"Naughty Peter," she said, "all these months and you have been nowhere near us."

"I, too, have a bone--you never sent me a word about my wedding."

She turned her head away. "I was frightfully ill just then. They didn't think I'd pull through. I did write afterwards to Clare, I told her how ill I'd been--"

"She never told me."

Peter bent over the sofa. "But I am ashamed, Norah, more ashamed than I can say. After I got well and went to live with the Galleons a new life seemed to begin for me and I was so eager and excited about it all. And then--" he hesitated for a moment--"there was Clare."

"Yes, I know there was Clare and I am so delighted about it--I know that you will both be so happy.... But, when one is lying here week after week and is worried and tired things take such a different outline.

I thought that you and Clare--that you ... had given me up altogether and--"

Suddenly hiding her face in her hands she began to cry. It was inexpressibly desolate there in the dim bare little room, and the sharp sense of his neglect and the remembrance of the good friend that she had been to him for so many years overwhelmed Peter.

He knelt down and put his arms round her. "Norah--don't, please, I can't bear it. It's all right. I've been a beast, a selfish cad. But it shan't happen again. I'll come often--I'm ashamed."

She cried for a little and then she smiled at him. "I'm a fool to cry like that but you see I'm weak and ill--and seeing you again after all this time and your being so successful and happy upset me I suppose.

Forgive it, Peter, and come again one day when I'm better and stronger--and bring Clare too."

She held tightly to his hand and her grasp was hot and feverish. He reassured her, told her that he would come soon again, that he would bring Clare and so left her.

He took a cab and drove back to Chelsea in a storm of agitation.

Suddenly, out of nothing as it were, all these people, this old life had been thrust up in front of him--had demanded, made claims. About him once again was the old atmosphere: figures were filling his brain, the world was a wild tossing place ... one of those Roundabouts with the hissing lights, the screaming music, the horses going up and down. Plain enough now that the old life was not done with. Every moment of his past life seemed to spring before him claiming recognition. He was drunk with the desire for work. He flung the cabman something, dashed into the little house, was in his room. The lamp was lighted, the door was shut, there was silence, and in his brain figures, scenes, sentences were racing--"The Stone House," neglected for so long, had begun once more, to climb.

The hours passed, the white sheets were covered and flung aside. Dimly through a haze, he saw Clare standing in the doorway.

"Bad old boy!"

He scarcely glanced up. "I'm not coming yet--caught by work."

"Don't be at it too late."

He made no reply.

She closed the door softly behind her.

CHAPTER V

THE IN-BETWEENS

I

Then, out of the wind and rain, came Mr. Zanti.

II

Three days after Peter's visit to Brockett's he was finishing a letter before dressing for dinner. He and Clare were going on to a party later in the evening but were dining quietly alone together first. The storms that had fallen upon London three days before were still pommelling and buffeting the city, the trees outside the window groaned and creaked with a mysterious importance as though they were trying to tell one another secrets, and little branches tapped at the dripping panes. He was writing in the little drawing-room--warm and comfortable--and the Maria Theresa, so small a person in so much glory, looked down on him from her silver frame and gave him company.

Then Sarah--a minute servant, who always entered a room as though swept into it by a cyclone--breathlessly announced that there was a gentleman to see Mr. Westcott.

"'E's drippin' in the 'all," she gasped and handed Peter a very dirty bit of paper.

Peter read:--"Dear Boy, Being about to leave this country on an expedition of the utmost importance I feel that I must shake you by the hand before I go. Emilio Zanti."

Mr. Zanti, enormous, smiling from ear to ear, engulfed in a great coat from which his huge head, buffeted by wind and rain--his red cheeks, his rosy nose, his sparkling eyes--stood out like some strange and cheerful flower--filled the doorway.

He enfolded Peter in his arms, pressed him against very wet garments, kissed him on both cheeks and burst into a torrent of explanation.

He was only in London for a very few days--he must see his dearest Peter--so often before he had wanted to see his Peter but he had thought that it would be better to leave him--and then he had heard that his Peter was married--well, he must see his lady--it was entirely necessary that he should kiss her hand and wish her well and congratulate her on having secured his "own, own Peter," for a life partner. Yes, he had found his address from that Pension where Peter used to live; they had told him and he had come at once because at once, this very night, he was away to Spain where there was a secret expedition--ah, very secret--and soon--in a month, two months--he would return, a rich, rich man. This was the adventure of Mr. Zanti's life and when he was in England again he, Mr. Zanti, would see much of Peter and of his beautiful wife--of course she was beautiful--and of the dear children that were to come--

Here Peter interrupted him. He had listened to the torrent of words in an odd confusion. The last time that he had seen Mr. Zanti he had left him, sitting with his head in his hands sobbing in the little bookshop.

Since then everything had happened. He, Peter, had had success, love, position, comfort--the Gods had poured everything into his hands--and now, to his amazement as he sat there, in the little room opposite his huge fantastic friend he was almost regretting all those glorious things that had come to him and was wishing himself back in the dark little bookshop--dark, but lighted with the fire of Mr. Zanti's amazing adventures.

But there was more than this in his thoughts. As he looked at Mr. Zanti, at his wild black locks, his flaming cheeks, his rolling eyes, his large red hands, he was aware suddenly that Clare would not appreciate him. It was the first time since his marriage that there had been any question of Clare's criticism, but now he knew, with absolute certainty, that Mr.

Zanti was entirely outside Clare's range of possible persons. For the first time, almost with a secret start of apprehension, he knew that there were things that she did not understand.

"I'm afraid," he said, "that my wife is dressing. But when you come back you shall meet of course--that will be delightful." And then he went on--"But I simply can't tell you how splendid it is to look at you again. Lots of things have happened to me since I saw you, of course, but I'm just the same--"

Whilst he was speaking his voice had become eager, his eyes bright--he began to pace the room excitedly--

"Oh, Zanti! ... the days we used to have. I suppose the times I've been having lately had put it all out of my head, but now, with you here, it's all as though it happened yesterday. The day we left Cornwall, you and I--the fog when we got to London ... everything." He drew a great breath and stood in the middle of the room listening to the rain racing down the pipes beyond the dark windows.

Mr. Zanti, getting up ponderously, placed his hands on Peter's shoulders.

"Still the same Peter," he said. "Now I know zat I go 'appy. Zat is all I came for--I said I must zee my Peter because Stephen--"

"Stephen--" broke in Peter sharply.

"Yes, our Stephen. He goes with me now to Spain. He is now, until to-night, in London but he will not come to you because 'e's afraid--"

"Afraid?"

"Yes 'e says you are married now and 'ave a lovely 'ouse and 'e says you 'ave not written for a ver' long time, and 'e just asked me to give you 'is love and say that when 'e comes back from Spain, per'aps--"

"Stephen!" Peter's voice was sharp with distress. "Zanti, where is he now? I must go and see him at once."

"No, 'e 'as gone already to the boat. I follow 'im." Then Mr. Zanti added in a softer voice--"So when he tell me that you 'ave not written I say 'Ah! Mr. Peter forgets his old friends,' and I was zorry but I say that I will go and make sure. And now I am glad, ver' glad, and Stephen will be glad too. All is well--"

"Oh! I am ashamed. I don't know what has come over me all this time. But wait--I will write a note that you shall take to him and then--when he comes back from Spain--"

He went to his table and began to write eagerly. Mr. Zanti, meanwhile, went round the room on tip-toe, examining everything, sometimes shaking his huge head in disapproval, sometimes nodding his appreciation.

Peter wrote: