CHAPTER XVII

“Our mind receives but what it holds—no more.”

PEOPLE whom everybody considers tender-hearted and good-natured do not like to wake up to the fact that they are neither. It takes a good deal to wake them up to it, and they are apt to be indignant and incredulous even then. Gladys had always been considered particularly, gracefully unselfish. People might think her a little astonishing and unconventional, but this they put down to her American training; as for being underhand, cruel and grasping, no one would have dreamed it of her, and she least of all of herself. Love is a teacher of many lessons, and tears away all screens; there is no room left for anything but the real.

Love and pain together are the two world forces for sincerity, and Gladys’ sincerity was not pleasant to look at. She was possessed with the one desire—Jack. She wanted him; she hated everything and everybody else. Right and wrong became two faint, inadequate words; she would have stopped at nothing to gain her ends.

Even the dramatic instinct which had carried her through emotional friendships made her attractive and alluring to those to whom she was utterly indifferent, devout and regular in her religious attendances, eager and sympathetic over the miseries of the poor, they were all swept away. She planned, plotted, schemed and lived to meet and win Jack Hurstly.

For the sake of meeting him she made friends to a far greater extent with Edith le Mentier. She smiled in tender graciousness upon Alec Bruce, she treated Sir Arthur Dallerton when she met him with the greatest interest and respect.

It was through him she learned first that Muriel was not going to India, second that her engagement with Jack Hurstly was “off,” after that she ceased to take any interest in him at all. People said it was time she was married.

It took Jack a long time to realize that Muriel meant what she said. He wrote again, and it was not till she stopped answering him that he began to believe her. The key he held to the woman riddle says that “A woman who goes on saying no is easier to turn than the woman who says nothing.” India and the old influences of the regiment had undone a good deal of her training.

Jack told himself he was a fool to have loved her, and agreed with the world’s verdict that she “really went too far.” In fact the world turned its back on her. She had had two good marriages in her hand and thrown them away; her society was a strain; she did unheard-of things; she was really better in the slums.

Everybody told him he was well out of it, and though he was outwardly indignant at their judgment it took the edge off his sorrow. He grew rapidly strong, and hunted more than ever. He was not to be invalided home, and he had been very badly treated. He looked upon this as virtual absolution for whatever dissipations he might be led into. Even in the nineteenth century few men have found a better excuse than “The woman Thou gavest me.”

One evening as Jack sat smoking in his quarters, wondering lazily what sort of a drink it would be most possible to enjoy, a knock at the door aroused him from his thoughts, and gave entrance to a favorite young subaltern.

“Hullo, Musgrave!—come in!” he said with warmth. “Have a drink?” he added as the young fellow sank into a chair. Musgrave shook his head. “Anything up?” Jack asked with surprise.

“Nothing particular,” said Jim Musgrave. “My aunt’s coming out here, though. I shall have to sit up for her.”

“Oh! I say that’s bad,” said his friend sympathetically.

“She’s going to bring a mighty pretty girl out with her, though, to jam the powder,” said the nephew irreverently. “The fact of the matter is I believe it’s for the girl’s sake she’s coming. There’s an awful dearth going on in London—herds of pretty girls and nothing to gain by it, you know—I don’t know what England’s coming to—we’re so scarce—they say the returns after the season are something awful!” Jack laughed grimly.

“I’m one of them,” he said. “I didn’t make myself scarce enough it seems. Who’s your aunt, by-the-bye? Perhaps I know her.”

“Mrs. Huntly. Her husband was a fellow of ‘ours,’ you know; but he got on the shelf, and they gave him some appointment at home to hush him asleep with. We have an awfully short day, haven’t we? And a beastly hot one!” The young man’s eyes grew wistful, for he loved his profession; and he had not been out long enough to grow stale, or to have his ambitions adjust themselves to lower standards. Jack sighed.

“It’s a bit too long for some of us,” he said; and he dutifully thought of Muriel, till the remembrance of a polo match transformed them both into enthusiasts, and the talk grew unintelligibly technical.

It was not until Jim Musgrave rose to go back to his own quarters that Jack remembered to tell him that his aunt was an old friend of his, and to ask if the pretty girl was her cousin, Miss Travers.

“By Jove, do you know her?” shouted the surprised Jim. Jack nodded.

“Good-night!” he said briefly, and Jim took his dismissal, wondering how well his friend had known Miss Travers. Jack remembered the look in Gladys’ eyes, and resolutely pretended that it meant nothing; nevertheless he was not altogether sorry he was going to see her again. He told himself it was because she was Muriel’s great friend.

Then he went out to have a final look at the pony; it was necessary that it should be really fit for to-morrow’s match.