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“‘Mrs. Lovyes!’ I choked the name out as she stepped from the parlour.

“‘Well?’ she asked. ‘What is it?’

“‘He is following–Robert Lovyes!’

“She sprang rigid, as though I had whipped her across the face. Then, ‘I knew it would come to this at the last,’ she said; and even as she spoke Robert Lovyes crossed the threshold.

“‘Molly,’ he said, and looked at her curiously. She stood singularly passive, twisting her fingers. ‘I hardly know you,’ he continued. ‘In the old days you were the wilfullest girl I ever clapped eyes on.’

“‘That was thirteen years ago,’ she said, with a queer little laugh at the recollection.

“He took her by the hand and led her into the parlour. I followed. Neither Mrs. Lovyes nor Robert remarked my presence, and as for John Lovyes, he rose from his chair as the pair approached him, stretched out a trembling hand, drew it in, stretched it out again, all without a word, and his face purple and ridged with the veins.

“‘Brother,’ said Robert, taking between his fingers half a gold coin, which was threaded on a chain about Mrs. Lovyes’ wrist, ‘where is the fellow to this? I gave it to you on the Gambia river, bidding you carry it to Molly as a sign that I would return.’

“I saw John’s face harden and set at the sound of his brother’s voice. He looked at his wife, and, since she now knew the truth, he took the bold course.

“‘I gave it to her,’ said he, ‘as a token of your death; and, by God! she was worth the lie!’

“The two men faced one another–Robert smoothing his chin, John with his arms folded, and each as white and ugly with passion as the other. Robert turned to Mrs. Lovyes, who stood like a stone.

“‘You promised to wait,’ he said in a constrained voice. ‘I escaped six years after my noble brother.’

“‘Six years?’ she asked. ‘Had you come back then you would have found me waiting.’

“‘I could not,’ he said. ‘A fortune equal to your own–that was what I promised to myself before I returned to marry you.’

“‘And much good it has done you,’ said John, and I think that he meant by the provocation to bring the matter to an immediate issue. ‘Pride, pride!’ and he wagged his head. ‘Sinful pride!’

“Robert sprang forward with an oath, and then, as though the movement had awakened her, Mrs. Lovyes stepped in between the two men, with an arm outstretched on either side to keep them apart.

“‘Wait!’ she said. ‘For what is it that you fight? Not, indeed, for me. To you, my husband, I will no more belong; to you, my lover, I cannot. My woman’s pride, my woman’s honour–those two things are mine to keep.’

“So she stood casting about for an issue, while the brothers glowered at one another across her. It was evident that if she left them alone they would fight, and fight to the death. She turned to Robert.

“‘You meant to live on Tresco here at my gates, unknown to me; but you could not.’

“‘I could not,’ he answered. ‘In the old days you had spoken so much of Scilly–every island reminded me–and I saw you every day.’

“I could read the thought passing through her mind. It would not serve for her to live beside them, visible to them each day. Sooner or later they would come to grips. And then her face flushed as the notion of her great sacrifice came to her.

“‘I see but the one way,’ she said. ‘I will go into the house that you, Robert, have built. Neither you nor John shall see me, but none the less, I shall live between you, holding you apart, as my hands do now. I give my life to you so truly that from this night no one shall see my face. You, John, shall live on here at Merchant’s Point. Robert, you at your cottage, and every day you will bring me food and water and leave it at my door.’

“The two men fell back shamefaced. They protested they would part and put the world between them; but she would not trust them. I think, too, the notion of her sacrifice grew on her as she thought of it. For women are tenacious of sacrifice even as men are of revenge. And in the end she had her way. That night Robert Lovyes nailed the boards across the windows, and brought the door-key back to her; and that night, twenty years ago, she crossed the threshold. No man has seen her since. But, none the less, for twenty years she has lived between the brothers, keeping them apart.”

This was the story which Mr. Wyeth told me as we sat over our pipes, and the next day I set off on my journey back to London. The conclusion of the affair I witnessed myself. For a year later we received a letter from Mr. Robert, asking that a large sum of money should be forwarded to him. Being curious to learn the reason for his demand, I carried the sum to Tresco myself. Mr. John Lovyes had died a month before, and I reached the island on Mr. Robert’s wedding-day. I was present at the ceremony. He was now dressed in a manner which befitted his station–an old man bent and bowed, but still handsome, and he bore upon his arm a tall woman, grey-haired and very pale, yet with the traces of great beauty. As the parson laid her hand in her husband’s, I heard her whisper to him, “Dust to Dust.”