Chapter 10

My Lord Marquess rides to Camylott.

When he went home my lord sate late over his books before he went to
his chamber, yet he read but little, finding his mood disturbed by
thoughts which passed through it in his despite. His blood had grown
hot at the coffee-house, and though 'twas by no means the first time it
had heated when he heard the heartless and coarse talk of woman which
it was the habit of most men of the day to indulge in, he realised that
it had never so boiled as when he listened to the brutal and
significant swagger of Sir John Oxon. His youth and beauty and cruel,
confident air had made it seem devilish in its suggestion of what his
past almost boyish years might have held of pitiless pleasures and
pitiless indifference to the consequences, which, while they were added
triumphs to him, were ruin and despair to their victims.

"The laugh in his blue eye was damnable," Roxholm murmured. "'Twas as
if there was no help for her or any other poor creature whom he chose
to pursue. The base unfairness of it! He is equipped with the whole
armament--of lures, of lies, of knowledge, and devilish skill. There
are women, 'tis true, who are his equals; but those who are not--those
who are ignorant and whose hearts he wins, as 'twould be easy for him
to win any woman's who believed his wooing face and voice--Nay, 'twould
be as dastardly as if an impregnable fortress should open all its
batteries upon a little child who played before it. And he stands
laughing among his mocking crew--triumphing, boasting--in cold
blood--of what he plans to do months to come. Fate grant he may not
come near me often. Some day I should break his devil's neck."

He found himself striding about the room. He was burning with rage
against the unfairness of it all, as he had burned when, a mere child,
he pondered on the story of Wildairs. To-day he was a man, yet his
passion of rebellion was curiously similar in its nature to his young
fury. Now, as then, there was naught to be done to help what seemed
like Fate. In a world made up of men all more or less hunters of the
weak, ready to accept the theory that all things defenceless and lovely
are fair game for the stronger, a man whose view was fairer was an
abnormality.

"I do not belong to my time," he said, flinging himself into his chair
again and speaking grimly. "I am too early--or too late--for it, and
must be content to seem a fool."

"There is a Fate," he said a little later, having sat a space gazing at
the floor and deep in thought--"there is a Fate which seems to link me
to the fortunes of these people. My first knowledge of their
wretchedness was a thing which sank deep. There are things a human