neffectual model of Bladesover itself, and contained eighty-five dolls
and had cost hundreds of pounds. I played under imperious direction with
that toy of glory.

I went back to school when that holiday was over, dreaming of beautiful
things, and got Ewart to talk to me of love; and I made a great story
out of the doll's house, a story that, taken over into Ewart's hands,
speedily grew to an island doll's city all our own.

One of the dolls, I privately decided, was like Beatrice.

One other holiday there was when I saw something of her--oddly enough my
memory of that second holiday in which she played a part is vague--and
then came a gap of a year, and then my disgrace.

VIII

Now I sit down to write my story and tell over again things in their
order, I find for the first time how inconsecutive and irrational a
thing the memory can be. One recalls acts and cannot recall motives;
one recalls quite vividly moments that stand out inexplicably--things
adrift, joining on to nothing, leading nowhere. I think I must have seen
Beatrice and her half-brother quite a number of times in my last holiday
at Bladesover, but I really cannot recall more than a little of the
quality of the circumstances. That great crisis of my boyhood stands out
very vividly as an effect, as a sort of cardinal thing for me, but when
I look for details, particularly details that led up to the crisis--I
cannot find them in any developing order at all. This halfbrother,
Archie Garvell, was a new factor in the affair. I remember him clearly
as a fair-haired, supercilious looking, weedily-lank boy, much taller
than I, but I should imagine very little heavier, and that we hated
each other by a sort of instinct from the beginning; and yet I cannot
remember my first meeting with him at all.

Looking back into these past things--it is like rummaging in a neglected
attic that has experienced the attentions of some whimsical robber--I
cannot even account for the presence of these children at Bladesover.
They were, I know, among the innumerable cousins of Lady Drew, and
according to the theories of downstairs candidates for the ultimate
possession of Bladesover. If they were, their candidature was
unsuccessful. But that great place, with all its faded splendour, its
fine furniture, its large traditions, was entirely at the old lady's
disposition; and I am inclined to think it is true that she used this
fact to torment and dominate a number of eligible peopl