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REST HARROW

A COMEDY OF RESOLUTION

By Maurice Hewlett


"Rest Harrow grows in any soil.... The seeds may be sown as soon as
ripe in warm, sheltered spots out of doors.... It is a British plant."
--WEATHERS


With Illustrations By Frank Craig


THI KANNICTHI




CONTENTS


BOOK I     OF THE NATURE OF A PROLOGUE, DEALING WITH A BRUISED PHILOSOPHER IN
RETIREMENT

BOOK II     SANCHIA AT WANLESS HALL

BOOK III     INTERLUDE OF THE RECLUSE PHILOSOPHER

BOOK IV     SANCHIA IN LONDON

BOOK V     OF THE NATURE OF AN EPILOGUE, DEALING WITH DESPOINA




ILLUSTRATIONS (not available in this edition)


Wrote deliberately to each of her sisters

The hum of cities, and buzz of dinner tables.. sound in his ears not
at all.

The housekeeper! This--person!

He had eloquence, he thought, as he watched her, he had won. But he was
anxious. She was such a deep one.

Ploughman in the vales would sometimes see his gaunt figure on the
sky-line.

"Well, Sanchia," he said, "here I am."

The great music went sobbing and chiding through her frame, like wounded
nightingales.

Senhouse came back to her bedside and put a little flower into her hand




[Illustration: Wrote deliberately to each of her sisters.]




BOOK I -- OF THE NATURE OF A PROLOGUE, DEALING WITH A BRUISED PHILOSOPHER IN RETIREMENT




I


An observant traveller, homing to England by the Ostend-Dover packet
in the April of some five years ago, relished the vagaries of a curious
couple who arrived by a later train, and proved to be both of his
acquaintance. He had happened to be early abroad, and saw them come on.
They were a lady of some personal attraction, comfortably furred,
who, descending from a first-class carriage, was met by a man from a
third-class, bare-headed, free in the neck, loosely clad in grey flannel
trousers which flapped about his thin legs in the sea-breeze, a white
sweater with a rolling collar, and a pair of sandals upon brown and
sinewy feet uncovered by socks: these two. The man's garniture was
extraordinary, but himself no less so. He had a lean and deeply bronzed
face, hatchet-shaped like a Hindoo's. You looked instinctively for rings
in his ears. His moustache was black and sinuous, outlining his
mouth rather than hiding it. His hair, densely black, was longish and
perfectly straight. His eyes were far-sighted and unblinking; he smiled
always, but furtively, as if the world at large amused him, but must
never know it. He seemed to observe everything, except the fact that
everybody observed himself.

To have once seen such a man must have provided for his recollection;
and yet our traveller, who was young and debonnaire, though not so young
as he seemed, first recognised the lady. "Mrs. Germain, by George!" This
to himself, but aloud, "Now, where's she been all this time?" The frown
which began to settle about his discerning eyes speedily dissolved in
wonder as they encountered the strange creature in the lady's company.
He stared, he gaped, then slapped his thigh. "Jack Senhouse! That's the
man. God of battles, what a start! Now, what on earth is Jack Senhouse
doing, playing courier to Mrs. Germain?"

That was precisely the employment. His man had handed the lady out of
her compartment, entered it when she left it, and was possessing
himself of her littered vestiges while these speculations were afloat.
Dressing-case, tea-basket, umbrellas, rugs, and what not, he filled his
arms with them, handed them over to expectant porters, then smilingly
showed their proprietress the carriage ridded. He led the way to the
steamer, deposited his burdens and saw to the bestowal of others,
fetched a chair, wrapped her in rugs, found her book, indicated her
whereabouts to a mariner in case of need. All this leisurely done, in
the way of a man who has privilege and duty for his warrants. Enquiring
then, with an engaging lift of the eyebrows, whether she was perfectly
comfortable, and receiving with a pleasant nod her answering nod of
thanks, he left her and returned to the train. Tracked through the
crowd, and easily by his height, bare head, and leisurely motions, he
was next seen shouldering a canvas bag on his way back to the
boat. Jack's belongings, his bag of tricks; Jack all over, the same
inexhaustible Jack! It was delightful to our traveller to find Jack
Senhouse thus verifying himself at every turn. He was for the steerage,
it appears--and of course he was!--where depressed foreigners share with
bicycles, motor cars, and newly boiled pigs the amenities of economical
travel. In this malodorous and slippery well his interested friend
saw him sit down upon his bundle, roll a cigarette, and fall into easy
conversation with an Italian voyager who, having shaved, was now putting
on a clean collar and a tartan necktie.

The traveller, Mr. William Chevenix, who had watched him so long, a
well-dressed and cheerful Englishman of some five-and-thirty summers,
with round eyes in a round and rosy face, now assuring himself that he
would be damned if he didn't have it out with the chap, descended the
companion, picked his way through the steerage, and approached the
seated philosopher. He saw that he was known, and immediately. Nothing
escaped Senhouse.

"How d'ye do, how d'ye do?" He held out his hand. Senhouse rose and
grasped it. The Italian took off his hat, and strolled away.

"I'm very well, thanks," he said. "Have you noticed those shores
beyond the canal? Samphire there just as we have it at home. Leagues of
samphire."

The younger man looked in the direction indicated cheerfully and
blankly. "'The samphire by the ocean's brim,'" he said lightly. "I
attach no importance to it whatever, but it's very like you to lift
one into your privacy at a moment's notice. I'm all for the formalities
myself, so I observe that I haven't seen you for years. Years! Not
since--why, it must be eighteen."

"It's precisely eight," said Senhouse, "and I've been abroad for four of
them."

His friend inspected him with candid interest. "At your old games, I
take it. You've filled England with hardy perennials and now you're
starting on Europe. Great field for you. You'll want a pretty big
trowel, though. A wheelbarrow might be handy, I should have said."

Senhouse fired. "I've been planting the Black Forest, you see. Great
games. They gave me a free hand, and ten thousand marks a year to spend.
I've done some rather showy things. Now I want to go to Tibet."

The other's attention had wandered. "I saw you come on board," he said.
"I watched you play the Squire of Dames to a rather pretty woman whom I
happen to know. She was a Mrs. Germain in those days."

"She still calls herself so," Senhouse said. He was staring straight
before him out to sea. The steamer was under way.

"Married a queer old file in Berkshire, who died worth a plum. Goodish
time ago. They called him Fowls, or Fowls of the Air. So she's still a
widow, eh?"

Senhouse nodded. "She's his widow." Then he asked, "You know her? You
might go and amuse her. I can't, because of these bonds." He exhibited
his sockless feet with a cheerful grin.

"Oh, I shall, you know," he was assured. "You're not dressy enough for
Mrs. Germain. She'd never stand it."

"She doesn't," said Senhouse. "She dislikes a fuss, and thinks me rather
remarkable."

"Well," said the other, "I think she's right. You always were a
conspicuous beggar. Now look at me. Think I'll do?"

Senhouse peered at him. "I think you are exactly what she wants just
now," he said. "Go in and approve yourself, Chevenix."

Mr. Chevenix, the spick and span, had something on his mind, however,
which he did not know how to put. He continued to reflect upon Mrs.
Germain, but only by way of marking time. "She used to be very good fun
in my young days. And she made things spin in Berkshire, they tell me.
I know she did in London--while it lasted. What's she doing? There was a
chap called Duplessis, I remember."

"There still is," Senhouse said, but in such a manner as to chalk No
Thoroughfare across the field. Chevenix perceived this rather late
in the day, and ended his ruminations in a whistle. "She kept him
dangling--" he had begun. Instead of pursuing, he said abruptly, "I say,
you remember Sancie Percival, of course."

A change came over Senhouse's aspect which a close observer might have
noticed. He was very quiet, hardly moved; but he seemed to be listening
with all his senses, listening with every pore of his skin. "Yes,"
he said, slowly. "Yes, I do; I'm not likely to forget her. She was my
dearest friend, and is so still, I hope."

The solemnity of his intended message clouded Mr. Chevenix's candid
brow. "She's still at Wanless, you know."

Senhouse set a watch upon himself. "No doubt she is," he said. "She's
well?"

The other probed him. "She's never made it up with her people. I think
she feels it nowadays."

Senhouse asked sharply, "Where's Ingram?"

"Ingram," said Chevenix, "is just off for a trip. He's to be abroad for
a year. India."

Senhouse shivered. "Alone?"

"Well, without her, anyhow. He always was a casual beggar, was Nevile."
He could see now that he was making a hit. "Got old Senhouse where he
lives," he told himself, and then continued. "Fact is, I've been out
with him as far as Brindisi. He asked me to. I had nothing to do. But
I want to see Sancie Percival again. I was awfully fond of her--of
the whole lot of them." He reflected, as a man might deliberate upon
familiar things, and discover them to be wonders. "What a family they
were, by Jove! Five--of--the--loveliest girls a man could meet with.
Melusine, what a girl she was! Married Tubby Scales--fat chap with a
cigar. Vicky, now. How about Vicky? She was my chum, you know. She's
married, too. Chap called Sinclair--