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LITTLE NOVELS

by Wilkie Collins

February, 1999  [Etext #1630]


The Project Gutenberg Etext of Little Novels, by Wilkie Collins
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[Italics are indicatedby underscores
James Rusk, jrusk@cyberramp.net.]





LITTLE NOVELS

by Wilkie Collins




MRS. ZANT AND THE GHOST.

I.

THE course of this narrative describes the return of a
disembodied spirit to earth, and leads the reader on new and
strange ground.

Not in the obscurity of midnight, but in the searching light of
day, did the supernatural influence assert itself. Neither
revealed by a vision, nor announced by a voice, it reached mortal
knowledge through the sense which is least easily self-deceived:
the sense that feels.

The record of this event will of necessity produce conflicting
impressions. It will raise, in some minds, the doubt which reason
asserts; it will invigorate, in other minds, the hope which faith
justifies; and it will leave the terrible question of the
destinies of man, where centuries of vain investigation have left
it--in the dark.

Having only undertaken in the present narrative to lead the way
along a succession of events, the writer declines to follow
modern examples by thrusting himself and his opinions on the
public view. He returns to the shadow from which he has emerged,
and leaves the opposing forces of incredulity and belief to fight
the old battle over again, on the old ground.

II.

THE events happened soon after the first thirty years of the
present century had come to an end.

On a fine morning, early in the month of April, a gentleman of
middle age (named Rayburn) took his little daughter Lucy out for
a walk in the woodland pleasure-ground of Western London, called
Kensington Gardens.

The few friends whom he possessed reported of Mr. Rayburn (not
unkindly) that he was a reserved and solitary man. He might have
been more accurately described as a widower devoted to his only
surviving child. Although he was not more than forty years of
age, the one pleasure which made life enjoyable to Lucy's father
was offered by Lucy herself.

Playing with her ball, the child ran on to the southern limit of
the Gardens, at that part of it which still remains nearest to
the old Palace of Kensington. Observing close at hand one of
those spacious covered seats, called in England "alcoves," Mr.
Rayburn was reminded that he had the morning's newspaper in his
pocket, and that he might do well to rest and read. At that early
hour the place was a solitude.

"Go on playing, my dear," he said; "but take care to keep where I
can see you."

Lucy tossed up her ball; and Lucy's father opened his newspaper.
He had not been reading for more than ten minutes, when he felt a
familiar little hand laid on his knee.

"Tired of playing?" he inquired--with his eyes still on the
newspaper.

"I'm frightened, papa."

He looked up directly. The child's pale face startled him. He
took her on his knee and kissed her.

"You oughtn't to be frightened, Lucy, when I am with you," he
said, gently. "What is it?" He looked out of the alcove as he
spoke, and saw a little dog among the trees. "Is it the dog?" he
asked.

Lucy answered:

"It's not the dog--it's the lady."

The lady was not visible from the alcove.

"Has she said anything to you?" Mr. Rayburn inquired.

"No."

"What has she done to frighten you?"

The child put her arms round her father's neck.

"Whisper, papa," she said; "I'm afraid of her hearing us. I think
she's mad."

"Why do you think so, Lucy?"

"She came near to me. I thought she was going to say something.
She seemed to be ill."

"Well? And what then?"

"She looked at me."

There, Lucy found herself at a loss how to express what she had
to say next--and took refuge in silence.

"Nothing very wonderful, so far," her father suggested.

"Yes, papa--but she didn't seem to see me when she looked."

"Well, and what happened then?"

"The lady was frightened--and that frightened me. I think," the
child repeated positively, "she's mad."

It occurred to Mr. Rayburn that the lady might be blind. He rose
at once to set the doubt at rest.

"Wait here," he said, "and I'll come back to you."

But Lucy clung to him with both hands; Lucy declared that she was
afraid to be by herself. They left the alcove together.

The new point of view at once revealed the stranger, leaning
against the trunk of a tree. She was dressed in the deep mourning
of a widow. The pallor of her face, the glassy stare in her eyes,
more than accounted for the child's terror--it excused the
alarming conclusion at which she had arrived.

"Go nearer to her," Lucy whispered.

They advanced a few steps. It was now easy to see that the lady
was young, and wasted by illness--but (arriving at a doubtful
conclusion perhaps under the present circumstances) apparently
possessed of rare personal attractions in happier days. As the
father and daughter advanced a little, she discovered them. After
some hesitation, she left the tree; approached with an evident
intention of speaking; and suddenly paused. A change to
astonishment and fear animated her vacant eyes. If it had not
been plain before, it was now beyond all doubt that she was not a
poor blind creature, deserted and helpless. At the same time, the
expression of her face was not easy to understand. She could
hardly have looked more amazed and bewildered, if the two
strangers who were observing her had suddenly vanished from the
place in which they stood.

Mr. Rayburn spoke to her with the utmost kindness of voice and
manner.

"I am afraid you are not well," he said. "Is there anything that
I can do--"

The next words were suspended on his lips. It was impossible to
realize such a state of things; but the strange impression that
she had already produced on him was now confirmed. If he could
believe his senses, her face did certainly tell him that he was
invisible and inaudible to the woman whom he had just addressed!
She moved slowly away with a heavy sigh, like a person
disappointed and distressed. Following her with his eyes, he saw
the dog once more--a little smooth-coated terrier of the ordinary
English breed. The dog showed none of the restless activity of
his race. With his head down and his tail depressed, he crouched
like a creature paralyzed by fear. His mistress roused him by a
call. He followed her listlessly as she turned away.

After walking a few paces only, she suddenly stood still.

Mr. Rayburn heard her talking to herself.

"Did I feel it again?" she said, as if perplexed by some doubt
that awed or grieved her. After a while her arms rose slowly, and
opened with a gentle caressing action--an embrace strangely
offered to the empty air! "No," she said to herself, sadly, after
waiting a moment. "More perhaps when to-morrow comes--no more
to-day." She looked up at the clear blue sky. "The beautiful
sunlight! the merciful sunlight!" she murmured. "I should have
died if it had happened in the dark."

Once more she called to the dog; and once more she walked slowly
away.

"Is she going home, papa?' the child asked.

"We will try and find out," the father answered.

He was by this time convinced that the poor creature was in no
condition to be permitted to go out without some one to take care
of her. From motives of humanity, he was resolved on making the
attempt to communicate with her friends.

III.

THE lady left the Gardens by the nearest gate; stopping to lower
her veil before she turned into the busy thoroughfare which leads
to Kensington. Advancing a little way along the High Street, she
entered a house of respectable appearance, with a card in one of
the windows which announced that apartments were to let.

Mr. Rayburn waited a minute--then knocked at the door, and asked
if he could see the mistress of the house. The servant showed him
into a room on the ground floor, neatly but scantily furnished.
One little white object varied the grim brown monotony of the
empty table. It was a visiting-card.

With a child's unceremonious curiosity Lucy pounced on the card,
and spelled the name, letter by letter: "Z, A, N, T," she
repeated. "What does that mean ?"

Her father looked at the card, as he took it away from her, and
put it back on the table. The name was printed, and the address
was added in pencil: "Mr. John Zant, Purley's Hotel."

The mistress made her appearance. Mr. Rayburn heartily wishe d
himself out of the house again, the moment he saw her. The ways
in which it is possible to cultivate the social virtues are more
numerous and more varied than is generally supposed. This lady's
way had apparently accustomed her to meet her fellow-creatures on
the hard ground of justice without mercy. Something in her eyes,
when she looked at Lucy, said: "I wonder whether that child gets
punished when she deserves it?"

"Do you wish to see the rooms which I have to let?" she began.

Mr. Rayburn at once stated the object of his visit--as clearly,
as civilly, and as concisely as a man could do it. He was
conscious (he added) that he had been guilty perhaps of an act of
intrusion.

The manner of the mistress of the house showed that she entirely
agreed with him. He suggested, however, that his motive might
excuse him. The mistress's manner changed, and asserted a
difference of opinion.

"I only know the lady whom you mention," she said, "as a person
of the highest respectability, in delicate health. She has taken
my first- floor apartments, with excellent references; and she
gives remarkably little trouble. I have no claim to interfere
with her proceedings, and no reason to doubt that she is capable
of taking care of herself."

Mr. Rayburn unwisely attempted to say a word in his own defense.

"Allow me to remind you--" he began.

"Of what, sir?"

"Of what I observed, when I happened to see the lady in
Kensington Gardens."

"I am not responsible for what you observed in Kensington
Gardens. If your time is of any value, pray don't let me detain
you."

Dismissed in those terms, Mr. Rayburn took Lucy's hand and
withdrew. He had just reached the door, when it was opened from
the outer side. The Lady of Kensington Gardens stood before him.
In the position which he and his daughter now occupied, their
backs were toward the window. Would she remember having seen them
for a moment in the Gardens?

"Excuse me for intruding on you," she said to the landlady. "Your
servant tells me my brother-in-law called while I was out. He
sometimes leaves a message on his card."

She looked for the message, and appeared to be disappointed:
there was no writing on the card.

Mr. Rayburn lingered a little in the doorway on the chance of
hearing something more. The landlady's vigilant eyes discovered
him.

"Do you know this gentleman?" she said maliciously to her lodger.

"Not that I remember."

Replying in those words, the lady looked at Mr. Rayburn for the
first time; and suddenly drew back from him.

"Yes," she said, correcting herself; "I think we met--"

Her embarrassment overpowered her; she could say no more.

Mr. Rayburn compassionately finished the sentence for her.

"We met accidentally in Kensington Gardens," he said.

She seemed to be incapable of appreciating the kindness of his
motive. After hesitating a little she addressed a proposal to
him, which seemed to show distrust of the landlady.

"Will you let me speak to you upstairs in my own rooms?" she
asked.

Without waiting for a reply, she led the way to the stairs. Mr.
Rayburn and Lucy followed. They were just beginning the ascent to
the first floor, when the spiteful landlady left the lower room,
and called to her lodger over their heads: "Take care what you
say to this man, Mrs. Zant! He thinks you're mad."

Mrs. Zant turned round on the landing, and looked at him. Not a
word fell from her lips. She suffered, she feared, in silence.
Something in the sad submission of her face touched the springs
of innocent pity in Lucy's heart. The child burst out crying.

That artless expression of sympathy drew Mrs. Zant down the few
stairs which separated her from Lucy.

"May I kiss your dear little girl?" she said to Mr. Rayburn. The
landlady, standing on the mat below, expressed her opinion of the
value of caresses, as compared with a sounder method of treating
young persons in tears: "If that child was mine," she remarked,
"I would give her something to cry for."

In the meantime, Mrs. Zant led the way to her rooms.

The first words she spoke showed that the landlady had succeeded
but too well in prejudicing her against Mr. Rayburn.

"Will you let me ask your child," she said to him, "why you think
me mad?"

He met this strange request with a firm answer.

"You don't know yet what I really do think. Will you give me a
minute's attention?"

"No," she said positively. "The child pities me, I want to speak
to the child. What did you see me do in the Gardens, my dear,
that surprised you?" Lucy turned uneasily to her father; Mrs.
Zant persisted. "I first saw you by yourself, and then I saw you
with your father," she went on. "When I came nearer to you, did I
look very oddly--as if I didn't see you at all?"

Lucy hesitated again; and Mr. Rayburn interfered.

"You are confusing my little girl," he said. "Allow me to answer
your questions--or excuse me if I leave you."

There was something in his look, or in his tone, that mastered
her. She put her hand to her head.

"I don't think I'm fit for it," she answered vacantly. "My
courage has been sorely tried already. If I can get a little rest
and sleep, you may find me a different person. I am left a great
deal by myself; and I have reasons for trying to compose my mind.
Can I see you tomorrow? Or write to you? Where do you live?"

Mr. Rayburn laid his card on the table in silence. She had
strongly excited his interest. He honestly desired to be of some
service to this forlorn creature--abandoned so cruelly, as it
seemed, to her own guidance. But he had no authority to exercise,
no sort of claim to direct her actions, even if she consented to
accept his advice. As a last resource he ventured on an allusion
to the relative of whom she had spoken downstairs.

"When do you expect to see your brother-in-law again?" he said.

"I don't know," she answered. "I should like to see him--he is so
kind to me."

She turned aside to take leave of Lucy.

"Good-by, my little friend. If you live to grow up, I hope you
will never be such a miserable woman as I am." She suddenly
looked round at Mr. Rayburn. "Have you got a wife at home?" she
asked.

"My wife is dead."

"And _you_ have a child to comfort you! Please leave me; you
harden my heart. Oh, sir, don't you understand? You make me envy
you!"

Mr. Rayburn was silent when he and his daughter were out in the
street again. Lucy, as became a dutiful child, was silent, too.
But there are limits to human endurance--and Lucy's capacity for
self-control gave way at last.

"Are you thinking of the lady, papa?" she said.

He only answered by nodding his head. His daughter had
interrupted him at that critical moment in a man's reflections,
when he is on the point of making up his mind. Before they were
at home again Mr. Rayburn had arrived at a decision. Mrs. Zant's
brother-in-law was evidently ignorant of any serious necessity
for his interference--or he would have made arrangements for
immediately repeating his visit. In this state of things, if any
evil happened to Mrs. Zant, silence on Mr. Rayburn's part might
be indirectly to blame for a serious misfortune. Arriving at that
conclusion, he decided upon running the risk of being rudely
received, for the second time, by another stranger.

Leaving Lucy under the care of her governess, he went at once to
the address that had been written on the visiting-card left at
the lodging-house, and sent in his name. A courteous message was
returned. Mr. John Zant was at home, and would be happy to see
him.

IV.

MR. RAYBURN was shown into one of the private sitting-rooms of
the hotel.

He observed that the customary position of the furniture in a
room had been, in some respects, altered. An armchair, a
side-table, and a footstool had all been removed to one of the
windows, and had been placed as close as possible to the light.
On the table lay a large open roll of morocco leather, containing
rows of elegant little instruments in steel and ivory. Waiting by
the table, stood Mr. John Zant. He said "Good-morning" in a bass
voice, so profound and so melodious that those two commonplace
words assumed a new importance, coming from his lips. His
personal appearance was in harmony with his magnificent voice--
he was a tall, finely-made man of dark complexion; with big
brilliant black eyes, and a noble curling beard, which hid the
whole lower part of his face. Having bowed with a happy mingling
of dignity and politeness, the conventional side of this
gentleman's character suddenly vanished; and a crazy side, to all
appearance, took its place. He dropped on his knees in front of
the footstool. Had he forgotten to say his prayers that morning,
and was he in such a hurry to remedy the fault that he had no
time to spare for consulting appearances? The doubt had hardly
suggested itself, before it was set at rest in a most unexpected
manner. Mr. Zant looked at his visitor with a bland smile, and
said:

"Please let me see your feet."

For the moment, Mr. Rayburn lost his presence of mind. He looked
at the instruments on the side-table.

"Are you a corn-cutter?" was all he could say.

"Excuse me, sir, " returned the polite operator, "the term you
use is quite obsolete in our profession." He rose from his knees,
and added modestly: "I am a Chiropodist."

"I beg your pardon."

"Don't mention it! You are not, I imagine, in want of my
professional services. To what motive may I attribute the honor
of your visit?"

By this time Mr. Rayburn had recovered himself.

"I have come here," he answered, "under circumstances which
require apology as well as explanation."

Mr. Zant's highly polished manner betrayed signs of alarm; his
suspicions pointed to a formidable conclusion--a conclusion that
shook him to the innermost recesses of the pocket in which he
kept his money.

"The numerous demands on me--" he began.

Mr. Rayburn smiled.

"Make your mind easy," he replied. "I don't want money. My object
is to speak with you on the subject of a lady who is a relation
of yours."

"My sister-in-law!" Mr. Zant exclaimed. "Pray take a seat."

Doubting if he had chosen a convenient time for his visit, Mr.
Rayburn hesitated.

"Am I likely to be in the way of persons who wish to consult
you?" he asked.

"Certainly not. My morning hours of attendance on my clients are
from eleven to one." The clock on the mantelpiece struck the
quarter-past one as he spoke. "I hope you don't bring me bad
news?" he said, very earnestly. "When I called on Mrs. Zant this
morning, I heard that she had gone out for a walk. Is it
indiscreet to ask how you became acquainted with her?"

Mr. Rayburn at once mentioned what he had seen and heard in
Kensington Gardens; not forgetting to add a few words, which
described his interview afterward with Mrs. Zant.

The lady's brother-in-law listened with an interest and sympathy,
which offered the strongest possible contrast to the unprovoked
rudeness of the mistress of the lodging-house. He declared that
he could only do justice to his sense of obligation by following
Mr. Rayburn's example, and expressing himself as frankly as if he
had been speaking to an old friend.

"The sad story of my sister-in-law's life," he said, "will, I
think, explain certain things which must have naturally perplexed
you. My brother was introduced to her at the house of an
Australian gentleman, on a visit to England. She was then
employed as governess to his daughters. So sincere was the regard
felt for her by the family that the parents had, at the entreaty
of their children, asked her to accompany them when they returned
to the Colony. The governess thankfully accepted the proposal."

"Had she no relations in England?" Mr. Rayburn asked.

"She was literally alone in the world, sir. When I tell you that
she had been brought up in the Foundling Hospital, you will
understand what I mean. Oh, there is no romance in my
sister-in-law's story! She never has known, or will know, who her
parents were or why they deserted her. The happiest moment in her
life was the moment when she and my brother first met. It was an
instance, on both sides, of love at first sight. Though not a
rich man, my brother had earned a sufficient income in mercantile
pursuits. His character spoke for itself. In a word, he altered
all the poor girl's prospects, as we then hoped and believed, for
the better. Her employers deferred their return to Australia, so
that she might be married from their house. After a happy life of
a few weeks only--"

His voice failed him; he paused, and turned his face from the
light.

"Pardon me," he said; "I am not able, even yet, to speak
composedly of my brother's death. Let me only say that the poor
young wife was a widow, before the happy days of the honeymoon
were over. That dreadful calamity struck her down. Before my
brother had been committed to the grave, her life was in danger
from brain-fever."

Those words placed in a new light Mr. Rayburn's first fear that
her intellect might be deranged. Looking at him attentively, Mr.
Zant seemed to understand what was passing in the mind of his
guest.

"No!" he said. "If the opinions of the medical men are to be
trusted, the result of the illness is injury to her physical
strength--not injury to her mind. I have observed in her, no
doubt, a certain waywardness of temper since her illness; but
that is a trifle. As an example of what I mean, I may tell you
that I invited her, on her recovery, to pay me a visit. My house
is not in London--the air doesn't agree with me--my place of
residence is at St. Sallins-on-Sea. I am not myself a married
man; but my excellent housekeeper would have received Mrs. Zant
with the utmost kindness. She was resolved--obstinately resolved,
poor thing--to remain in London. It is needless to say that, in
her melancholy position, I am attentive to her slightest wishes.
I took a lodging for her; and, at her special request, I chose a
house which was near Kensington Gardens.

"Is there any association with the Gardens which led Mrs. Zant to
make that request?"

"Some association, I believe, with the memory of her husband. By
the way, I wish to be sure of finding her at home, when I call
to-morrow. Did you say (in the course of your interesting
statement) that she intended--as you supposed--to return to
Kensington Gardens to-morrow? Or has my memory deceived me?"

"Your memory is perfectly accurate."

"Thank you. I confess I am not only distressed by what you have
told me of Mrs. Zant--I am at a loss to know how to act for the
best. My only idea, at present, is to try change of air and
scene. What do you think yourself?"

"I think you are right."

Mr. Zant still hesitated.

"It would not be easy for me, just now," he said, "to leave my
patients and take her abroad."

The obvious reply to this occurred to Mr. Rayburn. A man of
larger worldly experience might have felt certain suspicions, and
might have remained silent. Mr. Rayburn spoke.

"Why not renew your invitation and take her to your house at the
seaside?" he said.

In the perplexed state of Mr. Zant's mind, this plain course of
action had apparently failed to present itself. His gloomy face
brightened directly.

"The very thing!" he said. "I will certainly take your advice. If
the air of St. Sallins does nothing else, it will improve her
health and help her to recover her good looks. Did she strike you
as having been (in happier days) a pretty woman?"

This was a strangely familiar question to ask--almost an
indelicate question, under the circumstances A certain furtive
expression in Mr. Zant's fine dark eyes seemed to imply that it
had been put with a purpose. Was it possible that he suspected
Mr. Rayburn's interest in his sister-in-law to be inspired by any
motive which was not perfectly unselfish and perfectly pure? To
arrive at such a conclusion as this might be to judge hastily and
cruelly of a man who was perhaps only guilty of a want of
delicacy of feeling. Mr. Rayburn honestly did his best to assume
the charitable point of view. At the same time, it is not to be
denied that his words, when he answered, were carefully guarded,
and that he rose to take his leave.

Mr. John Zant hospitably protested.

"Why are you in such a hurry? Must you really go? I shall have
the honor of returning your visit to-morrow, when I have made
arrangements to profit by that excellent suggestion of yours.
Good-by. God bless you."

He held out his hand: a hand with a smooth  s urface and a tawny
color, that fervently squeezed the fingers of a departing friend.
"Is that man a scoundrel?" was Mr. Rayburn's first thought, after
he had left the hotel. His moral sense set all hesitation at
rest--and answered: "You're a fool if you doubt it."

V.

DISTURBED by presentiments, Mr. Rayburn returned to his house on
foot, by way of trying what exercise would do toward composing
his mind.

The experiment failed. He went upstairs and played with Lucy; he
drank an extra glass of wine at dinner; he took the child and her
governess to a circus in the evening; he ate a little supper,
fortified by another glass of wine, before he went to bed--and
still those vague forebodings of evil persisted in torturing him.
Looking back through his past life, he asked himself if any woman
(his late wife of course excepted!) had ever taken the
predominant place in his thoughts which Mrs. Zant had
assumed--without any discernible reason to account for it? If he
had ventured to answer his own question, the reply would have
been: Never!

All the next day he waited at home, in expectation of Mr. John
Zant's promised visit, and waited in vain.

Toward evening the parlor-maid appeared at the family tea-table,
and presented to her master an unusually large envelope sealed
with black wax, and addressed in a strange handwriting. The
absence of stamp and postmark showed that it had been left at the
house by a messenger.

"Who brought this?" Mr. Rayburn asked.

"A lady, sir--in deep mourning."

"Did she leave any message?"

"No, sir."

Having drawn the inevitable conclusion, Mr. Rayburn shut himself
up in his library. He was afraid of Lucy's curiosity and Lucy's
questions, if he read Mrs. Zant's letter in his daughter's
presence.

Looking at the open envelope after he had taken out the leaves of
writing which it contained, he noticed these lines traced inside
the cover:



"My one excuse for troubling you, when I might have consulted my
brother-in-law, will be found in the pages which I inclose. To
speak plainly, you have been led to fear that I am not in my
right senses. For this very reason, I now appeal to you. Your
dreadful doubt of me, sir, is my doubt too. Read what I have
written about myself--and then tell me, I entreat you, which I
am: A person who has been the object of a supernatural
revelation? or an unfortunate creature who is only fit for
imprisonment in a mad-house?"



Mr. Rayburn opened the manuscript. With steady attention, which
soon quickened to breathless interest, he read what follows:

VI.

THE LADY'S MANUSCRIPT.

YESTERDAY morning the sun shone in a clear blue sky--after a
succession of cloudy days, counting from the first of the month.

The radiant light had its animating effect on my poor spirits. I
had passed the night more peacefully than usual; undisturbed by
the dream, so cruelly familiar to me, that my lost husband is
still living--the dream from which I always wake in tears. Never,
since the dark days of my sorrow, have I been so little troubled
by the self-tormenting fancies and fears which beset miserable
women, as when I left the house, and turned my steps toward
Kensington Gardens--for the first time since my husband's death.

Attended by my only companion, the little dog who had been his
favorite as well as mine, I went to the quiet corner of the
Gardens which is nearest to Kensington.

On that soft grass, under the shade of those grand trees, we had
loitered together in the days of our betrothal. It was his
favorite walk; and he had taken me to see it in the early days of
our acquaintance. There, he had first asked me to be his wife.
There, we had felt the rapture of our first kiss. It was surely
natural that I should wish to see once more a place sacred to
such memories as these? I am only twenty-three years old; I have
no child to comfort me, no companion of my own age, nothing to
love but the dumb creature who is so faithfully fond of me.

I went to the tree under which we stood, when my dear one's eyes
told his love before he could utter it in words. The sun of that
vanished day shone on me again; it was the same noontide hour;
the same solitude was around me. I had feared the first effect of
the dreadful contrast between past and present. No! I was quiet
and resigned. My thoughts, rising higher than earth, dwelt on the
better life beyond the grave. Some tears came into my eyes. But I
was not unhappy. My memory of all that happened may be trusted,
even in trifles which relate only to myself--I was not unhappy.

The first object that I saw, when my eyes were clear again, was
the dog. He crouched a few paces away from me, trembling
pitiably, but uttering no cry. What had caused the fear that
overpowered him?

I was soon to know.

I called to the dog; he remained immovable--conscious of some
mysterious coming thing that held him spellbound. I tried to go
to the poor creature, and fondle and comfort him.

At the first step forward that I took, something stopped me.

It was not to be seen, and not to be heard. It stopped me.

The still figure of the dog disappeared from my view: the lonely
scene round me disappeared--excepting the light from heaven, the
tree that sheltered me, and the grass in front of me. A sense of
unutterable expectation kept my eyes riveted on the grass.
Suddenly, I saw its myriad blades rise erect and shivering. The
fear came to me of something passing over them with the invisible
swiftness of the wind. The shivering advanced. It was all round
me. It crept into the leaves of the tree over my head; they
shuddered, without a sound to tell of their agitation; their
pleasant natural rustling was struck dumb. The song of the birds
had ceased. The cries of the water-fowl on the pond were heard no
more. There was a dreadful silence.

But the lovely sunshine poured down on me, as brightly as ever.

In that dazzling light, in that fearful silence, I felt an
Invisible Presence near me. It touched me gently.

At the touch, my heart throbbed with an overwhelming joy.
Exquisite pleasure thrilled through every nerve in my body. I
knew him! From the unseen world--himself unseen--he had returned
to me. Oh, I knew him!

And yet, my helpless mortality longed for a sign that might give
me assurance of the truth. The yearning in me shaped itself into
words. I tried to utter the words. I would have said, if I could
have spoken: "Oh, my angel, give me a token that it is You!" But
I was like a person struck dumb--I could only think it.

The Invisible Presence read my thought. I felt my lips touched,
as my husband's lips used to touch them when he kissed me. And
that was my answer. A thought came to me again. I would have
said, if I could have spoken: "Are you here to take me to the
better world?"

I waited. Nothing that I could feel touched me.

I was conscious of thinking once more. I would have said, if I
could have spoken: "Are you here to protect me?"

I felt myself held in a gentle embrace, as my husband's arms used
to hold me when he pressed me to his breast. And that was my
answer.

The touch that was like the touch of his lips, lingered and was
lost; the clasp that was like the clasp of his arms, pressed me
and fell away. The garden-scene resumed its natural aspect. I saw
a human creature near, a lovely little girl looking at me.

At that moment, when I was my own lonely self again, the sight of
the child soothed and attracted me. I advanced, intending to
speak to her. To my horror I suddenly ceased to see her. She
disappeared as if I had been stricken blind.

And yet I could see the landscape round me; I could see the
heaven above me. A time passed--only a few minutes, as I
thought--and the child became visible to me again; walking
hand-in-hand with her father. I approached them; I was close
enough to see that they were looking at me with pity and
surprise. My impulse was to ask if they saw anything strange in
my face or my manner. Before I could speak, the horrible wonder
happened again. They vanished from my view.

Was the Invisible Presence still near? Was it passing between me
and my fellow-mortals; forbidding communication, in that place
and at that time?

It must have been so. When I turned away in  my
 ignorance, with a heavy heart, the dreadful blankness which had
twice shut out from me the beings of my own race, was not between
me and my dog. The poor little creature filled me with pity; I
called him to me. He moved at the sound of my voice, and followed
me languidly; not quite awakened yet from the trance of terror
that had possessed him.

Before I had retired by more than a few steps, I thought I was
conscious of the Presence again. I held out my longing arms to
it. I waited in the hope of a touch to tell me that I might
return. Perhaps I was answered by indirect means? I only know
that a resolution to return to the same place, at the same hour,
came to me, and quieted my mind.

The morning of the next day was dull and cloudy; but the rain
held off. I set forth again to the Gardens.

My dog ran on before me into the street--and stopped: waiting to
see in which direction I might lead the way. When I turned toward
the Gardens, he dropped behind me. In a little while I looked
back. He was following me no longer; he stood irresolute. I
called to him. He advanced a few steps--hesitated--and ran back
to the house.

I went on by myself. Shall I confess my superstition? I thought
the dog's desertion of me a bad omen.

Arrived at the tree, I placed myself under it. The minutes
followed each other uneventfully. The cloudy sky darkened. The
dull surface of the grass showed no shuddering consciousness of
an unearthly creature passing over it.

I still waited, with an obstinacy which was fast becoming the
obstinacy of despair. How long an interval elapsed, while I kept
watch on the ground before me, I am not able to say. I only know
that a change came.

Under the dull gray light I saw the grass move--but not as it had
moved, on the day before. It shriveled as if a flame had scorched
it. No flame appeared. The brown underlying earth showed itself
winding onward in a thin strip--which might have been a footpath
traced in fire. It frightened me. I longed for the protection of
the Invisible Presence. I prayed for a warning of it, if danger
was near.

A touch answered me. It was as if a hand unseen had taken my
hand--had raised it, little by little--had left it, pointing to
the thin brown path that wound toward me under the shriveled
blades of grass.

I looked to the far end of the path.

The unseen hand closed on my hand with a warning pressure: the
revelation of the coming danger was near me--I waited for it. I
saw it.

The figure of a man appeared, advancing toward me along the thin
brown path. I looked in his face as he came nearer. It showed me
dimly the face of my husband's brother--John Zant.

The consciousness of myself as a living creature left me. I knew
nothing; I felt nothing. I was dead.

When the torture of revival made me open my eyes, I found myself
on the grass. Gentle hands raised my head, at the moment when I
recovered my senses. Who had brought me to life again? Who was
taking care of me?

I looked upward, and saw--bending over me--John Zant.

VII.

THERE, the manuscript ended.

Some lines had been added on the last page; but they had been so
carefully erased as to be illegible. These words of explanation
appeared below the canceled sentences:

"I had begun to write the little that remains to be told, when it
struck me that I might, unintentionally, be exercising an unfair
influence on your opinion. Let me only remind you that I believe
absolutely in the supernatural revelation which I have endeavored
to describe. Remember this--and decide for me what I dare not
decide for myself."

There was no serious obstacle in the way of compliance with this
request.

Judged from the point of view of the materialist, Mrs. Zant might
no doubt be the victim of illusions (produced by a diseased state
of the nervous system), which have been known to exist--as in the
celebrated case of the book-seller, Nicolai, of Berlin--without
being accompanied by derangement of the intellectual powers. But
Mr. Rayburn was not asked to solve any such intricate problem as
this. He had been merely instructed to read the manuscript, and
to say what impression it had left on him of the mental condition
of the writer; whose doubt of herself had been, in all
probability, first suggested by remembrance of the illness from
which she had suffered--brain-fever.

Under these circumstances, there could be little difficulty in
forming an opinion. The memory which had recalled, and the
judgment which had arranged, the succession of events related in
the narrative, revealed a mind in full possession of its
resources.

Having satisfied himself so far, Mr. Rayburn abstained from
considering the more serious question suggested by what he had
read.

At any time his habits of life and his ways of thinking would
have rendered him unfit to weigh the arguments, which assert or
deny supernatural revelation among the creatures of earth. But
his mind was now so disturbed by the startling record of
experience which he had just read, that he was only conscious of
feeling certain impressions--without possessing the capacity to
reflect on them. That his anxiety on Mrs. Zant's account had been
increased, and that his doubts of Mr. John Zant had been
encouraged, were the only practical results of the confidence
placed in him of which he was thus far aware. In the ordinary
exigencies of life a man of hesitating disposition, his interest
in Mrs. Zant's welfare, and his desire to discover what had
passed between her brother-in-law and herself, after their
meeting in the Gardens, urged him into instant action. In half an
hour more, he had arrived at her lodgings. He was at once
admitted.

VIII.

MRS. ZANT was alone, in an imperfectly lighted room.

"I hope you will excuse the bad light," she said; "my head has
been burning as if the fever had come back again. Oh, don't go
away! After what I have suffered, you don't know how dreadful it
is to be alone."

The tone of her voice told him that she had been crying. He at
once tried the best means of setting the poor lady at ease, by
telling her of the conclusion at which he had arrived, after
reading her manuscript. The happy result showed itself instantly:
her face brightened, her manner changed; she was eager to hear
more.

"Have I produced any other impression on you?" she asked.

He understood the allusion. Expressing sincere respect for her
own convictions, he told her honestly that he was not prepared to
enter on the obscure and terrible question of supernatural
interposition. Grateful for the tone in which he had answered
her, she wisely and delicately changed the subject.

"I must speak to you of my brother-in-law," she said. "He has
told me of your visit; and I am anxious to know what you think of
him. Do you like Mr. John Zant?"

Mr. Rayburn hesitated.

The careworn look appeared again in her face. "If you had felt as
kindly toward him as he feels toward you," she said, "I might
have gone to St. Sallins with a lighter heart."

Mr. Rayburn thought of the supernatural appearances, described at
the close of her narrative. "You believe in that terrible
warning," he remonstrated; "and yet, you go to your
brother-in-law's house!"

"I believe," she answered, "in the spirit of the man who loved me
in the days of his earthly bondage. I am under _his_ protection.
What have I to do but to cast away my fears, and to wait in faith
and hope? It might have helped my resolution if a friend had been
near to encourage me." She paused and smiled sadly. "I must
remember," she resumed, "that your way of understanding my
position is not my way. I ought to have told you that Mr. John
Zant feels needless anxiety about my health. He declares that he
will not lose sight of me until his mind is at ease. It is
useless to attempt to alter his opinion. He says my nerves are
shattered--and who that sees me can doubt it? He tells me that my
only chance of getting better is to try change of air and perfect
repose--how can I contradict him? He reminds me that I have no
relation but himself, and no house open to me but his own--and
God knows he is right!"

She said those last words in accents of melancholy resignation,
which grieved the good man whose one merciful purpose was to
serve and console her. He spoke impulsively with the freedom of
an old friend

"I want to know more of you and Mr. John Zant than I know now,"
he said. "My motive is a better one than mere curiosity. Do you
believe that I feel a sincere interest in you?"

"With my whole heart."

That reply encouraged him to proceed with what he had to say.
"When you recovered from your fainting-fit," he began, "Mr. John
Zant asked questions, of course?"

"He asked what could possibly have happened, in such a quiet
place as Kensington Gardens, to make me faint."

"And how did you answer?"

"Answer? I couldn't even look at him!"

"You said nothing?"

"Nothing. I don't know what he thought of me; he might have been
surprised, or he might have been offended."

"Is he easily offended?" Mr. Rayburn asked.

"Not in my experience of him."

"Do you mean your experience of him before your illness?"

"Yes. Since my recovery, his engagements with country patients
have kept him away from London. I have not seen him since he took
these lodgings for me. But he is always considerate. He has
written more than once to beg that I will not think him
neglectful, and to tell me (what I knew already through my poor
husband) that he has no money of his own, and must live by his
profession."

"In your husband's lifetime, were the two brothers on good
terms?"

"Always. The one complaint I ever heard my husband make of John
Zant was that he didn't come to see us often enough, after our
marriage. Is there some wickedness in him which we have never
suspected? It may be--but _how_ can it be? I have every reason to
be grateful to the man against whom I have been supernaturally
warned! His conduct to me has been always perfect. I can't tell
you what I owe to his influence in quieting my mind, when a
dreadful doubt arose about my husband's death."

"Do you mean doubt if he died a natural death?"

"Oh, no! no! He was dying of rapid consumption--but his sudden
death took the doctors by surprise. One of them thought that he
might have taken an overdose of his sleeping drops, by mistake.
The other disputed this conclusion, or there might have been an
inquest in the house. Oh, don't speak of it any more! Let us talk
of something else. Tell me when I shall see you again."

"I hardly know. When do you and your brother-in-law leave
London?"

"To-morrow." She looked at Mr. Rayburn with a piteous entreaty in
her eyes; she said, timidly: "Do you ever go to the seaside, and
take your dear little girl with you?"

The request, at which she had only dared to hint, touched on the
idea which was at that moment in Mr. Rayburn's mind.

Interpreted by his strong prejudice against John Zant, what she
had said of her brother-in-law filled him with forebodings of
peril to herself; all the more powerful in their influence, for
this reason--that he shrank from distinctly realizing them. If
another person had been present at the interview, and had said to
him afterward: "That man's reluctance to visit his sister-in-law,
while her husband was living, is associated with a secret sense
of guilt which her innocence cannot even imagine: he, and he
alone, knows the cause of her husband's sudden death: his feigned
anxiety about her health is adopted as the safest means of
enticing her into his house--if those formidable conclusions had
been urged on Mr. Rayburn, he would have felt it his duty to
reject them, as unjustifiable aspersions on an absent man. And
yet, when he took leave that evening of Mrs. Zant, he had pledged
himself to give Lucy a holiday at the seaside: and he had said,
without blushing, that the child really deserved it, as a reward
for general good conduct and attention to her lessons!

IX.

THREE days later, the father and daughter arrived toward evening
at St. Sallins-on-Sea. They found Mrs. Zant at the station.

The poor woman's joy, on seeing them, expressed itself like the
joy of a child. "Oh, I am so glad! so glad!" was all she could
say when they met. Lucy was half-smothered with kisses, and was
made supremely happy by a present of the finest doll she had ever
possessed. Mrs. Zant accompanied her friends to the rooms which
had been secured at the hotel. She was able to speak
confidentially to Mr. Rayburn, while Lucy was in the balcony
hugging her doll, and looking at the sea.

The one event that had happened during Mrs. Zant's short
residence at St. Sallins was the departure of her brother-in-law
that morning, for London. He had been called away to operate on
the feet of a wealthy patient who knew the value of his time: his
housekeeper expected that he would return to dinner.

As to his conduct toward Mrs. Zant, he was not only as attentive
as ever--he was almost oppressively affectionate in his language
and manner. There was no service that a man could render which he
had not eagerly offered to her. He declared that he already
perceived an improvement in her health; he congratulated her on
having decided to stay in his house; and (as a proof, perhaps, of
his sincerity) he had repeatedly pressed her hand. "Have you any
idea what all this means?" she said, simply.

Mr. Rayburn kept his idea to himself. He professed ignorance; and
asked next what sort of person the housekeeper was.

Mrs. Zant shook her head ominously.

"Such a strange creature," she said, "and in the habit of taking
such liberties that I begin to be afraid she is a little crazy."

"Is she an old woman?"

"No--only middle-aged. This morning, after her master had left
the house, she actually asked me what I thought of my
brother-in-law! I told her, as coldly as possible, that I thought
he was very kind. She was quite insensible to the tone in which I
had spoken; she went on from bad to worse. "Do you call him the
sort of man who would take the fancy of a young woman?" was her
next question. She actually looked at me (I might have been
wrong; and I hope I was) as if the "young woman" she had in her
mind was myself! I said: "I don't think of such things, and I
don't talk about them." Still, she was not in the least
discouraged; she made a personal remark next: "Excuse me--but you
do look wretchedly pale." I thought she seemed to enjoy the
defect in my complexion; I really believe it raised me in her
estimation. "We shall get on better in time," she said; "I am
beginning to like you." She walked out humming a tune. Don't you
agree with me? Don't you think she's crazy?"

"I can hardly give an opinion until I have seen her. Does she
look as if she might have been a pretty woman at one time of her
life?"

"Not the sort of pretty woman whom I admire!"

Mr. Rayburn smiled. "I was thinking," he resumed, "that this
person's odd conduct may perhaps be accounted for. She is
probably jealous of any young lady who is invited to her master's
house--and (till she noticed your complexion) she began by being
jealous of you."

Innocently at a loss to understand how _she_ could become an
object of the housekeeper's jealousy, Mrs. Zant looked at Mr.
Rayburn in astonishment. Before she could give expression to her
feeling of surprise, there was an interruption--a welcome
interruption. A waiter entered the room, and announced a visitor;
described as "a gentleman."

Mrs. Zant at once rose to retire.

"Who is the gentleman?" Mr. Rayburn asked--detaining Mrs. Zant as
he spoke.

A voice which they both recognized answered gayly, from the outer
side of the door:

"A friend from London."

X.

"WELCOME to St. Sallins! " cried Mr. John Zant. "I knew that you
were expected, my dear sir, and I took my chance at finding you
at the hotel." He turned to his sister-in-law, and kissed her
hand with an elaborate gallantry worthy of Sir Charles Grandison
himself. "When I reached home, my dear, and heard that you had
gone out, I guessed that your object was to receive our excellent
friend. You have not felt lonely while I have been away? That's
right! that's right!" he looked toward the balcony, and
discovered Lucy at the open window, staring at the magnificent
stranger. "Your little daughter, Mr. Rayburn? Dear child! Come
and kiss me."

Lucy answered in one positive word: "No."

Mr. John Zant was not easily discouraged.

Show me your doll, darling," he said. "Sit on my knee."

Lucy answered in two positive words--"I won't."

Her father approached the window to administer the necessary
reproof. Mr. John Zant interfered in the cause of mercy with his
best grace. He held up his hands in cordial entreaty. "Dear Mr.
Rayburn! The fairies are sometimes shy; and _this_ little fairy
doesn't take to strangers at first sight. Dear child! All in good
time. And what stay do you make at St. Sallins? May we hope that
our poor attractions will tempt you to prolong your visit?"

He put his flattering little question with an ease of manner
which was rather too plainly assumed; and he looked at Mr.
Rayburn with a watchfulness which appeared to attach undue
importance to the reply. When he said: "What stay do you make at
St. Sallins?" did he really mean: "How soon do you leave us?"
Inclining to adopt this conclusion, Mr. Rayburn answered
cautiously that his stay at the seaside would depend on
circumstances. Mr. John Zant looked at his sister-in-law, sitting
silent in a corner with Lucy on her lap. "Exert your
attractions," he said; "make the circumstances agreeable to our
good friend. Will you dine with us to-day, my dear sir, and bring
your little fairy with you?"

Lucy was far from receiving this complimentary allusion in the
spirit in which it had been offered. "I'm not a fairy," she
declared. "I'm a child."

"And a naughty child," her father added, with all the severity
that he could assume.

"I can't help it, papa; the man with the big beard puts me out."

The man with the big beard was amused--amiably, paternally
amused--by Lucy's plain speaking. He repeated his invitation to
dinner; and he did his best to look disappointed when Mr. Rayburn
made the necessary excuses.

"Another day," he said (without, however, fixing the day). "I
think you will find my house comfortable. My housekeeper may
perhaps be eccentric--but in all essentials a woman in a
thousand. Do you feel the change from London already? Our air at
St. Sallins is really worthy of its reputation. Invalids who come
here are cured as if by magic. What do you think of Mrs. Zant?
How does she look?"

Mr. Rayburn was evidently expected to say that she looked better.
He said it. Mr. John Zant seemed to have anticipated a stronger
expression of opinion.

"Surprisingly better!" he pronounced. "Infinitely better! We
ought both to be grateful. Pray believe that we _are_ grateful."

"If you mean grateful to me," Mr. Rayburn remarked, "I don't
quite understand--"

"You don't quite understand? Is it possible that you have
forgotten our conversation when I first had the honor of
receiving you? Look at Mrs. Zant again."

Mr. Rayburn looked; and Mrs. Zant's brother-in-law explained
himself.

"You notice the return of her color, the healthy brightness of
her eyes. (No, my dear, I am not paying you idle compliments; I
am stating plain facts.) For that happy result, Mr. Rayburn, we
are indebted to you."

"Surely not?"

"Surely yes! It was at your valuable suggestion that I thought of
inviting my sister-in-law to visit me at St. Sallins. Ah, you
remember it now. Forgive me if I look at my watch; the dinner
hour is on my mind. Not, as your dear little daughter there seems
to think, because I am greedy, but because I am always punctual,
in justice to the cook. Shall we see you to-morrow? Call early,
and you will find us at home."

He gave Mrs. Zant his arm, and bowed and smiled, and kissed his
hand to Lucy, and left the room. Recalling their interview at the
hotel in London, Mr. Rayburn now understood John Zant's object
(on that occasion) in assuming the character of a helpless man in
need of a sensible suggestion. If Mrs. Zant's residence under his
roof became associated with evil consequences, he could declare
that she would never have entered the house but for Mr. Rayburn's
advice.

With the next day came the hateful necessity of returning this
man's visit.

Mr. Rayburn was placed between two alternatives. In Mrs. Zant's
interests he must remain, no matter at what sacrifice of his own
inclinations, on good terms with her brother-in-law--or he must
return to London, and leave the poor woman to her fate. His
choice, it is needless to say, was never a matter of doubt. He
called at the house, and did his innocent best--without in the
least deceiving Mr. John Zant--to make himself agreeable during
the short duration of his visit. Descending the stairs on his way
out, accompanied by Mrs. Zant, he was surprised to see a
middle-aged woman in the hall, who looked as if she was waiting
there expressly to attract notice.

"The housekeeper," Mrs. Zant whispered. "She is impudent enough
to try to make acquaintance with you."

This was exactly what the housekeeper was waiting in the hall to
do.

"I hope you like our watering-place, sir," she began. "If I can
be of service to you, pray command me. Any friend of this lady's
has a claim on me--and you are an old friend, no doubt. I am only
the housekeeper; but I presume to take a sincere interest in Mrs.
Zant; and I am indeed glad to see you here. We none of us
know--do we?--how soon we may want a friend. No offense, I hope?
Thank you, sir. Good-morning."

There was nothing in the woman's eyes which indicated an
unsettled mind; nothing in the appearance of her lips which
suggested habits of intoxication. That her strange outburst of
familiarity proceeded from some strong motive seemed to be more
than probable. Putting together what Mrs. Zant had already told
him, and what he had himself observed, Mr. Rayburn suspected that
the motive might be found in the housekeeper's jealousy of her
master.

XI.

REFLECTING in the solitude of his own room, Mr. Rayburn felt that
the one prudent course to take would be to persuade Mrs. Zant to
leave St. Sallins. He tried to prepare her for this strong
proceeding, when she came the next day to take Lucy out for a
walk.

"If you still regret having forced yourself to accept your
brother-in-law's invitation," was all he ventured to say, "don't
forget that you are perfect mistress of your own actions. You
have only to come to me at the hotel, and I will take you back to
London by the next train."

She positively refused to entertain the idea.

"I should be a thankless creature, indeed," she said, "if I
accepted your proposal. Do you think I am ungrateful enough to
involve you in a personal quarrel with John Zant? No! If I find
myself forced to leave the house, I will go away alone."

There was no moving her from this resolution. When she and Lucy
had gone out together, Mr. Rayburn remained at the hotel, with a
mind ill at ease. A man of readier mental resources might have
felt at a loss how to act for the best, in the emergency that now
confronted him. While he was still as far as ever from arriving
at a decision, some person knocked at the door.

Had Mrs. Zant returned? He looked up as the door was opened, and
saw to his astonishment--Mr. John Zant's housekeeper.

"Don't let me alarm you, sir," the woman said. "Mrs. Zant has
been taken a little faint, at the door of our house. My master is
attending to her."

"Where is the child?" Mr. Rayburn asked.

"I was bringing her back to you, sir, when we met a lady and her
little girl at the door of the hotel. They were on their way to
the beach--and Miss Lucy begged hard to be allowed to go with
them. The lady said the two children were playfellows, and she
was sure you would not object."

"The lady is quite right. Mrs. Zant's illness is not serious, I
hope?"

"I think not, sir. But I should like to say something in her
interests. May I? Thank you." She advanced a step nearer to him,
and spoke her next words in a whisper. "Take Mrs. Zant away from
this place, and lose no time in doing it."

Mr. Rayburn was on his guard. He merely asked: "Why?"

The housekeeper answered in a curiously indirect manner--partly
in jest, as it seemed, and partly in earnest.

"When a man has lost his wife," she said, "there's some
difference of opinion in Parliament, as I hear, whether he does
right or wrong, if he marries his wife's sister. Wait a bit! I'm
coming to the point. My master is one who has a long head on his
shoulders; he sees consequences which escape the notice of peopl
e like me. In his way of thinking, if one man may marry his
wife's sister, and no harm done, where's the objection if another
man pays a compliment to the family, and marries his brother's
widow? My master, if you please, is that other man. Take the
widow away before she marries him."

This was beyond endurance.

"You insult Mrs. Zant," Mr. Rayburn answered, "if you suppose
that such a thing is possible!"

"Oh! I insult her, do I? Listen to me. One of three things will
happen. She will be entrapped into consenting to it--or
frightened into consenting to it--or drugged into consenting to
it--"

Mr. Rayburn was too indignant to let her go on.

"You are talking nonsense," he said. "There can be no marriage;
the law forbids it."

"Are you one of the people who see no further than their noses?"
she asked insolently. "Won't the law take his money? Is he
obliged to mention that he is related to her by marriage, when he
buys the license?" She paused; her humor changed; she stamped
furiously on the floor. The true motive that animated her showed
itself in her next words, and warned Mr. Rayburn to grant a more
favorable hearing than he had accorded to her yet. "If you won't
stop it," she burst out, "I will! If he marries anybody, he is
bound to marry ME. Will you take her away? I ask you, for the
last time--_will_ you take her away?"

The tone in which she made that final appeal to him had its
effect.

"I will go back with you to John Zant's house," he said, "and
judge for myself."

She laid her hand on his arm:

"I must go first--or you may not be let in. Follow me in five
minutes; and don't knock at the street door."

On the point of leaving him, she abruptly returned.

"We have forgotten something," she said. "Suppose my master
refuses to see you. His temper might get the better of him; he
might make it so unpleasant for you that you would be obliged to
go."

"_My_ temper might get the better of _me_," Mr. Rayburn replied;
"and--if I thought it was in Mrs. Zant's interests--I might
refuse to leave the house unless she accompanied me."

"That will never do, sir."

"Why not?"

"Because I should be the person to suffer."

"In what way?"

"In this way. If you picked a quarrel with my master, I should be
blamed for it because I showed you upstairs. Besides, think of
the lady. You might frighten her out of her senses, if it came to
a struggle between you two men."

The language was exaggerated; but there was a force in this last
objection which Mr. Rayburn was obliged to acknowledge.

"And, after all," the housekeeper continued, "he has more right
over her than you have. He is related to her, and you are only
her friend."

Mr. Rayburn declined to let himself be influenced by this
consideration, "Mr. John Zant is only related to her by
marriage," he said. "If she prefers trusting in me--come what may
of it, I will be worthy of her confidence."

The housekeeper shook her head.

"That only means another quarrel," she answered. "The wise way,
with a man like my master, is the peaceable way. We must manage
to deceive him."

"I don't like deceit."

"In that case, sir, I'll wish you good-by. We will leave Mrs.
Zant to do the best she can for herself."

Mr. Rayburn was unreasonable. He positively refused to adopt this
alternative.

"Will you hear what I have got to say?" the housekeeper asked.

"There can be no harm in that," he admitted. "Go on."

She took him at his word.

"When you called at our house," she began, "did you notice the
doors in the passage, on the first floor? Very well. One of them
is the door of the drawing-room, and the other is the door of the
library. Do you remember the drawing-room, sir?"

"I thought it a large well-lighted room," Mr. Rayburn answered.
"And I noticed a doorway in the wall, with a handsome curtain
hanging over it."

"That's enough for our purpose," the housekeeper resumed. "On the
other side of the curtain, if you had looked in, you would have
found the library. Suppose my master is as polite as usual, and
begs to be excused for not receiving you, because it is an
inconvenient time. And suppose you are polite on your side and
take yourself off by the drawing-room door. You will find me
waiting downstairs, on the first landing. Do you see it now?"

"I can't say I do."

"You surprise me, sir. What is to prevent us from getting back
softly into the library, by the door in the passage? And why
shouldn't we use that second way into the library as a means of
discovering what may be going on in the drawing-room? Safe behind
the curtain, you will see him if he behaves uncivilly to Mrs.
Zant, or you will hear her if she calls for help. In either case,
you may be as rough and ready with my master as you find needful;
it will be he who has frightened her, and not you. And who can
blame the poor housekeeper because Mr. Rayburn did his duty, and
protected a helpless woman? There is my plan, sir. Is it worth
trying?"

He answered, sharply enough: "I don't like it."

The housekeeper opened the door again, and wished him good-by.

If Mr. Rayburn had felt no more than an ordinary interest in Mrs.
Zant, he would have let the woman go. As it was, he stopped her;
and, after some further protest (which proved to be useless), he
ended in giving way.

"You promise to follow my directions?" she stipulated.

He gave the promise. She smiled, nodded, and left him. True to
his instructions, Mr. Rayburn reckoned five minutes by his watch,
before he followed her.

XII.

THE housekeeper was waiting for him, with the street-door ajar.

"They are both in the drawing-room," she whispered, leading the
way upstairs. "Step softly, and take him by surprise."

A table of oblong shape stood midway between the drawing-room
walls. At the end of it which was nearest to the window, Mrs.
Zant was pacing to and fro across the breadth of the room. At the
opposite end of the table, John Zant was seated. Taken completely
by surprise, he showed himself in his true character. He started
to his feet, and protested with an oath against the intrusion
which had been committed on him.

Heedless of his action and his language, Mr. Rayburn could look
at nothing, could think of nothing, but Mrs. Zant. She was still
walking slowly to and fro, unconscious of the words of sympathy
which he addressed to her, insensible even as it seemed to the
presence of other persons in the room.

John Zant's voice broke the silence. His temper was under control
again: he had his reasons for still remaining on friendly terms
with Mr. Rayburn.

"I am sorry I forgot myself just now," he said.

Mr. Rayburn's interest was concentrated on Mrs. Zant; he took no
notice of the apology.

"When did this happen?" he asked.

"About a quarter of an hour ago. I was fortunately at home.
Without speaking to me, without noticing me, she walked upstairs
like a person in a dream."

Mr. Rayburn suddenly pointed to Mrs. Zant.

"Look at her!" he said. "There's a change!"

All restlessness in her movements had come to an end. She was
standing at the further end of the table, which was nearest to
the window, in the full flow of sunlight pouring at that moment
over her face. Her eyes looked out straight before her--void of
all expression. Her lips were a little parted: her head drooped
slightly toward her shoulder, in an attitude which suggested
listening for something or waiting for something. In the warm
brilliant light, she stood before the two men, a living creature
self-isolated in a stillness like the stillness of death.

John Zant was ready with the expression of his opinion.

"A nervous seizure," he said. "Something resembling catalepsy, as
you see."

"Have you sent for a doctor?"

"A doctor is not wanted."

"I beg your pardon. It seems to me that medical help is
absolutely necessary."

"Be so good as to remember, " Mr. John Zant answered, "that the
decision rests with me, as the lady's relative. I am sensible of
the honor which your visit confers on me. But the time has been
unhappily chosen. Forgive me if I suggest that you will do well
to retire."

Mr. Rayburn had not forgotten the housekeeper's advice, or the
promise which she had exacted from him. But the expression in
John Zant's face was a serious trial
 to his self-control. He hesitated, and looked back at Mrs. Zant.

If he provoked a quarrel by remaining in the room, the one
alternative would be the removal of her by force. Fear of the
consequences to herself, if she was suddenly and roughly roused
from her trance, was the one consideration which reconciled him
to submission. He withdrew.

The housekeeper was waiting for him below, on the first landing.
When the door of the drawing-room had been closed again, she
signed to him to follow her, and returned up the stairs. After
another struggle with himself, he obeyed. They entered the
library from the corridor--and placed themselves behind the
closed curtain which hung over the doorway. It was easy so to
arrange the edge of the drapery as to observe, without exciting
suspicion, whatever was going on in the next room.

Mrs. Zant's brother-in-law was approaching her at the time when
Mr. Rayburn saw him again.

In the instant afterward, she moved--before he had completely
passed over the space between them. Her still figure began to
tremble. She lifted her drooping head. For a moment there was a
shrinking in her--as if she had been touched by something. She
seemed to recognize the touch: she was still again.

John Zant watched the change. It suggested to him that she was
beginning to recover her senses. He tried the experiment of
speaking to her.

"My love, my sweet angel, come to the heart that adores you!"

He advanced again; he passed into the flood of sunlight pouring
over her.

"Rouse yourself!" he said.

She still remained in the same position; apparently at his mercy,
neither hearing him nor seeing him.

"Rouse yourself!" he repeated. "My darling, come to me!"

At the instant when he attempted to embrace her--at the instant
when Mr. Rayburn rushed into the room--John Zant's arms, suddenly
turning rigid, remained outstretched. With a shriek of horror, he
struggled to draw them back--struggled, in the empty brightness
of the sunshine, as if some invisible grip had seized him.

"What has got me?" the wretch screamed. "Who is holding my hands?
Oh, the cold of it! the cold of it!"

His features became convulsed; his eyes turned upward until only
the white eyeballs were visible. He fell prostrate with a crash
that shook the room.

The housekeeper ran in. She knelt by her master's body. With one
hand she loosened his cravat. With the other she pointed to the
end of the table.

Mrs. Zant still kept her place; but there was another change.
Little by little, her eyes recovered their natural living
expression--then slowly closed. She tottered backward from the
table, and lifted her hands wildly, as if to grasp at something
which might support her. Mr. Rayburn hurried to her before she
fell--lifted her in his arms--and carried her out of the room.

One of the servants met them in the hall. He sent her for a
carriage. In a quarter of an hour more, Mrs. Zant was safe under
his care at the hotel.

XIII.

THAT night a note, written by the housekeeper, was delivered to
Mrs. Zant.

"The doctors give little hope. The paralytic stroke is spreading
upward to his face. If death spares him, he will live a helpless
man. I shall take care of him to the last. As for you--forget
him."

Mrs. Zant gave the note to Mr. Rayburn.

"Read it, and destroy it," she said. "It is written in ignorance
of the terrible truth."

He obeyed--and looked at her in silence, waiting to hear more.
She hid her face. The few words she had addressed to him, after a
struggle with herself, fell slowly and reluctantly from her lips.

She said: "No mortal hand held the hands of John Zant. The
guardian spirit was with me. The promised protection was with me.
I know it. I wish to know no more."

Having spoken, she rose to retire. He opened the door for her,
seeing that she needed rest in her own room.

Left by himself, he began to consider the prospect that was
before him in the future. How was he to regard the woman who had
just left him? As a poor creature weakened by disease, the victim
of her own nervous delusion? or as the chosen object of a
supernatural revelation--unparalleled by any similar revelation
that he had heard of, or had found recorded in books? His first
discovery of the place that she really held in his estimation
dawned on his mind, when he felt himself recoiling from the
conclusion which presented her to his pity, and yielding to the
nobler conviction which felt with her faith, and raised her to a
place apart among other women.

XIV.

THEY left St. Sallins the next day.

Arrived at the end of the journey, Lucy held fast by Mrs. Zant's
hand. Tears were rising in the child's eyes.

"Are we to bid her good-by?" she said sadly to her father.

He seemed to be unwilling to trust himself to speak; he only
said:

"My dear, ask her yourself."

But the result justified him. Lucy was happy again.


MISS MORRIS AND THE STRANGER.

I.

WHEN I first saw him, he was lost in one of the Dead Cities of
England--situated on the South Coast, and called Sandwich.

Shall I describe Sandwich? I think not. Let us own the truth;
descriptions of places, however nicely they may be written, are
always more or less dull. Being a woman, I naturally hate
dullness. Perhaps some description of Sandwich may drop out, as
it were, from my report of our conversation when we first met as
strangers in the street.

He began irritably. "I've lost myself," he said.

"People who don't know the town often do that," I remarked.

He went on: "Which is my way to the Fleur de Lys Inn?"

His way was, in the first place, to retrace his steps. Then to
turn to the left. Then to go on until he found two streets
meeting. Then to take the street on the right. Then to look out
for the second turning on the left. Then to follow the turning
until he smelled stables--and there was the inn. I put it in the
clearest manner, and never stumbled over a word.

"How the devil am I to remember all that?" he said.

This was rude. We are naturally and properly indignant with any
man who is rude to us. But whether we turn our backs on him in
contempt, or whether we are merciful and give him a lesson in
politeness, depends entirely on the man. He may be a bear, but he
may also have his redeeming qualities. This man had redeeming
qualities. I cannot positively say that he was either handsome or
ugly, young or old, well or ill dressed. But I can speak with
certainty to the personal attractions which recommended him to
notice. For instance, the tone of his voice was persuasive. (Did
you ever read a story, written by one of _us_, in which we failed
to dwell on our hero's voice?) Then, again, his hair was
reasonably long. (Are you acquainted with any woman who can
endure a man with a cropped head?) Moreover, he was of a good
height. (It must be a very tall woman who can feel favorably
inclined toward a short man.) Lastly, although his eyes were not
more than fairly presentable in form and color, the wretch had in
some unaccountable manner become possessed of beautiful
eyelashes. They were even better eyelashes than mine. I write
quite seriously. There is one woman who is above the common
weakness of vanity--and she holds the present pen.

So I gave my lost stranger a lesson in politeness. The lesson
took the form of a trap. I asked him if he would like me to show
him the way to the inn. He was still annoyed at losing himself.
As I had anticipated, he bluntly answered: "Yes."

"When you were a boy, and you wanted something," I said, "did
your mother teach you to say 'Please'?"

He positively blushed. "She did," he admitted; "and she taught me
to say 'Beg your pardon' when I was rude. I'll say it now: 'Beg
your pardon.' "

This curious apology increased my belief in his redeeming
qualities. I led the way to the inn. He followed me in silence.
No woman who respects herself can endure silence when she is in
the company of a man. I made him talk.

"Do you come to us from Ramsgate?" I began. He only nodded his
head. "We don't think much of Ramsgate here," I went on. "There
is not an old building in the place. And their first Mayor was
only elected the other day!"

This point of view seemed to be new to him. He made no attempt to
dispute it; he only looked around him, and said: "Sandwich is a
melancholy place, miss." He was so rapidly improving in
politeness, that I encouraged him by a smile. As a citizen of
Sandwich, I may say that we take it as a compliment when we are
told that our town is a melancholy place. And why not? Melancholy
is connected with dignity. And dignity is associated with age.
And _we_ are old. I teach my pupils logic, among other
things--there is a specimen. Whatever may be said to the
contrary, women can reason. They can also wander; and I must
admit that _I_ am wandering. Did I mention, at starting, that I
was a governess? If not, that allusion to "pupils" must have come
in rather abruptly. Let me make my excuses, and return to my lost
stranger.

"Is there any such thing as a straight street in all Sandwich?"
he asked.

"Not one straight street in the whole town."

"Any trade, miss?"

"As little as possible--and _that_ is expiring."

"A decayed place, in short?"

"Thoroughly decayed."

My tone seemed to astonish him. "You speak as if you were proud
of its being a decayed place," he said.

I quite respected him; this was such an intelligent remark to
make. We do enjoy our decay: it is our chief distinction.
Progress and prosperity everywhere else; decay and dissolution
here. As a necessary consequence, we produce our own impression,
and we like to be original. The sea deserted us long ago: it once
washed our walls, it is now two miles away from us--we don't
regret the sea. We had sometimes ninety-five ships in our harbor,
Heaven only knows how many centuries ago; we now have one or two
small coasting vessels, half their time aground in a muddy little
river--we don't regret our harbor. But one house in the town is
daring enough to anticipate the arrival of resident visitors, and
announces furnished apartments to let. What a becoming contrast
to our modern neighbor, Ramsgate! Our noble market-place exhibits
the laws made by the corporation; and every week there are fewer
and fewer people to obey the laws. How convenient! Look at our
one warehouse by the river side--with the crane generally idle,
and the windows mostly boarded up; and perhaps one man at the
door, looking out for the job which his better sense tells him
cannot possibly come. What a wholesome protest against the
devastating hurry and over-work elsewhere, which has shattered
the nerves of the nation! "Far from me and from my friends" (to
borrow the eloquent language of Doctor Johnson) "be such frigid
enthusiasm as shall conduct us indifferent and unmoved'' over the
bridge by which you enter Sandwich, and pay a toll if you do it
in a carriage. "That man is little to be envied" (Doctor Johnson
again) who can lose himself in our labyrinthine streets, and not
feel that he has reached the welcome limits of progress, and
found a haven of rest in an age of hurry.

I am wandering again. Bear with the unpremeditated enthusiasm of
a citizen who only attained years of discretion at her last
birthday. We shall soon have done with Sandwich; we are close to
the door of the inn.

"You can't mistake it now, sir," I said. "Good-morning."

He looked down at me from under his beautiful eyelashes (have I
mentioned that I am a little woman?), and he asked in his
persuasive tones: "Must we say good-by?"

I made him a bow.

"Would you allow me to see you safe home?" he suggested.

Any other man would have offended me. This man blushed like a
boy, and looked at the pavement instead of looking at me. By this
time I had made up my mind about him. He was not only a gentleman
beyond all doubt, but a shy gentleman as well. His bluntness and
his odd remarks were, as I thought, partly efforts to disguise
his shyness, and partly refuges in which he tried to forget his
own sense of it. I answered his audacious proposal amiably and
pleasantly. "You would only lose your way again," I said, "and I
should have to take you back to the inn for the second time."

Wasted words! My obstinate stranger only made another proposal.

"I have ordered lunch here," he said, "and I am quite alone." He
stopped in confusion, and looked as if he rather expected me to
box his ears. "I shall be forty next birthday," he went on; "I am
old enough to be your father." I all but burst out laughing, and
stepped across the street, on my way home. He followed me. "We
might invite the landlady to join us," he said, looking the
picture of a headlong man, dismayed by the consciousness of his
own imprudence. "Couldn't you honor me by lunching with me if we
had the landlady?" he asked.

This was a little too much. "Quite out of the question, sir--and
you ought to know it," I said with severity. He half put out his
hand. "Won't you even shake hands with me?" he inquired
piteously. When we have most properly administered a reproof to a
man, what is the perversity which makes us weakly pity him the
minute afterward? I was fool enough to shake hands with this
perfect stranger. And, having done it, I completed the total loss
of my dignity by running away. Our dear crooked little streets
hid me from him directly.

As I rang at the door-bell of my employer's house, a thought
occurred to me which might have been alarming to a better
regulated mind than mine.

"Suppose he should come back to Sandwich?"

II.

BEFORE many more days passed I had troubles of my own to contend
with, which put the eccentric stranger out of my head for the
time.

Unfortunately, my troubles are part of my story; and my early
life mixes itself up with them. In consideration of what is to
follow, may I say two words relating to the period before I was a
governess?

I am the orphan daughter of a shopkeeper of Sandwich. My father
died, leaving to his widow and child an honest name and a little
income of L80 a year. We kept on the shop--neither gaining nor
losing by it. The truth is nobody would buy our poor little
business. I was thirteen years old at the time; and I was able to
help my mother, whose health was then beginning to fail. Never
shall I forget a certain bright summer's day, when I saw a new
customer enter our shop. He was an elderly gentleman; and he
seemed surprised to find so young a girl as myself in charge of
the business, and, what is more, competent to support the charge.
I answered his questions in a manner which seemed to please him.
He soon discovered that my education (excepting my knowledge of
the business) had been sadly neglected; and he inquired if he
could see my mother. She was resting on the sofa in the back
parlor--and she received him there. When he came out, he patted
me on the cheek. "I have taken a fancy to you," he said, "and
perhaps I shall come back again." He did come back again. My
mother had referred him to the rector for our characters in the
town, and he had heard what our clergyman could say for us. Our
only relations had emigrated to Australia, and were not doing
well there. My mother's death would leave me, so far as relatives
were concerned, literally alone in the world. "Give this girl a
first-rate education," said our elderly customer, sitting at our
tea-table in the back parlor, "and she will do. If you will send
her to school, ma'am, I'll pay for her education." My poor mother
began to cry at the prospect of parting with me. The old
gentleman said: "Think of it," and got up to go. He gave me his
card as I opened the shop-door for him. "If you find yourself in
trouble," he whispered, so that my mother could not hear him, "be
a wise child, and write and tell me of it." I looked at the card.
Our kind-hearted customer was no less a person than Sir Gervase
Damian, of Garrum Park, Sussex--with landed property in our
county as well! He had made himself (through the rector, no
doubt) far better acquainted than I was with the true state of my
mother's health. In four months from the memorable day when the
great man had taken tea with us, my time had come to be alone in
the world. I have no courage to dwell on it; my spirits sink,
even at this distance of time, when I think of myself in those
days. The good rector helped me with his advice--I wrote to Sir
Gervase Damian.

A change had come over his life as well as mine in the interval
since we had met.

Sir Gervas e had married for the second time--and, what was more
foolish still, perhaps, at his age, had married a young woman.
She was said to be consumptive, and of a jealous temper as well.
Her husband's only child by his first wife, a son and heir, was
so angry at his father's second marriage that he left the house.
The landed property being entailed, Sir Gervase could only
express his sense of his son's conduct by making a new will,
which left all his property in money to his young wife.

These particulars I gathered from the steward, who was expressly
sent to visit me at Sandwich.

"Sir Gervase never makes a promise without keeping it," this
gentleman informed me. "I am directed to take you to a first-rate
ladies' school in the neighborhood of London, and to make all the
necessary arrangements for your remaining there until you are
eighteen years of age. Any written communications in the future
are to pass, if you please, through the hands of the rector of
Sandwich. The delicate health of the new Lady Damian makes it
only too likely that the lives of her husband and herself will be
passed, for the most part, in a milder climate than the climate
of England. I am instructed to say this, and to convey to you Sir
Gervase's best wishes."

By the rector's advice, I accepted the position offered to me in
this unpleasantly formal manner--concluding (quite correctly, as
I afterward discovered) that I was indebted to Lady Damian for
the arrangement which personally separated me from my benefactor.
Her husband's kindness and my gratitude, meeting on the neutral
ground of Garrum Park, were objects of conjugal distrust to this
lady. Shocking! shocking! I left a sincerely grateful letter to
be forwarded to Sir Gervase; and, escorted by the steward, I went
to school--being then just fourteen years old.

I know I am a fool. Never mind. There is some pride in me, though
I am only a small shopkeeper's daughter. My new life had its
trials--my pride held me up.

For the four years during which I remained at the school, my poor
welfare might be a subject of inquiry to the rector, and
sometimes even the steward--never to Sir Gervase himself. His
winters were no doubt passed abroad; but in the summer time he
and Lady Damian were at home again. Not even for a day or two in
the holiday time was there pity enough felt for my lonely
position to ask me to be the guest of the housekeeper (I expected
nothing more) at Garrum Park. But for my pride, I might have felt
it bitterly. My pride said to me, "Do justice to yourself." I
worked so hard, I behaved so well, that the mistress of the
school wrote to Sir Gervase to tell him how thoroughly I had
deserved the kindness that he had shown to me. No answer was
received. (Oh, Lady Damian!) No change varied the monotony of my
life--except when one of my schoolgirl friends sometimes took me
home with her for a few days at vacation time. Never mind. My
pride held me up.

As the last half-year of my time at school approached, I began to
consider the serious question of my future life.

Of course, I could have lived on my eighty pounds a year; but
what a lonely, barren existence it promised to be!--unless
somebody married me; and where, if you please, was I to find him?
My education had thoroughly fitted me to be a governess. Why not
try my fortune, and see a little of the world in that way? Even
if I fell among ill-conditioned people, I could be independent of
them, and retire on my income.

The rector, visiting London, came to see me. He not only approved
of my idea--he offered me a means of carrying it out. A worthy
family, recently settled at Sandwich, were in want of a
governess. The head of the household was partner in a business
(the exact nature of which it is needless to mention) having
"branches" out of London. He had become superintendent of a new
"branch"--tried as a commercial experiment, under special
circumstances, at Sandwich. The idea of returning to my native
place pleased me--dull as the place was to others. I accepted the
situation.

When the steward's usual half-yearly letter arrived soon
afterward, inquiring what plans I had formed on leaving school,
and what he could do to help them, acting on behalf of Sir
Gervase, a delicious tingling filled me from head to foot when I
thought of my own independence. It was not ingratitude toward my
benefactor; it was only my little private triumph over Lady
Damian. Oh, my sisters of the sex, can you not understand and
forgive me?

So to Sandwich I returned; and there, for three years, I remained
with the kindest people who ever breathed the breath of life.
Under their roof I was still living when I met with my lost
gentleman in the street.

Ah, me! the end of that quiet, pleasant life was near. When I
lightly spoke to the odd stranger of the expiring trade of the
town, I never expected that my employer's trade was expiring too.
The speculation had turned out to be a losing one; and all his
savings had been embarked in it. He could no longer remain at
Sandwich, or afford to keep a governess. His wife broke the sad
news to me. I was so fond of the children, I proposed to her to
give up my salary. Her husband refused even to consider the
proposal. It was the old story of poor humanity over again. We
cried, we kissed, we parted.

What was I to do next?--Write to Sir Gervase?

I had already written, soon after my return to Sandwich; breaking
through the regulations by directly addressing Sir Gervase. I
expressed my grateful sense of his generosity to a poor girl who
had no family claim on him; and I promised to make the one return
in my power by trying to be worthy of the interest he had taken
in me. The letter was written without any alloy of mental
reserve. My new life as a governess was such a happy one that I
had forgotten my paltry bitterness of feeling against Lady
Damian.

It was a relief to think of this change for the better, when the
secretary at Garrum Park informed me that he had forwarded my
letter to Sir Gervase, then at Madeira with his sick wife. She
was slowly and steadily wasting away in a decline. Before another
year had passed, Sir Gervase was left a widower for the second
time, with no child to console him under his loss. No answer came
to my grateful letter. I should have been unreasonable indeed if
I had expected the bereaved husband to remember me in his grief
and loneliness. Could I write to him again, in my own trumpery
little interests, under these circumstances? I thought (and still
think) that the commonest feeling of delicacy forbade it. The
only other alternative was to appeal to the ever-ready friends of
the obscure and helpless public. I advertised in the newspapers.

The tone of one of the answers which I received impressed me so
favorably, that I forwarded my references. The next post brought
my written engagement, and the offer of a salary which doubled my
income.

The story of the past is told; and now we may travel on again,
with no more stoppages by the way.

III.

THE residence of my present employer was in the north of England.
Having to pass through London, I arranged to stay in town for a
few days to make some necessary additions to my wardrobe. An old
servant of the rector, who kept a lodging-house in the suburbs,
received me kindly, and guided my choice in the serious matter of
a dressmaker. On the second morning after my arrival an event
happened. The post brought me a letter forwarded from the
rectory. Imagine my astonishment when my correspondent proved to
be Sir Gervase Damian himself!

The letter was dated from his house in London. It briefly invited
me to call and see him, for a reason which I should hear from his
own lips. He naturally supposed that I was still at Sandwich, and
requested me, in a postscript, to consider my journey as made at
his expense.

I went to the house the same day. While I was giving my name, a
gentleman came out into the hall. He spoke to me without
ceremony.

"Sir Gervase," he said, "believes he is going to die. Don't
encourage him in that idea. He may live for another year or more,
if his friends will only persuade him to be hopeful about
himself."

With that, the gentleman left me; the servant said i t was the
doctor.

The change in my benefactor, since I had seen him last, startled
and distressed me. He lay back in a large arm-chair, wearing a
grim black dressing-gown, and looking pitiably thin and pinched
and worn. I do not think I should have known him again, if we had
met by accident. He signed to me to be seated on a little chair
by his side.

"I wanted to see you," he said quietly, "before I die. You must
have thought me neglectful and unkind, with good reason. My
child, you have not been forgotten. If years have passed without
a meeting between us, it has not been altogether my fault--"

He stopped. A pained expression passed over his poor worn face;
he was evidently thinking of the young wife whom he had lost. I
repeated--fervently and sincerely repeated--what I had already
said to him in writing. "I owe everything, sir, to your fatherly
kindness." Saying this, I ventured a little further. I took his
wan white hand, hanging over the arm of the chair, and
respectfully put it to my lips.

He gently drew his hand away from me, and sighed as he did it.
Perhaps _she_ had sometimes kissed his hand.

"Now tell me about yourself," he said.

I told him of my new situation, and how I had got it. He listened
with evident interest.

"I was not self-deceived," he said, "when I first took a fancy to
you in the shop. I admire your independent feeling; it's the
right kind of courage in a girl like you. But you must let me do
something more for you--some little service to remember me by
when the end has come. What shall it be?"

"Try to get better, sir; and let me write to you now and then," I
answered. "Indeed, indeed, I want nothing more."

"You will accept a little present, at least?" With those words he
took from the breast-pocket of his dressing-gown an enameled
cross attached to a gold chain. "Think of me sometimes," he said,
as he put the chain round my neck. He drew me to him gently, and
kissed my forehead. It was too much for me. "Don't cry, my dear,"
he said; "don't remind me of another sad young face--"

Once more he stopped; once more he was thinking of the lost wife.
I pulled down my veil, and ran out of the room.

IV.

THE next day I was on my way to the north. My narrative brightens
again--but let us not forget Sir Gervase Damian.

I ask permission to introduce some persons of distinction:--Mrs.
Fosdyke, of Carsham Hall, widow of General Fosdyke; also Master
Frederick, Miss Ellen, and Miss Eva, the pupils of the new
governess; also two ladies and three gentlemen, guests staying in
the house.

Discreet and dignified; handsome and well-bred--such was my
impression of Mrs. Fosdyke, while she harangued me on the subject
of her children, and communicated her views on education. Having
heard the views before from others, I assumed a listening
position, and privately formed my opinion of the schoolroom. It
was large, lofty, perfectly furnished for the purpose; it had a
big window and a balcony looking out over the garden terrace and
the park beyond--a wonderful schoolroom, in my limited
experience. One of the two doors which it possessed was left
open, and showed me a sweet little bedroom, with amber draperies
and maplewood furniture, devoted to myself. Here were wealth and
liberality, in the harmonious combination so seldom discovered by
the spectator of small means. I controlled my first feeling of
bewilderment just in time to answer Mrs. Fosdyke on the subject
of reading and recitation--viewed as minor accomplishments which
a good governess might be expected to teach.

"While the organs are young and pliable," the lady remarked, "I
regard it as of great importance to practice children in the art
of reading aloud, with an agreeable variety of tone and
correctness of emphasis. Trained in this way, they will produce a
favorable impression on others, even in ordinary conversation,
when they grow up. Poetry, committed to memory and recited, is a
valuable means toward this end. May I hope that your studies have
enabled you to carry out my views?"

Formal enough in language, but courteous and kind in manner. I
relieved Mrs. Fosdyke from anxiety by informing her that we had a
professor of elocution at school. And then I was left to improve
my acquaintance with my three pupils.

They were fairly intelligent children; the boy, as usual, being
slower than the girls. I did my best--with many a sad remembrance
of the far dearer pupils whom I had left--to make them like me
and trust me; and I succeeded in winning their confidence. In a
week from the time of my arrival at Carsham Hall, we began to
understand each other.

The first day in the week was one of our days for reciting
poetry, in obedience to the instructions with which I had been
favored by Mrs. Fosdyke. I had done with the girls, and had just
opened (perhaps I ought to say profaned) Shakespeare's "Julius
Caesar," in the elocutionary interests of Master Freddy. Half of
Mark Antony's first glorious speech over Caesar's dead body he
had learned by heart; and it was now my duty to teach him, to the
best of my small ability, how to speak it. The morning was warm.
We had our big window open; the delicious perfume of flowers in
the garden beneath filled the room.

I recited the first eight lines, and stopped there feeling that I
must not exact too much from the boy at first. "Now, Freddy," I
said, "try if you can speak the poetry as I have spoken it."

"Don't do anything of the kind, Freddy," said a voice from the
garden; "it's all spoken wrong."

Who was this insolent person? A man unquestionably--and, strange
to say, there was something not entirely unfamiliar to me in his
voice. The girls began to giggle. Their brother was more
explicit. "Oh," says Freddy, "it's only Mr. Sax."

The one becoming course to pursue was to take no notice of the
interruption. "Go on," I said. Freddy recited the lines, like a
dear good boy, with as near an imitation of my style of elocution
as could be expected from him.

"Poor devil!" cried the voice from the garden, insolently pitying
my attentive pupil.

I imposed silence on the girls by a look--and then, without
stirring from my chair, expressed my sense of the insolence of
Mr. Sax in clear and commanding tones. "I shall be obliged to
close the window if this is repeated." Having spoken to that
effect, I waited in expectation of an apology. Silence was the
only apology. It was enough for me that I had produced the right
impression. I went on with my recitation.

           "Here, under leave of Brutus, and the rest
           (For Brutus is an honorable man;
           So are they all, all honorable men),
           Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
           He was my friend, faithful and just to me--"

"Oh, good heavens, I can't stand _that!_ Why don't you speak the
last line properly? Listen to me."

Dignity is a valuable quality, especially in a governess. But
there are limits to the most highly trained endurance. I bounced
out into the balcony--and there, on the terrace, smoking a cigar,
was my lost stranger in the streets of Sandwich!

He recognized me, on his side, the instant I appeared. "Oh,
Lord!" he cried in tones of horror, and ran round the corner of
the terrace as if my eyes had been mad bulls in close pursuit of
him. By this time it is, I fear, useless for me to set myself up
as a discreet person in emergencies. Another woman might have
controlled herself. I burst into fits of laughter. Freddy and the
girls joined me. For the time, it was plainly useless to pursue
the business of education. I shut up Shakespeare, and
allowed--no, let me tell the truth, encouraged--the children to
talk about Mr. Sax.

They only seemed to know what Mr. Sax himself had told them. His
father and mother and brothers and sisters had all died in course
of time. He was the sixth and last of the children, and he had
been christened "Sextus" in consequence, which is Latin (here
Freddy interposed) for sixth. Also christened "Cyril" (here the
girls recovered the lead) by his mother's request; "Sextus" being
such a hideous name. And which of his Christian names does he
use? You wouldn't ask if you knew him! "Sextus," of course,
because it is the ugliest. Sextus  Sax? N ot the romantic sort of
name that one likes, when one is a woman. But I have no right to
be particular. My own name (is it possible that I have not
mentioned it in these pages yet?) is only Nancy Morris. Do not
despise me--and let us return to Mr. Sax.

Is he married? The eldest girl thought not. She had heard mamma
say to a lady, "An old German family, my dear, and, in spite of
his oddities, an excellent man; but so poor--barely enough to
live on--and blurts out the truth, if people ask his opinion, as
if he had twenty thousand a year!" "Your mamma knows him well, of
course?" "I should think so, and so do we. He often comes here.
They say he's not good company among grown-up people. _We_ think
him jolly. He understands dolls, and he's the best back at
leap-frog in the whole of England." Thus far we had advanced in
the praise of Sextus Sax, when one of the maids came in with a
note for me. She smiled mysteriously, and said, "I'm to wait for
an answer, miss."

I opened the note, and read these lines:--

"I am so ashamed of myself, I daren't attempt to make my
apologies personally. Will you accept my written excuses? Upon my
honor, nobody told me when I got here yesterday that you were in
the house. I heard the recitation, and--can you excuse my
stupidity?--I thought it was a stage-struck housemaid amusing
herself with the children. May I accompany you when you go out
with the young ones for your daily walk? One word will do. Yes or
no. Penitently yours--S. S."

In my position, there was but one possible answer to this.
Governesses must not make appointments with strange
gentlemen--even when the children are present in the capacity of
witnesses. I said, No. Am I claiming too much for my readiness to
forgive injuries, when I add that I should have preferred saying
Yes?

We had our early dinner, and then got ready to go out walking as
usual. These pages contain a true confession. Let me own that I
hoped Mr. Sax would understand my refusal, and ask Mrs. Fosdyke's
leave to accompany us. Lingering a little as we went downstairs,
I heard him in the hall--actually speaking to Mrs. Fosdyke! What
was he saying? That darling boy, Freddy, got into a difficulty
with one of his boot-laces exactly at the right moment. I could
help him, and listen--and be sadly disappointed by the result.
Mr. Sax was offended with me.

"You needn't introduce me to the new governess," I heard him say.
"We have met on a former occasion, and I produced a disagreeable
impression on her. I beg you will not speak of me to Miss
Morris."

Before Mrs. Fosdyke could say a word in reply, Master Freddy
changed suddenly from a darling boy to a detestable imp. "I say,
Mr. Sax!" he called out, "Miss Morris doesn't mind you a bit--she
only laughs at you."

The answer to this was the sudden closing of a door. Mr. Sax had
taken refuge from me in one of the ground-floor rooms. I was so
mortified, I could almost have cried.

Getting down into the hall, we found Mrs. Fosdyke with her garden
hat on, and one of the two ladies who were staying in the house
(the unmarried one) whispering to her at the door of the
morning-room. The lady--Miss Melbury--looked at me with a certain
appearance of curiosity which I was quite at a loss to
understand, and suddenly turned away toward the further end of
the hall.

"I will walk with you and the children," Mrs. Fosdyke said to me.
"Freddy, you can ride your tricycle if you like." She turned to
the girls. "My dears, it's cool under the trees. You may take
your skipping-ropes."

She had evidently something special to say to me; and she had
adopted the necessary measures for keeping the children in front
of us, well out of hearing. Freddy led the way on his horse on
three wheels; the girls followed, skipping merrily. Mrs. Fosdyke
opened the business by the most embarrassing remark that she
could possibly have made under the circumstances.

"I find that you are acquainted with Mr. Sax," she began; "and I
am surprised to hear that you dislike him."

She smiled pleasantly, as if my supposed dislike of Mr. Sax
rather amused her. What "the ruling passion" may be among men, I
cannot presume to consider. My own sex, however, I may claim to
understand. The ruling passion among women is Conceit. My
ridiculous notion of my own consequence was wounded in some way.
I assumed a position of the loftiest indifference.

"Really, ma'am," I said, "I can't undertake to answer for any
impression that Mr. Sax may have formed. We met by the merest
accident. I know nothing about him."

Mrs. Fosdyke eyed me slyly, and appeared to be more amused than
ever.

"He is a very odd man," she admitted, "but I can tell you there
is a fine nature under that strange surface of his. However," she
went on, "I am forgetting that he forbids me to talk about him in
your presence. When the opportunity offers, I shall take my own
way of teaching you two to understand each other: you will both
be grateful to me when I have succeeded. In the meantime, there
is a third person who will be sadly disappointed to hear that you
know nothing about Mr. Sax."

"May I ask, ma'am, who the person is?"

"Can you keep a secret, Miss Morris? Of course you can! The
person is Miss Melbury."

(Miss Melbury was a dark woman. It cannot be because I am a fair
woman myself--I hope I am above such narrow prejudices as
that--but it is certainly true that I don't admire dark women.)

"She heard Mr. Sax telling me that you particularly disliked him,
" Mrs. Fosdyke proceeded. "And just as you appeared in the hall,
she was asking me to find out what your reason was. My own
opinion of Mr. Sax, I ought to tell you, doesn't satisfy her; I
am his old friend, and I present him of course from my own
favorable point of view. Miss Melbury is anxious to be made
acquainted with his faults--and she expected you to be a valuable
witness against him."

Thus far we had been walking on. We now stopped, as if by common
consent, and looked at one another.

In my previous experience of Mrs. Fosdyke, I had only seen the
more constrained and formal side of her character. Without being
aware of my own success, I had won the mother's heart in winning
the goodwill of her children. Constraint now seized its first
opportunity of melting away; the latent sense of humor in the
great lady showed itself, while I was inwardly wondering what the
nature of Miss Melbury's extraordinary interest in Mr. Sax might
be. Easily penetrating my thoughts, she satisfied my curiosity
without committing herself to a reply in words. Her large gray
eyes sparkled as they rested on my face, and she hummed the tune
of the old French song, _"C'est l'amour, l'amour, l'amour!"_
There is no disguising it--something in this disclosure made me
excessively angry. Was I angry with Miss Melbury? or with Mr.
Sax? or with myself? I think it must have been with myself.

Finding that I had nothing to say on my side, Mrs. Fosdyke looked
at her watch, and remembered her domestic duties. To my relief,
our interview came to an end.

"I have a dinner-party to-day," she said, "and I have not seen
the housekeeper yet. Make yourself beautiful, Miss Morris, and
join us in the drawing-room after dinner."

V.

I WORE my best dress; and, in all my life before, I never took
such pains with my hair. Nobody will be foolish enough, I hope,
to suppose that I did this on Mr. Sax's account. How could I
possibly care about a man who was little better than a stranger
to me? No! the person I dressed at was Miss Melbury.

She gave me a look, as I modestly placed myself in a corner,
which amply rewarded me for the time spent on my toilet. The
gentlemen came in. I looked at Mr. Sax (mere curiosity) under
shelter of my fan. His appearance was greatly improved by evening
dress. He discovered me in my corner, and seemed doubtful whether
to approach me or not. I was reminded of our first odd meeting;
and I could not help smiling as I called it to mind. Did he
presume to think that I was encouraging him? Before I could
decide that question, he took the vacant place on the sofa. In
any other man--after what had passed in the morning--this would
have been an audacious proceeding. _He_ looked so painfully
embarrassed, that i t became a species of Christian duty to pity
him.

"Won't you shake hands?" he said, just as he had said it at
Sandwich.

I peeped round the corner of my fan at Miss Melbury. She was
looking at us. I shook hands with Mr. Sax.

"What sort of sensation is it," he asked, "when you shake hands
with a man whom you hate?"

"I really can't tell you," I answered innocently; "I have never
done such a thing."

"You would not lunch with me at Sandwich," he protested; "and,
after the humblest apology on my part, you won't forgive me for
what I did this morning. Do you expect me to believe that I am
not the special object of your antipathy? I wish I had never met
with you! At my age, a man gets angry when he is treated cruelly
and doesn't deserve it. You don't understand that, I dare say."

"Oh, yes, I do. I heard what you said about me to Mrs. Fosdyke,
and I heard you bang the door when you got out of my way."

He received this reply with every appearance of satisfaction. "So
you listened, did you? I'm glad to hear that."

"Why?"

"It shows you take some interest in me, after all."

Throughout this frivolous talk (I only venture to report it
because it shows that I bore no malice on my side) Miss Melbury
was looking at us like the basilisk of the ancients. She owned to
being on the wrong side of thirty; and she had a little
money--but these were surely no reasons why she should glare at a
poor governess. Had some secret understanding of the tender sort
been already established between Mr. Sax and herself? She
provoked me into trying to find out--especially as the last words
he had said offered me the opportunity.

"I can prove that I feel a sincere interest in you," I resumed.
"I can resign you to a lady who has a far better claim to your
attention than mine. You are neglecting her shamefully."

He stared at me with an appearance of bewilderment, which seemed
to imply that the attachment was on the lady's side, so far. It
was of course impossible to mention names; I merely turned my
eyes in the right direction. He looked where I looked--and his
shyness revealed itself, in spite of his resolution to conceal
it. His face flushed; he looked mortified and surprised. Miss
Melbury could endure it no longer. She rose, took a song from the
music-stand, and approached us.

"I am going to sing," she said, handing the music to him. "Please
turn over for me, Mr. Sax."

I think he hesitated--but I cannot feel sure that I observed him
correctly. It matters little. With or without hesitation, he
followed her to the piano.

Miss Melbury sang--with perfect self-possession, and an immense
compass of voice. A gentleman near me said she ought to be on the
stage. I thought so too. Big as it was, our drawing-room was not
large enough for her. The gentleman sang next. No voice at
all--but so sweet, such true feeling! I turned over the leaves
for him. A dear old lady, sitting near the piano, entered into
conversation with me. She spoke of the great singers at the
beginning of the present century. Mr. Sax hovered about, with
Miss Melbury's eye on him. I was so entranced by the anecdotes of
my venerable friend, that I could take no notice of Mr. Sax.
Later, when the dinner-party was over, and we were retiring for
the night, he still hovered about, and ended in offering me a
bedroom candle. I immediately handed it to Miss Melbury. Really a
most enjoyable evening!

VI.

THE next morning we were startled by an extraordinary proceeding
on the part of one of the guests. Mr. Sax had left Carsham Hall
by the first train--nobody knew why.

Nature has laid--so, at least, philosophers say--some heavy
burdens upon women. Do those learned persons include in their
list the burden of hysterics? If so, I cordially agree with them.
It is hardly worth speaking of in my case--a constitutional
outbreak in the solitude of my own room, treated with
eau-de-cologne and water, and quite forgotten afterward in the
absorbing employment of education. My favorite pupil, Freddy, had
been up earlier than the rest of us--breathing the morning air in
the fruit-garden. He had seen Mr. Sax and had asked him when he
was coming back again. And Mr. Sax had said, "I shall be back
again next month." (Dear little Freddy!)

In the meanwhile we, in the schoolroom, had the prospect before
us of a dull time in an empty house. The remaining guests were to
go away at the end of the week, their hostess being engaged to
pay a visit to some old friends in Scotland.

During the next three or four days, though I was often alone with
Mrs. Fosdyke, she never said one word on the subject of Mr. Sax.
Once or twice I caught her looking at me with that unendurably
significant smile of hers. Miss Melbury was equally unpleasant in
another way. When we accidentally met on the stairs, her black
eyes shot at me passing glances of hatred and scorn. Did these
two ladies presume to think--?

No; I abstained from completing that inquiry at the time, and I
abstain from completing it here.

The end of the week came, and I and the children were left alone
at Carsham Hall.

I took advantage of the leisure hours at my disposal to write to
Sir Gervase; respectfully inquiring after his health, and
informing him that I had been again most fortunate in my
engagement as a governess. By return of post an answer arrived. I
eagerly opened it. The first lines informed me of Sir Gervase
Damian's death.

The letter dropped from my hand. I looked at my little enameled
cross. It is not for me to say what I felt. Think of all that I
owed to him; and remember how lonely my lot was in the world. I
gave the children a holiday; it was only the truth to tell them
that I was not well.

How long an interval passed before I could call to mind that I
had only read the first lines of the letter, I am not able to
say. When I did take it up I was surprised to see that the
writing covered two pages. Beginning again where I had left off,
my head, in a moment more, began to swim. A horrid fear
overpowered me that I might not be in my right mind, after I had
read the first three sentences. Here they are, to answer for me
that I exaggerate nothing:--

"The will of our deceased client is not yet proved. But, with the
sanction of the executors, I inform you confidentially that you
are the person chiefly interested in it. Sir Gervase Damian
bequeaths to you, absolutely, the whole of his personal property,
amounting to the sum of seventy thousand pounds."

If the letter had ended there, I really cannot imagine what
extravagances I might not have committed. But the writer {head
partner in the firm of Sir Gervase's lawyers) had something more
to say on his own behalf. The manner in which he said it strung
up my nerves in an instant. I can not, and will not, copy the
words here. It is quite revolting enough to give the substance of
them.

The man's object was evidently to let me perceive that he
disapproved of the will. So far I do not complain of him--he had,
no doubt, good reason for the view he took. But, in expressing
his surprise "at this extraordinary proof of the testator's
interest in a perfect stranger to the family," he hinted his
suspicion of an influence, on my part, exercised over Sir
Gervase, so utterly shameful, that I cannot dwell on the subject.
The language, I should add, was cunningly guarded. Even I could
see that it would bear more than one interpretation, and would
thus put me in the wrong if I openly resented it. But the meaning
was plain; and part at least of the motive came out in the
following sentences:

"The present Sir Gervase, as you are doubtless aware, is not
seriously affected by his father's will. He is already more
liberally provided for, as heir under the entail to the whole of
the landed property. But, to say nothing of old friends who are
forgotten, there is a surviving relative of the late Sir Gervase
passed over, who is nearly akin to him by blood. In the event of
this person disputing the will, you will of course hear from us
again, and refer us to your legal adviser."

The letter ended with an apology for delay in writing to me,
caused by difficulty in discovering my address.

And what did I do?--Write to the rector, or to Mrs. Fosdyke, fo r
advice? Not I!

At first I was too indignant to be able to think of what I ought
to do. Our post-time was late, and my head ached as if it would
burst into pieces. I had plenty of leisure to rest and compose
myself. When I got cool again, I felt able to take my own part,
without asking any one to help me.

Even if I had been treated kindly, I should certainly not have
taken the money when there was a relative living with a claim to
it. What did _I_ want with a large fortune! To buy a husband with
it, perhaps? No, no! from all that I have heard, the great Lord
Chancellor was quite right when he said that a woman with money
at her own disposal was "either kissed out of it or kicked out of
it, six weeks after her marriage." The one difficulty before me
was not to give up my legacy, but to express my reply with
sufficient severity, and at the same time with due regard to my
own self-respect. Here is what I wrote:

"SIR--I will not trouble you by attempting to express my sorrow
on hearing of Sir Gervase Damian's death. You would probably form
your own opinion on that subject also; and I have no wish to be
judged by your unenviable experience of humanity for the second
time.

"With regard to the legacy, feeling the sincerest gratitude to my
generous benefactor, I nevertheless refuse to receive the money.

 "Be pleased to send me the necessary document to sign, for
transferring my fortune to that relative of Sir Gervase mentioned
in your letter. The one condition on which I insist is, that no
expression of thanks shall be addressed to me by the person in
whose favor I resign the money. I do not desire (even supposing
that justice is done to my motives on this occasion) to be made
the object of expressions of gratitude for only doing my duty."

So it ended. I may be wrong, but I call that strong writing.

In due course of post a formal acknowledgment arrived. I was
requested to wait for the document until the will had been
proved, and was informed that my name should be kept strictly
secret in the interval. On this occasion the executors were
almost as insolent as the lawyer. They felt it their duty to give
me time to reconsider a decision which had been evidently formed
on impulse. Ah, how hard men are--at least, some of them! I
locked up the acknowledgment in disgust, resolved to think no
more of it until the time came for getting rid of my legacy. I
kissed poor Sir Gervase's little keepsake. While I was still
looking at it, the good children came in, of their own accord, to
ask how I was. I was obliged to draw down the blind in my room,
or they would have seen the tears in my eyes. For the first time
since my mother's death, I felt the heartache. Perhaps the
children made me think of the happier time when I was a child
myself.

VII.

THE will had been proved, and I was informed that the document
was in course of preparation when Mrs. Fosdyke returned from her
visit to Scotland.

She thought me looking pale and worn.

"The time seems to me to have come," she said, "when I had better
make you and Mr. Sax understand each other. Have you been
thinking penitently of your own bad behavior?"

I felt myself blushing. I _had_ been thinking of my conduct to
Mr. Sax--and I was heartily ashamed of it, too.

Mrs. Fosdyke went on, half in jest, half in earnest. "Consult
your own sense of propriety!" she said. "Was the poor man to
blame for not being rude enough to say No, when a lady asked him
to turn over her music? Could _he_ help it, if the same lady
persisted in flirting with him? He ran away from her the next
morning. Did you deserve to be told why he left us? Certainly
not--after the vixenish manner in which you handed the bedroom
candle to Miss Melbury. You foolish girl! Do you think I couldn't
see that you were in love with him? Thank Heaven, he's too poor
to marry you, and take you away from my children, for some time
to come. There will be a long marriage engagement, even if he is
magnanimous enough to forgive you. Shall I ask Miss Melbury to
come back with him?"

She took pity on me at last, and sat down to write to Mr. Sax.
His reply, dated from a country house some twenty miles distant,
announced that he would be at Carsham Hall in three days' time.

On that third day the legal paper that I was to sign arrived by
post. It was Sunday morning; I was alone in the schoolroom.

In writing to me, the lawyer had only alluded to "a surviving
relative of Sir Gervase, nearly akin to him by blood." The
document was more explicit. It described the relative as being a
nephew of Sir Gervase, the son of his sister. The name followed.

It was Sextus Cyril Sax.

I have tried on three different sheets of paper to describe the
effect which this discovery produced on me--and I have torn them
up one after another. When I only think of it, my mind seems to
fall back into the helpless surprise and confusion of that time.
After all that had passed between us--the man himself being then
on his way to the house! what would he think of me when he saw my
name at the bottom of the document? what, in Heaven's name, was I
to do?

How long I sat petrified, with the document on my lap, I never
knew. Somebody knocked at the schoolroom door, and looked in and
said something, and went out again. Then there was an interval.
Then the door was opened again. A hand was laid kindly on my
shoulder. I looked up--and there was Mrs. Fosdyke, asking, in the
greatest alarm, what was the matter with me.

The tone of her voice roused me into speaking. I could think of
nothing but Mr. Sax; I could only say, "Has he come?"

"Yes--and waiting to see you."

Answering in those terms, she glanced at the paper in my lap. In
the extremity of my helplessness, I acted like a sensible
creature at last. I told Mrs. Fosdyke all that I have told here.

She neither moved nor spoke until I had done. Her first
proceeding, after that, was to take me in her arms and give me a
kiss. Having so far encouraged me, she next spoke of poor Sir
Gervase.

"We all acted like fools," she announced, "in needlessly
offending him by protesting against his second marriage. I don't
mean you--I mean his son, his nephew, and myself. If his second
marriage made him happy, what business had we with the disparity
of years between husband and wife? I can tell you this, Sextus
was the first of us to regret what he had done. But for his
stupid fear of being suspected of an interested motive, Sir
Gervase might have known there was that much good in his sister's
son."

She snatched up a copy of the will, which I had not even noticed
thus far.

"See what the kind old man says of you," she went on, pointing to
the words. I could not see them; she was obliged to read them for
me. "I leave my money to the one person living who has been more
than worthy of the little I have done for her, and whose simple
unselfish nature I know that I can trust."

I pressed Mrs. Fosdyke's hand; I was not able to speak. She took
up the legal paper next.

"Do justice to yourself, and be above contemptible scruples," she
said. "Sextus is fond enough of you to be almost worthy of the
sacrifice that you are making. Sign--and I will sign next as the
witness."

I hesitated.

"What will he think of me?" I said.

"Sign!" she repeated, "and we will see to that."

I obeyed. She asked for the lawyer's letter. I gave it to her,
with the lines which contained the man's vile insinuation folded
down, so that only the words above were visible, which proved
that I had renounced my legacy, not even knowing whether the
person to be benefited was a man or a woman. She took this, with
the rough draft of my own letter, and the signed
renunciation--and opened the door.

"Pray come back, and tell me about it!" I pleaded.

She smiled, nodded, and went out.

Oh, what a long time passed before I heard the long-expected
knock at the door! "Come in," I cried impatiently.

Mrs. Fosdyke had deceived me. Mr. Sax had returned in her place.
He closed the door. We two were alone.

He was deadly pale; his eyes, as they rested on me, had a wild
startled look. With icy cold fingers he took my hand, and lifted
it in silence to his lips. The sight of his agitation encouraged
me--I don't to this
 day know why, unless it appealed in some way to my compassion. I
was bold enough to look at him. Still silent, he placed the
letters on the table--and then he laid the signed paper beside
them. When I saw that, I was bolder still. I spoke first.

"Surely you don't refuse me?" I said.

He answered, "I thank you with my whole heart; I admire you more
than words can say. But I can't take it."

"Why not?"

"The fortune is yours," he said gently. "Remember how poor I am,
and feel for me if I say no more."

His head sank on his breast. He stretched out one hand, silently
imploring me to understand him. I could endure it no longer. I
forgot every consideration which a woman, in my position, ought
to have remembered. Out came the desperate words, before I could
stop them.

"You won't take my gift by itself?" I said.

"No."

"Will you take Me with it?"



That evening, Mrs. Fosdyke indulged her sly sense of humor in a
new way. She handed me an almanac.

"After all, my dear," she remarked, "you needn't be ashamed of
having spoken first. You have only used the ancient privilege of
the sex. This is Leap Year."


MR. COSWAY AND THE LANDLADY.

I.

THE guests would have enjoyed their visit to Sir Peter's country
house--but for Mr. Cosway. And to make matters worse, it was not
Mr. Cosway but the guests who were to blame. They repeated the
old story of Adam and Eve, on a larger scale. The women were the
first sinners; and the men were demoralized by the women.

Mr. Cosway's bitterest enemy could not have denied that he was a
handsome, well-bred, unassuming man. No mystery of any sort
attached to him. He had adopted the Navy as a profession--had
grown weary of it after a few years' service--and now lived on
the moderate income left to him, after the death of his parents.
Out of this unpromising material the lively imaginations of the
women built up a romance. The men only noticed that Mr. Cosway
was rather silent and thoughtful; that he was not ready with his
laugh; and that he had a fancy for taking long walks by himself.
Harmless peculiarities, surely? And yet, they excited the
curiosity of the women as signs of a mystery in Mr. Cosway's past
life, in which some beloved object unknown must have played a
chief part.

As a matter of course, the influence of the sex was tried, under
every indirect and delicate form of approach, to induce Mr.
Cosway to open his heart, and tell the tale of his sorrows. With
perfect courtesy, he baffled curiosity, and kept his supposed
secret to himself. The most beautiful girl in the house was ready
to offer herself and her fortune as consolations, if this
impenetrable bachelor would only have taken her into his
confidence. He smiled sadly, and changed the subject.

Defeated so far, the women accepted the next alternative.

One of the guests staying in the house was Mr. Cosway's intimate
friend--formerly his brother-officer on board ship. This
gentleman was now subjected to the delicately directed system of
investigation which had failed with his friend. With unruffled
composure he referred the ladies, one after another, to Mr.
Cosway. His name was Stone. The ladies decided that his nature
was worthy of his name.

The last resource left to our fair friends was to rouse the
dormant interest of the men, and to trust to the confidential
intercourse of the smoking-room for the enlightenment which they
had failed to obtain by other means.

In the accomplishment of this purpose, the degree of success
which rewarded their efforts was due to a favoring state of
affairs in the house. The shooting was not good for much; the
billiard-table was under repair; and there were but two really
skilled whist-players among the guests. In the atmosphere of
dullness thus engendered, the men not only caught the infection
of the women's curiosity, but were even ready to listen to the
gossip of the servants' hall, repeated to their mistresses by the
ladies' maids. The result of such an essentially debased state of
feeling as this was not slow in declaring itself. But for a lucky
accident, Mr. Cosway would have discovered to what extremities of
ill-bred curiosity idleness and folly can lead persons holding
the position of ladies and gentlemen, when he joined the company
at breakfast on the next morning.

The newspapers came in before the guests had risen from the
table. Sir Peter handed one of them to the lady who sat on his
right hand.

She first looked, it is needless to say, at the list of births,
deaths, and marriages; and then she turned to the general
news--the fires, accidents, fashionable departures, and so on. In
a few minutes, she indignantly dropped the newspaper in her lap.

"Here is another unfortunate man," she exclaimed, "sacrificed to
the stupidity of women! If I had been in his place, I would have
used my knowledge of swimming to save myself, and would have left
the women to go to the bottom of the river as they deserved!"

"A boat accident, I suppose?" said Sir Peter.

"Oh yes--the old story. A gentleman takes two ladies out in a
boat. After a while they get fidgety, and feel an idiotic impulse
to change places. The boat upsets as usual; the poor dear man
tries to save them--and is drowned along with them for his pains.
Shameful! shameful!"

"Are the names mentioned?"

"Yes. They are all strangers to me; I speak on principle."
Asserting herself in those words, the indignant lady handed the
newspaper to Mr. Cosway, who happened to sit next to her. "When
you were in the navy," she continued, "I dare say _your_ life was
put in jeopardy by taking women in boats. Read it yourself, and
let it be a warning to you for the future."

Mr. Cosway looked at the narrative of the accident--and revealed
the romantic mystery of his life by a burst of devout
exclamation, expressed in the words:

"Thank God, my wife's drowned!"

II.

To declare that Sir Peter and his guests were all struck
speechless, by discovering in this way that Mr. Cosway was a
married man, is to say very little. The general impression
appeared to be that he was mad. His neighbors at the table all
drew back from him, with the one exception of his friend. Mr.
Stone looked at the newspaper: pressed Mr. Cosway's hand in
silent sympathy--and addressed himself to his host.

"Permit me to make my friend's apologies," he said, until he is
composed enough to act for himself. The circumstances are so
extraordinary that I venture to think they excuse him. Will you
allow us to speak to you privately?"

Sir Peter, with more apologies addressed to his visitors, opened
the door which communicated with his study. Mr. Stone took Mr.
Cosway's arm, and led him out of the room. He noticed no one,
spoke to no one--he moved mechanically, like a man walking in his
sleep.

After an unendurable interval of nearly an hour's duration, Sir
Peter returned alone to the breakfast-room. Mr. Cosway and Mr.
Stone had already taken their departure for London, with their
host's entire approval.

"It is left to my discretion " Sir Peter proceeded, "to repeat to
you what I have heard in my study. I will do so, on one
condition--that you all consider yourselves bound in honor not to
mention the true names and the real places, when you tell the
story to others."

Subject to this wise reservation, the narrative is here repeated
by one of the company. Considering how he may perform his task to
the best advantage, he finds that the events which preceded and
followed Mr. Cosway's disastrous marriage resolve themselves into
certain well-marked divisions. Adopting this arrangement, he
proceeds to relate:

_The First Epoch in Mr. Cosway's Life._

The sailing of her Majesty's ship _Albicore_ was deferred by the
severe illness of the captain. A gentleman not possessed of
political influence might, after the doctor's unpromising report
of him, have been superseded by another commanding officer. In
the present case, the Lords of the Admiralty showed themselves to
be models of patience and sympathy. They kept the vessel in port,
waiting the captain's recovery.

Among the unimportant junior officers, not wanted on board under
these circumstances, and favored accordingly by obtaining leave
to wait for orders on shore, were two yo ung men, aged
respectively twenty-two and twenty-three years, and known by the
names of Cosway and Stone. The scene which now introduces them
opens at a famous seaport on the south coast of England, and
discloses the two young gentlemen at dinner in a private room at
their inn.

"I think that last bottle of champagne was corked," Cosway
remarked. "Let's try another. You're nearest the bell, Stone.
Ring."

Stone rang, under protest. He was the elder of the two by a year,
and he set an example of discretion.

"I am afraid we are running up a terrible bill," he said. "We
have been here more than three weeks--"

"And we have denied ourselves nothing," Cosway added. "We have
lived like princes. Another bottle of champagne, waiter. We have
our riding-horses, and our carriage, and the best box at the
theater, and such cigars as London itself could not produce. I
call that making the most of life. Try the new bottle. Glorious
drink, isn't it? Why doesn't my father have champagne at the
family dinner-table?"

"Is your father a rich man, Cosway?"

"I should say not. He didn't give me anything like the money I
expected, when I said good-by--and I rather think he warned me
solemnly, at parting, to take the greatest care of it.' There's
not a farthing more for you,' he said, 'till your ship returns
from her South American station.' _Your_ father is a clergyman,
Stone."

"Well, and what of that?"

"And some clergymen are rich."

"My father is not one of them, Cosway."

"Then let us say no more about him. Help yourself, and pass the
bottle."

Instead of adopting this suggestion, Stone rose with a very grave
face, and once more rang the bell. "Ask the landlady to step up,"
he said, when the waiter appeared.

"What do you want with the landlady?" Cosway inquired.

"I want the bill."

The landlady--otherwise Mrs. Pounce--entered the room. She was
short, and old, and fat, and painted, and a widow. Students of
character, as revealed in the face, would have discovered malice
and cunning in her bright black eyes, and a bitter vindictive
temper in the lines about her thin red lips. Incapable of such
subtleties of analysis as these, the two young officers differed
widely, nevertheless, in their opinions of Mrs. Pounce. Cosway's
reckless sense of humor delighted in pretending to be in love
with her. Stone took a dislike to her from the first. When his
friend asked for the reason, he made a strangely obscure answer.
"Do you remember that morning in the wood when you killed the
snake?" he said. "I took a dislike to the snake." Cosway made no
further inquiries.

"Well, my young heroes," said Mrs. Pounce (always loud, always
cheerful, and always familiar with her guests), "what do you want
with me now?"

"Take a glass of champagne, my darling," said Cosway; "and let me
try if I can get my arm round your waist. That's all _I_ want
with you."

The landlady passed this over without notice. Though she had
spoken to both of them, her cunning little eyes rested on Stone
from the moment when she appeared in the room. She knew by
instinct the man who disliked her--and she waited deliberately
for Stone to reply.

"We have been here some time," he said, "and we shall be obliged,
ma'am, if you will let us have our bill."

Mrs. Pounce lifted her eyebrows with an expression of innocent
surprise.

"Has the captain got well, and must you go on board to-night?"
she asked.

"Nothing of the sort!" Cosway interposed. "We have no news of the
captain, and we are going to the theater to-night."

"But," persisted Stone, "we want, if you please, to have the
bill."

"Certainly, sir," said Mrs. Pounce, with a sudden assumption of
respect. "But we are very busy downstairs, and we hope you will
not press us for it to-night?"

"Of course not!" cried Cosway.

Mrs. Pounce instantly left the room, without waiting for any
further remark from Cosway's friend.

"I wish we had gone to some other house," said Stone. "You mark
my words--that woman means to cheat us."

Cosway expressed his dissent from this opinion in the most
amiable manner. He filled his friend's glass, and begged him not
to say ill-natured things of Mrs. Pounce.

But Stone's usually smooth temper seemed to be ruffled; he
insisted on his own view. "She's impudent and inquisitive, if she
is not downright dishonest," he said. "What right had she to ask
you where we lived when we were at home; and what our Christian
names were; and which of us was oldest, you or I? Oh, yes--it's
all very well to say she only showed a flattering interest in us!
I suppose she showed a flattering interest in my affairs, when I
awoke a little earlier than usual, and caught her in my bedroom
with my pocketbook in her hand. Do you believe she was going to
lock it up for safety's sake? She knows how much money we have
got as well as we know it ourselves. Every half-penny we have
will be in her pocket tomorrow. And a good thing, too--we shall
be obliged to leave the house."

Even this cogent reasoning failed in provoking Cosway to reply.
He took Stone's hat, and handed it with the utmost politeness to
his foreboding friend. "There's only one remedy for such a state
of mind as yours," he said. "Come to the theater."


At ten o'clock the next morning Cosway found himself alone at the
breakfast-table. He was informed that Mr. Stone had gone out for
a little walk, and would be back directly. Seating himself at the
table, he perceived an envelope on his plate, which evidently
inclosed the bill. He took up the envelope, considered a little,
and put it back again unopened. At the same moment Stone burst
into the room in a high state of excitement.

"News that will astonish you!" he cried. "The captain arrived
yesterday evening. His doctors say that the sea-voyage will
complete his recovery. The ship sails to-day--and we are ordered
to report ourselves on board in an hour's time. Where's the
bill?"

Cosway pointed to it. Stone took it out of the envelope.

It covered two sides of a prodigiously long sheet of paper. The
sum total was brightly decorated with lines in red ink. Stone
looked at the total, and passed it in silence to Cosway. For
once, even Cosway was prostrated. In dreadful stillness the two
young men produced their pocketbooks; added up their joint stores
of money, and compared the result with the bill. Their united
resources amounted to a little more than one-third of their debt
to the landlady of the inn.

The only alternative that presented itself was to send for Mrs.
Pounce; to state the circumstances plainly; and to propose a
compromise on the grand commercial basis of credit.

Mrs. Pounce presented herself superbly dressed in walking
costume. Was she going out; or had she just returned to the inn?
Not a word escaped her; she waited gravely to hear what the
gentlemen wanted. Cosway, presuming on his position as favorite,
produced the contents of the two pocketbooks and revealed the
melancholy truth.

"There is all the money we have," he concluded. "We hope you will
not object to receive the balance in a bill at three months"

Mrs. Pounce answered with a stern composure of voice and manner
entirely new in the experience of Cosway and Stone.

"I have paid ready money, gentlemen, for the hire of your horses
and carriages," she said; "here are the receipts from the livery
stables to vouch for me; I never accept bills unless I am quite
sure beforehand that they will be honored. I defy you to find an
overcharge in the account now rendered; and I expect you to pay
it before you leave my house."

Stone looked at his watch.

"In three-quarters of an hour," he said, "we must be on board."

Mrs. Pounce entirely agreed with him. "And if you are not on
board," she remarked "you will be tried by court-martial, and
dismissed the service with your characters ruined for life."

"My dear creature, we haven't time to send home, and we know
nobody in the town," pleaded Cosway. "For God's sake take our
watches and jewelry, and our luggage--and let us go."

"I am not a pawnbroker," said the inflexible lady. "You must
either pay your lawful debt to me in honest money, or--"

She paused and looked at Cosway. Her fat face brightened--she
smiled graciously for the first time.

C osway stared at her in unconcealed perplexity. He helplessly
repeated her last words. " We must either pay the bill," he said,
"or what?"

"Or," answered Mrs. Pounce, "one of you must marry ME."

Was she joking? Was she intoxicated? Was she out of her senses?
Neither of the three; she was in perfect possession of herself;
her explanation was a model of lucid and convincing arrangement
of facts.

"My position here has its drawbacks," she began. "I am a lone
widow; I am known to have an excellent business, and to have
saved money. The result is that I am pestered to death by a set
of needy vagabonds who want to marry me. In this position, I am
exposed to slanders and insults. Even if I didn't know that the
men were after my money, there is not one of them whom I would
venture to marry. He might turn out a tyrant and beat me; or a
drunkard, and disgrace me; or a betting man, and ruin me. What I
want, you see, for my own peace and protection, is to be able to
declare myself married, and to produce the proof in the shape of
a certificate. A born gentleman, with a character to lose, and so
much younger in years than myself that he wouldn't think of
living with me--there is the sort of husband who suits my book!
I'm a reasonable woman, gentlemen. I would undertake to part with
my husband at the church door--never to attempt to see him or
write to him afterward--and only to show my certificate when
necessary, without giving any explanations. Your secret would be
quite safe in my keeping. I don't care a straw for either of you,
so long as you answer my purpose. What do you say to paying my
bill (one or the other of you) in this way? I am ready dressed
for the altar; and the clergyman has notice at the church. My
preference is for Mr. Cosway," proceeded this terrible woman with
the cruelest irony, "because he has been so particular in his
attentions toward me. The license (which I provided on the chance
a fortnight since) is made out in his name. Such is my weakness
for Mr. Cosway. But that don't matter if Mr. Stone would like to
take his place. He can hail by his friend's name. Oh, yes, he
can! I have consulted my lawyer. So long as the bride and
bridegroom agree to it, they may be married in any name they
like, and it stands good. Look at your watch again, Mr. Stone.
The church is in the next street. By my calculation, you have
just got five minutes to decide. I'm a punctual woman, my little
dears; and I will he back to the moment."

She opened the door, paused, and returned to the room.

"I ought to have mentioned," she resumed, "that I shall make you
a present of the bill, receipted, on the conclusion of the
ceremony. You will be taken to the ship in my own boat, with all
your money in your pockets, and a hamper of good things for the
mess. After that I wash my hands of you. You may go to the devil
your own way."

With this parting benediction, she left them.

Caught in the landlady's trap, the two victims looked at each
other in expressive silence. Without time enough to take legal
advice; without friends on shore; without any claim on officers
of their own standing in the ship, the prospect before them was
literally limited to Marriage or Ruin. Stone made a proposal
worthy of a hero.

"One of us must marry her," he said; "I'm ready to toss up for
it."

Cosway matched him in generosity. "No," he answered. "It was I
who brought you here; and I who led you into these infernal
expenses. I ought to pay the penalty--and I will."

Before Stone could remonstrate, the five minutes expired.
Punctual Mrs. Pounce appeared again in the doorway.

"Well?" she inquired, "which is it to be-- Cosway, or Stone?"

Cosway advanced as reckless as ever, and offered his arm.

"Now then, Fatsides," he said, "come and be married!"

In five-and-twenty minutes more, Mrs. Pounce had become Mrs.
Cosway; and the two officers were on their way to the ship.


_The Second Epoch in Mr. Cosway's Life._

Four years elapsed before the _Albicore_ returned to the port
from which she had sailed.

In that interval, the death of Cosway's parents had taken place.
The lawyer who had managed his affairs, during his absence from
England, wrote to inform him that his inheritance from his late
father's "estate" was eight hundred a year. His mother only
possessed a life interest in her fortune; she had left her jewels
to her son, and that was all.

Cosway's experience of the life of a naval officer on foreign
stations (without political influence to hasten his promotion)
had thoroughly disappointed him. He decided on retiring from the
service when the ship was "paid off." In the meantime, to the
astonishment of his comrades, he seemed to be in no hurry to make
use of the leave granted him to go on shore. The faithful Stone
was the only man on board who knew that he was afraid of meeting
his "wife." This good friend volunteered to go to the inn, and
make the necessary investigation with all needful prudence. "Four
years is a long time, at _her_ age," he said. "Many things may
happen in four years."

An hour later, Stone returned to the ship, and sent a written
message on board, addressed to his brother-officer, in these
words: "Pack up your things at once, and join me on shore. "

"What news?" asked the anxious husband.

Stone looked significantly at the idlers on the landing-place.
"Wait," he said, "till we are by ourselves."

"Where are we going?"

"To the railway station."

They got into an empty carriage; and Stone at once relieved his
friend of all further suspense.

"Nobody is acquainted with the secret of your marriage, but our
two selves," he began quietly. "I don't think, Cosway, you need
go into mourning."

"You don't mean to say she's dead!"

"I have seen a letter (written by her own lawyer) which announces
her death," Stone replied. "It was so short that I believe I can
repeat it word for word: 'Dear Sir--I have received information
of the death of my client. Please address your next and last
payment, on account of the lease and goodwill of the inn, to the
executors of the late Mrs. Cosway.' There, that is the letter.
'Dear Sir' means the present proprietor of the inn. He told me
your wife's previous history in two words. After carrying on the
business with her customary intelligence for more than three
years, her health failed, and she went to London to consult a
physician. There she remained under the doctor's care. The next
event was the appearance of an agent, instructed to sell the
business in consequence of the landlady's declining health. Add
the death at a later time-- and there is the beginning and the
end of the story. Fortune owed you a good turn, Cosway --and
Fortune has paid the debt. Accept my best congratulations."

Arrived in London, Stone went on at once to his relations in the
North. Cosway proceeded to the office of the family lawyer (Mr.
Atherton), who had taken care of his interests in his absence.
His father and Mr. Atherton had been schoolfellows and old
friends. He was affectionately received, and was invited to pay a
visit the next day to the lawyer's villa at Richmond.

"You will be near enough to London to attend to your business at
the Admiralty," said Mr. Atherton, "and you will meet a visitor
at my house, who is one of the most charming girls in
England--the only daughter of the great Mr. Restall. Good
heavens! have you never heard of him? My dear sir, he's one of
the partners in the famous firm of Benshaw, Restall, and
Benshaw."

Cosway was wise enough to accept this last piece of information
as quite conclusive. The next day, Mrs. Atherton presented him to
the charming Miss Restall; and Mrs. Atherton's young married
daughter (who had been his playfellow when they were children)
whispered to him, half in jest, half in earnest: "Make the best
use of your time; she isn't engaged yet."

Cosway shuddered inwardly at the bare idea of a second marriage.
Was Miss Restall the sort of woman to restore his confidence?

She was small and slim and dark--a graceful, well-bred, brightly
intelligent person, with a voice exquisitely sweet and winning in
tone. Her ears, hands, and feet were objects to worship; and she
had an attraction, irresistibly rare among the women of the
present time--the attraction of a perfectly natural smile. Before
Cosway had been an hour in the house, she discovered that his
long term of service on foreign stations had furnished him with
subjects of conversation which favorably contrasted with the
commonplace gossip addressed to her by other men. Cosway at once
became a favorite, as Othello became a favorite in his day.

The ladies of the household all rejoiced in the young officer's
success, with the exception of Miss Restall's companion (supposed
to hold the place of her lost mother, at a large salary), one
Mrs. Margery.

Too cautious to commit herself in words, this lady expressed
doubt and disapprobation by her looks. She had white hair,
iron-gray eyebrows, and protuberant eyes; her looks were
unusually expressive. One evening, she caught poor Mr. Atherton
alone, and consulted him confidentially on the subject of Mr.
Cosway's income. This was the first warning which opened the eyes
of the good lawyer to the nature of the "friendship" already
established between his two guests. He knew Miss Restall's
illustrious father well, and he feared that it might soon be his
disagreeable duty to bring Cosway's visit to an end.

On a certain Saturday afternoon, while Mr. Atherton was still
considering how he could most kindly and delicately suggest to
Cosway that it was time to say good-by, an empty carriage arrived
at the villa. A note from Mr. Restall was delivered to Mrs.
Atherton, thanking her with perfect politeness for her kindness
to his daughter. Circumstances," he added, "rendered it necessary
that Miss Restall should return home that afternoon."

The "circumstances" were supposed to refer to a garden-party to
be given by Mr. Restall in the ensuing week. But why was his
daughter wanted at home before the day of the party?

The ladies of the family, still devoted to Cosway's interests,
entertained no doubt that Mrs. Margery had privately communicated
with Mr. Restall, and that the appearance of the carriage was the
natural result. Mrs. Atherton's married daughter did all that
could be done: she got rid of Mrs. Margery for one minute, and so
arranged it that Cosway and Miss Restall took leave of each other
in her own sitting-room.

When the young lady appeared in the hall she had drawn her veil
down. Cosway escaped to the road and saw the last of the carriage
as it drove away. In a little more than a fortnight his horror of
a second marriage had become one of the dead and buried emotions
of his nature. He stayed at the villa until Monday morning, as an
act of gratitude to his good friends, and then accompanied Mr.
Atherton to London. Business at the Admiralty was the excuse. It
imposed on nobody. He was evidently on his way to Miss Restall.

"Leave your business in my hands," said the lawyer, on the
journey to town, "and go and amuse yourself on the Continent. I
can't blame you for falling in love with Miss Restall; I ought to
have foreseen the danger, and waited till she had left us before
I invited you to my house. But I may at least warn you to carry
the matter no further. If you had eight thousand instead of eight
hundred a year, Mr. Restall would think it an act of presumption
on your part to aspire to his daughter's hand, unless you had a
title to throw into the bargain. Look at it in the true light, my
dear boy; and one of these days you will thank me for speaking
plainly."

Cosway promised to "look at it in the true light."

The result, from his point of view, led him into a change of
residence. He left his hotel and took a lodging in the nearest
bystreet to Mr. Restall's palace at Kensington.

On the same evening he applied (with the confidence due to a
previous arrangement) for a letter at the neighboring
post-office, addressed to E. C.--the initials of Edwin Cosway.
"Pray be careful," Miss Restall wrote; "I have tried to get you a
card for our garden party. But that hateful creature, Margery,
has evidently spoken to my father; I am not trusted with any
invitation cards. Bear it patiently, dear, as I do, and let me
hear if you have succeeded in finding a lodging near us."

Not submitting to this first disappointment very patiently,
Cosway sent his reply to the post-office, addressed to A. R.--the
initials of Adela Restall. The next day the impatient lover
applied for another letter. It was waiting for him, but it was
not directed in Adela's handwriting. Had their correspondence
been discovered? He opened the letter in the street; and read,
with amazement, these lines:

"Dear Mr. Cosway, my heart sympathizes with two faithful lovers,
in spite of my age and my duty. I inclose an invitation to the
party tomorrow. Pray don't betray me, and don't pay too marked
attention to Adela. Discretion is easy. There will be twelve
hundred guests. Your friend, in spite of appearances, Louisa
Margery."

How infamously they had all misjudged this excellent woman!
Cosway went to the party a grateful, as well as a happy man. The
first persons known to him, whom he discovered among the crowd of
strangers, were the Athertons. They looked, as well they might,
astonished to see him. Fidelity to Mrs. Margery forbade him to
enter into any explanations. Where was that best and truest
friend? With some difficulty he succeeded in finding her. Was
there any impropriety in seizing her hand and cordially pressing
it? The result of this expression of gratitude was, to say the
least of it, perplexing.

Mrs. Margery behaved like the Athertons! She looked astonished to
see him and she put precisely the same question: "How did you get
here?" Cosway could only conclude that she was joking. "Who
should know that, dear lady, better than yourself?" he rejoined.
"I don't understand you," Mrs. Margery answered, sharply. After a
moment's reflection, Cosway hit on another solution of the
mystery. Visitors were near them; and Mrs. Margery had made her
own private use of one of Mr. Restall's invitation cards. She
might have serious reasons for pushing caution to its last
extreme. Cosway looked at her significantly. "The least I can do
is not to be indiscreet," he whispered-- and left her.

He turned into a side walk; and there he met Adela at last!

It seemed like a fatality. _She_ looked astonished; and _she_
said: "How did you get here?" No intrusive visitors were within
hearing, this time. "My dear!" Cosway remonstrated, "Mrs. Margery
must have told you, when she sent me my invitation." Adela turned
pale. "Mrs. Margery?" she repeated. "Mrs. Margery has said
nothing to me; Mrs. Margery detests you. We must have this
cleared up. No; not now--I must attend to our guests. Expect a
letter; and, for heaven's sake, Edwin, keep out of my father's
way. One of our visitors whom he particularly wished to see has
sent an excuse--and he is dreadfully angry about it."

She left him before Cosway could explain that he and Mr. Restall
had thus far never seen each other.

He wandered away toward the extremity of the grounds, troubled by
vague suspicions; hurt at Adela's cold reception of him. Entering
a shrubbery, which seemed intended to screen the grounds, at this
point, from a lane outside, he suddenly discovered a pretty
little summer-house among the trees. A stout gentleman, of mature
years, was seated alone in this retreat. He looked up with a
frown. Cosway apologized for disturbing him, and entered into
conversation as an act of politeness.

"A brilliant assembly to-day, sir."

The stout gentleman replied by an inarticulate sound--something
between a grunt and a cough.

"And a splendid house and grounds," Cosway continued.

The stout gentleman repeated the inarticulate sound.

Cosway began to feel amused. Was this curious old man deaf and
dumb?

"Excuse my entering into conversation," he persisted. "I feel
like a stranger here. There are so many people whom I don't
know."

The stout gentleman suddenly burst into speech. Cosway had
touched a sympathetic fiber at last.

"There are a good many people here whom _I_ don't know," he said,
gruffly. "You are one of them. What's your name?"

"My name is Cosway, sir. What's yours?"

The stout gentleman rose with fury in his looks. He burst out
with an oath; and  added the in tolerable question, already three
times repeated by others: "How did you get here?" The tone was
even more offensive than the oath. "Your age protects you, sir, "
said Cosway, with the loftiest composure. "I'm sorry I gave my
name to so rude a person."

"Rude?" shouted the old gentleman. "You want my name in return, I
suppose? You young puppy, you shall have it! My name is Restall."

He turned his back and walked off. Cosway took the only course
now open to him. He returned to his lodgings.

The next day no letter reached him from Adela. He went to the
postoffice. No letter was there. The day wore on to evening--and,
with the evening, there appeared a woman who was a stranger to
him. She looked like a servant; and she was the bearer of a
mysterious message.

"Please be at the garden-door that opens on the lane, at ten
o'clock to-morrow morning. Knock three times at the door--and
then say 'Adela.' Some one who wishes you well will be alone in
the shrubbery, and will let you in. No, sir! I am not to take
anything; and I am not to say a word more." She spoke--and
vanished.

Cosway was punctual to his appointment. He knocked three times;
he pronounced Miss Restall's Christian name. Nothing happened. He
waited a while, and tried again. This time Adela's voice answered
strangely from the shrubbery in tones of surprise: "Edwin, is it
really you?"

"Did you expect any one else?" Cosway asked. "My darling, your
message said ten o'clock--and here I am. "

The door was suddenly unlocked.

"I sent no message," said Adela, as they confronted each other on
the threshold.

In the silence of utter bewilderment they went together into the
summer-house. At Adela's request, Cosway repeated the message
that he had received, and described the woman who had delivered
it. The description applied to no person known to Miss Restall.
"Mrs. Margery never sent you the invitation; and I repeat, I
never sent you the message. This meeting has been arranged by
some one who knows that I always walk in the shrubbery after
breakfast. There is some underhand work going on--"

Still mentally in search of the enemy who had betrayed them, she
checked herself, and considered a little. "Is it possible--?" she
began, and paused again. Her eyes filled with tears. "My mind is
so completely upset," she said, "that I can't think clearly of
anything. Oh, Edwin, we have had a happy dream, and it has come
to an end. My father knows more than we think for. Some friends
of ours are going abroad tomorrow--and I am to go with them.
Nothing I can say has the least effect upon my father. He means
to part us forever--and this is his cruel way of doing it!"

She put her arm round Cosway's neck and lovingly laid her head on
his shoulder. With tenderest kisses they reiterated their vows of
eternal fidelity until their voices faltered and failed them.
Cosway filled up the pause by the only useful suggestion which it
was now in his power to make--he proposed an elopement.

Adela received this bold solution of the difficulty in which they
were placed exactly as thousands of other young ladies have
received similar proposals before her time, and after.

She first said positively No. Cosway persisted. She began to cry,
and asked if he had no respect for her. Cosway declared that his
respect was equal to any sacrifice except the sacrifice of
parting with her forever. He could, and would, if she preferred
it, die for her, but while he was alive he must refuse to give
her up. Upon this she shifted her ground. Did he expect her to go
away with him alone? Certainly not. Her maid could go with her,
or, if her maid was not to be trusted, he would apply to his
landlady, and engage "a respectable elderly person" to attend on
her until the day of their marriage. Would she have some mercy on
him, and just consider it? No: she was afraid to consider it. Did
she prefer misery for the rest of her life? Never mind _his_
happiness: it was _her_ happiness only that he had in his mind.
Traveling with unsympathetic people; absent from England, no one
could say for how long; married, when she did return, to some
rich man whom she hated--would she, could she, contemplate that
prospect? She contemplated it through tears; she contemplated it
to an accompaniment of sighs, kisses, and protestations--she
trembled, hesitated, gave way. At an appointed hour of the coming
night, when her father would be in the smoking-room, and Mrs.
Margery would be in bed, Cosway was to knock at the door in the
lane once more; leaving time to make all the necessary
arrangements in the interval.

The one pressing necessity, under these circumstances, was to
guard against the possibility of betrayal and surprise. Cosway
discreetly alluded to the unsolved mysteries of the invitation
and the message. "Have you taken anybody into our confidence?" he
asked.

Adela answered with some embarrassment. "Only one person," She
said--"dear Miss Benshaw."

"Who is Miss Benshaw?"

"Don't you really know, Edwin? She is richer even than papa--she
has inherited from her late brother one half-share in the great
business in the City. Miss Benshaw is the lady who disappointed
papa by not coming to the garden-party. You remember, dear, how
happy we were when we were together at Mr. Atherton's? I was very
miserable when they took me away. Miss Benshaw happened to call
the next day and she noticed it. 'My dear,' she said (Miss
Benshaw is quite an elderly lady now), 'I am an old maid, who has
missed the happiness of her life, through not having had a friend
to guide and advise her when she was young. Are you suffering as
I once suffered?' She spoke so nicely--and I was so
wretched--that I really couldn't help it. I opened my heart to
her."

Cosway looked grave. "Are you sure she is to be trusted?" he
asked.

"Perfectly sure."

"Perhaps, my love, she has spoken about us (not meaning any harm)
to some friend of hers? Old ladies are so fond of gossip. It's
just possible--don't you think so?"

Adela hung her head.

"I have thought it just possible myself," she admitted. "There is
plenty of time to call on her to-day. I will set our doubts at
rest before Miss Benshaw goes out for her afternoon drive."

On that understanding they parted.

Toward evening Cosway's arrangements for the elopement were
completed. He was eating his solitary dinner when a note was
brought to him. It had been left at the door by a messenger. The
man had gone away without waiting for an answer. The note ran
thus:

"Miss Benshaw presents her compliments to Mr. Cosway, and will be
obliged if he can call on her at nine o'clock this evening, on
business which concerns himself."

This invitation was evidently the result of Adela's visit earlier
in the day. Cosway presented himself at the house, troubled by
natural emotions of anxiety and suspense. His reception was not
of a nature to compose him. He was shown into a darkened room.
The one lamp on the table was turned down low, and the little
light thus given was still further obscured by a shade. The
corners of the room were in almost absolute darkness.

A voice out of one of the corners addressed him in a whisper:

"I must beg you to excuse the darkened room. I am suffering from
a severe cold. My eyes are inflamed, and my throat is so bad that
I can only speak in a whisper. Sit down, sir. I have got news for
you ."

"Not bad news, I hope, ma'am?" Cosway ventured to inquire.

"The worst possible news," said the whispering voice. "You have
an enemy striking at you in the dark."

Cosway asked who it was, and received no answer. He varied the
form of inquiry, and asked why the unnamed person struck at him
in the dark. The experiment succeeded; he obtained a reply.

"It is reported to me," said Miss Benshaw, "that the person
thinks it necessary to give you a lesson, and takes a spiteful
pleasure in doing it as mischievously as possible. The person, as
I happen to know, sent you your invitation to the party, and made
the appointment which took you to the door in the lane. Wait a
little, sir; I have not done yet. The person has put it into Mr.
Restall's head to send his daughter abroad tomorrow.

Cosway attempted to make her speak more plainly.

"Is this wretch
 a man or a woman?" he said.

Miss Benshaw proceeded without noticing the interruption.

"You needn't be afraid, Mr. Cosway; Miss Restall will not leave
England. Your enemy is all-powerful. Your enemy's object could
only be to provoke you into planning an elopement--and, your
arrangements once completed, to inform Mr. Restall, and to part
you and Miss Adela quite as effectually as if you were at
opposite ends of the world. Oh, you will undoubtedly be parted!
Spiteful, isn't it? And, what is worse, the mischief is as good
as done already."

Cosway rose from his chair.

"Do you wish for any further explanation?" asked Miss Benshaw.

"One thing more," he replied. "Does Adela know of this?"

"No," said Miss Benshaw; "it is left to you to tell her."

There was a moment of silence. Cosway looked at the lamp. Once
roused, as usual with men of his character, his temper was not to
be trifled with.

"Miss Benshaw," he said, "I dare say you think me a fool; but I
can draw my own conclusion, for all that. _You_ are my enemy."

The only reply was a chuckling laugh. All voices can be more or
less effectually disguised by a whisper but a laugh carries the
revelation of its own identity with it. Cosway suddenly threw off
the shade over the lamp and turned up the wick.

The light flooded the room, and showed him-- His Wife.


_The Third Epoch in Mr. Cosway's Life._

Three days had passed. Cosway sat alone in his lodging--pale and
worn: the shadow already of his former self.

He had not seen Adela since the discovery. There was but one way
in which he could venture to make the inevitable disclosure--he
wrote to her; and Mr. Atherton's daughter took care that the
letter should be received. Inquiries made afterward, by help of
the same good friend, informed him that Miss Restall was
suffering from illness.

The mistress of the house came in.

"Cheer up, sir, " said the good woman. "There is better news of
Miss Restall to-day."

He raised his head.

"Don't trifle with me!" he answered fretfully; "tell me exactly
what the servant said."

The mistress repeated the words. Miss Restall had passed a
quieter night, and had been able for a few hours to leave her
room. He asked next if any reply to his letter had arrived. No
reply had been received.

If Adela definitely abstained from writing to him, the conclusion
would be too plain to be mistaken. She had given him up--and who
could blame her?

There was a knock at the street-door. The mistress looked out.

"Here's Mr. Stone come back, sir!" she exclaimed joyfully--and
hurried away to let him in.

Cosway never looked up when his friend appeared.

"I knew I should succeed," said Stone. "I have seen your wife."

"Don't speak of her," cried Cosway. "I should have murdered her
when I saw her face, if I had not instantly left the house. I may
be the death of the wretch yet, if you presist in speaking of
her!"

Stone put his hand kindly on his friend's shoulder.

"Must I remind you that you owe something to your old comrade?"
he asked. "I left my father and mother, the morning I got your
letter-- and my one thought has been to serve you. Reward me. Be
a man, and hear what is your right and duty to know. After that,
if you like, we will never refer to the woman again."

Cosway took his hand, in silent acknowledgment that he was right.
They sat down together. Stone began.

"She is so entirely shameless," he said, "that I had no
difficulty in getting her to speak. And she so cordially hates
you that she glories in her own falsehood and treachery."

"Of course, she lies," Cosway said bitterly, "when she calls
herself Miss Benshaw?"

"No; she is really the daughter of the man who founded the great
house in the City. With every advantage that wealth and position
could give her the perverse creature married one of her father's
clerks, who had been deservedly dismissed from his situation.
From that moment her family discarded her. With the money
procured by the sale of her jewels, her husband took the inn
which we have such bitter cause to remember--and she managed the
house after his death. So much for the past. Carry your mind on
now to the time when our ship brought us back to England. At that
date, the last surviving member of your wife's family--her elder
brother--lay at the point of death. He had taken his father's
place in the business, besides inheriting his father's fortune.
After a happy married life he was left a widower, without
children; and it became necessary that he should alter his will.
He deferred performing his duty. It was only at the time of his
last illness that he had dictated instructions for a new will,
leaving his wealth (excepting certain legacies to old friends) to
the hospitals of Great Britain and Ireland. His lawyer lost no
time in carrying out the instructions. The new will was ready for
signature (the old will having been destroyed by his own hand),
when the doctors sent a message to say that their patient was
insensible, and might die in that condition."

"Did the doctors prove to be right?"

"Perfectly right. Our wretched landlady, as next of kin,
succeeded, not only to the fortune, but (under the deed of
partnership) to her late brother's place in the firm: on the one
easy condition of resuming the family name. She calls herself
"Miss Benshaw." But as a matter of legal necessity she is set
down in the deed as "Mrs. Cosway Benshaw." Her partners only now
know that her husband is living, and that you are the Cosway whom
she privately married. Will you take a little breathing time? or
shall I go on, and get done with it?"

Cosway signed to him to go on.

"She doesn't in the least care," Stone proceeded, "for the
exposure. 'I am the head partner,' she says 'and the rich one of
the firm; they daren't turn their backs on Me.' You remember the
information I received--in perfect good faith on his part--from
the man who keeps the inn? The visit to the London doctor, and
the assertion of failing health, were adopted as the best means
of plausibly severing the lady's connection (the great lady now!)
with a calling so unworthy of her as the keeping of an inn. Her
neighbors at the seaport were all deceived by the stratagem, with
two exceptions. They were both men--vagabonds who had
pertinaciously tried to delude her into marrying them in the days
when she was a widow. They refused to believe in the doctor and
the declining health; they had their own suspicion of the motives
which had led to the sale of the inn, under very unfavorable
circumstances; and they decided on going to London, inspired by
the same base hope of making discoveries which might be turned
into a means of extorting money."

"She escaped them, of course," said Cosway. "How?"

"By the help of her lawyer, who was not above accepting a
handsome private fee. He wrote to the new landlord of the inn,
falsely announcing his client's death, in the letter which I
repeated to you in the railway carriage on our journey to London.
Other precautions were taken to keep up the deception, on which
it is needless to dwell. Your natural conclusion that you were
free to pay your addresses to Miss Restall, and the poor young
lady's innocent confidence in 'Miss Benshaw's' sympathy, gave
this unscrupulous woman the means of playing the heartless trick
on you which is now exposed. Malice and jealousy--I have it,
mind, from herself!--were not her only motives. 'But for that
Cosway,' she said (I spare you the epithet which she put before
your name), 'with my money and position, I might have married a
needy lord, and sunned myself in my old age in the full blaze of
the peerage.' Do you understand how she hated you, now? Enough of
the subject! The moral of it, my dear Cosway, is to leave this
place, and try what change of scene will do for you. I have time
to spare; and I will go abroad with you. When shall it be?"

"Let me wait a day or two more," Cosway pleaded.

Stone shook his head. "Still hoping, my poor friend, for a line
from Miss Restall? You distress me."

"I am sorry to distress you, Stone. If I can get one pitying word
from _her_, I can submit to the miserable life that lies before
me."

"Are you not expecting too much?"

"You wouldn't say so, if you were as fond of her as I am."

They were silent. The evening slowly darkened; and the mistress
came in as usual with the candles. She brought with her a letter
for Cosway.

He tore it open; read it in an instant; and devoured it with
kisses. His highly wrought feelings found their vent in a little
allowable exaggeration. "She has saved my life!" he said, as he
handed the letter to Stone.

It only contained these lines:

"My love is yours, my promise is yours. Through all trouble,
through all profanation, through the hopeless separation that may
be before us in this world, I live yours--and die yours. My
Edwin, God bless and comfort you."


_The Fourth Epoch in Mr. Cosway's Life._

The separation had lasted for nearly two years, when Cosway and
Stone paid that visit to the country house which is recorded at
the outset of the present narrative. In the interval nothing had
been heard of Miss Restall, except through Mr. Atherton. He
reported that Adela was leading a very quiet life. The one
remarkable event had been an interview between "Miss Benshaw" and
herself. No other person had been present; but the little that
was reported placed Miss Restall's character above all praise.
She had forgiven the woman who had so cruelly injured her!

The two friends, it may be remembered, had traveled to London,
immediately after completing the fullest explanation of Cosway's
startling behavior at the breakfast-table. Stone was not by
nature a sanguine man. "I don't believe in our luck," he said.
"Let us be quite sure that we are not the victims of another
deception."

The accident had happened on the Thames; and the newspaper
narrative proved to be accurate in every respect. Stone
personally attended the inquest. From a natural feeling of
delicacy toward Adela, Cosway hesitated to write to her on the
subject. The ever-helpful Stone wrote in his place.

After some delay, the answer was received. It inclosed a brief
statement (communicated officially by legal authority) of the
last act of malice on the part of the late head-partner in the
house of Benshaw and Company. She had not died intestate, like
her brother. The first clause of her will contained the
testator's grateful recognition of Adela Restall's Christian act
of forgiveness. The second clause (after stating that there were
neither relatives nor children to be benefited by the will) left
Adela Restall mistress of Mrs. Cosway Benshaw's fortune--on the
one merciless condition that she did _not_ marry Edwin Cosway.
The third clause--if Adela Restall violated the condition--handed
over the whole of the money to the firm in the City, "for the
extension of the business, and the benefit of the surviving
partners."

Some months later, Adela came of age. To the indignation of Mr.
Restall, and the astonishment of the "Company," the money
actually went to the firm. The fourth epoch in Mr. Cosway's life
witnessed his marriage to a woman who cheerfully paid half a
million of money for the happiness of passing her life, on eight
hundred a year, with the man whom she loved.

But Cosway felt bound in gratitude to make a rich woman of his
wife, if work and resolution could do it. When Stone last heard
of him, he was reading for the bar; and Mr. Atherton was ready to
give him his first brief.

NOTE.--That "most improbable" part of the present narrative,
which is contained in the division called The First Epoch, is
founded on an adventure which actually occurred to no less a
person than a cousin of Sir Walter Scott. In Lockhart's
delightful "Life," the anecdote will be found as told by Sir
Walter to Captain Basil Hall. The remainder of the present story
is entirely imaginary. The writer wondered what such a woman as
the landlady would do under certain given circumstances, after
her marriage to the young midshipman--and here is the result.



MR. MEDHURST AND THE PRINCESS.

I.

THE day before I left London, to occupy the post of second
secretary of legation at a small German Court, I took leave of my
excellent French singing-master, Monsieur Bonnefoy, and of his
young and pretty daughter named Jeanne.

Our farewell interview was saddened by Monsieur Bonnefoy's family
anxieties. His elder brother, known in the household as Uncle
David, had been secretly summoned to Paris by order of a
republican society. Anxious relations in London (whether
reasonably or not, I am unable to say) were in some fear of the
political consequences that might follow.

At parting, I made Mademoiselle Jeanne a present, in the shape of
a plain gold brooch. For some time past, I had taken my lessons
at Monsieur Bonnefoy's house; his daughter and I often sang
together under his direction. Seeing much of Jeanne, under these
circumstances, the little gift that I had offered to her was only
the natural expression of a true interest in her welfare. Idle
rumor asserted--quite falsely--that I was in love with her. I was
sincerely the young lady's friend: no more, no less.

Having alluded to my lessons in singing, it may not be out of
place to mention the circumstances under which I became Monsieur
Bonnefoy's pupil, and to allude to the change in my life that
followed in due course of time.

Our family property--excepting the sum of five thousand pounds
left to me by my mother--is landed property strictly entailed.
The estates were inherited by my only brother, Lord Medhurst; the
kindest, the best, and, I grieve to say it, the unhappiest of
men. He lived separated from a bad wife; he had no children to
console him; and he only enjoyed at rare intervals the blessing
of good health. Having myself nothing to live on but the interest
of my mother's little fortune, I had to make my own way in the
world. Poor younger sons, not possessed of the commanding ability
which achieves distinction, find the roads that lead to
prosperity closed to them, with one exception. They can always
apply themselves to the social arts which make a man agreeable in
society. I had naturally a good voice, and I cultivated it. I was
ready to sing, without being subject to the wretched vanity which
makes objections and excuses--I pleased the ladies--the ladies
spoke favorably of me to their husbands--and some of their
husbands were persons of rank and influence. After no very long
lapse of time, the result of this combination of circumstances
declared itself. Monsieur Bonnefoy's lessons became the indirect
means of starting me on a diplomatic career--and the diplomatic
career made poor Ernest Medhurst, to his own unutterable
astonishment, the hero of a love story!

The story being true, I must beg to be excused, if I abstain from
mentioning names, places, and dates, when I enter on German
ground. Let it be enough to say that I am writing of a bygone
year in the present century, when no such thing as a German
Empire existed, and when the revolutionary spirit of France was
still an object of well-founded suspicion to tyrants by right
divine on the continent of Europe.

II.

ON joining the legation, I was not particularly attracted by my
chief, the Minister. His manners were oppressively polite; and
his sense of his own importance was not sufficiently influenced
by diplomatic reserve. I venture to describe him (mentally
speaking) as an empty man, carefully trained to look full on
public occasions.

My colleague, the first secretary, was a far more interesting
person. Bright, unaffected, and agreeable, he at once interested
me when we were introduced to each other. I pay myself a
compliment, as I consider, when I add that he became my firm and
true friend.

We took a walk together in the palace gardens on the evening of
my arrival. Reaching a remote part of the grounds, we were passed
by a lean, sallow, sour-looking old man, drawn by a servant in a
chair on wheels. My companion stopped, whispered to me, "Here is
the Prince," and bowed bareheaded. I followed his example as a
matter of course. The Prince feebly returned our salutation. "Is
he ill?" I asked, when we had put our hats on again.

"Shakespeare," the secretary replied, "tells us that 'one man in
his time plays many parts.' Under what various aspects the
Prince's character may have presented itself, in his younger
days, I am no t able to tell you. Since l have been here, he has
played the part of a martyr to illness, misunderstood by his
doctors."

"And his daughter, the Princess--what do you say of her?"

"Ah, she is not so easily described! I can only appeal to your
memory of other women like her, whom you must often have
seen--women who are tall and fair, and fragile and elegant; who
have delicate aquiline noses and melting blue eyes--women who
have often charmed you by their tender smiles and their supple
graces of movement. As for the character of this popular young
lady, I must not influence you either way; study it for
yourself."

"Without a hint to guide me?"

"With a suggestion," he replied, "which may be worth considering.
If you wish to please the Princess, begin by endeavoring to win
the good graces of the Baroness."

"Who is the Baroness?"

"One of the ladies in waiting--bosom friend of her Highness, and
chosen repository of all her secrets. Personally, not likely to
attract you; short and fat, and ill-tempered and ugly. Just at
this time, I happen myself to get on with her better than usual.
We have discovered that we possess one sympathy in common--we are
the only people at Court who don't believe in the Prince's new
doctor."

"Is the new doctor a quack?"

The secretary looked round, before he answered, to see that
nobody was near us.

"It strikes me," he said, "that the Doctor is a spy. Mind! I have
no right to speak of him in that way; it is only my
impression--and I ought to add that appearances are all in his
favor. He is in the service of our nearest royal neighbor, the
Grand Duke; and he has been sent here expressly to relieve the
sufferings of the Duke's good friend and brother, our invalid
Prince. This is an honorable mission no doubt. And the man
himself is handsome, well-bred, and (I don't quite know whether
this is an additional recommendation) a countryman of ours.
Nevertheless I doubt him, and the Baroness doubts him. You are an
independent witness; I shall be anxious to hear if your opinion
agrees with ours."

I was presented at Court, toward the end of the week; and, in the
course of the next two or three days, I more than once saw the
Doctor. The impression that he produced on me surprised my
colleague. It was my opinion that he and the Baroness had
mistaken the character of a worthy and capable man.

The secretary obstinately adhered to his own view.

"Wait a little," he answered, "and we shall see."

He was quite right. We did see.

III.

BUT the Princess--the gentle, gracious, beautiful Princess--what
can I say of her Highness?

I can only say that she enchanted me.

I had been a little discouraged by the reception that I met with
from her father. Strictly confining himself within the limits of
politeness, he bade me welcome to his Court in the fewest
possible words, and then passed me by without further notice. He
afterward informed the English Minister that I had been so
unfortunate as to try his temper: "Your new secretary irritates
me, sir--he is a person in an offensively perfect state of
health." The Prince's charming daughter was not of her father's
way of thinking; it is impossible to say how graciously, how
sweetly I was received. She honored me by speaking to me in my
own language, of which she showed herself to be a perfect
mistress. I was not only permitted, but encouraged, to talk of my
family, and to dwell on my own tastes, amusements, and pursuits.
Even when her Highness's attention was claimed by other persons
waiting to be presented, I was not forgotten. The Baroness was
instructed to invite me for the next evening to the Princess's
tea-table; and it was hinted that I should be especially welcome
if I brought my music with me, and sang.

My friend the secretary, standing near us at the time, looked at
me with a mysterious smile. He had suggested that I should make
advances to the Baroness--and here was the Baroness (under royal
instructions) making advances to Me!

"We know what _that_ means," he whispered.

In justice to myself, I must declare that I entirely failed to
understand him.

On the occasion of my second reception by the Princess, at her
little evening party, I detected the Baroness, more than once, in
the act of watching her Highness and myself, with an appearance
of disapproval in her manner, which puzzled me. When I had taken
my leave, she followed me out of the room.

"I have a word of advice to give you," she said. "The best thing
you can do, sir, is to make an excuse to your Minister, and go
back to England."

I declare again, that I entirely failed to understand the
Baroness.

IV.

BEFORE the season came to an end, the Court removed to the
Prince's country-seat, in the interests of his Highness's health.
Entertainments were given (at the Doctor's suggestion), with a
view of raising the patient's depressed spirits. The members of
the English legation were among the guests invited. To me it was
a delightful visit. I had again every reason to feel gratefully
sensible of the Princess's condescending kindness. Meeting the
secretary one day in the library, I said that I thought her a
perfect creature. Was this an absurd remark to make? I could see
nothing absurd in it--and yet my friend burst out laughing.

"My good fellow, nobody is a perfect creature," he said. "The
Princess has her faults and failings, like the rest of us."

I denied it positively.

"Use your eyes," he went on; "and you will see, for example, that
she is shallow and frivolous. Yesterday was a day of rain. We
were all obliged to employ ourselves somehow indoors. Didn't you
notice that she had no resources in herself? She can't even
read."

"There you are wrong at any rate," I declared. "I saw her reading
the newspaper."

"You saw her with the newspaper in her hand. If you had not been
deaf and blind to her defects, you would have noticed that she
couldn't fix her attention on it. She was always ready to join in
the chatter of the ladies about her. When even their stores of
gossip were exhausted, she let the newspaper drop on her lap, and
sat in vacant idleness smiling at nothing."

I reminded him that she might have met with a dull number of the
newspaper. He took no notice of this unanswerable reply.

"You were talking the other day of her warmth of feeling," he
proceeded. "She has plenty of sentiment (German sentiment), I
grant you, but no true feeling. What happened only this morning,
when the Prince was in the breakfast-room, and when the Princess
and her ladies were dressed to go out riding? Even she noticed
the wretchedly depressed state of her father's spirits. A man of
that hypochondriacal temperament suffers acutely, though he may
only fancy himself to be ill. The Princess overflowed with
sympathy, but she never proposed to stay at home, and try to
cheer the old man. Her filial duty was performed to her own
entire satisfaction when she had kissed her hand to the Prince.
The moment after, she was out of the room--eager to enjoy her
ride. We all heard her laughing gayly among the ladies in the
hall."

I could have answered this also, if our discussion had not been
interrupted at the moment. The Doctor came into the library in
search of a book. When he had left us, my colleague's strong
prejudice against him instantly declared itself.

"Be on your guard with that man," he said.

"Why?" I asked.

"Haven't you noticed," he replied, "that when the Princess is
talking to you, the Doctor always happens to be in that part of
the room?"

"What does it matter where the Doctor is?"

My friend looked at me with an oddly mingled expression of doubt
and surprise. "Do you really not understand me?" he said.

"I don't indeed."

"My dear Ernest, you are a rare and admirable example to the rest
of us--you are a truly modest man."

What did he mean?

V.

EVENTS followed, on the next day, which (as will presently be
seen) I have a personal interest in relating.

The Baroness left us suddenly, on leave of absence. The Prince
wearied of his residence in the country; and the Court returned
to the capital. The charming Princess was reported to be
"indisposed," and retired to the seclusion of her own apartments.

A week later, I received a note f rom the Baroness, marked
"private and confidential." It informed me that she had resumed
her duties as lady-in-waiting, and that she wished to see me at
my earliest convenience. I obeyed at once; and naturally asked if
there were better accounts of her Highness's health.

The Baroness's reply a little surprised me. She said, "The
Princess is perfectly well."

"Recovered already!" I exclaimed.

"She has never been ill," the Baroness answered. "Her
indisposition was a sham; forced on her by me, in her own
interests. Her reputation is in peril; and you--you hateful
Englishman--are the cause of it."

Not feeling disposed to put up with such language as this, even
when it was used by a lady, I requested that she would explain
herself. She complied without hesitation. In another minute my
eyes were opened to the truth. I knew--no; that is too
positive--let me say I had reason to believe that the Princess
loved me!

It is simply impossible to convey to the minds of others any idea
of the emotions that overwhelmed me at that critical moment of my
life. I was in a state of confusion at the time; and, when my
memory tries to realize it, I am in a state of confusion now. The
one thing I can do is to repeat what the Baroness said to me when
I had in some degree recovered my composure.

"I suppose you are aware," she began, "of the disgrace to which
the Princess's infatuation exposes her, if it is discovered? On
my own responsibility I repeat what I said to you a short time
since. Do you refuse to leave this place immediately?"

Does the man live, honored as I was, who would have hesitated to
refuse? Find him if you can!

"Very well," she resumed. "As the friend of the Princess, I have
no choice now but to take things as they are, and to make the
best of them. Let us realize your position to begin with. If you
were (like your elder brother) a nobleman possessed of vast
estates, my royal mistress might be excused. As it is, whatever
you may be in the future, you are nothing now but an obscure
young man, without fortune or title. Do you see your duty to the
Princess? or must I explain it to you?"

I saw my duty as plainly as she did. "Her Highness's secret is a
sacred secret," I said. "I am bound to shrink from no sacrifice
which may preserve it."

The Baroness smiled maliciously. "I may have occasion," she
answered, "to remind you of what you have just said. In the
meanwhile the Princess's secret is in danger of discovery."

"By her father?"

"No. By the Doctor."

At first, I doubted whether she was in jest or in earnest. The
next instant, I remembered that the secretary had expressly
cautioned me against that man.

"It is evidently one of your virtues," the Baroness proceeded,
"to be slow to suspect. Prepare yourself for a disagreeable
surprise. The Doctor has been watching the Princess, on every
occasion when she speaks to you, with some object of his own in
view. During my absence, young sir, I have been engaged in
discovering what that object is. My excellent mother lives at the
Court of the Grand Duke, and enjoys the confidence of his
Ministers. He is still a bachelor; and, in the interests of the
succession to the throne, the time has arrived when he must
marry. With my mother's assistance, I have found out that the
Doctor's medical errand here is a pretense. Influenced by the
Princess's beauty the Grand Duke has thought of her first as his
future duchess. Whether he has heard slanderous stories, or
whether he is only a cautious man, I can't tell you. But this I
know: he has instructed his physician--if he had employed a
professed diplomatist his motive might have been suspected--to
observe her Highness privately, and to communicate the result.
The object of the report is to satisfy the Duke that the
Princess's reputation is above the reach of scandal; that she is
free from entanglements of a certain kind; and that she is in
every respect a person to whom he can with propriety offer his
hand in marriage. The Doctor, Mr. Ernest, is not disposed to
allow you to prevent him from sending in a favorable report. He
has drawn his conclusions from the Princess's extraordinary
kindness to the second secretary of the English legation; and he
is only waiting for a little plainer evidence to communicate his
suspicions to the Prince. It rests with you to save the
Princess."

"Only tell me how I am to do it!" I said.

"There is but one way of doing it," she answered; "and that way
has (comically enough) been suggested to me by the Doctor
himself."

Her tone and manner tried my patience.

"Come to the point!" I said.

She seemed to enjoy provoking me.

"No hurry, Mr. Ernest--no hurry! You shall be fully enlightened,
if you will only wait a little. The Prince, I must tell you,
believes in his daughter's indisposition. When he visited her
this morning, he was attended by his medical adviser. I was
present at the interview. To do him justice, the Doctor is worthy
of the trust reposed in him--he boldly attempted to verify his
suspicions of the daughter in the father's presence."

"How?"

"Oh, in the well-known way that has been tried over and over
again, under similar circumstances! He merely invented a report
that you were engaged in a love-affair with some charming person
in the town. Don't be angry; there's no harm done."

"But there _is_ harm done," I insisted. "What must the Princess
think of me?"

"Do you suppose she is weak enough to believe the Doctor? Her
Highness beat him at his own weapons; not the slightest sign of
agitation on her part rewarded his ingenuity. All that you have
to do is to help her to mislead this medical spy. It's as easy as
lying: and easier. The Doctor's slander declares that you have a
love-affair in the town. Take the hint--and astonish the Doctor
by proving that he has hit on the truth."

It was a hot day; the Baroness was beginning to get excited. She
paused and fanned herself.

"Do I startle you?" she asked.

"You disgust me."

She laughed.

"What a thick-headed man this is!" she said, pleasantly. "Must I
put it more plainly still? Engage in what your English prudery
calls a 'flirtation,' with some woman here--the lower in degree
the better, or the Princess might be jealous--and let the affair
be seen and known by everybody about the Court. Sly as he is, the
Doctor is not prepared for that! At your age, and with your
personal advantages, he will take appearances for granted; he
will conclude that he has wronged you, and misinterpreted the
motives of the Princess. The secret of her Highness's weakness
will be preserved--thanks to that sacrifice, Mr. Ernest, which
you are so willing and so eager to make."

It was useless to remonstrate with such a woman as this. I simply
stated my own objection to her artfully devised scheme.

"I don't wish to appear vain," I said; "but the woman to whom I
am to pay these attentions may believe that I really admire
her--and it is just possible that she may honestly return the
feeling which I am only assuming."

"Well--and what then?"

"It's hard on the woman, surely?"

The Baroness was shocked, unaffectedly shocked.

"Good heavens!" she exclaimed, "how can anything that you do for
the Princess be hard on a woman of the lower orders? There must
be an end of this nonsense, sir! You have heard what I propose,
and you know what the circumstances are. My mistress is waiting
for your answer. What am I to say?"

"Let me see her Highness, and speak for myself," I said.

"Quite impossible to-day, without running too great a risk. Your
reply must be made through me."

There was to be a Court concert at the end of the week. On that
occasion I should be able to make my own reply. In the meanwhile
I only told the Baroness I wanted time to consider.

"What time?" she asked.

"Until to-morrow. Do you object?"

"On the contrary, I cordially agree. Your base hesitation may
lead to results which I have not hitherto dared to anticipate."

"What do you mean?"

"Between this and to-morrow," the horrid woman replied, "the
Princess may end in seeing you with my eyes. In that hope I wish
you good-morning."

VI.

MY enemies say that I am a weak man, unduly influenced by persons
of rank--because of their  rank. If this we re true, I should have
found little difficulty in consenting to adopt the Baroness's
suggestion. As it was, the longer I reflected on the scheme the
less I liked it. I tried to think of some alternative that might
be acceptably proposed. The time passed, and nothing occurred to
me. In this embarrassing position my mind became seriously
disturbed; I felt the necessity of obtaining some relief, which
might turn my thoughts for a while into a new channel. The
secretary called on me, while I was still in doubt what to do. He
reminded me that a new prima donna was advertised to appear on
that night; and he suggested that we should go to the opera.
Feeling as I did at the time, I readily agreed.

We found the theater already filled, before the performance
began. Two French gentlemen were seated in the row of stalls
behind us. They were talking of the new singer.

"She is advertised as 'Mademoiselle Fontenay,'" one of them said.
"That sounds like an assumed name."

"It _is_ an assumed name," the other replied. "She is the
daughter of a French singing-master, named Bonnefoy."

To my friend's astonishment I started to my feet, and left him
without a word of apology. In another minute I was at the
stage-door, and had sent in my card to "Mademoiselle Fontenay."
While I was waiting, I had time to think. Was it possible that
Jeanne had gone on the stage? Or were there two singing-masters
in existence named Bonnefoy? My doubts were soon decided. The
French woman-servant whom I remembered when I was Monsieur
Bonnefoy's pupil, made her appearance, and conducted me to her
young mistress's dressing-room. Dear good Jeanne, how glad she
was to see me!

I found her standing before the glass, having just completed her
preparations for appearing on the stage. Dressed in her
picturesque costume, she was so charming that I expressed my
admiration heartily, as became her old friend. "Do you really
like me?" she said, with the innocent familiarity which I
recollected so well. "See how I look in the glass--that is the
great test." It was not easy to apply the test. Instead of
looking at her image in the glass, it was far more agreeable to
look at herself. We were interrupted--too soon interrupted--by
the call-boy. He knocked at the door, and announced that the
overture had begun.

"I have a thousand things to ask you," I told her. "What has made
this wonderful change in your life? How is it that I don't see
your father--"

Her face instantly saddened; her hand trembled as she laid it on
my arm to silence me.

"Don't speak of him now," she said, "or you will unnerve me. Come
to me to-morrow when the stage will not be waiting; Annette will
give you my address." She opened the door to go out, and
returned. "Will you think me very unreasonable if I ask you not
to make one of my audience to-night? You have reminded me of the
dear old days that can never come again. If I feel that I am
singing to _you_--" She left me to understand the rest, and
turned away again to the door. As I followed her out, to say
good-by, she drew from her bosom the little brooch which had been
my parting gift, and held it out to me. "On the stage, or off, "
she said, "I always wear it. Good-night, Ernest."

I was prepared to hear sad news when we met the next morning.

My good old friend and master had died suddenly. To add to the
bitterness of that affliction, he had died in debt to a dear and
intimate friend. For his daughter's sake he had endeavored to add
to his little savings by speculating with borrowed money on the
Stock Exchange. He had failed, and the loan advanced had not been
repaid, when a fit of apoplexy struck him down. Offered the
opportunity of trying her fortune on the operatic stage, Jeanne
made the attempt, and was now nobly employed in earning the money
to pay her father's debt.

"It was the only way in which I could do justice to his memory,"
she said, simply. "I hope you don't object to my going on the
stage?"

I took her hand, poor child--and let that simple action answer
for me. I was too deeply affected to be able to speak.

"It is not in me to be a great actress," she resumed; "but you
know what an admirable musician my father was. He has taught me
to sing, so that I can satisfy the critics, as well as please the
public. There was what they call a great success last night. It
has earned me an engagement for another year to come, and an
increase of salary. I have already sent some money to our good
old friend at home, and I shall soon send more. It is my one
consolation--I feel almost happy again when I am paying my poor
father's debt. No more now of my sad story! I want to hear all
that you can tell me of yourself." She moved to the window, and
looked out. "Oh, the beautiful blue sky! We used sometimes to
take a walk, when we were in London, on fine days like this. Is
there a park here?"

I took her to the palace gardens, famous for their beauty in that
part of Germany.

Arm in arm we loitered along the pleasant walks. The lovely
flowers, the bright sun, the fresh fragrant breeze, all helped
her to recover her spirits. She began to be like the happy Jeanne
of my past experience, as easily pleased as a child. When we sat
down to rest, the lap of her dress was full of daisies. "Do you
remember," she said, "when you first taught me to make a
daisy-chain? Are you too great a man to help me again now?"

We were still engaged with our chain, seated close together, when
the smell of tobacco-smoke was wafted to us on the air.

I looked up and saw the Doctor passing us, enjoying his cigar. He
bowed; eyed my pretty companion with a malicious smile; and
passed on.

"Who is that man?" she asked.

"The Prince's physician," I replied.

"I don't like him," she said; "why did he smile when he looked at
me?"

"Perhaps," I suggested, "he thought we were lovers."

She blushed. "Don't let him think that! tell him we are only old
friends."

We were not destined to finish our flower chain on that day.

Another person interrupted us, whom I recognized as the elder
brother of Monsieur Bonnefoy--already mentioned in these pages,
under the name of Uncle David. Having left France for political
reasons, the old republican had taken care of his niece after her
father's death, and had accepted the position of Jeanne's
business manager in her relations with the stage. Uncle David's
object, when he joined us in the garden, was to remind her that
she was wanted at rehearsal, and must at once return with him to
the theater. We parted, having arranged that I was to see the
performance on that night.

Later in the day, the Baroness sent for me again.

"Let me apologize for having misunderstood you yesterday," she
said: "and let me offer you my best congratulations. You have
done wonders already in the way of misleading the Doctor. There
is only one objection to that girl at the theater--I hear she is
so pretty that she may possibly displease the Princess. In other
respects, she is just in the public position which will make your
attentions to her look like the beginning of a serious intrigue.
Bravo, Mr. Ernest--bravo!"

I was too indignant to place any restraint on the language in
which I answered her.

"Understand, if you please," I said, "that I am renewing an old
friendship with Mademoiselle Jeanne--begun under the sanction of
her father. Respect that young lady, madam, as I respect her."

The detestable Baroness clapped her hands, as if she had been at
the theater.

"If you only say that to the Princess," she remarked, "as well as
you have said it to me, there will be no danger of arousing her
Highness's jealousy. I have a message for you. At the concert, on
Saturday, you are to retire to the conservatory, and you may hope
for an interview when the singers begin the second part of the
programme. Don't let me detain you any longer. Go back to your
young lady, Mr. Ernest--pray go back!"

VII.

ON the second night of the opera the applications for places were
too numerous to be received. Among the crowded audience, I
recognized many of my friends. They persisted in believing an
absurd report (first circulated, as I imagine, by the Doctor),
which asserted that my interest in the new singer was something
more than the interest of an old friend. When I went behind the
scenes to congratulate Jeanne on her success, I was annoyed in
another way--and by the Doctor again. He followed me to Jeanne's
room, to offer _his_ congratulations; and he begged that I would
introduce him to the charming prima donna. Having expressed his
admiration, he looked at me with his insolently suggestive smile,
and said he could not think of prolonging his intrusion. On
leaving the room, he noticed Uncle David, waiting as usual to
take care of Jeanne on her return from the theater--looked at him
attentively--bowed, and went out.

The next morning, I received a note from the Baroness, expressed
in these terms:

"More news! My rooms look out on the wing of the palace in which
the Doctor is lodged. Half an hour since, I discovered him at his
window, giving a letter to a person who is a stranger to me. The
man left the palace immediately afterward. My maid followed him,
by my directions. Instead of putting the letter in the post, he
took a ticket at the railway-station--for what place the servant
was unable to discover. Here, you will observe, is a letter
important enough to be dispatched by special messenger, and
written at a time when we have succeeded in freeing ourselves
from the Doctor's suspicions. It is at least possible that he has
decided on sending a favorable report of the Princess to the
Grand Duke. If this is the case, please consider whether you will
not act wisely (in her Highness's interests) by keeping away from
the concert."

Viewing this suggestion as another act of impertinence on the
part of the Baroness, I persisted in my intention of going to the
concert. It was for the Princess to decide what course of conduct
I was bound to follow. What did I care for the Doctor's report to
the Duke! Shall I own my folly? I do really believe I was jealous
of the Duke.

VIII.

ENTERING the Concert Room, I found the Princess alone on the
dais, receiving the company. "Nervous prostration" had made it
impossible for the Prince to be present. He was confined to his
bed-chamber; and the Doctor was in attendance on him.

I bowed to the Baroness, but she was too seriously offended with
me for declining to take her advice to notice my salutation.
Passing into the conservatory, it occurred to me that I might be
seen, and possibly suspected, in the interval between the first
and second parts of the programme, when the music no longer
absorbed the attention of the audience. I went on, and waited
outside on the steps that led to the garden; keeping the glass
door open, so as to hear when the music of the second part of the
concert began.

After an interval which seemed to be endless, I saw the Princess
approaching me.

She had made the heat in the Concert Room an excuse for retiring
for a while; and she had the Baroness in attendance on her to
save appearances. Instead of leaving us to ourselves, the
malicious creature persisted in paying the most respectful
attentions to her mistress. It was impossible to make her
understand that she was not wanted any longer until the Princess
said sharply, "Go back to the music!" Even then, the detestable
woman made a low curtsey, and answered: "I will return, Madam, in
five minutes."

I ventured to present myself in the conservatory.

The Princess was dressed with exquisite simplicity, entirely in
white. Her only ornaments were white roses in her hair and in her
bosom. To say that she looked lovely is to say nothing. She
seemed to be the ethereal creature of some higher sphere; too
exquisitely delicate and pure to be approached by a mere mortal
man like myself. I was awed; I was silent. Her Highness's sweet
smile encouraged me to venture a little nearer. She pointed to a
footstool which the Baroness had placed for her. "Are you afraid
of me, Ernest?" she asked softly.

Her divinely beautiful eyes rested on me with a look of
encouragement. I dropped on my knees at her feet. She had asked
if I was afraid of her. This, if I may use such an expression,
roused my manhood. My own boldness astonished me. I answered:
"Madam, I adore you."

She laid her fair hand on my head, and looked at me thoughtfully.
"Forget my rank," she whispered--"have I not set you the example?
Suppose that I am nothing but an English Miss. What would you say
to Miss?"

"I should say, I love you."

"Say it to Me."

My lips said it on her hand. She bent forward. My heart beats
fast at the bare remembrance of it. Oh, heavens, her Highness
kissed me!

"There is your reward," she murmured, "for all you have
sacrificed for my sake. What an effort it must have been to offer
the pretense of love to an obscure stranger! The Baroness tells
me this actress--this singer--what is she?--is pretty. Is it
true?"

The Baroness was quite mischievous enough to have also mentioned
the false impression, prevalent about the Court, that I was in
love with Jeanne. I attempted to explain. The gracious Princess
refused to hear me.

"Do you think I doubt you?" she said. "Distinguished by me, could
you waste a look on a person in _that_ rank of life?" She laughed
softly, as if the mere idea of such a thing amused her. It was
only for a moment: her thoughts took a new direction--they
contemplated the uncertain future. "How is this to end?" she
asked. "Dear Ernest, we are not in Paradise; we are in a hard
cruel world which insists on distinctions in rank. To what
unhappy destiny does the fascination which you exercise over me
condemn us both?"

She paused--took one of the white roses out of her bosom--touched
it with her lips--and gave it to me.

"I wonder whether you feel the burden of life as I feel it?" she
resumed. "It is immaterial to me, whether we are united in this
world or in the next. Accept my rose, Ernest, as an assurance
that I speak with perfect sincerity. I see but two alternatives
before us. One of them (beset with dangers) is elopement. And the
other," she added, with truly majestic composure, "is suicide."

Would Englishmen in general have rightly understood such fearless
confidence in them as this language implied? I am afraid they
might have attributed it to what my friend the secretary called
"German sentiment." Perhaps they might even have suspected the
Princess of quoting from some old-fashioned German play. Under
the irresistible influence of that glorious creature, I
contemplated with such equal serenity the perils of elopement and
the martyrdom of love, that I was for the moment at a loss how to
reply. In that moment, the evil genius of my life appeared in the
conservatory. With haste in her steps, with alarm in her face,
the Baroness rushed up to her royal mistress, and said, "For
God's sake, Madam, come away! The Prince desires to speak with
you instantly."

Her Highness rose, calmly superior to the vulgar excitement of
her lady in waiting. "Think of it to-night," she said to me, "and
let me hear from you to-morrow."

She pressed my hand; she gave me a farewell look. I sank into the
chair that she had just left. Did I think of elopement? Did I
think of suicide? The elevating influence of the Princess no
longer sustained me; my nature became degraded. Horrid doubts
rose in my mind. Did her father suspect us?

IX.

NEED I say that I passed a sleepless night?

The morning found me with my pen in my hand, confronting the
serious responsibility of writing to the Princess, and not
knowing what to say. I had already torn up two letters, when
Uncle David presented himself with a message from his niece.
Jeanne was in trouble, and wanted to ask my advice.

My state of mind, on hearing this, became simply inexplicable.
Here was an interruption which ought to have annoyed me. It did
nothing of the kind--it inspired me with a feeling of relief!

I naturally expected that the old Frenchman would return with me
to his niece, and tell me what had happened. To my surprise, he
begged that I would excuse him, and left me without a word of
explanation. I found Jeanne walking up and down her little
sitting-room, flushed and angry. Fragments of torn paper and
heaps of flowers littered the floor; and three unopen jewel-cases
appeared to have been thrown into the empty fireplace. She caught
me
 excitedly by the hand the moment I entered the room.

"You are my true friend," she said; "you were present the other
night when I sang. Was there anything in my behavior on the stage
which could justify men who call themselves gentlemen in
insulting me?"

"My dear, how can you ask the question?"

"I must ask it. Some of them send flowers, and some of them send
jewels; and every one of them writes letters--infamous,
abominable letters--saying they are in love with me, and asking
for appointments as if I was--"

She could say no more. Poor dear Jeanne--her head dropped on my
shoulder; she burst out crying. Who could see her so cruelly
humiliated--the faithful loving daughter, whose one motive for
appearing on the stage had been to preserve her father's good
name--and not feel for her as I did? I forgot all considerations
of prudence; I thought of nothing but consoling her; I took her
in my arms; I dried her tears; I kissed her; I said, "Tell me the
name of any one of the wretches who has written to you, and I
will make him an example to the rest!" She shook her head, and
pointed to the morsels of paper on the floor. "Oh, Ernest, do you
think I asked you to come here for any such purpose as that?
Those jewels, those hateful jewels, tell me how I can send them
back! spare me the sight of them!"

So far it was easy to console her. I sent the jewels at once to
the manager of the theater--with a written notice to be posted at
the stage door, stating that they were waiting to be returned to
the persons who could describe them.

"Try, my dear, to forget what has happened," I said. "Try to find
consolation and encouragement in your art."

"I have lost all interest in my success on the stage," she
answered, "now I know the penalty I must pay for it. When my
father's memory is clear of reproach, I shall leave the theater
never to return to it again."

"Take time to consider, Jeanne."

"I will do anything you ask of me."

For a while we were silent. Without any influence to lead to it
that I could trace, I found myself recalling the language that
the Princess had used in alluding to Jeanne. When I thought of
them now, the words and the tone in which they had been spoken
jarred on me. There is surely something mean in an assertion of
superiority which depends on nothing better than the accident of
birth. I don't know why I took Jeanne's hand; I don't know why I
said, "What a good girl you are! how glad I am to have been of
some little use to you!" Is my friend the secretary right, when
he reproaches me with acting on impulse, like a woman? I don't
like to think so; and yet, this I must own--it was well for me
that I was obliged to leave her, before I had perhaps said other
words which might have been alike unworthy of Jeanne, of the
Princess, and of myself. I was called away to speak to my
servant. He brought with him the secretary's card, having a line
written on it: "I am waiting at your rooms, on business which
permits of no delay."

As we shook hands, Jeanne asked me if I knew where her uncle was.
I could only tell her that he had left me at my own door. She
made no remark; but she seemed to be uneasy on receiving that
reply.

X.

WHEN I arrived at my rooms, my colleague hurried to meet me the
moment I opened the door.

"I am going to surprise you," he said; "and there is no time to
prepare you for it. Our chief, the Minister, has seen the Prince
this morning, and has been officially informed of an event of
importance in the life of the Princess. She is engaged to be
married to the Grand Duke."

Engaged to the Duke--and not a word from her to warn me of it!
Engaged--after what she had said to me no longer ago than the
past night! Had I been made a plaything to amuse a great lady?
Oh, what degradation! I was furious; I snatched up my hat to go
to the palace--to force my way to her--to overwhelm her with
reproaches. My friend stopped me. He put an official document
into my hand.

"There is your leave of absence from the legation," he said;
"beginning from to-day. I have informed the Minister, in strict
confidence, of the critical position in which you are placed. He
agrees with me that the Princess's inexcusable folly is alone to
blame. Leave us, Ernest, by the next train. There is some
intrigue going on, and I fear you may be involved in it. You know
that the rulers of these little German States can exercise
despotic authority when they choose?"

"Yes! yes!"

"Whether the Prince has acted of his own free will--or whether he
has been influenced by some person about him--I am not able to
tell you. He has issued an order to arrest an old Frenchman,
known to be a republican, and suspected of associating with one
of the secret societies in this part of Germany. The conspirator
has taken to flight; having friends, as we suppose, who warned
him in time. But this, Ernest, is not the worst of it. That
charming singer, that modest, pretty girl--"

"You don't mean Jeanne?"

"I am sorry to say I do. Advantage has been taken of her
relationship to the old man, to include that innocent creature in
political suspicions which it is simply absurd to suppose that
she has deserved. She is ordered to leave the Prince's domains
immediately.--Are you going to her?"

"Instantly!" I replied.

Could I feel a moment's hesitation, after the infamous manner in
which the Princess had sacrificed me to the Grand Duke? Could I
think of the poor girl, friendless, helpless--with nobody near
her but a stupid woman-servant, unable to speak the language of
the country--and fail to devote myself to the protection of
Jeanne? Thank God, I reached her lodgings in time to tell her
what had happened, and to take it on myself to receive the
police.

XI.

IN three days more, Jeanne was safe in London; having traveled
under my escort. I was fortunate enough to find a home for her,
in the house of a lady who had been my mother's oldest and
dearest friend.

We were separated, a few days afterward, by the distressing news
which reached me of the state of my brother's health. I went at
once to his house in the country. His medical attendants had lost
all hope of saving him: they told me plainly that his release
from a life of suffering was near at hand.

While I was still in attendance at his bedside, I heard from the
secretary. He inclosed a letter, directed to me in a strange
handwriting. I opened the envelope and looked for the signature.
My friend had been entrapped into sending me an anonymous letter.

Besides addressing me in French (a language seldom used in my
experience at the legation), the writer disguised the identity of
the persons mentioned by the use of classical names. In spite of
these precautions, I felt no difficulty in arriving at a
conclusion. My correspondent's special knowledge of Court
secrets, and her malicious way of communicating them, betrayed
the Baroness.

I translate the letter; restoring to the persons who figure in it
the names under which they are already known. The writer began in
these satirically familiar terms:



"When you left the Prince's dominions, my dear sir, you no doubt
believed yourself to be a free agent. Quite a mistake! You were a
mere puppet; and the strings that moved you were pulled by the
Doctor.

"Let me tell you how.

"On a certain night, which you well remember, the Princess was
unexpectedly summoned to the presence of her father. His
physician's skill had succeeded in relieving the illustrious
Prince, prostrate under nervous miseries. He was able to attend
to a state affair of importance, revealed to him by the
Doctor--who then for the first time acknowledged that he had
presented himself at Court in a diplomatic, as well as in a
medical capacity.

"This state affair related to a proposal for the hand of the
Princess, received from the Grand Duke through the authorized
medium of the Doctor. Her Highness, being consulted, refused to
consider the proposal. The Prince asked for her reason. She
answered: 'I have no wish to be married.' Naturally irritated by
such a ridiculous excuse, her father declared positively that the
marriage should take place.

"The impression produced on the Grand Duke's favorite and
emissary was of a different kind.


"Certain suspicions of the Princess and yourself, which you had
successfully contrived to dissipate, revived in the Doctor's mind
when he heard the lady's reason for refusing to marry his royal
master. It was now too late to regret that he had suffered
himself to be misled by cleverly managed appearances. He could
not recall the favorable report which he had addressed to the
Duke--or withdraw the proposal of marriage which he had been
commanded to make.

"In this emergency, the one safe course open to him was to get
rid of You--and, at the same time, so to handle circumstances as
to excite against you the pride and anger of the Princess. In the
pursuit of this latter object he was assisted by one of the
ladies in waiting, sincerely interested in the welfare of her
gracious mistress, and therefore ardently desirous of seeing her
Highness married to the Duke.

"A wretched old French conspirator was made the convenient pivot
on which the intrigue turned.

"An order for the arrest of this foreign republican having been
first obtained, the Prince was prevailed on to extend his
distrust of the Frenchman to the Frenchman's niece. You know this
already; but you don't know why it was done. Having believed from
the first that you were really in love with the young lady, the
Doctor reckoned confidently on your devoting yourself to the
protection of a friendless girl, cruelly exiled at an hour's
notice.

"The one chance against us was that tender considerations,
associated with her Highness, might induce you to hesitate. The
lady in waiting easily moved this obstacle out of the way. She
abstained from delivering a letter addressed to you, intrusted to
her by the Princess. When the great lady asked why she had not
received your reply, she was informed (quite truly) that you and
the charming opera singer had taken your departure together. You
may imagine what her Highness thought of you, and said of you,
when I mention in conclusion that she consented, the same day, to
marry the Duke.

"So, Mr. Ernest, these clever people tricked you into serving
their interests, blindfold. In relating how it was done, I hope I
may have assisted you in forming a correct estimate of the state
of your own intelligence. You have made a serious mistake in
adopting your present profession. Give up diplomacy--and get a
farmer to employ you in keeping his sheep."

                                 * * * * *

Do I sometimes think regretfully of the Princess?

Permit me to mention a circumstance, and to leave my answer to be
inferred. Jeanne is Lady Medhurst.


MR. LISMORE AND THE WIDOW.

I.

LATE in the autumn, not many years since, a public meeting was
held at the Mansion House, London, under the direction of the
Lord Mayor.

The list of gentlemen invited to address the audience had been
chosen with two objects in view. Speakers of celebrity, who would
rouse public enthusiasm, were supported by speakers connected
with commerce, who would be practically useful in explaining the
purpose for which the meeting was convened. Money wisely spent in
advertising had produced the customary result--every seat was
occupied before the proceedings began.

Among the late arrivals, who had no choice but to stand or to
leave the hall, were two ladies. One of them at once decided on
leaving the hall. "I shall go back to the carriage," she said,
"and wait for you at the door." Her friend answered, "I shan't
keep you long. He is advertised to support the second Resolution;
I want to see him--and that is all."

An elderly gentleman, seated at the end of a bench, rose and
offered his place to the lady who remained. She hesitated to take
advantage of his kindness, until he reminded her that he had
heard what she said to her friend. Before the third Resolution
was proposed, his seat would be at his own disposal again. She
thanked him, and without further ceremony took his place He was
provided with an opera-glass, which he more than once offered to
her, when famous orators appeared on the platform; she made no
use of it until a speaker--known in the City as a
ship-owner--stepped forward to support the second Resolution.

His name (announced in the advertisements) was Ernest Lismore.

The moment he rose, the lady asked for the opera-glass. She kept
it to her eyes for such a length of time, and with such evident
interest in Mr. Lismore, that the curiosity of her neighbors was
aroused. Had he anything to say in which a lady (evidently a
stranger to him) was personally interested? There was nothing in
the address that he delivered which appealed to the enthusiasm of
women. He was undoubtedly a handsome man, whose appearance
proclaimed him to be in the prime of life--midway perhaps between
thirty and forty years of age. But why a lady should persist in
keeping an opera-glass fixed on him all through his speech, was a
question which found the general ingenuity at a loss for a reply.

Having returned the glass with an apology, the lady ventured on
putting a question next. "Did it strike you, sir, that Mr.
Lismore seemed to be out of spirits?" she asked.

"I can't say it did, ma'am."

"Perhaps you noticed that he left the platform the moment he had
done?"

This betrayal of interest in the speaker did not escape the
notice of a lady, seated on the bench in front. Before the old
gentleman could answer, she volunteered an explanation.

"I am afraid Mr. Lismore is troubled by anxieties connected with
his business," she said. "My husband heard it reported in the
City yesterday that he was seriously embarrassed by the
failure--"

A loud burst of applause made the end of the sentence inaudible.
A famous member of Parliament had risen to propose the third
Resolution. The polite old man took his seat, and the lady left
the hall to join her friend.

"Well, Mrs. Callender, has Mr. Lismore disappointed you?"

"Far from it! But I have heard a report about him which has
alarmed me: he is said to be seriously troubled about money
matters. How can I find out his address in the City?"

"We can stop at the first stationer's shop we pass, and ask to
look at the Directory. Are you going to pay Mr. Lismore a visit?"

"I am going to think about it."

II.

THE next day a clerk entered Mr. Lismore's private room at the
office, and presented a visiting-card. Mrs. Callender had
reflected, and had arrived at a decision. Underneath her name she
had written these explanatory words: "On important business."

"Does she look as if she wanted money?" Mr. Lismore inquired.

"Oh dear, no! She comes in her carriage."

"Is she young or old?"

"Old, sir."

To Mr. Lismore--conscious of the disastrous influence
occasionally exercised over busy men by youth and beauty--this
was a recommendation in itself. He said: "Show her in."

Observing the lady, as she approached him, with the momentary
curiosity of a stranger, he noticed that she still preserved the
remains of beauty. She had also escaped the misfortune, common to
persons at her time of life, of becoming too fat. Even to a man's
eye, her dressmaker appeared to have made the most of that
favorable circumstance. Her figure had its defects concealed, and
its remaining merits set off to advantage. At the same time she
evidently held herself above the common deceptions by which some
women seek to conceal their age. She wore her own gray hair; and
her complexion bore the test of daylight. On entering the room,
she made her apologies with some embarrassment. Being the
embarrassment of a stranger (and not of a youthful stranger), it
failed to impress Mr. Lismore favorably.

"I am afraid I have chosen an inconvenient time for my visit,"
she began.

"I am at your service," he answered a little stiffly; "especially
if you will be so kind as to mention your business with me in few
words."

She was a woman of some spirit, and that reply roused her.

"I will mention it in one word, " she said smartly. "My business
is--gratitude."

He was completely at a loss to understand what she meant, and he
said so plainly. Instead of explaining herself, she put a
question.

"Do you remember the night of the eleventh of March, between five
and six years since?"

He considered for a moment.

"No,"  he said, "I don't r emember it. Excuse me, Mrs. Callender,
I have affairs of my own to attend to which cause me some
anxiety--"

"Let me assist your memory, Mr. Lismore; and I will leave you to
your affairs. On the date that I have referred to, you were on
your way to the railway-station at Bexmore, to catch the night
express from the North to London."

As a hint that his time was valuable the ship-owner had hitherto
remained standing. He now took his customary seat, and began to
listen with some interest. Mrs. Callender had produced her effect
on him already.

"It was absolutely necessary," she proceeded, "that you should be
on board your ship in the London Docks at nine o'clock the next
morning. If you had lost the express, the vessel would have
sailed without you."

The expression of his face began to change to surprise. "Who told
you that?" he asked.

"You shall hear directly. On your way into the town, your
carriage was stopped by an obstruction on the highroad. The
people of Bexmore were looking at a house on fire."

He started to his feet.

"Good heavens! are you the lady?"

She held up her hand in satirical protest.

"Gently, sir! You suspected me just now of wasting your valuable
time. Don't rashly conclude that I am the lady, until you find
that I am acquainted with the circumstances."

"Is there no excuse for my failing to recognize you?" Mr. Lismore
asked. "We were on the dark side of the burning house; you were
fainting, and I--"

"And you," she interposed, "after saving me at the risk of your
own life, turned a deaf ear to my poor husband's entreaties, when
he asked you to wait till I had recovered my senses."

"Your poor husband? Surely, Mrs. Callender, he received no
serious injury from the fire?"

"The firemen rescued him under circumstances of peril," she
answered, "and at his great age he sank under the shock. I have
lost the kindest and best of men. Do you remember how you parted
from him--burned and bruised in saving me? He liked to talk of it
in his last illness. 'At least' (he said to you), 'tell me the
name of the man who has preserved my wife from a dreadful death.'
You threw your card to him out of the carriage window, and away
you went at a gallop to catch your train! In all the years that
have passed I have kept that card, and have vainly inquired for
my brave sea-captain. Yesterday I saw your name on the list of
speakers at the Mansion House. Need I say that I attended the
meeting? Need I tell you now why I come here and interrupt you in
business hours?"

She held out her hand. Mr. Lismore took it in silence, and
pressed it warmly.

"You have not done with me yet," she resumed with a smile. "Do
you remember what I said of my errand, when I first came in?"

"You said it was an errand of gratitude."

"Something more than the gratitude which only says 'Thank you,' "
she added. "Before I explain myself, however, I want to know what
you have been doing, and how it was that my inquiries failed to
trace you after that terrible night."

The appearance of depression which Mrs. Callender had noticed at
the public meeting showed itself again in Mr. Lismore's face. He
sighed as he answered her.

"My story has one merit," he said; "it is soon told. I cannot
wonder that you failed to discover me. In the first place, I was
not captain of my ship at that time; I was only mate. In the
second place, I inherited some money, and ceased to lead a
sailor's life, in less than a year from the night of the fire.
You will now understand what obstacles were in the way of your
tracing me. With my little capital I started successfully in
business as a ship-owner. At the time, I naturally congratulated
myself on my own good fortune. We little know, Mrs. Callender,
what the future has in store for us."

He stopped. His handsome features hardened--as if he was
suffering (and concealing) pain. Before it was possible to speak
to him, there was a knock at the door. Another visitor, without
an appointment, had called; the clerk appeared again, with a card
and a message.

"The gentleman begs you will see him, sir. He has something to
tell you which is too important to be delayed."

Hearing the message, Mrs. Callender rose immediately.

"It is enough for to-day that we understand each other," she
said. "Have you any engagement to-morrow, after the hours of
business?"

"None."

She pointed to her card on the writing-table. "Will you come to
me to-morrow evening at that address? I am like the gentleman who
has just called; I, too, have my reason for wishing to see you."

He gladly accepted the invitation. Mrs. Callender stopped him as
he opened the door for her.

"Shall I offend you," she said, "if I ask a strange question
before I go? I have a better motive, mind, than mere curiosity.
Are you married?"

"No."

"Forgive me again," she resumed. "At my age, you cannot possibly
misunderstand me; and yet--"

She hesitated. Mr. Lismore tried to give her confidence. "Pray
don't stand on ceremony, Mrs. Callender. Nothing that _you_ can
ask me need be prefaced by an apology."

Thus encouraged, she ventured to proceed.

"You may be engaged to be married?" she suggested. "Or you may be
in love?"

He found it impossible to conceal his surprise. But he answered
without hesitation.

"There is no such bright prospect in _my_ life," he said. "I am
not even in love."

She left him with a little sigh. It sounded like a sigh of
relief.

Ernest Lismore was thoroughly puzzled. What could be the old
lady's object in ascertaining that he was still free from a
matrimonial engagement? If the idea had occurred to him in time,
he might have alluded to her domestic life, and might have asked
if she had children? With a little tact he might have discovered
more than this. She had described her feeling toward him as
passing the ordinary limits of gratitude; and she was evidently
rich enough to be above the imputation of a mercenary motive. Did
she propose to brighten those dreary prospects to which he had
alluded in speaking of his own life? When he presented himself at
her house the next evening, would she introduce him to a charming
daughter?

He smiled as the idea occurred to him. "An appropriate time to be
thinking of my chances of marriage!" he said to himself. "In
another month I may be a ruined man."

III.

THE gentleman who had so urgently requested an interview was a
devoted friend--who had obtained a means of helping Ernest at a
serious crisis in his affairs.

It had been truly reported that he was in a position of pecuniary
embarrassment, owing to the failure of a mercantile house with
which he had been intimately connected. Whispers affecting his
own solvency had followed on the bankruptcy of the firm. He had
already endeavored to obtain advances of money on the usual
conditions, and had been met by excuses for delay. His friend had
now arrived with a letter of introduction to a capitalist, well
known in commercial circles for his daring speculations and for
his great wealth.

Looking at the letter, Ernest observed that the envelope was
sealed. In spite of that ominous innovation on established usage,
in cases of personal introduction, he presented the letter. On
this occasion, he was not put off with excuses. The capitalist
flatly declined to discount Mr. Lismore's bills, unless they were
backed by responsible names.

Ernest made a last effort.

He applied for help to two mercantile men whom he had assisted in
_their_ difficulties, and whose names would have satisfied the
money-lender. They were most sincerely sorry--but they, too,
refused

The one security that he could offer was open, it must be owned,
to serious objections on the score of risk. He wanted an advance
of twenty thousand pounds, secured on a homeward-bound ship and
cargo. But the vessel was not insured; and, at that stormy
season, she was already more than a month overdue. Could grateful
colleagues be blamed if they forgot their obligations when they
were asked to offer pecuniary help to a merchant in this
situation? Ernest returned to his office, without money and
without credit.

A man threatened by ruin is in no state of mind to keep an
engagement at a lady's tea-table. Ernest sent a letter of  apology
to Mrs. Call ender, alleging extreme pressure of business as the
excuse for breaking his engagement.

"Am I to wait for an answer, sir?" the messenger asked.

"No; you are merely to leave the letter."

IV.

IN an hour's time--to Ernest's astonishment--the messenger
returned with a reply.

"The lady was just going out, sir, when I rang at the door," he
explained, "and she took the letter from me herself. She didn't
appear to know your handwriting, and she asked me who I came
from. When I mentioned your name, I was ordered to wait."

Ernest opened the letter.



"DEAR MR. LISMORE--One of us must speak out, and your letter of
apology forces me to be that one. If you are really so proud and
so distrustfull as you seem to be, I shall offend you. If not, I
shall prove myself to be your friend.

"Your excuse is 'pressure of business.' The truth (as I have good
reason to believe) is 'want of money.' I heard a stranger, at
that public meeting, say that you were seriously embarrassed by
some failure in the City.

"Let me tell you what my own pecuniary position is in two words.
I am the childless widow of a rich man--"



Ernest paused. His anticipated discovery of Mrs. Callender's
"charming daughter" was in his mind for the moment. "That little
romance must return to the world of dreams," he thought--and went
on with the letter.



"After what I owe to you, I don't regard it as repaying an
obligation--I consider myself as merely performing a duty when I
offer to assist you by a loan of money.

"Wait a little before you throw my letter into the wastepaper
basket.

"Circumstances (which it is impossible for me to mention before
we meet) put it out of my power to help you--unless I attach to
my most sincere offer of service a very unusual and very
embarrassing condition. If you are on the brink of ruin, that
misfortune will plead my excuse--and your excuse, too, if you
accept the loan on my terms. In any case, I rely on the sympathy
and forbearance of the man to whom I owe my life.

"After what I have now written, there is only one thing to add. I
beg to decline accepting your excuses; and I shall expect to see
you tomorrow evening, as we arranged. I am an obstinate old
woman--but I am also your faithful friend and servant,

                                          MARY CALLENDER."



Ernest looked up from the letter. "What can this possibly mean?"
he wondered.

But he was too sensible a man to be content with wondering--he
decided on keeping his engagement.

V.

WHAT Doctor Johnson called "the insolence of wealth" appears far
more frequently in the houses of the rich than in the manners of
the rich. The reason is plain enough. Personal ostentation is, in
the very nature of it, ridiculous. But the ostentation which
exhibits magnificent pictures, priceless china, and splendid
furniture, can purchase good taste to guide it, and can assert
itself without affording the smallest opening for a word of
depreciation, or a look of contempt. If I am worth a million of
money, and if I am dying to show it, I don't ask you to look at
me--I ask you to look at my house.

Keeping his engagement with Mrs. Callender, Ernest discovered
that riches might be lavishly and yet modestly used.

In crossing the hall and ascending the stairs, look where he
might, his notice was insensibly won by proofs of the taste which
is not to be purchased, and the wealth which uses but never
exhibits its purse. Conducted by a man-servant to the landing on
the first floor, he found a maid at the door of the boudoir
waiting to announce him. Mrs. Callender advanced to welcome her
guest, in a simple evening dress perfectly suited to her age. All
that had looked worn and faded in her fine face, by daylight, was
now softly obscured by shaded lamps. Objects of beauty surrounded
her, which glowed with subdued radiance from their background of
sober color. The influence of appearances is the strongest of all
outward influences, while it lasts. For the moment, the scene
produced its impression on Ernest, in spite of the terrible
anxieties which consumed him. Mrs. Callender, in his office, was
a woman who had stepped out of her appropriate sphere. Mrs.
Callender, in her own house, was a woman who had risen to a new
place in his estimation.

"I am afraid you don't thank me for forcing you to keep your
engagement," she said, with her friendly tones and her pleasant
smile.

"Indeed I do thank you," he replied. "Your beautiful house and
your gracious welcome have persuaded me into forgetting my
troubles--for a while."

The smile passed away from her face. "Then it is true," she said
gravely.

"Only too true."

She led him to a seat beside her, and waited to speak again until
her maid had brought in the tea.

"Have you read my letter in the same friendly spirit in which I
wrote it?" she asked, when they were alone again.

"I have read your letter gratefully, but--"

"But you don't know yet what I have to say. Let us understand
each other before we make any objections on either side. Will you
tell me what your present position is--at its worst? I can and
will speak plainly when my turn comes, if you will honor me with
your confidence. Not if it distresses you," she added, observing
him attentively.

He was ashamed of his hesitation--and he made amends for it.

"Do you thoroughly understand me?" he asked, when the whole truth
had been laid before her without reserve.

She summed up the result in her own words.

"If your overdue ship returns safely, within a month from this
time, you can borrow the money you want, without difficulty. If
the ship is lost, you have no alternative (when the end of the
month comes) but to accept a loan from me or to suspend payment.
Is that the hard truth?"

"It is."

"And the sum you require is--twenty thousand pounds?"

"Yes "

"I have twenty times as much money as that, Mr. Lismore, at my
sole disposal--on one condition."

"The condition alluded to in your letter?"

"Yes."

"Does the fulfillment of the condition depend in some way on any
decision of mine?"

"It depends entirely on you."

That answer closed his lips.

With a composed manner and a steady hand she poured herself out a
cup of tea.

"I conceal it from you," she said; "but I want confidence. Here"
(she pointed to the cup) "is the friend of women, rich or poor,
when they are in trouble. What I have now to say obliges me to
speak in praise of myself. I don't like it--let me get it over as
soon as I can. My husband was very fond of me: he had the most
absolute confidence in my discretion, and in my sense of duty to
him and to myself. His last words, before he died, were words
that thanked me for making the happiness of his life. As soon as
I had in some degree recovered, after the affliction that had
fallen on me, his lawyer and executor produced a copy of his
will, and said there were two clauses in it which my husband had
expressed a wish that I should read. It is needless to say that I
obeyed."

She still controlled her agitation--but she was now unable to
conceal it. Ernest made an attempt to spare her.

"Am I concerned in this?" he asked.

"Yes. Before I tell you why, I want to know what you would do--in
a certain case which I am unwilling even to suppose. I have heard
of men, unable to pay the demands made on them, who began
business again, and succeeded, and in course of time paid their
creditors."

"And you want to know if there is any likelihood of my following
their example?" he said. "Have you also heard of men who have
made that second effort--who have failed again--and who have
doubled the debts they owed to their brethren in business who
trusted them? I knew one of those men myself. He committed
suicide."

She laid her hand for a moment on his.

"I understand you," she said. "If ruin comes--"

"If ruin comes," he interposed, "a man without money and without
credit can make but one last atonement. Don't speak of it now."

She looked at him with horror.

"I didn't mean _that!_" she said.

"Shall we go back to what you read in the will?" he suggested.

"Yes--if you will give me a minute to compose myself."

VI.

IN less than the minute she had asked for, Mrs. Callender was
calm enough to go on.

"I now possess what i s called a life-interest in my husband's
fortune," she said. "The money is to be divided, at my death,
among charitable institutions; excepting a certain event--"

"Which is provided for in the will?" Ernest added, helping her to
go on.

"Yes. I am to be absolute mistress of the whole of the four
hundred thousand pounds--" her voice dropped, and her eyes looked
away from him as she spoke the next words--"on this one
condition, that I marry again."

He looked at her in amazement.

"Surely I have mistaken you," he said. "You mean on this one
condition, that you do _not_ marry again?"

"No, Mr. Lismore; I mean exactly what I have said. You now know
that the recovery of your credit and your peace of mind rests
entirely with yourself."

After a moment of reflection he took her hand and raised it
respectfully to his lips. "You are a noble woman!" he said.

She made no reply. With drooping head and downcast eyes she
waited for his decision. He accepted his responsibility.

"I must not, and dare not, think of the hardship of my own
position," he said; "I owe it to you to speak without reference
to the future that may be in store for me. No man can be worthy
of the sacrifice which your generous forgetfulness of yourself is
willing to make. I respect you; I admire you; I thank you with my
whole heart. Leave me to my fate, Mrs. Callender--and let me go."

He rose. She stopped him by a gesture.

"A _young_ woman," she answered, would shrink from saying--what
I, as an old woman, mean to say now. I refuse to leave you to
your fate. I ask you to prove that you respect me, admire me, and
thank me with your whole heart. Take one day to think--and let me
hear the result. You promise me this?"

He promised. "Now go," she said.

VII.

NEXT morning Ernest received a letter from Mrs. Callender. She
wrote to him as follows:



"There are some considerations which I ought to have mentioned
yesterday evening, before you left my house.

"I ought to have reminded you--if you consent to reconsider your
decision--that the circumstances do not require you to pledge
yourself to me absolutely.

"At my age, I can with perfect propriety assure you that I regard
our marriage simply and solely as a formality which we must
fulfill, if I am to carry out my intention of standing between
you and ruin.

"Therefore--if the missing ship appears in time, the only reason
for the marriage is at an end. We shall be as good friends as
ever; without the encumbrance of a formal tie to bind us.

"In the other event, I should ask you to submit to certain
restrictions which, remembering my position, you will understand
and excuse.

"We are to live together, it is unnecessary to say, as mother and
son. The marriage ceremony is to be strictly private; and you are
so to arrange your affairs that, immediately afterward, we leave
England for any foreign place which you prefer. Some of my
friends, and (perhaps) some of your friends, will certainly
misinterpret our motives--if we stay in our own country--in a
manner which would be unendurable to a woman like me.

"As to our future lives, I have the most perfect confidence in
you, and I should leave you in the same position of independence
which you occupy now. When you wish for my company you will
always be welcome. At other times, you are your own master. I
live on my side of the house, and you live on yours--and I am to
be allowed my hours of solitude every day, in the pursuit of
musical occupations, which have been happily associated with all
my past life and which I trust confidently to your indulgence.

"A last word, to remind you of what you may be too kind to think
of yourself.

"At my age, you cannot, in the course of Nature, be troubled by
the society of a grateful old woman for many years. You are young
enough to look forward to another marriage, which shall be
something more than a mere form. Even if you meet with the happy
woman in my lifetime, honestly tell me of it--and I promise to
tell her that she has only to wait.

"In the meantime, don't think, because I write composedly, that I
write heartlessly. You pleased and interested me, when I first
saw you, at the public meeting. I don't think I could have
proposed, what you call this sacrifice of myself, to a man who
had personally repelled me--though I might have felt my debt of
gratitude as sincerely as ever. Whether your ship is saved, or
whether your ship is lost, old Mary Callender likes you--and owns
it without false shame.

"Let me have your answer this evening, either personally or by
letter--whichever you like best."

VIII.

MRS. CALLENDER received a written answer long before the evening.
It said much in few words:

"A man impenetrable to kindness might be able to resist your
letter. I am not that man. Your great heart has conquered me."



The few formalities which precede marriage by special license
were observed by Ernest. While the destiny of their future lives
was still in suspense, an unacknowledged feeling of
embarrassment, on either side, kept Ernest and Mrs. Callender
apart. Every day brought the lady her report of the state of
affairs in the City, written always in the same words: "No news
of the ship."

IX.

ON the day before the ship-owner's liabilities became due, the
terms of the report from the City remained unchanged--and the
special license was put to its contemplated use. Mrs. Callender's
lawyer and Mrs. Callender's maid were the only persons trusted
with the secret. Leaving the chief clerk in charge of the
business, with every pecuniary demand on his employer satisfied
in full, the strangely married pair quitted England.

They arranged to wait for a few days in Paris, to receive any
letters of importance which might have been addressed to Ernest
in the interval. On the evening of their arrival, a telegram from
London was waiting at their hotel. It announced that the missing
ship had passed up Channel--undiscovered in a fog, until she
reached the Downs--on the day before Ernest's liabilities fell
due.

"Do you regret it?" Mrs. Lismore said to her husband.

"Not for a moment!" he answered.

They decided on pursuing their journey as far as Munich.

Mrs. Lismore's taste for music was matched by Ernest's taste for
painting. In his leisure hours he cultivated the art, and
delighted in it. The picture-galleries of Munich were almost the
only galleries in Europe which he had not seen. True to the
engagements to which she had pledged herself, his wife was
willing to go wherever it might please him to take her. The one
suggestion she made was, that they should hire furnished
apartments. If they lived at an hotel, friends of the husband or
the wife (visitors like themselves to the famous city) might see
their names in the book, or might meet them at the door.

They were soon established in a house large enough to provide
them with every accommodation which they required.

Ernest's days were passed in the galleries; Mrs. Lismore
remaining at home, devoted to her music, until it was time to go
out with her husband for a drive. Living together in perfect
amity and concord, they were nevertheless not living happily.
Without any visible reason for the change, Mrs. Lismore's spirits
were depressed. On the one occasion when Ernest noticed it she
made an effort to be cheerful, which it distressed him to see. He
allowed her to think that she had relieved him of any further
anxiety. Whatever doubts he might feel were doubts delicately
concealed from that time forth.

But when two people are living together in a state of artificial
tranquillity, it seems to be a law of Nature that the element of
disturbance gathers unseen, and that the outburst comes
inevitably with the lapse of time.

In ten days from the date of their arrival at Munich, the crisis
came. Ernest returned later than usual from the picture-gallery,
and--for the first time in his wife's experience--shut himself up
in his own room.

He appeared at the dinner-hour with a futile excuse. Mrs. Lismore
waited until the servant had withdrawn. "Now, Ernest," she said,
"it's time to tell me the truth."

Her manner, when she said those few words, took him by surprise.
She was unquestionably confused;  and, instead of lookin g at him,
she trifled with the fruit on her plate. Embarrassed on his side,
he could only answer:

"I have nothing to tell."

"Were there many visitors at the gallery?" she asked.

"About the same as usual."

"Any that you particularly noticed?" she went on. "I mean, among
the ladies."

He laughed uneasily. "You forget how interested I am in the
pictures," he said.

There was a pause. She looked up at him--and suddenly looked away
again. But he saw it plainly: there were tears in her eyes.

"Do you mind turning down the gas?" she said. "My eyes have been
weak all day."

He complied with her request--the more readily, having his own
reasons for being glad to escape the glaring scrutiny of the
light.

"I think I will rest a little on the sofa," she resumed. In the
position which he occupied, his back would have been now turned
on her. She stopped him when he tried to move his chair. "I would
rather not look at you, Ernest," she said, "when you have lost
confidence in me."

Not the words, but the tone, touched all that was generous and
noble in his nature. He left his place, and knelt beside her--and
opened to her his whole heart.

"Am I not unworthy of you?" he asked, when it was over.

She pressed his hand in silence.

"I should be the most ungrateful wretch living," he said, "if I
did not think of you, and you only, now that my confession is
made. We will leave Munich to-morrow--and, if resolution can help
me, I will only remember the sweetest woman my eyes ever looked
on as the creature of a dream."

She hid her face on his breast, and reminded him of that letter
of her writing, which had decided the course of their lives.

"When I thought you might meet the happy woman in my life-time, I
said to you, 'Tell me of it--and I promise to tell _her_ that she
has only to wait.' Time must pass, Ernest, before it can be
needful to perform my promise. But you might let me see her. If
you find her in the gallery to-morrow, you might bring her here."

Mrs. Lismore's request met with no refusal. Ernest was only at a
loss to know how to grant it.

"You tell me she is a copyist of pictures," his wife reminded
him. "She will be interested in hearing of the portfolio of
drawings by the great French artists which I bought for you in
Paris. Ask her to come and see them, and to tell you if she can
make some copies. And say, if you like, that I shall be glad to
become acquainted with her."

He felt her breath beating fast on his bosom. In the fear that
she might lose all control over herself, he tried to relieve her
by speaking lightly. "What an invention yours is!" he said. "If
my wife ever tries to deceive me, I shall be a mere child in her
hands."

She rose abruptly from the sofa--kissed him on the forehead--and
said wildly, "I shall be better in bed!" Before he could move or
speak, she had left him.

X.

THE next morning he knocked at the door of his wife's room and
asked how she had passed the night.

"I have slept badly," she answered, "and I must beg you to excuse
my absence at breakfast-time." She called him back as he was
about to withdraw. "Remember," she said, "when you return from
the gallery to-day, I expect that you will not return alone."

                         *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Three hours later he was at home again. The young lady's services
as a copyist were at his disposal; she had returned with him to
look at the drawings.

The sitting-room was empty when they entered it. He rang for his
wife's maid--and was informed that Mrs. Lismore had gone out.
Refusing to believe the woman, he went to his wife's apartments.
She was not to be found.

When he returned to the sitting-room, the young lady was not
unnaturally offended. He could make allowances for her being a
little out of temper at the slight that had been put on her; but
he was inexpressibly disconcerted by the manner--almost the
coarse manner--in which she expressed herself.

"I have been talking to your wife's maid, while you have been
away," she said. "I find you have married an old lady for her
money. She is jealous of me, of course?"

"Let me beg you to alter your opinion," he answered. "You are
wronging my wife; she is incapable of any such feeling as you
attribute to her."

The young lady laughed. "At any rate you are a good husband," she
said satirically. "Suppose you own the truth? Wouldn't you like
her better if she was young and pretty like me?"

He was not merely surprised--he was disgusted. Her beauty had so
completely fascinated him, when he first saw her, that the idea
of associating any want of refinement and good breeding with such
a charming creature never entered his mind. The disenchantment to
him was already so complete that he was even disagreeably
affected by the tone of her voice: it was almost as repellent to
him as the exhibition of unrestrained bad temper which she seemed
perfectly careless to conceal.

"I confess you surprise me," he said, coldly.

The reply produced no effect on her. On the contrary, she became
more insolent than ever.

"I have a fertile fancy," she went on, "and your absurd way of
taking a joke only encourages me! Suppose you could transform
this sour old wife of yours, who has insulted me, into the
sweetest young creature that ever lived, by only holding up your
finger--wouldn't you do it?"

This passed the limits of his endurance. "I have no wish," he
said, "to forget the consideration which is due to a woman. You
leave me but one alternative." He rose to go out of the room.

She ran to the door as he spoke, and placed herself in the way of
his going out.

He signed to her to let him pass.

She suddenly threw her arms round his neck, kissed him
passionately, and whispered, with her lips at his ear: "Oh,
Ernest, forgive me! Could I have asked you to marry me for my
money if I had not taken refuge in a disguise?"

XI.

WHEN he had sufficiently recovered to think, he put her back from
him. "Is there an end of the deception now?" he asked, sternly.
"Am I to trust you in your new character?"

"You are not to be harder on me than I deserve," she answered,
gently. "Did you ever hear of an actress named Miss Max?"

He began to understand her. "Forgive me if I spoke harshly," he
said. "You have put me to a severe trial."

She burst into tears. "Love," she murmured, "is my only excuse."

From that moment she had won her pardon. He took her hand, and
made her sit by him.

"Yes," he said, "I have heard of Miss Max and of her wonderful
powers of personation--and I have always regretted not having
seen her while she was on the stage."

"Did you hear anything more of her, Ernest?"

"Yes, I heard that she was a pattern of modesty and good conduct,
and that she gave up her profession, at the height of her
success, to marry an old man."

"Will you come with me to my room?" she asked. "I have something
there which I wish to show you."

It was the copy of her husband's will.

"Read the lines, Ernest, which begin at the top of the page. Let
my dead husband speak for me."

The lines ran thus:



"My motive in marrying Miss Max must be stated in this place, in
justice to her--and, I will venture to add, in justice to myself.
I felt the sincerest sympathy for her position. She was without
father, mother, or friends; one of the poor forsaken children,
whom the mercy of the Foundling Hospital provides with a home.
Her after life on the stage was the life of a virtuous woman:
persecuted by profligates; insulted by some of the baser
creatures associated with her, to whom she was an object of envy.
I offered her a home, and the protection of a father--on the only
terms which the world would recognize as worthy of us. My
experience of her since our marriage has been the experience of
unvarying goodness, sweetness, and sound sense. She has behaved
so nobly, in a trying position, that I wish her (even in this
life) to have her reward. I entreat her to make a second choice
in marriage, which shall not be a mere form. I firmly believe
that she will choose well and wisely--that she will make the
happiness of a man who is worthy of her--and that, as wife and
mother, she will set an example of inestimable value in the
social sphere that she occupies. In proof of the
 heartfelt sincerity with which I pay my tribute to her virtues,
I add to this my will the clause that follows."

With the clause that followed, Ernest was already acquainted.

"Will you now believe that I never loved till I saw your face for
the first time?" said his wife. "I had no experience to place me
on my guard against the fascination--the madness some people
might call it--which possesses a woman when all her heart is
given to a man. Don't despise me, my dear! Remember that I had to
save you from disgrace and ruin. Besides, my old stage
remembrances tempted me. I had acted in a play in which the
heroine did--what I have done! It didn't end with me, as it did
with her in the story. _She_ was represented as rejoicing in the
success of her disguise. _I_ have known some miserable hours of
doubt and shame since our marriage. When I went to meet you in my
own person at the picture-gallery--oh, what relief, what joy I
felt, when I saw how you admired me--it was not because I could
no longer carry on the disguise. I was able to get hours of rest
from the effort; not only at night, but in the daytime, when I
was shut up in my retirement in the music-room; and when my maid
kept watch against discovery. No, my love! I hurried on the
disclosure, because I could no longer endure the hateful triumph
of my own deception. Ah, look at that witness against me! I can't
bear even to see it!"

She abruptly left him. The drawer that she had opened to take out
the copy of the will also contained the false gray hair which she
had discarded. It had only that moment attracted her notice. She
snatched it up, and turned to the fireplace.

Ernest took it from her, before she could destroy it. "Give it to
me," he said.

"Why?"

He drew her gently to his bosom, and answered: "I must not forget
my old wife."


MISS JEROMETTE AND THE CLERGYMAN.

I.

MY brother, the clergyman, looked over my shoulder before I was
aware of him, and discovered that the volume which completely
absorbed my attention was a collection of famous Trials,
published in a new edition and in a popular form.

He laid his finger on the Trial which I happened to be reading at
the moment. I looked up at him; his face startled me. He had
turned pale. His eyes were fixed on the open page of the book
with an expression which puzzled and alarmed me.

"My dear fellow," I said, "what in the world is the matter with
you?"

He answered in an odd absent manner, still keeping his finger on
the open page.

"I had almost forgotten," he said. "And this reminds me."

"Reminds you of what?" I asked. "You don't mean to say you know
anything about the Trial?"

"I know this," he said. "The prisoner was guilty."

"Guilty?" I repeated. "Why, the man was acquitted by the jury,
with the full approval of the judge! What call you possibly
mean?"

"There are circumstances connected with that Trial," my brother
answered, "which were never communicated to the judge or the
jury--which were never so much as hinted or whispered in court.
_I_ know them--of my own knowledge, by my own personal
experience. They are very sad, very strange, very terrible. I
have mentioned them to no mortal creature. I have done my best to
forget them. You--quite innocently--have brought them back to my
mind. They oppress, they distress me. I wish I had found you
reading any book in your library, except _that_ book!"

My curiosity was now strongly excited. I spoke out plainly.

"Surely," I suggested, "you might tell your brother what you are
unwilling to mention to persons less nearly related to you. We
have followed different professions, and have lived in different
countries, since we were boys at school. But you know you can
trust me."

He considered a little with himself.

"Yes," he said. "I know I can trust you." He waited a moment, and
then he surprised me by a strange question.

"Do you believe," he asked, "that the spirits of the dead can
return to earth, and show themselves to the living?"

I answered cautiously--adopting as my own the words of a great
English writer, touching the subject of ghosts.

"You ask me a question," I said, "which, after five thousand
years, is yet undecided. On that account alone, it is a question
not to be trifled with."

My reply seemed to satisfy him.

"Promise me," he resumed, "that you will keep what I tell you a
secret as long as I live. After my death I care little what
happens. Let the story of my strange experience be added to the
published experience of those other men who have seen what I have
seen, and who believe what I believe. The world will not be the
worse, and may be the better, for knowing one day what I am now
about to trust to your ear alone."

My brother never again alluded to the narrative which he had
confided to me, until the later time when I was sitting by his
deathbed. He asked if I still remembered the story of Jeromette.
"Tell it to others," he said, "as I have told it to you."

I repeat it after his death--as nearly as I can in his own words.

II.

ON a fine summer evening, many years since, I left my chambers in
the Temple, to meet a fellow-student, who had proposed to me a
night's amusement in the public gardens at Cremorne.

You were then on your way to India; and I had taken my degree at
Oxford. I had sadly disappointed my father by choosing the Law as
my profession, in preference to the Church. At that time, to own
the truth, I had no serious intention of following any special
vocation. I simply wanted an excuse for enjoying the pleasures of
a London life. The study of the Law supplied me with that excuse.
And I chose the Law as my profession accordingly.

On reaching the place at which we had arranged to meet, I found
that my friend had not kept his appointment. After waiting vainly
for ten minutes, my patience gave way and I went into the Gardens
by myself.

I took two or three turns round the platform devoted to the
dancers without discovering my fellow-student, and without seeing
any other person with whom I happened to be acquainted at that
time.

For some reason which I cannot now remember, I was not in my
usual good spirits that evening. The noisy music jarred on my
nerves, the sight of the gaping crowd round the platform
irritated me, the blandishments of the painted ladies of the
profession of pleasure saddened and disgusted me. I opened my
cigar-case, and turned aside into one of the quiet by-walks of
the Gardens.

A man who is habitually careful in choosing his cigar has this
advantage over a man who is habitually careless. He can always
count on smoking the best cigar in his case, down to the last. I
was still absorbed in choosing _my_ cigar, when I heard these
words behind me--spoken in a foreign accent and in a woman's
voice:

"Leave me directly, sir! I wish to have nothing to say to you."

I turned round and discovered a little lady very simply and
tastefully dressed, who looked both angry and alarmed as she
rapidly passed me on her way to the more frequented part of the
Gardens. A man (evidently the worse for the wine he had drunk in
the course of the evening) was following her, and was pressing
his tipsy attentions on her with the coarsest insolence of speech
and manner. She was young and pretty, and she cast one entreating
look at me as she went by, which it was not in manhood--perhaps I
ought to say, in young-manhood--to resist.

I instantly stepped forward to protect her, careless whether I
involved myself in a discreditable quarrel with a blackguard or
not. As a matter of course, the fellow resented my interference,
and my temper gave way. Fortunately for me, just as I lifted my
hand to knock him down, at policeman appeared who had noticed
that he was drunk, and who settled the dispute officially by
turning him out of the Gardens.

I led her away from the crowd that had collected. She was
evidently frightened--I felt her hand trembling on my arm--but
she had one great merit; she made no fuss about it.

"If I can sit down for a few minutes," she said in her pretty
foreign accent, "I shall soon be myself again, and I shall not
trespass any further on your kindness. I thank you very much,
sir, for taking care of me."

We sat down on a bench in a retired par t of the Gardens, near a
little fountain. A row of lighted lamps ran round the outer rim
of the basin. I could see her plainly.

I have said that she was "a little lady." I could not have
described her more correctly in three words.

Her figure was slight and small: she was a well-made miniature of
a woman from head to foot. Her hair and her eyes were both dark.
The hair curled naturally; the expression of the eyes was quiet,
and rather sad; the complexion, as I then saw it, very pale; the
little mouth perfectly charming. I was especially attracted, I
remembered, by the carriage of her head; it was strikingly
graceful and spirited; it distinguished her, little as she was
and quiet as she was, among the thousands of other women in the
Gardens, as a creature apart. Even the one marked defect in
her--a slight "cast" in the left eye--seemed to add, in some
strange way, to the quaint attractiveness of her face. I have
already spoken of the tasteful simplicity of her dress. I ought
now to add that it was not made of any costly material, and that
she wore no jewels or ornaments of any sort. My little lady was
not rich; even a man's eye could see that.

She was perfectly unembarrassed and unaffected. We fell as easily
into talk as if we had been friends instead of strangers.

I asked how it was that she had no companion to take care of her.
"You are too young and too pretty," I said in my blunt English
way, "to trust yourself alone in such a place as this."

She took no notice of the compliment. She calmly put it away from
her as if it had not reached her ears.

"I have no friend to take care of me," she said simply. "I was
sad and sorry this evening, all by myself, and I thought I would
go to the Gardens and hear the music, just to amuse me. It is not
much to pay at the gate; only a shilling."

"No friend to take care of you?" I repeated. "Surely there must
be one happy man who might have been here with you to-night?"

"What man do you mean?" she asked.

"The man," I answered thoughtlessly, "whom we call, in England, a
Sweetheart."

I would have given worlds to have recalled those foolish words
the moment they passed my lips. I felt that I had taken a vulgar
liberty with her. Her face saddened; her eyes dropped to the
ground. I begged her pardon.

"There is no need to beg my pardon," she said. "If you wish to
know, sir--yes, I had once a sweetheart, as you call it in
England. He has gone away and left me. No more of him, if you
please. I am rested now. I will thank you again, and go home."

She rose to leave me.

I was determined not to part with her in that way. I begged to be
allowed to see her safely back to her own door. She hesitated. I
took a man's unfair advantage of her, by appealing to her fears.
I said, "Suppose the blackguard who annoyed you should be waiting
outside the gates?" That decided her. She took my arm. We went
away together by the bank of the Thames, in the balmy summer
night.

A walk of half an hour brought us to the house in which she
lodged--a shabby little house in a by-street, inhabited evidently
by very poor people.

She held out her hand at the door, and wished me good-night. I
was too much interested in her to consent to leave my little
foreign lady without the hope of seeing her again. I asked
permission to call on her the next day. We were standing under
the light of the street-lamp. She studied my face with a grave
and steady attention before she made any reply.

"Yes," she said at last. "I think I do know a gentleman when I
see him. You may come, sir, if you please, and call upon me
to-morrow."

So we parted. So I entered--doubting nothing, foreboding
nothing--on a scene in my life which I now look back on with
unfeigned repentance and regret.

III.

I AM speaking at this later time in the position of a clergyman,
and in the character of a man of mature age. Remember that; and
you will understand why I pass as rapidly as possible over the
events of the next year of my life--why I say as little as I can
of the errors and the delusions of my youth.

I called on her the next day. I repeated my visits during the
days and weeks that followed, until the shabby little house in
the by-street had become a second and (I say it with shame and
self-reproach) a dearer home to me.

All of herself and her story which she thought fit to confide to
me under these circumstances may be repeated to you in few words.

The name by which letters were addressed to her was "Mademoiselle
Jeromette." Among the ignorant people of the house and the small
tradesmen of the neighborhood--who found her name not easy of
pronunciation by the average English tongue--she was known by the
friendly nickname of "The French Miss." When I knew her, she was
resigned to her lonely life among strangers. Some years had
elapsed since she had lost her parents, and had left France.
Possessing a small, very small, income of her own, she added to
it by coloring miniatures for the photographers. She had
relatives still living in France; but she had long since ceased
to correspond with them. "Ask me nothing more about my family,"
she used to say. "I am as good as dead in my own country and
among my own people."

This was all--literally all--that she told me of herself. I have
never discovered more of her sad story from that day to this.

She never mentioned her family name--never even told me what part
of France she came from or how long she had lived in England.
That she was by birth and breeding a lady, I could entertain no
doubt; her manners, her accomplishments, her ways of thinking and
speaking, all proved it. Looking below the surface, her character
showed itself in aspects not common among young women in these
days. In her quiet way she was an incurable fatalist, and a firm
believer in the ghostly reality of apparitions from the dead.
Then again in the matter of money, she had strange views of her
own. Whenever my purse was in my hand, she held me resolutely at
a distance from first to last. She refused to move into better
apartments; the shabby little house was clean inside, and the
poor people who lived in it were kind to her--and that was
enough. The most expensive present that she ever permitted me to
offer her was a little enameled ring, the plainest and cheapest
thing of the kind in the jeweler's shop. In all relations with me
she was sincerity itself. On all occasions, and under all
circumstances, she spoke her mind (as the phrase is) with the
same uncompromising plainness.

"I like you," she said to me; "I respect you; I shall always be
faithful to you while you are faithful to me. But my love has
gone from me. There is another man who has taken it away with
him, I know not where."

Who was the other man?

She refused to tell me. She kept his rank and his name strict
secrets from me. I never discovered how he had met with her, or
why he had left her, or whether the guilt was his of making of
her an exile from her country and her friends. She despised
herself for still loving him; but the passion was too strong for
her--she owned it and lamented it with the frankness which was so
preeminently a part of her character. More than this, she plainly
told me, in the early days of our acquaintance, that she believed
he would return to her. It might be to-morrow, or it might be
years hence. Even if he failed to repent of his own cruel
conduct, the man would still miss her, as something lost out of
his life; and, sooner or later, he would come back.

"And will you receive him if he does come back?" I asked.

"I shall receive him," she replied, "against my own better
judgment--in spite of my own firm persuasion that the day of his
return to me will bring with it the darkest days of my life."

I tried to remonstrate with her.

"You have a will of your own," I said. "Exert it if he attempts
to return to you."

"I have no will of my own," she answered quietly, "where _he_ is
concerned. It is my misfortune to love him." Her eyes rested for
a moment on mine, with the utter self-abandonment of despair. "We
have said enough about this," she added abruptly. "Let us say no
more."

From that time we never spoke again of the unknown man. During
the year that followed o ur first meeting, she heard nothing of
him directly or indirectly. He might be living, or he might be
dead. There came no word of him, or from him. I was fond enough
of her to be satisfied with this--he never disturbed us.

IV.

 THE year passed--and the end came. Not the end as you may have
anticipated it, or as I might have foreboded it.

You remember the time when your letters from home informed you of
the fatal termination of our mother's illness? It is the time of
which I am now speaking. A few hours only before she breathed her
last, she called me to her bedside, and desired that we might be
left together alone. Reminding me that her death was near, she
spoke of my prospects in life; she noticed my want of interest in
the studies which were then supposed to be engaging my attention,
and she ended by entreating me to reconsider my refusal to enter
the Church.

"Your father's heart is set upon it," she said. "Do what I ask of
you, my dear, and you will help to comfort him when I am gone."

Her strength failed her: she could say no more. Could I refuse
the last request she would ever make to me? I knelt at the
bedside, and took her wasted hand in mine, and solemnly promised
her the respect which a son owes to his mother's last wishes.

Having bound myself by this sacred engagement, I had no choice
but to accept the sacrifice which it imperatively exacted from
me. The time had come when I must tear myself free from all
unworthy associations. No matter what the effort cost me, I must
separate myself at once and forever from the unhappy woman who
was not, who never could be, my wife.

At the close of a dull foggy day I set forth with a heavy heart
to say the words which were to part us forever.

Her lodging was not far from the banks of the Thames. As I drew
near the place the darkness was gathering, and the broad surface
of the river was hidden from me in a chill white mist. I stood
for a while, with my eyes fixed on the vaporous shroud that
brooded over the flowing water--I stood and asked myself in
despair the one dreary question: "What am I to say to her?"

The mist chilled me to the bones. I turned from the river-bank,
and made my way to her lodgings hard by. "It must be done!" I
said to myself, as I took out my key and opened the house door.

She was not at her work, as usual, when I entered her little
sitting-room. She was standing by the fire, with her head down
and with an open letter in her hand.

The instant she turned to meet me, I saw in her face that
something was wrong. Her ordinary manner was the manner of an
unusually placid and self-restrained person. Her temperament had
little of the liveliness which we associate in England with the
French nature. She was not ready with her laugh; and in all my
previous experience, I had never yet known her to cry. Now, for
the first time, I saw the quiet face disturbed; I saw tears in
the pretty brown eyes. She ran to meet me, and laid her head on
my breast, and burst into a passionate fit of weeping that shook
her from head to foot.

Could she by any human possibility have heard of the coming
change in my life? Was she aware, before I had opened my lips, of
the hard necessity which had brought me to the house?

It was simply impossible; the thing could not be.

I waited until her first burst of emotion had worn itself out.
Then I asked--with an uneasy conscience, with a sinking
heart--what had happened to distress her.

She drew herself away from me, sighing heavily, and gave me the
open letter which I had seen in her hand.

"Read that," she said. "And remember I told you what might happen
when we first met."

I read the letter.

It was signed in initials only; but the writer plainly revealed
himself as the man who had deserted her. He had repented; he had
returned to her. In proof of his penitence he was willing to do
her the justice which he had hitherto refused--he was willing to
marry her, on the condition that she would engage to keep the
marriage a secret, so long as his parents lived. Submitting this
proposal, he waited to know whether she would consent, on her
side, to forgive and forget.

I gave her back the letter in silence. This unknown rival had
done me the service of paving the way for our separation. In
offering her the atonement of marriage, he had made it, on my
part, a matter of duty to _her_, as well as to myself, to say the
parting words. I felt this instantly. And yet, I hated him for
helping me.

She took my hand, and led me to the sofa. We sat down, side by
side. Her face was composed to a sad tranquillity. She was quiet;
she was herself again.

"I have refused to see him, she said, "until I had first spoken
to you. You have read his letter. What do you say?"

I could make but one answer. It was my duty to tell her what my
own position was in the plainest terms. I did my duty--leaving
her free to decide on the future for herself. Those sad words
said, it was useless to prolong the wretchedness of our
separation. I rose, and took her hand for the last time.

I see her again now, at that final moment, as plainly as if it
had happened yesterday. She had been suffering from an affection
of the throat; and she had a white silk handkerchief tied loosely
round her neck. She wore a simple dress of purple merino, with a
black-silk apron over it. Her face was deadly pale; her fingers
felt icily cold as they closed round my hand.

"Promise me one thing," I said, "before I go. While I live, I am
your friend--if I am nothing more. If you are ever in trouble,
promise that you will let me know it."

She started, and drew back from me as if I had struck her with a
sudden terror.

"Strange!' she said, speaking to herself. "_He_ feels as I feel.
He is afraid of what may happen to me, in my life to come."

I attempted to reassure her. I tried to tell her what was indeed
the truth--that I had only been thinking of the ordinary chances
and changes of life, when I spoke.

She paid no heed to me; she came back and put her hands on my
shoulders and thoughtfully and sadly looked up in my face.

"My mind is not your mind in this matter," she said. "I once
owned to you that I had my forebodings, when we first spoke of
this man's return. I may tell you now, more than I told you then.
I believe I shall die young, and die miserably. If I am right,
have you interest enough still left in me to wish to hear of it?"

She paused, shuddering--and added these startling words:

"You _shall_ hear of it."

The tone of steady conviction in which she spoke alarmed and
distressed me. My face showed her how deeply and how painfully I
was affected.

"There, there!" she said, returning to her natural manner; "don't
take what I say too seriously. A poor girl who has led a lonely
life like mine thinks strangely and talks strangely--sometimes.
Yes; I give you my promise. If I am ever in trouble, I will let
you know it. God bless you--you have been very kind to
me--good-by!"

A tear dropped on my face as she kissed me. The door closed
between us. The dark street received me.

It was raining heavily. I looked up at her window, through the
drifting shower. The curtains were parted: she was standing in
the gap, dimly lit by the lamp on the table behind her, waiting
for our last look at each other. Slowly lifting her hand, she
waved her farewell at the window, with the unsought native grace
which had charmed me on the night when we first met. The curtain
fell again--she disappeared--nothing was before me, nothing was
round me, but the darkness and the night.

V.

IN two years from that time, I had redeemed the promise given to
my mother on her deathbed. I had entered the Church.

My father's interest made my first step in my new profession an
easy one. After serving my preliminary apprenticeship as a
curate, I was appointed, before I was thirty years of age, to a
living in the West of England.

My new benefice offered me every advantage that I could possibly
desire--with the one exception of a sufficient income. Although
my wants were few, and although I was still an unmarried man, I
found it desirable, on many accounts, to add to my resources.
Following the example of other young clergymen in my position, I
det ermined to receive pupils who might stand in need of
preparation for a career at the Universities. My relatives
exerted themselves; and my good fortune still befriended me. I
obtained two pupils to start with. A third would complete the
number which I was at present prepared to receive. In course of
time, this third pupil made his appearance, under circumstances
sufficiently remarkable to merit being mentioned in detail.

It was the summer vacation; and my two pupils had gone home.
Thanks to a neighboring clergyman, who kindly undertook to
perform my duties for me, I too obtained a fortnight's holiday,
which I spent at my father's house in London.

During my sojourn in the metropolis, I was offered an opportunity
of preaching in a church, made famous by the eloquence of one of
the popular pulpit-orators of our time. In accepting the
proposal, I felt naturally anxious to do my best, before the
unusually large and unusually intelligent congregation which
would be assembled to hear me.

At the period of which I am now speaking, all England had been
startled by the discovery of a terrible crime, perpetrated under
circumstances of extreme provocation. I chose this crime as the
main subject of my sermon. Admitting that the best among us were
frail mortal creatures, subject to evil promptings and
provocations like the worst among us, my object was to show how a
Christian man may find his certain refuge from temptation in the
safeguards of his religion. I dwelt minutely on the hardship of
the Christian's first struggle to resist the evil influence--on
the help which his Christianity inexhaustibly held out to him in
the worst relapses of the weaker and viler part of his nature--on
the steady and certain gain which was the ultimate reward of his
faith and his firmness--and on the blessed sense of peace and
happiness which accompanied the final triumph. Preaching to this
effect, with the fervent conviction which I really felt, I may
say for myself, at least, that I did no discredit to the choice
which had placed me in the pulpit. I held the attention of my
congregation, from the first word to the last.

While I was resting in the vestry on the conclusion of the
service, a note was brought to me written in pencil. A member of
my congregation--a gentleman--wished to see me, on a matter of
considerable importance to himself. He would call on me at any
place, and at any hour, which I might choose to appoint. If I
wished to be satisfied of his respectability, he would beg leave
to refer me to his father, with whose name I might possibly be
acquainted.

The name given in the reference was undoubtedly familiar to me,
as the name of a man of some celebrity and influence in the world
of London. I sent back my card, appointing an hour for the visit
of my correspondent on the afternoon of the next day.

VI.

THE stranger made his appearance punctually. I guessed him to be
some two or three years younger than myself. He was undeniably
handsome; his manners were the manners of a gentleman--and yet,
without knowing why, I felt a strong dislike to him the moment he
entered the room.

After the first preliminary words of politeness had been
exchanged between us, my visitor informed me as follows of the
object which he had in view.

"I believe you live in the country, sir?" he began.

"I live in the West of England," I answered.

"Do you make a long stay in London?"

"No. I go back to my rectory to-morrow."

"May I ask if you take pupils?"

"Yes."

"Have you any vacancy?"

"I have one vacancy."

"Would you object to let me go back with you to-morrow, as your
pupil?"

The abruptness of the proposal took me by surprise. I hesitated.

In the first place (as I have already said), I disliked him. In
the second place, he was too old to be a fit companion for my
other two pupils--both lads in their teens. In the third place,
he had asked me to receive him at least three weeks before the
vacation came to an end. I had my own pursuits and amusements in
prospect during that interval, and saw no reason why I should
inconvenience myself by setting them aside.

He noticed my hesitation, and did not conceal from me that I had
disappointed him.

"I have it very much at heart," he said, "to repair without delay
the time that I have lost. My age is against me, I know. The
truth is--I have wasted my opportunities since I left school, and
I am anxious, honestly anxious, to mend my ways, before it is too
late. I wish to prepare myself for one of the Universities--I
wish to show, if I can, that I am not quite unworthy to inherit
my father's famous name. You are the man to help me, if I can
only persuade you to do it. I was struck by your sermon
yesterday; and, if I may venture to make the confession in your
presence, I took a strong liking to you. Will you see my father,
before you decide to say No? He will be able to explain whatever
may seem strange in my present application; and he will be happy
to see you this afternoon, if you can spare the time. As to the
question of terms, I am quite sure it can be settled to your
entire satisfaction."

He was evidently in earnest--gravely, vehemently in earnest. I
unwillingly consented to see his father.

Our interview was a long one. All my questions were answered
fully and frankly.

The young man had led an idle and desultory life. He was weary of
it, and ashamed of it. His disposition was a peculiar one. He
stood sorely in need of a guide, a teacher, and a friend, in whom
he was disposed to confide. If I disappointed the hopes which he
had centered in me, he would be discouraged, and he would relapse
into the aimless and indolent existence of which he was now
ashamed. Any terms for which I might stipulate were at my
disposal if I would consent to receive him, for three months to
begin with, on trial.

Still hesitating, I consulted my father and my friends.

They were all of opinion (and justly of opinion so far) that the
new connection would be an excellent one for me. They all
reproached me for taking a purely capricious dislike to a
well-born and well-bred young man, and for permitting it to
influence me, at the outset of my career, against my own
interests. Pressed by these considerations, I allowed myself to
be persuaded to give the new pupil a fair trial. He accompanied
me, the next day, on my way back to the rectory.

VII.

LET me be careful to do justice to a man whom I personally
disliked. My senior pupil began well: he produced a decidedly
favorable impression on the persons attached to my little
household.

The women, especially, admired his beautiful light hair, his
crisply-curling beard, his delicate complexion, his clear blue
eyes, and his finely shaped hands and feet. Even the inveterate
reserve in his manner, and the downcast, almost sullen, look
which had prejudiced _me_ against him, aroused a common feeling
of romantic enthusiasm in my servants' hall. It was decided, on
the high authority of the housekeeper herself, that "the new
gentleman" was in love--and, more interesting still, that he was
the victim of an unhappy attachment which had driven him away
from his friends and his home.

For myself, I tried hard, and tried vainly, to get over my first
dislike to the senior pupil.

I could find no fault with him. All his habits were quiet and
regular; and he devoted himself conscientiously to his reading.
But, little by little, I became satisfied that his heart was not
in his studies. More than this, I had my reasons for suspecting
that he was concealing something from me, and that he felt
painfully the reserve on his own part which he could not, or
dared not, break through. There were moments when I almost
doubted whether he had not chosen my remote country rectory as a
safe place of refuge from some person or persons of whom he stood
in dread.

For example, his ordinary course of proceeding, in the matter of
his correspondence, was, to say the least of it, strange.

He received no letters at my house. They waited for him at the
village post office. He invariably called for them himself, and
invariably forbore to trust any of my servants with his own
letters for the post. Again, when we were out walking together, I
more than once caught him looking furtively over his shoulder, as
if he suspected some person of following him, for some evil
purpose. Being constitutionally a hater of mysteries, I
determined, at an early stage of our intercourse, on making an
effort to clear matters up. There might be just a chance of my
winning the senior pupil's confidence, if I spoke to him while
the last days of the summer vacation still left us alone together
in the house.

"Excuse me for noticing it," I said to him one morning, while we
were engaged over our books--"I cannot help observing that you
appear to have some trouble on your mind. Is it indiscreet, on my
part, to ask if I can be of any use to you?"

He changed color--looked up at me quickly--looked down again at
his book--struggled hard with some secret fear or secret
reluctance that was in him--and suddenly burst out with this
extraordinary question: "I suppose you were in earnest when you
preached that sermon in London?"

"I am astonished that you should doubt it," I replied.

He paused again; struggled with himself again; and startled me by
a second outbreak, even stranger than the first.

"I am one of the people you preached at in your sermon," he said.
"That's the true reason why I asked you to take me for your
pupil. Don't turn me out! When you talked to your congregation of
tortured and tempted people, you talked of Me."

I was so astonished by the confession, that I lost my presence of
mind. For the moment, I was unable to answer him.

"Don't turn me out!" he repeated. "Help me against myself. I am
telling you the truth. As God is my witness, I am telling you the
truth!"

"Tell me the _whole_ truth," I said; "and rely on my consoling
and helping you--rely on my being your friend."

In the fervor of the moment, I took his hand. It lay cold and
still in mine; it mutely warned me that I had a sullen and a
secret nature to deal with.

"There must be no concealment between us," I resumed. "You have
entered my house, by your own confession, under false pretenses.
It is your duty to me, and your duty to yourself, to speak out."

The man's inveterate reserve--cast off for the moment
only--renewed its hold on him. He considered, carefully
considered, his next words before he permitted them to pass his
lips.

"A person is in the way of my prospects in life," he began
slowly, with his eyes cast down on his book. "A person provokes
me horribly. I feel dreadful temptations (like the man you spoke
of in your sermon) when I am in the person's company. Teach me to
resist temptation. I am afraid of myself, if I see the person
again. You are the only man who can help me. Do it while you
can."

He stopped, and passed his handkerchief over his forehead.

"Will that do?" he asked--still with his eyes on his book.

"It will _not_ do," I answered. "You are so far from really
opening your heart to me, that you won't even let me know whether
it is a man or a woman who stands in the way of your prospects in
life. You used the word 'person,' over and over again--rather
than say 'he' or 'she' when you speak of the provocation which is
trying you. How can I help a man who has so little confidence in
me as that?"

My reply evidently found him at the end of his resources. He
tried, tried desperately, to say more than he had said yet. No!
The words seemed to stick in his throat. Not one of them would
pass his lips.

"Give me time," he pleaded piteously. "I can't bring myself to
it, all at once. I mean well. Upon my soul, I mean well. But I am
slow at this sort of thing. Wait till to-morrow."

To-morrow came--and again he put it off.

"One more day!" he said. "You don't know how hard it is to speak
plainly. I am half afraid; I am half ashamed. Give me one more
day."

I had hitherto only disliked him. Try as I might (and did) to
make merciful allowance for his reserve, I began to despise him
now.

VIII.

THE day of the deferred confession came, and brought an event
with it, for which both he and I were alike unprepared. Would he
really have confided in me but for that event? He must either
have done it, or have abandoned the purpose which had led him
into my house.

We met as usual at the breakfast-table. My housekeeper brought in
my letters of the morning. To my surprise, instead of leaving the
room again as usual, she walked round to the other side of the
table, and laid a letter before my senior pupil--the first
letter, since his residence with me, which had been delivered to
him under my roof.

He started, and took up the letter. He looked at the address. A
spasm of suppressed fury passed across his face; his breath came
quickly; his hand trembled as it held the letter. So far, I said
nothing. I waited to see whether he would open the envelope in my
presence or not.

He was afraid to open it in my presence. He got on his feet; he
said, in tones so low that I could barely hear him: "Please
excuse me for a minute"--and left the room.

I waited for half an hour--for a quarter of an hour after
that--and then I sent to ask if he had forgotten his breakfast.

In a minute more, I heard his footstep in the hall. He opened the
breakfast-room door, and stood on the threshold, with a small
traveling-bag in his hand.

"I beg your pardon," he said, still standing at the door. "I must
ask for leave of absence for a day or two. Business in London."

"Can I be of any use?" I asked. "I am afraid your letter has
brought you bad news?"

"Yes," he said shortly. "Bad news. I have no time for breakfast."

"Wait a few minutes," I urged. "Wait long enough to treat me like
your friend--to tell me what your trouble is before you go."

He made no reply. He stepped into the hall and closed the
door--then opened it again a little way, without showing himself.

"Business in London," he repeated--as if he thought it highly
important to inform me of the nature of his errand. The door
closed for the second time. He was gone.

I went into my study, and carefully considered what had happened.

The result of my reflections is easily described. I determined on
discontinuing my relations with my senior pupil. In writing to
his father (which I did, with all due courtesy and respect, by
that day's post), I mentioned as my reason for arriving at this
decision:--First, that I had found it impossible to win the
confidence of his son. Secondly, that his son had that morning
suddenly and mysteriously left my house for London, and that I
must decline accepting any further responsibility toward him, as
the necessary consequence.

I had put my letter in the post-bag, and was beginning to feel a
little easier after having written it, when my housekeeper
appeared in the study, with a very grave face, and with something
hidden apparently in her closed hand.

"Would you please look, sir, at what we have found in the
gentleman's bedroom, since he went away this morning?"

I knew the housekeeper to possess a woman's full share of that
amicable weakness of the sex which goes by the name of
"Curiosity." I had also, in various indirect ways, become aware
that my senior pupil's strange departure had largely increased
the disposition among the women of my household to regard him as
the victim of an unhappy attachment. The time was ripe, as it
seemed to me, for checking any further gossip about him, and any
renewed attempts at prying into his affairs in his absence.

"Your only business in my pupil's bedroom," I said to the
housekeeper, "is to see that it is kept clean, and that it is
properly aired. There must be no interference, if you please,
with his letters, or his papers, or with anything else that he
has left behind him. Put back directly whatever you may have
found in his room."

The housekeeper had her full share of a woman's temper as well as
of a woman's curiosity. She listened to me with a rising color,
and a just perceptible toss of the head.

"Must I put it back, sir, on the floor, between the bed and the
wall?" she inquired, with an ironical assumption of the humblest
deference to my wishes. "_That's_ where the girl found it when
she was sweeping the room. Anybody can see for themselves,"
pursued the housekeeper indignantly, "that the poor gentleman has
gone away broken-hearted.
 And there, in my opinion, is the hussy who is the cause of it!"

With those words, she made me a low curtsey, and laid a small
photographic portrait on the desk at which I was sitting.

I looked at the photograph.

In an instant, my heart was beating wildly--my head turned
giddy--the housekeeper, the furniture, the walls of the room, all
swayed and whirled round me.

The portrait that had been found in my senior pupil's bedroom was
the portrait of Jeromette!

IX.

I HAD sent the housekeeper out of my study. I was alone, with the
photograph of the Frenchwoman on my desk.

There could surely be little doubt about the discovery that had
burst upon me. The man who had stolen his way into my house,
driven by the terror of a temptation that he dared not reveal,
and the man who had been my unknown rival in the by-gone time,
were one and the same!

Recovering self-possession enough to realize this plain truth,
the inferences that followed forced their way into my mind as a
matter of course. The unnamed person who was the obstacle to my
pupil's prospects in life, the unnamed person in whose company he
was assailed by temptations which made him tremble for himself,
stood revealed to me now as being, in all human probability, no
other than Jeromette. Had she bound him in the fetters of the
marriage which he had himself proposed? Had she discovered his
place of refuge in my house? And was the letter that had been
delivered to him of her writing? Assuming these questions to be
answered in the affirmative, what, in that case, was his
"business in London"? I remembered how he had spoken to me of his
temptations, I recalled the expression that had crossed his face
when he recognized the handwriting on the letter--and the
conclusion that followed literally shook me to the soul. Ordering
my horse to be saddled, I rode instantly to the railway-station.

The train by which he had traveled to London had reached the
terminus nearly an hour since. The one useful course that I could
take, by way of quieting the dreadful misgivings crowding one
after another on my mind, was to telegraph to Jeromette at the
address at which I had last seen her. I sent the subjoined
message--prepaying the reply:

"If you are in any trouble, telegraph to me. I will be with you
by the first train. Answer, in any case."

There was nothing in the way of the immediate dispatch of my
message. And yet the hours passed, and no answer was received. By
the advice of the clerk, I sent a second telegram to the London
office, requesting an explanation. The reply came back in these
terms:

"Improvements in street. Houses pulled down. No trace of person
named in telegram."

I mounted my horse, and rode back slowly to the rectory.

"The day of his return to me will bring with it the darkest days
of my life." . . . . . "I shall die young, and die miserably.
Have you interest enough still left in me to wish to hear of it?"
.... "You _ shall_ hear of it." Those words were in my memory
while I rode home in the cloudless moonlight night. They were so
vividly present to me that I could hear again her pretty foreign
accent, her quiet clear tones, as she spoke them. For the rest,
the emotions of that memorable day had worn me out. The answer
from the telegraph office had struck me with a strange and stony
despair. My mind was a blank. I had no thoughts. I had no tears.

I was about half-way on my road home, and I had just heard the
clock of a village church strike ten, when I became conscious,
little by little, of a chilly sensation slowly creeping through
and through me to the bones. The warm, balmy air of a summer
night was abroad. It was the month of July. In the month of July,
was it possible that any living creature (in good health) could
feel cold? It was _not_ possible--and yet, the chilly sensation
still crept through and through me to the bones.

I looked up. I looked all round me.

My horse was walking along an open highroad. Neither trees nor
waters were near me. On either side, the flat fields stretched
away bright and broad in the moonlight.

I stopped my horse, and looked round me again.

Yes: I saw it. With my own eyes I saw it. A pillar of white
mist--between five and six feet high, as well as I could
judge--was moving beside me at the edge of the road, on my left
hand. When I stopped, the white mist stopped. When I went on, the
white mist went on. I pushed my horse to a trot--the pillar of
mist was with me. I urged him to a gallop---the pillar of mist
was with me. I stopped him again--the pillar of mist stood still.

The white color of it was the white color of the fog which I had
seen over the river--on the night when I had gone to bid her
farewell. And the chill which had then crept through me to the
bones was the chill that was creeping through me now.

I went on again slowly. The white mist went on again slowly--with
the clear bright night all round it.

I was awed rather than frightened. There was one moment, and one
only, when the fear came to me that my reason might be shaken. I
caught myself keeping time to the slow tramp of the horse's feet
with the slow utterances of these words, repeated over and over
again: "Jeromette is dead. Jeromette is dead." But my will was
still my own: I was able to control myself, to impose silence on
my own muttering lips. And I rode on quietly. And the pillar of
mist went quietly with me.

My groom was waiting for my return at the rectory gate. I pointed
to the mist, passing through the gate with me.

"Do you see anything there?" I said.

The man looked at me in astonishment.

I entered the rectory. The housekeeper met me in the hall. I
pointed to the mist, entering with me.

"Do you see anything at my side?" I asked.

The housekeeper looked at me as the groom had looked at me.

"I am afraid you are not well, sir," she said. "Your color is all
gone--you are shivering. Let me get you a glass of wine. "

I went into my study, on the ground-floor, and took the chair at
my desk. The photograph still lay where I had left it. The pillar
of mist floated round the table, and stopped opposite to me,
behind the photograph.

The housekeeper brought in the wine. I put the glass to my lips,
and set it down again. The chill of the mist was in the wine.
There was no taste, no reviving spirit in it. The presence of the
housekeeper oppressed me. My dog had followed her into the room.
The presence of the animal oppressed me. I said to the woman:
"Leave me by myself, and take the dog with you."

They went out, and left me alone in the room.

I sat looking at the pillar of mist, hovering opposite to me.

It lengthened slowly, until it reached to the ceiling. As it
lengthened, it grew bright and luminous. A time passed, and a
shadowy appearance showed itself in the center of the light.
Little by little, the shadowy appearance took the outline of a
human form. Soft brown eyes, tender and melancholy, looked at me
through the unearthly light in the mist. The head and the rest of
the face broke next slowly on my view. Then the figure gradually
revealed itself, moment by moment, downward and downward to the
feet. She stood before me as I had last seen her, in her
purple-merino dress, with the black-silk apron, with the white
handkerchief tied loosely round her neck. She stood before me, in
the gentle beauty that I remembered so well; and looked at me as
she had looked when she gave me her last kiss--when her tears had
dropped on my cheek.

I fell on my knees at the table. I stretched out my hands to her
imploringly. I said: "Speak to me--O, once again speak to me,
Jeromette."

Her eyes rested on me with a divine compassion in them. She
lifted her hand, and pointed to the photograph on my desk, with a
gesture which bade me turn the card. I turned it. The name of the
man who had left my house that morning was inscribed on it, in
her own handwriting.

I looked up at her again, when I had read it. She lifted her hand
once more, and pointed to the handkerchief round her neck. As I
looked at it, the fair white silk changed horribly in color--the
fair white silk became darkened and drenched in blood.

A moment more--and the vision of her began to grow dim. By slow
degrees, the fi gure, then the face, faded back into the shadowy
appearance that I had first seen. The luminous inner light died
out in the white mist. The mist itself dropped slowly
downward--floated a moment in airy circles on the
floor--vanished. Nothing was before me but the familiar wall of
the room, and the photograph lying face downward on my desk.

X.

THE next day, the newspapers reported the discovery of a murder
in London. A Frenchwoman was the victim. She had been killed by a
wound in the throat. The crime had been discovered between ten
and eleven o'clock on the previous night.

I leave you to draw your conclusion from what I have related. My
own faith in the reality of the apparition is immovable. I say,
and believe, that Jeromette kept her word with me. She died
young, and died miserably. And I heard of it from herself.

Take up the Trial again, and look at the circumstances that were
revealed during the investigation in court. His motive for
murdering her is there.

You will see that she did indeed marry him privately; that they
lived together contentedly, until the fatal day when she
discovered that his fancy had been caught by another woman; that
violent quarrels took place between them, from that time to the
time when my sermon showed him his own deadly hatred toward her,
reflected in the case of another man; that she discovered his
place of retreat in my house, and threatened him by letter with
the public assertion of her conjugal rights; lastly, that a man,
variously described by different witnesses, was seen leaving the
door of her lodgings on the night of the murder. The
Law--advancing no further than this--may have discovered
circumstances of suspicion, but no certainty. The Law, in default
of direct evidence to convict the prisoner, may have rightly
decided in letting him go free.

But _I_ persisted in believing that the man was guilty. _I_
declare that he, and he alone, was the murderer of Jeromette. And
now, you know why.


MISS MINA AND THE GROOM

I.

I HEAR that the "shocking story of my conduct" was widely
circulated at the ball, and that public opinion (among the
ladies), in every part of the room, declared I had disgraced
myself. But there was one dissentient voice in this chorus of
general condemnation. You spoke, Madam, with all the authority of
your wide celebrity and your high rank. You said: "I am
personally a stranger to the young lady who is the subject of
remark. If I venture to interfere, it is only to remind you that
there are two sides to every question. May I ask if you have
waited to pass sentence, until you have heard what the person
accused has to say in her own defense?"

These just and generous words produced, if I am correctly
informed, a dead silence. Not one of the women who had condemned
me had heard me in my own defense. Not one of them ventured to
answer you.

How I may stand in the opinions of such persons as these, is a
matter of perfect indifference to me. My one anxiety is to show
that I am not quite unworthy of your considerate interference in
my favor. Will you honor me by reading what I have to say for
myself in these pages?

I will pass as rapidly as I can over the subject of my family;
and I will abstain (in deference to motives of gratitude and
honor) from mentioning surnames in my narrative.

My father was the second son of an English nobleman. A German
lady was his first wife, and my mother. Left a widower, he
married for the second time; the new wife being of American
birth. She took a stepmother's dislike to me--which, in some
degree at least, I must own that I deserved.

When the newly married pair went to the United States they left
me in England, by my own desire, to live under the protection of
my uncle--a General in the army. This good man's marriage had
been childless, and his wife (Lady Claudia) was, perhaps on that
account, as kindly ready as her husband to receive me in the
character of an adopted daughter. I may add here, that I bear my
German mother's Christian name, Wilhelmina. All my friends, in
the days when I had friends, used to shorten this to Mina. Be my
friend so far, and call me Mina, too.

After these few words of introduction, will your patience bear
with me, if I try to make you better acquainted with my uncle and
aunt, and if I allude to circumstances connected with my new life
which had, as I fear, some influence in altering my character for
the worse?

II.

WHEN I think of the good General's fatherly kindness to me, I
really despair of writing about him in terms that do justice to
his nature. To own the truth, the tears get into my eyes, and the
lines mingle in such confusion that I cannot read them myself. As
for my relations with my aunt, I only tell the truth when I say
that she performed her duties toward me without the slightest
pretension, and in the most charming manner.

At nearly fifty years old, Lady Claudia was still admired, though
she had lost the one attraction which distinguished her before my
time-- the attraction of a perfectly beautiful figure. With fine
hair and expressive eyes, she was otherwise a plain woman. Her
unassuming cleverness and her fascinating manners were the
qualities no doubt which made her popular everywhere. We never
quarreled. Not because I was always amiable, but because my aunt
would not allow it. She managed me, as she managed her husband,
with perfect tact. With certain occasional checks, she absolutely
governed the General. There were eccentricities in his character
which made him a man easily ruled by a clever woman. Deferring to
his opinion, so far as appearances went, Lady Claudia generally
contrived to get her own way in the end. Except when he was at
his Club, happy in his gossip, his good dinners, and his whist,
my excellent uncle lived under a despotism, in the happy delusion
that he was master in his own house.

Prosperous and pleasant as it appeared on the surface, my life
had its sad side for a young woman.

In the commonplace routine of our existence, as wealthy people in
the upper rank, there was nothing to ripen the growth of any
better capacities which may have been in my nature. Heartily as I
loved and admired my uncle, he was neither of an age nor of a
character to be the chosen depositary of my most secret thoughts,
the friend of my inmost heart who could show me how to make the
best and the most of my life. With friends and admirers in
plenty, I had found no one who could hold this position toward
me. In the midst of society I was, unconsciously, a lonely woman.

As I remember them, my hours of happiness were the hours when I
took refuge in my music and my books. Out of the house, my one
diversion, always welcome and always fresh, was riding. Without,
any false modesty, I may mention that I had lovers as well as
admirers; but not one of them produced an impression on my heart.
In all that related to the tender passion, as it is called, I was
an undeveloped being. The influence that men have on women,
_because_ they are men, was really and truly a mystery to me. I
was ashamed of my own coldness--I tried, honestly tried, to copy
other girls; to feel my heart beating in the presence of the one
chosen man. It was not to be done. When a man pressed my hand, I
felt it in my rings, instead of my heart.

These confessions made, I have done with the past, and may now
relate the events which my enemies, among the ladies, have
described as presenting a shocking story.

III.

WE were in London for the season. One morning, I went out riding
with my uncle, as usual, in Hyde Park.

The General's service in the army had been in a cavalry
regiment-- service distinguished by merits which justified his
rapid rise to the high places in his profession. In the
hunting-field, he was noted as one of the most daring and most
accomplished riders in our county. He had always delighted in
riding young and high-spirited horses; and the habit remained
with him after he had quitted the active duties of his profession
in later life. From first to last he had met with no accident
worth remembering, until the unlucky morning when he went out
with me.

His horse, a fiery chestnut, ran away with him, in that part of
the Park-ride call ed Rotten Row. With the purpose of keeping
clear of other riders, he spurred his runaway horse at the rail
which divides the Row from the grassy inclosure at its side. The
terrified animal swerved in taking the leap, and dashed him
against a tree. He was dreadfully shaken and injured; but his
strong constitution carried him through to recovery--with the
serious drawback of an incurable lameness in one leg.

The doctors, on taking leave of their patient, united in warning
him (at his age, and bearing in mind his weakened leg) to ride no
more restive horses. "A quiet cob, General," they all suggested.
My uncle was sorely mortified and offended. "If I am fit for
nothing but a quiet cob," he said, bitterly, "I will ride no
more." He kept his word. No one ever saw the General on horseback
again.

Under these sad circumstances (and my aunt being no horsewoman),
I had apparently no other choice than to give up riding also. But
my kind-hearted uncle was not the man to let me be sacrificed to
his own disappointment. His riding-groom had been one of his
soldier-servants in the cavalry regiment--a quaint sour tempered
old man, not at all the sort of person to attend on a young lady
taking her riding-exercise alone. "We must find a smart fellow
who can be trusted," said the General. "I shall inquire at the
club."

For a week afterward, a succession of grooms, recommended by
friends, applied for the vacant place.

The General found insurmountable objections to all of them. "I'll
tell you what I have done," he announced one day, with the air of
a man who had hit on a grand discovery; "I have advertised in the
papers."

Lady Claudia looked up from her embroidery with the placid smile
that was peculiar to her. "I don't quite like advertising for a
servant,Ó she said. "You are at the mercy of a stranger; you
don't know that you are not engaging a drunkard or a thief."

"Or you may be deceived by a false character," I added on my
side. I seldom ventured, at domestic consultations, on giving my
opinion unasked--but the new groom represented a subject in which
I felt a strong personal interest. In a certain sense, he was to
be _my_ groom.

"I'm much obliged to you both for warning me that I am so easy to
deceive," the General remarked satirically. "Unfortunately, the
mischief is done. Three men have answered my advertisement
already. I expect them here tomorrow to be examined for the
place."

Lady Claudia looked up from her embroidery again. "Are you going
to see them yourself?" she asked softly. "I thought the
steward--"

"I have hitherto considered myself a better judge of a groom than
my steward," the General interposed. "However, don't be alarmed;
I won't act on my own sole responsibility, after the hint you
have given me. You and Mina shall lend me your valuable
assistance, and discover whether they are thieves, drunkards, and
what not, before I feel the smallest suspicion of it, myself."

IV.

WE naturally supposed that the General was joking. No. This was
one of those rare occasions on which Lady Claudia's
tact--infallible in matters of importance--proved to be at fault
in a trifle. My uncle's self-esteem had been touched in a tender
place; and he had resolved to make us feel it. The next morning a
polite message came, requesting our presence in the library, to
see the grooms. My aunt (always ready with her smile, but rarely
tempted into laughing outright) did for once laugh heartily. "It
is really too ridiculous!" she said. However, she pursued her
policy of always yielding, in the first instance. We went
together to the library

The three grooms were received in the order in which they
presented themselves for approval. Two of them bore the
ineffaceable mark of the public-house so plainly written on their
villainous faces, that even I could see it. My uncle ironically
asked us to favor him with our opinions. Lady Claudia answered
with her sweetest smile: "Pardon me, General--we are here to
learn." The words were nothing; but the manner in which they were
spoken was perfect. Few men could have resisted that gentle
influence--and the General was not one of the few. He stroked his
mustache, and returned to his petticoat government. The two
grooms were dismissed.

The entry of the third and last man took me completely by
surprise.

If the stranger's short coat and light trousers had not
proclaimed his vocation in life, I should have taken it for
granted that there had been some mistake, and that we were
favored with a visit from a gentleman unknown. He was between
dark and light in complexion, with frank clear blue eyes; quiet
and intelligent, if appearances were to be trusted; easy in his
movements; respectful in his manner, but perfectly free from
servility. "I say!" the General blurted out, addressing my aunt
confidentially, "_he_ looks as if he would do, doesn't he?"

The appearance of the new man seemed to have had the same effect
on Lady Claudia which it had produced on me. But she got over her
first feeling of surprise sooner than I did. "You know best," she
answered, with the air of a woman who declined to trouble herself
by giving an opinion.

"Step forward, my man," said the General. The groom advanced from
the door, bowed, and stopped at the foot of the table--my uncle
sitting at the head, with my aunt and myself on either side of
him. The inevitable questions began.

"What is your name?"

"Michael Bloomfield."

"Your age?"

"Twenty-six."

My aunt's want of interest in the proceedings expressed itself by
a little weary sigh. She leaned back resignedly in her chair.

The General went on with his questions: "What experience have you
had as a groom?"

"I began learning my work, sir, before I was twelve years old."

"Yes! yes! I mean what private families have you served in?"

"Two, sir."

"How long have you been in your two situations?"

"Four years in the first; and three in the second."

The General looked agreeably surprised. "Seven years in only two
situations is a good character in itself," he remarked. "Who are
your references?"

The groom laid two papers on the table.

"I don't take written references," said the General.

"Be pleased to read my papers, sir," answered the groom.

My uncle looked sharply across the table. The groom sustained the
look with respectful but unshaken composure. The General took up
the papers, and seemed to be once more favorably impressed as he
read them. "Personal references in each case if required in
support of strong written recommendations from both his
employers," he informed my aunt. "Copy the addresses, Mina. Very
satisfactory, I must say. Don't you think so yourself?" he
resumed, turning again to my aunt.

Lady Claudia replied by a courteous bend of her head. The General
went on with his questions. They related to the management of
horses; and they were answered to his complete satisfaction.

"Michael Bloomfield, you know your business," he said, "and you
have a good character. Leave your address. When I have consulted
your references, you shall hear from me."

The groom took out a blank card, and wrote his name and address
on it. I looked over my uncle's shoulder when he received the
card. Another surprise! The handwriting was simply
irreproachable--the lines running perfectly straight, and every
letter completely formed. As this perplexing person made his
modest bow, and withdrew, the General, struck by an
after-thought, called him back from the door.

"One thing more," said my uncle. "About friends and followers? I
consider it my duty to my servants to allow them to see their
relations; but I expect them to submit to certain conditions in
return--"

"I beg your pardon, sir," the groom interposed. "I shall not give
you any trouble on that score. I have no relations."

"No brothers or sisters?" asked the General.

"None, sir."

"Father and mother both dead?"

"I don't know, sir."

"You don't know! What does that mean?"

"I am telling you the plain truth, sir. I never heard who my
father and mother were--and I don't expect to hear now."

He said those words with a bitter composure which impressed me
painfully. Lady Claudia was far from feeling it as I did. Her
languid interest in the engagement of the
 groom seemed to be completely exhausted--and that was all. She
rose, in her easy graceful way, and looked out of the window at
the courtyard and fountain, the house-dog in his kennel, and the
box of flowers in the coachman's window.

In the meanwhile, the groom remained near the table, respectfully
waiting for his dismissal. The General spoke to him sharply, for
the first time. I could see that my good uncle had noticed the
cruel tone of that passing reference to the parents, and thought
of it as I did.

"One word more, before you go," he said. "If I don't find you
more mercifully inclined toward my horses than you seem to be
toward your father and mother, you won't remain long in my
service. You might have told me you had never heard who your
parents were, without speaking as if you didn't care to hear."

"May I say a bold word, sir, in my own defense?"

He put the question very quietly, but, at the same time, so
firmly that he even surprised my aunt. She looked round from the
window--then turned back again, and stretched out her hand toward
the curtain, intending, as I supposed, to alter the arrangement
of it. The groom went on.

"May I ask, sir, why I should care about a father and mother who
deserted me? Mind what you are about, my lady!" he
cried--suddenly addressing my aunt. "There's a cat in the folds
of that curtain; she might frighten you."

He had barely said the words before the housekeeper's large tabby
cat, taking its noonday siesta in the looped-up fold of the
curtain, leaped out and made for the door.

Lady Claudia was, naturally enough, a little perplexed by the
man's discovery of an animal completely hidden in the curtain.
She appeared to think that a person who was only a groom had
taken a liberty in presuming to puzzle her. Like her husband, she
spoke to Michael sharply.

"Did you see the cat?" she asked.

"No, my lady."

"Then how did you know the creature was in the curtain?"

For the first time since he had entered the room the groom looked
a little confused.

"It's a sort of presumption for a man in my position to be
subject to a nervous infirmity," he answered. "I am one of those
persons (the weakness is not uncommon, as your ladyship is aware)
who know by their own unpleasant sensations when a cat is in the
room. It goes a little further than that with me. The
'antipathy,' as the gentlefolks call it, tells me in what part of
the room the cat is."

My aunt turned to her husband, without attempting to conceal that
she took no sort of interest in the groom's antipathies.

"Haven't you done with the man yet?" she asked.

The General gave the groom his dismissal.

"You shall hear from me in three days' time. Good-morning."

Michael Bloomfield seemed to have noticed my aunt's ungracious
manner. He looked at her for a moment with steady attention
before he left the room.

V.

"You don't mean to engage that man?" said Lady Claudia as the
door closed.

"Why not?" asked my uncle.

"I have taken a dislike to him."

This short answer was so entirely out of the character of my aunt
that the General took her kindly by the hand, and said:

"I am afraid you are not well."

She irritably withdrew her hand.

"I don't feel well. It doesn't matter."

"It does matter, Claudia. What can I do for you?"

"Write to the man--" She paused and smiled contemptuously.
"Imagine a groom with an antipathy to cats!" she said, turning to
me. "I don't know what you think, Mina. I have a strong
objection, myself, to servants who hold themselves above their
position in life. Write," she resumed, addressing her husband,
"and tell him to look for another place."

"What objection can I make to him?" the General asked,
helplessly.

"Good heavens! can't you make an excuse? Say he is too young."

My uncle looked at me in expressive silence-- walked slowly to
the writing-table--and glanced at his wife, in the faint hope
that she might change her mind. Their eyes met--and she seemed to
recover the command of her temper. She put her hand caressingly
on the General's shoulder.

"I remember the time," she said, softly, "when any caprice of
mine was a command to you. Ah, I was younger then!"

The General's reception of this little advance was thoroughly
characteristic of him. He first kissed Lady Claudia's hand, and
then he wrote the letter. My aunt rewarded him by a look, and
left the library.

"What the deuce is the matter with her?" my uncle said to me when
we were alone. "Do you dislike the man, too?"

"Certainly not. As far as I can judge, he appears to be just the
sort of person we want."

"And knows thoroughly well how to manage horses, my dear. What
_can_ be your aunt's objection to him?"

As the words passed his lips Lady Claudia opened the library
door.

"I am so ashamed of myself," she said, sweetly. "At my age, I
have been behaving like a spoiled child. How good you are to me,
General! Let me try to make amends for my misconduct. Will you
permit me?"

She took up the General's letter, without waiting for permission;
tore it to pieces, smiling pleasantly all the while; and threw
the fragments into the waste-paper basket. "As if you didn't know
better than I do!" she said, kissing him on the forehead. "Engage
the man by all means."

She left the room for the second time. For the second time my
uncle looked at me in blank perplexity--and I looked back at him
in the same condition of mind. The sound of the luncheon bell was
equally a relief to both of us. Not a word more was spoken on the
subject of the new groom. His references were verified; and he
entered the General's service in three days' time.

VI.

ALWAYS careful in anything that concerned my welfare, no matter
how trifling it might be, my uncle did not trust me alone with
the new groom when he first entered our service. Two old friends
of the General accompanied me at his special request, and
reported the man to be perfectly competent and trustworthy. After
that, Michael rode out with me alone; my friends among young
ladies seldom caring to accompany me, when I abandoned the park
for the quiet country roads on the north and west of London. Was
it wrong in me to talk to him on these expeditions? It would
surely have been treating a man like a brute never to take the
smallest notice of him--especially as his conduct was uniformly
respectful toward me. Not once, by word or look, did he presume
on the position which my favor permitted him to occupy.

Ought I to blush when I confess (though he was only a groom) that
he interested me?

In the first place, there was something romantic in the very
blankness of the story of his life.

He had been left, in his infancy, in the stables of a gentleman
living in Kent, near the highroad between Gravesend and
Rochester. The same day, the stable-boy had met a woman running
out of the yard, pursued by the dog. She was a stranger, and was
not well-dressed. While the boy was protecting her by chaining
the dog to his kennel, she was quick enough to place herself
beyond the reach of pursuit.

The infant's clothing proved, on examination, to be of the finest
linen. He was warmly wrapped in a beautiful shawl of some foreign
manufacture, entirely unknown to all the persons present,
including the master and mistress of the house. Among the folds
of the shawl there was discovered an open letter, without date,
signature, or address, which it was presumed the woman must have
forgotten.

Like the shawl, the paper was of foreign manufacture. The
handwriting presented a strongly marked character; and the
composition plainly revealed the mistakes of a person imperfectly
acquainted with the English language. The contents of the letter,
after alluding to the means supplied for the support of the
child, announced that the writer had committed the folly of
inclosing a sum of a hundred pounds in a banknote, "to pay
expenses." In a postscript, an appointment was made for a meeting
in six months' time, on the eastward side of London Bridge. The
stable-boy's description of the woman who had passed him showed
that she belonged to the lower class. To such a person a hundred
pounds would be a fortune. She had, no doubt, abandoned the
child, and made off with the money.

No trace of her was ever discovered. On the day of the
appointment the police watched the eastward side of London Bridge
without obtaining any result. Through the kindness of the
gentleman in whose stable he had been found, the first ten years
of the boy's life were passed under the protection of a
charitable asylum. They gave him the name of one of the little
inmates who had died; and they sent him out to service before he
was eleven years old. He was harshly treated and ran away;
wandered to some training-stables near Newmarket; attracted the
favorable notice of the head-groom, was employed among the other
boys, and liked the occupation. Growing up to manhood, he had
taken service in private families as a groom. This was the story
of twenty-six years of Michael's life.

But there was something in the man himself which attracted
attention, and made one think of him in his absence.

I mean by this, that there was a spirit of resistance to his
destiny in him, which is very rarely found in serving-men of his
order. I remember accompanying the General "on one of his
periodical visits of inspection to the stable." He was so well
satisfied that he proposed extending his investigations to the
groom's own room.

"If you don object, Michael?" he added, with his customary
consideration for the self-respect of all persons in his
employment. Michael's color rose a little; he looked at me. "I am
afraid the young lady will not find my room quite so tidy as it
ought to be," he said as he opened the door for us.

The only disorder in the groom's room was produced, to our
surprise, by the groom's books and papers.

Cheap editions of the English poets, translations of Latin and
Greek classics, handbooks for teaching French and German "without
a master," carefully written "exercises" in both languages,
manuals of shorthand, with more "exercises" in that art, were
scattered over the table, round the central object of a
reading-lamp, which spoke plainly of studies by night. "Why, what
is all this?" cried the General. "Are you going to leave me,
Michael, and set up a school?" Michael answered in sad,
submissive tones. "I try to improve myself, sir--though I
sometimes lose heart and hope." "Hope of what?" asked my uncle.
"Are you not content to be a servant? Must you rise in the world,
as the saying is?" The groom shrank a little at that abrupt
question. "If I had relations to care for me and help me along
the hard ways of life," he said, "I might be satisfied, sir, to
remain as I am. As it is, I have no one to think about but
myself--and I am foolish enough sometimes to look beyond myself."

So far, I had kept silence; but I could no longer resist giving
him a word of encouragement--his confession was so sadly and so
patiently made. "You speak too harshly of yourself," I said; "the
best and greatest men have begun like you by looking beyond
themselves." For a moment our eyes met. I admired the poor lonely
fellow trying so modestly and so bravely to teach himself--and I
did not care to conceal it. He was the first to look away; some
suppressed emotion turned him deadly pale. Was I the cause of it?
I felt myself tremble as that bold question came into my mind.
The General, with one sharp glance at me, diverted the talk (not
very delicately, as I thought) to the misfortune of Michael's
birth.

"I have heard of your being deserted in your infancy by some
woman unknown," he said. "What has become of the things you were
wrapped in, and the letter that was found on you? They might lead
to a discovery, one of these days." The groom smiled. "The last
master I served thought of it as you do, Sir. He was so good as
to write to the gentleman who was first burdened with the care of
me-- and the things were sent to me in return."

He took up an unlocked leather bag, which opened by touching a
brass knob, and showed us the shawl, the linen (sadly faded by
time) and the letter. We were puzzled by the shawl. My uncle, who
had served in the East, thought it looked like a very rare kind
of Persian work. We examined with interest the letter, and the
fine linen. When Michael quietly remarked, as we handed them back
to him, "They keep the secret, you see," we could only look at
each other, and own there was nothing more to be said

VII.

THAT night, lying awake thinking, I made my first discovery of a
great change that had come over me. I felt like a new woman.

Never yet had my life been so enjoyable to me as it was now. I
was conscious of a delicious lightness of heart. The simplest
things pleased me; I was ready to be kind to everybody, and to
admire everything. Even the familiar scenery of my rides in the
park developed beauties which I had never noticed before. The
enchantments of music affected me to tears. I was absolutely in
love with my dogs and my birds--and, as for my maid, I bewildered
the girl with presents, and gave her holidays almost before she
could ask for them. In a bodily sense, I felt an extraordinary
accession of strength and activity. I romped with the dear old
General, and actually kissed Lady Claudia, one morning, instead
of letting her kiss me as usual. My friends noticed my new
outburst of gayety and spirit--and wondered what had produced it.
I can honestly say that I wondered too! Only on that wakeful
night which followed our visit to Michael's room did I arrive at
something like a clear understanding of myself. The next morning
completed the process of enlightenment. I went out riding as
usual. The instant when Michael put his hand under my foot as I
sprang into the saddle, his touch flew all over me like a flame.
I knew who had made a new woman of me from that moment.

As to describing the first sense of confusion that overwhelmed
me, even if I were a practiced writer I should be incapable of
doing it. I pulled down my veil, and rode on in a sort of trance.
Fortunately for me, our house looked on the park, and I had only
to cross the road. Otherwise I should have met with some accident
if I had ridden through the streets. To this day, I don't know
where I rode. The horse went his own way quietly--and the groom
followed me.

The groom! Is there any human creature so free from the hateful
and anti-Christian pride of rank as a woman who loves with all
her heart and soul, for the first time in her life? I only tell
the truth (in however unfavorable a light it may place me) when I
declare that my confusion was entirely due to the discovery that
I was in love. I was not ashamed of myself for being in love with
the groom. I had given my heart to the man. What did the accident
of his position matter? Put money into his pocket and a title
before his name--by another accident: in speech, manners, and
attainments, he would he a gentleman worthy of his wealth and
worthy of his rank.

Even the natural dread of what my relations and friends might
say, if they discovered my secret, seemed to be a sensation so
unworthy of me and of him, that I looked round, and called to him
to speak to me, and asked him questions about himself which kept
him riding nearly side by side with me. Ah, how I enjoyed the
gentle deference and respect of his manner as he answered me! He
was hardly bold enough to raise his eyes to mine, when I looked
at him. Absorbed in the Paradise of my own making, I rode on
slowly, and was only aware that friends had passed and had
recognized me, by seeing him touch his hat. I looked round and
discovered the women smiling ironically as they rode by. That one
circumstance roused me rudely from my dream. I let Michael fall
back again to his proper place, and quickened my horse's pace;
angry with myself, angry with the world in general, then suddenly
changing, and being fool enough and child enough to feel ready to
cry. How long these varying moods lasted, I don't know. On
returning, I slipped off my horse without waiting for Michael to
help me, and ran into the house without even wishing him
"Good-day."

VIII.

AFTER taking off my riding-habit, and cooling my hot face with
eaude-cologne and water, I went down to the room which we called
the morning-room. The piano there was my favorite instrument and
I had the idea of trying what music would  do toward helping me to
compo se myself.

As I sat down before the piano, I heard the opening of the door
of the breakfast-room (separated from me by a curtained archway),
and the voice of Lady Claudia asking if Michael had returned to
the stable. On the servant's reply in the affirmative, she
desired that he might be sent to her immediately.

No doubt, I ought either to have left the morning-room, or to
have let my aunt know of my presence there. I did neither the one
nor the other. Her first dislike of Michael had, to all
appearance, subsided. She had once or twice actually taken
opportunities of speaking to him kindly. I believed this was due
to the caprice of the moment. The tone of her voice too
suggested, on this occasion, that she had some spiteful object in
view, in sending for him. I knew it was unworthy of me--and yet,
I deliberately waited to hear what passed between them.

Lady Claudia began.

"You were out riding to-day with Miss Mina?"

"Yes, my lady."

"Turn to the light. I wish to see people when I speak to them.
You were observed by some friends of mine; your conduct excited
remark. Do you know your business as a lady's groom?"

"I have had seven years' experience, my lady."

"Your business is to ride at a certain distance behind your
mistress. Has your experience taught you that?"

"Yes, my lady."

"You were not riding behind Miss Mina--your horse was almost side
by side with hers. Do you deny it?"

"No, my lady."

"You behaved with the greatest impropriety--you were seen talking
to Miss Mina. Do you deny that?"

"No, my lady."

"Leave the room. No! come back. Have you any excuse to make?"

"None, my lady."

"Your insolence is intolerable! I shall speak to the General."

The sound of the closing door followed.

I knew now what the smiles meant on the false faces of those
women-friends of mine who had met me in the park. An ordinary
man, in Michael's place, would have mentioned my own
encouragement of him as a sufficient excuse. _He_, with the
inbred delicacy and reticence of a gentleman, had taken all the
blame on himself. Indignant and ashamed, I advanced to the
breakfast-room, bent on instantly justifying him. Drawing aside
the curtain, I was startled by a sound as of a person sobbing. I
cautiously looked in. Lady Claudia was prostrate on the sofa,
hiding her face in her hands, in a passion of tears.

I withdrew, completely bewildered. The extraordinary
contradictions in my aunt's conduct were not at an end yet. Later
in the day, I went to my uncle, resolved to set Michael right in
_his_ estimation, and to leave him to speak to Lady Claudia. The
General was in the lowest spirits; he shook his head ominously
the moment. I mentioned the groom's name. "I dare say the man
meant no harm--but the thing has been observed. I can't have you
made the subject of scandal, Mina. My wife makes a point of
it--Michael must go.

"You don't mean to say that she has insisted on your sending
Michael away?"

Before he could answer me, a footman appeared with a message. "My
lady wishes to see you, sir."

The General rose directly. My curiosity had got, by this time,
beyond all restraint. I was actually indelicate enough to ask if
I might go with him! He stared at me, as well he might. I
persisted; I said I particularly wished to see Lady Claudia. My
uncle's punctilious good breeding still resisted me. "Your aunt
may wish to speak to me in private," he said. "Wait a moment, and
I will send for you."

I was incapable of waiting: my obstinacy was something
superhuman. The bare idea that Michael might lose his place,
through my fault, made me desperate, I suppose. "I won't trouble
you to send for me," I persisted; "I will go with you at once as
far as the door, and wait to hear if I may come in." The footman
was still present, holding the door open; the General gave way. I
kept so close behind him that my aunt saw me as her husband
entered the room. "Come in, Mina," she said, speaking and looking
like the charming Lady Claudia of everyday life. Was this the
woman whom I had seen crying her heart out on the sofa hardly an
hour ago?

"On second thoughts," she continued, turning to the General, "I
fear I may have been a little hasty. Pardon me for troubling you
about it again--have you spoken to Michael yet? No? Then let us
err on the side of kindness; let us look over his misconduct this
time."

My uncle was evidently relieved. I seized the opportunity of
making my confession, and taking the whole blame on myself. Lady
Claudia stopped me with the perfect grace of which she was
mistress.

"My good child, don't distress yourself! don't make mountains out
of molehills!" She patted me on the cheek with two plump white
fingers which felt deadly cold. "I was not always prudent, Mina,
when I was your age. Besides, your curiosity is naturally excited
about a servant who is--what shall I call him?--a foundling."

She paused and fixed her eyes on me attentively. "What did he
tell you?" she asked. "Is it a very romantic story?"

The General began to fidget in his chair. If I had kept my
attention on him, I should have seen in his face a warning to me
to be silent. But my interest at the moment was absorbed in my
aunt. Encouraged by her amiable reception, I was not merely
unsuspicious of the trap that she had set for me--I was actually
foolish enough to think that I could improve Michael's position
in her estimation (remember that I was in love with him!) by
telling his story exactly as I have already told it in these
pages. I spoke with fervor. Will you believe it?--her humor
positively changed again! She flew into a passion with me for the
first time in her life.

"Lies!" she cried. "Impudent lies on the face of them--invented
to appeal to your interest. How dare you repeat them? General! if
Mina had not brought it on herself, this man's audacity would
justify you in instantly dismissing him. Don't you agree with
me?"

The General's sense of fair play roused him for once into openly
opposing his wife.

"You are completely mistaken," he said. "Mina and I have both had
the shawl and the letter in our hands--and (what was there
besides?)-- ah, yes, the very linen the child was wrapped in."

What there was in those words to check Lady Claudia's anger in
its full flow I was quite unable to understand. If her husband
had put a pistol to her head, he could hardly have silenced her
more effectually. She did not appear to be frightened, or ashamed
of her outbreak of rage--she sat vacant and speechless, with her
eyes on the General and her hands crossed on her lap. After
waiting a moment (wondering as I did what it meant) my uncle rose
with his customary resignation and left her. I followed him. He
was unusually silent and thoughtful; not a word passed between
us. I afterward discovered that he was beginning to fear, poor
man, that his wife's mind must be affected in some way, and was
meditating a consultation with the physician who helped us in
cases of need.

As for myself, I was either too stupid or too innocent to feel
any positive forewarning of the truth, so far. After luncheon,
while I was alone in the conservatory, my maid came to me from
Michael, asking if I had any commands for him in the afternoon. I
thought this rather odd; but it occurred to me that he might want
some hours to himself. I made the inquiry.

To my astonishment, the maid announced that Lady Claudia had
employed Michael to go on an errand for her. The nature of the
errand was to take a letter to her bookseller, and to bring back
the books which she had ordered. With three idle footmen in the
house, whose business it was to perform such service as this, why
had she taken the groom away from his work? The question obtained
such complete possession of my mind that I actually summoned
courage enough to go to my aunt. I said I had thought of driving
out in my pony-carriage that afternoon, and I asked if she
objected to sending one of the three indoor servants for her
books in Michael's place.

She received me with a strange hard stare, and answered with
obstinate self-possession: "I wish Michael to go!" No explanation
followed. With reason or without it, agreeable to me or not
agreeable to me, she wished Michael to go.

I begged her pardon for interfering, and replied that I would
give up the idea of driving on that day. She made no further
remark. I left the room, determining to watch her. There is no
defense for my conduct; it was mean and unbecoming, no doubt. I
was drawn on, by some force in me which I could not even attempt
to resist. Indeed, indeed I am not a mean person by nature!

At first, I thought of speaking to Michael; not with any special
motive, but simply because I felt drawn toward him as the guide
and helper in whom my heart trusted at this crisis in my life. A
little consideration, however, suggested to me that I might be
seen speaking to him, and might so do him an injury. While I was
still hesitating, the thought came to me that my aunt's motive
for sending him to her bookseller might be to get him out of her
way.

Out of her way in the house? No: his place was not in the house.
Out of her way in the stable? The next instant, the idea flashed
across my mind of watching the stable door.

The best bedrooms, my room included, were all in front of the
house. I went up to my maid's room, which looked on the
courtyard; ready with my excuse, if she happened to be there. She
was not there. I placed myself at the window, in full view of the
stable opposite.

An interval elapsed--long or short, I cannot say which; I was too
much excited to look at my watch. All I know is that I discovered
her! She crossed the yard, after waiting to make sure that no one
was there to see her; and she entered the stable by the door
which led to that part of the building occupied by Michael. This
time I looked at my watch.

Forty minutes passed before I saw her again. And then, instead of
appearing at the door, she showed herself at the window of
Michael's room; throwing it wide open. I concealed myself behind
the window curtain, just in time to escape discovery, as she
looked up at the house. She next appeared in the yard, hurrying
back. I waited a while, trying to compose myself in case I met
any one on the stairs. There was little danger of a meeting at
that hour. The General was at his club; the servants were at
their tea. I reached my own room without being seen by any one,
and locked myself in.

What had my aunt been doing for forty minutes in Michael's room?
And why had she opened the window?

I spare you my reflections on these perplexing questions. A
convenient headache saved me from the ordeal of meeting Lady
Claudia at the dinner-table. I passed a restless and miserable
night; conscious that I had found my way blindly, as it were, to
some terrible secret which might have its influence on my whole
future life, and not knowing what to think, or what to do next.
Even then, I shrank instinctively from speaking to my uncle. This
was not wonderful. But I felt afraid to speak to Michael--and
that perplexed and alarmed me. Consideration for Lady Claudia was
certainly not the motive that kept me silent, after what I had
seen.

The next morning my pale face abundantly justified the assertion
that I was still ill.

My aunt, always doing her maternal duty toward me, came herself
to inquire after my health before I was out of my room. So
certain was she of not having been observed on the previous
day--or so prodigious was her power of controlling herself--that
she actually advised me to go out riding before lunch, and try
what the fresh air and the exercise would do to relieve me!
Feeling that I must end in speaking to Michael, it struck me that
this would be the one safe way of consulting him in private. I
accepted her advice, and had another approving pat on the cheek
from her plump white fingers. They no longer struck cold on my
skin; the customary vital warmth had returned to them. Her
ladyship's mind had recovered its tranquillity.

IX.

I LEFT the house for my morning ride.

Michael was not in his customary spirits. With some difficulty, I
induced him to tell me the reason. He had decided on giving
notice to leave his situation in the General's employment. As
soon as I could command myself, I asked what had happened to
justify this incomprehensible proceeding on his part. He silently
offered me a letter. It was written by the master whom he had
served before he came to us; and it announced that an employment
as secretary was offered to him, in the house of a gentleman who
was "interested in his creditable efforts to improve his position
in the world."

What it cost me to preserve the outward appearance of composure
as I handed back the letter, I am ashamed to tell. I spoke to him
with some bitterness. "Your wishes are gratified," I said; "I
don't wonder that you are eager to leave your place." He reined
back his horse and repeated my words. "Eager to leave my place? I
am heart-broken at leaving it." I was reckless enough to ask why.
His head sank. "I daren't tell you," he said. I went on from one
imprudence to another. "What are you afraid of?" I asked. He
suddenly looked up at me. His eyes answered: _"You."_

Is it possible to fathom the folly of a woman in love? Can any
sensible person imagine the enormous importance which the veriest
trifles assume in her poor little mind? I was perfectly
satisfied--even perfectly happy, after that one look. I rode on
briskly for a minute or two--then the forgotten scene at the
stable recurred to my memory. I resumed a foot-pace and beckoned
to him to speak to me.

"Lady Claudia's bookseller lives in the City, doesn't he?" I
began.

"Yes, miss."

"Did you walk both ways?"

"Yes."

"You must have felt tired when you got back?"

"I hardly remember what I felt when I got back--I was met by a
surprise."

"May I ask what it was?"

"Certainly, miss. Do you remember a black bag of mine?"

"Perfectly."

"When I returned from the City I found the bag open; and the
things I kept in it--the shawl, the linen, and the letter--"

"Gone?"

"Gone."

My heart gave one great leap in me, and broke into vehement
throbbings, which made it impossible for me to say a word more. I
reined up my horse, and fixed my eyes on Michael. He was
startled; he asked if I felt faint. I could only sign to him that
I was waiting to hear more.

"My own belief," he proceeded, "is that some person burned the
things in my absence, and opened the window to prevent any
suspicion being excited by the smell. I am certain I shut the
window before I left my room. When I closed it on my return, the
fresh air had not entirely removed the smell of burning; and,
what is more, I found a heap of ashes in the grate. As to the
person who has done me this injury, and why it has been done,
those are mysteries beyond my fathoming--I beg your pardon,
miss--I am sure you are not well. Might I advise you to return to
the house?"

I accepted his advice and turned back.

In the tumult of horror and amazement that filled my mind, I
could still feel a faint triumph stirring in me through it all,
when I saw how alarmed and how anxious he was about me. Nothing
more passed between us on the way back. Confronted by the
dreadful discovery that I had now made, I was silent and
helpless. Of the guilty persons concerned in the concealment of
the birth, and in the desertion of the infant, my nobly-born,
highly-bred, irreproachable aunt now stood revealed before me as
one! An older woman than I might have been hard put to it to
preserve her presence of mind, in such a position as mine.
Instinct, not reason, served me in my sore need. Instinct, not
reason, kept me passively and stupidly silent when I got back to
the house. "We will talk about it to-morrow," was all I could say
to Michael, when he gently lifted me from my horse.

I excused myself from appearing at the luncheon-table; and I drew
down the blinds in my sitting-room, so that my face might not
betray me when Lady Claudia's maternal duty brought her upstairs
to make inquiries. The same excuse served in both cases--my ride
had failed to relieve me of my headache. My aunt's brief visit
led to one result which is worth mentioning. The indescribable
horror of her that I felt forced the conviction on my mind that
we two could live no longer under the same roof. While I was
still trying to face this alternative with the needful composure,
my un cle presented himself, in some anxiety about my continued
illness. I should certainly have burst out crying, when the kind
and dear old man condoled with me, if he had not brought news
with him which turned back all my thoughts on myself and my aunt.
Michael had shown the General his letter and had given notice to
leave. Lady Claudia was present at the time. To her husband's
amazement, she abruptly interfered with a personal request to
Michael to think better of it, and to remain in his place!

"I should not have troubled you, my dear, on this unpleasant
subject," said my uncle, "if Michael had not told me that you
were aware of the circumstances under which he feels it his duty
to leave us. After your aunt's interference (quite
incomprehensible to me), the man hardly knows what to do. Being
your groom, he begs me to ask if there is any impropriety in his
leaving the difficulty to your decision. I tell you of his
request, Mina; but I strongly advise you to decline taking any
responsibility on yourself."

I answered mechanically, accepting my uncle's suggestion, while
my thoughts were wholly absorbed in this last of the many
extraordinary proceedings on Lady Claudia's part since Michael
had entered the house. There are limits--out of books and
plays--to the innocence of a young unmarried woman. After what I
had just heard the doubts which had thus far perplexed me were
suddenly and completely cleared up. I said to my secret self:
"She has some human feeling left. If her son goes away, she knows
that they may never meet again!"

From the moment when my mind emerged from the darkness, I
recovered the use of such intelligence and courage as I naturally
possessed. From this point, you will find that, right or wrong, I
saw my way before me, and took it.

To say that I felt for the General with my whole heart, is merely
to own that I could be commonly grateful. I sat on his knee, and
laid my cheek against his cheek, and thanked him for his long,
long years of kindness to me. He stopped me in his simple
generous way. "Why, Mina, you talk as if you were going to leave
us!" I started up, and went to the window, opening it and
complaining of the heat, and so concealing from him that he had
unconsciously anticipated the event that was indeed to come. When
I returned to my chair, he helped me to recover myself by
alluding once more to his wife. He feared that her health was in
some way impaired. In the time when they had first met, she was
subject to nervous maladies, having their origin in a "calamity"
which was never mentioned by either of them in later days. She
might possibly be suffering again, from some other form of
nervous derangement, and he seriously thought of persuading her
to send for medical advice.

Under ordinary circumstances, this vague reference to a
"calamity" would not have excited any special interest in me. But
my mind was now in a state of morbid suspicion. I had not heard
how long my uncle and aunt had been married; but I remembered
that Michael had described himself as being twenty-six years old.
Bearing these circumstances in mind, it struck me that I might be
acting wisely (in Michael's interest) if I persuaded the General
to speak further of what had happened, at the time when he met
the woman whom an evil destiny had bestowed on him for a wife.
Nothing but the consideration of serving the man I loved would
have reconciled me to making my own secret use of the
recollections which my uncle might innocently confide to me. As
it was, I thought the means would, in this case, be for once
justified by the end. Before we part, I have little doubt that
you will think so too.

I found it an easier task than I had anticipated to turn the talk
back again to the days when the General had seen Lady Claudia for
the first time. He was proud of the circumstances under which he
had won his wife. Ah, how my heart ached for him as I saw his
eyes sparkle, and the color mount in his fine rugged face!

This is the substance of what I heard from him. I tell it
briefly, because it is still painful to me to tell it at all.


My uncle had met Lady Claudia at her father's country house. She
had then reappeared in society, after a period of seclusion,
passed partly in England, partly on the Continent. Before the
date of her retirement, she had been engaged to marry a French
nobleman, equally illustrious by his birth and by his diplomatic
services in the East. Within a few weeks of the wedding-day, he
was drowned by the wreck of his yacht. This was the calamity to
which my uncle had referred.

Lady Claudia's mind was so seriously affected by the dreadful
event, that the doctors refused to answer for the consequences,
unless she was at once placed in the strictest retirement. Her
mother, and a French maid devotedly attached to her, were the
only persons whom it was considered safe for the young lady to
see, until time and care had in some degree composed her. Her
return to her friends and admirers, after the necessary interval
of seclusion, was naturally a subject of sincere rejoicing among
the guests assembled in her father's house. My uncle's interest
in Lady Claudia soon developed into love. They were equals in
rank, and well suited to each other in age. The parents raised no
obstacles; but they did not conceal from their guest that the
disaster which had befallen their daughter was but too likely to
disincline her to receive his addresses, or any man's addresses,
favorably. To their surprise, they proved to be wrong. The young
lady was touched by the simplicity and the delicacy with which
her lover urged his suit. She had lived among worldly people.
This was a man whose devotion she could believe to be sincere.
They were married.

Had no unusual circumstances occurred? Had nothing happened which
the General had forgotten? Nothing.

X.

IT is surely needless that I should stop here, to draw the plain
inferences from the events just related.

Any person who remembers that the shawl in which the infant was
wrapped came from those Eastern regions which were associated
with the French nobleman's diplomatic services--also, that the
faults of composition in the letter found on the child were
exactly the faults likely to have been committed by the French
maid--any person who follows these traces can find his way to the
truth as I found mine.

Returning for a moment to the hopes which I had formed of being
of some service to Michael, I have only to say that they were at
once destroyed, when I heard of the death by drowning of the man
to whom the evidence pointed as his father. The prospect looked
equally barren when I thought of the miserable mother. That she
should openly acknowledge her son in her position was perhaps not
to be expected of any woman. Had she courage enough, or, in
plainer words, heart enough to acknowledge him privately?

I called to mind again some of the apparent caprices and
contradictions in Lady Claudia's conduct, on the memorable day
when Michael had presented himself to fill the vacant place. Look
back with me to the record of what she said and did on that
occasion, by the light of your present knowledge, and you will
see that his likeness to his father must have struck her when he
entered the room, and that his statement of his age must have
correctly described the age of her son. Recall the actions that
followed, after she had been exhausted by her first successful
efforts at self-control--the withdrawal to the window to conceal
her face; the clutch at the curtain when she felt herself
sinking; the harshness of manner under which she concealed her
emotions when she ventured to speak to him; the reiterated
inconsistencies and vacillations of conduct that followed, all
alike due to the protest of Nature, desperately resisted to the
last--and say if I did her injustice when I believed her to be
incapable of running the smallest risk of discovery at the
prompting of maternal love.

There remained, then, only Michael to think of. I remember how he
had spoken of the unknown parents whom he neither expected nor
cared to discover. Still, I could not reconcile it to my
conscience to accept a chance outbreak of temper as my sufficient
ju stification for keeping him in ignorance of a discovery which
so nearly concerned him. It seemed at least to be my duty to make
myself acquainted with the true state of his feelings, before I
decided to bear the burden of silence with me to my grave.

What I felt it my duty to do in this serious matter, I determined
to do at once. Besides, let me honestly own that I felt lonely
and desolate, oppressed by the critical situation in which I was
placed, and eager for the relief that it would be to me only to
hear the sound of Michael's voice. I sent my maid to say that I
wished to speak to him immediately. The crisis was already
hanging over my head. That one act brought it down.

XI.

He came in, and stood modestly waiting at the door.

After making him take a chair, I began by saying that I had
received his message, and that, acting on my uncle's advice, I
must abstain from interfering in the question of his leaving, or
not leaving, his place. Having in this way established a reason
for sending for him, I alluded next to the loss that he had
sustained, and asked if he had any prospect of finding out the
person who had entered his room in his absence. On his reply in
the negative, I spoke of the serious results to him of the act of
destruction that had been committed. "Your last chance of
discovering your parents," I said, "has been cruelly destroyed."

He smiled sadly. "You know already, miss, that I never expected
to discover them."

I ventured a little nearer to the object I had in view.

"Do you never think of your mother?" I asked. "At your age, she
might be still living. Can you give up all hope of finding her,
without feeling your heart ache?"

"If I have done her wrong, in believing that she deserted me," he
answered, "the heart-ache is but a poor way of expressing the
remorse that I should feel."

I ventured nearer still.

Even if you were right," I began--"even it she did desert you--"

He interrupted me sternly. "I would not cross the street to see
her," he said. "A woman who deserts her child is a monster.
Forgive me for speaking so, miss! When I see good mothers and
their children it maddens me when I think of what _my_ childhood
was."

Hearing these words, and watching him attentively while he spoke,
I could see that my silence would be a mercy, not a crime. I
hastened to speak of other things.

"If you decide to leave us," I said, "when shall you go?"

His eyes softened instantly. Little by little the color faded out
of his face as he answered me.

"The General kindly said, when I spoke of leaving my place--" His
voice faltered, and he paused to steady it. "My master," he
resumed, "said that I need not keep my new employer waiting by
staying for the customary month, provided--provided you were
willing to dispense with my services."

So far, I had succeeded in controlling myself. At that reply I
felt my resolution failing me. I saw how he suffered; I saw how
manfully he struggled to conceal it.

"I am not willing," I said. "I am sorry--very, very sorry to lose
you. But I will do anything that is for your good. I can say no
more."

He rose suddenly, as if to leave the room; mastered himself;
stood for a moment silently looking at me--then looked away
again, and said his parting words.

"If I succeed, Miss Mina, in my new employment--if I get on to
higher things--is it--is it presuming too much, to ask if I
might, some day--perhaps when you are out riding alone--if I
might speak to you--only to ask if you are well and happy--"

He could say no more. I saw the tears in his eyes; saw him shaken
by the convulsive breathings which break from men in the rare
moments when they cry. He forced it back even then. He bowed to
me--oh, God, he bowed to me, as if he were only my servant! as if
he were too far below me to take my hand, even at that moment! I
could have endured anything else; I believe I could still have
restrained myself under any other circumstances. It matters
little now; my confession must be made, whatever you may think of
me. I flew to him like a frenzied creature--I threw my arms round
his neck--I said to him, "Oh, Michael, don't you know that I love
you?" And then I laid my head on his breast, and held him to me,
and said no more.

In that moment of silence, the door of the room was opened. I
started, and looked up. Lady Claudia was standing on the
threshold.

I saw in her face that she had been listening--she must have
followed him when he was on his way to my room. That conviction
steadied me. I took his hand in mine, and stood side by side with
him, waiting for her to speak first. She looked at Michael, not
at me. She advanced a step or two, and addressed him in these
words:

"It is just possible that _you_ have some sense of decency left.
Leave the room."

That deliberate insult was all that I wanted to make me
completely mistress of myself. I told Michael to wait a moment,
and opened my writing desk. I wrote on an envelope the address in
London of a faithful old servant, who had attended my mother in
her last moments. I gave it to Michael. "Call there to-morrow
morning," I said. "You will find me waiting for you."

He looked at Lady Claudia, evidently unwilling to leave me alone
with her. "Fear nothing," I said; "I am old enough to take care
of myself. I have only a word to say to this lady before I leave
the house. "With that, I took his arm, and walked with him to the
door, and said good-by almost as composedly as if we had been
husband and wife already.

Lady Claudia's eyes followed me as I shut the door again and
crossed the room to a second door which led into my bed-chamber.
She suddenly stepped up to me, just as I was entering the room,
and laid her hand on my arm.

"What do I see in your face?" she asked as much of herself as of
me--with her eyes fixed in keen inquiry on mine.

"You shall know directly," I answered. "Let me get my bonnet and
cloak first."

"Do you mean to leave the house?"

"I do."

She rang the bell. I quietly dressed myself, to go out.

The servant answered the bell, as I returned to the sitting-room.

"Tell your master I wish to see him instantly," said Lady
Claudia.

"My master has gone out, my lady."

"To his club?"

"I believe so, my lady."

"I will send you with a letter to him. Come back when I ring
again." She turned to me as the man withdrew. "Do you refuse to
stay here until the General returns?"

"I shall be happy to see the General, if you will inclose my
address in your letter to him."

Replying in those terms, I wrote the address for the second time.
Lady Claudia knew perfectly well, when I gave it to her, that I
was going to a respectable house kept by a woman who had nursed
me when I was a child.

"One last question," she said. "Am I to tell the General that it
is your intention to marry your groom?"

Her tone stung me into making an answer which I regretted the
moment it had passed my lips.

"You can put it more plainly, if you like," I said. "You can tell
the General that it is my intention to marry _your_ son."

She was near the door, on the point of leaving me. As I spoke,
she turned with a ghastly stare of horror--felt about her with
her hands as if she was groping in darkness--and dropped on the
floor.

I instantly summoned help. The women-servants carried her to my
bed. While they were restoring her to herself, I wrote a few
lines telling the miserable woman how I had discovered her
secret.

"Your husband's tranquillity," I added, "is as precious to me as
my own. As for your son, you know what he thinks of the mother
who deserted him. Your secret is safe in my keeping--safe from
your husband, safe from your son, to the end of my life."

I sealed up those words, and gave them to her when she had come
to herself again. I never heard from her in reply. I have never
seen her from that time to this. She knows she can trust me.

And what did my good uncle say, when we next met? I would rather
report what he did, when he had got the better of his first
feelings of anger and surprise on hearing of my contemplated
marriage. He consented to receive us on our wedding-day; and he
gave my husband the appointment which places us both in an
independent position for life.

But he had his misgivings. He checked me when I tried to thank
him.

"Come back in a year's time," he said. "I will wait to be thanked
till the experience of your married life tells me that I have
deserved it."

The year passed; and the General received the honest expression
of my gratitude. He smiled and kissed me; but there was something
in his face which suggested that he was not quite satisfied yet.

"Do you believe that I have spoken sincerely?" I asked.

"I firmly believe it," he answered--and there he stopped.

A wiser woman would have taken the hint and dropped the subject.
My folly persisted in putting another question:

"Tell me, uncle. Haven't I proved that I was right when I married
my groom?"

"No, my dear. You have only proved that you are a lucky woman!"


MR. LEPEL AND THE HOUSEKEEPER

FIRST EPOCH.

THE Italians are born actors.

At this conclusion I arrived, sitting in a Roman theater--now
many years since. My friend and traveling companion, Rothsay,
cordially agreed with me. Experience had given us some claim to
form an opinion. We had visited, at that time, nearly every city
in Italy. Where-ever a theater was open, we had attended the
performances of the companies which travel from place to place;
and we had never seen bad acting from first to last. Men and
women, whose names are absolutely unknown in England, played (in
modern comedy and drama for the most part) with a general level
of dramatic ability which I have never seen equaled in the
theaters of other nations. Incapable Italian actors there must
be, no doubt. For my own part I have only discovered them, by
ones and twos, in England; appearing among the persons engaged to
support Salvini and Ristori before the audiences of London.

On the occasion of which I am now writing, the night's
performances consisted of two plays. An accident, to be presently
related, prevented us from seeing more than the introductory part
of the second piece. That one act--in respect of the influence
which the remembrance of it afterward exercised over Rothsay and
myself--claims a place of its own in the opening pages of the
present narrative.

The scene of the story was laid in one of the principalities of
Italy, in the bygone days of the Carbonaro conspiracies. The
chief persons were two young noblemen, friends affectionately
attached to each other, and a beautiful girl born in the lower
ranks of life

On the rising of the curtain, the scene before us was the
courtyard of a prison. We found the beautiful girl (called Celia
as well as I can recollect) in great distress; confiding her
sorrows to the jailer's daughter. Her father was pining in the
prison, charged with an offense of which he was innocent; and she
herself was suffering the tortures of hopeless love. She was on
the point of confiding her secret to her friend, when the
appearance of the young nobleman closed her lips. The girls at
once withdrew; and the two friends--whom I now only remember as
the Marquis and the Count--began the dialogue which prepared us
for the story of the play.

The Marquis had been tried for conspiracy against the reigning
Prince and his government; had been found guilty, and is
condemned to be shot that evening. He accepts his sentence with
the resignation of a man who is weary of his life. Young as he
is, he has tried the round of pleasures without enjoyment; he has
no interests, no aspirations, no hopes; he looks on death as a
welcome release. His friend the Count, admitted to a farewell
interview, has invented a stratagem by which the prisoner may
escape and take to flight. The Marquis expresses a grateful sense
of obligation, and prefers being shot. "I don't value my life,"
he says; "I am not a happy man like you." Upon this the Count
mentions circumstances which he has hitherto kept secret. He
loves the charming Celia, and loves in vain. Her reputation is
unsullied; she possesses every good quality that a man can desire
in a wife--but the Count's social position forbids him to marry a
woman of low birth. He is heart-broken; and he too finds life
without hope a burden that is not to be borne. The Marquis at
once sees a way of devoting himself to his friend's interests. He
is rich; his money is at his own disposal; he will bequeath a
marriage portion to Celia which will make her one of the richest
women in Italy. The Count receives this proposal with a sigh. "No
money," he says, "will remove the obstacle that still remains. My
father's fatal objection to Celia is her rank in life. "The
Marquis walks apart--considers a little--consults his watch--and
returns with a new idea. "I have nearly two hours of life still
left," he says. "Send for Celia: she was here just now, and she
is probably in her father's cell." The Count is at a loss to
understand what this proposal means. The Marquis explains
himself. "I ask your permission," he resumes, "to offer marriage
to Celia--for your sake. The chaplain of the prison will perform
the ceremony. Before dark, the girl you love will be my widow. My
widow is a lady of title--a fit wife for the greatest nobleman in
the land." The Count protests and refuses in vain. The jailer is
sent to find Celia. She appears. Unable to endure the scene, the
Count rushes out in horror. The Marquis takes the girl into his
confidence, and makes his excuses. If she becomes a widow of
rank, she may not only marry the Count, but will be in a position
to procure the liberty of the innocent old man, whose strength is
failing him under the rigors of imprisonment. Celia hesitates.
After a struggle with herself, filial love prevails, and she
consents. The jailer announces that the chaplain is waiting; the
bride and bridegroom withdraw to the prison chapel. Left on the
stage, the jailer hears a distant sound in the city, which he is
at a loss to understand. It sinks, increases again, travels
nearer to the prison, and now betrays itself as the sound of
multitudinous voices in a state of furious uproar. Has the
conspiracy broken out again? Yes! The whole population has risen;
the soldiers have refused to fire on the people; the terrified
Prince has dismissed his ministers, and promises a constitution.
The Marquis, returning from the ceremony which has just made
Celia his wife, is presented with a free pardon, and with the
offer of a high place in the re-formed ministry. A new life is
opening before him--and he has innocently ruined his friend's
prospects! On this striking situation the drop-curtain falls.

While we were still applauding the first act, Rothsay alarmed me:
he dropped from his seat at my side, like a man struck dead. The
stifling heat in the theater had proved too much for him. We
carried him out at once into the fresh air. When he came to his
senses, my friend entreated me to leave him, and see the end of
the play. To my mind, he looked as if he might faint again. I
insisted on going back with him to our hotel.

On the next day I went to the theater, to ascertain if the play
would be repeated. The box-office was closed. The dramatic
company had left Rome.

My interest in discovering how the story ended led me next to the
booksellers' shops--in the hope of buying the play. Nobody knew
anything about it. Nobody could tell me whether it was the
original work of an Italian writer, or whether it had been stolen
(and probably disfigured) from the French. As a fragment I had
seen it. As a fragment it has remained from that time to this.

SECOND EPOCH.

ONE of my objects in writing these lines is to vindicate the
character of an innocent woman (formerly in my service as
housekeeper) who has been cruelly slandered. Absorbed in the
pursuit of my purpose, it has only now occurred to me that
strangers may desire to know something more than they know now of
myself and my friend. "Give us some idea," they may say, "of what
sort of persons you are, if you wish to interest us at the outset
of your story."

A most reasonable suggestion, I admit. Unfortunately, I am not
the right man to comply with it.

In the first place, I cannot pretend to pronounce judgment on my
own character. In the second place, I am incapable of writing
impartially of my friend. At the imminent  risk of his own life,
Rothsay re scued me from a dreadful death by accident, when we
were at college together. Who can expect me to speak of his
faults? I am not even capable of seeing them.

Under these embarrassing circumstances--and not forgetting, at
the same time, that a servant's opinion of his master and his
master's friends may generally be trusted not to err on the
favorable side--I am tempted to call my valet as a witness to
character.

I slept badly on our first night at Rome; and I happened to be
awake while the man was talking of us confidentially in the
courtyard of the hotel--just under my bedroom window. Here, to
the best of my recollection, is a faithful report of what he said
to some friend among the servants who understood English:

"My master's well connected, you must know--though he's only
plain Mr. Lepel. His uncle's the great lawyer, Lord Lepel; and
his late father was a banker. Rich, did you say? I should think
he _was_ rich--and be hanged to him! No, not married, and not
likely to be. Owns he was forty last birthday; a regular old
bachelor. Not a bad sort, taking him altogether. The worst of him
is, he is one of the most indiscreet persons I ever met with.
Does the queerest things, when the whim takes him, and doesn't
care what other people think of it. They say the Lepels have all
got a slate loose in the upper story. Oh, no; not a very old
family--I mean, nothing compared to the family of his friend,
young Rothsay. _They_ count back, as I have heard, to the ancient
kings of Scotland. Between ourselves, the ancient kings haven't
left the Rothsays much money. They would be glad, I'll be bound,
to get my rich master for one of their daughters. Poor as Job, I
tell you. This young fellow, traveling with us, has never had a
spare five-pound note since he was born. Plenty of brains in his
head, I grant you; and a little too apt sometimes to be
suspicious of other people. But liberal--oh, give him his
due--liberal in a small way. Tips me with a sovereign now and
then. I take it--Lord bless you, I take it. What do you say? Has
he got any employment? Not he! Dabbles in chemistry (experiments,
and that sort of thing) by way of amusing himself; and tells the
most infernal lies about it. The other day he showed me a bottle
about as big as a thimble, with what looked like water in it, and
said it was enough to poison everybody in the hotel. What rot!
Isn't that the clock striking again? Near about bedtime, I should
say. Wish you good night."

There are our characters--drawn on the principle of justice
without mercy, by an impudent rascal who is the best valet in
England. Now you know what sort of persons we are; and now we may
go on again.




Rothsay and I parted, soon after our night at the theater. He
went to Civita Vecchia to join a friend's yacht, waiting for him
in the harbor. I turned homeward, traveling at a leisurely rate
through the Tyrol and Germany.

After my arrival in England, certain events in my life occurred
which did not appear to have any connection at the time. They
led, nevertheless, to consequences which seriously altered the
relations of happy past years between Rothsay and myself.

The first event took place on my return to my house in London. I
found among the letters waiting for me an invitation from Lord
Lepel to spend a few weeks with him at his country seat in
Sussex.

I had made so many excuses, in past years, when I received
invitations from my uncle, that I was really ashamed to plead
engagements in London again. There was no unfriendly feeling
between us. My only motive for keeping away from him took its
rise in dislike of the ordinary modes of life in an English
country-house. A man who feels no interest in politics, who cares
nothing for field sports, who is impatient of amateur music and
incapable of small talk, is a man out of his element in country
society. This was my unlucky case. I went to Lord Lepel's house
sorely against my will; longing already for the day when it would
be time to say good-by.

The routine of my uncle's establishment had remained unaltered
since my last experience of it.

I found my lord expressing the same pride in his collection of
old masters, and telling the same story of the wonderful escape
of his picture-gallery from fire--I renewed my acquaintance with
the same members of Parliament among the guests, all on the same
side in politics--I joined in the same dreary amusements--I
saluted the same resident priest (the Lepels are all born and
bred Roman Catholics)--I submitted to the same rigidly early
breakfast hour; and inwardly cursed the same peremptory bell,
ringing as a means of reminding us of our meals. The one change
that presented itself was a change out of the house. Death had
removed the lodgekeeper at the park-gate. His widow and daughter
(Mrs. Rymer and little Susan) remained in their pretty cottage.
They had been allowed by my lord's kindness to take charge of the
gate.

Out walking, on the morning after my arrival, I was caught in a
shower on my way back to the park, and took shelter in the lodge.

In the bygone days I had respected Mrs. Rymer's husband as a
thoroughly worthy man--but Mrs. Rymer herself was no great
favorite of mine. She had married beneath her, as the phrase is,
and she was a little too conscious of it. A woman with a sharp
eye to her own interests; selfishly discontented with her
position in life, and not very scrupulous in her choice of means
when she had an end in view: that is how I describe Mrs. Rymer.
Her daughter, whom I only remembered as a weakly child,
astonished me when I saw her again after the interval that had
elapsed. The backward flower had bloomed into perfect health.
Susan was now a lovely little modest girl of seventeen--with a
natural delicacy and refinement of manner, which marked her to my
mind as one of Nature's gentlewomen. When I entered the lodge she
was writing at a table in a corner, having some books on it, and
rose to withdraw. I begged that she would proceed with her
employment, and asked if I might know what it was. She answered
me with a blush, and a pretty brightening of her clear blue eyes.
"I am trying, sir, to teach myself French," she said. The weather
showed no signs of improving--I volunteered to help her, and
found her such an attentive and intelligent pupil that I looked
in at the lodge from time to time afterward, and continued my
instructions. The younger men among my uncle's guests set their
own stupid construction on my attentions "to the girl at the
gate," as they called her--rather too familiarly, according to my
notions of propriety. I contrived to remind them that I was old
enough to be Susan's father, in a manner which put an end to
their jokes; and I was pleased to hear, when I next went to the
lodge, that Mrs. Rymer had been wise enough to keep these
facetious gentlemen at their proper distance

The day of my departure arrived. Lord Leper took leave of me
kindly, and asked for news of Rothsay. "Let me know when your
friend returns," my uncle said; "he belongs to a good old stock.
Put me in mind of him when I next invite you to come to my
house."

On my way to the train I stopped of course at the lodge to say
good-by. Mrs. Rymer came out alone I asked for Susan.

"My daughter is not very well to-day."

"Is she confined to her room?"

"She is in the parlor."

I might have been mistaken, but I thought Mrs. Rymer answered me
in no very friendly way. Resolved to judge for myself, I entered
the lodge, and found my poor little pupil sitting in a corner,
crying. When I asked her what was the matter, the excuse of a
"bad headache" was the only reply that I received. The natures of
young girls are a hopeless puzzle to me. Susan seemed, for some
reason which it was impossible to understand, to be afraid to
look at me.

"Have you and your mother been quarreling?" I asked.

"Oh, no!"

She denied it with such evident sincerity that I could not for a
moment suspect her of deceiving me. Whatever the cause of her
distress might be, it was plain that she had her own reasons for
keeping it a secret.

Her French books were on the table. I tried a little allusion to
her lessons.

"I hope you will  go on regularly with your studies ," I said.

"I will do my best, sir--without you to help me."

She said it so sadly that I proposed--purely from the wish to
encourage her--a continuation of our lessons through the post.

"Send your exercises to me once a week," I suggested; "and I will
return them corrected "

She thanked me in low tones, with a shyness of manner which I had
never noticed in her before. I had done my best to cheer her--and
I was conscious, as we shook hands at parting, that I had failed.
A feeling of disappointment overcomes me when I see young people
out of spirits. I was sorry for Susan.

THIRD EPOCH.

ONE of my faults (which has not been included in the list set
forth by my valet) is a disinclination to occupy myself with my
own domestic affairs. The proceedings of my footman, while I had
been away from home, left me no alternative but to dismiss him on
my return. With this exertion of authority my interference as
chief of the household came to an end. I left it to my excellent
housekeeper, Mrs. Mozeen, to find a sober successor to the
drunken vagabond who had been sent away. She discovered a
respectable young man--tall, plump, and rosy--whose name was
Joseph, and whose character was beyond reproach. I have but one
excuse for noticing such a trifling event as this. It took its
place, at a later period, in the chain which was slowly winding
itself round me.

My uncle had asked me to prolong my visit and I should probably
have consented, but for anxiety on the subject of a near and dear
relative--my sister. Her health had been failing since the death
of her husband, to whom she was tenderly attached. I heard news
of her while I was in Sussex, which hurried me back to town. In a
month more, her death deprived me of my last living relation. She
left no children; and my two brothers had both died unmarried
while they were still young men.

This affliction placed me in a position of serious embarrassment,
in regard to the disposal of my property after my death.

I had hitherto made no will; being well aware that my fortune
(which was entirely in money) would go in due course of law to
the person of all others who would employ it to the best
purpose--that is to say, to my sister as my nearest of kin. As I
was now situated, my property would revert to my uncle if I died
intestate. He was a richer man than I was. Of his two children,
both sons, the eldest would inherit his estates: the youngest had
already succeeded to his mother's ample fortune. Having literally
no family claims on me, I felt bound to recognize the wider
demands of poverty and misfortune, and to devote my superfluous
wealth to increasing the revenues of charitable institutions. As
to minor legacies, I owed it to my good housekeeper, Mrs. Mozeen,
not to forget the faithful services of past years. Need I add--if
I had been free to act as I pleased--that I should have gladly
made Rothsay the object of a handsome bequest? But this was not
to be. My friend was a man morbidly sensitive on the subject of
money. In the early days of our intercourse we had been for the
first and only time on the verge of a quarrel, when I had asked
(as a favor to myself) to be allowed to provide for him in my
will.

"It is because I am poor," he explained, "that I refuse to profit
by your kindness--though I feel it gratefully."

I failed to understand him--and said so plainly.

"You will understand this," he resumed; "I should never recover
my sense of degradation, if a mercenary motive on my side was
associated with our friendship. Don't say it's impossible! You
know as well as I do that appearances would be against me, in the
eyes of the world. Besides, I don't want money; my own small
income is enough for me. Make me your executor if you like, and
leave me the customary present of five hundred pounds. If you
exceed that sum I declare on my word of honor that I will not
touch one farthing of it." He took my hand, and pressed it
fervently. "Do me a favor," he said. "Never let us speak of this
again !"

I understood that I must yield--or lose my friend.

In now making my will, I accordingly appointed Rothsay one of my
executors, on the terms that he had prescribed. The minor
legacies having been next duly reduced to writing, I left the
bulk of my fortune to public charities.

My lawyer laid the fair copy of the will on my table.

"A dreary disposition of property for a man of your age," he
said, "I hope to receive a new set of instructions before you are
a year older."

"What instructions?" I asked.

"To provide for your wife and children," he answered.

My wife and children! The idea seemed to be so absurd that I
burst out laughing. It never occurred to me that there could be
any absurdity from my own point of view.

I was sitting alone, after my legal adviser had taken his leave,
looking absently at the newly-engrossed will, when I heard a
sharp knock at the house-door which I thought I recognized. In
another minute Rothsay's bright face enlivened my dull room. He
had returned from the Mediterranean that morning.

"Am I interrupting you?" he asked, pointing to the leaves of
manuscript before me. "Are you writing a book?"

"I am making my will."

His manner changed; he looked at me seriously.

"Do you remember what I said, when we once talked of your will?"
he asked. I set his doubts at rest immediately--but he was not
quite satisfied yet. "Can't you put your will away?" he
suggested. "I hate the sight of anything that reminds me of
death."

"Give me a minute to sign it," I said--and rang to summon the
witnesses.

Mrs. Mozeen answered the bell. Rothsay looked at her, as if he
wished to have my housekeeper put away as well as my will. From
the first moment when he had seen her, he conceived a great
dislike to that good creature. There was nothing, I am sure,
personally repellent about her. She was a little slim quiet
woman, with a pale complexion and bright brown eyes. Her
movements were gentle; her voice was low; her decent gray dress
was adapted to her age. Why Rothsay should dislike her was more
than he could explain himself. He turned his unreasonable
prejudice into a joke--and said he hated a woman who wore slate
colored cap-ribbons!

I explained to Mrs. Mozeen that I wanted witnesses to the
signature of my will. Naturally enough--being in the room at the
time--she asked if she could be one of them.

I was obliged to say No; and not to mortify her, I gave the
reason.

"My will recognizes what I owe to your good services," I said.
"If you are one of the witnesses, you will lose your legacy. Send
up the men-servants."

With her customary tact, Mrs. Mozeen expressed her gratitude
silently, by a look--and left the room.

"Why couldn't you tell that woman to send the servants, without
mentioning her legacy?" Rothsay asked. "My friend Lepel, you have
done a very foolish thing."

"In what way?"

"You have given Mrs. Mozeen an interest in your death."

It was impossible to make a serious reply to this ridiculous
exhibition of Rothsay's prejudice against poor Mrs. Mozeen.

"When am I to be murdered?" I asked. "And how is it to be done?
Poison?"

"I'm not joking," Rothsay answered. "You are infatuated about
your housekeeper. When you spoke of her legacy, did you notice
her eyes."

"Yes."

"Did nothing strike you?"

"It struck me that they were unusually well preserved eyes for a
woman of her age."

The appearance of the valet and the footman put an end to this
idle talk. The will was executed, and locked up. Our conversation
turned on Rothsay's travels by sea. The cruise had been in every
way successful. The matchless shores of the Mediterranean defied
description; the sailing of the famous yacht had proved to be
worthy of her reputation; and, to crown all, Rothsay had come
back to England, in a fair way, for the first time in his life,
of making money.

"I have discovered a treasure," he announced.

"It _was_ a dirty little modern picture, picked up in a by-street
at Palermo. It is a Virgin and Child, by Guido."

On further explanation it appeared that the picture exposed for
sale was painted on copper. Noticing the contrast between the
rare material and the wretchedly bad painting that covered it,
Rothsay had called t o mind some of the well-known stories of
valuable works of art that had been painted over for purposes of
disguise. The price asked for the picture amounted to little more
than the value of the metal. Rothsay bought it. His knowledge of
chemistry enabled him to put his suspicion successfully to the
test; and one of the guests on board the yacht--a famous French
artist--had declared his conviction that the picture now revealed
to view was a genuine work by Guido. Such an opinion as this
convinced me that it would be worth while to submit my friend's
discovery to the judgment of other experts. Consulted
independently, these critics confirmed the view taken by the
celebrated personage who had first seen the work. This result
having been obtained, Rothsay asked my advice next on the
question of selling his picture. I at once thought of my uncle.
An undoubted work by Guido would surely be an acquisition to his
gallery. I had only (in accordance with his own request) to let
him know that my friend had returned to England. We might take
the picture with us, when we received our invitation to Lord
Lepel's house.

FOURTH EPOCH.

My uncle's answer arrived by return of post. Other engagements
obliged him to defer receiving us for a month. At the end of that
time, we were cordially invited to visit him, and to stay as long
as we liked.

In the interval that now passed, other events occurred--still of
the trifling kind.

One afternoon, just as I was thinking of taking my customary ride
in the park, the servant appeared charged with a basket of
flowers, and with a message from Mrs. Rymer, requesting me to
honor her by accepting a little offering from her daughter.
Hearing that she was then waiting in the hall, I told the man to
show her in. Susan (as I ought to have already mentioned) had
sent her exercises to me regularly every week. In returning them
corrected, I had once or twice added a word of well-deserved
approval. The offering of flowers was evidently intended to
express my pupil's grateful sense of the interest taken in her by
her teacher.

I had no reason, this time, to suppose that Mrs. Rymer
entertained an unfriendly feeling toward me. At the first words
of greeting that passed between us I perceived a change in her
manner, which ran in the opposite extreme. She overwhelmed me
with the most elaborate demonstrations of politeness and respect;
dwelling on her gratitude for my kindness in receiving her, and
on her pride at seeing her daughter's flowers on my table, until
I made a resolute effort to stop her by asking (as if it was
actually a matter of importance to me!) whether she was in London
on business or on pleasure.

"Oh, on business, sir! My poor husband invested his little
savings in bank stock, and I have just been drawing my dividend.
I do hope you don't think my girl over-bold in venturing to send
you a few flowers. She wouldn't allow me to interfere. I do
assure you she would gather and arrange them with her own hands.
In themselves I know they are hardly worth accepting; but if you
will allow the motive to plead--"

I made another effort to stop Mrs. Rymer; I said her daughter
could not have sent me a prettier present.

The inexhaustible woman only went on more fluently than ever.

"She is so grateful, sir, and so proud of your goodness in
looking at her exercises. The difficulty of the French language
seem as nothing to her, now her motive is to please you. She is
so devoted to her studies that I find it difficult to induce her
to take the exercise necessary to her health; and, as you may
perhaps remember, Susan was always rather weakly as a child. She
inherits her father's constitution, Mr. Lepel--not mine."

Here, to my infinite relief, the servant appeared, announcing
that my horse was at the door.

Mrs. Rymer opened her mouth. I saw a coming flood of apologies on
the point of pouring out--and seized my hat on the spot. I
declared I had an appointment; I sent kind remembrances to Susan
(pitying her for having such a mother with my whole heart); I
said I hoped to return to my uncle's house soon, and to continue
the French lessons. The one thing more that I remember was
finding myself safe in the saddle, and out of the reach of Mrs.
Rymer's tongue.

Reflecting on what had passed, it was plain to me that this woman
had some private end in view, and that my abrupt departure had
prevented her from finding the way to it. What motive could she
possibly have for that obstinate persistence in presenting poor
Susan under a favorable aspect, to a man who had already shown
that he was honestly interested in her pretty modest daughter? I
tried hard to penetrate the mystery--and gave it up in despair.

Three days before the date at which Rothsay and I were to pay our
visit to Lord Lepel, I found myself compelled to undergo one of
the minor miseries of human life. In other words I became one of
the guests at a large dinner-party. It was a rainy day in
October. My position at the table placed me between a window that
was open and a door that was hardly ever shut. I went to bed
shivering; and woke the next morning with a headache and a
difficulty in breathing. On consulting the doctor, I found that I
was suffering from an attack of bronchitis. There was no reason
to be alarmed. If I remained indoors, and submitted to the
necessary treatment, I might hope to keep my engagement with my
uncle in ten days or a fortnight.

There was no alternative but to submit. I accordingly arranged
with Rothsay that he should present himself at Lord Lepel's house
(taking the picture with him), on the date appointed for our
visit, and that I should follow as soon as I was well enough to
travel.

On the day when he was to leave London, my friend kindly came to
keep me company for a while. He was followed into my room by Mrs.
Mozeen, with a bottle of medicine in her hand. This worthy
creature, finding that the doctor's directions occasionally
escaped my memory, devoted herself to the duty of administering
the remedies at the prescribed intervals of time. When she left
the room, having performed her duties as usual, I saw Rothsay's
eyes follow her to the door with an expression of sardonic
curiosity. He put a strange question to me as soon as we were
alone.

"Who engaged that new servant of yours?" he asked. "I mean the
fat fellow, with the curly flaxen hair."

"Hiring servants," I replied, "is not much in my way. I left the
engagement of the new man to Mrs. Mozeen."

Rothsay walked gravely up to my bedside.

"Lepel," he said, "your respectable housekeeper is in love with
the fat young footman."

It is not easy to amuse a man suffering from bronchitis. But this
new outbreak of absurdity was more than I could resist, even with
a mustard-plaster on my chest.

"I thought I should raise your spirits," Rothsay proceeded. "When
I came to your house this morning, the valet opened the door to
me. I expressed my surprise at his condescending to take that
trouble. He informed me that Joseph was otherwise engaged. 'With
anybody in particular?' I asked, humoring the joke. 'Yes, sir,
with the housekeeper. She's teaching him how to brush his hair,
so as to show off his good looks to the best advantage.' Make up
your mind, my friend, to lose Mrs. Mozeen--especially if she
happens to have any money."

"Nonsense, Rothsay! The poor woman is old enough to be Joseph's
mother."

"My good fellow, that won't make any difference to Joseph. In the
days when we were rich enough to keep a man-servant, our
footman--as handsome a fellow as ever you saw, and no older than
I am--married a witch with a lame leg. When I asked him why he
had made such a fool of himself he looked quite indignant, and
said: 'Sir! she has got six hundred pounds.' He and the witch
keep a public house. What will you bet me that we don't see your
housekeeper drawing beer at the bar, and Joseph getting drunk in
the parlor, before we are a year older?"

I was not well enough to prolong my enjoyment of Rothsay's boyish
humor. Besides, exaggeration to be really amusing must have some
relation, no matter how slender it may be, to the truth. My
housekeeper belonged to a respectable family,  and was essentially
a person accust omed to respect herself. Her brother occupied a
position of responsibility in the establishment of a firm of
chemists whom I had employed for years past. Her late husband had
farmed his own land, and had owed his ruin to calamities for
which he was in no way responsible. Kind-hearted Mrs. Mozeen was
just the woman to take a motherly interest in a well-disposed lad
like Joseph; and it was equally characteristic of my
valet--especially when Rothsay was thoughtless enough to
encourage him--to pervert an innocent action for the sake of
indulging in a stupid jest. I took advantage of my privilege as
an invalid, and changed the subject.

A week passed. I had expected to hear from Rothsay. To my
surprise and disappointment no letter arrived.

Susan was more considerate. She wrote, very modestly and
prettily, to say that she and her mother had heard of my illness
from Mr. Rothsay, and to express the hope that I should soon be
restored to health. A few days later, Mrs. Rymer's politeness
carried her to the length of taking the journey to London to make
inquiries at my door. I did not see her, of course. She left word
that she would have the honor of calling again.

The second week followed. I had by that time perfectly recovered
from my attack of bronchitis--and yet I was too ill to leave the
house.

The doctor himself seemed to be at a loss to understand the
symptoms that now presented themselves. A vile sensation of
nausea tried my endurance, and an incomprehensible prostration of
strength depressed my spirits. I felt such a strange reluctance
to exert myself that I actually left it to Mrs. Mozeen to write
to my uncle in my name, and say that I was not yet well enough to
visit him. My medical adviser tried various methods of treatment;
my housekeeper administered the prescribed medicines with
unremitting care; but nothing came of it. A physician of great
authority was called into consultation. Being completely puzzled,
he retreated to the last refuge of bewildered doctors. I asked
him what was the matter with me. And he answered: "Suppressed
gout."

FIFTH EPOCH.

MIDWAY in the third week, my uncle wrote to me as follows:


"I have been obliged to request your friend Rothsay to bring his
visit to a conclusion. Although he refuses to confess it, I have
reason to believe that he has committed the folly of falling
seriously in love with the young girl at my lodge gate. I have
tried remonstrance in vain; and I write to his father at the same
time that I write to you. There is much more that I might say. I
reserve it for the time when I hope to have the pleasure of
seeing you, restored to health."


Two days after the receipt of this alarming letter Rothsay
returned to me.

Ill as I was, I forgot my sufferings the moment I looked at him.
Wild and haggard, he stared at me with bloodshot eyes like a man
demented.

"Do you think I am mad? I dare say I am. I can't live without
her." Those were the first words he said when we shook hands.

But I had more influence over him than any other person; and,
weak as I was, I exerted it. Little by little, he became more
reasonable; he began to speak like his old self again.

To have expressed any surprise, on my part, at what had happened,
would have been not only imprudent, but unworthy of him and of
me. My first inquiry was suggested by the fear that he might have
been hurried into openly confessing his passion to
Susan--although his position forbade him to offer marriage. I had
done him an injustice. His honorable nature had shrunk from the
cruelty of raising hopes, which, for all he knew to the contrary,
might never be realized. At the same time, he had his reasons for
believing that he was at least personally acceptable to her.

"She was always glad to see me," said poor Rothsay. "We
constantly talked of you. She spoke of your kindness so prettily
and so gratefully. Oh, Lepel, it is not her beauty only that has
won my heart! Her nature is the nature of an angel."

His voice failed him. For the first time in my remembrance of our
long companionship, he burst into tears.

I was so shocked and distressed that I had the greatest
difficulty in preserving my own self-control. In the effort to
comfort him, I asked if he had ventured to confide in his father.

"You are the favorite son," I reminded him. "Is there no gleam of
hope in the future?"

He had written to his father. In silence he gave me the letter in
reply.

It was expressed with a moderation which I had hardly dared to
expect. Mr. Rothsay the elder admitted that he had himself
married for love, and that his wife's rank in the social scale
(although higher than Susan's) had not been equal to his own.

"In such a family as ours," he wrote--perhaps with pardonable
pride--"we raise our wives to our own degree. But this young
person labors under a double disadvantage. She is obscure, and
she is poor. What have you to offer her? Nothing. And what have I
to give you? Nothing."

This meant, as I interpreted it, that the main obstacle in the
way was Susan's poverty. And I was rich! In the excitement that
possessed me, I followed the impulse of the moment headlong, like
a child.

"While you were away from me," I said to Rothsay, "did you never
once think of your old friend? Must I remind you that I can make
Susan your wife with one stroke of my pen?" He looked at me in
silent surprise. I took my check-book from the drawer of the
table, and placed the inkstand within reach. "Susan's marriage
portion," I said, "is a matter of a line of writing, with my name
at the end of it."

He burst out with an exclamation that stopped me, just as my pen
touched the paper.

"Good heavens!" he cried, "you are thinking of that play we saw
at Rome! Are we on the stage? Are you performing the part of the
Marquis--and am I the Count?"

I was so startled by this wild allusion to the past--I recognized
with such astonishment the reproduction of one of the dramatic
situations in the play, at a crisis in his life and mine--that
the use of the pen remained suspended in my hand. For the first
time in my life I was conscious of a sensation which resembled
superstitious dread.

Rothsay recovered himself first. He misinterpreted what was
passing in my mind.

"Don't think me ungrateful," he said. "You dear, kind, good
fellow, consider for a moment, and you will see that it can't be.
What would be said of her and of me, if you made Susan rich with
your money, and if I married her? The poor innocent would be
called your cast-off mistress. People would say: 'He has behaved
liberally to her, and his needy friend has taken advantage of
it.' "

The point of view which I had failed to see was put with terrible
directness of expression: the conviction that I was wrong was
literally forced on me. What reply could I make? Rothsay
evidently felt for me.

"You are ill," he said, gently; "let me leave you to rest."

He held out his hand to say good-by. I insisted on his taking up
his abode with me, for the present at least. Ordinary persuasion
failed to induce him to yield. I put it on selfish grounds next.

"You have noticed that I am ill," I said, "I want you to keep me
company."

He gave way directly.

Through the wakeful night, I tried to consider what moral
remedies might be within our reach. The one useful conclusion at
which I could arrive was to induce Rothsay to try what absence
and change might do to compose his mind. To advise him to travel
alone was out of the question. I wrote to his one other old
friend besides myself--the friend who had taken him on a cruise
in the Mediterranean.

The owner of the yacht had that very day given directions to have
his vessel laid up for the winter season. He at once
countermanded the order by telegraph. "I am an idle man," he
said, "and I am as fond of Rothsay as you are. I will take him
wherever he likes to go." It was not easy to persuade the object
of these kind intentions to profit by them. Nothing that I could
say roused him. I spoke to him of his picture. He had left it at
my uncle's house, and neither knew nor cared to know whether it
had been sold or not. The one consideration which ultimately
influenced Rothsay was presented by the doctor; speaking as
follows (to quote his own explanation) in the interests of my
health:

"I warned your friend," he said, "that his conduct was causing
anxiety which you were not strong enough to bear. On hearing this
he at once promised to follow the advice which you had given to
him, and to join the yacht. As you know, he has kept his word.
May I ask if he has ever followed the medical profession?"

Replying in the negative, I begged the doctor to tell me why he
had put his question.

He answered, "Mr. Rothsay requested me to tell him all that I
knew about your illness. I complied, of course; mentioning that I
had lately adopted a new method of treatment, and that I had
every reason to feel confident of the results. He was so
interested in the symptoms of your illness, and in the remedies
being tried, that he took notes in his pocketbook of what I had
said. When he paid me that compliment, I thought it possible that
I might be speaking to a colleague."

I was pleased to hear of my friend's anxiety for my recovery. If
I had been in better health, I might have asked myself what
reason he could have had for making those entries in his
pocketbook.

Three days later, another proof reached me of Rothsay's anxiety
for my welfare.

The owner of the yacht wrote to beg that I would send him a
report of my health, addressed to a port on the south coast of
England, to which they were then bound. "If we don't hear good
news," he added, "I have reason to fear that Rothsay will
overthrow our plans for the recovery of his peace of mind by
leaving the vessel, and making his own inquiries at your
bedside."

With no small difficulty I roused myself sufficiently to write a
few words with my own hand. They were words that lied--for my
poor friend's sake. In a postscript, I begged my correspondent to
let me hear if the effect produced on Rothsay had answered to our
hopes and expectations.

SIXTH EPOCH.

THE weary days followed each other--and time failed to justify
the doctor's confidence in his new remedies. I grew weaker and
weaker.

My uncle came to see me. He was so alarmed that he insisted on a
consultation being held with his own physician. Another great
authority was called in, at the same time, by the urgent request
of my own medical man. These distinguished persons held more than
one privy council, before they would consent to give a positive
opinion. It was an evasive opinion (encumbered with hard words of
Greek and Roman origin) when it was at last pronounced. I waited
until they had taken their leave, and then appealed to my own
doctor. "What do these men really think?" I asked. "Shall I live,
or die?"

The doctor answered for himself as well as for his illustrious
colleagues. "We have great faith in the new prescriptions," he
said.

I understood what that meant. They were afraid to tell me the
truth. I insisted on the truth.

"How long shall I live?" I said. "Till the end of the year?"

The reply followed in one terrible word:

"Perhaps."

It was then the first week in December. I understood that I might
reckon--at the utmost--on three weeks of life. What I felt, on
arriving at this conclusion, I shall not say. It is the one
secret I keep from the readers of these lines.

The next day, Mrs. Rymer called once more to make inquiries. Not
satisfied with the servant's report, she entreated that I would
consent to see her. My housekeeper, with her customary kindness,
undertook to convey the message. If she had been a wicked woman,
would she have acted in this way? "Mrs. Rymer seems to be sadly
distressed," she pleaded. "As I understand, sir, she is suffering
under some domestic anxiety which can only be mentioned to
yourself."

Did this anxiety relate to Susan? The bare doubt of it decided
me. I consented to see Mrs. Rymer. Feeling it necessary to
control her in the use of her tongue, I spoke the moment the door
was opened.

"I am suffering from illness; and I must ask you to spare me as
much as possible. What do you wish to say to me?"

The tone in which I addressed Mrs. Rymer would have offended a
more sensitive woman. The truth is, she had chosen an unfortunate
time for her visit. There were fluctuations in the progress of my
malady; there were days when I felt better, and days when I felt
worse--and this was a bad day. Moreover, my uncle had tried my
temper that morning. He had called to see me, on his way to
winter in the south of France by his physician's advice; and he
recommended a trial of change of air in my case also. His country
house (only thirty miles from London) was entirely at my
disposal; and the railway supplied beds for invalids. It was
useless to answer that I was not equal to the effort. He reminded
me that I had exerted myself to leave my bedchamber for my
arm-chair in the next room, and that a little additional
resolution would enable me to follow his advice. We parted in a
state of irritation on either side which, so far as I was
concerned, had not subsided yet.

"I wish to speak to you, sir, about my daughter," Mrs. Rymer
answered.

The mere allusion to Susan had its composing effect on me. I said
kindly that I hoped she was well.

"Well in body," Mrs. Rymer announced. "Far from it, sir, in
mind."

Before I could ask what this meant, we were interrupted by the
appearance of the servant, bringing the letters which had arrived
for me by the afternoon post. I told the man, impatiently, to put
them on the table at my side.

"What is distressing Susan?" I inquired, without stopping to look
at the letters.

"She is fretting, sir, about your illness. Oh, Mr. Lepel, if you
would only try the sweet country air! If you only had my good
little Susan to nurse you!"

_She_, too, taking my uncle's view! And talking of Susan as my
nurse!

"What are you thinking of?" I asked her. "A young girl like your
daughter nursing Me! You ought to have more regard for Susan's
good name!"

"I know what _you_ ought to do!" She made that strange reply with
a furtive look at me, half in anger, half in alarm.

"Go on," I said.

"Will you turn me out of your house for my impudence?" she asked.

"I will hear what you have to say to me. What ought I to do?"

"Marry Susan."

I heard the woman plainly--and yet, I declare, I doubted the
evidence of my senses.

"She's breaking her heart for you," Mrs. Rymer burst out. "She's
been in love with you since you first darkened our doors--and it
will end in the neighbors finding it out. I did my duty to her; I
tried to stop it; I tried to prevent you from seeing her, when
you went away. Too late; the mischief was done. When I see my
girl fading day by day--crying about you in secret, talking about
you in her dreams--I can't stand it; I must speak out. Oh, yes, I
know how far beneath you she is--the daughter of your uncle's
servant. But she's your equal, sir, in the sight of Heaven. My
lord's priest converted her only last year--and my Susan is as
good a Papist as yourself."

How could I let this go on? I felt that I ought to have stopped
it before.

"It's possible," I said, "that you may not be deliberately
deceiving me. If you are yourself deceived, I am bound to tell
you the truth. Mr. Rothsay loves your daughter, and, what is
more, Mr. Rothsay has reason to know that Susan--"

"That Susan loves him?" she interposed, with a mocking laugh.
"Oh, Mr. Lepel, is it possible that a clever man like you can't
see clearer than that? My girl in love with Mr. Rothsay! She
wouldn't have looked at him a second time if he hadn't talked to
her about _you_. When I complained privately to my lord of Mr.
Rothsay hanging about the lodge, do you think she turned as pale
as ashes, and cried when _he_ passed through the gate, and said
good-by?"

She had complained of Rothsay to Lord Lepel--I understood her at
last! She knew that my friend and all his family were poor. She
had put her own construction on the innocent interest that I had
taken in her daughter. Careless of the difference in rank, blind
to the malady that was killing me, she was now bent on separating
Rothsay and Susan, by throwing the girl into the arms of a rich
husband like myself!

"You are wasting your breath," I told her; "I don't believe one
word you say to me."

"Believe Susan, then!"
 cried the reckless woman. "Let me bring her here. If she's too
shamefaced to own the truth, look at her--that's all I ask--look
at her, and judge for yourself!"

This was intolerable. In justice to Susan, in justice to Rothsay,
I insisted on silence. "No more of it!" I said. "Take care how
you provoke me. Don't you see that I am ill? don't you see that
you are irritating me to no purpose?"

She altered her tone. "I'll wait," she said, quietly, "while you
compose yourself."

With those words, she walked to the window, and stood there with
her back toward me. Was the wretch taking advantage of my
helpless condition? I stretched out my hand to ring the bell, and
have her sent away--and hesitated to degrade Susan's mother, for
Susan's sake. In my state of prostration, how could I arrive at a
decision? My mind was dreadfully disturbed; I felt the imperative
necessity of turning my thoughts to some other subject. Looking
about me, the letters on the table attracted my attention.
Mechanically, I took them up; mechanically I put them down again.
Two of them slipped from my trembling fingers; my eyes fell on
the uppermost of the two. The address was in the handwriting of
the good friend with whom Rothsay was sailing.

Just as I had been speaking of Rothsay, here was the news of him
for which I had been waiting.

I opened the letter and read these words:


"There is, I fear, but little hope for our friend--unless this
girl on whom he has set his heart can (by some lucky change of
circumstances) become his wife. He has tried to master his
weakness; but his own infatuation is too much for him. He is
really and truly in a state of despair. Two evenings since--to
give you a melancholy example of what I mean--I was in my cabin,
when I heard the alarm of a man overboard. The man was Rothsay.
My sailing-master, seeing that he was unable to swim, jumped into
the sea and rescued him, as I got on deck. Rothsay declares it to
have been an accident; and everybody believes him but myself. I
know the state of his mind. Don't be alarmed; I will have him
well looked after; and I won't give him up just yet. We are still
bound southward, with a fair wind. If the new scenes which I hope
to show him prove to be of no avail, I must reluctantly take him
back to England. In that case, which I don't like to contemplate,
you may see him again--perhaps in a month's time."


He might return in a month's time--return to hear of the death of
the one friend, on whose power and will to help him he might have
relied. If I failed to employ in his interests the short interval
of life still left to me, could I doubt (after what I had just
read) what the end would be? How could I help him? Oh, God! how
could I help him?

Mrs. Rymer left the window, and returned to the chair which she
had occupied when I first received her.

"Are you quieter in your mind now?" she asked.

I neither answered her nor looked at her.

Still determined to reach her end, she tried again to force her
unhappy daughter on me. "Will you consent," she persisted, "to
see Susan?"

If she had been a little nearer to me, I am afraid I should have
struck her. "You wretch!" I said, "do you know that I am a dying
man?"

"While there's life there's hope," Mrs. Rymer remarked.

I ought to have controlled myself; but it was not to be done.

"Hope of your daughter being my rich widow?" I asked.

Her bitter answer followed instantly.

"Even then," she said, "Susan wouldn't marry Rothsay."

A lie! If circumstances favored her, I knew, on Rothsay's
authority, what Susan would do.

The thought burst on my mind, like light bursting on the eyes of
a man restored to sight. If Susan agreed to go through the form
of marriage with a dying bridegroom, my rich widow could (and
would) become Rothsay's wife. Once more, the remembrance of the
play at Rome returned, and set the last embers of resolution,
which sickness and suffering had left to me, in a flame. The
devoted friend of that imaginary story had counted on death to
complete his generous purpose in vain: _he_ had been condemned by
the tribunal of man, and had been reprieved. I--in his place, and
with his self-sacrifice in my mind--might found a firmer trust in
the future; for I had been condemned by the tribunal of God.

Encouraged by my silence, the obstinate woman persisted. "Won't
you even send a message to Susan?" she asked.

Rashly, madly, without an instant's hesitation, I answered:

"Go back to Susan, and say I leave it to _her_."

Mrs. Rymer started to her feet. "You leave it to Susan to be your
wife, if she likes?"

"I do."

"And if she consents?"

"_I_ consent."

In two weeks and a day from that time, the deed was done. When
Rothsay returned to England, he would ask for Susan--and he would
find my virgin-widow rich and free.

SEVENTH EPOCH.

WHATEVER may be thought of my conduct, let me say this in justice
to myself--I was resolved that Susan should not be deceived.

Half an hour after Mrs. Rymer had left my house, I wrote to her
daughter, plainly revealing the motive which led me to offer
marriage, solely in the future interest of Rothsay and herself.
"If you refuse," 1 said in conclusion, "you may depend on my
understanding you and feeling for you. But, if you consent--then
I have a favor to ask Never let us speak to one another of the
profanation that we have agreed to commit, for your faithful
lover's sake."

I had formed a high opinion of Susan--too high an opinion as it
seemed. Her reply surprised and disappointed me. In other words,
she gave her consent.

I stipulated that the marriage should be kept strictly secret,
for a certain period. In my own mind I decided that the interval
should be held to expire, either on the day of my death, or on
the day when Rothsay returned.

My next proceeding was to write in confidence to the priest whom
I have already mentioned, in an earlier part of these pages. He
has reasons of his own for not permitting me to disclose the
motive which induced him to celebrate my marriage privately in
the chapel at Lord Lepel's house. My uncle's desire that I should
try change of air, as offering a last chance of recovery, was
known to my medical attendant, and served as a sufficient reason
(although he protested against the risk) for my removal to the
country. I was carried to the station, and placed on a bed--slung
by ropes to the ceiling of a saloon carriage, so as to prevent me
from feeling the vibration when the train was in motion. Faithful
Mrs. Mozeen entreated to be allowed to accompany me. I was
reluctantly compelled to refuse compliance with this request, in
justice to the claims of my lord's housekeeper; who had been
accustomed to exercise undivided authority in the household, and
who had made every preparation for my comfort. With her own
hands, Mrs. Mozeen packed everything that I required, including
the medicines prescribed for the occasion. She was deeply
affected, poor soul, when we parted.

I bore the journey--happily for me, it was a short one--better
than had been anticipated. For the first few days that followed,
the purer air of the country seemed, in some degree, to revive
me. But the deadly sense of weakness, the slow sinking of the
vital power in me, returned as the time drew near for the
marriage. The ceremony was performed at night. Only Susan and her
mother were present. No persons in the house but ourselves had
the faintest suspicion of what had happened.

I signed my new will (the priest and Mrs. Rymer being the
witnesses) in my bed that night. It left everything that I
possessed, excepting a legacy to Mrs. Mozeen, to my wife.

Obliged, it is needless to say, to preserve appearances, Susan
remained at the lodge as usual. But it was impossible to resist
her entreaty to be allowed to attend on me, for a few hours
daily, as assistant to the regular nurse. When she was alone with
me, and had no inquisitive eyes to dread, the poor girl showed a
depth of feeling, which I was unable to reconcile with the
motives that could alone have induced her (as I then supposed) to
consent to the mockery of our marriage. On occasions when I was
so far able to resist the languor that oppressed  me as to observe
what was passing at my bedside--I saw Susan look at me as if
there were thoughts in her pressing for utterance which she
hesitated to express. Once, she herself acknowledged this. "I
have so much to say to you," she owned, "when you are stronger
and fitter to hear me." At other times, her nerves seemed to be
shaken by the spectacle of my sufferings. Her kind hands trembled
and made mistakes, when they had any nursing duties to perform
near me. The servants, noticing her, used to say, "That pretty
girl seems to be the most awkward person in the house." On the
day that followed the ceremony in the chapel, this want of
self-control brought about an accident which led to serious
results.

In removing the small chest which held my medicines from the
shelf on which it was placed, Susan let it drop on the floor. The
two full bottles still left were so completely shattered that not
even a teaspoonful of the contents was saved.

Shocked at what she had done, the poor girl volunteered to go
herself to my chemist in London by the first train. I refused to
allow it. What did it matter to me now, if my death from
exhaustion was hastened by a day or two? Why need my life be
prolonged artificially by drugs, when I had nothing left to live
for? An excuse for me which would satisfy others was easily
found. I said that I had been long weary of physic, and that the
accident had decided me on refusing to take more.

That night I did not wake quite so often as usual. When she came
to me the next day, Susan noticed that I looked better. The day
after, the other nurse made the same observation. At the end of
the week, I was able to leave my bed, and sit by the fireside,
while Susan read to me. Some mysterious change in my health had
completely falsified the prediction of the medical men. I sent to
London for my doctor--and told him that the improvement in me had
begun on the day when I left off taking his remedies. "Can you
explain it?" I asked.

He answered that no such "resurrection from the dead" (as he
called it) had ever happened in his long experience. On leaving
me, he asked for the latest prescriptions that had been written.
I inquired what he was going to do with them. "I mean to go to
the chemist," he replied, "and to satisfy myself that your
medicines have been properly made up."

I owed it to Mrs. Mozeen's true interest in me to tell her what
had happened. The same day I wrote to her. I also mentioned what
the doctor had said, and asked her to call on him, and ascertain
if the prescriptions had been shown to the chemist, and if any
mistake had been made.

A more innocently intended letter than this never was written.
And yet there are people who have declared that it was inspired
by suspicion of Mrs. Mozeen!

EIGHTH EPOCH.

WHETHER I was so weakened by illness as to be incapable of giving
my mind to more than one subject for reflection at a time (that
subject being now the extraordinary recovery of my health)--or
whether I was preoccupied by the effort, which I was in honor
bound to make, to resist the growing attraction to me of Susan's
society--I cannot presume to say. This only I know: when the
discovery of the terrible position toward Rothsay in which I now
stood suddenly overwhelmed me, an interval of some days had
passed. I cannot account for it. I can only say--so it was.

Susan was in the room. I was wholly unable to hide from her the
sudden change of color which betrayed the horror that had
overpowered me. She said, anxiously: "What has frightened you?"

I don't think I heard her. The play was in my memory again--the
fatal play, which had wound itself into the texture of Rothsay's
life and mine. In vivid remembrance, I saw once more the dramatic
situation of the first act, and shrank from the reflection of it
in the disaster which had fallen on my friend and myself.

"What has frightened you?" Susan repeated.

I answered in one word--I whispered his name: "Rothsay!"

She looked at me in innocent surprise. "Has he met with some
misfortune?" she asked, quietly.

"Misfortune"--did she call it? Had I not said enough to disturb
her tranquillity in mentioning Rothsay's name? "I am living!" I
said. "Living--and likely to live!"

Her answer expressed fervent gratitude. "Thank God for it!"

I looked at her, astonished as she had been astonished when she
looked at me.

"Susan, Susan," I cried--"must I own it? I love you!"

She came nearer to me with timid pleasure in her eyes--with the
first faint light of a smile playing round her lips.

"You say it very strangely," she murmured. "Surely, my dear one,
you ought to love me? Since the first day when you gave me my
French lesson--haven't I loved You?"

"You love _me?_" I repeated. "Have you read--?" My voice failed
me; I could say no more.

She turned pale. "Read what?" she asked.

"My letter."

"What letter?"

"The letter I wrote to you before we were married."




Am I a coward? The bare recollection of what followed that reply
makes me tremble. Time has passed. I am a new man now; my health
is restored; my happiness is assured: I ought to be able to write
on. No: it is not to be done. How can I think coolly? how force
myself to record the suffering that I innocently, most
innocently, inflicted on the sweetest and truest of women?
Nothing saved us from a parting as absolute as the parting that
follows death but the confession that had been wrung from me at a
time when my motive spoke for itself. The artless avowal of her
affection had been justified, had been honored, by the words
which laid my heart at her feet when I said "I love you."

. . .

She had risen to leave me. In a last look, we had silently
resigned ourselves to wait, apart from each other, for the day of
reckoning that must follow Rothsay's return, when we heard the
sound of carriage-wheels on the drive that led to the house. In a
minute more the man himself entered the room.

He looked first at Susan--then at me. In both of us be saw the
traces that told of agitation endured, but not yet composed. Worn
and weary he waited, hesitating, near the door.

"Am I intruding?" he asked.

"We were thinking of you, and speaking of you," I replied, "just
before you came in."

"_We?_" he repeated, turning toward Susan once more. After a
pause, he offered me his hand--and drew it back.

"You don't shake hands with me," he said.

"I am waiting, Rothsay, until I know that we are the same firm
friends as ever."

For the third time he looked at Susan.

"Will _you_ shake hands?" he asked.

She gave him her hand cordially. "May I stay here?" she said,
addressing herself to me.

In my situation at that moment, I understood the generous purpose
that animated her. But she had suffered enough already--I led her
gently to the door. "It will be better," I whispered, "if you
will wait downstairs in the library." She hesitated. "What will
they say in the house?" she objected, thinking of the servants
and of the humble position which she was still supposed to
occupy. "It matters nothing what they say, now." I told her. She
left us.

"There seems to be some private understanding between you,"
Rothsay said, when we were alone.

"You shall hear what it is," I answered. "But I must beg you to
excuse me if I speak first of myself."

"Are you alluding to your health?"

"Yes."

"Quite needless, Lepel. I met your doctor this morning. I know
that a council of physicians decided you would die before the
year was out."

He paused there.

"And they proved to be wrong," I added.

"They might have proved to be right," Rothsay rejoined, "but for
the accident which spilled your medicine and the despair of
yourself which decided you on taking no more."

I could hardly believe that I understood him. "Do you assert," I
said, "that my medicine would have killed me, if I had taken the
rest of it?"

"I have no doubt that it would."

"Will you explain what you mean?"

"Let me have your explanation first. I was not prepared to find
Susan in your room. I was surprised to see traces of tears in her
face. Something has happened in my absence. Am I concerned in
it?"

"You are."

I said it quietly--in full possession of myself. The trial of
fortitude through which I had already passed seemed to have
blunted my
 customary sense of feeling. I approached the disclosure which I
was now bound to make with steady resolution, resigned to the
worst that could happen when the truth was known.

"Do you remember the time," I resumed, "when I was so eager to
serve you that I proposed to make Susan your wife by making her
rich?"

"Yes."

"Do you remember asking me if I was thinking of the play we saw
together at Rome? Is the story as present to your mind now, as it
was then?"

"Quite as present."

"You asked if I was performing the part of the Marquis--and if
you were the Count. Rothsay! the devotion of that ideal character
to his friend has been my devotion; his conviction that his death
would justify what he had done for his friend's sake, has been
_my_ conviction; and as it ended with him, so it has ended with
me--his terrible position is _my_ terrible position toward you,
at this moment."

"Are you mad?" Rothsay asked, sternly.

I passed over that first outbreak of his anger in silence.

"Do you mean to tell me you have married Susan?" he went on.

"Bear this in mind," I said. "When I married her, I was doomed to
death. Nay, more. In your interests--as God is my witness--I
welcomed death."

He stepped up to me, in silence, and raised his hand with a
threatening gesture.

That action at once deprived me of my self-possession. I spoke
with the ungovernable rashness of a boy.

"Carry out your intention," I said. "Insult me."

His hand dropped.

"Insult me," I repeated; "it is one way out of the unendurable
situation in which we are placed. You may trust me to challenge
you. Duels are still fought on the Continent; I will follow you
abroad; I will choose pistols; I will take care that we fight on
the fatal foreign system; and I will purposely miss you. Make her
what I intended her to be--my rich widow."

He looked at me attentively.

"Is _that_ your refuge?" he asked, scornfully. "No! I won't help
you to commit suicide."

God forgive me! I was possessed by a spirit of reckless despair;
I did my best to provoke him.

"Reconsider your decision," I said; "and remember--you tried to
commit suicide yourself."

He turned quickly to the door, as if he distrusted his own powers
of self-control.

"I wish to speak to Susan," he said, keeping his back turned on
me.

"You will find her in the library."

He left me.

I went to the window. I opened it and let the cold wintry air
blow over my burning head. I don't know how long I sat at the
window. There came a time when I saw Rothsay on the house steps.
He walked rapidly toward the park gate. His head was down; he
never once looked back at the room in which he had left me.

As he passed out of my sight, I felt a hand laid gently on my
shoulder. Susan had returned to me.

"He will not come back," she said. "Try still to remember him as
your old friend. He asks you to forgive and forget."

She had made the peace between us. I was deeply touched; my eyes
filled with tears as I looked at her. She kissed me on the
forehead and went out. I afterward asked what had passed between
them when Rothsay spoke with her in the library. She never has
told me what they said to each other; and she never will. She is
right.



Later in the day I was told that Mrs. Rymer had called, and
wished to "pay her respects."

I refused to see her. Whatever claim she might have otherwise had
on my consideration had been forfeited by the infamy of her
conduct, when she intercepted my letter to Susan. Her sense of
injury on receiving my message was expressed in writing, and was
sent to me the same evening. The last sentence in her letter was
characteristic of the woman.

"However your pride may despise me," she wrote, "I am indebted to
you for the rise in life that I have always desired. You may
refuse to see me--but you can't prevent my being the
mother-in-law of a gentleman."


Soon afterward, I received a visit which I had hardly ventured to
expect. Busy as he was in London, my doctor came to see me. He
was not in his usual good spirits.

"I hope you don't bring me any bad news?" I said.

"You shall judge for yourself," he replied. "I come from Mr.
Rothsay, to say for him what he is not able to say for himself."

"Where is he?"

"He has left England."

"For any purpose that you know of?"

"Yes. He has sailed to join the expedition of rescue--I ought
rather to call it the forlorn hope--which is to search for the
lost explorers in Central Australia."

In other words, he had gone to seek death in the fatal footsteps
of Burke and Wills. I could not trust myself to speak.

The doctor saw that there was a reason for my silence, and that
he would do well not to notice it. He changed the subjectj.

"May I ask," he said, "if you have heard from the servants left
in charge at your house in London?"

"Has anything happened?"

"Something has happened which they are evidently afraid to tell
you, knowing the high opinion which you have of Mrs. Mozeen. She
has suddenly quitted your service, and has gone, nobody knows
where. I have taken charge of a letter which she left for you."

He handed me the letter. As soon as I had recovered myself, I
looked at it.

There was this inscription on the address: "For my good master,
to wait until he returns home." The few lines in the letter
itself ran thus:


"Distressing circumstances oblige me to leave you, sir, and do
not permit me to enter into particulars. In asking your pardon, I
offer my sincere thanks for your kindness, and my fervent prayers
for your welfare."


That was all. The date had a special interest for me. Mrs. Mozeen
had written on the day when she must have received my letter--the
letter which has already appeared in these pages.

"Is there really nothing known of the poor woman's motives?" I
asked.

"There are two explanations suggested," the doctor informed me.
"One of them, which is offered by your female servants, seems to
me absurd. They declare that Mrs. Mozeen, at her mature age, was
in love with the young man who is your footman! It is even
asserted that she tried to recommend herself to him, by speaking
of the money which she expected to bring to the man who would
make her his wife. The footman's reply, informing her that he was
already engaged to be married, is alleged to be the cause which
has driven her from your house."

I begged that the doctor would not trouble himself to repeat more
of what my women servants had said.

"If the other explanation," I added, "is equally unworthy of
notice--"

"The other explanation," the doctor interposed, "comes from Mr.
Rothsay, and is of a very serious kind."

Rothsay's opinion demanded my respect.

"What view does he take?" I inquired.

"A view that startles me," the doctor said. "You remember my
telling you of the interest he took in your symptoms, and in the
remedies I had employed? Well! Mr. Rothsay accounts for the
incomprehensible recovery of your health by asserting that
poison--probably administered in small quantities, and
intermitted at intervals in fear of discovery--has been mixed
with your medicine; and he asserts that the guilty person is Mrs.
Mozeen."

It was impossible that I could openly express the indignation
that I felt on hearing this. My position toward Rothsay forced me
to restrain myself.

"May I ask," the doctor continued, "if Mrs. Mozeen was aware that
she had a legacy to expect at your death?"

"Certainly."

"Has she a brother who is one of the dispensers employed by your
chemists?"

"Yes."

"Did she know that I doubted if my prescriptions had been
properly prepared, and that I intended to make inquiries?"

"I wrote to her myself on the subject."

"Do you think her brother told her that I was referred to _him_,
when I went to the chemists?"

"I have no means of knowing what her brother did."

"Can you at least tell me when she received your letter?"

"She must have received it on the day when she left my house."

The doctor rose with a grave face.

"These are rather extraordinary coincidences," he remarked.

I merely replied, "Mrs. Mozeen is as incapable of poisoning as I
am."

The doctor wished me good-morning.

I repeat here my conviction of my housekeeper's innocence. I
protest against the cruelty which accuses her. And, whate ver may
have been her motive in suddenly leaving my service, I declare
that she still possesses my sympathy and esteem, and I invite her
to return to me if she ever sees these lines.

I have only to add, by way of postscript, that we have heard of
the safe return of the expedition of rescue. Time, as my wife and
I both hope, may yet convince Rothsay that he will not be wrong
in counting on Susan's love--the love of a sister.

In the meanwhile we possess a memorial of our absent friend. We
have bought his picture.


MR. CAPTAIN AND THE NYMPH.

I.

"THE Captain is still in the prime of life," the widow remarked.
"He has given up his ship; he possesses a sufficient income, and
he has nobody to live with him. I should like to know why he
doesn't marry."

"The Captain was excessively rude to Me," the widow's younger
sister added, on her side. "When we took leave of him in London,
I asked if there was any chance of his joining us at Brighton
this season. He turned his back on me as if I had mortally
offended him; and he made me this extraordinary answer: 'Miss! I
hate the sight of the sea.' The man has been a sailor all his
life. What does he mean by saying that he hates the sight of the
sea?"

These questions were addressed to a third person present--and the
person was a man. He was entirely at the mercy of the widow and
the widow's sister. The other ladies of the family--who might
have taken him under their protection--had gone to an evening
concert. He was known to be the Captain's friend, and to be well
acquainted with events in the Captain's life. As it happened, he
had reasons for hesitating to revive associations connected with
those events. But what polite alternative was left to him? He
must either inflict disappointment, and, worse still, aggravate
curiosity--or he must resign himself to circumstances, and tell
the ladies why the Captain would never marry, and why (sailor as
he was) he hated the sight of the sea. They were both young women
and handsome women--and the person to whom they had appealed
(being a man) followed the example of submission to the sex,
first set in the garden of Eden. He enlightened the ladies, in
the terms that follow:

THE British merchantman, _Fortuna_, sailed from the port of
Liverpool (at a date which it is not necessary to specify) with
the morning tide. She was bound for certain islands in the
Pacific Ocean, in search of a cargo of sandal-wood--a commodity
which, in those days, found a ready and profitable market in the
Chinese Empire.

A large discretion was reposed in the Captain by the owners, who
knew him to be not only trustworthy, but a man of rare ability,
carefully cultivated during the leisure hours of a seafaring
life. Devoted heart and soul to his professional duties, he was a
hard reader and an excellent linguist as well. Having had
considerable experience among the inhabitants of the Pacific
Islands, he had attentively studied their characters, and had
mastered their language in more than one of its many dialects.
Thanks to the valuable information thus obtained, the Captain was
never at a loss to conciliate the islanders. He had more than
once succeeded in finding a cargo under circumstances in which
other captains had failed.

Possessing these merits, he had also his fair share of human
defects. For instance, he was a little too conscious of his own
good looks--of his bright chestnut hair and whiskers, of his
beautiful blue eyes, of his fair white skin, which many a woman
had looked at with the admiration that is akin to envy. His
shapely hands were protected by gloves; a broad-brimmed hat
sheltered his complexion in fine weather from the sun. He was
nice in the choice of his perfumes; he never drank spirits, and
the smell of tobacco was abhorrent to him. New men among his
officers and his crew, seeing him in his cabin, perfectly
dressed, washed, and brushed until he was an object speckless to
look upon--a merchant-captain soft of voice, careful in his
choice of words, devoted to study in his leisure hours--were apt
to conclude that they had trusted themselves at sea under a
commander who was an anomalous mixture of a schoolmaster and a
dandy. But if the slightest infraction of discipline took place,
or if the storm rose and the vessel proved to be in peril, it was
soon discovered that the gloved hands held a rod of iron; that
the soft voice could make itself heard through wind and sea from
one end of the deck to the other; and that it issued orders which
the greatest fool on board discovered to be orders that had saved
the ship. Throughout his professional life, the general
impression that this variously gifted man produced on the little
world about him was always the same. Some few liked him;
everybody respected him; nobody understood him. The Captain
accepted these results. He persisted in reading his books and
protecting his complexion, with this result: his owners shook
hands with him, and put up with his gloves.

The _Fortuna_ touched at Rio for water, and for supplies of food
which might prove useful in case of scurvy. In due time the ship
rounded Cape Horn, favored by the finest weather ever known in
those latitudes by the oldest hand on board. The mate--one Mr.
Duncalf--a boozing, wheezing, self-confident old sea-dog, with a
flaming face and a vast vocabulary of oaths, swore that he didn't
like it. "The foul weather's coming, my lads," said Mr. Duncalf.
"Mark my words, there'll be wind enough to take the curl out of
the Captain's whiskers before we are many days older!"

For one uneventful week, the ship cruised in search of the
islands to which the owners had directed her. At the end of that
time the wind took the predicted liberties with the Captain's
whiskers; and Mr. Duncalf stood revealed to an admiring crew in
the character of a true prophet.

For three days and three nights the _Fortuna_ ran before the
storm, at the mercy of wind and sea. On the fourth morning the
gale blew itself out, the sun appeared again toward noon, and the
Captain was able to take an observation. The result informed him
that he was in a part of the Pacific Ocean with which he was
entirely unacquainted. Thereupon, the officers were called to a
council in the cabin.

Mr. Duncalf, as became his rank, was consulted first. His opinion
possessed the merit of brevity. "My lads, this ship's bewitched.
Take my word for it, we shall wish ourselves back in our own
latitudes before we are many days older." Which, being
interpreted, meant that Mr. Duncalf was lost, like his superior
officer, in a part of the ocean of which he knew nothing.

The remaining members of the council having no suggestions to
offer, left the Captain to take his own way. He decided (the
weather being fine again) to stand on under an easy press of sail
for four-and-twenty hours more, and to see if anything came of
it.

Soon after nightfall, something did come of it. The lookout
forward hailed the quarter-deck with the dread cry, "Breakers
ahead!" In less than a minute more, everybody heard the crash of
the broken water. The _Fortuna_ was put about, and came round
slowly in the light wind. Thanks to the timely alarm and the fine
weather, the safety of the vessel was easily provided for. They
kept her under a short sail; and they waited for the morning.

The dawn showed them in the distance a glorious green island, not
marked in the ship's charts--an island girt about by a
coral-reef, and having in its midst a high-peaked mountain which
looked, through the telescope, like a mountain of volcanic
origin. Mr. Duncalf, taking his morning draught of rum and water,
shook his groggy old head and said (and swore): "My lads, I don't
like the look of that island." The Captain was of a different
opinion. He had one of the ship's boats put into the water; he
armed himself and four of his crew who accompanied him; and away
he went in the morning sunlight to visit the island.

Skirting round the coral reef, they found a natural breach, which
proved to be broad enough and deep enough not only for the
passage of the boat, but of the ship herself if needful. Crossing
the broad inner belt of smooth water, they approached the golden
sands of the island, strew ed with magnificent shells, and
crowded by the dusky islanders--men, women, and children, all
waiting in breathless astonishment to see the strangers land.

The Captain kept the boat off, and examined the islanders
carefully. The innocent, simple people danced, and sang, and ran
into the water, imploring their wonderful white visitors by
gestures to come on shore. Not a creature among them carried arms
of any sort; a hospitable curiosity animated the entire
population. The men cried out, in their smooth musical language,
"Come and eat!" and the plump black-eyed women, all laughing
together, added their own invitation, "Come and be kissed!" Was
it in mortals to resist such temptations as these? The Captain
led the way on shore, and the women surrounded him in an instant,
and screamed for joy at the glorious spectacle of his whiskers,
his complexion, and his gloves. So the mariners from the far
north were welcomed to the newly-discovered island.

III.

THE morning wore on. Mr. Duncalf, in charge of the ship, cursing
the island over his rum and water, as a "beastly green strip of a
place, not laid down in any Christian chart," was kept waiting
four mortal hours before the Captain returned to his command, and
reported himself to his officers as follows:

He had found his knowledge of the Polynesian dialects sufficient
to make himself in some degree understood by the natives of the
new island. Under the guidance of the chief he had made a first
journey of exploration, and had seen for himself that the place
was a marvel of natural beauty and fertility. The one barren spot
in it was the peak of the volcanic mountain, composed of
crumbling rock; originally no doubt lava and ashes, which had
cooled and consolidated with the lapse of time. So far as he
could see, the crater at the top was now an extinct crater. But,
if he had understood rightly, the chief had spoken of earthquakes
and eruptions at certain bygone periods, some of which lay within
his own earliest recollections of the place.

Adverting next to considerations of practical utility, the
Captain announced that he had seen sandal-wood enough on the
island to load a dozen ships, and that the natives were willing
to part with it for a few toys and trinkets generally distributed
among them. To the mate's disgust, the _Fortuna_ was taken inside
the reef that day, and was anchored before sunset in a natural
harbor. Twelve hours of recreation, beginning with the next
morning, were granted to the men, under the wise restrictions in
such cases established by the Captain. That interval over, the
work of cutting the precious wood and loading the ship was to be
unremittingly pursued.

Mr. Duncalf had the first watch after the _Fortuna_ had been made
snug. He took the boatswain aside (an ancient sea-dog like
himself), and he said in a gruff whisper: "My lad, this here
ain't the island laid down in our sailing orders. See if mischief
don't come of disobeying orders before we are many days older."

Nothing in the shape of mischief happened that night. But at
sunrise the next morning a suspicious circumstance occurred; and
Mr. Duncalf whispered to the boatswain: "What did I tell you?"
The Captain and the chief of the islanders held a private
conference in the cabin, and the Captain, after first forbidding
any communication with the shore until his return, suddenly left
the ship, alone with the chief, in the chief's own canoe.

What did this strange disappearance mean? The Captain himself,
when he took his seat in the canoe, would have been puzzled to
answer that question. He asked, in the nearest approach that his
knowledge could make to the language used in the island, whether
he would be a long time or a short time absent from his ship.

The chief answered mysteriously (as the Captain understood him)
in these words: "Long time or short time, your life depends on
it, and the lives of your men."

Paddling his light little boat in silence over the smooth water
inside the reef, the chief took his visitor ashore at a part of
the island which was quite new to the Captain. The two crossed a
ravine, and ascended an eminence beyond. There the chief stopped,
and silently pointed out to sea.

The Captain looked in the direction indicated to him, and
discovered a second and a smaller island, lying away to the
southwest. Taking out his telescope from the case by which it was
slung at his back, he narrowly examined the place. Two of the
native canoes were lying off the shore of the new island; and the
men in them appeared to be all kneeling or crouching in curiously
chosen attitudes. Shifting the range of his glass, he next beheld
a white-robed figure, tall and solitary--the one inhabitant of
the island whom he could discover. The man was standing on the
highest point of a rocky cape. A fire was burning at his feet.
Now he lifted his arms solemnly to the sky; now he dropped some
invisible fuel into the fire, which made a blue smoke; and now he
cast other invisible objects into the canoes floating beneath
him, which the islanders reverently received with bodies that
crouched in abject submission. Lowering his telescope, the
Captain looked round at the chief for an explanation. The chief
gave the explanation readily. His language was interpreted by the
English stranger in these terms:

"Wonderful white man! the island you see yonder is a Holy Island.
As such it is _Taboo_--an island sanctified and set apart. The
honorable person whom you notice on the rock is an all-powerful
favorite of the gods. He is by vocation a Sorcerer, and by rank a
Priest. You now see him casting charms and blessings into the
canoes of our fishermen, who kneel to him for fine weather and
great plenty of fish. If any profane person, native or stranger,
presumes to set foot on that island, my otherwise peaceful
subjects will (in the performance of a religious duty) put that
person to death. Mention this to your men. They will be fed by my
male people, and fondled by my female people, so long as they
keep clear of the Holy Isle. As they value their lives, let them
respect this prohibition. Is it understood between us? Wonderful
white man! my canoe is waiting for you. Let us go back."

Understanding enough of the chief's language (illustrated by his
gestures) to receive in the right spirit the communication thus
addressed to him, the Captain repeated the warning to the ship's
company in the plainest possible English. The officers and men
then took their holiday on shore, with the exception of Mr.
Duncalf, who positively refused to leave the ship. For twelve
delightful hours they were fed by the male people, and fondled by
the female people, and then they were mercilessly torn from the
flesh-pots and the arms of their new friends, and set to work on
the sandal-wood in good earnest. Mr. Duncalf superintended the
loading, and waited for the mischief that was to come of
disobeying the owners' orders with a confidence worthy of a
better cause.

IV.

STRANGELY enough, chance once more declared itself in favor of
the mate's point of view. The mischief did actually come; and the
chosen instrument of it was a handsome young islander, who was
one of the sons of the chief.

The Captain had taken a fancy to the sweet-tempered, intelligent
lad. Pursuing his studies in the dialect of the island, at
leisure hours, he had made the chief's son his tutor, and had
instructed the youth in English by way of return. More than a
month had passed in this intercourse, and the ship's lading was
being rapidly completed--when, in an evil hour, the talk between
the two turned on the subject of the Holy Island.

"Does nobody live on the island but the Priest?" the Captain
asked.

The chief's son looked round him suspiciously. "Promise me you
won't tell anybody!" he began very earnestly.

The Captain gave his promise.

"There is one other person on the island," the lad whispered; "a
person to feast your eyes upon, if you could only see her! She is
the Priest's daughter. Removed to the island in her infancy, she
has never left it since. In that sacred solitude she has only
looked on two human beings--her father and her mother. I once saw
her from my canoe, taking care not to
 attract her notice, or to approach too near the holy soil. Oh,
so young, dear master, and, oh, so beautiful!" The chief's son
completed the description by kissing his own hands as an
expression of rapture.

The Captain's fine blue eyes sparkled. He asked no more
questions; but, later on that day, he took his telescope with
him, and paid a secret visit to the eminence which overlooked the
Holy Island. The next day, and the next, he privately returned to
the same place. On the fourth day, fatal Destiny favored him. He
discovered the nymph of the island.

Standing alone upon the cape on which he had already seen her
father, she was feeding some tame birds which looked like
turtle-doves. The glass showed the Captain her white robe,
fluttering in the sea-breeze; her long black hair falling to her
feet; her slim and supple young figure; her simple grace of
attitude, as she turned this way and that, attending to the wants
of her birds. Before her was the blue ocean; behind her rose the
lustrous green of the island forest. He looked and looked until
his eyes and arms ached. When she disappeared among the trees,
followed by her favorite birds, the Captain shut up his telescope
with a sigh, and said to himself: "I have seen an angel!"

From that hour he became an altered man; he was languid, silent,
interested in nothing. General opinion, on board his ship,
decided that he was going to be taken ill.

A week more elapsed, and the officers and crew began to talk of
the voyage to their market in China. The Captain refused to fix a
day for sailing. He even took offense at being asked to decide.
Instead of sleeping in his cabin, he went ashore for the night.

Not many hours afterward (just before daybreak), Mr. Duncalf,
snoring in his cabin on deck, was aroused by a hand laid on his
shoulder. The swinging lamp, still alight, showed him the dusky
face of the chief's son, convulsed with terror. By wild signs, by
disconnected words in the little English which he had learned,
the lad tried to make the mate understand him. Dense Mr. Duncalf,
understanding nothing, hailed the second officer, on the opposite
side of the deck. The second officer was young and intelligent;
he rightly interpreted the terrible news that had come to the
ship.

The Captain had broken his own rules. Watching his opportunity,
under cover of the night, he had taken a canoe, and had secretly
crossed the channel to the Holy Island. No one had been near him
at the time but the chief's son. The lad had vainly tried to
induce him to abandon his desperate enterprise, and had vainly
waited on the shore in the hope of hearing the sound of the
paddle announcing his return. Beyond all reasonable doubt, the
infatuated man had set foot on the shores of the tabooed island.

The one chance for his life was to conceal what he had done,
until the ship could be got out of the harbor, and then (if no
harm had come to him in the interval) to rescue him after
nightfall. It was decided to spread the report that he had really
been taken ill, and that he was confined to his cabin. The
chief's son, whose heart the Captain's kindness had won, could be
trusted to do this, and to keep the secret faithfully for his
good friend's sake.

Toward noon, the next day, they attempted to take the ship to
sea, and failed for want of wind. Hour by hour, the heat grew
more oppressive. As the day declined, there were ominous
appearances in the western heaven. The natives, who had given
some trouble during the day by their anxiety to see the Captain,
and by their curiosity to know the cause of the sudden
preparations for the ship's departure, all went ashore together,
looking suspiciously at the sky, and reappeared no more. Just at
midnight, the ship (still in her snug berth inside the reef)
suddenly trembled from her keel to her uppermost masts. Mr.
Duncalf, surrounded by the startled crew, shook his knotty fist
at the island as if he could see it in the dark. "My lads, what
did I tell you? That was a shock of earthquake."

With the morning the threatening aspect of the weather
unexpectedly disappeared. A faint hot breeze from the land, just
enough to give the ship steerage-way, offered Mr. Duncalf a
chance of getting to sea. Slowly the _Fortuna_, with the mate
himself at the wheel, half sailed, half drifted into the open
ocean. At a distance of barely two miles from the island the
breeze was felt no more, and the vessel lay becalmed for the rest
of the day.

At night the men waited their orders, expecting to be sent after
their Captain in one of the boats. The intense darkness, the
airless heat, and a second shock of earthquake (faintly felt in
the ship at her present distance from the land) warned the mate
to be cautious. "I smell mischief in the air," said Mr. Duncalf.
"The Captain must wait till I am surer of the weather."

Still no change came with the new day. The dead calm continued,
and the airless heat. As the day declined, another ominous
appearance became visible. A thin line of smoke was discovered
through the telescope, ascending from the topmost peak of the
mountain on the main island. Was the volcano threatening an
eruption? The mate, for one, entertained no doubt of it. "By the
Lord, the place is going to burst up!" said Mr. Duncalf. "Come
what may of it, we must find the Captain to-night!"

V.

WHAT was the Captain doing? and what chance had the crew of
finding him that night?

He had committed himself to his desperate adventure, without
forming any plan for the preservation of his own safety; without
giving even a momentary consideration to the consequences which
might follow the risk that he had run. The charming figure that
he had seen haunted him night and day. The image of the innocent
creature, secluded from humanity in her island solitude, was the
one image that filled his mind. A man, passing a woman in the
street, acts on the impulse to turn and follow her, and in that
one thoughtless moment shapes the destiny of his future life. The
Captain had acted on a similar impulse, when he took the first
canoe he had found on the beach, and shaped his reckless course
for the tabooed island.

Reaching the shore while it was still dark, he did one sensible
thing--he hid the canoe so that it might not betray him when the
daylight came. That done, he waited for the morning on the
outskirts of the forest.

The trembling light of dawn revealed the mysterious solitude
around him. Following the outer limits of the trees, first in one
direction, then in another, and finding no trace of any living
creature, he decided on penetrating to the interior of the
island. He entered the forest.

An hour of walking brought him to rising ground. Continuing the
ascent, he got clear of the trees, and stood on the grassy top of
a broad cliff which overlooked the sea. An open hut was on the
cliff. He cautiously looked in, and discovered that it was empty.
The few household utensils left about, and the simple bed of
leaves in a corner, were covered with fine sandy dust.
Night-birds flew blundering out of the inner cavities of the
roof, and took refuge in the shadows of the forest below. It was
plain that the hut had not been inhabited for some time past.

Standing at the open doorway and considering what he should do
next, the Captain saw a bird flying toward him out of the forest.
It was a turtle-dove, so tame that it fluttered close up to him.
At the same moment the sound of sweet laughter became audible
among the trees. His heart beat fast; he advanced a few steps and
stopped. In a moment more the nymph of the island appeared, in
her white robe, ascending the cliff in pursuit of her truant
bird. She saw the strange man, and suddenly stood still; struck
motionless by the amazing discovery that had burst upon her. The
Captain approached, smiling and holding out his hand. She never
moved; she stood before him in helpless wonderment--her lovely
black eyes fixed spellbound on his face; her dusky bosom
palpitating above the fallen folds of her robe; her rich red lips
parted in mute astonishment. Feasting his eyes on her beauty in
silence, the Captain after a while ventured to speak to her in
the language of the main island. The sound
 of his voice, addressing her in the words that she understood,
roused the lovely creature to action. She started, stepped close
up to him, and dropped on her knees at his feet.

"My father worships invisible deities," she said, softly. "Are
you a visible deity? Has my mother sent you?" She pointed as she
spoke to the deserted hut behind them. "You appear," she went on,
"in the place where my mother died. Is it for her sake that you
show yourself to her child? Beautiful deity, come to the
Temple--come to my father!"

The Captain gently raised her from the ground. If her father saw
him, he was a doomed man.

Infatuated as he was, he had sense enough left to announce
himself plainly in his own character, as a mortal creature
arriving from a distant land. The girl instantly drew back from
him with a look of terror.

"He is not like my father," she said to herself; "he is not like
me. Is he the lying demon of the prophecy? Is he the predestined
destroyer of our island?"

The Captain's experience of the sex showed him the only sure way
out of the awkward position in which he was now placed. He
appealed to his personal appearance.

"Do I look like a demon?" he asked.

Her eyes met his eyes; a faint smile trembled on her lips. He
ventured on asking what she meant by the predestined destruction
of the island. She held up her hand solemnly, and repeated the
prophecy.

The Holy Island was threatened with destruction by an evil being,
who would one day appear on its shores. To avert the fatality the
place had been sanctified and set apart, under the protection of
the gods and their priest. Here was the reason for the taboo, and
for the extraordinary rigor with which it was enforced. Listening
to her with the deepest interest, the Captain took her hand and
pressed it gently.

 "Do I feel like a demon?" he whispered.

Her slim brown fingers closed frankly on his hand. "You feel soft
and friendly," she said with the fearless candor of a child.
"Squeeze me again. I like it!"

The next moment she snatched her hand away from him; the sense of
his danger had suddenly forced itself on her mind. "If my father
sees you," she said, "he will light the signal fire at the
Temple, and the people from the other island will come here and
put you to death. Where is your canoe? No! It is daylight. My
father may see you on the water." She considered a little, and,
approaching him, laid her hands on his shoulders. "Stay here till
nightfall," she resumed. "My father never comes this way. The
sight of the place where my mother died is horrible to him. You
are safe here. Promise to stay where you are till night-time."

The Captain gave his promise.

Freed from anxiety so far, the girl's mobile temperament
recovered its native cheerfulness, its sweet gayety and spirit.
She admired the beautiful stranger as she might have admired a
new bird that had flown to her to be fondled with the rest. She
patted his fair white skin, and wished she had a skin like it.
She lifted the great glossy folds of her long black hair, and
compared it with the Captain's bright curly locks, and longed to
change colors with him from the bottom of her heart. His dress
was a wonder to her; his watch was a new revelation. She rested
her head on his shoulder to listen delightedly to the ticking, as
he held the watch to her ear. Her fragrant breath played on his
face, her warm, supple figure rested against him softly. The
Captain's arm stole round her waist, and the Captain's lips
gently touched her cheek. She lifted her head with a look of
pleased surprise. "Thank you," said the child of Nature, simply.
"Kiss me again; I like it. May I kiss you?" The tame turtle-dove
perched on her shoulder as she gave the Captain her first kiss,
and diverted her thoughts to the pets that she had left, in
pursuit of the truant dove. "Come," she said, "and see my birds.
I keep them on this side of the forest. There is no danger, so
long as you don't show yourself on the other side. My name is
Aimata. Aimata will take care of you. Oh, what a beautiful white
neck you have!" She put her arm admiringly round his neck. The
Captain's arm held her tenderly to him. Slowly the two descended
the cliff, and were lost in the leafy solitudes of the forest.
And the tame dove fluttered before them, a winged messenger of
love, cooing to his mate.

VI.

THE night had come, and the Captain had not left the island.

Aimata's resolution to send him away in the darkness was a
forgotten resolution already. She had let him persuade her that
he was in no danger, so long as he remained in the hut on the
cliff; and she had promised, at parting, to return to him while
the Priest was still sleeping, at the dawn of day.

He was alone in the hut. The thought of the innocent creature
whom he loved was sorrowfully as well as tenderly present to his
mind. He almost regretted his rash visit to the island. "I will
take her with me to England," he said to himself. "What does a
sailor care for the opinion of the world? Aimata shall be my
wife."

The intense heat oppressed him. He stepped out on the cliff,
toward midnight, in search of a breath of air.

At that moment, the first shock of earthquake (felt in the ship
while she was inside the reef) shook the ground he stood on. He
instantly thought of the volcano on the main island. Had he been
mistaken in supposing the crater to be extinct? Was the shock
that he had just felt a warning from the volcano, communicated
through a submarine connection between the two islands? He waited
and watched through the hours of darkness, with a vague sense of
apprehension, which was not to be reasoned away. With the first
light of daybreak he descended into the forest, and saw the
lovely being whose safety was already precious to him as his own,
hurrying to meet him through the trees.

She waved her hand distractedly as she approached him. "Go!" she
cried; "go away in your canoe before our island is destroyed!"

He did his best to quiet her alarm. Was it the shock of
earthquake that had frightened her? No: it was more than the
shock of earthquake--it was something terrible which had followed
the shock. There was a lake near the Temple, the waters of which
were supposed to be heated by subterranean fires. The lake had
risen with the earthquake, had bubbled furiously, and had then
melted away into the earth and been lost. Her father, viewing the
portent with horror, had gone to the cape to watch the volcano on
the main island, and to implore by prayers and sacrifices the
protection of the gods. Hearing this, the Captain entreated
Aimata to let him see the emptied lake, in the absence of the
Priest. She hesitated; but his influence was all-powerful. He
prevailed on her to turn back with him through the forest.

Reaching the furthest limit of the trees, they came out upon open
rocky ground which sloped gently downward toward the center of
the island. Having crossed this space, they arrived at a natural
amphitheater of rock. On one side of it the Temple appeared,
partly excavated, partly formed by a natural cavern. In one of
the lateral branches of the cavern was the dwelling of the Priest
and his daughter. The mouth of it looked out on the rocky basin
of the lake. Stooping over the edge, the Captain discovered, far
down in the empty depths, a light cloud of steam. Not a drop of
water was visible, look where he might.

Aimata pointed to the abyss, and hid her face on his bosom. "My
father says," she whispered, "that it is your doing."

The Captain started. "Does your father know that I am on the
island?"

She looked up at him with a quick glance of reproach. "Do you
think I would tell him, and put your life in peril?" she asked.
"My father felt the destroyer of the island in the earthquake; my
father saw the coming destruction in the disappearance of the
lake." Her eyes rested on him with a loving languor. "Are you
indeed the demon of the prophecy?" she said, winding his hair
round her finger. "I am not afraid of you, if you are. I am a
creature bewitched; I love the demon." She kissed him
passionately. "I don't care if I die," she whispered between the
kisses, "if I only die with you!"

The Captain made no attempt to reason with her. He took the wiser
way--he appealed to her feelings.

"You will come and live with me happily in my own country," he
said. "My ship is waiting for us. I will take you home with me,
and you shall be my wife."

She clapped her hands for joy. Then she thought of her father,
and drew back from him in tears.

The Captain understood her. "Let us leave this dreary place," he
suggested. "We will talk about it in the cool glades of the
forest, where you first said you loved me."

She gave him her hand. "Where I first said I loved you!" she
repeated, smiling tenderly as she looked at him. They left the
lake together.

VII.

THE darkness had fallen again; and the ship was still becalmed at
sea.

Mr. Duncalf came on deck after his supper. The thin line of
smoke, seen rising from the peak of the mountain that evening,
was now succeeded by ominous flashes of fire from the same
quarter, intermittently visible. The faint hot breeze from the
land was felt once more. "There's just an air of wind," Mr.
Duncalf remarked. "I'll try for the Captain while I have the
chance."

One of the boats was lowered into the water--under command of the
second mate, who had already taken the bearings of the tabooed
island by daylight. Four of the men were to go with him, and they
were all to be well armed. Mr. Duncalf addressed his final
instructions to the officer in the boat.

"You will keep a lookout, sir, with a lantern in the bows. If the
natives annoy you, you know what to do. Always shoot natives.
When you get anigh the island, you will fire a gun and sing out
for the Captain."

"Quite needless," interposed a voice from the sea. "The Captain
is here!"

Without taking the slightest notice of the astonishment that he
had caused, the commander of the _Fortuna_ paddled his canoe to
the side of the ship. Instead of ascending to the deck, he
stepped into the boat, waiting alongside. "Lend me your pistols,"
he said quietly to the second officer, "and oblige me by taking
your men back to their duties on board." He looked up at Mr.
Duncalf and gave some further directions. "If there is any change
in the weather, keep the ship standing off and on, at a safe
distance from the land, and throw up a rocket from time to time
to show your position. Expect me on board again by sunrise."

"What!" cried the mate. "Do you mean to say you are going back to
the island--in that boat--all by yourself?"

"I am going back to the island," answered the Captain, as quietly
as ever; "in this boat--all by myself." He pushed off from the
ship, and hoisted the sail as he spoke.

"You're deserting your duty!" the old sea-dog shouted, with one
of his loudest oaths.

"Attend to my directions," the Captain shouted back, as he
drifted away into the darkness.

Mr. Duncalf--violently agitated for the first time in his
life--took leave of his superior officer, with a singular mixture
of solemnity and politeness, in these words:

"The Lord have mercy on your soul! I wish you good-evening."

VIII.

ALONE in the boat, the Captain looked with a misgiving mind at
the flashing of the volcano on the main island.

If events had favored him, he would have removed Aimata to the
shelter of the ship on the day when he saw the emptied basin on
the lake. But the smoke of the Priest's sacrifice had been
discovered by the chief; and he had dispatched two canoes with
instructions to make inquiries. One of the canoes had returned;
the other was kept in waiting off the cape, to place a means of
communicating with the main island at the disposal of the Priest.
The second shock of earthquake had naturally increased the alarm
of the chief. He had sent messages to the Priest, entreating him
to leave the island, and other messages to Aimata suggesting that
she should exert her influence over her father, if he hesitated.
The Priest refused to leave the Temple. He trusted in his gods
and his sacrifices--he believed they might avert the fatality
that threatened his sanctuary.

Yielding to the holy man, the chief sent re-enforcements of
canoes to take their turn at keeping watch off the headland.
Assisted by torches, the islanders were on the alert (in
superstitious terror of the demon of the prophecy) by night as
well as by day. The Captain had no alternative but to keep in
hiding, and to watch his opportunity of approaching the place in
which he had concealed his canoe. It was only after Aimata had
left him as usual, to return to her father at the close of
evening, that the chances declared themselves in his favor. The
fire-flashes from the mountain, visible when the night came, had
struck terror into the hearts of the men on the watch. They
thought of their wives, their children, and their possessions on
the main island, and they one and all deserted their Priest. The
Captain seized the opportunity of communicating with the ship,
and of exchanging a frail canoe which he was ill able to manage,
for a swift-sailing boat capable of keeping the sea in the event
of stormy weather.

As he now neared the land, certain small sparks of red, moving on
the distant water, informed him that the canoes of the sentinels
had been ordered back to their duty.

Carefully avoiding the lights, he reached his own side of the
island without accident, and, guided by the boat's lantern,
anchored under the cliff. He climbed the rocks, advanced to the
door of the hut, and was met, to his delight and astonishment, by
Aimata on the threshold.

"I dreamed that some dreadful misfortune had parted us forever,"
she said; "and I came here to see if my dream was true. You have
taught me what it is to be miserable; I never felt my heart ache
till I looked into the hut and found that you had gone. Now I
have seen you, I am satisfied. No! you must not go back with me.
My father may be out looking for me. It is you that are in
danger, not I. I know the forest as well by dark as by daylight."

The Captain detained her when she tried to leave him.

"Now you _are_ here," he said, "why should I not place you at
once in safety? I have been to the ship; I have brought back one
of the boats. The darkness will befriend us--let us embark while
we can."

She shrank away as he took her hand. "You forget my father!" she
said.

"Your father is in no danger, my love. The canoes are waiting for
him at the cape; I saw the lights as I passed."

With that reply he drew her out of the hut and led her toward the
sea. Not a breath of the breeze was now to be felt. The dead calm
had returned--and the boat was too large to be easily managed by
one man alone at the oars.

"The breeze may come again," he said. "Wait here, my angel, for
the chance."

As he spoke, the deep silence of the forest below them was broken
by a sound. A harsh wailing voice was heard, calling:

"Aimata! Aimata!"

"My father!" she whispered; "he has missed me. If he comes here
you are lost."

She kissed him with passionate fervor; she held him to her for a
moment with all her strength.

"Expect me at daybreak," she said, and disappeared down the
landward slope of the cliff.

He listened, anxious for her safety. The voices of the father and
daughter just reached him from among the trees. The Priest spoke
in no angry tones; she had apparently found an acceptable excuse
for her absence. Little by little, the failing sound of their
voices told him that they were on their way back together to the
Temple. The silence fell again. Not a ripple broke on the beach.
Not a leaf rustled in the forest. Nothing moved but the reflected
flashes of the volcano on the main island over the black sky. It
was an airless and an awful calm.

He went into the hut, and laid down on his bed of leaves--not to
sleep, but to rest. All his energies might be required to meet
the coming events of the morning. After the voyage to and from
the ship, and the long watching that had preceded it, strong as
he was he stood in need of repose.

For some little time he kept awake, thinking. Insensibly the
oppression of the intense heat, aided in its influence by his own
fatigue, treacherously closed his eyes. In spite of himself, the
weary man fell into a deep sleep.

He was awakened by a roar like the explosion  of a park of
artillery. The volcano on th e main island had burst into a state
of eruption. Smoky flame-light overspread the sky, and flashed
through the open doorway of the hut. He sprang from his bed--and
found himself up to his knees in water.

Had the sea overflowed the land?

He waded out of the hut, and the water rose to his middle. He
looked round him by the lurid light of the eruption. The one
visible object within the range of view was the sea, stained by
reflections from the blood-red sky, swirling and rippling
strangely in the dead calm. In a moment more, he became conscious
that the earth on which he stood was sinking under his feet. The
water rose to his neck; the last vestige of the roof of the hut
disappeared.

He looked round again, and the truth burst on him. The island was
sinking--slowly, slowly sinking into volcanic depths, below even
the depth of the sea! The highest object was the hut, and that
had dropped inch by inch under water before his own eyes. Thrown
up to the surface by occult volcanic influences, the island had
sunk back, under the same influences, to the obscurity from which
it had emerged!

A black shadowy object, turning in a wide circle, came slowly
near him as the all-destroying ocean washed its bitter waters
into his mouth. The buoyant boat, rising as the sea rose, had
dragged its anchor, and was floating round in the vortex made by
the slowly sinking island. With a last desperate hope that Aimata
might have been saved as _he_ had been saved, he swam to the
boat, seized the heavy oars with the strength of a giant, and
made for the place (so far as he could guess at it now) where the
lake and the Temple had once been.

He looked round and round him; he strained his eyes in the vain
attempt to penetrate below the surface of the seething dimpling
sea. Had the panic-stricken watchers in the canoes saved
themselves, without an effort to preserve the father and
daughter? Or had they both been suffocated before they could make
an attempt to escape? He called to her in his misery, as if she
could hear him out of the fathomless depths: "Aimata! Aimata!"
The roar of the distant eruption answered him. The mounting fires
lit the solitary sea far and near over the sinking island. The
boat turned slowly and more slowly in the lessening vortex. Never
again would those gentle eyes look at him with unutterable love!
Never again would those fresh lips touch his lips with their
fervent kiss! Alone, amid the savage forces of Nature in
conflict, the miserable mortal lifted his hands in frantic
supplication--and the burning sky glared down on him in its
pitiless grandeur, and struck him to his knees in the boat. His
reason sank with his sinking limbs. In the merciful frenzy that
succeeded the shock, he saw afar off, in her white robe, an angel
poised on the waters, beckoning him to follow her to the brighter
and the better world. He loosened the sail, he seized the oars;
and the faster he pursued it, the faster the mocking vision fled
from him over the empty and endless sea.

IX.

THE boat was discovered, on the next morning, from the ship.

All that the devotion of the officers of the _Fortuna_ could do
for their unhappy commander was done on the homeward voyage.
Restored to his own country, and to skilled medical help, the
Captain's mind by slow degrees recovered its balance. He has
taken his place in society again--he lives and moves and manages
his affairs like the rest of us. But his heart is dead to all new
emotions; nothing remains in it but the sacred remembrance of his
lost love. He neither courts nor avoids the society of women.
Their sympathy finds him grateful, but their attractions seem to
be lost on him; they pass from his mind as they pass from his
eyes--they stir nothing in him but the memory of Aimata.



"Now you know, ladies, why the Captain will never marry, and why
(sailor as he is) he hates the sight of the sea."


MR. MARMADUKE AND THE MINISTER.

I.

September 13th.--Winter seems to be upon us, on the Highland
Border, already.

I looked out of window, as the evening closed in, before I barred
the shutters and drew the curtains for the night. The clouds hid
the hilltops on either side of our valley. Fantastic mists parted
and met again on the lower slopes, as the varying breeze blew
them. The blackening waters of the lake before our window seemed
to anticipate the coming darkness. On the more distant hills the
torrents were just visible, in the breaks of the mist, stealing
their way over the brown ground like threads of silver. It was a
dreary scene. The stillness of all things was only interrupted by
the splashing of our little waterfall at the back of the house. I
was not sorry to close the shutters, and confine the view to the
four walls of our sitting-room.

The day happened to be my birthday. I sat by the peat-fire,
waiting for the lamp and the tea-tray, and contemplating my past
life from the vantage-ground, so to speak, of my fifty-fifth
year.

There was wonderfully little to look back on. Nearly thirty years
since, it pleased an all-wise Providence to cast my lot in this
remote Scottish hamlet, and to make me Minister of Cauldkirk, on
a stipend of seventy-four pounds sterling per annum. I and my
surroundings have grown quietly older and older together. I have
outlived my wife; I have buried one generation among my
parishioners, and married another; I have borne the wear and tear
of years better than the kirk in which I minister and the manse
(or parsonage-house) in which I live--both sadly out of repair,
and both still trusting for the means of reparation to the pious
benefactions of people richer than myself. Not that I complain,
be it understood, of the humble position which I occupy. I
possess many blessings; and I thank the Lord for them. I have my
little bit of land and my cow. I have also my good daughter,
Felicia; named after her deceased mother, but inheriting her
comely looks, it is thought, rather from myself.

Neither let me forget my elder sister, Judith; a friendless
single person, sheltered under my roof, whose temperament I could
wish somewhat less prone to look at persons and things on the
gloomy side, but whose compensating virtues Heaven forbid that I
should deny. No; I am grateful for what has been given me (from
on high), and resigned to what has been taken away. With what
fair prospects did I start in life! Springing from a good old
Scottish stock, blessed with every advantage of education that
the institutions of Scotland and England in turn could offer;
with a career at the Bar and in Parliament before me--and all
cast to the winds, as it were, by the measureless prodigality of
my unhappy father, God forgive him! I doubt if I had five pounds
left in my purse, when the compassion of my relatives on the
mother's side opened a refuge to me at Cauldkirk, and hid me from
the notice of the world for the rest of my life.



September 14th.--Thus far I had posted up my Diary on the evening
of the 13th, when an event occurred so completely unexpected by
my household and myself, that the pen, I may say, dropped
incontinently from my hand.

It was the time when we had finished our tea, or supper--I hardly
know which to call it. In the silence, we could hear the rain
pouring against the window, and the wind that had risen with the
darkness howling round the house. My sister Judith, taking the
gloomy view according to custom--copious draughts of good Bohea
and two helpings of such a mutton ham as only Scotland can
produce had no effect in raising her spirits--my sister, I say,
remarked that there would be ships lost at sea and men drowned
this night. My daughter Felicia, the brightest-tempered creature
of the female sex that I have ever met with, tried to give a
cheerful turn to her aunt's depressing prognostication. "If the
ships must be lost," she said, "we may surely hope that the men
will be saved." "God willing," I put in--thereby giving to my
daughter's humane expression of feeling the fit religious tone
that was all it wanted--and then went on with my written record
of the events and reflections of the day. No more was said.
Felicia took up a book. Judith took up her knitting.

On a sudden, the silence was broken by
 a blow on the house-door.

My two companions, as is the way of women, set up a scream. I was
startled myself, wondering who could be out in the rain and the
darkness and striking at the door of the house. A stranger it
must be. Light or dark, any person in or near Cauldkirk, wanting
admission, would know where to find the bell-handle at the side
of the door. I waited a while to hear what might happen next. The
stroke was repeated, but more softly. It became me as a man and a
minister to set an example. I went out into the passage, and I
called through the door, "Who's there?"

A man's voice answered--so faintly that I could barely hear
him--"A lost traveler."

Immediately upon this my cheerful sister expressed her view of
the matter through the open parlor door. "Brother Noah, it's a
robber. Don't let him in!"

What would the Good Samaritan have done in my place? Assuredly he
would have run the risk and opened the door. I imitated the Good
Samaritan.

A man, dripping wet, with a knapsack on his back and a thick
stick in his hand, staggered in, and would, I think, have fallen
in the passage if I had not caught him by the arm. Judith peeped
out at the parlor door, and said, "He's drunk." Felicia was
behind her, holding up a lighted candle, the better to see what
was going on. "Look at his face, aunt," says she. "Worn out with
fatigue, poor man. Bring him in, father--bring him in."

Good Felicia! I was proud of my girl. "He'll spoil the carpet,"
says sister Judith. I said, "Silence, for shame!" and brought him
in, and dropped him dripping into my own armchair. Would the Good
Samaritan have thought of his carpet or his chair? I did think of
them, but I overcame it. Ah, we are a decadent generation in
these latter days!

"Be quick, father"' says Felicia; "he'll faint if you don't give
him something!"

I took out one of our little drinking cups (called among us a
"Quaigh"), while Felicia, instructed by me, ran to the kitchen
for the cream-jug. Filling the cup with whisky and cream in equal
proportions, I offered it to him. He drank it off as if it had
been so much water. "Stimulant and nourishment, you'll observe,
sir, in equal portions," I remarked to him. "How do you feel
now?"

"Ready for another," says he.

Felicia burst out laughing. I gave him another. As I turned to
hand it to him, sister Judith came behind me, and snatched away
the cream-jug. Never a generous person, sister Judith, at the
best of times--more especially in the matter of cream.

He handed me back the empty cup. "I believe, sir, you have saved
my life," he said. "Under Providence," I put in--adding, "But I
would remark, looking to the state of your clothes, that I have
yet another service to offer you, before you tell us how you came
into this pitiable state." With that reply, I led him upstairs,
and set before him the poor resources of my wardrobe, and left
him to do the best he could with them. He was rather a small man,
and I am in stature nigh on six feet. When he came down to us in
my clothes, we had the merriest evening that I can remember for
years past. I thought Felicia would have had a hysteric fit; and
even sister Judith laughed--he did look such a comical figure in
the minister's garments.

As for the misfortune that had befallen him, it offered one more
example of the preternatural rashness of the English traveler in
countries unknown to him. He was on a walking tour through
Scotland; and he had set forth to go twenty miles a-foot, from a
town on one side of the Highland Border, to a town on the other,
without a guide. The only wonder is that he found his way to
Cauldkirk, instead of perishing of exposure among the lonesome
hills.

"Will you offer thanks for your preservation to the Throne of
Grace, in your prayers to-night?" I asked him. And he answered,
"Indeed I will!"

We have a spare room at the manse; but it had not been inhabited
for more than a year past. Therefore we made his bed, for that
night, on the sofa in the parlor; and so left him, with the fire
on one side of his couch, and the whisky and the mutton ham on
the other in case of need. He mentioned his name when we bade him
good-night. Marmaduke Falmer of London, son of a minister of the
English Church Establishment, now deceased. It was plain, I may
add, before he spoke, that we had offered the hospitality of the
manse to a man of gentle breeding.



September 15th.--I have to record a singularly pleasant day; due
partly to a return of the fine weather, partly to the good social
gifts of our guest.

Attired again in his own clothing, he was, albeit wanting in
height, a finely proportioned man, with remarkably small hands
and feet; having also a bright mobile face, and large dark eyes
of an extraordinary diversity of expression. Also, he was of a
sweet and cheerful humor; easily pleased with little things, and
amiably ready to make his gifts agreeable to all of us. At the
same time, a person of my experience and penetration could not
fail to perceive that he was most content when in company with
Felicia. I have already mentioned my daughter's comely looks and
good womanly qualities. It was in the order of nature that a
young man (to use his own phrase) getting near to his
thirty-first birthday should feel drawn by sympathy toward a
well-favored young woman in her four-and-twentieth year. In
matters of this sort I have always cultivated a liberal turn of
mind, not forgetting my own youth.

As the evening closed in, I was sorry to notice a certain change
in our guest for the worse. He showed signs of fatigue--falling
asleep at intervals in his chair, and waking up and shivering.
The spare room was now well aired, having had a roaring fire in
it all day.

I begged him not to stand on ceremony, and to betake himself at
once to his bed. Felicia (having learned the accomplishment from
her excellent mother) made him a warm sleeping-draught of eggs,
sugar, nutmeg, and spirits, delicious alike to the senses of
smell and taste. Sister Judith waited until he had closed the
door behind him, and then favored me with one of her dismal
predictions. "You'll rue the day, brother, when you let him into
the house. He is going to fall ill on our hands."

II.

November 28th.--God be praised for all His mercies! This day, our
guest, Marmaduke Falmer, joined us downstairs in the sitting-room
for the first time since his illness.

He is sadly deteriorated, in a bodily sense, by the wasting
rheumatic fever that brought him nigh to death; but he is still
young, and the doctor (humanly speaking) has no doubt of his
speedy and complete recovery. My sister takes the opposite view.
She remarked, in his hearing, that nobody ever thoroughly got
over a rheumatic fever. Oh, Judith! Judith! it's well for
humanity that you're a single person! If haply, there had been
any man desperate enough to tackle such a woman in the bonds of
marriage, what a pessimist progeny must have proceeded from you!

Looking back over my Diary for the last two months and more, I
see one monotonous record of the poor fellow's sufferings;
cheered and varied, I am pleased to add, by the devoted services
of my daughter at the sick man's bedside. With some help from her
aunt (most readily given when he was nearest to the point of
death), and with needful services performed in turn by two of our
aged women in Cauldkirk, Felicia could not have nursed him more
assiduously if he had been her own brother. Half the credit of
bringing him through it belonged (as the doctor himself
confessed) to the discreet young nurse, always ready through the
worst of the illness, and always cheerful through the long
convalescence that followed. I must also record to the credit of
Marmaduke that he was indeed duly grateful. When I led him into
the parlor, and he saw Felicia waiting by the armchair, smiling
and patting the pillows for him, he took her by the hand, and
burst out crying. Weakness, in part, no doubt--but sincere
gratitude at the bottom of it, I am equally sure.



November 29th.--However, there are limits even to sincere
gratitude. Of this truth Mr. Marmaduke seems to be insufficiently
aware. Entering the sitting-room soon after noon today, I found
our convalescen t guest and his nurse alone. His head was resting
on her shoulder; his arm was round her waist--and (the truth
before everything) Felicia was kissing him.

A man may be of a liberal turn of mind, and may yet consistently
object to freedom when it takes the form of unlicensed embracing
and kissing; the person being his own daughter, and the place his
own house. I signed to my girl to leave us; and I advanced to Mr.
Marmaduke, with my opinion of his conduct just rising in words to
my lips--when he staggered me with amazement by asking for
Felicia's hand in marriage.

"You need feel no doubt of my being able to offer to your
daughter a position of comfort and respectability," he said. "I
have a settled income of eight hundred pounds a year."

His raptures over Felicia; his protestations that she was the
first woman he had ever really loved; his profane declaration
that he preferred to die, if I refused to let him be her
husband--all these flourishes, as I may call them, passed in at
one of my ears and out at the other. But eight hundred pounds
sterling per annum, descending as it were in a golden avalanche
on the mind of a Scottish minister (accustomed to thirty years'
annual contemplation of seventy-four pounds)--eight hundred a
year, in one young man's pocket, I say, completely overpowered
me. I just managed to answer, "Wait till tomorrow" --and hurried
out of doors to recover my self-respect, if the thing was to be
anywise done. I took my way through the valley. The sun was
shining, for a wonder. When I saw my shadow on the hillside, I
saw the Golden Calf as an integral part of me, bearing this
inscription in letters of flame--"Here's another of them!"



_November 30th._--I have made amends for yesterday's backsliding;
I have acted as becomes my parental dignity and my sacred
calling.

The temptation to do otherwise, has not been wanting. Here is
sister Judith's advice: "Make sure that he has got the money
first; and, for Heaven's sake, nail him!" Here is Mr. Marmaduke's
proposal: "Make any conditions you please, so long as you give me
your daughter." And, lastly, here is Felicia's confession:
"Father, my heart is set on him. Oh, don't be unkind to me for
the first time in your life!"

But I have stood firm. I have refused to hear any more words on
the subject from any one of them, for the next six months to
come.

"So serious a venture as the venture of marriage," I said, "is
not to be undertaken on impulse. As soon as Mr. Marmaduke can
travel, I request him to leave us, and not to return again for
six months. If, after that interval, he is still of the same
mind, and my daughter is still of the same mind, let him return
to Cauldkirk, and (premising that I am in all other respects
satisfied) let him ask me for his wife."

There were tears, there were protestations; I remained immovable.
A week later, Mr. Marmaduke left us, on his way by easy stages to
the south. I am not a hard man. I rewarded the lovers for their
obedience by keeping sister Judith out of the way, and letting
them say their farewell words (accompaniments included) in
private.

III.

May 28th.--A letter from Mr. Marmaduke, informing me that I may
expect him at Cauldkirk, exactly at the expiration of the six
months' interval--viz., on June the seventh.

Writing to this effect, he added a timely word on the subject of
his family. Both his parents were dead; his only brother held a
civil appointment in India, the place being named. His uncle (his
father's brother) was a merchant resident in London; and to this
near relative he referred me, if I wished to make inquiries about
him. The names of his bankers, authorized to give me every
information in respect to his pecuniary affairs, followed.
Nothing could be more plain and straightforward. I wrote to his
uncle, and I wrote to his bankers. In both cases the replies were
perfectly satisfactory--nothing in the slightest degree doubtful,
no prevarications, no mysteries. In a word, Mr. Marmaduke himself
was thoroughly well vouched for, and Mr. Marmaduke's income was
invested in securities beyond fear and beyond reproach. Even
sister Judith, bent on picking a hole in the record somewhere,
tried hard, and could make nothing of it.

The last sentence in Mr. Marmaduke's letter was the only part of
it which I failed to read with pleasure.

He left it to me to fix the day for the marriage, and he
entreated that I would make it as early a day as possible. I had
a touch of the heartache when I thought of parting with Felicia,
and being left at home with nobody but Judith. However, I got
over it for that time, and, after consulting my daughter, we
decided on naming a fortnight after Mr. Marmaduke's arrival--that
is to say, the twenty-first of June. This gave Felicia time for
her preparations, besides offering to me the opportunity of
becoming better acquainted with my son-in-law's disposition. The
happiest marriage does indubitably make its demands on human
forbearance; and I was anxious, among other things, to assure
myself of Mr. Marmaduke's good temper.

IV.

June 22d.--The happy change in my daughter's life (let me say
nothing of the change in _my_ life) has come: they were married
yesterday. The manse is a desert; and sister Judith was never so
uncongenial a companion to me as I feel her to be now. Her last
words to the married pair, when they drove away, were: "Lord help
you both; you have all your troubles before you!"

I had no heart to write yesterday's record, yesterday evening, as
usual. The absence of Felicia at the supper-table completely
overcame me. I, who have so often comforted others in their
afflictions, could find no comfort for myself. Even now that the
day has passed, the tears come into my eyes, only with writing
about it. Sad, sad weakness! Let me close my Diary, and open the
Bible--and be myself again.



June 23d.--More resigned since yesterday; a more becoming and
more pious frame of mind--obedient to God's holy will, and
content in the belief that my dear daughter's married life will
be a happy one.

They have gone abroad for their holiday--to Switzerland, by way
of France. I was anything rather than pleased when I heard that
my son-in-law proposed to take Felicia to that sink of iniquity,
Paris. He knows already what I think of balls and playhouses, and
similar devils' diversions, and how I have brought up my daughter
to think of them--the subject having occurred in conversation
among us more than a week since. That he could meditate taking a
child of mine to the headquarters of indecent jiggings and
abominable stage-plays, of spouting rogues and painted Jezebels,
was indeed a heavy blow.

However, Felicia reconciled me to it in the end. She declared
that her only desire in going to Paris was to see the
picture-galleries, the public buildings, and the fair outward
aspect of the city generally. "Your opinions, father, are my
opinions," she said; "and Marmaduke, I am sure, will so shape our
arrangements as to prevent our passing a Sabbath in Paris."
Marmaduke not only consented to this (with the perfect good
temper of which I have observed more than one gratifying example
in him), but likewise assured me that, speaking for himself
personally, it would be a relief to him when they got to the
mountains and the lakes. So that matter was happily settled. Go
where they may, God bless and prosper them!

Speaking of relief, I must record that Judith has gone away to
Aberdeen on a visit to some friends. "You'll be wretched enough
here," she said at parting, "all by yourself." Pure vanity and
self-complacence! It may be resignation to her absence, or it may
be natural force of mind, I began to be more easy and composed
the moment I was alone, and this blessed state of feeling has
continued uninterruptedly ever since.

V.

September 5th.--A sudden change in my life, which it absolutely
startles me to record. I am going to London!

My purpose in taking this most serious step is of a twofold
nature. I have a greater and a lesser object in view.

The greater object is to see my daughter, and to judge for myself
whether certain doubts on the vital question of her happiness,
which  now torment me night and day, are unhappily founded on
truth. She and her husband returned in August from their
wedding-tour, and took up their abode in Marmaduke's new
residence in London. Up to this time, Felicia's letters to me
were, in very truth, the delight of my life--she was so entirely
happy, so amazed and delighted with all the wonderful things she
saw, so full of love and admiration for the best husband that
ever lived. Since her return to London, I perceive a complete
change.

She makes no positive complaint, but she writes in a tone of
weariness and discontent; she says next to nothing of Marmaduke,
and she dwells perpetually on the one idea of my going to London
to see her. I hope with my whole heart that I am wrong; but the
rare allusions to her husband, and the constantly repeated desire
to see her father (while she has not been yet three months
married), seem to me to be bad signs. In brief, my anxiety is too
great to be endured. I have so arranged matters with one of my
brethren as to be free to travel to London cheaply by steamer;
and I begin the journey tomorrow.

My lesser object may be dismissed in two words. Having already
decided on going to London, I propose to call on the wealthy
nobleman who owns all the land hereabouts, and represent to him
the discreditable, and indeed dangerous, condition of the parish
kirk for want of means to institute the necessary repairs. If I
find myself well received, I shall put in a word for the manse,
which is almost in as deplorable a condition as the church. My
lord is a wealthy man--may his heart and his purse be opened unto
me!

Sister Judith is packing my portmanteau. According to custom, she
forbodes the worst. "Never forget," she says, "that I warned you
against Marmaduke, on the first night when he entered the house."

VI.

September 10th.--After more delays than one, on land and sea, I
was at last set ashore near the Tower, on the afternoon of
yesterday. God help us, my worst anticipations have been
realized! My beloved Felicia has urgent and serious need of me.

It is not to be denied that I made my entry into my son-in-law's
house in a disturbed and irritated frame of mind. First, my
temper was tried by the almost interminable journey, in the noisy
and comfortless vehicle which they call a cab, from the
river-wharf to the west-end of London, where Marmaduke lives. In
the second place, I was scandalized and alarmed by an incident
which took place--still on the endless journey from east to
west--in a street hard by the market of Covent Garden.

We had just approached a large building, most profusely
illuminated with gas, and exhibiting prodigious colored placards
having inscribed on them nothing but the name of Barrymore. The
cab came suddenly to a standstill; and looking out to see what
the obstacle might be, I discovered a huge concourse of men and
women, drawn across the pavement and road alike, so that it
seemed impossible to pass by them. I inquired of my driver what
this assembling of the people meant. "Oh," says he, "Barrymore
has made another hit." This answer being perfectly unintelligible
to me, I requested some further explanation, and discovered that
"Barrymore" was the name of a stage-player favored by the
populace; that the building was a theater, and that all these
creatures with immortal souls were waiting, before the doors
opened, to get places at the show!

The emotions of sorrow and indignation caused by this discovery
so absorbed me that I failed to notice an attempt the driver made
to pass through, where the crowd seemed to be thinner, until the
offended people resented the proceeding. Some of them seized the
horse's head; others were on the point of pulling the driver off
his box, when providentially the police interfered. Under their
protection, we drew back, and reached our destination in safety,
by another way. I record this otherwise unimportant affair,
because it grieved and revolted me (when I thought of the
people's souls), and so indisposed my mind to take cheerful views
of anything. Under these circumstances, I would fain hope that I
have exaggerated the true state of the case, in respect to my
daughter's married life.

My good girl almost smothered me with kisses. When I at last got
a fair opportunity of observing her, I thought her looking pale
and worn and anxious. Query: Should I have arrived at this
conclusion if I had met with no example of the wicked
dissipations of London, and if I had ridden at my ease in a
comfortable vehicle?

They had a succulent meal ready for me, and, what I call, fair
enough whisky out of Scotland. Here again I remarked that Felicia
ate very little. and Marmaduke nothing at all. He drank wine,
too--and, good heavens, champagne wine!--a needless waste of
money surely when there was whisky on the table. My appetite
being satisfied, my son-in-law went out of the room, and returned
with his hat in his hand. "You and Felicia have many things to
talk about on your first evening together. I'll leave you for a
while--I shall only be in the way." So he spoke. It was in vain
that his wife and I assured him he was not in the way at all. He
kissed his hand, and smiled pleasantly, and left us.

"There, father!" says Felicia. "For the last ten days he has gone
out like that, and left me alone for the whole evening. When we
first returned from Switzerland, he left me in the same
mysterious way, only it was after breakfast then. Now he stays at
home in the daytime, and goes out at night."

I inquired if she had not summoned him to give her some
explanation.

"I don't know what to make of his explanation," says Felicia.
"When he went away in the daytime, he told me he had business in
the City. Since he took to going out at night, he says he goes to
his club."

"Have you asked where his club is, my dear?"

"He says it's in Pall Mall. There are dozens of clubs in that
street--and he has never told me the name of _his_ club. I am
completely shut out of his confidence. Would you believe it,
father? he has not introduced one of his friends to me since we
came home. I doubt if they know where he lives, since he took
this house."

What could I say?

I said nothing, and looked round the room. It was fitted up with
perfectly palatial magnificence. I am an ignorant man in matters
of this sort, and partly to satisfy my curiosity, partly to
change the subject, I asked to see the house. Mercy preserve us,
the same grandeur everywhere! I wondered if even such an income
as eight hundred a year could suffice for it all. In a moment
when I was considering this, a truly frightful suspicion crossed
my mind. Did these mysterious absences, taken in connection with
the unbridled luxury that surrounded us, mean that my son-in-law
was a gamester? a shameless shuffler of cards, or a debauched
bettor on horses? While I was still completely overcome by my own
previsions of evil, my daughter put her arm in mine to take me to
the top of the house.

For the first time I observed a bracelet of dazzling gems on her
wrist. "Not diamonds?" I said. She answered, with as much
composure as if she had been the wife of a nobleman, "Yes,
diamonds--a present from Marmaduke." This was too much for me; my
previsions, so to speak, forced their way into words. "Oh, my
poor child!" I burst out, "I'm in mortal fear that your husband's
a gamester!"

She showed none of the horror I had anticipated; she only shook
her head and began to cry.

"Worse than that, I'm afraid," she said.

I was petrified; my tongue refused its office, when I would fain
have asked her what she meant. Her besetting sin, poor soul, is a
proud spirit. She dried her eyes on a sudden, and spoke out
freely, in these words: "I am not going to cry about it. The
other day, father, we were out walking in the park. A horrid,
bold, yellow-haired woman passed us in an open carriage. She
kissed her hand to Marmaduke, and called out to him, 'How are
you, Marmy?' I was so indignant that I pushed him away from me,
and told him to go and take a drive with his lady. He burst out
laughing. 'Nonsense!' he said; 'she has known me for years--you
don't understand our easy London manners.' We have made it up
since then; but I have my own opinion of the creature in th e
open carriage."

Morally speaking, this was worse than all. But, logically viewed,
it completely failed as a means of accounting for the diamond
bracelet and the splendor of the furniture.

We went on to the uppermost story. It was cut off from the rest
of the house by a stout partition of wood, and a door covered
with green baize.

When I tried the door it was locked. "Ha!" says Felicia, "I
wanted you to see it for yourself!" More suspicious proceedings
on the part of my son-in-law! He kept the door constantly locked,
and the key in his pocket. When his wife asked him what it meant,
he answered: "My study is up there--and I like to keep it
entirely to myself." After such a reply as that, the preservation
of my daughter's dignity permitted but one answer: "Oh, keep it
to yourself, by all means!"

My previsions, upon this, assumed another form.

I now asked myself--still in connection with my son-in-law's
extravagant expenditure--whether the clew to the mystery might
not haply be the forging of bank-notes on the other side of the
baize door. My mind was prepared for anything by this time. We
descended again into the dining-room. Felicia saw how my spirits
were dashed, and came and perched upon my knee. "Enough of my
troubles for to-night, father," she said. "I am going to be your
little girl again, and we will talk of nothing but Cauldkirk,
until Marmaduke comes back." I am one of the firmest men living,
but I could not keep the hot tears out of my eyes when she put
her arm round my neck and said those words. By good fortune I was
sitting with my back to the lamp; she didn't notice me.

A little after eleven o'clock Marmaduke returned. He looked pale
and weary. But more champagne, and this time something to eat
with it, seemed to set him to rights again--no doubt by relieving
him from the reproaches of a guilty conscience.

I had been warned by Felicia to keep what had passed between us a
secret from her husband for the present; so we had (superficially
speaking) a merry end to the evening. My son-in-law was nearly as
good company as ever, and wonderfully fertile in suggestions and
expedients when he saw they were wanted. Hearing from his wife,
to whom I had mentioned it, that I purposed representing the
decayed condition of the kirk and manse to the owner of Cauldkirk
and the country round about, he strongly urged me to draw up a
list of repairs that were most needful, before I waited on my
lord. This advice, vicious and degraded as the man who offered it
may be, is sound advice nevertheless. I shall assuredly take it.

So far I had written in my Diary, in the forenoon. Returning to
my daily record, after a lapse of some hours, I have a new
mystery of iniquity to chronicle. My abominable son-in-law now
appears (I blush to write it) to be nothing less than an
associate of thieves!

After the meal they call luncheon, I thought it well before
recreating myself with the sights of London, to attend first to
the crying necessities of the kirk and the manse. Furnished with
my written list, I presented myself at his lordship's residence.
I was immediately informed that he was otherwise engaged, and
could not possibly receive me. If I wished to see my lord's
secretary, Mr. Helmsley, I could do so. Consenting to this,
rather than fail entirely in my errand, I was shown into the
secretary's room.

Mr. Helmsley heard what I had to say civilly enough; expressing,
however, grave doubts whether his lordship would do anything for
me, the demands on his purse being insupportably numerous
already. However, he undertook to place my list before his
employer, and to let me know the result. "Where are you staying
in London?" he asked. I answered: "With my son-in-law, Mr.
Marmaduke Falmer." Before I could add the address, the secretary
started to his feet and tossed my list back to me across the
table in the most uncivil manner.

"Upon my word," says he, "your assurance exceeds anything I ever
heard of. Your son-in-law is concerned in the robbery of her
ladyship's diamond bracelet--the discovery was made not an hour
ago. Leave the house, sir, and consider yourself lucky that I
have no instructions to give you in charge to the police." I
protested against this unprovoked outrage, with a violence of
language which I would rather not recall. As a minister, I ought,
under every provocation, to have preserved my self-control.

The one thing to do next was to drive back to my unhappy
daughter.

Her guilty husband was with her. I was too angry to wait for a
fit opportunity of speaking. The Christian humility which I have
all my life cultivated as the first of virtues sank, as it were,
from under me. In terms of burning indignation I told them what
had happened. The result was too distressing to be described. It
ended in Felicia giving her husband back the bracelet. The
hardened reprobate laughed at us. "Wait till I have seen his
lordship and Mr. Helmsley," he said, and left the house.

Does he mean to escape to foreign parts? Felicia, womanlike,
believes in him still; she is quite convinced that there must be
some mistake. I am myself in hourly expectation of the arrival of
the police.



With gratitude to Providence, I note before going to bed the
harmless termination of the affair of the bracelet--so far as
Marmaduke is concerned. The agent who sold him the jewel has been
forced to come forward and state the truth. His lordship's wife
is the guilty person; the bracelet was hers--a present from her
husband. Harassed by debts that she dare not acknowledge, she
sold it; my lord discovered that it was gone; and in terror of
his anger the wretched woman took refuge in a lie.

She declared that the bracelet had been stolen from her. Asked
for the name of the thief, the reckless woman (having no other
name in her mind at the moment) mentioned the man who had
innocently bought the jewel of her agent, otherwise my
unfortunate son-in-law. Oh, the profligacy of the modern Babylon!
It was well I went to the secretary when I did or we should
really have had the police in the house. Marmaduke found them in
consultation over the supposed robbery, asking for his address.
There was a dreadful exhibition of violence and recrimination at
his lordship's residence: in the end he re-purchased the
bracelet. My son-in-law's money has been returned to him; and Mr.
Helmsley has sent me a written apology.

In a worldly sense, this would, I suppose, be called a
satisfactory ending.

It is not so to my mind. I freely admit that I too hastily
distrusted Marmaduke; but am I, on that account, to give him back
immediately the place which he once occupied in my esteem? Again
this evening he mysteriously quitted the house, leaving me alone
with Felicia, and giving no better excuse for his conduct than
that he had an engagement. And this when I have a double claim on
his consideration, as his father-in-law and his guest.



September 11th.--The day began well enough. At breakfast,
Marmaduke spoke feelingly of the unhappy result of my visit to
his lordship, and asked me to let him look at the list of
repairs. "It is just useless to expect anything from my lord,
after what has happened," I said. "Besides, Mr. Helmsley gave me
no hope when I stated my case to him." Marmaduke still held out
his hand for the list. "Let me try if I can get some
subscribers," he replied. This was kindly meant, at any rate. I
gave him the list; and I began to recover some of my old friendly
feeling for him. Alas! the little gleam of tranquillity proved to
be of short duration.

We made out our plans for the day pleasantly enough. The check
came when Felicia spoke next of our plans for the evening. "My
father has only four days more to pass with us," she said to her
husband. "Surely you won't go out again to-night, and leave him?"
Marmaduke's face clouded over directly; he looked embarrassed and
annoyed. I sat perfectly silent, leaving them to settle it by
themselves.

"You will stay with us this evening, won't you?" says Felicia.
No: he was not free for the evening. "What! another engagement?
Surely you can put it off?" No; impossible to put it off. "Is it
a ball, or a party of some kind?" No answer; he changed the
subjec t--he offered Felicia the money repaid to him for the
bracelet. "Buy one for yourself, my dear, this time." Felicia
handed him back the money, rather too haughtily, perhaps. "I
don't want a bracelet," she said; "I want your company in the
evening."

He jumped up, good-tempered as he was, in something very like a
rage--then looked at me, and checked himself on the point (as I
believe) of using profane language. "This is downright
persecution!" he burst out, with an angry turn of his head toward
his wife. Felicia got up, in her turn. "Your language is an
insult to my father and to me!" He looked thoroughly staggered at
this: it was evidently their first serious quarrel.

Felicia took no notice of him. "I will get ready directly,
father; and we will go out together." He stopped her as she was
leaving the room--recovering his good temper with a readiness
which it pleased me to see. "Come, come, Felicia! We have not
quarreled yet, and we won't quarrel now. Let me off this one time
more, and I will devote the next three evenings of your father's
visit to him and to you. Give me a kiss, and make it up." My
daughter doesn't do things by halves. She gave him a dozen
kisses, I should think--and there was a happy end of it.

"But what shall we do to-morrow evening?" says Marmaduke, sitting
down by his wife, and patting her hand as it lay in his.

"Take us somewhere," says she. Marmaduke laughed. "Your father
objects to public amusements. Where does he want to go to?"
Felicia took up the newspaper. "There is an oratorio at Exeter
Hall," she said; "my father likes music." He turned to me. "You
don't object to oratorios, sir?" "I don't object to music," I
answered, "so long as I am not required to enter a theater."
Felicia handed the newspaper to me. "Speaking of theaters,
father, have you read what they say about the new play? What a
pity it can't be given out of a theater!" I looked at her in
speechless amazement. She tried to explain herself. "The paper
says that the new play is a service rendered to the cause of
virtue; and that the great actor, Barrymore, has set an example
in producing it which deserves the encouragement of all truly
religious people. Do read it, father!" I held up my hands in
dismay. My own daughter perverted! pinning her faith on a
newspaper! speaking, with a perverse expression of interest, of a
stage-play and an actor! Even Marmaduke witnessed this lamentable
exhibition of backsliding with some appearance of alarm. "It's
not her fault, sir," he said, interceding with me. "It's the
fault of the newspaper. Don't blame her!" I held my peace;
determining inwardly to pray for her. Shortly afterward my
daughter and I went out. Marmaduke accompanied us part of the
way, and left us at a telegraph office. "Who are you going to
telegraph to?" Felicia asked. Another mystery! He answered,
"Business of my own, my dear"--and went into the office.



September 12th.--Is my miserable son-in-law's house under a
curse? The yellow-haired woman in the open carriage drove up to
the door at half-past ten this morning, in a state of
distraction. Felicia and I saw her from the drawing-room
balcony--a tall woman in gorgeous garments. She knocked with her
own hand at the door--she cried out distractedly, "Where is he? I
must see him!" At the sound of her voice, Marmaduke (playing with
his little dog in the drawing-room) rushed downstairs and out
into the street. "Hold your tongue!" we heard him say to her.
"What are you here for?"

What she answered we failed to hear; she was certainly crying.
Marmaduke stamped on the pavement like a man beside himself--took
her roughly by the arm, and led her into the house.

Before I could utter a word, Felicia left me and flew headlong
down the stairs.

She was in time to hear the dining-room locked. Following her, I
prevented the poor jealous creature from making a disturbance at
the door. God forgive me--not knowing how else to quiet her--I
degraded myself by advising her to listen to what they said. She
instantly opened the door of the back dining-room, and beckoned
to me to follow. I naturally hesitated. "I shall go mad," she
whispered, "if you leave me by myself!" What could I do? I
degraded myself the second time. For my own child--in pity for my
own child!

We heard them, through the flimsy modern folding-doors, at those
times when he was most angry, and she most distracted. That is to
say, we heard them when they spoke in their loudest tones.

"How did you find out where I live?" says he. "Oh, you're ashamed
of me?" says she. "Mr. Helmsley was with us yesterday evening.
That's how I found out!" "What do you mean?" "I mean that Mr.
Helmsley had your card and address in his pocket. Ah, you were
obliged to give your address when you had to clear up that matter
of the bracelet! You cruel, cruel man, what have I done to
deserve such a note as you sent me this morning?" "Do what the
note tells you!" "Do what the note tells me? Did anybody ever
hear a man talk so, out of a lunatic asylum? Why, you haven't
even the grace to carry out your own wicked deception--you
haven't even gone to bed!" There the voices grew less angry, and
we missed what followed. Soon the lady burst out again, piteously
entreating him this time. "Oh, Marmy, don't ruin me! Has anybody
offended you? Is there anything you wish to have altered? Do you
want more money? It is too cruel to treat me in this way--it is
indeed!" He made some answer, which we were not able to hear; we
could only suppose that he had upset her temper again. She went
on louder than ever "I've begged and prayed of you--and you're as
hard as iron. I've told you about the Prince--and _that_ has had
no effect on you. I have done now. We'll see what the doctor
says." He got angry, in his turn; we heard him again. "I won't
see the doctor!" "Oh, you refuse to see the doctor?--I shall make
your refusal known--and if there's law in England, you shall feel
it!" Their voices dropped again; some new turn seemed to be taken
by the conversation. We heard the lady once more, shrill and
joyful this time. "There's a dear! You see it, don't you, in the
right light? And you haven't forgotten the old times, have you?
You're the same dear, honorable, kind-hearted fellow that you
always were!"

I caught hold of Felicia, and put my hand over her mouth.

There was a sound in the next room which might have been--I
cannot be certain--the sound of a kiss. The next moment, we heard
the door of the room unlocked. Then the door of the house was
opened, and the noise of retreating carriage-wheels followed. We
met him in the hall, as he entered the house again.

My daughter walked up to him, pale and determined.

"I insist on knowing who that woman is, and what she wants here."
Those were her first words. He looked at her like a man in utter
confusion. "Wait till this evening; I am in no state to speak to
you now!" With that, he snatched his hat off the hall table and
rushed out of the house.

It is little more than three weeks since they returned to London
from their happy wedding-tour--and it has come to this!

The clock has just struck seven; a letter has been left by a
messenger, addressed to my daughter. I had persuaded her, poor
soul, to lie down in her own room. God grant that the letter may
bring her some tidings of her husband! I please myself in the
hope of hearing good news.

My mind has not been kept long in suspense. Felicia's
waiting-woman has brought me a morsel of writing paper, with
these lines penciled on it in my daughter's handwriting: "Dearest
father, make your mind easy. Everything is explained. I cannot
trust myself to speak to you about it to-night--and _he_ doesn't
wish me to do so. Only wait till tomorrow, and you shall know
all. He will be back about eleven o'clock. Please don't wait up
for him--he will come straight to me."



September 13th.--The scales have fallen from my eyes; the light
is let in on me at last. My bewilderment is not to be uttered in
words--I am like a man in a dream.

Before I was out of my room in the morning, my mind was upset by
the arrival of a telegram addressed to myself. It was the first
thing of the kind I ever received; I trembled under the prev
ision of some new misfortune as I opened the envelope.

Of all the people in the world, the person sending the telegram
was sister Judith! Never before did this distracting relative
confound me as she confounded me now. Here is her message: "You
can't come back. An architect from Edinburgh asserts his
resolution to repair the kirk and the manse. The man only waits
for his lawful authority to begin. The money is ready--but who
has found it? Mr. Architect is forbidden to tell. We live in
awful times. How is Felicia?"

Naturally concluding that Judith's mind must be deranged, I went
downstairs to meet my son-in-law (for the first time since the
events of yesterday) at the late breakfast which is customary in
this house. He was waiting for me--but Felicia was not present.
"She breakfasts in her room this morning," says Marmaduke; "and I
am to give you the explanation which has already satisfied your
daughter. Will you take it at great length, sir? or will you have
it in one word?" There was something in his manner that I did not
at all like--he seemed to be setting me at defiance. I said,
stiffly, "Brevity is best; I will have it in one word."

"Here it is then," he answered. "I am Barrymore. "

                POSTSCRIPT ADDED BY FELICIA.

If the last line extracted from my dear father's Diary does not
contain explanation enough in itself, I add some sentences from
Marmaduke's letter to me, sent from the theater last night. (N.
B.--I leave out the expressions of endearment: they are my own
private property.)

. . . "Just remember how your father talked about theaters and
actors, when I was at Cauldkirk, and how you listened in dutiful
agreement with him. Would he have consented to your marriage if
he had known that I was one of the 'spouting rogues,' associated
with the 'painted Jezebels' of the playhouse? He would never have
consented--and you yourself, my darling, would have trembled at
the bare idea of marrying an actor.

"Have I been guilty of any serious deception? and have my friends
been guilty in helping to keep my secret? My birth, my name, my
surviving relatives, my fortune inherited from my father--all
these important particulars have been truly stated. The name of
Barrymore is nothing but the name that I assumed when I went on
the stage.

"As to what has happened, since our return from Switzerland, I
own that I ought to have made my confession to you. Forgive me if
I weakly hesitated. I was so fond of you; and I so distrusted the
Puritanical convictions which your education had rooted in your
mind, that I put it off from day to day. Oh, my angel ....!

"Yes, I kept the address of my new house a secret from all my
friends, knowing they would betray me if they paid us visits. As
for my mysteriously-closed study, it was the place in which I
privately rehearsed my new part. When I left you in the mornings,
it was to go to the theater rehearsals. My evening absences began
of course with the first performance.

"Your father's arrival seriously embarrassed me. When you (most
properly) insisted on my giving up some of my evenings to him,
you necessarily made it impossible for me to appear on the stage.
The one excuse I could make to the theater was, that I was too
ill to act. It did certainly occur to me to cut the Gordian knot
by owning the truth. But your father's horror, when you spoke of
the newspaper review of the play, and the shame and fear you
showed at your own boldness, daunted me once more.

"The arrival at the theater of my written excuse brought the
manageress down upon me, in a state of distraction. Nobody could
supply my place; all the seats were taken; and the Prince was
expected. There was what we call a scene between the poor lady
and myself. I felt I was in the wrong; I saw that the position in
which I had impulsively placed myself was unworthy of me--and it
ended in my doing my duty to the theater and the public. But for
the affair of the bracelet, which obliged me as an honorable man
to give my name and address, the manageress would not have
discovered me. She, like every one else, only knew of my address
at my bachelor chambers. How could you be jealous of the old
theatrical comrade of my first days on the stage? Don't you know
yet that you are the one woman in the world . . . . ?

"A last word relating to your father, and I have done.

"Do you remember my leaving you at the telegraph office? It was
to send a message to a friend of mine, an architect in Edinburgh,
instructing him to go immediately to Cauldkirk, and provide for
the repairs at my expense. The theater, my dear, more than
trebles my paternal income, and I can well afford it. Will your
father refuse to accept a tribute of respect to a Scottish
minister, because it is paid out of an actor's pocket? You shall
ask him the question.

"And, I say, Felicia--will you come and see me act? I don't
expect your father to enter a theater; but, by way of further
reconciling him to his son-in-law, suppose you ask him to hear me
read the play?"


MR. PERCY AND THE PROPHET.

PART 1.--THE PREDICTION.

CHAPTER I.

THE QUACK.

THE disasters that follow the hateful offense against
Christianity, which men call war, were severely felt in England
during the peace that ensued on the overthrow of Napoleon at
Waterloo. With rare exceptions, distress prevailed among all
classes of the community. The starving nation was ripe and ready
for a revolutionary rising against its rulers, who had shed the
people's blood and wasted the people's substance in a war which
had yielded to the popular interests absolutely nothing in
return.

Among the unfortunate persons who were driven, during the
disastrous early years of this century, to strange shifts and
devices to obtain the means of living, was a certain obscure
medical man, of French extraction, named Lagarde. The Doctor
(duly qualified to bear the title) was an inhabitant of London;
living in one of the narrow streets which connect the great
thoroughfare of the Strand with the bank of the Thames.

The method of obtaining employment chosen by poor Lagarde, as the
one alternative left in the face of starvation, was, and is still
considered by the medical profession to be, the method of a
quack. He advertised in the public journals.

Addressing himself especially to two classes of the community,
the Doctor proceeded in these words:

"I have the honor of inviting to my house, in the first place:
Persons afflicted with maladies which ordinary medical practice
has failed to cure--and, in the second place: Persons interested
in investigations, the object of which is to penetrate the
secrets of the future. Of the means by which I endeavor to
alleviate suffering and to enlighten doubt, it is impossible to
speak intelligibly within the limits of an advertisement. I can
only offer to submit my system to public inquiry, without
exacting any preliminary fee from ladies and gentlemen who may
honor me with a visit. Those who see sufficient reason to trust
me, after personal experience, will find a money-box fixed on the
waiting-room table, into which they can drop their offerings
according to their means. Those whom I am not fortunate enough to
satisfy will be pleased to accept the expression of my regret,
and will not be expected to give anything. I shall be found at
home every evening between the hours of six and ten."

Toward the close of the year 1816 this strange advertisement
became a general topic of conversation among educated people in
London. For some weeks the Doctor's invitations were generally
accepted--and, all things considered, were not badly remunerated.
A faithful few believed in him, and told wonderful stories of
what he had pronounced and prophesied in the sanctuary of his
consulting-room. The majority of his visitors simply viewed him
in the light of a public amusement, and wondered why such a
gentlemanlike man should have chosen to gain his living by
exhibiting himself as a quack.

CHAPTER II.

THE NUMBERS.

ON a raw and snowy evening toward the latter part of January,
1817, a gentleman, walking along the Strand, turned into the
street in which Doctor Lagarde lived, and knocked at the
physician's door.

He was admitted by an eld erly male servant to a waiting-room on
the first floor. The light of one little lamp, placed on a
bracket fixed to the wall, was so obscured by a dark green shade
as to make it difficult, if not impossible, for visitors meeting
by accident to recognize each other. The metal money-box fixed to
the table was just visible. In the flickering light of a small
fire, the stranger perceived the figures of three men seated,
apart and silent, who were the only occupants of the room beside
himself.

So far as objects were to be seen, there was nothing to attract
attention in the waiting-room. The furniture was plain and neat,
and nothing more. The elderly servant handed a card, with a
number inscribed on it, to the new visitor, said in a whisper,
"Your number will be called, sir, in your turn," and disappeared.
For some minutes nothing disturbed the deep silence but the faint
ticking of a clock. After a while a bell rang from an inner room,
a door opened, and a gentleman appeared, whose interview with
Doctor Lagarde had terminated. His opinion of the sitting was
openly expressed in one emphatic word--"Humbug!" No contribution
dropped from his hand as he passed the money-box on his way out.

The next number (being Number Fifteen) was called by the elderly
servant, and the first incident occurred in the strange series of
events destined to happen in the Doctor's house that night.

One after another the three men who had been waiting rose,
examined their cards under the light of the lamp, and sat down
again surprised and disappointed.

The servant advanced to investigate the matter. The numbers
possessed by the three visitors, instead of being Fifteen,
Sixteen and Seventeen, proved to be Sixteen, Seventeen and
Eighteen. Turning to the stranger who had arrived the last, the
servant said:

"Have I made a mistake, sir? Have I given you Number Fifteen
instead of Number Eighteen?"

The gentleman produced his numbered card.

A mistake had certainly been made, but not the mistake that the
servant supposed. The card held by the latest visitor turned out
to be the card previously held by the dissatisfied stranger who
had just left the room--Number Fourteen! As to the card numbered
Fifteen, it was only discovered the next morning lying in a
corner, dropped on the floor!

Acting on his first impulse, the servant hurried out, calling to
the original holder of Fourteen to come back and bear his
testimony to that fact. The street-door had been opened for him
by the landlady of the, house. She was a pretty woman--and the
gentleman had fortunately lingered to talk to her. He was
induced, at the intercession of the landlady, to ascend the
stairs again.

On returning to the waiting-room, he addressed a characteristic
question to the assembled visitors. "_More_ humbug?" asked the
gentleman who liked to talk to a pretty woman.

The servant--completely puzzled by his own stupidity--attempted
to make his apologies.

"Pray forgive me, gentlemen," he said. "I am afraid I have
confused the cards I distribute with the cards returned to me. I
think I had better consult my master."

Left by themselves, the visitors began to speak jestingly of the
strange situation in which they were placed. The original holder
of Number Fourteen described his experience of the Doctor in his
own pithy way. "I applied to the fellow to tell my fortune. He
first went to sleep over it, and then he said he could tell me
nothing. I asked why. 'I don't know,' says he. '_ I_ do,' says
I--'humbug!' I'll bet you the long odds, gentlemen, that _you_
find it humbug, too."

Before the wager could be accepted or declined, the door of the
inner room was opened again. The tall, spare, black figure of a
new personage appeared on the threshold, relieved darkly against
the light in the room behind him. He addressed the visitors in
these words:

"Gentlemen, I must beg your indulgence. The accident--as we now
suppose it to be--which has given to the last comer the number
already held by a gentleman who has unsuccessfully consulted me,
may have a meaning which we can none of us at present see. If the
three visitors who have been so good as to wait will allow the
present holder of Number Fourteen to consult me out of his
turn--and if the earlier visitor who left me dissatisfied with
his consultation will consent to stay here a little
longer--something may happen which will justify a trifling
sacrifice of your own convenience. Is ten minutes' patience too
much to ask of you?"

The three visitors who had waited longest consulted among
themselves, and (having nothing better to do with their time)
decided on accepting the Doctor's proposal. The visitor who
believed it all to be "humbug" coolly took a gold coin out of his
pocket, tossed it into the air, caught it in his closed hand, and
walked up to the shaded lamp on the bracket.

"Heads, stay," he said, "Tails, go." He opened his hand, and
looked at the coin. "Heads! Very good. Go on with your
hocus-pocus, Doctor--I'll wait."

"You believe in chance," said the Doctor, quietly observing him.
"That is not my experience of life."

He paused to let the stranger who now held Number Fourteen pass
him into the inner room--then followed, closing the door behind
him.

CHAPTER III.

THE CONSULTATION.

THE consulting-room was better lighted than the waiting-room, and
that was the only difference between the two. In the one, as in
the other, no attempt was made to impress the imagination.
Everywhere, the commonplace furniture of a London lodging-house
was left without the slightest effort to alter or improve it by
changes of any kind.

Seen under the clearer light, Doctor Lagarde appeared to be the
last person living who would consent to degrade himself by an
attempt at imposture of any kind. His eyes were the dreamy eyes
of a visionary; his look was the prematurely-aged look of a
student, accustomed to give the hours to his book which ought to
have been given to his bed. To state it briefly, he was a man who
might easily be deceived by others, but who was incapable of
consciously practicing deception himself.

Signing to his visitor to be seated, he took a chair on the
opposite side of the small table that stood between them--waited
a moment with his face hidden in his hands, as if to collect
himself--and then spoke.

"Do you come to consult me on a case of illness?" he inquired,
"or do you ask me to look to the darkness which hides your future
life?"

The answer to these questions was frankly and briefly expressed.
"I have no need to consult you about my health. I come to hear
what you can tell me of my future life."

"I can try," pursued the Doctor; "but I cannot promise to
succeed."

"I accept your conditions," the stranger rejoined. "I never
believe nor disbelieve. If you will excuse my speaking frankly, I
mean to observe you closely, and to decide for myself."

Doctor Lagarde smiled sadly.

"You have heard of me as a charlatan who contrives to amuse a few
idle people," he said. "I don't complain of that; my present
position leads necessarily to misinterpretation of myself and my
motives. Still, I may at least say that I am the victim of a
sincere avowal of my belief in a great science. Yes! I repeat it,
a great science! New, I dare say, to the generation we live in,
though it was known and practiced in the days when pyramids were
built. The age is advancing; and the truths which it is my
misfortune to advocate, before the time is ripe for them, are
steadily forcing their way to recognition. I am resigned to wait.
My sincerity in this matter has cost me the income that I derived
from my medical practice. Patients distrust me; doctors refuse to
consult with me. I could starve if I had no one to think of but
myself. But I have another person to consider, who is very dear
to me; and I am driven, literally driven, either to turn beggar
in the streets, or do what I am doing now."

He paused, and looked round toward the corner of the room behind
him. "Mother," he said gently, "are you ready?"

An elderly lady, dressed in deep mourning, rose from her seat in
the corner. She had been, thus far, hidden from notice by the
high back of the easy-chair in which her son sat. Excepting some
f olds of fine black lace, laid over her white hair so as to form
a head-dress at once simple and picturesque, there was nothing
remarkable in her attire. The visitor rose and bowed. She gravely
returned his salute, and moved so as to place herself opposite to
her son.

"May I ask what this lady is going to do?" said the stranger.

"To be of any use to you," answered Doctor Lagarde, "I must be
thrown into the magnetic trance. The person who has the strongest
influence over me is the person who will do it to-night."

He turned to his mother. "When you like," he said.

Bending over him, she took both the Doctor's hands, and looked
steadily into his eyes. No words passed between them; nothing
more took place. In a minute or two, his head was resting against
the back of the chair, and his eyelids had closed.

"Are you sleeping?" asked Madame Lagarde.

"I am sleeping," he answered.

She laid his hands gently on the arms of the chair, and turned to
address the visitor.

"Let the sleep gain on him for a minute or two more," she said.
"Then take one of his hands, and put to him what questions you
please."

"Does he hear us now, madam?"

"You might fire off a pistol, sir, close to his ear, and he would
not hear it. The vibration might disturb him; that is all. Until
you or I touch him, and so establish the nervous sympathy, he is
as lost to all sense of our presence here, as if he were dead."

"Are you speaking of the thing called Animal Magnetism, madam?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you believe in it, of course?"

"My son's belief, sir, is my belief in this thing as in other
things. I have heard what he has been saying to you. It is for me
that he sacrifices himself by holding these exhibitions; it is in
my poor interests that his hardly-earned money is made. I am in
infirm health; and, remonstrate as I may, my son persists in
providing for me, not the bare comforts only, but even the
luxuries of life. Whatever I may suffer, I have my compensation;
I can still thank God for giving me the greatest happiness that a
woman can enjoy, the possession of a good son."

She smiled fondly as she looked at the sleeping man. "Draw your
chair nearer to him," she resumed, "and take his hand. You may
speak freely in making your inquiries. Nothing that happens in
this room goes out of it."

With those words she returned to her place, in the corner behind
her son's chair.

The visitor took Doctor Lagarde's hand. As they touched each
other, he was conscious of a faintly-titillating sensation in his
own hand--a sensation which oddly reminded him of bygone
experiments with an electrical machine, in the days when he was a
boy at school!

"I wish to question you about my future life," he began. "How
ought I to begin?"

The Doctor spoke his first words in the monotonous tones of a man
talking in his sleep.

"Own your true motive before you begin," he said. "Your interest
in your future life is centered in a woman. You wish to know if
her heart will be yours in the time that is to come--and there
your interest in your future life ends."

This startling proof of the sleeper's capacity to look, by
sympathy, into his mind, and to see there his most secret
thoughts, instead of convincing the stranger, excited his
suspicions. "You have means of getting information," he said,
"that I don't understand."

The Doctor smiled, as if the idea amused him.

Madame Lagarde rose from her seat and interposed.

"Hundreds of strangers come here to consult my son," she said
quietly. "If you believe that we know who those strangers are,
and that we have the means of inquiring into their private lives
before they enter this room, you believe in something much more
incredible than the magnetic sleep!"

This was too manifestly true to be disputed. The visitor made his
apologies.

"I should like to have _some_ explanation," he added. "The thing
is so very extraordinary. How can I prevail upon Doctor Lagarde
to enlighten me?"

"He can only tell you what he sees," Madame Lagarde answered;
"ask him that, and you will get a direct reply. Say to him: 'Do
you see the lady?' "

The stranger repeated the question. The reply followed at once,
in these words:

"I see two figures standing side by side. One of them is your
figure. The other is the figure of a lady. She only appears
dimly. I can discover nothing but that she is taller than women
generally are, and that she is dressed in pale blue."

The man to whom he was speaking started at those last words. "Her
favorite color!" he thought to himself--forgetting that, while he
held the Doctor's hand, the Doctor could think with _his_ mind.

"Yes," added the sleeper quietly, "her favorite color, as you
know. She fades and fades as I look at her," he went on. "She is
gone. I only see _you_, under a new aspect. You have a pistol in
your hand. Opposite to you, there stands the figure of another
man. He, too, has a pistol in his hand. Are you enemies? Are you
meeting to fight a duel? Is the lady the cause? I try, but I fail
to see her."

"Can you describe the man?"

"Not yet. So far, he is only a shadow in the form of a man."

There was another interval. An appearance of disturbance showed
itself on the sleeper's face. Suddenly, he waved his free hand in
the direction of the waiting-room.

"Send for the visitors who are there," he said. "They are all to
come in. Each one of them is to take one of my hands in
turn--while you remain where you are, holding the other hand.
Don't let go of me, even for a moment. My mother will ring."

Madame Lagarde touched a bell on the table. The servant received
his orders from her and retired. After a short absence, he
appeared again in the consulting-room, with one visitor only
waiting on the threshold behind him.

CHAPTER IV.

THE MAN.

"The other three gentlemen have gone away, madam," the servant
explained, addressing Madame Lagarde. "They were tired of
waiting. I found _this_ gentleman fast asleep; and I am afraid he
is angry with me for taking the liberty of waking him."

"Sleep of the common sort is evidently not allowed in this
house." With that remark the gentleman entered the room, and
stood revealed as the original owner of the card numbered
Fourteen.

Viewed by the clear lamplight, he was a tall, finely-made man, in
the prime of life, with a florid complexion, golden-brown hair,
and sparkling blue eyes. Noticing Madame Lagarde, he instantly
checked the flow of his satire, with the instinctive
good-breeding of a gentleman. "I beg your pardon," he said; "I
have a great many faults, and a habit of making bad jokes is one
of them. Is the servant right, madam, in telling me that I have
the honor of presenting myself here at your request?"

Madame Lagarde briefly explained what had passed.

The florid gentleman (still privately believing it to be all
"humbug") was delighted to make himself of any use. "I
congratulate you, sir," he said, with his easy humor, as he
passed the visitor who had become possessed of his card. "Number
Fourteen seems to be a luckier number in your keeping than it was
in mine."

As he spoke, he took Doctor Lagarde's disengaged hand. The
instant they touched each other the sleeper started. His voice
rose; his face flushed. "You are the man!" he exclaimed. "I see
you plainly now!"

"What am I doing?"

"You are standing opposite to the gentleman here who is holding
my other hand; and (as I have said already) you have met to fight
a duel."

The unbeliever cast a shrewd look at his companion in the
consultation.

"Considering that you and I are total strangers, sir," he said,
"don't you think the Doctor had better introduce us, before he
goes any further? We have got to fighting a duel already, and we
may as well know who we are, before the pistols go off." He
turned to Doctor Lagarde. "Dramatic situations don't amuse me out
of the theater," he resumed. "Let me put you to a very
commonplace test. I want to be introduced to this gentleman. Has
he told you his name?"

"No."

"Of course, you know it, without being told?"

"Certainly. I have only to look into your own knowledge of
yourselves, while I am in this trance, and while you have got my
hands, to know both your names as well as you do."

"Introduce us, then! " retorted the jesting gentleman. "And take
my name first."

"Mr. Percy Linwood," replied the Doctor; "I have the honor of
presenting you to Captain Bervie, of the Artillery."

With one accord, the gentlemen both dropped Doctor Lagarde's
hands, and looked at each other in blank amazement.

"Of course he has discovered our names somehow!" said Mr. Percy
Linwood, explaining the mystery to his own perfect satisfaction
in that way.

Captain Bervie had not forgotten what Madame Lagarde had said to
him, when he too had suspected a trick. He now repeated it (quite
ineffectually) for Mr. Linwood's benefit. "If you don't feel the
force of that argument as I feel it," he added, "perhaps, as a
favor to me, sir, you will not object to our each taking the
Doctor's hand again, and hearing what more he can tell us while
he remains in the state of trance?"

"With the greatest pleasure!" answered good-humored Mr. Linwood.
"Our friend is beginning to amuse me; I am as anxious as you are
to know what he is going to see next."

Captain Bervie put the next question.

"You have seen us ready to fight a duel--can you tell us the
result?"

"I can tell you nothing more than I have told you already. The
figures of the duelists have faded away, like the other figures I
saw before them. What I see now looks like the winding
gravel-path of a garden. A man and a woman are walking toward me.
The man stops, and places a ring on the woman's finger, and
kisses her."

Captain Bervie opened his lips to continue his inquiries--turned
pale--and checked himself. Mr. Linwood put the next question.

"Who is the happy man?" he asked.

"_You_ are the happy man," was the instantaneous reply.

"Who is the woman?" cried Captain Bervie, before Mr. Linwood
could speak again.

"The same woman whom I saw before; dressed in the same color, in
pale blue."

Captain Bervie positively insisted on receiving clearer
information than this. "Surely you can see _something_ of her
personal appearance?" he said.

"I can see that she has long dark-brown hair, falling below her
waist. I can see that she has lovely dark-brown eyes. She has the
look of a sensitive nervous person. She is quite young. I can see
no more."

"Look again at the man who is putting the ring on her finger,"
said the Captain. "Are you sure that the face you see is the face
of Mr. Percy Linwood?"

"I am absolutely sure."

Captain Bervie rose from his chair.

"Thank you, madam," he said to the Doctor's mother. "I have heard
enough."

He walked to the door. Mr. Percy Linwood dropped Doctor Lagarde's
hand, and appealed to the retiring Captain with a broad stare of
astonishment.

"You don't really believe this?" he said.

"I only say I have heard enough," Captain Bervie answered.

Mr. Linwood could hardly fail to see that any further attempt to
treat the matter lightly might lead to undesirable results.

"It is difficult to speak seriously of this kind of exhibition,"
he resumed quietly. "But I suppose I may mention a mere matter of
fact, without meaning or giving offense. The description of the
lady, I can positively declare, does not apply in any single
particular to any one whom I know."

Captain Bervie turned round at the door. His patience was in some
danger of failing him. Mr. Linwood's unruffled composure,
assisted in its influence by the presence of Madame Lagarde,
reminded him of the claims of politeness. He restrained the rash
words as they rose to his lips. "You may make new acquaintances,
sir," was all that he said. "_You_ have the future before you."

Upon that, he went out. Percy Linwood waited a little, reflecting
on the Captain's conduct.

Had Doctor Lagarde's description of the lady accidentally
answered the description of a living lady whom Captain Bervie
knew? Was he by any chance in love with her? and had the Doctor
innocently reminded him that his love was not returned? Assuming
this to be likely, was it really possible that he believed in
prophetic revelations offered to him under the fantastic
influence of a trance? Could any man in the possession of his
senses go to those lengths? The Captain's conduct was simply
incomprehensible.

Pondering these questions, Percy decided on returning to his
place by the Doctor's chair. "Of one thing I am certain, at any
rate," he thought to himself. "I'll see the whole imposture out
before I leave the house!"

He took Doctor Lagarde's hand. "Now, then! what is the next
discovery?" he asked.

The sleeper seemed to find some difficulty in answering the
question.

"I indistinctly see the man and the woman again," he said.

"Am I the man still?" Percy inquired.

"No. The man, this time, is the Captain. The woman is agitated by
something that he is saying to her. He seems to be trying to
persuade her to go away with him. She hesitates. He whispers
something in her ear. She yields. He leads her away. The darkness
gathers behind them. I look and look, and I can see no more."

"Shall we wait awhile?" Percy suggested, "and then try again?"

Doctor Lagarde sighed, and reclined in his chair. "My head is
heavy," he said; "my spirits are dull. The darkness baffles me. I
have toiled long enough for you. Drop my hand and leave me to
rest."

Hearing those words, Madame Lagarde approached her son's chair.

"It will be useless, sir, to ask him any more questions
to-night," she said. "He has been weak and nervous all day, and
he is worn out by the effort he has made. Pardon me, if I ask you
to step aside for a moment, while I give him the repose that he
needs."

She laid her right hand gently on the Doctor's head, and kept it
there for a minute or so. "Are you at rest now?" she asked.

"I am at rest," he answered, in faint, drowsy tones.

Madame Lagarde returned to Percy. "If you are not yet satisfied,"
she said, "my son will be at your service to-morrow evening,
sir."

"Thank you, madam, I have only one more question to ask, and you
can no doubt answer it. When your son wakes, will he remember
what he has said to Captain Bervie and to myself?"

"My son will be as absolutely ignorant of everything that he has
seen, and of everything that he has said in the trance, as if he
had been at the other end of the world."

Percy Linwood swallowed this last outrageous assertion with an
effort which he was quite unable to conceal. "Many thanks,
madam," he said; "I wish you good-night."

Returning to the waiting-room, he noticed the money-box fixed to
the table. "These people look poor," he thought to himself, "and
I feel really indebted to them for an amusing evening. Besides, I
can afford to be liberal, for I shall certainly never go back."
He dropped a five-pound note into the money-box, and left the
house.

Walking toward his club, Percy's natural serenity of mind was a
little troubled by the remembrance of Captain Bervie's language
and conduct. The Captain had interested the young man in spite of
himself. His first idea was to write to Bervie, and mention what
had happened at the renewed consultation with Doctor Lagarde. On
second thoughts, he saw reason to doubt how the Captain might
receive such an advance as this, on the part of a stranger.
"After all," Percy decided, "the whole thing is too absurd to be
worth thinking about seriously. Neither he nor I are likely to
meet again, or to see the Doctor again--and there's an end of
it."

He never was more mistaken in his life. The end of it was not to
come for many a long day yet.

PART II.--THE FULFILLMENT.

CHAPTER V.

THE BALLROOM.

WHILE the consultation at Doctor Lagarde's was still fresh in the
memory of the persons present at it, Chance or Destiny, occupied
in sowing the seeds for the harvest of the future, discovered as
one of its fit instruments a retired military officer named Major
Mulvany.

The Major was a smart little man, who persisted in setting up the
appearance of youth as a means of hiding the reality of fifty.
Being still a bachelor, and being always ready to make himself
agreeable, he was generally popular in the society of women. In
the ballroom he was a really welcome addition to the company. The
German waltz had then been imported into England little more than
three years since. The outcry raised against the dance, by
persons ski lled in the discovery of latent impropriety, had not
yet lost its influence in certain quarters. Men who could waltz
were scarce. The Major had successfully grappled with the
difficulties of learning the dance in mature life; and the young
ladies rewarded him nobly for the. effort. That is to say, they
took the assumption of youth for granted in the palpable presence
of fifty.

Knowing everybody and being welcome everywhere, playing a good
hand at whist, and having an inexhaustible fancy in the invention
of a dinner, Major Mulvany naturally belonged to all the best
clubs of his time. Percy Linwood and he constantly met in the
billiard-room or at the dinner-table. The Major approved of the
easy, handsome, pleasant-tempered young man. "I have lost the
first freshness of youth," he used to say, with pathetic
resignation, "and I see myself revived, as it were, in Percy.
Naturally I like Percy."

About three weeks after the memorable evening at Doctor
Lagarde's, the two friends encountered each other on the steps of
a club.

"Have you got anything to do to-night?" asked the Major.

"Nothing that I know of," said Percy, "unless I go to the
theater."

"Let the theater wait, my boy. My old regiment gives a ball at
Woolwich to-night. I have got a ticket to spare; and I know
several sweet girls who are going. Some of them waltz, Percy!
Gather your rosebuds while you may. Come with me."

The invitation was accepted as readily as it was given. The Major
found the carriage, and Percy paid for the post-horses. They
entered the ballroom among the earlier guests; and the first
person whom they met, waiting near the door, was--Captain Bervie.

Percy bowed a little uneasily. "I feel some doubt," he said,
laughing, "whether we have been properly introduced to one
another or not."

"Not properly introduced!" cried Major Mulvany. "I'll soon set
that right. My dear friend, Percy Linwood; my dear friend, Arthur
Bervie--be known to each other! esteem each other!"

Captain Bervie acknowledged the introduction by a cold salute.
Percy, yielding to the good-natured impulse of the moment,
alluded to what had happened in Doctor Lagarde's consulting-room.

"You missed something worth hearing when you left the Doctor the
other night," he said. "We continued the sitting; and _you_
turned up again among the persons of the drama, in a new
character--"

"Excuse me for interrupting you," said Captain Bervie. "I am a
member of the committee, charged with the arrangements of the
ball, and I must really attend to my duties."

He withdrew without waiting for a reply. Percy looked round
wonderingly at Major Mulvany. "Strange!" he said, "I feel rather
attracted toward Captain Bervie; and he seems to have taken such
a dislike to me that he can hardly behave with common civility.
What does it mean?"

"I'll tell you," answered the Major, confidentially. "Arthur
Bervie is madly in love--madly is really the word--with a Miss
Bowmore. And (this is between ourselves) the young lady doesn't
feel it quite in the same way. A sweet girl; I've often had her
on my knee when she was a child. Her father and mother are old
friends of mine. She is coming to the ball to-night. That's the
true reason why Arthur left you just now. Look at him--waiting to
be the first to speak to her. If he could have his way, he
wouldn't let another man come near the poor girl all through the
evening; he really persecutes her. I'll introduce you to Miss
Bowmore; and you will see how he looks at us for presuming to
approach her. It's a great pity; she will never marry him. Arthur
Bervie is a man in a thousand; but he's fast becoming a perfect
bear under the strain on his temper. What's the matter? You don't
seem to be listening to me."

This last remark was perfectly justified. In telling the
Captain's love-story, Major Mulvany had revived his young
friend's memory of the lady in the blue dress, who had haunted
the visions of Doctor Lagarde.

"Tell me," said Percy, "what is Miss Bowmore like? Is there
anything remarkable in her personal appearance? I have a reason
for asking."

As he spoke, there arose among the guests in the rapidly-filling
ballroom a low murmur of surprise and admiration. The Major laid
one hand on Percy's shoulder, and, lifting the other, pointed to
the door.

"What is Miss Bowmore like?" he repeated. "There she is! Let her
answer for herself."

Percy turned toward the lower end of the room.

A young lady was entering, dressed in plain silk, and the color
of it was a pale blue! Excepting a white rose at her breast, she
wore no ornament of any sort. Doubly distinguished by the perfect
simplicity of her apparel, and by her tall, supple, commanding
figure, she took rank at once as the most remarkable woman in the
room. Moving nearer to her through the crowd, under the guidance
of the complaisant Major, young Linwood gained a clearer view of
her hair, her complexion, and the color of her eyes. In every one
of these particulars she was the living image of the woman
described by Doctor Lagarde!

While Percy was absorbed over this strange discovery, Major
Mulvany had got within speaking distance of the young lady and of
her mother, as they stood together in conversation with Captain
Bervie. "My dear Mrs. Bowmore, how well you are looking! My dear
Miss Charlotte, what a sensation you have made already! The
glorious simplicity (if I may so express myself) of your dress
is--is--what was I going to say?--the ideas come thronging on me;
I merely want words."

Miss Bowmore's magnificent brown eyes, wandering from the Major
to Percy, rested on the young man with a modest and momentary
interest, which Captain Bervie's jealous attention instantly
detected.

"They are forming a dance," he said, pressing forward impatiently
to claim his partner. "If we don't take our places we shall be
too late."

"Stop! stop!" cried the Major. "There is a time for everything,
and this is the time for presenting my dear friend here, Mr.
Percy Linwood. He is like me, Miss Charlotte--_he_ has been
struck by your glorious simplicity, and _he_ wants words." At
this part of the presentation, he happened to look toward the
irate Captain, and instantly gave him a hint on the subject of
his temper. "I say, Arthur Bervie! we are all good-humored people
here. What have you got on your eyebrows? It looks like a frown;
and it doesn't become you. Send for a skilled waiter, and have it
brushed off and taken away directly!"

"May I ask, Miss Bowmore, if you are disengaged for the next
dance?" said Percy, the moment the Major gave him an opportunity
of speaking.

"Miss Bowmore is engaged to _me_ for the next dance," said the
angry Captain, before the young lady could answer.

"The third dance, then?" Percy persisted, with his brightest
smile.

"With pleasure, Mr. Linwood," said Miss Bowmore. She would have
been no true woman if she had not resented the open exhibition of
Arthur's jealousy; it was like asserting a right over her to
which he had not the shadow of a claim. She threw a look at Percy
as her partner led her away, which was the severest punishment
she could inflict on the man who ardently loved her.

The third dance stood in the programme as a waltz.

In jealous distrust of Percy, the Captain took the conductor of
the band aside, and used his authority as committeeman to
substitute another dance. He had no sooner turned his back on the
orchestra than the wife of the Colonel of the regiment, who had
heard him, spoke to the conductor in her turn, and insisted on
the original programme being retained. "Quote the Colonel's
authority," said the lady, "if Captain Bervie ventures to
object." In the meantime, the Captain, on his way to rejoin
Charlotte, was met by one of his brother officers, who summoned
him officially to an impending debate of the committee charged
with the administrative arrangements of the supper-table. Bervie
had no choice but to follow his brother officer to the
committee-room.

Barely a minute later the conductor appeared at his desk, and the
first notes of the music rose low and plaintive, introducing the
third dance.

"Percy, my boy!" cried the Major, recognizing the melody, "you're
in luck's way--it's going to be a wa ltz!"

Almost as he spoke, the notes of the symphony glided by subtle
modulations into the inspiriting air of the waltz. Percy claimed
his partner's hand. Miss Charlotte hesitated, and looked at her
mother.

"Surely you waltz?" said Percy.

"I have learned to waltz," she answered, modestly; "but this is
such a large room, and there are so many people!"

"Once round," Percy pleaded; "only once round!"

Miss Bowmore looked again at her mother. Her foot was keeping
time with the music, under her dress; her heart was beating with
a delicious excitement; kind-hearted Mrs. Bowmore smiled and
said: "Once round, my dear, as Mr. Linwood suggests."

In another moment Percy's arm took possession of her waist, and
they were away on the wings of the waltz!

Could words describe, could thought realize, the exquisite
enjoyment of the dance? Enjoyment? It was more--it was an epoch
in Charlotte's life--it was the first time she had waltzed with a
man. What a difference between the fervent clasp of Percy's arm
and the cold, formal contact of the mistress who had taught her!
How brightly his eyes looked down into hers; admiring her with
such a tender restraint, that there could surely be no harm in
looking up at him now and then in return. Round and round they
glided, absorbed in the music and in themselves. Occasionally her
bosom just touched him, at those critical moments when she was
most in need of support. At other intervals, she almost let her
head sink on his shoulder in trying to hide from him the smile
which acknowledged his admiration too boldly. "Once round," Percy
had suggested; "once round," her mother had said. They had been
ten, twenty, thirty times round; they had never stopped to rest
like other dancers; they had centered the eyes of the whole room
on them--including the eyes of Captain Bervie--without knowing
it; her delicately pale complexion had changed to rosy-red; the
neat arrangement of her hair had become disturbed; her bosom was
rising and falling faster and faster in the effort to
breathe--before fatigue and heat overpowered her at last, and
forced her to say to him faintly, "I'm very sorry--I can't dance
any more!"

Percy led her into the cooler atmosphere of the refreshment-room,
and revived her with a glass of lemonade. Her arm still rested on
his--she was just about to thank him for the care he had taken of
her--when Captain Bervie entered the room.

"Mrs. Bowmore wishes me to take you back to her," he said to
Charlotte. Then, turning to Percy, he added: "Will you kindly
wait here while I take Miss Bowmore to the ballroom? I have a
word to say to you--I will return directly."

The Captain spoke with perfect politeness--but his face betrayed
him. It was pale with the sinister whiteness of suppressed rage.

Percy sat down to cool and rest himself. With his experience of
the ways of men, he felt no surprise at the marked contrast
between Captain Bervie's face and Captain Bervie's manner. "He
has seen us waltzing, and he is coming back to pick a quarrel
with me." Such was the interpretation which Mr. Linwood's
knowledge of the world placed on Captain Bervie's politeness. In
a minute or two more the Captain returned to the
refreshment-room, and satisfied Percy that his anticipations had
not deceived him.

CHAPTER VI.

LOVE.

FOUR days had passed since the night of the ball.

Although it was no later in the year than the month of February,
the sun was shining brightly, and the air was as soft as the air
of a day in spring. Percy and Charlotte were walking together in
the little garden at the back of Mr. Bowmore's cottage, near the
town of Dartford, in Kent.

"Mr. Linwood," said the young lady, "you were to have paid us
your first visit the day after the ball. Why have you kept us
waiting? Have you been too busy to remember your new friends?"

"I have counted the hours since we parted, Miss Charlotte. If I
had not been detained by business--"

"I understand! For three days business has controlled you. On the
fourth day, you have controlled business--and here you are? I
don't believe one word of it, Mr. Linwood!"

There was no answering such a declaration as this. Guiltily
conscious that Charlotte was right in refusing to accept his
well-worn excuse, Percy made an awkward attempt to change the
topic of conversation.

They happened, at the moment, to be standing near a small
conservatory at the end of the garden. The glass door was closed,
and the few plants and shrubs inside had a lonely, neglected
look. "Does nobody ever visit this secluded place?" Percy asked,
jocosely, "or does it hide discoveries in the rearing of plants
which are forbidden mysteries to a stranger?"

"Satisfy your curiosity, Mr. Linwood, by all means," Charlotte
answered in the same tone. "Open the door, and I will follow
you."

Percy obeyed. In passing through the doorway, he encountered the
bare hanging branches of some creeping plant, long since dead,
and detached from its fastenings on the woodwork of the roof. He
pushed aside the branches so that Charlotte could easily follow
him in, without being aware that his own forced passage through
them had a little deranged the folds of spotless white cambric
which a well-dressed gentleman wore round his neck in those days.
Charlotte seated herself, and directed Percy's attention to the
desolate conservatory with a saucy smile.

"The mystery which your lively imagination has associated with
this place," she said, "means, being interpreted, that we are too
poor to keep a gardener. Make the best of your disappointment,
Mr. Linwood, and sit here by me. We are out of hearing and out of
sight of mamma's other visitors. You have no excuse now for not
telling me what has really kept you away from us."

She fixed her eyes on him as she said those words. Before Percy
could think of another excuse, her quick observation detected the
disordered condition of his cravat, and discovered the upper edge
of a black plaster attached to one side of his neck.

"You have been hurt in the neck!" she said. "That is why you have
kept away from us for the last three days!"

"A mere trifle," he answered, in great confusion; "please don't
notice it."

Her eyes, still resting on his face, assumed an expression of
suspicious inquiry, which Percy was entirely at a loss to
understand. Suddenly, she started to her feet, as if a new idea
had occurred to her. "Wait here," she said, flushing with
excitement, "till I come back: I insist on it!"

Before Percy could ask for an explanation she had left the
conservatory.

In a minute or two, Miss Bowmore returned, with a newspaper in
her hand. "Read that," she said, pointing to a paragraph
distinguished by a line drawn round it in ink.

The passage that she indicated contained an account of a duel
which had recently taken place in the neighborhood of London. The
names of the duelists were not mentioned. One was described as an
officer, and the other as a civilian. They had quarreled at
cards, and had fought with pistols. The civilian had had a narrow
escape of his life. His antagonist's bullet had passed near
enough to the side of his neck to tear the flesh, and had missed
the vital parts, literally, by a hair's-breadth.

Charlotte's eyes, riveted on Percy, detected a sudden change of
color in his face the moment he looked at the newspaper. That was
enough for her. "You _are_ the man!" she cried. "Oh, for shame,
for shame! To risk your life for a paltry dispute about cards!"

"I would risk it again," said Percy, "to hear you speak as if you
set some value on it."

She looked away from him without a word of reply. Her mind seemed
to be busy again with its own thoughts. Did she meditate
returning to the subject of the duel? Was she not satisfied with
the discovery which she had just made?

No such doubts as these troubled the mind of Percy Linwood.
Intoxicated by the charm of her presence, emboldened by her
innocent betrayal of the interest that she felt in him, he opened
his whole heart to her as unreservedly as if they had known each
other from the days of their childhood. There was but one excuse
for him. Charlotte was his first love.

"You don't know how completely you have become a part of my life,
sinc e we met at the ball," he went on. "That one delightful
dance seemed, by some magic which I can't explain, to draw us
together in a few minutes as if we had known each other for
years. Oh, dear! I could make such a confession of what I
felt--only I am afraid of offending you by speaking too soon.
Women are so dreadfully difficult to understand. How is a man to
know at what time it is considerate toward them to conceal his
true feelings; and at what time it is equally considerate to
express his true feelings? One doesn't know whether it is a
matter of days or weeks or months--there ought to be a law to
settle it. Dear Miss Charlotte, when a poor fellow loves you at
first sight, as he has never loved any other woman, and when he
is tormented by the fear that some other man may be preferred to
him, can't you forgive him if he lets out the truth a little too
soon?" He ventured, as he put that very downright question, to
take her hand. "It really isn't my fault," he said, simply. "My
heart is so full of you I can talk of nothing else."

To Percy's delight, the first experimental pressure of his hand,
far from being resented, was softly returned. Charlotte looked at
him again, with a new resolution in her face.

"I'll forgive you for talking nonsense, Mr. Linwood," she said;
"and I will even permit you to come and see me again, on one
condition--that you tell the whole truth about the duel. If you
conceal the smallest circumstance, our acquaintance is at an
end."

"Haven't I owned everything already?" Percy inquired, in great
perplexity. "Did I say No, when you told me I was the man?"

"Could you say No, with that plaster on your neck?" was the ready
rejoinder. "I am determined to know more than the newspaper tells
me. Will you declare, on your word of honor, that Captain Bervie
had nothing to do with the duel? Can you look me in the face, and
say that the real cause of the quarrel was a disagreement at
cards? When you were talking with me just before I left the ball,
how did you answer a gentleman who asked you to make one at the
whist-table? You said, 'I don't play at cards.' Ah! You thought I
had forgotten that? Don't kiss my hand! Trust me with the whole
truth, or say good-by forever."

"Only tell me what you wish to know, Miss Charlotte," said Percy
humbly. "If you will put the questions, I will give the
answers--as well as I can."

On this understanding, Percy's evidence was extracted from him as
follows:

"Was it Captain Bervie who quarreled with you?"

"Yes."

"Was it about me?"

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

"He said I had committed an impropriety in waltzing with you."

"Why?"

"Because your parents disapproved of your waltzing in a public
ballroom."

"That's not true! What did he say next?"

"He said I had added tenfold to my offense, by waltzing with you
in such a manner as to make you the subject of remark to the
whole room."

"Oh! did you let him say that?"

"No; I contradicted him instantly. And I said, besides, 'It's an
insult to Miss Bowmore, to suppose that she would permit any
impropriety.' "

"Quite right! And what did he say?"

"Well, he lost his temper; I would rather not repeat what he said
when he was mad with jealousy. There was nothing to be done with
him but to give him his way."

"Give him his way? Does that mean fight a duel with him?"

"Don't be angry--it does."

"And you kept my name out of it, by pretending to quarrel at the
card-table?"

"Yes. We managed it when the cardroom was emptying at
supper-time, and nobody was present but Major Mulvany and another
friend as witnesses."

"And when did you fight the duel?"

"The next morning."

"You never thought of _me_, I suppose?"

"Indeed, I did; I was very glad that you had no suspicion of what
we were at."

"Was that all?"

"No; I had your flower with me, the flower you gave me out of
your nosegay, at the ball."

"Well?"

"Oh, never mind, it doesn't matter."

"It does matter. What did you do with my flower?"

"I gave it a sly kiss while they were measuring the ground; and
(don't tell anybody!) I put it next to my heart to bring me
luck."

"Was that just before he shot at you?"

"Yes."

"How did he shoot?"

"He walked (as the seconds had arranged it) ten paces forward;
and then he stopped, and lifted his pistol--"

"Don't tell me any more! Oh, to think of my being the miserable
cause of such horrors! I'll never dance again as long as I live.
Did you think he had killed you, when the bullet wounded your
poor neck?"

"No; I hardly felt it at first."

"Hardly felt it? How he talks! And when the wretch had done his
best to kill you, and when it came to your turn, what did you
do?"

"Nothing."

"What! You didn't walk your ten paces forward?"

"No."

"And you never shot at him in return?"

"No; I had no quarrel with him, poor fellow; I just stood where I
was, and fired in the air--"

Before he could stop her, Charlotte seized his hand, and kissed
it with an hysterical fervor of admiration, which completely
deprived him of his presence of mind.

"Why shouldn't I kiss the hand of a hero?" she cried, with tears
of enthusiasm sparkling in her eyes. "Nobody but a hero would
have given that man his life; nobody but a hero would have
pardoned him, while the blood was streaming from the wound that
he had inflicted. I respect you, I admire you. Oh, don't think me
bold! I can't control myself when I hear of anything noble and
good. You will understand me better when we get to be old
friends--won't you?"

She spoke in low sweet tones of entreaty. Percy's arm stole
softly round her.

"Are we never to be nearer and dearer to each other than old
friends?" he asked in a whisper. "I am not a hero--your goodness
overrates me, dear Miss Charlotte. My one ambition is to be the
happy man who is worthy enough to win _you_. At your own time! I
wouldn't distress you, I wouldn't confuse you, I wouldn't for the
whole world take advantage of the compliment which your sympathy
has paid to me. If it offends you, I won't even ask if I may
hope."

She sighed as he said the last words; trembled a little, and
silently looked at him.

Percy read his answer in her eyes. Without meaning it on either
side their heads drew nearer together; their cheeks, then their
lips, touched. She started back from him, and rose to leave the
conservatory. At the same moment, the sound of slowly-approaching
footsteps became audible on the gravel walk of the garden.
Charlotte hurried to the door.

" My father! " she exclaimed, turning to Percy. "Come, and be
introduced to him."

Percy followed her into the garden.

CHAPTER VII.

POLITICS.

JUDGING by appearances, Mr. Bowmore looked like a man prematurely
wasted and worn by the cares of a troubled life. His eyes
presented the one feature in which his daughter resembled him. In
shape and color they were exactly reproduced in Charlotte; the
difference was in the expression. The father's look was
habitually restless, eager, and suspicious. Not a trace was to be
seen in it of the truthfulness and gentleness which made the
charm of the daughter's expression. A man whose bitter experience
of the world had soured his temper and shaken his faith in his
fellow-creatures--such was Mr. Bowmore as he presented himself on
the surface. He received Percy politely--but with a preoccupied
air. Every now and then, his restless eyes wandered from the
visitor to an open letter in his hand. Charlotte, observing him,
pointed to the letter.

"Have you any bad news there, papa?" she asked.

"Dreadful news!" Mr. Bowmore answered. "Dreadful news, my child,
to every Englishman who respects the liberties which his
ancestors won. My correspondent is a man who is in the confidence
of the Ministers," he continued, addressing Percy. "What do you
think is the remedy that the Government proposes for the
universal distress among the population, caused by an infamous
and needless war? Despotism, Mr. Linwood; despotism in this free
country is the remedy! In one week more, sir, Ministers will
bring in a Bill for suspending the Habeas Corpus Act!"

Before Percy could do justice in words to the impression produced
on him, Charlotte innocently asked a question which shocked her
father.

"What is the Habeas Corpus Act,
 papa"'

"Good God!" cried Mr. Bowmore, "is it possible that a child of
mine has grown up to womanhood, in ignorance of the palladium of
English liberty? Oh, Charlotte! Charlotte!"

"I am very sorry, papa. If you will only tell me, I will never
forget it."

Mr. Bowmore reverently uncovered his head, saluting an invisible
Habeas Corpus Act. He took his daughter by the hand, with a
certain parental sternness: his voice trembled with emotion as he
spoke his next words:

"The Habeas Corpus Act, my child, forbids the imprisonment of an
English subject, unless that imprisonment can be first justified
by law. Not even the will of the reigning monarch can prevent us
from appearing before the judges of the land, and summoning them
to declare whether our committal to prison is legally just."

He put on his hat again. "Never forget what I have told you,
Charlotte!" he said solemnly. "I would not remove my hat, sir,"
he continuing, turning to Percy, "in the presence of the proudest
autocrat that ever sat on a throne. I uncover, in homage to the
grand law which asserts the sacredness of human liberty. When
Parliament has sanctioned the infamous Bill now before it,
English patriots may be imprisoned, may even be hanged, on
warrants privately obtained by the paid spies and informers of
the men who rule us. Perhaps I weary you, sir. You are a young
man; the conduct of the Ministry may not interest you."

"On the contrary," said Percy, "I have the strongest personal
interest in the conduct of the Ministry."

"How? in what way?" cried Mr. Bowmore eagerly.

"My late father had a claim on government," Percy answered, "for
money expended in foreign service. As his heir, I inherit the
claim, which has been formally recognized by the present
Ministers. My petition for a settlement will be presented by
friends of mine who can advocate my interests in the House of
Commons."

Mr. Bowmore took Percy's hand, and shook it warmly.

"In such a matter as this you cannot have too many friends to
help you," he said. "I myself have some influence, as
representing opinion outside the House; and I am entirely at your
service. Come tomorrow, and let us talk over the details of your
claim at my humble dinner-table. To-day I must attend a meeting
of the Branch-Hampden-Club, of which I am vice-president, and to
which I am now about to communicate the alarming news which my
letter contains. Excuse me for leaving you--and count on a hearty
welcome when we see you to-morrow."

The amiable patriot saluted his daughter with a smile, and
disappeared.

"I hope you like my father?" said Charlotte. "All our friends say
he ought to be in Parliament. He has tried twice. The expenses
were dreadful; and each time the other man defeated him. The
agent says he would be certainly elected, if he tried again; but
there is no money, and we mustn't think of it."

A man of a suspicious turn of mind might have discovered, in
those artless words, the secret of Mr. Bowmore's interest in the
success of his young friend's claim on the Government. One
British subject, with a sum of ready money at his command, may be
an inestimably useful person to another British subject (without
ready money) who cannot sit comfortably unless he sits in
Parliament. But honest Percy Linwood was not a man of a
suspicious turn of mind. He had just opened his lips to echo
Charlotte's filial glorification of her father, when a
shabbily-dressed man-servant met them with a message, for which
they were both alike unprepared:

"Captain Bervie has called, Miss, to say good-by, and my mistress
requests your company in the parlor."

CHAPTER VIII.

THE WARNING.

HAVING delivered his little formula of words, the shabby servant
cast a look of furtive curiosity at Percy and withdrew. Charlotte
turned to her lover, with indignation sparkling in her eyes and
flushing on her cheeks at the bare idea of seeing Captain Bervie
again. "Does he think I will breathe the same air," she
exclaimed, "with the man who attempted to take your life!"

Percy gently remonstrated with her.

"You are sadly mistaken," he said. "Captain Bervie stood to
receive my fire as fairly as I stood to receive his. When I
discharged my pistol in the air, he was the first man who ran up
to me, and asked if I was seriously hurt. They told him my wound
was a trifle; and he fell on his knees and thanked God for
preserving my life from his guilty hand. 'I am no longer the
rival who hates you,' he said. 'Give me time to try if change of
scene will quiet my mind; and I will be _your_ brother, and _her_
brother.' Whatever his faults may be, Charlotte, Arthur Bervie
has a great heart. Go in, I entreat you, and be friends with him
as I am."

Charlotte listened with downcast eyes and changing color. "You
believe him?" she asked in low and trembling tones.

"I believe him as I believe You," Percy answered.

She secretly resented the comparison, and detested the Captain
more heartily than ever. "I will go in and see him, if you wish
it," she said. "But not by myself. I want you to come with me."

"Why?" Percy asked.

"I want to see what his face says, when you and he meet."

"Do you still doubt him, Charlotte?"

She made no reply. Percy had done his best to convince her, and
had evidently failed.

They went together into the cottage. Fixing her eyes steadily on
the Captain's face, Charlotte saw it turn pale when Percy
followed her into the parlor. The two men greeted one another
cordially. Charlotte sat down by her mother, preserving her
composure so far as appearances went. "I hear you have called to
bid us good-by," she said to Bervie. "Is it to be a long
absence?"

"I have got two months' leave," the Captain answered, without
looking at her while he spoke.

"Are you going abroad?"

"Yes. I think so."

She turned away to her mother. Bervie seized the opportunity of
speaking to Percy. "I have a word of advice for your private
ear." At the same moment, Charlotte whispered to her mother:
"Don't encourage him to prolong his visit."

The Captain showed no intention to prolong his visit. To
Charlotte's surprise, when he took leave of the ladies, Percy
also rose to go. "His carriage," he said, "was waiting at the
door; and he had offered to take Captain Bervie back to London."

Charlotte instantly suspected an arrangement between the two men
for a confidential interview. Her obstinate distrust of Bervie
strengthened tenfold. She reluctantly gave him her hand, as he
parted from her at the parlor-door. The effort of concealing her
true feeling toward him gave a color and a vivacity to her face
which made her irresistibly beautiful. Bervie looked at the woman
whom he had lost with an immeasurable sadness in his eyes. "When
we meet again," he said, "you will see me in a new character." He
hurried out of the gate, as if he feared to trust himself for a
moment longer in her presence.

Charlotte followed Percy into the passage. "I shall be here
to-morrow, dearest!" he said, and tried to raise her hand to his
lips. She abruptly drew it away. "Not that hand!" she answered.
"Captain Bervie has just touched it. Kiss the other!"

"Do you still doubt the Captain?" said Percy, amused by her
petulance.

She put her arm over his shoulder, and touched the plaster on his
neck gently with her finger. "There's one thing I don't doubt,"
she said: "the Captain did _that!_"

Percy left her, laughing. At the front gate of the cottage he
found Arthur Bervie in conversation with the same
shabbily-dressed man-servant who had announced the Captain's
visit to Charlotte.

"What has become of the other servant?" Bervie asked. "I mean the
old man who has been with Mr. Bowmore for so many years."

"He has left his situation, sir."

"Why?"

"As I understand, sir, he spoke disrespectfully to the master."

"Oh! And how came the master to hear of _you?_"

"I advertised; and Mr. Bowmore answered my advertisement."

Bervie looked hard at the man for a moment, and then joined Percy
at the carriage door. The two gentlemen started for London.

"What do you think of Mr. Bowmore's new servant?" asked the
Captain as they drove away from the cottage. "I don't like the
look of the fellow."

"I didn't particularly notice him," Percy a nswered.

There was a pause. When the conversation was resumed, it turned
on common-place subjects. The Captain looked uneasily out of the
carriage window. Percy looked uneasily at the Captain.

They had left Dartford about two miles behind them, when Percy
noticed an old gabled house, sheltered by magnificent trees, and
standing on an eminence well removed from the high-road.
Carriages and saddle-horses were visible on the drive in front,
and a flag was hoisted on a staff placed in the middle of the
lawn.

"Something seems to be going on there," Percy remarked. "A fine
old house! Who does it belong to?"

Bervie smiled. "It belongs to my father," he said. "He is
chairman of the bench of local magistrates, and he receives his
brother justices to-day, to celebrate the opening of the
sessions."

He stopped and looked at Percy with some embarrassment. "I am
afraid I have surprised and disappointed you," he resumed,
abruptly changing the subject. "I told you when we met just now
at Mr. Bowmore's cottage that I had something to say to you; and
I have not yet said it. The truth is, I don't feel sure whether I
have been long enough your friend to take the liberty of advising
you."

"Whatever your advice is," Percy answered, "trust me to take it
kindly on my side."

Thus encouraged, the Captain spoke out.

"You will probably pass much of your time at the cottage," he
began, "and you will be thrown a great deal into Mr. Bowmore's
society. I have known him for many years. Speaking from that
knowledge, I most seriously warn you against him as a thoroughly
unprincipled and thoroughly dangerous man."

This was strong language--and, naturally enough, Percy said so.
The Captain justified his language.

"Without alluding to Mr. Bowmore's politics," he went on, "I can
tell you that the motive of everything he says and does is
vanity. To the gratification of that one passion he would
sacrifice you or me, his wife or his daughter, without hesitation
and without remorse. His one desire is to get into Parliament.
You are wealthy, and you can help him. He will leave no effort
untried to reach that end; and, if he gets you into political
difficulties, he will desert you without scruple."

Percy made a last effort to take Mr. Bowmore's part--for the one
irresistible reason that he was Charlotte's father.

"Pray don't think I am unworthy of your kind interest in my
welfare," he pleaded. "Can you tell me of any _facts_ which
justify what you have just said?"

"I can tell you of three facts," Bervie said. "Mr. Bowmore
belongs to one of the most revolutionary clubs in England; he has
spoken in the ranks of sedition at public meetings; and his name
is already in the black book at the Home Office. So much for the
past. As to the future, if the rumor be true that Ministers mean
to stop the insurrectionary risings among the population by
suspending the Habeas Corpus Act, Mr. Bowmore will certainly be
in danger; and it may be my father's duty to grant the warrant
that apprehends him. Write to my father to verify what I have
said, and I will forward your letter by way of satisfying him
that he can trust you. In the meantime, refuse to accept Mr.
Bowmore's assistance in the matter of your claim on Parliament;
and, above all things, stop him at the outset, when he tries to
steal his way into your intimacy. I need not caution you to say
nothing against him to his wife and daughter. His wily tongue has
long since deluded them. Don't let him delude _you!_ Have you
thought any more of our evening at Doctor Lagarde's?" he asked,
abruptly changing the subject.

"I hardly know," said Percy, still under the impression of the
formidable warning which he had just received.

"Let me jog your memory," the other continued. "You went on with
the consultation by yourself, after I had left the Doctor's
house. It will be really doing me a favor if you can call to mind
what Lagarde saw in the trance--in my absence?"

Thus entreated Percy roused himself. His memory of events were
still fresh enough to answer the call that his friend had made on
it. In describing what had happened, he accurately repeated all
that the Doctor had said.

Bervie dwelt on the words with alarm in his face as well as
surprise.

"A man like me, trying to persuade a woman like--" he checked
himself, as if he was afraid to let Charlotte's name pass his
lips. "Trying to induce a woman to go away with me," he resumed,
"and persuading her at last? Pray, go on! What did the Doctor see
next?"

"He was too much exhausted, he said, to see any more."

"Surely you returned to consult him again?"

"No; I had had enough of it."

"When we get to London," said the Captain, "we shall pass along
the Strand, on the way to your chambers. Will you kindly drop me
at the turning that leads to the Doctor's lodgings?"

Percy looked at him in amazement. "You still take it seriously?"
he said.

"Is it _not_ serious?" Bervie asked. "Have you and I, so far, not
done exactly what this man saw us doing? Did we not meet, in the
days when we were rivals (as he saw us meet), with the pistols in
our hands? Did you not recognize his description of the lady when
you met her at the ball, as I recognized it before you?"

"Mere coincidences!" Percy answered, quoting Charlotte's opinion
when they had spoken together of Doctor Lagarde, but taking care
not to cite his authority. "How many thousand men have been
crossed in love? How many thousand men have fought duels for
love? How many thousand women choose blue for their favorite
color, and answer to the vague description of the lady whom the
Doctor pretended to see?"

"Say that it is so," Bervie rejoined. "The thing is remarkable,
even from your point of view. And if more coincidences follow,
the result will be more remarkable still."

Arrived at the Strand, Percy set the Captain down at the turning
which led to the Doctor's lodgings. "You will call on me or write
me word, if anything remarkable happens?" he said.

"You shall hear from me without fail, " Bervie replied.

That night, the Captain's pen performed the Captain's promise, in
few and startling words.

"Melancholy news! Madame Lagarde is dead. Nothing is known of her
son but that he has left England. I have found out that he is a
political exile. If he has ventured back to France, it is barely
possible that I may hear something of him. I have friends at the
English embassy in Paris who will help me to make inquiries; and
I start for the Continent in a day or two. Write to me while I am
away, to the care of my father, at 'The Manor House, near
Dartford.' He will always know my address abroad, and will
forward your letters. For your own sake, remember the warning I
gave you this afternoon! Your faithful friend, A. B."

CHAPTER IX.

OFFICIAL SECRETS

THERE WAS a more serious reason than Bervie was aware of, at the
time, for the warning which he had thought it his duty to address
to Percy Linwood. The new footman who had entered Mr. Bowmore's
service was a Spy.

Well practiced in the infamous vocation that he followed, the
wretch had been chosen by the Department of Secret Service at the
Home Office, to watch the proceedings of Mr. Bowmore and his
friends, and to report the result to his superiors. It may not be
amiss to add that the employment of paid spies and informers, by
the English Government of that time, was openly acknowledged in
the House of Lords, and was defended as a necessary measure in
the speeches of Lord Redesdale and Lord Liverpool.*

The reports furnished by the Home Office Spy, under these
circumstances, begin with the month of March, and take the form
of a series of notes introduced as follows:

"MR. SECRETARY--Since I entered Mr. Bowmore's service, I have the
honor to inform you that my eyes and ears have been kept in a
state of active observation; and I can further certify that my
means of making myself useful in the future to my honorable
employers are in no respect diminished. Not the slightest
suspicion of my true character is felt by any person in the
house.

FIRST NOTE.

"The young gentleman now on a visit to Mr. Bowmore is, as you
have been correctly informed, Mr. Percy Linwood. Although he is
engaged to be married to Miss
 Bowmore, he is not discreet enough to conceal a certain want of
friendly feeling, on his part, toward her father. The young lady
has noticed this, and has resented it. She accuses her lover of
having allowed himself to be prejudiced against Mr. Bowmore by
some slanderous person unknown.

"Mr. Percy's clumsy defense of himself led (in my hearing) to a
quarrel! Nothing but his prompt submission prevented the marriage
engagement from being broken off.

" 'If you showed a want of confidence in Me' (I heard Miss
Charlotte say), 'I might forgive it. But when you show a want of
confidence in a man so noble as my father, I have no mercy on
you.' After such an expression of filial sentiment as this, Mr.
Percy wisely took the readiest way of appealing to the lady's
indulgence. The young man has a demand on Parliament for moneys
due to his father's estate; and he pleased and flattered Miss
Charlotte by asking Mr. Bowmore to advise him as to the best
means of asserting his claim. By way of advancing his political
interests, Mr. Bowmore introduced him to the local Hampden Club;
and Miss Charlotte rewarded him with a generosity which must not
be passed over in silence. Her lover was permitted to put an
engagement ring on her finger, and to kiss her afterward to his
heart's content."

SECOND NOTE.

"Mr. Percy has paid more visits to the Republican Club; and
Justice Bervie (father of the Captain) has heard of it, and has
written to his son. The result that might have been expected has
followed. Captain Bervie announces his return to England, to
exert his influence for political good against the influence of
Mr. Bowmore for political evil.

"In the meanwhile, Mr. Percy's claim has been brought before the
House of Commons, and has been adjourned for further
consideration in six months' time. Both the gentlemen are
indignant--especially Mr. Bowmore. He has called a meeting of the
Club to consider his young friend's wrongs, and has proposed the
election of Mr. Percy as a member of that revolutionary society."

THIRD NOTE.

"Mr. Percy has been elected. Captain Bervie has tried to awaken
his mind to a sense of the danger that threatens him, if he
persists in associating with his republican friends--and has
utterly failed. Mr. Bowmore and Mr. Percy have made speeches at
the Club, intended to force the latter gentleman's claim on the
immediate attention of Government. Mr. Bowmore's flow of frothy
eloquence has its influence (as you know from our shorthand
writers' previous reports) on thousands of ignorant people. As it
seems to me, the reasons for at once putting this man in prison
are beyond dispute. Whether it is desirable to include Mr. Percy
in the order of arrest, I must not venture to decide. Let me only
hint that his seditious speech rivals the more elaborate efforts
of Mr. Bowmore himself.

"So much for the present. I may now respectfully direct your
attention to the future.

"On the second of April next the Club assembles a public meeting,
'in aid of British liberty,' in a field near Dartford. Mr.
Bowmore is to preside, and is to be escorted afterward to
Westminster Hall on his way to plead Mr. Percy's cause, in his
own person, before the House of Commons. He is quite serious in
declaring that 'the minions of Government dare not touch a hair
of his head.' Miss Charlotte agrees with her father And Mr. Percy
agrees with Miss Charlotte. Such is the state of affairs at the
house in which I am acting the part of domestic servant.

"I inclose shorthand reports of the speeches recently delivered
at the Hampden Club, and have the honor of waiting for further
orders."

FOURTH NOTE.

"Your commands have reached me by this morning's post.

"I immediately waited on Justice Bervie (in plain clothes, of
course), and gave him your official letter, instructing me to
arrest Mr. Bowmore and Mr. Percy Linwood.

"The venerable magistrate hesitated.

"He quite understood the necessity for keeping the arrest a
strict secret, in the interests of Government. The only
reluctance he felt in granting the warrant related to his son's
intimate friend. But for the peremptory tone of your letter, I
really believe he would have asked you to give Mr. Percy time for
consideration. Not being rash enough to proceed to such an
extreme as this, he slyly consulted the young man's interests by
declining, on formal grounds, to date the warrant earlier than
the second of April. Please note that my visit to him was paid at
noon, on the thirty-first of March.

"If the object of this delay (to which I was obliged to submit)
is to offer a chance of escape to Mr. Percy, the same chance
necessarily includes Mr. Bowmore, whose name is also in the
warrant. Trust me to keep a watchful eye on both these gentlemen;
especially on Mr. Bowmore. He is the most dangerous man of the
two, and the most likely, if he feels any suspicions, to slip
through the fingers of the law.

"I have also to report that I discovered three persons in the
hall of Justice Bervie's house, as I went out.

"One of them was his son, the Captain; one was his daughter, Miss
Bervie; and the third was that smooth-tongued old soldier, Major
Mulvany. If the escape of Mr. Bowmore and Mr. Linwood is in
contemplation, mark my words: the persons whom I have just
mentioned will be concerned in it--and perhaps Miss Charlotte
herself as well. At present, she is entirely unsuspicious of any
misfortune hanging over her head; her attention being absorbed in
the preparation of her bridal finery. As an admirer myself of the
fair sex, I must own that it seems hard on the girl to have her
lover clapped into prison, before the wedding-day.

"I will bring you word of the arrest myself. There will be plenty
of time to catch the afternoon coach to London.

"Here--unless something happens which it is impossible to
foresee--my report may come to an end."

* Readers who may desire to test the author's authority for this
statement, are referred to "The Annual Register" for 1817,
Chapters I. and III.; and, further on, to page 66 in the same
volume.

CHAPTER X.

THE ELOPEMENT.

ON the evening of the first of April, Mrs. Bowmore was left alone
with the servants. Mr. Bowmore and Percy had gone out together to
attend a special meeting of the Club. Shortly afterward Miss
Charlotte had left the cottage, under very extraordinary
circumstances.

A few minutes only after the departure of her father and Percy,
she received a letter, which appeared to cause her the most
violent agitation. She said to Mrs. Bowmore:

"Mamma, I must see Captain Bervie for a few minutes in private,
on a matter of serious importance to all of us. He is waiting at
the front gate, and he will come in if I show myself at the hall
door."

Upon this, Mrs. Bowmore had asked for an explanation.

"There is no time for explanation," was the only answer she
received; "I ask you to leave me for five minutes alone with the
Captain. "

Mrs. Bowmore still hesitated. Charlotte snatched up her garden
hat, and declared, wildly, that she would go out to Captain
Bervie, if she was not permitted to receive him at home. In the
face of this declaration, Mrs. Bowmore yielded, and left the
room.

In a minute more the Captain made his appearance.

Although she had given way, Mrs. Bowmore was not disposed to
trust her daughter, without supervision, in the society of a man
whom Charlotte herself had reviled as a slanderer and a false
friend. She took up her position in the veranda outside the
parlor, at a safe distance from one of the two windows of the
room which had been left partially open to admit the fresh air.
Here she waited and listened.

The conversation was for some time carried on in whispers.

As they became more and more excited, both Charlotte and Bervie
ended in unconsciously raising their voices.

"I swear it to you on my faith as a Christian!" Mrs. Bowmore
heard the Captain say. "I declare before God who hears me that I
am speaking the truth!"

And Charlotte had answered, with a burst of tears:

"I can't believe you! I daren't believe you! Oh, how can you ask
me to do such a thing? Let me go! let me go!"

Alarmed at those words, Mrs. Bowmore advanced to the window and
looked in.

Bervie had put her da ughter's arm on his arm, and was trying to
induce her to leave the parlor with him. She resisted, and
implored him to release her. He dropped her arm, and whispered in
her ear. She looked at him--and instantly made up her mind.

"Let me tell my mother where I am going," she said; "and I will
consent."

"Be it so!" he answered. "And remember one thing: every minute is
precious; the fewest words are the best."

Mrs. Bowmore re-entered the cottage by the adjoining room, and
met them in the passage. In few words, Charlotte spoke.

"I must go at once to Justice Bervie's house. Don't be afraid,
mamma! I know what I am about, and I know I am right."

"Going to Justice Bervie's!" cried Mrs. Bowmore, in the utmost
extremity of astonishment. "What will your father say, what will
Percy think, when they come back from the Club?"

"My sister's carriage is waiting for me close by," Bervie
answered. "It is entirely at Miss Bowmore's disposal. She can
easily get back, if she wishes to keep her visit a secret, before
Mr. Bowmore and Mr. Linwood return."

He led her to the door as he spoke. She ran back and kissed her
mother tenderly. Mrs. Bowmore called to them to wait.

"I daren't let you go," she said to her daughter, "without your
father's leave!"

Charlotte seemed not to hear, the Captain seemed not to hear.
They ran across the front garden, and through the gate--and were
out of sight in less than a minute.

More than two hours passed; the sun sank below the horizon, and
still there were no signs of Charlotte's return.

Feeling seriously uneasy, Mrs. Bowmore crossed the room to ring
the bell, and send the man-servant to Justice Bervie's house to
hasten her daughter's return.

As she approached the fireplace, she was startled by a sound of
stealthy footsteps in the hall, followed by a loud noise as of
some heavy object that had dropped on the floor. She rang the
bell violently, and opened the door of the parlor. At the same
moment, the spy-footman passed her, running out, apparently in
pursuit of somebody, at the top of his speed. She followed him,
as rapidly as she could, across the little front garden, to the
gate. Arrived in the road, she was in time to see him vault upon
the luggage-board at the back of a post-chaise before the
cottage, just as the postilion started the horses on their way to
London. The spy saw Mrs. Bowmore looking at him, and pointed,
with an insolent nod of his head, first to the inside of the
vehicle, and then over it to the high-road; signing to her that
he designed to accompany the person in the post-chaise to the end
of the journey.

Turning to go back, Mrs. Bowmore saw her own bewilderment
reflected in the faces of the two female servants, who had
followed her out.

"Who can the footman be after, ma'am?" asked the cook. "Do you
think it's a thief?"

The housemaid pointed to the post-chaise, barely visible in the
distance.

"Simpleton!" she said. "Do thieves travel in that way? I wish my
master had come back," she proceeded, speaking to herself: "I'm
afraid there's something wrong."

Mrs. Bowmore, returning through the garden-gate, instantly
stopped and looked at the woman.

"What makes you mention your master's name, Amelia, when you fear
that something is wrong?" she asked.

Amelia changed color, and looked confused.

"I am loth to alarm you, ma'am," she said; "and I can't rightly
see what it is my duty to do."

Mrs. Bowmore's heart sank within her under the cruelest of all
terrors, the terror of something unknown. "Don't keep me in
suspense," she said faintly. "Whatever it is, let me know it."

She led the way back to the parlor. The housemaid followed her.
The cook (declining to be left alone) followed the housemaid.

"It was something I heard early this afternoon, ma'am," Amelia
began. "Cook happened to be busy--"

The cook interposed: she had not forgiven the housemaid for
calling her a simpleton. "No, Amelia, if you _must_ bring me into
it--not busy. Uneasy in my mind on the subject of the soup."

"I don't know that your mind makes much difference," Amelia
resumed. "What it comes to is this--it was I, and not you, who
went into the kitchen-garden for the vegetables."

"Not by _my_ wish, Heaven knows!" persisted the cook.

"Leave the room!" said Mrs. Bowmore. Even her patience had given
way at last.

The cook looked as if she declined to believe her own ears. Mrs.
Bowmore pointed to the door. The cook said "Oh?"--accenting it as
a question. Mrs. Bowmore's finger still pointed. The cook, in
solemn silence, yielded to circumstances, and banged the door.

"I was getting the vegetables, ma'am," Amelia proceeded, "when I
heard voices on the other side of the paling. The wood is so old
that one can see through the cracks easy enough. I saw my master,
and Mr. Linwood, and Captain Bervie. The Captain seemed to have
stopped the other two on the pathway that leads to the field; he
stood, as it might be, between them and the back way to the
house--and he spoke severely, that he did!"

"What did Captain Bervie say?"

"He said these words, ma'am: 'For the last time, Mr. Bowmore,'
says he, 'will you understand that you are in danger, and that
Mr. Linwood is in danger, unless you both leave this neighborhood
to-night?' My master made light of it. 'For the last time,' says
he, 'will you refer us to a proof of what you say, and allow us
to judge for ourselves?' 'I have told you already,' says the
Captain, 'I am bound by my duty toward another person to keep
what I know a secret.' 'Very well,' says my master, '_I_ am bound
by my duty to my country. And I tell you this,' says he, in his
high and mighty way, 'neither Government, nor the spies of
Government, dare touch a hair of my head: they know it, sir, for
the head of the people's friend!' "

"That's quite true," said Mrs. Bowmore, still believing in her
husband as firmly as ever.

Amelia went on:

"Captain Bervie didn't seem to think so," she said. "He lost his
temper. 'What stuff!' says he; 'there's a Government spy in your
house at this moment, disguised as your footman.' My master
looked at Mr. Linwood, and burst out laughing. 'You won't beat
that, Captain,' says he, 'if you talk till doomsday.' He turned
about without a word more, and went home. The Captain caught Mr.
Linwood by the arm, as soon as they were alone. 'For God's sake,'
says he, 'don't follow that madman's example!' "

Mrs. Bowmore was shocked. "Did he really call my husband a
madman?" she asked.

"He did, indeed, ma'am--and he was in earnest about it, too. 'If
you value your liberty,' he says to Mr. Linwood; 'if you hope to
become Charlotte's husband, consult your own safety. I can give
you a passport. Escape to France and wait till this trouble is
over.' Mr. Linwood was not in the best of tempers--Mr. Linwood
shook him off. 'Charlotte's father will soon be my father,' says
he, 'do you think I will desert him? My friends at the Club have
taken up my claim; do you think I will forsake them at the
meeting to-morrow? You ask me to be unworthy of Charlotte, and
unworthy of my friends--you insult me, if you say more.' He
whipped round on his heel, and followed my master."

"And what did the Captain do?"

"Lifted up his hands, ma'am, to the heavens, and looked--I
declare it turned my blood to see him. If there's truth in mortal
man, it's my firm belief--"

What the housemaid's belief was, remained unexpressed. Before she
could get to her next word, a shriek of horror from the hall
announced that the cook's powers of interruption were not
exhausted yet.

Mistress and servant both hurried out in terror of they knew not
what. There stood the cook, alone in the hall, confronting the
stand on which the overcoats and hats of the men of the family
were placed.

"Where's the master's traveling coat?" cried the cook, staring
wildly at an unoccupied peg. "And where's his cap to match! Oh
Lord, he's off in the post-chaise! and the footman's after him!"

Simpleton as she was, the woman had blundered on a very serious
discovery.

Coat and cap--both made after a foreign pattern, and both
strikingly remarkable in form and color to English eyes--had
unquestionably disappeared. It  was equally certain that they were
well known to the foot man, whom the Captain had declared to be a
spy, as the coat and cap which his master used in traveling. Had
Mr. Bowmore discovered (since the afternoon) that he was really
in danger? Had the necessities of instant flight only allowed him
time enough to snatch his coat and cap out of the hall? And had
the treacherous manservant seen him as he was making his escape
to the post-chaise? The cook's conclusions answered all these
questions in the affirmative--and, if Captain Bervie's words of
warning had been correctly reported, the cook's conclusion for
once was not to be despised.

Under this last trial of her fortitude, Mrs. Bowmore's feeble
reserves of endurance completely gave way. The poor lady turned
faint and giddy. Amelia placed her on a chair in the hall, and
told the cook to open the front door, and let in the fresh air.

The cook obeyed; and instantly broke out with a second terrific
scream; announcing nothing less, this time, than the appearance
of Mr. Bowmore himself, alive and hearty, returning with Percy
from the meeting at the Club!

The inevitable inquiries and explanations followed.

Fully assured, as he had declared himself to be, of the sanctity
of his person (politically speaking), Mr. Bowmore turned pale,
nevertheless, when he looked at the unoccupied peg on his clothes
stand. Had some man unknown personated him? And had a post-chaise
been hired to lead an impending pursuit of him in the wrong
direction? What did it mean? Who was the friend to whose services
he was indebted? As for the proceedings of the man-servant, but
one interpretation could now be placed on them. They distinctly
justified what Captain Bervie had said of him. Mr. Bowmore
thought of the Captain's other assertion, relating to the urgent
necessity for making his escape; and looked at Percy in silent
dismay; and turned paler than ever.

Percy's thoughts, diverted for the moment only from the lady of
his love, returned to her with renewed fidelity. "Let us hear
what Charlotte thinks of it," he said. "Where is she?"

It was impossible to answer this question plainly and in few
words.

Terrified at the effect which her attempt at explanation produced
on Percy, helplessly ignorant when she was called upon to account
for her daughter's absence, Mrs. Bowmore could only shed tears
and express a devout trust in Providence. Her husband looked at
the new misfortune from a political point of view. He sat down
and slapped his forehead theatrically with the palm of his hand.
"Thus far," said the patriot, "my political assailants have only
struck at me through the newspapers. _Now_ they strike at me
through my child!"

Percy made no speeches. There was a look in his eyes which boded
ill for Captain Bervie if the two met. "I am going to fetch her,"
was all he said, "as fast as a horse can carry me."

He hired his horse at an inn in the town, and set forth for
Justice Bervie's house at a gallop.

During Percy's absence, Mr. Bowmore secured the front and back
entrances to the cottage with his own hands.

These first precautions taken, he ascended to his room and packed
his traveling-bag. "Necessaries for my use in prison," he
remarked. "The bloodhounds of Government are after me." "Are they
after Percy, too?" his wife ventured to ask. Mr. Bowmore looked
up impatiently, and cried "Pooh!"--as if Percy was of no
consequence. Mrs. Bowmore thought otherwise: the good woman
privately packed a bag for Percy, in the sanctuary of her own
room.

For an hour, and more than an hour, no event of any sort
occurred.

Mr. Bowmore stalked up and down the parlor, meditating. At
intervals, ideas of flight presented themselves attractively to
his mind. At intervals, ideas of the speech that he had prepared
for the public meeting on the next day took their place. "If I
fly to-night," he wisely observed, "what will become of my
speech? I will _not_ fly to-night! The people shall hear me."

He sat down and crossed his arms fiercely. As he looked at his
wife to see what effect he had produced on her, the sound of
heavy carriage-wheels and the trampling of horses penetrated to
the parlor from the garden-gate.

Mr. Bowmore started to his feet, with every appearance of having
suddenly altered his mind on the question of flight. Just as he
reached the hall, Percy's voice was heard at the front door. "Let
me in. Instantly! Instantly!"

Mrs. Bowmore drew back the bolts before the servants could help
her. "Where is Charlotte?" she cried; seeing Percy alone on the
doorstep.

"Gone!" Percy answered furiously. "Eloped to Paris with Captain
Bervie! Read her own confession. They were just sending the
messenger with it, when I reached the house."

He handed a note to Mrs. Bowmore, and turned aside to speak to
her husband while she read it. Charlotte wrote to her mother very
briefly; promising to explain everything on her return. In the
meantime, she had left home under careful protection--she had a
lady for her companion on the journey--and she would write again
from Paris. So the letter, evidently written in great haste,
began and ended.

Percy took Mr. Bowmore to the window, and pointed to a carriage
and four horses waiting at the garden-gate.

"Do you come with me, and back me with your authority as her
father?" he asked, sternly. "Or do you leave me to go alone?"

Mr. Bowmore was famous among his admirers for his "happy
replies." He made one now.

"I am not Brutus," he said. "I am only Bowmore. My daughter
before everything. Fetch my traveling-bag."

While the travelers' bags were being placed in the chaise, Mr.
Bowmore was struck by an idea.

He produced from his coat-pocket a roll of many papers thickly
covered with writing. On the blank leaf in which they were tied
up, he wrote in the largest letters: "Frightful domestic
calamity! Vice-President Bowmore obliged to leave England!
Welfare of a beloved daughter! His speech will be read at the
meeting by Secretary Joskin, of the Club. (Private to Joskin.
Have these lines printed and posted everywhere. And, when you
read my speech, for God's sake don't drop your voice at the ends
of the sentences.)"

He threw down the pen, and embraced Mrs. Bowmore in the most
summary manner. The poor woman was ordered to send the roll of
paper to the Club, without a word to comfort and sustain her from
her husband's lips. Percy spoke to her hopefully and kindly, as
he kissed her cheek at parting.

On the next morning, a letter, addressed to Mrs. Bowmore, was
delivered at the cottage by private messenger.

Opening the letter, she recognized the handwriting of her
husband's old friend, and her old friend--Major Mulvany. In
breathless amazement, she read these lines:

"DEAR MRS. BOWMORE--In matters of importance, the golden rule is
never to waste words. I have performed one of the great actions
of my life--I have saved your husband.

"How I discovered that my friend was in danger, I must not tell
you at present. Let it be enough if I say that I have been a
guest under Justice Bervie's hospitable roof, and that I know of
a Home Office spy who has taken you unawares, under pretense of
being your footman. If I had not circumvented him, the scoundrel
would have imprisoned your husband, and another dear friend of
mine. This is how I did it.

"I must begin by appealing to your memory.

"Do you happen to remember that your husband and I are as near as
may be of about the same height? Very good, so far. Did you, in
the next place, miss Bowmore's traveling coat and cap from their
customary peg? I am the thief, dearest lady; I put them on my own
humble self. Did you hear a sudden noise in the hall? Oh, forgive
me--I made the noise! And it did just what I wanted of it. It
brought the spy up from the kitchen, suspecting that something
might be wrong.

"What did the wretch see when he got into the hall? His master,
in traveling costume, running out. What did he find when he
reached the garden? His master escaping, in a post-chaise, on the
road to London. What did he do, the born blackguard that he was?
Jumped up behind the chaise to make sure of his prisoner. It was
dark when we got to London. In a hop, skip, and jump, I was out
of the carriage, and in at my own door, before he could l ook me
in the face.

"The date of the warrant, you must know, obliged him to wait till
the morning. All that night, he and the Bow Street runners kept
watch They came in with the sunrise--and who did they find? Major
Mulvany snug in his bed, and as innocent as the babe unborn. Oh,
they did their duty! Searched the place from the kitchen to the
garrets--and gave it up. There's but one thing I regret--I let
the spy off without a good thrashing. No matter. I'll do it yet,
one of these days.

"Let me know the first good news of our darling fugitives, and I
shall be more than rewarded for what little I have done.

                                       "Your always devoted,

                                       "TERENCE MULVANY."


CHAPTER XI.

PURSUIT AND DISCOVERY.

FEELING himself hurried away on the road to Dover, as fast as
four horses could carry him, Mr. Bowmore had leisure to criticise
Percy's conduct, from his own purely selfish point of view.

"If you had listened to my advice," he said, "you would have
treated that man Bervie like the hypocrite and villain that he
is. But no! you trusted to your own crude impressions. Having
given him your hand after the duel (I would have given him the
contents of my pistol!) you hesitated to withdraw it again, when
that slanderer appealed to your friendship not to cast him off.
Now you see the consequence!"

"Wait till we get to Paris!" All the ingenuity of Percy's
traveling companion failed to extract from him any other answer
than that.

Foiled so far, Mr. Bowmore began to start difficulties next. Had
they money enough for the journey? Percy touched his pocket, and
answered shortly, "Plenty." Had they passports? Percy sullenly
showed a letter. "There is the necessary voucher from a
magistrate," he said. "The consul at Dover will give us our
passports. Mind this!" he added, in warning tones, "I have
pledged my word of honor to Justice Bervie that we have no
political object in view in traveling to France. Keep your
politics to yourself, on the other side of the Channel."

Mr. Bowmore listened in blank amazement. Charlotte's lover was
appearing in a new character--the character of a man who had lost
his respect for Charlotte's father!

It was useless to talk to him. He deliberately checked any
further attempts at conversation by leaning back in the carriage,
and closing his eyes. The truth is, Mr. Bowmore's own language
and conduct were insensibly producing the salutary impression on
Percy's mind which Bervie had vainly tried to convey, under the
disadvantage of having Charlotte's influence against him.
Throughout the journey, Percy did exactly what Bervie had once
entreated him to do--he kept Mr. Bowmore at a distance.

At every stage, they inquired after the fugitives. At every
stage, they were answered by a more or less intelligible
description of Bervie and Charlotte, and of the lady who
accompanied them. No disguise had been attempted; no person had
in any case been bribed to conceal the truth.

When the first tumult of his emotions had in some degree
subsided, this strange circumstance associated itself in Percy's
mind with the equally unaccountable conduct of Justice Bervie, on
his arrival at the manor house.

The old gentleman met his visitor in the hall, without
expressing, and apparently without feeling, any indignation at
his son's conduct. It was even useless to appeal to him for
information. He only said, "I am not in Arthur's confidence; he
is of age, and my daughter (who has volunteered to accompany him)
is of age. I have no claim to control them. I believe they have
taken Miss Bowmore to Paris; and that is all I know about it."

He had shown the same dense insensibility in giving his official
voucher for the passports. Percy had only to satisfy him on the
question of politics; and the document was drawn out as a matter
of course. Such had been the father's behavior; and the conduct
of the son now exhibited the same shameless composure. To what
conclusion did this discovery point? Percy abandoned the attempt
to answer that question in despair.

They reached Dover toward two o'clock in the morning.

At the pier-head they found a coast-guardsman on duty, and
received more information.

In 1817 the communication with France was still by
sailing-vessels. Arriving long after the departure of the regular
packet, Bervie had hired a lugger, and had sailed with the two
ladies for Calais, having a fresh breeze in his favor. Percy's
first angry impulse was to follow him instantly. The next moment
he remembered the insurmountable obstacle of the passports. The
Consul would certainly not grant those essentially necessary
documents at two in the morning!

The only alternative was to wait for the regular packet, which
sailed some hours later--between eight and nine o'clock in the
forenoon. In this case, they might apply for their passports
before the regular office hours, if they explained the
circumstances, backed by the authority of the magistrate's
letter.

Mr. Bowmore followed Percy to the nearest inn that was open,
sublimely indifferent to the delays and difficulties of the
journey. He ordered refreshments with the air of a man who was
performing a melancholy duty to himself, in the name of humanity.

"When I think of my speech," he said, at supper, "my heart bleeds
for the people. In a few hours more, they will assemble in their
thousands, eager to hear me. And what will they see? Joskin in my
place! Joskin with a manuscript in his hand! Joskin, who drops
his voice at the ends of his sentences! I will never forgive
Charlotte. Waiter, another glass of brandy and water. "

After an unusually quick passage across the Channel, the
travelers landed on the French coast, before the defeated spy had
returned from London to Dartford by stage-coach. Continuing their
journey by post as far as Amiens, they reached that city in time
to take their places by the diligence to Paris.

Arrived in Paris, they encountered another incomprehensible
proceeding on the part of Captain Bervie.

Among the persons assembled in the yard to see the arrival of the
diligence was a man with a morsel of paper in his hand, evidently
on the lookout for some person whom he expected to discover among
the travelers. After consulting his bit of paper, he looked with
steady attention at Percy and Mr. Bowmore, and suddenly
approached them. "If you wish to see the Captain," he said, in
broken English, "you will find him at that hotel." He handed a
printed card to Percy, and disappeared among the crowd before it
was possible to question him.

Even Mr. Bowmore gave way to human weakness, and condescended to
feel astonished in the face of such an event as this. "What
next?" he exclaimed.

"Wait till we get to the hotel," said Percy.

In half an hour more the landlord had received them, and the
waiter had led them to the right door. Percy pushed the man
aside, and burst into the room.

Captain Bervie was alone, reading a newspaper. Before the first
furious words had escaped Percy's lips, Bervie silenced him by
pointing to a closed door on the right of the fireplace.

"She is in that room," he said; "speak quietly, or you may
frighten her. I know what you are going to say," he added, as
Percy stepped nearer to him. "Will you hear me in my own defense,
and then decide whether I am the greatest scoundrel living, or
the best friend you ever had?"

He put the question kindly, with something that was at once grave
and tender in his look and manner. The extraordinary composure
with which he acted and spoke had its tranquilizing influence
over Percy. He felt himself surprised into giving Bervie a
hearing.

"I will tell you first what I have done," the Captain proceeded,
"and next why I did it. I have taken it on myself, Mr. Linwood,
to make an alteration in your wedding arrangements. Instead of
being married at Dartford church, you will be married (if you see
no objection) at the chapel of the embassy in Paris, by my old
college friend the chaplain."

This was too much for Percy's self-control. "Your audacity is
beyond belief," he broke out.

"And beyond endurance," Mr. Bowmore added. "Understand this, sir!
Whatever your defense may be, I ob ject, under any circumstances,
to be made the victim of a trick."

"You are the victim of your own obstinate refusal to profit by a
plain warning," Bervie rejoined. "At the eleventh hour, I
entreated you, and I entreated Mr. Linwood, to provide for your
own safety; and I spoke in vain."

Percy's patience gave way once more.

"To use your own language," he said, "I have still to decide
whether you have behaved toward me like a scoundrel or a friend.
You have said nothing to justify yourself yet."

"Very well put!" Mr. Bowmore chimed in. "Come to the point, sir!
My daughter's reputation is in question."

"Miss Bowmore's reputation is not in question for a single
instant," Bervie answered. "My sister has been the companion of
her journey from first to last."

"Journey?" Mr. Bowmore repeated, indignantly. "I want to know,
sir, what the journey means. As an outraged father, I ask one
plain question. Why did you run away with my daughter?"

Bervie took a slip of paper from his pocket, and handed it to
Percy with a smile.

It was a copy of the warrant which Justice Bervie's duty had
compelled him to issue for the "arrest of Orlando Bowmore and
Percy Linwood." There was no danger in divulging the secret now.
British warrants were waste-paper in France, in those days.

"I ran away with the bride," Bervie said coolly, "in the certain
knowledge that you and Mr. Bowmore would run after me. If I had
not forced you both to follow me out of England on the first of
April, you would have been made State prisoners on the second.
What do you say to my conduct now?"

"Wait, Percy, before you answer him," Mr. Bowmore interposed. "He
is ready enough at excusing himself. But, observe--he hasn't a
word to say in justification of my daughter's readiness to run
away with him."

"Have you quite done?" Bervie asked, as quietly as ever."

Mr. Bowmore reserved the right of all others which he most
prized, the right of using his tongue. "For the present," he
answered in his loftiest manner, "I have done."

Bervie proceeded: "Your daughter consented to run away with me,
because I took her to my father's house, and prevailed upon him
to trust her with the secret of the coming arrests. She had no
choice left but to let her obstinate father and her misguided
lover go to prison--or to take her place with my sister and me in
the traveling-carriage." He appealed once more to Percy. "My
friend, you remember the day when you spared my life. Have I
remembered it, too?"

For once, there was an Englishman who was not contented to
express the noblest emotions that humanity can feel by the
commonplace ceremony of shaking hands. Percy's heart overflowed.
In an outburst of unutterable gratitude he threw himself on
Bervie's breast. As brothers the two men embraced. As brothers
they loved and trusted one another, from that day forth.

The door on the right was softly opened from within. A charming
face--the dark eyes bright with happy tears, the rosy lips just
opening into a smile--peeped into the room. A low sweet voice,
with an under-note of trembling in it, made this modest protest,
in the form of an inquiry:

"When you have quite done, Percy, with our good friend, perhaps
you will have something to say to ME?"

LAST WORDS.

THE persons immediately interested in the marriage of Percy and
Charlotte were the only persons present at the ceremony.

At the little breakfast afterward, in the French hotel, Mr.
Bowmore insisted on making a speech to a select audience of six;
namely, the bride and bridegroom, the bridesmaid, the Chaplain,
the Captain, and Mrs. Bowmore. But what does a small audience
matter? The English frenzy for making speeches is not to be
cooled by such a trifle as that. At the end of the world, the
expiring forces of Nature will hear a dreadful voice--the voice
of the last Englishman delivering the last speech.

Percy wisely made his honeymoon a long one; he determined to be
quite sure of his superior influence over his wife before he
trusted her within reach of her father again.

Mr. and Mrs. Bowmore accompanied Captain Bervie and Miss Bervie
on their way back to England, as far as Boulogne. In that
pleasant town the banished patriot set up his tent. It was a
cheaper place to live in than Paris, and it was conveniently
close to England, when he had quite made up his mind whether to
be an exile on the Continent, or to go back to his own country
and be a martyr in prison. In the end, the course of events
settled that question for him. Mr. Bowmore returned to England,
with the return of the Habeas Corpus Act.


The years passed. Percy and Charlotte (judged from the romantic
point of view) became two uninteresting married people. Bervie
(always remaining a bachelor) rose steadily in his profession,
through the higher grades of military rank. Mr. Bowmore, wisely
overlooked by a new Government, sank back again into the
obscurity from which shrewd Ministers would never have assisted
him to emerge. The one subject of interest left, among the
persons of this little drama, was now represented by Doctor
Lagarde. Thus far, not a trace had been discovered of the French
physician, who had so strangely associated the visions of his
magnetic sleep with the destinies of the two men who had
consulted him.

Steadfastly maintaining his own opinion of the prediction and the
fulfillment, Bervie persisted in believing that he and Lagarde
(or Percy and Lagarde) were yet destined to meet, and resume the
unfinished consultation at the point where it had been broken
off. Persons, happy in the possession of "sound common sense,"
who declared the prediction to be skilled guesswork, and the
fulfillment manifest coincidence, ridiculed the idea of finding
Doctor Lagarde as closely akin to that other celebrated idea of
finding the needle in the bottle of hay. But Bervie's obstinacy
was proverbial. Nothing shook his confidence in his own
convictions.

More than thirteen years had elapsed since the consultation at
the Doctor's lodgings, when Bervie went to Paris to spend a
summer holiday with his friend, the chaplain at the English
embassy. His last words to Percy and Charlotte when he took his
leave were: "Suppose I meet with Doctor Lagarde?"

It was then the year 1830. Bervie arrived at his friend's rooms
on the 24th of July. On the 27th of the month the famous
revolution broke out which dethroned Charles the Tenth in three
days.

On the second day, Bervie and his host ventured into the streets,
watching the revolution (like other reckless Englishmen) at the
risk of their lives. In the confusion around them they were
separated. Bervie, searching for his companion, found his
progress stopped by a barricade, which had been desperately
attacked, and desperately defended. Men in blouses and men in
uniform lay dead and dying together: the tricolored flag waved
over them, in token of the victory of the people.

Bervie had just revived a poor wretch with a drink from an
overthrown bowl of water, which still had a few drops left in it,
when he felt a hand laid on his shoulder from behind. He turned
and discovered a National Guard, who had been watching his
charitable action. "Give a helping hand to that poor fellow,"
said the citizen-soldier, pointing to a workman standing near,
grimed with blood and gunpowder. The tears were rolling down the
man's cheeks. "I can't see my way, sir, for crying," he said.
"Help me to carry that sad burden into the next street." He
pointed to a rude wooden litter, on which lay a dead or wounded
man, his face and breast covered with an old cloak. "There is the
best friend the people ever had," the workman said. "He cured us,
comforted us, respected us, loved us. And there he lies, shot
dead while he was binding up the wounds of friends and enemies
alike!"

"Whoever he is, he has died nobly," Bervie answered "May I look
at him?"

The workman signed that he might look.

Bervie lifted the cloak--and met with Doctor Lagarde once more.


MISS BERTHA AND THE YANKEE.

[PRELIMINARY STATEMENTS OF WITNESSES FOR THE DEFENSE, COLLECTED
AT THE OFFICE OF THE SOLICITOR.]

No. 1.--Miss Bertha Laroche, of Nettlegrove Hall, testifies and
says:--

I.

TOWARD the middle of June, in the year 1817, I went to take the
waters at Maplesworth, in Derbyshire, accompanied by my nearest
relative--my aunt.

I am an only child; and I was twenty-one years old at my last
birthday. On coming of age I inherited a house and lands in
Derbyshire, together with a fortune in money of one hundred
thousand pounds. The only education which I have received has
been obtained within the last two or three years of my life; and
I have thus far seen nothing of Society, in England or in any
other civilized part of the world. I can be a competent witness,
it seems, in spite of these disadvantages. Anyhow, I mean to tell
the truth.

My father was a French colonist in the island of Saint Domingo.
He died while I was very young; leaving to my mother and to me
just enough to live on, in the remote part of the island in which
our little property was situated. My mother was an Englishwoman.
Her delicate health made it necessary for her to leave me, for
many hours of the day, under the care of our household slaves. I
can never forget their kindness to me; but, unfortunately, their
ignorance equaled their kindness. If we had been rich enough to
send to France or England for a competent governess we might have
done very well. But we were not rich enough. I am ashamed to say
that I was nearly thirteen years old before I had learned to read
and write correctly.

Four more years passed--and then there came a wonderful event in
our lives, which was nothing less than the change from Saint
Domingo to England.

My mother was distantly related to an ancient and wealthy English
family. She seriously offended those proud people by marrying an
obscure foreigner, who had nothing to live on but his morsel of
land in the West Indies. Having no expectations from her
relatives, my mother preferred happiness with the man she loved
to every other consideration; and I, for one, think she was
right. From that moment she was cast off by the head of the
family. For eighteen years of her life, as wife, mother, and
widow, no letters came to her from her English home. We had just
celebrated my seventeenth birthday when the first letter came. It
informed my mother that no less than three lives, which stood
between her and the inheritance of certain portions of the family
property, had been swept away by death. The estate and the
fortune which I have already mentioned had fallen to her in due
course of law, and her surviving relatives were magnanimously
ready to forgive her at last!

We wound up our affairs at Saint Domingo, and we went to England
to take possession of our new wealth.

At first, the return to her native air seemed to have a
beneficial effect on my mother's health. But it was a temporary
improvement only. Her constitution had been fatally injured by
the West Indian climate, and just as we had engaged a competent
person to look after my neglected education, my constant
attendance was needed at my mother's bedside. We loved each other
dearly, and we wanted no strange nurses to come between us. My
aunt (my mother's sister) relieved me of my cares in the
intervals when I wanted rest.

For seven sad months our dear sufferer lingered. I have only one
remembrance to comfort me; my mother's last kiss was mine--she
died peacefully with her head on my bosom.

I was nearly nineteen years old before I had sufficiently rallied
my courage to be able to think seriously of myself and my
prospects.

At that age one does not willingly submit one's self for the
first time to the authority of a governess. Having my aunt for a
companion and protectress, I proposed to engage my own masters
and to superintend my own education.

My plans failed to meet with the approval of the head of the
family. He declared (most unjustly, as the event proved) that my
aunt was not a fit person to take care of me. She had passed all
the later years of her life in retirement. A good creature, he
admitted, in her own way, but she had no knowledge of the world,
and no firmness of character. The right person to act as my
chaperon, and to superintend my education, was the high-minded
and accomplished woman who had taught his own daughters.

I declined, with all needful gratitude and respect, to take his
advice. The bare idea of living with a stranger so soon after my
mother's death revolted me. Besides, I liked my aunt, and my aunt
liked me. Being made acquainted with my decision, the head of the
family cast me off, exactly as he had cast off my mother before
me.

So I lived in retirement with my good aunt, and studied
industriously to improve my mind until my twenty-first birthday
came. I was now an heiress, privileged to think and act for
myself. My aunt kissed me tenderly. We talked of my poor mother,
and we cried in each other's arms on the memorable day that made
a wealthy woman of me. In a little time more, other troubles than
vain regrets for the dead were to try me, and other tears were to
fill my eyes than the tears which I had given to the memory of my
mother.

II.

I MAY now return to my visit, in June, 1817, to the healing
springs at Maplesworth.

This famous inland watering-place was only between nine and ten
miles from my new home called Nettlegrove Hall. I had been
feeling weak and out of spirits for some months, and our medical
adviser recommended change of scene and a trial of the waters at
Maplesworth. My aunt and I established ourselves in comfortable
apartments, with a letter of introduction to the chief doctor in
the place. This otherwise harmless and worthy man proved,
strangely enough, to be the innocent cause of the trials and
troubles which beset me at the outset of my new life.

The day after we had presented our letter of introduction, we met
the doctor on the public walk. He was accompanied by two
strangers, both young men, and both (so far as my ignorant
opinion went) persons of some distinction, judging by their dress
and manners. The doctor said a few kind words to us, and rejoined
his two companions. Both the gentlemen looked at me, and both
took off their hats as my aunt and I proceeded on our walk.

I own I thought occasionally of the well-bred strangers during
the rest of the day, especially of the shortest of the two, who
was also the handsomest of the two to my thinking. If this
confession seems rather a bold one, remember, if you please, that
I had never been taught to conceal my feelings at Saint Domingo,
and that the events which followed our arrival in England had
kept me completely secluded from the society of other young
ladies of my age.

The next day, while I was drinking my glass of healing water
(extremely nasty water, by the way) the doctor joined us.

While he was asking me about my health, the two strangers made
their appearance again, and took off their hats again. They both
looked expectantly at the doctor, and the doctor (in performance
of a promise which he had already made, as I privately suspected)
formally introduced them to my aunt and to me. First (I put the
handsomest man first) Captain Arthur Stanwick, of the army, home
from India on leave, and staying at Maplesworth to take the
waters; secondly, Mr. Lionel Varleigh, of Boston, in America,
visiting England, after traveling all over Europe, and stopping
at Maplesworth to keep company with his friend the Captain.

On their introduction, the two gentlemen, observing, no doubt,
that I was a little shy, forbore delicately from pressing their
society on us.

Captain Stanwick, with a beautiful smile, and with teeth worthy
of the smile, stroked his whiskers, and asked me if I had found
any benefit from taking the waters. He afterward spoke in great
praise of the charming scenery in the neighborhood of
Maplesworth, and then, turning away, addressed his next words to
my aunt. Mr. Varleigh took his place. Speaking with perfect
gravity, and with no whiskers to stroke, he said:

"I have once tried the waters here out of curiosity. I can
sympathize, miss, with the expression which I observed on your
face when you emptied your glass just now. Permit me to offer you
something nice to take the taste of the waters out of your
mouth." He produced from his pocket a beautiful little box filled
with sugar-plums. "I bought it in Paris," h e explained. "Having
lived a good deal in France, I have got into a habit of making
little presents of this sort to ladies and children. I wouldn't
let the doctor see it, miss, if I were you. He has the usual
medical prejudice against sugar-plums." With that quaint warning,
he, too, made his bow and discreetly withdrew.

Thinking it over afterward, I acknowledged to myself that the
English Captain--although he was the handsomest man of the two,
and possessed the smoothest manners--had failed, nevertheless, to
overcome my shyness. The American traveler's unaffected sincerity
and good-humor, on the other hand, set me quite at my ease. I
could look at him and thank him, and feel amused at his sympathy
with the grimace I had made, after swallowing the ill-flavored
waters. And yet, while I lay awake at night, wondering whether we
should meet our new acquaintances on the next day, it was the
English Captain that I most wanted to see again, and not the
American traveler! At the time, I set this down to nothing more
important than my own perversity. Ah, dear! dear! I know better
than that now.

The next morning brought the doctor to our hotel on a special
visit to my aunt. He invented a pretext for sending me into the
next room, which was so plainly a clumsy excuse that my curiosity
was aroused. I gratified my curiosity. Must I make my confession
plainer still? Must I acknowledge that I was mean enough to
listen on the other side of the door?

I heard my dear innocent old aunt say: "Doctor! I hope you don't
see anything alarming in the state of Bertha's health."

The doctor burst out laughing. "My dear madam! there is nothing
in the state of the young lady's health which need cause the
smallest anxiety to you or to me. The object of my visit is to
justify myself for presenting those two gentlemen to you
yesterday. They are both greatly struck by Miss Bertha's beauty,
and they both urgently entreated me to introduce them. Such
introductions, I need hardly say, are marked exceptions to my
general rule. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred I should have
said No. In the cases of Captain Stanwick and Mr. Varleigh,
however, I saw no reason to hesitate. Permit me to assure you
that I am not intruding on your notice two fortune-hunting
adventurers. They are both men of position and men of property.
The family of the Stanwicks has been well known to me for years;
and Mr. Varleigh brought me a letter from my oldest living
friend, answering for him as a gentleman in the highest sense of
the word. He is the wealthiest man of the two; and it speaks
volumes for him, in my opinion, that he has preserved his
simplicity of character after a long residence in such places as
Paris and Vienna. Captain Stanwick has more polish and ease of
manner, but, looking under the surface, I rather fancy there may
be something a little impetuous and domineering in his temper.
However, we all have our faults. I can only say, for both these
young friends of mine, that you need feel no scruple about
admitting them to your intimacy, if they happen to please
you--and your niece. Having now, I hope, removed any doubts which
may have troubled you, pray recall Miss Bertha. I am afraid I
have interrupted you in discussing your plans for the day."

The smoothly eloquent doctor paused for the moment; and I darted
away from the door.

Our plans for the day included a drive through the famous scenery
near the town. My two admirers met us on horseback. Here, again,
the Captain had the advantage over his friend. His seat in the
saddle and his riding-dress were both perfect things in their
way. The Englishman rode on one side of the carriage and the
American on the other. They both talked well, but Mr. Varleigh
had seen more of the world in general than Captain Stanwick, and
he made himself certainly the more interesting and more amusing
companion of the two.

On our way back my admiration was excited by a thick wood,
beautifully situated on rising ground at a little distance from
the high-road: "Oh, dear," I said, "how I should like to take a
walk in that wood!" Idle, thoughtless words; but, oh, what
remembrances crowd on me as I think of them now!

Captain Stanwick and Mr. Varleigh at once dismounted and offered
themselves as my escort. The coachman warned them to be careful;
people had often lost themselves, he said, in that wood. I asked
the name of it. The name was Herne Wood. My aunt was not very
willing to leave her comfortable seat in the carriage, but it
ended in her going with us.

Before we entered the wood, Mr. Varleigh noted the position of
the high-road by his pocket-compass. Captain Stanwick laughed at
him, and offered me his arm. Ignorant as I was of the ways of the
world and the rules of coquetry, my instinct (I suppose) warned
me not to distinguish one of the gentlemen too readily at the
expense of the other. I took my aunt's arm and settled it in that
way.

A winding path led us into the wood.

On a nearer view, the place disappointed me; the further we
advanced, the more horribly gloomy it grew. The thickly-growing
trees shut out the light; the damp stole over me little by little
until I shivered; the undergrowth of bushes and thickets rustled
at intervals mysteriously, as some invisible creeping creature
passed through it. At a turn in the path we reached a sort of
clearing, and saw the sky and the sunshine once more. But, even
here, a disagreeable incident occurred. A snake wound his
undulating way across the open space, passing close by me, and I
was fool enough to scream. The Captain killed the creature with
his riding-cane, taking a pleasure in doing it which I did not
like to see.

We left the clearing and tried another path, and then another.
And still the horrid wood preyed on my spirits. I agreed with my
aunt that we should do well to return to the carriage. On our way
back we missed the right path, and lost ourselves for the moment.
Mr. Varleigh consulted his compass, and pointed in one direction.
Captain Stanwick, consulting nothing but his own jealous humor,
pointed in the other. We followed Mr. Varleigh's guidance, and
got back to the clearing. He turned to the Captain, and said,
good-humoredly: "You see the compass was right." Captain
Stanwick, answered, sharply: "There are more ways than one out of
an English wood; you talk as if we were in one of your American
forests."

Mr. Varleigh seemed to be at a loss to understand his rudeness;
there was a pause. The two men looked at each other, standing
face to face on the brown earth of the clearing--the Englishman's
ruddy countenance, light auburn hair and whiskers, and
well-opened bold blue eyes, contrasting with the pale complexion,
the keenly-observant look, the dark closely-cut hair, and the
delicately-lined face of the American. It was only for a moment:
I had barely time to feel uneasy before they controlled
themselves and led us back to the carriage, talking as pleasantly
as if nothing had happened. For days afterward, nevertheless,
that scene in the clearing--the faces and figures of the two men,
the dark line of trees hemming them in on all sides, the brown
circular patch of ground on which they stood--haunted my memory,
and got in the way of my brighter and happier thoughts. When my
aunt inquired if I had enjoyed the day, I surprised her by saying
No. And when she asked why, I could only answer: "It was all
spoiled by Herne Wood."

III.

THREE weeks passed.

The terror of those dreadful days creeps over me again when I
think of them. I mean to tell the truth without shrinking; but I
may at least consult my own feelings by dwelling on certain
particulars as briefly as I can. I shall describe my conduct
toward the two men who courted me in the plainest terms, if I say
that I distinguished neither of them. Innocently and stupidly I
encouraged them both.

In books, women are generally represented as knowing their own
minds in matters which relate to love and marriage. This is not
my experience of myself. Day followed day; and, ridiculous as it
may appear, I could not decide which of my two admirers I liked
best!

Captain Stanwick was, at first, the man of my choice. While he
kept his temper under control, h e charmed me. But when he let it
escape him, he sometimes disappointed, sometimes irritated me. In
that frame of mind I turned for relief to Lionel Varleigh,
feeling that he was the more gentle and the more worthy man of
the two, and honestly believing, at such times, that I preferred
him to his rival. For the first few days after our visit to Herne
Wood I had excellent opportunities of comparing them. They paid
their visits to us together, and they divided their attentions
carefully between me and my aunt. At the end of the week,
however, they began to present themselves separately. If I had
possessed any experience of the natures of men, I might have
known what this meant, and might have seen the future possibility
of some more serious estrangement between the two friends, of
which I might be the unfortunate cause. As it was; I never once
troubled my head about what might be passing out of my presence.
Whether they came together, or whether they came separately,
their visits were always agreeable to me. and I thought of
nothing and cared for nothing more.

But the time that was to enlighten me was not far off.

One day Captain Stanwick called much earlier than usual. My aunt
had not yet returned from her morning walk. The Captain made some
excuse for presenting himself under these circumstances which I
have now forgotten.

Without actually committing himself to a proposal of marriage he
spoke with such tender feeling, he managed his hold on my
inexperience so delicately, that he entrapped me into saying some
words, on my side, which I remembered with a certain dismay as
soon as I was left alone again. In half an hour more, Mr. Lionel
Varleigh was announced as my next visitor. I at once noticed a
certain disturbance in his look and manner which was quite new in
my experience of him. I offered him a chair. To my surprise he
declined to take it.

"I must trust to your indulgence to permit me to put an
embarrassing question to you," he began. "It rests with you, Miss
Laroche, to decide whether I shall remain here, or whether I
shall relieve you of my presence by leaving the room."

"What can you possibly mean?" I asked.

"Is it your wish," he went on, "that I should pay you no more
visits except in Captain Stanwick's company, or by Captain
Stanwick's express permission?"

My astonishment deprived me for the moment of the power of
answering him. "Do you really mean that Captain Stanwick has
forbidden you to call on me?" I asked as soon as I could speak.

"I have exactly repeated what Captain Stanwick said to me half an
hour since," Lionel Varleigh answered.

In my indignation at hearing this, I entirely forgot the rash
words of encouragement which the Captain had entrapped me into
speaking to him. When I think of it now, I am ashamed to repeat
the language in which I resented this man's presumptuous
assertion of authority over me. Having committed one act of
indiscretion already, my anxiety to assert my freedom of action
hurried me into committing another. I bade Mr. Varleigh welcome
whenever he chose to visit me, in terms which made his face flush
under the emotions of pleasure and surprise which I had aroused
in him. My wounded vanity acknowledged no restraints. I signed to
him to take a seat on the sofa at my side; I engaged to go to his
lodgings the next day, with my aunt, and see the collection of
curiosities which he had amassed in the course of his travels. I
almost believe, if he had tried to kiss me, that I was angry
enough with the Captain to have let him do it!

Remember what my life had been--remember how ignorantly I had
passed the precious days of my youth, how insidiously a sudden
accession of wealth and importance had encouraged my folly and my
pride--and try, like good Christians, to make some allowance for
me!

My aunt came in from her walk, before Mr. Varleigh's visit had
ended. She received him rather coldly, and he perceived it. After
reminding me of our appointment for the next day, he took his
leave.

"What appointment does Mr. Varleigh mean?" my aunt asked, as soon
as we were alone. "Is it wise, under the circumstances, to make
appointments with Mr. Varleigh?" she said, when I had answered
her question. I naturally inquired what she meant. My aunt
replied, "I have met Captain Stanwick while I was out walking. He
has told me something which I am quite at a loss to understand.
Is it possible, Bertha, that you have received a proposal of
marriage from him favorably, without saying one word about your
intentions to me?"

I instantly denied it. However rashly I might have spoken, I had
certainly said nothing to justify Captain Stanwick in claiming me
as his promised wife. In his mean fear of a fair rivalry with Mr.
Varleigh, he had deliberately misinterpreted me. "If I marry
either of the two," I said, "it will be Mr. Varleigh!"

My aunt shook her head. "These two gentlemen seem to be both in
love with you, Bertha. It is a trying position for you between
them, and I am afraid you have acted with some indiscretion.
Captain Stanwick tells me that he and his friend have come to a
separation already. I fear you are the cause of it. Mr. Varleigh
has left the hotel at which he was staying with the Captain, in
consequence of a disagreement between them this morning. You were
not aware of that when you accepted his invitation. Shall I write
an excuse for you? We must, at least, put off the visit, my dear,
until you have set yourself right with Captain Stanwick."

I began to feel a little alarmed, but I was too obstinate to
yield without a struggle. "Give me time to think over it," I
said. "To write an excuse seems like acknowledging the Captain's
authority. Let us wait till to-morrow morning."

IV.

THE morning brought with it another visit from Captain Stanwick.
This time my aunt was present. He looked at her without speaking,
and turned to me, with his fiery temper showing itself already in
his eyes.

"I have a word to say to you in private," he began.

"I have no secrets from my aunt," I answered. "Whatever you have
to say, Captain Stanwick, may be said here."

He opened his lips to reply, and suddenly checked himself. He was
controlling his anger by so violent an effort that it turned his
ruddy face pale. For the moment he conquered his temper--he
addressed himself to me with the outward appearance of respect at
least.

"Has that man Varleigh lied?" he asked; "or have you given _him_
hopes, too--after what you said to me yesterday?"

"I said nothing to you yesterday which gives you any right to put
that question to me," I rejoined. "You have entirely
misunderstood me, if you think so."

My aunt attempted to say a few temperate words, in the hope of
soothing him. He waved his hand, refusing to listen to her, and
advanced closer to me.

"_You_ have misunderstood _me_," he said, "if you think I am a
man to be made a plaything of in the hands of a coquette!"

My aunt interposed once more, with a resolution which I had not
expected from her.

"Captain Stanwick," she said, "you are forgetting yourself."

He paid no heed to her; he persisted in speaking to me. "It is my
misfortune to love you," he burst out. "My whole heart is set on
you. I mean to be your husband, and no other man living shall
stand in my way. After what you said to me yesterday, I have a
right to consider that you have favored my addresses. This is not
a mere flirtation. Don't think it! I say it's the passion of a
life! Do you hear? It's the passion of a man's whole life! I am
not to be trifled with. I have had a night of sleepless misery
about you--I have suffered enough for you--and you're not worth
it. Don't laugh! This is no laughing matter. Take care, Bertha!
Take care!"

My aunt rose from her chair. She astonished me. On all ordinary
occasions the most retiring, the most feminine of women, she now
walked up to Captain Stanwick and looked him full in the face,
without flinching for an instant.

"You appear to have forgotten that you are speaking in the
presence of two ladies," she said. "Alter your tone, sir, or I
shall be obliged to take my niece out of the room."

Half angry, half frightened, I  tried to speak in my turn. My aunt
signed to me to be silent. The Captain drew back a step as if he
felt her reproof. But his eyes, still fixed on me, were as
fiercely bright as ever. _There_ the gentleman's superficial
good-breeding failed to hide the natural man beneath.

"I will leave you in undisturbed possession of the room," he said
to my aunt with bitter politeness. "Before I go, permit me to
give your niece an opportunity of reconsidering her conduct
before it is too late." My aunt drew back, leaving him free to
speak to me. After considering for a moment, he laid his hand
firmly, but not roughly, on my arm. "You have accepted Lionel
Varleigh's invitation to visit him," he said, "under pretense of
seeing his curiosities. Think again before you decide on keeping
that engagement. If you go to Varleigh tomorrow, you will repent
it to the last day of your life." Saying those words, in a tone
which made me tremble in spite of myself, he walked to the door.
As he laid his hand on the lock, he turned toward me for the last
time. "I forbid you to go to Varleigh's lodgings," he said, very
distinctly and quietly. "Understand what I tell you. I forbid
it."

With those words he left us.

My aunt sat down by me and took my hand kindly. "There is only
one thing to be done," she said; "we must return at once to
Nettlegrove. If Captain Stanwick attempts to annoy you in your
own house, we have neighbors who will protect us, and we have Mr.
Loring, our rector, to appeal to for advice. As for Mr. Varleigh,
I will write our excuses myself before we go away."

She put out her hand to ring the bell and order the carriage. I
stopped her. My childish pride urged me to assert myself in some
way, after the passive position that I had been forced to occupy
during the interview with Captain Stanwick.

"No," I said, "it is not acting fairly toward Mr. Varleigh to
break our engagement with him. Let us return to Nettlegrove by
all means, but let us first call on Mr. Varleigh and take our
leave. Are we to behave rudely to a gentleman who has always
treated us with the utmost consideration, because Captain
Stanwick has tried to frighten us by cowardly threats? The
commonest feeling of self-respect forbids it."

My aunt protested against this outbreak of folly with perfect
temper and good sense. But my obstinacy (my firmness as I thought
it!) was immovable. I left her to choose between going with me to
Mr. Varleigh, or letting me go to him by myself. Finding it
useless to resist, she decided, it is needless to say, on going
with me.

We found Mr. Varleigh very courteous, but more than usually grave
and quiet. Our visit only lasted for a few minutes; my aunt using
the influence of her age and her position to shorten it. She
mentioned family affairs as the motive which recalled us to
Nettlegrove. I took it on myself to invite Mr. Varleigh to visit
me at my own house. He bowed and thanked me, without engaging
himself to accept the invitation. When I offered him my hand at
parting, he raised it to his lips, and kissed it with a fervor
that agitated me. His eyes looked into mine with a sorrowful
admiration, with a lingering regret, as if they were taking their
leave of me for a long while. "Don't forget me!" he whispered, as
he stood at the door, while I followed my aunt out. "Come to
Nettlegrove," I whispered back. His eyes dropped to the ground;
he let me go without a word more.

This, I declare solemnly, was all that passed at our visit. By
some unexpressed consent among us, no allusion whatever was made
to Captain Stanwick; not even his name was mentioned. I never
knew that the two men had met, just before we called on Mr.
Varleigh. Nothing was said which could suggest to me the
slightest suspicion of any arrangement for another meeting
between them later in the day. Beyond the vague threats which had
escaped Captain Stanwick's lips--threats which I own I was rash
enough to despise--I had no warning whatever of the dreadful
events which happened at Maplesworth on the day after our return
to Nettlegrove Hall.

I can only add that I am ready to submit to any questions that
may be put to me. Pray don't think me a heartless woman. My worst
fault was ignorance. In those days, I knew nothing of the false
pretenses under which men hide what is selfish and savage in
their natures from the women whom it is their interest to
deceive.

No. 2.--Julius Bender, fencing-master, testifies and says:--

I am of German nationality; established in England as teacher of
the use of the sword and the pistol since the beginning of the
present year.

Finding business slack in London, it unfortunately occurred to me
to try what I could do in the country. I had heard of Maplesworth
as a place largely frequented by visitors on account of the
scenery, as well as by invalids in need of taking the waters; and
I opened a gallery there at the beginning of the season of 1817,
for fencing and pistol practice. About the visitors I had not
been deceived; there were plenty of idle young gentlemen among
them who might have been expected to patronize my establishment.
They showed the most barbarous indifference to the noble art of
attack and defense--came by twos and threes, looked at my
gallery, and never returned. My small means began to fail me.
After paying my expenses, I was really at my wits' end to find a
few pounds to go on with, in the hope of better days.

One gentleman, I remember, who came to see me, and who behaved
most liberally.

He described himself as an American, and said he had traveled a
great deal. As my ill luck would have it, he stood in no need of
my instructions. On the two or three occasions when he amused
himself with my foils and my pistols, he proved to be one of the
most expert swordsmen and one of the finest shots that I ever met
with. It was not wonderful: he had by nature cool nerves and a
quick eye; and he had been taught by the masters of the art in
Vienna and Paris.

Early in July--the 9th or 10th of the month, I think--I was
sitting alone in my gallery, looking ruefully enough at the last
two sovereigns in my purse, when a gentleman was announced who
wanted a lesson. "A _private_ lesson," he said, with emphasis,
looking at the man who cleaned and took care of my weapons.

I sent the man out of the room. The stranger (an Englishman, and,
as I fancied, judging by outward appearances, a military man as
well) took from his pocket-book a fifty-pound banknote, and held
it up before me. "I have a heavy wager depending on a fencing
match," he said, "and I have no time to improve myself. Teach me
a trick which will make me a match for a man skilled in the use
of the foil, and keep the secret--and there are fifty pounds for
you."

I hesitated. I did indeed hesitate, poor as I was. But this devil
of a man held his banknote before me whichever way I looked, and
I had only two pounds left in the world!

"Are you going to fight a duel?'' I asked.

"I have already told you what I am going to do," he answered.

I waited a little. The infernal bank-note still tempted me. In
spite of myself, I tried him again.

"If I teach you the trick," I persisted, "will you undertake to
make no bad use of your lesson?"

"Yes, " he said, impatiently enough.

I was not quite satisfied yet.

"Will you promise it, on your word of honor?" I asked.

"Of course I will," he answered. "Take the money, and don't keep
me waiting any longer."

I took the money, and I taught him the trick--and I regretted it
almost as soon as it was done. Not that I knew, mind, of any
serious consequences that followed; for I returned to London the
next morning. My sentiments were those of a man of honor, who
felt that he had degraded his art, and who could not be quite
sure that he might not have armed the hand of an assassin as
well. I have no more to say.

No. 3.--Thomas Outwater, servant to Captain Stanwick, testifies
and says:--

If I did not firmly believe my master to be out of his senses, no
punishment that I could receive would prevail upon me to tell of
him what I am going to tell now.

But I say he is mad, and therefore not accountable for what he
has done--mad for love of a young woman. If I could have my way,
I should like to twist her neck, though she _is_ a lady, and a gr
eat heiress into the bargain. Before she came between them, my
master and Mr. Varleigh were more like brothers than anything
else. She set them at variance, and whether she meant to do it or
not is all the same to me. I own I took a dislike to her when I
first saw her. She was one of the light-haired, blue-eyed sort,
with an innocent look and a snaky waist--not at all to be
depended on, as I have found them.

I hear I am not expected to give an account of the disagreement
between the two gentlemen, of which this lady was the cause. I am
to state what I did in Maplesworth, and what I saw afterward in
Herne Wood. Poor as I am, I would give a five-pound note to
anybody who could do it for me. Unfortunately, I must do it for
myself.

On the 10th of July, in the evening, my master went, for the
second time that day, to Mr. Varleigh's lodgings.

I am certain of the date, because it was the day of publication
of the town newspaper, and there was a law report in it which set
everybody talking. There had been a duel with pistols, a day or
two before, between a resident in the town and a visitor, caused
by some dispute about horses. Nothing very serious came of the
meeting. One of the men only was hurt, and the wound proved to be
of no great importance. The awkward part of the matter was that
the constables appeared on the ground, before the wounded man had
been removed. He and his two seconds were caught, and the
prisoners were committed for trial. Dueling (the magistrates
said) was an inhuman and unchristian practice, and they were
determined to put the law in force and stop it. This sentence
made a great stir in the town, and fixed the date, as I have just
said, in my mind.

Having been accidentally within hearing of some of the disputes
concerning Miss Laroche between my master and Mr. Varleigh, I had
my misgivings about the Captain's second visit to the friend with
whom he had quarreled already. A gentleman called on him, soon
after he had gone out, on important business. This gave me an
excuse for following him to Mr. Varleigh's rooms with the
visitor's card, and I took the opportunity.

I heard them at high words on my way upstairs, and waited a
little on the landing. The Captain was in one of his furious
rages; Mr. Varleigh was firm and cool as usual. After listening
for a minute or so, I heard enough (in my opinion) to justify me
in entering the room. I caught my master in the act of lifting
his cane--threatening to strike Mr. Varleigh. He instantly
dropped his hand, and turned on me in a fury at my intrusion.
Taking no notice of this outbreak of temper, I gave him his
friend's card, and went out. A talk followed in voices too low
for me to hear outside the room, and then the Captain approached
the door. I got out of his way, feeling very uneasy about what
was to come next. I could not presume to question Mr. Varleigh.
The only thing I could think of was to tell the young lady's aunt
what I had seen and heard, and to plead with Miss Laroche herself
to make peace between them. When I inquired for the ladies at
their lodgings, I was told that they had left Maplesworth.

I saw no more of the Captain that night.

The next morning he seemed to be quite himself again. He said to
me, "Thomas, I am going sketching in Herne Wood. Take the
paint-box and the rest of it, and put this into the carriage."

He handed me a packet as thick as my arm, and about three feet
long, done up in many folds of canvas. I made bold to ask what it
was. He answered that it was an artist's sketching umbrella,
packed for traveling.

In an hour's time, the carriage stopped on the road below Herne
Wood. My master said he would carry his sketching things himself,
and I was to wait with the carriage. In giving him the so-called
umbrella, I took the occasion of his eye being off me for the
moment to pass my hand over it carefully; and I felt, through the
canvas, the hilt of a sword. As an old soldier, I could not be
mistaken--the hilt of a sword.

What I thought, on making this discovery, does not much matter.
What I did was to watch the Captain into the wood, and then to
follow him.

I tracked him along the path to where there was a clearing in the
midst of the trees. There he stopped, and I got behind a tree. He
undid the canvas, and produced _two_ swords concealed in the
packet. If I had felt any doubts before, I was certain of what
was coming now. A duel without seconds or witnesses, by way of
keeping the town magistrates in the dark--a duel between my
master and Mr. Varleigh! As his name came into my mind, the man
himself appeared, making his way into the clearing from the other
side of the wood.

What could I do to stop it? No human creature was in sight. The
nearest village was a mile away, reckoning from the further side
of the wood. The coachman was a stupid old man, quite useless in
a difficulty, even if I had had time enough to go back to the
road and summon him to help me. While I was thinking about it,
the Captain and Mr. Varleigh had stripped to their shirts and
trousers. When they crossed their swords, I could stand it no
longer--I burst in on them. "For God Almighty's sake, gentlemen,"
I cried out, "don't fight without seconds!" My master turned on
me, like the madman he was, and threatened me with the point of
his sword. Mr. Varleigh pulled me back out of harm's way. "Don't
be afraid," he whispered, as he led me back to the verge of the
clearing; "I have chosen the sword instead of the pistol
expressly to spare his life."

Those noble words (spoken by as brave and true a man as ever
breathed) quieted me. I knew Mr. Varleigh had earned the repute
of being one of the finest swordsmen in Europe.

The duel began. I was placed behind my master, and was
consequently opposite to his antagonist. The Captain stood on his
defense, waiting for the other to attack. Mr. Varleigh made a
pass. I was opposite the point of his sword; I saw it touch the
Captain's left shoulder. In the same instant of time my master
struck up his opponent's sword with his own weapon, seized Mr.
Varleigh's right wrist in his left hand, and passed his sword
clean through Mr. Varleigh's breast. He fell, the victim of a
murderous trick--fell without a word or a cry.

The Captain turned slowly, and faced me with his bloody sword in
his hand. I can't tell you how he looked; I can only say that the
sight of him turned me faint with terror. I was at Waterloo--I am
no coward. But I tell you the cold sweat poured down my face like
water. I should have dropped if I had not held by the branch of a
tree.

My master waited until I had in a measure recovered myself. "Feel
if his heart beats," he said, pointing to the man on the ground.

I obeyed. He was dead--the heart was still; the beat of the pulse
was gone. I said, "You have killed him!"

The Captain made no answer. He packed up the two swords again in
the canvas, and put them under his arm. Then he told me to follow
him with the sketching materials. I drew back from him without
speaking; there was a horrid hollow sound in his voice that I did
not like. "Do as I tell you," he said: "you have yourself to
thank for it if I refuse to lose sight of you now." I managed to
say that he might trust me to say nothing. He refused to trust
me; he put out his hand to take hold of me. I could not stand
that. "I'll go with you," I said; "don't touch me!" We reached
the carriage and returned to Maplesworth. The same day we
traveled by post to London.

In London I contrived to give the Captain the slip. By the first
coach the next morning I want back to Maplesworth, eager to hear
what had happened, and if the body had been found. Not a word of
news reached me; nothing seemed to be known of the duel in Herne
Wood.

I went to the wood--on foot, fearing that I might be traced if I
hired a carriage. The country round was as solitary as usual. Not
a creature was near when I entered the wood; not a creature was
near when I looked into the clearing.

There was nothing on the ground. The body was gone.

No. 4.--The Reverend Alfred Loring, Rector of Nettlegrove,
testifies and says:--

I.

EARLY in the month of October, 1817, I was informed that Miss
Bertha Laroche had called at
 my house, and wished to see me in private.

I had first been presented to Miss Laroche on her arrival, with
her aunt, to take possession of her property at Nettlegrove Hall.
My opportunities of improving my acquaintance with her had not
been so numerous as I could have desired, and I sincerely
regretted it. She had produced a very favorable impression on me.
Singularly inexperienced and impulsive--with an odd mixture of
shyness and vivacity in her manner, and subject now and then to
outbursts of vanity and petulance which she was divertingly
incapable of concealing--I could detect, nevertheless, under the
surface the signs which told of a true and generous nature, of a
simple and pure heart. Her personal appearance, I should add, was
attractive in a remarkable degree. There was something in it so
peculiar, and at the same time so fascinating, that I am
conscious it may have prejudiced me in her favor. For fear of
this acknowledgment being misunderstood, I think it right to add
that I am old enough to be her grandfather, and that I am also a
married man.

I told the servant to show Miss Laroche into my study.

The moment she entered the room, her appearance alarmed me: she
looked literally panic-stricken. I offered to send for my wife;
she refused the proposal. I entreated her to take time at least
to compose herself. It was not in her impulsive nature to do
this. She said, "Give me your hand to encourage me, and let me
speak while I can." I gave her my hand, poor soul. I said, "Speak
to me, my dear, as if I were your father."

So far as I could understand the incoherent statement which she
addressed to me, she had been the object of admiration (while
visiting Maplesworth) of two gentlemen, who both desired to marry
her. Hesitating between them and perfectly inexperienced in such
matters, she had been the unfortunate cause of enmity between the
rivals, and had returned to Nettlegrove, at her aunt's
suggestion, as the best means of extricating herself from a very
embarrassing position. The removal failing to alleviate her
distressing recollections of what had happened, she and her aunt
had tried a further change by making a tour of two months on the
Continent. She had returned in a more quiet frame of mind. To her
great surprise, she had heard nothing of either of her two
suitors, from the day when she left Maplesworth to the day when
she presented herself at my rectory.

Early that morning she was walking, after breakfast, in the park
at Nettlegrove when she heard footsteps behind her. She turned,
and found herself face to face with one of her suitors at
Maplesworth. I am informed that there is no necessity now for my
suppressing the name. The gentleman was Captain Stanwick.

He was so fearfully changed for the worse that she hardly knew
him again.

After his first glance at her, he held his hand over his
bloodshot eyes as if the sunlight hurt them. Without a word to
prepare her for the disclosure, he confessed that he had killed
Mr. Varleigh in a duel. His remorse (he declared) had unsettled
his reason: only a few days had passed since he had been released
from confinement in an asylum.

"You are the cause of it," he said wildly. "It is for love of
you. I have but one hope left to live for--my hope in you. If you
cast me off, my mind is made up. I will give my life for the life
that I have taken; I will die by my own hand. Look at me, and you
will see that I am in earnest. My future as a living man depends
on your decision. Think of it to-day, and meet me here to-morrow.
Not at this time; the horrid daylight feels like fire in my eyes,
and goes like fire to my brain. Wait till sunset--you will find
me here."

He left her as suddenly as he had appeared. When she had
sufficiently recovered herself to be able to think, she decided
on saying nothing of what had happened to her aunt. She took her
way to the rectory to seek my advice.

It is needless to encumber my narrative by any statement of the
questions which I felt it my duty to put to her under these
circumstances. My inquiries informed me that Captain Stanwick had
in the first instance produced a favorable impression on her. The
less showy qualities of Mr. Varleigh had afterward grown on her
liking; aided greatly by the repelling effect on her mind of the
Captain's violent language and conduct when he had reason to
suspect that his rival was being preferred to him. When she knew
the horrible news of Mr. Varleigh's death, she "knew her own
heart" (to repeat her exact words to me) by the shock that she
felt. Toward Captain Stanwick the only feeling of which she was
now conscious was, naturally, a feeling of the strongest
aversion.

My own course in this difficult and painful matter appeared to me
to be clear. "It is your duty as a Christian to see this
miserable man again," I said. "And it is my duty as your friend
and pastor, to sustain you under the trial. I will go with you
to-morrow to the place of meeting.

II.

THE next evening we found Captain Stanwick waiting for us in the
park.

He drew back on seeing me. I explained to him, temperately and
firmly, what my position was. With sullen looks he resigned
himself to endure my presence. By degrees I won his confidence.
My first impression of him remains unshaken--the man's reason was
unsettled. I suspected that the assertion of his release was a
falsehood, and that he had really escaped from the asylum. It was
impossible to lure him into telling me where the place was. He
was too cunning to do this--too cunning to say anything about his
relations, when I tried to turn the talk that way next. On the
other hand, he spoke with a revolting readiness of the crime that
he had committed, and of his settled resolution to destroy
himself if Miss Laroche refused to be his wife. "I have nothing
else to live for; I am alone in the world," he said. "Even my
servant has deserted me. He knows how I killed Lionel Varleigh."
He paused and spoke his next words in a whisper to me. "I killed
him by a trick--he was the best swordsman of the two."

This confession was so horrible that I could only attribute it to
an insane delusion. On pressing my inquiries, I found that the
same idea must have occurred to the poor wretch's relations, and
to the doctors who signed the certificates for placing him under
medical care. This conclusion (as I afterward heard) was greatly
strengthened by the fact that Mr. Varleigh's body had not been
found on the reported scene of the duel. As to the servant, he
had deserted his master in London, and had never reappeared. So
far as my poor judgment went, the question before me was not of
delivering a self-accused murderer to justice (with no corpse to
testify against him), but of restoring an insane man to the care
of the persons who had been appointed to restrain him.

I tried to test the strength of his delusion in an interval when
he was not urging his shocking entreaties on Miss Laroche. "How
do you know that you killed Mr. Varleigh?" I said.

He looked at me with a wild terror in his eyes. Suddenly he
lifted his right hand, and shook it in the air, with a moaning
cry, which was unmistakably a cry of pain. "Should I see his
ghost," he asked, "if I had not killed him? I know it, by the
pain that wrings me in the hand that stabbed him. Always in my
right hand! always the same pain at the moment when I see him!"
He stopped and ground his teeth in the agony and reality of his
delusion. "Look!" he cried. "Look between the two trees behind
you. There he is--with his dark hair, and his shaven face, and
his steady look! There he is, standing before me as he stood in
the wood, with his eyes on my eyes, and his sword feeling mine!"
He turned to Miss Laroche. "Do _you_ see him too?" he asked
eagerly. "Tell me the truth. My whole life depends on your
telling me the truth."

She controlled herself with a wonderful courage. "I don't see
him," she answered.

He took out his handkerchief, and passed it over his face with a
gasp of relief. "There is my last chance!" he said. "If she will
be true to me--if she will be always near me, morning, noon, and
night, I shall be released from the sight of him. See! he is
fading away already! Gone!" h e cried, with a scream of
exultation. He fell on his knees, and looked at Miss Laroche like
a savage adoring his idol. "Will you cast me off now?" he asked,
humbly. "Lionel was fond of you in his lifetime. His spirit is a
merciful spirit. He shrinks from frightening you, he has left me
for your sake; he will release me for your sake. Pity me, take me
to live with you--and I shall never see him again!"

It was dreadful to hear him. I saw that the poor girl could
endure no more. "Leave us," I whispered to her; "I will join you
at the house.

He heard me, and instantly placed himself between us. "Let her
promise, or she shan't go."

She felt, as I felt, the imperative necessity of saying anything
that might soothe him. At a sign from me she gave him her promise
to return.

He was satisfied--he insisted on kissing her hand, and then he
let her go. I had by this time succeeded in inducing him to trust
me. He proposed, of his own accord, that I should accompany him
to the inn in the village at which he had been staying. The
landlord (naturally enough distrusting his wretched guest) had
warned him that morning to find some other place of shelter. I
engaged to use my influence with the man to make him change his
purpose, and I succeeded in effecting the necessary arrangements
for having the poor wretch properly looked after. On my return to
my own house, I wrote to a brother magistrate living near me, and
to the superintendent of our county asylum, requesting them to
consult with me on the best means of lawfully restraining Captain
Stanwick until we could communicate with his relations. Could I
have done more than this? The event of the next morning answered
that question--answered it at once and forever.

III.

PRESENTING myself at Nettlegrove Hall toward sunset, to take
charge of Miss Laroche, I was met by an obstacle in the shape of
a protest from her aunt.

This good lady had been informed of the appearance of Captain
Stanwick in the park, and she strongly disapproved of encouraging
any further communication with him on the part of her niece. She
also considered that I had failed in my duty in still leaving the
Captain at liberty. I told her that I was only waiting to act on
the advice of competent persons, who would arrive the next day to
consult with me; and I did my best to persuade her of the wisdom
of the course that I had taken in the meantime. Miss Laroche, on
her side, was resolved to be true to the promise that she had
given. Between us, we induced her aunt to yield on certain
conditions.

"I know the part of the park in which the meeting is to take
place," the old lady said; "it is my niece's favorite walk. If
she is not brought back to me in half an hour's time, I shall
send the men-servants to protect her."

The twilight was falling when we reached the appointed place. We
found Captain Stanwick angry and suspicious; it was not easy to
pacify him on the subject of our delay. His insanity seemed to me
to be now more marked than ever. He had seen, or dreamed of
seeing, the ghost during the past night. For the first time (he
said) the apparition of the dead man had spoken to him. In solemn
words it had condemned him to expiate his crime by giving his
life for the life that he had taken. It had warned him not to
insist on marriage with Bertha Laroche: "She shall share your
punishment if she shares your life. And you shall know it by this
sign--_She shall see me as you see me._

I tried to compose him. He shook his head in immovable despair.
"No," he answered; "if she sees him when I see him, there ends
the one hope of release that holds me to life. It will be good-by
between us, and good-by forever!"

We had walked on, while we were speaking, to a part of the park
through which there flowed a rivulet of clear water. On the
further bank, the open ground led down into a wooded valley. On
our side of the stream rose a thick plantation of fir-trees
intersected by a winding path. Captain Stanwick stopped as we
reached the place. His eyes rested, in the darkening twilight, on
the narrow space pierced by the path among the trees. On a sudden
he lifted his right hand, with the same cry of pain which we had
heard before; with his left hand he took Miss Laroche by the arm.
"There!" he said. "Look where I look! Do you see him there?"

As the words passed his lips, a dimly-visible figure appeared,
advancing toward us along the path.

Was it the figure of a living man? or was it the creation of my
own excited fancy? Before I could ask myself the question, the
man advanced a step nearer to us. A last gleam of the dying light
fell on his face through an opening in the trees. At the same
instant Miss Laroche started back from Captain Stanwick with a
scream of terror. She would have fallen if I had not been near
enough to support her. The Captain was instantly at her side
again. "Speak!" he cried. "Do _you_ see it, too?"

She was just able to say "Yes" before she fainted in my arms.

He stooped over her, and touched her cold cheek with his lips.
"Goodby!" he said, in tones suddenly and strangely changed to the
most exquisite tenderness. "Good-by, forever!"

He leaped the rivulet; he crossed the open ground; he was lost to
sight in the valley beyond.

As he disappeared, the visionary man among the fir-trees
advanced; passed in silence; crossed the rivulet at a bound; and
vanished as the figure of the Captain had vanished before him.

I was left alone with the swooning woman. Not a sound, far or
near, broke the stillness of the coming night.

No 5.--Mr. Frederic Darnel, Member of the College of Surgeons,
testifies and says:--

IN the intervals of my professional duty I am accustomed to
occupy myself in studying Botany, assisted by a friend and
neighbor, whose tastes in this respect resemble my own. When I
can spare an hour or two from my patients, we go out together
searching for specimens. Our favorite place is Herne Wood. It is
rich in material for the botanist, and it is only a mile distant
from the village in which I live.

Early in July, my friend and I made a discovery in the wood of a
very alarming and unexpected kind. We found a man in the
clearing, prostrated by a dangerous wound, and to all appearance
dead.

We carried him to the gamekeeper's cottage on the outskirts of
the woods, and on the side of it nearest to our village. He and
his boy were out, but the light cart in which he makes his
rounds, in the remoter part of his master's property, was in the
outhouse. While my friend was putting the horse to, I examined
the stranger's wound. It had been quite recently inflicted, and I
doubted whether it had (as yet, at any rate) really killed him. I
did what I could with the linen and cold water which the
gamekeeper's wife offered to me, and then my friend and I removed
him carefully to my house in the cart. I applied the necessary
restoratives, and I had the pleasure of satisfying myself that
the vital powers had revived. He was perfectly unconscious, of
course, but the action of the heart became distinctly
perceptible, and I had hopes.

In a few days more I felt fairly sure of him. Then the usual
fever set in. I was obliged, in justice to his friends, to search
his clothes in presence of a witness. We found his handkerchief,
his purse, and his cigar-case, and nothing more. No letters or
visiting cards; nothing marked on his clothes but initials. There
was no help for it but to wait to identify him until he could
speak.

When that time came, he acknowledged to me that he had divested
himself purposely of any clew to his identity, in the fear (if
some mischance happened to him) of the news of it reaching his
father and mother abruptly, by means of the newspapers. He had
sent a letter to his bankers in London, to be forwarded to his
parents, if the bankers neither saw him nor heard from him in a
month's time. His first act was to withdraw this letter. The
other particulars which he communicated to me are, I am told,
already known. I need only add that I willingly kept his secret,
simply speaking of him in the neighborhood as a traveler from
foreign parts who had met with an accident.

His convalescence was a long one. It was the beginning of Octob
er before he was completely restored to health. When he left us
he went to London. He behaved most liberally to me; and we parted
with sincere good wishes on either side.

No. 6.--_Mr. Lionel Varleigh, of Boston, U. S. A., testifies and
says:--_

MY first proceeding, on my recovery, was to go to the relations
of Captain Stanwick in London, for the purpose of making
inquiries about him.

I do not wish to justify myself at the expense of that miserable
man. It is true that I loved Miss Laroche too dearly to yield her
to any rival except at her own wish. It is also true that Captain
Stanwick more than once insulted me, and that I endured it. He
had suffered from sunstroke in India, and in his angry moments he
was hardly a responsible being. It was only when he threatened me
with personal chastisement that my patience gave way. We met
sword in hand. In my mind was the resolution to spare his life.
In his mind was the resolution to kill me. I have forgiven him. I
will say no more.

His relations informed me of the symptoms of insane delusion
which he had shown after the duel; of his escape from the asylum
in which he had been confined; and of the failure to find him
again.

The moment I heard this news the dread crossed my mind that
Stanwick had found his way to Miss Laroche. In an hour more I was
traveling to Nettlegrove Hall.

I arrived late in the evening, and found Miss Laroche's aunt in
great alarm about her niece's safety. The young lady was at that
very moment speaking to Stanwick in the park, with only an old
man (the rector) to protect her. I volunteered to go at once, and
assist in taking care of her. A servant accompanied me to show me
the place of meeting. We heard voices indistinctly, but saw no
one. The servant pointed to a path through the fir-trees. I went
on quickly by myself, leaving the man within call. In a few
minutes I came upon them suddenly, at a little distance from me,
on the bank of a stream.

The fear of seriously alarming Miss Laroche, if I showed myself
too suddenly, deprived me for a moment of my presence of mind.
Pausing to consider what it might be best to do, I was less
completely protected from discovery by the trees than I had
supposed. She had seen me; I heard her cry of alarm. The instant
afterward I saw Stanwick leap over the rivulet and take to
flight. That action roused me. Without stopping for a word of
explanation, I pursued him.

Unhappily, I missed my footing in the obscure light, and fell on
the open ground beyond the stream. When I had gained my feet once
more, Stanwick had disappeared among the trees which marked the
boundary of the park beyond me. I could see nothing of him, and I
could hear nothing of him, when I came out on the high-road.
There I met with a laboring man who showed me the way to the
village. From the inn I sent a letter to Miss Laroche's aunt,
explaining what had happened, and asking leave to call at the
Hall on the next day.

Early in the morning the rector came to me at the inn. He brought
sad news. Miss Laroche was suffering from a nervous attack, and
my visit to the Hall must be deferred. Speaking next of the
missing man, I heard all that Mr. Loring could tell me. My
intimate knowledge of Stanwick enabled me to draw my own
conclusion from the facts. The thought instantly crossed my mind
that the poor wretch might have committed his expiatory suicide
at the very spot on which he had attempted to kill me. Leaving
the rector to institute the necessary inquiries, I took
post-horses to Maplesworth on my way to Herne Wood.

Advancing from the high-road to the wood, I saw two persons at a
little distance from me--a man in the dress of a gamekeeper, and
a lad. I was too much agitated to take any special notice of
them; I hurried along the path which led to the clearing. My
presentiment had not misled me. There he lay, dead on the scene
of the duel, with a blood-stained razor by his side! I fell on my
knees by the corpse; I took his cold hand in mine; and I thanked
God that I had forgiven him in the first days of my recovery.

I was still kneeling, when I felt myself seized from behind. I
struggled to my feet, and confronted the gamekeeper. He had
noticed my hurry in entering the wood; his suspicions had been
aroused, and he and the lad had followed me. There was blood on
my clothes; there was horror in my face. Appearances were plainly
against me; I had no choice but to accompany the gamekeeper to
the nearest magistrate.

My instructions to my solicitor forbade him to vindicate my
innocence by taking any technical legal objections to the action
of the magistrate or of the coroner. I insisted on my witnesses
being summoned to the lawyer's office, and allowed to state, in
their own way, what they could truly declare on my behalf; and I
left my defense to be founded upon the materials thus obtained.
In the meanwhile I was detained in custody, as a matter of
course.

With this event the tragedy of the duel reached its culminating
point. I was accused of murdering the man who had attempted to
take my life!



This last incident having been related, all that is worth
noticing in my contribution to the present narrative comes to an
end. I was tried in due course of law. The evidence taken at my
solicitor's office was necessarily altered in form, though not in
substance, by the examination to which the witnesses were
subjected in a court of justice. So thoroughly did our defense
satisfy the jury, that they became restless toward the close of
the proceedings, and returned their verdict of Not Guilty without
quitting the box.

When I was a free man again, it is surely needless to dwell on
the first use that I made of my honorable acquittal. Whether I
deserved the enviable place that I occupied in Bertha's
estimation, it is not for me to say. Let me leave the decision to
the lady who has ceased to be Miss Laroche--I mean the lady who
has been good enough to become my wife.


MISS DULANE AND MY LORD.

Part I.

TWO REMONSTRATIONS.

I.

ONE afternoon old Miss Dulane entered her drawing-room; ready to
receive visitors, dressed in splendor, and exhibiting every
outward appearance of a defiant frame of mind.

Just as a saucy bronze nymph on the mantelpiece struck the
quarter to three on an elegant clock under her arm, a visitor was
announced--"Mrs. Newsham."

Miss Dulane wore her own undisguised gray hair, dressed in
perfect harmony with her time of life. Without an attempt at
concealment, she submitted to be too short and too stout. Her
appearance (if it had only been made to speak) would have said,
in effect: "I am an old woman, and I scorn to disguise it."

Mrs. Newsham, tall and elegant, painted and dyed, acted on the
opposite principle in dressing, which confesses nothing. On
exhibition before the world, this lady's disguise asserted that
she had reached her thirtieth year on her last birthday. Her
husband was discreetly silent, and Father Time was discreetly
silent: they both knew that her last birthday had happened thirty
years since.

"Shall we talk of the weather and the news, my dear? Or shall we
come to the object of your visit at once?" So Miss Dulane opened
the interview.

"Your tone and manner, my good friend, are no doubt provoked by
the report in the newspaper of this morning. In justice to you, I
refuse to believe the report." So Mrs. Newsham adopted her
friend's suggestion.

"You kindness is thrown away, Elizabeth. The report is true."

"Matilda, you shock me!"

"Why?"

"At your age!"

"If _he_ doesn't object to my age, what does it matter to _you?_"

"Don't speak of that man!"

"Why not?"

"He is young enough to be your son; and he is marrying
you--impudently, undisguisedly marrying you--for your money!"

"And I am marrying him--impudently, undisguisedly marrying
him--for his rank."

"You needn't remind me, Matilda, that you are the daughter of a
tailor."

"In a week or two more, Elizabeth, I shall remind you that I am
the wife of a nobleman's son."

"A younger son; don't forget that."

"A younger son, as you say. He finds the social position, and I
find the money--half a million at my own sole disposal. My future
husband is a good fellow in his way, and his future wife is anot
her good fellow in her way. To look at your grim face, one would
suppose there were no such things in the world as marriages of
convenience."

"Not at your time of life. I tell you plainly, your marriage will
be a public scandal."

"That doesn't frighten us," Miss Dulane remarked. "We are
resigned to every ill-natured thing that our friends can say of
us. In course of time, the next nine days' wonder will claim
public attention, and we shall be forgotten. I shall be none the
less on that account Lady Howel Beaucourt. And my husband will be
happy in the enjoyment of every expensive taste which a poor man
call gratify, for the first time in his life. Have you any more
objections to make? Don't hesitate to speak plainly."

"I have a question to ask, my dear."

"Charmed, I am sure, to answer it--if I can."

"Am I right in supposing that Lord Howel Beaucourt is about half
your age?"

"Yes, dear; my future husband is as nearly as possible half as
old as I am."

Mrs. Newsham's uneasy virtue shuddered. "What a profanation of
marriage!" she exclaimed.

"Nothing of the sort," her friend pronounced positively.
"Marriage, by the law of England (as my lawyer tells me), is
nothing but a contract. Who ever heard of profaning a contract?"

"Call it what you please, Matilda. Do you expect to live a happy
life, at your age, with a young man for your husband?"

"A happy life," Miss Dulane repeated, "because it will be an
innocent life." She laid a certain emphasis on the last word but
one.

Mrs. Newsham resented the emphasis, and rose to go. Her last
words were the bitterest words that she had spoken yet.

"You have secured such a truly remarkable husband, my dear, that
I am emboldened to ask a great favor. Will you give me his
lordship's photograph?"

"No," said Miss Dulane, "I won't give you his lordship's
photograph."

"What is your objection, Matilda?"

"A very serious objection, Elizabeth. You are not pure enough in
mind to be worthy of my husband's photograph."

With that reply the first of the remonstrances assumed hostile
proportions, and came to an untimely end.

II.

THE second remonstrance was reserved for a happier fate. It took
its rise in a conversation between two men who were old and true
friends. In other words, it led to no quarreling.

The elder man was one of those admirable human beings who are
cordial, gentle, and good-tempered, without any conscious
exercise of their own virtues. He was generally known in the
world about him by a fond and familiar use of his Christian name.
To call him "Sir Richard" in these pages (except in the character
of one of his servants) would be simply ridiculous. When he lent
his money, his horses, his house, and (sometimes, after unlucky
friends had dropped to the lowest social depths) even his
clothes, this general benefactor was known, in the best society
and the worst society alike, as "Dick." He filled the hundred
mouths of Rumor with his nickname, in the days when there was an
opera in London, as the proprietor of the "Beauty-box." The
ladies who occupied the box were all invited under the same
circumstances. They enjoyed operatic music; but their husbands
and fathers were not rich enough to be able to gratify that
expensive taste. Dick's carriage called for them, and took them
home again; and the beauties all agreed (if he ever married) that
Mrs. Dick would be the most enviable woman on the face of the
civilized earth. Even the false reports, which declared that he
was privately married already, and on bad terms with his wife,
slandered him cordially under the popular name. And his intimate
companions, when they alluded among each other to a romance in
his life which would remain a hidden romance to the end of his
days, forgot that the occasion justified a serious and severe use
of his surname, and blamed him affectionately as "poor dear
Dick."

The hour was midnight; and the friends, whom the most hospitable
of men delighted to assemble round his dinner-table, had taken
their leave with the exception of one guest specially detained by
the host, who led him back to the dining-room.

"You were angry with our friends," Dick began, "when they asked
you about that report of your marriage. You won't be angry with
Me. Are you really going to be the old maid's husband?"

This plain question received a plain reply: "Yes, I am."

Dick took the young lord's hand. Simply and seriously, he said:
"Accept my congratulations."

Howel Beaucourt started as if he had received a blow instead of a
compliment.

"There isn't another man or woman in the whole circle of my
acquaintance," he declared, "who would have congratulated me on
marrying Miss Dulane. I believe you would make allowances for me
if I had committed murder."

"I hope I should," Dick answered gravely. "When a man is my
friend--murder or marriage--I take it for granted that he has a
reason for what he does. Wait a minute. You mustn't give me more
credit than I deserve. I don't agree with you. If I were a
marrying man myself, I shouldn't pick an old maid--I should
prefer a young one. That's a matter of taste. You are not like
me. _You_ always have a definite object in view. I may not know
what the object is. Never mind! I wish you joy all the same."

Beaucourt was not unworthy of the friendship he had inspired. "I
should be ungrateful indeed," he said, "if I didn't tell you what
my object is. You know that I am poor?"

"The only poor friend of mine," Dick remarked, "who has never
borrowed money of me."

Beaucourt went on without noticing this. "I have three expensive
tastes," he said. "I want to get into Parliament; I want to have
a yacht; I want to collect pictures. Add, if you like, the
selfish luxury of helping poverty and wretchedness, and hearing
my conscience tell me what an excellent man I am. I can't do all
this on five hundred a year--but I can do it on forty times five
hundred a year. Moral: marry Miss Dulane."

Listening attentively until the other had done, Dick showed a
sardonic side to his character never yet discovered in
Beaucourt's experience of him.

"I suppose you have made the necessary arrangements," he said.
"When the old lady releases you, she will leave consolation
behind her in her will."

"That's the first ill-natured thing I ever heard you say, Dick.
When the old lady dies, my sense of honor takes fright, and turns
its back on her will. It's a condition on my side, that every
farthing of her money shall be left to her relations."

"Don't you call yourself one of them?"

"What a question! Am I her relation because the laws of society
force a mock marriage on us? How can I make use of her money
unless I am her husband? and how can she make use of my title
unless she is my wife? As long as she lives I stand honestly by
my side of the bargain. But when she dies the transaction is at
an end, and the surviving partner returns to his five hundred a
year."

Dick exhibited another surprising side to his character. The most
compliant of men now became as obstinate as the proverbial mule.

"All very well," he said, "but it doesn't explain why--if you
must sell yourself--you have sold yourself to an old lady. There
are plenty of young ones and pretty ones with fortunes to tempt
you. It seems odd that you haven't tried your luck with one of
them."

"No, Dick. It would have been odd, and worse than odd, if I had
tried my luck with a young woman."

"I don't see that."

"You shall see it directly. If I marry an old woman for her
money, I have no occasion to be a hypocrite; we both know that
our marriage is a mere matter of form. But if I make a young
woman my wife because I want her money, and if that young woman
happens to be worth a straw, I must deceive her and disgrace
myself by shamming love. That, my boy, you may depend upon it, I
will never do."

Dick's face suddenly brightened with a mingled expression of
relief and triumph.

"Ha! my mercenary friend," he burst out, "there's something mixed
up in this business which is worthier of you than anything I have
heard yet. Stop! I'm going to be clever for the first time in my
life. A man who talks of love as you do, must have felt love
himself. Where is the young one and the pretty one? And what
 has she done, poor dear, to be deserted for an old woman? Good
God! how you look at me! I have hurt your feelings--I have been a
greater fool than ever--I am more ashamed of myself than words
can say!"

Beaucourt stopped him there, gently and firmly.

"You have made a very natural mistake," he said. "There _was_ a
young lady. She has refused me--absolutely refused me. There is
no more love in my life. It's a dark life and an empty life for
the rest of my days. I must see what money can do for me next.
When I have thoroughly hardened my heart I may not feel my
misfortune as I feel it now. Pity me or despise me. In either
case let us say goodnight."

He went out into the hall and took his hat. Dick went out into
the hall and took _his_ hat.

"Have your own way," he answered, "I mean to have mine--I'll go
home with you."

The man was simply irresistible. Beaucourt sat down resignedly on
the nearest of the hall chairs. Dick asked him to return to the
dining-room. "No," he said; "it's not worth while. What I can
tell you may be told in two minutes." Dick submitted, and took
the next of the hall chairs. In that inappropriate place the
young lord's unpremeditated confession was forced out of him, by
no more formidable exercise of power than the kindness of his
friend.

"When you hear where I met with her," he began, "you will most
likely not want to hear any more. I saw her, for the first time,
on the stage of a music hall."

He looked at Dick. Perfectly quiet and perfectly impenetrable,
Dick only said, "Go on." Beaucourt continued in these words:

"She was singing Arne's delicious setting of Ariel's song in the
'Tempest,' with a taste and feeling completely thrown away on the
greater part of the audience. That she was beautiful--in my eyes
at least--I needn't say. That she had descended to a sphere
unworthy of her and new to her, nobody could doubt. Her modest
dress, her refinement of manner, seemed rather to puzzle than to
please most of the people present; they applauded her, but not
very warmly, when she retired. I obtained an introduction through
her music-master, who happened to be acquainted professionally
with some relatives of mine. He told me that she was a young
widow; and he assured me that the calamity through which her
family had lost their place in the world had brought no sort of
disgrace on them. If I wanted to know more, he referred me to the
lady herself. I found her very reserved. A long time passed
before I could win her confidence--and a longer time still before
I ventured to confess the feeling with which she had inspired me.
You know the rest."

"You mean, of course, that you offered her marriage?"

"Certainly."

"And she refused you on account of your position in life."

"No. I had foreseen that obstacle, and had followed the example
of the adventurous nobleman in the old story. Like him, I assumed
a name, and presented myself as belonging to her own respectable
middle class of life. You are too old a friend to suspect me of
vanity if I tell you that she had no objection to me, and no
suspicion that I had approached her (personally speaking) under a
disguise."

"What motive could she possibly have had for refusing you?" Dick
asked.

"A motive associated with her dead husband," Beaucourt answered.
"He had married her--mind, innocently married her--while his
first wife was living. The woman was an inveterate drunkard; they
had been separated for years. Her death had been publicly
reported in the newspapers, among the persons killed in a railway
accident abroad. When she claimed her unhappy husband he was in
delicate health. The shock killed him. His widow--I can't, and
won't, speak of her misfortune as if it was her fault--knew of no
living friends who were in a position to help her. Not a great
artist with a wonderful voice, she could still trust to her
musical accomplishments to provide for the necessities of life.
Plead as I might with her to forget the past, I always got the
same reply: 'If I was base enough to let myself be tempted by the
happy future that you offer, I should deserve the unmerited
disgrace which has fallen on me. Marry a woman whose reputation
will bear inquiry, and forget me.' I was mad enough to press my
suit once too often. When I visited her on the next day she was
gone. Every effort to trace her has failed. Lost, my
friend--irretrievably lost to me!"

He offered his hand and said good-night. Dick held him back on
the doorstep.

"Break off your mad engagement to Miss Dulane," he said. "Be a
man, Howel; wait and hope! You are throwing away your life when
happiness is within your reach, if you will only be patient. That
poor young creature is worthy of you. Lost? Nonsense! In this
narrow little world people are never hopelessly lost till they
are dead and underground. Help me to recognize her by a
description, and tell me her name. I'll find her; I'll persuade
her to come back to you--and, mark my words, you will live to
bless the day when you followed my advice."

This well-meant remonstrance was completely thrown away.
Beaucourt's despair was deaf to every entreaty that Dick had
addressed to him. "Thank you with all my heart," he said. "You
don't know her as I do. She is one of the very few women who mean
No when they say No. Useless, Dick--useless!"

Those were the last words he said to his friend in the character
of a single man.

Part II

PLATONIC MARRIAGE.

III.

"SEVEN months have passed, my dear Dick, since my 'inhuman
obstinacy' (those were the words you used) made you one of the
witnesses at my marriage to Miss Dulane, sorely against your
will. Do you remember your parting prophecy when you were out of
the bride's hearing? 'A miserable life is before that woman's
husband--and, by Jupiter, he has deserved it!'

"Never, my dear boy, attempt to forecast the future again. Viewed
as a prophet you are a complete failure. I have nothing to
complain of in my married life.

"But you must not mistake me. I am far from saying that I am a
happy man; I only declare myself to be a contented man. My old
wife is a marvel of good temper and good sense. She trusts me
implicitly, and I have given her no reason to regret it. We have
our time for being together, and our time for keeping apart.
Within our inevitable limits we understand each other and respect
each other, and have a truer feeling of regard on both sides than
many people far better matched than we are in point of age. But
you shall judge for yourself. Come and dine with us, when I
return on Wednesday next from the trial trip of my new yacht. In
the meantime I have a service to ask of you.

"My wife's niece has been her companion for years. She has left
us to be married to an officer, who has taken her to India; and
we are utterly at a loss how to fill her place. The good old lady
doesn't want much. A nice-tempered refined girl, who can sing and
play to her with some little taste and feeling, and read to her
now and then when her eyes are weary--there is what we require;
and there, it seems, is more than we can get, after advertising
for a week past. Of all the 'companions' who have presented
themselves, not one has turned out to be the sort of person whom
Lady Howel wants.

"Can you help us? In any case, my wife sends you her kind
remembrances; and (true to the old times) I add my love."

~ On the day which followed the receipt of this letter, Dick paid
a visit to Lady Howel Beaucourt.

"You seem to be excited," she said. "Has anything remarkable
happened?"

"Pardon me if I ask a question first," Dick replied. "Do you
object to a young widow?"

"That depends on the widow."

"Then I have found the very person you want. And, oddly enough,
your husband has had something to do with it."

"Do you mean that my husband has recommended her?"

There was an undertone of jealousy in Lady Howel's
voice---jealousy excited not altogether without a motive. She had
left it to Beaucourt's sense of honor to own the truth, if there
had been any love affair in his past life which ought to make him
hesitates before he married. He had justified Miss Dulane's
confidence in him; acknowledging an attachment to a young widow,
and adding that she had positively refused
 him. "We have not met since," he said, "and we shall never meet
again." Under those circumstances, Miss Dulane had considerately
abstained from asking for any further details. She had not
thought of the young widow again, until Dick's language had
innocently inspired her first doubt. Fortunately for both of
them, he was an outspoken man; and he reassured her unreservedly
in these words: "Your husband knows nothing about it."

"Now," she said, "you may tell me how you came to hear of the
lady."

"Through my uncle's library," Dick replied. "His will has left me
his collection of books--in such a wretchedly neglected condition
that I asked Beaucourt (not being a reading man myself) if he
knew of any competent person who could advise me how to set
things right. He introduced me to Farleigh & Halford, the
well-known publishers. The second partner is a book collector
himself, as well as a bookseller. He kindly looks in now and
then, to see how his instructions for mending and binding are
being carried out. When he called yesterday I thought of you, and
I found he could help us to a young lady employed in his office
at correcting proof sheets."

"What is the lady's name?"

"Mrs. Evelin."

"Why does she leave her employment?"

"To save her eyes, poor soul. When the senior partner, Mr.
Farleigh, met with her, she was reduced by family misfortunes to
earn her own living. The publishers would have been only too glad
to keep her in their office, but for the oculist's report. He
declared that she would run the risk of blindness, if she
fatigued her weak eyes much longer. There is the only objection
to this otherwise invaluable person--she will not be able to read
to you."

"Can she sing and play?"

"Exquisitely. Mr. Farleigh answers for her music."

"And her character?"

"Mr. Halford answers for her character."

"And her manners?"

"A perfect lady. I have seen her and spoken to her; I answer for
her manners, and I guarantee her personal appearance.
Charming--charming!"

For a moment Lady Howel hesitated. After a little reflection, she
decided that it was her duty to trust her excellent husband. "I
will receive the charming widow," she said, "to-morrow at twelve
o'clock; and, if she produces the right impression, I promise to
overlook the weakness of her eyes."

IV.

BEAUCOURT had prolonged the period appointed for the trial trip
of his yacht by a whole week. His apology when he returned
delighted the kind-hearted old lady who had made him a present of
the vessel.

"There isn't such another yacht in the whole world," he declared.
"I really hadn't the heart to leave that beautiful vessel after
only three days experience of her." He burst out with a torrent
of technical praises of the yacht, to which his wife listened as
attentively as if she really understood what he was talking
about. When his breath and his eloquence were exhausted alike,
she said, "Now, my dear, it's my turn. I can match your perfect
vessel with my perfect lady."

"What! you have found a companion?"

"Yes."

"Did Dick find her for you?"

"He did indeed. You shall see for yourself how grateful I ought
to be to your friend."

She opened a door which led into the next room. "Mary, my dear,
come and be introduced to my husband."

Beaucourt started when he heard the name, and instantly recovered
himself. He had forgotten how many Marys there are in the world.

Lady Howel returned, leading her favorite by the hand, and gayly
introduced her the moment they entered the room.

"Mrs. Evelin; Lord--"

She looked at her husband. The utterance of his name was
instantly suspended on her lips. Mrs. Evelin's hand, turning cold
at the same moment in her hand, warned her to look round. The
face of the woman more than reflected the inconcealable agitation
in the face of the man.

The wife's first words, when she recovered herself, were
addressed to them both.

"Which of you can I trust," she asked, "to tell me the truth?"

"You can trust both of us," her husband answered.

The firmness of his tone irritated her. "I will judge of that for
myself," she said. "Go back to the next room," she added, turning
to Mrs. Evelin; "I will hear you separately."

The companion, whose duty it was to obey--whose modesty and
gentleness had won her mistress's heart--refused to retire.

"No," she said; "I have been deceived too. I have _my_ right to
hear what Lord Howel has to say for himself."

Beaucourt attempted to support the claim that she had advanced.
His wife sternly signed to him to be silent. "What do you mean?"
she said, addressing the question to Mrs. Evelin.

"I mean this. The person whom you speak of as a nobleman was
presented to me as 'Mr. Vincent, an artist.' But for that
deception I should never have set foot in your ladyship's house."

"Is this true, my lord?" Lady Howel asked, with a contemptuous
emphasis on the title of nobility.

"Quite true," her husband answered. "I thought it possible that
my rank might prove an obstacle in the way of my hopes. The blame
rests on me, and on me alone. I ask Mrs. Evelin to pardon me for
an act of deception which I deeply regret."

Lady Howel was a just woman. Under other circumstances she might
have shown herself to be a generous woman. That brighter side of
her character was incapable of revealing itself in the presence
of Mrs. Evelin, young and beautiful, and in possession of her
husband's heart. She could say, "I beg your pardon, madam; I have
not treated you justly." But no self-control was strong enough to
restrain the next bitter words from passing her lips. "At my
age," she said, "Lord Howel will soon be free; you will not have
long to wait for him."

The young widow looked at her sadly--answered her sadly.

"Oh, my lady, your better nature will surely regret having said
that!"

For a moment her eyes rested on Beaucourt, dim with rising tears.
She left the room--and left the house.

There was silence between the husband and wife. Beaucourt was the
first to speak again.

"After what you have just heard, do you persist in your jealousy
of that lady, and your jealousy of me?" he asked.

"I have behaved cruelly to her and to you. I am ashamed of
myself," was all she said in reply. That expression of sorrow, so
simple and so true, did not appeal in vain to the gentler side of
Beaucourt's nature. He kissed his wife's hand; he tried to
console her.

"You may forgive me," she answered. "I cannot forgive myself.
That poor lady's last words have made my heart ache. What I said
to her in anger I ought to have said generously. Why should she
not wait for you? After your life with me--a life of kindness, a
life of self-sacrifice--you deserve your reward. Promise me that
you will marry the woman you love--after my death has released
you."

"You distress me, and needlessly distress me," he said. "What you
are thinking of, my dear, can never happen; no, not even if--" He
left the rest unsaid.

"Not even if you were free?" she asked.

"Not even then."

She looked toward the next room. "Go in, Howel, and bring Mrs.
Evelin back; I have something to say to her."

The discovery that she had left the house caused no fear that she
had taken to flight with the purpose of concealing herself. There
was a prospect before the poor lonely woman which might be
trusted to preserve her from despair, to say the least of it.

During her brief residence in Beaucourt's house she had shown to
Lady Howel a letter received from a relation, who had emigrated
to New Zealand with her husband and her infant children some
years since. They had steadily prospered; they were living in
comfort, and they wanted for nothing but a trustworthy governess
to teach their children. The mother had accordingly written,
asking if her relative in England could recommend a competent
person, and offering a liberal salary. In showing the letter to
Lady Howel, Mrs. Evelin had said: "If I had not been so happy as
to attract your notice, I might have offered to be the governess
myself."

Assuming that it had now occurred to her to act on this idea,
Lady Howel felt assured that she would apply for advice either to
the publishers who had recommended her,  or to Lord Howel's old
friend.

Beaucourt at once offered to make th e inquiries which might
satisfy his wife that she had not been mistaken. Readily
accepting his proposal, she asked at the same time for a few
minutes of delay.

"I want to say to you," she explained, "what I had in my mind to
say to Mrs. Evelin. Do you object to tell me why she refused to
marry you? I couldn't have done it in her place."

"You would have done it, my dear, as I think, if her misfortune
had been your misfortune." With those prefatory words he told the
miserable story of Mrs. Evelin's marriage.

Lady Howel's sympathies, strongly excited, appeared to have led
her to a conclusion which she was not willing to communicate to
her husband. She asked him, rather abruptly, if he would leave it
to her to find Mrs. Evelin. "I promise," she added, "to tell you
what I am thinking of, when I come back."

In two minutes more she was ready to go out, and had hurriedly
left the house.

V.

AFTER a long absence Lady Howel returned, accompanied by Dick.
His face and manner betrayed unusual agitation; Beaucourt noticed
it.

"I may well be excited," Dick declared, "after what I have heard,
and after what we have done. Lady Howel, yours is the brain that
thinks to some purpose. Make our report--I wait for you."

But my lady preferred waiting for Dick. He consented to speak
first, for the thoroughly characteristic reason that he could
"get over it in no time."

"I shall try the old division," he said, "into First, Second, and
Third. Don't be afraid; I am not going to preach--quite the
contrary; I am going to be quick about it. First, then, Mrs.
Evelin has decided, under sound advice, to go to New Zealand.
Second, I have telegraphed to her relations at the other end of
the world to tell them that she is coming. Third, and last,
Farleigh & Halford have sent to the office, and secured a berth
for her in the next ship that sails--date the day after
to-morrow. Done in half a minute. Now, Lady Howel!"

"I will begin and end in half a minute too," she said, "if I can.
First," she continued, turning to her husband, "I found Mrs.
Evelin at your friend's house. She kindly let me say all that I
could say for the relief of my poor heart. Secondly--"

She hesitated, smiled uneasily, and came to a full stop.

"I can't do it, Howel," she confessed; "I speak to you as usual,
or I can never get on. Saying many things in few words--if the
ladies who assert our rights will forgive me for confessing
it--is an accomplishment in which we are completely beaten by the
men. You must have thought me rude, my dear, for leaving you very
abruptly, without a word of explanation. The truth is, I had an
idea in my head, and I kept it to myself (old people are
proverbially cautious, you know) till I had first found out
whether it was worth mentioning. When you were speaking of the
wretched creature who had claimed Mrs. Evelin's husband as her
own, you said she was an inveterate drunkard. A woman in that
state of degradation is capable, as I persist in thinking, of any
wickedness. I suppose this put it into my head to doubt her--no;
I mean, to wonder whether Mr. Evelin--do you know that she keeps
her husband's name by his own entreaty addressed to her on his
deathbed?--oh, I am losing myself in a crowd of words of my own
collecting! Say the rest of it for me, Sir Richard!"

"No, Lady Howel. Not unless you call me 'Dick.' "

"Then say it for me--Dick."

"No, not yet, on reflection. Dick is too short, say 'Dear Dick.'
"

"Dear Dick--there!"

"Thank you, my lady. Now we had better remember that your husband
is present." He turned to Beaucourt. "Lady Howel had the idea,"
he proceeded, "which ought to have presented itself to you and to
me. It was a serious misfortune (as she thought) that Mr.
Evelin's sufferings in his last illness, and his wife's anxiety
while she was nursing him, had left them unfit to act in their
own defense. They might otherwise not have submitted to the
drunken wretch's claim, without first making sure that she had a
right to advance it. Taking her character into due consideration,
are we quite certain that she was herself free to marry, when Mr.
Evelin unfortunately made her his wife? To that serious question
we now mean to find an answer. With Mrs. Evelin's knowledge of
the affair to help us, we have discovered the woman's address, to
begin with. She keeps a small tobacconist's shop at the town of
Grailey in the north of England. The rest is in the hands of my
lawyer. If we make the discovery that we all hope for, we have
your wife to thank for it." He paused, and looked at his watch.
"I've got an appointment at the club. The committee will
blackball the best fellow that ever lived if I don't go and stop
them. Good-by."

The last day of Mrs. Evelin's sojourn in England was memorable in
more ways than one.

On the first occasion in Beaucourt's experience of his married
life, his wife wrote to him instead of speaking to him, although
they were both in the house at the time. It was a little note
only containing these words: "I thought you would like to say
good-by to Mrs. Evelin. I have told her to expect you in the
library, and I will take care that you are not disturbed."

Waiting at the window of her sitting-room, on the upper floor,
Lady Howel perceived that the delicate generosity of her conduct
had been gratefully felt. The interview in the library barely
lasted for five minutes. She saw Mrs. Evelin leave the house with
her veil down. Immediately afterward, Beaucourt ascended to his
wife's room to thank her. Carefully as he had endeavored to hide
them, the traces of tears in his eyes told her how cruelly the
parting scene had tried him. It was a bitter moment for his
admirable wife. "Do you wish me dead?" she asked with sad
self-possession. "Live," he said, "and live happily, if you wish
to make me happy too." He drew her to him and kissed her
forehead. Lady Howel had her reward.

Part III.

NEWS FROM THE COLONY.

VI.

FURNISHED with elaborate instructions to guide him, which
included golden materials for bribery, a young Jew holding the
place of third clerk in the office of Dick's lawyer was sent to
the town of Grailey to make discoveries. In the matter of
successfully instituting private inquiries, he was justly
considered to be a match for any two Christians who might try to
put obstacles in his way. His name was Moses Jackling.

Entering the cigar-shop, the Jew discovered that he had presented
himself at a critical moment.

A girl and a man were standing behind the counter. The girl
looked like a maid-of-all-work: she was rubbing the tears out of
her eyes with a big red fist. The man, smart in manner and shabby
in dress, received the stranger with a peremptory eagerness to do
business. "Now, then! what for you?" Jackling bought the worst
cigar he had ever smoked, in the course of an enormous experience
of bad tobacco, and tried a few questions with this result. The
girl had lost her place; the man was in "possession"; and the
stock and furniture had been seized for debt. Jackling thereupon
assumed the character of a creditor, and ask to speak with the
mistress.

"She's too ill to see you, sir," the girl said.

"Tell the truth, you fool," cried the man in possession. He led
the way to a door with a glass in the upper part of it, which
opened into a parlor behind the shop. As soon as his back was
turned, Jackling whispered to the maid, "When I go, slip out
after me; I've got something for you." The man lifted the curtain
over the glass. "Look through," he said, "and see what's the
matter with her for yourself."

Jackling discovered the mistress flat on her back on the floor,
helplessly drunk. That was enough for the clerk--so far. He took
leave of the man in possession, with the one joke which never
wears out in the estimation of Englishmen; the joke that foresees
the drinker's headache in the morning. In a minute or two more
the girl showed herself, carrying an empty jug. She had been sent
for the man's beer, and she was expected back directly. Jackling,
having first overwhelmed her by a present of five shillings,
proposed another appointment in the evening. The maid promised to
be at the place of meeting; and in memory of the five shillings
she kept her word.

"What wages do you get?" was the first question that astonished
her.

"Three pounds a year, sir," the unfortunate creature replied.

"All paid?"

"Only one pound paid--and I say it's a crying shame."

"Say what you like, my dear, so long as you listen to me. I want
to know everything that your mistress says and does--first when
she's drunk, and then when she's sober. Wait a bit; I haven't
done yet. If you tell me everything you can remember--mind _
everything_--I'll pay the rest of your wages."

Madly excited by this golden prospect, the victim of domestic
service answered inarticulately with a scream. Jackling's right
hand and left hand entered his pockets, and appeared again
holding two sovereigns separately between two fingers and thumbs.
From that moment, he was at liberty to empty the
maid-of-all-work's memory of every saying and doing that it
contained.

The sober moments of the mistress yielded little or nothing to
investigation. The report of her drunken moments produced
something worth hearing. There were two men whom it was her habit
to revile bitterly in her cups. One of them was Mr. Evelin, whom
she abused--sometimes for the small allowance that he made to
her; sometimes for dying before she could prosecute him for
bigamy. Her drunken remembrances of the other man were associated
with two names. She called him "Septimus"; she called him
"Darts"; and she despised him occasionally for being a "common
sailor." It was clearly demonstrated that he was one man, and not
two. Whether he was "Septimus," or whether he was "Darts," he had
always committed the same atrocities. He had taken her money away
from her; he had called her by an atrocious name; and he had
knocked her down on more than one occasion. Provided with this
information, Jackling rewarded the girl, and paid a visit to her
mistress the next day.

The miserable woman was exactly in the state of nervous
prostration (after the excess of the previous evening) which
offered to the clerk his best chance of gaining his end. He
presented himself as the representative of friends, bent on
helping her, whose modest benevolence had positively forbidden
him to mention their names.

"What sum of money must you pay," he asked, "to get rid of the
man in possession?"

Too completely bewildered to speak, her trembling hand offered to
him a slip of paper on which the amount of the debt and the
expenses was set forth: L51 12s. 10d.

With some difficulty the Jew preserved his gravity. "Very well,"
he resumed. "I will make it up to sixty pounds (to set you going
again) on two conditions."

She suddenly recovered her power of speech. "Give me the money!"
she cried, with greedy impatience of delay.

"First condition," he continued, without noticing the
interruption: "you are not to suffer, either in purse or person,
if you give us the information that we want."

She interrupted him again. "Tell me what it is, and be quick
about it."

"Second condition," he went on as impenetrably as ever; "you take
me to the place where I can find the certificate of your marriage
to Septimus Darts."

Her eyes glared at him like the eyes of a wild animal. Furies,
hysterics, faintings, denials, threats--Jackling endured them all
by turns. It was enough for him that his desperate guess of the
evening before, had hit the mark on the morning after. When she
had completely exhausted herself he returned to the experiment
which he had already tried with the maid. Well aware of the
advantage of exhibiting gold instead of notes, when the object is
to tempt poverty, he produced the promised bribe in sovereigns,
pouring them playfully backward and forward from one big hand to
the other.

The temptation was more than the woman could resist. In another
half-hour the two were traveling together to a town in one of the
midland counties.

The certificate was found in the church register, and duly
copied.

It also appeared that one of the witnesses to the marriage was
still living. His name and address were duly noted in the clerk's
pocketbook. Subsequent inquiry, at the office of the Customs
Comptroller, discovered the name of Septimus Darts on the
captain's official list of the crew of an outward bound merchant
vessel. With this information, and with a photographic portrait
to complete it, the man was discovered, alive and hearty, on the
return of the ship to her port.

His wife's explanation of her conduct included the customary
excuse that she had every reason to believe her husband to be
dead, and was followed by a bold assertion that she had married
Mr. Evelin for love. In Moses Jackling's opinion she lied when
she said this, and lied again when she threatened to prosecute
Mr. Evelin for bigamy. "Take my word for it," said this new
representative of the unbelieving Jew, "she would have extorted
money from him if he had lived." Delirium tremens left this
question unsettled, and closed the cigar shop soon afterward,
under the authority of death.

The good news, telegraphed to New Zealand, was followed by a
letter containing details.

At a later date, a telegram arrived from Mrs. Evelin. She had
reached her destination, and had received the dispatch which told
her that she had been lawfully married. A letter to Lady Howel
was promised by the next mail.

While the necessary term of delay was still unexpired, the
newspapers received the intelligence of a volcanic eruption in
the northern island of the New Zealand group. Later particulars,
announcing a terrible destruction of life and property, included
the homestead in which Mrs. Evelin was living. The farm had been
overwhelmed, and every member of the household had perished.

Part IV.

THE NIGHT NURSE.

VII.

_Indorsed as follows:_ "Reply from Sir Richard, addressed to
Farleigh & Halford."

"Your courteous letter has been forwarded to my house in the
country.

"I really regret that you should have thought it necessary to
apologize for troubling me. Your past kindness to the unhappy
Mrs. Evelin gives you a friendly claim on me which I gladly
recognize--as you shall soon see.

" 'The extraordinary story,' as you very naturally call it, is
nevertheless true. I am the only person now at your disposal who
can speak as an eye-witness of the events.

"In the first place I must tell you that the dreadful
intelligence, received from New Zealand, had an effect on Lord
Howel Beaucourt which shocked his friends and inexpressibly
distressed his admirable wife. I can only describe him, at that
time, as a man struck down in mind and body alike.

"Lady Howel was unremitting in her efforts to console him. He was
thankful and gentle. It was true that no complaint could be made
of him. It was equally true that no change for the better
rewarded the devotion of his wife.

"The state of feeling which this implied imbittered the
disappointment that Lady Howel naturally felt. As some relief to
her overburdened mind, she associated herself with the work of
mercy, carried on under the superintendence of the rector of the
parish. I thought he was wrong in permitting a woman, at her
advanced time of life, to run the risk encountered in visiting
the sick and suffering poor at their own dwelling-places.
Circumstances, however, failed to justify my dread of the
perilous influences of infection and foul air. The one untoward
event that happened, seemed to be too trifling to afford any
cause for anxiety. Lady Howel caught cold.

"Unhappily, she treated that apparently trivial accident with
indifference. Her husband tried in vain to persuade her to remain
at home. On one of her charitable visits she was overtaken by a
heavy fall of rain; and a shivering fit seized her on returning
to the house. At her age the results were serious. A bronchial
attack followed. In a week more, the dearest and best of women
had left us nothing to love but the memory of the dead.

"Her last words were faintly whispered to me in her husband's
presence: 'Take care of him,' the dying woman said, 'when I am
gone.'

"No effort of mine to be worthy of that sacred trust was left
untried. How could I hope to succeed where _she_ had failed? My
house in London  and my house in the country were both open to
Beaucourt; I entreated him to live with me, or (if he preferred
it) to be my guest for a short time only, or (if he wished to be
alone) to choose the place of abode which he liked best for his
solitary retreat. With sincere expressions of gratitude, his
inflexible despair refused my proposals.

"In one of the ancient 'Inns,' built centuries since for the
legal societies of London, he secluded himself from friends and
acquaintances alike. One by one, they were driven from his dreary
chambers by a reception which admitted them with patient
resignation and held out little encouragement to return. After an
interval of no great length, I was the last of his friends who
intruded on his solitude.

"Poor Lady Howel's will (excepting some special legacies) had
left her fortune to me in trust, on certain conditions with which
it is needless to trouble you. Beaucourt's resolution not to
touch a farthing of his dead wife's money laid a heavy
responsibility on my shoulders; the burden being ere long
increased by forebodings which alarmed me on the subject of his
health.

"He devoted himself to the reading of old books, treating (as I
was told) of that branch of useless knowledge generally described
as 'occult science.' These unwholesome studies so absorbed him,
that he remained shut up in his badly ventilated chambers for
weeks together, without once breathing the outer air even for a
few minutes. Such defiance of the ordinary laws of nature as this
could end but in one way; his health steadily declined and
feverish symptoms showed themselves. The doctor said plainly,
'There is no chance for him if he stays in this place.'

"Once more he refused to be removed to my London house. The
development of the fever, he reminded me, might lead to
consequences dangerous to me and to my household. He had heard of
one of the great London hospitals, which reserved certain rooms
for the occupation of persons capable of paying for the medical
care bestowed on them. If he were to be removed at all, to that
hospital he would go. Many advantages, and no objections of
importance, were presented by this course of proceeding. We
conveyed him to the hospital without a moment's loss of time.

"When I think of the dreadful illness that followed, and when I
recall the days of unrelieved suspense passed at the bedside, I
have not courage enough to dwell on this part of my story.
Besides, you know already that Beaucourt recovered--or, as I
might more correctly describe it, that he was snatched back to
life when the grasp of death was on him. Of this happier period
of his illness I have something to say which may surprise and
interest you.

"On one of the earlier days of his convalescence my visit to him
was paid later than usual. A matter of importance, neglected
while he was in danger, had obliged me to leave town for a few
days, after there was nothing to be feared. Returning, I had
missed the train which would have brought me to London in better
time.

"My appearance evidently produced in Beaucourt a keen feeling of
relief. He requested the day nurse, waiting in the room, to leave
us by ourselves.

" 'I was afraid you might not have come to me to-day,' he said.
'My last moments would have been imbittered, my friend, by your
absence.'

" 'Are you anticipating your death,' I asked, 'at the very time
when the doctors answer for your life?'

" 'The doctors have not seen her,' he said; 'I saw her last
night.'

" 'Of whom are you speaking?'

" 'Of my lost angel, who perished miserably in New Zealand. Twice
her spirit has appeared to me. I shall see her for the third
time, tonight; I shall follow her to the better world.'

"Had the delirium of the worst time of the fever taken possession
of him again? In unutterable dread of a relapse, I took his hand.
The skin was cool. I laid my fingers on his pulse. It was beating
calmly.

" 'You think I am wandering in my mind,' he broke out. 'Stay here
tonight--I command you, stay!--and see her as I have seen her.'

"I quieted him by promising to do what he had asked of me. He had
still one more condition to insist on.

" 'I won't be laughed at,' he said. 'Promise that you will not
repeat to any living creature what I have just told you.'

"My promise satisfied him. He wearily closed his eyes. In a few
minutes more his poor weak body was in peaceful repose.

"The day-nurse returned, and remained with us later than usual.
Twilight melted into darkness. The room was obscurely lit by a
shaded lamp, placed behind a screen that kept the sun out of the
sick man's eyes in the daytime.

" 'Are we alone?' Beaucourt asked.

" 'Yes.'

" 'Watch the door. '

" 'Why?'

" 'You will see her on the threshold.'

"As he said those words the door slowly opened. In the dim light
I could only discern at first the figure of a woman. She slowly
advanced toward me. I saw the familiar face in shadow; the eyes
were large and faintly luminous--the eyes of Mrs. Evelin.

"The wild words spoken to me by Beaucourt, the stillness and the
obscurity in the room, had their effect, I suppose, on my
imagination. You will think me a poor creature when I confess it.
For the moment I did assuredly feel a thrill of superstitious
terror.

"My delusion was dispelled by a change in her face. Its natural
expression of surprise, when she saw me, set my mind free to feel
the delight inspired by the discovery that she was a living
woman. I should have spoken to her if she had not stopped me by a
gesture.

"Beaucourt's voice broke the silence. 'Ministering Spirit!' he
said, 'free me from the life of earth. Take me with you to the
life eternal.'

"She made no attempt to enlighten him. 'Wait,' she answered
calmly, 'wait and rest.'

"Silently obeying her, he turned his head on the pillow; we saw
his face no more.

"I have related the circumstances exactly as they happened: the
ghost story which report has carried to your ears has no other
foundation than this.



"Mrs. Evelin led the way to that further end of the room in which
the screen stood. Placing ourselves behind it, we could converse
in whispers without being heard. Her first words told me that she
had been warned by one of the hospital doctors to respect my
friend's delusion for the present. His mind partook in some
degree of the weakness of his body, and he was not strong enough
yet to bear the shock of discovering the truth.

"She had been saved almost by a miracle.

"Released (in a state of insensibility) from the ruins of the
house, she had been laid with her dead relatives awaiting burial.
Happily for her, an English traveler visiting the island was
among the first men who volunteered to render help. He had been
in practice as a medical man, and he saved her from being buried
alive. Nearly a month passed before she was strong enough to bear
removal to Wellington (the capital city) and to be received into
the hospital.

"I asked why she had not telegraphed or written to me.

" 'When I was strong enough to write,' she said, 'I was strong
enough to bear the sea-voyage to England. The expenses so nearly
exhausted my small savings that I had no money to spare for the
telegraph.'

"On her arrival in London, only a few days since, she had called
on me at the time when I had left home on the business which I
have already mentioned. She had not heard of Lady Howel's death,
and had written ignorantly to prepare that good friend for seeing
her. The messenger sent with the letter had found the house in
the occupation of strangers, and had been referred to the agent
employed in letting it. She went herself to this person, and so
heard that Lord Howel Beaucourt had lost his wife, and was
reported to be dying in one of the London hospitals.

" 'If he had been in his usual state of health,' she said, 'it
would have been indelicate on my part--I mean it would have
seemed like taking a selfish advantage of the poor lady's
death--to have let him know that my life had been saved, in any
other way than by writing to him. But when I heard he was dying,
I forgot all customary considerations. His name was so well-known
in London that I easily discovered at what hospital he had been
received. There I heard that the report was false and that he was
out of danger. I ought to hav e been satisfied with that--but oh,
how could I be so near him and not long to see him? The old
doctor with whom I had been speaking discovered, I suppose, that
I was in trouble about something. He was so kind and fatherly,
and he seemed to take such interest in me, that I confessed
everything to him. After he had made me promise to be careful, he
told the night-nurse to let me take her place for a little while,
when the dim light in the room would not permit his patient to
see me too plainly. He waited at the door when we tried the
experiment. Neither he nor I foresaw that Lord Howel would put
such a strange interpretation on my presence. The nurse doesn't
approve of my coming back--even for a little while only--and
taking her place again to-night. She is right. I have had my
little glimpse of happiness, and with that little I must be
content.'

"What I said in answer to this, and what I did as time advanced,
it is surely needless to tell you. You have read the newspapers
which announce their marriage, and their departure for Italy.
What else is there left for me to say?

"There is, perhaps, a word more still wanting.

"Obstinate Lord Howel persisted in refusing to take the fortune
that was waiting for him. In this difficulty, the conditions
under which I was acting permitted me to appeal to the bride.
When she too said No, I was not to be trifled with. I showed her
poor Lady's Howel's will. After reading the terms in which my
dear old friend alluded to her she burst out crying. I
interpreted those grateful tears as an expression of repentance
for the ill-considered reply which I had just received. As yet, I
have not been told that I was wrong."


MR. POLICEMAN AND THE COOK.

A FIRST WORD FOR MYSELF.

BEFORE the doctor left me one evening, I asked him how much
longer I was likely to live. He answered: "It's not easy to say;
you may die before I can get back to you in the morning, or you
may live to the end of the month."

I was alive enough on the next morning to think of the needs of
my soul, and (being a member of the Roman Catholic Church) to
send for the priest.

The history of my sins, related in confession, included
blameworthy neglect of a duty which I owed to the laws of my
country. In the priest's opinion--and I agreed with him--I was
bound to make public acknowledgment of my fault, as an act of
penance becoming to a Catholic Englishman. We concluded,
thereupon, to try a division of labor. I related the
circumstances, while his reverence took the pen and put the
matter into shape.

Here follows what came of it:

I.

WHEN I was a young man of five-and-twenty, I became a member of
the London police force. After nearly two years' ordinary
experience of the responsible and ill-paid duties of that
vocation, I found myself employed on my first serious and
terrible case of official inquiry--relating to nothing less than
the crime of Murder.

The circumstances were these:

I was then attached to a station in the northern district of
London--which I beg permission not to mention more particularly.
On a certain Monday in the week, I took my turn of night duty. Up
to four in the morning, nothing occurred at the station-house out
of the ordinary way. It was then springtime, and, between the gas
and the fire, the room became rather hot. I went to the door to
get a breath of fresh air--much to the surprise of our Inspector
on duty, who was constitutionally a chilly man. There was a fine
rain falling; and a nasty damp in the air sent me back to the
fireside. I don't suppose I had sat down for more than a minute
when the swinging-door was violently pushed open. A frantic woman
ran in with a scream, and said: "Is this the station-house?"

Our Inspector (otherwise an excellent officer) had, by some
perversity of nature, a hot temper in his chilly constitution.
"Why, bless the woman, can't you see it is?" he says. "What's the
matter now?"

"Murder's the matter!" she burst out. "For God's sake, come back
with me. It's at Mrs. Crosscapel's lodging-house, number 14
Lehigh Street. A young woman has murdered her husband in the
night! With a knife, sir. She says she thinks she did it in her
sleep."

I confess I was startled by this; and the third man on duty (a
sergeant) seemed to feel it too. She was a nice-looking young
woman, even in her terrified condition, just out of bed, with her
clothes huddled on anyhow. I was partial in those days to a tall
figure--and she was, as they say, my style. I put a chair for
her; and the sergeant poked the fire. As for the Inspector,
nothing ever upset _him_. He questioned her as coolly as if it
had been a case of petty larceny.

"Have you seen the murdered man?" he asked.

"No, sir."

"Or the wife?"

"No, sir. I didn't dare go into the room; I only heard about it!"

"Oh? And who are You? One of the lodgers?"

"No, sir. I'm the cook."

"Isn't there a master in the house?"

"Yes, sir. He's frightened out of his wits. And the housemaid's
gone for the doctor. It all falls on the poor servants, of
course. Oh, why did I ever set foot in that horrible house?"

The poor soul burst out crying, and shivered from head to foot.
The Inspector made a note of her statement, and then asked her to
read it, and sign it with her name. The object of this proceeding
was to get her to come near enough to give him the opportunity of
smelling her breath. "When people make extraordinary statements,"
he afterward said to me, "it sometimes saves trouble to satisfy
yourself that they are not drunk. I've known them to be mad--but
not often. You will generally find _that_ in their eyes."

She roused herself and signed her name--"Priscilla Thurlby." The
Inspector's own test proved her to be sober; and her eyes--a nice
light blue color, mild and pleasant, no doubt, when they were not
staring with fear, and red with crying--satisfied him (as I
supposed) that she was not mad. He turned the case over to me, in
the first instance. I saw that he didn't believe in it, even yet.

"Go back with her to the house," he says. "This may be a stupid
hoax, or a quarrel exaggerated. See to it yourself, and hear what
the doctor says. If it is serious, send word back here directly,
and let nobody enter the place or leave it till we come. Stop!
You know the form if any statement is volunteered?"

"Yes, sir. I am to caution the persons that whatever they say
will be taken down, and may be used against them."

"Quite right. You'll be an Inspector yourself one of these days.
Now, miss!" With that he dismissed her, under my care.

Lehigh Street was not very far off--about twenty minutes' walk
from the station. I confess I thought the Inspector had been
rather hard on Priscilla. She was herself naturally angry with
him. "What does he mean," she says, "by talking of a hoax? I wish
he was as frightened as I am. This is the first time I have been
out at service, sir--and I did think I had found a respectable
place."

I said very little to her--feeling, if the truth must be told,
rather anxious about the duty committed to me. On reaching the
house the door was opened from within, before I could knock. A
gentleman stepped out, who proved to be the doctor. He stopped
the moment he saw me.

"You must be careful, policeman," he says. "I found the man lying
on his back, in bed, dead--with the knife that had killed him
left sticking in the wound."

Hearing this, I felt the necessity of sending at once to the
station. Where could I find a trustworthy messenger? I took the
liberty of asking the doctor if he would repeat to the police
what he had already said to me. The station was not much out of
his way home. He kindly granted my request.

The landlady (Mrs. Crosscapel) joined us while we were talking.
She was still a young woman; not easily frightened, as far as I
could see, even by a murder in the house. Her husband was in the
passage behind her. He looked old enough to be her father; and he
so trembled with terror that some people might have taken him for
the guilty person. I removed the key from the street door, after
locking it; and I said to the landlady: "Nobody must leave the
house, or enter the house,  till the Inspector comes. I must
examine the premises to see if any on e has broken in."

"There is the key of the area gate," she said, in answer to me.
"It's always kept locked. Come downstairs and see for yourself."
Priscilla went with us. Her mistress set her to work to light the
kitchen fire. "Some of us," says Mrs. Crosscapel, "may be the
better for a cup of tea." I remarked that she took things easy,
under the circumstances. She answered that the landlady of a
London lodging-house could not afford to lose her wits, no matter
what might happen.

I found the gate locked, and the shutters of the kitchen window
fastened. The back kitchen and back door were secured in the same
way. No person was concealed anywhere. Returning upstairs, I
examined the front parlor window. There, again, the barred
shutters answered for the security of that room. A cracked voice
spoke through the door of the back parlor. "The policeman can
come in," it said, "if he will promise not to look at me." I
turned to the landlady for information. "It's my parlor lodger,
Miss Mybus," she said, "a most respectable lady." Going into the
room, I saw something rolled up perpendicularly in the bed
curtains. Miss Mybus had made herself modestly invisible in that
way. Having now satisfied my mind about the security of the lower
part of the house, and having the keys safe in my pocket, I was
ready to go upstairs.

On our way to the upper regions I asked if there had been any
visitors on the previous day. There had been only two visitors,
friends of the lodgers--and Mrs. Crosscapel herself had let them
both out. My next inquiry related to the lodgers themselves. On
the ground floor there was Miss Mybus. On the first floor
(occupying both rooms) Mr. Barfield, an old bachelor, employed in
a merchant's office. On the second floor, in the front room, Mr.
John Zebedee, the murdered man, and his wife. In the back room,
Mr. Deluc; described as a cigar agent, and supposed to be a
Creole gentleman from Martinique. In the front garret, Mr. and
Mrs. Crosscapel. In the back garret, the cook and the housemaid.
These were the inhabitants, regularly accounted for. I asked
about the servants. "Both excellent characters," says the
landlady, "or they would not be in my service."

We reached the second floor, and found the housemaid on the watch
outside the door of the front room. Not as nice a woman,
personally, as the cook, and sadly frightened of course. Her
mistress had posted her, to give the alarm in the case of an
outbreak on the part of Mrs. Zebedee, kept locked up in the room.
My arrival relieved the housemaid of further responsibility. She
ran downstairs to her fellow-servant in the kitchen.

I asked Mrs. Crosscapel how and when the alarm of the murder had
been given.

"Soon after three this morning," says she, "I was woke by the
screams of Mrs. Zebedee. I found her out here on the landing, and
Mr. Deluc, in great alarm, trying to quiet her. Sleeping in the
next room he had only to open his door, when her screams woke
him. 'My dear John's murdered! I am the miserable wretch--I did
it in my sleep!' She repeated these frantic words over and over
again, until she dropped in a swoon. Mr. Deluc and I carried her
back into the bedroom. We both thought the poor creature had been
driven distracted by some dreadful dream. But when we got to the
bedside--don't ask me what we saw; the doctor has told you about
it already. I was once a nurse in a hospital, and accustomed, as
such, to horrid sights. It turned me cold and giddy,
notwithstanding. As for Mr. Deluc, I thought _he_ would have had
a fainting fit next."

Hearing this, I inquired if Mrs. Zebedee had said or done any
strange things since she had been Mrs. Crosscapel's lodger.

"You think she's mad?" says the landlady. "And anybody would be
of your mind, when a woman accuses herself of murdering her
husband in her sleep. All I can say is that, up to this morning,
a more quiet, sensible, well-behaved little person than Mrs.
Zebedee I never met with. Only just married, mind, and as fond of
her unfortunate husband as a woman could be. I should have called
them a pattern couple, in their own line of life."

There was no more to be said on the landing. We unlocked the door
and went into the room.

II.

HE lay in bed on his back as the doctor had described him. On the
left side of his nightgown, just over his heart, the blood on the
linen told its terrible tale. As well as one could judge, looking
unwillingly at a dead face, he must have been a handsome young
man in his lifetime. It was a sight to sadden anybody--but I
think the most painful sensation was when my eyes fell next on
his miserable wife.

She was down on the floor, crouched up in a corner--a dark little
woman, smartly dressed in gay colors. Her black hair and her big
brown eyes made the horrid paleness of her face look even more
deadly white than perhaps it really was. She stared straight at
us without appearing to see us. We spoke to her, and she never
answered a word. She might have been dead--like her
husband--except that she perpetually picked at her fingers, and
shuddered every now and then as if she was cold. I went to her
and tried to lift her up. She shrank back with a cry that
well-nigh frightened me--not because it was loud, but because it
was more like the cry of some animal than of a human being.
However quietly she might have behaved in the landlady's previous
experience of her, she was beside herself now. I might have been
moved by a natural pity for her, or I might have been completely
upset in my mind--I only know this, I could not persuade myself
that she was guilty. I even said to Mrs. Crosscapel, "I don't
believe she did it."

While I spoke there was a knock at the door. I went downstairs at
once, and admitted (to my great relief) the Inspector,
accompanied by one of our men.

He waited downstairs to hear my report, and he approved of what I
had done. "It looks as if the murder had been committed by
somebody in the house." Saying this, he left the man below, and
went up with me to the second floor.

Before he had been a minute in the room, he discovered an object
which had escaped my observation.

It was the knife that had done the deed.

The doctor had found it left in the body--had withdrawn it to
probe the wound--and had laid it on the bedside table. It was one
of those useful knives which contain a saw, a corkscrew, and
other like implements. The big blade fastened back, when open,
with a spring. Except where the blood was on it, it was as bright
as when it had been purchased. A small metal plate was fastened
to the horn handle, containing an inscription, only partly
engraved, which ran thus: "To John Zebedee, from--" There it
stopped, strangely enough.

Who or what had interrupted the engraver's work? It was
impossible even to guess. Nevertheless, the Inspector was
encouraged.

"This ought to help us," he said--and then he gave an attentive
ear (looking all the while at the poor creature in the corner) to
what Mrs. Crosscapel had to tell him.

The landlady having done, he said he must now see the lodger who
slept in the next bed-chamber.

Mr. Deluc made his appearance, standing at the door of the room,
and turning away his head with horror from the sight inside.

He was wrapped in a splendid blue dressing-gown, with a golden
girdle and trimmings. His scanty brownish hair curled (whether
artificially or not, I am unable to say) in little ringlets. His
complexion was yellow; his greenish-brown eyes were of the sort
called "goggle"--they looked as if they might drop out of his
face, if you held a spoon under them. His mustache and goat's
beard were beautifully oiled; and, to complete his equipment, he
had a long black cigar in his mouth.

"It isn't insensibility to this terrible tragedy," he explained.
"My nerves have been shattered, Mr. Policeman, and I can only
repair the mischief in this way. Be pleased to excuse and feel
for me."

The Inspector questioned this witness sharply and closely. He was
not a man to be misled by appearances; but I could see that he
was far from liking, or even trusting, Mr. Deluc. Nothing came of
the examination, except what Mrs.  Crosscapel had in substance
already mentioned to me. Mr. Deluc returned
 to his room.

"How long has he been lodging with you?" the Inspector asked, as
soon as his back was turned.

"Nearly a year," the landlady answered.

"Did he give you a reference?"

"As good a reference as I could wish for." Thereupon, she
mentioned the names of a well-known firm of cigar merchants in
the city. The Inspector noted the information in his pocketbook.

I would rather not relate in detail what happened next: it is too
distressing to be dwelt on. Let me only say that the poor
demented woman was taken away in a cab to the station-house. The
Inspector possessed himself of the knife, and of a book found on
the floor, called "The World of Sleep." The portmanteau
containing the luggage was locked--and then the door of the room
was secured, the keys in both cases being left in my charge. My
instructions were to remain in the house, and allow nobody to
leave it, until I heard again shortly from the Inspector.

III.

THE coroner's inquest was adjourned; and the examination before
the magistrate ended in a remand--Mrs. Zebedee being in no
condition to understand the proceedings in either case. The
surgeon reported her to be completely prostrated by a terrible
nervous shock. When he was asked if he considered her to have
been a sane woman before the murder took place, he refused to
answer positively at that time.

A week passed. The murdered man was buried; his old father
attending the funeral. I occasionally saw Mrs. Crosscapel, and
the two servants, for the purpose of getting such further
information as was thought desirable. Both the cook and the
housemaid had given their month's notice to quit; declining, in
the interest of their characters, to remain in a house which had
been the scene of a murder. Mr. Deluc's nerves led also to his
removal; his rest was now disturbed by frightful dreams. He paid
the necessary forfeit-money, and left without notice. The
first-floor lodger, Mr. Barfield, kept his rooms, but obtained
leave of absence from his employers, and took refuge with some
friends in the country. Miss Mybus alone remained in the parlors.
"When I am comfortable," the old lady said, "nothing moves me, at
my age. A murder up two pairs of stairs is nearly the same thing
as a murder in the next house. Distance, you see, makes all the
difference."

It mattered little to the police what the lodgers did. We had men
in plain clothes watching the house night and day. Everybody who
went away was privately followed; and the police in the district
to which they retired were warned to keep an eye on them, after
that. As long as we failed to put Mrs. Zebedee's extraordinary
statement to any sort of test--to say nothing of having proved
unsuccessful, thus far, in tracing the knife to its purchaser--we
were bound to let no person living under Mr. Crosscapel's roof,
on the night of the murder, slip through our fingers.

IV.

IN a fortnight more, Mrs. Zebedee had sufficiently recovered to
make the necessary statement--after the preliminary caution
addressed to persons in such cases. The surgeon had no
hesitation, now, in reporting her to be a sane woman.

Her station in life had been domestic service. She had lived for
four years in her last place as lady's-maid, with a family
residing in Dorsetshire. The one objection to her had been the
occasional infirmity of sleep-walking, which made it necessary
that one of the other female servants should sleep in the same
room, with the door locked and the key under her pillow. In all
other respects the lady's-maid was described by her mistress as
"a perfect treasure."

In the last six months of her service, a young man named John
Zebedee entered the house (with a written character) as a
footman. He soon fell in love with the nice little lady's-maid,
and she heartily returned the feeling. They might have waited for
years before they were in a pecuniary position to marry, but for
the death of Zebedee's uncle, who left him a little fortune of
two thousand pounds. They were now, for persons in their station,
rich enough to please themselves; and they were married from the
house in which they had served together, the little daughters of
the family showing their affection for Mrs. Zebedee by acting as
her bridesmaids.

The young husband was a careful man. He decided to employ his
small capital to the best advantage, by sheep-farming in
Australia. His wife made no objection; she was ready to go
wherever John went.

Accordingly they spent their short honeymoon in London, so as to
see for themselves the vessel in which their passage was to be
taken. They went to Mrs. Crosscapel's lodging-house because
Zebedee's uncle had always stayed there when in London. Ten days
were to pass before the day of embarkation arrived. This gave the
young couple a welcome holiday, and a prospect of amusing
themselves to their heart's content among the sights and shows of
the great city.

On their first evening in London they went to the theater. They
were both accustomed to the fresh air of the country, and they
felt half stifled by the heat and the gas. However, they were so
pleased with an amusement which was new to them that they went to
another theater on the next evening. On this second occasion,
John Zebedee found the heat unendurable. They left the theater,
and got back to their lodgings toward ten o'clock.

Let the rest be told in the words used by Mrs. Zebedee herself.
She said:

"We sat talking for a little while in our room, and John's
headache got worse and worse. I persuaded him to go to bed, and I
put out the candle (the fire giving sufficient light to undress
by), so that he might the sooner fall asleep. But he was too
restless to sleep. He asked me to read him something. Books
always made him drowsy at the best of times.

"I had not myself begun to undress. So I lit the candle again,
and I opened the only book I had. John had noticed it at the
railway bookstall by the name of 'The World of Sleep.' He used to
joke with me about my being a sleepwalker; and he said, 'Here's
something that's sure to interest you'--and he made me a present
of the book.

"Before I had read to him for more than half an hour he was fast
asleep. Not feeling that way inclined, I went on reading to
myself.

"The book did indeed interest me. There was one terrible story
which took a hold on my mind--the story of a man who stabbed his
own wife in a sleep-walking dream. I thought of putting down my
book after that, and then changed my mind again and went on. The
next chapters were not so interesting; they were full of learned
accounts of why we fall asleep, and what our brains do in that
state, and such like. It ended in my falling asleep, too, in my
armchair by the fireside.

"I don't know what o'clock it was when I went to sleep. I don't
know how long I slept, or whether I dreamed or not. The candle
and the fire had both burned out, and it was pitch dark when I
woke. I can't even say why I woke--unless it was the coldness of
the room.

"There was a spare candle on the chimney- piece. I found the
matchbox, and got a light. Then for the first time, I turned
round toward the bed; and I saw--"

She had seen the dead body of her husband, murdered while she was
unconsciously at his side--and she fainted, poor creature, at the
bare remembrance of it.

The proceedings were adjourned. She received every possible care
and attention; the chaplain looking after her welfare as well as
the surgeon.

I have said nothing of the evidence of the landlady and servants.
It was taken as a mere formality. What little they knew proved
nothing against Mrs. Zebedee. The police made no discoveries that
supported her first frantic accusation of herself. Her master and
mistress, where she had been last in service, spoke of her in the
highest terms. We were at a complete deadlock.

It had been thought best not to surprise Mr. Deluc, as yet, by
citing him as a witness. The action of the law was, however,
hurried in this case by a private communication received from the
chaplain.

After twice seeing, and speaking with, Mrs. Zebedee, the reverend
gentleman was persuaded that she had no more to do than himself
with the murder of her husband. He did not consider that he was
ju stified in repeating a confidential communication--he would
only recommend that Mr. Deluc should be summoned to appear at the
next examination. This advice was followed.

The police had no evidence against Mrs. Zebedee when the inquiry
was resumed. To assist the ends of justice she was now put into
the witness-box. The discovery of her murdered husband, when she
woke in the small hours of the morning, was passed over as
rapidly as possible. Only three questions of importance were put
to her.

First, the knife was produced. Had she ever seen it in her
husband's possession? Never. Did she know anything about it?
Nothing whatever.

Secondly: Did she, or did her husband, lock the bedroom door when
they returned from the theater? No. Did she afterward lock the
door herself? No.

Thirdly: Had she any sort of reason to give for supposing that
she had murdered her husband in a sleep-walking dream? No reason,
except that she was beside herself at the time, and the book put
the thought into her head.

After this the other witnesses were sent out of court The motive
for the chaplain's communication now appeared. Mrs. Zebedee was
asked if anything unpleasant had occurred between Mr. Deluc and
herself.

Yes. He had caught her alone on the stairs at the lodging-house;
had presumed to make love to her; and had carried the insult
still farther by attempting to kiss her. She had slapped his
face, and had declared that her husband should know of it, if his
misconduct was repeated. He was in a furious rage at having his
face slapped; and he said to her: "Madam, you may live to regret
this."

After consultation, and at the request of our Inspector, it was
decided to keep Mr. Deluc in ignorance of Mrs. Zebedee's
statement for the present. When the witnesses were recalled, he
gave the same evidence which he had already given to the
Inspector--and he was then asked if he knew anything of the
knife. He looked at it without any guilty signs in his face, and
swore that he had never seen it until that moment. The resumed
inquiry ended, and still nothing had been discovered.

But we kept an eye on Mr. Deluc. Our next effort was to try if we
could associate him with the purchase of the knife.

Here again (there really did seem to be a sort of fatality in
this case) we reached no useful result. It was easy enough to
find out the wholesale cutlers, who had manufactured the knife at
Sheffield, by the mark on the blade. But they made tens of
thousands of such knives, and disposed of them to retail dealers
all over Great Britain--to say nothing of foreign parts. As to
finding out the person who had engraved the imperfect inscription
(without knowing where, or by whom, the knife had been purchased)
we might as well have looked for the proverbial needle in the
bundle of hay. Our last resource was to have the knife
photographed, with the inscribed side uppermost, and to send
copies to every police-station in the kingdom.

At the same time we reckoned up Mr. Deluc--I mean that we made
investigations into his past life--on the chance that he and the
murdered man might have known each other, and might have had a
quarrel, or a rivalry about a woman, on some former occasion. No
such discovery rewarded us.

We found Deluc to have led a dissipated life, and to have mixed
with very bad company. But he had kept out of reach of the law. A
man may be a profligate vagabond; may insult a lady; may say
threatening things to her, in the first stinging sensation of
having his face slapped--but it doesn't follow from these blots
on his character that he has murdered her husband in the dead of
the night.

Once more, then, when we were called upon to report ourselves, we
had no evidence to produce. The photographs failed to discover
the owner of the knife, and to explain its interrupted
inscription. Poor Mrs. Zebedee was allowed to go back to her
friends, on entering into her own recognizance to appear again if
called upon. Articles in the newspapers began to inquire how many
more murderers would succeed in baffling the police. The
authorities at the Treasury offered a reward of a hundred pounds
for the necessary information. And the weeks passed and nobody
claimed the reward.

Our Inspector was not a man to be easily beaten. More inquiries
and examinations followed. It is needless to say anything about
them. We were defeated--and there, so far as the police and the
public were concerned, was an end of it.

The assassination of the poor young husband soon passed out of
notice, like other undiscovered murders. One obscure person only
was foolish enough, in his leisure hours, to persist in trying to
solve the problem of Who Killed Zebedee? He felt that he might
rise to the highest position in the police force if he succeeded
where his elders and betters had failed--and he held to his own
little ambition, though everybody laughed at him. In plain
English, I was the man.

V.

WITHOUT meaning it, I have told my story ungratefully.

There were two persons who saw nothing ridiculous in my
resolution to continue the investigation, single-handed. One of
them was Miss Mybus; and the other was the cook, Priscilla
Thurlby.

Mentioning the lady first, Miss Mybus was indignant at the
resigned manner in which the police accepted their defeat. She
was a little bright-eyed wiry woman; and she spoke her mind
freely.

"This comes home to me," she said. "Just look back for a year or
two. I can call to mind two cases of persons found murdered in
London--and the assassins have never been traced. I am a person,
too; and I ask myself if my turn is not coming next. You're a
nice-looking fellow and I like your pluck and perseverance. Come
here as often as you think right; and say you are my visitor, if
they make any difficulty about letting you in. One thing more! I
have nothing particular to do, and I am no fool. Here, in the
parlors, I see everybody who comes into the house or goes out of
the house. Leave me your address--I may get some information for
you yet."

With the best intentions, Miss Mybus found no opportunity of
helping me. Of the two, Priscilla Thurlby seemed more likely to
be of use.

In the first place, she was sharp and active, and (not having
succeeded in getting another situation as yet) was mistress of
her own movements.

In the second place, she was a woman I could trust. Before she
left home to try domestic service in London, the parson of her
native parish gave her a written testimonial, of which I append a
copy. Thus it ran:


"I gladly recommend Priscilla Thurlby for any respectable
employment which she may be competent to undertake. Her father
and mother are infirm old people, who have lately suffered a
diminution of their income; and they have a younger daughter to
maintain. Rather than be a burden on her parents, Priscilla goes
to London to find domestic employment, and to devote her earnings
to the assistance of her father and mother. This circumstance
speaks for itself. I have known the family many years; and I only
regret that I have no vacant place in my own household which I
can offer to this good girl,

(Signed) "HENRY DEERINGTON, Rector of Roth."


After reading those words, I could safely ask Priscilla to help
me in reopening the mysterious murder case to some good purpose.

My notion was that the proceedings of the persons in Mrs.
Crosscapel's house had not been closely enough inquired into yet.
By way of continuing the investigation, I asked Priscilla if she
could tell me anything which associated the housemaid with Mr.
Deluc. She was unwilling to answer. "I may be casting suspicion
on an innocent person," she said. "Besides, I was for so short a
time the housemaid's fellow servant--"

"You slept in the same room with her," I remarked; "and you had
opportunities of observing her conduct toward the lodgers. If
they had asked you, at the examination, what I now ask, you would
have answered as an honest woman."

To this argument she yielded. I heard from her certain
particulars, which threw a new light on Mr. Deluc, and on the
case generally. On that information I acted. It was slow work,
owing to the claims on me of my regular duties; but with
Priscilla's help, I steadily advanced toward the end I had in
view.

Besides this, I owed another obligation to Mrs. Crosscapel's
nice-looking cook. The confession must be made sooner or
later--and I may as well make it now. I first knew what love was,
thanks to Priscilla. I had delicious kisses, thanks to Priscilla.
And, when I asked if she would marry me, she didn't say No. She
looked, I must own, a little sadly, and she said: "How can two
such poor people as we are ever hope to marry?" To this I
answered: "It won't be long before I lay my hand on the clew
which my Inspector has failed to find. I shall be in a position
to marry you, my dear, when that time comes."

At our next meeting we spoke of her parents. I was now her
promised husband. Judging by what I had heard of the proceedings
of other people in my position, it seemed to be only right that I
should be made known to her father and mother. She entirely
agreed with me; and she wrote home that day to tell them to
expect us at the end of the week.

I took my turn of night-duty, and so gained my liberty for the
greater part of the next day. I dressed myself in plain clothes,
and we took our tickets on the railway for Yateland, being the
nearest station to the village in which Priscilla's parents
lived.

VI.

THE train stopped, as usual, at the big town of Waterbank.
Supporting herself by her needle, while she was still unprovided
with a situation, Priscilla had been at work late in the
night--she was tired and thirsty. I left the carriage to get her
some soda-water. The stupid girl in the refreshment room failed
to pull the cork out of the bottle, and refused to let me help
her. She took a corkscrew, and used it crookedly. I lost all
patience, and snatched the bottle out of her hand. Just as I drew
the cork, the bell rang on the platform. I only waited to pour
the soda-water into a glass--but the train was moving as I left
the refreshment room. The porters stopped me when I tried to jump
on to the step of the carriage. I was left behind.

As soon as I had recovered my temper, I looked at the time-table.
We had reached Waterbank at five minutes past one. By good luck,
the next train was due at forty-four minutes past one, and
arrived at Yateland (the next station) ten minutes afterward. I
could only hope that Priscilla would look at the time-table too,
and wait for me. If I had attempted to walk the distance between
the two places, I should have lost time instead of saving it. The
interval before me was not very long; I occupied it in looking
over the town.

Speaking with all due respect to the inhabitants, Waterbank (to
other people) is a dull place. I went up one street and down
another--and stopped to look at a shop which struck me; not from
anything in itself, but because it was the only shop in the
street with the shutters closed.

A bill was posted on the shutters, announcing that the place was
to let. The outgoing tradesman's name and business, announced in
the customary painted letters, ran thus: _James Wycomb, Cutler,
etc._

For the first time, it occurred to me that we had forgotten an
obstacle in our way, when we distributed our photographs of the
knife. We had none of us remembered that a certain proportion of
cutlers might be placed, by circumstances, out of our
reach--either by retiring from business or by becoming bankrupt.
I always carried a copy of the photograph about me; and I thought
to myself, "Here is the ghost of a chance of tracing the knife to
Mr. Deluc!"

The shop door was opened, after I had twice rung the bell, by an
old man, very dirty and very deaf. He said "You had better go
upstairs, and speak to Mr. Scorrier--top of the house."

I put my lips to the old fellow's ear-trumpet, and asked who Mr.
Scorrier was.

"Brother-in-law to Mr. Wycomb. Mr. Wycomb's dead. If you want to
buy the business apply to Mr. Scorrier."

Receiving that reply, I went upstairs, and found Mr. Scorrier
engaged in engraving a brass door-plate. He was a middle-aged
man, with a cadaverous face and dim eyes After the necessary
apologies, I produced my photograph.

"May I ask, sir, if you know anything of the inscription on that
knife?" I said.

He took his magnifying glass to look at it.

"This is curious," he remarked quietly. "I remember the queer
name--Zebedee. Yes, sir; I did the engraving, as far as it goes.
I wonder what prevented me from finishing it?"

The name of Zebedee, and the unfinished inscription on the knife,
had appeared in every English newspaper. He took the matter so
coolly that I was doubtful how to interpret his answer. Was it
possible that he had not seen the account of the murder? Or was
he an accomplice with prodigious powers of self-control?

"Excuse me," I said, "do you read the newspapers?"

"Never! My eyesight is failing me. I abstain from reading, in the
interests of my occupation."

"Have you not heard the name of Zebedee mentioned--particularly
by people who do read the newspapers?"

"Very likely; but I didn't attend to it. When the day's work is
done, I take my walk. Then I have my supper, my drop of grog, and
my pipe. Then I go to bed. A dull existence you think, I daresay!
I had a miserable life, sir, when I was young. A bare
subsistence, and a little rest, before the last perfect rest in
the grave--that is all I want. The world has gone by me long ago.
So much the better."

The poor man spoke honestly. I was ashamed of having doubted him.
I returned to the subject of the knife.

"Do you know where it was purchased, and by whom?" I asked.

"My memory is not so good as it was," he said; "but I have got
something by me that helps it."

He took from a cupboard a dirty old scrapbook. Strips of paper,
with writing on them, were pasted on the pages, as well as I
could see. He turned to an index, or table of contents, and
opened a page. Something like a flash of life showed itself on
his dismal face.

"Ha! now I remember," he said. "The knife was bought of my late
brother-in-law, in the shop downstairs. It all comes back to me,
sir. A person in a state of frenzy burst into this very room, and
snatched the knife away from me, when I was only half way through
the inscription!"

I felt that I was now close on discovery. "May I see what it is
that has assisted your memory?" I asked.

"Oh yes. You must know, sir, I live by engraving inscriptions and
addresses, and I paste in this book the manuscript instructions
which I receive, with marks of my own on the margin. For one
thing, they serve as a reference to new customers. And for
another thing, they do certainly help my memory."

He turned the book toward me, and pointed to a slip of paper
which occupied the lower half of a page.

I read the complete inscription, intended for the knife that
killed Zebedee, and written as follows:

"To John Zebedee. From Priscilla Thurlby."

VII.

I DECLARE that it is impossible for me to describe what I felt
when Priscilla's name confronted me like a written confession of
guilt. How long it was before I recovered myself in some degree,
I cannot say. The only thing I can clearly call to mind is, that
I frightened the poor engraver.

My first desire was to get possession of the manuscript
inscription. I told him I was a policeman, and summoned him to
assist me in the discovery of a crime. I even offered him money.
He drew back from my hand. "You shall have it for nothing," he
said, "if you will only go away and never come here again." He
tried to cut it out of the page--but his trembling hands were
helpless. I cut it out myself, and attempted to thank him. He
wouldn't hear me. "Go away!" he said, "I don't like the look of
you."

It may be here objected that I ought not to have felt so sure as
I did of the woman's guilt, until I had got more evidence against
her. The knife might have been stolen from her, supposing she was
the person who had snatched it out of the engraver's hands, and
might have been afterward used by the thief to commit the murder.
All very true. But I never had a moment's doubt in my own mind,
from the time when I read the damnable line in the engraver's
book.

I went back to the railway without any plan in my head. The train
by which I had proposed to follow her had left Waterbank. The
next train
 that arrived was for London. I took my place in it--still
without any plan in my head.

At Charing Cross a friend met me. He said, "You're looking
miserably ill. Come and have a drink."

I went with him. The liquor was what I really wanted; it strung
me up, and cleared my head. He went his way, and I went mine. In
a little while more, I determined what I would do.

In the first place, I decided to resign my situation in the
police, from a motive which will presently appear. In the second
place, I took a bed at a public-house. She would no doubt return
to London, and she would go to my lodgings to find out why I had
broken my appointment. To bring to justice the one woman whom I
had dearly loved was too cruel a duty for a poor creature like
me. I preferred leaving the police force. On the other hand, if
she and I met before time had helped me to control myself, I had
a horrid fear that I might turn murderer next, and kill her then
and there. The wretch had not only all but misled me into
marrying her, but also into charging the innocent housemaid with
being concerned in the murder.

The same night I hit on a way of clearing up such doubts as still
harassed my mind. I wrote to the rector of Roth, informing him
that I was engaged to marry her, and asking if he would tell me
(in consideration of my position) what her former relations might
have been with the person named John Zebedee.

By return of post I got this reply:


"SIR--Under the circumstances, I think I am bound to tell you
confidentially what the friends and well-wishers of Priscilla
have kept secret, for her sake.

"Zebedee was in service in this neighborhood. I am sorry to say
it, of a man who has come to such a miserable end--but his
behavior to Priscilla proves him to have been a vicious and
heartless wretch. They were engaged--and, I add with indignation,
he tried to seduce her under a promise of marriage. Her virtue
resisted him, and he pretended to be ashamed of himself. The
banns were published in my church. On the next day Zebedee
disappeared, and cruelly deserted her. He was a capable servant;
and I believe he got another place. I leave you to imagine what
the poor girl suffered under the outrage inflicted on her. Going
to London, with my recommendation, she answered the first
advertisement that she saw, and was unfortunate enough to begin
her career in domestic service in the very lodging-house to which
(as I gather from the newspaper report of the murder) the man
Zebedee took the person whom he married, after deserting
Priscilla. Be assured that you are about to unite yourself to an
excellent girl, and accept my best wishes for your happiness."


It was plain from this that neither the rector nor the parents
and friends knew anything of the purchase of the knife. The one
miserable man who knew the truth was the man who had asked her to
be his wife.

I owed it to myself--at least so it seemed to me--not to let it
be supposed that I, too, had meanly deserted her. Dreadful as the
prospect was, I felt that I must see her once more, and for the
last time.

She was at work when I went into her room. As I opened the door
she started to her feet. Her cheeks reddened, and her eyes
flashed with anger. I stepped forward--and she saw my face. My
face silenced her.

I spoke in the fewest words I could find.

"I have been to the cutler's shop at Waterbank," I said. "There
is the unfinished inscription on the knife, complete in your
handwriting. I could hang you by a word. God forgive me--I can't
say the word."

Her bright complexion turned to a dreadful clay-color. Her eyes
were fixed and staring, like the eyes of a person in a fit. She
stood before me, still and silent. Without saying more, I dropped
the inscription into the fire. Without saying more, I left her.

I never saw her again.

VIII.

BUT I heard from her a few days later. The letter has long since
been burned. I wish I could have forgotten it as well. It sticks
to my memory. If I die with my senses about me, Priscilla's
letter will be my last recollection on earth.

In substance it repeated what the rector had already told me.
Further, it informed me that she had bought the knife as a
keepsake for Zebedee, in place of a similar knife which he had
lost. On the Saturday, she made the purchase, and left it to be
engraved. On the Sunday, the banns were put up. On the Monday,
she was deserted; and she snatched the knife from the table while
the engraver was at work.

She only knew that Zebedee had added a new sting to the insult
inflicted on her when he arrived at the lodgings with his wife.
Her duties as cook kept her in the kitchen--and Zebedee never
discovered that she was in the house. I still remember the last
lines of her confession:

"The devil entered into me when I tried their door, on my way up
to bed, and found it unlocked, and listened a while, and peeped
in. I saw them by the dying light of the candle--one asleep on
the bed, the other asleep by the fireside. I had the knife in my
hand, and the thought came to me to do it, so that they might
hang _her_ for the murder. I couldn't take the knife out again,
when I had done it. Mind this! I did really like you--I didn't
say Yes, because you could hardly hang your own wife, if you
found out who killed Zebedee."


Since the past time I have never heard again of Priscilla
Thurlby; I don't know whether she is living or dead. Many people
may think I deserve to be hanged myself for not having given her
up to the gallows. They may, perhaps, be disappointed when they
see this confession, and hear that I have died decently in my
bed. I don't blame them. I am a penitent sinner. I wish all
merciful Christians good-by forever.





End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Little Novels, by Wilkie Collins