"I dare not swerve
From my soul's rights; a slave, though serving thee.
I but forbear more nobly to deserve;
The free gift only cometh of the free."
—O. Meredith.

"Well, old chap?"

Lenox tried to speak carelessly; to evade the inevitable; for he was sore, with the twofold soreness of insomnia and thwarted passion; and when all a man's nerves are laid bare, he naturally dreads a touch in the wrong place:—hence irascibility. To any one else he would have presented an impenetrable curtain of reserve, of ironical refusal to admit that anything was wrong. But Desmond had the man's tenderness, which is sometimes greater than the woman's: and, as Quita had once said, he was privileged, simply by being what he was.

Having set glasses and spirit-decanter within reach of their two chairs, he came over to Lenox, and set both hands on his shoulders.

"My dear fellow, it's no use shirking facts," he said straightly. "You're only flesh and blood; and the strain of all this is just knocking you to pieces again. No reflection on your wife. You know what I mean?"

"Yes. I know very well what you mean." Lenox spoke with repressed bitterness. "I once heard hell defined as disqualification in the face of opportunity."

Desmond turned back to the table, and helped himself to a fresh cigar. "Are you so dead certain about the disqualification?" he asked without looking up: and he heard Lenox grind his teeth.

"Oh Lord, man, if you're going on that tack, I'm off."

"Indeed you're not. There's a deal more to be said. As far as I understand matters, I imagine that your wife's coming here makes a decided difference in regard to—ultimate possibilities?"

"Yes; that's just it. She has cut away the ground from under my feet on all sides." He was thinking of his promise that afternoon, and his voice lost its schooled hardness. "She's set on going through with things, at any price. But then . . she doesn't realise . . ."

"Believe me, it wouldn't make the smallest difference if she did. Women are made that way, to our eternal good fortune. Their capacity for loving us in spite of what we are is a thing to go down on one's knees for. You'll appreciate it, one of these days, if you haven't done so already."

"Appreciate it? Great Scott, Desmond, haven't I ten times more cause to do so than you can ever have had? But that doesn't wipe out facts or principles."

He left the hearth-rug, and paced the room in restless agitation. Desmond sat down, lit his cigar, and waited. His own suggestion could best be made if Lenox could be induced to unburden himself a little first. Presently he sat on the edge of the writing-table, well out of range of the lamp; stretched out his long legs, and folded his arms.

"By rights, I suppose I ought to have let her go back to Dalhousie at once. She suggested it herself. But it seemed too brutal; and I wasn't up to the wrench of letting her go just then. Besides, there was your wife's illness. It would have been out of the question. And now I'm in a bigger hole than before. We are living at cross purposes. She sees I'm holding back; and she's puzzled, and unhappy. But how the deuce is a man to tell her plainly that by an act of pure pluck and devotion, at the wrong moment, she has practically pushed me deeper into the pit than I've been yet? In fact, I'm beginning to be afraid that . . . the damage may be permanent."

Desmond stifled an exclamation of dismay.

"I wonder if you could bring yourself to tell me exactly what you mean by that?" he said quietly. "Perhaps I have no business to ask; but unless one goes to the root of a thing it's useless to talk of it at all."

"I know that. If I hadn't meant to tell you, I shouldn't be in here now. The fact is . . it's gone a good bit beyond tobacco this last fortnight." He hesitated; but Desmond made no sign. "Did you never miss that bottle of chlorodyne you brought me the day I was bowled over?"

This time Desmond started.

"Good heavens, yes! I had to get a fresh one . . for Honor. But it never occurred to me . . ."

"It wouldn't. You're not the sort. I emptied it, though, in no time. But it's poor stuff. It didn't half work. Then, one night—I was mad with pain, and want of sleep—I got hold of the raw drug, in pellets—from the bazaar." He shivered at the recollection: "I tell you, Desmond, it's appalling to feel the foundations of things giving way. But I've taken it ever since, . . pain or no.—Now do you doubt the disqualification I spoke of? Personally I don't feel fit to touch her hand."

The bitterness of conviction in his tone made Desmond lean forward to get a better sight of him.

"Lenox, old man," he said, almost tenderly, "such exaggerated notions are all a part of your unsettled nerves.—Smash up your devil's box of pills; or . . hand it over to me . . if you will . . . ?"

Lenox hesitated; but his face gave no sign of the short sharp struggle within. "You shall have the thing, if you wish it," he said at length. "It gives me no pleasure to make a beast of myself. But that doesn't touch the heart of the difficulty. So long as she's here, I haven't a chance. If I give up the stuff, I shall go to pieces with headache and insomnia. That's flat."

"Indeed I think you're mistaken," Desmond spoke with deliberate lightness. "At all events, I have a suggestion to make that may help you . . for the moment. I have quite decided that Honor must leave this, directly she is strong enough to stand the short journey to Sheik Budeen; probably in three or four days; and after a week or two there, she must go on to Dalhousie till September. Can you see a chink of daylight now?"

"Why, naturally. You want Quita to go up with her? A capital notion!"

His eagerness was an unconscious revelation of all that he had endured.

"Yes. I want you to tell her, from me, that she would be doing us both a very real kindness. Honor would break her poor heart alone at Sheik Budeen; and if you put it to Quita that way, I don't think she will take your suggestion amiss."

"I'm positive she won't. I'll speak to her to-morrow."

He got up; squared his shoulders, with a great sigh of relief; helped himself to whisky-and-soda; and emptied half the tumbler at a draught.

"By Jove, Desmond, you've put fresh spirit into me. This will give me a chance to fight the thing squarely; and I hope to God I may succeed,—even yet."

"Of course you'll succeed. We may take that for granted," Desmond answered, smiling. "You've won the great talisman that puts failure out of the question. As soon as we are officially through with the cholera, you should take sick leave, and go off into the hills. You'll not fight to any purpose, till you're in sound health again."

"How about Dick, though? It's his turn for leave."

"He'll survive missing it. He's in splendid condition; and this is a life-and-death matter for you. Besides, Courtenay will never let you start duty till you've been away. 'Dick' can take fifteen days when you get back."

"Poor chap! But I'm afraid that's the only programme possible."

He sat down at last; and for a time they smoked contentedly; then Lenox drew a letter from his breast-pocket.

"From Sir Henry Forsyth at Simla," he explained, "about my chances up Gilgit way. If we decide on re-establishing the Agency there, he evidently counts on sending me up again, with young Travers as my Assistant. He and I have done some decent work together in that part of the world. Nothing I should like better, of course. But . . in the face of recent developments, I swear I don't know how to answer him."

He handed the letter to Desmond, who read it and looked thoughtful

"If you get this chance, I think you must take it," he said. "With your special knowledge, you'd be the right man in the right place, up there: and apart from your own ambition, you owe something to India, after what you've done already."

Lenox sighed.

"I owe something to my wife also. You'd be the last to deny that.—Jove, it's amazing what a fine crop of complications will grow out of one false step. A little want of frankness on her part; a little over-hastiness on mine; . . and see where we've travelled in consequence. All my work in the past five years has been tending towards something of this kind. But it would never do . . for Quita. Think what a life for a woman, even if one could hope to have her there in time. Shut up in the heart of the hills, with half a dozen Englishmen, and a husband who might end in going to the devil. Not another woman nearer than Srinagar; and communication with India cut off for six months in the year. No. One would never get permission. It would simply wrench us apart again.—There seems to be a Fate against this marriage of mine every way. My fault, no doubt. Perhaps as a soldier with a taste for exploration, I was a fool to go in for it at all."

Desmond leaned forward, and flicked the ash from his cigar.

"Nonsense, man," he said emphatically. "You're talking heresy and schism! Soldier or no soldier, I believe in marriage. Always have done. With all its difficulties, it's an incomparable bond; as you'll find out, once you two are on the right footing. But you're hardly fit enough yet to see things in their true perspective. All this Gilgit business is still a good way ahead; and I can only say that if it does come to spending a good part of your service up in the wilds, you could not have chosen a woman more fitted for it than Quita. The better one knows her, the more one admires her . ."

The other's face softened.

"She's as straight and as plucky as a man," he said simply. "And whenever comes of it, I'm a lucky devil to be her husband.—Think I'll turn in now, and try for a little sleep. I never meant to inflict my affairs on you like this. But you bring it on yourself, Desmond, by being so confoundedly sympathetic!"

Before the two men parted, the box of opium pills had changed hands: and Lenox, by way of trying for a little sleep, lit a fresh cigar,—he was beginning to tolerate them now,—and went out into the garden.

Its open spaces were saturated with moonlight; while trees and bushes, solitary or huddled together, stood in black pools of shadow, and fragments of curded cloud trailed across the sky. Absorbed in thought, Lenox crossed a stretch of lawn set with rose-beds; and turning at the far end strolled back towards the house, that loomed, an unwieldy mass of shadow, against the palpitating radiance beyond.

The light in his own room showed through the split bamboo of the 'chick' in hair-line streaks of brightness; but from the door next his own it issued in a wide stream that lost itself in the moon-splashed verandah. Quita had rolled up her 'chick,' and stood leaning against the doorpost in an attitude that suggested weariness, or despondency, or both; the tall slender form of her thrown into strong relief by the light within. He knew that she must have seen him; and his hope was that she would come out and say good-night to him. Since he must speak, it would be a relief to speak at once, and get it over. It might even be possible to sleep, if matters could be definitely settled between them without further discord; otherwise, bereft of the opium, his chances were small indeed.

But though he drew steadily nearer, she remained motionless; to all appearance unaware of his presence. But the mere craving to touch her, to hear her voice, grew stronger every minute; and he was not to be thwarted thus. At the verandah's edge he paused.

"Quita," he said, scarcely above his breath.

"Yes."

"Have you forgiven me?"

"No. Not quite."

"But I want you."

"Come to me, then." A slight movement suggested a defiant tilt of her chin.

The verandah itself stood more than two feet above the ground; but instead of going round by the steps, he sprang up on it, flung away his cigar, and stood before her with proffered hands.

She surrendered her own.

"Now?" he asked, smiling.

"No, no."

He stooped and kissed her hair.

"Now, perhaps?"

"Yes, . . almost. Though I'm not sure that you deserve it."

"I don't," he answered humbly, taking the wind out of her sails.

Then objects in the room behind her caught his attention:—her dressing-table, with its silver-backed brushes and hand-glass, its dainty feminine litter; her blue dressing-gown flung over a chair; and, tucked away in a corner, her small comfortless bed.

"Come out into the garden, away from all this," he said hurriedly, almost angrily. "Why on earth did you drag me up here?"

"Because it's the man's place to come to the woman," she answered, with a demure dignity more provocative than tenderness. "It has been too much the other way round between us lately. As one has to suffer from the drawbacks of being a woman, one may as well enjoy the advantages also."

"And having enjoyed them, will you graciously condescend to come out there with me?"

"But yes; of course I will."

He turned on his heel; and they went out together. In the strong Indian moonlight her soft blue dinner-dress, sweeping the grass behind her, was blanched to a silvery pallor; her bare neck and arms gleamed like marble touched into life; and unconsciously she swayed a little towards him as she walked, like a tall flower in a breeze. The radiant mystery of earth and sky, the scarcely less radiant mystery of womanhood beside him, conspired with her veiled mood of gentle aloofness to strike his defences from him. But he kept his hands in his pockets by way of safeguard; and because he had small skill in broaching a difficult subject, he held his tongue.

Half-way across the lawn, she came deliberately closer.

"You know, you hurt me cruelly this afternoon, Eldred."

"Did I, lass? That was abominable of me. But you must make allowances, even if you don't understand. I'm a man, and you're a woman. That seems to be the root of the difficulty. And now I'm half afraid I may hurt you again."

"Why?"

"Because I'm a clumsy brute; and I do it without meaning to. But I suppose it's plain to you that we can't go on much longer as we are doing now?"

"Of course we can't." She let out a breath of relief. "I've been wondering when you were going to see that."

"I have seen it all along. Only, for the life of me, I didn't know how to make the next move. But I have just had a talk with Desmond, . . about his wife. He wants to send her to Sheik Budeen, the minute she's fit to spend a night in a doolie."

"Where . . and what . . is Sheik Budeen?"

The perceptible change in her tone disconcerted him. But the thing had to be got through; and he went ahead without swerving.

"It is an apology for a Hill Station, about fifty miles north of this. Just a handful of bungalows, on an ugly desolate rock, rising straight out of the plain. No trees; no water, except what they collect in a tank for use. But being nearly four thousand feet up, it's a few degrees cooler than this: and probably after a week or two there Mrs Desmond would be fit to stand the journey to Dalhousie."

It was characteristic of him that he made no attempt to soften facts: and Quita, edging a little away from him, lifted her head.

"Is it settled when one is to start for this inviting spot?" she asked, critically examining a distant star.

"In a few days, if Mackay agrees. Poor Desmond, he hates letting his wife go. But for her sake he wants to get her away from here as soon as possible."

"I see. And you want to get me away from here as soon as possible.
It's a very convenient arrangement for you both."

Her implication stabbed him. He stood still, and faced her; his eyes full of pain. But he made no attempt to touch her: which was a mistake.

She stood still also,—head uplifted, hands clasped behind her,—without discontinuing her scrutiny of the heavens.

"By the Lord, you are hitting back harder than I deserve," he reproached her desperately. "At least you might believe of me all that I said of Desmond, . . that it is for your sake, and that I shall hate letting you go. The suggestion was entirely his own. He asked me to tell you, from him, that you would be doing them both a very real kindness by going with Mrs Desmond; and I thought . . you would be glad of a chance to help either of them; especially since you must know, after all I said at Kajiar, that it is impossible . . yet for us to start fair and square."

It was a long speech for Eldred, and it brought her down from the stars.

"Naturally I am delighted to do anything on earth for the Desmonds," she said sweetly, ignoring his final remark. "You speak as if I might refuse to go. But I haven't fallen quite so low as that."

"Quita, have you no mercy on a man?" he flashed out between anger and pain. "There has never been any question of 'falling' on your side, and you know it. But surely you understand that, in spite of all that has happened between, what I dared not to do a month ago, I dare not do now."

"Do you mean . . is . . the trouble not any less?"

"No."

"But I thought you were going . . to fight it?"

"So I am; so I shall, till I break it, or it breaks me. But look back over the past few weeks, and ask yourself if I have had much of a chance so far."

She unclasped her hands and looked up at him, speech hovering in her eyes. But she dropped them again, and stood so, with bowed head, shifting her rings nervously up and down her slim third finger.

"Dear lass, what's troubling you?" he asked. "We've got to understand one another to-night; so don't be afraid to speak out. Better make a clean wound and have done with it, than think hard things of me that may be unjust. Tell me the thought I saw in your eyes."

"I was thinking of something Michael said." She spoke in an even voice without looking up.

"Michael? Well . . what was it?" Anxiety sharpened his tone.

"He said that if . . if you really . . wanted me back again, your conscientious scruples would be swept away like straws before a flood. I wouldn't believe him then. But now . . I'm afraid it's true."

"Confound the man! What does he know about my scruples?" Lenox broke out with irrepressible vehemence; and she looked up quickly.

"Please don't be violent, Eldred. You told me to speak out. Besides,
Michael is my brother."

"I'm sorry. But if he were ten times your brother, I'd say the same. He had no business to try and set you against me like that." He caught her unresisting hands now, and held them fast.

"You take Michael's word against mine . . is that so?" he asked, a dull flush rising in his face; and he tried to look into her eyes. But she would not have it.

"Oh, my dear, can't you see it's not," she said, so low that he scarcely heard her. "It's . . your own actions, contradicting your own words, that make me feel he must be right."

Lenox stood aghast at this new and unanswerable aspect of the case; at the knowledge that, in respect of practical proof to the contrary, his hands were tied.

"Good God! what can a man do to convince you?" he demanded on a note of smothered passion. "Quita . . my very wife, look me in the eyes, and answer me straight. Do you honestly believe that I have been insulting you with mere lip-service all this while?"

He stood before her in mingled dignity and humility, trying to master himself, to find some admissible outlet for the tumult of feeling that was undermining the foundations of his will. But she did not answer at once; nor did she look up.

"Think how I welcomed you a week ago," he urged.

"I do think of it. But . . since then . . ." She hesitated; and a slow wave of colour crimsoned her neck and face, even to her forehead. "I . . I don't know what to believe," she added very low.

The words struck away his last defences, and he caught her in his arms; straining her to him, and kissing her almost roughly on lips and eyes and throat. She submitted at first, in sheer amazement and half-frightened joy at having roused him thus. Then she tried to free herself; but he held her close, and hard.

"Do you believe now," he asked, his lips at her ear, "that I want you . . that I love you . . with every part of me, heart, and mind, and body?"

For all answer she leaned her head against him with a broken sob.

"Oh, Eldred," she rebuked him through her tears. "I never knew you could behave . . like that!"

"No more did I," he answered bluntly. "Forgive me, darling, if you can. I was a brute to lose control of myself. But you pushed me too far. There are things no man of human passions can put up with; and if you are going to begin by doubting my sincerity, all hope of real union between us is at an end."

"Dear love, I promise I'll never doubt it again," she whispered fervently. "I'll go away, and stay away . . without any fuss, if only I can see things straight and clear; if only you won't quite shut me out from the best part of yourself."

"I've no notion of shutting you out from any part of myself, you precious woman. But the habit of half a lifetime is not easy to break through; and I suppose that when two people marry they have to learn one another bit by bit, like a new language; except in such a rare case as the Desmonds, where love and understanding are not two things, but one, like the man and woman themselves. There . . did you ever guess I had thought all that about marriage!"

She laughed contentedly.

"No. How could I? And it's your thoughts I want, Eldred;—the hidden you, that belongs to no one but me."

"Do you, though? It sounds rather wholesale! But I'll do my best."

"Come over and sit on the steps; and I'll try to tell you just how matters stand, and how I feel about it all."

He led her back to the verandah, and establishing her on the topmost step, seated himself lower down, one arm passed behind her, his left hand covering hers that lay folded in her lap. Quita, looking down upon it in a flutter of happiness, noted and approved it as an epitome of the man; large, without clumsiness, nervous and full of character.

Then he told her, simply and straightly, a part of what he had told Desmond; and more, that was for herself alone. Through all he said, and left unsaid, Quita felt the force of his ascetic personality, of a strong man, stern with himself and his own passion; and, womanlike, thrilled at thought of her dominion over him; her power to set him vibrating by a word, a look, a touch. Yet she listened without movement or interruption; for the which he blessed her in his heart.

"I suppose there are numbers of men who would take . . what I refuse without a twinge of conscience," he said finally. "But the fact that I should be acting dead against the right, as I see it, would make capitulation wrong for me, . . if not for them. Besides, one dare not trifle with an inherited evil. One's only chance lies in taking strong measures on the spot. You understand?"

"Yes, I understand . . now; though I didn't at first. And I wouldn't have you different by one hair's-breadth, though your strength and single-mindedness does make things harder for both of us."

He pressed her hands.

"It's worth all I've been through, and more, to hear you say that. Only remember, lass, it's not simply a question of principles that may seem to you high-flown, but of bedrock facts. I don't want to enlarge on the ugly or painful side of a very ugly subject; but I do want you to understand that not only my career, but our whole future happiness depends upon my crushing out this habit before it degenerates to a craving; before my conscience gets blunted, my will-power undermined. Opium is worse than drink in both respects: and if things ever reached such a pass—which God forbid—it would mean losing my commission; just going under, like dozens of ill-fated chaps, and sinking in the scale: or at best scraping along in the army by means of constant subterfuges, at the hourly risk of discovery and disgrace. A nice sort of life for you, my proud little woman. And for——" he broke off short.

She tried to speak, but tears were clutching at her throat; and after a moment's pause, he went on: "There is a great black something deep down in me, Quita, that rises up now and then, like a spiritual fog, and blots all the light and colour out of life. This, and the dread of those hideous possibilities I spoke of, made me feel, a month ago, as if it might be better for you to be left in comparative freedom, than chained to a man with a devil inside him. But your coming down here has put all that out of the question."

"Thank God I came, then."

"Yes. Thank God you came," he echoed fervently. "Though I was afraid you didn't quite realise . . ."

"Dear, I did. More than you imagine. But I wanted . . to help you in spite of yourself; and I hoped we could fight it out together."

He shook his head.

"Don't think me brutal, Quita, but a man's got to fight out this sort of thing alone with his own soul . . and God. You can only help just by . . loving me, and believing that I shall pull through. Dear old Desmond has done about as much for me as one human being seems permitted to do for another in big contingencies; and, by the way, he said rather a charming thing to-night."

"He has a gift for that. What was it?"

"He said I won the great talisman that put failure out the question."

She laughed again, softly.

"Oh, how I love that man, and his incurable idealism!"

"You do? You lawless young woman! How many more?"

"Only one more . . I think!"

And freeing her left hand she slipped it round his head, that was on a level with her shoulder, drew it close against her, and ran her fingers lightly through his thick hair.

"I'm going to weave a magic over your head to make you sleep, and reward you for giving up the opium, you poor, poor darling."

And with a sigh Lenox yielded himself to the ecstasy of her touch.

Their talk grew fitful, and fragmentary; intimate lover's talk, interspersed with luminous pauses, that were but hidden channels of speech; till Quita felt the walls within walls giving way under her 'magic,' and knew that she had reached the shy, inmost heart of the man at last. That enchanted hour lifted them beyond the ardours of passion, to the mastery of spirit; to a passing revelation of the eternal beauty underlying earth's tragedies and complexities: and both were conscious of an exalted strength.

The harsh clanging of the police gong, twelve times repeated, brought them back to the iron facts of life. With a murmur of reluctance they rose; and Lenox escorted his wife to the door of her room.

"Shall I let down your 'chick' for you?" he asked.

"Please."

He untied the strings that held it up. Then, as the curtain fell between them and the lamplit room, Quita turned, and with a gesture all tenderness, laid both arms round his neck.

"I shall never forget to-night, Eldred," she whispered, "even if we live to be cross prosaic old people together. You may go to the other end of the world, now, and stay there as long as you like! I am sure of you; and I feel in every fibre of me that we are going to win through in the end."