The Secret Places of the Heart

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lk over the downs round Avebury they went by way of

oor little heap of stones; it did not even dominate the landscape; it was some way from the crest of the swelling down on which it stood and it was further dwarfed by the colossal air-ship hangars and clustering offices of the air station that the great war had c

ide of the road stood a travel-stained middle-class automobile, with a miscellany of dusty luggage, rugs and luncheon

tile and a small but resolute boy of perhaps five or six who proposed to leave the enclosure

the small boy. "It isunt anything

ery day, young man," said th

boy, with extreme conviction. "It's rocks

rnstile mutely co

arm here," the doctor advised, and the

he lamps with great assiduity. The two gentlemen lingered at the turnstile for a moment or so to watch his pr

nd--at his age," said the custodian, j

artineau went on towards the circle. "When she encountered her first dra

the great prostrate stones in the centre of the place. She was a black-haired, sun-burnt individual and she stood with her arms akimbo, quite frankly amused at the disappearance of Master Anthony, and offering no sort of help for his recovery. On the greensward before her stood the paterfamilias of the family automobile, and he was making a trumpet with his hands in order to repeat th

hastisement to a hidden hearer. "That's what he is doing. He oug

rather than to the angry parent below, "he's perfectly safe and happy. The Druids haven't got him. Indeed, they've

d tell Price he's gone back to the car.... They

e to supervise the lamp cleaning. The head of the family found some difficulty, it would seem, in readjusting his mind to the comparative innocence of Anthony, and Sir Richmond and the young lady on the rock so

e," she said, smiling in the frankest and fr

is manner. "I was explaining to the young lady that it dates from the ea

s ever been found her

arly bronze age, anyho

um. "Bronze got to Britain somewhere b

as who should say, 'This

f the family. "It is difficult to see how that could

ung lady on the stone. "I can't imag

n the tone of one accustomed to find a gentle spo

place. They hung things

ings?" asked

s perhaps. Mats of rushes. Bast clot

a delightful idea;" said the f

ossible one," s

g lady went on, undismayed. She seemed t

and gesture of one who would recall erring wits to sanity, "it is far mor

id Sir Richmond. "In which case it wouldn't have sto

rove," said the young lady,

ech," said S

the midsummer sunrise," s

mily in the reproving tone of one who never allows

is was covered in all right. A dark hunched old place in a wood. Beech stems, smooth, like pillars. And they came to it at night, in procession, beating drums, and scared half out of their wits. They

was, V.V." said the lady in grey, who w

thony's younger sister to h

the younger, in a noiseless voice that ce

ch of breadth in the brow and softness in the cheek bones, that faint flavour of the Amerindian, one sees at times in American women. Her voice was a very soft and pleasing voice, and she spoke persuasively and not assertively as so many American women do. Her determination

ep up on the prostrate megalith and stand beside her, the better to appreciate her poi

river, nor of the alleged race course to the north, nor had she ever heard that the stones were supposed to

tio

endured some further particulars with manifest impatience, no longer able, now that Sir Richmond was encouraging the girl, to keep her in check with the slightly derisive smile pro

came floating back. "Talking wanton nonsense.... Any p

out of t

d and the younger lady went on very cheerfully to the population, agriculture, housing and general scenery of the surrounding Downland during the later Stone Age. The shorter

" she remarked, "she m

started, and his face assumed the distressed politeness of the mo

lady. "Why! She's a fiend at it

visited

this before?' she said. 'What's Notre Dame to this? This is where we came from. This is the real starting point of the MAYFLOWER. Belinda,' she said, 'we've got to see all we can of this

ntion that a plumber gives to a tap that is misbehaving, and like a plumber refraine

o Sir Richmond and the rest to the doctor. "It is ne

to us," said

," said the shorter lady, who

ted gently. "Life is always beginning agai

to all that. She's been saying it right across Europe. Rome, Paris, London; they'

.V. "I said that if people went on building with fluted pillars and Corinthian c

red it and laughed cheerfully. "I suppose E

e lady who answered to the name of Belinda. "It gave me cold shive

s of architecture. I do anyhow. And those columns with Corinthian capitals have got to be a sort of symbol for me for everything in Europe that I don't want and have no sort of use for

classical

uzzle

thian column is a weed spread by t

and keeps on repeating the same thing. And can't sit down. 'The empire, gentlemen--the Empire. Empire.' Rome itself is perfectly frightful. It stares at you with its great round stupid arches as though it couldn't imagine that you could pos

RTALIS," said

f that. It's no good-telling me that it did. It escaped from it.... So I said to Belinda here, 'Let's burrow, if we can, und

y Corinthian, something called the Capitol," Sir Ri

, so conclusively that it seemed to leav

ism," she vouchsafed. "We

beneath the

nted che

nd years

ace! Happ

than this. And older still is Avebury. Have you heard in America of Avebur

the lady who was

ry?" asked V.V. "I've n

was a lord,"

neau, embarked upon an account of the glory and wo

tiously, a thick, respectable gold watch, for the doctor was not the sort of man to wear his watch upon his wrist. He clicked it open and looked at it. Thereby

ect their course. He found himself called upon to make personal sacrifices to facilitate the painless transport of the two ladies to Salisbury, where their luggage awaited them at the Old George Hotel. In some way too elusive to trace, it became evident that he and Sir Richmond were to stay at this same Old George Hotel. The luggag

l imagination before, and he was evidently very greatly excited and re

tio

was to hear later. He ran his overcrowded little car, overcrowded so far as the dicky went, over the crest of the Down and dow

th a little stretching,"

land gradients, quivering very slightly with the vibration of the road, came swiftly and easily to meet and pass the throbbing little car as he

eltic; it, saw the Romans and the Saxons through, and for a time it was a Norman city. Now it is pasture for sheep. Latest as yet is Salisbury,--English, real English. It may last a few centuries still. It is little more than seven hundred years old. But when I think of those great hangars back there by Stonehenge, I fee

sympathetic fellow travelle

et whose interest in history didn't se

picturesque. We stare at the natives--like visitors at a Zoo. We don't realize that we belong.... I know our style.... But we aren't all like that. Some of us are learning a bit better than that. We have one or two teachers

of any of them,"

ngs happened between Adam and the Mayflower that we ought to be told about. I allow it's a recent revival. The United States has been like one of those men you read about in the papers who go away from home and turn up in some distant place with their memories gone. They've forgotte

do you fin

and c

this country b

led radiantly at her. "But if I say that Amer

e people,"

W

ts of Europe anyho

ilized person I've me

d person I've met in Europe for a

of reasonable, civil

r seen very l

scattered

ard to

to an American for some time. I want to know very badly

oing. Her ways recently have been a little difficult to u

aid Sir

ss. We feel a sort of ownership in England. It's

of that," said

h you

mals. And poor Aunt Britannia almost deliberately lost her

vours t

e d

know all

nd I may have the pleasure of showing yo

land on our way to Falmouth. Where I join a father in a few days' time, and I go

said Sir

o-morrow. Why not? Perhaps if we did as the Germans do and gave our names no

knighthood. So my name is now Sir Richmond Hardy. My friend is a very distinguished Harley Street physician. Chiefly nervous and mental cases. His name is Dr. Martineau. He is quite

ommendations. Through the oval window glared an expression of ma

ope on Red Cross work and since the peace I've been settling up things and t

il Gra

ris now. Paris it seems is where everything is to be settled against you. Belinda is a sort of companion I have acquired for the purposes of independent travel. S

Har

nd and Dr.

Old Sarum. The little ancient city that faded away when Salisbury lift

tineau was grim about th

tio

bjections to any such modification of their original programme. When they arrived in Salisbury, the doctor did make some slight effort to suggest a different hotel from that in which the two ladies had engaged their rooms, but on the spur of the moment and in their presence he could produce no sufficient reason for refusing the accommodation the Old George had ready for him. He was reduce

Avebury to-morrow," said Sir Richmond.

say nothing. He stared over his tea-cup dour-faced. An objectio

its best, in the full tide of its mediaeval ascendancy, had called it into being. He was making some extremely loose and inaccurate generalizations about the buildings and ruins each age

ammont compared. "Rome of the

clearness. In front and keeping just a little beyond the range of his intervention, Sir Richmond would go with Miss Grammont; he h

?" asked Mi

o do--before the post goes,

cealed dismay. He was, if one may put it in such a fashion, not l

d the doctor muli

addition of, "You t

those things you want to buy, Belinda; a fountain pen and the little books. We can all go together a

minably unjust. And it was also clear to him that he must keep closely to his own room or h

would not be disagreeable. He

y make to Sir Richmond about the unwarrantable, the absolutely unwarrantable, al

though he judged her no older than five and twenty, the word "girl" with its associations of virginal ignorances, invisible purdah, and trite ideas newly discovered, seemed even less appropriate for her than the word "boy." She had an air of having in some obscure way graduated

ens from one of those jackdaw collections of bright things so many clever women waste their wits in accumulating. She was not talking for effect at all, she

gh a wrought-iron gate of a delightful garden of spring flowers, alyssum, aubrietia, snow-upon-the-mountains, daffodils, narcissus and the like, held them for a tim

cathedral," said Sir Richmond. "B

eyes blinking up at the sunlit spire sharp against the blue. "I've been a

ploration in Europe. "My friend, the philosopher," he had said, "will not have it that we are really the individuals we think we are. You must talk to him--he is a very cur

man," she h

ditch at Avebury was on the inside instead of the outside of the vallum, so now Miss Grammont a

adition," said Sir Richmond. "But

and then at him with a fa

d his rep

e wanted to exercise and display our power over stone. We made it into reeds and branches. We squirted it up in all these spires and pinnacles. The

member that I ever wor

architecture in a mood of flaming ambition. The Freemasons on the building could hardly refrain from jeering at the little pries

y of the sky-scraper spirit.... You are doing

But it seems to me now that I do begin to remember building this cathedral and all th

id. "And my s

ica. It's still large enough, mentally and materially, to build all

uilding now? And what do you th

ve almost grown up. I believe it is time w

building any

ew w

t me,"

undations," said Sir Richmo

believe they w

bt we are scrapp

est end and along the path under the trees towards the river, exchanging their ideas very frankly and freely

tio

. They were quietly but definitely dressed, pretty alterations had happened to their coiffure, a silver band and deep red stones lit the dusk of Miss Grammont's hair and a necklace of the same colourings kept the peace between her jolly sun-burnt cheek

discursive and exclamatory. She broke every thread that appeared. The Old George at Salisbury is really old; it shows it, and Miss Seyffert laced the entire evenin

azy contentment had taken possession of the younger lady. She sat deep in a basket chair and spoke now and then. M

ment that Italy was frightfully overpopulated. "In some parts of Italy it is like

loads big enough for mu

rking like slaves,"

le at work by the roadside. Who ought

"It doesn't imply want. But I agree that a large part of Italy is frigh

its present soci

organization," s

yffert, and added amazingly: "I'm o

eau in a state of sudden distress attempted

"Which amount to nothing. Which do not even represent happiness. And whi

t of liking for their live

ns of one common life. All that they feel has been felt, all that they do has been done better before. Because they are

there in the world?

hundred, fifteen hun

n your

t most. It would be quite enough for this little planet

enough, I have never thought about that que

ifty million aristocrats?" began Miss Gra

million would do, They'd be able to develop fully, all of them. As t

always say," sa

population, as much as fuel, will be under a world control. If one thing, why not th

" Miss Seyffert injected, foll

patience, "that the movement of thought is away from haphazard tow

man," said Sir Richmond.

me a lit

nquiry at Miss Seyffert.

human beings with room to live and breathe in and no need for wars. Will they live in palaces? Will they all be healthy

mond. Just for a moment they stoo

door closed behind the two Americ

ding before the fireplace. There was no doubt whatever

ican type," the doctor

r Richmond

so. "You are committed to the pro

see Avebury," s

amused by his thoughts and staring at

on the top of the docto

nd paused. "I shall leave th

ichmond. "To give them a chance of seeing the cathe

suppose we

" said Sir Rich

o tell the truth, I do not find this encounter so amusing as you seem to do.... I shall not be s

something mulish in th

extremely interesting--an

dent

things and your position, I do not care very greatly for the part of an accessory to what may easily develop, as you know very well, into a very serious flirtation. An absurd, mischievous, irrelevant flirtation. You may not like the word. You may pretend it is a conversation, an ordinary intellectual con

himself alone. With

tio

mselves together again by the fireplace in the Old George smoking-room. They

Sir Richmond in a tone of extreme reasonableness, and I admi

ibus, said Dr. Martineau. "I am not

eally! as one man to another, it does seem to me to be a bit

And above all, if I spend another day in or near the company of

mond and bit his low

quite a manageable person. Quite. She could--for example--be left behind with the luggage and sent on by tr

that his companion would agree, and then he perceived that t

d that side of the thing, mor

mond sai

different angle if I tell you that twice today Mis

rse you tol

second o

mond smi

ther uncongenial to me. It is the sort of thing that

njust, indeed, and almost insulting, to this Miss Grammont? After all, she's a young lady of very good social position indeed. She doesn't strike you--does she?--as an undignified or helpless human being. Her manners suggest a person of considerable self-control. And knowing less of me tha

d brought a scrutinizing eye

Miss Grammont for a day or

prefer to leav

some moment

in this dilemma," said Sir Richmond wit

e differ upon a question of taste and convenience. But before I suggested this trip, I had intended to spend

e sorry al

e doctor, "that these ladies h

nature remained to be said. But neither gentleman

ween a man and a woman will not be subjected to the--the inconveniences your p

fore. In matters of property, economics and public conduct it will probably be just the reverse. Then, there will be much more collective control and much more insistence, legal insistence, upon individual responsibility. But we are not living in a new age yet; we are living in the patched-up ruins of a very old one. And you--if you will forgive me--are living in the patched

d a curious feeling that he was back

Richmond found rather trying, to give his impre

attention, but that fact has enabled me to see her in profile. Miss Seyffert is a fairly crude mixture of frankness, insincerity and self-explanatory egotism, and I hav

are apt to be pretty go

know

told me

s been any stepmother, either friendly or hostile? There hasn't been. I thought not. She has had various governesses and companions, ladies of birth and education, engaged to look after her and she has done exactly what sh

chmond

enkind, give them money and power, let them loose on the world.... It is a sort of moral laziness masquerading as affection.... Still I suppose custom and tradition kept this girl in her place

ar the truth of her biog

e she has

on't m

y. Miss Grammont is not silly and all this homage and facile approval probably bored her more than she realized. To anyone too intelligent to be steadily excited by buying things and wearing things and dancing and playing games and going to places of entertainment, and being given flowers, sweets, jewellery, pet animals, and books bound in a special sort of leather, the prospect of being a rich man's only daughter until such time as it becomes advisable to change i

ou think s

irl might find a considerable variety of active, interesting men, rising politicians, university men of distinction,

entertainments and amusements of her life a monstrous silly waste of time. With the facility of her sex she would pick up from one of them the idea that made life worth while for hi

ow

e. And something more than that. What it is I don't know. The war has turned an ugly face to her. She has seen death and suffering and ruin. Perhaps she has seen people she knew killed. Perhaps the man has been killed. Or she has met with cowardice or cruelty or treachery where she didn't expect it. She has been shocked out of the first confidence of youth. She has c

you see as much in Miss Grammont as all that, why don't y

ord--to them. YOU can't look at a woman for five minutes without losing sight of her in a mist of imaginative excitement. Because she looks back at you. I have the privilege of the negl

see what you

ammont has an impulsive and adventurous character. And as I have been saying she was a spoilt child, with no discipline.... You also are a person of high intelligence and defective c

y thing in petticoats that seemed to promise you three ha'porth of kindness. A lost dog looking for a master! You're a stray man looking for a mistress. Miss Grammont being a woman is a little more selective than that. But if she's at a loose end as I suppose, she isn't protected b

that?" said Sir Richmond, wi

ese miracles--grotesquely--happen," he said. "She knows

and you fall in love, as the p

was a

moment or so as if he took counsel wit

t that. And the gulf in our ages--in our quality! From the Psychologist of a New Age I find this amazing. Are men and women to go on for ever--separated by this p

you two anyhow. And at present the world is not prepared to tolerate friendship

smoothed over the extreme harshness of their sepa

ion, "I am very sorry indeed, Martin