"Everyone to his taste," remarked Green. "But I'd rather be anything under the sun than Mrs. Fielding's paid companion." He glanced at Juliet with a smile as he spoke, but there was a certain earnestness in his speech that told her he meant what he said. He sat with his back to a rock, smoking a cigarette. His attitude was one of repose, but in the strong light his dark face showed a tenseness that did not wholly agree with it.

"Do you really think you'll like it?" he asked, as Juliet did not speak.

She also had a cigarette between her lips, and there was genuine relaxation in her fashion of lounging on the shingle.

"I really don't know," she said. "I've got to find out."

"Don't let them bully you!" said Green.

She smiled. "No, they won't do that. I think it is rather kind of them to take me without references, don't you?"

"No," said Green.

She turned and surveyed him with a gleam of amusement in her look. "You sound cross! Are you cross about anything?"

His eyes flashed down to hers with a suddenness almost startling. He did not speak for a moment, then again he smiled abruptly with his eyes still holding hers. "I believe I am," he said.

"I wonder why," said Juliet.

He laughed. "Yes, you do, don't you? Great impertinence on my part of course. It's nice of you to put it so mildly."

"I don't think you impertinent," said Juliet; "only rather silly."

"Oh, thanks!" said Green. "Kinder and kinder. Silly to be cross on your account, is that it? Well, it certainly sounds silly."

Juliet smiled. "No, silly to think I am not capable of taking care of myself."

"Oh!" said Green. "Well, I have some reason for thinking that, haven't I?"

"None whatever," said Juliet.

"All right. I haven't," he said, and looked away.

"You are cross!" ejaculated Juliet, and broke into a laugh.

Green smoked steadily for some seconds with his eyes upon the sea. A few yards below them Robin wandered bare-footed along the shore, accompanied by Columbus who had bestowed a condescending species of friendship upon him.

Green's dark, alert face looked strangely swarthy against the rock behind him. His expression was one of open discontent.

"I hate to think of you turning into that woman's slave," he said abruptly. "To be quite honest, that was what brought me along to-day, intruding upon your picnic with Robin. I want to warn you, I've got to warn you."

"You have warned me," said Juliet.

"Without result," he said.

"No, not without result. I am very grateful to you, and I shall remember your warning."

"But you won't profit by it," Green's voice was moody.

"I think I shall," she said. "In any case, I am only going for a week on trial. That couldn't hurt anyone."

He did not look at her. "You're going out of the goodness of your heart," he said. "And—though you won't like it—you'll stay for the same reason."

"Oh, don't you think you are rather absurd?" said Juliet. "I am not at all that sort of person, I assure you."

"I think you are," said Green.

She laughed again. "Well I am told you are quite a frequent visitor there. Why do you go—if you don't like it?"

"That is different," he said. "I can hold my own—anyway with Mr.
Fielding."

She lifted her brows. "And you think I can't?"

"I think you'll lead a dog's life," he said.

"Oh, I hope not. It won't be on a chain anyhow. I've provided against that."

"You'll hate it," Green said with conviction.

"I don't think I shall," she answered quietly. "If I do, I shall come away."

"It'll be too late then," he said.

"Too late!" Juliet's soft eyes opened wide. "What can you mean?"

He made a gesture which though half-restrained was yet vehement "It's a hostile atmosphere—a hateful atmosphere. She will poison you with her sneers and snobbery!"

A light began to break upon Juliet. She sat up very suddenly. "That sort of poison doesn't have any effect upon me," she said, and she spoke with a stateliness that brought the man's eyes swiftly down to her. "I am—sneer-proof."

"She won't sneer at you," said Green quickly.

With her eyes looking straight up to him, she laughed.

"Oh, I quite catch your meaning, Mr. Green. But—really I am not in the position of listening to sneers against my friends. Now will you be satisfied?"

He laughed also though still with a touch of restraint. "Yes, I feel better for that. You are so royal in your ways. I might have known I was safe there."

"'Loyal' is a better word I think," said Juliet quietly. "Why should a paid companion aspire to be any higher in the social scale than a village schoolmaster? Do you think occupation really makes any difference?"

"Theoretically—no!" said Green.

"Neither theoretically nor practically," said Juliet. "I detest snobbery, so do you. If you came to the Court to sweep the kitchen chimney, I should be just as pleased to see you. What a man does is nothing. How could it make any difference?"

"It couldn't—to you," said Green.

"Or to you?" said Juliet.

He laughed a little, his black brows working comically. "Madame, if I met you hawking stale fish for cat's meat in the public street, I couldn't venerate you more or adore you less. Whatever you do—is right."

"Good heavens!" said Juliet, and flushed in spite of herself. "What a magnificent compliment! It's a pity you are not wearing a slouch hat with an ostrich plume! You really need a plume to express that sort of sentiment properly."

"Yes, I know," said Green. "But—I imagine you are not attracted by plumes. In fact, you have just told me so. Proof positive of your royalty! It is only crowned heads that can afford to despise them nowadays."

"Mine isn't a crowned head," protested Juliet.

He looked at her searchingly. "Have you never been to Court?"

She snapped her fingers airily. "Of course! Dozens of times! Poor companions always go to Court. How often do you go!"

"As often as you admit me to your most gracious presence," he said.

She clapped her hands softly. "Why, that is even prettier than the stale fish one! Mr. Green, what can have happened to you?"

"I daren't tell you," he said.

A sudden silence fell upon the words. Juliet puffed the smoke from her cigarette, and watched it rise. "Well, don't spoil it, will you?" she said, as it vanished into air.

Green's hand suddenly gripped a handful of shingle and ground it forcibly. He did not speak for a second or two. Then: "No, I won't spoil it," he said, in a low voice.

A moment later he flung the stones abruptly from him and got up.

"You're not going?" said Juliet.

"Yes, I've got work to do. Shall I take Robin with me?"

There was a dogged note in his voice. His eyes avoided hers.

Juliet rose slowly. "Never mind Robin! Walk a little way with me!" she said.

"I think I'd better go," said Green restlessly.

"Please!" said Juliet gently.

He turned beside her without a word. They went down the shingle to the edge of the sand and began to walk along the shore.

For many seconds they walked in silence. Juliet's eyes were fixed upon the mighty outline of High Shale Point that stood out like a fortress, dark, impregnable, against the calm of the evening sky. Her companion sauntered beside her, his hands behind him. He had thrown away his cigarette.

She spoke at length, slowly, with evident effort. "I want to tell you—something—about myself."

"Something I really don't know?" asked Green, his dark face flashing to a smile.

There was no answering smile on Juliet's face. "Yes, something you don't know," she said soberly. "It's just this. I have much more in common with Mrs. Fielding than you have any idea of. I have lived for pleasure practically all my life. I have scrambled for happiness with the rest of the world, and I haven't found it. It's only just lately that I've realized why. I read a book called The Valley of Dry Bones. Do you know it? But of course you do. It is by Dene Strange. I hate the man—if it is a man. And I hate his work—the bitter cynicism of it, the merciless exposure of humanity at its lowest and meanest. I don't know what his ideals are—if he has any. I think he is probably very wicked, but detestably—oh, damnably—clever. I burnt the book I hated it so. But I felt—afterwards—as if I had been burnt, seared by hot irons—ashamed—most cruelly ashamed." Juliet's voice sank almost to a whisper. "Because—life really is like that—one vast structure of selfishness—and in many ways I have helped to make it so."

She stopped. Green was looking at her attentively. He spoke at once with decision. "I know the book. I've read it. It's an exaggeration—probably intentional. It wasn't written—obviously—for the super-sensitive."

"Wasn't it?" Juliet's lips were quivering. "Well, it's been a positive nightmare to me. I haven't got over it yet."

"That's curious," he said. "I shouldn't have thought it could have touched you anywhere."

"That is because you have a totally wrong impression of me," she said. "That is what I am trying to put right. I am the sort of person that horrible book applies to, and I've fallen out with myself very badly in consequence, Mr. Green. I haven't told anyone but you, but—somehow—I feel as if you ought to know."

"Thank you," said Green. "But why?"

She met his eyes very steadily. "Because I'm trying to play the game now, and—I don't want you to have any illusions."

"You don't want me to make a fool of myself," he said. "Is that it?"

She coloured very vividly, but she did not avoid his look. "I don't think there is much danger of that, is there?" she said.

He stood still suddenly and faced her. His eyes burned with an amazing brightness. "I don't know," he said, speaking emphatically and very rapidly. "It depends of course upon the point of view. But I'll tell you this. I'd give all I've got—and all I'm ever likely to get—to prevent you going to Shale Court as a companion."

"Oh, but aren't you unreasonable?" Juliet said.

"No, I'm not." He made a vigorous gesture of repudiation. "Presumptuous perhaps—but not unreasonable. I know too much of what goes on there. Miss Moore, I beseech you—think again! Don't go!"

She looked at him in perplexity. "But it wouldn't be fair to draw back now," she objected. "Besides—"

"Besides," he broke in almost fiercely, "you've got your living to make like the rest of us. Yes, I know—I know! You regard this as a Heaven-sent opportunity. It isn't. It's quite the reverse. If you were unhappy in London, you'll be a thousand times more so there. And—and I shan't be able to help you—shan't get anywhere near you there."

"It's very kind of you," began Juliet.

He cut her short again. "No, it isn't kind. You're the only woman of your station I have ever met who has deigned to treat me as an equal. It—it's a bit rash on your part, you know." He smiled at her abruptly, and something sent a queer sensation through her—a curious feeling of familiarity that held and yet eluded her. "And—as you see—I'm taking full advantage of it. I hope you won't think me an awful cad after this. I can't help it if you do. Miss Moore, forgive my asking,—are you really obliged to work for your living? Can't you—can't you wait a little?"

Juliet was looking at him with wonder in her soft eyes. His sudden vehemence was rather bewildering.

"I don't quite know," she said vaguely. "But I rather want to do something, you know."

"Oh, I know—I know," he said. "But you're not obliged to do this. Something else is bound to turn up. Or if it doesn't—if it doesn't—" He ground his heel deep into the yielding sand, and ended in a husky undertone. "My God! What wouldn't I give for the privilege of working for you?"

The words were uttered and beyond recall. He looked her straight in the face as he spoke them, but an instant later he turned and stared out over the wide, calm sea in a stillness that was somehow more forcible even than his low, half-strangled speech had been.

Juliet stood silent also, almost as if she were waiting for him to recover his balance. Her eyes also were gazing straight before her to that far mysterious sky-line. They were very grave and rather sad.

He broke the silence after many seconds. "You will never speak to me again after this."

"I hope I shall," she said gently.

He wheeled and faced her. "You're not angry then?"

She shook her head. "No."

His eyes flashed over her with amazing swiftness. "I almost wish you were," he said.

"But why?" she said.

"Because I should know then it mattered a little. Now I know it doesn't. I am just one of the many. Isn't that it? There are so many of us that one more or less doesn't count either way." He laughed ruefully. "Well, I won't repeat the offence. Even your patience must have its limits. Shall we go back?"

It was then that Juliet turned, moved by an impulse so strangely urgent that she could not pause to analyse it. She held out her hand to him, quickly, shyly, and as he gripped and held it, she spoke, her voice tremulous, breathless, barely coherent.

"I am not—offended. I am—very—very—deeply—honoured. Only you—you—don't understand."

He kept her hand closely in his own. His grasp vibrated with electric force, but he had himself in check. "You are more generous than I deserve," he said, his voice sunk to a whisper. "Perhaps—some day—understanding will come. May I hope for that?"

She did not answer him, but for one intimate second her eyes looked straight into his. Then with a little, sobbing breath she slipped her hand free.

"We—are forgetting Robin," she said, with an effort.

He turned at once. "By George, yes! I'm afraid I had forgotten him," he said.

They walked back along the shore side by side.