was anxious to begin; it is almost a fact that, as
she looked at those drawers, she grudged the time
that must be given to-day to Tommy and his ring.
Do you see her now, ready to start? She was
wearing her brown jacket with the fur collar, over
which she used to look so searchingly at Tommy.
To think there was a time when that serene face
had to look searchingly at him I It nearly made
her sad again. She paused to bring out the ring
and take another exultant look at it. It was at-
tached now to a ribbon round her neck. Sweet
ring I She put it to her eyes. That was her way
of letting her eyes kiss it. Then she rubbed them
and it, in case the one had left a tear upon the
other.
And then she went out, joy surging in her heart.
For this was Grizel's glorious hour, the end of it.
79
CHAPTER XXIII
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
It was not Aaron's good fortune to find Tommy.
He should have looked for him in the Den.
In that haunt of happier lovers than he, Tommy
walked slowly, pondering. He scarce noticed
that he had the Den to himself, or that, since he
was last here, autumn had slipped away, leaving
all her garments on the ground. By this time,
undoubtedly, Elspeth had said her gentle No ; but
he was not railing against Fate, not even for strik-
ing the final blow at him through that innocent
medium. He had still too much to do for that —
to help others. There w^ere three of them at
present, and by some sort of sympathetic jugglery
he had an arm for each.
" Lean on me, Grizel — dear sister Elspeth, you
little know the harm you have done — David, old
friend, your hand."
Thus loaded, he bravely returned at the fitting
time to the cottage. His head was not even bent.
Had you asked Tommy what Elspeth would
probably do when she dismissed David, he might
80
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
have replied that she would go up to his room and
lock herself into it, so that no one should disturb
her for a time. And this he discovered, on return-
ing home, was actually what had happened. How
well he knew her I How distinctly he heard every
beat of her tender heart, and how easy to him to
tell why it was beating ! He did not go up ; he
waited for little Elspeth to come to him, all in her
own good time. And when she came, looking
just as he knew she would look, he had a brave,
bright face for her.
She was shaking after her excitement, or perhaps
she had ceased to shake and begun again as she
came down to him. He pretended not to notice
it; he would notice it the moment he was sure
she wanted him to, but perhaps that would not
be until she was in bed and he had come to say
good-night and put out her light, for, as we
know, she often kept her great confidences till
then, when she discovered that he already knew
them.
" The doctor has been in."
She began almost at once, and in a quaking
voice and from a distance, as if in hope that the
bullet might be spent before it reached her brother.
" I am sorry I missed him," he replied cau-
tiously. " What a fine fellow he is I "
"You always liked him," said Elspeth, clinging
eagerly to that.
81
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
'No one could help liking him. Elspeth. he has
such winning ways," said Tommy, perhaps a little
in the voice with which at funerals we reter to the
departed. She loved his words, but she knew she
had a surprise tor him this time, and she tried to
blurt it out.
" He said something to me. He — oh. what a
high opinion he has of you I " (^She really thought
he^'had.)
*' Was that the something*? " Tommv asked,
with a smile that helped her. as it was meant
to do.
" You understand, don't you *? " she said, almost
in a whisper.
" Of course I do, Elspeth." he answered reas-
suringly: but somehow she still thought he didn't.
"No one could have been more manly and
crentle and humble.'' she said beseechinc^ly.
" I am sure of it/' said Tommy.
"He thinks nothing of himself,'* she said.
" We shall always think a great deal of him,"
replied Tommy.
" Yes. but " Elspeth found the strangest
difficulty in continuing, for, though it would have
surprised him to be told so. Tommy was not help-
ing her nearly as much as he imamned.
" I told him,'' she said, shaking, " that no one
could be to me what you were. I told him "
and then timid Elspeth altogether broke down.
82
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
Tommy drew her to him, as he had so often done
since she was the smallest child, and pressed her
head against his breast, and waited. So often he
had waited thus upon Elspeth.
" There is nothing to cry about, dear," he said
tenderly, when the time to speak came. " You
have, instead, the right to be proud that so good a
man loves you. I am very proud of it, Elspeth."
" If I could be sure of that ! " she gasped.
" Don't you believe me, dear ? "
"Yes, but — that is not what makes me cry.
Tommy, don't you see ^ "
"Yes," he assured her, " I see. You are crying
because you feel so sorry for him. But I don't feel
sorry for him, Elspeth. If I know anything at all,
it is this : that no man needs pity who sincerely
loves ; whether that love be returned or not, he
walks in a new and more beautiful world for
evermore."
She clutched his hand. " I don't understand
how you know those things," she whispered.
Please God, was Tommy's reflection, she should
never know. He saw most vividly the pathos of
his case, but he did not break down under it ; it
helped him, rather, to proceed.
" It will be the test of Gemmell," he said, " how
he bears this. No man, I am very sure, was ever
told that his dream could not come true more
kindly and tenderly than you told it to him." He
83
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
was in the middle of the next sentence (a fine one)
before her distress stopped him.
" Tommy," she cried, " you don't understand.
That is not what I told him at all ! "
It was one of the few occasions on which the
expression on the face of T. Sandys perceptibly
changed.
" What did you tell him ? " he asked, almost
sharply.
" I accepted him," she said guiltily, backing
away from this alarming face.
" What ! "
" If you only knew how manly and gentle and
humble he was," she cried quickly, as if something
dire might happen if Tommy were not assured of
this at once.
" You — said you would marry him, Elspeth ? "
" Yes ! "
" And leave me ? "
" Oh, oh I " She flung her arms around his neck.
" Yes, but that is what you are prepared to do ! "
said he, and he held her away from him and stared
at her, as if he had never seen Elspeth before.
" Were you not afraid? " he exclaimed, in amaze-
ment.
" I am not the least bit afraid," she answered.
" Oh Tommy, if you knew how manly " And
then sh^ remembered that she had said that
already.
84
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
" You did not even say that you would — con-
sult me ? "
" Oh, oh ! "
" Why didn't you, Elspeth ? "
"I — I forgot I" she moaned. "Tommy, you
are angry I " She hugged him, and he let her do
it, but all the time he was looking over her head
fixedly, with his mouth open.
"And I was always so sure of you I " were the
words that came to him at last, with a hard little
laugh at the end of them.
" Can you think it makes me love you less," she
sobbed, "because I love him, too? Oh, Tommy,
I thought you would be so glad ! "
He kissed her; he put his hand fondly upon her
head.
" I am glad," he said, with emotion. " When
that which you w^ant has come to you, Elspeth,
how can I but be glad ? But it takes me aback,
and if for a moment I felt forlorn, if, when I
should have been rejoicing only in your happiness,
the selfish thought passed through my mind,
'What is to become ofme?' I hope — I hope "
Then he sat down and buried his face in the table.
And he might have been telling her about
Grizell Has the shock stunned you. Tommy'?
Elspeth thinks it has been a shock of pain. May
we lift your head to show her your joyous face ?
" I am so proud," she was saying, " that at last,
85
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
after you have done so much for me, I can do a
httle thing for you. For it is something to free
you, Tommy. You have always pretended, for
my sake, that we could not do without each other,
but we both knew all the time that it was only I
who was unable to do without you. You can't
deny it."
He might deny it, but it was true. Ah, Tommy,
you bore with her with infinite patience, but did it
never strike you that she kept you to the earth '?
If Elspeth could be happy without you ! You
were sure she could not, but if she could I — had that
thought never made you flap your wings ?
" I often had a pain at my heart," she told him,
" which I kept from you. It was a feeling that
your solicitude for me, perhaps, prevented your
caring for any other woman. It seemed terrible
and unnatural that I should be a bar to that. I
felt that I was starving you, and not you only, but
an unknown woman as well."
" So long as I had you, Elspeth," he said
reproachfully, " was not that enough *? "
" It seemed to be enough," she answered gravely,
" but even while I comforted myself with that, I
knew that it should not be enough, and still I
feared that if it was,, the blame was mine. Now
I am no longer in the way, and I hope, so ardently,
that you will fall in love, like other people. If
you never do, I shall always have the fear that
86
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
I am the cause, that you lost the capacity in the
days when I let you devote yourself too much to
me."
Oh, blind Elspeth I Now is the time to tell
her, Tommy, and fill her cup of happiness to the
brim.
But it is she who is speaking still, almost
gaily now, yet with a full heart. " What a time
you have had with me, Tommy ! I told David
all about it, and what he has to look forward to,
but he says he is not afraid. And w^hen you find
someone you can love," she continued sweetly,
though she had a sigh to stifie, " I hope she will be
someone quite unlike me, for oh, my dear, good
brother, I know you need a change."
Not a word said Tommy.
She said, timidly, that she had begun to hope of
late that Grizel might be the woman, and still he
did not speak. He drev/ Elspeth closer to him,
that she might not see his face and the horror of
himself that surely sat on it. To the very marrow
of him he was in such cold misery that I wonder
his arms did not chill her.
This poor devil of a Sentimental Tommy ! He
had wakened up in the world of facts, where he
thought he had been dwelling of late, to discover
that he had not been here for weeks, except at
meal-times. During those weeks he had most
honestly thought that he was in a passion to be
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
married. What do you say to pitying instead of
cursing him? It is a sudden idea of mine, and we
must be quick, for joyous Grizel is drawing near,
and this, you know, is the chapter in which her
heart breaks.
It was Elspeth who opened the door to Grizel.
" Does she know ? " said Elspeth to herself, before
either of them spoke.
" Does she know ? " It was what Grizel was
saying also.
" Oh, Elspeth, I am so glad I David has , told
me."
" She does know," Elspeth told herself, and she
thought it was kind of Grizel to come so quickly.
She said so.
" She doesn't know I " thought Grizel, and then
these two kissed for the first time. It was a kiss
of thanks from each.
" But why does she not know ? " Grizel wondered
a little as they entered the parlour, where Tommy
was; he had been standing with his teeth knit
since he heard the knock. As if in answer to the
question, Elspeth said : " I have just broken it to
Tommy. He has been in a few minutes only, and
he is so surprised he can scarcely speak."
Grizel laughed happily, for that explained it.
Tommy had not had time to tell her yet. She
laughed again at Elspeth, who had thought she
88
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
had so much to tell and did not know half the
story.
Elspeth begged Tommy to listen to the beauti-
ful things Grizel was saying about David, but,
truth to tell, Grizel scarcely heard them herself
She had given Tommy a shy, rapturous glance.
She was w^ondering when he w^ould begin. What
a delicious opening w^hen he shook hands I Sup-
pose he had kissed her instead ! Or, suppose he
casually addressed her as darling I He might do
it at any moment now I Just for once she would
not mind though he did it in public. Perhaps as
soon as this new remark of Elspeth's was finished,
he meant to say : " You are not the only engaged
person in the room, Miss Elspeth ; I think I see
another two I " Grizel laughed as if she had heard
him say it. And then she ceased laughing sud-
denly, for some little duty had called Elspeth into
the other room, and as she went out she stopped
the movement of the earth.
These two were alone w^ith their great joy.
Elspeth had said that she would be back in two
minutes. Was Grizel w^asting a moment w^hen
she looked only at him, her eyes filmy with love,
the crooked smile upon her face so happy that it
could not stand still? Her arms made a slight
gesture towards him ; her hands were open ; she
was giving herself to him. She could not see.
For a fraction of time the space between them
89
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
seemed to be annihilated. His arms were closing
round her. Then she knew that neither of them
had moved.
" Grizel I "
He tried to be true to her by deceiving her. It
was the only way. " At last, Grizel," he cried,
"- at last ! " and he put joyousness into his voice.
" It has all come right, dear one ! " he cried like an
ecstatic lover. Never in his life had he tried so
hard to deceive at the sacrifice of himself But he
was fighting something as strong as the instinct
of self-preservation, and his usually expressionless
face gave the lie to his joyous words. Loud above
his voice his ashen face was speaking to her, and
she cried in terror, "What is wrong'?" Even
then he attempted to deceive her, but suddenly
she knew the truth.
" You don't want to be married ! "
I think the room swam round with her. When
it was steady again, " You did not say that, did
you â– ? " she asked. She was sure he had not said
it. She was smiling again tremulously to show
him that he had not said it.
" I want to be married above all else on earth,"
he said imploringly; but his face betrayed him
still, and she demanded the truth, and he was
forced to tell it.
A little shiver passed through her, that was
all.
90
TOMMY LOSES GRIZEL
" Do you mean that you don't love me ? " she
said. "You must tell me what you mean."
" That is how others would put it, I suppose,"
he replied. " I believe they would be wrong. I
think I love you in my own way; but I thought
I loved you in their way, and it is the only way
that counts in this world of theirs. It does not
seem to be my world. I was given wings, I think,
but I am never to know that I have left the earth
until I come flop upon it with an arrow through
them. I crawl and wriggle here, and yet" — he
laughed harshly — "I believe I am rather a fine
fellow when I am flying ! "
She nodded. " You mean you want me to let
you off?" she asked. "You must tell me what
you mean." And as he did not answer instantly,
"Because I think I have some little claim upon
you," she said, with a pleasant smile.
"I am as pitiful a puzzle to myself as I can be
to you," he replied. " All I know is that I don't
want to marry anyone. And yet I am sure I
could die for you, Grizel."
It was quite true. A burning house and Grizel
among the flames, and he would have been the
first on the ladder. But there is no such luck for
you, Tommy.
" You are free," was what she said. " Don't
look so tragic," she added, again with the pleasant
smile. " It must be very distressing to you, but —
91
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
you will soon fly again." Her lips twitched tremu-
lously. '' I can't fly," she said.
She took the ring from her neck. She took it
ofl" its ribbon.
" I brought it," she said, " to let you put it on
my finger. I thought you would want to do that,"
she said.
" Grizel," he cried, " can we not be as we have
been ? "
" No," she answered.
" It would all come right, Grizel. I am sure it
would. I don't know why I am as I am ; but I
shall try to change myself. You have borne with
me since we were children. Won't you bear with
me for a little longer ^ "
She shook her head, but did not trust herself to
speak.
" I have lost you," he said, and she nodded.
" Then I am lost indeed ! " said he, and he knew
it, too ; but with a gesture of the hand she begged
him not to say that.
"Without your love to help me " he began.
" You shall always have that," she told him with
shining eyes, " always, always." And what could
he do but look at her with the wonder and the awe
that come to every man who, for one moment in
his life, know^s a woman well ?
" You can love me still, Grizel ! " His voice
was shaky.
92
TOMxMY LOSES GRIZEL
" Just the same," she answered, and I suppose
he looked uphfted. " But you should be sorry,"
she said gravely, and it was then that Elspeth
came back. She had not much exceeded her two
minutes.
It was always terrible to Tommy not to have
the feelings of a hero. At that moment he could
not endure it. In a splendid burst of self-sacrifice
he suddenly startled both Grizel and himself by
crying, " Elspeth, I love Grizel, and I have just
asked her to be my wife."
Yes, the nobility of it amazed himself, but be-
witched him, too, and he turned gloriously to
Grizel, never doubting but that she would have
him still.
He need not have spoken so impulsively, nor
looked so grand. She swayed for an instant and
then was erect again. " You must forgive me,
Elspeth," she said, " but I have refused him " ; and
that was the biggest surprise Tommy ever got in
his life.
" You don't care for him I " Elspeth blurted out.
"Not in the way he cares for me," Grizel re-
plied quietly, and when Elspeth would have said
more she begged her to desist. " The only thing
for me to do now, Elspeth," she said, smiling, "is
to run away, but I want you first to accept a little
wedding-gift from me. I wish you and David so
much happiness; you won't refuse it, will you?"
93
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
Elspeth, still astounded, took the gift. It was a
little garnet ring.
" It will have to be cut," Grizel said. " It was
meant, I think, for a larger finger. I have had it
some time, but I never wore it."
Elspeth said she would always treasure her ring,
and that it was beautiful.
" I used to think it — rather sweet," Grizel ad-
mitted, and then she said good-bye to them both
and went away.
94
CHAPTER XXIV
THE MONSTER
Tommy's new character was that of a monster. He
always Hked the big parts.
Concealed, as usual, in the garments that clung
so oddly to him, modesty, generosity, indifference
to applause and all the nobler impulses, he could
not strip himself of them, try as he would, and so
he found, to his scornful amusement, that he still
escaped the public fury. In the two months that
preceded Elspeth's marriage there was positively
scarce a soul in Thrums who did not think rather
well of him. " If they knew what I really am," he
cried with splendid bitterness, " how they would
run from me I "
Even David could no longer withhold the hand
of fellowship, for Grizel would tell him nothing,
except that, after all, and for reasons sufficient to
herself, she had declined to become Mrs. Sandys.
He sought in vain to discover how Tommy could
be to blame. " And now," Tommy said grimly to
Grizel, " our doctor thinks you have used me
badly, and that I am a fine fellow to bear no resent-
95
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
ment I Elspeth told me that he admires the gentle
and manly dignity with which I submit to the
blow, and I have no doubt that, as soon as I heard
that, I made it more gentle and manly than ever I
" I have forbidden Elspeth," he told her, " to up-
braid you for not accepting me, with the result that
she thinks me too good to live I Ha, ha I what do
you think, Grizel ? "
It became known in the town that she had re-
fused him. Everybody was on Tommy's side.
They said she had treated him badly. Even Aaron
was staggered at the sight of Tommy accepting his
double defeat in such good part. "And all the
time I am the greatest cur unhung," says Tommy.
" Why don't you laugh, Grizel ? "
Never, they said, had there been such a generous
brother. The town was astir about this poor man's
gifts to the lucky bride. There were rumours that
among the articles was a silver coal-scuttle, but it
proved to be a sugar-bowl in that pattern. Three
bandboxes came for her to select from ; somebody
discovered who was on the watch, but may I be
struck dead if more than one went back. Yester-
day it was bonnets; to-day she is at Tilliedrum
again, trying on her going-away dress. And she
really was to go away in it, a noticeable thing, for
in Thrums society, though they usually get a
going-away dress, they are too canny to go away
in it. The local shops were not ignored, but the
96
THE MONSTER
best of the trousseau came from London. " That
makes the second box this week, as I 'm a hving
sinner," cries the lady on the watch again. When
boxes arrived at the station Corp wheeled them
up to Elspeth without so much as looking at the
label.
Ah, what a brother I They said it openly to
their own brothers, and to Tommy in the way they
looked at himi.
" There has been nothing like it," he assured
Grizel, " since Red Riding-hood and the wolf.
Why can't I fling off my disguise and cry, ' The
better to eat you with I ' "
He always spoke to her now^ in this vein of mag-
nificent bitterness, but Grizel seldom rewarded him
by crying, " Oh, oh ! " She might, however, give
him a patient, reproachful glance instead, and it
had the irritating effect of making him feel that
perhaps he was under life-size, instead of over it.
" I daresay you are right," says Tommy, savagely.
" I said nothing."
" You don't need to say it. What a grand
capacity you have for knocking me off my horse,
Grizel I "
" Are you angry with me for that '? "
"No; it is delicious to pick one's self out of the
mud, especially when you find it is a baby you are
picking up, instead of a brute. Am I a baby only,
Grizel ? "
97
TOMMY AND GRIZEL
" I think it is childish of you," she replied, " to
say you are a brute."
"There is not to be even that satisfaction, left to
me I You are hard on me, Grizel."
" I am trying to help you. How can you be
angry with me '? "
" The instinct of self-preservation, I suppose. I
see myself dwindling so rapidly under your treat-
ment that soon there will be nothing of me left."
It was said cruelly, for he knew that the one
thing Grizel could not bear now was the implica-
tion that she saw his faults only. She always went
down under that blow with pitiful surrender, show-
ing the woman suddenly, as if under a physical
knouting.
He apologized contritely. "But, after all, it
proves my case," he said^ "for I could not hurt
you in this way, Grizel, if I were not a pretty
well-grown specimen of a monster."
" Don't," she said ; but she did not seek to help
him by drawing him away to other subjects, which
would have been his way. " What is there mon-
strous," she asked, " in your being so good to El-
speth*? It is very kind of you to give her all
these things."
"Especially when by rights they are yours,
Grizel ! "
" No, not when you did not want to give them
to me."
98
THE xMONSTER
He dared say nothing to that ; there were some
matters on which he must not contradict Grizel
now.
" It is nice of you," she said, " not to complain,
though Elspeth is deserting you. It must have
been a blow."
" You and I only know why," he answered.
" But for her, Grizel, I might be whining sentiment
to you at this moment."
" That," she said, " would be the monstrous
thing."
"And it is not monstrous, I suppose, that I
should let Gemmell press my hand under the
conviction that, after all, I am a trump."
" You don't pose as one."
" That makes them think the more highly of
me ! Nothing monstrous, Grizel, in my standing
quietly by while you are showing Elspeth how to
furnish her house — I, who know w^hy you have
the subject at your finger-tips ! "
For Grizel had given all her sweet ideas to
Elspeth. Heigh-ho I how she had guarded them
once, confiding them half reluctantly even to
Tommy; half reluctantly, that is, at the start,
because they were her very own, but once she
was embarked on the subject talking with such
rapture that every minute or two he had to beg her
to be calm. She was the first person in that part of