"Luke," she said, "it's all very well, but the matter does concern you in a way; far more so, in fact, than it does Lord Radclyffe. Nothing can make any difference to Lord Radclyffe, but if what this young man asserts is all true, then it will make a world of difference to you."

"I know that. That's just the trouble."

"You were thinking of yourself?"

"No. I was thinking of you."

"Of me?"

"Yes," he said now very abruptly, quite roughly and crudely, not choosing his words lest they helped to betray what he felt, and all that he felt. "If what this man says is true, then I am a penniless nonentity whom you are not going to marry."

"You are talking nonsense, Luke, and you know it," was all she said. And she said it very quietly, very decisively. He was talking nonsense, of course, for, whatever happened or didn't happen, there was one thing in the world that was absolutely, undeniably impossible, and that was that she should not marry Luke.

Whilst she Louisa Harris, plain, uninteresting, commonplace Louisa Harris was of this world, her marriage with Luke must be. People, in this present day, matter-of-fact world, didn't have their hearts wrenched out of them; they were not made to suffer impossible and unendurable tortures; then why should she Louisa Harris, be threatened with such a cataclysm?

"I am not," he was saying rather tonelessly, "talking nonsense, Lou. I have thought all that over. It's over eight days since that letter came; eight times twenty-four hours since I seemed in a way to see all my future through a thick, black cloud, and I've had time to think. I saw you too, through that thick, black cloud – I saw you just as you are, exquisite, beautiful, like a jewel that should forever remain in a perfect setting. I – "

He broke off abruptly, and, mechanically, his hand went up to his forehead and eyes. Where was he? He gave a sudden, quaint laugh.

"What a drivelling fool you must think me, Lou."

She looked straight at him, pure of soul, simple of heart, with a passion of tenderness and self-abnegation as yet dormant beneath the outer crust of a conventional education and of commonplace surroundings, but with the passion there nevertheless. And it was expressed in the sudden, strange luminosity of her eyes – I would not have you think that they were tears – as they met and held his own.

They didn't say anything more just then. People of their type and class in England do not say much, you know, under such circumstances. They have been drilled not to: drilled and drilled from childhood upward, from the time when, after a fall and a cut lip or broken tooth, the tears have to be held back, lest the words "snivel" or "cry-baby" be mentioned. But quietude does not necessarily mean freedom from pain. A cut lip hurts worse when it is not wetted with tears.

It was only the shadow that was hovering over these two as yet: nothing really tangible. And the shadow was not between them. She would not let it come between them. If it covered him, it should wrap her too. The commonplace woman had no fear of its descent, only as far as it affected him.

"Nothing," she said after awhile, "could make a difference to our marriage, Luke. Except, of course, if you ceased to care."

"Or you, Lou," he suggested meekly.

"Do you think," she retorted, "that I should? Just because you had no money?"

"Not," he owned, "because of that. But I should be such a nonentity. I have no real profession, and there are the others. Jim in the Blues costs a fearful lot a year, and Frank in the diplomatic service must have his promised allowance. I have read for the bar, but beyond that what am I?"

"Your uncle's right hand," she retorted firmly, "his agent, his secretary, his factotum, all rolled into one. You manage his estates, his charities, his correspondence. You write his speeches and control his household. Lord Radclyffe – every one says it in London – would not be himself at all without Luke de Mountford behind him."

"That's not what I mean, Lou."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that – "

He paused a moment then added with seeming irrelevance:

"We all know that Uncle Rad is a curious kind of man. If this story turns out to be true, he would still say nothing, but he would fret and fret and worry himself into his grave."

"The story," she argued obstinately, "will not turn out to be true. It's not like you, Luke, to jump at conclusions, or to be afraid of a nightmare."

"I am not afraid," he rejoined simply. "But I must look at possibilities. Yes, dear," he continued more forcibly, "it is possible that this story is true. No good saying that it is impossible: improbable if you like, but not impossible. Look at it how you like, you must admit that it is not impossible. Uncle Arthur may have married in Martinique; he was out there in 1881; he may have had a son; his telling no one about his marriage is not to be wondered at; he was always reticent and queer about his own affairs. This Philip may possibly be Uncle Rad's sole and rightful heir, and I may possibly be a beggar."

She uttered an exclamation of incredulity. Luke, a beggar! Luke the one man in all the world, different from every other man! Luke ousted by that stranger upstart!

God hath too much sense of humour to allow so ridiculous a Fate to work her silly caprice.

"And," she said with scorn, "because of all these absurd possibilities you talk of breaking off your engagement to me. Do you care so little as all that, Luke?"

He did not reply, but continued to walk beside her, just a yard or so apart from her, turning his steps in the direction of the gates, toward the Albert Bridge, their nearest way home. She – meekly now, for already she was sorry – turned to look at him. Something in his attitude, the stoop of the shoulders, usually so square and erect, the hands curiously clasped behind his back, told her that her shaft – very thoughtlessly aimed – had struck even deeper than it should.

"I am so sorry, dear," she said gently.

His look forgave her, even before the words were fully out of her mouth, but with characteristic reticence, he made no reply to her taunt. Strangely enough she was satisfied that he should say nothing. The look, which did not reproach even whilst it tried to conceal the infinite depth of the wound so lightly dealt, had told her more than any words could do. Whatever Luke decided to do, it would be from a sense of moral obligation, that desire for doing the right thing – in the worldly sense of the term – which is inherent in Englishmen of a certain class. No sentiment save that of a conventional one of honour would be allowed to sway her destiny and his.

Conventionality – that same strained sense of honour and duty – decreed that under certain mundane circumstances a man and woman should not mate. Differences of ancestry, of parentage, of birth and of country, divergence of taste, of faith, of belief – all these matter not one jot. But let the man be beggared and the woman rich, and convention steps in and says, "It shall not be!"

These two bowed to that decree: unconventional, in so far that they both made the sacrifice out of the intense purity of their sentiment to one another. They made an absolutely worldly sacrifice for a wholly unworldly motive. Luke would as soon have thought of seeing Louisa in a badly fitting serge frock, and paying twopence for a two-mile ride in an omnibus, as he would expect to see a diamond tiara packed in a card-board box, it would be unfair on the jeweller who had made the tiara thus to subject it to rough treatment; and it would be equally unfair on the Creator of Louisa to let her be buffeted about by the cruder atoms of this world.

Louisa only thought of Luke and that perhaps he would feel happier in his mind if she allowed him to make this temporary sacrifice.

There is such wonderful balm in self-imposed sacrifice.

"What," she asked simply, "do you want me to say, Luke?"

"Only that – that you won't give me up altogether unless – "

Here he checked himself abruptly. Was there ever an Englishman born who could talk sentiment at moments such as this? Luke was no exception to that rule. There was so much that he wanted to say to Louisa, and yet the very words literally choked him before he could contrive to utter them.

"Don't," she said quietly, "let us even refer to such things, Luke. I do not believe in this shadow, and I cannot even understand why you should worry about it. But whatever happens, I should never give you up. Never. We will put off fixing the day of our wedding; since we have made no announcement this won't matter at all: but I only agree to this because I think that it is what you would like. I fancy that it would ease your mind. As for breaking our engagement in the future – in case the worst happens – well it shall not be with my consent, Luke, unless you really cease to care."

They had reached the gate close to the bridge. Life pulsated all round them, the life of the big city, callous, noisy, and cruel. Omnibuses, cabs, heavy vans, rattled incessantly past them. People jostled one another, hurrying and scurrying, pigmies and ants adding their tiny load of work, of care, of sorrow to the titanic edifice of this living world.

Louisa's last words remained unanswered. Luke had, by his silence, said everything there was to say. They stood on the pavement for a moment, and Luke hailed a passing taxicab.

At the corner opposite, an omnibus pulled up on its way westward. A man stepped off the curb ready to enter it. Louisa caught his eye, and he raised his hat – the man who had passed them in the park just now.

CHAPTER VI
JUST A DISAGREEABLE OLD MAN

The luncheons at Grosvenor Square were always rather dull and formal, but Louisa did not mind that very much. She was used to dull and formal affairs: they were part and parcel of her daily life. London society is full of it. The dull and formal dominate; the others – vulgar if more lively – were not worth cultivating.

Then, she almost liked Lord Radclyffe, because he was so fond of Luke. And even then "almost" was a big word. No one – except Luke – could really like the old man. He was very bad tempered, very dictatorial, a perfect tyrant in his own household. His opinions no one dared contradict, no one cared to argue with him, and his advanced Tory views were so rabid that he almost made perverts from the cause, of all those whom he desired to convince.

And even these were few, for Lord Radclyffe had no friends and very few acquaintances. He had a strange and absolute dislike for his fellow men. He did not like seeing people, he hated to exchange greetings, to talk or to mingle with any crowd that was purely on pleasure bent. He went up to the House and made speeches – political, philanthropic, economic speeches – which Luke prepared for him, and which he spoke without enthusiasm or any desire to please. This he did, not because he liked it or took any interest in things political, philanthropic or economic, but only because he considered that a man in his position owed certain duties to the State – duties which it would be cowardly to shirk.

But he really cared nothing for the thoughts of others, for their opinions, their joys, or their sorrows. He had schooled himself not to care, to call philanthropy empty sentiment, politics senseless ambition, economics grasping avarice.

His was a life entirely wrapped up in itself. In youth he had been very shy: a shyness caused at first by a serious defect of speech which, though cured in later years, always left an unconquerable diffidence, an almost morbid fear of ridicule in its train.

Because of this, I think, he had never been a sportsman – or, rather, had never been an athlete, for he was splendid with a gun and the finest revolver shot in England, so I've been told, and an acknowledged master of fence, but with bat, ball, or racquet he was invariably clumsy.

He had always hated to be laughed at, and therefore had never gone through the rough mill of a tyro in athletics or in games. Arthur, one of his brothers, had been a blue at Oxford; the other one, James – you remember James de Mountford? was the celebrated cricketer; but he, the eldest, always seemed to remain outside that magic circle of sport, the great ring of many links which unites Englishmen one to another in a way that no other conformity of tastes, of breeding, or of religion can ever do.

Because of this diffidence too, no doubt, he had never married. I was told once by an intimate friend of his, that old Rad – as he was universally called – had never mustered up sufficient courage to propose to any woman. And as he saw one by one the coveted matrimonial prizes – the pretty girls whom at different times he had admired sufficiently to desire for wife – snapped up by more enterprising wooers, his dour moroseness grew into positive chronic ill-humour.

He liked no one and no one liked him: and during sixty years of life he had succeeded in eliminating from his entire being every feeling of sentiment save one. He had to all appearances an absolutely callous heart: he cared neither for dog nor horse – he ordered a splendid mare to be shot without the slightest compunction after she had carried him in the hunting field and in the park faithfully and beautifully for over eight years, just because she had shied at a motor-car and nearly thrown him. He was not cruel, you know, just callous in all respects save one: void of all sentiment – he called it sentimentality – save in his affection for Luke.

Luke had been – ever since he was a growing lad – the buffer in the establishment between the irascible master and the many subordinates. From Mr. Warren – the highly paid and greatly snubbed secretary – down to the maids below stairs, one and all brought troubles, complaints, worries to Mr. Luke. No one dared approach his lordship. A word out of season brought instant dismissal, and no one thought of leaving a place where, besides excellent wages, there was the pleasure of waiting on Mr. Luke. Never Mr. de Mountford, you notice, always Mr. Luke. He had grown up amongst the household; Winston, the old coachman, had taught him to ride; Mary, now housekeeper, then a nurse, had bathed him in a wash-hand basin when he was less than eighteen inches long.

Therefore the atmosphere of the gloomy old house pleased Louisa Harris. With the perfect and unconscious selfishness of a woman in love, she gauged everything in life just as it affected Luke. She even contrived to like Lord Radclyffe. He trod on every one of her moral and spiritual corns, it is true; he had that lofty contempt for the entire feminine sex which pertains to the Oriental, more than to the more civilized Western races; he combated her opinions, both religious and political, without any pretence at deference; he smoked very strong cigars in every room in the house, without the slightest regard for the feelings of his lady visitors; he did or left undone a great many other things which would tend to irritate and even to offend a woman accustomed to the conventional courtesies of daily social life; but when Luke entered a room, where, but a moment ago, Lord Radclyffe had been venting his chronic ill-humour on an offending or innocent subordinate, the old man's dour face would become transfigured, irradiated with a look of pride and of joy at sight of the man on whom he had lavished all the affection of which his strong nature was capable.

Luke could do no wrong. Luke was always right. He could argue with his lordship, contradict him, obtain anything he liked from him. Eternal contradictions of human nature: the childless man in perfect adoration before a brother's son; the callous, hard-hearted misanthrope soft as wax in the hands of one man.

CHAPTER VII
THE PART PLAYED BY A FIVE-POUND NOTE

And it was into this atmosphere of gloom and of purposeless misanthropy that Louisa Harris brought this morning the cheering sunshine of her own indomitable optimism.

She knew of course from the first that the subject which interested every one in the house more than any other subject could ever do was not to be mentioned in Lord Radclyffe's presence. But she was quite shrewd enough to see that dear old Luke – unsophisticated and none too acute an observer – had overestimated his uncle's indifference to the all-absorbing matter.

The old man's face – usually a mirror of contemptuous cynicism – looked, to the woman's keener insight, distinctly troubled, and his surly silence was even more profound than hitherto.

He hardly did more than bid Louisa a curt, "How de do?" when she entered, and then relapsed into moroseness wholly unbroken before luncheon was announced.

Jim – "in the Blues" – was there when she arrived, and Edie came in a few moments later, breathless and with hat awry and tawny hair flying in all directions, straight from a tussle with the dogs and the sharp wind in the park.

Evidently no secret had been made before these two of the strange events which had culminated this very morning in their brother's avowal to Louisa, and the postponement sine die of the wedding. But equally evidently these young creatures absorbed in their own life, their own pursuits and amusements, were not inclined to look on the matter seriously.

Their sky had been so absolutely cloudless throughout their lives that it was impossible for them at the moment to realize that the dark shadow on the distant horizon might possibly conceal thunder in its filmy bosom.

Edie – just over twenty years of age and already satiated with the excitement of three London seasons, her mind saturated with novel reading and on the lookout for some new sensations – was inclined to look on the affair as an exhilarating interlude between the Shrove Tuesday dance at Wessex House and the first Drawing-Room in May. Jim – "in the Blues" – very eligible as a possible husband for the daughters of ambitious mammas, a trifle spoiled, a little slow of wit, and not a little self-satisfied – dismissed the whole incident as "tommy-rot."

When Louisa first greeted them, Edie had whispered excitedly:

"Has he told you?"

And without waiting for a direct reply had continued, with unabated eagerness:

"Awful exciting, don't you think?"

But Jim with the elegant drawl peculiar to his kind had suppressed further confidences by an authoritative:

"Awful rot I call it, don't you? Luke is soft to worry about it."

Strangely enough, at luncheon it was Lord Radclyffe who brought up the subject matter. Edie with the tactlessness of youth had asked a point-blank question:

"Well," she said, "when is that wedding to be? and what are we bridesmaids going to wear? I warn you I won't have white – I hate a white wedding."

Then as no answer came she said impatiently:

"I wish you'd name the day, you two stupids. Awfully soft I call it hanging about like this."

Luke would have said something then, but Louisa interposed.

"It is all my fault, Edie," she said. "You know I want to take the twins out myself this season. I must give them a real good time before I marry."

"Bosh!" remarked Edith unceremoniously. "Mabel and Chris will have a far better time when you are married and can present them yourself. Tell them from me that its no fun being 'out' and the longer they put it off the better they'll enjoy themselves later on. Besides, Colonel Harris will take them about."

"Father hates sitting up late – " hazarded Louisa, somewhat lamely.

"The truth of the matter is," here broke in Lord Radclyffe dryly, "that Luke had persuaded you to put off the wedding because of this d – d impostor who seems to have set you all off by the ears."

Edie laughed and said, "Bosh!" Jim growled and murmured, "Rot!"

Luke and Louisa were silent, the while Lord Radclyffe's closely-set, dark, piercing eyes, wandered from one young face to the other. Louisa, feeling uncomfortable beneath that none too amiable scrutiny, did not know what to say, but Luke quietly remarked after awhile:

"You're right, uncle. It is my doing, but Lou agrees with me, and we are going to wait until this cloud is properly cleared up."

If any one else had spoken so clearly and decisively in direct contradiction to the old man's obvious wishes in the matter, the result would have been an outburst of ill-humour and probably a volley of invectives, not unmixed with more forcible language. But since it was Luke who had spoken – and Luke could do no wrong – Lord Radclyffe responded quite gently:

"My dear boy," he said, and it was really touching to hear the hard voice soften and linger on the endearing words, "I have told you once and for all that the story of this so-called Philip de Mountford is a fabrication from beginning to end. There is absolutely no reason for you to fret one single instant because of the lies a blackmailer chooses to trump up. As for your putting off your wedding one single hour because of this folly, why, it is positive nonsense. I should have thought you had more common-sense – and Miss Harris, too, for a matter of that."

Luke was silent for a moment or two while Edie tossed her irresponsible young head with the gesture of an absolute "I told you so." Jim muttered something behind his heavy cavalry moustache. Louisa, with head bent and fingers somewhat restless and fidgety, waited to hear what Luke would say.

"If only," he said, "you would consent, Uncle Rad to let Mr. Dobson go through this man's papers."

"What were the good of wasting Mr. Dobson's time?" retorted Lord Radclyffe with surprising good humour. "I know that the man is an impostor. I don't think it," he reiterated emphatically, "I know it."

"How?"

Before the old man had time to reply, the butler – sober, solemn Parker – came in with a card on a salver, which he presented to his master. Lord Radclyffe took up the card and grunted as he glanced at it. He always grunted when he was threatened with visitors.

"Why," he said gruffly, and he threw the card back onto the salver, "haven't you told Mr. Warren?"

"Mr. Warren," said solemn Parker, "is out, my lord."

"Then ask Mr. Dobson to call another time."

"It's not Mr. Dobson hisself, my lord. But a young gentleman from his office."

"Then tell the young gentleman from the office that I haven't time to bother about him."

"Shall I see him, sir?" asked Luke, ready to go.

"Certainly not," retorted the irascible old man. "Stay where you are. You have got Miss Harris to entertain."

"The young gentleman," resumed Parker with respectful insistence, "said he wouldn't keep your lordship five minutes. He said he'd brought some papers for your lordship's signature."

"The Tower Farm lease, Uncle Rad," remarked Luke.

"I think, Mr. Luke," assented the butler, "that the young gentleman did mention the word lease."

"Why has that confounded Warren taken himself off just when I want him?" was Lord Radclyffe's gruff comment as he rose from the table.

"Let me go, sir," insisted Luke.

"No, hang it, boy, you can't sign my name – not yet anyway. I am not yet a helpless imbecile. Show the young man into the library, Parker. I can't think why Dobson is always in such a confounded hurry about leases – sending a fool of a clerk up at most inconvenient hours."

Still muttering half audibly, he walked to the library door, which Parker held open for him, and even this he did not do without surreptitiously taking hold of Luke's hand and giving it a friendly squeeze. For a moment it seemed as if Luke would follow him, despite contrary orders. He paused, undecided, standing in the middle of the room, Louisa's kind gray eyes following his slightest movement.

Jim stolidly pulled the cigar box toward him, and Edie, with chin resting in both hands, looked sulky and generally out of sorts.

Parker – silent and correct of mien – had closed the library door behind his master, and now with noiseless tread he crossed the dining-room and opened the other door – the one that gave on the hall. Louisa instinctively turned her eyes from Luke and saw – standing in the middle of the hall – a young man in jacket suit and overcoat, who had looked up, with palpitating eagerness expressed in his face, the moment he caught sight of Parker.

It was the same man who had lifted his hat to Luke and to herself in Battersea Park this very morning. Luke saw him too and apparently also recognized him.

"That's why he bowed to us, Luke – in the park – you remember?" she said as soon as the door had once more closed on Parker and the visitor.

"Funny that you didn't know him," she continued since Luke had made no comment.

"I didn't," he remarked curtly.

"Didn't what?"

"I did not and do not know this man."

"Not Mr. Dobson's clerk?"

Luke did not answer but went out into the hall. Parker was standing beside the library door which he had just closed, having introduced the visitor into his lordship's presence.

"Parker," said Luke abruptly, "what made you tell his lordship that that young gentleman came from Mr. Dobson?"

The question had come so suddenly that Parker – pompous, dignified Parker – was thrown off his balance, and the reply which took some time in coming, sounded unconvincing.

"The young gentleman," he said slowly, "told me, Mr. Luke, that he came from Mr. Dobson."

"No, Parker," asserted Luke unhesitatingly, "he did nothing of the sort. He wanted to see his lordship and got you to help him concoct some lie whereby he could get what he wanted."

A grayish hue spread over Parker's pink and flabby countenance.

"Lord help me, Mr. Luke," he murmured tonelessly, "how did you know?"

"I didn't," replied Luke curtly. "I guessed. Now I know."

"I didn't think I was doing no harm."

"No harm by introducing into his lordship's presence strangers who might be malefactors?"

Already Luke, at Parker's first admission, had gone quickly to the library door. Here he paused, with his hand on the latch, uncertain if he should enter. The house was an old one, well-built and stout; from within came the even sound of a voice speaking quite quietly, but no isolated word could be distinguished. Parker was floundering in a quagmire of confused explanations.

"Malefactor, Mr. Luke!" he argued, "that young man was no malefactor. He spoke ever so nicely. And he had plenty of money about him. I didn't see I was doing no harm. He wanted to see his lordship and asked me to help him to it – "

"And," queried Luke impatiently, "paid you to help him, eh?"

"I thought," replied the man loftily ignoring the suggestion, "that taking in one of Mr. Dobson's cards that was lying in the tray could do no harm. I thought it couldn't do no harm. The young gentleman said his lordship would be very grateful to me when he found out what I'd done."

"And how grateful was the young gentleman to you, Parker?"

"To the tune of a five-pound note, Mr. Luke."

"Then as you have plenty of money in hand, you can pack up your things and get out of this house before I've time to tell his lordship."

"Mr. Luke – "

"Don't argue. Do as I tell you."

"I must take my notice from his lordship," said Parker, vainly trying to recover his dignity.

"Very well. You can wait until his lordship has been told."

"Mr. Luke – "

"Best not wait to see his lordship, Parker. Take my word for it."

"Very well, Mr. Luke."

There was a tone of finality in Luke's voice which apparently Parker did not dare to combat. The man looked confused and troubled. What had seemed to him merely a venial sin – the taking of a bribe for a trivial service – now suddenly assumed giant proportions – a crime almost, punished by a stern dismissal from Mr. Luke.

He went without venturing on further protest, and Luke, left standing alone in the hall, once more put his hand on the knob of the library door. This time he tried to turn it. But the door had been locked from the inside.