But the unexpected only came out of Tommy.  Never was there a softer heart.  In London the old lady who sold matches at the street corner had got all his pence; had he heard her, or any other, mourning a son sentenced to the gallows, he would immediately have wondered whether he might take the condemned one’s place. (What a speech Tommy could have delivered from the scaffold!) There was nothing he would not jump at doing for a woman in distress, except, perhaps, destroy his note-book.  And Grizel was in anguish.  She was his suppliant, his brave, lonely little playmate of the past, the noble girl of to-day, Grizel whom he liked so much.  As through a magnifying-glass he saw her top-heavy with remorse for life, unable to sleep of nights, crushed and——­

He was not made of the stuff that could endure it.  The truth must out.  “Grizel,” he said impulsively, “you have nothing to be sorry for.  You were quite right.  I did not hurt my foot that night in the Den, but afterwards, when I was alone, before the doctor came.  I wricked it here intentionally in the door.  It sounds incredible; but I set my teeth and did it, Grizel, because you had challenged me to a duel, and I would not give in.”

As soon as it was out he was proud of himself for having the generosity to confess it.  He looked at Grizel expectantly.

Yes, it sounded incredible, and yet she saw that it was true.  As Elspeth returned at that moment, Grizel could say nothing.  She stood looking at him only over her high collar of fur.  Tommy actually thought that she was admiring him.

CHAPTER VIII

WHAT GRIZEL’S EYES SAID

To be the admired of women—­how Tommy had fought for it since first he drank of them in Pym’s sparkling pages!  To some it seems to be easy, but to him it was a labour of Sisyphus.  Everything had been against him.  But he concentrated.  No labour was too Herculean; he was prepared, if necessary, to walk round the world to get to the other side of the wall across which some men can step.  And he did take a roundabout way.  It is my opinion, for instance, that he wrote his book in order to make a beginning with the ladies.

That as it may be, at all events he is on the right side of the wall now, and here is even Grizel looking wistfully at him.  Had she admired him for something he was not (and a good many of them did that) he would have been ill satisfied.  He wanted her to think him splendid because he was splendid, and the more he reflected the more clearly he saw that he had done a big thing.  How many men would have had the courage to wrick their foot as he had done? (He shivered when he thought of it.) And even of these Spartans how many would have let the reward slip through their fingers rather than wound the feelings of a girl?  These had not been his thoughts when he made confession; he had spoken on an impulse; but now that he could step out and have a look at himself, he saw that this made it a still bigger thing.  He was modestly pleased that he had not only got Grizel’s admiration, but earned it, and he was very kind to her when next she came to see him.  No one could be more kind to them than he when they admired him.  He had the most grateful heart, had our Tommy.