Over the River

“Not five per cent.”

“I should like a sniff of home air to-night, and a long look at the stars…”

Clare turned her head.

“Don’t, Tony!”

“How then?”

“You’ve been with me all the evening.”

“If only I could take you home!”

“You can’t, my dear. Squeeze my little finger, and pull yourself together.”

“Clare!”

“Look! They’re just in front—now vanish! Get a good long drink at the Club and dream of horses. There! Was that close enough? Good-night, dear Tony!”

“God! Good-night!”

CHAPTER 15

Time has been compared with a stream, but it differs—you ca

November, then, became December, but December did not become November. Except for a cold snap or two the weather remained mild. Unemployment decreased; the adverse balance of trade increased; seven foxes escaped for every one killed; the papers fluttered from the storms in their tea-cups; a great deal of income tax was paid; still more was not; the question: “Why has prosperity gone to pot?” continued to bewilder every mind; the pound went up, the pound went down. In short, time flowed, but the conundrum of existence remained unsolved.

At Condaford the bakery scheme was dropped. Every pe

The new Member, visiting his constituency, spent Christmas at Condaford, talking almost exclusively of pigs, instinct telling him that they were just then the surest line of approach to Di

“This house wouldn’t work without your niece, Mr. Cherrell.”

“It wouldn’t. Di

“Doesn’t she ever think of herself?”

Adrian looked at him sideways. The pale-brown, rather hollow-cheeked face, with its dark hair, and hazel eyes, was sympathetic; for a lawyer and a politician, he looked sensitive. Inclined, however, to a sheepdog attitude where Di

“Why no, no more than reason; indeed, not so much.”

“She looks to me sometimes as if she’d been through something pretty bad.”

Adrian shrugged. “She’s twenty-seven.”

“Would you mind awfully telling me what it was? This isn’t curiosity. I’m—well, I’m in love with her, and terrified of butting in and hurting her through ignorance.”

Adrian took a long gurgling pull at his pipe.

“If you’re in dead earnest—”

“Absolutely dead earnest.”

“It might save her a pang or two. She was terribly in love, the year before last, and it came to a tragic end.”

“Death?”

“No. I can’t tell you the exact story, but the man had done something that placed him, in a sense—or at all events he thought so—outside the pale; and he put an end to their engagement rather than involve Di

“I see. Thank you very much. You’ve done me a great service.”

“Sorry if it’s hurt,” murmured Adrian; “but better, perhaps, to have one’s eyes open.”

“Much.”

Resuming the tune on his pipe, Adrian stole several glances at his silent neighbour. That averted face wore an expression not exactly dashed or sad, but as if contending deeply with the future. ‘He’s the nearest approach,’ he thought, ‘to what I should like for her—sensitive, quiet, and plucky. But things are always so damnably perverse!’

“She’s very different from her sister,” he said at last.

Dornford smiled.

“Ancient and modern.”

“Clare’s a pretty creature, though.”

“Oh, yes, and lots of qualities.”

“They’ve both got grit. How does she do her work?”

“Very well; quick in the uptak’, good memory, heaps of savoir-faire.”

“Pity she’s in such a position. I don’t know why things went wrong, and I don’t see how they can come right.”

“I’ve never met Corven.”

“Quite nice to meet; but, by the look of him, a streak of cruelty.”

“Di

Adrian nodded. “I should think so. And that’s bad when it comes to divorce. But I hope it won’t—always a dirty business, and probably the wrong person tarred. I don’t remember a divorce in our family.”

“Nor in mine, but we’re Catholics.”

“Judging by your experience in the Courts, should you say English morality is going downhill?”

“No. On the upgrade, if anything.”

“But surely the standard is slacker?”

“People are franker, not quite the same thing.”

“You lawyers and judges, at all events,” said Adrian, “are exceptionally moral men.”

“Oh! Where did you get that from?”

“The papers.”

Dornford laughed.

“Well!” said Adrian, rising. “Let’s have a game of billiards…”

On the Monday after New Year’s Day the party broke up. In the afternoon Di

She got up, and, having bathed her face in cold water, stood at her window looking into the starry dark, still shuddering a little from the vivid misery of her dream. ‘One more river!’

Someone tapped on the door.

“Yes?”

“It’s old Mrs. Purdy, Miss Di