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diff --git a/17052.txt b/17052.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6891caa --- /dev/null +++ b/17052.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4825 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Argosy, by Various + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Argosy + Vol. 51, No. 6, June, 1891 + +Author: Various + +Editor: Charles W. Wood + +Release Date: November 11, 2005 [EBook #17052] +[Date last updated: March 25, 2006] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ARGOSY *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Murray, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + _"Laden with Golden Grain"_ + + * * * * * + + THE + ARGOSY. + + + EDITED BY + CHARLES W. WOOD. + + * * * * * + + + VOLUME LI. + + _January to June, 1891._ + + * * * * * + + + RICHARD BENTLEY & SON, + 8, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, LONDON, W. + + Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty. + + _All rights reserved._ + + + LONDON: + PRINTED BY OGDEN, SMALE AND CO. LIMITED, + GREAT SAFFRON HILL, E.C. + + + + +_CONTENTS._ + + +THE FATE OF THE HARA DIAMOND. Illustrated by M.L. GOW. + + Chap. I. My Arrival at Deepley Walls Jan + II. The Mistress of Deepley Walls Jan + III. A Voyage of Discovery Jan + IV. Scarsdale Weir Jan + V. At Rose Cottage Feb + VI. The Growth of a Mystery Feb + VII. Exit Janet Hope Feb + VIII. By the Scotch Express Feb + IX. At "The Golden Griffin" Mar + X. The Stolen Manuscript Mar + XI. Bon Repos Mar + XII. The Amsterdam Edition of 1698 Mar + XIII. M. Platzoff's Secret--Captain Ducie's Translation of + M. Paul Platzoff's MS Mar + XIV. Drashkil-Smoking Apr + XV. The Diamond Apr + XVI. Janet's Return Apr + XVII. Deepley Walls after Seven Years Apr + XVIII. Janet in a New Character May + XIX. The Dawn of Love May + XX. The Narrative of Sergeant Nicholas May + XXI. Counsel taken with Mr. Madgin May + XXII. Mr. Madgin at the Helm Jun + XXIII. Mr. Madgin's Secret Journey Jun + XXIV. Enter Madgin Junior Jun + XXV. Madgin Junior's First Report Jun + + * * * * * + +THE SILENT CHIMES. By JOHNNY LUDLOW (Mrs. HENRY WOOD). + + Putting Them Up Jan + Playing Again Feb + Ringing at Midday Mar + Not Heard Apr + Silent for Ever May + + * * * * * + +THE BRETONS AT HOME. By CHARLES W. WOOD, F.R.G.S. With + 35 Illustrations Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun + + * * * * * + +About the Weather Jun +Across the River. By HELEN M. BURNSIDE Apr +After Twenty Years. By ADA M. TROTTER Feb +A Memory. By GEORGE COTTERELL Feb +A Modern Witch Jan +An April Folly. By GILBERT H. PAGE Apr +A Philanthropist. By ANGUS GREY Jun +Aunt Phoebe's Heirlooms: An Experience in Hypnotism Feb +A Social Debut Mar +A Song. By G.B. STUART Jan +Enlightenment. By E. NESBIT Feb +In a Bernese Valley. By ALEXANDER LAMONT Feb +Legend of an Ancient Minster. By JOHN GRAEME Mar +Longevity. By W.F. AINSWORTH, F.S.A. Apr +Mademoiselle Elise. By EDWARD FRANCIS Jun +Mediums and Mysteries. By NARISSA ROSAVO Feb +Miss Kate Marsden Jan +My May Queen. By JOHN JERVIS BERESFORD, M.A. May +Old China Jun +On Letter-Writing. By A.H. JAPP, LL.D. May +Paul. By the Author of "Adonais, Q.C." May +"Proctorised" Apr +Rondeau. By E. NESBIT Mar +Saint or Satan? By A. BERESFORD Feb +Sappho. By MARY GREY Mar +Serenade. By E. NESBIT Jun +Sonnets. By JULIA KAVANAGH Jan, Feb, Apr, Jun +So Very Unattractive! Jun +Spes. By JOHN JERVIS BERESFORD, M.A. Apr +Sweet Nancy. By JEANIE GWYNNE BETTANY May +The Church Garden. By CHRISTIAN BURKE May +The Only Son of his Mother. By LETITIA MCCLINTOCK Mar +To my Soul. From the French of Victor Hugo Jun +Unexplained. By LETITIA MCCLINTOCK Apr +Who Was the Third Maid? Jan +Winter in Absence Feb + + * * * * * + +_POETRY._ + +Sonnets. By JULIA KAVANAGH Jan, Feb, Apr, Jun +A Song. By G.B. STUART Jan +Enlightenment. By E. NESBIT Feb +Winter in Absence Feb +A Memory. By GEORGE COTTERELL Feb +In a Bernese Valley. By ALEXANDER LAMONT Feb +Rondeau. By E. NESBIT Mar +Spes. By JOHN JERVIS BERESFORD, M.A. Apr +Across the River. By HELEN M. BURNSIDE Apr +My May Queen. By JOHN JERVIS BERESFORD, M.A. May +The Church Garden. By CHRISTIAN BURKE May +Serenade. By E. NESBIT Jun +To my Soul. From the French of Victor Hugo Jun +Old China Jun + + * * * * * + +_ILLUSTRATIONS._ + +By M.L. Gow. + + "I advanced slowly up the room, stopped, and curtsied." + + "I saw and recognised the mysterious midnight visitor." + + "He came back in a few minutes, but so transformed in outward + appearance that Ducie scarcely knew him." + + "Behold!" + + "Sister Agnes knelt for a few moments and bent her head in silent + prayer." + + "He put his hand to his side, and motioned Mirpah to open the letter." + + * * * * * + +Illustrations to "The Bretons at Home." + + + + +[Illustration: HE PUT HIS HAND TO HIS SIDE, AND MOTIONED MIRPAH TO +OPEN THE LETTER.] + + + + +THE ARGOSY. + +_JUNE, 1891._ + + + + +THE FATE OF THE HARA DIAMOND. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +MR. MADGIN AT THE HELM. + + +Mr. Madgin's house stood somewhat back from the main street of Eastbury. +It was an old-fashioned house, of modest exterior, and had an air of +being elbowed into the background by the smarter and more modern +domiciles on each side of it. Its steep, overhanging roof and porched +doorway gave it a sleepy, reposeful look, as though it were watching the +on-goings of the little town through half-closed lids, and taking small +cognizance thereof. + +Entering from the street through a little wooden gateway of a bright +green colour, a narrow pathway, paved with round pebbles that were very +trying to people with tender feet, conducted you to the front door, on +which shone a brass plate of surpassing brightness, whereon was +inscribed:-- + + ___________________________________ + | | + | MR. SOLOMON MADGIN. | + | _General Agent_, | + | _Valuer, &c._ | + |_________________________________| + +The house was a double-fronted one. On one side of the passage as you +went in was the office; on the other side was the family sitting-room. +Not that Mr. Madgin's family was a large one. It consisted merely of +himself, his daughter Mirpah, and one strong servant-girl with an +unlimited capacity for hard work. Mirpah Madgin deserves some notice at +our hands. + +She was a tall, superb-looking young woman of two-and-twenty, and bore +not the slightest resemblance in person, whatever she might do in mind +or disposition, to that sly old fox her father. Mirpah's mother had been +of Jewish extraction, and in Mirpah's face you read the unmistakable +signs of that grand style of beauty which is everywhere associated with +the downtrodden race. She moved about the little house in her +inexpensive prints and muslins like a discrowned queen. That she had +reached the age of two-and-twenty without having been in love was no +source of surprise to those who knew her; for Mirpah Madgin hardly +looked like a girl who would marry a poor clerk or a petty tradesman, or +who could ever sink into the commonplace drudge of a hand-to-mouth +household. She looked like a girl who would some day be claimed by a +veritable hero of romance--by some Ivanhoe of modern life, well endowed +with this world's goods--who would wed her, and ride away with her to +the fairy realms of Tyburnia and Rotten Row. + +And yet, truth to tell, the thread of romance inwoven with the +composition of Mirpah Madgin was a very slender one. In so far she +belied her own beauty. For a young woman she was strangely practical, +and that in a curiously unfeminine way. She was her father's managing +clerk and _alter ego_. The housewifely acts of sewing and cooking she +held in utter distaste. For domestic management in any of its forms she +had no faculty, unless it were for that portion of it which necessitated +a watchful eye upon the purse-strings. Such an eye she had been trained +to use since she was quite a girl, and Mirpah the superb could on +occasion haggle over a penny as keenly as the most ancient fishwife in +Eastbury market. + +At five minutes past nine precisely, six mornings out of every seven, +Mirpah Madgin sat down in her father's office and proceeded to open the +letters. Mr. Madgin's business was a multifarious one. Not only was he +Lady Chillington's general agent and man of business, although that was +his most onerous and lucrative appointment, and the one that engaged +most of his time and thoughts, but he was also agent for several lesser +concerns, always contriving to have a number of small irons in the fire +at one time. Much of Mr. Madgin's time was spent in the collection of +rents and in out-door work generally, so that nearly the whole of the +office duties devolved upon Mirpah, and by no clerk could they have been +more efficiently performed. She made up and balanced the numerous +accounts with which Mr. Madgin had to deal in one shape or another. +Three-fourths of the letters that emanated from Mr. Madgin's office were +written by her. From long practice she had learned to write so like her +father that only an expert could have detected the difference between +the two hands; and she invariably signed herself, "Yours truly, Solomon +Madgin." Indeed, so accustomed was she to writing her father's name that +in her correspondence with her brother, who was an actor in London, she +more frequently than not signed it in place of her own; so that Madgin +junior had to look whether the letter was addressed to him as a son or +as a brother before he could tell by whom it had been written. + +As her father's assistant Mirpah was happy after a quiet, staid sort of +fashion. The energies of her nature found their vent in the busy life in +which she took so much delight. She was not at all sentimental: she was +not the least bit romantic. She was thoroughly practical, and was as +keen in money-making as her father himself. Yet with all this, Mirpah +Madgin could be charitable on occasion, and was by no means deficient of +high and generous impulses--only she never allowed her impulses to +interfere with "business." + +Mr. Madgin never took any important step without first consulting his +daughter. Herein he acted wisely, for Mirpah's clear, good sense, and +feminine quickness at penetrating motives where he himself was sometimes +at fault, had often proved invaluable to him in difficult transactions. +In a matter of so much moment as that of the Great Hara Diamond it was +not likely that he would be long contented without taking her into his +confidence. He had scarcely finished his first pipe when he heard her +opening the door with her latch-key, and his face brightened at the +sound. She had been on one of those holy pilgrimages in which all who +are thus privileged take so much delight: she had been to the bank to +increase the little store which lay there already in her father's name. +She came into the room tired but smiling. A white straw bonnet, a black +silk mantle, and a muslin dress, small in pattern, formed the chief +items of her quiet attire. She was carefully gloved and booted; but to +whatever she wore Mirpah imparted an air of distinction that put it at +once beyond a suggestion of improvement. + +"Smoking at this time of day, papa!" exclaimed Mirpah. "And the whisky +out, too! Are we about to retire on our fortunes, or what does it all +mean?" + +"It means, child, that I have got one of the hardest nuts to crack that +were ever put before me. If I crack it, I get five thousand pounds for +the kernel. If I don't crack it--but that's a possibility I can't bear +to think about." + +"Five thousand pounds! That would indeed be a kernel worth having. My +teeth are younger than yours, and perhaps I may be able to help you." + +Mr. Madgin smoked in silence for a little while, while Mirpah toyed +patiently with her bonnet strings. "The nut is simply this," said the +old man at last. "In India, twenty years ago, a diamond was stolen from +a dying man. I am now told to find the thief, to obtain from him the +diamond either by fair means or foul--supposing always that he is still +alive and has the diamond still in his possession--and on the day I give +the stone to its rightful owner the aforementioned five thousand pounds +become mine." + +"A grand prize, and one worth striving for!" + +"Even so; but how can I strive, when I have nothing to strive against? I +am like a man put into a dark room to fight a duel. I cannot find my +antagonist. I grope about, not knowing whether he is on the right hand +of me or the left, before me or behind me. In fact, I am utterly at +sea; and the more I think about the matter the more hopelessly +bewildered I seem to become." + +"Two heads are better than one, papa. Let me try to help you. Tell me +the case from beginning to end, with all the details as they are known +to you." + +Mr. Madgin willingly complied, and related _in extenso_ all that he had +heard that morning at Deepley Walls. The little man had a high opinion +of his daughter's sagacity. That such an opinion was in nowise lessened +by the result of the present case will be best seen by the following +excerpts from Mr. Madgin's diary, which, as having a particular bearing +on the case of the Great Hara Diamond, we proceed at once to lay before +the reader:-- + + +EXCERPTS FROM THE DIARY OF MR. SOLOMON MADGIN. + + "July 9th, Evening.--After the wonderful revelation made to me by + Lady Chillington this morning, I came home, and got behind a + churchwarden, and set my wits to work to think the matter out. I + shut my eyes and puffed away for an hour and a half, but at the end + of that time I was as much in a fog as when I first sat down. + Nowhere could I discern a single ray of light. Then in came Mirpah, + and when she begged of me to tell her the story, I was glad to do + so, remembering how often she had helped me through a puzzle in + days gone by--but none of them of such magnitude as this one. So I + told her everything as far as it was known to myself. After that we + discussed the whole case carefully step by step. The immediate + result of this discussion was, that as soon as tea was over, I went + as far as the White Hart tavern in search of Sergeant Nicholas. I + found him on the bowling-green, watching the players. I called for + a quart of old ale and some tobacco, and before long we were as + cosy as two old cronies who have known each other for twenty years. + The morning had shown me that the Sergeant was a man of some + intelligence, and of much worldly experience; and when I had + lowered myself imperceptibly to the level of his intellect, so as + to put him more completely at his ease, I had no difficulty in + inducing him to talk freely and fully on that one subject which, + for the last few hours, has had for me an interest paramount to + that of any other. My primary object was to induce him to retail to + me every scrap of information that he could call to mind respecting + the Russian, Platzoff, who is said to have stolen the diamond. It + was Mirpah's opinion and mine, that he must be in possession of + many bits of special knowledge, such as might seem of no + consequence to him, but which might be invaluable to us in our + search, and such as he would naturally leave out of the narrative + he told Lady Chillington. The result proved that our opinion was + well founded. I did not leave the Sergeant till I had pumped him + thoroughly dry. (Mem.: An excellent tap of old ale at the White + Hart. Must try some of it at home.) + + "I found Mirpah watering her geraniums in the back garden. She was + all impatience to learn the result of my interview. I am thankful + that increasing years have not impaired my memory. I repeated to + Mirpah every word bearing on the case in point that the Sergeant + had confided to me. Then I waited in silence for her opinion. I was + anxious to know whether it coincided in any way with my own. I am + happy to think that it did coincide. Father and daughter were + agreed. + + "'I think that you have done a very good afternoon's work, papa,' + said Mirpah, after a few moments given to silent thought. 'After a + lapse of twenty years, it is not likely that Sergeant Nicholas + should have a very clear recollection of any conversation that he + may have overheard between Captain Chillington and M. Platzoff. + Indeed, had he pretended to repeat any such conversation, I should + have felt strongly inclined to doubt the truth of his entire + narrative. Happily he disclaims any such abnormal powers of memory. + He can remember nothing but a chance phrase or two which some + secondary circumstance fixed indelibly on his mind. But he can + remember a great number of little facts bearing on the relations + between his master and the Russian. These facts, considered singly, + may seem of little or no importance, but taken in the aggregate, + and regarded as so many bits of mosaic work forming part of a + complicated whole, they assume an aspect of far greater importance. + In any case, they put us on a trail, which may turn out to be the + right one or the wrong one, but at present certainly seems to be + worth following up. Finally, they all tend to deepen our first + suspicion that M. Platzoff was neither more nor less than a + political refugee. The next point is to ascertain whether he is + still alive.' + + "Here again the clear logical intellect of Mirpah (so like my own) + came to my assistance. Before parting for the night we were agreed + as to what our mode of procedure ought to be on the morrow. This + most extraordinary case engages all my thoughts. I am afraid that I + shall not be able to sleep much to-night. + + "July 10th.--I owe it to Mirpah to say that it was entirely in + consequence of a hint from her that I went at an early hour this + morning to the office of the _Eastbury Courier_, there to consult a + file of that newspaper. Six months ago the daughter of Sir John + Pennythorne was married to a rich London gentleman. Mirpah had read + the account of the festivities consequent on that event, and seemed + to remember that among other friends of the bridegroom invited down + to Finch Hall was some foreign gentleman, who was stated in the + newspaper to belong to the Russian Legation in London. Acting on + Mirpah's hint, I went back through the files of the _Courier_ till + I lighted on the account of the wedding. True enough, among other + guests on that occasion, I found catalogued the name of a certain + Monsieur H---- of the Russian Embassy. I had got all I wanted from + the _Eastbury Courier_. + + "My next proceeding was to hasten up to Deepley Walls, to obtain an + interview with Lady Chillington, and to induce her ladyship to + write to Sir John Pennythorne, asking him to write to the aforesaid + M. H----, and inquire whether, among the archives (I think that is + the correct word) of the Embassy, they had any record of a + political refugee by name Paul Platzoff, who, twenty years ago, was + in India, etc. I had considerable difficulty in persuading her + ladyship to write, but at last the letter was sent. I await the + result anxiously. The chances seem to me something like a thousand + to one against our inquiry being productive of any tangible result. + What I dread more than all is that M. Platzoff is no longer among + the living. + + "July 20th.--Nine days without a word from Sir John Pennythorne, + except to say that he had written his friend Monsieur H----, as + requested by Lady Chillington. I began to despair. Each morning I + inquired of her ladyship whether she had received any reply from + Sir John, and each morning her ladyship said: 'I have had no reply, + Mr. Madgin, beyond the one you have already seen.' + + "Certain matters connected with a lease took me up to Deepley Walls + this afternoon for the second time to-day. The afternoon post came + in while I was there. Among other letters was one from Sir John + Pennythorne, which, when she had read it, her ladyship tossed over + to me. It enclosed one from M. H---- to Sir John. It was on the + latter that I pounced. It was written in French, but even at the + first hasty reading I could make it out sufficiently to know that + it was of far greater importance than even in my wildest dreams I + had dared to imagine. + + "I never saw Lady Chillington so excited as she was during the few + moments which I took up in reading the letter. During the nine days + that had elapsed since the writing of her letter to Sir John she + had treated me somewhat slightingly; there was, or so I fancied, a + spice of contempt in her manner towards me. The step I had induced + her to take in writing to Sir John had met with no approbation at + her hands; it had seemed to her an utterly futile and ridiculous + thing to do; therefore was I now proportionately well pleased to + find that my wild idea had been productive of such excellent fruit. + + "'I must certainly compliment you, Mr. Madgin, on the success of + your first step,' said her ladyship. 'It was like one of the fine + intuitions of genius to imagine that you saw a way to reach M. + Platzoff through the Russian Embassy. You have been fully justified + by the result. Madgin, the man yet lives!--the man whose + sacrilegious hands robbed my dead son of that which he had left as + a sacred gift to his mother. May the curse of a widowed mother + attend him through life! Let me hear the letter again, Madgin; or + stay, I will read it myself: your French is execrable. Ha, ha! + Monsieur Paul Platzoff, we shall have our revenge out of you yet.' + + "She read the letter through for the second time with a sort of + deliberate eagerness which showed me how deeply interested her + heart was in the affair. She dropped her eye-glass and gave a great + sigh when she came to the end of it. 'And what do you propose to do + next, Mr. Madgin?' she asked. 'Your conduct so far satisfies me + that I cannot do better than leave the case entirely in your + hands.' + + "'With all due deference to your ladyship,' I replied, 'I think + that my next step ought to be to reconnoitre the enemy's camp.' + + "'Exactly my own thought,' said her ladyship. 'When can you start + for Windermere?' + + "'To-morrow morning, at nine.' + + "After a little more conversation I left her ladyship. She seemed + in better spirits than I had seen her for a long time. + + "I need not attempt to describe dear Mirpah's delight when I read + over to her the contents of Monsieur H.'s note. She put her arms + round me and kissed me. 'The five thousand pounds shall yet be + yours, papa,' she said. Stranger things than that have come to pass + before now. But I am working only for her and James. Should I ever + be so fortunate as to touch the five thousand pounds, one-half of + it will go to form a dowry for my Mirpah. Below is a free + translation of the business part of M.H.'s letter, which was simply + an extract from some secret ledger kept at the Embassy:-- + + "'Platzoff, Paul. A Russian by birth and a conspirator by choice. + Born in Moscow in 1802, his father being a rich leather-merchant of + that city. Implicated at the age of nineteen in sundry + insurrectionary movements; tried, and sentenced to three years' + imprisonment in a military fortress. After his release, left Russia + without permission, having first secretly transferred his property + into foreign securities. Went to Paris. Issued a scurrilous + pamphlet directed against his Majesty the Emperor. Spent several + years in travel--now in Europe, now in the East, striving wherever + he went to promulgate his revolutionary ideas. More than suspected + of being a member of several secret political societies. Has + resided for the last few years at Bon Repos, on the banks of + Windermere, from which place he communicates constantly with other + characters as desperate as himself. Russia has no more bitter and + determined enemy than Paul Platzoff. He is at once clever and + unscrupulous. While he lives he will not cease to conspire.' + + "After this followed a description of Platzoff's personal + appearance, which it is needless to transcribe here. + + "I start for Windermere by the first train to-morrow." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +MR. MADGIN'S SECRET JOURNEY. + + +Mr. Madgin left home by an early train on the morning of the day +following that on which Lady Chillington had received a reply from Sir +John Pennythorne. His first intention had been to make the best of his +way to Windermere, and there ascertain the exact locality of Bon Repos. +But a fresh view of the case presented itself to his mind as he lay +thinking in bed. Instead of taking the train for the North, he took one +for the South, and found himself at Euston as the London clocks were +striking twelve. After an early dinner, and a careful consultation of +the Post-Office Directory, Mr. Madgin ordered a hansom, and was driven +to Hatton Garden, in and about which unfragrant locality the diamond +merchants most do congregate. After due inquiries made and answered, Mr. +Madgin was driven eastward for another mile or more. Here a similar set +of inquiries elicited a similar set of answers. Mr. Madgin went back to +his hotel well pleased with his day's work. + +His inquiries had satisfied him that no green diamond of the size and +value attributed to the Great Hara had either been seen or heard of in +the London market during the last twenty years. It still remained to +test the foreign markets in the same way. Mr. Madgin's idea was that +this work could be done better by some trustworthy agent well acquainted +with the trade than by himself. He accordingly left instructions with an +eminent diamond merchant to have all needful inquiries made at Paris, +Amsterdam, and St. Petersburg, as to whether such a stone as the Great +Hara had come under the cognizance of the trade any time during the last +twenty years. The result of the inquiry was to be communicated to Mr. +Madgin by letter. + +Next day Mr. Madgin journeyed down to Windermere. Arrived at Bowness, he +found no difficulty in ascertaining the exact locality of Bon Repos, the +house and its owner being known by sight or repute to almost every +inhabitant of the little town. Mr. Madgin stopped all night at Bowness. +Next morning he hired a small boat, and was pulled across the lake to a +point about half a mile below Bon Repos, and there he landed. + +Mr. Madgin was travelling _incog_. The name upon his portmanteau was +"Joshua Deedes, Esq." He was dressed in a suit of glossy black, with a +white neck-cloth, and gold-rimmed spectacles. He had quite an episcopal +air. He did not call himself a clergyman, but people were at liberty to +accept him as one if they chose. + +Assisted by the most unimpeachable of malaccas, Mr. Madgin took the +high-road that wound round the grounds of Bon Repos. But so completely +was the house hidden in its nest of greenery that the chimney-pots were +all of it that was visible from the road. But under a spur of the hill +by which the house was shut in at the back, Mr. Madgin found a tiny +hamlet of a dozen houses, by far the most imposing of which was the +village inn--hotel, it called itself, and showed to the world the sign +of The Jolly Fishers. Into this humble hostelry Mr. Madgin marched +without hesitation, and called for some refreshment. So impressed was +the landlord with the clerical appearance of his guest that he whipped +off his apron, ushered him into the state parlour, and made haste to +wait upon him himself. He, the guest, had actually called for a bottle +of the best dry sherry, and when the landlord took it in he invited him +to fetch another glass, and come and join him over it. Mr. Joshua Deedes +was a tourist--well-to-do, without doubt; the landlord could see as much +as that--and having never visited Lakeland before, he was naturally +delighted with the freshness and novelty of everything that he saw. The +change from London life was so thorough, so complete in every respect, +that he could hardly believe he had left the great Babel no longer ago +than yesterday. It seemed years since he had been there. He had thought +Bowness a charming spot, but this little nook surpassed Bowness, +inasmuch as it was still farther removed and shut out from the +frivolities and follies of the great world. Here one was almost alone +with Nature and her wondrous works. Then Mr. Deedes filled up his own +glass and that of the landlord. + +"Perhaps, sir, you would like to stay here for a night or two," +suggested the host timidly; "we have a couple of spare beds." + +"Nothing would please me better," answered Mr. Deedes, with solemn +alacrity. "I feel that the healthful air of these hills is doing me an +immensity of good. Kindly send to the Crown at Bowness for my +portmanteau, and ascertain what you have in the house for dinner." + +After a while came dinner, and a little later on, Mr. Deedes having +expressed a desire to see something of the lake, the landlord sent to +borrow a boat, and then took his guest for an hour's row on Windermere. +From the water they had a capital view of the low white front of Bon +Repos. There were two gentlemen smoking on the terrace. The lesser of +the two, said the landlord, was M. Platzoff. The taller man was Captain +Ducie, at present a guest at Bon Repos. Then the landlord wandered off +into a long, rambling account of Bon Repos and its owner. Mr. Deedes was +much interested in hearing about the eccentric habits and strange mode +of life of M. Platzoff, with the details of which the landlord was as +thoroughly acquainted as though he had formed one of the household. +Their row on the lake was prolonged for a couple of hours, and Mr. +Deedes went back to the hotel much edified. + +In the dusk of evening he encountered Cleon, M. Platzoff's valet, as he +was lounging slowly down the village street on his way to The Jolly +Fishers. Mr. Deedes scrutinised the dark-skinned servant narrowly in +passing. "The face of a cunning, unscrupulous rascal, if ever I saw +one," he muttered to himself. "Nevertheless, I must make his +acquaintance." + +And he did make his acquaintance. As Cleon and the landlord sat +hob-nobbing together in the little snuggery behind the bar, Mr. Deedes +put in his head to ask a question of the latter. Thereupon the landlord +begged permission to introduce his friend Mr. Cleon to the notice of his +guest, Mr. Deedes. The two men bowed, Mr. Cleon rather sulkily; but Mr. +Deedes was all affability and smiling _bonhommie_. He had several +questions to ask, and he sat down on the only vacant chair in the little +room. He wanted to know the distance to Keswick; how much higher +Helvellyn was than Fairfield; whether it was possible to get any potted +char for breakfast, and so on; on all which questions both Cleon and the +landlord had something to say. But talking being dry work, as Mr. Deedes +smilingly observed, brought naturally to mind the fact that the landlord +had some excellent dry sherry, and that one could not do better this +warm evening than have another bottle fetched up out of the cool depths +of the cellar. Mr. Cleon, being pressed, was nothing loth to join Mr. +Deedes over this bottle. Mr. Deedes, without condescending into +familiarity, made himself very agreeable, but did not sit long. After +imbibing a couple of glasses, he bade the landlord and the valet an +affable good-night, and went off decorously to bed. + +Mr. Deedes was up betimes next morning, and took a three miles' trudge +over the hills before breakfast. He spent a quiet day mooning about the +neighbourhood, and really enjoying himself after his own fashion, +although his mind was busily engaged all the time in trying to solve the +mystery of the Great Diamond. In the evening he took care to have a few +pleasant words with Cleon, and then early to bed. Two more days passed +away after a similar quiet fashion, and then Mr. Deedes began to chafe +inwardly at the small progress he was making. + +Although he had been so successful in tracing out M. Platzoff, and in +working the case up to its present point in a remarkably short space of +time, he acknowledged to himself that he was completely baffled when he +came to consider what his next step ought to be. He could not, indeed, +see his way to a single step beyond his present standpoint. Much as he +seemed to have gained at a single leap, was he in reality one +hair's-breadth nearer the secret object of his quest than on that day +when the name of the Great Hara Diamond first made music in his ears? He +doubted it greatly. + +When he first decided on coming down to Bon Repos, he trusted that the +chapter of accidents and the good fortune which had so far attended him +would somehow put it in his power to scrape an acquaintance with M. +Platzoff himself, and such an acquaintance once made, it would be his +own fault if, in one way or another, he did not make it subservient to +the ambitious end he had in view. + +But in M. Platzoff he found a recluse: a man who made no fresh +acquaintanceships; who held the whole tourist tribe in horror, and who +even kept himself aloof from such of the neighbouring families as might +be considered his equals in social position. It was quite evident to Mr. +Deedes that he might reside close to Bon Repos for twenty years, and at +the end of that time not have succeeded in addressing half-a-dozen words +to its owner. + +Then again he had succeeded little better with regard to Cleon than with +regard to Cleon's master. All his advances, made with a mixture of +affability and _bonhommie_ which Mr. Deedes flattered himself was +irresistible with most people, were productive of little or no effect +upon the mulatto. He received them, not with suspicion, for he had +nothing of which to suspect harmless Mr. Deedes, but with a sort of +sulky indifference, as though he considered them rather a nuisance than +otherwise, and would have preferred their being offered to anyone else. +Did Mr. Deedes, in conversation with him and the landlord, venture to +bring the talk round to Bon Repos and M. Platzoff; did he hazard the +remark that since his arrival in Lakeland several people had spoken to +him of the strange character and eccentric mode of life of Mr. Cleon's +employer--he was met with a stony silence, which told him as plainly as +any words could have done that M. Platzoff and his affairs were matters +that in no wise concerned him. It was quite evident that neither the +Russian nor his dark-skinned valet was of any avail for the furtherance +of that scheme which had brought Mr. Deedes all the way to the wilds of +Westmoreland. + +He began to despair, and was on the point of writing to Mirpah, thinking +that her shrewd woman's wit might be able to suggest some stratagem or +mode of attack other than that made use of by him, when suddenly a +prospect opened before him such as in his wildest dreams of success he +dared not have bodied forth. He was not slow to avail himself of it. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +ENTER MADGIN JUNIOR. + + +"Beg your pardon, sir," said the landlord of The Jolly Fishers one +morning to his guest, Mr. Deedes, "but I think I have more than once +heard you say that you came from London?" + +"I do come from London," answered Mr. Deedes; "_I_ am Cockney born and +bred. I came direct from London to Windermere. But why do you ask?" + +"Simply, sir, because they are in want of a footman at Bon Repos, to +fill up the place of one who has gone away to get married. Mossoo +Platzoff don't like advertising for servants, and Mr. Cleon is at a loss +where to find a fellow that can wait at table and has some manners about +him. You see sir, the country louts about here are neither useful nor +ornamental in a gentleman's house. Now, sir, it struck me that among +your friends you might perhaps know some gentleman who would be glad to +recommend a respectable man for such a place. Must have a good character +from his last situation, and be able to wait at table; and I hope, sir, +you will pardon the liberty I've taken in mentioning it to you." + +Mr. Deedes was holding up a glass of wine to the light as the landlord +brought his little speech to a close. He sipped the wine slowly, with +his eyes bent on the floor; then he put down the glass and rubbed his +hands softly one within the other. Then he spoke. + +"It happens, singularly enough," he said, "that a particular friend of +mine--Mr. Madgin, a gentleman, I daresay, whose name you have never +heard--spoke to me only three weeks ago about one of his people for whom +he was desirous of obtaining another situation, he himself being about +to break up his establishment and go to reside on the Continent. I will +write Mr. Madgin to-night, and if the young man has not engaged himself, +I will ask my friend to send him down here. He will have a first-class +testimonial, and I have no doubt he would suit M. Platzoff admirably. I +am obliged to you, landlord, for mentioning this matter to me." + +Mr. Deedes went off at once to his room, and wrote and despatched the +following letter:-- + + "MY DEAR BOY,--I saw by an advertisement in last week's + _Era_ that you are still out of an engagement. I have an opening + for you down here in a drama of real life. It will be greatly to + your advantage to accept it, so do not hesitate for a moment. Come + without delay. Book yourself from Euston Square to Windermere. Take + steamer from the latter place to Newby Bridge. There, at the hotel, + await my arrival. Bear in mind that down here my name is _Mr. + Joshua Deedes_, and that yours is _James Jasmin_, a footman, at + present out of a situation. To a person of your intelligence I need + not say more. + + "Your affectionate father, + "S.M. + + "N.B.--This communication is secret and confidential. All expenses + paid. Do not on any account fail to come. I will be at the Newby + Bridge Hotel on Thursday morning at eleven." + +This letter he addressed, "Mr. James Madgin, Royal Tabard Theatre, +Southwark, London." Having posted it with his own hands, he went for a +long, solitary ramble among the hills. He wanted to think out and +elaborate the great scheme that had unfolded itself before his dazzled +eyes while the landlord was talking to him. He had seen the whole +compass of it at a glance; he wanted now to consider it in detail. There +was an elation in his eye and an elasticity in his tread that made him +seem ten years younger than on the previous day. + +He had requested the landlord to tell Mr. Cleon what steps he was about +to take with the view of supplying M. Platzoff with a new footman. In +these proceedings the mulatto acquiesced ungraciously. Truth to tell, he +was bored by Mr. Deedes and his friendly officiousness, and although +secretly glad that the trouble of hunting out a new servant had been +taken off his hands, he was not a man willingly to acknowledge his +obligations to another. + +Mr. Deedes set out immediately after breakfast on Thursday morning, and +having walked to the Ferry Hotel, he took the steamer from that place to +Newby Bridge. Mr. James Jasmin was at the landing-stage, awaiting his +arrival. After shaking hands heartily, and inquiring as to each other's +health, the two wandered off arm-in-arm down one of the quiet country +roads. Then Mr. Deedes explained to Mr. Jasmin his reasons for sending +for him from London, and with what view he was desirous of introducing +him into Bon Repos. The younger man listened attentively. When the elder +one had done, he said: + +"Father, this is a very pretty scheme of yours; but it seems to me that +I am to be nothing more than a cat's-paw in the affair. You have only +given me half your confidence. You must give me the whole of it before I +can agree to act as you wish. I want to hear the whole history of the +case, and how you came to be mixed up in it. Further, I want to know how +much Lady Chillington intends to give you in case you succeed in getting +back the diamond, and what my share of the recompense is to be?" + +"Dear, dear! what a headstrong boy you are!" moaned Mr. Deedes. "Why +can't you be content with what I tell you, and leave the rest to me?" + +The younger man made no reply in words, but turned abruptly on his heel +and began to walk back. + +"James! James!" cried the old man, catching his son by the coat tails, +"do not go off in that way. It shall be as you wish. I will tell you +everything. You headstrong boy! Do you want to break your poor father's +heart?" + +"Break your fiddlestick!" said Mr. Jasmin, irreverently. "Let us sit +down on this green bank, and you shall tell me all about the Diamond +while I try the quality of these cigars. I am all attention." + +Thus adjured, Mr. Deedes sighed deeply, wiped his forehead with his +handkerchief, looked meditatively into his hat for a few seconds, and +then began. + +Beginning with the narrative of Sergeant Nicholas, Mr. Deedes went on +from that point to detail by what means he had discovered that M. +Platzoff was still alive and where he was now living. Then he told of +his coming down to Bon Repos, and all that had happened to him since +that time. He had already told his son with what view he had sent for +him from London--that not being able to make any further headway in the +case himself, he was desirous of introducing his dear James, in the +guise of a servant, into Bon Repos, as an agent on whose integrity and +cleverness he could alike depend. + +"But you have not yet told your dear James the amount of the honorarium +you will be entitled to receive in case you recover the stolen Diamond." + +"What do you say to five thousand pounds?" asked Mr. Deedes in a solemn +whisper. + +The younger man opened his eyes. "Hum! A very pretty little amount," he +said, "but I have yet to learn what proportion of that sum will +percolate into the pockets of this child. In other words, what is to be +my share of the plunder?" + +"Plunder, my dear boy, is a strange word to make use of. Pray be more +particular in your choice of terms. The mercenary view you take of the +case is very distressing to my feelings. A proper recompense for your +time and trouble it was my intention to make you; but as regards the +five thousand pounds, I hoped to be able to fund it in toto, to add it +to my little capital, and to leave it intact for those who will come +after me. And you know very well, James, that there will only be you and +Mirpah to divide whatever the old man may die possessed of." + +"But, my dear dad, you are not going to die for these five-and-twenty +years. My present necessities are imperative: like the daughters of the +horse-leech, they are continually asking for more." + +"James! James! how changed you are from the dear, unselfish boy of ten +years ago!" + +"And very proper too. But do let us be business-like, if you please. The +role of the 'heavy father' doesn't suit you at all. Keep sentiment out +of the case, and then we shall do very well. Listen to my ultimatum. The +day I place the Hara Diamond in your hands you must give me a cheque for +fifteen hundred pounds." + +"Fifteen hundred pounds!" gasped the old man. "James! James! do you wish +to see me die in a workhouse?" + +"Fifteen hundred pounds. Not one penny less," reiterated Madgin, junior. +"What do you mean by a workhouse? You will then have three thousand, +five hundred pounds to the good, and will have got the job done very +cheaply. But there is another side to the question. Both you and I have +been counting our chickens before they are hatched. Suppose I don't +succeed in laying hold of the Diamond--what then? And, mind you, I don't +think I shall succeed. To begin with--I don't half believe in the +existence of your big Diamond. It looks to me very much like a hoax from +beginning to end. But granting the existence of the stone, and that it +was stolen by your Russian friend, are not the chances a thousand to one +either that he has disposed of it long ago, or else that he has hidden +it away in some place so safe that the cleverest burglar in London +would be puzzled to get at it? Suppose, for instance, that it is +deposited by him at his banker's: in that case, what are your +expectations worth? Not a brass farthing. No, my dear dad, the risk of +failure is too great, outweighing, as it does, the chances of success a +thousandfold, for me to have the remotest hope of ever fingering the +fifteen hundred pounds. I have, therefore, to appraise my time and +services as the hero of a losing cause. I say the hero; for I certainly +consider that I am about to play the leading part in the forthcoming +drama--that I am the bright particular 'star' round which the lesser +lights will all revolve. Such being the case, I do not consider that I +am rating my services too highly when I name two hundred guineas as the +lowest sum for which I am willing to play the part of James Jasmin, +footman, spy and amateur detective." + +Again Mr. Deedes gasped for breath. He opened his mouth, but words +refused to come. He shook his head with a fine tragic air, and wiped his +eyes. + +"Take an hour or two to consider it," said the son, indulgently. "If you +agree to my proposition, I shall want it put down in black and white and +properly signed. If you do not agree to it, I start back for town by +this night's mail." + +"James, James, you are one too many for me!" said the old man, +pathetically. "Let us go and dine." + +The first thing Madgin junior did after they got back to the hotel was +to place before his father a sheet of note-paper, an inkstand and a pen. +"Write," he said; and the old man wrote to his dictation:-- + + "I, Solomon Madgin, on the part of Lady Chillington, of Deepley + Walls, do hereby promise and bind myself to pay over into the hands + of my son, James Madgin, the sum of fifteen hundred pounds (L1,500) + on the day that the aforesaid James Madgin places safely in my + hands the stone known as the Hara Diamond. + + "Should the aforesaid James Madgin, from causes beyond his own + control, find himself unable to obtain possession of the said + Diamond, I, Solomon Madgin, bind myself to reimburse him in the sum + of two hundred guineas (L210) as payment in full for the time and + labour expended by him in his search for the Hara Diamond. + + "(Signed) SOLOMON MADGIN. + + "July 21st, 18--." + + +Mr. Madgin threw down the pen when he had signed his name and chuckled +quietly to himself. "You don't think, dear boy, that a foolish paper +like that would be worth anything in a court of law?" he said, +interrogatively. + +"As a legal document it would probably be laughed at," said Madgin +junior. "But in another point of view I have no doubt that it would +carry with it a certain moral weight. For instance, suppose the claim +embodied in this paper were disputed, and I were compelled to resort to +ulterior measures, the written promise given by you might not be found +legally binding, but, on the other hand, neither Lady Chillington nor +you would like to see that document copied in extenso into all the +London papers, nor the whole of your remarkable scheme for the recovery +of the Hara Diamond detailed by the plaintiff in open court, to be +talked over next morning through the length and breadth of England. +"Extraordinary Case between a Lady of Rank and an Actor." How would that +read, eh?" + +"My dear James, let me shake hands with you," exclaimed the old man with +emotion. "You are a most extraordinary young man. I am proud of you, my +dear boy, I am indeed. What a pity that you adopted the stage as your +profession! You ought to have entered the law. In the law you would have +risen--nothing could have kept you down." + +"That is as it may be," returned James. "If I am satisfied with my +profession you have no cause to grumble. But here comes dinner." + +Mr. James Madgin was first low comedian at one of the transpontine +theatres. The height of his ambition was to have the offer of an +engagement from one of the West-end managers. Only give him the +opportunity, and he felt sure that he could work his way with a +cultivated audience. When a lad of sixteen he had run away from home +with a company of strolling players, and from that time he had been a +devoted follower of Thespis. He had roughed it patiently in the +provinces for years, his only consolation during a long season of +poverty and neglect arising from the conviction that he was slowly but +surely improving himself in the difficult art he had chosen as his mode +of earning his daily bread. When the manager of the Royal Tabard, then +on a provincial tour, picked him out from all his brother actors, and +offered him a Metropolitan engagement, James Madgin thought himself on +the high road to fame and fortune. Time had served to show him the +fallacy of his expectations. He had been four years at the Royal Tabard, +during the whole of which time he had been in receipt of a tolerable +salary for his position--that of first low comedian; but fame and +fortune still seemed as far from his grasp as ever. With opportunity +given him, he had hoped one day to electrify the town. But that hope was +now buried very deep down in his heart, and if ever brought out, like an +"old property," to be looked at and turned about, its only greeting was +a quiet sneer, after which it was relegated to the limbo whence it had +been disinterred. James Madgin had given up the expectation of ever +shining in the theatrical system as a "great star;" he was trying to +content himself with the thought of living and dying a respectable +mediocrity--useful, ornamental even, in his proper sphere, but certainly +never destined to set the Thames on fire. The manager of the Tabard had +recently died, and at present James Madgin was in want of an engagement. + +As father and son sat together at table, you might, knowing their +relationship to each other, have readily detected a certain likeness +between them; but it was a likeness of expression rather than of +features, and would scarcely have been noticed by any casual observer. + +Madgin junior was a fresh complexioned, sprightly young fellow of six or +seven and twenty, with dark, frank-looking eyes, a prominent nose, and +thin mobile lips. He had dark-brown hair, closely cropped; and, as +became one of his profession, he was guiltless of either beard or +moustache. Like Mirpah, he inherited his eyes and nose from his mother, +but in no other feature could he be said to resemble his beautiful +sister. + +Father and son were very merry over dinner, and did not spare the wine +afterwards. The old man could not sufficiently admire the shrewd +business-like aptitude shown by his son in their recent conference. The +latter's extraction of a written promise by his own father was an action +that the elder man could fully appreciate; it was a stroke of business +that touched him to the heart, and made him feel proud of his "dear +James." + +"But how will you manage about waiting at table?" asked Solomon of his +son as they strolled out together to smoke their cigars on the little +bridge by the hotel. "I am afraid that you will betray your ignorance, +and break down when you come to be put to the test." + +"Never fear; I shall pull through somehow," answered James. "I am not so +ignorant on such matters as you may suppose. Geary used to say that I +did the flunkey business better than any man he ever had at the Tabard: +I have always been celebrated for my footmen. Of course I am quite aware +that the real article is very different from its stage counterfeit, but +I have actually been at some pains to study the genus in its different +varieties, and to arrive at some knowledge of the special duties it has +to perform. One of our supers had been footman in the family of a +well-known marquis, and from him I picked up a good deal of useful +information. Then, whenever I have been out to a swell dinner of any +kind, I have always kept my eye on the fellows who waited at table. So +what with one thing and what with another, I don't think I shall make +any very terrible blunders." + +"I hope not, or else Mr. Cleon will give you your _conge_, and that will +spoil everything. Further, as regards the mulatto, I have a word or two +to say to you. It is quite evident to me that he is the presiding genius +at Bon Repos. If you wish to retain your situation you must pay court to +him far more than to M. Platzoff, with whom, indeed, it is doubtful +whether you will ever come into personal contact. You must therefore, my +dear boy, swallow your pride for the time being, and take care to let +the mulatto see that you regard him as a patron to whose kindness you +hold yourself deeply indebted." + +"All that I can do, and more, to serve my own ends," answered the son. +"Your words are words of wisdom, and shall live in my memory." + +Mr. Madgin stopped with his son till summoned by the whistle of the last +steamer. The two bade each other an affectionate farewell. When next +they met it would be as strangers. + +Mr. Cleon and the landlord were enjoying the cool of the evening and +their cigars outside the house as Mr. Deedes walked up to The Jolly +Fishers. He stopped for a moment to speak to them. + +"I had a note this morning from my friend Mr. Madgin, of Deepley Walls," +he said, "in which that gentleman informs me that the young man, James +Jasmin, will be with you in the course of the day after to-morrow at the +latest. He hopes that Jasmin will suit you, and he is evidently much +pleased that a position has been offered him in an establishment in +every way so unexceptionable as that of Bon Repos." + +The mulatto's white teeth glistened in the twilight. Evidently he was +pleased. He muttered a few words in reply. Mr. Deedes bowed courteously, +wished him and the landlord a very good night, and withdrew. + +Late in the afternoon of the day but one following that of his visit to +Newby Bridge, as Mr. Deedes was busy with a London newspaper three or +four days old, the landlord ushered a young man into his room, who, with +a bow and a carrying of the forefinger to his forehead, announced +himself as James Jasmin, from Deepley Walls. + +"Don't you go, landlord," said Mr. Deedes; "I may want you." Then he +deliberately put on his gold-rimmed glasses, and proceeded to take a +leisurely survey of the new corner, who was dressed in a neat (but not +new) suit of black, and was standing in a respectful attitude, and +slowly brushing his hat with one sleeve of his coat. + +"So you are James Jasmin, from Deepley Walls, are you?" asked Mr. +Deedes, looking him slowly down from head to feet. + +"Yes, sir, I am the party, sir," answered James. + +"Well, Jasmin, and how did you leave my friend Mr. Madgin? and what is +the latest news from Deepley Walls?" + +"Master and family all pretty well, sir, thank you. Master has got a +tenant for the old house, and the family will all start for the +Continong next week." + +"Well, Jasmin, I hope you will contrive to suit your new employer as +well as you appear to have suited my friend. Landlord, let him have some +dinner, and he had better perhaps wait here till Mr. Cleon comes down +this evening." + +When Mr. Cleon arrived a couple of hours later, Jasmin was duly +presented to him. The mulatto scrutinised him keenly and seemed pleased +with his appearance, which was decidedly superior to that of the +ordinary run of Jeameses. He finished by asking him for his +testimonials. + +"I have none with me, sir," answered Jasmin, discreetly emphasising the +_sir_. "I can only refer you to my late master, Mr. Madgin, of Deepley +Walls, who will gladly speak as to my qualifications and integrity." + +"That being the case, I will take you for the present on the +recommendation of Mr. Deedes, and will write Mr. Madgin in the course of +a post or two. You can go up to Bon Repos at once, and I will induct you +into your new duties to-morrow." + +Jasmin thanked Mr. Cleon respectfully and withdrew. Ten minutes later, +with his modest valise in his hand, he set out for his new home. He and +Mr. Deedes did not see each other again. Next day Mr. Deedes announced +that he was summoned home by important letters. He bade the landlord and +Cleon a friendly farewell, and left early on the following morning in +time to catch the first train from Windermere going south. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +MADGIN JUNIOR'S FIRST REPORT. + + +Mr. Madgin senior lost no time after his arrival at home before +hastening up to Deepley Walls to see Lady Chillington. He had a brief +conference with Mirpah while discussing his modest chop and glass of +bitter ale; and he found time to read a letter which had arrived for him +some days previously from the London diamond merchant whom he had +employed to make inquiries as to whether any such gem as the Great Hara +had been offered for sale at any of the great European marts during the +past twenty years. The letter was an assurance that no such stone had +been in the market, nor was any such known to be in the hands of any +private individual. + +Mr. Madgin took the letter with him to Deepley Walls. In her grim way +Lady Chillington seemed greatly pleased to see him. She was all +impatience to hear what news he had to tell her. But Mr. Madgin had his +reservations; he did not deem it advisable to detail to her ladyship +step by step all that he had done. Her sense of honour might revolt at +certain things he had found it necessary to do in furtherance of the +great object he had in view. He told her of his inquiries among the +London diamond merchants, and read to her the letter he had received +from one of them. Then he went on to describe Bon Repos and its owner +from the glimpses he had had of both. For all such details her ladyship +betrayed a curiosity that seemed as if it would never be satisfied. He +next went on to inform her that he had succeeded in placing his son as +footman at Bon Repos, and that everything now depended on the +discoveries James might succeed in making. But nothing was said as to +the false pretences and the changed name under which Madgin junior had +entered M. Platzoff's household. Those were details which Mr. Madgin +kept judiciously to himself. Her ladyship was perfectly satisfied with +his report; she was more than satisfied--she was pleased. She was very +sanguine as to the existence of the diamond, and also as to its +retention by M. Platzoff; far more so, in fact, than Mr. Madgin himself +was. But the latter was too shrewd a man of business to parade his +doubts of success before a client who paid so liberally, so long as her +hobby was ridden after her own fashion. Mr. Madgin's chief aim in life +was to ride other people's hobbies, and be well paid for his jockeyship. + +"I am highly gratified, Mr. Madgin," said her ladyship, "by the style, +_plein de finesse_, in which you have so far conducted this delicate +investigation. I will not ask you what your next step is to be. You know +far better than I can tell you what ought to be done. I leave the matter +with confidence in your hands." + +"Your ladyship is very kind," observed Mr. Madgin, deferentially. "I +will do my best to deserve a continuance of your good opinion." + +"As week after week goes by, Mr. Madgin," resumed Lady Chillington, "the +conviction seems to take deeper root within me that that man--that +villain--M. Platzoff, has my son's diamond still in his possession. I +have a sort of spiritual consciousness that such is the case. My waking +intuitions, my dreams by night, all point to the same end. You, with +your cold, worldly sense, may laugh at such things; we women, with our +finer organisation, know how often the truth comes to us on mystic +wings. The diamond will yet be mine!" + +"What nonsense women sometimes talk," said Mr. Madgin contemptuously to +himself as he walked back through the park. "Who would believe that my +lady, so sensible on most things, could talk such utter rubbish. But +women have a way of leaping to results, and ignoring processes, that is +simply astounding to men of common sense. The diamond hers, indeed! +Although I have been so successful so far, there is as much difference +between what I have done and what has yet to be done as there is between +the simple alphabet and a mathematical theorem. To-morrow's post ought +to bring me a letter from Bon Repos." + +To-morrow's post did bring Mr. Madgin a letter from Bon Repos. The +writer of it was not his son, but Cleon. It was addressed, as a matter +of course, to Deepley Walls, of which place the mulatto had been led to +believe Mr. Madgin was the proprietor. The note, which was couched in +tolerable English, was simply a request to be furnished with a +testimonial as to the character and abilities of James Jasmin, late +footman at Deepley Walls. Mr. Madgin replied by return of post as +under:-- + + "Deepley Walls, July 27th. + + "SIR,--In reply to your favour of the 25th inst, inquiring + as to the character and respectability of James Jasmin, late a + footman in my employ, I beg to say that I can strongly recommend + him, and have much pleasure in so doing, for any similar + employment under you. Jasmin was with me for several years; during + the whole time I found him to be trustworthy, sober and intelligent + in an eminent degree. Had I not been reducing my establishment + previous to a lengthened residence in the south of Europe, I should + certainly have retained Jasmin in the position which he has + occupied for so long a time with credit to himself and with + satisfaction to me. + + "I have the honour, sir, to remain, + "Your obedient servant, + "SOLOMON MADGIN. + + "---- CLEON, Esq., +"Bon Repos, Windermere." + + +After writing and despatching the above epistle, over the composition of +which he chuckled to himself several times, Mr. Madgin was obliged to +wait, with what contentment was possible to him, the receipt of a +communication from his son. But one day passed after another without +bringing news from Bon Repos, till Mr. Madgin grew fearful that some +disaster had befallen both James and his scheme. At length he made up +his mind to wait two days longer, and should no letter come within that +time, to start at once for Windermere. Fortunately his anxiety was +relieved and the journey rendered unnecessary by the receipt, next day, +of a long letter from his son. It was Mirpah who took it from the +postman's hand, and Mirpah took it to her father in high glee. She knew +the writing and deciphered the post-mark. For once in his life Mr. +Madgin was too agitated to read. He put his hand to his side, and +motioned Mirpah to open the letter. + +"Read it," he said in a husky voice, as she was about to hand it to him. +So Mirpah sat down near her father and read what follows:-- + + "Bon Repos, July + "(some date, but I'll be hanged if I know what). + + "MY DEAR DAD,--In some rustic nook reclining, silken + tresses softly twining, Far-off bells so faintly ringing, While we + list the blackbird singing, Merrily his roundelay. There! I + composed those lines this morning during the process of shaving. I + don't think they are very bad. I put them at the beginning of my + letter so as to make sure that you will read them, a process of + which I might reasonably be doubtful had I left them for the fag + end of my communication. Learn, sir, that you have a son who is a + born poet!!! + + "But now to business. + + "Don't hurry over my letter, dear dad; don't run away with the idea + that I have any grand discovery to lay before you. My epistle will + be merely a record of trifles and commonplaces, and that simply + from the fact that I have nothing better to write about. To me, at + least, they seem nothing but trifles. For you they may possess an + occult significance of which I know nothing. + + "In the first place. On the day following that of your departure + from Windermere, I was duly inducted by Cleon into my new duties. + They are few in number, and by no means difficult. So far I have + contrived to get through them without any desperate blunder. + Another thing I have done of which you will be pleased to hear: I + have contrived to ingratiate myself with the mulatto, and am in + high favour with him. You were right in your remarks; he is worth + cultivation, in so far that he is all-powerful in our little + establishment. M. Platzoff never interferes in the management of + Bon Repos. Everything is left to Cleon; and whatever the mulatto + may be in other respects, so far as I can judge he is quite worthy + of the trust reposed in him. I believe him to be thoroughly + attached to his master. + + "Of M. Platzoff I have very little to tell you. Even in his own + house and among his own people he is a recluse. He has his own + special rooms, and three-fourths of his time is spent in them. + Above all things he dislikes to see strange faces about him, and I + have been instructed by Cleon to keep out of his way as much as + possible. Even the old servants, people who have been under his + roof for years, let themselves be seen by him as seldom as need be. + In person he is a little, withered-up, yellow-skinned man, as dry + as a last year's pippin, but very keen, bright and vivacious. He + speaks such excellent English that he must have lived in this + country for many years. One thing I have discovered about him, that + he is a great smoker. He has a room set specially apart for the + practice of the sacred rite to which he retires every day as soon + as dinner is over, and from which he seldom emerges again till it + is time to retire for the night. Cleon alone is privileged to enter + this room. I have never yet been inside it. Equally forbidden + ground is M. Platzoff's bedroom, and a small study beyond, all _en + suite_. + + "Those who keep servants keep spies under their roof. It has been + part of my purpose to make myself agreeable to the older domestics + at Bon Repos, and from them I have picked up several little facts + which all Mr. Cleon's shrewdness has not been able entirely to + conceal. In this way I have learned that M. Platzoff is a confirmed + opium-smoker. That once, or sometimes twice, a week he shuts + himself up in his room and smokes himself into a sort of trance, in + which he remains unconscious for hours. That at such times Cleon + has to look after him as though he were a child; and that it + depends entirely on the mulatto as to whether he ever emerges from + his state of coma, or stops in it till he dies. The accuracy of + this latter statement, however, I must beg leave to doubt. + + "Further gossip has informed me, whether truly or falsely I am not + in a position to judge, that M. Platzoff is a refugee from his own + country. That were he to set foot on the soil of Russia, a + life-long banishment to Siberia would be the mildest fate that he + could expect; and that neither in France nor in Austria would he be + safe from arrest. The people who come as guests to Bon Repos are, + so I am informed, in nearly every instance foreigners, and, as a + natural consequence, they are all set down by the servants' gossip + as red-hot republicans, thirsting for the blood of kings and + aristocrats, and willing to put a firebrand under every throne in + Europe. In fact, there cannot be a popular outbreak against bad + government in any part of Europe without M. Platzoff and his + friends being credited with having at least a finger in the pie. + + "All these statements and suppositions you will of course accept + _cum grano salis_. They may have their value as serving to give you + a rude and exaggerated idea as to what manner of man is the owner + of Bon Repos; and it is quite possible that some elements of truth + may be hidden in them. To me, M. Platzoff seems nothing more than a + mild old gentleman; a little eccentric, it may be, as differing + from our English notions in many things. Not a smiling fiend in + patent boots and white cravat, whose secret soul is bent on murder + and rapine; but a shy valetudinarian, whose only firebrand is a + harmless fusee wherewith to light a pipe of fragrant cavendish. + + "One permanent guest we have at Bon Repos--a guest who was here + before my arrival, and of whose departure no signs are yet visible. + That is why I call him permanent. His name is Ducie, and he is an + ex-captain in the English army. He is a tall, handsome man of four + or five and forty, and is a thorough gentleman both in manners and + appearance. I like him much, and he has taken quite a fancy to me. + One thing I can see quite plainly; that he and Cleon are quietly at + daggers drawn. Why they should be so I cannot tell, unless it is + that Cleon is jealous of Captain Ducie's influence over Platzoff; + although the difference in social position of the two men ought to + preclude any feeling of that kind. Captain Ducie might be M. + Platzoff's very good friend without infringing in the slightest + degree on the privileges of Cleon as his master's favourite + servant. On one point I am certain: that the mulatto suspects Ducie + of some purpose or covert scheme in making so long a stay at Bon + Repos. He has asked me to act as a sort of spy on the Captain's + movements; to watch his comings and goings, his hours of getting up + and going to bed, and to report to him, Cleon, anything that I may + see in the slightest degree out of the common way. + + "It was not without a certain inward qualm that I accepted the + position thrust upon me by Cleon. In accepting it, I flatter myself + that I took a common-sense view of the case. In the _petit_ drama + of real life in which I am now acting an uneventful part, I look + upon myself as a 'general utility' man, bound to enact any and + every character which my manager may think proper to entrust into + my hands. Now, you are my manager, and if it seem to me conducive + to your interests (you being absent) that, in addition to my + present character, I should be a 'cast' for that of spy or amateur + detective, I see no good reason why I should refuse it. So far, + however, all my Fouche-like devices have resulted in nothing. The + Captain's comings and goings--in fact, all his movements--are of a + commonplace and uninteresting kind. But I have this advantage, that + the character I have undertaken enables me to assume, with Cleon's + consent, certain privileges such as under other circumstances would + never have been granted me. Further, should I succeed in + discovering anything of importance, it by no means follows that I + should consider myself bound to reveal the same to Cleon. It might + be greatly more to my interest to retain any such facts for my own + use. Meanwhile, I wait and watch. + + "Thus you will perceive, my dear dad, that an element of + interest--a dramatic element--is being slowly evolved out of the + commonplace duties of my position. This nucleus of interest may + grow and develop into something startling; or it may die slowly out + and expire for lack of material to feed itself upon. In any case, + dear dad, you may expect a frequent feuilleton from + + "Your affectionate Son, + "J.M. (otherwise JAMES JASMIN). + + "P.S.--I should not like to be a real flunkey all my life. Such a + position is not without its advantages to a man of a lazy turn, but + it is terribly soul-subduing. Not a sign yet of the G.H.D." + +"There is nothing much in all this to tell her ladyship," said Mr. +Madgin, as he took off his spectacles and refolded the letter. "Still, I +do not think it by any means a discouraging report. If James's patience +only equal his shrewdness and audacity, and if there be really anything +to worm out, he will be sure to make himself master of it in the course +of time. Ah! if he had only my patience, now--the patience of an old man +who has won half his battles by playing a waiting game." + +"Is it not possible that Lady Chillington may want you to read the +letter?" + +"It is quite possible. But James's irreverent style is hardly suited in +parts for her ladyship's ears. You, dear child, must make an improved +copy of the letter. Your own good taste will tell you which sentences +require to be altered or expunged. Here and there you may work in a neat +compliment to your father; as coming direct from James, her ladyship +will not deem it out of place--it will not sound fulsome in her ears, +and will serve to remind her of what she too often forgets--that in +Solomon Madgin she has a faithful steward, who ought to be better +rewarded than he is. Write out the copy at once, my child, and I will +take it up to Deepley Walls the first thing to-morrow morning." + +(_To be continued_.) + + + + +ABOUT THE WEATHER. + + +Why is it that we in England talk so much about the weather? One reason, +I suppose, is because we are shy and awkward in the presence of +strangers, and the weather is a safe subject far removed from +personalities of any kind. Then the variableness of our climate +furnishes an opportunity for comment which does not exist in countries +where for months there is not a cloud in the sky, and you can tell long +before what kind of weather there will be on any particular day. + +Whatever else may be said of our English climate, it cannot be accused +of monotony. You are not sure of seeing the same sky every morning you +arise, than which there is no greater source of ennui. Those of us who +have lived long abroad know how tired we got of a cloudless blue sky. We +can sympathise with the sailor who, on returning to London from the +Mediterranean, joyfully exclaimed--"Here's a jolly old fog, and no more +of your confounded blue skies!" Certainly we could do with a little more +sunshine in England than we get. It is not true that while we have much +weather we have no sunshine, but we have not as much of it as many of us +would like. Still England is not as bad as some places; for instance, +Halifax, Nova Scotia, where they have nine months' winter and three +months' bad weather. Indeed, the English takes rather a good place +amongst the climates of the world. It is free from extremes, and allows +us to go out every day and at all hours. + +However, judging from the way we grumble, it would seem that we are +anything but satisfied with our climate. + +_Scene_--Drawing-room at Scarborough. Melissa (writing): "Aunty, +darling, how do you spell damnable?" "Good gracious, darling, never use +such a word. I am surprised." "Well, but, auntie, I am writing to papa, +to tell him about the weather." "Oh, well, my darling, I suppose I may +tell you. D-a-m-n-a-b-l-e; but remember that you must not use the word +except to describe the weather." + +I suppose the clerk of the weather office has long ago ceased trying to +satisfy us in this matter. What seems wretched weather to one person +makes another happy. Cold, that the young enjoy because it makes them +feel their vitality to the tips of their fingers, is death to the old. +Those who are fond of skating look out of the windows of their bedrooms, +hoping to see a good hard frost. The man who has three or four hunters +"eating their heads off" in the stable wishes for open weather, so that +he and they may have a run. The farmer says that frost is good for his +land; the sportsman, who has hired an expensive shooting, does not like +it. A young lady enjoys her walk and looks her best on a fine frosty +morning; but she should not forget that the weather which is so +pleasant to her puts thousands of people out of work. + +Idle people feel changes of weather most. A man who lives a busy life in +a hot climate once said to me: "I do not know why people growl about the +heat; for my part, I have no time to be hot." And if the energetic feel +heat less than do the indolent, they certainly feel cold less. They are +too active to be cold; and perhaps it is easier to make oneself warm in +a cold climate than cool in a hot one. + +A man who had been complaining because it had not rained for a good +while, when the rain did come then grumbled because it did not come +sooner. The rich, however, rather than the poor, talk of the "wretched +weather," because they have fewer real sorrows to grumble at. Indeed, +the poor often set an example of cheerfulness and resignation in this +matter which is very praiseworthy. "What wretched weather we are +having!" said a man to an old woman of his acquaintance whom he passed +on the road. "Well, sir," she replied, "any weather is better than +none." Fuller tells us of a gentleman travelling on a misty morning who +asked a shepherd--such men being generally skilled in the physiognomy of +the heavens--what weather it would be. "It will be," said the shepherd, +"what weather shall please me." Being asked to explain his meaning, he +said, "Sir, it shall be what weather pleaseth God; and what weather +pleaseth God, pleaseth me." + +The people who are most satisfied with their climate are the Australians +and New Zealanders. I never met one of them who did not, in five +minutes, begin to abuse the English climate and glorify his own. They +will not admit that it has a single fault, though we have all heard of +the hot winds that make the Australian summer terribly oppressive. The +fact is that every country has a bad wind, or some other kind of +supposed drawback, which is very trying to strangers, but which, whether +they know it or not, suits the inhabitants. God knows better than we do +the sort of weather that each country should have. + +What are we to say about the winter we have lately been enduring? Well, +it was very "trying" for us all, and an even stronger word might be used +by the poor, the aged, and the delicate. Still, let us remember that +without omniscience it is impossible to say whether any given season is +good or bad. So infinitely complex are the relations of things that we +are very bad judges as to what is best for us. How do we know that our +past winter of discontent may not be followed by a glorious summer, and +that the two may not be merely antecedent and consequent, but in some +degree cause and effect? + +On no other subject are people so prone to become panegyrists of the +past as in this matter of the weather. "Ah," they say, "we never now +have the lovely summers we used to have." Reading the other day +Walpole's Letters, I discovered that so far from the summers in his day +being "lovely," they were not uniformly better than the winters: "The +way to ensure summer in England," he writes, "is to have it framed and +glazed in a comfortable room." This remark was made of the summer of +1773; that of 1784 was not more balmy, judging from the same writer's +comment: "The month of June, according to custom immemorial, is as cold +as Christmas. I had a fire last night, and all my rosebuds, I believe, +would have been very glad to sit by it." + +Here is another weather grumble from the same quaint letter-writer: "The +deluge began here but on Monday last, and then rained nearly +eight-and-forty hours without intermission. My poor bag has not a dry +thread to its back. In short, every summer one lives in a state of +mutiny and murmur, and I have found the reason: it is because we will +affect to have a summer, and have no title to any such thing." + +This reminds us of Quin, who, being asked if he had ever seen so bad a +winter, replied: "Yes, just such an one last summer." If people could be +satisfied about the weather, this sort of summer ought to have pleased +the Irishman who, as he warmed his hands at a fire remarked: "What a +pity it is that we can't have the cold weather in the summer." + + + + +SERENADE. + + + "Come out! the moon is white, and on the river + The white mist lies; + The twilight deepens, and the stars grow brighter + In the pure, perfect skies; + The dewy woods with silent voices call you; + Come out, heart of my heart, light of my eyes! + + "Come out, for where you are not, beauty is not; + Come out, my Dear! + See how the fairies will adorn the meadows + The moment you draw near; + And the world wear that robe and crown of glory + It never wears except when you are here." + + In vain!--a little light among the jasmine + Her lattice gleams, + Her white hand at the closing of it lingers + A moment--so it seems-- + To drop an unseen rose down to her lover: + White rose--whose scent will sanctify his dreams! + +E. NESBIT + + + + +A PHILANTHROPIST. + +BY ANGUS GREY. + + +I. + +"And when I had your own bottle finished, Doctor, an ould man that was +passing by to the fair of Kinvarra told me that there was nothin' in the +world so good for a stiff arm as goose's grease or crane's lard, +rendered, rubbed in, and, says he, in a few days your arm will be as +limber as limber. So I went to the keeper at Inchguile, and he shot a +crane for me; but there wasn't so much lard in it as I thought there'd +be, because it was just after rearing a chitch." + +"Well, we must try and get you a better one next time," said the Doctor, +nodding farewell to his loquacious patient, one of those non-paying ones +who look on a "dispensary ticket" as conveying an unlimited right of +discourse on the one hand and attention on the other. But the Doctor was +just now in a position of vantage, being seated on his car, on which he +slowly jogged out of sight, leaving the victim of rheumatism who had +stopped him still experimentally rubbing the joints of his arm. + +It was the first of June by the calendar, but the outward signs of the +season were but slightly visible in that grey West Country, where stones +lay as the chief crop in the fields and innumerable walls took the place +of hedges, and a drizzling mist from the Atlantic hid all distant +outlines. + +The Doctor had been all day face to face with such cheerless +surroundings, and was on his way homewards. But presently he stopped at +the entrance of a little "boreen," where a wrinkled, red-skirted dame +was standing sentry, leaning on a stout blackthorn stick. "Is it me +you're looking out for, Mrs. Capel?" he asked. "I hope Mary is no worse +to-day." + +"She's the one way always," was the reply; "and it wasn't of you I was +thinking, Doctor, but standing I was to watch that ruffian of a pig of +Mr. Rourke's that had me grand cabbages eat last night, and me in Cloon +buying a pound of madder to colour a petticoat. Ah, then, look at him +now standing there by the wall watching me out of the corner of his +eye!" and flourishing her stick the energetic old lady trotted off to +the attack. + +"I may as well go in and see Mary," muttered the Doctor, tying the reins +to an isolated gate-post, and walking up the narrow lane to the thatched +cottage it led to. + +"God save all here," he said, putting his head in over the half-door. + +"God save you kindly," was the reply from an old man in corduroy +knee-breeches and a tall hat, who sat smoking a short pipe in the deep +chimney-corner, and watching with interest the assault of various hens +and geese upon the heap of potato-skins remaining in a basket-lid which +had done duty as a dinner-table. + +The Doctor passed through to a little room beyond, whitewashed and +containing a large four-post bed. The invalid, a gentle, +consumptive-looking girl, lay on the pillows and smiled a greeting to +the Doctor. + +His eye, however, passed her, and rested with startled curiosity on a +visitor who was sitting by her side, and who rose and bowed slightly. +The stranger was a lady, young and slight, with dark eyes and hair and a +small, graceful head. He guessed at once she must be Miss Eden, the new +Resident Magistrate's sister, of whose ministrations to the poor he had +heard much since his return from his late holiday. + +He stopped awkwardly, rather confused at so unexpected a meeting; but +the stranger held out her hand, and looking up at him said: "I am so +glad you have come back; we have wanted you so much." + +The Doctor did not answer. The sweet, low voice, with no touch of Irish +accent, was a new sound to him, the little hand that she gave him was +fairer and smaller and more dainty than any he had ever touched. To say +the truth, his early farm-house life and his hospital training and +dispensary practice had not brought him into contact with much +refinement, and this girl with her slight, childlike figure and soft, +earnest eyes seemed to him to have stepped from some unreal world. Then, +finding he still held the little hand, he blushed and let it go. + +"How are you getting on, Mary?" he asked, turning to his patient. + +"Middling, sir, thank you," said the girl. "I do have the cough very bad +some nights, but more nights it's better; and the lady, may God enable +her, has me well cared." + +"I could not do much," said the lady, with an appealing glance, "and you +must not be angry with me for meddling with your patients. But now that +you have come I am sure Mary will be better." + +"Don't be troubling yourself about me," said the sick girl, gently. +"I'll never be better till I see Laurence again." + +"Oh, don't be giving yourself up like that," said the Doctor, cheerily; +"we won't let you die yet awhile." + +"I won't die," she answered, gravely, "till the same day that Laurence +died: the 13th of September. There's no fear of me till then." + +She looked tired, and her visitors left, the Doctor telling his new +acquaintance as they walked down the lane what a strong, bright girl +this had been till a year ago, when her brother had died of consumption. +From that day her health had begun to fail, the winter had brought a +cough, and Easter had found her kept to her bed. It was a hopeless case, +he thought, though she might linger for a time. + +"Indeed, and she's a loss to us," put in old Mrs. Capel, who had now +joined them, having returned from her pursuit of the predatory pig. "She +was a great one for slavin', and as strong as any girl on the estate, +but she did be frettin' greatly after her brother, and then she got cold +out of her little boots that let in the water, and there she's lying +now, and couldn't get up if all Ireland was thrusting for it." + +The mist had now turned to definite rain, and Louise Eden accepted "a +lift" on the Doctor's car, as he had to pass her gate in going home. His +shyness soon wore off as the girl talked to him with complete ease and +simplicity, first of some of his poor patients, then of herself and her +interest in them. + +She was half-Irish, she said, her mother having come from this very West +Country, but she had lost both her parents early and been brought up at +school and with English relatives. Lately her brother, or rather +step-brother, having been made an R.M. and appointed to the Cloon +district, had asked her to live with him, and this she was but too happy +to do. She had always longed to give her life to the poor and especially +the Irish poor, of whose wants she had heard so much. She had even +thought of becoming a deaconess, but her friends would not hear of it, +and she had been obliged to submit herself to their conventional +suburban life. "But here at last," she said, "I find my hands full and +my heart also. These people welcome me so warmly and need so much, the +whole day is filled with work for them; and now that you have come, Dr. +Quin," she added, smiling at him, "I can do so much more, for you will +tell me how to work under you and to nurse your patients back to health +again." + +It was almost dark when they came to the gate of Inagh, the house +usually tenanted by the Resident Magistrate of the day, and here Louise +Eden took leave of her new acquaintance, again giving him her hand in +its little wet glove. The Doctor watched her as she ran lightly towards +the house. She wore a grey hat and cloak, and the rough madder-dyed +skirt of the peasant women of the district. None of the "young ladies" +he had hitherto met would have deigned to appear in one of these fleecy +crimson garments, so becoming to its present wearer. She turned and +waved her hand at the corner of the drive, and the Doctor having gazed a +moment longer into the grey mist that shrouded her, went on his journey +home. + +His little house on the outskirts of Cloon had not many outward charms, +being built in the inverted box style so usual in Ireland. A few bushes +of aucuba and fuchsia scarcely claimed for the oblong space enclosed in +front the name of a garden. But within he found a cheerful turf fire, +and his old housekeeper soon put a substantial meal on the table. + +"Any callers to-day, Mamie?" he asked as he sat down. + +"Not a one, sir, only two," was the reply. "The first was a neighbouring +man from Killeen that was after giving himself a great cut with a +reaping-hook where he was cutting a few thorns out of the hedge for to +stop a gap where the cows did be coming into his oatfield. Sure I told +him you wouldn't be in this long time, and he went to Cloran to bandage +him up." + +"And who was the other, Mamie?" + +"The second first, sir, was a decent woman, Mrs. Cloherty, from Cranagh, +with a sore eye she has where she was cuttin' potatoes and a bit flew up +and hot it, and she's after going to the Friars at Loughrea to get a rub +off the blessed cross, but it did no good after." + +The old woman rambled on, but the Doctor gave her but a divided +attention. He laughed and blushed a little presently to find himself +gazing in the small round mirror that hung against the wall, his +altitude of six feet just bringing his head to its level. The face that +laughed and blushed back at him was a pleasant one: frank, blue eyes and +a square brow surmounted by wavy fair hair were reflected, and the glad +healthfulness of four-and-twenty years. He had been looked on as a +"well-looking" man in his small social circle of Galway and Dublin, and +had laughed and joked and danced with the girls he had met at merry +gatherings, but without ever having given a preference in thought to one +above another. Certainly no eyes had ever followed him into his solitude +as the dark ones first seen to-day were doing. + +He went out presently, the rain having ceased, and sauntered down the +unattractive "Main Street" of Cloon. + +The shops were shut, save those frequent ones which added the sale of +liquor to that of more innocent commodities. In one a smart-looking +schoolboy was reading the _Weekly Freeman_ aloud to a group of +frieze-coated hearers. At the door of another a ballad-singer was +plaintively piping the "Mother's Farewell," with its practical +refrain:-- + + "Then write to me often, _and send me all you can_, + And don't forget where'er you are that you're an Irishman." + +The Doctor might at another time have joined and enlivened one of the +listless groups standing about, but, after a moment or two of +hesitation, he turned his back to them and walked in the direction of +the gate of Inagh. "There's Mrs. Connell down there, that I ought to go +and see; she's always complaining," he said to himself, in self-excuse. +But having arrived at her cottage, he saw by a glance at the unshuttered +window that his visit would be a work of supererogation, as she was +busily engaged in carding wool by the fireside, the clear light of the +paraffin lamp, which without any intervening stage of candles had +superseded her rushlight, showing her comely face to be hale and hearty. + +Half unconsciously the young man passed on, crossed a stile and walked +up a narrow, laurel-bordered path towards the light of another window +which was drawing him, moth-like, by its gleam. It also, though in the +"Removable's" house, was unshuttered, testifying to the peaceful state +of the district. He could see a cheerful sitting-room, gay with flowers +and chintzes, the light of a shaded lamp falling on Louise Eden's fair +head, bent over a heavy volume on the table, an intrusive white kitten +disputing her attention with it. He drew back, with a sudden sense of +shame at having ventured so far, and hurried homewards to dream of the +fair vision the day had brought him. + +It was the beginning of an enchanted summer for the young Doctor. Day +after day he met Miss Eden, at first by so-called accident; but soon +their visits were pre-arranged to fall together at some poor cottage, +where she told him he could bring healing or he told her she could bring +help. + +She had thrown herself with devotion into the tending of the poor. "I +have wasted so many years at school," she would say, "just on learning +accomplishments for myself alone; but now I have at last the chance of +helping others I must make the most of it, especially as it is in my own +dear Ireland." + +"The lady" was soon well known amongst the neglected tenants of an +estate in Chancery. Her self-imposed duties increased from day to day. +The old dying man would take no food but from her hands. The Doctor +found her at his house one evening. She had cut herself badly in trying +to open a bottle for him, and was deadly pale. "I can't bear the sight +of blood," she confessed, and fainted on the earthen floor. It was with +gentle reverence that he carried her out and laid her on the cushions of +his car, spread by the roadside; but the sweet consciousness of having +for that one moment held her in his arms never left him when alone. In +her presence her frank friendliness drove away all idle dreams and +visions. + +It was on a Sunday afternoon of September that Dr. Quin and Louise Eden +met again sadly at the house where they had first seen each ocher, that +of the Capels. They were called there by a sudden message that the poor +girl Mary was dying, and before they could obey the summons she had +passed away. + +The little room was brighter now; a large-paned window, the gift of her +ministering friend, let the light fall upon the closed eyes. At the foot +of the bed hung a beautiful engraving of the Magdalen at the Saviour's +feet, while a bunch of tea-roses in a glass still gave out their +delicate fragrance. Neighbours were beginning to throng in, but gave +place to "the lady." The old father silently greeted her and wrung her +offered hand, but moved away without speaking. The mother, staying her +loud weeping, was less reserved. + +"It's well you earned her indeed, miss," she said; "and she did be +thinking of you always. The poor child, she was ill for near ten months, +but I wouldn't begrudge minding her if it was for seven year. Sure I got +her the best I could, the drop of new milk and a bit o' white bread and +a grain o' tea in a while, and meself and the old man eatin' nothin' but +stirabout, and on Christmas night we had but a herrin' for our dinner, +not like some of the neighbours that do be scattering. Sure we never +thought she was goin' till this morning, when she bid us send for the +priest. And when she saw the old man crying, 'Father,' says she, 'don't +fret. I'll soon be in Heaven praying for you with me own Laurence.' Sure +she always said she'd die on the same day as him, and she didn't +after--it was of a Saturday he died and this is a Sunday." + +Louise and the Doctor looked up suddenly at each other. This was indeed +the 13th of September, the day on which Laurence Capel had last year +passed away. + +They presently left the house of mourning, soon to become, by sad +incongruity, a house of feasting, Louise leaving a little money for "the +wake" in the old woman's hands. They walked towards home together, the +Doctor leading his horse. + +"I hope there is nothing wrong, Miss Eden," he asked after a little, +noticing how abstracted and depressed she seemed. + +"Yes," she answered; "I have had news that troubles me. My brother has +written to tell me that he is going to marry the lady at whose house he +has been staying in Yorkshire; and that, as she has a large property +there, he will give up his Irish appointment. They offer me a home, and +I am sure they would be very kind. But what troubles me is the thought +of leaving Cloon, where I have learned to help the people and to love +them. I can never settle into a dull, selfish, luxurious life again." +Her eyes filled with tears as she spoke. + +The young man's heart beat fast. Might he--might he dare to lay himself +at her feet? He nervously played with the horse's mane and said +tremulously, "We can never do without you now, Miss Eden. We should all +be lost without you." + +He paused and looked at her. She was gazing sadly at the distant blue +outline of the Clare hills, and the sun sinking behind them flashed upon +her tearful eyes. She was on the other side of the horse and a little in +advance, and he could not, had he dared, have touched her hand. The +words came out suddenly: + +"We can never do without you here: I can never do without you. Will you +stay with me? I haven't much to offer you: two hundred pounds a-year is +all I am earning now, and I may soon get the hospital. I can't give you +what you are used to; but if I had the whole world and its riches, it's +to you I would bring them." + +She had stopped now and listened to him, startled. Then she turned +again, looked at the tranquil hills and the far-stretching woods of +Inchguile, and the smoke curling from many a poor hearthstone. A vision +flashed across her mind of a life spent here in the country she had +learned to love, amongst the people she longed to succour, with for a +helper the strong, skilful man who had stood with her by so many beds of +sickness. Then she thought of what her future would be in a luxurious +English household. She could see the well-regulated property, the tidy +cottages, where squire and parson would permit her help, but not need +it. An old woman looked from her doorway as they passed and said: "God +speed ye! God bring ye safe home and to heaven!" + +They had come to the high road now, and as they stopped to let a drove +of cattle pass, she turned and met the Doctor's wistful eyes with a +flash of enthusiasm in hers. + +"I will stay," she said. "I will give my life to Cloon and its poor!" + +Then, as they reached the stile which led into Inagh, she crossed it +lightly and walked up the narrow path, scarcely remembering to look back +before she was out of sight and wave her hand in farewell to her happy +lover. + +Happy was not, perhaps, the word to describe him by. A sudden rapture +had swept over him, blinding his vision, when she had said, "I will +stay." Yet now that she was out of sight without having deigned him one +touch of her hand, one soft word, he felt as if all had been a dream; +and was also conscious of a feeling, too subtle to be formed into a +thought, that there was something wanting in this supreme moment which +surely is not wanting when two hearts for the first time know themselves +to be beating for each other. But she had always been such an object of +worship to him, as one beyond his sphere, that he remembered how far +away she had been from him but yesterday, and that doubtless the +ordinary rules of love must be put aside when one so high stooped to +crown the life of so unworthy a worshipper. + + +II. + +Colonel Eden returned that evening, and for some days Louise was +constantly occupied with his affairs, driving and walking with him and +listening to his plans and projects, and thus giving up her own solitary +expeditions and visits. + +She was glad of the excuse to do this. The moment of exaltation in which +she had resolved to devote her life to these poor Galway peasants had +passed away, and though she kept pictures before her mind of a redeemed +district, and children brought up in health and cleanliness instead of +disease and dirt, and home industries taking the place of the idleness +that followed spasmodic labour, misgivings entered with them as she saw +herself no longer "the lady" who stooped from a high level, but a mere +doctor's wife (she would not admit even to her thoughts the undesirable +title of "Mrs. Quin"), living in that small staring house at the +entrance of the town. Of one thing she was certain, she could not +possibly suggest such an idea to her brother. She could imagine too well +his raised eyebrows and sarcastic words. She must wait until he had +broken all ties with the neighbourhood, and then she could come back +without consulting him. Her affianced husband's personality she kept as +much as possible in the background. He was to be her fellow in good +works, her superior in the skill and knowledge of a healer. She had only +seen him during her ministrations to the poor, only talked with him of +their needs and his own aspirations, had hardly looked on him as a being +in whom she could take a personal interest, until that moment in the +sunset when she had in the impulse of a moment linked her life to his. + +A dread began to creep over her of seeing him again. How should she meet +him? Could she still keep him at a fitting distance? Would he not feel +that he had some claim upon her even now? + +One morning, hearing wheels, she looked up from her half-hearted study +of an Irish grammar and saw the well-known car and the bony grey horse +appearing. To fly out by the back door, catching up her hat on the way +was the work of a second. She ran down the laurel walk, crossed the +stile, and was soon safely on her way to the Inchguile woods. + +She was overtaken presently by a frieze-coated man, Martin Regan, who, +though an Inchguile tenant and out of her usual beat, she had met once +or twice, his bedridden father having sent to beg a visit from her. +Their holding was a poor one enough, but by constant hard work the son +had managed to keep things going. She knew the old woman who ruled in +the house was his stepmother, but had not noticed any want of harmony in +the family. Rumours, however, had reached her lately that the old man +had been making a will, by which he left the farm and all his +possessions to his wife, who had already written to recall her own son +from America to share the expected legacy with her. + +These rumours came back to the mind of Louise Eden as she noticed the +trouble in Martin Regan's face. + +"I was just going up to speak to your honour, miss," he said, "when I +seen you going through the gate, so I followed you to tell of the +trouble I'm in." + +"Is what I have heard true, then?" asked Louise. "Surely your father +could not be so unjust as to leave the farm you have worked on so hard +away from you?" + +"It's true indeed, miss," said Martin. "And I'm after going to the agent +about it, for Sir Richard is away, and if he could hear of it--he's a +good landlord and would never see me wronged. But he says all the power +is gone from the landlord now, and that if the old man was to leave the +land to Parnell or another and away from all his own blood the law +couldn't stop him. So God help us! I dunno at all what'll I do." + +"Had you any quarrel with your father that led to this?" asked Louise, +with sympathy that won the confidence of her companion, who had walked +on with her to the woods, where their path was brilliantly bordered by +the opaque red berries of the mountain ash, and the transparent hues of +the guelder-rose. + +"None at all," was the answer. "They made the will unknownst to me, and +they have the little farm and the little stock, and all there is left to +themselves, and for me nothing but the outside of the door and the +workhouse." + +"Do you think they threatened him or used force?" suggested the girl. + +"Did they force him to do it, is it? They did not. But it's too much +whisky and raisin cakes they had, and me coming into the house after +selling a sick pig. I never heard word or sound about it till a +neighbouring man told me they were gathered in the house with the +priest, and looking for a witness, and I went in, and Peter Kane was in +the house preparing to sign his name, and I took him by the neck and +threw him out of the door, and the stepmother she took me by the skin of +the shirt, and gave me a slap across the face with the flat of her hand, +and I called Peter Kane to witness that she struck me, and he said he +never saw it. And why? Because he had a cup of whisky given him before, +and believe me, when he turned about, it smelled good! After that, no +decent man could be found to sign his name, till they got two paid men. +Sure there's schemers about that 'ud hang you up for half a glass of +whisky." + +"And who drew up the will?" inquired Miss Eden. + +"The curate, Father Sheehy that did it. Sure our own priest would never +have done it, but it was a strange curate from the County Mayo. And I +asked him did he know there was such a one as me in the world, and he +said he never did. Then yourself'll need forgiveness in heaven, Father, +says I, as well as that silly old man." + +"Could you not speak quietly to your father about it?" suggested Louise. + +"Sure I never see the old man but when I go into the room in the morning +to wipe my face with the little towel after washing it, and he don't +speak to me himself, but to himself he do be speaking. And the old woman +says to me, 'Go down now to your landlord and see what he can do for +you;' and I said I will go, for if he was at home, there was never a +bishop or a priest or a friar spoke better and honester words to me than +his honour's self." + +Martin Regan paused to take breath and wipe his mouth with his coat +sleeve, and after a moment's abstracted gaze at the vista of tall fir +trees before him, burst out again: + +"And now it's whisky and tea for the old woman, and trimmings at two +shillings the yard for the sister's dress, and what for Martin? what for +the boy that worked for them the twelve months long? Me that used to go +a mile beyond Cloon every morning to break stones, and to deal for two +stone o' meal every Saturday to feed the childer when there was nothing +in the field. And it's trying to drive me from the house now they are, +and me to wet my own tea and to dress my own bed, and me after wringing +my shirt twice, with respects to ye, after working all the day in the +potato ridges." + +"Could no one influence your stepmother; has she no friends here?" asked +Louise, much moved. + +Martin Regan laughed bitterly. + +"Sure she never belonged to the estate at all," he said, "but came in +the middle of the night on me and the little sister sitting by the +little fire of bushes, and me with a little white coat on me. And we +never knew where she came from, and never brought a penny nor a blanket +nor a stitch of clothes with her, and our own mother brought seventy +pounds and two feather beds. And now she's stiffer than a woman that +would have a hundred pounds. And now the old man's like to die, and +maybe he won't pass the night, and where'll I be? Sure if he would keep +him living a little longer he might get repentance." + +"Had you not better ask the Doctor to see him?" said Louise. "He might +bring him round for a time, and then we must do our best for you." + +"I was thinking that myself," said Regan; "and I believe I'd best go +look for him now; I might chance to find him at home. I heard the old +woman had the priest sent for; but, sure, he's wore out anointing +him--he threatened to die so often. But he's worse now than ever I saw +him." And taking off his hat with many expressions of gratitude, he left +Louise to finish her walk alone. + +An hour or two later she returned, her hands full of sprays and berries +as an excuse for her wanderings. The Colonel was smoking contentedly on +the bench outside the door. + +"Ah, Louise," he said, "you have missed your friend the Doctor you were +so full of when you wrote to me. He seemed to want to see you--I suppose +to have a crack about some of your patients; so I asked him to come and +dine this evening." + +No escape now! Louise bit her lip, and proceeded to arrange her berries. + +"He seems an intelligent young man," the Colonel went on; "rather +good-looking, if he had a drill-sergeant to teach him to hold himself +up; and I hear he doesn't drink, which can't often be said of these +dispensary doctors." + +The red deepened in the girl's face. How could she ever say, "This is +the man I have promised to marry?" With much uneasiness she looked +forward to dinner-time. Dr. Quin sent no apology; nay, was worse than +punctual. He came in rather shyly, looking awkward in a new and +ill-fitting evening suit, for which he had put aside his usual rough +homespun. Louise, furious with herself for having blushed as he +appeared, gave him a cold and formal reception. + +Dinner began uncomfortably for all three, as the Colonel, who had +trusted to his sister to entertain their guest, found himself obliged to +exert his own powers of conversation. The Doctor's discomfort was +intensified by what seemed to one of his simple habits the unusual +variety of courses and dishes. His fish-knife embarrassed him; he waited +to use fork or spoon until he had watched to see which implement was +preferred by his host. He chose "sherry wine" as a beverage; and left a +portion of each viand on his plate, in the groundless fear that if he +finished it he would be pressed to take a further supply. When dessert +was at last on the table, he felt more at ease; his host's genial manner +gave him confidence; and he was led on to talk of his work and prospects +at Cloon, of the long drives over the "mountainy roads," and the often +imaginary ailments of the patients who demanded his attendance, and +their proneness when really ill to take the advice of priest or +passer-by on sanitary matters rather than his own. "But I'll get out of +it, I hope, some day," he said, looking at Louise; "when I get a few +more paying patients and the infirmary, I can give up the dispensary." + +Louise listened, dismayed. It was the thought of succouring the poor and +destitute that had led her to make the resolve of marrying their +physician; and he now dreamed of giving up his mission amongst them! He, +poor lad, only thought for the moment of how he might best secure a home +for his fair bride not too much out of harmony with her present +surroundings. + +"And are you pretty sure of the infirmary?" asked the Colonel with an +appearance of warm interest. + +"Well, I'm not rightly sure," was the answer. "I have a good deal of +promises and everybody knows me, and the other man, Cloran, is no doctor +at all--only took to it lately. Sure his shop in Cloon isn't for +medicine at all, but for carrot-seed and turnip-seed and every +description of article. But there's bribery begun already; and +yesterday, Mr. Stratton asked one of the Guardians to keep his vote for +me, and says he, 'how can I when I have the other man's money in my +pocket?'" + +"And where did you learn doctoring?" asked the Colonel. + +"Well, I walked St. James' Hospital in Dublin three years; and before +that I was in the Queen's College, Galway, where I went after leaving +the National School in Killymer." + +"Were you well taught there?" inquired his host. + +"I was indeed. I learned a great deal of geography and arithmetic. +There's no history taught at all though, nor grammar. But you'll wonder +how good the master was at mathematics, and he nothing to look at at +all. His name was Shee," went on the Doctor, now quite over his shyness; +"and he was terrible fond of roast potatoes. I remember he used to put +them in the grate to roast and take them out with two sticks, for in +those days there were no tongs; and one day I brought four round stones +in my pocket and put them in the grate as if they were potatoes to roast +for myself. By-and-by, he went over and took the stick and raked out one +of them, and took it up in his hand and rubbed it on his trousers (so) +to clean it, and not a tint of skin was left on his hand. And I out of +the door and he after me, and I never dared go to the school again till +my grandfather went before me to make peace." + +The Colonel laughed heartily and was proceeding further to draw out his +ingenuous guest, but Louise, visibly impatient, rose to leave the room. +She was chafing with shame and mortification. Had she ever thought of +becoming the wife of that man with his awkward manners and Connaught +brogue? Certainly she had never realised what it meant. She could never +look her brother in the face again if the idea of the engagement should +dawn on him. How could she escape it? Carry it out she could not. All +her enthusiastic wish to spend her life in making this poor district +better was now overshadowed by the unendurable thought of what her +promise entailed. + +Presently the Doctor came in alone, Colonel Eden having gone to write a +letter he wished to send by late post. He came forward at first gladly, +then timidly, repelled by the girl's cold expression as she stood by the +fire in her long white dress. She felt that her only chance of avoiding +dangerous topics was in plunging into the subject of their mutual +patients. + +"Did Regan find you in time to bring you to his father?" she asked. + +"He found me," said the Doctor; "but I told him I couldn't come before +to-morrow as I was to dine here. I thought there was no occasion for +hurry." + +"But did he tell you how much depends on his father's life?" said +Louise, unconsciously glad to find something definite at which she might +show displeasure. "Do you not know of the unjust will he has made, and +that if he dies now his son will be disinherited?" + +"He was telling me about it, but there's no danger of his dying yet +awhile," answered the Doctor, unaware of the gathering storm. "That old +man has a habit of dying; he was often like that before." + +"I thought it was your duty to go at once when you are told there is +urgent necessity," said Louise, with heightened colour; "and until now I +thought it was your pleasure also." + +"I'd have gone quick enough, Miss Eden, if I'd known _you_ were so +anxious about it," was the rather unfortunate reply; "and I'll go now +this minute if you wish me to." + +"My wishes are not in question," said the girl, yielding to the +irritation she felt against herself and against him; "but if you neglect +the call of the dying on such a trivial plea as a dinner invitation, I +do not think you are justified in holding the position you do." + +Colonel Eden at this moment came in, and the Doctor, feeling he had +given offence, but rather puzzled as to the cause, asked at once that +his car might be ordered, as he had to go and see a patient some way +off. + +"So late, and on such a dark night!" said the Colonel, good-naturedly; +"surely he could wait till to-morrow. Don't you think so, Louise?" + +"I have no opinion to give on the matter," said his sister, coldly. + +She was now really vexed by the young man's quick obedience to what he +interpreted to be her wish. He had no sooner taken leave than she went +to her room and burst into sobs of mortified pride and real perplexity. + +A day or two passed by during which she stayed in the house and garden. +The Colonel was away, doing duty for some fellow "Removable" absent on +leave. On his return he told his sister that he had found a letter +awaiting him calling for his immediate return to Yorkshire on business +connected with settlements. + +"I must go the day after to-morrow," he said; "and would it not be a +good plan, Louise, for you to come with me and make friends with Agnes?" + +A light flashed in the girl's eyes. Was not this a way of escape for +her? Oh, that she might leave Cloon while no one knew of the momentary +folly that now she blushed to remember! + +She quickly assented, and next morning began to make her preparations. +She knew, though she would not confess to the knowledge, that she was +saying good-bye for ever to Inagh, the bright little home where she had +been so happy; but a thought of changing her resolution never crossed +her mind. She still nervously dreaded a visit from the man she was +conscious she was about to wound cruelly, and in the afternoon, hearing +wheels, was relieved to see only her brother driving up. He had called +for a cup of tea, having to drive on and wind up some business at +another village in his jurisdiction. + +"I was sorry to hear of Dr. Quin's accident," he said as he waited. "I +hope it is not so serious as they say." + +"What accident?" asked Louise, startled. + +"Oh, did you not hear that the night he dined here he went on up that +narrow road to Ranahasey to see some old man, and in the dark he was +thrown off his car and the wheel went over him? They brought him back to +Cloon on the car; which was a mistake, and must have caused him agony. +Dr. Cloran, his rival, is looking after him, and seems rather puzzled +about the case, and says if he is not better to-morrow he will send to +Limerick for further advice. I am very sorry, for he seemed an +intelligent, good-hearted young fellow." + +Louise remained alone, sick at heart. What had she done? Had she +brought upon this poor lad, in return for his worship of her, actual +bodily injury even before the keener pain that was to follow? + +The dignified letter of dismissal and farewell she had been meditating +all day became suddenly inadequate. She must ask his pardon and break to +him very gently the hard sentence of renunciation and separation. Keen +remorse took hold of her as she remembered his gentle ways with the sick +and suffering, his strength and wisdom, when fighting against disease +and death. Oh that she had never come across his path, or that she had +had a mother or friend to warn her of the dangerous precipice to which +she was unconsciously leading him. What could she do now? She could not +write to him, not knowing into what hands the letter might fall. She +could not leave him to hear by chance next day of her departure. It was +growing dark, and there was no time to lose. She would go to his house, +and at all events leave a message for him. It was hardly a mile away, +and she was not likely to meet anyone on the road. + +The low terraced hills looked bleak and dreary, a watery sky above them. +The pale sunset gleams were reflected in the pools of water on the +roadside, not yet absorbed into the light limestone soil. The straggling +one-sided street forming the entrance to Cloon looked more squalid than +usual, the houses more wretched under their grass-grown thatch, the +gleam and ring from the smithy the only touch of light and sound that +relieved their gloom. + +Louise Eden walked up the little path to the Doctor's house, and, +knocking at the door, asked the old woman who appeared for news of her +master. + +"Indeed, he's the one way always," was the reply; "no better and no +worse since they brought him and laid him on the bed. You'd pity him to +see him lying there, me fine boy." + +"Will you give him a message from me?" asked Louise. "Will you say I +have come to ask how he is, and to say good-bye, as I am going back to +England?" + +"He'll be sorry for that, indeed," said the old woman. "Sure, you'd best +go up and see him yourself." + +"Oh, no," said Louise, shrinking back, "unless--his life is not in +danger, I hope?" + +"Danger, is it," echoed old Mamie, indignantly, though not without a +momentary glance of uneasiness. "Why would he be in danger? Sure he +wasn't so much hurted as that. He bled hardly at all only for a little +cut on the head, and sure he has all he wants, and a nurse coming from +Dublin and one of the nuns sitting with him now. It'd be a bad job if he +was in danger, only twenty-four year old, and having such a nice way of +living, and, indeed, he has the prayers of the poor. Go up the stairs +and see him--here's his reverence coming, and might want me," she +continued, as a car stopped at the gate. + +Reluctantly, yet not knowing how to draw back, and unwilling to meet +the priest, whom she knew slightly, Louise went up the narrow staircase. +She knocked at a door standing ajar, and hearing a low "come in," +entered. It was a small bare room enough, no carpet save one narrow +strip, whitened walls, and a great fire smouldering under the +chimney-board of black painted wood. Even at that first glance she +noticed that the only attempt at ornament was a vase containing a bunch +of the red-seeded wild iris; she remembered having gathered and given it +to the Doctor a little time before as a "yerb" sometimes in request +amongst his patients. + +The fading light fell on the low iron bed upon which the young man lay, +propped up with pillows. His face was much altered by these two or three +days of suffering. The fair hair was covered by a bandage and the blue +eyes looked larger for the black shades beneath them. But as he saw who +his visitor was, a smile, very sweet and radiant, lighted them up, and a +little colour came into the pallid cheeks. A nun, dressed in black and +with a heavily-veiled bonnet half concealing her face, sat by his +bedside, and looked with curiosity at the girl as she came in and gave +her hand to the patient. + +"I have come to ask how you are," she said, "and to tell you how very +sorry I am--we are--for your accident. I am doubly grieved because--" +and she stopped, embarrassed at having to speak before a third person. +The Doctor's eyes were fixed on her face with the same glad smile. + +"_I_ wanted to see you," he said gently, "but I never thought you would +come to this poor place. I wanted to tell you I had seen old Regan +before I was hurt, and I did my best for him, and I think he won't die +yet awhile." + +"I am sorry," began Louise again, and then hesitated. How could she +explain for how much she was sorry? How could she at this moment make +any explanation at all? "I am going away," she went on--"I am going to +England with my brother to-morrow. I have come to say good-bye." + +The eyes that rested on her lost none of their glad look of content; she +was not sure if her words had been understood, and went on talking +rather hurriedly of her brother's arrangements, and who was to take his +place, and of the long journey to Yorkshire. + +"And now I must go," she concluded, "for I have a good deal to do at +home." + +The hand which lay on the counterpane sought a little packet beside the +pillow. + +"This was for you," he said, handing it to her. + +She said good-bye again, and went slowly away; but, turning at the door, +she was filled once more with keen remorse at the sight of the strong +frame laid low, and the glance that followed her was so full of +wistfulness that she felt that she would have stooped and, in asking +forgiveness, have kissed the white-bandaged brow, if it had not been for +the nun's silent presence. + +It was not until late at night that she remembered and opened the little +packet. It contained a massive marriage ring, such as were used by the +fisher-folk on the Galway coast. She was troubled at seeing it. The +strong-clasped hands and golden heart were an emblem that vexed her. She +felt that while she kept it she could not be free from the promise she +had given, and that her farewell could not have been understood as a +final one. She determined to leave it at the Doctor's house as she +passed to-morrow, and wrote, to enclose with it, a letter, penitent, +humble, begging forgiveness for the wrong she had thoughtlessly done to +so good and loyal a friend. She did not care now if others read it; she +must confess her desertion and implore pardon. The letter was blotted +with tears as she folded it round the heavy ring. + +But that ring of betrothal was never returned. In the morning, as +Colonel Eden and his sister drove for the last time into Cloon, they saw +groups of frieze-coated men and blue-cloaked women whispering together +with sad faces, and a shutter being closed over each little shop window. + +And when they came to the Doctor's house they saw that the blinds were +all drawn down. + + + + +SONNET. + + + Our life is one long poem. In our youth + We rise and sing a noble epic song, + A trumpet note of sound both clear and strong, + With idyls now and then too sweet for truth. + A lyric of lament, it swells along + The tide of years, a protest 'gainst the wrong + Of life, an unavailing cry for ruth, + A wish to know the end--the end forsooth! + 'Tis not on earth. The end which makes or mars + The song of life, we who sing seldom know. + That end is where, beyond the pale fair stars + Which have looked down so calmly on our woe, + Eternal music will set right the jars + Of all that sounds so harsh and sad below. + +JULIA KAVANAGH. + + + + +THE BRETONS AT HOME. + +BY CHARLES W. WOOD, F.R.G.S., AUTHOR OF "IN SUNNY CLIMES," "LETTERS +FROM MAJORCA," ETC. ETC. + + +We were very sorry to leave Morlaix. The old town had gained upon our +affections. We had found the Hotel d'Europe very comfortable, and Mr. +and Mrs. Hellard kind and attentive beyond praise. The indiscretions of +that fatal night were more than effaced and forgotten. Morlaix, at the +time of the Fair, was a Pandemonium: at the Regatta, if not exactly +Paradise, it was at least very lively and amusing; whilst, when neither +Fair nor Regatta was in question, Morlaix was full of the charm of +repose; a sleepy atmosphere that accorded well with its old-world +outlines. + +[Illustration: FISHWOMEN, BRITTANY.] + +Not least was our regret at saying good-bye to Catherine. She was an +original character, who had much amused and entertained us. There was a +vein of humour in her composition which the slightest touch brought to +the surface. The solemnity of her features never relaxed, and whilst she +made others laugh, and laugh again, her own face would invariably be +grave as a judge's. It was also a pleasure--in these days of +incapacity--to meet with a woman who managed the affairs of her little +world with all the discretion of a Prime Minister. + +"Ces messieurs are going to Quimper," she exclaimed that last morning. +We were alone in the dining-room, taking an early breakfast. Our small +side-table faced the end window, and we looked upon the old square, and +the canal, where a long row of women were already washing, beating, +rinsing their linen, their white caps conspicuous, their voices raised +in laughter that rippled down the troubled waters. It was a lively +scene; very picturesque; very suited to the old town. + +"Ces messieurs are going to Quimper," said Catherine, speaking the name +in the very italics of scorn. "They would do much better to remain in +Morlaix, where at least there is a good hotel, and a Catherine who is +ready to serve them night and day. But human nature is curious and must +see everything. One house is like another; one street like another; the +sea coast is the same everywhere; the same water, the same air, the same +sky; but just because one shore is a bay and the other a point, because +one coast is flat and the other has cliffs, mankind must rush about and +call it seeing the world." + +"Would you have us stay here for ever?" we asked, amused at Catherine's +idea of life and travel. + +"Well, no," she acknowledged; "I suppose not. It would hardly do. +Morlaix, after all, is not exciting. Only I am sorry you are going, and +it makes me unjust to the rest of the world," she acknowledged. "We +shall have a quiet time all this week, and I could have served you +better than I did last. But I don't like Quimper. There is not a decent +hotel in the place, and I wouldn't live there for a hundred francs a +week. I cannot breathe there; I grow limp. It has a dreadful river right +in front of the hotels--you will have benefit. I have heard that there +are seventy-two separate smells in Cologne--in Quimper the seventy-two +are concentrated into one." + +This was not encouraging; but we knew that as Catherine's strong nature +saw things in extremes, so her opinions had to be taken cum grano salis. +In spite of what she said, we departed with much hope and expectation. + +Everyone assisted in seeing us off the premises. They declared it to be +a melancholy pleasure, a statement hard to reconcile with their beaming +faces. Catherine alone was grave and immovable as the Man with the Iron +Mask. Yet she actually presented us--this downright, determined, +apparently unromantic woman--with buttonholes of small white roses tied +up with white ribbon: ribbon that in our grandmothers' days, I believe, +was called _love_ ribbon. + +"We shall look quite bridal," we said, as she placed them in the +destined receptacle next our hearts. "Catherine, why have you never +married?" + +Catherine laughed. "Thereby hangs a tale," she replied, actually +blushing. "It has not been for want of offers, you may be sure; I might +have married twenty times over had I so wished." And so we gathered that +Catherine, too, had had her little romance. Perhaps it had helped to +form her character, and develop her capacities. "And now, be sure that +some day you come back to Morlaix," she added, as she finally +accomplished her delicate task to her satisfaction. + +"Shall we find you here?" we asked. "You may have married and gone +away." + +"To toil and slave like Madame Mirmiton!" cried Catherine. "I would not +marry if it was the President of the Republic, or even the Marquis de +Carabas. Besides, who would have me at my age? No? no! I know when I am +well off. Men, do you see, are not angels; they are much nearer allied +to the opposite, sauf votre respect! Of course, _gentlemen_, I admit, +_are_ angels--sometimes. But then, no gentleman would have me. No; I am +a fixture, here, every bit as much as the doors and the windows. +Monsieur and Madame and the hotel would go to ruin without me." + +And, although Monsieur and Madame assisted at this conference, +Catherine's statement went uncontradicted. She was certainly their right +hand, and added no little to the popularity of the establishment. + +Finally we were off. The omnibus took our traps, whilst we walked up +Jacob's Ladder. We let our gaze linger and rest upon all the old +familiar points; the quaint gables, the dormer windows in the red, red +roofs; the latticed panes, behind which life must seem less sad and +sorrowful than it really is; the antiquarian and his old curiosities. He +knew we were leaving, and was on the look-out for us. The pale, +spiritual face stood out conspicuously amidst its surroundings: the +spiritual strangely contrasting with the material. The eyes looked into +ours with their sad, dreamy, far-away gaze, so full of the pain and +suffering of life. Behind him stood his Adonis of a son, the flush of +genius making the countenance yet more beautiful. Perched on his +shoulder was the cherub. He held out his arms as soon as he saw us, and +seemed quite ready to go forth with us and, as Catherine would have +said, see the world. Some of the old Louis Quatorze furniture had been +transferred from the seclusion of the monastery to the glitter of the +outer world, and here found a temporary repose. + +"You are leaving," said the old antiquarian sadly--but his tones were +always sad. "I am sorry. I am always sorry when anyone leaves who +possesses the true artistic temperament. The town feels more deserted. +There are so many things around us that appeal only to the few. But you +have made quite a long stay amongst us; people generally come one day +and depart the next. And now you are bound for Quimper?" + +"Yes. What shall we find there?" + +"Much that is interesting; the loveliest church in Brittany; many quaint +and curious houses and perspectives; some things that are better than +Morlaix, but nothing better than our Grande Rue. Brittany has nothing +better than that in its way; nothing so good. Du reste, comparisons +should never be made. But you will find few antiquities in Quimper--and +no old antiquarian," he added with a quiet smile. + +"I am under the impression," said H.C., a sensitive flush mantling to +his poetical and expressive eyes, "that some of these good people are +mistaking us for dealers in curiosities, and fancy that this is our +object in travelling." + +[Illustration: QUIMPER.] + +"What would your aunt, Lady Maria, say to her nephew's being so +degraded?" we asked. + +"She would diminish her supply of crystallised violets," he returned. +"You know she lives by weight--Apothecaries' Weight--and measures +everything she takes. She would put a few grains less into the balance, +and incense her rooms." + +All the same, I thought him mistaken, and asked the old antiquarian the +plain question. He smiled; the nearest approach we ever saw him give to +a laugh. + +"No, sirs," he replied; "I have not so far erred. We do not make those +mistakes. Besides, you have too much love and veneration for the +beautiful. Indeed we know with whom we have to deal, and in our little +way possess a knowledge of the world." + +But time and tide wait for no man. Our hour was up; the omnibus had +rumbled past us, and we had to depart. We reluctantly turned away from +this interesting group. The rift within the lute was probably busy with +household matters above, and no discordant element marred our farewell. +But we were sad, for we felt that somehow here was being lost and wasted +a great deal of that true talent which is so rare in the world. + +The train rolled away from Morlaix. We had a long journey before us; a +journey right through the heart of Finistere. The first portion of it as +far as Landerneau had already been taken; the remainder was new ground. +The trains are slow and lingering in Brittany; this goes without saying, +and has already been said; but patience was an easy virtue. In spite of +Catherine, new ground must always be interesting. + +The guard had put us into a compartment at Morlaix containing two +people; a young bride and bridegroom or an engaged couple; we could not +be quite sure at which stage they had arrived. The train was almost in +motion and we had no time to change. The gentleman glared at us, and we +felt very uncomfortably in the way. At the next station we left and went +into the next compartment, which contained nothing but a priest reading +his breviary; a dignified ecclesiastic; proving once more that there is +only one step from the ridiculous to the sublime. We carefully removed +all our small traps, including H.C.'s numerous antique parcels. But he +forgot his umbrella, which he had placed up in the rack. A dreadful +umbrella, which had been a martyrdom to me ever since we had left +England. An umbrella that was only fit for a poet or a Mrs. Gamp; huge, +bulky, tied round like a lettuce, with half a yard of stick above the +material, and a crane's head for a handle with a perpetual grin upon it +that was terribly irritating. H.C. called it one of his antiquities, and +was proud of it. When he had first bought it he had offered it to his +aunt, Lady Maria, for a carriage sunshade, who straightway went off into +one of her fainting fits, and very nearly disinherited him. At Quimper I +could stand it no longer, and when his back was turned, I quietly put +it up the chimney. There it no doubt still remains, unless it has +suffered martyrdom in the flames, in return for the martyrdom it had +inflicted upon others. But I am dating forward. + +This horrible apparition he left in the rack of the first compartment. I +saw the omission, and was delighted to think that we had at last got rid +of the encumbrance. Had I only remembered the tale of the Eastern +Slippers I might have taken warning. The train went off; he took a +sketch of the priest, and then hastily looked round. + +"My umbrella!" he exclaimed in an agony. "Where is it? You have not +thrown it out of window?" + +My will had been good to do it many a time, as the familiar saying runs; +but he carried a stick as well as an umbrella, and he was five times as +strong as I. + +"You may have left it at Morlaix," I suggested. "Now I come to think of +it--" + +"The next compartment," he interrupted. "I distinctly remember putting +it up in the rack, and thinking how quaint and pretty the crane's head +looked as it gaped through the netting." + +It is always so. The fateful crossness of events pursues us through the +world. The only time when he should have been absent-minded and +oblivious, his memory served him well. At the next station he got out +for his umbrella, and returned after quite a long interval, not looking +exactly triumphant; rather flushed and uncomfortable; but in proud +possession of the horror. + +"I had quite a difficulty in getting it back," he said. "They had +actually put it up and were sitting under its shade. He complained of +the glare of the sunshine. You see, although these are first-class +compartments, there are no blinds to the windows. So very public." + +"But the morning is grey," I observed. "There is no sunshine." + +H.C. looked out; he had not observed the absence of sunlight. + +"Oh, well," he returned, doubtfully, "perhaps it was the draught they +complained of. You know I am rather dull at French, and have to make a +shot at a good deal that's said. Any way," he added, with a frank look +of innocence, "I am sure they are only an engaged couple, not married. +Married people wouldn't sit in a railway carriage under one umbrella. +She's very pretty--I wonder whether she's very fond of him? It looks +like it. One compartment--one umbrella. It was _my_ umbrella--then _I_ +ought to have had his place," he added dreamily, as if in some way or +other he felt that something was wrong and the world was a little out of +joint. + +The priest looked up from his breviary. I should have thought he +understood English, only that his expression was rather comical than +reproving. I changed the subject and asked him a question. He +immediately closed his book and disposed himself for conversation We +found him an extremely intellectual and entertaining companion He +intimately knew both Brittany and the Breton character. + +"I am not a Breton," he said in reply to a remark, "but I have lived +amongst them for thirty years. My early days were passed in Paris, and +to live in Paris up to the age of twenty-one is alone an education. My +father was X----, the great minister of his time. My grandfather went +through all the horrors of the French Revolution. He saw the beautiful +head of Marie Antoinette roll into the sawdust; heard the last footfall +of Charlotte Corday as she ascended the scaffold. He always said that +she was one of our most heroic martyrs, and as she walked patiently and +full of courage to her doom, the expression of a saint upon her +features. She was a saint, more worthy of canonisation than some who are +found in the calendar. He was a young man in those days, but its horrors +turned his hair white. Later on he was of great assistance to Napoleon, +although we have always been Royalists. But he held that it was well to +sacrifice private opinion for the good of one's country. It is of no use +fighting against the stream. Life is short, the present only is ours; +therefore why waste the present in vainly wishing for what is not?" + +"And you have chosen neither sword nor portfolio?" we observed. + +"'The lot is cast into the lap,'" he quoted. "I was to have been a +soldier, but just at that moment my sight failed. I was threatened with +blindness. Fortunately it passed off with time, and I now see better +than I did at twenty. But my career as a soldier was ended. I had no +taste for politics--the world is not sufficiently honest. It seems to me +a constant struggling for party and power rather than an earnest union +of hearts and minds to do one's very best for King and country, avienne +que pourra. And as extremes meet in human nature just as they sometimes +meet in the physical world, so I, throwing aside the sword, took to the +cowl. Yes; I withdrew from the world; I entered a monastery; the severe +order of the Trappists. But I made a mistake--I did not know myself. A +life of seclusion, of inactivity, could never be mine. I should have +become demoralised. Half the men who enter monasteries make the same +mistake, but they have not the courage to withdraw. I went back into the +world before my novitiate was six months over. Not to forsake religion, +but to enter the Church." + +"We have heard of you as a great preacher," we remarked. + +"I believe that it is my vocation," he returned with a smile which quite +illumined his face. "Heaven has bestowed upon me the gift of sympathy; I +have influence with my fellow mortals--Heaven grant that I use it well. +I first touch their hearts, then I have gained their minds. This is +especially necessary with the good Breton folk. They are fervently +religious, but not intellectual. They are sterling, but narrow-minded +and superstitious. Nor did I choose my sphere of action; it was placed +before me and I accepted it. I would rather have preached to Parisian +congregations, the refined and cultivated of the earth; but I should +probably not have done more good--if I have done good at all--and it +might have been a snare to me. I might have grown worldly; +intellectually proud; too fond of the good things of this life at the +tables of the rich and great. All that is not possible in Brittany. With +us, more or less, it is Lent all the year round, intellectually as well +as physically. We need very few indulgences from his Holiness." + +There was something extremely winning about him. It must have been the +charm of character, for he had long passed the charm of youth. His hair, +worn long, was white as snow; he must have been verging upon sixty. His +face was pale and very pure in expression; his eyes were large, dark, +and singularly soft and luminous, without a trace of age about them, or +of their early weakness. He was tall and powerfully made, and a tendency +to embonpoint only added to his dignity and importance. He had a fund of +quiet humour about him also, which made him an excellent companion. + +[Illustration: OLD MILL, LANDERNEAU.] + +"We should much like to hear you preach," we said. "Is there no chance +of our doing so?" + +"I am bound for Quimper," he returned; "so are you. Next Sunday I shall +preach in the cathedral, and if you are still there your wish may easily +be gratified." + +"We are Protestant," I remarked. "You will look upon us as a heretic." + +"Indeed, no," he returned quickly. "I am not so narrow-minded as some of +my cloth. One is of Paul, another of Cephas. I would not even try to +convert you, though I am aware that my Church demands it. But to a +certain extent man must be a free agent and judge for himself. I do not +hold with my Church in all things. We are all bound for the same goal, +just as two rivers flowing from opposite directions may empty themselves +into one sea. All roads lead to Rome--it would be sad if only one road +led to Heaven." + +Thus the hours passed swiftly and pleasantly. The country on either side +was diversified and interesting. Occasionally a river, flowing to the +sea, reflected the sky and clouds above, giving poetry to the landscape. +Now hills and gently sloping undulations, here rocky and barren, there +fringed with trees whose graceful curves and branches were traced +against the pale background of sky. Again there were long stretches of +plain, dreary and monotonous, sad and sombre, like the Breton character. + +The peasantry, indeed, are much influenced by their climate, by the sad +aspect of the long reaches of field and plain that so often meet their +gaze, unbroken perhaps by any other object than a cross or calvary +erected under religious influence in days gone by. And these very +crosses, beautiful in themselves, have a saddening tendency, reminding +them constantly of the fact that here they have "no continuing city." +These wide reaches, artistically, are full of tone and beauty, but here +again they are at fault. They know nothing of "tone," of "greys and +greens;" they only know that the general influence is melancholy; that +the sun shines too seldom in their skies, and that those skies too often +weep. They cannot argue and analyse; cannot tell why the tendency of +their nature, individually and collectively, is grave and sombre; +reasoning is beyond them, and if they think of it at all, they arrive at +the truth by instinct. For instinct takes the place of reason, and +gradually dies out as the higher powers of the intellect are developed. + +They stood out here and there in the fields, few and far between, very +picturesque objects; something sad and patient in their very attitudes. +But it was not the time for ploughing and seed-sowing, when they are +seen to greatest advantage; for what is more picturesque than a peasant +following a plough drawn by the patient oxen, who are never, like so +many of the men and women of the world, "unequally yoked together." Here +and there a woman would be kneeling in the fields, her favourite +attitude when minding cattle; kneeling and knitting; there they stay +from sunrise to sunset, their mind a blank; vegetating; expecting +nothing better from life; untroubled by the mysterious problems that +disturb and perplex so many of us; in very many ways so much to be +envied; escaping the heritage of those more richly endowed: the mental +and spiritual pain and oppression of existence. + +The day passed on and we approached Quimper. We thought of Catherine and +wondered what we should find awaiting us. Much, according to her, that +would be better avoided. But as we drew near to the ancient town and +saw, rising heavenwards, the beautiful spires of her cathedral, standing +out in the romantic gloaming as an architectural dream against the +background of sky, we felt that here would be our reward, come what else +might. The train steamed into the station; our day's journey was over. +We must now part from our pleasant travelling companion. + +"I hope not, for ever," he said, as he bared his head on the platform, +according to the polite custom of his country. "We have some things in +common; we see much from the same point of view; accident made me a +Frenchman and a priest, and I would not have it otherwise; but I think +that I could also have been very happy as an Englishman and a member of +your Church. Here I think that we meet half-way; for if I find myself so +much in touch with an Englishman, you seem to me in still closer union +with the French nature." + +Then he gave us his card and asked us if we would go and see him. + +"Do not be afraid," he laughed; "I will not try to convert you--pervert, +you would call it. I think we are both too broad-minded to meddle with +things that do not concern us. Here, I am the guest of the Bishop, but +he is absent, and will only return the day before my departure. It is a +pity, for he would charm you by many delightful qualities, though he may +not be quite so tolerant as I." + +We parted with an understanding that it was to meet again, and went our +different ways. We consigned our traps to the omnibus, H.C. for once +trusting his precious treasures out of sight, but retaining his umbrella +with all the determination of an inquisitor inflicting torture upon a +fellow mortal. A short avenue brought us to the river, which flowed +through the town, and, not without reason, had been condemned by +Catherine. We crossed the bridge and went down the quay. It was lined +with trees, and in fine weather is rather a pleasant walk. The chief +hotels of the town are centred here, and some of the principal shops and +cafes. It is fairly bustling and lively, but not romantic. + +We had been recommended to the Hotel de l'Epee as the best in Quimper, +and soon found ourselves entering its wide portals; a huge porte-cochere +that swallowed up at a single mouthful the omnibus and the piled-up +luggage that had quickly followed us from the station. + +Ostlers and landlord immediately came forward with ladders and other +attentions, and we were soon domiciled. + +It was a rambling old inn, with winding staircases, dark and dirty, and +guiltless of carpet. The walls might have been painted at the beginning +of the century, but hardly since. "In fact," said H.C., "they look quite +mediaeval." There were passages long and gloomy, in which we lost +ourselves. Ancient windows let in any amount of draught and rain, and +would have been the despair of old maids. But we were given a large +room, the very essence of neatness, and beds adorned with spotless +linen. A chambermaid waited upon us, dressed in a Breton cap that was +wonderfully picturesque, and made us feel more in Brittany than ever. +She had long passed her youth, but possessed a frank and expressive +face, and was superior to most of the hotel servants. In early life she +had lived with a noble family, and had travelled with them for many +years. She had seen something of the world. + +Our windows looked on to the back of the hotel, in comparison with which +the front was tame and commonplace. Below us we saw an accumulation of +gables and angles; a perfect sea of wonderful red roofs, with all the +beauty and colouring of age. Some of them possessed dormer windows, that +just now reflected the afterglow of sunset; small dormer windows high up +in the slanting roofs that perhaps had reflected the changes of light +and shade, and day and night, for centuries. Here and there we traced +picturesque courtyards and gardens that were small oases of green in +this wilderness of red-roofed buildings. On the one side flowed the +second river of Quimper, on the other, like a celestial vision, rose the +wonderful cathedral. A dream, a vision of Paradise, it did indeed look +in this fast falling twilight. The towers, crowned by their graceful +spires, rose majestically above this sea of houses. Beyond, one traced +the outlines of pinnacle and flying buttress, slanting roof and +beautiful windows. + +We were just in time for table d'hote, and groped our way down the dark, +winding stairs. The way to the dining-room lay through the bureau, where +Madame sat in state at her desk, entertaining a select party of friends, +who had evidently called in upon her for a little scandal and +conversation. She was a tall, majestic woman, with a loud voice, and +apparently a long life before her; but at a second visit we paid Quimper +not long after, she, too, had passed into the regions that lie "beyond +the veil." + +The dining-room was long and large and crowded. Most of the people at +table were evidently commercial travellers, and more or less habitues of +the place. All the women who served wore those wonderful Brittany caps, +and quite redeemed the room from its common-place elements. + +The shades of night had quite fallen upon the old town when we went out +to reconnoitre. It would only be possible to gain a faint and scarcely +true impression of what the town was like. At night, new things often +look old, and old new, outlines are magnified, and general effects are +altogether lost. The river ran down the quay like a dark and sluggish +thread; there was no poetry or romance about it. The banks were built up +with granite, which made it look more like a canal than a river. To be +at all picturesque it wanted the addition of boats and barges, of which +just now it was free and void. The trees whispered in the night breeze. +On the opposite bank, covering a large space, a fair was holding its +revelry; a small pandemonium; shows were lighted up with flaring gas, +and houris in spangles danced and threw out their fascinations. Big +drums and trumpets made night hideous. The high cliffs beyond served as +a sort of sounding-board, so that nothing was lost. + +We turned away and soon found ourselves in the cathedral square. Before +us rose the great building in all its majesty, distinctly outlined +against the dark sky. In Brittany, one rather hungers for these fine +ecclesiastical monuments, Normandy is so full of them that we miss them +here. Brittany has the advantage in its old towns, but the mind +sometimes asks for something higher and more perfect than mere street +architecture. + +[Illustration: BRITTANY PEASANT.] + +Therefore, even to-night, in the darkness, we revelled and gloried in +the magnificent cathedral that stood before us in such grand +proportions. The spires seemed to touch the skies. The west front was in +deep shadow. We traced the outlines of flying buttresses, of heavier +buttresses between the windows, of the beautiful apse. The windows, +faintly lighted up, added wonderfully to the effect. Surely the church +was not closed? We tried the west door, it yielded, and we entered. + +The interior was in semi-darkness; a gloom that almost inspired awe; a +silence and repose which forbade the faintest echo of our footsteps. +Pillars and aisles and arches could be barely outlined. Everything +seemed dim and intangible; we felt that we were going through a vision, +there was so little that was real or earthly about it; so much that was +beautiful, mysterious, full of repose and saintly influence. The far +east end was lost in obscurity, and we could barely trace the outlines +of the splendid roof. Far down, near a confessional, knelt a small group +of hooded women, motionless as carven images. Their heads were bowed, +their whole attitude betrayed the penitential mood. There might have +been eight or ten at most, and they never stirred. But every now and +then a fair penitent issued from the confessional box; and, cloaked and +hooded, glided back to the seat she had lately occupied, and resumed the +penitential attitude. The ceremony was drawing near its end when we +entered, and when all was over they rose in a group and, noiselessly as +phantoms, like spirits from the land of shadows, passed down the long +aisle and disappeared into the night. + +It was a strange hour for confession, and there must have been some +special reason for it. They were strangely dressed, too, in their silken +cloaks and hoods, as if they belonged to some religious order, or some +charitable institution. We wondered much. + +When the west doorway had closed behind them, and not before, the priest +left his box, and we started as we recognised our fellow traveller. How +came it that he was confessing so soon after his arrival, or confessing +at all, in a church to which, as far as we knew, he was not attached? +His tall and portly form looked magnificent and commanding as he stepped +forth into the shadowy aisle, and, preceded by a verger, or suisse, +bearing a lighted flambeau and a staff of office, was soon lost in the +sacristy. + +We lost ourselves in dreams. It is wonderfully refreshing to fall out of +the influence of the crowded and commonplace world into these silent +resting-places, which whisper so much of Heaven, and seem to breathe out +a full measure of the spiritual life. They seem steeped in a religious, +a celestial atmosphere; just as, on the Sabbath, in quiet country +places, far from crowded haunts, surrounded only by the beauties of +nature, there seems a special peace and repose in earth and sky, and +people say to each other, "One feels that it is Sunday." + +But we were very nearly in danger of prolonging our dreams until the +night shadows passed away, and the day-dawn broke and lighted up that +far-off east window. H.C. was a very broken reed to trust to on such +occasions. He was not only wrapped in visions--his spirit seemed +altogether to have taken flight. I was rudely brought back to earthly +scenes and necessities by hearing the key hastily turned in the west +door by which we had entered, and the verger commencing to retrace his +steps, preparatory to putting out the lights and departing himself +through the sacristy. + +We hurried up to him, having no mind to pass the night in silent +contemplation, with the pavement for couch and a stone for pillow. The +influence we had just experienced must have given us "pallid sorrowful +faces," for the verger almost dropped his torch, and his keys fell to +the ground and awoke mysterious echoes in the distant arches. + +It was a weird, wonderfully expressive scene. The torch threw lights and +shadows upon aisle and arch, which flickered and danced like so many +ghosts at play, until our nerves felt overwrought and our flesh creeped. +In our present mood it all seemed too strange, too mysterious for earth. +We felt as if we had joined the land of shadows in very truth. But the +verger's voice awoke us to realities: a very earthly voice, unmusical +and pronounced, not at all in harmony with the moment. It grated upon +us; nevertheless, under the circumstances, it was good hearing. + +"Sirs, you are very imprudent," he cried. "You might have been locked up +for the night, and I promise you that it is neither warm nor lively in +this great building at three o'clock in the morning. You also alarmed +me, for I took you for ghosts. I have seen them and believe in them, and +I ought to know. When I die I am persuaded that I, too, shall visit +these haunts, whose pavement I have trod with staff and torch for fifty +years. I took you for ghosts, look you, for you seem harmless and +peaceable, incapable of visiting these sacred aisles for sacrilegious +purposes." + +We felt flattered. The countenance is undoubtedly the index to the inner +man, though it is not given to everyone to read the riddle. It was +consoling to hear that we did not exactly look like midnight assassins. + +"I have never come across anyone like this before," continued the +verger. "I was not in the least prepared for you. What could have +induced you to come in and contemplate all this darkness, and risk being +locked up for the night? If I had been at the other end when I +discovered you, I should have fled, quite sure that you were ghosts. I +tell you that I have seen ghosts, but I do not care to converse with +them; they rather frighten me." + +"Those fair penitents," murmured H.C. "They looked very graceful and +picturesque; therefore they ought to be very pretty. Could I go and see +them, and make a sketch of them? Do you think they would admit me? Are +they nuns?" + +"They are not nuns, or they would not be here," returned the old verger. +"But they do a great deal of good. For my part I should say their +confession was superfluous. They can have no sins. _I_ never go to +confession. What could I say? My life is always the same. I get up in +the morning, open the church; lock it up at night, go to bed. I eat my +meals in peace, do harm to no one, am in charity with all men. There is +my life from January to December. What have I to confess?" + +"You are an extremely interesting character, but not so interesting as +the fair penitents," said H.C., bringing him back to the point from +which he had wandered. "Who are they, and can I go and call upon them?" + +"I don't believe they would admit you if you took them an order from the +Pope," returned the old verger emphatically. "Without being nuns, they +have taken a vow of celibacy, and live in partial retirement. No man is +ever admitted within their portals, excepting their Father Confessor, +and he is old and ugly; in fact, the very image of a baboon. A very good +and pious man, all the same, is his reverence, and very learned. These +ladies teach the children of the poor; they nurse the sick; they have a +small orphanage; and they are full of good works." + +"Why were they here to-night?" + +"Whenever that very holy man, the Reverend Father, visits Quimper, they +always make it a point of going to confess to him the very first night +of his arrival. The good Mother of the establishment, as she is called, +is his cousin. I am told that she is Madame la Comtesse, by right, but +renounced the world for the sake of doing good. The Reverend Father +arrived only this evening by train. He went straight to the palace, took +a bouillon, and immediately came on here. He is a great man. You should +come on Sunday and hear him preach. There have been times when I have +seen the women sob, and the men bow their heads. But it grows late, +sirs. It is not worth while opening that west door again. If you will +follow me, I will let you out by the sacristy. We will lock up together, +and leave this great building to darkness and the ghosts." + +And ghosts indeed there seemed to be as we followed him up the aisle. He +put out the few lights that remained, until his torch alone guided our +footsteps, which sounded in the immense space, and disturbed the +mysterious silence by yet more mysterious echoes. Lights and shadows +cast by the torch flitted about like wings. The choir gates were closed, +and within them all was darkness and solemnity. Finally we entered the +sacristy, where again the surplices hanging up in rows looked strange +and suggestive. The old verger opened the door, extinguished his torch, +and we stood once more in the outside night, under the stars and the +sky. + +"How often we come in for these experiences," said H.C. "How delightful +they are; full of a sacred beauty and solemnity. How few ever attempt to +enter a cathedral at night, and how much they lose. And yet," he mused, +"perhaps not so much as we imagine. If their souls responded to such +influences, they would seek them out. The needle is attracted to the +pole; like seeks like--and finds it. You cannot draw sweet water from a +bitter well." + +The town was in darkness. The shops were now all closed, but lights +gleamed from many windows. The beautiful latticed panes we had found in +Morlaix were here very few and far between. Here and there we came upon +gabled outlines, but much that we saw seemed modern and unpicturesque; +very tame and commonplace after our late experience in the cathedral. +The streets were silent and deserted; all doors were closed; the people +of Quimper, like those of Morlaix, evidently carried out the good old +rule of retiring early. Occasionally we came upon a group of buildings, +or a solitary house standing out conspicuously amidst its fellows, which +promised well for the morrow, and made us "wish for the morning." + +When we found our way back to the quay, all was in darkness. The fair +had put out its lights, closed its doors, and dismissed the assembly. +Where the people had gone to, we knew not; we had seen none of them. A +few cafes were still open, and their lights fell across the pavement and +athwart the roads, and gleamed upon the rustling trees. We turned in to +the hotel, where all was quiet. The night was yet young, but the +staircases were in darkness and we had to grope our way. Decidedly it +was the most uncivilized place we had yet come to, and Catherine was not +very far wrong in her judgment. + +[Illustration: A BRITTANY SERVANT.] + +The next morning we awoke to grey skies. "It always rains at Quimper," +said Catherine, and she was only quoting a proverb. There was something +close and oppressive and depressing about the town. The air was +enervating. The hotels were unfavourably placed. The quays were +commonplace--for Brittany. There was nothing romantic or beautiful about +the river, which, I have said, resembled a canal. Its waters were black +and sluggish, confined, as they probably were, by locks. In front rose +high cliffs which shut out the sky and the horizon and heaven's +glorious oxygen. We many of us know what it is to dwell for some time +under the shadow of a great mountain. Gradually it seems to oppress us +and crush down upon us until we feel that we must get away from it or +die of suffocation. Here there was a heaviness in the air which taxed +all our mental resources, our reserve of energy, our amiability to the +utmost. + +The cathedral by daylight should be our first care, and we found it +worthy of all the effect it had produced upon us last night. All its +mystery and magic had gone, but all the beauty and perfection of +architecture remained. Certainly we had seen nothing like it in +Brittany. + +It is dedicated to St. Corentin, a holy man who is supposed to have come +over from Cornwall in the very early ages of the Christian era. Quimper +was then the capital of the Cornouaille, a corruption, as we can easily +trace, of the word Cornwall. The cathedral, commenced about the year +1239, was only completed in 1515. The spires are modern, but of such +excellent workmanship and design that they in no way interfere with the +general effect. The harmony of the whole is indeed remarkable when it is +considered that it was nearly three centuries in process of +construction. The west front is very fine and stately, with deep portals +magnificently sculptured. It was commenced in 1424, and is surmounted by +two flamboyant windows, one above the other. Within the contour of the +arch is a triple row of angels, sculptured with a great deal of artistic +finish. Time, however, whilst beautifying it, has robbed it of some of +its fineness. + +The towers were also commenced in 1424, and the great bell of the clock +which they contain dates from 1312. The north and south doorways are +both fine. The latter is dedicated to St. Catherine, and a figure of the +saint adorns a niche in the left buttress. Both portals possess scrolls +bearing inscriptions or mottoes, such as, A ma Vie, one of the mottoes +of the House of Brittany. In the pediment of the west doorway is the +finest heraldic sculpturing that the Middle Ages of Brittany produced. +In the centre, the lion of Montfort holds the banner of Brittany, on +which may be read the motto of Duke John V.: Malo au riche duc. In the +corner to the left are the arms of Bishop Bertrand de Rosmadec, stamped +with the mitre and crozier, and the motto, En bon Espoir. Many other +mottoes, such as Perac (Wherefore?); A l'aventure; Leal a ma foy; En +Dieu m'attens, belonging to different lords of Brittany, will also be +found here. + +The effect of the interior is extremely grand and imposing. It is of +great height, whilst the side chapels and outer aisles give it an +appearance of more breadth than it deserves. The apse is polygonal. The +principal nave, with its large arches, its curved triforium, and its +flamboyant windows, bears the mark of the fifteenth century. The choir +is thirteenth century, and possesses a triforium with a double gallery, +surrounded by gothic arches supported by small columns, of which the +capitals are extremely elegant. + +The church has a peculiarity which is not often found, at any rate in so +pronounced a manner. The chancel is not in a line with the nave, but +inclines to the left, or north. Thus, in standing at the west end, only +a portion of the apse can be seen. The effect is singular, and, at the +first moment, seems to offend. But after a time the peculiarity becomes +decidedly effective. The stiffness of the straight line, of the sides +running exactly parallel one with the other, is lost. One grows almost +to like the break in the uniformity of design. It appeals to the +imagination. Certain other cathedrals incline in the same way, but in a +more modified form. The architects' reasons for thus inclining the choir +are lost in obscurity. By some it has been supposed that their motive +was purely effect; by others that it was in imitation or commemoration +of our Lord, Who, when hanging upon the cross, inclined His Head to the +left. + +Many of the windows are old, and add greatly to the fine effect of the +interior. Those in the nave date from the end of the fifteenth century. +Some of those in the choir--unfortunately the most conspicuous--are +modern; but a few are ancient. The whole interior has suffered in tone +by restoration and scraping. + +The high-altar is richly decorated with enamels and precious stones. The +tabernacle--in the centre of which is a figure of the Saviour in the act +of blessing--is flanked by twelve arcades, containing the figures of the +Apostles in relief, holding the instrument of their martyrdom. It is +crowned by a cross with double rows, or branches, at the foot of which +are the evangelists with their symbolical animals. The lower arms of the +cross bear the figures of the Virgin and St. John weeping at the feet of +the crucified Redeemer. + +Amongst the treasures of the cathedral are preserved three drops of +blood, of which the following is the legend:-- + +A pilgrim of Quimper, on starting for the Holy Land, had confided a sum +of money to a friend. On returning, he claimed the money, but the friend +denied having received it, offering to take an oath to that effect +before the crucifix in the church of St. Corentin. At the moment of +raising his hand to take the oath, he gave a stick that he carried to +his friend to hold. The stick was hollow and contained the gold. As soon +as he had taken the oath, the stick miraculously broke in two, and the +money rolled on to the pavement. At the same moment the feet of the +crucifix, held together by a single nail, separated, and three drops of +blood fell on to the altar. These drops were carefully absorbed by some +linen, which is preserved amongst the treasures of the church. The +miracle is reproduced in a painted window of one of the chapels. + +Last night we had seen the interior in the gloom and mystery of +darkness; this morning we saw it by the dim religious light of day. It +was difficult to say which view was the more impressive. The results +were very different. We now gazed upon all its beauty of detail, all the +harmony of perfect architecture. The coloured rays coming in through the +ancient stained windows added their glamour and refinement to the scene; +to those that were more modern we tried to shut our eyes. The lofty +pillars of the nave, separating the aisles, rose majestically, fitting +supports for the beautiful gothic arches above them, in their turn +surmounted by the triforium; in their turn again crowned by the ancient +windows. Above all, at a great height, came the arched roof. Thus the +eye was carried up from beauty to beauty until it seemed lost in +dreamland. Wandering aside, it fell upon the aisles and side chapels, +visions of beauty interrupted only by the wonderful columns, with their +fine bases and rich capitals. The east window seemed very far off, a +portion of it lost in the curve to the left, together with the beautiful +gothic arches and double triforium of that side of the choir. + +We sat and gazed upon all, and lost ourselves in the spell of the +vision; and presently our old friend the verger found us out. + +"But you _live_ in the cathedral!" he exclaimed. + +"No," we replied; "we should only like to do so. We envy you, whose days +are chiefly passed here." + +"I don't know," he returned, with the resigned air of a martyr. "If you +had trodden this pavement for fifty years as I have, I think you would +like to change the scene. And I have not the chance of doing it even in +the next state, for you know I have a conviction that I shall come back +here as a ghost. I thought _you_ were ghosts last night, and a fine +fright you gave me. I don't know why ghosts should frighten one, but +they do. I don't like to feel that when I get into the next state, and +come back to earth as a ghost, I shall frighten people. It would be +better not to come back at all." + +"What are they like, those that you have seen?" we asked, out of +curiosity. + +He closed his eyes, as if invoking a vision, put on a very solemn +expression, and then opened them with a wide stare into vacancy. We +quite started and looked behind us to see if any were visible. + +"No, they are not there," he said. "They only come at night. How can I +describe them? How can you describe a shadow? They are all shadows, and +they seem everywhere at once. I never hear them, but I can see them and +feel them. I mean that I feel them morally--their influence: of course +you cannot handle a ghost. The air grows cold, and an icy wind touches +my face as they pass to and fro." + +"Then if the wind is icy they cannot come from purgatory?" suggested +H.C. very innocently. + +The old verger seemed a little doubtful; the idea had not occurred to +him. "I don't know about that," he said. "I have heard that the extremes +of heat and cold have the same effect upon one. So perhaps what feels +like ice to me is really the opposite. But my idea is that the ghosts +who appear on earth are exempt from purgatory: to visit the scenes of +their former haunts under different conditions must be sufficient +punishment for their worst sins." + +[Illustration: QUIMPER.] + +So that our verger was also a philosopher. + +"Have you never spoken to one, and made some inquiry about the next +world?" we asked. "Have they never given you some idea of what it is all +like?" + +"Never," he replied. "I am much too frightened. Just as frightened now +as I was when I first saw them fifty years ago. Nor would they reply. +How can they? How can shadows talk? I only once took courage to speak," +he added, as if by an after recollection. "I thought it was the ghost of +a woman who promised to marry me, and then jilted me for a journeyman +cabinet-maker. He treated her badly and she died at the end of two +years. Somehow I felt as if it was her spirit hovering about me, and I +took courage and spoke." + +"Well?" + +"I received no answer; only a long, long sigh, which seemed to float all +through the building and pass away out of the windows. But it was a +windy night, and it may have been only that. For if shadows can't talk, +I don't see how they can sigh." + +The old verger evidently had faith in his ghosts. The fancy had gained +upon him and strengthened with time into part of himself; as inseparable +from the cathedral as its aisles and arches. + +"Have you never tried the experiment of passing a night in these old +walls?" we asked. + +"Once; thirty years ago." + +"And the result?" + +He turned pale. "I can never speak of that night. What I saw then will +never be known. I cannot think of it without emotion--even after thirty +years. Ah, well! my time is growing short. I shall soon know the great +secret. When we are young and going up-hill, we think ourselves +immortal, for we cannot see the bottom of the other side, where lies the +grave. But I have been going down-hill a long time; I am very near the +end of the journey, and see the grave very distinctly." + +"Yet you seem very happy and cheerful," said H.C. + +"Why not?" returned the old verger. "Old age should not be miserable, +but the contrary. The inevitable cannot be painful and was never +intended to be anything but a source of consolation; I have heard the +Reverend Father say so more than once. Shall you come and hear him +preach next Sunday? The whole place will be thronged. He spoke to me +about you this morning--it must be you--I have just been to the Eveche +for his commands--and said that in case you came I was to reserve two +places for you inside the choir gates--quite the place of honour, sirs. +You will see and hear well; and when preaching, it is almost as good to +watch him as to listen. Ah! I have been here fifty years, but I never +saw his equal." + +"And the Bishop?" + +"I never make comparisons; they must always be to the disadvantage of +one or the other," replied this singular old man. "And now I must away +to my duties." + +"One word more," said H.C. hastily. "Will those picturesque ladies come +again to Confession to-night?" + +"To-night!" he returned reproachfully. "Do you think those virtuous +creatures pass their lives in sinning--like ordinary beings? No, no. +Besides--enough's as good as a feast, and they were well shriven last +night. They are now reposing in the odour of sanctity. Au revoir, +messieurs. I see your hearts are in the cathedral, and I know that I +shall meet you here again before Sunday." + +He departed. We watched his stooping figure and his white hair moving +slowly up the aisle, so fitting an object for the venerable building +itself. He disappeared in the sacristy, and a few moments after we found +ourselves without the building, standing in the shadow of the great +towers, under the grey skies of Quimper. + + + + +TO MY SOUL. + +_From the French of Victor Hugo._ + + + You stray, my soul, whilst gazing on the sky! + The path of duty is the path of life! + Sit by the cold hearth where dead ashes lie, + Put on the captive's chain--endure the strife. + Be but a servant in this realm of night, + O child of light! + + To lost and wandering feet deliverance bring; + Fulfil the perfect law of suffering; + Drink to the dregs the bitter cup; remain + In battle last; be first in tears and pain-- + Then, with a prayer that much may be forgiven, + Go back to Heaven! + +C.E. MEETKERKE. + + + + +SO VERY UNATTRACTIVE! + + +"Yes," meditated pretty Mrs. Hart; "I suppose it would be invidious to +pass her over and ask the other three, but I would so much rather have +them." + +"Cannot you ask the whole four?" suggested her sister. + +"Does it not strike you as being almost too much of a good thing? You +see, our space is not unlimited." + +"Ask the three eldest," said Bertie Paine decidedly. + +"But I do not want her. What use is she? She can sing, certainly, but +you cannot keep her singing all the evening; and the rest of the time +she neither talks nor flirts. And she is altogether so very +unattractive," ended Mrs. Hart, despondently. + +"Who is it?" asked the handsomest man in the room, strolling up to the +group by the window. "Who is this unfortunate lady? I always feel such +sympathy with the unattractive, as you know." + +"Naturally," laughed Mrs. Hart. "The individual in question is a Miss +Mildmay, a plain person and the eldest of four sisters." + +"Mildmay? Who are they? I used to know people of that name, and there +were four girls in the family. One of them--her name was Minnie, I +remember--promised to grow up very pretty." + +"So she is; Minnie is the third. They are certainly your friends, Mr. +Ratcliff. They are all pretty but the eldest, and all their names begin +with M: Margaret, Miriam, Minnie, and Maud. Absurd, is it not?" + +"Somebody had a strong fancy for alliteration. So Miss Mildmay is +plain?" + +"Very plain, very dull, very uninteresting," said Mrs. Hart and her +sister in a breath. "Much given to stocking-knitting and good works." + +"And good works comprise?" quoth Mr. Ratcliff, interrogatively. + +"She sat up every night for a week with Blanche Carter's children when +they had diphtheria, and saved their lives by her nursing," said Elsie +Paine indignantly. "That is the woman that those good people sneer at. +You are not fair to her, Mrs. Hart. She has a sweet face when you come +to know her." + +"There, you have put Elsie up," cried mischievous Bertie. "No more peace +for you here, Mrs. Hart. Come out into the garden with me, and postpone +this question in favour of tennis." + +The conclave broke up and Mark Ratcliff said and heard no more of +Margaret Mildmay. He betook himself to solitude and cigars, and as he +strode over the breezy downs he wondered what a predilection for +stocking-knitting and good works might signify in the once merry girl, +and if they might be possibly a form of penance for past misdeeds. + +"She did behave abominably," he said to himself, flinging a cigar-end +viciously away into a patch of dry grass, which ignited and required +much stamping before it consented to go out. "Yes, she behaved +abominably, and at my time of life I might amuse myself better than in +thinking of a fickle girl. Poor Margaret! stockings and good works--she +might have done as well taking care of me!" + +Then he lit another cigar, put up a covey of partridges, remembered how +he used to shoot with Margaret's father, told himself that there was no +fool like an old fool--not referring to Mr. Mildmay in the least--and +took himself impatiently back into the town. + +And there he did a very dishonourable thing. + +A bowery lane ran at the bottom of the gardens attached to a row of +scattered villas, picturesque residences inhabited by well-to-do people; +and along the bank were placed benches here and there, inviting the +passer-by to rest. + +From one of the gardens came the sound of quiet voices, one of which he +knew, though it had been unheard for years. He sat himself deliberately +down upon the bench conveniently near the spot, and hearkened to what +that voice had to say. + +"Sing to me, Margaret, dear," pleaded the other speaker. "I am selfish +to be always wanting it, I know, but it will not be for long now, and if +you do not sing me 'Will he Come?' I shall keep on hearing it till I +have to try to sing it myself, and that hurts." + +"Hush, Ailie. You know I will sing," and Mark Ratcliff held his breath +in surprise as the notes of the song rose upward. + +Margaret used to sing, but not like this. Every note was like a winged +soul rising out of prison. He had never heard such a voice before. No +wonder that Mrs. Hart had said that she could sing, and no wonder that +this sick girl wanted to hear it. By the way, this was one of the good +works, of course! + + "Rest to the weary spirit, + Peace to the quiet dead," + +repeated Ailie as the song died away. "He never came, Margaret, and he +never will come to me. It may be wicked, but I could die gladly if I +could see him first and know that he had not betrayed me. It is terrible +to lie drifting out into the dark without a word from him!" + +"Dear Ailie, why do you make me sing this wretched song? Why do you try +to dwell on the thought of faithless loves? Have patience a little; your +letters may yet find him." + +"Too late. In time for him to drop a tear over my grave and tell you +that he never meant to hurt me," cried the girl hysterically. "Oh, +Margaret! Why do I tell you all the anguish that eats upon my heart? If +you could only know the comfort you are to me! the blessed relief of +lying in your arms and telling you what nobody else could forgive or +understand! You are the best person I know, and yet you never make me +feel myself lost beyond redemption." + +"You are talking nonsense, darling," said the voice of the very dull +person. + +"Am I, you pearl of womanhood? What would you say if I told you all the +fancies I have about you? Ah, Margaret, I do not want to know that you +have had your heart broken by a false lover!" + +"My dear, I was always a plain and unattractive person, just as I am at +this day," answered Margaret in a voice of infinite gentleness. "But why +should you not know? There are more faithless than faithful lovers, may +be; the one I had grew tired of so dull a person and he went away. That +was all." + +Then the two women moved away towards the house and the garden lay in +silence. + +Mark Ratcliff sat stiff with astonishment. + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed at last. "She flings all the blame on me! The +whole treachery was hers, and this is positively the coolest thing that +ever I heard. Faithless lover, indeed! When she dismissed me with actual +insult! But a woman with such a voice might do almost anything, you +plain and unattractive Miss Mildmay!" + +He lit another cigar, rose in leisurely fashion and sought the way to +the front entrances of the villas. Under the shade of the +horse-chestnuts, which his critical eye decided to be, like himself and +Margaret, approaching the season of the sere and yellow leaf, he +loitered, smoking and watching, and counting up the years since he had +waited and watched for the same person before. + +At last the right door opened and down the steps came a very +sober-looking and unconscious lady. She was thinking of nothing but the +dying girl from whom she had just parted. + +"Margaret!" + +She started violently. She knew the voice well enough, but after these +years it was impossible that it should be sounding here. + +"Margaret!" he said again imperatively. + +"Mr. Ratcliff," she faltered. "I did not expect to see you again." + +"Your expectations seem to be a little curious," he replied, surveying +her coolly. "There is a great deal that you have to explain to me. What +do you mean by calling me a false lover?" + +"Who told you that I accused you of falsehood?" she asked, dropping the +book she was carrying in her surprise. "If I did you could scarcely +contradict me, but this is not quite the place for such discussions." + +He possessed himself of the book and led the way to the public gardens, +where the principal walks offered privacy enough at an hour when most of +the world was busy over tennis. Children and nursemaids do not count as +intruders on privacy. + +"See here, Margaret, I was eavesdropping under the garden-fence, while +you talked with your sick friend, and I heard you giving me a famously +bad character. At least," suddenly recollecting himself, "unless I have +made a fool of myself, and it was somebody else you meant." + +Margaret said nothing. + +"Had you ever any other love?" + +"Never," said she, and the colour flew up into her pale face. She did +not at all understand the accusation brought against her, or the +fierceness of the accuser. + +"Then apologise at once for the charge you have brought against me." + +She looked up at him with knitted brows. She wanted to look at him, but +her eyes would drop again immediately. + +"Are you not unreasonable?" she asked. "Years ago you made love to me. +Then you went away. Your father was ill, and you could not choose but +go, but you gave me to understand that you were coming back to me. You +never came. Do you call that faithfulness?" + +"I wrote." + +"Never." + +"Margaret!" he cried indignantly. "I wrote and had your answer. Are you +dreaming?" + +"You never wrote. In my life I never wrote to you." + +"Good heavens! When I have your letter in my pocket! I wrote to you +asking if I might come back as your accepted lover, and you sent me this +in return," said he, giving her the paper for which he had searched his +pocket-book. + +She took it and looked it over. When she gave it back her glance was +fixed far away over the miraculous river that ran with mimic waterfalls +through the gardens, and she was ghastly pale. + +"I did not write that," she said. "You ought to have known it." + +"It is your signature and your hand." + +"It is like my hand. I never signed myself M. Mildmay. How could I, when +we were all M. Mildmay?" + +A light broke in upon him. They were all M. Mildmay, of course, and he +remembered a long-forgotten feud with Miriam. He bit his lip and stamped +his foot angrily. What a fool he had been! + +"I am sorry," said Margaret humbly. "For all the world I would not have +insulted you, and it is cruel that you should have had to think it of +me. I do apologise for any share I have had in it." + +Her heart and throat were almost bursting with agony as she spoke in +those quiet tones, and he stamped away up the path with his back to her. + +"Margaret!" he said, coming back and seizing her hands. "I thought I was +case-hardened, but just tell me that you loved me then!" + +"I love you now," she answered, crying a little. "I am not of the sort +that changes in the matter of loving. Is it bold to say that, and I so +unattractive?" + +"Hang your unattractiveness! Margaret, just say, 'I love you, Mark +Ratcliff,' and set me some atoning penance for my idiocy. You do not +know what a curse that vile paper has been to me," and he shot the +offending missive into the foolish little river and broke into vigorous +and ungraceful language with regard to the writer. + +"Hush, hush!" cried Margaret, in deep distress. "She is my sister, and +she could not know how much it meant to me." + +"Of course not! And what did it matter to her that I must go hungry and +thirsty all these years, cursing the whole of womankind because you had +tricked me!" + +"Oh, why did you distrust me?" exclaimed she sorrowfully, leaning back +against the holly arbour in which they had sheltered, and bursting into +downright weeping. + +"What an amiable desire you evince to throw the fault on me, Margaret," +and he drew her hands from her face very gently; "must there be tears +now that I have found you again? Forgive me, dear. I was worse than a +fool to doubt you, but now we will leave room for no more possibilities +of trouble and parting. I am going to find out that other poor +distrusted beggar, your friend Ailie's lover, and let him know what you +women accuse him of, and when I come back, we shall see!" + +"See what?" gasped Margaret. + +"What we shall see!" he returned, triumphantly. + + * * * * * + +"Awfully sorry to have been late for dinner, Mrs. Hart," said Mr. +Ratcliff, without the least appearance of distress, when he joined the +ladies in the drawing-room; "I was unavoidably detained. By the way, +your party is not for another month, I think?" + +"No," she replied, wondering why her handsome friend looked so gleefully +mischievous. "I have fixed upon the thirtieth; I do not want to clash +with Mrs. Dent and Mrs. Clarence." + +"Then I am commissioned to tell you that you may invite all the Misses +Mildmay, without the least inconvenience. Miss Mildmay the undesirable +will not be in a position to accept your invitation. It is anticipated +that she will then be on her wedding tour as Mrs. Mark Ratcliff." + +"Good gracious! How sudden!" exclaimed Mrs. Hart, opening her pretty +blue eyes to their widest extent; and for the life of her she could not +help adding under her breath, "And she so very unattractive!" + + + + +MADEMOISELLE ELISE. + +BY EDWARD FRANCIS. + + +I. + +M. Lorman, director of the Theatre Royal, Rocheville, stood at a window +of Mademoiselle Elise's apartment that looked on the Rue Murillo, Paris. +His gloves were drawn on, he carried his hat and stick, and he waited +impatiently--now smoothing his grey moustache, now looking at his watch, +now tapping his well-polished boot with the tip of his cane. Then he +turned his back to the window and began to walk to and fro. At the +second turn, he paused before a picture--a little water-colour +sketch--that hung from the wall. It was a painting of a girl dressed in +a rich costume of the Empire. Her slight figure was bent a little +forward, and her tiny hands drew back a pale green skirt, just so much +as to show one dainty pink shoe. M. Lorman adjusted his spectacles to +make a closer inspection. + +The door of the room opened, and Mademoiselle Elise came in, carrying an +open note-book in her hand. + +Mademoiselle was about twenty-four years of age, and not tall, her +figure was slender and well-proportioned, her dress fitted perfectly. +Her hair and eyes were dark, her lips thin. When she talked her features +grew animate, and she became beautiful. + +"Yes," she said, "you may take rooms for me at the Hotel St. Amand. I +want to be close by the cathedral." + +Then she looked at the picture. + +"Did you recognise me?" + +"Of course. But who did it? It is charming." + +"It is very nice. Bouvard painted it and gave it to me. I am very fond +of it." + +"It is an excellent likeness!" + +"I think it is. I am vain enough to be proud of it. But tell me--what +shall I do with myself at Rocheville?" + +"As if you were ever at a loss! You will have enough society; and there +are the students and the officers--" + +"Bah! I am sick of them all. I shall turn recluse and spend all my days +in some quiet nook by the sea. After Paris, one hates society." + +"After Paris," said M. Lorman, "one hates many good things." + +He laughed self-complacently, and held out his hand. + +"Good-bye." + +She went with him to the hall, and waited, leaning against the table and +breaking to pieces a shred of grass that she had taken from a vase, +while he drew a great packet of loose papers from the breast-pocket of +his coat, and tried to discover the time of his train. + +"Who will play the dance in 'Le vrai Amant?'" she asked. + +"Monsieur Raoul--a man who fiddles for love of the thing. He is a +hunchback, or nearly so, and will interest you." + +"Why will he interest me?" + +Monsieur, as he answered, ran his gloved finger slowly down the line of +close figures. + +"He will interest you for several reasons. Firstly, because he plays +superbly and asks for no pay. He is rich. Secondly, because he is clever +and dislikes women; and, finally--because you won't understand him." + +Mademoiselle laughed defiantly. + +"He is a gentleman, then?" + +"Yes." + +"Will he dislike _me_?" + +"Perhaps I have used a wrong word. It is more disdain than dislike." + +"Will he disdain me?" + +M. Lorman replaced the papers in his pocket and looked with comic +gravity at her, as if to judge the effect she would be likely to have on +his friend. Then, his eyes twinkling with mischief, he answered +deliberately: + +"Yes." + +He took up his hat and stick and prepared to go. + +"Eh bien," she retorted, "that is a challenge. You have found something +to occupy me. Adieu. Take care that my room faces the cathedral." + + +II. + +Someone had gone out by the stage-door and the noise of the storm came +in along the low passage. The theatre was almost in darkness. Only +Monsieur Raoul and old Jacques Martin were there. In the shadow, as he +bent over his violin case, the younger man seemed tall and well-made; +but when he stood up, though he was tall, his bent shoulders became +apparent, and the light fell on a stern, pale face that seemed older +than its thirty years. He began to button his cloak around him. + +"You might tell ma femme, Monsieur Raoul, that I shall be late. I must +prepare for to-morrow." + +The old man and his wife kept house for Raoul, who was a bachelor. + +"Assuredly I will tell her." Then Raoul went away. + +The rain had ceased, but the scream of the wind sounded again and again. +The thin, weather-beaten trees bent low, like reeds; and heavy clouds, +suffused with moonlight, drove inland in rugged broken masses. + +For a few moments Jacques lingered on; then he put out the lights, +locked up, drew his coat closer round his spare body, and hurried across +to the more cheerful shelter of the Cafe des Artistes. + +In the Rue Louise the door of Raoul's house opened directly into the +kitchen. Madame Martin was sitting patiently by the fire, knitting. She +rose and took the violin case and wiped the raindrops from its +waterproof covering. Then she hung up Raoul's cloak. + +"And Jacques, Monsieur?" she inquired. + +"Jacques will be late. He bade me tell you, Julie." + +"He is always late!" + +"He has to prepare for Mademoiselle Elise, who comes to-morrow." + +Raoul went to his room, and in a few moments Julie carried his supper up +to him there. Then, with the assurance of an old servant, she stood a +moment at the door, with her hands crossed before her. + +"The new actress comes from Paris, Monsieur?" + +"Yes." + +"It will be a good thing." + +"A very good thing--for the Theatre Royal." + +"She will require a great salary." + +"Of course; but the proprietors will gain. Everybody will want to see +her." + +"She lodges at M. Lorman's?" + +"No. She will stay at the Hotel St. Amand, opposite the cathedral." + +"Is she old, Monsieur?" + +"No, not old; not thirty years." + +"Ah!--The sea is very rough to-night, Monsieur." + +"Yes; more so than we often see it." + +She went downstairs. By-and-by, as she sat knitting, she heard +Monsieur's fiddle as he played over a passage in the morrow's score. + + +III. + +Mademoiselle Elise was down early at the theatre, which looked very grey +and very miserable in the pitiless daylight. M. Lorman was with her. +When Raoul appeared, she said: + +"So this is your monster. Introduce him to me." + +And the hunchback, with his fiddle under his arm and his bow hanging +loosely from his left hand, was duly presented. Mademoiselle's eyes +beamed graciously as she held out her hand and said what pleasure it +gave her to make the acquaintance of one who loved art for its own sake. +Then, while M. Lorman bustled here and there, she took the violin and +begged Raoul to show her how to hold it. She laughed like a child when +the drawing of the bow across the strings only produced a horrid noise. +Then she asked him to play the dance movement from the garden scene. + +He played. + +"A little slower, please." + +He played more slowly. She moved a few steps, and then paused and sat +down, marking the time of the music with her foot. + +"Yes, that is beautiful!" she said. + +Raoul sat and watched while the rehearsal proceeded. + +They played "Le vrai Amant." Mademoiselle infused a new life into all, +and scarcely seemed to feel the labour of it. Raoul marvelled that a +woman, apparently delicate, should be possessed of such tireless energy. +She criticised so freely, and insisted so much on the repetition of +seeming trivialities, that, as the morning wore on, Augustin--who was +"le vrai Amant"--lost patience and glanced markedly at his watch. But +she did not heed him. + +Beside Raoul sat M. Lorman, in high spirits. "Good! good!" he ejaculated +at intervals. "But she is marvellous!" And after each outburst of +satisfaction he took a pinch of snuff. + +When at last Mademoiselle sank exhausted into her chair, the others +seized hats and cloaks and fled hurriedly, lest she should revive and +begin all over again. + +She called to Raoul to bring his score, that she might show him where to +play slowly and where to pause; and M. Lorman having wrapped a shawl +around her shoulders, she began gossiping with Augustin. When they +differed, she appealed to Raoul, and agreed prettily with his decision. +Augustin succumbed to her influence at once, and lost all his sulkiness. +He had played at the Odeon, and he knew what art was. M. Sarcey had said +of him that he would do well; and M. Regnier had been pleased to advise +him. He told Mademoiselle this, and he promised to bring to her a copy +of the _Temps_ that she might read the great critic's words for herself. +She ended the conversation with coquettish abruptness, and begged Raoul +to kneel beside her chair a moment, and follow her pencil as she marked +the manuscript and explained what her marks were intended to mean. + +When Augustin had gone, she leaned back to where M. Lorman stood waiting +behind her. + +"Beg of your friend," she said, "to be my chevalier and to protect me +from the dreadful people while I look at the sea." + +Then at once, turning with a pleading glance towards Raoul, she added +with comic earnestness: + +"Have mercy on me, Monsieur, I beseech you." + +M. Lorman looked uncomfortable. There was an awkward pause. Then Raoul +stammered a fit reply and reddened, and, as he packed his violin away, +he muttered angrily: "Shall I never rid myself of this childish +sensitiveness? It is a shame to me that an accident has deformed me." + +As Mademoiselle came from her room she whispered wickedly to M. Lorman: + +"You may prepare your forfeit." + +But he shook his head and laughed. + +"No, no," he said. "Not yet; there is time enough." + + * * * * * + +Along the sea front the folk stared covertly at the new actress, as she +chatted volubly of the doings of the morning. + +"Bah! they act badly--very badly," she said. "They should work +harder--they are too lazy. Work--work--work--that is the only cure for +them. But to-morrow they will do better, and we shall have a success." + +Then she became more serious and talked of her own experience, and of +the long hours that she had spent in study. "Often I used to be so +tired," she said, "that I could not even sleep." + +To his great astonishment Raoul found himself at his ease with her as he +discussed the necessity of steady labour and the uselessness of sitting +down and waiting for inspiration. In the heat of the argument they +reached the Rue Louise. The violin was handed in, and they turned back +again towards the sea. Madame held the door ajar to watch them. + +Afterwards they strolled up through the town to the Place St. Amand. +Then, because he must be tired, Mademoiselle insisted that he should +stay and rest awhile, and they sat by the window like very old friends. +Finally, she permitted him to depart, in order, she said, that he might +get to sleep early and be strong for the morrow. + +As she moved here and there in her room, she laughed quite quietly to +herself, and wondered what M. Lorman had meant when he had said that she +would not understand his friend. + + +IV. + +Gerome Perrin, the collector, of Rouen, whose reputation as a +connoisseur in the matter of violins has never been questioned, once +offered Raoul for his violin six thousand francs. The mere record of +this offer will explain why the hunchback always carried the instrument +to and from the theatre. He held that he could only be quite sure of its +safety so long as it remained in his keeping. It was generally agreed +that the famous violin was heard at its best on the night that +Mademoiselle Elise made her appearance at the Theatre Royal, Rocheville, +as Lisette, in "Le vrai Amant." + +The theatre was crowded. In the first and second scenes the new actress +justified her fame, and won outright the sympathy of the audience. In +the third scene she surpassed herself. To Rocheville it was an artistic +revelation. Even the inveterate critics praised her, despite their +creed that, outside the Comedie Francaise, one should not seek +perfection. + +The scene was the garden of an old chateau. In the bright light the +costumes of the players made a mass of rich colour. Mademoiselle stood, +prettily defiant. A ripple of music burst from the orchestra, and died +away in a stately movement. With a merry laugh the revellers posed for +the dance. They bowed low in courtesy--joined hands--advanced--retired. +Then Raoul's violin alone continued the measure, as, one by one, the +others drew away and left Mademoiselle alone. It was the Bouvard +water-colour, but living and moving. Her lithe, slender body seemed +light as air. Every gesture, every pose, was full of a grave dignity. In +the dark theatre there was complete silence. All eyes were centred on +the supple, graceful form of the dancer. Music, life, and colour were in +harmony. Gradually the full orchestra took up the strain +again--Mademoiselle, panting, flung herself into the ready arms of +Augustin, and the stillness was broken by the thunder of applause. + + * * * * * + +After the curtain had fallen, and while the folk were yet streaming out, +Jacques summoned Raoul to Mademoiselle's room. She met him with her +hands outstretched. + +"Chevalier, you played beautifully," she said; "and I have never danced +better. You inspired me; you are my good angel. Come to me to-morrow and +take me to mass." + +Is she acting still? he thought. He was not sure, but it was admirably +done. He felt her hands on his and he could only bow obedience and +escape as speedily as possible. + +Before he went to bed he took a candle and placed it so that he might +see himself in the mirror. He gazed long and steadily as at a picture of +a stranger. He saw a man with black hair, with a pale, earnest face, +clean shaven, and with shoulders bent. In the darkness, afterwards, when +he remembered the face of Mademoiselle, as she came to him with her arms +outstretched, he remembered also what the mirror had shown him. + + * * * * * + +Mademoiselle, in her room at the Hotel St. Amand, wrote to Paris: + +"He is a hunchback and I have appointed him chevalier. Do not laugh, my +dear Helene; you would not, if you could but see him. His sad eyes would +command your pity. His face is pale and stern, but handsome, and he is +kind and gentle. They say that he dislikes women; from what I have seen +of the women here I do not think he is altogether to blame. He is to +escort me to mass to-morrow. The good people will think that I am mad. +So much the better." + + * * * * * + +She laid her pen down and leaned back with her hands clasped behind her +head. + +Suddenly the half smile faded from her lips, and a pained expression +flashed across her face. She sat up and finished the letter quietly. As +she rose to seal it she said to herself: "No; he is too good. A grande +passion would kill him." + +For a week she gave herself up to Raoul's guidance. At the end of that +time she knew Rocheville almost as if she had lived her life there. + + +V. + +A month passed. Mademoiselle Elise still retained her guide. Every +afternoon they wandered together somewhere or other; either through the +town, or by the sea, or in the woods. At a loss for any logical +explanation of the strange friendship, people assumed that the two were +old acquaintances. Mademoiselle never contradicted this assumption. + +"He is my chevalier," she explained. + +During the first few days, she commanded him with a playful authority, +and talked a great deal of nonsense, much as she would have talked with +any acquaintance for whom she felt but a passing interest. But it was +impossible to continue in this strain with Raoul. He treated her as a +reasoning being, and not as a creature fit merely to be humoured and +flattered. Despite herself she began to speak from her heart and without +any constraint. But she adhered honourably to her decision not to +inspire him with a grande passion, and to this end she conducted herself +with a simple propriety which recalled to her mind the convent +discipline of the gentle Ursuline Sisters, who had taught her her first +lessons. + +Each day her respect for Raoul increased, as closer acquaintance +revealed his character. Finally, her respect became reverence. His +nature stood out in such strong contrast with the even, easy-going, +selfish natures of the others with whom she came into contact. He was +unlike them. He thought about life, they merely lived it. He seemed to +her to be superior to the common pains and pleasures of the world. She +could not imagine him being swayed by circumstances, by petty likes and +dislikes. She felt that it would be easy to bear any trouble with such a +friend near. His strong will attracted her. His impenetrable reserve and +the strange, stern mood that came over him at times mystified and almost +frightened her. + +One day, on the Boulevard, they met the troops marching with quick step +into the town. She thought that he tried, involuntarily, to straighten +his shoulders as the stalwart figures passed. She seemed to know how the +sight of them must sadden him, and her heart became filled with an +inexpressible pity. But when he spoke, there was not the least tinge of +dissatisfaction in his voice. + +"I admire their happy nonchalance," he said. "Unconsciously they are +very good philosophers. They take life as it comes to them and gauge it +at its true value." + +"Yes," she said; "they are happy enough now. But it must be terrible in +war-time, to have to march straight to death." + +"Do you think so?" he replied. "I doubt whether they perceive the terror +of it. It is part of their business to die." + +"Do you not fear death?" she asked him afterwards. + +He was silent for a moment. Then he said slowly: "I can quite imagine +circumstances in which death would be preferable to life." + +"It is because life has been so unjust to him that he disdains it," she +thought. + +Another evening, as they sat together, looking on to the square where +the women were selling flowers, he began, casually, to talk of himself. +He spoke impassively of the time, eight years before, when he had fallen +by accident, in the winter. For months he had lain in agony; and then +slowly he had returned, almost from the grave. In three years he had +regained his strength, but deformed for the rest of his life. + +Her lips quivered ominously as she listened. + +"It makes my heart ache to think of it," she said. "I could not have +borne it." + +"You would have got used to it as I did," he replied. + +"I would have prayed to die." + +"There was no need. I could have died if I had chosen." + +He spoke simply and without the least emotion. She shuddered. + +"I do not understand," she said. + +"Of course you do not understand," he answered gently; "neither do the +angels." + +She made no response, but pressed her lips tightly together and +aimlessly watched the market-people. + +When he had gone away, she sat for a long time quite still. + +"If he had someone to love," she said to herself at last, "he would not +be so stern." + + +VI. + +A fortnight later Raoul went on business to Rouen, and Mademoiselle was +left alone. + +The first day of his absence she busied herself as usual, going down to +rehearsal in the morning and playing in the evening. But at night, for +some indefinable reason, she felt unhappy and discontented. The next +morning she sat in her room and sewed, and the hours seemed long--very +long. In the afternoon she went out and, almost irresponsibly, bought a +little present and carried it down to the Rue Louise to Madame Martin. +She stayed there and chatted until evening. Madame was delighted to find +anyone who would listen with pleasure to praise of Monsieur Raoul. The +third morning Mademoiselle said to herself "It would be pleasant to go +to Rouen and see the shops," and she dressed ready to start. Then her +face flushed and she took off her cloak again and set it aside. After +midday Raoul returned and brought her a great bunch of roses. Her face +beamed with pleasure as she took them, but immediately she became +self-conscious and disquieted and would not let her eyes meet his. After +he had gone she sat pensive, with a smile on her lips. Suddenly the +blood mounted to her face, her expression changed, she became agitated +in every nerve. "Of what folly do I dream!" she exclaimed. She went to +dress for the theatre and took the roses and placed them in water on the +table by her bedside. When she was ready to set out, she turned round, +raised the flowers to her lips and kissed them. + +At the theatre she met him again and grew unaccountably nervous. It +needed all her power of will and all the prompter's aid to enable her to +retain the thread of her part. At times her mind would wander and she +would forget the words. Yet, to judge by the applause with which she was +rewarded, her acting did not suffer noticeably. + +When the curtain fell, she complained that her head ached, and sent for +Raoul, and begged him to take her to walk by the sea, that the cool air +might restore her. + +They walked down to the Rue Louise and left the violin and then strolled +on for half-an-hour by the water. Then they turned away to the Place St. +Amand. The square was deserted. A single lamp fluttered in the wind. The +stars shone brightly and the milky way stretched like a faint, pale +cloud high over the huge black mass of the cathedral. + +She was leaning on his arm, and she made him pause a moment while she +stood to look up. + +"If I were in pain," she said, after a moment, "or if a passion consumed +me, I should watch the stars all night. They are so cold and +passionless: they would teach me patience." + +"You are beginning to talk poetry," he answered quietly, "and that shows +that you are tired out." + +"Yes," she said, "I am tired out. To-morrow I shall be better, and we +will go to the woods." + +Then she stood in the shadow of the hotel door and watched him until his +figure disappeared in the darkness. + + +VII. + +The morning was bright and warm. The woods above Rocheville were brown +with autumn foliage, and the brambles were heavy with long sprays of +berries, red and black. Mademoiselle gave Raoul her cloak to carry, and +wandered here and there, gathering the ripest fruit. By-and-by she cast +away all she had gathered, and came to walk soberly beside him. + +At St. Pierre, a little beyond the woods, they lunched merrily. + +In the afternoon they strolled slowly back until they came to the brow +of the hill that rises to the west of Rocheville. + +Overhead, white clouds floated in a clear blue sky. Below, the +purple-roofed houses huddled around the grey cathedral, and the distant +sea, flashing in the sunlight, broke against the yellow beach. + +Beside the dusty hill path were rough seats. On one of these +Mademoiselle spread her cloak and rested, bidding Raoul sit on the grass +beside. The birds stirred in the trees, and the low, long surge of the +sea sounded monotonously. + + * * * * * + +It was after a long silence that Raoul looked up as if he were about to +speak. Their eyes met. He paled visibly. Her face became scarlet. With a +manifest effort he regained self-possession and stood up. + +"It grows late, Mademoiselle," he said; "let us go home." And his voice +sounded dry and harsh. + +She rose obediently. He wrapped the cloak about her, and they walked on +down the hill in silence, and entered the avenue that leads to +Rocheville. The swallows wheeled and fell in long graceful circles, and +the setting sunlight streaming through the trees made of the white road +a mosaic of light and shadow. The glow had faded from Mademoiselle's +face. Once as he moved her arm the cloak half fell. He replaced it +tenderly. + +At the hotel door he kissed her hand and left her. + + +VIII. + +For an hour he walked aimlessly, often baring his hair to the cold +sea-wind. Then he went back to the Place St. Amand and from under the +shrine at the corner watched her lighted window. Then he went home, and +until long past midnight sat without moving. Mademoiselle seemed to be +near him. He recalled every event of the day. The pleasant sunlight in +the woods; the merry nonsense of the lunch at St. Pierre; the homeward +walk; the distant heaving waters. The blood surged like fire through his +veins; he bowed down his face and groaned aloud. + +Day by day he had maintained a secret battle with himself. The very +philosophy which had frightened and saddened Mademoiselle was evidence +of the bitter struggle, though she did not know this. If he had someone +to love, she had said mentally, he would not be so stern. She deceived +herself. It was because he wrestled with a passion that threatened to +overwhelm his reason that he wore so often the mask of sternness. + +Early in the morning he left Rocheville for Rouen. Madame, when she +found his bed undisturbed, said to her husband that Monsieur must have +had bad news. + + * * * * * + +Mademoiselle woke from a fitful sleep with her head aching. She waited +anxiously, but Raoul did not come. It was past midday when M. Lorman, +with a grim smile, showed to her a note he had received. + + "It is necessary for me to go to Rouen," it ran, "and I shall + probably remain there for a few days. I beg of you to excuse me, + and to convey my compliments and good wishes to Mademoiselle Elise + when she departs for Paris." + +As Mademoiselle read she grew cold and shuddered. + +M. Lorman eyed the untouched food on the table and smiled slily. + +"You have won," he said. "I am your debtor. What is to be the forfeit?" + +"I am not well to-day," she answered peevishly. "Don't be stupid, +please. What was it that you came to see me about?" + +He looked embarrassed, and replied hastily: + +"Nothing--I was passing, and called in on my way to meet Augustin. I +dare not stay. He will be waiting for me. I am sorry you are ill. You +must rest. Good-bye." + +In the street he took out his snuff-box and excitedly inhaled two large +pinches. + +"Parbleu!" he muttered; "it has surprised me. I didn't think it +possible." + +Mademoiselle went to her bedroom and locked the door, as if to shut all +the world out from her. Then she cast herself down and sobbed as if her +heart would break. "Why did he not come to me?" she moaned. "Why did he +not let me know?--I cannot live without him." + +At Rouen, Raoul engaged a room at the Hotel de Bordeaux. Then he started +off to visit M. Gerome Perrin, but turned aside and went into the +country instead. The peasants saluted him as they passed, but he did not +reply. At times he talked half aloud and laughed bitterly. + +Once he paused abruptly. It occurred to him that perhaps, after all, his +own vanity was misleading him. No doubt Mademoiselle had already +forgotten what had happened, and was wondering what had become of him. +"I must write to her," he said. And the idea that he was acting +unaccountably strengthened itself in his mind, and gradually he regained +the mastery of himself. Was it not stupid, he thought, to suspect that +Mademoiselle had discerned his secret. He had guarded it so carefully; +he had never given the least sign--until her eyes had robbed him of his +self-control. But to think that she should for a moment dream that a +hunchback would dare.--The idea was absurd. He began to see things +clearly again. + +Half-an-hour later he turned and walked back to Rouen, paid his bill at +the Hotel de Bordeaux, drove to the station, and took the train to +Rocheville. He had resolved to explain to Mademoiselle that he had been +called unexpectedly away. + +M. Lorman frowned when Jacques came to tell him that Monsieur Raoul had +been able to return. + + * * * * * + +It was dark when Mademoiselle, pale and trembling, rose from her bed, +her face wet with tears. She lighted a candle and began to write. Note +after note she altered and destroyed. When at length she had written one +to her liking, she sealed it up. Then she put on her cloak and went down +towards the Rue Louise. + + +IX. + +Outside, the rain pattered against the window; within Jacques and his +wife sat at supper. Someone tapped at the door and Madame went to open +it: "Ciel!" she cried. "But you are wet!" + +Mademoiselle Elise spoke with quickened breath as if she had been +hurrying. + +"I only come to see Jacques--Jacques do you know where Monsieur Raoul is +staying at Rouen? I have a message for him." + +Jacques looked at his wife. It was she who answered: "Monsieur returned +unexpectedly this afternoon, Mademoiselle; he is upstairs now." + +The muscles of Mademoiselle's face twitched as with a sudden pain. A +look of terror came into her bright eyes. She rested her hand on the +chair beside her, as if she were faint. + +"Take off your cloak," said Madame, "and Jacques will tell Monsieur that +you are here." + +Jacques rose, but Mademoiselle stopped him. "No," she said; "I will go +to him, if I may. I have a message for him." + +Mademoiselle Elise went up. Raoul opened the door. + +"Did you wonder what had become of me?" he stammered. The unexpectedness +of her coming unnerved him. He forgot his planned excuse. + +"I thought you were at Rouen," she said mechanically, and without +raising her eyes, "or I should not have come. I have a message for you." + +"You are wet," he said. "Give me your cloak, and rest until Madame +Martin has dried it." + +He gave the cloak to Julie and closed the door. + +The small room was lighted by a single candle. Opposite the door the +wall was covered with books from floor to ceiling. In a corner an open +bureau was strewed with papers. The violin was laid carelessly on an old +harpsichord. + +Mademoiselle saw these things as she walked over and stood by the +fireplace. Her dark hair, disordered by the hood of the cloak, hung +loosely over her forehead and heightened the worn expression on her +white face. She drew back her black dress slightly and rested one foot +on the edge of the fender, and watched the steam that rose from the damp +shoe. + +Jacques brought up a cup of coffee, with a message that Mademoiselle was +to drink it at once, lest she should catch a cold. She smiled sadly, +took the cup, raised it, touched it with her parched lips, and set it +aside. + +Raoul came and stood facing her. Though she did not look up she felt his +gaze upon her and became uneasy, and pressed her clasped hands nervously +together. + +"I came to get your address from Jacques," she said. "I thought you were +at Rouen." She paused and caught her breath. "I am going away +to-morrow." + +As he listened and watched her, he found himself noticing how like a +little child she seemed. + +"Sit down," he said, speaking with effort. "You are not well." + +"I have scarcely slept," she answered. "I have been thinking all +night--and all day--." Her bosom heaved. The tears sprang to her eyes. +She covered her face with her hands. + +Raoul paled, and trembled from head to foot. He clenched his teeth. His +hand that rested on the edge of the mantel-shelf grasped it as if it +would have crushed it. + +"Why did you go away?" she said, with plaintive vehemence. "Why did you +not come to me?" + +Then, as if her strength failed her, she sat down. + +He knelt beside her. "You have been too kind to me--Elise," he said +unsteadily. "I went away from you because I feared lest I should lose +command of myself; lest I should forget that I was--what I am." + +At the sound of his voice pronouncing her name a strange, sudden +happiness shone in her eyes. She looked at him. He read the truth, but +could only believe in his happiness when, the next moment, she was +clasped in his arms. + + * * * * * + +It was eleven o'clock when Madame Martin knocked at the door. + +"I thought you would like to know, Monsieur," she said, "that the rain +has stopped, that it grows late, and that Mademoiselle's cloak is quite +dry." + + +X. + +I subjoin the following extract for the information of those who may be +sufficiently interested:-- + + "LA LANTERNE (_Journal Conservateur de Rocheville, Jeudi, + 5 Fevrier_).--Mariage--M. Berhault, Raoul Joseph Victor, 30 ans, et + Mlle. Lanfrey, Elise Marie, 25 ans." + + + + +OLD CHINA. + + + My china makes my old room bright-- + On table, shelf and chiffonnier, + Sevres, Oriental, blue and white, + Leeds, Worcester, Derby--all are here. + + The Stafford figures, quaint and grim, + The Chelsea shepherdesses, each + Has its own tale--in twilight dim + My heart can hear their old-world speech. + + That vase came with a soldier's "loot," + From Eastern cities over seas, + That dish held golden globes of fruit, + When oranges were rarities. + + That tea-cup touched two lovers' hands, + When Lady Betty poured the tea; + That jar came from far Mongol lands + To hold Dorinda's pot-pourri. + + That flask of musk, still faintly smelling, + On Mistress Coquette's toilet lay; + And there's a tale, too long for telling, + Connected with that snuffer-tray. + + What vows that patch-box has heard spoken! + That bowl was deemed a prize to win, + Till the dark day when it got broken, + And someone put these rivets in. + + My china breathes of days, not hours, + Of patches, powder, belle and beau, + Of sun-dials, secrets, yew-tree bowers, + And the romance of long ago. + + It tells old stories--verse and prose-- + Which no one now has wit to write, + The sweet, sad tales that no one knows, + The deathless charm of dead delight. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Argosy, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ARGOSY *** + +***** This file should be named 17052.txt or 17052.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/0/5/17052/ + +Produced by Paul Murray, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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