“Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity!⁠ ⁠… their root shall be as rottenness and their blossom shall go up as dust.”...

To Gabrielle Brooke Moncure Plus sapit vulgus, quia tantum, quantum opus est, sapit....

Mr. Cabell, in making ready this second or intended edition of The Cords of Vanity, performs an act of reclamation which is at the same time an act of fresh creation. For the purely reclamatory aspect...

“In the house and garden of his dream he saw a child moving, and could divide the main streams at least of the winds that had played on him, and study so the first stage in that mental journey.”...

It appeared to me that my circumstances clamored for betterment, because never in my life have I been able to endure the contact of unhappiness. And my mother was always crying now, over (though I did...

It appeared to me that my circumstances clamored for betterment, because never in my life have I been able to endure the contact of unhappiness. And my mother was always crying now, over (though I did...

I lay flat upon my stomach, having found that posture most conformable to the practice of reading, and I considered the cover of this slim, green book; the name of John Charteris, stamped thereon in f...

In such disconnected fashion, as hereafter, I record the moments of my life which I most vividly remember. For it is possible only in the last paragraphs of a book, and for a book’s people only, to lo...

“His has been the summer air, and the sunshine, and the flowers; and gentle ears have listened to him, and gentle eyes have been upon him. Let others eat his honey that please, so that he has had his ...

When I first knew Stella she was within a month of being fifteen, which is for womankind an unattractive age. There were a startling number of corners to her then, and she had but vague notions as to ...

When I first knew Stella she was within a month of being fifteen, which is for womankind an unattractive age. There were a startling number of corners to her then, and she had but vague notions as to ...

All this was at a summer resort, which was called the Green Chalybeate. Stella and I and others of our age attended the hotel hops in the evening with religious punctuality, for well-meaning elders in...

It was a world of sweet odors and strange lights, flooded with a kindly silence which was, somehow, composed of many lispings and trepidations and thin echoes. The night was warm, the sky all transpar...

Then, moved by some queer impulse, I stared over the railing for a little at this great, wonderful, ambiguous world, and said solemnly: “It is good.” “Yes,” Stella agreed, in a curious, quiet and tiny...

In the crude morning I approached Stella, with a fatuous smile. She apparently both perceived and resented my bearing, although she never once looked at me. There was something of great interest to he...

I saw no more of Stella for a lengthy while, since within two days of the events recorded it pleased my mother to seek out another summer resort. “For in September,” she said, “I really must have perf...

I saw no more of Stella for a lengthy while, since within two days of the events recorded it pleased my mother to seek out another summer resort. “For in September,” she said, “I really must have perf...

For in old Fairhaven I spent, of course, a period of ostensible study, as four generations of my fathers had done aforetime. But in that leisured, slatternly and ancient city I garnered a far larger h...

Once Bettie demanded of me, “I often wonder what you really think of me? Honest injun, I mean.” I meditated, and presently began, with leisure: “Miss Hamlyn is a young woman of considerable personal a...

Meantime, during these years, I had fallen in and out of love assiduously. Since the Anabasis of lad’s love traverses a monotonous country, where one hill is largely like another, and one meadow a dup...

“Dear boy,” said Bettie, when I had made an end of reading, “and are you very miserable?” Her fingers were interlocked behind her small black head; and the sympathy with which she regarded me was tend...

“Dear me!” said Stella, wonderingly; “I would never have known you in the world! You’ve grown so fa⁠—I mean, you are so well built. I’ve grown? Nonsense!⁠—and besides, what did you expect me to do in ...

“Dear me!” said Stella, wonderingly; “I would never have known you in the world! You’ve grown so fa⁠—I mean, you are so well built. I’ve grown? Nonsense!⁠—and besides, what did you expect me to do in ...

So that during the fleet moments of these Finals, while our army was effecting a landing in Cuba, I saw as much of Stella as was possible; and veracity compels the admission that she made no marked ef...

I said goodbye to Bettie Hamlyn rather late one evening. It was in her garden. The Finals were over, and Stella had left Fairhaven that afternoon. I was to follow in the morning, by an early train. It...

And all the ensuing summer I followed Stella Musgrave from one watering place to another, with an engaging and entire candor as to my desires. I was upon the verge of my majority, when, under the term...

Stella’s mother had closed Bellemeade for the year, however, and they were to spend the winter in Lichfield; and Stella, to reduplicate her phrase, promised to “think it over very seriously.” But I su...

One woman at least I was beginning to “let alone,” in that I was writing Bettie Hamlyn letters which grew shorter and shorter.⁠ ⁠… Her mother had fallen ill, not long after I left college; and she and...

They named her Stella, I fancy, because her eyes were so like stars. It is manifestly an irrelevant detail that there do not happen to be any azure stars. Indeed, I am inclined to think that Nature be...

So, for the seventh time, I asked Stella to marry me. Nearly every fellow I knew had done as much, particularly Peter Blagden; and it is always a mistake to appear unnecessarily reserved or exclusive....

Yes, it was quite like other weddings. I only wonder for what conceivable reason I remember its least detail, and so vividly. For it all happened a great while ago, when⁠—of such flimsy stuff is glory...

It was upon the evening of this day, after Mr. and Mrs. Blagden had been duly rice-pelted and entrained, that I first talked against John Charteris. The novelist was, as has been said, a cousin of Pet...

It was upon the evening of this day, after Mr. and Mrs. Blagden had been duly rice-pelted and entrained, that I first talked against John Charteris. The novelist was, as has been said, a cousin of Pet...

Charteris had heard, one may presume, of my disastrous love-business; and with all an author’s relish of emotion, in others, chose his gambit swiftly. “Mr. Townsend, is it not? Then may a murrain ligh...

But at this point I raised my hand. “That is easily done, Mr. Charteris, inasmuch as the world cares nothing whatever about it. The world is composed of men and women who have their own affairs to min...

“He said it,” I more lately observed⁠—“yes, he undoubtedly said it. And he wrote ‘Ashtaroth’s Lackey’ and ‘In Old Lichfield’ and ‘The Foolish Prince,’ and he knows all the magazine editors personally,...

So I went to Willoughby Hall, which stands, as you may be aware, upon the eastern outskirt of Fairhaven. My reappearance created some stir among the older students and the town-folk, though, one and a...

So I went to Willoughby Hall, which stands, as you may be aware, upon the eastern outskirt of Fairhaven. My reappearance created some stir among the older students and the town-folk, though, one and a...

By a disastrous chance did Bettie Hamlyn spend that spring, as well as the preceding year, in Colorado with her mother, who died there that summer; and to me Fairhaven proper without Bettie Hamlyn see...

Meanwhile, this was the first time for many years that Willoughby Hall had been occupied by any other than caretakers; and Fairhaven, to confess the truth, was a trifle ill-at-ease before the modish p...

And meanwhile too, John Charteris could never see enough of me, whom, as I today suspect, Charteris was studying conscientiously, to the end that I should be converted into “copy.” For me, I was waiti...

“Well?” I queried, when she had vanished. I was speaking under cover of the orchestra⁠—a courtesy title accorded a very ancient and very feeble piano. “Well, and what do you think of her⁠—of her looks...

“A most enjoyable performance,” said Mr. Charteris, as we came out of the Opera House. “I have always had a sneaking liking for burlesque.” Thereupon he paused to shake hands with Mrs. Adrian Rabbet, ...

We walked slowly down Fairhaven’s one real street, which extends due east from the College for as much as a mile, to end inconsequently in those carefully preserved foundations, which are now the only...

Left to myself, I began to retrace my steps. Solitude had mitigated my craving for tobacco in a surprising manner; indeed, a casual observer might have thought it completely forgotten, for I walked wi...

Left to myself, I began to retrace my steps. Solitude had mitigated my craving for tobacco in a surprising manner; indeed, a casual observer might have thought it completely forgotten, for I walked wi...

“Beastly awkward,” said I, as meditatively; “I’d give a great deal to know how I’m going to get my hat back without breaking through the blessed hedge, and rousing the house, and being taken for a bur...

“Didn’t I know it⁠—didn’t I know it?” I demanded of my soul, and my pulses sang a paean; “I knew, with that voice, she couldn’t be a common actress⁠—a vulgar, raddled creature out of a barn! You not a...

“I really think,” said Miss Montmorenci, judicially, “that it would be best for you to seek some shelter from this devastating wind. It really is not safe, you know, in the open. You might be swept aw...

“And, oh, but it is good to be with you again, Signorina!” cried I, as I came with quick strides into the moonlit garden. I caught both her hands in mine, and laughed like an ineffably contented perso...

“And, oh, but it is good to be with you again, Signorina!” cried I, as I came with quick strides into the moonlit garden. I caught both her hands in mine, and laughed like an ineffably contented perso...

“So you don’t like my stage-name?” she asked, as I sat down beside her. “Well, for that matter, no more do I.” “It doesn’t suit you,” I protested⁠—“not in the least. Whereas, you might be a Signorina ...

She would not tell me her real name. She was unmarried⁠—this much she told me, but of her past life, her profession, or of her future she never spoke. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said, candid...

In fact, the moon seemed to shine down each night upon that particular garden in a more and more delightful and dangerous manner. And I being a fairly normal and healthy young man, the said moonshine ...

Thursday was the twenty-third of the month, so upon that afternoon I wrote to Bettie Hamlyn, in far-off Colorado. It was a lengthy letter. It told her of how desolate her garden was and of how odd Fai...

This was, as I have stated, on Thursday afternoon. Upon the following evening⁠— “And why not?” I demanded, for the ninth time. But she was resolute. “Oh, it is dear of you!” she cried; “and I⁠—I do ca...

“And besides, why not?” I said⁠—for the eleventh time. “There are a thousand reasons. I am not your equal, I am just an ostensible actress⁠—Why, it would be your ruin!” “My dear Mrs. Grundy, I confess...

Yet I approached the garden on Saturday night with an elated heart. This was the last evening of the engagement of the Imperial Dramatic Company. Tomorrow the troupe was to leave Fairhaven; but I was ...

Yet I approached the garden on Saturday night with an elated heart. This was the last evening of the engagement of the Imperial Dramatic Company. Tomorrow the troupe was to leave Fairhaven; but I was ...

I found her beneath a great maple in the heart of the enclosure. It was a place of peace; the night was warm and windless, and the moon, now come to its full glory, rode lazily in the west through a f...

Lethbury was fumbling at the gate. “Such nuishance,” he complained, “havin’ gate won’t unlock. Latch mus’ got los’⁠—po’ li’l latch,” murmured Mr. Lethbury, plaintively⁠—“all ’lone in cruel worl’!” I o...

It was not long before John Charteris knew of the entire affair, for in those days I had few concealments from him: and the little wizened man brooded awhile over my misery, with an odd wistfulness. “...

It was not long before John Charteris knew of the entire affair, for in those days I had few concealments from him: and the little wizened man brooded awhile over my misery, with an odd wistfulness. “...

Upon the doings of myself in Europe during the ensuing two years I prefer to dwell as lightly as possible. I had long anticipated a sojourn in divers old-world cities; but the London I had looked to f...

It was during this first year abroad that I wrote The Apostates, largely through the urging of John Charteris. “You have the ability, though, that dances most gracefully in fetters. You will never wri...

It thus fell about that in the second European year, not very long after my mother’s death, The Apostates was given to the world, with what result the world has had a plenty of time wherein to forget....

I was vexed, however, at the time to find I could not achieve an appropriate emotion over my mother’s death. The news came, to be sure, at a season when I was preoccupied with getting rid of Agnes Far...

Charteris had returned to Algiers in the autumn my book was published, but I elected to pass the winter in England. “Of course,” was Mr. Charteris’s annotation⁠—“because it is precisely the most dange...

“We were just speaking of you,” Mrs. Hardress told me, the afternoon of my arrival⁠—“Blanche and I were talking of you, Mr. Townsend, the very moment we heard your wheels.” I shook hands. “I trust you...

It was the following day, about noon, as I sat intent upon my Paris Herald that a tiny finger thrust a hole in it. I gave an inaudible observation, and observed a very plump young person in white with...

It was the following day, about noon, as I sat intent upon my Paris Herald that a tiny finger thrust a hole in it. I gave an inaudible observation, and observed a very plump young person in white with...

She told me not long after this, “When I saw Gladys loved you, of course I loved you too.” And I hereby soberly record the statement that to have a woman fall thoroughly in love with him is the most u...

I remember one of these contentions. She is abominably rouged, and before me she is grovelling, as she must have seen some actress do upon the stage. “Oh, I lied to you,” she wailed; “but you are so c...

Well, but women are queer. There is positively no way of affronting them, sometimes. She had not even the grace to note that I had taken a little too much to drink that night.⁠ ⁠… But over all this pa...

I remembered, anyway, after Gillian had gone from my room, to write Bettie Hamlyn a postcard. It was no longer, strictly speaking, the twenty-third, but considerably after midnight, of course. Still, ...

And thereafter Gillian Hardress made almost no concealment of her feeling toward me, or employed at best the flimsiest of disguises. All that winter she wrote to me daily, and, when the same roof shel...

They were Americans, I should have said earlier, but to all intents they lived abroad, and had done so for years. Hardress’s father had been thoughtful enough to leave him a sufficient fortune to coun...

“Yes,” I said, “I am to meet the Charterises in Genoa. Yes, it is rather sudden. I am off tomorrow. I shall not see you dear good people for some time, I fancy.⁠ ⁠…” When Hardress had gone the woman s...

I met the Charterises in Genoa, just as I had planned. Anne’s first exclamation was, “Heavens, child, how dissipated you look! I would scarcely have known you.” Charteris said nothing. But he and I lu...

I met the Charterises in Genoa, just as I had planned. Anne’s first exclamation was, “Heavens, child, how dissipated you look! I would scarcely have known you.” Charteris said nothing. But he and I lu...

Francine proved cordial; but John Charteris was ever fickle, and not long afterward an Italian countess, classic in feature, but in coloring smacking of an artistic renaissance, had drawn us both to S...

I lowered my head with a distinct sigh of relief. “I say,” I called, “it is infinitely nicer up here⁠—superb view of the city, and within a minute’s drop of the square! Better come up.” “Go first,” sa...

I heaved another sigh of relief, and waving her aside from the ladder, dragged it after me to the eaves of the rear wing. As I had foreseen, this ladder reached easily to the eaves of the house behind...

“You are,” I cried, with conviction, “the bravest, the most⁠—er⁠—the bravest woman I ever knew!” I heaved a little sigh, but this time of content. “For I wonder,” said I, in my soul, “if you have any ...

Into the lobby of the Hôtel d’Angleterre strolled, an hour later, a tall young man, in a green dressing-gown, and inquired for Charteris. The latter, in evening dress, was mournfully breakfasting in h...

Into the lobby of the Hôtel d’Angleterre strolled, an hour later, a tall young man, in a green dressing-gown, and inquired for Charteris. The latter, in evening dress, was mournfully breakfasting in h...

I was very tired, but I awakened about noon and managed to procure enough clothes to make myself not altogether unpresentable to the public eye. Charteris had gone already about his own affairs, and I...

But I lack the heart to set down all that brief and dreary talk of ours. How does it matter what we said? We two at least knew, even as we talked, that all we said meant in the outcome, nothing. Yet w...

Then I left her. I had not any inclination just now to pursue my fair Elena. Rather I sat alone in my new bedroom, thinking, confusedly, first of Amelia Van Orden, and how I danced with her a good eig...

Then Charteris came into the room. “John,” said I, “this is a truly remarkable world, and only hypercriticism would venture to suggest that it is probably conducted by an inveterate humourist. So lend...

It was on the trip homeward I first met with Celia Reindan. I then considered her a silly little nuisance.⁠ ⁠… For I crossed the Atlantic in a contained fury of repentance for the wasted months. I had...

By the way she looked back over her shoulder, I knew that Stella had not recognized me. I stood with a yet lifted hat, irresolute. “By Jove!” said I, in my soul, “then the Blagdens are in Lichfield! W...

“You are quite by way of being a gentleman,” had been Stella’s greeting, that afternoon. Then, on a sudden, she rested both hands upon my breast. When she did that you tingled all over, in an agreeabl...

“You are quite by way of being a gentleman,” had been Stella’s greeting, that afternoon. Then, on a sudden, she rested both hands upon my breast. When she did that you tingled all over, in an agreeabl...

Stella was all in pink, with golden fripperies sparkling in unanticipated localities. Presumably the gown was tucked and ruched and appliquéd, and had been subjected to other processes past the compre...

“Peter says you talk to everybody that way,” quoth she⁠—almost resentfully, and after a pause. “Oh!” said I. For it was really no affair of Peter’s. And so⁠— “Peter, everybody tells me, is getting fat...

Stella drove on fine afternoons, under the protection of a trim and preternaturally grave tiger. The next afternoon, by a Lichfieldian transition, was irreproachable. I was to remember, afterward, won...

Stella drove on fine afternoons, under the protection of a trim and preternaturally grave tiger. The next afternoon, by a Lichfieldian transition, was irreproachable. I was to remember, afterward, won...

A vagrant puff of wind was abroad in the Boulevard that afternoon. It paused for a while to amuse itself with a stray bit of paper. Presently the wind grew tired of this plaything and tossed between t...

It was Stella’s sister, the Marquise d’Arlanges, who sent for me that night. Across the street a hand-organ ground out its jingling tune as Lizzie’s note told me what the playful wind had brought abou...

Nice customs curtsey to death. I am standing at Stella’s bedside, and the white-capped nurse has gone. There are dim lights about the room, and heavy carts lumber by in the dawn without. A petulant sp...

“Goodbye,” said she, in a tired voice. “Goodbye, Stella,” said I; and I kissed her. “And I don’t think you are a mess. And I don’t hate you.” She was smiling very strangely. “Yes, I remember that firs...

I came to Fairhaven half-bedrugged with memories of Stella’s funeral⁠—say, of how lightly she had lain, all white and gold, in the grotesque and horrid box, and of Peter’s vacant red-rimmed eyes that ...

I came to Fairhaven half-bedrugged with memories of Stella’s funeral⁠—say, of how lightly she had lain, all white and gold, in the grotesque and horrid box, and of Peter’s vacant red-rimmed eyes that ...

It was very odd to see Bettie again. I had been sublimely confident, though, that we would pick up our intercourse precisely where we had left off; and this, as I now know, is something which can neve...

It was a long while afterward I discovered that “some damned good-natured friend,” as Sir Fretful has immortally phrased it, had told Bettie Hamlyn of seeing me at the theatre in Lichfield, with Stell...

That, though, is a business I shall not detail, because it was one of the very vulgarest sort. It was the logical outgrowth of my admiration for her yellow hair⁠—she did have extraordinary hair, confo...

I had meanwhile decided, first, to write another and a better book than The Apostates or Afield had ever pretended to be; and afterward to marry Rosalind Jemmett, whom I found, in my too-hackneyed but...

When I began to scribble these haphazard memories I had designed to be very droll concerning the “provincialism” of Lichfield; for, as every inhabitant of it will tell you, it is “quite hopelessly pro...

I had aforetime ordered Mr. George Bulmer to read The Apostates, and, as the author of this volume explained, from motives that were purely well-meaning. Tonight I was superintending the process. “For...

I had aforetime ordered Mr. George Bulmer to read The Apostates, and, as the author of this volume explained, from motives that were purely well-meaning. Tonight I was superintending the process. “For...

Next morning, I notified the desk-clerk, and, quite casually, both the newspaper correspondents, that the Green Chalybeate was about to be bereft of the presence of a distinguished novelist. Then, as ...

I whistled. Subsequently I galloped back to the hotel. “See here!” said I, to the desk-clerk; “how long does this place keep open?” “Season closes latter part of September, sir.” I told him I would ne...

So it was Uncle George Bulmer who presently left the Green Chalybeate, to pursue Mrs. Chaytor with his lawless arts. I stayed out the season. Now I cannot conscientiously recommend the Green Chalybeat...

So it was Uncle George Bulmer who presently left the Green Chalybeate, to pursue Mrs. Chaytor with his lawless arts. I stayed out the season. Now I cannot conscientiously recommend the Green Chalybeat...

Only it is true that sometimes, when it rained, say, with that hopeless insistency which, I protest, is unknown anywhere else in the world; and when Marian was not immediately accessible, and cigarett...

So the book was builded, after all, a little by a little. Hardly an evening came when after leaving Marian I had not at least one excellent and pregnant jotting to record in my notebook. Now it would ...

“It will be dreadful,” sighed she; “for we have to stay a whole week longer, and I shall come here every afternoon. And there will be only ghosts in the woods, and I shall be very lonely.” “Dear,” sai...

I returned to Lichfield and wrote As the Coming of Dawn. I spent six months in this. My work at first was mere copying of the book that already existed in my brain; but when it was transcribed therefr...

Thus I dandled the child of my brain for a long while, and arrayed it in beautiful and curious garments, adorning each beloved notion with far-sought words that had a taste in the mouth, and would one...

A few weeks later, I sent for Mr. George Bulmer, and informed him of his avuncular connection with a genius; and waved certain typewritten pages to establish his title. Subsequently I read aloud diver...

And I read it with an augmenting irritation. Here was my great and comely idea transmuted by “George Glock”⁠—which was the woman’s foolish pen-name⁠—into a rather clever melodrama, and set forth anyho...

Naturally I put the entire affair into a short story. And⁠—though even to myself it seems incredible⁠—Miss Winwood wrote me within three days of the tale’s appearance, a very indignant letter. For she...

I had, in a general way, intended to marry Rosalind Jemmett so soon as I had completed As the Coming of Dawn; but in the fervour of writing that unfortunate volume, I had at first put off a little, an...

I had, in a general way, intended to marry Rosalind Jemmett so soon as I had completed As the Coming of Dawn; but in the fervour of writing that unfortunate volume, I had at first put off a little, an...

And this gave an additional whet to my intentions. So I called upon the girl, and she, to my chagrin, received me with an air of having danced with me some five or six times the night before; our conv...

It was perhaps a week later she told me: “This, beyond any reasonable doubt, is the Forest of Arden.” “But where Rosalind is is always Arden,” I said, politely. Yet I made a mental reservation as to a...

“I had rather a scene with Alfred yesterday morning. He said you drank, and gambled, and were always running after⁠—people, and weren’t in fine, a desirable person for me to know. He insinuated, in fa...

Now was I come near to the summit of my desires, and advantageously betrothed to a girl with whom I was, in any event, almost in love; but I presently ascertained, to my dismay, that sophisticated, “p...

Now was I come near to the summit of my desires, and advantageously betrothed to a girl with whom I was, in any event, almost in love; but I presently ascertained, to my dismay, that sophisticated, “p...

And in September Rosalind came to visit her Aunt Marcia in Lichfield, to get clothes and all other matters ready for our wedding in November; and Lichfield, as always, made much of Rosalind, and she h...

“I must thank you,” I said, one afternoon, when I arose to go, “for a most pleasant dream of⁠—what we’ll call the Heart’s Desire. I suppose I have been rather stupid, Lizzie; and I apologise for it; b...

But a servant was lighting up the front-hall, and the glare of it came through the open door, and now the room was just like any other room. “And you are Robert Townsend!” the marquise observed. “The ...

But, for all this, I meditated for a long while upon what Lizzie had said. It was true that I was really fond of “proper” little Rosalind Jemmett; concerning myself I had no especial illusions; and, t...

“Do you know why I want to marry you?” I demanded of Rosalind, in such surroundings, apropos of a Mrs. Vokins who had taken a house in Lichfield for the winter, and had been at school somewhere in the...

She left Lichfield the next day but one, and spent the following winter with the aunt that lived in Brooklyn. She was Rosalind Gelwix the next time I saw her.⁠ ⁠… And Aunt Marcia, whose taste is upon ...

Within the week I had repented of what I termed my idiotic quixotism, and for precisely nine days after that I cursed my folly. And then, at the Provises, I comprehended that in breaking off my engage...

Within the week I had repented of what I termed my idiotic quixotism, and for precisely nine days after that I cursed my folly. And then, at the Provises, I comprehended that in breaking off my engage...

“And so,” I said in my soul, as the men redistributed themselves, “she is married⁠—married while you were pottering with books and the turn of phrases and immortality and such trifles⁠—oh, you ass! An...

I found her inspecting a bulky folio with remarkable interest. There was a lamp, with a red shade, that cast a glow over her, such as one sometimes sees reflected from a great fire. The people about u...

She had been a widow even when I first encountered her in Liége. I may have passed her dozens of times, only she was in mourning then, for Barry-Smith, and so I never really saw her. It seems, though,...

She had been a widow even when I first encountered her in Liége. I may have passed her dozens of times, only she was in mourning then, for Barry-Smith, and so I never really saw her. It seems, though,...

Now of Mrs. Vokins I desire to speak with the greatest respect, if only for the reason that she was Elena Barry-Smith’s mother. Mrs. Vokins had, no doubt, the kindest heart in the world; but she had s...

It was, and is, the oddest thing I ever knew of that Elena could have been her daughter. Though, mind you, even today, I cannot commit myself to any statement whatever as concerns Elena Barry-Smith, b...

For instance: the night of the Allardyce dance, after seeing Elena home, I stepped in for a moment to get warm and have her mix me a highball. We sat for a considerable while on the long sofa in the d...

In any event, she was not only beautiful but exceedingly well-to-do likewise, since her dead father and her husband also had provided for her amply; and Lichfield sniggered in consequence, and as a ma...

“Will you not have me, lady?” I began that afternoon. “No, my lord,” she demurely responded, “for I’ve decided it would be too much like living in my Sunday-clothes.” And “I give it up. So what’s the ...

That night Elena and I played bridge against Nannie Allsotts and Warwick Risby. I was very much in love with Elena, but I hold it against her, even now, that she insisted on discarding from strength. ...

And I went homeward almost physically sick with rage. I knew, even then, that, while Elena would forgive me in the outcome, if I set about the matter properly, I could never bring myself to ask forgiv...

It was within a month of this other disaster that Jasper Hardress came to America, accompanied by his wife. They planned a tour of the States, which they had not visited in seven years, and more parti...

It was within a month of this other disaster that Jasper Hardress came to America, accompanied by his wife. They planned a tour of the States, which they had not visited in seven years, and more parti...

For, first, he came as an agent of the Philomatheans, who were endeavouring to secure official recognition by the churches of America and England of a revised translation of, in any event, the New Tes...

And the same afternoon I was alone with Gillian Hardress, for the first time in somewhat more than two years. We had never written each other; I had been too cautious for that; and now when the lean, ...

When I had come again to Lichfield I found that in the brief interim of my absence Elena Barry-Smith, without announcement, had taken the train for Washington, and had in that city married Warwick Ris...

I had within the week, an unsigned communication which, for a long while afterward, I did not comprehend. It was the photograph of an infant, with the photographer’s address scratched from the cardboa...

But now the spring was come again, and, as always at this season, I was pricked with vague longings to have done with roofs and paven places. I wanted to be in the open. I think I wanted to fall in lo...

But now the spring was come again, and, as always at this season, I was pricked with vague longings to have done with roofs and paven places. I wanted to be in the open. I think I wanted to fall in lo...

I was at Gridlington entirely comfortable. It was spring, to begin with, and out of doors in spring you always know, at twenty-five, that something extremely pleasant is about to happen, and that She ...

And a half-hour subsequently, true to my word, I was scaling a ten-foot stone wall, thickly overgrown with ivy. At the top of it I paused, and sat down to take breath and to meditate, my legs meanwhil...

So I regarded her for a rather lengthy interval, considering meanwhile, with an immeasurable content how utterly and entirely impossible it would always be to describe her. Clearly, it would be out of...

So I regarded her for a rather lengthy interval, considering meanwhile, with an immeasurable content how utterly and entirely impossible it would always be to describe her. Clearly, it would be out of...

To this effect, then, I discoursed with my soul, what time I sat upon the wall-top and smiled and kicked my heels to and fro among the ivy. By and by, though, the girl sighed. “You are placing me in a...

But, “She is entirely too adorable,” I reasoned with myself, some three-quarters of an hour later. “In fact, I regard it as positively inconsiderate in any impecunious young person to venture to upset...

“Well?” said Peter. “Well?” said I. “What’s the latest quotation on heiresses?” Mr. Blagden demanded. “Was she cruel, my boy, or was she kind? Did she set the dog on you or have you thrashed by her fa...

“Well?” said Peter. “Well?” said I. “What’s the latest quotation on heiresses?” Mr. Blagden demanded. “Was she cruel, my boy, or was she kind? Did she set the dog on you or have you thrashed by her fa...

The next morning I discoursed with my soul, what time I sat upon the wall-top and smiled and kicked my heels to and fro among the ivy. “For, in spite of appearances,” I debated with myself, “it is bar...

But she did come. She was very much surprised to see me. “You!” she said, with a gesture which was practically tantamount to disbelief. “Why, how extraordinary!” “You rogue!” I commented, internally: ...

By a peculiar coincidence, at twelve o’clock the following day, I happened to be sitting on the same wall at the same spot. Peter said at luncheon it was a queer thing that some people never could man...

“Avis⁠—” “You must not call me that.” “Why not? It’s your name, isn’t it?” “Yes⁠—to my friends.” “Aren’t we friends⁠—Avis?” “We! We have not known each other long enough, Mr. Townsend.” “Oh, what’s th...

Yet, the very next day, paradoxically enough, she told me: “I shall always think of you as a very, very dear friend. But it is quite impossible we should ever be anything else.” “And why, Avis?” “Beca...

For I was, by this time, as thoroughly in love as Amadis of Gaul or Aucassin of Beaucaire or any other hero of romance you may elect to mention. Some two weeks earlier I would have scoffed at the noti...

We met, then, in the clear May morning, with what occult trepidations I cannot say. You may depend upon it, though, we had our emotions. And about us, spring was marshaling her pageant, and from diver...

We met, then, in the clear May morning, with what occult trepidations I cannot say. You may depend upon it, though, we had our emotions. And about us, spring was marshaling her pageant, and from diver...

I had taken both her firm, warm hands in salutation, and held them, for a breathing-space, between my own. And my own hands seemed to me two very gross, and hulking, and raw, and red monstrosities, in...

But, by and by, she questioned me. “Are you sure⁠—quite sure,” she queried, wistfully, “that you wouldn’t rather have me Margaret Hugonin, the heiress?” I raised a deprecatory hand. “Avis!” I reproach...

“I am now” said I, in my soul, “quite immeasurably, and insanely, and unreasonably, and unadulteratedly happy. Why, of course I am.” This statement was advanced just two weeks later than the events pr...

“I am now” said I, in my soul, “quite immeasurably, and insanely, and unreasonably, and unadulteratedly happy. Why, of course I am.” This statement was advanced just two weeks later than the events pr...

And that, oddly enough, was the one private talk I ever had with the Margaret Hugonin whom, for some two weeks, I had believed myself to be upon the verge of marrying; for the next time I conversed wi...

And meanwhile Peter Blagden and I had called at Selwoode once or twice in unison and due estate. And Peter considered “Miss Beechinor a damn fine girl, and Miss Hugonin too, only⁠—” “Only,” I prompted...

For Bettie had answered the wild rhapsody which I wrote to tell her how much in love I was with Elena Barry-Smith. And in the nature of things I had not written Bettie again to tell her I was, and by ...

When I had done so, Bettie shook her head. “Oh, Robin, Robin!” she said, “how did I ever come to raise a child that doesn’t know his own mind for as much as two minutes? And how dared that Barry-Smith...

Nothing had changed. It was as though I had somehow managed, after all, to push back the hands of the clock. Fairhaven accepted me incuriously. I was only “an old student.” In addition, I was vaguely ...

And what I wrote in those last five chapters of my book was so good that in common decency I was compelled to alter the preceding twenty-nine and bring them a bit nearer to Bettie’s standard. For I wa...

All in all, we were a deal more than happy during these three very hot months. It was a sort of Lotus Eaters’ existence, shared by just us two, with Josiah Clarriker intruding occasionally, and with e...

Meantime, I meditated. “I am in love with Avis⁠—oh, granted! I am not the least bit in love with⁠—we will euphemistically say ‘anyone else.’ But confound it! I am coming to the conclusion that marryin...

I started for that walk I was to take. But Dr. Jeal and Colonel Snawley were seated in armchairs in front of Clarriker’s Emporium, just as they had been used to sit there in my college days, enjoying,...

In fine, it is a symbol that I never took the walk which was to dust the cobwebs from my brain and make me just like all the other persons, thick about me, who grow up, and mate, and beget, and die, i...

I was in the act of writing to Avis when the letter came; and I put it aside unopened, until after supper, for I had never found the letters of Avis particularly interesting reading. “It will be what ...

I was in the act of writing to Avis when the letter came; and I put it aside unopened, until after supper, for I had never found the letters of Avis particularly interesting reading. “It will be what ...

I did, some four weeks later, when with a deal of mail I received the last letter I was ever to receive from Avis Beechinor. Wrote Avis: Dear Robert: Thank you very much for returning my letters and f...

In the moonlighted garden I found Bettie. But with her was Josiah Clarriker, Fairhaven’s leading businessman. He shook hands, and whatever delight he may have felt at seeing me was admirably controlle...

“And that,” said I, when Mr. Clarriker had gone, “is what you are actually considering! I have always believed Dickens invented that man to go into one of the latter chapters of Edwin Drood. It is the...

It was two days later that John Charteris came to Fairhaven; and I met him the same afternoon upon Cambridge street. The little man stopped short and in full view of the public achieved what, had he b...

It was excellent to have Charteris to talk against. The little man had many tales to tell me of those dissolute gay people we had known and frolicked with; indeed, I think that he was trying to allure...

Meanwhile he and Bettie got on together a deal better than I had ever anticipated. Charteris, though, received my confidence far too lightly. “You are going to marry her! Why, naturally! Ever since I ...

I was quite contented now and assured as to the future. I foreknew the future would be tranquil and lacking in any particular excitement, and I had already ceded, in anticipation, the last tittle of m...

I was quite contented now and assured as to the future. I foreknew the future would be tranquil and lacking in any particular excitement, and I had already ceded, in anticipation, the last tittle of m...

Next day, in Cedarwood, a woman in mourning⁠—in mourning fluffed and jetted and furbelowed in such pleasing fashion that it seemed flamboyantly to demand immediate consolation of all marriageable male...

Then I caught the afternoon train for Fairhaven, and went back to my capable fiancée. But I walked over to Willoughby Hall that night and found Charteris alone in his queer library, among the serried ...

But I would not go along with Charteris the next morning when he came by the Hamlyns’ on his way to King’s College. I could not, because I was labouring over a batch of proof-sheets; and as I laboured...

But I would not go along with Charteris the next morning when he came by the Hamlyns’ on his way to King’s College. I could not, because I was labouring over a batch of proof-sheets; and as I laboured...

There were two cheques from magazines. Life was very pleasant, in a quiet uneventful world. The Fairhaven Gazette for the week had come, too, to indicate that, as usual, nothing of grave import was ha...

But as I reached out toward the portieres, a man came into the room, entering from the hallway. And I gave a little whistling sound of astonishment and hastened to him with extended hand. “My dear fel...

I had my hand upon the garden-gate, and Hardress had just turned the corner below, going toward Cambridge Street, when Bettie came upon the porch. “Well,” she said, “and who’s your fat friend, Mr. She...

So I waited there alone. Whatever the four shots implied, I must tell Bettie everything, because she was Bettie, and it was not fair I should have any secrets from her. “Oh, just be honest with me,” s...