Her own line taken, Lady Aspenick gathered a tiny faction to raise Jenny's banner. They could not do much against Lady Sarah's open viciousness, Fillingford's icy silence, the union of High Church and Low in the persons and the adherents of Alison and of Mrs. Jepps. But Sir John followed his wife, Bindlecombe took courage to uplift a friendly voice, and old Mr. Dormer began to waver. His memories went back to George IV.--days in which they were not hard on pretty women--having, indeed, remarkably little right to be. Mr. Dormer was reported to be inclined to think that the men of the surrounding families might ride in Jenny's park--about their ladies it was, perhaps, another question. It was understood that Lady Aspenick's faction gave great offense at Fillingford Manor. The alliance between the two houses had been close, and Fillingford Manor saw treachery to itself in any defense of Jenny. So they debated and gossiped, sparred and wrangled--and no more news came. At the Priory we began to settle down into a sort of routine, trying to find ourselves work to do, trying to fill the lives that seemed now so empty. Our position--like Bertram Ware's attitude about the park road--was provisional--hopelessly provisional. We were not living; we were only waiting. Not the actual events of to-day, but the possible event of to-morrow was the thing for which we existed. It was like listening perpetually for a knock on the door. Little could be made of a life like that. Well, we were not to sink into the dullness of our routine just yet. In my youth I have heard a sage preach to the young men, his hearers and critical disciples, on the text of the certainty of life; discarding, perhaps thinking trite, perhaps deeming misleading, the old _Memento mori_. He bade them recollect that for practical purposes they had to reckon on--and with--thirty, forty, fifty, years of life and activity. That was a long time--order the many days! You could not afford to calculate on the accident of an early death to end your responsibility. It was well said; yet not even the broadest sanest argument can altogether persuade Death out of his traditional role, nor induce Atropos to wield her shears always without caprice. Yet again, in this case there seemed little caprice; the likely ending came rather quickly--that was all; it was just such an ending as, in some form or other, might have been expected--just such as once, in talk with me, the man himself had, hardly gravely yet quite sincerely, treated as likely, almost as inevitable. I was the first to get the news--at breakfast time one November morning. A telegram came to me from Jenny; it was sent from Tours. "Leonard has died from wound received in a duel. Do not come to me. I want to be alone.--JENNY DRIVER."