was, somehow, no escaping from it. To check it was impossible; and the gesture of escape was ludicrous. The only sensible thing to do was to go on in the usual way and ignore the things outside the world of noise. That was what Calamy tried to do. But he was conscious, none the less, that the things were still there. They were still calmly and immutably there, however much he might agitate himself and distractedly pretend to ignore them. Mutely they claimed attention. They had claimed it, of late, with a most irritating persistence. Calamy’s response had been to make love to Mary Thriplow. That was something which ought to keep him well occupied. And up to a point it did. Up to a point. The best indoor sport, old Cardan had called it; but one demanded something better. Could he go on like this? Or if not, what should he do? The questions exasperated him. It was because the things were there, outside the tumult, that he had to ask them. They forced themselves on him, those questions. But it was intolerable to be bullied. He refused to let himself be bullied. He’d do what he damned well liked. But then, did he really like philandering with Mary Thriplow? In a way, no doubt, up to a point. But the real answer was no; frankly, no. But yes, yes, he insisted with another part of his mind. He did like it. And even if he didn’t, he’d damned well say that he did. And if necessary he’d damned well do what he didn’t like—just because he chose to. He’d do what he didn’t like; and that was the end of it. He worked himself up into a kind of fury.

‘What are you thinking about?’ Miss Thriplow suddenly asked.

‘You,’ he said; and there was a savage exasperation in his voice, as though he passionately resented the fact that he was thinking about Mary Thriplow.

‘Tiens!’ she said on a note of polite curiosity.

‘What would you say if I told you I was in love with you?’ he asked.

‘I should say that I didn’t believe you.’

‘Do you want me to compel you to believe?’

‘I’d be most interested to know, at any rate, how you proposed to set about it.’

Calamy halted, put his hand on Mary Thriplow’s shoulder and turned her round towards him. ‘By force, if necessary,’ he said, looking into her face.

Miss Thriplow returned his stare. He looked insolent still, still arrogantly conscious of power; but all the drowsiness and indolence that had veiled his look were now fallen away, leaving his face bare, as it were, and burning with a formidable and satanic beauty. At the sight of this strange and sudden transformation Miss Thriplow felt at once exhilarated and rather frightened. She had never seen that expression on a man’s face before. She had aroused passions, but never a passion so violent, so dangerous as this seemed to be.

‘By force?’ By the tone of her voice, by the mockery of her smile she tried to exasperate him into yet fiercer passion.

Calamy tightened his grip on her shoulder. Under his hand the bones felt small and fragile. When he spoke, he found that he had been clenching his teeth. ‘By force,’ he said. ‘Like this.’ And taking her head between his two hands he bent down and kissed her, angrily, again and again. Why do I do this? he was thinking. This is a folly. There are other things, important things. ‘Do you believe me now?’ he asked.

Mary Thriplow’s face was flushed. ‘You’re insufferable,’ she said. But she was not really angry with him.

CHAPTER IV

‘Why have you been so funny all vese days?’ Lord Hovenden had at last brought himself to put the long-premeditated question.

‘Funny?’ Irene echoed on another note, trying to make a joke of it, as though she didn’t understand what he meant. But of course she did understand, perfectly well.

They were sitting in the thin luminous shadow of the olive trees. The bright sky looked down at them between the sparse twi-coloured leaves. On the parched grass about the roots of the trees the sunlight scattered an innumerable golden mintage. They were sitting at the edge of a little terrace scooped out of the steep slope, their legs dangling, their backs propped against the trunk of a hoary tree.

‘You know,’ said Hovenden. ‘Why did you suddenly avoid me?’

‘Did I?’

‘You know you did.’

Irene was silent for a moment before she admitted: ‘Yes, perhaps I did.’

‘But why,’ he insisted, ‘why?’

‘I don’t know,’ she answered unhappily. She couldn’t tell him about Aunt Lilian.

Her tone emboldened Lord Hovenden to become more insistent. ‘You don’t know?’ he repeated sarcastically, as though he were a lawyer carrying out a cross-examination. ‘Perhaps you were walking in your sleep all ve time.’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ she said in a weary little voice.

‘At any rate, I’m not too stupid to see vat you were running after vat fellow Chelifer.’ Lord Hovenden became quite red in the face as he spoke. For the sake of his manly dignity, it was a pity that his th’s should sound quite so childish.

Irene said nothing, but sat quite still, her head bent, looking down at the slanting grove of olives. Framed within the square-cut hair, her face was sad.

‘If you were so much interested in him, why did you suggest vat we should go for a walk vis afternoon?’ he asked. ‘Perhaps you fought I was Chelifer.’ He was possessed by an urgent desire to say disagreeable and hurting things. And yet he was perfectly aware, all the time, that he was making a fool of himself and being unfair to her. But the desire was irresistible.

‘Why do you try to spoil everything?’ she asked with an exasperating sadness and patience.

‘I don’t try to spoil anyfing,’ Hovenden answered irritably. ‘I merely ask a simple question.’

‘You know I don’t take the slightest interest in Chelifer,’ she said.

‘Ven why do you trot after him all day long, like a little dog?’

The boy’s stupidity and insistence began to annoy her. ‘I don’t,’ she said angrily. ‘And in any case it’s no business of yours.’

‘Oh, it’s no business of mine, is it?’ said Hovenden in a provocative voice. ‘Fanks for ve information.’ And he was pointedly silent.

For a long time neither of them spoke. Some dark brown sheep with bells round their necks came straying between the trees a little way down the slope. With set, sad faces the two young people looked at them. The bells made a tinkling as the creatures moved. The sweet thin noise sounded, for some reason, extremely sad in their ears. Sad, too, was the bright sky between the leaves; profoundly melancholy the redder, richer light of the declining sun, colouring the silver leaves, the grey trunks, the parched thin grass. It was Hovenden who at last broke silence. His anger, his desire to say hurting, disagreeable things had utterly evaporated; there remained only the conviction that he had made a fool of himself and been unfair—only that and the profound aching love which had given his anger, his foolish cruel desire such force. ‘You know I don’t take the slightest interest in Chelifer.’ He hadn’t known but now that she had said so, and in that tone of voice, now he knew. One couldn’t doubt; and even if one could, was it worth doubting?

‘Look here,’ he said at last, in a muffled voice, ‘I made a fool of myself, I’m afraid. I’ve said stupid things. I’m sorry, Irene. Will you forgive me?’

Irene turned towards him the little square window in her hair. Her face looked out of it smiling. She gave him her hand. ‘One day I’ll tell you,’ she said.

They sat there hand in hand for what seemed to them at once a very long time and a timeless instant. They said nothing, but they were very happy. The sun set. A grey half-night came creeping in under the trees. Between the black silhouetted leaves the sky looked exceedingly pale. Irene sighed.

‘I think we ought to be getting back,’ she said reluctantly.

Hovenden was the first to scramble to his feet. He offered Irene his hand. She took it and raised herself lightly up, coming forward as she rose towards him. They stood for a moment very close together. Lord Hovenden suddenly took her in his arms and kissed her again and again. Irene uttered a cry. She struggled, she pushed him away.

‘No, no,’ she entreated, averting her face, leaning back, away from his kisses. ‘Please.’ And when he let her go, she covered her face with her hands and began to cry. ‘Why did you spoil it again?’ she asked through her tears. Lord Hovenden was overwhelmed with remorse. ‘We’d been so happy, such friends.’ Irene dabbed her eyes with her handkerchief; but her voice still came sobbingly.

‘I’m a brute,’ said Hovenden; and he spoke with such a passion of self-condemnation that Irene couldn’t help laughing. There was something positively comic about a repentance so sudden and whole-hearted.

‘No, you’re not a brute,’ she said. Her sobs and her laughter were getting curiously mixed up together. ‘You’re a dear and I like you. So much, so much. But you mustn’t do that, I don’t know why. It spoils everything. I was a goose to cry. But somehow . . .’ She shook her head. ‘I like you so much,’ she repeated. ‘But not like that. Not now. Some day, perhaps. Not now. You won’t spoil it again? Promise.’

Lord Hovenden promised devoutly. They walked home through the grey night of the olive orchard.

That evening at dinner the conversation