John Jacks’ presence in London, and alone, at this time of the year had naturally another explanation than that he felt tired of the seaside.  In truth, he had come up to see a medical specialist.  Carefully he kept from his wife the knowledge of a disease which was taking hold upon him, which—­as he had just learnt—­threatened rapidly fatal results.  From his son, also, he had concealed the serious state of his health, lest it should interfere with Arnold’s happy mood in prospect of marriage.  He was no coward, but a life hitherto untroubled by sickness had led him to hope that he might pass easily from the world, and a doom of extinction by torture perturbed his philosophy.

He liked to forget himself in contemplation of Piers Otway’s youth and soundness.  He had pleasure, too, in Piers’ talk, which reminded him of Jerome Otway, some half-century ago.

Mrs. Jacks was staying with her own family, and from that house would pass to others, equally decorous, where John had promised to join her.  Of course she was uneasy about him; that entered into her role of model spouse:  but the excellent lady never suspected the true cause of that habit of sadness which had grown upon her husband during the last few years, a melancholy which anticipated his decline in health.  John Jacks had made the mistake natural to such a man; wedding at nearly sixty a girl of much less than half his age, he found, of course, that his wife had nothing to give him but duty and respect, and before long he bitterly reproached himself with the sacrifice of which he was guilty.

    “Soar on thy manhood clear of those
     Whose toothless Winter claws at May,
     And take her as the vein of rose
     Athwart an evening grey.”

These lines met his eye one day in a new volume which bore the name of George Meredith, and they touched him nearly; the poem they closed gave utterance to the manful resignation of one who has passed the age of love, yet is tempted by love’s sweetness, and John Jacks took to heart the reproach it seemed to level at himself.  Putting aside the point of years, he had not chosen with any discretion; he married a handsome face, a graceful figure, just as any raw boy might have done.  His wife, he suspected, was not the woman to suffer greatly in her false position; she had very temperate blood, and a thoroughly English devotion to the proprieties; none the less he had done her wrong, for she belonged to a gentle family in mediocre circumstances, and his prospective “M.P.,” his solid wealth, were sore temptations to put before such a girl.  He had known—­yes, he assuredly knew—­that it was nothing but a socially sanctioned purchase.  Beauty should have become to him but the “vein of rose,” to be regarded with gentle admiration and with reverence, from afar.  He yielded to an unworthy temptation, and, being a man of unusual sensitiveness, very soon paid the penalty in self-contempt.

He could not love his wife; he could scarce honour her—­for she too must consciously have sinned against the highest law.  Her irreproachable behaviour only saddened him.  Now that he found himself under sentence of death, his solace was the thought that his widow would still be young enough to redeem her error—­if she were capable of redeeming it.