The doctor called early the next morning, and looked serious. Leonard had had a restless night, and his symptoms were becoming very grave. He still kept up his efforts at conversation, though they were more painful than ever.

"I—I\'m not going to die, Doc," he panted.

"Well, keep quiet, and we\'ll see about it," said the doctor.

"But have you heard about my brother?... the one who fills the Albert Hall?... Oh, \'ninety-nine,\' since you insist."

Nigel had been sent over to Dormans the first thing in the morning, to buy up all the papers he could. Several of them had a report of von Gleichroeder\'s concert, and most of these mentioned Nigel\'s performance favourably.

"Mr. Furlonger has undoubtedly a great deal to learn on the mechanical side of his art, but he has a wonderful force of temperament, which last night compensated in many ways for faulty technique. He even managed to work some emotional beauty into Scriabin\'s bundle of tricks, and one can imagine that in music which depended on the beautiful instead of on the bizarre for its appeal, he would have the chance, which was denied him last night, of a really fine performance. We do not say that Mr. Furlonger will ever be a master, but if he will avoid fashionable[Pg 269] gymnastics and not despise such out-of-date considerations as beauty and harmony, he may become a temperamental violinist of the first order." All the critics, more or less, had a hit at the "advanced" type of music, and Nigel imagined von Gleichroeder\'s wrath.

Len insisted on having all the criticisms read to him, and a thrill of pride went through even Janey\'s numb breast. She had never tried to speak to Nigel alone, and he gave her no hint that he knew she was in trouble. But when his heart was not bursting with anxiety for Len, it brimmed with compassion for Janey. She might have been nursing her brother for weeks instead of hours to judge by her haggard face, white lips, and faded eyes. Her movements were listless, and her figure in rest had the droop of utter exhaustion.

She and Nigel divided the nursing between them. Len was never left alone. He had to be fed every two hours, and it generally took both of them to do it, as he was very perverse in the matter of meals, saying that the food choked him. In the afternoon he became a little delirious. He seemed to be trying to ask for things, and yet to be unable to say what he really meant, often saying something quite different. He was intensely pathetic in his weakness. This dulling, or rather disturbance, of his faculties seemed to distress him far more than his difficult breathing or the pain in his side. Now and then he would hold out his hands piteously to Nigel and Janey, and would lie for some time holding the hand of each, his brown eyes staring at them imploringly, as if they were[Pg 270] fighting for the powers of speech which the tongue had lost—in the way that the eyes of animals often fight.

They tried to make him go to sleep, but he was always restless and awake. They read to him, talked to him and to each other, with no success. Outside, the day was dull, yet warm and steamy. Every now and then a shower would rustle noisily on the leaves, and after it passed there would be many drippings.

Nigel went out for an hour or two\'s work on the farm when evening fell. It seemed extraordinary that only some eighteen hours lay between him and the concert at the Bechstein Hall. That part of his life had been put aside—not for ever, perhaps, but none the less temporarily banished by a usurping present. Some day, no doubt, he would put on the last six months again, just as he would put on the dress clothes he had folded away, but now he wore corduroys and the last eighteen hours.

At six the doctor called again. He shook his head at the sight of Leonard.

"He must have a nurse," he said.

"Oh, no ... for heaven\'s sake!" groaned Len.

"Nigel and I can nurse him," said Janey.

"My dear young lady, have you seen your own face in the glass?"

Len raised himself with difficulty on his pillows.

"Lord, Janey!—you look quite cooked up.... I say, old girl, I won\'t have it.... Doctor, I surrender."

[Pg 271]

"I don\'t know whether I can send any one in to-night—but I\'ll try. Anyhow, to-morrow morning—now \'ninety-nine,\' please."

Nigel went over to East Grinstead for ice and fruit. Len was dreadfully thirsty all the evening. They put bags of ice on his forehead and sides, but it did not seem to cool him much. The doctor had left a sleeping-draught, to be administered the last thing at night.

"If I take it," said Len, "will you two go to bed?"

"Janey will," said Nigel. "I\'ll have a shake-down in here."

"Well, it\'ll keep me quiet, I suppose ... so I\'ll take the beastly thing.... I want to sleep ... but I don\'t want to die.... I won\'t die, in fact."

"Don\'t talk of it, old man."

He lifted Len in his strong arms, and settled him more comfortably in the bedclothes. Then he gave him the sleeping-draught.

The window was wide open, and one could hear the rain pattering on the lilac bushes. The wind, sweet-smelling with damp and hay, puffed the curtains into the room, then sucked them back. A fire was burning low on the hearth. Janey went and sat beside it. Nigel sat by the bed, for between sleeping and waking his brother suffered from strange fears.

At last, after a few sighs and struggles, Len fell asleep, still high on his pillows, the lines of his face very tired and grim. There was a little light in the room, or rather the mingled lights of a dying[Pg 272] fire and a fighting moon. Nigel rose softly, and went over to Janet.

"You must go to bed."

"No—I\'d rather stay here."

"You must have some sleep, or you\'ll be worn out."

"I couldn\'t sleep."

The words broke from her in a strangling sigh, and the next minute his arm crept round her, for he remembered Leonard\'s words.

"Dear Janey ..." he whispered.

She began to cry.

For a moment or two he held her to him, helping her to choke her sobs against his breast.

"Won\'t you tell me what it is?"

"How do you know there\'s anything more than that?" and she pointed towards the bed.

"Len told me."

"About Quentin?..."

"Quentin!"

"Yes—I thought you said he\'d told you."

"He told me you were wretched about something. But who\'s Quentin?—not Quentin Lowe?"

They were the very words Len had used, and Janey shuddered.

"Yes ..." she said faintly, "Quentin Lowe."

"But——"

"You\'ll never understand.... I hid it from you for three years."

"Hid what, Janey?"

"My—my love."

Nigel\'s arm dropped from her waist, but hers[Pg 273] was round his neck, and she clung to him feverishly.

"Yes, I loved him. I loved him and I pitied him ... and I wanted, I tried, to help him—and—and I\'ve been his ruin—and another woman has saved him."

Nigel was speechless. What astonished him, the man of secrets, most, was that Janey should have had a secret from him for three years.

"Don\'t tremble so, darling—but tell me about it. I won\'t be hard on you."

"You will—when you know all."

"Does Len know all?"

"Yes."

He glanced over to the sleeping man, then put back his arm round Janey\'s waist.

"Now tell me—all."

Janey told him—all.

For some moments there was silence. The rain was still beating on the leaves, but the moon had torn through the clouds, and flung a white patch over Leonard\'s feet. The fire was just a red lump, and Janey and Nigel, sitting outside the moonrays, were lost in darkness.

Janey wondered when her brother would speak. She could see the outline of his face, blurred in the shado............