Sister Teresa

ay for the moment about the desert; all the same, he continued to tell of fetid, stale, putrid wells, and of the haunting terror with which the Saharian starts in the morning lest he should find no wa

s ideas, and his life had been lived in accordance with his beliefs. As the years advanced his imaginative writing had become perhaps a little didactic; his culture had become more noticeable-Owen laughed: it pleased him to caricature his friends-and he thought of the stream of culture which every hostess could turn on when Harding was her guest. The phrase pleased him: a stream of culture flowing down the white napery of every country house in England, for Harding travelled from one to another. Owen had seen him laying his plans at Nice, beginning his year as an old woman begins a stocking (setting up the stitches) by writing to Lady So-and-so, saying he was coming back to England at a certain time. Of course Lady So-and-so would ask him to stay with her. Then Harding would write to the nearest neighbour, saying, "I am staying with So-and-so for a week and shall be going on to the north the week after next-now would it be putting you to too much trouble if I were to spend the interval with you?" News of these visits would soon get about, and would suggest to another neighbour that she might ask him for a week. Harding would perhaps answer her that he could not come for a week, but if she would allow him to come for a fortnight he would be very glad because then he would be able to get on to Mrs.--. In a very short time January, February, March, and April would be allotted; and Owen imagined Harding walking under immemorial elms gladdened by great expanses of park and pleased in the contemplation of swards which had been rolled for at least a thousand years. "A castellated wall, a rampart, the remains of a moat, a turreted c

session of him if the House of Lords were seriously threatened. He would leave some seat of ancient story, and proceed towards the midlands, seeking some blast furnace wherein to throw himself. "A sort of modern Empedocles." And Owen laug

hair lost in a great bitterness but without resentment. Next day, acting on a sudden resolve, he started for New York. But he did not remain there

him more perhaps than of the story-a man who suddenly finds his will paralysed. "It was just that, paralysis of will, for after dinner when the time came to go to her I sat thinking of her, unable to get out of my chair, sayin

rstand is why you

n. There you have it, Harding; don't ask me any more for I can't tell you any more. During the voyage I was near out of my mind, and could have thrown mys

r more distinct than ever. Now why is it that one loves one woman more than another, and what is there in this

t, Harding, that a man should love one woman so much more than another? It certainly isn't because she has got a prettier face, or a more perfect figure, or a more sensual temperament; for there is no end to pretty faces, perfect figures, and sensual temperaments. Evelyn was pretty well furnished with these things. I am prepared to admit that she was, but of cours

vine es

inning out of chaos, creating myriads of things or the appearance of different things, for there is only one thing. That is how the mystics talk-isn't it? You know more about them than I do. If to every man some woman represented more of this

ed you into a poet,

just to save oneself from going mad: the empty spaces, the solitude, the sun! One of these days when you have finished y

was

the eagles. Haven't I

me did you meet Tahar, and

you about that lake, about its wild fowl, about the buried city and the heron which was killed. We fou

er. Tell me abo

asis. But you haven't heard about Béclère's, the proprietor, you might say, of one oasis; he discovered a Roma

o hear about the

hing to tell now except I tell it at length: those great birds, nearly three feet high, with long heads like javelins, and round, clear eyes, and lank bodies, feathered thighs, and talons that find out instinctively the v

e these bir

s are carried on the wrist, but a bird three feet high cannot be car

zelles taken and th

hen there are large rocks between which the gazelles can take cover; then the bird will alight on the rock and wait for the deer to be driven out, and the deer dreads the eagle so much that sometimes they won't leave the rocks, and we pick them up in our hands. The instinct of the eagle is extraordinary, as you will see; the first gazelle was a doe, and the eagle swept on in front

deer; now it would be more

ost anything, driving the sheep headlong over the precipices. We caught many a fox. The eagle strikes the fox with one talon, reserving the other to clutch the fox's thro

nes doesn't r

something," O

me this box. You haven't seen the inscription, have you?" And Harding had to get up and read it; he did this with a lack of enthusiasm and interest which annoyed Owen, but which did not prevent him f

who under his moustache wondered how anybody could be so self-centred, so blind to the picture he presented. "Eighty-five let

hought you would

we used to send

her cigarette, and sat down, determined to wait and see. Owen continued talking for the next half-hour. "True, he

ait, Harding; you l

portrait singing like a skylark-background, face, hair, dress-cadenza upon cadenza. When the blinds were let down, the music became graver, and the strain almost a religious one. And these changes in the portrait were like Evelyn herself, for she varied a good deal, as Owen had often remarked to Harding; for one reason or for some other-no matter the reason: suffice it to say that the picture would be like her when the gold had faded from her hair and no pair of stays would discover her hips. And now, sitting looking at it, Owen remembered the seeming accident which had inspired him to bring Evelyn to see the great painter whose genius it had been to Owen's credit to recognise always. One morning in the studio Evelyn had happened to sit on the edge of a chair; the painter had once seen her

ieved with shadow and light, the light faint

t beautiful in the world, and the backg

ding said, "and she rises o

so, H

, perhaps, if he never saw her again. Not to see her again! The words sounded very gloomy; for h

it is getting lat

good-night among the footm

hat the nuns could influence his action at three thousand miles distance, seemed as if he were dropping into some base superstition. Between sleeping and waking a thought emerged which kept him awake till morning: "Why had Evelyn returned to the stage?" When he saw her last at Thornton Grange her retirement seemed to be definitely fixed. Nothing he could say had been able to move her. She was going to retire from the stage.... But she had not done so. Now, who had persuaded her? Was it U

home," the serv

n the mu

ir. Wha

nes, for coming into your house so abruptly, but I was afraid you mightn't see me if I sent in my

are Sir O

e is nothing to tell you; she has been here, I know, and has told you everything. But perhaps you don't know I have just come from t

t answer for

er went to

met was at Thornton Grange, and she told me she had decided definitely to leave the stag

Innes's contempt as much as it did his pity. "All the same he is suffering, and it is clear that he loves her very deeply." So per

phemed in the silence of the old music-room, Innes watching him, amazed tha

week; that is all I k

wen A

r to me whether she returns or not? She won'

ight go on copying. Owen noticed this, but it was impossible for him to leave the room. For the last twelve years he had been thinking a

elp; it," and he dropped into a chair. "You hav

ry well, never laying any bl

an. That is the one th

s character; and Owen could not resist the temptation to try to take Evel

ve story is a little farther back than mine

s is the common lot of all men. The conversation dropped again, and

instruments for the first time. Not one, I think, has disa

of the viola da gamba. But if they were not to talk about Evelyn there was no use tarrying any longer in Dulwich; he had learned

h small, inquisitive eyes who stood watching him must be Owen Asher, hoping that it was not so, and, at the same

it must be you. I had heard so much about you,

sat criticising, watching him rather cynically, interested in his youth and in his thick, rebellious hair, flowing upwards from a white forehead. The full-fleshed face, lit with nervous, grey eyes, reminded Owen of a Roman bust. "A young Roman emperor," he said t

re assembled outside the windows, within hearing of the stories which Ulick was telling about them. Very amusing were the young man's anecdotes and comments, but it seemed t

ck. I don't know if Sir Owen has anything else to do, but

they must part, that was Owen's intention, but before he could utter it Ulick begged of him to wait a second, for he had forgotten his gloves. Without waiting for an answ

tight kid gloves which Ulick was forcing over his fingers. "Do yo

ic, of harpsichords and viols, they walked on t

ust missed

, and there was no other

care for a walk, we might go as far as Peckham. To walk to Lond

not walk to London? We can i