Elwyn could remember every bush, almost every
flower that had flowered, in the walled garden during those enchanted
weeks. Against the background of his mind every ornament, every odd
piece of furniture in that old cottage, stood out as having been the
silent, it had seemed at the time the kindly, understanding witnesses of
what had by then become an exquisite friendship. He, the man, had known
almost from the first where they too were drifting, but she, the woman,
had slipped into love as a wanderer at night slips suddenly into a deep
and hidden pool. In a story book they would both have gone away openly together--but
somehow the thought of doing such a thing never seriously occurred to
Elwyn. He was far too fond of Bellair--it seemed absurd to say that now,
but the truth, especially the truth of what has been, is often absurd. Elwyn had contented himself with stealing Bellair's wife; he had no
desire to put public shame and ridicule upon his friend. And fortune,
favouring him, had prolonged the other man's enforced absence. And then? And then at last Bellair had come back,--and trouble began. As
to many things, nay, as to most things which have to do with the flesh
rather than the spirit, men are more fastidiously delicate than are
women. There had come months of misery, of revolt, and, on Elwyn's part,
of dulling love....

Then, once more, Chance gave him an unlooked-for opportunity--an
opportunity of escape from what had become to him an intolerable
position. The war broke out, and Hugh Elwyn was among the very first of those
gallant fellows who volunteered during the dark November of '99. By a curious irony of fate, the troopship that bore him to South Africa
had Bellair also on board, but owing to Elwyn's secret decision--he was
far the cleverer man of the two--he and his friend were no longer bound
together by that wordless intimacy which is the basis of any close tie
among men. By the time the two came back from Africa they had become
little more than cordial acquaintances. Marriage, so Bellair sometimes
told himself ruefully, generally plays the devil with a man's bachelor
friendships. He was a kindly, generous hearted soul, who found much
comfort in platitudes.... But that, alas! had not been the end. On Elwyn's return home there had
come to him a violent, overmastering revival of his passion. Again he
and Fanny met--again they loved. Then one terrible day she came and told
him, with stricken eyes, what he sometimes hoped, even now, had not been
true--that she was about to have a child, and that it would be his
child. At that moment, as he knew well, Mrs. Bellair had desired
ardently to go away with him, openly. But he had drawn back, assuring
himself--and this time honestly--that his shrinking from that course,
now surely the only honest course, was not wholly ignoble. Were he to do
such a thing it would go far to kill his mother--worse, it would
embitter every moment of the life which remained to her. For a while Elwyn went in deadly fear lest Fanny should tell her husband
the truth. But the weeks and months drifted by, and she remained silent. And as he had gone about that year, petted and made much of by his
friends and acquaintances--for did he not bear on his worn, handsome
face that look which war paints on the face of your sensitive modern
man?--he heard whispered the delightful news that after five years of
marriage kind Jim and dear Fanny Bellair were at last going to be made
happy--happy in the good old way. Among the other memories of that hateful time, one came back, to-night,
with especial vividness. Hurrying home across the park one afternoon,
seven years ago now, almost to a day, he had suddenly run up against
Bellair. They had talked for a few moments on indifferent things, and then Jim
had said shyly, awkwardly, but with a beaming look on his face, "You
know about Fanny? Of course I can't help feeling a bit anxious, but
she's so healthy--not like those women who have always something the
matter with them!" And he, Elwyn, had gripped the other man's hand, and
muttered the congratulation which was being asked of him. That meeting, so full of shameful irony, had occurred about a week
before the child's birth. Elwyn had meant to be away from London--but
Chance, so carelessly kind a friend to him in the past, at last proved
cruel, for surely it was Chance and Chance alone that led him, on the
very eve of the day he was starting for Norway, straight across the
quiet square, composed of high Georgian houses, where the Bellairs still
lived. To-night, thanks to his mother, every incident of that long, agonizing
night came back. He could almost feel the tremor of half fear, half
excitement, which had possessed him when he had suddenly become aware
that his friends' house was still lit up and astir, and that fresh straw
lay heaped up in prodigal profusion in the road where, a little past the
door, was drawn up a doctor's one-horse brougham. Even then he might
have taken another way, but something had seemed to drive him on, past
the house,--and there Elwyn, staying his deadened footsteps, had heard
float down to him from widely opened windows above, certain sounds,
muffled moans, telling of a physical extremity which even now he winced
to remember. He had waited on and on--longing to escape, and yet prisoned between
imaginary bounds within which he paced up and down, filled with an
obscure desire to share, in the measure that was possible to him, her
torment. At last, in the orange, dust-laden dawn of a London summer morning, the
front door of the house had opened, and Elwyn had walked forward, every
nerve quivering with suspense and fatigue, feeling that he must know....

A great doctor, with whose face he was vaguely acquainted, had stepped
out accompanied by Bellair--Bellair with ruffled hair and red-rimmed
eyes, but looking if tired then content, even more, triumphant. Elwyn
had heard him say the words, "Thanks awfully. I shall never forget how
kind you have been, Sir Joseph. Yes, I'll go to bed at once. I know you
must have thought me rather stupid." And then Bellair had suddenly seen Elwyn standing on the pavement; he
had accepted unquestioningly the halting explanation that he was on his
way home from a late party, and had happened, as it were, that way. "It's a boy!" he had said exultantly, although Elwyn had asked him no
question, and then, "Of course I'm awfully pleased, but I'm dog tired! She's had a bad time, poor girl--but it's all right now, thank God! Come
in and have a drink, Hugo." But Elwyn had shaken his head. Again he had gripped his old friend's
hand, as he had done a week before, and again he had muttered the
necessary words of congratulation. Then, turning on his heel, he had
gone home, and spent the rest of the night in desultory packing. *       *       *       *       *

That was just seven years ago, and Elwyn had never seen Fanny's child.