IT had come to an end; and that first Christmas after the Armistice was spent by Emmie at Endells.

On Christmas eve they had an afternoon party for the children of the village; with the curate, a schoolmistress, Mr. Sturgess the doctor, and a few friendly neighbours to assist Miss Verinder in entertaining the guests. She acted as hostess for old Mr. Dyke, and was indeed treated by all as though she had been a daughter of the house. Everybody there knew her and liked her.

After a plenteous tea she led the company to a hall or annexe that had been used as parish-room and general meeting-place in the days when the house was the rectory as well as the residence of the squire.

“Keep down here, please,” said Emmie. “I have something to say to you all.”

The children, surging into the big room, had made at once towards a screen of curtains at the far end; from behind which came the sound of whispers and busy movements, suggesting that some mystery was in preparation there. Now they obediently flocked back towards the wide hearth, and formed a dense half circle of eager shining faces.

“That’s right. Thank you,” said Emmie.

It was a pretty old-fashioned little scene; very pleasant, in its homelike character, to eyes that for so long had been gazing towards the smoke-clouds of foreign lands. The electric light burning gaily brought out the cheerful colours of flags, paper festoons, and holly berries, with which Miss Verinder had decorated the walls and ceiling beams. The boys, smooth and oily of pate, were still rather shy; the bigger girls, in their very best frocks, looked dignified but self-conscious; and some tiny little girls, large-eyed and fluffy-haired, like dolls, hopped excitedly and clapped their small hands. One of these animated dolls had attached herself to Miss Verinder, and moved with her while a chair was fetched from the wall and placed in the middle of the room.

Miss Verinder made Mr. Dyke sit on the chair. He had carried plates of cake, waiting on the children at their tea; he was so happy, and so much pleased with the party, that he would not spare his old legs or think for a moment of the danger of overtiring himself.

“Now,” said Emmie, with her hand on the back of his chair, beginning the expected oration. At the same moment the curate went to the door, and stationed himself by the switches that controlled the electric light. In the background there was a delighted whispering and giggling of the servants. “Now, first I think you ought all to thank Mr. Dyke for giving us this treat.”

“Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir.” Prompted by the schoolmistress, a noisy chorus of thanks burst from the attentive audience.

“Don’t thank me. Thank Miss Verinder,” said old Dyke, beaming. “It’s she who has taken the trouble.”

“Thank you, miss. Thank you, miss.”

Miss Verinder smiled, blushed, and then continued her speech. “I want to speak about Father Christmas. It is Father Christmas, is it not? who comes down the chimney at night and puts things in your stockings. It is he who goes into the dark woods and grubs up the lovely Christmas trees and drags them over the fields to the village. You like those trees of his, don’t you? Yes, and Father Christmas carries a great sack over his shoulder full of toys to hang on the tree—or perhaps the sack is a bran pie! And he has a staff in his hand. You’ve seen heaps of pictures of him, haven’t you? But you’ve never seen him himself. Oh, how nice it would be to see him! Perhaps”—and Miss Verinder smiled archly—“I say perhaps, he is really close by—only afraid to show himself. I believe he is afraid of the lights. He always moves about in the dark. Shall we turn down the lights?”

“No,” cried the little child at Emmie’s skirts, “don’t turn down the lights. I’m more afraid of the dark zan Fazer Kissmuss is of anysing”; and she clung to Emmie.

“Only for a moment, dear. And you’ve got my hand. There, I’ll keep my arm round you. Now you don’t mind. Mr. Vincent!” And the curate by the switches received his signal.

The room was in darkness, except for the glow of the fire and certain gleams that came through those curtains. One could hear everybody breathing hard. Then out burst the lamp-light again, dazzling one.

“Oh, oh, oh!” The children, recoiling, stared in awe and ecstasy. Father Christmas was in their midst.

He was enormous, overwhelming; a magnificent apparition, all in red, with immense white beard, cotton-wool eyebrows, high reddened cheek-bones, and a great beak of a nose. He stalked towards the curtains, the enraptured children following him.

He drew the curtains wide open; and exhibited a most splendid Christmas tree as high as the ceiling covered with fairy lamps and glittering ornaments, its branches hanging low under the rich burden of toys. He began at once, under the direction of Miss Verinder, and aided by Hannah the housekeeper, to pluck the fruit of the tree and to distribute it.

And very soon the children lost their awe of Father Christmas, hustling him, pulling his skirts; thinking only of the toys, and saying, “Gi’ me that gun—oh, please. Hi, mister, let me have this box o’ dom’nos. I’m older than what she is.... Sir, play fair, sir. My turn, sir.”

The little girl alone still believed in his supernatural attributes, still clung to Emmie and shrank from him.

“Send him away,” she implored. “I don’t like him.”

“He’s only a man, really,” said Emmie.

“No, he isn’t. He’s Fazer Kissmus.”

Then Emmie issued a command.

“Tony, pull off your beard.”

Father Christmas, willingly obeying, divested himself of beard and cotton wool, and thus brought into view the rumpled grey hair and reddened cheeks of that well-known and respected local personage, Mr. Anthony Dyke.

He went away to get the paint off his face, and was soon back again, capering gaily about in an ordinary blue serge suit that could frighten nobody. He played with the boys, he danced with the girls, and he kissed Hannah under the mistletoe. Hannah, resisting, called him “Master Anthony,” and told him that he ought to be ashamed of himself.

Shyness and constraint had long since left the young guests; after an orgy of cracker pulling and the loot of the tree, the party became a romp.

At dinner, when they talked it over, all agreed that it had been a great success. They had with them for dinner the curate and his wife and Mr. Sturgess, the doctor, kindly simple people of whom Emmie was fond. Comfort and peace presided over the friendly meal, and in this old room, sitting beside the old, old man, Emmie looked quite young. She could see Anthony casting glances of admiration at her throughout some very long anecdotes with which Mr. Sturgess always loved to refresh himself when he dined at Endells.

It was the first time that she and the younger Mr. Dyke had ever been here together. The war, destroying so much else, had blown away that delicacy which used to separate them during Anthony’s visits to his home. All over the world—as Emmie thought, sending back glance for glance—this first Christmas of peace had reunited those who loved one another. Oh, what a peace it would have been if it could have brought with it a law that there were never again to be any more good-byes and partings! In the midst of the warmth, the joy, and the contentment, sadness coldly touched her heart.

They spent the evening in an oaken parlour, where the polished floor reflected things as in black water, and round mirrors gave one small framed pictures of the whole room and its occupants. Emmie, seated at the immensely ancient cottage piano, played pretty old-fashioned melodies that she used to play in Prince’s Gate as a girl; the curate sang; and the doctor, regardless of the music, told more anecdotes. Old Mr. Dyke, although obviously tired, would not allow the guests to leave early. Then when they had at last said Good-night and he himself had gone upstairs to bed, Emmie and his son lingered, sitting together before the fire.

Hannah came in to tell them that it was nearly twelve o’clock and she, too, was retiring.

“I’ve seen to the shutters,” she said severely. “But now can I trust you, Mr. Anthony, to turn out all the lights, and make sure the fires are safe in here and the dining-room?”

Mr. Anthony promised to do his duty.

Then Hannah turned to Emmie. “Your hot-water bottle, miss! Louisa took them up an hour ago or more.”

“Thank you, Hannah.”

Just before midnight Dyke went and undid some of Hannah’s shutters in order to open the front door. He wrapped Emmie in one of his overcoats, and they stood side by side on the gravel outside the house. The night was fine and still with the stars very bright in a dark but cloudless sky. Above the black mass of the ilex trees they could see vaguely the church tower.

“Will the bells be rung?” asked Dyke.

“Oh, no,” said Emmie. “That’s the new year, you’re thinking of. They don’t ring in Christmas.”

Presently the church clock began to strike the midnight hour. Dyke counted the strokes, and when the twelfth came he stooped and kissed her forehead.

“A happy Christmas, Emmie.”

“And to you, Tony dear. But are you happy, I wonder?”

“As happy as several birds”; and he put his arm round her waist. “How could I be otherwise?”

They came in again, and barred the door. As she went upstairs she looked down at him and saw him looking up at her, his face all gay and bright.

“Good-night. Good-night.”

From the landing at the top of the stairs she looked down again, and saw his whole attitude relax. His head drooped, his shoulders hunched themselves; and with his hands in his pockets he went slowly back to the room they had left.

In spite of his eighty-five years and bodily weakness, the old man got up long before daylight and attended the early celebration. They went with him to the ordinary service at eleven o’clock; he leaning on Emmie’s arm as they walked through the garden, and Anthony solemnly following. Anthony looked fantastic as well as solemn in an astounding top-hat and a skimpy black coat, at least thirty years old, that he had unearthed from a wardrobe of his dressing-room. At certain of the sacred words that they presently heard Emmie turned her eyes towards him with unutterable love in them, and she felt a great tenderness and compassion as she held the hymn-book for his father and listened to his thin quavering voice as he piped the sweet Christmas songs; but during most of the service there was rather a far-away look on her face. She was in truth thinking very deeply.

The sun shone on them as they came out of the church, and after all the greetings and interchange of good wishes with neighbours on the church path, Emmie and the old man went to sit in that small walled garden that they both loved. It was really warm here. The sunshine made strong dark shadows as well as bright patches among the stalks and branches of the flowerless borders. Mr. Dyke said he could feel it on his hands. She had wrapped a rug about his knees and under his feet; and she turned up his coat collar and muffled his neck with a big scarf. Here, sitting comfortably in the sun and out of the wind, they had a long serious talk.

Anthony, having cast his ancient finery and clothed himself in a loose Norfolk jacket, was on the little terrace and busily engaged with the man who worked the electric light engine. They were mending a kitchen box for the cook. Anthony, thoroughly enjoying this carpenter’s job, only ceased his chat with the electrician to fling a cheery word from time to time towards the sunlit pair on the bench down below.

“Mr. Dyke, we must face the fact,” Emmie was saying. “He is not happy. It is all pretence. Ever since he came home he has been trying hard not to let me see what he feels. But I can see always—knowing him as I do. He wants to go back there once more.”

“Go back there!” And she saw the sun-warmed hands begin to shake upon the shrunken knees. “Not—not to the Antarctic?”

Emmie nodded her head. “Yes, he can’t deceive me. It is more than a wish—he feels that it is a duty.”

“Oh, no, he has other duties.”

“But he feels that this duty is sacred—a sort of charge upon him. Unless he fulfils it—or at least tries to fulfil it—I know that he will never be really happy or at peace.”

“Oh, no”; and the poor weak hands were shaking very visibly. “He mustn’t do it. He is too old.”

“Well, that is what I want us to consider carefully,” Emmie said in a quiet business-like tone. “Is he too old? He is fifty-nine. That of course would be too old for any one else; but then he is not like other men.”

Instinctively they both looked upward to the terrace. Anthony, after stooping over the box, was standing at his fullest height and stretching his arms. He stooped a little even now, as if the weight of his big shoulders was not quite so easy to carry as it had once been; but his head and neck were magnificent, with the sunlight on the thick grey hair, the strong bold features, and the close-cropped beard. If you judged him merely by the indefinable impression that age itself produces, and at this slight distance, you would have said that he was a man of forty-five whose hair had become prematurely grey.

“He says himself that he feels all right—ready for anything. He is not conscious of the smallest diminution of his strength. Mr. Dyke, his health is wonderful”; and as Emmie said this, she was like a sensible unemotional mother speaking about a grown-up son. “Have you noticed, too, that he is less deaf—scarcely deaf at all?” And Emmie’s tone changed, and her face grew sad. “No, I’m afraid we can’t in justice rule him out on the score of health and age. Three or four years hence perhaps. But not now.”

She looked up to the terrace again, and then spoke with great firmness. “Of course, if he does go, it must be his very last voyage. There must be no nonsense about that. He must solemnly promise us both.”

“Emmie, he musn’t go”; and the old fellow put a trembling hand on her arm. “Don’t encourage him.”

“You shall advise me, dear Mr. Dyke. But let me tell you everything first.”

“Yes; but he mustn’t go,” he said eagerly. “He can’t go—if you consider it. We needn’t frighten ourselves. You and I may think he is still young—not yet too old for it. But he’ll never persuade other people to think that. He’ll never get anyone to give him another chance.”

“Ah!” Emmie winced, and moved her hands swiftly. “When I remember what has always happened, I believe that he will go anyhow—somehow. The real question is the how.”

Then she told Mr. Dyke all about her money.

“My dear Emmie, what an astounding affair! It sounds like a fairy tale.”

“I wish it was a fairy tale,” she said; “but unfortunately it is sober truth. No, I ought not to say that. It’s very wrong of me. Only, now you see the position in which I am placed—with all this money—so much more than I want or could possibly use—with this power in my hands. Oh, Mr. Dyke, what am I to do? You see what I mean? He need not persuade other people to give him a last chance. I myself can give it to him.”

“Oh, no, he would never take money from you.”

“I think he would. I’m sure he would. To begin with, I could show him that I should still have enough, even after he’d taken all that he needed—all that he needed to do things in such a style as has never been possible to him till now. So there would be no question of leaving me impoverished.”

“That would make no difference. He’d never consent.”

“Dear Mr. Dyke, you may trust my instinct. He would refuse at first; then, after a little while, he would consent. He is eating his heart out—so that the mere personal temptation would be more than he could resist. But, beyond that, there is this idea of his that has grown so very strong. He feels that it is not only his own duty, but the duty of all English people to complete the work of that brave Englishman who gave his life down there to bring honour to England. He would feel that I could not spend my money in a better way—We’ll say no more for a moment.”

Anthony was coming down the brick steps from the terrace.

“I am having a confidential talk with your father,” said Miss Verinder, in the primly crushing manner of a grown-up person interrupted by a troublesome child.

“Secrets, what?” He laughed, and went away again.

“That is the position,” she said quietly, when he was back on the terrace and busy with his carpentering. “I feel that I ought to help him to his heart’s desire—I feel now that I have no choice really. But I want you to advise me—to tell me what you think.”

“He oughtn’t to go,” said Mr. Dyke, once more touching, her arm. “It wouldn’t be fair to you.”

“Oh, me!” Her lips twitched, and for a moment her whole face seemed to be distorted, as if with a spasm of violent pain. “I mustn’t be allowed to count for a moment. No, leave me out of it altogether.”

“Emmie, dear. Emmie”; and Mr. Dyke kept his hand on her arm.

Quite quietly, without any convulsive movements of her throat or bosom, she had begun to cry. The tears flooded her eyes, rolled down her pale cheeks, and she looked through them towards the terrace while remaining absolutely still; so that no one up there who saw her rigid attitude could possibly guess what was happening. Presently, with furtive caution, she got out a handkerchief and dried her eyes.

“I have tried not to be selfish, dear Mr. Dyke—all along, you know. I claim no merit. For how could I be selfish, in such a case? Indeed his work and what the world says of him make up my life really. They are my life—that is, my pride and my joy. But one is weak. He himself is so much to me—so dreadfully much—so incredibly more, it always seems, than at the very beginning, when I was young—when we were both young. This time, it seems as if his going will be almost more than I can bear. It will seem like suicide if I bring it about, myself. In these last weeks I have been struggling with myself. Oh, dear Mr. Dyke, I have struggled in such terrible agony. I want him with me so dreadfully, and yet he wants to go away from me. And if he could do something big and splendid to wind up his career—well, I could never, never forgive myself if it was I who prevented him.”Mr. Dyke was greatly perturbed.

“I said I wasn’t selfish,” she went on. “It is selfish, what I am doing now, pushing my burden on to you. But you are always so brave and so wise—and there is no one else that I can ask for counsel. Besides, you are his father. You have the right to be consulted—to decide. A much greater right than I—everybody would say.”

“If he goes,” said the old man, in a low voice, “I shall never see him again.”

“Oh, no, don’t say that—don’t think it.”

“I know it. I shan’t be here to welcome him home.”

Then Emmie shed tears again, and again succeeded in wiping them away without being observed by either of the box-menders on the terrace.

“We have to bear in mind, dear Mr. Dyke, that it is very doubtful if either of us could prevent him from going sooner or later. And certainly, if he is to go, it should be as soon as possible. But my most dreadful thought is this. If I don’t give him the money he will start as usual, poorly equipped—he will be defeated by difficulties and turn back. Yet that perhaps may mean his eventual safety. Whereas, if he is really well fitted out for once, if he has every possible chance in his favour, then he will be able to push right on—and that may mean his doom. It’s a horrible responsibility. Think of it. It would be I who had sent him to his death.”

“No.” Old Mr. Dyke raised himself on the bench and looked at her. “No, Emmie, no,” he said; and in his dim eyes she saw a faint flash that made him seem like a thin small ghost of Anthony. “No. If he is to do it, let him go for the big prize. Give him his full chance and don’t count the risks. Let it be all or nothing.”

She jumped up from the bench and stood looking down at him.

“I can’t decide,” he said. “You only can do that. The sacrifice will be yours, not mine. Only, as I venture to say, don’t spoil it by half measures.”

Then she called to Anthony. She had decided.

Anthony Dyke refused her offer, and stood firm to his refusal for two days. Then on the morning of the third day he accepted. He was of course enraptured. He echoed Mr. Dyke’s words in saying that her acquisition of comparative wealth was like a fairy tale.

“All this time I never knew I had a fairy godmother—I who have groused about my bad luck. At the fateful moment you suddenly show the shining crown on your dear head, you wave your magic wand, you give me the enchanted key. Oh, Emmie, what can I say? What can I ever do?”

“You can come back safe and sound,” said Emmie. “And you can give me your sacred word that you’ll never leave me again.”

Kissing her with frenzied warmth, he made his vow. But this first ecstasy being over, he began at once to treat her with a new and strange deference. He said that she had become the patron and chieftain of the glorious project.

“Oh, yes, it’s your show entirely. You trust me, you honour me with your instructions.”

Before that evening everything was settled between them. She made a proviso that he should arrange for a relief expedition to follow after him at a certain date. This must be an integral part of the plan. And the whole thing must be organised in its smallest details before he himself started southward. She was very firm as to all this.

He agreed, saying she was quite right and he knew the very man to put in command of the relief ship—“Twining, who was my navigating officer in 1910.”

He bowed deferentially to her decision with regard to other matters; saying, “Oh, your word would be law. You would be the real head, and I shouldn’t forget it.” Then he smiled. “You pay the piper, Emmie, and you call the tune.”

She said that there must be no departure from plans.

“No, no. But you’d give me a free hand when I get down there?”

“Yes, but only within specified limits.”

“Very good,” he said humbly.

Then, in reply to her questions, he said he intended to follow Captain Scott’s line. The fact that it was sixty miles longer than the other one was of no consequence. He proposed to go to America and get his ship and everything else there.

“The Yanks will pull themselves together quicker than we can hope to do over here. America’s the shop to buy our little bag of tricks in.” And he had a bright idea. “I say, old J. L. Porter might be willing to stand some of the racket. I let him down rather badly last time; but he’s a real sportsman—and I may as well try to touch him again.”

“No,” said Miss Verinder firmly. “This is my show. And I don’t want anybody else in it.”