In spite of the amusing defection of his host, Saxonstowe had fully enjoyed the short time he had spent under the Damerels’ roof. Mrs. Berenson had amused him almost as much as if she had been a professional comedian brought there to divert the company; Darlington had interested him as a specimen of the rather reserved, purposeful sort of man who might possibly do things; and Haidee had made him wonder how it is that some women possess great beauty and very little mind. But the recollection which remained most firmly fixed in him was of Sprats, and on the first afternoon he had at liberty he set out to find the Children’s Hospital which she had invited him to visit.

He found the hospital with ease—an ordinary house in Bayswater Square, with nothing to distinguish it from its neighbours but a large brass plate on the door, which announced that it was a Private Nursing Home for Children. A trim maid-servant, who stared at him with reverent awe after she had glanced at his card, showed him into a small waiting-room adorned with steel engravings of Biblical subjects, and there Sprats shortly discovered him inspecting a representation of the animals leaving the ark. It struck him as he shook hands with her that she looked better in her nurse’s uniform than in the dinner-gown which she had worn a few nights earlier—there was something businesslike and strong about her in her cap and cuffs and apron and streamers: it was like seeing a soldier in fighting trim.

‘I am glad that you have come just now,’ she said. ‘I have a whole hour to spare, and I can show you all over the place. But first come into my parlour and have some tea.’

She led him into another room, where Biblical prints{150} were not in evidence—if they had ever decorated the walls they were now replaced by Sprats’s own possessions. He recognised several water-colour drawings of Simonstower, and one of his own house and park at Saxonstowe.

‘These are the work of Cyprian Damerel—Lucian’s father, you know,’ said Sprats, as he uttered an exclamation of pleasure at the sight of familiar things. ‘Lucian gave them to me. I like that one of Saxonstowe Park—I have so often seen that curious atmospheric effect amongst the trees in early autumn. I am very fond of my pictures and my household gods—they bring Simonstower closer to me.’

‘But why, if you are so fond of it, did you leave it?’ he asked, as he took the chair which she pointed out to him.

‘Oh, because I wanted to work very hard!’ she said, busying herself with the tea-cups. ‘You see, my father married Lucian Damerel’s aunt—a very dear, nice, pretty woman—and I knew she would take such great care of him that I could be spared. So I went in for nursing, having a natural bent that way, and after three or four years of it I came here; and here I am, absolute she-dragon of the establishment.’

‘Is it very hard work?’ he asked, as he took a cup of tea from her hands.

‘Well, it doesn’t seem to affect me very much, does it?’ she answered. ‘Oh yes, sometimes it is, but that’s good for one. You must have worked hard yourself, Lord Saxonstowe.’

Saxonstowe blushed under his tan.

‘I look all right too, don’t I?’ he said, laughing. ‘I agree with you that it’s good for one, though. I’ve thought since I came back that—— ’ He paused and did not finish the sentence.

‘That it would do a lot of people whom you’ve met a lot of good if they had a little hardship and privation to go through,’ she said, finishing it for him. ‘That’s it, isn’t it?’{151}

‘I wouldn’t let them off with a little,’ he said. ‘I’d give them—some of them, at any rate—a good deal. Perhaps I’m not quite used to it, but I can’t stand this sort of life—I should go all soft and queer under it.’

‘Well, you’re not obliged to endure it at all,’ said Sprats. ‘You can clear out of town whenever you please and go to Saxonstowe—it is lovely in summer.’

‘Yes,’ he answered, ‘I’m going there soon. I—I don’t think town life quite appeals to me.’

‘I suppose that you will go off to some waste place of the earth again, sooner or later, won’t you?’ she said. ‘I should think that if one once tastes that sort of thing one can’t very well resist the temptation. What made you wish to explore?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he answered. ‘I always wanted to travel when I was a boy, but I never got any chance. Then the title came to me rather unexpectedly, you know, and when I found that I could indulge my tastes—well, I indulged them.’

‘And you prefer the desert to the drawing-room?’ she said, watching him.

‘Lots!’ he said fervently. ‘Lots!’

Sprats smiled.

‘I should advise you,’ she said, ‘to cut London the day your book appears. You’ll be a lion, you know.’

‘Oh, but!’ he exclaimed, ‘you don’t quite recognise what sort of book it is. It’s not an exciting narrative—no bears, or Indians, or scalpings, you know. It’s—well, it’s a bit dry—scientific stuff, and so on.’

Sprats smiled the smile of the wise woman and shook her head.

‘It doesn’t matter what it is—dry or delicious, dull or enlivening,’ she remarked sagely, ‘the people who’ll lionise you won’t read it, though they’ll swear to your face that they sat up all night with it. You’ll see it lying about, with the pages all cut and a book-marker sticking out, but most of the people who’ll rave to your face about it wouldn’t be able to answer any question that you asked them concerning it. Lionising is an{152} amusing feature of social life in England—if you don’t like the prospect of it, run away.’

‘I shall certainly run,’ he answered. ‘I will go soon. I think, perhaps, that you exaggerate my importance, but I don’t want to incur any risk—it isn’t pleasant to be stared at, and pointed out, and all that sort of—of——’

‘Of rot!’ she said. ‘No—it isn’t, to some people. To other people it seems quite a natural thing. It never seemed to bother Lucian Damerel, for example. You cannot realise the adulation which was showered upon him when he first flashed into the literary heavens. All the women were in love with him; all the girls love-sick because of his dark face and wondrous hair; he was stared at wherever he went; and he might have breakfasted, lunched, and dined at somebody else’s expense every day.’

‘And he liked—that?’ asked Saxonstowe.

‘It’s a bit difficult,’ answered Sprats, ‘to know what Lucian does like. He plays lion to perfection. Have you ever been to the Zoo and seen a real first-class, AI diamond-of-the-first-water sort of lion in his cage?—especially when he is filled with meat? Well, you’ll have noticed that he gazes with solemn eyes above your head—he never sees you at all—you aren’t worth it. If he should happen to look at you, he just wonders why the devil you stand there staring at him, and his eyes show a sort of cynical, idle contempt, and become solemn and ever-so-far-away again. Lucian plays lion in that way beautifully. He looks out of his cage with eyes that scorn the miserable wondering things gathered open-mouthed before him.’

‘Does he live in a cage?’ asked Saxonstowe.

‘We all live in cages,’ answered Sprats. ‘You had better hang up a curtain in front of yours if you don’t wish the crowd to stare at you. And now come—I will show you my children.’

Saxonstowe followed her all over the house with exemplary obedience, secretly admiring her mastery of{153} detail, her quickness of perception, and the motherly fashion in which she treated her charges. He had never been in a children’s hospital before, and he saw some sights that sent him back to Sprats’s parlour a somewhat sad man.

‘I dare say you get used to it,’ he said, ‘but the sight of all that pain must be depressing. And the poor little mites seem to bear it well—bravely, at any rate.’

Sprats looked at him with the speculative expression which always came into her face when she was endeavouring to get at some other person’s real self.

‘So you, too, are fond of children?’ she said, and responded cordia............