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- 6. Editors Jan Willmann, Philippe Block, Marco Hutter, Kendra Byrne and Tim Schork Robotic Fabrication in Architecture, Art and Design 2018 Foreword by Sigrid Brell-Çokcan and Johannes Braumann, Association for Robots in Architecture
- 7. Editors Jan Willmann Faculty of Art and Design, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Weimar, Germany Philippe Block Department of Architecture, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland Marco Hutter Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland Kendra Byrne San Francisco, CA, USA Tim Schork Faculty of Design, Architecture and Building, University of Technology, Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia ISBN 978-3-319-92293-5 e-ISBN 978-3-319-92294-2 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-92294-2 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018950095 Funded by KUKA Robotics Germany and the Association for Robots in Architecture © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other
- 8. physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
- 9. Foreword by the Association for Robots in Architecture Since the beginning of the Association for Robots in Architecture, it has been our goal to promote collaboration within the community, but also with partners from industry and cross-disciplines. Robots in Architecture is proud to be associated with leading research organizations within architecture, such as ACADIA, or eCAADe but the scope of work that is being done by the community is starting to exceed the field of architecture into many other new domains, and we feel that it is important to accompany such steps. One measure to ensure the exchange across disciplines and other domains is to open the community to disciplines such as engineering and robotics by establishing common platforms where people can meet and exchange their ideas and research. Together with Springer, the Association for Robots in Architecture has therefore established a new Journal for Construction Robotics with the first published issue at the end of 2017 to foster collaborative papers and high-quality research in architecture. Another goal for the Association was to join forces with associations in Robotics. In 2016, Robots in Architecture joined euRobotics AISBL, the largest public–private partnership involving robotics in Europe. Sigrid Brell-Çokcan co-established a new Topic Group on Construction Robotics, acting alongside the other established 30 topic groups within euRobotics, ranging from wearables, bio-inspired robotics, health care, mining to infrastructure. In 2018, Sigrid has joined the board of directors. Through networks such as euRobotics, it is not only possible to promote a field of research, but also to actively shape policy, so that the importance of Construction Robotics is recognized, and appropriate research funding is allocated to relevant topics. Through the Multi- Annual Roadmap in research for the EU and its Horizon 2020 programme, these initiatives not only reach a chosen few researchers in academia, but also a wide range of commercial and non-commercial research institutions, robotics developers and users alike in Europe and beyond.
- 10. This year, we recognize the importance of such public–private partnerships and euRobotics by presenting euRobotics chairman Bernd Liepert with the Rob|Arch Community Contribution award. It is our goal that more researchers within the Robots in Architecture community will reach out to large-scale research and believe strongly that euRobotics AISBL is a prime example on how to combine economic with academic and political interests, fostering the common goal of creating robotic innovation. Innovation is also one of the core qualities we are looking for when selecting awardees. This year’s Pioneering Achievement and Pioneering Industry Award goes to two very different architectural companies, who have greatly facilitated the potential of robotic processes in their work. The internationally highly reputed architectural office Snøhetta was one of the first architectural companies to invest in robotic arms, joining us for our first KUKA|prc workshop in 2010 at the Advances in Architectural Geometry Conference in Vienna. For them, the robot has been an important tool for prototyping new approaches and design, placed closely to the open office in Oslo. The second awardee is Branch Technology from Tennessee in the USA, who have gone even further by not just using robots as CNC machines, but by developing their own robotic processes for large-scale robotic 3D printing. What we feel is special about Branch is that it is a company by architects who develop products for architects. As such, they did not stem from academia but from practice and therefore had to find investors to fund their ideas. Today they have a team with a wide variety of backgrounds and have realized a number of large-scale projects, collaborated with companies such as Foster + Partners and even won an award for their joint vision of future construction on Mars by the NASA. We believe that this drive embodies the true spirit of the community. We see in Branch a perfect role model where robotics lies at the core to enable technology-driven creativity in new business models. By Yu Lei’s research at Tsinghua University in China and his own professional workshop, we do not just honour a single person, who has made significant contributions to architectural robotics in China, but also the entire Chinese community of companies and researchers,
- 11. where the past years have seen great developments and a surge of new ideas and initiatives, as was demonstrated at this year’s CAADRIA conference organized by Prof. Xu Weiguo and the DADA community. While the potential for Construction Robotics in China is huge, there is also a great need for education and research and thus educators like Yu Lei are important trailblazers by sharing and starting new business models in architecture. We also believe that it is important to recognize the researchers, without whose work into robotics we would not have today’s sophisticated methods and machines at hand, and who create tomorrow’s tools and processes today. Jonas Buchli, director of the ETH Zurich Agile & Dexterous Robotics Lab, is one such pioneer whose work spans across many disciplines—from neurobiology and human locomotion to service robotics and also architecture, where has been a Principal Investigator of the NCCR Digital Fabrication, developing the In situ Fabricator (IF), with the goal of enabling the machine to autonomously perform precise mobile manipulation tasks in unstructured and unpredictable environments. We recognize his work with a Pioneering Research Award. In 2018, the Rob|Arch conference is back in Europe for the first time since Vienna in 2012 and is being hosted at ETH Zurich. ETH Zurich, in particular through the work of Gramazio Kohler Research, has been a central part of the research community and further solidified that status with the creation of the NCCR Digital Fabrication, a multi- disciplinary research cluster with more than 14 professors. We see ETH Zurich and the NCCR Digital Fabrication as a prime example how research can happen on a very large scale, with highly interdisciplinary and diverse research teams. At the same time, we believe that innovative research can also be done at a smaller scale, as it is demonstrated by this year’s 15 Rob|Arch conference workshops, involving tutors from more than 25 institutions, that are hosted centrally in ETH Zurich’s Robotic Fabrication Laboratory. An effort like Rob|Arch 2018 is only possible when many people work together towards a common goal. We would like to thank our local hosts at ETH Zurich and the NCCR Digital Fabrication, the Scientific Board led by Jan Willmann and all minds and hands involved in setting up such a big event.
- 12. We are grateful to Matt Jezyk (Autodesk) and Alois Buchstab (KUKA) for their continuing and enthusiastic support of the community through their respective companies, and we would like to thank all sponsors of this conference – Arup, BCG, Sika, Erne, Moog, and Bachmann Engineering – for this year’s collaboration in making Rob|Arch 2018 a success. Sigrid Brell-Çokcan (Association for Robots in Architecture) Johannes Braumann (Association for Robots in Architecture)
- 13. Preface New Scientific Frontiers The emergence of robotics with the creative sectors has led to an entirely new epistemology of collective making that is inextricably open and future-oriented. Challenged by increasingly complex technological and environmental problems, architects, designers, civil and process engineers, and roboticists are seeking novel practices of collaboration and exchange that deliberately overcome and dissolve traditional disciplinary boundaries. This collective approach to working with robots is not only revolutionizing how things are designed and made, but is fundamentally transforming the culture, politics and economics of the creative industries as a whole. What distinguishes contemporary industrial robots from their industrial predecessors—and indeed from other contemporary computer-controlled devices—is their versatility. Like computers, today’s robotic arms are suitable for a wide variety of tasks: they are “generic”, open-ended, adaptable and not restricted to any particular application or disciplinary focus. This versatility allows them to be readily customized and programmed to suit a wide range of specific intentions, both at the material and conceptual levels. It has also allowed us to shift our perception of robots as mechanistic, utilitarian devices suited to standardized serial production, towards understanding them as creative tools for exploring, designing and realizing physical objects and the built environment. If the first robotic age—the age of industrial automation—vastly improved our physical productivity, the second robotic age will surely come to distinguish itself as a driver of creative capacity. The present moment is ripe for connecting robot technology with imagination and materialization, inspiring new fundamental discoveries and opening new scientific frontiers. In fact, we have within reach access to volumes of information and centuries of knowledge about how to design and realize the material world. Aided by global digital connectedness, open-source ideals and collective encounters, robotics rejuvenates traditional disciplinary wisdom with entirely new practices of scientific collaboration and knowledge transfer. Now, more
- 14. than ever, we are coming to understand that robotics research should not be bound by constricting disciplinary standards, constraints or ideologies lest we limit its potential. Yet to explore this unprecedented potential requires not only a technical grasp of robots’ capabilities and limitations, but also an in-depth understanding of the disciplinary consequences of robotics research. With its theme of “Radical Cross- disciplinarity”, Rob|Arch 2018 facilitates this understanding by encouraging novel scientific approaches, applications and collaborations, not just in robotics, but beyond. Closing the Loop The Rob|Arch conference series was first launched in Vienna, Austria, in 2012 by Sigrid Brell-Çokcan and Johannes Braumann, the founders of the Association for Robots in Architecture. Their purpose was to make industrial robots more accessible to the creative industries—including art, design and architecture—by sharing ideas, research results and technological developments. The series has since become a biannual tradition in the international community (travelling to Michigan, US, in 2014 and to Sydney, Australia, in 2016) and has decisively boosted the exchange and dynamics within. In 2018, Rob|Arch lands at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich), marking an important milestone for the digital fabrication community: ETH Zurich is not only one of the leading international universities for technology and science, it is also the institution where the first industrial robotic fabrication laboratory for non-standard architectural fabrication processes was installed in 2005. Closing this loop gives us the opportunity to foster novel explorations and state-of-the-art knowledge, techniques and methods, while consolidating and advancing our collective understanding of the evolution and impact of robotics in art, design and architecture. It is no coincidence that Rob|Arch 2018 is also co-hosted by the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) in Digital Fabrication. Launched in 2014, the NCCR Digital Fabrication is itself a truly cross-disciplinary research platform meant to foster the seamless combination of digital technologies and physical building processes through cooperation and exchange beyond disciplinary boundaries.
- 15. Content and Contributions The Rob|Arch 2018 publication features the most important contributions to the conference. Rather than featuring merely formalist or technicist robotic adventures, this publication goes beyond pure built outcome to forward fresh approaches to scientific innovation, knowledge exchange and cross-disciplinary collaboration. This includes designers, artists and architects, and also—and increasingly— computation and robotics experts and builders, materials scientists and engineers, process and systems specialists and manufacturers, to name just a few. As a consequence, this book gathers exceptional, scientifically rigorous projects that not only transform the way we design and make, but which also build collaborative capacity in the field of robotic fabrication. The structure of this publication addresses this “new territory” of collaborative research. Stepping beyond theoretical observation, it outlines five distinct epicentres of practical research, which range from design and simulation research to automated assembly and real-world applications. Robotics and material and structural engineering play an integral role in each of these five areas. Chapter 1 (“Design and Simulation”) discusses new computational approaches to image classification using neural networks, stochastic assembly and deep learning for robotic construction; it also presents procedural fabrication workflows and haptic programming techniques, automatic path planning methods, visual feedback techniques, and function representation models. Novel materials and material processes for robotic fabrication are introduced in Chapter 2 (“Material and Processes”), including thermally tuned concrete panel printing, time-based material deposition, and digitally controlled concrete injection processes. This is complemented by research into the robotic manipulation of filament material and the automated control of material behaviour for spatial extrusion processes. In Chapter 3 (“Construction and Structure”), the emphasis is on new robotic construction processes and structural applications, for example bespoke concrete reinforcement, highly versatile wood processing, automated band-saw cutting for complex timber structures,
- 16. fabrication-aware methods for the realization of non-standard timber shells, and an advanced hybrid subtractive-additive approach to robotically construct double-curved concrete shells. Finally, the chapter presents a novel approach to the construction of jammed architectural structures. Robotic control, machinery, tooling and fabrication are discussed in Chapter 4 (“Control and Fabrication”), involving tubular composite fabrication with the aid of robotic swarms, automated manufacturing of natural composites, 3D printing with clay on freeform moulds, choreographic robotic wood manipulation, aerial construction using a cyber-physical macro-material system, as well as adaptive robotic carving. Also outlined in this chapter are approaches for multi-mode hybrid fabrication, robotic extrusion of functionally graded building components, as well as of elements with non-standard topology, on-site robotic construction and additive manufacturing techniques for non- woven textiles. The transfer to larger scales of real-world applications and practices is addressed in Chapter 5 (“Application and Practice”). Here we present automated slipforming for façade elements, robotic brick printing and stacking, robotic sewing of wooden shells, additive manufacturing of truss-shaped concrete pillars, and the realization of topology-optimized concrete structures using abrasive techniques. Large-scale bespoke timber frame construction and cooperative robotic brick assembly are also discussed. Workshop Activities Rob|Arch 2018 features a variety of formats and sessions to encourage creative dabbling and encounters with different research topics, practices and field-wide issues. Led by experts from academia, practice and industry, Rob|Arch 2018 workshops empower participants to learn and practise hands-on skills, and discuss cutting-edge fabrication techniques and trends with their peers in a collaborative environment. This year’s workshops offer a broad range of topics, including multiple robotic fabrication, industry-grade robotic programming using HAL, robotic real-time control using Grasshopper, robotic fabrication through the COMPAS framework, chainsawed wood joinery, cooperative
- 17. robotic assembly of spatial timber structures, large-scale robotic construction, hybrid robotic 3D printing of concrete shell structures, autonomous robotic swarm systems, adaptive spatial 3D printing of space frame structures, automated assembly in constrained sites, mixed reality environments for complex steel structures, mixed reality simulation for collaborative design exploration, as well as an introduction to KUKA|prc for Dynamo. Beyond Boundaries Rob|Arch 2018 aims to bring the community ground-breaking approaches to robotic fabrication from the most innovative research laboratories in the world, all while illuminating alternative pathways to boosting cross-disciplinary research and exchange. This publication therefore highlights contributions that not only substantially advance the state-of-the-art in robotic fabrication, but also challenge the reputedly clear division between research, practice and industry. It is our belief that effective knowledge transfer and exchange between different disciplines is crucial for the development of truly innovative and high-impact research in robotics, a priori, rather than a posteriori. Specifically, Rob|Arch 2018 looks at new paradigms of scientific collaboration, along with the challenges, risks and dynamics within this process. Given that our collective expertise includes autonomous control systems, advanced construction, collaborative design tools, computerized materials and structures, adaptive sensing and actuation, on-site and cooperative robotics, machine-learning, human–machine interaction, large-scale robotic fabrication and networked workflows (the list goes on), we can no longer discuss cross- disciplinarity, cooperation and collaboration in abstract terms. Doing so would be utterly inadequate to address the manifold cultures and practices of robotics that have emerged to master the increasingly complex technological and environmental challenges we face today. While we have observed a growing capacity for knowledge transfer and exchange in Rob|Arch submissions with each subsequent edition of the conference, this year the blurring of disciplinary boundaries between creative-, scientific- and practice-based domains is particularly
- 18. significant. We view this as a sign that complex problems cannot be dealt with from a single disciplinary perspective alone. Yet, while this blurring has yielded many new robotic explorations and real-world applications, these have not taken place uniformly. For example, the fields of intelligent computational design and simulation systems are particularly benefiting from an expanded set of collaborations and exchange between researchers and industry practitioners. Other areas that have especially benefitted from collaborative exchange include: advanced robotic control systems, and feedback processes that enable robots to adapt to different material conditions and changing environments. In all these cases, constant interaction and knowledge transfer between architects, designers, engineers and roboticists are pivotal, both as a result and as a catalysing instrument. The fast pace of creative and scientific research documented by Rob|Arch is no doubt a result of the bringing-together of diverse disciplines, competences and cultures. Perhaps the emerging cross- disciplinary culture of robotic fabrication research will, through the collaboratively built future environment, one day yield a generational change in how we view the collaborative creative process more broadly. As Richard Sennett once described it: it stimulates a gathering of creative explorations similar to collective encounters that in the pre- machinic age used to be related with, and venerated for, all things man- made. Acknowledgments The Scientific Chairs would like to express their gratitude to the Conference Chairs, Fabio Gramazio and Matthias Kohler, for entrusting us with the development of Rob|Arch 2018. We would like to extend our gratitude to the Association for Robots in Architecture, namely Sigrid Brell-Çokcan and Johannes Braumann, for their invaluable support and commitment, and, above all, for the forming of a global (and cross-disciplinary) creative robotics community through the development and promotion of Rob|Arch. In addition, we would also like to thank Autodesk, KUKA, ARUP, Boston Consulting Group, Sika, ERNE, Moog and Bachmann Engineering who financially supported
- 19. Rob|Arch 2018. Our sincere appreciation goes out as well to the Paper Committee; this conference and publication would not have been possible without their timeless effort and support. The Scientific Chairs also wish to thank the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) Digital Fabrication for co-hosting and supporting Rob|Arch 2018. The engagement of the NCCR Digital Fabrication, including its management staff, technicians and researchers, has been decisive in making this conference and publication possible. As such, a special thanks goes to Russell Loveridge, Orkun Kasap and Kaitlin McNally for their extraordinary commitment and work in coordinating and pushing Rob|Arch 2018 forward. We would also like to thank our Workshop Chair, Romana Rust, and all our workshop partners for their exceptional engagement. And, we would also like to extend our gratitude to ETH Zurich and the Department of Architecture for the generous opportunity to pursue Rob|Arch 2018 in Zurich at the Hoenggerberg Campus. Last but not least, we would like to thank all our research partners and peer institutions, our local supporters and colleagues at ETH Zurich, University of Technology, Sydney, and Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. Finally, we would also like to thank Springer Engineering for their kind support in editing and publishing this scientific publication. Jan Willmann Philippe Block Kendra Byrne Marco Hutter Tim Schork June 2018
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- 21. especially as we have all been discussing the advisability of your taking Beatrix away." "For a honeymoon?" asked Franklin involuntarily. "Exactly," Aunt Honoria gave a little laugh. "Because you two young despots have broken the conventions by this secret marriage, I think it follows that you should do something to stop gossip and comment by conforming to an old custom. What do you say, my friend?" Franklin put a curb upon his eagerness. To get Beatrix to sea on his yacht—that was the thing. It would give him a chance, just a chance, to win his way to Beatrix's untouched and wilful heart, and go far to show York that his intuition and cunning reasoning were wrong. "If you think so," he said, "I am perfectly willing to fall in with your wishes." "That's extremely nice of you!" Franklin showed his excellent teeth and gave a little bow. But not being a lady's man he failed to produce an Elizabethan compliment or one that might have proved that there is gallantry even in these careless days. Aunt Honoria took the word for the deed, and Franklin's arm down the steps. The sun was dipping into the Sound and the whole panorama of sky was striped and splashed with red. Young voices drifted toward them from the tennis courts and a flock of wild ducks high up in a wide V flew rapidly above their heads. The scent of flowers rose up to them as they walked and a very golden day slipped gently into evening.
- 22. "I don't know what Beatrix will have to say about it," said Franklin. There was a rather dry laugh. "Oh, I had not forgotten that Beatrix, although happily married, is a factor to be consulted." Franklin laughed too. "No," he said, with several memories very clear in his mind, "one could hardly forget that." And then the tall, white-haired, dignified woman, about whom there was an intellectual humanity very rarely met with, did an unexpected thing. She stopped suddenly and stood in front of Franklin, eye to eye with him. "My dear Pelham," she said, with a touch of propheticism, "you will not find the woman in Beatrix, nor will she have discovered the woman in herself, until that precious moment when, quite conscious of her abdication of a mock throne, she falls in with your wishes like a simple trusting child. When that moment comes, if ever it does, I shall give praise to God, because the woman in Beatrix will be very sweet and beautiful." And then they continued on their way through the sleepy gardens. "So shall I," said Franklin quietly. "The fact that the pastoral will not be given will help us considerably. Beatrix, who, by the way, has taken small part in the rehearsals, will turn for amusement to something else. Her father and mother both desire that she shall put an end to gossip and give our good friends no further excuse to hold her up as the most unconventional girl of the day. That sort of reputation so rightly belongs to young women of the stage whose success depends far more on advertisement than talent. Where is your yacht?" "Lying in the river, fully commissioned."
- 23. "Oh, well, then everything is easy! Surely nothing could be more delightful for Beatrix than to make a cruise under these romantic circumstances. Leave it all to me, my dear boy. I'll see that you get your wife to yourself, never fear." Beatrix ran her arm round Aunt Honoria's waist. "Well," she said, with the smile that she always used when it was urgently necessary to win a heart, "am I to be allowed in this conference, or am I a back number in the family now?" She had watched this intimate talk between Miss Vanderdyke and Franklin with growing uneasiness. Finally, in the middle of one of Ida Larpent's best stories, she had sprung up, made short work of the distance between herself and them and broken into the conversation. "We were talking about you, my dear," said Aunt Honoria. "No!" cried Beatrix. "Impossible!" Franklin caught her mocking glance and dug his heels into the path. "We were making plans for you, charming plans, honeymoon plans as a matter of fact, and as the pastoral is cancelled you will no doubt fall in with them with enthusiasm." "The pastoral cancelled? Why?" The girl's voice was incredulous. "But I've been to all the trouble of getting a special costume, nearly all the younger people in the house-party have been chosen on purpose." "Our friend the matinée idol has flown away to pick up a bigger seed elsewhere." A flush of anger colored Beatrix's face and her eyes glinted. "He said something to me this morning about motion pictures. I thought
- 24. he was endeavoring to advertise himself. I never dreamed he would have the impertinence to chuck us!" "Well, his withdrawal simplified things, my dear, as I will tell you later. Come to my room ten minutes before dinner and I will give you the latest family plan. In the meantime, two's company, and I will get a few words with my old friend, the Admiral, who is wandering about like a lost soul." Aunt Honoria nodded and with her shoulders as square as those of a well-drilled man, went gracefully to where the septuagenarian lover was either chewing the cud of bitter reflection or recovering from a long bout of exaggerated and over-emphasized commonplaces. And then Beatrix turned sharply to Franklin. "Be good enough to tell me what all this means," she said. Franklin showed his teeth in his peculiar silent laugh. "Why put a pin through Miss Vanderdyke's little surprise?" Beatrix intended to know. Her curiosity was alight. It was so obvious that she had been under discussion and as the family was to be dragged in, so certain that she was going to be coerced into something totally against her wishes. But she changed her tactics. "Oh, look," she cried, "isn't that sail perfectly charming against the sky?" "Corking," said Franklin, not looking at it, but at her. By Jupiter, how lovely, how desirable, but how amazingly perverse she was! A man would have not lived for nothing who could break her and make her, even if she never returned his love. "It's a good world," she said, with a little sigh, waiting to catch Franklin on the hop. "Sometimes I'm consumed with a longing to be right away in the middle of the sea—to get even with things."
- 25. She caught him. It was uncanny. "The chance is yours," he said, easily beaten. "It has been decided that we go for our honeymoon on the Galatea." She whipped around. "Oh, so that's it, is it? You've been working up a conspiracy to get me on your yacht so that you may escape from gossip? I see. Quite clever to enrol my family against me, but my answer to you this afternoon holds good." For all the love that had come upon him so suddenly, Franklin lost patience. He put his hand on her arm and held her in a close grip. "Let it hold good," he said. "Stand out against being my wife until you see sense and learn that others deserve consideration besides yourself. But conform now to your people's wishes and put York off the scent. That's all you're required to do at the moment." "Take your hand away," said Beatrix icily. "This is not a woman's bedroom. I can call for help here remember." Franklin retained his grip. He was very angry. "You fool," he said, too completely out of control to choose his words. "Look at this thing sanely. Come out of your house of cards and play the game like a grown woman. The scandal that drove you into taking advantage of me will be ten thousand times worse if York gets to work." "That doesn't worry me," said Beatrix calmly. "I'll thank you for my arm." "You don't count," said Franklin. "Consideration must be given to your people and to me." "I'm perfectly willing and even anxious to protect my people, but"—and she gave him two fearless eyes—"I see no reason why I should worry about you."
- 26. "Why not? Where would you be now but for my having come to the rescue?" Beatrix gave a most tantalizing laugh. "When you learned to play the trumpet you were a good pupil, Mr. Franklin. Any other man would have done as well, you know." Franklin dropped her arm. "Good God," he said, "you beat me. I can't compete with you. I might just as well try to drive sense into a lunatic." It was good, it was worth being alive to Beatrix to see this man, this fine, strong, clean-built, square-shouldered man, who had dared to conceive the remote possibility of humbling her for what she had done, who had had the sublime audacity to believe that he could teach her a lesson, standing impotent before her, self-confessedly her inferior, when it came to wits. She showed it in her smile, in her almost bland and child-like glee, in her frank pleasure. He had said a thing to her that no man should ever have said to a woman and expect to be forgiven. She would remember it as long as she lived and make him pay for it and pay and pay again. "Even lunatics have their sane moments," she said. "Mine come whenever I think about you. Isn't that Malcolm Fraser on the terrace? How delightful. Suppose we go back now, after yet another of our little wrangles, shall we?" She stood silhouetted against the darkening sky, with her hands behind her back, her head held high, the very epitome of utter carelessness, the last word in individualism, the thoughtless and selfish enjoyment of the moment and of life generally so long as it was without responsibility, concentration, or a call to do anything for anybody but herself.
- 27. "Count me out, please," said Franklin. "You must get out of this business in your own way. I shall leave here to-night and go to sea. I wish you luck." He bowed, turned on his heel and walked away, and as he went, he hoped that he might never see that girl again. XV "Now, old man," said Franklin when at last he found himself with Malcolm Fraser, "let's get out of earshot of this chattering crowd and come up to things." "The sooner the better," said Fraser. They left the hall and passed the ball-room, to which everyone with a sense of rhythm, even if with no ear for music, had been drawn by the irresistible syncopation of a large banjo band of colored musicians. The drummer was already committing demented acts upon a scavenger collection of tins, boxes, and whistles. They went out into the moonlight and through the gardens to the summer house. The dynamic energy which radiated from Franklin did much, so far as Fraser was concerned, to spoil the exquisite peace and lassitude of the night. All the poet in him gave him the keys with which to open some of the unnoticed doors to Nature's storehouses of beauty and called him to stand very still and fill his brain and soul with the sight that met his eyes. He had never felt prouder of his country than when he revelled in the picture of the moon-touched
- 28. Sound, magic with the reflection of a multitude of stars, and ran his eyes along the dim outline of shore to his right and caught the bright eyes of thousands of cheerful lights. It seemed to him that Nature, with the proud consciousness of her genius as an artist, had outdone herself in setting a scene for the human comedy in which he had been cast for the second male part. Water and moon and stars, the mystery of night, the feeling of illimitable space, the scent of sleeping flowers, the whisper of fairies, all as old and even older than the hills—surely this was an appropriate setting for the working out of the ancient and inevitable drama, the ever-recurring clash, between a man and a woman. "Go ahead, Pel," he said. "This morning in New York you left this strange story of yours at the point where the entrance of York into it made you decide to marry Beatrix. I have not got the novelist's brain so I can't for the life of me see what can have happened in the chapter that has been begun since then." "My dear chap," said Franklin, flinging the end of a cigarette over the wall, "don't you know that more impossible things are done every hour in life than ever find their way into books?" "Yes, I know that." "Well, the thing that I should have thought the very limit of impossibility happened here, on this very spot, this afternoon when I got back. Take a guess." Fraser's answer came quickly. "Beatrix loves you." There was no mirth in Franklin's laugh. "Guess again." "You love Beatrix." "A precious clever fellow, aren't you? What the devil made you get to love so quickly? I expected you to flounder through a dozen
- 29. guesses and then be wide of the mark." "A man and a woman and love," said Fraser. "Why hire a detective to make a mystery of that? It's any poet's job." Franklin kicked the wall viciously. "There's nothing for a poet in this," he said. "I do love this girl. I wish to God I didn't. I'd give ten years of my life if she left me as cold as a flapping fish. You know what we talked over this morning. We decided that there was only one way for me to get out honestly of that fool maze in which I'd been caught. The reasons were pretty obvious. My family and the Vanderdykes were at the mercy of that glossy charlatan and because of the ungovernable impulses of this ... this—what in thunder is the right word for Beatrix? I give it up." "Undiscovered girl. Will that do?" "No," said Franklin. "Not a bit like it." "Well, then, dollar-ruined, misnamed victim of a false civilization. How's that?" "Too long and too pedantic. I wanted one word. However, let it go. What's it matter? It's a waste of words to describe her and a waste of time to consider her. When I put things to her plainly and bluntly, she told me to go to the devil. I sent for you to use your influence, hoping, as of course you can see, that she might come down to solid things and see sense,—hoping too that, married, I might be able to force my way into her heart, if she's got one." "Oh, yes, she's got one." "I doubt it. Very highly finished watch works is all the heart she's got. However, since that first talk we've had another and that's made your kindness in coming here utterly useless."
- 30. Fraser turned eagerly towards his friend. He had no hope of ever being any more to Beatrix than an art student can be to a very perfect Gainsborough at which he gazes from behind a rail. He could neither buy her nor win her. She was completely out of his reach. Not able to marry her himself, he would rather see her married to Franklin than any living man. "Why?" he asked. "Because I'm off. I'm out. I'm through. I'm not an expert in love. As a matter of fact I'm a boob in the business. It's new to me. But it's hit me good and hard, old son, and with any encouragement or with half a chance, I'd go for it with everything decent that's in me." "Go for it," said Fraser, with an odd thrill in his voice. "You have all the luck." Franklin shook his head. "No. I've done. She has no use for me. She mocks me, twists me round her finger, holds me up by the scruff of the neck, gets more fun out of me than if I were a red-nosed comedian and nearly drives me to murder. I just have to get away. I'm going to-night." "To-night? But my dear old Pel, you—you only found out that you loved her a few hours ago." "Quite long enough." "But, good Lord, you must let me see what I can do. When we were kids I used to have some influence with her. That is, once or twice she did things for my sake. To chuck the whole thing now, when it looks far more serious than ever,—why Pel, my dear man, talk about ungovernable impulses——" "Oh, I know," growled Franklin. "We're both tarred with the same brush. We're both money-maniacs. However, in perfectly cold
- 31. blood, standing here to-night, I assure you that I am better out of her way. I can't help her. She won't be helped. She doesn't give a red cent for anything that may happen. All she cares about is just to go laughing through the moment. Well, let her. But she'll have to go alone. I love her in the sort of way that makes me want to choke her when she starts her tricks. That's the truth. I'm sorry. I don't want to be unsporting and all that but, Malcolm, she isn't safe with me." His voice shook as he said this thing. "Wait until the morning," said Fraser urgently. "Let me show her the mess she's in." "Can't be done," said Franklin. "I've told Albert to put my things in the car and I'm off to town right away. I shall go aboard in the morning and weigh anchor at two o'clock. I'll wait for you till then and not a second later." He laid his hand on Fraser's shoulder. "Get your things and come now. There's nothing to do here, worse luck." "In any case," said Fraser, "I want to have a bit of a talk with Beatrix now that I'm here." "All right. Well, then, so long, Malcolm. It was mighty good of you to come. Don't fail to be in time to-morrow." He turned and went, walking quickly and waking all the flowers with his energy. Fraser watched him go,—his tall, wiry, square-shouldered, muscular figure thrown out against the moon-silvered stone-work of the terrace. Then he turned back to the scene that filled his brain with imagery and that inarticulate worship which is offered by all good students to the Master for the perfection of His work. The silence sang. Many of the shore lights had gone out. But the moon rode high and the stars were at their brightest. The faint breeze had fallen away. Fraser raised his hand above his head in a sort of salute
- 32. and then wheeled round and followed Franklin toward the elephantine house that made a huge black patch against the transparent sky. As he got nearer to it the music of a Hula-Hula thing came to him,—a fascinating, hip-moving mixture that suggested both Hawaii and Broadway and he could see the dancers flitting past the open windows of the ball-room. Among them was Beatrix, in the arms of one of those spineless semi-professional dancing men, a new, curious and uncomfortable breed that has developed in New York since the craze carried it on to its feet. Her mouth was open and her teeth gleaming and her young body moving with exquisite grace and ease. Fraser went up to one of the windows and watched her until the tune came to an end. Every man has a dream. Somewhere or other in the life of men, all men, there is one precious, priceless thing tucked away in the secret drawer of the heart. Beatrix, as a little, frank, fearless girl, lived and was glorified, for Fraser. He allowed himself just one short sigh. "And now," he said to himself, "to show for the first time in history that a poet can be a man of action for the sake of a friend. If I fail, I'll, yes, I'll eat and drink my self-filling pen." It was one o'clock the next day when Franklin left the chart-room of the Galatea, where he had been planning out a cruise with the skipper. He went on deck. All hands had been busily at work since early morning, cleaning and polishing. The yacht looked like a beautiful woman, fresh from the hands of manicure and maid. There was a shout of "Galatea ahoy" from the port side. Franklin took no notice. It was probably the arrival of the last boat-
- 33. load of stores. He stood with his arms behind him and his mind back in the Vanderdyke gardens with the afternoon sun aslant upon them, and as he watched the retreating figure of the imperious girl to whom he was less than the dust, a mere pawn to be moved when it was necessary in her game, the amazing thrill which had discovered to him the love that was to be the greatest thing in his life, ran all over him again, and shook him with its strength and passion. Well, he was bolting from her, bolting because he was afraid. It was the act of a coward, perhaps, but that girl had the power of making queer creatures of men. And he did not intend to be one of them. That was all. A laugh, taken up by the breeze and thrown past his ear like the petal of a flower, turned him round. Unable to believe his eyes, he saw Beatrix, Ida Larpent and Malcolm Fraser, standing on deck, while luggage was being piled about them. Fraser waved his hand triumphantly. Mrs. Larpent gave one of her slow smiles and Beatrix, with the expression of an angel and a touch of timidity and even humbleness that Franklin had never seen before, came forward. "Come aboard, sir," she said, with a very proper salute. "Malcolm showed me the error of my ways last night and like a good and faithful wife I am going on my honeymoon." And then the old Beatrix returned and a mocking smile turned Franklin's heart to ice. XVI
- 34. Franklin was a man who inherited a horror of scenes. If he saw a crowd in the street reinforced by running figures he turned on his heel and went the other way. Anything in the nature of an argument sent him out into the street. He was at any time perfectly willing to fight, either for the sake of the exercise or to punish an offender, but he shied at a fracas, a domestic wrangle or the remote possibility of placing himself in a position of being surrounded by many people all talking at the same time. He had camped in solitary places, and communed with nature in her forest cathedrals. He liked the silences. The moment that this amazing boat-load came aboard the Galatea he saw himself plunged into a scene, if ever there was one. Malcolm Fraser was bursting with information and explanations. Mrs. Larpent gave every indication of the fact that she felt that some justification for her presence was required, and behind Beatrix's impish laugh there was a high-spirited story waiting to be told. Just for one moment Franklin stood bare-headed in front of Beatrix completely and utterly nonplussed. She was the last person on earth whom he had expected to see on the yacht. He had, indeed, made up his mind never to see her again.—to cut and run from the pain of her, the allurement, the overwhelming attraction. He gazed at her as if she had fallen from the clouds. He had been treated like a child again, "used" once more, and he was angry, but as he took in her charming appearance, the calm audacity of her expression, the indescribable loveliness of her face, he rejoiced. Then he pulled himself together and tried to perform the operation of smiling as a new husband should. "You're in excellent time," he said, and gave a shout, caught the eye of the mate and beckoned
- 35. him to come forward. "Get everything ready for Mrs. Franklin and Mrs. Larpent. Look alive and have Mr. Fraser's things taken down to his stateroom at once." The mate was English. "Aye! Aye, sir!" He was also young and sandy and somewhat precocious, and from the tail-end of his eye there came a look of deep admiration for the owner's wife, whom he now saw for the first time. "Stop a minute," said Franklin. "I don't see anything of your maid, Beatrix. You'll never be able to get along without her." "You're very thoughtful," said Beatrix, graciously. "Anyone would think you had been on a honeymoon before." And then she laughed. "For some reason or other Helene is very much afraid of you. I brought her, but evidently she's hidden behind something,—the baggage probably." She called "Helene," and the pretty face and compact figure of the young Breton appeared reluctantly from behind several huge innovation trunks, hat-boxes, boot-cases, cabin- trunks, and the Lord knows what besides,—enough, as it seemed to Franklin, to supply half a dozen wives with unnecessaries. "Perhaps you'll go below with Mr. Jones and make your own arrangements. Otherwise, I'm afraid you won't be very comfortable." Beatrix smiled in her best social manner. "It's too bad to put you to all this inconvenience and worry," she said. "I'm so sorry, but I dare say we shall all fit in with perfect ease and comfort. More like a young liner than a yacht, isn't she? And who named her the Galatea? So terribly suitable, as little Mrs. Reeves would say. Lead the way, Mr. Jones." There was a touch of almost navy etiquette about the way in which the mate saluted and obeyed.
- 36. Beatrix beckoned to Helene, who was as frightened as a rabbit at sight of dogs, and the little party went below. Franklin watched her go, saw her look about her with a touch of perfectly simple excitement, envied the sun as she put up her face to catch it and the friendly smile with which she rewarded the mate. "If only," he said to himself, "if only——" And then Mrs. Larpent came forward. There was a most curious little smile round her very red lips and wide nostrils, and a whole dictionary of meaning in her eyes. "You must be a little surprised to see——" Franklin cut her short. "Not at all. Delighted!" he said, bluntly. "Would you be good enough to follow Beatrix and take your choice of staterooms? I will endeavor to get a stewardess for you before we sail." "Thanks, so much!" said Ida Larpent, making no attempt to disguise her sense of triumph at being on the yacht. "How delightful it will be to get away from the land and its people for a time. I congratulate you on the Galatea." Franklin waited until she had disappeared and then strode over to Malcolm Fraser, who was watching the arriving baggage, took his arm and marched him out of ear-shot of the crew. "What the devil have you done? You call yourself a friend and land me in this mess!" His voice was thick with anger. Fraser looked as astonished as he felt. "But you called me down to the Vanderdykes to do this very thing," he said. "I've done it. What's the trouble?" "You colossal idiot!" said Franklin. "Haven't you imagination enough to see it for yourself? Have you forgotten every blessed
- 37. thing that I told you last night? You haven't persuaded this girl to come aboard to oblige her people or to keep my name out of the papers. She doesn't give a solitary curse whether hers is in them or not. She's come just to have the satisfaction of playing with fire, and has brought Ida Larpent because she knows instinctively that she is the last woman on earth I care to see her with or have on the Galatea." All the way back to town, Fraser had been congratulating himself on having achieved the impossible. He opened his mouth to speak. "I think you'd better dry up," said Franklin, "and give me time to cool down. At this moment I feel like pitching you overboard." He turned on his heel, went forward and stood, with his hands thrust into his pockets, gazing down the river. Like all poets, Malcolm Fraser was a very sensitive person. He was deeply hurt at the way in which his efforts were received by the man for whom he had a very deep regard. Like all poets,—even those who confine themselves to gloomy verses, to graves and broken hearts and wind in the trees,—he was an optimist. He had made up his mind that he had only to get Beatrix away to sea with Franklin to bring romance into their very strange, exotic story. He held the belief,—shared by many philosophers,—that in most cases love is the outcome of propinquity,—especially at sea. He didn't possess much, but he would give it all to watch the girl he loved become a woman and find herself for love of his friend. He threw a sympathetic glance at the square shoulders of his friend, and went below to his own familiar stateroom. From this he could hear Beatrix's merry laugh. She, at any rate, seemed to be happy, and
- 38. that was something. He could not for the life of him understand,— with his friend's confession still warm in his memory,—why, he, too, was not in the seventh heaven of delight at the fulfilment of what had yesterday seemed to be a dream. To the amazing unconventionality of the whole affair he gave no thought. He was an artist. Finally, and with a huge effort to master his anger and amazement, joy and sense of impending trouble, Franklin summed things up to the best of his ability: "Here's Beatrix," he said to himself, "not married to me,—supposedly on our honeymoon. I love her like an idiotic school-boy—she loathes me like the devil. Here's Ida Larpent, out for everything that she can get, playing her own hand with all the cunning of a card-sharp. Here's Fraser, one of the very best, a man with a heart of gold to whom friendship means loyalty, with a love for Beatrix which has outlasted his boyhood. And almost in sight of us all is the open sea. Great Scott, what a mess!" And then Captain McBean stood at his elbow. "Orders stand, sir?" "Of course," said Franklin. "But before we put off do what you can to get a stewardess aboard for Mrs. Larpent. You had better send Jones ashore. He has a wide smile and does things pretty quick, and,—wait a second, Captain,—let him bring back all the latest novels that he can find. We shall need something to keep the ladies busy." The Captain chuckled. He had been married twice. XVII
- 39. The Galatea was under way at two o'clock,—a clear, bright, sparkling afternoon with a hot sun, a transparent sky and hardly a puff of wind. Built on thorough sea-going lines, newly painted and in apple- pie order and carrying a crew of forty men she was, as well she might be, the envy of passing craft. Men who knew, ran their eyes along her graceful lines with admiration and took pleasure in her swan-like movement. Others on tugboats, shifting a quid, made rough guesses as to her daily cost in the manner of women talking over the clothes, jewels and spendings of a distinguished leader of society. About one-thirty two things happened,—the first of them comic, the other not without a touch of pathos. The sandy-headed mate, Horatio Jones, whose middle name of Nelson was dropped by him with a sneaking sense of its unfitness, had used his wide smile and glib tongue to some purpose and returned to the yacht with Mrs. O'Dowd after a busy thirty minutes. The young Irish, childless, wife of a sea-faring friend of his, she was not above earning good wages as stewardess and taking a look at the world, her husband being away. Also he brought with him a heterogeneous box full of what the book-seller had called the latest novels, but some of them had been out six months and so were in ripe old age. There was no time to make much of a choice, but Jones had, as usual, looked after himself by seeing that his collection included Rex Beach, Jack London, Irvin Cobb, Robert Chambers, Gene Stratton-Porter and Sinclair Lewis. It was simply to make up weight that he threw in Wells, Walpole, Dunsany, Lucas Malet, Conrad, Galsworthy, and other drawing-room "geezers," as he called them. They meant
- 40. nothing to him. He handed Mrs. O'Dowd over to the chief steward and with an air of pride and satisfaction followed the case down to the library and arranged its pristine contents in a long alluring line on the centre table. It seemed to him that the hardly-ever read sporting and technical volumes behind the glass of all the cases turned up their noses in contempt. The pathetic incident was the unexpected arrival of little Mrs. Lester Keene, who came on board with the air of a moving picture heroine chased by at least six desperate and obviously made up villains armed to the teeth. A little bag into which she had placed all her small items of jewelry and other treasures was clutched in one agitated hand and she carried an umbrella in the other. She was one of those women who regard an umbrella as the patent of respectability rather than as a weapon of service. She took it with her walking or driving,—wet or fine. It was a fetish, an institution. Deprived of her umbrella she would have felt like an actor without his daily advertisement or an Oxford Don caught naked by a chambermaid. She was assisted aboard, with many gasps, by a deck hand, and drew up, expecting apparently to see pirates and the skull and cross bones. Franklin turned and saw her and smiled a welcome. For some reason which he didn't endeavor to define he was glad to see the admirable little woman who had won his complete respect and admiration in her endeavor to put up a fight in Beatrix's bedroom that memorable night. "My dear Mrs. Keene," he said, holding out his hand, "I'm delighted to see you. Welcome to the Galatea! I was wondering how it was that my wife came to leave you behind."
- 41. Mrs. Keene bridled with indignation. "Your wife?" she said. "Well, this is really a most extraordinary country." "I beg your pardon," said Franklin, "I should have said Miss Vanderdyke." It had seemed to him quite natural to use the word "wife." "That's why I have come," said Mrs. Keene, her rather loose skin wabbling nervously. "Need I say more?" "Nothing more, but I must ask you at once to oblige me by remembering that everybody on this yacht believes, and must continue to believe, that Miss Vanderdyke is Mrs. Franklin. You know why as well as I do. That is understood, of course." His question, behind which there was very palpably the suggestion of a drastic course of action, achieved a bow from Mrs. Keene. He then pointed to a small suit-case. "Is that all you've brought?" "I had no time to pack anything else," she said. "Where is Beatrix?" "Below, settling for the cruise." "The cruise? Is this to be a cruise? Can nothing prevent this rash act?" Franklin shook his head. "You know Beatrix, Mrs. Keene." The little woman, who had great grit and even heroism beneath her indecisive and fluttering exterior, drew herself up. "Very good," she said, "I shall do what I conceive to be my duty." All the same she threw an anxious glance about her. It was quite obvious that she was looking for life-belts, life-boats, rafts and all the other paraphernalia of shipwrecks. No one could guess, nor did she herself quite realize, the immensity of her triumph of mind over matter in trusting herself at sea or the extent of the damage to her sense of
- 42. propriety that was made by her being obliged to lend her countenance to a quite indescribable proceeding. If she had imagined that she would ever find herself a companion to a young woman who went for a honeymoon with a man to whom she had not been married she would willingly have starved in London or taken a position as a waitress in an A.B.C. shop. "I was not well last night," she said, with a quiver in her voice. "I had one of my most severe attacks of neuralgia. I overslept myself this morning. I can only think that Beatrix left me behind because she was too thoughtful to disturb me. Mr. Franklin, I am not very strong. I have had a terrible time to get here. You must please forgive my agitation." Franklin felt thoroughly inclined to put his arm round the tremulous lady's shoulder and say, "There, there!" as Beatrix always did, and soothe her with soft words. It seemed to him that she was, with her pedantic and old-fashioned ideas, rather like the Dodo in the century to which he belonged, or that she resembled a faded stuffed canary under a glass case in a room furnished and painted by cubists. "You will find your stateroom very comfortable," he said, "and I will do all that I can to make you happy and contented. I'm very glad you've come." "Thank you! You are kinder than my former experience led me to expect. And now, please, where are the stairs?" Franklin smothered his laugh. He was glad for her sake that the mate was not in earshot. He called up one of the deck boys. "Take Mrs. Lester Keene below," he said, "and tell the chief steward to look after her."
- 43. It so happened that Mrs. Keene was immediately seen by Beatrix, and before Franklin moved away he heard her high, clear voice. "Brownie, you darling! Fancy seeing you here. I left you with red flannel round your face. You must have come by aeroplane." And then he heard the sound of someone bursting into tears and moved away. It was not until the Galatea had left her mooring well behind her that Malcolm Fraser screwed up his courage to face his friend. He found Franklin forward with his arms folded and a pipe between his teeth, watching the amazing skyline of the receding city, and running his eyes over the great docks that lined the banks of the river, the gigantic ferries, the impertinent tugs and a transatlantic liner being edged inch by inch into her berth, her portside all a-flutter with waving handkerchiefs. For several minutes Fraser stood shoulder to shoulder with his best pal, waiting for him to turn. He would have waited for an hour without a word because he had the rare gift of imagination and therefore of sympathy. The two are twins. But presently Franklin turned and there was an irresistible twinkle in his eyes. "Now then," he said, as though continuing a conversation, "how the blazes did you do it?" To Fraser that twinkle was worth a great deal. "Do you want to know the details, old man?" "'Course I do. Women aren't the only curious animals on earth, y' know." "After you had left," said Fraser gravely, "I tackled Beatrix. I had to wait until the dance was over and most of the people had gone to bed. Oddly enough I caught her at a moment when she was more
- 44. like the little simple girl with whom I used to play games as a kid than I've seen her for years. Perhaps it was due to the moon or the stars,—or both. Anyway she took my arm and we wandered into the garden and for quite a long time we talked of the old days and some of the things that she used to dream about. I think the fairies must have been dancing somewhere near. Then I switched things round to the present and told her, pretty plainly, what I conceived it to be her duty to do to retrieve herself. I spoke to her honestly and bluntly, like a brother, and she was very patient and listened to me without a word. I didn't exaggerate things at all. I didn't see how I could. They've gone to the whole lengths of exaggeration already. I talked about her family and their wholesome desire to avoid scandal, and I painted a picture of what York could do to put the name of Vanderdyke, which stands so high, into the kitchen, the garage and the reeking saloon. I pointed out that if, for the first time in her life, she didn't do something all against the grain she would jeopardize the noble efforts of Aunt Honoria and outrage all the endeavors of her father and mother to build up an aristocracy in this country. I believe I must have talked for half an hour and all the time she sat with her hands clasped together and the moonlight on her face, more beautiful than I have ever seen her look and more like the child that she used to be before she discovered the intolerance of wealth and had been spoiled by the obsequiousness of everybody round her. Just when I thought that I had won my point and was beginning to feel the warm glow of triumph, she got up. 'My dear old Malcolm, no wonder you write poetry,' she said. 'You are a sort of cherub, my dear. You have a head—a very nice head—and two wings, and that's all. All the same there is much heart in your
- 45. eloquence and an immense amount of common sense. The only thing is, I don't intend to marry Pelham Franklin under any circumstances whatever, so God bless you, old boy, and good night.' And with that she turned away, sang a little song and foxtrotted through the gardens on to the terrace and into the house. Presently I saw a light in her window, gave the whole thing up and went off to bed with my tail between my legs. Imagine my surprise when about eight o'clock this morning a discreet man-servant brought me a letter from her. Here it is." He slipped it out of his pocket and read it aloud:
- 46. "Dear Poet: "I have altered my mind just to prove to you that I am a woman after all, little as you think so. Also,—two reasons are better than one,—because I am bored stiff and have decided to take a cruise on the Galatea. But you must come, because we shall need a fourth at bridge,—make that an absolute stipulation,—and Mrs. Larpent will make the third. Pack your little trunk, dear Malcolm, and be ready immediately after breakfast. Heigh-ho, for the wind and the sea." "H'm," said Franklin, "she beats me." XVIII As he sat down to dinner that night in the admirable saloon, wholly devoid of the frills and furbelows which are so dear to the hearts of incurable landlubbers, Franklin threw an amused glance at Malcolm Fraser, who read it, laughed and signalled back. "Yes, by Jove, a very different table from the one we're used to! How about compensations?" Franklin looked from one guest to another, with close scrutiny. He caught the meaning of Fraser's mental question. Compensation? Beatrix Vanderdyke, dressed as though she were a woman of thirty bound for the opera,—in the highest spirits, her laugh ringing out frequently; Mrs. Claude Larpent, with her irresistible touch of
- 47. Paris, her fingers gleaming with rings and a queer Oriental stone which might have been the eye of some skeptical god watching everyone from her hair; and Mrs. Lester Keene, the very epitome of the Kensington of Thackeray's time, her nondescript hair, much touched with grey, scrupulously drawn back from her forehead, her mouse-colored dress lightened by a lace thing round her shoulders which might easily have been an anti-macassar. Malcolm Fraser also ran his eye round the table at which he had hitherto seen the open, healthy faces and square shoulders of Franklin's sporting friends. He was not at all sure,—perhaps because he was a poet,—that this new sight was not more pleasant to him than the old one. There was, however, one question that he asked himself again. "Why Mrs. Larpent?" He was not in any sense of the word a man of the world. He believed that all women were chaste and devoid of guile, but there was something about Mrs. Larpent which made him a little sorry to see her in the company of Beatrix,— he didn't know why. The portholes were open, as the night was hot. They framed round patches of a sky pitted with stars. The steady conscientious pulse of the engines and the slight swing of the yacht were the only indications of her activity. An excellent dinner was being served by four expert stewards who had devoted the most minute care in the decoration of the table in honor of "Mrs. Franklin." In the gallery a string quartette with piano was playing Bohême, almost to perfection. There was just the slightest inclination on the part of the pianist to syncopate the music. The poor wretch had been doomed to a cabaret for two seasons. Franklin, partly recovered from his shock, was determined to make the best of things. The sight of Beatrix in all the glory of her
- 48. youth was a delight to him. It filled him with joy and pride to see her sitting in that yacht of his, which he regarded as home. His blood danced every time that her laugh rang out. She added something to the atmosphere of the saloon which he had always subconsciously missed and desired. Nevertheless he told himself, and believed it to be true, that he had routed out of his mind every thought of making her his wife, even in name. Her dislike of him, expressed very definitely, and now shown by the aloof but perfectly courteous way in which she included him in the conversation, made the mere idea of such a thing impossible and absurd. She was on board to please herself, to carry out a whim and an impulse to do something new and different, and she had taken care to surround herself with a body guard in order to protect her. He saw all that and shrugged his shoulders. He said, as he had said over and over again, "She beats me. I can't compete with her. I give it up. She must have her head. At any rate all this will do something to put York off the scent, so what's the use of worrying? I bow the knee to autocracy." That was the mood of the man who had never hitherto allowed himself to be beaten by men or beasts. Women were not included in this list for the simple reason that they had never been permitted to interfere with his way of life. As for Beatrix, she was not thinking, dissecting or going to the mental bother of introspection. She was enjoying a new sensation, delighting in the thrill of a dangerous and what would be to most girls an inconceivable adventure. She looked upon the whole thing as merely an episode, an act in the drama of her life, and with enough sense of excitement to spur her on played her part of Franklin's wife with one appreciative eye on herself. She believed
- 49. that York would carry out his threat, knowing the man as well as she did, and she knew that as soon as the whole house of cards fell flat, as it was bound to do, her family, headed by Aunt Honoria, would punish severely. They would spoil her life at least for a year. She had gone on the cruise because the word "yacht" had filled her with the desire to smell the sea and try a new form of amusement. That was all. Franklin, either as a man or an enemy, or as one who had come to her rescue, counted for nothing. He meant no more to her than Captain McBean or Mr. Horatio Jones. He was merely the means of providing her with the antidote against boredom. She was out to enjoy a new experience at his expense. Hurrah for the open sea! Sufficient for the day, so long as the day was fine and the people in it kept her merry. When it came to Ida Larpent and the way in which she regarded her totally unexpected presence on the Galatea, the mental processes of her mind were as busily at work as the mechanical appliances of the ship's engine. This was no mere joy-ride for her. It was a business trip, the chances of which had been grasped eagerly with all the cunning of a woman who had lived on her wits and brought individualism to a fine art. She was going to use every moment to her own ultimate advantage. The fact that Beatrix had placed her among her favorites was an admirable step forward. She was clever enough to know that the sunshine of the beautiful young autocrat's smile might at any moment cloud over,—that her reign as a favorite was most ephemeral. But she had already watched things closely and had come to the conclusion that the marriage which had caused so much rejoicing among the Vanderdykes, romantic as it seemed, was an empty and hollow affair. She saw very plainly that
- 50. the heart of Beatrix was utterly untouched. She had yet to discover precisely how Franklin had been affected. She was no optimist, but it seemed to her that Franklin was as cool as Beatrix. He had, however, a way of hiding his feelings that would make it necessary for her to put him under her microscope. As things appeared on the surface, at any rate, everything was in her favor. She measured herself against Beatrix without egotism. The girl had all the advantage of youth and,—as her knowledge of men told her,—many of the disadvantages. She was going to set herself with the utmost calculation to stir up Franklin's passion. It seemed to her that the propinquity forced upon them all by living aboard a yacht would make that easy. She had examined herself in the mirror of her stateroom and come to the conclusion that she had never looked more beautiful or so completely feminine. Without any sense of loyalty to Beatrix, to whom she was indebted for this chance, she had made up her mind to attract Franklin with all the arts that she possessed. To become his mistress meant absolute freedom from money troubles, and that would be excellent. To become his wife,— well, why not? The laws of the country were all in her favor. Divorce was a hobby, an institution, and Beatrix was a worshipper at the altar of Something New. When it came to Malcolm Fraser, whom Beatrix had called the fourth of the party,—he was usually the fourth of every party,—what was he but simply a man who could do no more than enjoy the glamour of the impossible—a sort of star-gazer! His love for Beatrix dominated his secret life and he knew that he could show it only in one way,—by being her friend. He had no pain in his heart. He had no right to possess a heart at all where she was concerned, but no
- 51. one could prevent him from placing her in the throne of it and locking her in. And so he just revelled in her presence and was happy. There remained little Mrs. Lester Keene, the last member of this strange ill-assorted party, and she, who took everything seriously, and whose god was convention, was undergoing very genuine suffering. To be herself a party to any arrangement so unabashed in its smashing of all the rules of life was bad enough. Her self-respect, which meant so much to her, was deeply wounded, and when she thought of the girl who seemed to her to be a sort of queen and for whose beauty and purity she had the most intense admiration and regard, her perturbation became painful, even tragical. She suspected Franklin. Like all women who have gone through life looking at the truth through a key-hole, herself hidden, she believed no good of men. They were all wolves in sheep's clothing. They were the enemies of women. She conceived Franklin to be no different from those worldly creatures of whom she had read so frequently in her favorite novels, most of which had been written in the period of her youth by women. She was, therefore, most unhappy. She was also dreading sea-sickness. Poor little lady, what a combination of mental disquiet! XIX Franklin and Fraser left the dining saloon after a brief talk and joined the ladies in the little used drawing-room. They found that the
- 52. orchestra, which was as much a part of the yacht as the engines and invariably played Franklin's favorite melodies during and after dinner, had been dismissed. The Victrola was at work instead and the voluptuous strains of a more than usually saccharine Viennese waltz filled the charming room. Franklin drew up short at the door and put his hand on Fraser's arm. "Look," he said, quietly. With absolute lack of self-consciousness and a nymph-like grace, her lips wearing the smile of a child, Beatrix was dancing and winding her way between the chairs and little tables. With her white arms outstretched and her hands moving like the wings of a bird she seemed to bring the music to life and to give it a sense of youth and beauty that turned the room into a moon-struck wood of thin trees. The two men watched her until the tune ran out and in the hearts of both were love and desire. Franklin went quickly to the Victrola, wound it up and started the record again. "What a pity you don't dance, Malcolm," said Beatrix, panting a little. "But I do," said Franklin, and took her in his arms. He didn't imagine himself to be a fine dancer. He had a healthy contempt of the dancing man breed,—those anæmic creatures who try so hard to look immaculate and treat all women with a tedious mixture of familiarity and condescension. He waltzed well, all the same, with a perfectly straight back, an excellent sense of time and a steady left arm. In fact he danced like a civilized man who had achieved the art of not being noticed in a crowd.
- 53. From her deep and comfortable chair under the reading lamp Ida Larpent, with a determined exposure of lace stocking, watched this little scene with quiet amusement. It seemed to her that those two danced like people who had been married for years. They said nothing. They didn't look at each other. They were as much two people as though they were at opposite ends of the earth. The almost grim expression on Franklin's face made jealousy impossible. So also did the slight air of social martyrdom that was all about Beatrix. Anyone less expert as a psychologist than Ida Larpent could have told that Beatrix merely performed a duty. It would, however, have taken a quite microscopic eye to have seen the riotous blaze in Franklin's mind. To Mrs. Lester Keene's mid-Victorian way of thinking, this "exhibition," as she inwardly called it, watching from behind the new number of Vogue, was singularly bad form. If she had known the expressive word "stunt" she would have applied it with all her British horror of such a thing. "And now," said Beatrix, when once more the popular tune arrived at its inevitable and hackneyed conclusion, "for bridge. Don't you think so?" Franklin rang for a steward. The blood was in his head. The intoxication of the girl's fragrance was all about his brain. "Good God," he said to himself, "how am I going to go through this and come out sane?" "Splendid," said Mrs. Larpent, putting down "The Dark Flower." "I'd love a rubber or two." "And I," said Fraser,—"that is if you don't want to play, Mrs. Keene."