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  CHAPTER XXVI

  Although the old coaches, with their gay panels and the guard's horn,and the humors of the box and the vicissitudes of the road, have longmoldered into dust so far as they were matter, and are preserved in theprinted pages of our novelists so far as they partook of the spirit,a journey to London by express train can still be a very pleasant andromantic adventure. Cassandra Otway, at the age of twenty-two, couldimagine few things more pleasant. Satiated with months of green fieldsas she was, the first row of artisans' villas on the outskirts of Londonseemed to have something serious about it, which positively increasedthe importance of every person in the railway carriage, and even, to herimpressionable mind, quickened the speed of the train and gave a note ofstern authority to the shriek of the engine-whistle. They were bound forLondon they must have precedence of all traffic not similarly destined.A different demeanor was necessary directly one stepped out uponLiverpool Street platform, and became one of those preoccupied and hastycitizens for whose needs innumerable taxi-cabs, motor-omnibuses, andunderground railways were in waiting. She did her best to lookdignified and preoccupied too, but as the cab carried her away, witha determination which alarmed her a little, she became more and moreforgetful of her station as a citizen of London, and turned her headfrom one window to another, picking up eagerly a building on this sideor a street scene on that to feed her intense curiosity. And yet, whilethe drive lasted no one was real, nothing was ordinary; the crowds, theGovernment buildings, the tide of men and women washing the base of thegreat glass windows, were all generalized, and affected her as if shesaw them on the stage.

  All these feelings were sustained and partly inspired by the fact thather journey took her straight to the center of her most romantic world.A thousand times in the midst of her pastoral landscape her thoughtstook this precise road, were admitted to the house in Chelsea, and wentdirectly upstairs to Katharine's room, where, invisible themselves,they had the better chance of feasting upon the privacy of the room'sadorable and mysterious mistress. Cassandra adored her cousin; theadoration might have been foolish, but was saved from that excessand lent an engaging charm by the volatile nature of Cassandra'stemperament. She had adored a great many things and people in thecourse of twenty-two years; she had been alternately the pride and thedesperation of her teachers. She had worshipped architecture and music,natural history and humanity, literature and art, but always at theheight of her enthusiasm, which was accompanied by a brilliant degreeof accomplishment, she changed her mind and bought, surreptitiously,another grammar. The terrible results which governesses had predictedfrom such mental dissipation were certainly apparent now that Cassandrawas twenty-two, and had never passed an examination, and dailyshowed herself less and less capable of passing one. The more seriousprediction that she could never possibly earn her living was alsoverified. But from all these short strands of different accomplishmentsCassandra wove for herself an attitude, a cast of mind, which, ifuseless, was found by some people to have the not despicable virtuesof vivacity and freshness. Katharine, for example, thought her a mostcharming companion. The cousins seemed to assemble between them a greatrange of qualities which are never found united in one person andseldom in half a dozen people. Where Katharine was simple, Cassandra wascomplex; where Katharine was solid and direct, Cassandra was vague andevasive. In short, they represented very well the manly and the womanlysides of the feminine nature, and, for foundation, there was theprofound unity of common blood between them. If Cassandra adoredKatharine she was incapable of adoring any one without refreshing herspirit with frequent draughts of raillery and criticism, and Katharineenjoyed her laughter at least as much as her respect.

  Respect was certainly uppermost in Cassandra's mind at the presentmoment. Katharine's engagement had appealed to her imagination as thefirst engagement in a circle of contemporaries is apt to appeal to theimaginations of the others; it was solemn, beautiful, and mysterious;it gave both parties the important air of those who have been initiatedinto some rite which is still concealed from the rest of the group.For Katharine's sake Cassandra thought William a most distinguished andinteresting character, and welcomed first his conversation and then hismanuscript as the marks of a friendship which it flattered and delightedher to inspire.

  Katharine was still out when she arrived at Cheyne Walk. After greetingher uncle and aunt and receiving, as usual, a present of two sovereignsfor "cab fares and dissipation" from Uncle Trevor, whose favorite nieceshe was, she changed her dress and wandered into Katharine's room toawait her. What a great looking-glass Katharine had, she thought, andhow mature all the arrangements upon the dressing-table were compared towhat she was used to at home. Glancing round, she thought that the billsstuck upon a skewer and stood for ornament upon the mantelpiece wereastonishingly like Katharine, There wasn't a photograph of Williamanywhere to be seen. The room, with its combination of luxury andbareness, its silk dressing-gowns and crimson slippers, its shabbycarpet and bare walls, had a powerful air of Katharine herself; shestood in the middle of the room and enjoyed the sensation and then,with a desire to finger what her cousin was in the habit of fingering,Cassandra began to take down the books which stood in a row upon theshelf above the bed. In most houses this shelf is the ledge upon whichthe last relics of religious belief lodge themselves as if, late atnight, in the heart of privacy, people, skeptical by day, find solace insipping one draught of the old charm for such sorrows or perplexitiesas may steal from their hiding-places in the dark. But there was nohymn-book here. By their battered covers and enigmatical contents,Cassandra judged them to be old school-books belonging to Uncle Trevor,and piously, though eccentrically, preserved by his daughter. There wasno end, she thought, to the unexpectedness of Katharine. She had oncehad a passion for geometry herself, and, curled upon Katharine's quilt,she became absorbed in trying to remember how far she had forgotten whatshe once knew. Katharine, coming in a little later, found her deep inthis characteristic pursuit.

  "My dear," Cassandra exclaimed, shaking the book at her cousin, "mywhole life's changed from this moment! I must write the man's name downat once, or I shall forget--"

  Whose name, what book, which life was changed Katharine proceeded toascertain. She began to lay aside her clothes hurriedly, for she wasvery late.

  "May I sit and watch you?" Cassandra asked, shutting up her book. "I gotready on purpose."

  "Oh, you're ready, are you?" said Katharine, half turning in the midstof her operations, and looking at Cassandra, who sat, clasping herknees, on the edge of the bed.

  "There are people dining here," she said, taking in the effect ofCassandra from a new point of view. After an interval, the distinction,the irregular charm, of the small face with its long tapering noseand its bright oval eyes were very notable. The hair rose up offthe forehead rather stiffly, and, given a more careful treatment byhairdressers and dressmakers, the light angular figure might possess alikeness to a French lady of distinction in the eighteenth century.

  "Who's coming to dinner?" Cassandra asked, anticipating furtherpossibilities of rapture.

  "There's William, and, I believe, Aunt Eleanor and Uncle Aubrey."

  "I'm so glad William is coming. Did he tell you that he sent me hismanuscript? I think it's wonderful--I think he's almost good enough foryou, Katharine."

  "You shall sit next to him and tell him what you think of him."

  "I shan't dare do that," Cassandra asserted.

  "Why? You're not afraid of him, are you?"

  "A little--because he's connected with you."

  Katharine smiled.

  "But then, with your well-known fidelity, considering that you'restaying here at least a fortnight, you won't have any illusions leftabout me by the time you go. I give you a week, Cassandra. I shall seemy power fading day by day. Now it's at the climax; but to-morrow it'llhave begun to fade. What am I to wear, I wonder? Find me a blue dress,Cassandra, over there in the long wardrobe."

  She spoke disconnectedly, handling brush and comb, and p
ulling out thelittle drawers in her dressing-table and leaving them open. Cassandra,sitting on the bed behind her, saw the reflection of her cousin's facein the looking-glass. The face in the looking-glass was serious andintent, apparently occupied with other things besides the straightnessof the parting which, however, was being driven as straight as a Romanroad through the dark hair. Cassandra was impressed again by Katharine'smaturity; and, as she enveloped herself in the blue dress which filledalmost the whole of the long looking-glass with blue light and made itthe frame of a picture, holding not only the slightly moving effigy ofthe beautiful woman, but shapes and colors of objects reflected fromthe background, Cassandra thought that no sight had ever been quite soromantic. It was all in keeping with the room and the house, and thecity round them; for her ears had not yet ceased to notice the hum ofdistant wheels.

  They went downstairs rather late, in spite of Katharine's extreme speedin getting ready. To Cassandra's ears the buzz of voices inside thedrawing-room was like the tuning up of the instruments of the orchestra.It seemed to her that there were numbers of people in the room, and thatthey were strangers, and that they were beautiful and dressed with thegreatest distinction, although they proved to be mostly her relations,and the distinction of their clothing was confined, in the eyes of animpartial observer, to the white waistcoat which Rodney wore. But theyall rose simultaneously, which was by itself impressive, and they allexclaimed, and shook hands, and she was introduced to Mr. Peyton, andthe door sprang open, and dinner was announced, and they filed off,William Rodney offering her his slightly bent black arm, as she hadsecretly hoped he would. In short, had the scene been looked atonly through her eyes, it must have been described as one of magicalbrilliancy. The pattern of the soup-plates, the stiff folds of thenapkins, which rose by the side of each plate in the shape of arumlilies, the long sticks of bread tied with pink ribbon, the silverdishes and the sea-colored champagne glasses, with the flakes of goldcongealed in their stems--all these details, together with a curiouslypervasive smell of kid gloves, contributed to her exhilaration, whichmust be repressed, however, because she was grown up, and the world heldno more for her to marvel at.

  The world held no more for her to marvel at, it is true; but it heldother people; and each other person possessed in Cassandra's mind somefragment of what privately she called "reality." It was a gift that theywould impart if you asked them for it, and thus no dinner-party couldpossibly be dull, and little Mr. Peyton on her right and William Rodneyon her left were in equal measure endowed with the quality which seemedto her so unmistakable and so precious that the way people neglected todemand it was a constant source of surprise to her. She scarcely knew,indeed, whether she was talking to Mr. Peyton or to William Rodney.But to one who, by degrees, assumed the shape of an elderly man witha mustache, she described how she had arrived in London that veryafternoon, and how she had taken a cab and driven through the streets.Mr. Peyton, an editor of fifty years, bowed his bald head repeatedly,with apparent understanding. At least, he understood that she was veryyoung and pretty, and saw that she was excited, though he could notgather at once from her words or remember from his own experience whatthere was to be excited about. "Were there any buds on the trees?" heasked. "Which line did she travel by?"

  He was cut short in these amiable inquiries by her desire to knowwhether he was one of those who read, or one of those who look out ofthe window? Mr. Peyton was by no means sure which he did. He ratherthought he did both. He was told that he had made a most dangerousconfession. She could deduce his entire history from that one fact. Hechallenged her to proceed; and she proclaimed him a Liberal Member ofParliament.

  William, nominally engaged in a desultory conversation with AuntEleanor, heard every word, and taking advantage of the fact that elderlyladies have little continuity of conversation, at least with those whomthey esteem for their youth and their sex, he asserted his presence by avery nervous laugh.

  Cassandra turned to him directly. She was enchanted to find that,instantly and with such ease, another of these fascinating beings wasoffering untold wealth for her extraction.

  "There's no doubt what YOU do in a railway carriage, William," she said,making use in her pleasure of his first name. "You never ONCE look outof the window; you read ALL the time."

  "And what facts do you deduce from that?" Mr. Peyton asked.

  "Oh, that he's a poet, of course," said Cassandra. "But I must confessthat I knew that before, so it isn't fair. I've got your manuscript withme," she went on, disregarding Mr. Peyton in a shameless way. "I've gotall sorts of things I want to ask you about it."

  William inclined his head and tried to conceal the pleasure that herremark gave him. But the pleasure was not unalloyed. However susceptibleto flattery William might be, he would never tolerate it from people whoshowed a gross or emotional taste in literature, and if Cassandra erredeven slightly from what he considered essential in this respect hewould express his discomfort by flinging out his hands and wrinkling hisforehead; he would find no pleasure in her flattery after that.

  "First of all," she proceeded, "I want to know why you chose to write aplay?"

  "Ah! You mean it's not dramatic?"

  "I mean that I don't see what it would gain by being acted. But thendoes Shakespeare gain? Henry and I are always arguing about Shakespeare.I'm certain he's wrong, but I can't prove it because I've only seenShakespeare acted once in Lincoln. But I'm quite positive," sheinsisted, "that Shakespeare wrote for the stage."

  "You're perfectly right," Rodney exclaimed. "I was hoping you were onthat side. Henry's wrong--entirely wrong. Of course, I've failed, as allthe moderns fail. Dear, dear, I wish I'd consulted you before."

  From this point they proceeded to go over, as far as memory served them,the different aspects of Rodney's drama. She said nothing that jarredupon him, and untrained daring had the power to stimulate experienceto such an extent that Rodney was frequently seen to hold his forksuspended before him, while he debated the first principles of the art.Mrs. Hilbery thought to herself that she had never seen him to suchadvantage; yes, he was somehow different; he reminded her of some onewho was dead, some one who was distinguished--she had forgotten hisname.

  Cassandra's voice rose high in its excitement.

  "You've not read 'The Idiot'!" she exclaimed.

  "I've read 'War and Peace'," William replied, a little testily.

  "'WAR AND PEACE'!" she echoed, in a tone of derision.

  "I confess I don't understand the Russians."

  "Shake hands! Shake hands!" boomed Uncle Aubrey from across the table."Neither do I. And I hazard the opinion that they don't themselves."

  The old gentleman had ruled a large part of the Indian Empire, but hewas in the habit of saying that he had rather have written the works ofDickens. The table now took possession of a subject much to its liking.Aunt Eleanor showed premonitory signs of pronouncing an opinion.Although she had blunted her taste upon some form of philanthropy fortwenty-five years, she had a fine natural instinct for an upstart or apretender, and knew to a hairbreadth what literature should be and whatit should not be. She was born to the knowledge, and scarcely thought ita matter to be proud of.

  "Insanity is not a fit subject for fiction," she announced positively.

  "There's the well-known case of Hamlet," Mr. Hilbery interposed, in hisleisurely, half-humorous tones.

  "Ah, but poetry's different, Trevor," said Aunt Eleanor, as if she hadspecial authority from Shakespeare to say so. "Different altogether.And I've never thought, for my part, that Hamlet was as mad as they makeout. What is your opinion, Mr. Peyton?" For, as there was a minister ofliterature present in the person of the editor of an esteemed review,she deferred to him.

  Mr. Peyton leant a little back in his chair, and, putting his headrather on one side, observed that that was a question that he had neverbeen able to answer entirely to his satisfaction. There was much to besaid on both sides, but as he considered upon which side he should sayit, Mrs. Hilbery broke in upon
his judicious meditations.

  "Lovely, lovely Ophelia!" she exclaimed. "What a wonderful power itis--poetry! I wake up in the morning all bedraggled; there's a yellowfog outside; little Emily turns on the electric light when she bringsme my tea, and says, 'Oh, ma'am, the water's frozen in the cistern, andcook's cut her finger to the bone.' And then I open a little green book,and the birds are singing, the stars shining, the flowers twinkling--"She looked about her as if these presences had suddenly manifestedthemselves round her dining-room table.

  "Has the cook cut her finger badly?" Aunt Eleanor demanded, addressingherself naturally to Katharine.

  "Oh, the cook's finger is only my way of putting it," said Mrs. Hilbery."But if she had cut her arm off, Katharine would have sewn it on again,"she remarked, with an affectionate glance at her daughter, who looked,she thought, a little sad. "But what horrid, horrid thoughts," she woundup, laying down her napkin and pushing her chair back. "Come, let usfind something more cheerful to talk about upstairs."

  Upstairs in the drawing-room Cassandra found fresh sources of pleasure,first in the distinguished and expectant look of the room, and then inthe chance of exercising her divining-rod upon a new assortment of humanbeings. But the low tones of the women, their meditative silences, thebeauty which, to her at least, shone even from black satin and the knobsof amber which encircled elderly necks, changed her wish to chatter toa more subdued desire merely to watch and to whisper. She enteredwith delight into an atmosphere in which private matters were beinginterchanged freely, almost in monosyllables, by the older women who nowaccepted her as one of themselves. Her expression became very gentle andsympathetic, as if she, too, were full of solicitude for the world whichwas somehow being cared for, managed and deprecated by Aunt Maggie andAunt Eleanor. After a time she perceived that Katharine was outside thecommunity in some way, and, suddenly, she threw aside her wisdom andgentleness and concern and began to laugh.

  "What are you laughing at?" Katharine asked.

  A joke so foolish and unfilial wasn't worth explaining.

  "It was nothing--ridiculous--in the worst of taste, but still, if youhalf shut your eyes and looked--" Katharine half shut her eyes andlooked, but she looked in the wrong direction, and Cassandra laughedmore than ever, and was still laughing and doing her best to explain ina whisper that Aunt Eleanor, through half-shut eyes, was like the parrotin the cage at Stogdon House, when the gentlemen came in and Rodneywalked straight up to them and wanted to know what they were laughingat.

  "I utterly refuse to tell you!" Cassandra replied, standing up straight,clasping her hands in front of her, and facing him. Her mockery wasdelicious to him. He had not even for a second the fear that she hadbeen laughing at him. She was laughing because life was so adorable, soenchanting.

  "Ah, but you're cruel to make me feel the barbarity of my sex," hereplied, drawing his feet together and pressing his finger-tips upon animaginary opera-hat or malacca cane. "We've been discussing all sortsof dull things, and now I shall never know what I want to know more thananything in the world."

  "You don't deceive us for a minute!" she cried. "Not for a second.We both know that you've been enjoying yourself immensely. Hasn't he,Katharine?"

  "No," she replied, "I think he's speaking the truth. He doesn't caremuch for politics."

  Her words, though spoken simply, produced a curious change in the light,sparkling atmosphere. William at once lost his look of animation andsaid seriously:

  "I detest politics."

  "I don't think any man has the right to say that," said Cassandra,almost severely.

  "I agree. I mean that I detest politicians," he corrected himselfquickly.

  "You see, I believe Cassandra is what they call a Feminist," Katharinewent on. "Or rather, she was a Feminist six months ago, but it's no goodsupposing that she is now what she was then. That is one of her greatestcharms in my eyes. One never can tell." She smiled at her as an eldersister might smile.

  "Katharine, you make one feel so horribly small!" Cassandra exclaimed.

  "No, no, that's not what she means," Rodney interposed. "I quite agreethat women have an immense advantage over us there. One misses a lot byattempting to know things thoroughly."

  "He knows Greek thoroughly," said Katharine. "But then he also knows agood deal about painting, and a certain amount about music. He's verycultivated--perhaps the most cultivated person I know."

  "And poetry," Cassandra added.

  "Yes, I was forgetting his play," Katharine remarked, and turning herhead as though she saw something that needed her attention in a farcorner of the room, she left them.

  For a moment they stood silent, after what seemed a deliberateintroduction to each other, and Cassandra watched her crossing the room.

  "Henry," she said next moment, "would say that a stage ought to be nobigger than this drawing-room. He wants there to be singing and dancingas well as acting--only all the opposite of Wagner--you understand?"

  They sat down, and Katharine, turning when she reached the window, sawWilliam with his hand raised in gesticulation and his mouth open, as ifready to speak the moment Cassandra ceased.

  Katharine's duty, whether it was to pull a curtain or move a chair, waseither forgotten or discharged, but she continued to stand by the windowwithout doing anything. The elderly people were all grouped togetherround the fire. They seemed an independent, middle-aged community busywith its own concerns. They were telling stories very well and listeningto them very graciously. But for her there was no obvious employment.

  "If anybody says anything, I shall say that I'm looking at the river,"she thought, for in her slavery to her family traditions, she was readyto pay for her transgression with some plausible falsehood. She pushedaside the blind and looked at the river. But it was a dark night and thewater was barely visible. Cabs were passing, and couples were loiteringslowly along the road, keeping as close to the railings as possible,though the trees had as yet no leaves to cast shadow upon theirembraces. Katharine, thus withdrawn, felt her loneliness. The eveninghad been one of pain, offering her, minute after minute, plainer proofthat things would fall out as she had foreseen. She had faced tones,gestures, glances; she knew, with her back to them, that William, evennow, was plunging deeper and deeper into the delight of unexpectedunderstanding with Cassandra. He had almost told her that he was findingit infinitely better than he could have believed. She looked out ofthe window, sternly determined to forget private misfortunes, to forgetherself, to forget individual lives. With her eyes upon the dark sky,voices reached her from the room in which she was standing. She heardthem as if they came from people in another world, a world antecedent toher world, a world that was the prelude, the antechamber to reality; itwas as if, lately dead, she heard the living talking. The dream natureof our life had never been more apparent to her, never had life beenmore certainly an affair of four walls, whose objects existed onlywithin the range of lights and fires, beyond which lay nothing, ornothing more than darkness. She seemed physically to have stepped beyondthe region where the light of illusion still makes it desirable topossess, to love, to struggle. And yet her melancholy brought her noserenity. She still heard the voices within the room. She was stilltormented by desires. She wished to be beyond their range. She wishedinconsistently enough that she could find herself driving rapidlythrough the streets; she was even anxious to be with some one who, aftera moment's groping, took a definite shape and solidified into the personof Mary Datchet. She drew the curtains so that the draperies met in deepfolds in the middle of the window.

  "Ah, there she is," said Mr. Hilbery, who was standing swaying affablyfrom side to side, with his back to the fire. "Come here, Katharine.I couldn't see where you'd got to--our children," he observedparenthetically, "have their uses--I want you to go to my study,Katharine; go to the third shelf on the right-hand side of the door;take down 'Trelawny's Recollections of Shelley'; bring it to me. Then,Peyton, you will have to admit to the assembled company that you havebeen mistaken."

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p; "'Trelawny's Recollections of Shelley.' The third shelf on the right ofthe door," Katharine repeated. After all, one does not check children intheir play, or rouse sleepers from their dreams. She passed William andCassandra on her way to the door.

  "Stop, Katharine," said William, speaking almost as if he were consciousof her against his will. "Let me go." He rose, after a second'shesitation, and she understood that it cost him an effort. She kneltone knee upon the sofa where Cassandra sat, looking down at her cousin'sface, which still moved with the speed of what she had been saying.

  "Are you--happy?" she asked.

  "Oh, my dear!" Cassandra exclaimed, as if no further words wereneeded. "Of course, we disagree about every subject under the sun," sheexclaimed, "but I think he's the cleverest man I've ever met--and you'rethe most beautiful woman," she added, looking at Katharine, and asshe looked her face lost its animation and became almost melancholy insympathy with Katharine's melancholy, which seemed to Cassandra the lastrefinement of her distinction.

  "Ah, but it's only ten o'clock," said Katharine darkly.

  "As late as that! Well--?" She did not understand.

  "At twelve my horses turn into rats and off I go. The illusion fades.But I accept my fate. I make hay while the sun shines." Cassandra lookedat her with a puzzled expression.

  "Here's Katharine talking about rats, and hay, and all sorts of oddthings," she said, as William returned to them. He had been quick. "Canyou make her out?"

  Katharine perceived from his little frown and hesitation that he did notfind that particular problem to his taste at present. She stood uprightat once and said in a different tone:

  "I really am off, though. I wish you'd explain if they say anything,William. I shan't be late, but I've got to see some one."

  "At this time of night?" Cassandra exclaimed.

  "Whom have you got to see?" William demanded.

  "A friend," she remarked, half turning her head towards him. Sheknew that he wished her to stay, not, indeed, with them, but in theirneighborhood, in case of need.

  "Katharine has a great many friends," said William rather lamely,sitting down once more, as Katharine left the room.

  She was soon driving quickly, as she had wished to drive, through thelamp-lit streets. She liked both light and speed, and the sense of beingout of doors alone, and the knowledge that she would reach Mary in herhigh, lonely room at the end of the drive. She climbed the stone stepsquickly, remarking the queer look of her blue silk skirt and blue shoesupon the stone, dusty with the boots of the day, under the light of anoccasional jet of flickering gas.

  The door was opened in a second by Mary herself, whose face showednot only surprise at the sight of her visitor, but some degree ofembarrassment. She greeted her cordially, and, as there was no time forexplanations, Katharine walked straight into the sitting-room, and foundherself in the presence of a young man who was lying back in a chair andholding a sheet of paper in his hand, at which he was looking as if heexpected to go on immediately with what he was in the middle of sayingto Mary Datchet. The apparition of an unknown lady in full evening dressseemed to disturb him. He took his pipe from his mouth, rose stiffly,and sat down again with a jerk.

  "Have you been dining out?" Mary asked.

  "Are you working?" Katharine inquired simultaneously.

  The young man shook his head, as if he disowned his share in thequestion with some irritation.

  "Well, not exactly," Mary replied. "Mr. Basnett had brought some papersto show me. We were going through them, but we'd almost done.... Tell usabout your party."

  Mary had a ruffled appearance, as if she had been running her fingersthrough her hair in the course of her conversation she was dressed moreor less like a Russian peasant girl. She sat down again in a chair whichlooked as if it had been her seat for some hours; the saucer which stoodupon the arm contained the ashes of many cigarettes. Mr. Basnett, a veryyoung man with a fresh complexion and a high forehead from which thehair was combed straight back, was one of that group of "very able youngmen" suspected by Mr. Clacton, justly as it turned out, of an influenceupon Mary Datchet. He had come down from one of the Universities notlong ago, and was now charged with the reformation of society. Inconnection with the rest of the group of very able young men he haddrawn up a scheme for the education of labor, for the amalgamation ofthe middle class and the working class, and for a joint assault of thetwo bodies, combined in the Society for the Education of Democracy,upon Capital. The scheme had already reached the stage in which it waspermissible to hire an office and engage a secretary, and he had beendeputed to expound the scheme to Mary, and make her an offer of theSecretaryship, to which, as a matter of principle, a small salary wasattached. Since seven o'clock that evening he had been reading out loudthe document in which the faith of the new reformers was expounded, butthe reading was so frequently interrupted by discussion, and it was sooften necessary to inform Mary "in strictest confidence" of the privatecharacters and evil designs of certain individuals and societies thatthey were still only half-way through the manuscript. Neither ofthem realized that the talk had already lasted three hours. In theirabsorption they had forgotten even to feed the fire, and yet both Mr.Basnett in his exposition, and Mary in her interrogation, carefullypreserved a kind of formality calculated to check the desire of thehuman mind for irrelevant discussion. Her questions frequently began,"Am I to understand--" and his replies invariably represented the viewsof some one called "we."

  By this time Mary was almost persuaded that she, too, was included inthe "we," and agreed with Mr. Basnett in believing that "our" views,"our" society, "our" policy, stood for something quite definitelysegregated from the main body of society in a circle of superiorillumination.

  The appearance of Katharine in this atmosphere was extremelyincongruous, and had the effect of making Mary remember all sorts ofthings that she had been glad to forget.

  "You've been dining out?" she asked again, looking, with a little smile,at the blue silk and the pearl-sewn shoes.

  "No, at home. Are you starting something new?" Katharine hazarded,rather hesitatingly, looking at the papers.

  "We are," Mr. Basnett replied. He said no more.

  "I'm thinking of leaving our friends in Russell Square," Mary explained.

  "I see. And then you will do something else."

  "Well, I'm afraid I like working," said Mary.

  "Afraid," said Mr. Basnett, conveying the impression that, in hisopinion, no sensible person could be afraid of liking to work.

  "Yes," said Katharine, as if he had stated this opinion aloud. "I shouldlike to start something--something off one's own bat--that's what Ishould like."

  "Yes, that's the fun," said Mr. Basnett, looking at her for the firsttime rather keenly, and refilling his pipe.

  "But you can't limit work--that's what I mean," said Mary. "I mean thereare other sorts of work. No one works harder than a woman with littlechildren."

  "Quite so," said Mr. Basnett. "It's precisely the women with babieswe want to get hold of." He glanced at his document, rolled it into acylinder between his fingers, and gazed into the fire. Katharine feltthat in this company anything that one said would be judged upon itsmerits; one had only to say what one thought, rather barely and tersely,with a curious assumption that the number of things that could properlybe thought about was strictly limited. And Mr. Basnett was only stiffupon the surface; there was an intelligence in his face which attractedher intelligence.

  "When will the public know?" she asked.

  "What d'you mean--about us?" Mr. Basnett asked, with a little smile.

  "That depends upon many things," said Mary. The conspirators lookedpleased, as if Katharine's question, with the belief in their existencewhich it implied, had a warming effect upon them.

  "In starting a society such as we wish to start (we can't say any moreat present)," Mr. Basnett began, with a little jerk of his head, "thereare two things to remember--the Press and the public. Other societies,which shall be nameless, have
gone under because they've appealed onlyto cranks. If you don't want a mutual admiration society, which dies assoon as you've all discovered each other's faults, you must nobble thePress. You must appeal to the public."

  "That's the difficulty," said Mary thoughtfully.

  "That's where she comes in," said Mr. Basnett, jerking his head inMary's direction. "She's the only one of us who's a capitalist. She canmake a whole-time job of it. I'm tied to an office; I can only give myspare time. Are you, by any chance, on the look-out for a job?" he askedKatharine, with a queer mixture of distrust and deference.

  "Marriage is her job at present," Mary replied for her.

  "Oh, I see," said Mr. Basnett. He made allowances for that; he andhis friends had faced the question of sex, along with all others, andassigned it an honorable place in their scheme of life. Katharine feltthis beneath the roughness of his manner; and a world entrusted to theguardianship of Mary Datchet and Mr. Basnett seemed to her a good world,although not a romantic or beautiful place or, to put it figuratively,a place where any line of blue mist softly linked tree to tree upon thehorizon. For a moment she thought she saw in his face, bent now over thefire, the features of that original man whom we still recall everynow and then, although we know only the clerk, barrister, Governmentalofficial, or workingman variety of him. Not that Mr. Basnett, giving hisdays to commerce and his spare time to social reform, would long carryabout him any trace of his possibilities of completeness; but, for themoment, in his youth and ardor, still speculative, still uncramped, onemight imagine him the citizen of a nobler state than ours. Katharineturned over her small stock of information, and wondered what theirsociety might be going to attempt. Then she remembered that she washindering their business, and rose, still thinking of this society, andthus thinking, she said to Mr. Basnett:

  "Well, you'll ask me to join when the time comes, I hope."

  He nodded, and took his pipe from his mouth, but, being unable to thinkof anything to say, he put it back again, although he would have beenglad if she had stayed.

  Against her wish, Mary insisted upon taking her downstairs, and then, asthere was no cab to be seen, they stood in the street together, lookingabout them.

  "Go back," Katharine urged her, thinking of Mr. Basnett with his papersin his hand.

  "You can't wander about the streets alone in those clothes," said Mary,but the desire to find a cab was not her true reason for standing besideKatharine for a minute or two. Unfortunately for her composure, Mr.Basnett and his papers seemed to her an incidental diversion of life'sserious purpose compared with some tremendous fact which manifesteditself as she stood alone with Katharine. It may have been their commonwomanhood.

  "Have you seen Ralph?" she asked suddenly, without preface.

  "Yes," said Katharine directly, but she did not remember when or whereshe had seen him. It took her a moment or two to remember why Maryshould ask her if she had seen Ralph.

  "I believe I'm jealous," said Mary.

  "Nonsense, Mary," said Katharine, rather distractedly, taking her armand beginning to walk up the street in the direction of the main road."Let me see; we went to Kew, and we agreed to be friends. Yes, that'swhat happened." Mary was silent, in the hope that Katharine would tellher more. But Katharine said nothing.

  "It's not a question of friendship," Mary exclaimed, her anger rising,to her own surprise. "You know it's not. How can it be? I've no rightto interfere--" She stopped. "Only I'd rather Ralph wasn't hurt," sheconcluded.

  "I think he seems able to take care of himself," Katharine observed.Without either of them wishing it, a feeling of hostility had risenbetween them.

  "Do you really think it's worth it?" said Mary, after a pause.

  "How can one tell?" Katharine asked.

  "Have you ever cared for any one?" Mary demanded rashly and foolishly.

  "I can't wander about London discussing my feelings--Here's a cab--no,there's some one in it."

  "We don't want to quarrel," said Mary.

  "Ought I to have told him that I wouldn't be his friend?" Katharineasked. "Shall I tell him that? If so, what reason shall I give him?"

  "Of course you can't tell him that," said Mary, controlling herself.

  "I believe I shall, though," said Katharine suddenly.

  "I lost my temper, Katharine; I shouldn't have said what I did."

  "The whole thing's foolish," said Katharine, peremptorily. "That's whatI say. It's not worth it." She spoke with unnecessary vehemence, but itwas not directed against Mary Datchet. Their animosity had completelydisappeared, and upon both of them a cloud of difficulty and darknessrested, obscuring the future, in which they had both to find a way.

  "No, no, it's not worth it," Katharine repeated. "Suppose, as you say,it's out of the question--this friendship; he falls in love with me. Idon't want that. Still," she added, "I believe you exaggerate; love'snot everything; marriage itself is only one of the things--" They hadreached the main thoroughfare, and stood looking at the omnibuses andpassers-by, who seemed, for the moment, to illustrate what Katharine hadsaid of the diversity of human interests. For both of them it had becomeone of those moments of extreme detachment, when it seems unnecessaryever again to shoulder the burden of happiness and self-assertiveexistence. Their neighbors were welcome to their possessions.

  "I don't lay down any rules,"' said Mary, recovering herself first, asthey turned after a long pause of this description. "All I say is thatyou should know what you're about--for certain; but," she added, "Iexpect you do."

  At the same time she was profoundly perplexed, not only by what sheknew of the arrangements for Katharine's marriage, but by the impressionwhich she had of her, there on her arm, dark and inscrutable.

  They walked back again and reached the steps which led up to Mary'sflat. Here they stopped and paused for a moment, saying nothing.

  "You must go in," said Katharine, rousing herself. "He's waiting allthis time to go on with his reading." She glanced up at the lightedwindow near the top of the house, and they both looked at it and waitedfor a moment. A flight of semicircular steps ran up to the hall, andMary slowly mounted the first two or three, and paused, looking downupon Katharine.

  "I think you underrate the value of that emotion," she said slowly, anda little awkwardly. She climbed another step and looked down once moreupon the figure that was only partly lit up, standing in the street witha colorless face turned upwards. As Mary hesitated, a cab came by andKatharine turned and stopped it, saying as she opened the door:

  "Remember, I want to belong to your society--remember," she added,having to raise her voice a little, and shutting the door upon the restof her words.

  Mary mounted the stairs step by step, as if she had to lift her body upan extremely steep ascent. She had had to wrench herself forciblyaway from Katharine, and every step vanquished her desire. She heldon grimly, encouraging herself as though she were actually making somegreat physical effort in climbing a height. She was conscious that Mr.Basnett, sitting at the top of the stairs with his documents, offeredher solid footing if she were capable of reaching it. The knowledge gaveher a faint sense of exaltation.

  Mr. Basnett raised his eyes as she opened the door.

  "I'll go on where I left off," he said. "Stop me if you want anythingexplained."

  He had been re-reading the document, and making pencil notes in themargin while he waited, and he went on again as if there had beenno interruption. Mary sat down among the flat cushions, lit anothercigarette, and listened with a frown upon her face.

  Katharine leant back in the corner of the cab that carried her toChelsea, conscious of fatigue, and conscious, too, of the sober andsatisfactory nature of such industry as she had just witnessed. Thethought of it composed and calmed her. When she reached home she letherself in as quietly as she could, in the hope that the household wasalready gone to bed. But her excursion had occupied less time than shethought, and she heard sounds of unmistakable liveliness upstairs. Adoor opened, and she drew herself into a grou
nd-floor room in case thesound meant that Mr. Peyton were taking his leave. From where she stoodshe could see the stairs, though she was herself invisible. Some one wascoming down the stairs, and now she saw that it was William Rodney. Helooked a little strange, as if he were walking in his sleep; his lipsmoved as if he were acting some part to himself. He came down veryslowly, step by step, with one hand upon the banisters to guide himself.She thought he looked as if he were in some mood of high exaltation,which it made her uncomfortable to witness any longer unseen. Shestepped into the hall. He gave a great start upon seeing her andstopped.

  "Katharine!" he exclaimed. "You've been out?" he asked.

  "Yes.... Are they still up?"

  He did not answer, and walked into the ground-floor room through thedoor which stood open.

  "It's been more wonderful than I can tell you," he said, "I'm incrediblyhappy--"

  He was scarcely addressing her, and she said nothing. For a moment theystood at opposite sides of a table saying nothing. Then he asked herquickly, "But tell me, how did it seem to you? What did you think,Katharine? Is there a chance that she likes me? Tell me, Katharine!"

  Before she could answer a door opened on the landing above and disturbedthem. It disturbed William excessively. He started back, walked rapidlyinto the hall, and said in a loud and ostentatiously ordinary tone:

  "Good night, Katharine. Go to bed now. I shall see you soon. I hope Ishall be able to come to-morrow."

  Next moment he was gone. She went upstairs and found Cassandra on thelanding. She held two or three books in her hand, and she was stoopingto look at others in a little bookcase. She said that she could nevertell which book she wanted to read in bed, poetry, biography, ormetaphysics.

  "What do you read in bed, Katharine?" she asked, as they walked upstairsside by side.

  "Sometimes one thing--sometimes another," said Katharine vaguely.Cassandra looked at her.

  "D'you know, you're extraordinarily queer," she said. "Every one seemsto me a little queer. Perhaps it's the effect of London."

  "Is William queer, too?" Katharine asked.

  "Well, I think he is a little," Cassandra replied. "Queer, but veryfascinating. I shall read Milton to-night. It's been one of the happiestnights of my life, Katharine," she added, looking with shy devotion ather cousin's beautiful face.