Oh, believe me, Nell, it is an awful thing to be a wife.—Charlotte BrontË.

Lettice, dragging up the steps of No. 33 Canning Street, paused to unfasten her waterproof and shake her wet umbrella. It was raining, it seemed to have been raining ever since she got back to town, chill November rain, a yellow haze down every street; and the weather matched her mood. Ever since April she had been trying to shut her eyes to the future, but as time drew on it refused to be ignored. It lay in wait outside the Museum, it came home with her in the Tube, it took possession of her attic, it was translating itself with appalling rapidity into the present, and she was no more ready for it than she had been months ago.

Well! she had still a week's grace, and anything might happen in a week. Lettice detached her mind with an effort, picked up a letter from the hall table, and came upstairs at a snail's pace, reading it. Her own room she expected to be dark, so with her usual deaf and blind absorption in anything to read she lingered outside on the landing. She became aware, as she stood, of another scent mingling with that of the lamp, of another clearer light than its brownish obscurity, but her eyes remained glued to her letter; not till she had reached the end did she slowly raise them from the sheet, and then she saw her door open, her room full of firelight, a white cloth gleaming, a dark figure standing in the entrance watching her with a smile.

"Buenas noches, seÑorita," said Gardiner, politely removing his cigarette.

"O-o-oh—it's you," said Lettice with striking originality.

"The curse is come upon me!" suggested Gardiner. His smile widened. "Exactly. You look so pleased!"

Lettice, after that first involuntary pause of dismay, had come into the room; she stood by the table, slowly, slowly drawing off her gloves.

"Well, of course I'm pleased; but why, why, why didn't you let me know? You said you weren't coming out till next week!"

"So sorry, but I didn't know myself. It was little Scott worked the oracle—said I was in a bad way or something." Lettice said nothing, but her chin had a mutinous cock. "Shall I go back again?"

"If you'd let me know in time," said Lettice, "I'd have got you something nice for tea. Now you'll have to put up with what there is."

That minute offended voice, that reproachful pianissimo drawl! Gardiner laughed out.

"Lettice, you're inimitable! I swear you haven't turned a hair! Do you know—do you know you've got the same button off the same coat?"

"Well, you wouldn't expect me to have the same button off another coat, would you?"

"I would not have you in any single particular in any degree different from what you are now," Gardiner declared. He dropped into a chair. "As a matter of fact, they shot me out yesterday; and if it comes to letting people know, I went straight off to Starbridge under the impression I should find you in the bosom of your family. I was shown in right on top of a Belgian work party. Awful. I came out again with my tail between my legs. That upset I couldn't even face you. I spent the night in the fields."

"It was raining."

"Quite; it was. I was under a tarpaulin on top of a stack. Oh yes, thanks, I slept like a hog. I've been dropping off at intervals ever since, in the train or any old place. Making up for lost time, I suppose."

His speech ended in a yawn. Lettice stole a glance at him out of the tail of her eye. "Were you sleeping badly right up to the end?" she asked.

"Yes; it's been rather rotten. Never mind, all over now. It's good to be out. Brrr! You leave that toasting fork alone. Drop it! My job. You're tired; you've been fagging all day in the B.M. SiÉntese usted, seÑorita."

"You'll burn it," cried Lettice, defensively holding on. He looked up lazily; his black eyes were melting soft, his voice a seductive murmur.

"Ah! prendita mÍa, don't you know I'm going to make your toast for you every evening of your life?"

Lettice was extinguished. She sat down, unwilling but unresisting. He could make toast, and he could do what was far more difficult and unusual—make her obey him. He spoke lightly, but he was watching her all the time; he beset her with his eyes. They said bold things, but he did not press them; he made her color, and he laughed, yet he did not touch her. Why he did it? That was quite plain; he was hoarding up his happiness, playing cat and mouse, holding her life in his hand, as he had sworn he could, without closing his fingers on it. Lettice knew not whether to be glad or sorry at the respite.

"Have you seen Mr. Gardiner yet?" she asked. She preferred talking to being watched.

"Not yet. I'm booked for Woodlands to-night, but I thought I'd see you first and present him with our plans ready made; he flurries himself over anything like a discussion, dear old boy. Bet you sixpence you don't guess what I mean to do?" Lettice looked inquiring. "No; not enlist. This hand does me out of that. But I've a job in my mind's eye that will do me quite as well or even better. What do you say to the Secret Service? Don't you dare screw your nose up at me!" He was laughing at her again. "Seriously, you know, I'm cut out for it. I pass anywhere as a Spaniard, and though I say it, I have quite a pretty turn for finesse. The padre at the prison, Roche his name was, has a father who's a big brass hat in that line, and he's giving me a leg up. I shall go directly I'm fit. I'm still pretty frail; I wouldn't trust myself not to leg it out of a tight place, which at best would be ignominious, and might lead to a handy wall and a firing squad—oh, wouldn't suit my book at all. No. I give myself a fat month. I've certain plans for that month which I propose presently to lay before you. You go raspberry-pink when you blush, LÆtitia Jane; did you know it?"

"Will you have some more tea?" asked Lettice repressively.

"No, I will not have some more tea. No, and I won't have a cigarette either. You are a little liar, you hate smoke. I got that out of that pretty sister of yours—by the way, I think I can get round your people without much trouble; I'm rather a dog, you know, when I give my mind to it. Always well to be on good terms with your in-laws—but that's not the point at present. I've certain plans for this next month, as I said; but before we discuss them this house will go into committee on ways and means. The sad fact is that, bar a few pounds in the bank, I'm a blooming pauper. Every cent I possess went with the Bellevue. I suppose a grateful country will support me while I'm lying in the bosom of the Hun—What are you looking at me like that for?"

"Don't you know?"

"Know what?"

"About your, your—your what do you call it."

"My—?"

"It was in Denis's letter. I've just heard from him. About Dot O'Connor."

"Lucid, very," said Gardiner. "Get a move on, darling. Steady over the stones. What about Dot O'Connor?"

"Well, I'm telling you as fast as I can. You, you, you do hurry me so," Lettice complained. She took breath and tried again. "She, she—it was her will. You heard she left him a lot of money for his old aeroplanes?"

Gardiner nodded. "Yes, that was in The Mail. 'Bequest to an Airman.' Roche told me. I was very glad about it; poor dear old chap, it'll be something to take his mind off. But I don't see—"

"Well, she's left you some too. To show her gratitude for your consideration."

"How much? Five thousand? Good Lord! I say, Lettice, I can't possibly take it!" Lettice was silent. "Don't you agree with me?"

"No. I think you should."

"After all that's happened?"

"Well, you never did hate her, did you?" said Lettice. "And she didn't hate you, at any rate not at the last. She'd be sorry if you refused."

"No, I never hated her," said Gardiner. He lay back, thinking. "I say, Lettice."

"Well?"

"I say, I was cut up over that business. Weren't you?" Lettice nodded. He leaned forward, fingering the fringe of her tea-cloth. "Not for Denis's sake, I don't mean, but for her own. I—I liked her, you know. You couldn't help feeling she ought to have been such a jolly kid!"

"I owe her a good deal," said Lettice on a rare impulse.

"You do?"

"She stuck a knife into a German for me."

Gardiner looked up quickly. "In time?"

"If it hadn't been I shouldn't be here," said Lettice very concisely.

"H'm," said Gardiner. His face was expressionless. Lettice wondered what he was thinking. She was apt to go astray in other people's thoughts where they concerned herself, because she habitually underrated her own significance. She wished she had not told him. She had never told Denis. She scourged herself for giving confidences unasked.

There came a pause. Gardiner seemed deep in thought. Lettice with a darkened face was noiselessly putting cups and saucers together. She hoped to get out of the room without attracting his attention, but he shot out of his chair in time to open the door.

"Where are you off to with those things?"

"It's Beatrice's afternoon out, and I'm going to carry them down into the basement," said Lettice in an uninviting hurry. She was afraid he would offer to come too, but he did not, nor did her tone provoke a smile.

"Hurry up back, then, I want to talk to you," was all he said.

Lettice did not hurry back; she stayed to wash up, a work of supererogation, found half-a-dozen other unnecessary things to do, loitered on the stairs, delayed on the landing. She had at last to force herself to the door against a reluctance like a pain; and then she halted on the threshold. He had fallen asleep.

Lettice crossed the floor with her soft, slow step and stood looking down on him. Awake, except for being thinner, he was not so much changed from his old self; asleep, he showed the ravages of the past twelvemonth—helplessly, openly. Lettice knew without being told that he hated to be watched in his sleep for that very reason, because he could not guard his secrets; yet he trusted himself unreservedly to her. He and his secrets were quite at her mercy. It was too much; he gave too much and he asked too much. So unlike Denis, who asked nothing, took things for granted, never criticized either himself or her! But this alert, restless, observant mind, for ever analyzing and appraising—how was she to cope with it? She felt like a mole dragged into the sunshine.

There was some affinity between them, and she had power over him—yes; but she did not want it. She only longed to creep back underground. She could give him friendship, she could even give him love of the quality she gave to Denis, provided he asked no more; if he did ask more, all her instincts bent away from him towards something very like hostility. What was she going to do, then? Keep her word, that of course; but how? Could she deceive him? She could not; that was just what she found intolerable. But if she did not, would he be satisfied? Or would he actually enjoy holding her against her will? Lettice was not sure. He was not cruel, but he was passionate, and passion is cruel. He made her conscious, always, that he was a man. Entangled in the personal relation, her judgment was all astray.

Well! she supposed she must set her teeth and do the best she could. After all, the fault was hers, not his, the unnatural lack was in her. Remembering little Dorothea's freehearted giving, Lettice despised her own sterility.

But there was a deeper affinity between them than she knew; and he showed it now by answering the call of her presence and waking under her eyes. He woke in terror, with her name on his lips, a cry of agony, which changed, when he saw her, to relief—instantaneous. He turned and hid his face against her, in the gesture of a frightened child. Lettice never forgot that moment. It was a sword through her heart. She drew a deep breath; without impulse, deliberately rather, she put her arm round his shoulders and held him there, strong to comfort. Her face was stern.... Moments passed; little by little the tremors and the quick uneven breathing subsided. He sat up.

"Apologies," he said with a half-laugh, unconcealably shaken, but unashamed.

"Do you often wake like that?" asked Lettice unsmiling.

"Do I? Occasionally. When I get the jim-jams. Yes, I have pretty often lately. It's all your fault, you know."

"My fault?"

"That story of yours, that particular danger—well, it happened to be my particular nightmare. I don't think there were many minutes when it was out of my head. I kept it under mostly during the day, but at night it used to wear through and wake me up. I used to visualize it in all sorts of variations. You, Lettice, who hate to have a hand laid on you—"

"Who told you I disliked that?"

"You have yourself, a dozen times."

She let that pass. "I am thankful you are out of that place," she said in a low voice, half to herself. He smiled.

"I'm all right, darling. Or I soon shall be, when—"

"When what?"

"Nothing," said Gardiner. "I shall be all right soon."

He captured the hand which hung by her side and kissed it softly, inside and out. "It's been rather sport pulling your tail when you've always tried to pull mine, but I can't keep it up any longer. Are you going to give me what I want, Lettice of my heart?"

"What do you want?"

"You. All of you. Mind as well as body. Mind principally. I told you before, I tell you again, it was you brought me through. You have me—all of me. And if I'm better worth having than I was a year ago, it's your doing. I claim no credit. I put myself into your hands to do what you like with. Will you take on the job?" Lettice did not answer—could not answer; she was in travail, and hers was no easy delivery. Gardiner looked up. "My God, you don't want to!"

She put out her hand quickly. "I will marry you."

"No, you won't. I decline."

"You—you don't understand. I will marry you."

"Oh, damn," said Gardiner. "Oh, I can't stand this. It's quite all right. I can get on without you." He stood by the table, striking match after match in vain efforts to light his cigarette; when he had it burning, he threw it away. Then he began on the matches again; the floor was strewn with broken ends. "My darling, it really is all right. I should have seen it before if I hadn't been an ass. What you can't give is the least part of what I want. Put me on the same ration as Denis, and I shall do famously."

"You don't understand," said Lettice, "and I am such a dolt—"

"Lettice, I will not take what you don't want to give. I saw what you were feeling. Think you could take me in after we were married? Think I should enjoy the position? I tell you one reason why your instincts are rebelling now, and that's the—the—what that poor child killed. Isn't it so?" Lettice was mute. "Well, do you think I want to even myself with that?"

"I don't care what you think," said Lettice with staccato distinctness, "and I am going to marry you."

He turned and seized her shoulders. "Lettice, you don't love me?" She was dumb again. "Do you? Do you? Lettice—alma de mi vida, niÑa de mi corazÓn—saladisima, preciosisima, hermosisima—"

If he had never known it before, he saw now that he had power over her; she could not resist that tone. "Well, I can't have you waking up like that, can I?"

"How would you have me wake?" asked Gardiner under his breath. He did not know what he expected, certainly not what he got: a swift turn, Lettice's face grim with feeling, her hands strongly drawing him down against her heart. She said not a syllable, but she held him there; and by and by she bent her graceful little neck and kissed him, the oddest little salute, it might have been called a peck, quite definite and not at all shy. Gardiner sprang up, flushed, impassioned, freeing himself from her arms to seize her in his own; then holding her off, with one lingering scruple—"Sure it's all right, Lettice? Sure you don't mind? I swear I'll take nothing you don't freely give—now or as your husband, nothing!"

"You are not all there is of most intelligent, are you?" said Lettice.

But if her tongue was perverse, her eyes were very soft—soft as only Lettice's eyes could be, always with a sparkle in their sweetness; and Gardiner was not critical. He was far too much occupied in making love, which he did very prettily, with a wealth of soft Spanish superlatives. He was drunk with happiness; his most enterprising dreams had never pictured such a surrender.

And Lettice was happy too. She knew now, she had learned in the moment when he woke with her name on his lips, that she was not afraid of passion; and if she had surprised him, he had surprised her too. She had thought she understood him pretty well; but she knew the worst better than the best, and the unselfishness, the delicacy, the almost fantastic chivalry of his love left her wondering and self-reproachful. So it happened that she finally surrendered the keys of her heart (with reserves: there were certain chambers which she really couldn't and wouldn't unlock, though she spoiled her Harry in every other conceivable way) with fewer regrets than she had thought possible, and with no misgivings at all. Her mind was at rest; she had built her house upon a rock.

March, 1920, on the Semois.

Strong sunshine and silver rain-storms; the winds of the equinox marshaling great swan-white droves of cloud across the blue, the wet earth sparkling like a jewel. The hill of the crucifix was green, pea-green with the growth of young wheat; the hill of woods opposite, still leafless, had a million delicate buds, cloud on cloud of russet, and bronze, and lilac, and faint yellow, and fainter green, softly rounding the shape of every bush. Great oaks detached themselves, gnarled lichen-gray skeletons, distinct in branch and twig, from purple hollows of the woodland. The valley was a streak of emerald; the river glistened like thin silver in the sun.

So peaceful, and so little changed! Across the stream the bridge lay broken-backed, but sounds of hammering came up through the thin air, and midget figures moved about with wheelbarrows, repairing it. Among the crushed roofs of Poupehan white scaffolding took the eye. Farther down the valley, where the woods had been stripped, and the Roche des Corneilles showed bare and gray on a bare purple hill-side, the young plantations were rising among the brushwood in dotted lines of green. The orchards of the Bellevue, brutally hacked down, had been doctored and replanted, and were whitening with early blossom; and through their branches a quick eye could discern other signs of growth and restoration. Of the original Bellevue not one stone was left upon another, but a new one was rising in its room. Soon, very soon, the scars would heal, and all would be as it had been.

One change there was, not due to the tide of war. The forlorn wooden cross on the hill-top had gone: had given place to another, a lovely thing in marble, the inspiration of a French artist, standing forty feet high on its pedestal of steps. It had been put up by an English avion, presumably to commemorate his miraculous escape from death on that very spot, though the inscription on the plinth did not quite tally with that theory. Strange that a heretic and an Englishman should choose to erect a crucifix, stranger still to those who had known this Englishman before; but times change, and men with them. At any rate there stood the cross; and Rochehaut, if it could not understand, was inordinately proud of it. "Eh, madame, vous allez au Christ, n'est-ce pas?" said Madame Hasquin of the farm to the wife of her temporary lodger. "Ah! c'est beau Ça, savez-vous! Mettez une petite priÈre pour moi, je vous prie!"

So Lettice, sitting on the steps with a pair of masculine socks, as she had once sat on the stones with the green tablecloth, added a prayer for little murdered Denise (which was what Madame meant by her moi) to the petition requested by the cross:

THE END