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her sympathy. She stole shy glances at Diana's unusual color, as the
latter poured the tea mechanically, but joined little in the
conversation. Diana caught Mabel's eyes wonderingly fastened upon
her. She could no longer endure the close room.
"I must get a breath of air. Can Mabel go with me?" she said, as
she rose from her untouched tea.
Sir Charles was explaining to Lady Elizabeth some details of the
previous night's rowdy conduct at the House. They both paused for
a moment.
"Do take a turn with Mabel in the park," said Sir Charles. "It will
refresh you."
"Remember we are due at the opera to-night," Lady Elizabeth
said, as she rose. Sir Charles protested. "But it's just why I'm going
myself," Lady Elizabeth confessed. "I'll send the carriage back for
Mabel."
A few minutes later Diana and Mabel entered the park. The
pungent smell of the damp earth filled the air. Great crimson and
yellow pools of color dotted the ground; they were the battered-
down blossoms of the afternoon. Some stronger plants than the
others were lifting their swaying stems. The paths were covered with
bruised leaves, and from the branches came the drip-drip of the
gleaming rain-drops. At times under interlaced branches it seemed
as though the storm still continued, so heavy was the splashing of
the drenched trees. The usually crowded meeting-ground of fashion
was practically deserted; even the guards had not left their corners
of refuge. Here and there a stray gardener in a by-path was pityingly
regarding his damaged beds.
 The fresh, wet air blew against Diana's face and calmed her
troubled spirit. Mabel linked her arm through Diana's: neither spoke.
On and on they walked, in and out of deserted side-paths, until a
turn in the road brought them opposite to the Serpentine Bridge,
and they faced the public driveway of the park. A gust of wind blew
across the ground a deluge of broken boughs; it caused them to
hesitate on the edge of the crossing. Mabel started forward as a cab
dashed towards them at a tremendous speed.
"Why, Di, there's Henry in that hansom," Mabel gasped, as she
blew a tangle of loosened hair out of her eyes.
But Diana could only see the occupant nearest to her in the cab
—it was a woman with a strangely interesting foreign face.
"Nonsense," she answered, as she held firm the wind-blown
hat. "Henry is in the city. You are mistaken, dear."
As she spoke the storm began afresh. The wind blew the
sodden blossom leaves and broken branches into a hurricane cloud
around them. Grasping Mabel by the hand, Diana made her way
against the violence of the wind and finally reached the entrance to
the park. In the rush of keen air and the fight against it, everything
else was forgotten. They quickly reached the house, and Diana saw
Mabel drive away in the shelter of the waiting carriage. A few
minutes later she was in her own room.
She loosened her long, brown hair, and kneeling before the
glowing fire held the wet coils to its warmth. On her bed lay a gown
to be worn that night, and the light from the fire cast a delicate
sheen over its folds. It flickered and blazed with merry bursts of
flame, lighting up the old-fashioned chintz draperies of the quaintly
furnished room. Through the closed window she could hear the faint
splutter of the rain on the casement. As she leaned against the tall
chair close to the fireplace, a soft, warm languor stole over her and
the tension of her mind relaxed. The beauty of her present life
stretched out innumerable magic wands that lulled into insensibility
the frightened thoughts of the afternoon. Soothed by the warmth
and comfort of the room after the fatigue of her walk against the
gale in the park, she abandoned herself to pleasant, intangible
dreams. A knock at the door aroused her.
It was her aunt's maid, who carried a large box of flowers.
Diana opened them; they were from Henry. Again they reiterated his
apologies for the afternoon's disappointment. The perfume of the
gardenias filled the room as she sank into a chair before her
dressing-table and buried her face in the masses of delicate
blossoms. The quiet servant gathered up the tangled hair.
"Her ladyship would like you to come to her room before you
leave for the opera," she said, as she drew the brush across the soft
brown locks.
Diana did not reply.
Yes, she was admitting to herself she had been unreasonable,
as her father said. Life was beautiful and wonderful, and she meant
to gather all its sweetness and bloom.

CHAPTER III

The rain that battered down the glory of color into the soaked earth
of the park had slashed and beaten black, struggling lines against
the gray stone-wall of the buildings in Lincoln's Inn. The radiance of
the sun never wholly penetrated the court, but to-day the old place
seemed like a tomb. In one of the forbidding-looking dwellings, in
his solicitor's chambers, sat Lord Kerhill. He glanced around the
silent room, and aimlessly took in the array of large tin boxes, with
their painted family names, piled high on the shelves encircling the
walls. Conspicuous among them was his own. With the exception of
a few unattractive pieces of solid mahogany and some large leather
chairs, the room was almost empty. Its ugliness jarred him. As he
sat there, his face in repose showed that the years had given an
added touch of bitterness to his expression. He still retained his well-
cut features, and their beauty of line was only a little marred by a
certain heaviness that had recently developed. His dark mustache
hid the weak mouth with its suggestion of sensuality; indeed, the
whole man showed a strong tendency towards grossness as yet only
noticeable to the careful observer.
He still had the ineffable quality of charm, when he willed to
exert it, which made his selfishness seem to many only the outcome
of impulsive youthfulness. In a shamefaced way he admitted to
himself now that he was in the wrong and that he had stupidly
involved his affairs, but he comforted himself in the same moment,
with the fatuousness of self-indulgence, that everything would work
out all right. To tide over this difficulty or adjust and evade for a time
the demand of the hour had been his policy for so long that he could
not realize that an end was possible to the long tether he so often
abused.
He had come in response to an urgent summons. Opposite him,
deeply absorbed in some papers, sat Johnston Petrie, the trusted
solicitor of the Kerhill family since Henry's father came into the title.
He was a large, powerfully built man of fifty-five, with a massive
head, piercing black eyes under shaggy eyebrows, and close-
cropped iron-gray curls above the shrewd face. Henry rose
impatiently to go.
As he did so, Petrie lifted his glasses on their black ribbon to his
eyes, and said, "I'm exceedingly sorry, your Lordship, but you must
give me time to look more closely into that affair before I can
venture a final opinion as to the condition of the estate. Besides, I
have several other matters of the gravest importance to question
you about; they pertain to some business transactions you made
recently without my knowledge, while you were abroad."
He motioned his lordship to a chair as though to pursue deeper
the conversation, and drew several documents from a drawer. Henry
Kerhill fidgeted.
"It's impossible, Petrie. Next week, after the wedding, or after
we return from Scotland, I'll have leisure then to discuss these
things with you, and I really mean this time to have you adjust
everything and set me quite straight."
Johnston Petrie shook his head.
"Oh, I know," Henry continued, "I've been careless, but I mean
to pull up. I'll start fair from next week."
Johnston Petrie looked up sharply. He knew more of his client's
career than Henry cared to remember. He had known him from
boyhood, and his shrewd summing up of human nature could see
only pitfalls ahead for Lady Elizabeth's son. He had tried in every
way to stop the reckless living of his client. From the incessant
demands made on the estate for large sums of ready money he
knew that Henry Wynnegate, irritated by the conservative principles
of his firm, had used outside help to prevent his family adviser from
obtaining knowledge of some recent speculations.
Long ago Johnston Petrie would have asked to be released from
the responsibilities of the Kerhill affairs, out for a loyal devotion to
his dead client, the late Earl, and a desire to protect Lady Elizabeth's
fast diminishing rights. He was not in the least deceived by Henry's
machinations, but wilfully allowed himself to seem blind to certain
matters. He wished to be able to keep his hand at the lever, and
argued with his brother that the end justified the means.
Lady Elizabeth in a recent interview had assured him that the
coming marriage would be the turning-point in Henry's career.
Nevertheless, he feared her judgment. Something in Henry's attitude
to-day had made him more apprehensive; it had been impossible to
pin him down to a serious consideration of his affairs. Petrie
determined to venture a final effort, by enrolling his brother's
services to strengthen his admonitions.
"Lord Kerhill," he said. "My brother is also most anxious to see
you regarding some stocks you asked his advice about." He touched
a bell; a clerk answered from an adjoining room.
"Ask Mr. Malcolm Petrie to come to us. Say that the Earl of
Kerhill is here."
Henry chafed under the calm firmness of his solicitor. He had
come in answer to an imperative note, and the discussion of his
complicated affairs was extremely disagreeable. He was in no mood
to continue it further. He moved to the door as Malcolm Petrie
entered; a smaller counterpart of his brother, and a silent member of
the firm, he took the same personal interest in the Kerhill affairs that
his brother did. As he started to speak he was stopped by Henry.
"It's no use. I can wait no longer. A most important engagement
demands my leaving at once. Advise me by letter—it will reach me
to-morrow." And before either of the men could urge upon him the
necessity of being allowed to advise him on certain negotiations, he
had reached the outer door of the chambers, mounted the few steps
leading to the court, and was in the square where his cab was
waiting. He cursed the dreariness of the day as the rain splashed
him. For a moment he hesitated. They had detained him far too
long, these croaking fogies in their stuffy office. His hand fumbled in
his pocket where lay a letter with a message not to be disregarded.
On its arrival at his club early in the afternoon the note to Diana had
been despatched.
The fury of haste that had made him so eager to escape from
his business interview now deserted him. The rain drenched him in
warm torrents. The driver on the box was a running stream, and
from the horse came clouds of heavy steam.
Then the momentary irresolution passed as he gave his orders
to the impassive cabman. He leaned back in his cab, tearing into
shreds the mauve letter with its gold monogram as he muttered,
"It's for the last time, by God." The hansom started with a jerk. It
rattled down an alley. To Henry the damp, dismal court looked more
than ever like a graveyard. He was glad when they turned into the
vortex of the Strand.

That night at the opera, a new singer was to make her début in
"Carmen." In Paris and America this sloe-eyed Italian had made the
sensation of the half-century in her creation of the gypsy wanton.
The brilliant throng in Covent Garden was alive with anticipation.
The royalties were expected; indeed, the queen herself had
especially commanded this reception for the gifted woman whom
she had honored as her guest on the Riviera, where this singing
Rachel had entranced her with the folk-songs and lullabies of her
beloved country.
All that the London season could assemble of wit, beauty, and
distinction was gathered in the Opera-House. The tiers of boxes
were filling unusually early. Near the stage sat the Prime-Minister, a
man of strong artistic perceptions and a writer of extraordinary
talent. His face, with the marked cleft in the square chin, looked less
dreamy than usual to-night, and the large, pale-blue eyes, amusedly
surveyed the house. He seemed to have slipped off the yoke of
tangled politics as he turned to his secretary, who was pointing out
to him the celebrities in the stalls.
"There is the delightful American whom I met last week at Lord
Blight's." As he spoke, he bowed to the new American favorite, Mrs.
Hobart Chichester Chichester Jones, a radiant figure in scarlet, who
found many glasses levelled at her.
"Only an American would dress so originally," the minister
replied.
The American wore a gown of clinging scarlet fabric, the
decidedly low-cut corsage showing the perfection of the white
shoulders and arms. Around her throat she had twisted one long
rope of uncut pearls and diamonds that reached below her waist,
and in the soft, waving, red-gold hair she had arranged some daring
scarlet geraniums. With her pale skin and great green eyes she
enchanted London by her unusual type. Near her was the famous
story-book Duchess, as the most popular of the younger beauties
was called. "Too good to be true," Truth declared her, and indeed
she seemed to have been especially created to confirm the mode of
the old-fashioned romances extolling the grace and loveliness of an
English Duchess. The crowd noticed the famous rubies that shone
like tiny flames against the white gown.
Here and there a Dowager gleamed like a shelf in a Bond Street
jeweller's shop, so promiscuous was her array of gems. The younger
school of beauties with more wisdom employed their jewels
differently, using them as an added tone of color or a touch of
brilliance to a costume. In the stalls the art world was well
represented. Painters and writers with a sprinkling of actors and
actresses, who were not playing, were on hand to-night to greet the
new-comer. From the gallery rail a crowd of eager, swarthy faces
peered, impatiently gesticulating to one another, because of the
failure of the curtain to ascend at the given time. It was known that
the prima-donna was a capricious creature, often swayed by a mere
whim from making her appearance. Once the death of a mocking-
bird had postponed her début as Marguerite. Would she really
appear?
As the royalties entered the box, the excitement was at fever-
heat. Henry with his mother impatiently awaited Diana's arrival.
The overture began its sensuous, stirring appeal, and before the
cigarette-girl crossed the bridge in the street scene, every seat and
box was occupied.
The singer made the ill-starred Carmen a bewitching and
compelling wanton. Who that saw her will ever forget her delicious
cajolery as she urged the bewitched Don José to loosen the ropes
that bound her? With her Habanera she eclipsed all predecessors
and made the role irrevocably hers. The first act ended with a storm
of bravas from the gallery and vociferous applause from the rest of
the house.
It was not until the tumultuous ovation over the first act had
ceased that Diana's presence was noticed by the audience.
Accompanied by her father, she had arrived at the close of the
overture, and had only time to slip into her place before the curtain
arose. The walk in the rain had given her delicate skin a touch of
color and heightened the beauty of her tender eyes, "so deeply blue
that they were black," as Lord Patrick Illington described them on his
first meeting at her presentation at Court. Her bands of straight hair
were wound around her head; pale-green draperies encircled her
lithesome body, and the gardenia blossoms in her hair gave her a
fleeting likeness to the water-sprite Undine. In the horseshoe of
fashionable mondaines the fragrance of her beauty was like that of a
dew-sprayed rose.
Mrs. Hobart Chichester Chichester Jones, with her usual
common-sense of seeing things as they were, leaned towards the
man beside her.
"That is a beauty—the real thing; no chic, no gowning, no Paris
wisdom of make-up, but a beauty. I'm glad I've seen it." She sank
back as though philosophically preparing for a Waterloo.
From his box the Prince noticed the daughter of Sir Charles
Marjoribanks whose services in diplomacy in his youth were not
forgotten. Forthwith an equerry was sent to Sir Charles and Diana
inviting them to visit the royal presence.
 Diana was the social novelty of the season. The Prime-Minister
remembered his classics as he dreamily gazed at her and murmured,
"Is this the face that launched a thousand ships?"
From the back of the box, Henry watched Diana's impression on
the house. His eyebrows were drawn into horns of suppressed
temper and there was an air of brutal determination in his bearing.
Gradually his expression cleared. Diana's beauty that night stirred
the best in him. He tried to dismiss the events of the afternoon; he
would be worthy of this child-woman. He set his shoulders square as
though preparing to fight unseen forces.
"Lucky fellow, Kerhill," one man confided to another as they
watched the crowd's sweeping glasses pause constantly at Diana
Marjoribanks's box and saw the triumphant look on Henry's face.
The sinuous, commanding Carmen had reached her triumphant
entry with the toreador when the mad Don José's dagger drew the
purple stain on the gold-embroidered gown. Over the house a spell-
bound silence reigned. As from an animal wounded to the death, low
sounds of agonized pain came from the great actress—she forgot to
sing, and the house forgot that she was a singer in an opera
comique. For the moment it faced the realistic truth of a grim
tragedy.
Excited and intoxicated by the sensuous music, Diana was
hardly conscious that the opera was over. She was like a child with
the world for a great, colored balloon. As she came down the
winding staircase she was almost happy, and turned to smile at
Henry, who was by her side. As she did so she saw him frown. They
reached the foot of the staircase, and found their way half-barred by
a dark, foreign-looking woman robed in a spun-gold gown. Diana
noticed the insolent, amused expression on her handsome face, but
at that moment her attention was diverted by some one who spoke
to her, and she only vaguely noticed Henry's constrained bow, and
the sudden brutal flame in his eyes.
Only later, as she sleepily looked over at the park in the dim
light, did she remember that the woman in cloth of gold at the
bottom of the staircase was strangely like the vivid, foreign-looking
woman who had flashed past her in the park as the storm broke.
The wedding took place at St. George's, Hanover Square. It was
the first brilliant wedding of the season and royalty honored it, not
by sending a deputy, but by its personal presence. Diana passed
through the gay pageant and heard the conventional words of well-
wishers like one in a dream. She remembered being changed into a
going-away frock—the curious street crowd gathering around her as
she left the reception at the Park Lane house. Then as she entered
the brougham she was conscious of Henry's face drawn close to
hers, and the old frightened instincts that her father only a week ago
had soothed and quelled again took possession of her. A great wall
of fear closed in about her.
At last the carriage reached the station.
Diana leaned back in their compartment in the train northbound
for Scotland. The bustle of the outgoing crowds was holding Henry's
attention as she glanced over the afternoon paper, which gave a
prominent position to the brilliant wedding that had taken place at
St. George's only a few hours ago.
Suddenly she espied a name that made her heart leap. A brief
paragraph told of the reward to be conferred on Captain James
Wynnegate, but a longer account followed, giving details of his
gallant work in the Northwestern Hills.
A great longing to see the friend of her childhood came over
her. She was ashamed that she had forgotten him so long.
Henry entered the compartment, the guard closed the door, and
the train started on its journey. Her husband spoke to her and she
answered him in an absent manner. The sudden remembrance of
her old playmate grew vividly and seemed to blot out all else, as,
following on her self-reproach for forgetting him, came the thought,
growing more poignant; "Did Jim remember her?"

CHAPTER IV

Jim lay in the hospital ward convalescing. Of the march back to the
nearest hospital post, after the fight which has taken place three
months before in the Northwestern Hills, when his name had been
flashed over Europe in praise of his magnificent service to his flag,
his mind held no memory.
Night after night in his delirium he lived again through the
scenes of the fight that had brought glory to his name. Now it was
the evening before the battle, when, acting upon information
brought by the spy Rham-shi, he and his men kept their long vigil,
sitting silently in their saddles the entire night awaiting the onslaught
of the fanatical natives across the hill. Again it was early dawn, and
in his fever-tossed dreams he heard the roar of the voices as the
assault began; again he climbed to the summit of the hill and saw
the dreaded gun of the enemy that was riddling his men. On—on he
mounted. He felt the warm blood ooze down his body, the mists
swim before his eyes, and the stinging pain pierce his side. In
despair that he might not reach the monster in time to prevent it
from completing its deadly work, his cry of agony often rang out in
the silent room.
"Oh, God, God, my men—my splendid men—give me courage!"
Then his thoughts would wander to the hours when he lay on
the ground with the blood dripping from his wound, and with the
loaded carbine snatched from a fallen trooper he brought down a
tribesman at the enemy's gun. As he fell, another sprang forward—
there was another shot and still another as the tribesmen went
down before his sure aim. There was but one thought in his brain—
to prevent the firing of the gun, the devastation of his men. Difficult
and more difficult it grew to lift the weakening arm. He could feel as
he tossed on his couch the gurgle of the blood that glued him to the
ground. He made an effort to rise to his knees. Another devil was
about to load the gun. He must catch this one again—he must. It
was his last cartridge. He stretched out his stiffening arm feebly; he
tried to pull the trigger, but his strength failed him. Then—one
supreme effort, and a report flashed through the air. The rest was a
blank, but he had carried the day.
These delirious hours passed and there followed a vague mid-air
suspension of existence. Of tangible things he was no part. The
years of fighting were forgotten. He was back in the Fairies' Corner
with Diana, he saw the giant trees bending and whispering in the
starlight. The smell of the damp earth from the sun-hidden
enclosure filled the sick-room, and the vibrant, strong, compelling
cry of the night-jar echoed in his dreams. Again, he and Diana
listened for the flutter of the fairies' wings in the tree-tops.
Gradually, even these mists cleared from his brain, and to-day he
waited with impatience the surgeon, who was to decide whether he
might obtain his leave.
The doctor found him sitting up in bed, his lean hands idly
resting on the coverlet.
"Well, doctor," he asked, "what is the verdict? Am I to be
allowed to join my regiment?"
The surgeon looked into the brave eyes. Jim was a wraith of the
man who had gone into battle. The drawn cheek-bones were like
high lights in the sunken face, the gauntness of the body could be
discerned under the bedclothes, but the unflinching eyes held the
same expression of everlasting courage. The doctor took Jim's long,
meagre hand.
"We are done with you, Wynnegate. You fought a bigger battle
here on this cot than you did yon day on the Hills, but you've won."
Jim only smiled.
"Your regiment is ordered home within a month, and you must
go to your station to join it. Fighting will be a little out of your line
for a while. I think you'll find you need England—a summer of
sunshine in the open fields. Then come back later to us again." A
suspicious moisture clouded his glasses. He was a man many years
older than Jim, and he had seen his own boy go down at the head of
his troops. Still, with the instinctive loyalty of the Englishman to his
country, he concluded, "We need such men as you, my son."
The surgeon moved away. Jim closed his eyes. Presently he
looked up.
 He saw the long line of wounded men with here and there a
wasted, propped-up figure—the quiet nurses passing and repassing.
He began to feel the pulsating call of life again. For him the sick-
room existence was ended; soon he would be back in the Fairies'
Corner; he could hear the flutter of their wings.

The men were in the mess. Dunlap and Singleton were stretched out
in long, wicker-basket chairs. Tomlinson was talking in an excited
voice with several officers of the Tenth Hussars. "It means that Jim
will receive a mention and a damn fine one," Tomlinson was saying,
as he leaned back in his chair and gulped down his gin-and-seltzer.
Singleton called to the orderly to bring a whiskey-and-soda. Dunlap
leaned forward to Tomlinson as he asked:
"Is that absolutely sure? We all know that Jim has done fine
work in his seven years here, but are the powers above really going
to commend his last bit of pluck?"
"The powers above," thundered Tomlinson, who loathed being
doubted, "not only mean to commend him, but they mean to
decorate him with the bronze cross itself. I had it from Watkins."
A long whistle greeted this bit of news. Watkins was not apt to
talk without positive information.
Tomlinson was fairly bursting with enthusiasm and importance.
For him station life in India meant gossip—good or bad news—so
long as it was news. He could work himself into a fever of
enthusiasm, get all the glory out of another man's receiving a
decoration, and rejoice as though it had been given to himself. He
only asked that it should occur in his station. "Tommy," as he was
called, had been known to incite blackballing from his club against a
man whom he had never seen, because no opposition was made. It
meant news, and the passing of the word from one mess to another.
When the man was blackballed, Tomlinson, in a high fever of
indignation, sought the downed man and became so incensed with
sympathy that he threatened to resign from a club that could offer
such indignities: by that time he had forgotten that he had caused it.
At the moment he was basking in the glory of Jim's coming honors.
He took another gin-and-seltzer.
"By George! he was down and done for when he came here
from the hospital," Dunlap said. "Never saw such a goner. But he's
picked up tremendously during the past month."
Singleton took his whiskey-and-potash from the orderly.
"Strange," he continued, as he sat up, glass in hand.
"Wynnegate is so eager to go back: never saw anything like it.
Seems as though this illness had knocked soldiering out of him, and
he was such a keen one before."
"Mighty fortunate the regiment's time was up and we're ordered
home. Talk about Jim's being glad—Gad! it means something to see
those kiddies of mine. Wonder if the little beggars will remember
me," Dunlap mused.
After three gins-and-seltzers, it was time for Tomlinson to listen
to Dunlap about his children. He had heard it all before. He had
come from his own mess with the news about Jim. That was all that
interested him, so he got up to go.
"Who'll play polo this evening?" he asked.
Singleton promised he would.
"I'll walk back with you," Tomlinson said.
 They started to leave, but catching sight of an orderly with a
mail-bag, Singleton let Tomlinson go on alone.
"See you at six for polo, Tommy; and I say, send any of our
fellows in that you see. Tell them the post is in," he called as he saw
Jim's long, loose-jointed stride across the road.
A blazing sun beat down on Jim as he crossed to the mess. The
April weather was anticipating India's most wearing heat. But only
vaguely he noted the ominous lead-colored sky, with its promise of
dust storms. The green of England filled his vision. Since the days in
the hospital, his thoughts had recurred incessantly to Diana. A
picture in an illustrated paper, picked up in his ward, showed him
Miss Diana Marjoribanks as a beautiful young girl—little Diana no
longer. There was the same Madonna face, but more exquisitely fair
than the child he had left had promised to be. He hardly cared to
admit to himself how much the picture had stirred him.
When he entered the mess he found the men in groups,
absorbed in their letters. Singleton and Dunlap both called to him.
"There are two for you, Jim."
Letters did not often come his way. When he first left England,
several child's letters had come from Diana—these he had answered.
He never heard from Henry, and his aunt wrote seldom.
"Dinningfold." He saw the familiar old postmark. It was from
Lady Elizabeth, then. Boyishly, he fingered its ample thickness. It
was good of her to write such a budget, he thought, as he tore it
open. The chatter of voices about him fell unheeding on his ears as
the men read their letters.
"God! Breese is dead—dropped down quite suddenly at the
club," Singleton remarked as he turned a page of the letter he was
reading.
His words were almost drowned by an eager, exulting cry. Half
the fellows turned toward Dick Farninsby. He was usually so quiet.
To-night his young, fair face was the color of a puppy.
"I've come into the money," he stammered.
Every one knew that Farninsby's uncle had been an old
reprobate and that Dick had had a close pinch on his meagre
allowance. They also knew that a pretty girl was waiting for him at
home. A buzz of congratulations followed. But Tim took no part in
them. He was reading his aunt's letter.
"... We are so sorry that you won't be home in time for the
wedding. Diana and Henry are to be married. It will be a London
wedding. Diana has grown into a beautiful girl and will make a
worthy wife for Henry and a charming mistress of Maudsley
Towers...."
As he read, the page became a dancing mass of hieroglyphics.
The men were beginning to light their cigarettes and pipes as they
called bits of news to one another from the English papers. He tried
hard to make the strange letters shape themselves and form words.
He reread them. "Diana and Henry are to be married." He turned the
page. "On the 30th of April," it said. To-day was the 2d of May.
Several of the men started for the polo-fields. Some one called,
"What's your news, Wynnegate?" He forgot to answer. He crushed
the letter in his hand and left the mess. Mechanically he put the
unopened letter from headquarters, with the news of his brilliant
reward, in his pocket. Across the polo-fields he could see the heavy
atmosphere gathering in great clouds. A dust-storm was nursing its
imminent wrath.
 It all seemed far away from the Fairies' Corner.

CHAPTER V

Since the day in his mess when Jim read the news of Diana's
approaching marriage to Henry, he had been immersed in a strange
dreariness of feeling and a curious indifference to the homeward-
bound journey. Night after night he stood alone on the forward-deck
of the Crocodile bound from Bombay for England, and heard the
soldiers singing their camp-songs, their strong, rough voices growing
tender as they sang their cockney ballads of home. But they roused
no responsive echo in Jim; watching the Southern Cross in the sky,
his thoughts often drifted back to the seven years of fighting with
their sun-scorched days of fatigue and danger, full of work that
drained body and brain. He almost wished that he were returning to
them.
One night at Ismailia the pendulum of his emotions swung back
from this indifference to the first hours of joy that he had
experienced when he received the news that his regiment was
ordered back. The ship had anchored there for a few hours to obtain
supplies. With Dunlap and Singleton he went ashore to the little
hotel with its Continental atmosphere of cheap table-d'hôte dinners
and slipshod Italian waiters. It was a shaky wooden building, built
around an inside court, with balconies over which clambered in
exuberance pale, waxy tea-roses, while the front of the building
hung over a cypress-tree garden.
 The indifferently good but pretentious meal was served in the
tiny court. Dunlap's and Singleton's boisterous mood jarred Jim. He
found himself watching the other guests of Monsieur Carlos' hostelry.
At adjacent tables parties of tourists were making merry while
waiting for the P.&O. steamer to carry them from Cleopatra's land to
golden Italy, and from a dance-hall came the fantastic music of the
nautch women's instruments. In half an hour the hotel was empty of
all the diners save Jim, who lingered until the shabby proprietor,
Monsieur Carlos, informed Monsieur le Capitaine that after ten the
court was closed, but the verandas were at Monsieur's disposal for
his kummel and cigarettes. Jim ascended the creaking staircase to
the broad veranda partly hidden from the road by its screen of
blooming roses gleaming like stars against the shadowed foliage.
Here and there a tight, pink-tipped bud shone like a tiny flame.
The moon had risen and illumined the entire place with an
uncanny brilliance, turning the night into an unreal day. Jim sank
into a chair. The air was heavy with the perfume of the rose-trees. In
the distance he could hear the barbarous clash of the dancing
women's cymbals. It was their trade-night with two ships in the
harbor. Jim took from his pocket a leather portmonnaie and drew
from it the picture of Diana that he had cut from the paper in the
hospital.
He had never willingly thought of her since the day he received
his aunt's letter. As he sat on the deserted veranda, with the torn
page lying on his knee, he was conscious of a sudden, intangible
feeling of apprehension. Diana was the tenderest memory of his
boyhood. Why did he fear this marriage with Henry? Vainly he
studied the picture, trying to gain from the cheap illustration some
knowledge of the woman into which Diana had grown. He tried
honestly to face the truth of his great anxiety concerning the
marriage. He knew that through his convalescence when the longing
to go home had overmastered the soldier in him, the thought of
renewing his friendship with Diana had been his happiest
anticipation. He sought to reassure himself that his disappointment
was selfishness—that he feared to find Diana absorbed in new
interests, with his place completely crowded out of her life. Then a
vision of Henry, sullen and defiant as he had last seen him, flashed
before him.... Yet might not Henry's character have been redeemed
by his love for Diana? Jim knew that the meagre fortune of Sir
Charles Marjoribanks could not be a material factor in the marriage.
This proved his most reassuring thought. Then his memory reverted
to Diana, and he recalled the child Di, who had clung to him on the
morning of his departure and begged him to return. He remembered
how as a boy he had often played that he was her knight, and
fought the unseen foes that were supposed to lurk in the alleyways
of the giant trees. Was it a prophetic vision of the future?
He rose from his chair. Sweeping clouds were rolling over the
pale moon. The desolation of the place grew more terrible.
Far out at sea he could see the black phantom ship now
appearing, now disappearing. It seemed at the mercy of the heavy
vapors that at times touched its topmasts. The desire to reach
England again grew strong in him. He felt he had a purpose to fulfil.
A half-hour passed. Suddenly the moon swept from under a
heavy cloud, shaped like the wing of a monster bird. Across the road
he could see the straggling groups of travellers returning from the
festivities. Their tired, excited voices reached him, and he was glad
to escape from the hotel and make his way to the waiting dinghy.
Dunlap and Singleton joined him, and as he leaned back in the skiff,
strong and incessant as the incoming tide that beat against the boat
grew the strength of his resolve. Diana should obtain happiness if he
could serve her to that end.
Three weeks later the Crocodile swung into the harbor at
Portsmouth. A symphony in blues and greens greeted Jim's eyes as
they anchored within sight of the Victory. An English June sky with
riotous blues—from the palest flaky azure to the deepest turquoise—
hung in the heavens over a vivid green sea. The very atmosphere
seemed floating about in nebulous clouds of pearly tinted indigo. To
Jim it was like the beauty of no other land.
Towards evening Jim reached London. The town was alive with
the roar and rush of hansoms and crowded 'buses carrying the day's
workers to their homes. His cab turned from St. James's Park into
the Mall towards his club. How he loved the gray, majestic beauty of
the place!
The expected arrival of the Crocodile had been duly noticed by
the papers, and his part in the brilliant work of his regiment warmly
commended. At the club he found letters of welcome awaiting him.
Among them was one from Diana, urging him to come to them at
once. It seemed the letter of a woman calm in her established
womanhood. "Henry and I," it said, "will be so happy to see you to-
morrow at luncheon at two o'clock. Do come." The letter further told
him that Lady Elizabeth and Mabel were staying at the Towers.
"Henry wanted a town-house, so we are settled at Pont Street for
the season."
 Late that night Jim sat alone in his club, and wrote an answer to
Diana's letter. He spoke of his pleasure in being able to go to them
on the morrow, but its phrases gave no sign of his intense feeling
and his great desire for her happiness. He left the club and walked
to the pillar-box opposite. He slipped the letter into the slit of the
box, and slowly retraced his steps. A slight haze was beginning to
creep over the city, and in the distance it looked as though a gauze
theatre-drop was shutting off the scene from the spectators.
Jim was loath to leave the streets. There was an enchantment
for him in the smoky atmosphere that intoxicated him. The call of
London was in his blood. As he crossed the quiet Square near the
Mall, he stretched out his arms, and youth and the joy of life rang
out in one great cry—Oh, it was good to be home!

CHAPTER VI

Jim slept but little that night. In the morning his first thought was to
reach the War Office, which he did almost before that dignified
machine was prepared to receive him. A rumor was afloat that the
Tenth Hussars might have to start shortly for South Africa, but he
found that the gossip had been greatly exaggerated. Even if troops
were sent out, he was assured that the Tenth Hussars were immune
from active service for a long period. He rejoiced at the news, for he
was tired of foreign service. His long illness had left him shaken and
requiring a much-needed rest for recuperation.
 At the War Office he learned that Henry had resigned his
regiment and was at the head of the Surrey Yeomanry, with
headquarters near the Towers. This argued well, he told himself; it
meant work and responsibility for Henry that would engage his
interest and surely win him away from his old, reckless way of living.
The morning slipped away with its many demands on his first
day in town. His hansom turned into Sloane Street only as a clock
near by struck two. In a few minutes the door of the Pont Street
house was opened to him, and he was ushered into the library.
He dropped lightly into an arm-chair near a table heaped with
books. Suddenly a door opened as though at the end of a corridor.
He distinctly heard voices raised in strong argument behind the
hangings; one sounded like Henry's; a half-suppressed oath
followed.
"It's no use," the voice went on. "You must do as I say. Don't
preach." He could not hear the words that followed. Jim wished it
were possible to make known his presence in the room. He crossed
to the farther window to avoid hearing the remainder of the
conversation, but the clear and incisive words of the first speaker—
this time Jim knew it was Henry—again struck his ears sharply.
"I must have the money, Petrie; make what explanation you
like, but send it to me within a week. It's useless arguing. I've lost
heavily in speculation. Here are the papers." The opening and
slamming of several drawers followed. To Jim the words that he had
just heard were like a knell to his hopes of the past week for Diana's
happiness. So this was the truth! Another mortgage! He knew
enough of the involved condition of the estate to dread the
possibilities of that word.
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