A Yellow God: an Idol of Africa / Haggard, H. Rider (Henry Rider), 1856-1925

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Yellow God, by H. Rider Haggard

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org


Title: The Yellow God
       An Idol of Africa

Author: H. Rider Haggard

Release Date: April 3, 2006 [EBook #2857]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YELLOW GOD ***




Produced by John Bickers; Dagny; Emma Dudding





THE YELLOW GOD

AN IDOL OF AFRICA


By H. Rider Haggard



CHAPTER I

SAHARA LIMITED

Sir Robert Aylward, Bart., M.P., sat in his office in the City of
London. It was a very magnificent office, quite one of the finest that
could be found within half a mile of the Mansion House. Its exterior
was built of Aberdeen granite, a material calculated to impress the
prospective investor with a comfortable sense of security. Other stucco,
or even brick-built, offices might crumble and fall in an actual or a
financial sense, but this rock-like edifice of granite, surmounted by a
life-sized statue of Justice with her scales, admired from either corner
by pleasing effigies of Commerce and of Industry, would surely endure
any shock. Earthquake could scarcely shake its strong foundations; panic
and disaster would as soon affect the Bank of England. That at least
was the impression which it had been designed to convey, and not without
success.

"There is so much in externals," Mr. Champers-Haswell, Sir Robert's
partner, would say in his cheerful voice. "We are all of us influenced
by them, however unconsciously. Impress the public, my dear Aylward. Let
solemnity without suggest opulence within, and the bread, or rather the
granite, which you throw upon the waters will come back to you after
many days."

Mr. Aylward, for this conversation occurred before his merits or the
depth of his purse had been rewarded by a baronetcy, looked at his
partner in the impassive fashion for which he was famous, and answered:

"You mix your metaphors, Haswell, but if you mean that the public are
fools who must be caught by advertisement, I agree with you. Only this
particular advertisement is expensive and I do not want to wait many
days for my reward. However, L20,000 one way or the other is a small
matter, so tell that architect to do the thing in granite."

Sir Robert Aylward sat in his own quiet room at the back of this
enduring building, a very splendid room that any Secretary of State
might have envied, but arranged in excellent taste. Its walls were
panelled with figured teak, a rich carpet made the footfall noiseless,
an antique Venus stood upon a marble pedestal in the corner, and over
the mantelpiece hung a fine portrait by Gainsborough, that of a certain
Miss Aylward, a famous beauty in her day, with whom, be it added, its
present owner could boast no connection whatsoever.

Sir Robert was seated at his ebony desk playing with a pencil, and the
light from a cheerful fire fell upon his face.

In its own way it was a remarkable face, as he appeared then in his
fourth and fortieth year; very pale but with a natural pallor, very well
cut and on the whole impressive. His eyes were dark, matching his black
hair and pointed beard, and his nose was straight and rather prominent.
Perhaps the mouth was his weakest feature, for there was a certain
shiftiness about it, also the lips were thick and slightly sensuous.
Sir Robert knew this, and therefore he grew a moustache to veil them
somewhat. To a careful observer the general impression given by this
face was such as is left by the sudden sight of a waxen mask. "How
strong! How lifelike!" he would have said, "but of course it isn't
real. There may be a man behind, or there may be wood, but that's only
a mask." Many people of perception had felt like this about Sir Robert
Aylward, namely, that under the mask of his pale countenance dwelt a
different being whom they did not know or appreciate.

If these had seen him at this moment of the opening of our story, they
might have held that Wisdom was justified of her children. For now
in the solitude of his splendid office, of a sudden Sir Robert's mask
seemed to fall from him. His face broke up like ice beneath a thaw. He
rose from his table and began to walk up and down the room. He talked to
himself aloud.

"Great Heavens!" he muttered, "what a game to have played, and it will
go through. I believe that it will go through."

He stopped at the table, switched on an electric light and made a rapid
calculation on the back of a letter with a blue pencil.

"Yes," he said, "that's my share, a million and seventeen thousand
pounds in cash, and two million in ordinary shares which can be worked
off at a discount--let us say another seven hundred and fifty thousand,
plus what I have got already--put that at only two hundred and fifty
thousand net. Two millions in all, which of course may or may not be
added to, probably not, unless the ordinaries boom, for I don't mean
to speculate any more. That's the end of twenty years' work, Robert
Aylward. And to think of it, eighteen months ago, although I seemed so
rich, I was on the verge of bankruptcy--the very verge, not worth five
thousand pounds. Now what did the trick? I wonder what did the trick?"

He walked down the room and stopped opposite the ancient marble, staring
at it--

"Not Venus, I think," he said, with a laugh, "Venus never made any man
rich." He turned and retraced his steps to the other end of the room,
which was veiled in shadow. Here upon a second marble pedestal stood an
object that gleamed dimly through the gloom. It was about ten inches or
a foot high, but in that place nothing more could be seen of it, except
that it was yellow and had the general appearance of a toad. For some
reason it seemed to attract Sir Robert Aylward, for he halted to stare
at it, then stretched out his hand and switched on another lamp, in the
hard brilliance of which the thing upon the pedestal suddenly declared
itself, leaping out of the darkness into light. It was a terrible
object, a monstrosity of indeterminate sex and nature, but surmounted by
a woman's head and face of extraordinary, if devilish loveliness, sunk
back between high but grotesquely small shoulders, like to those of a
lizard, so that it glared upwards. The workmanship of the thing was
rude yet strangely powerful. Whatever there is cruel, whatever there
is devilish, whatever there is inhuman in the dark places of the world,
shone out of the jewelled eyes which were set in that yellow female
face, yellow because its substance was of gold, a face which seemed not
to belong to the embryonic legs beneath, for body there was none, but
to float above them. A hollow, life-sized mask with two tiny frog-like
legs, that was the fashion of it.

"You are an ugly brute," muttered Sir Robert, contemplating this effigy,
"but although I believe in nothing in heaven above or earth below,
except the abysmal folly of the British public, I am bothered if I don't
believe in you. At any rate from the day when Vernon brought you into
my office, my luck turned, and to judge from the smile on your sweet
countenance, I don't think it is done with yet. I wonder what those
stones are in your eyes. Opals, I suppose, from the way they change
colour. They shine uncommonly to-day, I never remember them so bright.
I----"

At this moment a knock came on the door. Sir Robert turned off the lamp
and walked back to the fireplace.

"Come in," he said, and as he spoke once more his pale face grew
impassive and expressionless.

The door opened and a clerk entered, an imposing-looking clerk with
iron-grey hair, who wore an irreproachable frock coat and patent leather
boots. Advancing to his master, he stood respectfully silent, waiting to
be addressed. For quite a long while Sir Robert looked over his head as
though he did not see him; it was a way of his. Then his eyes rested on
the man dreamily and he remarked in his cold, clear voice:

"I don't think I rang, Jeffreys."

"No, Sir Robert," answered the clerk, bowing as though he spoke to
Royalty, "but there is a little matter about that article in _The
Cynic_."

"Press business," said Sir Robert, lifting his eyebrows; "you should
know by this time that I do not attend to such details. See Mr.
Champers-Haswell, or Major Vernon."

"They are both out at the moment, Sir Robert."

"Go on, then, Jeffreys," replied the head of the firm with a resigned
sigh, "only be brief. I am thinking."

The clerk bowed again.

"The _Cynic_ people have just telephoned through about that article we
sent them. I think you saw it, sir, and you may remember it begins----"
and he read from a typewritten copy in his hand which was headed "Sahara
Limited":

"'We are now privileged to announce that this mighty scheme which will
turn a desert into a rolling sea bearing the commerce of nations and
cause the waste places of the earth to teem with population and to
blossom like the rose, has been completed in its necessary if dull
financial details and will within a few days be submitted to investors
among whom it has already caused so much excitement. These details we
will deal with fully in succeeding articles, and therefore now need only
pause to say that the basis of capitalization strikes us as wonderfully
advantageous to the fortunate public who are asked to participate in
its vast prospective prosperity. Our present object is to speak of its
national and imperial aspects----'"

Sir Robert lifted his eyes in remonstrance:

"How much more of that exceedingly dull and commonplace puff do you
propose to read, Jeffreys?" he asked.

"No more, Sir Robert. We are paying _The Cynic_ thirty guineas to insert
this article, and the point is that they say that if they have to put in
the 'national and imperial' business they must have twenty more."

"Indeed, Jeffreys? Why?"

"Because, Sir Robert--I will tell you, as you always like to hear the
truth--their advertisement-editor is of opinion that Sahara Limited is a
national and imperial swindle. He says that he won't drag the nation and
the empire into it in an editorial under fifty guineas."

A faint smile flickered on Sir Robert's face.

"Does he, indeed?" he asked. "I wonder at his moderation. Had I been
in his place I should have asked more, for really the style is a little
flamboyant. Well, we don't want to quarrel with them just now--feed the
sharks. But surely, Jeffreys, you didn't come to disturb me about such a
trifle?"

"Not altogether, Sir Robert. There is something more important. _The
Daily Judge_ not only declines to put any article whatsoever, but
refuses our advertisement, and states that it means to criticize the
prospectus trenchantly."

"Ah!" said his master after a moment's thought, "that _is_ rather
serious, since people believe in the _Judge_ even when it is wrong.
Offer them the advertisement at treble rates."

"It has been done, sir, and they still refuse."

Sir Robert walked to the corner of the room where the yellow object
squatted on its pedestal, and contemplated it a while, as a man often
studies one thing when he is thinking of another. It seemed to give him
an idea, for he looked over his shoulder and said:

"That will do, Jeffreys. When Major Vernon comes in, give him my
compliments and say that I should be obliged by a word or two with him."

The clerk bowed and went as noiselessly as he had entered.

"Let's see," added Sir Robert to himself. "Old Jackson, the editor of
_The Judge_, was a great friend of Vernon's father, the late Sir William
Vernon, G.C.B. I believe that he was engaged to be married to his sister
years ago, only she died or something. So the Major ought to be able to
get round him if anybody can. Only the worst of it is I don't altogether
trust that young gentleman. It suited us to give him a share in the
business because he is an engineer who knows the country, and this
Sahara scheme was his notion, a very good one in a way, and for other
reasons. Now he shows signs of kicking over the traces, wants to know
too much, is developing a conscience, and so forth. As though the
promoters of speculative companies had any business with consciences.
Ah! here he comes."

Sir Robert seated himself at his desk and resumed his calculations upon
a half-sheet of note-paper, and that moment a clear, hearty voice was
heard speaking to the clerks in the outer office. Then came the sound of
a strong, firm footstep, the door opened and Major Alan Vernon appeared.

He was still quite a young man, not more than thirty-two or three years
of age, though he lacked the ultra robust and rubicund appearance which
is typical of so many Englishmen of his class at this period of life. A
heavy bout of blackwater fever acquired on service in West Africa, which
would have killed anyone of weaker constitution, had robbed his face of
its bloom and left it much sallower, if more interesting than once it
had been. For in a way there was interest about the face; also a certain
charm. It was a good and honest face with a rather eager, rather puzzled
look, that of a man who has imagination and ideas and who searches for
the truth but fails to find it. As for the charm, it lay for the most
part in the pleasant, open smile and in the frank but rather round brown
eyes overhung by a somewhat massive forehead which projected a little,
or perhaps the severe illness already alluded to had caused the rest
of the face to sink. Though thin, the man was bigly built, with broad
shoulders and well-developed limbs, measuring a trifle under six feet in
height.

Such was the outward appearance of Alan Vernon. As for his mind, it was
able enough in certain fashions, for instance those of engineering,
and the soldier-like faculties to which it had been trained; frank
and kindly also, but in other respects not quick, perhaps from its
unsuspiciousness. Alan Vernon was a man slow to discover ill and slower
still to believe in it even when it seemed to be discovered, a weakness
that may have gone far to account for his presence in the office
of those eminent and brilliant financiers, Messrs. Aylward &
Champers-Haswell. Just now he looked a little worried, like a fish out
of water, or rather a fish which has begun to suspect the quality of the
water, something in its smell or taste.

"Jeffreys tells me that you want to see me, Sir Robert," he said in his
low and pleasant voice, looking at the baronet rather anxiously.

"Yes, my dear Vernon, I wish to ask you to do something, if you kindly
will, although it is not quite in your line. Old Jackson, the editor of
_The Judge_, is a friend of yours, isn't he?"

"He was a friend of my father's, and I used to know him slightly."

"Well, that's near enough. As I daresay you have heard, he is an
unreasonable old beggar, and has taken a dislike to our Sahara scheme.
Someone has set him against it and he refuses to receive advertisements,
threatens criticisms, etc. Now the opposition of _The Judge_ or any
other paper won't kill us, and if necessary we can fight, but at the
same time it is always wise to agree with your enemy while he is in the
way, and in short--would you mind going down and explaining his mistake
to him?"

Before answering Major Vernon walked to the window leisurely and looked
out.

"I don't like asking favours from family friends," he replied at length,
"and, as you said, I think it isn't quite my line. Though of course if
it has anything to do with the engineering possibilities, I shall be
most happy to see him," he added, brightening.

"I don't know what it has to do with; that is what I shall be obliged if
you will find out," answered Sir Robert with some asperity. "One can't
divide a matter of this sort into watertight compartments. It is
true that in so important a concern each of us has charge of his
own division, but the fact remains that we are jointly and severally
responsible for the whole. I am not sure that you bear this sufficiently
in mind, my dear Vernon," he added with slow emphasis.

His partner moved quickly; it might almost have been said that he
shivered, though whether the movement, or the shiver, was produced by
the argument of joint and several liability or by the familiarity of the
"my dear Vernon," remains uncertain. Perhaps it was the latter, since
although the elder man was a baronet and the younger only a retired
Major of Engineers, the gulf between them, as any one of discernment
could see, was wide. They were born, lived, and moved in different
spheres unbridged by any common element or impulse.

"I think that I do bear it in mind, especially of late, Sir Robert,"
answered Alan Vernon slowly.

His partner threw a searching glance on him, for he felt that there was
meaning in the words, but only said:

"That's all right. My motor is outside and will take you to Fleet Street
in no time. Meanwhile you might tell them to telephone that you are
coming, and perhaps you will just look in when you get back. I haven't
got to go to the House to-night, so shall be here till dinner time, and
so, I think, will your cousin Haswell. Muzzle that old bulldog, Jackson,
somehow. No doubt he has his price like the rest of them, in meal or
malt, and you needn't stick at the figure. We don't want him hanging on
our throat for the next week or two."

Ten minutes later the splendid, two-thousand guinea motor brougham drew
up at the offices of the _Judge_ and the obsequious motor-footman bowed
Major Vernon through its rather grimy doorway. Within, a small boy in
a kind of box asked his business, and when he heard his name, said that
the "Guvnor" had sent down word that he was go up at once--third floor,
first to the right and second to the left. So up he went, and when
he reached the indicated locality was taken possession of by a
worried-looking clerk who had evidently been waiting for him, and almost
thrust through a door to find himself in a big, worn, untidy room. At
a huge desk in this room sat an elderly man, also big, worn, and
untidy-looking, who waved a long slip of galley-proof in his hand, and
was engaged in scolding a sub-editor.

"Who is that?" he said, wheeling round. "I'm busy, can't see anyone."

"I beg your pardon," answered the Major with humility, "your people told
me to come up. My name is Alan Vernon."

"Oh! I remember. Sit down for a moment, will you, and--Mr. Thomas,
oblige me by taking away this rot and rewriting it entirely in the sense
I have outlined."

Mr. Thomas snatched his rejected copy and vanished through another door,
whereon his chief remarked in an audible voice:

"That man is a perfect fool. Lucky I thought to look at his stuff. Well,
he is no worse than the rest, in this weary world," and he burst into a
hearty laugh and swung his chair round, adding, "Now then, Alan, what
is it? I have a quarter of an hour at your service. Why, bless me! I
was forgetting that it's more than a dozen years since we met; you
were still a boy then, and now you have left the army with a D.S.O. and
gratuity, and turned financier, which I think wouldn't have pleased your
old father. Come, sit down here and let us talk."

"I didn't leave the army, Mr. Jackson," answered his visitor; "it left
me; I was invalided out. They said I should never get my health back
after that last go of fever, but I did."

"Ah! bad luck, very bad luck, just at the beginning of what should have
been a big career, for I know they thought highly of you at the
War Office, that is, if they can think. Well, you have grown into a
fine-looking fellow, like your father, very, and someone else too," and
he sighed, running his fingers through his grizzled hair. "But you don't
remember her; she was before your time. Now let us get to business;
there's no time for reminiscences in this office. What is it, Alan, for
like other people I suppose that you want something?"

"It is about that Sahara flotation, Mr. Jackson," he began rather
doubtfully.

The old editor's face darkened. "The Sahara flotation! That
accursed----" and he ceased abruptly. "What have you, of all people in
the world, got to do with it? Oh! I remember. Someone told me that you
had gone into partnership with Aylward the company promoter, and that
little beast, Champers-Haswell, who really is the clever one. Well, set
it out, set it out."

"It seems, Mr. Jackson, that _The Judge_ has refused not only our
article, but also the advertisement of the company. I don't know much
about this side of the affair myself, but Sir Robert asked me if I would
come round and see if things couldn't be arranged."

"You mean that the man sent you to try and work on me because he knew
that I used to be intimate with your family. Well, it is a poor errand
and will have a poor end. You can't--no one on earth can, while I sit in
this chair, not even my proprietors."

There was silence broken at last by Alan, who remarked awkwardly:

"If that is so, I must not take up your time any longer."

"I said that I would give you a quarter of an hour, and you have only
been here four minutes. Now, Alan Vernon, tell me as your father's old
friend, why you have gone to herd with these gilded swine?"

There was something so earnest about the man's question that it did not
even occur to his visitor to resent its roughness.

"Of course it is not original," he answered, "but I had this idea about
flooding the Desert; I spent a furlough up there a few years ago and
employed my time in making some rough surveys. Then I was obliged to
leave the Service and went down to Yarleys after my father's death--it's
mine now, you know, but worth nothing except a shooting rent, which just
pays for the repairs. There I met Champers-Haswell, who lives near
and is a kind of distant cousin of mine--my mother was a Champers--and
happened to mention the thing to him. He took it up at once and
introduced me to Aylward, and the end of it was, that they offered me a
partnership with a small share in the business, because they said I was
just the man they wanted."

"Just the man they wanted," repeated the editor after him. "Yes, the
last of the Vernons, an engineer with an old name in his county, a
clean record and plenty of ability. Yes, you would be just the man they
wanted. And you accepted?"

"Yes. I was on my beam ends with nothing to do; I wanted to make some
money. You see Yarleys has been in the family for over five hundred
years, and it seemed hard to have to sell it. Also--also----" and he
paused.

"Ever meet Barbara Champers?" asked Mr. Jackson inconsequently. "I did
once. Wonderfully nice girl, and very good-looking too. But of course
you know her, and she is her uncle's ward, and their place isn't far off
Yarleys, you say. Must be a connection of yours also."

Major Vernon started a little at the name and his face seemed to redden.

"Yes," he said, "I have met her and she is a connection."

"Will be a big heiress one day, I think," went on Mr. Jackson, "unless
old Haswell makes off with her money. I think Aylward knows that; at any
rate he was hanging about when I saw her."

Vernon started again, this time very perceptibly.

"Very natural--your going into the business, I mean, under all the
circumstances," went on Mr. Jackson. "But now, if you will take my
advice, you'll go out of it as soon as you can."

"Why?"

"Because, Alan Vernon, I am sure you don't want to see your name dragged
in the dirt, any more than I do." He fumbled in a drawer and produced
a typewritten document. "Take that," he said, "and study it at your
leisure. It's a sketch of the financial career of Messrs. Aylward and
Champers-Haswell, also of the companies which they have promoted and
been connected with, and what has happened to them and to those who
invested in them. A man got it out for me yesterday and I'm going to use
it. As regards this Sahara business, you think it all right, and so it
may be from an engineering point of view, but you will never live to
sail upon that sea which the British public is going to be asked to find
so many millions to make. Look here. We have only three minutes more, so
I will come to the point at once. It's Turkish territory, isn't it, and
putting aside everything else, the security for the whole thing is a
Firman from the Sultan?"

"Yes, Sir Robert Aylward and Haswell procured it in Constantinople. I
have seen the document."

"Indeed, and are you well acquainted with the Sultan's signature? I know
when they were there last autumn that potentate was very ill----"

"You mean----" said Major Vernon, looking up.

"I mean, Alan, that I like not the security. I won't say any more,
as there is a law of libel in this land. But _The Judge_ has certain
sources of information. It may be that no protest will be made at once,
for baksheesh can stop it for a while, but sooner or later the protest
or repudiation will come, and perhaps some international bother;
also much scandal. As to the scheme itself, it is shamelessly
over-capitalized for the benefit of the promoters--of whom, remember,
Alan, you will appear as one. Now time's up. Perhaps you will take my
advice, and perhaps you won't, but there it is for what it's worth as
that of a man of the world and an old friend of your family. As for your
puff article and your prospectus, I wouldn't put them in _The Judge_
if you paid me a thousand pounds, which I daresay your friend, Aylward,
would be quite ready to do. Good-bye. Come and see me again sometime,
and tell me what has happened--and, I say"--this last was shouted
through the closing door,--"give my kind regards to Miss Barbara, for
wherever she happens to live, she is an honest woman."



CHAPTER II

THE YELLOW GOD

Alan Vernon walked thoughtfully down the lead-covered stairs, hustled
by eager gentlemen hurrying up to see the great editor, whose bell
was already ringing furiously, and was duly ushered by the obsequious
assistant-chauffeur back into the luxurious motor. There was an electric
lamp in this motor, and by the light of it, his mind being perplexed,
he began to read the typewritten document given to him by Mr. Jackson,
which he still held in his hand.

As it chanced they were blocked for a quarter of an hour near the
Mansion House, so that he found time, if not to master it, at least to
gather enough of its contents to make him open his brown eyes very wide
before the motor pulled up at the granite doorway of his office. Alan
descended from the machine, which departed silently, and stood for a
moment wondering what he should do. His impulse was to jump into a bus
and go straight to his rooms or his club, to which Sir Robert did not
belong, but being no coward, he dismissed it from his mind.

His fate hung in the balance, of that he was well aware. Either he must
disregard Mr. Jackson's warning, confirmed as it was by many secret
fears and instincts of his own, and say nothing except that he had
failed in his mission, or he must take the bull by the horns and break
with the firm. To do the latter meant not only a good deal of moral
courage, but practical ruin, whereas if he chose the former course,
probably within a fortnight he would find himself a rich man. Whatever
Jackson and a few others might say in its depreciation, he was certain
that the Sahara flotation would go through, for it was underwritten,
of course upon terms, by responsible people, moreover the unissued
preferred shares had already been dealt in at a heavy premium. Now to
say nothing of the allotment to which he was entitled upon his holding
in the parent Syndicate, the proportion of cash due to him as a partner,
would amount to quite a hundred thousand pounds. In other words, he, who
had so many reasons for desiring money, would be wealthy. After working
so hard and undergoing so much that he felt to be humiliating and even
degrading, why should he not take his reward and clear out afterwards?

This he remembered he could do, since probably by some oversight of
Aylward's, who left such matters to his lawyers, his deed of partnership
did not bind him to a fixed term. It could be broken at any moment.
To this argument there was only one possible answer, that of his
conscience. If once he were convinced that things were not right,
it would be dishonest to participate in their profits. And he was
convinced. Mr. Jackson's arguments and his damning document had thrown a
flood of light upon many matters which he had suspected but never quite
understood. He was the partner of, well, adventurers, and the money
which he received would in fact be filched from the pockets of
unsuspecting persons. He would vouch for that of which he was doubtful
and receive the price of sharp practice. In other words he, Alan Vernon,
who had never uttered a wilful untruth or taken a halfpenny that was not
his own, would before the tribunal of his own mind, stand convicted as
a liar and a thief. The thing was not to be borne. At whatever cost it
must be ended. If he were fated to be a beggar, at least he would be an
honest beggar.

With a firm step and a high head he walked straight into Sir Robert's
room, without even going through the formality of knocking, to find
Mr. Champers-Haswell seated at the ebony desk by his partner's
side examining some document through a reading-glass, which on his
appearance, was folded over and presently thrust away into a drawer.
It seemed, Alan noticed, to be of an unusual shape and written in some
strange character.

Mr. Haswell, a stout, jovial-looking, little man with a florid
complexion and white hair, rose at once to greet him.

"How do you do, Alan," he said in a cheerful voice, for as a cousin by
marriage he called him by his Christian name. "I am just this minute
back from Paris, and you will be glad to learn that they are going to
support us very well there; in fact I may say that the Government has
taken up the scheme, of course under the rose. You know the French have
possessions all along that coast and they won't be sorry to find
an opportunity of stretching out their hand a little further. Our
difficulties as to capital are at an end, for a full third of it is
guaranteed in Paris, and I expect that small investors and speculators
for the rise will gobble a lot more. We shall plant L10,000,000 worth of
Sahara scrip in sunny France, my boy, and foggy England has underwritten
the rest. It will be a case of 'letters of Allotment and regret,' _and_
regret, Alan, financially the most successful issue of the last dozen
years. What do you say to that?" and in his elation the little man
puffed out his chest and pursing up his lips, blew through them, making
a sound like that of wind among wires.

"I don't know, Mr. Haswell. If we are all alive I would prefer to answer
the question twelve months hence, or later, when we see whether the
company is going to be a practical success as well, or not."

Again Mr. Haswell made the sound of wind among wires, only this time
there was a shriller note in it; its mellowness was gone, it was as
though the air had suddenly been filled with frost.

"A practical success!" he repeated after him. "That is scarcely our
affair, is it? Promoters should not bother themselves with long views,
Alan. These may be left to the investing public, the speculative
parson and the maiden lady who likes a flutter--those props of modern
enterprise. But what do you mean? You originated this idea and always
said that the profits should be great."

"Yes, Mr. Haswell, on a moderate capitalization and provided that we are
sure of the co-operation of the Porte."

Mr. Haswell looked at him very searchingly and Sir Robert, who had been
listening, said in his cold voice:

"I think that we thrashed out these points long ago, and to tell you the
truth I am rather tired of them, especially as it is too late to change
anything. How did you get on with Jackson, Vernon?"

"I did not get on at all, Sir Robert. He will not touch the thing on any
terms, and indeed means to oppose it tooth and nail."

"Then he will find himself in a minority when the articles come out
to-morrow. Of course it is a bore, but we are strong enough to snap our
fingers at him. You see they don't read _The Judge_ in France, and no
one has ever heard of it in Constantinople. Therefore we have nothing to
fear--so long as we stick together," he added meaningly.

Alan felt that the crisis had come. He must speak now or for ever hold
his peace; indeed Aylward was already looking round for his hat.

"Sir Robert and Mr. Haswell," he broke in rather nervously, "I have
something to say to you, something unpleasant," and he paused.

"Then please say it at once, Vernon. I want to dress for dinner, I am
going to the theatre to-night and must dine early," replied Aylward in a
voice of the utmost unconcern.

"It is, Sir Robert," went on Alan with a rush, "that I do not like the
lines upon which this business is being worked, and I wish to give up my
interest in it and retire from the firm, as I have a right to do under
our deed of partnership."

"Have you?" said Aylward. "Really, I forget. But, my dear fellow, do not
think that we should wish to keep you for one moment against your will.
Only, might I ask, has that old puritan, Jackson, hypnotized you, or is
it a case of sudden madness after influenza?"

"Neither," answered Alan sternly, for although he might be diffident on
matters that he did not thoroughly understand, he was not a man to brook
trifling or impertinence. "It is what I have said, no more nor less. I
am not satisfied either as to the capitalization or as to the guarantee
that the enterprise can be really carried out. Further"--and he
paused,--"Further, I should like what I have never yet been able to
obtain, more information as to that Firman under which the concession is
granted."

For one moment a sort of tremor passed over Sir Robert's impassive
countenance, while Mr. Haswell uttered his windy whistle, this time in a
tone of plaintive remonstrance.

"As you have formally resigned your membership of the firm, I do not see
that any useful purpose can be served by discussing such matters.
The fullest explanations, of course, we should have been willing to
give----"

"My dear Alan," broke in Mr. Champers-Haswell, who was quite upset, "I
do implore you to reflect for one moment, for your own sake. In a single
week you would have been a wealthy man; do you really mean to throw away
everything for a whim?"

"Perhaps Vernon remembers that he holds over 1700 of the Syndicate
shares which we have worked up to L18, and thinks it wiser to capture
the profit in sight, generally speaking a very sound principle,"
interrupted Aylward sarcastically.

"You are mistaken, Sir Robert," replied Alan, flushing. "The way that
those shares have been artificially put up is one of the things to which
I most object. I shall only ask for mine the face value which I paid for
them."

Now notwithstanding their experience, both of the senior partners
did for a moment look rather scared. Such folly, or such honesty, was
absolutely incredible to them. They felt that there must be much behind.
Sir Robert, however, recovered instantly.

"Very well," he said; "it is not for us to dictate to you; you must make
your own bed and lie on it. To argue or remonstrate would only be rude."
He put out his hand and pushed the button of an electric bell, adding as
he did so, "Of course we understand one thing, Vernon, namely, that as
a gentleman and a man of honour you will make no public use of the
information which you have acquired during your stay in this office,
either to our detriment, personal or financial, or to your own
advantage."

"Certainly you may understand that," replied Vernon. "Unless my
character is attacked and it becomes necessary for me to defend myself,
my lips are sealed."

"That will never happen--why should it?" said Sir Robert with a polite
bow.

The door opened and the head clerk, Jeffreys, appeared.

"Mr. Jeffreys," said Sir Robert, "please find us the deed of partnership
between Major Vernon and ourselves, and bring it here. One moment.
Please make out also a transfer of Major Vernon's parcel of Sahara
Syndicate shares to Mr. Champers-Haswell and myself at par value, and
fill in a cheque for the amount. Please remove also Major Vernon's name
wherever it appears in the proof prospectus, and--yes--one thing more.
Telephone to Specton--the Right Honourable the Earl of Specton, I mean,
and say that after all I have been able to arrange that he shall have a
seat on the Board and a block of shares at a very moderate figure,
and that if he will wire his assent, his name shall be put into the
prospectus. You approve, don't you, Haswell?--yes--then that is all, I
think, Jeffreys, only please be as quick as you can, for I want to get
away."

Jeffreys, the immaculate and the impassive, bowed, and casting one swift
glance at Vernon out of the corner of his eye, departed.

What is called an awkward pause ensued; in fact it was a very awkward
pause. The die was cast, the matter ended, and what were the principals
to do until the ratifications had been exchanged or, a better simile
perhaps, the _decree nisi_ pronounced absolute. Mr. Champers-Haswell
remarked that the weather was very cold for April, and Alan agreed with
him, while Sir Robert found his hat and brushed it with his sleeve. Then
Mr. Haswell, in desperation, for in minor matters he was a kindly sort
of man who disliked scenes and unpleasantness, muttered something as
to seeing him--Alan--at his house, The Court, in Hertfordshire, from
Saturday to Monday.

"That was the arrangement," answered Alan bluntly, "but possibly after
what has happened you will not wish that it should be kept."

"Oh! why not, why not?" said Mr. Haswell. "Sunday is a day of rest when
we make it a rule not to talk business, and if we did, perhaps we might
all change our minds about these matters. Sir Robert is coming, and I
am sure that your cousin Barbara will be very disappointed if you do not
turn up, for she understands nothing about these city things which are
Greek to her."

At the mention of the name of Barbara Sir Robert Aylward looked up from
the papers which he affected to be tidying, and Alan thought that there
was a kind of challenge in his eyes. A moment before he had made up his
mind that no power on earth would induce him to spend a Sunday with his
late partners at The Court. Now, acting upon some instinct or impulse,
he reversed his opinion.

"Thanks," he said, "if that is understood, I shall be happy to come. I
will drive over from Yarleys in time for dinner to-morrow. Perhaps you
will say so to Barbara."

"She will be glad, I am sure," answered Mr. Haswell, "for she told
me the other day that she wants to consult you about some outdoor
theatricals that she means to get up in July."

"In July!" answered Alan with a little laugh. "I wonder where I shall be
in July."

Then came another pause, which seemed to affect even Sir Robert's
nerves, for abandoning the papers, he walked down the room till he came
to the golden object that has been described, and for the second time
that day stood there contemplating it.

"This thing is yours, Vernon," he said, "and now that our relations are
at an end, I suppose that you will want to take it away. What is its
history? You never told me."

"Oh! that's a long story," answered Alan in an absent voice. "My uncle,
who was a missionary, brought it from West Africa. I rather forget the
facts, but Jeekie, my negro servant, knows them all, for as a lad my
uncle saved him from sacrifice, or something, in a place where they
worship these things, and he has been with us ever since. It is a fetish
with magical powers and all the rest of it. I believe they call it the
Swimming Head and other names. If you look at it, you will see that it
seems to swim between the shoulders, doesn't it?"

"Yes," said Sir Robert, "and I admire the beautiful beast. She is cruel
and artistic, like--like finance. Look here, Vernon, we have quarrelled,
and of course henceforth are enemies, for it is no use mincing matters,
only fools do that. But in a way you are being hardly treated. You
could get L10 apiece to-day for those shares of yours in a block on the
market, and I am paying you L1. I understand your scruples, but there
is no reason why we should not square things. This fetish of yours has
brought me luck, so let's do a deal. Leave it here, and instead of a
check for L1700, I will make you one out for L17,000."

"That's a very liberal offer," said Vernon. "Give me a moment to think
it over."

Then he also walked into the corner of the room and contemplated the
golden mask that seemed to float between the frog-like shoulders. The
shimmering eyes drew his eyes, though what he saw in them does not
matter. Indeed he could never remember. Only when he straightened
himself again there was left on his mind a determination that not
for seventeen or for seventy thousand pounds would he part with his
ownership in this very unique fetish.

"No, thank you," he said presently. "I don't think I will sell the
Yellow God, as Jeekie calls it. Perhaps you will kindly keep her here
for a week or so, until I make up my mind where to stow her."

Again Mr. Champers-Haswell uttered his windy whistle. That a man should
refuse L17,000 for a bit of African gold worth L100 or so, struck him
as miraculous. But Sir Robert did not seem in the least surprised, only
very disappointed.

"I quite understand your dislike to selling," he said. "Thank you for
leaving it here for the present to see us through the flotation," and he
laughed.

At that moment Jeffreys entered the room with the documents. Sir Robert
handed the deed of partnership to Alan, and when he had identified it,
took it from him again and threw it on the fire, saying that of course
the formal letter of release would be posted and the dissolution
notified in the _Gazette_. Then the transfer was signed and the cheque
delivered.

"Well, good-bye till Saturday," said Alan when he had received the
latter, and nodding to them both, he turned and left the room.

The passage ran past the little room in which Mr. Jeffreys, the head
clerk, sat alone. Catching sight of him through the open door, Alan
entered, shutting it behind him. Finding his key ring he removed from
it the keys of his desk and of the office strongroom, and handed them
to the clerk who, methodical in everything, proceeded to write a formal
receipt.

"You are leaving us, Major Vernon?" he said interrogatively as he signed
the paper.

"Yes, Jeffreys," answered Alan, then prompted by some impulse, added,
"Are you sorry?"

Mr. Jeffreys looked up and there were traces of unwonted emotion upon
his hard, regulated face.

"For myself, yes, Major--for you, on the whole, no."

"What do you mean, Jeffreys? I do not quite understand."

"I mean, Major, that I am sorry because you have never tried to shuffle
off any shady business on to my back and leave me to bear the brunt of
it; also because you have always treated me as a gentleman should, not
as a machine to be used until a better can be found, and kicked aside
when it goes out of order."

"It is very kind of you to say so, Jeffreys, but I can't remember having
done anything particular."

"No, Major, you can't remember what comes natural to you. But I and the
others remember, and that's why I am sorry. But for yourself I am glad,
since although Aylward and Haswell have put a big thing through and are
going to make a pot of money, this is no place for the likes of you,
and now that you are going I will make bold to tell you that I always
wondered what you were doing here. By and by, Major, the row will come,
as it has come more than once in the past, before your time."

"And then?" said Alan, for he was anxious to get to the bottom of this
man's mind, which hitherto he had always found so secret.

"And then, Major, it won't matter much to Messrs. Aylward and
Champers-Haswell, who are used to that kind of thing and will probably
dissolve partnership and lie quiet for a bit, and still less to folk
like myself, who are only servants. But if you were still here it would
have mattered a great deal to you, for it would blacken your name and
break your heart, and then what's the good of the money? I tell you,
Major," the clerk went on with quiet intensity, "though I am nobody and
nothing, if I could afford it I would follow your example. But I can't,
for I have a sick wife and a family of delicate children who have to
live half the year on the south coast, to say nothing of my old mother,
and--I was fool enough to be taken in and back Sir Robert's last little
venture, which cost me all I had saved. So you see I must make a bit
before the machine is scrapped, Major. But I tell you this, that if I
can get L5000 together, as I hope to do out of Saharas before I am a
month older, for they had to give me a look-in, as I knew too much, I am
off to the country, where I was born, to take a farm there. No more
of Messrs. Aylward and Haswell for Thomas Jeffreys. That's my bell.
Good-bye, Major, I'll take the liberty to write you a line sometimes,
for I know you won't give me away. Good-bye and God bless you, as I am
sure He will in the long run," and stretching out his hand, he took that
of the astonished Alan and wrung it warmly.

When he was gone Alan went also, noticing that the clerks, whom some
rumour of these events seemed to have reached, eyed him curiously
through the glass screens behind which they sat at their desks, as
he thought not without regret and a kind of admiration. Even the
magnificent be-medalled porter at the door emerged from the carved teak
box where he dwelt and touching his cap asked if he should call a cab.

"No, thank you, Sergeant," answered Alan, "I will take a bus, and,
Sergeant, I think I forgot to give you a present last Xmas. Will you
accept this?--I wish I could make it more," and he presented him with
ten shillings.

The Sergeant drew himself up and saluted.

"Thank you kindly, Major," he said. "I'd rather take that from you than
L10 from the other gentlemen. But, Major, I wish we were out on the West
Coast again together. It's a stinking, barbarous hole, but not so bad as
this 'ere city."

For once these two had served as comrades, and it was through Alan that
the sergeant obtained his present lucrative but somewhat uncongenial
post.

He was outside at last. The massive granite portal vanished behind him
in the evening mists, much as a nightmare vanishes. He, Alan Vernon, who
for a year or more had been in bondage, was a free man again. All his
dreams of wealth had departed; indeed if anything, save in experience,
he was poorer than when first the shadow of yonder doorway fell upon
him. But at least he was safe, safe. The deed of partnership which had
been as a chain about his neck, was now white ashes; his name was erased
from that fearful prospectus of Sahara Limited, wherein millions which
someone would provide were spoken of like silver in the days of Solomon,
as things of no account. The bitterest critic could not say that he
had made a halfpenny out of the venture, in fact, if trouble came, his
voluntary abandonment of the profits due to him must go to his credit.
He had plunged into the icy waters of renunciation and come up clean if
naked. Never since he was a boy could Alan remember feeling so utterly
light-hearted and free from anxiety. Not for a million pounds would he
have returned to gather gold in that mausoleum of reputations. As for
the future, he did not in the least care what happened. There was no
one dependent on him, and in this way or in that he could always earn a
crust, a nice, honest crust.

He ran down the street and danced for joy like a child, yes, and
presented a crossing-sweeper against whom he butted with a whole
sixpence in compensation. Thus he reached the Mansion House, not
unsuspected of inebriety by the police, and clambered to the top of a
bus crowded with weary and anxious-looking City clerks returning home
after a long day's labour at starvation wage. In that cold company and
a chilling atmosphere some of his enthusiasm evaporated. He remembered
that this step of his meant that sooner or later, within a year or two
at most, Yarleys, where his family had dwelt for centuries, must go to
the hammer. Why had he not accepted Aylward's offer and sold that old
fetish to him for L17,000? There was no question of share-dealing there,
and if a very wealthy man chose to give a fancy price for a curiosity,
he could take it without doubt or shame. At least it would have sufficed
to save Yarleys, which after all was only mortgaged for L20,000. For the
life of him he could not tell. He had acted on impulse, a very curious
impulse, and there was an end of it perhaps; it might be because his
uncle had told him as a boy that the thing was unique, or perhaps
because old Jeekie, his negro servant, venerated it so much and swore
that it was "lucky." At any rate he had declined and there was an end.

But another and a graver matter remained. He had desired wealth to save
Yarleys, but he desired it still more for a different purpose. Above
everything on earth he loved Barbara, his distant cousin and the niece
of Mr. Champers-Haswell, who until an hour ago had been his partner.
Now she was a great heiress, and without fortune he could not marry her,
even if she would marry him, which remained in doubt. For one thing
her uncle and guardian Haswell, under her father's will, had absolute
discretion in this matter until she reached the age of twenty-five, and
for another he was too proud. Therefore it would seem that in abandoning
his business, he had abandoned his chance of Barbara also, which was a
truly dreadful thought.

Well, it was in order that he might see her, that he had agreed to visit
The Court on the morrow, even though it meant a meeting with his late
partners, who were the last people with whom he desired to foregather
again so soon. Then and there he made up his mind that before he bade
Barbara farewell, he would tell her the whole story, so that she might
not misjudge him. After that he would go off somewhere--to Africa
perhaps. Meanwhile he was quite tired out, as tired as though he had
lain a week in the grip of fever. He must eat some food and get to
bed. Sufficient unto the day was the evil thereof, yet on the whole he
blessed the name of Jackson, editor of _The Judge_ and his father's old
friend.



When Alan had left the office Sir Robert turned to Mr. Champers-Haswell
and asked him abruptly, "What the devil does this mean?"

Mr. Haswell looked up at the ceiling and whistled in his own peculiar
fashion, then answered:

"I cannot say for certain, but our young friend's strange conduct seems
to suggest that he has smelt a rat, possibly even that Jackson, the old
beast, has shown him a rat--of a large Turkish breed."

Sir Robert nodded.

"Vernon is a fellow who doesn't like rats; they seem to haunt his
sleep," he said; "but do you think that having seen it, he will keep it
in the bag?"

"Oh! certainly, certainly," answered Mr. Haswell with cheerfulness;
"the man is the soul of honour; he will never give us away. Look how he
behaved about those shares. Still, I think that perhaps we are well rid
of him. Too much honour, like too much zeal, is a very dangerous quality
in any business."

"I don't know that I agree with you," answered Sir Robert. "I am not
sure that in the long run we should not do better for a little more of
the article. For my part, although it will not hurt us publicly, for the
thing will never be noticed, I am sorry that we have lost Vernon, very
sorry indeed. I don't think him a fool, and awkward as they may be, I
respect his qualities."

"So do I, so do I," answered Mr. Haswell, "and of course we have acted
against his advice throughout, which must have been annoying to him.
The scheme as he suggested it was a fair business proposition that might
have paid ten per cent. on a small capital, but what is the good of ten
per cent. to you and me? We want millions and we are going to get them.
Well, he is coming to The Court to-morrow, and perhaps after all we
shall be able to arrange matters. I'll give Barbara a hint; she has
great influence with him, and you might do the same, Aylward."

"Miss Champers has great influence with everyone who is fortunate enough
to know her," answered Sir Robert courteously. "But even if she chooses
to use it, I doubt if it will avail in this case. Vernon has been making
up his mind for a long while. I have watched him and am sure of that.
To-night he determined to take the plunge and I do not think that we
shall see any more of him in this office. Haswell," he added with sudden
energy, "I tell you that of late our luck has been too good to last. The
boom, the real boom, came in with Vernon, and with Vernon I think that
it will go."

"At any rate it must leave something pretty substantial behind it this
time, Aylward, my friend. Whatever happens, within a week we shall be
rich, really rich for life."

"For life, Haswell, yes, for life. But what is life? A bubble that any
pin may prick. Oh! I know that you do not like the subject, but it is
as well to look it in the face sometimes. I'm no church-goer, but if
I remember right we were taught to pray the good Lord to deliver us
especially 'in all times of our wealth,' which is followed by something
about tribulation and sudden death, for when they wrote that prayer the
wheel of human fortune went round just as it does to-day. There, let's
get out of this before I grow superstitious, as men who believe in
nothing sometimes do, because after all they must believe in something,
I suppose. Got your hat and coat? So have I, come on," and he switched
off the light, so that the room was left in darkness except for the
faint glimmering of the fire.

His partner grumbled audibly, for in turning he had knocked his hand
against the desk.

"Leave me my only economy, Haswell," he answered with a hard little
laugh. "Electricity is strength and I hate to see strength burning to
waste. Why do you mind?" he went on as he stepped towards the door.
"Is it the contrast? In all times of our wealth, in all times of our
tribulation, from sickness and from sudden death----"

"Good Lord deliver us," chimed in Mr. Haswell in a shaking voice behind
him. "What the devil's that?"

Sir Robert looked round and saw, or thought that he saw, something very
strange. From the pillar on which it stood the golden fetish with a
woman's face, appeared to have floated. The firelight showed it gliding
towards them across, but a few inches above the floor of the great room.
It came very slowly, but it came. Now it reached them and paused,
and now it rose into the air until it attained the height of Mr.
Champers-Haswell and stayed there, staring into his face and not a
hand's breadth away, just as though it were a real woman glaring at him.

He uttered a sound, half whistle and half groan, and fell back, as it
chanced on to a morocco-covered seat behind him. For a moment or two
the gleaming, golden mask floated in the air. Then it turned very
deliberately, rose a little way, and moving sidelong to where Sir Robert
stood, hung in front of _his_ face.

Presently Aylward staggered to the mantelpiece and began to fumble for
the switch; in the silence his nails scratching at the panelling made
a sound like to that of a gnawing mouse. He found it at last, and next
instant the office broke into a blaze of light, showing Mr. Haswell,
his rubicund face quite pale, his hat and umbrella on the floor, gasping
like a dying man upon the couch, and Sir Robert himself clinging to the
mantel-shelf as a person might do who had received a mortal wound, while
the golden fetish reposed calmly on its pillar, to all appearance as
immovable and undisturbed as the antique Venus which matched it at the
other end of the room. For a while there was silence. Then Sir Robert,
recovering himself, asked:

"Did you notice anything unusual just now, Haswell?"

"Yes," whispered his partner. "I thought that hideous African thing
which Vernon brought here, came sliding across the floor and stared into
my face with its glittering eyes, and in the eyes----"

"Well, what was in the eyes?"

"I can't remember. It was a kind of picture and the meaning of it was
Sudden Death--oh Lord! Sudden Death. Tell me it was a fancy bred of that
ill-omened talk of yours?"

"I can't tell you anything of the sort," answered Aylward in a hollow
voice, "for I saw something also."

"What?" asked his partner.

"Death that wasn't sudden, and other things."

Again the silence fell till it was broken by Aylward.

"Come," he said, "we have been over-working--too much strain, and now
the reaction. Keep this rubbish to yourself, or they will lock you up in
an asylum."

"Certainly, Aylward, certainly. But can't you get rid of that beastly
image?"

"Not on any account, Haswell, even if it haunts us all day. Here it
shall stop until the Saharas are floated on Monday, if I have to lock it
in the strongroom and throw the keys into the Thames. Afterwards Vernon
can take it, as he has a right to do, and I am sure that with it will go
our luck."

"Then the sooner our luck goes, the better," replied Haswell, with
a mere ghost of his former whistle. "Life is better than luck,
and--Aylward, that Yellow God you are so fond of means to murder us. We
are being fatted for the sacrifice, that is all. I remember now, that
was one of the things I saw written in its eyes!"



CHAPTER III

JEEKIE TELLS A TALE

The Court, Mr. Champers-Haswell's place, was a very fine house indeed,
of a sort. That is, it contained twenty-nine bedrooms, each of them with
a bathroom attached, a large number of sitting-rooms, ample garages,
stables, and offices, the whole surrounded by several acres of
newly-planted gardens. Incidentally it may be mentioned that it was
built in the most atrocious taste and looked like a suburban villa seen
through a magnifying glass.

It was in this matter of taste that it differed from Sir Robert
Aylward's home, Old Hall, a few miles away. Not that this was old
either, for the original house had fallen down or been burnt a hundred
years before. But Sir Robert, being gifted with artistic perception, had
reared up in place of it a smaller but really beautiful dwelling of soft
grey stone, long and low, and built in the Tudor style with many gables.

This house, charming as it was, could not of course compare with
Yarleys, the ancient seat of the Vernons in the same neighbourhood.
Yarleys was pure Elizabethan, although it contained an oak-roofed hall
which was said to date back to the time of King John, a remnant of a
former house. There was no electric light or other modern convenience
at Yarleys, yet it was a place that everyone went to see because of its
exceeding beauty and its historical associations. The moat by which it
was surrounded, the grass court within, for it was built on three sides
of a square, the mullioned windows, the towered gateway of red brick,
the low-panelled rooms hung with the portraits of departed Vernons,
the sloping park and the splendid oaks that stood about, singly or in
groups, were all of them perfect in their way. It was one of the most
lovely of English homes, and oddly enough its neglected gardens and the
air of decay that pervaded it, added to rather than decreased its charm.

But it is with The Court that we have to do at present, not with
Yarleys. Mr. Champers-Haswell had a week-end party. There were ten
guests, all men, and with the exception of Alan, who it will be
remembered was one of them, all rich and in business. They included two
French bankers and three Jews, everyone a prop of the original Sahara
Syndicate and deeply interested in the forthcoming flotation. To
describe them is unnecessary, for they have no part in our story, being
only financiers of a certain class, remarkable for the riches they had
acquired by means that for the most part would not bear examination. The
riches were evident enough. Ever since the morning the owners of this
wealth had arrived by ones or twos in their costly motorcars, attended
by smart chauffeurs and valets. Their fur coats, their jewelled studs
and rings, something in their very faces suggested money, which indeed
was the bond that brought and held them together.

Alan did not come until it was time to dress for dinner, for he knew
that Barbara would not appear before that meal, and it was her society
he sought, not that of his host or fellow guests. Accompanied by his
negro servant, Jeekie, for in a house like this it was necessary to have
someone to wait upon him, he drove over from Yarleys, a distance of ten
miles, arriving about eight o'clock.

"Mr. Haswell as gone up to dress, Major, and so have the other
gentlemen," said the head butler, Mr. Smith, "but Miss Champers told me
to give you this note and to say that dinner is at half-past eight."

Alan took the note and asked to be shown to his room. Once there,
although he had only five and twenty minutes, he opened it eagerly,
while Jeekie unpacked his bag.

"Dear Alan," it ran: "Don't be late for dinner, or I may not be able to
keep a place next to me. Of course Sir Robert takes me in. They are a
worse lot than usual this time, odious--odious!--and I can't stand one
on the left hand as well as on the right. Yours,

"B.


"P.S. What _have_ you been doing? Our distinguished guests, to say
nothing of my uncle, seem to be in a great fuss about you. I overheard
them talking when I was pretending to arrange some flowers. One of them
called you a sanctimonious prig and an obstinate donkey, and another
answered--I think it was Sir Robert --'No doubt, but obstinate donkeys
can kick and have been known to upset other people's applecarts ere
now.' Is the Sahara Syndicate the applecart? If so, I'll forgive you.

"P.P.S. Remember that we will walk to church together to-morrow, but
come down to breakfast in knickerbockers or something to put them off,
and I'll do the same--I mean I'll dress as if I were going to golf.
We can turn into Christians later. If we don't--dress like that, I
mean--they'll guess and all want to come to church, except the Jews,
which would bring the judgment of Heaven on us.

"P.P.P.S. Don't be careless and leave this note lying about, for the
under-footman who waits upon you reads all the letters. He steams them
over a kettle. Smith the butler is the only respectable man in this
house."

Alan laughed outright as he finished this peculiar and outspoken
epistle, which somehow revived his spirits, that since the previous day
had been low enough. It refreshed him. It was like a breath of
frosty air from an open window blowing clean and cold into a scented,
overheated room. He would have liked to keep it, but remembering
Barbara's injunctions and the under-footman, threw it onto the fire and
watched it burn. Jeekie coughed to intimate that it was time for his
master to dress, and Alan turned and looked at him in an absent-minded
fashion.

He was worth looking at, was Jeekie. Let the reader imagine a very tall
and powerfully-built negro with a skin as black as a well-polished boot,
woolly hair as white as snow, a little tufted beard also white, a
hand like a leg of mutton, but with long delicate fingers and pink,
filbert-shaped nails, an immovable countenance, but set in it beneath a
massive brow, two extraordinary humorous and eloquent black eyes which
expressed every emotion passing through the brain behind them, that is
when their owner chose to allow them to do so. Such was Jeekie.

"Shall I unlace your boots, Major?" he said in his full, melodious voice
and speaking the most perfect English. "I expect that the gong will
sound in nine and a half minutes."

"Then let it sound and be hanged to it," answered Alan; "no, I forgot--I
must hurry. Jeekie, put that fire out and open all the windows as soon
as I go down. This room is like a hot-house."

"Yes, Major, the fire shall be extinguished and the sleeping-chamber
ventilated. The other boot, if you please, Major."

"Jeekie," said Alan, "who is stopping in this place? Have you heard?"

"I collected some names on my way upstairs, Major. Three of the
gentlemen you have never met before, but," he added suddenly breaking
away from his high-flown book-learned English, as was his custom when
in earnest, "Jeekie think they just black niggers like the rest, thief
people. There ain't a white man in this house, except you and Miss
Barbara and me, Major. Jeekie learnt all that in servant's hall palaver.
No, not now, other time. Everyone tell everything to Jeekie, poor old
African fool, and he look up an answer, 'O law! you don't say so?' but
keep his eyes and ears open all the same."

"I'll be bound you do, Jeekie," replied Alan, laughing again. "Well, go
on keeping them open, and give me those trousers."

"Yes, Major," answered Jeekie, reassuming his grand manner, "I shall
continue to collect information which may prove to your advantage, but
personally I wish that you were clear of the whole caboodle, except Miss
Barbara."

"Hear, hear," ejaculated Alan, "there goes the gong. Mind you come in
and help to wait," and hurrying into his coat he departed downstairs.

The guests were gathered in the hall drinking sherry and bitters, a
proceeding that to Alan's mind set a stamp upon the house. His host, Mr.
Champers-Haswell, came forward and greeted him with much affectionate
enthusiasm, and Alan noticed that he looked very pale, also that his
thoughts seemed to be wandering, for he introduced a French banker to
him as a noted Jew, and the noted Jew as the French banker, although
the distinction between them was obvious and the gentlemen concerned
evidently resented the mistake. Sir Robert Aylward, catching sight of
him, came across the hall in his usual, direct fashion, and shook him by
the hand.

"Glad to see you, Vernon," he said, fixing his piercing eyes upon Alan
as though he were trying to read his thoughts. "Pleasant change this
from the City and all that eternal business, isn't it? Ah! you are
thinking that one is not quite clear of business after all," and he
glanced round at the company. "That's one of your cousin Haswell's
faults; he can never shake himself free of the thing, never get any real
recreation. I'd bet you a sovereign that he has a stenographer waiting
by a telephone in the next room, just in case any opportunity should
arise in the course of conversation. That is magnificent, but it is not
wise. His heart can't stand it; it will wear him out before his time.
Listen, they are all talking about the Sahara. I wish I were there; it
must be quiet at any rate. The sands beneath, the eternal stars above.
Yes, I wish I were there," he repeated with a sigh, and Alan noted that
although his face could not be more pallid than its natural colour, it
looked quite worn and old.

"So do I," he answered with enthusiasm.

Then a French gentleman on his left, having discovered that he was the
engineer who had formulated the great flooding scheme, began to address
him as "Cher maitre," speaking so rapidly his own language that Alan,
whose French was none of the best, struggled after him in vain. Whilst
he was trying to answer a question which he did not understand, the door
at the end of the hall opened, and through it appeared Barbara Champers.

It was a large hall and she was a long way off, which caused her to look
small, who indeed was only of middle height. Yet even at that distance
it was impossible to mistake the dignity of her appearance. A slim woman
with brown hair, cheerful brown eyes, a well-modelled face, a rounded
figure and an excellent complexion, such was Barbara. Ten thousand young
ladies could be found as good, or even better looking, yet something
about her differentiated her from the majority of her sex. There was
determination in her step, and overflowing health and vigour in her
every movement. Her eyes had a trick of looking straight into any other
eyes they met, not boldly, but with a kind of virginal fearlessness
and enterprise that people often found embarrassing. Indeed she was
extremely virginal and devoid of the usual fringe of feminine airs and
graces, a nymph of the woods and waters, who although she was three and
twenty, as yet recked little of men save as companions whom she liked
or disliked according to her instincts. For the rest she was sweetly
dressed in a white robe with silver on it, and wore no ornaments save
a row of small pearls about her throat and some lilies of the valley at
her breast.

Barbara came straight onwards, looking neither to the right or to the
left, till she reached her uncle, to whom she nodded. Then she walked to
Alan and, offering him her hand, said:

"How do you do! Why did you not come over at lunch time? I wanted to
play a round of golf with you this afternoon."

Alan answered something about being busy at Yarleys.

"Yarleys!" she replied. "I thought that you lived in the City now,
making money out of speculations, like everyone else that I know."

"Why, Miss Champers," broke in Sir Robert reproachfully, "I asked you to
play a round of golf before tea and you would not."

"No," she answered, "because I was waiting for my cousin. We are better
matched, Sir Robert."

There was something in her voice, usually so soft and pleasant, as she
spoke these words, something of steeliness and defiance that caused
Alan to feel at once happy and uncomfortable. Apparently also it caused
Aylward to feel angry, for he flashed a glance at Alan over her head of
which the purport could not be mistaken, though his pale face remained
as immovable as ever. "We are enemies. I hate you," said that glance.
Probably Barbara saw it; at any rate before either of them could speak
again, she said:

"Thank goodness, there is dinner at last. Sir Robert, will you take me
in, and, Alan, will you sit on the other side of me? My uncle will show
the rest their places."

The meal was long and magnificent; the price of each dish of it would
have kept a poor family for a month, and on the cost of the exquisite
wines they might have lived for a year or two. Also the last were well
patronized by everyone except Barbara, who drank water, and Alan, who
since his severe fever took nothing but weak whiskey and soda and a
little claret. Even Aylward, a temperate person, absorbed a good deal
of champagne. As a consequence the conversation grew animated, and under
cover of it, while Sir Robert was arguing with his neighbour on the
left, Barbara asked in a low voice:

"What is the row, Alan? Tell me, I can't wait any longer."

"I have quarrelled with them," he answered, staring at his mutton as
though he were criticizing it. "I mean, I have left the firm and have
nothing more to do with the business."

Barbara's eyes lit up as she whispered back:

"Glad of it. Best news I have heard for many a day. But then, may I ask
why you are here?"

"I came to see you," he replied humbly--"thought perhaps you wouldn't
mind," and in his confusion he let his knife fall into the mutton,
whence it rebounded, staining his shirt front.

Barbara laughed, that happy, delightful little laugh of hers, presumably
at the accident with the knife. Whether or no she "minded" did not
appear, only she handed her handkerchief, a costly, last-fringed trifle,
to Alan to wipe the gravy off his shirt, which he took thinking it was
a napkin, and as she did so, touched his hand with a little caressing
movement of her fingers. Whether this was done by chance or on purpose
did not appear either. At least it made Alan feel extremely happy. Also
when he discovered what it was, he kept that gravy-stained handkerchief,
nor did she ever ask for it back again. Only once in after days when she
happened to come across it stuffed away in the corner of a despatch-box,
she blushed all over, and said that she had no idea that any man could
be so foolish out of a book.

"Now that _you_ are really clear of it, I am going for them," she said
presently when the wiping process was finished. "I have only restrained
myself for your sake," and leaning back in her chair she stared at the
ceiling, lost in meditation.

Presently there came one of those silences which will fall upon
dinner-parties at times, however excellent and plentiful the champagne.

"Sir Robert Aylward," said Barbara in that clear, carrying voice of
hers, "will you, as an expert, instruct a very ignorant person? I want a
little information."

"Miss Champers," he answered, "am I not always at your service?" and
all listened to hear upon what point their hostess desired to be
enlightened.

"Sir Robert," she went on calmly, "everyone here is, I believe, what
is called a financier, that is except myself and Major Vernon, who only
tries to be and will, I am sure, fail, since Nature made him something
else, a soldier and--what else did Nature make you, Alan?"

As he vouchsafed no answer to question, although Sir Robert muttered an
uncomplimentary one between his lips which Barbara heard, or read, she
continued:

"And you are all very rich and successful, are you not, and are going to
be much richer and much more successful--next week. Now what I want to
ask you is--how is it done?"

"Accepting the premises for the sake of argument, Miss Champers,"
replied Sir Robert, who felt that he could not refuse the challenge,
"the answer is that it is done by finance."

"I am still in the dark," she said. "Finance, as I have heard of it,
means floating companies, and companies are floated to earn money for
those who invest in them. Now this afternoon as I was dull, I got hold
of a book called the Directory of Directors, and looked up all your
names in it, except those of the gentlemen from Paris, and the companies
that you direct--I found out about those in another book. Well, I could
not make out that any of these companies have ever earned any money, a
dividend, don't you call it? Therefore how do you all grow so rich, and
why do people invest in them?"

Now Sir Robert frowned, Alan coloured, two or three of the company
laughed outright, and one of the French gentlemen who understood English
and had already drunk as much as was good for him, remarked loudly to
his neighbour, "Ah! she is charming. She do touch the spot, like that
ointment you give me to-day. How do we grow rich and why do the people
invest? _Mon Dieu!_ why do they invest? That is the great mystery. I
say that _cette belle demoiselle, votre niece, est ravissante. Elle a
d'esprit, mon ami Haswell._"

Apparently her uncle did not share these sentiments, for he turned as
red as any turkey-cock, and said across the great round table:

"My dear Barbara, I wish that you would leave matters which you do not
understand alone. We are here to dine, not to talk about finance."

"Certainly, Uncle," she answered sweetly. "I stand, or rather sit,
reproved. I suppose that I have put my foot into it as usual, and the
worst of it is," she added, turning to Sir Robert, "that I am just as
ignorant as I was before."

"If you want to master these matters, Miss Champers," said Aylward with
a rather forced laugh, "you must go into training and worship at the
shrine of"--he meant to say Mammon, then thinking that the word sounded
unpleasant, substituted--"the Yellow God as we do."

At these words Alan, who had been studying his plate, looked up quickly,
and her uncle's face turned from red to white. But the irrepressible
Barbara seized upon them.

"The Yellow God," she repeated. "Do you mean money or that fetish thing
of Major Vernon's with the terrible woman's face that I saw at the
office in the City. Well, to change the subject, tell us, Alan, what is
that yellow god of yours and where did it come from?"

"My uncle Austin, who was my mother's brother and a missionary, brought
it from West Africa a great many years ago. He was the first to visit
the tribe who worship it; in fact I do not think that anyone has ever
visited them since. But really I do not know all the story. Jeekie can
tell you about it if you want to know, for he is one of that people and
escaped with my uncle."

Now Jeekie having left the room, some of the guests wished to send
for him, but Mr. Champers-Haswell objected. The end of it was that
a compromise was effected, Alan undertaking to produce his retainer
afterwards when they went to play billiards or cards.



Dinner was over at length and the diners, who had dined well, were
gathered in the billiard room to smoke and amuse themselves as they
wished. It was a very large room, sixty feet long indeed, with a wide
space in the centre between the two tables, which was furnished as a
lounge. When the gentlemen entered it they found Barbara standing by
the great fireplace in this central space, a little shape of white and
silver in its emptiness.

"Forgive me for intruding on you," she said, "and please do not stop
smoking, for I like the smell. I have sat up expressly to hear Jeekie's
story of the Yellow God. Alan, produce Jeekie, or I shall go to bed at
once."

Her uncle made a movement as though to interfere, but Sir Robert said
something to him which appeared to cause him to change his mind, while
the rest in some way or another signified an enthusiastic assent. All of
them were anxious to see this Jeekie and hear his tale, if he had one
to tell. So Jeekie was sent for and presently arrived clad in the dress
clothes which are common to all classes in England and America. There
he stood before them white-headed, ebony-faced, gigantic, imperturbable.
There is no doubt that his appearance produced an effect, for it was
unusual and indeed striking.

"You sent for me, Major?" he said, addressing his master, to whom he
gave a military salute, for he had been Alan's servant when he was in
the Army.

"Yes, Jeekie. Miss Barbara here and these gentlemen, wish you to tell
them all that you know about the Yellow God."

The negro started and rolled his round eyes upwards till the whites of
them showed, then began in his school-book English:

"That is a private subject, Major, upon which I should prefer not to
discourse before this very public company."

A chorus of remonstrance arose and one of the Jewish gentlemen
approaching Jeekie, slipped a couple of sovereigns into his great hand,
which he promptly transferred to his pocket without seeming to notice
them.

"Jeekie," said Barbara, "don't disappoint me."

"Very well, miss, I fall in with your wishes. The Yellow God that all
these gentlemen worship, quite another god to that of which you desire
that I should tell you. You know all about him. My god is of female
sex."

At this statement his audience burst into laughter while Jeekie rolled
his eyes again and waited till they had finished. "My god," he went on
presently, "I mean, gentlemen, the god I used to pray to, for I am a
good Christian now, has so much gold that she does not care for any
more," and he paused.

"Then what does she care for?" asked someone.

"Blood," answered Jeekie. "She is god of Death. Her name is Little
Bonsa or Small Swimming Head; she is wife of Big Bonsa or Great Swimming
Head."

Again there was laughter, though less general--for instance, neither Sir
Robert nor Mr. Champers-Haswell laughed. This merriment seemed to excite
Jeekie. At any rate it caused him to cease his stilted talk and relapse
into the strange vernacular that is common to all negroes, tinctured
with a racy slang that was all his own.

"You want to hear Yellow God palaver?" he said rapidly. "Very well, I
tell you, you cocksure white men who think you know everything, but
know nothing at all. My people, people of the Asiki, that mean people of
Spirits, what you call ghosts and say you no believe in, but always look
for behind door, they worship Yellow God, Bonsa Big and Bonsa Little,
worship both and call them one; only Little Bonsa on trip to this
country just now and sit and think in City office. Yellow God live long
way up a great river, then turn to the left and walk six days through
big forest where dwarf people shoot you with poisoned arrow. Then turn
to the right, walk up stream where many wild beasts. Then turn to the
left again and go in canoe through swamp where you die of fever, and
across lake. Then walk over grassland and mountains. Then in kloof of
the mountains where big black trees make a roof and river fall like
thunder, find Asiki and gold house of the Yellow God. All that mountain
gold, full of gold and beneath gold house Yellow God afloat in water.
She what you call Queen, priestess, live there also, always there, very
beautiful woman called Asika with face like Yellow God, cruel, cruel.
She take a husband every year, and every year he die because she always
hunt for right man but never find him."

"Does she kill him then?" asked Barbara.

"Oh! no, she no kill him, Miss, he kill himself at end of year, glad to
get away from Asika and go to spirits. While he live he have a very good
time, plenty to eat, plenty wives, fine house, much gold as he like,
only nothing to spend it on, pretty necklace, nice paint for face. But
Asika, little bit by little bit she eat up his spirit. He see too many
ghosts. The house where he sleep with dead men who once have his billet,
full of ghosts and every night there come more and sit with him, sit all
round him, look at him with great eyes, just like you look at me, till
at last when Asika finish eating up his spirit, he go crazy, he howl
like man in hell, he throw away all the gold they give him, and then,
sometimes after one week, sometimes after one month, sometimes after one
year if he be strong but never more, he run out at night and jump into
canal where Yellow God float and god get him, while Asika sit on the
bank and laugh, 'cause she hungry for new man to eat up his spirit too."

Jeekie's big voice died away to a whisper and ceased. There was a
silence in the room, for even in the shine of the electric light and
through the fumes of champagne, in more than one imagination there rose
a vision of that haunted water in which floated the great Yellow God,
and of some mad being casting himself to his death beneath the moon,
while his beautiful witch wife who was "hungry for more spirits" sat
upon its edge and laughed. Although his language was now commonplace
enough, even ludicrous at times, the negro had undoubtedly the art of
narration. His auditors felt that he spoke of what he knew, or had seen,
that the very recollection of it frightened him, therefore he frightened
them.

Again Barbara broke the silence which she felt to be awkward.

"Why do more ghosts come very night to sit with the queen's husband,
Jeekie?" she asked. "Where do they come from?"

"Out of the dead, miss, dead husbands of Asika from beginning of the
world; what they call Munganas. Also always they make sacrifice to
Yellow God. From far, far away them poor niggers send people to be
sacrifice that their house or tribe get luck. Sometimes they send kings,
sometimes great men, sometimes doctors, sometimes women what have twin
babies. Also the Asiki bring people what is witches, or have drunk
poison stuff which blacks call _muavi_ and have not been sick, or
perhaps son they love best to take curse off their roof. All these come
to Yellow God. Then Asiki doctor, they have Death-palaver. On night of
full moon they beat drum, and drum go Wow! Wow! Wow! and doctors pick
out those to die that month. Once they pick out Jeekie, oh! good Lord,
they pick out _me_," and as he said the words he gasped and with his
great hand wiped off the sweat that started from his brow. "But Yellow
God no take Jeekie that time, no want him and I escape."

"How?" asked Sir Robert.

"With my master, Major's uncle, Reverend Austin, he who come try to make
Asiki Christian. He snap his fingers, put on small mask of Yellow God
which he prig, Little Bonsa herself, that same face which sit in your
office now," and he pointed to Sir Robert, "like one toad upon a stone.
Priests think that god make herself into man, want holiday, take me out
into forest to kill me and eat my life. So they let us go by and we go
just as though devil kick us--fast, fast, and never see the Asiki any
more. But Little Bonsa I bring with me for luck, tell truth I no dare
leave her behind, she not stand that; and now she sit in your office and
think and think and make magic there. That why you grow rich, because
she know you worship her."

"That's a nice way for a baptized Christian to talk," said Barbara,
adding, "But Jeekie, what do you mean when you say that the god did not
take you?"

"I mean this, miss; when victim offered to Big Yellow God, priest-men
bring him to edge of canal where the great god float. Then if Yellow God
want him, it turn and swim across water."

"Swim across water! I thought you said it was only a mask of gold?"

"I don't know, miss, perhaps man inside the mask, perhaps spirit. I say
it swim across water in the night, always in the night, and lift
itself up and look in victim's face. Then priest take him and kill him,
sometimes one way--sometimes another. Or if he escape and they not kill
him, all same for that Johnnie, he die in about one year, always die,
no one ever live long if Yellow God swim to him in dark and rise up and
smile in his face. No matter if it Big Bonsa or Little Bonsa, for they
man and wife joined in holy matrimony and either do trick."

As these words left Jeekie's lips Alan became aware of some unusual
movement on his left and looking round, saw that Mr. Champers-Haswell,
who stood by him, had dropped the cigar which he held and, white as a
sheet, was swaying to and fro. Indeed in another instant he would have
fallen had not Alan caught him in his arms and supported him till others
came to his assistance, when between them they carried him to a sofa. On
their way they passed a table where spirits and soda water were set out,
and to his astonishment Alan noticed that Sir Robert Aylward, looking
little if at all better than his partner, had helped himself to half a
tumbler of cognac, which he was swallowing in great gulps. Then there
was confusion and someone went to telephone the doctor, while the deep
voice of Jeekie was heard exclaiming:

"That Yellow God at work--oh yes, Little Bonsa on the job. Jeekie
Christian man but no doubt she very powerful fetish and can do anything
she like to them that worship her, and you see, she sit in office of
these gentlemen. 'Spect she make Reverend Austin and me bring her
to England because she got eye on firm of Messrs. Aylward & Haswell,
London, E.C. Oh, shouldn't wonder at all, for Bonsa know everything."

"Oh, confound you and your fetish! Be off, you old donkey," almost
shouted Alan.

"Major," replied the offended Jeekie, assuming his grand manner
and language, "it was not I who wished to narrate this history of
blood-stained superstitions of poor African. Mustn't blame old Jeekie if
they make Christian gents sick as Channel steamer."

"Be off," repeated Alan, stamping his foot.

So Jeekie went, but outside the door, as it chanced, he encountered one
of the Jew gentlemen who also appeared to be a little "sick." An idea
striking him, he touched his white hair with his finger and said:

"You like Jeekie's pretty story, sir? Well, Jeekie think that if you
make little present to him, like your brother in there, it please Yellow
God very much, and bring you plenty luck."

Then acting upon some unaccustomed impulse, that Jew became exceedingly
generous. In his pocket was a handful of sovereigns which he had been
prepared to stake at bridge. He grasped them all and thrust them into
Jeekie's outstretched palm, where they seemed to melt.

"Thank you, sir," said Jeekie. "Now I sure you have plenty luck, just
like your grandpa Jacob in Book when he do his brudder in eye."



CHAPTER IV

ALAN AND BARBARA

There was no bridge or billiards at the Court that night, where
ordinarily the play ran high enough. After Mr. Haswell had been carried
to his room, some of the guests, among them Sir Robert Aylward, went to
bed, remarking that they could do no good by sitting up, while others,
more concerned, waited to hear the verdict of the doctor, who must drive
from six miles away. He came, and half an hour later Barbara entered
the billiard room and told Alan, who was sitting there smoking, that her
uncle had recovered from his faint, and that the doctor, who was to stay
all night, said that he was in no danger, only suffering from a heart
attack brought on apparently by over-work or excitement.

When Alan woke next morning the first thing that he heard through his
open window was the sound of the doctor's departing dogcart. Then Jeekie
appeared and told him that Mr. Haswell was all right again, but that
all night he had shaken "like one jelly." Alan asked what had been the
matter with him, but Jeekie only shrugged his shoulders and said that he
did not know--"perhaps Yellow God touch him up."

At breakfast, as in her note she had said she would, Barbara appeared
wearing a short skirt. Sir Robert, who was there, also looked extremely
pale even for him and with black rims round his eyes, asked her if she
were going to golf, to which she answered that she would think it over.
It was a somewhat melancholy meal, and as though by common consent no
mention was made of Jeekie's tale of the Yellow God, and beyond the
usual polite inquiries, very little of their host's seizure.

As Barbara went out she whispered to Alan, who opened the door for her,
"Meet me at half-past ten in the kitchen garden."

Accordingly, having changed his clothes surreptitiously, Alan, avoiding
the others, made his way by a circuitous route to this kitchen garden,
which after the fashion of modern places was hidden behind a belt of
trees nearly a quarter of a mile from the house. Here he wandered about
till presently he heard Barbara's pleasant voice behind him saying:

"Don't dawdle so, we shall be late for church."

So they started, somewhat furtively like runaway children. As they went
Alan asked how her uncle was.

"All right now," she answered, "but he has had a bad shake. It was
that Yellow God story which did it. I know, for I was there when he
was coming to, with Sir Robert. He kept talking about it in a confused
manner, saying that it was swimming to him across the floor, till at
last Sir Robert bent over him and told him to be quiet quite sternly.
Do you know, Alan, I believe that your pet fetish has been manifesting
itself in some unpleasant fashion up there in the office?"

"Indeed. If so, it must be since I left, for I never heard of anything
of the sort, nor are Aylward and your uncle likely people to see ghosts.
In fact Sir Robert wished to give me about L17,000 for the thing only
the day before yesterday, which doesn't look as though it had been
frightening him."

"Well, he won't repeat the offer, Alan, for I heard him promise my uncle
only this morning that it should be sent back to Yarleys at once. But
why did he want to buy it for such a lot of money? Tell me quickly,
Alan, I am dying to hear the whole story."

So he began and told her, omitting nothing, while she listened eagerly
to every word, hardly interrupting him at all. As he finished his tale
they reached the door of the quaint old village church just as the clock
was striking eleven.

"Come in, Alan," she said gently, "and thank Heaven for all its mercies,
for you should be a grateful man to-day."

Then without giving him time to answer she entered the church and they
took their places in the great square pew that for generations had been
occupied by the owners of the ancient house which Mr. Haswell pulled
down when he built The Court. There were their monuments upon the
wall and their gravestones in the chancel floor. But now no one except
Barbara ever sat in their pew; even the benches set aside for the
servants were empty, for those who frequented The Court were not
church-goers and "like master, like man." Indeed the gentle-faced old
clergyman looked quite pleased and surprised when he saw two inhabitants
of that palatial residence amongst his congregation, although it is true
that Barbara was his friend and helper.

The simple service went on; the first lesson was read. It cried woe upon
them that joined house to house and field to field, that draw iniquity
with cords of vanity and sin as it were with a cart rope; that call evil
good and good evil, that put darkness for light and light for darkness,
that justify the wicked for reward; that feast full but regard not the
work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of His hand, for of
such it prophesied that their houses great and fair should be without
inhabitant and desolate.

It was very well read, and Alan, listening, thought that the
denunciations of the old seer of thousands of years ago were not
inappropriate to the dwellers in some houses great and fair of his own
day, who, whatever they did or left undone, regarded not the work of
the Lord, neither considered the operation of His hand. Perhaps Barbara
thought so too; at any rate a rather sad little smile appeared once or
twice upon her sweet, firm face as the immortal poem echoed down the
aisle.

The peace that passeth understanding was invoked upon their heads, and
rising with the rest of the scanty congregation they went away.

"Shall we walk home by the woods, Alan?" asked Barbara. "It is three
miles round, but we don't lunch till two."

He nodded, and presently they were alone in those woods, the beautiful
woods through which the breath of spring was breathing, treading upon
carpets of bluebells, violet and primrose; quite alone, unaccompanied
save by the wild things that stole across their path, undisturbed save
by the sound of the singing birds and of the wind among the trees.

"What did you mean, Barbara, when you said that I should be a grateful
man to-day?" asked Alan presently.

Barbara looked him in the eyes in that open, virginal fashion of hers
and answered in the words of the lesson, "'Woe unto them that draw
iniquity with the cords of vanity and sin as it were with a cart-rope,
that lay house to house,'" and through an opening in the woods she
pointed to the roof of The Court standing on one hill, and to the roof
of Old Hall standing upon another--"'and field to field,'" and with a
sweep of her hand she indicated all the country round, "'for many houses
great and fair that have music in their feasts shall be left desolate.'"
Then turning she said:

"Do you understand now, Alan?"

"I think so," he answered. "You mean that I have been in bad company."

"Very bad, Alan. One of them is my own uncle, but the truth remains the
truth. Alan, they are no better than thieves; all this wealth is stolen,
and I thank God that you have found it out in time before you became one
of them in heart as well as in name."

"If you refer to the Sahara Syndicate," he said, "the idea is sound
enough; indeed, I am responsible for it. The thing can be done, great
benefits would result, too long to go into."

"Yes, yes, Alan, but you know that they never mean to do it, they only
mean to get the millions from the public. I have lived with my uncle for
ten years, ever since my poor father died, and I know the backstairs
of the business. There have been half a dozen schemes like this, and
although they have had their bad times, very bad times, he and Sir
Robert have grown richer and richer. But what has happened to those who
have invested in them? Oh! let us drop the subject, it is unpleasant.
For myself it doesn't matter, because although it isn't under my
control, I have money of my own. You know we are a plebeian lot on the
male side, my grandfather was a draper in a large way of business, my
father was a coal-merchant who made a great fortune. His brother, my
uncle, in whom my father always believed implicitly, took to what is
called Finance, and when my father died he left me, his only child,
in his guardianship. Until I am five and twenty I cannot even marry or
touch a halfpenny without his consent; in fact if I should marry against
his will the most of my money goes to him."

"I expect that he has got it already," said Alan.

"No, I think not. I found out that, although it is not mine, it is not
his. He can't draw it without my signature, and I steadily refuse to
sign anything. Again and again they have brought me documents, and I
have always said that I would consider them at five and twenty, when
I came of age under my father's will. I went on the sly to a lawyer
in Kingswell and paid him a guinea for his advice, and he put me up to
that. 'Sign nothing,' he said, and I have signed nothing, so, except by
forgery nothing can have gone. Still for all that it may have gone.
For anything I know I am not worth more than the clothes I stand in,
although my father was a very rich man."

"If so, we are about in the same boat, Barbara," Alan answered with a
laugh, "for my present possessions are Yarleys, which brings in about
L100 a year less than the interest on its mortgages and cost of upkeep,
and the L1700 that Aylward paid me back on Friday for my shares. If I
had stuck to them I understand that in a week or two I should have been
worth L100,000, and now you see, here I am, over thirty years of age
without a profession, invalided out of the army and having failed in
finance, a mere bit of driftwood without hope and without a trade."

Barbara's brown eyes grew soft with sympathy, or was it tears?

"You are a curious creature, Alan," she said. "Why didn't you take the
L17,000 for that fetish of yours? It would have been a fair deal and
have set you on your legs."

"I don't know," he answered dejectedly. "It went against the grain, so
what is the use of talking about it? I think my old uncle Austin told
me it wasn't to be parted with--no, perhaps it was Jeekie. Bother the
Yellow God! it is always cropping up."

"Yes," replied Barbara, "the Yellow God is always cropping up,
especially in this neighbourhood."

They walked on a while in silence, till suddenly Barbara sat down upon a
bole of felled oak and began to cry.

"What is the matter with you?" asked Alan.

"I don't know," she answered. "Everything goes wrong. I live in a kind
of gilded hell. I don't like my uncle and I loath the men he brings
about the place. I have no friends, I scarcely know a woman intimately,
I have troubles I can't tell you and--I am wretched. You are the only
creature I have left to talk to, and I suppose that after this row you
must go away too to make your living."

Alan looked at her there weeping on the log and his heart swelled within
him, for he had loved this girl for years.

"Barbara," he gasped, "please don't cry, it upsets me. You know you are
a great heiress----"

"That remains to be proved," she answered. "But anyway, what has it to
do with the case?"

"It has everything to do with it, at least so far as I am concerned. If
it hadn't been for that I should have asked you to marry me a long
while ago, because I love you, as I would now, but of course it is
impossible."

Barbara ceased her weeping, wiped her eyes with the back of her hand,
and looked up at him.

"Alan," she said, "I think that you are the biggest fool I ever
knew--not but that a fool is rather refreshing when one lives among
knaves."

"I know I am a fool," he answered. "If I wasn't I should not have
mentioned my misfortune to you, but sometimes things are too much for
one. Forget it and forgive me."

"Oh! yes," she said; "I forgive you; a woman can generally forgive a
man for being fond of her. Whatever she may be, she is ready to take
a lenient view of his human weakness. But as to forgetting, that is
a different matter. I don't exactly see why I should be so anxious to
forget, who haven't many people to care about me," and she looked at him
in quite a new fashion, one indeed which gave him something of a shock,
for he had not thought the nymph-like Barbara capable of such a look as
that. She and any sort of passion had always seemed so far apart.

Now after all Alan was very much a man, if a modest one, with all a
man's instincts, and therefore there are appearances of the female face
which even such as he could not entirely misinterpret.

"You--don't--mean," he said doubtfully, "you don't really mean----" and
he stood hesitating before her.

"If you would put your question a little more clearly, Alan, I might be
able to give you an answer," she replied, that quaint little smile of
hers creeping to the corners of her mouth like sunshine through a mist
of rain.

"You don't really mean," he went on, "that you care anything about me,
like, like I have cared for you for years?"

"Oh! Alan," she said, laughing outright, "why in the name of goodness
shouldn't I care about you? I didn't say that I do, mind, but why
shouldn't I? What is the gulf between us?"

"The old one," he answered, "that between Dives and Lazarus--that
between the rich and the poor."

"Alan," said Barbara, looking down, "I don't know what has come over me,
but for some unexplained and inexplicable reason I am inclined to
give Lazarus a lead--across that gulf, the first one, I mean, not the
second!"

Like the glance which preceded it, this was a saying that even Alan
could not misunderstand. He sat himself on the log beside her, while
she, still looking down, watched him out of the corners of her eyes.
He went red, he went white, his heart beat very violently. Then he
stretched out his big brown hand and took her small white one, and as
this familiarity produced no remonstrance, let it fall, and passing his
arm about her, drew her to him and embraced her, not once, but
often, with such vigour that a squirrel which had been watching these
proceedings from a neighbouring tree, bolted round it scandalized and
was seen no more.

"I love you, I love you," he said huskily.

"So I gather," she answered in a feeble voice.

"Do you care for me?" he asked.

"It would seem that I must, Alan, otherwise I should scarcely--oh! you
foolish Alan," and heedless of her Sunday hat, which never recovered
from this encounter, but was kept as a holy relic, she let her head fall
upon his shoulder and began to cry again, this time for very happiness.

He kissed her tears away, then as he could think of nothing else to say,
asked her if she would marry him.

"It is the general sequel to this kind of thing, I believe," she
answered; "or at any rate it ought to be. But if you want a direct
answer--yes, I will, if my uncle will let me, which he won't, as you
have quarrelled with him, or at any rate two years hence, when I am five
and twenty and my own mistress; that is if we have anything to marry
on, for one must eat. At present our worldly possessions seem to consist
chiefly of a large store of mutual affection, a good stock of clothes
and one Yellow God, which after what happened last night, I do not think
you will get another chance of turning into cash."

"I must make money somehow," he said.

"Yes, Alan, but I am afraid it is not easy to do--honestly. Nobody
wants people without capital whose only stock in trade is a brief but
distinguished military career, and a large experience of African fever."

Alan groaned at this veracious but discouraging remark, and she went on
quickly:

"I mean to spend another guinea upon my friend the lawyer at Kingswell.
Perhaps he can raise the wind, by a post-obit, or something," she added
vaguely, "I mean a post-uncle-obit."

"If he does, Barbara, I can't live on your money alone, it isn't right."

"Oh! don't you trouble about that, Alan. If once I can get hold of those
dim thousands you will soon be able to make more, for unto him that hath
shall be given. But at present they are very dim, and for all I know may
be represented by stock in deceased companies. In short, the financial
position is extraordinarily depressed, as they say in the Market
Intelligence in _The Times_. But that's no reason why we should be
depressed also."

"No, Barbara, for at any rate we have got each other."

"Yes," she answered, springing up, "we have got each other, dear, until
Death do us part, and somehow I don't think he'll do that yet awhile;
it comes into my heart that he won't do that, Alan, that you and I are
going to live out our days. So what does the rest matter? In two years
I shall be a free woman. In fact, if the worst comes to the worst, I'll
defy them all," and she set her little mouth like a rock, "and marry you
straight away, as being over age, I can do, even if it costs me every
halfpenny that I've got."

"No, no," he said, "it would be wrong, wrong to yourself and wrong to
your descendants."

"Very well, Alan, then, we will wait, or perhaps luck will come our
way--why shouldn't it? At any rate for my part I never felt so happy in
my life; for, dear Alan, we have found what we were born to find, found
it once and for always, and the rest is mere etceteras. What would be
the use of all the gold of the Asiki people that Jeekie was talking
about last night, to either of us, if we had not each other? We can
get on without the wealth, but we couldn't get on apart, or at least I
couldn't and I don't mind saying so."

"No, my darling, no," he answered, turning white at the very thought,
"we couldn't get on apart--now. In fact I don't know how I have done so
so long already, except that I was always hoping that a time would
come when we shouldn't be apart. That is why I went into that infernal
business, to make enough money to be able to ask you to marry me.
And now I have gone out of the business and asked you just when I
shouldn't."

"Yes, so you see you might as well have done it a year or two ago when
perhaps things would have been simpler. Well, it is a fine example of
the vanity of human plans, and, Alan, we must be going home to lunch. If
we don't, Sir Robert will be organizing a search party to look for us;
in fact, I shouldn't wonder if he is doing that already, in the wrong
direction."

The mention of Sir Robert Aylward's name fell on them both like a blast
of cold wind in summer, and for a while they walked in silence.

"You are afraid of that man, Barbara," said Alan presently, guessing her
thoughts.

"A little," she answered, "so far as I can be afraid of anything any
more. And you?"

"A little also. I think that he will give us trouble. He can be very
malevolent and resourceful."

"Resourceful, Alan; well, so can I. I'll back my wits against his any
day. He shan't separate us by anything short of murder, which he won't
go in for. Men like that don't like to break the law; they have too much
to lose. But no doubt he will make things uncomfortable for you, if he
can, for several reasons."

Again they walked on lost in reflections, when Barbara suddenly saw her
lover's face brighten.

"What is it, Alan?" she asked.

"Something that is rare enough with me, Barbara--an idea. You remember
speaking about that Asiki gold just now. Well, why shouldn't I go and
get it?"

She stared at him.

"It sounds a little speculative," she said; "something like one of my
uncle's companies."

"Not half so speculative as you think. I have no doubt it is there and
Jeekie knows the way. Also I seem to remember that there is a map and an
account of the whole thing in Uncle Austin's diaries, though to tell you
the truth the old fellow wrote such a fearful hand, that I have never
taken the trouble to read it. You see," he went on with enthusiasm, "it
is the kind of business that I can do. I am thoroughly salted to fever,
I know the West Coast, where I spent three years on that Boundary
Commission, I have studied the natives and can talk several of their
dialects. Of course there would be a risk, but there are risks in
everything, and like you I am not afraid about that, for I believe that
we have got our lives before us."

"Read up those diaries, Alan, and we will talk the thing over again.
I'll pump Jeekie, who will tell me anything by coaxing, and try to get
at the truth. Meanwhile what are you going to do about my uncle?"

"Speak to him, of course, and have the row over."

"Yes," she answered, "that is the best and the most honest. Of course
he can turn you out, but he can't prevent my seeing you. If he does, go
home to Yarleys and I'll come over and call. Here we are, let us go in
by the back door," and she pointed to her crushed hat, and laughed.



CHAPTER V

BARBARA MAKES A SPEECH

While Alan and Barbara, on the most momentous occasion of their lives,
were seated upon the fallen oak in the woods that thrilled with
the breath of spring, another interview was taking place in Mr.
Champers-Haswell's private suite at The Court, the decorations of
which, as he was wont to inform his visitors, had cost nearly L2000. Sir
Robert, whose taste at any rate was good, thought them so appalling that
while waiting for his host and partner, whom he had come to see, he took
a seat in the bow window of the sitting-room and studied the view that
nobody had been able to spoil. Presently Mr. Haswell emerged from his
bedroom, wrapped in a dressing gown and looking very pale and shaky.

"Delighted to see you all right again," said Sir Robert as he wheeled up
a chair into which Mr. Haswell sank.

"I am not all right, Aylward," he answered; "I am not all right at all.
Never had such an upset in my life; thought I was going to die when that
accursed savage told his beastly tale. Aylward, you are a man of the
world, tell me, what is the meaning of the thing? You remember what we
thought we saw in the office, and then--that story."

"I don't know," he answered; "frankly I don't know. I am a man who has
never believed in anything I cannot see and test, one who utterly lacks
faith. In my leisure I have examined into the various religious
systems and found them to be rubbish. I am convinced that we are but
highly-developed mammals born by chance, and when our day is done,
departing into the black nothingness out of which we came. Everything
else, that is, what is called the higher and spiritual part, I attribute
to the superstitions incident to the terror of the hideous position in
which we find ourselves, that of gods of a sort hemmed in by a few years
of fearful and tormented life. But you know the old arguments, so why
should I enter on them? And now I am confronted with an experience
which I cannot explain. I certainly thought that in the office on Friday
evening I saw that gold mask to which I had taken so strange a fancy
that I offered to give Vernon L17,000 for it because I thought that it
brought us luck, swim across the floor of our room and look first into
your face and then into mine. Well, the next night that negro tells his
story. What am I to make of it?"

"Can't tell you," answered Mr. Champers-Haswell with a groan. "All I
know is that it nearly made a corpse of me. I am not like you, Aylward,
I was brought up as an Evangelical, and although I haven't given much
thought to these matters of late years--well, we don't shake them off in
a hurry. I daresay there is something somewhere, and when the black
man was speaking, that something seemed uncommonly near. It got up and
gripped me by the throat, shaking the mortal breath out of me, and upon
my word, Aylward, I have been wishing all the morning that I had led a
different kind of life, as my old parents and my brother John, Barbara's
father, who was a very religious kind of man, did before me."

"It is rather late to think of all that now, Haswell," said Sir Robert,
shrugging his shoulders. "One takes one's line and there's an end.
Personally I believe that we are overstrained with the fearful and
anxious work of this flotation, and have been the victims of an
hallucination and a coincidence. Although I confess that I came to look
upon the thing as a kind of mascot, I put no trust in any fetish. How
can a bit of gold move, and how can it know the future? Well, I have
written to them to clear it out of the office to-morrow, so it won't
trouble us any more. And now I have come to speak to you on another
matter."

"Not business," said Mr. Haswell with a sigh. "We have that all the week
and there will be enough of it on Monday."

"No," he answered, "something more important. About your niece Barbara."

Mr. Haswell glanced at him with those little eyes of his which were so
sharp that they seemed to bore like gimlets.

"Barbara?" he said. "What of Barbara?"

"Can't you guess, Haswell? You are pretty good at it, generally. Well,
it is no use beating about the bush; I want to marry her."

At this sudden announcement his partner became exceedingly interested.
Leaning back in the chair he stared at the decorated ceiling, and
uttered his favourite wind-in-the-wires whistle.

"Indeed," he said. "I never knew that matrimony was in your line,
Aylward, any more than it has been in mine, especially as you are always
preaching against it. Well, has the young lady given her consent?"

"No, I have not spoken to her. I meant to do so this morning, but she
has slipped off somewhere, with Vernon, I suppose."

Mr. Haswell whistled again, but on a new note.

"Pray do stop that noise," said Sir Robert; "it gets upon my nerves,
which are shaky this morning. Listen: It is a curious thing, one less
to be understood even than the coincidence of the Yellow God, but at
my present age of forty-four, for the first time in my life I have
committed the folly of what is called falling in love. It is not the
case of a successful, middle-aged man wishing to _ranger_ himself and
settle down with a desirable _partie_, but of sheer, stark infatuation.
I adore Barbara; the worse she treats me the more I adore her. I had
rather that the Sahara flotation should fail than that she should refuse
me. I would rather lose three-quarters of my fortune than lose her. Do
you understand?"

His partner looked at him, pursed up his lips to whistle, then
remembered and shook his head instead.

"No," he answered. "Barbara is a nice girl, but I should not have
imagined her capable of inspiring such sentiments in a man almost old
enough to be her father. I think that you are the victim of a kind of
mania, which I have heard of but never experienced. Venus--or is it
Cupid?--has netted you, my dear Aylward."

"Oh! pray leave gods and goddesses out of it, we have had enough of them
already," he answered, exasperated. "That is my case at any rate, and
what I want to know now is if I have your support in my suit. Remember,
I have something to offer, Haswell, for instance, a large fortune of
which I will settle half--it is a good thing to do in our business,--and
a baronetcy that will be a peerage before long."

"A peerage! Have you squared that?"

"I think so. There will be a General Election within the next three
months, and on such occasions a couple of hundred thousand in cool cash
come in useful to a Party that is short of ready money. I think I may
say that it is settled. She will be the Lady Aylward, or any other name
she may fancy, and one of the richest women in England. Now have I your
support?"

"Yes, my dear friend, why not, though Barbara does not want money, for
she has plenty of her own, in first-class securities that I could never
persuade her to vary, for she is shrewd in that way and steadily refuses
to sign anything. Also she will probably be my heiress--and, Aylward,"
here a sickly look of alarm spread itself over his face, "I don't know
how long I have to live. That infernal doctor examined my heart this
morning and told me that it was weak. Weak was his word, but from the
tone in which he said it, I believe that he meant more. Aylward, I
gather that I may die any day."

"Nonsense, Haswell, so may we all," he replied, with an affectation of
cheerfulness which failed to carry conviction.

Presently Mr. Haswell, who had hidden his face in his hand, looked up
with a sigh and said:

"Oh! yes, of course you have my support, for after all she is my only
relation and I should be glad to see her safely married. Also, as it
happens, she can't marry anyone without my consent, at any rate until
she is five and twenty, for if she does, under her father's will all her
property goes away, most of it to charities, except a beggarly L200 a
year. You see my brother John had a great horror of imprudent marriages
and a still greater belief in me, which as it chances, is a good thing
for you."

"Had he?" said Sir Robert. "And pray why is it a good thing for me?"

"Because, my dear Aylward, unless my observation is at fault, there is
another Richard in the field, our late partner, Vernon, of whom, by
the way, Barbara is extremely fond, though it may only be in a friendly
fashion. At any rate she pays more attention to his wishes and opinions
than to mine and yours put together."

At the mention of Alan's name Aylward started violently.

"I feared it," he said, "and he is more than ten years my junior and
a soldier, not a man of business. Also there is no use disguising the
truth, although I am a baronet and shall be a peer and he is nothing
but a beggarly country gentleman with a D.S.O. tacked on to his name,
he belongs to a different class to us, as she does too on her mother's
side. Well, I can smash him up, for you remember I took over that
mortgage on Yarleys, and I'll do it if necessary. Practically our friend
has not a shilling that he can call his own. Therefore, Haswell, unless
you play me false, which I don't think you will, for I can be a nasty
enemy," he added with a threat in his voice, "Alan Vernon hasn't much
chance in that direction."

"I don't know, Aylward, I don't know," replied Haswell, shaking his
white head. "Barbara is a strong-willed woman and she might choose to
take the man and let the money go, and then--who can stop her? Also I
don't like your idea of smashing Vernon. It isn't right, and it may come
back on our own heads, especially yours. I am sorry that he has left us,
as you were on Friday night, for somehow he was a good, honest stick to
lean on, and we want such a stick. But I am tired now, I really can't
talk any more. The doctor warned me against excitement. Get the girl's
consent, Aylward, and we'll see. Ah! here comes my soup. Good-bye for
the present."

When Sir Robert came down to luncheon he found Barbara looking
particularly radiant and charming, already presiding at that meal and
conversing in her best French to the foreign gentlemen, who were paying
her compliments.

"Forgive me for being late," he said; "first of all I have been
talking to your uncle, and afterwards skimming through the articles in
yesterday's papers on our little venture which comes out to-morrow. A
cheerful occupation on the whole, for with one or two exceptions they
are all favourable."

"Mon Dieu," said the French gentlemen on the right, "seeing what
they did cost, that is not strange. Your English papers they are so
expensive; in Paris we have done it for half the money."

Barbara and some of the guests laughed outright, finding this frankness
charming.

"But where have you been, Miss Champers? I thought that we were going to
have a round of golf together. The caddies were there, I was there, the
greens had been specially rolled this morning, but there was no You."

"No," she answered, "because Major Vernon and I walked to church and
heard a very good sermon upon the observance of the Sabbath."

"You are severe," he said. "Do you think it wrong for men who work hard
all the week to play a harmless game on Sunday?"

"Not at all, Sir Robert." Then she looked at him and, coming to a sudden
decision, added, "If you like I will play you nine holes this afternoon
and give you a stroke a hole, or would you prefer a foursome?"

"No, let us fight alone and let the best player win."

"Very well, Sir Robert; but you mustn't forget that I am handicapped."

"Don't look angry," she whispered to Alan as they strolled out into the
garden after lunch, "I must clear things up and know what we have to
face. I'll be back by tea-time, and we will have it out with my uncle."



The nine holes had been played, and by a single stroke Barbara had won
the match, which pleased her very much, for she had done her best, and
with such heavy odds in his favour Sir Robert, who had also done his
best, was no mean opponent, even for a player of her skill. Indeed the
fight had been quite earnest, for each party knew that it was but a
prelude to another and more serious fight, and looked upon the result as
in some sense an omen.

"I am conquered," he said in a voice in which vexation struggled with a
laugh, "and by a woman over whom I had an advantage. It is humiliating,
for I confess I do not like being beaten."

"Don't you think that women generally win if they mean to?" asked
Barbara. "I believe that when they fail, which is often enough, it
is because they don't care, or can't make up their minds. A woman in
earnest is a dangerous antagonist."

"Yes," he answered, "or the best of allies." Then he gave the clubs and
half-a-crown to the caddies, and when they were out of hearing, added,
"Miss Champers, I have been wondering for some time whether it is
possible that you would become such an ally to me."

"I know nothing of business, Sir Robert; my tastes do not lie that way."

"You know well that I was not speaking of business, Miss Champers. I was
speaking of another kind of partnership, that which Nature has ordained
between men and women--marriage. Will you accept me as a husband?"

She opened her lips to speak, but he lifted his hand and went on.
"Listen before you give that ready answer which it is so hard to recall,
or smooth away. I know all my disadvantages, my years, which to you may
seem many; my modest origin; my trade, which, not altogether without
reason, you despise and dislike. Well, the first two cannot be changed
except for the worse; the second can be, and already is, buried beneath
the gold and ermine of wealth and titles. What does it matter if I am
the son of a City clerk who never earned more than L2 a week and was
born in a tenement at Battersea, when I am one of the rich men of this
rich land and shall die a peer in a palace, leaving millions and honours
to my children? As for the third, my occupation, I am prepared to give
it up. It has served my turn, and after next week I shall have earned
the amount that years ago I determined to earn. Thenceforth, set above
the accidents of fortune, I propose to devote myself to higher aims,
those of legitimate ambition. So far as my time would allow I have
already taken some share in politics as a worker; I intend to continue
in them as a ruler which I still have the health and ability to do. I
mean to be one of the first men in this Empire, to ride to power over
the heads of all the nonentities whose only claim upon the confidence of
their countrymen is that they were born in a certain class, with money
in their pockets and without the need to spend the best of their manhood
in work. With you at my side I can do all these things and more, and
such is the future that I have to offer you."

Again she would have broken in upon his speech and again he stopped her,
reading the unspoken answer on her lips.

"Listen: I have not told you all. Perhaps I have put first what should
have come last. I have not told you that I love you earnestly and
sincerely, with the settled, unalterable love that sometimes comes to
men in middle-age who have never turned their thought that way before.
I will not attempt the rhapsodies of passion which at my time of life
might sound foolish or out of place; yet it is true that I am filled
with this passion which has descended on me and taken possession of me.
I who often have laughed at such things in other men, adore you. You
are a joy to my eyes. If you are not in the room, for me it is empty. I
admire the uprightness of your character, and even your prejudices, and
to your standard I desire to approximate my own. I think that no man can
ever love you quite so well as I do, Barbara Champers. Now speak. I am
ready to meet the best or the worst."

After her fashion Barbara looked him straight in the face with her
steady eyes, and answered gently enough, for the man's method of
presenting his case, elaborate and prepared though it evidently was, had
touched her.

"I fear it is the worst, Sir Robert. There are hundreds of women
superior to myself in every way who would be glad to give you the help
and companionship you ask, with their hearts thrown in. Choose one of
them, for I cannot do so."

He heard and for the first time his face broke, as it were. All this
while it had remained masklike and immovable, even when he spoke of his
love, but now it broke as ice breaks at the pressure of a sudden flood
beneath, and she saw the depths and eddies of his nature and understood
their strength. Not that he revealed them in speech, angry or pleading,
for that remained calm and measured enough. She did not hear, she saw,
and even then it was marvellous to her that a mere change in a man's
expression could explain so much.

"Those are very cruel words," he said. "Are they unalterable?"

"Quite. I do not play in such matters, it would be wicked."

"May I ask you one question, for if the answer is in the negative, I
shall still continue to hope? Do you care for any other man?"

Again she looked at him with her fearless eyes and answered:

"Yes, I am engaged to another man."

"To Alan Vernon?"

She nodded.

"When did that happen? Some years ago?"

"No, this morning."

"Great Heavens!" he muttered in a hoarse voice turning his head away,
"this morning. Then last night it might not have been too late, and last
night I should have spoken to you, I had arranged it all. Yes, if it had
not been for the story of that accursed fetish and your uncle's illness,
I should have spoken to you, and perhaps succeeded."

"I think not," she said.

He turned upon her and notwithstanding the tears in his eyes they burned
like fire.

"You think--you think," he gasped, "but I know. Of course after this
morning it was impossible. But, Barbara, I say that I will win you yet.
I have never failed in any object that I set before myself, and do
not suppo