CHAPTER L. THREE MET AGAIN
When, on the following morning, Charles Heathcote repaired to the hotel where he had left his friend Lord Agincourt, he was surprised to hear the sound of voices and laughter as he drew nigh the room; nor less astonished was he, on entering, to discover O’Shea seated at the breakfast-table, and manifestly in the process of enjoying himself. Had there been time to retire undetected, Heathcote would have done so, for his head was far too full of matters of deep interest to himself to desire the presence of a stranger, not to say that he had a communication to make to his friend both delicate and difficult. O’Shea’s quick glance had, however, caught him at once, and he cried out, “Here’s the very man we wanted to make us complete, – the jolliest party of three that ever sat down together.”
“I scarcely thought to see you in these parts,” said Heathcote, with more of sulk than cordiality in the tone.
“Your delight ought to be all the greater, though, maybe, it is n’t! You look as glum as the morning I won your trap and the two nags.”
“By the way, what became of them?” asked Heathcote.
“I sold the chestnut to a young cornet in the Carabineers. He saw me ride him through all the bonfires in Sackville Street the night the mob beat the police, and he said he never saw his equal to face fire; and he was n’t far wrong there, for the beast was stone blind.”
“And the gray?”
“The gray is here, in Rome, and in top condition; and if I don’t take him over five feet of timber, my name is n’t Gorman.” A quick wink and a sly look towards Agincoort conveyed to Heathcote the full meaning of this speech.
“And you want a high figure for him?” asked he.
“If I sell him, – if I sell him at all; for you see, if the world goes well with me, and I have a trump or two in my hand, I won’t part with that horse. It’s not every day in the week that you chance on a beast that can carry fifteen stone over a stiff country, – ay, and do it four days in the fortnight!”
“What’s his price?” asked Agincourt.
“Let him tell you,” said O’Shea, with a most expressive look at Heathcote. “He knows him as well or better than I do.”
“Yes,” said Heathcote, tantalizing him on purpose; “but when a man sets out by saying, ‘I don’t want to sell my horse,’ of course it means, ‘If you will have him, you must pay a fancy price.’”
If O’Shea’s expression could be rendered in words, it might be read thus: “And if that be the very game I’m playing, ain’t you a downright idiot to spoil it?”
“Well,” said Agincourt, after a pause, “I ‘m just in the sort of humor this morning to do an extravagant thing, or a silly one.”
“Lucky fellow!” broke in Heathcote, “for O’Shea’s the very man to assist you to your project.”
“I am!” said O’Shea, firmly and quickly; “for there’s not the man living has scattered his money more freely than myself. Before I came of age, when I was just a slip of a boy, about nineteen – ”
“Never mind the anecdote, old fellow,” said Heathcote, laughingly, as he laid his hand on the other’s shoulder. “Agincourt has just confessed himself in the frame of mind to be ‘done.’ Do him, therefore, by all means. Say a hundred and fifty for the nag, and he ‘ll give it, and keep your good story for another roguery.”
“Isn’t he polite? – isn’t he a young man of charming manners and elegant address?” said O’Shea, with a strange mixture of drollery and displeasure.
“He’s right, at all events,” said Agincourt, laughing at the other’s face; “he’s right as regards me. I ‘ll give you a hundred and fifty for the horse without seeing him.”
“Oh, mother of Moses! I wish your guardian was like you.”
“Why so? What do you mean?”
“I mean this, – that I wish he ‘d buy me, too, without seeing me!” And then, seeing that by their blank looks they had failed to catch his meaning, he added, “Is n’t he one of the Cabinet now?”
“Yes, he is Colonial Secretary.”
“That ‘s the very fellow I want. He ‘s giving away things every day, that any one of them would be the making of me.”
“What would you take?”
“Whatever I ‘d get. There’s my answer. Whatever I ‘d get I’d be a Bishop, or a Judge, or a boundary Commissioner, or a Treasurer, – I ‘d like to be that best, – or anything in reason they could offer a man of good family, and who had a seat in the House.”
“I think you might get him something; I’m sure you might,” said Heathcote.
“Well, I can try, at all events. I ‘ll write to-day.”
“Will you really?”
“I give you my word on it. I ‘ll say that, independently of all personal claims of your own, you ‘re an intimate and old friend, whose advancement I will accept as a favor done to myself.”
“That’s the ticket. But mind no examination, – no going before the Civil Service chaps. I tell you fairly, I would n’t take the Governor-Generalship of India if I had to go up for the multiplication-table. I think I see myself sitting trembling before them, one fellow asking me, ‘Who invented “pitch and toss”?’ and another inquiring ‘Who was the first man ever took pepper with oysters?’”
“Leave all that to Agincourt,” said Heathcote; “he’ll explain to his guardian that you were for several sessions a distinguished member of the House – ”
“‘T was I that brought ‘crowing’ in. I used to crow like a cock when old Sibthorp got up, and set them all off laughing.”
“I ‘ll mention your public services – ”
“And don’t say that I ‘m hard up. Don’t make it appear that it ‘s because I ‘m out at the elbows I ‘m going, but just a whim, – the way Gladstone went to Greece the other day; that’s the real dodge, for they keep the Scripture in mind up in Downing Street, and it’s always the ‘poor they send empty away.’”
“And you’ll dine with us here, at seven?” said Agincourt, rising from the table.
“That ‘s as much as to say, ‘Cut your lucky now, Gorman; we don’t want you till dinner-time.’”
“You forget that he has got the letter to write about you,” said Heathcote. “You don’t want him to lose a post?”
“And the gray horse?”
“He’s mine; I ‘ve bought him.”
“I suppose you ‘ve no objection to my taking a canter on him this morning?”
“Ride him, by all means,” said Agincourt, shaking his hand cordially while he said adieu.
“Why did you ask him to dinner to-day?” said Heathcote, peevishly. “I wanted you to have come over and dined with us. My father is eager to see you, and so is May.”
“Let us go to tea, then. And how are they? – how is he looking?”
“Broken, – greatly broken. I was shocked beyond measure to see him so much aged since we met, and his spirits gone, – utterly gone.”
“Whence is all this?”
“He says that I deserted him, – that he was forsaken.”
“And is he altogether wrong, Charley? Does not conscience prick you on that score?”
“He says, too, that I have treated May as cruelly and as unjustly; also, that I have broken up their once happy home. In fact, he lays all at my door.”
“And have you seen her?”
“Yes, we had a meeting last night, and a long talk this morning; and, indeed, it was about that I wanted to speak to you when I found O’Shea here. Confound the fellow! he has made the thing more difficult than ever, for I have quite forgotten how I had planned it all.”
“Planned it all! Surely there was no need of a plan, Charley, in anything that you meant to say to me?”
“Yes, but there was, though. You have very often piqued me by saying that I never knew my own mind from one day to another, that you were always prepared for some change of intention in me, and that nothing would surprise you less than that I should ‘throw you over’ the very day before we were to sail for India.”
“Was I very, very unjust, Charley?” said he, kindly.
“I think you were, and for this reason: he who is master of his own fate, so far as personal freedom and ample fortune can make him, ought not to judge rashly of the doubts and vacillations and ever changing purposes of him who has to weigh fifty conflicting influences. The one sufficiently strong to sway others may easily take his line and follow it; the other is the slave of any incident of the hour, and must be content to accept events, and not mould them.”
“I read it all, Charley. You ‘ll not go out?”
“I will not.”
Agincourt repressed the smile that was fast gathering on his lips, and, in a grave and quiet voice, said, “And why?”
“For the very reason you have so often given me. She cares for me; she has told me so herself, and even asked me not to leave them! I explained to her that I had given you not only a promise, but a pledge, that, unless you released me, I was bound in honor to accompany you. She said, ‘Will you leave this part of the matter to me?’ and I answered, ‘No, I’ll go frankly to him, and say, “I’m going to break my word with you: I have to choose between May Leslie and you, and I vote for her.’’”
“What a deal of self-sacrifice it might have saved you, Charley,” said he, laughing, “had you seen this telegram which came when I had sat down to breakfast.” It came from the Horse Guards, sent by some private friend of Agincourt’ s, and was in these words: “The row is over, no more drafts for India, do not go.”
Heathcote read and re-read the paper for several minutes. “So, then, for once I have luck on my side. My resolve neither wounds a friend nor hurts my own self-esteem. Of course you ‘ll not go?”
“Certainly not. I ‘ll not go out to hunt the lame ducks that others have wounded.”
“You ‘ll let me take this and show it to my father,” said Heathcote. “He shall learn the real reason of my stay hereafter, but for the present this will serve to make him happy; and poor May, too, will be spared the pain of thinking that in yielding to her wish I have jeopardized a true friendship. I can scarcely believe all this happiness real, Agincourt. After so long a turn of gloom and despondency, I cannot trust myself to think that fortune means so kindly by me. Were it not for one unhappy thought, – one only, – I could say I have nothing left to wish for.”
“And what is that? – Is it anything in which I can be of service to you?”
“No, my dear fellow; if it were, I’d never have said it was a cause for sorrow. It is a case, however, equally removed from your help as from mine. I told you some time back that my father, yielding to a game of cleverly played intrigue, had determined to marry this widow, Mrs. Penthony Morris, whom you remember. So long as the question was merely mooted in gossip, I could not allude to it; but when he wrote himself to me on the subject, I remonstrated with him as temperately as I was able. I adverted to their disproportion of age, their dissimilarity of habits; and, lastly, I spoke out and told him that we knew nothing, any of us, of this lady, her family, friends, or connections; that though I had inquired widely, I never met the man who could give me any information about her, or had ever heard of her husband. I wrote all this, and much more of the same kind, in the strain of frank confidence a son might employ towards his father, particularly when they had long lived together in relations of the dearest and closest affection. I waited eagerly for his answer. Some weeks went over, and then there came a letter, not from him, but from her. The whole mischief was out: he had given her my letter, and said, ‘Answer it.’ I will show you her epistle one of these days. It is really clever. There wasn’t a word of reproach, – not an angry syllable in the whole of it She was pained, fretted, deeply fretted by what I had written, but she acknowledged that I had, if I liked to indulge them, reasonable grounds for all my distrusts, though, perhaps, it might have been more generous to oppose them. At first, she said, she had resolved to satisfy all my doubts by the names and circumstances of her connections, with every detail of family history and fortune; but, on second thoughts, her pride revolted against a step so offensive to personal dignity, and she had made up her mind to confine these revelations to my father, and then leave his roof forever. ‘Writing,’ continued she, ‘as I now do, without his knowledge of what I say, – for, with a generous confidence in me that I regret is not felt in other quarters, he has refused to read my letter, – I may tell you that I shall place my change of purpose on such grounds as can never possibly endanger your future relations with your father. He shall never suspect, in fact, from anything in my conduct, that my departure was influenced in the slightest degree by what has fallen from you. The reasons I will give him for my step will refer solely to circumstances that refer to myself. Go back, therefore, in all confidence and love, and give your whole affection to one who needs and who deserves it!
“There was, perhaps, a slight tendency to dilate upon what ought to constitute my duties and regards; but, on the whole, the letter was well written and wonderfully dispassionate. I was sorely puzzled how to answer it, or what course to take, and might have been more so, when my mind was relieved by a most angry epistle from my father, accusing me roundly, not only of having wilfully forsaken him, but having heartlessly insulted the very few who compassionated his lonely lot, and were even ready to share it.
“This ended our correspondence, and I never wrote again till I mentioned my approaching departure for India, and offered, if he wished it, to take Italy on my way and see him once more before I went. To this there came the kindest answer, entreating me to come and pass as many days as I could with him. It was all affection, but evidently written in great depression of mind and spirits. There were three lines of a postscript, signed ‘Louisa,’ assuring me that none more anxiously looked forward to my visit than herself; that she had a pardon to crave of me, and would far rather sue for it in person than on paper. ‘As you are coming,’ said she, ‘I will say no more, for when you do come you will both pity and forgive me.’”
As Heathcote had just finished the last word, the door of the room was quietly opened, and O’Shea peeped in. “Are you at the letter? for, if you are, you might as well say, ‘Mr. Gorman O’Shea was never violent in his politics, but one of those who always relied upon the good faith and good will of England towards his countrymen.’ That’s a sentence the Whigs delight in, and I remark it’s the sure sign of a good berth.”
“Yes, yes, I ‘ll book it; don’t be afraid,” said Agincourt, laughing; and the late member for Inch retired, fully satisfied. “Go on, Charley; tell me the remainder.”
“There is no more to tell; you have heard all. Since I arrived I have not seen her. She has been for two days confined to bed with a feverish cold, and, apprehending something contagious, she will not let May visit her. I believe, however, it is a mere passing illness, and I suppose that to-morrow or next day we shall meet.”
“And how? for that, I own, is a matter would puzzle me considerably.”
“It will all depend upon her. She must give the key-note to the concert. If she please to be very courteous and affable, and all the rest of it, talk generalities and avoid all questions of real interest, I must accept that tone, and follow it If she be disposed to enter upon private and personal details, I have only to be a listener, except she give me an opportunity to speak out regarding the marriage.” “And you will?”
“That I will. I suspect, shrewdly, that she is mistaken about our circumstances, and confounds May Leslie’s means with ours. Now, when she knows that my father has about five hundred a year in the world for everything, it is just possible that she may rue her bargain, and cry ‘off.’”
“Scarcely, I think,” said Agincourt. “The marriage would give her station and place at once, if she wants them.”
“What if O’Shea were to supplant Sir William? I half suspect he would succeed. He hasn’t a sixpence. It’s exactly his own beat to find some one willing to support him.”
“Well, I ‘ll back myself to get him a place. I ‘ll not say it will be anything very splendid or lucrative, but something he shall have. Come, Charley, leave this to me. Let O’Shea and myself dine tête-à-tête to-day, and I ‘ll contrive to sound him on it.”
“I mean to aid you so far, for I know my father would take it ill were I to dine away from home, – on the first day too; but I own I have no great confidence in your plan, nor any unbounded reliance on your diplomacy.”
“No matter, I’ll try it; and, to begin, I’ll start at once with a letter to Downing Street I have never asked for anything yet, so I ‘ll write like one who cannot contemplate a refusal.”
“I wish you success, for all our sakes,” said Charles; and left him.
END OF VOL. I
ONE OF THEM, Volume II
CHAPTER I. THE LONE VILLA ON THE ÇAMPAGNA
About half-way between Rome and Albano, and something more than a mile off the high-road, there stands on a little swell of the Çampagna a ruined villa, inhabited by a humble family of peasants, who aid their scanty means of support by showing to strangers the view from the house-top. It is not, save for its extent, a prospect in any way remarkable. Rome itself, in the distance, is not seen in its most imposing aspect, and the Çampagna offers little on which the eye cares to rest long.
The “Villa of the Four Winds,” however, is a place sought by tourists, and few leave Rome without a visit to it. These are, of course, the excursions of fine days in the fine season, and never occur during the dark and gloomy months of midwinter. It was now such a time. The wind tore across the bleak plain, carrying fitful showers of cold rain, driving cattle to their shelter, and sending all to seek a refuge within doors; and yet a carriage was to be seen toiling painfully through the deep clay of the by-road which led from the main line, and making for the villa. After many a rugged shake and shock, many a struggling effort of the weary beasts, and many a halt, it at length reached the little paved courtyard, and was speedily surrounded by the astonished peasants, curious to see the traveller whose zeal for the picturesque could bid defiance to such weather.
As the steps were let down, a lady got out, muffled in a large cloak, and wearing the hood over her head, and hastily passed into the little kitchen of the house. Scarcely had she entered, than, throwing off her cloak, she said, in a gay and easy voice, “I have often promised myself a visit to the villa when there would be a grand storm to look at. Don’t you think that I have hit on the day to keep my pledge?” The speech was made so frankly that it pleased the hearers, nowise surprised, besides, at any eccentricity on the part of strangers; and now the family, young and old, gathered around the visitor, and talked, and questioned, and admired her dress and her appearance, and told her so, too, with a pleasant candor not displeasing. They saw she was a stranger, but knew not from where. Her accent was not Roman; they knew no more; nor did she give much time for speculating, as she contrived to make herself at home amongst them by ingratiating herself imperceptibly into the good graces of each present, from the gray-headed man to whom she discoursed of cattle and their winter food, to the little toddling infant, who would insist upon being held upon her lap.
The day went on, and yet never a lull came in the storm that permitted a visit to the roof to see the lightning that played along the distant horizon. She betrayed no impatience, however; she laughingly said she was very comfortable at the fireside, and could afford to wait. She expected her brother, it is true, to have met her there, and more than once despatched a messenger to the door to see if he could not descry a horseman on the high-road. The same answer came always back: nothing to be seen for miles round.
“Well,” said she, good-humoredly, “you must give me a share of your dinner, for my drive has given me an appetite, and I will still wait here another hour.”
It would have made a pleasing picture as she sat there, – her fair and beautiful features graced with that indescribable charm of expression imparted by the wish to please in those who have made the art to please their study; to have seen her surrounded by those bronzed and seared and careworn looks, now brightened up by the charm of a spell that had often worked its power on their superiors; to have marked how delicately she initiated herself into their little ways, and how marvellously the captivation of her gentleness spread its influence over them. In their simple piety they likened her to the image of all that embodies beauty to their eyes, and murmured to each other that she was like the Madonna. A cruel interruption to their quiet rapture was now given by the clattering sound of a horse’s feet, and, immediately after, the entrance of a man drenched to the skin, and dripping from the storm. After a few hasty words of greeting, the strangers ascended the stairs, and were shown into a little room, scantily furnished, but from which the view they were supposed to come for could be obtained.
“What devotion to come out in such weather!” said she, when they were alone. “It is only an Irishman, and that Irishman the O’Shea, could be capable of this heroism.”
“It’s all very nice making fun of a man when he’s standing like a soaked sponge,” said he; “but I tell you what, Mrs. Morris, the devil a Saxon would do it. It’s not in them to risk a sore-throat or a pain in the back for the prettiest woman that ever stepped.”
“I have just said so, but not so emphatically, perhaps; and, what is more, I feel all the force of the homage as I look at you.”
“Well, laugh away,” said he. “When a woman has pretty teeth or good legs, she does n’t want much provocation to show them. But if we are to stay any time here, could n’t we have a bit of fire?”
“You shall come down to the kitchen presently, and have both food and fire; for I’m sure there’s something left, though we ‘ve just dined.”
“Dined? – where?”
“Well, eaten, if you like the word better; and perhaps it is the more fitting phrase. I took my plate amongst these poor people, and I assure you there was a carrot soup by no means bad. Sir William’s chef would have probably taken exception to the garlic, which was somewhat in excess, and there was a fishy flavor, also slightly objectionable. They called it ‘baccala.’”
“Faith, you beat me entirely!” exclaimed O’Shea. “I can’t make you out at all, at all.”
“I assure you,” resumed she, “it was quite refreshing to dine with people who ate heartily, and never said an ill word of their neighbors. I regret very much that you were not of the party.”
“Thanks for the politeness, but I don’t exactly concur with the regret.”
“I see that this wetting has spoiled your temper. It is most unfortunate for me that the weather should have broken just as I wanted you to be in the very best of humors, and with the most ardent desire to serve me.”
If she began this speech in a light and volatile tone, before she had finished it her manner was grave and earnest.
“Here I am, ready and willing,” said he, quickly. “Only say the word, and see if I ‘m not as good as my promise.”
She took two or three turns of the room without speaking; then wheeling round suddenly, she stood right in front of where he sat, her face pale, and her whole expression that of one deeply occupied with one purpose.
“I don’t believe,” said she, in a slow, collected voice, “that there exists a more painful position than that of a woman who, without what the world calls a natural protector, must confront the schemes of a man with the inferior weapons of her sex, and who yet yearns for the privilege of setting a life against a life.”
“You’d like to be able to fight a duel, then?” asked he, gravely.
“Yes. That my own hand might vindicate my own wrong, I ‘d consent freely to lose it the hour after.”
“That must needs have been no slight injury that suggests such a reparation.”
She only nodded in reply.
“It is nothing that the Heathcotes – ”
“The Heathcotes!” broke she in, with a scornful smile; “it is not from such come heavy wrongs. No, no; they are in no wise mixed up in what I allude to, and if they had been, I would need no help to deal with them. The injury I speak of occurred long ago, – years before I knew you. I have told you,” – here she paused, as if for strength to go on, – “I have told you that I accept your aid, and on your own conditions. Very few words will suffice to show for what I need it. Before I go further, however, I would ask you once more, are you ready to meet any and every peril for my sake? Are you prepared to encounter what may risk even your life, if called upon? I ask this now, and with the firm assurance that if you pledge your word you will keep it.”
“I give you my solemn oath that I’ll stand by you, if it lead me to the drop before the jail.”
She gave a slight shudder. Some old memories had, perhaps, crossed her at the moment; but she was soon self-possessed again.
“The case is briefly this. And mind,” said she, hurriedly, “where I do not seem to give you full details, or enter into clear explanations, it is not from inadvertence that I do so, but that I will tell no more than I wish, nor will I be questioned. The case is this: I was married unhappily. I lived with a man who outraged and insulted me, and I met with one who assumed to pity me and take my part. I confided to him my miseries, the more freely that he had been the witness of the cruelties I endured. He took advantage of the confidence to make advances to me. My heart – if I had a heart – would not have been difficult to win. It was a theft not worth guarding against. Somehow, I cannot say wherefore, this man was odious to me, more odious than the very tyrant who trampled on me; but I had sold myself for a vengeance, – yes, as completely as if the devil had drawn up the bond and I had signed it. My pact with myself was to be revenged on him, come what might afterwards. I have told you that I hated this man; but I had no choice. The whole wide world was there, and not another in it had ever offered to be my defender; nor, indeed, did he. No, the creature was a coward; he only promised that if he found me as a waif he would shelter me; he was too cautious to risk a finger in my cause, and would only claim what none disputed with him. And I was abject enough to be content with that, to be grateful for it, to write letters full of more than gratitude, protesting – Oh, spare me! if even yet I have shame to make me unable to repeat what, in my madness, I may have said to him. I thought I could go on throughout it all, but I cannot. The end was, my husband died; yes! he was dead! and this man – who I know, for I have the proofs, had shown my letters to my husband – claimed me in marriage; he insisted that I should be his wife, or meet all the shame and exposure of seeing my letters printed and circulated through the world, with the story of my life annexed. I refused, fled from England, concealed myself, changed my name, and did everything I could to escape discovery; but in vain. He found me out; he is now upon my track; he will be here – here, at Rome – within the week, and, with these letters in his hand, repeat his threat, he says, for the last time, and I believe him.” The strength which had sustained her up to this now gave way, and she sank heavily to the ground, like one stricken by a fit. It was some time before she rallied; for O’Shea, fearful of any exposure, had not called others to his aid, but, opening the window, suffered the rude wind to blow over her face and temples. “There, there,” said she, smiling sadly, “it is but seldom I show so poor a spirit, but I am somewhat broken of late. Leave me to rest my head on this chair, and do not lift me from the ground yet. I ‘ll be better presently. Have I cut my forehead?”
“It is but a slight scratch. You struck the foot of the table in your fall.”
“There,” said she, making a mark with the blood on his wrist, “it is thus the Arabs register the fidelity of him who is to avenge them. You will not fail me, will you?”
“Never, by this hand!” cried he, holding it up firmly clenched over his head.
“It’s the Arab’s faith, that if he wash away the stain before the depth of vengeance is acquitted, he is dishonored; there’s a rude chivalry in the notion that I like well.” She said this in his ear as he raised her from the ground and placed her on a chair. “It is time you should know his name,” said she, after a few minutes’ pause. “He is called Ludlow Paten. I believe he is Captain Paten about town.”
“I know him by repute. He’s a sort of swell at the West-End play clubs. He is amongst all the fast men.”
“Oh, he’s fashionable, – he’s very fashionable.”
“I have heard him talked of scores of times as one of the pleasantest fellows to be met with.”
“I ‘m certain of it. I feel assured that he must be a cheerful companion, and reasonably honest and loyal in his dealings with man. He is of a class that reserve all their treachery and all their baseness for where they can be safely practised; and, strange enough, men of honor know these things, – men of unquestionable honor associate freely with fellows of this stamp, as if the wrong done to a woman was a venial offence, if offence at all.”
“The way of the world,” said OShea, with a half sigh.
“Pleasant philosophy that so easily accounts for every baseness and even villany by showing that they are popular. But come, let us be practical. What’s to be done here? – what do you suggest?”
“Give me the right to deal with him, and leave the settlement to me.”
“The right – that is – ” She hesitated, flushed up for an instant, and then grew lividly pale again.
“Yes,” said he, taking his place at her side, and leaning an arm on the back of her chair, “I thought I never saw your equal when you were gay and light-hearted, and full of spirits; but I like you better, far better now, and I ‘d rather face the world with you than – ”
“I don’t want to deceive you,” said she, hurriedly, and her lips quivered as she spoke; “but there are things which I cannot tell you, – things of which I could not speak to any one, least of all to him who says he is willing to share his fate with me. It is a hard condition to make, and yet I must make it.”