced by the vehemence and the passion of one who was steeped in sin.\nAnd yet the two opposites had, to some extent, the same effect. Julian\ndid not yet realize this thoroughly, and did not analyze it at all. Had\nany one hinted to him that the waning influence of Valentine for good\ncould ever be balanced by the waxing influence of the lady of the\nfeathers, he would have laughed at the crazy notion. And in the first\nplace he would have denied that Valentine's spell upon him had changed in\nnature; for Valentine was still as a god to him. And Cuckoo could never\nbe a goddess, either to him or to any one else. But, though he would\nscarcely acknowledge it even to himself, he did not care for Cuckoo to\nknow fully the changing way of his life. Perhaps it was the curiously\nstrong line she had from the first taken with regard to his actions that\nmade him careful with her. Perhaps it was the incident of the vision of\nthe flame--but no; remembrance of that had been well-nigh lulled to sleep\nby the lullabies of Valentine, by his disregard of it, his certainty that\nit was an hallucination, a mirage. Whatever the cause might be, Julian\nfelt somewhat like a naughty boy in the angry presence of Cuckoo. As he\nlooked at her the greenish twilight painted a chill and menacing gleam in\nher eyes, and made her twisting lips venomous and acrid to his glance.\nHer rouge vanished in the twilight, or seemed only as a dull, darkish\ncloud upon her thin and worn cheeks. She sat at the table almost like a\nscarecrow, giving the tables of some strange law to a trembling and an\nunwilling votary.\n\n\"I know!\" she reiterated.\n\nJulian said nothing. He did not choose to deny what was in fact the\ntruth, that his stay in Paris had not been free from fault, and yet he\ndid not feel inclined to do what most men in his situation must by all\nmeans have done, challenge Cuckoo's right to sit in judgment, or even for\na moment to criticise any action of his. There was something about her, a\nfrankness perhaps, which made it impossible to put her out of court by\nany allusion to her own life. And indeed that must have been cowardice\nand an impossibility. Besides, she put herself and her own deeds calmly\naway as unworthy and impossible of discussion, as things sunk down\nbeneath the wave of notice or comment, remote from criticism or\ncondemnation, because the life of their hopelessness had been so long\nand sunless.\n\nCuckoo, with her eyes on Julian, was silent, too, now. She understood\nthat what her suspicion had affirmed, without actually knowing, was true,\nand her stormy heart was swept by a whirlwind of jealousy, and of\nwomanish pity for the man she was jealous of. In that moment she felt\na sickness of life more sharp than she had ever felt before, and a dull\nlonging to be a different woman, a woman of Julian's class, and clever,\nthat she might be able to do something to keep him from sinking to the\nlevel of the men she hated.\n\nHow could she, in her nakedness of permanent degradation, give a helping\nhand to anybody? That was a clear rendering of the vague thought, vague\nas this twilight in which they sat, that ran through her mind. Suddenly\nshe turned to the tray and poured herself out a cup of tea. The tea had\nbeen standing while they talked, and was black and strong. She drank it\neagerly, and a wave of nervous energy rushed over her, surging up to her\nbrain like light and electricity. It gave to her a sort of reckless\nvalour to say just the thing she felt. She turned towards Julian with a\nmanner that was half shrew, half wildcat--street girls cannot always\ncompass the impressive, though they may feel the great eternities\nnestling round their hearts--and cried out:\n\n\"I just hate you!\"\n\nAll her jealousy rang in that cry, smothering the whisper of the maternal\npassion that went ever with it. Julian could no longer doubt the truth of\nValentine's words.\n\n\"Cuckoo, don't be silly,\" he said hastily, and awkwardly enough.\n\n\"Silly!\" she burst out. \"What do I care for that? I ain't silly, either,\nand I ain't blind like you are. I can see where you're goin'.\"\n\n\"I shall go away from here,\" Julian said, trying to laugh, \"if you talk\nin this ridiculous way.\"\n\nShe sprang up and ran passionately in front of the door, as if she\nthought he was really going to escape.\n\n\"No, you don't,\" she said, and her accent seemed to draw near to that of\nWhitechapel as her voice rose higher. \"Not till I've said what I mean.\"\n\n\"Hush, Cuckoo! We shall have Mrs. Brigg up, thinking I'm murdering you.\"\n\n\"Let her come! And you are, that's what you are, murderin' me, and worse,\nseein' you go where you're goin'. He's takin' you. It's all him. Yes, it\nis! He'll make you as he is.\"\n\n\"Cuckoo, I won't have it.\"\n\nJulian spoke sternly and got up. The little dogs, alarmed by the tumult,\nhad begun to whine uneasily, and at his movement Jessie barked in a thin\nvoice. Julian went to Cuckoo, took her wrists in his two hands, and drew\nher away from the door; but she tore herself from his grasp with fury,\nfor the touch of his hands gave a clearer vision to her jealousy of his\nsecret deeds, and made her understand better the depth of her present\nfeeling.\n\n\"You shall have it,\" she cried. \"You shall. I know men. I know what\nyou'll be. I know what women'll make of you.\"\n\n\"A man makes himself,\" Julian interrupted.\n\n\"Rot! That's all you know about it. I've seen them begin so nice and go\nright down, like a stone in a well. And they never come up again. Not\nthey. No more'll you. D'you hear that?\"\n\n\"I shall hear you better if you speak lower.\"\n\nCuckoo suddenly changed from a sort of frenzy to a violent calm.\n\n\"You're different already,\" she said. \"Can't I see it?\"\n\nAs if to emphasize her remark she approached her face quite close to his\nin the twilight. While they had been arguing a cloud had passed over the\nsun, and dimness increased in the little room. Both of them were still\nstanding up, and now Cuckoo peered into Julian's eyes with almost hungry\nscrutiny. Her lips were still trembling with excitement and her mouth was\ncontorted into a sideways grin, expressive of contemptuous knowledge\nof the descent of Julian's nature. She was a mere mask of passion, no\ndoubt a ridiculous object enough, touzled, dishevelled and shaken with\ntemper, as she leaned forward to get a better view of him. And Julian\nwas both vexed and disgusted by her outbreak, and sick of a scene which,\nlike all men, he ardently hated and would have given much to avoid. He\nfaced her coldly, endeavouring to calm her by banishing every trace of\nexcitement from his expression.\n\nAnd then, in the twilight of the dingy room, and in the twilight of her\neyes, he saw the flame once more. A thin glint of sunshine found its way\nin from the street, and threw a shadow near them. Cuckoo's eyes emitted\na greenish ray like a cat's, and in this ray the flame swam and\nflickered, cold and pale, and, Julian fancied, menacing.\n\nPerhaps, because he was already irritated and slightly strung up by\nCuckoo's attack, he felt a sudden anger against the flame, almost as he\nmight have felt a rage against a person. As he stared upon it, he could\nalmost believe that it, too, had eyes, scrutinizing, upbraiding,\ncondemning him, and that in the thin riband and shade of its fire there\ndwelt a heart to hate him for the dear sin to which, at last, he began to\ngive himself. For the moment Cuckoo and the flame were as one, and for\nthe moment he feared and hated them both.\n\nAbruptly he held up his hand to stop the further words that were\nfluttering on her thin and painted lips.\n\n\"Hush!\" he said, in a little hiss of protest against sound.\n\nFor again, fighting with the anger, there was awe in his heart.\n\nThere was something unusual in his expression which held her silent, a\nfurtive horror and expectation which she did not understand. And while\nshe waited, Julian turned suddenly, and left the room and the house.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS LEARNS WISDOM\n\n\nJulian did not come again to the house in the Marylebone Road for at\nleast a fortnight, and during that time the lady of the feathers was left\nalone with her life and with her sad thoughts. The summer days went\nheavily by, and the sultry summer nights. No rain fell, and London was\nveiled in dust. The pavements were so hot that they burned the feet that\ntrod them. Sometimes they seemed to burn Cuckoo's very soul, and to sear\nher heart as she stood upon them for hours in the night, while the crowds\nof Piccadilly flitted by like shadows in an evil dream. She stared\nmechanically at the faces of those passing as she strolled with a lagging\nfootstep along the line of houses. She turned to meet the eyes of the\npale-faced loungers in the lighted entrance of the St. James's\nrestaurant, \"Jimmy's,\" as she called it. But her mind was preoccupied. A\nproblem had fastened upon it with the tenacity of some vampire or strange\nclinging creature of night. Cuckoo was wrestling with an angel; or was it\na devil? And often, when she stopped on the pavement and exchanged a word\nor two with some casual stranger, she scarcely knew what she said, or to\nwhat kind of man she was speaking. She was possessed by one thought, the\nthought of Julian and of his danger. Valentine, in her thoughts, was\nstrangely a pale shadow, incredibly evil, incredibly persistent, luring\nJulian downwards, beckoning him with the thin hand of a saint to depths\nunpierced by the gaze of even the most sinful. And that hand of the saint\nwas only part of the appalling deception of his beautiful and tragically\nlying body, a crystal temple in which a demon dwelt secretly, peering\nfrom its concealment through the shadowy blue windows, in which Julian\nsaw truth and honour, but in which Cuckoo read things to terrify and to\ndismay.\n\nFor she was not wholly unaware of the mystery of Valentine, of the sharp\ncontrast between his appearance and the vision of his nature as it came\nto her. She understood that there was something in the fine beauty of\nhis face and figure to account for Julian's blindness and refusal to be\nwarned against him. Cuckoo's intuition, the intuition of an unlearned and\ninstinctive creature trained by the hardest circumstances to rely on what\nshe called her wits, laid the crystal temple in ruins, and drove the\ndemon from its lurking-place naked and shrieking into the open. But,\nafter all, was not she rather deceived than Julian? Julian, from the\nfirst moment of meeting Valentine, looked upon him as saint. Cuckoo,\nfrom the first moment of meeting, looked upon him as devil. Each put\nhim aside from the general run of humanity, the one in a heaven of the\nimagination, the other in a hell. Neither would allow him to be midway\nbetween the two, containing possibilities of both,--ordinary, natural\nman. Julian angrily scouted the notion of Valentine's being like other\nmen. Cuckoo felt instinctively that he was not. And so they glorified\nand cursed him.\n\nCuckoo had at first cursed him plainly in the market-place and upon the\nhouse-top. But that was before she had learned wisdom. Slowly she learnt\nit on these hot days and nights, when the London dust filtered over the\npaint upon her cheeks and lips, clung round the shadows in the hollows\nbeneath her eyes, and slept in the artificial primrose of her elaborate\ncloud of hair. Slowly she learnt it in many vague and struggling mental\narguments, in which logic was a dwarf and passion a giant, in which\ninstinct strangled reason, and love wandered as a shamefaced fairy with\ntear-dimmed eyes.\n\nJulian's prolonged absence and silence first taught the lady of the\nfeathers the slow necessity of wisdom, otherwise, perhaps, her vehement\nignorance could never have absorbed the precious thing. Women of her\ntraining and vile experience, nerve-ridden, and clothed in hysteria as\nin a garment, often think to gain what they want by the mere shrillness\nof outcry, the mere grabbing of ostentatious, eager hands and frenzy of\nbody. Their lives lead them through a wonder of knowledge and of danger\nto the demeanour of babyhood, and they cry for every rattle, much more\nfor every moon. So Cuckoo had thrown her feelings down before Julian.\nShe had dashed her hatred of Valentine in his face; she had cried her\nfears of his downfall to that which she consorted with eternally and\nloathed--when she had still the energy to loathe it, which was not\nalways--in his ears with the ardent shrillness of a boatswain's whistle.\nShe had, in fact, done all that her instinct prompted her to do, and the\nresult was the exit of Julian from her life. This set her, always in her\nsharp and yet childish way, sometimes oddly clear sighted, often muddled\nand distressed, to turn upon instinct with a contempt not known before,\nto discard it with the fury still of a child. And instinct thus forsaken\nby an essentially instinctive creature opened the gates of distress and\nof confusion.\n\nBy day Cuckoo sat in her stuffy little parlour brooding wearily. She\nwaited in day after day, always hoping that Julian would return, full of\nresolutions, prompted by fear, to be gentle, even lively, to him when he\ndid come, full of excited intention which could not be fulfilled; for he\ndid not come. And by night, while she tramped the streets, still Cuckoo's\nanxious mind revolved the question of her behaviour in the future. For\nshe would not, passionately would not, allow herself to contemplate the\npossibility that Julian's anger against her would keep him forever\nbeyond reach either of her fury or of her tenderness. She insisted on\ncontemplating his ultimate reappearance, and her wits were at work to\ndevise means to win him from Valentine's influence without stirring his\nhorror at any thought of disloyalty to his friend. Cuckoo, in fact,\nwanted to be subtle, intended to be subtle, and sought intensely the\nright way of subtlety. She sought it as she walked, as she hovered at\nstreet corners in the night, while the hours ran by, sometimes till the\nstreets were nearly deserted, sometimes even till the dawn sang in the\nsky to the wail of the hungry woman beneath it. She sought it even in the\ncompany of those strangers who stepped for a night into her life as into\na public room, and stepped from it on the morrow with a careless and\neverlasting adieu, half-drowned in the chink of money.\n\nAnd sometimes she thought, with a sick dreariness, that she would never\nfind it, and sometimes courage failed her, and, despite her passionate\nresolution, she did for a moment say to herself, \"If he should never come\nagain.\" There were moments, too, when every other feeling was drowned by\nsheer jealousy of Julian, when the tiger-cat woke in this street-girl who\nhad always had to fight, when her thin frame shivered with the shaking\nviolence of the soul it held. Then she clenched her hands, and longed to\nplant her nails in the faces of those other women, divined, though never\nseen,--those French women who had sung him, like sirens, to Paris, away\nfrom the sea of her greedy love. Her similes were commonplace. In her\nheart she called such sirens hussies. Had she met them the battle of\nwords would have been strong and singularly unclean. That she herself was\na hussy to other men, not to Julian, did not trouble her. She did not\nrealize it. Human nature has always one blind eye, even when the other\ndoes not squint. This passion of jealousy, circling round an absent man,\nseized her at the strangest, the most inopportune moments. Sometimes it\ncame upon her in the street, and the meditation of it was so vital and\ncomplete that Cuckoo could not go on walking, lest she should, by\nmovement, miss the keenest edge of the agony. Then she would stop\nwherever she was, lean against the down-drawn shutter of a shop, or the\ncorner of a public house, among the gaping loungers, let her powdered\nchin drop upon her breast, and sink into a fit of desperate detective\nduty, during which she followed Julian like a shadow through imagined\nwanderings, and watched him committing all those imagined actions that\ncould cause her to feel the wildest and most inhuman despair.\n\nOne night, when she was thus sunk and swallowed up in the maw of\nmiserable inward contemplation, a young man, who was walking by, observed\nher. He was very young and eager, fresh from Cambridge, ardent after the\nmysteries and the subtleties of life, as is the fashion of clever modern\nyouth. The sight of this painted girl leaning, motionless as some doll or\npuppet, against the iron shutters of the vacant house, her head drooped,\nand her hands, as if the strings to manipulate her had fallen loose from\nthe grasp that guided them, caught and eventually fascinated him. It was\na late hour of night. He passed on and returned, shooting each time a\ndevouring, analytical glance upon Cuckoo. Again he came back, walking a\nlittle nearer to the houses. His heart beat quicker as he approached the\npuppet. Its complete immobility was almost appalling, and each time he\ncame within view of it he examined it violently to see if a limb was\ndisplaced. No; one might almost suppose that it was the body of some one\nstruck dead so suddenly against the shop that she had not had time to\nfall, and so remained leaning thus. With shorter and shorter revolutions,\nlike a dog working itself up to approach some motionless but strange\nobject, the youth went by Cuckoo, hesitating more and more each time he\ncame in front of her with strange feelings of one being vaguely criminal.\nHe longed to touch the puppet, to see if any quiver would convulse its\nlimbs, any light flicker into its eyes. And he was so fascinated and\ninterested that at last he did furtively stop precisely in front of it.\nFor a second both of them were motionless, he from contemplation of the\noutward, she of the inward. Then Cuckoo's thoughtful jealousy came to a\nghastly crisis. Her imagination had shown her frightful things and\nherself an utterly helpless and compelled spectator. The puppet opened\nits red lips to utter a sob, lifted up its white and heavy eyelids to let\nloose tears upon its unnaturally bright cheeks, stirred its hanging hands\nto clasp them in a crude gesture of dull fury. The youth started as at a\ncorpse showing suddenly the pangs of life. His movement shot Cuckoo like\na bullet into her real world. Through her tears she saw a man regarding\nher. In a flash, old habit brought to her a smile, a turned head of\ncoquetry, an entreating hand, a hackneyed phrase that reiteration\nrendered parrot-like in intonation. The youth shrank back and fled away\nin the darkness. Long afterwards that incident haunted him as an epitome\nof all the horrors of cruel London.\n\nAnd Cuckoo, thus roused and deserted, put aside for the moment her\nnightmare, and started once more upon her promenade of the night.\n\nAt last she began to fear that Julian would never come back, and by a\nsudden impulse she wrote to him a short, very ill-spelt letter, hoping he\nwould come to tea with her on a certain afternoon. On the day mentioned\nshe waited in an agony of expectation. She had put on his black dress,\nremoved all traces of paint and powder from her face, remembering his\nformer request and her experiment, tricked Jessie out in a bright yellow\nsatin riband twisted into a bow almost larger than herself, and bought\nflowers--large ones, sunflowers--to give to her dingy room an air of\nrefinement and of gaiety. Amid all this brilliancy of yellow satin and\nyellow flowers she waited uneasily in her simple black gown. The day was\ndull, not wet, but brooding and severe, iron-grey, like a hard-featured\nPuritan, and still with the angry peace of coming thunder. The window was\nopen to let in air, but no air seemed to enter, only the weariful and\nincessant street noises. Jessie wriggled about, biting sideways with\nanimation to get at her yellow adornment, and pattering around the\nfurniture seeking stray crumbs, which sometimes eluded her for a while\nand, lying in hidden nooks and corners, unexpectedly rewarded her\ndesultory and impromptu search. Cuckoo leaned her arms across the table,\nglanced at the tea things for two, and listened. A cab stopped presently.\nShe twisted in her chair to face the window. It had drawn up next door,\nand she subsided again into her fever of attention. Jessie found a crumb\nand swallowed it with as much action and large air of tasting it as if it\nhad been a city dinner. The hands of the clock drew to the hour named in\nCuckoo's note, touched it, passed it. A sickness of despair began to\ncreep upon her like a thousand little biting insects. She shuffled in her\nseat, glanced this way and that, pressed her lips together, and, taking\nher arms from the table, clasped her hands tightly in her lap. Then she\nsat straight up and counted the tickings of the clock, the spots on the\ntablecloth, the gold stars upon the wallpaper of the room. She counted\nand counted until her head began to swim. And all the time she waited,\nthe lady of the feathers was learning wisdom. The lesson was harsh, as\nthe lessons of time usually are; the lesson was bitter as Marah waters.\nAnd she thought the lesson was going to be a cross too heavy for her\nnarrow shoulders to bear when the iron gate of the garden sang its\ninvariable little note of protest on being opened. Cuckoo's head turned\nslowly to one side. Her haggard eyes swept the view of the path. Julian\nwas walking up it.\n\nShe met him very quietly, almost seriously, and he shook hands with\nher as if they had been together quite recently and parted the best of\nfriends. Only, as he held her hand, she noticed that he cast a hasty, and\nas she fancied a fearful, glance into her eyes. Then he seemed reassured\nand they sat down to tea. Cuckoo supposed that he had for the moment\ndreaded what she called another row, and was satisfied by her expression\nof good temper. They drank their tea, and after a short interval of\nconstraint began chattering together very much as usual. At first Cuckoo\nhad hardly dared to look much at Julian, lest he should see the joy she\nfelt at his coming, but when she was pouring out his second cup she let\nher eyes rest fully on his face, and only then did she realize that a\nshadow lay upon it, a shadow from which it had been free before.\n\nWith a trembling hand she filled the cup and stared upon the shadow.\nShe knew its brethren so well. In dead days she herself had helped to\nmanufacture such shadows upon the faces of men. She had seen them come,\nthin, faint, delicate, impalpable as a veil of mist before morning. Only\nmorning light never followed them. And she had seen them stay and grow\nand deepen and darken. Shadow over the eyes of the man, shadow round his\nlips, shadow like a cloud upon the forehead, shadow over the picture\npainted by the soul, working through the features, that we call\nexpression. Many times had she seen the journey taken by a man's face\nto that haunted bourne, arrived at which it is scarcely any more a man's\nface, but only a mask expressive of one, or of many, sins. Had Julian\nthen definitely set foot upon that journey? As yet the shadow that lay\nover him was no more than the lightest film, suggestive of a slightly\nunnatural and forbidding fatigue. Yet Cuckoo shrank from it as from a\nghost.\n\n\"Why, Cuckoo, your hand is trembling!\" Julian said.\n\n\"Oh, I was out late last night,\" she answered, putting the teapot hastily\ndown. And they talked on, pretending there were only two of them and no\nshadowy third.\n\nJulian, having returned at last to the Marylebone Road, fell into his\nold habit of coming there often. And each time that he came the lady of\nthe feathers counted a fresh step on his hideous journey towards the\nhaunted bourne. Yet she never spoke of the dreary addition sum she was\ndoing. She never reproached Julian, or wept, or let him see that her\nheart was growing cold as a pilgrim who kneels, bare, in long prayers\nupon the steps of a shrine. For she had learnt wisdom, and hugged it in\nher arms. Valentine was scarcely ever mentioned between them; but once,\nand evidently by accident, Julian allowed an expression to escape him\nwhich implied that Valentine now objected to the intimacy with Cuckoo.\nImmediately the words were uttered, Julian looked confused, and obviously\nwould have wished to recall them, had it been possible.\n\n\"Oh, I know as he don't like me,\" Cuckoo said.\n\nJulian answered nothing.\n\n\"Why d'you come, then?\" she continued, with a certain desperation. \"There\nain't nothin' here to bring you. I know that well enough.\"\n\nShe cast a comprehensive glance round over the badly furnished room.\n\n\"Nothin' at all,\" she added with a sigh.\n\nWhile she spoke Julian began to wonder, too, why he came, why he liked\nto come there. As Cuckoo said, there was nothing at all to bring him so\noften. He liked her, he was sorry for her, he had even a deep-running\nsympathy for her, but he did not love her. Yet he was fascinated to come\nto her, and there were sometimes moments when he seemed taken possession\nof, led by the hand, to that squalid room and that squalid presence in\nit. Why was that? What led him? He could not tell.\n\n\"I like coming here,\" he said; \"and of course it's nothing to Valentine\nwhere I go.\"\n\nCuckoo glanced up hastily at the words. A little serpent enmity surely\nhissed in them. Julian spoke as if he were a man with some rebel feeling\nat his heart. But the serpent glided and was gone as he added:\n\n\"I'm always with him when I'm not with you, for I haven't seen the doctor\nfor ages.\"\n\n\"The doctor! Who's that, then,\" asked Cuckoo.\n\n\"Doctor Levillier. Surely you've heard me talk about him.\"\n\n\"No, dearie.\"\n\n\"Oh, he's a nerve-doctor, and a sort of little saint, lives for his work,\nand is a deuced religious chap, never does anything, you know.\"\n\nJulian looked at her.\n\n\"Oh,\" she said.\n\n\"And believes in everything. He's a dear little chap, the kindest heart\nin the world, good to every one, no matter who it is. He's devoted to\nValentine.\"\n\n\"Eh?\" said Cuckoo, with a long-drawn intonation of astonishment.\n\n\"I say he's devoted to Valentine,\" Julian repeated rather irritably. His\ntemper was much less certain and sunny lately than of old. \"But I believe\nhe's devoted to every one he can do any good to. We used to see him\ncontinually, but he's been abroad for weeks, looking after a bad case, a\nRussian Grand Duke in Italy, who would have him, and pays him all the\nfees he'd be getting in London. He'll be coming back directly, I think.\"\n\n\"Where does he live?\" said Cuckoo, ever so carelessly.\n\nJulian gave the number in Harley Street rather abstractedly. Their\nconversation had led him to think of the little doctor. Would he be glad\nto see him again? And would Valentine? He tried to realize, and presently\nunderstood, and had a moment of shame at his own feeling. Soon afterwards\nhe went away. That night, before she went to Piccadilly, Cuckoo walked\nround to Harley Street. She wandered slowly down the long thoroughfare\nand presently came to the doctor's house. There was a brass plate upon\nthe door. The light from a gas lamp, just lit, flickered upon it, and\nCuckoo, stopping, bent downwards and slowly read the printed name,\n\"Doctor Levillier.\" Did it look a nice name, a kind name? She considered\nthat question childishly, standing there alone. Then, without making up\nher mind on the subject, she turned to go. As she did so she saw the tall\nfigure of a man motionless under the gas-lamp on the other side of the\nstreet. He was evidently regarding her, and Cuckoo felt a sudden thrill\nof terror as she recognized Valentine. They stood still on the two\npavements for a minute, looking across at one another. Cuckoo could only\nsee Valentine's face faintly, but she fancied it was angry and distorted,\nand her terror grew. She hesitated what to do, when he made what seemed\nto her a threatening gesture, and walked quickly away down the street.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS BUCKLES ON HER ARMOUR\n\n\nThat evening Cuckoo remained in a condition of mingled terror and\nresolution. There was something about Valentine that filled her, not\nmerely with alarm, but with a nameless horror, indescribable and\ninveterate. She felt that he was her deadly enemy and the enemy of\nJulian. But he had cast such a spell over Julian that the latter was\nblinded and ready to follow him anywhere, and not merely to follow him,\nbut to defend every step he took. Cuckoo had a sense of entering upon a\ncombat with Valentine. As she stood upon the doorstep in Harley Street\nand faced him under the gas-lamp, were they not as antagonists definitely\ncrossing swords for the first time? It seemed so to her. And the\nimpression upon her was so strong and so exciting, that for once she\nbroke through her invariable routine. Instead of going to Piccadilly she\nwent home to her lodgings. It was about half-past nine when she arrived\nand opened the door with her latchkey. Mrs. Brigg happened to be in the\npassage _en route_ to the kitchen from some business in the upper\nregions. She stared upon Cuckoo with amazement.\n\n\"What ever,\" she began, her voice croaky with interrogation. \"Are you\nill? What are you back for?\"\n\n\"I'm all right,\" said Cuckoo crossly. \"Leave me alone, do.\"\n\nShe turned into her sitting-room. Mrs. Brigg followed, open-mouthed.\n\n\"Ain't you a-goin' out ag'in?\"\n\n\"No; oh do leave off starin'. What's the matter with you?\"\n\nMrs. Brigg heaved a thick sigh and shuffled round upon her heels, which\nmade a noise upon the oilcloth like the boots of the comic man at a\nmusic-hall.\n\n\"Well,\" she said with a sudden grimness, \"I hope it'll be all right about\nthe rent, that's all.\"\n\nShe vanished, shaking her head, on which a stray curl-paper, bereft of\nits comrades of the morning, sat unique in a thin forest of iron-grey\nwisps.\n\nCuckoo shut her door and sat down to think. But at first she had to\nreceive the attentions of Jessie, who was even more surprised than Mrs.\nBrigg at her unexpected return, and who began to bark with shrill joy\nand run violently round the room with the speed of a rat emancipated from\na cage. As she would not consent to repose herself again, Cuckoo at last\nput her into the next room, on the bed, and shut the door on her. Then\nshe returned, lit all the three gas-burners and turned them full on,\nbefore she removed her hat, and definitely settled herself in for the\nevening. She was fearful, and dreaded darkness, or even twilight. The\npulse of London beat round her while she stretched herself on the hard\nsofa, let down her touzled yellow hair, and frowned slowly as the\nunlearned do when they know that they want to meditate.\n\nNow and then she rose suddenly on her elbow, half turned her head towards\nthe window and listened. She had thought she heard a step on the pavement\npause, and the cry of the little iron gate. Then, reassured, she leaned\nback once more. She had taken off her boots, and her feet, in black\nstockings gone a little white at the toes, were tilted up on the shoulder\nof the sofa. She fixed her eyes mechanically upon them while she began,\nall-confusedly, and with the blurred vagueness of the illiterate, to plan\nout a campaign. Not that she said that word to herself; she did not know\nits meaning. All that she knew was, that she wanted to put her back\nagainst the wall, or get into an angle, like a cornered animal, and use\nher teeth and claws against Valentine, that menacing figure with an\nangel's face. And what disgusted and drove Cuckoo almost mad as she\nlay there in the crude gaslight was the abominable fact that she was\ndesperately afraid of Valentine. There was something about him which\nfilled her not only with intense horror, but with something worse than\nhorror,--intense fear. Why, she had all three gas-burners alight because,\nhaving met him that night and seen him watching her, she trembled at the\nfaintest shadow and must see things plainly, lest their dim outlines\nshould appal her fancy by taking his form.\n\nOnly once had the lady of the feathers known such enfeebling terror as\nthis, on the night when she fled from the hotel in the Euston Road and\nleft Marr dying on the bed between the tall windows. More than once,\nin her thoughts, had she loosely linked Marr with Valentine, puzzled,\nscarcely knowing why she did so. And, she repeated the mental operation\nnow more definitely. They had at least one thing in common, this\nextraordinary power of striking fear into her soul. And Cuckoo was\nnot accustomed to sit with fear. Her life had bred in her a strong,\ntough-fibred restlessness. She was essentially a careless creature, ready\nto argue, quarrel, hold her own with anybody, proud, as a rule, of being\na match for any man and well able to take care of herself. She had\nknocked about, and was utterly familiar with many horrors of the streets,\nand of nameless houses. She had heard many rows at night; had been in\nbrawls; had been waked, in the dense hours, by sudden sharp cries for\nhelp; was accustomed to be alone with strangers, men of unknown history,\nof unknown deeds. And all these circumstances she met with absolute\ncarelessness, with a devil-may-care laugh, or the sigh of one weary, but\nnot afraid. She was no more timid than the average English street-boy.\nOnly these two men, one dead, one alive, knew how to dress her in terror\nfrom head to foot, brain, heart, and body. And so she joined them in a\nghastly brotherhood.\n\nBut to-night she was making a conscious effort against the domination of\nValentine, for the awakening of fear in her was counterbalanced by other\nfeelings prompting her to fight. And once Cuckoo began to fight she felt\nthat she would not lack courage. For she clung to action, and hated\nthought, walking clearly in the one, but through a maze in the other.\n\nDespite her fear of him, something drove her to fight Valentine; only she\ndid not know how to fight him. It was in a mood of doubt that she had\nwandered into Harley Street and bent to read the name on the door of\nDr. Levillier. Julian's description of the doctor had appealed to her.\nThe mention of his goodness, of his pure life, of his care for others,\nhad impressed her, she scarcely knew why, and brought into her mind a\ndesire to see this little man. Yet he was devoted to Valentine. And then\nCuckoo, lying back on the sofa, felt heart-sick, wondering at the power\nof this man whom she hated and feared, wondering how she could ever fight\nagainst his influence over Julian; wondering, too, a little, why it was\nthat she knew she must and certainly would fight it. For beyond the\nmotive power of her love and jealousy, beyond the ordinary woman's desire\nto keep the man she admired from sinking to the level of the men she\ndespised, there was another fiery and strong and urging insistent\ninfluence working upon her, working within her, crying to her, like a\nvoice, to buckle on her armour and to do battle with the enemy. This\ninfluence came silently from without, and spoke to the lady of the\nfeathers when she was alone, and never more clearly and powerfully than\nto-night. It wrestled with her terror of Valentine, and told her to put\nit away, to come into closer relations with him fearlessly, not to flee\nfrom him, but rather to watch him, dog him, learn what he was and what\nhe was doing or trying to do. Yet fear fought this growing, stirring,\nstrange warm influence that burned like a fire at Cuckoo's heart. She\nflushed and she paled as she lay there, with down-drawn brows and enlaced\nhands, her yellow hair falling over the hard, shiny horsehair of the\nsofa. She longed for some one to come to her who would give her counsel,\nhelp, courage, that she might fight for Julian, who was too spell-bound\nto fight for himself, and who was falling so fast, so terribly fast,\ninto the abyss where men crawl like insects and women are as poisonous\nweeds in the slime of the pit.\n\nOh, for some one!\n\nInvoluntarily she sat up and extended her thin arms almost as if in a\nbeckoning gesture.\n\nAs she did so the front door bell rang.\n\nCuckoo was startled and felt as if it rang for her. But that was\nunlikely; and there were other lodgers of her kind in the house. No\ndoubt it was a visitor for one of them.\n\nMrs. Brigg went in weary procession along the passage and opened the\ndoor. A few words were indistinctly spoken in a man's voice. Then the\nstreet door shut, and almost simultaneously the door of Cuckoo's\nsitting-room opened very quietly and Valentine entered.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nVALENTINE EXPOUNDS THE GOSPEL OF INFLUENCE TO THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\nValentine closed the door behind him and stood by it, looking at Cuckoo\ngravely. She had pushed herself up on the sofa, using her elbows as a\nlever, and in an awkward attitude, half sitting, half lying down, stared\nat him with startled eyes. Her unshod feet were drawn in towards her\nbody, and her dyed hair hung in a thick tangle round her face and on her\nshoulders. She said nothing.\n\nValentine put his hat down on the table and began to take off his gloves.\n\n\"I am glad to find you at home,\" he said politely.\n\nCuckoo shifted a little farther back on the sofa. Now that she was\nactually shut up alone with Valentine, fear returned upon her and\nbanished every other feeling, every desire except the desire to be\naway from him. She ran her tongue over her lips, which had suddenly\nbecome dry.\n\n\"What are you come for?\" she asked, never taking her eyes from his.\n\n\"To see you. I have never yet returned your kind call upon me.\"\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\nCuckoo spoke in the tone of one who had become deaf, and she felt as if\nthe agitation of her mind actually clamoured within her like a crowd of\nhuman voices, deadening sounds from without. Valentine repeated his\nremark, adding:\n\n\"Won't you ask me to sit down?\"\n\nHe put his hand on the back of a chair.\n\n\"May I?\"\n\nCuckoo gave her body a jerk which brought her feet down to the floor, so\nthat she was sitting upright. She pushed out one of her hands as if in\nprotest.\n\n\"You can't sit here,\" she murmured.\n\n\"I? Why not?\"\n\n\"I can't have you here, nor I won't either.\"\n\nHer voice was growing louder and fiercer as the first paralysis of\nsurprise died gradually away from her. After all, she had not buckled\non her armour only to run away from the enemy in it. The street Arab\nimpudence was not quite killed in her by the strange influence of this\nman. The mere fact of having her feet firmly planted upon the floor gave\nCuckoo a certain fillip of courage, and she tossed her head with that old\nvulgar gesture of hers which suggested the harridan. She pointed to the\ndoor.\n\n\"Out you go!\" she cried.\n\nFor her intrepidity had not risen to calm contemplation of an interview.\nShe was only bracing herself up to the necessary momentary endurance of\nhis presence, which followed upon Mrs. Brigg's admittance of him within\nthe door.\n\nValentine heard the gentle hint unmoved, and replied to it by drawing\na chair out from the table and sitting down upon it. A sort of rage,\nstirred by terror, ran over Cuckoo. She seized the back of his chair\nwith both hands and shook it violently.\n\n\"No, you don't stay,\" she ejaculated; \"I won't have it!\"\n\nIt was characteristic of her to lose all sense of dignity at an instant,\nwhen dignity might have served her purpose. Her outburst might have been\ndirected against a statue. Valentine neither moved nor looked in any way\naffected. Glancing at Cuckoo with a whimsical amusement, he said:\n\n\"What a child you are! When will you learn wisdom!\"\n\nCuckoo took away her hands. A conviction pierced her that the weapons a\nwoman may use with effect against an ordinary man could be of no service\nnow, and with this man. She faded abruptly from anger and violence into\nfatigue, always closely accompanied by fear.\n\n\"I'm awfully tired to-night,\" she said. \"Please do go! I'm home because\nI'm tired.\"\n\n\"The walk from Harley Street was too much for you. You shouldn't make\nsuch exertions.\"\n\nFor the first time a sinister note rang in his voice.\n\n\"I shall go where I like,\" Cuckoo answered, and this time with some real\nsturdiness of manner. \"It ain't nothin' to you where I go, nor what I\ndo.\"\n\n\"How can you tell that?\"\n\nShe laid her chin in the upturned palms of her two hands, planting her\nelbows on her knees.\n\n\"How can it be?\" she said. \"I'm nothin' to you, nor I ain't going to be\neither.\"\n\n\"That's what you say.\"\n\n\"And it's God's truth too!\" she cried again with violence, as the sense\nof Valentine's inflexible power grew in her.\n\n\"I'm going to smoke if you will allow me,\" Valentine said.\n\nSlowly he drew out and lit a cigarette, Cuckoo neither refusing nor\npermitting it. With protruding lips he threw the light smoke round him.\nThen speaking through it he said:\n\n\"Tell me why you go to Harley Street.\"\n\n\"I ain't goin' to talk to you.\"\n\n\"Tell me why. It lies out of your beat; it's a respectable thoroughfare.\"\n\nThe words were said to sting. Cuckoo let them go by. She had been stung\ntoo often, and repetition of cruelty sometimes kills what it repeats. She\nset her lips to silence, with a look of obstinacy not impressive, but\nmerely mulish and childish.\n\n\"Well?\" Valentine said.\n\nShe made no answer. He did not seem angry, but continued:\n\n\"You find few fish for your net there, I imagine. But perhaps you don't\ngo for fish. What was the name you read upon the door while I watched\nyou?\"\n\nThis time Cuckoo, changing her mind, as she often did, with all the\nswiftness of a crude nature, answered him:\n\n\"You know well enough!\"\n\n\"It was Dr. Levillier, wasn't it?\"\n\nShe nodded her head silently.\n\n\"Why do you go to his door? What do you want with him?\"\n\nCuckoo's quick woman's instinct detected a suspicion of something that\nwas like anxiety in his voice as he said the words. In an instant the\nwarm impulse that, in her silent meditation, had led her to buckle on her\narmour and to think, with a certain courage, that she was to fight one\nday, stirred and glowed and leaped up, an impulse greater than herself.\nThe fear that had fallen upon her was lessened, for she felt that this\nman, too, might, nay did, know fear.\n\n\"What's that to you?\"\n\nShe turned upon him boldly with the question, and he knew her for\nthe first time as an antagonist, who might actively attack as well as\npassively hate. He leaned forward, and looked into her eyes searchingly,\nwith a sort of rapture, of anxiety, too. It recalled something to Cuckoo.\nShe tried to remember what, but for a moment could not. Then, as if\nreassured, he resigned his eager and nervous posture of inquiry. That\nsecond movement brought the light that Cuckoo's puzzled mind sought.\nIt was Julian who had looked first into her eyes with that strange\nwatchfulness. These men echoed one another in that glance which she\ncould not understand. What they sought in her eyes she could not tell.\nIf it were the same thing it could not be love. And it seemed to be a\nthing that they feared to find.\n\n\"Doctor Levillier is a great friend of mine,\" Valentine said. \"He is a\nfamous nerve-doctor. Seeing you hovering about his door led me to suppose\nyou might be ill, and were going to consult him. I hope you are not ill.\"\n\n\"Not I!\"\n\n\"Because he is away from home at present.\"\n\n\"Oh!\"\n\n\"Do you want to see him?\"\n\n\"I suppose I can see him, like any one else, if I've a mind to.\"\n\n\"Well! He's--he doesn't see quite every one. His practice is only among\nthe richest and smartest people in town. Some one else might answer your\npurpose better.\"\n\nHe spoke suavely, but the words he said cemented Cuckoo's previously\nvague thought of trying, perhaps, to see Doctor Levillier into a sudden,\nstrong determination. She divined that, for some reason, Valentine was\nanxious that she should not see him. That was enough. She would, at\nwhatever cost, make his acquaintance.\n\n\"I'll see him if I like,\" she said hastily, lost to any appreciation\nof wisdom, through the desire of aiming an instant blow at Valentine.\n\n\"Of course! Why not?\" was his reply.\n\n\"You don't want me to. I can see that,\" she went on, still more\nunadvisedly. \"You needn't think as you can get over me so easily.\"\n\nValentine's smile showed a certain contempt that angered her.\n\n\"I know you,\" she cried.\n\n\"Do you?\" he said. \"I wonder if you would like to know me? Do you\nremember Marr?\"\n\nThe lady of the feathers turned cold.\n\n\"Marr!\" she faltered; \"what of him?\"\n\n\"You have not forgotten him.\"\n\n\"He's dead!\"\n\nA pause.\n\n\"He's dead, I say.\"\n\n\"Exactly! As dead as a strong man who has lived long in the world ever\ncan be.\"\n\n\"What d'you mean? I say he's dead and buried and done with.\" Her voice\nwas rather noisy and shrill.\n\n\"That's just where you make a mistake,\" Valentine said quite gravely,\nrather like a philosopher about to embark upon an argument. \"He is not\ndone with. Suppose you fear a man, you hate him, you kill him, you put\nhim under the ground, you have not done with him.\"\n\n\"I didn't kill him! I didn't, I didn't!\" Cuckoo cried out, shrilly,\nhalf rising from the sofa. A wild suspicion suddenly came over her that\nValentine was pursuing her as an avenger of blood, under the mistaken\nidea that she had done Marr to death in the night.\n\n\"Hush! I know that. He died naturally, as a doctor would say, and he has\nbeen buried; and by now probably he is a shell that can only contain the\ndarkness of his grave. Yet, for all that, he's not done with, Miss\nBright.\"\n\n\"He is! he is!\" she persisted.\n\nThe mention of Marr always woke terror in her. She sat, her eyes fixed\non Valentine, her memory fixed on Marr. Perhaps for this reason what her\nmemory saw and what her eyes saw seemed gradually to float together,\nand fuse and mingle, till eyes and memory mingled, too, into one sense,\nobservant of one being only, neither wholly Marr nor wholly Valentine,\nbut both in one. She had linked them together vaguely before, but never\nas now. Yet even now the clouds were floating round her and the vapours.\nShe might think she saw, but she could not understand, and what she saw\nwas rather a phantom standing in a land of mirage than a man standing\nin the world of men.\n\n\"Some day, perhaps, I will prove to you that he is not,\" Valentine said.\n\n\"Eh, how?\"\n\nShe had lost all self-consciousness now, and in her eagerness of fear,\nwonder, and curiosity seemed tormented by the veil of yellow hair that\nwas flopping in frizzy strands round her face and over her eyes. She\nseized it in her two hands, and with a few shooting gestures, in and out,\nwound it into a dishevelled lump, which she stuck to the back of her head\nwith two or three pins. All the time she was looking at Valentine for an\nanswer to her question.\n\n\"Perhaps I don't know how yet.\"\n\n\"Yes, you do, though. I can see you do. What have you got to do with him,\nwith Marr?\"\n\n\"I never said I had anything to do with him.\"\n\n\"Ah! but you have. I always knew it!\"\n\n\"Many men are linked together by thin, perhaps invisible threads,\nimpalpable and impossible to define.\"\n\nThe lady of the feathers was out of her depth in this sentence, so she\nonly tossed her head and murmured:\n\n\"Oh, I dessay!\" with an effort after contempt.\n\nBut Valentine's mood seemed to change. An abstracted gaiety stole over\nhim. If it was simulated, the simulation was very perfect and complete.\nSitting back in his chair, the cigarette smoke curling lightly round\nhim, his large blue eyes glancing gravely now at Cuckoo crumpled up on\nthe horsehair sofa, now meditatively at some object in the little room,\nor at the ceiling, he spoke in a low, clear, level voice, as if uttering\nhis thoughts aloud, careless or oblivious of any listener.\n\n\"Every man who lives, and who has a personality, has something to do with\nmany men whom he has never seen, whom he will never see. Messengers go\nfrom him as carrier-pigeons go from a ship. He may live alone, as a ship\nis alone in mid-ocean, but the messengers are winged, and their wings are\nstrong. They fly high and they fly far, and wherever they pause and rest,\nthat man has left a mark, has stamped himself, has uttered himself, has\nplanted a seed of his will. Have you a religion?\"\n\nValentine stopped abruptly after uttering this question, and waited for\nan answer. It was characteristic enough.\n\n\"What?\" said the lady of the feathers, staring wide-eyed.\n\n\"I say, have you a religion?\"\n\n\"Not I. How can I when I don't go to no church?\"\n\n\"That is, no doubt, a convincing proof of heathendom. And yet I have a\nreligion that never leads me to a church door. My religion is will, my\ngospel is the gospel of influence, and my god is power. Will binds the\nworld into a net, whose strands are like iron. Will dies if it is weak,\nbut if it is strong enough it becomes practically immortal. But, though\nit lives itself, it has the power to kill others. It can murder a soul in\na man or a woman, and throw it into the grave to decay and go to dust,\nand in the man it can create a soul diametrically opposite to the corpse,\nand the world will say the man is the same; but he is not the same. He is\nanother man. Or if the will is not strong enough actually to kill a\nsoul\"--at this point Valentine spoke more slowly, and there was a certain\nnote of uneasiness, even almost of agitation, in his voice--\"it can yet\nexpel it from the body in which it resides, and drive it, like a new\nIshmael, into the desert, where it must hover, useless, hopeless,\ndegraded, and naked, because it has no body to work in. Yes! yes! that\nmust be so! The soul can have no power divorced from the body! none!\nnone!\"\n\nHe got up from his chair, and began to pace the little room. Cuckoo\nwatched him as a child might watch a wild animal in its cage. His face\nwas hard and thin with deep thought, and hers was contorted under her\nyellow hair--contorted in a frantic effort to grasp and to understand\nwhat he was saying; for, stupid, ignorant as the lady of the feathers\nwas, she had a sharp demon in her that often told her the truth, and\nthis demon whispered now in her ear:\n\n\"Listen, and you may learn things that you long to know!\"\n\nAnd she listened motionless, her eyes bright and eager, her lips shut\ntogether, her slim body a-quiver with intensity, mental and physical.\n\n\"How can it?\" Valentine went on. \"What is a soul without a body? You\ncannot see it. You cannot hear it, and if you think you can, that is\na vile trick of the mind, an hallucination. For if one man can see it,\nwhy not another? Here, let me look into your eyes again.\"\n\nAs he said the last words, he stopped opposite to Cuckoo, suddenly caught\nher chin in his two hands, which felt hard and cold, and forcibly pushed\nup her face towards his. She was terrified, beginning now to think him\nmad, and to fear personal injury. Gazing hard and furtively into her\neyes, he said:\n\n\"No; it's a lie! It is not there. It never was! It is dead and finished\nwith, and I won't fear it.\"\n\nAs if struck by the fatigue of some sudden reaction, he sank down again\ninto his chair, and went on with his apparently fantastic monologue:\n\n\"And if it was ever alive, what could it do? A soul can't work, except\nthrough a body; it must fasten on a body, and bend the body to its\nwill--man is such a creature that he can only be influenced through flesh\nand blood, nerves, sinews, eyes, things he can see, things that he can\nhear. He is so grovelling that nothing more delicate than these really\nappeals to him.\"\n\nAgain, and this time with less abstraction, and with a sort of\ncontemptuous humour, he turned to the lady of the feathers, and\ncontinued, as if once more aware of her presence:\n\n\"Are you imbibing my gospel, the gospel of will and of influence? I see\nyou are by your pretty attitude and by the engaging face you are making\nat me. Well, don't get it wrong. A gospel gone wrong in a mind is\ndangerous, and worse than no gospel at all. If you get this gospel wrong\nyou may become conceited, and fancy yourself possessed of a power which\nyou haven't a notion of. To use will in any really affective way, you\nmust train your body, and take care of it, not ruin it, and let it run\nto seed, or grow disfigured, or a ghastly tell-tale, a truth-teller, a\ntown-crier with a big bell going about and calling aloud all the silly\nor criminal things you do. Now you have forgotten this, or perhaps you\nnever knew it, and so will could not work in you; not even, I believe,\na malign will to do mischief. You have thrown your body to the wolves,\nand whoever looks upon you must see the marks of their teeth.\"\n\nIt was evident that he gloated on this idea that the body of the lady of\nthe feathers was forever useless for good, and even powerless to do much\neffective evil. He seemed to revel in the notion that she was simply a\nthing powerless, negative, and totally vain.\n\n\"I was mad ever to imagine the contrary,\" he said. Then, glancing away\nfrom personality, he exclaimed with more energy:\n\n\"But sometimes a will is so great, so trained, so watchful of\nopportunities, so acute and ready, that, instead of passing away\npractically on the passing away of the body in which it has been born\nand has lived, and merely living and working through the emanations\nof itself that have clung to men and women in many different places,\ninstead--in fact--of being diffused--you understand me?\" he broke\nout, with an obvious delight in the grossness of her ignorance and the\ndenseness of her bewilderment and misunderstanding of him--\"which is a\nsort of death, it seizes, whole, as a body, with all the members sound,\nupon another home. It commits, in effect, a great act of brigandage.\nIt lives on complete, powerful--even more powerful than ever before,\nbecause to all its original powers it adds a glory of deception, and\nis a living lie. If only you could understand me!\"\n\nSuddenly he burst into a peal of laughter that was a full stop to his\nphilosophy. His cigarette had gone out. He threw it into the grate and\nstretched out his arms, still laughing. And Cuckoo gazing at him, as if\nfascinated, said silently to herself, \"If only I could!\"\n\nFor she felt as if Valentine were telling her a great secret, secure in\nthe hideous knowledge that, though she heard it, it must remain a secret\nfrom her on account of her ignorance and of her stupidity. There was\nsomething in that feeling peculiarly maddening, yet Cuckoo displayed no\nirritation. The sharp little demon at her elbow whispered to her to be\nsilent, told her that she might learn, might yet understand, if she would\nplay a part, and be no more the wildcat, the foolishly impulsive lady of\nthe feathers. Valentine struck his hand upon the table, and repeated:\n\n\"Why--why can't you understand?\"\n\nThe piquancy of the situation evidently delighted his mind and his\nsense of mischief. He enjoyed playing the philosopher to a fool; and\nthe more the fool became a fool, the higher soared his philosophy and\nhis appreciation of it. There is always something paradoxical in wisdom\ninstructing folly, for, after all, folly can never really learn, can\nnever really understand. Valentine hugged that thought.\n\n\"Go on,\" the lady of the feathers said, apparently in gaping wonderment.\n\n\"Why? do you mean to tell me you are interested?\"\n\n\"I'm listenin'! It sounds wonderful!\"\n\n\"It is wonderful!\" Valentine cried. \"Every living lie is wonderful.\nBut you don't know yet much about will. My gospel is full of secrets\nand of subtleties, and only a few people are beginning to guess at its\nfar-reaching power, and to aim at learning its truths and sounding\nits depths. And many unbelievers play with it, and never know that they\nare playing with fire. A man did this once. Shall I tell you about him?\"\n\n\"Yes!\" said Cuckoo.\n\nAnd her soul cried to the darkness in which she imagined some vague power\nto dwell; cried aloud for understanding. This silent cry was so intense\nthat she lay back upon the hard sofa, almost exhausted, and as she lay\nthere, something hot, like fire, seemed to make its nest in her heart,\nand to flame there, and to be alive, as a flame is alive, and to speak to\nher, but not aloud, as a flame speaks in the coals to the imagination of\nthe watcher by the hearth. In that moment the lady of the feathers felt\nas if she were conscious of a new companion, a companion full of some\nintensity towards her, some anxiety about her, anxious and brilliant as a\nflame is, vital, keen, blazing, intense. Although she could not define\nher sensation thus, that lack of analytical power could not deprive her\nof it. She knew that her vision became clearer, that her mind became\nbrighter, that a light illumined her, that she was, for the moment,\ngreater than herself. But Valentine did not know it. He looked towards\nthe sofa and saw spread upon it a thin, painted, haggard young creature\ncurled into a position at once passionate, languid, and merely awkward,\nwith relentless, thickly tangled hair, staring eyes, and half-opened\nlips, glowering in rouged stupidity and a coarseness of the gutter. He\nwas a philosopher, with a beauty of the stars and of snows, with a\nrefinement, white in its brilliance. She was an image of Regent Street,\na ghastly idol of the town; and he was telling her strange things that\nshe could never comprehend, in a jargon that was to her as Greek or as\nHebrew. It was too absurd. Yet he loved to tell her, and he could\nscarcely tell why he loved it.\n\n\"Go on,\" said the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"This man,\" Valentine said, assuming a devout earnestness to trick her\nmore, and watching for the puzzled expression to grow and to deepen in\nher eyes,--\"this man had a holy nature, or I will say an unalterable will\nto do only things pure, reserved, refined--things that could not lead his\nbody into difficulties, or his mind into quagmires. He was a saint\nwithout a religion. That is a possibility, I assure you; for a will\ncan be amazingly independent. He had the peculiar grace that is said to\nbelong to angels, a definite repugnance to sin. I know you understand\nme.\"\n\nShe nodded bluntly.\n\n\"I know--he couldn't go wrong, if it was ever so,\" she ejaculated.\n\n\"If it was ever so--as the housemaids say--you put the position of this\nman in a nutshell, and if this strange will of his had never relented,\nthe transformation I am going to describe, or--\" he paused for a moment\nas if in doubt, then continued--\"or rather to hint at, would never have\ntaken place. But he grew dissatisfied with his will. It bored him ever so\nlittle. He fancied he would like to change it, and to substitute for it\nthe will of the world. And the will of the world, as you know well, my\nlady of the feathers, is to sin. For some time he longed, vaguely enough,\nto be different, to be, in fact, lower down in the scale than he was.\nBut his longing to be able to desire sin did not lead him to desire it\nactually. One can force one's self to do a thing, you see, but one cannot\nforce one's self to wish to do it, or to enjoy doing it. And this man,\nbeing a selfish saint--saints are very often very selfish--would not sin\nwithout desiring it. So it seemed that he must remain forever as he was,\na human piece of flawless porcelain, wishing to be cracked and common\ndelft.\"\n\n\"Whatever did he wish it for?\" asked Cuckoo, with the surprise of a zany.\n\n\"Who can tell why one man wishes for one thing, another for another?\nThat, too, is a mystery. The point is, that he did wish it, and that he\ndid something more.\"\n\n\"What was that, eh?\"\n\n\"He deliberately tried to weaken and to deface his will; to alter it.\nAnd he chose curious means, acting under suggestion from another will\nor influence that was more powerful than his own, because it was utterly\nself-satisfied and desired only to be what it was. I don't think I will\ntell you what the means were. But his original dissatisfaction with his\nown goodness was the weapon that brought about his own destruction. His\nwill did not change, as he believed; but what do you think actually\nhappened to it? I will tell you. It was expelled from his body. He lost\nit forever. He lost, in fact, his identity. For will is personality,\nsoul, the ego, the man himself. And this soul, if you choose to call it\nso, was driven into the air. It went away in the darkness, like a bird.\nDo you see?\"\n\nHe waved his hand upward, and lifted his eyes, as if following with them\nthe flight that he described.\n\n\"It flew away!\"\n\n\"Where did it go?\" ejaculated Cuckoo.\n\nValentine seemed suddenly to become fully aware of the depth of her\ninterest.\n\n\"Ah! even you are fascinated by my gospel, you who cannot understand it,\"\nhe said. \"But I cannot tell you where it went. I too have wondered.\"\n\nHe knit his brows rather moodily over this question of location. \"I too\nhave wondered. But I imagine that it died; that it ceased to be. Divorced\nfrom the body that was its home, degraded by dissatisfaction with itself,\nof what use could it be to any one? Even if it still continues to be, it\nis practically dead, for it can work neither harm nor good to any one,\nand the thing that cannot be good or evil, or turn others towards the\none or the other, is dead. It is no more a will. It is no more an\ninfluence. It is a heart without a pulse in it; in fact, it is nothing.\"\n\nA sort of joy had leapt into his face as he dwelt on this idea of\nnothingness, and he added:\n\n\"It is something like your soul, my lady of the feathers. Do you hear\nme?\"\n\n\"Yes. I hear!\"\n\n\"But the will that ousted it gained in power by that triumph. Totally\nself-satisfied, desirous of being only that which it is, having no enemy\nof yearning disappointment with itself in its camp, it can do what will\nnever did before. It can lead captive the soul that was formerly the\ncaptive of the soul that it drove away to die. Like an enemy it has\nseized its opponent's camp, and the slave dwelling in that camp is now\nits slave forever.\"\n\nAs Valentine spoke he seemed to become almost intoxicated with the\nthoughts conjured up by his own words. His blue eyes blazed with a fury\nof shining excitement. His white cheeks were suffused with blood.\n\n\"I have made myself, my will, a god!\" he exclaimed passionately.\n\nAt the words the lady of the feathers moved suddenly forward on the sofa.\n\n\"What--_you_!\" she said.\n\nThe last word was uttered with an intensity that could surely only\nspring from something near akin to comprehension, if not from actual\ncomprehension itself. It certainly startled Valentine, or seemed to\nstartle him. His face showed an amazement like the amazement of\na man raving to an image of wood, to whom, abruptly, the wood speaks\nwith a tongue.\n\n\"What do you mean?\" he said, and his voice faltered from its note of\ntriumph and of exultation.\n\nCuckoo resumed her former position.\n\n\"Only was you the will, or the man, or whatever it all is?\" she replied\nin the voice of one hopelessly muddled.\n\nValentine was reassured as to her stupidity.\n\n\"That has nothing to do with the story,\" he said.\n\n\"There was two of them, was there?\" she persisted, but still with the\naccent of a hopeless dullard.\n\n\"Oh yes. One will must always work upon another, or else there could be\nno story worth the telling.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see; that's it.\"\n\nValentine again broke into laughter.\n\n\"You see, do you?\" he said. \"You see that, but do you see the truth of\nwhat I told you before about the connection of the will with the body?\nDo you see why you have no power now, can never have power again? Do you\nunderstand that the wreck of your body inevitably causes the wreck of\nyour will, so that it really dies and ceases, because it can no more\ninfluence others? Do you understand that? I'll make you understand it\nnow. Come here.\"\n\nHe got up from his chair and seized her two hands in his, dragging her\nalmost violently up from the sofa. Her fear of him, always lurking near,\ncame upon her with a rush at the contact of his hands, and she hung back,\nmoved by an irresistible repulsion. The slight and momentary struggle\nbetween them caused her hair, carelessly turned up and loosely pinned, to\ncome down. It fell all round her in a loose shock of unnatural colour.\nValentine's hands were strong, and Cuckoo soon felt that resistance was\nuseless. She let her body yield, and he drew her in front of the glass\nthat stood over the mantelpiece. Pushing back the table behind them, he\nmade her stand still in the unwinking glare of the three gas-jets, which\nshe had herself turned up earlier in the evening.\n\n\"Look there!\" he cried; \"look at yourself well! How can you have power\nover anybody?\"\n\nTheir two faces, set close together as in a frame, stared at them from\nthe mirror, and Cuckoo--forced to obedience--examined them as if indeed\nthey were a picture. She saw the man's face, fair, beautiful, refined,\ntriumphant, full of the courage that is based upon experience of itself\nand of its deeds and possibilities, full of a strange excitement that\nfilled the face with amazingly vivid expression. She saw the bright blue\neyes gazing at her, the red lips of the mouth curved in a smile. There\nwas health in the face as well as thought. And there was power, which is\ngreater than health, more beautiful even than beauty. And then she turned\nher eyes to the face's companion. Thin, sharp, faded, it met her eyes,\nhalf-shrouded in the thick, tumbled hair that shone in the mirror with\nthe peculiar frigid glare that can only be imparted by a chemical dye,\nand can never be simulated by nature. One cheek was chalk-white. The\nother, which had been pressed against the horsehair of the sofa, showed\na harsh, scarlet patch. All the varying haggard expressions of the world\nseemed crowding in the eyes of this scarecrow, and peering beneath the\nthickly blackened eyelashes that struck a violent discord against the\nyellow hair. The thin lips of the mouth were pressed together in an\nexpression of pain, fear, and weariness. Shadows slept under the eyes\nwhere the face had fallen into hollows. To-night there seemed no vestige\nof prettiness in those peaked features. Nothing of health, youth, gaiety,\nor even girlhood, was written in them, but only a terrible, a brutal\nrecord of spoliation and of wreckage, of plunder, and of despair. And\nthe gaslight, striking the flat surface of the mirror, made the record\nglitter with a thin, cheap sparkle, like the tinsel trappings of the\nlife whose story the mirror revealed in its reflection.\n\nHow, indeed, could such a creature have power over fellow man or woman\nfor good or for evil? If weakness can be written without words, it seemed\nwritten in that wasted countenance, which Cuckoo examined with a creeping\nhorror that numbed her like frost. As she did so, Valentine was watching\nthe ungraciousness of her face in the glass deepen and glide, moment by\nmoment, into greater ugliness, greater degradation. And as the little\nlight there had ever been behind those unquiet eyes, faded gradually\naway, in his reflected eyes the light leaped up into fuller glare,\nsparkling to unbridled triumph. And his reflected lips smiled more\ndefiantly, until the smile was no longer touched merely with triumph,\nbut with something more vehement and more malign! Cuckoo did not see\nthe change. She saw only herself, and her heart cried and wailed, What\ngood--what good to love Julian? What good to hate Valentine? What good\nto fight for the man she loved against the man she loathed? As well set\na doll to move its tense joints against an army, or a scarecrow to defy\na god! Never before had she realized thoroughly the complete tragedy of\nher life. Hitherto she had assisted at it in fragments, coming in for\na scene here, a scene there. Now she sat through the whole of the five\nacts, and the only thing she missed was the fall of the curtain. That\nremained up. But why? There was--there could be--nothing more to come,\nunless a dreary recapitulation of such dreary events as had already been\ndisplayed. Such a cup could hold no wine that was not foul, thick, and\npoisonous. And she had known herself so little as to imagine that she\ncould really love, and that her love might fulfil itself in protection\ninstead of sensual gratification. Yes, vaguely she had believed that.\nShe had even believed that she could put on armour and do battle\nagainst--and at this point in her desperate meditation the lady of the\nfeathers shifted her eyes from her own face mirrored to the face beside\nit. As she did so, a sudden cry escaped from her lips. For a moment she\nthought she saw the face of the dead Marr, and the hallucination was so\nvivid that when it was gone and the mirror once more revealed the face\nof Valentine, Cuckoo had no thought but that she had really seen Marr.\nShe turned sharply round and cast a glance behind her. Then:\n\n\"Did you see him?\" she whispered to Valentine.\n\n\"Whom?\"\n\n\"Him--Marr! He's not dead; he's here; he's here, I tell you. I see him in\nthe glass!\"\n\nShe shivered. The room seemed spinning round with her, and the two faces\ndanced and sprang in the mirror, as if a hand shook it up and down, from\nside to side.\n\n\"If he is here,\" Valentine said, \"it is not in the way you fancy. Your\nimagination has played you a trick.\"\n\n\"Didn't you--didn't you see him? Don't you see him now?\"\n\n\"I see only you and myself.\"\n\nAs if for a joke he bent his head and peered closely at the mirror, like\na man endeavouring to discern some very pale and dim reflection there.\n\n\"No, he's--he's not there!\" he murmured, \"but--\"\n\nWith a harsh exclamation he dashed his fist against the mirrored face of\nthe lady of the feathers. The glass cracked and broke from top to bottom.\nCuckoo cried out. Valentine's hand had blood upon it. He did not seem to\nknow this, and swung round upon her with an almost savage fury.\n\n\"Don't--don't, for God's sake,\" she cried, fearing an attack.\n\nBut he made no movement against her. On the contrary, an expression of\nrelief chased the anger from his lips and eyes.\n\n\"Ah!\" he said, \"that's a lying mirror! It lied to you and to me. I\nsmashed it. Well, I'll give you another that is more truthful, and more\nornamental too.\"\n\n\"What was it you saw?\" she murmured.\n\n\"A silly vision, power where there is only weakness; a will, a soul,\nwhere there could not be one!\"\n\n\"Eh? was it that you struck at?\"\n\n\"Why do you ask?\" he said with sudden suspicion.\n\n\"You struck where my face was,\" she said doggedly. \"You did, you did!\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\"\n\n\"It ain't! Why did you do it, then?\"\n\nA gleam of hope had shot into her eyes, lit by his weird attack upon\nher mirrored image. After all, despite his sneers at her faded body, his\ngibes at her faded and decaying soul, he struck at her as a man strikes\nat the thing he fears. In that faded soul a wild hope and courage leaped\nup, banishing all the sick despair which had preceded it. The lady of the\nfeathers faced Valentine with a deathless resolution of glance and of\nattitude.\n\n\"You've been telling lies,\" she said \"you've been telling me damned\nlies!\"\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"You said as I was--was done with.\"\n\nA forced smile came like a hissing snake on Valentine's lips.\n\n\"So you are!\"\n\n\"I ain't! I ain't! What's more, you know it!\"\n\n\"You have broken yourself to pieces as I have broken that mirror!\"\n\nHe spoke with an effort after scathing contempt, but she detected a\nquiver of agitation in his voice.\n\n\"If I have, I'll break you yet!\" she cried.\n\n\"Me? What are you talking about?\"\n\n\"You know well enough.\"\n\n\"But do you know--do you know that I--I am Marr?\"\n\nHe almost whispered the last words! A chill of awe fell over the lady of\nthe feathers. She did not understand what he meant, and yet she felt as\nif he spoke the truth, as if this inexplicable mystery were yet indeed no\nfiction, no phantasy, but stern fact, and as if, strangely, she had at\nthe back of her mind divined it, known it when she first knew Valentine,\nyet only realized it now that he himself told her. She did not speak. She\nonly looked at him, turning white slowly as she looked.\n\n\"I am Marr,\" he repeated. \"Now do you understand my gospel? Understand it\nif you can, for you are bereft of the power that belongs of right only to\nthe woman who is pure. Long ago, perhaps, you might have fought me. Who\nknows, you might even have conquered me? But you have thrown yourself to\nthe wolves, and they have torn you till you are only a skeleton. And how\ncan a soul dwell in a skeleton? Your soul, your will, is as useless as\nthat vagrant soul of Valentine, which I expelled into the air and into\nthe night. It can do nothing; you can do nothing either. If I have ever\nfeared you, and hated you because I feared you, I have fooled myself. I\nhave divined your thoughts. I have known your enmity against me, and your\nlove--_yours_!--for Julian. But if the soul and the will of Valentine\ncould not save Julian from my possession, how can yours? You are an\noutcast of the streets! Go back to the streets. Live in them! Die in\nthem! They are your past, your present, your future. They are your hell,\nyour heaven. They are everything to you. I tell you that you are as much\nof them as are the stones of the pavement that the feet of such women as\nyou tread night after night. And what soul can a street thing have? What\ncan be the will of a creature who gives herself to every man who beckons,\nand who follows every voice that calls? I feared you. I might as well\nhave feared a shadow, an echo, a sigh of the wind, or the fall of an\nautumn leaf. I might as well have feared that personal devil whom men\nraise up for themselves as a bogey. Will is God! Will is the Devil! Will\nis everything! And you--you, having tossed your will away--are nothing.\"\n\nHe had spoken gravely, even sombrely. On the last word he was gone.\n\nThe lady of the feathers stood alone in the ugly little room, and heard\nthe clock of the great church close by chime the hour of midnight. Her\nface was set and white under its rouge, in its frame of disordered\ncanary-coloured hair. Her eyes were clouded with perplexity, with horror,\nand with awe. Yet she looked undaunted. Staring at the door through which\nthe man men still called Valentine Cresswell had vanished, she whispered:\n\n\"It ain't true! It ain't! Nothin' does for a woman; not when she loves a\nman! Nothin'. Nothin'.\"\n\nShe fell down against the hard horsehair sofa, and stretched her arms\nupon it, and laid her head against them, as if she prayed.\n\n\n\n\nBOOK IV--DOCTOR LEVILLIER\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nTHE LADY VISITS DOCTOR LEVILLIER\n\n\nThe Russian Grand Duke, whose malady was mainly composed of two\ningredients, unlimited wealth and almost unlimited power, was slow\nin recovering, and slower still in making up his mind to part with the\nlittle nerve-doctor whom he had summoned from England. And so London\nwas beginning to fall into its misty autumn mood before Doctor Levillier\nwas once more established in Harley Street. He had heard occasionally\nfrom both Valentine and Julian during his long absence, but their letters\nhad not communicated much, and once or twice when he, in replying to\nthem, had put one or two friendly questions as to their doings, those\nquestions had remained unanswered. The doctor had been particularly\nreluctant to leave England at the time when the Grand Duke's summons\nreached him, as his interest and curiosity about Valentine had just been\nkeenly and thoroughly roused. But fate fought for the moment against his\ncuriosity. It remained entirely ungratified. He had not once seen\nValentine since the afternoon in Victoria Street, when the lamentation\nof that thoroughfare's saint had struck consternation into the hearts of\nmusical sinners. Nor had the doctor met any one who could give him news\nof the two youths over whose welfare his soul had learned to watch. Now,\nwhen he returned to London, he found that both Valentine and Julian were\nabroad. Only Rip, left in charge of Julian's servant, greeted him with\njoy; Rip, whose conduct had given the first strong impulse to his wonder\nand doubt about Valentine.\n\nDoctor Levillier took up the threads of his long-forsaken practice, and\ngave himself to his work while autumn closed round London. One day he\nheard casually from a patient that Valentine and Julian had returned to\ntown. He wondered that they had not let him know: the omission seemed\ncurious and unfriendly.\n\nDuring the day on which the news reached him he was, as usual,\nbusily engaged from morning till evening in the reception of\npatients. His reputation was very great, and men and women thronged\nhis consulting-rooms. Although his rule was that nobody could ever\ngain admission to him without an appointment, it was a rule made to be\nbroken. He never had the heart to turn any one from his door in distress,\nand so it frequently happened that his working-day was prolonged by the\nadmission of people who unexpectedly intruded themselves upon him. Great\nladies, more especially, often came to him on the spur of the moment,\nprompted to seek his solace by sudden attacks of the nerves. A lover had\nused them ill, perhaps, or a husband had turned upon them and had rent a\nlong dressmaker's bill into fragments, without paying it first. Or the\n_ennui_ of an exquisite life of unbridled pleasure had suddenly sprung\nupon them like a grisly spectre, torn their hearts, shaken them into\ntears. Or--and this happened often--a fantastic recognition of the\nobvious fact that even butterflies must die, had abruptly started into\ntheir minds, obtruding a skeleton head above the billowing _chiffons_,\nrattling its bones until the dismal sound outvied the _frou-frou_ of\nsilk, the burr of great waving fans, the click of high heels from Paris.\nThen, in terror, they drove to Doctor Levillier's door and begged to see\nhim, if only for a moment.\n\nThere was no doctor in London so universally sought by the sane lunatics\nof society as Dr. Levillier. He was no mad-doctor. He had no private\nasylum. He had never definitely aimed at becoming a famous specialist in\nlunacy. But the pretty lunatics came to him, nevertheless; the lunatics\nwho live at afternoon parties, till the grave yawns at their feet, and\nthey must go down the strange ways of another world, teacup in hand,\nscandal still fluttering upon their ashy lip; the lunatics who live\nfor themselves, until their eyes are hollow as tombs and their mouths\nfall in from selfishness, and their cheeks are a greenish white from\nsatiety, and lust's gratified flame beacons on their drawn cheeks and\nalong their crawling wrinkles; the lunatics who seek to be what they can\nnever be, the beauties of this world, the great Queens of the Sun, whose\ngaze shall glorify, whose smile shall crown and bless, whose touch shall\ncall hearts to agony and to worship, whose word shall take a man from\nhis plough and send him out to win renown, or snatch a leader from his\nambition and set him creeping in the dust, like a white mouse prisoned\nby a scarlet silken thread; the lunatics who dandle religions like dolls,\nand play with faiths as a boy plays with marbles, until the moment comes\nwhen the game is over, and the player is faced by the terror of a great\nlesson; the lunatics who stare away their days behind prancing horses in\nthe Park, who worship in the sacred groves of bonnets, who burn incense\nto rouged and powdered fashions, who turn literature into a \"movement,\"\nand art into a cult, and humanity into a bogey, and love into an\nadulterous sensation; the lunatics who think that to \"live\" is only\nanother word for to sin, that innocence is a prison and vice liberty; the\nlunatics who fill their boudoirs with false gods, and cry everlastingly,\n\"Baal, hear us!\" till the fire comes down from heaven, which is no\npainted ceiling presided over by a plaster god. These came to Doctor\nLevillier day by day, overtaken by sad moments, by sudden, dreary\ncrises of the soul, that set them impotently wailing, like Job among\nthe potsherds. Many of them did not \"curse God,\" only because they did\nnot believe in Him.\n\nIt is not the fashion in London to believe in God just now.\n\nDr. Levillier had always, since he was a youth, walking hospitals and\nsearching the terror of life for all its secrets, felt a deep care, a\ndeep solicitude, for each duet, body and soul, that walked the world. He\nhad never set them apart, never lost sight of one in turning his gaze\nupon the other. This fact, no doubt, accounted partially for the fact\nthat many looked upon him as the greatest nerve-doctor in London. For the\nnervous system is surely a network lacing the body to the soul, and _vice\nversa_. Every _liaison_ has its connecting links, the links that have\nbrought it into being. One lust stretches forth a hook and finds an eye\nin another, and there is union. So with faiths, with longings, with fine\naspirations, with sordid grovellings. There is ever the hook seeking the\nappropriate eye. The body has a hook, the soul an eye. They meet at birth\nand part only at death.\n\nDr. Levillier was constantly, and ignorantly, entreated to adjust the\none comfortably in the other. It is a delicate business, this adjustment,\nsometimes an impossible business. Half of the Harley Street patients came\nsaying, \"Make me well.\" What they really meant was, \"Make me happy.\" Yet\nthe most of them would have resented a valuable mixed prescription,\nadvice for the hook, and advice for the eye. Such prescriptions had to\nbe very deftly, sometimes very furtively, made up. Often the doctor felt\nan intense exhaustion steal over him towards the close of day. This\ntremendous and eternal procession passing onwards through his life,\nfiling before him like a march-past of sick soldiers, saluting him\nwith cries, and with questions, and with entreaties; this never-ceasing\nprogress fatigued him. There were moments when he longed to hide his\nface, to turn away, to shut his ears to the murmuring voices, and his\neyes to the pale, expressive faces, to put his great profession from\nhim, as one puts a beggar into the night. But these were only moments,\nand they passed quickly. And the little doctor was always bitterly\nashamed of them, as a brave man is ashamed of a secret tug of cowardice\nat his heart. For it seemed to him the greatest thing in all the world to\nhelp to make the unhappy rightly happier.\n\nAnd this was, and had always been, his tireless endeavour. Upon this day\none of these hated moments of mental and physical exhaustion had come\nupon him, and he struggled hard against his enemy. The procession of\npatients had been long, and more than once in the tiny interval between\nthe exit of one and the entry of another, Dr. Levillier had peeped at his\nwatch. His last appointment was at a quarter to five, then he would be\nfree, and he said to himself that he would take a cab and drive down to\nVictoria Street. Valentine was often at home about six. The doctor put\naside the little devil of pride that whispered, \"You have been badly\ntreated,\" and resolved to make the advance to this friend, who seemed\nto have forgotten him. In times of fatigue and depression he had often\nsought Valentine in order to be solaced by his music. But this solace was\nat an end, unless, indeed, the strange burden of musical impotence had\nbeen lifted from Valentine, and his talent had been restored to him.\n\nThe last patient came to the doctor's door punctually and was punctually\ndismissed as the clock chimed the quarter of an hour after five. The last\nprescription was written. The doctor drew in a deep breath of relief. He\ntouched the bell and his servant appeared.\n\n\"There is no one waiting?\" he asked.\n\n\"No, sir.\"\n\n\"I have made no other appointment for to-day, and I am going out almost\nimmediately. If any patients should call casually tell them I cannot\npossibly see them to-day. Ask them to make an appointment. But I cannot\nsee any one to-day under any circumstances.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\nDr. Levillier took his way upstairs, made a careful toilet, selected from\nhis absurd array of boots a pair perfectly polished, put them on, took\nhis hat and gloves, sighed once again heavily, almost as a dog sighs\npreparatory to its sleep, and turned to go downstairs. He forgot for the\nmoment that he was prepared to watch Valentine. Perhaps, indeed, his long\nperiod of absence had dulled in his memory the recollection of any\napparent change in his friend. For at this moment of fatigue he only\nrecalled Valentine's expression of purity and high-souled health, and\nthe atmosphere of lofty serenity in which he seemed habitually to dwell.\nThe doctor wanted relief. How Valentine's presence would refresh him\nafter this dreary array of patients, after the continuous murmurs of\ntheir plaintive voices! As he opened his bedroom door he perceived his\nman-servant mounting the stairs.\n\n\"Lawler, I can't see any one,\" he said, more hastily than usual. \"I told\nyou so distinctly. I am going out immediately.\"\n\nThe man paused. He had been with the doctor for many years, and both\nadored and understood him. The doctor looked at him.\n\n\"It is a patient, I suppose?\" he asked.\n\n\"Well, sir, I can't exactly say.\"\n\n\"A lady?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir. At least, sir--well, no, sir.\"\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"A female, sir.\"\n\n\"What does she want?\"\n\n\"To see you, sir. I can't get her to go. I asked her to, sir; then I told\nher to.\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"She only gave me this and said she'd come to see you, and if you were in\nshe'd wait.\"\n\nHe handed a card to his master. The doctor took it and read:\n\n\"Cuckoo Bright, 400 Marylebone Road.\"\n\nThe words conveyed nothing to his mind, for neither Julian nor Valentine\nhad ever talked to him of the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"Cuckoo Bright,\" he said. \"An odd name! And an odd person, I suppose,\nLawler?\"\n\nLawler pursed his lips rather primly.\n\n\"Very odd, sir. Not at all a usual sort of patient, sir.\"\n\n\"H'm. Go and ask her if she comes as a patient or on private business.\"\n\nThe man retreated and returned.\n\n\"The--lady says she's ill and must see you, sir, if only for a moment.\"\n\nThis was Cuckoo's ruse to get into the house, and was based upon Julian's\nlong-ago remark that the doctor could never resist helping any one who\nwas in trouble. Standing on the doorstep, she had histrionically\nsimulated faintness for the special benefit of Lawler, who regarded\nher with deep suspicion.\n\n\"I suppose I must see her,\" the doctor said with a sigh. \"Show her in,\nLawler.\"\n\nLawler departed, disapprovingly, to do so, and after a moment the doctor\nfollowed him. He walked into his consulting-room, where he found the lady\nof the feathers standing by the writing table. The autumn day was growing\ndark, and the street was full of deepening mist. Cuckoo was but a\nfantastic shadow in the room. Her dress rustled with an uneasy sound\nas the doctor came in. His first act was to turn on the electric light.\nIn a flash the rustling shadow was converted into substance. Cuckoo and\nthe doctor stood face to face, and Cuckoo's tired eyes fastened with a\nhungry, almost a wolfish, scrutiny upon this stranger. She wanted so much\nof him. The look was so full of intense meaning that, coming in a flash\nwith the electric flash, it startled the doctor. Yet he had seen\nsomething like it before in the eyes of those who suspected that they\ncarried death within them, and came to ask him if it were true. He was\nsurprised, too, by her appearance. The women of the streets did not come\nto him, although if they had been able to read the writing in his heart\nmany of them would surely have come. He shook hands with Cuckoo, told\nher to sit down, and sat down himself opposite to her.\n\n\"What is the matter? Please tell me your symptoms,\" he said gently.\n\n\"Eh?\" was the reply, spoken in a thin and high voice.\n\n\"What has been troubling you?\"\n\nCuckoo, who was wholly unaccustomed to answer a doctor's questions,\nstarted violently. She fancied from his words that he had divined the lie\nshe had told when she said that she was ill, and knew that she came for a\nmental reason. Instinctively she connected the word \"trouble\" with the\nheart, in a way that was oddly and pathetically girlish. Acting upon this\nimpulse she exclaimed:\n\n\"Then you know as I ain't ill?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier was still more surprised. Not understanding what was in\nher mind, he entirely failed to keep pace with its agility.\n\n\"Why do you come to me, then?\" he asked.\n\n\"Oh,\" she returned, with a quickly gathering hesitation, \"I thought as\nperhaps you knew.\"\n\n\"I! But we have never met before.\"\n\nThe doctor bent his eyes on her searchingly. For a moment he began to\nwonder whether his visitor was quite right in her head. Cuckoo shuffled\nunder his gaze. The very kindliness of his face and gentleness of his\nvoice made her feel hot and abashed. A prickly sensation ran over her\nbody as she cleared her throat and said, monosyllabically:\n\n\"No.\"\n\nThe doctor waited.\n\n\"What is it?\" he said at length. \"Tell me why you have called. If you are\nnot ill, what is it you want of me?\"\n\n\"You'll laugh, p'r'aps.\"\n\n\"Laugh? Is it something funny, then?\"\n\n\"Funny! Not it!\"\n\nThe sound of her voice seemed to give her some courage, for she went on\nwith more hardy resolution:\n\n\"Look here, you can see what I am--oh yes, you can--and you wonder what\nI'm doin' here. Well, if I tell you, will you promise as you won't laugh\nat me?\"\n\nThis was Cuckoo's way of delicately sounding the doctor's depths. She\nthought it decidedly subtle.\n\n\"Yes, I'll promise that,\" the doctor said.\n\nHe looked at her faded young face and felt no inclination to laugh.\n\n\"Well, then,\" Cuckoo said, more excitedly, \"you know Ju--Mr. Addison,\ndon't you?\"\n\nThe doctor began to see a ray of light.\n\n\"Certainly I do,\" he said.\n\n\"And Mr. Cresswell?\"\n\n\"He is one of my most intimate friends.\"\n\nThe words were spoken with an unconscious warmth that chilled Cuckoo. For\nsurely the man who spoke thus of the man she hated, must be her enemy.\nShe faltered visibly, and a despairing expression crept into her eyes.\n\n\"I don't know as it's any use my sayin' it,\" she began as if half to\nherself.\n\nThe doctor saw that she was much troubled and the kindness of his nature\nwas roused.\n\n\"Don't be afraid of me,\" he said. \"You have come here to tell me\nsomething, tell it frankly. I am a friend of both the people you\nmention.\"\n\n\"You can't be that,\" she suddenly cried. \"Nobody can't be that!\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"You ought to know.\"\n\nShe said it fiercely. All her self-consciousness was suddenly gone, swept\naway by the flood of thought and of remembrance that was surging through\nher mind.\n\n\"Why can't you see what he is,\" she exclaimed, \"any more than he can,\nthan Julian--Mr. Addison, I mean? Any one'd think you was all mad, they\nwould.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier was glad he had admitted the lady of the feathers to his\npresence. Interest sprang up in him, alive and searching.\n\n\"Tell me what you mean,\" he said. \"Are you talking about Mr. Cresswell?\"\n\n\"Yes, I am; and I say of all the beasts in London he's the greatest.\"\n\nCuckoo did not choose her words carefully. She was highly excited and she\nwanted to be impressive. It seemed to her that to use strong language was\nthe only way to be impressive. So she used it. The doctor's face grew\ngraver.\n\n\"Surely you hardly know what you're saying,\" he said very quietly.\n\nBut his thoughts flew to that summer night when his mastiffs howled\nagainst Valentine, and he felt as if a mystery were deepening round\nhim as the autumn mist of evening deepened in the street outside.\n\n\"I do,\" she reiterated. \"I do. But nobody won't see it. And it's no use\nwhat I see. How can it be?\"\n\nThe words were almost a wail.\n\n\"Tell me what you see.\"\n\nCuckoo looked into the doctor's sincere eyes, and a sudden rush of hope\ncame to her.\n\n\"That's what I want to. But if you like him you'll only be angry.\"\n\n\"No, I shall not.\"\n\n\"Well, then. I see as he's ruinin' his friend.\"\n\n\"Ruining Mr. Addison?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nIt struck the doctor as very strange that such a girl as Cuckoo obviously\nwas should cry out in such a passionate way against the ruin of any young\nman. Was it not her fate to ruin others as she herself had been ruined?\nHe wondered what her connection with the two youths was, and perhaps his\nface showed something of his wonder, for Cuckoo added, after a long\nglance at him:\n\n\"It's true; yes, it is,\" as if she read his doubts.\n\n\"How do you come to know it?\" the doctor said, not at all unkindly, but\nas if anxious to elucidate matters.\n\n\"Why, I tell you I can see it plain. Besides,\" and here she dropped her\nvoice, \"Valentine, as he calls himself--though he ain't--as good as told\nme. He did tell me, only I couldn't understand. He knew I couldn't--d'you\nsee? That's why he told me. Oh, if he'd only tell you!\"\n\nFragments of Valentine's exposition of his deeds and of his strange\ngospel were floating through Cuckoo's mind as fragments of broken wood\nfloat by on a stream, fragments of broken wood that were part of a\npuzzle, that should be rescued by some strong hand from the stream,\nand fitted together into a perfect whole.\n\n\"Valentine! You say he told you that he was ruining Julian?\"\n\nUnconsciously the doctor used the Christian names. His doing so set\nCuckoo more at her ease.\n\n\"Yes. Not like that. But he told me. He ain't what you think, nor what\nJulian thinks. He's somebody else, and you can't tell it. He's laughing\nat you all.\"\n\nThus the gospel came forth from the painted lips of Cuckoo, crude and\ngarbled, yet true gospel. The doctor was completely puzzled. All he\ngathered from this announcement was that Valentine seemed in some way\nto have been confiding in this girl of the streets. Such a fact was\nsufficiently astounding. That they should ever have been associated\ntogether in any way was almost incredible to any one who knew Valentine.\nYet it was quite obvious that they did know each other, and in no\nordinary manner.\n\n\"Do you know Mr. Cresswell well?\" the doctor said.\n\nHe saw that he could only make the tangle clear by being to some extent\njudicial. Humanity merely excited Cuckoo to something that was violently\ninvolved, passionate, and almost hysterical.\n\n\"Well enough.\"\n\n\"And Mr. Addison?\"\n\nCuckoo flushed slowly.\n\n\"Yes, I know him--quite well.\"\n\nAn almost similar answer, but given with such a change of manner as would\nbe possible only in a woman. It told the doctor much of the truth and\ngave him the first page of a true reading of Cuckoo's character. But\nhe went on with apparently unconscious quietude:\n\n\"And you came here to tell me, who know and like them both, that the one\nis ruining the other. What made you come to me?\"\n\n\"Why, somethin' Julian said once. He thinks a lot of you. I was afraid to\ncome, but I--I thought I would. It's seein' them--at least Julian--since\nthey got back made me come.\"\n\n\"I haven't seen them yet,\" the doctor said, and there was an\ninterrogation in the accent with which he spoke. Something in Cuckoo's\nintense manner roused both wonder and alarm in him. She evidently spoke\ndriven by tremendous impulse. What vision had given that impulse life?\n\n\"Ah!\" she said, and fell suddenly into a dense silence, touching her left\ncheek mechanically with her hand, which was covered by a long, black silk\nglove. She alternately pressed the fingers of it against the cheek bone\nand withdrew them, as one who marks the progress of a tune, hummed or\nplayed on some instrument. Her eyes were staring downwards upon the\ncarpet. The doctor watched her, and the wonder and fear grew in him.\n\n\"Have you nothing more to tell me?\" he said at last.\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\nShe put down her hand slowly and turned her eyes on him.\n\n\"What do you wish me to do?\" he said, \"I do not know yet what may--\" he\nchecked himself and substituted, \"I must go and see my friends.\"\n\n\"Yes, go.\"\n\nShe nodded her head slowly, and then she shivered as she sat in the\nchair.\n\n\"Go, and do somethin',\" she said. \"I would--I want to--but I can't. It's\ntrue, I suppose, what he said. I'm nearly done with, I'm spoilt. I say,\nyou're a doctor, aren't you? You know things? Tell me then, do, what's\nthe good of goin' on being able to feel--I mean to feel just like\nanybody, anybody as hasn't gone down, you know--if you can't do anythin'\nthe same as they can, get round anybody to make 'em go right? I could\nsend him right, I could, as well as any girl, if feelin' 'd only do it.\nBut feelin' ain't a bit of good. It's looks, I suppose. Everythin' 's\nlooks.\"\n\n\"No, not everything,\" the doctor said.\n\nCuckoo's speech both interested and touched him. Its confused wistfulness\ncame straight from the heart. And then it recalled to the doctor a\nconversation he had had with Valentine, when they talked over the\nextraordinary influence that the mere appearance--will working through\nfeatures--of one man or woman can have over another. The doctor could\nonly at present rather dimly apprehend the feeling entertained for Julian\nby Cuckoo. But as he glanced at her, he understood very well the pathos\nof the contest raging at present between her heart and the painted shell\nwhich held it.\n\n\"Nobody who feels goodness is utterly bereft of the power of bringing\ngood to another,\" he said. \"For we can seldom really feel what we can\nnever really be.\"\n\nLight shone through the shadows of the tired face at the words.\n\n\"He said different from that,\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"He--who?\"\n\n\"Him as you call Valentine. That's why he told me all about it, because\nhe knew as I shouldn't understand, and because he thinks I can't do\nnothin' for any one. But I say, you do somethin' for Julian, will you,\nwill you?\"\n\nThere was a passion of pleading in her voice. She had lost her fear of\nhim, and, stretching out her hand, touched the sleeve of his coat.\n\n\"I don't understand it all,\" the doctor said. \"I don't like to accept\nwhat you say about Mr. Cresswell, even in thought. But I will go and see\nhim, and Julian. The dogs,\" he added in a low and secret voice to\nhimself. \"There is something terribly strange in all this.\"\n\nHe fell into a silence of consideration that lasted longer than he knew.\nThe lady of the feathers began to fidget in it uneasily. She felt that\nher mission was perhaps accomplished and that she ought to go. She\nlooked across at the doctor, pulled her silk gloves up on her thin arms,\nand kicked one foot against the other. He did not seem to notice. She\nglanced towards the window. The fog was pressing its face against the\nglass like a dreary and terrible person looking upon them with haggard\neyes. It was time, she supposed, for her to drift out into the arms that\nbelonged to that dreary and terrible face. She got up.\n\n\"I'll go now,\" she said.\n\nThe doctor did not hear.\n\n\"I'll go now, please,\" she repeated.\n\nThis time he heard and got up. He looked at her and said, \"I have your\naddress. I will see you again.\"\n\nIf misery chanced to stand once in his path, he seldom lost sight of it\ntill he had at least tried to bring a smile to its lips, a ray of hope to\nits eyes. But in the instance of Cuckoo he had other reasons, or might\nhave other reasons, for seeing her in the future.\n\n\"You are sure you have nothing more to say to me?\" he asked.\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"No, I don't think,\" she murmured.\n\n\"Then good-bye.\"\n\nHe held out his hand. She put hers in it, with an action that was oddly\nladylike for Cuckoo. Then she went out, rather awkwardly, in a reaction,\nto the hall, the doctor following. He opened the door for her, and the\nmist crawled instantly in.\n\n\"It's a gloomy night,\" he said. \"Very autumnal.\"\n\n\"Yes, ain't it? I do hate the nights.\"\n\nShe spoke the words with an accent that was venemous.\n\n\"C-r-r!\" she said.\n\nAnd with that ejaculation, half an uttered shiver, half a muttered curse,\nshe gave herself to the fog, and was gone.\n\nDoctor Levillier stood for a moment looking into the vague and dreamy\ndarkness. Then he put on his coat and hat, caught up a cab whistle, and\nwith a breath, sent a shrill and piercing note into the night. Long and\nmournfully it sounded. And only the moist silence answered like that\nparadox--a voice that is dumb. Again and again the cry went forth, and at\nlast there was an answering rattle. Two bright eyes advanced in the fog\nvery slowly, looking for the sound, it seemed, as for a thing visible.\nThe doctor got into the cab, and set forth in the fog to visit Valentine.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE VOICE IN THE EMPTY ROOM\n\n\nWhen the doctor arrived at the Victoria Street flat Valentine's man\nanswered his ring. Wade had been with Valentine for many years and was\nalways famous for his great devotion to, and admiration of, his master.\nWade was also especially partial--as he would have expressed himself--to\nDoctor Levillier, and when he saw who the visitor was, his face relaxed\ninto contentment that strongly suggested a smile.\n\n\"Back at last Wade, you see,\" the doctor said, cheerfully. \"Is Mr.\nCresswell in?\"\n\n\"No, sir. But I expect him every minute to dress for dinner. He's dining\nout, and it's near seven now. Will you come in and wait?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nThe doctor entered and walked into the drawing-room, preceded by Wade,\nwho turned on the light.\n\n\"Why! what have you been doing to the room?\" the doctor said, looking\nround in some surprise. \"Dear me. It's very much altered.\"\n\nIn truth, the change in it was marked. The grand piano had vanished, and\nin its place stood an enormous cabinet made of wood, stained black, and\ncovered with grotesque gold figures, whose unnatural faces were twisted\ninto the expressions of all the vices. Some of these faces smiled, others\nscowled, others protruded forked tongues like snakes and seemed to hiss\nalong the blackness of the background. The shapes of the figures were\nvoluptuous and yet suggested, rather than fully revealed, deformity, as\nif the minds of these monsters sought to reveal their distortion by the\nvery lines of their curved and wanton limbs. Upon the top of this cabinet\nstood a gigantic rose-coloured jar filled with orchids, the Messalinas of\nthe hothouse, whose mauve corruption and spotted faces leered down to\ngreet the gold goblins beneath. It was easy to imagine them whispering to\neach other soft histories of unknown sins, and jeering at the corrupt\nrespectabilities of London, as they clustered together and leaned above\nthe ruddy ramparts of the china, wild flowers as no hedgerow violet, or\npale smirking primrose, is ever wild in the farthest wood.\n\nGlancing from this cabinet, and those that stood upon it, the doctor\nwas aware of a deep and dusty note of red in the room, sounding from\ncarpet and walls, tingling drowsily in the window curtains and in the\ncushions that lay upon the couches. This was not the crude and cheerful\nsealing-wax red with which the festive Philistine loves to dye the\nwhiteness of his dining-room walls, cooling its chubby absurdity with\npanels of that old oak, which is forever new. It was a dim and deep\ncolour, such as a dust-filmed ruby might emit if illuminated by a soft\nlight. And Valentine had shrouded it so adroitly that though it pervaded\nthe entire room, it always seemed distant and remote, a background, vast\nperhaps, but clouded and shadowed by nearer things. These nearer things\nwere many, for Valentine's original asceticism, which had displayed\nitself essentially in the slight bareness of his principal sitting-room\nhad apparently been swept away by a tumultuous greed for ornaments. The\nroom was crowded with furniture, chairs, and sofas of the most peculiar\nshapes, divans and tables, bookstands and settees. One couch was made of\nwood, carved and painted into the semblance of a woman, between whose\noutstretched arms was placed the pillow to receive the head of one\nresting there. Another lay on the bent backs of two grinning Indian\nboys, whose crouching limbs seemed twined into a knot. Upon the tables\nand cabinets stood a thousand ornaments, many of them silver toys,\nsweetmeat-boxes, tiny ivory figures and wriggling atrocities from the\nEast. But what struck the doctor most in the transformation of the room\nwas the panorama presented upon its walls. The pictures that he\nremembered so well were all gone. The classical figures, the landscapes\nfull of atmosphere and of delicacy had vanished. And from their places\nleered down jockeys and street-women painted by Jan Van Beers and D\u00e9gas,\nChaplin and Gustav Courbet, while above the mantelpiece, where once had\nhung \"The Merciful Knight,\" a Cocotte by Leibl smoked a pipe into the\nroom. It seemed incredible that Valentine could be at rest in such a\nlivid chamber, and not even the vague communications of Cuckoo woke\nin the doctor such a definite and alive sensation of discomfort as\nthis vision of outward change that must surely betoken an inward\ntransformation of the most vivid and unusual kind. And everywhere, as\na deep and monotonous bell ringing relentlessly through a symphony of\ndiscordant and crying passions, there sounded that sinister note of deep\nand dusty red. Despite his own complete health of mind, and the frantic\ndisquisitions of the morbid Nordau, the little doctor felt as if he heard\nthe colour, as if it spoke from beneath his very feet, as if it sang\nunder his fingers when he laid them on the brocade of a couch, as if the\nroom palpitated with a heavy music which murmured drowsily in his ears\na monotonous song of dull and weary change. No silence had ever before\nspoken to him so powerfully. He was greatly affected, and did not scruple\nto show his discomfort to Wade, who waited respectfully by the door.\n\n\"What an alteration!\" he said again, but in a lower and more withdrawn\nvoice. \"I cannot recognize the room I once knew--and loved!\"\n\n\"Mr. Valentine has been doing it up, sir.\"\n\n\"But why, Wade; why?\"\n\n\"I don't know, sir; a fancy, I suppose, sir.\"\n\n\"An evil one,\" the doctor murmured to himself.\n\nHe glanced at Wade. It struck him that the man's mind might possibly\nmarch with Cuckoo's in detection of his master's transformation, if\ntransformation there were. Wade returned the doctor's glance with calm,\ngood breeding.\n\n\"Mr. Valentine is well, I hope, Wade?\" he said.\n\n\"Very well, sir, I believe.\"\n\n\"And Mr. Addison?\"\n\n\"I couldn't quite say, sir, as to that.\"\n\n\"Do you mean that he looks ill?\"\n\n\"I couldn't say, sir. Mr. Julian don't look quite what he was, to my\nview, sir.\"\n\n\"Oh.\"\n\nThe butler's level voice mingled with the clouded red of the room, and\nagain a prophetic chord of change was struck.\n\n\"Thank you, Wade\" said the doctor.\n\nThe man retired, and the doctor was left alone in the empty room.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAlthough he was intensely sensitive, Doctor Levillier was not a man whose\nnerves played him tricks. He was, above all things, sane, both in mind\nand in body, full of a lively calm, and a bright power of observation.\nIndeed, having made the nervous system his special life study, he was,\nperhaps, less liable than most other human beings to be carried away by\nthe fancies that many people tabulate as realities, or to be governed\nby the beings that have no real existence and are merely projected by\nthe action of the imagination. Half, at least, of his great success in\nlife had been owing to his self-possession, which never verged on\nhardness or fused itself with its near relation, stolidity. No man, in\nfact, was less likely to be upset by the creatures of his mind than he.\nYet when Wade had gently closed the drawing-room door and retreated into\nhis private region, the doctor allowed himself to become the possession\nof an influence which, to the end of his life, he believed to proceed\nfrom the empty room in which he sat, not from his mind who sat there.\nThe electric light shone softly beneath the shades that shrouded it, and\nrevealed delicately but clearly every smallest detail of the crowded\nchamber.\n\nThe hour was quiet. No fire danced in the grate. Doctor Levillier\nleaned back in his low chair with the intention of composedly awaiting\nValentine's return. But the composure which had already been slightly\nshaken by the visit of the lady of the feathers, and by the words of\nWade, was destined to be curiously upset by the motionless vision of the\nempty room.\n\nSitting thus in it alone the doctor examined it with more detail, and\nwith a more definite remembrance of Valentine's habit of mind than\nbefore. And he found himself increasingly amazed and confounded. For not\nonly was the change great, but it was not governed and directed by good\ntaste, or even by any definite taste, either good or bad. A number of\npeople might have devised the arrangement and selection of the mass of\nfurniture and ornaments, and have thrown things down here and there in\nsheer defiance of each other's predilections. Only in the setting, the\nred setting of the picture, was there evidence of the presence of a\npresiding genius. In that red setting the doctor supposed that he was to\nread Valentine. He could read nobody in the rest of the room, or perhaps\neverybody whose taste refused purity and calm as foolish Dead Sea\ngrowths. Some of the silver ornaments might have assembled in the garish\nboudoir of a Parisian _fille de joie_, as the carved woman might have\nbeen the couch to which Thais tempted Paphnuce, and the Indian boys the\nlifeless slaves of Aphrodite. The jockeys on the wall would have been at\nhome on the lid of a cigar box belonging to any average member of the\n_jeunesse dor\u00e9e_ of any Continental city, while an etching of Felicien\nRops that lounged upon a sidetable would have been eminently suitable to\nthe house of a certain celebrity nicknamed the \"Queen of Diamonds.\" The\ngolden figures that sprawled over the huge cabinet must have delighted\ncertain modern artists, whose rickety fingers can only portray in line\na fanciful corruption totally devoid of relation to humanity, but such\nfrail spectres would have shrunk with horror from certain robust works of\nart, over which the most healthy of the beefy brigade might have smacked\nlarge lips for hours. The room was in fact one quarrel between the\nmasculine and feminine, the corrupt \"modern\" and the flagrant Philistine,\nthe vaguely suggestive Nineteenth Century Athenian and the larky and\nunbridled schoolboy. A neurotic woman seemed to have been at work here, a\nsordid youth there. On a sidetable the hysterical man of our civilization\nfought a duel in taste with some Amazon whose kept vow had evidently\nwrought a cancer in her mind. In every corner there was the clash of\ncivil war. Yet there was always the cloudy red, visible through the\nlattice-work of decoration, as the blue sky is visible through the\nlattice-work of a Tadema interior. In that clouded red the doctor felt\nhimself reading a new yet powerful Valentine, and in the grotesque\norchids leaning their misshapen chins upon the rosy rim of their vase.\nThose flowers had evil faces, and they seemed strangely at home in the\nsilent room where no clock ticked and no caged bird twittered. Only the\nred cloud spoke like a dull voice, and Doctor Levillier sat and listened\nto it, until he felt as if he began to know a new Valentine. There is an\ninfluence that emanates from lifeless things, strong, subtle, and\npenetrating; an influence in form, in colour, in scent, even in\njuxtaposition. And such influence is like a voice speaking to the soul.\nThere was a voice in that empty room; and the words it uttered stirred\nthe doctor to a greater surprise, a greater dread than the words of\nCuckoo. Her painted lips related that which might well be a legend of\nher fancy or of her hate. This voice related a reality and no legend.\n\nAs the doctor sat there he conversed of many strange and evil matters,\nof many discomforting affairs. He was the interrogator, the perpetual\nanxious questioner, and the voice in the empty room gave vague and\nsinister answers. That was a terrible catechism, a catechism of the\ndevil, not of God. Question and answer flowed on, and in the doctor's\nsoul the anxiety and the distress ever deepened. Nor could he control\ntheir development, although at moments his common sense broke into the\ncatechism like a cool voice from without, and sought to interrupt it\nfinally. But the twig could not stay the torrent. And the darkness\ndeepened, darkness in which there was a vision of fire, the vision of a\nman, fantastic and menacing. He was the genius of this room. This room\nsang of him. Yes, even now the twisted silver goblins, the curved\nmonstrosities on the cabinet, the crouched Indian boys, the leering\npictures, and always the dull red cloud on wall and carpet, cushion and\nhanging. And then a strange deception overtook the doctor and shook his\nusually steady nerves. The red cloud seemed to his observing eyes to\ntremble, like a flame shaken in a breath of wind, and to glow all around\nhim. He looked again, endeavouring to laugh at his delusion. But the glow\ndeepened and there was surely distinct movement. Everywhere on walls,\nfloor, hangings, couches, faint, thin shadows took shape, grew more\ndefinite. He watched them and saw that they were tiny flames, glowing red\nrelieved against the red. It was as if he sat in the midst of a ghostly\nfurnace; for these flames had no pleasant crackling voices. Silently they\nburned, and fluttered upward noiselessly. He saw them move this way and\nthat. Some leaped up; others bent sideways; others wavered uncertainly,\nas if their desire were incomplete and their intention undecided. The\ndoctor stared upon them, and listened for the chorus that fires sing\nto tremble and to murmur from their lips. Yet they sang no chorus, but\nalways, in a ghostly silence, aspired around him. He knew himself to be\nthe victim of a delusion. He knew what he would have said to a patient\nseeking his aid against such a deception of the senses. In his common\nsense he knew this, and yet he gradually lost the notion that he was\nbeing deceived, and allowed himself to drift, as he had seen others\ndrift, into the fancy that he was holding strange intercourse with the\nactual. These flames were real. They had forms. They moved. They enclosed\nhim in a circle. They embraced him. As he watched them he fancied that\nthey longed to be near to him, and--and--yes--so ran his thoughts--to\ncommunicate something to him, to sigh out their fiery hearts on his. They\ntrembled as if convulsed with emotion, with desire. They tried to escape\nfrom the sinister red background that held them in its grasp as in a\nleash. The doctor was impelled ardently to believe that they yearned to\nfind voices and to utter some word. And then, on a sudden, he recalled\nJulian's declaration on the night of Valentine's trance, that he had seen\na flame shine from his friend's lips, and fade away in the darkness. He\nrecalled, too, Julian's question about death-beds. Was the soul of a man\na flame? And, if so, were these flames many souls, or one soul reproduced\non all sides by his excitement, and by the intensity of his gaze after\nthem?\n\nThey burned more clearly. Their forms were more defined. Then suddenly\nthey grew vague, blurred, faint all around him. They faded. They died\ninto the red of the room. And once more the doctor sat alone.\n\nHe listened and heard the click of a key in the front door. And then\nsuddenly the horror that he had felt long ago, on the night when he was\nfollowed in Regent Street, once more possessed him. He got on his feet\nto face it, and, as the drawing-room door was pushed slowly open, faced\nValentine.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE DOCTOR MEETS TWO STRANGERS\n\n\nUpon seeing the doctor, Valentine paused on the threshold of the door,\nand, as he paused, the doctor's horror fled.\n\n\"Valentine,\" he said, holding out his hand.\n\n\"Doctor.\"\n\nTheir hands met and their eyes. And then Levillier had an instant\nsensation that he shook hands with a stranger. He looked upon the face of\nValentine certainly, but he was aware of a subtle, yet large, change in\nit. All the features were surely coarser, heavier. There was a line or\ntwo near the eyes, a loose fullness about the mouth. Yet, as he looked\nagain, he could not be certain if it were so, or if his memory were at\nfault, groping after a transformation that was not there. The words he\nnow said truthfully expressed his real feeling in the matter.\n\n\"You are quite a stranger to me,\" he said.\n\nValentine accepted the remark in the conventional sense.\n\n\"Yes, quite a stranger. We have not met for an age.\"\n\nThe voice was cool and careless.\n\n\"I have been waiting for you,\" the doctor went on, still unable to feel\nat his ease. \"By the way, how you have changed your room.\"\n\n\"Yes. Do you like it?\"\n\n\"Well, frankly, no.\"\n\n\"I am sorry for that,\" Valentine replied, drawing off his gloves. \"Julian\nchose a great many of the things in it.\"\n\n\"Julian! Did he devise the colour scheme?\"\n\n\"That curious red? No, that was my idea. But he had a great deal to do\nwith the new furniture and the ornaments.\"\n\n\"I should have supposed many minds had been at work here.\"\n\nValentine smiled, and the doctor was convinced that both his mouth and\neyes had altered in expression.\n\n\"That's true in a way,\" he answered. \"Julian has had various advisers--of\nthe feminine gender. The love of the moment is visible all over this\nroom. That is why it amuses me. Those silver ornaments were chosen\nby a pretty Circassian. A Parisian picked out that black cabinet in a\nwarehouse of Boulogne. A little Italian insisted upon that vulgar-painted\nsofa--and so on.\"\n\n\"Why do you allow such people to have any intercourse with a room of\nyours?\"\n\n\"Oh, it amused Julian, and I was tired of my room as it was. After 'The\nMerciful Knight' went to be cleaned, I resolved on a change.\"\n\n\"For the worse.\"\n\n\"Is it for the worse?\"\n\n\"Surely.\"\n\nThe eyes of the two men challenged each other. Valentine's glance\nwas carelessly impudent and hardy. The deference which he had always\ngiven to the doctor was gone. If it had been genuine it was dead. If\nit had only been a mask it had apparently served its purpose and was\nnow contemptuously thrown aside. Doctor Levillier was deeply moved\nby the transformation. His friend had become a stranger during the\ninterval of his absence. The man he admired was less admirable than\nof old. He recognized that, although he was not yet fully aware of the\ntransformation of Valentine. Before he left England he vaguely suspected\na change. Now the change hit him full in the heart. So acute was it\nthat, in an age of miracles, he could well have believed Cuckoo Bright's\ndisjointed statement. Valentine was, to his mind, even in some strange\nway to his eye, at this moment no longer Valentine. He was talking with a\nman whose features he knew certainly, but whose mind he did not know, had\nnever known. And his former resolution to watch Valentine closely was\nconsolidated. It became a passion. The doctor woke in the man. Nor was\nthe old friend and lover of humanity lulled to sleep.\n\n\"How is Julian?\" the doctor asked, dropping his eyes.\n\n\"Very well, I think. He will be here directly. He's coming to fetch me.\nWe are dining at the Prince's in Piccadilly in the same party. That\nreminds me, I must dress. But do stay, and have some coffee.\"\n\n\"No coffee, thank you.\"\n\n\"But you will stay and see Julian. I dare say he will be here early.\"\n\n\"Yes, I will stay. I should like to meet him.\"\n\nAfter a word or two more Valentine vanished to dress, and the doctor\nwas once more alone. He was much perplexed and saddened, but keenly\ninterested too, and, getting up from the chair in which he had been\nsitting, he moved about the grotesque and vulgar room, threading his\nway through the graceless furniture with a silent and gentle caution.\nAnd as he walked meditatively he remembered a conversation he had held\nwith Valentine long ago, when the latter had spoken complainingly of\nthe tyranny of an instinctive purity. The very words he had used came\nback to him now:\n\n\"The minds of men are often very carefully, very deftly poised, and a\nlittle push can send them one way or the other. Remember if you lose\nheaven, the space once filled by heaven will not be left empty.\"\n\nHad not the little push been given? Had not heaven been lost? That was\nthe problem. But Doctor Levillier, if he saw a little way into effect,\nwas quite at a loss as to cause. And already he had a suspicion that the\nchange in Valentine was not quite on the lines of one of those strange\nand dreadful human changes familiar to any observant man. This suspicion,\nalready latent, and roused, perhaps, in the first instance long ago by\nthe mystery of Rip's avoidance of his master, and by the shattering of\nValentine's musical powers, was confirmed in the strongest way when\nJulian appeared a few minutes later. Yet the change in Julian would\nhave seemed to most people far more remarkable.\n\nHe came into the drawing-room rather hastily, in evening dress with\na coat over it. Wade had forewarned him of the doctor's presence, and\nhe entered, speaking loud words of welcome, and holding out a greeting\nhand. The too-ready voice and almost premature hand betokened his latent\nuneasiness. Vice makes some people unconscious, some self-conscious.\nJulian belonged at present to the latter tribe. Whether he was thoroughly\naware of self-alteration or not, he evidently stirred uneasily under an\nexpectation of the doctor's surprise. This drove his voice to loud notes\nand his manner to a boisterous heartiness, belied by the shifting glance\nof his brown eyes.\n\nThe doctor was astounded as he looked at him. Yet the change here was\nfar less inexplicable than that other change in Valentine. Its mystery\nwas the familiar mystery of humanity. Its horror was the horror that we\nall accept as one of the elements of life. Deterioration, however rapid,\nhowever complete, does not come upon us like a ghost in the night to\npuzzle us absolutely. It is not altogether out of the range of our\nexperience. Most men have seen a man crumble gradually, through the\naction of some vice, as a wall crumbles through the action of time, falls\ninto dust and decay, filters away into the weed-choked ditches of utter\nruin and degradation. Most women have watched some woman slip from the\npurity and hope and innocence of girlhood into the faded hunger and\npainted and wrinkled energies of animalism. Such tragedies are no more\nunfamiliar to us than are the tragedies of Shakespeare. And such a\ntragedy--not complete yet, but at a third-act point, perhaps--now faced\nDoctor Levillier in Julian. The wall that had been so straight and trim,\nso finely built and carefully preserved, was crumbling fast to decay. A\nragged youth slunk in the face, beggared of virtue, of true cheerfulness,\nof all lofty aspiration and high intent. It was youth still, for nothing\ncan entirely massacre that gift of the gods, except inevitable Time. But\nit was youth sadder than age, because it had run forward to meet the\nwearinesses that dog the steps of age but that should never be at home\nwith age's enemy. Julian had been the leaping child of healthy energy.\nHe was now quite obviously the servant of lassitude. His foot left the\nground as if with a tired reluctance, and his hands were fidgetty, yet\nnerveless. The eyes, that looked at the doctor and looked away by swift\nturns, burned with a haggard eagerness unutterably different from their\nformer bright vivacity. Beneath them wrinkles crept on the puffy white\nface as worms about a corpse. Busy and tell-tale, they did not try to\nconceal the story of the body into which they had prematurely cut\nthemselves. Nor did Julian's features choose to back up any reserve\nhis mind might possibly feel about acknowledging the consummate\nalteration of his life. They proclaimed, as from a watch-tower, the\narrival of enemies. The cheeks were no longer firm, but heavy and\nflaccid. The mouth was deformed by the down-drawn looseness of the\nsensualist, and the complexion beaconed with an unnatural scarlet that\nwas a story to be read by every street-boy.\n\nYet, even so, the doctor, as he looked pitifully and with a gnawing grief\nupon Julian, felt not the mysterious thrill communicated to him by\nValentine. These two men, these old time friends of his, were both in a\nsense strangers. But it was as if he had at least heard much of Julian,\nknew much of him, understood him, comprehended exactly why he was a\nstranger. Valentine was the total stranger, the unknown, the undivined.\nLong ago the doctor had foreseen the possibility of the Julian who now\nstood before him. He had never foreseen the possibility of the new\nValentine. The one change was summed up in an instant. The other walked\nin utter mystery. The doctor had been swift to notice Julian's furtive\nglance, and was equally swift in banishing all trace of surprise from\nhis own manner. So they met with a fair show of cordiality, and Julian\ndeveloped a little of his old cheerfulness.\n\n\"Val's dressing,\" he said. \"Well, there's plenty of time. By the way,\nhow's your Russian, doctor?\"\n\n\"Better.\"\n\n\"You've cured him! Bravo!\"\n\n\"I hope I have persuaded him to cure himself.\"\n\nJulian looked up hastily.\n\n\"Oh, that sort of complaint, was it?\"\n\nHe laughed, not without a tinge of bitterness.\n\n\"Perhaps he doesn't want to be cured.\"\n\n\"I have persuaded him to want to be, I think.\"\n\n\"Isn't that rather a priest's office?\" Julian asked.\n\nThe doctor noticed that a very faint hostility had crept into his manner.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know. Such an illness is a matter of temperament, I dare\nsay, and the clergy tinker at our temperaments, don't they? while you\ndoctors tinker at our bodies.\"\n\n\"A nerve-doctor has as much to do with mind as body, and no doctor can\npossibly do much good if he entirely ignores the mind. But you know my\ntheories.\"\n\n\"Yes. They make you clergyman and doctor in one, a dangerous man.\"\n\nAnd he laughed again, jarringly, and shifted in his seat, looking around\nhim with quick eyes.\n\n\"What do you think of the room?\" he said abruptly.\n\n\"I think it entirely spoilt and ruined,\" the doctor answered gravely.\n\n\"It's altered, certainly.\"\n\n\"Yes, for the worse. It was a beautiful room, one of the most beautiful\nin London.\"\n\nA momentary change came over Julian. He dropped his hard manner, which\nseemed an assumption to cover inward discomfort or shame.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said almost regretfully. \"I suppose it was. But it's gayer now,\ngot more things in it. Full of memories this room is.\"\n\nThe last remark was evidently put forth as a feeler, to find out what\nValentine had been talking about. Dr. Levillier was habitually truthful,\nalthough he could be very reserved if occasion seemed to require it. At\npresent he preferred to be frank.\n\n\"Memories of women,\" he remarked.\n\n\"Oh, you've heard?\"\n\n\"That several tastes helped to make his room the pandemonium which it is.\nYes.\"\n\n\"You're severe, doctor.\"\n\n\"Perhaps you like the room for its memories, Addison.\"\n\nJulian looked doubtful.\n\n\"I don't know. I suppose so,\" he hesitated.\n\n\"By the way, is there among these vagrant memories of Circassians,\nGreeks, and Italians anything chosen by Cuckoo Bright?\"\n\nJulian started violently.\n\n\"Cuckoo Bright,\" he exclaimed, \"what do you know of her?\"\n\nAs he spoke Valentine strolled into the room dressed for dinner. He was\ndrawing on a pair of lavender gloves, and looked down sideways at his\ncoat to see if his buttonhole of three very pale and very perfectly\nmatched pink roses was quite straight.\n\n\"Cuckoo Bright?\" he echoed. \"Does everybody know her, then? How came she\ninto your strict life, doctor?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier noticed that Valentine, like Julian, carefully set him\naside as a being in some different sphere, much as a great many people\ninsist on setting clergymen. This fact alone showed that he was talking\nwith two strangers, and seemed to give the lie to long years of the most\nfriendly and almost brotherly intercourse.\n\n\"Is my life so strict, then?\" he asked gently.\n\n\"I think little Cuckoo would call it so, eh, Julian?\"\n\nHe glanced at Julian and laughed softly, still drawing on his gloves. In\nevening dress he looked curiously young and handsome, and facially less\naltered than the doctor had at first supposed him to be. Still there was\na difference even in the face; but it was so slight that only a keen\nobserver would have noticed it. The almost frigid and glacial purity had\nfloated away from it like a lovely cloud. Now it was unveiled, and there\nwas something hard and staring about it. The features were still\nbeautiful, but their ivory lustre was gone. A line was penciled, too,\nhere and there. Yet the doctor could understand that even Valentine's own\nman might not appreciate the difference. The manner, however, was more\nviolently altered. It was that which made the doctor think again and\nintensely of Cuckoo's vague yet startling statement.\n\n\"Where did you meet Cuckoo, doctor?\"\n\nIt was Julian who spoke, and the words were uttered with some excitement.\n\n\"I have met her,\" Levillier replied.\n\nIt was sufficiently evident that he did not intend to say where.\n\nBut Valentine broke in:\n\n\"She has called on you again, then, and this time found you at home.\nI scarcely thought she would take the trouble.\"\n\n\"Again!\" the doctor said.\n\n\"Yes. One evening when you were away I saw her at your door and ventured\nto give her a piece of advice.\"\n\n\"And that was?\"\n\n\"Not to trouble you. I told her your patients were of a different class.\"\n\n\"In that case I fear you misrepresented me, Cresswell. I do not choose my\npatients. But Cuckoo Bright is no patient of mine.\"\n\n\"If she's not ill,\" Julian said, \"why should she go to you?\"\n\n\"That is her affair, and mine,\" the doctor answered, in his quietest and\nmost finishing tone.\n\nJulian accepted the delicate little snub quietly, but Valentine sneered.\n\n\"Perhaps she went to seek you in your capacity of a doctor of the mind\nrather than of the body. Perhaps, after all, she sought your aid.\"\n\nAs he spoke the doctor could not help having driven into him the\nconviction that the words were spoken with meaning, that Valentine knew\nthe nature of Cuckoo's mission to Harley Street. There rose in him\nsuddenly a violent sensation of enmity against Valentine. He strove\nto beat it down, but he could not. Never had he felt such enmity against\nany man. It was like the fury so obviously felt by Cuckoo. The doctor\nwas ashamed to be so unreasonable, and believed for a moment that the\npoor street-girl had absolutely swayed him, and predisposed him to this\nanimus that surged up over his normal charity and good, clear impulses\nof tenderness for all that lived.\n\n\"My aid,\" he said--and the turmoil within him caused him to speak with\nunusual sternness. \"And if she did, what then?\"\n\n\"Poor Cuckoo!\" Julian said, and there was a touch of real tenderness in\nhis voice.\n\n\"Oh, I have nothing to say against it,\" Valentine replied, buttoning\nslowly and carefully the last button of the second glove. \"Only, Cuckoo\nBright is beyond aid. She can neither help herself nor any one else.\"\n\n\"How do you know, Cresswell?\"\n\n\"Because I have observed, doctor. Once I, too, thought that even\nCuckoo might--might--well, have some fight in her. I know now that\nshe has not. Her corruption of body has led to worse than corruption\nof mind, to corruption of will. Cuckoo Bright is as helpless as is a\nseabird with a shot through its wings, upon the sea. She can only drift\nin the present--die in the future.\"\n\nThe doctor listened silently. But Julian said again:\n\n\"Poor, poor Cuckoo!\"\n\nThe exclamation seemed to irritate Valentine, for he caught up his cloak\nand cried:\n\n\"Bah! Let's forget her. Doctor, we must say good-night. We are due at the\nPrince's. It has been good to meet you again.\"\n\nThe last words sounded like the bitterest sarcasm.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE DEATH OF RIP\n\n\nAlthough Dr. Levillier's visit to Victoria Street had been such a painful\none, he had no intention whatever of letting the two young men drift away\nout of his acquaintance. He wanted especially to be with them in public\nplaces, and to see for himself, if possible, whether Cuckoo's accusation\nagainst Valentine were true. That a frightful change had taken place in\nJulian's life, and that he was rapidly sinking in a slough of wholly\ninordinate dissipation was clear enough. But did Valentine, this new,\nstrange Valentine, lead him, or merely go with him, or stand aloof\nsmiling at him and letting him take his own way like a foolish boy? That\nquestion the doctor must decide for himself. He could only decide it\nsatisfactorily by ignoring Valentine's impertinence to himself, and\nendeavouring to resume his former relations of intimacy with these old\nfriends who were strangers. He began by asking them both to dinner.\nRather to his surprise they accepted and came. The mastiffs were shut\nclose in their den below, lest they should repeat their performance of\nthe summer. The dinner passed off with some apparent cheerfulness, but\nit served to show the doctor the gulf that was now fixed between him and\nhis former dear associates. He was on one shore, they on another. Their\nfaces were altered as if by the desolate influence of distance. Even\ntheir voices sounded strange and far away. Great spaces had widened\nbetween their minds and his. He endeavoured at first to cover those\nspaces, to bridge that gulf; but he soon came to learn the vanity of\nsuch an attempt. He could not go to them, nor would they return to him.\nHe could only pretend to bridge the gulf by the exercise of a suave\ndiplomacy, and by carefully banishing from his manner every trace of that\ndispraising elderliness which seems to the young the essence of prudery\narising, like an appalling Phoenix, from the ashes of past imprudence.\nIn this way he drew a little nearer to Julian, who obviously feared at\nfirst to suffer condemnation at his hands, but, finding only geniality,\nlost his uneasiness and suffered himself to become more natural.\n\nBut this thawing of Julian, the quick response of humanity to the adroit\ntreatment of it, only threw into harsher relief the immobility of\nValentine, and to him the doctor drew no nearer, but seemed, with each\nmoment, more distant, more absolutely divided from him. And the gulf\nbetween them was full of icebergs, which filled the atmosphere with the\nbreath of a deadly frost. This was what the doctor felt. What Valentine,\nthe new Valentine, felt could not be ascertained. He wore a brilliant\nmask, on whose gay mouth the society smile was singularly well painted.\nHe wore a manner edged with tinkling bells of brilliancy. Happiness and\nease beamed in his eyes. Yet his look, his voice, his smile, his gaiety\nchilled the doctor and set him mentally shivering. And with each bright\nsaying and merry laugh he struck a blow upon the former friendship.\nThe doctor fancied he could actually hear the sound of the hammer at\nits work.\n\nThe simile of the hammer was peculiarly consonant with his present\nview of the new Valentine, for, despite the latter's gaiety, ease, and\nself-possession, his smiling sociability and expansiveness, the doctor\nwas perpetually conscious of a lurking violence, an incessant and\nforcible exigence in him. It might be a fancy, but the doctor was not,\nas a rule, the prey of fancies. Yet Valentine gave no outward hint of\ninward turmoil. Rather did the doctor divine it as by a curious intuition\nthat guided him to that which lay in hiding. And it was this apprehension\nof a deep violence and peculiar, excessive animation in Valentine that\nwoke the doctor's deepest wonder, and set the gulf between them so\nwidely. For all violence had once been so specially abhorred by\nValentine. He had so loved and sought all calm. The calm, he had often\nsaid, were the true aristocrats of life. Fury and any wild movements of\nthe passions were of the gutter.\n\nThat dinner was returned. The doctor dined with Valentine and Julian\nmore than once, and accompanied them to the theatre. But he was unable to\nmake certain of Valentine's precise attitude towards Julian, although he\nsaw easily that the influence of the one over the other had rather waxed\nthan waned. This being so, it followed that Julian, having completely\nchanged, the influence that guided him must have completely changed also.\nThe pendulum had swung back. That often happened in the record of men's\nlives. But not in such a way as this. The doctor, like Cuckoo, recognized\nthe existence of a mystery. But he was by no means prepared to accept\nher fantastic and ignorantly vague explanation of it. That was a wild\nfable, a fairy tale for a child, not a reasonable elucidation for a man\nand a doctor. The most curious thing of all was that she declared that\nValentine had actually told her the truth about the matter, knowing that\nshe could not understand it. The doctor resolved to see her later, and\nto question her more minutely on this point. Meanwhile he began to watch\nValentine carefully, and with the most sedulous attention to every detail\nand _nuance_ of manner, look, and word. He understood Julian. His sad\ncase was to an extent due to his long happiness and freedom from the\nbondage in which so many men move wearily. It was as if his passions had\nbeen dammed up by the original influence of Valentine. Through the years,\nbehind the height of the dam, the waters had been rising, accumulating,\npressing. Suddenly the dam was removed, and a devastating flood swept\nforth, uncontrollable, headlong, and furious. Julian needed rescue, but\nthe only way to rescue seemed to lie through Valentine, within whose\ncircle of influence he was so closely bound. The mystery of Valentine\nmust be laid bare.\n\nAnd so the doctor watched and wondered, bringing all his knowledge of the\nworld and of the minds and bodies of men to help him.\n\nAnd meanwhile the lady of the feathers was seen nightly in Piccadilly.\n\nAnd Julian went his way steadily downwards.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOne night there was a flicker of snow over London, and the air was chill\nwith the breath of coming winter. The dreary light of snow illumined the\nfaces of all who walked in the streets, painting the brightest cheeks\nwith a murky grey pigment, and making the sweetest eyes hollow and\nexpressive of depression. Heavily the afternoon went by and the evening\ncame sharply, like a blow.\n\nDr. Levillier was engaged to dine with Julian and Valentine at the\nformer's rooms in Mayfair. Of late Valentine had seemed to seek him\nout, and especially to enjoy seeing him in the company of Julian. And\nthe doctor fancied he detected something of a triumph that was almost\nblatant in Valentine's manner when they three were together, and when the\ndoctor's eyes rested sorrowfully upon that crumbling wall, which had once\nbeen so fair and strong. Of late, too, the doctor, ever watching for the\nsigns of change in Valentine, had grown more and more aware that he was\nan utterly, through and through, different man from the youth men had\ncalled the Saint of Victoria Street. He felt the transformation to be\ninhuman, and, by slow and reluctant degrees, he was beginning to form\nan opinion. It was only in embryo as yet, a shadow hesitating in the\nbackground of his mind. He shrank from holding it. He shuddered at its\ncoming. Yet, if it were right, it might explain everything, might make\nwhat was otherwise incredible clear and comprehensible.\n\nWas this vile change in his friend caused by a radical distortion of\nmind? Was Valentine a madman?\n\nLunacy turns temperaments upside down, transforms the lamb into the\ntiger, the saint into the murderer.\n\nWas Valentine then mad? and was the monstrous distortion of his brain\nplaying upon the life of Julian, who, like the rest of the world,\nbelieved him sane?\n\nThe thought came to the doctor, and once it had been born it was often\nnear to him. Yet he would not encourage it unless he could rest it upon\nfacts. That a man should change was not a proof of his madness, however\nunaccountable the change might seem. The doctor watched Valentine, and\nwas compelled to admit to himself that in every way Valentine seemed\nperfectly sane. His cynicism, his love of ordinary life, his toleration\nof common and wretched people, might seem amazing to one who had known\nhim well years ago, but there were many perfectly sane men of the same\nhabits and opinions, of the same modes of speech and of action. If the\ndoctor's strange thought were to become a definite belief, much more\nwas needed, something at least of proof, something that would carry\nconviction not merely to the imagination, but to the cool and searching\nintellect.\n\nOn this night of the first snow the doctor's thought moved a step forward\ntowards conviction.\n\nWhen he arrived at Julian's rooms, he was greeted by Valentine alone.\n\n\"Our host has deserted us,\" he said, leading the doctor into the fire.\n\n\"What, is he ill?\"\n\n\"He has not returned. He went away last night--on a quest of a certain\npleasure. This afternoon he wired, asking me to entertain you. He was\nunavoidably detained, but hoped to arrive in time for dessert. His\npresent love's arms are very strong. They keep him.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" the doctor said, slipping out of his cloak; \"we dine here then?\"\n\n\"We do, alone. I don't think we've dined alone since Julian and I came\nback from abroad, and you deserted your Russian.\"\n\n\"No. I will consider myself your guest.\"\n\nIt struck the doctor that here was an excellent opportunity for\nconfirming or abandoning his dreary suspicion. Alone with Valentine, he\nwould be able to lead the conversation in any direction he chose. He was\nglad that Julian had not returned, and resolved to use this opportunity.\n\nThey went into the dining-room and sat down to dinner. Valentine was\napparently rather amused at playing the host in another man's house.\nIt was novel, and entertained him. He was obviously in splendid spirits,\nate with good appetite and drank the champagne with an elation not\nunlike the elation of the dancing wine. More than once, too, he alluded\nto Julian's absence and probable occupation, as if both the one and\nthe other were bouquets in his cap, or laurels in some crown which he\nalone could wear. Dr. Levillier noticed it and sought to draw him on\nin that direction, and to lead him to some open acknowledgment of his\nshare in Julian's rapidly proceeding ruin. But Valentine changed the\nconversation into another channel without apparently observing his\ncompanion's intention, or deliberately frustrating it. He chattered\nof a thousand things, mostly of topics that are the common converse\nof London dinner-tables. The doctor joined in. To a listening stranger\nthe two men would have seemed old friends, pleasantly at ease and secure\nwith one another. Yet the doctor was doing detective duty all the time.\nAnd Valentine! was he not secretly revelling in that destruction of a\nhuman soul that was galloping apace?\n\nCourse succeeded course. At last dessert was placed upon the table.\nValentine raised his glass with a smile:\n\n\"Let us drink the health of Julian's absence,\" he said. \"For you and I\nget on so perfectly together.\"\n\n\"Rather a cruel toast in Julian's own rooms,\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Ah, but he's happy enough where he is.\"\n\n\"You know where that is?\"\n\n\"No--I only suspect,\" Valentine cried gaily. \"In the wilds of South\nKensington, in a tiny house, all Morris tapestry and Burne-Jones stained\nglass, dwells the latest siren who has been calling to our Ulysses. He\nis there, I suspect. Wait a moment, though. His telegram might tell us.\nWhere was it sent from?\"\n\nHe sprang up, went to the writing-table near the window, and caught up\nthe crumpled thin paper that he had flung down there. Smoothing it out,\nhe read, holding the paper close to a wax candle:\n\n\"Handed in at the Marylebone Road office at 5:50.\"\n\nHis brow clouded.\n\n\"Marylebone Road,\" he repeated, looking at the doctor. \"Why should he be\nthere?\"\n\nHis words immediately set the doctor on the track.\n\n\"Does not Cuckoo Bright live there?\" he said.\n\n\"Yes, she does.\"\n\n\"May he not be with her?\"\n\nValentine had dropped the telegram. He was standing at the table, and he\npressed his two fists, clenched, upon the white cloth.\n\n\"I have told him he must give Cuckoo up,\" he said, almost in a snarl.\n\nThe doctor glanced at him quickly.\n\n\"You have told him?\"\n\n\"Advised him, I mean.\"\n\n\"You dislike her?\"\n\n\"I! No. How can one dislike a painted rag? How can one dislike a pink and\nwhite shell that holds nothing?\"\n\n\"Every body holds a soul. Every human shell holds its murmur of the great\nsea.\"\n\n\"The body of Cuckoo then contains a soul that's cankered with disease,\nmoth-eaten with corruption, worn away to an atom not bigger than a grain\nof dust. I would not call it a soul at all.\"\n\nHe spoke with more than a shade of excitement, and the gay expression of\nhis face had changed to an uneasy anger. The doctor observed it, and\nrejoined quietly:\n\n\"How can you answer for another person's soul? We see the body, it is\ntrue. But are we to divine the soul from that--wholly and solely?\"\n\n\"The soul! Let us call it the will.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"The will of man is the soul of man. It is possible to judge the will\nby the body. The will of such a woman as Cuckoo Bright is a negative\nquantity. Her body is the word 'weakness,' written in flesh and blood\nfor all to read.\"\n\n\"Ah, you speak of her will for herself,\" the doctor said, thinking of\nCuckoo's broken wail to him, as she sat on that autumn evening in his\nconsulting-room. \"But what of her will for another, her soul for\nanother?\"\n\nHe had spoken partly at random, partly led by the thought, the suspicion,\nthat Cuckoo's abandoned body held a fine love for Julian. He was by no\nmeans prepared for the striking effect his remark had upon Valentine.\nNo sooner were the words spoken than a strong expression of fear was\nvisible in Valentine's face, of terror so keen that it killed the anger\nwhich had preceded it. He trembled as he stood, till the table shook; and\napparently noticing this, and wishing to conceal so extreme an exhibition\nof emotion, he slid hastily into a seat.\n\n\"Her will for another,\" he repeated,--\"for another. What do you mean by\nthat? where's the other, then? who is it?\"\n\nThe doctor looked upon him keenly.\n\n\"Anybody for whom she has any desire, any solicitude, or any love--you,\nmyself, or--Julian.\"\n\n\"Julian!\" Valentine repeated unsteadily. \"Julian! you mean to say you--\"\n\nHe pulled himself together abruptly.\n\n\"Doctor,\" he said, \"forgive me for saying that you are scarcely talking\nsense when you assume that such a creature as Cuckoo Bright can really\nlove anybody. And even if she did, Julian's the last man--oh, but the\nwhole thing is absurd. Why should you and I talk about a street-girl,\na drab whose life begins and ends in the gutter? Julian will be here\ndirectly. Meanwhile let us have coffee.\"\n\nHe pushed his cigarette-case over to the doctor and touched the bell.\n\n\"Coffee!\" he said, when Julian's man answered it.\n\nThe door stood open, and as the man murmured, \"Yes, sir,\" a dog close by\nhowled shrilly.\n\nThe noise diverted Valentine's attention and roused him from the\nagitation into which he had fallen. He glanced at the doctor.\n\n\"Rip,\" he said.\n\n\"Howling for his master,\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Wait a moment,\" Valentine said to the man, who was preparing to leave\nthe room. Then, to the doctor:\n\n\"I am his master.\"\n\n\"To be sure,\" rejoined the doctor, who had, in truth, for the moment\nforgotten the fact, so long a time had elapsed since the little dog took\nup his residence with Julian.\n\n\"You think he's howling for me?\" Valentine said.\n\n\"I was thinking of Julian at the moment.\"\n\n\"And what do you say now? Still that he is howling for his master?\"\n\nThe dog's voice was heard again. It sounded almost like a shriek of fear.\n\n\"No,\" the doctor replied, wondering what intention was growing in\nValentine's face.\n\n\"Oh!\" Valentine said curtly.\n\nHe turned to the man.\n\n\"Bateman, bring Rip in here to us.\"\n\nThe man hesitated.\n\n\"I don't think he'll come, sir.\"\n\n\"I said, bring him to us.\"\n\nThe man went out, as if with reluctance. Valentine turned to the doctor.\n\n\"We spoke about soul--that is, will--just now,\" he said. \"To deny the\nwill is death, despite Schopenhauer. Death? Worse than death--cowardice.\nTo assert the will is life and victory. With each assertion a man steps\nnearer to a god. With each conquest of another will a man mounts, and\nif any man wants to enjoy an eternity he must create it for himself by\nfeeding his will or soul with conquest till it is so strong that it\ncannot die.\"\n\nHis eyes shone with excitement. It seemed to the doctor that he was\ncaught in the whirlpool of a violent reaction. He had shown fear,\nweakness; he was aware of it, and determined to reassert himself. The\ndoctor answered nothing, neither agreeing with his fantastic philosophy\nnor striving to controvert it. And at this moment there was the sound of\na struggle and of whining outside. The door was pushed open, and Julian's\nman appeared, hauling Rip along by the collar. The little dog was hanging\nback, with all its force, and striving to get away. Having succeeded in\ngetting it into the room, the man quickly retreated, shutting the door\nhastily behind him. The little dog was left with Valentine and the\ndoctor. It remained shrinking up against the door in a posture that\ndenoted abject fear, its pretty head turned in the direction of\nValentine, its eyes glaring, its teeth snapping at the air. The doctor\nlooked at it and at Valentine. His pity for the dog's condition was held\nin check by a strange fascination of curiosity. He leaned his arms on the\ntable and his eyes were fixed on Valentine, who got up slowly from his\nchair.\n\n\"I have let Rip be the prey of his absurd fancies long enough, doctor,\"\nhe said. \"To-night I will make him like me as he used to, or at least\ncome to me.\"\n\nAnd he whistled to the dog and called Rip, standing by the table. Rip\nhowled and trembled in reply, and snapped more fiercely in the direction\nof Valentine.\n\n\"Do you see that, doctor? But he shall come. I will make him.\"\n\nHe shut his lips firmly and stared upon the animal. It was very evident\nthat he was exerting himself strongly in some way. Indeed, he looked\nlike a man performing some tremendous physical feat. Yet all his limbs\nwere still. The violence of his mind created the illusion. Rip wavered\nagainst the door. There was foam on his jaws and his white legs trembled.\nValentine snapped his fingers as one summoning or coaxing a dog. The\ndoctor started at the sound and leaned further forward along the table\nto see the upshot of this strange fight between a man's desire and an\nanimal's fear. Rip scarcely whined now, but turning his head rapidly\nfrom one side to the other, with a motion that seemed to become merely\nmechanical, he made a hoarse noise that was like a terrified and\ndistressed growl half strangled in his throat. But though he wavered\nagainst the door, he did not obey Valentine and go to him, and the\ndoctor was conscious of a sudden thrill of joy in the dog's obstinacy.\nThis obstinacy angered Valentine greatly. His face clouded. He bent\nforward. He put out his hands as if to seize Rip. The dog snapped at\nhim frantically, wildly. But Valentine did not recoil. On the contrary,\nhe advanced, bending down over the wretched little creature. Then Rip\nshrank down on all fours before the door. To the doctor's watching\neyes he seemed to wane visibly smaller. He dropped his head. Valentine\nbent lower. Rip lay right down, pressing himself upon the floor. As\nValentine's hand touched him a quiver ran over him, succeeded by a\nsurprising stillness.\n\nThe doctor made a slight sound. He knew that Rip was dead. Valentine took\nthe little dog by the scruff of its neck and lifted it up. Then he, too,\nsaw what he held. He glanced at the doctor, and there was a glare of\ndefeat in his eyes. Then he passed across the room to the window, still\nholding the dog, pulled aside the curtain and thrust up the window. The\nground was white and the snow was falling. With an angry gesture he flung\nthe body out. It dropped with a soft noise in the snow and lay there.\n\nValentine closed the window, but the doctor felt as if he still saw the\npoor little corpse in the snow. And he shuddered.\n\nA moment afterwards there was a step in the passage and Julian entered.\nHe was looking haggard and excited, and ill with dissipation. His eyes\nshone in deep hollows that seemed to have been painted with indigo,\nand his lips were parched and feverish.\n\n\"Where have you been, Julian?\" said Valentine.\n\n\"Oh, with her--with Molly, of course,\" he replied.\n\n\"What? Till now?\"\n\nJulian seemed uneasy under his scrutiny.\n\n\"Till this morning,\" he replied, almost suddenly.\n\n\"Well, but since then?\"\n\n\"With Cuckoo. Oh! don't bother me.\"\n\nHe went over towards the window.\n\n\"Oh, how hot it is here,\" he said.\n\nHe glanced at the bright fire.\n\n\"Intolerably!\" he murmured.\n\nAnd he opened the window to the drifting snow.\n\n\"Am I mad?\" he suddenly cried to them. \"I saw the flame in her eyes again\nto-day, in Cuckoo's eyes. It held me with her. I'll swear it held me. It\nwouldn't let me go--wouldn't let me--till now!\"\n\nHe sank down in a chair by the window, and turning his back on them,\npushed his head out to get air.\n\n\"I say,\" he suddenly called. \"What's that, that lying there?\"\n\nValentine and the doctor joined him. He was pointing to the body of Rip,\nwhich was already almost covered by the snow.\n\n\"That,\" Valentine said; \"that is--\"\n\n\"The body of a creature that died fighting,\" the doctor interrupted. \"A\nfine fashion of dying. Look at it, Julian. Its soul was indomitable to\nthe last, and so it won the battle it fought. It won by its very death\neven. Nature is at work on its winding-sheet.\"\n\nValentine said nothing.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nDOCTOR LEVILLIER VISITS THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\nJulian's utterance about the flame that held him with the lady of the\nfeathers struck Dr. Levillier forcibly at the time it was made, and\nremained in his mind. He could not fail to connect it with his own\nexperience in Valentine's empty room, and, going further back, with\nthe last sitting of the two young men which was succeeded by the long\ntrance of Valentine. And as he thought of these things, it suddenly\noccurred to him that the ghastly change which had taken place in\nValentine might well date from that night. Since the death of Rip the\ndoctor had formed the opinion that Valentine was no longer perfectly\nsane. His excitement, the fury of his eyes when he spoke of the triumphs\nof will, seemed to give the clue to his transformation. The insane\nperpetually glorify themselves, and are transcendent egoists. Surely\nthe egoism of insanity had peeped out in Valentine's diatribe upon the\neternity of a strong man's individual will. The night of the trance had\nbeen a strange crisis of his life. He had seemed to recover from it,\nto come back from that wonderful simulation of death healthy, calm,\nreasonable as before. This might have been only seeming. In that sleep\nthe sane and beautiful Valentine might have died, the insane and\nunbeautiful Valentine have been born. There are many instances of a\nsudden and acute shock to the nervous system leaving an indelible and\ndreary writing upon the nature. If Valentine had thus been tossed to\nmadness, it was very possible that his dog, an instinctive creature,\nshould recognize the change with terror. It was even possible that other\ninstinctive creatures should divine the hideous mind of a maniac hidden\nin the beautiful body of an apparently normal man. And Cuckoo, she too\nwas instinctive, a girl without education, culture, the reading that\nopens the mind and sometimes shuts the eyes. Cuckoo Bright, she had\ndivined the evil of Valentine. To her he had made confession. In her\neyes Julian had seen the mysterious flame. Some influence from her had\nkept him from his invited guests and from his house. Yes, Cuckoo, the\nlady of the feathers, the blessed damozel of Regent Street and Piccadilly\nCircus, the painted and possessed, faded and degraded, wanderer of the\npavements, seemed to become the centre of this wheel of circumstances,\nas Doctor Levillier reflected upon her.\n\nIt was time for him to go to Cuckoo. Julian's descent must be stayed,\nbefore he went down, like a new Orpheus without a mission, into Hades.\nValentine's influence, whether mad or sane, must be fought. It was to be\na struggle, a battle of wills, of what Valentine chose to consider souls.\nAnd some prompting led the doctor to think of Cuckoo as a possible\nweapon. Why? Because she had even once held Julian against his will,\nagainst the intention of his soul.\n\nSo the doctor at length sought the lady of the feathers. She had been\npassing through a period of great and benumbing desolation, believing\nthat her last appeal, her great effort for Julian, had been a failure.\nFor the doctor had not come to her, and Cuckoo could not tell that he\nwas making observations for himself and that she was often in his mind.\nShe supposed that he, like all others, laughed at her pretensions to\ngravity, swept her exhibition of real and honest emotion away from his\nmemory with a sneer, considered her despair over another's ruin a vile\ntravesty, a grinning absurdity and trick. Never had Cuckoo felt more\nlonely than in these days, though a vast loneliness is the constant\ncompanion of her large sisterhood. Even Jessie failed to comfort her,\nand she could find little courage within herself. And yet there were\nmoments when the vigour that had led her once to defy Valentine, when\nthe fire that had sprung up in her, as a flame may burst forth in a\nswamp, seemed to be near to her again. She felt a new possibility within\nher, stirring, striving. It was at such moments that she longed to see\nthe doctor, and could have cursed him for not coming to her. For at\nsuch moments she seemed only waiting for a touch of sympathy, a word of\nencouragement, to perform some great action, some momentous deed. But the\ntouch, the word, were lacking, and her life and experience of constant\nand monotonous degradation dulled the impulse, stifled the enthusiasm\nthat she could not understand. And she fell again to brooding, and to\nan ignorant and vague consciousness of impotence.\n\nShe bought a new hair-dye, painted her thin cheeks more heavily than ever\nbefore, and sought, almost with a wild exultation that swiftly fled away,\nto sink lower.\n\nThe monotony of sin is one of the scourges of sin. In those days Cuckoo\nsuffered many stripes. Her eyes grew more weary, her smile in Piccadilly\nmore mechanical, her walk more puppet-like than ever. Life was like\na moving dream of horror. And yet no day passed without a gleam of that\nstrange sensation of ignorant power, fluttering upward, fading away,\npausing, passing, dead.\n\nShe did not know what it meant. She could not keep it nor use it. She\ncould not unravel its message nor rest upon its strength. It was gone\nalmost while it came, but it did something for the lady of the feathers.\nIt gave to her the little seed of expectation that, quite alone in a\nweary desert, yet makes of that desert the plot men call a garden. Like a\nthread of steel, it held up this girl from the uttermost abyss, until at\nlast the doctor's hand struck upon her door.\n\nJulian's occasional visits were as the scourgings of God, giving to\nCuckoo a vision of shifting ruin, in which she--so she told herself,\nthinking of the dance of the hours--had been the first to have a share.\n\nIt was a wintry afternoon when the doctor came. Frost clung stealthily\nround the grimy black trees, outlining their naked boughs with meagre\nlines of white sewn with smuts. Above the frost hung the fog as if in\ncharge of the town, a despondent and gloomy sentinel. During the morning\nthe sun had lain in the fog like a faint blood-red jewel in a thick and\nawkward sulphur setting, but with the afternoon the jewel faded to a\ndistant dim phantom, from that to blank nothingness. As if satisfied\nwith this piteous exit, the fog drew closer, keeping especially heavy\nwatch upon the long and bleak line of the Marylebone Road, and taking\nthe high and narrow house in which Cuckoo dwelt under its severest\nprotection. Twilight wanted to come as the afternoon drew on, but it had\nbeen forestalled and was practically already there. Doubtless it did\ncome, but no one was much the wiser. The lamps had been alight all day,\nand no procession of gloomy things, advancing from whithersoever,\ncould have added much to the volume of the crowding darkness, or have\nappreciably increased its density. In the darkness the cold gathered,\nand the frost began to take a harder grip of everything,--of desolate,\nsolitary pumps in tiny and squalid back yards, of pipes that crawled like\nliver-coloured snakes over the unpresentable sides of houses, of pools\nthick with orange-brown mud, and vagrant bushes creaking above the\ngrimy earth in places that children named gardens.\n\nFog and frost had taken a strong grip, too, upon the heart of the lady\nof the feathers. Somewhere about eleven o'clock in the morning she had\nstirred wearily in her bed, had stretched out her arms to the stagnant\nair of the room, and crouched up on her pillow in a grotesque hump. For a\nwhile the hump remained motionless. Then Cuckoo rolled round and extended\na bare thin leg to test the atmosphere. The leg was quickly withdrawn,\nthe atmosphere having been evidently tried in the balance and found\nwanting. Cuckoo's bell rang, and Mrs. Brigg was called for tea and toast,\nwhile once more the hump decorated the upper part of the disordered bed.\nJessie, awakened in her basket at the foot of the bed, joined the hump,\nwhining a greeting, and wriggling furiously in an effort to tunnel her\nway to the ultimate depths of sheets and blankets. Then Mrs. Brigg, of\nyellowish and bleak aspect, beneath a tumbled appurtenance that she\ncalled a cap, appeared with a tray.\n\n\"Going to stop abed?\" she asked, in a husky voice, in which the smuts\nseemed floating.\n\n\"Yes. What's there to get up for?\" Cuckoo groaned.\n\n\"Nothun' as I know of.\"\n\nAnd Mrs. Brigg was gone about her business.\n\nAll the morning Cuckoo lay staring at the blank square of the window, and\nJessie snored under the blankets. The tea was drunk, the toast lay about\nin fragments. One bit, hard and many cornered as it seemed, somehow\ngained entrance to the bed, and greeted Cuckoo's every movement with\nuncompromising grittiness. No shaking of coverlet and sheet, no beating\nof pillow, no kicks and scufflings could expel it. The bed seemed full of\nhard bits of toast, and Cuckoo felt as if an additional burden were laid\nupon her by this slight evil. But, indeed, the horror of her existence\nreached a culminating point to-day,--a point of loneliness, vacant\ndreariness, squalor, and degradation that could not be surpassed. The\npreceding night had been peculiarly horrible, and as Cuckoo now lay on\nthe tumbled bed, in the dim, cold room, with the fog gazing in, the\nleaden hours of winter crawling by, she felt as if she could bear no\nmore. She could bear no more addition to her sick weariness; no more\naddition to her useless hunger of love for Julian, that could never\nbe crowned with anything but despair; no more addition to her bodily\nfatigue, born of tramping monotony succeeded by yet more enervating\nweariness of the flesh. She could bear no more. Yes, but she must bear\nmore. For Cuckoo knew that she was not dying, was not even ill. She was\nonly tired in body, prostrate in heart, deserted in life, and forced to\nwitness the quick and running ruin of the man she had the farcical\nabsurdity to love. Imaginative, for once, in her morbid fatigue, she\nbegan to wish that she could fade away and become part of the fog that\nlay about London, be drawn into its murkiness, with all her murky\nrecollections, her fiendish knowledge, her mechanical wiles of the\nstreets, her thin and ghostly despairs and desires. For they seemed thin\nand ghostly, they too, to-day, fit food for the fog, as indeed the whole\nof her was. How could such as she evaporate into sweet air, a clear\nheaven?\n\nShe caught at the hand-glass, leaning far out on the bed, as the blessed\ndamozel o'er the bright bar of heaven, and tried to see, with staring\neyes, how the new hair-dye that she was now using became her. Her mind\nwas vagrant, coming and going miserably, from that love of hers which was\nstrangely strong and subtle, to the powder-box with its arsenic-green\nlid, or the rouge-pot of dirty white china. And by each event it paused\nand sank, as if benumbed by the increasing frost. Leaning again to put\nback the hand-glass she fell over too far and dropped it. The glass fell\nface downwards and was smashed. Cuckoo laughed aloud, revelling feebly in\nthe additional misery a superstitious mind now began to promise her. The\nfragments of broken glass actually pleased her, and, on a sudden, she\nresolved to set her feet in them, that she might be cut and wounded, that\nshe might bleed outwardly as she had been bleeding inwardly for so long.\nShe swung her legs over the breadth of the bed, disorganizing Jessie,\nplanted her feet in the array of glass and stood up. As she did so the\ndoctor mounted her doorstep, plied the knocker and rang the bell. Cuckoo\nstood listening. A fragment of glass had really penetrated the bare sole\nof her foot, which bled a little gently on the carpet. But she scarcely\nknew it. She heard Mrs. Brigg go by, and then steps sounding in the\npassage. Then there came to her ears a quiet voice with a very\ncharacteristic note of bright calmness in it. Standing in her frilled\nnightdress among the bits of glass, Cuckoo flushed scarlet all over her\nface and neck. She knew who the visitor was. With one dart she reached\nthe washhand-stand. Sponges, brushes, combs, all her weapons of the\ntoilet, were immediately in commotion, and when Mrs. Brigg opened her\ndoor, the room was a whirlpool of quick activities, in the midst of\nwhich, as on a frouzy throne, Jessie stood upon the bed barking\nexcitedly. Mrs. Brigg came in and closed the door. Her thin lips were\npursed.\n\n\"Light the fire!\" Cuckoo called at her from the basin.\n\n\"What do you want the doctor for?\"\n\nMrs. Brigg uttered the words with some suspicion.\n\n\"Hurry up and light the fire!\"\n\nCuckoo turned round, her hands darting in her hair, and actually laughed\nwith a touch of merriment.\n\n\"You old owl! He's not come to doctor me, only to see me.\"\n\nMrs. Brigg looked relieved, but still surprised.\n\n\"Oh,\" she said. \"That's it, is it?\"\n\nShe paused as if in consideration.\n\nSuddenly Cuckoo sprang on her, twisted her round, and spun her out into\nthe cold passage. \"Light the fire, I tell you!\"\n\nShe banged the bedroom door and went on with her rapid toilet.\n\nWhen she came into the sitting-room an uneasy fire was sputtering in\nthe grate, one gas-jet flared, and Doctor Levillier was standing by the\nwindow looking out at the fog. He turned to greet her.\n\n\"I thought you'd forgotten--or didn't mean to come,\" Cuckoo said; \"they\noften do--people that say they will to me, I mean.\"\n\nThe doctor held out his hand with a smile.\n\n\"No. Am I interrupting you?\"\n\n\"Me!\" said Cuckoo, in amazement, thinking of her empty days. \"Lord, no.\"\n\nHer accent was convincing. The little doctor sat down by the fire and put\nhis hat and gloves on the table.\n\n\"Mrs. Brigg thought I was ill--you bein' a doctor,\" Cuckoo said, with an\nattempt at a laugh. She felt nervous now, and was not sustained today by\nthe strung-up enthusiasm which had supported her in Harley Street. \"Funny\nthere bein' a fog again this time, ain't it?\"\n\n\"Yes. I hope we shall meet some day in clear weather.\"\n\nAs the doctor said that, following a tender thought of the girl, he\nglanced round the room and at Cuckoo. \"I hope so,\" he repeated. Then,\nrather abruptly:\n\n\"Two or three nights ago I went to dine with Mr. Addison. He was out. He\nwas here with you.\"\n\nCuckoo got red. She could still be very sensitive with a few people, and\nperhaps Mrs. Brigg and her kind had trained her into irritable suspicion\nof suspicion in others.\n\n\"Only for a friendly visit,\" she said hastily. \"Nothin' else. He would\nstop.\"\n\n\"I understand perfectly,\" the doctor said gently. Cuckoo was reassured.\n\n\"Did he say as he'd been?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nCuckoo looked at the doctor and a world of reproach dawned in her eyes.\n\n\"I say,\" she said, \"you haven't done nothin'. He's worse than ever. He's\ngettin'--oh, he's gettin' cruel bad.\"\n\nTears came up over the world of reproach.\n\n\"It's all him, all Valentine,\" she said.\n\nAnd Doctor Levillier was moved to cast reticence, the usual loyalty of\none man to another who has been his friend, away. Somehow the dead body\nof Rip lying in the snow put that old friendship far off. And also an\ninward thrill caught him near to Cuckoo. An impulse, swift and vital,\nthrust his mind to hers.\n\n\"You are right,\" he answered. \"I believe that it is all Valentine.\"\n\n\"There! Didn't I tell you?\" Cuckoo cried with eyes of triumph. \"It's been\nhim from the first. Oh, get him--get Julian away.\"\n\nThe doctor laid his hand upon Cuckoo's, which was stretched upon the\ntablecloth, very gently, almost abstractedly.\n\n\"Will you tell me something?\" he said.\n\n\"What's it?\"\n\n\"You love Julian?\"\n\n\"Me!\" the lady of the feathers said.\n\nHer voice trembled over the word. She stole a hasty, hunted glance at the\ndoctor. Was he, too, going to jeer at her? Would no one allow her to have\na clean corner in her heart?\n\n\"You're laughin' at me. What's the good of such as me doin' a thing like\nthat--lovin' a man?\"\n\n\"I think you must love Julian. If you do, perhaps you are meant to\nprotect and save him.\"\n\nA secret voice prompted the doctor with the words he spoke, gave them to\nhim, bent him irresistibly to repeat them. Never before had he felt what\nit is to be between the strong hands of destiny.\n\n\"Me! Me save any one!\" Cuckoo said, trembling.\n\n\"Yes, you. There is something in you--I feel it and I can't tell you why,\nnor what it is--something that has hold of Julian. He told us so the\nother night. Don't you know what it is?\"\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\n\"Perhaps he feels that you love him--purely, cleanly.\"\n\n\"I do--oh! I do that!\" Cuckoo cried.\n\nA wonder as to the relations between Julian and this girl shot through\nthe doctor. He was the last man in the world to think evil of any one,\nbut just then, as Cuckoo moved, the gaslight struck fully on her. The dye\non her hair shone crudely. The red and white of her face burned as on the\nface of a clown. And then even the doctor's good heart wondered. Cuckoo\nknew it in an instant, and her face hardened and looked older.\n\n\"Oh, go on,\" she said rudely. \"Think as the others do. Damn you men! Damn\nyou! Damn you!\"\n\nAnd without warning she put her head down on the table and broke into a\nwild passion of tears. She sobbed, and as she sobbed she cursed and\nclenched her hands. She lost herself in fury and in despair. The Fates\nhad stung her too hard this time, and she must blaspheme against them\nwith her voice of the streets, her language of the streets, her poor\nheart--not quite of the streets. The Fates had stung her too hard, for\nthey had put a flaw even in this one self-respect of hers. That one\nnight accused her whenever she thought of Julian, whenever she saw the\ndissipation deepen round his eyes. She was not to have even one thing\nthat she could be quite proud of; not one thing of which she could say,\n\"This has been always pure.\" And then she turned on the doctor and cried:\n\n\"Go on--think it--think it! Think what you like! But I'll tell you the\ntruth. There was only once I did him any harm, and that wasn't my fault.\nI never wanted to. I hated it. I told him I hated it. I didn't want him\nto be that, like the others. And that was Valentine, too. And now--just\nbecause of that I'm no use. And you'd said I might be, you'd said I might\nbe.\"\n\n\"And I say you shall be.\"\n\nThe wail died in Cuckoo's throat. The tears were arrested as by a spell.\nDr. Levillier had got upon his feet. All the truth and tenderness of his\nheart was roused and quickened. He knew real passion, real grief, and\nfrom that moment he knew and trusted the lady of the feathers. And by\nthe strength of her bitterness, even by the broken curses that would have\nshocked so many of the elect of this world, he measured the width and\nthe depth of her possibilities. She had sent to damnation--what? The\nvile cruelty, the loathsome, unspeakable, dastardly mercilessness of the\nworld. To damnation with it! That was the loud echo in his man's heart.\n\n\"That one night is nothing,\" he said. \"Or rather it is something that you\nmust redeem. It is good to have to pay for a thing. It is that makes one\nwork. There is a work for you to do, a work which I believe no one else\ncan do. You love Julian. Love him more. Make him love you. My will cannot\nfight the will of Valentine over him. No man's will can. A woman's may.\nYours may, shall.\"\n\nHis pale, small, delicate face flamed with excitement as he spoke. Few\nof his patients looking upon him just then would have known their calm\nlittle doctor. But Cuckoo had cried to him out of the very depths, and\nout of the very depths he answered her, still prompted--though now he\nknew it not--by that secret voice which sometimes rules a man, at which\nhe wonders ignorantly, the voice of some soul, some great influence,\nhidden from him in the spaces of the air, the voice of a flame, warm,\nkeen, alive, and power-prompting.\n\nAnd Cuckoo, as she listened to the doctor, had once again a hint of her\nown strength, a thrill of hope, a sense that she, even she, was not\nbroken quite in pieces upon the cruel wheel of the world.\n\n\"Whatever can I do?\" she said; \"Valentine's got him.\"\n\nAs she spoke, the doctor, restless, as men are in excitement, had moved\nover to the mantelpiece, and stood with one foot upon the edge of the\nfender. Thinking deeply, he glanced over the photographs of Cuckoo's\nacquaintance, without actually seeing them. But presently one, at which\nhe had looked long and fixedly, dawned upon him, cruelly, powerfully. It\nwas the face of Marr.\n\n\"Who is that?\" he said abruptly to Cuckoo.\n\n\"That?\" She too got up and came near to him, lowering her voice almost to\na whisper. \"That's really _him_.\"\n\n\"Him?\"\n\n\"Valentine.\"\n\nThe doctor looked at her in blank astonishment.\n\n\"Yes, it is,\" Cuckoo reiterated, and nodding her head with the obstinacy\nof a child.\n\n\"That--Valentine! It has no resemblance to him.\"\n\nThe doctor took up the photograph, and examined it closely. \"This is not\nValentine.\"\n\n\"He told me it was. It's Marr--and somehow it's him now.\"\n\n\"Marr,\" said the doctor, sharply. \"Why, he is dead. Julian told me so.\nHe died--he died in the Euston Road on the night of Valentine's trance.\nAh, but you know nothing about that. Did you know Marr, then?\"\n\n\"Yes, I knew him.\"\n\nCuckoo hesitated. But something taught her to be perfectly frank with the\ndoctor. So she added:\n\n\"I'd been with him at that hotel the night he died.\"\n\n\"You were the woman! But, then, how can you say that this (he touched the\nphotograph with his finger) is Valentine?\"\n\n\"He says he's really Marr.\"\n\nCuckoo spoke in the most mulish manner, following her habit when she was\ncompletely puzzled, but sticking to what she believed to be the truth.\n\n\"Marr and Valentine one man! He told you that?\"\n\n\"He says to me--'I'm Marr.'\"\n\nCuckoo repeated the words steadily, but like a parrot. The doctor said\nnothing, only looked at her and at the photograph. He was thinking now\nof his suspicion as to Valentine's sanity. Had he, perhaps in his\nmadness, been playing on the ignorance of the lady of the feathers?\nShe went on:\n\n\"It was on the night he told me all that. I couldn't understand what he\nis and what he's doing. And he said that the real Valentine had gone. And\nthen he said--'I am Marr.'\"\n\n\"The real Valentine gone. Yes,\" said the doctor, gravely, \"that is true.\nDoes he then know that he is--?\" \"Mad\" was on his lips, but he checked\nhimself.\n\n\"What else did he say that night?\" he asked. \"Can you remember? If you\nsucceed, you may help Julian.\"\n\nCuckoo frowned till her long, broad eyebrows nearly met. The grimace gave\nher the aspect of a sinister boy, bold and audacious. For she protruded\nher under lip, too, and the graces of ardent feeling, of pain and of\npassion, died out of her eyes. But this abrupt and hard mask was only\ncaused by the effort she was making after thought, after understanding.\nShe pressed her feet upon the ground, and the toes inside her worn shoes\ncurved themselves inwards. What had Valentine said? What--what? She\nstared dully at the doctor under her corrugated brows.\n\n\"What did he say?\" she murmured in an inward voice, \"Well--he didn't want\nme to see you. He came here about that--my seeing you.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"And--and Marr's not dead, he says, at least not done with. Yes, that was\nit--he says as no strong man who's lived long's done with when he's put\naway. See?\"\n\nHer face lighted up a little. She was beginning to trust her memory.\n\n\"The influence of men lives after them,\" the doctor said. \"Marr's too.\nYes. He said that?\"\n\nShe nodded. Then with a flash of understanding, a flash of that\nsmouldering power which she had felt in loneliness and longed to tear\nout from its prison, she cried:\n\n\"That's it. That's how he's Marr, then.\"\n\nShe hesitated.\n\n\"Isn't it?\" she said, flushing with the thought that she might be showing\nherself a fool. For she scarcely understood what she really meant.\n\n\"Valentine, no longer himself, but endowed with the influence of Marr,\"\nthe doctor muttered; \"she means that he told her something like that.\nThe phantasy of an unsteady brain.\"--\"Go on,\" he added to her.\n\nBut Cuckoo was relapsing into confusion already.\n\n\"And then he talked a lot about will, as he called it. Can't remember\nwhat he said.\"\n\n\"Try to.\"\n\nShe was silent, knitting her brows.\n\n\"It's no use. I can't,\" she said, despairingly. \"But I know he says that\nhe's really Marr and that he's killed Valentine. He said that; I know he\ndid.\"\n\nShe glanced eagerly at the doctor, in the obvious hope that his\ncleverness, which she believed to be unlimited and profound, would\nin a flash divine all the strange secret from this exposition of her\ndisjointed recollection. With each word she spoke, however, the doctor\nbecame more and more convinced that Valentine had only been cruelly\namusing himself with her, or weaving for her benefit some intricate\nweb of vain madness. And Cuckoo, noticing this now, and recollecting the\nmomentary clearness of comprehension which had seized her at one point in\nValentine's wild sermon to her, was mad with herself for not being able\nto seize again that current of inspiration, almost mad with the doctor\nfor not unravelling the mystery. This excess of feeling finally drowned\nand swept away as a corpse the memory of the gospel of influence.\n\n\"I can't remember no more,\" she said stolidly. \"There was ever such a lot\nabout--about some one as was good and didn't want to be good any more,\nand so it was driven away--I don't know. P'rhaps he was only gamin' me.\"\n\nShe stared moodily at her feet, which she had stuck out from under her\ndress. The doctor said nothing, but at her last speech his face had lit\nup with a sort of excitement. For had she not described in those few\nill-chosen words the very mental position of the former Valentine? A\nsaint at first with his will, a saint at last against his will--and now\na saint no more. That was, perhaps, the key to the whole matter. A good\nman prays to be no longer good. His prayer is granted. His grievous\ndesire is fulfilled. And then he may pray forever in vain to be as he\nonce was. Yet the change in Valentine was more even than this, more\nthan the gliding from white purity to black sin. There was something.\n\nAs Cuckoo and the doctor sat in silence, she staring vacantly and empty\nof thought, being now utterly and chaotically puzzled, he thinking\ndeeply, the door bell rang. In a moment Mrs. Brigg appeared, went to\nCuckoo and muttered in her ear:\n\n\"Mr. Haddison wants to come in. I told him you was busy.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Cuckoo, \"I say--wait,\" and then to the doctor, \"It's him. It's\nJulian.\"\n\n\"Let him in,\" the doctor said quickly.\n\nTo see Cuckoo and Julian together might tell him much.\n\nJulian came in, stumbling rather heavily at the entrance of the room.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nCLEAR WEATHER\n\n\n\"Damn that mat!\" he exclaimed. \"I say, Cuckoo, who the--?\" The question\nfaded on his lips as he saw Doctor Levillier, on whom he gazed with a\nvacant surprise that, added to the unsteadiness of his movement upon\nthem, spoke his condition very plainly.\n\n\"You, doctor! Well, I'm damned! What are you here for?\"\n\n\"To see Miss Bright,\" the doctor said, coolly.\n\nHe had pushed forward a chair quickly with his foot. Julian collapsed in\nit by the table. Beads of the fog lay all over his long greatcoat and\nupon his hat, which he had not yet taken off. His face was flushed and\ndull.\n\n\"It's an infernal evening,\" he said. \"You doctoring Cuckoo, eh?\"\n\n\"I have been talking to Miss Bright.\"\n\n\"Oh, all right. I don't mind. Cuckoo, help me off with this coat. There's\na good girl.\"\n\nShe obeyed without a word. When the coat was off Julian threw himself\nback in the chair and heaved a long sigh. His hat fell onto the floor\nwith a bang, but he did not seem to notice it. His face was moody and\nmiserable.\n\n\"Molly's thrown me over,\" he said.\n\nCuckoo caught her breath sharply and stole a glance at the doctor.\n\n\"Have some tea?\" she said.\n\n\"No; a brandy and soda.\"\n\n\"Haven't got it. You must do with tea.\"\n\nShe rang the bell and ordered it despite his grumblings. Mrs. Brigg made\nno difficulty. Julian had long ago soothed her delicate susceptibilities\nwith gold.\n\nSo, Cuckoo, oddly shy and excited, made tea for the doctor and Julian.\nThe tea cleared the latter's fogged brain a little, but he was still\nmorose and self-centred. He had evidently come to pour some woes out\nto Cuckoo and was restrained by the presence of the doctor, at whom he\nlooked from time to time with an expression that was near to disfavour.\nBut the doctor began to chat easily and cordially, and Julian gradually\nthawed.\n\n\"I suppose you know Rip's dead,\" he said presently. \"Went out the other\nnight and got frozen in the snow. Poor little beggar. Val's awfully cut\nup about it.\"\n\n\"Is he?\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Yes. Dear old Val. Dev'lish hard Rip's never making it up with him\nagain, wasn't it? Rip didn't know a good fellow, did he, doctor?\"\n\n\"He was devoted to Valentine once,\" the doctor said.\n\n\"Ah, but he changed. Dogs are just like women, just like women, never the\nsame two days together. Curse them.\"\n\nHe appeared to have forgotten Cuckoo's presence, and she sat listening\neagerly, quite unmoved by the dagger thrust at her sex.\n\n\"Dogs don't usually change. Their faithfulness bears everything without\nbreaking.\"\n\n\"Except a trance, then,\" Julian said, still with a wavering in-and-out\nstolidity, at the same time mournful and almost ludicrous.\n\n\"That trance did for Rip; did for him, I tell you. He never knew poor old\nVal again. As if he thought him another man after that, another man.\"\n\nThe doctor's eyes met Cuckoo's. She had a teacup at her rouged lips, and\nhad paused in the act of drinking, fascinated by the words that wound so\nnaturally into the legend of change which she knew and knew not.\n\n\"As if Val wasn't just the same,\" Julian pursued, shaking his head\nslowly. \"Just the same.\"\n\n\"You think so?\" the doctor said, quickly.\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\n\"You think that trance made no difference to him?\"\n\n\"Why, how should it?\"\n\nCuckoo drank her tea hastily and put the cup down.\n\n\"How should it?\" Julian repeated, as if with a heavy challenge.\n\n\"It might in many ways, to his health--\"\n\n\"He's stronger than ever he was.\"\n\n\"Or to his mind, his nature. You see no change there that might have\nfrightened Rip?\"\n\n\"Not I. He's more of a man, good old Val, even than he was.\"\n\n\"Ah! You acknowledge there is a change.\"\n\n\"Give me some more tea, Cuckoo,\" Julian said, thrusting his cup towards\nher. \"Make it strong. It's picking me up.\" He sat forward in his chair\nand began to light a cigar, keeping his eyes on the doctor.\n\n\"Well, if you call that a change; to get like other men. Old Val was a\nsaint. I loved him then, but I love him ten times more now he's--a--the\nother thing, you know. Ten times more. He knows the world now, and his\nadvice is worth having. I'd follow him anywhere. He can't go wrong. Takes\ncare of himself, and of me too. I might have been anything--anything, but\nfor him. Instead of what I am--\"\n\nHe drew himself up with some pride, and pulled at the cup which Cuckoo\npushed towards him.\n\n\"I'm just what Val makes me; just what he makes me,\" he said, taking\nobvious joy in the thought. \"Val can make me do anything. You know that,\ndoctor?\"\n\n\"Yes. Then you have changed with him, become more of a man, as you call\nit, with him. Is that so, Julian?\"\n\n\"I suppose so.\"\n\nJulian was drinking his tea, which had become very strong from standing.\n\n\"And are you happier than you were before?\"\n\nThe doctor spoke insistently and gravely. Cuckoo had taken Jessie onto\nher lap and now stroked the little dog quickly and softly with a thin,\nfluttering hand. Julian seemed trying to think, to dive into his mind and\ndiscover its real feelings.\n\n\"I suppose so,\" he said presently. \"But who's happy? I should like to\nknow. Cuckoo isn't. Are you, Cuckoo?\"\n\nIt seemed a cruel question, addressed to that spectre of girlhood.\n\n\"I dunno,\" she answered swiftly. \"It don't matter much either way.\"\n\n\"She may be,\" the doctor said. \"And you were happy, Julian.\"\n\nThe tea had certainly cleared the boy's brain. His manner was more\nsensible, and the heavy sensuality had gone from his eyes. Though he\nstill looked haggard and wretched, he was no longer the mere wreck of\nvice he had seemed when he drifted into the little room out of the fog.\n\n\"Was I?\" he said slowly. \"It seems a devil of a time ago.\"\n\nThe doctor's heart warmed to these two young creatures, children to\nhim, yet who had seen so much, gone so far down into the depths that\nlie beneath the feet of life. He thought in that moment that he could\nwillingly give up all his own peace of mind, success, fame, restfulness\nof heart, to set them straight up, face to face with strength and purity\nonce more. One was well born, educated, still handsome, the other a\nso-called lost woman, and originally only a very poor and hopelessly\nignorant girl. Yet their community of misery and sorrow put them side\nby side, like two children who gather violets in a lane together, or\ndrown together in some strong, sad river.\n\n\"It is not so long, Julian,\" he said. \"Only before Valentine's trance.\"\n\nJulian caught him up quickly.\n\n\"Why d'you say that, doctor?\"\n\n\"Why? Simply because it is truth.\"\n\n\"You're always at that trance. I believe it's just because you told us\nnot to sit again. But there was no harm done.\"\n\n\"You are sure of that?\"\n\nAs he put the question the doctor's mind was on a hunt round that sleep\nand waking. He had gradually come to think that night a night of some\nstrange crisis, through which Valentine had passed from what he had\nbeen to what he was. Yet his knowledge could not set at the door of that\nunnatural slumber the blame of all that followed it. His imagination\nmight, but not his knowledge. He wondered whether Julian might not help\nhim to elucidation.\n\n\"Sure? of course! Why not? Valentine's all right. I'm all right. Rip's\nthe only one gone. And if he'd only stayed in the house that night he'd\nbe all right too.\"\n\n\"No, Addison.\"\n\nJulian stared at this flat contradiction.\n\n\"Not?\"\n\n\"Rip never went out of the house.\"\n\n\"But he died in the snow.\"\n\n\"No,\" the doctor said quietly. \"He died in your dining-room, of\nfear--fear of his old master, Valentine.\"\n\n\"What?\" said Julian, gripping the table with his right hand. \"Val had\nbeen at him?\"\n\nIn two or three simple, straightforward words, the doctor described the\ndeath of Rip. When he had finished Cuckoo gave a little cry, and clasped\nthe astonished and squirming Jessie close in her arms. Julian's brow\nclouded.\n\n\"He might have left Rip alone,\" he said. \"It's odd dogs can't bear Val\nnow.\"\n\n\"Again since that trance,\" the doctor said.\n\nJulian looked at him with acute irritation, but said nothing. Then,\nturning his eyes on Cuckoo, who was still hugging Jessie, he snapped his\nfingers at the little dog and called its name. Cuckoo extended her arms,\nholding Jessie, to Julian, and he took the small creature gently. And as\nhe took her he bent forward and gazed long and deeply into Cuckoo's eyes.\nShe trembled and flushed, half with pleasure, half with a nervous\nconsciousness of the doctor's presence.\n\n\"Oh, why do you?\" she murmured, turning her head away. The action seemed\nto make Julian aware that perhaps his manner was odd, and his subsequent\nglance at the doctor was very plainly, and even rudely, explanatory\nof a wish to be alone with Cuckoo. The doctor read its meaning and\nresolved to go away. With the quick observation and knowledge of men\nwhich long years of training had given to him, he saw that, strangely\nenough, the only creature whose influence could in any way cope with the\ninfluence of Valentine was not himself, who once had been as a seer to\nthe two young men, but the thin, spectral, weary, painted Cuckoo. There,\nin that small room, with the long murmur of London outside, sat these two\nhuman beings, desolate woman, vice-ridden man, both fallen down in the\ndeep mire, both almost whelmed in the flood of Fate. And he stood strong,\nfaithful, clean-souled, brave-hearted, yet impotent, regarding them. For\nsome power willed it that misery alone could hold out a helping hand to\nmisery, that vice and degradation must rise to thrust back vice and\ndegradation. The fallen creature was to be the protector, the unredeemed\nto be the redeemer. Doctor Levillier knew this when he saw Julian's\nlong glance into the hollow eyes of Cuckoo. And he thrilled with the\nknowledge. It seemed to him a great demonstration of the root, the core,\nof divine pity which he believed to be the centre of the scheme of the\nworld. Round this centre revolved wheels within wheels of cruelty, of\nagony, of ruthless passions and of lawless bitterness. Yet they radiated\nfrom pity. They radiated from love. How it was so he could not tell, and\nthere the pessimist had him by the throat. But that it was so he felt in\nhis inmost heart, and never more than now, when the tired boy sneered at\nhim, who was an old friend, clean of life, gentle of nature, and turned\nto this girl, this thing that loathsome men played with and scorned.\nCuckoo flushed and trembled; this divine pity outpainted her rouge, and\nshook that body which had so often betrayed itself to destroyers. This\ndivine pity gave to her, who had lost all, the power to find freedom for\nanother soul that lay in bondage.\n\nThe doctor gazed for an instant at the boy and girl, and was deeply\nmoved. His lips breathed a word that was a prayer, for Julian, for the\nlady of the feathers.\n\nThen he got up.\n\n\"I have to go,\" he said.\n\nJulian said nothing; Cuckoo flushed again, and accompanied the doctor to\nthe hall door. When she had opened it, and they looked out, it was very\ncold, but the fog had lifted, and was floating away to reveal a sky full\nof stars, which always seem to shine more brightly upon frost. The doctor\ntook the girl's hand.\n\n\"I see you in clear weather,\" he said.\n\n\"You don't--you don't think as he'll--as I'll--\" stammered Cuckoo,\nglancing awkwardly towards the lighted doorway of the little\nsitting-room, and then at the doctor. The church clock striking\n7:30 pointed the application of the hesitating murmur. It was\nunconventionally late for an afternoon call.\n\n\"It'll be all right, you know that?\" said the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"Yes, I know that,\" he answered. \"You have to fight, I feel that; only\nyou can do it. You have to fight this--this--\" and here the doctor's\nloyalty spoke, for he could not betray even this new Valentine,--\"this\nstrange madness of Valentine's. Pit your will against his, and conquer\nfor Julian's sake.\"\n\n\"Will,\" said Cuckoo. \"That's what he says I can't have.\"\n\n\"Won't you pray to have it given you?\" said the little doctor.\n\nCuckoo looked at him, wondering. Then she said:\n\n\"I believe I could fight better 'n pray.\"\n\n\"Sometimes battle is the greatest of all prayers,\" said the doctor.\n\nThe iron gate clicked. He was gone. Cuckoo cast an oblique glance up\nat the stars before she shut the door, and retraced her steps down the\npassage.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nBATTLE ARRAY\n\n\nWhen Julian left the Marylebone Road that night it was nearly ten\no'clock. He was quite sober, and looked preternaturally grave as he\nopened the little gate and stepped out into the frost-bound street.\nIn the lighted aperture of the doorway behind him Cuckoo stood like\na shadow half revealed peeping after him, and he turned and waved his\nhand to her. Then he walked away slowly, meditating. That night the\nfight for the possession of his will, his soul, had begun in deadly\nearnest. He did not know it, yet he was vaguely aware that he began to\nmove in the midst of unwonted circumstances. Cuckoo had not been able\nwholly to conceal from him her strong mental excitement. Since her\nconversation with the doctor she had become a different woman. For the\none word had been spoken which could change weakness into strength,\nutter self-distrust into something that at least resembled self-reliance.\nThe doctor had broken Valentine's spell over Cuckoo with that word. He\nbelieved in her. He told her to fight. He assumed that she had some\npower, even more power for Julian than he had. \"Only you can do it,\" he\nhad said. The sentence armed her from head to foot, put weapons in her\nhands, light in her hollow eyes, a leaping exultation in her heart. The\nflickering power that she had marvelled at, and then despaired of, burnt\nup at last into a strong flame. That evening it had dazzled Julian's\neyes. He seemed to see a new Cuckoo, and he was thinking of her as he\nwalked along now in the frost under the stars. His meditation was not\nvery intellectual or very profound, for since the change in his life\nJulian had put his old intellectualities away from him. Passion, so\nlong guarded, so bravely repressed, once it had broken loose stormed\nall the heights of his nature, and drove every sentiment that tried to\noppose it into exile. The animalism that is so generally present in a\nboy physically strong took possession of him, and would not tolerate\nany divided allegiance. It declined to permit his life to be a thing of\nmingled enjoyments, now rejoicing in the leaping desires of the body, now\ndisregarding them for the aspirations and clear contentments of the mind.\nIt seemed vengeful, like a man long kept fasting against his will, and\nhaving at last come into its empire made that empire an autocracy, a\ntyranny. Julian had passed at a step from one extreme to another, and had\nalready so lost the habit of following any mental process to a conclusion\nthat he could no longer think clearly with ease, or observe himself with\nany acuteness. He was for the time all body, knew his muscles, his flesh,\nhis limbs, like intimates; his mind only distantly, like a stranger. With\npassion, with greed, he had seized on all those pleasures which he had\npreviously feared and shunned, until his brain was heavy as is the brain\nof a glutton and a drunkard, and his mind stepped in any direction with a\nlanguid lethargy. So to-night he had the face of a man puzzled as he\nwalked in the frost under the stars.\n\nOnce the hint of some power lurking in Cuckoo had thrilled and awed\nhim, as only a certain clearness--a certain receptive, appreciative\nclearness--can be thrilled and awed. Now the abrupt development of\nthat power almost distressed, because it confused him. He had gone\ndown lower in the interval between the two possibilities of sensation.\n\n\"What the devil's come over Cuckoo?\" so ran his thought with a schoolboy\ngait. That something had come over her he recognized. She was no longer\nthe girl he had stared at in Piccadilly, the creature he had pitied in\nthe twilight hour of their first friendly interview. Nor was she the\nwoman whose soul he had injured by his cruel whim, the woman who had\nbeaten him with reproaches, and made him for an instant almost ashamed\nof his lusts. All these humanities perhaps slept, or woke, in her still.\nYet it was not they which heavily concerned him on his way to the Marble\nArch. There is a vitality about power of whatever kind that makes itself\ninstantly felt, even when it is not understood, even when it is neither\nbeloved nor appreciated. Julian was confused by his dull and sudden\nrecognition of power in Cuckoo. No longer did it flash upon him, a\nmystery of flame in her eyes, moving him to the awe and the constraint\nthat a man may feel at sight of an unearthly thing, a phantom, or a\nvision of the night. (He had looked for the flame in her eyes, and he\nhad not found it.) But it glowed upon him more steadily, with a warmth of\nhumanity, of something inherent, rooted, not detached, and merely for the\nmoment and as if by chance prisoned in some particular place, from which\nat a breath it might escape. It drew him to Cuckoo, and at the same time\nit slightly repelled him, the latter--though Julian did not know it--by\nthe sharp abruptness of its novelty. For the doctor had lit a blaze of\nstrength in the girl by a word. Julian's eyes were dazzled by the blaze.\nCustom might teach them to face it more calmly. At present he could look\nat the stars with greater ease. Indeed, as he walked, he did look at\nthem, and thought of the eyes of Cuckoo, and then of the eyes of all\nwomen, and of their strange intensities of suggestion and of realization,\nof their language of the devil and of the clouds, of their kindling\nvigours. But the eyes of Cuckoo were no longer as the eyes of any other\nwoman. Julian glanced at a girl who watched him from the corner of the\nstreet. He knew that Cuckoo looked each night at men as that girl looked\nat him. He knew it, yet he felt that he did not believe it. For to him\nshe was dressed already in the fillet of some priestess, in the robes\nof one tending some strange and unnamed altar. She woke in him a little\nof the uneasy fear and uneasy attraction that a creature whom a man feels\nto be greater than himself often wakes in him. That evening, while Julian\nsat with her, he had been seized with curious conflicting desires to\nfall before her or to strike her, to draw her close or to fend her off\nfrom him, all dull, too, and vague as in heaviness of dreaming. Those\nfeelings, vague in the house, were scarcely clearer in the cold and in\nthe open spaces of the night, and Julian was conscious of a sense of\nirritation, of anger against himself. He felt as if he were an oaf, a\nlout. Was it, could it be, Cuckoo who had made him feel so? After all,\nwhat was she? Julian tried to hug and soothe himself in the unworthy\nremembrance of Cuckoo's monotonous life and piteous deeds, to reinstate\nhimself in contented animalism by thoughts of the animalism of this\npriestess! He laughed aloud under the stars, but the laugh rang hollow.\nHe could not reinstate himself. He could only wearily repeat, \"What the\ndevil's come over Cuckoo?\" with an iteration of dull, moody petulance.\n\nA hansom suddenly pulled up beside him and a voice called:\n\n\"Julian! Julian, where are you coming from?\"\n\nIt was Valentine. He was muffled in a fur coat, and stretched himself\nover the wooden apron to attract his friend's attention.\n\n\"I have been to your rooms,\" he continued. \"Don't you remember we had\narranged to dine together?\"\n\nJulian looked at him without animation.\n\n\"I had forgotten it,\" he answered.\n\n\"Your memory is becoming very treacherous,\" Valentine said. \"Where are\nyou off to? Get in. I will drive you.\"\n\n\"I hadn't any plan,\" Julian said, getting into the cab.\n\n\"Drive to the Savoy,\" Valentine called to the cabman. \"I want some\nsupper,\" he added.\n\n\"I can't come in. I'm not dressed.\"\n\n\"We will have a private room, then. Have you dined?\"\n\n\"I? No.\"\n\nValentine looked at him narrowly.\n\n\"Have you been in the Marylebone Road again?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"I don't know.\"\n\nThe answer was the bald truth. In making it Julian experienced a slight\nfeeling of relief. He was putting into words the vagueness that perplexed\nhim. He wondered why he did go to see Cuckoo.\n\n\"But you must know. You must have a reason,\" said Valentine.\n\n\"If I have I don't know what it is. I wish you would tell me, old\nfellow.\"\n\n\"I can't supply you with reasons for all your actions.\"\n\n\"And I can't supply myself with reasons for any of them,\" Julian said\nslowly. The words were leading him to a dawning wonder at his own way of\nlife, a dawning desire to know if there were really any reasons for the\nthings he did. But Valentine did not accept the reply as satisfactory. On\nthe contrary, it evidently irritated him still more, for he said with\nunusual warmth:\n\n\"Your reason for dropping your engagements, throwing me over and\nwasting my evenings is quite obvious. The blessed damozel of the\nfeathers is attractive to you. Her freshness captivates you. Her\nbrilliant conversation entertains you. She is the powdered and\npainted reason of these irrelevant escapades.\"\n\n\"Don't sneer at her, Val.\"\n\nThe words came quickly, like a bolt. Valentine frowned, and a deepening\nsuspicion flashed in his eyes.\n\n\"I did not think you were so easily flattered,\" he continued.\n\n\"Flattered?\"\n\n\"Yes. Cuckoo Bright admires you, and you go to number 400 to smell the\nrather rank fumes of the incense which she burns at your shrine.\"\n\n\"Nonsense!\" Julian cried warmly.\n\n\"What other reason can you have? She has no beauty; she has no\nconversation, no gaiety, no distinction, no manners--she has nothing.\nShe is nothing.\"\n\n\"Ah, it's there you're wrong.\"\n\n\"Wrong!\"\n\n\"When you say she is nothing.\"\n\n\"I say it again,\" Valentine reiterated almost fiercely.\n\n\"The lady of the feathers is nothing, nothing at all. God and the\ndevil--they have completely forgotten her. A creature like that is\nneither good, nor would I call her really evil, for she is evil merely\nthat she may go on living, not because she has a fine pleasure in sin.\nBut if you sell your will for bread and butter, you slip out of the\nworld, the world that must be reckoned with. I say, Cuckoo Bright is\nnothing.\"\n\n\"And I tell you she is something extraordinary.\"\n\nAs Julian spoke the words the cab stopped at the Savoy. Valentine sprang\nout and paid the man. His face was flushed as if with heat, despite the\npiercing cold of the night.\n\n\"A private room and supper for two,\" he said to the man in the vestibule.\n\"Take my coat,\" and he drew himself with obvious relief from the embrace\nof his huge coat. Julian and he said nothing more until they were\nsitting opposite to one another at a small oval table in a small and\nstrongly decorated room, whose windows faced the Thames Embankment. The\nwaiter uncorked a bottle of champagne with the air of one performing a\nreligious rite. The electric light gleamed and a fire chased the frost\nfrom recollection. Julian had already forgotten what they had been\ntalking about in the cab. The first sip of champagne swept the heavy\nmeditativeness from him. But Valentine, unfolding his napkin slowly, and\nwith his eyes on the _menu_, said:\n\n\"In what way is she something extraordinary?\"\n\n\"H'm?\" Julian muttered.\n\n\"Surely you can define it.\"\n\n\"What, Val?\"\n\n\"The peculiarity of Cuckoo Bright that you laid so much stress on just\nnow.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, now I remember. No, I can't define it. How good this soup is.\nThe soup here--\"\n\n\"Yes, yes; our coming here again and again to eat it proves our\nappreciation. Julian, do endeavour to answer my question. I am really\ninterested to know exactly what it is that has taken you again to\nMarylebone Road.\"\n\nJulian drank some more champagne. His eyes began to sparkle.\n\n\"Can you give a reason for everything you do?\" he asked.\n\n\"I think I certainly could for every act that I reiterate.\"\n\n\"Then you're built differently from me. But I've told you all I can.\nI like Cuckoo. She's a damned nice girl.\"\n\nValentine's lip curled.\n\n\"I can't agree with you, Julian.\"\n\n\"You don't know her as I do.\"\n\n\"Not quite.\"\n\nJulian reddened.\n\n\"Come, now,\" he began, and then checked himself and laughed\ngood-naturedly. \"You can't play the saint any more, you know, Val,\"\nhe said.\n\n\"I have no wish to. I discovered long ago that a saint is only the corpse\nof a man, not a living man at all. But we are talking about this corpse\nof a woman.\"\n\n\"Cuckoo's no corpse. By Jove, no. I believe she's got a power that no\nother woman has.\"\n\n\"How so? You haven't been imagining that absurd flame in her eyes again?\"\n\nValentine spoke with furtive uneasiness. He was scarcely eating or\ndrinking, but Julian was doing ample justice to the wine, and displayed a\nvery tolerable appetite. He lifted his glass to his lips and put it down\nbefore he answered:\n\n\"No. It's gone.\"\n\nValentine seemed relieved.\n\n\"Of course. I knew it was an hallucination. You went to satisfy yourself,\nI suppose. And now--\"\n\n\"Since it's gone Cuckoo seems to me--I don't know--changed somehow. Val,\nthere must be a few people in the world with great power over others. You\nare one. Marr was another, and--\" He paused.\n\n\"And what?\" Valentine said rather loudly.\n\n\"Well,\" Julian paused again, as if conscious that he was about to say\nsomething that would seem ridiculous, \"Cuckoo--\"\n\n\"Is a third! You think it reasonable to bracket me with a woman like\nthat, to compare my will, mine, who have lived the life of thought as\nwell as the life of action, who have trained my powers to the highest\npoint, and offered up sacrifices--yes, sacrifices--to my will, to that\ndegraded, powerless creature! Julian!\"\n\nHe stopped, clenching his hand as it lay upon the table. Never before\nhad Julian seen him so profoundly moved. All his normal calm and\nself-possession seemed deserting him. His lips worked like those of a\nman in the very extremity of rage, and the red glow in his cheeks\nfaded into the grey of suppressed passion. Julian was utterly taken\naback by such an exhibition of feeling.\n\n\"My dear fellow,\" he stammered, \"I didn't mean--I had no idea--\"\n\n\"You did mean that. You do. And I--I have been fool enough to believe\nthat you relied upon me, on my judgment; that you looked up to me;\nthat--good God, how absurd!\"\n\nHe lay back in his chair and burst into a paroxysm of loud and mirthless\nlaughter, while Julian, holding his champagne-glass between his fingers,\nand twisting it stealthily round and round, regarded him with a blank\nstare of utter confusion and perplexity. Valentine continued to laugh\nso long that it seemed as if he were seized in the grip of a horrible\nhysteria. But just as the situation was becoming actually intolerable,\nhe suddenly controlled himself with an obvious and painful effort. After\nremaining perfectly silent for two or three minutes, he said, in a voice\nthat struggled to be calm and succeeded in being icy:\n\n\"Julian, you have torn the veil of the Holy of Holies from the top to the\nbottom with a vengeance. But why have you kept up the deception so long,\nwhen, after all, there was nothing behind the veil? That was surely\nunnecessary.\"\n\n\"What is the matter with you, Val? I don't understand you.\"\n\n\"Nor I you. And yet we say that we are intimate friends. There's an\nirony.\"\n\nAt this point the waiter came in with an omelette, and the conversation\nceased, checked by his peripatetic presence. As soon as he had retreated,\nwith all the hushed activity of a mute rolling on casters, Julian\nexclaimed:\n\n\"It's not an irony. You choose to make it so. You're not yourself\nto-night, Valentine. I do not compare you with poor Cuckoo. How could\nI? She's down in the dirt and you are far away from the dirt. And of\ncourse your power over any one must be a thousand times greater than\nhers.\"\n\n\"If it came to a battle? If it came to a battle?\" interrupted Valentine.\n\"You say that, Julian?\"\n\n\"A battle! of what?\"\n\n\"Of wills, naturally, Cuckoo Bright's will against mine?\"\n\n\"But what a strange idea--\"\n\n\"You haven't answered my question.\"\n\n\"Because I don't see the force of it.\"\n\n\"Answer it nevertheless.\"\n\n\"Then Cuckoo would be beaten at once,\" Julian said. But there was no\nring of conviction in his voice, and he fell at once into silence after\nhe had spoken the words. Valentine saw by his frowning face and puckered\nforehead that the idea of such a battle had set in motion a train of\nthought in his mind.\n\n\"You are wondering, Julian,\" Valentine said.\n\nJulian looked up.\n\n\"Who doesn't wonder in this beastly world?\" he said morosely.\n\n\"I never do. I prefer to act. Drink some more champagne?\"\n\nHe pushed the bottle over and went on:\n\n\"You are wondering why I spoke of a battle between Cuckoo Bright and me.\nWell, I'll tell you. I spoke because I see that there is to be such a\nbattle.\"\n\nJulian drank his champagne and looked definitely and increasingly\nastonished, as Valentine continued:\n\n\"There is to be such a battle. I have seen it for a long time. Julian,\nyou may think you know women. You don't. I said just now that a woman\nlike Cuckoo Bright is nothing, but I said it for the sake of uttering\na paradox. No woman is ever nothing in a world that is full of the\nthings called men. No woman's ever nothing so long as there is a bottle\nof hair-dye, a rouge-pot, a dressmaker, and--a man within reach. She may\nbe in the very gutter. That doesn't matter. For from the very gutter she\ncan see--not the stars, but the twinkling vanities of men, and they will\nlight her on her way to Mayfair drawing-rooms, even, perhaps, to Court.\nWho knows? And God--or the devil--has given to every woman the knowledge\nof her possibilities. Men have only the ignorance of theirs.\"\n\n\"What has this to do with Cuckoo and me?\" Julian said. \"This bottle is\nempty, Valentine.\"\n\nValentine rang hastily for another.\n\n\"And what on earth has it got to do with a battle between you and\nCuckoo?\"\n\n\"Everything. She hates me. She has told you so again and again.\"\n\nJulian looked expressively uncomfortable.\n\n\"I've always stood up for you,\" he began.\n\n\"I believe it. She hates me not because I am myself, but simply because I\nam your closest friend. Hush, Julian. It's much better all this should be\nsaid once for all. Many women are intensely jealous of the men friends of\nmen whom they either love, or who they mean shall love them. Look at the\nwives who drive their husbands' old chums from intimacy into the outer\ndarkness of acquaintanceship. Wedding-days break, as well as bind, faith.\nAnd you have had your wedding-day with Cuckoo.\"\n\n\"That was an accident. She loathes to think of it.\"\n\n\"She may say so. But it puts a fine edge on her hatred of me,\nnevertheless.\"\n\n\"No, Valentine, no. Her dislike of you is simply silly--instinctive.\"\n\n\"She tells you so. Ah! I was wrong to call her nothing. But it is her\nhatred of me that must bring us to battle unless--\"\n\n\"Unless what?\"\n\n\"You give her up now, once and for all.\"\n\n\"Give Cuckoo up!\"\n\nThe words came slowly, and the voice that uttered them sounded startled\nand even shocked. Valentine began to gauge the new power of the lady of\nthe feathers from that moment.\n\n\"That's a--a strong thing to do, Val.\"\n\n\"It won't hurt you to do a strong thing for once in your life.\"\n\n\"Even if it didn't hurt me I think it would hurt her very much. For,\nValentine, I believe you said the truth when you said to me once, 'That\ngirl loves you.' Do you remember?\"\n\n\"Perfectly. Loves you, your birth, your position, your money, your good\nlooks, perhaps your standpoint above the gutter. I can well believe that\nMiss Bright, like all her sisterhood, loves with undying love that\ncombination of flesh-pots, her notion of the ego of a man.\"\n\n\"She has never accepted a halfpenny from me.\"\n\n\"Because she means eventually to have twenty-one shillings in the pound.\nHave some more champagne.\"\n\n\"Yes. You are wrong, Val, utterly wrong. Cuckoo's not mercenary. If such\na girl could be good, she is good.\"\n\nThere was just a touch of the maudlin in Julian's voice. He went on very\nearnestly, and nodding his head emphatically over even his conjunctions.\n\n\"And if she were what you say, she would have no influence over me, and\nI should hate her. But to me she is just what a good girl might be. Why,\neven the doctor--\"\n\n\"Was he there to-night?\" Valentine cried, with a sudden inspiration.\n\n\"Of course he was. And you know what a particular little chap he is.\"\n\n\"Why was he there?\"\n\n\"Just to see Cuckoo, you know, in a friendly way.\"\n\nValentine realized then that the battle had begun. He divined the meaning\nof the doctor's visit. He guessed what it had done for the lady of the\nfeathers. And he sat silent while Julian went on drinking more\nchampagne.\n\n\"I believe he likes Cuckoo, Val. I am sure he does. And he behaved quite\nas if--quite as if he--you know--respected her. And it's all nonsense her\nhating you, and having a battle, and all that kind of thing, with you.\nShe's only fanciful. She's not--\"\n\n\"Would you give her up if I asked you to? Mind, Julian, I don't say I\never shall ask you. But if I do?\"\n\n\"Don't ask me to, don't ask me. Poor Cuckoo, poor girl, she's got no\nfriends, money, or--or anything. Poor Cuckoo. Poor Cuck--Cuck--\"\n\nHe fell back in his chair, nodding his head, and reiterating his\ncommiseration for the lady of the feathers in a faint and recurring\nhiccough. Valentine got up and rang the bell.\n\n\"The bill, please, waiter.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\nThe man glanced at Julian with the shadow of a pleasing, and apparently\nalso pleased, smile and withdrew. Valentine stood for a moment looking\nat the leaning figure on the chair, relaxed in the first throes of a\ndrunken slumber. His anger and almost unbridled emotion completely died\naway as he looked.\n\n\"Can it be called a battle after all?\" he said to himself. \"They may not\nknow it, but it is practically won already.\"\n\nThe waiter re-entered. Valentine paid the bill, and the breath of the\nfrost shortly revived Julian into an attempt at conversation.\n\n\"Don't ask me to give her up, Val; don't, don't ask me. Poor girl. Poor,\npoor Cuck--Cuck.\"\n\nThe name of the lady of the feathers seemed a good one for a tipsy tongue\nto play with.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE DOCTOR RECEIVES A VISIT FROM MRS. WILSON\n\n\nDoctor Levillier grew more puzzled day by day. His observation of\nValentine taught him only one thing certainly, and beyond possibility of\ndoubt and that was the death of the youth he had once loved, the living\npresence of a youth whom he could not love, whom he could only shrink\nfrom and even fear. He held to the theory that this radical and ghastly\nchange must be caused by some obscure dementia, some secret overturning\nof the mind; but he was obliged to confess to himself that he held to\nit only because, otherwise, he would be floating helpless, and without a\nspar, upon a tide of perplexity and confusion. He could not honestly say\nthat he was able to put his finger upon any definite signs of madness\nexhibited by Valentine, any that would satisfy a mad-doctor. He could\nonly say that Valentine's character had been strangely beautiful and was\nnow strangely evil, and that the soul of Julian was following rapidly the\nsoul of Valentine. The more closely he watched Valentine, the more\nastounded did he become and the more eager to detach Julian from him. But\nthe strangest thing of all, as the doctor allowed in one of his frequent\nself-communings, was, that though formerly he had loved Valentine\nbetter than Julian, it never occurred to him that the work of rescue\nmight be undertaken on behalf of the former. His mind dismissed the new\nValentine into a region that was beyond his scope and power. He felt\ninstinctively that here was a soul, a will, that his soul could not turn\nfrom its ends or detach from its pursuits. The new Valentine was a law to\nhimself. What moved the doctor to such horror was that the new Valentine\nwas a law to Julian. And there was something peculiarly dreadful in the\nidea which he held, that Julian, once under the beautiful influence of\nValentine's sanity, was now under the baneful influence of his insanity.\nThe doctor had gone the length of deciding, in his own mind, that\nValentine's sane period of life and insane period lay one on each side\nof a fixed gulf, and that fixed gulf was his long trance succeeding the\nfinal sitting of the two young men. This conclusion was arrived at with\nease, once the theory of a subtle lunacy was accepted as a fact. For,\non sending his mind back along the ways of recollection, the doctor was\nable to recall hints of the new Valentine dating from that very night,\nbut never before it. The first hint was Rip's manifested fear, and this\nled on to others which have been already mentioned. Having made up his\nmind that this trance was the motive power of Valentine's supposed\nmadness, the doctor sought in every direction to increase his knowledge\non the subject of simulations of death by the human body. He looked up\nagain the cases of innumerable hysterical patients whom he had himself\ntreated, sometimes with success, sometimes with failure. He consulted\nother doctors, of course without mentioning the object of his research.\nHe endeavoured to apply to Valentine's case standards by which he was\nquickly able to form a satisfactory opinion on the cases of others. He\neven went so far as to examine as closely as possible into the history of\ntable-turning, the uses ascribed to it by its votaries, and the results\nobtained from it by credible--as opposed to merely credulous--witnesses.\nBut he found no case that seemed in any way analogous to the strange case\nof Valentine. As was only natural, the doctor did not forget the\npossibility of hypnotism, which had struck him during his second\nconversation with the lady of the feathers. Her confused declarations on\nthe subject of Valentine and Marr being one person, if they were really\na true account of what Valentine had said to her--which seemed very\ndoubtful--could only be made clear by accepting as a fact that the dead\nMarr had laid a hypnotic spell upon Valentine, which continued to exist\nactively long after its weaver slept in the grave. But Marr and Valentine\nhad never met. This fact seemed fully established. Valentine had always\ndenied any knowledge of him before the trance. Julian had always assumed\nthat only he of the two friends had any acquaintance with Marr. And\nagain, when the doctor, one day, quite casually, said to Valentine, \"By\nthe way, you never did meet Marr, did you?\" Valentine replied, \"Never,\ntill I saw him lying dead in the Euston Road.\"\n\nThe doctor could see no ray of light in the darkness that could guide him\nto the clue of the mystery. He could only say to himself, \"It must be, it\nmust be an obscure and horrible madness,\" and keep his theory to himself.\nSometimes, as he sat pondering over the whole affair, he smiled, half\nsadly, half sarcastically. For the event brought home to his ready\nmodesty the sublime ignorance of all clever and instructed men, taught\nhim to wonder, as he had often wondered, that there exists in such a\nworld as ours such a fantastic growth as the flourishing weed, conceit.\n\nAnother matter that puzzled him greatly was this: As the days went on,\nand as Valentine grew--and he did grow--more certain of his own power for\nevil over Julian, and as, consequently, he took less and less pains to\nhide the truth of his personality from the knowledge of the doctor, the\nlatter was frequently seized with the appalled sensation which had long\nago overtaken him when he was followed in Regent Street and in Vere\nStreet. This recurrence of sensation, and the certainty forced gradually\nupon the doctor that it was caused by the presence of Valentine,\nnaturally led him to wonder whether it were possible that the man who\nhad dogged his steps, and eventually fled from him, could have been\nValentine himself. If that were indeed so, then this madness--if it did\nexist--must surely have come upon Valentine before the trance. Nothing\nbut a madness could have led him thus in the night hours to steal out\nin pursuit of the friend who had just left his house and company. But the\ndoctor knew of no means by which he could satisfy himself of Valentine's\nmovements on the night in question. To ask Valentine himself would be to\ncourt a lie. Once the doctor thought for a moment of having recourse to\nWade. But then he remembered that the butler did not sleep in the flat,\nand had no doubt long gone home before the event of the night in\nquestion. So, again, he was confronted with a dead-wall, beyond which\nhe could see no clear view or comprehensible country.\n\nAbout this time there happened an event which struck strongly upon\nthe doctor's mind. He was one day, as usual, in his consulting-room,\nreceiving a multitude of patients, when his man-servant entered with\na card on a salver.\n\n\"A lady, sir, who wishes to see you. She has no appointment.\"\n\nThe doctor took the card. On it was printed merely \"Mrs. Wilson.\"\n\n\"I cannot see the lady to-day,\" he said, \"unless she can call again after\nfive o'clock. But I can see her then, or to-morrow morning at ten. Ask\nher which she would prefer.\"\n\nAfter a moment's absence Lawler returned.\n\n\"The lady will come at five o'clock this evening, sir.\"\n\n\"Very well.\"\n\nAnd the doctor bent his mind once more steadily upon his work.\n\nAt five o'clock the door opened, and a tall, square, and strong-looking\nwoman, dressed in black, walked quietly into the room. She bowed to the\ndoctor and sat down.\n\n\"I am glad you could see me to-day,\" she said. \"I leave London early\nto-morrow morning. I hate London.\"\n\nShe spoke in a full and rather rich voice, with a slightly burring\naccent, and looked the doctor full in the face with a pair of large and\nsensible grey eyes. Nature had certainly built her to be one of those\ntowers of women, strong for themselves, for their sex, and often for men\nalso, who possess a peculiar power, given in quite full measure to no\nmale creature, of large sympathy and lofty composure. But the doctor saw\nat a glance that some adverse fate had disagreed with the intentions of\nnature, and fought against them with success. Circumstances must have\narisen in this woman's life to break down her unusual equipment of\ncourage and resolution, or if not to break it down, to dint and batter\nthe shield she carried over her heart and life. For her fine face was\nlined with care, her naturally firm mouth was tormented by an apparently\nirresistible quivering, that, once prompted by long and painful emotion,\nhad now become habitual and mechanical, and her eyes, although they met\nthe eyes of the doctor with a peculiar large reception and return of\nscrutiny, held in their depths that hunted expression which is only\ndeveloped by long agony, either physical or mental. So much the doctor\nread in a glance before his patient began to detail her symptoms. She\ndetailed them with a certain obvious shame and a slow conquering of\nreticence that made her speak very deliberately.\n\nShe began by saying, in no insulting manner, that she had kept clear of\ndoctors during almost the whole of her life; that she had meant to keep\nclear of them till her death.\n\n\"For I was born with a constitution of iron,\" she said, \"and I have\nalways lived on the most sanitary principles, and with the utmost\nsimplicity. So I hoped to go to my grave without much suffering.\nCertainly I never expected to have to consult any one on the ground\nof nervous breakdown. Yet that is exactly why I am here with you at\nthis moment. The circumstances of my life have been too much for me,\nI suppose.\"\n\nThere was a grave pathos in her voice as she uttered the last words.\n\n\"At any rate,\" she continued, after a pause, \"I would like you to help\nme if you can. The cause of my breakdown is remote enough, several years\nold. I had a tremendous burden to bear then, and I bore it, as I thought\nbravely, for a long time. At last it grew intolerable, and then I\nsucceeded at last in getting it removed, in getting rid of it, you\nunderstand, altogether. The odd thing is, that while I was bearing my\nburden my strength did not fail me, my courage did not utterly give way.\nOnly when the burden was removed did I faint because of it. My trouble\nwas partially physical--I had to endure grave physical cruelty at that\ntime--but chiefly mental. My agony of mind ran a race with my agony of\nbody, and won easily. It's generally so with women, I believe?\"\n\nShe waited as if for a reply.\n\n\"Yes, it is often so,\" Doctor Levillier answered.\n\n\"Ever since the burden was lifted from my shoulders,\" she continued, \"I\nhave been getting steadily worse. Each month, each year, I became more\nand more degraded in my cowardice, my fear of trifles, even of things\nwhich have no existence at all. All this is perhaps--perhaps--peculiarly\npainful to me because I am naturally, you must understand, what sane\npeople call a strong-minded woman. I had originally complete physical\ncourage, didn't know the meaning of the word 'fear,' despised those who\ndid, I am afraid. So you see this is very bad for me; it cuts so deep\ninto my mind, you see. It makes me hate and loathe myself so. I sleep\nbadly, and have the usual symptoms of nervous collapse, I believe. I'm\nstrong one moment, feeble, no good at all, the next. My appetite has long\nbeen bad, and so on. But it isn't that sort of thing I mind. I could\nfight with that well enough. It's my horrible deterioration of mind that\ntroubles me, that has brought me here, to you, in spite of my hatred of\nLondon, of every city. It was in a city, though not in London, that I\nbore that burden I told you of. It doesn't seem possible to me, but I'm\ntold, and I read, that my mind diseased may be an effect, and that the\ncause may lie in my body. That's why I come to you. Doctor Levillier,\nroot out the disease if you can.\"\n\nShe ended speaking almost with passion, her lips trembling all the time\nand her eyes never leaving his face. Then she added with a curious\ncharacteristic abruptness:\n\n\"I will tell you that I've plenty of money. Lack of funds is no weapon\nagainst my return to health--if my return is in any way possible.\"\n\nDoctor Levillier smiled slightly.\n\n\"You are anticipating the usual 'long-sea voyage' formula, I see,\" he\nsaid.\n\n\"Possibly.\"\n\n\"I should not prescribe it for you off-hand,\" he said. \"Sea air is not a\nspecific for all nervous complaints, as some people seem to think. You\nhave no bodily pain?\"\n\n\"No. I often wish I had.\"\n\n\"What you tell me about your gradual collapse coming on after the crisis\nof your troubles was over, and not during it, does not surprise me. Nor\nam I puzzled by your malady increasing if, as I suppose, you are living\nidly.\"\n\n\"I am. I have no courage to do anything or see anybody.\"\n\n\"Exactly. You live in a sort of hiding.\"\n\n\"Why--yes. You see, once I was well known to a good many people. My\ntroubles became known to them too. I could not get rid of that burden I\ntold you of except by blazoning them abroad. I shrink from meeting any\npeople now. Therefore I live very quietly. I--\"\n\nSuddenly she seemed to grow tired of the half measures in frankness that\nhad so far governed her communications. She spread forth her hands with\na very characteristic, ample gesture of sudden confidence.\n\n\"I think I'll tell you exactly what it was,\" she said. \"You may have\nread of me. Long ago, some years at least, I was obliged to take action\nagainst my husband, a Mr. Wilson, who afterwards assumed the name of\nMarr. I charged him with cruelty, won my case, and obtained a judicial\nseparation.\"\n\nThen Dr. Levillier knew that he looked on the former wife of the strange,\ncruel, dead man, whose influence had entered into the lives of his two\nfriends.\n\n\"You may have heard of my case?\" Mrs. Wilson said.\n\n\"Certainly I have.\"\n\n\"It was bad, even from a newspaper point of view, I believe. People\ncongratulated me on getting rid of a brute, and thought I was all right\nand ought to be happy. But the newspapers and the world never knew what\nI had gone through, the real horrors, before I insisted on release. You\nstarted when I called my husband a brute just now, Dr. Levillier; I\nnoticed it. The phrase hurt you, coming from any wife about any husband.\nI know why, a boy once told me that his mother was always drunk. He hurt\nme then into hating him for the rest of my days. But I called a stranger\na brute, not the man I loved and married, not the man I loved after I\nmarried him. Dr. Levillier, do you believe in possessions?\"\n\nShe had been gradually getting excited while she spoke, and, on the last\nwords, she leaned forward in her chair and struck her hand down in her\nlap.\n\n\"Do you mean possession by the devil?\" said the doctor, very quietly,\nopposing a strong calm to her intensity.\n\n\"Yes. I do. My experience obliges me to. I knew, for a year before I\nmarried him, I married, I lived for two years after I married him, with\na man who was my conception of what a man should be, strong, gentle,\ntender, brave, a hero to me. I got rid of a devil, after I had endured\ntwo years of torture at his hands. It is no use to tell me those two\ndistinct men I knew were one and the same man. My soul, my heart, declare\nthat it's a lie. There were such differences. My husband loved music;\nthis man hated it; yet had the power to use it as a means of tormenting\nme. But I needn't dwell on the evidences of change. Suffice it to say\nthat the thing that crushed me, the thing that has brought me down into\nthe dust where I am, dust of cowardice, and weakness, and impotence to\ndo or to be anything, was the horror of awakening to a knowledge of that\nchange, of having to live as wife with this devil, whom I knew not, who\nwas a stranger to me. Only the features were my husband's, nothing else.\nI got rid of a stranger. The man found dead in the Euston Road was a\nstranger whom I hated, nothing more to me than that.\"\n\nAs she spoke, in a deep, resonant voice that pulsated through the room,\nDr. Levillier recalled, almost with a thrill, Julian's words to him in\nHarley Street, on the night of the _fracas_ with the mastiffs, words\nspoken about the dead Marr: \"His face dead was the most absolutely direct\ncontradiction possible to his face alive. He was not the same man.\" He\nrecalled these words and the thought shot through his mind: \"Did the man\nthis woman loved return at the moment of death?\"\n\nAnd that change in Valentine!\n\nHe said to Mrs. Wilson, betraying none of the excitement that he really\nfelt:\n\n\"You spoke of cruelty. You had to endure physical cruelty?\"\n\n\"Worse, to see it endured by others, dumb, helpless creatures, by my own\ndog.\"\n\nA great shudder ran through her.\n\n\"I can't talk of it,\" she said. \"But it made me what I am. Can you do\nanything for me? Why do you look at me like that?\"\n\nFor, at her word about the dog, the doctor had fallen into a tense\nreverie, looking steadily upon her, yet as one who sees little or\nnothing. He roused himself quickly.\n\n\"Tell me something of the symptoms of your mental malady,\" he said.\n\"These fancies that distress you, of what nature are they?\"\n\nShe told him. Many of them were symptoms well known to all those who have\nsuffered acutely after some great shock, imagined sounds, movements, and\nso forth. The doctor listened. He had heard such a story many times\nbefore.\n\n\"I, _I_ am full of these ghastly, these degrading fancies,\" Mrs. Wilson\ncried, with a sort of large indignation against herself, and yet an\nuncertain terror. \"Is it not--?\"\n\nShe suddenly stopped speaking.\n\n\"There's some one at your door,\" she said, after a second or two of\napparent attention to some sound without.\n\n\"I dare say. A patient.\"\n\nAt this moment a voice, which Dr. Levillier immediately recognized as the\nvoice of Valentine, was audible in the hall.\n\nMrs. Wilson turned suddenly very pale, and began to tremble and gnaw her\nnether lip with her teeth in an access of nervous disturbance.\n\n\"In God's name tell me who that is,\" she whispered, turning her head in\nthe direction of the door. \"It can't be--it can't be--\" Valentine's voice\nrose a little louder. \"It _is_ his voice.\"\n\n\"Fancy!\" the doctor said firmly. \"It is the voice of a friend of mine,\nMr. Valentine Cresswell.\"\n\nMrs. Wilson said nothing. She was trying to force herself to believe\nthe evidence of another's sense against her own. Such a task is always\ndifficult. At last she looked up and said:\n\n\"There, doctor, there you have an exhibition of my illness. It's horrible\nto me. Can you cure it?\"\n\n\"I will try,\" the doctor answered.\n\nBut he found it very difficult just at that moment to say the three\nwords quietly, to let Valentine go after leaving his message, without\nconfronting him with this haggard patient who was entering the pool of\nBethesda.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nA SHADOW ON FIRE\n\n\nWhen a naturally calm, clear, and courageous mind finds itself besieged\nby what seem hysterical fancies, it is troubled and perplexed, and is\ninclined to take drastic measures to restore itself to its normal\ncondition. Dr. Levillier found himself the prey of such fancies after\nhis interview with Mrs. Wilson. He had prescribed for her. He had very\ncarefully considered what way of life would be likely to restore her\nto health, and to banish the demons which had brought her strength and\nunusual self-reliance so low. He had received her gratitude, and had\ndismissed her to the following of his plans for her benefit. All this\nhe had done with calm deliberation, the very cheerful composure which\nhe always practiced towards the victims of nervous complaints. But even\nwhile he did this his own mind was in a turmoil. For this woman had let\nfall statements with regard to her dead husband which most curiously\nbolstered up Cuckoo's fantastic assertion that Valentine and Marr were\nthe same man. Marr had been cruel to animals, to dogs, had evidently\ntaken a keen enjoyment in torturing them, and on hearing Valentine's\nvoice she had turned pale and declared that it was the voice of her\nhusband. Then her strange declaration about her husband's use of music\nas a mode of cruelty! These circumstances appealed powerfully to the\ndoctor's mind, or at least to that unscientific side of it which inclined\nhim to romance, and to a certain sympathy with the mysteries of the\nworld. Many Europeans who go to India return to their own continent\nimbued with a belief in miracles, modern miracles, which no argument, no\nsarcasm, can shake. But there are miracles in Europe too. The magicians\nof the East work wonders in the strange atmosphere of that strange\ncountry, whose very air is heavy with magic. Yet England, too, has her\nmagicians. London holds in the arms of its yellow fogs and dust-laden\nclouds miracles. Doctor Levillier found himself assailed by ideas like\nthese as he thought of that transformed Marr, \"possessed,\" as the pale,\nstrongly built wreck of a grand, powerful woman had named it, as he\nthought of the transformed Valentine, the hour of whose transformation\ncoincided with the hour of Marr's death. Why had this new, horrible,\nyet beautiful creature risen out of the ashes of the trance that was\npractically a death? Why had he such amazing points of resemblance to\nMarr? Why had the influence of Marr been deliberately intruded into the\ncalm, happy, and safe lives of Julian and Valentine? Marr was cruel to\ndogs, and dogs showed rage and terror when the new Valentine approached\nthem. Marr had a hatred, yet a knowledge of music. The new Valentine,\nwhen forced to sing, sang like some wild, desolate thing, with reluctant\nand terrible voice. And at this point the doctor used the curb suddenly\nand pulled himself up sharply. He felt that is was useless, that it was\nunworthy, to plunge himself thus in romance, and to hang veils of mystery\naround these facts which he had to accept and to deal with. A touch of\nhumanity is worth all the unhuman romance in the world. Humanity lay at\nthe doctor's gate, sore distressed, sinking to something that was beyond\ndistress. So, putting his fancies resolutely behind him, Doctor Levillier\nresolved to fight through that frail weapon, the lady of the feathers,\nthe battle of Julian's will against the will--which he now fully and\nonce for all recognized as malign--of the man he must still call\nValentine. Valentine had said to Julian, at the Savoy, \"If it came to a\nbattle--Cuckoo Bright's will against mine!\" The doctor had not heard\nthose words. Yet, under the stars on the doorstep of Cuckoo's dwelling\nhe, too, had spoken to the girl of a fight. Thus he had poured a great\nardour into her heart. The three souls, Cuckoo's, Doctor Levillier's,\nValentine's, were thus set in battle array. They understood what they\nfaced, or at least that they faced warfare. Only Julian did not\nunderstand--yet. He was besotted by the spell of the one he called friend\nlaid upon him, and by the vices in which he had been taught to wallow.\nHis brain was clouded and his eyes were dim, as the brains and eyes of\nthe _malades imaginaires_ who carry on the scheme of sin and sorrow in\nthe world, and prolong by their deeds the long travail of their race.\nJulian did not understand. For now he seldom thought sincerely. Sincere\nthoughts and the incessant and violent acts of passion do not often dwell\ntogether.\n\nThe progress of Julian towards degradation had now become so rapid that\nhis many acquaintances talked of him openly as of one who had practically\n\"gone under.\" Not that he had ever done any of those few things at which\nsociety, whose door is generally ajar, with Mrs. Grundy's large ear glued\nto the keyhole, resolutely shuts the door. He had not forged, or stolen a\nwatch, or killed anybody, or married a grocer's widow, or anything of\nthat kind. But he had thrown his life to the pleasures of the body, and\nmade no secret of the fact. And the pleasures of the body, like eager\nrats, had gnawed away his power of self-control until he could resist\nnothing, no wish of the moment, no desire born illegitimately of passing\nexcitement or the prompting of wine. So he committed many follies, and\nhis follies had loud voices. They shrieked and shouted. And society heard\ntheir cries, held the door a little more ajar, and listened with that\npassion of attention which virtue accords to vice. But society, having\nheard a good deal, shook its head over Julian. He had acquired such a\ntaste for low company that he ought to have been born a peer. Certainly,\nhe had money. That made his errors chink rather pleasantly, and filled\nthe bosoms of many mothers with an expansive charity towards him. Still,\nthe general opinion was that he was sinking very low. In fact, the legend\nof Julian's shame was now written on his face in such legible and vital\ncharacters that the most short-sighted eyes could not fail to read it.\nThe eager beauty of untarnished youth had faded into the dull, and often\nsulky, languors of the utterly indulged body. Julian was often exhausted\nand passing through those leaden-footed dreams that fitfully entrance\nthe vicious,--those dreams that are colourless and sombre, that press\nupon all the faculties, and yet have no real meaning, that stifle all\nintentions, and put an end, for the moment, to all active desires. People\ntalk of the vicious as \"living,\" but half their time they are curiously\ndead, for their sins blunt their energies and lull them into a condition\nthat resembles rather paralysis than slumber.\n\nSince the night on which he had supped with Valentine at the Savoy,\nJulian had given himself up to the company and influence of his friend\nmore than ever, and London, which had once nicknamed Valentine the Saint\nof Victoria Street, began to dub him with quite another name. For it\ngradually became apparent to those who only knew the two young men\nslightly that Valentine exerted an extraordinarily powerful influence\nover Julian, and that the influence was imperatively evil. At first\nmany were deceived by the clear beauty of Valentine's face, but that was\nbeginning to fade. A thin line, pencilled here and there with a fairylike\ndelicacy, a slight puffiness beneath the blue eyes, a looseness of the\ncheeks, a droop of the lips, all very demure, as it were, and furtive,\nshed alteration upon his fair beauty. He himself noticed it, as he looked\nin a mirror one night, and silently cursed the inevitable effect which\nmind produces upon matter. No man's face can forever remain an entirely\ndeceptive mask. The saintly expression of Valentine's was rapidly\nbecoming a thing of the past. He wondered whether Julian noticed it.\nBut Julian was too much preoccupied with his own energies of dreary\naction and lacerating fatigues of subsequent thought, or it would be\ntruer to say moodiness, to notice anything. He was self-centred, as are\nall sinners, immersed in his own downfall, like a man in an ocean. He\nwas unconscious that he was the subject of battle, that four wills were\nto contend for his soul's sake. Four wills, yet one expressed itself in\nno outward form. It was in exile, till the day of its redemption should\ndawn.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOn the night when Valentine heard Julian babble incoherently the name\nof the lady of the feathers, he said to himself that the battle should\nbe his, and he leaned upon his will to feel its power and its glory.\nThat night he forgot its fury, the intense emotion that had overtaken\nhim at the supper-table as he gauged, or strove to gauge, the influence\nthat Cuckoo was obtaining over Julian. He forgot Doctor Levillier. He\nremembered only himself and his own strength, which he was now to test\nto its foundations. And when he woke again to thoughts of others, it was\nonly to laugh at the force arrayed against him. The lady of the feathers\nmoved, to his fancy, like the most piteous of puppets, a jeering fate\nmanipulating the strings. This manipulator had kept her long to one set\nof motions, stiff pleading arm, anxious head, interrogative joints,\nand a strut of wolfish eagerness and hunger. But such a game was now\nto be abandoned. And behold the puppet a warrior forsooth, a very\nAmazon, hounded to fight by the doctor's voice, the doctor's word of\nencouragement, battling with the stiff arms that had abandoned the\npleading gesture, stern in a wooden attitude of defiance. And Fate,\nin fits of laughter at the string-holding! Then Valentine lost his fear,\nand could have been angry that such a scarecrow was the creature selected\nby Fate to draw a sword against him. He chose to forget the vision in the\nmirror when he struck at the staring reflection of the lady of the\nfeathers and shivered under the influence of a cold terror. He chose\nto remember only the thin and fearful woman who had given her body to\nthe world, and so had surely given her soul to a mill that had long ago\nground it to powder.\n\nThere is nothing so terrible to one screwed up to the highest pitch of\naction as a monotony of waiting. Scourging were better, the hemp or the\nfire. The lady of the feathers had been stirred to a strange enthusiasm,\nand to a belief in herself, a faith more wonderful to some, more\nunaccustomed and remote than any faith in God or devil. A flood of energy\nflowed over her, warm as blood, strong as love, keen with the salt of\nbeautiful novelty, turbulent as the seas when the great tides take hold\non them. It was to her as if for the moment the world's centre was just\nthere where she was in the winter, and in the Marylebone Road, within\nsound of the great church clock, the great church bells, the cries of\nthe street, the very steam panting up from the Baker Street Station.\nCuckoo was in the core of things, and the core of things is fierce and\nhot and action-prompting. That half-revealed shadow waving good-bye to\nJulian, as he stepped into the frosty night, was a shadow on fire. Yet he\nhad scarcely looked back at it. But Cuckoo was to learn to the last word\nthe lesson of patience. Inspired by the sympathy of the doctor and by\nsomething deep in her own heart, she was, for the moment, all courage,\nall flame. She was ready to fight. She was ready to do supreme things,\nto touch the stars. The stars went out and she had not touched them. The\nmorning dawned very chilly, very dark, the morning that brought Mrs.\nBrigg to her room yellow and complaining. Still, Cuckoo was conscious\nof a high, beating courage that made summer in that winter day. She\nastonished the old keeper of that weary house by the vivacity of her\nmanner, the brightness of her look. For Mrs. Brigg was well accustomed\nto sad morning moods, to petulant lassitude, and dull grimness of\nunpainted and unpowdered fatigue, but had long been a stranger to early\nmoods of hope or of gaiety. Mornings in houses such as hers are recurring\ntragedies, desolating pulses of Time, shaking human hearts with each beat\nnearer and nearer to the ultimatum of sorrow. She knew not what to make\nof this new morning mood of Cuckoo, and wagged a heavily pensive head\nover it, unresponsive and muttering. Jessie, too, was astonished, but\nmore pleasantly. The little dog, dwelling ignorantly in the midst of\ndegradation, had learned quickly the swing of its beloved mistress's\nmoods. In the dim morning it was ever the comforter of misery it could\nnot rightly understand, not the playfellow of happiness that stirred it\nto leaps and barks of wonder and excitement. In the mornings Cuckoo held\nit long against her thin bosom, sometimes crushed it nearly breathless,\npushing its little head down in the nest of her arms and telling it a\ntale of the world's woe that sent long and thin whimpers twittering\nthrough its body. The fluttering whisper of morning misery, or the\nsilence of vacant fatigue, these were accustomed things to Jessie. Even\nif she did not thoroughly understand them, she was ready for them, and\neagerly responsive, as dogs are, to emotions along whose verges they\ntread with the soft feet of sympathy, the sweeter for the ignorance\nthat paints their generosity in such tender colours. But Jessie was\n_boulevers\u00e9e_ by this passionate, eager Cuckoo; this shadow on fire, who\nwas alive almost ere London was alive, instead of half dead until half\nLondon slept. The shadow on fire snatched her out of her sleep, tossed\nher in air, spoke to her with a voice that thrilled her to quick barking\nexcitement, played with her till the little dog's flux of emotions\nthreatened to consummate in a canine apoplexy, and Mrs. Brigg battered at\nthe door with a shrill, \"Keep that beast quiet, can't yer?\" All this was\nCuckoo fighting; battle in the bedclothes, battle with soap and water,\ncurling-pins, corset, shoes. Each little act was performed with an energy\nit did not demand. The sponge was squeezed dry like a live thing being\nstrangled; the toothbrush played as Maxim guns on an enemy; buttons went\ninto button-holes with a manner of ramrods going into muskets; hooks met\neyes as one army meets another. Battle in all that morning's common\ntasks, setting them high, dressing them with chivalry and strong\nendeavour. Cuckoo went into her sitting-room swiftly, with glowing cheeks\nand flaming eyes, as one ardently expectant. And then--? Mrs. Brigg had\nlit the fire, but it had spluttered out into a mass of blackened, ghostly\npaper and skeleton sticks. A little more battle in the relighting of it.\nBut then--the blank day of the girl of the streets. Cuckoo sat down,\nwatched the growing fire, and wondered what she had expected. She was\nconscious that she had expected something, and something not small. Her\nmood had demanded it. But our moods are often like disappointed brigands,\nwho, having waylaid a pauper, demand with levelled pistols that which the\npauper has so vainly prayed for all his life. Moods come from within.\nThey are not evoked to dance valses with suitable partners from without.\nAnd so Cuckoo's strong excitement and energy found nothing to dance with.\nShe sat there growing gradually less alive, and wondering why she had\nhastened to get up; why she was fully dressed instead of wrapped in the\nusual staring pink dressing-gown with the chiffon cascades down the\nfront. Mornings were of no use to her--never had been. God might as well\nnever have included them in the scheme of His days, so far as she was\nconcerned. But this morning she had thought, had felt--it seemed\nimpossible that she should feel so unusual and that nothing should\nhappen. She was ready, but Fate was in bed and asleep. That was really\nthe gist of the feeling that came over her. She thought of Dr. Levillier,\nthe man who had set a torch at last to her nature and fired it with a new\nardour. He was at his work in the morning, seeing, speaking to, that\npassing line of strangers, who walked on forever through his life. His\nenergies were employed. Perhaps he had forgotten Cuckoo and her empty\nmornings. Almost for the first time in her life the lady of the feathers\ndefinitely longed for a legitimate occupation. How she could have flown\nat it to-day. But already the bright mood was fading. It could not last\nin such an atmosphere. As Cuckoo had said, she could fight better than\nshe could pray. But it seemed to her, after a while, that there was only\nroom in this cheerless, dark house to pray, no room at all to fight. She\ntried reading yesterday's evening paper, left on the horsehair sofa by\nJulian. But reading had never been a favourite occupation of hers, and\nto-day she wanted to save Julian, to make him love her, and so to win him\nfrom Valentine. She did not want to sit in the twilight of a winter's day\nreading about people she had never seen, things she did not understand.\nAnd she threw the paper down.\n\nTo make Julian love her. Cuckoo flushed, yes, even sitting there quite\nalone, for Jessie had retired to the warmth of the bedroom blankets, as\nshe said it in her mind. The doctor had told her to do so. Her heart had\ntold her to try to do it long ago. But she trusted the doctor and she did\nnot trust her heart. And how could she trust her power to make Julian\nlove her? Cuckoo had once known very well how to make a man desire her.\nIn the very early days of her career she had been a very pretty girl.\nHer old mother, who believed her dead, had often cried and said to the\nneighbours that her beauty had been Cuckoo's undoing. Thus do we lay\nblame on the few fine gifts that should gild our lives. But Cuckoo\nhad been very pretty and had soon learnt the first foul lesson of her\n_m\u00e9tier_, to wake swift desire. As time went on and she wasted her gift\nof beauty along the pavements of London, she found this poor power\nfailing in strength and in certainty. As to the power of wakening that\nslower, deeper, kindred, yet opposed desire of love, Cuckoo had never\nknown whether she possessed it. She had had many lovers, but nobody to\nlove her really, and this in days of her beauty, or at any rate her\ngracious prettiness. No wonder, then, that now a chill ran over her at\nthe thought of the task that lay before her if she was to gain her\nbattle. To break Valentine's influence she had to make Julian love her.\nHow? Instinctively, and with a sense of horror, she knew that her usual\npractised arts, instead of helping, almost fatally handicapped her now.\nShe loved Julian purely, so purely that she could not endure that he\nshould meet her degradation as he had met it on that one night she never\nthought of but with repentance. Yet to her ignorance, to her, rising\ntowards purity now, yet ever steeped in the coarsest knowledge, it\nseemed that the thing called love could hardly utter itself save by some\nthreadbare blandishment, or parrot combination of words, used each night\nby a hundred women of the town. Cuckoo knew no language of love that was\nnot, so to say, bad language, inasmuch as it was used by those whom she\nhated. And hitherto she had been content to keep her love for Julian a\nsilent love, except on the few occasions when she had obliquely showed\nit by the anger of jealousy or of reproach. She wished nothing bodily\nfrom him, or if she did, stifled the wish in the mutely repeated record\nof her own unworthiness. But now, if she was to draw his soul to hers,\nshe must move forward, she must surely commit some sacrifice, perform\nsome deed. What deed could she perform? What sacrifice could she make\nthat would win upon him, that would alter his relation towards her from\none of eccentric friendship to one of affection that might even be\ngoverned?\n\nThe lady of the feathers did not reason this all out in her mind as\nshe sat before the spluttering fire, but she felt it, a tangled mass\nof thoughts, catching her brain as in a net, catching her life as in\na net too. How could she make Julian love her? What could she do? And\nall the time, as she asked herself passionately that question, the\nhours were gliding by towards the evening refrain of her life. Cuckoo\nbegan to consider this evening refrain as she had never considered it\nbefore, as it might affect another if he loved her. If she made Julian\nlove her, if she succeeded in this attempt that seemed as if it must\nbe impossible, what of her evening refrain then? And what would be the\nconclusion of such a love? She could not tell; she could only wonder.\nThe strange thing about the lady of the feathers, and about many of her\nkind, was, that she never dreamed of such a thing as owing a duty to\nherself, to her own body, her own soul, or nature. Cuckoo knew not the\nmeaning of self-respect. Had you told her that her body was a temple--not\nof the Holy Ghost, but of a wonderful, exquisite thing called womanhood,\nand for that reason should not be defiled, she would have stared at you\nunder drawn eyebrows, like a fierce boy, and wondered what in heaven or\nearth you were talking jargon about. To get at her sympathy you must talk\nto her of duty to another; and if she had a soft feeling for that other,\nthen she understood you, and then alone. It was the cause of Julian and\nhis safety that made her now consider this evening refrain of her life as\nshe sat there. And her mind ran back to Julian's first visit to her and\nto his first request. He asked her to stay at home just for one night\nwith Jessie. And she refused. If she had not refused. If she had stayed\nat home. If she had at that moment, from that moment, given up her life\nof the street, would Julian have loved her then? Would she have been able\nto do something for him? For hours Cuckoo sat there pondering in her\nvague, desolate way over questions such as these. But she could give no\nanswer to them. And then she thought of that horrible night when the\nhours danced to the music of the devil, when she gave Julian that first\nlittle impetus which started him on his journey to the abyss. And at that\nthought she grew white, and she grew hot, and she wondered why she had\nbeen born to be the lady of the feathers, and the wrecker, not of men's\nlives--she never thought of men tenderly in the mass--but of this one\nlife, of this one man, whom she loved in a strange, wild, good-woman way.\n\n\"C-r-r-r!\" she said, her tongue flickering against her teeth. Jessie\nstirred in the blankets, came to the floor with a \"t'bb\" and ran into the\nroom with curved attitudes of submission. But Cuckoo would not notice\nthe little dog. She stared at the fire and looked so old, and almost\nintellectual. But there was nobody to see her. What a long, empty day it\nhad been, this day for which she had risen eagerly as to a day of battle!\nWhat a long, empty day, and no deed done in it. And now the hour of the\nevening refrain was come. Cuckoo had wanted this day to be a special day,\nfor it was the first of those new days which were to come after the\ndoctor's word of hope. And nothing had happened in it. Nobody had come.\nThe doctor was with his patients. Julian was--ah, surely--with Valentine.\nAnd she, Cuckoo, this poor, pale girl, who wanted to fight and to do\nbattle, was alone. And she had been so eager in the morning. And now the\nnight was falling and she had not struck a blow. The hour chimed. It was\nthe hour of the evening refrain.\n\nSuddenly Cuckoo got up. She went over to the window and pulled down the\nblind so sharply that she nearly broke it. She struck a match violently\nand lit the gas. She ran into the bedroom, caught her hat, which lay\nready for service on the top of the chest of drawers, and cast it with\na crash into a cardboard box, jamming the lid down on it. She seized her\njacket, which lay on the bed, and strung it up on a hook, as if she were\nhanging a criminal. Then she came back into the sitting-room, sat down in\nthe chair, took up the evening paper of yesterday and began to read, with\neyes that gleamed under frowning brows, about \"Foreign Affairs\" and\n\"Bimetallism.\"\n\nAnd that night the evening refrain of Cuckoo's life did not follow the\nverse of her day.\n\nShe sat there all alone.\n\nIt was her way--the only way she could devise--of beginning to fight the\nbattle for Julian.\n\nShe did not stay at home with any thought of purifying herself by the\naction. Another day she might go out as usual. But Julian had once asked\nher not to go. She had gone then. Now she obeyed him, and the obedience\nseemed to bring him a little nearer to her.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE DOCTOR DRIVES OUT WITH THE LADY OF THE FEATHERS\n\n\nSome days later Cuckoo received a telegram from Harley Street. It came in\nthe morning, and ran as follows:\n\n\"Call here to-day if possible. Important. Levillier.\"\n\nCuckoo read it, trembling. In her early days telegrams came often to her\ndoor--\"Meet me at Verrey's, four-thirty\"; \"Piccadilly Circus, five\no'clock to-day.\" Such messages flickered through her youth, forming\ngradually a legend of her life. But this summons from the doctor at the\nsame time frightened her and braced her heart. It might mean that Julian\nwas ill, in danger--she knew not what. But at least it broke through the\nappalling inaction, the dreary stagnation, of her days. The lady of the\nfeathers had fought indeed, of late, that worst enemy, mental despair,\nbred of grim patience at last grown weary. That was not the battle she\nhad been inspired to expect, to prepare for. The doctor's telegram at\nleast swept the unforeseen foe from the field, and seemed to set the real\nenemy full in view.\n\n\"There ain't any answer,\" the lady of the feathers said to Mrs. Brigg,\nwho waited in an attitude expressive of greedy curiosity.\n\n\"Which of 'em is it?\" demanded that functionary.\n\n\"Shan't tell you,\" Cuckoo hissed at her.\n\nThe filthy groove in which the landlady's mind forever ran began to rouse\nher to an intense animosity.\n\n\"Well, it's all one to me so long as I'm paid regular,\" muttered Mrs.\nBrigg, with a swing of her dusty skirts and a toss of her grey head,\ngoverned by pomade, since it was a Saturday. Mrs. Brigg must once have\nheld Christian principles, as she always prepared the ground for certain\nSabbath curls the day before.\n\nCuckoo ran to dress herself. It was seldom indeed that she stirred out\nin the morning, so seldom that that alone was an experience. Arrived\nin the bedroom, she pounced mechanically on rouge and powder, and was\nabout to decorate herself when she suddenly paused with outstretched\nhands. She was going out into the bright wintry sunlight, and she was\ngoing to the doctor's house, full, perhaps, of those smart patients of\nwhom Valentine had once spoken to her. What sort of an apparition would\nshe be among them? She dropped her hands, hesitating. Then she turned\nto a cupboard, drew out the one famous black gown, and put it on. She\ncrowned her head with Julian's hat, hid her hands in black silk gloves,\npulled down her veil and seized an umbrella. Somehow Cuckoo vaguely\nconnected respectability with umbrellas, although even the most vicious\nare fain to carry them in showery London. Then she looked at herself in\nthe glass and wondered if her appearance were deceptive enough to trick\nthe sharp eyes of the patients. The glance reassured her. She seemed to\nherself an epitome of black propriety, and she set forth with a more easy\nheart. As she walked, her mind ran on before, seeking what this summons\nmeant and debating possibilities without arriving at conclusions. At\nthe end of Harley Street her walk, which had been rapid, achieved a\n_ritardando_ and nearly came to a full close before she gained the\ndoctor's door. Cuckoo could be a brazen hussy. A year ago she could\nscarcely be anything else. But that love of hers for Julian had, it\nseemed, a strange power of undermining old habits. It laid hands upon so\nmany perceptions, so many emotions, with which it should surely have had\nnothing to do, and made subtle inroads upon every dark corner of the\ngirl's nature. From it came this _ritardando_. For Cuckoo was filled with\na very human dread of exposing Doctor Levillier to misconception by her\nappearance in the midst of his patients. Had it been late afternoon\ninstead of morning her fortitude would certainly have been greater,\nand might even have drawn near to impudence. But the clear light of\napproaching noontide set her mind blinking with rapid eyelids, and\nwhen she actually gained the street door her discomfort was acute.\n\nAs she put up her hand to touch the bell the door opened softly and a\nstout Duchess issued forth. Cuckoo didn't know she was a Duchess, but she\nquailed before the plethoric glance cast upon her, and her voice was\nuneven as she asked for the doctor.\n\n\"Have you an appointment, ma'am?\" asked Lawler, who did not recognize her\nbehind her black veil.\n\n\"I was asked to come,\" Cuckoo murmured.\n\n\"What name, ma'am?\"\n\n\"Cuck--Miss Bright.\"\n\nShe was admitted. The doctor, in a hurry of business, had omitted to give\nLawler any instructions in the event of Cuckoo's prompt response to his\ntelegram. So she was shown into the waiting-room, in which three or four\npeople were turning over illustrated papers with an air of watchful\nidleness and attentive leisure. Cuckoo sat down in a corner as quietly\nas possible, and Lawler vanished. The leaves of the illustrated papers\nrustled in the air with a dry sound. To Cuckoo they seemed to be\ncrackling personal remarks about her, and to be impregnated with\ncondemnation. She cast a furtive glance upon the square room and\nperceived that they were returned by four ladies, and that three of\nthese ladies were looking straight at her. The eight eyes met in a\nglance of inquiry and were instantly cast down. Again the leaves of the\nillustrateds rustled, this time, Cuckoo felt convinced, more fiercely\nthan before. The _frou-frou_ of the skirts of one of the ladies joined\nin the chorus, which was far from crying \"Hallelujah!\" Cuckoo began to\nfeel a growing certainty that, despite the black veil and the neat\numbrella, feminine instinct had divined her. She was totally unaccustomed\nto such an atmosphere as that which prevailed in this room, and began\nto be the victim of an odd, prickly sensation, which she believed to be\nphysical, but which was certainly more than half moral. A wave of heat\nran over her body. It was like the heat which follows on a received\nslap. One of the illustrateds deleted its voice from the general chorus.\nCuckoo was aware of this, and looked up again to find two eyes fixed\nupon her with an expression of thin distaste that was incapable of\nmisinterpretation. A second illustrated ceased to sing, two heads were\ninclined towards one another, and the \"t'p, t'p, t'p\" of a low whisper\nset the remaining two ladies at their posts as sentinels on the lady of\nthe feathers.\n\nCuckoo put her hand to her face to pull her veil a little lower down. By\naccident she tugged too hard, or it had been badly fastened to her hat,\nfor one side got loose instantly and it fell down, revealing her face\nfrankly.\n\nThe \"t'p, t'p, t'p\" sounded again, multiplied by two. Cuckoo, thrown\ninto confusion by the malign behaviour of her veil, caught awkwardly at\nthe dropped end with an intention of readjusting it, but something in\nthe sound of the whispering suddenly moved her to a different action.\nShe snatched the veil quite off, set her feet firmly against the thick\nTurkey carpet, raised her eyes and stared with all her might at the four\nladies, hurling, as a man hurls a bomb, an expression of savage defiance\ninto her gaze. The whispers stopped; a thin and repeated cough, dry as\nSahara, attacked the silence, and eight eyes were vehemently cast down.\nCuckoo continued staring, folding her hands in her lap. The prickly\nsensation increased, but she considered it now as a thing to be jumped\non. Recognizing that she was recognized, she was instantly moved to\nplay up to her part, and she longed to stare the four women out into\nHarley Street. If the energy of a gaze could have achieved that object,\nthey must have backed through the doctor's plate glass into the area\nforthwith. They were, in fact, most obviously moved, and their attitudes\nexpressed, by a community of lines, virtue rampant and agitation gules.\nA shattering silence endured till Lawler appeared to bid two of these\nvirgins with lit lamps of self-righteousness to the consulting-room.\nAs they rose the two other ladies rose also and followed in their wake.\nLawler politely protested, but they were now to proclaim their beauty\nof character.\n\n\"We should prefer to wait in another room,\" said the lady who had coughed\nas a communication with heaven.\n\n\"Yes, another room,\" added the other, and as she spoke she half turned,\nindicating the corner where Cuckoo sat.\n\nWithout a word Lawler showed them out and closed the door. For another\ntwenty minutes Cuckoo sat alone, glaring at the table by which these\nmembers of her sex had sat, and seeing no material objects but only--as\nis the way of humanity--her own point of view. The ladies saw only\ntheirs. In this respect, at least, they closely resembled the lady of\nthe feathers. When Lawler at length returned with his grave: \"This way,\nif you please, ma'am,\" Cuckoo rose to her feet with the inflexibility\nof some iron thing set in motion by mechanism, and marched in his wake\nto the doctor's presence.\n\nThe doctor was standing up by a bright fire; he looked very grave.\n\n\"I am very sorry to have kept you,\" he said, \"very sorry. I did not think\nyou could get here so quickly.\"\n\nCuckoo cleared her throat.\n\n\"I wish I hadn't,\" she answered bluntly.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"It don't matter. I started directly your wire came.\"\n\n\"That was good of you. Please sit down.\"\n\nCuckoo sat with a straight back in the straightest chair she could\nperceive. The doctor still remained standing by the fire. He appeared\nto be thinking deeply. His eyes looked downward at his gaily shining\nboots. After a minute or two he said:\n\n\"I speak to you now in strict confidence, trusting your secrecy\nimplicitly.\"\n\nThe back of Cuckoo became less straight. Even a gentle curve made it more\ngracious if less admirable from the dancing-mistress point of view.\n\n\"Honour!\" she interjected rapidly, like a schoolboy.\n\nThe doctor looked up at her and a smile came to his lips. And as he\nlooked up he noticed the neatness of her black gown, the simplicity of\nher hat, the absence of paint and powder. Being, after all, only a man,\nhe was surprised at Cuckoo's appearance of propriety. The four ladies had\nbeen surprised at her appearance of impropriety. But the doctor, seeing\nher so much better than usual, thought her--in looks--quite well, as\nindeed she was in comparison with the _tout ensemble_ of her usual days.\nHe looked from her black gloves, which held the thick black veil, to the\nwinter sunshine sparkling, like a dancing, eager child, at the window.\n\n\"Do you like driving?\" he said.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Driving--do you like it?\"\n\n\"Pretty well, if the horse don't come down,\" said Cuckoo, at once\nconcentrated on cabs.\n\n\"My horses won't.\"\n\n\"Yours!\"\n\n\"Yes. I have no more patients to-day. I have a half-holiday and I want to\ntalk to you. Shall we go for a drive to Hampstead and talk out in the\nopen air and the sunshine?\"\n\nThe four ladies, the illustrateds, the cough, dry as Sahara, were\ninstantly forgotten. Cuckoo became all curves, almost like Jessie in\nmoments of supreme emotion.\n\n\"Me and you?\" she exclaimed. \"Oh yes!\"\n\nThe doctor rang the bell.\n\n\"Take this lady to the dining-room and give her some lunch,\" he said to\nLawler. \"And please order the victoria round at once.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"While you lunch,\" he said to Cuckoo, \"I'll just get through two letters\nthat must be written, and then we'll start.\"\n\nCuckoo followed Lawler with a sense of airy wonder and delight.\n\nA quarter of an hour later she was seated with the doctor in the\nvictoria, the veil tightly stretched across her face, her poor mode of\nliving up to his trust in her, and deserving the honour now conferred\nupon her. The coachman let his horses go, and Harley Street was left\nbehind. Such a bright day it was. Even the cold seemed a gay and festive\nthing, spinning the circulation like a gold coin till it glittered,\ndecorating the poorest cheeks with the brightest rose as if in honour\nof a festival. To Cuckoo London, as seen from a private carriage, was\na wonder and a dream of novelty, a city of kings instead of a city of\nbeggars, a city of crystal morning instead of a city of dreadful night.\nShe gazed at it out of a new heart as these horses--that never came\ndown--trotted briskly forward. Through the silk of her gloves her thumbs\nand fingers felt silently the warm sables of the rug that caressed her\nknees. And she thought that this feeling, and the feeling in her heart,\nmust be constituent parts of the emotion called happiness. If the four\nladies could see her now! If they could see her now, Cuckoo thought, she\nwould take off her veil, just for a moment. When the aspect of the street\nbegan to change, when little gardens appeared, and bare trees standing\nbravely in the sun behind high walls and iron gates, the doctor said to\nCuckoo:\n\n\"Now I will tell you why I telegraphed to you.\"\n\nAnd then Cuckoo remembered that she was in this wonderful expedition for\na reason. The doctor continued speaking in a low voice, with the obvious\nintention of being inaudible to the coachman, whose large furred back\npresented an appearance of broad indifference to their two lives.\n\n\"You remember what I said to you the other day--that perhaps you could\nhelp Julian from great evil.\"\n\nCuckoo nodded earnestly.\n\n\"And you are prepared to do anything you can?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nShe had forgotten the smart carriage, and the horses that never came\ndown, now.\n\n\"Good,\" said the doctor, shortly and decisively. \"I will speak to you\nquite plainly to-day, for something leads me to trust you, and to say to\nyou what I would say to no other person. Something leads me to believe\nthat you can do more for Addison than any one else. Addison once implied\nit; but what I have observed for myself in your house leads me to be\ncertain of it.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Cuckoo.\n\nShe had nothing more to say. She could have said nothing more. The stress\nof her excitement was too great.\n\n\"Look at that holly tree. What a quantity of berries it has!\" the doctor\nsaid. \"That's because it is a hard winter. Miss Bright, you are right in\nyou conviction. Valentine Cresswell is--has been--totally evil, and is\ndeliberately, coldly, but with determination, compassing the utter ruin\nof the man who trusts him and believes in him--of Addison.\"\n\nCuckoo nodded again, this time with a strangely matter-of-course air,\nwhich assured the doctor in a flash of the long certainty of her\nknowledge of Valentine.\n\n\"Such a thing seemed to me entirely incredible,\" the doctor pursued. \"I\nam forced--forced--to believe it is true. But remember this: I have known\nMr. Cresswell for several years intimately. I have been again and again\nwith him and Julian. I have noticed the extraordinary influence he had\nover Julian, and I know that influence used to be a noble influence, used\nsolely for good. Mr. Cresswell was a man of extraordinary high-mindedness\nand purity of life. He had a brilliant intellect,\" the doctor continued,\nforgetting to whom he was talking, as his mind went back to the Valentine\nof the old days. \"But, far more than that, he was born with a very\nwonderful and unusual nature. It was written in his face in the\ngrandeur--I can call it nothing else--of his expression. And it was\nwritten in his life, in all his acts. But, most of all it was written\nin all he did for Julian. Ah, you look surprised!\"\n\nIndeed Cuckoo's face, such of it as was visible under the black shadow of\nthe veil, was a mask of blank wonderment. She looked upon the doctor as\nall that was clever and perfect and extraordinary; so this, it seemed\nto her, idiocy of his outlook upon Valentine was too much for her manner.\n\n\"Well, I never! Him!\" she could not help ejaculating with a long breath,\nthat was almost like a little puff.\n\n\"Remember,\" said Dr. Levillier, \"this was before you knew him.\"\n\nHe had taken the trouble to ascertain from Julian the exact date of\nValentine's first introduction to the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"Oh yes,\" said Cuckoo, still with absolute incredulity of the truth of\nthe doctor's panegyric expressed in voice and look.\n\n\"Men change greatly, terribly.\"\n\n\"Oh, not like that,\" she jerked out suddenly, moved by an irresistible\nimpulse to contradict his apparent deduction.\n\n\"No, there you are right,\" he answered with emphasis. \"Sane men do not,\ncan never, I believe, change so utterly.\"\n\n\"That's what I say. I've seen men go down, lots of 'em, but it ain't like\nthat.\"\n\nCuckoo spoke with some authority, as of one speaking from depths of a\ndeep experience. She put her hands under the warm rug with a sensation of\nsomething that was like dignity of mind. She and the doctor were talking\non equal terms of intellectuality just at this moment. She was saying\nsensible things and he was obliged to agree with her.\n\n\"Not like that,\" she murmured again out of the embrace of the rug.\n\nHe turned towards her so that he could see her more distinctly and make\nhis words more impressive.\n\n\"Remember now that what I am going to say to you must not be mentioned\nto Julian on any account, or to any one,\" he said.\n\n\"I'll remember. Honour. I'll never tell.\"\n\n\"I have a very sad theory to explain this great change in Mr. Cresswell,\nfrom what he was as I knew him, and you must take his beauty of character\nfrom me--to what he is as you and I know him now. I believe that he has\nbecome mad.\" For the doctor had resolutely put away from his mind the\nfancies called up in it by the visit of Marr's wife.\n\nCuckoo gave a little cry of surprise, then hastily glanced at the\ncoachman's back and pushed her hands under the rug up towards her mouth.\n\n\"Hush,\" said the doctor. \"Only listen quietly.\"\n\n\"Yes, pardon,\" she said. \"But he ain't--oh, he can't be.\"\n\n\"I am forced to think it, forced to think it,\" the doctor said, with\npressure. \"He has, in great measure, one of the most common, most\nuniversal, of the fatuous beliefs of the insane,--a deep-rooted, an\nalmost incredible belief in himself, in his own glory, power, will,\npersonality.\"\n\nCuckoo tried to throw in some remark here, but he went on without a\npause:\n\n\"There are madmen confined in asylums all over England who think\nthemselves the Messiah--this is the commonest form of religious\nmania--emperors, kings, regenerators of the human race, doers of great\ndeeds that must bring them everlasting fame. On all other points they\nare sane, and you might spend hours alone with them and never discover\nthe one crank in their mind that makes the whole mind out of joint. So\nyou have been alone with Mr. Cresswell and have not suspected him. Yet\nhe has a madness, and it is this madness which leads him to this\nfrightful conduct of his towards Julian, conduct which you will never\nknow the extent of.\"\n\nHere Cuckoo succeeded in getting in a remark:\n\n\"Will,\" she said, catching hold of that one word and beginning to look\neager. \"That's what he was at all the time he was talking to me that\nnight. Will, he says, is this and that and the other; will, he says, is\neverythin', I remember. Will, he says, is my God, or somethin' like it.\nHe did. He did.\"\n\n\"Ah! you see; even you have noticed it.\"\n\n\"Yes; but he ain't mad, though,\" Cuckoo concluded, with an echo of that\nobstinacy which she could never completely conquer. She said what she\nfelt. She could not help it. The doctor was in no wise offended by this\nunskilled opinion opposed to his skilled one. He even smiled slightly.\n\n\"Why do you say that?\" he asked.\n\n\"He's too sharp. He's a sight too sharp.\"\n\n\"Madmen are very cunning.\"\n\n\"So are women,\" Cuckoo exclaimed. \"I could see if a man was mad.\"\n\nShe was a little intoxicated with the swift motion, the bright sun, the\nkeen air, the clang of the horse's hoofs on the hard roads, and, most of\nall, with this conference which the befurred coachman was on no account\nto hear. This made her hold fast to her opinion, with no thought of being\nrude or presuming. The doctor, accustomed to have duchesses and others\nhanging upon his words of wisdom, was whipped into a refreshed humour\nby this odd attitude of an ignorant girl, and he replied with extreme\nvivacity:\n\n\"You will think as I do one day. Meanwhile listen to me. When Mr.\nCresswell came to you and broke out into this tirade, which you say\nyou remember, on the subject of will, did he not show any excitement?\"\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\n\"Did he get excited, very hot and eager? Did he speak unusually loud,\nor make any curious gestures with his hands? Did he do anything, that\nyou can remember, such as an ordinary man would not do?\"\n\n\"Why, yes,\" Cuckoo answered. \"So he did.\"\n\n\"Ah! What was it? What did he do?\"\n\n\"Well, after he'd been talkin' a bit he caught hold of me and pulled me\nin front of the glass. See?\"\n\n\"Yes, yes.\"\n\n\"And he made me look into it.\"\n\n\"What for?\"\n\nBut at this point Cuckoo got restive.\n\n\"I--I can't remember,\" she murmured, almost sullenly, recalling\nValentine's bitter sarcasms on her appearance and way of life.\n\n\"Never mind, then. Leave that. But after; what came next?\"\n\n\"While we was standin' like that he seemed to get frightened or\nsomethin', like he saw somethin' in the glass. He was frightened, scared,\nand he hit out all on a sudden, just where my face was in the glass, and\nsmashed it.\"\n\n\"Smashed the glass?\"\n\n\"Yes. And then he snatched hold of me and looked in my eyes awful queer,\nand then he burst out laughin' and says as the mirror was tellin' him\nlies. That's all.\"\n\n\"He was perfectly sober?\"\n\n\"Oh, he hadn't been on the booze.\"\n\n\"Sober and did that, and then you can tell me that there is no madness in\nhim.\"\n\nThe doctor spoke almost in a bantering tone, but Cuckoo stuck to her\nguns.\n\n\"I don't think it,\" she said, with her under lip sticking out.\n\n\"Well, Miss Bright, I want you to assume something.\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"To pretend to yourself that you think something, whether you do really\nthink it or not.\"\n\n\"Make believe!\" cried Cuckoo, childishly.\n\n\"Exactly.\"\n\n\"What about?\"\n\n\"I want you to 'make believe' that Mr. Cresswell is not himself--is not\nsane.\"\n\n\"O-oh-h!\" said Cuckoo, with a long intonation of surprise.\n\n\"I do honestly believe it; you are to pretend to believe it. Now,\nremember that.\"\n\n\"All right.\"\n\n\"You are not to contradict any more, you see.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" began Cuckoo, in sudden distress. \"Pardon. I didn't--\"\n\n\"Hush! That's all right. Act with me on the make-believe or assumption\nthat Mr. Cresswell is not himself at present.\"\n\n\"Ah, but that ain't no make-believe. He told me as he wasn't himself when\nhe says, 'I am Marr.'\"\n\n\"Yes--yes,\" said the doctor. Secretly, almost angrily, he said to himself\nthat Valentine, in some access of insanity, had actually confessed to the\nlady of the feathers that he knew himself to be mad.\n\n\"He says he ain't himself,\" she repeated again, with an eager feeling\nthat perhaps, at last, she had got at the right interpretation of the\ngospel of Valentine.\n\n\"That is practically the same thing as his saying to you that he was mad.\nNow you have told me what you feel for Julian.\"\n\nCuckoo flushed, and muttered something unintelligible, twining her hands\nin the sables till she nearly pulled them from Doctor Levillier's knees.\n\n\"And you have seen the terrible change that has come over him, and that\nis fast, fast deepening to something that must end in utter ruin. You\nhave not seen him these last few days, I think.\"\n\n\"No\", said Cuckoo, her eyes fixed hungrily on the doctor's face. She\nbegan to tug at her veil. \"What's it? Is he--is he?\"\n\nShe collapsed into a nervous silence, still tugging with a futile hand at\nthe veil, which remained implacably stretched across her face. The doctor\nlooked at her, and said steadily:\n\n\"He has gone a little further--down. You understand me?\"\n\n\"I ought to,\" she said, bitterly.\n\n\"As you are mounting upward,\" the doctor rejoined, with a kind and firm\ngravity that seemed indeed to lift Cuckoo, as a sweet wind lifts a\nfeather and sends it on high.\n\nThe bitterness went out of her face, but she said nothing, only sat\nlistening attentively while the doctor went on:\n\n\"My belief is this, and if you hold it you can perhaps act in this matter\nwith more boldness, more fearlessness, than if you do not hold it. I\nbelieve that Mr. Cresswell, who played very foolish tricks with his\nnerves some time ago, just before he got to know you, has become mad to\nthis extent, that he believes himself to have a power of will unlike that\npossessed by any other man,--an inhuman power, in fact. He fancies that\nhe has the will of a sort of god, and he wishes to prove this to himself\nmore especially. Everything is for self in a madman. Now he looks about\nfor a means of proving that his will can do everything. He wants to make\nit do something extraordinary, uncommon. What does he find for it to do?\nThis, the ruin of Julian. And now I'll tell you why this ruin of Julian\nwould be a peculiar triumph for his will. Originally, when Cresswell was\nsane and splendid, his splendour of sanity guarded Julian from all that\nwas dangerous. Julian was naturally inclined to be wild. He has an ardent\nnature, and five years ago, when he was a mere boy, might have fallen\ninto a thousand follies. Cresswell's influence first kept him from these\nfollies, and at last taught him to loathe and despise them. And Julian,\nremember this, told Cresswell at last that he had been to him a sort of\nsaviour. You can follow me?\"\n\n\"'M,\" Cuckoo ejaculated with shut mouth and a nod of her head.\n\n\"So that Cresswell knew what his will had been able to do in the\ndirection of lifting Julian high up, almost above his nature. Well, then\nfollowed certain foolish practices which I need not describe. Cresswell\nand Julian joined in a certain trickery, often practised by people who\ncall themselves spiritualists and occultists. It certainly had an effect\nupon them at the time, and I advised them earnestly to drop it. They\ndisregarded my advice, and the result was that Mr. Cresswell fell into\nan extraordinary condition of body. He fell into a trance, became as if\nhe were dead, and remained so for some hours on a certain night. I was\ncalled in to him, and actually thought that he was dead. But he revived.\nNow, I believe that though he seemed to recover, and did recover in\nbody, he never recovered from that insensibility in mind. I believe he\nwent into that sleep sane and came out of it mad, and that he remains\nmad to this moment. Certainly, ever since then he has been an altered\nman, the man you know, not at all the man he used to be. Since that\nnight he, who used to be almost unconscious of the wonder of his own\nwill, has become intensely self-conscious, and engrossed with it, and\nhas wished to make it obey him and perform miracles. And what is the\nspecial miracle to which he is devoting himself at this moment, as you\nhave observed? Just this: the ruin of the thing he originally saved. It\nis like this,\" he said, noting that Cuckoo was becoming puzzled and\nconfused, \"Cresswell, by his influence, made Julian loathe sin. Coming\nout of this trance, as I believe, a madman, he seeks to make his will\ndo something extraordinary. What shall he make it do? His eyes fall on\nJulian, who is always with him, as you know. And he resolves to make\nJulian love what he has taught him to loathe--sin, vice, degradation of\nevery kind. So he sets to work with all the cunning of a diseased mind,\nand hour by hour, day by day, he works for this horrible end. At first he\nis quiet and careful. But at last he becomes almost intoxicated as he\nsees his own success. And he allows himself to be led into outbreaks of\ntriumph. One of those outbreaks you yourself seem to have witnessed. I\nhave witnessed another--on the night I dined alone with Cresswell, when\nhe killed the dog, Rip, and threw him out into the snow. Cresswell is\nintoxicated with the mental intoxication of mania, at the degradation\ninto which his will has forced Julian, who had learnt to love him, to\nthink that everything he did must be right. And this intoxication is\nleading him to excesses. It is my firm belief that he intends to drag\nJulian down into intolerable abysses of sin, to plunge him into utter\nruin, to bring him perhaps to prison, and to death.\"\n\nCuckoo was listening now with a white face--even her lips looked almost\ngrey. The sunshine still lay over the winter world. The horses trotted.\nThe sables were warm about her. They had nearly left the city behind\nthem and were gaining the heights, on which the air was keener and more\nlife-giving, and from which the outlook was larger and more inspiring.\nBut the girl's gaiety and almost wild sense of vivacity and protectedness\nhad vanished. For the doctor's face and voice had become grave, and his\nwords were weighty with a conviction, which, added to her own knowledge\nof Julian and Valentine, made her fears unutterable. As the doctor paused\nshe opened her lips as if to speak, but she said nothing. He could not\nbut perceive the cloud that had settled on her, and his manner quickly\nchanged. A brightness, a hopefulness, illumined his face, and he said\nquickly:\n\n\"This tragedy is what you and I, but you especially, must prevent.\"\n\nThen Cuckoo spoke at last:\n\n\"How ever?\" she said.\n\n\"Remember this,\" he answered. \"If Cresswell is mad we must pity him,\nnot condemn him. But we must, above all, fight him. Could I prove his\nmadness the danger would be averted? Possibly time will give me the\nmeans of proving it. I have watched him. I shall continue to watch him.\nBut as yet, although I see enough to convince me of his insanity, I\ndon't see enough to convince the world, or, above all, to convince\nJulian. Therefore never give Julian the slightest hint of what I have\ntold you of to-day. His adoration of Valentine is such that even a hint\nmight easily lead him to regard both you and me as his enemies. Keep your\nown counsel and mine, but act with me on the silent assumption that\nCresswell being a madman, we are justified in fighting him to the bitter\nend, you and I, with all our forces.\"\n\n\"I see,\" Cuckoo said, a burning excitement beginning to wake in her.\n\n\"Justified in fighting him, but not in hating him.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" she said, with a much more doubtful accent.\n\n\"Scarcely any human being, if indeed any, is completely hateful. How then\ncan a human being, whose mind is ill and out of control, be hateful?\"\nsaid the doctor, gently.\n\nShe felt herself rebuked, and a quick thought of herself, of what she\nwas, rebuked her too.\n\n\"I'll try not,\" she murmured, but with no inward conviction of success.\n\nThey were on the heath now, and the smoke of London hung in the wintry\nair beyond and below them. The sun was already beginning to wear the\naspect of a traveller on the point of departure for a journey. His once\ngolden face was sinister with that blood-red hue which it so often\nassumes on winter afternoons, and which seems to set it in a place more\nthan usually remote, more than usually distant from our world, and in a\nclime that is sad and strange. Winds danced over the heath like young\nwitches. The horses, whipped by the more intense cold, pulled hard\nagainst the bit, and made the coachman's arms ache. The doctor looked\naway for a moment at the vapours that began to clothe the afternoon in\nthe hollows and depressions of the landscape, and at the sun, whose\ngathering change of aspect smote on his imagination as something akin to\nthe change that falls over the faces of men towards that hour when the\nsun of their glory makes ready for its setting. Still keeping his glance\non that sad red sun in its nest of radiating vapours, he said, in a\nwithdrawn voice:\n\n\"We must hate nothing except the hatefulness of sin in ourselves and in\nothers.\"\n\nCuckoo listened as to the voice of some one on a throne, and tears that\nshe could not fully understand rose in her eyes.\n\nBut now the doctor turned from the sun to the lady of the feathers, and\nthere was a bright light in his quiet eyes.\n\n\"You and I must fight with all our forces,\" he said. \"Have you ever\nthought about this thing will which Cresswell worships insanely? Have you\never felt it in you, Miss Bright?\"\n\n\"I don't know as I have,\" Cuckoo said, secretly wondering if it were\nthat strange and fleeting power which had come to her of late, which\nhad made her for a moment fearless of Valentine as she defied him in the\nloneliness of her room, which had stirred her even to a faith in herself\nwhen she spoke with the doctor under the stars upon her doorstep.\n\n\"I think you have. I think you will. It must be there, for Julian feels\nit in you. He--he calls it a flame.\"\n\n\"Eh? A flame?\"\n\n\"Yes. He sees it in your eyes, and it holds him near you.\"\n\nSo the doctor spoke, partly out of his conviction, partly because he\nhad definitely resolved to put away from him all the things that fought\nagainst his reason and that his imagination perhaps loved too much.\nSuch things, he thought, floated like clouds across the clearness of\nhis vision, and drowned the light of his power to do good. So his\nfancies that had fastened on the mystery of the dead Marr and the living\nValentine, connecting them together, and weaving a veil of magic about\ntheir strange connection, were banished. He would not hold more commerce\nwith them, nor would he accept the fancies of others as realities. Thus,\nin his mind, Julian's legend of the flame in this girl's eyes, despite\nthe doctor's own vision of flames, became merely a story of the truth\nof human will and an acknowledgment of its power.\n\n\"Is that why he looks at me so?\" Cuckoo asked, in a manner unusually\nmeditative. \"But then he, Valentine, did the same! Why, could that be\nwhat scared him that night--what he struck at?\"\n\n\"He too may feel that you have a power for good, to fight against his\npower for evil. Yes, he does feel it. Make him feel it more. Rely on\nyourself. Trust that there's something great within you, something placed\nthere for you to use. Never mind what your life has been. Never mind your\nown weakness. You are the home, the temple, of this power of will. Julian\nfeels it, and it draws him to you, but it is as nothing yet compared\nwith the power of Cresswell. You have to make it more powerful, so that\nyou may win Julian back from this danger.\"\n\n\"Eh? How?\"\n\n\"Rest on it; trust in it; teach it to act. Show Julian more and more that\nyou have it. Can't you think of a way of showing that you have this\npower?\"\n\n\"Not I. No,\" Cuckoo murmured.\n\nThe doctor lowered his voice still more. Quite at a venture he drew a\nbow, and with his first arrow smote the lady of the feathers to the\nheart.\n\n\"Has Julian ever asked you to do anything?\" he said.\n\nSuddenly Cuckoo's face was scarlet.\n\n\"Why? How d' you know?\" she stammered.\n\n\"Anything for him that was not evil?\" the doctor pursued, following out\nan abstract theory, not as Cuckoo fancied, dealing with known facts. \"I\nknow nothing. I only ask you to try and remember, to search your mind.\"\n\nThere was no need for the lady of the feathers to do that.\n\n\"Yes, he did once,\" she said, looking still confused and furtive.\n\n\"Was it difficult?\"\n\nShe hesitated.\n\n\"I s'pose so,\" she answered at last.\n\n\"Did you do it?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nThe doctor had noticed that his questions gave pain.\n\n\"I don't want to know what it was and I don't ask,\" he said. \"I have\nneither the right to, nor the desire to. But can't you do it, and show\nJulian that you have done it? If you do I think he will see that flame,\nwhich he fears and which fascinates him, burn more clearly, more\nsteadily, in your eyes.\"\n\n\"I'll see,\" Cuckoo said with a kind of gulp.\n\n\"Do more than this. This is only a part, one weapon in the fight.\nCresswell is always near Julian; you must be near him. Cresswell\npursues Julian; you must pursue him, use your woman's wit, use all your\nexperience of men; use your heart. Wake up and throw yourself into this\nbattle, and make yourself worthy of fighting. Only you can tell how. But\nthis is a fact. Our wills, our powers of doing things, are made strong,\nor made weak by our own lives. Each time we do a degradingly low, beastly\nthing\"--he chose the words most easily comprehended by such a woman as\nshe was--\"we weaken our will, and make it less able to do anything good\nfor another. If you commit loveless actions from to-day--though Julian\nhas nothing to do with them--with each loveless action you will lose a\npoint in the battle against the madness of Cresswell. And you must lose\nno points. Remember you are fighting a madman, as I believe, for the\nsafety of the man you love. If I could tell you what--\"\n\nThe doctor pulled himself up short.\n\n\"No,\" he said, \"no need to tell you more than that, within these last\nfew days I have found that all you said about Cresswell's present\n_diablerie_\"--he shook his head impatiently at the language he was using\nto the lady of the feathers--\"Cresswell's present impulse for evil is\nless horribly true than the truth. I shall watch him, day by day, from\nnow. And if I can act, I shall do so. If his insanity is too sharp for\nme, as it may well be, I shall be checkmated in any effort to forcibly\nkeep him from doing harm. In that case I can only trust to you, and\nhope that some chance circumstance may lead to the opening of Julian's\neyes. But they are closed--closed fast. In any case you will help me and\nI will help you. You shall have opportunities of meeting Julian often. I\nwill arrange that. And Cresswell--\"\n\nHe paused as if in deep thought.\n\n\"How to do it,\" he murmured, almost to himself. \"How to bring this battle\nto the issue!\"\n\nThen he turned his eyes on Cuckoo.\n\nShe was sitting bolt upright in the carriage. Her cheeks were flushed.\nHer hollow eyes were sparkling. She had drawn her hands out from under\nthe rug and clasped them together in her lap.\n\n\"Oh, I'll do anything I can,\" she said, \"anything. And--and I can do that\none thing!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the doctor. \"Which?\"\n\n\"The thing that he asked me once, and what I said no to,\" she answered,\nbut in such a low murmur that the doctor scarcely caught the words.\n\nHe leaned forward in the carriage.\n\n\"Home now, Grant,\" he said to the coachman. \"Or--no--drive first to 400\nMarylebone Road.\"\n\nThe doctor turned again towards Cuckoo. She was looking away from him, so\nmuch that he was obliged to believe that she wished to conceal her face,\nwhich was towards the sunset.\n\nThe sky over London glowed with a dull red like a furnace. It deepened,\nwhile they looked, passing rapidly through the biting cold of the late\nwinter afternoon.\n\nThe red cloud near the fainting sun broke and parted.\n\nSpears of gold were thrust forth.\n\n\"Flames,\" the doctor whispered to himself. \"Flames! The will, the soul of\nGod in nature.\"\n\n\n\n\nPART V--FLAMES\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nVALENTINE INVITES HIS GUESTS\n\n\nValentine and Julian sat together in the tentroom at night, as they sat\ntogether many months ago, when Julian confessed his secret and Valentine\nexpressed his strange desire to have a different soul. Now it was deep\nwinter. The year was old. In three days it must die. It lay in the snow,\nlike some abandoned beggar waiting for the inevitable end. Some, who were\nhappy, would fain have succoured it and kept it with them. Others,\nwho were sad, said: \"Let it go--this beggar. Already it has taken too\nmany alms from us.\" But neither the happy nor the sad could affect its\nfate. So it lay in the snow and in the wind, upon its deathbed.\n\nThe tentroom had not been altered. Still the green draperies, veiled\nwalls, windows and door, meeting in a point at the ceiling. The fire\ndanced and shone. The electric moons gleamed with a twilight softness.\nOnly Rip was gone from the broad and cushioned divan upon which he had\nloved to lie, half sleeping, half awake, while his master talked and\nJulian listened or replied. The room was the same, and this very fact\nemphasized the transformation of the two men who sat in it. They leaned\nin their low chairs on each side of the fire, thinly veiled from time to\ntime in cigarette-smoke. No sound of London reached them in this small\nroom. Even the voice of the winter wind whispered and sang in vain.\nStifled by the thick draperies, it failed in its effort to gain their\nattention, and sighed among the chimney-tops the chagrin of its soul. The\nface of Julian was drawn and heavy. His eyes were downcast. His arms hung\nover the cushioned elbows of his chair, in which he sat very low, in the\nshrivelled posture of one desperately fatigued. From time to time he\nopened his lips in a sort of dull gape, then shut his teeth tightly as if\nhe ground them together. The drooping lids of his eyes were covered with\nlittle lines, and there were deeper lines at the corners of his mouth.\nThe colour of his face was the colour of the misty cloud that haunts the\nsteps of evening on an autumn day--grey, as if it clothed processes of\ndecay and desolation. Years seemed to crouch upon him like lean dogs upon\na doorstep. Within a few months he had stepped from boyhood to the\ncreaking threshold of premature age.\n\nThe change in Valentine was far less marked to a careless eye. There was\nstill a peculiar cleanness in his large blue eyes, a white delicacy in\nhis features. The lips of his mouth were red and soft, not dry, as were\nthe lips of Julian. The crisp gold of his hair caught the light, and his\nlithe figure rested in his chair in a calm posture of pleasant ease. Yet\nhe, too, was changed. Expression of a new nature now no longer lurked\nfurtively in his face, but boldly, even triumphantly, asserted itself.\nIt did not shrink behind a soft smile, or glide and pass in a fleeting\ngaiety, but stared upon the world with something of the hard and fixed\nimmobility of a mask. Every mask, whatever expression be painted upon\nit, wears a certain aspect of shamelessness. Valentine's was a hard and\nshameless face, although his features, if coarser than of old, were still\nnoble, and, in line, a silent legend of almost priestly intellectuality.\n\nHe was looking across at Julian, who held idly between his lax fingers\na letter written with violet ink upon pink paper, which had a little bird\nstamped in the left-hand corner.\n\n\"When did you get it?\" he said.\n\n\"Two or three days ago, I think. I can't remember. I can't remember\nanything now,\" Julian answered heavily.\n\n\"And you have had two since?\"\n\n\"Yes. And to-day she called.\"\n\n\"You were out?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"She shows herself very exigent all of a sudden. She is afraid of losing\nyou. I told you long ago she cherished absurd ambitions with regard to\nyou. Do you intend to answer her notes?\"\n\n\"Oh yes,\" Julian said. \"Cuckoo has always been very fond of me; very\nfond.\"\n\nHe glanced at the absurdly vulgar little bird in the corner of the\nletter. \"And that's something,\" he added slowly.\n\n\"You are weighed down with gratitude? No wonder. Are you grateful to\nothers who have always cared for you in a different way--unselfishly,\nthat is?\"\n\n\"I don't seem to feel very much about anybody now,\" Julian said. \"I do\nsuch a lot. The more you do, the less you feel. Damnable life! All\ncruelty. I can't feel satisfied. But there must be something; something\nI haven't tried. I must find it,\" he said, almost fiercely, and, stirring\nin a sudden energy, \"I must find it--or--curse you, Val, why don't you\nfind it for me?\"\n\nValentine laughed.\n\n\"The last novelty has failed? You are a very discontented sinner, Julian.\nAnd yet London begins to think you too enterprising. I hear that Lady\nCrichton is the last person to shut her doors against you. What did she\nhear of?\"\n\n\"How should I know?\"\n\nHe laughed bitterly.\n\n\"She oughtn't to be particular. She used to receive Marr. I met him first\nin her yellow drawing-room.\"\n\n\"London had not discussed him, perhaps. You are rapidly becoming a legend\nand a warning. That is fame. To be the accepted warning for others.\"\n\n\"Or infamy; which is much the same thing.\"\n\n\"But you are only at the first posting-station of your journey,\"\nValentine continued, looking at him with a smile. \"If you are\ndissatisfied, it is because you have not tasted yet half that strength\nof the spring we once talked of. You have not completely thrown off\nthe foolish yoke of public opinion. The chains still jangle about you.\nCast them away and you will yet be happy.\"\n\n\"Shall I? Shall I, Valentine?\"\n\nThe exhausted, worn, and weary figure leaned abruptly forward in its\nchair. Julian's tired eyes glittered greedily.\n\n\"To be happy, I'd commit any crime,\" he said.\n\n\"Crime is merely opinion,\" Valentine answered. \"Everything is opinion.\nYou will commit crimes probably. Most brave men do.\"\n\n\"But shall I be happy?\"\n\n\"You are greedy, Julian, greedy of everything, knowledge of life, lust,\njoy. You are never satisfied. That's because you and I fasted for so\nlong; and the greedy man is never quite happy while he is eating, for\nhe is always anticipating the next course. And, let philosophers say what\nthey will, happiness does not lie in anticipation. Go on eating. Pass on\nfrom course to course. At last there will come a time, a beautiful time,\nwhen your appetite will be satisfied and you will rest contented. But,\nremember, not till you have journeyed through the whole _menu_, played\nwith your dessert and even drunk your black coffee. Go on, only go on.\nMen and women are unhappy. They think it is because they have done too\nmuch. They reproach themselves for a thousand things that they have done.\nFools! They are unhappy because they have not done enough. The text\nwhich will haunt me on my deathbed will be: 'I have left undone those\nthings which I ought to have done.' Yes, during my long cursed years of\ninaction, when I was called the Saint of Victoria Street. Ah! Julian, you\nand I slept; we are awake now. You and I were dead; we are now alive. But\nwe are only at the beginning of our lives. We have those years, those\nwhite and empty years, to drown in the waters of Lethe. They are like\nmonstrous children that should have been strangled almost ere they were\nborn, white, vacant children. And now, day by day, we are pressing them\ndown in the waters with our hands. At last they will sink. The waves will\nflow over their haggard faces. The waves will sweep them away. Then we\nshall be happy. We shall redeem those years on which the locust fed, and\nwe shall be happy.\"\n\n\"Yes, by God, we shall be happy, we will--we will be happy. Only teach me\nto be happy, Valentine, anywhere, anyhow.\"\n\n\"Not with the lady of the feathers. She will not make you happy.\"\n\n\"Cuckoo? No! For she's terribly unhappy herself. Poor old Cuckoo. I\nwonder what she's doing now.\"\n\n\"Searching in the snow for her fate,\" Valentine said, with a sneer.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt was not so. Cuckoo was sitting alone in the little room of the\nMarylebone Road looking a new spectre in the face, the spectre of\nhunger, only shadowy as yet, scarcely defined, scarcely visible. And\nthe lady of the feathers wondered, as she gazed, if she and the spectre\nmust become better acquainted, clasp hands, kiss lips, be day-fellows\nand night-fellows.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"I am going to write to Cuckoo,\" Julian said a day later. \"What shall I\nsay?\"\n\nValentine hesitated.\n\n\"What have you thought of saying?\" he asked.\n\n\"Oh, I don't know. First one thing, then another. Good-bye among the\nnumber. That's what you wish me to say, Val, isn't it?\"\n\nHe spoke in a listless voice, monotonous in inflection and lifeless\nin timbre. The dominion of Valentine over him since the supper at the\nSavoy had increased, consolidating itself into an undoubted tyranny,\nwhich Julian accepted, carelessly, thoughtlessly, a prey to the internal\ndegradation of his mind. Once he had only been nobly susceptible, a fine\npower. Now he was drearily weak, an ungracious disability. But with his\nweakness came, as is usual, a certain lassitude which even resembled\ndespair, an indifference peculiar to the slave, how opposed to the\nindifference peculiar to the autocrat. Valentine recognized in the voice\nthe badge of serfdom, even more than in the question, and he smiled with\na cold triumph. He had intended telling Julian now, once for all, to\nbreak with the lady of the feathers, of whom even yet he stood in vague\nfear. But the question, the voice of Julian, gave him pause, slid into\nhis soul a new and bizarre desire, child of the strange intoxication of\npower which was beginning to grip him, and which the doctor had remarked.\nIf Julian broke with Cuckoo, repulsed her forever into the long street\nthat was her pent and degraded world, would not the sharp salt of\nValentine's triumph be taken from him? Would not the wheels of his\nJuggernaut car fail to do their office in his sight--there was the\npoint!--upon a precious victim? The lady of the feathers thus\ndeliberately abandoned by Julian would suffer perhaps almost to the\nlimit of her capability of pain, but Valentine would have lost sight\nof her in the dark, and though he would have conquered that spectral\nopposition which she had whimsically offered to him--he laughed to\nhimself now, thinking of his fear of it--he would not see that greatest\nvision, the flight of his enemy. These thoughts flashed through his mind,\nmoving him to an answer that astonished Julian.\n\n\"Good-bye!\" he said. \"Why should I wish that?\"\n\n\"You said the other day at the Savoy that she hated you; that you and she\nmust have a battle unless I chose between you.\"\n\n\"I was laughing.\"\n\nThe lifelessness left Julian's voice as he exclaimed:\n\n\"Valentine! But you were--\"\n\n\"Sober, and you were not. Can you deny it?\"\n\nJulian was silent.\n\n\"I so little meant that nonsense,\" Valentine continued, \"that I have\nconceived a plan. To-morrow is the last night of the old year. The doctor\nasked us to spend it with him. We refused. Providence directed that\nrefusal, for now we are at liberty to celebrate the proper occasion\nfor burying hatchets by burying our particular hatchet. The lady of the\nfeathers, your friend, my enemy, shall see the new year in here, in this\ntentroom, where long ago we--you and I--with how ill success, sought to\nexchange our souls.\"\n\nJulian looked utterly astonished at this proposition.\n\n\"Cuckoo wouldn't come here,\" he began.\n\n\"So you said once before. But she came then, and she will come now.\"\n\n\"And then the doctor! If he gets to hear of it! We said we were dining\nout.\"\n\nValentine's hard smile grew yet harder, and his eyes sparkled eagerly.\n\n\"I'll arrange that,\" he said. \"The doctor shall come here too.\"\n\nIt seemed indeed as if he meant that his triumph should culminate on this\nfinal night of the year, his year. He laughed Julian's astonishment at\nthis vagary aside, sat down and wrote the two notes of invitation, and\nthen went out with Julian, saying:\n\n\"Julian, come out with me. You remember what I said about the greedy man?\nCome; Fate shall present you with another course, one more step towards\nyour _caf\u00e9 noir_ and--happiness. _Voil\u00e0!_\"\n\nValentine was right in his supposition that both the lady of the feathers\nand the doctor would accept his invitation, but he did not understand\nthe precise motive which prompted their acceptance. Nor did he much care\nto understand it. Cuckoo, Doctor Levillier! After all, what were they\nto him now? Spectators of his triumph. Interesting, therefore, to a\ncertain extent, as an unpaying audience may be interesting to an actor.\nInteresting, inasmuch as they could contribute to swell the bladder of\nhis vanity, and follow in procession behind his chariot wheels. But he no\nlonger cared to divine the shades of their emotions, or to busy himself\nin fathoming their exact mental attitudes in relation to himself. So he\nthought, touched perhaps with a certain delirium, though not with the\ndelirium of insanity attributed to him by Doctor Levillier.\n\nThe doctor had intended celebrating the last night of the year in Harley\nStreet with Cuckoo and the two young men. The refusal of the latter put\nan end to the opening of his plan of campaign in this strange battle,\nand he was greatly astonished when he received Valentine's invitation.\nStill, he had no hesitation in accepting it.\n\n\"So,\" he said to himself, as he read the note, \"we join issue within the\nvery wall of the enemy. Poor, deluded, twisted Valentine! that I should\nhave to call him, to think of him as an enemy! We begin the fight within\nthe shadow of our opponent's tent.\"\n\nLiterally that was the fact.\n\nCuckoo's thoughts were less definite, more tinged with passion, less\nshaped by the hands of intellect. They were as clouds, looming large,\nyet misty, hanging loose in torn fragments now, and now merging into\nindistinguishable fog that yet seemed pregnant with possibilities.\nPoor thoughts, vague thoughts; yet they pressed upon her brain until\nher tired head ached. And they stole down to her heart, and that ached\ntoo, and hoped and then despaired--then hoped again.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nCAF\u00c9 NOIR\n\n\nSnow fell, melodramatically, on the year's death-night. During the day\nValentine occupied himself oddly in decorating his flat for the evening.\nBut although he thus seemed to fall in with the consecrated humours of\nthe season his decorations would scarcely have commanded the approval of\nthose good English folk who think that no plant is genial unless it is\nprickly, and that prickly things represent appropriately to the eye the\ninward peace and good will that grows, like a cactus, perhaps within the\nheart. He did not put holly rigidly above his doors. No mistletoe drooped\nfrom the apex of the tentroom. Instead, he filled his flat with flowers,\nbrought from English conservatories or from abroad. Crowds of strange and\nspotted orchids stood together in the drawing-room, staring upon the\nhurly-burly of furniture and ornaments. In the corners of the room were\nimmense red flowers, such as hang among the crawling green jungles of\nthe West Indies. They gleamed, like flames, amid a shower of cunningly\narranged green leaves, and palms sheltered them from the electric rays\nof the ceiling. The tentroom was a maze of tulips, in vases, in pots,\nin china bowls that hung by thin chains from the sloping green roof.\nFew of these tulips were whole coloured. They were slashed, and striped,\nand spotted with violent hues. Some were of the most vivid scarlet\nstreaked with black. Others were orange-coloured with livid pink spots,\ncircus-pink, such as you see round the eyes of horses bred specially for\nthe ring. There were white tulips, stained as if with blood, pale pink\ntulips tipped with deepest brown, rose-coloured tulips barred with wounds\nwhose edges were saffron-hued, tulips of a warm wallflower tint dashed\nwith the stormy yellow of an evening sky. And hidden among those\nscentless flowers, in secret places cunningly contrived, were great\ngroups of hyacinths, which poured forth their thick and decadent scent,\nbreathing heavily their hearts into the small atmosphere of the room,\nand giving a strange and unnatural soul to the tulips who had spent\nall their efforts in the attainment of form and daring combinations of\ncolour. As if relapsing into sweet simplicity, after the vagaries of a\nwayward nature had run their course, Valentine had filled his hall and\ndining-room with violets, purple and white, and a bell of violets hung\nfrom the ceiling over the chair which the lady of the feathers was to\noccupy at dinner. These were white only, white and virginal, flowers for\nsome sweet woman dedicated to the service of God, or to the service of\nsome eternal altar-flame burning, as the zeal of nature burns, through\nall the dawning and fading changes of the world.\n\nThus Valentine passed his day among flowers, and only when the last\ntwilight of the year fell had he fixed the last blossom in its place.\nThen he rested, as after six days of creation, and from the midst of\nhis flowers saw the snow falling delicately upon London. Lights began\nto gleam in the tall houses opposite his drawing-room windows. He glanced\nat them, and they brought him thoughts at which he smiled. Behind those\nsquares of light he imagined peace and good will in enormous white\nwaistcoats and expansive shirt-fronts, red-faced, perhaps even whiskered,\ngetting ready for good temper and turkey, journalistic geniality and plum\npudding. And holly everywhere, with its prickly leaves and shining,\nphlegmatic surfaces.\n\nPeace and good will!\n\nHe glanced at his orchids and at the red West Indian flowers, and he\nthought of those crawling green jungles from which they should have come,\nand smiled gently.\n\nPeace and good will!\n\nHe went to dress.\n\n          *       *       *       *       *\n\nMeanwhile, in the Marylebone Road the lady of the feathers achieved\nher toilet, assisted by Jessie. The only evening dress that Cuckoo\npossessed had been given to her long ago by a young man in the millinery\ndepartment of a large London shop. For a week he had adored Cuckoo.\nDuring that week he had presented her with this tremendous gift. She\nwent into her bedroom now, took it out and looked at it. The gown rustled\na great deal whenever it was moved; this had been the young man's idea.\nHe considered that the more a gift rustled, the more aristocratic it\nwas, and, being well acquainted with all the different noises made by\ndifferent fabrics, he had selected one with a voice as of many waters.\nCuckoo heard it now as in a dream. She laid it down upon the bed and\nregarded it by candle-light. The young man's taste in sound found its\nequivalent in his taste in colour. The hue of the gown was also very\nloud, the brightest possible green, trimmed with thick yellow imitation\nlace. Once it had enchanted Cuckoo, she had put it on with a thrill to go\nto music-halls with the young man. But now she gazed upon it with a lack\nlustre and a doubtful eye. The flickering flame of the candle lit it up\nin patches, and those patches had a lurid aspect. Remembering that Julian\nhad liked her best in black, she shrank from appearing before him in\nanything so determined. Yet it was her only dress for the evening,\nand at first she supposed the wearing of it to be inevitable. She put\nit on and went in front of the glass. In these days she had become even\nthinner than of old, and more haggard. The gown increased her tenuity\nand pallor to the eye, and, after a long moment of painful consideration,\nCuckoo resolved to abandon these green glories. Once her mind was\nmade up, she was out of the dress in an instant; time was short. She\nhurriedly extracted her black gown from the wardrobe, caught hold of\na pair of scissors, and in a few minutes had ripped the imitation lace\nfrom its foundations and was transferring it with trembling fingers\nto Julian's gift. Never before had she worked at any task with such\ngrim determination, or with such deftness; inspired by exceptional\ncircumstances, she might for twenty minutes have been a practised\ndressmaker. Certainly, pins were called in as weapons to the attack;\nbut what of that? Compromises are often only stuck together with pins.\nIn any case Cuckoo was not entirely in despair with the new aspect of\nan old friend, and when she was ready was able at least to hope that\nthings might have been worse.\n\nPutting on over the dress a black jacket, she went out into the passage\nand called down to Mrs. Brigg, who, as usual, was wandering to and fro in\nher kitchen, like an uneasy shade in nethermost Hades.\n\n\"Mrs. Brigg! Mrs. Brigg, I say!\"\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"Where's the whistle?\"\n\nMrs. Brigg came to the bottom of the kitchen stairs.\n\n\"What d' yer want it for?\"\n\n\"A cab, of course,\" cried Cuckoo, in the narrow voice of one in a hurry.\n\n\"A cab!\" rejoined Mrs. Brigg, ascending the dark stairs all the time she\nwas speaking. \"And what do you want with cabs, I should like to know? Who\npays for 'em, that's what I say; who's to do it?\"\n\nHer grey head hove in sight.\n\n\"Where are you going? Piccadilly?\"\n\n\"No; get the whistle.\"\n\n\"What--and no hat!\"\n\nShe was evidently impressed.\n\n\"A toff is it?\" she ejaculated, obviously appeased. \"Well! so long as I\nget the rent I--\"\n\nWith a white glare Cuckoo seized the whistle from her claw, and in a\nmoment was driving away through the snow.\n\nMrs. Brigg trotted back to the kitchen decidedly relieved. Cuckoo's\nsuddenly altered mode of life had tried her greatly. The girl had taken\nto going out in the day and staying at home at night. Simultaneously\nwith this changed _r\u00e9gime_ her funds had evidently become low. She had\nbegun to live less well, to watch more keenly than of old the condition\nin which her commons went down to the kitchen and returned from it on\nthe advent of the next meal. By various little symptoms the landlady\nknew that her lodger was getting hard up. Yet no amount of badgering\nand argument would induce Cuckoo to say why she sat indoors at night.\nShe acknowledged that she was not ill. Mrs. Brigg had been seriously\nexercised. But now her old heart was glad. Cuckoo was, perhaps, mounting\ninto higher circles, circles in which hats were not worn during the\nevening. And as Mrs. Brigg entered her nethermost hell she broke into\na thin, quavering song:\n\n\"In 'er 'air she wore a white cam-eeiyer,\nDark blue was the colour of 'er heye.\"\n\nIt was her song of praise. She always sang it on great occasions.\n\nWhen the lady of the feathers reached Victoria Street she found the\nlittle party already assembled. Valentine met her ceremoniously in the\nviolet-scented hall and helped her to slide out of her jacket. His glance\nupon the imitation lace was quick and gay, but Cuckoo did not see it. She\nwas gazing at the flowers, and when she entered the drawing-room and\nfound herself in the midst of the orchids, the West Indian flowers and\nthe palms, her astonishment knew no bounds.\n\n\"I never!\" she murmured under her breath.\n\nThen she forgot the flowers, having only time to remember to be shy.\nDinner was immediately announced by Wade, whose years of trained\ndiscretion could not banish a faint accent of surprise from his voice.\nHe was, in fact, _boulevers\u00e9_ by this celebration of the death of the\nold year. Valentine offered Cuckoo his arm. She took it awkwardly, with\na shooting glance of question at the doctor, who seemed her only spar in\nthis deep social sea. Valentine placed her beneath the bell of violets,\nand took his seat beside her. Julian was on her other hand, the doctor\nexactly opposite. Wade presented her with _hors-d'oeuvres._ Cuckoo\nselected a sardine. She understood sardines, having met them at the\nMonico. Valentine and the doctor began to talk. Julian ate slowly, and\nCuckoo stole a glance at him. His aspect startled her so much that she\nwith difficulty repressed a murmur of astonishment. He had the appearance\nof one so completely exhausted as to be scarcely alive. Most people,\nhowever stupid, however bored, have some air, when in society, of\nlistening even when they do not speak, of giving some sort of attention\nto those about them, or to the place in which they find themselves. They\nglance this way and that, however phlegmatically. They bend in attention\nor lean back in observation. It is seen that they are conscious of their\nenvironment. But Julian was engrossed with fatigue. The lids drooped over\nhis eyes. His face wore a leaden hue. Even his lips were colourless. He\nate slowly and mechanically till his plate was empty. Then he laid down\nhis fork and remained motionless, his eyes still cast down towards the\ntablecloth, his two hands laid against the table edge, while the fingers\nwere extended upon the cloth on either side of his plate. Cuckoo looked\nat him with terror, wondering if he were ill. Then, glancing up, she met\nthe eyes of the doctor. They seemed to bid her take no heed of Julian's\ncondition, and she did not look at him again just then. Trying to control\nher fears, she listened to Valentine's conversation with the doctor.\n\n\"Doctors are sceptics by profession,\" she heard him say.\n\n\"I believe in individualism too firmly to allow that any beliefs or\nunbeliefs can be professional, Cresswell.\"\n\n\"Possibly you are right,\" Valentine answered lightly. \"What a pity it is\nthat there is no profession of which all the members at least believe in\nthemselves.\"\n\n\"Ah; would you enter it?\"\n\n\"I scarcely think it would be necessary.\"\n\nHe glanced first at the doctor, then at Cuckoo as he spoke.\n\n\"I am thankful to say,\" he added in his clear, cool voice, \"that I have\nno longer either the perpetual timidity of the self-doubter or even the\noccasional anxiety of the egoist.\"\n\n\"You have passed into a region which even egoism cannot enter.\"\n\n\"Possibly--the average egoism.\"\n\n\"The average egoism of the end of the century moves in a very rarefied\nair.\"\n\n\"Its feet touch ground nevertheless.\"\n\n\"And yours?\"\n\nValentine only laughed, as if he considered the question merely\nrhetorical or jocose.\n\n\"But we are getting away from the question, which was not personal,\"\nhe said. \"I contend that doctors, as a body, are bound to combat these\nmodern Athenians, who are inclined to attribute everything to some\nobscure action of the mind. For, if their beliefs are founded on rock,\nand if they can themselves sufficiently, by asceticism, or by following\nany other fixed course of life which they may select as the right one,\ntrain their minds to do that which they believe can be done, the\nprofession of doctors may in time be abolished. Mind will be the\nuniversal medicine; will, not simply the cure, but the preventive,\nof disease.\"\n\n\"And of death?\" the doctor asked quietly. \"Will man be able to think\nhimself into an eternity on earth?\"\n\nValentine looked at him very strangely.\n\n\"You ask that question seriously?\" he said.\n\n\"I ask seriously whether you think so.\"\n\nIt was evident that the doctor meant to make the question above all\nthings a personal one. This time Valentine accepted that condition.\nHe sat for a moment twisting his champagne-glass about in his long\nfingers, and glancing rapidly from the doctor to Cuckoo, who heard this\nconversation without very well understanding it. Indeed, she sat beneath\nher bell of violets in much confusion, _distraite_ in her desire to\ncommand intellectual faculties which she did not possess. Valentine\nwatched her narrowly, though he seemed unattentive to her. Perhaps\nhe thought of his delivery of his gospel to her, and wondered if she\nrecalled it at this moment; or perhaps once more he began to rejoice\nin her mental distress and alienation.\n\n\"Wade,\" he said \"the champagne to Mr. Addison. Well, doctor, suppose I\nacknowledged that I did so--mind, I don't acknowledge it!--you might, on\nyour side, think something too--that I am mad, for instance. Ah! Miss\nBright has knocked over her glass!\"\n\nCuckoo murmured a stumbling apology, gazing with nervous intentness at\nValentine. It seemed to her that he had a gift of divination. Doctor\nLevillier laughed gently.\n\n\"I am not inclined to suppose all my opponents in thought mad,\" he said.\n\"Still, such a belief would certainly indicate in the holder of it the\npossession of a mind so uncommon, so unique, I may say, that it would\nnaturally rouse one to very close attention and observation of it.\"\n\n\"Exactly,\" Valentine rejoined.\n\nA certain audacity was slowly creeping into his demeanour and growing\nwhile he talked. It manifested itself in slight gesticulations, conceited\nmovements of the hand and head, in the colour of the voice and the blunt\ndirectness of his glances.\n\n\"Exactly. Attention and observation directed towards the object of\nsatisfying yourself that the man--myself, let us say--was mad? You\ndon't reply. Let me ask you a question. Why should a profound belief\nin human power of will indicate madness?\"\n\n\"A belief that is not based on any foundation or proof--that is my point.\nAn extraordinary belief, personal to one person, rejected by mankind in\nthe mass, and founded upon nothing, no fact, no inference even, in the\nhistory of mankind, is decidedly a strong indication of dementia.\"\n\n\"But suppose it is a belief founded upon a fact?\"\n\n\"Of course that would entirely alter the matter.\"\n\nThe two men looked across at one another with a long and direct glance\nfull in the eyes. Cuckoo watched them anxiously. Julian sat with his\neyes cast down. He seemed unaware that there was any one near him, any\nconversation going on around him. Wade moved softly about, ministering\nto the wants of his master's guests. Course succeeded course.\n\n\"Do you propose to give me a fact proving the reasonableness of\nentertaining a belief that a man, by his own deliberate action of the\nwill, can compass immortality on earth, or even prolong his life in such\na way as this, for instance; by the successful domination, or banishment,\nof any disease recognized as mortal?--For I acknowledge that the will to\nlive may prolong for a certain time a life threatened merely by the\nsapping action of old age.--Do you propose to give me a fact to prove\nthat?\"\n\n\"I do not say that I intend to give it to you,\" Valentine answered, with\nscarcely veiled insolence.\n\n\"But you know of such a fact?\" said the doctor, ignoring his host's tone.\n\n\"Possibly.\"\n\nThe voice of Valentine thrilled with triumph as he spoke the word. Again\nhe glanced at the lady of the feathers.\n\n\"Cannot you convert the doctor?\" he asked her, in tones full of sarcastic\nmeaning. \"You know something of my theories, something of their putting\ninto practice.\"\n\n\"I don't know--I don't understand,\" she murmured helplessly.\n\nShe looked down at her plate, flushing scarlet with a sense of shame at\nher own complete mental impotence.\n\n\"What's the matter, Cuckoo?\"\n\nThe words came slowly from the lips of Julian, whose heavy eyes were now\nraised and fixed with a stare of lethargic wonder upon Cuckoo.\n\n\"What are they saying to you?\"\n\nHis look travelled on, still slow and unwieldy, to the doctor and to\nValentine.\n\n\"I won't have Cuckoo worried,\" he said. And then he relapsed with a\nmechanical abruptness upon the consideration of his food. Valentine\nseemed about to make some laughing rejoinder, but, after a glance at\nJulian, he apparently resigned the idea as absurd, and, turning again\nto the doctor, remarked:\n\n\"It is sometimes injudicious to state all that one knows.\"\n\n\"Still more so all that one does not know. But I have no desire to press\nyou,\" the doctor said, lightly. \"This is wonderful wine. Where did you\nget it?\"\n\n\"At the _Cercle Blanc_ sale,\" Valentine answered quickly.\n\nIt seemed that he was slightly irritated. He frowned and cast a glance\nthat was almost threatening upon the doctor.\n\n\"Would you assume weakness in every strong man who refuses to take off\nhis coat, roll up his shirt sleeve and display the muscle of his arm?\"\nhe said, harshly.\n\n\"The case is not analogous. That muscle exists in the world is a proved\nfact. When I was at Eton, I was knocked down by a boy stronger than I\nwas. Since then I acknowledge the power of muscle.\"\n\n\"And have you never been knocked down mentally?\"\n\n\"Not in the way you suggest.\"\n\nValentine shifted in his seat. It did not escape the doctor that he\nhad the air of a man longing to either say or do something startling,\nbut apparently held back by tugging considerations of prudence or of\nexpediency.\n\n\"Some day you may be,\" he said at last, obviously conquered by this\nprompting prudence.\n\n\"When I am, the 'Christian scientist' who once declared to me that she\ncured a sprained ankle by walking on it many miles a day, and thinking\nit was well while she walked, shall receive my respectful apologies,\"\nthe doctor answered, laughing.\n\nValentine handed the lady of the feathers some strawberries. On her\nnervous refusal of them he exclaimed:\n\n\"I see you have finished your wine, doctor. No more? Really? Nor you,\nJulian?\"\n\nJulian made no reply. He simply pushed his glass a little away from him.\n\n\"Then shall we accompany Miss Bright into the tentroom? I thought we\nwould have coffee there. You have never seen the tentroom,\" he added to\nCuckoo, getting up from his seat as he spoke.\n\n\"I usually sit in it when I am alone or with Julian. You will not mind\nour cigarettes, I know.\"\n\nHe led the way down the scented corridor, scented with the thin, gently\nbright scent of violets.\n\n\"The tentroom has a history,\" he continued to Cuckoo, opening a door\non the left. \"It was once the scene of an--an absurd experiment. Eh,\ndoctor?\"\n\nThey entered the room. As they did so the hot, sticky scent of the hidden\nhyacinths poured out to meet them. For a moment it seemed overwhelming,\nand Cuckoo hung back with an almost unconquerable sensation of aversion\nand even of fear. The aspect of this small room astonished her; she had\nnever seen any chamber so arranged. Certainly, it looked very unusual\nto-night. The small fire was hidden by a large screen of white wood, with\npanels of dull green brocade. Only one of the electric lamps was turned\non, and that was shaded, so that the diffused light was faint, a mere\nunflickering twilight. The masses of tulips hung like quantities of\nmonotonously similar shadows from the tented ceiling, and the flood of\nscent caused the room to seem even smaller than it really was, a tiny\ntemple dedicated to the uncommon, perhaps to the sinister.\n\n\"We will see the old year out and drink our _caf\u00e9 noir_ here,\" said\nValentine. \"Where will you sit, Miss Bright?\"\n\n\"I don't mind. It's all one to me,\" murmured Cuckoo. \"What a funny room,\nthough!\" she could not help adding. \"It ain't like a room at all.\"\n\n\"Imagine it an Arab tent, the home of a Bedouin Sheik in a desert of\nNubia,\" said Valentine. \"This divan is very comfortable. Let me arrange\nthe cushions for you.\"\n\nAs he bent over her to do so, he murmured in her ear:\n\n\"And you, having tossed your will away, are nothing!\"\n\nThey had been the last words of his gospel, proclaimed to her that night\non which she prayed!\n\nThe lady of the feathers looked up at him with a new knowledge, the\nknowledge of her recent lonely nights, of which he knew nothing as yet;\nthe knowledge of that glancing spectre of want whom, by her own action,\nshe summoned while she feared its gaunt presence; the knowledge of the\ndoctor's trust in her; the knowledge of her great love for Julian; the\nknowledge, perhaps, that leaning her arms upon the slippery horse-hair\nsofa in her little room, she had once thrown a muttered prayer,\nincoherent, unfinished, yet sincere, out into the great darkness that\nencompasses the beginning, the progress, and the ending of all human\nlives with mystery. She looked up at him with this world of mingling\nknowledge in her eyes, and Valentine drew away from her with a stifling\nsensation of frigid awe.\n\n\"What--what?\" he began. Then, recovering himself, he turned suddenly\naway.\n\n\"Sit down, doctor. Do you like my flowers? Julian, are you still tired?\nThe coffee will wake you up. A cigarette, doctor, or a cigar? Here are\nthe matches.\"\n\nJulian came over heavily and sat down on the divan by Cuckoo. His\nunnatural lethargy was gradually passing away into a more explicable\nfatigue, no longer speechless. Leaning on his elbow, he looked into\nher face with his weary eyes, in which to-night there was a curious dim\npathos. It seemed that the only thing which had so far struck him during\nthe evening was still Cuckoo's confusion over her own misunderstanding\nat dinner, for he now again referred to it.\n\n\"Have they been chaffing you, Cuckoo?\" he said, striking a match on the\nheel of his shoe and lighting a cigarette. \"Have they been worrying you?\nNever mind. It's only Val's fun. He doesn't mean anything by it. I say,\nhow awfully pale you look to-night, and thin.\"\n\nHe paused, considering her with a glance that was almost severe.\n\n\"I'm all right,\" said Cuckoo, trying to repress the agitation she always\nfelt now when speaking to Julian. \"I ain't ill. Why don't you come to see\nme now?\" she added. \"You don't never come.\"\n\nJulian glanced over to Valentine, who was standing by the hearth talking\nto the doctor, who sat in an armchair.\n\n\"I've been busy,\" he said. \"I've had a lot of things to do. Do you miss\nme, Cuckoo, when I don't come?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she replied, but without softness. Then she added, lowering her\nvoice almost to a whisper:\n\n\"Don't he want you to come?\"\n\nJulian did not reply, but puffed rather moodily at his cigarette,\nglancing towards Valentine. He was thinking of the conversation at\nthe Savoy and of the antagonism between Valentine and Cuckoo. Suddenly\nthere came into his mind a dull wish to reconcile these two on the last\nnight of the year, to--in Valentine's own words--bury the hatchet. He\nsat meditating over his plan and trying to revolve different and dramatic\nmethods of accomplishing it. Presently he said:\n\n\"Cuckoo, you and Val have got to be friends from to-night.\"\n\nShe started, stirring uneasily on the great cushions that were heaped at\nher back.\n\n\"We are,\" she said.\n\nHe shook his head.\n\n\"Not real friends.\"\n\n\"Oh, we are all right.\"\n\n\"D'you hate him still?\"\n\n\"He don't like me,\" she answered, evasively.\n\n\"Yet he invites you here,\" Julian said. \"Why does he do that?\"\n\n\"I dunno,\" Cuckoo said.\n\nShe wondered why. Not so the doctor, to whom it had become evident\nthat Valentine had asked his guests out of vanity, and with a view to\nsome peculiar and monstrous display of his power over Julian. While\nCuckoo and Julian talked together on the divan Valentine came over to\nthe doctor. His eyes still held an expression of awe created in him by\nthe strange new glance of the lady of the feathers. He sought to conquer\nthis sensation of awe, which fought fiercely against his intended blatant\ntriumph of to-night.\n\n\"Your cigarette all right, doctor?\" he said, in a quick voice.\n\n\"A delicious one, thanks.\"\n\nValentine began touching the ornaments on the mantelpiece with nervous\nfingers.\n\n\"We didn't quite finish our conversation at dinner,\" he said.\n\n\"No?\"\n\n\"I did not give you a reason for my belief.\"\n\nA deep interest woke in the doctor, but he did not show it. He thought:\n\n\"So, he must insanely return to this one subject, round which his brain\nmakes an eternal tour.\"\n\n\"No,\" he said aloud; \"you have a reason then?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nValentine's voice vibrated with arrogance. His hand still darted to\nand fro on the mantelpiece while he stood looking down at the doctor.\nThere was something in his manner that suggested a mixture of triumph\nand fighting anxiety in his mind. But, as he continued to speak, the\nformer got the upper hand.\n\n\"A reason that might convince even you if you knew it.\"\n\n\"Convince me, of exactly what?\" the doctor asked, indifferently.\n\nHis indifference seemed to pique Valentine, who replied with energy:\n\n\"That human will can be cultivated, has been developed, until it has\nmoved the mountain, achieved the thing men call a miracle.\"\n\n\"By whom has it been so developed?\"\n\nValentine hesitated almost like one who fears to be led into a trap. The\ndoctor could see \"By me!\" trembling upon his lips. He didn't actually\nutter it, but instead exclaimed with a laugh:\n\n\"Some day you will discover.\"\n\nAnd as he spoke he looked at Julian and the lady of the feathers.\nThe doctor was anxious to lead him on, and leaning easily back in his\ncomfortable chair, occupied himself with his cigarette for a minute, as a\nman calmly at ease. Between his whiffs he presently threw out carelessly:\n\n\"This man has compassed eternity by his own will?\"\n\n\"Oh, I did not say that.\"\n\n\"He has contented himself with curing a sprained ankle by walking upon\nit, like my Christian scientist?\"\n\n\"Now you fly to the other extreme--from the very great to the very\nlittle. Take a middle course.\"\n\n\"Where would that lead me?\"\n\nValentine threw a glance round the dim, hot, scented little room, then\nonce more his eyes rested on Julian and Cuckoo.\n\n\"What if I said--To this little room, to Julian and that girl, to\nmyself?\" he answered in a low voice.\n\n\"And the miracle?\" said the doctor.\n\nThe door opened. Wade appeared with coffee.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE HEALTH OF THE NEW YEAR\n\n\nValentine turned quickly, with an air of mingled irritation and relief at\nthe interruption.\n\n\"We must all take coffee,\" he cried. \"It will give us impetus, vitality,\nso that as the old year dies we may live more swiftly, more strongly. I\nlike to feel that my life is increasing while that of another--the old\nyear for instance--is decreasing.\"\n\nBut the doctor noticed that his eyes had rested with a curiously\nsignificant expression upon Julian as he spoke the last sentence.\n\n\"Leave the coffee-pot on that little table,\" he added to Wade, when the\nman had filled all four cups. \"We may want it.\"\n\nWade obeyed him and disappeared.\n\n\"Your man makes wonderful coffee,\" the doctor said, sipping.\n\n\"Yes. Julian, have you reached that _caf\u00e9 noir_ I spoke of the other\nday?\" Valentine asked laughingly, returning to his simile of the greedy\nman and happiness.\n\n\"I don't know. Not yet, Val, I think,\" Julian answered. This coffee\nseemed to give him life at last. The heavy weariness disappeared from\nhis face. His eyes gleamed with something of their old youthfulness and\nardour.\n\n\"If so, I must be close on happiness,\" he added.\n\nAs he spoke he looked into the hollow eyes of Cuckoo, seeming, strangely,\nto seek in them the will-o'-the-wisp of which he spoke.\n\n\"Never look for it in unfurnished rooms,\" Valentine exclaimed with sudden\nviolence.\n\nThis glance of Julian, so the doctor judged, precipitated his curious and\nsubtle insanity towards an outburst.\n\n\"You will find it in the thing that is most definite, not in the thing\nthat is most indefinite. Isn't it so, doctor? Happiness lies in the\npositive, not in the negative.\"\n\n\"Happiness lies in many places. Each finds it in a different house.\"\n\n\"Perhaps you can't tell where I should find it, Val,\" Julian interposed,\nwith a certain sturdiness of manner.\n\n\"No,\" said Cuckoo, eagerly.\n\nThe coffee, it appeared, had an effect upon her too. There was a life,\na keen intentness in her thin, white face, not visible there before.\nValentine turned round upon her. He was holding his coffee cup in his\nright hand. With the other he put his cigarette to his lips.\n\n\"Can you tell us where Mr. Addison is likely to find happiness?\" he said.\n\"Can you tell us, lady of the feathers?\"\n\n\"No. He can tell himself. That's all,\" she said. \"Let him find it\nhimself.\"\n\n\"Each for himself and God for us all, eh?\"\n\n\"I don't know about God,\" she said, looking towards the doctor as if for\nassistance.\n\n\"Each for another and God for us all is perhaps a better motto,\" the\ndoctor interposed.\n\n\"Ah, Charity!\"\n\nValentine took out his watch and looked at it.\n\n\"Charity! Midnight is approaching, and, of course, this is Charity's\nbenefit-night by common consent. Thank you, doctor, for the hint. Did\nthe dying old year prompt you with its husky voice full of the wind and\nof the snow?\"\n\n\"Possibly.\"\n\n\"Let us have some more coffee. Julian, give me Miss Bright's cup. You\nshall have your absinthe presently. Wade has not forgotten it.\"\n\n\"Absinthe?\" said the doctor.\n\n\"Julian drinks it every night. He has got tired of whiskey. Doctor, your\ncup too.\"\n\n\"We shall not sleep a wink to-night.\"\n\n\"All the better. Why should not we see the dawn in, as we did once\nbefore? You recollect.\"\n\n\"Ah, Val! on the night of your trance.\"\n\n\"Yes. You were not here then, lady of the feathers.\"\n\nHe spoke with a light mockery.\n\n\"I fainted, or died--the doctor was deceived into thinking so--and was\nborn again in the dawn of the very day on which Julian first met you.\"\n\nCuckoo shivered with the recollection of Marr and her horror of that\nnight.\n\n\"Why do you shiver?\" Valentine continued. \"Do you find the room cold?\"\n\n\"No, no.\"\n\nIndeed, the heat and the overpowering scent of the hyacinths had\npreviously weighed upon her physique, and increased the _malaise_\ninto which her curious new dutifulness, and the faint spectre which\ndrew near to her, had brought her.\n\n\"Perhaps you shiver in the influence of this little room,\" he continued,\npersistently. \"Julian and I once did so. Eh, Julian?\"\n\n\"Yes, in those sittings.\"\n\n\"I didn't shiver,\" Cuckoo said, bluntly and very obviously lying.\n\nShe quickly drank some more coffee.\n\n\"If you had, it might not have been astonishing,\" said Valentine. \"For\nthis little room has seen marvels, and strange things that happen perhaps\nstamp their strange impression upon the places in which they happen.\nWe ought to discuss the occult, doctor, on the last night of the year.\"\n\n\"By all means.\"\n\n\"How long ago it seems!\" Julian said suddenly, with a sigh.\n\n\"Yes,\" Valentine answered. \"Because so much has happened in the interval.\nThe greedy man has eaten so many courses, Julian.\"\n\nHe seemed to take a delight in throwing out allusions to one and the\nother of his guests, allusions which nobody but the person addressed\ncould understand rightly. For he now went on, addressing himself to\nCuckoo:\n\n\"In this little room was committed the great act of brigandage of which\nI once spoke to you. Do you remember?\"\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n\"Never mind. But, though you cannot remember, that might make you\nshiver.\"\n\n\"What act of brigandage, Valentine?\" Julian asked.\n\n\"Oh, the attempt--my attempt to seize upon a different soul.\"\n\n\"But you failed.\"\n\n\"Did I? Do you think so, doctor?\"\n\nHis apparent audacity seemed to increase. In the twilight of the scented\nroom he drew himself up as he stood by the brocaded screen that hid the\nfire. He closed and unclosed rapidly his left hand which hung at his\nside. His foot tapped the thick carpet gently.\n\n\"Did you not?\" the doctor answered quietly.\n\nBut Julian was roused to vivacity.\n\n\"What do you mean, Valentine?\" he said. \"Of course you may have changed,\nor developed, or whatever you like to call it, since then. But to say you\nhave got a different soul!\"\n\n\"Is absurd? Yes, you are right. Because if I had got a different soul\nthe original 'I,' that was dissatisfied with itself, must have ceased\nto be. Since the soul of a man--his will to do things, his will to feel\nthings--is the man himself, if I had a different soul I should be another\nman. The former man would have ceased to be.\"\n\n\"Or would be elsewhere.\"\n\nIt was the doctor who spoke, and he spoke without special interest,\nsimply expressing his thought of what might happen in so whimsical an\nevent as that harped upon by Valentine. But Valentine seemed painfully\nstruck by the almost idle words.\n\n\"Elsewhere!\" he exclaimed, with a lowering expression. \"What do you mean,\ndoctor? What do you imply?\"\n\nThe doctor looked at him surprised.\n\n\"Merely that a thing expelled is not necessarily a thing slain. If you\nturn me out of this room I am not certain to expire on the doormat.\"\n\nValentine broke into a nervous and uneasy laugh, and cast a quick glance\nall around him, and especially on Cuckoo, who sat listening silently with\nher eyebrows drawn together in a pent frown of puzzled attention.\n\n\"I see, I see,\" he said hastily. And here Julian broke in.\n\n\"But the whole thing's impossible,\" he said with a laugh.\n\n\"You would say so, doctor?\"\n\nValentine addressed this question to Doctor Levillier in a very marked\nand urgent manner.\n\n\"You would say so, since the will of man cannot perform miracles?\"\n\n\"Certainly, I should say so, despite the triumphs of hypnotism. A man\nmay change greatly through outside influence, or perform occasional acts\nforeign to his nature under the influence of 'suggestion' or hypnotism.\nBut I do not believe he can change radically and permanently, except from\none cause.\"\n\nThe last words were spoken after a moment of hesitation. Valentine\nrejoined quickly:\n\n\"What? What? One cause, you say! You allow that--wait, though! What is\nthe cause?\"\n\nDoctor Levillier was silent. He was asking himself should he play this\nforcing card, make this sharp, cutting experiment. He resolved that he\nwould make it.\n\n\"A man may change radically,\" he said, \"if he becomes insane.\"\n\nA short breath, like a sigh, came from Cuckoo. Valentine stood quite\nstill, regarding the doctor closely for a moment. Then he said\ncontemptuously:\n\n\"Mad! Oh, madmen don't interest me.\"\n\nThe doctor had gained nothing from his experiment. It was impossible\nto gather from Valentine's manner that he was in any way struck by this\nsuggestion, and indeed he abandoned all allusion to it with careless\nhaste, and returned to that other suggestion of which the doctor\nhimself had thought nothing.\n\n\"Supposing the soul of a man to be expelled,\" he said, abruptly,\n\"where--where do you suppose it would go, would be?\"\n\nIt was obvious that he endeavoured to speak lightly, but there was a most\npeculiar anxiety visible in his manner. The doctor wondered from what\ncause it sprang.\n\n\"I have never formed a supposition on that matter,\" he said.\n\n\"Well--well--try to form one now. Yes, and you, Julian, too.\"\n\nHe did not address himself to the lady of the feathers, but he looked\nat her long and narrowly. The doctor lit another cigarette. He seemed\nto be seriously considering this odd question. Julian, whose lethargy\nwas changing into an almost equally pronounced excitement, was not so\nhesitating. As if struck by a sudden flashing idea, he exclaimed:\n\n\"How if it was in the air? How if it was wandering about from place to\nplace. By God, Val!\" he cried, with emphasis, \"do you know what I read in\na book I took up from your shelves the other day--something about souls\nbeing like flames? It was in Rossetti: Flames!\"\n\nHe turned to Cuckoo and stared into her eyes.\n\n\"I was half asleep when I read it,\" he said. \"Why should I remember\nit now? That flame--I saw that flame months ago.\" He seemed like a man\npuzzling something out, trying to trace a way through a tangled maze of\nthought that yet might be clear. \"It came from you, Val, that night, with\na cry like a lost thing. A soul expelled, did you say?\"\n\nSuddenly his face was set in an awestruck gravity.\n\n\"Why--but then, if so, that flame would be _you_. Valentine, the flame\nthat seemed to haunt me, that I have seen in--\"\n\nHe looked at Cuckoo again and was silent.\n\n\"Yes, Julian?\" Valentine said in a hard, thin voice. \"Go on, I am\nlistening.\"\n\nJulian stared at him with strong excitement.\n\n\"And what are you, then, Valentine? Where do you come from?\" he said\nslowly.\n\n\"From Marr.\"\n\nThe words came from the divan, from the dry lips of Cuckoo. Doctor\nLevillier knew not why, but he was thrilled to the very soul by them,\nas by a revelation throwing strong light upon the depths of things.\nWhether it was the influence of this strange scented room, in which\nstrange things had happened, or the influence of the hour and the\nclimax and death of the year, or a voice in his heart speaking to him\nwith authority, he could not tell. Only he knew that on a sudden all\nhis guiding reason, all his knowledge, all his cool contemplation of\nthe physician and common sense of the man, were swept entirely away.\nHis theory of insanity seemed in a moment the theory of a dwarf\nintellect trying to stick wretched, absurd pins through angels--white\nor black--that it thought butterflies. His conversation with Cuckoo on\nthe Hampstead Heights seemed the vain babble of a tricked and impotent\nobserver. His mind fell on its knees before the mind of the lady of the\nfeathers. Reason was stricken by instinct. The confused feeling of the\nwoman had conquered the logical inferences of the man. From that moment\nthe doctor secretly abandoned the old landmarks which had guided him all\nhis life, and entered into a new world--a world in which he would not\nhave dreamed of permitting any of his patients to walk if he could help\nit. A strange magic floated round him like a mist blotting out the crude\nfamiliarities of the normal world. The tentroom, with its shadowy tulips,\nits scented warmth, its pale twilight, its quick silences when voices\nceased, was a temple of wonder and a home of the miraculous. And those\ngathered in it, what were they? Men and a woman? Bodies? Earthly\ncreatures? No. To his mind they were stripped bare of the clothes in\nwhich man--governed by decrees of some hidden power--must make his life\npilgrimage. They were stripped bare and naked of their bodies. They were\nwarm, stirring, disembodied things--they were flames leaping, waving,\ncontending, aspiring. And he remembered the night when he sat alone in\nthe drawing-room of Valentine, and saw the red walls glow, and the light\ndeepen, and saw the stillness grow to movement, and the shadows come away\nfrom their background, and take forms--the forms of flames. Was that\nnight a night of prophesy? Were those flames silent voices speaking\nto the ear of his mind? He looked around him like a man in a strange\ncountry, who takes a long breath and liberates his soul in wonder. He\nlooked around, and the shadowy, thin girl leaning forward on the divan,\nwith one arm outstretched as if she gave a message, was among the other\nflames as a flame upon an altar. At least his instinct had not played\nhim false with regard to her. He knew it now. In the wild and sad\nstreets, where feet of men tread ever, where tears of women flow ever,\ngrow flowers of Paradise, strange flowers, leap flames from the eternal\nfires of heaven. And the voice of Cuckoo thrilled him as the voice of\nrevelation.\n\nValentine turned upon the lady of the feathers, hearing her cry.\n\n\"Marr!\" he said, \"your lover who died! Ah!\"\n\nThe brutality of the remark was so unexpected, so savage, that it struck\nall those who heard it like a whip. Cuckoo shrank back among her cushions\ntrembling. Julian made a slight forward movement as if to stop Valentine.\nThe doctor laid his hands on the arms of his chair and pressed them hard.\nHe felt a need of physical energy. In the sudden silence Valentine\ntouched the electric bell. Before any one spoke it was answered by Wade,\nwho carried a tray on which stood various bottles and glasses.\n\n\"We must counteract the exciting effects of our _caf\u00e9 noir_,\" Valentine\nsaid, addressing his guests in a group. \"Otherwise we shall be strung\nup to a pitch of tension that will make us think the requiem of church\nbells, which we shall hear in a few minutes, the voices of spirits or\nof spectres. Julian, here is your absinthe. What will you drink, Miss\nBright? Brandy, lemonade, whiskey?\"\n\n\"Lemonade, please,\" Cuckoo said, almost in a whisper.\n\nThe tears were crowding in her eyes. She dared not look Julian in the\nface. Never before had her past risen up before her painted in such grim\nand undying colours. The reprise of Valentine had been as the reprise of\na Maxim gun to a volley fired by a child from an air-tube. So Cuckoo\nfelt. But how greatly was she deceived! Perhaps physical conditions\nplayed a subtle part in the terrible desolation that seized her now,\nafter her outburst of daring and of excitement. The warmth and smallness\nof the room, the penetrating scent that filled it, even the movements\nof her companions, the sound of their voices, suddenly became almost\ninsupportable to Cuckoo. She was the victim of a reaction that was so\nswift and so intense as to be unnatural. And in it both her mind and body\nwere bound in chains. Then she was petrified. Her very heart felt cold\nand cramped, and then hard, icy, inhuman. Her tears did not fall, but\nwere dried up in her eyes, like dew by a scorching sun. She looked at\nJulian, and felt as indifferent towards him as if he had been a shadow on\nthe grass in the evening time. Then he became remote, with a removedness\nattained by no shadow even. For a shadow is in the world, and Julian\nseemed beyond the world to Cuckoo. She thought, even repeated, with\ntiny lip-movements, the cruel words of Valentine, and they seemed to her\nno longer cruel, or of any meaning, bad or good. For they came from too\nfar away. They were as a cry of shrill music from a cave leagues onward\nbeyond the caves of any winds.\n\nValentine poured out some lemonade and gave it to her. She accepted it\nmechanically. She even put it to her lips and drank some of it. But her\npalate was aware of no flavour, no coolness of liquid. And she continued\nsipping without tasting anything.\n\nMeanwhile Julian was saying to Valentine:\n\n\"I don't think I'll take any absinthe to-night. Give me some lemonade\ntoo.\"\n\n\"Lemonade for you? Nonsense. I ordered the absinthe specially. You must\nhave some. Here it is.\"\n\nAs he spoke he poured some of the opalescent liquid into a tumbler and\nhanded it to Julian. While he did so his eyes were on the doctor and they\ngleamed again with a sort of audacity or triumph. He seemed recovering\nhimself, returning to his former mood and veiled intentions. And Doctor\nLevillier thought he saw the flame of Valentine's soul glow more deeply\nand fiercely. The three men, as if with one accord, ignored the lady of\nthe feathers at this period of the evening. Valentine, having shot his\nbolt, left his victim to shudder in the dust. Julian and the doctor, full\nof pity or of wonder, were drawn instinctively to leave her for the\nmoment outside of the circle of intimacy, lest the conflict should be\nrenewed. They did not know how far outside of it she felt; how dim the\ntwilight was becoming to her eyes; how dim the voices to her ears. She\nlay back on her pillows, in the shadow of the divan, and they supposed\nher to be listening, as before, to what they said; to be drawing into her\nnostrils the scent of the hyacinths, and into her soul--it might be--some\nfragments of their uttered thoughts. But for the moment they seemed to\nput her outside the door.\n\nJulian did not protest against the absinthe. He took it and placed it\non a little table beside him, and as he talked he occasionally drank a\nlittle of it, till his glass was empty. Valentine had again looked at his\nwatch.\n\n\"The flame of the year is flickering very low,\" he said.\n\nThis simile of the flame of the year, so ordinary, he had spoken\nagainst his will. He asked himself angrily why he had said flame, and\nagain the doctor saw the flame of Valentine's soul trying to leap higher,\nto aspire to some strange and further region than that in which it seemed\nto dwell. Julian sat looking at Valentine with a gaze that was surely\nnew in his eyes, the dawning gaze of inquiry which a man directs upon\na stranger just come into his life. He had not alluded in any way to\nCuckoo's startling and vehement interposition. Valentine had killed that\nconversation with one blow, it seemed. They buried it by deserting it.\nYet the thought of it was obviously with them, making quick interchange\nof words on another subject difficult. Valentine had seized again on the\npoor, prostrate year; yet he carried even to it the memory of that which\nseemed to encompass them as with a ring of fire, and that despite\nhimself.\n\n\"We shall hear the bells directly,\" he added. \"I hate bells at night.\nThey will sound odd in this room.\"\n\n\"Very odd,\" the doctor said.\n\n\"We ought to sit reviewing our past year,\" Valentine went on.\n\n\"Our past year and all it has done for us.\"\n\n\"Do you think it has done much for you, Addison?\" the doctor asked. And,\ndespite his intention, there was a certain significance in his tone.\n\nJulian looked rather grave and moody, yet excited too, like a man who\nmight burst into either gaiety or anger at a moment's notice.\n\n\"I suppose it has,\" he answered. \"Yes, more than any year since I was\nquite a boy.\"\n\n\"It has taught you how to live,\" Valentine said quickly.\n\n\"Or how to--die,\" the doctor could not resist saying.\n\n\"Why do you say that, doctor?\" Valentine asked sharply. \"Julian is\nneither sick nor sad; are you, Julian?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know. Don't bother about me.\"\n\nBut Valentine seemed suddenly determined that Julian should state in\nprecise terms his contentment with his present fate.\n\n\"You are making your grand tour towards happiness,\" he exclaimed.\n\"Dessert, _caf\u00e9 noir_--then the cigarette and contentment.\"\n\n\"I have had the _caf\u00e9 noir_,\" Julian said, indicating his empty cup,\nwhich Wade had by accident omitted to clear away. \"I have had the\ncigarette.\"\n\n\"Well. What then? Are you unhappy?\"\n\n\"I tell you I don't know. Give me some more absinthe.\"\n\nThe doctor watched his excitement growing as he drank. It seemed an\nexcitement adverse to Valentine.\n\n\"One may have too much black coffee,\" he suddenly said.\n\n\"And that exerts a very depressing effect upon the nerves,\" said the\ndoctor, taking him literally. \"Neither you nor I are likely to sleep well\nto-night, Addison.\"\n\n\"I never sleep well now, doctor,\" Julian said.\n\nAll this time he continued to regard Valentine in the peculiar,\nobservant manner of a stranger who is trying to make up his mind\nabout the unfamiliar man at whom he looks.\n\n\"Then you should not drink black coffee.\"\n\nAs he spoke a very faint sound of bells penetrated to the tentroom.\n\n\"The psychological moment!\" said Valentine.\n\nAnd then they were all silent, listening.\n\nTo the doctor, the prey of magic art since the soft cry of the lady of\nthe feathers, the bells seemed magical and strange to-night, thin and\ndreamy and remote. They rang outside the circle of the flames, yet they,\ntoo, had an eerie meaning. Nor did their music come, he thought, from any\nchurch tower, from any belfry, summoned by the tugging hands of men. Very\nsoftly they rang. Their sound was deadened by the thick draperies. They\nceased.\n\n\"My year is born,\" Valentine said.\n\n\"Your year?\" the doctor repeated.\n\n\"Yes. I feel that in this year I shall culminate; I shall touch a point;\nI shall put the corner-stone to the temple of my ambition. No one can\nprevent me now, no one. Look, she has fainted!\"\n\nHe had been watching Cuckoo, and had seen her posture of mere rest\nchange, almost imperceptibly, to the prostration of insensibility.\n\nThe doctor sprang up from his chair. Julian uttered an exclamation.\nValentine only smiled. The door was opened. A fan was used. Air was\nlet into the room. Presently Cuckoo stirred and sat up. The three men\nwere gathered round her, and suddenly Valentine said:\n\n\"My trance over again. The lady of the feathers imitates me.\"\n\nJulian turned round to him with abrupt irritation.\n\n\"That's not so,\" he said. \"Cuckoo is herself always.\" He turned again to\nher.\n\n\"Are you better?\" he asked, touching her hand gently.\n\n\"Yes, I'm all right. It was--them.\"\n\nShe glanced vaguely round at the tulips, as if searching for the cause of\nthe scent which filled the room.\n\n\"There are hyacinths somewhere,\" the doctor said.\n\n\"Yes, they are hidden!\" said Valentine. \"A hidden power is the greatest\npower. But now you may see them.\"\n\nAnd he drew from a nook, guarded by some large ferns, a pot of red\nhyacinths.\n\nCuckoo sat up and drank a little brandy, which the doctor gave to her.\nSome colour came into her pale and thin cheeks.\n\n\"I'm as right as ninepence now,\" she said, with an effort after\nbrightness.\n\nThe bells began again.\n\n\"What's that?\" she asked. \"Not New Year, is it?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" answered Valentine. \"A happy New Year to you, lady of the\nfeathers.\"\n\nJulian was struck by a sudden thought.\n\n\"Val,\" he said, \"Cuckoo, I want you to be real friends this year.\"\n\nHe caught hold of Valentine's hand and placed it in Cuckoo's. But then,\nagain, a bewilderment seemed to take hold of him, for even as he touched\nValentine's hand he looked at him askance, and the eagerness died away\nfrom his face.\n\n\"I don't know,\" he muttered to himself, and getting up from the end of\nthe divan, where he had been sitting, he moved away towards the fire,\nleaving Cuckoo's hand in the hand of Valentine.\n\nValentine smiled coldly on Cuckoo.\n\n\"Lady of the feathers,\" he said, \"we are to be allies.\"\n\n\"What's that?\" she asked, pulling her hand away, directly Julian had\nturned his back upon them.\n\n\"When people fight together against a common enemy they are allies.\"\n\n\"Then we ain't,\" she whispered, \"New Year or not.\"\n\n\"You defy me,\" he said, raising his voice so that the doctor might hear\nthe words.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said.\n\n\"Doctor, do you hear?\"\n\nHe seemed suddenly bent on forcing a quarrel. Doctor Levillier felt again\nthat sense of dread and horror which had attacked him now more than once\nof late in Valentine's presence. This time the sensation was so acute\nthat he could scarcely combat it sufficiently to reply.\n\n\"I hear,\" he murmured.\n\n\"Julian!\" Valentine called. \"Julian, come here. Miss Bright wishes to\ntell you something.\"\n\nJulian turned round.\n\n\"Now, lady of the feathers!\"\n\nBut Cuckoo burst into a shrill little laugh. Her head was spinning again.\n\n\"I've nothing--nothing to say,\" she cried out. \"Give me some more\nbrandy.\"\n\n\"Very well. Let us all drink to the health of the New Year.\"\n\nValentine filled the glasses--Julian's with absinthe--and gave the toast:\n\n\"The New Year!\"\n\nThey all raised their glasses to their lips simultaneously. One fell with\na crash to the ground and was broken. It was Julian's.\n\n\"I won't drink it,\" he said, doggedly, looking at Valentine.\n\nThere was a silence. Then Valentine said, calmly:\n\n\"Have you an animus against the thing you don't yet know?\"\n\nIt was sufficiently obvious that he alluded to the year just coming in\nupon London. But the words were taken by the doctor, and apparently by\nJulian, in a hidden and different sense.\n\n\"Perhaps because I don't yet know it thoroughly, and had thought I did,\"\nJulian answered, staring him full in the face still with that strange\nglance of mingled interrogation and bewilderment.\n\nValentine watched him.\n\n\"You are treating the poor thing--and my carpet--scurvily, Julian,\" he\nsaid. \"And you have startled Miss Bright.\"\n\nCuckoo's eyes were shining.\n\n\"No,\" she ejaculated.\n\nValentine rang the bell and directed Wade to collect the fragments of\nglass. While the man was doing so silence again reigned, and the little\nroom seemed full of uneasiness. Only Valentine either was or affected to\nbe nonchalant. As soon as Wade had gone he said to the doctor:\n\n\"This room is destined to be dedicated to strange uses, and to influence\nthose who come within it. Julian is not himself to-night.\"\n\n\"Are you?\" Julian asked.\n\n\"Myself?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"My dear Julian, we shall be forced to think the absinthe has been at\nwork too busily in your brain. What is the matter?\"\n\n\"Nothing.\"\n\n\"One would think we had been having a sitting, you are so excited.\"\n\nJulian suddenly drew his breath sharply, as if struck by a shot of an\nidea.\n\n\"Let us have one,\" he cried.\n\nThe distant bells rang faintly. The doctor thrilled to the suggestion,\nstill bound by magic, surely. For now, since the inspiring exclamation of\nCuckoo, which had broken his theories on the wheel and swept his reason\nlike a dead flower along the wind, he no longer condemned, as a danger\nonly, that which had produced the trance from which, as from a strange\nprison, had come the new Valentine. The former sitting had, it seemed,\nbeckoned that trance, and with the trance had beckoned an incredibly evil\nand powerful thing. What if that which had the power to give had also the\npower to take away? Often it is so in ordinary conditions of life. Why\nnot also in extraordinary conditions? So his thoughts ran, fantastically\nenough, to the sound of the far-off bells.\n\n\"A good notion,\" he said on the spur of the moment and this quick\nreflection.\n\n\"You think so?\" said Valentine. \"You who condemned us, even wrung a\npromise from us against sitting.\"\n\nHis regard was suspicious.\n\n\"Perhaps I have changed my mind. Perhaps I take the matter less\nseriously,\" said the doctor.\n\nHe had never been more near lying, nor was he ashamed of his\ndissimulation. There are creatures against which we must, whatever\nour principles, take up the nearest weapon that comes to hand. The\ndoctor looked at Julian and at Valentine, and could have perjured\nhimself a thousand times to wrest the one from the other.\n\n\"But Miss Bright is ill,\" said Valentine.\n\n\"No, I ain't. I'm all right now,\" Cuckoo said.\n\nShe did not understand what was being proposed, but she gathered that\nthe doctor desired it. That was enough for her. Valentine looked at\nthem all three with eyes that plainly betokened a busy mind, then a smile\nflickered over his lips. It was the smile of one in power watching his\nslaves creeping at their work--for him. He touched the point--of which he\nhad spoken earlier in the evening--in that smile, a point of delirium.\n\n\"Let them try to break me,\" his mind said within itself. \"Their very\ntrial shall consolidate my empire.\"\n\nAnd then his eyes left the others and rested only on Julian.\n\n\"Very well, we will sit,\" he said.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE SIXTH SITTING\n\n\nJulian was painfully excited, but he strove to repress all evidences of\nhis inward turmoil as he began to pull out a table and arrange it in the\ncentre of the room. This act threw him with a jerk back into the days of\nthe past, recalling so vividly the former life of himself and Valentine\nthat he could not help saying:\n\n\"This is like last year.\"\n\n\"Like the year that the locust hath eaten,\" Valentine answered. \"We must\npush our empty white years down into the water, Julian.\"\n\nJulian made no reply. The table was soon arranged, the screen was drawn\nmore closely round the fire, which had been allowed to burn low. Four\nchairs were set. Valentine turned to Cuckoo, who sat hunched on the divan\nstaring with wide open eyes at these preparations.\n\n\"Will you come?\" he said, with his hands on the back of one of the\nchairs.\n\n\"Whatever are we going to do?\" she asked nervously.\n\n\"Something very simple--and perhaps very foolish,\" said the doctor,\nwondering, indeed, now the moment for beginning the phantasy was arrived,\nwhether he was not to blame for encouraging a thing that in his under\nmind he so thoroughly disapproved of. \"We are going to sit round that\ntable in the dark with our hands upon it, and wait.\"\n\n\"Whatever for?\"\n\nHer simple and blatant question caused the doctor actually to blush. His\nconfusion was quite obvious, but it was covered by Julian, who exclaimed,\nrather roughly:\n\n\"Now, Cuckoo, don't chatter, but come here and sit quiet.\"\n\nHe drew her from the divan into a chair and sat down beside her.\nValentine glided swiftly into the chair on her other side and said:\n\n\"Oh, doctor, I forgot the light. Do you mind turning it out?\"\n\nThe doctor obeyed, felt his way to the chair opposite Cuckoo and sat\ndown.\n\nAlmost at the moment he turned out the light the bells that rang,\n\"_Le roi est mort, vive le roi_,\" ceased. Cuckoo was directed to lay\nher hands on the table, and to touch with her fingers the fingers of her\ncompanions. She did so, trembling. This was a new experience to her, and\nher entire lack of knowledge of what was expected to happen filled the\ndarkness with immoderate possibilities, and her soul with awe and with\nconfusion. Then, to sit between the man she loved and the man she\nloathed, thus in the blackness, was a nerve-shaking experience which her\npreceding fainting-fit did not deprive of its normal terrors. The hand of\nValentine and the hand of Julian were as ice and as fire to her. The\ndarkness seemed crowded with nameless things. She could fancy that she\nheard it whisper incessantly in her ear.\n\nBut the real interest of this sitting, to any little demon gifted with\na miraculous power of pushing its detective way into the minds of the\nsitters, would have lain, perhaps, chiefly in the mind of Doctor\nLevillier. It has been said that, suddenly struck to the soul by the\nconviction with which the instinctive Cuckoo pronounced those words,\n\"From Marr,\" Doctor Levillier entered into a new world, abandoning old\nlandmarks. He remained in this new world of the senses certainly, but\nalready he was becoming accustomed to it, clear-headed, keen-sighted,\neven reasonable in it. Moved by some strange conviction that he was in\nthe presence of an inexplicable mystery, he no longer tried to explain\nit in some ordinary fashion. He abandoned his theory of insanity, or it\nabandoned him. In any case, it was dead, buried, whether he would or no.\nHe recognized a mystery at present beyond his capacity to understand or\nto explain. Having got thus far, and having entered, at Julian's word,\ninto this present circumstance of sitting, table-turning, or rapping, or\nwhatever you may choose to call it, he cleared any ordinary furniture of\ndoctor's prejudices right out of his mind--made a clean sweep of them.\nThat done--and the doing of it required some strong effort--his mind\nwas receptive, ready for anything, odd or ordinary, that might come\nalong. There he sat with his empty room waiting to be filled--the only\nreasonable way of waiting for that of which we have no knowledge. He did\nnot clamour \"I won't,\" or \"I will.\" He said nothing at all, only waited\nwith the strict desire and intention of recognizing things to be what\nthey truly were, neither dressing them up nor tearing their garments\noff their backs. When he put out the light and sat down, what he\nexpected--so far as he expected anything--was this, that the addition\nof darkness would add a cloud to his mind, and endeavour to give\nvarious finishing-touches to any spurious excitement created in him,\nhowever much against his will, by the enemy's doings. In this expectation\nhe was entirely deceived. The falling of darkness drew a veil from his\nmind, leaving his mental sight singularly, even preternaturally,\nclear. The falling of silence gave an amazing acuteness to his inner\nsense of hearing. Certain people are so made that they can, under\ncertain conditions, and at certain moments, hear the workings of their\nneighbours' minds, as you and I can hear the whirr of machinery, or the\ncry of a child in the street. An ordinary man or woman can only hear a\nmind when lips, teeth, and tongue utter it with living sounds that set\nthe air in vibration. These abnormal people hear, in these abnormal\nmoments, the silent murmurs of the mind making no effort at all to utter\nitself through the usual speech apparatus. Till this moment the doctor\nhad supposed himself to be an entirely normal man, but he had been\nsitting only a very short time before he began to become aware of the\nsilent murmurs of these three minds around him. The darkness set his own\nmind free from clouds of excitement and from mists of unreason. That was\nthe first step. But it did more. It developed in him this marvellous\nfaculty of the hearing of silence, called by some divination. All his\nsenses were rendered amazingly acute. A perfectly distinct impression of\nthe precise feelings of Cuckoo, of Valentine, and of Julian respectively\ncame to him as he sat there, although he could neither see nor hear them.\nEach of them seemed to pour his or her thoughts into the doctor's mind.\nThus, at first, did his empty room become furnished with the thoughts of\nhis companions. He was sitting in the circle between Julian and Valentine\nand held their hands. And it was Valentine who forged the first link in\nthis strange chain of unuttered communication. As the darkness cleared\nthe doctor's mind, and set him once more on his feet--although in a new\nworld--an aroma of triumph floated to him softly, like a scent in a damp\nwood at night. He heard then the mind of Valentine murmuring in the\nstillness the Litany of its glory, a long and an ornate Litany, deep and\nfull, and he knew that he had been right in supposing that Valentine had\ninvited him to witness that glory. But the doctor became aware, too, that\nat moments the Litany faltered, hesitated, as if the mind of Valentine\ngrew uncertain or was assailed by vague fears. And these fears ran like\nlittle pale furtive things to Valentine from the lady of the feathers. By\ndegrees the doctor could imagine that he actually saw them stealing back\nand forth. Now one would come alone as if to listen to the Litany, and\nthen another would follow, and another, and, growing brave, they would\ncombine against it. Then Valentine would waver and become uneasy, as one\nwho hears little voices crying against him in the night, and knows not\nwhence they come or from whom. But the Litany would begin again, and\nValentine would triumph over the pale fears and they would shrink away.\nAnd in the Litany one name recurred again and again--the name of Julian.\nOver him was the triumph. In his ruin and fall and ultimate destruction\nthe glory lived. To witness the complete possibility of this ruin, the\ncomplete sovereignty of this glory, the doctor and the lady of the\nfeathers were there. And the doctor grew to feel that only some outside\ncircumstance, alarming Valentine to anxiety and waking Julian to a new\nobservation, had hindered the intended triumph. What circumstance was\nthat? He looked back along the past evening and found it in himself, in\nhis theory that a soul expelled was not necessarily a soul dead. The rift\nin the glory of the Litany came with that. Valentine was trying to close\nit by this act of sitting, to impress the strength of his will upon his\ncompanions in the darkness. The doctor felt his effort like a continually\nrepeated blow, stealthy and hard and merciless.\n\nAnd now, in the darkness and in the silence, the doctor heard the mind of\nJulian. Another scent floated through that imagined damp and breathing\nwood from another--but how different--soul-flower. No Litany of triumph\nmurmured in the blackness where Julian sat, but a hoarse and broken solo,\npart despair, part fear, part anger, and all perplexed and flooded with\nbewilderment and with excitement. The doctor drew into him the murmur\nof Julian's mind until it seemed to become, for the time, the murmur of\nhis own mind. He was conscious of a dreadful turmoil of doubt, and dread\nand perplexity, so strong, so painful, that it lay upon him like a dense\nand a suffocating burden. In that moment he knew utterly that the\ngreatest load in the world laid on any man is the load of his own,\nperhaps beloved, sin. He was staggering wearily with Julian away from\nthe light. His eyes were dim--with the eyes of Julian. His ears, like\nJulian's, were assailed with the dastard clamour of the calling sin.\n\"Listen! Listen! you want me. I am here. Take me! Take me!\" And the\nweltering seas of heavy flooding impotence rolled round him as they\nrolled round Julian. He grew numb and vacant and inert, then--alive ever\nto the murmur of Julian's mind--caught a glimpse, through the waters of\nthat whelming sea, of far-away light, and heard that the voices of the\nimportunate sins grew fainter. But whether the voices were loud or low,\nwhether the seas flowed above his head or sank and failed, he was always\nconscious of the dominating mood of almost wild perplexity and a madness\nof bewilderment. For Julian stirred under the yoke that Valentine had\nlaid upon him, as if at last conscious distinctly that it was indeed a\nyoke, and that it galled him; as if at last conscious, too, that without\nthat yoke was freedom. And he shot against Valentine in the darkness\narrows of inquiry. But always he lived in doubt and almost in terror.\n\nAnd then, detaching himself from the triumph, touched with anxiety, of\nValentine, and from the wild turmoil of Julian, Dr. Levillier opened the\ndoor of his mind wide, and the lady of the feathers entered in.\n\nHe heard the thoughts of a woman.\n\nThat was strangest of all--the most fantastic, eerie, wayward, wonderful\nmusic the doctor had dreamed of.\n\nHave you listened to far-off and mingling melodies at night--melodies of\nthings opposed and differing, yet drawn together, in strange places far\nfrom your home? Have you heard a woman wailing over some abominable\nsorrow in a dark house, and an organ--before which filthy children dance\nfantastically--playing a merry Neapolitan tune in front of it, while the\nmutter of scowling men comes from the blazing corner where the gin-palace\nfaces the night? There you have sorrow, sunshine, crime, singing together\nin a great city. Or have you stood in a land not your own, and gleaned\nthe whisper of an ancient river, the sough of a desert wind, the hoarse\nand tuneless song of a black man at a waterwheel, the soprano ballad of\na warbling hotel English lady, and the remote and throbbing roar of a\nsavage Soudanese hymn and beaten drums from the golden Eastern night?\nThere you have nature, toil, shrill civilization and war claiming you\nwith one effort in a sad and sweet country. Or have you, in a bright and\ndewy morning, heard the \"murmur of folk at their prayers,\" the drone of a\nchurch organ, and, beyond the hedgerow, two graceless lovers quarrelling,\nand an atheist, leaning over the church gate, sneering to his fellow at\nthe devotion of deluded Sabbath-keepers? There you have love of the\nhidden and faith, love of the visible and distrust, hatred of hidden love\nand faithlessness, making a symphony for you. Such mingled music is\nstrange--strange as life. But to the doctor the music of this girl,\nCuckoo, in the dark seemed stranger and more eerie far. Her mind sang to\nhim of a thousand things in a moment, as is the fashion of women. Only\nmen normally hear but one, at most two or three, of the many feminine\nmelodies. And now Doctor Levillier heard them all, as a man may hear\nthose differing songs already recounted, simultaneously and clearly.\nDegradation and the hopelessness that catches it by the hand, passion\nand the strength and purity of passion, hatred, fear, physical fatigue,\nignorant nervousness, grossness of the gutter, which will cling even to\na soul capable of great devotion and noble effort, and accompany it on\nthe upward journey, very far and very high, resolve and shrinking, mere\nstreet-boy virulence of enmity, and mere angel tenderness of pity--all\nthese sang their song from the mind and heart of Cuckoo to the mind and\nheart of the doctor. It was a chorus of women in one woman, as it so\noften is in the dearest women we know. In that choir a harlot sat,\nhating, by a girl who was all love and reverence. And they sang out\nof the same hymn-book. Jenny joined her voice with Susannah, Mary\nMagdalene with Mary Mother, so near together in one thing, so far\napart in another--alike in this, that both were singing. And in that\nchoir--celestial and infernal--sang the jealous woman with grey cheeks\nand haggard eyes, and the timorous woman, and she of the fearless face,\nand the woman who could scale the stars for the creature she worshipped,\nand the woman who could lie down in the mud and let the world see her\nthere, and the woman who had sold her soul for food, and a thin woman,\nsuch a thin, almost transparent, wistful creature, who was facing the\nthing men call with bated breath--starvation. She sang too, but, of all\nthese women, she was the only one the doctor could not rightly hear nor\nrightly see. For she, as yet, was remote, far down the level line of that\nchoir, hardly perhaps one with it yet, faint of voice, dim of outline.\n\nThe doctor heard the choir sing, and then--\n\nHis mind, as the time of the darkness grew longer, continued to grow\nmore and more clear, until he felt thoroughly, and was able to try to\nanalyze its unnatural condition. Scales had fallen from him and from\nhis companions for him. Their bodies were clothed, their souls, their\nflames, seemed stripped bare and offered to him naked. He had examined\nthem with this greedy, yet sane, attention and curiosity. He had led them\ninto the empty room and stayed with them there. He had heard the Litany\nof the Glory of Valentine, and the suffocation, and the anger, and the\nstirring beneath his yoke of Julian. He had heard the many women sing in\nthe heart of the lady of the feathers. But all this seemed leading him\nforward and onward, step by step, as to a threshold beyond which was some\ngreater, some more importunate, thing. And he took the last step with\nCuckoo. It was as if he was handed on from one room to another, as is the\nfashion in the palace of a great king, his name being called in each, and\nsent before, like a voice sent on the wind, and as if Cuckoo was in the\nlast anteroom that gave upon the audience-chamber. Now he had arrived,\nand suddenly a great wave of mysterious expectation ran over him and\nfilled the cup of his soul. He felt that he stood still and waited. The\nsense of Cuckoo, of all she felt and thought in the darkness, gradually\ndropped away from him, like leaves from a tree, till every branch was\nleafless. And this autumnal ravishment, like the ravishment of nature,\nwas but a preparation surely for a future spring.\n\nThe doctor waited outside that door, beyond which, perhaps, spring\nblossomed and sang. He lost at last all sense of being in a company of\npeople, and felt as one feels who is entirely alone, expectant, calm,\nready. And still only the darkness and the silence. Nothing more at\nfirst. But presently what seemed to him a marvel.\n\nHe had by this time grown at ease with his power of thought-reading,\nat ease with this new sense of the hearing of silence. The differing\nscents of these three flowers hidden in the night had been breathed\nout to him. With infallible certainty he had recognized each one,\ndifferentiated the one from the other. And as the scent of one flower\nhad failed, the scent of another had risen upon him, until he had known\nthe heart of each of the three. Then for a while was the night scentless,\nsilent, blank, empty. But presently the doctor was aware of an uneasiness\nand of an anxiety stealing upon him. Whence it came he could not tell.\nOnly this he knew, that he received it from something, but that it came\nneither from the lady of the feathers, from Valentine, nor from Julian.\nFrom whom, then, could it emanate, this weird eagerness, this fluttering,\npulsing fear, and hope, and intention? From himself only? He asked\nhimself that question. Was he communing in the dark with his own soul?\nHe knew that he was not. The scent of this new and unknown flower grew\nstronger in the night, more penetrating and intentional. Yet was it\nvaguer, more distant, than that emitted by those other three flowers.\nThe exact impression received by the doctor at this moment was very\nsubtle. Precisely it was this: It seemed to him that he was gradually\ncoming into communication with a fourth mind, or soul; that this soul was\nactually more strong, more vehement, even more determined, than the souls\nof his three companions, but that some barrier removed it from him, set\nit very far of. The flame of a match held to a man's eyes may dazzle him\nmore than the flame of a great fire on the horizon. This new flame was as\nthe latter in comparison to match-flames that had been flaring in the\ndoctor's eyes. And this great and distant flame burned slowly in a smoke\nof mystery and upon the verge of dense darkness.\n\nNever had the doctor known so peculiar, and even awe-striking, an\nexperience as that which he now underwent. What utterly bewildered him\nwas the circumstance of this undoubted new and definite personality\nenclosed in this tiny room with him and with his three companions. He\nwas receiving the impression of the thoughts of a stranger. Yet there\nwas no stranger in the chamber. And he was vexed and curiously irritated\nby the fact of the impression being at the same time very vague and very\nviolent, like the cry of a man which reaches you faintly from a very long\ndistance, but which you feel instinctively to have been uttered with the\nfrantic force of death or of despair. And the mind of this stranger was\ntugging at the doctor's mind, anxiously, insistently. There was a depth\nof distress in it that was as no mere human distress, and that moved the\ndoctor to a mood beyond the mood of tears or of prayers. There came over\nhim an awful sense of pity for this stranger-soul. What had it done? How\nwas it circumstanced? In what ghastly train of events did it move? It was\nsurely powerful and helpless at the same time; a cripple with a mind on\nfire with fight; Samson blind. He felt that it wanted something--of him,\nor of his companions, some light in its severe desolation. Deeper and\ndeeper grew his horror and pity for it, deeper and deeper his sense of\nits ill fate. The woe of it was unearthly, yet more than earthly woe.\nSimiles came to the doctor to compare with its dreadful circumstance:\na child motherless in a world all winter; a saint devoted to hell by\nsome great error of God; even one more blasphemous, and more _bizarre_\nstill--God worsted by humanity, and, at the last, helpless to reclaim\nthe souls to which He had Himself given being; lonely God in a lonely\nheaven, seeing far-off hell bursting with the countless multitudes of\nthe writhing lost. This last simile stayed with him. He fancied, he\nfelt--not heard--the voice of this frustrate God calling to him: \"Do what\nI could not do. Strive to help My impotence. A little--a little--and even\nyet hell would stand empty, the vacant courts of heaven be filled.\nAct--act--act.\"\n\n\"Doctor, why are you trembling? Why are you trembling?\"\n\nIt was the voice of Valentine that spoke. The doctor, by an effort so\npainful that the memory of it remained with him to the end of his life,\nrecalled his mind from its journey.\n\n\"Trembling!\" he said. \"What do you mean? I am all right. I am quietly in\nmy place. How long have we been sitting?\"\n\n\"An immense time I fancy. It seems fruitless, Julian!\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nJulian's voice sounded heavy and weary.\n\n\"Don't you think we had better stop?\"\n\n\"If you like.\"\n\nValentine got up and turned on the light.\n\nThen they saw that the lady of the feathers, leaning back in her chair,\nwas fallen asleep, no doubt from sheer weariness. Her face was very\nwhite, and in sleep its expression had become ethereal and purified. Her\nthin hands still rested nervelessly upon the table. She seemed like a\nlittle child that had known sorrow early, and sought gently to lose the\nsense of it in rest.\n\n\"Cuckoo,\" Julian said, leaning over her, \"Cuckoo!\"\n\nShe stirred and woke.\n\n\"I'm awfully done,\" she murmured, in her street voice. \"Pardon!\"\n\nShe sat up.\n\n\"I seemed as if I was put to sleep,\" she said.\n\n\"You were,\" Valentine answered her. \"I willed that you should sleep.\"\n\nHe looked at the doctor, and his eyes said:\n\n\"I have had my triumph. You witness it.\"\n\nCuckoo reddened with anger, but she said nothing.\n\n\"Did you feel anything, Julian?\" Valentine asked.\n\nJulian looked strangely hopeless.\n\n\"Nothing,\" he said. \"It's all different from what it was; like a dead\nthing that used to be alive.\"\n\nIt seemed as if the sitting had filled him with a dogged despair.\n\n\"A dead thing,\" he repeated.\n\nThen he went over to the spirit-stand and poured himself out more\nabsinthe.\n\n\"And you, doctor?\" said Valentine. \"What did you feel?\"\n\n\"I was thinking all the time,\" he said, \"of other things. Not of the\ntable or of table-turning.\"\n\nWhen he and Cuckoo left the flat that night, or rather in the chill first\nmorning of the new year, they left Julian with Valentine.\n\nHe said he would stay, speaking in the voice of a man drugged almost into\nuncertainty of his surroundings.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE LADY OF THE FEATHERS STARVES\n\n\nDown in her dreary kitchen, among her dingy pots and pans, Mrs. Brigg was\nfilled with an anger that seemed to her as righteous as the anger of a\nPuritan against Museum-opening on Sunday. Her ground-floor lodger was\ngoing to the bad. Analysed, reduced to its essence, that was her feeling\nabout the lady of the feathers. Cuckoo had lived at number 400 for a\nconsiderable time. Being, in some ways, easy-going, or perhaps one should\nsay rather reckless, she had given herself with a good enough grace to be\nplucked by the claws of the landlady. She had endured being ruthlessly\nrooked, with but little murmuring, as do so many of her patient class,\naccustomed to be the prey of each unit in the large congregation of the\nmodern Fates. For months and years she had paid a preposterous price for\nher badly furnished little rooms. She had been overcharged habitually for\nevery morsel of food she ate, every drop of beer or of tea she drank,\nevery fire that was kindled in her badly cleaned grate, every candle that\nlighted her, almost every match she struck. She and Mrs. Brigg had had\nmany rows, had, times without number, lifted up their respective voices\nin vituperation, and shown command of large and vile vocabularies. But\nthese rows had not been on the occasion of the open cheating of the\nformer by the latter. Fallen women, as they are called, seldom resent\nbeing cheated by those in whose houses they live. Rather do they expect\nthe bleeding process as part of the penalty to be paid for a lost\ncharacter. The landlord of the leper is owed, for his charity and\ntolerance, good hard cash. The landlady of the Pariah puts down mentally\nin each added-up bill this item: \"To loss of character--so much.\" And the\nPariah understands and pays. Such is the recognized dispensation. Mrs.\nBrigg had had a fine time of robbery during the stay of Cuckoo in her\nugly house, and, in consequence, a certain queer and slow respect for\nher lodger had very gradually grown up in her withered and gnarled old\nnature. She had that feeling towards Cuckoo that a bad boy, too weak\nto steal apples, has towards a bad boy not too weak to steal them. It\ncould hardly be called an actual liking. Of that the old creature in\nher nethermost Hades was nearly incapable. But she enjoyed seeing apples\noff the tree lying in her kitchen, and so could have patted any hands\nthat had gathered them nefariously. So far as she looked into the future\nshe saw there always Cuckoo, and herself robbing Cuckoo comfortably,\nfaithfully, unblamed and unrepentant, while the years rolled along,\nthe leech ever at its sucking profession.\n\nNow this agreeable vision was abruptly changed. This slide of the magic\nlantern was smashed to fragments. And Mrs. Brigg was filled with the\nrighteous anger of a balked and venerable robber. As a mother, dependent\nupon the earnings of her child in some godly profession might feel on the\nabrupt and reasonless refusal of that child to continue in it, so did\nMrs. Brigg feel now.\n\nThe lady of the feathers had, for the moment at least, given up\nher profession. She sat at home with folded hands at night. It was\nearth-shaking. It stirred the depths of the Brigg being. Quakings of a\nworld in commotion were as nothing to it. And the sweet Brigg dream that\nhad dawned on the last night of the old year, dream of a rich \"toff\" in\nlove with Cuckoo and winding her up to gilded circles, in which the fall\nof night set gay ladies bareheaded, and scattered all feathered hats to\nlimbo, died childless and leaving no legacies. Certainly, Cuckoo was not\nmaking money on the quiet enough in one night to keep her as seven or\nfourteen nights would formerly have supplied. Mrs. Brigg questioned,\nremonstrated, stormed, sulked, was rude, insinuating, artful, blunt, and\nblackguardly--all to no purpose. Cuckoo would give no explanation of her\nconduct. In the day she went out, but Mrs. Brigg was not to be deceived\nby that. She based her observations and conclusions on weighty matters\nconnected with the culinary art and with things about which her trained,\ndisgraceful intelligence could not be deceived. Cuckoo was falling into\npoverty. In the eyes of Brigg she had formerly been in touch with riches,\nthat is to say, she had--so the landlady considered--lived well. She had\ngot along without falling into debt. The exorbitant rent, regularly\nearned, had been as regularly paid. The Brigg perquisites had not been\ndisputed. No watchful eye had been directed upon the claws that grabbed\nand clung, the fingers that filched and retained.\n\nBut now was come a devastating change. Cuckoo grown, or growing, poor\nwas no longer easy-going. Living much less well, she also began to keep\na sharp eye on all she had. If it went mysteriously, without explanatory\naction of her own, she called loudly on Brigg for enlightment. Where had\nit gone? The old lady, disgusted to be brought to subterfuge, a thing to\nwhich she was frankly unaccustomed, lied freely and with a good courage.\nBut her lies did not stand her in much stead with Cuckoo, who had, from\nthe start, no intention whatever of believing any word she might say.\nSo war of a novel kind came about between them. Mrs. Brigg was forced to\nlive and hear herself named thief, a distressing circumstance which she\ncould scarcely surmount with dignity, whatever she might manage in the\nway of fortitude. Denial only armed forces for the attack. Battles were\nnumerous and violent. Cuckoo, who had in some directions no perception\nat all of what was humiliating, took to measuring proportions of legs of\nmutton going down to Hades and remeasuring them on their return. If the\ninches did not tally, Mrs. Brigg knew it. Her soul revolted against such\nsurveyor's work on meat that her own hands had cooked. She called Cuckoo\nnames, and was called worse names in reply. But still the measurings went\non, and still Cuckoo spent her evenings within doors, sometimes without a\nfire in the winter cold.\n\nMrs. Brigg therefore said within herself that Cuckoo had gone to the bad,\nand beheld, with fancy's agitated eye, a time in the near future when not\nonly prequisites would be no more, but the very rent itself would be in\njeopardy. Fury sparkled in her heart.\n\nMeanwhile the situation of Cuckoo above stairs was becoming at once\nsordid and tragic. Starvation is always sordid. It exposes cheek-bones,\nputs sharp points on elbows, writes ugliness over a face, and sets a\nwolf crouching in the heart. Tragic it must always be, for a peculiar\nsorrow walks with it; but when it is obstinate, and springs from the mule\nin a human being, the tragedy has a lustre, a colour of its own. The lady\nof the feathers was forever obstinate. She had been obstinate in vice,\nshe was now obstinate in virtue. In the old days Julian had said to her,\n\"Take some of my money and let the streets alone--even for one night.\"\nShe had refused. Now Doctor Levillier had said to her, \"Prove your will.\nLean on it. Do something for Julian.\" She could only do this one thing.\nShe could only leave the street! With frowning, staring obstinacy she\nleft it. There was always something pathetically blind about Cuckoo's\nproceedings. She was not lucid. But once she had grasped an idea she was\nlike the limpet on the rock. So now she sat at home. Out of her earnings\nshe had managed to save a very little money. One or two men had made her\nsmall presents from time to time. For a little while she could exist. As\nshe sat alone on those strange new evenings she did much mental\narithmetic, calculating how long, with these reduced expenses, which\nbrought Mrs. Brigg's so low, she could live without earning. Sad sums\nwere these, whether rightly or wrongly worked out. The time must be\nshort. And afterwards? This question drove Cuckoo out in the mornings,\nvaguely seeking an occupation. She knew that London was full of \"good\"\ngirls, who went forth to work while she lay in bed in the morning, and\ncame home to tea, and one boiled egg and watercress, when she started out\nin the evening. So she put on her hat and jacket and went forth to find\nout what work they did, and whether she could join in it. Those were\nvariegated pilgrimages full of astonishment. Cuckoo would stroll along\nthe road till she saw, perhaps, a girl who looked good--that is, as\nunlike herself as possible--descend into the frost, or the mud from a\nbus. Then she would dog the footsteps of this girl, find out where she\nwent, with a view of deducing from it what she did. In this manner she\nonce came to a sewing-machine shop in Praed Street, on the trail of a\nbright-looking stranger, who walked gaily as to pleasant toil. Cuckoo\nremained outside while the stranger went in and disappeared. She examined\nthe window--rows of sewing-machines, beyond them the dressed head of a\nwoman in a black silk gown. What did the stranger do here to gain a\nliving, and that bright smile of hers? Suddenly Cuckoo walked into the\nshop and up to the lady with the dressed head.\n\n\"A machine, ma'am?\" said the lady, with a very female look at Cuckoo.\n\nCuckoo shook her head.\n\n\"What can I do for you?\"\n\n\"I'd like some work.\"\n\n\"Work!\" said the lady, her voice travelling from the contralto to the\nsoprano register.\n\n\"I ain't got nothing to do. I want something; I'll do anything, like she\ndoes,\" this, with a nod in the direction of a door through which the\npleasant stranger had vanished.\n\n\"Miss King; our bookkeeper! You know her?\"\n\n\"No. I only see her in the street.\"\n\n\"Good morning,\" came from the lady, and a back confronted Cuckoo.\n\nThe pilgrimages were resumed. Cuckoo visited dressmakers, bonnet-shops,\nABC establishments, with no success. Her face, even when unpainted, told\nits tale. Nature can write down the truth of a sin better than art.\nCuckoo learnt that fact by her walks. But still she trudged, learning\neach day more truths, one of which--a finale to the long sermon, it\nseemed--was that there is no army on earth more difficult to enlist in,\nunder certain circumstances her own, than the army of good working-girls.\nThe day she thoroughly understood that finale Cuckoo went home and had a\nviolent row with Mrs. Brigg. A cold scrag of mutton was supposed to be\nthe bone of contention, but that was only supposition. Cuckoo was really\ncursing Mrs. Brigg because the world is full of close boroughs, not at\nall because cold mutton has not learnt how to achieve eternal life, while\nat the same time fulfilling its duties as an edible. Not understanding\nthis subtlety of emotion, Mrs. Brigg let herself loose in sarcasm.\n\n\"Why don't yer go out of a night?\" she screamed, battering with one hand\non a tea-tray, held perpendicularly, to emphasize her words. \"What's come\nto yer? Go out; go out of a night.\"\n\n\"Shan't.\"\n\n\"Turned pious, 'ave yer?\" sneered the landlady. \"Or waitin' for a\n'usband? Which is it to be? Mr. H'Addison, I dessey! Hee, hee, hee.\"\n\nShe burst into a bitter snigger. Cuckoo flushed scarlet and uttered words\nof the pavement. Any one hearing her then must have put her down as\nutterly unredeemed and irredeemable, a harridan to bandy foul language\nwith a cabman, or to outvie a street-urchin bumped against by a rival in\nthe newspaper trade. She covered Mrs. Brigg with abuse, prompted by the\ngnawings at her heart, the hunger of mind and body, fear of the future,\nwonder at the impossibilities of life. Her own greatness--for her love\nand following obstinate unselfishness, without religious prompting or\nself-respect, as it was, might be called great--turned sour within her\nheart at such a moment. Her very virtue became as vinegar. Mrs. Brigg\nwas drowned in epithets and finally pushed furiously out into the\npassage. Cuckoo turned from the door to Jessie yelping, and directed a\nkick at the little dog. Jessie wailed, as only a toy dog can, like the\n\"mixture\" stop of an organ, wailed and ran as one that runs to meet an\nunknown future. Then Cuckoo pursued, caught her, and burst into tears\nover her. The little creature's domed skull and india-rubber ears were\nwet with the tears of her mistress. And she whimpered, too, but with much\nrelief, for she was back in her world of Cuckoo's lap; and could not be\nquite unhappy there. But in what a world was Cuckoo!\n\nIt will be said that Dr. Levillier knew of her circumstances; but\nanxiously kind and thoughtful though he was, he did not yet realize the\neffect of his advice given to the lady of the feathers during the drive\non the Hampstead Heights. He had told her to prove her will by doing the\nthing that Julian had asked of her. But he did not know what Julian had\nasked. And he did not comprehend the bitter fruit that her following of\nhis further advice to keep from low and loveless actions must bring to\nthe ripening. When he spoke, as the sun went down on London, he was\ncarried on by excitement, and was thinking rather of the fate of Julian,\nthe _diablerie_ of Valentine, than of the individual life of the girl at\nhis side. He was arming her for the battle. But he dreamed of weapons,\nnot of rations, like many an enthusiast. He forgot that the soldier must\nbe fed as well as armed. He said to Cuckoo: \"Fight! Use your woman's wit;\nuse your heart; wake up, and throw yourself into this battle.\" And she,\nfilled with determination, and with a puzzled, pent ardour to do\nsomething, did not know what to do except--starve. So she began to\nstarve for Julian's sake, and because the doctor had fired her heart.\nHe had said: \"Do what Julian asked you to do, and show Julian that you\nhave done it.\" But something within Cuckoo forbade her to fulfil this\nlast injunction. She could give up the street, but an extraordinary\nshyness, false shame, and awkwardness had so far prevented her from\nletting Julian know it. If he knew it, he would understand what it meant\nfor her, and would force money on her, and Cuckoo, having once made up\nher mind that money and Julian should never be linked together in her\nrelations with him, stuck to secrecy on this subject with her normal dull\npertinacity. So matters move slowly towards a deadlock. The lady of the\nfeathers did not neglect the pawnshop. Her few trinkets went there very\nsoon. Then things that were not trinkets, that green evening dress, for\ninstance, the imitation lace, and one day a sale took place. Cuckoo\ndisposed, for an absurd sum, of her title deed, the headgear that had\ngiven birth to her nickname. She was no longer the lady of the feathers.\nThe hat that had seen so much of her life reposed upon the head of\nvirtue, and knew Piccadilly no more. But Julian's present remained with\nher, and indeed came into every-day use. And still Jessie sported her\nyellow riband. Later there came a terrible time, when the eyes of\nCuckoo--appraising everything on which they looked--fell with that\nfateful expression, not merely upon Jessie's yellow riband, but upon\nJessie herself. But that time was not quite yet.\n\nWhile Cuckoo endured this fate, Dr. Levillier was in a perplexity of\nanother kind. The first round of that battle had ended in apparent\ndecisive defeat of Valentine's accusers. During the evening the fortunes\nof war had certainly wavered to the doctor's side. Julian had displayed\nsudden strong signs of an awakening; but the sitting had thrown him back\ninto his dream, had pushed him more firmly beneath the yoke of his\nmaster. The doctor did not understand why, although he recognized the\nfact; he could not divine the exact effect that disappointment would have\nupon sudden suspicious eagerness. Julian had been waked to wonder, to\nobserve Valentine for an instant with new eyes, to look the mystery of\nthe great change in him in the face, and know it as a mystery. Yes, he\nhad even thought of Valentine as a stranger, and said to himself, \"Where,\nthen, is my friend?\" The new Valentine had risen out of the ashes of\nsleep. Julian pressed forward the sitting as a means, the only one, of\nsearching among these ashes. In the old days each sitting had quickened\nhis senses into a strange life, as the last sitting quickened the senses\nof the doctor. But to Julian this last sitting brought nothing but\ndisappointment; the thing which had been alive was dead, and so the\nsudden hope which had come with the new wonder died too. He supposed\nthat he had been the prey of an absurd fancy created by the idle words\nof the doctor, or by an idiotic movement of his mind, which had cried\nto him on a sudden: \"If the Valentine you love and revere is really gone\naway, what are you worshipping now?\" Now, in his heavy disappointment he\nthought of this cry as a mad exclamation, and he sought to drown all\nmemory of it, and every memory in fresh vices, and in his fatal habit\nof absinthe-drinking. He lay down under the yoke beneath which he had\npreviously wept, and so succeeded in going still lower. So that night\nValentine had won his intended triumph, although for a while it had been\nin jeopardy.\n\nDoctor Levillier was in perplexity; he had been brought to the very\nthreshold of revelation, and then thrust back into an every-day world\nof thwarted hopes and broken ambitions. But the memory of magic was\nstill with him, and gave him a feeling of unrest, and a pertinacity that\nwas not to be without reward forever. Valentine's triumph held for the\nconqueror a poison seed from which a flower was to spring. The doctor's\ndetermination to continue the fight was frustrated at this time by\nJulian, rather than by Valentine. Julian's disappointment plunged him\nin a deep sea of indifference, from which he declined to be rescued. The\ndoctor's invitations to him remained unanswered. If he called, Julian\nwas never at home. Several times the doctor met Valentine, who, with a\ndeprecating smile, told him that Julian was away on some mad errand.\n\n\"I seldom see him now,\" he even added upon one occasion. \"He has gone\nbeyond me. Julian is living so fast that my poor agility cannot keep pace\nwith him.\"\n\nIt seemed as if the whole affair was going completely out of the doctor's\nknowledge, and that even Cuckoo had no longer any power of attraction for\nJulian. The doctor wrote to her and received an ill-spelt answer, telling\nhim that Julian had not been near her since the last night of the year.\nIn this event the doctor's only hope lay in keeping closely in touch with\nValentine. To do this proved an easy matter. Valentine responded readily\nto his invitations, asked him out in return, seemed glad to be with him.\nThe doctor believed he read the reason of this joy in Valentine's anxiety\nto prove the depth of Julian's degradation. He had now begun to play\ndevilishly upon a pathetic stop, and sought every occasion to descant\nupon the social ruin that was overtaking Julian, and his deep concern\nin the matter. This hypocrisy was so transparent and so offensive that\nthere were moments when it stank in the doctor's nostrils, and he could\nscarcely repress his horror and disgust. Yet to show them would be not\nonly impolitic, but would only add fuel to the flames of Valentine's pyre\nof triumph. So the doctor, too, sought to play his part, and never\nwearied in seeking Julian, although his quest was in vain. From Valentine\nhe gathered that Julian was now dropped even by the gay world; that his\nclubs looked askance at him; that men began to shun him, and to whisper\nagainst him.\n\n\"The stone is going down in the sea,\" Valentine said.\n\n\"Who threw it into the sea?\" the doctor asked. \"Tell me that.\"\n\nValentine shrugged whimsical shoulders.\n\n\"Fate, I suppose,\" he answered. \"Fate is a mischievous boy, and is always\nthrowing stones. Is the lady of the feathers disconsolate?\"\n\nThe doctor did not trust himself to reply, but was silent, plotting\nanother meeting to sit. For he had begun, still magic-bound perhaps, to\ndivine some possible salvation in that act which he had once condemned,\nled, as he thought, by knowledge and by experience, of the nervous system\nforsooth! Now he was led unscientifically by pure feeling, like a child\nby a warm, close hand. The instinct that had guided Cuckoo seemed to\nstretch out fingers to him. He must respond. But how to reach Julian?\nWhile he strove to solve this problem it was solved for him in a manner\nutterly surprising to him, although engineered by words of his.\n\nCuckoo wrought a strange work with the skeleton hands of hunger and of\npain.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE SELLING OF JESSIE\n\n\nOne chill morning of earliest February, a stirring of Jessie at the foot\nof her bed wakened Cuckoo from a short and uneasy sleep. She opened her\neyes to the faint light that filtered through the green Venetian blind.\nJessie moved again, slowly rotating like a drowsy top, then suddenly\ndropped into the warm centre of a nest of bedclothes, breathing a big\ndog-sigh of satisfaction that shook her tiny frame. She slept. But she\nhad wakened her mistress, who lay with her head resting on one hand,\ndeep in thought while the day grew outside. Cuckoo, having directed her\nsteps down a blind-alley had, not unnaturally, reached a dead-wall,\nblotting out the horizon. Lying there, she faced it. She stared at the\nwall, and the wall seemed to stare back at her. Perhaps for that reason\na dull blankness flowed over and filled her mind, and made her widely\nopened eyes almost as expressionless as the eyes of a corpse. For a\nlong time she lay in this alive stupor. Then Jessie stirred again, and\nCuckoo, as she had been before spurred into wakefulness, was stirred\ninto thoughtfulness. She began to pass the near past, the present,\neventually the future, in review. The past was a crescendo, solitude\ngrowing louder each night, poverty growing louder, obstinacy growing\nlouder, Mrs. Brigg growing louder. What an orchestra! Cuckoo had not\nseen Julian once. She had seen the doctor, to be told of his baffled\nefforts, of Julian's escape from all his friends, of Valentine's\ndeclaration of the stone going down in the sea, of utter deadlock,\nutter stagnation. For the doctor treated Cuckoo frankly as a brave\nwoman, not deceitfully as a timid child to be buoyed on the waves of\nill-circumstances with gas-filled bladders. Cuckoo knew the worst of\nthings, and by the knowledge was confirmed in her mule's attitude which\nso weighed upon Mrs. Brigg. Her hands were tied in every direction\nexcept one. She could only dumbly prove that Valentine was wrong; that\nher will was not dead, by exercising it to the detriment of her worldly\nsituation. Doggedly then she put her whole past behind her, despite the\never-increasing curses of the landlady. She had given up her pilgrimages\nin search of honest work. They were too hopeless. She had pawned\neverything she could pawn, and sold every trifle that was saleable. Even\nJessie's broad band of yellow satin had been included in a heterogeneous\nparcel of odds and ends purchased by a phlegmatic German with eyes like\nmarbles and the manner of a stone image. Living less and less well, doing\nwithout fires, sitting often in the dark at night to save the expense of\ngas, Cuckoo had managed to pay her rent until a week ago. Then money had\nfailed, and the great earthquake had at length tossed and swallowed the\nwretched Mrs. Brigg. The scene had been tropical. Mrs. Brigg was really\nmoved to the very depths of her being. For days she had been, as it were,\neating and drinking apprehension. Now apprehension choked her. She was\nshot up in the air by the cannon of climax. Limbs and mind were in the\nextreme of commotion. From her point of view it must be acknowledged that\nthe situation was unduly exasperating. For Cuckoo would give no reason\nwhatever for her reiterated formula of refusal to earn any money. And now\nshe could not pay her week's rent, plunging Mrs. Brigg into the further\ncircle of an _inferno_, and yet sat within doors day after day. Mrs.\nBrigg approached apoplexy by way of persuasion, was by turns pathetic\nand paralytic with passion. She coaxed with the ardour of an executioner\ninveigling the victim's neck to the noose and in haste to be off to\nbreakfast. She threatened like Jove in curl-papers. Cuckoo was\ninexorable.\n\n\"Then out you go!\" said Mrs. Brigg at last. \"Out of my house you pack,\nyou--\" Nameless words followed.\n\nCuckoo got up from her chair with no show of emotion and moved towards\nher bedroom stonily to pack her box. She didn't care. She was in a mood\nto lie down in the gutter and wait the last blow of Fate, living only in\nher one obstinate determination to do what the doctor had told her, the\none thing Julian had asked of her. She did not any longer war with words\nagainst the purple and hard-breathing landlady. And her silence and her\nmovement of obedience awed Mrs. Brigg for the moment into another mood.\nShe shuffled after Cuckoo into the bedroom.\n\n\"Eh? What is it?\" she ejaculated. \"What are you a-doing of?\"\n\n\"Going,\" Cuckoo threw at her.\n\n\"Now?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Where to?\"\n\nNo answer. Cuckoo was thrusting the few things still left to her into the\nonly box she now possessed in the world. Mrs. Brigg stood in the folding\ndoorway watching, and making mouths, as is the fashion of the elderly\nwhen emotional.\n\n\"What are you going for?\" she said presently, as Cuckoo, bending down,\nstuffed a white petticoat into the depths.\n\n\"Can't pay,\" snarled Cuckoo.\n\n\"It don't matter--for a day or two,\" said Mrs. Brigg, reluctantly.\n\nShe stumped downstairs, torn by conflicting emotions. She had got\naccustomed to Cuckoo, and then both Julian and Valentine, Cuckoo's\nvisitors, had taught her the colour of the British sovereign. They had\nnot been near 400 lately, but they might come again. And then Doctor\nLevillier. Cuckoo had some fine friends, who would surely do something\nfor her. Mrs. Brigg had no other possible lodger in her eye. On the\nwhole, prudence dictated a day or two's patience, just a day or two,\nor a week's, not more, not a moment more. Thus it came about that Cuckoo\nhad now been another week beneath the roof of Mrs. Brigg without paying\nhard cash for the asylum. The previous evening the landlady had burst\nout again into fury, refusing to get in any more food for Cuckoo, and\ndemanding the fortnight's rent. She had even, carried away by cupidity\nand passion, striven to drive Cuckoo out to her night's work. A physical\nstruggle had taken place between them, ending in the landlady's\nhysterics. Other lodgers had been drawn by the noise from their floors\nto witness the row. Two of them had come, on the scene accompanied by\nmen, and to them Mrs. Brigg had shrieked her wrongs and explanations of\nthis swindling virtue of a woman who had formerly paid her way honestly\nfrom the street. The lodgers and their men had provided an accompaniment\nof jeering laughter to the Brigg solo, and Cuckoo, her clothes nearly\ntorn from her back, had flung at last into her sitting-room and locked\nthe door. That was last night--the past which she now reviewed in the\nmorning twilight. What was she to do? She was without food. She was in\ndebt, must leave Mrs. Brigg, no doubt, but must pay her first, had no\nmeans to pay for another lodging. She might apply to Doctor Levillier.\nWhat held her back from taking that road was mainly this. She had the\ndumb desire to make a sacrifice for Julian, and the doctor had given her\nthe idea of the only sacrifice she could make--retention of herself from\nthe degradation that kept her free of debt. If she asked the doctor to\npay the expenses of the sacrifice, whose would it be? His, not hers. So\nthere was no banker in the world for Cuckoo. The dead-wall faced her.\nThe horizon was shut out. She lay there and tried to think--and tried to\nthink. How to get some money? Something--the devil perhaps--prompted the\nsleeping Jessie to stir again at the bottom of the bed. Cuckoo felt the\nlittle dog's back shift against her stretched-out toes, and suddenly a\nbitter flood of red ran over her thin, half-starved face, and she hid it\nin the tumbled pillow, pressing it down. The movement was the attempted\nphysical negation of an abominable, treacherous thought which had just\nstabbed her mind. How could it have come to her, when she hated it so?\nShe burrowed further into the pillow, at the same time caressing the back\nof Jessie with little movements of her toes. Horrible, horrible thought!\nIt brought tears which stained the pillow. It brought a hard beating of\nthe heart. And these manifestations showed plainly that Cuckoo had not\ndismissed it yet. She tried to dismiss it, shutting her eyes up tightly,\nshaking her head at the black, venomous thing. But it stayed and grew\nlarger and more dominant. Then she took her head from the pillow, faced\nit, and examined it. It was a clear-cut, definite thought now, perfectly\nfinished, coldly complete.\n\nJessie was embodied money, an embodied small sum of money.\n\nLong ago Cuckoo had said to Julian with pride:\n\n\"She's a show-dog. I wouldn't part with her for nuts.\"\n\nNow she remembered those words, and knew, could not help knowing, that a\nshow-dog was worth more than nuts. At that moment she wished Jessie were\nworthless. Then the sting would be drawn from her horrible thought.\nMeanwhile Jessie slept calmly on, warm and cosey.\n\nCuckoo was cold and trembling. She knew that she was on the verge of\nstarvation. The doctor had said that one day she could help Julian, only\nshe. So she must not starve. Love alone would not let her do that.\nBetween her and starvation lay Jessie, curved in sleep, unconscious that\nher small future was being debated with tears and with horror.\n\nLong ago the little dog had entered Cuckoo's heart to be cherished\nthere. Many wretched London women own such a little dog, to whom they\ncling with a passion such as more fortunate women lavish upon their\nchildren. A great many subtleties combine to elevate companions with\ntails to the best thrones the poor, the wicked, and the deserted can\ngive them. A dog has such a rich nature to give to the woman who is poor,\nso much innocence at hand for the woman who is wicked, such completeness\nof attachment ready for the woman who is lonely. It is so beautifully\nhumble upon its throne, abased in its own eyes before the shrine of its\nmistress, on whom it depends entirely for all its happiness. A little\nking, perhaps, it has the pretty manners of a little servitor. And even\nwhen it presumes to be determined in the expressed desire for the dryness\nof a biscuit or the warmth of a lap, with how small a word or glance can\nit be laid upon its back, in the abject renunciation of every pretension,\nanxious only for the forgiveness that nobody with a touch of tenderness\ncould withhold. Ah, there is much to be thankful for in a companion with\na tail! Jessie had winning ways, the deep heart of a dog. A toy dog she\nwas, no doubt, but hers was no toy nature. Cuckoo could not have shed\nsuch tears as those she now shed over any toy. For she began to cry\nweakly at the mere thought that had come to her, although it was not yet\nbecome a resolve. Life with Jessie had been very sordid, very sad. What\nwould life be without her? What would such a morning as this be, for\ninstance? Cuckoo's imagination set tempestuously to work, with physical\naids--such as the following. She drew away her feet from the bottom of\nthe bed, where they touched the little dog's back. Doing this she said\nto herself, \"Now, Jessie is gone.\" Curled up, she set herself to realize\nthe lie. And perhaps she might have succeeded thoroughly in the sad\nattempt had not Jessie, in sleep missing the contact of her mistress,\nwriggled lazily on her side up the bed after Cuckoo's feet, discovering\nwhich, she again composed herself to slumber. The renunciation was\nnot to be complete in imagination. Jessie's love, when present, was too\nfrustrating. And Cuckoo, casting away her horrible thought in a sort of\nhasty panic, caught her companion with a tail in her arms, and made her\nrest beside her, close, close. Jessie was well content, but still sleepy.\nShe reposed her tiny head upon the pillow, lengthened herself between the\nsheets and dreamed again. And while she dreamed, the black thought about\nher came back to Cuckoo. It was assertive, and Cuckoo began to fear it.\nThe fear of a thought is a horrible thing; sometimes it is worse than\nthe fear of death. This one made Cuckoo think herself more cruel than\nany woman since the world began. Yet she could not exorcise it. On the\ncontrary, she grew familiar with it as the day marched on, until it put\non a fatal expression of duty. All that day she revolved it. Mrs. Brigg\nattacked her again. Food was lacking. Cuckoo's case became desperate. She\nturned over carefully all her few remaining possessions to see if there\nwas any inanimate thing that she had omitted to turn into money. Jessie,\npoor innocent, assisted with animation at the forlorn inventory, nestling\namong the tumbled garments, leaping on and off the bed. Her ingenuous\nnature supposed some odd game to be in progress, and was anxious to play\na principal and effective part in it. Yet she was quieted by the look\nCuckoo cast upon her when the wardrobe had been passed in review and no\nsaleable thing was to be found. She shrank into a corner, ready for\nwhimpering. That night Cuckoo did not sleep, and through all the long\nhours she held Jessie in her arms, and heard, as so often before, the\nregular breathing of this little companion of hers. And each drawn breath\npierced her heart.\n\nNext morning she got up early. She was faint with hunger and with a\nresolve that she had made. She dressed herself, then carried Jessie to\nthe flannel-lined basket, put her into it and kissed her.\n\n\"Go bials,\" she said, with a raised finger. \"Go bials.\"\n\nJessie winked her eyes pathetically, her chin resting on the basket edge.\nCuckoo went out into the passage and called down to Mrs. Brigg.\n\n\"What is it?\" cried Hades.\n\n\"I'm going to get some money.\"\n\nMrs. Brigg ran out.\n\n\"Money!\" she said in a keen treble. \"Where are you going to git it?\"\n\n\"Never you mind,\" said Cuckoo, in a dull voice.\n\nShe turned from Mrs. Brigg's flooding ejaculations and was gone. In her\nperegrinations about London she had sometimes encountered in a certain\nthoroughfare a broad old man with a face marked with small-pox, who\nwore a fur cap and leggings. This individual conveyed upon his thickest\nperson certain clinging rats, which crawled about him in the public view\nwhile he walked, and he led in strings three or four terriers, sometimes\na pup or two. Cuckoo had seen him more than once in conversation with\nsome young swell, even with gaily-dressed women, had noticed that his\nterriers here to-day were often gone to-morrow, replaced by other dogs,\npugs perhaps, or a waddling, bow-legged dachshund. She drew her own\nconclusions. And she had seen that the old man's eyes, in his poacher\nface, were kindly, that his trotting dogs often aimed their sharp, or\nblunt, noses at his hands and seemed to claim his notice. Her morning\nerrand was to him.\n\nShe walked a long time in search of him, trembling with the fear of\nfinding him, inconsistently. Her mind, reacting on her ill-fed body,\nplanted a crawling weariness there, and at last she had to stop and\nexamine her pockets. She came upon two or three pence, went into a shop,\nbought a bun, and ate it sitting by a marble-topped table. It nearly\nchoked her. Yet she knew she needed it badly. With one penny the less she\nresumed her pilgrimage. But nowhere could she see the old man in his\nleggings, and suddenly a sort of joyful spasm shook her superstitiously.\nFate opposed her cruel resolution. In a rush of eager contrition she\nstarted for home, walking as quickly as her abnormal fatigue would allow\nher. She had left the street in which the old man generally walked, and\ntook care, as she turned its corner, not to cast one glance behind her.\nShe passed through the next street, and the next, and was far away from\nhis neighbourhood, rejoicing, when suddenly she saw him coming straight\ntowards her slowly, the rats resting on his shoulders, various small dogs\nin strings pattering on each side of him.\n\nCuckoo's heart gave a great thump, and then for an appreciable fragment\nof time stopped beating. She muttered a bad word under her breath and had\nan impulse to flee as from an enemy. She did not flee, but stood still\nlike one condemned, while the old man stolidly approached with his\nmenagerie. When he reached her she lifted her head and looked him in the\nface. The little dogs were jumping to reach his hands. Evidently they\nloved him.\n\n\"I say,\" Cuckoo said huskily.\n\nThe old gentleman stopped, lifted a rat from his shoulder, placed it on\nhis breast, like a man who arranged his necktie, clicked his tongue\nagainst his teeth, and remarked:\n\n\"Parding, lydy.\"\n\nCuckoo swallowed. She felt as if she had a ball in her throat shifting up\nand down.\n\n\"I say,\" she repeated. \"You buy toy dogs, eh?\"\n\n\"I buys 'em and I sells 'em,\" answered the old man, with a large accent\non the conjunction. \"Buys 'em dear and sells 'em cheap. There's a wy to\nmike a living, lydy!\"\n\nHis small eyes twinkled with humour as he spoke.\n\nCuckoo swallowed again. The ball in her throat was getting larger.\n\n\"Want to buy one this morning?\" she asked. \"A show little dog, eh?\"\n\nShe choked.\n\nThe old man did not appear to notice it. He looked at her with sharp\nconsideration.\n\n\"Oh, you means selling!\" he remarked. \"Where is it, then?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"The show little dawg?\"\n\nCuckoo gulped out her address. All this time the old man had been summing\nher up, and drawing his own conclusions from her thin figure and haggard\nface. He scented a possible bargain.\n\n\"Trot along, lydy,\" he said, turning on his heels with all his little\ndogs in commotion. \"Trot along. I'm with yer.\"\n\nCuckoo heard muffled drums of a dead-march as she walked. She, who had\nlived a life so shameless, shivered with shame at the thought of what\nshe was going to do. Her treachery laid her out in its winding-sheet.\nThe old man tried to entertain her, as they went, by chatting about his\nprofession, declaiming the merits of his rats, and spreading before her\nmind a verbal panorama of the canine life that had defiled through his\nchangeful existence. Cuckoo did not hear a word--they turned into\nthe Marylebone Road. She walked slower and slower, yet never had the\nstreet in which she lived seemed so short. At length the iron gate of\nnumber 400 was reached. Cuckoo stopped.\n\n\"In 'ere, lydy?\" said the old man.\n\nShe nodded, unable to speak. He turned in with his crowd of pattering\ndogs, and proceeded jauntily up the narrow path. Cuckoo followed slowly\nand with a furtive step. She longed to open the front door, let him in,\nand then run away herself. Anywhere, anywhere, only to be away, out of\nsight and hearing of the cruel scene that was coming.\n\nNow they were on the doorstep. The old man waited. She fumbled for her\nlatchkey, found it, thrust it into the door. Instantly the shrill bark of\nJessie was heard. Cuckoo's guilty shining eyes met the twinkling eyes of\nthe old man.\n\n\"That she a-barkin'?\" he inquired, with a professional air.\n\nCuckoo nodded again.\n\n\"A nice little pype,\" he rejoined. \"This wy, is it?\"\n\nThe patter of feet in the oil-clothed passage roused Jessie to a frenzied\nexcitement. When the two opened the door of the sitting-room, the little\ncreature, planted tree-like upon her four tiny feet, was barking her dog\nlife into the air. Cuckoo, entering first, snatched her up and gave her a\nsudden, vehement kiss.\n\nIt was good-bye.\n\nThen she turned and faced the old man, who had paused in the doorway. She\nheld Jessie silently towards him. Transferring the strings held in his\nright hand to his left, he took the wriggling dog from Cuckoo, lifted her\nup and down as if considering her weight, ran his eyes over her points\nwith the quick decision of knowledge.\n\n\"'Ardly a show dawg, lydy,\" he said.\n\nCuckoo flamed at him.\n\n\"She is, she is,\" she cried vehemently, all her passion trying to find a\nvent in the words. \"You shan't have her, you shan't have her, you shan't\nif--\"\n\n\"Neow, neow; I ain't sying nothink ag'in 'er,\" he interposed. \"She's a\npretty dawg, a very pretty dawg. 'Ow much do yer sy, lydy?\"\n\nCuckoo sickened. She looked away. She could not have met the eyes of\nJessie at that moment.\n\n\"'Ow much, then?\" repeated the old man, still weighing the whining Jessie\nup and down.\n\n\"I dunno; you say.\"\n\nThe old man mentioned a price. It was bigger than Cuckoo had expected.\nShe nodded, moving her tongue across her lips. Then she looked away out\nof the window. She heard the chink of money.\n\n\"Put it on the table,\" she murmured.\n\nHe did so, looking steadily at her.\n\n\"You feels the parting, lydy,\" he began. \"Very nat'ral, very. I knows\nwhat it is.\"\n\nHe extended Jessie, now whining furiously, towards Cuckoo.\n\n\"Want to sy good-bye, lydy?\" he said.\n\nCuckoo shook her head. The old man popped Jessie into one of the\ncapacious side-pockets of his coat and buttoned the flap down.\n\n\"Mornin', lydy,\" he said, turning towards the door.\n\nCuckoo made no reply. Her chest was heaving and her lips were working.\nThe old man went out. Cuckoo heard the pattering feet of the little army\nof dogs on the oilcloth of the passage. The hall door opened and shut. A\npause. The iron gate clicked. She had never moved. The money lay on the\ntable. At last Cuckoo went out into the passage, and called in a strange\nvoice:\n\n\"Mrs. Brigg.\"\n\nThe landlady came with hasty alacrity.\n\n\"Come here,\" said Cuckoo, leading the way into the sitting-room.\n\"There--there's some money for you.\"\n\nMrs. Brigg pounced on it with a vulture's eagerness.\n\n\"'Owever did yer--\" she began.\n\nBut Cuckoo had rushed into the bedroom. The landlady stood with the money\nin her hand, and heard the key turned in the lock of the door.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nA MEETING OF STARVATION AND EXCESS\n\n\nNow an awful loneliness, like the loneliness of the grave, fell round\nCuckoo. Like Judas, she could have gone out and hanged herself, but for\none thing, the love in her heart that seemed so useless. In her muddled,\nillogical way, and to stifle gnawing thoughts of the betrayed Jessie, she\ndwelt upon this love of hers for Julian. What had it ever brought her?\nWhat had it brought him? To her it had given many sorrows, humiliations.\nShe remembered them one by one, and they looked at her like ghosts. Her\ndawning recognition of her own degradation never yet come to surmise; her\ntearing jealousy when Julian went out to do as other men did, preceded by\nand linked with the knowledge of that dreary incident in which she played\nthe part of accomplice, that incident which she always believed had\nstarted him on his journey to destruction; her acquaintance with\nValentine and the arrows planted in her heart by him; her despair when\nshe learned from him her own impotence; not yet counterbalanced by full\ntrust in herself or in her power for good, despite the faith of the\ndoctor; her vision of the constantly falling Julian, of the stone going\ndown in the deep sea; her desperate adherence to the doctor's request to\nprove her will, rewarded now by an apparently useless starvation, and by\nthis treacherous sale of Jessie, her truest, trustiest friend. Cuckoo\nreviewed these ghosts, and no longer prayed, but cursed. So long as she\nhad Jessie--she knew it now--she had never been really quite hopeless,\noften as she had thought herself hopeless. She had never even been\nutterly without self-respect, because Jessie had always deeply respected\nher and had thus given her little moments of clean and cheering\nconfidence. And she had never been absolutely alone. Now she was alone,\nand felt like Judas, a betrayer. By turns she thought of Julian lost and\nof Jessie sold to strange hands, strange hearts, in a cruel and a bitter\nworld. But even now she did not think much or often of herself, for\nCuckoo was no egotist. Her very lack of egotism must have been the\ndespair of any good woman trying to rescue her. She sat at home and\nstarved and betrayed now, not because her egoism shrank from the touch of\nthe men of the street, not because she had any idea of the great duty a\nwoman owes to herself--to keep herself pure--but simply moved by the\ndogged determination to do something for Julian. Were Julian dead Cuckoo\nwould have gone out into Piccadilly again as of old, and earned the rent\nfor Mrs. Brigg, and food for herself, and a sovereign or two to buy back\nJessie. The circumstances of her life had stuffed cotton wool into the\nears of her soul and rendered it deaf to the voices that govern good\nwomen. Cuckoo was pathetically incomprehensible to most people, because\nshe was pathetically twisted in mind. But her heart grew straight and\nsurely towards heaven.\n\nThe sale of Jessie had brought in enough money to keep Mrs. Brigg quiet\nfor a little while, but not enough to satisfy her claim against Cuckoo,\nor to give Cuckoo food. It went as an instalment towards the rent. Now\nthe landlady began to clamour again, and Cuckoo was literally starving.\nOne night her despair reached a point of cruelty which drove her out into\nthe street, not for the old reason, not at all for that. Cuckoo was\nsheathed in armour from head to foot against sin and its wages. Her\nobstinacy seemed to her the only thing that really lived in her miserable\nbody, her miserable soul. It was surely obstinacy which pulsed in her\nheart, which shone in her hollow eyes, tingled in her tired limbs,\nflushed her thin cheeks with blood, gave her mind a thought, her will the\nimpetus to mark time in this desolation. Cuckoo was like a hollow shell\ncontaining the everlasting murmur, \"I'll starve--for him.\" Whether her\nstarvation was useless or not did not concern her at this moment. She no\nlonger even saw those ghosts. She seemed blind and deaf and dull in a\nfashion, yet driven by an active despair. Had Jessie been with her still,\nshe could have stayed within doors. The little dog's faint and regular\nbreathing, her occasional rustling movements, had made just enough music\nto keep Cuckoo still faintly singing even when her heart was saddest. Now\nher room and her life were empty of all song, and Jessie's untenanted\nbasket--in which the red flannel seemed to Cuckoo like blood--was a\nspectre and a vision of hell.\n\nSo, on this night, Cuckoo put on her hat and jacket. She meant to go out,\nto walk anywhere, just to move, to be in the open air. As she went into\nthe passage she ran against Mrs. Brigg. The gas-jet was alight, and the\nlandlady could see how she was dressed. Suddenly Mrs. Brigg fell on\nCuckoo and began slobbering her with kisses.\n\nThe old wretch actually began to whimper. She had been sore tried, and\nmust have had a fragment of affection for Cuckoo somewhere about her\nnature. For she did not want to part with her, and the tears she now let\nfall were prompted not only by a prospect of money coming in to her, but\nalso of pleasure in the thought that Cuckoo had not entirely gone to the\nbad. She wept like the mother who sees her child return from its evil\nway.\n\nCuckoo thrust her away without a word, violently. Mrs. Brigg did not\nresent the action, but fell against the passage wall sobbing and\nmurmuring, \"My precious, my chickabiddy!\" while Cuckoo banged the hall\ndoor and went out into the night. Then the landlady, moved by a sacred\nimpulse of pardon, bolted down to her kitchen and began to rummage\nenthusiastically in her larder. She knew Cuckoo had been near to\nstarving, and had supported the knowledge with great equanimity while\nthis prodigal daughter chose to wander in wicked ways of idleness. But\nnow she killed the fatted calf with trembling hands, and made haste to\nset out a reverend supper in Cuckoo's parlour to welcome her on her\nreturn. The cold bacon, the pot of porter, the bread, the butter, all\nwere Mrs. Brigg's symbols of pardon and of peace! And as she laid them\non the table she sang:\n\n\"In 'er 'air (_whimper_) she wore a white cam-eelyer,\nDark blue (_whimper_) was the colour of 'er heye.\" (_Whimper._)\n\nIt was like a religious service with one devout worshipper.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nMeanwhile Cuckoo walked slowly along. It was a dark night, very still\nand very damp. The frost had gone. The stars were spending their\nbrightness on clouds that were a carpet to them, a roof to poor human\nbeings who could not see them. In the air was the unnatural, and so\nalmost unpleasant, warmth that, coming suddenly out of due season,\nstrikes at the health of many people, and exhausts them as it would\nnever exhaust them in time of summer. Cuckoo, faint with hunger, fainter\nyet with sorrow, felt intensely fatigued. She did not consider where she\nwas going, but just walked on slowly and heavily; but the habit of her\nlife, profiting by her unconsciousness, led her towards that long street\nin which she had passed hours which, if added together, would have made a\nlarge part of her life. Piccadilly drew her to it as the whirlpool draws\nthe thing which inadvertently touches even the farthest outpost of its\ninfluence. Presently she was at the Circus. The little boys upon the\nkerb, crying newspapers, greeted her with excited comments and with\nlaughter. They had missed her for so long that they had imagined her\nill, perhaps dead. Seeing her turn up again, they were full of greedy\nardour for her news. They put to her searching and opprobrious questions.\nShe did not hear them. Soon she was in the midst of the crowd. Yet she\nscarcely realized that she was not alone. No mechanical smile came to her\nface. It seemed as if she had forgotten the old wiles of the streets, put\noff forever the frigid mask of vice, that freezes young blood, yet makes\nold blood sometimes run strangely faster. What was the street to Cuckoo\nnow, or Cuckoo to the street? Once it had at least been much, almost\neverything, to her. And she had been perhaps as much to it as one of the\npaving-stones on which the feet of its travellers trod. Now things were\nchanged. The human wolf was in the snow still, but it no longer feared\nstarvation. Rather did it live in starvation with a fervour that was\nuntouched by anything animal.\n\nCuckoo walked on.\n\nThe crowd flowed up and down, in two opposed and gliding streams. The\nwarm heaviness of this premature air of spring had brought many people\nout, and had even induced some of the women to assume costumes of\nmid-summer. There were great white hats floating on the stream, like\nswans. Bright and light coloured dresses touched the black gown of Cuckoo\nas with fingers of contempt. She did not see them. Many women who knew\nher by sight murmured to each other their surprise at her reappearance.\nOne, a huge negress in orange cotton, ejaculated a loud and guttural:\n\"My sakes!\"\n\nUnheeding, Cuckoo walked on.\n\nA few of the men looked at her. More especially did those observe her who\nlove vice that is quiet, sedate, demure, and unobtrusive. To these her\npale, unpainted cheeks, her unconscious demeanour, her downcast eyes,\nand severely plain black dress and hat appealed with emphasis. One or two\nof them turned to follow her. She never heard their footsteps. One spoke\nto her. She did not reply. He persisted. When at last she was obliged to\nheed him she only shook her head. He fell away, abashed by the dull\nglance of her eyes, and wondering discontentedly why she was there and\nwhat she was doing.\n\nForgetting him instantly, she walked on.\n\nSome one she had known in old days met her. It was the young man in the\nmillinery establishment who had loved her for a week, and given her the\ngreen evening dress trimmed with the imitation lace. Since those days\nhe had become strictly respectable, had married an assistant in the shop,\nrented a tiny villa at Clapham, added two childish lives to the teeming\nword, and developed on Sundays into a sidesman at a suburban church.\nNow he was on his way to Charing Cross from a solemn supper given by his\nemployers at a restaurant to some of their staff. He recognized Cuckoo\nand the spirit moved him to speak to her. He touched her arm.\n\n\"Miss-er-Miss Bright,\" he said.\n\nCuckoo stopped.\n\n\"Miss Bright, you remember me? Alf Heywood!\"\n\nHe was a little man, with a whitish face and wispy light brown hair. Now\nhis pale brown eyes glanced up at Cuckoo rather nervously under rapidly\nwinking lids. She stared at him.\n\n\"Alf Heywood?\" she repeated, without meaning.\n\n\"Yes, yes; Alf Heywood, as was in Brenton's millinery establishment, top\nof Regent Street. Him as give you that green dress. Don't you recall?\"\n\nCuckoo shook her head.\n\n\"Green, with white lace on it,\" he continued, with nervous emphasis.\n\nSuddenly Cuckoo said:\n\n\"White; no, it was yellow.\"\n\nMr. Heywood was delighted at this evidence of recollection.\n\n\"So it was, so it was,\" he said. \"But what I wanted to say was, that I'm\nsorry to see you here still.\"\n\n\"Eh?\"\n\n\"Sorry to see you here. I'm married, you know, turned over a new leaf,\nwith two children of my own, and come to see the error of my ways. I\nhoped as you--\"\n\nCuckoo walked on.\n\nHer dream of despair was not to be broken by Mr. Heywood and his\nnew-found respectability. Fate shattered it to fragments in very\ndifferent fashion. A sudden thrill ran through the crowd, coming from\na distance. People began to pause, to turn their heads, to murmur to\none another, then to press forward in one direction, craning their necks\nas if to catch sight of something. The street was almost blocked, and\nCuckoo was entangled in this seething excitement, of which at first she\ncould not divine the cause. Presently she heard shouts. The crowd swayed.\nThen a man's fierce yell cut the general murmur with the sharpness of a\nknife. Suddenly Cuckoo's dream fled. She pushed her way forward in the\ndirection of the cry; she struggled; she crept under arms and glided\nthrough narrow spaces with extraordinary dexterity and swiftness.\n\n\"He's mad,\" she heard a voice say.\n\n\"No; only drunk.\"\n\n\"He'll kill the other fellow if he gets at him.\"\n\n\"The coppers will be on him in a minute.\"\n\nCuckoo was panting with her effort, but she passed the voices and came\nupon the core of the crowd, the man who had yelled--Julian. She saw in\na moment that he was mad with drink. His hat was off; his coat was torn;\nhis evening clothes were covered with mud. Apparently he had fallen while\ngetting out of a cab. Two men--strangers of the street--were holding him\nforcibly back while he struggled furiously to attack another man, who\nfaced him calmly on the pavement with a smile of keen contempt. This man\nwas Valentine. Julian was screaming incoherent curses at him and wild\nthreats of murder. The crowd listened and jeered.\n\nCuckoo caught Julian by the arm. He turned on her to strike her. Then\nhis arm fell by his side. It seemed as if he recognized her even through\nthe veil of his excess. The drunken man looked on the starving woman, and\nthe curses died upon his lips. He began to shiver and to tremble from\nhead to foot. Valentine made a step towards him, but some in the crowd\ninterposed.\n\n\"Let him alone,\" they said. \"You'll only make him worse. Leave him to\nher.\"\n\nThe cab from which Julian had apparently just alighted was drawn up by\nthe kerbstone. Cuckoo, who had not uttered a word as yet, drew Julian\ntowards it. He staggered after her in silence, stumbled into the cab\nand collapsed in a heap in the corner, half on the floor, half on the\nseat. She got in after him, watched by the crowd, who seemed awed by the\nabrupt silence of this yelling madman at the touch of this spectral girl\nin black. Cuckoo gave her address to the cabman. Just as he was whipping\nup his horse to drive away, she leaned forward out of the cab as if to\nthe crowd--really to one man in it.\n\n\"He's my man!\" she said, drawing her thick eyebrows together, and with a\nnod of her head. \"He's my man. I'll see to him.\"\n\nThe cab drove off into the darkness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nAN AWAKENING\n\n\nThat drive in the night was taken in silence. Julian, a crumpled heap of\ndegraded humanity, slept. Cuckoo watched over him, half supporting him\nwith one thin arm. Exultation shone in her eyes and beat in her heart.\nThe glory of being alone with this drunken creature, his protector, his\nguide, lay round the girl like a glory of heaven. As she looked at his\nwhite face, and pressed her handkerchief against the blood that trickled\nfrom his forehead, wild tears of triumph, passionate tears of joy and\ndetermination, swam to her eyes. She felt at last the pride and the\nself-respect of one who possesses a will, and who has exercised it.\nThat was a justification of life to her mind. Something had given even\nto her the power to snatch this man to herself from the jaws of dark\nLondon, to carry him off, a succoured prey, from the world laughing at\nhis degradation. She bent over him in the rattling cab and touched his\nface with her lips. Was that a kiss? She, who had known so many kisses,\nwondered. It was the going forth of her soul to purify with flame the\nthing it loved.\n\nThe cab stopped; Cuckoo shook Julian. He stirred uneasily, opened his\neyes and shut them again, relapsing into something that seemed rather a\nsort of fit than a slumber. She called to the cabman to come and help\nher. Between them they carried Julian into the house and laid him out\nupon the horsehair sofa.\n\n\"He'll come to all right, lady,\" said the cabby, with a pleasant grin of\nknowledge. \"There's a many it takes like that. It ain't nothing.\"\n\nHe paused for his payment, and then Cuckoo remembered that she had no\nmoney. The thought did not worry her; it seemed too far off.\n\n\"I ain't got no money,\" she said.\n\nCabby's jaw dropped.\n\n\"Wait a second,\" she said. \"Go out, I'll get some.\"\n\nThe man withdrew doubtfully, then Cuckoo robbed Julian. She, who had\nnever yet taken money from him, stole the price of his fare to her\nprotection. Then she let the cabman out, locked the street door, and\nreturned. She sat down by Julian, who still appeared to sleep. And now\nsuddenly she felt that she was starving. She looked round the room; there\nwas nothing upon the table. Mrs. Brigg, an hour after her \"Te Deum,\" had\nbeen seized in the claws of reaction, and had repented of her generosity.\nSuspicions and doubts obscured the previous rapture of her mind. She\nbethought herself that Cuckoo might chance to return alone, still\npenniless; she remembered the rent still owing. Her impulse to kill\nfatted calves suddenly struck her as the act of a mad woman. As locusts\nclear a smiling country of all that nourishes, she swept the table of\nCuckoo clear, impounding to her larder with trembling, eager hands the\nfood that might never have been paid for. Thereupon she went to bed,\nnodding her old head, and muttering to herself with pursed lips.\n\nSo the eyes of Cuckoo looked in vain for something to stay the bodily\nmisery that stole upon her as she watched by Julian. Starvation stripped\naway all the mists from her soul and left it naked with the burdened\nsoul it loved. Despite her increasing pain of body, Cuckoo was conscious\ngradually of a light and airy delicacy of sensation that was touched with\nsomething magical. This awful hunger made her feel strangely pure, as\nif her deeds, which for years had clung round her like a brood of filthy\nvampires, were falling away from her one by one. They dropped down into\nthe night; she was mounting into freedom. And, despite faint agonies\nwhich at moments threatened to overwhelm her, she had never felt so\nhappy. Instinct led her to get away from the consciousness of her body\nby leaning utterly upon her mind. She sat down by Julian, bent over him,\nabsorbed herself in him. One of his hands she took gently in her own.\nThe little act baptized him hers in her mind, and she was aware of a\ngreat rush of happiness never known before. For she had him there in her\nnest, she alone. And she loved him. Even in his drunken sleep, even in\nhis massacred condition of ugliness and hatefulness, he was so beautiful\nto her that she could have wept from thankfulness. The world had taken\nfrom her everything, the very little that she had ever possessed, the\npurity that every creature has once, the innocence that she had never\nunderstood, left her this tipsy, degraded, abandoned, tragic atom of\nevil. And a great glory was hers. She could have fallen upon her knees\nin blessing and thankfulness, forgetful of all her tribe of sorrows,\nconscious only that she was a woman crowned and throned. By degrees she\nforgot that she was starving, forgot everything in an ecstasy of pure\npassion and pride, an ecstasy that brought food, rest, calm, to her.\n\nIn the dawn Julian stirred and murmured incoherent words. Cuckoo bent\ndown to hear them. But he slept again. And as the dawn grew, the light\nand airy feeling within her grew with it, till she seemed to be floating\nin the air and among soft, billowing clouds. At first there was light\nthrough them, light of the sun, strong and beautiful. But then it faded.\nAnd darkness came, and strange sounds like far-off voices, and a murmur\nas of waters deepening in volume and rushing upon her. They reached her.\nShe put out her hands and thought she cried out.\n\nThe waters swept her away.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"Cuckoo! Cuckoo! What is it? Cuckoo!\"\n\n\"She's a-comin'--she's a-comin' to.\"\n\n\"Give me some more water, then.\"\n\nCuckoo felt it very cold upon her face, and fancied at first that it was\nthose rushing waters of her dream. But the darkness parted, showing her\ntwo faces close together, one old and withered and yellow, one young, but\nwhite and lined. At first she looked at them without recognition. Again\nshe felt the cold drops of water dashing against her cheeks and lips, and\nthen she knew Mrs. Brigg and Julian, and she saw her little room, and\nthat it was morning and light. They helped her to sit up. She glanced\nwearily towards the table.\n\n\"What is it, Cuckoo?\" Julian said.\n\n\"Food; I'm starving,\" she whispered, faintly.\n\nHorror was written on his face.\n\n\"Starving! What the devil does she mean?\"\n\nHe turned on Mrs. Brigg, who suddenly shrunk away muttering:\n\n\"I'll get something; breakfast--I'll get it.\"\n\nJulian looked dazed. He was only recovering gradually from his drunken\nstupor.\n\n\"Starving--starving,\" he repeated, vacantly staring at Cuckoo, who said\nnothing more, only lay back, trying to understand things, and to emerge\nfrom the mists and noises in which she still seemed to be floating.\nPresently Mrs. Brigg returned and shuffled about the table with a\nfurtive, contorted face, laying breakfast. The teapot smoked.\n\n\"Come along, my dearie,\" began the old creature.\n\nBut Julian thrust her out of the room. He brought Cuckoo tea and food,\nfed her, put the cup to her lips. At first she had scarcely the strength\nto swallow, but presently she began to revive, and then ate and drank so\nravenously that Julian, even in his vague condition, was appalled.\n\n\"Good God, it's true!\" he said. \"Cuckoo starving!\"\n\nHe sat by her turning this piercing matter over in his mind. Its\nstrangeness helped to sober him.\n\n\"You eat too,\" she said.\n\nHe shook his head.\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" she insisted feverishly.\n\nTo pacify her he made a sort of attempt at breakfast, and felt the better\nfor it. Together they progressed slowly towards the normal. At last the\nmeal was over. Cuckoo lay back, feeling wonderfully better and calm and\nhappy. But Julian's eyes were searching hers insistently.\n\n\"What have you been doing?\" he said. \"You've got to tell me. Starving!\nWhat's the meaning of it?\"\n\nHis voice sounded almost angry and threatening.\n\n\"I ain't got any money,\" she said.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\nShe didn't answer.\n\n\"Why--I say?\" he repeated.\n\n\"Because I've given up the street,\" she said simply.\n\n\"Given up the street--Cuckoo!\"\n\nHe laid his hand down heavily upon one of hers.\n\n\"Since when?\"\n\n\"Oh--a little while. It don't matter how long.\"\n\nHe sat glancing about the room.\n\n\"Where's Jessie?\" he asked suddenly.\n\nCuckoo burst out crying.\n\n\"I had to--I had to,\" she sobbed.\n\n\"To do what?\"\n\n\"To part with her.\"\n\n\"What! You've sold Jessie!\"\n\nJulian stood up. This last fact struck right home to him, banishing all\nhis vagueness, setting his mind on its feet firmly.\n\n\"Jessie sold!\" he exclaimed again, in a loud voice. \"Cuckoo, why have you\ndone this? Tell me--tell me at once.\"\n\nShe strove to control her sobs.\n\n\"I didn't know what to do to get you away from him,\" she said presently,\nflushing scarlet. \"I didn't never see you; I didn't know where you was. I\nknew as you didn't like me going on the street. Once you asked me not to.\nRemember?\"\n\nJulian nodded, with a piercing gaze on her.\n\n\"So--so thinks I--I'll keep away; p'rhaps it'll get him back.\"\n\n\"Me?\"\n\nHe sat down with a white face. All about him there was flame. He seemed\nto understand what he had never understood before, the wonder of the lady\nof the feathers, the mystery that had drawn him so strangely to her. He\ncaught her in his arms.\n\n\"Oh, Cuckoo, Cuckoo,\" he said, brokenly. \"You love me.\"\n\nHe laid his lips on hers, and pressed her mouth in a passion of emotion\nthat was almost an assault. And still the fire was about him. She clung\nto him with her thin arms.\n\n\"That's it,\" she whispered, in reply to his words.\n\nJulian held her in silence, felt her heart beating, the piteous tenuity\nof her little body, the weak grasp of her arms round him. These things\nbroke upon him one by one with a crescendo of meaning that came like a\ngreat revelation, came to him shod with flame, winged with flame, moving\nin flame, warm like flame.\n\n\"You starved for me, sold Jessie for me,\" he whispered. \"How I love you!\nHow I love you!\"\n\nAnd he crushed her close in an embrace that was almost brutal.\n\nThe door bell rang. Julian let Cuckoo go.\n\n\"He has come for me,\" he said.\n\nShe knew it too, and looked at him with a piteous, greedy questioning.\n\n\"I hate him now,\" he said in answer.\n\nThe door of the room opened. They both turned towards it. Valentine\nentered.\n\n\"I thought I should find you here,\" he said, stopping near the door. \"Are\nyou better, Julian?\"\n\n\"Better?\"\n\n\"Last night you were not yourself.\"\n\n\"I have not been myself for a long time,\" Julian replied.\n\n\"I had not noticed any change.\"\n\nJulian made no reply. A dogged expression had come into his face. He was\nstill sitting close to Cuckoo. Now he took her hand in his. As he did so,\nValentine moved a little nearer, as if urged by a sudden impulse. He bent\ndown to gaze into Cuckoo's face, and uttered a short exclamation.\n\n\"The battle!\" he said.\n\nAn expression almost of awe had come into his eyes, and for a moment he\nhesitated, even half turned as if to slink away. But then, with a strong\neffort, he recovered himself and again fixed his eyes on Julian.\n\n\"Come, Julian!\" he said.\n\n\"I will not come.\"\n\n\"I have a cab here waiting.\" Valentine spoke with an iron calm. \"We had\narranged to go to Magdalen's.\"\n\nJulian uttered an oath.\n\n\"That devil!\" he exclaimed. \"I won't go to her. I am half dead. I am\nkilling myself.\"\n\nHe pulled himself up short, then cried out savagely, and half\ndespairingly:\n\n\"No, by God, you are killing me!\"\n\nHe began to tremble, and looked towards Cuckoo as a man looks who seeks\nfor refuge.\n\n\"You are treating me very strangely, Julian,\" Valentine said frigidly.\n\"Last night you were drunk. You seemed to take me for some enemy, and\nstruck me. Many men would resent your conduct. I am too much your\nfriend.\"\n\n\"You--my friend!\" Julian exclaimed bitterly.\n\n\"You!\"\n\nAbruptly he sprang up, tearing his hand out of Cuckoo's. He went over to\nValentine and stared with a passion of perplexity and of loathing into\nhis eyes.\n\n\"What, in God's name, are you?\" he said, in an uncertain voice. \"Are you\nman or devil? You are not Valentine--not the man I loved. I'll swear it.\nYou are some damned stranger, and I have lived with you\"--he shuddered\nirrepressibly--\"and never knew it till now.\"\n\n\"You say I am a stranger?\"\n\n\"Yes, with the face of my friend.\"\n\n\"How can that be?\"\n\nAgain a misery of confusion and of fear swept over Julian.\n\n\"Whence did I come, then?\" Valentine asked.\n\nHe began to have the air of a man bent on some revelation. An immense\npower infused itself through him. His blue eyes were utterly fearless.\nThe moment of open battle had come at last. Well, he would not attempt\nto avoid it, to gain further uneasy peace. He would strike a final blow,\nsecure of his own victory.\n\nAnd Cuckoo sat watching silently. She remembered the night on which\nValentine had half revealed the mystery to her, who could not understand\nit. Was he about to reveal it now to Julian? Her eyes flamed with\neagerness, and again Valentine looked into them and faltered for a\nmoment. Then he turned resolutely away from her, as if he gave his whole\nheart and soul to the business before him, to this Julian who at last\nbegan to shrink from him, to feel terror at his approach, even to\nrepudiate him.\n\n\"From what have I come, then?\" he repeated.\n\nJulian paused, as if he sought an answer, looking backwards into the\npast. Suddenly he cried:\n\n\"From that trance! Yes; it was then. That flame going away, it was--it\nmust have been--Valentine.\"\n\n\"You talk like a madman.\"\n\nBut Julian did not heed the sneer. He was passionately engrossed by\nthe flood of thoughts that had come to him. He was struggling to wake\nfinally from the dreary and infamous dream in which he had been\nwalking--deceived, tricked, tyrant-ridden--for so long.\n\n\"But then Valentine is dead,\" he cried.\n\nHis face went white. He sank down, clinging suddenly to Cuckoo.\n\n\"Dead!\" he repeated in a whisper.\n\nThe girl's touch was strangely warm on his hands, like fire. He looked up\ninto her eyes, seeking passionately for that flame that now he began\nvaguely to connect with the Valentine he had lost.\n\n\"Or is he--?\"\n\nJulian hesitated, still gazing at the white and weary face of Cuckoo.\nSuddenly Valentine said loudly:\n\n\"You are right. He is dead.\"\n\nHe laughed aloud.\n\n\"I killed him,\" he said, \"when I took his place. Julian, you shall\nknow now, what the lady of the feathers knows already, what a human\nwill can do, when it is utterly content with itself, when it is trained,\ndeveloped, perfected. I came through Marr to Valentine. I was Marr.\"\n\n\"Marr!\" Julian said slowly. \"You!\"\n\n\"And Marr, too, was my prey. Like Valentine he was not content with\nhimself. His weakness of discontent was my opportunity. I expelled his\nwill, for mine was stronger than his. I lived in his body until the time\ncame for me to be with you. Have you ever read of vampires?\"\n\nJulian muttered a hoarse assent. He seemed bound by a strange spell,\ninert, paralysed almost.\n\n\"There are vampires in the modern world who feed, not upon bodies, but\nupon souls, wills. And each soul they feed upon gives to them greater\nstrength, a longer reign upon the earth. Who knows? One of them in\ntime may compass eternity.\"\n\nHe seemed to tower up in the little room, to blaze with triumph.\n\n\"When you see a man go down, sink into the mire, and you say, 'He is\nweak--he has come under a bad influence'--it is a vampire who feeds upon\nhis soul, who sucks the blood of his will. Sometimes the vampire comes in\nhis own form, sometimes he wears a mask--the mask of a friend's form and\nface. The influences that wreck men are the vampires of the soul at work,\nJulian, at work.\"\n\nHis face was terrible. Julian shrank from it. He turned to Cuckoo.\n\n\"They feed on women too,\" he said. \"On the souls of women. Men say that\nmagic is a dream and a chimera. Women say that miracles are past, or that\nthere never were such things. But the power of sin is magical. The death\nof beauty and of innocence in a soul is a miracle. My power over you,\nJulian, is magic. The bondage of your soul to mine is a miracle. Come\nwith me.\"\n\n\"I will not come.\"\n\nBut Julian's face, his whole attitude, betokened the most piteous and\ndegraded irresolution. This man, this creature, governed him despite\nhimself. He felt once more for the hand of Cuckoo, and finding it, spoke\nagain more firmly:\n\n\"I'll not come,\" he said. \"I'll stay with her. I love her.\"\n\nValentine cast a malign glance upon Cuckoo, but again fear seemed to draw\nnear to him. He made no answer.\n\n\"Only once I'll come,\" Julian said. \"To-night. I lost Valentine in the\ndark. In the dark I'll seek for him, I'll find him again. Cuckoo shall\ncome too, and the doctor. That flame--it went into the air. I'll find\nit--I'll find it again.\"\n\n\"Come, then--seek it--seek Valentine. But I, too, was with you in the\ndark. And in the dark I will destroy you. Till to-night then, Julian!\"\n\nHe turned and went out.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE LAST SITTING\n\n\nThat evening Julian drove Cuckoo down Victoria Street. On the way\nthey scarcely spoke. The doctor, summoned by a messenger, was there\nbefore them. He, although ignorant of what had passed been Julian and\nValentine, was deeply expectant. Cuckoo was exhausted by the sleepless\nnight of her vigil over Julian, and by the severe joy, almost like pain,\nthat had burst upon her with his avowal and with his savage embrace.\n\nWhen she entered the tentroom followed by Julian, she looked like a\nshadow gliding wearily through twilight. The doctor was there with\nValentine. Valentine's face was gay. His manner was ardent, almost\ntempestuous. The clear calmness so generally characteristic of him had\nvanished, swept away by the flood of his triumph perhaps. Julian seemed\nnervous, and his appearance was so haggard as to be engrossing to any one\nwho was observant. There was a hunted, fearful look in his eyes. His\nhands were never for a moment still. He kept close to Cuckoo. He even\nheld her hands as he sat by her, and she felt that his were burning hot.\nHe scarcely noticed the doctor, who observed him closely. Valentine\nwatched his feverish excitement with laughing eyes. Of those four people\nhe alone seemed entirely untouched by any deep emotion, entirely master\nof himself. For even Doctor Levillier was curiously moved that night, and\nwas unable to suppress every trace of abnormal emotion.\n\nThey sat down. There were no flowers in the room. Valentine explained\nthat he had remembered Cuckoo's fainting fit and feared its renewal.\n\n\"I am afraid you are still scarcely yourself,\" he added, with a\nsolicitude that was too elaborate to be agreeable. \"You are looking\npale and tired. You are sure to sleep again.\"\n\n\"I'll not sleep to-night,\" she answered, showing none of her usual fear\nof him.\n\nThe assertion of her will, her momentary rescue of Julian, Julian's\navowed love for her, his clinging to her as to a refuge--all these\nthings, so Cuckoo thought, built up in her a great fearlessness. In her\nbodily weakness she felt strong. Her faded, weakly frame held now a large\nspirit of which she was finely conscious. And she attributed this leaping\nspirit, so brave, so intense to these things, these facts of which she\ncould make a list. She did not know that behind them all there was a\nmotive power inspiring her, through them perhaps, but of itself. How\noften is the power behind the throne unsuspected, unheeded. Cuckoo did\nnot recognize it in this crisis, although there had been moments in the\npast when the murmur of its voice had stolen upon her and stirred her to\nwonder and to perturdation. And Valentine, to whom the combat came, saw\nnot his real foe. And Julian looked only into Cuckoo's faded eyes for\nrefuge, for comfort. And Doctor Levillier--? At present he could only\nwait patiently in the hope, doubtful, fragmentary of revelation.\n\nConversation that night was uneasy and disjointed. Cuckoo's defiance\nof Valentine was fully apparent. Julian's fear, obviously grown up to\nhatred, of his former friend shone clearly. There was a nakedness about\nthe manners of both tired woman and shattered man that was disquieting\nand unusual. Valentine did not seem to notice it or to be moved about it.\nIf anything, it might be supposed to add to his pleasure an unnatural\nrevelry in being hated. Doctor Levillier, glancing from him to Julian,\nfound him self-involved in remembrances of Rip and Valentine. The terror\nand the hate of the dog seemed to be reproduced vividly in the terror and\nthe hate of the man. Valentine watched both with smiling eyes and drew\ndraughts of power from that fountain of horror.\n\nAt last conversation failed entirely. Julian was half stretched on the\ndivan, gazing at Cuckoo as one who aspires to salvation. It was apparent\nthat he was fully awake to the terror of his own situation; that he\npierced the depths of the abyss into which he had fallen, in which he lay\ncrippled, prisoned, ruined. Yet a hope had dawned on him with the dawning\nof the full knowledge of his fall, of his fantastic self-deception. The\ngreat love in this woman's eyes shone down into the abyss, shone from\nthat face pinched by starvation. There was Heaven in it. There was the\nflame. Yes, he saw it now, not literally as in the past days, when its\nmystery had plunged him in awe, when its presence had touched him with a\ngreat fear, but imaginatively, as men see flames of help, and of faith,\nand of purity, shining in the eyes of the good women they worship, with\nthe reverence of earth for the distant wonder of the sky. He saw it now\nwithout fear, but with a passion of desire, a sharp consciousness of his\ndegradation, that swept over him like a storm. And even yet, in this new\nknowledge, this rapture of awakening, he was still a bond slave, or\nfeared he was, to this stranger with the face of a friend, this enemy\nwith the presence of his former guardian angel. Only Cuckoo could save\nhim, he said to himself, if indeed the day of salvation were not long\nago past--only Cuckoo. For despite her many sins, the flame shone in her\neyes. And where the flame shone there alone was even the shadow of help,\na shadow within the shadow of those eyes.\n\nIn the silence that had come upon his guests, Valentine turned to them,\nand said:\n\n\"We are supposed to be here for a sitting. Well, shall we have it?\"\n\n\"Yes--yes,\" Julian said, \"a last sitting.\"\n\n\"Why--last?\"\n\nJulian sat up on the divan, and his hands were clenched on the cushions.\n\n\"Because if nothing happens to-night I'll give it up. I'll never sit\nagain. And if Cuckoo sleeps--\"\n\nHe paused.\n\n\"She will sleep,\" Valentine said. \"I have the power to make her.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Cuckoo.\n\n\"Don't you think so, doctor?\"\n\n\"It seemed so the other night,\" the doctor answered.\n\n\"And with each sitting my power will increase. Do you hear, Julian?\"\n\n\"You're very fond of talking about your power,\" Julian said, roughly.\n\n\"No. But I may be very fond of exercising it. Why help me, then, by\nsitting?\"\n\nHe spoke in a bantering tone. Julian began to look doubtful. Could it\nbe that all was changed, that there was only danger in this act, that to\ngrope thus in the darkness for lost hope, lost safety, a lost Valentine,\nwith love, trust, beauty, still clinging about him, was to stumble\nfurther into a deepening night? It might be so. And if Cuckoo slept--!\n\nValentine smiled at this wavering approach of indecision. But Doctor\nLevillier said, decisively:\n\n\"I wish to sit. It interests me. Send me to sleep, too, if you can,\nCresswell.\"\n\n\"I will,\" Valentine answered, lightly. \"Come.\"\n\nThe doctor saw him standing for a moment in the light, with a glory\nof power and of triumph upon his face, and remembered that glory, even\nseemed to see it, a clear vision, when darkness filled the room.\n\nOut of the darkness came the murmur of a voice.\n\n\"The last sitting,\" it said.\n\nJulian was the speaker. Nobody replied. Silence followed. As before,\nthe doctor sat between Julian and Valentine and touched their hands. As\nbefore, the darkness, and this mutual act in it, developed in him the\nfaculty of hearing, or of thinking he heard, the voices of the thoughts\nof his companions. So far this night echoed the last night of the year.\nWould it echo that night farther still to the ultimate notes of this\nmusic of minds? The doctor wondered. He was soon to know.\n\nOnce again the notes of Valentine's Litany stole upon his heart. And\nto-night they seemed to him louder, more strident than before, as if\nblared from a soul that held a veritable brass band of shrill egoism\nwithin it. The doctor listened. He remembered presently that the former\nLitany had been broken sometimes, hesitating, that Valentine had been\nassailed by vague fears that stole upon him like ghosts from the lady of\nthe feathers. To-night those little ghosts were laid. They came not. It\nseemed that Valentine had conquered them. No longer did they crowd to\nhear the bold fury of the Litany. No longer dared even one to creep along\nalone to bend and to listen. The doctor knew then that this night was not\ndestined to be a mere echo of its fore-runner. It was at first as if\nValentine had closed the rift in his lute, had bridged the gulf between\nhis trial and his triumph. A tremendous sadness came upon the doctor with\nthis thought, enveloping him in a cloud of cold. His heart fainted within\nhim, as at some great catastrophe. He could have wept like a man who\nfinds the trust of his life ill-founded, the faith in which he has dwelt\nbuilded upon the quicksand. He fancied that Valentine instantly became\naware of his distress, and that the knowledge swelled the mighty tide of\nthe music of the Litany. And this thought struck him and roused the man\nin him, like the call of circumstance on valour, crying: \"Will a man say\nthat anything is irrevocable, while there is breath in him to give the\nbattle-cry, strength in him to stir a limb?\" Then the faintness left him\nwith the demeanour of that which is ashamed. The cold cloud evaporated.\nHe heard the Litany without fear, but with a great desire to strike a\nlightning silence through it, with a fine hatred that destroyed his\nformer hopelessness. This blatant will that sang ever the song of self,\nthat had no desire but to itself, no glory but in its own deeds, no\naim but to impress itself upon some slave, some Julian of this world,\nstood before the doctor's imagination like a personality, a devil\nembodied,--more, like the devil of whom men and women speak, against whom\nreligion prays, and strives and rears great churches, and consecrates\npriests. Egoism developed to the utmost limits, is that the Devil? The\ndoctor asked himself the question, and the great shadow that dogs the\nsteps of life went by him on its black mission in the likeness of\nValentine singing. And all the modern world stood still to hear and\nwhispered: \"Hark! It is an angel singing! If we but echo the song we\ntouch the stars. If we but echo the song we, who are weary of time, shall\nknow eternity. If we but echo the song we shall lay grief to rest beneath\nmany roses, and draw from its sculptured sepulchre the radiant form of\njoy. We shall sing that we shall be great.\" And the modern world lifted\nup its voice, and when it sang, harmony was slain by discord.\n\nThe doctor shuddered, seeing an inferno of many circles. But the coward\nin him did not rise again. There was the gleam of a distant light upon\nhim, unquenchable and serene. He doubted the eternity of the triumph of\nthis Valentine, though he knew not why he doubted, nor upon what his\ndoubts were based.\n\nAnd as this doubt, which was a faith, blossomed within him he had a fancy\nthat the music of the Litany wavered, faltered--that through it ran a\nthrill like a faint shadow of some dull despair.\n\nAt this moment Valentine spoke in the darkness.\n\n\"What are you doing, Julian?\" he asked, quickly.\n\n\"Nothing,\" Julian answered.\n\n\"I heard you whisper.\"\n\n\"I only said something to Cuckoo.\"\n\n\"We must not talk. Let us link our fingers instead of only touching each\nother.\"\n\nThey all did so and were silent once more.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd now a fear seized the doctor. He became aware that a drowsy spirit\nlike the little sandman who threw the dust of slumber into the eyes of\nthe children stole round the circle. In his hands were poppy-seeds and\nopiates, and his touch was magical with sleep. Valentine had surely\nevoked him by a strange effort of will. He came, and his feet were shod\nso that he moved without noise. He filled the atmosphere with heaviness,\nand with a murmurous melody, like the melody of the drooping streams that\nhang their silver ribands over the hills of the far Lotus land. Passing\nthe doctor, he stole to the place where Cuckoo sat between Julian and\nValentine. And then he paused. The doctor divined his mission, to weave\na veil and cast a cloud of sleep around the lady of the feathers. The\nweariness of Cuckoo's life lay like a burden upon her, a heavy burden\nto-night, despite the wild wakefulness of her spirit, the passion of\nher answered love, the strength of her resolution, the purity that drew\nnear to her at last with ivory wings along the miry ways. She, who was at\nlast awake, and conscious of the glory of a woman's will to rescue and to\nshelter, was to sleep again. The sentinel was to be overcome at her post,\nthat the enemy might penetrate the lines and seize the citadel. How heavy\nthe air was! To the doctor it seemed alive with sleep, as the waters of\nthe great sea are alive with death for the sailor who sinks down in them.\nHe saw the weaving of the veil that was dropping gently round Cuckoo. He\nsaw the cloud shrouding her in a scarcely palpable mist. Or was it his\ndream? Or was it his fancy? For it was dark. There stood the tiny,\nobstinate spirit by Cuckoo's side. His hands touched her forehead, and\ntouched her white and weary eyelids, and the doctor knew that all the\nfatigues of her life trooped together, as at a word of command, and came\nupon her to conquer her. They pressed round, nameless wearinesses induced\nby acts which had made Cuckoo that which she was. And they seemed to\nwhisper to her: \"You cannot fight. You cannot protect--it is all over.\nYou can only sleep--you can only sleep. Sleep! You are so weary. Sleep,\nfor life, which has taken everything else from you, has left you that.\"\nCuckoo's face was white with the story of her life, and with the wonder\nof her recent self-denial, and with the memory of her martyrdom when the\nlittle old man of the many dogs shuffled to the door, bearing from her\nthe friend of her loneliness. Her eyes were hollow and desolate. It\nseemed that she gave heed to the voices and listened to the beautiful\nlegend of the magic and the holiness of sleep. And as she seemed to\ngive heed, the devil of the egoism of Valentine rose again before the\ndoctor, sharply outlined and distinct, and smiled with the triumph of\nthe egoism--that modern vampire--of all the world, terrifically\nunconquerable. Would Cuckoo sleep? The doctor debated this question\nsilently and with an agony of anxiety. He felt as if the fate of worlds\nhung upon it, and the destinies of kings.\n\nWould she sleep?\n\nThe obstinate spirit stood by her always, and the song of Valentine was a\nprocession of triumph in the night.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nJulian's thoughts broke upon the doctor fiercely, and swept him from his\ncontemplation of Cuckoo. No drowsy poppy-bed was Julian's. The shadowy\nspirit of sleep strove not to influence him. No opiates gave him peace.\nNo veil of gentle forgetfulness descended upon him. He was a human being\nplunged in the deepest abyss of fate, beneath the range of the starlight\nand the gaze of other worlds. He was trembling, stretching out his feeble\nhands in the blackness for guidance, sick with apprehension, betrayed,\ndeluded. And now he began to writhe in the grasp of a new terror, for it\nseemed to the doctor that he, too, was conscious of the obstinate spirit\nthat stood beside Cuckoo, and that he dreaded the approach of his doom in\nher slumber. He, too, murmured silently, \"Will she sleep? Will she\nsleep?\" If indeed she slept at the word of Valentine--Julian's last hope\nwas gone. For he had now concentrated himself almost utterly on Cuckoo.\nNo longer did he draw near to her half in awe, half in derision, led to\nher by the presence of the flame that flickered, something strangely\napart from her, in her sad eyes. No longer did he set her and the flame\napart. To him she was the flame, the only refuge, the only safety. For he\nsought the lost Valentine indeed, but with a strange hopelessness of ever\nfinding him again. She must not sleep. She must not sleep. In her slumber\nthe flame would die down, flicker lower and lower to a spark, to grey,\ncold ashes. And Julian in his distraction thought of himself as\ninevitably lost should the flame die, should Cuckoo sleep, ruled by\nValentine. The fight was between Cuckoo, the flame, and Valentine.\nEverything else fell away and left Julian's world bare of all things save\nthis one contest. This the doctor learnt in the darkness. But still the\nspirit of sleep kept vigil by Cuckoo, and the air grew heavy and full of\nslumber.\n\nThe doctor began to feel that his own powers were being strenuously\nattacked. Inertia grew in his body. He sat almost like one paralyzed. His\nlimbs, at first heavy as if loaded with intolerable weights, gradually\nbecame numb, until he was no longer aware of them. He seemed to be merely\na live mind poised there in the darkness, striving against the power that\nsought to sweep from its path all those that fought against it or dared,\nhowever feebly, to resist it. But his mind, poised thus in this strange\ncircle of slumber, came by imperceptible degrees to have a grip upon the\npast. Imitating the mind that is enclosed within a drowning body, it\ngazed upon the wildly flitting pictures of the years that were gone.\nRegent Street by night rose up before it. The doctor saw, painted upon\nthe background of the dense gloom in which they sat, the huge and vacant\nthoroughfare in the last watch of the night. Faint figures wandered here\nand there, or paused beneath the shadow of the tall blind houses,\nassuming postures of fatigue or of leering and attentive evil. But one\nmoved onward steadily, scarcely glancing to the right or to the left. The\ndoctor's mind, watching, knew that this moving figure was himself, and,\nas if with bodily eyes, he marked its course down the long vista of the\ndim street until it passed into more private ways of the town. It passed\ninto more private ways, but not alone. A shadow followed it, and the face\nof the shadow was turned away. The doctor could not see it, but there\nrose in him the horror and the fear which had attacked him long ago, when\nhe turned to pursue the thing that dogged him in the darkness. And he saw\nthe shadow waver, pause, then turn to flee. And as it turned he thought\nthat it had the soul, though not the face, of the new Valentine. Then\nsuddenly a great anger against himself was born in him. Why had he been\nso blind, so deceived? He might have protected Julian. But he, too, had\nbeen a foolish victim of outward beauty, the prey of the glory of a face.\nHe had not read the book of the heart. And other pictures succeeded this\nvision of the streets and of the shadows that walk in them by night. He\nsaw Valentine singing while he and Julian listened. And the eyes of\nValentine were as the eyes of a saint, but now he knew that behind them\ncrouched a soul that was filled with evil. Slowly the air grew heavy.\nSlumber paced in the tiny room. The doctor struggled against it. But the\ncolours of the brain-pictures faded. He saw them still, but only as one\nsees the world in a fog; looming forms that have lost their true\ncharacter, that have assumed a vagueness of mystery, outlines at once\nheavy and remote, suggestive yet indefinite. And still the spirit of\nsleep keep vigil by Cuckoo.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere was a slight hoarse cry in the night.\n\n\"What is that?\" Valentine said, sharply.\n\nThere was no reply. The doctor could have told him that the cry came from\nJulian, and that the lady of the feathers, leaning low in her chair, had\npassed from consciousness into insensibility.\n\nThe spirit of sleep stole away. His work was accomplished. Julian sank\nforward upon the table with a gesture of utter abnegation. He thought\nthat Cuckoo was dead. He felt that she was dead, as long ago he had felt\nthat his loved friend, that Valentine who had protected him and taught\nhim the right way of life, was dead in the night.\n\nDoctor Levillier seemed to see Rip crouching down against the wall.\n\nAnd now Valentine's will prepared to assert itself finally. It rose up to\ntriumph as it had risen up to triumph over Rip. Was that struggle going\nto be repeated? Nothing had intruded upon it except the marvellous\ntenacity of the dog, who had died rather than yield obedience, died\nfighting. That tenacity surely did not dwell in the nerveless Julian,\nutterly despairing, utterly wrecked.\n\nThe doctor trembled, feeling that the close of the strange mystery was\nat hand. And as he trembled he seemed to see in the dense darkness a\ntiny flame. It shivered up in the blackness where Cuckoo slept, moved\naway from her, like a thing blown on a light wind, and flickered above\nthe bowed, despairing head of Julian. And, as he watched it, wondering,\nthe doctor was conscious once more that there was a new presence in the\nroom, something mysterious, intent, vehement, yet touched with a strange\nand pathetic helplessness, something that cried against itself, something\nthat had suffered a martyrdom unknown, unequalled, in all the pale\nhistory of the martyrdoms of the world. The doctor recalled the sitting\nof the former night and his impression then--and again he was governed by\nthe tragedy of this unknown soul. Its despair laid upon him cold hands.\nIts impotence crushed him. He could have wept and prayed for it. This was\nfor a moment. Then a new wonder grew in him. His eyes were on the flame\nwhich burned above the bowed head of Julian, and presently, while he\ngazed, he seemed to see, beyond and through it--as one who peers through\na lit window--the face of Valentine, the beautiful, calm, lofty Valentine\nwhom once he had loved. The face was white with a soft glory of\nendurance, and the eyes smiled like the eyes of a great king. And the\ndoctor knew comfort. For this face, although marred by the shadow intense\nsuffering ever leaves behind it, was instinct with the majesty of\ntriumph. And the eyes were bent on Julian. Then Julian moved in the\ndarkness and looked upward, despair seeking hope.\n\nThe man who sat by the doctor, and who was now nameless to him, was\nfilled with a passionate fury. The doctor heard the Litany of his glory\ncease, and the long pulse of his heart throbbing with effort. His soul\nrose up, as the cruel spectre of the new Valentine had risen up to seize\nupon Rip, and moved towards Julian to dominate him finally, to draw him\ninto its own eternal evil and pride and passion of degraded power. But\nJulian stretched his arms towards the flame which drew its brightness and\nits force from Cuckoo sleeping. That was a last battle of souls, and the\nallegory of it came clearly to the doctor's mind.\n\nHe divined, as in a vision, or as in a dream that is more real than\nreality, the story of his friend, the true Valentine, whom he had loved.\nHe remembered Valentine's dissatisfaction with the glory of his own\nbeautiful nature, his mad desire to change it. That dissatisfaction, that\ndesire, had been the opportunity of the enemy. The soul that sighed in\nsorrow as it contemplated its own loveliness had been expelled by the\nsoul that was completely satisfied with its own hatefulness. The weakness\nof the flame of purity had built up the strength of the flame of\nimpurity. And so beauty was driven out to wander in the wilderness of the\nair, and ugliness dwelled in its body, its temple swept and garnished,\nlike the seven devils of the Scripture. For how long a time had the\nwandering flame or soul of beauty been helpless, impotent, tortured by\nthe appalling deception of the soul of Julian, whom it could no longer\nprotect! Unable to be at rest, it had stayed to contemplate the dreary\nlegend of Julian's gradual fall. It had seen his confidence in his love\nfor the stranger whom he thought his friend and his protector. In the\npale and delicate dawn, shrouded in the mystery of night and day,\nenclosed between the clasping hands of the angels of darkness and of\nlight, it had hung in the air above the solitary Julian, as he walked\nhomeward after his vigil by the lifeless body of Valentine. With a\npassionate effort it had sought to draw him to a knowledge of the truth,\nthat he might wake from the dream in which lay his insecurity, at last\nhis tragic danger. And faintly, even as the first sunbeam it had dawned\nupon him, once as he met the lady of the feathers, again as he bent his\ngaze upon the theatrical glories that attended the apotheosis of\nMargaret. And it had flickered behind the film of the tears in a woman's\neyes, seeking to make itself known through the beauty of the love that\nclung inexorably to the heart of Cuckoo in the midst of the degradation\nand the corruption of her fate. Cuckoo had given it a home. She was\nalone. It approached her. She was an outcast. It stayed with her. She\nwas beaten by the thongs of a world that teems with Pharisees. It clung\nto her. She had, through all her days and nights, been put only to the\nblack uses of evil. It sought to use her only for good. And now at last\nit drew strength and power from the soul of the lady of the feathers. And\nthe doctor knew that the secret of Cuckoo's grand influence to succour\nlay in her completeness. Degraded, wretched, soiled, ignorant, pent\nwithin the prison-house of lust--yet she loved completely. And because\nshe loved completely, the sad, wandering, driven soul of Valentine chose\nher from all the world to help him in the rescue of Julian. For she, like\nthe widow, had given her all to feed the poor. Her starvation had set her\non high, more than the starvation and the mortification of saints and\nhermits. For they crucify the flesh for the good of their own souls.\nCuckoo thought ever and only of another. She had betrayed Jessie and\ntouched the stars. Now in her slumber, physical allegory of her\nabnegation of self, she fought in this battle of the souls.\n\nThe flame above the head of Julian grew brighter. The flame of Marr,\nstriving with the fury of despair, flickered lower.\n\nDoctor Levillier held his breath and prayed. Again he thought of Rip.\nWould Julian too die rather than yield to the final grip of evil? Would\nhe die fighting?\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nA strange thin cry broke through the silence. The doctor saw two flames\nfloat up together through the darkness. They passed before the face of\nCuckoo and were lost in the air above her. Two happy flames.\n\nShe stirred suddenly and murmured.\n\nThe thing that sat by the doctor sprang up. Light flashed through the\nroom.\n\nAs it flashed the doctor leaned towards Julian, who lay forward with his\narms stretched along the table.\n\nHe was dead.\n\nValentine--the spirit, at least, that had usurped the body of\nValentine--stood looking down upon Julian, dead, in silence.\n\nThen it turned upon the doctor. The doctor stood up as one that nerves\nhimself to meet a great horror.\n\nHe watched the light fade out of the eyes of this horror, the expression\nslink from the features, the breath remove from the lips, the pulses\ncease in the veins and arteries, until an image, some lifeless and\nstaring idol, stood before him.\n\nIt swayed. It tottered. It fell, crumpling itself together like things\nthat return to dust. The flesh, formerly kept alive by the spirit, now\ndeserted finally by that which had dwelt within it and sought to use it\nfor destruction, went down to death.\n\nThen the lady of the feathers awoke at last from her sleep. The doctor\nbent over her and took her hands in his. It seemed to him that she had\nwon a great battle. He felt awestruck as he looked into her eyes. He\ntried to speak to her, but no words came to him except these, which he\nmurmured at last below his breath:\n\n\"Your victory.\"\n\nCuckoo looked up at him. Her eyes were still lightly clouded with sleep,\nbut they were smiling, as if they had been gazing upon the face of\nbeauty.\n\nFor how long had Cuckoo slept? Surely through all the length of her life,\nthrough all the tears that she had shed, through all the sad deeds that\nshe had committed! Now, at last, she woke.\n\nHer slumber had been as the deep slumber of death.\n\nAnd from death do we not awake to a new understanding and to a new world?","title":"Flames","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":171479}