He knew this certainly, though he knew it dimly;
and he was apart from other men, preparing himself for a great
experiment. With such thoughts as these for his secret and concealed treasure, he
was able to bear the threatened invasion of Mrs. Nixon with something
approaching indifference. He knew, indeed, that her presence between
his wife and himself would be unwelcome to him, and he was not without
grave doubts as to the woman's sanity; but after all, what did it
matter? Besides, already a faint glimmering light had risen within him
that showed the profit of self-negation, and in this matter he had
preferred his wife's will to his own. _Et non sua poma_; to his
astonishment he found a delight in denying himself his own wish, a
process that he had always regarded as thoroughly detestable. This was a
state of things which he could not in the least understand; but, again,
though a member of a most hopeless class, living in the most hopeless
surroundings that the world has ever seen, though he knew as much of the
_askesis_ as of Chinese metaphysics; again, he had the grace not to deny
the light that had begun to glimmer in his soul. And he found a present reward in the eyes of Mary, when she welcomed him
home after his foolish labours in the cool of the evening. They sat
together, hand in hand, under the mulberry tree, at the coming of the
dusk, and as the ugly walls about them became obscure and vanished into
the formless world of shadows, they seemed to be freed from the bondage
of Shepherd's Bush, freed to wander in that undisfigured, undefiled
world that lies beyond the walls. Of this region Mary knew little or
nothing by experience, since her relations had always been of one mind
with the modern world, which has for the true country an instinctive and
most significant horror and dread. Mr. Reynolds had also shared in
another odd superstition of these later days--that it is necessary to
leave London at least once a year; consequently Mary had some knowledge
of various seaside resorts on the south and east coasts, where
Londoners gather in hordes, turn the sands into one vast, bad
music-hall, and derive, as they say, enormous benefit from the change. But experiences such as these give but little knowledge of the country
in its true and occult sense; and yet Mary, as she sat in the dusk
beneath the whispering tree, knew something of the secret of the wood,
of the valley shut in by high hills, where the sound of pouring water
always echoes from the clear brook. And to Darnell these were nights of
great dreams; for it was the hour of the work, the time of
transmutation, and he who could not understand the miracle, who could
scarcely believe in it, yet knew, secretly and half consciously, that
the water was being changed into the wine of a new life. This was ever
the inner music of his dreams, and to it he added on these still and
sacred nights the far-off memory of that time long ago when, a child,
before the world had overwhelmed him, he journeyed down to the old grey
house in the west, and for a whole month heard the murmur of the forest
through his bedroom window, and when the wind was hushed, the washing of
the tides about the reeds; and sometimes awaking very early he had heard
the strange cry of a bird as it rose from its nest among the reeds, and
had looked out and had seen the valley whiten to the dawn, and the
winding river whiten as it swam down to the sea. The memory of all this
had faded and become shadowy as he grew older and the chains of common
life were riveted firmly about his soul; all the atmosphere by which he
was surrounded was well-nigh fatal to such thoughts, and only now and
again in half-conscious moments or in sleep he had revisited that valley
in the far-off west, where the breath of the wind was an incantation,
and every leaf and stream and hill spoke of great and ineffable
mysteries. But now the broken vision was in great part restored to him,
and looking with love in his wife's eyes he saw the gleam of water-pools
in the still forest, saw the mists rising in the evening, and heard the
music of the winding river. They were sitting thus together on the Friday evening of the week that
had begun with that odd and half-forgotten visit of Mrs. Nixon, when, to
Darnell's annoyance, the door-bell gave a discordant peal, and Alice
with some disturbance of manner came out and announced that a gentleman
wished to see the master. Darnell went into the drawing-room, where
Alice had lit one gas so that it flared and burnt with a rushing sound,
and in this distorting light there waited a stout, elderly gentleman,
whose countenance was altogether unknown to him. He stared blankly, and
hesitated, about to speak, but the visitor began. 'You don't know who I am, but I expect you'll know my name. It's Nixon.' He did not wait to be interrupted. He sat down and plunged into
narrative, and after the first few words, Darnell, whose mind was not
altogether unprepared, listened without much astonishment. 'And the long and the short of it is,' Mr. Nixon said at last, 'she's
gone stark, staring mad, and we had to put her away to-day--poor thing.' His voice broke a little, and he wiped his eyes hastily, for though
stout and successful he was not unfeeling, and he was fond of his wife. He had spoken quickly, and had gone lightly over many details which
might have interested specialists in certain kinds of mania, and
Darnell was sorry for his evident distress. 'I came here,' he went on after a brief pause, 'because I found out she
had been to see you last Sunday, and I knew the sort of story she must
have told.' Darnell showed him the prophetic leaflet which Mrs. Nixon had dropped in
the garden. 'Did you know about this?' he said. 'Oh, _him_,' said the old man, with some approach to cheerfulness; 'oh
yes, I thrashed _him_ black and blue the day before yesterday.' 'Isn't he mad? Who is the man?' 'He's not mad, he's bad. He's a little Welsh skunk named Richards. He's
been running some sort of chapel over at New Barnet for the last few
years, and my poor wife--she never could find the parish church good
enough for her--had been going to his damned schism shop for the last
twelve-month. It was all that finished her off. Yes; I thrashed _him_
the day before yesterday, and I'm not afraid of a summons either. I know
him, and he knows I know him.' Old Nixon whispered something in Darnell's ear, and chuckled faintly as
he repeated for the third time his formula--

'I thrashed _him_ black and blue the day before yesterday.' Darnell could only murmur condolences and express his hope that Mrs.
Nixon might recover. The old man shook his head. 'I'm afraid there's no hope of that,' he said. 'I've had the best
advice, but they couldn't do anything, and told me so.' Presently he asked to see his niece, and Darnell went out and prepared
Mary as well as he could.