



Produced by Charles Franks, Carel Miske and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team








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