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“The door opened and the old woman came in, followed by—oh, what luck is mine 1—my untamed man of the woods, my primeval giant.” Synopsis of Preceding Chapters: I —^ KOM babyhood John Ashley has known no ^ life except that of a lonely English farm, no society except that of hts moroBe father and the farm laborers. At the age of he learns the reason for this—his mother ran away with his father's closest friend a year after her marriage. The elder Ashley has been deter, mined that his son should be spared a fate like his own and has guarded him against the wiles of worldly-wise women. Learning of the death of his wife who forsook him and their child, the elder Ashley kills himself. A few months later Hetty Blundell, a charming, but heartless married coquette, visits at a neighboring farm, learns John's history, and writes to her London woman friend. Milly Cator, of her proposed conquest. (Continued from Last Sunday) CHAPTER IV. The Victim Appears. A ND then, with her sweet face glowing, her eyes dancing, and carrying her head slightly on one side, like an analytical chemist starting on a new experiment, Hetty Blundell tripped downstairs and took the turn ing to the right. She followed the corn-lined road until, with in a quarter of a mile from the village, It ran up a hill. Here she branched off the road Into a Held, tree-topped, where there was a gap. Looking down upon a clump of irregular red roofs grouped, chicken-wtse, under the wing of their mother church, she stopped, tired, expectant, amused and resourceful. The sun was setting. There was a sudden hush in the world. Little Mrs. Blundell bent forward as though to give her eyes less dis tance to peer through. The silver bell marked off another quarter. A quick smile came sud denly to Betty's face She could recognize the height, the breadth, the slow, swinging stride of the man placed upon earth to amuse her till the novelty of him wore off, or until it be came necessary to drop him for reasons of a diplomatic nature. On came the man of Nature, head up, arms behind, long, slow, swinging stride. Against the sky. directly In his way, with wide-open, simple eyes, waited the little wom an of the world like a white, risen moon. ", . .No words of mine, my dear Milly,” Betty wrote, "can convey the very least idea of the intense enjoyment that moment gave me. Even now—1 have been back three hours —I can feel In my back that pleasant thrill which an exquisite liar of music or a big mo ment In a well-written play always causes. Do you know? A sort of tingling—a fillip to that part of one which Is genuinely sympathetic and responsive. "1 didn't look at him for some minutes— seconds, 1 suppose—in cold, accurate English Apparently my eyes were fixed on the sky with that hungry, dreamy, girlish look, which it took me so long to acquire, and which has come In most usefully on many former occa sions. Nevertheless, I saw him stop with a great gasp, and stand with his huge arms hanging loosely at his sides, looking at me as though I were a will-o’-the-wisp, a vapor, a live poem. 1 wore that muslin 1 got for the Veysey's garden party, transparent at the neck —they call it peck and arms, and the poppy- hat everybody raved about so much and copied—the beasts. All Nature seemed to be helping me, too. The faint red glow, the green at my feet, the clear gold behlud me. I felt like one of those angels painted on tinted tassellated stuff over the little altar in one of those funny side-chapels In what’s the name of the church in Home? 1 believe that if I could have kept it up. we should still be there. But 1 wanted the extra satisfaction of seeing what he would do when 1 looked into his eyes. So—■ oh. my dear, how thankful 1 am that Provi dence decided ! should be a girl I gave myself a little shake, as though 1 had suddenly fallen to earth, and with one of my best wide-eyed looks of intense, fearless innocence, suddenly met his gaze. "I really thought he would have fallen down. In all my life, in the whole course of my ex perience, I never felt so thoroughly warmed and contented with myself. It was like, 1 take it, a sudden, prolonged burst of applause from a packed theatre, or a eulogistic criticism in the pages of some really important paper. 1 wish you could have seen my wild man of the woods. His mouth fell open, his eyes seemed to start out of his head, and his heart jumped and beat, and panted—I could see it in his neck. "For just a second I confess I was scared. He is so big, so strong, so—so untutored, so much a child of Nature, that for a moment I thought he might catch hold of me and— well, 1 took my eyes away, and went quickly past him down the hill. "I was afraid to turn at first to see what he was doing, because, of course, I thought he would be looking after me. They usually do, you know. But finally, as I didn't wish to lose any of the enjoyment of the thing, I stooped down, pretending to pick some grass, and looked back under my arm. My dear, he hadn't moved! There he was, just as I had left him. with his back to me, his arms still hanging at his sides, hts shoulders heaving. "As 1 looked, he moved, pulled himself to gether, and staggering like a man who wakes from a sleeping-draught, went away—never once looking back. 1 wonder if he still thinks 1 came from the sky? I say sky, because it sounds better than the other word 1 was thinking of. I remember betng awfully pleased once because Reggie Rawnsley—dear old Reggie!—suddenly shook me quite violently and told me I was a she-devil. Funny thing to be pleased about, wasn't it?” CHAPTER V. The Joy of Love. TTERLY unable to settle down to the work on the farm, young Ashley wan dered about the house restlessly. His thoughts were chaotic. His whole mental out look had undergone a tremendous change. It seemed to him Incredible, almost ludicrous, that so many years of his life should have been entirely devoted to the common round, the daily task, when the world contained such a creature as the woman he had seen upon the hill; a creature so exquisite, so sweet, so won derful! Compared with her, how commonplace, how trivial seemed inanimate nature. The breaking of day, the setting of the sun, the bursting of the bud, the crash of thunder— what were they when compared with the lift ing of a beautiful woman's eyelid, the touch of her hand, the soft murmur of her voice? All the man in him cried aloud for that woman. One sight of her had killed every de sire to look at everything else. Nothing else mattered. In an instant he had seen the empti ness, the incompleteness of his life. He wanted that woman. He wanted to lie at her feet and watch her mouth as she smiled. He wanted to feel her cool hand on his face, to taste her breath, to hold her tight in his arms, to kiss her hair and eyes and lips. The birds had their mates, the very flowers knew the joy of mar riage. Was he to be the one man In the world (o remain unsatisfied? He asked himself these things as he paced the house. When he went into the sitting room, however, he kept his eyes away from the direc tion of the fireplace. There was a look in the eyes of the photograph that he could not meet. His dinner remained untouched. The son of his father’s dead sheep dog licked his hand, and received no affectionate word. Old Sloke got no response to his nervous "Good night." The canaries in the cage In the window sat blinking at the lamp. No one had put the cover over the cage. The clock struck nine and ten and eleven, and still young Ashley paced the long room. Then suddenly he cried out, "Father, father!" and ran hatless Into the night. John Ashley stopped at the grave of his father. It had been dug at the farthest corner of the churchyard, away from the graves of the people who had not left the world by a shorter cut than death takes them, but In con secrated ground, for the parson was a humble man, who cultivated some of the spirit of his Master, and paid little heed to the ignorant and pompous hypocrisy of his kind. A plain, square stone marked the place where the man lay who died forgiving. The letters of his name,' “John Everard Campbell Ashley,” were Tiot yet blurred by the passing of time, and the sentence beneath them stood out clearly: “For 1 loved." "Father," whispered young Ashley, “father!” He paused for an instant and listened. The leaves of a weeping willow rustled softly. Young Ashley bent lower over the stone. “Father, all women are not like that—not all women. Even you forgave, and left me here to go to the one you loved. Father!” He bent still lower, and flung his arm over the stone caressingly. “You asked too much of me. I can’t keep my promise. Let me off. 1 was happy until I understood what it meant to go without. Until yesterday 1 never had a wish to break my promise. But now you must let me off. You must. I love too—madly as you did—at once, and forever. There’s no fighting It. Wherever she goes I must go. Father!” He listened again. His voice, when he spoke next, was no longer pleading; it was eager, hopeful, excited. “Father, you should see her! She Isn’t the kind of woman to treat me as you were treated. She is different. She is like a flower—a sweet, # slim flower. I thought when I came upon her that she was growing where she stood. When I knew that she was a woman I ran away. Ah, ha! think of that. I can’t live alone any longer. I know now that it isn’t life alone. It Is a— a mere pretence; not the real thing. Why shouldn’t I be allowed to live? I say that she isn’t a woman who Isn’t worthy of a man’s whole love. She Is too beautiful, too wonder ful for that. I must be let off and take my chance. Father, don’t stand in my way. Father, father!” Young Ashley drew back and rested for a long, listening moment on his knees. Then with a little cry, half gladness, half excite ment, queerly boyish, he leant over the stone and kissed the letters of the name. Then he rose and flung back his head and squared his shoulders. The cloud passed away from the moon, and its light showed a face aglow, with shining eyes and a smile on the lips. Walking quickly, young Ashley left the churchyard, made his way through the village and back through the copse. The branches and roots did their best more eagerly than ever to hold him back. But on went Ashley, young Ashley—and the way he considered the right way was the way he wanted to go. On the hill where the little woman of the world has risen, young Ashley stopped and flung out his arms. A feeling of enormous re lief passed over him. He was free! Free, and still friends with his father. And he was in love for the first time in his life. He joyed in it. It was delicious. He would marry her, of course, and take her home to his farm, or go Into the world with her. Where, it didn’t matter, so long as she was at his side. God! what a day! Books were all very well once. Pictures were all very well in the old days. Nature, whose every mood he understood, was all very well so long ago. But what were they as compared to flesh and blood, the beauty, the grace, the mystery of a woman? “Dead things,” he cried, “dead things. I want life!” CHAPTER VI. The Mountain does to Mahomet. ^ WENT out to my hill again this after- I noon,” wrote little Mrs. Blundell—“hut my man wasn’t there. The grass was still flat and sorry for itself where his great body had been; and, having nothing better to do, I sat there to wait for him. “I had plenty to think about. I had that morning received, among the batch you sent me from the flat, a most Insolent, and yet a most ingenious letter from Valentine Worthing. He said, in effect, that he had all along per fectly well understood the game I had been playing with him, and that he had been play- . ing precisely the' same game with me. Of course 1 don’t believe this. It is so easy to guess the solution of a riddle after one has been told the answer. My suddenly going away gave him the cue to my pastime. But I couldn't feel any annoyance with him. All I felt was that, after all, he was merely an ordi nary, commonplace person, with the addition of a hideous deformity. What, I confess, did anger me were the letters from my trades people asking me for immediate settlement. What a peculiar race tradespeople are. Im mediate settlement Is the most ridiculous ex pression. Of course, naturally—like any one else who is expected to do with the pittance of a naval officer’s wife—I am hideously In debt. My dressmaker's bill makes my blood run cold. What Evelyn will say I can con ceive only too well. That one of Friola’s alone would, if settled as it stands, swamp a year's pay! And I have repeatedly assured him that 1 have done extremely well on the allowance he made me. I know what it means. It means that I shall b ive to devote all my time and all my best sn to him to get him to write to his uncle f the money. He’ll kick, anyhow. He calls It eating the pie of humilia tion to borrow money. In the end the payment I shall make him for doing so will heal his wounded pride—but at what Inconvenience to me! “Well, I waited oil our hill in this ecstatic mood for two hours, and 1 believe I should . ADAMX CLAY THE J’TORY ©F A .TOTOUDEJT COQUITTI AMP THE HE/yPlTjr «FHE BROKE have been there two hours longer but for a sudden clap of thunder, following a vivid flash of lightning. Without my noticing them, a great bank of clouds had been gathering be hind me. I jumped up as the first spot of rain hit me—positively hit me—on the cheek. With it—what an odd thing the brain is!—came a sudden inspiration. Time was short, and as Mahomet wouldn’t come to the mountain, the mountain would have_ to go to Mahomet. Do you see? 1 made up my mind to take advan tage of the storm, make my way quickly to his farm house, run to the door with my best expression of timid fright, and beg for shelter. “This 1 djd, half regretting It when 1 found that I was bound to cover at least a mile and a half. My dear. It came down, literally, in buckets. Luckily I had on one of my oldest frocks, for It was wringing wet in no time. Every time a flash came and the flame darted about among the trees, I wished I hadn’t come. Every time I saw how my frock clung to me, I was glad I had. I was dead beat when at last, a drowned rat, I reached the farm. I wasn’t sure that it was his farm, but It was the only one about, so I ran up to the door and rang the bell. It was opened by an old man, with a prim, crinkled face, who looked as though he saw a ghost. I begged him to let me sit somewhere out of the storm, giving him a faint, sweet smile. Gasping with sutprise and with a wistful attempt at politeness, he asked me to enter the mister’s room. “My heart jumped. The blinds were down, the fire Irons and the glass were covered up with a cloth. I stood for a moment, looking around—such a lovely old room, beautifully furnished—and the old person murmured something about fetching his wife and ran off. “The old woman came almost at once. A nice old body, quite flustered with excitement. ‘Oh, poor lady,’ she cried; ‘such a beautiful dress too!’ And then, talking all the time, she ran upstairs, and presently came down with a towel and a man’s dressing gown and slippers. Shutting the door, talking nineteen to the dozen, she undid my frock, rubbed my hands and face, took off my hat and shoes and stock ings, put on the dressing gown—‘Mr. Ashley’s, she said—his, Milly dear!—and then ran to the kitchen with my wet things. “Isn’t my luck astounding? Here was I, not only in his own room, but in hts own room in such a helpful costume! Think of It from the purely artistic point of view. The dressing gown—evidently one John Ashley wore in his early youth—showed my neck, and my ankles and feet—my feet thrust Into a pair of red list slippers of the most ele phantine description. The rain had made my always curly hair all the more curly. I felt like Trilby In the studio, and I’m sure I looked infinitely sweeter than the one I saw. ‘‘Suddenly I heard a deep voice; then two others excitedly joining In. The door opened and the old wom an came in, followed by—oh, what luck is mine!—my untamed man of the woods, m.v primeval giant.” Mrs. Blundell put her pen dowu, threw back her head, and burst In to a peal of laughter. The silver notes of it danced about the little room long after she started writ ing again. “For some time he stood in the doorway, his handsome, unusual head almost touching the framework, blushing like a school boy. I stood up, timid, shy, constrained, clutch ing the dressing gown nervously about me, wordless, like an image in a play. The old woman, with all the latent romance in her nature stirred, babbled the story of my ar rival, while the old man got a word in here and there, whenever she was positively obliged to stop for breath. The situation was immensely amus ing. What more picturesque Intro duction to him could I have posibly desired? ” ‘I will go and make some tea for the young lady, sir,’ said the old. Woman at last. ‘Come, Jesse, quick.’ The door closed upon them, and we were alone. “Have you ever experienced that horrible desire to laugh In church, or at a funeral, or in the midst of some quiet serious scene at the theatre? The desire to laugh in ordinately seized me then. Luckily a sneeze came, and gave me relief, or I feel certain I should have fallen into the nearest chair and yelled! “My dear Milly, his face was a picture. It was positively alight! His eyes danced and gleamed with pleasure aud excitement. He looked at me as though he could have eaten me. But he made no attempt to speak. He simply stood behind a tall black chair (quite a good chair, excellent ly carved, and so old), leaning on the back of It, gazing at'me. " ‘I—1 am so very sorry to put everybody to so much trouble,’ I said, In that high pitched, girlish voice which has always been one of my most valuable stock in trades. ‘I don’t think 1 ever remember such a violent storm, I am dreadfully nervous of lightning.’ “1 paused and looked up at him. A smile passed over his face. It had the most ex traordinary effect upon it. It looked as a field looks when a sudden shaft of sun sweeps across it. But he said nothing. I don’t think he was nervous or shy as we mean it ordinarily. He merely seemed infinitely delighted in a boyish kind of way. He made me feel as though I were a new horse, or the latest gun presented to him on his birthday. At first his continu ous, wide-eyed stare made me quite uncom fortable, and I don’t think he listened to a single word of my small talk. He simply stood there, in an easy, unselfconscious attitude, his deeply tanned hands clasped round the back of the chair, devouring me. “I babbled on. I said how very kind he was to take me in, how very sorry I was to put his servants to any inconvenience, and what a lovely old house it seemed to be. Quite twenty minutes of this one sided conversation went on—if a conversation can be called one sided when one person replies silently through the medium of extremely expressive eyes, and says things which no one except a poet would have the pluck to say, unless he were engaged to be married. . "I confess I was a little relieved when the old couple brought in a tea tray. I had begun to feel that I had exhausted every subject of a commonplace nature I had ever thought about. “ ’Shall I pour out the tea?’ I asked, with a tiny, timid smile, when we were alone again. “ ’Thank you,’ he said. “And all the time he stood in front of me, watching me intently with an interest almost whimsical. It made the old occupation almost a new one, when I suddenly remembered that I was the first woman—gentlewoman—who had ever done so for him. He bowed as he took his cup in his hand, watched me as I stirred mine and sipped it. “Having nothing more to say, and not feel ing the need of making conversation, I con tented myself with returning his smile when I caught his rapt eyes, and ate. The run, and the cooler air, had made me ravenous, and the cakes were home made and perfectly delicious. And while I ate and drank I looked about me. Such a dear old room, Milly—just the sort of room one reads about in books, and so rarely comes across in real life. It was long and narrow—at least its length gave it the appear ance of narrowness—and was lined, five feet from the old oak floor, with bulging book shelves, except where the great Dutch fire place stood. “The whole place fitted my giant like a glove. It was all, like him, so good to look at, so simple, so upright, so clean, picturesque, and unconscious. It all, like him, seemed to be utterly behind the times, utterly unknow ing, utterly unspoilt. And as he stood there, tanned a brick dust color, with his eyes clear and steady and childlike, his eyebrows and hair burnt copper, his back broad and straight, his long, well-set legs firm and strong; upon my honor, he seemed to be related to the Scotch firs, the very child of the old wonderful books, the dark, beautiful prints, “When I looked at him, after all these things had flashed through my head, there he was still standing in front of me, untouched cup in hand, watching. “Any < :her man would have been boorish, impossible. But oddly enough, I looked for nothing else in my giant. "Nothing that he could have said, of course, could have fed my vanity half so satisfactorily as this long, silent, meaning stare. Every second the expression In his eyes changed. Wonder came, love came—that new-born won derful love—the first love—passion came. But not, I must own, till in an experimental way I slipped my foot out of its red felt barge, and pushed it out from under-the dressing gown. Then he clutched the chair tight and turned his eyes away, with quick breath coming and going, and when he looked again my foot was out of sight. “Oh, Milly, what a power it is! Beast or not, I know nothing in this world that gives me so keen, so delirious a pleasure as the exercise of it. I feel almost magical. It gives me the faculty of turning a man into a hungry animal —-even such a man as this one, who is ashamed and fearful, and who, for choice, would forget everything except just that I am beautiful and dainty and ethereal. “But I had broken the spell. He put down his cup and awoke. His smile became self- conscious and nervous. He fidgeted shyly, be gan sentences and left them unfinished. Luck ily, the old woman came in and said my dress was dry, and the storm had passed some time. There would be no more lightning. And so, with a smile as nervous as his own, and every bit as shy, I hurried after the old body out of the room and upstairs to hers. “It cost me half a sovereign. I would glad ly have paid fifty times that amount for the afternoon. “I dressed quietly, listening to the garrulous chatter of the well-meaning dame—my frock was utterly ruined—and then followed her down to the hall. “ ‘Good-bye, Mr. Ashley,’ I said, giving him my hand timidly. ‘Thank you so much!’ “He took my hand for an instant, and then letting it go said, stammering, ’May I . . , may I . . .’ • % “ ’Oh, that’s very kind of you. Indeed I shall be delighted. I think the storm has made me nervous.’ “On the face of the old woman as she watched us go out together there was a pecu liar smile in which I could read a reawakened romance, an almost pathetic hope. But the old man scowled at me. I was a new inven tion, and therefore—he was thoroughly Eng lish—a danger. I had the satisfaction of know ing that I was the first unvillagy woman—I ,hate the word lady, it reeks of tram-cars and clearance sales and suburban tea-fights—who had ever been seen with ‘the master.’ ‘“The white dust of the morning had be come mud. Pools had formed along the edges of the road. The freshness of everything was contagious. We both walked on springs. For no reason at all we both laughed. We were like two school-children let loose after school. I believe if I had started running helter-skelter along the road he would have chased me. "All his shyness faded. With the pride of the proprietor he pointed out to me the ex cellence of the crops, laughingly explaining the difference between corn and barley, barley and oats. He never referred to his first meet ing me, on the hill, but he referred to the hill, and told me—no doubt thinking what a diplo matic touch It was—that he always spent a certain amount of time there every day In the Summer, reading. “ ‘To-morrow,’ he added, T shall be there in the afternoon.’ "The sun had begun to set when I got back to the cottage. My dear, we had taken two hours to walk two miles. This time he had done all the talking, and if I needed any con vincing on the subject, he had convinced me as to his being the most interesting person on whom to exercise my peculiar gifts of any I had ever met. He had proved what a boy he was, and what a man he was, how immense was his knowledge of Nature, and how infini tesimal of hurhan nature—what an artist he •vas, and what a Goth. Oh, my dear, I feel that 1 am going to have some of the most en joyable days I shall ever have in my life.” CHAPTER VII. Love's Golden Key. SMILE was still playing round his mouth as Ashley swung into the road. He had removed his cap to Mrs. Blundell with the air of a Quixote. He had not forgotten to put it back. He kept his head bare to the soft breeze as a tribute to her as he made his way unconsciously to the hill where he had seen her first. He stood there erect and firm as the sun slipped away. A thousand voices sang to him. It was a new song, a song he had never heard before. It stirred and soothed and excited him. It made' him smile and tremble. It filled him with fear and joy. Love had thrust her golden key into his long-closed heart, turned it in the rusty lock, and flung the door wide open. He understood everything. He had not been living hitherto. He had thought that it was right that life should get everything out of him that was in him to devote to it. Now he knew that he should get everything out of life that there was in it to devote to him. The whole aspect of things was suddenly changed. It was as though someone had suddenly planted him on his feet after he had been standing all his life on his head. He was amazed to think that he could have spent all his years in such a position. Every thing, for the first time, looked right. The sun became his servant Instead of his master, the earth his very good friend, instead of a tyrant at whose very change of mood he shuddered. Everything that had seemed great became tiny! minute, a matter of slight consequence. What did it matter now if frost spoilt his early roots ^ rain his crops? Nothing. Nothing mattered!’ To Be Continued Kext Sunday. Copyright by Ess Ess Publishing Co., and Brentano’B. t