little man with the beard was remarking in an unexpectedly

friendly manner.
"The fact of it is," said Mr. Hoopdriver, sitting beside the road

to Salisbury, and with the sound of distant church bells in his
cars, "I had to give the fellow a lesson; simply had to."

"It seems so dreadful that you should have to knock people
about," said Jessie.

"These louts get unbearable," said Mr. Hoopdriver. "If now and
then we didn't give them a lesson,--well, a lady cyclist in the

roads would be an impossibility."
"I suppose every woman shrinks from violence," said Jessie. "I

suppose men ARE braver--in a way--than women. It seems to me-I
can't imagine -how one could bring oneself to face a roomful of

rough characters, pick out the bravest, and. give him an
exemplary thrashing. I quail at the idea. I thought only Ouida's

guardsmen did things like that."
"It was nothing more than my juty--as a gentleman," said Mr.

Hoopdriver.
"But to walk straight into the face of danger!"

"It's habit," said Mr. Hoopdriver, quite modestly, flicking off a
particle of cigarette ash that had settled on his knee.

THE ABASEMENT OF MR. HOOPDRIVER
XXXIII

On Monday morning the two fugitives found themselves breakfasting
at the Golden Pheasant in Blandford. They were in the course of

an elaborate doubling movement through Dorsetshire towards
Ringwood, where Jessie anticipated an answer from her

schoolmistress friend. By this time they had been nearly sixty
hours together, and you will understand that Mr. Hoopdriver's

feelings had undergone a considerable intensification and
development. At first Jessie had been only an impressionist

sketch upon his mind, something feminine, active, and dazzling,
something emphatically "above " him, cast into his company by a

kindly fate. His chief idea, at the outset, as you know, had been
to live up to her level, by pretending to be more exceptional,

more wealthy, better educated, and, above all, better born than
he was. His knowledge of the feminine mind was almost entirely

derived from the young ladies he had met in business, and in that
class (as in military society and among gentlemen's servants) the

good old tradition of a brutal social exclusiveness is still
religiously preserved. He had an almost intolerable dread of her

thinking him a I bounder.' Later he began to perceive the
distinction of her idiosyncracies. Coupled with a magnificent

want of experience was a splendid enthusiasm for abstract views
of the most advanceddescription, and her strength of conviction

completely carried Hoopdriver away. She was going to Live her Own
Life, with emphasis, and Mr. Hoopdriver was profoundly stirred to

similar resolves. So soon as he grasped the tenor of her views,
he perceived that he himself had thought as much from his

earliest years. "Of course," he remarked, in a flash of sexual
pride, "a man is freer than a woman. End in the Colonies, y'know,

there isn't half the Conventionality you find in society in this
country."

He made one or two essays in the display of unconventionality,
and was quite unaware that he impressed her as a narrow-minded

person. He suppressed the habits of years and made no proposal to
go to church. He discussed church-going in a liberal spirit.

"It's jest a habit," he said, "jest a custom. I don't see what
good it does you at all, really." And he made a lot of excellent

jokes at the chimney-pot hat, jokes he had read in the Globe
'turnovers' on that subject. But he showed his gentle breeding by

keeping his gloves on all through the Sunday's ride, and
ostentatiously throwing away more than half a cigarette when they

passed a church whose congregation was gathering for afternoon
service. He cautiously avoided literary topics, except by way of

compliment, seeing that she was presently to be writing books.
It was on Jessie's initiative that they attended service in the

old-fashioned gallery of Blandford church. Jessie's conscience, I
may perhaps tell you, was now suffering the severest twinges. She

perceived clearly that things were not working out quite along
the lines she had designed-. She had read her Olive Schreiner and

George Egerton, and so forth, with all the want of perfect
comprehension of one who is still emotionally a girl. She knew

the thing to do was to have a flat and to go to the British
Museum and write leading articles for the daily p,tpers until

something better came along. If Bechamel (detestable person) had
kept his promises, instead of behaving with unspeakable

horridness, all would have been well. Now her only hope was that
liberal-minded woman, Miss Mergle, who, a year ago, had sent her

out, highly educated, into the world. Miss Mergle had told her at
parting to live fearlessly and truly, and had further given her a

volume of Emerson's Essays and Motley's "Dutch Republic," to help
her through the rapids of adolescence.

Jessie's feelings for her stepmother's household at Surbiton
amounted to an active detestation. There are no graver or more

solemn women in the world than these clever girls whose
scholastic advancement has retarded their feminine coquetry. In

spite of the advanced tone of 'Thomas Plantagenet's' antimarital
novel, Jessie had speedily seen through that amiable woman's

amiable defences. The variety of pose necessitated by the corps
of 'Men' annoyed her to an altogetherunreasonable degree. To

return to this life of ridiculous unreality--unconditional
capitulation to 'Conventionality' was an exasperating prospect.

Yet what else was there to do? You will understand, therefore,
that at times she was moody (and Mr. Hoopdriver respectfully

silent and attentive) and at times inclined to eloquent
denunciation of the existing order of things. She was a

Socialist, Hoopdriver learnt, and he gave a vague intimation that
he went further, intending, thereby, no less than the horrors of

anarchism. He would have owned up to the destruction of the
Winter Palace indeed, had he had the faintest idea where the

Winter Palace was, and had his assurance amounted to certainty
that the Winter Palace was destroyed. He agreed with her

cordially that the position of women was intolerable, but checked
himself on the' verge of the proposition that a girl ought not to

expect a fellow to hand down boxes for her when he was getting
the 'swap' from a customer. It was Jessie's preoccupation with

her own perplexities, no doubt, that delayed the unveiling of Mr.
Hoopdriver all through Saturday and Sunday. Once or twice,

however, there were incidents that put him about terribly--even
questions that savoured of suspicion.

On Sunday night, for no conceivable reason, an unwonted
wakefulness came upon him. Unaccountably he realised he was a

contemptible liar, All through the small hours of Monday he
reviewed the tale of his falsehoods, and when he tried to turn

his mind from that, the financial problem suddenly rose upon him.
He heard two o'clock strike, and three. It is odd how unhappy

some of us are at times, when we are at our happiest.
XXXIV

"Good morning, Madam," said Hoopdriver, as Jessie came into the
breakfast room of the Golden Pheasant on Monday morning, and he

smiled, bowed, rubbed his hands together, and pulled out a chair
for her, and rubbed his hands again.

She stopped abruptly, with a puzzled expression on her face.
"Where HAVE I seen that before?" she said.

"The chair?" said Hoopdriver, flushing.
"No--the attitude."