"She made it herself," Mark observed.
"Then she likes her Jack. Such a girl would not prink to please a man to whom she was indifferent."
Jim Corrance thrust out his big jaw. "Mary may have made that hat to please herself. If I'd her face, by gad, I'd make just such a hat and enjoy myself with a looking-glass."
"So would I," said Mark.
Pynsent and Jim returned to town before dinner. They promised to come again, and often, but Mark guessed that such promises were written in ink, blue and variable as a May sky. He expected to be much alone, and during the months that followed was not disappointed. From his friends at the Mission he held aloof. He knew they would ask questions, deeming it a duty to argue and reprove.
Mark had written the truth to David Ross after the night on Ben Caryll. In reply, David wisely made no protest against Mark's determination to leave the Church. That he would speak in due time Mark was uncomfortably aware, and he learned—not without a feeling of relief—that his old chief was the busiest man in Poplar.
May passed quickly, devoid of incident and accident. Towards the end of it, however, Mark, reading his morning paper, was horrified to learn that Bagshot, the man he had tried to reclaim, had murdered his wife in a drunken fit. He hastened to London, saw the prisoner—an abject, cowering wreck of what he had been—and listened to his dreadful story. The poor fellow had struggled hard against the craving for drink, yet in the end he had slain the woman he loved. It was heartrending—the triumph of evil over good.
After seeing Bagshot, Mark reread that battered memorandum-book which he had carried through terrible slums. Once more, the appeal of the friendless and helpless stirred him profoundly. Very stealthily, like "humble Allen," he began to revisit some of his waifs; most of them had disappeared; others as wretched and forlorn occupied their place. But his ministrations—necessarily ill-sustained and intermittent—appeared ineffectual. The joyous confidence of former days had departed. The squalor seemed invincible, the forces against which he contended so vast and ungovernable that sense and sensibility revolted. Only faith could remove such mountains, and faith had forsaken Mark Samphire. None the less, he persevered.
About the end of June Archibald and his wife came back from France and settled down in Cadogan Place. Archibald asked Mark to meet them in a long letter, full of a description of Chenonçeau. At the end was a postscript in Betty's handwriting: "Please come." Mark obeyed—a prey to feelings which cannot be set down. For six weeks he had seen Betty's face looking out of the window of the train, white, piteous, despairing. But when they met he was amazed to find her rosy and smiling, full of plans, in high health and spirits. Then he remembered that his own health was excellent. Archibald made him welcome, entreated his advice about the arrangement of books and engravings, begged him to hang his hat on his own peg, and alluded only vaguely to the red tie.
"You will come back to us," he said confidently.