Greatheart E-Book

Ethel M. Dell

• Herausgeber: Ktoczyta.pl
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

First published in 1918. Ethel M. Dell was an English writer of popular romance novels. You will find some fascinating glimpses of the period in her books, as well as a substantial dose of romance and adventure. There were two of them as unlike as two men could be. Sir Eustace, big, domineering, haughty, used to sweeping all before him with the power of his personality. The other was Stumpy, small, insignificant, quiet, with a little limp. They clashed over the greatest question that may come to men the love of a girl. This story opens in a pleasing resort in the Swiss Alps, the heroine is sweet and charmingly naive. Did she choose wisely? Is Greatheart more to be desired than great riches? The answer is the most vivid and charming story that Ethel M. Dell has written in a long time.

Leseprobe

Contents

PART I

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

CHAPTER XVII

CHAPTER XVIII

CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XX

CHAPTER XXI

CHAPTER XXII

CHAPTER XXIII

CHAPTER XXIV

CHAPTER XXV

CHAPTER XXVI

CHAPTER XXVII

CHAPTER XXVIII

CHAPTER XXIX

CHAPTER XXX

PART II

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

CHAPTER XVII

CHAPTER XVIII

CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XX

CHAPTER XXI

CHAPTER XXII

CHAPTER XXIII

CHAPTER XXIV

CHAPTER XXV

CHAPTER XXVI

CHAPTER XXVII

CHAPTER XXVIII

CHAPTER XXIX

PART I

CHAPTER I

THE WANDERER

Biddy Maloney stood at the window of her mistress’s bedroom, and surveyed the world with eyes of stern disapproval. There was nothing of the smart lady’s maid about Biddy. She abominated smart lady’s maids. A flyaway French cap and an apron barely reaching to the knees were to her the very essence of flighty impropriety. There was just such a creature in attendance upon Lady Grace de Vigne who occupied the best suite of rooms in the hotel, and Biddy very strongly resented her existence. In her own mind she despised her as a shameless hussy wholly devoid of all ideas of “dacency.” Her resentment was partly due to the fact that the indecent one belonged to the party in possession of the best suite, which they had occupied some three weeks before Biddy and her party had appeared on the scene.

It was all Master Scott’s fault, of course. He ought to have written to engage rooms sooner, but then to be sure the decision to migrate to this winter paradise in the Alps had been a sudden one. That had been Sir Eustace’s fault. He was always so sudden in his ways.

Biddy sighed impatiently. Sir Eustace had always been hard to manage. She had never really conquered him even in the days when she had made him stand in the corner and go without sugar in his tea. She well remembered the shocking occasion on which he had flung sugar and basin together into the fire so that the others might be made to share his enforced abstinence. She believed he was equal to committing a similar act of violence if baulked even now. But he never was baulked. At thirty-five he reigned supreme in his own world. No one ever crossed him, unless it were Master Scott, and of course no one could be seriously angry with him, poor dear young man! He was so gentle and kind. A faint, maternal smile relaxed Biddy’s grim lips. She became aware that the white world below was a-flood with sunshine.

The snowy mountains that rose against the vivid blue were dream-like in their beauty. Where the sun shone upon them, their purity was almost too dazzling to behold. It was a relief to rest the eyes upon the great patches of pine-woods that clothed some of the slopes.

“I wonder if Miss Isabel will be happy here,” mused Biddy.

That to her mind was the only thing on earth that really mattered, practically the only thing for which she ever troubled her Maker. Her own wants were all amalgamated in this one great desire of her heart–that her darling’s poor torn spirit should be made happy. She had wholly ceased to remember that she had ever wanted anything else. It was for Miss Isabel that she desired the best rooms, the best carriages, the best of everything. Even her love for Master Scott–poor dear young man!–depended largely upon the faculty he possessed for consoling and interesting Miss Isabel. Anyone who did that earned Biddy’s undying respect and gratitude. Of the rest of the world–save for a passing disapproval–she was scarcely aware. Nothing else mattered in the same way. In fact nothing else really mattered at all.

Ah! A movement from the bed at last! Her quick ears, ever on the alert, warned her on the instant. She turned from the window with such mother-love shining in her old brown face under its severe white cap as made it as beautiful in its way as the paradise without.

“Why, Miss Isabel darlint, how you’ve slept then!” she said, in the soft, crooning voice which was kept for this one beloved being alone.

Two white arms were stretched wide outside the bed. Two dark eyes, mysteriously shadowed and sunken, looked up to hers.

“Has he gone already, Biddy?” a low voice asked.

“Only a little way, darlint. He’s just round the corner,” said Biddy tenderly. “Will ye wait a minute while I give ye your tay?”

There was a spirit-kettle singing merrily in the room. She busied herself about it, her withered face intent over the task.

The white arms fell upon the blue travelling-rug that Biddy had spread with loving care outside the bed the night before to add to her mistress’s comfort. “When did he go, Biddy?” the low voice asked, and there was a furtive quality in the question as if it were designed for none but Biddy’s ears. “Did he–did he leave no message?”

“Ah, to be sure!” said Biddy, turning her face for a moment. “And the likes of me to have forgotten it! He sent ye his best love, darlint, and ye were to eat a fine breakfast before ye went out.”

The sad eyes smiled at her from the bed, half-gratified, half-incredulous, like the eyes of a lonely child who listens to a fairy-tale. “It was like him to think of that, Biddy. But–I wish he had stayed a little longer. I must get up and go and find him.”

“Hasn’t he been with ye through the night?” asked Biddy, bent again to her task.

“Nearly all night long!” The answer came on a note of triumph, yet there was also a note of challenge in it also.

“Then what more would ye have?” said Biddy wisely. “Leave him alone for a bit, darlint! Husbands are better without their wives sometimes.”

A low laugh came from the bed. “Oh, Biddy, I must tell him that! He would love your bon-mots. Did he–did he say when he would be back?”

“That he did not,” said Biddy, still absorbed over the kettle. “But there’s nothing in that at all. Ye can’t be always expecting a man to give account of himself. Now, mavourneen, I’ll give ye your tay, and ye’ll be able to get up when ye feel like it. Ah! There’s Master Scott! And would ye like him to come in and have a cup with ye?”

Three soft knocks had sounded on the door. The woman in the bed raised herself, and her hair fell in glory around her, hair that at twenty-five had been raven-black, hair that at thirty-two was white as the snow outside the window.

“Is that you, Stumpy dear? Come in! Come in!” she called.

Her voice was hollow and deep. She turned her face to the door–a beautiful, wasted face with hungry eyes that watched and waited perpetually.

The door opened very quietly and unobtrusively, and a small, insignificant man came in. He was about the size of the average schoolboy of fifteen, and he walked with a slight limp, one leg being a trifle shorter than the other. Notwithstanding this defect, his general appearance was one of extreme neatness, from his colourless but carefully trained moustache and small trim beard to his well-shod feet. His clothes–-like his beard–fitted him perfectly.

His close-cropped hair was also colourless and grew somewhat far back on his forehead. His pale grey eyes had a tired expression, as if they had looked too long or too earnestly upon the turmoil of life.

He came to the bedside and took the thin white hand outstretched to him on which a wedding ring hung loose. He walked without awkwardness; there was even dignity in his carriage.

He bent to kiss the uplifted face. “Have you slept well, dear?”

Her arms reached up and clasped his neck. “Oh, Stumpy, yes! I have had a lovely night. Basil has been with me. He has gone out now; but I am going to look for him presently.”

“Many happy returns of the day to ye, Master Scott!” put in Biddy rather pointedly.

“Ah yes. It is your birthday. I had forgotten. Forgive me, Stumpy darling! You know I wish you always the very, very best.” The clinging arms held him more closely,

“Thank you, Isabel.” Scott’s voice was as tired as his eyes, and yet it had a certain quality of strength. “Of course it’s a very important occasion. How are we going to celebrate it?”

“I have a present for you somewhere. Biddy, where is it?” Isabel’s voice had a note of impatience in it.

“It’s here, darlint! It’s here!” Biddy bustled up to the bed with a parcel.

Isabel took it from her and turned to Scott. “It’s only a silly old cigarette-case, dear, but I thought of it all myself. How old are you now, Stumpy?”

“I am thirty,” he answered, smiling. “Thank you very much, dear. It’s just the thing I wanted–only too good!”

“As if anything could be too good for you!” his sister said tenderly. “Has Eustace remembered?”

“Oh yes. Eustace has given me a saddle, but as he didn’t think I should want it here, it is to be presented when we get home again.” He sat down on the side of the bed, still inspecting the birthday offering.

“Haven’t you had anything from anyone else?” Isabel asked, after a moment.

He shook his head. “Who else is there to bother about a minnow like me?”

“You’re not a minnow, Scott. And didn’t–didn’t Basil give you anything?”

Scott’s tired eyes looked at her with a sudden fixity. He said nothing; but a piteous look came into Isabel’s face under his steady gaze, and she dropped her own as if ashamed.

“Whisht, Master Scott darlint, for the Lord’s sake, don’t ye go upsetting her!” warned Biddy in a sibilant whisper. “I had trouble enough last night. If it hadn’t been for the draught, she wouldn’t have slept at all, at all.”

Scott did not look at her. “You should have called me,” he said, and leaning forward took his sister’s hand. “Isabel, wouldn’t you like to come out and see the skaters? There is some wonderful luging going on too.”

She did not raise her eyes; her whole demeanour had changed. She seemed to droop as if all animation had gone; “I don’t know,” she said listlessly. “I think I would almost as soon stay here.”

“Have your tay, darlint!” coaxed Biddy, on her other side.

“Eustace will be coming to look for you if you don’t,” said Scott.

She started at that, and gave a quick shiver. “Oh no, I don’t want Eustace! Don’t let him come here, Stumpy, will you?”

“Shall I go and tell him you are coming then?” asked Scott, his eyes still steadily watching her.

She nodded. “Yes, yes. But I don’t want to be made. Basil never made me do things.”

Scott rose. “I will wait for you downstairs. Thank you, Biddy. Yes, I’ll drink that first. No tea in the world ever tastes like your brew.”

“Get along with your blarney, Master Scott!” protested Biddy. “And you and Sir Eustace mustn’t tire Miss Isabel out. Remember, she’s just come a long journey, and it’s not wonderful at all that she don’t feel like exerting herself.”

A red fire of resentment smouldered in the old woman’s eyes, but Scott paid no attention to it. “You’d better get some sleep yourself, Biddy, if you can,” he said. “No more, thanks. You will be out in an hour then, Isabel?”

“Perhaps,” she said.

He paused, standing beside her. “If you are not out in an hour I shall come and fetch you,” he said.

She put forth an appealing hand like a child. “I will come out, Stumpy. I will come out,” she said tremulously.

He pressed the hand for a moment. “In an hour then, I want to show you everything. There is plenty to be seen.”

He turned to the door, looked back with a parting smile, and went out.

Isabel did not see the smile. She was staring moodily downwards with eyes that only looked within.

CHAPTER II

THE LOOKER-ON

Down on the skating-rink below the hotel, a crowd of people were making merry. The ice was in splendid condition. It sparkled in the sun like a sheet of frosted glass, and over it the skaters glided with much mirth and laughter.

Scott stood on the road above and watched them. There were a good many accomplished performers among them, and there were also several beginners. But all seemed alike infected with the gaiety of the place. There was not one face that did not wear a smile.

It was an invigorating scene. From a slope of the white mountain-side beyond the rink the shouts and laughter of higers came through the crystal air. A string of luges was shooting down the run, and even as Scott caught sight of it the foremost came to grief, and a dozen people rolled ignominiously in the snow. He smiled involuntarily. He seemed to have stepped into an atmosphere of irresponsible youth. The air was full of the magic fluid. It stirred his pulses like a draught of champagne.

Then his eyes returned to the rink, and almost immediately singled out the best skater there. A man in a white sweater, dark, handsome, magnificently made, supremely sure of himself, darted with the swift grace of a swallow through the throng. His absolute confidence and splendid physique made him conspicuous. He executed elaborate figures with such perfect ease and certainty of movement that many turned to look at him in astonished admiration.

“Great Scott!” said a cracked voice at Scott’s shoulder.

He turned sharply, and met the frank regard of a rosy-faced schoolboy a little shorter than himself.

“Look at that bloomin’ swell!” said the new-comer in tones of deep disgust. “He seems to have sprouted in the night. I’ve no use for these star skaters myself. They’re all so beastly sidey.”

He addressed Scott as an equal, and as an equal Scott made reply. “P’raps when you’re a star skater yourself, you’ll change your mind about ‘em.”

The boy grinned. “Ah! P’raps! You’re a new chum, aren’t you?”

“Very new,” said Scott.

“Can you skate?” asked the lad. “But of course you can. I suppose you’re another dark horse. It’s too bad, you know; just as Dinah and I are beginning to fancy ourselves at it. We began right at the beginning too.”

“Consider yourself lucky!” said Scott rather briefly.

“What do you mean?” The boy’s eyes flashed over him intelligently, green eyes humorously alert.

Scott glanced downwards. “I mean my legs are not a pair, so I can’t even begin.”

“Oh, bad luck, sir!” The equality vanished from the boy’s voice. He became suddenly almost deferential, and Scott realized that he was no longer regarded as a comrade. “Still”–he hesitated–“you can luge, I suppose?”

“I don’t quite see myself,” said Scott, looking across once more to the merry group on the distant run.

“Any idiot can do that,” the boy protested, then turned suddenly a deep red. “Oh, lor, I didn’t mean that! Hi, Dinah!” He turned to cover his embarrassment and sent a deafening yell at the sun-bathed façade of the hotel. “Are you never coming, you cuckoo? Half the morning’s gone already!”

“Coming, Billy!” at once a clear gay voice made answer, and the merriest face that Scott had ever seen made a sudden appearance at an open window. “Darling Billy, do keep your hair on for just two minutes longer! Yvonne has been trying on my fancy dress, but she’s nearly done.”

The neck and shoulders below the laughing face were bare and a bare arm waved in a propitiatory fashion ere it vanished.

“Looks as if the fancy dress is a minus quantity,” observed Billy to his companion with a grin. “I didn’t see any of it, did you?”

Scott tried not to laugh. “Your sister?” he asked.

Billy nodded affirmation. “She ain’t a bad urchin,” he observed, “as sisters go. We’re staying here along with the de Vignes. Ever met ‘em? Lady Grace is a holy terror. Her husband is a horrible stuck-up bore of an Anglo-Indian,–thinks himself everybody, and tells the most awful howlers. Rose–that’s the daughter–is by way of being very beautiful. There she goes now; see? That golden-haired girl in red! She’s another of your beastly star skaters. I’ll bet she’ll have that big bounder cutting capers with her before the day’s out.”

“Think so?” said Scott.

Billy nodded again. “I suppose he’s a prince at least. My word, doesn’t he fancy himself? Look at that now? Side–sheer side!”

The skater under discussion had just executed a most intricate figure not far from them. Having accomplished it with that unerring and somewhat blatant confidence that so revolted Billy’s schoolboy soul, he straightened his tall figure, and darted in a straight line for the end of the rink above which they stood. His hands were in his pockets. His bearing was superb. He described a complete circle below them before he brought himself to a stand. Then he lifted his dark arrogant face. He wore a short clipped moustache which by no means hid the strength of a well-modelled though slightly sneering mouth. His eyes were somewhat deeply set, and shone extraordinarily blue under straight black brows that met. The man’s whole expression was one of dominant self-assertion. He bore himself like a king.

“Well, Stumpy,” he said, “where’s Isabel?”

Scott’s companion jumped, and beat a swift retreat. Scott smiled a little as he made reply.

“I have been up to see her. She will be out presently. Biddy had to give her a sleeping-draught last night.”

“Damn!” said the other in a fierce undertone. “Did she call you first?”

“No.”

“Then why the devil didn’t she? I shall sack that woman. Isabel hasn’t a chance to get well with a mischievous old hag like that always with her.”

“I think Isabel would probably die without her,” Stumpy responded in his quiet voice which presented a vivid contrast to his brother’s stormy utterance. “And Biddy would probably die too–if she consented to go, which I doubt.”

“Oh, damn Biddy! The sooner she dies the better. She’s nothing but a perpetual nuisance. What is Isabel like this morning?”

Scott hesitated, and his brother frowned.

“That’s enough. What else could any one expect? Look here, Scott! This thing has got to end. I shall take that sleeping-stuff away.”

“If you can get hold of it,” put in Scott drily.

“You must get hold of it. You have ample opportunity. It’s all very well to preach patience, but she has been taking slow poison for seven years. I am certain of it. It’s ridiculous! It’s monstrous! It’s got to end.” He spoke with impatient finality, his blue eyes challenging remonstrance.

Scott made none. Only after a moment he said, “If you take away one prop, old chap, you must provide another. A broken thing can’t stand alone. But need we discuss it now? As I told you, she is coming out presently, and this glorious air is bound to make a difference to her. It tastes like wine.”

It was at this point that the golden-haired girl in red suddenly glided up and sat down on the bank a few yards away to adjust a skate.

Sir Eustace turned his head, and a sparkle came into his eyes. He watched her for a moment, then left his brother without further words.

“Can I do that for you?” he asked.

She lifted a flushed face. “Oh, how kind of you! But I have just managed it. How lovely the ice is this morning!”

She rose with the words, balancing herself with a grace as finished as his own, and threw him a dazzling smile of gratitude. Scott, from his post of observation on the bank, decided that she certainly was beautiful. Her face was almost faultless. And yet it seemed to him that there was infinitely more of witchery in the face that had laughed from the window a few minutes before. Almost unconsciously he was waiting to see the owner of that face emerge.

He watched the inevitable exchange of commonplaces between his brother and the beautiful Miss de Vigne whose graciousness plainly indicated her willingness for a nearer acquaintance, and presently he saw them move away side by side.

“What did I tell you?” said Billy’s voice at his shoulder. “But you might have said that chap belonged to you. How was I to know?”

“Oh, quite so,” said Scott. “Pray don’t apologize! He doesn’t belong to me either. It is I who belong to him.”

Billy’s green eyes twinkled appreciatively. “You’re his brother, aren’t you?”

Scott looked at him. “Now how on earth did you know that?”

He looked back with his frank, engaging grin. “Oh, there’s the same hang about you. I can’t tell you what it is. Dinah would know directly. You’d better ask her.”

“I don’t happen to have the pleasure of your sister’s acquaintance,” observed Scott, with his quiet smile.

“Oh, I’ll soon introduce you if that’s what you want,” said Billy. “Come along! There she is now, just crossing the road. By the way, I don’t think you told me your name.”

“My name is Studley–Scott Studley, Stumpy to my friends,” said Scott, in his whimsical, rather weary fashion.

Billy laughed. “You’re a sport,” he said. “When I know you a bit better, I shall remember that. Hi, Dinah! What a deuce of a time you’ve been. This is Mr. Studley, and he saw you at the window without anything on.”

“I’m sure he didn’t! Billy, how dare you?” Dinah’s brown face burned an indignant red; she looked at Scott with instant hostility.

“Oh, please!” he protested mildly. “That’s not quite fair on me.”

“Serves you right,” declared Billy with malicious delight. “You played me a shabby trick, you know.”

Dinah’s brow cleared. She smiled upon Scott. “Isn’t he a horrid little pig? How do you do? Isn’t it a ripping day? It makes you want to climb, doesn’t it? I wish I’d got an alpenstock.”

“Can’t you get one anywhere?” asked Scott. “I thought they were always to be had.”

“Yes, but they cost money,” sighed Dinah. “And I haven’t got any. It doesn’t really matter though. There are lots of other things to do. Are you keen on luging? I am.”

Her bright eyes smiled into his with the utmost friendliness, and he knew that she would not commit Billy’s mistake and ask him if he skated.

Her smile was infectious. The charm of it lingered after it had passed. Her eyes were green like Billy’s, only softer. They had a great deal of sweetness in them, and a spice–just a spice of devilry as well. The rest of the face would have been quite unremarkable, but the laughter-loving mouth and pointed chin wholly redeemed it from the commonplace. She was a little brown thing like a woodland creature, and her dainty air and quick ways put Scott irresistibly in mind of a pert robin.

In reply to her question he told her that he had arrived only the night before. “And I am quite a tyro,” he added. “I have been watching the luging on that slope, and thanking all the stars that control my destiny that I wasn’t there.”

She laughed, showing a row of small white teeth. “Oh, you’d love it once you started. It’s a heavenly sport if the run isn’t bumpy. Isn’t this a glorious atmosphere? It makes one feel so happy.”

She came and stood by his side to watch the skaters. Billy was seated on the bank, impatiently changing his boots.

“I’m not going to wait for you any longer, Dinah,” he said. “I’m fed up.”

“Don’t then!” she retorted. “I never asked you to.”

“What a lie!” said Billy, with all a brother’s gallantry.

She threw him a sister’s look of scorn and deigned no rejoinder. But in a moment the incident was forgotten. “Oh, look there!” she suddenly exclaimed. “Isn’t that just like Rose de Vigne? She’s always sure to appropriate the most handsome man within sight. I’ve been watching that man from my window. He is a perfect Apollo, and skates divinely. And now she’s got him!”

Deep disgust was audible in her voice. Billy looked up with a sideways grin. “You don’t suppose he’d look at a sparrow like you, do you?” he said. “He prefers a swan, you bet.”

“Be quiet, Billy!” commanded Dinah, making an ineffectual dig at him with her foot. “I don’t want him to look at me. I hate men. But it is too bad the way Rose always chooses the best. It’s just the same with everything. And I long–oh, I do long sometimes–to cut her out!”

“I should myself,” said Scott unexpectedly. “But why don’t you. I’m sure you could.”

She threw him a whimsical smile. “I!” she said. “Why that’s about as likely as–” she stopped short in some confusion.

He laughed a little. “You mean I might as soon hope to cut out Apollo? But the cases are not parallel, I assure you. Besides, Apollo happens to be my brother, which makes a difference.”

“Oh, is he your brother? What a good thing you told me!” laughed Dinah. “I might have said something rude about him in a minute.”

“Like me!” said Billy, stumbling to his feet. “I made a most horrific blunder, didn’t I, Mr. Studley? I called him a bounder!”

Dinah looked at him witheringly. “You would!” she said. “Well, I hope you apologized.”

Billy stuck out his tongue at her. “I didn’t then!” he returned, and skated elegantly away on one leg.

“Billy,” remarked Dinah dispassionately, “is not really such a horrid little beast as he seems.”

Scott smiled his courteous smile. “I had already gathered that,” he said.

Her green eyes darted him a swift look, as if to ascertain if he were in earnest. Then: “That was very nice of you,” she said. “I wonder how you knew.”

He still smiled, but without much mirth. “A looker-on sees a good many things, you know,” he said.

Dinah’s eyes flashed understanding. She said no more.

CHAPTER III

THE SEARCH

When Isabel came slowly forth at length from the hotel door whither Biddy had conducted her, Scott was sitting alone on a bench in the sunshine.

He rose at once to join her. “Why, how quick you have been! Or else the time flies here. Eustace is still skating. I had no idea he was so accomplished. See, there he is!”

But Isabel set her haggard face towards the mountain-road that wound up beyond the hotel. “I am going to look for Basil,” she said.

“It is waste of time,” said Scott quietly.

But he did not attempt to withstand her. They turned side by side up the hard, snowy track.

For some time they walked in silence. At a short distance from the hotel, the road ascended steeply through a pine-wood, dark and mysterious as an enchanted forest, through which there rose the sound of a rushing stream.

Scott paused to listen, but instantly his sister laid an imperious hand upon him.

“I can’t wait,” she said. “I am sure he is just round the corner. I heard him whistle.”

He moved on in response to her insistence. “I heard that whistle too,” he said. “But it was a mountain-boy.”

He was right. At a curve in the road, they met a young Swiss lad who went by them with a smile and salute, and fell to whistling again when he had passed.

Isabel pressed on in silence. She had started in feverish haste, but her speed was gradually slackening. She looked neither to right nor left; her eyes perpetually strained forward as though they sought for something just beyond their range of vision. For a while Scott limped beside her without speaking, but at last as they sighted the end of the pine-wood he gently broke the silence.

“Isabel dear, I think we must turn back very soon.”

“Oh, why?” she said. “Why? You always say that when–” There came a break in her voice, and she ceased to speak.

Her pace quickened so that he had some difficulty in keeping up with her, but he made no protest. With the utmost patience he also pressed on.

But it was not long before her strength began to fail. She stumbled once or twice, and he put a supporting hand under her elbow. As they neared the edge of the pines it became evident that the road dwindled to a mere mountain-path winding steeply upwards through the snow. The sun shone dazzlingly upon the great waste of whiteness.

Very suddenly Isabel stopped. “He can’t have gone this way after all,” she said, and turned to her brother with eyes of tragic hopelessness. “Stumpy, Stumpy, what shall I do?”

He drew her hand very gently through his arm. “We will go back, dear,” he said.

A low sob escaped her, but she did not weep. “If I only had the strength to go on and on and on!” she said. “I know I should find him some day then.”

“You will find him some day,” he answered with grave assurance. “But not yet.”

They went back to the turn in the road where the sound of the stream rose like fairy music from an unseen glen. The snow lay pure and untrodden under the trees.

Scott paused again, and this time Isabel made no remonstrance. They stood together listening to the rush of the torrent.

“How beautiful this place must be in springtime!” he said.

She gave a sharp shiver. “It is like a dead world now.”

“A world that will very soon rise again,” he answered.

She looked at him with vague eyes. “You are always talking of the resurrection,” she said.

“When I am with you, I am often thinking of it,” he said with simplicity.

A haunted look came into her face. “But that implies–death,” she said, her voice very low.

“And what is Death?” said Scott gently, as if he reasoned with a child. “Do you think it is more than a step further into Life? The passing of a boundary, that is all.”

“But there is no returning!” she protested piteously. “It must be more than that.”

“My dear, there is never any returning,” he said gravely. “None of us can go backwards. Yesterday is but a step away, but can we retrace that step? No, not one of us.”

She made a sudden, almost fierce gesture. “Oh, to go back!” she cried. “Oh, to go back! Why should we be forced blindly forward when we only want to go back?”

“That is the universal law,” said Scott. “That is God’s Will.”

“It is cruel! It is cruel!” she wailed.

“No, it is merciful. So long as there is Death in the world we must go on. We have got to get past Death.”

She turned her tragic eyes upon him. “And what then? What then?”

Scott was gazing steadfastly into her face of ravaged beauty. “Then–the resurrection,” he said. “There are millions of people in the world, Isabel, who are living out their lives solely for the sake of that, because they know that if they only keep on, the Resurrection will give back to them all that they have lost. My dear, it is not going back that could help anyone. The past is past, the present is passing; there is only the future that can restore all things. We are bound to go forward, and thank God for it!”

Her eyes fell slowly before his. She did not speak, but after a moment gave him her hand with a shadowy smile. They continued the descent side by side.

Another curve of the road brought them within sight of the hotel.

Scott broke the silence. “Here is Eustace coming to meet us!”

She looked up with a start, and into her face came a curious, veiled expression, half furtive, half afraid.

“Don’t tell him, Stumpy!” she said quickly.

“What, dear?”

“Don’t tell him I have been looking for Basil this morning. He–he wouldn’t understand. And–and–you know–I must look for him sometimes. I shall lose him altogether if I don’t.”

“Shall we pretend we are enjoying ourselves?” said Scott with a smile.

She answered him with feverish earnestness. “Yes–yes! Let us do that! And, Stumpy, Stumpy dear, you are good, you can pray. I can’t, you know. Will you–will you pray sometimes–that I may find him?”

“I shall pray that your eyes may be opened, Isabel,” he answered, “so that you may know you have never really lost him.”

She smiled again, her fleeting, phantom smile. “Don’t pray for the impossible, Stumpy!” she said. “I–I think that would be a mistake.”

“Is anything impossible?” said Scott.

He raised his hand before she could make any answer, and sent a cheery holloa down to his brother who waved a swift response. They quickened their steps to meet him.

Eustace was striding up the hill with the easy swing of a giant. He held out both hands to Isabel as he drew near. She pulled herself free from Scott, and went to him as one drawn by an unseen force.

“Ah, that’s right,” he said, and bent to kiss her. “I’m glad you’ve been for a walk. But you might have come and spoken to me first. I was only on the rink.”

“I didn’t want to see a lot of people,” said Isabel, shrinking a little. “I–I don’t like so many strangers, Eustace.”

“Oh, nonsense!” he said lightly. “You have been buried too long. It’s time you came out of your shell. I shan’t take you home again till you have quite got over that.”

His tone was kindly but it held authority. Isabel attempted no protest. Only she looked away over the sparkling world of white and blue with something near akin to despair in her eyes.

Scott took out his cigarette-case, and handed it to his brother. “Isabel’s birthday present to me!” he said.

Eustace examined it with a smile. “Very nice! Did you think of it all by yourself, Isabel?”

“No,” she said with dreary listlessness. “Biddy reminded me.”

Eustace’s face changed. He frowned slightly and gave the case back to his brother.

“Have a cigarette!” said Scott.

He took one absently, and Scott did the same.

“How did you get on with the lady in red?” he asked.

Eustace threw him a glance half-humorous, half-malicious. “If it comes to that, how did you get on with the little brown girl?”

“Oh, very nicely,” smiled Scott. “Her name is Dinah. Your lady’s name is Rose de Vigne, if you care to know.”

“Really?” said Eustace. “And who told you that?”

“Dinah, of course, or Dinah’s brother. I forget which. They belong to the same party.”

“I should think that little snub-nosed person feels somewhat in the shade,” observed Eustace.

“I expect she does. But she has plenty of wits to make up for it. She seems to find life quite an interesting entertainment.”

“She can’t skate a bit,” said Eustace.

“Can’t she? You’ll have to give her a hint or two. I am sure she would be very grateful.”

“Did she tell you so?”

“I’m not going to tell you what she told me. It wouldn’t be fair.”

Eustace laughed with easy tolerance. “Oh, I’ve no objection to giving her a hand now and then if she’s amusing, and doesn’t become a nuisance. I’m not going to let myself be bored by anybody this trip. I’m out for sport only.”

“It’s a lovely place,” observed Scott.

“Oh, perfect. I’m going to ski this afternoon. How do you like it, Isabel?”

Abruptly the elder brother accosted her. She was walking between them as one in a dream. She started at the sound of her name.

“I don’t know yet,” she said. “It is rather cold, isn’t it? I–I am not sure that I shall be able to sleep here.”

Eustace’s eyes held hers for a moment. “Oh, no one expects to sleep here,” he said lightly. “You skate all day and dance all night. That’s the programme.”

Her lips parted a little. “I–dance!” she said.

“Why not?” said Eustace.

She made a gesture that was almost expressive of horror. “When I dance,” she said, in her deep voice, “you may put me under lock and key for good and all, for I shall be mad indeed.”

“Don’t be silly!” he said sharply.

She shrank as if at a blow, and on the instant very quietly Scott intervened. “Isabel and I prefer to look on,” he said, drawing her hand gently through his arm. “I fancy it suits us both best.”

His eyes met his brother’s quick frown deliberately, with the utmost steadiness, and for a few electric seconds there was undoubted tension between them. Isabel was aware of it, and gripped the supporting arm very closely.

Then with a shrug Eustace turned from the contest. “Oh, go your own way! It’s all one to me. You’re one of the slow coaches that never get anywhere.”

Scott said nothing whatever. He smoked his cigarette without a sign of perturbation. Save for a certain steeliness in his pale eyes, his habitually placid expression remained unaltered.

He walked in silence for a few moments, then without effort began to talk in a general strain of their journey of the previous day. Had Isabel cared about the sleigh-ride? If so, they would go again one day.

She lighted up in response with an animation which she had not displayed during the whole walk. Her eyes shone a little, as with a far-off fire of gratitude.

“I should like it if you would, Stumpy,” she said.

“Then we will certainly go,” he said. “I should enjoy it very much.”

Eustace came out of a somewhat sullen silence to throw a glance of half-reluctant approval towards his brother. He plainly regarded Scott’s move as an achievement of some importance.

“Yes, go by all means!” he said. “Enjoy yourselves. That’s all I ask.”

Isabel’s faint smile flitted across her tired face, but she said nothing.

Only as they reached and entered the hotel, she pressed Scott’s hand for a moment in both her own.

CHAPTER IV

THE MAGICIAN

“Well, Dinah, my dear, are you ready?”

Rose de Vigne, very slim and graceful, with her beautiful hair mounted high above her white forehead and falling in a shower of golden ringlets behind after the style of a hundred years ago, stood on the threshold of Dinah’s room, awaiting permission to enter. Her dress was of palest green satin brocade, a genuine Court dress of a century old. Her arms and neck gleamed with a snowy whiteness. She looked as if she had just stepped out of an ancient picture.

There came an impatient cry from within the room. “Oh, come in! Come in! I’m not nearly ready,–never shall be, I think. Where is Yvonne? Couldn’t she spare me a single moment?”

The beautiful lady entered with a smile. She could afford to smile, being complete to the last detail and quite sure of taking the ballroom by storm. She found Dinah scurrying barefooted about the room with her hair in a loose bunch on her neck, her attire of the scantiest description, her expression one of wild desperation.

“I’ve lost my stockings. Where can they be? I know I had them this morning. Can Yvonne have taken them by mistake? She put everything ready for me,–or said she had.”

The bed was littered with articles of clothing all flung together in hopeless confusion. Rose came forward. “Surely Yvonne didn’t leave your things like this?” she said.

“No. I’ve been hunting through everything for the stockings. Where can they be? I shall have to go without them, that’s all.”

“My dear child, they can’t be far away. You had better get on with your hair while I look for them. I am afraid you will not be able to count on any help from Yvonne to-night. She has only just finished dressing me, and has gone now to help Mother. You know what that means.”

“Oh, goodness, yes!” said Dinah. “I wish I’d never gone in for this stupid fancy dress at all. I shall never be done.”

Rose smiled in her indulgent way. She was always kind to Dinah. “Well, I can help you for a few minutes. I can’t think how you come to be so late. I thought you came in long ago.”

“Yes, but Billy wanted some buttons sewn on, and that hindered me.” Dinah was dragging at her hair with impatient fingers. “What a swell you look, Rose! I’m sure no one will dare to ask you for any but square dances.”

“Do you think so, dear?” said Rose, looking at herself complacently in the glass over Dinah’s head.

Dinah made a sudden and hideous grimace. “Oh, drat my hair! I can’t do anything with it. I believe I shall cut it all off, put on just a pinafore, and go as a piccaninny.”

“That sounds a little vulgar,” observed Rose. “There are your stockings under the bed. You must have dropped them under. I should think the more simply you do your hair the better if you are going to wear a coloured kerchief over it. You have natural ringlets in front, and that is the only part that will show.”

“And they will hang down over my eyes,” retorted Dinah, “unless I fasten them back with a comb, which I haven’t got. Oh, don’t stay, Rose! I know you are wanting to go, and you can’t help me. I shall manage somehow.”

“Are you quite sure?” said Rose turning again to survey herself.

“Quite–quite! I shall get on best alone. I’m in a bad temper too, and I want to use language–horrid language,” said Dinah, tugging viciously at her dark hair.

Rose lowered her stately gaze and watched her for a moment. Then as Dinah’s green eyes suddenly flashed resentful enquiry upon her she lightly touched the girl’s flushed cheek, and turned away. “Poor little Dinah!” she said.

The door closed upon her graceful figure in its old-world, sweeping robe and Dinah whizzed round from the glass like a naughty fairy in a rage. “Rose de Vigne, I hate you!” she said aloud, and stamped her unshod foot upon the floor.

A period of uninterrupted misfortune followed this outburst. Everything went wrong. The costume which the French maid had so deftly fitted upon her that morning refused to be adjusted properly. The fastenings baffled her, and finally a hook at the back took firm hold of the lawn of her sleeve and maliciously refused to be disentangled therefrom.

Dinah struggled for freedom for some minutes till the lawn began to tear, and then at last she became desperate. “Billy must do it,” she said, and almost in tears she threw open the door and ran down the passage.

Billy’s room was round a corner, and this end of the corridor was dim. As she turned it, she almost collided with a figure coming in the opposite direction–a boyish-looking figure in evening dress which she instantly took for Billy.

“Oh, there you are!” she exclaimed. “Do come along and help me like a saint! I’m in such a fix.”

There was an instant’s pause before she discovered her mistake, and then in the same moment a man’s voice answered her.

“Of course I will help you with pleasure. What is wrong?”

Dinah started back, as if she would flee in dismay. But perhaps it was the kindness of his response, or possibly only the extremity of her need–something held her there. She stood her ground as it were in spite of herself.

“Oh, it is you! I do beg your pardon. I thought it was Billy. I’ve got my sleeve caught up at the back, and I want him to undo it.”

“I’ll undo it if you will allow me,” said Scott.

“Oh, would you? How awfully kind! My arm is nearly broken with trying to get free. You can’t see here though,” said Dinah. “There’s a light by my door.”

“Let us go to it then!” said Scott. “I know what it is to have things go wrong at a critical time.”

He accompanied her back again with the utmost simplicity, stopped by the light, and proceeded with considerable deftness to remedy the mischief.

“Oh, thank you!” said Dinah, with heart-felt gratitude as he freed her at last. “Billy would have torn the stuff in all directions. I’m dressing against time, you see, and I’ve no one to help me.”

“Do you want any more help?” asked Scott, looking at her with a quizzical light in his eyes.

She laughed, albeit she was still not far from tears. “Yes, I want someone to pin a handkerchief on my head in the proper Italian fashion. I don’t look much like a contadina yet, do I?”

He surveyed her more critically. “It’s not a bad get-up. You look very nice anyhow. If you like to bring me the handkerchief, I will see what I can do. I know a little about it from the point of view of an amateur artist. You want some earrings. Have you got any?”

Dinah shook her head. “Of course not.”

“I believe my sister has,” said Scott. “I’ll go and see.”

“Oh no, no! What will she think?” cried Dinah in distress.

He uttered his quiet laugh. “I will present you to her by-and-bye if I may. I am sure she will be interested and pleased. You finish off as quickly as you can! I shall be back directly.”

He limped away again down the passage, moving more quickly than was his wont, and Dinah hastened back into her room wondering if this informality would be regarded by her chaperon as a great breach of etiquette.

“Rose thinks I’m vulgar,” she murmured to herself. “I wonder if I really am. But really–he is such a dear little man. How could I possibly help it?”

The dear little man’s return put an end to her speculations. He came back in an incredibly short time, armed with a leather jewel-case which he deposited on the threshold.

Dinah came light-footed to join him, all her grievances forgotten. Her hair, notwithstanding its waywardness, clustered very prettily about her face. There was a bewitching dimple near one corner of her mouth.

“You can come in if you like,” she said. “I’m quite dressed–all except the handkerchief.”

“Thank you; but I won’t come in,” he answered. “We mustn’t shock anybody. If you could bring a chair out, I could manage quite well.”

She fetched the chair. “If anyone comes down the passage, they’ll wonder what on earth we are doing,” she remarked.

“They will take us for old friends,” said Scott in a matter of-fact tone as he opened the jewel-case.

She laughed delightedly. There was a peculiarly happy quality about her laugh. Most people smiled quite involuntarily when they heard it, though Billy compared it to the neigh of a cheery colt.

“Now,” said Scott, looking at her quizzically, “are you going to sit in the chair, or am I going to stand on it?”

“Oh, I’ll sit,” she said. “Here’s the handkerchief! You will fasten it so that it doesn’t flop, won’t you? May I hold that case? I won’t touch anything.”

He put it open into her lap. “There is a chain of coral there. Perhaps you can find it. I think it would look well with your costume.”

Dinah pored over the jewels with sparkling eyes. “But are you sure–quite sure–your sister doesn’t mind?”

“Quite sure,” said Scott, beginning to drape the handkerchief adroitly over her bent head.

“How very sweet of her–of you both!” said Dinah. “I feel like Cinderella being dressed for the ball. Oh, what lovely pearls! I never saw anything so exquisite.”

She had opened an inner case and was literally revelling in its contents.

“They were–her husband’s wedding present to her,” said Scott in his rather monotonous voice.

“How lovely it must be to be married!” said Dinah, with a little sigh.

“Do you think so?” said Scott.

She turned in her chair to regard him. “Don’t you?”

“I can’t quite imagine it,” he said.

“Oh, can’t I!” said Dinah. “To have someone in love with you, wanting no one but you, thinking there’s no one else in the world like you. Have you never dreamt that such a thing has happened? I have. And then waked up to find everything very flat and uninteresting.”

Scott was intent upon fastening an old gold brooch in the red kerchief above her forehead. He did not meet the questioning of her bright eyes.

“No,” he said. “I don’t think I ever cajoled myself, either waking or sleeping, into imagining that anybody would ever fall in love with me to that extent.”

Dinah laughed, her upturned face a-brim with merriment. “If any woman ever wants to marry you, she’ll have to do her own proposing, won’t she?” she said.

“I think she will,” said Scott.

“I wish Rose de Vigne would fall in love with you then,” declared Dinah. “Men are always proposing to her, she leads them on till they make perfect idiots of themselves. I think it’s simply horrid of her to do it. But she says she can’t help being beautiful. Oh, how I wish–” Dinah broke off.

“What do you wish?” said Scott.

She turned her face away to hide a blush. “You must think me very silly and childish. So I am, but I’m not generally so. I think it’s in the air here. I was going to say, how I wished I could outshine her for just one night! Isn’t that piggy of me? But I am so tired of being always in the shade. She called me ‘Poor little Dinah!’ only to-night. How would you like to be called that?”

“Most people call me Stumpy,” observed Scott, with his whimsical little smile.

“How rude of them! How horrid of them!” said Dinah. “And do you actually put up with it?”

He bent with her over the jewel-case, and picked out the coral chain. “I don’t care the toss of a halfpenny,” he said.

She gave him a quick, searching glance. “Not really? Not in your secret heart?”

“Not in the deepest depth of my unfathomable soul,” he declared.

“Then you’re a great man,” said Dinah, with conviction.

Scott’s laugh was one of genuine amusement. “Oh, does that follow? I’ve never seen myself in that light before.”

But Dinah was absolutely serious and remained so. There was even a touch of reverence in her look. “You evidently don’t know yourself in the least,” she said. “Anyhow, you’ve made me feel a downright toad.”

“I don’t know why,” said Scott. “You don’t look like one if that’s any comfort.” He stooped to fasten the necklace. “Now for the earrings, and you are complete.”

“It is good of you,” she said gratefully. “I am longing to go and look at myself. But can you fasten them first? I’m sure I can’t.”

He complied with his almost feminine dexterity, and in a few moments a sparkling and glorified Dinah rose and skipped into her room to see the general effect of her transformation.

Scott lingered to close the jewel-case. Frankly, he had enjoyed himself during the last ten minutes. Moreover he was sure she would be pleased with the result of his labours. But he was hardly prepared for the cry of delight that reached him as he turned to depart.

He paused as he heard it, and in a moment Dinah flashed out again like a radiant butterfly and gave him both her hands.

“You–magician!” she cried. “How did you do it? How can I thank you? I’ve never been so nearly pretty in my life!”

He bowed in courtly fashion over the little brown hands. “Then you have never seen yourself with the eyes of others,” he said. “I congratulate you on doing so to-night.”

She laughed her merry laugh. “Thank you! Thank you a hundred times! I’ve only one thing left to wish for.”

“What is that?” he said.

She told him with a touch of shyness. “That–Apollo–will dance with me!”

Scott laughed and let her go. “Oh, is that all? Then I will certainly see that he does.”

“Oh, but don’t tell him!” pleaded Dinah.

“I never repeat confidences,” declared Scott. “Good-bye, Signorina!”

And with another bow, he left her.

CHAPTER V

APOLLO

The salon was a blaze of lights and many shifting colours. The fantastic crowd that trooped thither from the salle-à-manger was like a host of tropical flowers. The talking and laughter nearly drowned the efforts of the string band in the far corner.

Scott in ordinary evening-dress stood near the door talking to an immense Roman Emperor, looking by contrast even smaller and more insignificant than usual. Yet a closer observation would have shown that the same instinctive dignity of bearing characterized them both. Utterly unlike though they were, yet in this respect it was not difficult to trace their brotherhood. Though moulded upon lines so completely dissimilar, they bore the same indelible stamp–the stamp of good birth which can never be attained by such as have it not. Sir Eustace Studley was the handsomest man in the room. His imperial costume suited his somewhat arrogant carriage. He looked like a man born to command. His keen eyes glanced hither and thither with an eagle-like intensity that missed nothing. He seemed to be on the watch for someone.

“Who is it?” asked Scott, with a smile. “The lady of the rink?”

The black brows went up haughtily for a moment, then descended in an answering smile. “She is the only woman I’ve seen here yet that’s worth looking at,” he observed.

“Don’t you be too sure of that!” said Scott. “I can show you a little Italian peasant girl who is well worth your august consideration. I think you ought to bestow a little favour on her as you have each chosen to assume the same nationality.”

Sir Eustace laughed. “A protégée of yours, eh? That little brown girl, I suppose? Charming no doubt, my dear fellow; but ordinary–distinctly ordinary.”

“You haven’t seen her yet,” said Scott. “You had your back to her in the salle-à-manger.„

“Where is she then? You had better find her before the beautiful Miss de Vigne makes her appearance. I don’t mind giving her a dance or two, but you must take her off my hands if we don’t get on.”

“I will certainly do that,” said Scott in his quiet voice that seemed to veil a touch of irony. “I believe she is in the vestibule now. No, here she is!”

Dinah, with laughing lips and sparkling eyes, had just ventured to the door with Billy. “We’ll just peep,” she said to her brother in the gay young tones that penetrated so much further than she realized. “But I shall never dare to dance. Why, I’ve never even seen the inside of a ballroom before. And as to dancing with a real live man–“ She broke off as she caught sight of the two brothers standing together near the entrance.

Eustace turned his restless eyes upon her, gave her a swift, critical glance and muttered something to Scott.

The latter at once stepped forward, receiving a smile so radiant that even Eustace was momentarily dazzled. The little brown girl certainly had points.

“May I introduce my brother?” said Scott. “Sir Eustace Studley–Miss–I am afraid I don’t know your surname.”

“Sketchy,” murmured Eustace, as he bowed.

But Dinah only laughed her ringing, merry laugh. “Of course you don’t know. How could you? Our name is Bathurst. I’m Dinah and this is Billy. I am years older than he is, of course.” She gave Eustace a shy glance. “How do you do?”

“She’s just thirty,” announced Billy, in shrill, cracked tones. “She’s just pretending to be young to-night, but she ain’t young really. You should see her without her warpaint.”

The music became somewhat more audible at this point. Eustace bent slightly, looking down at the girl with eyes that were suddenly soft as velvet. “They are beginning to dance,” he said. “May I have the pleasure? It’s a pity to lose time.”

Her red lips smiled delighted assent. She laid her hand with a feathery touch upon the arm he offered. “Oh, how lovely!” she said, and slid into his hold like a giddy little water-fowl taking to its own beloved element.

“Well, I’m jiggered!” said Billy. “And she’s never danced with a man–except of course me–before!”

“Live and learn!” said Scott.

He watched the couple go up the great room, and he saw that, as he had suspected, Dinah was an exquisite dancer. Her whole being was merged in movement. She was as an instrument in the hand of a skilled player.

Sir Eustace Studley was an excellent dancer too, though he did not often trouble himself to dance as perfectly as he was dancing now. It was not often that he had a partner worthy of his best, and it was a semi-conscious habit of his never voluntarily to give better than he received.

But this little gipsy-girl of Scott’s discovery called forth all his talent. She did not want to talk. She only wanted to dance, to spend herself in a passion of dancing that was an ecstasy beyond all speech. She was as sensitive as a harp-string to his touch; she was music, she was poetry, she was charm. The witchery of her began to possess him. Her instant response to his mood, her almost uncanny interpretation thereof, became like a spell to his senses. From wonder he passed to delight, and from delight to an almost feverish desire for more. He swayed her to his will with a well-nigh savage exultation, and she gave herself up to it so completely, so freely, so unerringly, that it was as if her very individuality had melted in some subtle fashion and become part of his. And to the man there came a moment of sheer intoxication, as though he drank and drank of a sparkling, inspiriting wine that lured him, that thrilled him, that enslaved him.

It was just when the sensation had reached its height that the music suddenly quickened for the finish. That brought him very effectually to earth. He ceased to dance and led her aside.

She turned her bright face to him for a moment, in her eyes the dazed, incredulous look of one awaking from an enthralling dream. “Oh, can’t we dance it out?” she said, as if she pleaded against being aroused.

He shook his head. “I never dance to a finish. It’s too much like the clown’s turn after the transformation scene. It is bathos on the top of the superb. At least it would be in this case. Who in wonder taught you to dance like that?”