Katherine sighed.

"I suppose it is indeed divine, but please do not let us talk of it; it makes everyday life grey and commonplace by contrast."

The Duke was sufficiently master of himself to realise that it was wiser to take her advice. To discuss love on a March morning with this most attractive and forbidden young woman was not wisdom, so he changed the subject by expressing his contrition at having come to the schoolroom.

He hated to think that his chivalry had been at fault.

Then they talked of many things, all in the abstract, evolution and ethics and aspirations and theories, and at last Katherine said:

"How glorious to be you! To have all that is n.o.ble your own by right, and so to have leisure to let your soul expand to the highest, without wasting it in the struggle to emerge from clay."

Her deep voice had a pa.s.sion in it, and her eyes flashed. "You, and all aristocrats, should be grateful to G.o.d."

Later in the day, Mordryn felt that it was fortunate that at this particular moment they had reached the gate of the far lodge, the opening of which broke the spell, of what he might have answered he did not feel altogether sure, so deeply had she affected him.

Mrs. Peterson was a good deal better, it seemed, and Katherine proposed to stay with her for half an hour--so she came out of the door and asked the Duke not to wait for her.

"Go back without me--I have been so happy--and please--do not talk to me any more to-day--and, oh! please, remember who you are and who I am, and leave me alone."

And to his intense surprise and sudden unhinging, her fearless glance was softened by a mist which might have presaged tears.

CHAPTER XXVIII

Mordryn spent a most unrestful day; he found it very difficult to settle to anything. He felt it wiser whenever his thoughts turned to Katherine Bush, immediately to picture Bindon's Green and the auctioneer father and butcher grandfather!--they acted as a kind of antidote to the very powerful intoxicant which was flooding his veins.

And Katherine sat typing mechanically her morning's work, but some third sense beyond eye and hand was busy with agitating thoughts. No, she could play no further game with the Duke, fate had beaten her. It would be no acting. She knew that she was just a woman, after all, and he was a man, and the Dukedom had gone into shadowland.

He possessed everything that Algy had lacked, there would be no blank half-hours when pa.s.sion was lulled, with him. His perfectly cultivated intellect could enchant her always. She adored his point of view, as unconsciously arrogant as Lady Garribardine's, and yet as free and expanded. How she could soar with him to guide her! What happiness to take refuge from everything in his arms.

He did not seem old to her; indeed, except for his thick, iron-grey hair and the expression of having greatly suffered, which now and then showed in his proud eyes, there were no unlovely signs of age about him. He could still call forth for many years the pa.s.sionate love of women. And what was age? A ridiculous phantasy--the soul was the thing.

Katherine was beginning to believe that she herself had a soul, and that Otto Weininger was altogether wrong about individuals, even if his deductions were correct concerning the majority of women.

Several guardsmen from Windsor came over to luncheon, which was so crowded that there was no necessity for Katherine to go down, and tea came before she again saw the Duke. He deliberately allowed himself to be entrapped by one of the trio of Graces, and did not come near her; and when Katherine got into the drawing-room after dinner, he was nowhere in sight. A Cabinet Minister, one of the few Her Ladyship considered sufficiently worthy to be allowed to visit Blissington, had arrived in the afternoon, and the Duke and the hostess, and another man and woman, made a group in the small, red drawing-room in earnest converse; while most of the rest of the company danced in the hall. And Katherine went among these, and presently she slipped up to her old schoolroom.

His Grace was carrying out her request, it appeared, but therein she found no joy.

And later, Mordryn drank his final hock and seltzer in his old friend's boudoir, where they had a little talk together alone.

"It has been dear of you to stay so long, Mordryn," she told him.

"Especially as the diversions which I hoped I had provided for you turned out of no more use than a plague of gnats. I hope you have not been too bored?"

"I am never bored with you, dear friend."

"No, I know that; but in a big party, I cannot give you as much time as I should like. You will come again when we are quiet, though, just as you always used to, and I will really find you a suitable bride."

The Duke was in a cynical mood, it seemed, for he treated this proposal not at all in the light fashion he had done at the beginning of the visit.

He replied gloomily that he had decided to select something steady and plain, if he must marry--he knew he could never care for a woman again, and a healthy, quiet, well-bred creature with tact, who would leave him alone, was all he asked. Life was a hideous disappointment and very difficult to understand, and to try to do one's duty to one's state, and get through with it, was all that anyone could hope to accomplish.

But to this Her Ladyship said a vigorous, "Tut--tut! You speak like a boy crossed in love, Mordryn! If you were five-and-twenty, you could not have a more delightful vista opening out in front of you, '_Si jeunesse savait. Si vieillesse pouvait_'--that was cried from a wise and envious heart! Well, you both _know_ and _can_, so what more could a man ask of fate! I have no patience with you! I don't want you now only to do your duty, to fulfil the obligations of your station. You have always done so. Your life has been one long carrying out of _n.o.blesse oblige_. I want you to kick over the traces and be happy, Mordryn! Ridiculously, boyishly happy!--do you hear, conscientious martyr!"

Mordryn heard, but his smile was still bitter, as he answered:

"We are not so made, Seraphim, neither you nor I--we could not do as you say, even when we were young, and tradition and obligation to our order will still dominate us to the end of time, dear friend."

Then he said good-night and good-bye--for he was leaving at c.o.c.k-crow for a place of his in the North.

When Lady Garribardine was alone, she did not look at all disturbed at the pa.s.sage of events, as she reviewed her Easter party. She smiled happily, in fact, and decided that she would take her secretary to Valfreyne for Whitsuntide, after all!

Man "proposed," but, she reflected sagely, G.o.d often "disposed" in favour of intelligent women!

In the following week, the establishment from Blissington moved up to Berkeley Square for the season, and Katherine's duties became heavy again.

Her first meeting with Gerard Strobridge happened quite soon; he came into the secretary's room from the library after luncheon.

"Now tell me all about everything," he said. "I have gathered from Gwendoline that you came down every night and had your usual success at the Easter party, and that Mordryn evidently liked you, for he told Gwen that you were the most intelligent girl that he had ever met."

Katherine half smiled, a little sadly.

"Yes, he may have thought so, but eventually the secretary swallowed up the guest. I do not know if he will ever speak to me again."

"He felt as badly as that, did he! Poor Mordryn! No doubt you tormented him; but Mordryn is no weak creature like me. If he feels very much about you, he will either defy convention, or break away from all temptation"--then his voice changed, and he asked a little anxiously:

"Katherine, do you begin to care for him?"

"Yes."

"How much?"

"I do not know--I could care a great deal--he pleases me in every way--I love his looks and his mind--and he--he makes me feel something which I have never felt before--is it the capability for devotion?--I do not know."

For the first time in their acquaintance, Mr. Strobridge saw her undecided, gentle, a little helpless even--it touched him deeply. He loved her so very dearly. He would rather see her happy if he could aid her to become so. He came over to her and leaned upon the table.

"Dearest girl--everything is a sickening jumble in this world, it seems.

I have a kind of premonition, though, that you will emerge triumphant, however it goes; but after to-day, Katherine, I shall not see you until late in the autumn. I am going away--to Russia this time--and I am going to try once more not to care."

So even her one friend would be far from her. Well, she must not lose her nerve. She gave him her blessing for his journey, and they said good-bye. And the days went on apace.

Matilda was engaged to be married to Charlie Prodgers, and was full of importance and glee, and had drifted further and further away from her sister ever since the engagement was announced. Some instinctive feminine jealousy made her feel that she would prefer Katherine to be as far as possible from her fiance.