When William Marchmill had finished his inquiries for lodgings at a well-known watering-place in Upper Wessex, he returned to the hotel to findhis wife. She, with the children, had rambled along the shore, andMarchmill followed in the direction indicated by the military-lookinghall-porter

'By Jove, how far you've gone! I am quite out of breath,' Marchmillsaid, rather impatiently, when he came up with his wife, who was readingas she walked, the three children being considerably further ahead withthe nurse.

Mrs. Marchmill started out of the reverie into which the book had thrownher. 'Yes,' she said, 'you've been such a long time. I was tired ofstaying in that dreary hotel. But I am sorry if you have wanted me,Will?'

'Well, I have had trouble to suit myself. When you see the airy andcomfortable rooms heard of, you find they are stuffy and uncomfortable.Will you come and see if what I've fixed on will do? There is not muchroom, I am afraid; hut I can light on nothing better. The town is ratherfull.'

The pair left the children and nurse to continue their ramble, and wentback together.

In age well-balanced, in personal appearance fairly matched, and indomestic requirements conformable, in temper this couple differed, thougheven here they did not often clash, he being equable, if not lymphatic,and she decidedly nervous and sanguine. It was to their tastes andfancies, those smallest, greatest particulars, that no common denominatorcould be applied. Marchmill considered his wife's likes and inclinationssomewhat silly; she considered his sordid and material. The husband'sbusiness was that of a gunmaker in a thriving city northwards, and hissoul was in that business always; the lady was best characterized by thatsuperannuated phrase of elegance 'a votary of the muse.' Animpressionable, palpitating creature was Ella, shrinking humanely fromdetailed knowledge of her husband's trade whenever she reflected thateverything he manufactured had for its purpose the destruction of life.She could only recover her equanimity by assuring herself that some, atleast, of his weapons were sooner or later used for the extermination ofhorrid vermin and animals almost as cruel to their inferiors in speciesas human beings were to theirs.

She had never antecedently regarded this occupation of his as anyobjection to having him for a husband. Indeed, the necessity of gettinglife-leased at all cost, a cardinal virtue which all good mothers teach,kept her from thinking of it at all till she had closed with William, hadpassed the honeymoon, and reached the reflecting stage. Then, like aperson who has stumbled upon some object in the dark, she wondered whatshe had got; mentally walked round it, estimated it; whether it were rareor common; contained gold, silver, or lead; were a clog or a pedestal,everything to her or nothing.

She came to some vague conclusions, and since then had kept her heartalive by pitying her proprietor's obtuseness and want of refinement,pitying herself, and letting off her delicate and ethereal emotions inimaginative occupations, day-dreams, and night-sighs, which perhaps wouldnot much have disturbed William if he had known of them.

Her figure was small, elegant, and slight in build, tripping, or ratherbounding, in movement. She was dark-eyed, and had that marvellouslybright and liquid sparkle in each pupil which characterizes persons ofElla's cast of soul, and is too often a cause of heartache to thepossessor's male friends, ultimately sometimes to herself. Her husbandwas a tall, long-featured man, with a brown beard; he had a ponderingregard; and was, it must be added, usually kind and tolerant to her. Hespoke in squarely shaped sentences, and was supremely satisfied with acondition of sublunary things which made weapons a necessity.

Husband and wife walked till they had reached the house they were insearch of, which stood in a terrace facing the sea, and was fronted by asmall garden of wind-proof and salt-proof evergreens, stone steps leadingup to the porch. It had its number in the row, but, being rather largerthan the rest, was in addition sedulously distinguished as Coburg Houseby its landlady, though everybody else called it 'Thirteen, New Parade.'The spot was bright and lively now; but in winter it became necessary toplace sandbags against the door, and to stuff up the keyhole against thewind and rain, which had worn the paint so thin that the priming andknotting showed through.

The householder, who bad been watching for the gentleman's return, metthem in the passage, and showed the rooms. She informed them that shewas a professional man's widow, left in needy circumstances by the rathersudden death of her husband, and she spoke anxiously of the conveniencesof the establishment.

Mrs. Marchmill said that she liked the situation and the house; but, itbeing small, there would not be accommodation enough, unless she couldhave all the rooms.

The landlady mused with an air of disappointment. She wanted thevisitors to be her tenants very badly, she said, with obvious honesty.But unfortunately two of the rooms were occupied permanently by abachelor gentleman. He did not pay season prices, it was true; but as hekept on his apartments all the year round, and was an extremely nice andinteresting young man, who gave no trouble, she did not like to turn himout for a month's 'let,' even at a high figure. 'Perhaps, however,' sheadded, 'he might offer to go for a time.'

They would not hear of this, and went back to the hotel, intending toproceed to the agent's to inquire further. Hardly had they sat down totea when the landlady called. Her gentleman, she said, had been soobliging as to offer to give up his rooms for three or four weeks ratherthan drive the new-comers away.

'It is very kind, but we won't inconvenience him in that way,' said theMarchmills.

'O, it won't inconvenience him, I assure you!' said the landladyeloquently. 'You see, he's a different sort of young man frommost--dreamy, solitary, rather melancholy--and he cares more to be herewhen the south-westerly gales are beating against the door, and the seawashes over the Parade, and there's not a soul in the place, than he doesnow in the season. He'd just as soon be where, in fact, he's goingtemporarily, to a little cottage on the Island opposite, for a change.'She hoped therefore that they would come.

The Marchmill family accordingly took possession of the house next day,and it seemed to suit them very well. After luncheon Mr. Marchmillstrolled out towards the pier, and Mrs. Marchmill, having despatched thechildren to their outdoor amusements on the sands, settled herself inmore completely, examining this and that article, and testing thereflecting powers of the mirror in the wardrobe door.

In the small back sitting-room, which had been the young bachelor's, shefound furniture of a more personal nature than in the rest. Shabbybooks, of correct rather than rare editions, were piled up in a queerlyreserved manner in corners, as if the previous occupant had not conceivedthe possibility that any incoming person of the season's bringing couldcare to look inside them. The landlady hovered on the threshold torectify anything that Mrs. Marchmill might not find to her satisfaction.

'I'll make this my own little room,' said the latter, 'because the booksare here. By the way, the person who has left seems to have a good many.He won't mind my reading some of them, Mrs. Hooper, I hope?'

'O dear no, ma'am. Yes, he has a good many. You see, he is in theliterary line himself somewhat. He is a poet--yes, really a poet--and hehas a little income of his own, which is enough to write verses on, butnot enough for cutting a figure, even if he cared to.'

'A poet! O, I did not know that.'

Mrs. Marchmill opened one of the books, and saw the owner's name writtenon the title-page. 'Dear me!' she continued; 'I know his name verywell--Robert Trewe--of course I do; and his writings! And it is hisrooms we have taken, and him we have turned out of his home?'

Ella Marchmill, sitting down alone a few minutes later, thought withinterested surprise of Robert Trewe. Her own latter history will bestexplain that interest. Herself the only daughter of a struggling man ofletters, she had during the last year or two taken to writing poems, inan endeavour to find a congenial channel in which to let flow herpainfully embayed emotions, whose former limpidity and sparkle seemeddeparting in the stagnation caused by the routine of a practicalhousehold and the gloom of bearing children to a commonplace father.These poems, subscribed with a masculine pseudonym, had appeared invarious obscure magazines, and in two cases in rather prominent ones. Inthe second of the latter the page which bore her effusion at the bottom,in smallish print, bore at the top, in large print, a few verses on thesame subject by this very man, Robert Trewe. Both of them had, in fact,been struck by a tragic incident reported in the daily papers, and hadused it simultaneously as an inspiration, the editor remarking in a noteupon the coincidence, and that the excellence of both poems prompted himto give them together.

After that event Ella, otherwise 'John Ivy,' had watched with muchattention the appearance anywhere in print of verse bearing the signatureof Robert Trewe, who, with a man's unsusceptibility on the question ofsex, had never once thought of passing himself off as a woman. To besure, Mrs. Marchmill had satisfied herself with a sort of reason fordoing the contrary in her case; that nobody might believe in herinspiration if they found that the sentiments came from a pushingtradesman's wife, from the mother of three children by a matter-of-factsmall-arms manufacturer.

Trewe's verse contrasted with that of the rank and file of recent minorpoets in being impassioned rather than ingenious, luxuriant rather thanfinished. Neither symboliste nor decadent, he was a pessimist in so faras that character applies to a man who looks at the worst contingenciesas well as the best in the human condition. Being little attracted byexcellences of form and rhythm apart from content, he sometimes, whenfeeling outran his artistic speed, perpetrated sonnets in the looselyrhymed Elizabethan fashion, which every right-minded reviewer said heought not to have done.

With sad and hopeless envy, Ella Marchmill had often and often scannedthe rival poet's work, so much stronger as it always was than her ownfeeble lines. She had imitated him, and her inability to touch his levelwould send her into fits of despondency. Months passed away thus, tillshe observed from the publishers' list that Trewe had collected hisfugitive pieces into a volume, which was duly issued, and was much orlittle praised according to chance, and had a sale quite sufficient topay for the printing.

This step onward had suggested to John Ivy the idea of collecting herpieces also, or at any rate of making up a book of her rhymes by addingmany in manuscript to the few that had seen the light, for she had beenable to get no great number into print. A ruinous charge was made forcosts of publication; a few reviews noticed her poor little volume; butnobody talked of it, nobody bought it, and it fell dead in a fortnight--ifit had ever been alive.

The author's thoughts were diverted to another groove just then by thediscovery that she was going to have a third child, and the collapse ofher poetical venture had perhaps less effect upon her mind than it mighthave done if she had been domestically unoccupied. Her husband had paidthe publisher's bill with the doctor's, and there it all had ended forthe time. But, though less than a poet of her century, Ella was morethan a mere multiplier of her kind, and latterly she had begun to feelthe old afflatus once more. And now by an odd conjunction she foundherself in the rooms of Robert Trewe.

She thoughtfully rose from her chair and searched the apartment with theinterest of a fellow-tradesman. Yes, the volume of his own verse wasamong the rest. Though quite familiar with its contents, she read ithere as if it spoke aloud to her, then called up Mrs. Hooper, thelandlady, for some trivial service, and inquired again about the youngman.

'Well, I'm sure you'd be interested in him, ma'am, if you could see him,only he's so shy that I don't suppose you will.' Mrs. Hooper seemednothing loth to minister to her tenant's curiosity about her predecessor.'Lived here long? Yes, nearly two years. He keeps on his rooms evenwhen he's not here: the soft air of this place suits his chest, and helikes to be able to come back at any time. He is mostly writing orreading, and doesn't see many people, though, for the matter of that, heis such a good, kind young fellow that folks would only be too glad to befriendly with him if they knew him. You don't meet kind-hearted peopleevery day.'

'Ah, he's kind-hearted . . . and good.'

'Yes; he'll oblige me in anything if I ask him. "Mr. Trewe," I say tohim sometimes, "you are rather out of spirits." "Well, I am, Mrs.Hooper," he'll say, "though I don't know how you should find it out.""Why not take a little change?" I ask. Then in a day or two he'll saythat he will take a trip to Paris, or Norway, or somewhere; and I assureyou he comes back all the better for it.'

'Ah, indeed! His is a sensitive nature, no doubt.'

'Yes. Still he's odd in some things. Once when he had finished a poemof his composition late at night he walked up and down the roomrehearsing it; and the floors being so thin--jerry-built houses, youknow, though I say it myself--he kept me awake up above him till I wishedhim further . . . But we get on very well.'

This was but the beginning of a series of conversations about the risingpoet as the days went on. On one of these occasions Mrs. Hooper drewElla's attention to what she had not noticed before: minute scribblingsin pencil on the wall-paper behind the curtains at the head of the bed.

'O! let me look,' said Mrs. Marchmill, unable to conceal a rush of tendercuriosity as she bent her pretty face close to the wall.

'These,' said Mrs. Hooper, with the manner of a woman who knew things,'are the very beginnings and first thoughts of his verses. He has triedto rub most of them out, but you can read them still. My belief is thathe wakes up in the night, you know, with some rhyme in his head, and jotsit down there on the wall lest he should forget it by the morning. Someof these very lines you see here I have seen afterwards in print in themagazines. Some are newer; indeed, I have not seen that one before. Itmust have been done only a few days ago.'

'O yes! . . . '

Ella Marchmill flushed without knowing why, and suddenly wished hercompanion would go away, now that the information was imparted. Anindescribable consciousness of personal interest rather than literarymade her anxious to read the inscription alone; and she accordinglywaited till she could do so, with a sense that a great store of emotionwould be enjoyed in the act.

Perhaps because the sea was choppy outside the Island, Ella's husbandfound it much pleasanter to go sailing and steaming about without hiswife, who was a bad sailor, than with her. He did not disdain to go thusalone on board the steamboats of the cheap-trippers, where there wasdancing by moonlight, and where the couples would come suddenly down witha lurch into each other's arms; for, as he blandly told her, the companywas too mixed for him to take her amid such scenes. Thus, while thisthriving manufacturer got a great deal of change and sea-air out of hissojourn here, the life, external at least, of Ella was monotonous enough,and mainly consisted in passing a certain number of hours each day inbathing and walking up and down a stretch of shore. But the poeticimpulse having again waxed strong, she was possessed by an inner flamewhich left her hardly conscious of what was proceeding around her.

She had read till she knew by heart Trewe's last little volume of verses,and spent a great deal of time in vainly attempting to rival some ofthem, till, in her failure, she burst into tears. The personal elementin the magnetic attraction exercised by this circumambient,unapproachable master of hers was so much stronger than the intellectualand abstract that she could not understand it. To be sure, she wassurrounded noon and night by his customary environment, which literallywhispered of him to her at every moment; but he was a man she had neverseen, and that all that moved her was the instinct to specialize awaiting emotion on the first fit thing that came to hand did not, ofcourse, suggest itself to Ella.

In the natural way of passion under the too practical conditions whichcivilization has devised for its fruition, her husband's love for her hadnot survived, except in the form of fitful friendship, any more than, oreven so much as, her own for him; and, being a woman of very livingardours, that required sustenance of some sort, they were beginning tofeed on this chancing material, which was, indeed, of a quality farbetter than chance usually offers.

One day the children had been playing hide-and-seek in a closet, whence,in their excitement, they pulled out some clothing. Mrs. Hooperexplained that it belonged to Mr. Trewe, and hung it up in the closetagain. Possessed of her fantasy, Ella went later in the afternoon, whennobody was in that part of the house, opened the closet, unhitched one ofthe articles, a mackintosh, and put it on, with the waterproof capbelonging to it.

'The mantle of Elijah!' she said. 'Would it might inspire me to rivalhim, glorious genius that he is!'

Her eyes always grew wet when she thought like that, and she turned tolook at herself in the glass. His heart had beat inside that coat, andhis brain had worked under that hat at levels of thought she would neverreach. The consciousness of her weakness beside him made her feel quitesick. Before she had got the things off her the door opened, and herhusband entered the room.

'What the devil--'

She blushed, and removed them

'I found them in the closet here,' she said, 'and put them on in a freak.What have I else to do? You are always away!'

'Always away? Well . . . '

That evening she had a further talk with the landlady, who might herselfhave nourished a half-tender regard for the poet, so ready was she todiscourse ardently about him.

'You are interested in Mr. Trewe, I know, ma'am,' she said; 'and he hasjust sent to say that he is going to call to-morrow afternoon to look upsome books of his that he wants, if I'll be in, and he may select themfrom your room?'

'O yes!'

'You could very well meet Mr Trewe then, if you'd like to be in the way!'

She promised with secret delight, and went to bed musing of him.

Next morning her husband observed: 'I've been thinking of what you said,Ell: that I have gone about a good deal and left you without much toamuse you. Perhaps it's true. To-day, as there's not much sea, I'lltake you with me on board the yacht.'

For the first time in her experience of such an offer Ella was not glad.But she accepted it for the moment. The time for setting out drew near,and she went to get ready. She stood reflecting. The longing to see thepoet she was now distinctly in love with overpowered all otherconsiderations.

'I don't want to go,' she said to herself. 'I can't bear to be away! AndI won't go.'

She told her husband that she had changed her mind about wishing to sail.He was indifferent, and went his way.

For the rest of the day the house was quiet, the children having gone outupon the sands. The blinds waved in the sunshine to the soft, steadystroke of the sea beyond the wall; and the notes of the Green Silesianband, a troop of foreign gentlemen hired for the season, had drawn almostall the residents and promenaders away from the vicinity of Coburg House.A knock was audible at the door.

Mrs. Marchmill did not hear any servant go to answer it, and she becameimpatient. The books were in the room where she sat; but nobody came up.She rang the bell.

'There is some person waiting at the door,' she said.

'O no, ma'am! He's gone long ago. I answered it.'

Mrs. Hooper came in herself.

'So disappointing!' she said. 'Mr. Trewe not coming after all!'

'But I heard him knock, I fancy!'

'No; that was somebody inquiring for lodgings who came to the wronghouse. I forgot to tell you that Mr. Trewe sent a note just before lunchto say I needn't get any tea for him, as he should not require the books,and wouldn't come to select them.'

Ella was miserable, and for a long time could not even re-read hismournful ballad on 'Severed Lives,' so aching was her erratic littleheart, and so tearful her eyes. When the children came in with wetstockings, and ran up to her to tell her of their adventures, she couldnot feel that she cared about them half as much as usual.