Jehane looked at Nan vaguely, only half-comprehending. “Fruitful land! That's the difficulty. I was never fruitful land---- Tell me, why did you marry Billy?” “Why? I never thought about it.” “Think about it now. Why was it?” “I suppose because I loved him and wanted to help him.” Jehane's elbow slipped from under her. She lay back, staring at the ceiling, looking gaunt and faded, as though she had passed through a long illness. “To help him! When I loved I wanted to be helped. God's not been hard on me, little Nan; I've been hard on myself. I'm a hard woman. I've got what I deserved. And Ocky---- He was a fool. He had no mind--never read anything. He was clumsy and liked vulgar people best. But, perhaps, he's my doing. Perhaps!” Seeing that she had grown passive, Nan stole out to give the children their supper and to put them to bed. That night, the first time since Cassingland, she and Jehane slept together. The light had been put out for some time and Nan was growing drowsy, when Jehane spoke. “Madeira Lodge! It's funny. A house built on sand! A house built on---- That's what we came here to do for other people; we've done it for ourselves. O God, spare my little children, my----” Nan took her in her arms and soothed her. CHAPTER XVIII--PETER TO THE RESCUE It was all up. A warrant was out for the arrest of Ocky. Accusers came forward from all directions--people whom glib promises had kept silent and people who had kept themselves silent because they were friends of Barrington. Now that silence had lost its virtue, they shouted. Their numbers and the noise they made were a revelation and testimonial of a sort to Ocky's enterprising character. He must have been skating over thin ice for years. He had almost established a record. Such a performance, so dexterous and long protracted, had required a kind of gay courage that is rarely given to honest men. And Ocky was honest by tradition, if not in practice. His nerve was admirable. No wonder he drank. He was wanted on many charges. There were checks which he had cashed through tradesmen, drawn on banks where he had no effects. With his habitual folly, he had left tracks by negotiating some of these in London since his flight, using letters of a family nature from Barrington to inspire confidence. These began to be presented five weeks after his departure from Sandport. It seemed as though he had been doing himself well and his supplies were exhausted. His name found its way into the papers, largely because he was Barrington's cousin. So everything became public. The day before the reports occurred in the press, a man of his appearance had enquired at Cook's in Ludgate Circus about the exchange rates for French money. The Channel boats had been watched in consequence; but he must have taken warning and altered his plans. “He's ineffectual even in his sinning,” said Barrington. “Why couldn't the fool have skipped the country earlier and saved us the humiliation of a trial?”