who brought peace to the beholder. He found himself at a loss for words, and because he was not used to feeling shy before women he began to bluster, to give orders to the waiter in a loud voice, and when they came into the dining-room he complained about the position of the table; it was cramped against the wall, they must have the one in the opposite corner instead. Henry took charge and mollified the waiter. He gently teased his brother and changed the conversation, and soon they were all seated, Johnnie on the left of Katherine Eyre, and, rather than that she should think him a dullard and a boor, he at once plunged into a fantastic tale about the Crimea-she had asked some question on the war-hoping to impress her with its extravagance.
'I should like,' she said, 'to have been out there and helped Miss Nightingale. Not so much because of the nursing-I hardly think I could have stood it-but because so many of the men must have felt lonely and unhappy and would want comfort.'
She looked at him and smiled, and he turned away, crumbling a piece of bread, because he was reminded suddenly of himself in that appalling shambles at Sevastopol, taking a very different sort of comfort in the arms of a slant-eyed, rather dirty little refugee, and how he had gone without whisky for five days and nearly died in consequence.
'I don't think,' he said, 'you could have done much good…'
And then he saw Henry staring at Katherine Eyre across the table, with such tenderness and adoration that Johnnie felt a strange despair come upon him, a feeling that he was an outcast, a pariah dog, who had no business to be sitting here with his brother and Katherine Eyre. They belonged to another world, a world where people were normal and happy, and had faith and confidence in the future. And above all faith and confidence in themselves.
'Here,' he said loudly, 'no one's drinking anything. Aren't we going to toast the sheriff of Slane?'
And he thumped on the table for the waiter to attend them. The other people dining in the room turned round at the sound of his voice.
'Henry,' he said to Katherine Eyre, 'gets his way by being polite to people. I get mine by doing the opposite?
She did not answer, and once again he felt depressed and lost, not because there was any sign of disapproval in her eyes, or condemnation, but because the sight of her sitting there beside him made him wish to be different, someone who was quiet and peaceful like her* self. He felt that very possibly she considered it unimportant whether people got their own way or not, and that in any case to shout and to bluster was something she would never do.
There was his mother laughing and talking to Bill. She enjoyed life, anyway, and would continue to do so whatever happened, and Bill, that honest parson, chatted back politely to his mother-in-laws though no doubt he did not care about the dyed hair and the powdered face. Fanny, giving birth any minute, was like a mouse, and always had been; no chance of her ever breaking the peace; and Edward and Henry discussed the affairs of the day as though the words Conservative and Liberal meant anything at all. No, he was an outcast, and always would be, and no doubt everybody here, except perhaps his mother, wished that they could have dined without him, 'Well,' he said, leaning back in his chair, 'we have toasted Henry's future as a sheriff, what about toasting mine as a civilian?'
There was a pause in the conversation. Everybody looked at him.
'What do you mean, darling?' said Fanny-Rosa.
'Only that I am leaving the regiment,' said Johnnie. 'I sent in my papers today.'
At once a torrent of questions were flung at him.
What did he mean by it? And surely it was a pity, he had always said the life suited him, and one conventional phrase after the other. Only Edward, the other soldier present, made no comment. And Fanny-Rosa, with sudden intuition, wondered whether Johnnie had been re-quested to leave…
'Oh, I'm fed up with the service,' said Johnnie. 'All very fat and fine when there's some fighting to do, but to stand about all day on a barrack square is not my idea of amusement. I've had it in my mind to leave for some time. What will I do? I haven't the slightest idea, I shall probably go abroad. Anyway, what the devil does it matter? The fact is, Miss Eyre, I find it rather degrading, and not particularly profitable, to be six-and-twenty years of age with deuced little to live on, waiting for an old man of eighty-four to die and leave me all his money-was The speech made an uncomfortable impression.
His sister blushed. and glanced at her husband. His mother smiled a shade too brightly and began talking rather loudly to Henry about his plans for Christmas.
Only Katherine Eyre appeared unmoved. She looked up at Johnnie, her eyes grave and kindly.
'It is a very difficult position for you,' she said, 'and must make you feel so unsettled. Don't go abroad, though.'
'Why not?' said Johnnie.
'I don't think you would be happy.'
'I'm not happy anywhere.'
'Whose fault is that?'
'Nobody's. It's my misfortune to be cursed with the nature I have.'
'Don't say that. You are really the most kind and generous person. I have often talked about you to Henry.
He is very fond of you.'
'Is he? I doubt it.'
'You like to make yourself out worse than you are. That's foolishness. You ought to come across the water, and take an interest in your country.'
'What has my country ever done for me?'
'It's given you your life, for one thing.'
She laughed, and his heart smote him because she had so little knowledge of his true character, his selfishness, his vices, his utter want of principle.
'I've always understood,' he said, 'that I was a seven months' child. Perhaps that is why I lack all the virtues. And the nicest member of my family died the day I was born, my aunt Jane, who might have made something out of me. She was to have been my godmother. I think you are a little like the portrait of her that hangs in the dining-room at Clonmere.'
'I suppose,' she said, 'that you would not like me for a godmother instead?'
He stared at her suspiciously. What the devil was she driving at? The words would have sounded flirtatious, inviting, from anyone else, or deliberately provoking from an older, clever woman. But from Katherine Eyre they were unique, because they were sincere. She looked at him with her calm brown eyes, and once again she smiled.
'Are you afraid I should play the governess?' she said. 'I promise you I would never do that. But if my godson had twists I should want to help him unravel the knots.'
Johnnie had forgotten the rest of his family, forgotten the people in the dining-room and the passing waiters, the bustle and confusion. It seemed to him that there was no one but his tortured, angry, resentful self, and the blessed, healing presence of Katherine Eyre.
'You are a very unusual person,' he said slowly. 'I wish to God I had met you before.'
'We are going to see a lot of one another from now on,' she said, 'so the future will make up for the past. You must come and stay with us in Slane.'
Why, wondered Johnnie, was she so gracious to him, so kind, as though it mattered to her what became of him, as though she cared for him in some strange personal way, who had only met him an hour before? If he could think for one moment that there was to be someone in life who would bother about him, help him, smile at him, talk to him, why then there was hope indeed. She had asked him to stay in Slane. Did the Eyres live in Slane? He could not remember. How unusual she was, lacking all ordinary convention, and yet bearing no resemblance to the fluffy little coquettes with whom he amused himself in London. Yes, he would go back to his own country, he would stay with Katherine Eyre and her family in Slane, and perhaps, after he had seen a bit more of her, there would be some purpose in living after all. She would be merciful and kind, and if he shouted, and swore, and drank, and lost his temper, she would forgive him. That was what he needed more than anything in the world. Forgiveness. Mercy.
And now Henry was getting up with a glass in his hand, looking proud and happy. His brother supposed there
