Chapter VI: Part 6

"There is other trouble, Mr. Samphire."

Then Mark smiled pitifully. His premonition of disaster was justified.

"You can speak f-f-frankly," he stammered.

The surgeon spoke frankly, making plain in his precise phraseology what was and what might be. "You will take another opinion," he concluded, "but it is not a matter of opinion, but of fact. These," he pointed to some reagents, "never lie. Doctors do--sometimes."

"I thank you for not lying to me," said Mark gravely.

Barger fumbled with his test tubes, and then burst out vehemently:

"Your only chance lies in the most careful diet, a life in the open air; and even then the issue is doubtful."

"And--marriage?"

"Out of the question."

"But if I got better? Should I be justified in asking a woman to wait?"

His voice was dry and husky. Barger shook his head. The trouble might be staved off for a time, hut there was always the probability of return.

"You have neglected your body," he said irritably. "You have defrauded it of all things essential, and it has taken its revenge. Oh, you parsons who think of others, why can't you see that you would serve the world better if you thought more of yourselves?"

Mark could read the sympathy and pity latent beneath frowns and irritability. He held out his hand. Barger continued:

"You must go to a physician. Yours is not a case for a surgeon. You might try Sir John Drax. He's a specialist. Shall I write him a note? He lives near here, in Welbeck Street."

Berger scribbled a few lines, and handed them to Mark.

"See him at once," he commanded; "suspense is unendurable."

Mark went his way, so blinded by misery that in crossing the street he barely escaped being run over by a big van. He sprang to one side in obedience to the instinct of self-preservation.

Within half an hour Sir John Drax had confirmed Barger's diagnosis and prognosis. Then he asked bluntly if his patient had independent means. An affirmative simplified the case. He, too, prescribed fresh air, simple food, and moderate exercise.

"If I stick to my work in Bethnal Green?"

"You will find yourself in Kensal Green."

"And marriage----?"

"Madness, my dear sir, madness!"

Mark climbed on to the top of the first 'bus which was rolling eastward. As he did so he heard a small boy proclaiming the name of a winner. The name seemed familiar. Then he remembered that it was one of Harry Kirtling's horses. He could see Kirtling's square, stalwart body and the handsome sun-tanned face above it. Of all the bitter minutes in his life, this one seemed to be the bitterest.

When he reached the Mission, pressing work distracted his attention for some hours. He did it as thoroughly as usual, wondering what he should write to Betty when he was at liberty to go to his own room. He wondered also that his friends made no comment upon his appearance. Surely he carried scars. A small glass hung in the committee-room where he was sitting. He glanced at it. Outwardly he was unchanged.

Not till the clock struck nine did he find himself alone. He wrote a letter to Betty, a long letter, which he read and destroyed. The next letter was short, curt, cold: he burned this also. A few minutes later, feeling pain in his hands, he discovered that his nails had lacerated the flesh. Then he knew that a fight for life and reason was beginning. The demons were crying "Surrender!" If he died to-night, Betty would be free; if he lingered on for half a dozen years, she might deem herself bond to a dying man. Virility repudiated such a sacrifice.

"O God," he cried, "let me die to-night!"

Outside, the world of Whitechapel roared in derision. All Mark had known of poverty, of vice, of squalor, swelled into a chorus of despair. Here, in the heart of the slums, in an atmosphere tainted by the dead bodies of hundreds of thousands who had perished cursing God and man, he felt that he was choking for fresh air, that the pestilential fumes of every evil place into which he had entered were destroying him.

He sat down limply on the edge of his bed, wondering whether the end would come soon, telling himself that he was dead already. At any rate his work was done; he would leave the Mission on the morrow. The animal instinct to slink off to some lonely spot where none might witness his misery became overpowering. But a letter to Betty must be written first. He crossed to his desk, where Betty's face smiled out of a silver frame. Gazing at this, he became so absorbed that three sharp taps on the door were unheeded. The Bishop of Poplar entered the room, pausing when he saw the head bent over the table, the thin fingers clutching the silver frame. He closed the door, crossed the room, and laid his hand upon Mark's shoulder.

"You are in sore trouble."

Mark started to his feet with an exclamation compounded of fear and surprise.

"You--David----?" he stammered. "What b-brought you here?"

"You shall answer that question yourself," said Ross gravely.

The men confronted each other. Great as the contrast was between the robust health of the one and the infirmity of the other, a critical eye might have detected a similarity in the two faces--a resemblance the stronger because it was born of the spirit rather than the flesh.

"I was crossing Welbeck Street this afternoon," said Ross, "when I saw you leave one of the houses. It was in my mind to follow and speak to you, but I was hastening to an appointment for which I was late, and leaving town for Scotland at eight. But it happened that I had noted the number of the house you were leaving, and I looked it up in a directory on the platform at Euston. Mind you, my train was about to start, and I had taken my ticket, but when I found out that you had seen Drax, I guessed what had happened. I let the train go on without me, and came on here. Was it coincidence that led me into Welbeck Street this afternoon, or something more?"

"I am under sentence of death," said Mark.

"Tell me all about it." He grasped his friend's hand.

Mark obeyed. "She has always cared for me," he concluded, "always, you understand: ever since we were boy and girl. Many want her. Gorgeous insects have buzzed about her, but she flew to a poor drab-coloured moth. And I"--his voice shook--"I had fluttered about in the outer darkness----"

"Was it darkness, Mark?"

"I should have said twilight."

"Then she was your sun?"

Mark paused before he answered slowly: "God made the sun."

"You try to slip by me," replied the other quickly. "Have I misread you? It seemed to me that you had ideals, standards, rules higher than the average, that for you the light shone more clearly, revealing what lay beyond. Was that light the glamour in a woman's eyes?"

"The light was reflected in her eyes. You press me hard, David. Shall I plead that the light, no matter whence its source, dazzled me. There have been times when I seemed to see the other shore: an enchanted land, so desirable that I wondered why men preferred to linger here. But now"--his voice grew harsh and troubled--"I want this earth. I want to live and love--here."

"What do you propose to do?" David asked.

"Do?" Mark laughed bitterly. "What can I do, but die--the sooner the better? You are a strong man, David; it is hard for you to stand in my shoes; but if you were I you would surrender."

"What?"

"Shall I say--everything."

"You cannot surrender what you have done already, whether good or ill."

"I have to surrender love," Mark muttered. "What do you know of that, David?"

"I loved a woman," Ross replied, "and I love her still, although she is but a memory"--his voice softened--"a memory of what might have been, and what will be. And shall I say that this love has fortified me, because I see it as the reflection of a greater love? The love you talk of surrendering is an imperishable possession."

Mark said nothing.

Ross continued: "Drax is a great authority, but he does not know, as I know, that you have never given your body a fair chance. Now--my word to you is FIGHT. Fight for life, fight for health, fight to save yourself as you have fought tooth and nail to save others! Again and again I've begged you to go to my lodge in Sutherland. Go there with me to-morrow! Drax prescribes fresh air, plain food, complete rest. These may be straws, but clutch them--clutch them! Why, man, I have towed worse wrecks than you into dry dock, and I've seen 'em sail out of harbour with every stitch of canvas set staunch and seaworthy craft! Be my guest for six months! Mark, Mark, my dear, good, foolish, gallant Mark--_Fight!_"

"Thank you, David," Mark replied. Then the smile which Bagshot knew well lit up the thin haggard face, as he added slowly: "I d-d-don't think it was c-c-coincidence which led you into Welbeck Street this afternoon."

Next day Mark went North with David Ross. Before departure he wrote a letter to Betty, which successfully obscured the facts. He feared that Betty might insist upon appointing herself his nurse. And if she came to him, would he have strength to send her away? Once she had spoken shudderingly of a friend married to a hopeless invalid: a poor wretch lingering on, half dead, changing day by day into something unrecognisable in mind and body.

"You have the right," he wrote, "to demand an explanation, which I must give. I am and shall remain outside that garden into which we strayed last Saturday. What more can I say? Nothing. Try to think of me as a boy who was near and dear to you...."

The letter was filled up with details concerning his work. Reading it, the conclusion was inevitable that the writer had become absorbed in such work. He hinted at the possibility of taking a vow of celibacy.

Betty kissed this letter before she broke the seal, making sure that it was a love-letter. Then she read it, with perceptive faculties blunted by shock. Lady Randolph found her in the Italian garden, staring at the figure of Aphrodite.

"You were right," she exclaimed passionately. "Mark prefers his work to--me."

Lady Randolph kissed her.

"I have been a fool," said Betty, bursting into tears.

*CHAPTER XVIII*

*ARIADNE IN NAXOS*

Lady Randolph wisely said nothing, but she wrote to Mark. He replied by return of post.

"I love her devotedly, but I have an almost incurable disease: the result of neglect. Don't let my people know of this. I had the presumption to believe that the sacrifice of the flesh was a sort of burnt-offering to God. The folly of it is hard to bear. Many men here are in a like self-crippled condition, and the doctor in charge, a good sort, makes scathing remarks. David Ross warned me several times; as did his successor at the Mission. Betty, of course, must never find out the truth, which I could not withhold from you, my kind friend. You can best serve her and me by finding her a good, faithful husband, such a fellow as Harry Kirtling, or Jim Corrance.... She is made for the happiness which marriage brings. I can take comfort in the thought that another may give her what is not mine to offer."

Lady Randolph's eyes were wet, as she locked up this letter. Mark had not mentioned Archie as a possible husband. "That would break his heart," she muttered to herself.

Betty and she returned to London, where, during the month that followed, Betty's simulated high spirits and inordinate appetite for excitement provoked a warning.

"If you don't bend, you'll break."

"I am broken in pieces, like Humpty-Dumpty, who ought to have been a girl. Men don't break when they tumble off their castle walls. I've stuck myself together, but I'm a cracked vessel."

Lady Randolph wrote a note that evening to Mrs. Corrance. She had faith in the balsamic virtue of the atmosphere in and around King's Charteris, and she knew that Jim spent two days out of each week with his mother. Mrs. Corrance begged Betty to pay her a visit.

"Shall I go?" said Betty.

"I need a rest-cure," Lady Randolph replied pointedly.

So Betty went down into the pleasant Slowshire country, where the warmth of her welcome gave the girl a curious thrill. The kisses of the gentle, grey-haired woman sounded deeps, although they could not touch bottom, for the motherless girl has deeps unplumbed by any fellow-creature. Tea was set out in the pretty old-fashioned drawing-room with its freshly calendered chintzes, its quaint Chelsea figures, its simple dignity of expression. Mrs. Corrance possessed some Queen Anne silver, which she had used daily ever since Betty could remember anything. It sparkled softly like the rings upon the white hands that touched it, shining with a subdued radiance of other days. Betty saw the same quiet glow in her old friend's kind eyes: the peace on the face of age which passes the understanding of youth.

Hitherto she had regarded Mrs. Corrance with grateful affection, but as one to whom the wind had been tempered, one who lived in a fold seeing little beyond save Jim. Betty had always thought of her as mother. Now, she found herself wondering what part this quiet lady had played as sweetheart and wife. Tempests might have raged and died down, before she (Betty) was born. Mrs. Corrance's mind, like her house, was full of charming nooks, cosy corners, so to speak, wherein a tired spirit might take his ease, but perhaps there were also bare chambers into which none was allowed to enter. Into these, if they existed, Betty felt a shameful curiosity to go.

While they drank tea Mrs. Corrance asked no questions. Betty listened with interest to an account of Jim and his doings in the markets of the world.

"He would like to instal me, me, my dear, in a fine house in some fashionable quarter." She laughed, and Betty laughed too, seeing that the mother was delighted secretly that her son should desire to lavish his wealth upon her.

"Do you despise the world, that you live out of it--always?" said Betty.

"I love the country," replied the elder woman evasively; then she added, as if the possibility had just occurred to her: "I hope you won't find it very dull here."

"Not with you," said Betty, slipping her hand into her friend's.

Next day, Mrs. Samphire drove over from Pitt Hall. She looked pinker and plumper than ever, and her hair--arranged in Madonna bands--gave her the vacuous expression of a stout Dutch doll. When the name was announced, Betty rose to fly, but Mrs. Corrance entreated her to remain. While Betty was hesitating, fearing the voluble tongue of Mark's stepmother, the lady herself bustled across the lawn to the chestnut tree beneath which Mrs. Corrance was sitting. In a moment the pleasant silences were shattered.

"How cool you look! And this is dear Betty Kirtling. We never expected to have the honour of seeing so smart a lady in our humdrum circles. Thank you, my poor husband is only so-so. The doctor has prescribed golf. We have laid out a small links in the park. I think golf such a charming game--don't you? I love to look on at it. You agree with me, I'm sure."

Mrs. Corrance tried to lift this interjectional babble out of the rut.

"I suppose," she said reflectively, "that with us middle-aged women looking on at games is an inherited instinct. We have always looked on--haven't we? But Betty, I expect, likes to play golf."

Betty, however, unkindly said nothing, while Mrs. Samphire bleated: "Oh, yes, I do like to see the Squire play golf. Although, when he misses the ball, he does--well, I mustn't tell tales out of school--must I? How is dear Lady Randolph? Did you have a large party for Ascot? Was the Prince there? I have seen your name in the Marlborough House lists. Really, I wonder you speak to me at all."

"I haven't said much yet--have I?" said Betty. "Last time we met you were suffering horribly with neuralgia. Is it better?"

"I'm a martyr now to dyspepsia. I'm trying light and colour, Babbit, you know. If your poor, dear uncle were alive, how interested he would be. I'm wearing red next the skin."

"In July?" ejaculated Mrs. Corrance.

"And I've changed the paper in my boudoir, which used to be a depressing blue, to bright yellow. All the water I drink is acted upon by a red lens. I want Mark to read Babbit. He has had a sort of breakdown. You heard of it?"

"A breakdown?" exclaimed Betty. "Did you say a--breakdown?"

Light flashed upon her. Why had she not thought of this? Her thoughts crowding together clamoured so shrilly that she could barely hear Mrs. Samphire's querulous reply.

"We learned, quite by chance, that he was in a sanatorium in Sutherland. He ought to have come to Pitt Hall."

"Have you asked him?" said Betty in a low voice.

"He would come to us if he wanted us."

Shortly after Mrs. Samphire took her leave.

"Can Mark be seriously ill?" said Betty.

Mrs. Corrance's clear eyes lingered for a moment on Betty's flushed cheeks; then she said tranquilly: "It is not impossible. If so, I don't blame him for going to Scotland."

"He ought to be at Pitt Hall," said Betty. "I think I shall take a brisk walk."

Two days later Betty met the Squire in Westchester. She soon discovered that he was hurt because his son had not come home.

"Perhaps he was anxious to spare you--and others. That would be like him."

"Yes, yes; he's the best boy in the world. But I'm sure there's nothing serious the matter. We Samphires are as hard as nails."

"If he--died up there without making a sign."

The Squire stuttered and choked.

"God bless me! you alarm me. I must write at once. I shall insist on his coming home. Has he taken you into his confidence, my dear?"

"No."

"Um! I thought once that--well, I shall write."

Betty felt that her heart was beating.

"He will pay no attention to a letter. Why not go to him yourself, Mr. Samphire?"

"By God!--I will."

Betty smiled faintly, for the Squire, when he set his mind to a thing, was easily turned aside.

Then she went her way; and Mrs. Corrance noted in her diary that Betty seemed quieter, more like her old self.

On the following Saturday Jim arrived from town, exhaling and exuding Capel Court. He strolled with Betty through lanes, where they had picked primroses and blackberries long ago; and the familiar trees and hedgerows stood like sentinels of the past, guarding simple joys, which Betty told herself could never return. Jim reminded her that a missel-thrush had built in the old pollard close to the village pound, and that the eggs, when about to be blown, proved addled.

"You were very keen about eggs," she said.

"I've always been keen," said Jim. "By Jove!--it was a sell about those eggs. Well--I still collect eggs, and some are addled! That Cornucopia mine, for instance...."

He plunged into a description of a mining deal which had proved disastrous.

"But I got it back, and a lot more in six weeks."

"Which excites you most--winning or losing, Jim?"

"One gets accustomed to winning," said the successful speculator, "but losing is heart-breaking, particularly when you are unable to guess what the loss will be."

"Ah," said Betty. "What do you do with your gains?"

"Let 'em increase and multiply. The mater won't live in a better house, I mean a larger, and she refuses, in advance, all the presents that I've not given her." He laughed, then he continued in a hard voice: "That question of loss interests me."

He looked at Betty, who slightly lowered her parasol and made no reply.

"I never forget my losses."

"Because they have been few?"

"Because they have been heavy. The fellows in our market would tell you that I have a very serious failing: I don't know when to let go."

"I call that a virtue: in a word, you don't know when you're beat."

"No," he said steadily. "I don't know when I'm beat."

A silence followed, during which the tamer of bulls and bears decapitated a few dandelions. Betty watched him out of the corner of her eye. A certain dexterity and ruthlessness in Jim's use of his cane had significance. Then she found herself wondering what Jim looked like when he was a boy. She could not recall her old playmate, being obsessed for the moment by the man beside her. Some men always retain the look of youth--Mark was one of these; others would seem to have been born old; many, like Jim Corrance, assume early a hard and impenetrable crust of middle age. Jim's face was thin and lined, although he had the square figure of an athlete. One could not picture him as a rosy-cheeked urchin, nor could one believe that he would grow feeble, and bent, and white-haired. And yet, despite his strength and success, Betty felt poignantly sorry for him. And being a woman she showed her compassion in a score of inflections, gestures, which were as spikenard to the man who loved her.

"I wonder you are so nice to me," he said presently; then as she raised her delicate brows he added quickly: "I've cut loose from so much you revere. It's a pill for the mater, but I couldn't play the humbug. I look at life as it is: as it appears, I mean, to me--a place where the devil takes the hindmost."

"And those in front----"

"Oh--I dare say the devil takes them also--later."

Betty changed the subject, not because it was distasteful, but for the subtler reason that she feared her own thoughts, which stuck in a slough of despond. For the rest of the walk they prattled gaily enough of the pranks they had played as boy and girl. Jim's face insensibly softened, so that Betty caught a glimpse of the Harrovian. Then, at the mention of Archie's name, the talk flowed back into the present.

"I never asked you what you thought of that wonderful sermon of his."

Jim admitted surprise. "Old Archie has come on," he added. "He's a plodder, and he's good to look at, and he means to 'get there.'"

"To get--where?"

"To the bench of bishops."

"I used to underrate Archie, but there's a lot in him."

"A lot of him, too. Oh--you needn't frown, Betty. I think that Archie makes a capital parson; and I dare say he'll personally conduct a select party of you Slowshire people to heaven."

"How bitter you are, Jim."

"I won't be bitter when I'm with you," he promised. "I say, there's the bush where we caught the Duke of Burgundy fritillary. I saw it in the old cabinet the other day. You nailed it with your hat and gave it to me, although you wanted it yourself. I felt a beast for taking it, but I adored you for being so unselfish."

"You offered me your Purple Emperor next day."

"And you refused it," said Jim quickly.

"So I did. I must tell everybody that I have refused an Emperor."

"Not to mention smaller fry. Three months ago I thought you meant to marry Harry Kirtling, and he thought so too, by Jove!"

"You dare to insinuate that I encouraged him?"

"You have a way with you, Betty." He glanced at her ardently, but she looked down, faintly blushing, as he continued: "You are not one of these modern young women who can stand alone."

"That is true," she said simply. "I am not strong enough to stand alone, and I admire in men the qualities lacking in myself. We had better go home; your mother will be waiting for her tea."

Jim said no more, but in the evening he asked his mother if she had any reason to suppose that an understanding existed between Mark and Betty.

"When she refused Kirtling, Pynsent and I made certain she was engaged to Mark. Now he has gone to the uttermost ends of the earth, and she never mentions his name to me."

"Nor to me," said Mrs. Corrance. Then she touched her son's shoulder very gently. "Do not make ropes out of sand, dear."

Jim went back to town on Monday morning, but he returned to King's Charteris the following Friday, and walked once more with Betty in the lovely woods which lie between Westchester and the New Forest. Naturally and by training an acute observer, although a keener judge of men than women, Betty puzzled him. He saw that she was slightly contemptuous of the material side of life, although willing to listen by the hour to his presentment of it. This, however, might be a phase, a mood. He felt assured, now, that Betty would have married Mark had he asked her to do so, and he lay awake at night wondering whether she would marry anybody else. For the rest he determined that he must make haste slowly. He would give the girl the fellowship she craved without defining its elements. That she was grateful for such abstinence her manner proved. She became at once open, candid, a delightful companion.

Meantime the Squire had not left Pitt Hall. When he met Betty, he said, with some confusion, that the "Madam" (as he called Mrs. Samphire) had opposed so long a journey; one, moreover, which was like to prove a fool's errand. He excused himself by complaining querulously of an estate which exacted constant supervision. His face was even more florid than usual, and his manner less complacent. When Betty mentioned this to Archie (who rode over from Westchester on a well-bred cob), he expressed a fear that his father was losing money.

"He spoke of going North," Betty said, after a pause. "If Mark is really ill, surely he ought to be nursed by--by his nearest and dearest?"

Archie betrayed astonishment.

"Ill? Really ill? I've heard nothing of serious illness, not a word. How do you know, Betty?"

"I have guessed," she answered vehemently. "He has slipped away to--to _die_, perhaps!"

Archie showed a most lively concern.

"No, no, you exaggerate. Look here, Betty, if someone ought to go North, I'll go."

"Oh, Archie--if you would."

"Dear old Mark! Of course I'll go. It happens that I can get a week's leave. I'll bring him home with me."

He spoke in a warm, sympathetic tone, kindling Betty's gratitude and affection. Never had she liked Mark's brother so well.

"You can spare the time, Archie?"

"Yes, yes; I'm so glad you spoke to me. By the way, I've a piece of news for you--great news, too. I am commanded to preach at Windsor."

"Oh, Archie, I _am_ pleased to hear that. It will mean so much--won't it."

"Yes."

She asked questions: Was the date set? Had he a theme? and so forth. "You know," she continued gravely, "I shall never forget your Westchester sermon. Many sermons touch one, but that gripped. Often, I've not been quite fair to you, and now I'm horribly ashamed of myself. You forgive me?"

"My dear Betty! I say--was there so great a difference between that sermon and others I have preached?"

"Why, Archie, how modest you are! Don't you know that you climbed to the heights that Whit-Sunday? Before, you seemed to be rambling about on the comfortable plains. Oh, I know we can't scale mountains every day. Lord Randolph said as much----" She paused.

"What did Lord Randolph say?"

"He did not intend that it should reach your ears."

"Betty--you will do me a favour by repeating what he said as he said it. I am not thin-skinned."

"Well, he said that beer was good liquor, and that spirits should be used sparingly. You couldn't preach such a sermon as that every Sunday."

"Not I," said Archie.

"The great thing is that you can stir up hearts when the occasion comes. I feel sure you will surpass yourself at Windsor."

"I wish _I_ felt sure, Betty. Well--I'll do my best to persuade Mark to return with me, but he's obstinate as a mule where his health is concerned. Shall I give him any message from you?"

"You can give him--my love."

She spoke with assumed lightness of tone. Archie found a phrase.

"A man would travel farther than Sutherland to receive that." Then he took his leave, gravely smiling.

"He's a good sort," said Betty.

None the less she told herself that her intuitions in regard to men were fluid. Again and again she tried to grasp them, to mould them into permanent form, into definiteness; always they flowed away--peaceably sometimes, with a sweet melodic cadence, as of a Scotch burn, but more often roaring, like the same burn in spate; in either case leaving but a small silt behind.

The two days following Archie's departure she spent alone in the woods (for Mrs. Corrance seldom left her pretty garden), seeking from Nature an answer to the problem in her heart. The great oaks and beeches preserved an inviolate silence in those languorous July days, but the pines seemed to have a message for an attentive ear. Their sighs were, perhaps, the warning voices of the innumerable dead, hushed and (to most mortals) inarticulate. Here and there amidst this rich pastoral country Betty found sterile acres where even the hardy fir failed to find sustenance. These patches in the landscape had a weird fascination. Betty perceived beauty, dignity, in their subtle, faded tints, their delicate greys and shadowy browns. Once upon a time, doubtless, these barren spots had bloomed, too luxuriantly, perhaps; in due time they would bloom again in splendid resurrection. In the centre of one of the stony places a young birch tree of great beauty stretched slender limbs toward the green paradise which encompassed it, inclining slightly to the south.

"I am like that birch," said Betty.

*CHAPTER XIX*

*A SANATORIUM IN SUTHERLAND*

Archibald Samphire took with him to Scotland a suit-case and a small handbag. After leaving Perth, where he made an early breakfast, he opened the bag and pulled out a roll of foolscap covered with neat, scholarly handwriting. The reading of this MS. seemed to give him pleasure; but presently his fine brow puckered into wrinkles, and an excellent cigar was allowed to go out prematurely.

"It's not as good as I thought," he murmured; and he was not speaking of his cigar.

Presently he lit another cigar and reread the MS.--the sermon prepared for Royalty. When he wrote it, he told himself it eclipsed the one preached on Whit-Sunday at Westchester. Afterwards, rereading it in cold blood, he had come to the conclusion that it did not quite "grip," as Betty put it, although sound to the core doctrinally, and discreet; better suited, perhaps, for august ears than the other. Now, in this clear, cool northern air, judgment was of a less sanguine complexion. The theme warmed into life in the Close at Westchester lacked vitality in the Highlands. Mountain and moor made it seem anaemic. Archibald looked out of the window, which was open, and inhaled the fresh, pungent air. Not a house was to be seen, not even a shepherd's hut; the moors spread a purple carpet on which no human creature walked; the mountains, vast, rugged, solitary, encompassed the moors. Yet in the heart of this lonely wilderness men had swarmed together in conflict. These mountains had not barred the progress of an army. Guns, horses, transport waggons had defiled through the passes and across the treacherous peat bogs. That clear burn yonder had run red with blood. Here was fought the battle of Killiecrankie! Archie thought of these things as he sat with the sheets of his sermon in his hand. He bundled the MS. back into his bag, and closed it with a snap, divining his inability to deal adequately with what was primal!

He had wired to Mark that he was coming North; accordingly, at Lairg he found a "machine" awaiting him, a ramshackle cart drawn by a sturdy pony, whose attempts to leave the rough roads and plunge on to the moor indicated that he was more at ease beneath a deer packsaddle than between a pair of shafts. The driver eyed somewhat derisively Archie's clerical garments. "Ye're no a meenister?" he asked; and receiving a reply in the affirmative, added with emphasis, "Ye're verra young for that." A minute later he asked if his passenger were college-bred.

"I took my degree at Cambridge," said Archie.

"Indeed. A'm interested in the Punic Wars. Yon Scipio Africanus was a gran' man. I'd be obliged if ye'd tell me all ye ken aboot him."

Archie changed from pink to the colour of Turkey twill. What he knew about Scipio Africanus could have been put into a grain of millet seed. In some confusion--not wasted upon the critical Scot--he explained that the Punic Wars were beyond his horizon. The driver nodded compassionately, expressing no surprise at the Sassenach's ignorance. He was thin and angular; his grey eyes had curious flecks of brown in them; his face and hands were very red and hairy, and beneath the red hair Archie detected a certain amount of dirt. This restored the minor canon's sense of superiority. The Scot, however, wore stout homespun and superb stockings.

"You wear good clothes," said Archie.

"D'ye think they're too guid?"

"Certainly not," said Archie hastily. "Your Highland sheep look in fine condition."

Once more the driver's queer eyes met his. The brown flecks danced in the grey.

"They're no mine, and they cam frae Teviotdale--they white-faced sheep." The contempt in the man's voice was unmistakable.

Archie wondered if the man also came from the border; he did not look like a Highlander; Highlanders always said "whateffer." He wished to ask questions about Crask, Ross's lodge, but the brown flecks in the small, closely-set eyes were oddly disconcerting, so he stared at the face of the landscape instead of that of the man. They were driving over a bleak moor which stretched, far as the eye could reach, to some delicately blue hills fringing the western skies. The scene was panoramic and indescribably desolate. Along the road black posts, set at intervals, served as guides to such travellers--shepherds for the most part--who were obliged to cross the moors in winter-time, when snow covered all things. Archie thought of November and shivered. Presently they passed a small slate-tiled cottage built of rough grey stone and surrounded by a grey stone wall. Peats were piled close to a vast midden, on which some hens were scratching; beyond the peat stack stood the byre; garden, ornamental or useful, there was none. As the pony came to a sudden halt, three rough collies rushed out, barking furiously. The driver spoke to them and got down; he strode into the house, remained there ten minutes, and came out wiping his hairy chin. Archie smelled whisky. The driver picked up the reins, the collies barked, the pony shambled forward. Evidently the whisky had had an effect, for the Scot became communicative.

"He's a verra mean man, yon," he said, jerking his head in the direction of the house. "We were tasting the noo, and I said, as he was filling the glass--'Stop!' And wad ye believe it, the brute stoppit?"

Mark would have laughed. Archibald remained calm.

"There's too much whisky drunk in Scotland," he said.

"There's' mair drunk oot of it," retorted the driver.

Archie refused to enter into argument, and the driver filled a black cutty with evil-smelling tobacco. After the moor was crossed, the character of the scenery changed. The road wound its way beside a charming burn to which heather-covered hills sloped steeply. Farther on, a loch reflected the saffron splendours of the sky. A splendid mountain--Ben Caryll--towered to the right.

"Yon's the hoose," said the driver.

The house crowned a small spur of Ben Caryll. At one side stood a small wooden chapel embellished by a diminutive bell-tower, in which hung a single bell of great sweetness of tone. A big lawn lay on the other side of the house, and Archie noted with surprise that tennis-courts were marked out. He noted also, with equal surprise, the profusion of flowers and flowering shrubs and the care which allotted to each its particular place in the general plan of the garden. The house looked grey and grim, like all houses in this part of Scotland, and the windows had been enlarged, giving the building somewhat the appearance of a small factory. Behind the tennis-courts stood a row of rough sheds covered with creepers and facing the south. In the sheds he caught a glimpse of tables, chairs, sofas, and other simple furnishings.

Archie rang the bell, which jangled discordantly. The door was opened by Mark, who held out both hands, smiling. "It's awfully good of you, old fellow," he said. "I don't know how to thank you. You're just in time for supper. Here's the Bishop. He's up for a day or two."

David Ross nodded cordially and gripped Archie's hand. Two men came forward and were introduced. One shouldered the big suit-case and went upstairs with it, ignoring protests. Archie followed, carrying his small black bag and feeling that he had come on a fool's errand so far as Mark was concerned. Dying? Why, he looked stronger than he had looked for months. As soon as the brothers were alone Archie said as much.

"I suppose it's the air," Mark explained. "I'm out-of-doors night and day. My trouble is scotched."

"I can't understand how you can joke about it," said Archie.

"A vile pun, but irresistible. I say, wash that frown off your face and come down. We'll have a pipe and a good jaw afterwards. If you think, by the way, that I do look better, you might say so to David Ross. He's been awfully kind."

"Why didn't you go home?"

"I c-c-couldn't," said Mark shortly.

In the refectory, a long, low annexe to the house, the Bishop's guests sat at meat. Some of them were ruddy and robust; others looked thin and white, but not one, so Archie remarked, wore the sable of discontent. The eyes that met his were candid and clear--the eyes of men satisfied with their lot in life. At the foot of the table sat a little fellow with a big head, which waggled comically. Archie wondered where he had seen him before; then he remembered. The little man looked like Mr. Pickwick, although he lacked that illustrious character's deportment and dignity.

"Who is that?" he whispered to Mark, who sat beside him.

"That's Stride, our resident doctor. He's mad keen about the open-air cure. He got his ideas from Father Kneippe."

In those days neither Father Kneippe nor his ideas were famous. The open-air treatment for disease was practically unknown. Mark explained Stride's methods: his theories on diet and physical culture, facts now familiar to everybody.

"Stride lives here all the year round, you know. David Ross comes and goes at long intervals."

"It must be desolate in winter." Archie gave his impressions, including a description of the house with the huge midden. "It was larger than the cottage," he said in great disgust, "and the drunken savage who drove me wanted to learn what I knew about Scipio Africanus and the Punic wars. Punic wars indeed!"

"I like the country and the people," said Mark, "but you have to climb to get at either."

After supper the guests marched outside and settled themselves in the sheds, which were lit with lamps. Some read, some played chess, some listened to Stride, who talked unceasingly. The Bishop led Archie aside and asked him if he would like to smoke a pipe on the lawn.

"I'll smoke a cigar," said Archie. "Can I offer you one?"

"I prefer a pipe," said the Bishop.

They strolled together on to the lawn. Although it was nearly ten, twilight still lingered about the landscape, as if loath to leave a scene so fair in darkness. Archie listened attentively to what his companion was saying.

"Your brother has neglected his body." (Ross had been warned by Mark to say no more than this.) "In such cases more or less of a breakdown is inevitable. I am delighted that you see a change for the better. Six months up here, under Stride, may set him up."

"I hoped to take him back with me. I came up for that purpose."

"Your brother can return with you, if he wishes, but would it be wise?"

"Perhaps not, perhaps not," said Archie. "We did not know that you were prepared to offer so generous a hospitality."

"He will be a paying guest in more senses than one. I dare say you would like to talk to him. Good night! I have an immense pile of letters to answer. I hope you will stay with us as long as you please."

He grasped Archie's hand, and strode off. Archie watched him for a moment, enviously. Ross gave the impression of power in action. It was certain that his amazing stride would take him far on any road--and always _upward and onward_: the motto adopted by his followers.

When he found himself alone with Mark, in the bedroom assigned to him, Archie said: "Ross seems to think that you are doing better here than you would, for instance, in Slowshire."

"Why, of course. I'm mending rapidly. One cannot do anything rapidly in Slowshire. It's not even a place to die in. One would dawdle over it."

"You will speak with such levity----"

"I've not your gravity, my dear old fellow. Now then, tell me about yourself. What are you doing?"

"I've been commanded to preach at Windsor."

Mark was so eager and warm in his congratulations that Archie found it easy to go on.

"I've brought my MS. with me. I want you to skim through it."

"I must read it at once. This is wildly exciting."

Archie paced up and down, while Mark sat on the bed reading the sermon. Judging from his face, the fare was proving unpalatable. Archie saw that he was frowning and fidgeting with his fingers, as he used to do at Harrow, when he was looking over his major's verses. This familiar expression made the big fellow feel ludicrously like a boy. He half shut his eyes and waited for the inevitable: "I say, you know, this is awful bosh," of the Fifth Form days. Mark read the MS. through, and then glanced again at certain passages, before he said a word.

"Well," said Archie nervously, "will it do?"

Mark slid off the bed, put his hands in his pockets, and stared at his brother.

"That depends. It will do to light some fires with; but it won't set the Thames, near Windsor, ablaze."

"Call it 'bosh' and have done with it."

"It's not bosh. You've taken one of the Beatitudes."

"The Dean suggested that. He said it would please. Of course he knows."

"The text is the most inspiring in the New Testament, but you've treated it conventionally. Now look here----" He paused to collect his ideas. Archie saw that his eyes were shining with that suffused light which betokened in him mental or spiritual excitement. He began to pace up and down the narrow room; then he burst out: "You lay stress on the reward hereafter; a hereafter which the finite mind is unable to grasp. _The pure in heart shall see God in His Heaven_. Don't you know that the pure in heart see God here? That He is revealed, and only to the pure, in everything that lies around us. Ah, that is a theme, a celestial theme: the revelation of the Creator in the things created. And impurity blinds us. We look up to God, if we do look up, through a fog. You must take that line, Archie. Burn this--and begin again. And be sure that you define purity of heart aright. Don't confound it with purity of body. You are eloquent on the purity of a child. Why, man, the purity which knows not impurity is emasculate compared with the purity which knows impurity, which has fought with impurity, and yet, in the end, after conflicts innumerable, vanquishes impurity! I tell you that what men and women want to-day is substance. An ideal Heaven, an ideal earth, appeal to us, yes, but they charm as a mirage charms; they melt and fade as the mirage does. What you have written here," he tapped the foolscap impatiently, "might feed saints, but flesh-and-blood sinners would go empty away. By Heaven! if I had your voice, I would make the sinners hear."

"You must help me," said Archie in a low, hesitating voice.

"Why not?" said Mark excitedly. "Give me the night to think. To-morrow we'll put our heads together and the sparks shall fly. I haven't used my brains for a month. This will do me good."

"Will it?" said Archie doubtfully. Already Mark's face was drawn and haggard; he looked ten years older than his brother.

"What is life," said Mark contemptuously, "if the salt of helping a pal be taken from it? I'm not useless yet. Good night. I sleep in a shed, you know. And I can see the stars whenever I open my eyes."

"It's so cloudy here," said Archibald.

"I can see through most clouds, but s-s-some----"

Mark paused abruptly, the light faded in his eyes, as he turned and left the room.

*CHAPTER XX*

*BETTY SEES A SPRIG OF RUE*

Archibald returned to Westchester some three days later. In the small black bag was another MS. quite as bulky as the first, and covered with Mark's handwriting. Blots and smudges deformed it; the edges were dog-eared, whole sentences were excised, red pencil marks flamed amidst the black. Yet Archibald read it through again and again, smiling, and nodding his handsome head. He was not alone in his first-class carriage, and his companion, a shrewd Scotch lawyer, guessed why the minister kept moving his lips as he read his MS. In fancy he was declaiming it.

The day after his arrival at the lodge the elder brother had said to Mark: "By the way, Betty Kirtling sent her love to you. Have you any message for her?"

"None," said he slowly. "I hope she is well."

Archie, not detecting the anxiety in his tone, thought Betty was looking very well. Then he mentioned Jim.

"He comes from Friday to Monday, every week. He wants Betty, but I don't fancy he'll get her."

"Have you any reason for saying that?" Mark asked, wondering whether Archie was clearer-sighted than he had supposed.

"Jim is a materialist."

"Oh, come now!"

"A money-grubber and an agnostic."

"One of the best of fellows. Ross never appeals to him in vain."

"As if any rich man couldn't write a cheque. Betty ought to marry somebody very different."

"Don't abuse him to Betty."

"Betty is rather--undisciplined."

"You can say that of all of us. I hope to God she won't marry a schoolmaster." He glanced at his brother with an eye that flamed. He had been smitten by the fear that Betty might marry Archie.

"What strong expressions you use, Mark. It doesn't sound quite--how shall I put it?--well, seemly, for a man who holds Orders. I see no chance of Betty marrying a schoolmaster. I have great hopes that she will choose wisely. She said 'No' to Harry Kirtling, and she will say 'No' to Jim Corrance."

"And she said 'No' to you," Mark reflected.

Within the week Archibald rode over to King's Charteris, where he found Betty in Mrs. Corrance's garden gathering roses. He had wired that he was returning without Mark. She took the telegram to her room, where pride dried her eyes and hardened her heart. That night Jim told himself he had a chance. She had never been so kind to him, so understanding, so alluring. But on the brink of declaration he hesitated, fearing to leap. Afterwards he wondered what might have happened if he had--leaped boldly instead of looking and longing.

Betty received Archie with the question, "Is Mark really ill?"

Archie hesitated.

"He looks stronger," he said slowly. "And he is in his usual spirits: the life and soul of the place. There can't be anything really wrong. In fact he joked about his health. He doesn't take anything very seriously, you know. David Ross told me that he had overworked himself--more or less."

"You gave him my love?" Betty murmured lightly. She had the faintest tinge of colour in her cheeks, but her voice was almost cold.

"Yes."

"And I hope he sent a nice message to me in return?"

"No. He asked if you were well. I said--yes. You do look uncommonly well, Betty."

She wore white, which set off the delicate tints and admirable texture of her skin, but her hat was black, giving a necessary note of contrast. At her throat, holding together a _jabot_ of creamy laces, sparkled an old-fashioned enamel ornament set with tiny brilliants. Standing on the sloping lawn, her figure defined against a towering yew fence, and holding in her hand the roses she had just gathered, the girl made a picture which lured Archie's thoughts even from Windsor.

"I suppose a country life agrees with me."

"You are wonderful."

She moved to a bench, the young man following her with eager feet and eyes. He could not see that her heart was beating, nor did he notice that the brilliancy of her eyes was due to an abnormal enlargement of the pupil. She sat down, smiling derisively. Then she bade him tell her about the sanatorium. When he had finished, she said quietly, "You were very, very kind to take that long journey."

"It's easy to be kind to people like you--and Mark."

His delightful voice softened, because when he mentioned his brother's name the memory of what that brother had done on his behalf filled him with gratitude.

"I hear you are kind to everybody. All Slowshire sings your praises."

Archibald shook his head, wondering whether Betty would mention the sermon. He was burning with impatience to try on, so to speak, some of its phrases, to watch the effect of them on a woman who had listened to the Gamaliels of the day. Betty possessed sincerity, imagination, sympathy. These would flow freely at the touch of a friend's hand.

"If it would not bore you," he said, "I should like to talk over the Windsor sermon. You can help me----"

"I? Help--you?"

"You can, indeed"; his voice grew eager. "Whatever I say will be the fresher and purer if it passes through your mind before it is given to the world."

"My mind _is_ a sort of filter." She laughed. None the less she was pleased and flattered. Archibald began to speak in a soft monotone. Betty half closed her eyes and the lines of her figure slightly relaxed beneath the caressing inflections of the speaker's voice. Whenever Archie sang she was affected in the same way. A languor overcame her. For the moment she was not attempting to grasp the meaning of his words, which, even as inarticulate sounds, possessed value and significance. But, soon, she opened her eyes wide and sat up. By this time Archie was at the core of his theme, and his treatment of it was so masterly that Betty found herself thrilling with surprise and delight. A few minutes before life had seemed empty. Now it was full again, brimming over, bubbling, with possibilities swelling from shadow into substance. Archie, be it remembered, was not preaching the sermon. He was rather submitting the material, the tissues, the threads, the patterns, out of which a fine piece of work had been already fashioned. Now and again Betty was invited to choose, to select, out of these wares some one which pleased her fancy. She realised that Archie had more of Mark in him than she had deemed possible. Once or twice she seemed to hear Mark's eager tones.

"You say that like Mark."

"Has Mark talked to you on this theme?"

"Oh, no," Betty replied, "but he pours out his ideas, as you do."

"Mark and I have talked about this. He helped me. He always does."

Archie spoke hesitatingly, on the edge of full confession. He had a genuine desire to tell Betty the truth. The words formed on his lips.

"Yes, yes," said Betty absently. "Mark has helped me too, many a time; but he's in Sutherland." Her voice became cold as she recalled his letter. "I feel as if he were at the North Pole! Well, Archie, I've enjoyed our talk immensely."

"And when may I come to talk to you again?"

"You are not going--now?"

The "now" brought a sparkle to his eyes.

"I must. I'm one of the busiest men in Westchester."

"I shall run down to Windsor to hear your sermon," she said.

"Our sermon, Betty."