I

The room was full of cigarette smoke. It eddied and drifted about, forming a thin blue haze. Through it came the sound of three voices occupied with the betterment of the human race and the encouragement of art⁠—especially art that defied all known conventions.

Sebastian Levinne, leaning back against the ornate marble mantelpiece of his mother’s town house, spoke didactically, gesticulating with the long yellow hand that held his cigarette. The tendency to lisp was still there, but very faint. His yellow Mongolian face, his surprised-looking ears, were much the same as they had been at eleven years old. At twenty-two he was the same Sebastian, sure of himself, perceptive, with the same love of beauty and the same unemotional and unerring sense of values.

In front of him, reclining in two immense leather covered armchairs, were Vernon and Joe. Very much alike these two, cast in the same sharply accentuated black and white mould. But, as of old, Joe’s was the more aggressive personality, energetic, rebellious, vehement. Vernon, an immense length, lay back slothfully in his chair. His long legs rested on the back of another chair. He was blowing smoke rings and smiling thoughtfully to himself. He occasionally contributed grunts to the conversation, or a short lazy sentence.

“That wouldn’t pay,” Sebastian had just said decisively.

As he had half expected, Joe was roused at once to the point of virulence.

“Who wants a thing to pay? It’s so⁠—so rotten⁠—that point of view! Treating everything from a commercial standpoint. I hate it.”

Sebastian said calmly: “That’s because you’ve got such an incurably romantic view of life. You like poets to starve in garrets, and artists to toil unrecognized, and sculptors to be applauded after they are dead.”

“Well⁠—that’s what happens. Always!”

“No, not always. Very often, perhaps. But it needn’t be as often as it is. That’s my point. The world never likes anything new⁠—but I say it could be made to. Taken the right way, it could be made to. But you’ve got to know just what will go down and what won’t.”

“That’s compromise,” murmured Vernon indistinctly.

“It’s common sense! Why should I lose money by backing my judgment?”

“Oh, Sebastian,” cried Joe, “you⁠—you⁠—”

“Jew!” said Sebastian calmly. “That’s what you mean. Well, we Jews have got taste⁠—we know when a thing is fine and when it isn’t. We don’t go by the fashion⁠—we back our own judgment, and we’re right! People always see the money side of it, but the other’s there too.”

Vernon grunted. Sebastian went on:

“There are two sides to what we’re talking about⁠—there are people who are thinking of new things, new ways of doing old things, new thoughts altogether⁠—and who can’t get their chance because people are afraid of anything new. And there are the other people⁠—the people who know what the public have always wanted, and who go on giving it to them, because it’s safe and there’s a sure profit. But there’s a third way⁠—to find things that are new and beautiful, and take a chance on them. That’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to run a picture gallery in Bond Street⁠—I signed the deeds yesterday⁠—and a couple of theatres⁠—and later I want to run a weekly of some kind on entirely different lines from anything that has been done before. And what’s more, I’m going to make the whole thing pay. There are all sorts of things that I admire, that a cultivated few would admire⁠—but I’m not going out for those. Anything I run’s going to be a popular success. Dash it all, Joe, don’t you see that half the fun of the thing is making it pay? It’s justifying yourself by success.”

Joe shook her head, unconvinced.

“Are you really going to have all those things?” said Vernon.

Both the cousins looked at Sebastian with a tinge of envy. Queer, and rather wonderful, to be in old Sebastian’s position. His father had died some years before. Sebastian, at twenty-two, was master of so many millions that it took one’s breath away to think about them.

The friendship with Sebastian, begun all those years ago at Abbots Puissants, had endured and strengthened. He and Vernon had been friends at Eton, they were at the same college at Cambridge. In the holidays, the three had always managed to spend a good deal of time together.

“What about sculpture?” asked Joe suddenly. “Is that included?”

“Of course. Are you still keen about taking up modelling?”

“Rather. It’s the only thing I really care about.”

A derisive hoot of laughter came from Vernon.

“Yes, and what will it be this time next year? You’ll be a frenzied poet or something.”

“It takes one some time to find one’s true vocation,” said Joe with dignity. “But I’m really in earnest this time.”

“You always are,” said Vernon. “However, thank heaven you’ve given up that damned violin.”

“Why do you hate music so, Vernon?”

“Dunno⁠—I always have.”

Joe turned back to Sebastian. Unconsciously her voice took on a different note. It sounded ever so faintly constrained.

“What do you think of Paul la Marre’s work? Vernon and I went to his studio last Sunday.”

“No guts,” said Sebastian succinctly.

A slight flush rose in Joe’s cheek.

“That’s simply because you don’t understand what he’s aiming at. I think he’s wonderful.”

“Anaemic,” said Sebastian, unperturbed.

“Sebastian, I think you’re perfectly hateful sometimes. Just because La Marre has the courage to break away from tradition⁠—”

“That’s not it at all,” said Sebastian. “A man can break away from tradition by modelling a Stilton cheese and calling it his idea of a nymph bathing. But if he can’t convince you and impress you by doing so, he’s failed. Just doing things differently to anyone else isn’t genius. Nine times out of ten it’s aiming at getting cheap notoriety.”

The door opened and Mrs. Levinne looked in.

“Tea’th ready, dearths,” she said, and beamed on them.

Jet dangled and twinkled on her immense bust. A large black hat with feathers sat on top of her elaborately arranged coiffure. She looked the complete symbol of material prosperity. Her eyes dwelt with adoration on Sebastian.

They got up, and prepared to follow her. Sebastian said in a low voice to Joe:

“Joe⁠—you’re not angry, are you?”

There was suddenly something young and pathetic about his voice⁠—a pleading in it that exposed him as immature and vulnerable. A moment ago he had been the master spirit laying down the law in complete self-confidence.

“Why should I be angry?” said Joe coldly.

She moved towards the door without looking at him. Sebastian’s eyes rested on her wistfully. She had that dark magnetic beauty that matures early. Her skin was dead white, and her eyelashes so thick and dark that they looked like jet against the even colour of her cheeks. There was magic in her way of moving, something languorous and passionate that was wholly unconscious as yet of its own appeal. Although she was the youngest of the three, just past her twentieth birthday, she was at the same time the oldest. To her Vernon and Sebastian were boys, and she despised boys. That queer doglike devotion of Sebastian’s irritated her. She liked men of experience, men who could say exciting, half understood things. She lowered her white eyelids for a moment, remembering Paul la Marre.

II

Mrs. Levinne’s drawing-room was a curious mixture of sheer blatant opulence, and an almost austere good taste. The opulence was due to her⁠—she liked velvet hangings and rich cushions and marble and gilding⁠—the taste was Sebastian’s. It was he who had torn down a medley of pictures from the wall and substituted two of his own choosing. His mother was reconciled to their plainness, as she called it, by the immense price that had been paid for them. The old Spanish leather screen was one of her son’s presents to her⁠—so was the exquisite cloisonné vase.

Seated behind an unusually massive silver tea-tray, Mrs. Levinne raised the teapot with two hands and made conversational inquiries, lisping slightly.

“And how’th your dear mother? She never comes to town nowadays. You tell her from me she’ll be getting rusty.”

She laughed, a good-natured fat wheezy chuckle.

“I’ve never regretted having this town hou’th as well as a country one. Deerfields is all very well, but one wantth a bit of life. And of course Sebastian will be home soon for good⁠—and that full of schemes as he ith! Well, well, his father was much the same. Went into deals against everybody’th advice, and instead of losing his money he doubled and trebled it every time. A smart fellow, my poor Yakob.”

Sebastian thought to himself: “I wish she wouldn’t. That’s just the sort of remark Joe always hates. Joe’s always against me nowadays.⁠ ⁠…”

Mrs. Levinne went on: “I’ve got a box for Kings in Arcady on Wednesday night. What about it, my dearth? Will you come?”

“I’m awfully sorry, Mrs. Levinne,” said Vernon. “I wish we could. But we’re going down to Birmingham tomorrow.”

“Oh! you’re going home.”

“Yes.”

Why hadn’t he said “going home”? Why did it sound so fantastic in his ears? There was only one home, of course⁠—Abbots Puissants. Home! A queer word, so many meanings to it. It reminded him of the ridiculous words of a song that one of Joe’s young men used to bray out (what a damnable thing music was!) while he fingered his collar and looked at her sentimentally. “Home, love, is where the heart is, where’er the heart may be⁠ ⁠…”

But in that case his home ought to be in Birmingham where his mother was.

He experienced that faint feeling of disquietude that always came over him when he thought of his mother. He was very fond of her, naturally. Mothers, of course, were hopeless people to explain things to, they never understood. But he was very fond of her⁠—it would be unnatural if he wasn’t. As she so often said, he was all she had.

Suddenly a little imp seemed to jump in Vernon’s brain. The imp said suddenly and unexpectedly: “What rot you are talking! She’s got the house, and the servants to talk to and bully, and friends to gossip with, and her own people all round her. She’d miss all that far more than she’d miss you. She loves you, but she’s relieved when you go back to Cambridge⁠—and even then she’s not as relieved as you are!”

“Vernon!” It was Joe’s voice, sharp with annoyance. “What are you thinking of? Mrs. Levinne was asking about Abbots Puissants⁠—if it’s still let?”

How fortunate that when people said, “What are you thinking about?” they didn’t in the least mean that they wanted to know! Still, you could always say “Nothing much,” just as when you were small you had said “Nothing.”

He answered Mrs. Levinne’s questions, promised to deliver her various messages to his mother.

Sebastian saw them to the door, they said a final goodbye and walked out into the London streets. Joe sniffed the air ecstatically.

“How I love London! You know, Vernon, my mind’s made up. I’m coming up to London to study. I’m going to tackle Aunt Myra about it this time. And I won’t live with Aunt Ethel, either. I’m going to be on my own.”

“You can’t do that, Joe. Girls don’t.”

“They do. I could share rooms with another girl or girls. But to live with Aunt Ethel, always asking me where I’m going, and who with⁠—I just can’t stand it. And anyway she hates me being a suffragette.”

The Aunt Ethel they referred to was Aunt Carrie’s sister, an aunt by courtesy only. They were staying with her at the present moment.

“Oh, and that reminds me,” went on Joe. “You’ve got to do something for me, Vernon.”

“What?”

“Tomorrow afternoon Mrs. Cartwright’s taking me to that Titanic Concert as a special treat.”

“Well?”

“Well, I don’t want to go⁠—that’s all.”

“You can make some excuse or other, I suppose.”

“It’s not so easy as that. You see, Aunt Ethel’s got to think I’ve gone to the concert. I don’t want her ferreting out where I am going.”

Vernon gave a whistle.

“Oh! so that’s it? What are you really up to, Joe? Who is it this time?”

“It’s La Marre, if you really want to know.”

“That bounder.”

“He’s not a bounder. He’s wonderful⁠—you don’t know how wonderful he is.”

Vernon grinned.

“No, indeed I don’t. I don’t like Frenchmen.”

“You’re so horribly insular. But it doesn’t matter whether you like him or not. He’s going to motor me down to the country to a friend’s house where his chef d’oeuvre is. I do so want to go, and you know perfectly that Aunt Ethel would never let me.”

“You oughtn’t to go racketing about the country with a fellow like that.”

“Don’t be an ass, Vernon. Don’t you know that I can look after myself?”

“Oh! I suppose so.”

“I’m not one of those silly girls who know nothing about anything.”

“I don’t see, though, where I come in.”

“Well, you see,” Joe displayed a trace of anxiety. “You’re to go to the concert.”

“No, I won’t do anything of the kind. You know I hate music.”

“Oh! you must, Vernon. It’s the only way. If I say I can’t go, she’ll ring up Aunt Ethel and suggest one of the girls coming instead, and then the fat will be in the fire. But if you just turn up instead of me⁠—I’m to meet her at the Albert Hall⁠—and give some weak excuse, everything will be all right. She’s very fond of you⁠—she likes you heaps better than me.”

“But I loathe music.”

“I know, but you can just bear it for one afternoon. An hour and a half. That’s all it will be.”

“Oh, damn it all, Joe, I don’t want to.”

His hand shook with irritation. Joe stared at him.

“You are funny about music, Vernon! I’ve never known anyone who sort of⁠—well, hates it like you. Most people just don’t care for it. But I do think you might go⁠—you know I always do things for you.”

“All right,” said Vernon abruptly.

It was no good. It had got to be. Joe and he always stood together. After all, as she had said, it would only be an hour and a half. Why should he feel that he had taken a momentous decision? His heart felt like lead⁠—right down in his boots. He didn’t want to go⁠—oh! he didn’t want to go!

Like a visit to the dentist⁠—best not to think about it. He forced his mind away to other things. Joe looked up sharply as she heard him give vent to a chuckle.

“What is it?”

“I was thinking of you as a kid⁠—so grand about saying you were never going to have anything to do with men. And now it’s always men with you, one after the other. You fall in and out of love about once a month.”

“Don’t be so horrid, Vernon. Those were just silly girls’ fancies. La Marre says if you have any temperament that always happens⁠—but the real grand passion is quite different when it comes.”

“Well, don’t go and have a grand passion for La Marre.”

Joe did not answer. Presently she said:

“I’m not like Mother. Mother was⁠—was so soft about men. She gave in to them⁠—would do anything for anyone she was fond of. I’m not like that.”

“No,” said Vernon, after thinking for a moment. “No, I don’t think you are. You won’t make a mess of your life in the same way she did. But you might make a mess of it in a different way.”

“What sort of a way?”

“I don’t quite know. Going and marrying someone you thought you had a grand passion for, just because everyone else disliked him, and then spending your life fighting him. Or deciding to go and live with someone just because you thought Free Love was a fine idea.”

“So it is.”

“Oh! I am not saying it isn’t⁠—though as a matter of fact, I really think it is antisocial myself. But you’re always the same. If anyone forbids you anything you always want to do it⁠—quite irrespective of whether you really want to. I haven’t put that well, but you know what I mean.”

“What I really want is to do something! To be a great sculptor.”

“That’s because you’ve got a pash for La Marre.”

“It isn’t. Oh! Vernon, why will you be so trying? I’ve always wanted to do something⁠—always⁠—always! I used to say so at Abbots Puissants.”

“It’s odd,” said Vernon thoughtfully. “Old Sebastian used to say then very much what he says now. Perhaps one doesn’t change as much as one thinks.”

“You were going to marry someone very beautiful and live at Abbots Puissants always,” said Joe with slight scorn. “You don’t still feel that to be your life’s ambition, do you?”

“One might do worse,” said Vernon.

“Lazy⁠—downright lazy!”

Joe looked at him in unconcealed impatience. She and Vernon were so alike in some ways, and so different in others!

Vernon was thinking, “Abbots Puissants. In a year I shall be twenty-one.”

They were passing a Salvation Army meeting. Joe stopped. A thin, white-faced man was standing on a box. His voice, high and raucous, came echoing across to them:

“Why won’t you be saved? Why won’t you? Jesus wants you! Jesus wants you!” Tremendous emphasis on the you. “Yes, brothers and sisters, and I’ll tell you something more. You want Jesus. You won’t admit it to yourselves, you turn your back on him, you’re afraid⁠—that’s what it is, you’re afraid, because you want him so badly⁠—you want him and you don’t know!” His arms waved, his white face shone with ecstasy. “But you will know⁠—you will know⁠—there are things that you can’t run away from forever.” He spoke slowly, almost menacingly. “I say unto you, this very night shall thy soul be required of thee.”

Vernon turned away with a slight shiver. A woman on the outskirts of the crowd gave a hysterical sob.

“Disgusting,” said Joe, her nose very much in the air. “Indecent and hysterical! For my part, I can’t see how any rational being can be anything but an atheist.”

Vernon smiled to himself, though he said nothing. He was remembering the time, a year ago, when Joe had risen every day to attend early service and had insisted on eating a boiled egg with some ostentation on Fridays, and had sat spellbound listening to the somewhat uninteresting but strictly dogmatical sermons of handsome Father Cuthbert at the Church of St. Bartholomew’s, which was reputed to be so “high” that Rome itself could do no more.

“I wonder,” he said aloud, “what it would feel like to be ‘saved’?”

III

It was half-past six on the following afternoon when Joe returned from her stolen day’s pleasure. Her Aunt Ethel met her in the hall.

“Where’s Vernon?” inquired Joe, in case she might be asked how she had liked the concert.

“He came in about half an hour ago. He said there was nothing the matter, but somehow I don’t think he’s very well.”

“Oh!” Joe stared. “Where is he? In his room? I’ll go up and see.”

“I wish you would, dear. Really he didn’t look well at all.”

Joe ran quickly up the stairs, gave a perfunctory rap on Vernon’s door and walked in. Vernon was sitting on his bed, and something in his appearance gave Joe a shock. She had never seen Vernon look quite like this.

He didn’t answer. He had the dazed look of someone who has undergone a terrible shock. It was as though he were too far away to be reached by mere words.

“Vernon.” She shook him by the shoulder. “What is the matter with you?”

He heard her this time.

“Nothing.”

“There must be something. You’re looking⁠—you’re looking⁠—”

Words failed her to express how he was looking. She left it at that.

“Nothing,” he repeated dully.

She sat down on the bed beside him.

“Tell me,” she said gently but authoritatively.

A long shuddering sigh broke from Vernon.

“Joe, do you remember that man yesterday?”

“Which man?”

“That Salvation Army chap⁠—those cant phrases he used. And that one⁠—a fine one⁠—from the Bible: This night shall thy soul be required of thee. I said afterwards I wondered what it would be like to be saved. Just idly. Well, I know!”

Joe stared at him. Vernon! Oh! but such a thing was impossible.

“Do you mean⁠—do you mean⁠—” Difficult somehow to get the words. “Do you mean you’ve ‘got religion’⁠—suddenly⁠—like people do?”

She felt it was ridiculous as she said it. She was relieved when he gave a sudden spurt of laughter.

“Religion? Good God, no! Or is it that for some people? I wonder⁠ ⁠… No, I mean⁠—” He hesitated, brought the word out at last very softly, almost as though he dared not speak it. “Music.”

“Music?” She was still utterly at sea.

“Yes. Joe, do you remember Nurse Frances?”

“Nurse Frances? No, I don’t think I do. Who was she?”

“Of course you wouldn’t. It was before you came⁠—the time I broke my leg. I’ve always remembered something she said to me. About not being in a hurry to run away from things before you’ve had a good look. Well, that’s what happened to me today. I couldn’t run away any longer⁠—I just had to look. Joe, music’s the most wonderful thing in the world⁠—”

“But⁠—but⁠—you’ve always said⁠—”

“I know. That’s why it’s been such an awful shock. Not that I mean music is so wonderful now⁠—but it could be⁠—if you had it as it was meant to be! Little bits of it are ugly⁠—it’s like going up to a picture and seeing a nasty grey smear of paint⁠—but go to a distance and it falls into its place as the most wonderful shadow. It’s got to be a whole. I still think one violin’s ugly, and a piano’s beastly⁠—but useful in a way, I suppose. But⁠—oh! Joe, music could be so wonderful⁠—I know it could.”

Joe was silent, bewildered. She understood now what Vernon had meant by his opening words. His face had the queer dreamy exaltation that one associated with religious fervour. And yet she was a little frightened. His face had always expressed so little. Now, she thought, it expressed too much. It was a worse face or a better face⁠—just as you chose to look on it.

He went on talking, hardly to her, more to himself.

“There were nine orchestras, you know. All massed. Sound can be glorious if you get enough of it⁠—I don’t mean just loudness⁠—it shows more when it’s soft. But there must be enough. I don’t know what they played⁠—nothing, I think, that was real. But it showed one⁠—it showed one⁠—”

He turned queer bright excited eyes upon her.

“There’s so much to know⁠—to learn. I don’t want to play things⁠—never that. But I want to know about every instrument there is. What it can do, what are its limitations, what are its possibilities. And the notes, too. There are notes they don’t use⁠—notes that they ought to use. I know there are. Do you know what music’s like now, Joe? It’s like the little sturdy Norman pillars in the crypt of Gloucester Cathedral. It’s at its beginnings, that’s all.”

He sat silent, leaning forward dreamily.

“Well, I think you’ve gone quite mad,” said Joe.

She tried on purpose to make her voice sound practical and matter-of-fact. But, in spite of herself, she was impressed. That white-hot conviction. And she had always thought Vernon rather a slow coach⁠—reactionary, prejudiced, unimaginative.

“I’ve got to begin to learn. As soon as ever I can. Oh! it’s awful⁠—to have wasted twenty years!”

“Nonsense,” said Joe. “You couldn’t have studied music when you were an infant in a cot.”

He smiled at that. He was coming out of his trance by degrees.

“You think I’m mad? I suppose it must sound like that. But I’m not. And oh! Joe, it’s the most awful relief. As though you had been pretending for years, and now you needn’t pretend any more. I’ve been horribly afraid of music⁠—always. Now⁠—”

He sat up, squared his shoulders.

“I’m going to work⁠—work like a nigger. I’m going to know the ins and outs of every instrument. By the way, there must be more instruments in the world⁠—many more. There ought to be a kind of waily thing⁠—I’ve heard it somewhere. You’d want ten⁠—fifteen of those. And about fifty harps.”

He sat there, planning composedly details that to Joe sounded sheer nonsense. Yet it was evident that to his inner vision some event was perfectly clear.

“It’ll be supper time in ten minutes,” Joe reminded him timidly.

“Oh! will it? What a nuisance. I want to stay here and think and hear things in my head. Tell Aunt Ethel I’ve got a headache or that I’ve been frightfully sick. As a matter of fact, I think I am going to be sick.”

And somehow that impressed Joe more than anything else. It was a homely familiar happening. When anything upset you very much, either pleasurably or otherwise, you always wanted to be sick! She had felt that herself, often.

She stood in the door hesitating. Vernon had relapsed into abstraction again. How queer he looked⁠—quite different. As though⁠—as though⁠—Joe sought for the words she wanted⁠—as though he had suddenly come alive.

She was a little frightened.