CHRISTOPHER AND COLUMBUS

By the Author of _Elizabeth and Her German Garden_

Frontispiece by Arthur Litle

Garden City New YorkDoubleday, Page & Company

1919

[Illustration: "Oh, yes. You're both very fond of me, " said Mr. Twist, pulling his mouth into a crooked and unhappy smile. 

"We love you. " said Anna-Felicitas simply. ]

CHAPTER I

Their names were really Anna-Rose and Anna-Felicitas; but they decided, as they sat huddled together in a corner of the second-class deck of theAmerican liner _St. Luke_, and watched the dirty water of the Merseyslipping past and the Liverpool landing-stage disappearing into mist, and felt that it was comfortless and cold, and knew they hadn't got afather or a mother, and remembered that they were aliens, and realizedthat in front of them lay a great deal of gray, uneasy, dreadfully wetsea, endless stretches of it, days and days of it, with waves on top ofit to make them sick and submarines beneath it to kill them if theycould, and knew that they hadn't the remotest idea, not the veryremotest, what was before them when and if they did get across to theother side, and knew that they were refugees, castaways, derelicts, twowretched little Germans who were neither really Germans nor reallyEnglish because they so unfortunately, so complicatedly were both, --theydecided, looking very calm and determined and sitting very closetogether beneath the rug their English aunt had given them to put roundtheir miserable alien legs, that what they really were, were Christopherand Columbus, because they were setting out to discover a New World. 

"It's very pleasant, " said Anna-Rose. "It's very pleasant to go anddiscover America. All for ourselves. "

It was Anna-Rosa who suggested their being Christopher and Columbus. Shewas the elder by twenty minutes. Both had had their seventeenthbirthday--and what a birthday: no cake, no candles, no kisses andwreaths and home-made poems; but then, as Anna-Felicitas pointed out, tocomfort Anna-Rose who was taking it hard, you can't get blood out of anaunt--only a month before. Both were very German outside and veryEnglish inside. Both had fair hair, and the sorts of chins Germans have, and eyes the colour of the sky in August along the shores of the Baltic. Their noses were brief, and had been objected to in Germany, where, ifyou are a Junker's daughter, you are expected to show it in your nose. Anna-Rose had a tight little body, inclined to the round. Anna-Felicitas, in spite of being a twin, seemed to have made the mostof her twenty extra minutes to grow more in; anyhow she was tall andthin, and she drooped; and having perhaps grown quicker made her eyesmore dreamy, and her thoughts more slow. And both held their heads upwith a great air of calm whenever anybody on the ship looked at them, aswho should say serenely, "We're _thoroughly_ happy, and having the timeof our lives. "

For worlds they wouldn't have admitted to each other that they were evenaware of such a thing as being anxious or wanting to cry. Like otherpersons of English blood, they never were so cheerful nor pretended tobe so much amused as when they were right down on the very bottom oftheir luck. Like other persons of German blood, they had the squashiestcorners deep in their hearts, where they secretly clung to cakes andChristmas trees, and fought a tendency to celebrate every possibleanniversary, both dead and alive. 

The gulls, circling white against the gloomy sky over the rubbish thatfloated on the Mersey, made them feel extraordinarily forlorn. Emptyboxes, bits of straw, orange-peel, a variety of dismal dirtiness layabout on the sullen water; England was slipping away, England, theirmother's country, the country of their dreams ever since they couldremember--and the _St. Luke_ with a loud screech had suddenly stopped. 

Neither of them could help jumping a little at that and getting an inchcloser together beneath the rug. Surely it wasn't a submarine already?

"We're Christopher and Columbus, " said Anna-Rose quickly, changing as itwere the unspoken conversation. 

As the eldest she had a great sense of her responsibility toward hertwin, and considered it one of her first duties to cheer and encourageher. Their mother had always cheered and encouraged them, and hadn'tseemed to mind anything, however awful it was, that happened toher, --such as, for instance, when the war began and they three, theirfather having died some years before, left their home up by the Baltic, just as there was the most heavenly weather going on, and the garden wasa dream, and the blue Chinchilla cat had produced four perfect kittensthat very day, --all of whom had to be left to what Anna-Felicitas, whosethoughts if slow were picturesque once she had got them, called thetender mercies of a savage and licentious soldiery, --and came by slowand difficult stages to England; or such as when their mother begancatching cold and didn't seem at last ever able to leave off catchingcold, and though she tried to pretend she didn't mind colds and thatthey didn't matter, it was plain that these colds did at last mattervery much, for between them they killed her. 

Their mother had always been cheerful and full of hope. Now that she wasdead, it was clearly Anna-Rose's duty, as the next eldest in the family, to carry on the tradition and discountenance too much drooping inAnna-Felicitas. Anna-Felicitas was staring much too thoughtfully at thedeepening gloom of the late afternoon sky and the rubbish brooding onthe face of the waters, and she had jumped rather excessively when the_St. Luke_ stopped so suddenly, just as if it were putting on the brakehard, and emitted that agonized whistle. 

"We're Christopher and Columbus, " said Anna-Rose quickly, "and we'regoing to discover America. "

"Very well, " said Anna-Felicitas. "I'll be Christopher. "

"No. I'll be Christopher, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Very well, " said Anna-Felicitas, who was the most amiable, acquiescentperson in the world. "Then I suppose I'll have to be Columbus. But Ithink Christopher sounds prettier. "

Both rolled their r's incurably. It was evidently in their blood, fornothing, no amount of teaching and admonishment, could get them out ofit. Before they were able to talk at all, in those happy days whenparents make astounding assertions to other parents about theintelligence and certain future brilliancy of their offspring, and theother parents, however much they may pity such self-deception, can'tcontradict, because after all it just possibly may be so, the mostfoolish people occasionally producing geniuses, --in those happy days ofundisturbed bright castle-building, the mother, who was English, of thetwo derelicts now huddled on the dank deck of the _St. Luke_, said tothe father, who was German, "At any rate these two blessed littlebundles of deliciousness"--she had one on each arm and was ticklingtheir noses alternately with her eyelashes, and they were screaming forjoy--"won't have to learn either German or English. They'll just _know_them. "

"Perhaps, " said the father, who was a cautious man. 

"They're born bi-lingual, " said the mother; and the twins wheezed andchoked with laughter, for she was tickling them beneath their chins, softly fluttering her eyelashes along the creases of fat she thought soadorable. 

"Perhaps, " said the father. 

"It gives them a tremendous start, " said the mother; and the twinssquirmed in a dreadful ecstasy, for she had now got to their ears. 

"Perhaps, " said the father. 

But what happened was that they didn't speak either language. Not, thatis, as a native should. Their German bristled with mistakes. They spokeit with a foreign accent. It was copious, but incorrect. Almost the lastthing their father, an accurate man, said to them as he lay dying, hadto do with a misplaced dative. And when they talked English it rolledabout uncontrollably on its r's, and had a great many long words in itgot from Milton, and Dr. Johnson, and people like that, whom theirmother had particularly loved, but as they talked far more to theirmother than to their father, who was a man of much briefness in wordsthough not in temper, they were better on the whole at English thanGerman. 

Their mother, who loved England more the longer she lived away fromit, --"As one does; and the same principle, " Anna-Rose explained toAnna-Felicitas when they had lived some time with their aunt and uncle, "applies to relations, aunts' husbands, and the clergy, "--never tired oftelling her children about it, and its poetry, and its spirit, and thegreatness and glory of its points of view. They drank it all in andbelieved every word of it, for so did their mother; and as they grew upthey flung themselves on all the English books they could lay handsupon, and they read with their mother and learned by heart most of theobviously beautiful things; and because she glowed with enthusiasm theyglowed too--Anna-Rose in a flare and a flash, Anna-Felicitas slow andsteadily. They adored their mother. Whatever she loved they lovedblindly. It was a pity she died. She died soon after the war began. Theyhad been so happy, so _dreadfully_ happy. . . . 

"You can't be Christopher, " said Anna-Rose, giving herself a shake, forhere she was thinking of her mother, and it didn't do to think of one'smother, she found; at least, not when one is off to a new life andeverything is all promise because it isn't anything else, and not ifone's mother happened to have been so--well, so fearfully sweet. "Youcan't be Christopher, because, you see, I'm the eldest. "

Anna-Felicitas didn't see what being the eldest had to do with it, butshe only said, "Very well, " in her soft voice, and expressed a hope thatAnna-Rose would see her way not to call her Col for short. "I'm afraidyou will, though, " she added, "and then I shall feel so like OnkelNicolas. "

This was their German uncle, known during his life-time, which hadabruptly left off when the twins were ten, as Onkel Col; a very ancientperson, older by far even than their father, who had seemed so very old. But Onkel Col had been older than anybody at all, except the pictures ofthe _liebe Gott_ in Blake's illustrations to the Book of Job. He came toa bad end. Neither their father nor their mother told them anythingexcept that Onkel Col was dead; and their father put a black band roundthe left sleeve of his tweed country suit and was more good-temperedthan ever, and their mother, when they questioned her, just said thatpoor Onkel Col had gone to heaven, and that in future they would speakof him as Onkel Nicolas, because it was more respectful. 

"But why does mummy call him poor, when he's gone to heaven?"Anna-Felicitas asked Anna-Rose privately, in the recesses of the garden. 

"First of all, " said Anna-Rose, who, being the eldest, as she so oftenexplained to her sister, naturally knew more about everything, "becausethe angels won't like him. Nobody _could_ like Onkel Col. Even ifthey're angels. And though they're obliged to have him there because hewas such a very good man, they won't talk to him much or notice him muchwhen God isn't looking. And second of all, because you _are_ poor whenyou get to heaven. Everybody is poor in heaven. Nobody takes theirthings with them, and all Onkel Col's money is still on earth. Hecouldn't even take his clothes with him. "

"Then is he quite--did Onkel Col go there quite--"

Anna-Felicitas stopped. The word seemed too awful in connection withOnkel Col, that terrifying old gentleman who had roared at them from thefolds of so many wonderful wadded garments whenever they were led in, trembling, to see him, for he had gout and was very terrible; and itseemed particularly awful when one thought of Onkel Col going to heaven, which was surely of all places the most _endimanché_. 

"Of course, " nodded Anna-Rose; but even she dropped her voice a little. She peeped about among the bushes a moment, then put her mouth close toAnna-Felicitas's ear, and whispered, "Stark. "

They stared at one another for a space with awe and horror in theireyes. 

"You see, " then went on Anna-Rose rather quickly, hurrying away from theawful vision, "one knows one doesn't have clothes in heaven because theydon't have the moth there. It says so in the Bible. And you can't havethe moth without having anything for it to go into. "

"Then they don't have to have naphthalin either, " said Anna-Felicitas, "and don't all have to smell horrid in the autumn when they take theirfurs out. "

"No. And thieves don't break in and steal either in heaven, " continuedAnna-Rose, "and the reason why is that there _isn't_ anything to steal. "

"There's angels, " suggested Anna-Felicitas after a pause, for she didn'tlike to think there was nothing really valuable in heaven. 

"Oh, nobody ever steals _them_, " said Anna-Rose. 

Anna-Felicitas's slow thoughts revolved round this new uncomfortableview of heaven. It seemed, if Anna-Rose were right, and she always wasright for she said so herself, that heaven couldn't be such a safe placeafter all, nor such a kind place. Thieves could break in and steal ifthey wanted to. She had a proper horror of thieves. She was sure thenight would certainly come when they would break into her father's_Schloss_, or, as her English nurse called it, her dear Papa's slosh;and she was worried that poor Onkel Col should be being snubbed upthere, and without anything to put on, which would make being snubbed somuch worse, for clothes did somehow comfort one. 

She took her worries to the nursemaid, and choosing a moment when sheknew Anna-Rose wished to be unnoticed, it being her hour forinconspicuously eating unripe apples at the bottom of the orchard, anexercise Anna-Felicitas only didn't indulge in because she had learnedthrough affliction that her inside, fond and proud of it as she was, wasyet not of that superior and blessed kind that suffers green applesgladly--she sought out the nursemaid, whose name, too, confusingly, wasAnna, and led the conversation up to heaven and the possible conditionsprevailing in it by asking her to tell her, in strict confidence and aswoman to woman, what she thought Onkel Col exactly looked like at thatmoment. 

"Unrecognizable, " said the nursemaid promptly. 

"Unrecognizable?" echoed Anna-Felicitas. 

And the nursemaid, after glancing over her shoulder to see if thegoverness were nowhere in sight, told Anna-Felicitas the true story ofOnkel Col's end: which is so bad that it isn't fit to be put in any bookexcept one with an appendix. 

A stewardess passed just as Anna-Felicitas was asking Anna-Rose not toremind her of these grim portions of the past by calling her Col, astewardess in such a very clean white cap that she looked both reliableand benevolent, while secretly she was neither. 

"Can you please tell us why we're stopping?" Anna-Rose inquired of herpolitely, leaning forward to catch her attention as she hurried by. 

The stewardess allowed her roving eye to alight for a moment on the twoobjects beneath the rug. Their chairs were close together, and the rugcovered them both up to their chins. Over the top of it their headsappeared, exactly alike as far as she could see in the dusk; roundheads, each with a blue knitted cap pulled well over its ears, and roundeyes staring at her with what anybody except the stewardess would haverecognized as a passionate desire for some sort of reassurance. Theymight have been seven instead of seventeen for all the stewardess couldtell. They looked younger than anything she had yet seen sitting aloneon a deck and asking questions. But she was an exasperated widow, whohad never had children and wasn't to be touched by anything except atip, besides despising, because she was herself a second-classstewardess, all second-class passengers, --"As one does, " Anna-Roseexplained later on to Anna-Felicitas, "and the same principle applies toJews. " So she said with an acidity completely at variance with thepromise of her cap, "Ask the Captain, " and disappeared. 

The twins looked at each other. They knew very well that captains onships were mighty beings who were not asked questions. 

"She's trifling with us, " murmured Anna-Felicitas. 

"Yes, " Anna-Rose was obliged to admit, though the thought was repugnantto her that they should look like people a stewardess would dare triflewith. 

"Perhaps she thinks we're younger than we are, " she said after asilence. 

"Yes. She couldn't see how long our dresses are, because of the rug. "

"No. And it's only that end of us that really shows we're grown up. "

"Yes. She ought to have seen us six months ago. "

Indeed she ought. Even the stewardess would have been surprised at theactivities and complete appearance of the two pupæ now rolled motionlessin the rug. For, six months ago, they had both been probationers in achildren's hospital in Worcestershire, arrayed, even as the stewardess, in spotless caps, hurrying hither and thither with trays of food, sweeping and washing up, learning to make beds in a given time, and bedeft, and quick, and never tired, and always punctual. 

This place had been got them by the efforts and influence of their AuntAlice, that aunt who had given them the rug on their departure and whohad omitted to celebrate their birthday. She was an amiable aunt, butshe didn't understand about birthdays. It was the first one they had hadsince they were complete orphans, and so they were rather sensitiveabout it. But they hadn't cried, because since their mother's death theyhad done with crying. What could there ever again be in the world badenough to cry about after that? And besides, just before she droppedaway from them into the unconsciousness out of which she never cameback, but instead just dropped a little further into death, she hadopened her eyes unexpectedly and caught them sitting together in a rowby her bed, two images of agony, with tears rolling down their swollenfaces and their noses in a hopeless state, and after looking at them amoment as if she had slowly come up from some vast depth and distanceand were gradually recognizing them, she had whispered with a flicker ofthe old encouraging smile that had comforted every hurt and bruise theyhad ever had, "_Don't cry_ . . . Little darlings, _don't_ cry. . . . "

But on that first birthday after her death they had got more and moresolemn as time passed, and breakfast was cleared away, and there were nosounds, prick up their ears as they might, of subdued preparations inthe next room, no stealthy going up and down stairs to fetch thepresents, and at last no hope at all of the final glorious flinging openof the door and the vision inside of two cakes all glittering withcandles, each on a table covered with flowers and all the things one hasmost wanted. 

Their aunt didn't know. How should she? England was a great and belovedcountry, but it didn't have proper birthdays. 

"Every country has one drawback, " Anna-Rose explained to Anna-Felicitaswhen the morning was finally over, in case she should by any chance bethinking badly of the dear country that had produced their mother aswell as Shakespeare, "and not knowing about birthdays is England's. "

"There's Uncle Arthur, " said Anna-Felicitas, whose honest mind gropedcontinually after accuracy. 

"Yes, " Anna-Rose admitted after a pause. "Yes. There's Uncle Arthur. "

CHAPTER II

Uncle Arthur was the husband of Aunt Alice. He didn't like foreigners, and said so. He never had liked them and had always said so. It wasn'tthe war at all, it was the foreigners. But as the war went on, and theseGerman nieces of his wife became more and more, as he told her, ablighted nuisance, so did he become more and more pointed, and said hedidn't mind French foreigners, nor Russian foreigners; and a few weekslater, that it wasn't Italian foreigners either that he minded; andstill later, that nor was it foreigners indigenous to the soil ofcountries called neutral. These things he said aloud at meals in ageneral way. To his wife when alone he said much more. 

Anna-Rose, who was nothing if not intrepid, at first tried to soften hisheart by offering to read aloud to him in the evenings when he came homeweary from his daily avocations, which were golf. Her own suggestioninstantly projected a touching picture on her impressionable imaginationof youth, grateful for a roof over its head, in return alleviating thetedium of crabbed age by introducing its uncle, who from his remarks wasevidently unacquainted with them, to the best productions of the greatmasters of English literature. 

But Uncle Arthur merely stared at her with a lacklustre eye when sheproposed it, from his wide-legged position on the hearthrug, where hewas moving money about in trouser-pockets of the best material. Andlater on she discovered that he had always supposed the "Faery Queen, "and "Adonais, " and "In Memoriam, " names he had heard at intervals duringhis life, for he was fifty and such things do sometimes get mentionedwere well-known racehorses. 

Uncle Arthur, like Onkel Col, was a very good man, and though he saidthings about foreigners he did stick to these unfortunate alien nieceslonger than one would have supposed possible if one had overheard whathe said to Aunt Alice in the seclusion of their bed. His orderedexistence, shaken enough by the war, Heaven knew, was shaken in itsinnermost parts, in its very marrow, by the arrival of the two Germans. Other people round about had Belgians in their homes, and groaned; butwho but he, the most immensely British of anybody, had Germans? And hecouldn't groan, because they were, besides being motherless creatures, his own wife's flesh and blood. Not openly at least could he groan; buthe could and did do it in bed. Why on earth that silly mother of theirscouldn't have stayed quietly on her Pomeranian sand-heap where shebelonged, instead of coming gallivanting over to England, and then whenshe had got there not even decently staying alive and seeing to herchildren herself, he at frequent intervals told Aunt Alice in bed thathe would like to know. 

Aunt Alice, who after twenty years of life with Uncle Arthur was bothsilent and sleek (for he fed her well), sighed and said nothing. Sheherself was quietly going through very much on behalf of her nieces. Jessup didn't like handing dishes to Germans. The tradespeople twittedthe cook with having to cook for them and were facetious about sausagesand asked how one made sauerkraut. Her acquaintances told her they werevery sorry for her, and said they supposed she knew what she was doingand that it was all right about spies, but really one heard such strangethings, one never could possibly tell even with children; and regularlythe local policeman bicycled over to see if the aliens, who wereregistered at the county-town police-station, were still safe. And thenthey looked so very German, Aunt Alice felt. There was no mistakingthem. And every time they opened their mouths there were all those r'srolling about. She hardly liked callers to find her nieces in herdrawing-room at tea-time, they were so difficult to explain; yet theywere too old to shut up in a nursery. 

After three months of them, Uncle Arthur suggested sending them back toGermany; but their consternation had been so great and their entreatiesto be kept where they were so desperate that he said no more about that. Besides, they told him that if they went back there they would be sureto be shot as spies, for over there nobody would believe they wereGerman, just as over here nobody would believe they were English; andbesides, this was in those days of the war when England was stillregarding Germany as more mistaken than vicious, and was as full as everof the tradition of great and elaborate indulgence and generosity towarda foe, and Uncle Arthur, whatever he might say, was not going to bebehind his country in generosity. 

Yet as time passed, and feeling tightened, and the hideous necklace ofwar grew more and more frightful with each fresh bead of horror strungupon it, Uncle Arthur, though still in principle remaining good, inpractice found himself vindictive. He was saddled; that's what he was. Saddled with this monstrous unmerited burden. He, the most patriotic ofBritons, looked at askance by his best friends, being given notice byhis old servants, having particular attention paid his house at night bythe police, getting anonymous letters about lights seen in his upperwindows the nights; the Zeppelins came, which were the windows of thefloor those blighted twins slept on, and all because he had married AuntAlice. 

At this period Aunt Alice went to bed with reluctance. It was not aplace she had ever gone to very willingly since she married UncleArthur, for he was the kind of husband who rebukes in bed; but now shewas downright reluctant. It was painful to her to be told that she hadbrought this disturbance into Uncle Arthur's life by having let himmarry her. Inquiring backwards into her recollections it appeared to herthat she had had no say at all about being married, but that UncleArthur had told her she was going to be, and then that she had been. Which was what had indeed happened; for Aunt Alice was a round littlewoman even in those days, nicely though not obtrusively padded withagreeable fat at the corners, and her skin, just as now, had the moistdelicacy that comes from eating a great many chickens. Also shesuggested, just as now, most of the things most men want to come hometo, --slippers, and drawn curtains, and a blazing fire, and peace withinone's borders, and even, as Anna-Rose pointed out privately toAnna-Felicitas after they had come across them for the first time, shesuggested muffins; and so, being in these varied fashions succulent, shewas doomed to make some good man happy. But she did find it real hardwork. 

It grew plain to Aunt Alice after another month of them that UncleArthur would not much longer endure his nieces, and that even if he didshe would not be able to endure Uncle Arthur. The thought was verydreadful to her that she was being forced to choose between two duties, and that she could not fulfil both. It came to this at last, that shemust either stand by her nieces, her dead sister's fatherless children, and face all the difficulties and discomforts of such a standing by, goaway with them, take care of them, till the war was over; or she muststand by Arthur. 

She chose Arthur. 

How could she, for nieces she had hardly seen, abandon her husband?Besides, he had scolded her so steadily during the whole of theirmarried life that she was now unalterably attached to him. Sometimes awild thought did for a moment illuminate the soothing dusk of her mind, the thought of doing the heroic thing, leaving him for them, and helpingand protecting the two poor aliens till happier days should return. Ifthere were any good stuff in Arthur would he not recognize, howeverangry he might be, that she was doing at least a Christian thing? Butthis illumination would soon die out. Her comforts choked it. She wastoo well-fed. After twenty years of it, she no longer had the figure forlean and dangerous enterprises. 

And having definitely chosen Arthur, she concentrated what she had ofdetermination in finding an employment for her nieces that would removethem beyond the range of his growing wrath. She found it in a children'shospital as far away as Worcestershire, a hospital subscribed to verylargely by Arthur, for being a good man he subscribed to hospitals. Thematron objected, but Aunt Alice overrode the matron; and from January toApril Uncle Arthur's house was pure from Germans. 

Then they came back again. 

It had been impossible to keep them. The nurses wouldn't work with them. The sick children had relapses when they discovered who it was whobrought them their food, and cried for their mothers. It had beenarranged between Aunt Alice and the matron that the unfortunatenationality of her nieces should not be mentioned. They were just to beAunt Alice's nieces, the Miss Twinklers, --("We will leave out the von, "said Aunt Alice, full of unnatural cunning. "They have a von, you know, poor things--such a very labelling thing to have. But Twinkler withoutit might quite well be English. Who can possibly tell? It isn't asthough they had had some shocking name like Bismarck. ")

Nothing, however, availed against the damning evidence of the rolledr's. Combined with the silvery fair hair and the determined littlemouths and chins, it was irresistible. Clearly they were foreigners, andequally clearly they were not Italians, or Russians, or French. Within aweek the nurses spoke of them in private as Fritz and Franz. Within afortnight a deputation of staff sisters went to the matron and asked, onpatriotic grounds, for the removal of the Misses Twinkler. The matron, with the fear of Uncle Arthur in her heart, for he was altogether thebiggest subscriber, sharply sent the deputation about its business; andbeing a matron of great competence and courage she would probably havecontinued to be able to force the new probationers upon the nurses if ithad not been for the inability, which was conspicuous, of the youngerMiss Twinkler to acquire efficiency. 

In vain did Anna-Rose try to make up for Anna-Felicitas's shortcomingsby a double zeal, a double willingness and cheerfulness. Anna-Felicitaswas a born dreamer, a born bungler with her hands and feet. She not onlynever from first to last succeeded in filling the thirty hot-waterbottles, which were her care, in thirty minutes, which was her duty, butevery time she met a pail standing about she knocked against it and itfell over. Patients and nurses watched her approach with apprehension. Her ward was in a constant condition of flood. 

"It's because she's thinking of something else, " Anna-Rose tried eagerlyto explain to the indignant sister-in-charge. 

"Thinking of something else!" echoed the sister. 

"She reads, you see, a lot--whenever she gets the chance she reads--"

"Reads!" echoed the sister. 

"And then, you see, she gets thinking--"

"Thinking! Reading doesn't make _me_ think. "

"With much regret, " wrote the matron to Aunt Alice, "I am obliged todismiss your younger niece, Nurse Twinkler II. She has no vocation fornursing. On the other hand, your elder niece is shaping well and I shallbe pleased to keep her on. "

"But I can't stop on, " Anna-Rose said to the matron when she announcedthese decisions to her. "I can't be separated from my sister. I'd likevery much to know what would become of that poor child without me tolook after her. You forget I'm the eldest. "

The matron put down her pen, --she was a woman who made many notes--andstared at Nurse Twinkler. Not in this fashion did her nurses speak toher. But Anna-Rose, having been brought up in a spot remote fromeverything except love and laughter, had all the fearlessness ofignorance; and in her extreme youth and smallness, with her eyes shiningand her face heated she appeared to the matron rather like an indignantkitten. 

"Very well, " said the matron gravely, suppressing a smile. "One shouldalways do what one considers one's first duty. "

So the Twinklers went back to Uncle Arthur, and the matron was greatlyrelieved, for she certainly didn't want them, and Uncle Arthur saidDamn. 

"Arthur, " gently reproved his wife. 

"I say Damn and I mean Damn, " said Uncle Arthur. "What the hell canwe--"

"Arthur, " said his wife. 

"I say, what the hell can we do with a couple of Germans? If peoplewouldn't swallow them last winter are they going to swallow them anybetter now? God, what troubles a man lets himself in for when hemarries!"

"I do beg you, Arthur, not to use those coarse words, " said Aunt Alice, tears in her gentle eyes. 

There followed a period of desperate exertion on the part of Aunt Alice. She answered advertisements and offered the twins as nurserygovernesses, as cheerful companions, as mothers' helps, even as orphanswilling to be adopted. She relinquished every claim on salaries, sheoffered them for nothing, and at last she offered them accompanied by abonus. "Their mother was English. They are quite English, " wrote AuntAlice innumerable times in innumerable letters. "I feel bound, however, to tell you that they once had a German father, but of course it wasthrough no fault of their own, " etc. , etc. Aunt Alice's hand ached withwriting letters; and any solution of the problem that might possiblyhave been arrived at came to nothing because Anna-Rose would not beseparated from Anna-Felicitas, and if it was difficult to find anybodywho would take on one German nobody at all could be found to take ontwo. 

Meanwhile Uncle Arthur grew nightly more dreadful in bed. Aunt Alice wasat her wits' end, and took to crying helplessly. The twins racked theirbrains to find a way out, quite as anxious to relieve Uncle Arthur oftheir presence as he was to be relieved. If only they could beindependent, do something, work, go as housemaids, --anything. 

They concocted an anonymous-advertisement and secretly sent it to _TheTimes_, clubbing their pocket-money together to pay for it. Theadvertisement was:

 Energetic Sisters of belligerent ancestry but unimpeachable Sympathies wish for any sort of work consistent with respectability. No objection to being demeaned. 

Anna-Felicitas inquired what that last word meant for it was Anna-Rose'sword, and Anna-Rose explained that it meant not minding things likebeing housemaids. "Which we don't, " said Anna-Rose. "Upper and Under. I'll be Upper, of course, because I'm the eldest. "

Anna-Felicitas suggested putting in what it meant then, for she regardedit with some doubt, but Anna-Rose, it being her word, liked it, andexplained that it Put a whole sentence into a nut-shell, and wouldn'tchange it. 

No one answered this advertisement except a society in London forhelping alien enemies in distress. 

"Charity, " said Anna-Rose, turning up her nose. 

"And fancy thinking _us_ enemies, " said Anna-Felicitas, "Us. Whilemummy--" Her eyes filled with tears. She kept them back, however, behind convenient long eye-lashes. 

Then they saw an advertisement in the front page of _The Times_ thatthey instantly answered without saying a word to Aunt Alice. Theadvertisement was:

 Slightly wounded Officer would be glad to find intelligent and interesting companion who can drive a 14 h. P. Humber. Emoluments by arrangement. 

"We'll _tell_ him we're intelligent and interesting, " said Anna-Rose, eagerly. 

"Yes--who knows if we wouldn't be really, if we were given a chance?"said Anna-Felicitas, quite flushed with excitement. 

"And if he engages us we'll take him on in turns, so that the emolumentswon't have to be doubled. "

"Yes--because he mightn't like paying twice over. "

"Yes--and while the preliminaries are being settled we could be learningto drive Uncle Arthur's car. "

"Yes--except that it's a Daimler, and aren't they different?"

"Yes--but only about the same difference as there is between a man and awoman. A man and a woman are both human beings, you know. And Daimlersand Humbers are both cars. "

"I see, " said Anna-Felicitas; but she didn't. 

They wrote an enthusiastic answer that very day. 

The only thing they were in doubt about, they explained toward the endof the fourth sheet, when they had got to politenesses and wererequesting the slightly wounded officer to allow them to express theirsympathy with his wounds, was that they had not yet had an opportunityof driving a Humber car, but that this opportunity, of course, would beinstantly provided by his engaging them. Also, would he kindly tell themif it was a male companion he desired to have, because if so it was veryunfortunate, for neither of them were males, but quite the contrary. 

They got no answer to this for three weeks, and had given up all hopeand come to the depressing conclusion that they must have betrayed theirwant of intelligence and interestingness right away, when one day aletter came from General Headquarters in France, addressed _To Both theMiss Twinklers_, and it was a long letter, pages long, from the slightlywounded officer, telling them he had been patched up again and sent backto the front, and their answer to his advertisement had been forwardedto him there, and that he had had heaps of other answers to it, and thatthe one he had liked best of all was theirs; and that some day he hopedwhen he was back again, and able to drive himself, to show them howglorious motoring was, if their mother would bring them, --quick motoringin his racing car, sixty miles an hour motoring, flashing through thewonders of the New Forest, where he lived. And then there was a long bitabout what the New Forest must be looking like just then, all quiet inthe spring sunshine, with lovely dappled bits of shade underneath thebig beeches, and the heather just coming alive, and all the windingsolitary roads so full of peace, so empty of noise. 

"Write to me, you two children, " said the letter at the end. "You've noidea what it's like getting letters from home out here. Write and tellme what you do and what the garden is like these fine afternoons. Thelilacs must be nearly done, but I'm sure there's the smell of themstill about, and I'm sure you have a beautiful green close-cut lawn, andtea is brought out on to it, and there's no sound, no sort of sound, except birds, and you two laughing, and I daresay a jolly dog barkingsomewhere just for fun and not because he's angry. "

The letter was signed (Captain) John Desmond, and there was a scrawl inthe corner at the end: "It's for jolly little English kids like you thatwe're fighting, God bless you. Write to me again soon. "

"English kids like us!"

They looked at each other. They had not mentioned their belligerentancestry in their letter. They felt uncomfortable, and as if CaptainDesmond were fighting for them, as it were, under false pretences. Theyalso wondered why he should conclude they were kids. 

They wrote to him again, explaining that they were not exactly whatcould be described as English, but on the other hand neither were theyexactly what could be described as German. "We would be very glad indeedif we were really _something_, " they added. 

But after their letter had been gone only a few days they saw in thelist of casualties in _The Times_ that Captain John Desmond had beenkilled. 

And then one day the real solution was revealed, and it was revealed toUncle Arthur as he sat in his library on a wet Sunday morningconsidering his troubles in detail. 

Like most great ideas it sprang full-fledged into being, --obvious, unquestionable, splendidly simple, --out of a trifle. For, chancing toraise his heavy and disgusted eyes to the bookshelves in front of him, they rested on one particular book, and on the back of this book stoodout in big gilt letters the word

 AMERICA

There were other words on its back, but this one alone stood out, and ithad all the effect of a revelation. 

There. That was it. Of course. That was the way out. Why the devilhadn't Alice thought of _that_? He knew some Americans; he didn't likethem, but he knew them; and he would write to them, or Alice would writeto them, and tell them the twins were coming. He would give the twins£200, --damn it, nobody could say that wasn't handsome, especially inwar-time, and for a couple of girls who had no earthly sort of claim onhim, whatever Alice might choose to think they had on her. Yet it wassuch a confounded mixed-up situation that he wasn't at all sure hewouldn't come under the Defence of the Realm Act, by giving them money, as aiding the enemy. Well, he would risk that. He would risk anything tobe rid of them. Ship 'em off, that was the thing to do. They would fallon their feet right enough over there. America still swallowed Germanswithout making a face. 

Uncle Arthur reflected for a moment with extreme disgust on theinsensibility of the American palate. "Lost their chance, that's what_they've_ done, " he said to himself--for this was 1916, and America hadnot yet made her magnificent entry into the war--as he had already saidto himself a hundred times. "Lost their chance of coming in on the sideof civilization, and helping sweep the world up tidy of barbarism. Shoulder to shoulder with us, that's where _they_ ought to have been. English-speaking races--duty to the world--" He then damned theAmericans; but was suddenly interrupted by perceiving that if they hadbeen shoulder to shoulder with him and England he wouldn't have beenable to send them his wife's German nieces to take care of. There was, he conceded, that advantage resulting from their attitude. He could not, however, concede any others. 

At luncheon he was very nearly gay. It was terrible to see UncleArthur very nearly gay, and both his wife and the twins were mostuncomfortable. "I wonder what's the matter now, " sighed Aunt Aliceto herself, as she nervously crumbled her toast. 

It could mean nothing good, Arthur in such spirits on a wet Sunday, whenhe hadn't been able to get his golf and the cook had overdone the joint. 

CHAPTER III

And so, on a late September afternoon, the _St. Luke_, sliding away fromher moorings, relieved Uncle Arthur of his burden. 

It was final this time, for the two alien enemies once out of it wouldnot be let into England again till after the war. The enemies themselvesknew it was final; and the same knowledge that made Uncle Arthur feel sopleasant as he walked home across his park from golf to tea that for amoment he was actually of a mind to kiss Aunt Alice when he got in, andperhaps even address her in the language of resuscitated passion, whichin Uncle Arthur's mouth was Old Girl, --an idea he abandoned, however, incase it should make her self-satisfied and tiresome--the same knowledgethat produced these amiable effects in Uncle Arthur, made his aliennieces cling very close together as they leaned over the side of the_St. Luke_ hungrily watching the people on the wharf. 

For they loved England. They loved it with the love of youth whoseenthusiasms have been led by an adored teacher always in one direction. And they were leaving that adored teacher, their mother, in England. Itseemed like losing her a second time to go away, so far away, and leaveher there. It was nonsense, they knew, to feel like that. She was withthem just the same; wherever they went now she would be with them, andthey could hear her saying at that very moment, "Little darlings, _don't_ cry. . . . " But it was a gloomy, drizzling afternoon, the sort ofafternoon anybody might be expected to cry on, and not one of the peoplewaving handkerchiefs were waving handkerchiefs to them. 

"We ought to have hired somebody, " thought Anna-Rose, eyeing thehandkerchiefs with miserable little eyes. 

"I believe I've gone and caught a cold, " remarked Anna-Felicitas in hergentle, staid voice, for she was having a good deal of bother with hereyes and her nose, and could no longer conceal the fact that she wassniffing. 

Anna-Rose discreetly didn't look at her. Then she suddenly whipped outher handkerchief and waved it violently. 

Anna-Felicitas forgot her eyes and nose and craned her head forward. "Who are you waving to?" she asked, astonished. 

"Good-bye!" cried Anna-Rose, waving, "Good-bye! Good-bye!"

"Who? Where? Who are you talking to?" asked Anna-Felicitas. "Has any onecome to see us off?"

"Good-bye! Good-bye!" cried Anna-Rose. 

The figures on the wharf were getting smaller, but not until they hadfaded into a blur did Anna-Rose leave off waving. Then she turned roundand put her arm through Anna-Felicitas's and held on to her very tightfor a minute. 

"There wasn't anybody, " she said. "Of course there wasn't. But do yousuppose I was going to have us _looking_ like people who aren't seenoff?"

And she drew Anna-Felicitas away to the chairs, and when they weresafely in them and rolled up to their chins in the rug, she added, "Thatman--" and then stopped. "What man?"

"Standing just behind us--"

"Was there a man?" asked Anna-Felicitas, who never saw men any more thanshe, in her brief career at the hospital, had seen pails. 

"Yes. Looking as if in another moment he'd be sorry for us, " saidAnna-Rose. 

"Sorry for us!" repeated Anna-Felicitas, roused to indignation. 

"Yes. Did you ever?"

Anna-Felicitas said, with a great deal of energy while she put herhandkerchief finally and sternly away, that she didn't ever; and after apause Anna-Rose, remembering one of her many new responsibilities andanxieties--she had so many that sometimes for a time she didn't remembersome of them--turned her head to Anna-Felicitas, and fixing a worriedeye on her said, "You won't go forgetting your Bible, will you, AnnaF. ?"

"My Bible?" repeated Anna-Felicitas, looking blank. 

"Your German Bible. The bit about _wenn die bösen Buben locken, so folgesie nicht_. "

Anna-Felicitas continued to look blank, but Anna-Rose with a troubledbrow said again, "You won't go and forget that, will you, Anna F. ?"

For Anna-Felicitas was very pretty. In most people's eyes she was verypretty, but in Anna-Rose's she was the most exquisite creature God hadyet succeeded in turning out. Anna-Rose concealed this conviction fromher. She wouldn't have told her for worlds. She considered it wouldn'thave been at all good for her; and she had, up to this, and ever sincethey could both remember, jeered in a thoroughly sisterly fashion at herdefects, concentrating particularly on her nose, on her leanness, andon the way, unless constantly reminded not to, she drooped. 

But Anna-Rose secretly considered that the same nose that on her ownface made no sort of a show at all, directly it got on toAnna-Felicitas's somehow was the dearest nose; and that her leanness waslovely, --the same sort of slender grace her mother had had in the daysbefore the heart-breaking emaciation that was its last phase; and thather head was set so charmingly on her neck that when she drooped andforgot her father's constant injunction to sit up, --"For, " had said herfather at monotonously regular intervals, "a maiden should be asstraight as a fir-tree, "--she only seemed to fall into even moreattractive lines than when she didn't. And now that Anna-Rose alone hadthe charge of looking after this abstracted and so charming youngersister, she felt it her duty somehow to convey to her while tactfullyavoiding putting ideas into the poor child's head which might make herconceited, that it behoved her to conduct herself with discretion. 

But she found tact a ticklish thing, the most difficult thing of all tohandle successfully; and on this occasion hers was so elaborate, and socarefully wrapped up in Scriptural language, and German Scripture atthat, that Anna-Felicitas's slow mind didn't succeed in disentanglingher meaning, and after a space of staring at her with a mild inquiry inher eyes, she decided that perhaps she hadn't got one. She was much toopolite though, to say so, and they sat in silence under the rug till the_St. Luke_ whistled and stopped, and Anna-Rose began hastily to makeconversation about Christopher and Columbus. 

She was ashamed of having shown so much of her woe at leaving England. She hoped Anna-Felicitas hadn't noticed. She certainly wasn't going onlike that. When the _St. Luke_ whistled, she was ashamed that it wasn'tonly Anna-Felicitas who jumped. And the amount of brightness she putinto her voice when she told Anna-Felicitas it was pleasant to go anddiscover America was such that that young lady, who if slow was sure, said to herself, "Poor little Anna-R. , she's really taking it dreadfullyto heart. "

The _St. Luke_ was only dropping anchor for the night in the Mersey, andwould go on at daybreak. They gathered this from the talk of passengerswalking up and down the deck in twos and threes and passing andrepassing the chairs containing the silent figures with the round headsthat might be either the heads of boys or of girls, and they weregreatly relieved to think they wouldn't have to begin and be sea-sickfor some hours yet. "So couldn't we walk about a little?" suggestedAnna-Felicitas, who was already stiff from sitting on the hard canechair. 

But Aunt Alice had told them that the thing to do on board a ship ifthey wished, as she was sure they did, not only to avoid being sick butalso conspicuous, was to sit down in chairs the moment the ship gotunder way, and not move out of them till it stopped again. "Or, atleast, as rarely as possible, " amended Aunt Alice, who had never herselfbeen further on a ship than to Calais, but recognized that it might bedifficult to avoid moving sooner or later if it was New York you weregoing to. "Two such young girls travelling alone should be seen asseldom as ever you can manage. Your Uncle is sending you second-classfor that very reason, because it is so much less conspicuous. "

It was also very much less expensive, and Uncle Arthur's generositieswere of the kind that suddenly grow impatient and leave off. Just as ineating he was as he said, for plain roast and boiled, and messes bedamned, so in benefactions he was for lump sums and done with it; andthe extras, the driblets, the here a little and there a little that werenecessary, or were alleged by Aunt Alice to be necessary, before hefinally got rid of those blasted twins, annoyed him so profoundly thatwhen it came to taking their passage he could hardly be got not to sendthem in the steerage. This was too much, however, for Aunt Alice, whosemaid was going with them as far as Euston and therefore would know whatsort of tickets they had, and she insisted with such quiet obstinacythat they should be sent first-class that Uncle Arthur at last split thedifference and consented to make it second. To her maid Aunt Alice alsoexplained that second-class was less conspicuous. 

Anna-Rose, mindful of Aunt Alice's words, hesitated as to the wisdom ofwalking about and beginning to be conspicuous already, but she too wasstiff, and anything the matter with one's body has a wonderful effect, as she had already in her brief career had numerous occasions toobserve, in doing away with prudent determinations. So, after cautiouslylooking round the corners to see if the man who was on the verge ofbeing sorry for them were nowhere in sight, they walked up and down thedamp, dark deck; and the motionlessness, and silence, and mist gave thema sensation of being hung mid-air in some strange empty Hades betweentwo worlds. 

Far down below there was a faint splash every now and then against theside of the _St. Luke_ when some other steamer, invisible in the mist, felt her way slowly by. Out ahead lay the sea, the immense uneasy seathat was to last ten days and nights before they got to the other side, hour after hour of it, hour after hour of tossing across it further andfurther away; and forlorn and ghostly as the ship felt, it yet, becauseon either side of it were still the shores of England, didn't seem asforlorn and ghostly as the unknown land they were bound for. Forsuppose, Anna-Felicitas inquired of Anna-Rose, who had been privatelyasking herself the same thing, America didn't like them? Suppose thesame sort of difficulties were waiting for them over there that haddogged their footsteps in England?

"First of all, " said Anna-Rose promptly, for she prided herself on thereadiness and clearness of her explanations, "America will like us, because I don't see why it shouldn't. We're going over to it in exactlythe same pleasant spirit, Anna-F. , --and don't you go forgetting it andshowing your disagreeable side--that the dove was in when it flew acrossthe waters to the ark, and with olive branches in our beaks just thesame as the dove's, only they're those two letters to Uncle Arthur'sfriends. "

"But do you think Uncle Arthur's friends--" began Anna-Felicitas, whohad great doubts as to everything connected with Uncle Arthur. 

"And secondly, " continued Anna-Rose a little louder, for she wasn'tgoing to be interrupted, and having been asked a question liked to giveall the information in her power, "secondly, America is the greatest ofthe neutrals except the _liebe Gott_, and is bound particularly toprize us because we're so unusually and peculiarly neutral. What ever wasmore neutral than you and me? We're neither one thing nor the other, andyet at the same time we're both. " Anna-Felicitas remarked that it soundedrather as if they were the Athanasian Creed. 

"And thirdly, " went on Anna-Rose, waving this aside, "there's £200waiting for us over there, which is a very nice warm thing to think of. We never had £200 waiting for us anywhere in our lives before, didwe, --so you remember that, and don't get grumbling. "

Anna-Felicitas mildly said that she wasn't grumbling but that shecouldn't help thinking what a great deal depended on the goodwill ofUncle Arthur's friends, and wished it had been Aunt Alice's friends theyhad letters to instead, because Aunt Alice's friends were more likely tolike her. 

Anna-Rose rebuked her, and said that the proper spirit in which to starton a great adventure was one of faith and enthusiasm, and that onedidn't have doubts. 

Anna-Felicitas said she hadn't any doubts really, but that she was veryhungry, not having had anything that could be called a meal sincebreakfast, and that she felt like the sheep in "Lycidas, " the hungryones who looked up and were not fed, and she quoted the lines in caseAnna-Rose didn't recollect them (which Anna-Rose deplored, for she knewthe lines by heart, and if there was any quoting to be done liked to doit herself), and said she felt just like that, --"Empty, " saidAnna-Felicitas, "and yet swollen. When do you suppose people have foodon board ships? I don't believe we'd mind nearly so much about--oh well, about leaving England, if it was after dinner. "

"I'm not minding leaving England, " said Anna-Rose quickly. "At least, not more than's just proper. "

"Oh, no more am I, of course, " said Anna-Felicitas airily. "Exceptwhat's proper. "

"And even if we were feeling it _dreadfully_, " said Anna-Rose, with alittle catch in her voice, "which, of course, we're not, dinner wouldn'tmake any difference. Dinner doesn't alter fundamentals. "

"But it helps one to bear them, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Bear!" repeated Anna-Rose, her chin in the air. "We haven't got much tobear. Don't let me hear you talk of bearing things, Anna-F. "

"I won't after dinner, " promised Anna-Felicitas. 

They thought perhaps they had better ask somebody whether there wouldn'tsoon be something to eat, but the other passengers had all disappeared. They were by themselves on the gloomy deck, and there were no lights. The row of cabin windows along the wall were closely shuttered, and thedoor they had come through when first they came on deck was shut too, and they couldn't find it in the dark. It seemed so odd to be feelingalong a wall for a door they knew was there and not be able to find it, that they began to laugh; and the undiscoverable door cheered them upmore than anything that had happened since seeing the last of UncleArthur. 

"It's like a game, " said Anna-Rose, patting her hands softly and vainlyalong the wall beneath the shuttered windows. 

"It's like something in 'Alice in Wonderland, '" said Anna-Felicitas, following in her tracks. 

A figure loomed through the mist and came toward them. They left offpatting, and stiffened into straight and motionless dignity against thewall till it should have passed. But it didn't pass. It was a malefigure in a peaked cap, probably a steward, they thought, and it stoppedin front of them and said in an American voice, "Hello. "

Anna-Rose cast rapidly about in her mind for the proper form of replyto Hello. 

Anna-Felicitas, instinctively responsive to example murmured "Hello"back again. 

Anna-Rose, feeling sure that nobody ought to say just Hello to peoplethey had never seen before, and that Aunt Alice would think they hadbrought it on themselves by being conspicuous, decided that perhaps"Good-evening" would regulate the situation, and said it. 

"You ought to be at dinner, " said the man, taking no notice of this. 

"That's what _we_ think, " agreed Anna-Felicitas earnestly. 

"Can you please tell us how to get there?" asked Anna-Rose, stilldistant, but polite, for she too very much wanted to know. 

"But _don't_ tell us to ask the Captain, " said Anna-Felicitas, even moreearnestly. 

"No, " said Anna-Rose, "because we won't. "

The man laughed. "Come right along with me, " he said, striding on; andthey followed him as obediently as though such persons as possible _böseBuben_ didn't exist. 

"First voyage I guess, " said the man over his shoulder. 

"Yes, " said the twins a little breathlessly, for the man's legs werelong and they could hardly keep up with him. 

"English?" said the man. 

"Ye--es, " said Anna-Rose. 

"That's to say, practically, " panted the conscientious Anna-Felicitas. 

"What say?" said the man, still striding on. "I said, " Anna-Felicitasendeavoured to explain, hurrying breathlessly after him so as to keepwithin reach of his ear, "practically. "

"Ah, " said the man; and after a silence, broken only by the pantings forbreath of the twins, he added: "Mother with you?"

They didn't say anything to that, it seemed such a dreadful question tohave to answer, and luckily he didn't repeat it, but, having got to thedoor they had been searching for, opened it and stepped into the brightlight inside, and putting out his arm behind him pulled them in oneafter the other over the high wooden door-frame. 

Inside was the same stewardess they had seen earlier in the afternoon, engaged in heatedly describing what sounded like grievances to anofficial in buttons, who seemed indifferent. She stopped suddenly whenthe man appeared, and the official took his hands out of his pockets andbecame alert and attentive, and the stewardess hastily picked up a trayshe had set down and began to move away along a passage. 

The man, however, briefly called "Hi, " and she turned round and cameback even more quickly than she had tried to go. 

"You see, " explained Anna-Rose in a pleased whisper to Anna-Felicitas, "it's Hi she answers to. "

"Yes, " agreed Anna-Felicitas. "It's waste of good circumlocutions tothrow them away on her. "

"Show these young ladies the dining-room, " said the man. 

"Yes, sir, " said the stewardess, as polite as you please. 

He nodded to them with a smile that developed for some reason into alaugh, and turned away and beckoned to the official to follow him, andwent out again into the night. 

"Who was that nice man?" inquired Anna-Rose, following the stewardessdown a broad flight of stairs that smelt of india-rubber and machine-oiland cooking all mixed up together. 

"And please, " said Anna-Felicitas with mild severity, "don't tell us toask the Captain, because we really do know better than that. "

"I thought you must be relations, " said the stewardess. 

"We are, " said Anna-Rose. "We're twins. "

The stewardess stared. "Twins what of?" she asked. 

"What of?" echoed Anna-Rose. "Why, of each other, of course. "

"I meant relations of the Captain's, " said the stewardess shortly, eyeing them with more disfavour than ever. 

"You seem to have the Captain greatly on your mind, " saidAnna-Felicitas. "He is no relation of ours. "

"You're not even friends, then?" asked the stewardess, pausing to stareround at them at a turn in the stairs as they followed her downarm-in-arm. 

"Of course we're friends, " said Anna-Rose with some heat. "Do yousuppose we quarrel?"

"No, I didn't suppose you quarrelled with the Captain, " said thestewardess tartly. "Not on board this ship anyway. "

She didn't know which of the two she disliked most, the short girl orthe long girl. 

"You seem to be greatly obsessed by the Captain, " said Anna-Felicitasgently. "Obsessed!" repeated the stewardess, tossing her head. She wasunacquainted with the word, but instantly suspected it of containing areflection on her respectability. "I've been a widow off and on for tenyears now, " she said angrily, "and I guess it would take more than eventhe Captain to obsess _me_. "

They had reached the glass doors leading into the dining-room, and thestewardess, having carried out her orders, paused before indignantlyleaving them and going upstairs again to say, "If you're friends, whatdo you want to know his name for, then?"

"Whose name?" asked Anna-Felicitas. 

"The Captain's, " said the stewardess. 

"We don't want to know the Captain's name, " said Anna-Felicitaspatiently. "We don't want to know anything about the Captain. "

"Then--" began the stewardess. She restrained herself, however, andmerely bitterly remarking: "That gentleman _was_ the Captain, " wentupstairs and left them. 

Anna-Rose was the first to recover. "You see we took your advice, " shecalled up after her, trying to soften her heart, for it was evident thatfor some reason her heart was hardened, by flattery. "You _told_ us toask the Captain. "

CHAPTER IV

In their berths that night before they went to sleep, it occurred tothem that perhaps what was the matter with the stewardess was that sheneeded a tip. At first, with their recent experiences fresh in theirminds, they thought that she was probably passionately pro-Ally, and hadalready detected all those Junkers in their past and accordinglycouldn't endure them. Then they remembered how Aunt Alice had said, "Youwill have to give your stewardess a little something. "

This had greatly perturbed them at the time, for up to then they hadbeen in the easy position of the tipped rather than the tippers, andanyhow they had no idea what one gave stewardesses. Neither, itappeared, had Aunt Alice; for, on being questioned, she said vaguelythat as it was an American boat they were going on she supposed it wouldhave to be American money, which was dollars, and she didn't know muchabout dollars except that you divided them by four and multiplied themby five, or else it was the other way about; and when, feeling stilluninformed, they had begged her to tell them why one did that, she saidit was the quickest way of finding out what a dollar really was, andwould they mind not talking any more for a little while because her headached. 

The tips they had seen administered during their short lives had allbeen given at the end of things, not at the beginning; but Americans, Aunt Alice told them, were in some respects, in spite of their talkingEnglish, different, and perhaps they were different just on this pointand liked to be tipped at both ends. Anna-Rose wanted to crane out herhead and call up to Anna-Felicitas and ask her whether she didn't thinkthat might be so, but was afraid of disturbing the people in theopposite berths. 

Anna-Felicitas was in the top berth on their side of the cabin, andAnna-Rose as the elder and accordingly as she explained toAnna-Felicitas, needing more comfort, in the lower one. On the oppositeside were two similar berths, each containing as Anna-Felicitaswhispered after peeping cautiously through their closed curtains, --forat first on coming in after dinner to go to bed the cabin seemed empty, except for inanimate things, like clothes hanging up and an immensesmell, --its human freight. They were awed by this discovery, for thehuman freight was motionless and speechless, and yet made none of thenoises suggesting sleep. 

They unpacked and undressed as silently and quickly as possible, but itwas very difficult, for there seemed to be no room for anything, noteven for themselves. Every now and then they glanced a little uneasilyat the closed curtains, which bulged, and sniffed cautiously anddelicately, trying to decide what the smell exactly was. It appeared tobe a mixture of the sauce one had with plum pudding at Christmas, andGerman bedrooms in the morning. It was a smell they didn't like the ideaof sleeping with, but they saw no way of getting air. They thought ofringing for the stewardess and asking her to open a window, though theycould see no window, but came to the conclusion it was better not tostir her up; not yet, at least, not till they had correctly diagnosedwhat was the matter with her. They said nothing out loud, for fear ofdisturbing whatever it was behind the curtains, but they knew what eachwas thinking, for one isn't, as they had long ago found out, a twin fornothing. 

There was a slight scuffle before Anna-Felicitas was safely hoisted upinto her berth, her legs hanging helplessly down for some time after therest of her was in it, and Anna-Rose, who had already neatly insertedherself into her own berth, after watching these legs in silence andfighting a desire to give them a tug and see what would happen, had toget out at last on hearing Anna-Felicitas begin to make sounds up thereas though she were choking, and push them up in after her. Her head wasthen on a level with Anna-Felicitas's berth, and she could see howAnna-Felicitas, having got her legs again, didn't attempt to do anythingwith them in the way of orderly arrangement beneath the blankets, butlay huddled in an irregular heap, screwing her eyes up very tight andstuffing one of her pigtails into her mouth, and evidently strugglingwith what appeared to be an attack of immoderate and ill-timed mirth. 

Anna-Rose observed her for a moment in silence, then was suddenly seizedherself with a dreadful desire to laugh, and with a hasty glance roundat the bulging curtains scrambled back into her own berth and pulled thesheet over her mouth. 

She was sobering herself by going over her different responsibilities, checking them off on her fingers, --the two five-pound notes under herpillow for extra expenses till they were united in New York to theircapital, the tickets, the passports, and Anna-Felicitas, --when two thickfair pigtails appeared dangling over the edge of her berth, followed byAnna-Felicitas's head. 

"You've forgotten to turn out the light, " whispered Anna-Felicitas, hereyelashes still wet from her late attack; and stretching her neck stillfurther down till her face was scarlet with the effort and the bloodrushing into it, she expressed a conviction to Anna-Rose that the humanfreight behind the curtains, judging from the suspicious negativeness ofits behaviour, had no business in their cabin at all and was reallystowaways. 

"German stowaways, " added Anna-Felicitas, nodding her head emphatically, which was very skilful of her, thought Anna-Rose, considering that itwas upside down. "_German_ stowaways, " whispered Anna-Felicitas, sniffing expressively though cautiously. 

Anna-Rose raised herself on her elbows and stared across at the bulgingcurtains. They certainly were very motionless and much curved. In spiteof herself her flesh began to creep a little. 

"They're men, " whispered Anna-Felicitas, now dangerously congested. "Stowaways are. "

There had been no one in the cabin when first they came on board andtook their things down, and they hadn't been in it since till they cameto bed. 

"_German_ men, " whispered Anna-Felicitas, again with a delicateexpressive sniff. 

"Nonsense, " whispered Anna-Rose, stoutly. "Men never come into ladies'cabins. And there's skirts on the hooks. "

"Disguise, " whispered Anna-Felicitas, nodding again. "Spies' disguise. "She seemed quite to be enjoying her own horrible suggestions. 

"Take your head back into the berth, " ordered Anna-Rose quickly, forAnna-Felicitas seemed to be on the very brink of an apoplectic fit. 

Anna-Felicitas, who was herself beginning to feel a littleinconvenienced, obeyed, and was thrilled to see Anna-Rose presentlyvery cautiously emerge from underneath her and on her bare feet creepacross to the opposite side. She knew her to be valiant to recklessness. She sat up to watch, her eyes round with interest. 

Anna-Rose didn't go straight across, but proceeded slowly, with severalpauses, to direct her steps toward the pillow-end of the berths. Havinggot there she stood still a moment listening, and then putting a carefulfinger between the curtain of the lower berth and its frame, drew it thesmallest crack aside and peeped in. 

Instantly she started back, letting go the curtain. "I beg your pardon, "she said out loud, turning very red. "I--I thought--"

Anna-Felicitas, attentive in her berth, felt a cold thrill rush down herback. No sound came from the berth on the other side any more thanbefore the raid on it, and Anna-Rose returned quicker than she had gone. She just stopped on the way to switch off the light, and then felt alongthe edge of Anna-Felicitas's berth till she got to her head, and pullingit near her by its left pigtail whispered with her mouth close to itsleft ear, "Wide awake. Watching me all the time. Not a man. Fat. "

And she crawled into her berth feeling unnerved. 

CHAPTER V

The lady in the opposite berth was German, and so was the lady in theberth above her. Their husbands were American, but that didn't make themless German. Nothing ever makes a German less German, Anna-Roseexplained to Anna-Felicitas. 

"Except, " replied Anna-Felicitas, "a judicious dilution of their bloodby the right kind of mother. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose. "Only to be found in England. "

This conversation didn't take place till the afternoon of the next day, by which time Anna-Felicitas already knew about the human freight beingGermans, for one of their own submarines came after the _St. Luke_ andno one was quite so loud in expression of terror and dislike as the twoGermans. 

They demanded to be saved first, on the ground that they were Germans. They repudiated their husbands, and said marriage was nothing comparedto how one had been born. The curtains of their berths, till then socarefully closed, suddenly yawned open, and the berths gave up theircontents just as if, Anna-Felicitas remarked afterwards to Anna-Rose, itwas the resurrection and the berths were riven sepulchres chucking uptheir dead. 

This happened at ten o'clock the next morning when the _St. Luke_ waspitching about off the southwest coast of Ireland. The twins, wakingabout seven, found with a pained surprise that they were not where theyhad been dreaming they were, in the sunlit garden at home playingtennis happily if a little violently, but in a chilly yet stuffy placethat kept on tilting itself upside down. They lay listening to thegroans coming from the opposite berths, and uneasily wondering how longit would be before they too began to groan. Anna-Rose raised her headonce with the intention of asking if she could help at all, but droppedit back again on to the pillow and shut her eyes tight and lay as quietas the ship would let her. Anna-Felicitas didn't even raise her head, she felt so very uncomfortable. 

At eight o'clock the stewardess looked in--the same stewardess, theylanguidly noted, with whom already they had had two encounters, for ithappened that this was one of the cabins she attended to--and said thatif anybody wanted breakfast they had better be quick or it would beover. 

"Breakfast!" cried the top berth opposite in a heart-rending tone; andinstantly was sick. 

The stewardess withdrew her head and banged the door to, and the twins, in their uneasy berths, carefully keeping their eyes shut so as not towitness the behaviour of the sides and ceiling of the cabin, feeblymarvelled at the stewardess for suggesting being quick to persons whowere being constantly stood on their heads. And breakfast, --theyshuddered and thought of other things; of fresh, sweet air, and of thescent of pinks and apricots warm with the sun. 

At ten o'clock the stewardess came in again, this time right in, andwith determination in every gesture. 

"Come, come, " she said, addressing the twins, and through them talkingat the heaving and groaning occupants of the other side, "you mustn'tgive way like this. What you want is to be out of bed. You must get upand go on deck. And how's the cabin to get done if you stay in it allthe time?"

Anna-Felicitas, the one particularly addressed, because she was more onthe right level for conversation than Anna-Rose, who could only see thestewardess's apron, turned her head away and murmured that she didn'tcare. 

"Come, come, " said the stewardess. "Besides, there's life-boat drill atmid-day, and you've got to be present. "

Anna-Felicitas, her eyes shut, again murmured that she didn't care. 

"Come, come, " said the stewardess. "Orders are orders. Every soul on theship, sick or not, has got to be present at life-boat drill. "

"Oh, I'm not a soul, " murmured Anna-Felicitas, who felt at that momenthow particularly she was a body, while the opposite berths redoubledtheir groans. 

"Come, come--" said the stewardess. 

Then the _St. Luke_ whistled five times, and the stewardess turned pale. For a brief space, before they understood what had happened, the twinssupposed she was going to be sick. But it wasn't that that was thematter with her, for after a moment's staring at nothing with horror onher face she pounced on them and pulled them bodily out of their berths, regardless by which end, and threw them on the floor anyhow. Then sheplunged about and produced life-jackets; then she rushed down thepassage flinging open the doors of the other cabins; then she whirledback again and tried to tie the twins into their life-jackets, but withhands that shook so that the strings immediately came undone again; andall the time she was calling out "Quick--quick--quick--" There was agreat tramping of feet on deck and cries and shouting. 

The curtains of the opposite berths yawned asunder and out came theGermans, astonishingly cured of their sea-sickness, and struggledvigorously into their life-jackets and then into fur coats, and had thefur coats instantly pulled off again by a very energetic steward who ranin and said fur coats in the water were death-traps, --a steward so muchbent on saving people that he began to pull off the other things theGerman ladies had on as well, saying while he pulled, disregarding theirprotests, that in the water Mother Nature was the best. "MotherNature--Mother Nature, " said the steward, pulling; and he was onlystopped just in the nick of time by the stewardess rushing in again andseeing what was happening to the helpless Germans. 

Anna-Rose, even at that moment explanatory, pointed out toAnna-Felicitas, who had already grasped the fact, that no doubt therewas a submarine somewhere about. The German ladies, seizing theirvaluables from beneath their pillows, in spite of the steward assuringthem they wouldn't want them in the water, demanded to be taken up andsomehow signalled to the submarine, which would never dare do anythingto a ship containing its own flesh and blood--and an American ship, too--there must be some awful mistake--but anyhow they must besaved--there would be terrible trouble, that they could assure thesteward and the twins and the scurrying passers-by down the passage, ifAmerica allowed two Germans to be destroyed--and anyhow they wouldinsist on having their passage money refunded. . . . 

The German ladies departed down the passage, very incoherent and veryunhappy but no longer sick, and Anna-Felicitas, clinging to the edge ofher berth, feeling too miserable to mind about the submarine, feeblywondered, while the steward tied her properly into her life-jacket, atthe cure effected in them. Anna-Rose seemed cured too, for she wasbuttoning a coat round Anna-Felicitas's shoulders, and generally seemedbusy and brisk, ending by not even forgetting their precious little bagof money and tickets and passports, and fastening it round her neck inspite of the steward's assuring her that it would drag her down in thewater like a stone tied to a kitten. 

"You're a _very_ cheerful man, aren't you, " Anna-Rose said, as he pushedthem out of the cabin and along the corridor, holding up Anna-Felicitason her feet, who seemed quite unable to run alone. 

The steward didn't answer, but caught hold of Anna-Felicitas at the footof the stairs and carried her up them, and then having got her on deckpropped her in a corner near the life-boat allotted to the set of cabinsthey were in, and darted away and in a minute was back again with a bigcoat which he wrapped round her. 

"May as well be comfortable till you do begin to drown, " he saidbriskly, "but mind you don't forget to throw it off, Missie, the minuteyou feel the water. "

Anna-Felicitas slid down on to the deck, her head leaning against thewall, her eyes shut, a picture of complete indifference to whatevermight be going to happen next. Her face was now as white as the frill ofthe night-gown that straggled out from beneath her coat, for the journeyfrom the cabin to the deck had altogether finished her. Anna-Rose wasthankful that she felt too ill to be afraid. Her own heart was blackwith despair, --despair that Anna-Felicitas, the dear and beautiful one, should presently, at any moment, be thrown into that awful heavingwater, and certainly be hurt and frightened before she was choked out oflife. 

She sat down beside her, getting as close as possible to keep her warm. Her own twin. Her own beloved twin. She took her cold hands and put themaway beneath the coat the steward had brought. She slid an arm round herand laid her cheek against her sleeve, so that she should know somebodywas there, somebody who loved her. "What's the _good_ of it all--_why_were we born--" she wondered, staring at the hideous gray waves asthey swept up into sight over the side of the ship and away again as theship rose up, and at the wet deck and the torn sky, and themiserable-looking passengers in their life-jackets collected togetherround the life-boat. 

Nobody said anything except the German ladies. They, indeed, kept up aconstant wail. The others were silent, the men mostly smokingcigarettes, the women holding their fluttering wraps about them, all ofthem staring out to sea, watching for the track of the torpedo toappear. One shot had been fired already and had missed. The ship waszig-zagging under every ounce of steam she could lay on. An officialstood by the life-boat, which was ready with water in it and provisions. That the submarine must be mad, as the official remarked, to fire on anAmerican ship, didn't console anybody, and his further assurance thatthe matter would not be allowed to rest there left them cold. They felttoo sure that in all probability they themselves were going to restthere, down underneath that repulsive icy water, after a struggle thatwas going to be unpleasant. 

The man who had roused Anna-Rose's indignation as the ship left thelanding-stage by looking as though he were soon going to be sorry forher, came across from the first class, where his life-boat was, to watchfor the track of the expected torpedo, and caught sight of the twinshuddled in their corner. 

Anna-Rose didn't see him, for she was staring with wide eyes out at thedesolate welter of water and cloud, and thinking of home: the home thatwas, that used to be till such a little while ago, the home that nowseemed to have been so amazingly, so unbelievably beautiful and blest, with its daily life of love and laughter and of easy confidence thatto-morrow was going to be just as good. Happiness had been the ordinarycondition there, a simple matter of course. Its place was taken now bycourage. Anna-Rose felt sick at all this courage there was about. Thereshould be no occasion for it. There should be no horrors to face, nocruelties to endure. Why couldn't brotherly love continue? Why mustpeople get killing each other? She, for her part, would be behind nobodyin courage and in the defying of a Fate that could behave, as she felt, so very unlike her idea of anything even remotely decent; but itoughtn't to be necessary, this constant condition of screwed-upness; itwas waste of effort, waste of time, waste of life, --oh the _stupidity_of it all, she thought, rebellious and bewildered. 

"Have some brandy, " said the man, pouring out a little into a small cup. 

Anna-Rose turned her eyes on him without moving the rest of her. Sherecognized him. He was going to be sorry for them again. He had muchbetter be sorry for himself now, she thought, because he, just as muchas they were, was bound for a watery bier. 

"Thank you, " she said distantly, for not only did she hate the smell ofbrandy but Aunt Alice had enjoined her with peculiar strictness on noaccount to talk to strange men, "I don't drink. "

"Then I'll give the other one some, " said the man. 

"She too, " said Anna-Rose, not changing her position but keeping adrearily watchful eye on him, "is a total abstainer. "

"Well, I'll go and fetch some of your warm things for you. Tell me whereyour cabin is. You haven't got enough on. "

"Thank you, " said Anna-Rose distantly, "we have quite enough on, considering the occasion. We're dressed for drowning. "

The man laughed, and said there would be no drowning, and that they hada splendid captain, and were outdistancing the submarine hand over fist. Anna-Rose didn't believe him, and suspected him of supposing her to bein need of cheering, but a gleam of comfort did in spite of herselfsteal into her heart. 

He went away, and presently came back with a blanket and some pillows. 

"If you _will_ sit on the floor, " he said, stuffing the pillows behindtheir backs, during which Anna-Felicitas didn't open her eyes, and herhead hung about so limply that it looked as if it might at any momentroll off, "you may at least be as comfortable as you can. "

Anna-Rose pointed out, while she helped him arrange Anna-Felicitas'sindifferent head on the pillow, that she saw little use in beingcomfortable just a minute or two before drowning. "Drowning be hanged, "said the man. 

"That's how Uncle Arthur used to talk, " said Anna-Rose, feeling suddenlyquite at home, "except that _he_ would have said 'Drowning be damned. '"

The man laughed. "Is he dead?" he asked, busy with Anna-Felicitas'shead, which defied their united efforts to make it hold itself up. 

"Dead?" echoed Anna-Rose, to whom the idea of Uncle Arthur's ever beinganything so quiet as dead and not able to say any swear words for such along time as eternity seemed very odd. 

"You said he _used_ to talk like that. "

"Oh, no he's not dead at all. Quite the contrary. "

The man laughed again, and having got Anna-Felicitas's head arranged ina position that at least, as Anna-Rose pointed out, had some sort ofself-respect in it, he asked who they were with. 

Anna-Rose looked at him with as much defiant independence as she couldmanage to somebody who was putting a pillow behind her back. He wasgoing to be sorry for them. She saw it coming. He was going to say "Youpoor things, " or words to that effect. That's what the people roundUncle Arthur's had said to them. That's what everybody had said to themsince the war began, and Aunt Alice's friends had said it to her too, because she had to have her nieces live with her, and no doubt UncleArthur's friends who played golf with him had said it to him as well, except that probably they put in a damn so as to make it clearer for himand said "You poor damned thing, " or something like that, and she wassick of the very words poor things. Poor things, indeed! "We're witheach other, " she said briefly, lifting her chin. 

"Well, I don't think that's enough, " said the man. "Not half enough. You ought to have a mother or something. "

"_Everybody_ can't have mothers, " said Anna-Rose very defiantly indeed, tears rushing into her eyes. 

The man tucked the blanket round their resistless legs. "There now, " hesaid. "That's better. What's the good of catching your deaths?"

Anna-Rose, glad that he hadn't gone on about mothers, said that withso much death imminent, catching any of it no longer seemed to herparticularly to matter, and the man laughed and pulled over a chairand sat down beside her. 

She didn't know what he saw anywhere in that dreadful situation to laughat, but just the sound of a laugh was extraordinarily comforting. Itmade one feel quite different. Wholesome again. Like waking up tosunshine and one's morning bath and breakfast after a nightmare. Heseemed altogether a very comforting man. She liked him to sit near them. She hoped he was a good man. Aunt Alice had said there were very fewgood men, hardly any in fact except one's husband, but this one did seemone of the few exceptions. And she thought that by now, he havingbrought them all those pillows, he could no longer come under theheading of strange men. When he wasn't looking she put out her handsecretly and touched his coat where he wouldn't feel it. It comfortedher to touch his coat. She hoped Aunt Alice wouldn't have disapproved ofseeing her sitting side by side with him and liking it. 

Aunt Alice had been, as her custom was, vague, when Anna-Rose, havinggiven her the desired promise not to talk or let Anna-Felicitas talk tostrange men, and desiring to collect any available information for herguidance in her new responsible position had asked, "But when are men_not_ strange?"

"When you've married them, " said Aunt Alice. "After that, of course, youlove them. "

And she sighed heavily, for it was bed-time. 

CHAPTER VI

Nothing more was seen of the submarine. 

The German ladies were certain the captain had somehow let them know hehad them on board, and were as full of the credit of having saved theship as if it had been Sodom and Gomorrah instead of a ship, and theythe one just man whose presence would have saved those cities if he hadbeen in them; and the American passengers were equally sure that thesubmarine, on thinking it over, had decided that President Wilson wasnot a man to be trifled with, and had gone in search of some prey whichwould not have the might and majesty of America at its back. 

As the day went on, and the _St. Luke_ left off zig-zagging, the reliefof those on board was the relief of a reprieve from death. Almosteverybody was cured of sea-sickness, and quite everybody was ready tooverwhelm his neighbour with cordiality and benevolence. Rich peopledidn't mind poor people, and came along from the first class and talkedto them just as if they had been the same flesh and blood as themselves. A billionairess native to Chicago, who had crossed the Atlantic fortytimes without speaking to a soul, an achievement she was as justly proudof as an artist is of his best creations, actually asked somebody in adingy mackintosh, whose little boy still looked pale, if he had beenfrightened; and an exclusive young man from Boston talked quite a longwhile to an English lady without first having made sure that she waswell-connected. What could have been more like heaven? The tone on the_St. Luke_ that day was very like what the tone in the kingdom of heavenmust be in its simple politeness. "And so you see, " said Anna-Rose, whowas fond of philosophizing in season and out of season, and particularlyout of season, "how good comes out of evil. "

She made this observation about four o'clock in the afternoon toAnna-Felicitas in an interval of absence on the part of Mr. Twist--such, the amiable stranger had told them, was his name--who had gone to seeabout tea being brought up to them; and Anna-Felicitas, able by now tosit up and take notice, the hours of fresh air having done their work, smiled the ready, watery, foolishly happy smile of the convalescent. Itwas so nice not to feel ill; it was so nice not to have to be saved. Ifshe had been able to talk much, she would have philosophized too, aboutthe number and size of one's negative blessings--all the things onehasn't got, all the very horrid things; why, there's no end to them onceyou begin to count up, she thought, waterily happy, and yet peoplegrumble. 

Anna-Felicitas was in that cleaned-out, beatific, convalescent mood inwhich one is sure one will never grumble again. She smiled at anybodywho happened to pass by and catch her eye. She would have smiled justlike that, with just that friendly, boneless familiarity at the devil ifhe had appeared, or even at Uncle Arthur himself. 

The twins, as a result of the submarine's activities, were having thepleasantest day they had had for months. It was the realization of thisthat caused Anna-Rose's remark about good coming out of evil. Thebackground, she could not but perceive, was a very odd one for theirpleasantest day for months--a rolling steamer and a cold wind flickingat them round the corner; but backgrounds, she pointed out toAnna-Felicitas, who smiled her agreement broadly and instantly, arenegligible things: it is what goes on in front of them that matters. Ofwhat earthly use, for instance, had been those splendid summerafternoons in the perfect woods and gardens that so beautifully framedin Uncle Arthur?

No use, agreed Anna-Felicitas, smiling fatuously. 

In the middle of them was Uncle Arthur. You always got to him in theend. 

Anna-Felicitas nodded and shook her head and was all feeble agreement. 

She and Anna-Felicitas had been more hopelessly miserable, Anna-Roseremarked, wandering about the loveliness that belonged to him than theycould ever have dreamed was possible. She reminded Anna-Felicitas howthey used to rub their eyes to try and see more clearly, for surelythese means of happiness, these elaborate arrangements for it all roundthem, couldn't be for nothing? There must be some of it somewhere, ifonly they could discover where? And there was none. Not a trace of it. Not even the faintest little swish of its skirts. 

Anna-Rose left off talking, and became lost in memories. For a longtime, she remembered, she had told herself it was her mother's deathblotting the light out of life, but one day Anna-Felicitas said aloudthat it was Uncle Arthur, and Anna-Rose knew it was true. Their mother'sdeath was something so tender, so beautiful, that terrible as it was tothem to be left without her they yet felt raised up by it somehow, raised on to a higher level than where they had been before, closer intheir hearts to real things, to real values. But Uncle Arthur came intopossession of their lives as a consequence of that death, and he hadtowered up between them and every glimpse of the sun. Suddenly there wasno such thing as freedom and laughter. Suddenly everything one said anddid was wrong. "And you needn't think, " Anna-Felicitas had said wisely, "that he's like that because we're Germans--or _seem_ to be Germans, "she amended. "It's because he's Uncle Arthur. Look at Aunt Alice. _She's_ not a German. And yet look at her. "

And Anna-Rose had looked at Aunt Alice, though only in her mind's eye, for at that moment the twins were three miles away in a wood picnicking, and Aunt Alice was at home recovering from a _tête-à-tête_ luncheon withUncle Arthur who hadn't said a word from start to finish; and though shedidn't like most of his words when he did say them, she liked them stillless when he didn't say them, for then she imagined them, and what sheimagined was simply awful, --Anna-Rose had, I say, looked at Aunt Alicein her mind's eye, and knew that this too was true. 

Mr. Twist reappeared, followed by the brisk steward with a tray of teaand cake, and their corner became very like a cheerful picnic. 

Mr. Twist was most pleasant and polite. Anna-Rose had told him quitesoon after he began to talk to her, in order, as she said, to clear hismind of misconceptions, that she and Anna-Felicitas, though theirclothes at that moment, and the pigtails in which their flair was done, might be misleading, were no longer children, but quite the contrary;that they were, in fact, persons who were almost ripe for going todances, and certainly in another year would be perfectly ripe for dancessupposing there were any. 

Mr. Twist listened attentively, and begged her to tell him any otherlittle thing she might think of as useful to him in his capacity offriend and attendant, --both of which, said Mr. Twist, he intended to betill he had seen them safely landed in New York. 

"I hope you don't think we _need_ anybody, " said Anna-Rose. "We shalllike being friends with you very much, but only on terms of perfectequality. "

"Sure, " said Mr. Twist, who was an American. 

"I thought--"

She hesitated a moment. 

"You thought?" encouraged Mr. Twist politely. 

"I thought at Liverpool you looked as if you were being sorry for us. "

"Sorry?" said Mr. Twist, in the tone of one who repudiates. 

"Yes. When we were waving good-bye to--to our friends. "

"Sorry?" repeated Mr. Twist. 

"Which was great waste of your time. "

"I should think so, " said Mr. Twist with heartiness. 

Anna-Rose, having cleared the ground of misunderstandings, an activityin which at all times she took pleasure, accepted Mr. Twist's attentionsin the spirit in which they were offered, which was, as he said, one ofmutual friendliness and esteem. As he was never sea-sick, he could moveabout and do things for them that might be difficult to do forthemselves; as he knew a great deal about stewardesses, he could tellthem what sort of tip theirs expected; as he was American, he couldilluminate them about that country. He had been doing Red Cross workwith an American ambulance in France for ten months, and was going homefor a short visit to see how his mother, who, Anna-Rose gathered, wasancient and widowed, was getting on. His mother, he said, lived inseclusion in a New England village with his sister, who had not married. 

"Then she's got it all before her, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Like us, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"I shouldn't think she'd got as much of it before her as you, " said Mr. Twist, "because she's considerably more grown up--I mean, " he addedhastily, as Anna-Rose's mouth opened, "she's less--well, less completelyyoung. "

"We're not completely young, " said Anna-Rose with dignity. "People arecompletely young the day they're born, and ever after that they spendtheir time becoming less so. "

"Exactly. And my sister has been becoming less so longer than you have. I assure you that's all I meant. She's less so even than I am. "

"Then, " said Anna-Rose, glancing at that part of Mr. Twist's head whereit appeared to be coming through his hair, "she must have got to thestage when one is called a maiden lady. "

"And if she were a German, " said Anna-Felicitas suddenly, who hadn'ttill then said anything to Mr. Twist but only smiled widely at himwhenever he happened to look her way, "she wouldn't be either a lady ora maiden, but just an It. It's very rude of Germans, I think, " went onAnna-Felicitas, abstractedly smiling at the cake Mr. Twist was offeringher, "never to let us be anything but Its till we've taken on some men. "

Mr. Twist expressed surprise at this way of describing marriage, andinquired of Anna-Felicitas what she knew about Germans. 

"The moment you leave off being sea-sick, Anna-F. , " said Anna-Rose, turning to her severely, "you start being indiscreet. Well, I suppose, "she added with a sigh to Mr. Twist, "you'd have had to know sooner orlater. Our name is Twinkler. "

She watched him to see the effect of this, and Mr. Twist, perceiving hewas expected to say something, said that he didn't mind that anyhow, andthat he could bear something worse in the way of revelations. 

"Does it convey nothing to you?" asked Anna-Rose, astonished, for inGermany the name of Twinkler was a mighty name, and even in England itwas well known. 

Mr. Twist shook his head. "Only that it sounds cheerful, " he said. 

Anna-Rose watched his face. "It isn't only Twinkler, " she said, speakingvery distinctly. "It's _von_ Twinkler. "

"That's German, " said Mr. Twist; but his face remained serene. 

"Yes. And so are we. That is, we would be if it didn't happen that weweren't. "

"I don't think I quite follow, " said Mr. Twist. 

"It _is_ very difficult, " agreed Anna-Rose. "You see, we used to have aGerman father. "

"But only because our mother married him, " explained Anna-Felicitas. "Else we wouldn't have. "

"And though she only did it once, " said Anna-Rose, "ages ago, it hasdogged our footsteps ever since. "

"It's very surprising, " mused Anna-Felicitas, "what marrying anybodydoes. You go into a church, and before you know where you are, you'reall tangled up with posterity. "

"And much worse than that, " said Anna-Rose, staring wide-eyed at her ownpast experiences, "posterity's all tangled up with you. It's reallysimply awful sometimes for posterity. Look at us. "

"If there hadn't been a war we'd have been all right, " saidAnna-Felicitas. "But directly there's a war, whoever it is you'vemarried, if it isn't one of your own countrymen, rises up against you, just as if he were too many meringues you'd had for dinner. "

"Living or dead, " said Anna-Rose, nodding, "he rises up against you. "

"Till the war we never thought at all about it, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Either one way or the other, " said Anna-Rose. 

"We never used to bother about what we were, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Wewere just human beings, and so was everybody else just human beings. "

"We didn't mind a bit about being Germans, or about other people notbeing Germans. "

"But you mustn't think we mind now either, " said Anna-Felicitas, "because, you see, we're not. "

Mr. Twist looked at them in turn. His ears were a little prominent andpointed, and they gave him rather the air, when he put his head on oneside and looked at them, of an attentive fox-terrier. "I don't think Iquite follow, " he said again. 

"It _is_ very difficult, " agreed Anna-Rose. 

"It's because you've got into your head that we're German because of ourfather, " said Anna-Felicitas. "But what's a father, when all's said anddone?"

"Well, " said Mr. Twist, "one has to have him. "

"But having got him he isn't anything like as important as a mother, "said Anna-Rose. 

"One hardly sees one's father, " said Anna-Felicitas. "He's always busy. He's always thinking of something else. "

"Except when he looks at one and tells one to sit up straight, " saidAnna-Rose pointedly to Anna-Felicitas, whose habit of drooping stillpersisted in spite of her father's admonishments. 

"Of course he's very kind and benevolent when he happens to rememberthat one is there, " said Anna-Felicitas, sitting up beautifully for amoment, "but that's about everything. "

"And of course, " said Anna-Rose, "one's father's intentions areperfectly sound and good, but his attention seems to wander. Whereasone's mother--"

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas, "one's mother--"

They broke off and looked straight in front of them. It didn't bearspeaking of. It didn't bear thinking of. 

Suddenly Anna-Felicitas, weak from excessive sea-sickness, began to cry. The tears just slopped over as though no resistance of any sort werepossible. 

Anna-Rose stared at her a moment horror-struck. "Look here, Anna-F. , "she exclaimed, wrath in her voice, "I won't _have_ you be sentimental--Iwon't _have_ you be sentimental. . . . "

And then she too began to cry. 

Well, once having hopelessly disgraced and exposed themselves, there wasnothing for it but to take Mr. Twist into their uttermost confidence. Itwas dreadful. It was awful. Before that strange man. A person theyhardly knew. Other strangers passing. Exposing their feelings. Showingtheir innermost miserable places. 

They writhed and struggled in their efforts to stop, to pretend theyweren't crying, that it was really nothing but just tears, --odd onesleft over from last time, which was years and years ago, --"But _really_years and years ago, " sobbed Anna-Rose, anxiously explaining, --"theyears one falls down on garden paths in, and cuts one's knees, andone's mother--one's mother--c-c-c-comforts one--"

"See here, " said Mr. Twist, interrupting these incoherences, and pullingout a beautiful clean pocket-handkerchief which hadn't even beenunfolded yet, "you've got to tell me all about it right away. "

And he shook out the handkerchief, and with the first-aid promptness hisRed Cross experience had taught him, started competently wiping up theirfaces. 

CHAPTER VII

There was that about Mr. Twist which, once one had begun them, encouraged confidences; something kind about his eyes, something not toodetermined about his chin. He bore no resemblance to those pictures ofefficient Americans in advertisements with which Europe isfamiliar, --eagle-faced gentlemen with intimidatingly firm mouths andchins, wiry creatures, physically and mentally perfect, offering incapital letters to make you Just Like Them. Mr. Twist was the reverse ofeagle-faced. He was also the reverse of good-looking; that is, he wouldhave been very handsome indeed, as Anna-Rose remarked several days laterto Anna-Felicitas, when the friendship had become a settledthing, --which indeed it did as soon as Mr. Twist had finished wipingtheir eyes and noses that first afternoon, it being impossible, theydiscovered, to have one's eyes and noses wiped by somebody without beingfriends afterwards (for such an activity, said Anna-Felicitas, belongedto the same order of events as rescue from fire, lions, or drowning, after which in books you married him; but this having only been wiping, said Anna-Rose, the case was adequately met by friendship)--he wouldhave been very handsome indeed if he hadn't had a face. 

"But you have to _have_ a face, " said Anna-Felicitas, who didn't thinkit much mattered what sort it was so long as you could eat with it andsee out of it. 

"And as long as one is as kind as Mr. Twist, " said Anna-Rose; butsecretly she thought that having been begun so successfully at his feet, and carried upwards with such grace of long limbs and happy proportions, he might as well have gone on equally felicitously for the last littlebit. 

"I expect God got tired of him over that last bit, " she mused, "and justput on any sort of head. "

"Yes--that happened to be lying about, " agreed Anna-Felicitas. "In ahurry to get done with him. "

"Anyway he's very kind, " said Anna-Rose, a slight touch of defiance inher voice. 

"Oh, _very_ kind, " agreed Anna-Felicitas. 

"And it doesn't matter about faces for being kind, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Not in the least, " agreed Anna-Felicitas. 

"And if it hadn't been for the submarine we shouldn't have got to knowhim. So you see, " said Anna-Rose, --and again produced her favouriteremark about good coming out of evil. 

Those were the days in mid-Atlantic when England was lost in its ownpeculiar mists, and the sunshine of America was stretching out towardsthem. The sea was getting calmer and bluer every hour, and submarinesmore and more unlikely. If a ship could be pleasant, whichAnna-Felicitas doubted, for she still found difficulty in dressing andundressing without being sea-sick and was unpopular in the cabin, thisship was pleasant. You lay in a deck-chair all day long, staring at theblue sky and blue sea that enclosed you as if you were living in themiddle of a jewel, and tried not to remember--oh, there were heaps ofthings it was best not to remember; and when the rail of the ship movedup across the horizon too far into the sky, or moved down across it andshowed too much water, you just shut your eyes and then it didn'tmatter; and the sun shone warm and steady on your face, and the windtickled the tassel on the top of your German-knitted cap, and Mr. Twistcame and read aloud to you, which sent you to sleep quicker thananything you had ever known. 

The book he read out of and carried about with him his pocket was called"Masterpieces You Must Master, " and was an American collection ofEnglish poetry, professing in its preface to be a Short Cut to Culture;and he would read with what at that time, it being new to them, seemedto the twins a strange exotic pronunciation, Wordsworth's "Ode toDooty, " and the effect was as if someone should dig a majestic Gregorianpsalm in its ribs, and make it leap and giggle. 

Anna-Rose, who had no reason to shut her eyes, for she didn't mind whatthe ship's rail did with the horizon, opened them very round when firstMr. Twist started on his Masterpieces. She was used to hearing them readby her mother in the adorable husky voice that sent such thrills throughone, but she listened with the courtesy and final gratitude due to theefforts to entertain her of so amiable a friend, and only the roundnessof her eyes showed her astonishment at this waltzing round, as itappeared to her, of Mr. Twist with the Stern Daughter of the Voice ofGod. He also read "Lycidas" to her, that same "Lycidas" Uncle Arthurtook for a Derby winner, and only Anna-Rose's politeness enabled her torefrain from stopping up her ears. As it was, she fidgeted to the pointof having to explain, on Mr. Twist's pausing to gaze at herquestioningly through the smoke-coloured spectacles he wore on deck, which made him look so like a gigantic dragon-fly, that it was becauseher deck-chair was so very much harder than she was. 

Anna-Felicitas, who considered that, if these things were short-cuts toanywhere, seeing she knew them all by heart she must have long ago gotthere, snoozed complacently. Sometimes for a few moments she would dropoff really to sleep, and then her mouth would fall open, which worriedAnna-Rose, who couldn't bear her to look even for a moment lessbeautiful than she knew she was, so that she fidgeted more than ever, unable, pinned down by politeness and the culture being administered, tomake her shut her mouth and look beautiful again by taking and shakingher. Also Anna-Felicitas had a trick of waking up suddenly andforgetting to be polite, as one does when first one wakes up and hasn'thad time to remember one is a lady. "To-morrow to fresh woods andpastures noo, " Mr. Twist would finish, for instance, with a sort of gulpof satisfaction at having swallowed yet another solid slab of culture;and Anna-Felicitas, returning suddenly to consciousness, would murmur, with her eyes still shut and her head lolling limply, things like, "After all, it _does_ rhyme with blue. I wonder why, then, one stilldoesn't like it. "

Then Mr. Twist would turn his spectacles towards her in mild inquiry, and Anna-Rose, as always, would rush in and elaborately explain whatAnna-Felicitas meant, which was so remote from anything resembling whatshe had said that Mr. Twist looked more mildly inquiring than ever. 

Usually Anna-Felicitas didn't contradict Anna-Rose, being too sleepy ortoo lazy, but sometimes she did, and then Anna-Rose got angry, and wouldget what the Germans call a red head and look at Anna-Felicitas veryseverely and say things, and Mr. Twist would close his book and watchwith that alert, cocked-up-ear look of a sympathetic and highlyinterested terrier; but sooner or later the ship would always give aroll, and Anna-Felicitas would shut her eyes and fade to paleness andbecome the helpless bundle of sickness that nobody could possibly go onbeing severe with. 

The passengers in the second class were more generally friendly thanthose in the first class. The first class sorted itself out into littlegroups, and whispered about each other, as Anna-Rose observed, watchingtheir movements across the rope that separated her from them. The secondclass remained to the end one big group, frayed out just a little at theedge in one or two places. 

The chief fraying out was where the Twinkler kids, as the second-classyoung men, who knew no better, dared to call them, interrupted thecircle by talking apart with Mr. Twist. Mr. Twist had no business there. He was a plutocrat of the first class; but in spite of the regulationswhich cut off the classes from communicating, with a view apparently tothe continued sanitariness of the first class, the implication beingthat the second class was easily infectious and probably overrun, therehe was every day and several times in every day. He must have heavilysquared the officials, the second-class young men thought until the daywhen Mr. Twist let it somehow be understood that he had known theTwinkler young ladies for years, dandled them in their not very remoteinfancy on his already full-grown knee, and had been specially appointedto look after them on this journey. 

Mr. Twist did not specify who had appointed him, except to the Twinkleryoung ladies themselves, and to them he announced that it was no less athing, being, or creature, than Providence. The second-class young men, therefore, in spite of their rising spirits as danger lay furtherbehind, and their increasing tendency, peculiar to those who go onships, to become affectionate, found themselves no further on inacquaintance with the Misses Twinkler the last day of the voyage thanthey had been the first. Not that, under any other conditions, theywould have so much as noticed the existence of the Twinkler kids. Intheir blue caps, pulled down tight to their eyebrows and hiding everytrace of hair, they looked like bald babies. They never came to meals;their assiduous guardian, or whatever he was, feeding them on deck withthe care of a mother-bird for its fledglings, so that nobody except thetwo German ladies in their cabin had seen them without the caps. Theyoung men put them down as half-grown only, somewhere about fourteenthey thought, and nothing but what, if they were boys instead of girls, would have been called louts. 

Still, a ship is a ship, and it is wonderful what can be managed in theway of dalliance if one is shut up on one long enough; and the MissesTwinkler, in spite of their loutishness, their apparent baldness, andtheir constant round-eyed solemnity, would no doubt have been theobjects of advances before New York was reached if it hadn't been forMr. Twist. There wasn't a girl under forty in the second class on thatvoyage, the young men resentfully pointed out to each other, exceptthese two kids who were too much under it, and a young lady of thirtywho sat manicuring her nails most of the day with her back supported bya life-boat, and polishing them with red stuff till they flashed rosilyin the sun. This young lady was avoided for the first two days, whilethe young men still remembered their mothers, because of what she lookedlike; but was greatly loved for the rest of the voyage precisely forthat reason. 

Still, every one couldn't get near her. She was only one; and therewere at least a dozen active, cooped-up young men taking lithe, imprisoned exercise in long, swift steps up and down the deck, ready forany sort of enterprise, bursting with energy and sea-air and spirits. Sothat at last the left-overs, those of the young men the lady of the rosynails was less kind to, actually in their despair attempted ghastlyflirtations with the two German ladies. They approached them with a kindof angry amorousness. They tucked them up roughly in rugs. They broughtthem cushions as though they were curses. And it was through this_rapprochement_, in the icy warmth of which the German ladies expandedlike bulky flowers and grew at least ten years younger, the ten yearsthey shed being their most respectable ones, that the ship became awareof the nationality of the Misses Twinkler. 

The German ladies were not really German, as they explained directlythere were no more submarines about, for a good woman, they said, becomes automatically merged into her husband, and they, therefore, weremerged into Americans, both of them, and as loyal as you could find, butthe Twinklers were the real thing, they said, --real, unadulterated, arrogant Junkers, which is why they wouldn't talk to anybody; for noJunker, said the German ladies, thinks anybody good enough to be talkedto except another Junker. The German ladies themselves had by sheer lucknot been born Junkers. They had missed it very narrowly, but they hadmissed it, for which they were very thankful seeing what believers theywere, under the affectionate manipulation of their husbands, indemocracy; but they came from the part of Germany where Junkers mostabound, and knew the sort of thing well. 

It seemed to Mr. Twist, who caught scraps of conversation as he cameand went, that in the cabin the Twinklers must have alienated sympathy. They had. They had done more; they had got themselves actively disliked. 

From the first moment when Anna-Rose had dared to peep into theirshrouded bunks the ladies had been prejudiced, and this prejudice hadlater flared up into a great and justified dislike. The ladies, to beginwith, hadn't known that they were von Twinklers, but had supposed themmere Twinklers, and the von, as every German knows, makes all thedifference, especially in the case of Twinklers, who, without it, were arace, the ladies knew, of small shopkeepers, laundresses and postmen inthe Westphalian district, but with it were one of the oldest families inPrussia; known to all Germans; possessed of a name ensuring subserviencewherever it went. 

In this stage of preliminary ignorance the ladies had treated the twoapparently ordinary Twinklers with the severity their conduct, age, andobvious want of means deserved; and when, goaded by their questionings, the smaller and more active Twinkler had let out her von at them much asone lets loose a dog when one is alone and weak against the attacks ofan enemy, instead of falling in harmoniously with the natural change ofattitude of the ladies, which became immediately perfectly polite andconciliatory, as well as motherly in its interest and curiosity, the twoyoung Junkers went dumb. They would have nothing to do with the mostmotherly questioning. And just in proportion as the German ladies foundthemselves full of eager milk of kindness, only asking to be permittedto nourish, so did they find themselves subsequently, after a day ortwo of such uncloaked repugnance to it, left with quantities of ituseless on their hands and all going sour. 

From first to last the Twinklers annoyed them. As plain Twinklers theyhad been tiresome in a hundred ways in the cabin, and as von Twinklersthey were intolerable in their high-nosed indifference. 

It had naturally been expected by the elder ladies at the beginning ofthe journey, that two obscure Twinklers of such manifest youth shouldrise politely and considerately each morning very early, and getthemselves dressed and out of the way in at the most ten minutes, leaving the cabin clear for the slow and careful putting together bit bybit of that which ultimately emerged a perfect specimen of a lady ofriper years, but the weedy Twinkler insisted on lying in her berth solate that if the ladies wished to be in time for the best parts ofbreakfast, which they naturally and passionately did wish, they wereforced to dress in her presence, which was most annoying and awkward. 

It is true she lay with closed eyes, apparently apathetic, but you neverknow with persons of that age. Experience teaches not to trust them. They shut their eyes, and yet seem, later on, to have seen; theyapparently sleep, and afterwards are heard asking their spectacledAmerican friend what people do on a ship, a place of so much gustiness, if their hair gets blown off into the sea. Also the weedy one had a mosttiresome trick of being sick instantly every time Odol was used, or alittle brandy was drunk. Odol is most refreshing; it has a lovely smell, without which no German bedroom is complete. And the brandy was notcommon schnaps, but an old expensive brandy that, regarded as a smell, was a credit to anybody's cabin. 

The German ladies would have persisted, and indeed did persist in usingOdol and drinking a little brandy, indifferent to the feeble prayer fromthe upper berth which floated down entreating them not to, but in theirown interests they were forced to give it up. The objectionable childdid not pray a second time; she passed immediately from prayer toperformance. Of two disagreeables wise women choose the lesser, but theyremain resentful. 

The other Twinkler, the small active one, did get up early and takeherself off, but she frequently mixed up her own articles of toilet withthose belonging to the ladies, and would pin up her hair, preparatory towashing her face, with their hairpins. 

When they discovered this they hid them, and she, not finding any, having come to the end of her own, lost no time in irresolution butpicked up their nail-scissors and pinned up her pigtails with that. 

It was a particularly sacred pair of nail-scissors that almosteverything blunted. To use them for anything but nails was an outrage, but the grossest outrage was to touch them at all. When they told hersharply that the scissors were very delicate and she was instantly totake them out of her hair, she tugged them out in a silence that wasitself impertinent, and pinned up her pigtails with their buttonhookinstead. 

Then they raised themselves on their elbows in their berths and askedher what sort of a bringing up she could have had, and they raised theirvoices as well, for though they were grateful, as they later ondeclared, for not having been born Junkers, they had neverthelessacquired by practice in imitation some of the more salient Junkercharacteristics. 

"You are _salop_, " said the upper berth lady, --which is untranslatable, not on grounds of propriety but of idiom. It is not, however, a term ofpraise. 

"Yes, that is what you are--_salop_, " echoed the lower berth lady. "Andyour sister is _salop_ too--lying in bed till all hours. "

"It is shameful for girls to be _salop_, " said the upper berth. 

"I didn't know it was your buttonhook. I thought it was ours, " saidAnna-Rose, pulling this out too with vehemence. 

"That is because you are _salop_, " said the lower berth. 

"And I didn't know it wasn't our scissors either. "

"_Salop, salop_, " said the lower berth, beating her hand on the woodenedge of her bunk. 

"And--and I'm sorry. "

Anna-Rose's face was very red. She didn't look sorry, she looked angry. And so she was; but it was with herself, for having failed indiscernment and grown-upness. She ought to have noticed that thescissors and buttonhook were not hers. She had pounced on them with theill-considered haste of twelve years old. She hadn't been a lady, --shewhose business it was to be an example and mainstay to Anna-Felicitas, in all things going first, showing her the way. 

She picked up the sponge and plunged it into the water, and was justgoing to plunge her annoyed and heated face in after it when the upperberth lady said: "Your mother should be ashamed of herself to havebrought you up so badly. "

"And send you off like this before she has taught you even the ABC ofmanners, " said the lower berth. 

"Evidently, " said the upper berth, "she can have none herself. "

"Evidently, " said the lower berth, "she is herself _salop_. "

The sponge, dripping with water, came quickly out of the basin inAnna-Rose's clenched fist. For one awful instant she stood there in hernightgown, like some bird of judgment poised for dreadful flight, hereyes flaming, her knotted pigtails bristling on the top of her head. 

The wet sponge twitched in her hand. The ladies did not realize thesignificance of that twitching, and continued to offer large angry facesas a target. One of the faces would certainly have received the spongeand Anna-Rose have been disgraced for ever, if it hadn't been for theprompt and skilful intervention of Anna-Felicitas. 

For Anna-Felicitas, roused from her morning languor by the unusualloudness of the German ladies' voices, and smitten into attention andopening of her eyes, heard the awful things they were saying and saw thesponge. Instantly she knew, seeing it was Anna-Rose who held it, whereit would be in another second, and hastily putting out a shaking littlehand from her top berth, caught hold feebly but obstinately of theupright ends of Anna-Rose's knotted pigtails. 

"I'm going to be sick, " she announced with great presence of mind andentire absence of candour. 

She knew, however, that she only had to sit up in order to be sick, andthe excellent child--_das gute Kind_, as her father used to call herbecause she, so conveniently from the parental point of view, invariablynever wanted to be or do anything particularly--without hesitationsacrificed herself in order to save her sister's honour, and sat up andimmediately was. 

By the time Anna-Rose had done attending to her, all fury had died out. She never could see Anna Felicitas lying back pale and exhausted afterone of these attacks without forgiving her and everybody elseeverything. 

She climbed up on the wooden steps to smoothe her pillow and tuck herblanket round her, and when Anna-Felicitas, her eyes shut, murmured, "Christopher--don't mind _them_--" and she suddenly realized, for theynever called each other by those names except in great moments ofemotion when it was necessary to cheer and encourage, whatAnna-Felicitas had saved her from, and that it had been donedeliberately, she could only whisper back, because she was so afraid ofcrying, "No, no, Columbus dear--of course--who really cares about_them_--" and came down off the steps with no fight left in her. 

Also the wrath of the ladies was considerably assuaged. They hadretreated behind their curtains until the so terribly unsettled Twinklershould be quiet again, and when once more they drew them a crack apartin order to keep an eye on what the other one might be going to do nextand saw her doing nothing except, with meekness, getting dressed, theymerely inquired what part of Westphalia she came from, and only in thetone they asked it did they convey that whatever part it was, it wasanyhow a contemptible one. 

"We don't come from Westphalia, " said Anna-Rose, bristling a little, inspite of herself, at their persistent baiting. 

Anna-Felicitas listened in cold anxiousness. She didn't want to have tobe sick again. She doubted whether she could bear it. 

"You must come from somewhere, " said the lower berth, "and being aTwinkler it must be Westphalia. "

"We don't really, " said Anna-Rose, mindful of Anna-Felicitas's wordsand making a great effort to speak politely. "We come from England. "

"England!" cried the lower berth, annoyed by this quibbling. "You wereborn in Westphalia. All Twinklers are born in Westphalia. "

"Invariably they are, " said the upper berth. "The only circumstance thatstops them is if their mothers happen to be temporarily absent. "

"But we weren't, really, " said Anna-Rose, continuing her efforts toremain bland. 

"Are you pretending--pretending to _us_, " said the lower berth lady, again beating her hand on the edge of her bunk, "that you are notGerman?"

"Our father was German, " said Anna-Rose, driven into a corner, "but Idon't suppose he is now. I shouldn't think he'd want to go on being onedirectly he got to a really neutral place. "

"Has he fled his country?" inquired the lower berth sternly, scentingwhat she had from the first suspected, something sinister in theTwinkler background. 

"I suppose one might call it that, " said Anna-Rose after a pause ofconsideration, tying her shoe-laces. 

"Do you mean to say, " said the ladies with one voice, feeling themselvesnow on the very edge of a scandal, "he was forced to fly fromWestphalia?"

"I suppose one might put it that way, " said Anna-Rose, againconsidering. 

She took her cap off its hook and adjusted it over her hair with adeliberation intended to assure Anna-Felicitas that she was remainingcalm. "Except that it wasn't from Westphalia he flew, but Prussia, " shesaid. 

"Prussia?" cried the ladies as one woman, again rising themselves ontheir elbows. 

"That's where our father lived, " said Anna-Rose, staring at them in hersurprise at their surprise. "So of course, as he lived there, when hedied he did that there too. "

"Prussia?" cried the ladies again. "He died? You said your father fledhis country. "

"No. _You_ said that, " said Anna-Rose. 

She gave her cap a final tug down over her ears and turned to the door. She felt as if she quite soon again in spite of Anna-Felicitas, mightnot be able to be a lady. 

"After all, it _is_ what you do when you go to heaven, " she said as sheopened the door, unable to resist, according to her custom, having thelast word. 

"But Prussia?" they still cried, still button-holing her, as it were, from afar. "Then--you were born in Prussia?"

"Yes, but we couldn't help it, " said Anna-Rose; and shut the doorquickly behind her. 

CHAPTER VIII

Mr. Twist, who was never able to be anything but kind--he had the mostamiable mouth and chin in the world, and his name was Edward--took alively interest in the plans and probable future of the two Annas. Healso took a lively and solicitous interest in their present, and aprofoundly sympathetic one in their past. In fact, their three tensesinterested him to the exclusion of almost everything else, and his chiefdesire was to see them safely through any shoals there might be waitingthem in the shape of Uncle Arthur's friends--he distrusted Uncle Arthur, and therefore his friends--into the safe and pleasant waters of realAmerican hospitality and kindliness. 

He knew that such waters abounded for those who could find the tap. Hereminded himself of that which he had been taught since childhood, ofthe mighty heart of America which, once touched, would take persons likethe twins right in and never let them out again. But it had to betouched. It had, as it were, to be put in connection with them by meansof advertisement. America, he reflected, was a little deaf. She had tobe shouted to. But once she heard, once she thoroughly grasped . . . 

He cogitated much in his cabin--one with a private bathroom, for Mr. Twist had what Aunt Alice called ample means--on these two defencelesschildren. If they had been Belgians now, or Serbians, or any personsplainly in need of relief! As it was, America would be likely, hefeared, to consider that either Germany or England ought to be lookingafter them, and might conceivably remain chilly and uninterested. 

Uncle Arthur, it appeared, hadn't many friends in America, and those hehad didn't like him. At least that was what Mr. Twist gathered from theconversation of Anna-Rose. She didn't positively assert but she verycandidly conjectured, and Mr. Twist could quite believe that UncleArthur's friends wouldn't be warm ones. Their hospitality he couldimagine fleeting and perfunctory. They would pass on the Twinklers assoon as possible, as indeed why should they not? And presently somedreary small job would be found for them, some job as pupil-teacher orgirls' companion in the sterile atmosphere of a young ladies' school. 

As much as a man of habitually generous impulses could dislike, Mr. Twist disliked Uncle Arthur. Patriotism was nothing at any time to Mr. Twist compared to humanity, and Uncle Arthur's particular kind ofpatriotism was very odious to him. To wreak it on these two poor aliens!Mr. Twist had no words for it. They had been cut adrift at a tender age, an age Mr. Twist, as a disciplined American son and brother, was unableto regard unmoved, and packed off over the sea indifferent to what mighthappen to them so long as Uncle Arthur knew nothing about it. Havingflung these kittens into the water to swim or drown, so long as hedidn't have to listen to their cries while they were doing it, UncleArthur apparently cared nothing. 

All Mr. Twist's chivalry, of which there was a great deal, rose upwithin him at the thought of Uncle Arthur. He wanted to go and ask himwhat he meant by such conduct, and earnestly inquire of him whether hecalled himself a man; but as he knew he couldn't do this, being on aship heading for New York, he made up for it by taking as much care ofthe ejected nieces as if he were an uncle himself, --but the right sortof uncle, the sort you have in America, the sort that regards you as asacred and precious charge. 

In his mind's eye Mr. Twist saw Uncle Arthur as a typical bullying, red-necked Briton, with short side-whiskers. He pictured him under-sizedand heavy-footed, trudging home from golf through the soppy green fieldsof England to his trembling household. He was quite disconcerted one dayto discover from something Anna-Rose said that he was a tall man, andnot fat at all, except in one place. 

"Indeed, " said Mr. Twist, hastily rearranging his mind's-eye view ofUncle Arthur. 

"He goes fat suddenly, " said Anna-Felicitas, waking from one of herdozes. "As though he had swallowed a bomb, and it had stuck when it gotto his waistcoat. "

"If you can imagine it, " added Anna-Rose politely, ready to explain anddescribe further if required. 

But Mr. Twist could imagine it. He readjusted his picture of UncleArthur, and this time got him right, --the tall, not bad-looking man, clean-shaven and with more hair a great deal than he, Mr. Twist, had. Hehad thought of him as an old ruffian; he now perceived that he could behardly more than middle-aged and that Aunt Alice, a lady for whom hefelt an almost painful sympathy, had a lot more of Uncle Arthur to getthrough before she was done. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose, accepting the word middle-aged as correct. "Neither of his ends looks much older than yours do. He's aged in themiddle. That's the only place. Where the bomb is. "

"I suppose that's why it's called middle-aged, " said Anna-Felicitasdreamily. "One middle-ages first, and from there it just spreads. Itmust be queer, " she added pensively, "to watch oneself graduallyrotting. "

These were the sorts of observations, Mr. Twist felt, that mightprejudice his mother against the twins If they could be induced not tosay most of the things they did say when in her presence, he felt thathis house, of all houses in America, should be offered them as a refugewhenever they were in need of one. But his mother was not, he feared, very adaptable. In her house--it was legally his, but it never felt asif it were--people adapted themselves to her. He doubted whether thetwins could or would. Their leading characteristic, he had observed, wascandour. They had no _savoir faire_. They seemed incapable of anythingbut naturalness, and their particular type of naturalness was not one, he was afraid, that his mother would understand. 

She had not been out of her New England village, a place called briefly, with American economy of time, Clark, for many years, and her ideal ofyouthful femininity was still that which she had been herself. She had, if unconsciously, tried to mould Mr. Twist also on these lines, in spiteof his being a boy, and owing to his extreme considerateness had not yetdiscovered her want of success. For years, indeed, she had beencompletely successful, and Mr. Twist arrived at and embarked onadolescence with the manners and ways of thinking of a perfect lady. 

Till he was nineteen he was educated at home, as it were at his mother'sknee, at any rate within reach of that sacred limb, and she had taughthim to reverence women; the reason given, or rather conveyed, being thathe had had and still was having a mother. Which he was never to forget. In hours of temptation. In hours of danger. Mr. Twist, with his virginalwhite mind, used to wonder when the hours of temptation and of dangerwould begin, and rather wish, in the elegant leisure of hishalf-holidays, that they soon would so that he might show how determinedhe was to avoid them. 

For the ten years from his father's death till he went to Harvard, helived with his mother and sister and was their assiduous attendant. Hismother took the loss of his father badly. She didn't get over it, aswidows sometimes do, and grow suddenly ten years younger. The sight ofher, so black and broken, of so daily recurring a patience, of suchfrequent deliberate brightening for the sake of her children, kept Mr. Twist, as he grew up, from those thoughts which sometimes occur to youngmen and have to do with curves and dimples. He was too much absorbed byhis mother to think on such lines. He was flooded with reverence andpity. Through her, all women were holy to him. They were all mothers, either actual or to be--after, of course, the proper ceremonies. Theywere all people for whom one leapt up and opened doors, placed chairsout of draughts, and fetched black shawls. On warm spring days, when hewas about eighteen, he told himself earnestly that it would be aprofanity, a terrible secret sinning, to think amorously--yes, hesupposed the word was amorously--while there under his eyes, pervadinghis days from breakfast to bedtime, was that mourning womanhood, thatlopped life, that example of brave doing without any hope or expectationexcept what might be expected or hoped from heaven. His mother waswonderful the way she bore things. There she was, with nothing left tolook forward to in the way of pleasures except the resurrection, yetshe did not complain. 

But after he had been at Harvard a year a change came over Mr. Twist. Not that he did not remain dutiful and affectionate, but he perceivedthat it was possible to peep round the corners of his mother, therock-like corners that had so long jutted out between him and the view, and on the other side there seemed to be quite a lot of interestingthings going on. He continued, however, only to eye most of them fromafar, and the nearest he got to temptation while at Harvard was to read"Madame Bovary. "

After Harvard he was put into an engineering firm, for the Twists onlyhad what would in English money be five thousand pounds a year, andbelonged therefore, taking dollars as the measure of standing instead ofbirth, to the middle classes. Aunt Alice would have described such anincome as ample means; Mrs. Twist called it straitened circumstances, and lived accordingly in a condition of perpetual self-sacrifice anddoings without. She had a car, but it was only a car, not aPierce-Arrow; and there was a bathroom to every bedroom, but there wereonly six bedrooms; and the house stood on a hill and looked over themost beautiful woods, but they were somebody else's woods. She felt, asshe beheld the lives of those of her neighbours she let her eyes reston, who were the millionaires dotted round about the charming environsof Clark, that she was indeed a typical widow, --remote, unfriended, melancholy, poor. 

Mrs. Twist might feel poor, but she was certainly comfortable. It washer daughter Edith's aim in life to secure for her the comfort andleisure necessary for any grief that wishes to be thorough. The housewas run beautifully by Edith. There were three servants, of whom Edithwas one. She was the lady's maid, the head cook, and the family butler. And Mr. Twist, till he went to Harvard, might be described as thepage-boy, and afterwards in his vacations as the odd man about thehouse. Everything centred round their mother. She made a good deal ofwork, because of being so anxious not to give trouble. She wouldn't getout of the way of evil, but bleakly accepted it. She wouldn't get out ofa draught, but sat in it till one or other of her children rememberedthey hadn't shut the door. When the inevitable cold was upon her and shewas lamentably coughing, she would mention the door for the first time, and quietly say she hadn't liked to trouble them to shut it, they hadseemed so busy with their own affairs. 

But after he had been in the engineering firm a little while, a furtherchange came over Mr. Twist. He was there to make money, more money, forhis mother. The first duty of an American male had descended on him. Hewished earnestly to fulfil it creditably, in spite of his own tastesbeing so simple that his income of £5000--it was his, not his mother's, but it didn't feel as if it were--would have been more than sufficientfor him. Out of engineering, then, was he to wrest all the things thatmight comfort his mother. He embarked on his career with as determinedan expression on his mouth as so soft and friendly a mouth could be madeto take, and he hadn't been in it long before he passed out altogetherbeyond the line of thinking his mother had laid down for him, anddefinitely grew up. 

The office was in New York, far enough away from Clark for him to be athome only for the Sundays. His mother put him to board with her brotherCharles, a clergyman, the rector of the Church of Angelic Refreshmentat the back of Tenth Street, and the teapot out of which Uncle Charlespoured his tea at his hurried and uncomfortable meals--for he practisedthe austerities and had no wife--dribbled at its spout. Hold it ascarefully as one might it dribbled at its spout, and added to theconfused appearance of the table by staining the cloth afresh every timeit was used. 

Mr. Twist, who below the nose was nothing but kindliness and generosity, his slightly weak chin, his lavishly-lipped mouth, being all amiabilityand affection, above the nose was quite different. In the middle camehis nose, a nose that led him to improve himself, to read and meditatethe poets, to be tenacious in following after the noble; and above wereeyes in which simplicity sat side by side with appreciation; and abovethese was the forehead like a dome; and behind this forehead wereinventions. 

He had not been definitely aware that he was inventive till he came intodaily contact with Uncle Charles's teapot. In his boyhood he had oftenfixed up little things for Edith, --she was three years older than he, and was even then canning and preserving and ironing, --littlesimplifications and alleviations of her labour; but they had been justtoys, things that had amused him to put together and that he forgot assoon as they were done. But the teapot revealed to him clearly what hisforehead was there for. He would not and could not continue, being thesoul of considerateness, to spill tea on Uncle Charles's table-cloth atevery meal--they had tea at breakfast, and at luncheon, and atsupper--and if he were thirsty he spilled it several times at everymeal. For a long time he coaxed the teapot. He was thoughtful with it. He handled it with the most delicate precision. He gave it time. Henever hurried it. He never filled it more than half full. And yet at theend of every pouring, out came the same devastating dribble on to thecloth. 

Then he went out and bought another teapot, one of a different pattern, with a curved spout instead of a straight one. 

The same thing happened. 

Then he went to Wanamaker's, and spent an hour in the teapot sectiontrying one pattern after the other, patiently pouring water, provided bya tipped but languid and supercilious assistant, out of each differentmake of teapot into cups. 

They all dribbled. 

Then Mr. Twist went home and sat down and thought. He thought andthought, with his dome-like forehead resting on his long thin hand; andwhat came out of his forehead at last, sprang out of it as complete inevery detail as Pallas Athene when she very similarly sprang, was thatnow well-known object on every breakfast table, Twist's Non-TricklerTeapot. 

In five years Mr. Twist made a fortune out of the teapot. His motherpassed from her straitened circumstances to what she still would onlycall a modest competence, but what in England would have been regardedas wallowing in money. She left off being middle-class, and was receivedinto the lower upper-class, the upper part of this upper-class beingreserved for great names like Astor, Rockefeller and Vanderbilt. Withthese Mrs. Twist could not compete. She would no doubt some day, forEdward was only thirty and there were still coffee-pots; but what he wasable to add to the family income helped her for a time to bear the lossof the elder Twist with less of bleakness in her resignation. It was asthough an east wind veered round for a brief space a little to thesouth. 

Being naturally, however, inclined to deprecation, when every otherreason for it was finally removed by her assiduous son she once moresought out and firmly laid hold of the departed Twist, and hung hercherished unhappiness up on him again as if he were a peg. When thenovelty of having a great many bedrooms instead of six, and a great dealof food not to eat but to throw away, and ten times of everything elseinstead of only once, began to wear off, Mrs. Twist drooped again, andpulled the departed Twist out of the decent forgetfulness of the past, and he once more came to dinner in the form of his favourite dishes, andassisted in the family conversations by means of copious quotations fromhis alleged utterances. 

Mr. Twist's income was anything between sixty and seventy thousandpounds a year by the time the war broke out. Having invented andpatented the simple device that kept the table-cloths of America, andindeed of Europe, spotless, all he had to do was to receive hispercentages; sit still, in fact, and grow richer. But so much had hechanged since his adolescence that he preferred to stick to hisengineering and his office in New York rather than go home and be happywith his mother. 

She could not understand this behaviour in Edward. She understood hisbehaviour still less when he went off to France in 1915, himselfequipping and giving the ambulance he drove. 

For a year his absence, and the dangers he was running, divided Mrs. Twist's sorrows into halves. Her position as a widow with an only son indanger touched the imagination of Clark, and she was never so muchcalled upon as during this year. Now Edward was coming home for a rest, and there was a subdued flutter about her, rather like the stirring ofthe funeral plumes on the heads of hearse-horses. 

While he was crossing the Atlantic and Red-Crossing the Twinklers--thiswas one of Anna-Felicitas's epigrams and she tried Anna-Rose's patienceseverely by asking her not once but several times whether she didn'tthink it funny, whereas Anna-Rose disliked it from the first because ofthe suggestion it contained that Mr. Twist regarded what he did for themas works of mercy--while Mr. Twist was engaged in these activities, athis home in Clark all the things Edith could think of that he used mostto like to eat were being got ready. There was an immense slaughteringof chickens, and baking and churning. Edith, who being now the headservant of many instead of three was more than double as hard-worked asshe used to be, was on her feet those last few days without stopping. And she had to go and meet Edward in New York as well. Whether Mrs. Twist feared that he might not come straight home or whether it was whatshe said it was, that dear Edward must not be the only person on theboat who had no one to meet him, is not certain; what is certain is thatwhen it came to the point, and Edith had to start, Mrs. Twist haddifficulty in maintaining her usual brightness. 

Edith would be a whole day away, and perhaps a night if the _St. Luke_got in late, for Clark is five hours' train journey from New York, andduring all that time Mrs. Twist would be uncared for. She thought Edithsurprisingly thoughtless to be so much pleased to go. She examined herflat and sinewy form with disapproval when she came in hatted and bootedto say good-bye. No wonder nobody married Edith. And the money wouldn'thelp her either now--she was too old. She had missed her chances, poorthing. 

Mrs. Twist forgot the young man there had been once, years before, whenEdward was still in the school room, who had almost married Edith. Hewas a lusty and enterprising young man, who had come to Clark to staywith a neighbour, and he had had nothing to do through a long vacation, and had taken to dropping in at all hours and interrupting Edith in herhousekeeping; and Edith, even then completely flat but of a healthyyoung uprightness and bright of eyes and hair, had gone silly andforgotten how to cook, and had given her mother, who surely had enoughsorrows already, an attack of indigestion. 

Mrs. Twist, however, had headed the young man off. Edith was toonecessary to her at that time. She could not possibly lose Edith. Andbesides, the only way to avoid being a widow is not to marry. She toldherself that she could not bear the thought of poor Edith's running therisk of an affliction similar to her own. If one hasn't a husband onecannot lose him, Mrs. Twist clearly saw. If Edith married she wouldcertainly lose him unless he lost her. Marriage had only two solutions, she explained to her silent daughter, --she would not, of course, discusswith her that third one which America has so often flown to for solaceand relief, --only two, said Mrs. Twist, and they were that either onedied oneself, which wasn't exactly a happy thing, or the other one did. It was only a question of time before one of the married was left aloneto mourn. Marriage began rosily no doubt, but it always ended black. "And think of my having to see you like _this_" she said, with a gestureindicating her sad dress. 

Edith was intimidated; and the young man presently went away whistling. He was the only one. Mrs. Twist had no more trouble. He passed entirelyfrom her mind; and as she looked at Edith dressed for going to meetEdward in the clothes she went to church in on Sundays, sheunconsciously felt a faint contempt for a woman who had had so much timeto get married in and yet had never achieved it. She herself had beenmarried at twenty; and her hair even now, after all she had gonethrough, was hardly more gray than Edith's. 

"Your hat's crooked, " she said, when Edith straightened herself afterbending down to kiss her good-bye; and then, after all unable to bearthe idea of being left alone while Edith, with that pleased face, wentoff to New York to see Edward before she did, she asked her, if shestill had a minute to spare, to help her to the sofa, because she feltfaint. 

"I expect the excitement has been too much for me, " she murmured, lyingdown and shutting her eyes; and Edith, disciplined in affection andattentiveness, immediately took off her hat and settled down to gettingher mother well again in time for Edward. 

Which is why nobody met Mr. Twist on his arrival in New York, and heaccordingly did things, as will be seen, which he mightn't otherwisehave done. 

CHAPTER IX

When the _St. Luke_ was so near its journey's end that people werepacking up, and the word Nantucket was frequent in the scraps of talkthe twins heard, they woke up from the unworried condition of mind Mr. Twist's kindness and the dreamy monotony of the days had produced inthem, and began to consider their prospects with more attention. Thisattention soon resulted in anxiety. Anna-Rose showed hers by beingirritable. Anna-Felicitas didn't show hers at all. 

It was all very well, so long as they were far away from America andnever quite sure that a submarine mightn't settle their future for themonce and for all, to feel big, vague, heroic things about a new life anda new world and they two Twinklers going to conquer it; but when the newworld was really upon them, and the new life, with all the multitudinousdetails that would have to be tackled, going to begin in a few hours, their hearts became uneasy and sank within them. England hadn't likedthem. Suppose America didn't like them either? Uncle Arthur hadn't likedthem. Suppose Uncle Arthur's friends didn't like them either? Theirhearts sank to, and remained in, their boots. 

Round Anna-Rose's waist, safely concealed beneath her skirt from whatAnna-Felicitas called the predatory instincts of their fellow-passengers, was a chamois-leather bag containing their passports, a letter to thebank where their £200 was, a letter to those friends of Uncle Arthur'swho were to be tried first, a letter to those other friends of his whowere to be the second line of defence supposing the first one failed, and ten pounds in two £5 notes. 

Uncle Arthur, grievously grumbling, and having previously used in bedmost of those vulgar words that made Aunt Alice so miserable, had givenAnna-Rose one of the £5 notes for the extra expenses of the journeytill, in New York, she should be able to draw on the £200, though whatexpenses there could be for a couple of girls whose passage was paidUncle Arthur was damned, he alleged, if he knew; and Aunt Alice hadsecretly added the other. This was all Anna-Rose's ready money, and itwould have to be changed into dollars before reaching New York so as tobe ready for emergencies on arrival. She judged from the growingrestlessness of the passengers that it would soon be time to go andchange it. How many dollars ought she to get?

Mr. Twist was absent, packing his things. She ought to have asked himlong ago, but they seemed so suddenly to have reached the end of theirjourney. Only yesterday there was the same old limitless sea everywhere, the same old feeling that they were never going to arrive. Now the waveshad all gone, and one could actually see land. The New World. The placeall their happiness or unhappiness would depend on. 

She laid hold of Anna-Felicitas, who was walking about just as if shehad never been prostrate on a deck-chair in her life, and was going tosay something appropriate and encouraging on the Christopher andColumbus lines; but Anna-Felicitas, who had been pondering the £5 notesproblem, wouldn't listen. 

"A dollar, " said Anna-Felicitas, worrying it out, "isn't like ashilling or a mark, but on the other hand neither is it like a pound. "

"No, " said Anna-Rose, brought back to her immediate business. 

"It's four times more than one, and five times less than the other, "said Anna-Felicitas. "That's how you've got to count. That's what AuntAlice said. "

"Yes. And then there's the exchange, " said Anna-Rose, frowning. "As ifit wasn't complicated enough already, there's the exchange. Uncle Arthursaid we weren't to forget that. "

Anna-Felicitas wanted to know what was meant by the exchange, andAnna-Rose, unwilling to admit ignorance to Anna-Felicitas, who had to bekept in her proper place, especially when one was just getting toAmerica and she might easily become above herself, said that it wassomething that varied. ("The exchange, you know, varies, " Uncle Arthurhad said when he gave her the £5 note. "You must keep your eye on thevariations. " Anna-Rose was all eagerness to keep her eye on them, ifonly she had known what and where they were. But one never askedquestions of Uncle Arthur. His answers, if one did, were confined toexpressions of anger and amazement that one didn't, at one's age, already know. )

"Oh, " said Anna-Felicitas, for a moment glancing at Anna-Rose out of thecorner of her eye, considerately not pressing her further. 

"I wish Mr. Twist would come, " said Anna-Rose uneasily, looking in thedirection he usually appeared from. 

"We won't always have _him_" remarked Anna-Felicitas. 

"I never said we would, " said Anna-Rose shortly. 

The young lady of the nails appeared at that moment in a hat sogorgeous that the twins stopped dead to stare. She had a veil on andwhite gloves, and looked as if she were going for a walk in Fifth Avenuethe very next minute. 

"Perhaps we ought to be getting ready too, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Yes. I wish Mr. Twist would come--"

"Perhaps we'd better begin and practise not having Mr. Twist, " saidAnna-Felicitas, as one who addresses nobody specially and means nothingin particular. 

"If anybody's got to practise that, it'll be you, " said Anna-Rose. "There'll be no one to roll you up in rugs now, remember. I won't. "

"But I don't want to be rolled up in rugs, " said Anna-Felicitas mildly. "I shall be walking about New York. "

"Oh, _you'll_ see, " said Anna-Rose irritably. 

She was worried about the dollars. She was worried about the tipping, and the luggage, and the arrival, and Uncle Arthur's friends, whosenames were Mr. And Mrs. Clouston K. Sack; so naturally she wasirritable. One is. And nobody knew and understood this better thanAnna-Felicitas. 

"Let's go and put on our hats and get ready, " she said, after a moment'spause during which she wondered whether, in the interests of Anna-Rose'srestoration to calm, she mightn't have to be sick again. She did hopeshe wouldn't have to. She had supposed she had done with that. It istrue there were now no waves, but she knew she had only to go near theengines and smell the oil. "Let's go and put on our hats, " shesuggested, slipping her hand through Anna-Rose's arm. 

Anna-Rose let herself be led away, and they went to their cabin; andwhen they came out of it half an hour later, no longer with that baldlook their caps had given them, the sun catching the little rings ofpale gold hair that showed for the first time, and clad, instead of inthe disreputable jerseys that they loved, in neat black coats andskirts--for they still wore mourning when properly dressed--witheverything exactly as Aunt Alice had directed for their arrival, theyoung men of the second class could hardly believe their eyes. 

"You'll excuse me saying so, " said one of them to Anna-Felicitas as shepassed him, "but you're looking very well to-day. "

"I expect that's because I _am_ well, " said Anna-Felicitas amiably. 

Mr. Twist, when he saw them, threw up his hands and ejaculated "My!"

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas, who was herself puzzled by the differencethe clothes had made in Anna-Rose after ten solid days of cap andjersey, "I think it's our hats. They do somehow seem very splendid. "

"Splendid?" echoed Mr. Twist. "Why, they'd make the very angels jealous, and get pulling off their haloes and kicking them over the edge ofheaven. "

"What is so wonderful is that Aunt Alice should ever have squeezed themout of Uncle Arthur, " said Anna-Rose, gazing lost in admiration atAnna-Felicitas. "He didn't disgorge nice hats easily at all. "

And one of the German ladies muttered to the other, as her eye fell onAnna-Felicitas, "_Ja, ja, die hat Rasse. _"

And it was only because it was the other German lady's hair that spentthe night in a different part of the cabin from her head and had beenseen doing it by Anna-Felicitas, that she cavilled and was grudging. "_Gewiss_, " she muttered back, "_bis auf der Nase. Die Nase aberentfremdet mich. Die ist keine echte Junkernase_. "

So that the Twinklers had quite a success, and their hearts came alittle way out of their boots; only a little way, though, for there werethe Clouston K. Sacks looming bigger into their lives every minute now. 

Really it was a beautiful day, and, as Aunt Alice used to say, that doesmake such a difference. A clear pale loveliness of light lay over NewYork, and there was a funny sprightliness in the air, a delicate drycrispness. The trees on the shore, when they got close, were delicatetoo--delicate pale gold, and green, and brown, and they seemed socomposed and calm, the twins thought, standing there quietly after theupheavals and fidgetiness of the Atlantic. New York was well into theFall, the time of year when it gets nearest to beauty. The beauty wasentirely in the atmosphere, and the lights and shadows it made. It waslike an exquisite veil flung over an ugly woman, hiding, softening, encouraging hopes. 

Everybody on the ship was crowding eagerly to the sides. Everybody wasexhilarated, and excited, and ready to be friendly and talkative. Theyall waved whenever another boat passed. Those who knew America pointedout the landmarks to those who didn't. Mr. Twist pointed them out to thetwins, and so did the young man who had remarked favourably onAnna-Felicitas's looks, and as they did it simultaneously and there wasso much to look at and so many boats to wave to, it wasn't till they hadactually got to the statue of Liberty that Anna-Rose remembered her £10and the dollars. 

The young man was saying how much the statue of Liberty had cost, andthe word dollars made Anna-Rose turn with a jump to Mr. Twist. 

"Oh, " she exclaimed, clutching at her chamois leather bag where it veryvisibly bulged out beneath her waistband, "I forgot--I must get change. And how much do you think we ought to tip the stewardess? I've nevertipped anybody yet ever, and I wish--I wish I hadn't to. "

She got quite red. It seemed to her dreadful to offer money to someoneso much older than herself and who till almost that very morning hadtreated her and Anna-Felicitas like the naughtiest of tiresome children. Surely she would be most offended at being tipped by people such yearsyounger than herself?

Mr. Twist thought not. 

"A dollar, " said the young man. "One dollar. That's the figure. Not acent more, or you girls'll get inflating prices and Wall Street'll bustup. "

Anna-Rose, not heeding him and clutching nervously the place where herbag was, told Mr. Twist that the stewardess hadn't seemed to mind themquite so much last night, and still less that morning, and perhaps somelittle memento--something that wasn't money--

"Give her those caps of yours, " said the young man, bursting intohilarity; but indeed it wasn't his fault that he was a low young man. 

Mr. Twist, shutting him out of the conversation by interposing ashoulder, told Anna-Rose he had noticed stewardesses, and also stewards, softened when journeys drew near their end, but that it didn't mean theywanted mementos. They wanted money; and he would do the tipping for herif she liked. 

Anna-Rose jumped at it. This tipping of the stewardess had haunted herat intervals throughout the journey whenever she woke up at night. Shefelt that, not having yet in her life tipped anybody, it was very hardthat she couldn't begin with somebody more her own size. 

"Then if you don't mind coming behind the funnel, " she said, "I can giveyou my £5 notes, and perhaps you would get them changed for me anddeduct what you think the stewardess ought to have. "

Mr. Twist, and also Anna-Felicitas, who wasn't allowed to stay behindwith the exuberant young man though she was quite unconscious of hispresence, went with Anna-Rose behind the funnel, where after a greatdeal of private fumbling, her back turned to them, she produced the twomuch-crumpled £5 notes. 

"The steward ought to have something too, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Oh, I'd be glad if you'd do him as well, " said Anna-Rose eagerly. "Idon't think I _could_ offer him a tip. He has been so fatherly to us. And imagine offering to tip one's father. "

Mr. Twist laughed, and said she would get over this feeling in time. Hepromised to do what was right, and to make it clear that the tips hebestowed were Twinkler tips; and presently he came back with messages ofthanks from the tipped--such polite ones from the stewardess that thetwins were astonished--and gave Anna-Rose a packet of very dirty-lookingslices of green paper, which were dollar bills, he said, besides avariety of strange coins which he spread out on a ledge and explained toher. 

"The exchange was favourable to you to-day, " said Mr. Twist, countingout the money. 

"How nice of it, " said Anna-Rose politely. "Did you keep your eye onits variations?" she added a little loudly, with a view to rousingrespect in Anna-Felicitas who was lounging against a seat and showing atotal absence of every kind of appropriate emotion. 

"Certainly, " said Mr. Twist after a slight pause. "I kept both my eyeson all of them. "

Mr. Twist had, it appeared, presented the steward and stewardess eachwith a dollar on behalf of the Misses Twinkler, but because the exchangewas so favourable this had made no difference to the £5 notes. Reducingeach £5 note into German marks, which was the way the Twinklers, inspite of a year in England, still dealt in their heads with money beforethey could get a clear idea of it, there would have been two hundredmarks; and as it took, roughly, four marks to make a dollar, the twohundred marks would have to be divided by four; which, leaving asidethat extra complication of variations in the exchange, and regarding theexchange for a moment and for purposes of simplification as keepingquiet for a bit and resting, should produce, also roughly, saidAnna-Rose a little out of breath as she got to the end of hercalculation, fifty dollars. 

"Correct, " said Mr. Twist, who had listened with respectful attention. "Here they are. "

"I said roughly, " said Anna-Rose. "It can't be _exactly_ fifty dollars. The tips anyhow would alter that. "

"Yes, but you forget the exchange. "

Anna-Rose was silent. She didn't want to go into that beforeAnna-Felicitas. Of the two, she was supposed to be the least bad atsums. Their mother had put it that way, refusing to say, as Anna-Roseindustriously tried to trap her into saying, that she was the better ofthe two. But even so, the difference entitled her to authority on thesubject with Anna-Felicitas, and by dint of doing all her calculationsroughly, as she was careful to describe her method, she allowed room forwithdrawal and escape where otherwise the inflexibility of figures mighthave caught her tight and held her down while Anna-Felicitas looked onand was unable to respect her. 

Evidently the exchange was something beneficent. She decided to rejoicein it in silence, accept whatever it did, and refrain from askingquestions. 

"So I did. Of course. The exchange, " she said, after a little. 

She gathered up the dollar bills and began packing them into her bag. They wouldn't all go in, and she had to put the rest into her pocket, for which also there were too many; but she refused Anna-Felicitas'soffer to put some of them in hers on the ground that sooner or later shewould be sure to forget they weren't her handkerchief and would blow hernose with them. 

"Thank you very much for being so kind, " she said to Mr. Twist, as shestuffed her pocket full and tried by vigorous patting to get it to lookinconspicuous. "We're never going to forget you, Anna-F. And me. We'llwrite to you often, and we'll come and see you as often as you like. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas dreamily, as she watched the shore of LongIsland sliding past. "Of course you've got your relations, but relationssoon pall, and you may be quite glad after a while of a little freshblood. "

Mr. Twist thought this very likely, and agreed with several other thingsAnna-Felicitas, generalizing from Uncle Arthur, said about relations, again with that air of addressing nobody specially and meaning nothingin particular, while Anna-Rose wrestled with the obesity of her pocket. 

"Whether you come to see me or not, " said Mr. Twist, whose misgivings asto the effect of the Twinklers on his mother grew rather than subsided, "I shall certainly come to see you. "

"Perhaps Mr. Sack won't allow followers, " said Anna-Felicitas, her eyesfar away. "Uncle Arthur didn't. He wouldn't let the maids have any, sothey had to go out and do the following themselves. We had a followeronce, didn't we, Anna-R. ?" she continued her voice pensive andreminiscent. "He was a friend of Uncle Arthur's. Quite old. At leastthirty or forty. I shouldn't have thought he _could_ follow. But he did. And he used to come home to tea with Uncle Arthur and produce boxes ofchocolate for us out of his pockets when Uncle Arthur wasn't looking. Weate them and felt perfectly well disposed toward him till one day hetried to kiss one of us--I forget which. And that, combined with thechocolates, revealed him in his true colours as a follower, and we toldhim they weren't allowed in that house and urged him to go to some placewhere they were, or he would certainly be overtaken by Uncle Arthur'svengeance, and we said how surprised we were, because he was so old andwe didn't know followers were as old as that ever. "

"It seemed a very shady thing, " said Anna-Rose, having subdued theswollenness of her pocket, "to eat his chocolates and then not want tokiss him, but we don't hold with kissing, Anna-F. And me. Still, we werefull of his chocolates; there was no getting away from that. So wetalked it over after he had gone, and decided that next day when he camewe'd tell him he might kiss one of us if he still wanted to, and we drewlots which it was to be, and it was me, and I filled myself to the brimwith chocolates so as to feel grateful enough to bear it, but he didn'tcome. "

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas. "He didn't come again for a long while, andwhen he did there was no follow left in him. Quite the contrary. "

Mr. Twist listened with the more interest to this story because it wasthe first time Anna-Felicitas had talked since he knew her. He was usedto the inspiriting and voluble conversation of Anna-Rose who had lookedupon him as her best friend since the day he had wiped up her tears; butAnna-Felicitas had been too unwell to talk. She had uttered languid andbrief observations from time to time with her eyes shut and her headlolling loosely on her neck, but this was the first time she had been, as it were, an ordinary human being, standing upright on her feet, walking about, looking intelligently if pensively at the scenery, and ina condition of affable readiness, it appeared, to converse. 

Mr. Twist was a born mother. The more trouble he was given the moreattached he became. He had rolled Anna-Felicitas up in rugs so oftenthat to be not going to roll her up any more was depressing to him. Hewas beginning to perceive this motherliness in him himself, and he gazedthrough his spectacles at Anna-Felicitas while she sketched the rise andfall of the follower, and wondered with an almost painful solicitudewhat her fate would be in the hands of the Clouston Sacks. 

Equally he wondered as to the other one's fate; for he could not thinkof one Twinkler without thinking of the other. They were inextricablymixed together in the impression they had produced on him, and theydwelt together in his thoughts as one person called, generally, Twinklers. He stood gazing at them, his motherly instincts uppermost, his hearty yearning over them now that the hour of parting was so nearand his carefully tended chickens were going to be torn from beneath hiswing. Mr. Twist was domestic. He was affectionate. He would have loved, though he had never known it, the sensation of pattering feet about hishouse, and small hands clinging to the apron he would never wear. And itwas entirely characteristic of him that his invention, the inventionthat brought him his fortune, should have had to do with a teapot. 

But if his heart was uneasy within him at the prospect of parting fromhis charges their hearts were equally uneasy, though not in the sameway. The very name of Clouston K. Sack was repugnant to Anna-Rose; andAnna-Felicitas, less quick at disliking, turned it over cautiously inher mind as one who turns over an unknown and distasteful object withthe nose of his umbrella. Even she couldn't quite believe that any goodthing could come out of a name like that, especially when it had gotinto their lives through Uncle Arthur. Mr. Twist had never heard of theClouston Sacks, which made Anna-Rose still more distrustful. She wasn'tin the least encouraged when he explained the bigness of America andthat nobody in it ever knew everybody--she just said that everybody hadheard of Mr. Roosevelt, and her heart was too doubtful within her evento mind being told, as he did immediately tell her within ear-shot ofAnna-Felicitas, that her reply was unreasonable. 

Just at the end, as they were all three straining their eyes, no onewith more anxiety than Mr. Twist, to try and guess which of the crowd onthe landing-stage were the Clouston Sacks, they passed on their otherside the _Vaterland_, the great interned German liner at its moorings, and the young man who had previously been so very familiar, as Anna-Rosesaid, but who was only, Mr. Twist explained, being American, camehurrying boldly up. 

"You mustn't miss this, " he said to Anna-Felicitas, actually seizing herby the arm. "Here's something that'll make you feel home-like rightaway. "

And he led her off, and would have dragged her off but forAnna-Felicitas's perfect non-resistance. 

"He _is_ being familiar, " said Anna-Rose to Mr. Twist, turning very redand following quickly after him. "That's not just being American. Everybody decent knows that if there's any laying hold of people's armsto be done one begins with the eldest sister. "

"Perhaps he doesn't realize that you _are_ the elder, " said Mr. Twist. "Strangers judge, roughly, by size. "

"I'm afraid I'm going to have trouble with her, " said Anna-Rose, notheeding his consolations. "It isn't a sinecure, I assure you, being leftsole guardian and protector of somebody as pretty as all that. And theworst of it is she's going on getting prettier. She hasn't nearly cometo the end of what she can do in that direction. I see it growing onher. Every Sunday she's inches prettier than she was the Sunday before. And wherever I take her to live, and however out of the way it is, I'msure the path to our front door is going to be black with suitors. "

This dreadful picture so much perturbed her, and she looked up at Mr. Twist with such worried eyes, that he couldn't refrain from patting heron her shoulder. 

"There, there, " said Mr. Twist, and he begged her to be sure tolet him know directly she was in the least difficulty, or evenperplexity, --"about the suitors, for instance, or anything else. You must let me be of some use in the world, you know, " he said. 

"But we shouldn't like it at all if we thought you were practising beinguseful on us, " said Anna-Rose "It's wholly foreign to our natures toenjoy being the objects of anybody's philanthropy. "

"Now I just wonder where you get all your long words from, " said Mr. Twist soothingly; and Anna-Rose laughed, and there was only one dimplein the Twinkler family and Anna-Rose had got it. 

"What do you want to get looking at _that_ for?" sheasked Anna-Felicitas, when she had edged through the crowdstaring at the _Vaterland_, and got to where Anna-Felicitasstood listening abstractedly to the fireworks of American slangthe young man was treating her to, --that terse, surprising, swifthitting-of-the-nail-on-the-head form of speech which she washearing in such abundance for the first time. 

The American passengers appeared one and all to be rejoicing over theimpotence of the great ship. Every one of them seemed to be violentlypro-Ally, derisively conjecturing the feelings of the _Vaterland_ asevery day under her very nose British ships arrived and departed andpresently arrived again, --the same ships she had seen depart coming backunharmed, unhindered by her country's submarines. Only the two Germanladies, once more ignoring their American allegiance, looked angry. Itwas incredible to them, simply _unfassbar_ as they said in theirthoughts, that any nation should dare inconvenience Germans, should darelay a finger, even the merest friendliest detaining one, on anythingbelonging to the mighty, the inviolable Empire. Well, these Americans, these dollar-grubbing Yankees, would soon get taught a sharp, deservedlesson--but at this point they suddenly remembered they were Americansthemselves, and pulled up their thoughts violently, as it were, on theirhaunches. 

They turned, however, bitterly to the Twinkler girl as she pushed herway through to her sister, --those renegade Junkers, those contemptiblelittle apostates--and asked her, after hearing her question toAnna-Felicitas, with an extraordinary breaking out of pent-up emotionwhere she, then, supposed she would have been at that moment if ithadn't been for Germany. 

"Not here I think, " said Anna-Rose, instantly and fatally ready as shealways was to answer back and attempt what she called reasonedconversation. "There wouldn't have been a war, so of course I wouldn'thave been here. "

"Why, you wouldn't so much as have been born without Germany, " said thelady whose hair came off, with difficulty controlling a desire to shakethis insolent and perverted Junker who could repeat the infamous Englishlie as to who began the war. "You owe your very existence to Germany. You should be giving thanks to her on your knees for her gift to you oflife, instead of jeering at this representative--" she flung a fingerout toward the _Vaterland_--"this patient and dignified-in-temporary-misfortune representative, of her power. "

"I wasn't jeering, " said Anna-Rose, defending herself and clutching atAnna-Felicitas's sleeve to pull her away. 

"You wouldn't have had a father at all but for Germany, " said the otherlady, the one whose hair grew. 

"And perhaps you will tell me, " said the first one, "where you wouldhave been _then_. "

"I don't believe, " said Anna-Rose, her nose in the air, "I don'tbelieve I'd have ever been at a loss for a father. "

The ladies, left speechless a moment by the arrogance as well as severalother things about this answer gave Anna-Rose an opportunity for furtherreasoning with them, which she was unable to resist. "There are lots offathers, " she said, "in England, who would I'm sure have been delightedto take me on if Germany had failed me. "

"England!"

"Take you on!"

"An English father for you? For a subject of the King of Prussia?"

"I--I'm afraid I--I'm going to be sick, " gasped Anna-Felicitas suddenly. 

"You're never going to be sick in this bit of bathwater, Miss Twinkler?"exclaimed the young man, with the instant ungrudging admiration of onewho is confronted by real talent. "My, what a gift!"

Anna-Rose darted at Anna-Felicitas's drooping head, that which she hadbeen going to say back to the German ladies dissolving on her tongue. "Oh no--_no_--" she wailed. "Oh _no_--not in your best hat, Columbusdarling--you can't--it's not done--and your hat'll shake off into thewater, and then there'll only be one between us and we shall never beable to go out paying calls and things at the same time--come away andsit down--Mr. Twist--Mr. Twist--oh, please come--"

Anna-Felicitas allowed herself to be led away, just in time as shemurmured, and sat down on the nearest seat and shut her eyes. She wasthankful Anna-Rose's attention had been diverted to her so instantly, for it would have been very difficult to be sick with the ship as quietas one's own bedroom. Nothing short of the engine-room could have madeher sick now. She sat keeping her eyes shut and Anna-Rose's attentionriveted, wondering what she would do when there was no ship andAnna-Rose was on the verge of hasty and unfortunate argument. Would shehave to learn to faint? But that would terrify poor Christopher sodreadfully. 

Anna-Felicitas pondered, her eyes shut, on this situation. Up to now inher life she had always found that situations solved themselves. Giventime. And sometimes a little assistance. So, no doubt, would this one. Anna-Rose would ripen and mellow. The German ladies would depart henceand be no more seen; and it was unlikely she and Anna-Rose would meet atsuch close quarters as a ship's cabin any persons so peculiarly andunusually afflicting again. All situations solved themselves; or, ifthey showed signs of not going to, one adopted the gentle methods thathelped them to get solved. Early in life she had discovered that objectswhich cannot be removed or climbed over can be walked round. A littledeviousness, and the thing was done. She herself had in the mostmasterly manner when she was four escaped church-going for several yearsby a simple method, that seemed to her looking back very like aninspiration, of getting round it. She had never objected to going, hadnever put into words the powerful if vague dislike with which it filledher when Sunday after Sunday she had to go and dangle her legshelplessly for two hours from the chair she was put on in the enclosedpew reserved for the _hohe gräfliche Herrschaften_ from the Slosh. 

Her father, a strict observer of the correct and a pious believer inGod for other people, attended Divine Service as regularly as he woundthe clocks and paid the accounts. He _repräsentierte_, as the Germanphrase went; and his wife and children were expected to _repräsentieren_too. Which they did uncomplainingly; for when one has to do withdetermined husbands and fathers it is quickest not to complain. But thepins and needles that patient child endured, Anna-Felicitas remembered, looking back through the years at the bunched-up figure on the chair asat a stranger, were something awful. The edge of the chair just caughther legs in the pins and needles place. If she had been a little biggeror a little smaller it wouldn't have happened; as it was, St. Paulwrestling with beasts at Ephesus wasn't more heroic than Anna-Felicitasperceived that distant child to have been, silently Sunday after Sundaybearing her legs. Then one Sunday something snapped inside her, and sheheard her own voice floating out into the void above the heads of themumbling worshippers, and it said with a terrible distinctness in a sortof monotonous wail: "I only had a cold potato for breakfast, "--and asecond time, in the breathless suspension of mumbling that followed uponthis: "I only had a cold potato for breakfast, "--and a third time sheopened her mouth to repeat the outrageous statement, regardless of hermother's startled hand laid on her arm, and of Anna-Rose's petrifiedstare, and of the lifted faces of the congregation, and of the bent, scandalized brows of the pastor, --impelled by something that possessedher, unable to do anything but obey it; but her father, a man of deeds, rose up in his place, took her in his arms, and carried her down thestairs and out of the church. And the minute she found herself reallyrescued, and out where the sun and wind, her well-known friends, werelarking about among the tombstones, she laid her cheek as affectionatelyagainst her father's head as if she were a daughter to be proud of, andwould have purred if she had had had a purr as loudly as the mostsatisfied and virtuous of cats. 

"_Mein Kind_, " said her father, standing her up on a convenient tomb sothat her eyes were level with his, "is it then true about the coldpotato?"

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas patting his face, pleased at what her legswere feeling like again. 

"_Mein Kind_, " said her father, "do you not know it is wrong to lie?"

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas placidly, the heavenly blue of her eyes, gazing straight into his, exactly like the mild sky above the trees. 

"No?" echoed her father, staring at her. "But, _Kind_, you know what alie is?"

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas, gazing at him tenderly in her satisfaction atbeing restored to a decent pair of legs; and as he still stood staringat her she put her hands one on each of his cheeks and squeezed his facetogether and murmured, "Oh, I do _love_ you. "

CHAPTER X

Lost in the contemplation of a distant past Anna-Felicitas sat with hereyes shut long after she needn't have. 

She had forgotten about the German ladies, and America, and the futureso instantly pressing on her, and was away on the shores of the Balticagain, where bits of amber where washed up after a storm, and the palerushes grew in shallow sunny water that was hardly salt, and the airseemed for ever sweet with lilac. All the cottage gardens in the littlevillage that clustered round a clearing in the trees had lilac bushes inthem, for there was something in the soil that made lilacs be morewonderful there than anywhere else in the world, and in May the wholeforest as far as one could walk was soaked with the smell of it. Afterrain on a May evening, what a wonder it was; what a wonder, that runningdown the black, oozing forest paths between wet pine stems, out on tothe shore to look at the sun setting below the great sullen clouds ofthe afternoon over on one's left where Denmark was, and that lifting ofone's face to the exquisite mingling of the delicate sea smell and thelilac. And then there was home to come back to when the forest began tolook too dark and its deep silence made one's flesh creep--home, and alight in the window where ones mother was. Incredible the security ofthose days, the safe warmth of them, the careless roominess. . . . 

"You know if you _could_ manage to feel a little better, Anna-F. , " saidAnna-Rose's voice entreatingly in her ear, "it's time we began to getoff this ship. "

Anna-Felicitas opened her eyes, and got up all confused andself-reproachful. Everybody had melted away from that part of the deckexcept herself and Anna-Rose. The ship was lying quiet at last alongsidethe wharf. She had over-done being ill this time. She was ashamed ofherself for having wandered off so easily and comfortably into the past, and left poor Christopher alone in the difficult present. 

"I'm so sorry, " she said smiling apologetically, and giving her hat atug of determination symbolic of her being ready for anything, especially America. "I think I must have gone to sleep. Have you--" shehesitated and dropped her voice. "Are they--are the Clouston Sacksvisible yet?"

"I thought I saw them, " said Anna-Rose, dropping her voice too, andlooking round uneasily over her shoulder. "I'd have come here sooner tosee how you were getting on, but I thought I saw them, and they lookedso like what I think they will look like that I went into our cabinagain for a few minutes. But it wasn't them. They've found the peoplethey were after, and have gone. "

"There's a great crowd waiting, " said Mr. Twist, coming up, "and I thinkwe ought to go and look for your friends. As you don't know what they'relike and they don't know what you're like it may be difficult. Heavenforbid, " he continued, "that I should hurry you, but I have to catch atrain if I'm to get home to-night, and I don't intend to catch it untilI've handed you over safely to the Sacks. "

"Those Sacks--" began Anna-Rose; and then she finished irrelevantly byremarking that it was the details of life that were discouraging, --fromwhich Anna Felicitas knew that Christopher's heart was once more in herboots. 

"Come along, " said Mr. Twist, urging them to wards the gangway. "Anything you've got to say about life I shall be glad to hear, but atsome time when we're more at leisure. "

It had never occurred to either of the twins that the Clouston Sackswould not meet them. They had taken it for granted from the beginningthat some form of Sack, either male or female, or at least theirplenipotentiary, would be on the wharf to take them away to the Sacklair, as Anna-Felicitas alluded to the family mansion. It was, theyknew, in Boston, but Boston conveyed nothing to them. Only Mr. Twistknew how far away it was. He had always supposed the Sacks would meettheir young charges, stay that night in New York, and continue on toBoston next day. The twins were so certain they would be met that Mr. Twist was certain too. He had concluded, with a growingly empty feelingin his heart as the time of separation drew near, that all that nowremained for him to do on behalf of the Twinklers was to hand them overto the Sacks. And then leave them. And then go home to that mother heloved but had for some time known he didn't like, --go home a bereft andlonely man. 

But out of the crowd on the pier, any of whom might have been Sacks forall the Twinklers, eagerly scanning faces, knew, nobody in fact seemedto be Sacks. At least, nobody came forward and said, "Are you theTwinklers?" Other people fell into each other's arms; the air was fullof the noise of kissing, the loud legitimate kissing of relations; butnobody took any notice of the twins. For a long while they stoodwaiting. Their luggage was examined, and Mr. Twist's luggage--only hiswas baggage--was examined, and the kissing and exclaiming crowd swayedhither and thither, and broke up into groups, and was shot through byinterviewers, and got packed off into taxis, and grew thinner andthinner, and at last was so thin that the concealment of the Sacks in itwas no longer possible. 

There were no Sacks. 

To the last few groups of people left in the great glass-roofed hallpiled with bags of wool and sulphur, Mr. Twist went up boldly and askedif they were intending to meet some young ladies called Twinkler. Histone, owing to perturbation, was rather more than one of inquiry, italmost sounded menacing; and the answers he got were cold. He wanderedabout uncertainly from group to group, his soft felt hat on the back ofhis head and his brow getting more and more puckered; and Anna-Rose, anxiously looking on from afar, became impatient at last of theserefusals of everybody to be Sacks, and thought that perhaps Mr. Twistwasn't making himself clear. 

Impetuous by nature and little given to calm waiting, she approached agroup on her own account and asked them, enunciating her words veryclearly, whether they were by any chance Mr. And Mrs. Clouston Sack. 

The group, which was entirely female, stared round and down at her inastonished silence, and shook its heads; and as she saw Mr. Twist beingturned away for the fifth time in the distance a wave of red despaircame over her, and she said, reproach in her voice and tears in hereyes, "But _somebody's_ got to be the Sacks. "

Upon which the group she was addressing stared at her in a moreastonished silence than ever. 

Mr. Twist came up mopping his brow and took he arm and led her back toAnna-Felicitas, who was taking care of the luggage and had sat downphilosophically to await developments on a bag of sulphur. She didn'tyet know what sulphur looked like on one's clothes after one has sat onit, and smiled cheerfully and encouragingly at Anna-Rose as she cametowards her. 

"There _are_ no Sacks, " said Anna-Rose, facing the truth. 

"It's exactly like that Uncle Arthur of yours, " said Mr. Twist, moppinghis forehead and speaking almost vindictively. "Exactly like him. A manlike that _would_ have the sort of friends that don't meet one. "

"Well, we must do without the Sacks, " said Anna-Felicitas, rising fromthe sulphur bag with the look of serene courage that can only dwell onthe face of one who is free from care as to what has happened to himbehind. "And it isn't, " she added sweetly to Mr. Twist, "as if we hadn'tgot _you_. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose, suddenly seeing daylight. "Of course. What doSacks really matter? I mean, for a day or two? You'll take us somewherewhere we can wait till we've found them. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Some nice quiet old-fashioned coffee-housesort of place, like the one the Brontes went to in St. Paul's Churchyardthe first time they were launched into the world. "

"Yes. Some inexpensive place. "

"Suited to the frugal. "

"Because although we've got £200, even that will need watching or itwill go. "

During this conversation Mr. Twist stood mopping his forehead. As oftenas he mopped it it broke out afresh and had to be mopped again. Theywere the only passengers left now, and had become very conspicuous. Hecouldn't but perceive that a group of officials with grim, locked-up-looking mouths were eyeing him and the Twinklers attentively. 

Always zealous in the cause of virtue, America provided her wharves andlanding-places with officials specially appointed to guard the purity offamily life. Family life obviously cannot be pure without a marriagebeing either in it or having at some time or other passed through it. The officials engaged in eyeing Mr. Twist and the twins were all marriedthemselves, and were well acquainted with that awful purity. But eye theTwist and Twinkler party as they might, they could see no trace ofmarriage anywhere about it. 

On the contrary, the man of the party looked so uneasy that it amountedto conscious illegality. 

"Sisters?" said the chief official, stepping forward abruptly. 

"Eh?" said Mr. Twist, pausing in the wiping of his forehead. 

"These here--" said the official, jerking his thumb at the twins. "Theyyour sisters?"

"No, " said Mr. Twist stiffly. 

"No, " said the twins, with one voice. "Do you think we look like him?"

"Daughters?"

"No, " said Mr. Twist stiffly. 

"No, " said the twins, with an ever greater vigour of repudiation. "You_can't_ really think we look as much like him as all that?"

"Wife and sister-in-law?"

Then the Twinklers laughed. They laughed aloud, even Anna-Roseforgetting her cares for a moment. But they were flattered, because itwas at least a proof that they looked thoroughly grown-up. 

"Then if they ain't your sisters, and they ain't your daughters, andthey ain't your wife and sister-in-law, p'raps you'll tell me--"

"These young ladies are not anything at all of mine, sir, " said Mr. Twist vehemently. 

"Don't you get sir-ing me, now, " said the official sticking out his jaw. "This is a free country, and I'll have no darned cheek. "

"These young ladies in no way belong to me, " said Mr. Twist morepatiently. "They're my friends. "

"Oh. Friends, are they? Then p'raps you'll tell me what you're going todo with them next. "

"Do with them?" repeated Mr. Twist, as he stared with puckered brow atthe twins. "That's exactly what I wish I knew. "

The official scanned him from head to foot with triumphant contempt. Hehad got one of them, anyhow. He felt quite refreshed already. There hadbeen a slump in sinners the past week, and he was as full of suppressedenergy and as much tormented by it as an unexercised and overfed horse. "Step this way, " he ordered curtly, waving Mr. Twist towards a woodenerection that was apparently an office. "Oh, don't you worry about thegirls, " he added, as his prey seemed disinclined to leave them. 

But Mr. Twist did worry. He saw Ellis Island looming up behind the twofigures that were looking on in an astonishment that had not yet hadtime to turn into dismay as he was marched off out of sight. "I'll beback in a minute, " he called over his shoulder. 

"That's as may be, " remarked the official grimly. 

But he was back; if not in a minute in a little more than five minutes, still accompanied by the official, but an official magically changedinto tameness and amiability, desirous to help, instructing hisinferiors to carry Mr. Twist's and the young ladies' baggage to a taxi. 

It was the teapot that had saved him, --that blessed teapot that wasalways protruding itself benevolently into his life. Mr. Twist hadidentified himself with it, and it had instantly saved him. In theshelter of his teapot Mr. Twist could go anywhere and do anything inAmerica. Everybody had it. Everybody knew it. It was as pervasive ofAmerica as Ford's cars, but cosily, quietly pervasive. It was only lessvisible because it stayed at home. It was more like a wife than Ford'scars were. From a sinner caught red-handed, Mr. Twist, its amiablecreator, leapt to the position of one who can do no wrong, for he hadnot only placed his teapot between himself and judgment but hadaccompanied his proofs of identity by a suitable number of dollar bills, pressed inconspicuously into the official's conveniently placed hand. 

The twins found themselves being treated with distinction. They werehelped into the taxi by the official himself, and what was to happen tothem next was left entirely to the decision and discretion of Mr. Twist--a man so much worried that at that moment he hadn't any ofeither. He couldn't even answer when asked where the taxi was to go to. He had missed his train, and he tried not to think of his mother'sdisappointment, the thought was so upsetting. But he wouldn't havecaught it if he could, for how could he leave these two poor children?

"I'm more than ever convinced, " he said, pushing his hat still furtheroff his forehead, and staring at the back of the Twinkler trunks piledup in front of him next to the driver, while the disregarded official atthe door still went on asking him where he wished the cab to go to, "that children should all have parents. "

CHAPTER XI

The hotel they were finally sent to by the official, goaded atlast by Mr. Twist's want of a made-up mind into independentinstructions to the cabman, was the Ritz. He thought this verysuitable for the evolver of Twist's Non-Trickler, and it was onlywhen they were being rushed along at what the twins, used to thebehaviour of London taxis and not altogether unacquainted withthe prudent and police-supervised deliberation of the taxis ofBerlin, regarded as a skid-collision-and-mutilation-provokingspeed, that a protest from Anna-Rose conveyed to Mr. Twist wherethey were heading for. 

"An hotel called Ritz sounds very expensive, " she said. "I've heardUncle Arthur talk of one there is in London and one there is in Paris, and he said that only damned American millionaires could afford to stayin them. Anna-Felicitas and me aren't American millionaires--"

"Or damned, " put in Anna-Felicitas. 

"--but quite the contrary, " said Anna-Rose, "hadn't you better take ussomewhere else?"

"Somewhere like where the Brontes stayed in London, " said Anna-Felicitasharping on this idea. "Where cheapness is combined with historicalassociations. "

"Oh Lord, it don't matter, " said Mr. Twist, who for the first time intheir friendship seemed ruffled. 

"Indeed it does, " said Anna-Rose anxiously. 

"You forget we've got to husband our resources, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"You mustn't run away with the idea that because we've got £200 we'rethe same as millionaires, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Uncle Arthur, " said Anna-Felicitas, "frequently told us that £200 is avery vast sum; but he equally frequently told us that it isn't. "

"It was when he was talking about having given to us that he said it wassuch a lot, " said Anna-Rose. 

"He said that as long as we had it we would be rich, " saidAnna-Felicitas, "but directly we hadn't it we would be poor. "

"So we'd rather not go to the Ritz, please, " said Anna-Rose, "if youdon't mind. "

The taxi was stopped, and Mr. Twist got out and consulted the driver. The thought of his Uncle Charles as a temporary refuge for the twinsfloated across his brain, but was rejected because Uncle Charles wouldspeak to no woman under fifty except from his pulpit, and approachedthose he did speak to with caution till they were sixty. He regardedthem as one of the chief causes of modern unrest. He liked them so muchthat he hated them. He could practise abstinence, but not temperance. Uncle Charles was no good as a refuge. 

"Well now, see here, " said the driver at last, after Mr. Twist hadrejected such varied suggestions of something small and quiet as theWaldorf-Astoria, the Plaza and the Biltmore, "you tell me where you wantto go to and I'll take you there. "

"I want to go to the place your mother would stay in if she came up fora day or two from the country, " said Mr. Twist helplessly. 

"Get right in then, and I'll take you back to the Ritz, " said thedriver. 

But finally, when his contempt for Mr. Twist, of whose identity he wasunaware, had grown too great even for him to bandy pleasantries withhim, he did land his party at an obscure hotel in a street off the lessdesirable end of Fifth Avenue, and got rid of him. 

It was one of those quiet and cheap New York hotels that yet are bothnoisy and expensive. It was full of foreigners, --real foreigners, thetwins perceived, not the merely technical sort like themselves, butpeople with yellow faces and black eyes. They looked very seedy andshabby, and smoked very much, and talked volubly in unknown tongues. Theentrance hall, a place of mottled marble, with clerks behind a counterall of whose faces looked as if they were masks, was thick with them;and it was when they turned to stare and whisper as Anna-Felicitaspassed and Anna-Rose was thinking proudly, "Yes, you don't see anythinglike that every day, do you, " and herself looked fondly at her Columbus, that she saw that it wasn't Columbus's beauty at all but the sulphur onthe back of her skirt. 

This spoilt Anna-Rose's arrival in New York. All the way up in the liftto the remote floor on which their bedroom was she was trying to brushit off, for the dress was Anna-F. 's very best one. 

"That's all your grips, ain't it?" said the youth in buttons who hadcome up with them, dumping their bags down on the bedroom floor. 

"Our what?" said Anna-Rose, to whom the expression was new. "Do you meanour bags?"

"No. Grips. These here, " said the youth. 

"Is that what they're called in America?" asked Anna-Felicitas, with theintelligent interest of a traveller determined to understand andappreciate everything, while Anna-Rose, still greatly upset by thecondition of the best skirt but unwilling to expatiate upon it beforethe youth, continued to brush her down as best she could with herhandkerchief. 

"I don't call them. It's what they are, " said the youth. "What I want toknow is, are they all here?"

"How interesting that you don't drop your h's, " said Anna-Felicitas, gazing at him. "The rest of you is so _like_ no h's. "

The youth said nothing to that, the line of thought being one he didn'tfollow. 

"Those _are_ all our--grips, I think, " said Anna-Rose counting themround the corner of Anna-Felicitas's skirt. "Thank you very much, " sheadded after a pause, as he still lingered. 

But this didn't cause him to disappear as it would have in England. Instead, he picked up a metal bottle with a stopper off the table, andshook it and announced that their ice-water bottle was empty. "Want someice water?" he inquired. 

"What for?" asked Anna-Felicitas. 

"What for?" echoed the youth. 

"Thank you, " said Anna-Rose, who didn't care about the youth's mannerwhich seemed to her familiar, "we don't want ice water, but we should beglad of a little hot water. "

"You'll get all you want of that in there, " said the youth, jerking hishead towards a door that led into a bathroom. "It's ice water and inkthat you get out of me. "

"Really?" said Anna-Felicitas, gazing at him with even more intelligentinterest, almost as if she were prepared, it being America, a country, she had heard, of considerable mechanical ingenuity, to find his personbristling with taps which only needed turning. 

"We don't want either, thank you, " said Anna-Rose. 

The youth lingered. Anna-Rose's brushing began to grow vehement. Whydidn't he go? She didn't want to have to be rude to him and hurt hisfeelings by asking him to go, but why didn't he? Anna-Felicitas, who wasmuch too pleasantly detached, thought Anna-Rose, for such a situation, the door being wide open to the passage and the ungetridable youthstanding there staring, was leisurely taking off her hat and smoothingher hair. 

"Suppose you're new to this country, " said the youth after a pause. 

"Brand, " said Anna-Felicitas pleasantly. 

"Then p'raps, " said the youth, "you don't know that the feller whobrings up your grips gets a tip. "

"Of course we know that, " said Anna-Rose, standing up straight andtrying to look stately. 

"Then if you know why don't you do it?"

"Do it?" she repeated, endeavouring to chill him into respectfulness byhaughtily throwing back her head. "Of course we shall do it. At theproper time and place. "

"Which is, as you must have noticed, " added Anna-Felicitas gently, "departure and the front door. "

"That's all right, " said the youth, "but that's only one of the timesand places. That's the last one. Where we've got to now is the firstone. "

"Do I understand, " said Anna-Rose, trying to be very dignified, whileher heart shrank within her, for what sort of sum did one offer peoplelike this?--"that to America one tips at the beginning as well?"

"Yep, " said the youth. "And in the middle too. Right along through. Never miss an opportunity, is as good a slogan as you'll get when itcomes to tipping. "

"I believe you'd have liked Kipps, " said Anna-Felicitas meditatively, shaking some dust off her hat and remembering the orgy of tipping thatimmortal young man went in for at the seaside hotel. 

"What I like now, " said the youth, growing more easy before theirmanifest youth and ignorance, "is tips. Guess you can call it Kipps ifit pleases you. "

Anna-Rose began to fumble nervously in her purse "It's horrid, I think, to ask for presents, " she said to the youth in deep humiliation, more onhis account than hers. 

"Presents? I'm not asking for presents. I'm telling you what's done, "said the youth. And he had spots on his face. And he was repugnant toher. 

Anna-Rose gave him what looked like a shilling. He took it, andremarking that he had had a lot of trouble over it, went away; andAnna-Rose was still flushed by this encounter when Mr. Twist knocked andasked if they were ready to be taken down to tea. 

"He might have said thank you, " she said indignantly to Anna-Felicitas, giving a final desperate brushing to the sulphur. 

"I expect he'll come to a bad end, " said Anna-Felicitas soothingly. 

They had tea in the restaurant and were the only people doing such athing, a solitary cluster in a wilderness of empty tables laid fordinner. It wasn't the custom much in America, explained Mr. Twist, tohave tea, and no preparations were made for it in hotels of that sort. The very waiters, feeling it was a meal to be discouraged, were showingtheir detachment from it by sitting in a corner of the room playingdominoes. It was a big room, all looking-glasses and windows, and thestreet outside was badly paved and a great noise of passing motor-vanscame in and drowned most of what Mr. Twist was saying. It was anunlovely place, a place in which one might easily feel homesick and thatthe world was empty of affection, if one let oneself go that way. Thetwins wouldn't. They stoutly refused, in their inward recesses, to bedaunted by these externals. For there was Mr. Twist, their friend andstand-by, still with them, and hadn't they got each other? But they feltuneasy all the same; for Mr. Twist, though he plied them with butteredtoast and macaroons and was as attentive as usual, had a somnambulatoryquality in his attention. He looked like a man who is doing things in adream. He looked like one who is absorbed in something else. Hisforehead still was puckered, and what could it be puckered about, seeingthat he had got home, and was going back to his mother, and had a clearand uncomplicated future ahead of him, and anyhow was a man?

"Have you got something on your mind?" asked Anna-Rose at last, when hehadn't even heard a question she asked, --he, the polite, the interested, the sympathetic friend of the journey across. 

Mr. Twist, sitting tilted back in his chair, his hands deep in hispockets, looked up from the macaroons he had been staring at and said, "Yes. "

"Tell us what it is, " suggested Anna-Felicitas. 

"You, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Me?"

"Both of you. You both of you go together. You're in one lump in mymind. And on it too, " finished Mr. Twist ruefully. 

"That's only because, " explained Anna-Felicitas, "you've got the ideawe want such a lot of taking care of. Get rid of that, and you'll feelquite comfortable again. Why not regard us merely as pleasant friends?"

Mr. Twist looked at her in silence. 

"Not as objects to be protected, " continued Anna Felicitas, "but asco-equals. Of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting. "

Mr. Twist continued to look at her in silence. 

"We didn't come to America to be on anybody's mind, " said Anna-Rose, supporting Anna-Felicitas. 

"We had a good deal of that in England, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Forinstance, we're quite familiar with Uncle Arthur's mind, we were on itso heavily and so long. "

"It's our fixed determination, " said Anna-Rose, "now that we're startinga new life, to get off any mind we find ourselves on _instantly_. "

"We wish to carve out our own destinies, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"We more than wish to, " corrected Anna-Rose, "we intend to. What were wemade in God's image for if it wasn't to stand upright on our own feet?"

"Anna-Rose and I had given this a good deal of thought, " saidAnna-Felicitas, "first and last, and we're prepared to be friends witheverybody, but only as co-equals and of a reasonable soul and humanflesh subsisting. "

"I don't know exactly, " said Mr. Twist, "what that means, but it seemsto give you a lot of satisfaction. "

"It does. It's out of the Athanasian Creed, and suggests such perfectequality. If you'll regard us as co-equals instead of as objects to belooked after, you'll see how happy we shall all be. "

"Not, " said Anna-Rose, growing tender, for indeed in her heart sheloved and clung to Mr. Twist, "that we haven't very much liked allyou've done for us and the way you were so kind to us on theboat, --we've been _most_ obliged to you, and we shall miss you very muchindeed, I know. "

"But we'll get over that of course in time, " put in Anna-Felicitas, "andwe've got to start life now in earnest. "

"Well then, " said Mr. Twist, "will you two Annas kindly tell me what itis you propose to do next?"

"Next? After tea? Go and look at the sights. "

"I mean to-morrow, " said Mr. Twist. 

"To-morrow, " said Anna-Rose, "we proceed to Boston. "

"To track the Clouston Sacks to their lair, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Ah. You've made up your minds to do that. They've behaved abominably, "said Mr. Twist. 

"Perhaps they missed the train, " said Anna-Felicitas mildly. 

"It's the proper course to pursue, " said Anna-Rose. "To proceed toBoston. "

"I suppose it is, " said Mr. Twist, again thinking that the really properand natural course was for him to have been able to take them to hismother. Pity one's mother wasn't--

He pulled himself up on the brink of an unfiliality. He was on the vergeof thinking it a pity one's mother wasn't a different one. 

CHAPTER XII

"Then, " said Mr. Twist, "if this is all you're going to see of New York, this one evening, let us go and look at it. "

He beckoned to the waiter who came up with the bill. Anna-Rose pulledout her purse. Mr. Twist put up his hand with severe determination. 

"You're my guest, " he said, "as long as I am with you. Useless toprotest, young lady. You'll not get me to belie my American manhood. Ionly listened with half an ear to all the things you both said in thetaxi, because I hadn't recovered from the surprise of finding myselfstill with you instead of on the train for Clark, and because you bothof you do say so very many things. But understand once and for all thatin this country everything female has to be paid for by some man. I'mthat man till I've left you on the Sack doorstep, and then it'll beSack--confound him, " finished Mr. Twist suddenly. 

And he silenced Anna-Rose's protests, which persisted and wereindignant, by turning on her with, an irascibility she hadn't yet seenin him, and inquiring of her whether then she really wished to put himto public shame? "You wouldn't wish to go against an established custom, surely, " he said more gently. 

So the twins gave themselves up for that one evening to whatAnna-Felicitas called government by wealth, otherwise plutocracy, whilereserving complete freedom of action in regard to Mr. Sack, who was, intheir ignorance of his circumstances, an unknown quantity. They mightbe going to be mothers' helps in the Sack _ménage_ for all theyknew, --they might, they said, be going to be anything, from honouredguests to typists. 

"Can you type?" asked Mr. Twist. 

"No, " said the twins. 

He took them in a taxi to Riverside Drive, and then they walked down tothe charming footpath that runs along by the Hudson for three enchantingmiles. The sun had set some time before they got there, and had left aclear pale yellow sky, and a wonderful light on the river. Lamps werebeing lit, and hung like silver globes in the thin air. Steep grassslopes, and groups of big trees a little deeper yellow than the sky, hidthat there were houses and a street above them on their right. Up anddown the river steamers passed, pierced with light, their delicate smokehanging in the air long after they had gone their way. It was so great ajoy to walk in all this after ten days shut up on the _St. Luke_ and tosee such blessed things as grass and leaves again, that the twins feltsuddenly extraordinarily brisked up and cheerful. It was impossible notto be cheerful, translated from the _St. Luke_ into such a place, trotting along in the peculiar dry air that made one all tingly. 

The world seemed suddenly quite good, --the simplest, easiest of objectsto tackle. All one had to do was not to let it weigh on one, to laughrather than cry. They trotted along humming bits of their infancy'ssongs, feeling very warm and happy inside, felicitously full of tea andmacaroons and with their feet comfortably on something that kept stilland didn't heave or lurch beneath them. Mr. Twist, too, was gayer thanhe had been for some hours. He seemed relieved; and he was. He had senta telegram to his mother, expressing proper sorrow at being detained inNew York, but giving no reason for it, and promising he would be withher rather late the next evening; and he had sent a telegram to theClouston Sacks saying the Twinklers, who had so unfortunately missedthem in New York, would arrive in Boston early next afternoon. His mindwas clear again owing to the determination of the twins to go to theSacks. He was going to take them there, hand them over, and then go backto Clark, which fortunately was only three hours' journey from Boston. 

If the twins had shown a disinclination to go after the Sacks who, inMr. Twist's opinion, had behaved shamefully already, he wouldn't havehad the heart to press them to go; and then what would he have done withthem? Their second and last line of defence, supposing they hadconsidered the Sacks had failed and were to be ruled out, was inCalifornia, a place they spoke of as if it were next door to Boston andNew York. How could he have let them set out alone on that four days'journey, with the possibility of once more at its end not being met? Nowonder he had been abstracted at tea. He was relieved to the extent ofhis forehead going quite smooth again at their decision to proceed tothe Sacks. For he couldn't have taken them to his mother withoutpreparation and explanation, and he couldn't have left them in New Yorkwhile he went and prepared and explained. Great, reflected Mr. Twist, the verb dropping into his mind with the _aplomb_ of an inspiration, arethe difficulties that beset a man directly he begins to twinkle. Alreadyhe had earnestly wished to knock the reception clerk in the hotel officedown because of, first, his obvious suspicion of the party before he hadheard Mr. Twist's name, and because of, second, his politeness, hisconfidential manner as of an understanding sympathizer with a rich man'srecreations, when he had. The tea, which he, had poured out of one ofhis own teapots, had been completely spoilt by the knowledge that it wasonly this teapot that had saved him from being treated as a White SlaveTrafficker. He wouldn't have got into that hotel at all with theTwinklers, or into any other decent one, except for his teapot. What acountry, Mr. Twist had thought, fresh from his work in France, freshfrom where people were profoundly occupied with the great business ofsurviving at all. Here he came back from a place where civilizationtoppled, where deadly misery, deadly bravery, heroism that couldn't beuttered, staggered month after month among ruins, and found Americauntouched, comfortable, fat, still with time to worry over the suspectedamorousness of the rich, still putting people into uniforms in order tobuttonhole a man on landing and cross-question him as to his privatepurities. 

He had been much annoyed, but he too couldn't resist the extremepleasure of real exercise on such a lovely evening, nor could he resistthe infection of the cheerfulness of the Twinklers. They walked along, talking and laughing, and seeming to walk much faster than he did, especially Anna-Rose who had to break into a run every few steps becauseof his so much longer legs, his face restored to all its usualkindliness as he listened benevolently to their remarks, and just whenthey were beginning to feel as if they soon might be tired and hungry arestaurant with lamp-hung gardens appeared as punctually as if they hadbeen in Germany, that land of nicely arranged distances between meals. They had an extremely cheerful little supper out of doors, with thingsto eat that thrilled the Twinklers in their delicious strangeness;heavenly food, they thought it after the rigours of the second-classcooking on the _St. Luke_, and the biggest ices they had seen in theirlives, --great dollops of pink and yellow divineness. 

Then Mr. Twist took them in a taxi to look at the illuminatedadvertisements in Broadway, and they forgot everything but the joy ofthe moment. Whatever the next day held, this evening was sheerhappiness. Their eyes shone and their cheeks flushed, and Mr. Twist wasquite worried that they were so pretty. People at the other tables atthe restaurant had stared at them with frank admiration, and so did thepeople in the streets whenever the taxi was blocked. On the ship he hadonly sometimes been aware of it, --there would come a glint of sunshineand settle on Anna-Rose's little cheek where the dimple was, or he wouldlift his eyes from the Culture book and suddenly see the dark softnessof Anna-Felicitas's eyelashes as she slept in her chair. But now, dressed properly, and in their dryland condition of cheerful animation, he perceived that they were very pretty indeed, and that Anna-Felicitaswas more than very pretty. He couldn't help thinking they were a mostunsuitable couple to be let loose in America with only two hundredpounds to support them. Two hundred pounds was just enough to let themslip about if it should enter their heads to slip about, --go off withoutexplanation, for instance, if they wanted to leave the CloustonSacks, --but of course ridiculous as a serious background to life. A girlshould either have enough money or be completely dependent on her malerelations. As a girl was usually young reflected Mr. Twist, hisspectacles with the Broadway lights in them blazing on the twospecimens opposite him, it was safest for her to be dependent. So wereher actions controlled, and kept within the bounds of wisdom. 

And next morning, as he sat waiting for the twins for breakfast at teno'clock according to arrangement the night before, their grape-fruit inlittle beds of ice on their plates and every sort of American dishordered, from griddle cakes and molasses to chicken pie, a page came inwith loud cries for Mr. Twist, which made him instantly conspicuous--athing he particularly disliked--and handed him a letter. 

The twins had gone. 

CHAPTER XIII

They had left early that morning for Boston, determined, as they wrote, no longer to trespass on his kindness. There had been a discussion intheir bedroom the night before when they got back in which Anna-Rosesupplied the heat and Anna-Felicitas the arguments, and it ended inAnna-Felicitas succeeding in restoring Anna-Rose to her originalstandpoint of proud independence, from which, lured by the comfort andsecurity of Mr. Twist's companionship, she had been inclined to slip. 

It took some time, because of Anna-Rose being the eldest. Anna-Felicitashad had to be as wary, and gentle, and persistently affectionate as awife whom necessity compels to try and get reason into her husband. Anna-Rose's feathers, even as the feathers of a husband, bristled at themere breath of criticism of her superior intelligence and wisdom. Shewas the leader of the party, the head and guide, the one who had thedollars in her pocket, and being the eldest naturally must know best. Besides, she was secretly nervous about taking Anna-Felicitas aboutalone. She too had observed the stares of the public, and had neversupposed that any of them might be for her. How was she to get to Bostonsuccessfully with so enchanting a creature, through all thecomplications of travel in an unknown country, without the support andcounsel of Mr. Twist? Just the dollars and quarters and dimes and centscowed her. The strangeness of everything, while it delighted her solong as she could peep at it from behind Mr. Twist, appalled her theminute she was left alone with it. America seemed altogether a foreigncountry, a strange place whose inhabitants by accident didn't talk in astrange language. They talked English; or rather what sounded likeEnglish till you found that it wasn't really. 

But Anna-Felicitas prevailed. She had all Anna-Rose's inborn horror ofaccepting money or other benefits from people who had no natural rightto exercise their benevolences upon her, to appeal to. Christopher, after long wrestling restored at last to pride, did sit down and writethe letter that so much spoilt Mr. Twist's breakfast next morning, whileColumbus slouched about the room suggesting sentences. 

It was a letter profuse in thanks for all Mr. Twist had done for them, and couched in language that betrayed the particular shareAnna-Felicitas had taken in the plan; for though they both loved longwords Anna-Felicitas's were always a little the longer. In rollingsentences that made Mr. Twist laugh in spite of his concern, theypointed out that his first duty was to his mother, and his second wasnot to squander his possessions in paying the hotel and railway bills ofpersons who had no sort of claim on him, except those general claims ofhumanity which he had already on the _St. Luke_ so amply discharged. They would refrain from paying their hotel bill, remembering his wordsas to the custom of the country, though their instincts were altogetheragainst this course, but they could and would avoid causing him thefurther expense and trouble and waste of his no doubt valuable time oftaking them to Boston, by the simple process of going there without him. They promised to write from the Sacks and let him know of their arrivalto the address at Clark he had given them, and they would never forgethim as long as they lived and remained his very sincerely, A. -R. , andA. -F. Twinkler. 

Mr. Twist hurried out to the office. 

The clerk who had been so confidential in his manner the evening beforelooked at him curiously. Yes, the young ladies had left on the 8. 15 forBoston. They had come downstairs, baggage and all, at seven o'clock, hadasked for a taxi, had said they wished to go to Boston, inquired aboutthe station, etc. , and had specially requested that Mr. Twist should notbe disturbed. 

"They seemed in a slight hurry to be off, " said the clerk, "and didn'tlike there being no train before the 8. 15. I thought you knew all aboutit, Mr. Twist, " he added inquisitively. 

"So I did--so I did, " said Mr. Twist, turning away to go back to hisbreakfast for three. 

"So he did--so he did, " muttered the clerk with a wink to the otherclerk; and for a few minutes they whispered, judging from theexpressions on their faces, what appeared to be very exciting things toeach other. 

Meanwhile the twins, after a brief struggle of extraordinary intensityat the station in getting their tickets, trying to understand the blackman who seized and dealt with their luggage, and closely following himwherever he went in case he should disappear, were sitting in a state ofrelaxation and relief in the Boston express, their troubles over for atleast several hours. 

The black porter, whose heart happened not to be black and who hadchildren of his own, perceived the helpless ignorance that lay behindthe twins' assumption a of severe dignity, and took them in hand andgot seats for them in the parlour car. As they knew nothing about cars, parlour or otherwise, but had merely and quite uselessly reiterated tothe booking-clerk, till their porter intervened, that they wantedthird-class tickets, they accepted these seats, thankful in the pressand noise round them to get anything so roomy and calm as thesedignified arm-chairs; and it wasn't till they had been in them sometime, their feet on green footstools, with attendants offering themfruit and chocolates and magazines at intervals just as if they had beenin heaven, as Anna-Felicitas remarked admiringly, that counting theirmoney they discovered what a hole the journey had made in it. But theywere too much relieved at having accomplished so much on their own, quite uphelped for the first time since leaving Aunt Alice, to take itparticularly to heart; and, as Anna-Felicitas said, there was still the£200, and, as Anna-Rose said, it wasn't likely they'd go in a trainagain for ages; and anyhow, as Anna-Felicitas said, whatever it had costthey were bound to get away from being constant drains on Mr. Twist'spurse. 

The train journey delighted them. To sit so comfortably and privately inchairs that twisted round, so that if a passenger should start staringat Anna-Felicitas one could make her turn her back altogether on him; tohave one's feet on footstools when they were the sort of feet that don'treach the ground; to see the lovely autumn country flying past, hillsand woods and fields and gardens golden in the October sun, while thehorrible Atlantic was nowhere in sight; to pass through towns so queerlyreminiscent of English and German towns shaken up together and yet not abit like either; to be able to have the window wide open withoutgetting soot in one's eyes because one of the ministering angels--clad, this one, appropriately to heaven, in white, though otherwiseblack--pulled up the same sort of wire screen they used to have in thewindows at home to keep out the mosquitoes; to imitate about twelve, when they grew bold because they were so hungry, the other passengersand cause the black angel to spread a little table between them andbring clam broth, which they ordered in a spirit of adventure andcuriosity and concealed from each other that they didn't like; to havethe young man who passed up and down with the candy, and whose mouth wasfull of it, grow so friendly that he offered them toffee from his ownprivate supply at last when they had refused regretfully a dozensuggestions to buy--"Have a bit, " he said, thrusting it under theirnoses. "As a gentleman to ladies--no pecuniary obligations--come on, now;" all this was to the twins too interesting and delightful forwords. 

They accepted the toffee in the spirit in which it was offered, andsince nobody can eat somebody's toffee without being pleasant in return, intermittent amenities passed between them and the young man as hejourneyed up and down through the cars. 

"First visit to the States?" he inquired, when with some reluctance, forpresently it appeared to the twins that the clam broth and the toffeedidn't seem to be liking each other now they had got together insidethem, and also for fear of hurting his feelings if they refused, theytook some more. 

They nodded and smiled stickily. 

"English, I guess. "

They hesitated, covering their hesitation with the earnest working oftheir toffee-filled jaws. 

Then Anna-Felicitas, her cheek distorted, gave him the answer she hadgiven the captain of the _St. Luke, _ and said, "Practically. "

"Ah, " said the young man, turning this over in his mind, the r in"practically" having rolled as no English or American r ever did; butthe conductor appearing in the doorway he continued on his way. 

"It's evident, " said Anna-Rose, speaking with difficulty, for her jawsclave together because of the toffee, "that we're going to be asked thatthe first thing every time a fresh person speaks to us. We'd betterdecide what we're going to say, and practise saying it withouthesitation. "

Anna-Felicitas made a sound of assent. 

"That answer of yours about practically, " continued Anna-Rose, swallowing her bit of toffee by accident and for one moment afraid itwould stick somewhere and make her die, "causes first surprise, thenreflection, and then suspicion. "

"But, " said Anna-Felicitas after a pause during which she haddisentangled her jaws, "it's going to be difficult to say one is Germanwhen America seems to be so very neutral and doesn't like Germans. Besides, it's only in the eye of the law that we are. In God's eye we'renot, and that's the principal eye after all. "

Her own eyes grew thoughtful. "I don't believe, " she said, "that parentswhen they marry have any idea of all the difficulties they're going toplace their children in. "

"I don't believe they think about it at all, " said Anna-Rose. "I mean, "she added quickly, lest she should be supposed to be questioning theperfect love and forethought of their mother, "fathers don't. "

They were silent a little after this, each thinking things tinged tosobriety by the effect of the inner conflict going on between the clambroth and the toffee. Also Boston was rushing towards them, and theClouston Sacks. Quite soon they would have to leave the peacefulsecurity of the train and begin to be active again, and quick andclever. Anna-Felicitas, who was slow, found it difficult ever to beclever till about the week after, and Anna-Rose, who was impetuous, wasso impetuous that she entirely outstripped her scanty store ofcleverness and landed panting and surprised in situations she hadn't anidea what to do with. The Clouston Sacks, now--Aunt Alice had said, "Youmust take care to be very tactful with Mr. And Mrs. Clouston Sack;" andwhen Anna-Rose, her forehead as much puckered as Mr. Twist's in herdesire to get exactly at what tactful was in order to be able diligentlyto be it, asked for definitions, Aunt Alice only said it was whatgentlewomen were instinctively. 

"Then, " observed Anna-Felicitas, when on nearing Boston Anna-Roserepeated Aunt Alice's admonishment and at the same time providedAnna-Felicitas for her guidance with the definition, "seeing that we'resupposed to be gentlewomen, all we've got to do is to behave accordingto our instincts. "

But Anna-Rose wasn't sure. She doubted their instincts, especiallyAnna-Felicitas's. She thought her own were better, being older, but evenhers were extraordinarily apt to develop in unexpected directionsaccording to the other person's behaviour. Her instinct, for instance, when engaged by Uncle Arthur in conversation had usually been to hithim. Was that tact? Yet she knew she was a gentlewoman. She had heardthat, since first she had heard words at all, from every servant, teacher, visitor and relation--except her mother--in her Prussian home. Indeed, over there she had been told she was more than a gentlewoman, for she was a noblewoman and therefore her instincts ought positively todrip tact. 

"Mr. Dodson, " Aunt Alice had said one afternoon towards the end, whenthe twins came in from a walk and found the rector having tea, "saysthat you can't be too tactful in America. He's been there. "

"Sensitive--sensitive, " said Mr. Dodson, shaking his head at his cup. "Splendidly sensitive, just as they are splendidly whatever else theyare. A great country. Everything on a vast scale, includingsensitiveness. It has to be met vastly. But quite easy really---" Heraised a pedagogic finger at the twins. "You merely add half as muchagain to the quantity of your tact as the quantity you encounter oftheir sensitiveness, and it's all right. "

"Be sure you remember that now, " said Aunt Alice, pleased. 

As Boston got nearer, Anna-Rose, trying to learn Mr. Dodson's recipe forsocial success by heart, became more silent. On the ship, when themeeting with the Sacks was imminent, she had fled in sudden panic to hercabin to hide from them. That couldn't have been tact. But it wasinstinct. And she was a gentlewoman. Now once again dread tookpossession of her and she wanted to hide, not to get there, to stay inthe train and go on and on. She said nothing, of course, of her dread toAnna-Felicitas in order not to undermine that young person's _morale_, but she did very much wish that principles weren't such important thingsand one needn't have cut oneself off from the protecting figure of Mr. Twist. 

"Now remember what Aunt Alice said, " she whispered severely toAnna-Felicitas, gripping her arm as they stood jammed in the narrowpassage to the door waiting to be let out at Boston. 

On the platform, they both thought, would be the Sacks, --certainly oneSack, and they had feverishly made themselves tidy and composed theirfaces into pleasant smiles preparatory to the meeting. But once again noSacks were there. The platform emptied itself just as the great hall ofthe landing-stage had emptied itself, and nobody came to claim theTwinklers. 

"These Sacks, " remarked Anna-Felicitas patiently at last, when it wasfinally plain that there weren't any, "don't seem to have acquired themeeting habit. "

"No, " said Anna-Rose, vexed but relieved. "They're like what Aunt Aliceused to complain about the housemaids, --neither punctual normethodical. "

"But it doesn't matter, " said Anna-Felicitas. "They shall not escape us. I'm getting quite hungry for the Sacks as a result of not having them. We will now proceed to track them to their lair. "

For one instant Anna-Rose looked longingly at the train. It was stillthere. It was going on further and further away from the Sacks. Happytrain. One little jump, and they'd be in it again. But she resisted, andengaged a porter. 

Even as soon as this the twins were far less helpless than they had beenthe day before. The Sack address was in Anna-Rose's hand, and they knewwhat an American porter looked like. The porter and a taxi were engagedwith comparative ease and assurance, and on giving the porter, who hadstaggered beneath the number of their grips, a dime, and seeing a cloudon his face, they doubled it instantly sooner than have trouble, andtrebled it equally quickly on his displaying yet furtherdissatisfaction, and they departed for the Sacks, their grips piled upround them in the taxi as far as their chins, congratulating themselveson how much easier it was to get away from a train than to get into one. 

But the minute their activities were over and they had time to think, silence fell upon them again. They were both nervous. They both composedtheir faces to indifference to hide that they were nervous, examiningthe streets they passed through with a calm and _blasé_ stare worthy ofa lorgnette. It was the tact part of the coming encounter that waschiefly unnerving Anna-Rose, and Anna-Felicitas was dejected by herconviction that nobody who was a friend of Uncle Arthur's could possiblybe agreeable. "By their friends ye shall know them, " thoughtAnna-Felicitas, staring out of the window at the Boston buildings. Alsothe persistence of the Sacks in not being on piers and railway stationswas discouraging. There was no eagerness about this persistence; therewasn't even friendliness. Perhaps they didn't like her and Anna-Rosebeing German. 

This was always the twins' first thought when anybody wasn'tparticularly cordial. Their experiences in England had made them alittle jumpy. They were conscious of this weak spot, and like a hurtfinger it seemed always to be getting in the way and being knocked. Anna-Felicitas once more pondered on the inscrutable behaviour ofProvidence which had led their mother, so safely and admirably English, to leave that blessed shelter and go and marry somebody who wasn't. Ofcourse there was this to be said for it, that she wasn't their motherthen. If she had been, Anna-Felicitas felt sure she wouldn't have. Then, perceiving that her thoughts were getting difficult to follow she gavethem up, and slid her hand through Anna-Rose's arm and gave it asqueeze. 

"Now for the New World, Christopher, " she said, pretending to be veryeager and brave and like the real Columbus, as the taxi stopped. 

CHAPTER XIV

The taxi had stopped in front of a handsome apartment house, and almostbefore it was quiet a boy in buttons darted out across the interveningwide pavement and thrust his face through the window. 

"Who do you want?" he said, or rather jerked out. 

He then saw the contents of the taxi, and his mouth fell open; for itseemed to him that grips and passengers were piled up inside it in aseething mass. 

"We want Mr. And Mrs. Clouston Sack, " said Anna-Rose in her mostgrown-up voice. "They're expecting us. "

"They ain't, " said the boy promptly. 

"They ain't?" repeated Anna-Rose, echoing his language in her surprise. 

"How do you know?" asked Anna-Felicitas. 

"That they ain't? Because they ain't, " said the boy. "I bet you mySunday shirt they ain't. "

The twins stared at him. They were not accustomed in their conversationswith the lower classes to be talked to about shirts. 

The boy seemed extraordinarily vital. His speech was so quick that itflew out with the urgency and haste of squibs going off. 

"Please open the door, " said Anna-Rose recovering herself. "We'll go upand see for ourselves. "

"You won't see, " said the boy. 

"Kindly open the door, " repeated Anna-Rose. 

"You won't see, " he said, pulling it open, "but you can look. If you dosee Sacks up there I'm a Hun. "

The minute the door opened, grips fell out. There were two umbrellas, two coats, a knapsack of a disreputable bulged appearance repugnant toAmerican ideas of baggage which run on big simple lines of huge trunks, an _attaché_ case, a suit case, a hold-all, a basket and a hat-box. Outside beside the driver were two such small and modest trunks thatthey might almost as well have been grips themselves. 

"Do you mind taking those in?" asked Anna-Rose, getting out withdifficulty over the umbrella that had fallen across the doorway, andpointing to the gutter in which the other umbrella and the knapsack layand into which the basket, now that her body no longer kept it in, wasrolling. 

"In where?" crackled the boy. 

"In, " said Anna-Rose severely. "In to wherever Mr. And Mrs. CloustonSack are. "

"It's no good your saying they are when they ain't, " said the boy, increasing the loudness of his crackling. 

"Do you mean they don't live here?" asked Anna-Felicitas, in her turndisentangling herself from that which was still inside the taxi, andimmediately followed on to the pavement by the hold-all and the_attaché_ case. 

"They did live here till yesterday, " said the boy, "but now they don't. One does. But that's not the same as two. Which is what I meant when yousaid they're expecting you and I said they ain't. "

"Do you mean to say--" Anna-Rose stopped with a catch of her breath. "Doyou mean, " she went on in an awe-struck voice, "that one of them--one ofthem is dead?"

"Dead? Bless you, no. Anything but dead. The exact opposite. Gone. Left. Got, " said the boy. 

"Oh, " said Anna-Rose greatly relieved, passing over his last word, whosemeaning escaped her, "oh--you mean just gone to meet us. And missed us. You see, " she said, turning to Anna-Felicitas, "they did try to afterall. "

Anna-Felicitas said nothing, but reflected that whichever Sack had triedto must have a quite unusual gift for missing people. 

"Gone to meet you?" repeated the boy, as one surprised by a new point ofview. "Well, I don't know about that--"

"We'll go up and explain, " said Anna-Rose. "Is it Mr. Or Mrs. CloustonSack who is here?"

"Mr. , " said the boy. 

"Very well then. Please bring in our things. " And Anna-Rose proceeded, followed by Anna-Felicitas, to walk into the house. 

The boy, instead of bringing them in, picked up the articles lying onthe pavement and put them back again into the taxi. "No hurry aboutthem, I guess, " he said to the driver. "Time enough to take them up whenthe gurls ask again--" and he darted after the gurls to hand them overto his colleague who worked what he called the elevator. 

"Why do you call it the elevator, " inquired Anna-Felicitas, mildlyinquisitive, of this boy, who on hearing that they wished to see Mr. Sack stared at them with profound and unblinking interest all the wayup, "when it is really a lift?"

"Because it is an elevator, " said the boy briefly. 

"But we, you see, " said Anna-Felicitas, "are equally convinced that it'sa lift. "

The boy didn't answer this. He was as silent as the other one wasn't;but there was a thrill about him too, something electric and tense. Hestared at Anna-Felicitas, then turned quickly and stared at Anna-Rose, then quickly back to Anna-Felicitas, and so on all the way up. He wasobviously extraordinarily interested. He seemed to have got hold of anidea that had not struck the squib-like boy downstairs, who wasentertaining the taxi-driver with descriptions of the domestic life ofthe Sacks. 

The lift stopped at what the twins supposed was going to be the door ofa landing or public corridor, but it was, they discovered, the actualdoor of the Sack flat. At any moment the Sacks, if they wished to commitsuicide, could do so simply by stepping out of their own front door. They would then fall, infinitely far, on to the roof of the lift lurkingat the bottom. 

The lift-boy pressed a bell, the door opened, and there, at once exposedto the twins, was the square hall of the Sack flat with a manservantstanding in it staring at them. 

Obsessed by his idea, the lift-boy immediately stepped out of his lift, approached the servant, introduced his passengers to him by saying, "Young ladies to see Mr. Sack, " took a step closer, and whispered in hisear, but perfectly audibly to the twins who, however, regarded it assome expression peculiarly American and were left unmoved by it, "Theco-respondents. "

The servant stared uncertainly at them. His mistress had only been gonea few hours, and the flat was still warm with her presence andauthority. She wouldn't, he well knew, have permitted co-respondents tobe about the place if she had been there, but on the other hand shewasn't there. Mr. Sack was in sole possession now. Nobody knew whereMrs. Sack was. Letters and telegrams lay on the table for her unopened, among them Mr. Twist's announcing the arrival of the Twinklers. In hisheart the servant sided with Mr. Sack, but only in his heart, for theservant's wife was the cook, and she, as she frequently explained, wasall for strict monogamy. He stared therefore uncertainly at the twins, his brain revolving round their colossal impudence in coming therebefore Mrs. Sack's rooms had so much as had time to get, as it were, cold. 

"We want to see Mr. Clouston Sack, " began Anna-Rose in her clear littlevoice; and no sooner did she begin to speak than a door was pulled openand the gentleman himself appeared. 

"I heard a noise of arrival--" he said, stopping suddenly when he sawthem. "I heard a noise of arrival, and a woman's voice--"

"It's us, " said Anna-Rose, her face covering itself with the brightconciliatory smiles of the arriving guest. "Are you Mr. Clouston Sack?"

She went up to him and held out her hand. They both went up to him andheld out their hands. 

"We're the Twinklers, " said Anna-Rose. 

"We've come, " said Anna-Felicitas, in case he shouldn't have noticed it. 

Mr. Sack let his hand be shaken, and it was a moist hand. He looked likea Gibson young man who has grown elderly. He had the manly profile andshoulders, but they sagged and stooped. There was a dilapidation abouthim, a look of blurred edges. His hair lay on his forehead in disorder, and his tie had been put on carelessly and had wriggled up to the rim ofhis collar. 

"The Twinklers, " he repeated. "The Twinklers. Do I remember, I wonder?"

"There hasn't been much time to forget, " said Anna-Felicitas. "It'sless than two months since there were all those letters. "

"Letters?" echoed Mr. Sack. "Letters?"

"So now we've got here, " said Anna-Rose, the more brightly that she wasunnerved. 

"Yes. We've come, " said Anna-Felicitas, also with feverish brightness. 

Bewildered, Mr. Sack, who felt that he had had enough to bear the lastfew hours, stood staring at them. Then he caught sight of the lift-boy, lingering and he further saw the expression on his servant's face Evento his bewilderment it was clear what he was thinking. 

Mr. Sack turned round quickly and led the way into the dining-room. "Come in, come in, " he said distractedly. 

They went in. He shut the door. The lift-boy and the servant lingered amoment making faces at each other; then the lift-boy dropped away in hislift, and the servant retired to the kitchen. "I'm darned, " was all hecould articulate. "I'm darned. "

"There's our luggage, " said Anna-Rose, turning to Mr. Sack on gettinginside the room, her voice gone a little shrill in her determinedcheerfulness. "Can it be brought up?"

"Luggage?" repeated Mr. Sack, putting his hand to his forehead. "Excuseme, but I've got such a racking headache to-day--it makes me stupid--"

"Oh, I'm _very_ sorry, " said Anna-Rose solicitously. 

"And so am I--_very_, " said Anna-Felicitas, equally solicitous. "Haveyou tried aspirin? Sometimes some simple remedy like that--"

"Oh thank you--it's good of you, it's good of you. The effect, you see, is that I can't think very clearly. But do tell me--why luggage?Luggage--luggage. You mean, I suppose, baggage. "

"Why luggage?" asked Anna-Rose nervously. "Isn't there--isn't therealways luggage in America too when people come to stay with one?"

"You've come to stay with me, " said Mr. Sack, putting his hand to hisforehead again. 

"You see, " said Anna-Felicitas, "we're the Twinklers. "

"Yes, yes--I know. You've told me that. "

"So naturally we've come. "

"But _is_ it natural?" asked Mr. Sack, looking at them distractedly. 

"We sent you a telegram, " said Anna-Rose, "or rather one to Mrs. Sack, which is the same thing--"

"It isn't, it isn't, " said the distressed Mr. Sack. "I wish it were. Itought to be. Mrs. Sack isn't here--"

"Yes--we're very sorry to have missed her. Did she go to meet us in NewYork, or where?"

"Mrs. Sack didn't go to meet you. She's--gone. "

"Gone where?"

"Oh, " cried Mr. Sack, "somewhere else, but not to meet you. Oh, " he wenton after a moment in which, while the twins gazed at him, he fought withand overcame emotion, "when I heard you speaking in the hall Ithought--I had a moment's hope--for a minute I believed--she had comeback. So I went out. Else I couldn't have seen you. I'm not fit to seestrangers--"

The things Mr. Sack said, and his fluttering, unhappy voice, were somuch at variance with the stern lines of his Gibson profile that thetwins viewed him with the utmost surprise. They came to no conclusionand passed no judgment because they didn't know but what if one was anAmerican one naturally behaved like that. 

"I don't think, " said Anna-Felicitas gently, "that you can call usstrangers. We're the Twinklers. "

"Yes, yes--I know--you keep on telling me that, " said Mr. Sack. "But Ican't call to mind--"

"Don't you remember all Uncle Arthur's letters about us? We're thenieces he asked you to be kind to for a bit--as I'm sure, "Anna-Felicitas added politely, "you're admirably adapted for being. "

Mr. Sack turned his bewildered eyes on to her. "Oh, aren't you a prettygirl, " he said, in the same distressed voice. 

"You mustn't make her vain, " said Anna-Rose, trying not to smile allover her face, while Anna-Felicitas remained as manifestly unvain as aperson intent on something else would be. 

"We know you got Uncle Arthur's letters about us, " she continued, "because he showed us your answers back. You invited us to come and staywith you. And, as you perceive, we've done it. "

"Then it must have been months ago--months ago, " said Mr. Sack, "beforeall this--do I remember something about it? I've had such troublesince--I've been so distracted one way and another--it may have slippedaway out of my memory under the stress--Mrs. Sack--" He paused andlooked round the room helplessly. "Mrs. Sack--well, Mrs. Sack isn't herenow. "

"We're _very_ sorry you've had trouble, " said Anna-Felicitassympathetically. "It's what everybody has, though. Man that is born ofwoman is full of misery. That's what the Burial Service says, and itought to know. "

Mr. Sack again turned bewildered eyes on to her. "Oh, aren't you apretty--" he again began. 

"When do you think Mrs. Sack will be back?" interrupted Anna-Rose. 

"I wish I knew--I wish I could hope--but she's gone for a long while, I'm afraid--"

"Gone not to come back at all, do you mean?" asked Anna-Felicitas. 

Mr. Sack gulped. "I'm afraid that is her intention, " he said miserably. 

There was a silence, in which they all stood looking at each other. 

"Didn't she like you?" then inquired Anna-Felicitas. 

Anna-Rose, sure that this wasn't tactful, gave her sleeve a little pull. 

"Were you unkind to her?" asked Anna-Felicitas, disregarding thewarning. 

Mr. Sack, his fingers clasping and unclasping themselves behind hisback, started walking up and down the room. Anna-Felicitas, forgetful ofwhat Aunt Alice would have said, sat down on the edge of the table andbegan to be interested in Mrs. Sack. 

"The wives I've seen, " she remarked, watching Mr. Sack with friendly andinterested eyes, "who were chiefly Aunt Alice--that's Uncle Arthur'swife, the one we're the nieces of--seemed to put up with the utmostcontumely from their husbands and yet didn't budge. You must have beensomething awful to yours. "

"I worshipped Mrs. Sack, " burst out Mr. Sack. "I worshipped her. I doworship her. She was the handsomest, brightest woman in Boston. I was asproud of her as any man has ever been of his wife. "

"Then why did she go?" asked Anna-Felicitas. 

"I don't think that's the sort of thing you should ask, " rebukedAnna-Rose. 

"But if I don't ask I won't be told, " said Ann Felicitas, "and I'minterested. "

"Mrs. Sack went because I was able--I was so constructed--that I couldbe fond of other people as well as of her, " said Mr. Sack. 

"Well, _that's_ nothing unusual, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"No, " said Anna-Rose, "I don't see anything in that. "

"I think it shows a humane and friendly spirit, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Besides, it's enjoined in the Bible, " said Anna-Rose. 

"I'm sure when we meet Mrs. Sack, " said Anna-Felicitas very politelyindeed, "much as we expect to like her we shall nevertheless continue tolike other people as well. You, for instance. Will she mind that?"

"It wasn't so much that I liked other people, " said Mr. Sack, walkingabout and thinking tumultuously aloud rather than addressing anybody, "but that I liked other people so _much_. "

"I see, " said Anna-Felicitas, nodding. "You overdid it. Like over-eatingwhipped cream. Only it wasn't you but Mrs. Sack who got the resultingache. "

"And aren't I aching? Aren't I suffering?"

"Yes, but you did the over-eating, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"The world, " said the unhappy Mr. Sack, quickening his pace, "is so fullof charming and delightful people. Is one to shut one's eyes to them?"

"Of course not, " said Anna-Felicitas. "One must love them. "

"Yes, yes, " said Mr. Sack. "Exactly. That's what I did. "

"And though I wouldn't wish, " said Anna-Felicitas, "to say anythingagainst somebody who so very nearly was my hostess, yet really, youknow, wasn't Mrs. Sack's attitude rather churlish?"

Mr. Sack gazed at her. "Oh, aren't you a pretty--" he began again, with a kind of agonized enthusiasm; but he was again cut short byAnna-Rose, on whom facts of a disturbing nature were beginning to press. 

"Aunt Alice, " she said, looking and feeling extremely perturbed as thesituation slowly grew clear to her, "told us we were never to stay withpeople whose wives are somewhere else. Unless they have a mother orother female relative living with them. She was most particular aboutit, and said whatever else we did we weren't ever to do this. So I'mafraid, " she continued in her politest voice, determined to behavebeautifully under circumstances that were trying, "much as we shouldhave enjoyed staying with you and Mrs. Sack if she had been here to staywith, seeing that she isn't we manifestly can't. "

"You can't stay with me, " murmured Mr. Sack, turning his bewildered eyesto her. "Were you going to?"

"Of course we were going to. It's what we've come for, " saidAnna-Felicitas. 

"And I'm afraid, " said-Anna-Rose, "disappointed as we are, unless youcan produce a mother--"

"But where on earth are we to go to, Anna-R. ?" inquired Anna-Felicitas, who, being lazy, having got to a place preferred if possible to stay init, and who besides was sure that in their forlorn situation a Sack inthe hand was worth two Sacks not in it, any day. Also she liked the lookof Mr. Sack, in spite of his being so obviously out of repair. He badlywanted doing up she said to herself, but on the other hand he seemed toher lovable in his distress, with much of the pathetic helplessness herown dear Irish terrier, left behind in Germany, had had the day hecaught his foot in a rabbit trap. He had looked at Anna-Felicitas, whileshe was trying to get him out of it, with just the same expression onhis face that Mr. Sack had on his as he walked about the room twistingand untwisting his fingers behind his back. Only, her Irish terrierhadn't had a Gibson profile. Also, he had looked much more efficient. 

"Can't you by any chance produce a mother?" she asked. 

Mr. Sack stared at her. 

"Of course we're very sorry, " said Anna-Rose. 

Mr. Sack stared at her. 

"But you understand, I'm sure, that under the circumstances--"

"Do you say, " said Mr. Sack, stopping still after a few more turns infront of Anna-Rose, and making a great effort to collect his thoughts, "that I--that we--had arranged to look after you?"

"Arranged with Uncle Arthur, " said Anna-Rose. "Uncle Arthur Abinger. Ofcourse you had. That's why we're here. Why, you wrote bidding uswelcome. He showed us the letter. "

"Abinger. Abinger. Oh--_that_ man, " said Mr. Sack, his mind clearing. 

"We thought you'd probably feel like that about him, " saidAnna-Felicitas sympathetically. 

"Why, then, " said Mr. Sack, his mind getting suddenly quite clear, "youmust be--why, you _are_ the Twinklers. "

"We've been drawing your attention to that at frequent intervals sincewe got here, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"But whether you now remember or still don't realize, " said Anna-Rosewith great firmness, "I'm afraid we've got to say good-bye. "

"That's all very well, Anna-R. , " again protested Anna-Felicitas, "butwhere are we to go to?"

"Go?" said Anna-Rose with a dignity very creditable in one of her size, "Ultimately to California, of course, to Uncle Arthur's other friends. But now, this afternoon, we get back into a train and go to Clark, toMr. Twist. He at least has a mother. "

CHAPTER XV

And so it came about that just as the reunited Twists, mother, son anddaughter, were sitting in the drawing-room, a little tired after a longafternoon of affection, waiting for seven o'clock to strike and, withthe striking, Amanda the head maid to appear and announce supper, butwaiting with lassitude, for they had not yet recovered from an elaboratewelcoming dinner, the Twinklers, in the lovely twilight of a golden day, were hastening up the winding road from the station towards them. Silent, and a little exhausted, the unconscious Twists sat in theirdrawing-room, a place of marble and antimacassars, while these lightfigures, their shoes white with the dust of a country-side that had hadno rain for weeks, sped every moment nearer. 

The road wound gently upwards through fields and woods, through quiet, delicious evening country, and there was one little star twinklingencouragingly at the twins from over where they supposed Clark would be. At the station there had been neither porter nor conveyance, nor indeedanybody or anything at all except themselves, their luggage, and a thin, kind man who represented authority. Clark is two miles away from itsstation, and all the way to it is uninhabited. Just at the station are acluster of those hasty buildings America flings down in out-of-the-wayplaces till she shall have leisure to make a splendid city; but the roadimmediately curved away from these up into solitude and the evening sky. 

"You can't miss it, " encouraged the station-master. "Keep right alongafter your noses till they knock up against Mrs. Twist's front gate. I'll look after the menagerie--" thus did he describe the Twinklerluggage. "Guess Mrs. Twist'll be sending for it as soon as you getthere. Guess she forgot you. Guess she's shaken up by young Mr. Twist'sarriving this very day. _I_ wouldn't have forgotten you. No, not for adozen young Mr. Twists, " he added gallantly. 

"Why do you call him young Mr. Twist, " inquired Anna-Felicitas, "when heisn't? He must be at least thirty or forty or fifty. "

"You see, we know him quite well, " said Anna-Rose proudly, as theywalked off. "He's a _great_ friend of ours. "

"You don't say, " said the station-master, who was chewing gum; and asthe twins had not yet seen this being done they concluded he had beeninterrupted in the middle of a meal by the arrival of the train. 

"Now mind, " he called after them, "you do whatever the road does. Giveyourselves up to it, and however much it winds about stick to it. You'llmeet other roads, but don't you take any notice of them. "

Freed from their luggage, and for a moment from all care, the twins wentup the hill. It was the nicest thing in the world to be going to seetheir friend again in quite a few minutes. They had, ever since thecollapse of the Sack arrangements, been missing him very much. As theyhurried on through the scented woods, past quiet fields, betweenyellow-leaved hedges, the evening sky growing duskier and the beckoningstar lighter, they remembered Mr. Twist's extraordinary kindness, hisdevoted and unfailing care, with the warmest feelings of gratitude andaffection. Even Anna-Felicitas felt warm. How often had he rearrangedher head when it was hopelessly rolling about; how often had he fed herwhen she felt better enough to be hungry. Anna-Felicitas was veryhungry. She still thought highly of pride and independence, but nowconsidered their proper place was after a good meal. And Anna-Rose, withall the shameless cheerfulness of one who for a little has got rid ofher pride and is feeling very much more comfortable in consequenceremarked that one mustn't overdo independence. 

"Let's hurry, " said Anna-Felicitas. "I'm so dreadfully hungry. I do soterribly want supper. And I'm sure it's supper-time, and the Twists willhave finished and we mightn't get any. "

"As though Mr. Twist wouldn't see to that!" exclaimed Anna-Rose, proudand confident. 

But she did begin to run, for she too was very hungry, and they racedthe rest of the way; which is why they arrived on the Twist doorsteppanting, and couldn't at first answer Amanda the head maid's surprisedand ungarnished inquiry as to what they wanted, when she opened the doorand found them there. 

"We want Mr. Twist, " said Anna-Rose, as soon as she could speak. 

Amanda eyed them. "You from the village?" she asked, thinking perhapsthey might be a deputation of elder school children sent to recitewelcoming poems to Mr. Twist on his safe return from the seat of war. Yet she knew all the school children and everybody else in Clark, andnone of them were these. 

"No--from the station, " panted Anna-Rose. 

"We didn't see any village, " panted Anna-Felicitas. 

"We want Mr. Twist please, " said Anna-Rose struggling with her breath. 

Amanda eyed them. "Having supper, " she said curtly. 

"Fortunate creature, " gasped Anna-Felicitas, "I hope he isn't eating itall. "

"Will you announce us please?" said Anna-Rose putting on her dignity. "The Miss Twinklers. "

"The who?" said Amanda. 

"The Miss Twinklers, " said Anna-Rose, putting on still more dignity, forthere was that in Amanda's manner which roused the Junker in her. 

"Can't disturb him at supper, " said Amanda briefly. 

"I assure you, " said Anna-Felicitas, with the earnestness of conviction, "that he'll like it. I think I can undertake to promise he'll show noresentment whatever. "

Amanda half shut the door. 

"We'll come in please, " said Anna-Rose, inserting herself into what wasleft of the opening. "Will you kindly bear in mind that we're totallyunaccustomed to the doorstep?"

Amanda, doubtful, but unpractised in such a situation, permittedherself, in spite of having as she well knew the whole of free and equalAmerica behind her, to be cowed. Well, perhaps not cowed, but takenaback. It was the long words and the awful politeness that did it. Shewasn't used to beautiful long words like that, except on Sundays whenthe clergyman read the prayers in church, and she wasn't used topoliteness. That so much of it should come out of objects so youngrendered Amanda temporarily dumb. 

She wavered with the door. Instantly Anna-Rose slipped through it;instantly Anna-Felicitas followed her. 

"Kindly tell your master the Miss Twinklers have arrived, " saidAnna-Rose, looking every inch a Junker. There weren't many inches ofAnna-Rose, but every one of them at that moment, faced by Amanda's wantof discipline, was sheer Junker. 

Amanda, who had never met a Junker in her happy democratic life, wasstirred into bristling emotion by the word master. She was about tofling the insult of it from her by an impetuous and ill-consideredassertion that if he was her master she was his mistress and so therenow, when the bell which had rung once already since they had beenstanding parleying rang again and more impatiently, and the dining-roomdoor opened and a head appeared. The twins didn't know that it wasEdith's head, but it was. 

"Amanda--" began Edith, in the appealing voice that was the nearestshe ever dared get to rebuke without Amanda giving notice; but shestopped on seeing what, in the dusk of the hall, looked like a crowd. "Oh--" said Edith, taken aback. "Oh--" And was for withdrawing her headand shutting the door. 

But the twins advanced towards her and the stream of light shiningbehind her and the agreeable smell streaming past her, with outstretchedhands. 

"How do you do, " they both said cordially. "_Don't_ go away again. "

Edith, feeling that here was something to protect her quietly feedingmother from, came rather hastily through the door and held it to behindher, while her unresponsive and surprised hand was taken and shaken evenas Mr. Sack's had been. 

"We've come to see Mr. Twist, " said Anna-Rose. 

"He's our friend, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"He's our best friend, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Is he in there?" asked Anna-Felicitas, appreciatively moving her nose, a particularly delicate instrument, round among the various reallyheavenly smells that were issuing from the dining-room and sorting themout and guessing what they probably represented, the while water rushedinto her mouth. 

The sound of a chair being hastily pushed back was heard and Mr. Twistsuddenly appeared in the doorway. 

"What is it, Edward?" a voice inside said. 

Mr. Twist was a pale man, whose skin under no circumstances changedcolour except in his ears. These turned red when he was stirred, andthey were red now, and seemed translucent with the bright light behindhim shining through them. 

The twins flew to him. It was wonderful how much pleased they were tosee him again. It was as if for years they had been separated from theirdearest friend. The few hours since the night before had been enough toturn their friendship and esteem for him into a warm proprietaryaffection. They felt that Mr. Twist belonged to them. EvenAnna-Felicitas felt it, and her eyes as she beheld him were bright withpleasure. 

"Oh there you are, " cried Anna-Rose darting forward, gladness in hervoice, and catching hold of his arm. 

"We've come, " said Anna-Felicitas, beaming and catching hold of hisother arm. 

"We got into difficulties, " said Anna-Rose. 

"We got into them at once, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"They weren't our difficulties--"

"They were the Sacks'--"

"But they reacted on us--"

"And so here we are. "

"Who is it, Edward?" asked the voice inside. 

"Mrs. Sack ran away yesterday from Mr. Sack, " went on Anna-Rose eagerly. 

"Mr. Sack was still quite warm and moist from it when we got there, "said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Aunt Alice said we weren't ever to stay in a house where they didthat, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Where there wasn't a lady, " said Anna-Felicitas

"So when we saw that she wasn't there because she'd gone, we turnedstraight round to you, " said Anna. Rose. 

"Like flowers turning to the sun, " said Anna-Felicitas, even in thatmoment of excitement not without complacency at her own aptness. 

"And left our things at the station, " Anna-Rose rushed on. 

"And ran practically the whole way, " said Anna-Felicitas, "because ofperhaps being late for supper and you're having eaten it all, and we sodreadfully hungry--"

"Who is it, Edward?" again called the voice inside, louder and moreinsistently. 

Mr. Twist didn't answer. He was quickly turning over the situation inhis mind. 

He had not mentioned the twins to his mother, which would have beennatural, seeing how very few hours he had of reunion with her, if shehadn't happened to have questioned him particularly as to hisfellow-passengers on the boat. Her questions had been confined to thefirst-class passengers, and he had said, truthfully, that he had hardlyspoken to one of them, and not at all to any of the women. 

Mrs. Twist had been relieved, for she lived in dread of Edward'sbecoming, as she put it to herself, entangled with ladies. Sin would bebad enough--for Mrs. Twist was obliged reluctantly to know that evenwith ladies it is possible to sin--but marriage for Edward would be evenworse, because it lasted longer. Sin, terrible though it was, had atleast this to be said for it, that it could be repented of and donewith, and repentance after all was a creditable activity; but there wasno repenting of marriage with any credit. It was a holy thing, and youdon't repent of holy things, --at least, you oughtn't to. If, asill-advised young men so often would, Edward wanted as years went on tomarry in spite of his already having an affectionate and sympathetichome with feminine society in it, then it seemed to Mrs. Twist mostimportant, most vital to the future comfort of the family, that itshould be someone she had chosen herself. She had observed him frominfancy, and knew much better than he what was needed for his happiness;and she also knew, if there must be a wife, what was needed for thehappiness of his mother and sister. She had not thought to inquire aboutthe second-class passengers, for it never occurred to her that a son ofhers could drift out of his natural first-class sphere into the slums ofa ship, and Mr. Twist had seen no reason for hurrying the Twinklers intoher mental range. Not during those first hours, anyhow. There would beplenty of hours, and he felt that sufficient unto the day would be theTwinklers thereof. 

But the part that was really making his ears red was that he had saidnothing about the evening with the twins in New York. When his motherasked with the fondness of the occasion what had detained him, he saidas many another honest man, pressed by the searching affection ofrelations, has said before him, that it was business. Now it appearedthat he would have to go into the dining-room and say, "No. It wasn'tbusiness. It was these. "

His ears glowed just to think of it. He hated to lie. Specially he hatedto have lied, --at the moment, one plunged in spurred by suddennecessity, and then was left sorrowfully contemplating one'sdegradation. His own desire was always to be candid; but his mother, hewell knew, could not bear the pains candour gave her. She had been soterribly hurt, so grievously wounded when, fresh from praying, --forbefore he went to Harvard he used to pray--he had on one or twooccasions for a few minutes endeavoured not to lie to her that sheerfright at the effect of his unfiliality made him apologize and beg herto forget it and forgive him. Now she was going to be still more woundedby his having lied. 

The meticulous tortuousness of family life struck Mr. Twist with asudden great impatience. After that large life over there in France, tocome back to this dreary petticoat lying, this feeling one's way aboutamong tender places . . . 

"Who is it, Edward?" called the voice inside for the third time. 

"There's someone in there seems quite particularly to want to know whowe are, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Why not tell her?"

"I expect it's your mother, " said Anna-Rose, feeling the fullsatisfaction of having got to a house from which the lady hadn't runanywhere. 

"It is, " said Mr. Twist briefly. 

"Edith!" called the voice, much more peremptorily. 

Edith started and half went in, but hesitated and quite stayed out. Shewas gazing at the Twinklers with the same kind eyes her brother had, but without the disfiguring spectacles. Astonishment and perplexity andanxiety were mixed with the kindness. Amanda also gazed; and if thetwins hadn't been so sure of their welcome, even they might graduallyhave begun to perceive that it wasn't exactly open-armed. 

"Edith--Edward--Amanda, " called the voice, this time with unmistakableanger. 

For one more moment Mr. Twist stood uncertain, looking down at the happyconfident faces turned up to him exactly, as Anna-Felicitas had justsaid, like flowers turning to the sun. Visions of France flashed beforehim, visions of what he had known, what he had just come back from. Hisfriends over there, the gay courage, the helpfulness, the ready, uninquiring affection, the breadth of outlook, the quick friendliness, the careless assumption that one was decent, that one's intentions weregood, --why shouldn't he pull some of the splendid stuff into his poor, lame little home? Why should he let himself drop back from heights likethose to the old ridiculous timidities, the miserable habit of avoidingthe truth? Rebellion, hope, determination, seized Mr. Twist. His eyesshone behind his spectacles. His ears were two red flags of revolution. He gripped hold of the twins, one under each arm. 

"You come right in, " he said, louder than he had ever spoken in hislife. "Edith, see these girls? They're the two Annas. Their other nameis Twinkler, but Anna'll see you through. They want supper, and theywant beds, and they want affection, and they're going to get it all. Sohustle with the food, and send the Cadillac for their baggage, and fixup things for them as comfortably as you know how. And as for Mrs. Sack, " he said, looking first at one twin and then at the other, "if ithadn't been for her running away from her worthless husband--I'mconvinced that fellow Sack is worthless--you might never have come hereat all. So you see, " he finished, laughing at Anna-Rose, "how good comesout of evil. "

And with the sound of these words preceding him he pushed open thedining-room door and marched them in. 

CHAPTER XVI

At the head of the table sat his mother; long, straight, and grave. Shewas in the seat of authority, the one with its back to the windows andits face to the door, from whence she could see what everybody did, especially Amanda. Having seen what Amanda did, she then complained toEdith. She didn't complain direct to Amanda, because Amanda could anddid give notice. 

Her eyes were fixed on the door. Between it and her was the table, covered with admirable things to eat, it being supper and therefore, according to a Twist tradition surviving from penurious days, all thefood, hot and cold, sweet and salt, being brought in together, andAmanda only attending when rung for. Half-eaten oyster patties lay onMrs. Twist's plate. In her glass neglected champagne had bubbled itselfflat. Her hand still held her fork, but loosely, as an object that hadlost its interest, and her eyes and ears for the last five minutes hadnot departed from the door. 

At first she had felt mere resigned annoyance that Amanda shouldn't haveanswered the bell, but she didn't wish to cast a shadow over Edward'shomecoming by drawing poor Edith's attention before him to how verybadly she trained the helps, and therefore she said nothing at themoment; then, when Edith, going in search of Amanda, had opened the doorand let in sounds of argument, she was surprised, for she knew no one sointimately that they would be likely to call at such an hour; but whenEdward too leapt up, and went out and stayed out and failed to answerher repeated calls, she was first astonished, then indignant, and thensuddenly was overcome by a cold foreboding. 

Mrs. Twist often had forebodings, and they were always cold. They seizedher with bleak fingers; and one of Edith's chief functions was tocomfort and reassure her for as long a while each time as was requiredto reach the stage of being able to shake them off. Here was one, however, too icily convincing to be shaken off. It fell upon her withthe swiftness of a revelation. Something unpleasant was going to happento her; something perhaps worse than unpleasant, --disastrous. Andsomething immediate. 

Those excited voices out in the hall, --they were young, surely, and theywere feminine. Also they sounded most intimate with Edward. What had hebeen concealing from her? What disgracefulness had penetrated throughhim, through the son the neighbourhood thought so much of, into her veryhome? She was a widow. He was her only son. Impossible to believe hewould betray so sacred a position, that he whom she had so lovingly andproudly welcomed a few hours before would allow his--well, she reallydidn't know what to call them, but anyhow female friends of whom she hadbeen told nothing, to enter that place which to every decent human beingis inviolable, his mother's home. Yet Mrs. Twist did instantly believeit. 

Then Edward's voice, raised and defiant--surely defiant?--came throughthe crack in the door, and every word he said was quite distinct. Anna;supper; affection . . . Mrs. Twist sat frozen. And then the door wasflung open and Edward tumultuously entered, his ears crimson, his faceas she had never seen it and in each hand, held tightly by the arm, agirl. 

Edward had been deceiving her. 

"Mother--" he began. 

"How do you do, " said the girls together, and actually with smiles. 

Edward had been deceiving her. That whole afternoon how quiet he hadbeen, how listless. Quite gentle, quite affectionate, but listless anduntalkative. She had thought he must be tired; worn out with his longjourney across from Europe. She had made allowances for him; beensympathetic, been considerate. And look at him now. Never had she seenhim with a face like that. He was--Mrs. Twist groped for the word andreluctantly found it--rollicking. Yes; that was the word that exactlydescribed him--rollicking. If she hadn't observed his languor up to afew minutes ago at supper, and seen him with her own eyes refusechampagne and turn his back on cocktails, she would have been forced tothe conclusion, dreadful though it was to a mother, that he had beendrinking. And the girls! Two of them. And so young. 

Mrs. Twist had known Edward, as she sometimes informed Edith, all hislife, and had not yet found anything in his morals which was notblameless. Watch him with what loving care she might she had foundnothing; and she was sure her mother's instinct would not have failedher. Nevertheless, even with that white past before her--he hadn't toldher about "Madame Bovary"--she now instantly believed the worst. 

It was the habit of Clark to believe the worst. Clark was very small, and therefore also very virtuous. Each inhabitant was the carefulguardian of his neighhour's conduct. Nobody there ever did anythingthat was wrong; there wasn't a chance. But as Nature insists on abalance, the minds of Clark dwelt curiously on evil. They were mindsactive in suspicion. They leapt with an instantaneous agility at theworst conclusions. Nothing was ever said in Clark, but everything wasthought. The older inhabitants, made fast prisoners in their mould ofvirtue by age, watched with jealous care the behaviour of those stillyoung enough to attract temptation. The younger ones, brought up ininhibitions, settled down to wakefulness in regard to each other. Everything was provided and encouraged in Clark, a place of pleasantorchards and gentle fields, except the things that had to do with love. Husbands were there; and there was a public library, and socialafternoons, and an Emerson society. The husbands died before the wives, being less able to cope with virtue; and a street in Clark of smallerhouses into which their widows gravitated had been christened by thestationmaster--a more worldly man because of his three miles off and allthe trains--Lamentation Lane. 

In this village Mrs. Twist had lived since her marriage, full of dignityand honour. As a wife she had been full of it, for the elder Mr. Twisthad been good even when alive, and as a widow she had been still fuller, for the elder Mr. Twist positively improved by being dead. Not a breathhad ever touched her and her children. Not the most daring anddistrustful Clark mind had ever thought of her except respectfully. Andnow here was this happening to her; at her age; when she was least ableto bear it. 

She sat in silence, staring with sombre eyes at the three figures. 

"Mother--" began Edward again; but was again interrupted by thetwins, who said together, as they had now got into the habit of sayingwhen confronted by silent and surprised Americans, "We've come. "

It wasn't that they thought it a particularly good conversationalopening, it was because silence and surprise on the part of the otherperson seemed to call for explanation on theirs, and they wereconstitutionally desirous of giving all the information in their power. 

"How do you do, " they then repeated, loosening themselves from Mr. Twistand advancing down the room with outstretched hands. 

Mr. Twist came with them. "Mother, " he said, "these are the Twinklergirls. Their name's Twinkler. They---"

Freed as he felt he was from his old bonds, determined as he felt he wason emulating the perfect candour and simplicity of the twins and theperfect candour and simplicity of his comrades in France, his mother'sdead want of the smallest reaction to this announcement tripped him upfor a moment and prevented his going on. 

But nothing ever prevented the twins going on. If they were pleased andexcited they went on with cheerful gusto, and if they were unnerved andfrightened they still went on, --perhaps even more volubly, anxiouslyseeking cover behind a multitude of words. 

Mrs. Twist had not yet unnerved and frightened them, because they weretoo much delighted that they had got to her at all. The relief Anna-Roseexperienced at having safely piloted that difficult craft, the clumsy ifadorable Columbus, into a respectable Port was so immense that itimmediately vented itself in words of warmest welcome to the lady in thechair to her own home. 

"We're _so_ glad to see you here, " she said, smiling till her dimpleseemed to be everywhere at once hardly able to refrain from giving thelady a welcome hug instead of just inhospitably shaking her hand. Shecouldn't even shake her hand, however, because it still held, immovably, the fork. "It would have been too awful, " Anna-Rose therefore finished, putting the heartiness of the handshake she wanted to give into hervoice instead, "if _you_ had happened to have run away too. "

"As Mrs. Sack has done from her husband, " Anna-Felicitas explained, smiling too, benevolently, at the black lady who actually having gotoyster patties on her plate hadn't bothered to eat them. "But of courseyou couldn't, " she went on, remembering in time to be tactful and make aSympathetic reference to the lady's weeds; which, indeed, consideringMr. Twist had told her and Anna-Rose that his father had died when hewas ten, nearly a quarter of a century ago, seemed to have kept theirheads up astonishingly and stayed very fresh. And true to her Germantraining, and undaunted by the fork, she did that which Anna-Rose in hercontentment had forgotten, and catching up Mrs. Twist's right hand, forkand all, to her lips gave it the brief ceremonious kiss of a wellbrought up Junker. 

Like Amanda's, Mrs. Twist's life had been up to this empty of Junkers. She had never even heard of them till the war, and pronounced theirname, and so did the rest of Clark following her lead, as if it had beenjunket, only with an r instead of a t at the end. She didn't thereforerecognize the action; but even she, outraged as she was, could not butsee its grace. And looking up in sombre hostility at the little headbent over her hand and at the dark line of eyelashes on the the flushedface, she thought swiftly, "_She's_ the one. "

"You see, mother, " said Mr. Twist, pulling a chair vigorously andsitting on it with determination, "it's like this. (Sit down, you two, and get eating. Start on anything you see in this show that hits yourfancy. Edith'll be fetching you something hot, I expect--soup, orsomething--but meanwhile here's enough stuff to go on with. ) You see, mother--" he resumed, turning squarely to her, while the twins obeyedhim with immense alacrity and sat down and began to eat whateverhappened to be nearest them, "these two girls--well, to start withthey're twins--"

Mr. Twist was stopped again by his mother's face. She couldn't conceivewhy he should lie. Twins the world over matched in size and features; itwas notorious that they did. Also, it was the custom for them to matchin age, and the tall one of these was at least a year older than theother one. But still, thought Mrs. Twist, let that pass. She wouldsuffer whatever it was she had to suffer in silence. 

The twins too were silent, because they were so busy eating. Perfectlyat home under the wing they knew so well, they behaved with an easynaturalness that appeared to Mrs. Twist outrageous. But still--let thattoo pass. These strangers helped themselves and helped each other, as ifeverything belonged to them; and the tall one actually asked her--her, the mistress of the house--if she could get _her_ anything. Well, letthat pass too. 

"You see, mother--" began Mr. Twist again. 

He was finding it extraordinarily difficult. What a tremendous holdone's early training had on one, he reflected, casting about for words;what a deeply rooted fear there was in one, subconscious, lurking inone's foundations, of one's mother, of her authority, of her quicklywounded affection. Those Jesuits, with their conviction that they coulddo what they liked with a man if they had had the bringing up of himtill he was seven, were pretty near the truth. It took a lot of shakingoff, the unquestioning awe, the habit of obedience of one's childhood. 

Mr. Twist sat endeavouring to shake it off. He also tried to bolsterhimself up by thinking he might perhaps be able to assist his mother tocome out from her narrowness, and discover too how warm and glorious thesun shone outside, where people loved and helped each other. Then herejected that as priggish. 

"You see, mother, " he started again, "I came across them--across thesetwo girls--they're both called Anna, by the way, which seems confusingbut isn't really--I came across them on the boat----"

He again stopped dead. 

Mrs. Twist had turned her dark eyes to him. They had been fixed onAnna-Felicitas, and on what she was doing with the dish of oysterpatties in front of her. What she was doing was not what Mrs. Twist wasaccustomed to see done at her table. Anna-Felicitas was behaving badlywith the patties, and not even attempting to conceal, as the decent do, how terribly they interested her. 

"You came across them on the boat, " repeated Mrs. Twist, her eyes on herson, moved in spite of her resolution to speech. And he had told herthat very afternoon that he had spoken to nobody except men. Anotherlie. Well, let that pass too . . . 

Mr. Twist sat staring back at her through his big gleaming spectacles. He well knew the weakness of his position from his mother's point ofview; but why should she have such a point of view, such a niggling, narrow one, determined to stay angry and offended because he had beenstupid enough to continue, under the influence of her presence, the oldsystem of not being candid with her, of being slavishly anxious to avoidoffending? Let her try for once to understand and forgive. Let her foronce take the chance offered her of doing a big, kind thing. But as hestared at her it entered his mind that he couldn't very well startmoving her heart on behalf of the twins in their presence. He couldn'ttell her they were orphans, alone in the world, helpless, poor, and sounfortunately German, with them sitting there. If he did, there would betrouble. The twins seemed absorbed for the moment in getting fed, but hehad no doubt their ears were attentive, and at the first suggestion ofsympathy being invoked for them they would begin to say a few of thosethings he was so much afraid his mother mightn't be able to understand. Or, if she understood, appreciate. 

He decided that he would be quiet until Edith came back, and then askhis mother to go to the drawing-room with him, and while Edith waslooking after the Annas he would, well out of earshot, explain them tohis mother, describe their situation, commend them to her patience andher love. He sat silent therefore, wishing extraordinarily hard thatEdith would be quick. 

But Anna-Felicitas's eyes were upon him now, as well as his mother's. "Is it possible, " she asked with her own peculiar gentleness, balancinga piece of patty on her fork, "that you haven't yet mentioned us to yourmother?"

And Anna-Rose, struck in her turn at such an omission, paused too withfood on the way to her mouth, and said, "And we such friends?"

"Almost, as it were, still red-not from being with you?" saidAnna-Felicitas. 

Both the twins looked at Mrs. Twist in their surprise. 

"I thought the first thing everybody did when they got back to theirmother, " said Anna-Rose, addressing her, "was to tell her everythingfrom the beginning. "

Mrs. Twist, after an instant's astonishment at this unexpected support, bowed her head--it could hardly be called a nod--in her son's direction. "You see--" the movement seemed to say, "even these . . . "

"And ever since the first day at sea, " said Anna-Felicitas, alsoaddressing Mrs. Twist, "up to as recently as eleven o'clock last night, he has been what I think can be quite accurately described as ourfaithful two-footed companion. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose. "As much as that we've been friends. Practicallyinseparable. "

"So that it really is _very_ surprising, " said Anna-Felicitas to Mr. Twist, "that you didn't tell your mother about us. "

Mr. Twist got up. He wouldn't wait for Edith. It was unhealthy in thatroom. 

He took his mother's arm and helped her to get up. "You're very wise, you two, " he flung at the twins in the voice of the goaded, "but you maytake it from me you don't know everything yet. Mother, come into thedrawing-room, and we'll talk. Edith'll see to these girls. I expect Iought to have talked sooner, " he went on, as he led her to the door, "but confound it all, I've only been home about a couple of hours. "

"Five, " said Mrs. Twist. 

"Five then. What's five? No time at all. "

"Ample, " said Mrs Twist; adding icily, "and did I you say confound, Edward?"

"Well, damn then, " said Edward very loud, in a rush of rank rebellion. 

CHAPTER XVII

This night was the turning-point in Mr. Twist's life. In it he brokeloose from his mother. He spent a terrible three hours with her in thedrawing-room, and the rest of the night he strode up and down hisbedroom. The autumn morning, creeping round the house in long whitewisps, found him staring out of his window very pale, his mouth pulledtogether as tight as it would go. 

His mother had failed him. She had not understood. And not only simplynot understood, but she had said things when at last she did speak, after he had explained and pleaded for at least an hour, of anincredible bitterness and injustice. She had seemed to hate him. If shehadn't been his mother Mr. Twist would have been certain she hated him, but he still believed that mothers couldn't hate their children. It wasstark against nature; and Mr. Twist still believed in the fundamentalrightness of that which is called nature. She had accused him of grossthings--she, his mother, who from her conversation since he couldremember was unaware, he had judged, of the very existence of suchthings. Those helpless children . . . Mr. Twist stamped as he strode. Well, he had made her take that back; and indeed she had afterwardsadmitted that she said it in her passion of grief and disappointment, and that it was evident these girls were not like that. 

But before they reached that stage, for the first time in his life hehad been saying straight out what he wanted to say to his mother just asif she had been an ordinary human being. He told her all he knew of thetwins, asked her to take them in for the present and be good to them, and explained the awkwardness of their position, apart from its tragedy, as Germans by birth stranded in New England, where opinion at thatmoment was so hostile to Germans. Then, continuing in candour, he hadtold his mother that here was her chance of doing a fine and beautifulthing, and it was at this point that Mrs. Twist suddenly began, on herside, to talk. 

She had listened practically in silence to the rest; had only startedwhen he explained the girls' nationality; but when he came to offeringher these girls as the great opportunity of her life to do somethingreally good at last, she, who felt she had been doing nothing else butnoble and beautiful things, and doing them with the most single-mindeddevotion to duty and the most consistent disregard of inclination, couldkeep silence no longer. Had she not borne her great loss without amurmur? Had she not devoted all her years to bringing up her son to be agood man? Had she ever considered herself? Had she ever flagged in herefforts to set an example of patience in grief, of dignity inmisfortune? She began to speak. And just as amazed as she had been atthe things this strange, unknown son had been saying to her and at themanner of their delivery, so was he amazed at the things this strange, unknown mother was saying to him, and at the manner of their delivery. 

Yet his amazement was not so great after all as hers. Because for years, away down hidden somewhere inside him, he had doubted his mother; foryears he had, shocked at himself, covered up and trampled on theseunworthy doubts indignantly. He had doubted her unselfishness; he haddoubted her sympathy and kindliness; he had even doubted her honesty, her ordinary honesty with money and accounts; and lately, before he wentto Europe, he had caught himself thinking she was cruel. Neverthelessthis unexpected naked justification of his doubts was shattering to him. 

But Mrs. Twist had never doubted Edward. She thought she knew him insideout. She had watched him develop. Watched him during the long years ofhis unconsciousness. She had been quite secure; and rather disposed, also somewhere down inside her, to a contempt for him, so easy had hebeen to manage, so ready to do everything she wished. Now it appearedthat she no more knew Edward than if he had been a stranger in thestreet. 

The bursting of the dykes of convention between them was a horriblething to them both. Mr. Twist had none of the cruelty of the youngergeneration to support him: he couldn't shrug his shoulder and takecomfort in the thought that this break between them was entirely hismother's fault, for however much he believed it to be her fault thebelief merely made him wretched; he had none of the pitiless blackpleasure to be got from telling himself it served her right. Sonaturally kind was he--weak, soft, stupid, his mother shook out athim--that through all his own shame at this naked vision of what hadbeen carefully dressed up for years in dignified clothes of wisdom andaffection, he was actually glad, when he had time in his room to thinkit over, glad she should be so passionately positive that he, and onlyhe, was in the wrong. It would save her from humiliation; and of thepainful things of late Mr. Twist could least bear to see a human beinghumiliated. 

That was, however, towards morning. For hours raged, striding about hisroom, sorting out the fragments into which his life as a son had fallen, trying to fit them into some sort of a pattern, to see clear about thefuture. Clearer. Not clear. He couldn't hope for that yet. The futureseemed one confused lump. All he could see really clear of it was thathe was going, next day, and taking the twins. He would take them to theother people they had a letter to, the people in California, and thenturn his face back to Europe, to the real thing, to the greatness oflife where death is. Not an hour longer than he could help would he orthey stay in that house. He had told his mother he would go away, andshe had said, "I hope never to see you again. " Who would have thoughtshe had so much of passion in her? Who would have thought he had so muchof it in him?

Fury against her injustice shook and shattered Mr. Twist. Not so couldfair and affectionate living together be conducted, on that basis ofsuspicion, distrust, jealousy. Through his instinct, though not throughhis brain, shot the conviction that his mother was jealous of thetwins, --jealous of the youth of the twins, and of their prettiness, andgoodness, and of the power, unknown to them, that these things gavethem. His brain was impervious to such a conviction, because it was aninnocent brain, and the idea would never have entered it that a woman ofhis mother's age, well over sixty, could be jealous in that way; but hisinstinct knew it. 

The last thing his mother said as he left the drawing-room was, "Youhave killed me. You have killed your own mother. And just because ofthose girls. "

And Mr. Twist, shocked at this parting shot of unfairness, could find, search as he might, nothing to be said for his mother's point of view. It simply wasn't true. It simply was delusion. 

Nor could she find anything to be said for his, but then she didn't tryto, it was so manifestly unforgivable. All she could do, faced by thisbitter sorrow, was to leave Edward to God. Sternly, as he flung out ofthe room at last, unsoftened, untouchable, deaf to her even when sheused the tone he had always obeyed the tone of authority, she said toherself she must leave her son to God. God knew. God would judge. AndClark too would know; and Clark too would judge. 

Left alone in the drawing-room on this terrible night of her secondgreat bereavement, Mrs. Twist was yet able, she was thankful to feel, toresolve she would try to protect her son as long as she could fromClark. From God she could not, if she would, protect him; but she wouldtry to protect him even now, as she had always protected him, fromearthly harm and hurt. Clark would, however, surely know in time, protect as she might, and judge between her and Edward. God knewalready, and was already judging. God and Clark. . . . Poor Edward. 

CHAPTER XVIII

The twins, who had gone to bed at half-past nine, shepherded by Edith, in the happy conviction that they had settled down comfortably for sometime, were surprised to find at breakfast that they hadn't. 

They had taken a great fancy to Edith, in spite of a want of restfulnesson her part that struck them while they were finishing their supper, andto which at last they drew her attention. She was so kind, and so likeMr. Twist; but though she looked at them with hospitable eyes and worean expression of real benevolence, it didn't escape their notice thatshe seemed to be listening to something that wasn't, anyhow, them, andto be expecting something that didn't, anyhow, happen. She went severaltimes to the door through which her brother and mother had disappeared, and out into whatever part of the house lay beyond it, and when she cameback after a minute or two was as wanting in composure as ever. 

At last, finding these abrupt and repeated interruptions hindered anyreal talk, they pointed out to her that reasoned conversation wasimpossible if one of the parties persisted in not being in the room, andinquired of her whether it were peculiar to her, or typical of theinhabitants of America, to keep on being somewhere else. Edith smiledabstractedly at them, said nothing, and went out again. 

She was longer away this time, and the twins having eaten, among otherthings, a great many meringues, grew weary of sitting with those theyhadn't eaten lying on the dish in front of them reminding them of thosethey had. They wanted, having done with meringues, to get away from themand forget them. They wanted to go into another room now, where thereweren't any. Anna-Felicitas felt, and told Anna-Rose who was staringlistlessly at the left-over meringues, that it was like having committedmurder, and being obliged to go on looking at the body long after youwere thoroughly tired of it. Anna-Rose agreed, and said that she wishednow she hadn't committed meringues, --anyhow so many of them. 

Then at last Edith came back, and told them she was sure they were verytired after their long day, and suggested their going upstairs to theirrooms. The rooms were ready, said Edith, the baggage had come, and shewas sure they would like to have nice hot baths and go to bed. 

The twins obeyed her readily, and she checked a desire on their part toseek out her mother and brother first and bid them good-night, on theground that her mother and brother were busy; and while the twins wereexpressing polite regret, and requesting her to convey their regret forthem to the proper quarter in a flow of well-chosen words thatastonished Edith, who didn't know how naturally Junkers make speeches, she hurried them by the drawing-room door through which, shut though itwas, came sounds of people being, as Anna-Felicitas remarked, very busyindeed; and Anna-Rose, impressed by the quality and volume of Mr. Twist's voice as it reached her passing ears, told Edith that intimatelyas she knew her brother she had never known him as busy as that before. 

Edith said nothing, but continued quickly up the stairs. 

They found they each had a bedroom, with a door between, and that eachbedroom had a bathroom of its own, which filled them with admiration andpleasure. There had only been one bathroom at Uncle Arthur's, and athome in Pomerania there hadn't been any at all. The baths there had beenvessels brought into one's bedroom every night, into which servants nextmorning poured water out of buckets, having previously pumped the waterinto the bucket from the pump in the backyard. They put Edith inpossession of these facts while she helped them unpack and brushed andplaited their hair for them, and she was much astonished, --both at theconditions of discomfort and slavery they revealed as prevalent in othercountries, and at the fact that they, the Twinklers, should hail fromPomerania. 

Pomerania, reflected Edith as she tied up their pigtails with theribbons handed to her for that purpose, used to be in Germany when shewent to school, and no doubt still was. She became more thoughtful thanever, though she still smiled at them, for how could she help it?Everyone, Edith was certain, must needs smile at the Twinklers even ifthey didn't happen to be one's own dear brother's _protegees_. And whenthey came out, very clean and with scrubbed pink ears, from their bath, she not only smiled at them as she tucked them up in bed, but she kissedthem good-night. 

Edith, like her brother, was born to be a mother, --one of thesatisfactory sort that keeps you warm and doesn't argue with you. Germans or no Germans the Twinklers were the cutest little things, thought Edith; and she kissed them, with the same hunger with which, being now thirty-eight, she was beginning to kiss puppies. 

"You remind me so of Mr. Twist, " murmured Anna-Felicitas sleepily, asEdith tucked her up and kissed her. 

"You do all the sorts of things he does, " murmured Anna-Rose, alsosleepily, when it was her turn to be tucked up and kissed; and in spiteof a habit now fixed in her of unquestioning acceptance and uncriticalfaith. Edith went downstairs to her restless vigil outside thedrawing-room door a little surprised. 

At breakfast the twins learnt to their astonishment that, thoughappearances all pointed the other way what they were really doing wasnot being stationary at all, but merely having a night's lodging andbreakfast between, as it were, two trains. 

Mr. Twist, who looked pale and said shortly when the twins remarkedsolicitously on it that he felt pale, briefly announced the fact. 

"What?" exclaimed Anna-Rose, staring at Mr. Twist and then atEdith--Mrs. Twist, they were told, was breakfasting in bed--"Why, we'veunpacked. "

"You will re-pack, " said Mr. Twist. 

They found difficulty in believing their ears. 

"But we've settled in, " remonstrated Anna-Felicitas, after an astonishedpause. 

"You will settle out, " said Mr. Twist. 

He frowned. He didn't look at them, he frowned at his own teapot. He hadmade up his mind to be very short with the Annas until they were safelyout of the house, and not permit himself to be entangled by them incontroversy. Also, he didn't want to look at them if he could help it. He was afraid that if he did he might be unable not to take them both inhis arms and beg their pardon for the whole horridness of the world. 

But if he didn't look at them, they looked at him. Four round, blanklysurprised eyes were fixed, he knew, unblinkingly on him. 

"We're seeing you in quite a new light, " said Anna-Rose at last, troubled and upset. 

"Maybe, " said Mr. Twist, frowning at his teapot. 

"Perhaps you will be so good, " said Anna-Felicitas stiffly, for at alltimes she hated being stirred up and uprooted, "as to tell us where youthink we're going to. "

"Because, " said Anna-Rose, her voice trembling a little, not only at thethought of fresh responsibilities, but also with a sense of outragedfaith, "our choice of residence, as you may have observed, is strictlylimited. "

Mr. Twist, who had spent an hour before breakfast with Edith, whose eyeswere red, informed them that they were _en route_ for California. 

"To those other people, " said Anna-Rose. "I see. "

She held her head up straight. 

"Well, I expect they'll be very glad to see us, " she said after asilence; and proceeded, her chin in the air, to look down her nose, because she didn't want Mr. Twist, or Edith or Anna-Felicitas, to noticethat her eyes had gone and got tears in them. She angrily wished shehadn't got such damp eyes. They were no better than swamps, shethought--undrained swamps; and directly fate's foot came down a littleharder than usual, up oozed the lamentable liquid. Not thus should theleader of an expedition behave. Not thus, she was sure, did the originalChristopher. She pulled herself together; and after a minute's strugglewas able to leave off looking down her nose. 

But meanwhile Anna-Felicitas had informed Mr. Twist with gentle dignitythat he was obviously tired of them. 

"Not at all, " said Mr. Twist. 

Anna-Felicitas persisted. "In view of the facts, " she said gently, "I'mafraid your denial carries no weight. "

"The facts, " said Mr. Twist, taking up his teapot and examining it withcare, "are that I'm coming with you. "

"Oh are you, " said Anna-Felicitas much more briskly; and it was herethat Anna-Rose's eyes dried up. 

"That rather dishes your theory, " said Mr. Twist, still turning histeapot about in his hands. "Or would if it didn't happen that I--well, Ihappen to have some business to do in California, and I may as well doit now as later. Still, I could have gone by a different route or train, so you see your theory _is_ rather dished, isn't it?"

"A little, " admitted Anna-Felicitas. "Not altogether. Because if youreally like our being here, here we are. So why hurry us off somewhereelse so soon?"

Mr. Twist perceived that he was being led into controversy in spite ofhis determination not to be. "You're very wise, " he said shortly, "butyou don't know everything. Let us avoid conjecture and stick to facts. I'm going to take you to California, and hand you over to your friends. That's all you know, and all you need to know. "

"As Keats very nearly said, " said Anna-Rose

"And if our friends have run away?" suggested Anna-Felicitas. 

"Oh Lord, " exclaimed Mr. Twist impatiently, putting the teapot down witha bang, "do you think we're running away all the time in America?"

"Well, I think you seem a little restless, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

Thus it was that two hours later the twins found themselves at theClark station once more, once more starting into the unknown, just as ifthey had never done it before, and gradually, as they adapted themselvesto the sudden change, such is the india-rubber-like quality of youth, almost with the same hopefulness. Yet they couldn't but meditate, leftalone on the platform while Mr. Twist checked the baggage, on themutability of life. They seemed to live in a kaleidoscope since the warbegan what a series of upheavals and readjustments had been theirs!Silent, and a little apart on the Clark platform, they reflectedretrospectively; and as they counted up their various starts since thedays, only fourteen months ago, when they were still in their home inGermany, apparently as safely rooted, as unshakably settled as the pinetrees in their own forests, they couldn't but wonder at the elusivenessof the unknown, how it wouldn't let itself be caught up with and at thetrouble it was giving them. 

They had had so many changes in the last year that they did want now tohave time to become familiar with some one place and people. Alreadyhowever, being seventeen, they were telling themselves, and each otherthat after all, since the Sacks had failed them, California was theirreal objective. Not Clark at all. Clark had never been part of theirplans. Uncle Arthur and Aunt Alice didn't even know it existed. It was aside-show; just a little thing of their own, an extra excursion slippedin between the Sacks and the Delloggs. True they had hoped to stay theresome time, perhaps even for months, --anyhow, time to mend theirstockings in, which were giving way at the toes unexpectedly, seeing hownew they were; but ultimately California was the place they had to goto. It was only that it was a little upsetting to be whisked out ofClark at a moment's notice. 

"I expect you'll explain everything to us when we're in the train andhave lots of time, " Anna-Rose had said to Mr. Twist as the car movedaway from the house and Edith, red-eyed, waved her handkerchief from thedoorstep. 

Mrs. Twist had not come down to say good-bye, and they had sent her manymessages. 

"I expect I will, " Mr. Twist had answered. 

But it was not till they were the other side of Chicago that he reallybegan to be himself again. Up to then--all that first day, and the nextmorning in New York where he took them to the bank their £200 was in andsaw that they got a cheque-book, and all the day after that waiting inthe Chicago hotel for the train they were to go on in to California--Mr. Twist was taciturn. 

They left Chicago in the evening; a raw, wintery October evening withcold rain in the air, and the twins, going early to bed in theircompartment, a place that seemed to them so enchanting that theirspirits couldn't fail to rise, saw no more of him till breakfast nextmorning. They then noticed that the cloud had lifted a little; and asthe day went on it lifted still more. They were going to be three daystogether in that train, and it would be impossible for Mr. Twist, theywere sure, to go on being taciturn as long as that. It wasn't hisnature. His nature was conversational. And besides, shut up like that ina train, the sheer getting tired of reading all day would make him wantto talk. 

So after lunch, when they were all three on the platform of theobservation car, though there was nothing to observe except limitlessflat stretches of bleak and empty country, the twins suggested that heshould now begin to talk again. They pointed out that his body wasbound to get stiff on that long journey from want of exercise, but thathis mind needn't, and he had better stretch it by conversing agreeablywith them as he used to before the day, which seemed so curiously longago, when they landed in America. 

"It does indeed seem long ago, " agreed Mr. Twist, lighting anothercigarette. "I have difficulty in realizing it isn't a week yet. "

And he reflected that the Annas had managed to produce pretty serioushavoc in America considering they had only been in it five days. He andhis mother permanently estranged; Edith left alone at Clark sittingthere in the ruins of her loving preparations for his return, withnothing at all that he could see to look forward to and live for exceptthe hourly fulfilment of what she regarded as duty; every plan upset;the lives, indeed, of his mother and of his sister and of himselfcompletely altered, --it was a pretty big bag in the time, he thought, flinging the match back towards Chicago. 

Mr. Twist felt sore. He felt like somebody who had had a bad tumble, andis sore and a little dizzy; but he recognized that these great rupturescannot take place without aches and doubts. He ached, and he doubted andhe also knew through his aches and doubts that he was free at last fromwhat of late years he had so grievously writhed under--the shame ofpretence. And the immediate cause of his being set free was, precisely, the Annas. 

It had been a violent, a painful setting free, but it had happened; andwho knew if, without their sudden appearance at Clark and the immediateeffect they produced on his mother, he wouldn't have lapsed after all, in spite of the feelings and determinations he had brought back withhim from Europe, into the old ways again under the old influence, andgone on ignobly pretending to agree, to approve, to enjoy, to love, whenhe was never for an instant doing anything of the sort? He might havetrailed on like that for years--Mr. Twist didn't like the picture of hisown weakness, but he was determined to look at himself as hewas--trailed along languidly when he was at home, living another lifewhen he was away, getting what he absolutely must have, the irreducibleminimum of personal freedom necessary to sanity, by means of small andshabby deceits. My goodness, how he hated deceits, how tired he was ofthe littleness of them!

He turned his head and looked at the profiles of the Annas sittingalongside him. His heart suddenly grew warm within him. They had on theblue caps again which made them look so bald and cherubic, and theireyes were fixed on the straight narrowing lines of rails that went backand back to a point in the distance. The dear little things; the dear, dear little things, --so straightforward, so blessedly straight andsimple, thought Mr. Twist. Fancy his mother losing a chance like this. Fancy _anybody_, thought the affectionate and kind man, missing anopportunity of helping such unfortunately placed children. 

The twins felt he was looking at them, and together they turned andlooked at him. When they saw his expression they knew the cloud hadlifted still more, and their faces broke into broad smiles of welcome. 

"It's pleasant to see you back again, " said Anna-Felicitas heartily, whowas next to him. 

"We've missed you very much, " said Anna-Rose. 

"It hasn't been like the same place, the world hasn't, " saidAnna-Felicitas, "since you've been away. "

"Since you walked out of the dining-room that night at Clark, " saidAnna-Rose. 

"Of course we know you can't always be with us, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Which we deeply regret, " interjected Anna-Rose. 

"But while you are with us, " said Anna-Felicitas, "for these last fewdays, I would suggest that we should be happy. As happy as we used to beon the _St. Luke_ when we weren't being sea-sick. " And she thought shemight even go so far as to enjoy hearing the "Ode to Dooty, " now. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose, leaning forward. "In three days we shall havedisappeared into the maw of the Delloggs. Do let us be happy while wecan. Who knows what their maw will be like? But whatever it's like, " sheadded firmly, "we're going to stick in it. "

"And perhaps, " said Anna-Felicitas, "now that you're a little restoredto your normal condition, you'll tell us what has been the matter. "

"For it's quite clear, " said Anna-Rose, "that something _has_ been thematter. "

"We've been talking it over, " said Anna-Felicitas, "and putting two andtwo together, and perhaps you'll tell us what it was, and then we shallknow if we're right. "

"Perhaps I will, " said Mr. Twist, cogitating, as he continuedbenevolently to gaze at them. "Let's see--" He hesitated, and pushedhis hat off his forehead. "I wonder if you'd understand--"

"We'll give our minds to it, " Anna-Felicitas assured him. 

"These caps make us look more stupid than we are, " Anna-Rose assuredhim, deducing her own appearance from that of Anna-Felicitas. 

Encouraged, but doubtful of their capabilities of comprehension onthis particular point, Mr. Twist embarked rather gingerly on hisexplanations. He was going to be candid from now on for the rest of hisdays, but the preliminary plunges were, he found, after all a littledifficult. Even with the pellucidly candid Annas, all ready with earspricked up attentively and benevolently and minds impartial, he found itdifficult. It was because, on the subject of mothers, he feared he wasup against their one prejudice. He felt rather than knew that theirattitude on this one point might be uncompromising, --mothers weremothers, and there was an end of it; that sort of attitude, coupled withextreme reprobation of himself for supposing anything else. 

He was surprised and relieved to find he was wrong. Directly they gotwind of the line his explanations were taking, which was very soon forthey were giving their minds to it as they promised and Mr. Twist'shesitations were illuminating, they interrupted. 

"So we were right, " they said to each other. 

"But you don't know yet what I'm going to say, " said Mr. Twist. "I'veonly started on the preliminaries. "

"Yes we do. You fell out with your mother, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Quarrelled, " said Anna-Felicitas, nodding

"We didn't think so at the time, " said Anna-Rose. 

"We just felt there was an atmosphere of strain about Clark, " saidAnna-Felicitas. 

"But talking it over privately, we concluded that was what hadhappened. "

Mr. Twist was so much surprised that for a moment he could only say"Oh. " Then he said, "And you're terribly shocked, I suppose. "

"Oh no, " they said airily and together. 

"No?"

"You see--" began Anna-Felicitas. 

"You see--" began Anna-Rose. 

"You see, as a general principle, " said Anna-Felicitas, "it'sreprehensible to quarrel with one's mother. "

"But we've not been able to escape observing--" said Anna-Rose. 

"In the course of our brief and inglorious career, " put inAnna-Felicitas. 

"--that there are mothers and mothers, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Yes, " said Mr. Twist; and as they didn't go on he presently added, "Yes?"

"Oh, that's all, " said the twins, once more airily and together. 

CHAPTER XIX

After this brief _éclaircissement_ the rest of the journey was happy. Indeed, it is doubtful if any one can journey to California and not behappy. 

Mr. Twist had never been further west than Chicago and break up or nobreak up of his home he couldn't but have a pleasant feeling ofadventure. Every now and then the realization of this feeling gave hisconscience a twinge, and wrung out of it a rebuke. He was having thebest of it in this business; he was the party in the quarrel who wentaway, who left the dreariness of the scene of battle with all itscorpses of dead illusions, and got off to fresh places and people whohad never heard of him. Just being in a train, he found, and rushing onto somewhere else was extraordinarily nerve-soothing. At Clark therewould be gloom and stagnation, the heavy brooding of a storm that hasburst but not moved on, a continued anger on his mother's side, naturally increasing with her inactivity, with her impotence. He wasgone, and she could say and do nothing more to him. In a quarrel, thought Mr. Twist, the morning he pushed up his blinds and saw thedesert at sunrise, an exquisite soft thing just being touched into faintcolours, --in a quarrel the one who goes has quite unfairly the best ofit. Beautiful new places come and laugh at him, people who don't knowhim and haven't yet judged and condemned him are ready to be friendly. He must, of course, go far enough; not stay near at hand in somefamiliar place and be so lonely that he ends by being remorseful. Well, he was going far enough. Thanks to the Annas he was going about as faras he could go. Certainly he was having the best of it in being the onein the quarrel who went; and he was shocked to find himself cynicallythinking, on top of that, that one should always, then, take care to bethe one who did go. 

But the desert has a peculiarly exhilarating air. It came in everywhere, and seemed to tickle him out of the uneasy mood proper to one who hasbeen cutting himself off for good and all from his early home. For thelife of him he couldn't help feeling extraordinarily light and free. Edith--yes, there was Edith, but some day he would make up to Edith foreverything. There was no helping her now: she was fast bound in miseryand iron, and didn't even seem to know it. So would he have been, hesupposed, if he had never left home at all. As it was, it was bound tocome, this upheaval. Just the mere fact of inevitable growth would haveburst the bands sooner or later. There oughtn't, of course, to have beenany bands; or, there being bands, he ought long ago to have burst them. 

He pulled his kind slack mouth firmly together and looked determined. Long ago, repeated Mr. Twist, shaking his head at his own weak past. Well, it was done at last, and never again--never, never again, he saidto himself, sniffing in through his open window the cold air of thedesert at sunrise. 

By that route, the Santa Fé, it is not till two or three hours beforeyou get to the end of the journey that summer meets you. It is waitingfor you at a place called San Bernardino. There is no trace of itbefore. Up to then you are still in October; and then you get to thetop of the pass, and with a burst it is June, --brilliant, windless, orange-scented. 

The twins and Mr. Twist were in the restaurant-car lunching when themiracle happened. Suddenly the door opened and in came summer, with agreat warm breath of roses. In a moment the car was invaded by the scentof flowers and fruit and of something else strange and new and veryaromatic. The electric fans were set twirling, the black waiters beganto perspire, the passengers called for cold things to eat, and the twinspulled off their knitted caps and jerseys. 

From that point on to the end of the line in Los Angeles the twins couldonly conclude they were in heaven. It was the light that did it, theextraordinary glow of radiance. Of course there were orchards afterorchards of orange trees covered with fruit, white houses smothered inflowers, gardens overrun with roses, tall groups of eucalyptus treesgiving an impression of elegant nakedness, long lines of pepper treeswith frail fern-like branches, and these things continued for the restof the way; but they would have been as nothing without that beautiful, great bland light. The twins had had their hot summers in Pomerania, andtheir July days in England, but had not yet seen anything like this. Here was summer without sultriness, without gnats, mosquitoes, threatening thunderstorms, or anything to spoil it; it was summer as itmight be in the Elysian fields, perfectly clear, and calm, and radiant. When the train stopped they could see how not a breath of wind stirredthe dust on the quiet white roads, and the leaves of the magnolia treesglistened motionless in the sun. The train went slowly and stoppedoften, for there seemed to be one long succession of gardens andvillages. After the empty, wind-driven plains they had come through, those vast cold expanses without a house or living creature in sight, what a laughing plenty, what a gracious fruitfulness, was here. And whenthey went back to their compartment it too was full of summersmells, --the smell of fruit, and roses, and honey. 

For the first time since the war began and with it their wanderings, thetwins felt completely happy. It was as though the loveliness wrappedthem round and they stretched themselves in it and forgot. No fear ofthe future, no doubt of it at all, they thought, gazing out of thewindow, the soft air patting their faces, could possibly bother themhere. They never, for instance, could be cold here, or go hungry. Agreat confidence in life invaded them. The Delloggs, sun-soaked andorange-fed for years in this place, couldn't but be gentle too, and kindand calm. Impossible not to get a sort of refulgence oneself, theythought, living here, and absorb it and give it out again. They picturedthe Delloggs as bland pillars of light coming forward effulgently togreet them, and bathing them in the beams of their hospitality. And thefeeling of responsibility and anxiety that had never left Anna-Rosesince she last saw Aunt Alice dropped off her in this place, and shefelt that sun and oranges, backed by £200 in the bank, would bedifficult things for misfortune to get at. 

As for Mr. Twist, he was even more entranced than the twins as he gazedout of the window, for being older he had had time to see more uglythings, had got more used to them and to taking them as principallymaking up life. He stared at what he saw, and thought with wonder of hismother's drawing-room at Clark, of its gloomy, velvet-upholstereddiscomforts, of the cold mist creeping round the house, and of thatlast scene in it, with her black figure in the middle of it, tall andthin and shaking with bitterness. He had certainly been in thatdrawing-room and heard her so terribly denouncing him, but it was verydifficult to believe; it seemed so exactly like a nightmare, and thisthe happy normal waking up in the morning. 

They all three were in the highest spirits when they got out at LosAngeles and drove across to the Southern Pacific station--the name alonemade their hearts leap--to catch the afternoon train on to where theDelloggs lived, and their spirits were the kind one can imagine inreleased souls on their first arriving in paradise, --high, yet subdued;happy, but reverential; a sort of rollicking awe. They were subdued, infact, by beauty. And the journey along the edge of the Pacific toAcapulco, where the Delloggs lived, encouraged and developed this kindof spirits, for the sun began to set, and, as the train ran for milesclose to the water with nothing but a strip of sand between it and thesurf, they saw their first Pacific sunset. It happened to be even inthat land of wonderful sunsets an unusually wonderful one, and none ofthe three had ever seen anything in the least like it. They could butsit silent and stare. The great sea, that little line of lovely islandsflung down on it like a chain of amethysts, that vast flame of sky, thatheaving water passionately reflecting it, and on the other side, throughthe other windows, a sharp wall of black mountains, --it wasfantastically beautiful, like something in a poem or a dream. 

By the time they got to Acapulco it was dark. Night followed upon thesunset with a suddenness that astonished the twins, used to theleisurely methods of twilight on the Baltic; and the only light in thecountry outside the town as they got near it was the light from myriadsof great stars. 

No Delloggs were at the station, but the twins were used now to notbeing met and had not particularly expected them; besides, Mr. Twist waswith them this time, and he would see that if the Delloggs didn't cometo them they would get safely to the Delloggs. 

The usual telegram had been sent announcing their arrival, and thetaxi-driver, who seemed to know the Dellogg house well when Mr. Twisttold him where they wanted to go, apparently also thought it naturalthey should want to go exactly there. In him, indeed, there did seem tobe a trace of expecting them, --almost as if he had been told to look outfor them; for hardly had Mr. Twist begun to give him the address thanglancing at the twins he said, "I guess you're wanting Mrs. Dellogg";and got down and actually opened the door for them, an attention sounusual in the taxi-drivers the twins had up to then met in America thatthey were more than ever convinced that nothing in the way ofunfriendliness or unkindness could stand up against sun and oranges. 

"Relations?" he asked them through the window as he shut the door gentlyand carefully, while Mr. Twist went with a porter to see about theluggage. 

"I beg your pardon?" said Anna-Rose. 

"Relations of Delloggses?"

"No, " said Anna-Rose. "Friends. "

"At least, " amended Anna-Felicitas, "practically. "

"Ah, " said the driver, leaning with both his arms on the window-sill inthe friendliest possible manner, and chewing gum and eyeing them withthoughtful interest. 

Then he said, after a pause during which his jaw rolled regularly fromside to side and the twins watched the rolling with an interest equal tohis interest in them, "From Los Angeles?"

"No, " said Anna-Rose. "From New York. "

"At least, " amended Anna-Felicitas, "practically. "

"Well I call that a real compliment, " said the driver slowly anddeliberately because of his jaw going on rolling. "To come all that way, and without being relations--I call that a real compliment, and afriendship that's worth something. Anybody can come along from LosAngeles, but it takes a real friend to come from New York, " and he eyedthem now with admiration. 

The twins for their part eyed him. Not only did his rolling jawsfascinate them, but the things he was saying seemed to them quaint. 

"But we wanted to come, " said Anna-Rose, after a pause. 

"Of course. Does you credit, " said the driver. 

The twins thought this over. 

The bright station lights shone on their faces, which stood out verywhite in the black setting of their best mourning. Before getting to LosAngeles they had dressed themselves carefully in what Anna-Felicitascalled their favourable-impression-on-arrival garments, --those garmentsAunt Alice had bought for them on their mother's death, expressing thewave of sympathy in which she found herself momentarily engulfed bygoing to a very good and expensive dressmaker; and in the blackperfection of these clothes the twins looked like two well-got-up andvery attractive young crows. These were the clothes they had put on onleaving the ship, and had been so obviously admired in, to theuneasiness of Mr. Twist, by the public; it was in these clothes thatthey had arrived within range of Mr. Sack's distracted but stillappreciative vision, and in them that they later roused the suspicionsand dislike of Mrs. Twist. It was in these clothes that they were nowabout to start what they hoped would be a lasting friendship with theDelloggs, and remembering they had them on they decided that perhaps itwasn't only sun and oranges making the taxi-driver so attentive, butalso the effect on him of their grown-up and awe-inspiring hats. 

This was confirmed by what he said next. "I guess you're old friends, then, " he remarked, after a period of reflective jaw-rolling. "Must be, to come all that way. "

"Well--not exactly, " said Anna-Rose, divided between her respect fortruth and her gratification at being thought old enough to be somebody'sold friend. 

"You see, " explained Anna-Felicitas, who was never divided in herrespect for truth, "we're not particularly old anything. "

The driver in his turn thought this over, and finding he had noobservations he wished to make on it he let it pass, and said, "You'llmiss Mr. Dellogg. "

"Oh?" said Anna-Rose, pricking up her ears, "Shall we?"

"We don't mind missing Mr. Dellogg, " said Anna-Felicitas. "It's Mrs. Dellogg we wouldn't like to miss. "

The driver looked puzzled. 

"Yes--that would be too awful, " said Anna-Rose, who didn't want arepetition of the Sack dilemma. "You did say, " she asked anxiously, "didn't you, that we were going to miss Mr. Dellogg?"

The driver, looking first at one of them and then at the other, said, "Well, and who wouldn't?"

And this answer seemed so odd to the twins that they could only as theystared at him suppose it was some recondite form of American slang, provided with its own particular repartee which, being unacquainted withthe language, they were not in a position to supply. Perhaps, theythought, it was of the same order of mysterious idioms as in Englandsuch sentences as I don't think, and Not half, --forms of speech whoseexact meaning and proper use had never been mastered by them. 

"There won't be another like Mr. Dellogg in these parts for many ayear, " said the driver, shaking his head. "Ah no. And that's so. "

"Isn't he coming back?" asked Anna-Rose. 

The driver's jaws ceased for a moment to roll. He stared at Anna-Rosewith unblinking eyes. Then he turned his head away and spat along thestation, and then, again fixing his eyes on Anna-Rose, he said, "Younggurl, you may be a spiritualist, and a table-turner, and apsychic-rummager, and a ghost-fancier, and anything else you please, andget what comfort you can out of your coming backs and the rest of theblessed truck, but I know better. And what I know, being a Christian, isthat once a man's dead he's either in heaven or he's in hell, andwhichever it is he's in, in it he stops. "

Anna-Felicitas was the first to speak. "Are we to understand, " sheinquired, "that Mr. Dellogg--" She broke off. 

"That Mr. Dellogg is--" Anna-Rose continued for her, but broke offtoo. 

"That Mr. Dellogg isn't--" resumed Anna-Felicitas with determination, "well, that he isn't alive?"

"Alive?" repeated the driver. He let his hand drop heavily on thewindow-sill. "If that don't beat all, " he said, staring at her. "What doyou come his funeral for, then?"

"His funeral?"

"Yes, if you don't know that he ain't?"

"Ain't--isn't what?"

"Alive, of course. No, I mean dead. You're getting me all tangled up. "

"But we haven't. "

"But we didn't. "

"We had a letter from him only last month. "

"At least, an uncle we've got had. "

"And he didn't say a word in it about being dead--I mean, there was nosign of his being going to be--I mean, he wasn't a bit ill or anythingin his letter--"

"Now see here, " interrupted the driver, sarcasm in his voice, "it ain'texactly usual is it--I put it to you squarely, and say it ain't_exactly_ usual (there may be exceptions, but it ain't exactly _usual_)to come to a gentleman's funeral, and especially not all the way fromNew York, without some sort of an idea that he's dead. Some sort of a_general_ idea, anyhow, " he added still more sarcastically; for hisadmiration for the twins had given way to doubt and discomfort, and asuspicion was growing on him that with incredible and horrible levity, seeing what the moment was and what the occasion, they were filling upthe time waiting for their baggage, among which were no doubt funeralwreaths, by making game of him. 

"Gurls like you shouldn't behave that way, " he went on, his voiceaggrieved as he remembered how sympathetically he had got down from hisseat when he saw their mourning clothes and tired white faces and helpedthem into his taxi, --only for genuine mourners, real sorry ones, goingto pay their last respects to a gentleman like Mr. Dellogg, would he, afree American have done that. "Nicely dressed gurls, well-cared forgurls. Daughters of decent people. Here you come all this way, I guesssent by your parents to represent them properly, and properly fitted outin nice black clothes and all, and you start making fun. Pretending. Playing kind of hide-and-seek with me about the funeral. Messing me upin a lot of words. I don't like it. I'm a father myself, and I don'tlike it. I don't like to see daughters going on like this when theirfather ain't looking. It don't seem decent to me. But I suppose youEasterners--"

The twins, however, were not listening. They were looking at each otherin dismay. How extraordinary, how terrible, the way Uncle Arthur'sfriends gave out. They seemed to melt away at one's mere approach. People who had been living with their husbands all their lives ran awayjust as the twins came on the scene; people who had been alive all theirlives went and died, also at that very moment. It almost seemed as ifdirectly anybody knew that they, the Twinklers, were coming to stay withthem they became bent on escape. They could only look at each other instricken astonishment at this latest blow of Fate. They heard no more ofwhat the driver said. They could only sit and look at each other. 

And then Mr. Twist came hurrying across from the baggage office, wipinghis forehead, for the night was hot. Behind him came the porter, ruefully balancing the piled-up grips on his truck. 

"I'm sorry to have been so--" began Mr. Twist, smiling cheerfully: buthe stopped short in his sentence and left off smiling when he saw theexpression in the four eyes fixed on him. "What has happened?" he askedquickly. 

"Only what we might have expected, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Mr. Dellogg's dead, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"You don't say, " said Mr. Twist; and after a pause he said again, "Youdon't say. "

Then he recovered himself. "I'm very sorry to hear it, of course, " hesaid briskly, picking himself up, as it were, from this sudden andunexpected tumble, "but I don't see that it matters to you so long asMrs. Dellogg isn't dead too. "

"Yes, but--" began Anna-Rose. 

"Mr. Dellogg isn't _very_ dead, you see, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

Mr. Twist looked from them to the driver, but finding no elucidationthere and only disapproval, looked back again. 

"He isn't dead and settled _down_, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Not _that_ sort of being dead, " said Anna-Felicitas. "He's _just_dead. "

"Just got to the stage when he has a funeral, " said Anna-Rose. 

"His funeral, it seems, is imminent, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Did you notgive us to understand, " she asked, turning to the driver, "that it wasimminent?"

"I don't know about imminent, " said the driver, who wasn't going towaste valuable time with words like that, "but it's to-morrow. "

"And you see what that means for us, " said Anna-Felicitas, turning toMr. Twist. 

Mr. Twist did. 

He again wiped his forehead, but not this time because the night washot. 

CHAPTER XX

Manifestly it is impossible to thrust oneself into a house where thereis going to be a funeral next day, even if one has come all the way fromNew York and has nowhere else to go. Equally manifestly it is impossibleto thrust oneself into it after the funeral till a decent interval haselapsed. But what the devil, Mr. Twist asked himself in language becomeregrettably natural to him since his sojourn at the front, is a decentinterval?

This Mr. Twist asked himself late that night, pacing up and down thesea-shore in the warm and tranquil darkness in front of the CosmopolitanHotel, while the twins, utterly tired out by their journey and theemotions at the end of it, crept silently into bed. 

How long does it take a widow to recover her composure? Recover, thatis, the first beginnings of it? At what stage in her mourning is itlegitimate to intrude on her with reminders of obligations incurredbefore she was a widow, --with, in fact, the Twinklers? Delicacy itselfwould shrink from doing it under a week thought Mr. Twist, or even undera fortnight, or even if you came to that, under a month; and meanwhilewhat was he to do with the Twinklers?

Mr. Twist, being of the artistic temperament for otherwise he wouldn'thave been so sympathetic nor would he have minded, as he so passionatelydid mind, his Uncle Charles's teapot dribbling on to the tablecloth--wassometimes swept by brief but tempestuous revulsions of feeling, andthough he loved the Twinklers he did at this moment describe themmentally and without knowing it in the very words of Uncle Arthur, asthose accursed twins. It was quite unjust, he knew. They couldn't helpthe death of the man Dellogg. They were the victims, from first to last, of a cruel and pursuing fate; but it is natural to turn on victims, andMr. Twist was for an instant, out of the very depth of his helplesssympathy, impatient with the Twinklers. 

He walked up and down the sands frowning and pulling his mouth together, while the Pacific sighed sympathetically at his feet. Across the roadthe huge hotel standing in its gardens was pierced by a thousand lights. Very few people were about and no one at all was on the sands. There wasan immense noise of what sounded like grasshoppers or crickets, and alsoat intervals distant choruses of frogs, but these sounds seemedaltogether beneficent, --so warm, and southern, and far away from lesshappy places where in October cold winds perpetually torment the world. Even in the dark Mr. Twist knew he had got to somewhere that wasbeautiful. He could imagine nothing more agreeable than, having handedover the twins safely to the Delloggs, staying on a week or two in thisplace and seeing them every day, --perhaps even, as he had pictured tohimself on the journey, being invited to stay with the Delloggs. Now allthat was knocked on the head. He supposed the man Dellogg couldn't helpbeing dead but he, Mr. Twist, equally couldn't help resenting it. It wasso awkward; so exceedingly awkward. And it was so like what one of thatcreature Uncle Arthur's friends would do. 

Mr. Twist, it will be seen, was frankly unreasonable, but then he wasvery much taken aback and annoyed. What was he to do with the Annas? Hewas obviously not a relation of theirs--and indeed no profiles couldhave been less alike--and he didn't suppose Acapulco was behind otherparts of America in curiosity and gossip. If he stayed on at theCosmopolitan with the twins till Mrs. Dellogg was approachable again, whenever that might be, every sort of question would be being asked inwhispers about who they were and what was their relationship, andpresently whenever they sat down anywhere the chairs all round themwould empty. Mr. Twist had seen the kind of thing happening in hotelsbefore to other people, --never to himself; never had he been in anysituation till now that was not luminously regular. And quite soon afterthis with the chairs had begun to happen, the people who created thesevacancies were told by the manager--firmly in America, politely inEngland, and sympathetically in France--that their rooms had beenengaged a long time ago for the very next day, and no others wereavailable. 

The Cosmopolitan was clearly an hotel frequented by the virtuous rich. Mr. Twist felt that he and the Annas wouldn't, in their eyes, come underthis heading, not, that is, when the other guests became aware of theentire absence of any relationship between him and the twins. Well, fora day or two nothing could happen; for a day or two, before his partyhad had time to sink into the hotel consciousness and the managerappeared to tell him the rooms were engaged, he could think things outand talk them over with his companions. Perhaps he might even see Mrs. Dellogg. The funeral, he had heard on inquiring of the hall porter wasnext day. It was to be a brilliant affair, said the porter. Mr. Dellogghad been a prominent inhabitant, free with his money, a supporter ofanything there was to support. The porter talked of him as thetaxi-driver had done, regretfully and respectfully; and Mr. Twist wentto bed angrier than ever with a man who, being so valuable and sonecessary, should have neglected at such a moment to go on living. 

Mr. Twist didn't sleep very well that night. He lay in his rosy room, under a pink silk quilt, and most of the time stared out through theopen French windows with their pink brocade curtains at the great starrynight, thinking. 

In that soft bed, so rosy and so silken as to have been worthy of therelaxations of, at least, a prima donna, he looked like some lean andalien bird nesting temporarily where he had no business to. He hadn'tthought of buying silk pyjamas when the success of his teapot put him inthe right position for doing so, because his soul was too simple for himto desire or think of anything less candid to wear in bed than flannel, and he still wore the blue flannel pyjamas of a careful bringing up. Inthat beautiful bed his pyjamas didn't seem appropriate. Also his head, so frugal of hair, didn't do justice to the lace and linen of a pillowprepared for the hairier head of, again at least, a prima donna. Andfinding he couldn't sleep, and wishing to see the stars he put on hisspectacles, and then looked more out of place than ever. But as nobodywas there to see him, --which, Mr. Twist sometimes thought when he caughtsight of himself in his pyjamas at bed-time, is one of the comforts ofbeing virtuously unmarried, --nobody minded. 

His reflections were many and various, and they conflicted with andcontradicted each other as the reflections of persons in a difficultposition who have Mr. Twist's sort of temperament often do. Faced by adribbling teapot, an object which touched none of the softer emotions, Mr. Twist soared undisturbed in the calm heights of a detached andconcentrated intelligence, and quickly knew what to do with it; faced bythe derelict Annas his heart and his tenderness got in the ways of anyclear vision. 

About three o'clock in the morning, when his mind was choked and strewnwith much pulled-about and finally discarded plans, he suddenly had anidea. A real one. As far as he could see, a real good one. He wouldplace the Annas in a school. 

Why shouldn't they go to school? he asked himself, starting offanswering any possible objections. A year at a first-rate school wouldgive them and everybody else time to consider. They ought never to haveleft school. It was the very place for luxuriant and overflowing natureslike theirs. No doubt Acapulco had such a thing as a finishing schoolfor young ladies in it, and into it the Annas should go, and once in itthere they should stay put, thought Mr. Twist in vigorous American, gathering up his mouth defiantly. 

Down these lines of thought his relieved mind cantered easily. He wouldseek out a lawyer the next morning, regularize his position to the twinsby turning himself into their guardian, and then get them at once intothe best school there was. As their guardian he could then pay all theirexpenses, and faced by this legal fact they would, he hoped, be soonpersuaded of the propriety of his paying whatever there was to pay. 

Mr. Twist was so much pleased by his idea that he was able to go tosleep after that. Even three months' school--the period he gave Mrs. Dellogg for her acutest grief--would do. Tide them over. Give them roomto turn round in. It was a great solution. He took off his spectacles, snuggled down into his rosy nest, and fell asleep with theinstantaneousness of one whose mind is suddenly relieved. 

But when he went down to breakfast he didn't feel quite so sure. Thetwins didn't look, somehow, as though they would want to go to school. They had been busy with their luggage, and had unpacked one of thetrunks for the first time since leaving Aunt Alice, and in honour of theheat and sunshine and the heavenly smell of heliotrope that was in thewarm air, had put on white summer frocks. 

Impossible to imagine anything cooler, sweeter, prettier and moreangelically good than those two Annas looked as they came out on to thegreat verandah of the hotel to join Mr. Twist at breakfast. Theyinstantly sank into the hotel consciousness. Mr. Twist had thought thiswouldn't happen for a day or two, but he now perceived his mistake. Nota head that wasn't turned to look at them, not a newspaper that wasn'tlowered. They were immediate objects of interest and curiosity, entirelybenevolent interest and curiosity because nobody yet knew anything aboutthem, and the wives of the rich husbands--those halves of thevirtuous-rich unions which provided the virtuousness--smiled as theypassed, and murmured nice words to each other like cute and cunning. 

Mr. Twist, being a good American, stood up and held the twins' chairsfor them when they appeared. They loved this; it seemed so respectful, and made them feel so old and looked-up to. He had done it that night inNew York at supper, and at all the meals in the train in spite of thetrain being so wobbly and each time they had loved it. "It makes onehave such self-respect, " they agreed, commenting on this agreeablepractice in private. 

They sat down in the chairs with the gracious face of the properlytreated, and inquired, with an amiability and a solicitous politeness ona par with their treatment how Mr. Twist had slept. They themselves hadobviously slept well, for their faces were cherubic in their blandplacidity, and already after one night wore what Mr. Twist later came torecognize as the Californian look, a look of complete unworriedness. 

Yet they ought to have been worried. Mr. Twist had been terribly worriedup to the moment in the night when he got his great idea, and he wasworried again, now that he saw the twins, by doubts. They didn't look asthough they would easily be put to school. His idea still seemed to himmagnificent, a great solution, but would the Annas be able to see it?They might turn out impervious to it; not rejecting it, but simplynon-absorbent. As they slowly and contentedly ate their grape-fruit, gazing out between the spoonfuls at the sea shining across the roadthrough palm trees, and looking unruffled itself, he felt it was goingto be rather like suggesting to two cherubs to leave their sereneoccupation of adoring eternal beauty and learn lessons instead. Still, it was the one way out, as far as Mr. Twist could see, of the situationproduced by the death of the man Dellogg. "When you've done breakfast, "he said, pulling himself together on their reaching the waffle stage, "we must have a talk. "

"When we've done breakfast, " said Anna-Rose, "we must have a walk. "

"Down there, " said Anna-Felicitas, pointing with her spoon. "On thesands. Round the curve to where the pink hills begin. "

"Mr. Dellogg's death, " said Mr. Twist, deciding it was necessary at onceto wake them up out of the kind of happy somnolescence they seemed to befalling into, "has of course completely changed--"

"How unfortunate, " interrupted Anna-Rose, her eyes on the palms and thesea and the exquisite distant mountains along the back of the bay, "tohave to be dead on a day like this. "

"It's not only his missing the fine weather that makes it unfortunate, "said Mr. Twist. 

"You mean, " said Anna-Rose, "it's our missing him. "

"Precisely, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Well, we know that, " said Anna-Felicitas placidly. 

"We knew it last night, and it worried us, " said Anna-Rose. "Then wewent to sleep and it didn't worry us. And this morning it stilldoesn't. "

"No, " said Mr. Twist dryly. "You don't look particularly worried, I mustsay. "

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas, "we're not. People who find they've got toheaven aren't usually worried, are they. "

"And having got to heaven, " said Anna-Rose, "we've thought of a plan toenable us to stay in it. "

"Oh have you, " said Mr. Twist, pricking up his ears. 

"The plan seemed to think of us rather than we of it, " explainedAnna-Felicitas. "It came and inserted itself, as it were, into our mindswhile we were dressing. "

"Well, I've thought of a plan too, " said Mr. Twist firmly, feeling surethat the twins' plan would be the sort that ought to be instantly nippedin the bud. 

He was therefore greatly astonished when Anna-Rose said, "Have you? Isit about schools?"

He stared at her in silence. "Yes, " he then said slowly, for he wasvery much surprised. "It is. "

"So is ours, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Indeed, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas. "We don't think much of it, but it will tideus over. "

"Exactly, " said Mr. Twist, still more astonished at this perfect harmonyof ideas. 

"Tide us over till Mrs. Dellogg is---" began Anna-Rose in her clearlittle voice that carried like a flute to all the tables round them. 

Mr. Twist got up quickly. "If you've finished let us go out of doors, "he said; for he perceived that silence had fallen on the other tables, and attentiveness to what Anna-Rose was going to say next. 

"Yes. On the sands, " said the twins, getting up too. 

On the sands, however, Mr. Twist soon discovered that the harmony ofideas was not as complete as he had supposed; indeed, something verylike heated argument began almost as soon as they were seated on somerocks round the corner of the shore to the west of the hotel and theybecame aware, through conversation, of the vital difference in the twoplans. 

The Twinkler plan, which they expounded at much length and with aprofusion of optimistic detail, was to search for and find a school inthe neighbourhood for the daughters of gentlemen, and go to it for threemonths, or six months, or whatever time Mrs. Dellogg wanted to recoverin. 

Up to this point the harmony was complete, and Mr. Twist could only nodapproval. Beyond it all was confusion, for it appeared that the twinsdidn't dream of entering a school in any capacity except as teachers. Professors, they said; professors of languages and literatures. Theycould speak German, as they pointed out, very much better than mostpeople, and had, as Mr. Twist had sometimes himself remarked, anextensive vocabulary in English. They would give lessons in English andGerman literature. They would be able to teach quite a lot about Heine, for instance, the whole of whose poetry they knew by heart and whose sadlife in Paris--

"It's no good running on like that, " interrupted Mr. Twist. "You're notold enough. "

Not old enough? The Twinklers, from their separate rocks, looked at eachother in surprised indignation. 

"Not old enough?" repeated Anna-Rose. "We're grown up. And I don't seehow one can be more than grown up. One either is or isn't grown up. Andthere can be no doubt as to which we are. "

And this the very man who so respectfully had been holding their chairsfor them only a few minutes before! As if people did things like thatfor children. 

"You're not old enough I say, " said Mr. Twist again, bringing his handdown with a slap on the rock to emphasize his words. "Nobody would takeyou. Why, you've got perambulator faces, the pair of you--"

"Perambulator--?"

"And what school is going to want two teachers both teaching the samething, anyway?"

And he then quickly got out his plan, and the conversation became soheated that for a time it was molten. 

The Twinklers were shocked by his plan. More; they were outraged. Go toschool? To a place they had never been to even in their suitable years?They, two independent grown-ups with £200 in the bank and nobody withany right to stop their doing anything they wanted to? Go to school now, like a couple of little suck-a-thumbs?

It was Anna-Rose, very flushed and bright of eye, who flung thisexpression at Mr. Twist from her rock. He might think they hadperambulator faces if he liked--they didn't care, but they did desirehim to bear in mind that if it hadn't been for the war they would be nowtaking their proper place in society, that they had already done acourse of nursing in a hospital, an activity not open to any but adults, and that Uncle Arthur had certainly not given them all that money tofritter away on paying for belated schooling. 

"We would be anachronisms, " said Anna-Felicitas, winding up thediscussion with a firmness so unusual in her that it showed howcompletely she had been stirred. 

"Are you aware that we are marriageable?" inquired Anna-Rose icily. 

"And don't you think it's bad enough for us to be aliens andundesirables, " asked Anna-Felicitas, "without getting chronologicallyconfused as well?"

Mr. Twist was quiet for a bit. He couldn't compete with the Twinklerswhen it came to sheer language. He sat hunched on his rock, his facesupported by his two fists, staring out to sea while the twins watchedhim indignantly. School indeed! Then presently he pushed his hat backand began slowly to rub his ear. 

"Well, I'm blest if I know what to do with you, then, " he said, continuing to rub his ear and stare out to sea. 

The twins opened their mouths simultaneously at this to protest againstany necessity for such knowledge on his part, but he interrupted them. "If you don't mind, " he said, "I'd like to resume this discussion whenyou're both a little more composed. "

"We're perfectly composed, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Less ruffled, then. "

"We're quite unruffled, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Well, you don't look it, and you don't sound like it. But as this isimportant I'd be glad to resume the discussion, say, to-morrow. Isuggest we spend to-day exploring the neighbourhood and steadying ourminds--"

"Our minds are perfectly steady, thank you. "

"--and to-morrow we'll have another go at this question. I haven't toldyou all my plan yet"--Mr. Twist hadn't had time to inform them of hiswish to become their guardian, owing to the swiftness with which he hadbeen engulfed in their indignation, --"but whether you approve of it ornot, what is quite certain is that we can't stay on at the hotel muchlonger. "

"Because it's so dear?"

"Oh, it isn't so much _that_, --the proprietor is a friend of mine, oranyhow he very well might be--"

"It looks very dear, " said Anna-Rose, visions of their splendid bedroomand bathroom rising before her. They too had slept in silken beds, andthe taps in their bathroom they had judged to be pure gold. 

"And it's because we can't afford to be in a dear place spending money, "said Anna-Felicitas, "that it's so important we should find a salariedposition in a school without loss of time. "

"And it's because we can't afford reckless squandering that we ought tostart looking for such a situation at once" said Anna-Rose. 

"Not to-day, " said Mr. Twist firmly, for he wouldn't give up the hopeof getting them, once they were used to it, to come round to his plan. "To-day, this one day, we'll give ourselves up to enjoyment. It'll do usall good. Besides, we don't often get to a place like this, do we. Andit has taken some getting to, hasn't it. "

He rose from his rock and offered his hand to help them off theirs. 

"To-day enjoyment, " he said, "to-morrow business. I'm crazy, " he addedartfully, "to see what the country is like away up in those hills. "

And so it was that about five o'clock that afternoon, having spent thewhole day exploring the charming environs of Acapulco, --having been seenat different periods going over the Old Mission in tow of a monk whowouldn't look at them but kept his eyes carefully fixed on the ground, sitting on high stools eating strange and enchanting ices at the shop inthe town that has the best ices, bathing deliciously in the warm sea atthe foot of a cliff along the top of which a great hedge ofrose-coloured geraniums flared against the sky, lunching under a groveof ilexes on the contents of a basket produced by Mr. Twist fromsomewhere in the car he had hired, wandering afterwards up througheucalyptus woods across the fields towards the foot of themountains, --they came about five o'clock, thirsty and thinking of tea, to a delightful group of flowery cottages clustering round a restaurantand forming collectively, as Mr. Twist explained, one of the manyAmerican forms of hotel. "To which, " he said, "people not living in thecottages can come and have meals at the restaurant, so we'll go right inand have tea. "

And it was just because they couldn't get tea--any other meal, theproprietress said, but no teas were served, owing to the Domestic HelpEight Hours Bill which obliged her to do without domestics during theafternoon hours--that Anna-Felicitas came by her great idea. 

CHAPTER XXI

But she didn't come by it at once. 

They got into the car first, which was waiting for them in the scentedroad at the bottom of the field they had walked across, and they gotinto it in silence and were driven back to their hotel for tea, and herbrain was still unvisited by inspiration. 

They were all tired and thirsty, and were disappointed at being thwartedin their desire to sit at a little green table under whispering treesand rest, and drink tea, and had no sort of wish to have it at theCosmopolitan. But both Mr. Twist, who had been corrupted by Europe, andthe twins, who had the habits of their mother, couldn't imagine doingwithout it in the afternoon, and they would have it in the hotel soonerthan not have it at all. It was brought to them after a long time ofwaiting. Nobody else was having any at that hour, and the waiter, whenat last one was found, had difficulty apparently in believing that theywere serious. When at last he did bring it, it was toast and marmaladeand table-napkins, for all the world as though it had been breakfast. 

Then it was that, contemplating this with discomfort and distaste, aswell as the place they were sitting in and its rocking-chairs and marbleand rugs, Anna-Felicitas was suddenly smitten by her idea. 

It fell upon her like a blow. It struck her fairly, as it were, betweenthe eyes. She wasn't used to ideas, and she stopped dead in the middleof a piece of toast and looked at the others. They stopped too in theireating and looked at her. 

"What's the matter?" asked Anna-Rose. "Has another button come off?"

At this Mr. Twist considered it wisest to turn his head away, forexperience had taught him that Anna-Felicitas easily came undone. 

"I've thought of something, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

Mr. Twist turned his head back again. "You don't say, " he said, mildlysarcastic. 

"_Ich gratuliere_, " said Anna-Rose, also mildly sarcastic. 

"I've got an idea, " said Anna-Felicitas. "But it's so luminous, " shesaid, looking from one to the other in a kind of surprise. "Of course. That's what we'll do. Ridiculous to waste time bothering about schools. "

There was a new expression on her face that silenced the comments risingto Anna-Rose's and Mr. Twist's tongues, both of whom had tired feet andwere therefore disposed to sarcasm. 

Anna-Felicitas looked at them, and they looked at her, and her facecontinued to become visibly more and more illuminated, just as if acurtain were being pulled up. Animation and interest shone in herusually dreamy eyes. Her drooping body sat up quite straight. Shereminded Anna-Rose, who had a biblically well-furnished mind, of Moseswhen he came down from receiving the Law on the mountain. 

"Well, tell us, " said Anna-Rose. "But not, " she added, thinking ofMoses, "if it's only more commandments. "

Anna-Felicitas dropped the piece of toast she was still holding in herfingers, and pushed back her cup. "Come out on to the rocks, " she saidgetting up--"where we sat this morning. " And she marched out, followedby the other two with the odd submissiveness people show towards any onewho is thoroughly determined. 

It was dark and dinner-time before they got back to the hotel. Throughout the sunset Anna-Felicitas sat on her rock, the same rock shehad sat on so unsatisfactorily eight hours earlier, and expounded heridea. She couldn't talk fast enough. She, so slow and listless, for oncewas shaken into burning activity. She threw off her hat directly she goton to the sands, climbed up the rock as if it were a pulpit, and withher hands clasped round her knees poured out her plan, the long shaftsof the setting sun bathing her in bright flames and making her more likeMoses than ever, --if, that is, one could imagine Moses as beautiful asAnna-F. , thought Anna-Rose, and as felicitously without his nose andbeard. 

It was wonderful how complete Anna-Felicitas's inspiration was. Itreminded Mr. Twist of his own about the teapot. It was, of course, a farmore complicated matter than that little device of his, and would haveto be thought out very carefully and approached very judiciously, butthe wealth of detail she was already ready with immensely impressed him. She even had a name for the thing; and it was when he heard this name, when it flashed into her talk with the unpremeditatedness of aninspiration, that Mr. Twist became definitely enthusiastic. 

He had an American eye for advertisement. Respect for it was in hisblood. He instantly saw the possibilities contained in the name. He sawwhat could be done with it, properly worked. He saw it on hoarding-onsignposts, in a thousand contrivances for catching the public attentionand sticking there. 

The idea, of course, was fantastic, unconventional, definitely outsidewhat his mother and that man Uncle Arthur would consider proper, but itwas outside the standards of such people that life and fruitfulness andinterest and joy began. He had escaped from the death-like grip of hismother, and Uncle Arthur had himself forcibly expulsed the Annas fromhis, and now that they were all so far away, instead of still timorouslytrying to go on living up to those distant sterile ideas why shouldn'tthey boldly go out into the light and colour that was waiting everywherefor the free of spirit?

Mr. Twist had often observed how perplexingly much there is to be saidfor the opposite sides of a question. He was now, but with noperplexity, for Anna-Felicitas had roused his enthusiasm, himself takingthe very opposite view as to the proper thing for the twins to do fromthe one he had taken in the night and on the rocks that morning. School?Nonsense. Absurd to bury these bright shoots of everlastingness--this iswhat they looked like to him, afire with enthusiasm and the settingsun--in such a place of ink. If the plan, owing to the extreme youth ofthe Annas, were unconventional, conventionality could be secured bygiving a big enough salary to a middle-aged lady to come and preside. Hehimself would hover beneficently in the background over the undertaking. 

Anna-Felicitas's idea was to use Uncle Arthur's £200 in renting one ofthe little wooden cottages that seemed to be plentiful, preferably oneabout five miles out in the country, make it look inside like an Englishcottage, all pewter and chintz and valances, make it look outside likethe more innocent type of German wayside inn, with green tables andspreading trees, get a cook who would concentrate on cakes, real lovelyones, various, poetic, wonderful cakes, and start an inn for tea alonethat should become the fashion. It ought to be so arranged that itbecame the fashion. She and Anna-Rose would do the waiting. The priceswould be very high, indeed exorbitant--this Mr. Twist regarded asanother inspiration, --so that it should be a distinction, give people a_cachet_, to have had tea at their cottage; and in a prominent positionin the road in front of it, where every motor-car would be bound to seeit, there would be a real wayside inn signboard, such as inns in Englandalways have, with its name on it. 

"If people here were really neutral you might have the Imperial arms ofGermany and England emblazoned on it, " interrupted Mr. Twist, "just toshow your own extreme and peculiar neutrality. "

"We might call it The Christopher and Columbus, " interrupted Anna-Rose, who had been sitting open-mouthed hanging on Anna-Felicitas's words. 

"Or you might call it The Cup and Saucer, " said Mr. Twist, "and have abig cup brimming with tea and cream painted on it--"

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas. "It is The Open Arms. That is its name. "

And Mr. Twist, inclined to smile and criticise up to this, bowed hishead in instantaneous recognition and acceptance. 

He became definitely enthusiastic. Of course he would see to it that nota shadow of ambiguousness was allowed to rest on such a name. The wholething as he saw it, his mind working rapidly while Anna-Felicitas stilltalked, would be a happy joke, a joyous, gay little assault on thepurses of millionaires, in whom the district abounded judging from thebeautiful houses and gardens he had passed that day, --but a joke and agay assault that would at the same time employ and support the Annas;solve them, in fact, saw Mr. Twist, who all day long had been regardingthem much as one does a difficult mathematical problem. 

It was Mr. Twist who added the final inspiration to Anna-Felicitas'smany, when at last she paused for want of breath. The inn, he said, should be run as a war philanthropy. All that was over after theexpenses were paid and a proper percentage reserved by the Annas asinterest on their invested capital--they listened with eager respect tothese business-like expressions--would be handed over to the AmericanRed Cross. "That, " explained Mr. Twist, "would seal the inn as bothrespectable and fashionable, which is exactly what we would want to makeit. "

And he then announced, and they accepted without argument or questioningin the general excitement, that he would have himself appointed theirlegal guardian. 

They didn't go back to the Cosmopolitan till dinnertime, there was somuch to say, and after dinner, a meal at which Mr. Twist had to suppressthem a good deal because The Open Arms kept on bursting through intotheir talk and, as at breakfast, the people at the tables round themwere obviously trying to hear, they went out once again on to thesea-front and walked up and down till late continuing the discussion, mostly simultaneously as regards the twins, while Mr. Twist chimed inwith practical suggestions whenever they stopped to take breath. 

He had to drive them indoors to bed at last, for the lights were goingout one by one in the Cosmopolitan bedroom windows, where the virtuousrich, exhausted by their day of virtue, were subsiding, prostrate withboredom and respectability, into their various legitimate lairs, and hestayed alone out by the sea rapidly sketching out his activities for thenext day. 

There was the guardianship to be arranged, the cottage to be found, andthe middle-aged lady to be advertised for. She, indeed, must be securedat once; got to come at once to the Cosmopolitan and preside over thetwins until they all proceeded in due season to The Open Arms. She mustbe a motherly middle-aged lady, decided Mr. Twist, affectionate, skilledin managing a cook, business-like, intellectual, and obedient. Herfeminine tact would enable her to appear to preside while she was inreality obeying. She must understand that she was there for the Annas, and that the Annas were not there for her. She must approach thesituation in the spirit of the enlightened king of a democratic country, who receives its honours, accepts its respect, but does not lose sightof the fact that he is merely the Chief Servant of the people. Mr. Twistdidn't want a female Uncle Arthur let loose upon those blessed littlegirls; besides, they would have the dangerous weapon in their hands ofbeing able to give her notice, and it would considerably dim thereputation of The Open Arms if there were a too frequent departure fromit of middle-aged ladies. 

Mr. Twist felt himself very responsible and full of anxieties as hepaced up and down alone, but he was really enjoying himself. Thatyouthful side of him, so usual in the artistic temperament, which leapedabout at the least pleasant provocation like a happy lamb when thesunshine tickles it, was feeling that this was great fun; and thebusiness side of him was feeling that it was not only great fun butprobably an extraordinarily productive piece of money-making. 

The ignorant Annas--bless their little hearts, he thought, he who onlythe night before on that very spot had been calling themaccursed--believed that their £200 was easily going to do everything. This was lucky, for otherwise there would have been some thorny paths ofargument and convincing to be got through before they would have allowedhim to help finance the undertaking; probably they never would have, intheir scrupulous independence. Mr. Twist reflected with satisfaction onthe usefulness of his teapot. At last he was going to be able to dosomething, thanks to it, that gave him real gladness. His ambulance toFrance--that was duty. His lavishness to his mother--that again wasduty. But here was delight, here at last was what his lonely heart hadalways longed for, --a chance to help and make happy, and be with andwatch being made happy, dear women-things, dear soft sweet kindwomen-things, dear sister-things, dear children-things. . . . 

It has been said somewhere before that Mr. Twist was meant by Nature tobe a mother; but Nature, when she was half-way through him, forgot andturned him into a man. 

CHAPTER XXII

The very next morning they set out house-hunting, and two days laterthey had found what they wanted. Not exactly what they wanted of course, for the reason, as Anna-Felicitas explained that nothing ever is_exactly_, but full of possibilities to the eye of imagination, andthere were six of this sort of eye gazing at the little house. 

It stood at right angles to a road much used by motorists because of itsbeauty, and hidden from it by trees on the top of a slope of greenfields scattered over with live oaks that gently descended down towardsthe sea. Its back windows, and those parts of it that a house is ashamedof, were close up to a thick grove of eucalyptus which continued to thefoot of the mountains. It had an overrun little garden in front, separated from the fields by a riotous hedge of sweetbriar. It had a feworange, and lemon, and peach trees on its west side, the survivors ofwhat had once been intended for an orchard, and a line of pepper treeson the other, between it and the road. Neglected roses and a hugewistaria clambered over its dilapidated face. Somebody had once plantedsyringas, and snowballs, and lilacs along the inside of the line ofpepper trees, and they had grown extravagantly and were an impenetrablescreen, even without the sweeping pepper trees from the road. 

It hadn't been lived in for years, and it was well on in decay, beingmade of wood, but the situation was perfect for The Open Arms. Everymotorist coming up that road would see the signboard outside the peppertrees, and would certainly want to stop at the neat little gate, andpass through the flowery tunnel that would be cut through the syringas, and see what was inside. Other houses were offered of a far higherclass, for this one had never been lived in by gentry, said thehouse-agent endeavouring to put them off a thing so broken down. Afarmer had had it years back, he told them, and instead of confininghimself to drinking the milk from his own cows, which was the onlyappropriate drink for a farmer the agent maintained--he was thepresident of the local Anti-Vice-In-All-Its-Forms League--he put hismoney as he earned it into gin, and the gin into himself, and so after abit was done for. 

The other houses the agent pressed on them were superior in every wayexcept situation; but situation being the first consideration, Mr. Twistagreed with the twins, who had fallen in love with the neglected littlehouse whose shabbiness was being so industriously hidden by roses, thatthis was the place, and a week later it and its garden had beenbought--Mr. Twist didn't tell the twins he had bought it, in order toavoid argument, but it was manifestly the simple thing to do--and overand round and through it swarmed workmen all day long, like so manydiligent and determined ants. Also, before the week was out, themiddle-aged lady had been found and engaged, and a cook of gifts in thematter of cakes. This is the way you do things in America. You decidewhat it is that you really want, and you start right away and get it. "And everything so cheap too!" exclaimed the twins gleefully, whose £200was behaving, it appeared, very like the widow's cruse. 

This belief, however, received a blow when they went without Mr. Twist, who was too busy now for any extra expeditions, to choose and buychintzes, and it was finally shattered when the various middle-agedladies who responded to Mr. Twist's cry for help in the advertisingcolumns of the Acapulco and Los Angeles press one and all demanded assalary more than the whole Twinkler capital. 

The twins had a bad moment of chill fear and misgiving, and then oncemore were saved by an inspiration, --this time Anna-Rose's. 

"I know, " she exclaimed, her face clearing. "We'll make itCo-operative. "

Mr. Twist, whose brow too had been puckered in the effort to think out away of persuading the twins to let him help them openly with his money, for in spite of his going to be their guardian they remained difficulton this point, jumped at the idea. He couldn't, of course, tell what inAnna-Rose's mind the word co-operative stood for, but felt confidentthat whatever it stood for he could manipulate it into covering hisdifficulties. 

"What is co-operative?" asked Anna-Felicitas, with a new respect for asister who could suddenly produce a business word like that and seem toknow all about it. She had heard the word herself, but it sat veryloosely in her head, at no point touching anything else. 

"Haven't you heard of Co-operative Stores?" inquired Anna-Rose. 

"Yes but--"

"Well, then. "

"Yes, but what would a co-operative inn be?" persisted Anna-Felicitas. 

"One run on co-operative lines, of course, " said Anna-Rose grandly. "Everybody pays for everything, so that nobody particular pays foranything. "

"Oh, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"I mean, " said Anna-Rose, who felt herself that this might be clearer, "it's when you pay the servants and the rent and the cakes and thingsout of what you get. "

"Oh, " said Anna-Felicitas. "And will they wait quite quietly till we'vegot it?"

"Of course, if we're all co-operative. "

"I see, " said Anna-Felicitas, who saw as little as before, but knew ofold that Anna-Rose grew irascible when pressed. 

"See here now, " said Mr. Twist weightily, "if that isn't an idea. Onlyyou've got hold of the wrong word. The word you want is profit-sharing. And as this undertaking is going to be a big success there will be bigprofits, and any amount of cakes and salaries will be paid for as gliblyand easily as you can say your ABC. "

And he explained that till they were fairly started he was going to stayin California, and that he intended during this time to be book-keeper, secretary, and treasurer to The Open Arms, besides Advertiser-in-Chief, which was, he said, the most important post of all; and if they would beso good as to leave this side of it unquestioningly to him, who had hada business training, he would undertake that the Red Cross, American orBritish, whichever they decided to support, should profit handsomely. 

Thus did Mr. Twist artfully obtain a free hand as financial backer ofThe Open Arms. The profit-sharing system seemed to the twins admirable. It cleared away every scruple and every difficulty, they now boughtchintzes and pewter pots in the faith of it without a qualm, and evenceased to blench at the salary of the lady engaged to be theirbackground, --indeed her very expensiveness pleased them, for it gavethem confidence that she must at such a price be the right one, becausenobody, they agreed, who knew herself not to be the right one would havethe face to demand so much. 

This lady, the widow of Bruce D. Bilton of Chicago of whom of course, she said, the Miss Twinklers had heard--the Miss Twinklers blushed andfelt ashamed of themselves because they hadn't, and indistinctlymurmured something about having heard of Cornelius K. Vanderbilt, though, and wouldn't he do--had a great deal of very beautifulsnow-white hair, while at the same time she was only middle-aged. Shefirmly announced, when she perceived Mr. Twist's spectacles dwelling onher hair, that she wasn't yet forty, and her one fear was that shemightn't be middle-aged enough. The advertisement had particularlymentioned middle-aged; and though she was aware that her brains andfingers and feet couldn't possibly be described as coming under thatheading, she said her hair, on the other hand, might well be regarded ashaving overshot the mark. But its turning white had nothing to do withage. It had done that when Mr. Bilton passed over. No hair could havestood such grief as hers when Mr. Bilton took that final step. She hadbeen considering the question of age, she informed Mr. Twist, from everyaspect before coming to the interview, for she didn't want to make amistake herself nor allow the Miss Twinklers to make a mistake; and shehad arrived at the conclusion that what with her hair being too old andthe rest of her being too young, taken altogether she struck an absoluteaverage and perfectly fulfilled the condition required; and as shewished to live in the country, town life disturbing her psychically toomuch, she was willing to give up her home and her circle--it was a realsacrifice--and accept the position offered by the Miss Twinklers. Shewas, she said, very quiet, and yet at the same time she was very active. She liked to fly round among duties, and she liked to retire into herown mentality and think. She was all for equilibrium, for the rightbalancing of body and mind in a proper alternation of suitable action. Thus she attained poise, --she was one of the most poised women herfriends knew, they told her. Also she had a warm heart, and liked bothphilanthropy and orphans. Especially if they were war ones. 

Mrs. Bilton talked so quickly and so profusely that it took quite a longtime to engage her. There never seemed to be a pause in which one coulddo it. It was in Los Angeles, in an hotel to which Mr. Twist had motoredthe twins, starting at daybreak that morning in order to see this lady, that the personal interview took place, and by lunch-time they had beenpersonally interviewing her for three hours without stopping. It seemedyears. The twins longed to engage her, if only to keep her quiet; butMrs. Bilton's spirited description of life as she saw it and of the wayit affected something she called her psyche, was without punctuation andwithout even the tiny gap of a comma in it through which one might havedexterously slipped a definite offer. She had to be interrupted at last, in spite of the discomfort this gave to the Twinkler and Twistpoliteness, because a cook was coming to be interviewed directly afterlunch, and they were dying for some food. 

The moment Mr. Twist saw Mrs. Bilton's beautiful white hair he knew shewas the one. That hair was what The Open Arms wanted and must have; thathair, with a well-made black dress to go with it, would be a shieldthrough which no breath of misunderstanding as to the singleness ofpurpose with which the inn was run would ever penetrate. He would havesettled it with her in five minutes if she could have been got tolisten, but Mrs. Bilton couldn't be got to listen; and when it becameclear that no amount of patient waiting would bring him any nearer theend of what she had to say Mr. Twist was forced to take off his coat, asit were, and plunge abruptly into the very middle of her flow of wordsand convey to her as quickly as possible, as one swimming for his lifeagainst the stream, that she was engaged. "Engaged, Mrs. Bilton, "--hecalled out, raising his voice above the sound of Mrs. Bilton's rushingwords, "engaged. " She would be expected at the Cosmopolitan, swiftlycontinued Mr. Twist, who was as particularly anxious to have her at theCosmopolitan as the twins were particularly anxious not to, --for for thelife of them they couldn't see why Mrs. Bilton should be stirred upbefore they started inhabiting the cottage, --within three days--

"Mr. Twist, it can't be done, " broke in Mrs. Bilton a fresh andmountainous wave of speech gathering above Mr. Twist's head. "Itabsolutely--"

"Within a week, then, " he called out quickly, holding up the breaking ofthe wave for an instant while he hastened to and opened the door. "Andgoodmorning Mrs. Bilton--my apologies, my sincere apologies, but wehave to hurry away--"

The cook was engaged that afternoon. Mr. Twist appeared to have mixed upthe answers to his advertisement, for when, after paying theluncheon-bill, he went to join the twins in the sitting-room, he foundthem waiting for him in the passage outside the door looking excited. 

"The cook's come, " whispered Anna-Rose, jerking her head towards theshut door. "She's a man. "

"She's a Chinaman, " whispered Anna-Felicitas. 

Mr. Twist was surprised. He thought he had an appointment with awoman, --a coloured lady from South Carolina who was a specialist inpastries and had immaculate references, but the Chinaman assured himthat he hadn't, and that his appointment was with him alone, with him, Li Koo. In proof of it, he said, spreading out his hands, here he was. "We make cakies--li'l cakies--many, lovely li'l cakies, " said Li Koo, observing doubt on the gentleman's face; and from somewhere on hisperson he whipped out a paper bag of them as a conjurer whips a rabbitout of a hat, and offered them to the twins. 

They ate. He was engaged. It took five minutes. 

After he had gone, and punctually to the minute of her appointment, anover-flowing Negress appeared and announced that she was the colouredlady from South Carolina to whom the gentleman had written. 

Mr. Twist uncomfortably felt that Li Koo had somehow been clever. Impossible, however, to go back on him, having eaten his cakes. Besides, they were perfect cakes, blown together apparently out of flowers andhoney and cream, --cakes which, combined with Mrs. Bilton's hair, wouldmake the fortune of The Open Arms. 

The coloured lady, therefore, was sent away, disappointed in spite ofthe _douceur_ and fair words Mr. Twist gave her; and she was so muchdisappointed that they could hear her being it out loud all the wayalong the passage and down the stairs, and the nature of her expressionof her disappointment was such that Mr. Twist, as he tried by animatedconversation to prevent it reaching the twins' ears, could only bethankful after all that Li Koo had been so clever. It did, however, reach the twins' ears, but they didn't turn a hair because of UncleArthur. They merely expressed surprise at its redness, seeing that itcame out of somebody so black. 

Directly after this trip to Los Angeles advertisements began to creepover the countryside. They crept along the roads where motorists werefrequent and peeped at passing cars round corners and over hedges. Theywere taciturn advertisements, and just said three words in big, straight, plain white letters on a sea-blue ground:

THE OPEN ARMS

People passing in their cars saw them, and vaguely thought it must bethe name of a book. They had better get it. Other people would have gotit. It couldn't be a medicine nor anything to eat, and was probably areligious novel. Novels about feet or arms were usually religious. A fewconsidered it sounded a little improper, and as though the book, farfrom being religious, would not be altogether nice; but only very properpeople who distrusted everything, even arms took this view. 

After a week the same advertisements appeared with three lines added:

THE OPEN ARMS YES BUTWHY? WHERE? WHAT?

and then ten days after that came fresh ones:

THE OPEN ARMS WILL OPEN WIDE

On November 20th at Four P. M. 

N. B. WATCH THE SIGNPOSTS. 

And while the countryside--an idle countryside, engaged almost wholly inholiday-making and glad of any new distraction--began to be interestedand asked questions, Mr. Twist was working day and night at getting thething ready. 

All day long he was in Acapulco or out at the cottage, urging, hurrying, criticizing, encouraging, praising and admonishing. His heart and souland brain was in this, his business instincts and his soft domesticside. His brain, after working at top speed during the day with thearchitect, the painter and decorator, the furnisher, the garden expert, the plumbing expert, the electric-light expert, the lawyer, the estateagent, and numberless other persons, during the night meditated andevolved advertisements. There was to be a continual stream week by weekafter the inn was opened of ingenious advertisements. Altogether Mr. Twist had his hands full. 

The inn was to look artless and simple and small, while actually beingthe last word in roomy and sophisticated comfort. It was to be as likean old English inn to look at as it could possibly be got to be going onhis own and the twins' recollections and the sensationally colouredElizabethan pictures in the architect's portfolio. It didn't disturb Mr. Twist's unprejudiced American mind that an English inn embowered inheliotrope and arum lilies and eucalyptus trees would be odd andunnatural, and it wouldn't disturb anybody else there either. Were notSwiss mountain chalets to be found in the fertile plains along thePacific, complete with fir trees specially imported and uprooted intheir maturity and brought down with tons of their own earth attached totheir roots and replanted among carefully disposed, apparently Swissrocks, so that what one day had been a place smiling with orange-groveswas the next a bit of frowning northern landscape? And were there notItalian villas dotted about also? But these looked happier and more athome than the chalets. And there were buildings too, like small Gothiccathedrals, looking as uncomfortable and depressed as a woman who hascome to a party in the wrong clothes. But no matter. Nobody minded. Sothat an English inn added to this company, with a little Germanbeer-garden--only there wasn't to be any beer--wouldn't cause the leastsurprise or discomfort to anybody. 

In the end, the sole resemblance the cottage had to an English inn wasthe signboard out in the road. With the best will in the world, and theliveliest financial encouragement from Mr. Twist, the architect couldn'tin three weeks turn a wooden Californian cottage into an ancientred-brick Elizabethan pothouse. He got a thatched roof on to it by amiracle of hustle, but the wooden walls remained; he also found a realantique heavy oak front door studded with big rusty nailheads in a SanFrancisco curiosity shop, that would serve, he said, as a basis for anywished-for hark-back later on when there was more time to the old girl'sepoch--thus did he refer to Great Eliza and her spacious days--andmeanwhile it gave the building, he alleged, a considerable air; but asthis door in that fine climate was hooked open all day long it didn'tdisturb the gay, the almost jocose appearance of the place wheneverything was finished. 

Houses have their expressions, their distinctive faces, very much aspeople have, meditated Mr. Twist the morning of the opening, as he satastride a green chair at the bottom of the little garden, where a hedgeof sweetbriar beautifully separated the Twinkler domain from the rollingfields that lay between it and the Pacific, and stared at his handiwork;and the conclusion was forced upon him--reluctantly, for it was the lastthing he had wanted The Open Arms to do--that the thing looked as if itwere winking at him. 

Positively, thought Mr. Twist, his hat on the back of his head, staring, that was what it seemed to be doing. How was that? He studied itprofoundly, his head on one side. Was it that it was so very gay? Hehadn't meant it to be gay like that. He had intended a restrained anddisciplined simplicity, a Puritan unpretentiousness, with those sweetmaidens, the Twinkler twins, flitting like modest doves in and out amongits tea-tables; but one small thing had been added to another smallthing at their suggestion, each small thing taken separately apparentlynot mattering at all and here it was almost--he hoped it was only hisimagination--winking at him. It looked a familiar little house; jocular;very open indeed about the arms. 

CHAPTER XXIII

Various things had happened, however, before this morning of the greatday was reached, and Mr. Twist had had some harassing experiences. 

One of the first things he had done after the visit to Los Angeles wasto take steps in the matter of the guardianship. He had written to Mrs. Bilton that he was the Miss Twinklers' guardian, though it was not atthat moment true. It was clear, he thought, that it should be made trueas quickly as possible, and he therefore sought out a lawyer in Acapulcothe morning after the interview. This was not the same lawyer who didhis estate business for him; Mr. Twist thought it best to have aseparate one for more personal affairs. 

On hearing Mr. Twist's name announced, the lawyer greeted him as an oldfriend. He knew, of course, all about the teapot, for the Non-Tricklerwas as frequent in American families as the Bible and much moreregularly used; but he also knew about the cottage at the foot of thehills, what it had cost--which was little--and what it would cost--whichwas enormous--before it was fit to live in. The only thing he didn'tknow was that it was to be used for anything except an ordinary_pied-à-terre_. He had heard, too, of the presence at the Cosmopolitanof the twins, and on this point, like the rest of Acapulco, was a littlecurious. 

The social column of the Acapulco daily paper hadn't been able to giveany accurate description of the relationship of the Twinklers to Mr. Twist. Its paragraph announcing his arrival had been obliged merely tosay, while awaiting more detailed information, that Mr. Edward A. Twist, the well-known Breakfast Table Benefactor and gifted inventor of thefamous Non-Trickler Teapot, had arrived from New York and was staying atthe Cosmopolitan Hotel with _entourage_; and the day after this thelawyer, who got about a bit, as everybody else did in that encouragingclimate, happening to look in at the Cosmopolitan to have a talk with afriend, had seen the _entourage_. 

It was in the act of passing through the hall on its way upstairs, followed by a boy carrying a canary in a cage. Even without the boy andthe canary it was a conspicuous object. The lawyer asked his friend whothe cute little girls were, and was interested to hear he was beholdingMr. Edward A. Twist's _entourage_. His friend told him that opinion inthe hotel was divided about the precise nature of this _entourage_ andits relationship to Mr. Twist, but it finally came to be generallysupposed that the Miss Twinklers had been placed in his charge byparents living far away in order that he might safely see them put toone of the young ladies' finishing schools in that agreeable district. The house Mr. Twist was taking was not connected in the Cosmopolitanmind with the Twinklers. Houses were always being taken in that paradiseby wealthy persons from unkinder climates. He would live in it threemonths in the year, thought the Cosmopolitan, bring his mother, and keepin this way an occasional eye on his charges. The hotel guests regardedthe Twinklers at this stage with nothing but benevolence and goodwill, for they had up to then only been seen and not heard; and as one oftheir leading characteristics was a desire to explain, especially ifanybody looked a little surprised, which everybody usually did quiteearly in conversation with them, this was at that moment, the delicatemoment before Mrs. Bilton's arrival, fortunate. 

The lawyer, then, who appreciated the young and pretty as much as otherhonest men, began the interview with Mr. Twist by warmly congratulatinghim, when he heard what he had come for, on his taste in wards. 

Mr. Twist received this a little coldly, and said it was not a matter oftaste but of necessity. The Miss Twinklers were orphans, and he had beenasked--he cleared his throat--asked by their relatives, by, in fact, their uncle in England, to take over their guardianship and see thatthey came to no harm. 

The lawyer nodded intelligently, and said that if a man had wards at allthey might as well be cute wards. 

Mr. Twist didn't like this either, and said briefly that he had had nochoice. 

The lawyer said, "Quite so. Quite so, " and continued to look at himintelligently. 

Mr. Twist then explained that he had come to him rather than, as mighthave been more natural, to the solicitor who had arranged the purchaseof the cottage because this was a private and personal matter--

"Quite so. Quite so, " interrupted the lawyer, with really almost toomuch intelligence. 

Mr. Twist felt the excess of it, and tried to look dignified, but thelawyer was bent on being friendly and frank. Friendliness was natural tohim when visited for the first time by a new client, and that thereshould be frankness between lawyers and clients he considered essential. If, he held, the client wouldn't be frank, then the lawyer must be; andhe must go on being so till the client came out of his reserve. 

Mr. Twist, however, was so obstinate in his reserve that the lawyercheerfully and unhesitatingly jumped to the conclusion that the_entourage_ must have some very weak spots about it somewhere. 

"There's another way out of it of course, Mr. Twist, " he said, when hehad done rapidly describing the different steps to be taken. There werenot many steps. The process of turning oneself into a guardian wassurprisingly simple and swift. 

"Out of it?" said Mr. Twist, his spectacles looking very big andastonished. "Out of what?"

"Out of your little difficulty. I wonder it hasn't occurred to you. Uponmy word now, I do wonder. "

"But I'm not in any little diff--" began Mr. Twist. 

"The elder of these two girls, now--"

"There isn't an elder, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Come, come, " said the lawyer patiently, waiting for him to be sensible. 

"There isn't an elder, " repeated Mr. Twist, "They're twins. "

"Twins, are they? Well I must say we manage to match up our twins betterthan that over here. But come now--hasn't it occurred to you you mightmarry one of them, and so become quite naturally related to them both?"

Mr. Twist's spectacles seemed to grow gigantic. 

"Marry one of them?" he repeated, his mouth helplessly opening. 

"Yep, " said the lawyer, giving him a lead in free-and-easiness. 

"Look here, " said Mr. Twist suddenly gathering his mouth together, "cutthat line of joke out. I'm here on serious business. I haven't come tobe facetious. Least of all about those children--"

"Quite so, quite so, " interrupted the lawyer pleasantly. "Children, youcall them. How old are they? Seventeen? My wife was sixteen when wemarried. Oh quite so, quite so. Certainly. By all means. Well then, they're to be your wards. And you don't want it known how recentlythey've become your wards--"

"I didn't say that, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Quite so, quite so. But it's your wish, isn't it. The relationship isto look as grass-grown as possible. Well, I shall be dumb of course, butmost things get into the press here. Let me see--" He pulled a sheetof paper towards him and took up his fountain pen. "Just oblige me withparticulars. Date of birth. Place of birth. Parentage--"

He looked up ready to write, waiting for the answers. 

None came. 

"I can't tell you off hand, " said Mr. Twist presently, his foreheadpuckered. 

"Ah, " said the lawyer, laying down his pen. "Quite so. Not known youryoung friends long enough yet. "

"I've known them quite long enough, " said Mr. Twist stiffly, "but wehappen to have found more alive topics of conversation than dates andparents. "

"Ah. Parents not alive. "

"Unfortunately they are not. If they were, these poor children wouldn'tbe knocking about in a strange country. "

"Where would they be?" asked the lawyer, balancing his pen across hisforefinger. 

Mr. Twist looked at him very straight. Vividly he remembered hismother's peculiar horror when he told her the girls he was throwing awayhis home life for and breaking her heart over were Germans. It had actedupon her like the last straw. And since then he had felt everywhere, with every one he talked to, in every newspaper he read, the same stronghostility to Germans, so much stronger than when he left America theyear before. 

Mr. Twist began to perceive that he had been impetuous in this matter ofthe guardianship. He hadn't considered it enough. He suddenly sawinnumerable difficulties for the twins and for The Open Arms if it wasknown it was run by Germans. Better abandon the guardianship idea thanthat such difficulties should arise. He hadn't thought; he hadn't hadtime properly to think; he had been so hustled and busy the last fewdays. . . . 

"They come from England, " he said, looking at the lawyer very straight. 

"Ah, " said the lawyer. 

Mr. Twist wasn't going to lie about the twins, but merely, by evading, he hoped to put off the day when their nationality would be known. Perhaps it never would be known; or if known, known later on wheneverybody, as everybody must who knew them, loved them for themselvesand accordingly wouldn't care. 

"Quite so, " said the lawyer again, nodding. "I asked because I overheardthem talking the other day as they passed through the hall of yourhotel. They were talking about a canary. The r in the word seemed alittle rough. Not quite English, Mr. Twist? Not quite American?"

"Not quite, " agreed Mr. Twist. "They've been a good deal abroad. "

"Quite so. At school, no doubt. "

He was silent a moment, intelligently balancing his pen on hisforefinger. 

"Then these particulars, " he went on, looking up at Mr. Twist, --"couldyou let me have them soon? I tell you what. You're in a hurry to fixthis. I'll call round to-night at the hotel, and get them direct fromyour young friends. Save time. And make me acquainted with a pair ofcharming girls. "

"No, " said Mr. Twist. He got on to his feet and held out his hand. "Notto-night. We're engaged to-night. To-morrow will be soon enough. I'llsend round. I'll let you know. I believe I'm going to think it over abit. There isn't any such terrible hurry, anyhow. "

"There isn't? I understood--"

"I mean, a day or two more or less don't figure out at much in the longrun. "

"Quite so, quite so, " said the lawyer, getting up too. "Well, I'm alwaysat your service, at any time. " And he shook hands heartily with Mr. Twist and politely opened the door for him. 

Then he went back to his writing-table more convinced than ever thatthere was something very weak somewhere about the _entourage_. 

As for Mr. Twist, he perceived he had been a fool. Why had he gone tothe lawyer at all? Why not simply have announced to the world that hewas the Twinkler guardian? The twins themselves would have believed itif he had come in one day and said it was settled, and nobody outsidewould ever have dreamed of questioning it. After all, you couldn't seeif a man was a guardian or not just by looking at him. Well, he would dono more about it, it was much too difficult. Bother it. Let Mrs. Biltongo on supposing he was the legal guardian of her charges. Anyway he hadall the intentions of a guardian. What a fool he had been to go to thelawyer. Curse that lawyer. Now he knew, however distinctly andfrequently he, Mr. Twist, might say he was the Twinkler guardian, thathe wasn't. 

It harassed Mr. Twist to perceive, as he did perceive with clearness, that he had been a fool; but the twins, when he told them that eveningthat owing to technical difficulties, with the details of which hewouldn't trouble them, the guardianship was off, were pleased. 

"We want to be bound to you, " said Anna-Felicitas her eyes very soft andher voice very gentle, "only by ties of affection and gratitude. "

And Anna-Rose, turning red, opened her mouth as though she were going tosay something handsome like that too, but seemed unable after all to getit out, and only said, rather inaudibly, "Yes. "

CHAPTER XXIV

Yet another harassing experience awaited Mr. Twist before the end ofthat week. 

It had been from the first his anxious concern that nothing should occurat the Cosmopolitan to get his party under a cloud; yet it did get undera cloud, and on the very last afternoon, too, before Mrs. Bilton'sarrival. Only twenty-four hours more and her snowy-haired respectabilitywould have spread over the twins like a white whig. They would have beensafe. His party would have been unassailable. But no; those Twinklers, in spite of his exhortation whenever he had a minute left to exhort in, couldn't, it seemed, refrain from twinkling, --the word in Mr. Twist'smind covered the whole of their easy friendliness, their flow oflanguage, their affable desire to explain. 

He had kept them with him as much as he could, and luckily the excitedinterest they took in the progress of the inn made them happy to hangabout it most of the time of the delicate and dangerous week before Mrs. Bilton came; but they too had things to do, --shopping in Acapulcochoosing the sea-blue linen frocks and muslin caps and aprons in whichthey were to wait at tea, and buying the cushions and flower-pots andcanary that came under the general heading, in Anna-Rose's speech, offeminine touches. So they sometimes left him; and he never saw them gowithout a qualm. 

"Mind and not say anything to anybody about this, won't you, " he wouldsay hastily, making a comprehensive gesture towards the cottage as theywent. 

"Of course we won't. "

"I meant, nobody is to know what it's really going to be. They're tothink it's just a _pied-à-terre. _ It would most ruin my advertisementscheme if they--"

"But of _course_ we won't. Have we ever?" the twins would answer, looking very smug and sure of themselves. 

"No. Not yet. But--"

And the hustled man would plunge again into technicalities withwhichever expert was at that moment with him, leaving the twins, as heneeds must, to God and their own discretion. 

Discretion, he already amply knew, was not a Twinkler characteristic. But the week passed, Mrs. Bilton's arrival grew near, and nothing hadhappened. It was plain to the watchful Mr. Twist, from the pleasantlooks of the other guests when the twins went in and out of therestaurant to meals, that nothing had happened. His heart grew lighter. On the last afternoon, when Mrs. Bilton was actually due next day, hisheart was quite light, and he saw them leave him to go back and rest atthe hotel, because they were tired by the accumulated standing about ofthe week, altogether unconcernedly. 

The attitude of the Cosmopolitan guests towards the twins was, indeed, one of complete benevolence. They didn't even mind the canary. Who wouldnot be indulgent towards two such sweet little girls and their pet bird, even if it did sing all day and most of the night without stopping? TheTwinkler girls were like two little bits of snapped-off sunlight, orbits of white blossom blowing in and out of the hotel in their shiningyouth and it was impossible not to regard them indulgently. But if theguests were indulgent, they were also inquisitive. Everybody knew whoMr. Twist was; who, however, were the Twinklers? Were they relations ofhis? _Protégées_? Charges?

The social column of the Acapulco daily paper, from which information asto new arrivals was usually got, had, as we know, in its embarrassmentat being ignorant to take refuge in French, because French may so easilybe supposed to mean something. The paper had little knowledge of, butmuch confidence in, French. _Entourage_ had seemed to it as good a wordas any other, as indeed did _clientèle_. It had hesitated between thetwo, but finally chose _entourage_ because there happened to be noaccent in its stock of type. The Cosmopolitan guests were amused at theword, and though inquisitive were altogether amiable; and, until thelast afternoon, only the manager didn't like the Twinklers. He didn'tlike them because of the canary. His sympathies had been alienated fromthe Miss Twinklers the moment he heard through the chambermaid that theyhad tied the heavy canary cage on to the hanging electric light in theirbedroom. He said nothing, of course. One doesn't say anything if one isan hotel manager, until the unique and final moment when one sayseverything. 

On the last afternoon before Mrs. Bilton's advent the twins, tired ofstanding about for days at the cottage and in shops, appeared in thehall of the hotel and sat down to rest. They didn't go to their room torest because they didn't feel inclined for the canary, and they sat downvery happily in the comfortable rocking-chairs with which the big hallabounded, and, propping their dusty feet on the lower bar of a smalltable, with friendly and interested eyes they observed the other guests. 

The other guests also observed them. 

It was the first time the _entourage_ had appeared without itscompanion, and the other guests were dying to know details about it. Ithadn't been sitting in the hall five minutes before a genial oldgentleman caught Anna-Felicitas's friendly eye and instantly drew up hischair. 

"Uncle gone off by himself to-day?" he asked; for he was of the party inthe hotel which inclined, in spite of the marked difference in profiles, to the relationship theory, and he made a shot at the relationship beingthat of uncle. 

"We haven't got an uncle nearer than England, " said Anna-Felicitasaffably. 

"And we only got him by accident, " said Anna-Rose, equally affably. 

"It was an unfortunate accident, " said Anna-Felicitas, considering hermemories. 

"Indeed, " said the old gentleman. "Indeed. How was that?"

"By the usual method, if an uncle isn't a blood uncle, " said Anna-Rose. "We happened to have a marriageable aunt, and he married her. So we haveto have him. "

"It was sheer bad luck, " said Anna-Felicitas, again brooding on thatdistant image. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose. "Just bad luck. He might so easily have marriedsome one else's aunt. But no. His roving glance must needs go and fallon ours. "

"Indeed, " said the old gentleman. "Indeed. " And he ruminated on this, with an affectionate eye--he was affectionate--resting in turn on eachAnna. 

"Then Mr. Twist, " he went on presently--"we all know him of course--apublic benefactor--"

"Yes, _isn't_ he, " said Anna-Rose radiantly. 

"A boon to the breakfast-table--"

"Yes, _isn't_ he, " said Anna-Rose again, all asparkle. "He _is_ sopleasant at breakfast. "

"Then he--Mr. Twist--Teapot Twist we call him where I live--"

"Teapot Twist?" said Anna-Rose. "I think that's irreverent. "

"Not at all. It's a pet name. A sign of our affection and gratitude. Then he isn't your uncle?"

"We haven't got a real uncle nearer than heaven, " said Anna-Felicitas, her cheek on her hand, dreamily reconstructing the image of Onkel Col. 

"Indeed, " said the old gentleman. "Indeed. " And he ruminated, on thistoo, his thirsty heart--he had a thirsty heart, and found difficulty inslaking it because of his wife--very indulgent toward the twins. 

Then he said: "That's a long way off. "

"What is?" asked Anna-Rose. 

"The place your uncle's in. "

"Not too far really, " said Anna-Felicitas softly. "He's safe there. Hewas very old, and was difficult to look after. Why, he got there at lastthrough his own carelessness. "

"Indeed, " said the old gentleman. 

"Sheer carelessness, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Indeed, " said the old gentleman. "How was that?"

"Well, you see where we lived they didn't have electric light, " beganAnna-Rose, "and one night--the the night he went to heaven--he put thepetroleum lamp--"

And she was about to relate that dreadful story of Onkle Col's endwhich has already been described in these pages as unfit for anywherebut an appendix for time had blunted her feelings, when Anna-Felicitasput out a beseeching hand and stopped her. Even after all these yearsAnna-Felicitas couldn't bear to remember Onkle Col's end. It had hauntedher childhood. It had licked about her dreams in leaping tongues offlame. And it wasn't only tongues of flame. There were circumstancesconnected with it. . . . Only quite recently, since the war had damped downlesser horrors, had she got rid of it. She could at least now talk ofhim calmly, and also speculate with pleasure on the probable aspect ofOnkle Col in glory, but she still couldn't bear to hear the details ofhis end. 

At this point an elderly lady of the spare and active type, very uprightand much wrinkled, that America seems so freely to produce, came downthe stairs; and seeing the twins talking to the old gentleman, crossedstraight over and sat down briskly next to them smiling benevolently. 

"Well, if Mr. Ridding can talk to you I guess so can I, " she said, pulling her knitting out of a brocaded bag and nodding and smiling atthe group. 

She was knitting socks for the Allied armies in France the next winter, but it being warm just then in California they were cotton socks becausewool made her hands too hot. 

The twins were all polite, reciprocal smiles. 

"I'm just crazy to hear about you, " said the brisk lady, knitting withincredible energy, while her smiles flicked over everybody. "You'refresh from Europe, aren't you? What say? Quite fresh? My, aren't youcute little things. Thinking of making a long stay in the States? Whatsay? For the rest of your lives? Why now, I call that just splendid. Parents coming out West soon too? What say? Prevented? Well, I guessthey won't let themselves be prevented long. Mr. Twist looking after youmeanwhile? What say? There isn't any meanwhile? Well, I don't quite--Mr. Twist your uncle, or cousin? What say? No relation at all? H'm, h'm. Norelation at all, is he. Well, I guess he's an old friend of yourparents, then. What say? They didn't know him? H'm, h'm. They didn'tknow him, didn't they. Well, I don't quite--What say? But you know him?Yes, yes, so I see. H'm, h'm. I don't quite--" Her needles flew in andout, and her ball of cotton rolled on to the floor in her surprise. 

Anna-Rose got up and fetched it for her before the old gentleman, whowas gazing with thirsty appreciation at Anna-Felicitas, could struggleout of his chair. 

"You see, " explained Anna-Felicitas, taking advantage of the silencethat had fallen on the lady, "Mr. Twist, regarded as a man, is old, butregarded as a friend he is new. "

"Brand new, " said Anna-Rose. 

"H'm, h'm, " said the lady, knitting faster than ever, and looking firstat one twin and then at the other. "H'm, h'm, h'm. Brand new, is he. Well, I don't quite--" Her smiles had now to struggle with theuncertainty and doubt, and were weakening visibly. 

"Say now, where did you meet Teapot Twist?" asked the old gentleman, whowas surprised too, but remained quite benevolent owing to hisaffectionate heart and his not being a lady. 

"We met Mr. Twist, " said Anna-Rose, who objected to this way of alludingto him, "on the steamer. "

"Not before? You didn't meet Mr. Twist before the steamer?" exclaimedthe lady, the last of her smiles flickering out. "Not before thesteamer, didn't you. Just a steamship acquaintance. Parents never seenhim. H'm, h'm, h'm. "

"We would have met him before if we could, " said Anna-Felicitasearnestly. 

"I should think so, " said Anna-Rose. "It has been the greatretrospective loss of our lives meeting him so late in them. "

"Why now, " said the old gentleman smiling, "I shouldn't call it soparticularly late in them. "

But the knitting lady didn't smile at all, and sat up very straight andsaid "H'm, h'm, h'm" to her flashing needles as they flew in and out;for not only was she in doubt now about the cute little things, but shealso regretted, on behalf of the old gentleman's wife who was a friendof hers, the alert interest of his manner. He sat there so very muchawake. With his wife he never seemed awake at all. Up to now she had notseen him except with his wife. 

"You mustn't run away with the idea that we're younger than we reallyare, " Anna-Rose said to the old gentleman. 

"Why no, I won't, " he answered with a liveliness that deepened theknitting lady's regret on behalf of his wife. "When I run away you betit won't be with an idea. "

And he chuckled. He was quite rosy in the face, and chuckled; he whomshe knew only as a quiet man with no chuckle in him. And wasn't what hehad just said very like what the French call a _double entendre?_ Shehadn't a husband herself, but if she had she would wish him to be atleast as quiet when away from her as when with her, and at least as freefrom _double entendres_. At least. Really more. "H'm, h'm, h'm, " shesaid, clicking her needles and looking first at the twins and then atthe old gentleman. 

"Do you mean to say you crossed the Atlantic quite alone, you two?" sheasked, in order to prevent his continuing on these remarkable andunusual lines of _badinage_. 

"Quite, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"That is to say, we had Mr. Twist of course, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Once we had got him, " amended Anna-Felicitas. 

"Yes, yes, " said the knitting lady, "so you say. H'm, h'm, h'm. Once youhad got him. I don't quite--"

"Well, I call you a pair of fine high-spirited girls, " said the oldgentleman heartily, interrupting in his turn, "and all I can say is Iwish I had been on that boat. "

"Here's Mrs. Ridding, " said the knitting lady quickly, relief in hervoice; whereupon he suddenly grew quiet. "My, Mrs. Ridding, " she addedwhen the lady drew within speaking distance, "you do look as though youneeded a rest. "

Mrs. Ridding, the wife of the old gentleman, Mr. Ridding, had beenapproaching slowly for some time from behind. She had been out on theverandah since lunch, trying to recover from it. That was the onedrawback to meals, she considered, that they required so much recoveringfrom; and the nicer they were the longer it took. The meals at theCosmopolitan were particularly nice, and really all one's time was takenup getting over them. 

She was a lady whose figure seemed to be all meals. The old gentlemanhad married her in her youth, when she hadn't had time to have had somany. He and she were then the same age, and unfortunately hadn't goneon being the same age since. It had wrecked his life this inability ofhis wife to stay as young and new as himself. He wanted a young wife, and the older he got in years--his heart very awkwardly retained itsearly freshness--the younger he wanted her; and, instead, the older hegot the older his wife got too. Also the less new. The old gentlemanfelt the whole thing was a dreadful mistake. Why should he have to bemarried to this old lady? Never in his life had he wanted to marry oldladies; and he thought it very hard that at an age when he mostappreciated bright youth he should be forced to spend his preciousyears, his crowning years when his mind had attained wisdom while hisheart retained freshness, stranded with an old lady of costly habits andinordinate bulk just because years ago he had fallen in love with achance pretty girl. 

He struggled politely out of his chair on seeing her. The twins, impressed by such venerable abundance, got up too. 

"Albert, if you try to move too quick you'll crick your back again, "said Mrs. Ridding in a monotonous voice, letting herself down carefullyand a little breathlessly on to the edge of a chair that didn't rock, and fanning herself with a small fan she carried on the end of a massivegold chain. Her fatigued eyes explored the twins while she spoke. 

"I can't get Mr. Ridding to remember that we're neither of us as youngas we were, " she went on, addressing the knitting lady but with her eyescontinuing to explore the twins. 

They naturally thought she was speaking to them, and Anna-Felicitas saidpolitely, "Really?" and Anna-Rose, feeling she too ought to make somecomment, said, "Isn't that very unusual?"

Aunt Alice always said, "Isn't that very unusual?" when she didn't knowwhat else to say, and it worked beautifully, because then the otherperson launched into affirmations or denials with the reasons for them, and was quite happy. 

But Mrs. Ridding only stared at the twins heavily and in silence. 

"Because, " explained Anna-Rose, who thought the old lady didn't quitefollow, "nobody ever is. So that it must be difficult not to rememberit. "

Mr. Ridding too was silent, but that was because of his wife. It wasquite untrue to say that he forgot, seeing that she was constantlyreminding him. "Old stranger, " he thought resentfully, as he carefullyarranged a cushion behind her back. He didn't like her back. Why shouldhe have to pay bills for putting expensive clothes on it? He didn't wantto. It was all a dreadful mistake. 

"You're the Twinkler girls, " said the old lady abruptly. 

They made polite gestures of agreement. 

The knitting lady knitted vigorously, sitting up very straight andsaying nothing, with a look on her face of disclaiming everyresponsibility. 

"Where does your family come from?" was the next question. 

This was unexpected. The twins had no desire to talk of Pomerania. Theyhadn't wanted to talk about Pomerania once since the war began; and theyfelt very distinctly in their bones that America, though she was aneutral, didn't like Germany any more than the belligerents did. It hadbeen their intention to arrange together the line they would take ifasked questions of this sort, but life had been so full and so excitingsince their arrival that they had forgotten to. 

Anna-Rose found herself unable to say anything at all. Anna-Felicitas, therefore, observing that Christopher was unnerved, plunged in. 

"Our family, " she said gently, "can hardly be said to come so much as tohave been. "

The old lady thought this over, her lustreless eyes on Anna-Felicitas'sface. 

The knitting lady clicked away very fast, content to leave themanagement of the Twinklers in more competent hands. 

"How's that?" asked the old lady, finally deciding that she hadn'tunderstood. 

"It's extinct, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Except us. That is, in the directline. "

The old lady was a little impressed by this, direct lines not being sonumerous or so clear in America as in some other countries. 

"You mean you two are the only Twinklers left?" she asked. 

"The only ones left that matter, " said Anna-Felicitas. "There arebranches of Twinklers still existing, I believe, but they're sounimportant that we don't know them. "

"Mere twigs, " said Anna-Rose, recovering her nerves on seeingAnna-Felicitas handle the situation so skilfully; and her noseunconsciously gave a slight Junker lift. 

"Haven't you got any parents?" asked the old lady. 

"We used to have, " said Anna-Felicitas flushing, afraid that her darlingmother was going to be asked about. 

The old gentleman gave a sudden chuckle. "Why yes, " he said, forgettinghis wife's presence for an instant, "I guess you had them once, or Idon't see how--"

"Albert, " said his wife. 

"We are the sole surviving examples of the direct line of Twinklers, "said Anna-Rose, now quite herself and ready to give Columbus a hand. "There's just us. And we--" she paused a moment, and then plunged--"wecome from England. "

"Do you?" said the old lady. "Now I shouldn't have said that. I can'tsay just why, but I shouldn't. Should you, Miss Heap?"

"I shouldn't say a good many things, Mrs. Ridding, " said Miss Heapenigmatically, her needles flying. 

"It's because we've been abroad a great deal with our parents, Iexpect, " said Anna-Rose rather quickly. "I daresay it has left its markon us. "

"Everything leaves its mark on one, " observed Anna-Felicitas pleasantly. 

"Ah, " said the old lady. "I know what it is now. It's the foreign r. You've picked it up. Haven't they, Miss Heap. "

"I shouldn't like to say what they haven't picked up, Mrs. Ridding, "said Miss Heap, again enigmatically. 

"I'm afraid we have, " said Anna-Rose, turning red. "We've been told thatbefore. It seems to stick, once one has picked it up. "

And the old gentleman muttered that everything stuck once one had pickedit up, and looked resentfully at his wife. 

She moved her slow eyes round, and let them rest on him a moment. 

"Albert, if you talk so much you won't be able to sleep to-night, " shesaid. "I can't get Mr. Ridding to remember we've got to be careful atour age, " she added to the knitting lady. 

"You seem to be bothered by your memory, " said Anna-Rose politely, addressing the old gentleman "Have you ever tried making notes on littlebits of paper of the things you have to remember? I think you wouldprobably be all right then. Uncle Arthur used to do that. Or rather hemade Aunt Alice do it for him, and put them where he would see them. "

"Uncle Arthur, " explained Anna-Felicitas to the old lady, "is an uncleof ours. The one, " she said turning to the old gentleman, "we were justtelling you about, who so unfortunately insisted on marrying our aunt. Uncle, that is, by courtesy, " she added, turning to the old lady, "notby blood. "

The old lady's eyes moved from one twin to the other as each one spoke, but she said nothing. 

"But Aunt Alice, " said Anna-Rose, "is our genuine aunt. Well, I wasgoing to tell you, " she continued briskly, addressing the old gentleman. "There used to be things Uncle Arthur had to do every day and everyweek, but still he had to be reminded of them each time, and Aunt Alicehad a whole set of the regular ones written out on bits of cardboard, and brought them out in turn. The Monday morning one was: Wind theClock, and the Sunday morning one was: Take your Hot Bath, and theSaturday evening one was: Remember your Pill. And there was one broughtin regularly every morning with his shaving water and stuck in hislooking-glass: Put on your Abdominable Belt. "

The knitting needles paused an instant. 

"Yes, " Anna-Felicitas joined in, interested by these recollections, herlong limbs sunk in her chair in a position of great ease and comfort, "and it seemed to us so funny for him to have to be reminded to put onwhat was really a part of his clothes every day, that once we wrote aslip of our own for him and left it on his dressing-table: Don't forgetyour Trousers. "

The knitting needles paused again. 

"But the results of that were dreadful, " added Anna-Felicitas, her facesobering at the thought of them. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose. "You see, he supposed Aunt Alice had done it, ina fit of high spirits, though she never had high spirits--"

"And wouldn't have been allowed to if she had, " explainedAnna-Felicitas. 

"And he thought she was laughing at him, " said Anna-Rose, "though wehave never seen her laugh--"

"And I don't believe he has either, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"So there was trouble, because he couldn't bear the idea of her laughingat him, and we had to confess. "

"But that didn't make it any better for Aunt Alice. "

"No, because then he said it was her fault anyhow for not keeping usstricter. "

"So, " said Anna-Felicitas, "after the house had been steeped in asulphurous gloom for over a week, and we all felt as though we werebeing slowly and steadily gassed, we tried to make it up by writing afinal one--a nice one--and leaving it on his plate at breakfast: Kissyour Wife. But instead of kissing her he--" She broke off, and thenfinished a little vaguely: "Oh well, he didn't. "

"Still, " remarked Anna-Rose, "it must be pleasant not to be kissed by ahusband. Aunt Alice always wanted him to, strange to say, which is whywe reminded him of it. He used to forget that more regularly thanalmost anything. And the people who lived in the house nearest us werejust the opposite--the husband was for ever trying to kiss the personwho was his wife, and she was for ever dodging him. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Like the people on Keats's Grecian Urn. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose. "And that sort of husband, must be even worse. 

"Oh, much worse, " agreed Anna-Felicitas. 

She looked round amiably at the three quiet figures in the chairs. "Ishall refrain altogether from husbands, " she said placidly. "I shalltake something that doesn't kiss. "

And she fell into an abstraction, wondering, with her cheek resting onher hand, what he, or it, would look like. 

There was a pause. Anna-Rose was wondering too what sort of a creatureColumbus had in her mind, and how many, if any, legs it would have; andthe other three were, as before, silent. 

Then the old lady said, "Albert, " and put out her hand to be helped onto her feet. 

The old gentleman struggled out of his chair, and helped her up. Hisface had a congested look, as if he were with difficulty keeping backthings he wanted to say. 

Miss Heap got up too, stuffing her knitting as she did so into herbrocaded bag. 

"Go on ahead and ring the elevator bell, Albert, " said the old lady. "It's time we went and had our nap. "

"I ain't going to, " said the old gentleman suddenly. 

"What say? What ain't you going to, Albert?" said the old lady, turningher slow eyes round to him. 

"Nap, " said the old gentleman, his face very red. 

It was intolerable to have to go and nap. He wished to stay where he wasand talk to the twins. Why should he have to nap because somebody elsewanted to? Why should he have to nap with an old lady, anyway? Never inhis life had he wanted to nap with old ladies. It was all a dreadfulmistake. 

"Albert, " said his wife looking at him. 

He went on ahead and rang the lift-bell. 

"You're quite right to see that he rests, Mrs. Ridding, " said Miss Heap, walking away with her and slowing her steps to suit hers. "I should sayit was essential that he should be kept quiet in the afternoons. Youshould see that Mr. Ridding rests more than he does. _Much_ more, " sheadded significantly. 

"I can't get Mr. Ridding to remember that we're neither of us--"

This was the last the twins heard. 

They too had politely got out of their chairs when the old lady began toheave into activity, and they stood watching the three departingfigures. They were a little surprised. Surely they had all been in themiddle of an interesting conversation?

"Perhaps it's American to go away in the middle, " remarked Anna-Rose, following the group with her eyes as it moved toward the lift. 

"Perhaps it is, " said Anna-Felicitas, also gazing after it. 

The old gentleman, in the brief moment during which the two ladies hadtheir backs to him while preceding him into the lift, turned quicklyround on his heels and waved his hand before he himself went in. 

The twins laughed, and waved back; and they waved with such goodwillthat the old gentleman couldn't resist giving one more wave. He wasseen doing it by the two ladies as they faced round, and his wife, asshe let herself down on to the edge of the seat, remarked that hemustn't exert himself like that or he would have to begin taking hisdrops again. 

That was all she said in the lift; but in their room, when she had gother breath again, she said, "Albert, there's just one thing in the worldI hate worse than a fool, and that's an old fool. "

CHAPTER XXV

That evening, while the twins were undressing, a message came up fromthe office that the manager would be obliged if the Miss Twinklers'canary wouldn't sing. 

"But it can't help it, " said Anna-Felicitas through the crack of doorshe held open; she was already in her nightgown. "You wouldn't either ifyou were a canary, " she added, reasoning with the messenger. 

"It's just got to help it, " said he. 

"But why shouldn't it sing?"

"Complaints. "

"But it always has sung. "

"That is so. And it has sung once too often. It's unpopular in thishotel, that canary of yours. It's just got to rest a while. Take iteasy. Sit quiet on its perch and think. "

"But it won't sit quiet and think. "

"Well, I've told you, " he said, going away. 

This was the bird that had been seen arriving at the Cosmopolitan abouta week before by the lawyer, and it had piercingly sung ever since. Itsang, that is, as long as there was any light, real or artificial, tosing by. The boy who carried it from the shop for the twins said itscage was to be hung in a window in the sun, or it couldn't do itselfjustice. But electric light also enabled it to do itself justice, thetwins discovered, and if they sat up late the canary sat up late too, singing as loudly and as mechanically as if it hadn't been a realcanary at all, but something clever and American with a machine insideit. 

Secretly the twins didn't like it. Shocked at its loud behaviour, theyhad very soon agreed that it was no lady, but Anna-Rose was determinedto have it at The Open Arms because of her conviction that no houseshowing the trail of a woman's hand was without a canary. That, and aworkbag. She bought them both the same day. The workbag didn't matter, because it kept quiet; but the canary was a very big, very yellow bird, much bigger and yellower than the frailer canaries of a more exhaustedcivilization, and quite incapable, unless it was pitch dark, of keepingquiet for a minute. Evidently, as Anna-Felicitas said, it had a greatmany lungs. Her idea of lungs, in spite of her time among them andsimilar objects at a hospital, was what it had always been: that theywere things like pink macaroni strung across a frame of bones on theprinciple of a lyre or harp, and producing noises. She thought thecanary had unusual numbers of these pink strings, and all of them of thebiggest and dearest kind of macaroni. 

The other guests at the Cosmopolitan had been rather restive from thefirst on account of this bird, but felt so indulgent toward its owners, those cute little relations or charges or whatever they were of TeapotTwist's, that they bore its singing without complaint. But on theevening of the day the Annas had the interesting conversation with Mr. And Mrs. Ridding and Miss Heap, two definite complaints were lodged inthe office, and one was from Mrs. Ridding and the other was from MissHeap. 

The manager, as has been said, was already sensitive about the canary. Its cage was straining his electric light cord, and its food, assiduously administered in quantities exceeding its capacity, litteredthe expensive pink pile carpet. He therefore lent a ready ear and sentup a peremptory message; and while the message was going up, Miss Heap, who had come herself with her complaint, stayed on discussing the Twistand Twinkler party. 

She said nothing really; she merely asked questions; and not one of thequestions, now they were put to him, did the manager find he couldanswer. No doubt everything was all right. Everybody knew about Mr. Twist, and it wasn't likely he would choose an hotel of so high a classto stay in if his relations to the Miss Twinklers were anything butregular. And a lady companion, he understood, was joining the partyshortly; and besides, there was the house being got ready, a permanentplace of residence he gathered, in which the party would settle down, and experience had taught him that genuine illicitness was neverpermanent. Still, the manager himself hadn't really cared about theTwinklers since the canary came. He could fill the hotel very easily, and there was no need to accommodate people who spoilt carpets. Also, the moment the least doubt or question arose among his guests, all ofwhom he knew and most of whom came back regularly every year, as to thesocial or moral status of any new arrivals, then those arrivals must go. Miss Heap evidently had doubts. Her standard, it is true, was the almostimpossibly high one of the unmarried lady of riper years, but Mrs. Ridding, he understood, had doubts too; and once doubts started in anhotel he knew from experience that they ran through it like measles. Thetime had come for him to act. 

Next morning, therefore, he briskly appeared in Mr. Twist's room as hewas pulling on his boots, and cheerfully hoped he was bearing in mindwhat he had been told the day he took the rooms, that they were engagedfor the date of the month now arrived at. 

Mr. Twist paused with a boot half on. "I'm not bearing it in mind, " hesaid, "because you didn't tell me. "

"Oh yes I did, Mr. Twist, " said the manager briskly. "It isn't likelyI'd make a mistake about that. The rooms are taken every year for thisdate by the same people. Mrs. Hart of Boston has this one, and Mr. AndMrs. --"

Mr. Twist heard no more. He finished lacing his boots in silence. Whathe had been so much afraid of had happened: he and the twins had gotunder a cloud. 

The twins had been saying things. Last night they told him they had madesome friends. He had been uneasy at that, and questioned them. But itappeared they had talked chiefly of their Uncle Arthur. Well, damnableas Uncle Arthur was as a man he was safe enough as a topic ofconversation. He was English. He was known to people in America like theDelloggs and the Sacks. But it was now clear they must have said thingsbesides that. Probably they had expatiated on Uncle Arthur from somepoint of view undesirable to American ears. The American ear was verysusceptible. He hadn't been born in New England without becoming awareof that. 

Mr. Twist tied his bootlaces with such annoyance that he got them intoknots. He ought never to have come with the Annas to a big hotel. Yetlodgings would have been worse. Why hadn't that white-haired gasbag, Mrs. Bilton--Mr. Twist's thoughts were sometimes unjust--joined themsooner? Why had that shirker Dellogg died? He got his bootlaceshopelessly into knots. 

"I'd like to start right in getting the rooms fixed up, Mr. Twist, " saidthe manager pleasantly. "Mrs. Hart of Boston is very--"

"See here, " said Mr. Twist, straightening himself and turning the fulllight of his big spectacles on to him, "I don't care a curse for Mrs. Hart of Boston. "

The manager expressed regret that Mr. Twist should connect a curse witha lady. It wasn't American to do that. Mrs. Hart--

"Damn Mrs. Hart, " said Mr. Twist, who had become full-bodied of speechwhile in France, and when he was goaded let it all out. 

The manager went away. And so, two hours later, did Mr. Twist and thetwins. 

"I don't know what you've been saying, " he said in an extremelyexasperated voice, as he sat opposite them in the taxi with their grips, considerably added to and crowned by the canary who was singing, piledup round him. 

"Saying?" echoed the twins, their eyes very round. 

"But whatever it was you'd have done better to say something else. Confound that bird. Doesn't it ever stop screeching?"

It was the twins, however, who were confounded. So much confounded bywhat they considered his unjust severity that they didn't attempt todefend themselves, but sat looking at him with proud hurt eyes. 

By this time they both had become very fond of Mr. Twist, andaccordingly he was able to hurt them. Anna-Rose, indeed, was so fond ofhim that she actually thought him handsome. She had boldly said so tothe astonished Anna-Felicitas about a week before; and whenAnna-Felicitas was silent, being unable to agree, Anna-Rose had heatedlyexplained that there was handsomeness, and there was the higherhandsomeness, and that that was the one Mr. Twist had. It was infinitelybetter than mere handsomeness, said Anna-Rose--curly hair and a straightnose and the rest of the silly stuff--because it was real and lasting;and it was real and lasting because it lay in the play of the featuresand not in their exact position and shape. 

Anna-Felicitas couldn't see that Mr. Twist's features played. She lookedat him now in the taxi while he angrily stared out of the window, andeven though he was evidently greatly stirred his features weren'tplaying. She didn't particularly want them to play. She was fond of andtrusted Mr. Twist, and would never even have thought whether he hadfeatures or not ii Anna-Rose hadn't taken lately to talking so muchabout them. And she couldn't help remembering how this very Christopher, so voluble now on the higher handsomeness, had said on board the _St. Luke_ when first commenting on Mr. Twist that God must have got tired ofmaking him by the time his head was reached. Well, Christopher hadalways been an idealist. When she was eleven she had violently loved thecoachman. Anna-Felicitas hadn't ever violently loved anybody yet, andseeing Anna-Rose like this now about Mr. Twist made her wonder when shetoo was going to begin. Surely it was time. She hoped her inability tobegin wasn't perhaps because she had no heart. Still, she couldn't beginif she didn't see anybody to begin on. 

She sat silent in the taxi, with Christopher equally silent beside her, both of them observing Mr. Twist through lowered eyelashes. Anna-Rosewatched him with hurt and anxious eyes like a devoted dog who has beenkicked without cause. Anna-Felicitas watched him in a more detachedspirit. She had a real affection for him, but it was not, she was sureand rather regretted, an affection that would ever be likely to get thebetter of her reason. It wasn't because he was so old, of course, shethought, for one could love the oldest people, beginning with thatstandard example of age, the _liebe Gott_; it was because she liked himso much. 

How could one get sentimental over and love somebody one so thoroughlyliked? The two things on reflection didn't seem to combine well. She wassure, for instance, that Aunt Alice had loved Uncle Arthur, amazing asit seemed, but she was equally sure she hadn't liked him. And look atthe _liebe Gott_. One loves the _liebe Gott_, but it would be going toofar, she thought, to say that one likes him. 

These were the reflections of Anna-Felicitas in the taxi, as sheobserved through her eyelashes the object of Anna-Rose's idealization. She envied Anna-Rose; for here she had been steadily expanding every daymore and more like a flower under the influence of her own power ofidealization. She used to sparkle and grow rosy like that for thecoachman. Perhaps after all it didn't much matter what you loved, solong as you loved immensely. It was, perhaps, thought Anna-Felicitasapproaching this subject with some caution and diffidence, the quantityof one's love that mattered rather than the quality of its object. Notthat Mr. Twist wasn't of the very first quality, except to look at; butwhat after all were faces? The coachman had been, as it were, nothingelse but face, so handsome was he and so without any otherrecommendation. He couldn't even drive; and her father had very soonkicked him out with the vigour and absence of hesitation peculiar toJunkers when it comes to kicking and Anna-Rose had wept all over herbread and butter at tea that day, and was understood to say that sheknew at last what it must be like to be a widow. 

Mr. Twist, for all that he was looking out of the taxi window with anangry and worried face, his attention irritably concentrated, so itseemed, on the objects passing in the road, very well knew he was beingobserved. He wouldn't, however, allow his eye to be caught. He wasn'tgoing to become entangled at this juncture in argument with the Annas. He was hastily making up his mind, and there wasn't much time to do itin. He had had no explanation with the twins since the manager's visitto his room, and he didn't want to have any. He had issued brief ordersto them, told them to pack, declined to answer questions, and had gotthem safely into the taxi with a minimum waste of time and words. Theywere now on their way to the station to meet Mrs. Bilton. Her train fromLos Angeles was not due till that evening at six. Never mind. Thestation was a secure place to deposit the twins and the baggage in tillshe came. He wished he could deposit the twins in the parcel-room aseasily as he could their grips--neatly labelled, put away safely on ashelf till called for. 

Rapidly, as he stared out of the window, he arrived at decisions. Hewould leave the twins in the waiting room at the station till Mrs. Bilton was due, and meanwhile go out and find lodgings for them and her. He himself would get a room in another and less critical hotel, and stayin it till the cottage was habitable. So would unassailablerespectability once more descend like a white garment upon the party andcover it up. 

But he was nettled; nettled; nettled by the _contretemps_ that hadoccurred on the very last day, when Mrs. Bilton was so nearly there;nettled and exasperated. So immensely did he want the twins to be happy, to float serenely in the unclouded sunshine and sweetness he felt wastheir due, that he was furious with them for doing anything to make itdifficult. And, jerkily, his angry thoughts pounced, as they so oftendid, on Uncle Arthur. Fancy kicking two little things like that out intothe world, two little breakable things like that, made to be cherishedand watched over. Mr. Twist was pure American in his instinct to regardthe female as an object to be taken care of, to be placed securely in acharming setting and kept brightly free from dust. If Uncle Arthur hadhad a shred of humanity in him, he angrily reflected, the Annas wouldhave stayed under his roof throughout the war, whatever the feeling wasagainst aliens. Never would a decent man have chucked them out. 

He turned involuntarily from the window and looked at the twins. Theireyes were fixed, affectionate and anxious, on his face. With the quickchange of mood of those whose chins are weak and whose hearts are warm, a flood of love for them gushed up within him and put out his anger. After all, if Uncle Arthur had been decent he, Edward A. Twist, neverwould have met these blessed children. He would now have been at Clark;leading lightless days; hopelessly involved with his mother. 

His loose, unsteady mouth broke into a big smile. Instantly the twofaces opposite cleared into something shining. 

"Oh dear, " said Anna-Felicitas with a sigh of relief, "it _is_refreshing when you leave off being cross. "

"We're fearfully sorry if we've said anything we oughtn't to have, " saidAnna-Rose, "and if you tell us what it is we won't say it again. "

"I can't tell you, because I don't know what it was, " said Mr. Twist, inhis usual kind voice. "I only see the results. And the results are thatthe Cosmopolitan is tired of us, and we've got to find lodgings. "

"Lodgings?"

"Till we can move into the cottage. I'm going to put you and Mrs. Biltonin an apartment in Acapulco, and go myself to some hotel. "

The twins stared at him a moment in silence. Then Anna-Rose said withsudden passion, "You're not. "

"How's that?" asked Mr. Twist; but she was prevented answering by thearrival of the taxi at the station. 

There followed ten minutes' tangle and confusion, at the end of whichthe twins found themselves free of their grips and being piloted intothe waiting-room by Mr. Twist. 

"There, " he said. "You sit here quiet and good. I'll come back about oneo'clock with sandwiches and candy for your dinner, and maybe astory-book or two. You mustn't leave this, do you hear? I'm going tohunt for those lodgings. "

And he was in the act of taking off his hat valedictorily when Anna-Roseagain said with the same passion, "You're not. "

"Not what?" inquired Mr. Twist, pausing with his hat in mid-air. 

"Going to hunt for lodgings. We won't go to them. "

"Of course we won't, " said Anna-Felicitas, with no passion but with aninfinitely rock-like determination. 

"And pray--" began Mr. Twist. 

"Go into lodgings alone with Mrs. Bilton?" interrupted Anna-Rose herface scarlet, her whole small body giving the impression of indignantfeathers standing up on end. "While you're somewhere else? Away from us?We won't. "

"Of course we won't, " said Anna-Felicitas again, an almost placidquality in her determination, it was so final and so unshakable. "Wouldyou?"

"See here--" began Mr. Twist. 

"We won't see anywhere, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Would you, " inquired Anna-Felicitas, again reasoning with him, "likebeing alone in lodgings with Mrs. Bilton?"

"This is no time for conversation, " said Mr. Twist, making for the door. "You've got to do what I think best on this occasion. And that's allabout it. "

"We won't, " repeated Anna-Rose, on the verge of those tears which alwayswith her so quickly followed any sort of emotion. 

Mr. Twist paused on his way to the door. "Well now what the devil's thematter with lodgings?" he asked angrily. 

"It isn't the devil, it's Mrs. Bilton, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Would youyourself like--"

'But you've got to have Mrs. Bilton with you anyhow from to-day on. "

"But not unadulterated Mrs. Bilton. You were to have been with us too. We can't be drowned all by ourselves in Mrs. Bilton. _You_ wouldn't likeit. "

"Of course I wouldn't. But it's only for a few days anyhow, " said Mr. Twist, who had been quite unprepared for opposition to his verysensible arrangement. 

"I shouldn't wonder if it's only a few days now before we can allsqueeze into some part of the cottage. If you don't mind dust and noiseand workmen about all day long. "

A light pierced the gloom that had gathered round Anna-Felicitas's soul. 

"We'll go into it to-day, " she said firmly, "Why not? We can camp out. We can live in those little rooms at the back over the kitchen, --theones you got ready for Li Koo. We'd be on the spot. We wouldn't mindanything. It would just be a picnic. "

"And we--we wouldn't be--sep--separated, " said Anna-Rose, getting it outwith a gasp. 

Mr. Twist stood looking at them. 

"Well, of all the--" he began, pushing his hat back. "Are you aware, "he went on more calmly, "that there are only two rooms over thatkitchen, and that you and Mrs. Bilton will have to be all together inone of them?"

"We don't mind that as long as you're in the other one, " said Anna-Rose. 

"Of course, " suggested Anna-Felicitas, "if you were to happen to marryMrs. Bilton it would make a fairer division. "

Mr. Twist's spectacles stared enormously at her. 

"No, no, " said Anna-Rose quickly. "Marriage is a sacred thing, and youcan't just marry so as to be more comfortable. "

"I guess if I married Mrs. Bilton I'd be more uncomfortable, " remarkedMr. Twist with considerable dryness. 

He seemed however to be quieted by the bare suggestion, for he fixed hishat properly on his head and said, sobriety in his voice and manner, "Come along, then. We'll get a taxi and anyway go out and have a look atthe rooms. But I shouldn't be surprised, " he added, "if before I've donewith you you'll have driven me sheer out of my wits. "

"Oh, _don't_ say that, " said the twins together, with all and more oftheir usual urbanity. 

CHAPTER XXVI

By superhuman exertions and a lavish expenditure of money, the rooms LiKoo was later on to inhabit were ready to be slept in by the time Mrs. Bilton arrived. They were in an outbuilding at the back of the house, and consisted of a living-room with a cooking-stove in it, a bedroombehind it, and up a narrow and curly staircase a larger room running thewhole length and width of the shanty. This sounds spacious, but itwasn't. The amount of length and width was small, and it was only justpossible to get three camp-beds into it and a washstand. The beds nearlytouched each other. Anna-Felicitas thought she and Anna-Rose were goingto be regrettably close to Mrs. Bilton in them, and again urged on Mr. Twist's consideration the question of removing Mrs. Bilton from the roomby marriage; but Anna-Rose said it was all perfect, and that there waslots of room, and she was sure Mrs. Bilton, used to the camp life soextensively practised in America, would thoroughly enjoy herself. 

They worked without stopping all the rest of the day at making thelittle place habitable, nailing up some of the curtains intended for theother house, unpacking cushions, and fetching in great bunches of thepale pink and mauve geraniums that scrambled about everywhere in thegarden and hiding the worst places in the rooms with them. Mr. Twist wasin Acapulco most of the time, getting together the necessary temporaryfurniture and cooking utensils, but the twins didn't miss him, for theywere helped with zeal by the architect, the electrical expert, thegarden expert and the chief plumber. 

These young men--they were all young, and very go-ahead--abandoned themain building that day to the undirected labours of the workmen theywere supposed to control, and turned to on the shanty as soon as theyrealized what it was to be used for with a joyous energy that delightedthe twins. They swept and they garnished. They cleaned the dust off thewindows and the rust off the stove. They fetched out the parcels withthe curtains and cushions in them from the barn where all parcels andpackages had been put till the house was ready, and extracted variousother comforts from the piled up packing-cases, --a rug or two, an easychair for Mrs. Bilton, a looking-glass. They screwed in hooks behind thedoors for clothes to be hung on, and they tied the canary to aneighbouring eucalyptus tree where it could be seen and hardly heard. The chief plumber found buckets and filled them with water, and theelectrical expert rigged up a series of lanterns inside the shanty, evenilluminating its tortuous staircase. There was much _badinage_, but asit was all in American, a language of which the twins were not yet ableto apprehend the full flavour, they responded only with pleasant smiles. But their smiles were so pleasant and the family dimple so engaging thatthe hours flew, and the young men were sorry indeed when Mr. Twist cameback. 

He came back laden, among other things, with food for the twins, whom hehad left in his hurry high and dry at the cottage with nothing at all toeat; and he found them looking particularly comfortable andwell-nourished, having eaten, as they explained when they refused hissandwiches and fruit, the chief plumber's dinner. 

They were sitting on the stump of an oak tree when he arrived, restingfrom their labours, and the grass at their feet was dotted with the fourexperts. It was the twins now who were talking, and the experts who weresmiling. Mr. Twist wondered uneasily what they were saying. It wouldn'thave added to his comfort if he had heard, for they were giving theexperts an account of their attempt to go and live with the Sacks, andinterweaving with it some general reflections of a philosophical naturesuggested by the Sack _ménage_. The experts were keenly interested, andeverybody looked very happy, and Mr. Twist was annoyed; for clearly ifthe experts were sitting there on the grass they weren't directing theworkmen placed under their orders. Mr. Twist perceived a drawback to thetwins living on the spot while the place was being finished; anotherdrawback. He had perceived several already, but not this one. Well, Mrs. Bilton would soon be there. He now counted the hours to Mrs. Bilton. Hepositively longed for her. 

When they saw him coming, the experts moved away. "Here's the boss, "they said, nodding and winking at the twins as they got up quickly anddeparted. Winking was not within the traditions of the Twinkler family, but no doubt, they thought, it was the custom of the country to wink, and they wondered whether they ought to have winked back. The young menwere certainly deserving of every friendliness in return for all theyhad done. They decided they would ask Mrs. Bilton, and then they couldwink at them if necessary the first thing to-morrow morning. 

Mr. Twist took them with him when he went down to the station to meetthe Los Angeles train. It was dark at six, and the workmen had gone homeby then, but the experts still seemed to be busy. He had been astonishedat the amount the twins had accomplished in his absence in the town tillthey explained to him how very active the experts had been, whereupon hesaid, "Now isn't that nice, " and briefly informed them they would gowith him to the station. 

"That's waste of time, " said Anna-Felicitas. "We could be givingfinishing touches if we stayed here. "

"You will come with me to the station, " said Mr. Twist. 

Mrs. Bilton arrived in a thick cloud of conversation. She supposed shewas going to the Cosmopolitan Hotel, as indeed she originally was, andall the way back in the taxi Mr. Twist was trying to tell her shewasn't; but Mrs. Bilton had so much to say about her journey, and herlast days among her friends, and all the pleasant new acquaintances shehad made on the train, and her speech was so very close-knit, that hefelt he was like a rabbit on the wrong side of a thick-set hedge runningdesperately up and down searching for a gap to get through. It wasnothing short of amazing how Mrs. Bilton talked; positively, therewasn't at any moment the smallest pause in the flow. 

"It's a disease, " thought Anna-Rose, who had several things she wantedto say herself, and found herself hopelessly muzzled. 

"No wonder Mr. Bilton preferred heaven, " thought Anna-Felicitas, also alittle restless at the completeness of her muzzling. 

"Anyhow she'll never hear the Annas saying anything, " thought Mr. Twist, consoling himself. 

"This hotel we're going to seems to be located at some distance fromthe station, " said Mrs. Bilton presently, in the middle of several pagesof rapid unpunctuated monologue. "Isolated, surely--" and off she wentagain to other matters, just as Mr. Twist had got his mouth open toexplain at last. 

She arrived therefore at the cottage unconscious of the change in herfate. 

Now Mrs. Bilton was as fond of comfort as any other woman who has beendeprived for some years of that substitute for comfort, a husband. Shehad looked forward to the enveloping joys of the Cosmopolitan, its bath, its soft bed and good food, with frank satisfaction. She thought itadmirable that before embarking on active duties she should for a spacerest luxuriously in an excellent hotel, with no care in regard toexpense, and exchange ideas while she rested with the interesting peopleshe would be sure to meet in it. Before the interview in Los Angeles, Mr. Twist had explained to her by letter and under the seal ofconfidence the philanthropic nature of the project he and the MissTwinklers were engaged upon, and she was prepared, in return for thevery considerable salary she had accepted, to do her duty loyally andunremittingly; but after the stress and hard work of her last days inLos Angeles she had certainly looked forward with a particular pleasureto two or three weeks' delicious wallowing in flesh-pots for which shehad not to pay. She was also, however, a lady of grit; and shepossessed, as she said her friends often told her, a redoubtable psyche, a genuine American free and fearless psyche; so that when, talkingceaselessly, her thoughts eagerly jostling each other as they streamedthrough her brain to get first to the exit of her tongue, she caught herfoot in some builder's débris carelessly left on the path up to thecottage and received in this way positively her first intimation thatthis couldn't be the Cosmopolitan, she did not, as a more timid femalesoul well might have, become alarmed and suppose that Mr. Twist, whomafter all she didn't know, had brought her to this solitary place forpurposes of assassination, but stopped firmly just where she was, andturning her head in the darkness toward him said, "Now Mr. Twist, I'llstand right here till you're able to apply some sort of illumination towhat's at my feet. I can't say what it is I've walked against but I'mnot going any further with this promenade till I can say. And whenyou've thrown light on the subject perhaps you'll oblige me withinformation as to where that hotel is I was told I was coming to. "

"Information?" cried Mr. Twist. "Haven't I been trying to give it youever since I met you? Haven't I been trying to stop your getting out ofthe taxi till I'd fetched a lantern? Haven't I been trying to offer youmy arm along the path--"

"Then why didn't you say so, Mr. Twist?" asked Mrs. Bilton. 

"Say so!" cried Mr. Twist. 

At that moment the flash of an electric torch was seen jerking up anddown as the person carrying it ran toward them. It was the electricalexpert who, most fortunately, happened still to be about. 

Mrs. Bilton welcomed him warmly, and taking his torch from him firstexamined what she called the location of her feet, then gave it back tohim and put her hand through his arm. "Now guide me to whatever it ishas been substituted without my knowledge for that hotel, " she said; andwhile Mr. Twist went back to the taxi to deal with her grips, she walkedcarefully toward the shanty on the expert's arm, expressing, in animmense number of words, the astonishment she felt at Mr. Twist's nothaving told her of the disappearance of the Cosmopolitan from heritinerary. 

The electrical expert tried to speak, but was drowned without furtherstruggle. Anna-Rose, unable to listen any longer without answering tothe insistent inquiries as to why Mr. Twist had kept her in the dark, raised her voice at last and called out, "But he wanted to--he wanted toall the time--you wouldn't listen--you wouldn't stop--"

Mrs. Bilton did stop however when she got inside the shanty. Her tongueand her feet stopped dead together. The electrical expert had lit allthe lanterns, and coming upon it in the darkness its lighted windowsgave it a cheerful, welcoming look. But inside no amount of light andbunches of pink geraniums could conceal its discomforts, its dreadfulsmallness; besides, pink geraniums, which the twins were accustomed toregard as precious, as things brought up lovingly in pots, were nothingbut weeds to Mrs. Bilton's experienced Californian eye. 

She stared round her in silence. Her sudden quiet fell on the twins witha great sense of refreshment. Standing in the doorway--for Mrs. Biltonand the electrical expert between them filled up most of thekitchen--they heaved a deep sigh. "And see how beautiful the stars are, "whispered Anna-Felicitas in Anna-Rose's ear; she hadn't been able to seethem before somehow, Mrs. Bilton's voice had so much ruffled the night. 

"Do you think she talks in her sleep?" Anna-Rose anxiously whisperedback. 

But Mr. Twist, arriving with his hands full, was staggered to find Mrs. Bilton not talking. An icy fear seized his heart. She was going torefuse to stay with them. And she would be within her rights if she did, for certainly what she called her itinerary had promised her afirst-rate hotel, in which she was to continue till a finished andcomfortable house was stepped into. 

"I wish you'd say something, " he said, plumping down the bags he wascarrying on the kitchen floor. 

The twins from the doorway looked at him and then at each other in greatsurprise. Fancy _asking_ Mrs. Bilton to say something. 

"They would come, " said Mr. Twist, resentfully, jerking his head towardthe Annas in the doorway. 

"It's worse upstairs, " he went on desperately as Mrs. Bilton still wasdumb. 

"Worse upstairs?" cried the twins, as one woman. 

"It's perfect upstairs, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"It's like camping out without _being_ out, " said Anna-Rose. 

"The only drawback is that there are rather a lot of beds in our room, "said Anna-Felicitas, "but that of course"--she turned to Mr. Twist--"might easily be arranged--"

"I wish you'd _say_ something, Mrs. Bilton, " he interrupted quickly andloud. 

Mrs. Bilton drew a deep breath and looked round her. She looked roundthe room, and she looked up at the ceiling, which the upright feather inher hat was tickling, and she looked at the faces of the twins, litflickeringly by the uncertain light of the lanterns. Then, woman ofgrit, wife who had never failed him of Bruce D. Bilton, widow who hadremained poised and indomitable on a small income in a circle ofwell-off friends, she spoke; and she said:

"Mr. Twist, I can't say what this means, and you'll furnish me no doubtwith information, but whatever it is I'm not the woman to put my hand toa plough and then turn back again. That type of behaviour may have beengood enough for Pharisees and Sadducees, who if I remember rightly hadto be specially warned against the practice, but it isn't good enoughfor me. You've conducted me to a shack instead of the hotel I waspromised, and I await your explanation. Meanwhile, is there any supper?"

CHAPTER XXVII

It was only a fortnight after this that the inn was ready to be opened, and it was only during the first days of this fortnight that the partyin the shanty had to endure any serious discomfort. The twins didn'tmind the physical discomfort at all; what they minded, and began to mindalmost immediately, was the spiritual discomfort of being at such closequarters with Mrs. Bilton. They hardly noticed the physical side of thatclose association in such a lovely climate, where the whole ofout-of-doors can be used as one's living-room; and their morningdressing, a difficult business in the shanty for anybody less young andmore needing to be careful, was rather like the getting up of a dogafter its night's sleep--they seemed just to shake themselves, and therethey were. 

They got up before Mrs. Bilton, who was, however, always awake andtalking to them while they dressed, and they went to bed before she did, though she came up with them after the first night and read aloud tothem while they undressed; so that as regarded the mysteries of Mrs. Bilton's toilette they were not, after all, much in her way. It was likecaravaning or camping out: you managed your movements and momentsskilfully, and if you were Mrs. Bilton you had a curtain slung acrossyour part of the room, in case your younger charges shouldn't always beasleep when they looked as if they were. 

Gradually one alleviation was added to another, and Mrs. Bilton forgotthe rigours of the beginning. Li Koo arrived, for instance, fetched by atelegram, and under a tent in the eucalyptus grove at the back of thehouse set up an old iron stove and produced, with no apparent exertion, extraordinarily interesting and amusing food. He went into Acapulco atdaylight every morning and did the marketing. He began almostimmediately to do everything else in the way of housekeeping. He wasexquisitely clean, and saw to it that the shanty matched him incleanliness. To the surprise and gratification of the twins, who hadsupposed it would be their lot to go on doing the housework of theshanty, he took it over as a matter of course, dusting, sweeping, andtidying like a practised and very excellent housemaid. The only thing herefused to do was to touch the three beds in the upper chamber. "Me nomake lady-beds, " he said briefly. 

Li Koo's salary was enormous, but Mr. Twist, with a sound instinct, cared nothing what he paid so long as he got the right man. He was, indeed, much satisfied with his two employees, and congratulated himselfon his luck. It is true in regard to Mrs. Bilton his satisfaction wasrather of the sorrowful sort that a fresh ache in a different part ofone's body from the first ache gives: it relieved him from one bysubstituting another. Mrs. Bilton overwhelmed him; but so had the Annasbegun to. Her overwhelming, however, was different, and freed him fromthat other worse one. He felt safe now about the Annas, and after allthere were parts of the building in which Mrs. Bilton wasn't. There washis bedroom, for instance. Thank God for bedrooms, thought Mr. Twist. Hegrew to love his. What a haven that poky and silent place was; what ablessing the conventions were, and the proprieties. Supposingcivilization were so far advanced that people could no longer see theharm there is in a bedroom, what would have become of him? Mr. Twistcould perfectly account for Bruce D. Bilton's death. It wasn't diabetes, as Mrs. Bilton said; it was just bedroom. 

Still, Mrs. Bilton was an undoubted find, and did immediately in thoserushed days take the Annas off his mind. He could leave them with her inthe comfortable certitude that whatever else they did to Mrs. Biltonthey couldn't talk to her. Never would she know the peculiar ease of theTwinkler attitude toward subjects Americans approach with care. Neverwould they be able to tell her things about Uncle Arthur, the kind ofthings that had caused the Cosmopolitan to grow so suddenly cool. Therewas, most happily for this particular case, no arguing with Mrs. Bilton. The twins couldn't draw her out because she was already, as it were, socompletely out. This was a great thing, Mr. Twist felt, and made up forany personal suffocation he had to bear; and when on the afternoon ofMrs. Bilton's first day the twins appeared without her in the mainbuilding in search of him, having obviously given her the slip, and saidthey were sorry to disturb him but they wanted his advice, for thoughthey had been trying hard all day, remembering they were ladies andpractically hostesses, they hadn't yet succeeded in saying anything atall to Mrs. Bilton and doubted whether they ever would, he merely smiledhappily at them and said to Anna-Rose, "See how good comes out ofevil"--a remark that they didn't like when they had had time to thinkover it. 

But they went on struggling. It seemed so unnatural to be all alone allday long with someone and only listen. Mrs. Bilton never left theirside, regarding it as proper and merely fulfilling her part of thebargain, in these first confused days when there was nothing for ladiesto do but look on while perspiring workmen laboured at apparentlyproducing more and more chaos, to become thoroughly acquainted with heryoung charges. This she did by imparting to them intimate and meticulousinformation about her own life, with the whole of the various uplifts, as she put it, her psyche had during its unfolding experienced. Therewas so much to tell about herself that she never got to inquiring aboutthe twins. She knew they were orphans, and that this was a good work, and for the moment had no time for more. 

The twins were profoundly bored by her psyche, chiefly because theydidn't know what part of her it was, and it was no use asking for shedidn't answer; but they listened with real interest to her concreteexperiences, and especially to the experiences connected with Mr. Bilton. They particularly wished to ask questions about Mr. Bilton, andfind out what he had thought of things. Mrs. Bilton was lavish in herdetails of what she had thought herself, but Mr. Bilton's thoughtsremained impenetrable. It seemed to the twins that he must have thoughta lot, and have come to the conclusion that there was much to be saidfor death. 

The Biltons, it appeared, had been the opposite of the Clouston-Sacks, and had never been separated for a single day during the whole of theirmarried life. This seemed to the twins very strange, and needing a greatdeal of explanation. In order to get light thrown on it the first thingthey wanted to find out was how long the marriage had lasted; but Mrs. Bilton was deaf to their inquiries, and having described Mr. Bilton'slast moments and obsequies--obsequies scheduled by her, she said, withso tender a regard for his memory that she insisted on a horse-drawnhearse instead of the more fashionable automobile conveyance, on theground that a motor hearse didn't seem sorry enough even on firstspeed--she washed along with an easy flow to descriptions of thedreadfulness of the early days of widowhood, when one's crepe veil keepson catching in everything--chairs, overhanging branches, and passers-by, including it appeared on one occasion a policeman. She inquired of thetwins whether they had ever seen a new-made widow in a wind. Chicago, she said, was a windy place, and Mr. Bilton passed in its windiestmonth. Her long veil, as she proceeded down the streets on the dailyconstitutional she considered it her duty toward the living to take, forone owes it to one's friends to keep oneself fit and not give way, wasblown hither and thither in the buffeting cross-currents of that uneasyclimate, and her walk in the busier streets was a series ofentanglements. Embarrassing entanglements, said Mrs. Bilton. Fortunatelythe persons she got caught in were delicacy and sympathy itself; often, indeed, seeming quite overcome by the peculiar poignancy of thesituation, covered with confusion, profuse in apologies. Sometimes thewind would cause her veil for a few moments to rear straight up aboveher head in a monstrous black column of woe. Sometimes, if she stopped amoment waiting to cross the street, it would whip round the body of anyone who happened to be near, like a cord. It did this once about thebody of the policeman directing the traffic, by whose side she hadpaused, and she had to walk round him backwards before it could beunwound. The Chicago evening papers, prompt on the track of a sensation, had caused her friends much painful if only short-lived amazement bycoming out with huge equivocal headlines:

WELL-KNOWN SOCIETY WIDOW AND POLICEMAN CAUGHT TOGETHER

and beginning their description of the occurrence by printing her namein full. So that for the first sentence or two her friends were a preyto horror and distress, which turned to indignation on discovering therewas nothing in it after all. 

The twins, their eyes on Mrs. Bilton's face, their hands clasped roundtheir knees, their bodies sitting on the grass at her feet, occasionallyfelt as they followed her narrative that they were somehow out of theirdepth and didn't quite understand. It was extraordinarily exasperatingto them to be so completely muzzled. They were accustomed to elucidatepoints they didn't understand by immediate inquiry; they had a habit ofasking for information, and then delivering comments on it. 

This condition of repression made them most uncomfortable. The ilex treein the field below the house, to which Mrs. Bilton shepherded them eachmorning and afternoon for the first three days, became to them, in spiteof its beauty with the view from under its dark shade across the sunnyfields to the sea and the delicate distant islands, a painful spot. Thebeauty all round them was under these conditions exasperating. Only oncedid Mrs. Bilton leave them, and that was the first afternoon, when theyinstantly fled to seek out Mr. Twist; and she only left them then--forit wasn't just her sense of duty that was strong, but also her dislikeof being alone--because something unexpectedly gave way in the upperpart of her dress, she being of a tight well-held-in figure, dependingmuch on its buttons; and she had very hastily to go in search of aneedle. 

After that they didn't see Mr. Twist alone for several days. They hardlyindeed saw him at all. The only meal he shared with them was supper, andon finding the first evening that Mrs. Bilton read aloud to people aftersupper, he made the excuse of accounts to go through and went into hisbedroom, repeating this each night. 

The twins watched him go with agonized eyes. They considered themselvesdeserted; shamefully abandoned to a miserable fate. 

"And it isn't as if he didn't _like_ reading aloud, " whisperedAnna-Rose, bewildered and indignant as she remembered the "Ode toDooty. "

"Perhaps he's one of those people who only like it if they do itthemselves, " Anna-Felicitas whispered back, trying to explain his basebehaviour. 

And while they whispered, Mrs. Bilton with great enjoymentdeclaimed--she had had a course of elocution lessons during Mr. Bilton'slife so as to be able to place the best literature advantageously beforehim--the diary of a young girl written in prison. The young girl hadbeen wrongfully incarcerated, Mrs. Bilton explained, and her pure soulonly found release by the demise of her body. The twins hated the younggirl from the first paragraph. She wrote her diary every day till herdemise stopped her. As nothing happens in prisons that hasn't happenedthe day before, she could only write her reflections; and the twinshated her reflections, because they were so very like what in theirsecret moments of slush they were apt to reflect themselves. Theirmother had had a horror of slush. There had been none anywhere abouther; but it is in the air in Germany, in people's blood, everywhere; andthough the twins, owing to the English part of them, had a horror of ittoo, there it was in them, and they knew it, --genuine German slush. 

They felt uncomfortably sure that if they were in prison they wouldwrite a diary very much on these lines. For three evenings they had tolisten to it, their eyes on Mr. Twist's door. Why didn't he come out andsave them? What happy, what glorious evenings they used to have at theCosmopolitan, spent in intelligent conversation, in a decent give andtake--not this button-holing business, this being got into a corner andheld down; and alas, how little they had appreciated them! They used toget sleepy and break them off and go to bed. If only he would come outnow and talk to them they would sit up all night. They wriggled withimpatience in their seats beneath the _épanchements_ of the young girl, the strangely and distressingly familiar _épanchements_. The diary waspublished in a magazine, and after the second evening, when Mrs. Biltonon laying it down announced she would go on with it while they weredressing next morning, they got up very early before Mrs. Bilton wasawake and crept out and hid it. 

But Li Koo found it and restored it. 

Li Koo found everything. He found Mrs. Bilton's outdoor shoes the thirdmorning, although the twins had hidden them most carefully. Their ideawas that while she, rendered immobile, waited indoors, they wouldzealously look for them in all the places where they well knew that theyweren't, and perhaps get some conversation with Mr. Twist. 

But Li Koo found everything. He found the twins themselves the fourthmorning, when, unable any longer to bear Mrs. Bilton's voice, they raninto the woods instead of coming in to breakfast. He seemed to find themat once, to walk unswervingly to their remote and bramble-filled ditch. 

In order to save their dignity they said as they scrambled out that theywere picking flowers for Mrs. Bilton's breakfast, though the ditch hadnothing in it but stones and thorns. Li Koo made no comment. He neverdid make comments; and his silence and his ubiquitous efficiency madethe twins as fidgety with him as they were with Mrs. Bilton for theopposite reason. They had an uncomfortable feeling that he was ratherlike the _liebe Gott_, --he saw everything, knew everything, and saidnothing. In vain they tried, on that walk back as at other times, topierce his impassivity with genialities. Li Koo--again, they silentlyreflected, like the _liebe Gott_--had a different sense of genialityfrom theirs; he couldn't apparently smile; they doubted if he even everwanted to. Their genialities faltered and froze on their lips. 

Besides, they were deeply humiliated by having been found hiding, andwere ashamed to find themselves trying anxiously in this manner toconciliate Li Koo. Their dignity on the walk back to the shanty seemedpainfully shrunk. They ought never to have condescended to do thechildish things they had been doing during the last three days. If theyhadn't been found out it would, of course, have remained a privatematter between them and their Maker, and then one doesn't mind so much;but they had been found out, and by Li Koo, their own servant. It wasintolerable. All the blood of all the Twinklers, Junkers from timeimmemorial and properly sensitive to humiliation, surged within them. They hadn't felt so naughty and so young for years. They were sure LiKoo didn't believe them about the ditch. They had a dreadful sensationof being led back to Mrs. Bilton by the ear. 

If only they could sack Mrs. Bilton!

This thought, immense and startling, came to Anna-Rose, who far morethan Anna-Felicitas resented being cut off from Mr. Twist, besides beingmore naturally impetuous; and as they walked in silence side by side, with Li Koo a little ahead of them, she turned her head and looked atAnna-Felicitas. "Let's give her notice, " she murmured, under her breath. 

Anna-Felicitas was so much taken aback that she stopped in her walk andstared at Anna-Rose's flushed face. 

She too hardly breathed it. The suggestion seemed fantastic in itsmonstrousness. How could they give anybody so old, so sure of herself, so determined as Mrs. Bilton, notice?

"Give her notice?" she repeated. 

A chill ran down Anna-Felicitas's spine. Give Mrs. Bilton notice! It wasa great, a breath-taking idea, magnificent in its assertion ofindependence, of rights; but it needed, she felt, to be approached withcaution. They had never given anybody notice in their lives, and theyhad always thought it must be a most painful thing to do--far, far worsethan tipping. Uncle Arthur usedn't to mind it a bit; did it, indeed, with gusto. But Aunt Alice hadn't liked it at all, and came out in acold perspiration and bewailed her lot to them and wished that peoplewould behave and not place her in such a painful position. 

Mrs. Bilton couldn't be said not to have behaved. Quite the contrary. She had behaved too persistently; and they had to endure it the wholetwenty-four hours. For Mrs. Bilton had no turn, it appeared, in spiteof what she had said at Los Angeles, for solitary contemplation, andafter the confusion of the first night, when once she had had time toenvisage the situation thoroughly, as she said, she had found that tosit alone downstairs in the uncertain light of the lanterns while thetwins went to bed and Mr. Twist wouldn't come out of his room, was notgood for her psyche; so she had followed the twins upstairs, andcontinued to read the young girl's diary to them during their undressingand till the noises coming from their beds convinced her that it wasuseless to go on any longer. And that morning, the morning they hid inthe ditch, she had even done this while they were getting up. 

"It isn't to be borne, " said Anna-Rose under her breath, one eye on LiKoo's ear which, a little in front of her, seemed slightly slantedbackward and sideways in the direction of her voice. "And why should itbe? We're not in her power. "

"No, " said Anna-Felicitas, also under her breath and also watching LiKoo's ear, "but it feels extraordinarily as if we were. "

"Yes. And that's intolerable. And it forces us to do silly baby things, wholly unsuited either to our age or our position. Who would havethought we'd ever hide from somebody in a ditch again!" Anna-Rose'svoice was almost a sob at the humiliation. 

"It all comes from sleeping in the same room, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Nobody can stand a thing that doesn't end at night either. "

"Of course they can't, " said Anna-Rose. "It isn't fair. If you have tohave a person all day you oughtn't to have to have the same person allnight. Some one else should step in and relieve you then. Just as theydo in hospitals. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Mr. Twist ought to. He ought to remove herforcibly from our room by marriage. 

"No he oughtn't, " said Anna-Rose hastily, "because we can remove herourselves by the simple process of giving her notice. "

"I don't believe it's simple, " said Anna-Felicia again feeling a chilltrickling down her spine. 

"Of course it is. We just go to her very politely and inform her thatthe engagement is terminated on a basis of mutual esteem but inflexibledetermination. "

"And suppose she doesn't stop talking enough to hear?"

"Then we'll hand it to her in writing. "

The rest of the way they walked in silence, Anna-Rose with her chinthrust out in defiance, Anna-Felicitas dragging her feet along with acertain reluctance and doubt. 

Mrs. Bilton had finished her breakfast when they got back, having seenno sense in letting good food get cold, and was ready to sit and chat tothem while they had theirs. She was so busy telling them what she hadsupposed they were probably doing, that she was unable to listen totheir attempted account of what they had done. Thus they were saved fromtelling humiliating and youthful fibs; but they were also prevented, asby a wall of rock, from getting the speech through to her ear thatAnna-Rose, trembling in spite of her defiance, had ready to launch ather. It was impossible to shout at Mrs. Bilton in the way Mr. Twist, when in extremity of necessity, had done. Ladies didn't shout;especially not when they were giving other ladies notice. Anna-Rose, who was quite cold and clammy at the prospect of her speech, couldn'thelp feeling relieved when breakfast was over and no opportunity for ithad been given. 

"We'll write it, " she whispered to Anna-Felicitas beneath the cover of alively account Mrs. Bilton was giving them, _à propos_ of their beinglate for breakfast, of the time it took her, after Mr. Bilton's passing, to get used to his unpunctuality at meals. 

That Mr. Bilton, who had breakfasted and dined with her steadily foryears, should suddenly leave off being punctual freshly astonished herevery day, she said. The clock struck, yet Mr. Bilton continued late. Itwas poignant, said Mrs. Bilton, this way of being reminded of her loss. Each day she would instinctively expect; each day would come the stab ofrecollection. The vacancy these non-appearances had made in her life wasbeyond any words of hers. In fact she didn't possess such words, anddoubted if the completest dictionary did either. Everything went justvacant, she said. No need any more to hurry down in the morning, so asto be behind the coffee pot half a minute before the gong went and Mr. Bilton simultaneously appeared. No need any more to think of him whenordering meals. No need any more to eat the dish he had been so fond ofand she had found so difficult to digest, Boston baked beans and bacon;yet she found herself ordering it continually after his departure, andchoking memorially over the mouthfuls--"And people in Europe, " cried MrsBilton, herself struck as she talked by this extreme devotion, "say thatAmerican women are incapable of passion!"

"We'll write it, " whispered Anna-Rose to Anna-Felicitas. 

"Write what?" asked Anna-Felicitas abstractedly, who as usual when Mrs. Bilton narrated her reminiscences was absorbed in listening to them andtrying to get some clear image of Mr. Bilton. 

But she remembered the next moment, and it was like waking up to therecollection that this is the day you have to have a tooth pulled out. The idea of not having the tooth any more, of being free from it charmedand thrilled her, but how painful, how alarming was the prospect ofpulling it out!

There was one good thing to be said for Mrs. Bilton's talk, and that wasthat under its voluminous cover they could themselves whisperoccasionally to each other. Anna-Rose decided that if Mrs. Bilton didn'tnotice that they whispered neither probably would she notice if shewrote. She therefore under Mrs. Bilton's very nose got a pencil and apiece of paper, and with many pauses and an unsteady hand wrote thefollowing:

DEAR MRS. BILTON--For some time past my sister and I have felt that wearen't suited to you, and if you don't mind would you mind regarding theengagement as terminated? We hope you won't think this abrupt, becauseit isn't really, for we seem to have lived ages since you came, andwe've been thinking this over ripely ever since. And we hope you won'ttake it as anything personal either, because it isn't really. It's onlythat we feel we're unsuitable, and we're sure we'll go on getting moreand more unsuitable. Nobody can help being unsuitable, and we'refearfully sorry. But on the other hand we're inflexible. --Yoursaffectionately, ANNA-ROSE and ANNA-FELICITAS TWINKLER

With a beating heart she cautiously pushed the letter across the tableunder cover of the breakfast _débris_ to Anna-Felicitas, who read itwith a beating heart and cautiously pushed it back. 

Anna-Felicitas felt sure Christopher was being terribly impetuous, andshe felt sure she ought to stop her. But what a joy to be without Mrs. Bilton! The thought of going to bed in the placid sluggishness dear toher heart, without having to listen, to be attentive, to remember to betidy because if she weren't there would be no room for Mrs. Bilton'sthings, was too much for her. Authority pursuing her into her bedroomwas what she had found most difficult to bear. There must be respite. There must be intervals in every activity or endurance. Even the _liebeGott_, otherwise so indefatigable, had felt this and arranged for therelaxation of Sundays. 

She pushed the letter back with a beating heart, and told herself thatshe couldn't and never had been able to stop Christopher when she was inthis mood of her chin sticking out. What could she do in face of such achin? And besides, Mrs. Bilton's friends must be missing her very muchand ought to have her back. One should always live only with one's ownsort of people. Every other way of living, Anna-Felicitas was sure evenat this early stage of her existence, was bound to come to a bad end. One could be fond of almost anybody, she held, if they were somewhereelse. Even of Uncle Arthur. Even he somehow seemed softened by distance. But for living-together purposes there was only one kind of peoplepossible, and that was one's own kind. Unexpected and various were theexteriors of one's own kind and the places one found them in, but onealways knew them. One felt comfortable with them at once; comfortableand placid. Whatever else Mrs. Bilton might be feeling she wasn'tfeeling placid. That was evident; and it was because she too wasn't withher own kind. With her eyes fixed nervously on Mrs. Bilton who wastalking on happily, Anna-Felicitas reasoned with herself in the abovemanner as she pushed back the letter, instead of, as at the back of hermind she felt she ought to have done, tearing it up. 

Anna-Rose folded it and addressed it to Mrs. Bilton. Then she got up andheld it out to her. 

Anna-Felicitas got up too, her inside feeling strangely unsteady andstirred round and round. 

"Would you mind reading this?" said Anna-Rose faintly to Mrs. Bilton, who took the letter mechanically and held it in her hand withoutapparently noticing it, so much engaged was she by what she was saying. 

"We're going out a moment to speak to Mr. Twist, " Anna-Rose then said, making for the door and beckoning to Anna-Felicitas, who still stoodhesitating. 

She slipped out; and Anna-Felicitas, suddenly panic-stricken lest sheshould be buttonholed all by herself fled after her. 

CHAPTER XXVIII

Mr. Twist, his mind at ease, was in the charming room that was to be thetea-room. It was full of scattered fittings and the noise of hammering, but even so anybody could see what a delightful place it would presentlyturn into. 

The Open Arms was to make a specialty of wet days. Those were the days, those consecutive days of downpour that came in the winter and lastedwithout interruption for a fortnight at a time, when visitors in thehotels were bored beyond expression and ready to welcome anything thatcould distract them for an hour from the dripping of the rain on thewindows. Bridge was their one solace, and they played it from afterbreakfast till bedtime; but on the fourth or fifth day of doing this, just the mere steady sitting became grievous to them. They ached withweariness. They wilted with boredom. All their natural kindness gotdamped out of them, and they were cross. Even when they won they werecross, and when they lost it was really distressing. They wouldn't, ofcourse, have been in California at all at such a time if it werepossible to know beforehand when the rains would begin, but one neverdid know, and often it was glorious weather right up to and beyondChristmas. And then how glorious! What a golden place of light andwarmth to be in, while in the East one's friends were being battered byblizzards. 

Mr. Twist intended to provide a break in the day each afternoon forthese victims of the rain. He would come to their rescue. He made uphis mind, clear and firm on such matters, that it should become thehabit of these unhappy people during the bad weather to motor out to TheOpen Arms for tea; and, full of forethought, he had had a covered waymade, by which one could get out of a car and into the house withoutbeing touched by a drop of rain, and he had had a huge open fireplacemade across the end of the tea-room, which would crackle and blaze awelcome that would cheer the most dispirited arrival. The cakes, at alltimes wonderful were on wet days to be more than wonderful. Li Koo had asecret receipt, given him, he said, by his mother for cakes of a quitepeculiar and original charm, and these were to be reserved for the rainyseason only, and be made its specialty. They were to become known andendeared to the public under the brief designation of Wet Day Cakes. Mr. Twist felt there was something thoroughly American about thisname--plain and business-like, and attractively in contrast to thesubtle, the almost immoral exquisiteness of the article itself. Thiscake had been one of those produced by Li Koo from the folds of hisgarments the day in Los Angeles, and Mr. Twist had happened to be theone of his party who ate it. He therefore knew what he was doing when hedecided to call it and its like simply Wet Day Cakes. 

The twins found him experimenting with a fire in the fireplace so as tobe sure it didn't smoke, and the architect and he were in their shirtsleeves, deftly manipulating wood shavings and logs. There was such ahammering being made by the workmen fixing in the latticed windows, andsuch a crackling being made by the logs Mr. Twist and the architect kepton throwing on the fire, that only from the sudden broad smile on thearchitect's face as he turned to pick up another log did Mr. Twistrealize that something that hadn't to do with work was happening behindhis back. 

He looked round and saw the Annas picking their way toward him. Theyseemed in a hurry. 

"Hello, " he called out. 

They made no reply to this, but continued hurriedly to pick their wayamong the obstacles in their path. They appeared to be much perturbed. What, he wondered, had they done with Mrs. Bilton? He soon knew. 

"We've given Mrs. Bilton notice, " panted Anna-Rose as soon as she gotnear enough to his ear for him to hear her in the prevailing noise. 

Her face, as usual when she was moved and excited, was scarlet, her eyeslooking bluer and brighter than ever by contrast. 

"We simply can't stand it any longer, " she went on as Mr. Twist onlystared at her. 

"And you wouldn't either if you were us, " she continued, the morepassionately as he still didn't say anything. 

"Of course, " said Anna-Felicitas, taking a high line, though her heartwas full of doubt, "it's your fault really. We could have borne it if wehadn't had to have her at night. "

"Come outside, " said Mr. Twist, walking toward the door that led on tothe verandah. 

They followed him, Anna-Rose shaking with excitement, Anna-Felicitastrying to persuade herself that they had acted in the only wayconsistent with real wisdom. 

The architect stood with a log in each hand looking after them andsmiling all by himself. There was something about the Twinklers thatlightened his heart whenever he caught sight of them. He and his fellowexperts had deplored the absence of opportunities since Mrs. Bilton cameof developing the friendship begun the first day, and talked of them ontheir way home in the afternoons with affectionate and respectfulfamiliarity as The Cutes. 

"Now, " said Mr. Twist, having passed through the verandah and led thetwins to the bottom of the garden where he turned and faced them, "perhaps you'll tell me exactly what you've done. "

"You should rather inquire what Mrs. Bilton has done, " saidAnna-Felicitas, pulling herself up as straight and tall as she would go. She couldn't but perceive that the excess of Christopher's emotion wasputting her at a disadvantage in the matter of dignity. 

"I can guess pretty much what she has done, " said Mr. Twist. 

"You can't--you can't, " burst out Anna-Rose. "Nobody could--nobody evercould--who hadn't been with her day and night. "

"She's just been Mrs. Bilton, " said Mr. Twist, lighting a cigarette togive himself an appearance of calm. 

"Exactly, " said Anna-Felicitas. "So you won't be surprised at our havingjust been Twinklers. "

"Oh Lord, " groaned Mr. Twist, in spite of his cigarette, "oh, Lord. "

"We've given Mrs. Bilton notice, " continued Anna-Felicitas, making agesture of great dignity with her hand, "because we find with regretthat she and we are incompatible. "

"Was she aware that you were giving it her?" asked Mr. Twist, endeavouring to keep calm. 

"We wrote it. "

"Has she read it?"

"We put it into her hand, and then came away so that she should have anopportunity of quietly considering it. "

"You shouldn't have left us alone with her like this, " burst outAnna-Rose again, "you shouldn't really. It was cruel, it was wrong, leaving us high and dry--never seeing you--leaving us to be talked today and night--to be read to--would _you_ like to be read to whileyou're undressing by somebody still in all their clothes? We've neverbeen able to open our mouths. We've been taken into the field for ourairing and brought in again as if we were newborns, or people in prams, or flocks and herds, or prisoners suspected of wanting to escape. Wehaven't had a minute to ourselves day or night. There hasn't been asingle exchange of ideas, not a shred of recognition that we're grownup. We've been followed, watched, talked to--oh, oh, how awful it hasbeen! Oh, oh, how awful! Forced to be dumb for days--losing our power ofspeech--"

"Anna-Rose Twinkler, " interrupted Mr. Twist sternly, "you haven't lostit. And you not only haven't, but that power of yours has increasedtenfold during its days of rest. "

He spoke with the exasperation in his voice that they had already heardseveral times since they landed in America. Each time it took themaback, for Mr. Twist was firmly fixed in their minds as the kindest andgentlest of creatures, and these sudden kickings of his each timeastonished them. 

On this occasion, however, only Anna-Rose was astonished. Anna-Felicitasall along had had an uncomfortable conviction in the depth of her heartthat Mr. Twist wouldn't like what they had done. He would be upset, shefelt, as her reluctant feet followed Anna-Rose in search of him. Hewould be, she was afraid very much upset. And so he was. He was appalledby what had happened. Lose Mrs. Bilton? Lose the very foundation of theparty's respectability? And how could he find somebody else at theeleventh hour and where and how could the twins and he live, unchaperoned as they would be, till he had? What a peculiar talent theseAnnas had for getting themselves and him into impossible situations! Ofcourse at their age they ought to be safe under the wing of a wise andunusually determined mother. Well, poor little wretches, they couldn'thelp not being under it; but that aunt of theirs ought to have stuck tothem--faced up to her husband, and stuck to them. 

"I suppose, " he said angrily, "being you and not being able to seefarther than the ends of your noses, you haven't got any sort of an ideaof what you've done. "

"We--"

"She--"

"And I don't suppose it's much use my trying to explain, either. Hasn'tit ever occurred to you, though I'd be real grateful if you'd give meinformation on this point--that maybe you don't know everything?"

"She--"

"We--"

"And that till you do know everything, which I take it won't be for sometime yet, judging from the samples I've had of your perspicacity, you'ddo well not to act without first asking some one's advice? Mine, forinstance?"

"She--" began Anna-Rose again; but her voice was trembling, for shecouldn't bear Mr. Twist's anger. She was too fond of him. When he lookedat her like that her own anger was blown out as if by an icy draught andshe could only look back at him piteously. 

But Anna-Felicitas, being free from the weaknesses inherent inadoration, besides continuing to perceive how Christopher's feelings puther at a disadvantage, drew Mr. Twist's attention from her by sayingwith gentleness, "But why add to the general discomfort by beingbitter?"

"Bitter!" cried Mr. Twist, still glaring at Anna-Rose. 

"Do you dispute that God made us?" inquired Anna-Felicitas, placingherself as it were like a shield between Mr. Twist's wrathfulconcentration on Christopher and that unfortunate young person'semotion. 

"See here, " said Mr. Twist turning on her, "I'm not going to argue withyou--not about _anything_. Least of all about God. "

"I only wanted to point out to you, " said Anna-Felicitas mildly, "thatthat being so, and we not able to help it, there seems little use inbeing bitter with us because we're not different. In regard to anythingfundamental about us that you deplore I'm afraid we must refer you toProvidence. "

"Say, " said Mr. Twist, not in the least appeased by this reasoning but, as Anna-Felicitas couldn't but notice, quite the contrary, "used you totalk like this to that Uncle Arthur of yours? Because if you did, uponmy word I don't wonder--"

But what Mr. Twist didn't wonder was fortunately concealed from thetwins by the appearance at that moment of Mrs. Bilton, who, emergingfrom the shades of the verandah and looking about her, caught sight ofthem and came rapidly down the garden. 

There was no escape. 

They watched her bearing down on them without a word. It was a mostunpleasant moment. Mr. Twist re-lit his cigarette to give himself acountenance, but the thought of all that Mrs. Bilton would probably saywas dreadful to him, and his hand couldn't help shaking a little. Anna-Rose showed a guilty tendency to slink behind him. Anna-Felicitasstood motionless, awaiting the deluge. All Mr. Twist's sympathies werewith Mrs. Bilton, and he was ashamed that she should have been treatedso. He felt that nothing she could say would be severe enough, and hewas extraordinarily angry with the Annas. Yet when he saw the injuredlady bearing down on them, if he only could he would have picked up anAnna under each arm, guilty as they were, and run and run; so much didhe prefer them to Mrs. Bilton and so terribly did he want, at thismoment, to be somewhere where that lady wasn't. 

There they stood then, anxiously watching the approaching figure, andthe letter in Mrs. Bilton's hand bobbed up and down as she walked, whiteand conspicuous in the sun against her black dress. What was theiramazement to see as she drew nearer that she was looking just aspleasant as ever. They stared at her with mouths falling open. Was itpossible, thought the twins, that she was longing to leave but hadn'tliked to say so, and the letter had come as a release? Was it possible, thought Mr. Twist with a leap of hope in his heart, that she was takingthe letter from a non-serious point of view?

And Mr. Twist, to his infinite relief, was right. For Mrs. Bilton, womanof grit and tenacity, was not in the habit of allowing herself to bedislodged or even discouraged. This was the opening sentence of herremarks when she had arrived, smiling, in their midst. Had she notexplained the first night that she was one who, having put her hand tothe plough, held on to it however lively the movements of the ploughmight be? She would not conceal from them, she said, that even Mr. Biltonhad not, especially, at first, been entirely without such movements. Hehad settled down, however on finding he could trust her to know betterthan he did what he wanted. Don't wise wives always? she inquired. Andthe result had been that no man ever had a more devoted wife while hewas alive, or a more devoted widow after he wasn't. She had told him oneday, when he was drawing near the latter condition and she wasconversing with him, as was only right, on the subject of wills, and hesaid that his affairs had gone wrong and as far as he could see shewould be left a widow and that was about all she would be left--she hadtold him that if it was any comfort to him to know it, he might rely onit that he would have the most devoted widow any man had ever had, andhe said--Mr. Bilton had odd fancies, especially toward the end--that awidow was the one thing a man never could have because he wasn't thereby the time he had got her. Yes, Mr. Bilton had odd fancies. And if shehad managed, as she did manage, to steer successfully among them, hebeing a man of ripe parts and character, was it likely that encounteringodd fancies in two very young and unformed girls--oh, it wasn't theirfault that they were unformed, it was merely because they hadn't hadtime enough yet--she would be unable, experienced as she was, to steeramong them too? Besides, she had a heart for orphans; orphans and dumbanimals always had had a special appeal for her. "No, no, Mr. Twist, "Mrs. Bilton wound up, putting a hand affectionately on Anna-Rose'sshoulder as a more convenient one than Anna-Felicitas's, "my youngcharges aren't going to be left in the lurch, you may rely on that. Idon't undertake a duty without carrying it out. Why, I feel a lastingaffection for them already. We've made real progress these few days inintimacy. And I just love to sit and listen to all their fresh youngchatter. "

CHAPTER XXIX

This was the last of Mr. Twist's worries before the opening day. 

Remorseful that he should have shirked helping the Annas to bear Mrs. Bilton, besides having had a severe fright on perceiving how near hisshirking had brought the party to disaster, he now had his meals withthe others and spent the evenings with them as well. He was immenselygrateful to Mrs. Bilton. Her grit had saved them. He esteemed andrespected her. Indeed, he shook hands with her then and there at the endof her speech, and told her he did, and the least he could do after thatwas to come to dinner. But this very genuine appreciation didn't preventhis finding her at close quarters what Anna-Rose, greatly chastened, nowonly called temperately "a little much, " and the result was a reallyfrantic hurrying on of the work. He had rather taken, those first fourdays of being relieved of responsibility in regard to the twins, tofinnicking with details, to dwelling lovingly on them with a sense ofhaving a margin to his time, and things accordingly had considerablyslowed down; but after twenty-four hours of Mrs. Bilton they hurried upagain, and after forty-eight of her the speed was headlong. At the endof forty-eight hours it seemed to Mr. Twist more urgent than anything hehad ever known that he should get out of the shanty, get into somewherewith space in it, and sound-proof walls--lots of walls--and longpassages between people's doors; and before the rooms in the inn wereanything like finished he insisted on moving in. 

"You must turn to on this last lap and help fix them up, " he said to thetwins. "It'll be a bit uncomfortable at first, but you must just takeoff your coats to it and not mind. "

Mind? Turn to? It was what they were languishing for. It was what, inthe arid hours under the ilex tree, collected so ignominiously roundMrs. Bilton's knee they had been panting for, like thirsty dogs withtheir tongues out. And such is the peculiar blessedness of work thatinstantly, the moment there was any to be done, everything that wastangled and irritating fell quite naturally into its proper place. Magically life straightened itself out smooth, and left off beingdifficult. _Arbeit und Liebe_, as their mother used to say, droppinginto German whenever a sentence seemed to her to sound better thatway--_Arbeit und Liebe_: these were the two great things of life; thetwo great angels, as she assured them, under whose spread-out wings layhappiness. 

With a hungry zeal, with the violent energy of reaction, the Annas fellupon work. They started unpacking. All the things they had bought inAcapulco, the linen, the china, the teaspoons, the feminine touches thathad been piled up waiting in the barn, were pulled out and undone andcarried indoors. They sorted, and they counted, and they arranged onshelves. Anna-Rose flew in and out with her arms full. Anna-Felicitasslouched zealously after her, her arms full too when she started, butnot nearly so full when she got there owing to the way things had ofslipping through them and dropping on to the floor. They were in ablissful, busy confusion. Their faces shone with heat and happiness. Here was liberty; here was freedom; here was true dignity--_Arbeit undLiebe_. . . . 

When Mr. Twist, as he did whenever he could, came and looked on for amoment in his shirt sleeves, with his hat on the back of his head andhis big, benevolent spectacles so kind, Anna-Rose's cup seemed full. Herdimple never disappeared for a moment. It was there all day long now;and even when she was asleep it still lurked in the corner of her mouth. _Arbeit und Liebe_. 

Immense was the reaction of self-respect that took hold of the twins. They couldn't believe they were the people who had been so crude andill-conditioned as to hide Mrs. Bilton's belongings, and actuallyfinally to hide themselves. How absurd. How like children. Howunpardonably undignified. Anna-Rose held forth volubly to this effectwhile she arranged the china, and Anna-Felicitas listened assentingly, with a kind of grave, ashamed sheepishness. 

The result of this reaction was that Mrs. Bilton, whose pressure on themwas relieved by the necessity of her too being in several places atonce, and who was displaying her customary grit, now became the definiteobject of their courtesy. They were the mistresses of a house, theybegan to realize, and as such owed her every consideration. This blandattitude was greatly helped by their not having to sleep with her anymore, and they found that the mere coming fresh to her each morning madethem feel polite and well-disposed. Besides, they were thoroughly andfinally grown-up now, Anna-Rose declared--never, never to lapse again. They had had their lesson, she said, gone through a crisis, and donethat which Aunt Alice used to say people did after severe trials, agedconsiderably. 

Anna-Felicitas wasn't quite so sure. Her own recent behaviour hadshaken and shocked her too much. Who would have thought she would havegone like that? Gone all to pieces, back to sheer naughtiness, on thefirst provocation? It was quite easy, she reflected while she worked, and cups kept on detaching themselves mysteriously from her fingers, andtables tumbling over at her approach, to be polite and considerate tosomebody you saw very little of, and even, as she found herself doing, to get fond of the person; but suppose circumstances threw one againinto the person's continual society, made one again have to sleep in thesame room? Anna-Felicitas doubted whether it would be possible for herto stand such a test, in spite of her earnest desire to behave; shedoubted, indeed, whether anybody ever did stand that test successfully. Look at husbands. 

Meanwhile there seemed no likelihood of its being applied again. Each ofthem had now a separate bedroom, and Mrs. Bilton had, in the lavishAmerican fashion, her own bathroom, so that even at that point there wasno collision. The twins' rooms were connected by a bathroom all tothemselves, with no other door into it except the doors from theirbedrooms, and Mr. Twist, who dwelt discreetly at the other end of thehouse, also had a bathroom of his own. It seemed as natural for Americanarchitects to drop bathrooms about, thought Anna-Rose, as for the littleclouds in the psalms to drop fatness. They shed them just as easily, andthe results were just as refreshing. To persons hailing from Pomerania, a place arid of bathrooms, it was the last word of luxury and comfort tohave one's own. Their pride in theirs amused Mr. Twist, used fromchildhood to these civilized arrangements; but then, as they pointed outto him, he hadn't lived in Pomerania, where nothing stood between youand being dirty except the pump. 

But it wasn't only the bathrooms that made the inn as planned by Mr. Twist and the architect seem to the twins the most perfect, the mostwonderful magic little house in the world: the intelligent Americanspirit was in every corner, and it was full of clever, simple devicesfor saving labour--so full that it almost seemed to the Annas as if itwould get up quite unaided at six every morning and do itself; and theywere sure that if the smallest encouragement were given to thekitchen-stove it would cook and dish up a dinner all alone. Everythingin the house was on these lines. The arrangements for servinginnumerable teas with ease were admirable. They were marvels of economyand clever thinking-out. The architect was surprised at the attentionand thought Mr. Twist concentrated on this particular part of the futurehousekeeping. "You seem sheer crazy on teas, " he remarked; to which Mr. Twist merely replied that he was. 

The last few days before the opening were as full of present joy andpromise of yet greater joys to come as the last few days of a happybetrothal. They reminded Anna-Felicitas of those days in April, thoseenchanting days she had always loved the best, when the bees get busyfor the first time, and suddenly there are wallflowers and a floweringcurrant bush and the sound of the lawn being mown and the smell of cutgrass. How one's heart leaps up to greet them, she thought. What athrill of delight rushes through one's body, of new hope, of deliciousexpectation. 

Even Li Koo, the wooden-faced, the brief and rare of speech seemed tofeel the prevailing satisfaction and harmony and could be heard in theevenings singing strange songs among his pots. And what he was singing, only nobody knew it, were soft Chinese hymns of praise of the twowhite-lily girls, whose hair was woven sunlight, and whose eyes weredeep and blue even as the waters that washed about the shores of hisfather's dwelling-place. For Li Koo, the impassive and inarticulate, insecret seethed with passion. Which was why his cakes were so wonderful. He had to express himself somehow. 

But while up on their sun-lit, eucalyptus-crowned slopes Mr. Twist andhis party--he always thought of them as his party--were innocently andhappily busy full of hopefulness and mutual goodwill, down in the townand in the houses scattered over the lovely country round the town, people were talking. Everybody knew about the house Teapot Twist wasdoing up, for the daily paper had told them that Mr. Edward A. Twist hadbought the long uninhabited farmhouse in Pepper Lane known as Batt's, and was converting it into a little _ventre-à-terre_ for his widowedmother--launching once more into French, as though there were somethingabout Mr. Twist magnetic to that language. Everybody knew this, and itwas perfectly natural for a well-off Easterner to have a little placeout West, even if the choice of the little place was whimsical. But whatabout the Miss Twinklers? Who and what were they? And also, Why?

There were three weeks between the departure of the Twist party from theCosmopolitan and the opening of the inn, and in that time much had beendone in the way of conjecture. The first waves of it flowed out from theCosmopolitan, and were met almost at once by waves flowing in from thetown. Good-natured curiosity gave place to excited curiosity when therumour got about that the Cosmopolitan had been obliged to ask Mr. Twist to take his _entourage_ somewhere else. Was it possible the cutelittle girls, so well known by sight on Main Street going from shop toshop, were secretly scandalous? It seemed almost unbelievable, butluckily nothing was really unbelievable. 

The manager of the hotel, dropped in upon casually by one guest afterthe other, and interviewed as well by determined gentlemen from thelocal press, was not to be drawn. His reserve was most interesting. MissHeap knitted and knitted and was persistently enigmatic. Her silence wasmost exciting. On the other hand, Mrs. Ridding's attitude was merely oneof contempt, dismissing the Twinklers with a heavy gesture. Why think ortrouble about a pair of chits like that? They had gone; Albert was quietagain; and wasn't that the gong for dinner?

But doubts as to the private morals of the Twist _entourage_ presentlywere superseded by much graver and more perturbing doubts. Nobody knewwhen exactly this development took place. Acapulco had been enjoying thefirst set of doubts. There was no denying that doubts about somebodyelse's morals were not unpleasant. They did give one, if one examinedone's sensations carefully, a distinct agreeable tickle; they did addthe kick to lives which, if they had been virtuous for a very long timelike the lives of the Riddings, or virgin for a very long time like thelife of Miss Heap, were apt to be flat. But from the doubts thatpresently appeared and overshadowed the earlier ones, one got nothingbut genuine discomfort and uneasiness. Nobody knew how or when theystarted. Quite suddenly they were there. 

This was in the November before America's coming into the war. Thefeeling in Acapulco was violently anti-German. The great majority of theinhabitants, permanent and temporary, were deeply concerned at theconduct of their country in not having, immediately after the torpedoingof the _Lusitania_, joined the Allies. They found it difficult tounderstand, and were puzzled and suspicious, as well as humiliated intheir national pride. Germans who lived in the neighbourhood, or whocame across from the East for the winter, were politely tolerated, butthe attitude toward them was one of growing watchfulness and distrust;and week by week the whispered stories of spies and gun-emplacements andsecret stores of arms in these people's cellars or back gardens, grewmore insistent and detailed. There certainly had been at least one spy, a real authentic one, afterward shot in England, who had stayed near-by, and the nerves of the inhabitants had that jumpiness on this subjectwith which the inhabitants of other countries have long been familiar. All the customary inexplicable lights were seen; all the customarymysterious big motor cars rushed at forbidden and yet unhindered speedsalong unusual roads at unaccountable hours; all the customary signallingout to sea was observed and passionately sworn to by otherwise calmpeople. It was possible, the inhabitants found, to believe with easethings about Germans--those who were having difficulty with religionwished it were equally easy to believe things about God. There wasnothing Germans wouldn't think of in the way of plotting, and nothingthey wouldn't, having thought of it, carry out with deadly thoroughnessand patience. 

And into this uneasy hotbed of readiness to believe the worst, arrivedthe Twinkler twins, rolling their r's about. 

It needed but a few inquiries to discover that none of the youngladies' schools in the neighbourhood had been approached on theirbehalf; hardly inquiries, --mere casual talk was sufficient, ordinarychatting with the principals of these establishments when one met themat the lectures and instructive evenings the more serious members of thecommunity organized and supported. Not many of the winter visitors wentto these meetings, but Miss Heap did. Miss Heap had a restless soul. Itwas restless because it was worried by perpetual thirst, --she couldn'therself tell after what; it wasn't righteousness, for she knew she wasstill worldly, so perhaps it was culture. Anyhow she would give culturea chance, and accordingly she went to the instructive evenings. Here shemet that other side of Acapulco which doesn't play bridge and is proudto know nothing of polo, which believes in education, and goes in formind training and welfare work; which isn't, that is, well off. 

Nobody here had been asked to educate the Twinklers. No classes had beenjoined by them. 

Miss Heap was so enigmatic, she who was naturally of an unquiet andexercise-loving tongue, that this graver, more occupied section of theinhabitants was instantly as much pervaded by suspicions as the idlestof the visitors in the hotels and country houses. It waved aside theinnocent appearance and obvious extreme youth of the suspects. Uselessto look like cherubs if it were German cherubs you looked like. Uselessbeing very nearly children if it were German children you very nearlywere. Why, precisely these qualities would be selected by those terriblyclever Germans for the furtherance of their nefarious schemes. It wouldbe quite in keeping with the German national character, that characterof bottomless artfulness, to pick out two such young girls with justthat type of empty, baby face, and send them over to help weave thegigantic invisible web with which America was presently to be chokeddead. 

The serious section of Acapulco, the section that thought, hit on thisexplanation of the Twinklers with no difficulty whatever once itssuspicions were roused because it was used to being able to explaineverything instantly. It was proud of its explanation, and presented itto the town with much the same air of deprecating but consciousachievement with which one presents drinking-fountains. 

Then there was the lawyer to whom Mr. Twist had gone about theguardianship. He said nothing, but he was clear in his mind that thegirls were German and that Mr. Twist wanted to hide it. He had thoughtmore highly of Mr. Twist's intelligence than this. Why hide it? Americawas a neutral country; technically she was neutral, and Germans couldcome and go as they pleased. Why unnecessarily set tongues wagging? Hedid not, being of a continuous shrewd alertness himself, a continuouswide-awakeness and minute consideration of consequences, realize, and ifhe had he wouldn't have believed, the affectionate simplicity andunworldliness of Mr. Twist. If it had been pointed out to him he wouldhave dismissed it as a pose; for a man who makes money in any quantityworth handling isn't affectionately simple and unworldly--he iscalculating and steely. 

The lawyer was puzzled. How did Mr. Twist manage to have a forehead anda fortune like that, and yet be a fool? True, he had a funny sort offace on him once you got down to the nose part and what came after, --afamily sort of face, thought the lawyer; a sort of rice pudding, wet-nurse face. The lawyer listened intently to all the talk andrumours, while himself saying nothing. In spite of being a married man, his scruples about honour hadn't been blunted by the urge to personalfreedom and the necessity for daily self-defence that sometimes afflictsthose who have wives. He remained honourably silent, as he had said hewould, but he listened; and he came to the conclusion that either therewas a quite incredible amount of stupidity about the Twist party, orthat there was something queer. 

What he didn't know, and what nobody knew, was that the house being gotready with such haste was to be an inn. He, like the rest of the world, took the newspapers _ventre-à-terre_ theory of the house for granted, and it was only the expectation of the arrival of that respectable lady, the widowed Mrs. Twist, which kept the suspicions a little damped down. They smouldered, hesitating, beneath this expectation; for TeapotTwist's family life had been voluminously described in the entireAmerican press when first his invention caught on, and it was known tobe pure. There had been snapshots of the home at Clark where he had beenborn, of the home at Clark (west aspect) where he would die--Mr. Twistread with mild surprise that his liveliest wish was to die in the oldhome--of the corner in the Clark churchyard where he would probably beentombed, with an inset showing his father's gravestone on which wouldclearly be read the announcement that he was the Resurrection and theLife. And there was an inset of his mother, swathed in the black symbolsof ungluttable grief, --a most creditable mother. And there were accountsof the activities of another near relative, that Uncle Charles whopresided over the Church of Heavenly Refreshment in New York, and asnapshot of his macerated and unrefreshed body in a cassock, --a mostcreditable uncle. 

These articles hadn't appeared so very long ago, and the impressionsurvived and was general that Mr. Twist's antecedents wereunimpeachable. If it were true that the house was for his mother and shewas shortly arriving, then, although still very odd and unintelligible, it was probable that his being there now with the two Germans was afterall capable of explanation. Not much of an explanation, though. Even themoderates who took this view felt this. One wasn't with Germans thesedays if one could help it. There was no getting away from that simplefact. The inevitable deduction was that Mr. Twist couldn't help it. Whycouldn't he help it? Was he enslaved by a scandalous passion for them, apassion cold-bloodedly planned for him by the German Government, whichwas known to have lists of the notable citizens of the United Stateswith photographs and details of their probable weaknesses, and wasexactly informed of their movements? He had met the Twinklers, so it wasreported, on a steamer coming over from England. Of course. All arrangedby the German Government. That was the peculiar evil greatness of thisdangerous people, announced the serious section of Acapulco, again withthe drinking-fountain-presentation air, that nothing was too private ortoo petty to escape their attention, to be turned to their own wickeduses. They were as economical of the smallest scraps of possibleusefulness as a French cook of the smallest scraps and leavings of food. Everything was turned to account. Nothing was wasted. Even themosquitoes in Germany were not wasted. They contained juices, Germanshad discovered, especially after having been in contact with humanbeings, and with these juices the talented but unscrupulous Germans madeexplosives. Could one sufficiently distrust a nation that did thingslike that? asked the serious section of Acapulco. 

CHAPTER XXX

People were so much preoccupied by the Twinkler problem that they wereless interested than they otherwise would have been in the sea-blueadvertisements, and when the one appeared announcing that The Open Armswould open wide on the 29th of the month and exhorting the public towatch the signposts, they merely remarked that it wasn't, then, thetitle of a book after all. Mr. Twist would have been surprised andnettled if he had known how little curiosity his advertisements wereexciting; he would have been horrified if he had known the reason. As itwas, he didn't know anything. He was too busy, too deeply absorbed, tobe vulnerable to rumour; he, and the twins, and Mrs. Bilton were safefrom it inside their magic circle of _Arbeit und Liebe_. 

Sometimes he was seen in Main Street, that street in Acapulco throughwhich everybody passes at certain hours of the morning, looking asthough he had a great deal to do and very little time to do it in; andonce or twice the Twinklers were seen there, also apparently very busy, but they didn't now come alone. Mrs. Bilton, the lady from LosAngeles--Acapulco knew all about her and admitted she was a lady ofstrictest integrity and unimpeachable character, but this only made theTwinkler problem more obscure--came too, and seemed, judging from theanimation of her talk, to be on the best of terms with her charges. 

But once an idea has got into people's heads, remarked the lawyer, whowas nudged by the friend he was walking with as the attractive trio wereseen approaching, --Mrs. Bilton with her black dress and her snowy hairsetting off, as they in their turn set her off, the twins in their cleanwhite frocks and shining youth, --once an idea has got into people'sheads it sticks. It is slow to get in, and impossible to get out. Yet onthe face of it, was it likely that Mrs. Bilton--

"Say, " interrupted his friend, "since when have you joined up with thewater-blooded believe-nothing-but-good-ites?"

And only his personal affection for the lawyer restrained him from usingthe terrible word pro-German; but it had been in his mind. 

The day before the opening, Miss Heap heard from an acquaintance in theEast to whom she had written in her uneasiness, and who was staying withsome people living in Clark. Miss Heap wrote soon after thedeparture--she didn't see why she shouldn't call it by its proper nameand say right out expulsion--of the Twist party from the Cosmopolitan, but letters take a long time to get East and answers take the same longtime to come back in, and messages are sometimes slow in being deliveredif the other person doesn't realize, as one does oneself, the tremendousinterests that are at stake. What could be a more tremendous interest, and one more adapted to the American genius, than safe-guarding publicmorals? Miss Heap wrote before the sinister rumours of Germanmachinations had got about; she was still merely at the stage ofuneasiness in regard to the morals of the Twist party; she couldn'tsleep at night for thinking of them. Of course if it were true that hismother was coming out . . . But was she? Miss Heap somehow felt unable tobelieve it. "Do tell your friends in Clark, " she wrote, "how_delighted_ we all are to hear that Mrs. Twist is going to be one of usin our sunny refuge here this winter. A real warm welcome awaits her. Her son is working day and night getting the house ready for her, helpedindefatigably by the two Miss Twinklers. "

She had to wait over a fortnight for the answer, and by the time she gotit those other more terrible doubts had arisen, the doubts as to theexact position occupied by the Twinklers and Mr. Twist in the Germansecret plans for, first, the pervasion, and, second, the invasion ofAmerica; and on reading the opening lines of the letter Miss Heap foundshe had to sit down, for her legs gave way beneath her. 

It appeared that Mrs. Twist hadn't known where her son was till MissHeap's letter came. He had left Clark in company of the two girlsmentioned, and about whom his mother knew nothing, the very morningafter his arrival home from his long absence in Europe. That was all hismother knew. She was quite broken. Coming on the top of all her othersorrow her only son's behaviour had been a fearful, perhaps a finishingblow, but she was such a good woman that she still prayed for him. Clarkwas horrified. His mother had decided at first she would try to shieldhim and say nothing, but when she found that nobody had the least ideaof what he had done she felt she owed it to her friends to be open andhave no secrets from them. Whatever it cost her in suffering andhumiliation she would be frank. Anything was better than keeping upfalse appearances to friends who believed in you. She was a brave woman, a splendid woman. The girls--poor Mrs. Twist--were Germans. 

On reading this Miss Heap was all of a tingle. Her worst suspicionshadn't been half bad enough. Here was everything just about as black asit could be; and Mr Twist, a well-known and universally respectedAmerican citizen, had been turned, by means of those girls playing uponweaknesses she shuddered to think of but that she had reason to believe, from books she had studied and conversations she had reluctantly takenpart in, were not altogether uncommon, into a cat's-paw of the GermanGovernment. 

What should she do? What should she say? To whom should she go? Whichwas the proper line of warning for her to take? It seemed to her thatthe presence of these people on the Pacific coast was a real menace toits safety, moral and physical; but how get rid of them? And if theywere got rid of wouldn't it only be exposing some other part of America, less watchful, less perhaps able to take care of itself, to the ripeningand furtherance of their schemes, whatever their schemes might be? Evenat that moment Miss Heap unconsciously felt that to let the Twinklers gowould be to lose thrills. And she was really thrilled. She prickled withexcitement and horror. Her circulation hadn't been so good for years. She wasn't one to dissect her feelings, so she had no idea of howthoroughly she was enjoying herself. And it was while she sat alone inher bedroom, her fingers clasping and unclasping the arms of her chair, her feet nervously nibbing up and down on the thick soft carpet, hesitating as to the best course for her to take, holding her knowledgemeanwhile tight, hugging it for a little altogether to herself, her veryown, shared as yet by no one, --it was while she sat there, that peopleout of doors in Acapulco itself, along the main roads, out in thecountry towards Zamora on the north and San Blas on the south, becamesuddenly aware of new signposts. 

They hadn't been there the day before. They all turned towards the spotat the foot of the mountains where Pepper Lane was. They all pointed, with a long white finger, in that direction. And on them all was writtenin plain, sea-blue letters, beneath which the distance in miles orfractions of a mile was clearly marked, _To The Open Arms_. 

Curiosity was roused at last. People meeting each other in Main Streetstopped to talk about these Arms wondered where and what they were, anddecided to follow the signposts that afternoon in their cars and trackthem down. They made up parties to go and track together. It would be arelief to have something a little different to do. What on earth couldThe Open Arms be? Hopes were expressed that they weren't somethingreligious. Awful to follow signposts out into the country only to findthey landed you in a meeting-house. 

At lunch in the hotels, and everywhere where people were together, thesignposts were discussed. Miss Heap heard them being discussed from hersolitary table, but was so much taken up with her own exciting thoughtsthat she hardly noticed. After lunch, however, as she was passing out ofthe restaurant, still full of her unshared news and still uncertain asto whom she should tell it first, Mr. Ridding called out from his tableand said he supposed she was going too. 

They had been a little chilly to each other since the afternoon of theconversation with the Twinklers, but he would have called out to any oneat that moment. He was sitting waiting while Mrs. Ridding finished herlunch, his own lunch finished long ago, and was in the condition ofmuffled but extreme exasperation which the unoccupied watching of Mrs. Ridding at meals produced. Every day three times this happened, that Mr. Ridding got through his meal first by at least twenty minutes and thensat trying not to mind Mrs. Ridding. She wasn't aware of these efforts. They would greatly have shocked her; for to try not to mind one's wifesurely isn't what decent, loving husbands ever have to do. 

"Going where?" asked Miss Heap, stopping by the table; whereupon Mr. Ridding had the slight relief of getting up. 

Mrs. Ridding continued to eat impassively. 

"Following these new signposts that are all over the place, " said Mr. Ridding. "Sort of paper-chase business. "

"Yes. I'd like to. Were you thinking of going, Mrs. Ridding?"

"After our nap, " said Mrs. Ridding, steadily eating. "I'll take you. Carat four o'clock, Albert. "

She didn't raise her eyes from her plate, and as Miss Heap well knewthat Mrs. Ridding was not open to conversation during meals and as shehad nothing to say to Mr. Ridding, she expressed her thanks andpleasure, and temporarily left them. 

This was a day of shocks and thrills. When the big limousine--symbol ofMrs. Ridding's power, for Mr. Ridding couldn't for the life of him seewhy he should have to provide a strange old lady with cars, and yet didso on an increasing scale of splendour--arrived at the turn on the mainroad to San Blas which leads into Pepper Lane and was confronted by thefinal signpost pointing up it, for the first time The Open Arms and theTwist and Twinkler party entered Miss Heap's mind in company. So toodid they enter Mr. Ridding's mind; and they only remained outside Mrs. Ridding's because of her profound uninterest. Her thoughts were mergedin aspic. That was the worst of aspic when it was as good as it was atthe Cosmopolitan; one wasn't able to leave off eating it quite in time, and then, unfortunately, had to go on thinking of it afterwards. 

The Twist house, remembered her companions simultaneously, was in PepperLane. Odd that this other thing, whatever it was, should happen to bethere too. Miss Heap said nothing, but sat very straight and alert, hereyes everywhere. Mr. Ridding of course said nothing either. Not forworlds would he have mentioned the word Twist, which so instantly andinevitably suggested that other and highly controversial word Twinkler. But he too sat all eyes; for anyhow he might in passing get a glimpse ofthe place containing those cunning little bits of youngness, theTwinkler sisters, and even with any luck a glimpse of their very selves. 

Up the lane went the limousine, slowly because of the cars in front ofit. It was one of a string of cars, for the day was lovely, there was nopolo, and nobody happened to be giving a party. All the way out fromAcapulco they had only had to follow other cars. Cars were going, andcars were coming back. The cars going were full of solemn people, pathetically anxious to be interested. The cars coming back were full ofanimated people who evidently had achieved interest. 

Miss Heap became more and more alert as they approached the bend in thelane round which the Twist house was situated. She had been therebefore, making a point of getting a friend to motor her past it inorder to see what she could for herself, but Mr. Ridding, in spite ofhis desire to go and have a look too, had always, each time he tried to, found Mrs. Ridding barring the way. So that he didn't exactly know whereit was; and when on turning the corner the car suddenly stopped, andputting his head out--he was sitting backwards--- he saw a great, old-fashioned signboard, such as he was accustomed to in pictures ofancient English village greens, with

 The Open Arms

in medieval letters painted on it, all he said was, "Guess we've run itto earth. "

Miss Heap sat with her hands in her lap, staring. Mrs. Ridding, her mindblocked by aspic, wasn't receiving impressions. She gazed with heavyeyes straight in front of her. There she saw cars. Many cars. Allstopped at this particular spot. With a dull sensation of fathomlessfatigue she dimly wondered at them. 

"Looks as though it's a hostelry, " said Mr. Ridding, who remembered hisDickens; and he blinked up, craning his head out, at the signboard, onwhich through a gap in the branches of the pepper trees a shaft ofbrilliant late afternoon sun was striking. "Don't see one, though. "

He jerked his thumb. "Up back of the trees there, I reckon, " he said. 

Then he prepared to open the door and go and have a look. 

A hand shot out of Miss Heap's lap at him. "Don't, " she said quickly. "Don't, Mr. Ridding. "

There was a little green gate in the thick hedge that grew behind thepepper trees, and some people he knew, who had been in the car in front, were walking up to it. Some other people he knew had already got to it, and were standing talking together with what looked like leaflets intheir hands. These leaflets came out of a green wooden box fastened onto one of the gate-posts, with the words _Won't you take one_? paintedon it. 

Mr. Ridding naturally wanted to go and take one, and here was Miss Heaplaying hold of him and saying "Don't. "

"Don't what?" he asked looking down at her, his hand on the door. 

"Hello Ridding, " called out one of the people he knew. "No good gettingout. Show doesn't open till to-morrow at four. Can't get in to-day. Gate's bolted. Nothing doing. "

And then the man detached himself from the group at the gate and cameover to the car with a leaflet in his hand. 

"Say--" he said, --"how are you to-day, Miss Heap? Mrs. Ridding, yourhumble servant--say, look at this. Teapot Twist wasn't born yesterdaywhen it comes to keeping things dark. No mention of his name on thisbook of words, but it's the house he was doing up all right, and it isto be used as an inn. Afternoon-tea inn. Profits to go to the AmericanRed Cross. Price per head five dollars. Bit stiff, five dollars for tea. Wonder where those Twinkler girls come in. Here--you have this, Ridding, and study it. I'll get another. " And taking off his hat a second time tothe ladies he went back to his friends. 

In great agitation Miss Heap turned to Mrs. Ridding, whose mind, galvanized by the magic words Twist and Twinkler, was slowly heavingitself free of aspic. "Perhaps we had best go back to the hotel, MrsRidding, " said Miss Heap, her voice shaking. "There's something I wishparticularly to tell you. I ought to have done so this morning, directlyI knew, but I had no idea of course that this. . . . " She waved a hand atthe signboard, and collapsed into speechlessness. 

"Albert--hotel, " directed Mrs. Ridding. 

And Mr. Ridding, clutching the leaflet, his face congested withsuppressed emotions, obediently handed on the order through thespeaking-tube to the chauffeur. 

CHAPTER XXXI

"It's _perfect_, " said the twins, looking round the tea-room. 

This was next day, at a quarter to four. They had been looking roundsaying it was perfect at intervals since the morning. Each time theyfinished getting another of the little tables ready, each time theybrought in and set down another bowl of flowers they stood back andgazed a moment in silence, and then said with one voice, "It's_perfect_. "

Mr. Twist, though the house was not, as we have seen, quite as sober, quite as restrained in its effect as he had intended, was obliged toadmit that it did look very pretty. And so did the Annas. Especially theAnnas. They looked so pretty in the sea-blue frocks and little Dutchcaps and big muslin aprons that he took off his spectacles and cleanedthem carefully so as to have a thoroughly uninterrupted view; and asthey stood at a quarter to four gazing round the room, he stood gazingat them, and when they said "It's _perfect_, " he said, indicating themwith his thumb, "Same here, " and then they all laughed for they were allvery happy, and Mrs. Bilton, arrayed exactly as Mr. Twist had picturedher when he engaged her in handsome black, her white hair beautifullybrushed and neat, crossed over to the Annas and gave each of them ahearty kiss--for luck, she said--which Mr. Twist watched with an oddfeeling of jealousy. 

"I'd like to do that, " he thought, filled with a sudden desire to hug. Then he said it out loud. "I'd like to do that, " he said boldly. Andadded, "As it's the opening day. "

"I don't think it would afford you any permanent satisfaction, " saidAnna-Felicitas placidly. "There's nothing really to be gained, we think, by kissing. Of course, " she added politely to Mrs. Bilton, "we like itvery much as an expression of esteem. "

"Then why not in that spirit--" began Mr. Twist. 

"We don't hold with kissing, " said Anna-Rose quickly, turning very red. Intolerable to be kissed _en famille_. If it had to be done at all, kissing should be done quietly, she thought. But she and Anna-Felicitasdidn't hold with it anyhow. Never. Never. To her amazement she foundtears in her eyes. Well, of all the liquid idiots. . . . It must be thatshe was so happy. She had never been so happy. Where on earth had herhandkerchief got to. . . . 

"Hello, " said Mr. Twist, staring at her. 

Anna-Felicitas looked at her quickly. 

"It's merely bliss, " she said, taking the corner of her beautiful newmuslin apron to Christopher's eyes. "Excess of it. We are, you know, "she said, smiling over her shoulder at Mr. Twist, so that the corner ofher apron, being undirected, began dabbing at Christopher's perfectlytearless ears, "quite extraordinarily happy, and all through you. Nevertheless Anna-R. " she continued, addressing her with firmness whileshe finished her eyes and began her nose, "You may like to be remindedthat there's only ten minutes left now before all those cars that werehere yesterday come again, and you wouldn't wish to embark on yourcareer as a waitress hampered by an ugly face, would you?"

But half an hour later no cars had come. Pepper Lane was still empty. The long shadows lay across it in a beautiful quiet, and the crickets inthe grass chirruped undisturbed. Twice sounds were heard as if somethingwas coming up it, and everybody flew to their posts--Li Koo to theboiling water, Mrs. Bilton to her raised desk at the end of the room, and the twins to the door--but the sounds passed on along the road anddied away round the next corner. 

At half-past four the _personnel_ of The Open Arms was sitting aboutsilently in a state of increasing uneasiness, when Mr. Ridding walkedin. 

There had been no noise of a car to announce him; he just walked inmopping his forehead, for he had come in the jitney omnibus to thenearest point and had done the last mile on his own out-of-conditionfeet. Mrs. Ridding thought he was writing letters in the smoking-room. She herself was in a big chair on the verandah, and with Miss Heap andmost of the other guests was discussing The Open Arms in all itsprobable significance. He hadn't been able to get away sooner because ofthe nap. He had gone through with the nap from start to finish so as notto rouse suspicion. He arrived very hot, but with a feeling ofdare-devil running of risks that gave him great satisfaction. He knewthat he would cool down again presently and that then the consequencesof his behaviour would be unpleasant to reflect upon, but meanwhile hisblood was up. 

He walked in feeling not a day older than thirty, --most gratifyingsensation. The _personnel_, after a moment's open-mouthed surprise, rushed to greet him. Never was a man more welcome. Never had Mr. Riddingbeen so warmly welcomed anywhere in his life. 

"Now isn't this real homey, " he said, beaming at Anna-Rose who took hisstick. "Wish I'd known you were going to do it, for then I'd have hadsomething to look forward to. "

"Will you have tea or coffee?" asked Anna-Felicitas, trying to look verysolemn and like a family butler but her voice quivering with eagerness. "Or perhaps you would prefer frothed chocolate? Each of these beveragescan be provided either hot or iced--"

"There's ice-cream as well, " said Anna-Rose, tumultuously in spite ofalso trying to look like a family butler. "_I'd_ have ice-cream if Iwere you. There's more body in it. Cold, delicious body. And you look sohot. Hot things should always as soon as possible be united to coldthings, so as to restore the proper balance--"

"And there's some heavenly stuff called cinnamon-toast--hot, you know, but if you have ice-cream at the same time it won't matter, " saidAnna-Felicitas, hanging up his hat for him. "I don't know whether you'vestudied the leaflets, " she continued, "but in case you haven't I feel Ioughtn't to conceal from you that the price is five dollars whatever youhave. "

"So that, " said Anna-Rose, "you needn't bother about trying to save, foryou can't. "

"Then I'll have tea to start with and see how I get on, " said Mr. Ridding, sitting down in the chair Anna-Felicitas held for him andbeaming up at her. 

She flicked an imaginary grain of dust off the cloth with the corner ofher apron to convey to him that she knew her business, and hurried awayto give the order. Indeed, they both hurried away to give the order. 

"Say--" called out Mr. Ridding, for he thought one Anna would have beenenough for this and he was pining to talk to them; but the twins weren'tto be stopped from both giving the very first order, and theydisappeared together into the pantry. 

Mrs. Bilton sat in the farthest corner at her desk, apparently absorbedin an enormous ledger. In this ledger she was to keep accounts and toenter the number of teas, and from this high seat she was to presideover the activities of the _personnel_. She had retired hastily to it onthe unexpected entrance of Mr. Ridding, and pen in hand was endeavouringto look as if she were totting up figures. As the pages were blank thiswas a little difficult. And it was difficult to sit there quiet. Shewanted to get down and go and chat with the guest; she felt she hadquite a good deal she could say to him; she had a great itch to go andtalk, but Mr. Twist had been particular that to begin with, till the roomwas fairly full, he and she should leave the guests entirely to theAnnas. 

He himself was going to keep much in the background at all times, butthrough the half-open door of his office he could see and hear; and hecouldn't help thinking, as he sat there watching and observed theeffulgence of the beams the old gentleman just arrived turned on thetwins, that the first guest appeared to be extraordinarily andundesirably affectionate. He thought he had seen him at theCosmopolitan, but wasn't sure. He didn't know that the Annas, aftertheir conversation with him there, felt towards him as old friends, andhe considered their manner was a little unduly familiar. Perhaps, afterall, he thought uneasily, Mrs. Bilton had better do the waiting and theAnnas sit with him in the office. The ledger could be written up at theend of the day. Or he could hire somebody. . . . 

Mr. Twist felt worried, and pulled at his ear. And why was there onlyone guest? It was twenty minutes to five; and this time yesterday theroad had been choked with cars. He felt very much worried. With everyminute this absence of guests grew more and more remarkable. Perhaps hehad better, this beings the opening day, go in and welcome the solitaryone there was. Perhaps it would be wise to elaborate the idea of the innfor his edification, so that he could hand on what he had heard to thoseothers who so unaccountably hadn't come. 

He got up and went into the other room; and just as Anna-Felicitas wasreappearing with the teapot followed by Anna-Rose with a tray of cakes, Mr. Ridding, who was sitting up expectantly and giving his tie a littlepat of adjustment, perceived bearing down upon him that fellow TeapotTwist. 

This was a blow. He hadn't run risks and walked in the afternoon heat tosit and talk to Twist. Mr. Ridding was a friendly and amiable old man, and at any other time would have talked to him with pleasure; but he hadmade up his mind for the Twinklers as one makes up one's mind for acertain dish and is ravaged by strange fury if it isn't produced. Besides, hang it all, he was going to pay five dollars for his tea, andfor that sum he ought to least to have it under the conditions hepreferred. 

"Glad to meet you, Mr. Twist, " he nevertheless said as Mr. Twistintroduced himself, his eyes, however, roving over the ministeringAnnas, --a roving Mr. Twist noticed with fresh misgivings. 

It made him sit down firmly at the table and say, "If you don't mind, Mr. --"

"Ridding is my name. "

"If you don't mind, Mr. Ridding, I'd like to explain our objects toyou. "

But he couldn't help wondering what he would do if there were severaltables with roving-eyed guests at them, it being clear that therewouldn't be enough of him in such a case to go round. 

Mr. Ridding, for his part, couldn't help wondering why the devil TeapotTwist sat down unasked at his table. Five dollars. Come now. For that aman had a right to a table to himself. 

But anyhow the Annas wouldn't have stayed talking for at that moment acar stopped in the lane and quite a lot of footsteps were heard comingup the neatly sanded path. Mr. Ridding pricked up his ears, for from thethings he had heard being said all the evening before and all thatmorning in Acapulco, besides most of the night from the lips of thatstrange old lady with whom by some dreadful mistake he was obliged tosleep, he hadn't supposed there would be exactly a rush. 

Four young men came in. Mr. Ridding didn't know them. No class, hethought, looking them over; and was seized with a feeling of sulkyvexation suitable to twenty when he saw with what enthusiasm theTwinklers flew to meet them. They behaved, thought Mr. Ridding crossly, as if they were the oldest and dearest friends. 

"Who are they?" he asked curtly of Mr. Twist, cutting into the longthings he was saying. 

"Only the different experts who helped me rebuild the place, " said Mr. Twist a little impatiently; he too had pricked up his ears inexpectation at the sound of all those feet, and was disappointed. 

He continued what Mr. Ridding, watching the group of young people, called sulkily to himself his rigmarole, but continued moreabstractedly. He also was watching the Annas and the experts. The youngmen were evidently in the highest spirits, and were walking round theAnnas admiring their get-up and expressing their admiration in laughterand exclamations. One would have thought they had known each other alltheir lives. The twins were wreathed in smiles. They looked as pleased, Mr. Twist thought, as cats that are being stroked. Almost he could hearthem purring. He glanced helplessly across to where Mrs. Bilton sat, ashe had told her, bent pen in hand over the ledger. She didn't move. Itwas true he had told her to sit like that, but hadn't the woman anyimagination? What she ought to do now was to bustle forward and takethat laughing group in charge. 

"As I was telling you--" resumed Mr. Twist, returning with an effort toMr. Ridding, only to find his eyes fixed on the young people and catchan unmistakably thwarted look in his face. 

In a flash Mr. Twist realized what he had come for, --it was solely tosee and talk to the twins. He must have noticed them at theCosmopolitan, and come out just for them. Just for that. "Unprincipledold scoundrel, " said Mr. Twist under his breath, his ears flaming. Aloudhe said, "As I was telling you--" and went on distractedly with hisrigmarole. 

Then some more people came in. They had motored, but the noise theexperts were making had drowned the sound of their arrival. Mr. Riddingand Mr. Twist, both occupied in glowering at the group in the middle ofthe room, were made aware of their presence by Anna-Felicitas suddenlydropping the pencil and tablets she had been provided with for writingdown orders and taking an uncertain and obviously timid step forward. 

They both looked round in the direction of her reluctant step, and sawa man and two women standing on the threshold. Mr. Twist, of course, didn't know them; he hardly knew anybody, even by sight. But Mr. Riddingdid. That is, he knew them well by sight and had carefully avoidedknowing them any other way, for they were Germans. 

Mr. Ridding was one of those who didn't like Germans. He was a man wholiked or disliked what his daily paper told him to, and his daily paperwas anti-German. For reasons natural to one who disliked Germans and yetat the same time had a thirstily affectionate disposition, he declinedto believe the prevailing theory about the Twinklers. Besides, he didn'tbelieve it anyhow. At that age people were truthful, and he had heardthem explain they had come from England and had acquired their rollingr's during a sojourn abroad. Why should he doubt? But he refrained fromdeclaring his belief in their innocence of the unpopular nationality, owing to a desire to avoid trouble in that bedroom he couldn't call hisbut was obliged so humiliatingly to speak of as ours. Except, however, for the Twinklers, for all other persons of whom it was said that theywere Germans, naturalized or not, immediate or remote, he had, instructed by his newspaper, what his called a healthy instinctiveabhorrence. 

"And she's got it too, " he thought, much gratified at this bond betweenthem, as he noted Anna-Felicitas's hesitating and reluctant advance tomeet the new guests. "There's proof that people are wrong. "

But what Anna-Felicitas had got was stage-fright; for here were thefirst strangers, the first real, proper visitors such as any shop orhotel might have. Mr. Ridding was a friend. So were the experts friends. This was trade coming in, --real business being done. Anna-Felicitashadn't supposed she would be shy when the long-expected and prepared-formoment arrived, but she was. And it was because the guests seemed sodisconcertingly pleased to see her. Even on the threshold the wholethree stood smiling broadly at her. She hadn't been prepared for that, and it unnerved her. 

"Charming, charming, " said the newcomers, advancing towards her andembracing the room and the tables and the Annas in one immense inclusivesmile of appreciation. 

"Know those?" asked Mr. Ridding, again cutting into Mr. Twist'sexplanations. 

"No, " said he. 

"Wangelbeckers, " said Mr. Ridding briefly. 

"Indeed, " said Mr. Twist, off whose ignorance the name glancedharmlessly. "Well, as I was telling yous--"

"But this is delicious--this is a conception of genius, " said Mr. Wangelbecker all-embracingly, after he had picked up Anna-Felicitas'stablets and restored them to her with a low bow. 

"Charming, charming, " said Mrs. Wangelbecker, looking round. 

"Real cunning, " said Miss Wangelbecker, "as they say here. " And shelaughed at Anna-Felicitas with an air of mutual understanding. 

"Will you have tea or coffee?" asked Anna-Felicitas nervously. "Orperhaps you would prefer frothed chocolate. Each of these beverages canbe--"

"Delicious, delicious, " said Mrs. Wangelbecker, envelopingAnna-Felicitas in her smile. 

"The frothed chocolate is very delicious, " said Anna-Felicitas with akind of grave nervousness. 

"Ah--charming, charming, " said Mrs. Wangelbecker, obstinatelyappreciative. 

"And there's ice-cream as well, " said Anna-Felicitas, her eyes on hertablets so as to avoid seeing the Wangelbecker smile. "And--and a greatmany kinds of cakes--"

"Well, hadn't we better sit down first, " said Mr. Wangelbecker genially, "or are all the tables engaged?"

"Oh I _beg_ your pardon, " said Anna-Felicitas, blushing and movinghastily towards a table laid for three. 

"Ah--that's better, " said Mr. Wangelbecker, following closely on herheels. "Now we can go into the serious business of ordering what weshall eat comfortably. But before I sit down allow me to present myself. My name is Wangelbecker. An honest German name. And this is my wife. Shetoo had an honest German name before she honoured mine by acceptingit--she was a Niedermayer. And this is my daughter, with whom I trustyou will soon be friends. "

And they all put out their hands to be shaken, and Anna-Felicitas shookthem. 

"Look at that now, " said Mr. Ridding watching. 

"As I was telling you--" said Mr. Twist irritably, for really why shouldAnna II. Shake hands right off with strangers? Her business was to wait, not to get shaking hands. He must point out to her very plainly. 

"Pleased to meet you Miss von Twinkler, " said Mrs. Wangelbecker; and atthis Anna-Felicitas was so much startled that she dropped her tablets asecond time. 

"As they say here, " laughed Miss Wangelbecker, again with that air ofmutual comprehension. 

"But they don't, " said Anna Felicitas hurriedly, taking her tablets fromthe restoring hand of Mr. Wangelbecker and forgetting to thank him. 

"What?" said Mrs. Wangelbecker. "When you are both so charming that foronce the phrase must be sincere?"

"Miss von Twinkler means she finds it wiser not to use her title, " saidMr. Wangelbecker. "Well, perhaps--perhaps. Wiser perhaps from the pointof view of convenience. Is that where you will sit, Güstchen? Still, weGermans when we are together can allow ourselves the refreshment ofbeing ourselves, and I hope to be frequently the means of giving you therelief, you and your charming sister, of hearing yourselves addressedcorrectly. It is a great family, the von Twinklers. A great family. Inthese sad days we Germans must hang together--"

Anna-Felicitas stood, tablets in hand, looking helplessly from oneWangelbecker to the other. The situation was beyond her. 

"But--" she began; then stopped. "Shall I bring you tea or coffee?" sheended by asking again. 

"Well now this is amusing, " said Mr. Wangelbecker, sitting downcomfortably and leaning his elbows on the table. "Isn't it, Güstchen. Tosee a von Twinkler playing at waiting on us. "

"Charming, charming, " said his wife. 

"It's real sporting, " said his daughter, laughing up at Anna-Felicitas, again with comprehension, --with, almost, a wink. "You must let me comeand help. I'd look nice in that costume, wouldn't I mother. "

"There is also frothed choc--"

"I suppose, now, Mr. Twist--he must be completely sympathy--"interrupted Mr. Wangelbecker confidentially, leaning forward andlowering his voice a little. 

Anna-Felicitas gazed at him blankly. Some more people were coming in atthe door, and behind them she could see on the path yet more, andAnna-Rose was in the pantry fetching the tea for the experts. 

"Would you mind telling me what I am to bring you?" she asked. "BecauseI'm afraid--"

Mr. Wangelbecker turned his head in the direction she was looking. 

"Ah--" he said getting up, "but this is magnificent Güstchen, here areMrs. Kleinbart and her sister--why, and there come the Diederichs--butsplendid, splendid--"

"Say, " said Mr. Ridding, turning to Mr. Twist with a congested face, "ever been to Berlin?"

"No, " said Mr. Twist, annoyed by a question of such wanton irrelevanceflung into the middle of his sentence. 

"Well, it's just like this. "

"Like this?" repeated Mr. Twist. 

"Those there, " said Mr. Ridding, jerking his head. "That lot there--see'em any day in Berlin, or Frankfurt, or any other of their confoundedtowns. "

"I don't follow, " said Mr. Twist, very shortly indeed. 

"Germans, " said Mr. Ridding. 

"Germans?"

"All Germans, " said Ridding. 

"All Germans?"

"Wangelbeckers are Germans, " said Mr. Ridding. "Didn't you know?"

"No, " said Mr. Twist. 

"So are the ones who've just come in. "

"Germans?"

"All Germans. So are those behind, just coming in. "

"Germans?"

"All Germans. "

There was a pause, during which Mr. Twist stared round the room. It waspresenting quite a populous appearance. Then he said slowly, "Well I'mdamned. "

And Mr. Ridding for the first time looked pleased with Mr. Twist. Heconsidered that at last he was talking sense. 

"Mr. Twist, " he said heartily, "I'm exceedingly glad you're damned. Itwas what I was sure at the bottom of my heart you would be. Shake hands, sir. "

CHAPTER XXXII

That evening depression reigned in The Open Arms. 

Mr. Twist paced up and down the tea-room deep in thought that wasobviously unpleasant and perplexed; Mrs. Bilton went to bed abruptly, after a short outpour of words to the effect that she had never seen somany Germans at once before, that her psyche was disharmonious toGermans, that they made her go goose-fleshy just as cats in a room madeMr. Bilton go goose-fleshy in the days when he had flesh to go it with, that she hadn't been aware the inn was to be a popular resort andrendezvous for Germans, and that she wished to speak alone with Mr. Twist in the morning; while the twins, feeling the ominousness of thislast sentence, --as did Mr. Twist, who started when he heard it, --andovercome by the lassitude that had succeeded the shocks of theafternoon, a lassitude much increased by their having tried to finish upthe pailsful of left-over ices and the huge piles of cakes slowlysoddening in their own souring cream, went out together on to themoonlit verandah and stood looking up in silence at the stars. Therethey stood in silence, and thought things about the immense distance andindifference of those bright, cold specks, and how infinitelyinsignificant after all they, the Twinklers were, and how they wouldboth in any case be dead in a hundred years. And this last reflectionafforded them somehow a kind of bleak and draughty comfort. 

Thus the first evening, that was to have been so happy, was spent byeverybody in silence and apart. Li Koo felt the atmosphere of oppressioneven in his kitchen, and refrained from song. He put away, after dealingwith it cunningly so that it should keep until a more propitious hour, awonderful drink he had prepared for supper in celebration of the openingday--"Me make li'l celebrity, " he had said, squeezing together strangeessences and fruits--and he moved softly about so as not to disturb themeditations of the master. Li Koo was perfectly aware of what had gonewrong: it was the unexpected arrival to tea of Germans. Being a memberof the least blood-thirsty of the nations, he viewed Germans withpeculiar disfavour and understood his master's prolonged walking up anddown. Also he had noted through a crack in the door the way these peopleof blood and death crowded round the white-lily girls; and was not thatsufficient in itself to cause his master's numerous and rapid steps?

Numerous indeed that evening were Mr. Twist's steps. He felt he mustthink, and he could think better walking up and down. Why had all thoseGermans come? Why, except old Ridding and the experts, had none of theAmericans come? It was very strange. And what Germans! So cordial, soexuberant to the twins, so openly gathering them to their bosoms, asthough they belonged there. And so cordial too to him, approaching himin spite of his withdrawals, conveying to him somehow, his disagreeableimpression had been, that he and they perfectly understood each other. Then Mrs. Bilton; was she going to give trouble? It looked like it. Itlooked amazingly like it. Was she after all just another edition of hismother, and unable to discriminate between Germans and Germans, betweenthe real thing and mere technicalities like the Twinklers? It is true hehadn't told her the twins were German, but then neither had he told herthey weren't. He had been passive. In Mrs. Bilton's presence passivitycame instinctively. Anything else involved such extreme and unusualexertion. He had never had the least objection to her discovering theirnationality for herself, and indeed had been surprised she hadn't doneso long ago, for he felt sure she would quickly begin to love the Annas, and once she loved them she wouldn't mind what their father had happenedto be. He had supposed she did love them. How affectionately she hadkissed them that very afternoon and wished them luck. Was all thatnothing? Was lovableness nothing, and complete innocence, after all inthe matter of being born, when weighed against the one fact of the von?What he would do if Mrs. Bilton left him he couldn't imagine. What wouldhappen to The Open Arms and the twins in such a case, his worried brainsimply couldn't conceive. 

Out of the corner of his eye every time he passed the open door on tothe verandah he could see the two Annas standing motionless on its edge, their up-turned faces, as they gazed at the stars, white in themoonlight and very serious. Pathetic children. Pathetic, solitary, alienchildren. What were they thinking of? He wouldn't mind betting it wastheir mother. 

Mr. Twist's heart gave a kind of tug at him. His sentimental, maternalside heaved to the top. A great impulse to hurry out and put his armsround them seized him, but he frowned and overcame it. He didn't want togo soft now. Nor was this the moment, his nicely brought up soul toldhim, his soul still echoing with the voice of Clark, to put his armsround them--this, the very first occasion on which Mrs. Bilton had leftthem alone with him. Whether it would become proper on the very secondoccasion was one of those questions that would instantly have suggesteditself to the Annas themselves, but didn't occur to Mr. Twist. He merelywent on to think of another reason against it, which was the chance ofMrs. Bilton's looking out of her window just as he did it. She might, hefelt, easily misjudge the situation, and the situation, he felt, wasdifficult enough already. So he restrained himself; and the Annascontinued to consider infinite space and to perceive, again with thatfeeling of dank and unsatisfactory consolation, that nothing reallymattered. 

Next day immediately after breakfast Mrs. Bilton followed him into hisoffice and gave notice. She called it formally tendering herresignation. She said that all her life she had been an upholder ofstraight dealing, as much in herself towards others as in others towardsherself--

"Mrs. Bilton--" interrupted Mr. Twist, only it didn't interrupt. 

She had also all her life been intensely patriotic, and Mr. Twist, shefeared, didn't look at patriotism with quite her single eye--

"Mrs. Bilton--"

As her eye saw it, patriotism was among other things a determination toresist the encroachments of foreigners--

"Mrs. Bilton--"

She had no wish to judge him, but she had still less wish to be mixed upwith foreigners, and foreigners for her at that moment meant Germans--

"Mrs. Bilton--"

She regretted, but psychically she would never be able to flourish in asoil so largely composed, as the soil of The Open Arms appeared to be, of that nationality--

"Mrs. Bilton--"

And though it was none of her business, still she must say it did seemto her a pity that Mr. Twist with his well-known and respected Americanname should be mixed up--

"Mrs. Bilton--"

And though she had no wish to be inquisitive, still she must say it didseem to her peculiar that Mr. Twist should be the guardian of two girlswho, it was clear from what she had overheard that afternoon, wereGerman--

Here Mr. Twist raised his voice and shouted. "Mrs. Bilton, " he shouted, so loud that she couldn't but stop, "if you'll guarantee to keep quietfor just five minutes--sit down right here at this table and not say onesingle thing, not one single thing for just five minutes, " he said, banging the table, "I'll tell you all about it. Oh yes, I'll accept yourresignation at the end of that time if you're still set on leaving, butjust for this once it's me that's going to do the talking. "

And this must be imagined as said so loud that only capital letterswould properly represent the noise Mr. Twist made. 

Mrs. Bilton did sit down, her face flushed by the knowledge of how goodher intentions had been when she took the post, and how deceitful--shewas forced to think it--Mr. Twist's were when he offered it. She wasprepared, however, to give him a hearing. It was only fair. But Mr. Twist had to burst into capitals several times before he had done, sodifficult was it for Mrs. Bilton, even when she had agreed, even whenshe herself wished, not to say anything. 

It wasn't five minutes but twenty before Mrs. Bilton came out of theoffice again. She went straight into the garden, where the Annas, awareof the interview going on with Mr. Twist, had been lingering anxiously, unable at so crucial a moment to settle to anything, and with solemnitykissed them. Her eyes were very bright. Her face, ordinarily colourlessas parchment, was red. Positively she kissed them without saying asingle word; and they kissed her back with such enthusiasm, with arelief that made them hug her so tight and cling to her so close, thatthe brightness in her eyes brimmed over and she had to get out herhandkerchief and wipe it away. 

"Gurls, " said Mrs. Bilton, "I had a shock yesterday, but I'm throughwith it. You're motherless. I'm daughterless. We'll weld. "

And with this unusual brevity did Mrs. Bilton sum up the situation. 

She was much moved. Her heart was touched; and once that happenednothing could exceed her capacity for sticking through what she calledthick and thin to her guns. For years Mr. Bilton had occupied theposition of the guns; now it would be these poor orphans. No Germanscould frighten her away, once she knew their story; no harsh judgmentsand misconceptions of her patriotic friends. Mr. Twist had told hereverything, from the beginning on the _St. Luke_, harking back to UncleArthur and the attitude of England, describing what he knew of theirmother and her death, not even concealing the part his own mother hadplayed or that he wasn't their guardian at all. He made the most of Mrs. Bilton's silence; and as she listened her heart melted within her, andthe immense store of grit which was her peculiar pride came to the topand once and for all overwhelmed her prejudices. But she couldn't think, and at last she burst out and told Mr. Twist she couldn't think, why hehadn't imparted all this to her long ago. 

"Ah, " murmured Mr. Twist, bowing his head as a reed in the wind beforethe outburst of her released volubility. 

Hope once more filled The Open Arms, and the Twist party looked forwardto the afternoon with renewed cheerfulness. It had just happened so thefirst day, that only Germans came. It was just accident. Mr. Twist, withthe very large part of him that wasn't his head, found himself feelinglike this too and declining to take any notice of his intelligence, which continued to try to worry him. 

Yet the hope they all felt was not realized, and the second afternoonwas almost exactly like the first. Germans came and clustered round theAnnas, and made friendly though cautious advances to Mr. Twist. The oneswho had been there the first day came again and brought others with themworse than themselves, and they seemed more at home than ever, and theair was full of rolling r's--among them, Mr. Twist was unable to deny, being the r's of his blessed Annas. But theirs were such little r's, hetold himself. They rolled, it is true, but with how sweet a rolling. While as for these other people--confound it all, the place might reallyhave been, from the sounds that were filling it, a _Conditorei_ Unterden Linden. 

All his doubts and anxieties flocked back on him as time passed and noAmericans appeared. Americans. How precious. How clean, and straight, and admirable. Actually he had sometimes, he remembered, thought theyweren't. What an aberration. Actually he had been, he remembered, impatient with them when first he came back from France. What folly. Americans. The very word was refreshing, was like clear water on athirsty day. One American, even one, coming in that afternoon would haveseemed to Mr. Twist a godsend, a purifier, an emollient--like someblessed unction dropped from above. 

But none appeared; not even Mr. Ridding. 

At six o'clock it was quite dark, and obviously too late to go onhoping. The days in California end abruptly. The sun goes down, andclose on its heels comes night. In the tea-room the charmingly shadedlights had been turned on some time, and Mr. Twist, watching from thepartly open door of his office, waited impatiently for the guests tobegin to thin out. But they didn't. They took no notice of the signalsof lateness, the lights turned on, the stars outside growing bright inthe surrounding blackness. 

Mr. Twist watched angrily. He had been driven into his office by thedisconcerting and incomprehensible overtures of Mr. Wangelbecker, andhad sat there watching in growing exasperation ever since. When sixstruck and nobody showed the least sign of going away he could bear itno longer, and touched the little muffled electric bell that connectedhim to Mrs. Bilton in what Anna-Felicitas called a mystical union--AnnaII. Was really excessively tactless; she had said this to Mrs. Bilton inhis presence, and then enlarged on unions, mystical and otherwise, withan embarrassing abundance of imagery--by buzzing gently against her kneefrom the leg of the desk. 

She laid down her pen, as though she had just finished adding up acolumn, and went to him. 

"Now don't talk, " said Mr. Twist, putting up an irritable hand directlyshe came in. 

Mrs. Bilton looked at him in much surprise. "Talk, Mr. Twist?" sherepeated. "Why now, as though--"

"Don't _talk_ I say, Mrs. Bilton, but listen. Listen now. I can't standseeing those children in there. It sheer makes my gorge rise. I want youto fetch them in here--now don't talk--you and me'll do the confoundedwaiting--no, no, don't talk--they're to stay quiet in here till the lastof those Germans have gone. Just go and fetch them, please Mrs. Bilton. No, no, we'll talk afterwards. I'll stay here till they come. " And heurged her out into the tea-room again. 

The guests had finished their tea long ago, but still sat on, for theywere very comfortable. Obviously they were thoroughly enjoyingthemselves, and all were growing, as time passed, more manifestly athome. They were now having a kind of supper of ices and fruit-salads. Five dollars, thought the sensible Germans, was after all a great dealto pay for afternoon tea, however good the cause might be and howeverimportant one's own ulterior motives; and since one had in any case topay, one should eat what one could. So they kept the Annas very busy. There seemed to be no end, thought the Annas as they ran hither andthither, to what a German will hold. 

Mrs. Bilton waylaid the heated and harried Anna-Rose as she was carryinga tray of ices to a party she felt she had been carrying ices toinnumerable times already. The little curls beneath her cap clung damplyto her forehead. Her face was flushed and distressed. What with havingto carry so many trays, and remember so many orders, and try at the sametime to escape from the orderers and their questions and admiration, she was in a condition not very far from tears. 

Mrs. Bilton took the tray out of her hands, and told her Mr. Twistwanted to speak to her; and Anna-Rose was in such a general bewildermentthat she felt quite scared, and thought he must be going to scold her. She went towards the office reluctantly. If Mr. Twist were to be severe, she was sure she wouldn't be able not to cry. She made her way veryslowly to the office, and Mrs. Bilton looked round the room for theother one. There was no sign of her. Perhaps, thought Mrs. Bilton, shewas fetching something in the kitchen, and would appear in a minute; andseeing a group over by the entrance door, for whom the tray she held wasevidently destined, gesticulating to her, she felt she had better keepthem quiet first and then go and look for Anna-Felicitas. 

Mrs. Bilton set her teeth and plunged into her strange new duties. Neverwould she have dreamed it possible that she should have to carry traysto Germans. If Mr. Bilton could see her now he would certainly turn inhis grave. Well, she was a woman of grit, of adhesiveness to her guns;if Mr. Bilton did see her and did turn in his grave, let him; he would, she dared say, be more comfortable on his other side after all theseyears. 

For the next few minutes she hurried hither and thither, and waitedsingle-handed. She seemed to be swallowed up in activity. No wonder thatchild had looked so hot and bewildered. Mr. Twist didn't come and help, as he had promised, and nowhere was there any sign of Anna-Felicitas;and the guests not only wanted things to eat, they wanted to talk, --talkand ask questions. Well, she would wait on them, but she wouldn't talk. She turned a dry, parchment-like face to their conversationalblandishments, and responded only by adding up their bills. Wonderfulare the workings of patriotism. For the first time in her life, Mrs. Bilton was grumbled at for not talking. 

CHAPTER XXXIII

In the office Anna-Rose found Mr. Twist walking up and down. 

"See here, " he said, turning on her when she came in, "I'm about tiredof looking on at all this twittering round that lot in there. You'rethrough with that for to-day, and maybe for to-morrow and the day afteras well. "

He waved his arm at the deep chair that had been provided for hisbusiness meditations. "You'll sit down in that chair now, " he saidseverely, "and stay put. "

Anna-Rose looked at him with a quivering lip. She went rather unsteadilyto the chair and tumbled into it. "I don't know if you're angry or beingkind, " she said tremulously, "but whichever it is I--I wish youwouldn't. I--I wish you'd manage to be something that isn't either. "And, as she had feared, she began to cry. 

"Anna-Rose, " said Mr. Twist, staring down at her in concern mixed withirritation--out there all those Germans, in here the weeping child; whata day he was having--"for heaven's sake don't do that. "

"I know, " sobbed Anna-Rose. "I don't want to. It's awful being sonatu--natu--naturally liquid. "

"But what's the matter?" asked Mr. Twist helplessly. 

"Nothing, " sobbed Anna-Rose. 

He stood over her in silence for a minute, his hands in his pockets. Ifhe took them out he was afraid he might start stroking her, and sheseemed to him to be exactly between the ages when such a form of comfortwould be legitimate. If she were younger . . . But she was a great girlnow; if she were older . . . Ah, if she were older, Mr. Twist couldimagine. . . . 

"You're overtired, " he said aloofly. "That's what you are. "

"No, " sobbed Anna-Rose. 

"And the Germans have been too much for you. "

"They haven't, " sobbed Anna-Rose, her pride up at the suggestion thatanybody could ever be that. 

"But they're not going to get the chance again, " said Mr. Twist, settinghis teeth as much as they would set, which wasn't, owing to his naturalkindliness, anything particular. "Mrs. Bilton and me--" Then heremembered Anna-Felicitas. "Why doesn't she come?" he asked. 

"Who?" choked Anna-Rose. 

"The other one. Anna II. Columbus. "

"I haven't seen her for ages, " sobbed Anna-Rose, who had been much upsetby Anna-Felicitas's prolonged disappearance and had suspected her, though she couldn't understand it after last night's finishings up, ofsecret unworthy conduct in a corner with ice-cream. 

Mr. Twist went to the door quickly and looked through. "I can't see hereither, " he said. "Confound them--what have they done to her? Worn herout too, I daresay. I shouldn't wonder if she'd crawled off somewhereand were crying too. "

"Anna-F. --doesn't crawl, " sobbed Anna-Rose, "and she--doesn't cry but--Iwish you'd find--her. "

"Well, will you stay where you are while I'm away, then?" he said, looking at her from the door uncertainly. 

And she seemed so extra small over there in the enormous chair, andsomehow so extra motherless as she obediently gurgled and choked apromise not to move, that he found himself unable to resist going backto her for a minute in order to pat her head. "There, there, " said Mr. Twist, very gently patting her head, his heart yearning over her; and ityearned the more that, the minute he patted, her sobs got worse; andalso the more because of the feel of her dear little head. 

"You little bit of blessedness, " murmured Mr. Twist before he knew whathe was saying; at which her sobs grew louder than ever, --grew, indeed, almost into small howls, so long was it since anybody had said thingslike that to her. It was her mother who used to say things like that;things almost exactly like that. 

"Hush, " said Mr. Twist in much distress, and with one anxious eye on thehalf-open door, for Anna-Rose's sobs were threatening to outdo the noiseof teacups and ice-cream plates, "hush, hush--here's a cleanhandkerchief--you just wipe up your eyes while I fetch Anna II. She'llworry, you know, if she sees you like this, --hush now, hush--there, there--and I expect she's being miserable enough already, hiding away insome corner. You wouldn't like to make her more miserable, would you--"

And he pressed the handkerchief into Anna-Rose's hands, and feeling muchflurried went away to search for the other one who was somewhere, he wassure, in a state of equal distress. 

He hadn't however to search. He found her immediately. As he came out ofthe door of his office into the tea-room he saw her come into thetea-room from the door of the verandah, and proceed across it towardsthe pantry. Why the verandah? wondered Mr. Twist. He hurried tointercept her. Anyhow she wasn't either about to cry or getting overhaving done it. He saw that at once with relief. Nor was she, it wouldseem, in any sort of distress. On the contrary, Anna-Felicitas lookedparticularly smug. He saw that once too, with surprise, --why smug?wondered Mr. Twist. She had a pleased look of complete satisfaction onher face. She was oblivious, he noticed, as she passed between thetables, of the guests who tried in vain to attract her attention anddetain her with orders. She wasn't at all hot, as Anna-Rose had been, nor rattled, nor in any way discomposed; she was just smug. And also shewas unusually, extraordinarily pretty. How dared they all stare up ather like that as she passed? And try to stop her. And want to talk toher. And Wangelbecker actually laying his hand--no, his paw; in hisannoyance Mr. Twist wouldn't admit that the object at the end of Mr. Wangelbecker's arm was anything but a paw--on her wrist to get her tolisten to some confounded order or other. She took no notice of thateither, but walked on towards the pantry. Placidly. Steadily. Obvious. Smug. 

"You're to come into the office, " said Mr. Twist when he reached her. 

She turned her head and considered him with abstracted eyes. Then sheappeared to remember him. "Oh, it's you, " she said amiably. 

"Yes. It's me all right. And you're to come into the office. "

"I can't. I'm busy. "

"Now Anna II. , " said Mr. Twist, walking beside her towards the pantrysince she didn't stop but continued steadily on her way, "that'strifling with the facts. You've been in the garden. I saw you come in. Perhaps you'll tell me the exact line of business you've been engagedin. "

"Waiting, " said Anna-Felicitas placidly. 

"Waiting? In the garden? Where it's pitch dark, and there's nobody towait on?"

They had reached the pantry, and Anna-Felicitas gave an order to Li Koothrough the serving window before answering; the order was tea and hotcinnamon toast for one. 

"He's having his tea on the verandah, " she said, picking out the mostdelicious of the little cakes from the trays standing ready, andcarefully arranging them on a dish. "It isn't pitch dark at all there. There's floods of light coming through the windows. He won't come in. "

"And why pray won't he come in?" asked Mr. Twist. 

"Because he doesn't like Germans. "

"And who pray is he?"

"I don't know. "

"Well I do, " burst out Mr. Twist. "It's old Ridding, of course. His nameis Ridding. The old man who was here yesterday. Now listen: I won'thave--"

But Anna-Felicitas was laughing, and her eyes had disappeared into twofunny little screwed-up eyelashy slits. 

Mr. Twist stopped abruptly and glared at her. These Twinklers. That onein there shaken with sobs, this one in here shaken with what she wouldno doubt call quite the contrary. His conviction became suddenly finalthat the office was the place for both the Annas. He and Mrs. Biltonwould do the waiting. 

"I'll take this, " he said, laying hold of the dish of cakes. "I'll sendMrs. Bilton for the tea. Go into the office, Anna-Felicitas. Your sisteris there and wants you badly. I don't know, " he added, as Li Koo pushedthe tea-tray through the serving window, "how it strikes you aboutlaughter, but it strikes me as sheer silly to laugh except atsomething. "

"Well, I was, " said Anna-Felicitas, unscrewing her eyes and with gentlefirmness taking the plate of cakes from him and putting it on the tray. "I was laughing at your swift conviction that the man out there is Mr. Ridding. I don't know who he is but I know heaps of people he isn't, andone of the principal ones is Mr. Ridding. "

"I'm going to wait on him, " said Mr. Twist, taking the tray. 

"It would be most unsuitable, " said Anna-Felicitas, taking it too. 

"Let go, " said Mr. Twist, pulling. 

"Is this to be an unseemly wrangle?" inquired Anna-Felicitas mildly; andher eyes began to screw up again. 

"If you'll oblige me by going into the office, " he said, having got thetray, for Anna-Felicitas was never one to struggle, "Mrs. Bilton and mewill do the rest of the waiting for to-day. "

He went out grasping the tray, and made for the verandah. His appearancein this new rôle was greeted by the Germans with subduedapplause--subdued, because they felt Mr. Twist wasn't quite as cordialto them as they had supposed he would be, and they were accordinglybeing a little more cautious in their methods with him than they hadbeen at the beginning of the afternoon. He took no notice of them, except that his ears turned red when he knocked against a chair and thetray nearly fell out of his hands and they all cried out _Houp là_. Damn them, thought Mr. Twist. _Houp là_ indeed. 

In the farthest corner of the otherwise empty and very chilly verandah, sitting alone and staring out at the stars, was a man. He was a youngman. He was also an attractive young man, with a thin brown face andvery bright blue twinkling eyes. The light from the window behind himshone on him as he turned his head when he heard the swing doors open, and Mr. Twist saw these things distinctly and at once. He also saw howthe young man's face fell on his, Mr. Twist's, appearance with the tray, and he also saw with some surprise how before he had reached him itsuddenly cleared again. And the young man got up too, just as Mr. Twistarrived at the table--got up with some little difficulty, for he had tolean hard on a thick stick, but yet obviously with _empressement. _

"You've forgotten the sugar, " said Anna-Felicitas's gentle voice behindMr. Twist as he was putting down the tray; and there she was, sureenough, looking smugger than ever. 

"This is Mr. Twist, " said Anna-Felicitas with an amiable gesture. "ThatI was telling you about, " she explained to the young man. 

"When?" asked Mr. Twist, surprised. 

"Before, " said Anna-Felicitas. "We were talking for some time before Iwent in to order the tea, weren't we?" she said to the young man, angelically smiling at him. 

"Rather, " he said; and since he didn't on this introduction remark toMr. Twist that he was pleased to meet him, it was plain he couldn't bean American. Therefore he must be English. Unless, suddenly suspectedMr. Twist who had Germans badly on his nerves that day and was ready tosuspect anything, he was German cleverly got up for evil purposes toappear English. But the young man dispersed these suspicions by sayingthat he was over from England on six months' leave, and that his namewas Elliott. 

"Like us, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

The young man looked at her with what would have been a greater interestthan ever if a greater interest had been possible, only it wasn't. 

"What, are you an Elliott too?" he asked eagerly. 

Anna-Felicitas shook her head. "On the contrary, " she said, "I'm aTwinkler. And so is my sister. What I meant was, you're like us aboutcoming from England. We've done that. Only our leave is for ever andever. Or the duration of the war. "

Mr. Twist waved her aside. "Anna-Felicitas, " he said, "your sister iswaiting for you in the office and wants you badly. I'll see to Mr. Elliott. "

"Why not bring your sister here?" said the young man, who, being in thenavy, was fertile in resourcefulness. And he smiled at Anna-Felicitas, who smiled back; indeed, they did nothing but smile at each other. 

"I think that's a brilliant idea, " she said; and turned to Mr. Twist. "You go, " she said gently, thereby proving herself, the young manconsidered, at least his equal in resourcefulness. "It's much morelikely, " she continued, as Mr. Twist gazed at her without moving, "thatshe'll come for you than for me. My sister, " she explained to the youngman, "is older than I am. "

"Then certainly I should say Mr. Twist is more likely--"

"But only about twenty minutes older. "

"What? A twin? I say, how extraordinarily jolly. Two of you?"

"Anna-Felicitas, " interrupted Mr. Twist, "you will go to your sisterimmediately. She needs you. She's upset. I don't wish to draw Mr. Elliott behind the scenes of family life, but as nothing seems to getyou into the office you force me to tell you that she is very, muchupset indeed, and is crying. "

"Crying?" echoed Anna-Felicitas. "Christopher?" And she turned anddeparted in such haste that the young man, who luckily was alert as wellas resourceful, had only just time to lean over and grab at a chair inher way and pull it aside, and so avert a deplorable catastrophe. 

"I hope it's nothing serious?" he inquired of Mr. Twist. 

"Oh no. Children will cry. "

"Children?"

Mr. Twist sat down at the table and lit a cigarette. "Tell me aboutEngland, " he said. "You've been wounded, I see. "

"Leg, " said the young man, still standing leaning on his stick andlooking after Anna-Felicitas. 

"But that didn't get you six months' leave. "

"Lungs, " said the young man, looking down impatiently at Mr. Twist. 

Then the swing doors swung to, and he sat down and poured out his tea. 

He had been in the battle of Jutland, and was rescued after hours in thewater. For months he was struggling to recover, but finally tuberculosishad developed and he was sent to California, to his sister who hadmarried an American and lived in the neighbourhood of Acapulco. This Mr. Twist extracted out of him by diligent questioning. He had to questionvery diligently. What the young man wanted to talk about wasAnna-Felicitas; but every time he tried to, Mr. Twist headed him off. 

And she didn't come back. He waited and waited, and drank and drank. When the teapot was empty he started on the hot water. Also he ate allthe cakes, more and more deliberately, eking them out at last withslowly smoked cigarettes. He heard all about France and Mr. Twist'sactivities there; he had time to listen to the whole story of theambulance from start to finish; and still she didn't come back. In vainhe tried at least to get Mr. Twist off those distant fields, nearerhome--to the point, in fact, where the Twinklers were. Mr. Twistwouldn't budge. He stuck firmly. And the swing doors remained shut. Andthe cakes were all eaten. And there was nothing for it at last but togo. 

So after half-an-hour of solid sitting he began slowly to get up, stillspreading out the moments, with one eye on the swing doors. It was bothlate and cold. The Germans had departed, and Li Koo had lit the usualevening wood fire in the big fireplace. It blazed most beautifully, andthe young man looked at it through the window and hesitated. 

"How jolly, " he said. 

"Firelight is very pleasant, " agreed Mr. Twist, who had got up too. 

"I oughtn't to have stayed so long out here, " said the young man with alittle shiver. 

"I was thinking it was unwise, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Perhaps I'd better go in and warm myself a bit before leaving. "

"I should say your best plan is to get back quickly to your sister andhave a hot bath before dinner, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Yes. But I think I might just go in there and have a cup of hot coffeefirst. "

"There is no hot coffee at this hour, " said Mr. Twist, looking at hiswatch. "We close at half-past six, and it is now ten minutes after. "

"Then there seems nothing for it but to pay my bill and go, " said theyoung man, with an air of cheerful adaptation to what couldn't behelped. "I'll just nip in there and do that. "

"Luckily there's no need for you to nip anywhere, " said Mr. Twist, "forsurely that's a type of movement unsuited to your sick leg. You can payme right here. "

And he took the young man's five dollars, and went with him as far asthe green gate, and would have helped him into the waiting car, seeinghis leg wasn't as other legs and Mr. Twist was, after all, humane, butthe chauffeur was there to do that; so he just watched from the gatetill the car had actually started, and then went back to the house. 

He went back slowly, perturbed and anxious, his eyes on the ground. Thissecond day had been worse than the first. And besides the continued andremarkable absence of Americans and the continued and remarkablepresence of Germans, there was a slipperiness suddenly developed in theAnnas. He felt insecure; as though he didn't understand, and hadn't gothold. They seemed to him very like eels. And this Elliott--what did hethink _he_ was after, anyway?

For the second time that afternoon Mr. Twist set his teeth. He defiedElliott. He defied the Germans. He would see this thing successful, thisOpen Arms business, or his name wasn't Twist. And he stuck out hisjaw--or would have stuck it out if he hadn't been prevented by theamiable weakness of that feature. But spiritually and morally, when hegot back into the house he was all jaw. 

CHAPTER XXXIV

That night he determined he would go into Acapulco next morning and dropin at his bank and at his lawyer's and other places, and see if he couldpick up anything that would explain why Americans wouldn't come and havetea at The Open Arms. He even thought he might look up old Ridding. Hedidn't sleep. He lay all night thinking. 

The evening had been spent _tête-à-tête_ with Anna-Felicitas. Anna-Rosewas in bed, sleeping off her tears; Mrs. Bilton had another headache, and disappeared early; so he was left with Anna-Felicitas, who slouchedabout abstractedly eating up the remains of ice-cream. She didn't talk, except once to remark a little pensively that her inside was dreadfullyfull of cold stuff, and that she knew now what it must feel like to be amausoleum; but, eyeing her sideways as he sat before the fire, Mr. Twistcould see that she was still smug. He didn't talk either. He felt he hadnothing at present to say to Anna-Felicitas that would serve a usefulpurpose, and was, besides, reluctant to hear any counter-observationsshe might make. Watchfulness was what was required. Silent watchfulness. And wariness. And firmness. In fact all the things that were mostforeign to his nature, thought Mr. Twist, resentful and fatigued. 

Next morning he had a cup of coffee in his room, brought by Li Koo, andthen drove himself into Acapulco in his Ford without seeing the others. It was another of the perfect days which he was now beginning to takeas a matter of course, so many had there been since his arrival. Peopletalked of the wet days and of their desolate abundance once theystarted, but there had been as yet no sign of them. The morningssucceeded each other, radiant and calm. November was merging intoDecember in placid loveliness. "Oh yes, " said Mr. Twist to himselfsardonically, as he drove down the sun-flecked lane in the graciouslight, and crickets chirped at him, and warm scents drifted across hisface, and the flowers in the grass, standing so bright and unruffledthat they seemed almost as profoundly pleased as Anna-Felicitas, noddedat him, and everything was obviously perfectly contented and happy, "Ohyes--I daresay. " And he repeated this remark several times as he lookedround him, --he couldn't but look, it was all so beautiful. These thingshadn't to deal with Twinklers. No wonder they could be calm and bright. So could he, if--

He turned a corner in the lane and saw some way down it two figures, aman and a girl, sitting in the grass by the wayside. Lovers, of course. "Oh yes--I daresay, " said Mr. Twist again, grimly. They hadn't to dealwith Twinklers either. No wonder they could sit happily in the grass. Socould he, if--

At the noise of the approaching car, with the smile of the last thingthey had been saying still on their faces, the two turned their heads, and it was that man Elliott and Anna-Felicitas. 

"Hello, " called out Mr. Twist, putting on the brakes so hard that theFord skidded sideways along the road towards them. 

"Hello, " said the young man cheerfully, waving his stick. 

"Hello, " said Anna-Felicitas mildly, watching his sidelong approachwith complacent interest. 

She had no hat on, and had evidently escaped from Mrs. Bilton just asshe was. Escaped, however, was far too violent a word Mr. Twist felt;sauntered from Mrs. Bilton better described her effect of natural andcomfortable arrival at the place where she was. 

"I didn't know you were here, " said Mr. Twist addressing her when thecar had stopped. He felt it was a lame remark. He had torrents of thingshe wanted to say, and this was all that came out. 

Anna-Felicitas considered it placidly for a moment, and came to theconclusion that it wasn't worth answering, so she didn't. 

"Going into the town?" inquired Elliott pleasantly. 

"Yes. I'll give you a lift. "

"No thanks. I've just come from there. "

"I see. Then _you'd_ better come with me, " said Mr. Twist toAnna-Felicitas. 

"I'm afraid I can't. I'm rather busy this morning. "

"Really, " said Mr. Twist, in a voice of concentrated sarcasm. But it hadno effect on Anna-Felicitas. She continued to contemplate him withperfect goodwill. 

He hesitated a moment. What could he do? Nothing, that he could see, before the young man; nothing that wouldn't make him ridiculous. He felta fool already. He oughtn't to have pulled up. He ought to have justwaved to them and gone on his way, and afterwards in the seclusion ofhis office issued very plain directions to Anna-Felicitas as to herfuture conduct. Sitting by the roadside like that! Openly; beforeeverybody; with a young man she had never seen twenty-four hours ago. 

He jammed in the gear and let the clutch out with such a jerk that thecar leaped forward. Elliott waved his stick again. Mr. Twist respondedby the briefest touch of his cap, and whirred down the road out ofsight. 

"Does he mind your sitting here?" asked Elliott. 

"It would be very unreasonable, " said Anna-Felicitas gently. "One has tosit somewhere. "

And he laughed with delight at this answer as he laughed with delight ateverything she said, and he told her for the twentieth time that she wasthe most wonderful person he had ever met, and she settled down tolisten again, after the interruption caused by Mr. Twist, with a readyear and the utmost complacency to these agreeable statements, and beganto wonder whether perhaps after all she mightn't at last be about tofall in love. 

In the new interest of this possibility she turned her head to look athim, and he told her tumultuously--for being a sailor-man he wentstraight ahead on great waves when it came to love-making--that her eyeswere as if pansies had married stars. 

She turned her head away again at this, for though it sounded lovely itmade her feel a little shy and unprovided with an answer; and then hesaid, again tumultuously, that her ear was the most perfect thing everstuck on a girl's cheek, and would she mind turning her face to him sothat he might see if she had another just like it on the other side. 

She blushed at this, because she couldn't remember whether she hadwashed it lately or not--one so easily forgot one's ears; there were somany different things to wash--and he told her that when she blushed itwas like the first wild rose of the first summer morning of the world. 

At this Anna-Felicitas was quite overcome, and subsided into acondition of blissful, quiescent waiting for whatever might come next. Fancy her face reminding him of all those nice things. She had seen itevery day for years and years in the looking-glass, and not noticedanything particular about it. It had seemed to her just a face. Something you saw out of, and ate with, and had to clean whatever elseyou didn't when you were late for breakfast, because there it was andcouldn't be hidden, --an object remote indeed from pansies, and stars, and beautiful things like that. 

She would have liked to explain this to the young man, and point outthat she feared his imagination ran ahead of the facts and that perhapswhen his leg was well again he would see things more as they were, butto her surprise when she turned to him to tell him this she found shewas obliged to look away at once again. She couldn't look at him. Fancythat now, thought Anna-Felicitas, attentively gazing at her toes. And hehad such dear eyes; and such a dear, eager sort of face. All the more, then, she reasoned, should her own eyes have dwelt with pleasure on him. But they couldn't. "Dear me, " she murmured, watching her toes ascarefully as if they might at any moment go away and leave her there. 

"I know, " said Elliott. "You think I'm talking fearful flowery stuff. I'd have said Dear me at myself three years ago if I had ever caughtmyself thinking in terms of stars and roses. But it's all the beastlyblood and muck of the war that does it, --sends one back with a rush tothings like that. Makes one shameless. Why, I'd talk to you about Godnow without turning a hair. Nothing would have induced me so much as tomention seriously that I'd even heard of him three years ago. Why, Iwrite poetry now. We all write poetry. And nobody would mind now beingseen saying their prayers. Why, if I were back at school and my mothercame to see me I'd hug her before everybody in the middle of the street. Do you realize what a tremendous change that means, you little girlwho's never had brothers? You extraordinary adorable little lovelything?"

And off he was again. 

"When I was small, " said Anna-Felicitas after a while, still watchingher feet, "I had a governess who urged me to consider, before I saidanything, whether it were the sort of thing I would like to say in thehearing of my parents. Would you like to say what you're saying to me inthe hearing of your parents?"

"Hate to, " said Elliott promptly. 

"Well, then, " said Anna-Felicitas, gentle but disappointed. She ratherwished now she hadn't mentioned it. 

"I'd take you out of earshot, " said Elliott. 

She was much relieved. She had done what she felt might perhaps beregarded by Aunt Alice as her duty as a lady, and could now give herselfup with a calm conscience to hearing whatever else he might have to say. 

And he had an incredible amount to say, and all of it of the most highlygratifying nature. On the whole, looking at it all round and taking onething with another, Anna-Felicitas came to the conclusion that this wasthe most agreeable and profitable morning she had ever spent. She satthere for hours, and they all flew. People passed in cars and saw her, and it didn't disturb her in the least. She perfectly remembered sheought to be helping Anna-Rose pick and arrange the flowers for thetea-tables, and she didn't mind. She knew Anna-Rose would be astonishedand angry at her absence, and it left her unmoved. By midday she washopelessly compromised in the eyes of Acapulco, for the people who hadmotored through the lane told the people who hadn't what they had seen. Once a great car passed with a small widow in it, who looked astonishedwhen she saw the pair but had gone almost before Elliott could call outand wave to her. 

"That's my sister, " he said. "You and she will love each other. "

"Shall we?" said Anna-Felicitas, much pleased by this suggestion ofcontinuity in their relations; and remarked that she looked as if shehadn't got a husband. 

"She hasn't. Poor little thing. Rotten luck. Rotten. I hate people todie now. It seems so infernally unnatural of them, when they're not inthe fighting. He's only been dead a month. And poor old Dellogg was sucha decent chap. She isn't going anywhere yet, or I'd bring her up to teathis afternoon. But it doesn't matter. I'll take you to her. "

"Shall you?" said Anna-Felicitas, again much pleased. Dellogg. The nameswam through her mind and swam out again. She was too busy enjoyingherself to remark it and its coincidences now. 

"Of course. It's the first thing one does. "

"What first thing?"

"To take the divine girl to see one's relations. Once one has found her. Once one has had"--his voice fell to a whisper--"the God-given luck tofind her. " And he laid his hand very gently on hers, which were claspedtogether in her lap. 

This was a situation to which Anna-Felicitas wasn't accustomed, and shedidn't know what to do with it. She looked down at the hand lying onhers, and considered it without moving. Elliott was quite silent now, and she knew he was watching her face. Ought she, perhaps, to be going?Was this, perhaps, one of the moments in life when the truly judiciouswent? But what a pity to go just when everything was so pleasant. Still, it must be nearly lunch-time. What would Aunt Alice do in a similarsituation? Go home to lunch, she was sure. Yet what was lunch when onewas rapidly arriving, as she was sure now that she was, at the conditionof being in love? She must be, or she wouldn't like his hand on hers. And she did like it. 

She looked down at it, and found that she wanted to stroke it. But wouldAunt Alice stroke it? No; Anna-Felicitas felt fairly clear about that. Aunt Alice wouldn't stroke it; she would take it up, and shake it, andsay good-bye, and walk off home to lunch like a lady. Well, perhaps sheought to do that. Christopher would probably think so too. But what apity. . . . Still, behaviour was behaviour; ladies were ladies. 

She drew out her right hand with this polite intention, andinstead--Anna-Felicitas never knew how it happened--she did nothing ofthe sort, but quite the contrary: she put it softly on the top of his. 

CHAPTER XXXV

Meanwhile Mr. Twist had driven on towards Acapulco in a state of painfulindecision. Should he or shouldn't he take a turning he knew of a coupleof miles farther that led up an unused and practically undrivable trackback by the west side to The Open Arms, and instruct Mrs. Bilton toproceed at once down the lane and salvage Anna-Felicitas? Should he orshouldn't he? For the first mile he decided he would; then, as his angercooled, he began to think that after all he needn't worry much. TheAnnas were lucidly too young for serious philandering, and even if thatElliott didn't realize this, owing to Anna-Felicitas's great length, hecouldn't do much before he, Mr. Twist, was back again along the lane. Inthis he under-estimated the enterprise of the British Navy, but itserved to calm him; so that when he did reach the turning he had made uphis mind to continue on his way to Acapulco. 

There he spent some perplexing and harassing hours. 

At the bank his reception was distinctly chilly. He wasn't used, sincehis teapot had been on the market, to anything but warmth when he wentinto a bank. On this occasion even the clerks were cold; and when afterdifficulty--actual difficulty--he succeeded in seeing the manager, hecouldn't but perceive his unusual reserve. He then remembered what hehad put down to mere accident at the time, that as he drove up MainStreet half an hour before, all the people he knew had been looking theother way. 

From the bank, where he picked up nothing in the way of explanation ofthe American avoidance of The Open Arms, the manager going dumb at itsmere mention, he went to the solicitors who had arranged the sale of theinn, and again in the street people he knew looked the other way. Thesolicitor, it appeared, wouldn't be back till the afternoon, and theclerk, an elderly person hitherto subservient, was curiously short aboutit. 

By this time Mr. Twist was thoroughly uneasy, and he determined to askthe first acquaintance he met what the matter was. But he couldn't findanybody. Every one, his architect, his various experts--those genial andfrolicsome young men--were either engaged or away on business somewhereelse. He set his teeth, and drove to the Cosmopolitan to seek out oldRidding--it wasn't a place he drove to willingly after his recentundignified departure, but he was determined to get to the bottom ofthis thing--and walking into the parlour was instantly aware of a hushfalling upon it, a holding of the breath. 

In the distance he saw old Ridding, --distinctly; and distinctly he sawthat old Ridding saw him. He was sitting at the far end of the greatparlour, facing the entrance, by the side of something vast and blackheaped up in the adjacent chair. He had the look on his pink andnaturally pleasant face of one who has abandoned hope. On seeing Mr. Twist a ray of interest lit him up, and he half rose. The formless massin the next chair which Mr. Twist had taken for inanimate matter, probably cushions and wraps, and now perceived was one of the highermammals, put out a hand and said something, --at least, it opened thatpart of its face which is called a mouth but which to Mr. Twist in theheated and abnormal condition of his brain seemed like the snap-to ofsome great bag, --and at that moment a group of people crossed the hallin front of old Ridding, and when the path was again clear the chairthat had contained him was empty. He had disappeared. Completely. Onlythe higher mammal was left, watching Mr. Twist with heavy eyes like twosmouldering coals. 

He couldn't face those eyes. He did try to, and hesitated while hetried, and then he found he couldn't; so he swerved away to the right, and went out quickly by the side door. 

There was now one other person left who would perhaps clear him up as tothe meaning of all this, and he was the lawyer he had gone to about theguardianship. True he had been angry with him at the time, but that waschiefly because he had been angry with himself. At bottom he had carriedaway an impression of friendliness. To this man he would now go as alast resource before turning back home, and once more he raced up MainStreet in his Ford, producing by these repeated appearances an effect ofagitation and restlessness that wasn't lost on the beholders. 

The lawyer was in his office, and disengaged. After his morning'sexperience Mr. Twist was quite surprised and much relieved by beingadmitted at once. He was received neither coldly nor warmly, but withunmistakable interest. 

"I've come to consult you, " said Mr. Twist. 

The lawyer nodded. He hadn't supposed he had come not to consult him, but he was used to patience with clients, and he well knew theirpreference in conversation for the self-evident. 

"I want a straight answer to a straight question, " said Mr. Twist, hisgreat spectacles glaring anxiously at the lawyer who again nodded. 

"Go on, " he said, as Mr. Twist paused. 

"What I want to know is, " burst out Mr. Twist, "what the hell--"

The lawyer put up a hand. "One moment, Mr. Twist, " he said. "Sorry tointerrupt--"

And he got up quickly, and went to a door in the partition between hisoffice and his clerks' room. 

"You may go out to lunch now, " he said, opening it a crack. 

He then shut it, and came back to his seat at the table. 

"Yes, Mr. Twist?" he said, settling down again. "You were inquiring whatthe hell--?"

"Well, I was about to, " said Mr. Twist, suddenly soothed, "but you're socalm--"

"Of course I'm calm. I'm a quietly married man. "

"I don't see what that's got to do with it. "

"Everything. For some dispositions, everything. Mine is one. Yours isanother. "

"Well, I guess I've not come here to talk about marriage. What I want toknow is why--"

"Quite so, " said the lawyer, as he stopped. "And I can tell you. It'sbecause your inn is suspected of being run in the interests of theGerman Government. "

A deep silence fell upon the room. The lawyer watched Mr. Twist with adetached and highly intelligent interest. Mr. Twist stared at thelawyer, his kind, lavish lips fallen apart. Anger had left him. Thisblow excluded anger. There was only room in him for blank astonishment. 

"You know about my teapot?" he said at last. 

"Try me again, Mr. Twist. "

"It's on every American breakfast table. "

"Including my own. "

"They wouldn't use it if they thought--"

"My dear sir, they're not going to, " said the lawyer. "They'reproposing, among other little plans for conveying the general sentimentto your notice, to boycott the teapot. It is to be put on an unofficialblack list. It is to be banished from the hotels. "

Mr. Twist's stare became frozen. The teapot boycotted? The teapot hismother and sister depended on and The Open Arms depended on, and all hishappiness, and the twins? He saw the rumour surging over America ingreat swift waves, that the proceeds of the Twist Non-Trickler were usedfor Germany. He saw--but what didn't he see in that moment of submergedhorror? Then he seemed to come to the surface again and resume reasonwith a gasp. "Why?" he asked. 

"Why they're wanting to boycott the teapot?"

"No. Why do they think the inn--"

"The Miss Twinklers are German. "

"Half. "

"The half that matters--begging my absent wife's pardon. I know allabout that, you see. You started me off thinking them over by that wardnotion of yours. It didn't take me long. It was pretty transparent. Sotransparent that my opinion of the intelligence of my fellow-townsfolkhas considerably lowered. But we live in unbalanced times. I guess it'swomen at the bottom of this. Women got on to it first, and the otherscaught the idea as they'd catch scarlet fever. It's a kind of scarletfever, this spy scare that's about. Mind you, I admit the germs arecertainly present among us. " And the lawyer smiled. He thought he sawhe had made a little joke in that last remark. 

Mr. Twist was not in the condition to see jokes, and didn't smile. "Doyou mean to say those children--" he began. 

"They're not regarded as children by any one except you. "

"Well, if they're not, " said Mr. Twist, remembering the grass by thewayside in the lane and what he had so recently met in it, "I guess I'dbest be making tracks. But I know better. And so would you if you'd seenthem on the boat. Why, twelve was putting their age too high on thatboat. "

"No doubt. No doubt. Then all I can say is they've matured prettyconsiderably since. Now do you really want me to tell you what is beingbelieved?"

"Of course. It's what I've come for. "

"You mayn't find it precisely exhilarating, Mr. Twist. "

"Go ahead. "

"What Acapulco says--and Los Angeles, I'm told, too, and probably bythis time the whole coast--is that you threw over your widowed mother, of whom you're the only son, and came off here with two German girls whogot hold of you on the boat--now, Mr. Twist, don't interrupt--on theboat crossing from England, that England had turned them out asundesirable aliens--quite so, Mr. Twist, but let me finish--that they'rein the pay of the German Government--no doubt, no doubt, Mr. Twist--andthat you're their cat's-paw. It is known that the inn each afternoon hasbeen crowded with Germans, among them Germans already suspected, I can'tsay how rightly or how wrongly, of spying, and that these people are sofamiliar with the Miss von Twinklers as to warrant the belief in acomplete secret understanding. "

For a moment Mr. Twist continued both his silence and his stare. Then hetook off his spectacles and wiped them. His hand shook. The lawyer wasstartled. Was there going to be emotion? One never knew with that sortof lips. "You're not--" he began. 

Then he saw that Mr. Twist was trying not to laugh. 

"I'm glad you take it that way, " he said, relieved but surprised. 

"It's so darned funny, " said Mr. Twist, endeavouring to compose hisfeatures. "To anybody who knows those twins it's so darned funny. Cat's-paw. Yes--rather feel that myself. Cat's-paw. That does seem a bitof a bull's eye--" And for a second or two his features flatly refusedto compose. 

The lawyer watched him. "Yes, " he said. "Yes. But the effect of thesebeliefs may be awkward. "

"Oh, damned, " agreed Mr. Twist, going solemn again. 

And there came over him in a flood the clear perception of what it wouldmean, --the sheer disaster of it, the horrible situation those helplessAnnas would be in. What a limitless fool he must have been in hisconduct of the whole thing. His absorption in the material side of ithad done the trick. He hadn't been clever enough, not imaginativeenough, nor, failing that, worldly enough to work the other sideproperly. When he found there was no Dellogg he ought to have insistedon seeing Mrs. Dellogg, intrusion or no intrusion, and handing over thetwins; and then gone away and left them. A woman was what was wanted. Fool that he was to suppose that he, a man, an unmarried man, could getthem into anything but a scrape. But he was so fond of them. He justcouldn't leave them. And now here they all were, in this ridiculous andterrible situation. 

"There are two things you can do, " said the lawyer. 

"Two?" said Mr. Twist, looking at him with anxious eyes. "For the lifeof me I can't see even one. Except running amoke in slander actions--"

"Tut, tut, " said the lawyer, waving that aside. "No. There are twocourses to pursue. And they're not alternative, but simultaneous. Youshut down the inn--at once, to-morrow--that's Saturday. Close onSaturday, and give notice you don't re-open--now pray let mefinish--close the inn as an inn, and use it simply as a privateresidence. Then, as quick as may be, marry those girls. "

"Marry what girls?"

"The Miss von Twinklers. "

Mr. Twist stared at him. "Marry them?" he said helplessly. "Marry themwho to?"

"You for one. "

Mr. Twist stared at him in silence. Then he said, "You've said that tome before. "

"Yep. And I'll say it again. I'll go on saying it till you've done it. "

"'Well, if that's all you've got to offer as a suggestion for a wayout--"

But Mr. Twist wasn't angry this time; he was too much battered byevents; he hadn't the spirits to be angry. 

"You've--got to--marry--one--of--those--girls, " said the lawyer, at eachword smiting the table with his open palm. "Turn her into an American. Get her out of this being a German business. And be able at the sametime to protect the one who'll be your sister in-law. Why, even if youdidn't want to, which is sheer nonsense, for of course any man wouldwant to--I know what I'm talking about because I've seen them--it's yourplain duty, having got them into this mess. "

"But--marry which?" asked Mr. Twist, with increased helplessness and yeta manifest profound anxiety for further advice. 

For the first time the lawyer showed impatience "Oh--either or both, " hesaid. "For God's sake don't be such a--"

He pulled up short. 

"I didn't quite mean that, " he resumed, again calm. "The end of thatsentence was, as no doubt you guess, fool. I withdraw it, and willsubstitute something milder. Have you any objection to ninny?"

No, Mr. Twist didn't mind ninny, or any other word the lawyer mightchoose, he was in such a condition of mental groping about. He took outhis handkerchief and wiped away the beads on his forehead and round hismouth. 

"I'm thirty-five, " he said, looking terribly worried. 

Propose to an Anna? The lawyer may have seen them, but he hadn't heardthem; and the probable nature of their comments if Mr. Twist proposed tothem--to one, he meant of course, but both would comment, the one heproposed to and the one he didn't--caused his imagination to reel. Hehadn't much imagination; he knew that now, after his conduct of thiswhole affair, but all there was of it reeled. 

"I'm thirty-five, " he said helplessly. 

"Pooh, " said the lawyer, indicating the negligibleness of this by amovement of his shoulder. 

"They're seventeen, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Pooh, " said the lawyer again, again indicating negligibleness. "Mywife was--"

"I know. You told me that last time. Oh, I know all _that_" said Mr. Twist with sudden passion. "But these are children. I tell you they're_children_--"

"Pooh, " said the lawyer a third time, a third time indicatingnegligibleness. 

Then he got up and held out his hand. "Well, I've told you, " he said. "You wanted to know, and I've told you. And I'll tell you one thingmore, Mr. Twist. Whichever of those girls takes you, you'll have thesweetest, prettiest wife of any man in the world except one, and that'sthe man who has the luck to get the other one. Why, sweetest andprettiest are poor words. She'll be the most delectable, the most--"

Mr. Twist rose from his chair in such haste that he pushed the tablecrooked. His ears flamed. 

"See here, " he said very loud. "I won't have you talk familiarly likethat about my wife. "

CHAPTER XXXVI

Wife. The word had a remarkable effect on him. It churned him all up. His thoughts were a chaotic jumble, and his driving on the way homematched them. He had at least three narrow shaves at cross streetsbefore he got out of the town and for an entire mile afterwards he wason the wrong side of the road. During this period, deep as he was inconfused thought, he couldn't but vaguely notice the anger on the facesof the other drivers and the variety and fury of their gesticulations, and it roused a dim wonder in him. 

Wife. How arid existence had been for him up to then in regard to theaffections, how knobbly the sort of kisses he had received in Clark. They weren't kisses; they were disapproving pecks. Always disapproving. Always as if he hadn't done enough, or been enough, or was suspected ofnot going to do or be enough. 

His wife. Mr. Twist dreadfully longed to kiss somebody, --somebody kindand soft, who would let herself be adored. She needn't even lovehim, --he knew he wasn't the sort of man to set passion alight; she needonly be kind, and a little fond of him, and let him love her, and be hisvery own. 

His own little wife. How sweet. How almost painfully sweet. Yes. But theAnnas. . . . 

When he thought of the Annas, Mr. Twist went damp. He mightpropose--indeed, everything pointed to his simply having got to--butwouldn't they very quickly dispose? And then what? That lawyer seemed tothink all he had to do was to marry them right away; not them, ofcourse, --one; but they were so very plural in his mind. Funny man, thought Mr. Twist; funny man, --yet otherwise so sagacious. It is true heneed only propose to one of them, for which he thanked God, but he couldimagine what that one, and what the other one too, who would be sure tobe somewhere quite near would . . . No, he couldn't imagine; he preferrednot to imagine. 

Mr. Twist's dampness increased, and a passing car got his mud-guard. Itwas a big car which crackled with language as it whizzed on its way, andMr. Twist, slewed by the impact half across the road, then perceived onwhich side he had been driving. 

The lane up to the inn was in its middle-day emptiness and somnolence. Where Anna-Felicitas and Elliott had been sitting cool and shaded whenhe passed before, there was only the pressed-down grass and crushedflowers in a glare of sun. She had gone home long ago of course. Shesaid she was going to be very busy. Secretly he wished she hadn't gonehome, and that little Christopher too might for a bit be somewhere else, so that when he arrived he wouldn't immediately have to face everybodyat once. He wanted to think; he wanted to have time to think; timebefore four o'clock came, and with four o'clock, if he hadn't come toany conclusion about shutting up the inn--and how could he if nobodygave him time to think?--those accursed, swarming Germans. It was theywho had done all this. Mr. Twist blazed into sudden fury. They and theirblasted war. . . . 

At the gate stood Anna-Rose. Her face looked quite pale in the greenshade of the tunnelled-out syringa bushes. She as peering out down thelane watching him approach. This was awful, thought Mr. Twist. At thevery gate one of them. Confronted at once. No time, not a minute's timegiven him to think. 

"Oh, " cried out Anna-Rose the instant he pulled up, for she had waved tohim to stop when he tried to drive straight on round to the stable, "sheisn't with you?"

"Who isn't?" asked Mr. Twist. 

Anna-Rose became paler than ever. "She has been kidnapped, " she said. 

"How's that?" said Mr. Twist, staring at her from the car. 

"Kidnapped, " repeated Anna-Rose, with wide-open horror-stricken eyes;for from her nursery she carried with her at the bottom of her mind, half-forgotten but ready to fly up to the top at any moment of panic, animpression that the chief activities and recreations of all thoseAmericans who weren't really good were two: they lynched, and theykidnapped. They lynched you if they didn't like you enough, and if theyliked you too much they kidnapped you. Anna-Felicitas, exquisite andunsuspecting, had been kidnapped. Some American's concupiscent eye hadalighted on her, observed her beauty, and marked her down. No otherexplanation was possible of a whole morning's absence from duties of oneso conscientious and painstaking as Anna-Felicitas. She never shirked;that is, she never had been base enough to shirk alone. If there was anyshirking to be done they had always done it together. As the hourspassed and she didn't appear, Anna-Rose had tried to persuade herselfthat she must have motored into Acapulco with Mr. Twist, strange andunnatural and reprehensible and ignoble as such arch shirking would havebeen; and now that the car had come back empty except for Mr. Twist shewas convinced the worst had happened--her beautiful, her preciousColumbus had been kidnapped. 

"Kidnapped, " she said again, wringing her hands. 

Mr. Twist was horror-struck too, for he thought she was announcing thekidnapping of Mrs. Bilton. Somehow he didn't think of Anna-Felicitas; hehad seen her too recently. But that Mrs. Bilton should be kidnappedseemed to him to touch the lowest depths of American criminal enterpriseand depravity. At the same time though he recoiled before this freshblow a thought did fan through his mind with a wonderful effect ofcoolness and silence, --"Then they'll gag her, " he said. 

"What?" cried Anna-Rose, as though a whip had lashed her. "Gag her?" Andpulling open the gate and running out to him as one possessed she criedagain, "Gag Columbus?"

"Oh that's it, is it, " said Mr. Twist, with relief but also withdisappointment, "Well, if it's that way I can tell you--"

He stopped; there was no need to tell her; for round the bend of thelane, walking bare-headed in the chequered light and shade as leisurelyas if such things as tours of absence didn't exist, or a distractedhousehold, or an anguished Christopher, with indeed, a complete, anextraordinary serenity, advanced Anna-Felicitas. 

Always placid, her placidity at this moment had a shining quality. Stillsmug, she was now of a glorified smugness. If one could imagine a lilyturned into a god, or a young god turned into a lily and walking downthe middle of a sun-flecked Californian lane, it wouldn't be far out, thought Mr. Twist, as an image of the advancing Twinkler. The god wouldbe so young that he was still a boy, and he wouldn't be worrying muchabout anything in the past or in the future, and he'd just be comingalong like that with the corners of his mouth a little turned up, andhis fair hair a little ruffled, and his charming young face full of asober and abstracted radiance. 

"Not much kidnapping there, I guess, " said Mr. Twist with a jerk of histhumb. "And you take it from me, Anna I. , " he added quickly, leaningover towards her, determined to get off to the garage before he foundhimself faced by both twins together, "that when next your imaginationgets the jumps the best thing you can do is to hold on to it hard tillit settles down again, instead of wasting your time and ruining yourconstitution going pale. "

And he started the Ford with a bound, and got away round the corner intothe yard. 

Here, in the yard, was peace; at least for the moment. The only livingthing in it was a cat the twins had acquired, through the services ofone of the experts, as an indispensable object in a really homey home. The first thing this cat had done had been to eat the canary, which gavethe twins much unacknowledged relief. It was, they thought secretly, quite a good plan to have one's pets inside each other, --it kept them soquiet. She now sat unmoved in the middle of the yard, carefully cleaningher whiskers while Mr. Twist did some difficult fancy driving in orderto get into the stable without inconveniencing her. 

Admirable picture of peace, thought Mr. Twist with a sigh of envy. 

He might have got out and picked her up, but he was glad to manoeuvreabout, reversing and making intricate figures in the dust, because itkept him longer away from the luncheon-table. The cat took no notice ofhim, but continued to deal with her whiskers even when his front wheelwas within two inches of her tail, for though she hadn't been long atThe Open Arms she had already sized up Mr. Twist and was aware that hewouldn't hurt a fly. 

Thanks to her he had a lot of trouble getting the Ford into the stable, all of which he liked because of that luncheon-table; and having got itin he still lingered fiddling about with it, examining its engine andwiping its bonnet; and then when he couldn't do that any longer he wentout and lingered in the yard, looking down at the cat with his hands inhis pockets. "I must think, " he kept on saying to himself. 

"Lunchee, " said Li Koo, putting his head out of the kitchen window. 

"All right, " said Mr. Twist. 

He stooped down as though to examine the cat's ear. The cat, who didn'tlike her ears touched but was prepared to humour him, got out of it bylying down on her back and showing him her beautiful white stomach. Shewas a black cat, with a particularly beautiful white stomach, and shehad discovered that nobody could see it without wanting to stroke it. Whenever she found herself in a situation that threatened to becomedisagreeable she just lay down and showed her stomach. Human beings insimilar predicaments can only show their tact. 

"Nice pussy--nice, nice pussy, " said Mr. Twist aloud, stroking thisirresistible object slowly, and forgetting her ear as she had intendedhe should. 

"Lunchee get cold, " said Li Koo, again putting his head out of thekitchen window. "Mis' Bilton say, Come in. "

"All right, " said Mr. Twist. 

He straightened himself and looked round the yard. A rake that shouldhave been propped up against the tool-shed with some other gardeningtools had fallen down. He crossed over and picked it up and stood it upcarefully again. 

Li Koo watched him impassively from the window. 

"Mis' Bilton come out, " he said; and there she was in the yard door. 

"Mr. Twist, " she called shrilly, "if you don't come in right away andhave your food before it gets all mushed up with cold I guess you'll besorry. "

"All right--coming, " he called back very loud and cheerfully, stridingtowards her as one strides who knows there is nothing for it now butcourage. "All right, Mrs. Bilton--sorry if I've kept you waiting. Youshouldn't have bothered about me--"

And saying things like this in a loud voice, for to hear himself beingloud made him feel more supported, he strode into the house, through thehouse, and out on to the verandah. 

They always lunched on the verandah. The golden coloured awning wasdown, and the place was full of a golden shade. Beyond it blazed thegarden. Beneath it was the flower-adorned table set as usual ready forfour, and he went out to it, strung up to finding the Annas at thetable, Anna-Felicitas in her usual seat with her back to the garden, herlittle fair head outlined against the glowing light as he had seen itevery day since they had lived in the inn, Anna-Rose opposite, probablyvolubly and passionately addressing her. 

And there was no one. 

"Why--" he said, stopping short. 

"Yes. It's real silly of them not to come and eat before everything isspoilt, " said Mrs. Bilton bustling up, who had stayed behind to give anorder to Li Koo. And she went to the edge of the verandah and shaded hereyes and called, "Gurls! Gurls! I guess you can do all that talkingbetter after lunch. "

He then saw that down at the bottom of the garden, in the most privateplace as regards being overheard, partly concealed by some arum liliesthat grew immensely there like splendid weeds, stood the twins facingeach other. 

"Better leave them alone, " he said quickly. "They'll come when they'reready. There's nothing like getting through with one's talking rightaway, Mrs. Bilton. Besides, " he went on still more quickly for sheplainly didn't agree with him and was preparing to sally out into thesun and fetch them in, "you and I don't often get a chance of a quietchat together--"

And this, combined with the resolute way he was holding her chair readyfor her, brought Mrs. Bilton back under the awning again. 

She was flattered. Mr. Twist had not yet spoken to her in quite thattone. He had always been the gentleman, but never yet the eagergentleman. Now he was unmistakably both. 

She came back and sat down, and so with a sigh of thankfulnessimmediately did he, for here was an unexpected respite, --while Mrs. Bilton talked he could think. Fortunately she never noticed if onewasn't listening. For the first time since he had known her he gavehimself up willingly to the great broad stream that at once startedflowing over him, on this occasion with something of the comfort ofwarm water, and he was very glad indeed that anyhow that day she wasn'tgagged. 

While he ate, he kept on furtively looking down the garden at the twofigures facing each other by the arum lilies. Whenever Mrs. Biltonremembered them and wanted to call them in, as she did at the differentstages, of the meal, --at the salad, at the pudding--he stopped her. Shebecame more and more pleased by his evident determination to lunch alonewith her, for after all one remains female to the end, and herconversation took on a gradual tinge of Mr. Bilton's views about secondmarriages. They had been liberal views; for Mr. Bilton, she said, hadhad no post-mortem pettiness about him, but they were lost on Mr. Twist, whose thoughts were so painfully preoccupied by first marriage. 

The conclusions he came to during that trying meal while Mrs. Biltontalked, were that he would propose first to Anna-Rose, she being theeldest and such a course being accordingly natural, and, if she refused, proceed at once to propose to Anna-Felicitas. But before proceeding toAnna-Felicitas, a course he regarded with peculiar misgiving, he wouldvery earnestly explain to Anna-Rose the seriousness of the situation andthe necessity, the urgency, the sanity of her marrying him. Theseproposals would be kept on the cool level of strict business. Everytrace of the affection with which he was so overflowing would be sternlyexcluded. For instance, he wasn't going to let himself remember the feelof Christopher's little head the afternoon before when he patted it tocomfort her. Such remembrances would be bound to bring a warmth into hisremarks which wouldn't be fair. The situation demanded the mostscrupulous fairness and delicacy in its treatment, the most carefulavoidance of taking any advantage of it. But how difficult, thought Mr. Twist, his hand shaking as he poured himself out a glass of iced water, how difficult when he loved the Annas so inconveniently much. 

Mrs. Bilton observed the shaking of his hand, and felt more female thanever. 

Still, there it was, this situation forced upon them all by the war. Nobody could help it, and it had to be faced with calmness, steadfastness and tact. Calmness, steadfastness and tact, repeated Mr. Twist, raising the water to his mouth and spilling some of it. 

Mrs. Bilton observed this too, and felt still more female. 

Marriage was the quickest, and really the only, way out of it. He sawthat now. The lawyer had been quite right. And marriage, he wouldexplain to the Annas, would be a mere formal ceremony which after thewar they--he meant, of course, she--could easily in that land of facileand honourable divorce get rid of. Meanwhile, he would point out, they--she, of course; bother these twins--would be safely American, andhe would undertake never to intrude love on them--her--unless by somewonderful chance, it was wanted. Some wonderful chance . . . Mr. Twist'sspectacles suddenly went dim, and he gulped down more water. 

Yes. That was the line to take: the austere line of self-mortificationfor the Twinkler good. One Twinkler would be his wife--again at the dearword he had to gulp down water--and one his sister-in-law. They wouldjust have to agree to this plan. The position was too serious forshilly-shallying. Yes. That was the line to take; and by the time hehad got to the coffee it was perfectly clear and plain to him. 

But he felt dreadfully damp. He longed for a liqueur, for anything thatwould support him. . . . 

"Is there any brandy in the house?" he suddenly flung across the web ofMrs. Bilton's words. 

"Brandy, Mr. Twist?" she repeated, at this feeling altogether female, for what an unusual thing for him to ask for, --"You're not sick?"

"With my coffee, " murmured Mr. Twist, his mouth very slack, his headdrooping. "It's nice. . . . "

"I'll go and see, " said Mrs. Bilton, getting up briskly and going awayrattling a bunch of keys. 

At once he looked down the garden. Anna-Felicitas was in the act ofputting her arm round Anna-Rose's shoulder, and Anna-Rose waspassionately disengaging herself. Yes. There was trouble there. He knewthere would be. 

He gulped down more water. 

Anna-Felicitas couldn't expect to go off like that for a whole morningand give Anna-Rose a horrible fright without hearing about it. Besides, the expression on her face wanted explaining, --a lot of explaining. Mr. Twist didn't like to think so, but Anna-Felicitas's recent conductseemed to him almost artful. It seemed to him older than her years. Itseemed to justify the lawyer's scepticism when he described the twins tohim as children. That young man Elliott--

But here Mr. Twist started and lost his thread of thought, for lookingonce more down the garden he saw that Anna-Felicitas was coming towardsthe verandah, and that she was alone. Anna-Rose had vanished. Why had hebothered about brandy, and let Mrs. Bilton go? He had counted, somehow, on beginning with Anna-Rose. . . . 

He seized a cigarette and lit it. He tried vainly to keep his handsteady. Before the cigarette was fairly plight there was Anna-Felicitas, walking in beneath the awning. 

"I'm glad you're alone, " she said, "for I want to speak to you. "

And Mr. Twist felt that his hour had come. 

CHAPTER XXXVII

"Hadn't you better have lunch first?" he asked, though he knew from thelook on her face that she wouldn't. It was a very remarkable look. Itwas as though an angel, dwelling in perfect bliss, had unaccountably gotits feet wet. Not more troubled than that; a little troubled, but notmore than that. 

"No thank you, " she said politely. "But if you've finished yours, do youmind coming into the office? Because otherwise Mrs. Bilton--"

"She's fetching me some brandy, " said Mr. Twist. 

"I didn't know you drank, " said Anna-Felicitas, even at this momentinterested. "But do you mind having it afterwards? Because otherwiseMrs. Bilton--"

"I guess the idea was to have it first, " said Mr. Twist. 

She was however already making for the tea-room, proceeding towards itwithout hurry, and with a single-mindedness that would certainly get herthere. 

He could only follow. 

In the office she said, "Do you mind shutting the door?"

"Not at all, " said Mr. Twist; but he did mind. His hour had come, and hewasn't liking it. He wanted to begin with Anna-Rose. He wanted to getthings clear with her first before dealing with this one. There was lessof Anna-Rose. And her dear little head yesterday when he patted it. . . . And she needed comforting. . . . Anna-Rose cried, and let herself becomforted. . . . And it was so sweet to Mr. Twist to comfort. . . . 

"Christopher--" began Anna-Felicitas, directly he had shut the door. 

"I know. She's mad with you. What can you expect, Anna II. ?" heinterrupted in a very matter-of-fact voice, leaning against a bookcase. Even a bookcase was better than nothing to lean against. 

"Christopher is being unreasonable, " said Anna-Felicitas, her voicesofter and gentler than he had yet heard it. 

Then she stopped, and considered him a moment with much of the look ofone who on a rather cold day considers the sea before diving in--with, that is, a slight but temporary reluctance to proceed. 

"Won't you sit down?" said Mr. Twist. 

"Perhaps I'd better, " she said, disposing herself in the big chair. "It's very strange, but my legs feel funny. You wouldn't think being inlove would make one want to sit down. "

"I beg your pardon?" said Mr. Twist. 

"I have fallen in love, " said Anna-Felicitas, looking up at him with akind of pensive radiance. "I did it this morning. "

Mr. Twist stared at her. "I beg your--what did you say?" he asked. 

She said, still with that air as she regarded him of pensive radiance, of not seeing him but something beyond him that was very beautiful toher and satisfactory, "I've fallen in love, and I can't tell you howpleased I am because I've always been afraid I was going to find it adifficult thing to do. But it wasn't. Quite the contrary. "

Then, as he only staged at her, she said, "He's coming round thisafternoon on the new footing, and I wanted to prepare your andChristopher's minds in good time so that you shouldn't be surprised. "

And having said this she lapsed into what was apparently, judging fromher expression, a silent contemplation of her bliss. 

"But you're too young, " burst out Mr. Twist. 

"Too young?" repeated Anna-Felicitas, coming out of her contemplationfor a moment to smile at him. "We don't think so. "

Well. This beat everything. 

Mr. Twist could only stare down at her. 

Conflicting emotions raged in him. He couldn't tell for a moment whatthey were, they were so violent and so varied. How dared Elliott. Howdared a person they had none of them heard of that time yesterday comemaking love to a girl he had never seen before. And in such a hurry. Sosuddenly. So instantly. Here had he himself been with the twinsconstantly for weeks, and wouldn't have dreamed of making love to them. They had been sacred to him. And it wasn't as if he hadn't wanted to hugthem often and often, but he had restrained himself as a gentlemanshould from the highest motives of delicacy, and consideration, andrespect, and propriety, besides a great doubt as to whether theywouldn't very energetically mind. And then comes along this blunderingBritisher, and straight away tumbles right in where Mr. Twist had fearedto tread, and within twenty-four hours had persuaded Anna-Felicitas tothink she was in love. New footing indeed. There hadn't been an oldfooting yet. And who was this Elliott? And how was Mr. Twist going to beable to find out if he were a proper person to be allowed to pay hisaddresses to one so precious as a Twinkler twin?

Anger, jealousy, anxiety, sense of responsibility and mortification, alltumbled about furiously together inside Mr. Twist as he leaned againstthe bookcase and gazed down at Anna-Felicitas, who for her part wasgazing beatifically into space; but through the anger, and the jealousy, and the anxiety, and the sense of responsibility and mortification onegreat thought was struggling, and it finally pushed every other asideand got out to the top of the welter: here, in the chair before him, hebeheld his sister-in-law. So much at least was cleared up. 

He crossed to the bureau and dragged his office-stool over next to herand sat down. "So that's it, is it?" he said, trying to speak verycalmly, but his face pulled all sorts of ways, as it had so often beensince the arrival in his life of the twins. 

"Yes, " she said, coming out of her contemplation. "It's love at last. "

"I don't know about at last. Whichever way you look at it, Anna II. , that don't seem to hit it off as a word. What I meant was, it'sElliott. "

"Yes, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Which is the same thing. I believe, " sheadded, "I now have to allude to him as John. "

Mr. Twist made another effort to speak calmly. "You don't, " he said, "think it at all unusual or undesirable that you should be calling a manJohn to-day of whom you'd never heard yesterday. "

"I think it's wonderful, " said Anna-Felicitas beaming. 

"It doesn't strike you in any way as imprudent to be so hasty. Itdoesn't strike you as foolish. "

"On the contrary, " said Anna-Felicitas. "I can't help thinking I'vebeen very clever. I shouldn't have thought it of myself. You see, I'mnot _naturally_ quick. " And she beamed with what she evidently regardedas a pardonable pride. 

"It doesn't strike you as even a little--well, a little improper. "

"On the contrary, " said Anna-Felicitas. "Aunt Alice told us that the oneman one could never be improper about, even if one tried, was one'shusband. "

"Husband?" Mr. Twist winced. He loved, as we have seen, the word wife, but then that was different. 

"It's not time yet to talk of husbands, " he said, full of a flamingunreasonableness and jealousy and the sore feeling that he who had beentoiling so long and so devotedly in the heat of the Twinkler sun had hada most unfair march stolen on him by this eleventh-hour stranger. 

He flamed with unreasonableness. Yet he knew this was the solution ofhalf his problem, --and of much the worst half, for it was after allAnna-Felicitas who had produced the uncomfortable feeling ofslipperiness, of eels; Anna-Rose had been quite good, sitting in a chaircrying and just so sweetly needing comfort. But now that the solutionwas presented to him he was full of fears. For on what now could he basehis proposal to Anna-Rose? Elliott would be the legitimate protector ofboth the Twinklers. Mr. Twist, who had been so much perturbed by theidea of having to propose to one or other twin, was miserably upset bythe realization that now he needn't propose to either. Elliott had cutthe ground from under his feet. He had indeed--what was the expressionhe used the evening before?--yes, nipped in. There was now no necessityfor Anna-Rose to marry him, and Mr. Twist had an icy and forlornfeeling that on no other basis except necessity would she. He wasthirty-five. It was all very well for Elliott to get proposing to peopleof seventeen; he couldn't be more than twenty-five. And it wasn't onlyage. Mr. Twist hadn't shaved before looking-glasses for nothing, and hewas very distinctly aware that Elliott was extremely attractive. 

"It's not time yet to talk of husbands, " he therefore hotly andjealously said. 

"On the contrary, " said Anna-Felicitas gently, "it's not only time butwar-time. The war, I have observed, is making people be quick and suddenabout all sorts of things. "

"You haven't observed it. That's Elliott said that. "

"He may have, " said Anna-Felicitas. "He said so many things--"

And again she lapsed into contemplation; into, thought Mr. Twist as hegazed jealously at her profile, an ineffable, ruminating, reminiscentsmugness. 

"See here, Anna II. , " he said, finding it impossibly painful to waitwhile she contemplated, "suppose you don't at this particular crisisfall into quite so many ecstatic meditations. There isn't as much timeas you seem to think. "

"No--and there's Christopher, " said Anna-Felicitas, giving herself ashake, and with that slightly troubled look coming into her face againas of having, in spite of being an angel in glory, somehow got her feetwet. 

"Precisely, " said Mr. Twist, getting up and walking about the room. "There's Christopher. Now Christopher, I should say, would be prettywell heart-broken over this. "

"But that's so unreasonable, " said Anna-Felicitas with gentledeprecation. 

"You're all she has got, and she'll be under the impression--theremarkably vivid impression--that she's losing you. "

"But _that's_ so unreasonable. She isn't losing me. It's sheer gain. Without the least effort or bother on her part she's acquiring abrother-in-law. "

"Oh, I know what Christopher feels, " said Mr. Twist, going up and downthe room quickly. "I know right enough, because I feel it all myself. "

"But _that's_ so unreasonable, " said Anna-Felicitas earnestly. "Whyshould two of you be feeling things that aren't?"

"She has always regarded herself as responsible for you, and I shouldn'tbe surprised if she were terribly shocked at your conduct. "

"But there has to _be_ conduct, " said Anna-Felicitas, still very gentle, but looking as though her feet were getting wetter. "I don't see howanybody is ever to fall in love unless there's been some conduct first. "

"Oh, don't argue--don't argue. You can't expect Anna-Rose not to mindyour wanting to marry a perfect stranger, a man she hasn't even seen. "

"But everybody you marry started by being a perfect stranger andsomebody you hadn't ever seen, " said Anna-Felicitas. 

"Oh Lord, if only you wouldn't _argue_!" exclaimed Mr. Twist. "And asfor your aunt in England, what's she going to say to thistwenty-four-hours, quick-lunch sort of engagement? She'll be terriblyupset. And Anna-Rose knows that, and is I expect nigh worried crazy. "

"But what, " asked Anna-Felicitas, "have aunts to do with love?"

Then she said very earnestly, her face a little flushed, her eyestroubled, "Christopher said all that you're saying now, and a lot more, down in the garden before I came to you, and I said what I've beensaying to you, and a lot more, but she wouldn't listen. And when I foundshe wouldn't listen I tried to comfort her, but she wouldn't becomforted. And then I came to you; for besides wanting to tell you whatI've done I wanted to ask you to comfort Christopher. "

Mr. Twist paused a moment in his walk. "Yes, " he said, staring at thecarpet. "Yes. I can very well imagine she needs it. But I don't supposeanything I would say--"

"Christopher is very fond of you, " said Anna-Felicitas gently. 

"Oh yes. You're both very fond of me, " said Mr. Twist, pulling his mouthinto a crooked and unhappy smile. 

"We love you, " said Anna-Felicitas simply. 

Mr. Twist looked at her, and a mist came over his spectacles. "You dearchildren, " he said, "you dear, dear children--"

"I don't know about children--" began Anna-Felicitas; but wasinterrupted by a knock at the door. 

"It's only the brandy, " said Mr. Twist, seeing her face assume theexpression he had learned to associate with the approach of Mrs. Bilton. "Take it away, please Mrs. Bilton, " he called out, "and put it on the--"

Mrs. Bilton however, didn't take anything away, but opened the door aninch instead. "There's someone wants to speak to you, Mr. Twist, " shesaid in a loud whisper, thrusting in a card. "He says he just must. Ifound him on the verandah when I took your brandy out, and as I'm notthe woman to leave a stranger alone with good brandy I brought him inwith me, and he's right here back of me in the tea-room. "

"It's John, " remarked Anna-Felicitas placidly. "Come early. "

"I say--" said a voice behind Mrs. Bilton. 

"Yes, " nodded Anna-Felicitas, getting up out of the deep chair. "That'sJohn. "

"I say--may I come in? I've got something important--"

Mr. Twist looked at Anna-Felicitas. "Wouldn't you rather--?" he began. 

"I don't mind John, " she said softly, her face flooded with a mostbeautiful light. 

Mr. Twist opened the door and went out. "Come in, " he said. "Mrs. Bilton, may I present Mr. Elliott to you--Commander Elliott of theBritish Navy. "

"Pleased to meet you, Commander Elliott, " said Mrs. Bilton. "Mr. Twist, your brandy is on the verandah. Shall I bring it to you in here?"

"No thank you, Mrs. Bilton. I'll go out there presently. Perhaps youwouldn't mind waiting for me there--I don't suppose Mr. Elliott willwant to keep me long. Come in, Mr. Elliott. "

And having disposed of Mrs. Bilton, who was in a particularly willingand obedient and female mood, he motioned Elliott into the office. 

There stood Anna-Felicitas. 

Elliott stopped dead. 

"This isn't fair, " he said, his eyes twinkling and dancing. 

"What isn't?" inquired Anna-Felicitas gently, beaming at him. 

"Your being here. I've got to talk business. Look here, sir, " he said, turning to Mr. Twist, "could _you_ talk business with her there?"

"Not if she argued, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Argued! I wouldn't mind her arguing. It's just her being there. I'vegot to talk business, " he said, turning to Anna-Felicitas, --"businessabout marrying you. And how can I with you standing there lookinglike--well, like that?"

"I don't know, " said Anna-Felicitas placidly, not moving. 

"But you'll interrupt--just your being there will interrupt. I shall seeyou out of the corner of my eye, and it'll be impossible not to--I meanI know I'll want to--I mean, Anna-Felicitas my dear, it isn't done. I'vegot to explain all sorts of things to your guardian--"

"He isn't my guardian, " corrected the accurate Anna-Felicitas gently. "He only very nearly once was. "

"Well, anyhow I've got to explain a lot of things that'll take sometime, and it isn't so much explain as persuade--for I expect, " he said, turning to Mr. Twist, "this strikes you as a bit sudden, sir?"

"It would strike anybody, " said Mr. Twist trying to be stern but findingit difficult, for Elliott was so disarmingly engaging and so disarminglyin love. The radiance on Anna-Felicitas's face might have been almost areflection caught from his. Mr. Twist had never seen two people look sohappy. He had never, of course, before been present at the firstwonderful dawning of love. The whole room seemed to glow with thesurprise of it. 

"There. You see?" said Elliott, again appealing to Anna-Felicitas, whostood smiling beatifically at him without moving. "I've got to explainthat it isn't after all as mad as it seems, and that I'm a fearfullydecent chap and can give you lots to eat, and that I've got a jollylittle sister here who's respectable and well-known besides, and I'mgoing to produce references to back up these assertions, and proofs thatI'm perfectly sound in health except for my silly foot, which isn'thealth but just foot and which you don't seem to mind anyhow, and how--Iask you _how_, Anna-Felicitas my dear, am I to do any of this with youstanding there looking like--well, like that?"

"I don't know, " said Anna-Felicitas again, still not moving. 

"Anna-Felicitas, my dear, " he said, "won't you go?"

"No, John, " said Anna-Felicitas gently. 

His eyes twinkled and danced more than ever. He took a step towards her, then checked himself and looked round beseechingly at Mr. Twist. 

"_Somebody's_ got to go, " he said. 

"Yes, " said Mr. Twist. "And I guess it's me. "

CHAPTER XXXVIII

He went straight in search of Anna-Rose. 

He was going to propose to her. He couldn't bear it. He couldn't bearthe idea of his previous twins, his blessed little Twinklers, both goingout of his life at the same time, and he couldn't bear, after what hehad just seen in the office, the loneliness of being left outside love. 

All his life he had stood on the door-mat outside the shut door of love. He had had no love; neither at home, where they talked so much about itand there wasn't any, nor, because of his home and its inhibitions gotso thoroughly into his blood, anywhere else. He had never tried tomarry, --again because of his home and his mother and the wholeonly-son-of-a-widow business. He would try now. He would risk it. It wasawful to risk it, but it was more awful not to. He adored Anna-Rose. Hownearly the afternoon before, when she sat crying in his chair, had hetaken her in his arms! Why, he would have taken her into them then andthere, while she was in that state, while she was in the need ofcomfort, and never let her go out of them again, if it hadn't been thathe had got the idea so firmly fixed in his head that she was a child. Fool that he was. Elliott had dispelled that idea for him. It wasn'tchildren who looked as Anna-Felicitas had looked just now in the office. Anna-Rose, it is true, seemed younger than Anna-Felicitas, but that wasbecause she was little and easily cried. He loved her for being little. He loved her because she easily cried. He yearned and hungered tocomfort, to pet to take care of. He was, as has been pointed out, a bornmother. 

Avoiding the verandah and Mrs. Bilton, Mr. Twist filled withrecklessness, hurried upstairs and knocked at Anna-Rose's door. Noanswer. He listened. Dead silence. He opened it a slit and peeped in. Emptiness. Down he went again and made for the kitchen, because Li Koo, who always knew everything, might know where she was. Li Koo did. Hejerked his head towards the window, and Mr. Twist hurried to it andlooked out. There in the middle of the yard was the cat, exactly wherehe had left her an hour before, and kneeling beside her stroking herstomach was Anna-Rose. 

She had her back to the house and her face was hidden. The sun streameddown on her bare head and on the pale gold rings of hair that friskedround her neck. She didn't hear him till he was close to her, so muchabsorbed was she apparently in the cat; and when she did she didn't lookup, but bent her head lower than before and stroked more assiduously. 

"Anna-Rose, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Yes. "

"Come and talk to me. "

"I'm thinking. "

"Don't think. Come and talk to me, little--little dear one. "

She bent her head lower still. "I'm thinking, " she said again. 

"Come and tell me what you're thinking. "

"I'm thinking about cats. "

"About cats?" said Mr. Twist, uncertainly. 

"Yes, " said Anna-Rose, stroking the cat's stomach faster and carefullykeeping her face hidden from him. "About how wise and wonderful theyare. "

"Well then if that's all, you can go on with that presently and come andtalk to me now. "

"You see, " said Anna-Rose, not heeding this, "they're invariably twins, and more than twins, for they're often fours and sometimes sixes, butstill they sit in the sun quietly all their lives and don't mind a bitwhat their--what their twins do--"

"Ah, " said Mr. Twist. "Now I'm getting there. "

"They don't mind a bit about anything. They just clean their whiskersand they purr. Perhaps it's that that comforts them. Perhaps if I--if Ihad whiskers and a--and a purr--"

The cat leaped suddenly to her feet and shook herself violently. Something hot and wet had fallen on her beautiful stomach. 

Anna-Rose made a little sound strangers might have taken for a laugh asshe put out her arms and caught her again, but it was a sound sowretched, so piteous in the attempt to hide away from him, that Mr. Twist's heart stood still. "Oh, don't go, " she said, catching at the catand hugging her tight, "I can't let _you_ go--" And she buried her facein her fur, so that Mr. Twist still couldn't see it. 

"Now that's enough about the cat, " he said, speaking very firmly. "You're coming with me. " And he stooped and picked her up, cat and all, and set her on her feet. 

Then he saw her face. 

"Good God, Anna-Rose!" he exclaimed. 

"I did try not to show you, " she said; and she added, taking shelterbehind her pride and looking at him as defiantly as she could out ofeyes almost closed up, "but you mustn't suppose just because I happento--to seem as if I'd been crying that I--that I'm minding anything. "

"Oh no, " said Mr. Twist, who at sight of her face had straightwayforgotten about himself and his longings and his proposals, and onlyknew that he must comfort Christopher. "Oh no, " he said, looking at heraghast, "I'm not supposing we're minding anything, either of us. "

He took her by the arm. Comfort Christopher; that's what he had got todo. Get rid as quickly as possible of that look of agony--yes, it wasdownright agony--on her face. 

He thought he guessed what she was thinking and feeling; he thought--hewas pretty sure--she was thinking and feeling that her beloved Columbushad gone from her, and gone to a stranger, in a day, in a few hours, toa stranger she had never even seen, never even heard of; that herColumbus had had secrets from her, had been doing things behind herback; that she had had perfect faith and trust in her twin, and now wastasting the dreadful desolation of betrayal; and he also guessed thatshe must be sick with fears, --for he knew how responsible she felt, howseriously she took the charge of her beautiful twin--sick with fearabout this unknown man, sick with the feeling of helplessness, oflooking on while Columbus rushed into what might well be, for all anyone knew, a deadly mess-up of her happiness. 

Well, he could reason her out of most of this, he felt. Certainly hecould reassure her about Elliott, who did inspire one with confidence, who did seem, anyhow outwardly, a very fitting mate for Anna-Felicitas. But he was aghast at the agony on her face. All that he guessed she wasthinking and feeling didn't justify it. It was unreasonable to suffer soviolently on account of what was, after all, a natural happening. Buthowever unreasonable it was, she was suffering. 

He took her by the arm. "You come right along with me, " he said; and ledher out of the yard, away from Li Koo and the kitchen window, towardsthe eucalyptus grove behind the house. "You come right along with me, "he repeated, holding her firmly for she was very wobbly on her feet, "and we'll tell each other all about the things we're not minding. Doyou remember when the _St. Luke_ left Liverpool? You thought I thoughtyou were minding things then, and were very angry with me. We've madefriends since, haven't we, and we aren't going to mind anything everagain except each other. "

But he hardly knew what he was saying, so great was his concern anddistress. 

Anna-Rose went blindly. She stumbled along, helped by him, clutching thecat. She couldn't see out of her swollen eyes. Her foot caught in aroot, and the cat, who had for some minutes past been thoroughly uneasy, became panic-stricken and struggled out of her arms, and fled into thewood. She tried to stop it, but it would go. For some reason this brokedown her self-control. The warm cat clutched to her breast had at leastbeen something living to hold on to. Now the very cat had gone. Herpride collapsed, and she tumbled against Mr. Twist's arm and justsobbed. 

If ever a man felt like a mother it was Mr. Twist at that moment. Hepromptly sat her down on the grass. "There now--there, there now, " hesaid, whipping out his handkerchief and anxiously mopping up her face. "This is what I did on the _St. Luke_--do you remember?--there now--thattime you told me about your mother--it looks like being my permanentjob--there, there now--don't now--you'll have no little eyes left soonif you go on like this--"

"Oh but--oh but--Co-Columbus--"

"Yes, yes I know all about Columbus. Don't you worry about her. She'sall right. She's all right in the office at this moment, and we're allright out here if only you knew it, if only you wouldn't cry suchquantities. It beats me where it all comes from, and you solittle--there, there now--"

"Oh but--oh but Columbus--"

"Yes, yes, I know--you're worrying yourself sick because you thinkyou're responsible for her to your aunt and uncle, but you won't be, youknow, once she's married--there, there now--"

"Oh but--oh but--"

"Now don't--now please--yes, yes, I know--he's a stranger, and youhaven't seen him yet, but everybody was a stranger once, " said Mr. Twist, quoting Anna-Felicitas's own argument, the one that hadespecially irritated him half-an-hour before, "and he's real good--I'msure of it. And you'll be sure too the minute you see him. That's tosay, if you're able to see anything or anybody for the next week out ofyour unfortunate stuck-together little eyes. "

"Oh but--oh but--you don't--you haven't--"

"Yes, yes, I have. Now turn your face so that I can wipe the other sideproperly. There now, I caught an enormous tear. I got him just in timebefore he trickled into your ear. Lord, how sore your poor little eyesare. Don't it even cheer you to think you're going to be asister-in-law, Anna-Rose?"

"Oh but you don't--you haven't--" she sobbed, her face not a whit lessagonized for all his reassurances. 

"Well, I know I wish I were going to be a brother-in-law, " said Mr. Twist, worried by his inability to reassure, as he tenderly andcarefully dabbed about the corners of her eyes and her soaked eyelashes. "My, shouldn't I think well of myself. "

Then his hand shook. 

"I wish I were going to be Anna-Felicitas's brother-in-law, " he said, suddenly impelled, perhaps by this failure to get rid of the misery inher face, to hurl himself on his fate. "Not _yours_--get your mind quiteclear about that, --but Anna-Felicitas's. " And his hand shook so muchthat he had to leave off drying. For this was a proposal. If onlyAnna-Rose would see it, this was a proposal. 

Anna-Rose, however, saw nothing. Even in normal times shewasn't good at relationships, and had never yet understood thethat-man's-father-was-my-father's-son one; now she simply didn'thear. She was sitting with her hands limply in her lap, and sobbingin a curious sort of anguish. 

He couldn't help being struck by it. There was more in this than he hadgrasped. Again he forgot himself and his proposal. Again he wasoverwhelmed by the sole desire to help and comfort. 

He put his hand on the two hands lying with such an air of beingforgotten on her lap. "What is it?" he asked gently. "Little dear one, tell me. It's clear I'm not dead on to it yet. "

"Oh--Columbus--"

She seemed to writhe in her misery. 

"Well yes, yes Columbus. We know all about that. "

Anna-Rose turned her quivering face to him. "Oh, you haven't seen--youdon't see--it's only me that's seen--"

"Seen what? What haven't I seen? Ah, don't cry--don't cry like that--"

"Oh, I've lost her--lost her--"

"Lost her? Because she's marrying?"

"Lost her--lost her--" sobbed Anna-Rose. 

"Come now, " remonstrated Mr. Twist. "Come now. That's just flat contraryto the facts. You've lost nothing, and you've gained a brother. "

"Oh, --lost her--lost her, " sobbed Anna-Rose. 

"Come, come now, " said Mr. Twist helplessly. 

"Oh, " she sobbed, looking at him out of her piteous eyes, "has nobodythought of it but me? Columbus hasn't. I--I know she hasn't fromwhat--from what--she said. She's too--too happy to think. But--haven'tyou thought--haven't you seen--that she'll be English now--reallyEnglish--and go away from me to England with him--and I--I can't go toEngland--because I'm still--I'm still--an alien enemy--and so I've losther--lost her--lost my own twin--"

And Anna-Rose dropped her head on to her knees and sobbed in anabandonment of agony. 

Mr. Twist sat without saying or doing anything at all. He hadn't thoughtof this; nor, he was sure, had Anna-Felicitas. And it was true. Now heunderstood Anna-Rose's face and the despair of it. He sat looking ather, overwhelmed by the realization of her misfortune. For a moment hewas blinded by it, and didn't see what it would mean for him. Then hedid see. He almost leaped, so sudden was the vision, and so luminous. 

"Anna-Rose, " he said, his voice trembling, "I want to put my arm roundyou. That's because I love you. And if you'll let me do that I couldtell you of a way there is out of this for you. But I can't tell you sowell unless--unless you let me put my arm round you first. . . . "

He waited trembling. She only sobbed. He couldn't even be sure she waslistening. So he put his arm round her to try. At least she didn'tresist. So he drew her closer. She didn't resist that either. Hecouldn't even be sure she knew about it. So he put his other arm roundher too, and though he couldn't be sure, he thought--he hardly daredthink, but it did seem as if--she nestled. 

Happiness, such as in his lonely, loveless life he had never imagined, flooded Mr. Twist. He looked down at her face, which was now so close tohis, and saw that her eyes were shut. Great sobs went on shaking herlittle body, and her tears, now that he wasn't wiping them, were rollingdown her cheeks unchecked. 

He held her closer to him, close to his heart where she belonged, andagain he had that sensation, that wonderful sensation, of nestling. 

"Little Blessed, the way out is so simple, " he whispered. "LittleBlessed, don't you see?"

But whether Anna-Rose saw seemed very doubtful. There was only thatfeeling, as to which he was no doubt mistaken, of nestling to go on. Hereyes, anyhow, remained shut, and her body continued to heave with sobs. 

He bent his head lower. His voice shook. "It's so, so simple, " hewhispered. "All you've got to do is to marry me. "

And as she made an odd little movement in his arms he held her tighterand began to talk very fast. 

"No, no, " he said, "don't answer anything yet. Just listen. Just let metell you first. I want to tell you to start with how terribly I loveyou. But that doesn't mean you've got to love me--you needn't if youdon't want to--if you can't--if you'd rather not I'm eighteen yearsolder than you, and I know what I'm like to look at--no, don't sayanything yet--just listen quiet first--but if you married me you'd be anAmerican right away, don't you see? Just as Anna-Felicitas is going tobe English. And I always intended going back to England as soon as maybe, and if you married me what is to prevent your coming too? Coming toEngland? With Anna-Felicitas and her husband. Anna-Rose--littleBlessed--think of it--all of us together. There won't be any aliens inthat quartette, I guess, and the day you marry me you'll be done withbeing German for good and all. And don't you get supposing it mattersabout your not loving me, because, you see, I love you so much, I adoreyou so terribly, that anyhow there'll be more than enough love to goround, and you needn't ever worry about contributing any if you don'tfeel like it--"

Mr. Twist broke off abruptly. "What say?" he said, for Anna-Rose wasmaking definite efforts to speak. She was also making definite andunmistakable movements, and this time there could be no doubt about it;she was coming closer. 

"What say?" said Mr. Twist breathlessly, bending his head. 

"But I do, " whispered Anna-Rose. 

"Do what?" said Mr. Twist, again breathlessly. 

She turned her face up to his. On it was the same look he had latelyseen on Anna-Felicitas's, shining through in spite of the disfigurationof her tears. 

"But--_of course_ I do, " whispered Anna-Rose, an extraordinary smile, an awe-struck sort of smile, coming into her face at the greatness ofher happiness, at the wonder of it. 

"What? Do what?" said Mr. Twist, still more breathlessly. 

"I--always did, " whispered Anna-Rose. 

"_What_ did you always did?" gasped Mr. Twist, hardly able to believeit, and yet--and yet--there on her little face, on her littletransfigured face, shone the same look. 

"Oh--_love_ you, " sighed Anna-Rose, nestling as close as she could get. 

 * * * * *

It was Mr. Twist himself who got on a ladder at five minutes past fourthat afternoon and pasted a strip of white paper obliquely across thesign of The Open Arms with the word. 

 SHUT

on it in big letters. Li Koo held the foot of the ladder. Mr. Twist hadonly remembered the imminence of four o'clock and the German inrush afew minutes before the hour, because of his being so happy; and when hedid he flew to charcoal and paper. He got the strip on only just intime. A car drove up as he came down the ladder. 

"What?" exclaimed the principal male occupant of the car, pointing, thwarted and astonished, to the sign. 

"Shut, " said Mr. Twist. 

"Shut?"

"Shut. "