He answered the broken spirit:  “I have killed one.  She sees me as I am.  I cannot go with you to my wife, because I am not worthy to touch her hand, and were I to go, I should do this to silence my self-contempt.  Go you to her, and when she asks of me, say I have a death upon my head that—­No! say that I am abroad, seeking for that which shall cleanse me.  If I find it I shall come to claim her.  If not, God help us all!”

She had no strength to contest his solemn words, or stay him, and he went forth.

CHAPTER XLI

A man with a beard saluted the wise youth Adrian in the full blaze of Piccadilly with a clap on the shoulder.  Adrian glanced leisurely behind.

“Do you want to try my nerves, my dear fellow?  I’m not a man of fashion, happily, or you would have struck the seat of them.  How are you?”

That was his welcome to Austin Wentworth after his long absence.

Austin took his arm, and asked for news, with the hunger of one who had been in the wilderness five years.

“The Whigs have given up the ghost, my dear Austin.  The free Briton is to receive Liberty’s pearl, the Ballot.  The Aristocracy has had a cycle’s notice to quit.  The Monarchy and old Madeira are going out; Demos and Cape wines are coming in.  They call it Reform.  So, you see, your absence has worked wonders.  Depart for another five years, and you will return to ruined stomachs, cracked sconces, general upset, an equality made perfect by universal prostration.”

Austin indulged him in a laugh.  “I want to hear about ourselves.  How is old Ricky?”

“You know of his—­what do they call it when greenhorns are licensed to jump into the milkpails of dairymaids?—­a very charming little woman she makes, by the way—­presentable! quite old Anacreon’s rose in milk.  Well! everybody thought the System must die of it.  Not a bit.  It continued to flourish in spite.  It’s in a consumption now, though—­emaciated, lean, raw, spectral!  I’ve this morning escaped from Raynham to avoid the sight of it.  I have brought our genial uncle Hippias to town—­a delightful companion!  I said to him:  ‘We’ve had a fine Spring.’  ‘Ugh!’ he answers, ‘there’s a time when you come to think the Spring old.’  You should have heard how he trained out the ‘old.’  I felt something like decay in my sap just to hear him.  In the prize-fight of life, my dear Austin, our uncle Hippias has been unfairly hit below the belt.  Let’s guard ourselves there, and go and order dinner.”

“But where’s Ricky now, and what is he doing?” said Austin.

“Ask what he has done.  The miraculous boy has gone and got a baby!”

“A child?  Richard has one?” Austin’s clear eyes shone with pleasure.

“I suppose it’s not common among your tropical savages.  He has one:  one as big as two.  That has been the death-blow to the System.  It bore the marriage—­the baby was too much for it.  Could it swallow the baby, ’twould live.  She, the wonderful woman, has produced a large boy.  I assure you it’s quite amusing to see the System opening its mouth every hour of the day, trying to gulp him down, aware that it would be a consummate cure, or a happy release.”